Bartholomew's Notes

The “World Summit of Religious Leaders”, which concluded in Moscow yesterday, excluded one particular religious leader. Interfax reports:

Chinese State Administration for Religious Affairs Director Ye Xiaowen praised the organization of a World Summit of Religious Leaders taking place in Moscow and thanked the Russian government for its understanding on the issue of Dalai Lama XIV’s visit to Russia.

…The Chinese leadership was satisfied to learn that the Dalai Lama was denied entry to Russia to take part in the religious summit, Ye said. “The Dalai Lama is not only a religious figure but also a politician, who is engaged in dissident activities against his country,” he said.

The wretched Ye Xiaowen has featured on this blog previously, when I noted his part in the imprisonment of Cai Zhuohua, a Chinese house-church leader, for printing Bibles.

However, the Dalai Lama was not the only uninvited religious leader. Radio Liberty notes:

Pope Benedict XVI was not invited due to the ongoing conflict between the Roman Catholic Church and the Orthodox Church, which accuses the Catholics of proselytizing in Russia. This long-standing rivalry continues to block a papal visit to Russia.

The summit comes two weeks before a G8 meeting in Russia, and its purpose was to

tell the G8 that the “voice of religion” needs to be heeded in efforts to counter terrorism and end armed conflicts.

The event was organised by the Interreligious Council of Russia; Ecumenical News International provides further details:

Patriarch Alexei II of the Russian Orthodox Church, which initiated the summit, emphasised the role of morality in avoiding conflicts. Ayatollah Muhammad Ali Taskhiri of Iran praised Putin’s efforts for seeking common ground with Islam and stressed that Islam is a religion of peace.

Actually, this sets off alarm-bells; when Alexei pontificates on “morality” he has a tendency to mean “no homosexuals” and “no secularism”. In fact (as I noted back in January), these are pretty much the bases for Russian-Iranian interreligious dialogue. Suspicion is increased when we read a March interview with Russian Orthodox spokesman Vsevolod Chaplin about the summit. Chaplin said that a central concern would be discussion

…between people who are posing human rights as supreme value, and those who discern higher goals-morals, patriotism, faith and holy things.

In fact, in April the Orthodox Church held a council that criticised the mainstream European view of human rights on just these grounds:

During the Council, many of participants spoke negatively about many aspects of the Western concept of human rights, which includes protection for euthanasia, homosexuality and other alternative lifestyles. Their views were also included in the statement:

“We should not allow situations in which realizing human rights destroys faith and moral tradition, leads to insults against religious and national feelings, against respected sacred objects, puts the very existence of our country at risk. It is dangerous to “invent” the “rights” that legalize the lifestyles condemned by traditional morals and all historic religions.”

In addition to the criticism, the Council rolled out an ambitious plan for protecting “non-political” human rights – a plan obviously aimed at pushing the traditionally anti-government Russian human rights groups to the sidelines.

Other participants at the Moscow summit included

More than 200 religious leaders from several dozen countries…Israel’s Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi Yona Metzger…Cardinal Walter Kasper…World Council of Churches general secretary Samuel Kobia, Pope Shenouda of Egypt’s Coptic Orthodox Church and the Grand Mufti of Syria, Baderddin Hassoun.

Despite the banning of the Dalai Lama, some leaders came with political concerns. Today.Az reported that Sheikulislam Allahshukur Pashazadeh will represent Azerbaijan in the event:

Pashazadeh will deliver a speech on Armenian aggression against Azerbaijan, separatism as well as renouncing aggression and inviolability of territorial integrity of states.

While there, he

will present Patriarch of All Russia Alexy II with the Sheikdom Order…in a private meeting with him.

That’s nice for Alexei, who is better known for handing out awards – to the likes of Belarus dictator Alexander Lukashenko, as I blogged here.

Returning to the interview with Chaplin, the spokesman explains why Russia is the best place for such a summit:

I hope the world is taking an interest in the Russian model of relations between religions. We have really achieved peaceful coexistence of the many religions, with the diverse lifestyles they demand, and with related judicial systems, which vary as widely. Thus, certain parts of the Russian Empire lived according to the Shari’a, and the adat was de facto governing Muslims even in the Soviet years. So, you see, Russia is able to incorporate many lifestyles and even different legal systems-a model that may prove useful worldwide.

Those on the sharp end of religious freedom issues in Russia – some of whom I’ve blogged about – may be inclined to disagree. But no doubt the summit will succeed in raising the global standing of Putin and Alexei; and if a side-effect is the marginalisation of Tibet’s most significant critic of the Chinese occupation, who’s to worry much about that?

UPDATE: More on the summit today.

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Back on Monday I blogged on a report from Jews on First about a Jewish family who had allegedly been forced to leave town after complaining about aggressive proselytising by the local Indian River School District in Delaware. One detail which was not included in that report, but which I picked up on via a commentator at Dispatches from the Culture Wars, was that an organisation named the “Stop the ACLU Coalition” (STACLU) had publicised the family’s home address and phone number, in order to “expose” them as “ACLU plaintiffs”. STACLU’s denunciation wasn’t even accurate  – the ACLU has given the family some support, but they are in fact being represented by a Wilmington law firm.

Jesus’ General has now contacted STACLU director Nedd Kareiva, to congratulate him for his part in what he calls the “Indian River Pogrom”:

I think you deserve partial credit for making that happen. After all, you did publish their name, address, and phone number on your web site (see screen cap below) as part of your “Expose ACLU Plaintiffs” project. It certainly wouldn’t be much of a stretch to say that such information gave people the means they needed to drive the Dobrich family from their home.

Of course, you didn’t do it all by yourself. The good god-fearing Christians of the Indian Hill School District deserve most of the credit…

Kareiva responds to the General (emphases added):

Pogrom? I’m not sure I want to call it that. That is not an appropriate term, however, I am pleased that we had an effect in this case. We have others we want to put up on the site to shame them but have not gotten around to it. And I’m not so sure I can take credit for it. However, if an ACLU speaker was booed, that’s music to my ears.

I would appreciate it if you would sign your actual name rather than JC Christian.

