A Roman Catholic diocese in Pennsylvania has begun the process to defrock a priest whose dalliances with a teenager were videotaped by her parents, the Associated Press reports. She later gave birth to a daughter.

But Berks County District Attorney John T. Adams says his office won't press charges against the Rev. Luis A. Bonilla Margarito because the relationship started when the girl was 18.

A spokesman says the Diocese of Allentown began putting paperwork together over the weekend for the process known as removal from the clerical state — popularly known as defrocking. The diocesan spokesman, Matt Kerr, says the final decision is up to the Vatican.

Last week, the girl's parents filed a lawsuit saying Bonilla carried on a sexual relationship with the girl while he was the chaplain of Reading Central Catholic High School and she was a senior there.

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 5:07 PM | Permalink | Comments (5)
        

The Mormon church is in talks with the People's Republic of China to improve relations for church members living in mainland China, the Associated Press reports.

The discussions are aimed at ensuring that members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints says are practicing their faith within the boundaries of Chinese law, the church said. The talks were initiated by a senior Chinese government official, who was not identified by name in the statement.

Dallin H. Oaks, a member of the church's senior leadership circle, the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, and Elder Donald L. Hallstrom, who both oversee church operations in Asia attended meetings in Beijing in February and May.

A third meeting was held Aug. 24 in Salt Lake City between a Chinese official and the 13 million-member faith's First Presidency.

"No U.S. government official or diplomat has been involved in any way in these discussions," said Mike Otterson, who runs the church's public affairs department. "This is purely between the leadership in Salt Lake City and the leadership in Beijing."

None of the discussions have addressed the possibility of church missionaries proselytizing in China, Otterson said.

"That issue is not even under consideration," Otterson said.

It's unclear how many Mormons are living in mainland China, although the church has had a presence in both Hong Kong and Taiwan for decades.

Otterson said talks with the Chinese reflect the development of a relationship over 30 years.

"The church deeply appreciates the courtesy of the Chinese leadership in opening up a way to better define how the church and its members can proceed with daily activities, all in harmony with Chinese law," Otterson said.

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 5:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
        

The Rev. Jeremiah Wright, President Barack Obama's controversial former pastor, accused people who wrongly believe Obama is Muslim of catering to political enemies during a fiery speech Sunday in Arkansas, the Associated Press reports.

In his sermon at New Millennium Church in Little Rock, Wright criticized supporters of the Iraq war and defended former state Court of Appeals Judge Wendell Griffen for speaking out against it. Griffen serves as the church's pastor.

Wright's only reference to Obama came when he compared Griffen's opponents to those who incorrectly think Obama is Muslim. The president, whose full name is Barack Hussein Obama, is Christian.

"Go after the military mindset ... and the enemy will come after you with everything," Wright told the packed church.

"He will surround you with sycophants who will criticize you and ostracize you and put you beyond the pale of hope and say 'you ain't really a Baptist' and say 'the president ain't really a Christian, he's a Muslim. There ain't no American Christian with a name like Barack Hussein,'" he added.

A poll released this month found that nearly one in five people, or 18 percent, said they thought Obama was Muslim, up from the 11 percent in March 2009. The proportion who correctly said he was Christian was 34 percent, down from 48 percent in March of last year. The poll, conducted by the nonpartisan Pew Research Center and its affiliated Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life, surveyed 3,003 people.

Obama cut ties with Wright in 2008, after Wright's more incendiary remarks hit the Internet during the presidential election. At a National Press Club appearance in April 2008, Wright claimed the U.S. government could plant AIDS in the black community, praised Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrahkan and suggested Obama was putting his pastor at arm's length for political purposes while privately agreeing with him.

Obama denounced Wright as "divisive and destructive" and left Wright's church in Chicago.

Griffen lost a re-election bid for the Arkansas Court of Appeals in 2008, after high profile battles with a state judicial panel over the rights of judges to speak out on political issues. Griffen was elected in May to a judicial post in Pulaski County, the state's most populous county that includes Little Rock.

Griffen said he invited Wright to speak at his church as part of a monthlong focus on the relationship between faith and the community.

Wright defended Griffen's outspokenness on political issues, saying it showed he was willing to speak out even if it would cost him politically.

Wright's sermon focused on the Old Testament story of the prophet Elisha thwarting an attack by the Aramean Army. Wright repeatedly made references to the war in Iraq and suggested parallels with the Biblical story.

"What was his motivation? Elisha had embarrassed him, like Saddam had embarrassed George Herbert Walker," Wright said, referring to the former president.

Wright spoke as Arkansas Republicans hope to capitalize on Obama's unpopularity in the fall election. Obama has not visited the state since 2006, and lost its six electoral votes in the 2008 election.

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 7:30 AM | Permalink | Comments (8)
        

Authorities say the man suspected of fatally shooting a Mormon church official in a central California church was later shot to death in a confrontation with police, the Associated Press reports.

Police say 42-year-old Mormon lay bishop Clay Sannar was shot Sunday in his office at the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Visalia, southeast of Fresno.

Visalia police chief Colleen Mestas says minutes later, a caller identified himself to police as the shooter. Police responded. The suspect was shot and died at a local hospital. No officers were injured.

Mestas says they've handed over the investigation of the officer-involved shooting to Tulare County sheriff's deputies.

Visalia police continue to investigate Sannar's shooting but haven't identified a motive. As far as police know, the shooter wasn't part of the church.

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 5:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
        

Strippers dressed in bikinis sunbathe in lawn chairs, their backs turned toward the gray clapboard church where men in ties and women in full-length skirts flock to Sunday morning services.

The strippers, fueled by Cheetos and nicotine, are protesting a fundamentalist Christian church whose Bible-brandishing congregants have picketed the club where they work, the Associated Press reports.

The dancers roll up with signs carrying messages adapted from Scripture, such as "Do unto others as you would have done unto you," to counter church members who for four years have photographed license plates of patrons and asked them if their mothers and wives know their whereabouts, AP correspondent Jeannie Nuss writes.

The dueling demonstrations play out in central Ohio, where nine miles of cornfields and Amish-buggy crossing signs separate The Fox Hole strip club from New Beginnings Ministries.

Club owner Tommy George met with the preacher and offered to call off his not-quite-nude crew from their three-month-long protest if the church responds in kind. But pastor Bill Dunfee believes that a higher power has tasked him with shutting down the strip club.

"As a Christian community, we cannot share territory with the devil," Dunfee said. "Light and darkness cannot exist together, so The Fox Hole has got to go."

AP Photo

New Beginnings is one of four churches in this one-traffic-light village of 900 people, 60 miles outside Columbus. There's one gas station and a sit-down restaurant that serves country staples like mashed potatoes with gravy and Salisbury steak.

On Sunday, four of The Fox Hole's seven strippers and more than a dozen supporters garnered both scorn and compassion from churchgoers — and quite a few honks from pickup trucks and other passing vehicles.

One woman offered her skills as a hair dresser to the dancers: "If you or your kids ever need a haircut, give me a holler." Another woman from the church waited on the protesters with plates of noodles and chocolate cake.

Laura Meske — known as Lola, stage age 36 but really 42 — hid behind a sign proclaiming, "Jesus loves the children of the world!" as the preacher extended his hand for a shake.

Two nights earlier, Dunfee and more than a dozen churchgoers stood outside the club, one of them calling out Meske's stripper name.

"He who casts the first stone ... ," Meske said Sunday.

The pastor cut her off and repeated, "Lola, Lord bless you."

"Everybody has sinned, and that doesn't mean I'm not gonna get into heaven," she said, the stud piercing in her chin shimmering in the sunlight. "I believe in Jesus. I don't believe what they preach. They preach hate."

Debi Durr, who attends the church, disagreed. "You don't stand up there for four years for hate. That's not hate. That's love," she said. Durr left Meske with a copy of Jeremiah 3:13 — a Bible passage that urges sinners to acknowledge their guilt.

Inside the church, voices from the 121 congregants seemed to float to the cedar rafters as they sang lyrics projected on a screen. Outside, a man strummed a guitar and sang, "God forbid you ever had to walk a mile in her shoes."

Dunfee has offered to help the strippers pay for food, rent, utilities and gas if they leave The Fox Hole. But many of the women say their jobs are only a stopover on the way to work in cosmetology or the medical field — a meal ticket that shelters them from another stigma: welfare.

"No little girl is growing up like, `I wanna do a pole trick,'" said Anny Donewald, a former stripper who lives in Grand Rapids, Mich., and ministers to dancers, prostitutes and porn stars.

She and other Christian groups that work with women in the adult entertainment industry have criticized Dunfee's methods of ministry as a means of putting the strippers on the defensive instead of showing support. x "I never saw Jesus with a picket sign," Donewald said.

Community advocacy groups, including Citizens for Community Values in Cincinnati, support Dunfee's protests. But the group's president, Phil Burress, said the strip club has a right to be there.

"It's a legal business whether he likes it or I like it or not," Burress said.

The club operates in a white plywood box of a building. Beer cans and a dollar bill peaked out from the grass like Easter eggs last Sunday.

The Fox Hole encourages customers to check out its $30 private dance special, promoting it on the kind of sign convenience stores use to advertise cheap milk and cigarettes. Out back, letters on a bulletin board have faded away so that "No touching" now reads "ouch."

It's here where dancers strip down to panties and pasties for cash. Meske — a tattooed mother of four — said she made $30 instead of a couple hundred dollars last Friday with the protesters outside.

"I'm not the most beautiful woman in the world," she said. "I go out there and I try to make my money."

A few houses and a ribs joint called Peggy Sue's separate the club from another white building, a church where some of the strippers donate blood during drives for the American Red Cross.

"I got a church 900 feet down the street that causes me no problems," club owner George said. "And I got this moron nine miles down the street that causes me more headaches."

Rae Anderson, who heads New Castle Ministries with her husband, says her church believes Dunfee is doing what the Lord called him to do, but her parish takes a different approach.

"You can share the truth, but you can't make anyone believe what you believe."

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 11:45 AM | Permalink | Comments (4)
        

Richard Mahan and Anita Hill are both Lutheran pastors who were inside a Minneapolis convention hall last summer when delegates for the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America voted to allow non-celibate gay and lesbian pastors.

Afterward, the Associated Press reports, each cried for different reasons.

Mahan, lead pastor at St. Timothy in Charleston, W.Va., said he cried because he realized he would likely leave the denomination in which he had invested 42 years of ministry. For Hill, the openly gay lead pastor at St. Paul-Reformation in St. Paul, they were tears of "joy and relief."

A year later, the ELCA is moving gay pastors into its fold — it's now the largest Protestant denomination in the U.S. to allow noncelibate gays into its ranks — even as the most visible dissidents strike out on their own.

Mahan and other critics of the decision plan to gather this week in Columbus, Ohio, for another Lutheran convention. Leaders of 18 former ELCA churches are expected to be among more than 1,000 Lutherans voting Friday to create a brand new Lutheran denomination that they claim will follow the Scriptures more faithfully: the North American Lutheran Church.

"The issue is departure from the word of God," Mahan said. His church has already voted twice to end its longtime identity as a ELCA church, also ending an annual $36,000 in tithing to the denomination.

Meanwhile, Hill will finally join the official roster of ELCA pastors. She was ordained in 2001, but she had been kept off the roster because she lived openly with her lesbian partner, with whom she'd shared a commitment ceremony in 1996. That meant she was not eligible for the full housing allowance and retirement benefits and could not be a voting delegate to churchwide assemblies.

Next month, Hill and two other lesbian pastors will gather to receive the ELCA's newly designed Rite of Reception and officially join the roster of the St. Paul Synod. The St. Paul bishop will "lay on hands," Hill said, in a ceremony that is becoming more frequent around the country. Seven gay and transgender pastors were received last month in San Francisco. Similar ceremonies are planned soon in Minneapolis and Chicago.

"At my church there is a sense of great celebration, of people being very happy that our work to make the ELCA a more inclusive place has come to fruition," Hill said.

Her denomination will be slightly smaller: As of early August, 199 congregations had cleared the hurdles to leave the ELCA for good, while another 136 awaited the second vote needed to make it official. In all there are 10,239 ELCA churches with about 4.5 million members, making it still by far the largest Lutheran denomination in the U.S.

And the breakaway members gathering in Ohio will face their own challenges if they vote to start another denomination at a time when attendance at mainline Protestant churches is falling and denominational distinctions appear irrelevant to a growing number of churchgoers.

But pastors in a few churches that plan to join the North American Lutheran Church say there are still good reasons to be part of a larger church body.

"For a lot of congregations and a lot of churchgoers, there is value in a larger Lutheran fellowship," said the Rev. Mark Braaten, pastor at Our Savior's Lutheran Church in Tyler, Texas, another charter member of the new denomination.

About 75 percent of the churches that already left the ELCA have affiliated with Lutheran Congregations in Mission for Christ — another, smaller denomination. But the Rev. Mark Chavez, Lutheran CORE's director, said some Lutherans found that denomination too loosely structured and wanted a choice that retained aspects of the ELCA identity.

Some ELCA refugees have a more bottom-line reason to join a new denomination. Under many church constitutions, congregations that leave the ELCA and try to strike out as a wholly independent church could actually see their ELCA synod council assert legal ownership of their property and church buildings. "People don't see it as too likely, but it's not a discussion too many want to have," Braaten said.

So why go through the hassles — especially when even critics of the ELCA's more liberalized policy admit that no congregations are likely to be compelled to install a gay pastor?

"I don't think it's the issue of whether someone is going to have a gay pastor forced upon their church, as much a question of what a straight pastor is going to be teaching," said the Rev. David Baer, pastor of Immanuel Lutheran Church in Whitewood, S.D., another charter member of the new denomination. "What's God's intention for marriage, for sexuality? The concern is the ELCA is trading in its teaching and losing its grounding in scripture and no longer having a moral center."

Organizers of the new denomination will reveal on Friday its 18 charter churches — a number they hope will grow to 200 or more within a year.

Earlier this month, the ELCA reported a nearly 3 percent drop in total receipts for its congregations from 2008 to 2009, and a decline in membership of 90,850 people. Three times since April 2009, the ELCA's council cut the denomination's budget by a total of $17.5 million and eliminated the equivalent of nearly 76 full-time jobs.

ELCA spokesman John Brooks said departures over the new clergy policy played a part in the picture but that the bad economy has also been a major factor in the denomination's financial struggles.

Hill, who in her early days at the church helped found a ministry for gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people, said she was disheartened by the departing churches.

"There are some who feel they must leave the ELCA over that," she said. "I feel sad about that, it's unfortunate. But to feel you have to leave over the inclusion of your brothers and sisters — that diminishes who we are as the body of Christ."

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 5:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
        

Michael Enright once volunteered with a group that promotes interfaith tolerance and has supported a proposal for a mosque near ground zero — an experience distinctly at odds with what authorities say happened inside a city taxi, the Associated Press reports.

The baby-faced college student was charged Wednesday with using a folding knife to slash the neck and face of the taxi's Bangladeshi driver after the driver said he was Muslim. Police say Enright was drunk at the time.

A taxi drivers' labor group quickly used the attack to denounce "bigotry" over plans to build an Islamic center and mosque two blocks north of ground zero. While supporters of the mosque say religious freedom should be protected, opponents say the mosque should be moved farther from where Islamic extremists destroyed the World Trade Center and killed nearly 2,800 people on Sept. 11, 2001.

Mayor Michael Bloomberg, a staunch supporter of the mosque project, invited the taxi driver to visit City Hall on Thursday.

"This attack runs counter to everything that New Yorkers believe no matter what god we pray to," the mayor said in a statement.

A criminal complaint alleges Enright uttered an Arabic greeting and told the driver, "Consider this a checkpoint," before attacking him Tuesday night inside the yellow cab in Manhattan.

A judge ordered Enright, 21, held without bail on charges of attempted murder and assault as hate crimes and weapon possession. The handcuffed defendant, wearing a polo shirt and cargo shorts, did not enter a plea during the brief court appearance.

Besides a serious neck wound, cabbie Ahmed H. Sharif, 43, suffered cuts to his forearms, his face and one hand while trying to fend off Enright, prosecutor James Zeleta said while arguing against bail.

Defense attorney Jason Martin told the judge his client was an honors student at the School of Visual Arts, had volunteered in Afghanistan and lives with his parents in suburban Brewster, N.Y.

To deny bail, given his background, "I don't think is warranted," Martin argued.

A representative for the volunteer group, Intersections International, called the situation "tragic."

"We've been working very hard to build bridges between folks from different religions and cultures," said the Rev. Robert Chase. "This is really shocking and sad for us."

The group, founded in 2007, says it's dedicated to promoting justice, reconciliation and peace among people of different faiths, cultures, ideologies, races and classes.

A trailer for a Enright's school film, "Home of the Brave," was excerpted on the group's website. Enright followed his former high school classmate, Cpl. Alex Eckner, and his Army unit through basic training in Hawaii and their deployment to Afghanistan.

The film, set for release in 2011, shows soldiers training with weapons in a pool, running in formation and celebrating birthdays and Christmas while in basic training.

"You can't not be scared, that helps you operate," one soldier says in the trailer. "It helps you do your job."

Sharif, who has driven a cab for 15 years, was quoted in a news release from the New York Taxi Workers Alliance as saying the attack left him shaken.

"I feel very sad," he said. With the tension over the mosque, he added, "All drivers should be more careful."

Enright hailed the cab around 6 p.m. Tuesday, police Deputy Inspector Kim Royster said.

Sharif told authorities that during the trip Enright asked him whether he was Muslim. When he said yes, Enright pulled out a weapon — believed to be a tool with a blade called a Leatherman — and attacked him, Royster said.

After the assault, the driver tried to lock Enright inside the cab and drive to a police station, police said. The attacker jumped out a rear window about 15 blocks from where he hailed the cab, they said.

An officer there noticed the commotion, found Enright slumped on a sidewalk and arrested him.

Advocates argued that the tense climate around the proposed Islamic center was creating the potential for anti-Muslim violence.

"As other American minorities have experienced, hate speech often leads to hate crimes," said Nihad Awad, national executive director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations. "Sadly, we've seen how the public vilification of Islam can lead some individuals to violence against innocent people."

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 11:23 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)
        

Shaukat Malik is a Muslim-American in Maryland. A native of Pakistan, he arrived in the United States in 1980.

For a moderate Muslim who has lived continuously in the West for more than thirty-eight years, the protests against the interfaith center proposed for Lower Manhattan is a wakeup call.

It highlights a deep distrust of Muslims and of our moderate belief system. In my version of Islam, I share my God and prophets with the Christians and the Jews, and hold them in equal reverence. I firmly believe that our religion is determined at birth by God and we must respect all religions. The only role of religion in my life is to give me hope and help me become a good citizen.

I do not need to grow a beard but those that do for symbolism are exercising their personal freedom -- and, perhaps without realizing it, are helping the environment by not wasting the water and energy consumed in the shaving process. I do not need any intermediary to pray for me to God, and strongly believe in the absolute separation of church and state.

Save for a tiny minority, Muslims do not subscribe to the orthodox brand of Islam that mistakenly assumes that Muslims are superior to all others and all humanity must be converted to Islam. If God wants us all to be Muslims, he surely has the power to make us so.

As human beings, we have every right to be very angry with the 19 madmen who killed thousands of innocent civilians on Sept. 11, 2001.

They were identified as Islamist terrorists -- as if a body of Muslim nations had ordered the attacks.

Fifteen of the nineteen hijackers were Saudi citizens, and are a product of the repressive kingdom that rules with an iron fist, using clerics as the enforcers. Through a system of subsidies and patronage, the kingdom has created a population of frustrated young men who are unemployed, disgruntled and angry. Osama Bin Laden and Al-Qaeda have exploited this frustration.

