Commentary & News Briefs

Commentary & News Briefs
December 18, 2006
Compiled by Jenni Barker

...Rabbi Andrew Bossov and Rev. Karen Onesti are celebrating different holidays this month, but one extraordinary gift. Doctors have approved surgery to give the New Jersey rabbi one of Onesti's kidneys. Onesti, who pastors a United Methodist church, met Bossov four years ago through the Interfaith Council of Greater Mount Laurel. When she learned that his decreased function allowed him to get on the list for a transplant, Onesti jumped at the chance to help him. After months of testing for compatibility, she called Bossov to let him know that the transplant team has approved the donation. The surgery could be done next month. [AP]

...A Methodist church has delivered more than 75 gifts to Mission, South Dakota, as part of a ministry to the state's Indian reservations. First United Methodist Church of Yankton works each year with Tree of Life Ministry, an ecumenical extension of the United Methodist Church of the Dakotas. Church member Jane Gilmore says children on the Pine Ridge, Rosebud and Crow Creek reservations should have the opportunity to open something at Christmas. Tree of Life executive director Russell Masartis says the organization worked with tribal officials to make sure that all families received gifts. The reservations held five Christmas fairs, in which heads of household could pick out a gift or two for the children in their homes. [AP]

...Calvin College in Grand Rapids, Michigan, is preparing to host the second annual "Faith and International Development Conference" on February 1-3, 2007. The 2007 conference is structured around the themes: "Do justice/ Have mercy/ Make peace/ Take care." A recent Christian Reformed Church Communications article pointed out that event sponsors -- the Christian Reformed World Relief Committee; the Mennonite Central Committee; Bread for the World; and Calvin's Lily Vocation Project -- hope to see last year's attendance figures double to at least 600 students from across the U.S. and Canada. Students attending the three-day gathering will focus in a deeper way on issues surrounding faith and development. Calvin junior Andrew VanStee, this year's conference chair, says he is "really excited" to see so many students interested about these topics; however, he notes, "they don't always have the knowledge base to get involved." VanStee says he and other conference leaders are "hoping to provide a place where people can move beyond saying, 'I care about this. This is important to me,' and [go on to] move into this area and do so knowledgably." Each of the four conference themes targets a key area of international development -- peace building and reconciliation; global health; environmental care, and economic justice; addressing these issues will be keynote speakers coming from a broad range of backgrounds. Among these are Anglican pastor and physician Peter Okaalet of Uganda, the Africa director of the Christian medical assistance group, MAP International; Baptist minister Rev. Celestin Musekura of Rwanda, president and founder of African Leadership and Reconciliation Ministries (ALARM, Inc.); and Augusto de la Torre, the World Bank's senior regional financial section advisor for Latin America and the Caribbean. As in 2006, the conference will be run by students; Roland Hoksbergen, a conference mentor, says, "God has blessed us with students who have tremendous motivation to see a difference in the world and [to make] Christ relevant in their day-to-day lives. They're saying, 'Help us understand how to make a real difference.' And that's the sort of request, when students make it, we want to be there for them." [Pat Centner]

...A special Catholic celebration of the Rosary in Southern California will be the largest outdoor event of its type in nearly 50 years. The Rose Bowl in Pasadena will host "The Rosary Bowl" on Saturday, May 19, 2007. According to Religion News Service, the full name for the celebration is "A World at Prayer Is a World at Peace: A Rosary Celebration, The Rosary Bowl." Planning the celebration, which is free of charge and open to the public, are Holy Cross Ministries of Easton, Massachusetts, and its local member Family Theater Productions of Hollywood in collaboration with the archdiocese of Los Angeles. According to Catholic belief, the Rosary combines prayer, meditation and reflection on important events in the life of Jesus Christ, as seen through his mother, Mary. According to Father John Phalen, president of Holy Cross Family Ministries, "The Rosary Bowl carries forward the tradition and mission of the 'Rosary priest,' Servant of God Father Patrick Peyton, CSC …." Father Peyton conducted 40 Rosary rallies throughout the world that drew 28 million people, and he also coined the famous slogan, "The family that prays together stays together." The 2007 Rosary Bowl will be the first celebration of its magnitude since Peyton's death in 1992. Cardinal Roger Mahony, archbishop of Los Angeles, is urging parishes, schools and individuals "to unite in prayer, labor and sacrifice in helping organize our communities' participation" in the celebration, which he describes as an "opportunity to enhance the prayer life of everyone through the Holy Rosary." [Pat Centner]

...Traditional marriage proponents in New Jersey are circling the wagons following the state's legalization of homosexual civil unions. New Jersey has become the third U.S. state to approve civil unions for homosexual couples seeking the same rights and privileges afforded to married couples. Len Deo is president of the New Jersey Family Policy Council, which opposed the civil unions bill and had asked that an amendment be attached to it defining marriage as the union of one man and one woman. The amendment, however, was struck down by the state Senate. Deo says the Garden State has a powerful homosexual lobby. "This is another step towards a radical redefinition of marriage," he observes; "and the same-sex 'marriage' proponents, even in their testimony in the committee hearings, stated that over and over -- that they want the title, marriage, and they will not stop until they get that title." The New Jersey Family Policy Council spokesman says the group will now be pushing for a state constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage. And although there is resistance in the governor's office and in the leadership of both the Senate and the Assembly, Deo notes, he believes the will of the people to protect traditional, one-man, one-woman marriage in New Jersey will eventually prevail. [Jim Brown]

...Ireland's High Court has rejected a bid by a legally married lesbian couple to have that marriage recognized in Ireland. The two women were legally married in Canada and subsequently returned to their home in Ireland to argue that, because homosexual marriage is internationally accepted, the Irish marriage law should be re-evaluated. But Justice Elizabeth Dunne disagreed, saying marriage was understood under the 1937 Irish Constitution to be confined to persons of the opposite sex. She further stated that "having regard to the clear understanding of the meaning of marriage in the numerous authorities opened to the court ... I do not see how marriage can be redefined by the court to encompass same-sex marriage." In her 138-page ruling, Justice Dunne also expressed concern about the effect of same-sex marriage on children, saying the lack of conclusive research into the results of homosexual parenting made it necessary to reserve judgment on the issue. [Fred Jackson]

...An Egyptian-born author says the United States is asking for trouble if it does not take steps to drastically restrict immigration from terrorist-harboring Islamic countries. Nonie Darwish has written a book called Now They Call Me Infidel: Why I Renounced Jihad for America, Israel, and the War on Terror. The former Muslim is deeply concerned that the U.S. will experience the problems of Europe and other areas of the world that have allowed unfettered Islamic immigration. So Darwish believes the U.S. should immediately stop issuing religious visas to Muslims wanting to immigrate here. "We have to ask [would-be immigrants] the question," she asserts, "do you want to live under shariah law?" And those who answer yes should never be granted a visa, the author insists, "because Sharia law is totally incompatible with Western democracy. It is cruel and unusual punishment, it is humiliation for women, and if a person wants to live under Sharia law, they might as well stay in the Muslim world." The United States should use a questionnaire to screen those desiring entry into the U.S. from Islamic nations, Darwish suggests, and should "only issue visas to Muslim doctors, engineers, or others whose fields of expertise would benefit the United States." And definitely, she adds, the U.S. should not allow in any religious extremists who indicate that they want to turn America into the same kind of place as those oppressive Islamist-controlled societies from whence they came. [Chad Groening]

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