c. 1999 Religion News Service

China steps up crackdown against Falun Gong

(RNS) Defiant members of the banned Falun Gong spiritual group staged continued protests in Beijing’s Tiananmen Square on Tuesday (Oct. 26) amid reports that as many as 1,000 movement members have been arrested in recent days.

The protests came as China’s parliament debated a bill designed to further curb the activities of Falun Gong and other groups the government views as cults.

Falun Gong _ which combines elements of Buddhism, Taoism and”qigong”meditation and physical exercises _ claims tens of millions of followers in China. The government, which closely controls all forms of religious or spiritual expression, considers the movement’s independent nature a threat to the nation’s stability.

Falun Gong’s founder and leader, New York-based Li Hongzhi, maintains the group is apolitical and poses no threat.

Gail Rachlin, a spokeswoman for Falun Gong in New York, said in a statement Tuesday that”as many as 1,000″members of the group”were arrested or detained this past weekend.” Reuters news agency reported most of those protesting were”ordinary middle-aged or elderly citizens (who) freely admitted to police they were Falun Gong members”before being arrested.

Rachlin also said two Falun Gong members died in police custody in China in August and September. Rachlin said the two were”brutally”tortured. She said”the abuse apparently became so severe”the prisoners _ Cheng Ying, 18, and Zhao Dong, 38 _”were forced to jump off the train”taking them to their home province.”Mr. Zhao’s body was found with handcuffs still on his wrists,”Rachlin added in a statement.

Without addressing the torture allegations directly, a Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman defended the government’s actions against Falun Gong.”Li Hongzhi and Falun Gong is an anti-human, anti-society and anti-science cult and an illegal organization,”said spokeswoman Zhang Qiyue.”It destroyed ordinary social order and harmed the physical and mental health of the public.” Falun Gong has been the target of a Chinese government crackdown since April, when some 10,000 members surprised officials by publicly protesting in Beijing for legal status for the movement.

Report faults Uzbekistan for treatment of orthodox Muslims

(RNS) Muslim men wearing beards and women wearing head scarves are being kept out of schools and universities in Uzbekistan, according to an international human rights group.

In a recent (Oct. 20) report on the former Soviet republic in central Asia, Human Rights Watch said the Uzbek government has been”unceremoniously”expelling orthodox Muslims from educational institutions in”a pernicious form of religious discrimination.” Human Rights Watch said the crackdown is part of the Uzbek government’s attempt to control Muslim observance out of fear more fundamentalist forms of the religion will threaten the secular-oriented government.

The government claims that beards and head scarves identify students as members of fundamentalist groups.

Since late 1997, said the report,”thousands of Muslims who do not adhere to officially sanctioned Islam or do not attend government-approved mosques”have been arrested.

The Human Rights Watch report echoes a recent U.S. State Department survey on international religious freedom that also faulted Uzbekistan’s treatment of its majority Muslim and minority Christian populations.

Study: Heart patients who were prayed for fared better

(RNS) Heart patients who were prayed for without their knowledge suffered 10 percent fewer complications, a study has found.”It’s potentially a natural explanation we don’t understand yet,”said William S. Harris, a heart researcher and lead author of the study.”It’s potentially a super- or other-than-natural mechanism.” He and other researchers at the Mid America Heart Institute, the heart program of St. Luke’s Hospital in Kansas City, Mo., conducted the study of 990 patients admitted during a year to the coronary care unit of the institute.

By a random process, the patients were divided into two groups _ one where they were prayed for daily by community volunteers for four weeks and another where no one was assigned to pray for them.

The volunteers were given only the first names of the patients and asked to pray daily for their rapid recovery with no complications. The patients, their families and their caregivers were not aware of the study, the Associated Press reported.

After four weeks, the patients who were prayed for had suffered about 10 percent fewer complications, ranging from chest pain to cardiac arrest. The researchers reported their findings in the issue of the Archives of Internal Medicine that was published Monday (Oct. 25) by the American Medical Association.

While the researchers said the findings suggest that prayer might be an effective addition to regular medical care, Harris acknowledged the limitations of his study. For one thing, many patients in the comparison group also could have had friends and relatives praying for them.

An expert not involved in the study said it and a similar one in 1988 that was done in San Francisco had questionable methods.

Both studies counted complications using their own scoring systems, which have not been proven to be medically valid, said the expert, Dr. Herbert Benson, a professor at Harvard Medical School and president of the Mind/Body Medical Institute at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston.

