c. 2000 Religion News Service

Store Agrees to Stop Selling Jeans Covered With Verses From Koran

(RNS) A Michigan clothing store has decided to stop selling women’s jeans decorated with verses from the Koran, the sacred book of Islam, after local Muslim groups threatened a boycott.

Hot Stuff 2 in Detroit’s Northland mall had sold jeans covered with the name of Allah and excerpts from the Koran, such as “In the name of God, most gracious, most merciful.”

Muslim leaders in the Detroit area, which has a large Arab and Muslim population, called for a boycott after Muslim shoppers complained. Among the protesters was the local chapter of the Council on Arab-American Relations, a group that three years ago launched a successful campaign to recall about 38,000 Nike sports shoes emblazoned with a logo similar to the word Allah written in Arabic.

“People simply don’t know that when they’re wearing these pants, it’s a sign of disrespect to the faith and to the people,” Imad Hamad, regional director of the Arab-American Anti-Discrimination Committee in Dearborn, told the Detroit News. He said Muslims exhibit the Koran only in appropriate settings such as libraries or mosques.

China Continues Crackdown on Falun Gong, Buddhism

(RNS) A follower of the outlawed Falun Gong spiritual movement has died after police officers attempted to break the woman’s hunger strike by force-feeding her, a human rights group reported Thursday (July 27), while in Tibet Chinese authorities have barred religious practices in public and will no longer permit students to visit Buddhist sites.

Elementary school teacher An Xiukun, 50, is the 25th Falun Gong follower to die while in policy custody, the Information Center for Democracy and Human Rights reported, according to Reuters news agency. She died at a detention center in Hengshui in Hebei province after choking on food guards attempted to force down her throat, the center said. An, arrested June 6 in Tiananmen Square for demonstrating against China’s ban on Falun Gong, launched the hunger strike to protest being shackled.

Chinese authorities gave An’s husband, Zhang Qizheng, a three-year labor reform sentence after he began demanding that those responsible for his wife’s death compensate him and face punishment, the center reported.

Falun Gong _ a combination of traditional Chinese exercises and Buddhist and Taoist principles _ was banned in China in July of last year after Chinese leaders decided the group was a threat to the Communist Party.

Thousands of Falun Gong practitioners have been arrested since then, and movement leaders have been sentenced to prison terms as long as 18 years.

China’s anti-religion crackdown also continued in Tibet, according to the London-based Tibet Information Network. Under the terms of restrictions imposed in Lhasa, the center of the predominantly Buddhist country, students who visit Buddhist temples or monasteries _ sites popular during end-of-school-year exams _ face expulsion from school.

Chinese officials told the Associated Press they know nothing about the restrictions.

Methodist Church in New Zealand Splits Over Homosexuality

(RNS) The Methodist Church in New Zealand is grappling with a schism over homosexuality that threatens to split the church in two by the end of the year.

The church of about 17,000 members was founded by the Methodist Church in Britain and is now independent. While the church shares theological roots with the United Methodist Church _ the second-largest Protestant church in the United States _ the two are not related.

In New Zealand, about 2,000 people have left the Methodist Church to form the New Zealand Wesleyan Methodist Church, according to Ecumenical News International, the Geneva-based religious news agency. If the trend continues, the church could be down to about 10,000 members by year’s end.

The church is also losing Samoan members after about 400 Samoans left to form six Samoan Evangelical Wesleyan congregations. Most dissidents, however, have not officially “resigned” from the Methodist Church and continue to be on the rolls, prompting church leaders to call it only a partial split.

The New Zealand church and the U.S. United Methodist Church are both struggling with the contentious issue of homosexuality. Dissidents in New Zealand say the church has become too liberal and has strayed from biblical teachings against homosexuality, a view echoed by U.S. conservatives.

“We can no longer stay within the Methodist Church of New Zealand because we refuse to compromise the Word of God,” said one pastor, the Rev. Alan Olliver.

Congregations and church leaders are also struggling with who gets to keep the buildings of dissident congregations. As in many U.S. churches, denominational leaders say the buildings belong to the denomination but the breakaway churches vow to take the buildings with them.

One longtime church observer questioned how long the Methodist Church could survive with only half its members. Jim Veitch, an associate professor at Victoria University in Wellington and a former Methodist pastor, said the church could die within 15 years if the exodus continues.

“Both Pacific Islanders and Europeans think their Wesleyan heritage has been betrayed,” Veitch said. “If I was in Methodist leadership, I would be quite concerned about what is happening.”