Regards
Nedd Kareiva
Director

UPDATE AND CLARIFICATION

This story has now received considerable attention on the blogosphere. Most vociferous among those defending Karieva’s posting of the address is Jay Stephenson of Stop the ACLU.com (not to be confused with Karieva’s Stop the ACLU.org). He writes:

Assuming the original reports are accurate, the mother and son apparently moved as early as late 2004. How could the 2006 publication of the address the father maintains have “driven” the family from their home in 2004 or played any role at all?

I must confess that it had not occurred to me that Karieva might have been so incompetent as to post an outdated and therefore incorrect address (although in fact the exact date from which the family was allegedly split up cannot be discerned from the article), but in fact I never claimed that the posting of the address had led to the family’s alleged flight; it just seemed to me to be a significant bit of context worth including in an overview. Karieva became a central issue only when he expressed his pleasure at having “had an effect” when told about the family’s predicament. We can draw significant conclusions about him and his movement from that, whether or not he actually managed to get the address right.

Karieva also insists that he is in no way anti-Semitic, being himself part Jewish. Stephenson, meanwhile, treats us to some rambling anti-Palestinian rhetoric in order to prove his own pro-Jewish credentials. Again, such an allegation was never made by me, although Karieva’s lack of concern about the family having been allegedly subjected to anti-Semitic abuse is telling. There does seem to be some surprising anti-Semitism in the USA (currently being dredged to the surface by Sacha Baron Cohen), but in this case Karieva was simply unlucky that his target was Jewish. Had an atheist family been run out of town, no doubt it could be “justified” (to some) on the grounds that atheists are either Communists or extreme moral relativists. Pagans could be dismissed as devil worshippers, Muslims as America-haters, Hindus and Buddhists as stroppy immigrants. Christians who prefer private devotion over officially-decreed piety would simply be baffling. But, for obvious historical reasons, picking on a Jewish family throws the unpleasantness of certain actions into sharp relief; hence the popularity of the term “Judeo-Christian” on the US right.

Now, it seems, Karieva has decided to end his campaign against private individuals:

It was suggested, NOT compelled or mandated, by our legal counsel to delete the content and thus take this page out of your [sic] arsenal. In its place, we will continue to post ACLU supporting lawyers and companies like Progressive Insurance and the Ford Foundation so that we may boycott them from ever getting our money and business.

Karieva addresses himself to “The Daily Kookoos (KOS with 3 extra O’s), Jesus (Armchair) General, (Hair) Salon and others.” I assume the last reference is to me, since my blog is [UPDATE: was] hosted by Salon magazine, but readers should be aware that I do not work for Salon itself.

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The Guardian reports on the importing of an ancient form of discrimination:

Researchers detail claims that many of the 50,000 Dalits in the UK – once known as India’s lower-caste “untouchables” – suffer discrimination from other castes in terms of jobs, healthcare, politics, education and schools.

…In a report likely to provoke bitter controversy, researchers were told how couples who marry outside their own caste face “violence, intimidation and exclusion”. The study, No Escape – Caste Discrimination in the UK, focuses on domestic discrimination, although campaigners are also trying to force British firms with commercial interests in India to outlaw practices unfair to Dalits. The government has promised to consider the issue in forthcoming legislation and to look at claims of discrimination against lower-caste Gurkhas in the British army.

David Haslam of the Dalit Solidarity Network, who organised the research, said the group had spoken to 130 people for the study.

The Dalit Solidarity Network (UK) has a website here, but unfortunately it does not appear to have been updated since 2002. There is more general information on the organisation’s international website, but nothing about the new report. In fact, the only likely reference to it comes from a Japanese website which makes reference to the following:

‘Research Project: Caste Discrimination in the UK Diaspora’, Dalit Rights- The Newsletter of the Dalit Solidarity Network-UK, Issue No.13, Winter 2005/6, p.4.

However, this issue of the newsletter does not appear to be available online.

How the British government should deal with caste was the subject of a Parliamentary debate last November. Labour left-winger Jeremy Corbyn noted that the

Dalit Solidarity Network UK produced a solid report on caste discrimination in the private sector. It lays down a number of demands that should be made of the private sector companies that invest in India. It has started talks with HSBC bank, Lloyds TSB, Standard Chartered and Barclays about their investment strategies.

That report was entitled “Caste Discrimination and the Private Sector: Employment Principles for Foreign Investors in South Asia”, and is available to read here (and a brief outline is here). Labour MP Rob Marris added that

We have caste-based discrimination here in the UK. Those who know the UK south Asian community quite well, and I count myself as one of those, can sometimes see, by looking at south Asians and those from a south Asian background, from what caste they have come—because of systematic discrimination for 2,500 years. Dalit people look different. That is reproduced in this country. Sometimes, sadly, here in the UK, it is possible to get a sense of which is a Dalit and which is a Jat temple, or gurdwara, on visiting them. Caste exists in this country, as well as in south Asia and Africa.

And regarding the Gurkhas (a brigade of Nepalese soldiers who serve in the British Army), Marris added that

There have been serious allegations of discrimination, as regards both recruitment and what happens to those recruited, in terms of their career progression—or, according to the allegations, lack of career progression.

However, not everyone thinks that the UK situation is a major cause for concern. Back to the Guardian (link added):

In India, Dalits and non-Dalits rarely eat together, but 81% of those questioned said the restriction did not usually apply here. Piara Khabra, MP for Ealing Southall, accused researchers of exaggerating the extent of problems: “It is a big issue in India, but not here. There is a broader community and different traditions. People live happily together.” He said many complainants may claim caste discrimination mistakenly or for political reasons. “I am the MP and people come to me who are from the lowest castes.”

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“Stop the ACLU Coalition” Publicised Home Address, Phone Number

A special “hello” to all my extra readers, currently coming via Jesus’ General, Crooks and Liars, Christianity Today Weblog, and elsewhere.

Back in 2004, the Center for Reclaiming America for Christ (based at Dr D. James Kennedy’s Coral Ridge Ministries) praised the efforts of a school board in Delaware to promote Christianity among the children under its care (link added):

Despite threats of litigation from the ACLU, one Delaware school district has made it abundantly clear that they will not surrender America’s Christian heritage without a fight.

