c. 2007 Religion News Service

AP, Dallas Morning News Win Wilbur Awards

(RNS) Religion writers for the Associated Press will be recognized for their work in the series, “The New Missionaries” at the 2007 Wilbur Awards, to be presented April 28 in Louisville, Ky.

Other newspapers to be presented with awards include The Dallas Morning News for best religion section and Lancaster (Pa.) New Era for “Lost Angels: The Amish School Shootings.”

The annual awards, sponsored by the Religion Communicators Council (RCC) honor secular media who communicate religious issues, values and themes in their news coverage.

Other recipients include:

_ National Magazine: Newsweek, “Billy Graham in Twilight”

_ Editorial Cartoon: John Sherffius, Boulder Daily Camera

_ Fiction Book: “The Best People in the World” by Justin Tussing

_ Non-fiction Book: “Water from the Well” by Anne Roiphe

_ Television (Drama): “Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip, Nevada Day Part 1&2”

_ National Television News: CBS News Sunday Morning, “Muslim in America”

_ Local Television News: KWQC-TV, “Big Church/Little Church”

_ Television Documentary: Vision TV, “Evangelical Tourism”

_ Dramatic Feature Film: Every Tribe Entertainment “The End of the Spear”

_ Melissa Stee

Fla. Bishop Rejects `Good Neighbor’ Proposal on Dissident Churches

(RNS) A top Anglican panel has recommended a “good neighbor” approach to solving disputes between six Episcopal breakway parishes in Florida and their bishop, but the bishop almost immediately rejected the plan.

Episcopal parishes in conflict with their bishop over gay rights and church politics could be placed under the oversight of a different bishop in a nearby diocese, the 13-member Panel of Reference recommended.

Under the plan, Bishop Samuel Johnson Howard of Jacksonville, Fla., would delegate his authority to a neighboring bishop acceptable to him and the dissenting churches.

But Howard rejected that idea, saying the parishes have already abandoned the Episcopal Church by linking up with foreign bishops from Africa, according to The Living Church magazine, an Episcopal journal.

Both Howard and Church of the Redeemer in Jacksonville appealed to the Panel of Reference for assistance in solving the dispute. The panel said their recommendations could be applied to the five other breakway parishes as well.

Until the Church of the Redeemer is willing to be in communion with the Diocese of Florida and the Episcopal Church, “they remain by their own choice outside the church and we we see no point at this time in discussing further implementation of the panel’s recommendations,” Howard wrote in a letter to the Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams, according to The Living Church.

The panel was created by Williams, the de facto leader of global Anglicanism, to mediate disputes. Neither the panel nor Williams hold power to enforce the recommendations.

The six Florida parishes have been battling Howard since the 2003 election of an openly gay man as bishop of New Hampshire. Howard did not support the election. The parishes said he should move further to withdraw from “sacramental fellowship” with the Episcopal Church, according to the panel.

When Howard refused to withdraw, the six parishes sought oversight from foreign Anglican churches, including the national churches of Uganda, Kenya and Rwanda.

_ Daniel Burke

Virginia Baptist Executive to Lead Southern Baptist Agency

(RNS) An executive of a Virginia Baptist group has been appointed as the new president of the Southern Baptist Convention’s domestic missions agency.

Geoff Hammond, senior associate director of the Southern Baptist Conservatives of Virginia, will officially begin his position with the North American Mission Board in early May.

Hammond has been a church-planting missionary for the state convention, helping it start new churches, and has a history of missionary life. He was born to missionaries in Nigeria and served as a missionary to Brazil, reported Baptist Press, the Southern Baptist Convention’s news service.

“I grew up as a kid looking at North America as a place that already had the Gospel,” he said. “That was until I came here. The longer I am here, the more I am convinced that we need to see North America as a mission field.”

Hammond, 49, succeeds Bob Reccord, who resigned last April from the agency based in Alpharetta, Ga. Two months before his resignation, a state Baptist newspaper raised questions about Reccord’s management practices.

Greg Faulls, chairman of the mission board’s president search committee, said Hammond was the unanimous recommendation of his committee.

“We were looking for someone who was not just mission-minded but had the mind of a missionary,” Faulls said.

Hammond begins his duties when the mission board’s trustees meet May 8-9.

_ Adelle M. Banks

Quote of the Day: Catholic League President Bill Donohue

(RNS) “This is one of the worst assaults on Christian sensibilities ever. It’s not just the ugliness of the portrayal, but the timing to choose Holy Week is astounding.”

_ Bill Donohue, president of the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights, criticizing the 6-foot chocolate sculpture of Jesus dubbed “My Sweet Lord” by the artist Cosimo Cavallaro. It is scheduled to debut Monday (April 2) at a gallery in a New York hotel. Donohue was quoted by The Associated Press.

KRE/CM END RNS