To avoid creating future monsters, instead of criticizing the creation of an interfaith center we should be concentrating on reforming the brand of Islam practiced in the Middle East. Kings and dictators in the region should embrace a more representative form of government. They should study Turkey’s transformation to a democracy, promoted and underwritten by a previously conservative Islamic party.

The promise of the Statue of Liberty and the U.S. Constitution’s unique recognition of the inherent rights of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness are crying out to the better judgment of the political pundits and misled majority.

If it is not safe to have an Islamic center two blocks from Ground Zero, who will decide on the exact distance needed for safety? What about the feelings of the Muslim mothers who also lost their sons on Sept. 11? Are they not also hurting? Like their fellow Jewish and Christian mothers, they all grieve for their loss. Instead of apportioning the levels of blame, we should target the enemy that caused us the pain.

America’s celebrated ideals of separation of church and state and freedom of religion are on the line. If we give in to the location of the Islamic center what will be next?

In any democracy, we are entitled to our views. But we must be reasonable. This is how persecution of the Jewish people started in Germany. Through propaganda and caricature, the Jewish population was blamed for the recession. The firebombing of Jewish-owned shops and the looting of Jewish property led eventually to the transportation of Jews to concentration camps. Six million Jews were slaughtered as the world stood silent.

To blame Muslim Americans for 9/11 is simply a crazy idea.

We must support this center and give a voice to the very large moderate majority around the world that has been silenced by terrorists. To do otherwise would be tantamount to robbing the land of the free of its freedoms.

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 5:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (21)
        

A new poll finds skepticism among Americans that Islam is likelier than other faiths to encourage violence. But the survey also finds that their overall view of the religion has worsened over the past five years, the Associated Press reports.

In addition, the poll by the nonpartisan Pew Research Center finds that the public leans 51 percent to 34 percent against building a Muslim center near the former site of New York's World Trade Center.

By 42 percent to 35 percent, most think Islam does not incite violence more than other religions. That's about the same as said so last year.

But more people have unfavorable than favorable views of Islam by 38 percent to 30 percent. In 2005, it was reversed: 41 percent had favorable views, 36 percent unfavorable.

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 5:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)
        

A new report in Northern Ireland says the British government and the Roman Catholic church colluded to cover up the involvement of a priest in a 1972 bombing that killed nine people and injured 30, the Associated Press reports.

The Northern Ireland police ombudsman's report says that Father James Chesney was the prime suspect in the blast in the village of Claudy, just outside of Londonderry.

The explosion hit the village without the customary warnings that paramilitaries used to limit civilian casualties.

Northern Ireland Secretary Owen Paterson said Tuesday that the government was "profoundly sorry."

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 10:21 AM | Permalink | Comments (10)
        

Supporters of a Greek Orthodox church destroyed on Sept. 11 say officials willing to speak out about a planned community center and mosque near ground zero have been silent on efforts to get the church rebuilt, the Associated Press reports.

But the World Trade Center site's owner says a deal to help rebuild St. Nicholas Greek Orthodox Church was offered and rejected, after years of negotiations, over money and other issues.

Though the projects are not related, supporters — including George Pataki, New York's governor at the time of the Sept. 11 attacks — have questioned why public officials have not addressed St. Nicholas' future while they lead a debate on whether and where the Islamic cultural center should be built.

"What about us? Why have they forgotten or abandoned their commitment to us?" asked Father Alex Karloutsos, assistant to the archbishop of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America. "When I see them raising issues about the mosque and not thinking about the church that was destroyed, it does bother us."

In an effort to deal with the furor over the planned location of the Islamic center, Gov. David Paterson has suggested that state land farther away from ground zero be used. He was scheduled to meet with New York Archbishop Timothy Dolan on Tuesday to discuss the Park51 project, which is planned for two blocks north of the 16-acre World Trade Center site.

"Rather than focus his attention on the mosque, Gov. Paterson should step in right away to ensure that the state of New York and the Port Authority uphold the agreement with the Greek Orthodox church so this project can go forward without further delay," state Sen. Dean Skelos said Monday.

Paterson declined to comment on the issue.

The 300-member congregation lost its 90-year-old parish just south of the World Trade Center when the twin towers collapsed on Sept. 11, 2001, leaving only a handful of artifacts that were removed from the rubble, including a small bell and cross, a crucifix and wax candles that had not melted.

Leaders of the church and the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey — the agency that owns ground zero — have spent years negotiating a deal that would let the church rebuild on land a bit farther south than the 1,200-square-foot lot it sat on, in exchange for financial help to rebuild it.

The agency said the church stopped negotiating after rejecting an offer in 2008 of $20 million in financing, plus up to an additional $40 million to cover costs related to the construction of a parking lot underneath the church.

Port Authority officials said the church wanted final approval on the design of the parking lot and the potential for an additional $20 million in public money. The agency said it made a final offer in 2009 that was rejected.

"St. Nicholas Church continues to retain the right to build on its original location," the agency said in a statement Monday. It said work could begin in 2013 if the church helped finance it.

Karloutsos, the archbishop's assistant, denied that any offer had been rejected, instead saying that Port Authority pulled the deal and has since ignored the church's attempts at dialogue. "This is about the Port Authority reneging on a promise," he said.

Pataki, who as governor promised that St. Nicholas would be rebuilt after the 2001 attacks, said Monday that the Port Authority needed to reach out to church officials.

"It's just wrong that the rebuilding of St. Nicholas Church, which was there, which was part of the master plan ... has basically been ignored," he said.

George Demos, a Long Island Republican congressional candidate seeking to unseat Rep. Tim Bishop, said he wrote President Barack Obama a letter lobbying for the church.

"All of our political leadership seems intent on assisting the mosque, at the same time they have taken no steps to make sure St. Nicholas is rebuilt," he said.

Both Demos and Pataki are opposed to building an Islamic center and mosque at a building two blocks north of the World Trade Center site. The uproar over the proposed $100 million center has become a national campaign issue and led hundreds to rally in front of ground zero over the weekend.

Critics of the project say it's an affront to the memories of the more than 2,700 people killed at ground zero on Sept. 11 to locate the center so close to the site. Proponents say accepting the center respects religious freedom and tolerance.

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 8:13 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
        

Britons planning to attend open-air services by Pope Benedict XVI next month have been told it's OK to bring a picnic — but leave the wine at home, the Associated Press reports.

Organizers of the pontiff's visit released a detailed list Monday of what is allowed and barred from two large-scale gatherings.

Sunscreen, banners, flags, cushions and folding chairs are all permitted, and people are encouraged to bring a "pilgrim picnic."

But barbecues, candles, musical instruments, pets and alcohol are banned because they "could pose a threat to yourself or others."

Some 80,000 people are expected to attend a Sept. 18 prayer meeting in London's Hyde Park, and 65,000 a Mass in Birmingham's Cofton Park the next day.

The four-day trip is the first papal visit to Britain since 1982.

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 12:50 PM | Permalink | Comments (7)
        

The proposed mosque near ground zero drew hundreds of fever-pitch demonstrators Sunday, with opponents carrying signs associating Islam with blood, supporters shouting, "Say no to racist fear!" and American flags waving on both sides, the Associated Press reports.

Police separated the two groups but there were some nose-to-nose confrontations, including a man and a woman screaming at each other across a barricade under a steady rain.

Opponents of the plan to build a $100 million, 13-story Islamic center and mosque two blocks from the World Trade Center site appeared to outnumber supporters. Bruce Springsteen's "Born in the USA" blared over loudspeakers as mosque opponents chanted, "No mosque, no way!"

Signs hoisted by hundreds of protesters standing behind police barricades read "SHARIA" — using dripping, blood-red letters to describe Islam's Shariah law. Around the corner, NYPD officers guarded a cordoned-off stretch of Park Place occupied by the old building that is to become the Islamic center.

Steve Ayling, a 40-year-old Brooklyn plumber who took his "SHARIA" sign to a dry spot by an office building, said the people behind the mosque project are "the same people who took down the twin towers."

Opponents demand that the mosque be moved farther from the site where nearly 3,000 people were killed on Sept. 11, 2001. Ayling said, "They should put it in the Middle East," and added that he still vividly remembers watching television on 9/11 "and seeing people jumping from the towers, and ashes falling on my house."

On a nearby sidewalk, police chased away a group that unfurled a banner with images of beating, stoning and other torture they said was committed by those who followed Islamic law.

The mosque project is being led by Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf and his wife, Daisy Khan, who insist the center will promote moderate Islam. The dispute has sparked a national debate on religious freedom and American values and is becoming an issue on the campaign trail ahead of the midterm elections. Republicans have been critical of President Barack Obama's stance: He has said the Muslims have the right to build the center at the site but has not commented on whether he thinks they should.

At a pro-mosque rally staged a block away from opponents' demonstration, several hundred people chanted, "Muslims are welcome here! We say no to racist fear!"

Dr. Ali Akram, a Brooklyn physician, came with his three sons and an 11-year-old nephew waving an American flag in his hand. He noted that scores of Muslims were among those who died in the towers, and he called those who oppose the mosque "un-American."

"They teach their children about the freedom of religion in America — but they don't practice what they preach," Akram said.

Gila Barzvi, whose son, Guy Barzvi, was killed in the towers, stood with mosque opponents, clutching a large photo of her son with both hands.

"This is sacred ground and it's where my son was buried," the native Israeli from Queens said. She said the mosque would be "like a knife in our hearts."

She was joined by a close friend, Kobi Mor, who flew from San Francisco to participate in the rally.

If the mosque gets built, "we will bombard it," Mor said. He would not elaborate but added that he believes the project "will never happen."

The Sunday rallies coincided with an annual motorcycle ride by a group that raises money for Sept. 11 first responders.

Bikers rolled in from the two other Sept. 11 attack sites, Washington and Shanksville, Pa.

The imam behind the project is in the middle of a Mideast trip funded by the U.S. State Department that is intended to promote religious tolerance. He has discussed efforts to combat extremism, but has avoided any comments on the rancor over the planned Islamic center.

Rauf told the Al Wasat newspaper in Bahrain that the freedoms enshrined by the U.S. Constitution also reflect true Muslim values. A portion of the interview — to be published Monday — was seen Sunday by The Associated Press.

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 3:38 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)
        

The furor over the planned mosque and Islamic center near ground zero has put Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf in a curious position: At the same time he is being vilified in the U.S. for spearheading the project, he is traveling the Mideast on a State Department mission as a symbol of American religious freedom.

Some of the imam's American critics said they fear he is using the taxpayer-funded trip to raise money and rally support in the Muslim world for the mosque, the Associated Press reports.

"I think there is no place for this," said the Rev. Franklin Graham, who is the son of evangelist Billy Graham and opposes the Islamic center and mosque. "Can you imagine if the State Department paid to send me on a trip anywhere? The separation of church and state — the critics would have been howling."

At his first event Friday in the Persian Gulf state of Bahrain, Rauf refused to discuss the uproar over plans for the community center two blocks from the World Trade Center site. State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley has said Rauf understands that he cannot solicit funds for the project on his 15-day tour.

The $100 million, 13-story project is modeled after the YMCA and Jewish Community Center. Rauf and his wife, Daisy Khan, a co-leader of the project, have a long record of interfaith outreach and insist the center will promote moderate Islam.

Opponents have condemned the plan as an affront to families who lost loved ones on Sept. 11, 2001, and the sensibilities of a nation still dealing with the wounds of the attacks. Some critics have accused Rauf of quietly harboring extremist views. The dispute has sparked a national debate on religious freedom and American values and is becoming an issue on the campaign trail ahead of the midterm elections.

In New York, Khan said organizers are sticking with their plan and are not considering scaling it back or changing locations.

"Dropping the plan is definitely not an option at all," she told The Associated Press in a telephone interview Friday.

Rauf has not commented on the controversy since it erupted earlier this summer.

During his visit to Bahrain, he led Friday prayers at a neighborhood mosque near the capital city of Manama, then said that radical religious views pose a security threat in both the West and the Muslim world.

"This issue of extremism is something that has been a national security issue — not only for the United States but also for many countries and nations in the Muslim world," Rauf said. "This is why this particular trip has a great importance."

He also said he has been working on a way to "Americanize Islam." He provided no specifics but noted that different interpretations of the faith have emerged over the religion's 1,400-year existence.

"The same principles and rituals were everywhere, but what happened in different regions was there were different interpretations," he said. "So we recognize that our heritage allows for re-expressing the internal principles of our religion in different cultural times and places."

This is Rauf's fourth U.S.-sponsored trip to the region, according to the State Department. He traveled twice to the Mideast in 2007 during the administration of President George W. Bush and once earlier this year. As part of his latest trip, Rauf will also visit Qatar and the United Arab Emirates during Ramadan to talk about Muslim life in America.

The trip is estimated to cost $16,000 and is funded by the State Department's Bureau of International Information Programs, which has existed in one form or another for decades. It aims to make friends for America abroad through cultural and educational exchanges that have involved everyone from dancers to scientists to leaders of different faiths.

Several American Muslim leaders who have traveled overseas for the State Department said they are often asked about discrimination against Muslims in the U.S. They said they acknowledge that prejudice does exist, but they also emphasize that many leaders of other religions, including Jews and evangelical Christians, defend the right of Muslims to practice their faith.

"There are times when the forces of religious division rear their head, but my point when people ask me about that is that religious freedom wins out," said Eboo Patel, an American Muslim who was asked to participate in the speakers program during the Bush administration.

Patel said there is no training by the State Department and no one tells them what to say.

Rauf will get a daily $200 honorarium for the tour. Airfare is included, as well as the standard government per diem for expenses and lodging in each of the cities he will visit, Crowley said. The per diem ranges from $400 to nearly $500.

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 7:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
        

The imam leading plans for an Islamic center near the Manhattan site of the Sept. 11 attacks said Friday he hopes to draw attention during his trip in the Middle East to the common challenges to battle radical religious beliefs, the Associated Press reports.

Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf, who is on the first leg of a 15-day Mideast tour funded by the U.S. State Department, refused to discuss the political firestorm over the plans for an Islamic cultural center about two blocks from the World Trade Center towers. Foes of the project say it is insensitive and disrespectful to the victims of 9/11 and their families. The debate has become politicized ahead of November's midterm congressional elections.

Instead, Rauf preferred to focus on shared concerns. Speaking after leading Friday prayers at a neighborhood mosque outside Bahrain's capital Manama, he said radical religious views pose a security threat in both the West and the Muslim world.

"This issue of extremism is something that has been a national security issue — not only for the United States but also for many countries and nations in the Muslim world," Rauf said. "This is why this particular trip has a great importance because all countries in the Muslim world — as well as the Western world — are facing this ... major security challenge."

The imam also said he has been working on a way to "Americanize Islam." While he did not elaborate on what an American version of Islam might look like, he did note that different interpretations of the faith have emerged over the religion's nearly 1,400-year existence.

"The same principles and rituals were everywhere, but what happened in different regions was there were different interpretations," he said. "So we recognize that our heritage allows for re-expressing the internal principles of our religion in different cultural times and places."

This is Rauf's fourth U.S-government sponsored trip to the region, according to the State Department. He traveled twice to the Mideast in 2007 during the Bush administration and once earlier this year. Rauf will also visit Qatar and the United Arab Emirates during this trip to talk about Muslim life in America.

Details of the imam's specific plans in each country have been closely guarded — possibly in reaction to the rancor in the United States over plans proposed by Rauf's organization, The Cordoba Initiative, for an Islamic cultural center near the site of the World Trade Center towers.

President Barack Obama has said he believes Muslims have the right to build an Islamic center in New York as a matter of religious freedom, though he's also said he won't take a position on whether they should actually build it. New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg came out in support of the mosque, calling it a test of the separation of church and state.

New York Gov. David Paterson suggested last week that leaders of the project might want to consider relocating out of sensitivity to families of those killed on Sept. 11.

He said he had the support of Islamic clergy, New York Archbishop Timothy Dolan and former Mayor Rudy Giuliani, who led the city through the attacks and their aftermath. The governor and state officials won't say what other site would be suitable for the center or where the state owns nearby land.

This week, Paterson said he had hoped to meet with developers in a couple of days to talk about the concerns of those still hurt and angry over the Sept. 11 attacks. He told WNYC Radio's "The Take Away" on Friday that he's still seeking a meeting, but that the group postponed a Monday meeting because of Rauf's travels.

Muslims have been holding prayer services since last year in the building that the new project will replace.

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 11:13 AM | Permalink | Comments (6)
        

President Barack Obama is a Christian who prays daily, a White House official said Thursday, trying to tamp down growing doubts about the president's religion, the Associated Press reports.

A new poll showed that nearly one in five people, or 18 percent, believe Obama is Muslim. That was up from 11 percent who said so in March 2009. The survey also showed that just 34 percent said Obama is Christian, down from 48 percent who said so last year. The largest share of people, 43 percent, said they don't know his religion.

White House spokesman Bill Burton said most Americans care more about the economy and wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and "they are not reading a lot of news about what religion the president is." He commented on Air Force One as Obama headed for a vacation in Massachusetts on Martha's Vineyard.

Burton added, "The president is obviously a Christian. He prays everyday."

The survey, conducted by the nonpartisan Pew Research Center and its affiliated Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life, is based on interviews conducted before the controversy over whether Muslims should be permitted to construct a mosque near the World Trade Center site. Obama has said he believes Muslims have the right to build an Islamic center there, though he's also said he won't take a position on whether they should actually build it.

In a separate poll by Time magazine/ABT SRBI conducted Monday and Tuesday — after Obama's comments about the mosque — 24 percent said they think he is Muslim, 47 percent said they think he is Christian and 24 percent didn't know or didn't respond.

In addition, 61 percent opposed building the Muslim center near the Trade Center site and 26 percent said they favor it.

The Pew poll found that about three in 10 of Obama's fiercest political rivals, Republicans and conservatives, say he is a Muslim. That is up significantly from last year and far higher than the share of Democrats and liberals who say so. But even among his supporters, the number saying he is a Christian has fallen since 2009, with just 43 percent of blacks and 46 percent of Democrats saying he is Christian.

Among independents, 18 percent say Obama is Muslim — up from 10 percent last year.

Pew analysts attribute the findings to attacks by his opponents and Obama's limited attendance at religious services, particularly in contrast with Presidents George W. Bush and Bill Clinton, whose worship was more public.

Andrew Kohut, the Pew Research Center's director, said the confusion partly reflects "the intensification of negative views about Obama among his critics." Alan Cooperman, the Pew Forum's associate director for research, said that with the public hearing little about Obama's religion, "maybe there's more possibility for other people to make suggestions that the president is this or he's really that or he's really a Muslim."

Obama is the Christian son of a Kenyan Muslim father and a Kansas mother. From age 6 to 10, Obama lived in predominantly Muslim Indonesia with his mother and Indonesian stepfather. His full name, Barack Hussein Obama, sounds Muslim to many.

On Wednesday, White House officials did not provide on-the-record comments on the survey but prompted Pastor Kirbyjon Caldwell of Houston to call The Associated Press.

Caldwell, who said he has known Obama for years, said the president is a Christian who prays every day. He said he was not sure where the public confusion about the president's religion came from, but he called false media reports about it "a 24-hour noise box committed to presenting the president in a false light."

Six in 10 of those saying Obama is a Muslim said they got the information from the media, with the largest portion — 16 percent — saying it was on television. Eleven percent said they learned it from Obama's behavior and words.

Despite the confusion about Obama's religion, there is noteworthy support for how he uses it to make decisions. Nearly half, or 48 percent, said he relies on his religion the right amount when making policy choices, 21 percent said he uses it too little and 11 percent too much.

Obama is seen as less reliant overall than Bush was on religion. Even so, the 48 percent who say Obama uses it appropriately for decisions is similar to the 53 percent who said the same about Bush in 2004. Just over half in the new poll said Obama mentions his faith and prayer the right amount, about the same as said so about Bush in 2006.

