c. 1997 Religion News Service
North Korean famine prompts differing responses
(RNS) A leader of a major Christian relief organization says North Korea is too proud to admit it is suffering from severe food shortages while a U.S. congressional group is complaining the communist country is too secretive about how it is distributing humanitarian aid.
World Vision’s vice president for the Asia-Pacific region, Watt Santatiwat, who just returned from a visit to the country, said North Korea doesn’t”want to admit to the world that people are starving or to allow the media to take pictures of the people who are on the verge of dying.”It goes against their nature and culture to admit they need help from the outside world,”said Santatiwat, the Associated Press reported Tuesday (Aug. 12).
World Vision, an independent, evangelical-oriented humanitarian agency, has sent seven shipments of aid to North Korea in the past three months aimed at aiding the 2.6 million children under the age of 5 _ those the United Nations and private relief agencies say are most at risk of starvation in the famine.
Last Friday (Aug. 8), UNICEF, the United Nations’ children’s agency, said 80,000 children in North Korea are in immediate danger of dying from hunger and disease, and another 80,000 are suffering a lesser degree of malnutrition.
A member of a U.S. congressional delegation that visited North Korea last week complained Tuesday (Aug. 12), however, that the country is too secretive about how it distributes humanitarian aid.”North Korea must make its food distribution to the civilian population fully transparent and verifiable in order to facilitate the United States consideration of additional assistance,”Rep. Porter J. Goss, R-Fla., told a news conference in Tokyo, the AP reported.
The United States has pledged $52 million in food aid to North Korea this year _ a fraction of what aid groups estimate is needed to meet the emergency.
Another member of the congressional delegation echoed Santatiwat’s view of the North Koreans.”It was very painful for them to admit that they have a problem,”said Rep. Sanford D. Bishop Jr., D-Ga.”They don’t want to violate their independence by having to ask for anything, and in many instances they feel that they would rather die than have to do that.”
Denver-area African-American groups plan protest of Baptist meeting
(RNS) Leaders of several Denver-area African-American organizations are planning to protest the September meeting of the National Baptist Convention, USA, in their city.
One group wants the conventioneers to patronize black-owned businesses and an official of another organization believes the Rev. Henry J. Lyons, the denomination’s president who has been embroiled in controversy recently, should step down. They voiced their concerns at a news conference Monday (Aug. 11).
The National Baptist Convention, USA, is scheduled to hold its annual meeting Sept. 1-5 in Denver. Between 40,000 and 60,000 people are expected to attend. Denominational officials could not be reached for comment.
Alvertis Simmons, head of Colorado’s Million Man March Local Organizing Committee, said his group plans to stage a”boycott”of the meeting by constantly protesting outside the convention center where the sessions will take place.
The National Baptist Convention, USA, which has about 8 million members, is the largest African-American denomination in the country.
Local Million Man March committee members say the denomination hasn’t responded to its demands that they encourage conventioneers to patronize black-owned businesses. They also plan to protest the meeting because the denomination has refused to recognize the Million Man March and its founder, Louis Farrakhan.
Bandele Ashwani, head of Denver’s African-American Leadership Institute, said Lyons has”disgraced himself, embarrassed the (National Baptist) organization and betrayed the trust of the organization and its members. If Rev. Lyons has any integrity or morality he will relinquish his power.” In March 1996, Lyons bought a $700,000 home in St. Petersburg, Fla., with a female business partner, Bernice Edwards. His wife, Deborah Lyons, was charged with setting fire to the house on July 6 and doing $30,000 in damages. Henry Lyons has since announced he is severing business ties with Edwards, whom he hired as the denomination’s public relations director of corporate affairs.
Simmons didn’t discuss Lyons at the news conference. He concentrated on the concerns his organization has with Lyons’ denomination.”It’s important for African-Americans to patronize each other,”said Simmons, who is a member of Zion Baptist Church, a Denver congregation that is affiliated with Lyons’ denomination.”We need to look out for ourselves.” He said he has repeatedly requested having a discussion with Lyons or other denominational leaders about his concerns. He has decided to give them two more weeks to respond. If no response is received, he said, there will be a protest.
Merger of Christian book distributors affects 200
(RNS) The merger of Ingram Christian Resources and Spring Arbor Distribution Co. has led to new management and a time of”transition”for about 200 employees in the Christian book distribution business.
Larry A. Carpenter, founding president of Ingram Christian Resources, has been named president of the merged entity, now called Spring Arbor Distributors.
