c. 2005 Religion News Service

Nun Who Ministered to Slaves Pushed for Sainthood

NEW ORLEANS (RNS) A Vatican lawyer has collected 2,918 pages of memories, testimonies, and historical and theological arguments in support of sainthood for Henriette Delille, a 19th century woman of color who spent a lifetime ministering to slaves in antebellum New Orleans.

Andrea Ambrosi, a Vatican lawyer specializing in the arcane ways of canonization, left New Orleans in mid-July. He carried files that are the product of 16 years of prayers, promotion and scholarly research by modern admirers of Delille in and out of the Sisters of the Holy Family, the religious order she founded.

Now the long canonization process shifts from years of historical and theological research in New Orleans to critical examination in Rome, church officials said.

Canonization, if it comes, could still be years away, they said.

New Orleans Archbishop Alfred Hughes and admirers of Delille celebrated the milestone with a Mass last Thursday (July 14) at the order’s motherhouse in New Orleans.

In a separate but related development, Delille supporters celebrated another milestone in Houston on Friday (July 15). Officials of the Archdiocese of Galveston-Houston said they would submit to Rome a case in which a 4-year-old girl at the point of death from an overwhelming lung infection experienced an extraordinary, rapid recovery.

Family and friends credit the cure eight years ago to their prayers for Delille’s intercession.

If Vatican medical examiners find no plausible alternative explanation, and if the research into Delille’s life passes theological muster, Delille might qualify for beatification, the next-to-last step to sainthood.

Supporters of Delille have worked since 1989 to win the church’s recognition for what they say is Delille’s life of holiness and exceptional virtue.

Her stage, from 1813 to 1862, was a New Orleans at the height of its commercial and social power, the “Paris of North America.” White Creoles ruled a polite society that bought African slaves at public auction. Wealthy white men often kept separate families by mixed-race mistresses under the placage system.

The great-granddaughter of an African slave, Delille’s mother was a free woman of color.

“We know that her mother lived in a placage relationship _ a mistress, probably of a white man. We don’t know for sure; we do know this was very common for free women of color,” said Sister Sylvia Thibodeaux, mother superior of Delille’s order.

“Henriette came from that tradition, but she broke with it and chose another way of life. She offered another alternative to free women of color: They could choose to be religious.”

_ Bruce Nolan

Election-Related Complaint Against Falwell’s Ministries Dismissed

(RNS) The Federal Election Commission has dismissed a complaint filed against Jerry Falwell Ministries concerning an e-mail he sent during the 2004 election season.

The unanimous decision, announced Monday (July 18) by Falwell’s lawyers, dismissed allegations by the Campaign Legal Center that Jerry Falwell Ministries and Liberty Alliance, a lobbying organization that supports Falwell’s Web site, had violated election laws by circulating a “Falwell Confidential” e-mail during the summer of 2004.

In the July 1, 2004, e-mail, Falwell stated: “For conservative people of faith, voting for principle this year means voting for the re-election of George W. Bush. The alternative, in my mind, is simply unthinkable.”

In a letter later that month to the FEC, the Campaign Legal Center said the e-mail was an inappropriate endorsement by a religious organization. The center also complained that the message improperly sought contributions to a political action committee.

Liberty Counsel President Mathew D. Staver, who represented Falwell, argued that Liberty Alliance and Jerry Falwell Ministries are covered by a press exemption and meet a “qualified nonprofit corporation” status because they are supported by private contributions rather than corporate ones. Falwell has founded television networks and radio stations and his religious television program, “Old Time Gospel Hour,” has been broadcast since 1956.

“Religious nonprofit groups are not orphans to the First Amendment,” Falwell said in a statement in response to the dismissal. “I have been expressing my views on politics for five decades and am pleased with the FEC’s ruling.”

Mark Glaze, a spokesman for the Campaign Legal Center, said his organization disagreed with the decision by the FEC commissioners.

“What they did was use their prosecutorial discretion to decline to pursue a matter,” he said in an interview.

_ Adelle M. Banks

Abortion Clinic Bomber Sentenced to Life, Says God Will Vindicate Him

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. (RNS) An unrepentant Eric Robert Rudolph has received two life sentences without parole for carrying out a 1998 bombing at a Birmingham, Ala., abortion clinic that killed an off-duty police officer and injured a nurse.

The 38-year-old Rudolph showed no hint of emotion Monday (July 18) as he heard the victims of his crime speak of their losses and of living in the aftermath of the bombing.

Emily Lyons, the nurse who survived the blast, called him a “monster,” and Felecia Sanderson told about the pain of having to tell her son of her husband’s death.

“There is no punishment in my opinion great enough for Eric Rudolph,” said Sanderson, wife of Birmingham police officer Robert “Sande” Sanderson.

Rudolph will receive two more life sentences when he is sentenced Aug. 22 in Atlanta. Authorities have speculated he will be sent to a maximum-security federal prison.

When allowed to address U.S. District Judge Lynwood Smith Jr., Rudolph lashed out against abortions and the clinics that perform them.

As he read a prepared statement, Rudolph gestured to accentuate his points.

“What I did on January 29, 1998, was pull back the lid on this stinking vat of vomit, revealing the murderers behind the new `progressive society,”’ Rudolph said.

Rudolph avoided the possibility of execution by pleading guilty in April to the bombing in Birmingham and bombings in Atlanta, including the 1996 Olympic Centennial Park blast that killed a woman and injured more than 120 people.

The judge handed down the sentence to Rudolph as called for in a plea agreement. He also ordered Rudolph to pay $1.2 million in restitution and ruled that any proceeds from his crime go toward the payment.

“In the name of faith, you hate,” Smith said. “For the professed goal of saving human life, you killed. These are riddles I cannot resolve.”

Rudolph, however, appeared to have no regrets for his actions as he goes to a prison cell for a lifetime.

“God is not fooled, posterity will certainly judge differently,” he said. “Even if it should take 10 years, 50 years, or 500 years … my actions in Birmingham that overcast day in January of 1998 will be vindicated.”

_ Val Walton

Connecticut School to Study Roots and Growth of Secularism

(RNS) A Swiss-based foundation is giving $2.8 million to Trinity College in Hartford, Conn., to study the rise of secularism in the U.S. and around the world, and its implications for politics, religion and culture.

The five-year grant will fund the Institute for the Study of Secularism in Society and Culture, which will be housed at Trinity’s Greenberg Center for the Study of Religion and Public Life.

The project is bankrolled by the Lucerne-based Posen Foundation, which previously funded the American Religious Identification Survey in 2001 that documented a doubling of the number of Americans who claim no religious affiliation.

That survey found the number of American adults who claimed no religion grew from 14 million to 29 million during the 1990s.

“We owe it to ourselves and future generations that secular ideas and phenomena are clearly understood, so that people can make informed choices,” the foundation said in a statement.

The institute will be headed by Barry Kosmin, who oversaw the 2001 ARIS study, and his research partner, Ariela Keysar. The institute and Greenberg Center will become part of a new Trinity Program on Public Values.

Mark Silk, who will oversee all the projects, said the institute will sponsor academic research, conferences, lectures and seminars on the growth of the non-religious. Silk said he believes it is the first U.S. center dedicated exclusively to the study of secularism.

_ Kevin Eckstrom

Quote of the Day: “Altar Boyz,” a musical comedy on a Christian boy band.

(RNS) “Jesus called me on my cell phone/No roaming charges were incurred/He told me that I should go out in the world/And spread his glorious word.”

_ Lyrics from “Altar Boyz,” an off-Broadway musical about a Christian boy band. The lyrics were quoted in the Washington Times.

MO/PH END RNS