wfn.org | Episcopal News Service Briefs

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2001-306

News Briefs

Economy, not tragedy, may reduce charitable giving

     (ENS) A survey released by the group Independent Sector reveals 73 percent 
of Americans who made charitable gifts in response to the September 11 terrorist 
attacks say they'll continue to give as much or more than they usually give to 
other charities.

     But one in ten Americans indicate they will completely stop their giving and 
an equal number say they will greatly reduce their giving if the economy worsens.

     The poll, conducted by Wirthlin Worldwide, found that only 26 percent of 
September 11 donors say they will not give as much as they usually do or won't 
give any more at all. 70 percent of Americans reported charitable involvement in 
some way following the attacks, with more than half (58%) giving money to 
charities in the four weeks just after September 11, while 13 percent gave blood 
and 11 percent gave time. 

     "The convergence of three factors--the terrorist attacks, a shaky economy, 
and rising needs--has made this a precarious time for charities as they work to 
serve their communities," said Sara E. Melindez, president of Independent Sector. 
"However, the results of this poll indicate that most Americans are thinking of 
their giving to September 11 charities as over and above their normal giving. 
Despite this encouraging finding, the economy presents a cause for concern."

     The survey was conducted from October 5 to 8 among 1,009 Americans adults 
and has a margin of error of 3.1 percentage points. Independent Sector is a 
nonprofit, nonpartisan coalition of more than 700 national organizations, 
foundations, and corporate philanthropy programs.

     European bishops urge controls to stem rise in world poverty  

     (ENI) A report commissioned by Roman Catholic bishops from European Union 
countries has called for a system of global governance to counter world-wide 
poverty and instability.  

       The report said world-wide economic interdependence had "grown 
extraordinarily" in a single generation--with a tripling of trade in goods and 
services since the 1970s--and would "neither stop nor go into reverse." However, 
the difference between rich and poor countries had doubled since 1960, with the 
richest 20 countries enjoying per capita incomes 40 times those of the poorest 
20, warned the Commission of the Bishops' Conferences of the European Community 
(COMECE) in the 10,000-word report released on October 24.  

     "Global governance is the key to ensure the positive impacts of 
globalization are enhanced and its potentially negative effects diminished," the 
report said. "Globalization has been brought about as a result of immense 
technological progress. It has brought us an exceptional growth in the exchange 
of information, capital and goods. However, it has not contributed sufficiently 
to significantly reducing poverty and inequality."  

      Among concrete proposals, the report called for the formation of a "Global 
Governance Group," composed of 24 government leaders, to hold annual summits with 
heads of the UN, International Monetary Fund, World Bank, World Trade 
Organisation (WTO) and the International Labour Organisation (ILO). The document 
added that a "world environment organization" should also initiate and supervise 
measures to tackle deterioration of the global climate, depletion of the ozone 
layer, and other urgent international problems.  

     The drafters of the COMECE report said that the September 11 terrorist 
attacks in the US was a "decisive moment for the future of global security," but 
warned that military and security measures would not resolve a "deep malaise" in 
many regions of the world, where richer countries were "resented as being unfair, 
selfish and oppressive."  

      COMECE represents approximately 750 Roman Catholic bishops from the 
European Union's 15 member-states. 

     

In the midst of war, a passage for prayer opened to Bethlehem 

      (ENI) Some 1000 Christian clergy and laymen marched from Jerusalem to the 
violence-torn streets of Bethlehem to pray for peace in the Holy Land.  

      As the demonstrators, accompanied by a few Muslim leaders, proceeded, they 
were honored by fighters in the front-line. Israeli soldiers briefly left their 
posts, tanks moved aside and Palestinian gunmen laid down their guns for a few 
hours during the procession on October 23.  

      "Suddenly all the soldiers and tanks disappeared and hid," said Father Raed 
Abushaliah, chancellor of the Latin Patriarchate in Jerusalem.  

      "God of peace, give our land peace," sang thousands of Palestinians, who 
joined the march through Bethlehem, revered as the birthplace of Jesus Christ.  

      Bethlehem is one of six Palestinian-controlled cities that have been 
encircled in the largest Israeli military offensive in the West Bank since the 
signing of the 1993 Oslo peace accords. The operation was launched following the 
assassination of the Israeli tourism minister,  Rehavam Zeevi, on October 17 in 
Jerusalem. A radical Palestinian group claimed responsibility for the 
assassination.  

      But the heads of the Christian churches in Jerusalem said that his murder 
did not justify Israel's siege against Palestinian-ruled cities, in particular 
Bethlehem. They called on the international community to pressure Israel to 
withdraw its troops.  

     In Bethlehem, a circles of stones was placed in Manger Square to mark the 
place where a worshipper emerging from the Church of the Nativity was killed by 
Israeli gunfire, according to Palestinian witnesses. The Church of the Nativity 
was built over the spot where Jesus is believed to have been born.  

      Israeli officials, however, denied aiming at the church, which was 
punctured by bullets. They accused the Palestinians of launching attacks from 
areas near churches, in the hopes of drawing return fire that would damage the 
Christian holy places. 

     Palestinian mortars were fired recently from Beit Jala at Gilo, a Jewish 
neighborhood of Jerusalem annexed from the West Bank in a move that has never 
been recognized by the international community.  

     "There is a cynical and deliberate use of Christian holy places by 
Palestinian militias in order to shoot against Israel," said Israeli Foreign 
Ministry spokesman Emmanuel Nahshon. "This is done deliberately in order to 
provoke an Israeli reaction, which would somehow put the Christian world at odds 
against Israel."

