The Weekly News In
Review
Newsletter is a
compilation of the news articles that have appeared
on the Understand The Times website during the
previous week.
 |
|
|
September 24 - Myanmar anti-junta protests biggest in 20 years
Article: Misc.
YANGON (Reuters) - Tens
of thousands of people joined streams
of Buddhist monks on marches through
Myanmar's capital on Monday in the
biggest
demonstration against the ruling generals
since they crushed student-led protests
nearly 20 years ago.
In the northwest coastal
town of Sittwe, residents said
it seemed entire
population of more than 100,000
people was marching with the
monks.
What
began as anger at last month's shock
fuel price rises has become a wider
movement against the generals, with one
monk group calling for peaceful mass
protests until the junta fell.
"There's no prospect now of the
monks just deciding to abandon this. They
are getting braver every day and
their demands are getting greater every
day, and it's much more overtly
political," a Yangon-based
diplomat said.
"The committee said they will
move
on with the struggle until the
end," the exile said.
Read More ....
|
|
|
|
|
September 24 - Tony Blair launches his Middle East plan
Article: Israel And The Last Days
Tony Blair last night said he has
an "ambitious but
achievable" plan to get the Middle East peace
process
back on track by the end of the
year.
At a UN press conference last night Mr
Blair, now Middle East envoy
for the Quartet of the United Nations,
European Union, United
States and Russia, said he aims
to put "real hope"
back into the peace process in the
region.
He said he
intended to gain a sense of
how a Palestinian state would look by the
end of this year.
Unless Israel can be
convinced that Palestinian
militants can be reined in, there is no way
the Israeli prime minister,
Ehud Olmert, will be persuaded to back a
meaningful peace agreement
at the summit.
From the Palestinian perspective, the
summit will be stillborn unless Israel makes firm
commitments to allow a
Palestinian state which in turn will require
sensitive issues like borders,
refugees and the division of Jerusalem to
be
addressed.
Read More ....
|
|
|
|
|
September 25 - Natorei Karta: Ahmadinejad man of peace
Article: Israel And The Last Days
Natorei Karta spokesman Rabbi
Yisroel Dovid Weiss on
Tuesday called Iranian President
Mahmoud Ahmandinejad
"an advocate of
peace," on the eve of the group's meeting
with
the controversial leader in
New York.
He added that
Natorei Karta members believed Ahmadinejad
was a
very religious man who was dedicated to
world peace based on mutual
respect and dialogue.
"We want to meet with the man
who has proven again and
again that he is interested in the welfare of
the Iranian Jewish community
and that he has a deep respect for the
Jewish world ... The Zionist
attempt to isolate this man and his people
is immoral and
tragic," he said.
Ahmadinejad's visit to New York as part of
the UN
General Assembly has
garnered harsh criticism from Jewish groups due to
his frequent calls to "wipe Israel off
the map."
Read More ....
|
|
|
|
|
September 25 - How to Harness Millennials for Christ
Article: Emerging Church
DALLAS, Texas - Millennials are a
passionate,
optimistic, global
thinking generation of
youths
capable of transforming the world, declared the
head
of an organization training
emerging
leaders.
However, current mission leaders must
understand the culture of this generation
in order to harness
their
passion to change the world for Christ.
The
leadership expert emphasized
the need
for
relevance or using what is cultural to say what is
timeless.
He
used to the acronym EPIC
created by theologian and futurist Dr.
Leonard Sweet to
summarize the generation in terms of how
to communicate with
them:Exp
eriential -
The generation prefers to be
communicated
through experiences.
Participatory - They want to
participate in the outcome.
Image rich - They are an
image
rich generation.
Connective - This generation
is
connected relationally and
technologically.
Read More ....
|
|
|
|
|
September 25 - Council of Europe to vote on creationism next week
Article: Creation / Evloution - Misc.
PARIS
(Reuters) - Europe's main human rights body will
vote next week on a resolution
opposing the
teaching of creationist and
intelligent design views in school science
classes.
