wfn.org | Episcopal News Service Briefs

[Daphne Mack <dmack@episcopalchurch.org>]

2002-186

News Briefs

Interfaith 'open house' to commemorate
September 11 anniversary

(ENS) The National Council of Churches of Christ
(NCCC) is encouraging Christian churches to participate
in an Interfaith Hospitality Project as a tangible way to
observe the anniversary of the September 11 terrorist
attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.
The project calls on congregations to "extend an 'Open
House' welcome to neighboring Muslims" in early
September, as a way to commemorate the tragedy. 

"In the days following the tragic events of last September,
the doors of many of our houses of worship were
opened, as people who were looking for comfort and
meaning sought out places to reflect and to gather with
others to pray," the NCCC invitation said. "During those
days, responsible leaders reminded us that it was a group
of Islamist terrorists, and not Islam nor ordinary American
Muslims, that had attacked the World Trade Center and
the Pentagon. Interfaith services and public programs
were held. Many mosques and Islamic centers around the
country held Open Houses, inviting the wider community
to come to know them." 

The Interfaith Relations Commission of the National
Council of Churches of Christ (USA) has prepared online
materials to help congregations considering the project,
which may be downloaded, copied and used freely, with
credit to National Council of Churches, USA. 

The Ecumenical & Interfaith Relations Office and the
NCCC request that Episcopal congregations participating
in the project e-mail Bishop Christopher Epting or Jay
Rock at NCCC with news of their plans. 

Survey says business people prefer divine
counsel over spouse, religious leaders

(WSJ) A survey of business leaders found that when
faced with a serious business decision, 74 percent "pray
to God for help or inspiration." By contrast, only 65
percent said they "talk it over with your spouse." 

The survey, commissioned by Central Lutheran Church of
Minneapolis and conducted by Lawrence Research of
Santa Ana, California, polled a random national sample of
500 business executives, defined as company owners,
officers, executives, directors or managers. Three out of
five of those surveyed were owners or managers of
companies with more than 10 workers. A
higher-than-average percentage of these executives
claimed membership in a church or synagogue,72 percent
as compared with 64 percent for all Americans. 

The poll wasn't related to the ethics controversy
ensnarling corporate America. Yet on the subject of
business ethics 70 percent said they believe that business
leaders try to obey the laws. However, six out of 10 said
they believe their specific competitors had done
something unethical to gain an advantage, and 13 percent
said their competitors had done it frequently. 

Central Lutheran commissioned the poll because the
church is located near downtown Minneapolis and yet
experiences minimal interaction with the business
community. The poll illustrated that gap: While 74 percent
of the surveyed executives would pray about a serious
business decision, only 33 percent would talk it over with
a spiritual or religious leader--even though 44 percent had
had a serious conversation within the past three years
with a pastor, priest or rabbi. 

The poll concluded that executives talk to religious
leaders not about business issues but rather about
personal and theological matters. Only 19 percent said
they had ever discussed a business problem with a
religious leader. 

Cremation of former archbishop's wife leads to
debate in Kenyan church

(ENI) The cremation of the wife of the former Anglican
archbishop of Kenya has sparked a debate about the
practice in a country where it is believed only two other
Africans have been cremated in the past 20 years. 

Mary Kuria, the wife of former Archbishop Manasses
Kuria, died on July 6 at age 73 and was cremated at a
private family ceremony two days later. The news of the
cremation came as a surprise to mourners who gathered
at Nairobi's Anglican All Saint's Cathedral for a service of
thanksgiving for Kuria's life. There were gasps of
astonishment when they were told that she had already
been cremated, the East African Standard reported.
They had expected that the service at the cathedral would
be followed by a burial. Kuria's son-in-law, Maurice
Murimi, said, "It was not the family's decision but the
express choice of our mother." 

The decision has led to a debate in the church about the
practice of cremation. Many Kenyans have strong
objections to cremation, which they do not believe is in
accordance with African traditions. The issue is now to
be taken up by the synod of the Anglican Church in
Kenya. 

Anglican Bishop Peter Njenga, who spoke at the
thanksgiving service on July 8, defended the cremation. "I
think the big problem with cremation is that people
believe cremation subjects the body to torture," he told
ENI. "In Kenya, land for burial is growing scarcer by the
day, and whatever remains is being grabbed left and right
by unscrupulous individuals. It would be a good idea for
Kenyans to think about cremation at this juncture." 

He conceded that after the service Christians told him
they had not been given a chance to discuss the issue and
had insisted that the practice of cremation was a "foreign
concept." It is believed that Kuria is only the third Kenyan
African to have been cremated in the past two decades.
But Njenga told ENI he was hopeful more Kenyans
would eventually accept the practice. The current
archbishop of Kenya, Archbishop David Gitari, said that
his church was "not averse" to decisions taken by families
to cremate or requests expressed in an individual's will. 

Church leaders condemn military build-up in
South Asia

(ENI) As India and Pakistan continue their military
stand-off over Kashmir, church leaders from South Asia
have issued a warning about the build up of weapons
across the sub-continent amid growing poverty and
deprivation. 

The church leaders, meeting in Sri Lanka's capital,
Colombo, warned of the danger of military conflict
between India and Pakistan and criticized the money
spent on armaments rather than on tackling the region's
social needs. "The colossal magnitude of human insecurity
and deprivations make South Asia the most vulnerable
space on the globe today," they said in a statement issued
at the end of the gathering that took place July 24-26.
The meeting was organized by the Christian Conference
of Asia (CCA) and the World Council of Churches
(WCC). 

