c. 2006 Religion News Service
`Justice Sunday III’ to Address Supreme Court Nomination
WASHINGTON (RNS) Conservative Christian leaders say the upcoming “Justice Sunday III” aims to keep “values voters” engaged in the confirmation process of the next Supreme Court justice.
The Washington-based Family Research Council is sponsoring the event, its third addressing the selection of justices for the nation’s highest court. The national event, to be broadcast to churches and radio and Christian TV stations from Philadelphia on Sunday (Jan. 8), is scheduled to include the Rev. Jerry Falwell, Focus on the Family founder James Dobson and Sen. Rick Santorum, R-Pa.
“Our courts have attacked the ability of people to display their faith in public,” said Tony Perkins, president of the council, in a teleconference with reporters Wednesday (Jan. 4). “We’re seeing hostility toward the church and Christianity in particular.”
Perkins hosted the first “Justice Sunday” event at a Louisville, Ky., church last April, and the second was held in August at a Nashville, Tenn., church.
The event occurs the day before the confirmation hearing for Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito is scheduled to begin on Capitol Hill. Perkins said Alito has “a very good record on religious liberty,” in cases related to Christians, Jews and Muslims.
As prominent conservatives prepare for the weekend event, opponents are questioning whether it is inappropriately partisan. Pastor Herbert Lusk, who is hosting the event at his Greater Exodus Baptist Church, has been criticized by Americans United for Separation of Church and State for endorsing President Bush in the 2000 elections.
“I’m not at all surprised that Pastor Lusk would turn his pulpit over to the religious right for partisan purposes,” said the Rev. Barry Lynn, executive director of Americans United, which filed a complaint with the Internal Revenue Service after Lusk endorsed Bush.
Lusk, on the teleconference call, dismissed Lynn’s concerns.
“The best thing we can do is ignore these allegations and continue with our fight,” he said.
Falwell, who also took part in the teleconference, defended church participation in matters of public policy.
“A pastor and a church, while they may not spend monies for or against a candidacy, may indeed speak out on the moral and social issues in such a way that the congregation is aware of who believes what and how each person stands on a particular issue,” he said.
_ Adelle M. Banks
Baby Jesus, Always in Their Hearts, Is Now Back in Their Arms
SAYREVILLE, N.J. (RNS) For the past two decades, Albert and Anne Filosa have set up a Nativity scene in the front yard of their home in Old Bridge.
Albert Filosa was crushed when he arrived home Dec. 28 to discover the life-size plastic baby Jesus was missing. “This is an important holiday to us. That’s why I consider this a bias crime,” he said.
On Tuesday (Jan. 3) the Filosas were one of several families to recover their stolen figurines from Sayreville police. On Monday, police found a total of 27 figurines while investigating the theft of the baby Jesus from St. Stanislaus Kostka Church and the desecration of objects at the church’s cemetery.
The Rev. Kenneth Murphy, pastor at St. Stanislaus, was overjoyed to recover the church’s baby Jesus. “I feel blessed. I feel like I am a dad who got his baby back,” Murphy said.
Police charged Christopher Olson, 18, and Michael Payne, 19, both of Old Bridge, and Nicholas Hess, 18, of Matawan, with stealing 27 Jesus figures. An unidentified 15-year-old boy was also arrested.
Sayreville police Detective Kenneth Kelly said the defendants drove around taking the figures and planned to burn them.
A resident who wrote down the license plate of an unfamiliar car helped police trace the tags to Payne’s truck, which was parked in front of Olson’s home Monday with the Nativity figures inside.
Prosecutors will review the police reports to determine whether the defendants should be charged with a bias crime, officials said. Payne and Olson were released on $25,000 bail, while Hess was still being held at a county jail.
Others also came to police headquarters hoping to recover stolen items that were at the center of their family traditions.
Rose Marie Pedro of Sayreville was getting ready to dismantle her Nativity scene Monday morning and noticed her Jesus was missing from his manger. “I was upset. I didn’t think I would get it back,” Pedro said. “But I got my baby now.”
_ Tom Haydon and Sharon Adarlo
Vatican Tightens Rules for Neocatechumenal Way Movement
VATICAN CITY (RNS) The Vatican has clamped down on the Neocatechumenal Way, ordering the movement of Catholic communities to regularly attend traditional Sunday Mass and follow church rules for worship and the liturgy.
