» Continued from Part 1

=== Others
14. Holy man? Sex abuser? Both? (Sai Baba)
15. Former witness settles lawsuit in Wenatchee sex abuse case
16. High court case tests key church-state battle
17. China Police Unveil Software to ''Purify'' Internet

=== Alternative Healing / Medicine
18. Alternative Medicine (Homeopathy)
19. Moving Alternative Medicine into Evidence-Based Medicine in the 21st Century

=== Death Penalty
20. New bill would repeal death penalty in Illinois

=== Books
21. Underground
22. Amid the rush to science, a voice says: Hold on now
23. Zondervan Targets Niche Of Travelers Who Don't Care Where The Best Bars Are


=== Others

14. Holy man? Sex abuser? Both?
The Vancouver Sun (Canada), Feb. 27, 2001
http://www.vancouversun.com/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
Sri Sathya Sai Baba -- ''The Protector,'' ''The Infinite,'' ''the Creator'' -- has only once left India, where he reigns as arguably the country's most famous living swami. But Sai Baba is here tonight at this temple in east Vancouver.

Sai Baba is sitting in the ochre robe on the wooden throne at the front altar, smelling the eye-stinging incense, listening to the spine-tingling chants and watching the earnest, multiracial followers bow to him.

Sai Baba is omni-present.

So believes B.C. Sai Baba president Nami Thiyagaratnam, who teaches management studies at the University of Victoria. To devotees, Sai Baba is an avatar, God on Earth, born of a virgin mother.

Separated by gender in the Vancouver temple, the scores of East Indians, Caucasians, Japanese, blacks and Chinese followers who sit on the red carpet revering Sai Baba believe he paranormally transports his invisible soul throughout the globe.

They are convinced that at this moment he is gazing contentedly at them and other adherents conducting similar rituals of worship around the planet at 6,700 Sai Baba temples, charity hospitals and schools, mostly in India, but including 500 centres in the U.S. and 70 in Canada.
(...)

But deep troubles are emerging in Sai Baba's wealthy, glorious universe, where people of all religions, from Christianity to Buddhism, are meant to come together, because, as Sai Baba teaches, ''all faiths are facets of the same truth.''

Accusations are mounting that Sai Baba has been sexually molesting comely young men for decades during private meetings at his giant ashram in India, where thousands visit each week.

The round-faced ''saint'' with the Jimi Hendrix hairdo, who is known for miraculously manifesting out of thin air everything from wristwatches to sacred stones and ash, has never admitted to sexual assault. But followers in Canada and elsewhere acknowledge they've taken part with him in what they call ''sexual healing.''
(...)

With the sex scandal rapidly being unveiled on various Internet sites and in a few newspapers, Sai Baba has told his adherents, whose numbers range from 10 million to 50 million, depending on whom you talk to, not to sign on to the World Wide Web.

The abuse charges are producing a mix of confusion and sadness, defensiveness and sublime indifference among those who remain acolytes.
(...)

The charges are taking their toll, however.
UNESCO recently cancelled its co-sponsorship of a conference in Sai Baba's hometown of Puttaparthi, in southern India, saying it was ''deeply concerned about widely reported allegations of sexual abuse involving youth and children that have been levelled at the leader of the movement.''

The many celebrity admirers of 75-year-old Sai Baba -- including Indian president Atal Bihari Vajpayee; Isaac Tigrett, co-founder of the Hard Rock restaurant chain and House of Blues; Sarah Ferguson, Prince Andrew's former wife, and dozens of prominent Indian professionals -- have so far been silent.

But graphic charges have come from all over the world.
(...)

Former Sai Baba leaders such as Swedish psychotherapist and former film star, Conny Larsson, who says the guru regularly performed oral sex on him and asked for it in return. Sai Baba was said to have claimed he was simply correcting Larsson's inner ''kundalini'' energy.
(...)

Still, no criminal charges have ever been laid against Sai Baba, although some speculate that's because of his exalted position and charitable work in India, where he's opened numerous well-appointed hospitals, schools, colleges and water-treatment facilities.

Dr. Michael Goldstein, the influential U.S. president of the Sai Baba organization, this year dismissed all the accusations. He says they're unbelievable and that Sai Baba remains divinely pure, filled only with ''selfless love.'' The answer for those who doubt, says Goldstein, is to show more faith.
(...)

Cleary, a 57-year-old businessman, said it's difficult to leave. ''Sai Baba makes you feel so important because he tells you he's chosen you.''

