c. 2005 Religion News Service

Poll: Large Majority Oppose Feeding Tube Removal in Non-terminal Patients

(RNS) A poll taken in the aftermath of Terry Schiavo’s death shows that 80 percent of Americans oppose removing the feeding tube of a disabled person who is not terminally ill or in a coma when that person has not left clear written wishes.

The poll, which was released Wednesday (April 6) by Zogby International, was conducted between March 30 and April 2, in the immediate aftermath of the death of Schiavo, 41, a brain-damaged Florida woman.

The feeding tube had been removed March 18 after a long legal battle that reached all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court and involved intervention by both President George W. Bush and the U.S. Congress.

The poll, which asked, “If a disabled person is not terminally ill, not in a coma and not being kept alive by life support, should or should they not be denied food and water?”, found that 80 percent said no, and only 7 percent said that food and water should be denied.

Forty-four percent of the 1,019 likely voters polled by Zogby said that an incapacitated person should be presumed to want to live if he or she does not have a “living will” or other written document detailing his or her wishes. The poll, which was conducted on behalf of the Christian Defense Coalition, had a margin of error of plus-or-minus 3.2 percentage points.

Other news and polling organizations have reported very different findings than what Zogby found. The Gallup Organization, which has polled on the case since 2003, has found that in a series of polls, a majority consistently supported the removal of Schiavo’s tube, with 61 percent supporting the removal as of March 22.

Groups and politicians that had advocated for Schiavo’s tube to be reinserted were disappointed in the apparent discrepancy in findings and accused other pollsters and news organizations of distorting the facts to achieve political goals.

“It was disconcerting to see multiple poll questions based on the misstatements of facts and inaccuracies during the Schiavo case,” Rep. Dave Weldon, R-Fla., said in a statement. “Here we finally see a poll that asks an accurate question and the American public overwhelmingly demonstrates the reason so many diverse individuals fought for the rights of Terri Schiavo.”

“It’s awful to watch as your fellow Americans are kept in the dark, asked their opinion, and then that manufactured opinion is used as a political hammer,” said Robert Knight, director of the Culture & Family Institute at Concerned Women for America, a conservative public policy women’s organization.

_ Holly Lebowitz Rossi

After Dip, Confidence in Religious Leaders Stabilizing

(RNS) An annual Harris Poll shows 27 percent of U.S. citizens have a great deal of public confidence in the leaders of organized religion.

While the 2005 number is the same as last year’s figure, it reflects a sustained notable increase from 2003, when only 19 percent reported having a great deal of confidence in religious leaders, probably because the Catholic sex abuse scandal was at its height.

“Once the issues are addressed, the people are likely to forgive more,” said George H. Moyser, political science chairman at the University of Vermont in Burlington. Roman Catholics’ “strong attachment to the church likely translates to a positive image of national religious leaders,” Moyser said.

Three-fourths of the public expressed at least some degree of confidence in the leaders of organized religion.

According to the latest Harris poll on leadership, released March 17, 16 percent of the public expressed a great deal of confidence in members of the U.S. Congress while 31 percent expressed a great deal of confidence in the Bush administration.

Those with a great deal of confidence in the leadership of the military fell by 15 percentage points since last year, from 62 to 47 percent. Overall confidence in leaders of major institutions _ including the U.S. Military, decreased from 55 percent to 53 percent.

_ Heather Horiuchi

Passover Holiday of Choice of Jewish-Christian Families, Group Says

(RNS) Passover appears to be the religious holiday of choice for interfaith families where one parent is Christian and the other Jewish.

It’s celebrated more than Hanukkah, Christmas and Easter, according to a recent study by a group that encourages interfaith families to observe Jewish holidays.

About 97 percent of survey respondents observed Passover, compared with 92 percent who celebrated Hanukkah, 87 percent who observed Christmas and 59 percent who celebrated Easter, according to the Passover Predicament Survey, conducted in February and released by InterfaithFamily.com.

“Interfaith families raising their children as Jews are dedicated to maintaining a strong Jewish identity by celebrating the Jewish holidays as religious holidays while observing Christian holidays … as cultural holidays,” said Edmund Case, publisher of InterfaithFamily.com, of Newton Upper Falls, Mass.

Case said the relatively low popularity of Easter is “interesting because the original meaning of Easter is deeply religious and focuses on the precise boundary between Jews and Christians, because it commemorates the divinity of Jesus.”

Passover is a celebration of the deliverance of the Jews as slaves from Egypt, when God “passed over” the Jewish houses as he slay the firstborn of Egypt.

One of the families surveyed said that observing Easter doesn’t adversely affect their children’s Jewish identity, using the analogy that “eating Chinese food doesn’t make you Chinese.”

