Free Republic

The Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), severely split over homosexuality, would maintain its ban on gay clergy but allow some leeway in enforcing it under a proposal headed to a national assembly vote on Tuesday. A key committee, which divided 30-28, proposed keeping on the books a church law mandating that lay officeholders as well as all clergy restrict sexual activity to heterosexual marriage. But another bill would give local congregations and regional "presbyteries" leeway on whether to require that rule in all cases. . . . Another bill that could prompt intense debate would encourage gender- neutral worship language for the...

In the coming days, leaders of the Presbyterian Church USA will take up a controversial issue – whether to divest from Israel. Why do these Presbyterians think as they do? Their critics overlook the obvious: It’s because of what’s being taught in some Presbyterian seminaries, where future church leaders are inculcated with the moral and religious foundations that shape their world views. Leaders of the Presbyterian Church USA take up an old obsession in the coming days: Israel. They’re expected to vote on whether to divest from some multinationals doing business there – a controversial process launched at last year’s...

A coalition of Jewish and Christian institutional investors - Jewish Voice for Peace, Sisters of Loretto, Mercy Investment Program, Sisters of Mercy, Maryknoll Sisters and Maryknoll Fathers and Brothers - joined in a resolution calling for the separation of the roles of CEO and Chairperson at Caterpillar, Inc. They say that they hope to encourage "corporate accountability." But what they really want is to scare the hell out of the corporation's management, from which they want action - against Israel. This coming Wednesday thousands of delegates to the Presbyterian General Assembly in Alabama will discuss the "violation of human rights...

(Austin) - UT journalism associate professor Robert Jensen has found himself at the center of many debates. This time, the conflict lies over his religious beliefs and membership in a local church. The Presbyterian church he has been attending since last December was reprimanded Friday for admitting him as a member. St. Andrew's Presbyterian Church was told by the Mission Presbytery, the regional governing body of 157 Presbyterian churches in South and Central Texas, that the acceptance of Jensen into membership was "irregular." Furthermore, it was "void" because Jensen has said in the past he doesn't believe in God. "I...

On Sunday, June 11, a boycott of Israeli academics, which had been adopted a few weeks earlier by the U.K. University and College Lecturers’ Union (NATFHE), was lifted after the move threatened to derail a merger plan with the larger U.K. Association of University Teachers. The development comes as the Ontario chapter of the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) passed a resolution at the end of May to “support the international campaign of boycott, divestment and sanctions” against Israel. These actions, gaining steam on multiple continents, did not develop out of thin air. Lurking behind them, and many similar...

"Torture is a Moral Issue" Ad On Tuesday, June 13, 27 religious leaders from across the religious spectrum, including Nobel laureates Pres. Jimmy Carter and Elie Weisel, are joining together in an advertisement on the op-ed page of the New York Times, calling for the elimination of torture and cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment as part of U.S. policy. (The ad was paid for in full by an anonymous donor.) You can help amplify the effect of this unprecedented action. Here's what you can do: Tell two other people you know about the ad. Feature notice of this ad on...

It's the season for denominational conventions. We've already told you what's on the agenda of the Presbyterian Church (USA). But who will the Episcopalians be honoring at their General Convention, which runs June 13-21 in Columbus, OH? The Episcopal Peace Fellowship (EPF) will give its 2006 EPF John Nevin Sayre Award to the Rev. Canon Naim Ateek, director of the Sabeel Ecumenical Liberation Theology Center in Jerusalem, and Madeline Trichel, director of the Interfaith Peace Center in Columbus, Ohio. Here are some words from Rev. Ateek, the "peacemaker": 1989: "It has taken me years to accept the establishment of the...

Last October, American soldiers serving in Iraq stripped the dead body of a young man, tied it to the back of a humvee, and dragged it through the city. No such incident ever happened, of course. To publish such a story would be to slander America’s men and women in uniform, and we would be right to entertain questions about the motivations and prejudices of a person who would not only accept but repeat such a story. The story, however, is of a familiar type. Stories casting enemy soldiers as inhumane monsters capable not only of desecrating a dead body,...

Norman G. Finkelstein, who invariably introduces himself as the Jewish son of survivors of Nazi concentration camps, has joined the lobbying effort to get the Presbyterian Church (USA) to begin its one-sided policy of "phased selective divestment" of its holdings in corporations that do business with Israel. Finkelstein posted on his Web site a copy of a letter he sent to commissioners and delegates to the 217th General Assembly and thumbnail photographs of a group of Presbyterians packaging and mailing the letter, along with one of his books, Beyond Chutzbah. (Click the photos and they enlarge.) Frankelstein's Web site pictures...

...... Which leads us to the Presbyterian Church USA (PCUSA). Two years ago PCUSA passed a resolution calling for "phased, selective divestment in multinational corporations operating in Israel." Apparently, this was not a resolution called for by the rank and file of the church, but by a number of radical left leaders. Not content with the classic leftist divestment tactic, elements of PCUSA, from the Chicago Middle East Task Force, met with leaders of the terrorist organization Hizbullah in Lebanon. Hizbullah, of course, is funded by Iran, does not recognize Israel’s existence, and is sworn to "the destruction of the...

