WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The more often Americans go to church, the more likely they are to support the torture of suspected terrorists, according to a new survey.
More than half of people who attend services at least once a week -- 54 percent -- said the use of torture against suspected terrorists is "often" or "sometimes" justified. Only 42 percent of people who "seldom or never" go to services agreed, according to the analysis released Wednesday by the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life.
White evangelical Protestants were the religious group most likely to say torture is often or sometimes justified -- more than six in 10 supported it. People unaffiliated with any religious organization were least likely to back it. Only four in 10 of them did.
The analysis is based on a Pew Research Center survey of 742 American adults conducted April 14-21. It did not include analysis of groups other than white evangelicals, white non-Hispanic Catholics, white mainline Protestants and the religiously unaffiliated, because the sample size was too small.
The president of the National Association of Evangelicals, Leith Anderson, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The survey asked: "Do you think the use of torture against suspected terrorists in order to gain important information can often be justified, sometimes be justified, rarely be justified, or never be justified?"
Roughly half of all respondents -- 49 percent -- said it is often or sometimes justified. A quarter said it never is.
The religious group most likely to say torture is never justified was Protestant denominations -- such as Episcopalians, Lutherans and Presbyterians -- categorized as "mainline" Protestants, in contrast to evangelicals. Just over three in 10 of them said torture is never justified. A quarter of the religiously unaffiliated said the same, compared with two in 10 white non-Hispanic Catholics and one in eight evangelicals.
Thursday, April 30, 2009
Tuesday, April 14, 2009
Tearful Suspect In California Girl's Slaying Appears In Court
(CNN) -- A California woman accused in the rape and murder of 8-year-old Sandra Cantu fought tears Tuesday as a judge read the charges against her in a brief court appearance.
Wearing red jail scrubs over a white T-shirt, Melissa Huckaby, 28, flinched at the mention of Sandra's name. She is charged with killing Sandra, who was a friend of her own daughter.
The Sunday school teacher's lip quivered and a single tear rolled down her cheek as the judge read special circumstances alleged against her -- that the murder was committed in conjunction with a kidnapping, the performance of a lewd and lascivious act upon a child, and rape by instrument.
Huckaby did not enter a plea or speak during the appearance. Public defender Ellen Schwarzenberg, who appeared in court with Huckaby, said she would not enter a plea at that time, adding she had spoken with Huckaby "very briefly."
The matter was continued for arraignment on April 24.
Schwarzenberg requested a gag order be imposed in the case, but the judge put off that matter until April 24 as well. Huckaby will remain in the San Joaquin County Jail without bond.
Huckaby is undergoing a medical evaluation as part of another case, an alleged petty theft being handled in a mental health court, Willett said.
Asked whether that would affect the murder case, he said, "Obviously, any mental health issues would have an effect on this case."
Schwarzenberg said she hopes people will not rush to judgment in the case until all the facts are known.
If convicted as charged, Huckaby faces the death penalty or life in prison without parole, San Joaquin County District Attorney James Willett told reporters after the hearing. A decision on whether to seek the death penalty will be made later, he said.
Sandra's body was found April 6, stuffed into a suitcase and submerged in a pond at a dairy farm. Huckaby was arrested Friday night after questioning by police.
Sandra was last seen alive March 27 in the mobile home park where she lived with her family -- the same mobile home park where Huckaby lives with her own 5-year-old daughter. The two children were close friends and played together frequently, police said.
Huckaby is the granddaughter of Clifford Lane Lawless, pastor of Clover Road Baptist Church near the mobile home park, and she taught Sunday school at the church, police said. The church was searched as part of the investigation into Sandra's disappearance and death.
Before her arrest, Huckaby acknowledged to a newspaper reporter that she owned the suitcase that contained Sandra's body. But Huckaby said the suitcase had been stolen.
Willett declined to comment on any of the evidence or allegations in the case, saying evidence would be presented in court.
Sunday, April 12, 2009
40 NH Christian Center Homes Burn On Easter Sunday
ALTON BAY, New Hampshire — A massive fire damaged or destroyed dozens of wood-frame buildings, mostly unoccupied summer homes, at a 146-year-old Christian center on Easter.
The fire erupted at 4:30 p.m. Sunday, when Christians were celebrating the resurrection of Jesus Christ. But the season hadn't begun yet at the Alton Bay Christian Conference Center on Lake Winnipesaukee, and state Fire Marshal William Degnan said no injuries to civilians had been reported.
