c. 1997 Religion News Service
Ga. Methodists upset at Emory support of same-sex marriage
(RNS) The North Georgia conference of the United Methodist Church and the president of one of the denomination’s leading universities are at loggerheads over a vanguard church issue of the 1990s _ same-sex marriage.
William M. Chace, president of Emory University in Atlanta, says yes to the use of university facilities for same-sex marriage. The North Georgia Conference says no.
Resolution of the conflict appears to center on whether a United Methodist-affiliated university has the same obligation to the denomination’s Social Principles statement, which bars such ceremonies, as do churches and members.
The issue arose when Chace ruled that disallowing same-sex ceremonies on campus would violate Emory’s non-discrimination policy. Chace’s action reversed a decision of Dean William Murdy at Oxford (Ga.) College, a branch of Emory. Murdy would not allow a gay marriage in the chapel at Oxford, according to United Methodist News Service, the denomination’s official news agency.
The North Georgia United Methodist Conference expressed its”strong disagreement and extreme displeasure”with Chace in a June 12 resolution and vowed to take the matter to the university’s board of trustees if Chace does not back down.
In a June 2 statement, Chace based his decision on the university’s Equal Opportunity Policy, saying his goal is to make Emory”a just and good place.” Apologizing to the gay couple in question, one a university employee, Chace wrote,”The university has clearly stated, under the policy, that no member of the community is to be treated differently or invidiously because of that person’s sexual orientation. Nothing customarily and routinely offered to one individual can be denied to another.” The conference resolution underscored the Social Principles policy, which states that”ceremonies that celebrate homosexual unions shall not be conducted by our ministers and shall not be conducted in our churches.” The conference said unless Chace reversed his decision it would petition the Emory board of trustees to take”decisive action”so that”the consecrated sacred places on the campus of Emory University may not be used in ways the United Methodist Church has declared to be inappropriate, unsuitable and unacceptable.” According to the news service, all five of the United Methodist bishops who sit on Emory’s board of trustees were scheduled to meet privately with Chace on Wednesday (June 18). The matter was to be discussed with the full board in an executive session on Thursday.
Vatican reports slight operating surplus for 1996
(RNS) The Holy See on Wednesday (June 18) reported a slight operating surplus in 1996, the forth straight year it has seen a gain after 23 consecutive years of red ink.
But the $260,000 profit for the 1996 calendar year was well below the 1995 surplus of $1.7 million.
The Vatican spent $194.3 million in 1996 and took in $194.5 million, primarily from real estate holdings, investments and donations, according to the consolidated budget. The budget does not include the Peter’s Pence Collection, which consists of donations used by the pope to finance charities.
The largest profit came from the church’s financial activities, in which it made $27 million from investments in securities, interest and dividends. However, even here the performance was disappointing. In 1995, the Holy See raked in a profit of about $42 million.”The year 1996 was not a good year for investments,”said Cardinal Edmund Szoka, the former Detroit archbishop who heads the Vatican’s economic affairs office.
Szoka said the Vatican has tried mightily to trim its expenses but has had only modest success doing so.
The biggest drain on Vatican finances is the money it shells out to operate its Osservatore Romano newspaper, Vatican Radio, the Vatican bookstore and its printing facilities. These church-related activities cost the church $24.3 million last year in deficit spending.
Also in the loss column was money spent on the Vatican curia, or bureaucracy, and its diplomatic offices and embassies abroad. They combined for a deficit of $16.2 million.
The church made a profit of $15 million on its vast real estate holdings, about $1 million more than in 1995.
Vatican officials forecast a $642,000 surplus for 1997.
NCC loses one effort at recouping $3 million of Bank of Bohemia blunder
(RNS) The National Council of Churches (NCC) has lost a round in its court effort to recover the remaining $3 million of an $8 million originally lost in a complex investment scheme involving the Bank of Bohemia in Prague, Czech Republic.
On Tuesday (June 17), Ecumenical News International (ENI), the Geneva-based religious news agency, reported that a jury had ruled on the single remaining charge from a suit filed by the NCC against First Union National Bank of Virginia and found the bank was not at fault in the NCC’s loss of the money.
Earlier, according to ENI, a judge in the federal district court of Northern Virginia had dismissed the other three charges.
First Union was the first bank to receive the money in the complex investment scheme initiated in 1993 by Emilio F. Carrillo Jr., then the NCC’s personnel officer, in which $8 million was invested in so-called”prime bank guarantees”issued in the name of the Prague-based Bank of Bohemia.
