c. 1999 Religion News Service

Catholic bishops, other groups react to Kevorkian verdict

(RNS) Catholic bishops and the Family Research Council are among those welcoming the guilty verdict Friday (March 26) against Dr. Jack Kevorkian, who was convicted of second-degree murder for giving a lethal injection to an ailing man.”While the outcome of Friday’s court case is welcome news … at the same time, it’s lamentable that it took 130 victims to get to this point,”said Cardinal Adam Maida of Detroit.”If nothing else, these verdicts … will bolster our efforts on behalf of patients, their families and their caregivers to increase the knowledge of _ and availability to _ medically and morally sound options for end-of-life decision-making.” Kevorkian, who has said he has assisted at 130 suicides since 1990, was found guilty in Pontiac, Mich., for the first time in five trials. He injected 52-year-old Thomas Youk, who suffered from Lou Gehrig’s disease, with a fatal mix of drugs on Sept. 17. Parts of the tape of that act aired on CBS'”60 Minutes.” Cardinal James Hickey of Washington said he was”heartened”by the conviction.”It is my hope that this conviction will encourage people of good will to redouble their efforts to secure legislation which protects the lives of the terminally and seriously ill from euthanasia and assisted suicide,”Hickey said.

Teresa Wagner, a legal analyst for the Family Research Council, said the conviction should be celebrated by all Americans.”Finally, the relentless Kevorkian killing campaign will cease,”she said.”America now knows that its homicide laws protect the weak, the sick and the disabled, as well as those who are strong and healthy.” In an op-ed column in USA Today on Monday (March 29), former first lady Rosalynn Carter urged that the conviction should move discussion beyond assisted suicide to improving the end of people’s lives through”palliative care”that provides comfort and support to the dying.

She is the honorary chair of Last Acts, a national coalition of more than 300 groups committed to improving end-of-life care.”If Americans cannot see a better way, assisted suicide will continue to be a topic of public debate,”Carter wrote.”Instead, we should be pointing to and building on the progress we are making in palliative care, so that at the end of life, we can have choices that are far more attractive than assisted suicide.”

Christians begin Holy Week by marking Palm Sunday

(RNS) Christians worldwide marked the beginning of Holy Week on Sunday (March 28) with Palm Sunday celebrations ranging from lavish and exuberant parades in Spain to a solemn Mass in Jerusalem.

Palm Sunday marks the beginning of Holy Week in the Christian calendar. It commemorates Jesus’ triumphal entrance into Jerusalem riding on a donkey, when his followers laid palm branches in his path. Annually, the day kicks off worldwide celebrations which peak on Good Friday, marking Jesus’ crucifixion, and conclude on Easter Sunday, when followers celebrate the Resurrection.

The predominantly-Catholic country of Spain usually produces some of the most extravagant celebrations to mark”Semana Santa,”or Holy Week. In Madrid, eager men carried ornate floats Sunday, bearing images of Jesus or the Virgin Mary, through the city streets. In the city of Seville, thousands of men competed for the honor of carrying similar flower-laden floats through the city’s narrow streets. The processions will continue throughout the week.

In Jerusalem, thousands of pilgrims gathered Sunday for an annual walk retracing Jesus’ steps from the Mount of Olives to the Old City of Jerusalem. People also came from around the world to participate in a Palm Sunday Mass at the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, where Jesus is believed to have been buried.

Meanwhile, church officials in the Philippines said that seven people have agreed to be nailed to wooden crosses near Manila on Good Friday. The re-enactment of Jesus’ crucifixion draws enormous crowds annually to witness the voluntary public penance which the church officially frowns upon.

From the Vatican, Pope John Paul II took time from his Palm Sunday Mass to urge an end to violence in Yugoslavia.”It is never to late”to meet and negotiate, John Paul said. The pontiff, a longtime advocate of nonviolence, renewed his appeal Monday (March 29) saying”in response to violence, more violence is never a way out of a crisis.”

