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A new generation of Christians has advanced itself into a 50-year-old ecumenical movement and is learning just how diverse faith groups are “being Christian together.” A hundred college students joined hundreds of participants from 80 Roman Catholic, Orthodox, Protestant, Pentecostal, Anglican, and Evangelical denominations and organizations over the past several days to discuss the progress of Christian unity and its future. "I think it's very good to see this fresh new wave of young scholars interested in talking with each other about what they find in common and what distinctives they bring to the understanding of Christian faith," commented Wesley...

RIVERSIDE'S TERROR RALLY By CHARLES E.F. MILLARD October 18, 2006 -- In the uproar over Monday's outrageously soft sentence for terror-aiding lawyer Lynne Stewart, Riverside Church seems to be distancing itself from the despicable rally it hosted in her support Sunday. Stewart was convicted by a jury of her peers. The uncontested facts were that she had smuggled messages from convicted terrorist Omar Abdel Rahman ("the blind sheik") to his followers in the Islamic world. Those messages directed his followers in the terror group Gama'a Islamiyya to end their cease-fire with the Egyptian government and begin killing Rahman's enemies. Rahman,...

WHY THE RELIGIOUS RIGHT MUST MOBILIZE AGAINST HILLARY:CLINTON CONFLATES EVANGELICAL CHRISTIANS AND ISLAMO-FASCIST TERRORISTS by Mia T, 03.16.06 It is wrong to demonize and cartoonize one another and ignore evidence and to make false charges and to bear false witness. Sometimes I think our friends on the other side have become the people of the Nine Commandments. It is wrong to bear false witness because we all see through [the] glass darkly.... We have a curious situation in American where the religious right has tried to turn all who disagree with them into two-dimensional cartoons. I read a very...

REV. JAMES FORBES Gets 510G a year. A group of parishioners at storied Riverside Church has charged that $10 million has "simply disappeared," finances are in disarray, and the church's high-profile minister has received excessive, unauthorized raises. Five parishioners — some of whom once held leadership positions at the soaring, Gothic landmark perched on the Hudson River — are asking a judge to appoint an independent receiver to examine Riverside's books and order a special meeting to discuss church governance. The parishioners say Riverside's leader, the Rev. James Forbes, receives a $280,000 salary and a $240,000 housing allowance, and...

To: Assignment Desk, Daybook Editor Contact: Connie Julian, 917-449-9064, Janet Yip 212-941-8086 or commission@nion.us News Advisory: From: International Commission of Inquiry on Crimes Against Humanity Committed by the Bush Administration WHEN: January 10, 2006 at 1:30 p.m. WHERE: The White House, Walk-in Gate, across from Lafayette Park WEBSITE: http://www.bushcommission.org An unprecedented series of indictments alleging war crimes and crimes against humanity, in five separate areas, on moral, political, and legal grounds, will be delivered by a citizens' tribunal to President Bush at the front gate of the White House this Tuesday, January 10th. Named in the indictments are: President of...

The words that the Rev. James A. Forbes chose to share with the roomful of black gay and lesbian faithful might have come straight from the civil rights struggles of the 1960s. Forbes reminded his listeners that discrimination has no place in this world and urged them to lay down the notion put forward by some black ministers that they are less favored by God. "Your job is to get up every day and be grateful to God for your DNA," Forbes said. "It took an artist divine to make this design!" Forbes, senior minister at the Riverside Church, was...

Should you wish to be a fully-fledged member of an anti-American support groups at the United Nations in New York you must hate George W. Bush, love John Kerry and be rich. To be both a member and a leader, you need to be unimaginably rich. During September, one such person -- the "Red Queen of Peace" -- was roaming the U.N. corridors as she has done for the past 36 years. It was Mrs. Cora Weiss, daughter of the late Faberge Fragrances millionaire and friend to the Soviets, Samuel Rubin. Paraphrasing Shakespeare, age has not withered her, nor custom...

Our ex-president's heart warned him a few days after he mounted the pulpit in Riverside Church to preach to the long converted. Once upon a time it was known as a Christian congregation, but today it is a Congregation of Faith -- many faiths. Bill, wearing a dark suit, a white shirt and a most solemn expression, did not quote from Bishop Augustine, who lived in 400 A.D. and is said to have prayed. Clinton had other issues -- such as the "moral and democratic crises" of our times to talk about. Crises are not new to Riverside Church, a...

