c. 1999 Religion News Service

Methodist bishops urge continued church attention to Kosovo

(RNS) The Council of Bishops of the United Methodist Church has issued an appeal to members of the 8.5 million-member denomination not to forget the plight of Kosovar refugees even though the war over Kosovo has ended.”In addition to rebuilding homes, schools and the infrastructure, there is a great need for emotional, psychological and spiritual healing from the trauma of war,”the bishops said in a statement made public Friday (July 16).

The bishops also announced that United Methodists and others have given $4 million to the denomination’s relief effort.

In the statement,”A Call to the United Methodists for Continued Support for the People of Kosovo,”the bishops pointed to a number of needs.”Women and their families need counseling to deal with the personal trauma and social stigma of rape,”the statement said.”People of all ages will have to cope with the loss of loved ones. In a country where ethnic tensions remain high, there is urgent need for ministries promoting tolerance, understanding and reconciliation.” The bishops put prayer at the top of a list of five things Methodists could do to help Kosovars. Others were raising awareness in worship, financial support for the United Methodist Committee on Relief, provision of material resources such as hygiene and school kits, and serving on a volunteer mission team.

Authoritative Jesuit journal declares that hell exists and is eternal

(RNS) Rejecting arguments that science and technology have made the concept of hell obsolete, an authoritative Jesuit journal said Friday (July 16) that hell exists and is eternal but it is man himself who chooses to be damned by rejecting God.

In an editorial published with Vatican approval, the journal Civilta Cattolica disputed the enduring picture of hell as the place of physical torments described by Dante in”The Divine Comedy”and painted by Hieronymus Bosch.”It is misleading, even if the popular imagination represents hell that way, to think that God, by means of demons, inflicts fearful torments on the damned like that of fire,”the editorial said.”Hell exists, not as a place but as a state, a way of being of the person who suffers the pain of the deprivation of God,”Civilta Cattolica said.

Hellfire, it said,”has nothing to do with the fire of which we have experience; it signifies the state of suffering of the entire human being through the fact of being deprived of God, who is the font of all happiness.” The 12-page editorial attacked the conclusions of a recent study on the limits of modern belief,”The Christian Message, Modern Society and the Catholic Church”by the Italian scholar Pietro Prini.”The world as constructed by modern science and technology is a world exorcised of the ancient signs of hell,”Prini wrote.”Science and technology have put to flight the devils with whom Bosch’s theological fantasy populated nature.” The editorial also took issue with the published argument of Italian philosopher Luigi Lombardi Vallauri that the very idea of eternal damnation is incompatible with the infinite love and mercy of God.”It is not God who condemns men to hell but man who freely condemns himself to eternal perdition,”Civilta Cattolica said.”It is man who inflicts it on himself, refusing the salvation that God offers him.”Rejecting the grace and love of God, man condemns himself to the deprivation of God, which is precisely what hell consists of,”the editorial said.”The damnation thus is not wanted by God but by man who refuses God, his grace and his love.” The editorial said the damned feel sensory pain that”is not inflicted externally by God by means of angels or devils as seen in many paintings or read in `The Divine Comedy,’ but it is the sinner that inflicts it on himself by the fact that his refusal of God puts the entire creation of God against him.” God cannot intervene to save man because this would limit”the greatness of the human liberty”with which he has endowed man. If God were to intervene, the threat of perdition would be little more than”the threat of the boogeyman that parents used to make to little children to make them be good.” La Civilta Cattolica (Catholic Civilization), which recently celebrated the 150th anniversary of its founding, is published twice-monthly by the Society of Jesus.

Gospel music sees 21 percent growth in first half of 1999

(RNS) The gospel music industry experienced a 21 percent increase in national album sales for the first six months of 1999 compared to the same period in 1998.

Total units sold of contemporary Christian and gospel music from Jan. 1 to June 30 were 20,562,000, compared to 16,950,000 for the same period in 1998. The increase of more than 3.6 million units was reported by SoundScan, a computerized network that collects sales data from retailers.

The increase in sales came during a time when 6 percent fewer new titles were released, the Gospel Music Association announced. In the first half of 1999, 871 titles were released, compared to 924 during the same time frame last year.

The top-selling albums during the first six months of the year included Kirk Franklin’s”Nu Nation Project”in the No. 1 spot, followed by the”Wow 1999″compilation project, the”Prince of Egypt”and”Touched by an Angel”soundtracks and”Sixpence None the Richer.” Christian retailers sold 56 percent of the albums and singles; mainstream retailers sold 44 percent.

Christian videos also saw a significant increase in the first half of 1999, with a 29 percent growth compared to the first half of 1998.

Big Idea’s”Veggie Tales”children’s video series and Bill Gaither’s”Homecoming”series are largely responsible for the growth in video sales.”We are pleased to reach the midyear point with this type of across-the-board growth,”said Frank Breeden, president of the Gospel Music Association and executive director of the Christian Music Trade Association.

Presbyterians launch churchwide study on domestic violence

(RNS) A Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) task force on domestic violence is asking the whole denomination to be part of a study on violence in interpersonal relationships, especially in the home, church officials announced Friday (July 16).