"Fortunately, it was at this time of year," he said. "During the summer, it's full."
The fire was under control by about 8:30 p.m. It was cold and windy Sunday, and Degnan said the strong winds off the lake, the state's biggest, helped spread the flames through the many cottage-style homes at the center, about 30 miles northeast of Concord.
One firefighter was hurt when a propane tank exploded. Others were treated for smoke inhalation or exhaustion.
The center's Web site says its purpose is to change lives in part by "encouraging commitment to Jesus." It says it tries to accomplish this through evangelism, encouragement of believers and equipping Christians to be effective leaders.
The center, founded in 1863, is on the southeastern corner of the lake.
The chairman of the center's safety organization, Russell Sample, was with Degnan as crews from numerous surrounding towns worked on the fire.
"A tremendous amount of history has been destroyed," Sample said.
Tuesday, March 31, 2009
Khmer Rouge Prison Chief Duch Goes On Trial In Cambodia
(from CNN)
TUOL SLENG, Cambodia -- Kaing Guek Eav is an elderly former math teacher and a born-again Christian.
He is also -- prosecutors contend -- a former prison chief with Cambodia's Khmer Rouge movement who oversaw the torture and killing of more than 15,000 men, women and children three decades ago.
The trial of the 66-year-old man, better known as Duch, began Monday in front of a U.N.-backed tribunal just outside the Cambodian capital, Phnom Penh.
Duch faces charges that include crimes against humanity, war crimes, torture and murder.
Spectators, many of them survivors of the abuse, watched the start of the trial from an auditorium separated from the courtroom by a large glass window.
While he has admitted his role in the Khmer Rouge's genocidal reign, Duch won't be spared weeks of evidence, much expected to be shocking.
The prison he headed was a converted school, Tuol Sleng, that the regime renamed S-21.
Here, men, women and children were shackled to iron beds and tortured -- before they were electrocuted, beaten and whipped to death, prosecutors said.
Prisoners were meticulously photographed before they were killed.
"It all seems so fresh," said Norng Champhal, who was a starving little boy when invading Vietnamese forces entered the prison. He had been separated from his mother after one night in the prison and never saw her again.
"It's hard to control my feelings when I see this," he said, as he watched footage of the prison taken 30 years ago. "I wonder whether my parents were tortured like these people," he said.
The Khmer Rouge swept to power in 1975. Three years, eight months and 20 days later, at least 1.7 million people -- nearly one-quarter of Cambodia's population -- were dead from execution, disease, starvation and overwork, according to the Documentation Center of Cambodia.
The organization has been at the forefront of recording the atrocities committed during the Khmer Rouge regime. Pol Pot and his followers envisioned a return to a nation of noble peasant farmers and sought to purge city dwellers, the rich, the religious, the educated, anyone from a different ethnic group.
Tuol Sleng was one of 189 similar institutions across Cambodia. Duch is the first former Khmer Rouge leader to stand trial.
The tribunal, which is made up of Cambodian and international judges, does not have the power to impose the death penalty. If convicted, Duch faces from five years to life in prison.
The trial is expected to last three or four months.
"Probably the most important thing about this court is: even after 35 years, you are still not going to get away with it. That is the message," said Chief Prosecutor Robert Petit.
When proceedings began last month, more than 500 people -- including three survivors from the prison Duch ran -- filled the tribunal. About 50 people came from Kampong Thom province, the birthplace of now-dead Khmer Rouge leader Pol Pot.
"I couldn't sleep last night. I was dreaming about my time at S-21," Vann Nath, one of the few survivors of the prison run by Duch, told The Phnom Penh Post last month.
Even though Duch was not a senior leader with the movement, many Cambodians were relieved that one of the regime's former leaders was facing justice, said Youk Chhang, head of the Documentation Center of Cambodia.
"I think there is a feeling of, well you know, finally -- now it's finally happening after all these years of waiting -- hearing, fighting, negotiating," he told CNN last month. "People have that kind of sense of relief that it's now moving. When I ask people around the center today, people say, 'Oh, it's about time.'"
Four of the regime's former leaders, also accused of war crimes and crimes against humanity, await trial before the tribunal. Pol Pot died in 1998.
