c. 1997 Religion News Service

Archbishop Tutu’s cancerous prostate removed

(RNS) Nobel peace laureate Desmond Tutu, the retired Anglican archbishop of Cape Town, underwent surgery this week in South Africa to have part of a cancerous prostate gland removed.

In a statement issued Friday (Jan. 17), South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission, the panel headed by Tutu that is investigating human rights violations under apartheid, said it is too early to know if the cancer had spread, the Associated Press reported.

After the surgery, the 65-year-old retired archbishop invited reporters into his hospital room and announced that he expects to return to work in three weeks.”We, of course, believe God is right here in our anguish and pain,”said Tutu, who did not elaborate on his condition.”One is aware that it could have been worse.” John Allan, Tutu’s spokesman, said the archbishop will undergo more tests and will remain in the hospital through the weekend.”Doctors have discovered cancer in Archbishop Desmond Tutu’s prostate gland but will take some weeks to establish how serious it is and whether it has spread beyond the prostate,”the Truth Commission stated.”There is nothing to suggest cancer outside the prostate at this stage but only tests will determine this accurately.” Genocide witness murdered after testimony before Rwanda tribunal

(RNS) A woman who supplied a United Nations human rights tribunal information about massacres in Rwanda’s 1994 genocide has been murdered, the tribunal’s deputy prosecutor revealed.

Honore Rakotomanana said Thursday (Jan. 16) that the witness, her husband, her four children and three other children were murdered during a Jan. 5 attack on the house where they were staying. Hutu militants were suspected in the murders, he said.

The woman had testified about massacres in the village of Taba, 30 miles southwest of Kigali, the capital, the AP reported. Taba’s former mayor, Jean-Paul Akayesu, is currently on trial for crimes against humanity for his alleged role in the massacres. He has pleaded innocent to the charges.

Rakotomanana said the tribunal’s witness-protection procedures are now being reviewed.”We are very concerned about the matter of witness protections, and we are troubled by the news of the murder of one of our witnesses,”he said.

Many have refused to testify before the tribunal fearing reprisal.

At least 500,000 Rwandans are believed to have been murdered in 1994 during weeks of ethnic blood-letting between Hutu and Tutsi tribal groups.

Founder of the U.S. Opus Dei movement dies at 73

(RNS) The Rev. Sal Ferigle, the priest who while still a laymen helped bring the influential but controversial Opus Dei lay Catholic movement to the United States, died on Jan. 9 after suffering a heart attack. He was 73.

Ferigle died after suffering a second heart attack while in intensive care from an initial heart attack on Dec. 25.

As a layman, he and the Rev. Joseph Muzquiz established the first U.S. center of Opus Dei in Chicago in 1949, while Ferigle was earning his doctorate from the Illinois Institute of Technology.

Opus Dei _ Work of God _ was founded in Spain in 1928 and describes itself as helping”ordinary lay people seek holiness in and through their everyday activities.” Although a secular, mainly lay organization, Opus Dei is officially recognized by the Vatican but liberal critics accuse it of secrecy, elitism and of wielding undue influence on church officials in Rome.

Ferigle was born in 1923 in Valencia, Spain. He was ordained a priest in 1956, became a U.S. citizen in 1965, and moved in 1971 to Boston, where he served as a student chaplain and a frequent seminar speaker.

He helped establish Opus Dei centers in several U.S. cities, including Boston, Washington, D.C., Milwaukee and St. Louis. There are now some 3,000 Opus Dei members in about 35 U.S. cities.

At Ferigle’s funeral Mass Jan. 11, Cardinal Bernard Law of Boston said that God had used Ferigle”in a mighty way.”We celebrate the wonderful expression of faith that Father Sal had brought to the work of God, Opus Dei,”Law said.

Catholic charities head warns of welfare fall-out

(RNS) The Rev. Fred Kammer, head of Catholic Charities U.S.A., warned Thursday (Jan. 16) that the social welfare programs of the nation’s religious bodies will be overwhelmed as provisions of the new federal welfare law goes into effect.”We have enormous fears that we’ll see immensely worse poverty,” Kammer said. “Our local directors are terrified. We have a real fear there aren’t enough jobs for people, or that people chronically on welfare need very intensive, specialized training to get off welfare, and they won’t get it.” Catholic Charities is the umbrella organization for the Roman Catholic Church’s social welfare agencies and their $1.9 billion-a-year programs that serve the poor.

Kammer said the demands on the churches’ social services programs will come from Americans newly made poor by what he said is a welfare reform program that will backfire and”make poverty much, much worse.” The welfare bill, passed by Congress and signed by President Clinton last year, aims to overhaul a system that many critics said was failing. Changes in the law limit the time a person may receive benefits, limit the size of benefits and impose tough, get-a-job deadlines on 13 million Americans on welfare.

But Kammer believes the changes offer the poor little or no practical help in getting off welfare. And, he said, the reforms ignore the reasons many are poor in the first place: depressed local economies, scant transportation or child-care, and a surplus of unskilled workers.”Our concern is this blanket approach won’t work,”he said.

Gallup religion pollser dies at 58

(RNS) Robert Bezilla, who edited Gallup Organization publications dealing with religion, died Jan. 2 in Princeton, N.J., from hardening of the arteries. He was 58.

Bezilla edited two publications issued by the Princeton Religion Research Center, a Gallup-affiliated organization: the weekly Gallup Religion Poll, which chronicles attitudes about religion and religious service attendance; and Emerging Trends, a monthly newsletter that focuses on spirituality and religion.

Since 1983, Bezilla also directed the Gallup Youth Survey and had been a consultant to the George H. Gallup International Institute since 1988, The New York Times reported.

Moyers wins award from National Endowment for the Humanities

(RNS) Veteran broadcast journalist Bill Moyers has been honored by the the National Endowment for the Humanities for his contribution to the intellectual life of the United States.

Moyers, an ordained Southern Baptist minister, was one of five recipients of the Charles Frankel Prize.

In remarks at the Jan. 9 ceremony, President Clinton praised Moyers’ role in broadcast journalism, reported Associated Baptist Press, an independent Baptist news service.”At a time in which the media often is used to truncate, oversimplify and distort ideas in a way that divide rather than enlighten, the work of Bill Moyers’ life is truly and profoundly important and encouraging,”the president said.

Clinton, a Southern Baptist, also remarked that Moyers stands out from other Baptist clergy.”Most important to me, he is a living rebuke to everybody’s preconceptions about Baptist preachers,”Clinton said.”He is truly a 20th-century Renaissance man.” Moyers said he was flattered by the award.”My role is very interesting to me, but minor,”Moyers said.”My job is to point the way to the people who truly are the giants.”

Quote of the day: President Bill Clinton

(RNS) President Bill Clinton designated Thursday (Jan. 16) as Religious Freedom Day 1997. In his official proclamation, Clinton noted that freedom from religious persecution was one of the first rights sought by the nation’s founders. He urged Americans to continue working for religious liberty, both in the United States and abroad: “America’s commitment to religious tolerance has empowered us to achieve an atmosphere of understanding, trust and respect in a society of diverse cultures and religious traditions. And today, much of the world still looks to the United States as the champion of religious liberty. Yet, even in America, we must be ever vigilant in protecting the freedoms so important to our ancestors and so admired by people throughout the world. The church arsons and the desecration of synagogues and mosques in recent years demonstrated for us all that our country is not entirely free from violence and religious hatred.”

MJP END RNS