Action Alert from People for the American Way

Today, Senator Barack Obama from Illinois introduced the Deceptive Practices and Voter Intimidation Act to ensure civil and criminal penalties for those who engage in voter suppression through disinformation and dirty tricks.

Click here to contact both your senators and ask them to cosponsor Sen. Obama’s Deceptive Practices and Voter Intimidation Act.

If passed, Sen. Obama’s bill would do the following for ALL federal elections starting in 2008:

• Make it a federal crime to communicate false information about the time or place of voting, the voting eligibility of any voter, or the party affiliation or endorsements of any candidate
• Allow any person or voter who has been harmed by false statements immediately preceding a federal election to obtain an injunction stopping the deceptive practices
• Require the U.S. Attorney General to investigate every claim of deceptive practices, and submit a public report on all claims to Congress
• Require the Attorney General to ensure the immediate release of corrective information in affected communities

Since its original introduction in 2005, PFAW staff and our allies have worked closely with Sen. Obama’s office to make sure this bill is as effective as possible at stopping voter disenfranchisement though deceptive practices.

Sen. Obama’s bill addresses a top-tier priority of PFAW’s 2007 Democracy Initiative -- an aggressive election reform agenda to put safeguards in place by the 2008 elections that could mean the difference between hundreds of thousands of eligible voters being disenfranchised or being able to vote and have their votes counted.

"I am deeply, deeply distressed that in the face of the most horrendous problems - we've got poverty, we've got conflict and war, we've got HIV/AIDS - and what do we concentrate on? We concentrate on what you are doing in bed."

- Desmond Tutu, Nobel Peace Prize Laureate and former Anglican Archbishop of Cape Town

Full story

The Rev. Jeremiah Wright Jr., pastor of Trinity United Church of Christ, was profiled recently in The Chicago Tribune.  Click here to read the story of how he turned a small dying church into the largest United Church of Christ congregation in the United States - a congregation made up of everyone from drug users seeking recovery, to Oprah, to a possible future president. 

The Rev. Robert F. Drinan, a Roman Catholic Priest who in the 1970s served as a member of the United States House of Representatives, died today. For many Americans he was a visible symbol of peace in a world torn apart by war.

Father Drinan ran for Congress to serve as an advocate for peace and reconciliation – the same causes that drew him to the priesthood. He was the first member of Congress to file papers calling for the impeachment of Richard Nixon (not for Watergate but in response to Nixon’s secret bombing of Cambodia). He ran afoul of Rome after supporting federal funding for abortion. In the best sense of the word he was a liberal deeply committed to building a just society.

From The Boston Globe:

Father Drinan was one of the most liberal members of the House of Representatives when he served. His strong anti-administration stands earned him a place on the Nixon "enemies list." His upset victory over US Representative Philip J. Philbin, a 14-term incumbent who was vice chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, in the 1970 Democratic primary in Massachusetts 3d Congressional District, was a high-water mark in the New Politics, which brought the antiwar movement to the ballot box.

Father Drinan's election was also a landmark in US church-state relations. A Catholic priest, Rev. Gabriel Richard, had served in Congress, in 1822, as a nonvoting delegate from Michigan Territory, but he had been appointed. And many Protestant clergymen had served as US representatives. Yet the sight of Father Drinan in the halls of Congress in his Roman collar was startling. Some even questioned the propriety of his wearing a cleric's collar and black suit on the floor of the House. Father Drinan had a standard response. "It's the only suit I own," he'd quip.

Father Drinan, a Jesuit, had long served as dean at Boston College Law School. Supporters saw his entering Congress as a logical union of his legal and spiritual vocations. "Our father, who art in Congress" became a popular, if unofficial, campaign slogan.

Praise be to God for the life of this modern day prophet.

All God's Children: Inside the Dark and Violent World of Street Families is a new book written by author Rene Denfeld that explores the story of Jessica Kate Williams, a young women murdered in Portland by a group of street youth.  As I wrote at the time:

Jessica Kate Williams was 22 years old and homeless when allegedly 12 other homeless youth and young adults repeatedly stabbed her, set her on fire, and left her to die under a Portland, Oregon bridge on May 23, 2003.

Williams, who suffered from serious mental health problems, was receiving services from agencies that work with homeless youth when she was killed.

Denfeld uses the account of the Williams murder to paint a picture of homeless youth - along with the agencies that work to transform their lives - that would make Newt Gingrich proud.

In an interview published by The Portland Tribune (and in excerpts from the book) she asserts that most homeless youth are on the street by choice and that agencies like Outside In only enable their lifestyles.

And she makes a direct attack on me that is completely false and without merit.

The National Coalition for the Homeless notes that "causes of homelessness among youth fall into three inter-related categories: family problems, economic problems, and residential instability" and Outside In, Portland's best known agency working with homeless youth, reports that data from their clients reveals that:

90% of youth report some form of violence in their homes.

36% of girls report a history of childhood sexual abuse, with the first incident occurring at age seven. These youth flee to the street in hope of increased safety. Some youth find themselves abandoned by their parents. One child was left with a drug dealer for an indefinite time. Another returned home to find the parents had moved out leaving no contact information. Other youth turn to the street because of poverty, joblessness, alcohol/drug use and/or mental health conditions within their families. They feel hopeless about a positive future in their current environment.

30% of homeless youth are sexual minorities: gay, lesbian, bi, trans, or questioning. These youth and their families cannot together manage the many complexities of a developing sexual/gender identity outside of the norm. Most often youth believe they will better their lives when they go to the street.

But Denfeld tells another story:

The majority of the youths I examined actually chose to be on the street. A lot of them came from very adequate, even very loving homes. Their parents often wanted them to come back.

The facts simply do not support Denfeld's statements.

Denfeld goes on the say that during the immediate aftermath of the murder agencies working with homeless youth were "more concerned with protecting the image of homeless youth than addressing the reality of street family violence..."

Provocative statements like that are meant to sell books and not to illuminate the story.  Few can (or should) take serious that those who work with homeless youth day in and day out do not take the causes and consequences of violence seriously.  As a former staff member at Outside In, I knew kids who died on the streets and knew kids who committed terrible crimes.  But the goal shared by all who work at Outside In (and other agencies that work with homeless youth) is to both hold kids accountable for their decisions and to provide them with the skills they need to escape life on the streets.  Outside In can report after years of study that "80% of youth who go through our transitional housing program never return to the streets."  But few can escape homelessness and poverty without the assistance of caring communities that provide support and that is why churches and others across the nation work with non-profits and government to increase needed services.   

Denfeld also reports that the media and others made it appear that Williams was unloved by her family and here she blames me directly:

Articles in the media mentioned Jessica's fetal alcohol syndrome without mentioning that she was adopted, leading the reader to assume Becky was the alcoholic mother who drank while pregnant. Angry readers called the Williams house to yell at Becky, blaming her for Jessica's disability and murder.

Chuck Currie, an advocate who served on the board of the National Coalition for the Homeless, wrote an article titled "Jessica Williams Did Not Have to Die," which implied Jessica had been forced out on the streets by her family. "The only way to truly bring justice to the death of Jessica Kate Williams would be to make sure no young person be forced out onto the streets where she can be killed," Currie concluded. An opinion piece in The Oregonian claimed Jessica's murder was the result of lack of funding to youth shelters, and suggested donations.

The article Denfeld refers to is one written while I was in seminary and published on the National Coalition for the Homeless web site.  It was a theological reflection on violence perpetrated against homeless people in the United States.

At no time did I claim that Jessica Williams had been forced out on the street by her family.  In fact, the paper dealt mostly with the Biblical stance that we are all responsible for the welfare of one another and that society left Williams down - in many different and complex ways - when she came into contact with those who killed her.  I put the blame for her death where it belonged: with her killers and argued that our criminal justice system was not up to the task of breaking the cycle of violence in our society. 

Had Denfeld actually spoken with me before publishing her book I would have been more than open to discussing these issues with her.  But after reading her interview and the excerpts published today it seems clear that facts would have gotten in the way of the story she wanted to write.    

From Ecumenical Ministries of Oregon:

Interfaith Advocacy Day. 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. beginning at First Congregational United Church of Christ, 700 Marion St. NE, Salem, then progressing to the state Capitol. Come and join people from many faiths to advocate for “Family and Community Stability: A Value for All Oregonians,” focusing on affordable housing, accessible healthcare and elimination of hunger. Confirmed speakers include Michael Anderson, Housing Alliance; Rabbi Michael Cahana, Congregation Beth Israel; Rep. Dave Hunt; Patti Whitney Wise, Oregon Hunger Relief Task Force; and Lisa Wenzlick, St. Luke Lutheran Church. Other invited speakers include Bruce Goldberg, MD, Oregon Department of Human Services, and Barbara Roberts, former Oregon governor. Sponsors include Sponsors include Ainsworth United Church of Christ; Albina Ministerial Alliance; the American Jewish Committee; Atkinson Memorial Church; Augustana Lutheran Church; Bilal Mosque Association; Bread for the World; Bridge City Friends Meeting, Peace & Social Concerns Committee; Care to Share; Central Pacific Conference of the United Church of Christ; Church of Scientology, Portland; Ecumenical Ministries of Oregon; Episcopal Peace and Justice Commission; Family Bridge; First Congregational United Church of Christ, Salem; First United Methodist Church, Portland; First Unitarian Church, Hunger Action Group; Fish Emergency Services; Fremont United Methodist Church; HOPE (Helping Other People Eat) Emergency Food Pantry; Interfaith Action for Justice of Central Oregon; Interfaith Council of Greater Portland; Interfaith Disabilities Network of Oregon; Inter-Religious Action Network of Washington County; Islamic Society of Greater Portland; Jewish Family and Child Service; Jewish Federation of Greater Portland; Jubilee Oregon; Lutheran Advocacy Ministry of Oregon; Northwest Portland Ministries; Oregon Center for Christian Values; Oregon Faith Roundtable Against Hunger; Oregon Farm Worker Ministry; Oregon-Idaho Annual Conference of the United Methodist Church, Bishop’s Initiative to Eliminate Hunger; Oregon Synod of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America; Portland Jobs with Justice, Faith Labor Committee; Presbytery of the Cascades, Peacemaking Unit; St. Luke Lutheran Church; St. Philip Neri Catholic Church, Peace and Justice Commission; St. Philip the Deacon Episcopal Church; SnowCap; Society of St. Vincent de Paul; Spiritual Assembly of the Baha’is of Beaverton; Tualatin United Methodist (Hilltop) Church; and Valley Community Presbyterian Church, Portland. Groups from congregations and community organizations are encouraged to participate. The registration fee is $15 and includes lunch and materials. Download registration form. Call (503) 221-1054 for more information.

I’m looking forward to participating.

In the long nightmare that has been Iraq there have been more defeats than victories in the fight to bring a war that should never had been fought to an end.

