c. 2006 Religion News Service
Arrests Relieve, Sadden Pastors of Burned Alabama Churches
BIRMINGHAM, Ala. (RNS) Leaders of churches destroyed by arson responded with relief at the arrest of three people Wednesday (March 8), but they also expressed sympathy for the suspects and their families.
“I feel sorry for the young guys,” said the Rev. Robert Murphy, pastor of Pleasant Sabine Baptist Church in Bibb County, which burned Feb. 3. “They’re going to lose a lot of years in their lives in prison for what they did. At their age, they haven’t got the opportunity to know what life’s all about. I feel bad for their parents who put so much into their education.”
The arson spree started Feb. 3, when five Baptist churches were burned in Bibb County.
Rehobeth Baptist Church in Lawley, Ashby Baptist in Brierfield and Pleasant Sabine Baptist in Centreville were destroyed; Old Union Baptist in Randolph and Antioch Baptist in Centreville were damaged.
The second group of fires came Feb. 7, when four more churches were set ablaze in Pickens, Sumter and Greene counties.
“It’s hard enough to raise kids, then for them to go out and do a heinous crime like this, it’s sad,” said Galilee Baptist Church Assistant Pastor Willie Speights.
Morning Star Missionary Baptist Church in Boligee, Dancy Baptist in Aliceville and Galilee Baptist in Panola were destroyed; Spring Valley Baptist Church in Gainesville was damaged.
“We’re very relieved to know this had no political, racial or religious overtones,” said the Rev. Jim Parker, pastor of Ashby Baptist Church in Bibb County. “To the churches in our community, this was devastating. For a blow like that, you’re looking for a reason. To think it was malicious vandalism, we’re just kind of taken aback.”
_ Greg Garrison
Leader of Nation’s Catholic Bishops Denies Charges He Abused Woman
(RNS) The nation’s top Roman Catholic bishop, William Skylstad of Spokane, Wash., is firmly denying charges that he sexually abused a woman in the 1960s.
“I have kept the promise of celibacy that I made when I was made a deacon 47 years ago,” Skylstad said in a statement Wednesday (March 8) to the Spokane Spokesman-Review newspaper.
The abuse reforms that Skylstad helped draft as vice president, and now president, of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops are unclear whether he should step down while the allegations are fully investigated.
The unnamed woman brought the charges against Skylstad, 70, as part of his diocese’s bankruptcy claims process. Greg Arpin, a lawyer for the diocese, said Skylstad “categorically denies the accusations.”
Skylstad said he hoped “the Spokane community will join me in praying for all those who have come forward to report sexual abuse. Please pray for me as well.”
Alleged victims have a Friday (March 10) deadline to file claims against the diocese; last month, Skylstad offered a $45.7 million settlement to 75 alleged victims. Arpin said the total number of victims has passed 135.
According to a statement passed by bishops in 2002 and reissued last summer, the senior archbishop within a “metropolitan” area should review charges brought against another bishop. In Washington state, the senior bishop is Archbishop Alex Brunett of Seattle.
The Archdiocese of Seattle referred all questions to Spokane; a spokesman for the Spokane diocese was not immediately available for comment.
Skylstad’s position as the nation’s top bishop appears secure. Monsignor Francis Maniscalco, spokesman for the bishops conference, declined to comment and said there are no “statutes or bylaws” that prompt Skylstad to step aside while the allegations are investigated.
David Clohessy, national director of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, said the details of the case are so murky that “it’s hard to say” whether Skylstad should step down from his leadership duties.
“But he, more than any bishop in the country, should be concerned about perception, and about following to a T at least the weak, vague rules that bishops themselves adopted,” Clohessy said.
_ Kevin Eckstrom
Markets Close to Protest Terrorist Blasts in Holy City of India
(RNS) Life came to a standstill in Varanasi, India, when a shutdown was called to protest terrorist bomb blasts that rocked the holy city in the northern India state of Uttar Pradesh.
Shops in the city downed their shutters and all the markets were closed for business on Wednesday (March 8).
The chief minister of Uttar Pradesh, Mulayam Singh Yadav, said that the Tuesday blasts were part of a “terror strike” and smacked of a “deep-rooted conspiracy.”
India itself remained on high alert to prevent sectarian violence in the aftermath of the three bomb attacks that killed 20 people and wounded more than 100. Armed police guarded temples and other holy places not only in Uttar Pradesh but across the country.
In Uttar Pradesh, anti-riot squads have been deployed throughout the state in a bid to prevent any backlash from Hindu groups, who blame Muslim militants for the violence.
