c. 2003 Religion News Service

Bush’s and Lieberman’s Faiths Do Not Affect Voter Choice, Poll Says

(RNS) Wide majorities of American voters said the well-known faiths of both President Bush and Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Joseph Lieberman are not reasons to vote for either man, according to a new Quinnipiac University poll.

Sixty-nine percent of voters said Bush’s “born again” Christian faith would not affect their vote, and 85 percent said Lieberman’s Orthodox Jewish faith makes no difference, the poll found.

Just 18 percent of Americans said they are more likely to vote for Bush because of his religion, and 6 percent of voters said the same for Lieberman. Eleven percent said Bush’s faith could be a negative factor, and 6 percent said Lieberman’s faith may make them less likely to vote for him.

“Americans insist they reject a religious test for public office,” said Maurice Carroll, director of the Quinnipiac poll. “They say neither President Bush’s born again Christianity nor Sen. Lieberman’s Orthodox Judaism would influence how they vote.”

Bush, a United Methodist, has not publicly claimed the “born again” label, but has talked frequently about a religious conversion at age 40 and describes Jesus as his favorite political philosopher. Lieberman was the first Jew on a major party presidential ticket when he ran as Al Gore’s running mate in 2000.

The survey also found broad support for raising the profile of religion in public life _ 67 percent of Americans said religion has “a lot” or “some” influence on politics and public policy. Forty-three percent of respondents _ and 61 percent of churchgoers _ said religion should have a larger role.

The poll found that 69 percent of people support organized public prayer in schools, and 89 percent support keeping the phrase “under God” in the Pledge of Allegiance. Seventy percent support the Bush administration’s new policy of giving federal grants to restore religious landmark sites.

The poll of 1,015 adults was conducted June 4-9 and has a margin of error of plus or minus 3.1 percentage points.

_ Kevin Eckstrom

State Department Trafficking Report Draws Mixed Reviews

WASHINGTON (RNS) A new State Department report on human trafficking, which found that 15 countries have not made significant efforts to stop such mistreatment, is drawing mixed reactions from groups that have monitored trafficking.

The 15 countries that have not met minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking are: Belize, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Burma, Cuba, Dominican Republic, Georgia, Greece, Haiti, Kazakhstan, Liberia, North Korea, Sudan, Suriname, Turkey and Uzbekistan.

“It is appalling that in the 21st century hundreds of thousands of women, children and men made vulnerable by civil conflict, dire economic circumstances, natural disasters or just their own desire for a better life are trafficked and exploited for the purposes of sex or forced labor,” said Secretary of State Colin Powell in a letter to readers of the report, released Wednesday (June 11).

The 177-page report cites a U.S. government estimate that about 800,000 to 900,000 people are trafficked annually across international borders worldwide, with 18,000 to 20,000 victims entering the United States.

Linda Smith, a former Republican congresswoman who founded the War Against Trafficking Alliance, said she differs with State Department officials on some classifications such as “the light treatment of the Netherlands,” where she believes legalized prostitution hides some human trafficking.

“But I am encouraged by the report’s inclusion of 30 new countries and the fact that if the anti-trafficking efforts of the worst offending nations do not improve by this fall, they will be faced with sanctions,” she said in a statement.

The Family Research Council, a Washington-based conservative Christian group, praised the report.

Connie Mackey, the council’s vice president for government affairs, said the report focuses on “compassionate policies of helping women and children out of their helpless situations.”

But Human Rights Watch, a New York-based nongovernmental organization, said the report does not properly evaluate efforts by governments to fight human trafficking.

“The report gives undue credit for minimal effort and ignores government practices, such as summary deportation and incarceration that effectively punish trafficking victims,” said LaShawn R. Jefferson, executive director of the women’s rights division of the human rights group.

_ Adelle M. Banks

Scottish Episcopal Church Approves Women Bishops

LONDON (RNS) The Scottish Episcopal Church on Thursday (June 12) became the first of Britain’s three Anglican churches to allow the ordination of women as bishops.

Its general synod, meeting in Edinburgh, voted by substantially more than the two-thirds majorities needed to give final approval to the canon endorsing this move.

All seven bishops voted in favor, with the clergy voting 63 to 10 (with one abstention) and the laity 54 to 14 (with four abstentions).

These figures suggest a slight increase in opposition to women bishops among the clergy and laity since the canon was given provisional approval a year ago.

Later this year a vacancy will occur on the episcopal bench, when Bishop Douglas Cameron of Argyll and the Isles retires in October.

Following acceptance of the canon, the synod unanimously pledged that opponents of women bishops would “continue for all time to have a valued and respected place within the Scottish Episcopal Church.”

The Scottish Episcopal Church was the last Anglican church in Britain and Ireland to approve the ordination of women priests, which it did in 1994. The Church of Ireland was the first in 1990, when it drew no distinction between ordination to the priesthood and ordination to the episcopate. But as yet it has not taken the opportunity to appoint a woman bishop.