The NCC had charged that First Union opened an NCC account in its Reston, Va., branch without authorization and subsequently took improper action in wiring the funds to another bank.
The $8 million was part of a special fund to guarantee continuing payment of health benefits to retired NCC employees.
Alerted in March 1994 by a Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) report that Banka Bohemia (Bank of Bohemia) had issued”possibly fraudulent”securities, the NCC leadership began concerted efforts to recover its money. A year later the NCC announced it had received $4 million from the Prague bank and another $1 million from a bank on the island of Jersey in the Channel Islands.
The Rev. Joan Brown Campbell, NCC general secretary, told ENI the recovered money _ minus $500,000 in legal fees and other costs _ is now invested and providing enough income to pay for the health benefits. But she said $3 million is a significant amount for an organization the size of the NCC and that losing it would be a serious financial blow.
From the standpoint of the NCC’s relationship with its supporters, Campbell said the entire episode was”not a confidence builder.” The NCC has another suit pending in a Boston federal district court against several other defendants. It has not decided whether to appeal the Virginia ruling.
Christians for Biblical Equality dismayed at inclusive Bible decision
(RNS) Christians for Biblical Equality (CBE), expressing”shock and dismay,”has weighed in against a May 27 decision by the International Bible Society (IBS) to cancel plans for an updated,”gender-accurate”edition of the most popular Bible translation in the United States.
Pressure from evangelical Christians, concerned about what they perceived as pandering to feminists, forced the IBS to back away from plans to create an”inclusive language edition”of the New International Version of the Bible (NIV). Such a version is already published in the United Kingdom.
A focal point of critics and supporters was the substitution of gender-neutral words, such as people, for gender-specific words, such as mankind.
In an open letter dated June 11 to Lars Dunbar, IBS president, the Minneapolis-based CBE wrote,”We are grieved that these actions have been planned in response to the recent controversy over inclusive language and revision plans.”We believe the criticisms represent a simplistic and inaccurate view of the nature and complexities of translation issues and process; spring from social and theological agendas of particular organizations, denominations and powerful leaders; and disregard abundant evidence that English is changing in its gender usage.” The May 27 decision was hailed in conservative quarters.
Said Albert Mohler, president of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Ky.,”I am concerned about any attempt to use a translation of Scripture or to revise a translation of Scripture in order to meet the demands of political correctness and gender inclusivity.” The CBE letter may have little effect. IBS officials, weary of the conflict, agreed the root problem with the projected new version had more to do with political correctness than with linguistic accuracy. “We have shelved all plans to ever discuss this,”said Steven Johnson, spokesman for the Colorado Springs, Colo.,-based IBS.”If the North American evangelical church ever wanted to discuss gender accuracy, I don’t know if we’d be willing again, but, in any case, that would be well down the road.”
Young British Christians approve sex outside marriage, oppose infidelity
(RNS) The vast majority of young Christians in Britain see nothing wrong with couples in a long-term relationship having sex without being married, according to a survey of some 3,000 youths between the ages of 16 and 18.
While virtually all self-described atheists and agnostics surveyed said they do not think it morally wrong for unmarried couples in a long-term relationship to make love, 85 percent of Roman Catholics and 80 percent of Anglicans took the same view.
The survey also found the Vatican’s disapproval of artificial contraception means little or nothing to young people _ either Anglican or Roman Catholic _ with 99 percent of Anglicans and 92 percent of Catholics saying they believe it morally acceptable for healthy couples to use artificial birth control.
On homosexuality, 60 percent of Anglicans and 63 percent of Roman Catholics do not believe sexual activity between male homosexuals is always morally wrong.
Half of atheists surveyed and 30 percent of Anglicans and Roman Catholic surveyed said they believe there are circumstances in which adultery is morally right.
The poll’s margin of error was not immediately available.
Quote of the day: David Yount, author of”Spiritual Simplicity” (RNS) In his new book,”Spiritual Simplicity: Simplify Your Life and Enrich Your Soul”(Simon & Schuster), author and lecturer David Yount writes on prayer:”We are drawn to prayer as moths to fire. Nearly all Americans admit they pray, the vast majority of us every day of our lives. Unlike moths, however, few of us are consumed by this instinctive attraction. More typically we are slightly suspicious of our predilection to reach out and capture God’s attention. Perhaps we suspect that we are only talking to ourselves.
MJP END RNS