Just hours after the bomb blasts in Varanasi, the police forces of Uttar Pradesh and of the capital city, New Delhi, hit back at the Lashkar-e-Taiba, which experts believe could have carried out Tuesday’s attacks at the Sankat Mochan temple, which is dedicated to the Hindu monkey deity Hanuman.
In two separate encounters, police groups shot dead in Lucknow, the state capital, a resident of Madhya Pradesh (central India) who was reportedly a senior organizer of the Lashkar, and two Lashkar militants in Delhi.
Speaking in Lok Sabha, the lower house of Parliament, in New Delhi, the presiding officer, Somnath Chatterjee, told members Wednesday: “The senseless acts of violence are being committed in a nefarious attempt to disturb the even tempo of our life and to affect India’s unity and integrity. Our people should, in a united manner, continue our fight against such acts of terrorism and violence.”
Taking a broader view of the Varanasi incidents, the leading Indian newspaper The Hindu said in an editorial Thursday: “Behind the inhumanity of the terrorist strikes in Varanasi’s Sankat Mochan temple and a railway station there was a clear plan and mission _ to generate communal tension and conflict. Responding effectively to the challenge of terrorism demands clarity of understanding as well as intellectual and technological resources. …”
_ Achal Narayanan
Catholic Bishops Launch Web Site Rebutting `Da Vinci Code’
(RNS) U.S. Catholic bishops are the latest group providing online information disputing historical claims in “The Da Vinci Code,” the best-selling novel soon to become a motion picture.
A Catholic Web site (http://www.jesusdecoded.com) was launched Thursday (March 9). It includes articles from theologians, media commentators and art historians, while promoting a television special called “Da Vinci Decoded,” produced by the Interfaith Broadcasting Commission for the purpose of presenting the Catholic point of view.
The Web site, operated by the U.S. Catholic Bishops Communication Campaign, also advertises a 16-page booklet entitled “The Authentic Jesus.” Soon to be a movie directed by Ron Howard and based on the book by Dan Brown, “The Da Vinci Code” introduces the idea that Jesus was married to Mary Magdalene and was a father, a view at odds with what is believed by the Roman Catholic Church and most other Christian groups. The film is scheduled for release May 19.
“Our concern is a pastoral one,” said Monsignor Francis Maniscalco, director of communications for the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops. He said the novel’s claim that “the Catholic Church doesn’t convey the truth (about Jesus) and that there is instead another truth is quite frankly absolute nonsense.”
The Web site also features the point of view of the Catholic prelature Opus Dei, which has publicly disputed its portrayal in the novel. In the novel and film, an albino assassin Opus Dei monk named Silas is a major obstacle to the hero’s goal. A representative from Opus Dei contributes an essay on the history and works of the group.
“Jesus Decoded” is slated to be released to NBC affiliates nationwide the weekend after “The Da Vinci Code” is released in theatres.
_ Nate Herpich
James Andrews, Architect of Presbyterian Reunion, Hit by Car, Dies
(RNS) The Rev. James E. Andrews, the longtime leader of the Presbyterian Church (USA) who helped orchestrate the 1983 reunion of the church’s northern and southern branches, died Tuesday (March 7) at age 77.
Andrews was struck and killed by a car near his home in Decatur, Ga., according to Presbyterian News Service.
The 1983 merger reunited two churches that had been split since the Civil War _ the Presbyterian Church in the United States (the Southern branch) and the United Presbyterian Church in the USA (the Northern branch).
Andrews was elected the stated clerk, or top elected officer, of the southern church in 1973. He held that post until the 1983 merger, served as co-stated clerk for one year, and served as stated clerk of the united church from 1984-1996.
“He’d probably say his crowning achievement was helping to bring about reunion,” his widow, Elizabeth, told Presbyterian News Service. He is also survived by two children and four grandchildren.
_ Kevin Eckstrom
Quote of the Day: Reform Jewish Rabbi Scott Sperling
(RNS) “We must decide to act upon the words of Deuteronomy 30:19, `I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing; therefore choose life, that both you and your seed may live.”’
_ Rabbi Scott Sperling, director of the Union for Reform Judaism Mid-Atlantic Council, who joined other religious leaders at a Washington news conference on Wednesday (March 8) to urge passage of an international family planning bill. He said U.S. aid that includes family planning services helps reduce maternal and infant deaths and prevents abortions in the developing world.
MO/JL END RNS
