c. 1998 Religion News Service
William Bennett criticizes Graham for comments on Clinton
(RNS) Former Reagan education secretary William Bennett has criticized the Rev. Billy Graham for remarks the evangelist made on NBC’s”Today”show concerning forgiving President Clinton.
The well-known evangelist was asked Thursday (March 5) about the allegations that the president had sexual relations with a former White House intern.”Certainly, I forgive him, because I know the frailty of human nature and I know how hard it is _ and especially a strong, vigorous young man like he is,”Graham said in the interview.”And he has such a tremendous personality, that I think the ladies just go wild over him.” Bennett, who has been critical of Americans who refuse to make judgments about allegations against Clinton, offered his viewpoints Friday in a column in the Wall Street Journal and in an appearance on”Today.””Billy Graham forgives him for what?”Bennett asked on”Today.””What has the president admitted to doing?” Asked what he would have preferred Graham to say, Bennett said,”I think what he should say is, people, when they have done wrong before they are forgiven should come forward and say what it is they’ve done.” Graham was not available for further comment.
California-Nevada Methodist officials voice support for Creech
(RNS) The cabinet _ the bishop and district superintendents _ of the California-Nevada annual conference of the United Methodist Church has publicly affirmed its support for pastors who perform same-sex union ceremonies.
The action comes as the denomination prepares to bring an Omaha, Neb., pastor, the Rev. Jimmy Creech, to trial for performing a union ceremony for a lesbian couple at his church last summer. The trial is scheduled to begin March. 11.
At a news conference in San Francisco, the Rev. Thomas Kimball, superintendent of the conference’s Golden Gate District, said the cabinet, headed by Bishop Melvin G. Talbert, had been asked to clarify what it would do”if one of our pastors came to us, saying they wanted to perform a holy union.” Kimball said the cabinet was”unequivocal”in supporting”the right of our pastors to be pastors in the local settings.” Debate over homosexuality has deeply divided the nation’s second largest Protestant denomination. The church currently holds that homosexuality is”incompatible”with Christian teaching.
Moderate Southern Baptists plan to influence state conventions
(RNS) Moderate Southern Baptists have formed a national council called Baptists Committed Connection to try to influence the direction of some state conventions of the Southern Baptist Convention.
Officials of the new organization hope to form Baptists Committed groups in as many as 15 additional states, reported Associated Baptist Press, an independent news service.
They hope the groups will follow the model of Texas Baptists Committed, the political group that has maintained moderate control of the Texas convention of Southern Baptists.
Similar groups already exist in two states where conservative Baptists control state conventions _ Arkansas and Oklahoma.
Herbert Reynolds, moderator of a March 2-3 meeting in Nashville, where the council was formed, said the effort intends”to preserve the integrity of the state conventions”and”leave a lasting legacy of freedom for our children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren.” Reynolds, chancellor of Baylor University in Waco, Texas, said many moderates do not want to leave state conventions. Other moderates have turned their attention to the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship, a national moderate group that offers alternative mission programs rather than trying to control the national and state Southern Baptist entities.
David Currie, coordinator of Texas Baptists Committeed, said some moderates must be convinced there’s a spiritual reason to be involved in denominational politics.”You have to give them the kingdom reason to do politics,”he said.”If you say, `Let’s take back the bureaucracy,’ it won’t work.” It is not certain how many state groups will form as a result of the March meeting. Baptists Committed was a national group in the late 1980s, but disbanded except in Texas after the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship began in 1991.
Leaders at the meeting voiced interest in having both organizations represented at state levels.
Mandela asks churches for help in fighting corruption
(RNS) South African President Nelson Mandela, acknowledging some members of his post-apartheid administration are as corrupt as the apartheid-era government, is asking the country’s churches to help fight what he called rampant corruption.”When we came to power (in 1994), we wanted a clean administration, but, after fighting for four years, the very men and women we put there have become as corrupt as the elements we wanted to drive out of the civil service,”Mandela said.
Mandela made his remarks at a meeting of the International Fellowship of Christian Churches.
He compared his plea for anti-corruption aid to the support the churches gave the struggle against apartheid, the South African system of racial separation.”We need your continuing help in implementing our programs to bring down the unacceptably high levels of crime in our country,”he added.”The churches and other religious organizations in particular have a vital role to play.” Mandela’s call to the churches was underscored by news reports that investigators had uncovered a $60 million fraud scheme in the provincial government of Southern Africa’s Northern Province, said Ecumenical News International, the Geneva-based religious news agency.
In late February, Judge William Heath, head of a special government investigation unit charged with rooting out corruption and fraud among government officials, said his panel _ investigating fraud going back as far as 1976 _ had found 834 cases of misuse of funds totaling $1.87 billion.
Mandela told the church meeting the moral fiber of the country had been eroded by the”immoral and illegitimate”rule of the apartheid era.”That is one of our greatest challenges, because our new society can only prosper if it is built on a sound moral foundation,”he said.
Nearly two-thirds of Disney-related films rated R, newsletter says
(RNS) Nearly two-thirds of movies released in 1997 by companies related to the Walt Disney Co. were rated R, a newsletter has reported.
Disney reaped revenues from the R-rated films of more than $750 million in 1997, almost quadruple similar revenues of $199 million in 1993, reported Baptist Press, the official news service of the Southern Baptist Convention.
Baptist Press based its information on Sound Mind Investing, a newsletter with offices in Louisville, Ky. According to the newsletter’s February issue, 65 percent of Disney’s movie offerings were rated R, an increase from 40 percent in 1993.”The overwhelming proportion of Disney’s films are not friendly to families, kids, or our Judeo-Christian values,”wrote Austin Pryor, publisher of the newsletter.
Some of Pryor’s comments referred to the boycott of Disney that has been supported by the Southern Baptist Convention, the Assemblies of God and other evangelical groups.”When we _ or our teens _ spend our money to watch Disney films, we are subsidizing corporate behavior that is at war with the things we cherish most,”Pryor wrote.”Still worse, our kids are absorbing Disney’s view of morality, ethics, and what brings satisfaction in life. … A question to ponder as you consider joining the boycott is not whether we will change Disney, but rather will we let Disney change us?” In a list of 23 Disney-related movies in theaters across the country in February and March, Pryor said only a re-release of”The Little Mermaid”was rated G. Of the rest, 15 were rated R, four PG-13 and three PG.
Disney-owned movie companies include Walt Disney Pictures, Hollywood Pictures, Buena Vista, Miramax, Caravan Pictures and Touchstone Pictures.
Quote of the Day: Southern Baptist seminary professor Paul House
(RNS)”The Southern Baptist Convention must do more to expose pedophiles, urge their prosecution and expose how utterly evil individuals rape our children, damage our marriages and foul our culture. … I pray that Southern Baptists will act before a generation of our children rises up and condemns us for remaining silent, soothing ourselves with the notion that everybody is against child abuse and there is not much we can do.” Paul House, Old Testament professor at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Ky., speaking at a Southern Baptist Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission annual seminar, as quoted in Baptist Press, the denomination’s news service.
DEA END RNS
