c. 1999 Religion News Service

White House ethics panel favors use of embryonic cells in research

(RNS) A White House advisory panel on bioethics has decided in a straw vote that scientists receiving federal funding should be permitted to derive embryonic cells for research as well as do research on cells derived by others.

In recent months, embryonic stem cells have been highlighted as a possible key to treating numerous diseases.

But one way of harvesting the cells is to destroy a living embryo, which opponents charge is morally wrong. Such embryos, microscopic clusters of a few hundred cells that are not yet ready to implant in the uterus, have been discarded by fertility clinics. The other method for gaining cells is to take them from aborted fetuses, a use the commission argues is equivalent to transplanting organs from a cadaver, The New York Times reported.

The vote Monday (June 28) by the National Bioethics Advisory Commission came as it tries to draw a line between those who say an embryo has the same rights as a person and those who believe the destruction of embryos is justified by the hopes of major medical advancement.

The Department of Health and Human Services issued an opinion in January that federally funded scientists can do research on human embryonic cells derived with private money but it would be illegal for them to derive the cells themselves.

One commission member, Dr. Thomas H. Murray, president of the Hastings Center, a research organization dealing with ethical issues, suggested having the government support cell research but not the derivation of cells would prevent offending those who are troubled by embryo destruction.

But other members said Congress _ which has prohibited federal funding for research involving destroyed embryos _ would more likely favor a consistent stand on the use and derivation of the embryos. Officials of the National Institutes of Health hope the HHS opinion will lead to a dropping of the prohibition, but dozens of members of Congress dispute the department’s interpretation of the law.

Ten commissioners voted against Murray’s suggestion, three abstained and none appeared to be in favor when the straw poll was taken.

Some commissioners said research from embryonic cells would continue in private companies if federally funded researchers do not get a go-ahead to do similar work.

As the commission nears completion of its report in July, resolution of the conflict is hard to predict.”N.I.H. doesn’t know that they have the votes to reverse the prohibition,”said Richard Doerflinger, associate director for policy development at the National Conference of Catholic Bishops.”But I don’t know that my side has the votes to get language that would explicitly ban it.”

Pope says he longs to make a pilgrimage to the Holy Land next year

(RNS) _ Pope John Paul II said today he longs to make a pilgrimage to the Holy Land in the year 2000 to traverse again”the road of divine Revelation,”but he stopped short of announcing definite plans for the trip.

Both Israeli and church officials have said they expect John Paul to visit Jerusalem and other holy sites in the Middle East in late March, and Vatican sources had said he might announce the trip during Tuesday’s (June 29) celebrations of the Feast of Sts. Peter and Paul.

But the pope, speaking to some 30,000 pilgrims gathered for the midday Angelus prayer, said he is leaving his desire to make the pilgrimage in God’s hands and asked for their prayers.

Announcing the Vatican would on Wednesday issue a”Letter on the Pilgrimage to Holy Places Linked to the Story of Salvation,”the pope said the document is”a reflection connected with my desire to personally carry out, if God wishes, a special jubilee pilgrimage, stopping in some localities linked to the salvation story.

In a key section of his prepared text, which the pope omitted, he listed the places he hoped to visit in Iraq, Egypt, Israel and the Palestinian Authority while indicating political problems are threatening to block the trip.”I want to underline the exclusively religious and spiritual significance of such a pilgrimage, to which, therefore, no other interpretations can be attributed,”he said.”To visit ancient Ur of the Caldeans, birthplace of Abraham, or Mount Sinai, symbol of the Exodus … and, above all, Nazareth, Bethlehem and Jerusalem signifies traversing again”the road of divine Revelation.””The longing is strong in me to go to pray in these places in which the living God has left his imprint and which I visited in part in 1965 when I was archbishop of Krakow,”the pope said.”To return as pilgrim pope on the occasion of 2000 is an intention that I entrust to the Lord and to the most blessed Madonna, confident also of your prayers.” In his homily at the Mass he celebrated in St. Peter’s Basilica, awash with the crimson of cardinals and magenta of bishops, the Roman Catholic pontiff appealed to Catholics and Orthodox to forget”the errors committed in the past”and end the schism that has divided them since the year 1054.

Welcoming a delegation sent to Rome for the feast by the Orthodox Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I, the pope said the”approach of the jubilee of the year 2000 invites us”to pray for unity.

He said as a”concrete expression of our will to join in the initiatives of our brothers of the Orthodox churches and at the same time of the desire that they take part in ours,”the Orthodox Feast of the Transfiguration will be placed on the Holy Year calendar as”a day of prayer and fasting for unity.” An Orthodox delegation did not attend last year’s celebrations of the Feast of Sts. Peter and Paul, but the pope’s visit to Orthodox Romania in May and the creation of committees to work out differences have helped to ease the strains.