_ Andrea James

Report: Majority of Doctors Say Physician-Assisted Suicide Is Ethical

(RNS) A clear majority of physicians believe that physician-assisted suicide is ethical, and a plurality believe it should be legal, but far fewer say they would actually assist a patient in committing suicide, according to a national survey released March 3.

Fifty-seven percent of the 1,000 physicians surveyed by the Louis Finkelstein Institute for Social and Religious Research and HCD Research said that they support assisting a patient who has made the decision to die based on unbearable suffering.

The survey, which had a margin of error of plus or minus 3 percent, also reported that 41 percent endorse the legalization of physician-assisted suicide.

However, close to that same number _ 46 percent _ said that they personally would not participate in ending a patient’s life for any reason. Thirty-four percent said that they would assist a patient in some cases, while only 20 percent said they would participate in a variety of situations.

Religious affiliations were predictors of physicians’ responses, the researchers said. A majority of Catholic, Protestant and Orthodox Jewish doctors said that assisted suicide is unethical, while Conservative, Reform and secular Jews supported the ethics of the practice.

Also, “differences between political conservatives and liberals are significant throughout the survey,” said Alan Mittleman, who is the director of the Finkelstein Institute. Seventy-two percent of doctors who identified themselves as “conservative” said physician-assisted suicide is unethical, while 81 percent of “liberal” physicians said it is ethical.

The survey was conducted in response to the Supreme Court’s decision to hear a case challenging Oregon’s Death with Dignity Act, which in 1997 became the nation’s only law allowing physician-assisted suicide.

_ Holly Lebowitz Rossi

Survey Shows Food and Fellowship Aids Satisfaction Among Christians

(RNS) Having friendship and food at church leads to greater satisfaction among Christians, according to a study by the Gallup Organization.

A survey of churchgoers showed people who report having strong friendships at church are 26 percent more likely to describe themselves as having an active faith and a close relationship to God.

Food was also a key factor, the February survey said, with 77 percent of respondents saying they were highly satisfied with their place of worship if they had broken bread with their congregation at least once in the past year. “The more people share meals together, the stronger their friendships grow, and the stronger their faith grows,” said Thom Schultz, chief executive officer of Group Publishing, who commissioned the study.

Schultz said the findings of the study are applicable for churches of any size. Providing an environment to develop friendships is a low-budget way to increase faith and church satisfaction, he said.

Another significant finding, Schultz said, was most respondents _ 1002 randomly selected Christians from a range of denominations _ were satisfied with the church they were attending.

Questions written by the Gallup organization included queries about friendship, spiritual maturity, church satisfaction and intimacy with God.

_ Celeste Kennel-Shank

Despite Ban, One-Third of Ultra-Orthodox in Israel Surf the Web

JERUSALEM (RNS) It might be assumed that members of Israel’s ultra-Orthodox Jewish community, known for their strict adherence to the commandments, modest attire and rejection of worldly things like TVs and secular newspapers, would not log on to the Internet.

A study at the University of Washington challenges this supposition, revealing that many “haredim,” or fervently religious Jews actually do surf the web.

The research, which was conducted by UW assistant professor Karine Barzilai-Nahon and Gad Barzilai, a visiting professor from Tel Aviv University, focused on the close-knit community’s relationship with technology. Findings were published in the February issue of Information Society Journal.

“When we started, we were almost certain this community would reject technology,” Barzilai-Nahon said in an article on the UW website. “Instead, we found they have modified it to meet their own needs.”

By examining the Internet-use record of 14,000 haredim _ there are roughly 800,000 in Israel _ the researchers were able to glimpse a world that is notoriously insular and shy of surveys. The data originates from the Israeli online service Hevre, which has 686,000 customers. From this data pool they identified 14,000 people who were clearly ultra-Orthodox.

The records revealed that despite the ban on private Internet use invoked by the community’s rabbis, almost one-third of the ultra-Orthodox actually do surf the Web, the article states.

Furthermore, community members who use the Internet were only half as likely as secular Israelis to send e-mail messages, which would bring them into written contact with outsiders, but were more likely than other Israelis to take part in online forums with members of their own community.

According to the article, far more ultra-Orthodox men were found to use the Internet than women, despite the fact that a large percentage of haredim women work outside the home and support the family, enabling their husbands to study full time in religious seminaries.

The researchers said that the Internet appears to act as a “safety valve” that enables internal voices within the community to express sometimes-unpopular opinions, including challenges to rabbinic authority, something most in the community would be fearful to do openly.

For the most part, they said, community members use the Internet to exchange ordinary information related to a precept in Jewish law, community affairs, or Israeli politics.

“Paradoxically, information technology has affected this community, has intruded into it, but has strengthened it as well,” the researchers are quoted as saying.

_ Michele Chabin

MO/JL RNS END