But today there was a small but important victory that should be remembered. From The Washington Post:

A day after President Bush pleaded with Congress to give his Iraq policy one last chance, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee rebuffed him by approving a nonbinding resolution declaring his troop increase in Iraq to be against "the national interest."

That the war in Iraq has been “against the national interest” I have no doubt.

I also believe that this war is an affront to God who has called God’s people to be peacemakers (Matthew 5.9 NRSV) and to be the repairer of the breach, the restorer of streets to live in (Isaiah 58:12 NRSV). Instead we have been the instigators of violence and destruction. Lord have mercy.

Press Release from the National Council of Churches USA

New York City, January 23, 2007--Religious leaders from many faith traditions are expressing outrage at recent political tactics in the 2008 U.S. presidential campaign.

Recent emails, blogs and one cable news program about Sen. Barack Obama's religious upbringing prompted several religious leaders to speak out against such divisive politics.  The stories suggested Obama had attended a radical Muslim madrasa school as a child.

"We are writing to deplore this despicable tactic," said the Rev. Bob Edgar, general secretary of the National Council of Churches of Christ in the USA, and eight other leaders.  "We have had enough of the slash and burn politics calculated to divide us as children of God," said the leaders today in an open letter to the religious community (complete text below).

"The bitter, destructive politics that have so riven our country in recent years cannot stand," states the open letter.  "As American leaders of different faiths - Catholic and Protestant, Muslim and Jew - who have worked cooperatively and greatly respect all of the 2008 candidates in both parties, we do not offer this statement as an endorsement of any individual candidate.  However, certain moral standards should infuse our national dialogue, and the recent attacks on Sen. Obama violate values at the heart of this dialogue.  The false and malicious attacks levied at him are anathema to all of our faith traditions, and we condemn them outright."

Several websites carried the reports that Obama's early education was linked to radical Islamic schooling.  CNN reported extensively last night there is no truth to the allegations and the senator has strongly denied the story.  One cable news program, "Fox and Friends," aired a discussion assuming the story to be factual.

"I've been saying for awhile now that we must not let fear, fundamentalism and Fox News set our nation's agenda," said NCC's Edgar separately.  "Now it appears Fox News is using a political candidate to further foment a fear of fundamentalism in hopes of dividing Americans and pitting people of faith against one another.  Faithful Americans must stand up and say no to such sinful behavior," Edgar said.

"It is important that we take a stand today against this willful, malicious attempt to mislead and inflame - and against any further attempts to use political attacks to divide the religious community," concluded the letter.

In addition to the NCC's Edgar the open letter was signed by Rabbi Jonah Dov Pesner; Imam Mahdi Bray, executive director, Muslim American Society, Freedom Foundation; Rev. Stephen J. Thurston, president, National Baptist Convention of America; the Rt. Rev. Preston W. Williams, president, Global Council of Bishops, African Methodist Episcopal Church; Sister Simone Campbell, SSS, executive director, NETWORK; Rev. John H. Thomas, general minister and president, United Church of Christ; Rev. Dr. C. Welton Gaddy, president, Interfaith Alliance; Rabbi Jill Jacobs, director of education, Jewish Funds for Justice.

Related Post: Barack Obama & The United Church Of Christ

(Read the Open Letter below the fold)

The health care needs of Oregon children are in the news again this week as the Legislature considers new initiatives to expand health care and Liz Smith Currie (known as the wife and / or mom around this house) is, as usual, in the thick of things.

From The Oregonian this morning:

Children without health insurance sometimes avoid seeking medical care until they face emergencies. Liz Smith Currie, policy director for Oregon's 44 school-based health clinics, has been collecting stories about uninsured students showing up at clinics with advanced illnesses.

An uninsured student, a senior at Sheldon High School in Eugene, said she put off seeing a doctor for two weeks after she became ill with a fever, vomiting and an aching stomach two years ago. When her abdomen started to swell, she visited the school health clinic and learned she had a ruptured appendix.

Some children who rarely see a doctor "only go when they think they literally are dying," said Debbie Johnson, nurse at Sheldon's health clinic.

Liz is actually the public policy director for the Oregon School Based Health Care Network. Her comments about the needs of rural health care where made in response to a new report released this week by Children First for Oregon documenting the health care crisis faced by Oregon’s kids. Click here to read the report.

This morning The Portland Tribune published an article about my concerns over how homeless children are educated in Multnomah County. I’ve argued recently in a sermon commemorating the life and ministry of The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and on my blog that Multnomah County should pull their funding from the Community Transitional School and use that tax-payer money to support efforts that integrate homeless students into the public school system. Let me recap my concerns:

Federal law states that the use of federal dollars on separate schools is illegal and advocates for the homeless – like the National Coalition for the Homeless and the National Association for the Education of Homeless Children and Youth – argue correctly that separate schools do not offer the full range of services that public schools do...

Multnomah County, however, funds such a separate school instead of working to integrate students into the public system. The Community Transitional School receives over $52,000 from Multnomah County each year. Students at this private facility are not subject to the same testing as public school students and the Multnomah County contract provides no real measurable outcomes for the program to achieve. The Portland and Parkrose school districts, both with high numbers of homeless students, operate under-funded programs without county support…

When students at separate schools are tested the results are discouraging. Results released in December from the Pappas School in Arizona, the granddaddy of all separate schools and the model for the Community Transitional School, showed that homeless kids in that program fared worse than homeless kids in public schools in both math and reading in every grade level…

Multnomah County should pull their funding from the Community Transitional School immediately and invest that money in public school programs. The public schools could use the support and we know their programs actually work. If the Multnomah County Board of County Commissioners is unwilling to take this important step then I challenge them to re-write the contract and require that students at the Community Transitional School be tested along side public school students. I'm confident the test scores will be as low as those shown by the Papas School.

The article today quotes the director of the Community Transitional School as saying that she is unwilling to have students in her program tested.

Since her (Cheryl Bickle) school is private it does not need to participate in standardized tests, and she doesn’t think it should have to. She says tests can’t measure everything a child learns in school, anyway — like the character-building she says her teachers instill in the small learning environment.

Because the Community Transitional School receives tax-payer money it is no run of the mill private school and tax-payers have every right to demand accountability. If, like the Papas School, the Community Transitional School is failing in their primary obligation to educate students county leaders need to know that.

Arguing that homeless students should not be held to the same standards as other children is tantamount to advocating that their lives are not as vital. I reject that.

Homeless children deserve all the same opportunities as housed kids and if the Community Transitional School is unwilling to be accountable to those kids and to the tax-payers it is not a program worthy of support.

This Sunday at Parkrose Community United Church of Christ our Scripture readings were Nehemiah 8:1-3, 5-6, 8-10 and 1 Corinthians 12:12-31a. My sermon focused on Paul’s message that no Christian can declare to another that “I have no need of you.”

Use the below link to download the podcast of the sermon for your iPod or personal computer.

Download ParkroseUnity.m4a

(click with the RIGHT mouse button on the hyperlink and choose “Save Target As” and save to your desktop or other folder – once downloaded click on the file to listen).

Bedtime one night this week in the Currie household:

"Daddy, I don’t want to sleep. Mommy, I don’t want to be in bed.

Pharaoh, let my people go!"

- Frances, age 2.

Someone was paying pretty close attention to the hymns we sang at church during the MLK tribute.

Whatever you think about Hillary Clinton – and I’m not inclined to support her because of her support for the Iraq war – the senator’s candidacy for the presidency is a remarkable event for a nation that just a generation ago excluded women from the corridors of power. How far have we come as a nation? When I was a baby my mother carried me in her arms at a protest demanding that women be admitted to The Citadel in Charleston. Now a woman serves as the Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives and my daughters have every chance to witness a woman sit in the Oval Office. If you want to thank someone for this amazing transformation feel free to thank Judith Bright, my mom, and all those women who have spent their lives opening doors for others. Photo: Judy and baby Chuck, 1969

Statement of the National Council of Churches of Christ in the USA
on the build up of more U.S. troops in Iraq

President George W. Bush has ordered a “surge” in troops in Iraq, ostensibly to help quell sectarian violence and stabilize Baghdad. This escalation of troop presence is likely only to result in an escalation in American and Iraqi deaths. Thus the call for more troops is morally unsupportable. 

Particularly in the wake of the barbaric execution of Saddam Hussein – an act that reflects not the ideals of democracy and justice, but rather mocks them – and an act that promises only to breed more violence, as only a violent act can – one would think that the United States would immediately seek to bring about a change of policy.  Sending more troops is not a change in policy, nor is it even a change in strategy; it is more of the same.   

Certainly a change in policy was what the November election results were all about.  And certainly a change in policy was the bottom-line recommendation of the Iraq Study Group (ISG), a collection of men and women chosen for their collective expertise and wisdom.  Instead, the president has chosen to ignore both the electorate and the ISG.   

Given a chance to build broad consensus on a change of policy under the cover of the ISG Report, we have the makings of yet another divisive debate on whether or not the U.S. should put more lives in harm’s way.  It seems that we are fated never to learn an important lesson of the Vietnam era - that U.S. leadership in the world does not depend on the continuation of failed policies - a lesson that became crystal clear during our recent funeral recollections of President Gerald Ford and his leadership.   

It is time for moral strength, not military power, to take precedence in the U.S. plan for Iraq.   

It is time to recognize the failure of a military policy that is not promoting freedom, not ending terrorism, not building up the Iraqi nation, not bringing security to the region, and not making the world safer. 

It is time - and here we agree with the president - to insist on political benchmarks for the Iraqi government, and to provide reconstruction aid to the Iraqi people, if it is not already too late.  But the benchmarks must be achievable, and this time the disbursement of aid must be transparent.   

It is time to enter into respectful negotiations with those countries in the region that can exert influence on Iraq; to attend to the central issue of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict; and to lead the United Nations Security Council in enforcing restrictions on arms proliferation in the region. 

And above all, it is time, not to send more troops, but to start bringing our troops home.   

The “surge” as recommended by the president is immoral.  What we do not need is an assertion of more military strength.  What we need is the strength of basic moral conviction.   

We make this statement in the spirit of the message last November from our member churches meeting in their annual General Assembly whose theme was, “...for the healing of the nations.” (Revelation 22:2).

Statements by the faith community
on the "surge" of troops to Iraq 

John H. Thomas
General Minister and President
United Church of Christ

Pastoral Letter in Response to
The President’s Call for More Troops in Iraq

January 11, 2007

The growing violence in Iraq, the enormous suffering being experienced by the citizens of Iraq, and the anguish of countless American families who have lost beloved sons and daughters to death and horrific injury calls for profound lament and repentance, not for stubborn commitment to the unilateralism and militarism that has been the hallmark of our failed policy in Iraq.  That is why the President’s speech is not only politically disappointing, but morally deficient as well.  The deceptions and arrogance which launched a war that brought Iraq to this place of pain and anguish and that have alienated the United States from so many of its friends must be acknowledged as more than strategic mistakes; they must be confessed as the core of the immoral justification for a war that failed to meet the criteria for a just war and that, as a result, cannot achieve the goals of a just peace.   