The resolution,
on the agenda for October 4, says
European schools should
"resist presentation of
creationist ideas in any
discipline other than religion." It describes
the "intelligent
design" argument as an updated version of
creationism.
"There
are different views of the creation of the world
and we respect that,"
she told Reuters. "The message we wanted to
send
was to
avoid creationism passing itself off as
science and being taught as
science. That's where the danger
lies."
"The
aim of this report is not to question or to fight
a belief," Brasseur wrote
in a memorandum added to the new resolution.
"It is not a matter of
opposing belief and science,
but it is
necessary to prevent belief from
opposing
science."
Read More ....
|
|
|
|
|
September 25 - Ahmadinejad sets out his vision of a world without Israel
Article: Israel And The Last Days
Iran's President Mahmoud
Ahmadinejad used his speech to the
United Nations General Assembly on
Tuesday to unveil a
vision of a world without Israel, in which
America and Europe would be freed
of what he said was Zionist
oppression.
Culminating a concerted assault on what he
described as the injustices and
oppressions practiced by the "big powers"
since World War II, he said that
the ungodly era of lewdness and violence was coming
to a close and that "the age
of monotheism has commenced."
The world was "nearing
the sunset of the time of empires,"
he said, and urged the dominant world powers to
eschew their "obedience
to Satan" and "submit to the will of
god." If they
did so, "they will be saved." If not,
"calamities will befall them."
But whether or not these powers chose to reform
themselves, he said, the day was
fast approaching when "occupied lands will be freed.
Palestine and Iraq will be liberated from the
domination of the occupiers."
And the people of America and Europe would be
liberated from Zionist oppression.
"This is the promise of
god," he said. "Therefore it will
be fulfilled."
Read More ....
|
|
|
|
|
September 25 - Holy See: Saving the Planet Is Task of All
Article: One World Religion
Monsignor
Parolin affirmed that "my
delegation wishes to stress
the underlying moral imperative that all,
without exception, have a
grave responsibility to protect the
environment."
Monsignor Parolin urged international cooperation
in finding and implementing a
solution to climate change.
"Since no country alone
can solve the problems related to our common
environment, we need to
overcome self-interest through
collective action," he
said. "On
the part of the international
community, this presupposes the adoption
of a coordinated, effective and
prompt international political strategy
capable of responding to such
a complex question."
States are free to adopt
international conventions and treaties," he
said, "but unless our words are matched
with
effective action and
accountability, we would do little to avert a bleak
future and may find ourselves
gathering again not too long from now to
lament another collective
failure."
Read More ....
|
|
|
|
|
September 25 - Vatican warning over pope 'relic'
Article: Roman Catholic Church And The Last Days
The
Vatican has warned Roman Catholics that
buying
relics is sacrilege, after reports that
pieces of former Pope John
Paul II's clothes were for sale online.
The website of
the Holy Diocese of
Rome has been offering small
pieces of John Paul II's white cassock as
part of the campaign to beatify
him.
The
website has been offering a
relic featuring a prayer on one
side and a "ex indumentis" - a piece
from the clothing - of the
former pope since early 2006.
Anyone who
clicks on the link to request the relic is
now sent to an article in which
diocese spokesman Monsignor Marco
Frisina warns that it is sacrilegious to buy or
sell relics.
The Italian
version of the website also specifies that
the relic
is free, and requests only an optional
small donation to cover
postage costs.
"It's only a devotional object. It's
useless to try to collect it or
sell it on the internet because we will
satisfy any request for this
object."
Read More ....
|
|
|
|
|
September 26- Three monks killed by Burmese army
Article: Misc.
Yangon
(AsiaNews) - Local sources said that
at least three monks were
killed today by Burmese security forces in an
attempt to stop anti-regime
demonstrations. One monk was shot as he
tried to disarm a soldier; the
other two died from wounds after they
were beaten by
police.Despite a ban
on
demonstrations issued by the
military junta and a 60-day curfew,
thousands of monks and
students gathered in front of Shwedagong Pagoda
to start their protest march.
