=== Waco / Branch Davidians
1. Judge Orders Waco Evidence

=== Catholic God's Spirit
2. Raps set vs cops involved in cult slays

=== Falun Gong
3. INS Struggles With Sect Cases

=== Scientology
4. Scientology Street Recruiting Illegal

=== Buddhism
5. More blacks turning to Buddhism
6. Buddhists Seek Asylum for Leader in India
7. Report: China Expels Tibetan Monks

=== Mormonism
8. Critics gather at temple
9. LDS Defender Began Crusade as a Theological Punching Bag
10. Indelible & Devout

=== Paganism / Witchcraft
11. Web of Witchcraft

=== Hate Groups
12. Alleged hate group may face religious blockade
13. Bigotry Racism lingers
14. South African Neo-Nazi Leader Released From Jail
15. Neo-Nazis Voice Regret For Killing
16. Tough Neo-Nazi Sentences Sought

=== Other News
17. Search for Attleboro cult boys in Maine lake comes up empty
18. Appeals Court Revives Procter & Gamble Lawsuit Against Amway
19. Amway Vindicated by Federal Appeals Court; 'No Facts' to P&G's
Claims in Satanism Lawsuit
20. FBI watching charity group that raised millions
21. Witness says victim had cult links
22. Join In, He Asked Religious Leaders, and 2,000 Will
23. Potter Stirs Magic Society Interest

=== Religious Freedom / Religious Intolerance
24. No Pray, No Play
25. Schools Holds Football Field Prayers

=== Death Penalty / False Memory Syndrome
26. Death-Penalty Convictions Can Rest On Flimsy Evidence Eyewitness
Testimony Is Both Believable And Unreliable

=== Noted
27. Breathing Lessons From the Master (Sri Sri Ravi Shankar)
28. ''Anybody can be sucked into a cult''

=== Books / Internet
29. Web Support For Those Who Change Their Religious Path
30. Review: Waiting for the UFOs


=== Waco / Branch Davidians

1. Judge Orders Waco Evidence
AOL/AP, Aug. 26, 2000
http://my.aol.com/news/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
WACO, Texas (AP) - The judge who presided over the Branch Davidians' wrongful death lawsuit against the government has ordered that new evidence in the case be turned over to his court.

The evidence was not identified in U.S. District Judge Walter S. Smith's order on Friday. The judge said the U.S. Attorney's office in Waco found relevant evidence and may be reluctant to turn it over.

Attorneys for the plaintiffs and government could not be reached for comment Saturday.
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


=== Catholic God's Spirit

2. Raps set vs cops involved in cult slays
The Manila Times (Philippines), Aug. 24, 2000
http://www.manilatimes.net/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
Philippine National Police Director General Panfilo Lacson yesterday ordered the filing of administrative charges against nine policemen who participated in the killing of 16 members of the Catholic God Spirit in Bukidnon on Aug. 11.

Lacson directed Criminal Investigation and Detection Group (CIDG) head Chief Supt. Francisco Zubia to file the charges before the Office of the Ombudsman.
(...)

However, Lacson has apparently started siding with his beleaguered policemen after a review of the video footage of the massacre of the 16 cultists.

''I am not retracting my previous statement that it was plain and simple murder. But as I review the footage and as the witnesses speak, the complexion changed… yes, but not my perception,'' Lacson said.
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


=== Falun Gong

3. INS Struggles With Sect Cases
San Jose Mercury News, Aug. 26, 2000
http://www7.mercurycenter.com/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
(...)
He did it so that every morning at dawn, he can stand in his friend's spare bedroom, feet slightly apart, eyes shut, breath steady, mind clear and arms moving in the smooth rhythmic motions prescribed by the Falun Dafa sect, popularly known as Falun Gong.

If he tried to do this in China, he could be interrogated, tortured or killed. He didn't even want his name used because just talking about his beliefs in the United States could pose a threat to family and friends back home.

That surgeon represents the latest thorny question facing U.S. immigration officials: what to do with the thousands of Chinese seeking asylum after their government's crackdown on Falun Gong a year ago.

U.S. immigration officials are taking a crash course on the nuances of the sect formed in the early 1990s by a former Chinese grain clerk now living in New York. His teachings promote exercise and mediation to arrive at enlightenment, supernatural powers and salvation.

The trick for U.S. officials is to try to distinguish between a genuine Falun Gong follower who might come to harm in China and an opportunist trying to get an easy green card.

In that process, U.S. immigration officials are adding another sentence to the definition of ``freedom.''

``It is a challenge to figure out who is telling the truth,'' said Bill Strassberger, with the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service in Washington, D.C. ``But we'd rather let in a few people who aren't legitimate Falun Gong followers than send one person back to China who could be persecuted there.''
(...)

The INS does not separate asylum applications into categories -- such as one for Falun Gong cases and another for political or religious persecution cases -- but agency officials estimate that several hundred Chinese nationals have been granted asylum since their government's ban last year. That is a significant number, because last year, 5,218 applications from Chinese people seeking asylum were filed or reopened. Only 943 were granted for claims including Falun Gong.

The number of Falun Gong asylum applications has steadily risen during the past year, according to the Justice Department's Executive Office for Immigration Review, which also grants asylum.
(...)

``It is an evil cult,'' said Xiao Zhong Yang, a Chinese government official in San Francisco. ``No responsible government could tolerate this.''

Yang said Falun Gong urges its members to avoid modern medicine and teaches that the human race will soon become extinct and that only the group's founder, Li Hongzhi, can save them.

Some U.S. academics also have branded Falun Gong a cult because of its belief in extraterrestrial life and levitation. But all the INS says cares about is whether practitioners could face persecution in their homeland.
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


=== Scientology

4. Scientology Street Recruiting Illegal
Stuttgarter Nachrichten (Germany), Aug. 26, 2000
Translation:
http://cisar.org/000826a.htm
[Story no longer online? Read this]
Once again a ban on recruiting on the streets and squares in Stuttgart will be strictly enforced for the Scientology Organization. This was stated by Executive Mayor Wolfgang Schuster. Specifically, members and staff of ''Dianetik Stuttgart Scientology Kirche e.V.'' are prohibited from verbally accosting pedestrians on public land and inviting them to meetings for more information. Also, the association may not distribute brochures. The codes office has been instructed to follow up on every instance of illicit conduct. Scientology has been under observation since 1997 by State Constitutional Security because studies have yielded points indicative of endeavors counter to the Constitution. The ban on recruiting has been upheld by the Stuttgart Administrative Court and by the Baden-Wuerttemberg Superior Administrative Court.
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


=== Buddhism

5. More blacks turning to Buddhism
Pioneer Planet, Aug. 26, 2000
http://www.pioneerplanet.com/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
(...)
``The basic tenets of Buddhism were very much in agreement with my own intuitive beliefs about life that really had been in conflict with Catholicism,'' said Chargoais, who was introduced to Buddhism at age 28 by the wife of a college friend. ``Three to six months after I first really started looking into Buddhism, I made a commitment to practice it seriously.''

