Presiding Bishop blasts U.S. for foreign policy This news digest was prepared from news and wire reports by Witnessnews editor, Pat McCaughan.
Presiding Bishop blasts U.S. for foreign policy In an interview with Religion News Service (RNS) on Jan. 10, Presiding Bishop Frank T. Griswold III called the rhetoric of U.S. foreign policy "reprehensible" and condemned the government’s blind eye toward poverty and suffering. Griswold also blasted the Bush administration for its wartime rhetoric, especially for labeling Iran, Iraq and North Korea as an "axis of evil."
"Quite apart from the bombs we drop, words are weapons and we have used our language so unwisely, so intemperately, so thoughtlessly ... that I’m not surprised we are hated and loathed everywhere I go," he said.
Griswold has argued that a pre-emptive strike against Iraq does not meet just-war criteria. A couple of days after the RNS interview, in a service at the Cathedral Church of St. Peter and St. Paul in Washington, D.C., (Washington National Cathedral) that marked his fifth anniversary as presiding bishop, Griswold characterized the AIDS pandemic as posing a far greater security threat to the U.S. because AIDS is creating a populace of orphans who live in abject poverty in fragile African democracies. The world, he said, rightly sees the U.S. "as greedy, self-interested and almost totally unconcerned about poverty, disease and suffering."
On January 13, Pope John Paul II condemned the possibility of a war in Iraq, saying it could be avoided and that it would be a defeat for humanity, Reuters reported. He made clear his opposition in his annual "State of the World" address to diplomats accredited to the Vatican. "War is never just another means that one can choose to employ for settling differences between nations," he said in a clear reference to the military build-up for a possible U.S.-led war against Iraq over its alleged weapons of mass destruction program. He said international law and diplomacy were the only means worthy of resolving differences.
The Cincinnati City Council voted November 27, 2002, to enact a Living Wage ordinance which states that all full-time employees of the city and employees of private companies with city contracts must be paid a "Living Wage," an amount they concluded to be $8.70 per hour for employees with health benefits and $10.20 per hour for those not receiving health benefits. Among those speaking in favor of the ordinance was Nancy Sullivan, a new member of the Episcopal Diocese of Southern Ohio’s Diocesan Council. Sullivan had served on the diocese’s Task Force on Work, which last year won passage of a living-wage resolution by Southern Ohio’s 127th diocesan convention. Sullivan brought the resolution with her when she spoke to the City Council.
Illinois Governor George Ryan empties state’s death row Following the pardoning of four death-row inmates on January 10, 2003, the governor of Illinois, George Ryan, handed out reduced sentences to all 156 inmates on the state’s death row (153 inmates received life sentences without possibility of parole and three others received shorter sentences). Ryan, a former death-penalty supporter, had issued a moratorium on executions in 2000 and convened a commission to investigate the system. Since 1976, when the U.S. Supreme Court reinstated the death penalty, Illinois has executed a dozen inmates. But another 13 death-row inmates were freed because they were found innocent or there were significant flaws in how they were convicted. "Because the Illinois death penalty system is arbitrary and capricious – and therefore immoral – I no longer shall tinker with the machinery of death," Ryan said. The governor’s move came two days before he left office.
California hate crime victim eulogized by LA EpiscopaliansAuthor, poet and civil rights activist Malcolm Boyd challenged 100 Episcopalians at a Dec. 6, 2002, candlelight vigil to make the death of hate crime victim Jeffrey Owens, 40, "not a statistic but something very significant in terms of human justice." Boyd, along with other clergy and laity from the Episcopal Diocese of Los Angeles were in Riverside, Calif., for the diocese’s 107th annual convention. Owens, an Inland Valley AIDS Project employee, died June 6, 2002, after he was attacked outside a well-known gay bar. He had come to the aid of a friend who had been attacked. Before Owens was stabbed repeatedly, his attacker used derogatory language referring to his sexual orientation. He died the next day. Standing in the same parking lot where Owens was stabbed, Boyd told those at the vigil that Owens "isn’t just another victim. He becomes a martyr and a symbol." Six suspects have been arrested in connection with Owens’ death and face potential hate crime penalties.
On Dec. 12, President George W. Bush signed executive orders that authorize federal agencies to allow religious groups that discriminate in hiring to receive federal tax dollars to operate social services. "His faith-based initiatives policy is designed to put religious groups on an equal footing. But he has created a special right for religious groups to discriminate using tax dollars, something other groups are forbidden from doing," said Ralph G. Neas, president of People For the American Way. "Far from championing equal rights, the president is endorsing tax-funded discrimination." The executive orders will ensure that religious institutions can receive federal tax dollars even if they refuse to hire employees because of their religious beliefs or lack thereof, an exemption from federal civil rights laws not available to non-religious charitable groups. Last year, the president failed to get his faith-based bill through Congress. Although the House passed the bill, the Senate could not muster enough votes.