TUOL SLENG, Cambodia -- Kaing Guek Eav is an elderly former math teacher and a born-again Christian.
He is also -- prosecutors contend -- a former prison chief with Cambodia's Khmer Rouge movement who oversaw the torture and killing of more than 15,000 men, women and children three decades ago.
The trial of the 66-year-old man, better known as Duch, began Monday in front of a U.N.-backed tribunal just outside the Cambodian capital, Phnom Penh.
Duch faces charges that include crimes against humanity, war crimes, torture and murder.
Spectators, many of them survivors of the abuse, watched the start of the trial from an auditorium separated from the courtroom by a large glass window.
While he has admitted his role in the Khmer Rouge's genocidal reign, Duch won't be spared weeks of evidence, much expected to be shocking.
The prison he headed was a converted school, Tuol Sleng, that the regime renamed S-21.
Here, men, women and children were shackled to iron beds and tortured -- before they were electrocuted, beaten and whipped to death, prosecutors said.
Prisoners were meticulously photographed before they were killed.
"It all seems so fresh," said Norng Champhal, who was a starving little boy when invading Vietnamese forces entered the prison. He had been separated from his mother after one night in the prison and never saw her again.
"It's hard to control my feelings when I see this," he said, as he watched footage of the prison taken 30 years ago. "I wonder whether my parents were tortured like these people," he said.
The Khmer Rouge swept to power in 1975. Three years, eight months and 20 days later, at least 1.7 million people -- nearly one-quarter of Cambodia's population -- were dead from execution, disease, starvation and overwork, according to the Documentation Center of Cambodia.
The organization has been at the forefront of recording the atrocities committed during the Khmer Rouge regime. Pol Pot and his followers envisioned a return to a nation of noble peasant farmers and sought to purge city dwellers, the rich, the religious, the educated, anyone from a different ethnic group.
Tuol Sleng was one of 189 similar institutions across Cambodia. Duch is the first former Khmer Rouge leader to stand trial.
The tribunal, which is made up of Cambodian and international judges, does not have the power to impose the death penalty. If convicted, Duch faces from five years to life in prison.
The trial is expected to last three or four months.
"Probably the most important thing about this court is: even after 35 years, you are still not going to get away with it. That is the message," said Chief Prosecutor Robert Petit.
When proceedings began last month, more than 500 people -- including three survivors from the prison Duch ran -- filled the tribunal. About 50 people came from Kampong Thom province, the birthplace of now-dead Khmer Rouge leader Pol Pot.
"I couldn't sleep last night. I was dreaming about my time at S-21," Vann Nath, one of the few survivors of the prison run by Duch, told The Phnom Penh Post last month.
Even though Duch was not a senior leader with the movement, many Cambodians were relieved that one of the regime's former leaders was facing justice, said Youk Chhang, head of the Documentation Center of Cambodia.
"I think there is a feeling of, well you know, finally -- now it's finally happening after all these years of waiting -- hearing, fighting, negotiating," he told CNN last month. "People have that kind of sense of relief that it's now moving. When I ask people around the center today, people say, 'Oh, it's about time.'"
Four of the regime's former leaders, also accused of war crimes and crimes against humanity, await trial before the tribunal. Pol Pot died in 1998.
Monday, March 30, 2009
Cult Mom Pleads Guilty In Son's Starvation Death
(from wbaltv.com)
BALTIMORE -- A Baltimore mother accused of being part of a cult pleaded guilty Monday to starving her baby to death.
Prosecutors claimed during the trial of Ria Ramkissoon that her 16-month-old son, Javon Thompson, was denied food and water because he stopped saying amen at meal times and had a rebellious spirit. He later died.
Ramkissoon, 22, admitted her guilt in one of the strangest plea agreements reached in a Maryland court, 11 News reporter Barry Simms said.
Under the plea agreement, Ramkissoon would get 20 years behind bars with a judge suspending all but time served. She must also undergo treatment, including the process of deprogramming and five years of probation.
But the plea agreement also included that the murder charges against her be dropped if her son was resurrected.
"This is something she absolutely insisted upon, and it's indicative of the fact that she is still brainwashed and still a victim of this cult, and until she's deprogrammed, she's not going to think any differently," said Ramkissoon's attorney, Steven Silverman.
