c. 1999 Religion News Service
Falwell says one of”Teletubbies”may be gay
(RNS) The Rev. Jerry Falwell thinks a popular”Teletubbies”character may be a gay role model and his newspaper has warned parents about the rotund”Tinky Winky.” The Lynchburg, Va.-based evangelist said in a statement that the”subtle depictions”in the children’s show are intentional.”As a Christian I feel that role modeling the gay lifestyle is damaging to the moral lives of children,”he said Tuesday (Feb. 9).
The February issue of the National Liberty Journal that Falwell edits and publishes contains an article alerting parents that Tinky Winky may be a gay role model, the Associated Press reported.
The publication says the character has the voice of a boy but carries a purse.”He is purple _ the gay-pride color; and his antenna is shaped like a triangle _ the gay-pride symbol,”it says.
A spokesman for Itsy Bitsy Entertainment Co., which licenses the Teletubbies in the United States, said the purse is actually the character’s magic bag.”The fact that he carries a magic bag doesn’t make him gay,”said Steve Rice.”It’s a children’s show, folks. To think we would be putting sexual innuendo in a children’s show is kind of outlandish.” The British show, which is aimed at toddlers, started airing last spring on U.S. public television stations. Actors in oversized, brightly colored costumes portray the Teletubbies, which have television screens on their stomachs.
Barry Lynn, executive director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State, a frequent critic of conservative groups, questioned Falwell’s statement.”Who’s Falwell going to out next? Winnie the Pooh?”Lynn asked.”Or maybe, Barney; he’s purple, you know.”
Southern Baptists drop recommendation of American Airlines
(RNS) The Southern Baptist Convention has dropped American Airlines as one of its”recommended”airlines for travel to its annual meeting in Atlanta this June.
Officials have announced that they believe American Airlines broke its promise to halt corporate support of gay activist groups, the denomination said.
Bill Merrell, vice president for convention relations of the SBC Executive Committee, said American Airlines last spring”gave explicit assurances to Southern Baptists and others of the evangelical Christian community that it would not lend support to movements destructive of the family and society.” Merrell added that”contrary to those assurances”the airlines gave $50,000 to media awards of the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation, which was nominating the controversial play”Corpus Christi”for an honor. The play, which features a homosexual Christ-like figure who has offstage sexual relations with his disciples,”is nothing less than blasphemous,”Merrell said.
He added that the airlines also gave another $25,000 to the Human Rights Campaign, another organization that supports homosexual causes.
But an airlines spokeswoman said no promise was broken.”I can tell you that the corporation never made a pledge to drop its support of any organizations,”Andrea Rader, a spokeswoman for American Airlines told Religion News Service.”While we’re disappointed that the Southern Baptists will not be flying with us … the decisions we make in corporate giving and our marketing programs, etc., will all be made in the interest of customers, our shareholders and employees.” She confirmed that the airlines had supported the two gay groups that the Baptists cited, but she could not specify the dollar amounts.
A controversy between American Airlines and evangelical leaders began in 1997 when prominent evangelicals took out full-page newspaper ads calling on the airline to drop policies that”promote homosexual behavior.” Subsequently, airline officials met with some of the concerned parties, including representatives of the Family Research Council, Concerned Women for America and Focus on the Family.”In retrospect, we think it may have been a mistake,”said Rader.”We think we have been singled out all because of trying to start a dialogue … We don’t feel that it has been a very productive exercise.”
Student sues for right to wear witch symbol to school
(RNS) A 17-year-old has sued her suburban Detroit high school saying the school’s refusal to let her wear a Wiccan symbol violates her religious freedom.”To be forced to conceal one’s religious symbol under one’s shirt is a feeling of shame,”said Crystal Siefferly, a self-proclaimed witch who attends Lincoln Park High School, just outside of Detroit.
She wears a pentagram necklace, but in October school officials barred her from visibly displaying the five-pointed star symbolic of the Wiccan religion and she has worn it under her clothing.
Wicca comes from the Old English word for witch. The religion celebrates seasonal and life cycles using rituals from pre-Christian Europe.
The Michigan American Civil Liberties Union filed suit in federal court Tuesday (Feb. 9) on Siefferly’s behalf, seeking a temporary order barring enforcement of the ban while a judge considers the case, wire services reported.
The ACLU says the policy violates the First Amendment’s free speech and religious freedom guarantees.”Christian students can wear crosses, and Jewish students can wear stars of David, but Wiccans can’t wear the pentagram,”said Michigan ACLU spokesman Tom Schram.
Siefferly, a senior at the high school, has practiced Wicca for several years after reading a book on the subject, Schram said
In addition to the pentagram, the school has also barred students from wearing symbols of white supremacy, gangs and Satan, and officials defended the policy as part of their effort to crack down on gangs, drugs and violence. Also banned are black nail polish, dog collars and what the schools calls”death-style make-up.” Lincoln Park schools Superintendent Randall Kite said that on the advice of his attorney he would not discuss the district’s policy in detail but that the policy is certainly”not intended to discriminate against anyone’s religion.”
Update: Robertson to again be Christian Coalition president
(RNS) Christian Coalition founder Pat Robertson will again become the organization’s president, replacing the departed Donald P. Hodel.
Robertson served as the organization’s president until 1997, when Hodel assumed the post. Since then, Robertson had been a senior adviser to the Chesapeake, Va.-based conservative lobbying group.
