c. 2000 Religion News Service
Virginia’s Senate Approves `Minute of Silence’ in Schools
(RNS) Virginia’s Senate approved a measure Tuesday (Feb. 1) that would call for a minute of silence for prayer, meditation or reflection at the start of each school day.
By a 28-11 vote, senators approved the legislation that has been praised by religious and social conservatives and criticized by civil libertarians. Supporters hope it might reduce violence in schools and opponents argue that it is unconstitutional. People on both sides expect it to become law.
Gov. James S. Gilmore III told The Washington Post he thinks the legislation can help “instill character in the lives of young people” and will not infringe on any students’ rights.
“I support separation of church and state, and I don’t think this crosses that line,” the Republican governor said.
Sen. Warren E. Barry, a Republican from Fairfax who sponsored the bill, reminded his colleagues of the massacre at Colorado’s Columbine High School.
“The big question is: What are we going to do to try and stem the increase in violence in our public schools?” he said. “This may just be a nibble, but it’s a nibble in the right direction.”
Kent Willis, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Virginia, said the state senators are “at the very least placing Virginia law right on the line of separation of church and state or they are crossing it. … The state is playing games with fire here.”
The U.S. Supreme Court, which ruled in the 1960s that organized school prayer is unconstitutional, decided in 1985 that an Alabama law calling for a “moment of silence” in public schools violated the principle of government neutrality toward religion.
The justices said it was clear through the history of the Alabama law that it was designed to encourage student prayer. Their decision left open the possibility that a law that is not designed to promote religion might be considered acceptable.
About half of the states across the country have some version of a law addressing a moment of silence. In recent months, a number of states have considered religious measures _ including some about posting the Ten Commandments _ in response to the killings at Columbine.
The Senate bill also deletes existing legal language that says students should “be subject to the least possible pressure from the Commonwealth either to engage in, or to refrain from, religious observation on school grounds.”
Christian Music to Reach In-Flight Airwaves
(RNS) Christian music will reach the airwaves in the air during a two-month feature on Delta Airlines’ in-flight audio channel.
The Gospel Music Association, Parable Christian Stores and CCM Magazine, a publication focusing on contemporary Christian music, announced Tuesday (Feb. 1) that they will sponsor a Delta in-flight audio channel from March 1 to April 30.
Listeners aboard Delta flights will hear music selected from nominees for the association’s annual Dove Awards. The in-flight program will be hosted by singer/songwriter Jaci Velasquez, a three-time winner of Dove Awards. The show will be held April 20 in Nashville, Tenn.”Christian music is making an incredible impact in the marketplace,”said Frank Breeden, president of the Gospel Music Association, which is based in Nashville. He hopes those who hear the music will become”frequent listeners”of Christian music as a result of the channel.
Delta Airlines research indicates that more than 6 million people listen to their in-flight audio offerings during each two-month cycle. The program of Christian music also will be listed in Delta’s magazine, which has an estimated readership of 14 million.
United Methodist Panel Mulls Same-Sex Union Charges
(RNS) A United Methodist panel began hearings Tuesday (Feb. 1) to decide whether to bring formal charges against dozens of pastors who participated in the blessing of a union of a lesbian couple.
The seven-member investigative committee, convened by the California-Northern Nevada United Methodist Conference, will determine whether to charge 67 ministers with violating church law for their involvement in the controversial marriage ceremony, held in Sacramento, Calif., in January 1999.
If a church trial determines the ministers are guilty, they could be removed from the clergy.
The two women who were married in the ceremony defended the ministers, saying they deserved praise, not punishment, the Associated Press reported.
“Now we share our church life with the gay community and share our gay life with the church,” said Ellie Charlton, who married Jeanne Barnett. “It was very stressful being in two different closets. Now we’re not in any closet.”
Twenty-five other ministers also participated in the event, but were not named in the formal complaint because they were from churches outside the California-Northern Nevada conference.
The minister who officiated at the wedding, the Rev. Donald Fado, said he believed the ceremony was comparable to an act of civil disobedience. He said he welcomed a church trial as an opportunity to force the church to respond to the needs of its gay members, and described the investigative panel’s hearings as enlightening.
“It’s like a pastors’ school with distinguished scholars,” he said. “I’ve taken notes for future sermons.”
The investigative panel, who met in the sanctuary of Community United Methodist Church in Fairfield, Calif., was expected to decide next week whether to bring the charges before a national Methodist conference when it meets in Cleveland in May.
In separate cases in the past, the Methodist church disciplined two ministers for presiding over same-sex marriages and unions.
French Catholic Bishop Suspected of Keeping Abuser’s Secret
(RNS) A French Roman Catholic bishop is the subject of a judicial investigation, suspected of failing to inform police that one of his priests had sexually abused young boys, the French Bishops’ Conference said on Tuesday (Feb. 1).
The investigation of Bishop Pierre Pican, from Bayeux in northern France, is an unprecedented move for French magistrates, one that raises legal concerns about the traditional secrecy of confession for Roman Catholics.
The investigation of Pican is linked with that of a priest with whom he worked, Rene Bisset, who was arrested in 1998 and has been accused of the rape and abuse of several boys between 1985 and 1996.