People of faith are not and must not be naïve.  The reality of evil is very much a part of our world.  It is evil that must be restrained.  The bipartisan Iraq Study Group recognized this and called for a diminishing but more strategic military force to be joined by a new and aggressive regional diplomacy that would press all in the region – our friends and enemies alike - to take responsibility for the evil they condone or in which they are complicit, and to join together across ideological and national interests to restrain the violence that threatens all.  Such an approach lacks the seductive appeal of a grand “war on terror,” the morally convenient but suspect naming of an “axis of evil,” or the notion of an epic ideological battle between the forces of democracy and oppression.  Instead it requires a much more honest view of the world that calls for coalitions that are real rather than illusory.  It requires the humility to acknowledge that we cannot impose our solutions by military force alone, and the courage to take initiatives even with partners we find threatening. 

The President’s course ignores this, calling for unilateral troop escalation in a place where additional troops have, in the recent past, simply escalated the violence, and for a growing reliance on the Iraqi government that has been far too complicit in the volatile sectarian politics that continues to fuel the violence and undermines the capacity of U.S. troops and Iraqi security forces to restrain it.  It is a course that fails to provide a credible challenge to other regional players, including Syria and Iran, to take responsibility for ending the violence, and it reinforces the unhealthy image of the United States as an occupying army and the Iraqi government as a subservient client state.  It is a course that places more American daughters and sons, including members of our own churches, in harms way.  While the call for additional resources for rebuilding Iraq is something we should affirm, assuming more stringent Congressional oversight to avoid the abuse and profiteering of the past, in response to the main elements of the President’s new course, it is time for people of faith to say “no!”

As we approach the annual observance of the birth of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., we are challenged by words he spoke forty years ago at the Riverside Church in New York City when he broke the silence about the war in Vietnam.   

We are now faced with the fact that tomorrow is today.  We are confronted with the fierce urgency of now.  In this unfolding conundrum of life and history there is such a thing as being too late.  Procrastination is still the thief of time.  Life often leaves us standing bare, naked, and dejected with a lost opportunity. . . .  Over the bleached bones and jumbled residue of numerous civilizations are written the pathetic words:  “Too late.”  There is an invisible book of life that faithfully records our vigilance or our neglect.  “The moving finger writes, and having writ moves on. . . .”  We still have a choice today:  non-violent coexistence or violent co-annihilation.   

The war in Iraq which has so preoccupied us at the expense of meaningful attentiveness to the tragedy of Darfur, the unresolved conflict between Israel and Palestine, and the crushing poverty faced by so many in the world, confronts people of faith with the urgency of today.  It is the urgency of a prophetic imagination that offers a vision of the world far richer than the one we have been offered, a future secured by aggression and greed.  And we are called to the urgency of prayer – prayer for the people of Iraq, prayer for our own soldiers and their families, especially those who grieve, prayer for the church and in particular for the small and vulnerable Christian community in Iraq, prayer for our leaders that they may listen with humility and act with wisdom.  Thus may history not judge us, “too late,” and may the oft sung words of the first preacher who graced the pulpit where King spoke inspire:  “Cure your children’s warring madness, bend our pride to your control.  Shame our reckless, selfish gladness, rich in things and poor in soul.  Grant us wisdom, grant us courage, for the facing of this hour, for the facing of this hour.”   

The Most Rev. Katharine Jefferts Schori
Presiding Bishop and Primate
The Episcopal Church

Presiding Bishop's response to President Bush's speech on Iraq

While I welcome President Bush's recognition that the situation in Iraq is unacceptable, I am deeply saddened by his failure to address peacemaking in the context of the whole region. It is a mistake to view Iraq only through the prism of terrorism. Others have pointed out that the road to peace goes through Jerusalem, not Baghdad. In order to bring peace to the Middle East, not just Iraq, and the land we Christians call holy, there must be a comprehensive regional plan that culminates in a two-state solution for Israelis and Palestinians. Our country must engage diplomatically not only the U.N., European Union and Russia, but all the nations in the Middle East, including Iran and Syria. Diplomacy, built on a foundation of mutual respect and interest among people of good will, not more troops, can bring an end to this tragic conflict. We continue to pray for our soldiers and their families, as well as for all the people of the Middle East, seeking God's wisdom in the search for peace with justice,
for shalom and salaam.

Stanley J. Noffsinger
General Secretary
Church of the Brethren General BoardNEWS
Baptist Leaders Oppose U.S. Troop 'Surge'

Bob Allen
01-11-07 

Rabbi David Saperstein
Director, the Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism
January 11, 2007

Statement in Response to President Bush’s Speech about the War in Iraq

January 12, 2007

As Christians, we are called to continually give witness to Jesus Christ, the Prince of Peace, who called us to love our enemies. Last summer, in July 2006, the Church of the Brethren Annual Conference made a resolution about the war in Iraq that is even more applicable today. 

As the highest authority in the Church of the Brethren, the Annual Conference voted to affirm our denomination’s historic and living witness that all war is sin. As disciples of Christ and members of one of the three Historic Peace Churches, we resolved that we cannot ignore the death, destruction, and violence of the war in Iraq.

The message of Jesus “to love your enemy,” from the Gospel of Matthew 5:44, is inconsistent with military action. Jesus’ words instead move us toward peaceful methods, diplomacy, moral suasion, nonviolent sanctions, and international cooperation to address violence and aggression.

War demeans and brutalizes all its participants. Military combatants and support personnel as well as innocent civilians, including women, children, and the infirm, are being killed and maimed. Military intervention in Iraq has triggered wave after wave of brutal acts of terrorism. In addition, the enormous expense of the war is a disastrous drain on the resources that are so desperately needed to relieve suffering at home and around the world.

The Church of the Brethren has called on its members to pray and give witness to the sin of violence, and has petitioned the federal government of the United States, the United Nations, and other nations and groups to seek peace by taking action to bring troops home from Iraq. 

Also, we have called on religious leaders from all faiths who preach violence to consider the things that truly make for peace. The wisdom of the scriptures, in the book of Jonah, provides direction: “Let everyone call urgently on God. Let them give up their evil ways and their violence” (Jonah 3:8). 

Now, in response to the points the President is seeking, these statements by the Church of the Brethren are reaffirmed. Furthermore, we reiterate the church’s prayerful call upon the global community to formulate and actively implement a nonviolent, just plan that will bring peace and security to Iraq and all its people.

A. Roy Medley
General Secretary
American Baptist Churches USA

We continue to believe that a just and sustainable peace in the Middle
East and a cessation of Middle-East based terrorism cannot be addressed
by military force alone.  We urge President Bush to use every diplomatic means possible to bring peace, including dialogue with Syria and Iran, as he has been urged to do by US religious leaders and a wide range of present and past government officials.  We also believe that Iraq and terrorism cannot be dealt with in isolation from the issues related to the Israeli/Palestinian dilemma.  We again urge our government to use its influence to bring the necessary parties to the table to address how both Israelis and Palestinians can live in  recognized and secure nations. 

In his speech to the nation on January 10, President George W. Bush announced plans to send more than 21,000 U.S. troops to Iraq. Clifton Kirkpatrick, Stated Clerk of the General Assembly, issued a statement in response to the speech, which we feature here.

Included with the statement is a reflection by Vernon Broyles on previous General Assembly actions about the conflict in Iraq. Broyles is volunteer Representative for Public Witness for the Office of the General Assembly.

Statement by The Reverend Dr. Clifton Kirkpatrick
in response to President George W. Bush’s speech on January 10, 2007
regarding Iraq military strategies

In 2004, the 216th General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) made a clear judgment “that the invasion of Iraq has been immoral, unwise and illegal.” While it also clearly affirmed our support for the troops and the right of people of conscience to disagree with that judgment, it was clear in its opposition to the war in Iraq. We believe that history has borne out the wisdom of the General Assembly’s action.

The General Assembly also expressed the conviction that in looking toward the future, the U.S. Government must assume responsibility to participate in the reconstruction of Iraq, but that such a reconstruction effort should be shared with the international community under the leadership of the United Nations. It further stated that in that process, further military deployment should be avoided as much as possible.

In light of these clear convictions, we view with grave concern the proposal of the President to send over 21,000 additional troops to Iraq. We urge the administration, instead, to give serious attention to the counsel of our General Assembly, other religious communities, and the bipartisan Iraq Study Group, to seek the stabilization and reconstruction in Iraq through other means.

January 11, 2007

Response to Iraq strategies outlined by President Bush on January 10, 2007 reflecting previous actions of the General Assembly:

The 216th General Assembly (2004) of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) concurred in the judgment of many critics “that the invasion of Iraq has been unwise, immoral and illegal.” Since that time, the number of deaths of U.S. military personnel has risen above 3,000 and it is estimated that more than 100,000 U.S. personnel have been physically and psychologically maimed by their involvement in the war—with their families suffering the “collateral damage.” Iraqi dead are numbered in the tens of thousands, and the toll of daily violence on the general Iraqi population is incalculable. Many now insist that the fruit of the current strategy is, in fact, civil war.

No sign of an end to the violence is in sight. In the face of the worsening internecine strife in Iraq and the continuing failure of U.S. military policy to ameliorate the situation, the presenting dilemma is how to find a way out, short of total disaster.

Widespread agreement exists among much of the U.S. military leadership that “success” by any measure is not attainable by simply continuing strategies that have been employed thus far. That includes previous efforts to increase U.S. military presence in particularly troublesome parts of Baghdad and other areas. These “surges” have been unable to quell the violence in any sustained fashion, whether it be inter-ethnic killing or actions opposition to the occupation.

What the President is now proposing can hardly be interpreted as anything short of an escalation of the current conflict. He acknowledges that in the “short term,” there will be continuing, perhaps increased, bloodshed, especially as that involves giving our troops a “green light” to invade areas like Sadr City—a guarantee of sustained, house-to-house fighting and further alienation of much of the poor Shiite population.

Even more ominous is the President’s repetitious “good versus evil” rhetoric with regard to Syria and Iran. “We’ll interrupt the flow of support from Iran and Syria, and we will seek out and destroy the networks that are providing advanced weaponry and training to our enemies in Iraq.” He threatens to put a stop to support from those two parties by the use of force at a time when the clear wisdom of the Iraq Study Group and many others is that no movement toward a lasting peace is possible without diplomatic contact with these two parties. This threat is even more disturbing in the face of informed speculation that the administration may have given its blessing to Israel to use its own nuclear capability, at some point in the future, against Iran’s suspected nuclear programs.