Acting on a request by Pope Benedict XVI, Cardinal Francis Arinze, head of the Vatican office on liturgy, instructed the Neocatechumenal Way to “accept and follow the liturgical books approved by the church without omitting or adding anything,” according to a confidential letter sent to the organization’s founders Dec. 1.
A copy of the letter was leaked to the Italian media in late December.
The Neocatechumenal Way, an international faith-formation program that emerged after the 1960s reforms of the Second Vatican Council, aims to revitalize the Catholic Mass using techniques attributed to the ancient and primitive church.
Catechists bake their own loaves of unleavened bread instead of consuming the mass-produced wafers used by most Catholic churches during Communion.
The bread and wine, which Catholics believe are the body and blood of Christ, are distributed to members while seated around a cloth-covered table positioned in the center of the church.
Arinze’s letter instructed the Neocatechumenal Way to phase out the practice.
“The Neocatechumenal Way will be given a transition period of not more than two years to pass from the common method of receiving holy Communion in its communities … to the manner normal to the entire church for receiving holy Communion,” the letter said.
Critics say the group’s practices create divisions within local parishes. The Neocatechumenal Way statutes, approved by John Paul II in 2002, allow its members to celebrate a separate weekly Mass on Saturday evenings.
Arinze’s letter gave tacit approval to this practice, but instructed the organization’s members to join the entire parish for Sunday Mass at least once a month. “Sunday is the Day of the Lord,” the letter said.
Critics have also said the Neocatechumenal Way diminishes the priest’s homily by allowing commentaries, known as “admonitions,” between Gospel readings.
“As for any admonitions issued before the readings, these must be brief,” Arinze’s letter said. “The homily, because of its nature and importance, is reserved to the priest or deacon.”
_ Stacy Meichtry
Gay Groups Try to Stop Massachusetts Gay Marriage Petition
BOSTON (RNS) Gay leaders in Massachusetts on Tuesday (Jan. 3) asked the state’s highest court to bar a proposed ballot question that seeks to outlaw same-sex marriages.
In a lawsuit, the Gay & Lesbian Advocates and Defenders in Boston said the attorney general was wrong to certify the proposed referendum, and cited the state constitution that prohibits a citizen-initiated constitutional amendment that “relates … to the reversal of a judicial decision.”
The proposed question, which aims to amend the state constitution to ban gay marriage, would trump the state Supreme Judicial Court decision in November 2003 that legalized same-sex marriages.
Gary D. Buseck, lawyer for the gay group, called Attorney General Thomas F. Reilly’s certification of the petition drive “a cramped and sort of an artificial construction of the constitution.”
Reilly’s office had said the “reversal of a judicial decision” phrase in the constitution refers to proposals intended to “recall … judicial decisions,” something that is different from amending the state constitution.
When petitioners seek to amend the constitution, they are attempting to change the rules to be applied by a court for future cases, not to say a court decision was wrong and should be ignored, Reilly’s office said.
Evelyn T. Reilly, director of public policy for the Massachusetts Family Institute, said the lawsuit is a “last resort” to block the proposed ballot question. She said she isn’t worried about the lawsuit.
“I don’t think it has any substance,” she said, citing the attorney general’s decision to certify the referendum.
The institute helped lead an effort that collected 123,356 certified signatures of registered voters for the proposed ballot question, far more than the 65,825 required by law.
The question, proposed for November 2008, would change the constitution to say the state would recognize marriages only of one man and one woman. Before it goes to the ballot, the question must be approved by at least 25 percent of the members of the state Legislature this year and then in 2007 or 2008.
The gay group’s lawsuit is expected to be heard by the state Supreme Judicial Court in May or June. The lawsuit asks the court to throw out the question and declare the attorney general erred in certifying the question.
_ Dan Ring
Quote of the Day: Randy Sharp of the American Family Association
(RNS) “They take our savior Jesus Christ and reflect him as an everyday Joe. How disrespectful. Our savior is to be worshipped and adored and not treated as your buddy riding down the street with you in the passenger seat of the car.”
_ Randy Sharp, director of special projects for the American Family Association, criticizing the portrayal of Jesus in “Book of Daniel,” a new NBC drama about an Episcopal priest who talks with Jesus. The show premieres Friday (Jan. 6) at 9 p.m. EST.
KRE/PH END RNS
Editors: To obtain a photo of the stolen Jesus figurines to accompany the second item, go to the RNS Web site at https://religionnews.com. On the lower right, click on “photos,” then search by subject or slug. If searching by subject, designate “exact phrase” for best results.
