In Brief

Saturday, February 3, 2007

MIDEAST VIOLENCE

Religious Leaders Meet With Rice

Christian, Jewish and Muslim leaders met with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice on Monday to press for a greater U.S. role in ending Mideast violence.

Meeting with Rice were Cardinal Theodore E. McCarrick, retired archbishop of Washington; Presiding Bishop Mark S. Hanson of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America; Episcopal Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori; Sayyid M. Syeed, national director of the Islamic Society of North America; Rabbi Paul Menitoff, a leader in Reform Judaism; and Rabbi Amy Small, a leader of the Reconstructionist branch of Judaism.

The leaders are part of the National Interreligious Leadership Initiative for Peace in the Middle East, which represents more than 35 religious groups and supports a two-state solution for the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

-- Associated Press

RURAL FIRES

Arsonist's Parents Visit Burned Church

The parents of a former Birmingham-Southern College student who pleaded guilty in a series of rural church arsons visited with the congregation of one burned church Sunday, asking for forgiveness and expressing remorse.

"My son wants you to know how sorry he is," Mike Cloyd told members of Galilee Baptist Church in Panola, Ala.

Mike and Kim Cloyd of Pelham, Ala., are the parents of Matthew Cloyd, one of three former college students who pleaded guilty to federal charges in the church arsons.

Matthew Cloyd, 21, Benjamin Moseley, 20, and Russell DeBusk, 20, await sentencing in federal court and also face state charges in the arson case.

-- Associated Press

PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH

Tennessee Congregation Votes to Leave

Signal Mountain Presbyterian Church of Signal, Tenn., has voted to leave the Presbyterian Church (USA) because of the congregation's theological differences with the national denomination.

The 2,000-member church voted overwhelmingly Sunday to break away and join the Evangelical Presbyterian Church, which has fewer than 200 churches and a more conservative view of Scripture than the 2.3 million-member Presbyterian Church.

The Presbyterian Church has been struggling for years to reconcile members who disagree over many religious issues, including ordaining partnered gays.

The Presbytery of East Tennessee will now consider whether the Signal Mountain church can keep its property.

-- Associated Press

INDIANA SENATE

Prayer Begins Session as Ruling Awaited

The Indiana Senate began its session Monday with a prayer for the first time since a federal judge's ruling barred sectarian House invocations as part of legislative business.

The Senate had been observing a moment of silence at the start of each session day since November 2005, when U.S. District Judge David Hamilton ruled that House prayers that mentioned Jesus Christ amounted to state endorsement of a religion. That case is on appeal to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 7th Circuit in Chicago.

Senate leaders said members felt it was important to return to oral prayer, even if the invocations cannot mention Jesus. Sen. Dennis Kruse (R) gave the opening prayer, which asked for "divine guidance."

-- Associated Press