Riot police shot in the air and fired tear gas
at columns of monks and
civilians, beating and arresting many of
them.
Few in the population
know how to continue the protest. Eyewitnesses
have told
AsiaNews that "fear is
palpable." No one can
forget the 1988 demonstrations when the military
shot and killed at least 3,000
people.
Read More ....
|
|
|
|
|
September 25 - Study: Christianity No Longer Looks Like Jesus
Article: Signs Of The Last Times
Young
Americans today are more
skeptical and resistant to
Christianity than were people of the same age
just a decade ago, says
a new study.
Only 16 percent of non-Christians
aged 16 to 29 years old said
they have a "good impression" of
Christianity, according
to a report released Monday by The Barna
Group.
According
to the study, 91
percent of the nation's
evangelicals believe that "Americans are
becoming more hostile and
negative toward Christianity."
Criticism,
however, was not limited to young people
outside the Christian faith.
Half of young
churchgoers said they
perceive Christianity to be judgmental,
hypocritical and too political.
Also, one-third said it was
old-fashioned and out of touch
with reality.
Among
other common impressions, 23 percent of young
non-Christians said "Christianity is changed from
what it used to be" and
"Christianity in today's society no longer looks
like Jesus." Young born-
again Christians were just as likely to say the
same (22
percent).
Read More ....
|
|
|
|
|
September 25 - East meets West - Theologian's work sets off Vatican's doctrinal alarms
Article: Roman Catholic Church And The Last Days
Currently a professor at Georgetown
University,
Father Phan in
2001 became the first non-Caucasian to serve as
president of the Catholic Theological
Society
of America,
and he's also a key adviser to the Federation of
Asian Bishops'
Conferences. Almost literally,
East and West
intersect in his work.
To critics, Father Phan
and his
colleagues offer a
classic example of good intentions run amuck. In
the name of
promoting interreligious tolerance, they say, Father
Phan fudges core
doctrines such as Jesus Christ as the unique savior
of the world, and
the Catholic church as a
singular channel
of grace. To his admirers, Father Phan is a
prophet. They
believe he's pointing the way to a Catholicism
more universal than Roman, one that
is
faithful to the
gospel yet responsive to a new historical
moment.
Whichever view one
takes, Father
Phan's story
captures in microcosm perhaps the
deepest transition
reshaping Catholicism at the dawn of the 21st
century - the
emergence of a truly global church, one in which
pressures for new
ways of approaching old questions is destined to
swell.
On that basis, Father
Phan defends
the idea of multiple
religious belonging, meaning that it's possible
for someone to be
a "Hindu Catholic" or a
"Buddhist
Catholic," drawing upon doctrines and practices of
both
traditions -
though only to the extent, he adds, that the
elements drawn
from the other religion don't contradict the truth
revealed in Christ.
Read More ....
|
|
|
|
|
September 27 - Ahmadinejad Meets Clerics, and Decibels Drop a Notch
Article: One World Religion
The session, held under
tight security at a chapel across the
street from the United Nations, was a
reminder that Mr. Ahmadinejad is
a religious
president of a religious nation who
relishes speaking on a religious
plane. He spent his 20 allotted
minutes at the start of the two-hour
meeting recounting
the chain of
prophets central to Judaism, Christianity
and Islam, and the commonality of their
messages.
He took questions from
a panel that included
a Quaker, a
Catholic, an Anglican, a Baptist and a
representative of the interfaith World
Council of Churches, some of
whom separately said they had been
criticized by other religious leaders for
sitting down with the Iranian president.
Given the furor over Mr.
Ahmadinejad's earlier appearances, there
was no advance publicity.
The gathering, which
included an audience of about
140 other religious
leaders, was organized by the
Mennonites and Quakers, churches
known for their commitment to pacifism.
The organizers said
that they had pressed hard to find a
Jewish leader to join the panel of
questioners, but that
those invited declined because they could
not win support from Jewish
organizations.
"My heart was broken
that there was
so little support from other religions to be
here," said Mary Ellen
McNish, general secretary of the American
Friends Service Committee, a
Quaker group that helped sponsor the
event. "If we
don't walk down this path of dialogue,
we're going to end up in
conflagration."