The task force, appointed by the denomination’s Advisory Committee on Social Witness Policy, will use the results of the study to formulate policy recommendations on the issue to be presented to the church’s General Assembly in 2001.”Participation of individuals and church groups will be crucial in developing policy for the Presbyterian Church so that we may become a more responsive community,”said Peter Sulyok, coordinator for the advisory committee.

A church study document,”Striking Terror No More: The Church Responds to Domestic Violence,”will be the key resource for the project. The document includes study sessions on various forms of interpersonal violence, including child abuse, date rape, elder abuse and spouse abuse.

Catholic `jubilee justice’ conference opens; Belo expected to attend

(RNS) The four-day National Catholic Gathering for Jubilee Justice opened in Los Angeles on Thursday (July 15) with Bishop Carlos Felipe Ximenes Belo of East Timor, co-winner of the 1996 Nobel Peace Prize, certain to receive something of a hero’s welcome when _ and if _ he arrives.

On Thursday, conference organizers received a faxed letter from the Nobel laureate saying Indonesian authorities had barred him from leaving Indonesia to attend the event.

The news prompted Bishop Joseph Fiorenza, president of the National Conference of Catholic Bishops, organizer of the jubilee event, to issue a statement expressing”sorrow and distress”at the action.

But on Friday, Arnold Kohen, author of a new book on Belo, received a fax at his Los Angeles hotel saying Belo had left Indonesia and would arrive in Los Angeles Friday evening. The letter was faxed from Jakarta by a priest in the bishop’s religious order, the Salesians of St. John Bosco.”He was able to leave today,”the priest said.

Fiorenza, in his early statement, noted that”as a leading voice for peace and nonviolence in his native East Timor, Bishop Belo has played an essential role in seeking that the United Nations-sponsored referendum scheduled for next month could result in a free and fair election.” He said the denial of Belo’s right to come to the conference”cannot, in my view, contribute to the successful completion of the referendum process.” In East Timor, meanwhile, bloodshed marred the start of the U.N.-sponsored voter registration process for the Aug. 20 or Aug. 21 referendum on whether East Timor should become an autonomous region within Indonesia or become fully independent.

Indonesia invaded the former Portuguese colony in 1975 and annexed it in 1976, sparking a sometimes-violent independence movement by native Timorese. Since the referendum was announced, anti-independence militias have been attacking supporters of independence. In Friday’s clashes, one militia member was killed and two people were injured in the village of Salasa, about 60 miles southwest of Dili.

Belo is scheduled to speak Saturday to the estimated 3,000 Catholics at the Gathering for Jubilee Justice.

Speaking on other issues Thursday, Fiorenza said the gathering will detail past successes in U.S. church efforts for peace and justice, but also push Catholics to create a more just new millennium.”We seek a few sparks of genius and a multitude of sparks of goodwill to reignite the fire for righteousness,”the bishop said.”We seek fire-tenders to make this spirit grow so it might illuminate minds, warm hearts and brighten the paths we must walk.” Priest told to stop using altar girls

(RNS) Bishop Paul Loverde, head of the Roman Catholic diocese of Arlington, Va., has ordered a priest in the Washington suburb of Falls Church, Va., to stop allowing girls to serve at Mass.

Loverde said the priest, the Rev. Horace”Tuck”Grinnell, pastor of St. Anthony of Padua Church, failed to get permission first, a move the bishop regarded as priestly disobedience.

Grinnell said he would comply with the order but publicly expressed his dissent from the bishop’s ruling, the Washington Post reported Friday (July 16).”Why is it normal that men and women should serve together as lectors (readers), eucharistic ministers and choir members, yet not serve together as altar servers?”the priest asked in the church’s weekly bulletin.”Both male and female altar servers are the norm in the rest of the United States and most of the world (including Rome).” A spokesman for the bishop said the issue was not altar girls but obedience.

The ban on altar girls in the Arlington diocese was put in place by the late Bishop John Keating. Loverde replaced Keating in March.

Pope John Paul II ruled in 1994 that girls can be altar servers, but he left the decision to each diocese. Keating barred the practice because he viewed serving at Mass as a way to encourage boys to become priests.

National leaders of Salvation Army to retire

(RNS) The couple that has served as national leaders of the Salvation Army for four years will retire at the end of August.

Commissioners Robert and Alice Watson, the army’s national commander and national president of U.S. women’s organizations, respectively, became the U.S. leaders of the charitable organization and evangelical denomination in 1995.

General Paul A. Rader announced that Commissioners John and Elsie Busby will become national commander and national president of the women’s organizations, respectively, effective Sept. 1.

John Busby currently serves as the territorial commander for the army’s Southern Territory, which includes 15 Southern states and the District of Columbia. Elsie Busby is territorial president of women’s organizations in that region.

The national president coordinates operations of the Salvation Army from its national headquarters in Alexandria, Va.

Quote of the day: the Rev. Lucia Guzman, executive director, Colorado Council of Churches

(RNS)”It’s still like Easter Sunday every week for a lot of churches, particularly in the Littleton area. … What this tragedy brought was a need for ritual, but the kind of ritual that churches can provide.” _ The Rev. Lucia Guzman, executive director of the Colorado Council of Churches, commenting Friday (July 16) in an Associated Press story on the continuing surge in church attendance following the April 20 shootings at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colo.

DEA END RNS