Even with clear acknowledgement by the President that Iraq must take on major responsibility for their future and his providing some “benchmarks” for measuring their willingness to do so, his overall strategy looks, in large measure, to be “more of the same” with regard to military strategies for the “pacification” of Iraq.

The President declared, “America’s commitment is not open-ended.” What he did not offer was any hint as to how long our own men and women might be placed at risk; however, earlier hints from the White House suggest that the “surge” in U.S. troops is hardly a short-term escalation. Indeed, The White House press secretary went so far as to say that the outcome of this strategy should not even be assessed for at least two years, a long time for U.S. personnel to continue to be at risk in a war that has already lasted longer than the U.S. involvement in World War II.

Our General Assembly recognizes that in assessing the justification for military action, traditional Just War Principles may be considered. Among those most salient in this situation is the criterion requiring that such actions must have a reasonable chance of success. At the moment, many doubts exist, especially among military strategists, as to the ability of the President’s “surge” strategy to meet that criterion. In fact, strong proponents of a “surge” such as Senator McCain argue that even the 21,000 additional “boots on the ground” promised by the President is insufficient to accomplish that mission.

The General Assembly has expressed its deep concern for those who are serving at great cost in this conflict. The assembly has called for adequate pastoral care for them and their families as well as for adequate logistical support and protection. While that support should not be abridged in any way, it does not follow that new financial resources should be allocated to place several thousand other men and women in the cauldron of violence in which injury and death will come, as the Administration has acknowledged.

The General Assembly has made clear that in such conflicts, there must be an effort to involve the community of nations—most important, the United Nations—as an agent through which the various parties may be brought together to find a way beyond the sectarian violence and to begin the process of rebuilding. In 2004, the 216th General Assembly urged the U.S. Government “to move speedily to restore sovereignty to Iraq, to internationalize the reconstruction efforts without penalty to those nations that chose not to endorse the U.S.-led invasion, and to recognize the United Nations as the body most suitable to facilitate the transition to peace, freedom, and participatory governance in Iraq.” 

In summary, the strategies announced by President Bush run counter to the carefully crafted advice of the Iraq Study Group, and a great many of the U.S. military commanders from whom the President, earlier, promised to take his signals about military deployments. They also run counter to the moral, ethical, and familial concerns of millions of Americans that surfaced in recent elections. It is time for the U.S. Congress, in whatever ways available to it, to tell the President “No!” to further escalation of the conflict by the United States.

Baptist leaders contacted Thursday by EthicsDaily.com disagreed with President Bush's plan to send more U.S. troops to Iraq.

"The situation in Iraq is unacceptable to the American people--and it is unacceptable to me," the president said in a 20-minute speech on Wednesday. "Our troops in Iraq have fought bravely. They have done everything we have asked them to do. Where mistakes have been made, the responsibility rests with me."

Bush committed 21,500 additional American troops to Iraq. The plan would increase the U.S. troop presence from the current 132,000 to 153,500 and cost $5.6 billion. Congress has already spent more than $350 billion in the war, and more than 3,000 Americans have lost their lives.

The president faces stiff opposition from Democrats in Congress and a few Republicans. Sen. Sam Brownback, R-Kansas, a presidential hopeful in 2008, said he does not believe more troops is the answer. Others considering running for the GOP nomination, like Arizona Sen. John McCain and former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, support the "surge."

Baptist leaders contacted by EthicsDaily.com agreed.

"President Bush has been wrong too often to be trusted now with yet another plan for victory in Iraq," said Robert Parham, executive director of the Baptist Center for Ethics. "He no longer has the confidence of the American people, most of whom oppose sending more troops to Iraq. He lacks the support of most Democrats and a growing number of Republican leaders. Yet he burrows blindly ahead in the darkness with little sense of where he is going and no appreciate that the nation is not following him."

Roy Medley, general secretary of American Baptist Churches in the U.S.A., said a just and sustainable peace in the Middle East cannot be addressed by military force alone. He urged Bush to "use every diplomatic means possible to bring peace, including dialogue with Syria and Iran, as he has been urged to do by U.S. religious leaders and a wide range of present and past government officials."

"Sending 20,000 additional troops is like putting a band-aid on a wound that requires a tourniquet," said Bruce Prescott of Mainstream Oklahoma Baptists. "American military force cannot resolve the political and religious differences that divide Iraqis. Prolonging this misguided war is doing nothing more than creating deeper divisions within our own country."

Alistair Brown of BMS World Mission said most Baptists in Great Britain have been against the war from the start, and a majority of the population wants the UK to move toward a strategic troop withdrawal. The U.S. move takes the military presence in the opposite direction. 

"Not many things are fixed by hitting them harder," Brown said. "And many Brits feel that President Bush's planned troop surge for Iraq is an attempt to bring peace by hitting the military problem harder."

Gary Nelson, general secretary of Canadian Baptist Ministries, said in a meeting with youth directors from all the conventions and unions in that nation most of their reaction is "disappointment--wishing and wondering why bridges of peace cannot be built rather than continued violence."

"Greater numbers of troops means greater chaos," Nelson said. "It is time to take Jesus' words seriously 'Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the children of God.'"

Brown said increasing troop levels will be perceived in Iraq as an increased invasion by the Christian West, creating danger for Christians around the world. "We stay strong in prayer," he said, "longing for a lasting peace soon and a chance to build a new, stable Iraq."

"The biblical witness tells us that when a blind man leads he stumbles into a ditch," said Parham. "That's why those with sight lead those who are blind. And now is the time, for the sighted Christian community to provide clarity about a way forward. We must offer the moral message that violence only begets more violence. Sending more troops will beget more violence. More violence is not an acceptable moral path. An acceptable path is more talking with our real and perceived adversaries, seeking the common ground of less violence."

Parham said the president's surge plan falls short of meeting historic Christian rules of a just war. 

"First, a surge does not provide a reasonable hope for success," he said. "It only prolongs the failed war. Winning the war is a myth. Second, a surge does not ensure non-combatant civilian immunity from war. It only escalates in a civil war the number of deaths and disfigurements. Third, a surge increases the war's costs, which already outweigh the original goals for the war."   

Medley said Iraq and terrorism cannot be dealt with in isolation from the Israeli/Palestinian problem. "We again urge our government to use its influence to bring the necessary parties to the table to address how both Israelis and Palestinians can live in recognized and secure nations," he said.

Digital Points Solutions offers a free service that tracks and maps visitors to your website over a 24-hour period and then allows you to see by location where you readers come from.  Over the last couple of weeks this has provided me with great enjoyment as I sit down each night and ponder why I'm read by folks in the UK, South Africa and that one person who checks in a couple times a week from Iran.  And I've really got to do something to up my readership from the Rocky Mountains to St. Louis. 

(Click on the map for a larger version)

Now that U.S. Senator Barack Obama has formed an exploratory presidential committee you can expect renewed and sometimes vicious attacks on his character - and because he speaks so freely about it - his faith.  The senator from Illinois is a member of Trinity United Church of Christ.

Albert Mohler, the Religious Right leader who serves as president of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, once famously said:

"The United Church of Christ is so 'inclusive' that one is hard pressed to imagine someone who would not be accepted for membership. As Mark Tooley of the Institute on Religion and Democracy comments, 'The most liberal of America's mainline denominations, the UCC marries gays, or ordains witches, and prefers sit-ins (just name the cause) to evangelistic rallies."

Similar false charges were made today on the right-wing Faith and Action website in an article about Obama. 

Inclusiveness is a hallmark of the United Church of Christ (Mohler gets that part right at least) but it is an inclusiveness rooted in the ministry of Jesus who declared with authority that all are welcome in the Kingdom. 

In our denomination there are no creeds or tests of faith.  From the UCC website:

The United Church of Christ embraces a theological heritage that affirms the Bible as the authoritative witness to the Word of God, the creeds of the ecumenical councils, and the confessions of the Reformation. The UCC has roots in the "covenantal" tradition--meaning there is no centralized authority or hierarchy that can impose any doctrine or form of worship on its members. Christ alone is Head of the church. We seek a balance between freedom of conscience and accountability to the apostolic faith. The UCC therefore receives the historic creeds and confessions of our ancestors as testimonies, but not tests of the faith.

Unlike the Mohler's Southern Baptist church, for example, we do not kick out congregations or exclude individuals over theological or political disagreements.  We have conservatives and liberals (if you want to use purely political terms) and a rich diversity.  But we also have a shared set of understandings that have been incorporated into a Statement of Faith:

We believe in God, the Eternal Spirit, who is made known to us in Jesus our brother, and to whose deeds we testify:

God calls the worlds into being, creates humankind in the divine image, and sets before us the ways of life and death.

God seeks in holy love to save all people from aimlessness and sin.

God judges all humanity and all nations by that will of righteousness declared through prophets and apostles.

In Jesus Christ, the man of Nazareth, our crucified and risen Lord, God has come to us and shared our common lot, conquering sin and death and reconciling the whole creation to its Creator.

God bestows upon us the Holy Spirit, creating and renewing the church of Jesus Christ, binding in covenant faithful people of all ages, tongues, and races.

God calls us into the church to accept the cost and joy of discipleship, to be servants in the service of the whole human family, to proclaim the gospel to all the world and resist the powers of evil, to share in Christ's baptism and eat at his table,to join him in his passion and victory.

God promises to all who trust in the gospel forgiveness of sins and fullness of grace, courage in the struggle for justice and peace, the presence of the Holy Spirit in trial and rejoicing, and eternal life in that kingdom which has no end.

Blessing and honor, glory and power be unto God.

Everyone knows that during a political campaign one side or the other will attempt to tear down their opponents.  One of the reasons Obama is so popular right now is that he has not done that but instead has worked to reach out across partisan lines to address issues of fundamental concern to the American people. 

I suspect, however, that some of his opponents will not return the favor and will lash out at anything - even his denomination - if they believe demonizing him will hurt his chances with the voters.

But anyone who questions the Christian commitment of the United Church of Christ - or of Barack Obama - will only bring shame on themselves by bearing false witness and open up questions about their own commitment to living the faith Jesus taught us to live.   

Here it is nearly one in the afternoon and the snow is still falling from the sky in something of a surprise storm.  Portland's Grant Park is filled with kids off from school but long before the high school students made it out of bed we were at the park with our kids and the dogs.  I hope everyone around town is staying warm.  If you have clothing donations (or cash donations for that matter) for those doing without consider getting in touch with Snow-Cap, Transition Projects, Outside In or the Goose Hollow Family Shelter.  These agencies need your help.

This morning on KPOJ’s The Thom Hartmann Show I shared my concerns with listeners about the homeless crisis being faced by our nation and in particular about the problems faced by homeless students in Oregon. You can download the podcast of the interview from the KPOJ website (click on the January 16th show).

