Secretary General Warns of Possible Global Religious Warfare

Opening the 61st session of the United Nations General Assembly on Tuesday, Secretary General Kofi Annan, in one paragraph of his speech (full text), warned of the potential of international religious warfare:

[A]t the very time when international migration has brought millions of people of different creed or culture to live as fellow-citizens, the misconceptions and stereotypes underlying the idea of a "clash of civilizations" have come to be more and more widely shared; and insensitivity towards other people's beliefs or sacred symbols -- intentional or otherwise -- is seized upon by those who seem eager to foment a new war of religion, this time on a global scale.

DPA reported Tuesday on this aspect of Annan's remarks.

Indonesia Court Dismisses Blasphemy Case From Muhammad Cartoons

A court in South Jakarta, Indonesia Wednesday dismissed a blasphemy case that had been brought against the editor of Rakyat Merdeka newspaper online for publishing controversial cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad last year. Yesterday's Washington Post reported that the charges were thrown out because the law used by the prosecutor required a showing of disrespect for Islam. The judge found that the paper used the cartoons merely as background for a news story. (See prior posting.)

School Appeals Gideon Bible Distribution Ban

Agape Press reported yesterday that an appeal was filed in the U.S. Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals last week by Missouri's South Iron R-1 School District. It seeks reversal of a trial court decision earlier this month that enjoined the school from permitting the distribution of Gideon Bibles on school property to elementary school students. The school district is being represented by Liberty Lobby, whose Chief Counsel, Erik W. Stanley, said that the lower court was treating the Bible as "a radioactive device that harms children when they are exposed to it".

College Can Require Instructors To Avoid Irrelevant Religious Discussion In Class

Yesterday, the U.S. Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals rejected claims brought by a part-time instructor of cosmetology at a public community college that the school's failure to re-hire her violated her constitutional rights, including her right to discuss her religious beliefs. In Piggee v. Carl Sandburg College, (7th Cir., Sept. 19, 2006), instructor Martha Piggee, upon discovering that one of her cosmetology students was gay, placed two pamphlets in the student's smock during clinical instruction time. She pressed the student to discuss the pamphlets with her. The materials that Piggee had given to student Jason Ruel were virulent religious denunciations of homosexuality in comic book format. When Ruel complained to college officials, they investigated and concluded that Piggee's conduct constituted sexual harassment. They found that "Piggee has been proselytizing in the hopes of changing Mr. Ruel's sexual orientation and religious beliefs." It appears that Piggee had given religious pamphlets to other of her students as well.

The court concluded that: " the college had an interest in ensuring that its instructors stay on message while they were supervising the beauty clinic, just as it had an interest in ensuring that the instructors do the same while in the classroom.... [W]e see no reason why a college or university cannot direct its instructors to keep personal discussions about sexual orientation or religion out of a cosmetology class or clinic." [Thanks to How Appealing for the lead.]

Chicago's Jewish Aldermen Urged On Religious Grounds To Keep Foie Gras Ban

In April, Chicago's City Council, concerned about animal cruelty issues, voted 48-1 to ban the sale of foie gras in Chicago. The Illinois Restaurant Association and a coalition of chefs have filed suit to overturn the ban, and some politicians, including the Mayor, are now pushing for repeal. The Chicago Sun-Times yesterday reported that two Jewish Aldermen have been urged on religious grounds to oppose the ban's repeal. Rabbi Asher Lopatin wrote Aldermen Burton F. Natarus and Bernard Stone, saying: "Beyond the Kosher dietary laws, God has told us to do what is 'good and proper in the eyes of God'. The cruelty inflicted on animals in the production of foie gras is unspeakable. It is undeniably disgusting in the eyes of God and in the eyes of any civilized person." And Jana Kohl, former director of the Simon Wiesenthal Center for Holocaust Studies, wrote the same two Aldermen: "As the only two Jewish members of the Council, it's particularly shameful and disgraceful of you to turn your back on our cherished concept of 'tikun olam,' namely our obligation to make our world a better, more compassionate place."

Lawyers Say Shared-Use By YMCA, School, Not A Church-State Problem

The Northland Pines School District in Wisconsin is proposing to lease land to the YMCA that would permit it to build a facility onto a new high school that is being constructed. Students would have free use of the YMCA athletic facilities during the school day. The Vilas County (WI) News-Review reported yesterday that a law firm engaged by the school board concluded that the agreement does not create church-state problems. The law firm of Davis & Kuelthau S.C., said that the YMCA is unlikely to be found to be a religious organization, despite the fact that it was originally founded on Christian principles. Moreover, it concluded, the purpose of the shared-use agreement between the school and the YMCA is purely secular, and it will not have the primary effect of promoting or advancing religion. Nevertheless, the Freedom From Religion Foundation has written to the school board, expressing concern that the shared-use agreement does not explicitly prohibit religious slogans or imagery in the YMCA building.