Ramkissoon was part of One Mind Ministries. Court charging documents showed members of the religious group and their leader, 40-year-old Queen Antoinette -- also known as Toni Sloan -- prayed for the child to rise again.
After about a week, the body was wrapped in a blanket and put in a wheeled suitcase with mothballs, and group members moved from Baltimore to Philadelphia, taking the suitcase with them.
The child's body was found in April 2008.
"Ria is as much a victim as Javon, though certainly under tragic circumstances. No one is more regretful about the death of the child as I am, but not withstanding the fact that she was victimized by a cult," Silverman said.
The child did not rise from the dead, so Ramkissoon pleaded guilty to child abuse resulting in death and agreed to cooperate with prosecutors in testifying against the other four members of the organization, all of whom have been charged with murder.
"This would not be considered a cult except for one fact -- it ended in a tragic, violent way," Silverman said.
"I mentioned to her that when she gets out, I want her to come home, and we can start building back together. She said she's not going backward. She's moving forward, meaning this family is not her family anymore -- she has a new family that she's going to move forward with … that's the cult," said Seta Khadan-Newton, Ramkissoon's mother.
"She had no business being around my son. She already admitted that she had killed Javon. She admitted that to my son. Then she admitted another story -- he's alive. You tell one story, then you tell another story. How can you be insane? You're not insane. She didn't look insane to me today," said Geraldine Ridgely, Javon's grandmother.
The other members of the cult were also in court Monday. Antoinette had no attorney present. She claimed God was her lawyer, Simms reported.
BALTIMORE -- A Baltimore mother accused of being part of a cult pleaded guilty Monday to starving her baby to death.
Prosecutors claimed during the trial of Ria Ramkissoon that her 16-month-old son, Javon Thompson, was denied food and water because he stopped saying amen at meal times and had a rebellious spirit. He later died.
Ramkissoon, 22, admitted her guilt in one of the strangest plea agreements reached in a Maryland court, 11 News reporter Barry Simms said.
Under the plea agreement, Ramkissoon would get 20 years behind bars with a judge suspending all but time served. She must also undergo treatment, including the process of deprogramming and five years of probation.
But the plea agreement also included that the murder charges against her be dropped if her son was resurrected.
"This is something she absolutely insisted upon, and it's indicative of the fact that she is still brainwashed and still a victim of this cult, and until she's deprogrammed, she's not going to think any differently," said Ramkissoon's attorney, Steven Silverman.
Ramkissoon was part of One Mind Ministries. Court charging documents showed members of the religious group and their leader, 40-year-old Queen Antoinette -- also known as Toni Sloan -- prayed for the child to rise again.
After about a week, the body was wrapped in a blanket and put in a wheeled suitcase with mothballs, and group members moved from Baltimore to Philadelphia, taking the suitcase with them.
The child's body was found in April 2008.
"Ria is as much a victim as Javon, though certainly under tragic circumstances. No one is more regretful about the death of the child as I am, but not withstanding the fact that she was victimized by a cult," Silverman said.
The child did not rise from the dead, so Ramkissoon pleaded guilty to child abuse resulting in death and agreed to cooperate with prosecutors in testifying against the other four members of the organization, all of whom have been charged with murder.
"This would not be considered a cult except for one fact -- it ended in a tragic, violent way," Silverman said.
"I mentioned to her that when she gets out, I want her to come home, and we can start building back together. She said she's not going backward. She's moving forward, meaning this family is not her family anymore -- she has a new family that she's going to move forward with … that's the cult," said Seta Khadan-Newton, Ramkissoon's mother.
"She had no business being around my son. She already admitted that she had killed Javon. She admitted that to my son. Then she admitted another story -- he's alive. You tell one story, then you tell another story. How can you be insane? You're not insane. She didn't look insane to me today," said Geraldine Ridgely, Javon's grandmother.
The other members of the cult were also in court Monday. Antoinette had no attorney present. She claimed God was her lawyer, Simms reported.
Sunday, March 29, 2009
Ex-megachurch Head Paulk Dies In Atlanta Hospital
(from AP)
ATLANTA — An evangelical pastor whose leadership of an Atlanta-area megachurch ended in a sex scandal has died.
Atlanta Medical Center said Archbishop Earl Paulk, who was in his 80s, died early Sunday. The hospital could not release a cause of death. Paulk had been in bad health for the past couple of years after a battle with cancer.
