Church & State articles from October 2007

Church & State archives from October 2007

D.C. parochial schools may convert to charters.(IN THE CAPITAL)(Brief article)
October 1, 2007... The Catholic Archdiocese of Washington, D.C., has announced a proposal to turn eight of its parochial schools into secular charter schools funded by the local government. In September, Archbishop Donald W. Wuerl approached Washington Mayor...

Indiana drops chaplaincy for social services agency.(AROUND THE STATES)(Brief article)
October 1, 2007... Plagued by controversy, an Indiana program that would have provided chaplains to employees of the Family and Social Services Administration (FSSA) has been dumped. More than a year ago, the Rev. Michael Latham, a Fort Wayne Baptist...

Missouri public school loses Gideon bible battle.(AROUND THE STATES)(Brief article)
October 1, 2007... A federal appeals court has upheld an injunction prohibiting a Missouri public school board from allowing distribution of Bibles to fifth-grade students during class time. In late August, the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals rejected the...

'Faith-based' inmate program in Oklahoma disappoints.(AROUND THE STATES)(Brief article)
October 1, 2007... A "faith-based" inmate counseling program performed no better than secular programs, an Oklahoma state commission has reported. In September, the Oklahoma Sentencing Commission reviewed a study by the Criminal Justice Resource Center that...

Christian student club can't discriminate, says Appeals Court.(AROUND THE STATES)(Brief article)
October 1, 2007... A federal appeals court has tossed aside a student religious club's lawsuit against a Washington State public school district's anti-discrimination policy. In late August, a three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled...

Round rock rumble: Americans United lawsuit challenges 'majority-rules' prayer at Texas school district graduations.
October 1, 2007... When word started to circulate that high school seniors in Round Rock, Texas, would vote on whether to have prayers during the graduation ceremony, Lisa Jones' first reaction was surprise--and then anger. "I was really shocked," said Jones,...

Public schools under fire: religious right pressure groups target public school children for conversion using an array of new tactics.
October 1, 2007... In mid-August, Texas Gov. Rick Perry signed something called the "Religious Viewpoints Antidiscrimination Act" into law. Although the new law has an innocuous-sounding title, it's really a ticking time-bomb, opponents say. The law requires...

Voucher showdown in Utah: public school supporters, civil liberties activists urge Utahns to vote 'no' on Referendum 1.
October 1, 2007... When the Utah legislature enacted the nation's first statewide private school voucher bill earlier this year, Parents for Choice in Education (PCE) hailed the measure's passage. "This law gives all families--particularly those in the middle...

New church-state poll reveals some troubling results--and challenges.(EDITORIAL)
October 1, 2007... A recent poll on Americans' view on the First Amendment contains plenty of food for thought. Like most polls on religious liberty and church-state separation, this one, conducted by the First Amendment Center, contains some news that is...

Dobson attacks AU after IRS probe into FOF politicking.(PEOPLE & EVENTS)(James C. Dobson, Americans United for Separation of Church and State, Internal Revenue Service, Focus on the Family)
October 1, 2007... Focus on the Family (FOF) founder James C. Dobson on Sept. 10 announced that his organization has been cleared by the Internal Revenue Service of allegations of unlawful partisan politicking and then launched into an attack oil Americans United...

Political Pastor Drake goes silent after advice from lawyers.(PEOPLE & EVENTS)(Rev. Wiley Drake of the First Southern Baptist Church )
October 1, 2007... A Religious Right pastor who called on followers to pray for the demise of Americans United for Separation of Church and State and its employees has stopped talking to the media. The Rev. Wiley Drake of the First Southern Baptist Church of...

Senate prayer protestors barred from returning to Capitol grounds.(PEOPLE & EVENTS)
October 1, 2007... Three fundamentalist Christians who disrupted a prayer by a Hindu religious leader in the U.S. Senate July 12 have been barred from the U.S. Capitol for one year. At a hearing Sept. 11 before Washington, D.C., Superior Court Judge Robert...