So seriously that 21 years later daily chanting is as much a fixture in Chargoais' weekly routine as Sunday Mass once was. She has become the spiritual kin of an untold number of African-Americans -- from jazz pianist Herbie Hancock to rock legend Tina Turner -- who have found a spiritual haven in the ancient religion.

There are no hard figures on the number of American Buddhists in the United States, but estimates hover somewhere around several hundred thousand, said Bill Aiken, vice general director for the Buddhist sect Soka Gakkai 13th International USA. The group is the American lay organization of Buddhism's Nichiren Daishonin denomination.

``No one knows exactly how many Buddhists -- let alone African-American Buddhists -- are in the United States,'' said Aiken, noting that his 100,000-member denomination has some 20,000 African-Americans, the most of any Buddhist group. ``There are a lot of people who identify themselves as Buddhists, but it's still hard to get an accurate count because of the people we call `nightstand Buddhists' -- they have a book by the Dalai Lama on their nightstand and they're influenced by Buddhist teachings, but they maintain their affiliation with another church.''

Buddhism began with the teachings of the sixth century B.C. Indian prince Siddhartha Gautama, but the religion requires no allegiance to a central religious authority. Buddhism's estimated 300 million followers worldwide are found mainly in the Far East and share, among other things, a belief that meditation and study can lead anyone to ultimate wisdom and peace.

Such an egalitarian principle appeals strongly to African-Americans, said Ronnie Smith, a Soka Gakkai regional director who converted to Buddhism about 28 years ago after his mother lured him to a meeting in the hopes he could find help to turn his life around.
(...)

For Smith, Buddhism's message of peace and harmony was instantly appealing, but the Eastern religion seemed light-years away from his Baptist heritage. Many of Smith's family and friends were skeptical of his new faith.

``In the beginning people were very surprised that I was interested in Buddhism because traditionally African-Americans come from a Christian background,'' he said. ``Some people would tell me I was going to hell and those sorts of things, but now they respect me for (becoming Buddhist) because they have seen its positive effect on my life and my family's life.''
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


6. Buddhists Seek Asylum for Leader in India
New York Times, Aug. 27, 2000
http://www.nytimes.com/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
Representatives of a major Buddhist order have petitioned the Indian government to grant asylum and freedom of movement to their 15-year-old leader, the Karmapa, who remains under virtual house arrest at a monastery in northern India eight months after fleeing Tibet.

About 400 of his followers from around the world, including a contingent from the order's American headquarters in Woodstock, N.Y., met in India last week to consider their next moves in a campaign to have the immigration status of the Karmapa clarified by India, which he entered illegally in January after a grueling overland Himalayan trek from Tibet through Nepal.

The Karmapa's followers are also demanding that he be allowed to take charge of his school's primary monastery outside Tibet, at Rumtek, in the Indian state of Sikkim.

The young religious leader, Ugyen Trinley Dorje, is recognized by Buddhists of the Kagyu school -- one of four main branches of Tibetan Buddhism -- as their leading reincarnated lama, or teacher.

Large communities of Kagyu Buddhists live in Europe, North America and East Asia. Their headquarters in the United States is the Karma Triyana Dharmachakra Center in upstate New York, a site chosen by the young Karmapa's predecessor. The monastery, known as K.T.D., is the largest Kagyu center outside the Himalayas. Monks and lay residents at the center expect that the Karmapa will come to Woodstock to stay for extended periods, once he is free to travel.
(...)

The Indian government has not replied to the request for asylum, American Buddhist leaders say. India faces a complicated situation in dealing with the Karmapa. His flight from the Tsurphu monastery, near the Tibetan capital, Lhasa, was an embarrassment to the Chinese government, with which India is attempting to improve relations.

Moreover, China's perceived enemy, the Dalai Lama, leader of another Buddhist school but recognized universally as Tibetan Buddhism's foremost figure and the leader of a Tibetan government in exile, has joined in demanding the Karmapa's release, saying that it was wrong to prevent him from taking up his religious duties and the higher studies he has said he went to India to pursue.

At a news conference in Los Angeles in June, the Dalai Lama said that the Karmapa would be an important symbol for new generations of Buddhists. ''Buddhist spirituality needs to be carried on,'' he said.
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


7. Report: China Expels Tibetan Monks
Associated Press, Aug. 26, 2000
http://beta.yellowbrix.com/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
BEIJING (AP) -- Officials in Chinese-ruled Tibet have expelled monks from Tibetan Buddhism's holiest shrine and ransacked homes looking for pictures of the Dalai Lama, a monitoring group reported Saturday.

Government teams began house-to-house searches in Tibet's capital, Lhasa, last month and have thrown religious objects and pictures of the Dalai Lama into the Tsangpo River, the London-based Tibetan Information Network reported.

Primarily targeting Communist Party members and government employees, including teachers, the general population has also been ordered to teach children atheism, the group said.

The actions are part of a 4-year-old campaign intended to break the fervently Buddhist Tibetan people's allegiance to the Dalai Lama, Tibet's temporal and spiritual leader who fled to India 41 years ago amid a failed uprising against Chinese rule.

Party and government leaders decided to renew the campaign at a meeting in April in Chengdu, the Sichuan provincial capital, Tibet Information Network said.

It added that they were likely motivated by the escape to India in January of the Karmapa, a high-ranking cleric China hoped to use to win over Tibetans.
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


=== Mormonism

8. Critics gather at temple
The Birmingham News, Aug. 24, 2000
http://www.al.com/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
Visitors to the new Mormon temple in Gardendale are likely to be greeted this week by non Mormons handing out pamphlets.

The tracts explain differences in teaching between the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints - popularly known as Mormons - and other denominations.

''We're not out here to cause a fight,'' said Bob Waldrep, Alabama director of Watchman Fellowship, an evangelical ''counter-cult'' group. ''This is not about bashing the Mormon faith.''

Watchman Fellowship, the North Jefferson Baptist Association and volunteers from 20 churches have set up tents on the grounds of the Church at Gardendale on Fieldstown Road and at First Assembly of God across from the Mormon temple at the corner of Mount Olive Road and U.S. 31.

Latter-day Saints officials hesitate to criticize the tract passing - their own missionaries knock on doors and pass out tracts - but it's obvious they're disappointed.

''Mostly we've gotten glowing reports and a great reception from the community,'' said Richard May, the regional, or stake, president of the Latter day Saints.
(...)

Watchman Fellowship leaders said they wish Mormons would quit concealing doctrinal differences with mainstream Christians.

''You make a covenant not to reveal the secrets,'' said former Mormon missionary Timothy Oliver, director of research for Watchman Fellowship in Texas. ''They call me a covenant breaker.''

Oliver, who took part in dozens of proxy rituals for the dead in the Mormon temples in Arizona and Utah, said the temple rituals teach secret handshakes that are necessary to get past angels in the afterlife. Such practices are unbiblical, said Oliver, who is handing out tracts this week.