At the same time, the poll provides broad indications that the public feels religion is playing a diminished role in politics today, with fewer people than in 2008 saying the Democratic and Republican parties are friendly toward religion.

With elections for control of Congress just over two months away, the poll contains optimistic news for Republicans. Half of white non-Hispanic Catholics, plus three in 10 unaffiliated with a religion and a third of Jews, support the GOP — all up since 2008.

The survey also found:

_The Democratic Party is seen as friendly to religion by 26 percent, while 43 percent say the same about the GOP. That's a 9 percentage point drop for Republicans since 2008, and 12 points lower for Democrats.

_Fifty-two percent say churches should stay away from politics, a reversal of the slim majorities that supported churches' political involvement from 1996 to 2006.

The poll, overseen by Princeton Survey Research Associates International, involved landline and cell phone interviews with 3,003 randomly chosen adults. It was conducted July 21-Aug. 5 and has a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 2.5 percentage points.

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 5:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (11)
        

Americans increasingly are convinced — incorrectly — that President Barack Obama is a Muslim, and a growing number are thoroughly confused about his religion, the Associated Press reports.

Nearly one in five people, or 18 percent, said they think Obama is Muslim, up from the 11 percent who said so in March 2009, according to a poll released Thursday. The proportion who correctly say he is a Christian is down to just 34 percent.

The largest share of people, 43 percent, said they don't know his religion, an increase from the 34 percent who said that in early 2009.

The survey, conducted by the nonpartisan Pew Research Center and its affiliated Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life, is based on interviews conducted before the controversy over whether Muslims should be permitted to construct a mosque near the World Trade Center site. Obama has said he believes Muslims have the right to build an Islamic center there, though he's also said he won't take a position on whether they should actually build it.

In a separate poll by Time magazine/ABT SRBI conducted Monday and Tuesday — after Obama's comments about the mosque — 24 percent said they think he is Muslim, 47 percent said they think he is Christian and 24 percent didn't know or didn't respond.

In addition, 61 percent opposed building the Muslim center near the Trade Center site and 26 percent said they favor it.

The Pew poll found that about three in 10 of Obama's fiercest political rivals, Republicans and conservatives, say he is a Muslim. That is up significantly from last year and far higher than the share of Democrats and liberals who say so. But even among his supporters, the number saying he is a Christian has fallen since 2009, with just 43 percent of blacks and 46 percent of Democrats saying he is Christian.

Among independents, 18 percent say Obama is Muslim — up from 10 percent last year.

Pew analysts attribute the findings to attacks by his opponents and Obama's limited attendance at religious services, particularly in contrast with Presidents George W. Bush and Bill Clinton, whose worship was more public.

Andrew Kohut, the Pew Research Center's director, said the confusion partly reflects "the intensification of negative views about Obama among his critics." Alan Cooperman, the Pew Forum's associate director for research, said that with the public hearing little about Obama's religion, "maybe there's more possibility for other people to make suggestions that the president is this or he's really that or he's really a Muslim."

Obama is the Christian son of a Kenyan Muslim father and a Kansas mother. From age 6 to 10, Obama lived in predominantly Muslim Indonesia with his mother and Indonesian stepfather. His full name, Barack Hussein Obama, sounds Muslim to many.

White House officials did not provide on-the-record comments on the survey, but they prompted Pastor Kirbyjon Caldwell of Houston to call The Associated Press.

Caldwell, who said he has known Obama for years, said the president is a Christian who prays every day. He said he was not sure where the public confusion about the president's religion came from, but he called false media reports about it "a 24-hour noise box committed to presenting the president in a false light."

Six in 10 of those saying Obama is a Muslim said they got the information from the media, with the largest portion — 16 percent — saying it was on television. Eleven percent said they learned it from Obama's behavior and words.

Despite the confusion about Obama's religion, there is noteworthy support for how he uses it to make decisions. Nearly half, or 48 percent, said he relies on his religion the right amount when making policy choices, 21 percent said he uses it too little and 11 percent too much.

At the same time, the poll provides broad indications that the public feels religion is playing a diminished role in politics today, with fewer people than in 2008 saying the Democratic and Republican parties are friendly toward religion.

With elections for control of Congress just over two months away, the poll contains optimistic news for Republicans. Half of white non-Hispanic Catholics, plus three in 10 unaffiliated with a religion and a third of Jews, support the GOP — all up since 2008.

The survey also found:

_The Democratic Party is seen as friendly to religion by 26 percent, while 43 percent say the same about the GOP. That's a 9 percentage point drop for Republicans since 2008, and 12 points lower for Democrats.

_Fifty-two percent say churches should stay away from politics, a reversal of the slim majorities that supported churches' political involvement from 1996 to 2006.

The poll, overseen by Princeton Survey Research Associates International, involved landline and cell phone interviews with 3,003 randomly chosen adults. It was conducted July 21-Aug. 5 and has a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 2.5 percentage points.

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 7:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (56)
        

American Muslims who support the proposed mosque and Islamic center near ground zero are facing skeptics within their own faith — those who argue that the project is insensitive to Sept. 11 victims and needlessly provocative at a time when Muslims are pressing for wider acceptance in the U.S., the Associated Press reports.

"For most Americans, 9/11 remains as an open wound, and anything associated with Islam, even for Americans who want to understand Islam — to have an Islamic center with so much publicity is like rubbing salt in open wounds," said Akbar Ahmed, professor of Islamic studies at American University, a former Pakistani ambassador to Britain and author of "Journey Into America, The Challenge of Islam." He said the space should include a synagogue and a church so it will truly be interfaith.

Abdul Cader Asmal, past president of the Islamic Council of New England, an umbrella group for more than 15 Islamic centers, said some opponents of the $100 million, 13-story project are indeed anti-Muslim. But he said many Americans have genuine, understandable questions about Islam and extremism.

In light of those fears, and the opposition of many relatives of 9/11 victims, Asmal said organizers should dramatically scale back the project to just a simple mosque, despite their legal right to construct what they want.

"Winning in the court of law is not going to help improve the image of Muslims nationwide," said Asmal, a Massachusetts physician. "You have to win the hearts and minds of the ordinary American people."

The project has touched off a national debate over religious tolerance, American ideals and the still-fresh pain of the terrorist attacks. The center's leaders, Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf, and his wife, Daisy Khan, have a long record of interfaith outreach in New York and beyond. They insist the center will be a voice for moderate Islam and will welcome people of all religions. Supporters are outraged that critics suspect the couple of an extremist agenda.

Asra Nomani, author of "Standing Alone: An American Woman's Struggle for the Soul of Islam," said she backs the idea of the mosque in principle but believes the feelings of families who lost loved ones in the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks should trump the plan.

"I haven't been able to support the building of the mosque right there in the location they've got," said Nomani, an advocate for women's rights and tolerance in the Muslim world.

The developers for the project, called Park51, have modeled their plan on a YMCA and Jewish Community Center. The site, two blocks from where the World Trade Center stood, will include a pool, gym and 500-seat auditorium for cultural events for the general public, along with a mosque and a Sept. 11 memorial. Rauf is now traveling overseas on his latest speaking tour for the U.S. State Department.

Even among American Muslims who back the idea, there has been grumbling about what they consider the organizers' public relations missteps. A plan to build what would essentially be a local city mosque has now turned into a national confrontation that is roiling Muslim communities nationwide. Rauf's decision to remain overseas without making a statement on the controversy has also caused some frustration. Khan, and developer Sharif El-Gamal of SoHo Properties, which owns the building, have mostly been the public face of Park51.

"The total absence of Feisal Rauf has a `Where's Waldo' quality that is maddening in itself," U.S. Muslim writer Aziz Poonawalla, who supports the center, told the blog ordinary-gentlemen.com. "I'm quite capable of defending Rauf against some of the accusations against him, but am not inclined to carry his water for him while he gallivants about the globe."

Beyond misgivings about the location, some U.S. Muslims have raised concerns about what the mosque could become after Rauf and Khan retire and inevitably turn the center over to new leadership. Like houses of worship in all faiths, Islamic centers can change over time depending on the worldviews of congregants and the imams who lead them.

Nomani said American Muslims have not fully confronted extremism in Islam, which makes her worried that any mosque has the potential to become a haven for those with rigid views.

"Yes, there is prejudice against Muslims in the modern day, but also Muslims in the modern day have an extremist problem," Nomani said.

Tawfik Hamid, an Egyptian scholar and reformer who said he was once a member of a terrorist group, said he had a "conditional objection" to the proposed Islamic center.

He said it was not enough for Park51 leaders to call themselves moderate. Instead, they should "clearly and unambiguously" reject radicalization by opposing specific extremist practices, such as killing apostates, stoning women for adultery, calling Jews "pigs and monkeys" and "declaring war" on non-Muslims who refuse to convert.

"This, in my view, will be perceived by radicals in Islam as a defeat for their ideology," said Hamid, senior fellow at the Potomac Institute for Policy Studies. "They think in a very primitive way. If they see a mosque near ground zero, this would certainly be perceived as a sign of victory for al-Qaeda. In the end, they will think, `They are bowing to us.'"

Few American Muslims who lost relatives in the terrorist strikes have spoken out, but those who have are also divided.

Talat Hamdani, a Muslim whose son Salman, a New York police cadet and emergency medical technician, was killed on Sept. 11, supports the proposal. "I'm not fighting for a mosque. I'm fighting for my rights," she said.

By contrast, Neda Bolourchi of Los Angeles, a native of Iran whose mother was on one of the planes that crashed into the World Trade Center, opposes the plan.

"I fear that over time, it will cultivate a fundamentalist version of the Muslim faith, embracing those who share such beliefs and hating those who do not," she wrote in a Washington Post op-ed. "To the supporters of this new Islamic cultural center, I must ask: Build your ideological monument somewhere else, far from my mother's grave, and let her rest."

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 5:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)
        

It's a plain wooden cross almost austere in its simplicity.

But as Associated Press writer Vanessa Gera reports from Warsaw, it is stirring passions in heavily Roman Catholic Poland that expose bitter divisions which make it seem like two separate nations sharing the same land and language.

The pale wood cross about four meters (13 feet) high was erected in front of the presidential palace by Boy and Girl Scouts days after the April plane crash in Russia that killed President Lech Kaczynski, his wife and 94 others.

It quickly became a spot for mourners to light candles, place flowers and pray.

Now, with a new president installed and the country returning to normal, the question of whether the cross should stay or go has set off wider disputes that underscore the deep divisions between traditional and modern Poles, conservatives and liberals, and even rich and poor.

"The cross is a catalyst that has mobilized people who are fed up with the clericalization of Polish public life," said Jacek Kucharczyk, president of the Institute of Public Affairs, a Warsaw think tank.

On one side are deeply nationalistic and religious supporters of the late president who want the cross to stay until a fitting memorial is built to the victims, among whom were top military brass and church leaders. Some of them cling to a conspiracy theory suggesting that Kaczynski's domestic political rivals and Russians conspired to kill him.

On the other is an increasingly self-confident secular society that dismisses the conspiracy theory as lunacy and believes the religious symbol does not belong in front of such an important public building. This group argues that despite the country's Catholic influence, the constitution guarantees a separation of church and state, and that the cross should move to a church.

The "defenders of the cross" — as they are commonly called — are in the minority, with just dozens of them turning out at the cross most days. Yet they have shown a tenacity that sparked a much larger counter-protest last week of thousands of mostly young Poles mobilized by a Facebook appeal.

The event took on the atmosphere of a street party, with the demonstrators playing with a plastic beach ball and even mocking their religious compatriots. One appeared at a balcony over the large crowd dressed in a pope costume — an act of irreverence rare in Poland, the native land of the much venerated late pontiff John Paul II.

"We just want the cross moved. It doesn't belong in this place," said Michal Buczynski, a 28-year-old economist at that rally. "I want to support a secular society. There is a vocal minority (defending the cross) and we want to push it back."

They also returned over the following days in smaller numbers. On Sunday evening a small group of young Poles blared music from a boombox that drowned out the praying cross defenders and danced around them in a conga line. One held up a sign with an ironic appeal: "Let's tear down the palace. It's overshadowing the cross."

The events reveal a deep cultural shift: 20 years ago, Poland threw off communism with the help of courageous priests who challenged a regime that tried to repress religious life by promoting atheism and keeping clergy under secret police surveillance. Crosses were then reinstated in many public places in what felt like an act of liberation to many.

But today a younger generation of Poles that had no role in that struggle increasingly views the church as too powerful. John Paul's death in 2005 was a watershed event in this shift as it deprived the country of its guiding moral authority. The late pope also put a progressive stamp on the Polish church, and with him gone the Polish church has taken a more conservative turn, alienating the young further.

An attempt by authorities on Aug. 3 to move the cross nearly sparked a riot by the cross defenders, with one woman tying herself to the cross, so authorities backed down and left it. But the scuffle raised the stakes and since then the cross defenders have camped out by it in front of the palace.

Over the weekend, police and other security officials removed the defenders from the cross in the middle of the night, but left the cross in place. It now stands in its spot but is barricaded behind metal barriers and police guard. It's not clear what will happen next, but its defenders continue to gather across the street, praying and holding up small crosses and rosaries in defiance.

"Our weapon is the rosary," said Barbara Grzegorzewska, a 50-year-old caretaker of preschool children who has joined the vigil at the cross off and on. "Poland is a Christian country and we are defending the right to have the cross in public."

She and others, however, list many grievances when asked why they are there; from meager salaries or pensions, to fears that EU will erode the Catholic identity of their nation — making it clear that the cross has also proven a way for socially marginalized Poles to vent their frustration.

Some accuse the pro-EU government of Prime Minister Donald Tusk — a rival of Kaczynski — of selling out the country to foreigners by privatizing state industries, a project undertaken to raise money and lower a ballooning deficit. They voice frustration that Russia is leading the investigation into the crash that killed Kaczynski — and express doubts into preliminary findings that the crash was caused by heavy fog and pilot error.

"There is suspicion among us that this was an assassination," Grzegorzewska said.

And the people who turn out to protest the cross?

"They are drug addicts and Satan worshippers — we don't take them seriously," she said.

The complex dispute over the cross is on one level also a political battle between Tusk's Civic Platform, also the party of the newly elected President Bronislaw Komorowski, and its main rival, Law and Justice, the pro-church party led by Kaczynski's twin brother Jaroslaw.

Kaczynski ran hoping to replace his brother, but lost to Komorowski in a runoff vote on July 4. He has encouraged the cross defenders by placing a wreath at the cross on the four-month anniversary of plane crash and by accusing Tusk and Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin of bearing "moral and political" responsibility for the crash.

Kaczynski died en route to a memorial ceremony for the victims of a World War II massacre of Poles by Soviet secret police. A couple of days earlier Tusk and Putin had attended a similar ceremony but Kaczynski was not invited.

Jaroslaw Kaczynski said last week that Tusk's rivalry with Lech Kacyznski and the president's exclusion from the main ceremonies with Putin put his brother in danger and increased the likelihood of disaster. He did not explain further but one of his supporters, Antoni Macierewicz, said Monday that Kaczynski's delegation did not receive the same high security standards provided to Tusk.

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 3:52 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
        

American Muslim leaders who recently returned from visiting Dauchau and Auschwitz have released a statement condemning Holocaust denial and anti-Semitism, the Associated Press reports.

The trip earlier this month was led by Rabbi Jack Bemporad of the Center for Interreligious Understanding in New Jersey, and co-sponsored by the Konrad Adenauer Foundation of Germany.

The Muslim leaders said that denying or justifying the Holocaust violates Islamic ethics.

"We condemn anti-Semitism in any form," the leaders wrote. "No creation of Almighty God should face discrimination based on his or her faith or religious conviction."

The leaders pledged to fight prejudice against Jews, Muslims and all people based on their religion, race or ethnicity.

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 11:57 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
        

Mexico City's leftist mayor said Tuesday he will take legal action if a Roman Catholic cardinal doesn't apologize for suggesting he bribed the Supreme Court to uphold a city law allowing adoptions by same-sex couples, the Associated Press reports.

Mayor Marcelo Ebrard says that if Cardinal Juan Sandoval Iniguez does not apologize by midnight, he is going to file a slander complaint.

The church opposes the Mexico City law, but the Supreme Court has ruled it constitutional.

Over the weekend, the cardinal suggested the justices may have been paid to uphold the law, using a slang word for corruption that refers to giving feed to livestock.

The court has denied and condemned the accusation.

In a statement, the Mexican Council of Bishops expressed its "solidarity and regards" for Sandoval Iniguez.

The council also stressed its continuing opposition to the adoption law and said "we regret that when these opinions are expressed, there are those who rebuke them and threaten to sound the alarm about intolerance."

"We spoke out, as part of the freedom of expression guaranteed by our democratic system, in opposition to the Supreme Court ruling, without implying any disrespect for the institutions of the Mexican government."

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 5:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)
        

Gay couples who had been gearing up to get married in California this week had to put their wedding plans on hold once again after a federal appeals court said it first wanted to consider the constitutionality of the state's same-sex marriage ban, the Associated Press reports.

A three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals imposed an emergency stay Monday on a trial court judge's ruling overturning the ban, known as Proposition 8. Chief U.S. District Court Judge Vaughn Walker had ordered state officials to stop enforcing the measure starting Wednesday, clearing the way for county clerks to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples.

"It's saddening just to know that we still have to keep waiting for this basic human right," Marcia Davalos, of Los Angeles, a health care advocate who had planned to marry her partner, Laurette Healey, said when the stay was issued Monday. "We were getting excited and then all of a sudden it's like, 'Ugh.' It's a roller-coaster."

Lawyers for the two gay couples who challenged the ban said Monday they would not appeal the panel's decision on the stay to the U.S. Supreme Court. They said they were satisfied the appeals court had agreed to fast-track its consideration of the Proposition 8 case by scheduling oral arguments for the week of Dec. 6.

"Today's order from the 9th Circuit for an expedited hearing schedule ensures that we will triumph over Prop. 8 as quickly as possible," said Chad Griffin, president of the American Foundation for Equal Rights, a group funding the effort to get the voter-approved gay marriage ban permanently overturned. "Our attorneys are ready to take this case all the way through the appeals court and to the United States Supreme Court."

Attorneys for backers of the voter-approved measure applauded the decision. In seeking the emergency stay, they had argued that sanctioning same-sex unions while the case was on appeal would create legal chaos if the ban is eventually upheld.

"Invalidating the people's vote based on just one judge's opinion would not have been appropriate, and would have shaken the people's confidence in our elections and the right to vote itself," said Andy Pugno, general counsel for the coalition of religious and conservative groups that sponsored Proposition 8.

Under the timetable laid out Monday, it was doubtful a decision would come down from the 9th Circuit before next year.

A different three-judge panel than the one that issued Monday's decision will be assigned to decide the constitutional question that many believe will eventually end up before the Supreme Court.

County clerks throughout the state had been preparing to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples for the first time since Proposition 8 passed in November 2008. The measure amended the California Constitution to overrule a state Supreme Court ruling that legalized same-sex unions earlier that year.

"I'm sad, but I'm also glad that I didn't pay the $100 to reserve an appointment at the clerk's office," said Thea Lavin, 31, of San Francisco, who had planned to wed her partner, Jess Gabbert, 30, if the stay were denied. "This has happened so many times before where we take two steps forward, one step back."

Walker ruled on Aug. 4 that Proposition 8 violated the equal protection and due process rights of gays and lesbians guaranteed under the U.S. Constitution.

The ban's sponsors appealed that ruling and also asked the 9th Circuit to block same-sex weddings in the meantime. They claimed in papers filed with the 9th Circuit that gay marriages would harm the state's interest in promoting responsible procreation through heterosexual marriage.

California Attorney General Jerry Brown had joined lawyers for the plaintiffs in urging the appeals court to allow the weddings this week, arguing that keeping the ban in place any longer would harm the civil rights of gays and lesbians.

