c. 2005 Religion News Service
Religious Groups Make Pleas for Choice of Supreme Court Nominee
(RNS) Gearing up for a showdown over President Bush’s nomination to replace Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor, the Rev. Jerry Falwell is circulating a petition to nominate an anti-abortion conservative while an interfaith coalition is asking Bush for bipartisan consultation.
In an e-mail dated July 4, Falwell asked his supporters to sign a petition calling on Bush to nominate a “true conservative” who opposes abortion rights and gay marriage.
“I need you to respond as a modern-day `Minuteman’ today,” he said, comparing his supporters to militiamen who fought during the Revolutionary War. “The stage is now set for a brutal fight. Every wacko group in America knows that the Supreme Court is their last and best hope to enact their radical anti-family agenda.”
Falwell said in his letter that he hoped a million people would sign the petition.
Meanwhile, the Washington-based Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism circulated a letter dated July 1 that encouraged Bush to consult with the Senate when making nominations for the next Supreme Court justice.
Twenty-nine religious groups signed the letter, which also warned against the use of religious rhetoric.
“The confirmation process must also be free of the divisive and dangerous practice of using senators’ and nominees’ faiths as a wedge,” the letter said.
_ Nancy Glass
In a First for Canada, Woman Leads Islamic Friday Prayers
TORONTO (RNS) An American convert to Islam made history when she became the first woman to lead Friday prayers in a Canadian mosque.
About 100 people attended the service at the United Muslim Association mosque here Friday (July 1) _ Canada Day _ as Pamela Taylor, co-chair of the New York-based Progressive Muslim Union, led the mixed-gender congregation in prayers. She also delivered a khutba (sermon) on the importance of equality between races, genders, sexual orientations and persons with disabilities.
“Canada is the Islamic ideal,” said Taylor, 40, who has been a Muslim for 19 years. “We’re trying to live up to that ideal, that women are fully participant in Muslim society, and that includes leading prayers for men and women.”
Protesters had threatened to disrupt the service but never showed.
“It’s about equality, it’s about harmony, and it’s about dignity on behalf of the Muslim nations,” a female worshipper told CBC News.
But Mohamed Elmasry, national president of the Canadian Islamic Congress, told the Globe and Mail newspaper that while the UMA is free to have whomever it chooses to lead its prayers, it is a fringe group.
“This is a non-issue for Canadian Muslims and must be ignored by the community,” he said. “It usually becomes a media circus and an opportunity to label Muslims.”
Last November, a York University student delivered part of the sermon marking the end of Ramadan at the liberal UMA mosque. She did not, however, lead prayers.
In April, a Canadian woman was the first to lead a mixed-gender congregation in prayer. But the event was moved to a private back yard after the mosque was hounded by opponents.
The same thing happened last March in New York, where Amina Wadud, professor of Islamic studies at Virginia Commonwealth University, led mixed-gender Friday prayers. The event had to be moved to an Anglican church building after mosques refused to host it.
_ Ron Csillag
Seventh-day Adventists Elect First Woman Vice President
(RNS) For the first time, Seventh-day Adventists have elected a woman as one of the top 10 leaders of their worldwide church.
Ella Simmons, a well-known educator among Seventh-day Adventists, was elected Sunday (July 3) as one of the nine vice presidents who will work with re-elected President Jan Paulsen to lead the international church, whose headquarters are in Silver Spring, Md.
“This is an incredible development in the structure of our church, which traditionally has not dealt with women’s leadership issues in an adequate way,” said John Banks, church spokesman, in an interview. “But this miracle has now taken place.”
Simmons, who is African-American, most recently served as provost and vice president for academic administration at La Sierra University in Riverside, Calif., and previously as vice president for academic affairs at Oakwood College in Huntsville, Ala. Both institutions are affiliated with the Seventh-day Adventist Church.
