August 2008 Archives

The holy Islamic month of Ramadan begins Monday, and it's causing some clock confusion in the Middle East, the Associated Press is reporting.

Egypt and the Palestinians are falling back an hour far earlier than usual, trying to reduce daylight hours for Muslims fasting until sunset in oppressive summer temperatures.

Here's the applicable definition of "fast" based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary. Breaking fast during Ramadan is often done with a piece of date. Pictured above are mahyoosa, or date paste cookies.

We're able to keep up with Amish migration trends thanks to a new study by the Young Center for Anabaptist and Pietist Studies at Elizabethtown College.

The Amish are expanding their presence in states such as Missouri, Kentucky and Minnesota as they search for affordable farmland to accommodate a growing population, the Associated Press reported this week.

There's been a lot of religion content at the Democratic National Convention this week in Denver.

If you missed it, U.S. Sen. Bob Casey Jr. of Pennsylvania took the convention stage Tuesday, telling the crowd that Obama could bring together supporters and opponents of abortion rights.

Remember that Casey's dad, who was also anti-abortion, was excluded from the 1992 convention, which many Catholics and evangelicals took as a snub. Religious leaders had urged Obama to invite Casey to speak to make up for that slight.

Two York pastors passed away recently -- the Revs. Paul Diener and Henry G. Springer.

Diener, 79, died Aug. 19 at York Hospital. As a professor at York College, he taught religion, ethics and philosophy for 23 years and chaired the humanities department.

He was pastor of Christ United Methodist Church in York from 1971-76. He served as a missionary in the Philippines with the Board of Global Ministries and taught at Silliman University there. He helped found the York Interfaith Alliance and was past president of York Habitat for Humanity.

In its original sense, "epistle" refers to one of the 21 letters found in the New Testament.

The apostle Paul, for example, had much to say. What he wrote are considered epistles because they were written in letter form to a particular person or group.

Here's a formal definition of "epistolary" I swiped from my husband's Page-A-Day calendar.

What does a political candidate's personal wealth say about their faith and character?

That is a question posed by blogger David Waters over at Under God. Waters is the editor of Newsweek/ washingtonpost.com's On Faith and former religion columnist for a daily newspaper in Memphis.

Waters notes that Jesus admonished the rich to take less and give more, trying to get them to see it's not what they have but what they do for others that matters.

Waters argues that the church that measures candidates on issues such as abortion, war and gay marriage should also consider wealth (ours and theirs).

Look for a story in Thursday's religion section about the new memorial garden at St. Paul's Lutheran Church in York.

columbarium

noun

(a) A dovecote or pigeon house.

(b) A vault with niches for urns containing ashes of the dead.

(c) One of the niches in such a vault.

A footnote: The term comes from the Latin columba (dove) and originally referred to compartmentalized housing for doves and pigeons.

Sens. John McCain and Barack Obama had an advance look at a few questions asked by the Rev. Rick Warren at Saturday's forum on faith at the Saddleback Church in California, the Washington Post is reporting.

Spokesman A. Larry Ross said megachurch pastor Warren provided McCain and Obama with the four subject areas -- leadership, stewardship, worldview and international compassion -- and a sense of the themes he'd touch on.

He also offered a few questions: What is your greatest moral failure? What is America's greatest moral failure? Who are the three people you rely on for wise advice?

The interviews were billed as frank conversations to which the candidates would offer off-the-cuff responses.

I was out of town and missed the forum. If you watched, how did the candidates handle questions about their faith? Did it change at all how you think about either candidate?

The Rev. Troy Perry of the Metropolitan Community Churches will speak at the fall convocation of Lancaster Theological Seminary 11 a.m. Sept. 18 in the Santee Chapel.

MCC is probably the most prominent of the small, Christian denominations dedicated to ministering to the GLBT community. The 43,000-member church specifically endorses gay clergy.

MCC was founded in 1968 (a year before New York's Stonewall Riots) to provide "a primary, positive ministry" to gays, lesbians, bisexual and transgender people, according to its Web site. Perry began the church in suburban Los Angeles after he was defrocked by a Pentecostal denomination because of his homosexuality.

Perry will speak on "Imagining the Church's Ministry Based on Luke 4:18-19."

A Unitarian pastor has written a book, "The Gospel According to Bruce Springsteen: Rock and Redemption from Asbury Park to Magic."

From "Born to Run" to "The Rising," the Boss's lyrics lend themselves to theological interpretation, author Jeffrey Symynkywicz told NPR Sunday.

The Harvard-trained minister is an uber Springsteen fan whose sermons contain many a reference to the Boss. He has parsed Springsteen lyrics and explored the history and context of the music and the ways his songs express spiritual themes.

"Hope is never far from the surface in his music. And it's not a pie-in-the-sky, Pollyanna, easy-optimism kind of hope," said Symynkywicz, pastor of First Parish Universalist Church in Stoughton, Mass.

After reading about the 250th anniversary of the Codorus Church of the Brethren in Springfield Township recently, York Daily Record/Sunday News editor Jim McClure had some thoughts about why so few Brethren, Mennonites or Amish settled in York County in the late 1700s and 1800s, preferring to stay east of the Susquehanna River in Lancaster farm country.

Anabaptists got their name when they organized because they denied the scriptural validity of infant baptism, baptizing adult converts or believers instead. They focused not on proper theology or liturgy but on godly living based on the Sermon on the Mount.

Bishops of the worldwide Anglican Communion meet once a decade in Canterbury, England, for the Lambeth Conference.

Central Pennsylvania Episcopal Bishop Nathan Baxter and his wife, York native Mary Ellen Walker, attended the three-week event for the first time, joining 650 other bishops representing the world's third-largest Christian body. He kept an online journal while at Lambeth, and The Middle Pew blog reprinted excerpts.

(At right, Baxter, second from left, poses with Bishops Ronald Ferris, John Goddard, Andrew Nakamura and leaders of a they visited mosque in Burnley, England.)

Who knew it was also a verb? Not I.

It's pronounced dee-kuhn.

Check back later in the month for the launch of our new religion and ethics blog.

In the meantime, you can find coverage of faith-related news here.