Bill Clinton bashed President Bush in a speech delivered from the pulpit of a prominent Manhattan church on the Sunday before the Republican National Convention began. Yet, Americans United for Separation of Church and State does not view Clinton's pulpit-based diatribe a violation of tax laws. Ever since then-Sen. Lyndon Johnson (D.-Tex.) slipped a provision into a bill back in 1954, federal law has prohibited tax-exempt churches from engaging in partisan political speech. Every election season, Americans United files complaints against churches that it alleges have violated this law. The group also opposes the Houses of Worship Free Speech Restoration...

It was quite telling that the strongest religious statement made at the Republican convention came not from a Republican but from a Democrat, Georgia Senator Zell Miller, who claimed, among other things, that the current President is the same person on Saturday that he is on Sunday morning. Convention speeches are carefully managed. And I suspect that a shrewd Republican handler ensured that the convention’s most emphatic statement in support of Bush’s faith be offered by a Democrat. Why? Because the Bush team has learned a crucial lesson: The press does not express outrage when Democratic politicians, unlike Republican politicians,...

Clergy members of many different faiths sing together at Riverside Church in New York during a Let Justice Roll rally Tuesday. (Photo by Harry DiOrio) The Rev. James Forbes, pastor of Riverside Church in New York, delivers a sermon at the Let Justice Roll rally. Riverside is a focal point of the revitalized religious progressive movement. (Photo by Harry DiOrio)   VALUES AND PHILANTHROPY Religious Left Says It's Ready for Major Political Push BY MARK O'KEEFE More Mark O'Keefe Stories NEW YORK -- With a full-page ad in the New York Times, a flashlight-illuminated protest on Broadway and a...

Rev. Bubba uses Billy pulpit to bash Bush BY MAGGIE HABERMAN DAILY NEWS CITY HALL BUREAU Bill Clinton hammered Republicans from a Manhattan church pulpit yesterday as a group of right-wingers bearing "false witness" against the Democrats. The attack was part of a two-pronged assault yesterday by the former President and his wife, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.), marking the unofficial launch of the Democrats' counter-offensive during the GOP convention. In a scripture-laden speech, Clinton also said controversial attack ads against Democrat John Kerry's military record were the same "smear" that was used on Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) and former...

Former President Clinton, quoting scripture from a church pulpit, sought to frame the 2004 election in moral terms on Sunday and said President Bush's Christianity doesn't keep him from seeing things "through a glass darkly....." Her husband, the former president, speaking at Riverside Church in upper Manhattan, said, "Politics and political involvement dictated by faith is not the exclusive province of the right wing.".... The Democrats, Clinton argued, need to show their policies are also rooted in faith. "The religious right has tried to turn us all, in disagreeing with them, into two-dimensional cartoons," he said. Speaking of Bush's religious...

NEW YORK - Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, D-N.Y., and former President Bill Clinton strongly implied Sunday that the Bush White House was involved in a "smear" attack on the Vietnam War record of Democratic presidential nominee John F. Kerry. President Bush and Ed Gillespie, party spokesman at the Republican National Convention, moved to distance themselves from the television ads sponsored by the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth. But Sen. Clinton said on CNN's "Late Edition with Wolf Blitzer," "It's so sad that these smear tactics have been undertaken by this group, and apparently with at least the knowledge, if not...

Clintons at Riverside, replaying now...

NEW YORK — Former President Clinton, quoting scripture from a church pulpit, sought to frame the 2004 election in moral terms on Sunday and said President Bush's Christianity doesn't keep him from seeing things "through a glass darkly." Hillary Rodham Clinton said Bush's re-election "would be a disaster." A day before the Republicans opened their convention, the Clintons spent the day reminding the GOP that New York City is still a Democratic town. Before joining her husband at church, Sen. Clinton, D-N.Y., made the rounds of TV talk shows. When asked if she agreed with Democratic presidential nominee John...

Former President, William J. Clinton will address the congregation during the worship service on Sunday, August, 29, 2004. Dr. Forbes will introduce Mr. Clinton as part of an anouncement about the current Mobilization 2004 campaign to recover America's spiritual, moral and democratic values. United States Senator, Hillary Rodham Clinton will also attend the service.