c. 2000 Religion News Service
Ohio School Voucher Program Struck Down by Appellate Court
WASHINGTON (RNS) An appellate ruling Monday (Dec. 11) striking down an Ohio school voucher program could lead to U.S. Supreme Court consideration of the matter, legal experts predict.
The 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals struck down the Cleveland taxpayer-funded program, stating in a 2-1 ruling it was unconstitutional.
Supporters and opponents of the program had contrasting reactions to the decision, but agreed that the nation’s highest court could be the final arbiter of the program’s constitutionality.
“This is a great Christmas present for America’s public schools and our constitutional principles,” said Barry W. Lynn, executive director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State, in a statement.
His Washington-based organization helped bring the lawsuit challenging the program.
“This decision is a disaster for every schoolchild in America, but it will be short-lived,” predicted Clint Bolick, litigation director of the Institute for Justice, a Washington-based public interest firm that has represented families defending the program.
Bolick plans to appeal the case and expects the high court to hear it.
“If this program is allowed to die, 4,000 low-income kids will be forced to leave the only good schools they’ve ever attended,” Bolick said in a statement. “The Supreme Court won’t allow that to happen without considering their plight.”
The decision of the appellate court upholds a December 1999 decision by a federal district court judge who ruled that the program violated constitutional safeguards mandating separation of church and state.
“If the U.S. Supreme Court agrees to hear an appeal of this case, it would set the stage for a historic showdown,” Lynn said. “This will be the most important case about public schools and church-state separation in decades.”
_ Adelle M. Banks
Denver Archdiocese: Prairie Dogs `Part of God’s Creation’
(DENVER) Prairie dogs “are part of God’s creation” and the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Denver has no intention of snuffing them, according to Gregory Kail, the archdiocese’s spokesman.
The church’s prairie dog dilemma is in Louisville, Colo., where the archdiocese owns 14 acres it wants to sell.
But a prairie dog removal agency can’t find a place for the dogs because local dog relocation sites are full.
“We’ve been working for a long time with Wild Places (a humane society) about relocating the prairie dogs, and we expect that will happen,” said Kail.
The dogs, called the church dogs by local residents, live underground near the intersection of McCaslin and Via Appia Streets in Louisville, on land the archdiocese has owned since 1995. Louisville is a small town northwest of Denver.
Louisville is interested in buying the property for a possible new police station, but city officials want the church dogs out first.
“It’s not buildable land now,” said Louisville Mayor Tom Davidson.
If the city bought the land with prairie dogs included, then Louisville would have to find a spot for the dogs and there is no more room in Louisville to relocate dogs, said Davidson.
Asked why it would be easier for the church to relocate the dogs, Davidson said, “The archdiocese owns 80 other acres around here. They own more land than we do.”
“The prairie dogs aren’t the reason we’re selling,” said Kail. “We see prairie dogs, as with all wildlife, as part of God’s creation. We’re exhausting all alternatives before we think of exterminating.”
_ Virginia Culver
Korean Presbyterians Plead for Ban on Same-Sex Unions
(RNS) If the Presbyterian Church (USA) allows the blessing of same-sex unions, it will lead to the “demise” of the 2.5 million-member church and impose a “curse” on gays and lesbians, according to a network of 37,000 Korean Presbyterians.
In a letter to the national church issued Monday (Dec. 11), the National Korean Presbyterian Council pleaded with the church’s regional presbyteries to ratify a ban on same-sex unions that was narrowly approved at the church’s annual meeting last June in Long Beach, Calif.
“Scripture defines the marriage God instituted in terms of heterosexual monogamy,” wrote the Rev. Kwan Sik Shim, the group’s moderator, and Yushin Lee, the group’s general secretary. “Scripture envisages no other kind of marriage or sexual intercourse, for God provided no alternative. Any sexual behavior outside of this definition, whether heterosexual or homosexual, is displeasing to God.”
Shim and Lee said there is “no doubt” that homosexual relationships are “incompatible with God’s created order” and that Scripture is clear that marriage is reserved for one man and one woman. Shim and Lee said pastors who bless unions are leading gay couples astray.
“It is inconsistent … for church officers to counsel folks to remain outside the will of God. It is not pastoral to bless behavior that is contrary to God’s revealed will.”
Asian Presbyterians represent one of the largest and fastest-growing segments of the church, as well as one of its most conservative and evangelical. Shim and Lee said “spiritually thirsty and hungry young people” will leave the church if same-sex unions are approved and the church will continue to suffer membership declines.
The same-sex union ban, which passed by just 17 votes, prohibits church ministers and buildings from participating in “any ceremony or event that pronounces blessing or gives approval of the church or invokes the blessing of God” on any non-heterosexual relationship.
In order to be added to the church’s constitution, the ban must be ratified by a majority of the church’s 173 presbyteries before the denomination meets in June. A similar ban failed in the presbyteries in 1995.
_ Kevin Eckstrom
Gaylord Entertainment to Close Christian Internet Sites
(RNS) Gaylord Entertainment, a Nashville, Tenn.-based company, has announced it will close its Internet operations, including Musicforce.com and Lightsource.com, two Christian sites.
The company, whose holdings include the Grand Ole Opry, announced Dec. 5 it would no longer be in the Internet business. It reported losses of $48 million in the first three quarters of the fiscal year, the Associated Press reported.