During the sermon I delivered this Sunday at our MLK tribute service I also talked about homelessness and public education. The audio of the sermon can be downloaded here.

Here is what I basically said on the air this morning and during my sermon on Sunday dealing specifically with the issue of education:

When most of us think about how to help those who are homeless we turn our attention to volunteering with shelters or soup kitchens. Yet for many of those living on our streets another issue has become critical: access to public education. Unfortunately, in Multnomah County we are not doing all that we can to address the needs of homeless students.

Almost everyone agrees that getting homeless students into public schools where they have the full range of educational opportunities as every other student is a key to their eventual success in life.

That’s the good news.

The bad news is that some communities have sought to keep homeless students out of public schools and set-up separate schools to serve homeless children. Separate, however, is never equal.

Federal law states that the use of federal dollars on separate schools is illegal and advocates for the homeless – like the National Coalition for the Homeless and the National Association for the Education of Homeless Children and Youth – argue correctly that separate schools do not offer the full range of services that public schools do. Bi-partisan leaders in Congress, education groups, civil rights organizations, and the United Church of Christ all support making sure homeless children can access public schools and oppose separate schools.

Multnomah County, however, funds such a separate school instead of working to integrate students into the public system. The Community Transitional School receives over $52,000 from Multnomah County each year. Students at this private facility are not subject to the same testing as public school students and the Multnomah County contract provides no real measurable outcomes for the program to achieve. The Portland and Parkrose school districts, both with high numbers of homeless students, operate under-funded programs without county support.

A recent study by the US Conference of Mayors – and confirmed by tallies of people who are homeless in Oregon – show that families with homeless children make up nearly half the homeless population. 13,159 homeless students attended Oregon public schools during 2005-2006.

When students at separate schools are tested the results are discouraging. Results released in December from the Pappas School in Arizona, the granddaddy of all separate schools and the model for the Community Transitional School, showed that homeless kids in that program fared worse than homeless kids in public schools in both math and reading in every grade level.

"We have learned over the years that model homeless education programs are those that keep children stable in their schools of origin, remove barriers to enrollment, attendance, and success, and afford homeless children and youth every opportunity to participate in school activities,” says Barbara Duffield, public policy director for National Association for the Education of Homeless Children and Youth.

In some cases students at the Community Transitional School have stayed there for years and they are now working to build a permanent facility. It will not be money well spent. Separate schools always fail in their primary obligation of educating students.

Multnomah County should pull their funding from the Community Transitional School immediately and invest that money in public school programs. The public schools could use the support and we know their programs actually work. If the Multnomah County Board of County Commissioners is unwilling to take this important step then I challenge them to re-write the contract and require that students at the Community Transitional School be tested along side public school students. I'm confident the test scores will be as low as those shown by the Papas School.

Tomorrow morning at 7:30 am I’ll be a guest on The Thom Hartmann Show on Portland’s 620 AM KPOJ. Tune in or listen via their website.

Click here to listen to Rev. King's historic address at Riverside Church: Martin Luther King: Beyond Vietnam -- A Time to Break Silence

Click here to listen to my sermon this past Sunday from a service at Parkrose Community United Church of Christ celebrating the life and ministry of Rev. King.

Our Sunday afternoon was spent at "Baby Loves Disco" at Portland's Crystal Ballroom.

Daddy & Frances

All across the country, Baby Loves Disco is slowly but surely transforming the hippest night clubs into child proof discos as toddlers, pre-schoolers and parents looking for a break from the routine playground circuit let loose for some post naptime, pre-dinner fun. Make no mistake, this is NOT the Mickey Mouse club, and Barney is Banned. Baby loves disco is an afternoon dance party featuring real music spun and mixed by real djs blending classic disco tunes From the 70s, & 80s guaranteed to get those little booties moving and grooving.

The fun spills out from all corners of the club: bubble machines, baskets of scarves and egg-shakers, a chill-out room (with tents, books and puzzles), diaper changing stations, a full spread of healthy snacks and dancing, LOTS of dancing. But at it’s core, Baby loves disco is a community event that brings kids together with kids and parents together with parents. Started by professional dancer (and professional mom) Heather Murphy, the idea was to create an alternative to the pre-packaged world of entertainment for young kids.

Mommy & Katherine

Good fun for everyone/

This morning at Parkrose Community United Church of Christ we celebrated the life and ministry of The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. with a special service. Our scripture readings included Isaiah 5:1-7 and Luke 4:16-19. The sermon dealt with the overall theme of prophetic ministry and the issue of justice in contemporary theology. To illustrate one justice issue faced by the church the question of how best to educate homeless youth was raised. Should homeless students be shuffled off to separate schools or integrated into public school systems?

Use the below link to download the podcast of my sermon for your iPod or personal computer.

Download ParkroseMLK.m4a

(click with the RIGHT mouse button on the hyperlink and choose “Save Target As” and save to your desktop or other folder – once downloaded click on the file to listen).

During the service we also read a pastoral letter issued by leaders from Churches Uniting In Christ.

Update:  Multnomah County Should Pull Funding From The Community Transitional School

For all those of us Pacific Northwesterners who like to make fun of the way they do things in Kansas there is this news to consider:

This week in Federal Way schools, it got a lot more inconvenient to show one of the top-grossing documentaries in U.S. history, the global-warming alert "An Inconvenient Truth."

After a parent who supports the teaching of creationism and opposes sex education complained about the film, the Federal Way School Board on Tuesday placed what it labeled a moratorium on showing the film. The movie consists largely of a computer presentation by former Vice President Al Gore recounting scientists' findings.

"Condoms don't belong in school, and neither does Al Gore. He's not a schoolteacher," said Frosty Hardison, a parent of seven who also said that he believes the Earth is 14,000 years old. "The information that's being presented is a very cockeyed view of what the truth is. ... The Bible says that in the end times everything will burn up, but that perspective isn't in the DVD."

Federal Way is located near Seattle.

The school district will now only allow the film to be shown if an “alternative” point of view is also shown to students.

So while the schools take into account the views of the crazies the world burns.

I’ve got very little patience for those who so misuse Scripture in moments like this. Children are hurt by such thinking and God’s call to us to act responsibly for the protection of Creation is deeply harmed. That is one reason that I have joined over 10,000 other clergy is signing this Open Letter Concerning Religion and Science:

Within the community of Christian believers there are areas of dispute and disagreement, including the proper way to interpret Holy Scripture. While virtually all Christians take the Bible seriously and hold it to be authoritative in matters of faith and practice, the overwhelming majority do not read the Bible literally, as they would a science textbook. Many of the beloved stories found in the Bible – the Creation, Adam and Eve, Noah and the ark – convey timeless truths about God, human beings, and the proper relationship between Creator and creation expressed in the only form capable of transmitting these truths from generation to generation. Religious truth is of a different order from scientific truth. Its purpose is not to convey scientific information but to transform hearts.

We the undersigned, Christian clergy from many different traditions, believe that the timeless truths of the Bible and the discoveries of modern science may comfortably coexist. We believe that the theory of evolution is a foundational scientific truth, one that has stood up to rigorous scrutiny and upon which much of human knowledge and achievement rests. To reject this truth or to treat it as “one theory among others” is to deliberately embrace scientific ignorance and transmit such ignorance to our children. We believe that among God’s good gifts are human minds capable of critical thought and that the failure to fully employ this gift is a rejection of the will of our Creator. To argue that God’s loving plan of salvation for humanity precludes the full employment of the God-given faculty of reason is to attempt to limit God, an act of hubris. We urge school board members to preserve the integrity of the science curriculum by affirming the teaching of the theory of evolution as a core component of human knowledge. We ask that science remain science and that religion remain religion, two very different, but complementary, forms of truth.

I hope that churches in Federal Way fight the school board and overturn this decision.

(Hat tip to br t)

The Rev. Bob Edgar, general secretary of the National Council of Churches USA, made remarks today about the president’s call for more troops in Iraq. Ekklesia reports:

"This escalation of troop presence only promises to guarantee an escalation in American and Iraqi deaths", says the Rev Dr Bob Edgar of NCCUSA today. The council brings together mainstream American denominations with a combined membership of 45 million.

He continued: "Particularly in the wake of the barbaric execution of Saddam Hussein - an act that reflects not the ideals of democracy and justice, but rather mocks them - and an act that promises only to breed more violence, as only a violent act can - one would think that the United States would immediately seek to bring about a change of policy. Sending more troops is not a change in policy, nor is it even a change in strategy; it is more of the same…"

"It is time for moral strength, not military power, to take precedence in the US plan for Iraq.

"It is time to recognize the failure of a military policy that is not promoting freedom, not ending terrorism, not building up the Iraqi nation, not bringing security to the region, and not making the world safer.

"It is time - and here we agree with the President - to insist on political benchmarks for the Iraqi government, and to provide reconstruction aid to the Iraqi people, if it is not already too late. But the benchmarks must be achievable, and this time the disbursement of aid must be transparent."

Click here for the full story.

The Rev. John H. Thomas, United Church of Christ General Minister and President, released the following pastoral letter in response to President Bush's Jan. 10 address calling for an escalation in the number of U.S. troops in Iraq:

The growing violence in Iraq, the enormous suffering being experienced by the citizens of Iraq, and the anguish of countless American families who have lost beloved sons and daughters to death and horrific injury calls for profound lament and repentance, not for stubborn commitment to the unilateralism and militarism that has been the hallmark of our failed policy in Iraq.  That is why the President’s speech is not only politically disappointing, but morally deficient as well.  The deceptions and arrogance which launched a war that brought Iraq to this place of pain and anguish and that have alienated the United States from so many of its friends must be acknowledged as more than strategic mistakes; they must be confessed as the core of the immoral justification for a war that failed to meet the criteria for a just war and that, as a result, cannot achieve the goals of a just peace.

People of faith are not and must not be naïve.  The reality of evil is very much a part of our world.  It is evil that must be restrained.  The bipartisan Iraq Study Group recognized this and called for a diminishing but more strategic military force to be joined by a new and aggressive regional diplomacy that would press all in the region – our friends and enemies alike - to take responsibility for the evil they condone or in which they are complicit, and to join together across ideological and national interests to restrain the violence that threatens all.  Such an approach lacks the seductive appeal of a grand “war on terror,” the morally convenient but suspect naming of an “axis of evil,” or the notion of an epic ideological battle between the forces of democracy and oppression.  Instead it requires a much more honest view of the world that calls for coalitions that are real rather than illusory.  It requires the humility to acknowledge that we cannot impose our solutions by military force alone, and the courage to take initiatives even with partners we find threatening.