Read More ....
|
|
|
|
|
September 26 - High-Tech Churches Worry Traditional Worshippers
Article: Emerging Church
"I
feel like it's too
much and it takes over the worship," said
the Rev. Dorothy
LaPenta, pastor of the 150-member Hope
Presbyterian
Church in
Mitchellville, according to The Washington Post.
"People will just be sitting there,
their eyes
fixated on the
screen. They're waiting to be given something instead
of
participating."
Church leaders who
implement the
technology say it's all about
reaching more
people. And to reach people in today's culture,
churches need to
be at the forefront of cutting edge
ideas.
"I don't think that God would
want us to try
to evangelize like
Jesus did 2,000 years ago," said the Rev.
Grainger Browning
Jr., pastor of the 10,000-member Ebenezer AME
Church in Fort
Washington, according to the Post.
Also, with the advent
of big screens,
fewer churches are providing
Bibles in their
pews - dropping from 86 percent in 2000 to 80
percent in
2005.
"In order to reach those that no
one else is
reaching, we will
have to do things that no one else is doing,"
he has
said.
Read More ....
|
|
|
|
|
September 27 - Zondervan / National Pastor's Convention & Events
Article: Emerging Church
Choose from critical concern
courses, seven general
sessions, and
over 60 seminars. Whether you need
new ministry ideas, rest,
or time with
your spouse, NPC
is the place to be for people in ministry.
"This remains the best educational
event I can
attend. The wide variety of workshops and
speakers provide
so many options and opportunities to broaden my
ministry
base."
"Amazing. We came here for the
sunshine and received
a fresh vision from God and a deep
rejuvenation for life
and ministry."
"A week at NPC offers more insight,
inspiration,
people, and
renewal than any other week I know.
It's such a full
experience for forward-thinking ministry leaders.
What a
great gift to pastors, their spouses, and others."
SPEAKERS:
Read More ....
|
|
|
|
|
September 27 - Anglicans look to 'emerging church' to heal wounds
Article: Emerging Church
Ottawa's Anglicans have
invited this leader
of the "emerging church" movement to
speak
tomorrow and
Saturday so that he might show them how to stay
faithful -- and
hopeful -- during a time when Anglicans are
undergoing one of
the most wrenching times in their church's
history.
Mr. McLaren
travels the world preaching that
there is another,
more faithful way of following Christ, that
doesn't split into
armed camps the way the Anglican church
seems poised to
do.
But its more far-
reaching agenda is to find a
way to "seek
the seekers," a strategy that is to reach over
several
years, reshaping
what it means to be Anglican in the new
millennium.
"We're right
in the middle of strategic planning,
bringing the church into a new
age,"
says Rev. Canon
Dr. Bill Prentice, director of parish and dicoesan
services.
"The response to the new
age is
McLaren's forte, so
we hope it will be helpful to us."
"We want to take what he has learned
and apply
it to our situation.
The Anglican church has a history as well as a
future."
Read More ....
|
|
|
|
|
September 28 - UK: Myanmar deaths 'far greater' than reported
Article: Misc.
Shots were fired to clear
crowds across the country
Friday as authorities reportedly cut Internet
connections, while graphic
new video footage showed troops using deadly
force.Witnesses told CNN
that police opened fire on crowds to
disperse
demonstrators,
resulting in fatalities. Other sources said they
had spoken to a Western
witness who had seen
up to 35 bodies in the
streets.
AP also reported
some dissident groups putting
the number killed as high as 200.
CNN could not independently
verify the claims.
A day earlier, troops with
automatic rifles fired into
crowds of anti-government demonstrators,
reportedly killing at least nine
people in the bloodiest day in
more than a month of protests demanding
an end to military
rule.
Read More ....
|
|
|
|
|
September 28 - Prof sees a role for ancient spiritual practices
Article: Emerging Church
"People get nervous about
the word mystics," said
Darling, assistant professor of
communications at Spring Arbor
University, who has co-written the new book,
"The God of Intimacy and
Action," published by John Wiley & Sons.
