FaithWorld

U.S. judge orders ban on circumcision off ballot

A California judge ordered a proposal to ban circumcisions of boys in San Francisco removed  from an upcoming municipal ballot, saying it would infringe on religious freedom.

But Superior Court Judge Loretta Giorgi, in finalizing a tentative decision reached on Wednesday, said she technically barred the measure on grounds that state laws disallow voter initiatives governing medical practices.

The law “leaves no room for localities to legislate in this area,” the judge wrote in her formal opinion.

Al Shabaab recruited dozens of Americans: U.S. report

An al Qaeda-affiliated group in Somalia, al Shabaab, has recruited more than 40 Muslim Americans to its battle in the war-ravaged country and at least 15 have been killed, a congressional report said on Wednesday.

U.S. officials have become increasingly worried about the group, particularly after capturing an al Shabaab commander who had allegedly been a liaison with al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, an active Yemeni group that has tried to strike the United States.

So far, al Shabaab has conducted only limited attacks outside of Somalia, notably the twin bombings in Uganda that killed 79 people watching the World Cup final last year. The group has waged a long, violent battle to control Somalia.

Republican Peter King of New York, chairman of the House of Representatives Homeland Security Committee, has been holding a series of hearings to probe concerns about Muslim Americans becoming radicalized and joining militant groups.

China criticizes Vatican for excommunicating bishops

China said on Monday the Vatican’s recent excommunication of two Chinese bishops who were ordained without papal approval was “unreasonable” and “rude,” in a sign of escalating tensions between the Vatican and Beijing.

In the government’s first response to the Vatican’s recent denunciations of the ordinations by China’s state-sanctioned Catholic church, the State Bureau of Religious Affairs said it was “greatly concerned” about the excommunication of Joseph Huang Bingzhang and Lei Shiyin.

The “threats of excommunication” are “extremely unreasonable and rude, which has severely hurt the feelings of Chinese Catholics and made its members feel sad,” state news agency Xinhua quoted a spokesman for the bureau as saying.

Huang was ordained without papal approval as bishop in Shantou City in southern Guangdong province in mid-July, and Lei was named as bishop of the city of Leshan on June 29.

Iran-born writer “kills” ayatollah in novel

GIJON, Spain – Nairi Nahapetian gets her own back on the Iranian regime which forced her into exile by writing a novel about the murder of a powerful religious leader.

Nahapetian returned to Iran as a journalist in 2005 but says that she had to turn to fiction to fully describe the complexities of the homeland she fled when she was nine.

“Thanks to fiction I can, for example, kill an ayatollah, which is something you cannot do in real life,” Nahapetian said at the “Semana Negra” crime-writing festival, attended by a million people every year in Gijon, northern Spain.

In “Qui a tue l’Ayatollah Kanuni” (Who killed Ayatollah Kanuni), Narek, an exiled journalist who returns to Iran, is in the wrong place at the wrong time when a religious leader is found dead. 

Russia’s Muslim Chechnya to ban energy drinks

Russia’s Muslim Chechnya region is planning to ban the sale of non-alcoholic energy drinks such as Red Bull to under 18s, saying they are un-Islamic and dangerous, health officials said.

The ban would be the latest restriction from authorities in Chechnya, where shops can only sell alcohol during a small morning time frame, eateries are shut during the Ramadan fasting month and women must wear headscarves in state buildings.

“Energy drinks are comparable to beer,” the deputy minister of health in Chechnya, Rukman Bartiyev, told Reuters, adding that they were harmful to health.

The proposed ban was met with praise from the more conservative sectors of society, but angered ordinary Chechens who are growing increasingly frustrated at laws that only apply to Chechnya and sometimes contradict the Russian constitution.

Malaysia sets up Vatican ties in gesture to Christian minority

Malaysia and the Vatican agreed on Monday to establish diplomatic ties, a move seen by analysts as a bid by the Malaysian government to appease minority Christians in the mainly Muslim Southeast Asian country. Prime Minister Najib Razak is trying to mend the government’s relations with Christians who make up about 9 percent of the country’s 28 million after a rise in religious tensions ahead of general elections widely expected next year.

Religious tensions have risen in Malaysia following general elections in 2008 when the government recorded its worst performance after mainly Chinese and Indian non-Muslim minorities abandoned Najib’s ruling coalition, complaining of marginalization.

Unhappiness among the Christian minority has since been deepened by an ongoing row over the use of the word “Allah” by Christians to describe God, which led to attacks on houses of worship including several churches last year. “This will be seen as an effort towards reconciliation with Malaysia’s Christian community but will only work to ease the unhappiness of some… because some of the issues have yet to be resolved,” said James Chin, political analyst at Monash University campus in Kuala Lumpur.

Najib has tried to ease the anger by reaching out to Christian groups by providing assurances on their right to practice their religion. But some in his United Malay National Organization or UMNO, the linchpin of the ruling coalition, have cast this approach aside in a bid to woo Malay Muslims, a key vote bank who make up 55 percent of the country’s population. Malaysia’s general election is not due until mid-2013 but many expect Najib to call one as early as next year to profit from continued economic growth in the country.