A phone listing for Paulk's family could not immediately be found.
Paulk co-founded the Cathedral at Chapel Hill in Decatur and helped grow it to a peak membership of about 10,000 in the early 1990s.
A lawsuit by a female employee sparked a chain of events that ended in Paulk pleading guilty in January 2008 to lying under oath by denying affairs with other women.
A paternity test revealed Paulk was the father of his nephew, who is now leader of the church.
ATLANTA — An evangelical pastor whose leadership of an Atlanta-area megachurch ended in a sex scandal has died.
Atlanta Medical Center said Archbishop Earl Paulk, who was in his 80s, died early Sunday. The hospital could not release a cause of death. Paulk had been in bad health for the past couple of years after a battle with cancer.
A phone listing for Paulk's family could not immediately be found.
Paulk co-founded the Cathedral at Chapel Hill in Decatur and helped grow it to a peak membership of about 10,000 in the early 1990s.
A lawsuit by a female employee sparked a chain of events that ended in Paulk pleading guilty in January 2008 to lying under oath by denying affairs with other women.
A paternity test revealed Paulk was the father of his nephew, who is now leader of the church.
Wednesday, March 25, 2009
Catholic Faithful Face Church Closures
By Jessica Ravitz - CNN
(CNN) -- Along the Rust Belt and in cities dotting the Northeast and Upper Midwest, Catholic communities are mourning the loss of parishes. It's a five-year trend of sweeping church closures that most recently hit Cleveland, Ohio.
Wally Martens, a Cleveland native, can look out his kitchen window and see the spiritual home that has served his family for five generations. St. Ignatius of Antioch has been with him and his loved ones through life and death.
"It's the place where most of us were baptized, most of us got married, most of us graduated from grade school and some of us were buried," Martens, 68, said of the west side urban parish that serves 1,200 households. To find out that the building is set to be shuttered is "like losing somebody in your family."
Earlier this month, Bishop Richard G. Lennon of the Diocese of Cleveland, which serves more than 750,000 Catholics, announced that 29 parishes will close and 41 others will merge. The reconfiguration plan, which will effectively cut 52 parishes in the current tally of 224, is scheduled to go into effect by June 30, 2010.
"Closing a parish is very emotional," Bishop Lennon said in a written statement. "I have personally experienced the closing of my own childhood parish in Boston, which members of my family helped establish in 1914. ... I pray that my decisions will serve the needs of this Diocese and its people."
Other cities that have had waves of closures have included places as various as Camden, New Jersey; Allentown, Pennsylvania; and New York City. All of this comes at a time when the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life reports that Catholicism in America has lost more affiliated members than any other faith tradition.
There are reportedly 67.1 million Catholics in the U.S., according to The Official Catholic Directory 2008. Compared to the 2007 number of 67.5, that's about a 400,000 decrease in one year. And the Pew Forum found that approximately a third of its survey respondents who were raised in the Roman Catholic Church no longer attend the church.
What drove the decision to close parishes in Cleveland were population shifts to outlying areas, financial strains that have 42 percent of parishes "operating in the red" and priest shortages, diocese spokesman Robert Tayek explained.
The bishop, he said, is trying to find "an equitable solution."
But the announcement has raised many questions. Among them: What happens to the struggling neighborhoods that have come to rely on outreach and programs offered by some of these inner-city parishes?
"Too many bishops are treating parishes as if they were Starbucks franchises," said Sister Christine Schenk, a Cleveland-area nun who's been fighting for nearly two decades to institute change in the church through her organization FutureChurch.
"It's about more than money. It's about mission to the people," she said. "This isn't what Jesus would do."
The Rev. Bob Begin of Saint Colman couldn't agree more.
"The founder of our church started his mission by saying, 'I came to bring good news to the poor,'" said Begin, who described his parish as serving about 1,300 people in a community where the average income is below $20,000.
Saint Colman, which is slated to merge with another parish elsewhere, gets daily knocks on its doors from nearby residents, many of them immigrants from 25 different countries, who are in need of all kinds of assistance, he said.
"If this parish weren't involved in bringing good news to the poor, I would not spend a lick of energy trying to keep it open," the pastor said. "But because it is bringing good news to the poor, then I have a responsibility to guard and defend this mission against anyone who threatens it."