In the Church of England a working party headed by Bishop Michael Nazir-Ali of Rochester is considering the theological implications of ordaining women bishops and is not expected to deliver its final report until 2005. Only after this would there be any question of introducing legislation to allow women bishops _ a process that would take at least two years.

The church in Wales would also need fresh legislation if it wanted to have women bishops.

_ Robert Nowell

Renegade Orthodox Priest Ordered Jailed in Republic of Georgia

MOSCOW (RNS) A court in the former Soviet republic of Georgia has ordered the arrest of a renegade Orthodox priest whose hundreds of followers have terrorized Baptists, Pentecostals and Jehovah’s Witnesses for nearly four years.

Some minority religious leaders welcomed Thursday (June 12) the news, saying it sends an important message throughout the mostly Orthodox Christian country of 5 million people.

“It is a step forward. Now, everyone knows that the law exists and that there is such a thing as freedom of religion,” Manuchar Tsimintia, a Jehovah’s Witness lawyer, said in a telephone interview from the Georgian capital, Tbilisi.

The influential priest, Father Basili Mkalavishvili, is on the lam, refusing to obey either an initial June 4 court order or a higher court’s June 10 decision upholding the ruling. His lawyer said Thursday that Mkalavishvili phones regularly and has no intention of surrendering.

The lawyer, Kartlos Garibashvili, added that Mkalavishvili is innocent of the charges that he led a mob into a warehouse and burned tons of Baptist religious literature in February 2001.

“You need to understand that a priest simply is not capable of doing this sort of thing,” Garibashvili said.

The leader of Georgia’s 15,000 Baptists, Bishop Malkhaz Songulashvili, is taking little heart in the court’s decision.

“I do not think the recent developments represent a significant change in the government’s willingness to defend religious freedom,” he commented in an e-mail exchange, adding that a “strong political will to change the situation is still missing.”

Earlier this year, Songulashvili deftly garnered support from U.S. lawmakers, former President Jimmy Carter and the World Council of Churches in a bid to pressure the Georgian government to rein in the priest.

Georgia, an impoverished nation located between Turkey and Russia, is heavily dependent on the West for economic and political support.

Mkalavishvili, who has an estimated 10,000 followers, objects to foreign influence and non-Orthodox faiths on the territory of Georgia, a Christian nation for over 1,500 years.

At least one Georgian human rights activist, Zurab Tchiabirashili of Tbilisi’s Liberty Institute, doubts that the police will arrest the priest any time soon.

“Mkalavishvili is on the air all the time. Journalists can find him but the police cannot,” the activist said. “He has given a number of interviews, live interviews. I saw him on live on Tuesday.”

_ Frank Brown

Pope: With His Election He Felt Urgent Need to Travel the World

VATICAN CITY (RNS) Pope John Paul II, who returned earlier this week from his 100th trip outside Italy, said Thursday (June 12) that since the day of his election almost 25 years ago he has felt an urgent need to travel the world preaching the gospel like the Apostle Peter.

To mark the 100th trip, a five-day visit to Croatia June 5-9, the 83-year-old Roman Catholic pontiff held a special Vatican audience for about 200 people involved in the trip.

“Since the day I was elected bishop of Rome, Oct. 16, 1978, the command of Jesus, `Go into all the world and proclaim the Good News to the whole creation,’ has resonated in my inmost self with particular intensity and urgency,” the pope said. “Thus I feel the duty to imitate the Apostle Peter, who `went here and there among all the believers’ to confirm and consolidate the vitality of the Church in faith.”

Since his first trip to the Dominican Republic, Mexico and the Bahamas Jan. 25 to Feb. 1, 1979, little more than three months after his election, the pope has made an average of four trips outside Italy each year, continuing to travel despite his increasing frailty.

John Paul said that traveling allows him to share the “pastoral problems and anxieties” of bishops; know from close up the “hopes, difficulties, suffering and joy” of the faithful, especially young people; and engage in dialogue with other Christian churches, Jews, Muslims and other non-Christian religious.

Those attending the audience included Italian Transport Minister Pietro Lunardi, officials of the Italian Alitalia Airline, representatives of Alitalia flight and ground crews, the Swiss Guards and Vatican Gendarmes and the Vatican’s radio, television center and newspaper and some 50 journalists, who traveled on the papal plane to Croatia.

John Paul thanked them for making it possible for him to “meet the men and women of our time in their habitual places of life” and to carry out his “itinerant missionary ministry.”

_ Peggy Polk

Quote of the Day: World Council of Churches General Secretary Konrad Raiser

(RNS) “In the long run, I remain convinced that it will become clear that the war (in Iraq) has not solved any of the political problems that were cited as objectives, and has created a chaotic situation for which no solution is in sight.”

_ Konrad Raiser, the general secretary of the Geneva-based World Council of Churches, in an interview about the war’s aftermath.

DEA END RNS