Bush apologizes to Wiccan war widow for meeting snub.(PEOPLE & EVENTS)(George W. Bush )
October 1, 2007... President George W. Bush has apologized to a Wiccan widow who was excluded from a meeting he held with the families of deceased veterans. While traveling in Nevada in August, Bush met with the families of several soldiers who have died in...

Florida TV preacher D. James Kennedy leaves theocratic legacy.(PEOPLE & EVENTS)(Obituary)
October 1, 2007... Florida-based TV preacher D. James Kennedy, a persistent advocate of the Religious Right's "Christian America" view, died Sept. 5 at age 76. Kennedy, whose Coral Ridge Ministries is based in Fort Lauderdale, suffered cardiac arrest on Dec....

Southern Baptists seek laws making 'will of Christ' supreme.(PEOPLE & EVENTS)
October 1, 2007... The Southern Baptist Convention (SBC), the nation's largest Protestant denomination whose leadership is a bulwark of far-right fundamentalism, is ratcheting up its political operations. The Christian Index, Georgia's state Baptist...

'Left Behind' video game won't go to U.S. troops in Iraq after protests.(PEOPLE & EVENTS)
October 1, 2007... An evangelical Christian group's plan to distribute a controversial video game to U.S. troops in Iraq has been scrapped after protests. A Dallas-based group called Operation Straight Up (OSU) planned to include copies of "Left Behind:...

Jonathan Falwell urges Virginia pastors to get political this November.(PEOPLE & EVENTS)
October 1, 2007... Jonathan Falwell, son of the late TV preacher Jerry Falwell, is picking up right where his father left off: He's urging pastors in Virginia to make sure that Religious Right allies are elected to the General Assembly next month. Virginia...

Members of the Arlington Group.(In other news about religion and politics)(Brief article)
October 1, 2007... * Members of the Arlington Group, a collection of Religious Right organizations that meet regularly to plot strategy, are screening Republican presidential candidates. Gary Bauer, a longtime Religious Right activist who helps lead the...

Fact, not fantasy: the real story of the Supreme Court's school prayer rulings.(BOOKS & IDEAS)(Book review)
October 1, 2007... Religious Right groups have spent years building up a mythology about prayer in public schools. Their story goes something like this: All of the schools sponsored daily prayer, and no one complained. Then, Madalyn Murray O'Hair, a noted...

Connecticut voters oppose mixing religion and politics.(AROUND THE STATES)(Brief article)
October 1, 2007... Religious talk on the presidential campaign trail may be popular in some parts of the nation, but Connecticut apparently isn't part of that landscape. A poll conducted by the Center for Survey Research and Analysis at the University of...

Jesus icon survives court battle in Louisiana.(AROUND THE STATES)(Brief article)
October 1, 2007... A federal judge has refused to order the removal of a devotional portrait of Jesus from a Louisiana city court after officials surrounded it with other pictures and documents. In early September, U.S. District Court Judge Ivan L.R. Lemelle...

Texas high court overturns state seminary regulations.(AROUND THE STATES)(Brief article)
October 1, 2007... Texas's top court has struck down a law that allowed government regulation of seminaries. HEB Ministries, the Hispanic Bible Institute and the Southern Bible Institute had sued the state, challenging on First Amendment grounds a law...

Turkey appoints president with Islamic political ties.(AROUND THE WORLD)
October 1, 2007... After months of legal and public wrangling, Abdullah Gul, a devout Muslim and former member of an Islamist political party, has been appointed president of Turkey. In late August, the Turkish Parliament voted overwhelmingly in favor of...

Pluralism, politics and God: protecting freedom while avoiding harm.(PERSPECTIVE)
October 1, 2007... After my freshman year in college, I took a memorable bus trip from Bethlehem, Pa., to Montreal to visit the 1967 World's Fair. A friend and I stayed in a motel that seemed to be constructed out of wood only slightly stronger than corrugated...