''The Mormons know what we're saying is accurate,'' Waldrep said. ''They want it to remain a secret.''
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]

* Watchman Fellowship resources on Mormonism
http://www.watchman.org/mormonm.htm

9. LDS Defender Began Crusade as a Theological Punching Bag
The Salt Lake Tribune, Aug. 26, 2000
http://beta.yellowbrix.com/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
Darryl Barksdale traces his call to defend Mormonism against its critics to Downey, Calif., where as an 8-year-old he found himself perched atop a cinderblock fence arguing with a Catholic playmate about the nature of God.
''Maria attended a Catholic school, and while I don't remember much about those discussions . . . I always lost. Always. She was deadly,'' said Barksdale, today president of the 2,000-member Foundation for Apologetic Information and Research (FAIR).
(...)

He forgot the encounter for 25 years. Then one night, surfing the Internet, Barksdale came across the same debate -- God as spirit vs. God as supernatural yet corporeal being -- in an online forum on Mormonism.

''Thus began my journey into the wonderful world of LDS apologetics,'' Barksdale, now 42, said in opening remarks prepared for the two-day Mormon Apologetics Symposium, which began Thursday at Alta's Peruvian Lodge. ''I sorted through the posts in my mind. 'Yup, I can answer that.' 'Yup, that too.' 'Whoa. Never saw that one before. . . . '

''When I found arguments that I couldn't answer, I researched them,'' he added. ''And an amazing transformation took place. I had a testimony of the gospel. I knew it was true on a spiritual level. I had always wondered, however, about the intellectual.''

Barksdale also found he was not alone. Three and a half years ago, the Ben Lomond, Calif., educational software consultant joined with like-minded Mormon scholars he had met online to found FAIR. The group held its first symposium in June 1999 near San Francisco, focusing on the LDS Church's purported doctrinal links to early Christianity.

This year's theme has a harder edge: ''The Methodology of Deceit: Tactics and Methods of LDS Critics.''

''Since the earliest days of the church, members have felt that many of the attacks made against the church were based on spurious interpretations of scripture, and quite often, dishonest representations of LDS doctrines,'' Barksdale said. ''This conference is an opportunity . . . to highlight these tactics and defend the church against them.''
(...)

While not officially sanctioned by the LDS Church, Barksdale said this year's symposium expected to hear from such noted Mormon scholars and researchers as Daniel Peterson, L. Ara Norwood and Daniel Bachman.

It will not be hearing from one of the 11 million-member faith's most reviled foes, Ed Decker, founder of the Issaquah, Wash.-based Saints Alive in Jesus and author of such LDS exposs as ''The Godmakers.''

Earlier this summer, rumors flew that Decker had asked to address the symposium, perhaps to repent and return to the LDS fold.

Decker quickly quashed the reports, while acknowledging he had contacted FAIR about speaking, but denying he had any intention of coming back to the church he left in 1976. Now a ''born again'' Christian, Decker said had he spoken to the group, he planned to point out the doctrinal differences between Mormonism and orthodox Christianity.
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]

* Mormons are not Christians, and do not represent Biblical Christianity.
Theologically, Mormonism is a cult of Christianity.

Saints Alive is not a recommended resource on the subject of Mormonism

10. Indelible & Devout
The Salt Lake Tribune, Aug. 26, 2000
http://beta.yellowbrix.com/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
Decorating the body with emblems of religious faith is a tradition that spans thousands of years.

The Aztecs adorned themselves with images of Quetzalcoatl, the feathered serpent God they worshiped. Egyptians mummies have been found with sun symbols tattooed into their preserved flesh. Members of indigenous North American tribes marked themselves with the symbol of their protective spirit in hopes it would watch over them. And ancient sailors sought tattoos of crucifixes and Christian fish symbols, which they believed would protect them from sea monsters and from falling off the edge of the Earth.

Today, religious tattoos fill much the same purpose, serving as signs of faith and pleas for protection, said Joe Hanussak, owner of Doc Holliday Tattooing and Piercing, 4777 S. State St.
(...)

''I love Utah, and for me the temple represents Utah,'' said Sharon Brouse, a tattoo artist at Artistic Skin Illustrations in Salt Lake City who has a paperback-book size Salt Lake LDS Temple tattooed on one shoulder. ''I'm definitely LDS, and I love my religion.''

So why not show it? That's a main impetus for getting a tattoo -- a desire to make a statement about something you care about, said Kelly Miller, owner of Suzie M's Gallery of Fine Tattooing, 1361 S. State St.

Which may be why a number of Mormons and missionaries for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints want ''CTR'' tattoos. The acronym stands for ''Choose The Right,'' a mantra taught to Mormon children in grade school.
(...)

''There is no recorded doctrine stating tattooing is wrong,'' Hanussak said. ''If it were true, they wouldn't let me go to the temple.''

Dale Bills, spokesman for the LDS Church, cites the following as official policy on tattoos and body piercing: ''Whether or not one's ears should be pierced for fashion purposes is a personal decision left to the individual, or, in the case of a minor, the parents. As for tattoos and the piercing of other parts of the body for the wearing of rings, such activities are, of course, also left to the individual.''

Carri Jenkins, spokeswoman for LDS Church-owned Brigham Young University in Provo, said the school has no policy against tattoos, but they are discouraged because members are urged to care for and respect their bodies.

In his book Mormon Doctrine, former LDS Apostle Bruce R. McConkie said tattoos desecrate the human body and ''should not be permitted,'' singling out in particular Mormon servicemen. And Roger Keller, a professor of church history and doctrine at BYU, said because the faith doesn't support the use of religious symbols, tattoos would seem to contradict LDS standards.
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]

* In Mormonism, doctrine can change at the drop of a hat, as the Mormon ''God''
changes his mind from time to time.

See: The Changing World of Mormonism (Online book)

=== Paganism / Witchcraft

11. Web of Witchcraft
Fox News, Aug. 25, 2000
http://www.foxnews.com/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
Witches from around the world are taking to the Web to spread their message: ''The modern Neo-Pagan movement cannot be denied.''

Followers of these so-called alternative religions have flocked to claim their share of cyber space, creating one of the most prolific online communities.

''We thank the goddess every day for the Internet,'' said Wren Walker, co-founder of Witchvox.com, also known as The Witch's Voice. Walker says it is the most popular site on the Web for information and news on witchcraft, Wicca and paganism.
(...)

Pagans also claim to have won the race to the Web. Pagan, Wiccan and witch group sites were virtually double the number of Christian church sites in 1992, according to figures accumulated for the pagan church of Y Tylwyth Teg by World Wide Web Worm and Web Crawler, two of the biggest search engines at the time.
(...)

The Internet provides instant access to annals of information on these ancient practices - once you had to know somebody who knew somebody, Walker said, and now you only need to search for the correct keyword.