In a two-page order granting the stay, the appeals court panel did not indicate why it was keeping Proposition 8 in effect until it could consider the appeal of Walker's verdict. But it ordered Proposition 8 sponsors to address in their opening brief due Sept. 17 whether they even have the legal right to try to have the trial judge's ruling overturned. Both Brown and California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, the original defendants in the case, have said they support same-sex marriage and refused to defend Proposition 8 in court.

"The delay is excruciating and heartbreaking I know for the couples, but the ruling did include a significant victory by expediting the case and by highlighting that the proponents have a heavy lift to show they even have the right to bring an appeal," said Shannon Minter, legal director of the National Center for Lesbian Rights. "So those aspects of today's ruling do go some way legally to counterbalance the disappointment."

Currently, same-sex couples can legally wed only in Massachusetts, Iowa, Connecticut, Vermont, New Hampshire and Washington, D.C.

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 1:15 PM | Permalink | Comments (105)
        

Taliban militants stoned a young couple to death for adultery after they ran away from their families in northern Afghanistan, the Associated Press reports.

Amnesty International said it was the first confirming stoning in Afghanistan since the fall of Taliban rule in the 2001 U.S.-led invasion.

The Taliban-ordered killing comes at a time when international rights groups have raised worries that attempts to negotiate with the Taliban to bring peace to Afghanistan could mean a step backward for human rights in the country. When the Islamist extremists ruled Afghanistan, women were not allowed to leave their houses without a male guardian, and public killings for violations of their harsh interpretation of the Quran were common.

This weekend's stoning appeared to arise from an affair between a married man and a single woman in Kunduz province's Dasht-e-Archi district.

The woman, Sadiqa, was 20 years old and engaged to another man, said the Kunduz provincial police chief, Gen. Abdul Raza Yaqoubi. Her lover, 28-year-old Qayum, left his wife to run away with her, and the two had holed up in a friend's house five days ago, said district government head, Mohammad Ayub Aqyar.

They were discovered by Taliban operatives on Sunday and stoned to death in front a crowd of about 150 men, Aqyar said.

First the woman was brought out and stoned, then the man a half an hour later, Aqyar said. He decried the punishment, which he said was ordered by two local Taliban commanders.

A spokesman for the provincial government also condemned the act.

"It is against all human rights and international conventions," said spokesman Mabubullah Sayedi. "There was no court. It was cruel."

Amnesty International called the stoning a "heinous crime" that showed the Taliban and other insurgent groups "are growing increasingly brutal in their abuses against Afghans."

"Amnesty International has warned that the Afghan government should not sacrifice human rights, particularly the rights of women and minorities, in the name of reconciliation with the Taliban and other insurgent groups," Amnesty said.

A Taliban spokesman could not immediately be reached for comment.

The ancient practice of death by stoning has been abandoned in all but a handful of countries. It is still a legal punishment in some countries, like Iran, which justify it under Shariah, or Islamic law, although human rights activists say the Quran never specifically prescribed stoning for adultery.

Last month, Iran's religious authorities called off the planned stoning of a woman convicted of cheating on her husband. Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani's sentence — which would have been Iran's first stoning since 2008 — was lifted following a campaign by politicians, rights groups, diplomats and celebrities around the world.

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 11:22 AM | Permalink | Comments (11)
        

Weighing his words carefully on a fiery political issue, President Barack Obama said Saturday that Muslims have the right to build a mosque near New York's Ground Zero, but he did not say whether he believes it is a good idea to do so, the Associated Press reports.

Obama commented during a trip to Florida, where he expanded on a Friday night White House speech asserting that Muslims have the same right to freedom of religion as everyone else in America.

The president's statements thrust him squarely into a debate that he had skirted for weeks and could put Democrats on the spot three months before midterm elections where they already were nervous about holding control of the House and maybe even the Senate. Until Friday, the White House had asserted that it did not want to get involved in local decision-making.

New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, an independent who has been a strong supporter of the mosque, welcomed Obama's White House speech as a "clarion defense of the freedom of religion."

Gov. Charlie Crist, R-Fla., who was among those who met with Obama on Saturday, lauded the president's position.

"I think he's right — I mean you know we're a country that in my view stands for freedom of religion and respect for others," Christ said after the Florida meeting with Obama and other officials. "I know there are sensitivities and I understand them. This is a place where you're supposed to be able to practice your religion without the government telling you you can't."

Others were quick to pounce.

Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Jeff Greene of Florida took Obama's Friday speech to mean the president supports the construction.

"President Obama has this all wrong and I strongly oppose his support for building a mosque near Ground Zero especially since Islamic terrorists have bragged and celebrated destroying the Twin Towers and killing nearly 3,000 Americans," Greene said. "Freedom of religion might provide the right to build the mosque in the shadow of Ground Zero, but common sense and respect for those who lost their lives and loved ones gives sensible reason to build the mosque someplace else."

The mosque would be part of a $100 million Islamic community center two blocks from where nearly 3,000 people perished when hijacked jetliners slammed into the World Trade Center towers on Sept. 11, 2001.

The proposed construction has sparked debate around the country that included opposition from top Republicans including Sarah Palin and Newt Gingrich as well as the Jewish civil rights group the Anti-Defamation League.

Obama's Friday comment was taken by some to mean that he strongly supports the building of an Islamic center near the site of the Sept. 11 terrorist attack, something he never actually said.

Speaking to a gathering at the White House Friday evening to observe the Islamic holy month of Ramadan, Obama said that he believes "Muslims have the same right to practice their religion as everyone else in this country."

"That includes the right to build a place of worship and a community center on private property in lower Manhattan, in accordance with local laws and ordinances," he said. "This is America, and our commitment to religious freedom must be unshakable."

Asked Saturday about the issue during his trip to Florida, Obama said: "I was not commenting and I will not comment on the wisdom of making a decision to put a mosque there. I was commenting very specifically on the right that people have that dates back to our founding."

Obama said that "my intention was simply to let people know what I thought. Which was that in this country we treat everybody equally and in accordance with the law, regardless of race, regardless of religion."

Some relatives of people killed in the Sept. 11 attacks supported Obama's comments.

The mosque is "in many ways ... a fitting tribute," said Colleen Kelly of the Bronx, who lost her brother Bill Kelly Jr. in the attacks.

"This is the voice of Islam that I believe needs a wider audience," said Kelly, who is Catholic. "This is what moderate Islam is all about."

Opinions are mixed among family members.

Sally Regenhard, whose firefighter son was killed at the World Trade Center, has said the president's comments show "a gross lack of sensitivity to the 9/11 families and to the people who were lost."

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 5:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (6)
        

President Barack Obama on Friday forcefully endorsed allowing a mosque near ground zero, saying the country's founding principles demanded no less, the Associated Press reports.

"As a citizen, and as president, I believe that Muslims have the same right to practice their religion as everyone else in this country," Obama said, weighing in for the first time on a controversy that has riven New York City and the nation.

"That includes the right to build a place of worship and a community center on private property in lower Manhattan, in accordance with local laws and ordinances," he said. "This is America, and our commitment to religious freedom must be unshakable."

Obama made the comments at an annual dinner in the White House State Dining Room celebrating the Islamic holy month of Ramadan.

The White House had not previously taken a stand on the mosque, which would be part of a $100 million Islamic center two blocks from where nearly 3,000 people perished when hijacked jetliners slammed into the World Trade Center towers on Sept. 11, 2001. Press secretary Robert Gibbs had insisted it was a local matter.

It was already much more than that, sparking debate around the country as top Republicans including Sarah Palin and Newt Gingrich announced their opposition. So did the Anti-Defamation League, a Jewish civil rights group.

Obama elevated it to a presidential issue Friday without equivocation.

While insisting that the place where the twin towers once stood was indeed "hallowed ground," Obama said that the proper way to honor it was to apply American values.

"Our capacity to show not merely tolerance, but respect towards those who are different from us — and that way of life, that quintessentially American creed, stands in stark contrast to the nihilism of those who attacked us on that September morning, and who continue to plot against us today," he said.

Obama harkened back to earlier times when the building of synagogues or Catholic churches also met with opposition. "But time and again, the American people have demonstrated that we can work through these issues, and stay true to our core values and emerge stronger for it," he said. "So it must be and will be today."

New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, an independent who has been a strong supporter of the mosque, welcomed Obama's words as a "clarion defense of the freedom of religion."

But some Republicans were quick to pounce.

"President Obama is wrong," said Rep. Peter King, R-N.Y. "It is insensitive and uncaring for the Muslim community to build a mosque in the shadow of ground zero. While the Muslim community has the right to build the mosque they are abusing that right by needlessly offending so many people who have suffered so much."

Entering the highly charged election-year debate, Obama surely knew that his words would not only make headlines but be heard by Muslims worldwide. The president has made it a point to reach out to the global Muslim community, and the over 100 guests at Friday's dinner included ambassadors and officials from numerous Muslim nations, including Saudi Arabia and Indonesia. Seated around candlelit tables, they listened closely as Obama spoke, then stood and applauded when the president finished his remarks.

While his pronouncement concerning the mosque might find favor in the Muslim world, Obama's stance runs counter to the opinions of the majority of Americans, according to polls. A CNN/Opinion Research poll released this week found that nearly 70 percent of Americans opposed the mosque plan while just 29 percent approved. A number of Democratic politicians have shied away from the controversy.

The group behind the $100 million project, the Cordoba Initiative, describes it as a Muslim-themed community center. Early plans call not only for prayer space but for a swimming pool, culinary school, art studios and other features. Developers envision it as a hub for interfaith interaction, as well as a place for Muslims to bridge some of their faith's own schisms.

Opponents, including some Sept. 11 victims' relatives, see the prospect of a mosque so near the destroyed trade center as an insult to the memory of those killed by Islamic terrorists in the 2001 attacks. Some of the Sept. 11 victims' relatives, however, are in favor.

The mosque has won approval from local planning boards but faces legal challenges, and New York's Conservative Party is planning a television ad campaign to pressure a New York City utility to use its power to block the project.

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 5:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (6)
        

The federal judge who overturned California's same-sex marriage ban has more bad news for the measure's backers, the Associated Press reports: He doubts they have the right to challenge his ruling that gay couples can begin marrying next week.

Chief U.S. District Judge Vaughn R. Walker on Thursday rejected a request to delay his decision barring Proposition 8 from taking effect until high courts can take up an appeal lodged by its supporters. One of the reasons, the judge said, is he's not sure the proponents have the authority to appeal since they would not be affected by or responsible for implementing his ruling.

By contrast, same-sex couples are being denied their constitutional rights every day they are prohibited from marrying, Walker said.

The ban's backers "point to harm resulting from a 'cloud of uncertainty' surrounding the validity of marriages performed after judgment is entered but before proponents' appeal is resolved," he said. "Proponents have not, however, argued that any of them seek to wed a same-sex spouse."

Walker gave opponents of same-sex marriage until Aug. 18 at 5 p.m. to get a ruling from the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on whether gay marriages should start before the court considers their broader appeal. Their lawyers filed a request asking the 9th Circuit to intervene and block the weddings on an emergency basis late Thursday.

They argued the appeals court should grant a stay of Walker's order requiring state officials to cease enforcing Proposition 8 "to avoid the confusion and irreparable injury that would flow from the creation of a class of purported same-sex marriages."

Depending on how the 9th Circuit rules, same-sex couples could begin tying the knot in California as early as next week or be put off while the appeal works its way through the court and potentially the U.S. Supreme Court as well.

California voters passed Proposition 8 as a state constitutional amendment in November 2008, five months after the California Supreme Court legalized same-sex unions and an estimated 18,000 same-sex couples already had married.

In refusing to suspend his ruling for more than a few days, Walker agreed with the lawyers who sued to strike down the ban that it's unclear if Proposition 8's sponsors have legal standing to appeal.

Although he allowed the coalition of religious and conservative groups that sponsored the measure to defend the lawsuit during the 13-day trial over which he presided, the judge said appellate courts have different rules for deciding when a party is eligible to challenge a lower court.

Based on his interpretation of those rules, it appears the ban's sponsors can only appeal his decision with the backing of either Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger or Attorney General Jerry Brown, Walker said. But that seems unlikely as both officials refused to defend Proposition 8 in Walker's court and said last week they see no reason why gay couples should not be able to tie the knot now.

Walker also turned aside arguments that marriages performed now could be thrown into legal chaos if Proposition 8 is later upheld by an appeals court. He pointed to the 18,000 same-sex couples who married legally in the five months that gay marriage was legal in California as proof.

San Francisco Chief Deputy City Attorney Therese Stewart, who during the trial helped argue that Proposition 8 should be overturned, said that while it will not be up to Walker to decide the eligibility issue, "it's very realistic" that the 9th Circuit could reach the same conclusion.

"We allocate the decision-making authority over how to enforce and defend and prosecute the laws to the executive branch," Stewart said. "Do you want every Tom, Dick and Harry second-guessing what the attorney general does and challenging every ruling the attorney general chooses not to?"

The ban's backers addressed the potential for such a roadblock in their emergency stay request, saying California's strong citizen initiative law permits ballot measure proponents to defend their interests when state officials refuse to.

"We are confident we do have standing to seek the appellate review here, and we realize this case has just begun and we will get the decision overturned on appeal," said Jim Campbell, an Alliance Defense Fund lawyer who is part of the legal team defending Proposition 8.

Other legal analysts think the appeals court will allow the group that raised $40 million to pass Proposition 8 to formally challenge Walker's ruling.

"What Judge Walker's ruling means is you can sponsor a proposition, direct it, research it, work for it, raise $40 million for it, get it on a ballot, successfully campaign for it and then have no ability to defend it independently in court," said Dale Carpenter, a University of Minnesota constitutional law professor who supports same-sex marriage. "And then a judge maybe let you be the sole defender in a full-blown trial and then says, 'by the way, you never can defend this.' It just seems very unlikely to me the higher courts will buy that."

Walker's order clearing the way for same-sex marriages to resume in California for the first time since 52 percent of the state's voters approved Proposition 8 nonetheless raised hopes among gay couples who flocked to government offices to await word that they soon will be able to exchange vows.

"We just want equal rights. We're tired of being second-class citizens," said Amber Fox, 35, who went to the Beverly Hills Municipal Courthouse on Thursday morning in hopes of marrying her partner. The couple wed in Massachusetts in June but wanted to make it official in their home state.

Teresa Rowe, 31, and her partner, Kristin Orbin, 31, said they were still happy with the decision even though the ceremony didn't happen. The couple went to San Francisco City Hall early Thursday morning to fill out a marriage license application.

"It's sad that we have to wait a little longer, but it's been six years," Rowe said.

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 1:58 PM | Permalink | Comments (8)
        

The Simon Wiesenthal Center criticized Israeli President Shimon Peres on Friday for thanking Romania for saving Jews, saying he should have condemned the Romanian state for the tens of thousands of Jews who were killed there during World War II, the Associated Press reports.

On Thursday, Peres publicly thanked Romania for helping 400,000 Romanian Jews emigrate to Israel during the communist regime that ended in 1989. Peres did that while making the first visit to Romania by an Israeli head of state since 1948 when Israel was formed.

Peres was speaking at a news conference with Romanian President Traian Basescu, who said that Romania would be a loyal partner of Israel and NATO, if there was a conflict with Iran. During that event, Peres did not mention Romania's role in the Holocaust.

In 2004, a historical commission set up to study the Holocaust in Romania found the country was responsible for the deaths of 280,000 Jews and 11,000 Roma during the Second World War under the regime of pro-Nazi Marshal Ion Antonescu.

On Friday, Efraim Zuroff, the Israel director of the Simon Wiesenthal Center, issued a statement essentially saying Peres should have mentioned this.

"His failure to condemn the horrific crimes of the Antonescu regime against the Jewish people are likely to have very dire consequences, especially in Romania and elsewhere in Eastern Europe, where there is a growing tendency in post-Communist societies to deny or minimize the highly significant role played by local Nazi collaborators in the annihilation of the Jews," said Zuroff, who also is a Holocaust historian.

During that time, Romanian administrators allowed the nation to become "a gigantic killing field for Jews," said Zuroff, whose center is the world's major Nazi-hunting organization.

On Friday, Peres made a comment while visiting the Holocaust memorial in Bucharest that appeared to address the center's concerns.

Speaking in Hebrew, the Israeli president acknowledged that there was a "cruel and unfair" time in Romania during World War II "when men, women and innocent children were killed for the fault of being Jewish" at the hands of "Romanian assassins."

But he also said Romania is a totally different today, a free and democratic nation that respects human rights.

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 12:55 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)
        

An atheist is suing to force the administrators of a towering cross in southern Illinois to return a $20,000 state grant toward its restoration, saying Thursday it was "blatantly unconstitutional" to spend taxpayer money on a Christian symbol, the Associated Press reports.

Caretakers of the 11-story Bald Knob Cross of Peace near Alto Pass, Ill., some 130 miles southeast of St. Louis, insist the grant was legally awarded to the 50-year-old landmark in mid-2008 by classifying it as a tourist attraction, not a religious symbol.

Rob Sherman disagrees, pressing in his federal lawsuit in Springfield, Ill., that the grant violates the U.S. Constitution's establishment clause used to argue a separation of church and state.

"There has never been any question, outside of southern Illinois, that this state grant is blatantly unconstitutional," said Sherman, who successfully sued to have an Illinois law requiring a daily "moment of silence" in Illinois public schools overturned.

"The job of atheists is to take clergy to court to challenge the epidemic of civil wrongs that they have perpetrated, on the sneak, against the people of Illinois," Sherman said on his website. "It's a big job, but somebody's gotta do it."

In his lawsuit filed Thursday, Chicago-based Sherman asks a judge to compel the caretakers of the cash-strapped cross to return the money or face what he pledged would be a drawn-out, expensive legal tangle.

Steve McKeown, a pastor and administrator of the cross, said he was confident Sherman would not win. He said Bald Knob drew roughly 1,000 visitors last weekend, underscoring its sway as a tourist draw.

"What Mr. Sherman fails to recognize is there's a long-standing precedent for the fact the just because an organization may have a sectarian purpose, it does not exempt them automatically from receiving tax dollars," McKeown said.

"What Mr. Sherman wants is a United States that's free from religion," McKeown said. "Our founding fathers never meant that to be the case."

The lawsuit's defendants include Gov. Pat Quinn and his predecessor, Rod Blagojevich, who is awaiting the verdict ini his trial on federal corruption charges. Also cited are the current and previous heads of Illinois' Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity, which awarded the grant to Friends of the Cross, the landmark's fundraising arm.

The cross — built in large measure with area farmers' profits from selling pigs — has been a fixture on the 1,025-foot-high Bald Knob Mountain for a half century, standing sentry over forests and much of the region's orchards and burgeoning wine country. Easter services have been held on the mountain since 1937.

Over the decades, the cross and its porcelain tiles fell into disrepair, prompting its caretakers' feverish bid to raise funds for the half-million-dollar restoration expected to be completed within months.

Sherman's lawsuit claims that under the state's 2008 contract with the cross' fundraising group, the portion of the restoration work to be covered by the grant was to be finished by last April. Sherman says that work continues.

According to the lawsuit, the rehabbing effort "has the primary effect of advancing a particular religious sect, namely Christianity," with taxpayer funding causing "an excessive entanglement between (the state) and the Christian religion."

Friends of the Cross has maintained the grant has been spent long ago, though Sherman counters that the $20,000 remains in a certificate of deposit readily returnable to the state.

"Nobody's hiding any money anywhere," McKeown said.

No hearing date was immediately set.

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 5:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (17)
        

Russia has rejected a U.S. court ruling to turn over a Jewish library to a Hasidic group in New York, the Associated Press reports.

