c. 1998 Religion News Service

Robertson, IRS settle tax case over political activities

(RNS) Ending a 12-year-old tax and politics case, Pat Robertson’s Christian Broadcasting Network has reached a settlement with the Internal Revenue Service that calls for CBN to make a”significant payment”to the IRS but preserves the organization’s tax-exempt status.

The settlement, announced Monday (March 16), stems from the IRS’s contention that CBN violated its tax-exempt status with its political activities during 1986 and 1987. The activities were conducted by three now-defunct CBN affiliates _ Freedom Council, the National Perspectives Institute and the National Freedom Institute _ created to encourage conservative Christian political involvement.

To settle the case, CBN agreed to surrender its tax-exempt status for 1986 and 1987 and to make an unspecified”significant payment”to the IRS.

CBN also agreed to a number of”operational modifications to ensure ongoing compliance with the tax laws, according to a CBN statement. These included increasing the number of outside directors on its board.

CBN did not admit to engaging in illegal activity, although Robertson acknowledged in the statement the settlement satisfied”legitimate concerns of the IRS.” In an interview, CBN spokeswoman Patty Silverman said”CBN sought to encourage Christians to make their voices heard in government. CBN felt these activities were part of our religious mission. The IRS disagreed with that.” However, the Rev. Barry W. Lynn, executive director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State, a religious liberties watchdog group based in Washington, said the settlement left no doubt that Robertson and CBN had crossed the line.”The IRS action sends a strong message to other religious ministries that engage in partisan politics,”Lynn said in a Friday (March 20) statement.”Robertson has tried to stampede churches into partisan politics. This shows what could happen to churches that follow his lead.” Silverman said the settlement does not impact those who made financial donations to CBN in 1986 and 1987.”The donations remain tax-deductible for the donors,”she said.

Amnesty: Nigeria rounding up dissidents in advance of papal visit

(RNS) Nigeria’s military government has reportedly detained dozens of democracy advocates and political opponents in advance of Pope John Paul II’s visit to the African nation, which begins Saturday (March 21.)

London-based Amnesty International said leading activist Olisa Agbakoba was among at least 30 individuals taken into custody. Amnesty International said Agbakoba was held for two days and beaten with rifle butts, the Associated Press reported.

In a statement, Amnesty International said:”Even the pope’s impending visit has not been enough to stop the Nigerian authorities from brutally supressing dissenting opinions. If the government can go on arresting and intimidating people just for attending seminars or marches while the media spotlight is focused on Nigeria, it sends a very clear message to the Nigerian people.” The pope will spend three days in Nigeria, which is ruled with an iron fist by military leader Gen. Sani Abacha. During his visit, John Paul is expected to call for the release of political prisoners held in Nigeria.

Dobson reassured on GOP backing for moral agenda

(RNS) James Dobson, the Focus on the Family president who has sought to prod congressional Republicans into adhering to his morality-based agenda, received assurances Thursday (March 19) from GOP leaders that they will seek to follow his lead.

The popular religious broadcaster met in Washington with House Majority Leader Dick Armey and House Majority Whip Tom DeLay, who told him they would push Republican lawmakers to pay more attention to such issues as abortion and religious persecution, a Dobson spokesman said.

Dobson also was reassured by a recent Armey memo sent to fellow Republicans stating,”values and morality will be the dominant issues of the (campaigns) in 1998 and 2000.” Dobson also met with 25 conservative House Republicans while in Washington.

Dobson has threatened to take leave from Focus on the Family, so as not to threaten its tax-exempt status, and engage in more direct conservative political action. He has charged Republicans with abandoning the morality concerns of religious conservatives whose votes contributed mightily to the GOP’s currently edge in Congress.

The Associated Press reported that Dobson was set to unleash more media criticism of Republican lawmakers while in Washington, but cancelled planned interviews after receiving the assurances from Armey and DeLay, both from Texas.

Two Mormon missionaries kidnapped in Russia

(RNS) Two Mormon missionaries have been abducted in Russia, according to church officials.

Don LeFevre, a spokesman in Salt Lake City for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, said the two 20-year-old American missionaries were abducted Wednesday (March 18). A ransom note demanding $300,000 was left on the doorstep of the Samara Mormon church from where the missionaries were snatched.

The missing men are Andrew Lee Propst of Lebanon, Ore., and Travis Robert Tuttle of Gilbert, Ariz.