''Access to the information is the key difference that the Internet revolution has brought to pagan traditions,'' said Rev. J. Gordon Melton, director of the Institute for the Study of American Religions and author of The Encyclopedia of American Religions. He says paganism is one of the most rapidly growing religious movements in the West.

''Teenagers interested in witchcraft have a free range of access to a wealth of information over the Internet, bypassing the controlling influence of any authority figures,'' Melton said.
(...)

Fears that teens are gaining an increasing interest in the craft may not be entirely misplaced. The top-selling book of the largest pagan printer, Llewellyn Publishing, is The Teen Witch, and Witchvox.com includes a separate ''young pagans'' search bar.

While the full effects of the Internet upon the breadth of the pagan community have yet to be gauged, insiders claim its growth is meteoric. There are between 150,000 to 600,000 adherents of paganism, according to PEN.
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


=== Hate Groups

12. Alleged hate group may face religious blockade
The Post-Crescent, Aug. 26, 2000
http://www.wisinfo.com/postcrescent/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
WAUPACA -- If necessary, a local clergyman will blockade an Amherst Bible camp to quash a so-called ''Christian Identity'' organization's planned Labor Day weekend retreat.
(...)

Scriptures For America Ministries Worldwide plans a four-day encampment at Riverside Bible Camp, 6355 County DD, starting Friday. Civil rights organizations identify the group's leader, Pete Peters of LaPorte, Colo., as a figurehead in the Christian Identity movement, which teaches that white Christians are God's chosen people.

''Their message of hatred and violence is not one we stand for and not one we want in our country,'' Motley said. ''They preach hate toward anyone who is not Anglo-Saxon. If you are Asian, African-American, Central American, or any other group, their theology says you are not human.''
(...)

Civil rights groups, such as the Southern Poverty Law Center, the Anti-Defamation League and Center for New Community, a religious-political organization based in Chicago, link the Christian Identity movement to white supremacist and militia organizations like the Ku Klux Klan, the Aryan Nation and the Posse Comitatus. It was the CNC that learned of the Labor Day weekend retreat, and asked Waupaca-area clergy to protest.

Peters did not return The Post-Crescent's phone calls this week. A woman who answered the telephone at Scriptures For America headquarters denied the group is white supremacist, and said she couldn't understand why civil rights groups believe otherwise.
(...)

Peters, who disavows the Christian Identity label, wrote a treatise called ''Intolerance of, Discrimination Against and the Death Penalty For Homosexuals is Prescribed in the Bible,'' which is posted on the Scriptures For America Web site. Civil rights organizations claim the militia movement emerged from a meeting of 160 neo-Nazis and Klansmen Peters organized in 1992, after federal agents shot and killed an alleged white supremacist's wife and son during a shootout at Ruby Ridge, Idaho.

Others scheduled to speak at the retreat are Richard Hoskins and Charles Weisman, both of whom the Southern Poverty Law Center and the Anti-Defamation League denounce as virulent racists.

Motley said the religious community is obligated to mount a vigorous protest.

''It is simply the duty of a Christian to stand up and speak the truth,'' Motley said. ''When the Christian church doesn't do it, there is simply no church. ... When wrongs and evil are running rampant, we can't just sit there and watch it.''
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


13. Bigotry Racism lingers
Charleston Gazette, Aug. 26, 2000
http://beta.yellowbrix.com/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
It's hard to believe that racial hatred still is advocated by some American groups, decades after Congress and every state legislature passed human rights laws to suppress such cruelty. A reminder surfaced this month when the National Association for the Advancement of White People gave school supplies to more than 250 children at the Loudendale Church of the Nazarene in Charleston's rural suburbs.

The giveaway wasn't odious. It helped youngsters in the moderate- income neighborhood. No attempt was made to instill prejudice in them. However, when church leaders learned the nature of the NAAWP, they felt misled, and vetoed a return visit by the Florida-based group.

Several Internet Web sites give this description of the NAAWP:

Former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke founded the organization in 1980. His assistant, and manager of his political campaigns, was Paul Allen, author of The Coming American Race War. Duke dropped out of the NAAWP to become a Republican campaigner, but still speaks at the group's events. Recently, he joined the National Alliance headed by West Virginia neo-Nazi William Pierce.

Apparently the NAAWP has split into factions. The group which came to Loudendale says it's part of the NAAWP National Inc. We aren't sure whether all the camps think alike - but the Internet declarations express hostility to blacks, Jews and other minorities. They seem little different from Hitler's message about the ''master race.''

Quotations from the NAAWP News talk of the ''criminal Negro underclass'' and say ''anti-Semitism is normal.'' They warn of ''ZOG, the Zionist-Owned Government'' and say ''Jewish control of the media is the single most dangerous threat to Christianity.''

The February 1995 newsletter said minorities will ''be drowned in the growing tidal wave of Christian White backlash.'' It praised the ''armed white militias we report springing up all over America.''

The Wall Street Journal said another NAAWP leader is Dan Daniels, a former Army colonel and sheriff who boasts: ''Americans had better get used to Trade Center-like bombing and Okie City.... They're only the tip of the iceberg. People are fighting back against government.''

The NAAWP leader who brought school supplies to Loudendale is Reno Wolfe - but a rival group, the NAAWP Florida Chapter Inc., alleges that ''Wolfe'' is the fake name of a man who was sued for fraud has an odd marriage record.

The Florida chapter's Web site says the ''children of Israel'' cited in the Bible means ''the White race.'' It says that ''God chose a holy and special people to be above all the races of the earth.'' It adds: ''The real evil in the world today is the false god of integration promoted by a godless United Nations and the New World Order.''

It's amazing that such crackpot gibberish finds an audience. America's principle of free speech allows these groups to voice their venom. All that conscientious folks can do is be aware of the racism, and condemn it.
[...entire item...]


14. South African Neo-Nazi Leader Released From Jail
Excite/Reuters, Aug. 24, 2000
http://news.excite.com/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
PRETORIA (Reuters) - South African neo-Nazi leader Eugene Terre Blanche was released from prison on parole on Thursday, six months before his one-year term for assaulting a black gas station attendant ends, a prisons official said.

Correctional Services Commissioner Lulamile Mbete said the Pretoria High Court had ordered Terre Blanche's immediate release until September 29, at which point he will be technically on bail pending an appeal against a conviction for the attempted murder of another black man.

Mbete said Terre Blanche had met all the parole conditions, including good behavior and the fact that he had a family to return to. The type of crime and length of sentence was also considered.

''He'll be free until the appeal is heard, but free in quotes because it is freedom that is determined by the bail conditions... If the appeal is heard and he loses that appeal then he comes back to prison to serve the six years he has been sentenced to serve,'' Mbete told Reuters.

Terre Blanche will appeal against the six-year sentence for the attempted murder of former security worker Paul Mothabe in 1996, which left the victim brain-damaged.