Gaylord Digital will close by the end of the year, causing the elimination of 85 positions. The subsidiary began a year ago when the company purchased Musicforce.com and Lightsource.com.
Lightsource.com is a Christian Internet broadcasting site and Musicforce.com is a Christian music retailing site.
Dennis Sullivan, president and chief executive officer of Gaylord, said the decision to close or sell Gaylord Digital by the end of the year is part of a restructuring plan at his company.
Earlier this year, the company decided to close Z Music Television, its 24-hour cable channel that featured Christian music videos.
Pope Enlists Taxi Drivers at Motorized Holy Year Celebration
VATICAN CITY (RNS) Giving his blessing to taxi drivers who converged on the Vatican for a motorized Holy Year celebration, Pope John Paul II enlisted them as missionaries, urging them to evangelize their captive audience in the back seat.
Hundreds of taxis arrived at St. Peter’s Square early Saturday (Dec. 9)
to join thousands of pedestrian pilgrims in Rome to mark the Roman Catholic Church’s Jubilee of the year 2,000.
As a special concession, the Vatican relaxed the ban on cars inside the cobblestone square, flanked by colonnades that curve outward from St. Peter’s Square.
“I think of you with affection,” John Paul told the drivers. “Your work puts you in constant contact with people. You can thus know the various faces of society, often winning the confidence of passengers.
“Always be ready to listen with courtesy and patience, trying to transmit serenity to those whom you meet. You will carry out a precious service of evangelization if you can communicate to your interlocutors the joy of your faith and of your Christian commitment,” the pontiff said.
Most of the drivers managed to mix business with religion. After walking through the Holy Door of St. Peter’s Basilica (opened only for jubilee celebrations), attending Mass and receiving the papal blessing, many drivers left with fares they picked up in the square.
_ Peggy Polk
Lexington Loses Its `Creche on the Green’
BOSTON _ The 70-year tradition of a Christmas creche on the Lexington, Mass., Green must end in order to preserve the spot’s historic character, a federal judge ruled Dec. 6.
U.S. District Judge Nancy Gertner upheld a local ordinance banning all displays, religious and otherwise, from the town Green. Specifically, it forbids the private placement of “unattended structures” on the Green for more than eight hours.
The Knights of Columbus sued on First Amendment grounds to get the ordinance struck down and thereby gain permission to erect the scene again this year.
But Gertner said the ordinance doesn’t violate the freedom of either speech or religion.
“I find the challenged regulations to be a permissible, content-neutral, time, place and manner restriction on plaintiffs’ speech,” Gertner wrote.
The statuesque scene with Jesus, Mary and Joseph has been a fiery issue for the Lexington Board of Selectmen for years, but it has become especially controversial since the mid-1990s. Opponents claim tolerance for the Knights’ display on public property amounts to a town endorsement of one religion. In protest, some recently filed for permits to display symbols from other faiths, such as a herd of cows for Hinduism and a pyramid to honor Ra, the Egyptian Sun God.
“The selectmen recognized that if they allowed the creche, they would also have to permit each of these other displays to avoid endorsing any particular religion in violation of the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution,” Gertner ruled. “On the other hand, the selectmen worried that allowing such a variety of unattended structures _ and livestock _ to clutter the Green would disturb the historic ambiance of the area and detract from residents’ and tourists’ experience of the town.”
The Lexington Green gained worldwide fame on April 19, 1775 when musket-toting colonists fired the opening shots of the American Revolution.
The Christmas creche on the Green dates back to the 1920s. In the early 1970s, the town turned sponsorship over to the Knights to avoid problems with public endorsement of religious symbolism.
_ G. Jeffrey MacDonald
Newspaper Challenges Britain’s Anti-Catholic Law
LONDON (RNS) A legal challenge to the 1701 Act of Settlement, which bars from the British throne anyone who is either a Roman Catholic or is married to a Roman Catholic, is being mounted by one of Britain’s major newspapers, the Guardian.
It is part of a campaign to open a debate on whether Britain should remain a monarchy or become a republic.
This involves a challenge to another piece of legislation, the 1848 Treason Felony Act, which according to the paper threatens with deportation anyone advocating republicanism.
The 1701 Act bars from the throne anyone who “is, are or shall be reconciled to or shall hold communion with the see or church of Rome or shall profess the popish religion or shall marry a papist.”
Last December the Scottish Parliament voted unanimously to ask the Westminster Parliament to repeal the Act. Churchmen who have expressed misgivings about the Act remaining in force include the Archbishop of York, David Hope, and Archbishop Cormac Murphy-O’Connor of Westminster.
The legal challenge to the Act will allege its incompatibility with the Human Rights Act, which came into force this year, incorporating the European Convention on Human Rights into British law.
_ Robert Nowell
Quote of the Day: Southern Baptist Bioethicist Ben Mitchell
(RNS) “Physicians should support life rather than endorse death. The professional organization once most identified with saving lives is now in the business of recommending over-the-counter drugs aimed at the unborn. This is so counterintuitive as to be nearly surreal.”
Southern Baptist bioethicist Ben Mitchell, reacting to the American Medical Association’s recent recommendation that the “morning-after” pill be available over the counter. He was quoted in Dec. 7 by Baptist Press, official news service of the Southern Baptist Convention.
DEA END RNS