But the
kicker is the subtitle, "Reconnecting Ancient
Spiritual Practices, Evangelism, and
Justice."
In the
first chapter,
Darling and
Campolo
explain the book is about spirituality and
how ordinary people can
mystically experience God. Mystical, they
explain, refers to experiences
when people are filled with the "spirit
of God," which can happen through
new insights, relationships, heightened
awareness and conversion
experiences.
Darling wrote,
"I now
realize that to be in an intimate
relationship with Jesus means I am a
mystic. It means that I can, and should,
cultivate the kind of mystical
intimacy with Jesus that empowers me to
do Jesus' work."
Campolo
wrote in the book and shared that
day with SAU students, "We want you to
learn about intimacy with Christ from
mystics who loved Christ and
experienced the life-changing grace of
God that empowered them to share
Christ and work for justice like
Wesley."
Read More ....
|
|
|
|
|
September 28 - Woman looks to various denominations for mystical guidance
Article: Emerging Church
Angelo
expressed her faith
through the Catholic Church
until 1994. Today she said she is
"nurtured"
through the Congregational
denomination but said, "My spirituality is
nurtured through the many
expressions of faith, Christian as well as
other belief systems."
Angelo learned about mystics from 12 years
of
Catholic education, but it
wasn't until retreats that her appreciation
for them deepened, she
said.
Now, she is aware of a spiritual
awakening -- among
Christians both Catholic and Protestant, and of many
Protestant denominations -- to
search out the mystics.
"This has been coming, and it's great.
There is
more of an appreciation of
other belief systems. We are more open and we
can't help but be exposed to
other traditions and seeing the richness
there," she said.
"It's mysterious, and
we tend to back away from it.
But if
you have an inquisitive spirit, you go
beyond what is told to
us," said Angelo, who has a master's
degree in theology from Mount
Angel Seminary in Oregon and is beginning
a program called "A
Training in Spiritual Guidance" led by Thomas
Atum
O'Kane, a graduate of the
Guild for Spiritual Guidance
which
focuses on the psychology of Carl Jung, the
vision of Teilhard de Chardin
and the practice of Christian mysticism.
Read More ....
|
|
|
|
|
September 29 - Mountain Temple Center offers something for everyone
Article: Rising Interest In Teh Supernatural
The retired
postal worker calls his center of
eclectic religions, 1533 E.
Lupine Ave., a place
"where the old gods are
alive." The Web site (http://home.earthlink.net/~xristos/GoldenDa
wn/index2.htm)
touts his New Age center as
an "informal,
secluded, open-minded and
intellectually adventurous place" for such
esoteric pursuits as
ceremonial magick, Wicca, tantra, Celtic, Norse and
mystic beliefs. Indian
petroglyphs on neighboring rocks, he said, add to
the sacred place.
"The only thing we don't
tolerate is intolerance," said Crowley, who
says his goal has been to help
anyone find their own spiritual path. "Each
individual has to find God
through themselves, so I can't dictate what
somebody is
doing."
He and his wife, Shari, began
the metaphysical center in 1983.
A
product of a "very formal Catholic
background"
and parochial school,
he was beset with drug and alcohol abuse.
When Crowley began recovery
29 years ago, he took
heed of the 12-step program's
third point, to turn over the care of
one's life to the "God of
your own understanding."
"A lot of people in the
past have thought anything this far outside of
Christian tradition was devil
worship, but most
people who are actually
involved in this don't even believe in the
existence of the
devil," he said.
Carol, 47, of Tempe said she
follows an Italian Wicca tradition called
Strega. "We have our angelic beings, our
particular way of doing our
altars - it's basically old Italian
spirituality." A one-time Catholic,
she started using tarot cards
and "hanging around with people" with
New
Age interests, then to Strega
from her Italian heritage.
Read More ....
|
|
We hope the Weekly News In Review has been a
blessing to you.
In Jesus,
Roger Oakland
|