Candidate Dole proposes libraries lose funding if linked to porn

(RNS) Republican presidential candidate Elizabeth Dole has proposed that public libraries should lose federal funds if they permit access to pornography via the Internet.

Dole said the pornography debate is a key part of America’s culture wars.”This isn’t about First Amendment protections,”she said.”It’s about our values.” Dole supports new computer software that helps filter out pornography for computer users, The Washington Post reported.”We shouldn’t let pornography slip in through an electronic back door,”Dole said at a news conference at a library near Seattle.”Libraries shouldn’t use federal tax money to put pornography on their shelves and they shouldn’t put it on their desktops or laptops.

The presidential hopeful has sent letters to congressional leaders and has urged Republicans on Capitol Hill to”close a loophole”in the House’s juvenile justice bill”that allows adults to gain access to pornographic material at federally funded libraries.” The legislation currently requires libraries to prevent children from viewing pornography on computers, but Dole said the legislation should be more strict.

Republican pollster Michael Baselice, who is neutral in the presidential race, expects conservatives will be particularly attracted to Dole’s plan.”If you can end smut on the Internet and cut off federal dollars going to fund access to it, it’s a twofer,”he said.

Serb Orthodox church leaders step up criticism of Milosevic

(RNS) Patriarch Pavle, head of the Serbian Orthodox Church, and Bishop Artemije, head of the church in Kosovo, have upped the church’s criticism of Serb President Slobodan Milosevic, saying his policies are the root of the evil done in Kosovo.

Speaking at a Monday (June 28) news conference at an Orthodox monastery in Gracanica, Kosovo, the patriarch said that if Serbia could survive only through”crime”then it should not survive at all, The New York Times reported.”If the only way to create a greater Serbia is by crime, then I do not accept that, and let that Serbia disappear,”he said.”And also, if a lesser Serbia can only survive by crime, let it also disappear. And if all the Serbs had to die and only I remained and I could live only by crime, then I would not accept that, it would be better to die.” The patriarch’s comments came on the 10th anniversary of Milosevic’s famous Serb nationalist speech in Kosovo widely regarded as setting the stage for a decade of conflict between Serbs and the ethnic Albanian majority in Kosovo, a province of Serbia.

Earlier this month, shortly after the end of the NATO bombing campaign, the church’s Holy Synod, it’s highest policy body, called on Milosevic to resign.

Artemije was in stronger in his criticism of the Serb leader.”We are both aware, as God knows, how much evil has been done in the course of the last year and especially in the last three months,”the bishop said.”The great part of the guilt lies with Milosevic.” While he also faulted extremist elements of the Kosovo Liberation Army for the violence that has followed the end of the bombing, he said the Albanians’ hatred and desire for revenge was understandable.”What is not understandable is the suffering caused by the undemocratic regime of Milosevic,”he said. “The Orthodox Church has called for the resignation of Milosevic not because we lost the war in Kosovo, but because we think the problem could have been resolved peacefully,”Artemije said.

Leader of Armenian Apostolic Church dead at 66

(RNS) Karekin I, the leader of the Armenian Apostolic Church, died Tuesday (June 29) after a bout with cancer.

The 66-year-old head of one of the world’s oldest Christian faiths had suffered from a”heavy illness,”the church stated.

Pope John Paul II had scheduled a visit to meet with Karekin this summer, but canceled the plans due to the health problems of the Armenian spiritual leader, whose title was”Catholicos.” The white-bearded, bespectacled Karekin had worked to promote Armenia and its church abroad, Reuters reported. He often called for a peaceful solution to an 11-year-old dispute with Azerbaijan, a neighboring Muslim republic, over the majority Armenian Karabakh region.

The Armenian Apostolic Church is 1,700 years old and is one of the Ancient Churches of the East that split away from Byzantine Christianity before the Great Schism of 1054, which divided the Eastern and Western churches.

Karekin, who was born in Syria and educated at Oxford University, became the leader of the church in 1995, four years after Armenia won independence from the Soviet Union.

Quote of the day: former Vice President Dan Quayle

(RNS)”Being there for the children means spending time with the family _ and I’m not talking about quality time, I’m speaking of quantity time. It is impossible for invisible parents to instill values in their children.” – Former Vice President and Republican presidential nomination candidate Dan Quayle in saying the government makes it too difficult for mothers to stay home with their children. Quayle was quoted by the Associated Press on Monday, June 28.

DEA END RNS