The President’s course ignores this, calling for unilateral troop escalation in a place where additional troops have, in the recent past, simply escalated the violence, and for a growing reliance on the Iraqi government that has been far too complicit in the volatile sectarian politics that continues to fuel the violence and undermines the capacity of U.S. troops and Iraqi security forces to restrain it.  It is a course that fails to provide a credible challenge to other regional players, including Syria and Iran, to take responsibility for ending the violence, and it reinforces the unhealthy image of the United States as an occupying army and the Iraqi government as a subservient client state.  It is a course that places more American daughters and sons, including members of our own churches, in harms way.  While the call for additional resources for rebuilding Iraq is something we should affirm, assuming more stringent Congressional oversight to avoid the abuse and profiteering of the past, in response to the main elements of the President’s new course, it is time for people of faith to say “no!"

As we approach the annual observance of the birth of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., we are challenged by words he spoke forty years ago at the Riverside Church in New York City when he broke the silence about the war in Vietnam.

We are now faced with the fact that tomorrow is today.  We are confronted with the fierce urgency of now.  In this unfolding conundrum of life and history there is such a thing as being too late.  Procrastination is still the thief of time.  Life often leaves us standing bare, naked, and dejected with a lost opportunity. . . .  Over the bleached bones and jumbled residue of numerous civilizations are written the pathetic words:  “Too late.”  There is an invisible book of life that faithfully records our vigilance or our neglect.  “The moving finger writes, and having writ moves on. . . .”  We still have a choice today:  non-violent coexistence or violent co-annihilation.

The war in Iraq which has so preoccupied us at the expense of meaningful attentiveness to the tragedy of Darfur, the unresolved conflict between Israel and Palestine, and the crushing poverty faced by so many in the world, confronts people of faith with the urgency of today.  It is the urgency of a prophetic imagination that offers a vision of the world far richer than the one we have been offered, a future secured by aggression and greed.  And we are called to the urgency of prayer – prayer for the people of Iraq, prayer for our own soldiers and their families, especially those who grieve, prayer for the church and in particular for the small and vulnerable Christian community in Iraq, prayer for our leaders that they may listen with humility and act with wisdom.  Thus may history not judge us, “too late,” and may the oft sung words of the first preacher who graced the pulpit where King spoke inspire:  “Cure your children’s warring madness, bend our pride to your control.  Shame our reckless, selfish gladness, rich in things and poor in soul.  Grant us wisdom, grant us courage, for the facing of this hour, for the facing of this hour.”

Yesterday the Republican Party-aligned Institute on Religion on Democracy (IRD), a group funded by right-wing extremists, released a "report" critical of funding sources relied on by the National Council of Churches USA.

"The institute, a Washington-based think tank, is allied with conservative groups on issues such as same-sex marriage. From its founding in 1981, its primary effort has been to challenge what it calls the "leftist" political positions of mainline Protestant denominations, such as the United Methodist Church and the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)," reports The Washington Post.

IRD has long opposed positions taken by the NCC on issues ranging from anti-poverty efforts (IRD promotes policies that benefit the wealthy at the expense of the "least of these" in society) to issues around war and peace (IRD strongly advocates the use of U.S. military force to resolve nearly all international disputes).  The group even questions the existence of global warming. 

IRD's leaders often confuse the Republican Party platform with the Gospel teachings of Jesus. 

The Washington Post, in their article on the release of IRD's report, reported today that:

...the institute released a 90-page report, titled "Strange Yokefellows: The National Council of Churches and Its Growing Non-Church Constituency." It argued that the council in recent years has faced diminishing contributions from its member churches and has made up the shortfall with grants from such "left-leaning" groups as the National Religious Partnership for the Environment, the Ford Foundation and the Sierra Club.

"Several of these [non-church] groups that the NCC has turned to for financial and other forms of support are so blatantly partisan that they can be accurately described as . . . the shadow Democratic Party," the report's main researcher, John Lomperis, told reporters.

The article did not mention that Lomperis worked on the Bush 2004 campaign. 

However, The Washington Post did report that:

James Tonkowich, the institute's president, said that about 60 percent of its roughly $1 million in annual revenue comes from individual donors and about 40 percent from conservative foundations, such as the Scaife, Bradley, Coors and Smith Richardson family charities.

Tonkowich also acknowledged that his organization has made public less information about its funders than the NCC has.

NCC, under the leadership of The Rev. Bob Edgar, has diversified their funding sources and turned a nearly $6 million deficit into a balanced budget.  The council has also worked with bi-partisan leaders in the United States on several issues and been critical of both democrats and republicans when needed.  Unlike IRD, the NCC is not beholden to partisan political interests.

Click on the photo to see John Lomperis on the job for the Bush campaign.

Tonight the president announced his plan to escalate the conflict in Iraq by sending additional U.S. troops. His plan flies in the face of advice offered by prominent U.S . military leaders and has the clear potential of worsening the humanitarian crisis that has exploded since the initial U.S. invasion. Religious leaders have called for the withdrawal of U.S. troops linked with benchmarks for rebuilding Iraqi society and I reaffirm my support for that position. Like Christians across the world – from the Vatican to the World Council of Churches – I remained convinced that the president's policies have created a deep moral crisis and that escalation of the war will create further chaos. Furthermore, I endorse calls in Congress to withhold funding from the administration that would be used to pay for additional troops in Iraq. The Prince of Peace calls on us to reject war and to seek justice and we have not done enough to answer that call.

Link: Listen to my 9/10/06 sermon dealing with Iraq

Update

Action Alert from the United Church of Christ Justice & Witness Ministries

On Wednesday, January 10, President Bush outlined his new strategy for the war in Iraq.  The strategy includes a proposed escalation in U.S. troop levels in Iraq, up to 20,000 additional troops, to serve for an unspecified length of time.  The President is also expected to recommend increased spending for economic development in Iraq as part of a job development program.

Many voices from across the political spectrum are expressing opposition to the troop escalation as an answer to the growing sectarian division in Iraq.  As people of faith, and members of a Just Peace church, it is critical to add our voices to the call to oppose a troop increase in Iraq.

In the House and Senate, bipartisan efforts are underway to oppose the President’s proposed strategy for Iraq.  They reflect the assessment of a number of current and retired military generals who have stated that an increase in U.S. troops, particularly absent other initiatives, would be counterproductive.

Sen. Kennedy (D-MA) has proposed legislation to block troop escalation in Iraq without congressional debate and approval.  Sen. Kennedy cited the fact that the case for war upon which the Congress authorized the President’s action in 2003 does not reflect what is now known to be true:  there were no weapons of mass destruction stockpiled in Iraq, and alleged ties between Iraq and al Qaeda have not been discovered.

The President’s proposed troop increase dismisses the message from the majority of American voters in the November 2006 elections, calling for a change of direction in Iraq.  Escalating U.S. military involvement in Iraq will not bring peace and stability to that conflict-torn country.  Greater emphasis must be placed on renewed diplomatic initiatives and stronger efforts to rebuild the country’s economic and social infrastructure.

To date, over 3,000 U.S. soldiers have died in the Iraq War, tens of thousands have come home severely wounded and traumatized, families have been shattered.  Untold numbers of Iraqis have died or have been wounded in the fighting, and they remain caught in the grip of terror, violence and economic desperation.

We need a better strategy in Iraq.  An escalation of  troops is not the answer.  Contact your members of Congress and urge them to oppose the President’s troop surge plan.  To send a fax or e-mail message to your members of Congress click www.UCCTakeAction.org/nomoretroops .

Today over 1,000 religious leaders from across the United States (including this blogging minister from Oregon) delivered a letter to Congress calling for an increase in the minimum wage.

Let Justice Roll reports:

Washington, DC -- Let Justice Roll, a nonpartisan coalition of ninety faith and community organizations, today sent a letter to members of Congress signed by more than 1,000 Christian, Jewish and Muslim faith leaders from across the country. Anticipating House debate on minimum wage this Wednesday, Jan. 10, faith leaders urge congressional support for The Fair Minimum Wage Act of 2007 (HR 2), which would increase the federal minimum wage to $7.25 from the $5.15 level set in 1997.

"As people of faith, we believe there is no better way to urgently address the poverty that afflicts so many low-wage working people and their families than by raising the minimum wage," said Rev. Dr. Paul Sherry, National Coordinator of Let Justice Roll and co-author of "A Just Minimum Wage: Good for Workers, Business and Our Future." Sherry added, "A job should keep you out of poverty, not keep you in it. That conviction is at the very heart of the faith we proclaim."

The Most Rev. Katharine Jefferts Schori, Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church, said, "We seek a just community for all people. We are a decade late in even beginning to raise the minimum wage toward a living wage. We call on Congress to remember the least among us, and raise the minimum wage without any further delay."

In December, the nation broke the record for the longest period in history -- more than nine years -- without a minimum wage raise, while Congress's ninth pay raise since 1997 is scheduled to take effect in February. Today, a full-time worker earning the federal minimum wage of $5.15 an hour makes an unconscionable $10,712 annually. Although worker productivity and corporate profits are both way up, the buying power of today's minimum wage is lower than it was in 1950.

As the faith leaders' letter states, "The strong victory on all the minimum wage ballot initiatives is evidence that there is strong and widespread support from Americans for a prompt, clean minimum wage increase at the federal level."

Click here to see the list of religious leaders who have endorsed the letter.

Better yet:  take action and call Congress on Tuesday, January 9th and tell your member to support The Fair Minimum Wage Act of 2007 (HR 2).  Click here for all the information you need to make that call. 

This Sunday (January 14, 2007) the people of Parkrose Community United Church of Christ will celebrate the life of The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. during morning worship at 10 am. All are welcome. The church is located at 4715 NE 106th Avenue in the Parkrose / NE area of Portland. E-mail the church or call 503-253-5457 for additional information.

Highland United Church of Christ will mark the official Martin Luther King, Jr. holiday on Monday (January 15th) with their sponsorship of the “22nd Annual Keep The Dream Alive Tribute.” The event starts at 11am and runs until 6pm. Invited guests include Oregon Governor Ted Kulongoski and Portland Mayor Tom Potter. Highland UCC recently relocated to accommodate their growing congregation. They can now be found at 7600 NE Glisan.

This morning at Parkrose Community United Church of Christ our scripture readings included Isaiah 43:1-7 and Luke 3:15-17, 21-22.  There is no podcast of the sermon available but my sermon notes are below.

This morning we celebrate the baptism of Jesus and in doing so we remember our own baptisms - one of the most important acts of the church and one of only two sacraments celebrated in the United Church of Christ.

The act of baptism - an act that Jesus himself underwent - is one that reminds us of what God already knows: that we are children of God, beloved by our creator, and that we are part of a larger family of people...the people of God.

What has always struck me about baptism are not the promises we make (or that our parents make on our behalf) but the promises that the congregation makes to the one about to be baptized.

These are some of the words that are spoken in our tradition:

We promise our love, support, and care.

AND

We promise you our continuing friendship and prayers
as we share the hopes and labors
of the church of Jesus Christ.
By the power of the Holy Spirit
may we continue to grow together
in God's knowledge and love
and be witness of our risen Savior.