Terre Blanche, a burly 60-year-old farmer who heads the Afrikaner Resistance Movement, is seen as the embodiment of extreme white opposition to black rule.
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


15. Neo-Nazis Voice Regret For Killing
Excite/AP, Aug. 23, 2000
http://news.excite.com/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
HALLE, Germany (AP) - The widow of a Mozambican man slain by neo-Nazis said she was kept awake by harassing phone calls clearly meant to intimidate her from taking the stand Wednesday, but she did not yield.

Angelika Adriano smoked nervously outside the courtroom after testifying about life with her husband Alberto, and bitterly rejected one defendant's expression of regret and his offer of money for her three fatherless children.

Three German skinheads are on trial for kicking Adriano so brutally on June 11 in the eastern city of Dessau that he died three days later. But his widow's torment reflected the unbroken threat of resurgent neo-Nazi attacks that has left at least three dead in formerly communist eastern Germany this year.
(...)

Police officers later testified that neo-Nazi propaganda, videocassettes and music from neo-Nazi rock bands were found at the defendants' homes, the court said in a statement.

One defendant laughed when a document referring to ''hatred of Jews'' was read in court Wednesday, prompting a rebuke from the presiding judge, the lawyer said.
(...)

High unemployment and lack of exposure to democratic values during 50 years of communist rule are often cited as reasons for the high rate of attacks on foreigners and other minorities in eastern Germany since unification a decade ago. However, there have also been attacks in the west, including one on an African man beaten by far-rightists Saturday night in northern Schleswig-Holstein state.
(...)

German commentators Wednesday urged the Saxony-Anhalt state court to hand down tough sentences. Some politicians said German judges too often treat neo-Nazi crime as routine.

''Many judges have not yet realized the extent and the structures of right-wing extremism,'' said Cem Ozdemir, a member of parliament for the Greens party whose parents came to Germany from Turkey in the 1960s.

''I would argue for sending judges to special workshops on rightist extremists,'' Ozdemir told the Badisches Tagblatt newspaper.
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


16. Tough Neo-Nazi Sentences Sought
Excite/AP, Aug. 24, 2000
http://news.excite.com/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
HALLE, Germany (AP) - Urging a tough response to protect Germany against resurgent neo-Nazis, prosecutors sought severe sentences Thursday for three skinheads charged with beating and kicking an African man to death.

''This case shows with special clarity how dramatic the situation is,'' the Federal Prosecutor's Office said in a statement after its final arguments in the closed murder trial. ''The assailants attacked not only the victim but the basic values of our society, and wanted to send a signal.''

The federal prosecutors demanded a life sentence for Enrico Hilprecht, 24, and 10-year juvenile terms for Christian Richter and Frank Miethbauer, both 16. Court officials say all three admitted attacking 39-year-old Mozambican Alberto Adriano in a park in the eastern city of Dessau on June 11, but they denied intending to kill him.
(...)

Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder and others have repeatedly urged citizens and civic leaders in recent weeks to stand up against extremism.

In one such move, a German bank said Thursday it was closing all accounts held by extreme-right parties and organizations. Postbank, which had to open an account for anyone who wanted one before its operating guidelines were changed in 1995, said this was a ''necessary contribution to political expediency and the strengthening of democracy in Germany.''

Elsewhere, five northern German states announced the creation of hot lines where people can report skinhead attacks and neo-Nazi content on the Internet. And in the northern German town of Neumuenster, a club known as an extreme-right hangout faces legal steps to close it down after a national lawmaker from the Greens party launched a petition to do so.
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


=== Other News

17. Search for Attleboro cult boys in Maine lake comes up empty
Boston Herald, Aug. 25, 2000
http://beta.yellowbrix.com/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
Investigators probing the disappearance of two young boys from an Attleboro cult went back to Maine and searched a lake last weekend with relatives of the fringe group - including a child - but once again, came up empty.
(...)

The investigators were assisted by relatives of the cult, some of whom ''overheard conversations'' and had some ''second-hand information'' from sect members, the source said.

''They were relatives, but were not people directly involved in the cult,'' said the source.
(...)

Since last fall, investigators have searched unsuccessfully three times in Baxter State Park, as well as in Attleboro, Pawtucket, R.I., and at the group's former Seekonk compound.
(...)

Robidoux, 27, has been jailed since December for refusing to tell authorities what happened to his son, while seven other cult members are locked up for stonewalling a grand jury probing the mystery. The grand jury, which is still hearing testimony, could return an indictment against Robidoux and other members on charges ranging from improper disposal of a body to murder, even though the bodies haven't been found.

Last week, an Attleboro Juvenile Court judge officially pronounced Samuel dead and took 13 other children away from the cult.
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


18. Appeals Court Revives Procter & Gamble Lawsuit Against Amway
Excite/Dow Jones, Aug. 24, 2000
http://news.excite.com/news/dj/000824/20000824-000761
[Story no longer online? Read this]
DENVER -(Dow Jones)- A federal appeals court revived part of Procter & Gamble Co.'s five-year-old lawsuit against Amway Corp. and some of its distributors over allegations that Amway perpetuated rumors that Procter & Gamble was linked to Satanism.

A federal judge in Salt Lake City last year dismissed a lawsuit brought by Procter & Gamble that accused Amway of spreading false rumors. The appeals court said the lower court made a mistake when it dismissed the suit,

Procter & Gamble, based in Cincinnati, contends that Amway fomented the satanic rumors since as early as the 1970's. It seeks millions in damages for lost sales.

The rumors, prevalent among some religious groups, include accusations that P&G's trademark incorporates satanic symbols. The trademark, which dates back to the 1850's, shows a bearded ''man in the moon'' looking over 13 stars, one for each of the original 13 colonies.
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


19. Amway Vindicated by Federal Appeals Court; 'No Facts' to P&G's Claims in Satanism Lawsuit
Excite/PRNewswire, Aug. 24, 2000 (Press Release)
http://news.excite.com/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
The Federal Court of Appeals for the 10th Circuit held Amway Corporation blameless in the spread of an old rumor about Procter & Gamble being involved with Satanism. This decision should finally put to rest Procter & Gamble's unjust efforts to hold Amway responsible for the false rumor.

The Court of Appeals, reviewing a decision by a Utah federal district court, soundly rejected P&G's accusations against Amway by ruling: ''In the present case, P&G cites no facts to show that Amway told the distributors to spread the [Satanism] message.'' The court also stated that ''Nothing in the record supports the conclusion that spreading ... satanic rumors regarding P&G ... was naturally and ordinarily incident to Amway's business.''
(...)

''If a $40-billion dollar corporate Goliath like P&G continues to pursue its case against the four individuals in Utah, P&G will only prove that it is a corporate bully,'' said Mohr. ''Those individuals did nothing more than the thousands of other people who innocently talked about a rumor that they did not know at the time to be false. And the Amway distributors promptly retracted and denounced the message once they learned that it was false. I am confident that these individuals will prevail; P&G is picking on them just because they are Amway distributors.''

