Associated Press
Wednesday, March 15, 2000; Page A11

COLUMBIA, S.C., March 14—Bob Jones University dropped from its Web site statements from its president calling Catholicism and Mormonism cults.

A new message on the site has Bob Jones III recounting how he contemplated on Christmas Eve "the growing worldwide hostility toward the evangelizing efforts of Bible-believing Christians."

But gone is the "President's Corner" message that was there as late as March 2 in which Jones said, "The diminution of evangelistic enterprise to cults which call themselves Christian, including Catholicism and Mormonism, is frightening."

The language was cited repeatedly after Texas Gov. George W. Bush was criticized for speaking on campus Feb. 2 in his campaign for the Republican presidential nomination, which he appears to have won.

Bush's rival Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) made the visit a campaign issue, and Bush later apologized repeatedly for not challenging the school's interracial dating ban and anti-Catholic views.

On March 3, as the attacks on the school continued, Jones lifted the dating ban.

Mary Shamblin, secretary to school spokesman Jonathan Pait, said the president's message on the Web site comes from the school's quarterly magazine.

"Every time that comes out [the Web page] is updated and, as I understand it, they were a couple of issues behind," Shamblin said. "It's up to date now." She said she did not know when it was changed.

Jones's father and grandfather, who founded the school, were unabashed critics of Catholicism. Bob Jones Jr. once said he would rather "speak to the devil himself" than meet Pope John Paul II during a visit to South Carolina in 1987.