What I hope that we always remember about baptism is that it is an act shared by the community and that the promises made by the congregation are as serious and as important as the vows made by the one being baptized. 

Think about this for a moment:  how many times have we all participated in a baptism, spoken the words that I just read where we make certain promises, and then never again spoken to the one baptized or inquired about their well-being?  Don't feel guilty if I'm describing something you have done.  Promoting guilt is not my aim.  What I hope we all feel instead of guilt is a new determination to reach out to all people in this church with the love and concern we feel for family because the people gathered here today in worship are our family.

There has always been a certain amount of controversy about the baptism of Jesus and what it meant. 

Barbara Brown Taylor, in her sermon The River of Life, has spoken on this. 

The Christian church has never been comfortable with the baptism of Jesus.  Compare the accounts of it in each of the fours gospels and you cannot miss the un-ease of the authors.  Matthew elaborates on Mark's story by adding that John tried to talk Jesus out of being baptized, and Luke will not even come out and say it was John who did it.  The fourth gospel is the most ticklish of all.  In it, John bears witness that he saw the Spirit descend like a dove upon Jesus, but he does not mention anything about a baptism at all.  Scholars say all this embarrassment is our surest proof Jesus really was baptized by John, because when someone tells you something that it is not in his best interest for you to know, then you can be reasonably sure he his telling you the truth.

The controversy exists because if Jesus was baptized and his sins were forgiven in the act (in the way that John the Baptist understood baptism) it would mean that Jesus, the divine and perfect one, might have had sins to be forgiven and it appears that this notion of Jesus, the one who was also human, was too much for some of the authors of the Gospels to bear.  So by the time we get to our account of Jesus baptism here in Luke it is unclear who baptized Jesus.  Was it John?  Did Jesus baptize himself?  Luke doesn't tell us.  But I suspect as well that John the Baptist was the one who baptized Jesus and that Jesus took his place among the other sinners who gathered around John. 

Again, Barbara Brown Taylor says:

Even if (Jesus) were innocent, even if his intentions were nothing but good, it was ruinous to his reputation.  Who was going to believe that he was there just because he cared about those people and refused to separate himself from them?  Gossip being what it was, who was not going to think that he had just a few teeny-weeny things to get off his conscience before he went into public ministry?

You see the problem.  We spend a lot of time in the Christian church talking about God's love for sinners, but we sure do go to a lot of trouble not to be mistaken for one of them.  Guilt by association and all that.  Only Jesus - our leader and our Lord - did not seem too concerned about that.  In him, God's being-with-us included God's being in the river with us, in the flesh with us, in the sorrow of repentance and the joy of new life with us.  So what if he did not have anything of his own to be sorry about?

The point to be made here is that we could be a more authentic Christian community if we opened our arms as easily to those labeled sinners as Jesus did.  And we'd be a more honest community if we more freely admitted that we are sinners too and that the line between "us and them" is a false one. 

In the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ), a denomination that in family terms would be the first cousin to the United Church of Christ, they practice adult baptism and for many reasons adult baptism makes sense to me.  Don't get me wrong - I'm not trying to diss infant baptism - but considering the complexities and the difficulty of the Christian faith...not to mention the promises we ask of those being baptized...I see the value in reserving the sacrament of baptism to those would are able to truly discern the meaning of the act about to be undertaken. 

My own daughters have not been baptized.  We instead brought Katherine and Frances to First Congregational United Church of Christ for a service of Thanksgiving for the birth of a child, a celebration that is similar to the act of baptism but instead of making promises of behalf of the twins we have left it up to them to make decisions at an older age.  I want them to be able to fully consider the costs associated with a Christian life.   

Now here is the question people always ask when I tell them this:  what happens if something terrible happens to the girls and they are not baptized? 

If I thought for a minute that God would reject anyone from the Kingdom of Heaven simply because they had not undergone a ceremony I'd renounce my ordination and my faith.  But I believe in a God whose love for creation is simply too deep for that kind of pettiness.  Want proof of God's expansive heart?  Think of the baptism story of Jesus again.  Remember that Jesus stood with the sinners and not apart from us.  That is the God that I follow.

Whatever you decide about baptism - infant or adult - (and there is no right or wrong answer here) the importance of the act is in the relationships it builds...between us and other faithful followers of Jesus and between us and God.  In baptism, we are reminded that our lives belong to God and with us God is well pleased.  Our obligation in this relationship is to reach out to everyone with the same love that God has shown through the life that Jesus led.  Each time that we baptize someone here in this church let the sacrament be a reminder to us of the responsibilities we have to one another and to God.   

Let us pray using words from the UCC Book of Worship:

O God, we praise you for calling us to faith and for gathering us into the church, he body of Christ. We thank you for your people gathered in this local church and rejoice that you have increased our community of faith.

Together may we live in the Spirit, building one another up in love, sharing in the life and worship of the church, and serving the world for the sake of Jesus Christ.

Amen. 

Painting: The Baptism of Christ, Jan van Scorel

Everywhere you go the talk is about the "surge" - a proposal under consideration by the White House to dramatically increase U.S. troops in Iraq to stem the tide of chaos (the "McCain doctrine" says John Edwards).  Our newly installed House and Senate leadership have appropriately condemned the proposal.   

But I reject out of hand any suggestion that American troops be hastily withdrawn.  Whether or not we like it - and I don't - we are in Iraq and we created the mess.  We have to do whatever we can and spend whatever it costs to help rebuild Iraqi society.  We cannot, as the U.S. did at the conclusion of the 1991 Iraq War, simply withdraw and allow the humanitarian crisis there to escalate.  Multinational troops will be needed in Iraq for many years to help with basic security.  Hopefully, other nations will contribute more if they see evidence the U.S. is willing to adjust policy. 

It was the height of political stupidity not to follow-up the invasion of Iraq with a Marshall-type plan for putting the nation back together.   

This fall the National Council of Churches USA released a pastoral letter calling for the withdrawal of U.S. troops but wisely linked any such move to the rebuilding of Iraq.

...we call upon the U.S. Government to recognize that the continued presence of occupying forces has not provided meaningful security for Iraqi citizens and only exacerbates escalating violence, and begin an immediate phased withdrawal of American and coalition forces from Iraq with a timetable that provides for an expeditious final troop withdrawal.  And we further call upon our government to link this withdrawal plan to benchmarks for rebuilding Iraqi society, since the reconstruction of infrastructure, the restoration of essential services, and a foundation for economic growth are necessary to nurture Iraqi hopes for a stable future, and to steps to meet the security concerns of all Iraqis, including the more vulnerable, smaller ethnic and religious communities. (Emphasis added)

We know what happens when powerful nations invade and then abandon countries where the economy and the infrastructure are destroyed.  Think Afghanistan post the Soviet Invasion.  Or dust off your old history books and remember how Hitler and the Nazis where able to turn Germany's humiliation and devastated economy into an opportunity to gain power. 

Progressives who fought to stop this war from ever happening (the good guys) need to start better articulating a vision for how to bring this war to a close without causing even more harm to the Iraqi people.  The letter from Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to President Bush never mentions rebuilding Iraq.  Our obligation to Iraq cannot simply end with the withdrawal of troops.

U.S. Congressman Virgil Goode, a Virginia Republican, recently attacked newly elected U.S. Congressman Keith Ellison for his decision to take the oath of office with his hand on the Quran.  Ellison is the first Muslim elected to the U.S. House of Representatives.  He is a Democrat from Minnesota. 

Goode wrote a letter to constituents in which he offered his view that the Bible is the only legitimate religious text for people in the United States and that without support for his hardline views on immigration Muslims will present a danger to the nation.  Ellison was born in the U.S. and traces his family history back generations.  The copy of the Quran that he used to take the oath once belonged to Thomas Jefferson. 

In response to Goode's comments, religious leaders have issued the following letter to Goode.  My name is on the list.  You are invited to sign as well and I hope you will.

As religious people from diverse traditions, we call upon Virginia Congressman Virgil Goode to re-examine his opposition to newly-elected Representative Keith Ellison, a Muslim, taking his unofficial oath of office using the Qur'an, and to apologize for his statement that, without punitive immigration reform, "there will be many more Muslims elected to office demanding the use of the Quran."

Mr. Goode insinuates that having more Muslims in the United States would be a danger to our country. As people of faith, we reject such ill-considered words.

An attack against one religion is an attack against them all. Next week, it could be Jews. Next month, it could be Christian fundamentalists or evangelicals. Right now, it is Muslims. It is they who feel targeted by repression and abuse, and they who live among us in a growing climate of fear.

Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel once implored us: "No religion is an island! We are all involved with one another. Spiritual betrayal on the part of one of us affects the faith of all of us."

We hold it to be self-evident that all Americans have the right to practice their faith, whatever it may be, and that any Americans - regardless of race, color or creed - may be elected and sworn into office holding whatever book they consider sacred.

We would point out that there are some five million Muslims in the US. Many have been here for generations. They are every bit as American as Rep. Goode. Some Americans have also converted to Islam, including Rep. Ellison. We call for a renewed unity among people of conscience and of faith.

We would further point out that just as it was appropriate for the late President Ford to be honored by a profoundly Christian memorial service, so it is equally appropriate for Rep. Ellison to be sworn into office, in a private ceremony, holding the book representing his deepest religious convictions.

Above all, we urge all Americans to stand up for religious freedom and to deplore the hurtful words of any public figure who would disparage a particular religion.

In a spirit of reconciliation and peace, we invite Rep. Goode to join with us in an inter-religious delegation to visit a mosque in his district, in order that the healing may begin.

Signed:

George Hunsinger
Princeton Theological Seminary

David A. Robinson, Executive Director
Pax Christi USA: National Catholic Peace Movement

Rev. Robert Edgar
National Council of Churches

Stephen Rockwell, Director
Institute for Progressive Christianity

Jeffrey Boldt
Wisconsin Christian Alliance for Progress

Katie Barge, Director of Communications
Faith in Public Life

Rev. Debra Hafner
Religious Institute on Sexual Morality, Justice, and Healing

Rev. Peter Laarman, Executive Director
Progressive Christians Uniting

Rev. Dr. Rick Schlosser, Executive Director
California Council of Churches

Rabbi Steven B. Jacobs
The Rabbi Steven B. Jacobs Progressive Faith Foundation

Elizabeth Sholes, Director of Public Policy
California Council of Churches

Rev. Rita Nakashima Brock, Ph.D.
Co-Director, Faith Voices for the Common Good

Jesse Lava, Co-founder and Executive Director
FaithfulDemocrats.com

Rev. Dr. Larry L. Greenfield, Executive Minister
American Baptist Churches of Metro Chicago

Rev. Cedric A. Harmon
Americans United for Separation of Church and State

Rev. Chuck Currie
Parkrose Community United Church of Christ, Portland, OR

Joseph C. Hough, Jr., President
Union Theological Seminary, New York

Mary E. Hunt, Ph.D., Co-director
Women's Alliance for Theology, Ethics and Ritual

Rev. Harry Knox, Director of Religion and Faith Program
Human Rights Campaign Foundation

Rabbi Rebecca Alpert, Chair
Department of Religion, Temple University

Vincent Isner, Executive Director
Faithful America

Rev. Timothy F. Simpson
Christian Alliance for Progress

This is a day for all our daughters.