His parish and others affected by the recent announcement had until 5 p.m. Friday to file an appeal with the diocese. According to The Plain Dealer, which conducted a survey of the parishes, at least 11 had filed as of Friday morning. The diocese itself refused to comment on numbers.
For those who didn't file, the bishop's decision is final. But if what happened in Boston, Massachusetts, is any indication, no parish should count on the appeal working.
Bishop Lennon came to Cleveland from the Archdiocese of Boston, where he oversaw the reorganization and closure of parishes and came under harsh criticism from many. One such critic was Peter Borré, chairman of the Council of Parishes, a Boston-based advocacy group for imperiled parishes.
In 2004, within months of the Archdiocese of Boston announcing it would pay a settlement of $85 million to more than 500 alleged sex abuse victims, 83 parishes were put on the chopping block, "which was a head spinner," Borré said.
In the end, because of his organization's relentless efforts, Borré said, only 60 parishes were cut.
His group coordinated around-the-clock vigils or sit-ins that are ongoing, four and a half years later, in five Boston-area parishes. He also has led the charge to navigate the appeal process for nine parishioner groups that have now taken their battle all the way up to the Apostolic Signatura, or, as Borré called it, the "Vatican Supreme Court."
The assumption is that the highest level of the Vatican will deny the appeals this spring, but Borré said it is important to him and the others to fight as far as they can go.
"Other than vigils, this is the only step still open to us," he said. "Secondly, we are the lead dog on this sled. We are the first that has experienced this phenomenon, and we have made it a self-appointed task to let the rest of America know what to expect."
As of Friday morning, eight Cleveland parishes had reached out to Borré for language to help in their appeals. Others likely drafted letters of their own.
But some affected parishes had no intention of fighting.
Ray Daull, 68, a deacon at Christ the King in Cleveland Heights says a merger, which will combine his parish with three others, is a good thing. It'll be sad to see his church of 52 years go, but given its deficit and shrinking attendance, with a merger, "We will have more resources ... and the money can go into doing our work," he said.
But for parishes such as St. Ignatius of Antioch, the one Wally Martens can see from his window, accepting the end is not yet possible.
"There was a general gasp, and then sadness turned to madness," the Rev. James McGonegdal, Marten's pastor of 20 years, said of the announcement he made at Mass on March 15. "Some of the parishes knew they'd be closing, whereas for St. Ignatius and a couple other parishes, it was almost like a sudden death. You grieve in a different way."
A standing-room only crowd poured into the parish last Sunday to show growing support. Martens said in a week's time, $900,000 had been pledged to finance the church and send a message to the diocese.
For Martens' 92-year-old mother, Pauline, pondering life without her parish is unthinkable. For most of her life, it's the only one she's known.
"I just thought the church would go on forever," she said. "I expected to be buried from there. But I guess the way things are going, I just don't know what'll happen to me."
(CNN) -- Along the Rust Belt and in cities dotting the Northeast and Upper Midwest, Catholic communities are mourning the loss of parishes. It's a five-year trend of sweeping church closures that most recently hit Cleveland, Ohio.
Wally Martens, a Cleveland native, can look out his kitchen window and see the spiritual home that has served his family for five generations. St. Ignatius of Antioch has been with him and his loved ones through life and death.
"It's the place where most of us were baptized, most of us got married, most of us graduated from grade school and some of us were buried," Martens, 68, said of the west side urban parish that serves 1,200 households. To find out that the building is set to be shuttered is "like losing somebody in your family."
Earlier this month, Bishop Richard G. Lennon of the Diocese of Cleveland, which serves more than 750,000 Catholics, announced that 29 parishes will close and 41 others will merge. The reconfiguration plan, which will effectively cut 52 parishes in the current tally of 224, is scheduled to go into effect by June 30, 2010.
"Closing a parish is very emotional," Bishop Lennon said in a written statement. "I have personally experienced the closing of my own childhood parish in Boston, which members of my family helped establish in 1914. ... I pray that my decisions will serve the needs of this Diocese and its people."
Other cities that have had waves of closures have included places as various as Camden, New Jersey; Allentown, Pennsylvania; and New York City. All of this comes at a time when the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life reports that Catholicism in America has lost more affiliated members than any other faith tradition.
There are reportedly 67.1 million Catholics in the U.S., according to The Official Catholic Directory 2008. Compared to the 2007 number of 67.5, that's about a 400,000 decrease in one year. And the Pew Forum found that approximately a third of its survey respondents who were raised in the Roman Catholic Church no longer attend the church.