Simmons’ election is only one example of broadening diversity within the church’s administration, Banks said. Another new vice president is Pastor Pardon Mwansa, who most recently served as president of the Southeran Africa-Indian Ocean region of the church. He is the second African elected to the post.
In addition, Daisy Jane Orion, a Filipino who has served as director of planning for the church’s Global Mission, and George Egwakhe, who is from Nigeria, were elected as associate treasurers for the worldwide church.
The third new vice president for Seventh-day Adventists is Mark Finley, a well-known evangelist in the church who formerly served as a longtime speaker/director of “It Is Written,” an Adventist television program.
In other election developments, Pastor Don Schneider was re-elected Saturday to a second, five-year term as president of the Seventh-day Adventist Church in North America.
_ Adelle M. Banks
To Prevent Catholic Sex Abuse, New Standard of Behavior Set in Cleveland
CLEVELAND (RNS) Catholic Church workers in the Cleveland area may not sleep in the same room with minors, be the only adult in a locker room used by youngsters or even take a child to a movie or ballgame by themselves under new standards decreed by Bishop Anthony Pilla.
The standards, which took effect Friday (July 1), set ethical boundaries for the more than 50,000 volunteers and church employees serving the region’s nearly 1 million Catholics.
They cover ministry to all age groups, from warning spiritual counselors against hugging adult clients to mandating that fifth-grade soccer coaches have more than one chaperone on any trip.
“It’s part of our commitment to integrity in ministry … and to challenge the society we live in to do the same,” said the Rev. Lawrence Jurcak, diocesan vicar for clergy and religious.
_ David Briggs
New President Leads Disciples of Christ Historical Society
(RNS) The Disciples of Christ Historical Society, one of the country’s leading religion repositories, has a new president, the Rev. Glenn Thomas Carson.
He officially took over the society in Nashville, Tenn., on Friday (July 1). Before recently concluding pastoral assignments in Kansas City, Carson was pastor of Rhett Avenue Christian Church in Charleston, S.C., and taught as professor of religion at Charleston Southern University.
Housed in a gray-stone Gothic-style building near Vanderbilt University, the Disciples Historical Society serves as a library and document repository with a collection of 37,000 volumes as well as records from thousands of congregations.
It is part of the more than 770,000-member Christian Church (Disciples of Christ).
The Historical Society serves two additional religious groups that, like the Disciples of Christ, sprang from a 19th-century religious unity movement on the American frontier. One of the groups, Christian Churches and Churches of Christ, exceeds 1 million members, while the other, the “a cappella” Churches of Christ, has about 1.5 million members.
Disciples of Christ historian Duane Cummins, whose one-year term as interim Society president ended with Carson’s arrival, said the organization is “considered one of the best religious repositories in the United States.” The outgoing leader added that the Society “is an important resource to sociologists, anthropologists, historians, as well as theologians and church historians. All of these draw upon its resources.”
Carson underscored the importance of the organization not only for his own religious heritage but for people of faith from a variety of traditions. The Society exists “to promote the values of ecumenical Christianity,” he said. “The way we promote those values is by preserving the heritage and telling the story of the Stone-Campbell tradition,” he explained.
While religious groups must preserve their own unique past, Carson said, in the process they sometimes forget how they fit into the broad picture of faith.
“Sectarian societies or organizations are often times kind of myopic,” Carson said. “Martin Luther and St. Francis and Augustine, … all of those are part of our heritage as well,” he said. “We’re wanting to connect with all people of faith, regardless.”
_ Ted Parks
Quote of the Day: Rick Warren, senior pastor, Saddleback Church
(RNS) “If Christians ought to be anywhere, they ought to be where people are talking about poverty. So I felt like Christians ought to show up big and strong, because if we don’t the world … looks up and says, `Where are the Christians when we talk about poverty?”’
_ Rick Warren, from the Live 8 rock concert in Philadelphia, Pa., on Saturday (July 2). Warren wrote the best-selling book “The Purpose Driven Life.” He was quoted by ASSIST News Service.
MO/PH END RNS