For years, the Indian River School District (IRSD) Board of Education of Sussex County, Delaware, has opened with an invocation. Recently, they received a threatening letter from the Delaware chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) demanding that they discontinue their tradition of prayer.

School Board Takes a Brave Stand

After seeking legal counsel, a meeting was called, and community residents gathered at the Frankford Elementary School. In response to the ACLU’s threats, IRSD board president Harvey Walls asked board member Dr. Donald G. Hattier to deliver a prayer. Amid the crowd’s loud cheers, Hattier rose and recited George Washington’s prayer which was offered during America’s fight for independence…

The Delaware Daily Times added:

…Many begged the school board not to take Jesus away from their children. Others read scriptures from the Bible citing instructions given by Jesus.

One parent announced that a petition was being circulated and so far more than 300 people had signed it.

Board members listened for more than an hour during the public comment period, making no opinion statements themselves.

Commenting on the ACLU’s complaint, Jan LaRue of Concerned Women for America asked (link in original):

“Where are the self-proclaimed, ‘Guardians of Liberty’ when a California school district is indoctrinating school kids with Islam?”…”This is one more example of the ACLU’s jihad to end public acknowledgement of the God of the Bible.”

(LaRue is referring to the California case discussed here)

However, the school board’s “brave stand” appears to be itself a bit of a “jihad” (as LaRue defines the term), according to Jews on First:

A large Delaware school district promoted Christianity so aggressively that a Jewish family felt it necessary to move to Wilmington, two hours away, because they feared retaliation for filing a lawsuit. The religion (if any) of a second family in the lawsuit is not known, because they’re suing as Jane and John Doe; they also fear retaliation. Both families are asking relief from “state-sponsored religion.”

The Jewish family is named as the Dobriches. Jews on First also gives an account of the 2004 meeting, with alleged details the CRAC report and the Daily Times left out:

On the evening in August 2004 when the board was to announce its new policy, hundreds of people turned out for the meeitng. The Dobrich family and Jane Doe felt intimidated and asked a state trooper to escort them.

The complaint recounts a raucous crowd that applauded the board’s opening prayer and then, when sixth-grader Alexander Dobrich stood up to read a statement, yelled at him “take your yarmulke off!” His statement, read by Samantha, confided “I feel bad when kids in my class call me Jew boy.”

…A  former board member suggested that Mona Dobrich might “disappear” like Madalyn Murray O’Hair, the atheist whose Supreme Court case resulted in ending organized school prayer. She disappeared in 1995 and her dismembered body was found six years later.

The crowd booed an ACLU speaker and told her to “go back up north.”

In the days after the meeting the community poured venom on the Dobriches. Callers to the local radio station said the family they should convert or leave the area. Someone called them and said the Ku Klux Klan was nearby.

Alex Dobrich claims that he was called “Christ-killer” by classmates; the school board’s lawyer, Thomas Neuberger of the Rutherford Institute, suggests that Dobrich is lying. The family is in fact being represented by a Wilmington law firm rather than the ACLU, but this did not prevent the Stop the ACLU Coalition from deciding to publicise the Dobriches’ home address and phone number, as part of an “Expose the ACLU Plaintiff” campaign.

The Dobriches have a litany of complaints about the school board’s alleged promotion of Christianity, including the claim that members of Bible Clubs were allowed to jump the queue for lunch. One reported incident appears particularly egregious, concerning Samantha Dobrich’s 2004 graduation:

She was the only Jewish student in her graduating class. The complaint relates that local pastor, Jerry Fike, in his invocation, followed requests for “our heavenly Father’s” guidance for the graduates with:

I also pray for one specific student, that You be with her and guide her in the path that You have for her. And we ask all these things in Jesus’ name.

Jerry Fike is the pastor of Mt Olivet Brethren Church in Georgetown (there’s a photo here). Apparently, even board member Hattier had to concede that the pastor’s involvement was out of line:

…Hattier added that the district had to change the practice of inviting pastors to give invocations at high-school graduations because it is against the law and had been for decades.

The Delaware Wave gave further details about the current litigation back in March:

Cheers of joy echoed through Sussex Central High School on Monday night when the Indian River School Board announced they would not pay a “six-figure” settlement to end prayer litigation.

The motion, made by Nina Lou Bunting and seconded by Donald Hattier, was unanimously carried.

“Put that in your pipe and smoke it, ACLU,” said David Bennett, a preacher at the Dagsboro Church of Christ, when the announcement was made.

Just two hours prior, while executive session was held, Bennett led nearly 100 spectators in song as they waited patiently for the news.

…”If these kids are taught evolution — that they came from apes — and they’re not given the basis of faith, what’s to stop them from acting like animals?” he said.

In fact, science appears to be a far lower priority for the school board than getting a Jew to convert, and students who wish to be excused biology lessons that cover evolution are reportedly allowed to attend a Bible Club instead.

But it seems that all this reported religious indoctrination is having only a limited effect, and the Indian River State Board would like the threat of violence to keep the kids in control. Delaware State News reported in April:

A Downstate lawmaker’s legislation to give school districts the ability spank misbehaving students has set off a stinging debate.

Rep. John C. Atkins, R-Millsboro, said he recently filed House Bill 376 at the behest of officials from the Indian River School District, which he represents.

“They are having a hard time controlling students and this would serve as a deterrent, especially if the kids see a teacher or administrator holding the paddle in the hallway when they walk by,” he said.

…They are talking about a couple of swats on a student’s buttocks, done in the privacy of an administrator’s office.

(Hat tip: Dispatches from the Culture Wars; the “Stop the ACLU Coalition” publication of the Dobriches’ home details was found by a commentator there)

UPDATE: Jesus’ General gives his take; Stop the ACLU responds. See my new entry here.

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With Israel poised to invade Gaza, a group of Christians seeks a bit of the action:

Strumming guitars and banging bongos, Christian pilgrims journeyed to Israel’s dusty border with the Gaza Strip on Thursday to offer support to Israeli troops participating in the military action.

About 25 people, wearing white T-shirts that said “Your God is my God,” waved Israeli flags and sang religious songs.

