c. 1997 Religion News Service

Campaign to end religious persecution debuts TV ad

(RNS) A 60-second TV ad urging additional White House, congressional and church action on the issue is the latest element in the growing campaign against the persecution of Christians and other religious minorities around the globe.

The ads will run first on the Fox News Channel cable station Thursday (May 29) through Sunday (June 1) in New York City, Washington, D.C., and Los Angeles, and in South Carolina and Oklahoma.

William J. Bennett, co-director of Empower America, said the ads _ which feature graphic photos and videotape of individuals said to have been killed or tortured because of their faith _ will run elsewhere as money is raised to purchase broadcast time. Bennett and Sen. Joseph Lieberman, D-Conn., provide the voice overs for the ad.

At a news conference Wednesday (May 28), Bennett _ joined by Lieberman and Jeane Kirkpatrick, the former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations _ also announced a”summit on religious persecution”set for June 23 in Washington, to which leading religious figures, political leaders and anti-persecution activists have been invited.”Our hope is that this gathering will be a starting point for making the fight against worldwide religious persecution a high national priority and for reaching a consensus on how we can best defeat this profound threat,”said Lieberman.

Religious persecution has become a hot human rights issue in Washington.

President Clinton last year appointed a special committee to advise the State Department on the matter. Last week, Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pa., and Rep. Frank Wolf, R-Va., introduced legislation that, among other things, would clamp trade and other economic sanctions on nations found to be persecuting their citizens on the basis of religion.

Christian activists have led the campaign, maintaining that Christian minorities in such nations as the Sudan, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, China and Vietnam are particularly at risk. However, Buddhists in Tibet, Baha’is in Iran and Muslims in Bosnia have also been named as religious minorities subject to state-sponsored persecution.

Bennett said the”key to progress”toward ending religious persecution”is greater church involvement.”Church leaders, he said, have the moral authority needed”to move Americans and get them concerned about this very basic issue of human rights.” Russian Orthodox win landmark case against new religions

(RNS) A seven-week-long court case in Russia has been resolved in a landmark decision that an”anti-sect”brochure did not libel new religious groups in the nation.

In a case that has been depicted as freedom of religion vs. freedom of information, a Moscow judge ruled Friday (May 23) in favor of Alexander Dvorkin of the Russian Orthodox Church’s education department, reported Ecumenical News International (ENI), a Geneva-based religious news agency.

The case underscored longstanding tensions between the Russian Orthodox Church and non-Orthodox religious groups accused by the Orthodox of proselytizing church members.

The case centered on a brochure produced by Dvorkin, with permission and official support from the Russian Orthodox Church’s Department of Religious Education and the Publishing Council, which warns against the dangers of such”totalitarian sects”as the Church of Scientology, the Unification Church (Moonies), Jehovah’s Witnesses and the Hare Krishna organization.

The brochure also includes information about activities of the religious groups, including recruitment practices.

Dvorkin told ENI the ruling was”a triumph of justice.” The judge, Lyudmila Saltykova, said,”The brochure expressed an opinion, and the sources that (Dvorkin) used gave him the right to speak those words.” Lev Levinson, a human rights activist and a plaintiff in the case, told ENI,”Religious organizations that conduct legal activities in Russia should not be whipping boys.”

Salt Lake City dismisses charges against church-based shelter

(RNS) The City of Salt Lake has dismissed all charges against a church-based homeless ministry that did not obtain a city”conditional use”permit before allowing homeless people to sleep in its emergency shelter.

The criminal charges, filed the day after Christmas 1996 against Minister Wayne Wilson of Spectacular Ministries of the Lord’s Servants, stemmed from a zoning dispute in which the city claimed the shelter is a half-block away from an area where churches are allowed to operate.

A Utah judge signed an order Tuesday (May 27) dismissing the criminal charges.

The Rutherford Institute, a nonprofit civil liberties organization specializing in the defense of religious liberty, is suing the city in a separate civil action.