A U.S. judge last week ruled against the Russian government for its refusal to return thousands of manuscripts that once belonged to a Chabad-Lubavitch rabbi. The library was seized by Red Army in Nazi Germany as war booty.

Russia's Foreign Ministry said late Wednesday that the ruling is a "rude violation" of international law.

It said the library was nationalized because its owner, Rabbi Joseph Isaac Schneersohn, had no heirs. Schneersohn was forced to leave Russia in 1927.

The ministry said the library is available for scientific study and worship.

Chabad-Lubavich said it feared some manuscripts were headed to the black market.

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 9:31 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
        

An attorney suing the Vatican on behalf of a clergy abuse victim in Oregon says the withdrawal of a similar lawsuit in Kentucky won't jeopardize other cases taking aim at Rome, the Associated Press reports.

The 6-year-old Kentucky suit that named the Holy See as a defendant virtually ended this week when the plaintiff's attorney filed a motion to dismiss his own case.

Jeff Anderson, the attorney in the lawsuit filed in Portland, noted the difficulty in taking on the head of the Roman Catholic Church. He says "it's not for the faint of heart (or) the weak of pocketbook."

And a legal expert says that the Oregon case has a tough road ahead in proving that American priests should be considered employees of the Vatican.

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 9:28 AM | Permalink | Comments (36)
        

The first sign of danger was the crackle of gunfire over their heads. Ten gunmen, their faces covered, rushed toward terrified humanitarian workers and began shouting "Satellite! Satellite!" — a demand to surrender their phones.

Moments later, 10 of them lay dead, including two women hiding in the back seat of a car the attackers hit with a grenade, according to an Afghan official familiar with the account the sole survivor gave police.

It is the first detailed narrative of the slaying of six Americans, two Afghans, one German and a Briton on Aug. 5 in remote northern Afghanistan, the Associated Press reports. They were ambushed and shot Aug. 5 after journeying about 100 miles — much of it on foot and horseback — through the Hindu Kush mountains, giving eye and other medical care to impoverished villagers.

Afghan and U.S. investigators spent at least four hours this week questioning the survivor, a 24-year-old father of three named Safiullah. He was employed as a driver for International Assistance Mission, a nonprofit Christian organization that has worked in Afghanistan since 1966.

Safiullah, who like many Afghans uses only one name, told investigators that the killings occurred around 7:30 a.m. or 8:30 a.m., according to the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to disclose details of the ongoing investigation.

The official, whose information has proven reliable in the past, said Safiullah, who is being held but not behind bars, gave the following account of how the killings unfolded.

At the end of the trip, the team spent their final night in a village. The next morning, riding in four-wheeled drive vehicles, they encountered a river swollen by heavy rains.

An Afghan man in the area offered to help the team as it was trying to cross the river. Two members of the team — including leader Tom Little, an optometrist from Delmar, New York, who had worked in Afghanistan since the late 1970s — rolled up their pants legs and waded in to find a spot shallow enough for the vehicles to ford the river.

After successfully crossing, the team stopped to take a break in a forested area at the side of the road, which ran through a narrow valley. They wanted to get ready for their long journey back though Badakhshan province and on to the Afghan capital, Kabul.

The Afghan man who had offered to help the group left. Then came the attack.

The gunmen rushed in, firing bullets over the medical team members' heads.

"What's happening?" Little shouted.

A gunman struck Little in the head with the back of an AK-47 rifle. Little fell bleeding to the ground. When he tried to get up, the attackers fatally shot him in the torso.

Two of three female members of the team had jumped inside one SUV to hide. The attackers tossed a grenade at the vehicle, killing them both. Then, one by one, they killed the rest of the group — except the driver.

Safiullah told investigators he believes the lead gunman was Pakistani because he yelled "Jadee! Jadee!" — a word used in several regional languages that means "hurry up." It is more commonly used in Pakistan and India than Afghanistan. He said all the attackers understood Dari and Pashto, the two main languages spoken in Afghanistan, but conversed in Pashaye, a local dialect used only in parts of the northeast corner of Afghanistan.

Safiullah said he doesn't know why he survived while two other Afghan members of the team were killed. He said he raised his arms in the air and recited verses from the Islamic holy book Quran as he begged the gunmen for his life.

The official said Safiullah speculated that the gunmen might have shot the team's Afghan cook, who was lying under one of the vehicles, because they thought he was armed. Safiullah said they might have killed the second Afghan, a guard employed at International Assistance Mission since 2007, because he was wearing a head scarf wrapped in a style favored by northern militias.

A fourth Afghan on the trip, Dr. Said Yasin, left the group a day before the killings, saying he was tired and wanted to take a more direct route back to Jalalabad where he has family. Dirk Frans, the IAM executive director, said Yasin told the team he was suffering from a kidney ailment and asked permission to leave on his own.

"He is fine now," Frans said about Yasin. "He's OK. He is well — of course extremely sad that all but one of his colleagues are gone."

After the killings, the gunmen took Safiullah with them on a seven- or eight-hour hike through a forest. During the journey, one of the gunmen spoke on a radio with a high antenna, saying, in Pashto, "Everything's finished. We killed them," Safiullah told investigators, according to the official.

The attackers stopped to pray in the evening, then continued on, walking toward a flashing light that Safiullah said was meant to guide them to a village near Barg-e-Matal, scene of heavy fighting in recent weeks between government forces and militants who crossed over from Pakistan.

There, they met up with another group of people, who asked Safiullah if he was a Muslim, his father's name, how many children he has and how he got a job working for foreigners.

The gunmen told Safiullah that he could leave, but he told investigators he feared he would be shot in the back if he did so. He said he dropped to his knees and began hugging the legs of one of the men. Eventually convinced that they had no plans to kill him, Safiullah said he started running. He said he rested by a large rock, and then despite extreme fatigue began running again.

An older man he met along the way let him briefly ride a donkey. Safiullah said he eventually found his way back to the town in the Kuran Wa Munjan district of Nuristan province where the group had left their three four-wheeled drive vehicles and rented eight horses at the beginning of the trip.

The group had assembled last month in Faizabad, the capital of Badakhshan, and then drove south, according to Safiullah.

They left their vehicles in Kuran Wa Munjan and then trekked nearly half a day on foot and horseback over mountainous terrain to reach the Parun valley. The valley is a harsh, isolated area about 9,500 feet above sea level where an estimated 50,000 people eke out a primitive existence as shepherds and subsistence farmers.

Safiullah said he was not aware of any threats to the team during the two weeks they spent walking from village to village providing medical care.

The Taliban said they carried out the attack because the team members were spying and trying to convert Muslims to Christianity. IAM said it is registered as a Christian organization with the Afghan government, but does not proselytize.

"IAM would not be invited back to villages if we were using aid as a cover for preaching," Frans said in a statement. "This specific camp, led by Tom Little, a man with four decades experience in Afghanistan, has led eye camps for many years to Nuristan — and was welcomed back every time."

The bodies of four of the Americans, escorted by FBI personnel, were flown to the United States on Wednesday aboard U.S. military aircraft, according to Caitlin Hayden, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Embassy in Kabul. "In accordance with their families' wishes, the remains of two American citizens will remain in Afghanistan and be laid to rest here, in the country they selflessly and courageously served for so many years," she said.

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 5:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)
        

Republican Rand Paul has apologized for saying he worried beer would be thrown at a church picnic he attended last weekend in western Kentucky, the Associated Press reports.

The U.S. Senate candidate issued the apology Wednesday through a statement from campaign manager Jesse Benton.

Paul told conservative radio personality Sean Hannity on Tuesday he worried people would throw beer on him at the picnic hosted by St. Jerome Parish in a tiny farming community.

Parishioners complained that Paul's comments created a false perception of the event. Beer isn't served at the picnic, and alcohol sales are illegal in the community.

The picnic is a church fundraiser and attracts Kentucky politicians who want to glad-hand with attendees and deliver stump speeches.

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 1:21 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)
        

Polygamous sect leader Warren Jeffs won't face a retrial in his Utah accomplice rape case until his criminal charges in Texas are resolved, Utah Attorney General Mark Shurtleff told the Associated Press Wednesday.

The Utah Supreme Court last month overturned Jeffs' 2007 convictions on accomplice rape charges. The court said faulty jury instructions denied Jeffs a fair trial, and the justices sent the case back for retrial.

After talking with Washington County Attorney Brock Belnap and Texas authorities, Shurtleff said all sides agreed to let Texas step in.

"The plan is we all want him tried there first," Shurtleff said. "Then if it looks like we need to try him up here, we'll bring him back."

Jeffs, 54, is the ecclesiastical head of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Saints, a southern Utah-based church that practices polygamy in marriages arranged by church leaders. Historically, some marriages have involved underage girls, although church leaders say the practice has stopped.

Texas authorities have charged Jeffs with bigamy, aggravated sexual assault and assault based on alleged incidents with underage girls at a church ranch near Eldorado, Texas. The information that led to the charges was gleaned from church and family records seized during a raid on the Yearning for Zion ranch in 2008.

Texas Gov. Rick Perry sent Herbert a letter July 29 demanding that Jeffs be arrested and turned over to Texas authorities.

Jeffs' Utah attorneys, Walter Bugden and Tara Isaacson, have said they would fight extradition. In June, Jeffs refused to sign a warrant for his extradition brought to him at the Utah State Prison, where he remained Wednesday.

"He can still fight it, but it's pretty much a done deal," Shurtleff said.

Shurtleff said he believes Texas authorities have strong cases and a good likelihood of success because Jeffs is directly accused in the crimes.

In Utah, Jeffs was charged as an accomplice to the rape of a 14-year-old follower to her 19-year-old cousin.

Jeffs performed the couple's religious marriage ceremony and later counseled the young bride to give herself "mind, body and soul" to her husband to try and make an unhappy marriage work.

During the trial, the bride, now an adult, said she objected to the marriage and was forced into sexual relations with her husband.

A jury convicted Jeffs on both counts and a 5th District Judge sentenced him to consecutive terms of five years to life in prison.

In its reversal of the convictions, Utah's Supreme Court was critical of how state prosecutors applied accomplice liability law and said Jeffs' actions could not be equated with those of the woman's husband.

Shurtleff said his office plans to ask justices to rehear the appeal of the case.

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 12:13 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
        

New York Gov. David Paterson offered state help Tuesday if the developers of a mosque near the site of the Sept. 11 attacks agree to move the project farther from the site, the Associated Press reports.

Paterson, a Democrat, said that he doesn't oppose the project as planned but indicated that he understands where opponents are coming from. He said he was willing to intervene to seek other suitable state property if the developers agreed.

"I think it's rather clear that building a center there meets all the requirements, but it does seem to ignite an immense amount of anxiety among the citizens of New York and people everywhere, and I think not without cause," Paterson said in a news conference in Manhattan.

"I am very sensitive to the desire of those who are adamant against it to see something else worked out," Paterson said.

The developers declined to comment. Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who last week made an impassioned defense of the project planned for lower Manhattan, declined to comment through a spokesman.

Paterson said he expects the state Public Service Commission, which must sign off on the Corboda Initiative's project, to follow the law and not politics in its review.

Paterson noted that "we really are still suffering in many respects" from Sept. 11 and that impassioned feelings were bound to emerge from a mosque just a couple of blocks from where nearly 3,000 people died at the hands of Muslim extremists.

He noted that Muslims died in the Sept. 11 attacks, too, and that "we have to remember that sometimes it's the fanaticism of religion that have driven people to do what they do, not the worship of the religion itself."

Supporters of the cultural center, including some Jewish activists, argue the aim of the Cordoba Initiative is to improve understanding of Islam. They point out that Muslims worshipped in the same area for a long time before the 13-story, $100 million proposal became public in May and was the subject of public hearings in the city and debate on television and radio nationwide.

Opponents note that the center will replace a building damaged by the landing gear of a jet that slammed into the World Trade Center on Sept. 11, 2001. They say the religion that fueled the hatred in the terrorists shouldn't be displayed so near to the site and in a place New Yorkers will have to pass daily.

A city board cleared the way for the existing building to be razed to make way for the center, which is to include athletic and arts facilities and be dedicated to peace and tolerance. Critics are suspicious of who will fund the project, and developers haven't released their sources of capital.

Carl Paladino, a Republican candidate for governor, said the plan is "no different than Japan asking to build a memorial to kamikaze pilots next to the USS Arizona in Pearl Harbor."

Bloomberg argues, though, that it "would be untrue to the best part of ourselves, and who we are as New Yorkers and Americans, if we said no to a mosque in lower Manhattan."

A Marist College poll released Tuesday found that 53 percent of New York City voters polled oppose constructing the mosque there. Just 34 percent favored the plan in the poll, which also showed a slide in Bloomberg's traditional high approval ratings.

The Marist poll surveyed 809 New York City residents July 28 through Aug. 5 and has a margin of error of plus or minus 3.5 percentage points.

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 5:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)
        

A name like Maria or Jose isn't a solid clue anymore that the person who answers to it will worship in a Catholic church on Sunday, the Associated Press reports.

An Associated Press-Univision poll finds that younger Latinos, as well as those who speak more English than Spanish, are much less likely to identify as Catholics than older, Hispanics who mostly speak Spanish.

The poll of 1,500 Latino adults also found significant divisions on social issues such as same-sex unions and abortion, along lines of age, language and whether one is Catholic or Protestant.

It's been more than a year since Melissa Solis went to Mass. An executive assistant at a New York financial firm, she was raised by a pious Catholic mother but calls herself "nonpracticing."

"There is peace in the house of God for me, but there is also inner peace," said Solis, 35. "I do believe there is a God, and that has helped me through tough times. But you can practice your religion in your home, and it doesn't necessarily have to be in a building labeled the house of God."

Overall, 62 percent of Hispanics identify as Catholic, but that includes only 55 percent of young adults 18 to 29, compared with 80 percent of elders 65 and over.

Catholicism is the primary religion in the ancestral countries of U.S. Latinos. Spanish missionaries brought the faith to what is now Florida and the American Southwest more than 400 years ago. But in the United States these days, religious sentiment seems to be keener among Latino Protestants than their Catholic counterparts.

Protestants are twice as likely to attend weekly services, according to the poll, also sponsored by The Nielsen Company and Stanford University. Many worship in evangelical or Pentecostal churches.

They tend to be more conservative than Catholics on matters of religious doctrine and social morality.

Seventy percent of Hispanic Protestants said the Bible is the actual word of God, to be taken literally, compared with 46 percent of Hispanic Catholics. Just 26 percent of Protestants said abortion should be mostly legal, compared with 41 percent of Catholics. And 59 percent of Protestants said same-sex couples should not be allowed to marry, compared with 29 percent of Catholics.

"What does it mean to be a Latino Catholic?" asked Robert P. Jones, founder of Public Religion Research Institute, a progressive think tank. "How does one move from religious belief to public policy? Among Catholics it's a much more complex process. While it takes into account scripture and church teachings, it also brings in reason and experience as authoritative sources."

Lindsay Dusenbery, 27, of Columbia, Md., said she gradually came to accept same-sex unions, even though Catholic bishops are staunchly opposed. Working as a preschool teacher, she met a lesbian couple and their rambunctious son.

"As much as I had thought it would mess up our social order, it doesn't seem like anything different now," said Dusenbery, who is of Panamanian and Nicaraguan heritage.

The lesbian couple "reminded me so much of what a normal couple would be like," she added. Their son "was just a normal two-year-old, running around and going crazy."

But Jose Ramos, 70, of La Puente, Calif., doesn't see how same-sex unions can work. "If the parents are two women, who are the children going to call daddy?" asked the retired truck driver. "If it's two men, who are the children going to call mommy? That business seems very difficult to me."

The poll found a large generation gap on same-sex marriage, with 46 percent of Hispanics ages 18 to 29 saying same-sex couples should be allowed to marry, compared with less than one-third of those in older age groups.

Overall, 31 percent of Hispanics said same-sex couples should be allowed to marry, while another 28 percent said they should be allowed to form civil unions, distinct from marriage. Thirty-five percent disapprove of allowing marriage or civil unions.

On another divisive issue, the poll found markedly less support for legal abortion among Latinos than among Americans overall. Thirty-nine percent of Hispanics said abortion should be mostly legal, compared with 51 percent of the general population in a 2009 AP-GfK poll.

But there are big disagreements among Latinos. Forty-nine percent of those who speak mainly English said abortion should be legal in most cases, about the same as the proportion of the general U.S. population holding a similar view. Hispanics who mainly speak Spanish were far more conservative, with only 31 percent saying abortion should be mostly legal.

"That's taking somebody's life away," said Martha De Leon, 26, a stay-at-home mother of three from Mercedes, Texas. "That's taking away the life of a child." She attends a Pentecostal church three times a week.

The AP-Univision poll was conducted from March 11 to June 3 by the National Opinion Research Center at the University of Chicago. Using a sample of households provided by The Nielsen Company, 1,521 Hispanics were interviewed in English and Spanish, mostly by mail but also by telephone and the Internet. The margin of sampling error is plus or minus 3.5 percentage points.

Stanford University's participation in the study was made possible by a grant from The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 10:49 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
        

Three men who sued the Vatican over sexual abuse by Roman Catholic priests in Kentucky have asked a court to dismiss their case, the Associated Press reports.

Plaintiff's attorney William McMurry told the AP that the case is ending because of an earlier ruling that the Vatican is a foreign nation and can't be held liable for policies the suit contended shielded abusive priests. He said most U.S. victims have reached settlements with a diocese and can't go after the Vatican now.

McMurry said a months-long search for victims who haven't settled and could pursue the lawsuit failed to find any willing to come forward.

The dismissal motion was filed Monday in federal court in Louisville.

Vatican lawyer Jeffrey Lena says the case showed "absolutely no evidence of Holy See involvement in the abuses."

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 5:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (30)
        

Cardinal Norberto Rivera sharply criticized Mexico's Supreme Court on Sunday for upholding a law allowing homosexuals to marry in the capital, calling the ruling "aberrant" and "immoral," the Associated Press reports.

The Roman Catholic archbishop said it was wrong to go against Christian doctrine that recognizes only marriages between a man and a woman.

"The church cannot fail to call evil evil," Rivera said in a statement.

On Thursday, the Supreme Court on an 8-2 vote upheld the constitutionality of gay marriages in Mexico City under a law passed by the state legislature. The federal government had sought to nullify the law.

The Federal District is the only part of Mexico that allows gay marriages. The city government said last week that since 320 same-sex couples had married since March, 173 of them male and 147 female.

Rivera said homosexuals have suffered abuses from the broader society, but argued that allowing same-sex marriages is not the way to try to atone for such injustices.

He called same-sex unions "inherently immoral," saying they "distort the nature of marriage raised by Christ to the dignity of a sacrament."

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 3:26 PM | Permalink | Comments (16)
        

A Mennonite aid group in Pennsylvania denied Monday that a member killed with nine others during a medical mission in Afghanistan had tried to convert Muslims to Christianity, the Associated Press reports.

The Mennonite Central Committee joined a chorus of protests over Taliban claims the volunteers had engaged in proselytizing.

John Williamson, a representative with the Akron, Pa.-based aid group, dismissed those claims as "rubbish" after a morning news conference about the death of member Glen Lapp. Lapp, a 40-year-old nurse from Lancaster, had been in Afghanistan for nearly two years.

Lapp was a "very kind, loving, respectful person" who enjoyed sharing stories with the Afghan people, Williamson said.

Lapp was among 10 aid workers — six Americans, two Afghans, one Briton and a German — fatally shot Thursday after being accosted by gunmen following a two-week medical mission to impoverished villagers in remote Nuristan province.

Lapp was on assignment with the International Assistance Mission, a Kabul-based Christian charity that organized the trip. An official with the group said it was authorized to treat people in the remote Parun valley for eye disease.

Director Dirk Frans insisted there was no attempt to preach Christianity. He said members were likely carrying personal Bibles in English and German — but not in Afghan languages as the Taliban alleged.