…The group had planned to visit Israel long before this week’s invasion. But after the military operation was launched, the pilgrims decided to show their support. Members came from the U.S., Singapore, Australia, Switzerland, New Zealand, Sweden, France and Germany.

A “pilgrim” from Finland is interviewed, but the actual identity of the group is not given. It seems, though, that their trip to Gaza comes just after a less successful incursion into the ultra-Orthodox district of Jerusalem known as Mea Shearim:

Details of the incident are sketchy. It began shortly after 10 AM, when a group of tourists, apparently from Germany, walked into the religious neighborhood of Meah She’arim wearing orange shirts, emblazoned with the missionary slogan ‘Your G-d is my god, Your people is my people.” Some eyewitnesses reported seeing a missionary emblem on the back of the shirts.

A group of religious youths and men very quickly surrounded the group and started yelling at them to get out of the neighborhood. It was not clear whether the hareidim pushed them before or after an orange-shirted man kicked one of the hareidim.

An ultra-Orthodox protest followed.

Arutz-7 has received anecdotal evidence of increased missionary activity in downtown Jerusalem. Jerusalem-area tour guide Yoni Berg told Arutz-7,

“I’m in downtown fairly frequently, and I have seen them of late. Friends of mine who work there have also noted them. They wear shirts with the words ‘Your G-d is my god, Your people is my people’, and they pass out pamphlets that have Jewish themes but are designed to lead the misinformed to believe in Jesus.”

An article published on the website of the Caspari Center offers some further clues:

Yaakov Damkani…teaches his Christian helpers first to thank Israelis for the Bible, for God, for the New Testament, for the Messiah…They wear T-shirts quoting Ruth’s Amekh ami ve’elohaikh elohai (“Your people is my people and your God is my God”).

A second essay explains that

Yaakov Damkani, the son of traditional Persian Jewish immigrants, has been among the most aggressive and persistent Israeli evangelists. Yaakov has been a leader for the past decade in outdoor evangelism on Israeli city streets and parks and beaches, outside festivals of rock music, theatres and at major public events. In recent years he has extended his outreach to Goa in India where masses of young Israelis have been backpacking after military service in the heavy atmosphere of the contemporary drug culture…Damkani maintains a center in Jaffa from which, with the help of foreign volunteers and some locals, he continues his bold evangelistic sorties.

Of course, it could be that the group spotted in Mea Sherim and Gaza just so happen to have the same t-shirts as Damkani’s foreign volunteer helpers. However, Damkani’s website has Swedish, Finnish, and German translations.

UPDATE: Shades of Rashomon – Ha’aretz carries a report on the Mea Shearim incident in which some crucial details are different:

A group of 50 pro-Israel Christian tourists came under attack Wednesday from some 100 residents of the ultra-Orthodox neighborhood of Mea She’arim in Jerusalem.

The tourists arrived at Mea She’arim wearing orange T-shirts with the words “Love your neighbor as yourself” printed across them.

Name variations: Jacob Damkani, Yakov Damkani

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Once again, WorldNetDaily‘s Aaron Klein acts as messenger boy for the Israeli religious right:

KIBBUTZ NAHAL OZ, Israel – A group of prominent rabbis is calling on President Bush to refuse political and financial support for Prime Minister Ehud Olmert’s plan to evacuate most of Judea and Samaria, stating the withdrawal is against U.S. interests, and that it violates basic tenets of Jewish law.

…”There is a clear definitive ruling in the Jewish Code of Law ‘Orach Chaim’ Chapter 329 which rules that it is strictly forbidden to give up even one inch of a Jewish border town to foreigners because it will lead to bloodshed. How much more so regarding retreating from holy land that enemies bent on your destruction have already stated will be used to launch attacks against Jews,” states the letter to Bush.

The grouping is known as the “Rabbinical Congress for Peace”, and Klein tells us that

…Congress members include some of the most esteemed Orthodox rabbis in the Jewish world.

Curiously, however, he doesn’t provide any of the “esteemed” names – despite having quoted the “congress” before (square brackets in original):

“Katrina is a consequence of the destruction of [Gaza’s] Gush Katif [slate of Jewish communities] with America’s urging and encouragement,” Rabbi Avraham Shmuel Lewin, executive director of the Rabbinic Congress for Peace, told WND. “The U.S. should have discouraged Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon from implementing the Gaza evacuation rather than pushing for it and pressuring Israel into concessions.”

I blogged on this theological trend, and the people behind the RCP, here. In particular, I noted the claim by the RCP’s deputy chairman, an illegal settler named Rabbi David Drukman, that Palestinians living in the West Bank and Gaza “should recognize their place”.

But what of the “Orach Chaim”? Here’s the relevant passage (square brackets in source):

When a city close to the border [is approached by a foreign power], then, even if [they state that] they come only for the purpose of [taking] straw and stubble, we desecrate the Shabbat [and wage battle against] them. For [if we do not prevent their coming] they may conquer the city, and from there the [rest of the] land will be easy for them to conquer.

However, not all Jewish interpreters are convinced that this is a “clear definitive ruling” on why Israel must continue its military occupation of the West Bank:

The “ruling” is based on the words of the Shulkhan Arukh Orach Chaim 329,6, which are themselves based on the Talmudic passage in Tr. Eruvin 45a. The passage deals with a case of Gentiles who are attacking Jewish towns. The Talmud determines that in the case of a border town, it is permitted to desecrate the Sabbath in order to defend it, even if they are coming merely to steal “hay and straw;” for we fear that otherwise they will capture the town, from where it will be easy for them to then capture the rest of the Land…This passage does not deal with the return of territories, but rather with a dispensation to violate the Sabbath even in the face of doubtful future endangement [sic] to life…The above has nothing whatsoever to do with the return of territories for the sake of peace.

This reading appears on the website of a “religious Zionist peace organization” opposed to “fundamentalist and extremist political arguments”. It’s based in Jerusalem, but is apparently not the kind of outfit to interest WorldNetDaily‘s “Jerusalem correspondent”.