Spring Arbor Distributors is the Belleville, Mich.-based division of Ingram Book Group, the nation’s largest wholesale distributor of books and related material. Spring Arbor Distribution Co. had been the nation’s largest wholesale distributor within the Christian bookstore market.”Ingram is the larger of the two entities but Spring Arbor has the larger foothold in the Christian bookstore market,”said Carpenter.”You’re taking Spring Arbor’s frontroom operations _ sales, marketing and purchasing … and combining that with Ingram’s backroom operations.” Prior to the merger, the La Vergne, Tenn.-based Ingram had seven warehouses and Spring Arbor had five. Three of the Spring Arbor warehouses will be closed, in part because the two companies had facilities in close proximity. Carpenter said workers in the facilities set to close will either be offered new jobs at an Ingram facility or a severance package.”Our goal is to hire as many of the experienced Spring Arbor people as we can,”he said.”We don’t know how many of those will elect to continue to work for us.” In addition to the closing of the warehouses, several positions in other departments, including finance, sales and marketing, have been terminated.
At most, Carpenter said, there are 200 affected by the change.”We anticipate a large number of those will elect to take the offer to come work for us,”he said.
Spring Arbor Distribution Co., founded in 1978, had annual sales of more than $220 million in books, music, Bibles and other products. Ingram reportedly has annual sales close to $1 billion, but Carpenter said the privately owned company does not release sales figures.
The merger of Spring Arbor into the Ingram Book Group was effective on May 22.
Conservative Jews press for mixed prayers at Israel’s Western Wall
(RNS) After a tumultuous melee Monday (Aug 11) at Jerusalem’s Western Wall, Conservative Jews in Israel said Tuesday they will continue their effort to hold mixed prayers of men and women at the Wall, one of Judaism’s holiest sites.
About 200 Conservative Jews were ushered _ sometimes roughly _ from the Western Wall Monday night after they angered Orthodox Jews who believe men and women must pray separately. In Conservative and Reform Judaism, men and women worship together.
The Monday incident took place on the eve of Tisha B’Av, the Associated Press reported, the date on the Jewish calendar that marks the destruction of the First and Second temples. The Western Wall is an outer retaining wall that remains from the Second Temple.
The Conservative Jews had entered an area in which segregated prayer is practiced, according to Reuters. Police broke up the gathering and forced the more liberal Jews down a hill and out of the Old City.”Women and men are not allowed to pray together in this area,”police spokeswoman Linda Menuhin told Reuters.”They (the Conservative Jews) were reluctant to listen to the police request to stop praying together and refused to leave.” Later, Jerusalem Police Chief Yair Yitzhaki told AP the police were protecting the worshipers from angry Orthodox Jews.
Conservative leaders, however, said they would not give up their effort to pray at the Wall.”The Western Wall belongs to the entire Jewish people, not only the Orthodox, and therefore all the groups in Judaism should be permitted to worship there,”said Conservative Rabbi Ehud Bander.
The incident was part of a larger struggle between the more liberal Conservative and Reform movements and the Orthodox, who hold a near-monopoly on recognized religious expression in Israel.
Pope accepts resignation of military archdiocese head
(RNS) Pope John Paul II has accepted the resignation, for health reasons, of Archbishop Joseph T. Dimino, head of the Archdiocese for Military Services, U.S.A., Archbishop Agostino Cacciavillan, papal envoy to the United States, announced Tuesday (Aug. 12).
The pope has named Archbishop Edwin O’Brien, 58, currently the coadjutor _ an assistant with the right of succession _ of the archdiocese, to succeed Dimino.
O’Brien, a native of New York City, studied in New York and Rome and was ordained to the priesthood in 1965. He became a chaplain in 1970.
As a chaplain he served at Fort Bragg, N.C., in Vietnam and at Fort Gordon, Ga. He was an assistant pastor at St. Patrick’s Cathedral and held several other posts in the New York archdiocese.
O’Brien was ordained a bishop in 1996 and named an auxiliary bishop in New York. On April 8, the Vatican named him coadjutor of the military archdiocese.
Dimino, 74, has headed the military archdiocese, formerly known as the Military Vicarate of the United States, since 1991. The non-geographic archdiocese serves some 1 million Catholics in the Armed Forces and the Department of Veterans Affairs as well as those in government service abroad.
Quote of the day: Czech theologian Milan Opocensky
(RNS) Czech theologian Milan Opocensky, general secretary of the World Alliance of Reformed Churches, in his opening report to WARC’s 23rd general council, meeting in Debrecen, Hungary, compared the church’s stand on racism to economic issues:”There is a reasonable consensus among Christians that racism is a sin and justification of racism is heresy. Analogously, one day we may see that our position on money and economic matters has bearing on the integrity of faith and that certain situations call for a confessional stance.”
MJP END RNS