In addition to the sex allegations catalogued by Bailey, a friend, Cleary is concerned about what he estimates are the billions of dollars that well-meaning devotees give to Sai Baba and his various charities.
(...)

Sai Baba is said to be the reincarnation of the revered Indian saint, Shirdi Sai Baba, who died in 1918. But Cleary said Sai Baba's teachings are ''pretty standard stuff.

''It's basically Hinduism with an eclectic mix of Christianity and Buddhism, so it will appeal to more people.''

Despite his anger, Cleary still believes Sai Baba probably has miraculous powers, including the ability to ''astral travel,'' which allows his soul to traverse the globe.

Cleary also believes Sai Baba, who has only physically travelled to Africa many years ago, may transport himself to sleep in various sacred beds that devotees keep for him around the world, including in Vancouver.
(...)

''I know Sai Baba has done sexual things,'' says Ann Jevons, 62. Ann and David, 65, acknowledged in an article for their newsletter that Sai Baba can show less interest in adults such as themselves and more interest in children and young people in general -- showering them with rings and watches that he mysteriously materializes out of nowhere.

But Jevons thinks sexual healing is a good thing, because ''there is a kundalini point between the anus and the genitals, where human energy starts.'' It is totally understandable, she says, that a saint would want to help people by curing disruptions in the flow of such a crucial life force.

''Sai Baba is faultless,'' Jevons says. ''He just opened the largest hospital in south India. He's done incredible service to the world. His accusers are wrong. And we're no gullible believers.''
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


15. Former witness settles lawsuit in Wenatchee sex abuse case
AP, Feb. 27, 2001
http://seattlep-i.nwsource.com/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
WENATCHEE -- A young woman who said authorities pressured her to accuse her parents of sexual abuse has settled her lawsuit against a former Wenatchee police detective and a former state social worker.

Sarah Marie Doggett, 22, who now lives in California, will receive $52,500 from the state and $25,000 from the city of Wenatchee under the settlement, said Gary Larson, a spokesman for the state attorney general's office.
(...)

The city and state admitted no wrongdoing in the settlement, and documents dismissing Doggett's lawsuit were filed last week in Chelan County Superior Court.

Doggett is the daughter of Carol and Mark Doggett, whose child sexual abuse convictions were overturned on appeal in 1997. They were two of 43 adults arrested in the now largely discredited 1994-95 Wenatchee child sex abuse investigations led by former police Detective Bob Perez.

The 18 people sent to prison in the cases all have been released, either because their convictions were overturned on appeal, or because they accepted post-conviction agreements to plead guilty to lesser charges while their cases were on appeal.
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


16. High court case tests key church-state battle
USA Today, Feb. 27, 2001
http://cgi.usatoday.com/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
WASHINGTON -- The Rev. Stephen Fournier opens meetings of the Good News Club in Milford, N.Y., with a song, then asks the Christian children's group to recite a Bible verse. When the kids get it right, they get lollipops or chocolate.

Fournier's study group aims to make the Bible ''fun'' for children ages 6 to 12 by teaching them Christianity and morality in a setting that is less formal than traditional Sunday schools. The Good News Club wants to break with tradition in another way, too: by holding its after-school meetings not in a church or home but in public schools, where kids spend most of their day.

The push for access to public schools by the club, which is part of an evangelical group with thousands of affiliates across the USA, is the latest national test of the constitutional line between church and state.

Wednesday, the U.S. Supreme Court will hear the club's argument that it should be treated like the Boy Scouts, 4-H Clubs and other secular groups allowed to meet in public schools when the school day is over. On the other side will be Milford officials who say the group's teaching of Jesus Christ as the root of morality is inappropriate for public schools, even after hours.

The Good News case is the first major church-state case to come before the high court since the justices ruled last June against school-sponsored prayers at high school football games. It also is part of a wave of lawsuits and other disputes that show the new battlefronts over religion in public schools. Nearly 40 years after the Supreme Court struck down school-sponsored prayer, religious activists are pressing as hard as ever to have a say in public education.
(...)

A recent USA TODAY/CNN/Gallup Poll found that most Americans said they believe religion should have more influence in public schools. Other surveys have indicated that most people believe U.S. schools aren't providing students with enough of a moral compass.

The USA TODAY survey indicated that 63% of Americans believe religion has ''too little presence'' in schools. Most wanted schools to allow prayer in classrooms and at graduation, and to permit student religious groups to use schools during after-school hours.
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


17. China Police Unveil Software to ''Purify'' Internet
Reuters, Feb. 27, 2001
http://www.insidechina.com/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
BEIJING, Feb 27, 2001 -- (Reuters) The Ministry of Public Security has released new software designed to keep ''cults, sex and violence'' off the Internet in China, a police official said.