US Presbyterian Leaders Challenge Church's Flawed Divestment Policy A press release from the National Christian Leadership Conference for Israel: US PRESBYTERIAN LEADERS CHALLENGE CHURCH’S FLAWED DIVESTMENT POLICY AGAINST ISRAEL & CALL ON PC-USA 217TH GENERAL ASSEMBLY TO RESCIND IT Completing a five-day fact finding mission throughout Israel, Gaza and the West Bank, a group of eleven Presbyterian Church (USA) leaders announced today that the Church’s current policy to divest their $7 billion pension fund against the State of Israel is flawed and called on the PCUSA’s over 500 voting commissioners to rescind the policy at their upcoming General Assembly June...

"Liberation Theology" was the theological justification for Western church groups that backed Marxist revolution 20 and 30 years ago. Its influence waned with those failed revolutions, especially in Latin America, but it continues to shape intellectual life in the Middle East, as a tool against Israel. The Jerusalem-based Sabeel Ecumenical Liberation Theology Center coordinates the anti-Israel advocacy of U.S. church groups. Sabeel guides and leads U.S. church delegations when they come to the Middle East, where they are exposed primarily to a pro-Palestinian perspective. When Sabeel conducts conferences in the U.S. or Canada, North American denominations host and promote the...

IT MIGHT BE no accident that the national decline in church attendance has mirrored the rise of activism by church leadership. One religious group famous for its social agenda is the National Council of Churches. Although supposedly a nonpartisan organization, for the past 40 years the NCC's politics has usually sat on the far left of the political spectrum. Since Rev. Bob Edgar took over as the NCC's general secretary in 2000, the group hasn't jettisoned its liberal ways. What is Edgar's record? For starters, he's carried on the NCC's ongoing love affair with Cuba. One of his first acts...

Leaders of the Christian left in Europe and the US are backing calls by the patriarchs and heads of churches in Jerusalem for the EU and the US to resume aid to Hamas. On April 11, the general secretary of the World Council of Churches [WCC] , Dr. Samuel Kobia, wrote to the chairman of the Council of the European Union, Austrian Foreign Minister Ursula Plassnik, asking the EU to exercise "respect for the democratic mandate given" to Hamas and to allow "time for the new government to find its feet and demonstrate its intentions." The WCC warned of "of...

Israel bears the burden of responsibility for the present crisis in the Middle East, the World Council of Churches has announced, following a meeting of its Executive Committee in Geneva from May 16-19. The Christian Left's leading ecumenical organization stated Israel's actions towards the Palestinians "cannot be justified morally, legally or even politically." The failure "to comply with international law" had "pushed the situation on the ground to a point of no return," they concluded. The WCC condemned the killing of innocent civilians by "both sides" in the conflict and called for the Palestinians to "maintain the existing one-party cease-fire...

On the plane back from a recent conference in Israel, Presbyterian Pastor Will McGarvey met members of another Christian tour group. They had visited many Christian holy sites on their tour, but they did not travel to Bethlehem or to any Palestinian cities in the West Bank. "Some folks go over and see the holy sites and don't ever talk to a Palestinian," said McGarvey, sitting amid stacks of papers and books in his office at the Community Presbyterian Church in Pittsburg. "The Christian community in the United States is very divided when it comes to questions of Israel and...

As Presbyterians across America gear up for their biennial assembly next month, the legacy of the last such meeting is still roiling the Jewish community and the church’s own members. Two years ago, the Presbyterian Church USA passed a resolution calling for “phased, selective divestment in multinational corporations operating in Israel.” Those who long have followed Jewish-Protestant relations weren’t surprised. “It was the culmination of decades - not years, but decades - of hostility toward Israel and Zionism, not by the rank-and-file members of these churches, but by some of the leadership,” said Rabbi A. James Rudin, senior interreligious adviser...

About 100 church-based, Muslim and secular activists gathered early this year in Pittsburgh for a conference devoted supposedly "[m]oving beyond the artificial polarization of 'pro-Israel' and 'pro-Palestinian' agendas." But the conference instead focused on harsh one-sided criticisms of the Jewish state coupled with defenses of the new Hamas regime of the Palestinians and plans to make Israel into "a pariah state." The gathering was organized by the North American affiliate of the Jerusalem-based Sabeel Ecumenical Liberation Theology Center. This Palestinian Christian group has "Friends of Sabeel" networks in Australia, Scandinavia, Ireland, the United Kingdom, Canada, and the United States. Co-sponsors...

The Geneva-based World Council of Churches (WCC), ostensibly representing 340 denominations globally, formally protested to the Israeli ambassador in Switzerland about the rock throwing of Israeli teen-age civilians. But a Palestinian suicide bomb in Tel Aviv that slaughtered nine people did not merit even a WCC news release. To be fair to the WCC, the rock throwing was aimed at the WCC’s own volunteers. A Swiss lawyer, a German social worker and a Norwegian sociologist were attacked with stones in two separate incidents on April 1 and April 20. The lawyer got seven stitches to the head, while the social...

It's one of today's most compelling news stories, yet it's all but ignored by most of the international media. I'm talking about the growing persecution of Christian minorities in the Islamic world. It briefly made headlines last month when machete-armed Egyptian fanatics attacked worshipers in three Coptic churches in Alexandria and murdered one aged man at prayer. Then of course, there was March — when an Afghan man escaped a death sentence for the "crime" of converting to Christianity. But how many people heard about the recent arrest and jailing in Saudi Arabia of a group of Filipino guest workers...