Coalition spokeswoman Molly Clatworthy also Wednesday (Feb. 10) denied that Hodel left the organization because of a dispute with Robertson, as was reported by the Washington Times.
She said Hodel, a former Reagan administration official, left to return to the retirement he had begun prior to joining the coalition. Hodel served the coalition without pay.
The Associated Press also quoted Hodel as denying he had left because of differences with Robertson.
Rep. Randy Tate, a former Republican congressman from Washington state, remains the organization’s executive director responsible for its day-to-day operations.
Moscow trial of Jehovah’s Witnesses tests Russia’s religion law
(RNS) Efforts by Russian prosecutors to bar Jehovah’s Witnesses from Moscow went on trial Tuesday in a case that is expected to test the way Russia’s new law regulating religion will work.
On Wednesday (Feb. 10), lawyers for the Witnesses defended the group on charges that it breaks up families, promotes discord and is a threat to society.
The trial, which began last September, resumed in Moscow on Tuesday.”Yesterday, the prosecutor said Russian minds were not prepared for our kind of religious literature,”said Judah Schroeder, a spokesman for the Witnesses.”This amounts to a call for reimposing censorship. Who is to decide what Russian minds are allowed to read?””The prosecutors accuse us of promoting religious discord, of breaking up families and posing a threat to society but they have yet to come up with any evidence,”Schroeder said.
If the Witnesses lose their case, under the Russian law they will be disbanded as a legal organization in Moscow. Schroeder said if the group loses it will take its case to the European court.
There have been Witnesses in Russia for more than a century and estimates put their current number at about 250,000 people.
Schroeder said if the group loses its case and is forced to disband, it will lose its buildings and other property and be forced underground.
The religion law, adopted in 1997 and sharply criticized by both the U.S. government and the Vatican, requires all religious groups in Russia to re-register with the government by the end of 1999. Unregistered groups lack full legal rights and cannot conduct missionary or educational work.
State trial of Baptist leader switches to defense
(RNS) The Florida state trial of the Rev. Henry J. Lyons appears to be more than half over as the prosecution has rested and the defense attorneys began their arguments Wednesday (Feb. 10).
The trial, which opened Jan. 25, deals with charges of racketeering and grand theft against Lyons, the president of the National Baptist Convention, USA, and Bernice Edwards, who served as the denomination’s public relations director.
On Tuesday (Feb. 9), Lyons took the stand briefly before the judge _ but not the jury _ to help determine whether prosecutors could enter as evidence a letter purportedly written by him, the St. Petersburg Times reported. Lyons said he did not write the letter that dealt with an offer to sell his denomination’s membership list and no such computer list existed at the time.
Lyons’ testimony cannot be presented unless he agrees to testify in front of jurors. His defense attorneys have said they do not know if he will take the stand on his own behalf.
Pinellas-Pasco Circuit Judge Susan Schaeffer did not make an immediate ruling about the letter.
But she did throw out one element of the state’s racketeering case that involved the payment of $70,000 to the convention by the Loewen Group, a Canadian funeral company.
The prosecution’s last witness was David Kurash, the chief state’s investigator. He rebutted claims by Lyons’ defense lawyers that the minister was simply a sloppy bookkeeper.”He was not in my judgment sloppy,”Kurash testified during cross-examination.”He did it for a very good reason. He did it so no one could figure out what was going on. No one.” Defense lawyers are expected to take about a week to present their case.
Survey: Germans consider few of Ten Commandments important
(RNS) Few of the Ten Commandments are important to most Germans, according to a survey published by Der Spiegel magazine.
The commandment,”I am the Lord your God, you shall have no other gods before me,”was found to be the least important one, with only 33 percent of those surveyed considering it important.”Only four of Christianity’s Ten Commandments are viewed as significant by almost all German men and women,”the magazine said.”A much higher number of Germans find it important to honor their parents than to be faithful to their spouse.” Ninety-seven percent of those surveyed said they accepted the commandment”You shall not kill.”Other commandments that most accepted were those that addressed honoring parents and not stealing. But there was less agreement on sexual morality: 75 percent said it was important to condemn adultery.
The magazine, whose findings were reported by the Adventist News Network Bulletin, also said few people accepted the commandment”You shall remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy.””Only 18 percent of Catholics and 5 percent of Protestants regularly attend worship,”said Holger Teubert, spokesman for the Seventh-day Adventist Church in Germany.”It is therefore not surprising that the observance of the day of rest in this country today has only little importance.” Ekkehardt Mueller, associate director of the Adventist Church’s Biblical Research Institute, said he found the survey results”distressing.””God gave us the commandments to help guide us, and if we disregard them, it will be our loss,”he said.
The Hamburg-based magazine, which means”The Mirror,”published the results of a survey by the Emnid-Institute in Bielefeld, Germany.
Quote of the Day: Christian author and broadcaster Steve Brown
(RNS)”Do you know what bothers me about President Clinton? It isn’t that he’s a sinner _ I am, too. It isn’t that he failed. It’s that (his situation has) given so many of us an opportunity to be arrogant and righteous.” Christian author and broadcaster Steve Brown, giving a keynote address Jan. 31 at the annual meeting of the National Religious Broadcasters in Nashville, Tenn.
DEA END RNS