Earlier this week, Procter & Gamble and its attorneys, the Cincinnati firm of Dinsmore & Shohl, were ordered to stand trial in Michigan federal court on charges that they inappropriately funneled misleading documents to an anti- Amway web site run by an individual who was also a paid consultant.

''Before filing its first lawsuit, P&G praised Amway for its efforts to quash the Satanism rumor,'' Mohr said. ''Since then, P&G has been cynically using Amway as a publicity scapegoat for a rumor they have not been able to stop for almost 20 years, and they let things get personal. We're glad to be vindicated.''
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


20. FBI watching charity group that raised millions
Daily Breeze (Torrance, CA)/AP, Aug. 21, 2000
http://www.dailybreeze.com/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
A telemarketer who raised $10.5 million in the name of AIDS, disabled children, law enforcement and veterans - then pocketed nearly 90 percent of the money, has been the target of a task force for three years.

The FBI-led criminal probe of Timothy J. Lyons so far hasn't found that he broke any laws and he's continued to raise $7 million since the telemarketing fraud investigation of Lyons and his church-founding friends began.
(...)

Police investigators believe Lyons' associates, who have no formal religious training, set up churches as fronts to avoid fund-raising reporting requirements that restrict most charities, the newspaper said.

The church founders haven't provided any evidence that money raised for the churches went to help an AIDS victim or police cause. Lyons has raised $10.7 million since 1993 and his cut was $9.5 million, state records show.
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


21. Witness says victim had cult links
Charleston Daily Mail, Aug. 25, 2000
http://www.dailymail.com/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
LEWISBURG -- A lifelong friend of Melba Fitzgerald, the Pocahontas County woman whose nude, decapitated body was found floating in a well last year, told jurors that Fitzgerald had often dabbled in the occult.

Barbara Tallman testified that she and another woman had consulted a Ouija board to locate Fitzgerald's body because Fitzgerald had often used the device to seek answers in her own life.

''If you believe in it, you can ask it questions and it will reveal the answers,'' Tallman said.

Defense lawyers for Fitzgerald's longtime companion, Roger Gelis, who is on trial for her murder, tried to cement the link between her death and cult activities as they presented their case Thursday afternoon.

The first witness on Gelis' behalf was the private investigator hired by defense lawyers -- Charles Camper of Marlinton. His testimony focused on the unusual, and possibly occult, objects, graffiti and pictures he observed in the house on the property where Fitzgerald's body was found.
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


22. Join In, He Asked Religious Leaders, and 2,000 Will
New York Times, Aug. 26, 2000
http://www.nytimes.com/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
Imagine a meeting that put Israel's chief rabbi, an emissary of Iran's top ayatollah, the head of the World Council of Churches and a granddaughter of Mahatma Gandhi together in the same room. An unexpected grouping, to be sure. But it would have only a few of the spiritual figures due to begin meeting at the United Nations on Monday, when 2,000 people from 90 nations and a wide spectrum of faiths gather to spend four days on issues related to peace.

''There's a unique opportunity for religious leaders to have an impact on the political process,'' said Bawa Jain, a veteran of interfaith activities who is general secretary of the event, the Millennium World Peace Summit of Religious and Spiritual Leaders.
(...)

The meeting, backed by a large advisory board filled with religious figures, scholars and diplomats, has been organized in cooperation with the office of the United Nations secretary general. But it is not an official United Nations event, and its financing has come largely from foundations.

In terms of its breadth, the event is not unique. At meetings in South Africa last year and in Chicago in 1993, the Parliament of the World's Religions drew wide interfaith participation.

But it may be, as Mr. Jain said, the biggest in terms of the high level of leadership involved. Among its goals is the creation of an advisory council of religious leaders to work with the United Nations.
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


23. Potter Stirs Magic Society Interest
AOL/AP, Aug. 27, 2000
http://my.aol.com/entertainment/
LONDON (AP) - The smash Harry Potter books, about an apprentice wizard and his friends at the Hogwarts Schools of Wizardry and Witchcraft, have caused a boom in applications to Britain's Magic Circle society.

Membership in the society's Young Magicians Club has increased by 25 percent since the popularity of the four J.K. Rowling books, with 50 of the 250 members joining in the last few months, said Roy Marsh, the club's secretary.

``It's not been cool for kids, particularly older kids, to be into magic,'' Marsh said. ``The Harry Potter books have swept this away. It's now cool again to believe in magic.''
(...)

The Magic Circle: themagiccircle.co.uk
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


=== Religious Freedom / Religious Intolerance

24. No Pray, No Play
Dallas Morning News, Aug. 26, 2000
http://www.dallasnews.com/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
Kody Shed has a vision of the way he believes high school football games in Texas should begin:

As the last echoes of ''The Star-Spangled Banner'' fade, one person in the stands, then a dozen people, then a thousand people start to recite Christianity's best-known prayer:

Our Father, who art in heaven ... And by the final ''amen,'' the bleachers are solid with praying people. Mr. Shed, 27, of Temple, has done more than dream.

He's created an organization called No Pray, No Play, cranked up a Web site and spent the past two months crisscrossing Texas with his T-shirts and his message.

His goal is to set up a network of religious and lay leaders committed to conducting voluntary pregame prayers. ''We want this movement to be broad enough and well-known enough that it becomes the right thing and the normal thing to do,'' Mr. Shed said. ''We're not breaking the law, and we're not protesting.'' No Pray, No Play may not be a protest, but it is one of several organized responses to the U.S. Supreme Court decision issued in June that declared school-run prayer before high school games unconstitutional. Apparently they've formed unbeknownst to one another. Mostly across the South, the groups all have the same goal: to encourage people to repeat the Lord's Prayer after the national anthem at high school football games.

A North Carolina-based group called ''We Still Pray'' also has a Web site. Last week, it hosted a rally that filled a stadium in Asheville and backed up traffic for miles. The event included ''The Star-Spangled Banner,'' followed by a mass recitation of the Lord's Prayer. ''One of the purposes of the rally was a dress rehearsal for football season,'' which started Fri-day, said Wendell Runion, head of International Baptist Outreach Missions and the owner of a local Christian radio station. Another pro-prayer group, one without a fancy slogan, has formed in Mississippi. It's being promoted on a syndicated radio talk show, Listen to the Eagle, that plays on Mondays in Mis-sissippi, Louisiana, Tennessee, Alabama and Arkansas. The show is normally devoted to hunting and fishing issues, but host Paul Ott decided to add the prayer cause to his discussions.

Dozens of pastors, some in the Dallas-Fort Worth area, have pledged their support to No Pray, No Play, Mr. Shed said.
(...)