     

Study: Protestants still majority, non-Christians on the increase 

     (RNS) A study of American religious identification shows that the majority 
of adult adherents continue to be tied to Protestant and other non-Catholic 
denominations but the numbers of those who say they are non-Christians or have no 
religion have risen substantially.

     The American Religious Identification Survey, 2001, released October 22 by 
the Graduate Center of the City University of New York, is a follow-up to a 
survey conducted in 1990. It found that 52 percent of American adults are 
Protestant, 24.5 percent are Catholic and 14.1 percent are not affiliated with a 
religion. Researchers determined that 1.3 percent of adult Americans described 
their religion as Jewish and 0.5 percent as Muslim.

     The results, based on more than 50,000 adult respondents, found that 
Protestant and other non-Catholic denominations continue to have the majority of 
adult adherents--more than 105.4 million--but their proportion dropped from 60 
percent in 1990 to 52 percent in 2001.

     The number of adults who identify with a non-Christian religion rose 
dramatically from about 5.8 million to 7.7 million. Their proportion increased 
slightly--to 3.7 percent from 3.3 percent in 1990. 

     Researchers found that the number of adults identifying with no religion 
more than doubled, from 14.3 million (8 percent) in 1990 to 29.4 million (14.1 
percent) in 2001.

     The number of adults describing their religion as Jewish dropped from 3.1 
million to 2.8 million. An additional 2.5 million who said they had no religion 
or identified with another religion have Jewish parents, were raised Jewish or 
consider themselves Jewish for some other reason.

     Adults who described themselves as Muslim or Islamic totaled 1.1 million, 
almost double the number in 1990. Twenty-three percent of this group said they 
were black while the vast majority of the others said they were white or Asian.

     

Planned UK law on religious hatred prompts protests  

     (ENI) In its efforts to prevent acts of religious hatred since the September 
11 terror attacks, the British government is planning to introduce a law "of 
which the Taliban might be proud," according to civil libertarian and lawyer John 
Mortimer.  

      Mortimer, who created the television character Rumpole of the Bailey--an 
exasperating but shrewd and lovable defense barrister--complained that the 
proposed law against incitement to religious hatred was "a disastrous attack on 
the freedom to debate one of the most important subjects of the world--religion."  

      In a move to protect the Muslim community in the aftermath of the September 
attacks, the British home secretary, David Blunkett, announced that he planned to 
extend the law on incitement to include religious as well as racial hatred. The 
maximum penalty for the offense, part of a package of emergency measures due to 
be introduced into Parliament before Christmas, will be seven years. Blunkett 
said he was determined that "attention seekers and extremists" should not be able 
to use religion "to divide and fragment communities in our country in this 
difficult time."  

      His plans were welcomed by the Muslim Council of Britain (MCB), the chief 
representative body for Muslims in the country. MCB secretary general Yousuf 
Bhailok said that the changes were "steps in the right direction" and an 
"important development." He praised Blunkett's comment that "the biggest freedom 
of all is the freedom from hate."  

     Joel Edwards, general director of the Evangelical Alliance, issued a warning 
about the proposed law, saying that it might restrict the Christian mission to 
spread the gospel. In a letter to The Times of London, he commented: "It would be 
ironic in the extreme if a well-intentioned piece of legislation aimed at 
protecting religious freedom were to have the opposite effect."  

     Edwards pointed to an official warning, announced October 24, to a prominent 
Christian radio station that it had breached broadcasting rules about criticizing 
other religions. The Radio Authority, which has regulatory powers, followed up 
complaints and found that Premier Christian Radio had aired offensive material 
about the Koran, as well as Hindu and Buddhist scriptures. This illustrated, 
Edwards said, the challenge of advancing the unique claims of Christ while 
minimizing statements that were offensive to other faiths.  

      Edwards said the Evangelical Alliance would stand firm against the 
victimization of members of other faiths, but he appealed to the British 
government not to confuse religious pluralism with syncretism--"to pretend that 
faiths are all the same, or where there are differences they don't  matter." 

     He indicated that religious leaders needed to accept some blame:  "Religion 
is in denial. It may be suggested that there is no such thing as bad religion, 
yet around the world bad political ideologies are being sustained by a framework 
of bad religions."

     

General Seminary board endorses next step in plans to share property with 
national offices

     (GTS) Trustees of the General Theological Seminary in New York endorsed 
plans to develop and share the seminary property in an agreement with the 
national offices of the Episcopal Church. The decision mirrored action taken by 
the church's Executive Council at its meeting in Jacksonville, Florida, October 
16.

     Each institution approved, in concept, plans for the seminary site presented 
last June by Dean Ward Ewing of GTS and Treasurer Steve Duggan of the church. The 
next step is to appoint a joint six-member committee to prepare a Letter of 
Agreement outlining the real estate, legal and financial details of the new 
relationship.

     "The proposal for the Church Center and GTS to share the site now occupied 
by the seminary at Chelsea Square is, at its core, a choice about more than urban 
geography. Rather, it is a choice about vision," said Dean Robert Giannini of 
Christ Church Cathedral in Indianapolis, chair of the GTS board. "I feel most 
gratified by the positive action taken by both institutions this week. It says 
that the vision before us can be realized."

     The project would include a major renovation of the seminary building on Ninth 
Avenue, adding space for national church offices and new offices for the seminary. 
The architects propose a dramatic atrium leading to the seminary's historic garden. 
At the other end of the property, a complex of buildings fronting Tenth Avenue would 
be transformed into a conference center with 60 rooms and state-of-art facilities. 

     The Letter of Agreement will be presented to the church's Executive Council and 
the GTS board in February 2002.