Bisset was removed in 1996 from the leadership of a parish in northern France, and sent to a religious retreat, but six months later he was given a new parish in another region of northern France.
Bisset has admitted to charges of sexual abuse and is scheduled to go to trial later this year, Reuters reported.
Lawyers representing the families of the abused boys believe Pican was aware of Bisset’s behavior in 1996, but did not tell anyone. Bishop Louis-Marie Bille, head of the bishops’ conference, rejected that idea.
“I am confident that if Monsignor Pican kept quiet about these things, then he would have done so because he believed that his conscience demanded that he was bound to keep a secret,” he said. “It is important not to mix up what the priest did and what the bishop has been reproached with.”
Pican could face up to three years in prison if he is convicted of the charges.
Human Rights Group: China Leads World in Executions
(RNS) China led the world in the number of executions carried out in 1998 with 1,769 confirmed _ more than the combined total of executions in the rest of the world, according to a report issued by a human rights group.
“These figures are believed to be far below the actual number of death sentences and executions in China during the year,” the report, issued by Amnesty International, read. “… Only a fraction of death sentences and executions carried out in China are publicly reported, with information selectively released by the relevant authorities.”
A total of 2,701 people were sentenced to death in 1998, the London-based group said, though not all of the sentences were completed that year. The group, which culled its information from public reports, found that an average of 51 people were executed each week in China.
In many cases verdicts are determined before the trial even begins, the report said, and people often receive death sentences for non-violent crimes such as embezzlement, tax fraud and credit card theft.
A number of the executions occurred during the Chinese government’s attempts to crack down on crime, the report noted, a campaign some say has been ineffective in reducing the country’s crime rate.
More recently the state-run Chinese press reported that Chinese courts executed or sentenced to death 24 people within a seven-day period, according to The Washington Post.
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhu Bangzao told the newspaper that the courts in China are “very prudent” when handling death sentence cases.
Pope Praises “Prophetic Presence” of Religious, Pays Tribute to Martyrs
(RNS) Pope John Paul II praised nuns, monks and other members of religious orders Wednesday (Feb. 2) as a “prophetic presence” for all Christians and paid special tribute to those who died as martyrs for their faith.
The Roman Catholic pontiff celebrated a Jubilee Candlemass in St. Peter’s Square to honor the more than one million members of Roman Catholic orders and institutions on the church’s Feast of the Presentation of the Lord.
More than 30,000 religious from throughout the world gathered in Rome during the weekend for a three-day Holy Year celebration culminating with the Mass. Vatican sources said they included nine members of the underground church from the parish of Wenzhou in China.
It was the first time in memory a pope celebrated an outdoor Mass in February. The weather was mild and cloudy, but there was no rain.
The feast marks the presentation of Jesus at the temple of Jerusalem, and the mass began with a traditional procession of the congregation, holding candles blessed by the pope to symbolize Christ as “the light of the peoples.”
In his homily, the pope described the consecrated life as a “great reserve of spiritual life for the church and at the same time a great hope for the future of the world.”
“Having been a pilgrim to many parts of the world, I have been able to see for myself the value of your prophetic presence for the entire Christian people,” John Paul said.
“More than a few of them have paid, even in recent years, with the supreme witness of blood for their choice of fidelity to Christ and to man without surrender and without compromise,” he said. “May the tribute of our admiration and our recognition go to them.”
The pope underlined the importance of the solemn vows of poverty, obedience and chastity taken by members of religious orders, calling them “a message that you fling to the world about the definitive destiny of man.”
“Far from being a renunciation that impoverishes, they constitute a choice that frees the person and a fuller actualization of your potentiality,” he said.
British Anglicans, Catholics Issue Statement on Marriage, Sexuality
(RNS) The Church of England and the Roman Catholic Church in England and Wales have joined forces to argue to the government that sex education in schools should promote traditional Christian marriage as “the fundamental building block of society and of family life and the proper context for the nurture of children.” In the context of the proposed repeal in Scotland of a law which bars local authorities from promoting homosexuality, the Church of England’s Board of Education and the Catholic Education Service have sent the Secretary of State for Education and Employment, David Blunkett, a joint statement of church expectations of guidance on sex and relationships education.
The government is considering providing schools with guidelines on sex education when _ and if _ the law, known as Section 28, is repealed. That may not come, however, until after the next general election if the House of Lords throws out the proposed repeal.
The churches’ statement describes human sexuality as a gift of God that finds its perfect expression within loving lifelong marriage. “Any other physical sexual expression falls short to some degree of that ideal,” it says. “It follows that human sexuality is not fulfilled in self-gratification or in promiscuous or casual relationships.”
The statement also argues that “lifelong celibacy can be fulfilling,” a way of life in which “an individual’s sexual instincts may be channelled into generous love and service to others.” It further emphasizes that “pupils have a right to develop without being subject to any physical or verbal abuse about sexual orientation or to the encouragement of sexual activity.”
Quote of the Day: Singer Tina Turner
(RNS) “People think `How can she be Buddhist in those dresses and red lips?’ But Buddhism isn’t against work. Our work helps us get to the next stage of bettering ourselves. Remember, I’m practicing Buddhism. It’s not like I’ve perfected it.”
_ Singer Tina Turner in an interview with USA Today published Tuesday (Feb. 1).
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