* No Pray, No Play Web site: www.nopraynoplay.org

* The U.S. Supreme Court's decision on school-sponsored prayer at high school football games: http://supct.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/99-62.ZS.html
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


25. Schools Holds Football Field Prayers
The Associated Press, Aug. 26, 2000
http://my.aol.com/news/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
BATESBURG-LEESVILLE, S.C. (AP) - Undaunted by the possibility of a lawsuit, Batesburg-Leesville High School's student body president took the microphone in the stadium press box and said a prayer as football fans stood silently.

Other schools across the country - mainly in the Bible Belt - faced the same dilemma Friday as the first high school football games of the season began: whether to continue a tradition or obey a two-month-old Supreme Court ruling that declares school-sponsored prayer at sporting events a violation of students' constitutional rights.
(...)

Legal scholars warned that some districts could be opening themselves up to legal challenges by allowing the prayers.

Two students already have called the American Civil Liberties Union's South Carolina branch to express concern about the ``voluntary'' prayer before the Batesburg-Leesville game, said LaVerne Neal, executive director of the group.

The Supreme Court's ruling came in a Texas case brought by two families, one Catholic and one Mormon, who challenged a school policy of letting students elect someone to lead the benediction.

The court, which ruled the district's policy of allowing such student-led prayers violated the constitutionally required separation of government, wrote: ``Nothing in the Constitution ... prohibits any public school student from voluntarily praying at any time before, during or after the school day. But the religious liberty protected by the Constitution is abridged when the state affirmatively sponsors the particular religious practice of prayer.''

For Lexington School District 3, which includes Batesburg-Leesville, the key word in allowing prayers was ``voluntary.'' School board members said they believe students stepping up to pray on their own - even over the school's public address system - won't run afoul of the court's ruling.
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


=== Death Penalty / False Memory Syndrome

26. Death-Penalty Convictions Can Rest On Flimsy Evidence Eyewitness Testimony Is Both Believable And Unreliable
Roanoke Times & World News, Aug. 18, 2000 (Commentary)
http://beta.yellowbrix.com/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
The recent execution of Gary Graham in Texas has served to highlight one of the most disturbing weaknesses in our criminal- justice system. The entire case against Graham rested on the testimony of a single eyewitness, a woman who at first failed to identify Graham as the killer she saw, but who has since remained convincingly steadfast in her certainty that it indeed was Graham she saw that night.
(...)

Although it is a scientifically well-established fact that eyewitness testimony is highly unreliable, juries and the public nevertheless give great weight to it in judging an accused individual's guilt or innocence.
(...)

First of all, much of what we do see is simply not deposited in our memory. Some things that one may have looked at but not specifically taken notice of - a license plate, for example - are most likely irretrievable under any circumstances for the simple reason that they weren't ''recorded'' in the first place.

Secondly, all or part of witnessed events that have been stored in memory can fade or alter over time. Most important, new elements can be added to a recalled event, and then these additions are ''seen'' in our mind's eye and thus recalled with utter certainty.

In reality, memories are interpretive reconstructions, and they can be remolded and re-formed by suggestion, by our emotional needs or simply via errors we make as we complete or clarify a partial or fuzzy recollection.

Numerous studies have shown that a leading question - for example, ''Did you see the stop sign at the intersection?'' - will cause most individuals who witnessed an accident or were shown a photo to ''remember'' seeing a sign that was not present. Further pressed, they will describe the shape and color of the sign that they now honestly recollect.

In later recall, the implanted stop sign will probably emerge as the most vividly real aspect of their memory. And, of course, were they consequently required to testify to this recalled event, their self-conviction would make them highly credible witnesses, indeed.

In the case of eyewitness identification, recall is equally susceptible to suggestion, and especially likely to be a target of influence attempts.

In a controlled laboratory study, college students witnessed a staged crime and were later asked individually to pick the ''culprit'' from a lineup. When they were falsely informed that the guilty individual was in the lineup, a staggering 78 percent picked out one of the innocent men as the criminal. Even among those not given such biased instructions, 33 percent wrongly fingered someone.

Another practice to induce false recall is to have witnesses who have viewed photos of a number of potential suspects, but who were unable to make an identification, to subsequently observe a lineup where only one of the individuals from the photo set appears.

The odds that the now twice-seen suspect will be picked out increase dramatically. What often happens is that the individual recognizes the face, but doesn't realize where it was actually seen, among the photos. The name of this phenomenon is unconscious transference.

In the case of Gary Graham, the eyewitness's initial failure to identify Graham suggests a strong probability that her later identification owed to this type of photo-biased lineup.

I should interject here that although I have not littered this discussion with references, every observation or theoretical perspective I have introduced, regarding both memory in general and eyewitness testimony particularly, is supported by a great deal of published research, and is not in debate among scholars.
(...)

In her fascinating book, ''Witness for the Defense,'' Dr. Elizabeth Loftus chronicles a number of cases of false convictions (every one later overturned, sometimes much later), all resting on erroneous eyewitness testimony. In most of these cases, the individuals whose lives were put into turmoil and often destroyed were upstanding, often middle-class, citizens who had never before had a brush with the law.

It saddens, angers and frightens me that so many Americans can enthusiastically support the way that capital punishment is practiced in the United States, glibly writing and calling in their personal little thumbs-downs for Gary Graham and his ilk, while they are so obviously ignorant of any of the information that has been amassed about the serious misworkings of this system.

Do they believe that the Republican governor of Illinois has taken the extraordinary step of suspending all executions until his state's system is studied and reformed on some whim?

Anyone who expresses unqualified support for the way capital punishment is meted out now, yet who feels no obligation, in this information society, to find out what is known about the serious flaws in the working of this system, is no different from the lynch mobs of the early 1900s, nor the sanctimonious Puritans who gladly hanged unfortunate young women who had been eyewitnessed practicing witchcraft.
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


=== Noted

27. Breathing Lessons From the Master
Washington Post, Aug. 26, 2000
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A28042-2000Aug26.html
[Story no longer online? Read this]
Ever struggle to explain the relationship between religion and spirituality? Try this analogy: ''Religion is the banana skin, and spirituality is the banana.''

That's the way spiritual master Sri Sri Ravi Shankar distinguishes between organized religion and human intuition about the divine. Religion is what you see, an outer covering of rituals and rules, while spirituality is the fruit--the core substance that connects to God and is God.

Shankar, an internationally known teacher of human values and stress-relieving breathing exercises, is in town for a two-day stopover en route to New York. There he will join 1,000 religious leaders--cardinals, rabbis, patriarchs, mullahs--at the Millennium World Peace Summit next week at the United Nations.
(...)

He also has thousands of followers around the world who take courses in rhythmic breathing and stress reduction at centers run by his Art of Living Foundation, a nonprofit organization. The course, also taught in hospitals, prisons and corporate offices, centers on the Sudarshan Kriya, an ancient yogic breathing technique adapted and patented by Shankar.
(...)

If these philosophies sound familiar, it might be because you've heard them from one of the other globe-trotting gurus, yogis and swamis who frequently appear at Washington area auditoriums, convention halls and meditation centers.

