c. 2003 Religion News Service
Survey: Undergraduates Ignorant of Religious Aspects of First Amendment
(RNS) The nation’s undergraduates are mostly ignorant about the First Amendment’s proclamation about freedom of religion, a survey shows.
A survey released Nov. 20 by the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education found that 30 percent of students overall named freedom of religion when they were asked to name any of the rights guaranteed by the First Amendment.
But when asked to specify which freedom is addressed first in the amendment, 10 percent of public college students and 5 percent of private college students correctly said freedom of religion.
“If the American experiment in liberty is to survive, citizens must both keep alive and cherish the free exchange of ideas, values and convictions,” said Alan Charles Kores, president of the foundation, in a statement. “These survey results are disheartening, but they unfortunately are not surprising.”
Far more students overall _ 73 percent _ mentioned freedom of speech when asked to name any specific right guaranteed by the First Amendment. Twenty percent cited right of assembly and association and 6 percent mentioned right to petition.
Kores’ Philadelphia-based foundation seeks to preserve the liberty of students on college campuses and has defended students whose religious rights it believes have been abridged.
The survey was conducted between Feb. 6 and April 7 by the Center for Survey Research and Analysis at the University of Connecticut. It was funded by a grant from the John Templeton Foundation.
A total of 1,037 students were surveyed at 339 colleges and universities. The findings had a margin of error of plus or minus 2.8 percentage points.
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Following suitable for graphic:
Undergraduates’ Knowledge of First Amendment’s Freedoms
Speech: 73 percent
Religion: 30 percent
Right of assembly/association: 20 percent
Petition: 6 percent
Source: Foundation for Individual Rights in Education
_ Adelle M. Banks
Pope Names Replacement for Bishop Involved in Fatal Hit-and-Run
WASHINGTON (RNS) Pope John Paul II has appointed the bishop of Wichita, Kan., as the new bishop of Phoenix to replace a bishop who resigned last June after a fatal hit-and-run accident.
Bishop Thomas Olmsted was named Tuesday (Nov. 25) to succeed Bishop Thomas O’Brien, whose trial on charges of leaving the scene of the June 14 accident begins Jan. 12.
O’Brien was charged in the death of pedestrian Jim Reed, who was crossing a Phoenix street as O’Brien was driving home from Mass. Investigators traced the car to O’Brien and found the car’s windshield shattered and caved in. O’Brien told police he thought he had hit an animal, or that someone had thrown a rock at his car.
Weeks before the accident, O’Brien had signed an agreement with a local prosecutor in which he agreed to cede much of his authority in exchange for avoiding criminal charges for his handling of abusive priests.
Archbishop Michael Sheehan of Santa Fe, N.M., had been named to oversee the Phoenix diocese after O’Brien’s resignation.
Olmsted was appointed coadjutor bishop of Wichita in 1999 and assumed full control of the diocese in 2001. Ordained in 1973, he received a canon law degree from the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome and served in the Vatican Secretariat of State and as spiritual director of the North American College in Rome from 1979 to 1988.
From 1989 to 1993, he was dean of formation at the Pontifical College Josephinum in Columbus, Ohio, and was named president in 1997.
_ Kevin Eckstrom
U.N. Reports Rise in Hunger in Developing Countries in Late 1990s
ROME (RNS) The number of hungry people in developing countries rose during the second half of the 1990s despite a concerted campaign against hunger in the world, the United Nations said Tuesday (Nov. 25).
The U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization said in its report on “The State of Food Insecurity in the World 2003” that the total number of the hungry in the developing world dropped by 37 million in the first half of the 1990s, then rose by 18 million in the second half of the decade.
“FAO’s latest estimates signal a setback in the war against hunger,” the report said. Nations represented at the World Food Summit organized by FAO in 1996 pledged to reduce the number of undernourished people worldwide by half by 2015.
“The goal can only be reached if the recent trend of increasing numbers is reversed. The annual reductions must be accelerated to 26 million per year, more than 12 times the pace of 2.1 million per year achieved during the 1990s,” said Hartwig de Haen, head of FAO’s Economic and Social Department.