The family of a young photographer who was among those killed said he had gone to the country to document its people and landscapes, along with the medical group's humanitarian efforts.

"He loved people and was particularly concerned for the poor," the family of Brian Carderelli, 25, of Harrisonburg, Va., said in a statement Monday.

Carderelli, a 2009 James Madison University graduate, was an Eagle Scout who enjoyed hiking, snowboarding and surfing. He went to Afghanistan in September and was compiling an album titled "The Beauty — It's Not All War."

In Tennessee, the father of a woman who was among those murdered said he hopes Afghan leaders will honor the victims by pushing for freedom in their country.

Cheryl Beckett, 32, understood the risks but had grown attached to the Afghan people after repeated visits over six years, according to her father, the Rev. Charles Beckett, a senior minister at Woodlawn Christian Church in Knoxville.

Carderelli was a lifelong member of Covenant Presbyterian Church in Harrisonburg, and was very active there, said family friend J.D. Patton, and elder at the church.

"Brian was a Christian who was killed as he was fulfilling his life ambition to use his talents and training to show the love of Christ to the poor and disadvantaged," the church said in a statement.

Lapp was just the third volunteer killed in the Mennonite group's 90 years of international relief work, Williamson said.

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 2:26 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
        

Muslims trying to build houses of worship in the nation's heartland, far from the heated fight in New York over plans for a mosque near ground zero, are running into opponents even more hostile and aggressive, the Associated Press reports.

Foes of proposed mosques have deployed dogs to intimidate Muslims holding prayer services and spray painted "Not Welcome" on a construction sign, then later ripped it apart.

The 13-story, $100 million Islamic center that could soon rise two blocks from the site of the Sept. 11 attacks would dwarf the proposals elsewhere, yet the smaller projects in local communities are stoking a sharper kind of fear and anger than has showed up in New York.

In the Nashville suburb of Murfreesboro, opponents of a new Islamic center say they believe the mosque will be more than a place of prayer. They are afraid the 15-acre site that was once farmland will be turned into a terrorist training ground for Muslim militants bent on overthrowing the U.S. government.

"They are not a religion. They are a political, militaristic group," said Bob Shelton, a 76-year-old retiree who lives in the area.

Shelton was among several hundred demonstrators recently who wore "Vote for Jesus" T-shirts and carried signs that said: "No Sharia law for USA!," referring to the Islamic code of law. Others took their opposition further, spray painting the sign announcing the "Future site of the Islamic Center of Murfreesboro" and tearing it up.

In Temecula, Calif., opponents brought dogs to protest a proposed 25,000-square-foot mosque that would sit on four acres next to a Baptist church. Opponents worry it will turn the town into haven for Islamic extremists, but mosque leaders say they are peaceful and just need more room to serve members.

Islam is a growing faith in the U.S., though Muslims represent less than 1 percent of the country's population. Ten years ago, there were about 1,200 mosques nationwide. Now there are roughly 1,900, according to Ihsan Bagby, professor of Islamic Studies at the University of Kentucky and a researcher on surveys of American mosques.

The growth involves Islamic centers expanding to accommodate more Muslims - as is the case in New York, California and Tennessee - as well as mosques cropping up in smaller, more isolated communities, Bagby said.

A 2007 survey of Muslim Americans by the Pew Research Center found that 39 percent of adult Muslims living in the United States were immigrants that had come here since 1990.

"In every religious community, one of the things that has happened over the course of immigration is that people get settled and eventually build something that says, 'We're here! We're not just camping,'" said Diana Eck, a professor of Comparative Religion at the Harvard University. "In part, that's because those communities have put down roots in America and made this their home."

Before the demonstration in Murfreesboro, a fundraiser was held for the new community center. Children behind a folding table sold homemade wooden plaques, door hangers and small serving trays decorated with glitter and messages like, "Peace," "I love being a Muslim" and "Freedom of Religion."

Mosque leader Essam Fathy, who helped plan the new building in Murfreesboro, has lived there for 30 years.

"I didn't think people would try that hard to oppose something that's in the Constitution," he said. "The Islamic center has been here since the early '80s, 12 years in this location. There's nothing different now except it's going to be a little bigger."

Bagby said that hasn't stopped foes from becoming more virulent.

"It was there before, but it didn't have as much traction. The larger public never embraced it," he said. "The level of anger, the level of hostility is much higher in the last few years."

The Murfreesboro mosque is one of three planned in the Nashville area that have drawn recent scrutiny.

Zuhdi Jasser, president of the American Islamic Forum for Democracy, a nonprofit that advocates for reform and modernization of Islam, said opposing mosques is no way to prevent terrorism.

Neighbors didn't want his family to build a mosque in 1979 in Neenah, Wis., because they didn't understand who Muslims were.

"If the Wisconsin mosque had not been allowed to be built, I, at 17, might have put up walls and become a different person," he said. "If we start preventing these from being built, the backlash will be increased radicalization."

A study by professors at the Duke University's Sanford School of Public Policy and the University of North Carolina backs up Jasser's statement. The study found that mosques, religious bookstores and other communal associations that bring Muslim-Americans together helps prevent radicalization.

In Murfreesboro, Imam Ossama Bahloul said the center has hired a security guard for Friday prayer services and a security camera constantly pans the parking lot and doors. Their fears are not without cause.

Two years ago, several men broke into the Islamic Center of Columbia, about 30 miles southwest of Murfreesboro, and torched it with molotov cocktails, stealing a stereo system and painting swastikas and "White Power" on the front of the building.

Bahloul said he hopes the controversy will die down with time. He said the situation has been hardest on the children.

"The second generation is facing a huge challenge because they did not think even for a second before that someone would say, 'You are not welcome.'"

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 9:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)
        

In Arizona, the shooting death of a rancher blew the lid off simmering anger over border security and helped solidify support for a tough new immigration law. Now a similar eruption threatens in Virginia, the Associated Press reports, following the death of a Catholic nun in a car accident involving a man in the country illegally and accused of drunken driving.

The Benedictine Sisters of Virginia tried to discourage using the death of Sister Denise Mosier as a "forum of the illegal immigration agenda" and pleaded for a focus on "Christ's command to forgive."

"The sisters' mission is peace and love," said Corey Stewart, chairman of Prince William County's Board of Supervisors. "My mission is law enforcement and the protection of public safety."

Prince William County, about 25 miles southwest of Washington, D.C., stepped up its immigration enforcement in 2007 amid explosive growth of its Hispanic and immigrant populations. Under Stewart's leadership, the county implemented a local policy requiring police to determine the immigration status of all people arrested on suspicion of violating state or local laws.

Stewart rushed back into the immigration debate after the Aug. 1 accident, firing off a statement that President Barack Obama, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano and members of Congress "all have blood on their hands."

"What I'm hoping is that this situation, which because it involves a nun has drawn the nation's attention, can serve as a catalyst for change and force the administration to come clean about its catch-and-release policies," Stewart said. He also says that the tragedy illustrates the need for Virginia to toughen its drunken driving laws.

Even though Stewart says he's not running for higher office now, he is seen as a possible lieutenant governor candidate in three years. "Regardless of what he says, there is no question people would be interested in seeing him move up within the Republican Party," said Stephen Farnsworth, an assistant communications professor at George Mason University.

The day after the crash, Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli II issued an advisory opinion concluding that police have authority to inquire into the immigration status of any person stopped or arrested, similar to the Arizona immigration law that is under federal court review.

Arizona passed the law after rancher Robert Krentz was fatally shot while checking water lines on his property near the Arizona-Mexico border. Authorities believe a scout for drug smugglers is to blame, although an investigation continues.

The sisters at the Bristow, Va., monastery have buried Mosier, who would have turned 67 on Aug. 26. Two other nuns injured in the crash, Charlotte Lange and Connie Ruth Lupton, have undergone surgery and remain in critical condition.

The man charged in the case, Carlos A. Martinelly Montano, 23, of Bolivia, had two prior drunken driving convictions, but was not required to serve any of his 30-day sentence for the first one. A Prince William County judge required Montano to serve only 20 days of his approximately one-year sentence on his second conviction.

Local officials turned him over to federal immigration enforcement officers after the second incident and after sentencing, but federal officers released him both times while he awaited hearings.

Montano is being held at the Prince William County Adult Detention Center, and the county's prosecutor is promising to ask a grand jury to consider charges that could put him in prison for 40 years.

Montano entered the U.S. illegally with his parents and siblings, his uncle Luis Ronald Montano told The Associated Press. He attended American schools in New Jersey and Virginia from third grade through high school. He is engaged and is the father of two boys, ages 1 and 2, who were born in Manassas, Va.

For a few years, the family had asked Montano, a T-shirt screenprinter, to seek professional help for his alcoholism. His family took away his cars, but he had taken his mother's Subaru at the time of the crash.

Luis Ronald Montano said the family understands Carlos has broken the law several times. They worry about the future of his two young sons. They expect he will be deported, but they have hired lawyers in hopes of keeping him here with minimum jail time.

"He's getting used to crucify all the illegal aliens in the United States," his uncle said.

The nuns have forgiven Montano. Mercy and forgiveness, the nuns say on their website, are not optional for Christians.

Nearly half of the 292,663 people deported or removed by ICE through July 22 of this year were considered criminals. In 2009, 35 percent, or 136,343, of all those deported were criminals, a reflection of ICE's focus on deporting people with criminal records.

Removals of non-citizens who are not criminals are below what they were at the same time last year, which has become fodder for criticism of the Obama administration.

The law requires mandatory detention for immigrants who have committed certain crimes. In other cases, immigration officials have to make judgment calls on whether to release someone.

In those cases, ICE considers the likelihood that the person will be a danger to the community and the likelihood the person will appear at deportation hearings, said David Leopold, president of the American Immigration Lawyers Association.

Factors they consider are ties to the community, such as whether they have family members or citizen children in the U.S.; length of time in the country; how the person entered the country; other immigration violations; and a criminal record. A judge's decision to relax a sentence also could be considered, Leopold said.

Stewart criticized ICE for releasing Montano, saying the county hands immigrants over "on a silver platter" after they've been convicted of crimes "and still they release them back into communities." He's asking Congress to subpoena statistics from ICE on how many people who have committed crimes are released to the community.

But Leopold dismissed the criticism, saying that no credible studies show that drunken driving is a problem particular to immigrants. "Frankly, drunk driving is a national problem which we deal with in every community," he said.

The Benedictine Sisters operate several ministries, including providing transitional housing for homeless women and their children and an adult literacy project. None solely targets undocumented immigrants, Smith said in an e-mail, and the services are available to everyone.

The Rule of Benedict and the Gospel of Jesus Christ "compels us to reach out to the neighbor and the stranger, to the rich and the poor, to all who may come to our door," Smith said. "I might add that Sister Denise was a model for us in this reaching out and acceptance of diverse persons and cultures."

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 7:30 AM | Permalink | Comments (7)
        

Writer, public health professional and attorney J. Samia Mair of Baltimore is the author of the children’s books Amira’s Totally Chocolate World and The Perfect Gift.

According to the Council on American-Islamic Relations, several mosques in the United States have been targeted either by anti-Muslim protests or by hate crimes. Some speculate that it is due to the controversy over the proposed building of the Cordoba House, a few blocks from Ground Zero. For example, a children’s playground was torched at a Texas mosque and the parking lot had obscene graffiti, defiling the name of God.

There also have been protests against a Kentucky mosque and California mosque. A Florida mosque was recently bombed, which officials described as terrorism.

On Friday, angry protesters from the group Operation Save America accosted worshipers at the Bridgeport Islamic Society in Connecticut. Among them was a 13-year-old who held up a sign stating “Islam is a Lie.” One protestor shouted “murderers” as he apparently shoved a placard at a group of young Muslim children.

The Anti-Defamation League calls itself “America’s prime resource for information on and responses to bigotry.”

According to its website, “The immediate object of the League is to stop, by appeals to reason and conscience and, if necessary, by appeals to law, the defamation of the Jewish people. Its ultimate purpose is to secure justice and fair treatment to all citizens alike and to put an end forever to unjust and unfair discrimination against and ridicule of any sect or body of citizens" (emphasis added).

To meet these ends, ADL states that it:

• probes the roots of hatred
• fosters interfaith/intergroup relations
• mobilizes communities to stand up against bigotry

Where is the ADL in fulfilling its stated mission to combat bigotry in this case? The answer should surprise you. In a recent statement, ADL took the unbelievable stand that although legal, it is wrong to build the Cordoba House near Ground Zero.

No one wants to inflict more pain on those who suffered personally from the tragedy on 9/11. But surely there is a better way to address the concerns raised than to pander to bigotry.

The ADL and any other organizations or individuals opposing the building of the Cordoba House because it is Islamic are on the side of groups such as Operation Save America who poison their children with hatred. They are providing the cover for these more extreme groups to express their angry hatred. They are legitimatizing bigotry. And although the ADL and others might not share in these extreme groups’ other views, they are sharing in the spread of hatred across this nation nonetheless.

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 5:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (43)
        

California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, who twice vetoed legislation that would have legalized same-sex marriage, has surprised gay rights supporters by urging a federal judge to allow gay couples to resume marrying in the state without further delay, the Associated Press reports.

Lawyers for Schwarzenegger, Attorney General Jerry Brown, two gay couples and the city of San Francisco all filed legal motions Friday asking Chief U.S. District Court Judge Vaughn Walker to implement his ruling striking California's voter-approved same-sex marriage ban as unconstitutional.

"The Administration believes the public interest is best served by permitting the court's judgment to go into effect, thereby restoring the right of same-sex couples to marry in California," the Republican governor's lawyers said on his behalf. "Doing so is consistent with California's long history of treating all people and their relationships with equal dignity and respect."

In his 136-page decision overturning Proposition 8 Wednesday, Walker said he was ordering the state to cease enforcing the 22-month-old ban. But he agreed to suspend the order until he could review the briefs submitted Friday.

The measure's sponsors have asked the judge to keep the ban in effect until their appeal of Walker's ruling invalidating Proposition 8 is decided by higher courts.

They argued in court papers filed earlier this week that resuming gay marriage now would cause legal chaos if the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals or U.S. Supreme Court eventually reverse Walker's ruling.

It was unclear when the judge would decide whether to grant a stay that would prevent marriage licenses from being issued to gay couples during the appeals process.

If he does clear the way for same-sex couples to wed, lawyers for sponsors of Proposition 8 said Friday they would seek an emergency order from the 9th Circuit to prevent that from happening.

The governor and attorney general almost always defend state laws when they are challenged, regardless of their personal views. But in this case, both Schwarzenegger and Brown refused to participate in fighting the lawsuit aimed at overturning the ban, even though they both were named as defendants.

That left the job of defending Proposition 8 to its backers, a coalition of religious and conservative groups known as Protect Marriage.

Although Schwarzenegger opposed the ban when it appeared on the November 2008 ballot and said after the election that it he hoped a court would overturn it, he officially took a neutral position in the lawsuit.

During the year it was in Walker's courtroom, the judge several times pointedly asked the governor's lawyer he was interested in knowing Schwarzenegger's position on the case. His Friday motion was his boldest pronouncement on the issue.

"His support today and at other critical junctures in our struggle against this discriminatory measure goes a long way in helping us realize our ultimate dream of achieving full equality for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender Californians," said Geoff Kors, executive director of Equality California, the state's largest gay rights group.

In 2005, Schwarzenegger vetoed a bill approved by the Legislature that would have legalized same-sex marriage. At the time, California had a law passed by voters in 2000 limiting marriage to a man and a woman. The governor said in his veto message he thought it was wrong for lawmakers to overturn a popular vote. He took the same position when the Legislature passed a second gay marriage bill two years later.

In May 2008, the California Supreme Court overturned the 2000 law and same-sex couples were allowed to wed. But Proposition 8 overrode the court's decision by amending the state Constitution.

Brown, the Democratic nominee who is seeking to replace Schwarzenegger when he is termed out of office this year, was more active than Schwarzenegger in supporting the lawsuit that led Walker to invalidate Proposition 8, submitting legal papers calling the ban unconstitutional.

He also said Friday that it's time for gays to begin marrying again.

"While there is still the potential for limited administrative burdens should future marriages of same-sex couples be later declared invalid, these potential burdens are outweighed by this court's conclusion, based on the overwhelming evidence, that Proposition 8 is unconstitutional," Brown said in his legal filing.

The legal team of David Boise and Ted Orson, who filed the lawsuit on behalf of two gay couples that led to Walker's ruling, also submitted a motion in conjunction with the city of San Francisco, another plaintiff.

They all argued that since the judge declared Proposition 8 to be illegal, gay couples should be able to marry now.

Boise and Orson said gay couples "will continue to suffer irreparable harm if Proposition 8's irrational deprivation of their constitutional rights is prolonged."

Santa Cruz County Clerk Gail Peelers, president of the California Association of Clerk and Elected Officials, said county agencies that issue marriage licenses will be ready to serve same-sex couples whenever they get the green light.

During the window in 2008 when same-sex marriage was legal in California, the state changed its marriage license applications to be gender-neutral so applicants only had to check boxes indicating "bride" or "groom" if they chose to.

At the same time, Peelers said local officials do not want to be in the position of being asked to issue licenses if Walker enforces his decision only to have an appeals court later impose a stay. It would be better for all involved to have the process be unambiguous, she said.

"We don't want to issue a couple who are in love and want to get married a $75 license and then turn around a minute or a week later and say that license is no longer valid," she said. "We don't want anyone to be in the position of being led down that path."

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 8:01 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)
        

Chief U.S. Judge Vaughn Walker has always been characterized as a conservative with libertarian leanings. But after he struck down California's voter-approved gay marriage ban this week, the Associated Press reports, he was accused by some of being something else entirely: a gay activist.

Rumors have circulated for months that Walker is gay, fueled by the blogosphere and a San Francisco Chronicle column that stated his sexual orientation was an "open secret" in legal and gay activism circles.

Walker himself hasn't addressed the speculation, and he did not respond to a request for comment by the AP on Thursday. Lawyers in the case, including those defending the ban, say the judge's sexuality — gay or straight — was not an issue at trial and will not be a factor on appeal.

But that hasn't stopped a public debate that exploded in the wake of the 66-year-old jurist's Wednesday decision. Most of the criticism has come from opponents of same-sex marriage.

"Here we have an openly gay federal judge, according to the San Francisco Chronicle, substituting his views for those of the American people and of our Founding Fathers who, I promise you, would be shocked by courts that imagine they have the right to put gay marriage in our Constitution," said Maggie Gallagher, chairwoman of The National Organization for Marriage, a group that helped fund the ban, known as Proposition 8.

In response, the Gay and Lesbian Victory Fund, a political action committee for gay candidates, launched an online petition accusing Gallagher's group of "gay-baiting."

But the debate raises the question: Why is sexuality different from other personal characteristics judges posses? Can a female judge rule on abortion issues? A black judge on civil rights?

"The evidence shows that, by every available metric, opposite-sex couples are not better than their same-sex counterparts; instead, as partners, parents and citizens, opposite-sex couples and same-sex couples are equal," Walker wrote in his exacting, 136-page opinion.

Gerard Bradley, a law professor at the University of Notre Dame, published a Fox News column in the hours before Walker filed his opinion faulting the media for not forcing Walker to address his sexual orientation.

And Byran Fischer, issues director for the American Family Association, urged the group's members to contact their congressional representatives about launching impeachment proceedings because Walker had not recused himself from a case in which "his own personal sexual proclivities utterly compromised his ability to make an impartial ruling."

William G. Ross, an expert on judicial ethics and law professor at Samford University in Alabama, said that a judge's sexual orientation has no more relevance to his or her ability to rule fairly on a case involving gay marriage than it would for a deeply religious judge or a judge who had been divorced multiple times.