Congress Will Award Medal To Dalai Lama

Last week Congress passed,and sent to the President S. 2784, The Fourteenth Dalai Lama Congressional Gold Medal Act. It calls for the award of a special gold medal by Congress to the Dalai Lama in recognition of his contributions to peace, non-violence, human rights, and religious understanding.

Texas State School Board Limited In Reviewing Textbook Content

On September 18, Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott issued Opinion No. GA-0456, holding that the State Board of Education may screen textbooks for factual errors, but may not go beyond the powers granted to it by statute in judging textbook content on controversial issues such as evolution, birth control and global warming. In holding this, Abbott reaffirmed a 1996 Attorney General's opinion. However, Abbott overruled one part of the earlier opinion and held that the State Board of Education has similar authority over ancillary materials like teacher manuals, charts and workbooks. Yesterday's Dallas Morning News reported on the AG Opinion. (See prior related posting.)

Conditions Of Parole At Faith-Based Shelter Challenged

Yesterday's Charleston Gazette reports that the ACLU of West Virginia has filed suit on behalf of William Stanley, challenging the conditions of his parole from prison. (ACLU Press Release.)Upon being granted parole, Stanley was not allowed to move, as planned, to his fiancee's home because of West Virginia's statutory prohibition on cohabitation. The state also rejected Stanley's proposal to live with his brother, because victims of his forgery crime lived nearby. After four months, Stanley arranged to be paroled to the Union Mission, a faith-based nonprofit homeless shelter. However, a condition of living at Union Mission was his participation in a program requiring daily prayer, religious classes and attendance at an approved church. The lawsuit claims that the government unconstitutionally participated in forcing religious practices on Stanley. The suit also challenges West Virginia's anti-cohabitation law.

Election Day Sukkot Holiday Poses Problem In Belgium

In Belgium, thousands of Orthodox Jews face a problem as the country's October 8 elections approach. Election day coincides with one of the days of the Jewish festival of Sukkot. The halachic ban on writing or using electrical equipment on the holiday will make it impossible for observant Jews to vote. Authorities have rejected a request from the country's Forum of Jewish Organizations to permit early voting on Friday, October 6. Voting is mandatory in Belgium. Individuals who do not go to the polls can face a fine, unless they have an authorized exemption. However there are no provisions for religious exemptions. Reporting on the issue, Vrtnieuws says that the only option is for Belgian Jews to vote by proxy. [Thanks to Steven H. Sholk for the information.]

New EEOC Commissioner Named

Last week, the White House announced that the President intends to nominate David Palmer to be a Commissioner of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, for the remainder of a five year term expiring in 2011. Palmer is currently Chief of the Employment Litigation Section of the Department of Justice Civil Rights Division. The EEOC enforces federal laws that ban employment discrimination on various grounds, including religion.

Church Involvement In Political Campaigns Decried

The issue of involvement by churches in political campaigns continues to attract attention. American Atheists yesterday issued a Press Release criticizing Tennessee Democratic candidate for the U.S. Senate, Harold Ford, Jr., for filming an ad in a Baptist Church. It said that using the church as a backdrop "sends a 'divisive' message and is 'religionizing' important public policy issues."

Meanwhile, Americans United For Separation of Church and State announced a national campaign to alert churches to the requirements of the federal tax law that prohibit them from taking sides in partisan political campaigns. The letter was sent to 117,000 churches in eleven states, in reaction to efforts by those on the religious right to mobilize churches on behalf of conservative Republican candidates. In a news conference yesterday, AU executive director, Rev. Barry W. Lynn, particularly criticized the political efforts of Dr. James Dobson's organization, Focus on the Family.

Virginia Senator Reacts Angrily To Suggestion Of Jewish Roots

The Washington Post reports on an unusual exchange between a reporter and Republican U.S. Senator George Allen in a debate yesterday between Allen and his challenger in the November election, Democrat Jim Webb. Last week, the Forward (a Jewish newspaper) reported that Senator Allen, a practicing Presbyterian, has Jewish roots. It said his Tunisian-born mother comes from a Sephardic Jewish family. In yesterday's debate, according to the Post, when a reporter asked Allen about this:

Allen recoiled as if he had been struck. His supporters in the audience booed and hissed. "To be getting into what religion my mother is, I don't think is relevant," Allen said, furiously. "Why is that relevant -- my religion, Jim's religion or the religious beliefs of anyone out there?"

Allen also lectured the reporter about the importance of "not making aspersions about people because of their religious beliefs." In the past, Allen has denied that his mother was Jewish, but has said that his grandfather was incarcerated by the Nazis in World War II.

