Articles – Page 21

China urged to give official recognition to Judaism

By Ekklesia, 14 June 2006

The Chinese government has been urged to recognise Judaism as an official religion and engage with it at a civic and legal level. The call came during a visit to Shanghai by Chief Rabbi Shlomo Amar, Israel’s rabbinic spokesperson for Jews of Middle Eastern descent and diaspora communities.

© 2006 Ekklesia. Posted on Religioscope with permission. An initiative of the Anvil Trust, Ekklesia is a not-for-profit think-tank which works to promote theological ideas in the public square. Website: www.ekklesia.co.uk

Nepal: Hindu bodies protest against secularisation

By Sudeshna Sarkar - Indo-Asian News Service, 8 June 2006

Hindu organisations Tuesday continued their protest against Nepal’s secularisation, once the world’s only Hindu kingdom, with parts of southern Nepal being shut down as protesters called a 48-hour closure.

© 2006 IANS India Private Limited, New Delhi. Posted on Religioscope with permission. — Indo-Asian News Service (IANS) is India’s first multinational and multilingual wire service. Website: www.ians.in. Subscription enquiries: contact IANS (mention Religioscope).

Europe: Churches call for a European peace agency

By Ekklesia, 20 May 2006

The role of political institutions and churches on issues of peace, security and reconciliation was the main question addressed by 40 church representatives from 18 European countries attending the plenary meeting of the Church and Society Commission of the Conference of European Churches (CEC) in Sigtuna, Sweden, earlier this month.

United Kingdom: poll suggests Da Vinci code undermines trust in Catholic church

By Ekklesia, 20 May 2006

Reading the Da Vinci Code has dramatically undermined the British people’s trust in the claims of the Catholic Church, a new survey suggests.

Religion in Egypt: beyond fantasies and rumours – Kees Hulsman and the work of the Centre for Arab-West Understanding

By Eildert Mulder, 1 May 2006

Imaginations and exaggerations poison the atmosphere between Egypt’s Christians and Muslims, but a Dutch-Egyptian private initiative to build a press archive and a website intends to change this.

© Trouw 2005. This article was originally published in the Dutch newspaper Trouw on 1 December 2005, available at http://www.trouw.nl. The copyright remains with Trouw and the author. The English translation was done by Kees Hulsman and Elizabeth Yell of CAWU. The article was slightly edited by Religioscope for an international audience, with the permission of the author and translators. Published by Religioscope with permission. This article cannot be republished without first getting written permission from Trouw and CAWU.

The Centre for Arab-West Understanding (CAWU), based in Egypt, publishes Arab-West Report, a weekly English language electronic overview of articles published in the Egyptian press. The centre is also building a searchable electronic documentation centre of around 12,000 translated articles and special reports on issues related to Muslim-Christian, Arab-West understanding. For more information about subscriptions or CAWU itself, see http://www.cawu.org.

CAWU meanwhile is seeking financial support to keep its work going.

Religion in Europe: EU searches for correct terms on Islam

By DPA-IANS, 24 April 2006

It may be just words, but European Union policymakers struggling to build better ties with Muslim nations have set themselves a new task – hammering out guidelines to ban the use of terms considered derogatory to Islam. The focus is on stopping the bloc’s officials and documents from using words that are considered offensive to Muslims or give the impression that Europe’s drive against terrorism is specifically aimed at Muslims.

Zimbabwe: clerics take joint stand – Churches unite against Mugabe

By Sarah Dlodlo - IWPR, 24 March 2006

With the notable exception of Roman Catholic Archbishop Pius Ncube, most of Zimbabwe’s Christian priests and pastors have coped with the country’s rapid political and economic deterioration by getting on quietly with helping the poor and suffering in their communities. But the situation is changing. More and more clerics are saying they can no longer remain silent as the country crumbles as a result of bad governance.

This article was first published on 21 March 2006 (AR No. 57) by the Institute for War & Peace Reporting (IWPR), London. Posted on Religioscope with permission.

Articles published by the IWPR can be accessed on its website: www.iwpr.net

Islam: Muslim scholars divided over Islam’s penalty for apostasy

By Joyce Davis - RFE/RL, 24 March 2006

How Afghanistan deals with the case of Abdul Rahman, the former Muslim turned Christian who is standing trial in Kabul for apostasy, is being closely watched around the globe, and could have a profound impact on the interpretation of Islamic law in the modern world. Islamic scholars may agree that apostasy is a heinous crime, but they differ on whether the punishment should be death.

© 2006 RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036.
Website: http://www.rferl.org/

United Kingdom: bill on women bishops could trigger church-state crisis

By Ekklesia, 19 March 2006

A bill is to be introduced to the House of Commons this week which some are saying has the potential to trigger a constitutional crisis with regard to the relationship between church and state.

United States: negative perception of Islam increasing

By Indo-Asian News Service, 9 March 2006

A growing number of Americans have unfavourable views about Islam, a Washington Post-ABC News poll showed Thursday. The poll, results of which were published in the Washington Post, found that 46 percent Americans have a negative view of Islam, seven percentage points higher than the figure during the months after the 9/11 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, when Muslims were often targeted for violence.