(Klein’s continued puffing of the Israeli religious right has been covered by me several times in the past – see here, here, and here. Terry Krepel has also written a general survey of Klein’s journalism at ConWebWatch

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South Korean evangelist and faith healer Lee Jae Rock is preparing to hold a “healing crusade” in New York. As ever, ASSIST Ministries reports:

The “New York 2006” healing crusade will take place in the historic Madison Square Garden on July 27, 28 and 29.

…Like at all of his crusades, Dr. Lee will pray for the sick who attend the meetings. Before each service, a medical table will be set up for people who are sick to go and be diagnosed by Korean and American doctors and nurses and then, after being prayed for, if they believe they are healed, they will return back so that the medics can check out whether the healing had taken place from a medical perspective.

How exactly doctors will be able to make medically-valid diagnoses from a swift once-over at a “medical table” is not explained. However, one New York senator is not bothered by such a detail. ASSIST’s Dan Wooding spoke to Johnny Kim, who liases with mere mortals on behalf of Lee (link added):

…Kim added that New York State Senator, the Rev. Dr. Ruben Diaz, who was born in Puerto Rico, has encouraged local pastors to attend the crusade in Madison Square Garden and bring along their congregations.

Diaz himself is a pastor with the Church of God.

Lee has been making dramatic claims about his supposed ability to heal the sick for several years. Back in 2003 I tipped off James Randi about a particularly dubious photo of someone who had apparently been “healed” at a healing crusade in Russia. At the time (see my later blog entry here), ASSIST also promised that a Russian academic was preparing a report that would prove Lee’s abilities; when I contacted Wooding about this some months later, he referred me back to Kim, who did not respond. I then gently suggested to Wooding (some of whose work I find quite useful) that he might like to take a more sceptical view; I then received a brief notice that I had been removed from ASSIST’s mailing list (which was odd, given that I wasn’t on it).

Earlier this month, Lee’s church produced a press release announcing that

Medical Doctors Present Scientific Evidence Of Divine Healing At Conference In The Philippines

Apparently

…real medical data backing the claims were presented by physicians on maladies such as gastric cancer, quadriplegia, intracerebral hemorrhage, severe disability, thoracic tumor, Celiac disease, infertility, facial burns, tennis elbow tendonitis, liver cirrhosis, and other incurable diseases.

Lee’s church also runs a website with the purported “evidence”.

Lee Jae-Rock has featured on this blog several times in the past. His theology is somewhat eccentric, and includes details about blood transfusions and UFOs. He has been marginalised by other Christian groups in South Korea, and he once attempted to prevent a critical TV documentary from being aired by having his church members invade the studio (the documentary can be seen here). He also claims to have photos of strange phenomena that prove his supernatural powers; I placed one of these on my blog here. There are various Christian websites which critique Lee and have some interesting information, such as this one.

Name variations: Jaerock Lee, Lee Jae-rok

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NOTE: A statement from Van Rooyen below makes a strong case that this is one those instances where someone acting in good faith got into a hole thanks to other parties and found themselves being chewed up by the machinery of the law – which is far from being the same thing as being “brought to justice”.

A brief report on Premier:

A South African pastor has been jailed for bringing illegal immigrants to the UK and paying them a minimum wage.

Pieter Van Rooyen from Life Church on the Isle of Man brought them over on false documents and made them work for one pound thirty six pence an hour.

He has been sentenced to six months.

The Times gave a fuller account a few days ago; the jail sentence is in fact suspended:

Van Rooyen appeared in court alongside Jacobus Frederick Visser, 43, a fellow South African and an illegal immigrant. They each admitted facilitating a breach of the Immigration Act by providing travel, false documents, accommodation and subsistence for the men.

The pastor made contact with Visser, who owns a building firm in South Africa, last August. Visser gave Van Rooyen a price for the job of renovating that the home the pastor shares with his [family].

The court was told that Van Rooyen gave a bogus invitation which suggested that the men were to take part in a business course. On the strength of the invitation the men were allowed to enter the country via Gatwick in September, before travelling on to the Isle of Man.

Once the men arrived, they were put to work under conditions that the Times likened to slavery.

The Times also notes that Van Rooyen has a background in banking. One website describes him as “Head of Banking at Barclays International”; more properly, this should have been head of “Barclays Private Clients International Limited”. In this capacity, he stated in April that

“As the number of people of other nationalities working in the UK increases, offshore mortgages are becoming increasingly popular…”

Not at wages of £1.36 an hour, I think. The website of Life Church Isle of Man gives further details about him (links added):

Pieter is the founder of Life Church ­ Isle of Man and is an Alumni of the School of Life and Ministry (SLM) where he attended Bible School, specialising in Pastoral Services. His first passion is to see lost souls saved and to disciple people to see Christ Jesus manifested in them. He also has a calling for sharing Kingdom principles with business people.

He is a member of the International Christian Chamber of Commerce and lectures at the SLM Business School in Kent. Pieter is a vastly experienced International Financial Consultant, Private Banker and offshore specialist.

He is an experienced facilitator, skilled negotiator, mentor and coach. He is a member of the of the International Coaching Federation in the USA. He has worked in the Far East, the Middle East, South Africa and the United Kingdom. He has been the chairman and served on the boards of several international financial institutions and is currently a executive director of a large international private clients bank.

Some of those financial links are explained in a separate profile at Mentors and Business Coaches International (which clearly dates from before his move to the Isle of Man):

Pieter is a vastly experienced International Financial Consultant, Private Banker and Offshore Tax-Havens specialist and has 12 years experience in advising High Net Worth Clients. He is also an experienced facilitator, skilled negotiator, mentor and coach. He also has experience in management buy-outs, take-overs and acquisitions. Pieter has wide industry knowledge with a track record of developing and implementing strategies and systems for small, medium and large companies. He has been an Executive Director on the boards of Inter-Alliance International (listed on the FTSE in London), Premier Global Alliance and served as Chairman on the board of Premier Advisory Services (an Isle of Man, Trust Company). He is a Regional Director of the International Christian Chamber of Commerce in the UK and lectures at the SLM Business School in Folkestone. He has worked in the Far East, the Middle East, and South Africa and is now based in Kent in the United Kingdom.

