c. 1998 Religion Service

Scientology charged in connection with woman’s death

(RNS) Criminal charges have been filed in Florida against an agency of the Church of Scientology in connection with the 1995 death of a 36-year-old woman who was in its care following an apparent nervous breakdown.

The church’s Flag Service Organization in Clearwater, Fla., was charged Friday (Nov. 13) with felony abuse or neglect of a disabled adult and with the unauthorized practice of medicine in connection with the death of Lisa McPherson. Florida law provides for a maximum penalty of $5,000 on each charge and the possible forfeiture of property.

McPherson died Dec. 5, 1995 following 17 days at a church-operated hotel in Clearwater after suffering an apparent breakdown following a minor traffic accident.

The Pinellas County medical examiner said McPherson, a longtime member of the controversial church, had been deprived of water for as many as 10 days prior to her death. The cause of death was listed as a blood clot resulting from dehydration, the New York Times reported.

The church maintains that McPherson was properly treated in accordance with the sect’s practices. Scientology frowns on psychiatric treatment, but McPherson was given injections of magnesium chloride in an attempt to get her to sleep, as well various vitamins, herbal remedies and prescription drugs.

None of the church members who administered to McPherson had a medical license, although several had medical training.

McPherson’s family has also filed a wrongful-death civil suit against the church, which claims some 8 million members worldwide.

Motive unclear in kidnapping of American missionary in Russia

(RNS) _ Kidnappers of an American missionary working in southern Russia have not made any demands of the man’s relatives or co-workers, according to a mission official who asked that neither his name nor that of his evangelical Protestant organization be identified.”We don’t know what they want or what their motivations are,”the Moscow-based mission official told RNS on Friday (Nov. 13).”We don’t know what role his being a Christian might play”in the abduction.

Herbert Gregg, 51, was kidnapped Wednesday afternoon from an orphanage playground while teaching youngsters to play basketball in the city of Makhachkala on the Caspian Sea.

Gregg is an experienced missionary and English teacher, speaks Russian fluently and was well aware of the dangers of working in the region, said the mission director.”He spent three years there,”said the mission director, adding that Gregg had completed one year of Russian-language training in Moscow before leaving for his assignment.”It’s not like he just went down there last weekend.” In an interview published Friday by a Moscow newspaper, Gregg’s wife, Linda, said that immediately after the kidnapping one of the boys at the orphanage ran to her home to tell her what happened. The boy recounted how four men posing as police officers summoned her husband to their car parked next to the orphanage playground. When the men asked Herbert Gregg to get into the car, he refused but was forced inside.

The mission director said officials with the U.S. embassy in Moscow were monitoring the progress of investigators by Russia’s Federal Security Service, the agency which took over many of the tasks of the former KGB.

In the past, the Russian government has had little success in securing the release of the scores of foreigners and Russian citizens kidnapped from the lawless, predominantly Muslim Caucasus region of Russia, which includes Makhachkala and war-torn Chechnya.

N.C. Baptist church members approve ministers’ role in same-sex unions

(RNS) Members of a Baptist church in Winston-Salem, N.C., have permitted their ministers to officiate at same-sex blessing ceremonies, an action that separates them from their state and national Baptist conventions.

Wake Forest Baptist Church members approved a statement Sunday (Nov. 15) that stopped short of affirming same-sex unions, but asked God to bless”all loving, committed and exclusive relationships between two people,”the Associated Press reported.

Previously, the congregation has authorized the use of church space for same-sex ceremonies. The Rev. Richard Groves, pastor of the church, said there are no definite plans for such ceremonies, but a couple of requests for same-sex ceremonies have been received.

The Rev. Mac Brunson, president of the Baptist State Convention of North Carolina, recently warned that the convention would end its relationship with Wake Forest Baptist if the church voted to affirm same-sex unions.”Regardless of how they phrase it, they’re sanctioning same-sex marriage,”he said after Sunday’s vote.

In 1992, the state convention severed ties with its only two member churches that have publicly affirmed same-sex unions.

The conservative-led Southern Baptist Convention has defined marriage in resolutions as marriage between a man and a woman. Wake Forest Baptist is a member of the SBC, but Groves said it is a relationship in name only.

The 325-member church meets on the campus of Wake Forest University, but is not governed by the school.

The university was founded by the state convention but became autonomous in 1986. It maintains voluntary, fraternal ties with the state convention.

British churches tell government: end poverty in two decades

(RNS) _ Church Action on Poverty, a British ecumenical agency, has challenged the British government to commit itself to eliminating poverty in the United Kingdom by the year 2020.

Launching what it called an agenda for change, the church-sponsored group said that over the 10 years from 1982 to 1991 the number of people living on half the average income more than doubled, from 4 million to over 11.5 million people.

It said the government should use the tax and benefits system to reduce both poverty and the inequalities in wealth that have grown over the past 20 years, and urged establishing a”minimum income standard”_ the level of income needed for individuals to be able to participate fully in society _ and to use such a standard for setting the level of welfare benefits.”Many families living on benefits have incomes so low that they are unable to participate in activities that most members of society would regard as normal or even necessary,”the churches’ anti-poverty group said.”The result has been the entrenchment of social exclusion.”

Quote of the day: Bishop Dimitrios, Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America

(RNS)”We realized that our participation in the ecumenical movement is a divine imperative. We cannot choose to not be a part of this movement.” _ Archbishop Dimitrios of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of North America in a report Nov. 13 to the National Council of Churches on the decision by Orthodox churches to remain a part of the NCC.

DEA END RNS