c. 2005 Religion News Service Robertson’s Comments Continue to Prompt Religious Reaction (RNS) Pat Robertson’s comments about assassinating Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez continue to reverberate, with one evangelical leader saying the religious broadcaster should retire and another considering a meeting with Chavez to make amends. Robertson, the founder of the Christian Broadcasting Network, apologized Wednesday (Aug. 24) for suggesting that Chavez should be assassinated. Two days earlier, he said, “We have the ability to take him out and I think the time has come that we exercise that ability.” The Rev. Jim Wallis, editor of the progressive evangelical magazine Sojourners, said Robertson’s apology is not enough. “Pat Robertson is an embarrassment to the church and a danger to American politics,” Wallis wrote in a column in his publication’s weekly e-newsletter. “It’s time for Christian leaders of all stripes to call on Robertson not just to apologize but to retire.” The Rev. Ted Haggard, president of the National Association of Evangelicals, flew to Mexico to meet with a Chavez friend and is “one step closer” to having a meeting with the Venezuelan president, a spokeswoman said. “If he did meet with President Chavez, he would apologize,” said Carolyn Haggard, the niece of Haggard. Haggard pastors New Life Church in Colorado Springs, Colo. She said the meeting was initiated by Chavez’s friend but Haggard is interested in addressing other issues, including evangelicals in the U.S. and Venezuela. Other religious leaders, from the Rev. Jesse Jackson, founder of the Chicago-based Rainbow/PUSH coalition to the Rev. William J. Shaw, president of the National Baptist Convention, USA, have decried Robertson’s words. “In seeking to be a patriot, the Reverend Robertson has forsaken being a priest or prophet of the Christian faith,” Shaw said in a statement. The Reuters news agency reported that Chavez said in a televised speech Sunday that he would take legal steps against Robertson and could seek his extradition. “I announce that my government is going to take legal action in the United States,” Chavez said. “To call for the assassination of a head of state is an act of terrorism.” _ Adelle M. Banks Update: Fox Program `24′ Airs Ad against Stereotyping Muslims

(RNS) The FOX television network aired a public service announcement Monday (Feb. 7) during its popular drama “24,” urging Americans not to stereotype Muslims.

The disclaimer aired during the show about a counter-terrorism unit in Los Angeles, which stars Kiefer Sutherland. In the show, an upper-middle-class Muslim American family is depicted as a terrorist sleeper cell that is involved with a plot to melt down nuclear reactors across the United States.

The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), a Washington-based civil liberties group, met with officials from FOX in mid-January to express their concerns about the program and make suggestions as to how the show might avoid inciting stereotypes and suspicion of American Muslims.

FOX consulted CAIR on the ad, which was read by Sutherland.

“While terrorism is obviously one of the most critical challenges facing our nation and the world, it’s important to recognize that the American Muslim community stands firmly beside their fellow Americans in denouncing and resisting terrorism in every form,” he said in the disclaimer.

In addition to airing the disclaimer, FOX has distributed a CAIR-produced public service announcement to network affiliates that aims to challenge commonly held stereotypes of Muslims.

_ Holly Lebowitz Rossi

English Church Learns Sarah the Curate Used to Be Colin

LONDON (RNS) Parishioners in Ross-on-Wye learned Monday that their newly ordained woman curate started life as a man.

Church of England Bishop Anthony Priddis of Hereford, who ordained 43-year-old Sarah Jones to the diaconate last July and will ordain her to the priesthood next September, told a meeting in Ross church hall that more than 10 years ago Sarah Jones had gone through the painful process of becoming the woman she now is.

“Sarah was open with us from the word go and has not sought to hide her medical history,” he said. “Everyone who we felt needed to know knew about her, and we are quite sure that no one has done anything wrong. Sarah has become a much loved curate in the short time she has been part of the Ross team (ministry).”

Sarah’s history became public when the Daily Mail found out about her and interviewed both her and Bishop Priddis.

Not only did Jones start life as Colin Jones, but she was baptized as a Roman Catholic and married when she was about 20, according to a report in The Times. The couple had no children and divorced amicably a few years later.

She told The Times that when she was 31 she changed socially to being a woman and had the sex-change operation two years later.

Jones is not the Church of England’s only sex-change cleric. Four and a half years ago a twice-married and twice-divorced vicar had the backing of his bishop when he underwent a sex-change operation to transform him from the Rev. Peter Stone to the Rev. Carol Stone.

_ Robert Nowell

Quote of the Week: Would-be Papal Assassin Ali Agca

(RNS) “I embrace you, Karol Wojtyla. I send you my best wishes.”

_ Ali Agca, who shot Pope John Paul II in 1981, in a handwritten get-well note to the pope using his Polish birth name, Karol Wojtyla. Agca was forgiven by the pope but is serving time in Turkey for other crimes. He was quoted by the Associated Press.

MO RNS END