Supreme Court rejects prayer appeal

(RNS) The Supreme Court rejected Monday (March 29) the appeal of a Utah man who sought to open a local city council meeting with a controversial prayer.

Without comment, the high court refused to hear the case of Snyder vs. Murray City, upholding an earlier federal appeals court ruling which declared Tom Snyder’s planned prayer more of a”political harangue,”that fell outside this nation’s”long-accepted genre of legislative prayer,”the Associated Press reported.

In addition to addressing”our Mother, who art in heaven (if, indeed there is a heaven and if there is a god that takes a woman’s form),”Snyder’s proposed prayer asked”that you deliver us from the evil of forced religious worship,”and questioned”if in fact you had a son that visited Earth.” Instead of allowing Snyder’s prayer, the city council in Salt Lake City chose to drop its custom of opening meetings in prayer altogether. So in March of 1994, Snyder took his prayer to Murray City, where the city attorney told him that prayer”is not a time to express political views (or) attack city policies or practices.” Snyder sued, claiming his First Amendment rights had been trampled. He lost his case in a federal court ruling and in a decision by the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. The appeals court said prayers that promote a particular religious creed or disparage another creed can be rejected without violating the Constitution.

Minister in same-sex trial receives support of his congregation

(RNS) The Rev. Gregory Dell received the renewed support of his Chicago congregation on Palm Sunday (March 28), two days after the United Methodist pastor was sentenced to an indefinite suspension from the ministry beginning July 5 for performing a same-sex uniting ceremony.

A church jury, made up of 13 United Methodist ministers from the denomination’s Northern Illinois Conference, Friday found Dell guilty of violating church law for officiating at the service, something he admits having done for 18 years. The ministers voted 10-3 that Dell had violated a church ban on the practice that was ruled binding by the denomination’s Judicial Council in 1998.

The jurors also said Dell should be suspended from the ministry unless he promised in writing by July 5 to no longer perform such ceremonies.

But during Sunday services at Broadway United Methodist Church, Dell made it clear he would not make such a promise. Dell said he would consider leaving the 8.5-million member church for another denomination rather than abandon his position that homosexuals deserve equal treatment by the church.”We will not rest until God’s family is affirmed in all of its diversity, in all its glory,”said Dell, whose congregation is about 30 percent homosexuals.”The church of Jesus Christ will not be defeated. God says don’t forget who you are _ and whose you are.” Members of Dell’s congregation prayed for him Sunday and pledged to continue supporting him. One unidentified woman quoted in The New York Times told Dell that”your ministry brought me back to church. This is a church where I could be comfortable.” Arlie Sims, 37, told Dell:”It took until my 20’s before a minister could look me in the eye without saying, `You’re evil and you’re going to hell.’ Because of you there are Methodist kids all over the country _ kids who thought they were the only ones _ who now know that they’re O.K. and that God loves them.” Another congregant, Dave Samber, said of Dell:”He would say `We are not here to tolerate you; we are here to celebrate you. That’s powerful stuff, you know.”

Islamic pilgrimage ends

(RNS) The annual Hajj pilgrimage to Mecca ended Monday (March 29), and Saudi Arabian officials said that unlike some previous years, this year’s event produced no serious incidents.

Nearly 2 million Muslims from around the world participated in this year’s Hajj, which is required of all Muslims healthy and wealthy enough to undertake the journey.

The event ended Monday with the ritual stoning of three pillars that symbolize the devil, followed by the circling of the cube-shaped Kaaba, which Muslims face in daily prayer and believe is built on the spot where Abraham came to sacrifice his son Ishmael in accordance with God’s commandment.

Saudi officials said a small fire that burned 40 tents temporarily housing pilgrims resulted in 12 injuries. But they noted that that was a far cry from the 180 who died last year during a stampede of pilgrims, or the 343 who died in a 1997 fire.

This year’s attendance of 1.7-million pilgrims was down about a half-million from 1998. Authorities blamed that on poor economic conditions in Indonesia and other southeast Asian nations with large Muslim populations.