"Under the logic of the people challenging the judge's fitness to rule on a case involving gay rights because he or she was gay, one would have to find a eunuch to serve on the case, because one could just as easily argue that a heterosexual judge couldn't rule on it either," Ross said.

Months before Walker struck down Proposition 8 as an unconstitutional violation of gay Americans' civil rights, members of the team defending the ban in court had complained about what they perceived as judicial bias.

Over their vigorous objections, Walker pushed to have the proceedings televised live, a plan the U.S. Supreme Court quashed at the last minute. Then, he refused to excuse as a witness a Proposition 8 supporter who had compared gays to child molesters during the 2008 campaign. Lawyers for the two same-sex couples who sued to invalidate the ban had called him as a witness to try to prove the measure was fueled by anti-gay prejudice.

Nevertheless, the defense does not plan to raise the specter of the judge's sexual orientation as they appeal his ruling to the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, said Jim Campbell, a lawyer with the defense team.

"The bottom line is this case, from our perspective, is and always will be about the law and not about the judge who decides it," Campbell said. "It's just something that collectively as a legal team we have decided and going up, that's what this case is. The appellate courts are going to focus on the law."

Walker has ruled in at least two other cases involving gay rights issues during his two decades as a judge. In 1999, he rejected arguments from the parents of a San Leandro boy who claimed their religious rights were violated by pro-gay comments their son's teacher had made in the classroom.

In the other case, he dismissed a free speech claim by two Oakland city employees whose managers had confiscated a bulletin board flier for a religious group that promoted "natural family, marriage and family values." The city had "significant interests in restricting discriminatory speech about homosexuals," Walker wrote in his 2005 ruling.

Until this week, though, Walker had come under more criticism for representing the U.S. Olympic Committee in a lawsuit against a gay ex-Olympian who had created the so-called Gay Olympics. Walker won, forcing the Gay Olympics to become the Gay Games. He also aggressively pursued legal fees by attaching a $97,000 lien to the home of the organization's founder while he was dying of AIDS.

Gay activists cried foul, and his appointment to a federal judgeship was delayed for two years in the waning days of Ronald Reagan's presidency.

Civil rights groups also opposed Walker's nomination because of his 15-year membership in the Olympic Club, an all-male athletic club that had only recently admitted its first black members. California's senior senator at the time, Democrat Alan Cranston, used the club issue to question Walker's fitness for the bench.

Observers usually describe him as a maverick who delights in keeping people guessing. They still are.

On the day of closing arguments in the gay marriage ban case, Walker said it was appropriate that the case was wrapping up in June.

"June, after all, is the month for ... " He let his deep voice trail off, and smiled at the predominantly gay courtroom. Many froze, wondering if he would refer to the month in which San Francisco celebrates gay pride like Mardi Gras. Would that be a nod to rumors he was gay?

Walker waited a beat longer, savoring the moment. The he settled the suspense.

"... weddings," he said.

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 3:44 PM | Permalink | Comments (6)
        

A group of Jewish activists and community leaders voiced their support for a planned mosque near ground zero and said opponents, including the nation's leading Jewish civil rights group, are perpetuating misunderstandings about Islam, the Associated Press reports.

Rabbi Arthur Waskow, of the Philadelphia-based Shalom Center, joined about 30 other religious leaders and Jewish activists Thursday at the spot where the Cordoba Initiative hopes to build an Islamic center that will include a mosque, an athletic center, a culinary school and art studios. Waskow says the mosque will help people learn more about Islam.

"Whenever there has been bloodshed allegedly in the name of one tradition or another, it's necessary to say, 'That's not what that tradition is about,'" Waskow, 76, said. "The Cordoba Initiative will keep saying that is not what Islam is about."

The mosque and community center would be located two blocks from the site of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. SoHo Properties, a partner in the effort, purchased the property for nearly $5 million. Early plans call for a 13-story, $100 million Islamic center, of which the mosque would be a part.

Big-name Republicans including former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin and former House Speaker Newt Gingrich have criticized the plan, saying it is provocative for a mosque to be built so close to a spot where Islamic terrorists killed thousands. Former Rep. Rick Lazio, a Republican running for governor of New York, has questioned where funding for the project is coming from.

The Anti-Defamation League, a Jewish civil rights group known for advocating religious freedom, also opposes the project.

"This is not a question of rights, but a question of what is right," the ADL said in a statement. "In our judgment, building an Islamic center in the shadow of the World Trade Center will cause some victims more pain — unnecessarily — and that is not right."

Waskow, an anti-war activist who has criticized Israel and lobbied for an independent Palestinian state, said he was disappointed by the ADL's opposition of the Islamic center.

"I was really surprised that the Anti-Defamation League opened the door to that kind of hatred," he said. "That door must be closed gently and firmly."

On Wednesday, a conservative advocacy group sued to try to stop the project.

At the rally Thursday, the Jewish leaders prayed, sang and presented housewarming gifts to Daisy Khan, a co-founder of the Cordoba Initiative. They said hundreds of people have signed on online statement in support of the mosque.

Khan said the center "will be dedicated to peace, tolerance and mutual understanding," but would not discuss how the center will be paid for. She thanked the plan's supporters, including New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg. A city community board also voted overwhelmingly last spring to back the project, and Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick has also said he supports it.

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 5:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)
        

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, seen as a key player in the passage of California's 2008 ballot initiative to ban same-sex marriage, says it regrets a federal judge's ruling Wednesday to overturn it.

Chief U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker agreed with two gay couples that the ballot initiative, known as Proposition 8, violated their civil rights.

In a statement, the church says it "regrets" the ruling:

"California voters have twice been given the opportunity to vote on the definition of marriage in their state and both times have determined that marriage should be recognized as only between a man and a woman. We agree. Marriage between a man and a woman is the bedrock of society.

“We recognize that this decision represents only the opening of a vigorous debate in the courts over the rights of the people to define and protect this most fundamental institution—marriage.

“There is no doubt that today’s ruling will add to the marriage debate in this country, and we urge people on all sides of this issue to act in a spirit of mutual respect and civility toward those with a different opinion.”

The church urged followers to give their time and money to support Proposition 8, which passed with 52 percent of the vote.

According to the Associated Press, church members were among the campaign's most vigorous volunteers and by some estimates contributed tens of millions of dollars to the effort. In a statement, the church said the decision reopens a vigorous debate about over the right of the people to define marriage.

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 1:52 PM | Permalink | Comments (42)
        

A new Iranian website that denies and mocks the Holocaust with anti-Semitic cartoons is provoking outrage in Israel, the Associated Press reports.

Israel's Holocaust memorial Yad Vashem said the site — which features sketches of long-nosed Jews conspiring to create "the great lie" of the Holocaust — is yet another example of Iran's continued contempt of the Nazi genocide of 6 million Jews.

The semiofficial Iranian Fars news agency reported that cartoonist Maziar Bijani launched the site and said it is financed by a non-governmental cultural foundation. The site has English, Arabic and Farsi versions.

"The vulgar and cynical approach of the website, a combination of Holocaust denial and distortion, illustrated with anti-Semitic caricatures, further illustrates Iran's disregard for reality and truth vis-a-vis the Holocaust, Jews and Israel," Yad Vashem said.

It called it "the latest salvo emanating from Iran that denies the facts of the Holocaust and attempts to influence those who are ignorant of history."

Iranian authorities would have had to approve the creation of the new site, but not necessarily its content and there was no indication the government was connected to it.

However, the views are in line with the government, which has repeatedly questioned or denied the Holocaust. Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has repeatedly called the Holocaust a "myth," and Iran has also hosted a conference endorsing Holocaust denial.

The site, holocartoons.com, opens with the Pink Panther theme song and a dedication to those who have been killed "under the pretext of the Holocaust."

Iran accuses Israel of using the Holocaust as an excuse to abuse Palestinians and has compared Israeli soldiers to Nazi troops.

One image on the site shows an Israeli tank filing up at a Nazi gas station. Another shows a soldier with a Star of David on his helmet and a tank of Zyklon B on his back — the same chemical the Nazis used to kill Jews in gas chambers at their death camps during World War II.

The website's design also makes use of Nazi imagery, with the icon for flipping pages marked with a swastika.

Yad Vashem has a Farsi-language website dedicated to educating Iranians about the Holocaust.

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 12:44 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
        

A federal judge has issued a judgment against the Russian government for its refusal to return a library of historic books and documents to a Jewish group, the Associated Press reports.

Royce Lamberth, the chief judge of U.S. District Court in Washington, ruled that taking the material was discriminatory, not for a public purpose and occurred without just compensation to the Jewish religious organization that is suing, Chabad-Lubavitch.

At issue are 12,000 religious books and manuscripts seized during the Bolshevik revolution and the Russian Civil War from 1917 to 1925 and 25,000 pages of handwritten teachings and other writings of religious leaders stolen by Nazi Germany during World War II.

The documents seized by the Nazis were transferred by the Soviet Red Army as trophy documents and war booty to the Russian State Military Archive.

Last year, lawyers for the Russian government argued that judges have no authority to tell the country how to handle the sacred Jewish documents.

Under the U.S. Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act, a sovereign nation is not immune to lawsuits in cases where property is taken in violation of international law.

Lamberth found that the religious group had established its claim to the material, which he said is "unlawfully" possessed by the Russian State Library and the Russian military archive.

According to court papers reciting the history behind the case, Russian President Boris Yeltsin once gave an explicit assurance to President George H.W. Bush's emissary, Secretary of State James Baker, that the Russian government would return the library of religious books and manuscripts to Chabad-Lubavitch.

Lamberth issued his decision on Friday.

Nathan Lewin, a longtime Washington lawyer representing the religious group, said that the U.S. government "has always supported the return of these materials. I would hope that the State Department would not interfere with enforcement of this order."

The State Department declined to comment because the issue involves an ongoing legal case.

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A federal judge overturned California's same-sex marriage ban Wednesday in a landmark case that could eventually land before the U.S. Supreme Court to decide if gays have a constitutional right to marry in America, the Associated Press reports.

Chief U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker made his ruling in a lawsuit filed by two gay couples who claimed the voter-approved ban violated their civil rights.

Gay couples waving rainbow and American flags outside the courthouse cheered, hugged and kissed as word of the ruling spread.

"This is a victory for the American people. It's a victory for our justice system," said former U.S. Solicitor General Theodore Olson, who delivered the closing argument at trial for opponents of the ban.

He said the ruling "vindicates the rights of a minority of our citizens to be treated with decency and respect and equality in our system."

Despite the favorable ruling for same-sex couples, gay marriage will not be allowed to resume immediately. Judge Walker said he wants to decide whether his order should be suspended while the proponents of the ban pursue their appeal in the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

The judge ordered both sides to submit written arguments by Aug. 6 on the issue.

Supporters argued the ban was necessary to safeguard the traditional understanding of marriage and to encourage responsible childbearing.

California voters passed the ban as Proposition 8 in November 2008, five months after the state Supreme Court legalized gay marriage.

Walker, however, found that the gay marriage ban violates the Constitution's due process and equal protection clauses while failing "to advance any rational basis in singling out gay men and lesbians for denial of a marriage license."

"Indeed, the evidence shows Proposition 8 does nothing more than enshrine in the California Constitution the notion that opposite-sex couples are superior to same-sex couples," the judge wrote in his 136-page ruling.

Both sides previously said an appeal was certain if Walker did not rule in their favor. The case would go first to the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, then the Supreme Court if the high court justices agree to review it.

Walker heard 13 days of testimony and arguments since January during the first trial in federal court to examine if states can prohibit gays from getting married.

The ruling puts Walker at the forefront of the gay marriage debate. The longtime federal judge was appointed by President Ronald Reagan.

The verdict was the second in a federal gay marriage case to come down in recent weeks. A federal judge in Massachusetts decided last month the state's legally married gay couples had been wrongly denied the federal financial benefits of marriage because of a law preventing the U.S. government from recognizing same-sex unions.

The plaintiffs in the California case presented 18 witnesses. Academic experts testified about topics ranging from the fitness of gay parents and religious views on homosexuality to the historical meaning of marriage and the political influence of the gay rights movement.

During trial, Olson told Judge Walker that tradition or fears of harm to heterosexual unions were legally insufficient grounds to discriminate against gay couples.

Olson teamed up with David Boies to argue the case, bringing together the two litigators best known for representing George W. Bush and Al Gore in the disputed 2000 election.

Defense lawyers called just two witnesses, claiming they did not need to present expert testimony because U.S. Supreme Court precedent was on their side. The attorneys also said gay marriage was an experiment with unknown social consequences that should be left to voters to accept or reject.

Former U.S. Justice Department lawyer Charles Cooper, who represented the religious and conservative groups that sponsored the ban, said cultures around the world, previous courts and Congress all accepted the "common sense belief that children do best when they are raised by their own mother and father."

In an unusual move, the original defendants, California Attorney General Jerry Brown and Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, refused to support Proposition 8 in court.

That left the work of defending the law to Protect Marriage, the group that successfully sponsored the ballot measure that passed with 52 percent of the vote after the most expensive political campaign on a social issue in U.S. history.

Currently, same-sex couples can only legally wed in Massachusetts, Iowa, Connecticut, Vermont, New Hampshire and Washington, D.C.

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 6:07 PM | Permalink | Comments (18)
        

The debate over a planned Islamic community center and mosque near ground zero became a court fight Wednesday, as a conservative advocacy group sued to try to stop a project that has become a fulcrum for balancing religious freedom and the legacy of the Sept. 11 attacks, the Associated Press reports.

The American Center for Law and Justice, founded by the Rev. Pat Robertson, filed suit Wednesday to challenge a city panel's decision to let developers tear down a building to make way for the mosque two blocks from ground zero.

The city Landmarks Preservation Commission moved too fast in making a decision, underappreciated the building's historic value and "allowed the intended use of the building and political considerations to taint the deliberative process," lawyer Brett Joshpe wrote in papers filed in a Manhattan state court. The Washington, D.C.-based group represents a firefighter who responded to and survived the terrorist attack at the World Trade Center.

City attorneys are confident the landmarks group adhered to legal standards and procedures, Law Department spokeswoman Kate O'Brien Ahlers said. A spokesman for the planned Islamic center, Oz Sultan, declined to comment on the lawsuit but said organizers were continuing to work toward choosing an architect.

The mosque has become a national political flashpoint, pitting several influential Republicans and the nation's most prominent Jewish civil rights group against New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg and others. In one of the latest signs of the issue's political reach beyond Manhattan, Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick expressed support Wednesday for the proposed mosque.

The group behind the $100 million project, the Cordoba Initiative, describes it as a Muslim-themed community center. Early plans call not only for prayer space but for a swimming pool, culinary school, art studios and other features. Developers envision it as a hub for interfaith interaction, as well as a place for Muslims to bridge some of their faith's own schisms.

"We want to create a model that shows the world that you can develop moderate Muslim communities," Sultan said Wednesday. "We would admonish people to, at least, give us a fair shake."

Opponents, including some Sept. 11 victims' relatives, see the prospect of a mosque so near the destroyed trade center as an insult to the memory of the nearly 3,000 people killed by Islamic terrorists in the 2001 attacks. Shouts of "shame on you!" erupted from the audience after the city panel voted Tuesday to deny landmark protection to the existing building, saying the 152-year-old structure wasn't distinctive enough.

Big-name Republicans including former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin and former House Speaker Newt Gingrich have criticized the plan — as has the Anti-Defamation League, a Jewish civil rights group known for advocating religious freedom.

Former Rep. Rick Lazio, a Republican running for governor of New York, has raised questions about the Cordoba Initiative's imam, Feisal Abdul Rauf. In a "60 Minutes" interview televised shortly after the Sept. 11 attacks, Rauf said that "United States policies were an accessory to the crime that happened."

But supporters of the planned Islamic center see it as a monument to tolerance and religious liberty.

"The World Trade Center site will forever hold a special place in our city, in our hearts," Bloomberg, a Republican-turned-independent, said Tuesday. "But we would be untrue to the best part of ourselves, and who we are as New Yorkers and Americans, if we said no to a mosque in lower Manhattan."

For now, the court case centers on the legalities of the landmarks commission's vote, which the lawsuit seeks to overturn.

The existing, Italianate building was built for shipping magnates and later occupied by the pharmaceuticals giant Merck & Co., among other businesses.

The law center argues it deserves landmark status for its architectural features — and for its newer historical significance as a structure that withstood being hit by debris from one of the hijacked jetliners used in the terrorist attacks.

"The building is the only building of its kind that links the growth of American free enterprise to the present-day events and the aftermath of Sept. 11, 2001, events which stand as a testament to economic, social and political freedom in the face of violence," Joshpe wrote.

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 5:26 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
        

Over at the Huffington Post, New York media and fashion mogul Russell Simmons writes that the debate over construction of a mosque near Ground Zero is "digging a hole in the soul of America."

Simmons, the activist cofounder of the Def Jam record label and the Phat Farm fashion line, writes of being able to see the hole that remains at Ground Zero from his apartment in Lower Manhattan, and of greeting the firefighters at his neighborhood station, who lost nearly all of their comrades on Sept. 11, 2001.

This is my neighborhood, my backyard. And in my backyard, I have no tolerance for a new fear-mongering, hateful rhetoric that has sprung up over the proposed $100 million Islamic cultural center that they plan on building blocks away from Ground Zero.

It is not insensitive to put a cultural center of any sort, that has a place of worship, anywhere in our city. This is what makes our country and our city great. As a nation that was founded by men and women who were being persecuted for their particular faith, we should know that the best path to finding freedom is finding freedom for others. We were formed as a pluralistic society and this means we welcome all religions. Islam did not attack the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001, sick and twisted men did, who not only hijacked four airplanes but also hijacked a religion. Let us not stereotype the over one billion Muslims around the world because of the evil acts of a few. A decision like this one, to support or not support the construction of this center, defines who we are as a nation. It's at the essence of our values, our freedom of expression, freedom of religion and religious tolerance.

As the Chairman of The Foundation Of Ethnic Understanding, my partner Rabbi Marc Schneier (also the Vice President, World Jewish Congress; Chairman, World Jewish Congress United States) and I have worked tirelessly to promote dialogue among different ethnic groups all over the world, particularly Jews and Muslims. We have witnessed the power of the fostering of this dialogue. We know that we must fight Antisemitism and Islamaphobia together and at the same time. We welcome and support this cultural center, as it will continue constructive conversations around a moderate approach to co-existence between all people, regardless of religious preference. In fact, we strongly feel that this center will bridge the divide that many of our nation's citizens have with the Islamic faith.

There are moments that define our nation. There are moments that test the strength of our character. There are moments that test the essence of our freedoms. Let this be that moment and let us pass this test with grace and dignity. As I will not stand for any sort of Islamaphobia in my backyard.

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 1:24 PM | Permalink | Comments (7)
        

Groups representing victims of clergy sex abuse in the U.S. are urging Pope Benedict XVI to remove Cardinal Bernard Law as head of a Rome basilica, issuing their appeal shortly before the former Boston archbishop leads an annual high-profile ceremony in the church, the Associated Press reports.

Benedict's predecessor, Pope John Paul II, named Law as archpriest of St. Mary Major Basilica after his 2002 resignation as Boston archbishop. Law quit to quell an outcry over handling of sex abuse cases in his diocese, becoming the highest-ranking U.S. church official to fall in the scandal that rocked the American church.

The traditional ceremony Thursday includes the release of white petals from the basilica's ceiling to recall a legendary August snowfall in Rome in 352.

Kristine Ward of the National Survivors Advocates Coalition called the ceremony a "bread and circuses" approach in the church at a time of crisis over sex abuse.

Since the crisis in the United States, the clergy abuse scandal has spread across Europe, with new accusations this year hitting the church in Germany, Italy, Belgium and elsewhere.

Victims groups have been lobbying for years to get Law removed, accusing the Vatican of giving a major culprit in the crisis a soft landing. The 78-year-old prelate also sits on a number of Vatican congregations and councils.

