Wallis Calls Bush Plan 'Criminal'

1. Many Christian pundits willing to say war is unjust, but few talking about troop increase Call it an escalation, call it a temporary surge, call it whatever you want, but it seems clear that there’s a new approach—in Jim Wallis‘s rhetoric on the Iraq War. “The war in Iraq was unjust; to continue it now is criminal,” he writes in his latest online column. “There is no winning in Iraq. This was a war that should have never been fought—or won. It can’t be won, and the truth is that there are no good solutions now—that’s how unjust wars often turn out. … [W]e have already failed in Iraq.” Wallis did not directly state that Bush should be charged with a crime.

Kudos to Wallis for being one of the few religious leaders directly addressing Bush’s plan to send 20,000 additional troops to Iraq. Over at Newsweek/The Washington Post‘s On Faith blog, Richard Mouw Miroslav Volf, and others are calling the Iraq war unjust, but are not talking about the troop increase. (In fairness, they weren’t really asked about it. The question was: “President Bush is preparing this week to send more troops to Baghdad. Do you believe there is such a thing as a ‘just war’? Is the Iraq war ‘just’?”)

Associated Baptist Press asked several past supporters of the Iraq war whether they still support it. Charles Colson and Richard Land declined to respond directly, but Daniel Heimbach, professor of Christian ethics at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary, was willing to say the war “was and continues to be, in retrospect, justified or justifiable” on the basis on enforcing the terms of Iraq’s 1991 surrender. Heimbach didn’t directly address the troop increase, but offered this calculus: “If it gets to the point that continuing to fight is costing more than whatever is at stake in winning the fight, then you should stop. Now, I for myself don’t think that we’re at that point. I think that we’re making significant progress. While you shouldn’t be engaging in a war lightly without counting the costs, neither should you quickly, after investing so much in terms of life and property, say, ‘I’m just getting tired; let’s get out.'”

2. Christians praise execution order While Christian leaders were largely critical of the execution of Saddam Hussein, Nigeria’s Christian leaders are chief cheerleaders for the execution of Emeka Ezeuko, a pastor who calls himself Reverend King. Back in July, the general overseer of the Christian Praying Assembly doused seven of his parishioners with gasoline and set them ablaze, making allusions to the flames of hell and his parishioners’ “burning with lust.” (Ezeuko claimed he had nothing to do with the incident; the judge cited “overwhelming evidence placing him at the scene.”) The heads of the Methodist Church of Nigeria and the Pentecostal Fellowship of Nigeria both praised Ezeuko’s sentence: Death by hanging. “The law has taken its rightful course,” says PFN’s Bishop Joseph Ojo. “It shows that the Nigerian judiciary can be trusted. Nigeria would soon come out of the woods.”

3. Weblog was kidding “By all means, let’s start having our governmental leaders weigh in by proxy on denominational disputes. Why aren’t Clinton and Carter leading the debate on whether Southern Baptists should speak in tongues?” —Weblog, Jan. 4.

“Former presidents Carter and Clinton call for ‘A New Baptist Covenant.'” —Baptist Press, Jan. 10.

I didn’t know this was in the works. Hmm. … By all means, let’s start giving big pay raises to the guy who runs the CT Weblog. Why aren’t Christian millionaires leading the way on writing checks to Christianity Today to support this effort?

4. Dallas Morning News closes its award-winning religion section The paper’s award-winning section, much praised by Christianity Today and others, is disappearing as religion coverage “will move to the Metro section.” It’s a move that’s widely seen as a cutback in religion coverage, though staff cutbacks happened quite some time ago.

The section “was topical, well-written and compellingly designed and won the top prize for best section from the Religion Newswriters Association five out of six years running,” notes Lakeland (Fla.) Ledger religion editor Cary McMullen. “It was the zenith, the gold standard of what specialized reporting on religion in a secular newspaper could be.”