Some 60 to 100 Mormon missionaries work out of Samara, which is about 500 miles southeast of Moscow on the Volga River. The church has about 600 to 800 missionaries and more than 5,000 church members in all of Russia.

LeFevre said he was not aware of Mormon missionaries ever having been kidnapped previously in Russia.

The church has about 58,000 missionaries serving worldwide. Mormons are asked by their church to serve as missionaries for two years.

Police in Samara had no comment on the case, the Associated Press reported.

Roy Tuttle, Travis’ father, said:”All we can do is rely on faith that they’re going to come home to us in safety and that our savior is by their side at this time.”

British Jewish community urged to consider launching TV station

(RNS) Britain’s 300,000-member Jewish community should consider using the opportunity provided by the advent of digital television and the vast increase in available television channels it will bring to set up a Jewish TV channel.

The suggestion was forward by Roger Silverstone, who in May will become the first professor of media and communication at the London School of Economics, in a policy paper published Friday (March 20) by the Institute for Jewish Policy Research.

Such a channel, Silverstone said, should aim at a wider audience than Jews alone, including both those connected with Jewry by marriage, origin, or conviction but not in the strict sense Jewish, as well as people from the non-Jewish population.

Silverstone, currently professor of media studies at the University of Sussex, estimated that setting it up would involve an initial investment of more than $1 million and the cost of renting transmission time would between $500,000 and $835,000 a year.

His paper cited two instances of existing Jewish TV stations _ the Alef Network in Buenos Aires, which for the past 10 years has been broadcasting 24 hours a day, seven days a week, to Argentina’s 225,000-strong Jewish community, and the Jewish Television Network of Los Angeles, a not-for-profit organization set up in 1981 and which distributes between six and 10 hours of weekly programming to public broadcasting and cable companies throughout the United States.

Silverstone said Jewish television should be seriously considered as a project to reinvigorate contemporary Anglo-Jewish culture _ a culture marked, he noted, by a tradition of assimilation.”It is now high time that Jews participate in electronic media space,”he said,”for doing so will enable them to confront and engage with their distinctiveness and their differences, to recover their heritage, redefine their identity and their social and cultural contribution, and make their presence felt in the wider public sphere. Television is hardly going to do this on its own, but without television it is unlikely to be possible at all.” Scientology launches European public relations campaign

(RNS) If there’s no such thing as bad publicity, then the Church of Scientology is making the best of bad news.

The church, which claims it is suffering religious persecution in its well-publicized struggle with the German government, has launched a multimillion-dollar advertising campaign in Western Europe, designed to urge people to see what the fuss is all about.”We are being talked about every day, but when you ask people what is (Scientology), they don’t know,”said Gaetane Asselin, public relations director for the church’s European operations, headquartered in Copenhagen, Denmark.”So we say, think for yourselves, buy a book.” Billboards, magazine ads, bus posters and other media will use the catch phrase”Think for yourself”and urge people to read Scientology’s seminal work,”Dianetics,”authored by the church’s late founder, L. Ron Hubbard, in 1950.

The ads show cartoon images such as a line-up of cavemen, all building square wheels except for one confident man who invents the round variety.

The church’s publicity campaign recently began in Holland and will also hit Germany, Denmark, Switzerland and Austria. About 600 billboards will go up in Germany alone, Asselin said.

The Los Angeles-based Church of Scientology, founded by Hubbard in 1954, claims 8 million followers worldwide, including celebrities John Travolta and Tom Cruise.

Asselin said she had no figures for membership in European countries but said there were 60 churches and 160 missions on the continent. Press reports say the church claims 30,000 members in Germany.

Scientologists believe humans can achieve higher levels of existence and overcome mental barriers to success and physical health. They do this through seminars and spiritual counseling known as”auditing.” Critics say the church charges exorbitant fees for such services and employs hardball tactics against perceived enemies.

Quote of the day: Anglican Archdeacon Peter Broadbent

(RNS)”We are a hostage to fortune on so many issues. Our agenda is terminally tedious _ we have become a refuge for the pedant, the bureaucrat and the bore.” _ Archdeacon Peter Broadbent, a senior policy-maker in the Church of England’s General Synod, the denomination’s top legislative body, in a report released Friday (March 20) on why journalists attending the synod meeting last November”almost died of boredom.”

DEA END RNS