Congratulations, Madam Speaker.

Related Post:  House Speaker Nancy Pelosi

Back when my dad was in television there were some really thoughtful and creative programs on the air with actors that stirred the imagination and caused us to really think about the human condition.  M*A*S*H comes to find.  Following in that tradition - a rare feat these days - is the surprise hit Battlestar Galactica staring Edward James Olmos.

"Commander William Adama" is in the news this week not for his award winning show but for his activism.  United Church News and the AP report:

Edward James Olmos, an Academy Award nominee for "Stand and Deliver" (1988), criticized the U.S. and Puerto Rican governments on Jan. 3 for not moving faster to clean up the site of a former bombing range on Puerto Rico's Vieques Island, according to the Associated Press.

Olmos said officials "have done nothing" to clean up the area tainted by dangerous pollutants nearly four years after the departure of the U.S. Navy. The actor wants to draw more public attention to the government's inaction. 

"We are not going to stop until we make them see that a (cleanup) is necessary," Olmos said at a news conference in San Juan. Born in East Los Angeles, Olmos has been involved in the Vieques campaign for many years. He was arrested for trespassing in 2001 in an attempt to stop the U.S. Navy's bombing exercises there.

The Navy, which withdrew from Vieques in May 2003 following three years of steady protests, including long-standing support form the UCC General Synod, has begun controlled detonations of unexploded bombs in sections of the 21-mile-long island and nearby waters, Associated Press reports.

This has sparked renewed protests by residents who say the explosions are causing more environmental damage on Vieques, some 6 miles off the southeastern coast of mainland Puerto Rico.

Click here for some background information. 

I've been a Deval Patrick fan since his days at the DOJ when as Clinton's point person on civil rights he was kind enough to consider my concerns about the voting rights of people who are homeless.  So this act, reported by United Church News editor J. Bennett Guess, doesn't surprise me:

When Massachusetts Governor-elect Deval Patrick takes the oath of office on Jan. 4, he will place his hand on a Bible given to John Quincy Adams by Africans held captive aboard the Amistad trade ship, according to Associated Press.

Patrick's inaugural committee reportedly borrowed the Bible from the Adams National Historic Park in Quincy. Patrick is African American.

The Amistad story is significant history within the United Church of Christ, since many black and white Congregationalists in New England formed the Amistad Support Committee that aided the illegally captured and traded Africans.

Adams, a Congregationalist and former U.S. President, argued on behalf of the Africans in front of the U.S. Supreme Court and secured their freedom in 1841. The Amistad Support Committee went on to continue its anti-racism work as the UCC-related American Missionary Association. That organization became part of the UCC's Justice and Witness Ministries in 2000.

In a related story, Keith Ellison, the first Muslim elected to Congress, will take his oath of office this week using a Quran. 

He decision has drawn fire from one crazed congressman who says that in America only the Bible should be used for government swearing-in ceremonies. 

Congressman-elect Ellison, who has been gracious about the flair-up, announced today that he would use a Quran once owned by Thomas Jefferson.  You can't get more patriotic than that.

Message from Jubilee USA Network

Click here to send your member of Congress a message about Jubilee 2007

In the late 1990s, a broad network of people of faith and conscience came together under the banner of Jubilee 2000, engaging their communities and challenging policy makers to address the international debt crisis.  This mobilization brought the issue of debt to the global stage, but it did not end the debt crisis.

In 2005, pressure from the Jubilee movement, together with the Global Call to Action Against Poverty, again pushed the issues of debt and global poverty onto the agenda of world leaders.  But once again, while significant steps were taken, the debt crisis was not ended.  The imperative to finish what was started remains: to lift the excruciating burden of debt that continues to siphon resources from impoverished countries that should be used for health care, education and clean water.

Inspired by the Jubilee vision of liberation and fullness of life for all, people of faith and conscience around the world are calling their political leaders to observe a Sabbath Year in 2007, seven years after Jubilee 2000.
 

The Sabbath Year: Rooted in Scripture
Seven years after the beginning of the new millennium, we live in a world that is seriously out of balance.  Every day, 13 percent of the world’s population goes hungry.  Every day, 30,000 children die of easily preventable diseases due to malnutrition and lack of adequate medical care.  The Jubilee vision that we find in scripture calls us to challenge this horrible reality.

In the Hebrew Scriptures we find a vision of life in community that is liberating and just, governed by Sabbath cycles -- the Sabbath Day, the Sabbath Year, and the Jubilee Year.  These cycles are a powerful reminder of God’s intent that all creatures enjoy fullness of life and partake in the abundance of God’s world.  The Sabbath Year is at the heart of Moses’ final instructions to the Hebrew people before they enter the Promised Land (Deuteronomy 15: 1-18).  Sabbath Year observance requires that every seven years debts are canceled and those enslaved because of debts are freed, restoring equal relations among community members and preventing a situation of ongoing exploitation in which the rich accumulate ever more wealth at the expense of the poor.

In the Gospel of Luke, Jesus declares a Jubilee or “year of the Lord’s favor” or the Jubilee year (Luke 4:18-19), proclaiming God’s liberation for all oppressed and impoverished people.  This jubilee vision was the cornerstone of Jesus’ ministry and gives us hope that life can be made new and can be redeemed in our own time.
 

Why A 2007 Sabbath Year?
The global gap between rich and poor continues to grow.  During the 2007 Sabbath Year the world will reach the half-way point to the Millenium Development Goals (MDGs), global commitments that would cut extreme poverty in half by 2015.  Despite these commitments, we are nowhere near meeting the goals.  In Sub Saharan Africa for example the percentage of people living in extreme poverty has increased steadily from 1990 until today.

Some of the money needed to meet the MDGs can be generated from aid, but new infusions of aid cannot be effective until the drain of debt payments is stopped.  Pouring more aid into impoverished countries without debt cancellation is like trying to fill a bathtub with the drain open.

In addition to its current impacts, the origins of the debt are unjust.  A large portion of debt is odious or illegitimate, accrued under oppressive regimes or on unfair terms.  During the Cold War era, loans were often made more for ideological and political reasons than for reasons of assisting development or addressing human needs.  In places such as apartheid South Africa, much of the money that was loaned was used to oppress the majority of the population.  As people of faith and conscience we must ask, “Why should the people of the South endlessly pay for bad loans that never benefited the people?”

In light of the jubilee message of salvation, redemption, deliverance and liberation, debt burdens that prevent countries from meeting the most basic needs of their people cease to be merely a financial concern for a few and become a spiritual concern for all of us. To advocate and educate for debt cancellation in solidarity with the people of the world’s impoverished countries is one way we can participate in God’s Jubilee.
 

The Year 2007: The Opportunity & The Call
2007 presents people of faith with many unique opportunities to raise a prophetic call for debt cancellation and economic justice:

• The World Social Forum will be held in Africa for the first time, serving as a platform for prophetic Jubilee campaigners from across the continent.
• We will reach the halfway point to the 2015 Millennium Development Goals.
• The G-8 summit will be held in Germany, the site of the initial Jubilee 2000 commitments.
• We will mark the 200th Anniversary of the end of the Atlantic Slave Trade by honoring the brave abolitionists who fought slavery as we build our own movements to abolish global poverty.

In 2007 we will use these opportunities to educate, organize and mobilize as we work for the jubilee vision of right relations between people and nations and an end to unjust debt and global poverty.

Our goal by the end of the 2007 Sabbath Year: A hearing in Congress on the JUBILEE Act, which would provide debt cancellation for many more nations that need it.

Take Action Today!
• Celebrate Jubilee Sunday in your Congregation. On January 21st congregations around the country will be launching the Sabbath Year with a Jubilee Sunday celebration. Special worship materials are available from Jubilee USA

• Become a Jubilee Congregation. Jubilee Congregations commit to work for a more economically just world by praying and acting for Jubilee justice. Contact Jubilee USA for worship and study resources and to find out how to enroll your congregation.

• Introduce a Resolution. Raise awareness and commitment within your synod or regional denominational assembly by introducing a resolution in support of debt cancellation for the world’s impoverished countries.  Draft resolutions are available for you to adapt.

• Support the Jubilee Act. Join people of faith and conscience around the United States by asking your Senators and Representative to support the Jubilee Act - a bill which calls for the cancellation of the debt of impoverished countries without harmful economic policy conditions attached.  More information is available from Jubilee USA.

• Come to Washington, D.C. Consider coming to Washington for Ecumenical Advocacy Days March 9-12th, or for a fall Jubilee event and lobby day (stay tuned for more details)

• Knowledge is power. Stay informed about the debt issue and upcoming opportunities for action through Jubilee USA’s monthly update email listserv. Join Our Listservs!

There will be many more opportunities for you or your congregation to take action for debt cancellation during the 2007 Sabbath Year.  For more information and helpful resources, please contact Jubilee USA’s Outreach and Congregations Coordinator Kristin Sundell at [email protected] or 202-546-4470.
 

The 2007 Sabbath Year: A Timeline of Events & Opportunities
January 2007
• Congregations celebrate Jubilee Sunday on January 21st.  The gospel reading will be Luke 4:14-21

March 2007
• Ecumenical Advocacy Days in Washington, DC will be held March 9-12th - come meet with your Members of Congress about the JUBILEE Act!

April 2007
• Jubilee USA’s second annual grassroots conference - location to be announced!

Spring/Summer 2007
• Official half-way point to the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).
• Sabbath Year resolutions introduced in denominational gatherings around the country (contact Jubilee USA for a draft resolution to adapt and introduce).
• G8 summit held in Germany (site of the Jubilee 2000 debt relief commitments) where people of faith and conscience are working to put global poverty and the need for cancellation of illegitimate debts on the summit agenda.

Fall 2007
• National rolling fast to call for a hearing on the JUBILEE Act.
• Annual meetings of the IMF and World Bank in Washington, DC.
• Fall event and lobby day organized by Jubilee USA.
• Jubilee launches its annual “Drop the Debt!” national speaking tour with partners from the Global South - consider inviting the speakers to your community!
• Hearing on the JUBILEE Act in the Financial Services Committee or a “people’s hearing” on Capitol Hill.

Slow news day, War of the Worlds? or have these guys just finally arrived?

What were the top stories concerning religion in 2006?  According to the good folks at the Religion Newswriters Association these were the top ten.