''The software, Internet Police 110, was released yesterday. It will prevent users from getting unhealthy information from foreign and domestic websites,'' he told Reuters.

''It was designed to block information of cults, sex and violence on the Internet,'' he said, without making clear whether installation was mandatory.
(...)

China routinely blocks Web sites of Western media outlets, human rights groups, the Falun Gong spiritual group, Tibetan exiles and other sources of information it deems politically sensitive or harmful.
(...)

But groups including dissidents and Falun Gong -- banned in China as an ''evil cult'' -- have used proxy addresses and other sophisticated methods to overcome Internet site blocks.
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


=== Alternative Healing / Medicine

18. Alternative Medicine
The Tucson Citizen, Feb. 24, 2001
http://beta.yellowbrix.com/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
As the popularity of homeopathy grows worldwide, this alternative approach to healing remains largely unproven by conventional medical standards and just beyond the fringe of acceptance in the United States.

A small but important federal grant recently awarded to a Tucson doctor and her Phoenix collaborator could be a first step toward changing that.

The $250,000 grant is one of the few ever made by the National Institutes of Health to study homeopathic medicine, said Dr. Iris Bell, director of research for the University of Arizona's Program in Integrative Medicine.

She is principal investigator for the study. Her main partner is Dr. Todd Rowe, director of the Desert Institute of Classical Homeopathy in Phoenix.
(...)

The study will evaluate homeopathy's effectiveness in treating fibromyalgia, a mysterious disease marked by chronic fatigue and pain. There is no definitive treatment for it in conventional medicine.

Another significant part of the study will be to set standards and methods for future studies of homeopathy, the difficulty of which can't be understated because every homeopathic remedy is specific to the individual being treated, Bell said.
(...)

A third element of the research will be to look for objective measures to use to predict who will do well with homeopathic therapy.
(...)

The lack of scientific proof for homeopathy's methods and success has been a major stumbling block to its acceptance in conventional Western medicine.

But that hasn't stopped it from becoming one of the world's most popular forms of alternative or complementary treatment.

''There are 250 forms of alternative medicine in the world today, and in terms of the most commonly practiced in the world today, homeopathy is No. 2, herbal medicine is No. 1, and acupuncture is No. 3,'' Rowe said.

Homeopathy is on par with conventional medicine in Belgium and also is widely used in Germany, France, England, India and many Latin American countries, Bell said.

''It just has a political problem here,'' Bell added.

Over the past decade, however, that problem - a perception that homeopathic medicine is little more than quackery - has run headfirst into the reality that American people are enormously interested in it and other forms of alternative medicine.

A 1998 Journal of the American Medical Association report found that the previous year 42 percent of Americans used alternative medicines and spent more out of pocket for complementary and alternative medicine than we paid out of pocket for all hospitalizations.

The result has been a new willingness by the U.S. government to fund research into alternative healing. A symbol of this was the creation in 1993 of the NIH's Office of Alternative Medicine and the elevation of it in 1998 into the National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine.
(...)

Even most practitioners of homeopathy will admit that science as we understand it cannot explain how a submolecular preparation can produce any result at all.

While there have been attempts to answer the question from a scientific viewpoint, most practitioners come at it from a metaphysical approach.

''In my view, there are two forms of healing,'' said Dr. Todd Rowe of the Desert Institute of Classical Homeopathy in Phoenix.

''There is healing that is based on matter, substance and biochemistry, and this is conventional medicine, and it's an effective way of approaching healing.
''But throughout history there has been another form of medicine that has been equally valid and effective and that has been based on energy. Homeopathy is an energy-based form of medicine.''

The human body is matter, substance and energy, he said. So both forms of healing are needed and can work together, he said.

The belief is that homeopathic remedies restore balance in the ''vital force,'' the same life energy that acupuncturists refer to as qi and in Latin is known as the animus. This force controls the body's processes.

According to homeopathic philosophy, this vital force is a single entity, one that reacts as a whole to an irritant. Disease is then a disturbance, caused by a strong irritant, of the vital force.

A homeopathic remedy, by itself acting as a disturbance, is designed to trigger the vital force into repelling the original irritant.
(...)

So, one might ask, is there any proof at all that it works?

The British Medical Journal says maybe.

