Presbyterians End Jewish Church's Funds
Presbyterian leaders voted this week to cut off funding of a controversial church for Jews midway through the five-year project.
Congregation Avodat Yisrael in Plymouth Meeting, Pa., was the only congregation of its kind funded by the Presbyterian Church (USA) and had been criticized by Jewish groups and church liberals across the country since opening in 2003.
Avodat Yisrael casts itself as an outreach to Messianic Jews, who believe in Jesus, as well as to interfaith couples and spiritually seeking Jews. Critics call its ministry inauthentic and even deceptive.
Amid the furor, the Presbytery of Philadelphia, the church's regional governing body, set up a special commission to oversee the project. After 18 months of study, the commission's chairman, the Rev. William Borror, issued a report Tuesday that questioned the theology and stagnant growth of Avodat Yisrael and called for cutting ties as of July 1.
"We concluded it was better to do this sooner rather than later," Borror told the 260 presbyters assembled at Old Pine Presbyterian Church in Philadelphia.
When it set up Avodat Yisrael as an ethnic new church project, the presbytery had pledged $145,000 over five years; the Pennsylvania Synod added $75,000 and the national church pledged $125,000. With the synod's decision, the remaining funding from those sources will end, Borror said.
-- Knight Ridder
Pastor's IRS Woes Prompt New Sermon
With April 15 looming, the Rev. Larry Miles of Richmond is advising colleagues that failure to file federal income tax returns could land you in jail.
He knows from experience. Miles, pastor of Fresh Anointing Cathedral Church of God in Christ, was released Feb. 18 after serving 24 days in a federal detention center for failing to file and is warning fellow pastors and church meetings, the Richmond Times-Dispatch reported.
Miles's troubles began in 2000 when Internal Revenue Service agents questioned why he hadn't filed returns the past four years.
"It was just procrastination and overload, as I explained to my congregation," Miles said. Besides leading his own growing church, he is active with Richmond's Faith Leaders Initiative, which seeks to attack root causes of violent crime.
Miles said his wife, who normally did their taxes, was involved in two car accidents, one of which left her permanently disabled. Tax preparation fell to him, and he kept putting it off.
Last year, he was charged with three misdemeanor counts of willfully failing to file returns on total income of $319,000 for 1997, 1998 and 1999. The 1997 and 1998 counts were dropped in exchange for a guilty plea for 1999.
The Times-Dispatch said that last year, the IRS won criminal cases against 194 people who served time in prison, a halfway house or home confinement.