Maryland county jury awards employees $169,000 in faith-bias suit

(RNS) A Montgomery County, Md., jury has awarded $169,000 to three former employees of a Christian school who claimed they were fired based on their religion.

The jury found that Montrose Christian School in Rockville and its principal, Greg Scheck, violated religious protections in the county’s anti-discrimination law, The Washington Post reported.

School attorney Craig Parshall said Scheck and the school will appeal the case by challenging the constitutionality of the law if the verdict is not thrown out by Montgomery Circuit Court Judge DeLawrence Beard.

Lawyers involved in the case believe it is the first to challenge the limits of the county’s human rights law. The law bans discrimination based on religion, race, national origin, age, sexual orientation or other personal factors.

The school said the three employees were fired for reasons other than their religion and that church membership was not necessary for non-teaching positions.

Mary Lou Jones, who is Catholic, was fired as a school secretary in June 1996 after working there 18 years. Her daughter, Sharon Walsh, also a Catholic, was fired the same day from a secretarial post she held for 14 years. Helen Poole, a Methodist, was fired after working in the cafeteria for six years.

Their lawsuit claimed they were dismissed by a new pastor and principal because they were not Baptists and were not members of Montrose Baptist Church, the largest Southern Baptist church in Maryland. The school is affiliated with the church.

None of the 18 school employees who were fired in the last days of the 1995-96 school year belonged to the church, said Arthur B. Spitzer, a lawyer for the American Civil Liberties Union, which filed the lawsuit on behalf of the three former employees. With the exception of two janitors, all of those who maintained their jobs were members.”It’s not true that all good employees of Montrose Christian School are members of Montrose Baptist Church,”said Spitzer.

Parshall argued that the three women were fired due to”loyalty problems”or because they were”difficult to deal with”rather than religious reasons.”This case is really about hurt feelings,”he argued.

The school will argue to Beard that it should be immune from paying damages because it is a charitable institution, Parshall said.

Pope names new archbishop of San Juan, Puerto Rico

(RNS) Pope John Paul II has accepted the resignation of Cardinal Luis Aponte Martinez as archbishop metropolitan of San Juan, Puerto Rico, and named Bishop Roberto Octavio Gonzales of Corpus Christi, Texas, to succeed him.

Aponte Martinez, a native of Mayaguez, Puerto Rico, and a cardinal since 1973, submitted his resignation because he has reached the mandatory retirement age of 75.

Gonzalez, at 48, is relatively young to lead an archdiocese of more than 1 million Catholics. His appointment puts him in line to become a cardinal and means he could be part of the conclave that will elect the next pope.

Born in Newark, N.J., he attended primary school in Puerto Rico and secondary school in New York. Joining the Franciscan Order in 1970, he received a master’s degree in theology from the Washington Theological Union and a degree in sociology from Fordham University in New York.

Following his ordination as a priest in 1977 in New York, he served as director of pastoral research at the Northeast Hispanic Catholic Center in New York and in 1988 became an auxiliary bishop of Boston.

The pope named him bishop coadjutor of Corpus Christi in 1995, and he became bishop of the diocese of 366,500 Catholics two years later. He also serves as chairman of the National Conference of Bishops’ Committee on the Church in Latin America, a consultant to the Committee on Liturgy and a member of the Committee on Pro-Life Activities.

Quote of the day: Holocaust survivor and author Elie Wiesel

(RNS)”I don’t like to compare anything to what we have been through, but if the world had reacted then the way we are reacting now, many tragedies would have been prevented.” _ Nobel Prize winner, author and Holocaust survivor Elie Wiesel, contrasting NATO air strikes against Yugoslavia, which is accused of widespread atrocities against Kosovo’s ethnic Albanians, and the Allies’ reluctance to take military action during World War II to specifically aid Jews facing death at the hands of the Nazis. He was quoted Monday (March 29) by Jewish Telegraphic Agency news service.

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