For the week of August 22, 2002
Cooperative Program
Southern Baptist Cooperative Program gifts totaled $13.5 million
last month, an increase of $716,548 (5.6 percent) from the previous July. With
just two months remaining in the conventions fiscal year, overall gifts
total $151.9 million, an increase of $5.9 million (4.1 percent) from the same
time last year. The total also stands more than $3.3 million (2.3 percent) ahead
of budget at this time. Meanwhile, designated gifts totaled almost $5.4 million
last month, a decrease of $2.2 million (29.7 percent) from the previous July.
For the year, designated gifts total $163 million, an increase of $1.9 million
(1.2 percent) from the same time last year.
Peru casualty
A budget battle between U.S. Congress and the Department of
State has its first casualty – the cash settlement earmarked for the family
of missionary Veronica Bowers and her infant daughter. Bowers and her daughter
were killed in June 2001 when a Peruvian air force jet shot down their missionary
airplane after it was misidentified as a potential drug-smuggling flight by
a CIA-operated surveillance plane. In the months after the attack, the State
Department refused to meet with the Bowers family to discuss an apology or a
settlement. After congressional intervention this year, the parties worked out
an $8 million settlement agreement for surviving family members and the pilot
of the missionary plane. However, the State Department apparently continues
to drag its feet on the payment, even though Congress has ordered it to make
the payment from its 2002 budget. However, the State Department says it does
not have the needed funds. “The State Department is doing everything it
can to delay the payment,” Rep. Pete Hoekstra, R-Mich., said. “I personally
think its an embarrassment for this government. Its a real shame.
Its been 15 months since they were killed.”
Partial-birth abortion
The U.S. House of Representatives once again has passed a measure
to ban partial-birth abortion, a procedure in which a late-term baby is almost
fully delivered, then aborted. The measure is a new version of a ban struck
down two years ago by the Supreme Court and was approved by a 274-151 vote.
President George Bush has promised to sign the bill into law – if it manages
to pass the Senate. At this point, Democratic Senate leaders have appeared noncommittal
on the issue. The House and Senate twice have passed a ban on the procedure,
but President Bill Clinton vetoed the measures in 1996 and 1997. Meanwhile,
in 2000, the U.S. Supreme Court struck down a state law patterned after the
federal ban. The new House measure seeks to address concerns raised by the court.
Same-sex marriages
The Georgia Supreme Court has affirmed a lower-court ruling
that a Vermont civil union is not the equivalent of marriage in Georgia. The
unanimous decision ends the nations first test case of the Vermont civil
union law, which was passed on behalf of homosexual couples. Observers had expressed
fears that other states could be forced to recognize such civil unions. The
federal government and many states have passed measures to guard against such
a development – but the legislation awaited court testing. In Georgia,
the test came when a lesbian sought recognition of her Vermont “civil union”
for the purposes of child visitation rights. However, the courts noted that
Georgia is not bound to recognize Vermont unions and that Georgia law prohibits
marriages between persons of the same sex.
Homosexual chaplains
The countrys only predominantly gay denomination has
been approved to supply chaplains for the Veterans Administration for
use in hospitals and other facilities. A leader of the Universal Fellowship
of Metropolitan Community Churches hailed the decision as “yet another
positive step toward full equality for Americas gay and lesbian citizens.”
The VAs National Chaplain Center currently accepts chaplains from about
225 registered religious groups, most of whom are also recognized by the armed
forces. Metropolitan Community Churches officials say they now plan to apply
to provide chaplains to the military.
Television time
Children who have televisions in their bedrooms watch them
five-and-a-half hours more per week, a National Institute on Media and the Family
study shows. “What the research shows is that kids who watch more television
… play less with friends,” said Douglas Gentile, co-author of the study.
“They are more likely to become obese, they do less well in school and
they are more likely to be aggressive and violent as adults.”
Dispute about trustees
Leaders of the Georgia Baptist Convention and Shorter College
are at odds about who controls the selection of trustees at the small liberal-arts
college in Rome, Ga. College trustees recently adopted a bylaw change, requiring
all future trustees to be approved by the current board prior to election by
convention messengers. Convention leaders say that is unacceptable. A total
of $9.3 million in Georgia Baptist funds budgeted for the college already are
in escrow, held since January, when convention leaders learned trustees had
quietly shifted control of the college to a self-perpetuating board. Trustees
reversed that decision and agreed to dialogue with convention leaders. However,
those talks stalled, leading to the latest action. College officials said the
step was taken to prevent accreditation problems. Convention officials charge
the move represents a desire by some to separate the college from the denomination.
Mission concerns
Japan Baptist Convention leaders have expressed fears related
to the recent request by the Southern Baptist Convention International Mission
Board for all its missionaries to affirm the Baptist Faith and Message statement.
Leaders voiced concern with the Baptist Faith and Message articles limiting
pastoral roles to men and calling for wives to submit to husbands. In Japan,
one pastor in every 10 is a woman, raising the prospect that requiring missionaries
to sign the statement might jeopardize future cooperation. Japanese leaders
also expressed fears that the submission article could lead to sexual discrimination
in their male-dominated culture. After Japanese leaders voiced their concerns
earlier this summer, then-SBC President James Merritt responded with a defense
of the Baptist Faith and Message statement. Scripture is plain on both issues
of concern, he said. “We do not as a convention desire to be exclusive
except where Scripture is exclusive,” Merritt said. “We do not desire
to be narrow except where Scripture is narrow, but I must tell you forthrightly
the Southern Baptist Convention will stand unequivocally on the truth of Gods
Word, and all other relationships will have to be second to that.”
Did you know?
In a recent poll, 9 percent of American adults said it is morally acceptable
for married persons to have affairs, while 87 percent denounced the idea as
morally wrong.