UPDATE: The New York Times reports that on Tuesday, Sen. Allen issued a statement confirming his Jewish ancestry, saying "I embrace and take great pride in every aspect of my diverse heritage..."

Judge Reprimanded For Ordering Probationer To Church

The Florida Supreme Court yesterday reprimanded state Circuit Judge Richard Albritton Jr. for 14 ethics violations, including ordering a probationer to go to church, even though Albritton knew that the order was unconstitutional. The Associated Press reports that the reprimand was agreed to by Albritton after it became clear that he would be running unopposed for re-election in November.

Suit To Challenge Arizona Tax Credit For Tuition Grant Contributions

The Arizona School Boards Association and the ACLU of Arizona plan to file a lawsuit today challenging S.B. 1499, Arizona's new tax credit for corporate contributions to groups that award private school scholarships to low-income students. (See prior posting.) According to the Associated Press, critics are concerned that the tax credits will divert funds from public schools. The court challenge will apparently focus on whether the tax credits violate state constitutional provisions prohibiting public funding for religious schools and requiring that the state provide a general and uniform public school system. In 1999, in Kotterman v. Killian, the Arizona Supreme Court upheld a similar tax credit for contributions by individuals. A federal constitutional challenge to the individual tax credit is currently before the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals.

India's Supreme Court Stays Ban On Haj Subsidy

On Monday, according to The Hindu, the Supreme Court of India stayed a temporary restraining order that had been issued in August by the Allahabad High Court in Uttar Pradesh prohibiting the state's government from granting subsidies to Haj pilgrims. The Supreme Court emphasized that because the Haj was underway, it would be too disruptive to stop subsidies for this year. Reducing the number of Indian Muslims attending would adversely affect the number of places Indians could obtain for the Haj in the future. However the Supreme Court expressed concern that a subsidy was being given only to pilgrims of one faith and ordered the Allahabad High Court to decide the challenge to Haj subsidies on the merits before next year's Haj. (See prior posting.)

Supreme Court To Screen Cert Petitions Next Week

Next Monday, the justices of the U.S. Supreme Court will meet to screen over one thousand petitions for certiorari that have been filed. Constitutionally Correct last week posted a listing of pending cert. petitions in areas of interest to the Alliance Defense Fund, including free exercise and establishment clause cases.

DA Under Investigation For Legal and Spiritual Advice To Prisoner

A Tennessee District Attorney, Bill Gibson, is under investigation by the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation and the state Supreme Court's Board of Professional Responsibility because of a deeply religious two-year exchange of letters with a murderer he helped prosecute. Today's Tennessean reports that in the letters Gibson offered convicted murderer Christopher Adams both legal and spiritual advice. Gibson argued to the state Supreme Court's Board of Professional Responsibility that prosecutors are "referred to in the case law as 'ministers of justice,' with a higher responsibility than merely seeking criminal convictions."

California Church May Resist IRS Summons

Last year it was announced that the Internal Revenue Service was investigating All Saints Episcopal Church in Pasadena, California, over whether an antiwar sermon, delivered two days before the 2004 presidential election, by guest speaker Rev. George F. Regas went beyond permissible bounds for a tax-exempt organization. Last Friday, according to the Los Angeles Times, the IRS issued a summons to the church demanding that it produce extensive information regarding Rev. Regas' appearance at the church, church policies regarding guest preachers, as well as all written and oral communications from or distributed at the church in 2004 that identify candidates for public office (other than mention of individuals in traditional prayers). The formal summons was a reformulation of broader requests that had been in an earlier letter from the IRS, to which the Church had objected.

The Church has issued a Release regarding the summons and another one that ordered the church's rector, Rev. Ed Bacon, to appear before the IRS in October. In a sermon yesterday to an overflow congregation, Bacon said: "Our faith mandates that always stopping short of endorsing or opposing political candidates, the church can neither be silent nor indifferent when there are public policies causing detriment to the least of these." Bacon said that he would consult with attorneys, but that he felt most congregants wanted to resist the summons. (See prior posting.) [Thanks to Steven H. Sholk for the lead.]

Orthodox Jews Gain Majority On Long Island School Board

Saturday's New York Times carried an interesting piece on the new majority of Orthodox Jews on the Lawrence, New York school board. Lawrence is in Nassau County on Long Island. Orthodox Jews there largely send their children to Jewish day schools instead of public schools, and many in Lawrence resent control of the school board by those who do not use its institutions. Public school enrollment in Lawrence is down, while private school enrollment has increased. In each of the last four years, mobilization by Orthodox Jewish voters has defeated the school budget. Orthodox leaders say they want to improve the schools while cutting waste, and many would also like to find a way to channel more aid to Jewish private schools in the district.