He said medical research has shown that people who believe in prayer or in God generally fare better than those who do not. But it still remains unproven whether prayer itself makes a difference.

Benson added that other studies have found no apparent benefits to being prayed for, and in one case, patients who were the subject of prayers actually fared worse.

Pope enjoys life but finds peace in thinking of his approaching death

(RNS) Pope John Paul II said Tuesday (Oct. 26) that at the age of 79 he continues to”enjoy life”but at the same time finds”great peace”in thinking of his approaching death.

The Roman Catholic pontiff made his comment in a”Letter to the Elderly,”in which he wrote in unusually personal terms of the problems and possibilities of old age and the place of the elderly in society. The letter marked the United Nations Year of the Elderly.

The Polish-born pope said he wrote as”someone who, with the passing of the years, has come to a deeper personal understanding of this phase of life and consequently feels a need for closer contact with other people of his own age so that we can reflect together on the things we have in common.” Addressing his readers as”dear elderly brothers and sisters,”he said:”I feel a spontaneous desire to share fully with you my own feelings at this point of my life, after more than 20 years of ministry on the throne of Peter and as we await the arrival, now imminent, of the third millennium.”Despite the limitations brought on by age, I continue to enjoy life. For this I thank the Lord,”he said.”At the same time, I find great peace in thinking of the time when the Lord will call me: from life to life!” Although he has undergone abdominal surgery, dislocated his shoulder, broken his thigh and suffers from a neurological ailment believed to be Parkinson’s disease, John Paul has only slightly reduced his taxing schedule in recent years.

At the Vatican, he holds a general audience and dozens of private audiences each week, and he attended the sessions of a three-week assembly of European bishops earlier this month. He is scheduled to travel to India and the Republic of Georgia Nov. 5 to 9 and hopes to make a series of holy year pilgrimages to the Middle East next year.”It is wonderful to be able to give oneself to the very end for the sake of the Kingdom of God!”the pope said.

John Paul said even with the Christian belief in an afterlife, it is natural for the elderly to find it hard to resign themselves to death.”The years pass quickly, and the gift of life, for all the effort and pain it involves, is too beautiful and precious for us ever to grow tired of it,”he said.

Condemning euthanasia as”an intrinsically evil act,”John Paul said there is a trend in the West to no longer esteem and value old age”due to a mentality which gives priority to immediate human usefulness and productivity.” This is wrong, he said, because the elderly”help us to see human affairs with greater wisdom”and serve as”the guardians of our collective memory.””To exclude the elderly is in a sense to deny the past, in which the present is firmly rooted, in the name of a modernity without memory,”the pope said.

The pontiff said society has a”threefold duty”to honor older people by”welcoming them, helping them and making good use of their qualities.”

Co-defendant in Henry Lyons’ trial sentenced for tax evasion

(RNS) A former publicist for the National Baptist Convention, USA, was sentenced Monday (Oct. 25) to 21 months in prison for failing to pay taxes on more than $500,000 she received while working for the denomination.

Bernice Edwards, 42, also must pay $109,000 to the Internal Revenue Service and serve three years of supervised release.

Edwards was the co-defendant in the trial of the Rev. Henry J. Lyons, the former president of the influential, predominantly black denomination who is now serving a 5 1/2-year sentence for swindling $4 million from companies doing business with the organization.

Edwards sobbed and asked U.S. District Judge Henry Lee Adams of Tampa, Fla., for leniency because she is a single mother of four children, including an infant.”I’m remorseful of the acts that I pleaded to and I take full responsibility for it,”she said.”I don’t know how we can make it.” Edwards, of Milwaukee, faced a maximum sentence of 10 years in prison and $500,000 in fines, the Associated Press reported.

She had been a director of public relations for the denomination and was accused with Lyons of diverting money from corporations to fund lavish lifestyles that included luxury cars, expensive homes and diamond jewelry.

She was acquitted of racketeering charges but pleaded guilty to tax evasion in March.

Quote of the day: United Methodist Bishop Marion M. Edwards

(RNS)”The needs are great, and volunteers are desperately needed. May Jesus Christ be glorified as we spend the day as servants among those who have lost much and who persevere with patience and hope.” _ United Methodist Bishop Marion M. Edwards of North Carolina, announcing his cancellation of a spiritual renewal retreat for clergy on Monday (Oct. 25) so that pastors could instead volunteer in flooded areas on that day. He was quoted by United Methodist News Service.

DEA END RNS