c. 1998 Religion News Service

Jim Bakker, former televangelist, to remarry

(RNS) Former televangelist Jim Bakker is hearing wedding bells again.

Bakker, who was convicted in 1989 of bilking supporters of his Praise the Lord (PTL) ministry out of $158 million, is engaged to a youth counselor he met in July.

Bakker and Lori Beth Graham met while she was addressing a Los Angeles women’s group, the Associated Press reported.”I fell in love first with her heart, the way she cares for people. Then I fell madly in love with her,”Bakker said Tuesday (Aug. 18).”I am overjoyed that the love was mutual and that Lori Beth has agreed to be my wife.” Bakker served five years in prison and now is a missionary at the 1,000-member Los Angeles International Church, where he works with drug addicts and the homeless.

Bakker’s ex-wife, Tammy Faye Messner, divorced him while he was in prison. She is now married to Roe Messner, a former close friend of Bakker’s who helped him build the former Heritage USA complex in Fort Mill, S.C.

Survey: People talk about their faith at work

(RNS) Most people engage in discussions about their faith while at work, according to a survey for Lutheran Brotherhood, the Minneapolis-based insurance company that serves Lutherans.

According to the survey, conducted by Yankelovich Partners, 70 percent of those surveyed said they talked about faith in the workplace. Half said such discussions take place at least once a month and 19 percent said they talk about religion with their coworkers at least once a year.”Religion and work are important aspects of many people’s lives,”said David Rustad, Lutheran Brotherhood spokesman.”Since Americans spend so many hours at work, it’s not surprising that conversations about religion crop up among coworkers.

The survey also found that women are twice as likely as men to discuss religion in the workplace more than once a month _ 29 percent to 15 percent. And Americans in rural areas also are more likely to talk about religion at work than are those in the suburbs _ 28 percent to 17 percent.

People also often pray for career guidance, according to the survey.

It found that 55 percent have prayed for such guidance, with women again more likely than men to have prayed for help with job and career directions _ 64 percent to 47 percent.”People seem to depend on their religious faith for support in their work life,”Rustad said.”People probably pray for help finding jobs, guidance to work out problems at work and for support to be successful in their jobs.”

Federal court strikes down law aiding religious schools

(RNS) A U.S. appeals court in New Orleans has struck down a 32-year-old federal law permitting public school systems to lend computers and other equipment to church-run private schools.

In the same ruling, however, the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said taxes may be used to pay special education teachers who work at church-run schools and also to pay bus drivers who carry students to those schools.

The suit was filed 13 years ago by two parents in the New Orleans suburb of Jefferson Parish.

The 70-page decision, written by Judge John M. Duhe, was handed down Tuesday (Aug. 18), the Associated Press reported. It declared as unconstitutional a federal education law known as Chapter Two and a similar state law.

The federal law, rewritten in 1994 as the”Innovative Education Program Strategies”section, sets up block grants to help buy instructional and educational materials for public and private schools. The materials _ computers, movie projectors, library books and televisions _ are administered by a public agency or contractor and lent to both public and private schools.

The appeals court found that part of the law unconstitutional.

Another part of the Chapter Two law paid for teachers of special education students in both religious and public schools. The court found that practice constitutional, basing its ruling on a 1997 U.S. Supreme Court ruling that said the program is constitutional because it has a secular purpose _ educating all special needs students _ and because it does not advance religion.

Lee Boothby, a Washington-based lawyer representing the parents who filed the original suit, predicted the case would wind up before the Supreme Court.

He said each side is likely to appeal the issue it lost on.

Oregon report: Eight have taken lives under suicide law

(RNS) The Oregon Health Division said Tuesday (Aug. 18) that eight people have taken their lives under provisions of the state’s first-in-the-nation assisted-suicide law permitting patients to ask doctors for lethal prescriptions. Since the law took effect in October, 10 patients have asked for the prescriptions.

According to the report, the average age of the patients was 71, and nine of the 10 suffered from cancer. One suffered from heart disease.

The two people who requested lethal prescriptions but did not use them died within days of the request, the report said.

The average time of death was 40 minutes after taking the drug, with no reported complications.

Barbara Coombs Lee, a nurse-turned-lawyer who helped craft the Oregon law that has been approved twice by Oregon voters, said the report vindicates supporters of assisted suicide, the Associated Press reported.”As we told voters in 1994 and 1997, this law is well-crafted, it is safe, workable and provides both doctors and patients a clear path to follow in the final days of life,”she said.

Opponents of the measure, however, scored the report and said they will seek ways to overturn the law.

Bob Castagna, executive director of the Oregon Catholic Conference, the action arm of the state’s Roman Catholic bishops, said the church will continue to press the U.S. Congress to pass a law barring doctors from prescribing drugs to assist suicide.

Quote of the day: Rosaline Mbure of Church House in Nairobi, Kenya.

(RNS)”I said to myself: `This cannot be Jesus returning because he cannot return with so much violence.'” _ Rosaline Mbure, a senior secretary at Church House, the headquarters of the National Church Council of Kenya, telling Ecumenical News International her reaction to the bombing of the U.S. embassy in Kenya. Church House is just some 250 feet away from the embassy.

DEA END RNS