In 1991, the journal published an analysis of 105 homeopathy- oriented studies. Eighty-one showed a positive result in using homeopathy to treat disease.
The article's authors cautioned that no definite conclusion could be drawn because of the low methodological quality of the studies but also said the results made a legitimate case for continued scientific study of homeopathy.
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


19. Moving Alternative Medicine into Evidence-Based Medicine in the 21st Century: Study in Journal of Alternative & Complementary Medicine Takes a First Step
Business Wire - February 23, 2001 (Press Release)
http://www.hoovershbn.hoovers.com/bin/story?StoryId=CoPxUubKbytaYntm
[Story no longer online? Read this]
Nearly seven in ten cancer patients in the U.S. have used complementary or alternative medicine, most often in combination with conventional therapies.

Surveys across 13 countries indicate that complementary and alternative treatments are used by 7 to 64 percent of all cancer patients. Reports of extraordinary survival ascribed to such therapies have long been made, but full and formal medical documentation of these results is too often lacking.

''The established medical community is demanding regulations and insisting that the promotion and sale of alternative therapies be subjected to the same standards of evaluation as other therapies,'' says the report of a new pilot study that tested the feasibility of performing outcomes and more advanced research for cancer patients at two complementary and alternative (CAM) clinics.

The paper, entitled ''Assessment of Outcomes at Alternative Medicine Cancer Clinics: A Feasibility Study,'' by Mary Ann Richardson, Dr.Ph.; Nancy C. Russell, M.P.H.; Tina Sanders, M.S.; Robert Barrett, Ph.D.; and Catherine Salveson, R.N., Ph.D., appears in The Journal of Alternative & Complementary Medicine: Research on Paradigm, Practice and Policy, Vol. 7, No. 1, published by Mary Ann Liebert, Inc.

The paper may be viewed online at http://www.liebertpub.com/acm/acmpaper1.pdf .

Because interest in alternative medicine is here to stay, say the authors, scientific testing is the next logical step. Their study is an analysis of what must be done by practitioners and researchers for such testing to be successfully implemented.
(...)

The study's three primary objectives were to determine the feasibility of (1) obtaining and collecting data from medical records, (2) determining five-year survival, and (3) comparing five-year survival to that of conventionally treated cancer patients who sought alternative treatments at the two clinics in 1992.

The report presents the barriers to achieving these goals and recommends strategies for facilitating high-quality research.
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


=== Death Penalty

20. New bill would repeal death penalty in Illinois
Chicago Tribune, Feb. 26, 2001
http://chicagotribune.com/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
A group of Illinois lawmakers said today they have introduced a bill that would repeal the death penalty in the state. The announcement was made at a news conference at the James R. Thompson Center sponsored by the Illinois Death Penalty Moratorium Project organization.

Bill Ryan, chairman of the organization, said the proposed bill ''is in keeping with the results of the annual report developed by our moratorium project that clearly documents that we have a system that is so badly flawed it can only be fixed by repealing current death penalty provisions and substituting life without parole.''
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


=== Books

21. Underground
The Guardian (England), Feb. 25, 2001
http://observer.co.uk/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
Underground
Haruki Murakami
Harvill £8.99, pp309

In Tokyo, on 20 March 1995, 12 people died and thousands were injured by a series of gas attacks on subway trains, perpetrated by members of the Aum Shinrikyo cult. Haruki Murakami, a well-known Japanese novelist, investigates through interviews with both victims and cult members the implications for the 'Japanese psyche', posing the question: 'Where did all that come from?'

Answers are not explored convincingly, however. There is too much passive recording of interviewees, and too little analysis from the author. We have the impression of Japan as a straight-jacketed, depressingly conformist culture, summed up by a subway employee: 'Work means you fulfil your duties.'

Interviews with Aum members merely illustrate general tendencies of cults - obsessive, leader-oriented, millenarian - rather than probing the motivations of this particular group. The reader is left frustrated by a dull book which delivers less than it promises.
[...entire item...]


22. Amid the rush to science, a voice says: Hold on now
Boston Globe, Feb. 25, 2001 (Book Review)
http://www.boston.com/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
Why Religion Matters: The Fate of the Human Spirit in an Age of Disbelief
By Huston Smith
HarperSanFrancisco, 288 pp., $25

The central metaphor of Huston Smith's ''Why Religion Matters'' comes from William Gass's 1995 novel, ''The Tunnel.'' In that book the protagonist, a lonely, middle-aged history professor, begins retreating to the basement of his large, comfortable home to escape his wife, his career, and his middle-class robotic existence. He begins digging through the floor and foundation, wriggling further and further through the dirt, in a desperate attempt to find a way out of the meaningless life he had so carefully constructed.