Van Rooyen’s church, and the School of Life and Ministry, are both part of Christ for the World, neo-Pentecostal ministry run by Robert Maasbach and his wife Virginia out of Folkestone, on the southeast coast of the UK. Robert is actually part of a Pentecostal dynasty: his late father Johan Maasbach ran the John Maasbach World Mission (which used to own a property in Windsor, NY that was eventually purchased by Randall Terry); one brother, David Maasbach, is an evangelist in Holland, while another relative, John Maasbach, is associated with Bishop Michael Reid of the Peniel Church in Essex (which I blogged on here). The Maasbachs emphasise miracle healings in their ministries, and Robert claims that he was cured of a broken neck. Some websites also suggest that Robert teaches the Gospel of Prosperity, although that is not clear from his own website.

UPDATE (1 June 2012): A long statement from Van Rooyen was posted as comment; I have decided to move the text up into the main text:

So here are the true and accurate facts and response to all previous speculations, false media disinformation reports and sensation seekers:

Without Prejudice:

My Family and I move to the United Kingdom ten years ago (2001). I studied business in South Africa up to Masters Degree level. With my qualifications, board appointment to a UK plc and many years of international financial experience I was granted a ‘highly skilled migrant’ visa. In 2004 my family and I got permanent residence (indefinite leave to remain) in the UK. I the same year I had a unusual dream in which I saw a cobra snake with a radio in its mouth. My pastor (Robert Maasbach) interpreted the dream as that ‘the media would try to destroy me’. I sadly ignored the warning as I had no idea what he was talking about.

Shortly after the dream and a lengthy fast I was head hunted and became a senior executive for one of the world’s largest private banks on the Isle of Man (IOM). Within months I was elected to the international board. The IOM is the ‘offshore capital of the world’ and many international banks have their international head office there to benefit from corporate tax benefits for the banking group. I received a second warning when the Holy Spirit woke me up at night and told me to read Isaiah 43: 2 “When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and through the rivers, they shall not overflow you. When you walk through the fire, you shall not be burned, Nor shall the flame scorch you.”

My family remained in Kent for the duration of the academic school year. Our Kent home was placed on the market and I commuted weekly to the IOM where we bought a family home, requiring major renovations. There were negative employment on the island and we were devastated to learn that local building contractors were booked up to two years ahead. Being desperate to have my family with me and made a judgment error. I accepted the quote of the foreign building contractor who approached me, quoting a good competitive price on the project (£55,000 for labor only. It later equated to £15 per person per hour worked on site).

The builder later requested ‘a letter of invitation’ for him and his own employees, which I naively conceded to. It later became evident that the contractor never applied for working visas pertaining to his own workforce, nor did he pass on the fair labor wages I paid him. I could never foresee the outcome of this liaison…

I was content; excelling in my high profile position, while my social worker wife and I planted and pastored a local church. The church grew rapidly to the second most attend church in the Isle of Man. We held several crusades and saw many miracles. We dealt with drug addicts and took some into our home; many were rehabilitated and restored. What we didn’t realized was that a fierce battle in the spiritual realm was created. According to the Bible we cannot serve God and Mammon (the love for and the control of the Babylonian money system). As an executive of the bank and being a pastor I was doing just that.

One day during a board meeting in London, I was astounded when informed that the builders were arrested and detained for lack of working permits. A few days afterwards came my unexpected arrest and an exhausting twelve-hour long interrogation, after which I was released on bail. My employers did not take kindly to the nerve wracking five months investigation which followed and I was suspended. To my shock and dismay the building contractor turned “Queen’s witness”, aiming to testify against me in order to mitigate his own situation.

With many qualms but acting with legal council’s advice, I resigned my executive position in order to plead guilty on the ‘minor statutory charge’ only; that of “providing the builders with a ‘a letter of invitation’, which enabled the work force to enter the UK, temporarily”. Council reasoned that this move would take the prosecution by surprise and disarm the contractor’s allegations. I was hereby expected merely to be fined a maximum of £5000.

These tactics proved successful in stopping the prosecution from bringing false charges of illegal trafficking and slave wages in a possibly lengthy High Court case. The matter however fueled sensation and a planned disinformation campaign throughout the media, who had a field time playing up this ‘huge story’ taking place in a very small community in a horrendous manner. The truth was pulled out of proportion while the public lapped up every juicy morsel of disinformation, speculating our deportation wildly. My dream about the cobra snake became a reality.

Life became almost unbearable. Not only did the media falsely accused me with alien trafficking, but having my career in tatters, my wife was unfairly suspended from her professional job and photo’s of my under aged children were placed in the international press. Many ‘friends’ abandoned us. I felt utterly abused and deserted. My sentencing was postponed several times, while the contractor and builders were deported.

The Holy Spirit led me to do another complete food fast. Before a Sunday morning church service a young pastor came to me and and told me that he asked the Lord to send two angels to come and release me from the burden. I was amazed to say the least. Unbeknown to me, a man I never heard of from Brisbane, Australia, was woken by the Holy Spirit and prompt that he needed to go to the IOM. He did not know why, but after prayer and confirmation from a pastor family member obeyed the Holy Spirit. Buying two plane tickets for himself and his son, they amazingly arrived on my doorstep through a series of events. The man introduced himself as Peter West and his son as Paul. They related the the Holy Spirit’s strange urge to come to the IOM. The visitors told us they were not ‘angels’ but that God had send them with a message. My wife and I just dissolved into tears and poured out our agony. They ensured us that they did not know of our plight; once again repeating the words that “everything will be okay” and departed for Brisbane after three days.

The media demanded our deportation but the High Bailiff turned the prosecution’s requests down and I faced the unthinkable when I was unexpectedly sentenced to three months imprisonment in the oldest working prison in Europe, with no sanitation or fresh water in my cell. I felt the Holy Spirit asking me to do a forty day total food fast to which I obeyed. I completed the fast without the knowledge of the prison authorities.

While my wife’s mum was critically ill abroad, she received hate mail and calls; had to deal with all the financial pressures as well as coping with the press. We still had two massive mortgages and no income. The house in Kent was not yet sold. The bank called up our mortgage and demanded full and instant repayment of a six figure sum although they had illegally frozen all our banking accounts and withheld a large severance settlement. Our family was shattered and had to ‘dig deep’ not to throw in the towel but kept encouraged against all logic by the Australians message that: “that everything will be okay”.