"The situation here is alarming. Development activities are
ignored in the name of national defense," said
Metropolitan Joseph Mar Irenaeus, from India, one of the
CCA's presidents. But the churches' attempt to draw
attention to the "wasteful" military expenditure had led
only to their being branded by nationalist groups as
"anti-national and unpatriotic" for questioning the arms
race, he said. 

Victor Azariah, general secretary of the National Council
of Churches in Pakistan, said that according to
unconfirmed sources, the actual defense allocation in
Pakistan was far above the 30 percent of the annual
budget officially acknowledged. The strengthening of
Pakistan's defense forces to match Indian military power
was having a serious impact on the country's economy
and the poor, he added. 

Mathews George Chunakkara, the WCC's Asia
secretary, said at the Colombo gathering that border
disputes such as that in Kashmir and internal conflicts in
South Asia were responsible for the increase in defense
spending in the region. He pointed out that even smaller
countries such as Bangladesh were now increasing their
military expenditure. The tension between India and
Pakistan made South Asia the only region in the world
where a nuclear war was "a clear possibility", he said. 

Pakistan church officials fear truth may never
be known about massacre

(ENI) Pakistan church officials say the deaths of four
people arrested in connection with a church massacre last
year means that the truth behind the massacre may now
never be known. 

Police in Pakistan's Bahawalpur district said in a
statement that the four were killed when a police vehicle
carrying the four came under attack. "When the assailants
tried to escape after freeing those in custody, police
opened fire," said Pakistan's Dawn newspaper, quoting
the police statement. The shoot-out "continued for an
hour" and resulted in the deaths of the four and two of the
attackers. 

The four men had been arrested in July in connection with
the attack last October by unidentified gunmen on a
church in Bahawalpur in which 15 worshippers and a
security guard died. They were being taken to a village 40
kilometers from Bahawalpur to retrieve the weapons used
in the church attack when the police vehicle was
ambushed, according to the police statement. 

"This means that it is now virtually impossible to know
who were behind the dastardly killing at Bahawalpur,"
Church of Pakistan Bishop John Victor Mall of Multan
diocese told ENI. "They [the arrested] should not have
been killed in this way. We wanted a full trial and
investigation so that we could know who masterminded
the shoot-out on our congregation," said Mall. 

Last October's attack was the worst single massacre of
Christians in Pakistan's history and came shortly after the
start of United States-led military action in neighboring
Afghanistan. The massacre was widely believed to be the
work of Islamic fundamentalists opposed to the US
attacks on Afghanistan. 

First ever Methodist-Episcopal dialogue meets
in Atlanta

(ENS) For the first time in the more than 200-year
history of both churches, representatives of the United
Methodist Church and the Episcopal Church met July
25-26, 2002, in Atlanta, Georgia. Bishop John Lipscomb
of the Diocese of Southwest Florida and Methodist
bishop William B. Oden of the Dallas Episcopal Area
co-chaired the meeting. 

Though both the United Methodist Church and the
Episcopal Church were founding members of the
Consultation on Church Union (now Churches Uniting in
Christ), the two churches have never sat down in a formal
bilateral dialogue. In the early 1990s the Episcopal
Church had a brief dialogue with the historically black
Methodist Churches (the African Methodist Episcopal
Church, the African Methodist Episcopal Church Zion,
and the Christian Methodist Episcopal Church). 

In addition, there has been ongoing dialogue between the
Church of England and the British Methodist Church. In
1972 these two churches came very close to reuniting.
Most recently the Church of England approved a
proposal to explore the possibility of covenanting with the
British Methodist Church. In 1996, the International
Anglican-Methodist dialogue produced the final statement
"Sharing in the Apostolic Communion," submitted to the
1998 Lambeth Conference. It commended the report to
Anglican provinces for further study and encouraged the
development of regional dialogues between Methodists
and Anglicans. 

"We are delighted that this dialogue is finally off the
ground," said Dr. Thomas Ferguson, the Episcopal
Church's associate deputy for ecumenical relations. "In
many ways the United Methodist Church is the church
closest to Anglicanism in terms of history and liturgy." 

The sessions focused on the historical commonality
between the two churches as well as the goals of the
dialogue. "Our goal is nothing less than full communion
and interchangeability of ministries, for the sake of
common witness and mission," said Oden, summing up
the consensus of the group. 

The group heard papers by Dr. Bruce Mullin, professor
of church history at the General Seminary, and Dr.
Russell Richey, dean of Candler School of Theology. In
his paper "Historical Commonality," Mullin noted that
while the Methodist-Anglican dialogue was in some
senses a "family reunion," he also noted it was a reunion
between two children separated at birth, since the United
Methodist Church and the Episcopal Church have never
been in formal dialogue with one another. Despite this
lack of dialogue Richey spoke on "Shared and Diverse
American Experience," noting that the two churches are in
many ways struggling with similar issues. Ferguson
presented a paper on "Our Ecumenical Foundations,"
with a particular emphasis on the Chicago-Lambeth
Quadrilateral as the blueprint of the Episcopal Church's
ecumenical ecclesiology. 

The dialogue concluded by identifying future agenda
items, including examining the documents produced by
the Church of England dialogue, exploring sources of
authority in both churches, the possibilities of eucharistic
sharing, and a discussion on the orders of ministry. The
next meeting of the dialogue is scheduled for February,
2003.