For Huston Smith, this character's burrowing is a metaphor for the postmodern search for meaning, and the tunnel represents the restraints and limitations of an increasingly less human and less religious culture. Smith, a longtime authority on world religions, argues that the intellectual and spiritual restriction of the tunnel is best understood within the ongoing antagonism between the traditional (read, religious) and modern (read, scientific) worldviews. Much of his book is a complex, historical examination of these two ways of interpreting and being in the world.

Drawing on a range of scientists, theologians, psychologists, and philosophers to build his case - from Darwin to Freud to Schleiermacher to Einstein - Smith concisely reviews many of the important intellectual trends in these fields over the last two centuries. This historical review provides context for Smith's position, and it helps to open the book to a wide readership.

Smith's expertise in world religions and his lifelong involvement in the debate of religion vs. science (from creationism to the legalization of peyote in the Native American Church) lays the groundwork for a compelling argument: that the reinvigoration of the traditional and religious worldview is the way out of the tunnel of modernity.

Smith is not angry at science, nor does he blame scientists for the age of disbelief. Rather, he is ''angry at us - modern Westerners who, forsaking clear thinking, have allowed ourselves to become so obsessed with life's material underpinnings that we have written science a blank check for science's claims concerning what constitutes knowledge and justified belief.'' The problem, he contends, is not science, but scientism: ''the belief that the scientific method is either the only reliable method, or the most reliable method of getting at the truth.''
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


23. Zondervan Targets Niche Of Travelers Who Don't Care Where The Best Bars Are
Book Publishing Report, Feb. 19, 2001 (Press Release)
http://www.simbanet.com/press/headlines/bp_02-19.html
[Story no longer online? Read this]
This spring Zondervan Publishing House will release the first four titles in its new travel series, filling a gap that has left Christian travelers stranded in a world of books that don't cater to their special interests.

Series creator and general editor Irving Hexham decided to write the guides after years of frustration over the lack of Christian content in traditional travel guides. After pitching the series-and facing rejections-for eight years, Hexham convinced Zondervan to take a chance on the books.

The debut titles-on Great Britain, Germany, Italy and France-are due in Christian and secular bookstores in April. If successful, the series is likely to spawn other entrants into this niche market.
(...)

If each book manages to sell at least 10,000 copies, Zondervan will likely extend the series, said Jack Kuhatschek, the senior acquisitions editor who worked on the guides.

''We'll keep doing these books as long as there is a need for them,'' Kuhatschek said. On tap are guides to the Netherlands, the Mediterranean, Greece, Spain and Portugal, Turkey, Austria and Eastern Europe.

The publisher is planning to run print ads in Christianity Today and Christian History. But the biggest concern isn't promoting the books-it's getting them into consumers' hands. In the national chains and secular independent stores, the guides will probably be placed among the Frommer's, Fodor's and Let's Go travel guides, but retailers in the Christian Booksellers Association have little experience selling travel guides.

''This is the first time we'll have these type of books,'' said Martin, also the owner of Whittemore's bookstore in Needham, MA. ''Do we put them in our Christian living section? Maybe with our gift books? Those are our closest things among the categories that we use,'' he said. ''Maybe we'll have to change our thinking about categories.''
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]

See also Irving Hexham's ''Christian Traveler's Website''

=== The Grinch Around The Corner

24. Lawyer hopes to challenge Christmas in high court
The Cincinnati Post, Feb. 26, 2001
http://beta.yellowbrix.com/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
[...more offbeat news...]
A Cincinnati lawyer who challenged Christmas as a public holiday is trying to take his case to the Supreme Court.

Hyde Park attorney Richard Ganulin mailed his petition to the high court Friday. He said it could be a few months before he finds out what happens next: Either the Supreme Court will agree to hear the case, or it will decide not to.

If the court declines to hear the case, it will let stand the December 1999 ruling by Cincinnati U.S. District Court Judge Susan Dlott, who found Christmas as a public holiday doesn't fall under the First Amendment's protection against Congress establishing a religion.

A year later the Cincinnati-based 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld Judge Dlott's decision.

Ganulin admits it's a long shot - he said the Supreme Court turns down 99 out of every 100 petitions - but ''nothing ventured, nothing gained,'' he said.

He said he's not against Christmas or Christians, but against preferential treatment: Why, he says, should the U.S. Congress guarantee that the followers of a particular religion don't have to work on a holy day?
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]