c. 2003 Religion News Service
Editors: Jimm in 2nd graf is CQ
Judge Says Harry Potter Books Must Not Be Restricted
(RNS) A federal judge in Arkansas has ruled that schoolchildren in Cedarville must have access to Harry Potter books, despite the objection of some parents who say the wildly popular novels teach witchcraft.
U.S. District Judge Jimm Larry Hendren rejected a policy that forced children to obtain permission slips to check the books out of a school library.
“The Cedarville School District is … directed to return to the books known as the `Harry Potter books’ to its library shelves, where they can be accessed without any restrictions other than those administrative restrictions that apply to all works of fiction in the libraries of the district,” Hendren ruled on Tuesday (April 22).
The policy was implemented last summer after one parent, Angie Haney, said her pastor had told her that the books about a young wizard taught children sorcery and witchcraft. The school board voted 3-2 to restrict the books, according to the Associated Press.
Billy and Mary Nell Counts, parents of a fourth-grader, filed suit with church-state and First Amendment groups to free up the books. The Countses were concerned that their daughter, Dakota, would be targeted if she were seen with the “evil” books.
School officials said they were studying the judge’s decision but planned to return the Harry Potter books to general circulation.
The Washington-based Americans United for the Separation of Church and State praised the judge’s ruling.
“This court has rescued Harry Potter from the clutches of religious hysteria,” said Americans United’s director, the Rev. Barry Lynn. “Instead of waving a magic wand, the judge waved the Constitution. In America, that’s more than enough.”
Supporters Say Paulist Founder Could Be Patron Saint of the Internet
(RNS) The founder of the Paulist media empire could be the next patron saint of the Internet, his supporters say.
The late Rev. James Alberione, an Italian priest who founded the best-known publishing and communications house in the Roman Catholic Church, will be beatified _ the penultimate step to sainthood _ by Pope John Paul II on Saturday (April 26).
Alberione, who died in 1971 at the age of 87, started the Society of St. Paul, the Daughters of St. Paul, the Sister Disciples of the Divine Master and other religious orders with the goal of using new technology to spread the Christian gospel around the world.
Alberione was considered a pioneer in harnessing the developing communications tools of the 20th century _ including radio, TV and films _ as evangelization tools.
“Our founder loved to say, `What would St. Paul do if he were alive today? He would use the media to spread the good news of Jesus Christ in the fastest way and to the most people possible,” said Sister Kathryn Hermes, creator of the Web site http://www.alberione.com. “Well, if Alberione were alive today, he would be using the Internet. We’re simply continuing his legacy, as apostles of Christ in the culture of communications.”
Alberione was born to a poor farming family in San Lorenzo di Fossano in 1884. He entered the seminary at age 16 and was ordained in 1907. In 1923, after he had already started the Paulists and a number of magazines, Alberione became seriously ill and said he was cured after praying to St. Paul. In 1996, the pope recognized Alberione’s “heroic virtues” and approved him for beatification last December.
_ Kevin Eckstrom
Orthodox Seize Government Building in Ukraine Holy Week Demonstration
MOSCOW (RNS) Orthodox Christian monks, novices and lay people used the Orthodox Holy Week to illegally occupy a former church in Kiev that belongs to the Ukrainian government in an attempt to force the return of the property.
“What was the church’s for centuries should be the church’s today, not the property of some museum or the government,” Father Georgy Kovalenko, a spokesman for the Ukrainian Orthodox Church-Moscow Patriarchate, said Thursday (April 24) in a telephone interview from Kiev.
Up to 200 people took part in the initial takeover of the small 18th-century Baroque church on Saturday when they forced their way in and planted a wooden cross just outside the entrance. That number has now dwindled to about a dozen monks and novices who maintain a round-the-clock presence. Police are observing the squatters but have made no arrests, Kovalenko said.
The church’s primate in Ukraine, Metropolitan Vladimir (Sabodan) voiced his support Wednesday for the takeover, telling journalists in Kiev, “We are not talking about a seizure of property, but about its return,” according to the Interfax news agency.
The protest has a special resonance because it comes during Holy Week, the period of intense fasting, praying and then feasting between Palm Sunday and Easter. The dates used by most Orthodox churches differ from those in the West because the Orthodox calculate Easter using the Julian calendar, which was abandoned as inaccurate by Pope Gregory XIII in 1582.
The protest will continue “as long as the building has not been returned to the church,” Kovalenko predicted, adding that squatter manpower would not be a problem. The church is located inside Kiev’s Pecherskaya Lavra, a monastery that is home to 200 monks and scores of novices.