News editor Bob Mong says the specialized reporting won’t go away. “Our emphasis on religion’s going to be strong,” he told the local alternative paper. “It’ll be different, but it’ll be good. We just didn’t get any advertising support for it. The core writers we have for it will continue to be there, and the amount of space we devote will be adequate for what we need, and it will let us do more Page One stories. As far as the devotion to the topic, it’s important to me, and we’re going to take it very seriously. It’ll just be in a slightly different format.” (Jeff Weiss and Sam Hodges will stay on the beat; religion editor Bruce Tomaso is being reassigned as his position is eliminated.)

For many papers, Religion Newswriters Association executive director Debra Mason said in an organizational newsletter, “the Dallas news is ho-hum. That’s because hundreds of daily newspapers do not and never have had religion sections. Instead, religion news is integrated throughout the paper.” There may be a lesson about format, but this is not “the beginning of the end for the religion beat. … We should not confuse religion sections with religion news as a whole. … If Dallas couldn’t make money from its religion section, few others will be able to, either. No editor in the country staked more of his heart or reputation on religion coverage than Bob Mong. He fought hard for the section and continues to be a religion news champion.”

Mason says she’s more disheartened by the news that The Wichita Eagle has laid off religion editor Tom Schaefer—and that this is the latest in several newspaper religion cutbacks.

If you’re sad about the Dallas Morning News, though, be of good cheer. The paper’s religion blog is becoming a must-read. Reporters for the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, Chicago Sun-Times, Colorado Springs Gazette, London Times, The Oregonian, Mobile Press-Register, Greensboro News-Record, and other newspapers also have really good official and unofficial blogs that should be in your bookmarks or blog readers if you like the CT Weblog.

5. Who funds the National Council of Churches? Back in 1983, the Institute on Religion and Democracy helped Reader’s Digest ask the question, “Do You Know Where Your Church Offerings Go?” The article charged that the National Council of Churches “supports Marxist-Leninist movements in the Third World” both through advocacy and direct funds. This week, the organization looked at the flow of money into the NCC. “Mostly liberal foundations are donating as much if not more than the member churches that the NCC is supposed to be representing,” the organization says. The NCC responds chiefly by noting that IRD is largely funded by conservative foundations. Get Religion’s Mollie Hemingway asks:

Considering that the Institute on Religion and Democracy has programs designed to help conservative laypeople in Methodist, Episcopal and Presbyterian churches who oppose their liberal leadership and liberal political agenda, where exactly would one expect their funds to come from? Church headquarters? … The two groups have completely different claims and completely different approaches. NCC claims to be an association of denominations. IRD does not. Whether or not the NCC gets more than half of its funding from churches or liberal foundations is an interesting question. The IRD does not claim to be an association of churches. And again, only one of these groups actually lobbies Congress. The other lobbies churches, more or less.

Quote of the day “I swear by my people and my country that will I not rest my arm or my soul as we build a new political system, a new social system, a new economic system. I swear by Christ, the greatest socialist in history, I will follow the wonderful mandates of this constitution, even if it costs me my own life and my own peace. Country, socialism or death, I swear it.”

—Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez, in his Jan. 10 inaugural address.

Iraq and Middle East | Church of the Holy Sepulchre | Sudan | Refugees | Military | Life ethics | Stem cells | Nigeria pastor to hang for murder | Crime | Religious freedom | Abortionist murder | Abuse | NPR series on abuse | Church life | Poland | Anglicanism | Baptists | IRD report on NCC funding | Money and business | Missions & ministry | Media and entertainment | Politics | Mitt Romney | Sexual ethics | U.K. protest against gay rights bill | U.K religion | Church and state | Education | Evolution | These kids today | People | Other stories of interest

Iraq and Middle East:

A criminal escalation of an unjust war | The war in Iraq was unjust; to continue it now is criminal (Jim Wallis, Sojourners)
Do Baptist leaders regret justifying Iraq war? | Statements from Richard Land, Charles Colson, and Daniel Heimbach (Associated Baptist Press)
A Christian exodus from the Arab world | Violence, terrorism and the Islamists’ growing influence pose a threat to Christianity in the Middle East. In some countries, members of an unpopular Christian minority are already fighting for their survival — or fleeing for their lives (Der Spiegel, Germany)
Muslim conflict splits Lebanese Christians | Hezbollah disarmament a key bone of contention (Montreal Gazette)

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