c. 2004 Religion News Service

Biology Curriculum Evolves Into `Intelligent Design’ Court Fight

(RNS) Civil liberties groups and 11 parents filed a federal lawsuit Tuesday (Dec. 14) aimed at blocking a Pennsylvania school board’s decision to teach “intelligent design” in a ninth-grade biology course.

The Dover School Board voted 6-3 in October to require teachers to present intelligent-design theory as an alternative to evolution, which must be taught under state academic standards.

Two of the dissenting board members, Carol Brown and her husband, Jeff Brown, resigned in protest after the vote. Board member Angie Yingling, who originally voted for the policy, announced during a Dec. 6 board meeting that she intended to resign after she was unable to get the board to reconsider its decision.

Intelligent-design theory holds that the universe is so complex that it must have been created by an unspecified higher power. Its champions say it provides an alternative argument to evolution, the generally accepted scientific principle that the Earth’s species have diversified through time under the influence of natural selection.

Critics say the introduction of the intelligent-design theory moves classroom discussion from science to theology.

“Teaching students about religion’s role in world history and culture is proper, but disguising a particular religious belief as science is not,” said American Civil Liberties Union of Pennsylvania Legal Director Witold Walczak. “Intelligent design is a Trojan horse for bringing religious creationism back into public school science classes.”

The federal lawsuit was filed on behalf of parents by lawyers from the ACLU and Americans United for Separation of Church and State. They contend the school board’s decision violates their religious liberties “by promoting religious beliefs to their children under the guise of science education.”

“I have no problem teaching creationism, but not as a science,” said one of the parents, Joel Leib. “I learned my creation in Sunday school, and I learned my evolution in high school.”

In recent weeks, Dover administrators have stressed they will not let their classrooms become a forum to “promote or inhibit” views about religion.

“The Dover Area School District wants to support and not discriminate against students and parents that do have competing beliefs, especially in the area of the origin-of-life debate,” the district said in a statement last month.

_ Charles Thompson and Mary Warner

Lay Groups Criticize Bishops’ Decision to Allow Self-Audits

(RNS) Two lay Catholic groups warned bishops that they will destroy trust and put children at risk unless they reinstate on-site audits to ensure that dioceses are in compliance with policies designed to prevent sexual abuse.

The two groups, Voice of the Faithful and the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP), said all dioceses _ not just those deemed incompliant in previous audits _ must be audited to ensure that children are safe.

The two groups appealed to Nicholas Cafardi, the new chairman of a lay-run oversight panel, to push for nationwide audits. One former board member called the decision to scale back the audits “disastrous.”

“Trust is on the line. If the bishops do not work to restore it, the church will remain in jeopardy in the United States,” said Voice of the Faithful leaders James Post and Kristine Ward in a Sunday (Dec. 12) letter to Cafardi.

Last January, auditors from the Boston-based Gavin Group said 90 percent of dioceses had complied with abuse policies adopted in 2002, and the results of a second audit are expected to be released in January.

In November, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops voted to allow dioceses to perform self-reported audits, and said auditors will be dispatched only to dioceses that failed the 2003 or 2004 audits.

SNAP leaders said that decision guts the 2002 reforms, comparing it to allowing a convicted drunken driver to drive a school bus after “unsupervised, written self-surveys.”

“We’re basically back to square one,” said SNAP leaders Barbara Blaine and David Clohessy, “where we have no choice but to trust in many of the same men whose repeated deceit and misconduct led to the molestation of thousands of innocent Catholic youngsters.”

Kathleen McChesney, the outgoing director of the bishops’ office for child protection, told the Associated Press that auditors will be sent back to dioceses if officials detect inconsistencies in the written reports.

And Bill Ryan, a spokesman for the bishops, said every diocese will eventually be subject to on-site audits every few years, although the time line needs to be worked out. “The last thing in the world the bishops would want would be to back away from the pledge … to provide for the safety of children,” Ryan said.

_ Kevin Eckstrom

American Baptist Officials Say Gay Debate `Threatens to Break Us Apart’

(RNS) Regional leaders of the American Baptist Churches USA have issued a pastoral letter declaring that denominational debate on homosexuality “threatens to break us apart.”

In their statement, released Dec. 2, regional executive ministers outlined steps they would take to deal with the differences, including refraining from approving “practicing homosexuals” for regional and national positions of the church.

“The controversy over homosexuality has consumed our agenda, our discussion time and our energy; yet the controversy still threatens to break us apart as American Baptists,” they wrote.

The executives said they took the action regarding gay and lesbian members “to preserve unity within our American Baptist fellowship and to promote faithfulness to the gospel of Jesus Christ.” They added that they would “continue listening to those who hold differing viewpoints.”

Other steps they pledged to take include refraining from conducting marriage ceremonies for same-sex couples and “participating in public demonstrations advocating on either side” of the debate over homosexuality.

The regional leaders noted that the “prevailing view” of American Baptists is that “the practice of homosexuality is incompatible with Christian teaching,” but they acknowledged that some individuals and congregations hold different points of view.

The statement was agreed upon at a Nov. 20 meeting.

_ Adelle M. Banks

Wax Nativity Scene Starring British Soccer Star Closed

LONDON (RNS) A Nativity tableau with wax figures of British soccer star David Beckham as Joseph and his celebrity wife, Victoria (Posh Spice of the Spice Girls), as the Virgin Mary has been closed after the figures were damaged by a visitor to Madame Tussauds museum Sunday.

Repairing the figures would take at least six weeks, and the tableau will not be reopened.

The Nativity scene also featured President Bush, British Prime Minister Tony Blair and the Duke of Edinburgh as the three wise men. It aroused strong criticism from Christians, with The Times of London quoting a Vatican spokesman as saying that the display was “if not blasphemous, then certainly in very poor taste.”

The choice of which modern figures should represent the figures in the Nativity scene came from voting by 300 visitors to Madame Tussauds in October.

Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O’Connor, archbishop of Westminster, called the display disrespectful.

“To have a very special part of Christianity depicted in this way and its most precious symbol, which is the coming of God into the world in Jesus Christ, seems to me to be not just disrespectful to Christians _ it is also disrespectful to the heritage of Britain and also does damage to the culture of this country,” he said.

In a television interview Sunday after the figures had been damaged, he said he was glad to see something he thought was distasteful had gone, but “I wouldn’t like to think that I’ve incited people to bash waxworks.”

_ Robert Nowell

Quote of the Day: Michael Gerson, President Bush’s Chief Speechwriter

(RNS) “I think the reality here is that scrubbing public discourse of religious ideas would remove one of the main sources of social justice in our history. Without an appeal to justice rooted in faith, there would be no abolition movement or civil rights movement or pro-life movement.”

_ Michael Gerson, President Bush’s chief speechwriter, defending the president’s religious rhetoric in a meeting with reporters in Key West, Fla. He was quoted by The Washington Post.

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