The sprawling monastery, one of the holiest sites in Orthodoxy, is divided into two halves, one controlled by the Ukrainian Orthodox Church and the other by the government. The disputed church building is in the government half.
In the early 1930s, Soviet authorities seized the now-occupied church, closed it and incorporated it into a sprawling Museum of Atheism devoted to rationalism and debunking religious belief. As the Soviet Union disintegrated, the church was rented out for office space.
_ Frank Brown
Magazine: Helping Others Can Be Good for Health
WASHINGTON (RNS) Many Americans believe that helping others on a regular basis can be good for your health, according to a new poll sponsored by Spirituality and Health magazine.
The study, conducted on the Internet by Equation Research, revealed that 58 percent of the 1,413 participants think that face-to-face volunteer work can produce health benefits such as stress relief and decreased sensitivity to physical and emotional pain. The poll had a 4 percent margin of error.
Although 77 percent of respondents said they volunteer in some form, only 13 percent volunteer consistently in a personal contact situation, meaning they spend at least four hours a month helping others face-to-face. The consistent volunteers said they perform such services as tutoring, aiding the sick and working with the homeless, as well as informal acts like helping a neighbor or giving advice.
According to Allan Luks, who wrote about the study in the May/June issue of Spirituality and Health and is head of Big Brothers Big Sisters of New York City, the health benefits of volunteering, such as reduced stress, are experienced only when people work consistently and personally with strangers, not just family or friends.
Eighty percent of the poll respondents said that the nation’s overall stress level would decrease with increased personal-contact volunteer work. In addition, 86 percent believe it could help reduce racial, religious and ethnic mistrust across the country.
The poll also showed that most people want to help others. Eighty-one percent of those sampled said they would like to spend at least two hours a month doing volunteer work face-to-face.
The study looked at ways to capitalize on the interest in voluntarism. About half of the respondents said that seeing a public figure participate in face-to-face volunteer work could motivate them to do the same.
“If President Bush, at this time of peril, could volunteer periodically with someone needy or ill, he might provide the long-needed spark to motivate more people to help others,” Luks wrote in the magazine.
_ Susie L. Oh
Colson, Templeton Honored by William E. Simon Foundation
(RNS) Prison Fellowship Founder Chuck Colson and philanthropist Sir John Templeton have been honored with the William E. Simon Foundation Awards.
The prizes were presented at a New York City luncheon Friday (April 25).
Colson, who founded the prison outreach ministry in 1976, was presented with the Prize in Social Entrepreneurship, along with a cash award of $250,000. He was recognized for working with government, churches and communities to help restore the lives of prisoners and their families.
Templeton is known for sponsoring groundbreaking research about the connections between religion and science through the John Templeton Foundation in Radnor, Pa. He received the Prize in Philanthropic Leadership, along with a contribution of $250,000 to the charity of his choice. He was honored for his funding of projects, books, college courses and essays that highlight benefits of cooperation between religion and science.
Templeton intends to use the award to establish a series of cash prizes for young people ages 15-25 who write essays on the magnanimous work of someone else or their own commitment to devoting their lives to humanity.
The Simon Prizes were inaugurated in 2001 as part of the New York-based foundation’s efforts to further the legacy of its namesake, who was U.S. treasury secretary in the mid-1970s.
_ Adelle M. Banks
Latest `Left Behind’ Title Tops Best-Seller Lists
(RNS) “Armageddon,” the latest book in the popular “Left Behind” series of apocalyptic thrillers, has debuted in the top spot of several best-seller lists.
Marking the fifth straight time for the series, the latest installment tops the lists in USA Today, The Wall Street Journal, Publishers Weekly and The New York Times.
The 11th title in the series by Tim LaHaye and Jerry B. Jenkins was released April 8.
“We continue to be amazed by the crossover success of these books and love to see the letters and e-mails that pour in every day,” said Jenkins in a statement.
The series, launched in 1995, has sold more than 57 million copies worldwide. The 12th book in the series is scheduled to be released in the spring of 2004.
_ Adelle M. Banks
Quote of the Day: Pop singer Madonna
(RNS) “Our job is to navigate through this world while understanding the only thing that matters is the state of our soul, and that’s very hard because I’m in the entertainment business, which is completely based on illusion and physical things. Any success I have is a manifestation of God. It’s my ego that wants to claim ownership. It’s hubris, arrogance and greed.”
_ Pop icon Madonna, speaking to USA Today about the lessons she has learned through studying the Jewish mystical tradition of Kabbalah.
DEA END RNS