I was released after forty-three days of ‘hell’. The bank pressured us to sell the IOM property for several hundred thousand pounds below their own valuation whilst we fell behind with our mortgage payments for the first time. Eight weeks after their first visit, the Australians unexpectedly came visiting again for the weekend, not being aware of neither sentence nor imprisonment. When they learned the facts, they came to the rescue; immediately canceling their scheduled flights back to Australia.

We were divinely led to an atheist Advocate, Paul Beckett who is on record that he is willing to confirm any fact and outcome pertaining to this case. He then informed us that in his opinion I became the subject of a planned conspiracy by the ‘Manx Mafia’. They controlled all money decisions on the island for hundreds of years and he felt my high personal profile and my church’s popularity threatened them.

The Australians then instructed advocate Paul Beckett to apply for an interdict against the bank who illegally froze my accounts. They furthermore offered to pay our mortgage up to date, plus one year’s mortgage in advance, allowing us to complete the renovations on the house! The advocate wanted to know why complete strangers were willing to part with so much money to complete strangers. Peter West simply replied: “God told us to do it. We need no contracts or any interest to be repaid. God is our witness and He will reward us for our obedience.” The atheist advocate was stunned and stormed out of the office. Within days our mortgage, overdraft and loans was paid. Under legal pressure, the bank released the freeze off all our accounts, as well as my severance payment. The atheist advocate was so moved by what God did for us that he repented his own sins and gave his heart to the Lord Jesus.

One year later I was still unemployed. Renovations on the IOM house were completed but it didn’t sell. Pressure was mounting once more since mortgage payments became due again. Again the Australians came forward with another year’s mortgage payments. Meanwhile the ‘credit crunch’ hit all property markets; yet the Australian’s kept our mortgage fully paid till the property eventually sold in April 2009 for a profit when the market was at its lowest in the biggest recession of a decade.

In total the Australians already visited us nine times in five years and parted with over a quarter of a million pounds, for which no agreement was signed or interest charged, …thus “everything became okay” during a really desperate situation. I indeed passed through the water and it did not overflow me. I walked through the fire, but I didn’t got burned nor scorched by the flame. Perhaps there is no greater truth than “with men this is impossible, but all things are possible with God!”

In 2007 I moved back to the UK. I was never deported as speculated, never charged for illegal trafficking and or paying slave wages as misinformed by the media. I only pleaded guilty for naively giving the building contractor a ‘letter of invitation’ that he abused to mislead customs control on arrival. The building contractor was deported with his workforce. The church we have planted is still in existence on the Isle of Man and is still growing. My family are now all UK nationals with dual citizenship. I am a successful author, ordained itinerant minister, business consultant, mentor and coach, Kingdom economist and international public speaker. God was right: “Everything has become OK!” Every bit of the glory belongs to the Lord Jesus!

These are the true facts and can be verified by Advocate Paul Beckett from Mannin Chambers on the Isle of Man. I now regular share this amazing story of God’s grace and power all over the world to His glory. The detailed story was published in 2010 under the title: “Business Unusual – Banking on God” – ISBN number 9780620439152. It can be ordered from http://www.businessunusual.org/store or from http://www.amazon.co.uk. You can also listen to my true testimony by clicking on the link:http://www.businessunusual.org/about/pieter-van-rooyen/testimony/

All rights reserved. This blog, ‘Business Unusual- Banking on God’, ISBN 978-1-4500-5782-0, photo’s or parts thereof may not be reproduced or published in any form, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form by any means- electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or otherwise- without prior written permission of the publisher and author, except as provided by European Union and or United Kingdom copyright laws. Copyright 2010© by Pieter van Rooyen

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Yet again, Zion Oil and Gas makes it into the news. BusinessWeek reports:

John Brown, a born-again Christian who believes the Bible will guide him to oil and gas in Israel, is planning to test the faith of investors in the U.S. in the next few weeks. The Texas-based novice oilman who founded Zion Oil & Gas is aiming to raise between $2.45 million and $14 million in an initial public offering, tentatively slated for July, to fund drilling at a kibbutz northeast of Tel Aviv. God, Brown says, “has promised in the Bible to bless Israel with one of the world’s largest oil and gas fields.”

This is a bit slow off the mark; the annoncement was made back in January, and I blogged it at the time. Brown believes that a passage in the Book of Deuternomy that mentions Asher dipping his foot in oil in fact refers to a hidden deposit of petroleum (Biblical hermeneutics is not his strong suit), and that a “stranger” mentioned in the Book of Kings is reference to himself (square brackets from Zion Oil’s website):

…Moreover concerning a stranger [John Brown], that is not of thy people Israel, but cometh out of a far country [U.S.A.] for thy name’s sake: (for they shall hear of thy great name, and of thy strong hand, and of thy stretched out arm); when he shall come and pray towards this house; hear thou in heaven thy dwelling place, and do according to ALL that the stranger calleth to thee for [Oil for Israel]: that all the people of the earth may know thy name, to fear thee, as do thy people Israel and that they may know that this house, which I have builded, is called by thy name.” (I Kings 8:41-43).

One well has already been drilled, with underwhelming results. BusinessWeek again:

Last spring, the team found luminescence in some of the rock they had fetched, suggesting it contained hydrogen and carbon—though that could amount to either natural gas or just tar. Still, they also saw gas bubbling up as they drilled. “Our sense is that the hydrocarbon is oil and gas,” says [CEO Eugene] Soltero. “We don’t know how much and whether or not we can produce it economically.”

That cost $8.8 million, apparently. BusinessWeek also notes a previous effort by Brown to raise funds:

He tried to raise money in an IPO two years ago, but couldn’t collect the $6.5 million required by the American Stock Exchange. He scrapped the deal and returned most of the $3.7 million he collected from hundreds of investors.