What drove the decision to close parishes in Cleveland were population shifts to outlying areas, financial strains that have 42 percent of parishes "operating in the red" and priest shortages, diocese spokesman Robert Tayek explained.
The bishop, he said, is trying to find "an equitable solution."
But the announcement has raised many questions. Among them: What happens to the struggling neighborhoods that have come to rely on outreach and programs offered by some of these inner-city parishes?
"Too many bishops are treating parishes as if they were Starbucks franchises," said Sister Christine Schenk, a Cleveland-area nun who's been fighting for nearly two decades to institute change in the church through her organization FutureChurch.
"It's about more than money. It's about mission to the people," she said. "This isn't what Jesus would do."
The Rev. Bob Begin of Saint Colman couldn't agree more.
"The founder of our church started his mission by saying, 'I came to bring good news to the poor,'" said Begin, who described his parish as serving about 1,300 people in a community where the average income is below $20,000.
Saint Colman, which is slated to merge with another parish elsewhere, gets daily knocks on its doors from nearby residents, many of them immigrants from 25 different countries, who are in need of all kinds of assistance, he said.
"If this parish weren't involved in bringing good news to the poor, I would not spend a lick of energy trying to keep it open," the pastor said. "But because it is bringing good news to the poor, then I have a responsibility to guard and defend this mission against anyone who threatens it."
His parish and others affected by the recent announcement had until 5 p.m. Friday to file an appeal with the diocese. According to The Plain Dealer, which conducted a survey of the parishes, at least 11 had filed as of Friday morning. The diocese itself refused to comment on numbers.
For those who didn't file, the bishop's decision is final. But if what happened in Boston, Massachusetts, is any indication, no parish should count on the appeal working.
Bishop Lennon came to Cleveland from the Archdiocese of Boston, where he oversaw the reorganization and closure of parishes and came under harsh criticism from many. One such critic was Peter Borré, chairman of the Council of Parishes, a Boston-based advocacy group for imperiled parishes.
In 2004, within months of the Archdiocese of Boston announcing it would pay a settlement of $85 million to more than 500 alleged sex abuse victims, 83 parishes were put on the chopping block, "which was a head spinner," Borré said.
In the end, because of his organization's relentless efforts, Borré said, only 60 parishes were cut.
His group coordinated around-the-clock vigils or sit-ins that are ongoing, four and a half years later, in five Boston-area parishes. He also has led the charge to navigate the appeal process for nine parishioner groups that have now taken their battle all the way up to the Apostolic Signatura, or, as Borré called it, the "Vatican Supreme Court."
The assumption is that the highest level of the Vatican will deny the appeals this spring, but Borré said it is important to him and the others to fight as far as they can go.
"Other than vigils, this is the only step still open to us," he said. "Secondly, we are the lead dog on this sled. We are the first that has experienced this phenomenon, and we have made it a self-appointed task to let the rest of America know what to expect."
As of Friday morning, eight Cleveland parishes had reached out to Borré for language to help in their appeals. Others likely drafted letters of their own.
But some affected parishes had no intention of fighting.
Ray Daull, 68, a deacon at Christ the King in Cleveland Heights says a merger, which will combine his parish with three others, is a good thing. It'll be sad to see his church of 52 years go, but given its deficit and shrinking attendance, with a merger, "We will have more resources ... and the money can go into doing our work," he said.
But for parishes such as St. Ignatius of Antioch, the one Wally Martens can see from his window, accepting the end is not yet possible.
"There was a general gasp, and then sadness turned to madness," the Rev. James McGonegdal, Marten's pastor of 20 years, said of the announcement he made at Mass on March 15. "Some of the parishes knew they'd be closing, whereas for St. Ignatius and a couple other parishes, it was almost like a sudden death. You grieve in a different way."
A standing-room only crowd poured into the parish last Sunday to show growing support. Martens said in a week's time, $900,000 had been pledged to finance the church and send a message to the diocese.
For Martens' 92-year-old mother, Pauline, pondering life without her parish is unthinkable. For most of her life, it's the only one she's known.
"I just thought the church would go on forever," she said. "I expected to be buried from there. But I guess the way things are going, I just don't know what'll happen to me."
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)