Law did not return a phone call seeking comment.

Terence McKiernan of BishopAccountability said it is especially urgent that Benedict remove Law from the Congregation of Bishops, saying he long used his influence to shield bishops allegedly involved in cover-ups of pedophile priests.

Law is often seen in Rome attending embassy receptions and Vatican events. He has led the August ceremony at St. Mary Major since his appointment in 2004.

According to legend, the Virgin Mary appeared in a dream to both Pope Liberius and a Roman patrician the night of Aug. 4, 352, predicting a snowfall. The next day, the pope himself traced the outline of a basilica on a miraculously snow-covered tract.

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 1:21 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)
Categories: Abuse, Catholicism, International, People
        

A New York City panel cleared the way Tuesday for the construction near ground zero of a mosque that has caused a political uproar over religious freedom and Sept. 11 even as opponents vowed to press their case in court, the Associated Press reports.

The Landmarks Preservation Commission voted unanimously to deny landmark status to a building two blocks from the World Trade Center site that developers want to tear down and convert into an Islamic community center and mosque. The panel said the 152-year-old lower Manhattan building isn't distinctive enough to be considered a landmark.

The decision drew praise from Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who stepped before cameras on Governor's Island with the Statue of Liberty as a backdrop shortly after the panel voted and called the mosque project a key test of Americans' commitment to religious freedom.

"The World Trade Center site will forever hold a special place in our city, in our hearts," said Bloomberg, a Republican turned independent. "But we would be untrue to the best part of ourselves, and who we are as New Yorkers and Americans, if we said no to a mosque in lower Manhattan."

The vote was a setback for opponents of the mosque, who say it disrespects the memory of those killed at the hands of Islamic terrorists on Sept. 11, 2001. Jeers and shouts of "Shame on you" could be heard after the panel's vote.

The American Center for Law and Justice, a conservative advocacy group founded by the Rev. Pat Robertson, announced it would challenge the panel's decision in state court Wednesday.

ACLJ attorney Brett Joshpe said the group would file a petition alleging that the landmarks panel "acted arbitrarily and abused its discretion."

The proposed mosque has emerged as a national political issue, with prominent Republicans from former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin to former House Speaker Newt Gingrich lining up against it. The Anti-Defamation League, the nation's most prominent Jewish civil rights group, known for advocating religious freedom, shocked many groups when it spoke out against the mosque last week.

The League said building the Islamic center "in the shadow of the World Trade Center will cause some victims more pain — unnecessarily — and that is not right."

Bloomberg said Tuesday that denying religious freedom to Muslims would play into terrorists' hands. He said firefighters and other first responders who died in the Sept. 11 attacks had done so to protect the U.S. Constitution.

"In rushing into those burning buildings, not one asked, 'What god do you pray to? What beliefs do you hold?'" Bloomberg said of the first responders. "We do not honor their lives by denying the very constitutional rights they died protecting."

Former Rep. Rick Lazio, a Republican running for governor of New York, attended the commission meeting with a handful of opponents to the mosque, which is being developed by a group called the Cordoba Initiative.

"This is not about religion," Lazio said. "It's about this particular mosque called the Cordoba Mosque, it's about it being at ground zero, it's about it being spearheaded by an imam who has associated himself with radical Islamic causes and has made comments that should chill every single American, frankly."

Lazio said the group's imam, Feisal Abdul Rauf, had refused to call the Palestinian group Hamas a terrorist organization. Rauf also said in a "60 Minutes" interview televised shortly after Sept. 11 that "United States policies were an accessory to the crime that happened."

The Cordoba Initiative says on its website that its goal is to foster a better relationship between the Muslim world and the West, "steering the world back to the course of mutual recognition and respect and away from heightened tensions."

"We believe it will be a place where the counter-momentum against extremism will begin," the imam's wife, Daisy Khan, told The Associated Press Friday. "We are committed to peace."

Khan told The Wall Street Journal that the center's board will include members of other religions and will explore including an interfaith chapel at the center.

The commission's decision not to designate the existing building as a landmark means that the developers can tear it down and start from scratch. If the building had been declared a landmark, they could have created a smaller mosque and community center there.

A partner in the project, SoHo Properties, bought the property for nearly $5 million. Early plans call for a 13-story, $100 million Islamic center.

Cordoba wants to transform the building into a glass tower with a swimming pool, basketball court, auditorium and culinary school besides the mosque. The center, called Park51, also would have a library, art studios and meditation rooms.

Landmarks Commissioner Stephen Byrns said the building's proximity to ground zero and the fact it was struck by airplane debris during the Sept. 11 attacks don't qualify it as a landmark.

"The debris field around ground zero was widespread, and one cannot designate hundreds of buildings on that criterion alone," Byrns said.

SoHo Properties CEO Sharif El-Gamal said he was "deeply grateful to the landmarks commission and to its staff." He did not respond to a question about the timing of demolition and construction.

While landmarks commission members went over the existing building's architectural features such as cornices and colonnades, some in the audience of about 60 at Pace University in lower Manhattan held signs telegraphing their opposition.

Linda Rivera's sign read, "Don't glorify murders of 3,000. No 9/11 victory mosque." She cried after the board's vote.

"I lost 3,000 American brothers and sisters, including courageous policemen and firemen, and this is a betrayal," she said.

But Zead Ramadan, president of the board of the New York chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, said Islam is "a religion of peace and justice."

"The people here are trying to connect this vile attack on our nation to the religion Islam," he said, "though that exact act stands against everything that Islam stands for."

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 6:03 PM | Permalink | Comments (8)
        

Prison officials may ban employees from wearing religious headscarves out of concerns they pose a safety risk, a U.S. appeals court in Philadelphia ruled Monday in a split 2-1 decision.

The majority said that prison officials have legitimate concerns the headscarves can hide drugs or other contraband, or be used by an inmate to strangle someone, the Associated Press reports.

The ruling dismisses a lawsuit filed by the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission on behalf of three Muslim women employed at the Delaware County Prison in suburban Thornton. The EEOC had said they were being forced to compromise their religious beliefs to keep their jobs.

The suit was filed against the Geo Group, a Boca Raton, Fla.-based contractor that formerly operated the facility.

After the prison implemented a ban on hats and headscarves in 2005, nurse Carmen Sharpe-Allen was fired for refusing to remove her headscarf, or khimar, at work. Intake clerk Marquita King and correctional officer Rashemma Moss, after some deliberation, agreed to remove their headscarves on the job.

U.S. District Judge John P. Fullam had dismissed the EEOC lawsuit, and two of three judges on the appeals panel agreed with him. They called it a close call, but said the prison's need for order trumped the women's right to wear the religious attire at work.

"The EEOC has an enviable history of taking steps to enforce the prohibition against religious discrimination in many forms," U.S. Circuit Judge Dolores K. Sloviter wrote. "On the other hand, ... a prison is not a summer camp and prison officials have the unenviable task of preserving order in difficult circumstances."

An EEOC spokeswoman said the agency was disappointed by the decision and was reviewing its options.

Prison officials had argued that baseball hats, headscarves and other head coverings make it difficult to identify people and can be used to hide drugs and other contraband. Lawyer Walter F. Kawalec III, who argued the case for the Geo Group, did not immediately return a call for comment.

In his dissent, Justice A. Wallace Tashima, a senior judge the 9th U.S. Circuit, said the Geo Group had not been made to prove that the use of headscarves by employees posed an undue burden.

In a related case, the U.S. 3rd Circuit ruled last year that Philadelphia police could likewise bar a female officer from wearing a headscarf under her police hat.

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 3:14 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)
        

Christians staged a free concert Monday promoting "PTL," or praise the lord, near where the cast of MTV's "Jersey Shore" enjoy "GTL," or the gym, tan and laundry lifestyle, the Associated Press reports.

The Toms River, N.J.-based Move the Earth ministry organized the "Jesus Shore" event on the boardwalk in Seaside Heights, N.J., as an alternative to the "fighting and fornicating" that organizers say the reality TV show celebrates.

The Rev. Anthony Storino, pastor of Abundant Grace Church in Toms River, says members are not against the TV program. But he says there's another side to the Jersey shore.

The concert featured Christian bands and a Christian-themed tattoo contest. Vendors also sold Christian books and T-shirts.

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 1:28 PM | Permalink | Comments (20)
        

Protesters shouting "Defend the cross!" scuffled with police Tuesday but managed to prevent Polish officials from moving a cross erected outside the presidential palace in memory of the late President Lech Kaczynski, the Associated Press reports.

About 20 demonstrators stood in front of the wooden cross, pleading with priests who were supposed to move it to the nearby St. Anne's Church. They were supported by a cheering crowd of hundreds gathered behind a police barrier across the street.

Security officials dragged away a few of the chanting, praying protesters — including a woman who tried to tie herself to the cross. But officials decided not to immediately press ahead with the plan, which is opposed by some Kaczynski supporters.

"The cross will not be moved to the church today," said Jacek Michalowski, a presidential palace official. "The level of aggression is too high ... the cross should not be used for political games."

It wasn't immediately clear whether officials would make another attempt to move it.

Amid deep national mourning, scouts groups put up the cross five days after the April 10 plane crash in Russia that killed Kaczynski, his wife Maria, and 94 others, including top military leaders.

Some members of the main opposition party — which is led by the late president's twin brother, Jaroslaw Kaczynski — have said the cross should remain put until a permanent monument is built at the site, a call backed by their conservative Roman Catholic supporters.

But President-elect Bronislaw Komorowski and Warsaw city officials want the cross moved to the church and worked out an agreement with church leaders to do so.

Lech Kaczynski's death was followed by an unusual period of harmony in Poland's often-bitter politics, but that has since frayed. Komorowski defeated Jaroslaw Kaczynski last month in an election for the vacant presidency and is to be sworn in on Friday.

The crash also inspired an improvement in traditionally tense Polish-Russian relations. Moscow shared in Poland's sorrow and pledged full cooperation in investigating the crash — which happened as Kaczynski flew to a memorial for 22,000 Polish officers murdered by Soviet dictator Josef Stalin's secret police in the 1940 Katyn massacres.

Still, Polish officials have complained this week that Russian officials are being slow in handing over documents needed for the Polish investigation into the crash. Officials in Moscow had no comment Tuesday on those complaints.

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 1:23 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
        

A Lutheran pastor in Minneapolis who opposes homosexuals being allowed to lead congregations said Monday he is attracted to men, but that he's not a hypocrite because he never acted on his urges, the Associated Press reports.

The Rev. Tom Brock told The Associated Press he has known for years he is sexually attracted to men, but doesn't consider himself gay because he never acted on it.

In June, the Minnesota gay magazine Lavender reported that Brock was a member of a support group for Christians who struggle with same-sex attraction. Brock's church, the Hope Lutheran Church, placed him on leave while a task force looked into the matter. The Rev. Tom Parrish, the church's executive pastor, said the investigation determined Brock's story checked out.

"I am a 57-year-old virgin," Brock told the Hope Lutheran congregation during services upon returning to the pulpit on Sunday.

Brock and Parrish would not share the full task force report, but Parrish said its members could find no evidence Brock ever had sex with men. They confirmed that Brock sought counseling and enlisted another minister as an "accountability partner" with whom he frequently discussed his struggles.

Brock said he intends to step down as senior pastor at Hope Lutheran, but will retain his affiliation with the church and still preach there from time to time. Having preached on Twin Cities cable access for about 20 years, he told the AP he hopes to take his broadcasts to a wider national audience with a new message: "You can have this struggle with same-sex attraction, say no to it, and still follow Christ."

Brock's broadcasts, in which he espoused conservative viewpoints on a number of scriptural issues, brought him some measure of prominence in Minnesota. He testified at the state Capitol about his opposition to same-sex marriage, and he was one of the most vocal opponents of the decision last summer by the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America to allow non-celibate gays in committed relationships to serve as clergy.

Hope Lutheran split from the ELCA in 2001, taking issue with the denomination's stance on gay clergy and abortion. The church joined the much smaller Association of Free Lutheran Congregations, but Brock has remained critical of the ELCA as it continued to liberalize its gay clergy policy.

A few months ago, the publisher of Lavender got a tip that Brock was attending meetings of Courage, a Catholic support group for people trying to resist same-sex urges. A freelance writer attended the group posing as a prospective member, then wrote about Brock's attendance there — a move viewed by many as journalistically unethical.

John Townsend, the article's author, said Monday he felt Hope Lutheran had the right to reinstate Brock and he hoped the pastor's openness would make members of the congregation more sympathetic to gay people.

As for Brock, "He's free to do what he wants to do and say what he wants to say," Townsend said. "But he will have less credibility on that now, I'm afraid."

Brock said he has personally forgiven Lavender and Townsend for publishing the piece, though he insists it contained erroneous information. He said he probably won't continue to attend Courage meetings, but will keep seeking counseling and spiritual guidance to overcome his same-sex attractions.

Brock said he does not believe people are born gay. "I think we're all born heterosexual actually, and then stuff goes wrong," he said.

He said he can't conclusively identify the origin of his own attraction to men, but said he believes it's related to a distant relationship with his father, who is now deceased, as well as having an older brother who was more athletic and, Brock felt, got more affection from other family members.

Brock said even if scientists were to establish definitive proof that homosexuality is genetic, that wouldn't deter his views. He said he believes people who engage in homosexual acts will go to hell, but he doesn't believe that makes him a bigot.

"My message doesn't change at all. I still think homosexual behavior is a sin," Brock said. "Because I struggle with it doesn't make it right."

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 7:30 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)
        

A special coin issued by Romania's central bank to commemorate a prime minister and religious leader who stripped Jews of their citizenship before World War II has drawn protests from Romanian Jews as well as a director at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, the Associated Press reports.

Radu Ioanid, who runs the museum's international archives, said he was "shocked" by the bank's decision to mint the coin depicting late Patriarch Miron Cristea, who led the Romanian Orthodox Church from 1925 to 1939 and was prime minister from 1938 to 1939.

The patriarch was responsible for revising the citizenship law, stripping about 225,000 Jews — or 37 percent of the Jewish population — of their Romanian citizenship, Ioanid said.

"I can't understand how the patriarch managed to pass through the filter," said Robert Schwartz, representative for Romanian Jews in the city of Cluj. "It is known there are black stains connected to his attitude towards the Jews." Schwartz said there were other Romanians, such as the patriarch's contemporary Queen Maria, who had done much for Jews and should have been honored.

National Bank of Romania spokesman Mugur Stet said the coin was part of a collectors' series of five silver-minted coins memorializing the five patriarchs who have headed the Romanian Orthodox Church since 1925.

Some 300,000 Jews and Gypsies were killed in Romania during the Holocaust. Today, the country has only 6,000 Jews.

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To spur blood donations, a Red Cross chapter in Northern Ohio is offering people who give a pint of blood the chance to win a car -- or, for the Amish who live in the region, a horse-drawn buggy, the Associated Press reports.

Spokeswoman Christy Chapman in Cleveland says the Red Cross didn't want to leave its many Amish donors out of the giveaway. The organization's Northern Ohio blood services region includes three counties with one of the nation's largest Amish populations.

The Red Cross regional operation has a board member who is Amish and who is arranging to have a buggy custom-made for the contest, which wraps up Sept. 6.

Blood donors who prefer a more modern mode of transportation can win a 2010 Nissan Versa.

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 4:04 PM | Permalink | Comments (11)
        

Darcy Bisset is a member of New Hope Community Church in Pikesville.

I spent the better part of last fall reading through Anne Rice's Christ the Lord books with a group of friends (reluctantly at first -- when our discussion group voted, my pick lost). I found myself captured by the beauty of Rice's writing and impressed by the theological and historical care she took with her subject matter.

And so when I heard the news last week that Rice had announced she was leaving Christianity and was no longer Christian, I felt a twist of emotions. I was sad, because I thought the Christ the Lord books were brilliant and I wanted more from that voice.

I was sympathetic, because I've been in that boat, where some one or some group, purportedly speaking for Christianity, is saying something you think is SO WRONG and you want to wear a big button proclaiming "I am not with them!"

I was also incredulous because, well, did she not know about the Roman Catholic Church's stance on homosexuality and birth control when she joined up?

It kind of reminds me of when people get divorced after a few years of marriage, citing as "irreconcilable differences" a bunch of personality quirks about which they were fully informed when they decided to get married.

I decided that if Anne Rice can make silly over-reaching statements, then so can I. Therefore, on behalf of Christianity and Christians, I refuse to accept her resignation.

If a person is not a Christian because she believes faith in Christ is central to her life, but disagrees with and is embarrased by some of his followers, then there is not a Christian in the world.

I think we all understand the impulse, but this whole vocal conversion to and then repudiation of organized Christianity strikes me as a bit adolescent -- that brooding petulance that says "my thoughts are so deep and original and brilliant; no group can contain me."

I say, welcome to the club with the rest of us Christ-following original thinkers. We're called Christians.

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 5:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (8)
        

Milton Hill wasn't the most visible among worshipers at Ark Church, Baltimore Sun colleague Erica Green writes. He mostly watched from a spot in the back of the room during a mid-week service, or while doing odd jobs in the church during choir practices.

But at the congregation's first Sunday service since his killing last week, Green writes, Hill's absence was felt from the parking lot to the pulpit.

It was the first Sunday that Ark churchgoers noticed that the grass on the East North Avenue property wasn't meticulously manicured, and that the remnants of weekend trash weren't completely cleared by 6 a.m.

The 70-year-old Hill — whose helpful nature and residence next to the church made him its volunteer caretaker and extra set of eyes for more than a decade — wasn't standing in his usual spot on the landing of his apartment stairs, greeting churchgoers as they walked in.

Instead, his face peered out from a flier that ushers handed out with church bulletins, advertising a vigil and to be held today in honor of his life, and condemnation of his senseless killing.

"Members and neighbors are feeling vulnerable," the Rev. J.L. Carter, senior pastor of Ark Church, said in a Sunday sermon. "Members have said, 'Pastor, what do we do now, after it hit so close to our house?' "

Read more about Milton Hill and Ark Church at baltimoresun.com.

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 9:56 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
        

... et bienvenue à nos amis francophones

The would-be robber who walked out of a cell phone shop empty-handed and apologizing after a clerk preached to him has been arrested -- after knocking over a shoe store just three hours later, reports the Sun-Sentinel, The Baltimore Sun's South Florida sister.

Authorities in Florida say investigators charged 37-year-old Israel Camacho in the crime, Sun-Sentinel reporter Sofia Santana writes.

Camacho was already in jail, charged in the hold-up of a Payless shoe store in Oakland Park after failing at a Metro PCS shop in Pompano earlier on July 23.

Nayara Goncalves, 20, who was working in the cell phone store alone that morning, had encouraged the would-be robber to "Go to Jesus." A surveillance videotape of the incident has become an internet sensation.

The devout Christian told him: "God has something better for you." Camacho told Goncalves that he, too, was a Christian, and they learned that they had attended the same church.

Goncalves was disappointed to learn Friday that the suspect in her case was linked to a robbery that happened later the same day.

"It's so sad," she said. "I thought God was giving him a second chance."

The would-be robber had told Goncalves that he needed $300 or he would be evicted, and that he had never done anything like that before.

Investigators, however, describe their suspect as a serial robber.

They said that soon after the Metro PCS attempted robbery was reported, Camacho went to the Payless.

He put a handgun in a shoe box and ordered a clerk to hand over cash from the register, according to the Broward Sheriff's Office, which investigated both cases.

Both incidents were recorded by surveillance cameras.

One detail, though, may also link both crimes: The offender in both cases told his victims "God bless you," as he made his exit.

Camacho was being held Friday night in the Broward Main Jail without bond on one count of armed robbery, one count of attempted armed robbery and a bench warrant from a child support case.

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 5:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)