Emory, United Methodists Look to Shared Future

(RNS) After years of strained relations, the United Methodist Church and Emory University are looking for ways for the church to stay involved as the Atlanta university becomes increasingly independent.

At a meeting of the church’s Southeastern Jurisdictional Conference _ a regional oversight body of nine southern states _ delegates defeated several moves to tighten control over the university and instead asked to revisit the issue in 2004.

Religious groups, especially the old mainline churches, are increasingly trying to reassert their influence with the secular-leaning colleges and universities they founded. Most church-sponsored colleges, such as Harvard and Princeton, eventually severed ties, but United Methodists have kept a steady hand in Emory’s affairs.

A series of nine resolutions would have required Emory’s president to be a United Methodist, would have banned non-Christian groups from meeting in campus chapels and would have rescinded a narrowly worded policy that allows the blessing of same-sex union ceremonies on Emory’s campus.

The university and the 8.4 million-member church are at odds on the same-sex union issue. Officially, the church prohibits the blessing of same-sex unions by its ministers or in its buildings. The Emory policy allows campus-affiliated ministers to conduct such ceremonies at Emory, but only if the minister’s religious group permits them.

A related resolution would have reversed a decision by Emory’s Board of Trustees to offer insurance benefits to same-sex partners of university employees. That resolution was rejected because it was unclear whether the church could veto a decision made by the university’s trustees.

The university and church leaders recently agreed to a plan to boost United Methodist representation on the school’s Board of Trustees to 60 percent, up from the current 50 percent.

Church officials said there was more than enough room for both the school and the church to have a say in the university’s life.

“We are crafting a 21st century relationship that makes sense in light of the kind of church we have today and the kind of international university that Emory has become,” said North Georgia Bishop Lindsey Davis. “You wouldn’t expect the wineskins of the 1950s to fit in the 21st century.”

Angolan Rebels Free Nuns, Priests

(RNS) Nine nuns and two Catholic priests were among 181 hostages freed Tuesday (July 25) by rebels in Angola after eight days of captivity.

Members of the National Union for the Total Independence of Angola captured the nuns and priests along with eight novices and 170 villagers from Dunde in southern Benguela province July 18. The group _ which has been battling the Angolan government since 1975 _ believed a local Catholic mission was actually a secret area for military use.

“(The rebels) considered the church a military area because they thought they had information the church was surrounded by civilian defense when they thought the church should be neutral,” one of the hostages, Father Pedro Chingando, told the independent station Radio Ecclesia, according to Reuters news agency.

Fighting between Independence separatists and the Angolan government has driven some 2,000 families from Dunde village and the surrounding area. The nation’s 25-year civil war _ begun when Angola won its independence from Portugal _ has claimed nearly 1 million lives.

Scottish King’s Legacy Reinstated

(RNS) An endowment left for prayers for his dead wife by Robert the Bruce, the Scottish king who won his country’s independence by defeating the English at Bannockburn in 1314, has been restored after a 25-year gap caused by local government reorganization.

In 1327, after his second wife, Elizabeth de Burgh, died during a visit to Cullen, the town on the Moray Firth 12 miles west of Banff, the king established an annual endowment of the equivalent of $2.67 in perpetuity for the town’s kirk (church) to pray for the repose of his wife’s soul. The endowment was supplemented in 1543 by Mary Queen of Scots, and even after the Reformation the payments continued though the prayers were no longer said for the dead queen and the money simply went to augment the minister’s salary.

In a government reform in 1975, the Cullen town council was disbanded and the payments forgotten. But local schoolchildren working on their town’s history asked the minister, the Rev. Melvyn Wood, if the payments were still being made.

Wood reminded the new local authority, Moray Council, of the tradition, and on Wednesday (July 26) the council’s policy and resources committee voted not only to restore the endowment _ now standing at $3.36 a year _ but to pay the missing installments, amounting to $84.

The town of Cullen is best known for giving its name to Cullen Skink, a soup made with smoked haddock and potato.

Quote of the Day: Roman Catholic Bishop Josef Homeyer

(RNS) “God, where were you in Paris? Why have you deserted us? Our hearts are heavy. The brute force of sudden death shocks and confounds us.”

_ German Roman Catholic Bishop Josef Homeyer speaking at a memorial service in Hanover, Germany, on Wednesday (July 26) for the 113 people who died when an Air France Concorde jet crashed minutes after takeoff Tuesday in Gonesse, France. He was quoted by the Washington Post.

DEA END RNS