According to FAO estimates, 842 million people were undernourished in 1999-2001, the most recent years for which figures are available. They included 10 million in the industrialized countries, 34 million in countries in transition and 798 million in developing countries.
The report said that factors contributing to increased hunger included low economic, social and agricultural growth; high population growth; frequent food emergencies; conflict; and high rates of HIV/AIDS.
It said that Latin America was the only region in which the number of hungry has dropped since the mid-1990s, and only 19 countries, including China, succeeded in reducing the number of undernourished throughout the decade.
In 22 countries, including Bangladesh, Haiti and Mozambique, “the number of undernourished declined during the second half of the decade after rising through the first five years,” the report said. “In 17 other countries, however, the trend shifted in the opposite direction and the number of undernourished people, which had been falling, began to rise. This group includes a number of countries with large populations, among them India, Indonesia, Nigeria, Pakistan and Sudan.”
Conflict increased hunger in Central and West Africa, the report noted.
_ Peggy Polk
NCC Urges Renewed Talks After Trip to North Korea
(RNS) A delegation led by the National Council of Churches returned from the Korean peninsula urging the Bush administration to re-engage North Korea in peace talks.
The seven-member delegation delivered 420 metric tons of refined wheat flour to the isolated communist nation and met with Christians on both sides of the Demilitarized Zone along the heavily fortified border.
The delegation, led by NCC General Secretary Bob Edgar and the Rev. John McCullough, executive director of the Church World Service humanitarian agency, will brief officials at the State Department on Wednesday (Nov. 26).
“It is our conviction that diplomacy and negotiations remain the best approach for finding durable solutions,” the delegation said, urging a new phase in the on-again, off-again talks with Pyongyang over its alleged nuclear program.
The delegation met with the Korean Christian Federation in North Korea and the National Council of Churches in Korea in Seoul, South Korea. Leaders urged prayer for the “isolated Christian family in North Korea.”
The Christian leaders also urged support for the United Nations’ $200 million appeal for humanitarian assistance in 2004 for North Korea, including increased aid from the United States.
The flour, which cost $99,960 to deliver, was paid for by the Church World Service’s member churches. Officials say it will help make 132,000 loaves of bread and should last through 2004.
_ Kevin Eckstrom
Florida Baptist Association Ousts Church With Husband-Wife Clergy Team
(RNS) A Florida church has been removed as a member from its local Baptist association because it has a husband-wife team as co-pastors.
Central Baptist Church of Daytona Beach was unanimously ousted from the Halifax Baptist Association at a meeting of the association’s executive committee on Nov. 18, the Florida Baptist Witness reported.
The Rev. Dave Phillips and the Rev. Sonya Phillips have been co-pastors since earlier this year.
“It saddens us that we have to take this position,” said Dennis Littleton, association moderator and pastor of a Palm Coast church, “but Central Baptist’s action prompted this action. We are grieved about it.”
Dennis Belz, director of missions for the association, said the calling of a woman pastor was “in direct opposition” to the Bible and to the revised faith statement of the Southern Baptist Convention, which declared in 2000 that “the office of pastor is limited to men as qualified by Scripture.”
The association, which includes Flagler and Volusia counties, now is comprised of 33 Southern Baptist churches. Central was one of the group’s charter members and its removal is the first such action in the association’s 46-year history.
“Dave Phillips just told us that removing his wife as a pastor was not going to happen,” Littleton said of an earlier meeting with Phillips.
Phillips repeated that statement in an interview with the Florida Baptist Witness, the weekly newsjournal of the Florida Baptist State Convention.
“We understand the actions of the association and will certainly abide by its ruling,” he added. “We’re just going to continue doing the Lord’s work here.”
Quote of the Day: “Biblegirl” Anayansi Schlipp
(RNS) “We get to wear spandex for Jesus.”
_ Anayansi Schlipp, who will play “Biblegirl” on tour beside her husband Robert T. Schlipp, who will become the next “Bibleman,” a Christian superhero character that previously was played by actor Willie Aames. She was quoted by Assemblies of God News & Information Service.
DEA END RNS