Vatican excommunicates pro-govt Chinese Catholic bishop, criticizes Beijing

A Chinese bishop ordained without papal approval has been excommunicated from the Catholic Church, the Vatican has said, bringing relations between the Vatican and Beijing to a new low. In a statement branding Thursday’s ordination illegitimate, the Vatican said Pope Benedict “deplores” the way communist authorities are treating Chinese Catholics who want to remain faithful to Rome instead of to the state-backed Church.

China’s state-sanctioned Catholic Church ordained Joseph Huang Bingzhang as bishop in Shantou city in southern Guangdong province on Thursday despite warnings he would not be recognized because the city has a Vatican-approved bishop.

“Consequently, the Holy See does not recognize him … and he lacks authority to govern the Catholic community of diocese,” the Vatican said on Saturday.

Chinese Catholics, believed to number between 8 million and 12 million, are divided between those who are members of the Church backed by the Communist Party and those loyal to the pope.

Obama meets Dalai Lama at White House, China sees U.S. interference

China accused the United States on Sunday of “grossly” interfering in its internal affairs and seriously damaging relations after President Barack Obama met exiled Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama at the White House. Obama met the Nobel Prize laureate for 45 minutes, praising him for embracing non-violence while reiterating that the United States did not support independence for Tibet.

China, which accuses the Dalai Lama of being a separatist who supports the use of violence to set up an independent Tibet, reacted swiftly, saying Obama’s meeting had had a “baneful” impact, and summoning a senior U.S. diplomat in Beijing.

“This action is a gross interference in China’s internal affairs, hurts the feelings of the Chinese people and damages Sino-U.S. relations,” Foreign Ministry spokesman Ma Zhaoxu said in a statement released in the early hours of Sunday. “The Dalai Lama has for a long time used the banner of religion to engage in anti-China splittist activities,” he added.

Obama stressed the “importance he attaches to building a U.S.-China cooperative partnership,” the White House said. “The president reiterated his strong support for the preservation of the unique religious, cultural and linguistic traditions of Tibet and the Tibetan people throughout the world,” spokesman Jay Carney said after the meeting. “He underscored the importance of the protection of human rights of Tibetans in China. The president commended the Dalai Lama’s commitment to nonviolence and dialogue with China.”

Hillary Clinton seeks to smooth Islamic defamation row with OIC

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton agreed with a major global Islamic organization on Friday to pursue new ways of resolving debates over religion without resorting to legal steps against defamation. Clinton met Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu, the head of the 57-nation Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC), in Istanbul to help set up new international mechanisms both protect free speech and combat religious discrimination around the world.

“Together we have begun to overcome the false divide that pits religious sensitivities against freedom of religion. We are pursuing a new approach based on concrete steps to fight intolerance wherever it occurs,” Clinton said.

Under heavy U.S. pressure, the OIC agreed in March to set aside its 12-year campaign to have religions protected from defamation, a step which allowed the U.N. Human Rights Council to approve a broader plan on religious tolerance. Western countries and their Latin American allies, strong opponents of the defamation concept, joined Muslim and African states in backing without vote the new approach that switches focus from protecting beliefs to protecting believers.

Ihsanoglu underscored that the OIC’s aim was not to limit free expression, but to combat religious intolerance which he said was spreading dangerously around the world. “Our cause, which stems from our general concern, should not be interpreted as calls for restriction of freedom,” he said. “We believe that mutual understanding, tolerance, respect and empathy should also be accompanying components when we advocate supremacy of freedom of expression.”

Athens debt crisis taxes cosy ties between state and Greek Orthodox Church

The Greek Orthodox Church owns more land than anyone except the state, employs thousands on the public payroll, has a stake in the nation’s biggest bank, but campaigners say its tax payments are derisory. The Church vehemently denies accusations it is one of Greece’s biggest tax dodgers and says it is playing a vital social, economic and spiritual role in this time of hardship.

With the third year of recession tormenting Greece’s 11 million people, the Church has provided solace, comfort and nourishment but activists say it’s now time to dig deep into its coffers to help with the bailout.

The Greek Orthodox Church has long enjoyed a privileged, some would say cosy, status when it comes to taxes in a country where it is responsible for the sole official religion, with one critic calling its complex finances at best opaque. But the sovereign debt crisis that has rocked the Greek state, thrown hundreds of thousands of people out of work, and forced painful cuts in salaries, pensions and benefits, has raised fresh questions about the Church’s tax position.

More than 100,000 people have joined a Greek Facebook page “Tax The Church”, and 29,000 have so far signed an online petition urging the state to harness “the huge fortune of churches” to reduce Greece’s crushing budget deficit. “The Church must pay its share of the tax burden,” said former finance minister Yannos Papantoniou. “It is totally unreasonable in this situation that they contribute so little.”