The details of this fiasco are included in certain documents posted on the Zion Oil website, which I blogged on last year. The problem was that one of Zion Oil’s major shareholders at that time was a man named Ralph DeVore, a cousin of Hal Lindsey and a director of Hal Lindsey Ministries. Lindsey used his status as supposed “prophecy expert” to promote the share option in his WorldNetDaily column (failing to mention that a relative stood to gain), but this was insufficient. Brown complained that DeVore had agreed to organise a number of meetings to promote Zion Oil, but he had failed to do so. DeVore’s bizarre response to suggest that the real reason why the IPO had failed was because Zion Oil was supposed to be an evangelical company, yet it had a number of Jews on its board. DeVore claimed to have received a personal message from Jesus, through the Holy Spirit, that this amounted to religious syncretism and rebellion towards God.

Brown is not the only evangelical to devote his resources to finding oil in Israel; before him, there was James Spillman and Hayseed Stephens. I covered both of these characters in a blog entry here.

(Hat tip: Christianity Today Weblog. Image via Jesus’ General)

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On June 8, US Reps Michael McCaul and Joe Crowley published a draft resolution on the subject of Palestinian Christians, beginning with a dramatic headline:

Help Save the Oldest Christian Community in the World

Co-sponsor a resolution recognizing the plight of Palestinian Christians

Dear Colleague:

It’s time for Congress, the President and the international community to address the systematic destruction of the oldest Christian community in the world. Since the Palestinian Authority gained control over the Gaza Strip and the West Bank, the political, social and economic status of the Christian community has declined precipitously. This has led to mass migration of Palestinian Christians out of territories under Palestinian Authority control. In addition, Christian holy sites and cemeteries have suffered repeated desecration with little response from the police.

…If we do not act now Christians around the world risk losing control of and access to the most ancient and holy sites in Christendom. Please join us in cosponsoring this resolution and working to save the Palestinian Christian community from devastation…

No actual details or references are given, but the authors are drawing on the recent report compiled by Justus Weiner, which I discussed in depth here. Weiner’s report raised serious issues that ought not to be dismissed out of hand, although his well-known biases and past journalistic excesses undermine his credibility.  McCaul and Crowley follow Weiner’s lead in attributing Palestinian Christian problems solely to increased Islamism in Palestinian society, while totally ignoring complaints by Palestinian Christian leaders against the Israeli occupation. In fact, this perspective actively seeks to discredit these leaders, who have received sympathetic hearings in a number of mainline churches. Most aggressive in this campaign in the USA is perhaps Mark Tooley, the ex-CIA employee now based at the Institute of Religion and Democracy. Tooley self-righteously castigates Palestinian clergy for making political statements critical of Israel instead of attending to spiritual matters – although he has no problem with Christian Zionists who provide crucial and uncritical backing for the most reactionary elements of Israeli society.

However, this Weiner/Tooley version of events has itself been challenged. The Forward notes a report by members of Rep Henry Hyde’s staff at the House International Relations Committee that describes

…sections of the [separation] barrier being built on Palestinian Christian land, the inability of Palestinian Christians to access their places of worship because of Israeli travel restrictions, and the Israeli government’s backing of aggressive attempts by militant Jewish settlers to move into the Christian Quarter of Jerusalem’s Old City and into other predominantly Christian parts of Jerusalem.

I have not been able to find the actual report, but details of it got picked up by Robert Novak and Cardinal Theodore McCarrick. Novak also did his own research, and highlighted how Israeli settlements have pressuried Palestinian Christians living in the village of Aboud (as I blogged here), and said that besides the Italian Franciscan guardian of the Holy Places, he “could not find another Catholic layman or prelate who complained of anti-Christian bias by Muslims”.

Further criticisms have come in the wake of the proposed resolution, and Forward gives voice to some of the sceptics (link added):

Daphne Tsimhoni, a professor at the Israel Institute of Technology in Haifa and a leading scholar on Christian minorities in the Middle East, told the Forward that almost all the bill’s assertions are either exaggerations, misrepresentations or sheer fabrications.

…”This, to me, is like trying to drown a fish in water,” said Afif Safieh, who heads the Palestine Liberation Organization’s mission to Washington. Safieh, a Roman Catholic with scores of relatives in the West Bank, said that the incidents of which he is aware are ones that can be attributed to “lawlessness from which the entire population suffers.” He added that the PLO always has been “extremely open-minded and fair toward the Christian community.”

Christians, he said, are overrepresented in the Palestinian political system and in the P.A.’s bureaucracy. He added that, despite his political differences with the ruling militant Hamas organization, he must admit that the Islamist movement has not taken any steps to discriminate against Christians and has not imposed Islamic law.

Al-Jazeerah, meanwhile, notes that a certain Dale Crowley was fired from a Christian radio station recently for publicly blaming Israel for Palestinian Christian woes. That firing may have been unfair, but it was no great loss: the fundamentalist Rev Crowley keeps company with unsavoury characters connected with the far-right Liberty Lobby and its Spotlight magazine. For many years Dale Crowley worked with Haviv Schieber, a former ultra-right Zionist who rejected Israel because of its supposed socialism (Public Eye has more).

More helpfully, al-Jazeerah also draws attention to the response of the Palestian Christian organisation Open Bethlehem to the resolution:

In response to Texas congressman Michael McCaul’s resolution on the plight of Palestinian Christians, Open Bethlehem’s chief executive Leila Sansour, a Christian from Bethlehem, has sent a letter to congress expressing her community’s shock at the gross misrepresentation of the real threat facing Christians of the Holy Land and has urged congress to pay heed to the real threat to the oldest Christian community in the world.

…By perpetuating the misconception that it is their Muslim neighbors and the Palestinian Authority who are creating this crisis, rather than policies imposed by the Israeli government, congressman McCaul is further entrenching the problems facing the Christian community rather than helping to address them…

Meanwhile, the Presbyterian Church USA has decided to rescind its 2004 decision to divest selectively from certain multinational corporations operating in Israel. Instead, the PCUSA has expressed regret for the “hurt and misunderstanding among many members of the Jewish community” which their policy allegedly caused. No doubt any “hurt and misunderstanding” felt by Palestinian Christians who thought they could rely on their US co-religionists to hold firm will pass unremarked.

UPDATE: The draft resolution has been “quietly withdrawn”. See here.

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