‘No more Nazi analogies,’ religious leaders urge. Religious leaders are calling on their colleagues and politicians to keep comparisons to Nazism and the Holocaust out of American public policy debates. The Interfaith Alliance responded to a recent onslaught of references to Adolf Hitler and the Holocaust, particularly as an analogy to the current discussion on health care reform. “There is no place in civil debate for the use of these types of metaphors,” 15 religious leaders said in an open letter. “Perpetrators of such language harm rather than help both the integrity of the democratic process and the credibility of religious commentary.” In one instance, Richard Land, the president of the Southern Baptist Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission, compared the proposed healthcare reforms to “what the Nazis did,” and gave an award to President Obama’s chief health care advisor that was named for a Nazi physician. Land later apologized in a letter to Abraham Foxman, the national director of the Anti-Defamation League. Other use of Nazi imagery has come from the Republican National Committee and Fox News Channel personality Glenn Beck.
Dissident Anglicans may join Catholics. The Vatican announced plans to open its doors to Anglicans upset with their church’s growing acceptance of homosexuality and women clergy. Citing many requests from Anglicans around the world, the Vatican said Pope Benedict XVI would permit the establishment of new national dioceses in which former Anglicans can join the Roman Catholic Church while retaining many of their traditional forms of worship. Each diocese will be headed by a former Anglican clergyman, who will exercise an administrative and leadership role equivalent to that of a bishop. Unmarried men in such positions also will be eligible for ordination as Catholic bishops, giving them the power to ordain new priests. Anglican clergy who already are married will be eligible for ordination as Catholic priests — but not bishops — within the new structures.
Vietnam criticized for persecution. Human rights activists are criticizing Vietnam for expelling followers of a renowned Buddhist monk from a monastery, calling it part of a pattern of religious persecution by the Communist government. The criticism, from New York-based Human Rights Watch, echoes concerns raised by the U.S. Embassy in Hanoi about the expulsion of the followers of longtime peace activist and Buddhist leader Thich Nhat Hanh. The monk returned to Vietnam in 2005 after 39 years in exile and opened the monastery with the government’s blessing. But the monastery, in the southern Vietnamese province of Lam Dong, has attracted large numbers of followers, apparently fueling fears by authorities. Police cordoned off the monastery, and undercover officers forcibly entered the monastery and forced 150 monks out, the advocacy group said. The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom has asked the State Department to list Vietnam among its “countries of particular concern” because of violations of human rights and freedom of religion. Vietnam was dropped from the list in 2006.
Compiled from Religion News Service