c. 2000 Religion News Service

L.A. Cardinal Offers Pro-life Prayer at Democratic Convention

(RNS) Los Angeles Cardinal Roger Mahony drew criticism from both the pro-choice and pro-life camps for opening the Democratic National Convention with a prayer asking God’s protection “especially on unborn children.”

Mahony, who has led the country’s largest and most diverse Catholic diocese since 1985, offered the invocation on Monday (Aug. 14) during the Democratic National Convention in Los Angeles.

Mahony kept to a fairly benign script in his prayer but reaffirmed his anti-abortion stance by praying for “unborn children, the sick and the elderly, those on skid row and those on death row.”

Pro-life activists said it was hypocritical for Mahony to pray at the convention since the Democrats support abortion rights. “If the Catholic church believes abortion is the murder of children, then how can Cardinal Mahony as a representative of the Catholic church give the Democratic Party his blessing?” asked Jeff White, a spokesman for Operation Rescue, according to The Washington Times.

Pro-choice delegates said Mahony should not have used his prayer to advocate against abortion. “It was very unpolitic of him to do that,” said Pat Patton, a North Carolina delegate. “He should have been very well aware of our platform. We certainly support a woman’s choice to make her own decision.”

Mahony’s office said his prayer was following in the pastoral tradition of the church to pray at political events without taking sides. Archbishop Anthony Bevilacqua of Philadelphia offered the benediction at the recent Republican National Convention.

Mahony, however, broke with recent tradition by accepting the offer to pray at the convention. The late Cardinal Joseph Bernardin did not accept an offer to pray for the Democrats in Chicago in 1996, and the late Cardinal John O’Connor refused a similar invitation when the Democrats met in New York in 1992.

Russian Orthodox Church Canonizes Czar Nicholas II and Family

(RNS) The Russian Orthodox Church agreed Monday (Aug. 14) to canonize Russia’s last czar and his entire family who died in 1918 at the hands of Russian revolutionaries.

Czar Nicholar II, his wife Alexandra and their five children will all become “passion bearers,” the lowest level of sainthood in the Russian Orthodox Church. The decision puts to rest months of controversy on whether the murdered czar should be given saintly status.

Nicholas and his family _ the last of the Romanov dynasty _ were killed in the Bolshevik Revolution that ushered in the Soviet Union. Nicholas was widely considered an inept ruler who failed to provide for his country during and after World War I.

But the czar’s canonization was based on his death, not his life, church officials said. Church leaders said Nicholas and his family were “people who sincerely tried to carry out the commandments of God” and who displayed “Christian faith” in their deaths, according to the Washington Post.

Some in Russia wondered whether the czar should be made a saint. While widely regarded as a committed Christian, his autocratic leadership made him unfit to be canonized, some said. Others said the canonization would rewaken nationalist sentiment in the troubled country.

“Nicholas II will become the banner of nationalist movements within and outside the church,” declared the Moscow News.

Update: ACLU Challenges Virginia’s `Minute of Silence’ Law

(RNS) The American Civil Liberties Union has challenged the new “minute of silence” law in the state of Virginia and hopes to get it overturned before school begins in the fall.

The Virginia chapter of the ACLU filed a motion Friday (Aug. 11) asking a federal district court in Alexandria to immediately overturn the law that requires a minute of silence for students. A hearing on the matter has been scheduled for Sept. 1 _ four days before the opening day of most public schools, The Washington Times reported.

Virginia previously had a law that left the decision to hold a minute of silence up to individual school districts. The General Assembly rewrote the law this year to require all public schools to hold a minute of silence for students to “meditate, pray or engage in any other silent activity” that does not cause a classroom distraction.

Stuart H. Newberger, the ACLU lawyer handling the case, filed the motion on behalf of seven Virginia families with children attending public schools. He hopes his challenge will be successful.

“The case law is rather clear on this,” he said, referring to the U.S. Supreme Court decision in June that declared a Texas school policy allowing student prayer before football games was unconstitutional.

David Botkins, spokesman for Virginia Attorney General Mark L. Earley, said state officials are comfortable with the law.

“The attorney general is confident the minute of silence law is constitutional,” Botkins said. “Nothing we have read in the motion for summary judgment changes that. We look forward to upholding the law in court.”

United Methodist Church Taps New Church and Society Secretary

(RNS) The United Methodist Church has tapped a Virginia lay leader to head the church’s social policy division and hopefully improve communications between the progressive agency and rank-and-file church members.

James E. Winkler, who currently serves as assistant general secretary for the General Board of Church and Society, has been nominated to succeed the Rev. Thom White Wolf Fassett, who is finishing a 12-year term.

Winkler was nominated by a search committee and approved by the agency’s executive committee. Winkler’s nomination now heads to the board of directors and must ultimately be approved by the church’s General Council on Ministries when it meets in October.

The Church and Society general secretary serves a 1-year term, up to a maximum of 12 years.

Winkler comes from a long line of Methodist pastors and has been working in the church for 15 years. From 1996 to 1999, Winkler served as liasion between the agency and the church’s 118 regional conferences around the world. Winkler has also worked as a seminar planner for youth, students and adults.

Winkler said his first priority will be to visit every annual (regional) conference in the United States and then every conference around the world. As a church bureaucrat, Winkler has extensive connections within the church that will help him foster better communication, he said.

The agency has come under fire in recent years by conservatives who say the liberal-leaning body does not truly speak for the church. Fassett drew major criticism for sponsoring a legal aid fund for Elian Gonzalez’s father, which was later transferred to the National Council of Churches.

Winkler said speaking for a 9.6 million-member global church is never easy, but better communication can draw all sides together.

“Someone once told me that Jesus got into trouble and so will we if we really address the powers and principalities and deal with real issues of justice,” Winkler said. “That’s unavoidalbe to a certain extent. I don’t think the board should always be about taking the most popular position. However, I think you can communicate it in a way that helps folks accept it.”

Claremont School of Theology Names New President

(RNS) A United Methodist pastor from Bloomington, Ind., has been named the new president of Claremont School of Theology.

The Rev. Philip A. Amerson, senior pastor of First United Methodist Church of Bloomington, will succeed the Rev. Robert Edgar, who left the presidential position to become general secretary of the National Council of Churches.

Amerson will be the fifth president of Claremont School of Theology, a graduate theological seminary of the United Methodist Church located in Claremont, Calif.

Amerson has been a pastor in Indianapolis and Evansville, Ind., and has served on the faculties of Candler School of Theology at Emory University in Atlanta, Westmont College in Santa Barbara, Calif., and Christian Theological Seminary in Indianapolis.

Quote of the Day: American Atheists President Ellen Johnson

(RNS) “The repulsive use of religious creeds, slogans and doctrines as campaign stickers is reaching a fever pitch. All of these candidates are citing their religious beliefs as if they are legitimate credentials for public office.”

_ American Atheists President Ellen Johnson, commenting on the role of religion in the presidential campaign.

DEA END RNS