Referring to the zoning issue, Matt Hilton, the attorney representing the Rutherford Institute, said,”Doesn’t this church have a right of sanctuary to keep people alive?”

Polish court strikes down legal abortion on eve of papal visit

(RNS) On the eve of a visit from Pope John Paul II, a Polish court has declared the nation’s recently liberalized abortion law unconstitutional.

On Wednesday (May 28), the Constitutional Tribunal of Poland ruled the abortion law contradicts a constitutionally guaranteed right to life, Reuters reported.”There is a lack of precise, justified criteria allowing for a distinction according to developmental phases of human life. From the moment it arises, human life becomes a value which is protected under the constitution,”Tribunal president Andrzej Zoll said in his announcement of the ruling.

The law will now return to Poland’s parliament, where it must be re-examined within six months. A two-thirds majority in parliament can overturn the court’s ruling.

In September, the nation will hold national elections, where the abortion issue promises to figure prominently. The Solidarity Election Action, one party hoping to gain power in the election, is campaigning on a platform of restricting abortion.

According to Reuters, Poles are split 50-50 on the abortion issue.

The pope, scheduled to visit his native land from May 31 to June 10, will likely applaud the ruling.

But opponents say the decision is against the dignity of women.”I think that the Tribunal took an important step today in the direction of a clerical state,”said Danuta Waniek, an ex-communist senior parliamentary deputy. Waniek had championed opposition to a 1993 Roman Catholic Church-inspired anti-abortion law.

Archbishop Carey, Cardinal Hume urge Christian unity

(RNS) The 1400th anniversary of the arrival of St. Augustine to convert the heathen English should challenge English Christians today to work toward unity, said Archbishop of Canterbury George Carey.

Carey made his remarks Monday (May 26) during a commemoration service in Canterbury Cathedral attended by Prince Charles, Roman Catholic Cardinal Basil Hume and other political and religious leaders.

Christians are messengers of peace entrusted with the message of reconciliation, he said.”And, here again, St. Augustine challenges us, because he calls to us across the centuries from the one, undivided church of Jesus Christ. … Can we, successors of Augustine’s mission in this land, reach for a vision of reconciliation that will lead us to the unity which we know to be the will of God?”Carey asked.

For his part, Hume, preaching at vespers celebrated in Canterbury Cathedral Tuesday (May 27), also emphasized the need for unity.

Recalling Pope John Paul II’s visit to Canterbury in 1982″to plead for unity,”Hume said:”There is no way forward for our churches, and indeed for our nation, unless we rediscover the value of a spiritual life for each one of us, and pray and strive for the unity of all the Christian churches. … Through prayer, unity can be glimpsed, not only as a possibility but as the essential way forward for all of us.” As part of the celebrations to mark the anniversary of Augustine’s arrival in Britain and also the death of St. Columba, apostle of the Scottish highlands, a party of 50 pilgrims that had set out from Rome at Pentecost arrived in Kent on Sunday (May 25).

They were greeted by Carey and Hume at the place near Ramsgate where Augustine landed in 597 A.D.

On Monday, they joined 400 pilgrims walking from Canterbury and making their way by three different routes to Derry, St Columba’s birthplace, with plans to arrive there June 9, the saint’s feast day.

Quote of the day: Senate Minority Leader Richard Gephardt, D-Mo.

(RNS) Senate Minority Leader Richard Gephardt, D-Mo., has broken with President Clinton and other leaders of his party over the issue of continuing normal trade relations with China. In a speech at the Economic Club of Detroit, Gephardt spelled out his reasons:”The United States has no business playing business as usual with a Chinese tyranny that persecutes Christian, Muslim and other religious leaders from many other faiths, precludes tens of millions from practicing their religion, sells the most lethal weapons to the most dangerous of nations, profits off slave labor and engages in the utter evil of forced abortion.”

MJP END RNS