What makes Sri Sri Ravi Shankar different, and why should you pay to hear him?

''I have no idea,'' he said. ''I never compare myself to anyone else. I simply say what is reality for me, and if someone benefits, that is all well and good.''

Shankar attracted attention at age 4 because he could recite the Bhagavad-Gita, an Indian epic, by heart, and over the years, he has established his reputation as a spiritual master. He is a frequent participant in international conferences on human rights and conflict resolution and will give the benediction after Monday's peace assembly at the United Nations.

Though raised a Hindu, Shankar adheres to no particular religion or school of thought. While some of his followers call him guru, or religious teacher, he does not refer to himself that way. Nor does he call himself a swami.

''Swami'' typically refers to the member of an ascetic or monastic order, much like a Catholic monk.

''I consider myself as nobody,'' he said.

But he does use the title ''sri sri,'' which means respected one and sets him apart from Ravi Shankar, the sitar master. One ''sri'' (pronounced shree) is a term of respect similar to ''mister,'' and the use of two is analogous to ''the reverend,'' he said.

Ariel Glucklich, assistant professor of theology at Georgetown University who specializes in Hinduism, said there's ''absolutely no objective way'' to tell ''a real enlightened spiritual guru from a fake one.''

But some people in India, where there are ''countless numbers of gurus,'' follow age-old rules of thumb, he said. Ancient Hindu and Buddhist texts, for example, say that a guru who takes on followers, or disciples, is a fake, while a guru who tells someone, in effect, to ''get lost'' is the real thing.
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


28. ''Anybody can be sucked into a cult''
Sueddeutsche Zeitung (Germany), Aug. 24, 2000
Translation: CISAR
http://cisar.org/000824a.htm
[Story no longer online? Read this]
Are cult members naive, emotionally unstable people? A study done by Munich psychologist Dieter Rohmann, who has been working with members and former cult members for 16 years, contradicts this stereotype. According to his study, cult members, as a rule, are extremely ready to help others, and are sensitive, idealistic people. They often grew up in a smaller city or in the country and often have some upper level education. Most joined when between 21 and 25 years old. The basis of the psychologist's research is his survey of family members and friends of 110 cult members from Germany, Austria and Switzerland.

SZ: Is there such a thing as a ''typical cult personality''?

Dieter Rohmann: I don't thinks so. It can happen to anybody, being pulled into a cult. There is a suitable cult for everybody. People who have an optimistic outlook on life are, perhaps, less at risk. But cult members are not more anxious, naive or weaker than others.

SZ: In your study you speak of external factors which have to come together before someone turns to a cult. Is the cult viewed as a saving hope in a desperate life situation?

Rohmann: Apparently. Even I was surprised that most cult members, at the time they joined, were struggling with three or four problems at the same time - in personal relations, in the work place or in school. Often there was an accident or the loss of a loved one in addition to that.

SZ: The statements you have on cult members come from their parents, siblings and former friends - from people, namely, who possibly were annoyed at the person's joining the cult. How objective is such data?

Rohmann: Naturally the tales from family members are tendentious. However I have taken the attitude that people who approach me with a request for help will at least give subjectively true answers. They are well aware that if they have not filled out the questionnaire properly that I cannot help them.
(...)

SZ: Is there anything that all cult members have in common?

Rohmann: Yes. The search for binding authority and for binding answers is found in the classic forms of cult which turn away from the world, as well as in the new cults which say they make people more fit for the world. Management courses with esoteric overtones are rather strongly on the rise. People ask themselves, ''Is my constantly ringing cellular phone really all there is to life?'' Whatever answer they get is always the right one. It is just that people have to pay attention to the people who are providing the answer and whether they really mean it seriously.
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


=== Books / Internet

29. Web Support For Those Who Change Their Religious Path
Newsbytes, Aug. 22, 2000
http://www.newsbytes.com/pubNews/00/153982.html
[Story no longer online? Read this]
Written by two ex-Christians, this site aims to provide support for others who no longer wish to be part of a particular faith. There is an archive of helpful (and sometimes very critical) articles, and the opportunity for discussion that may not be available from Christian friends and family. The site's owners stress that their particular problem is with ''the conservative, evangelical variety of Christianity of which we were once a part.'' World Wide Web: http://www.losingmyreligion.com/ .
[...entire item...]


30. Review: Waiting for the UFOs
CNN, Aug. 25, 2000
http://www.cnn.com/2000/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
(CNN) -- Books about unidentified flying objects generally fall into two categories. The first, and by far the larger, category is books written by UFO believers -- people convinced that there are unidentified craft whizzing around our planet carrying emissaries of alien civilizations. The second category of books is by UFO debunkers, who believe the reports of alien craft are either mistakes or hoaxes. Kevin Randle and Russ Estes try to fit both categories -- debunking some UFO sightings, yet concluding that there are alien spacecraft visiting us.

The title of their second collaboration tips the reader to their predisposition. ''Spaceships of the Visitors: An Illustrated Guide to Alien Spacecraft'' is not the name of a detached analysis of the UFO phenomenon. Randle has written eight other books about alien visitations and Estes produces documentaries that promote the extraterrestrial hypothesis. They are true believers.
(...)

Unlike many UFO believers, however, Randle and Estes don't issue a blanket condemnation of Project Blue Book as a government cover-up. Instead, they seem to understand that the Air Force wasn't interested in UFOs per se, but in assessing whether they presented a Cold War threat to the United States.
(...)

Such background information fills less than a third of the book. The bulk of it is devoted to thumbnail sketches of UFO reports. Each offers some of the details of the sighting and -- in most cases -- photographs offered as evidence of an alien encounter.

Fuzzy and indistinct
Many of the pictures described as ''sharp and clear'' are, in fact, fuzzy and indistinct. The authors give each report a ''reliability'' ranking from zero (unreliable) to ten (unimpeachable). Only one account ranks at the top of the scale. None hits the bottom (though a couple score a reliability of ''one''). Those that the authors consider obvious fakes are given their own section.

At first glance, Randle and Estes seem to be going out of their way to be fair in assessing these reports. But a closer look raises questions. The analysis of the odd lights that appeared over Phoenix in 1997, for example, contains no photograph, only a sketch -- one used to illustrate an earlier report from Belgium. Yet the Phoenix lights were widely photographed. While the authors conclude that the lights were ''a case of mistaken identity,'' they give the sighting a reliability rating of five, implying there's a 50 percent chance that it was a real UFO.

Even more telling is the analysis of the now-infamous 1978 Gulf Breeze sightings in Florida. The photograph offered as ''evidence'' is patently doctored. The photographer all but admitted he fabricated it. The authors conclude, ''his story, from the very beginning, was a hoax.'' And yet they rate his reliability at two -- not zero.

''Spaceships of the Visitors'' tries to have it both ways. It claims to offer a clear-eyed perspective on the UFO phenomenon. But the judgment of the authors remains clouded by their belief that UFOs are real, and alien in origin.
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]