Morning at the Office

General Convention

Tuesday, April 28, 2009

Trent Lott proves Republicans have No Integrity

This is part of what they're saying at Gather.com.

"
Not only did Senator Spector ignore the people that had voted for him...and the principles and perspectives they hold - He has forfeited whatever integrity he ever had
"

Does the name Trent Lott ring a bell?

Sunday, April 12, 2009

Unacceptable ! She's 8 years old not 10.

Saudi judge refuses to annul 8-year-old's marriage

  • Story Highlights
  • NEW: Judge said girl could petition "once she reaches puberty," relative tells CNN
  • Girl's father arranged her marriage to a 47-year-old to settle debts, lawyer says
  • Appeals court declined to certify original ruling, sent case back to judge
  • Girl's mother says she will continue to seek daughter's divorce
By Mohammed Jamjoom
CNN

(CNN) -- A Saudi judge has refused for a second time to annul a marriage between an 8-year-old girl and a 47-year-old man, a relative of the girl told CNN.

The most recent ruling, in which the judge upheld his original verdict, was handed down Saturday in the Saudi city of Onaiza, where late last year the same judge rejected a petition from the girl's mother, who was seeking a divorce for her daughter.

The relative said the judge, Sheikh Habib Al-Habib, "stuck by his earlier verdict and insisted that the girl could petition the court for a divorce once she reached puberty." The family member, who requested anonymity, added that the mother will continue to pursue a divorce for her daughter.

The case, which has drawn criticism from local and international rights groups, came to light in December when al-Habib declined to annul the marriage on a legal technicality. The judge ruled the girl's mother -- who is separated from the girl's father -- was not the girl's legal guardian and therefore could not represent her in court, according to Abdullah al-Jutaili, the mother's lawyer.

The girl's father, according to the attorney, arranged the marriage in order to settle his debts with the man, who is "a close friend" of his. At the time of the initial verdict, the judge required the girl's husband to sign a pledge that he would not have sex with her until she reaches puberty, al-Jutaili told CNN. The judge ruled that when the girl reaches puberty, she will have the right to request a divorce by filing a petition with the court, the lawyer said.

Last month, an appeals court in the Saudi capital of Riyadh declined to certify the original ruling, in essence rejecting al-Habib's verdict, and sent the case back to al-Habib for reconsideration.

Under the complicated Saudi legal process, the appeals court ruling meant that the marriage was still in effect, but that a challenge to the marriage was still ongoing. The appeals court in Riyadh will now take up the case again and a hearing is scheduled for next month, according to the relative.

The issue of child marriage has been a hot-button topic in the deeply conservative kingdom recently. While rights groups have been petitioning the government to enact laws that would protect children from this type of marriage, the kingdom's top cleric has said that it's OK for girls as young as 10 to wed.

"It is incorrect to say that it's not permitted to marry off girls who are 15 and younger," Sheikh Abdul Aziz Al-Sheikh, the kingdom's grand mufti, said in remarks last January quoted in the regional Al-Hayat newspaper. "A girl aged 10 or 12 can be married. Those who think she's too young are wrong and they are being unfair to her."

Al-Sheikh reportedly made the remarks when he was asked during a lecture about parents forcing their underage daughters to marry.

"We hear a lot in the media about the marriage of underage girls," he said, according to the newspaper. "We should know that Sharia law has not brought injustice to women."

Sharia law is Islamic law. Saudi Arabia follows a strict interpretation of Islam called Wahhabism.

CNN was unable to reach government officials for comment.

Christoph Wilcke, a Saudi Arabia researcher for Human Rights Watch, told CNN in December that his organization has heard of many other cases of child marriages.

"We've been hearing about these types of cases once every four or five months because the Saudi public is now able to express this kind of anger -- especially so when girls are traded off to older men," Wilcke said.

Wilcke explained that while Saudi ministries may make decisions designed to protect children, "It is still the religious establishment that holds sway in the courts, and in many realms beyond the court."

Last December, Zuhair al-Harithi, a spokesman for the Saudi government-run Human Rights Commission, said his organization is fighting against child marriages.

"The Human Rights Commission opposes child marriages in Saudi Arabia," al-Harithi said. "Child marriages violate international agreements that have been signed by Saudi Arabia and should not be allowed." He added that his organization has been able to intervene and stop at least one child marriage from taking place.

Wajeha al-Huwaider, co-founder of the Society of Defending Women's Rights in Saudi Arabia, told CNN that achieving human rights in the kingdom means standing against those who want to "keep us backward and in the dark ages."

She said the marriages cause girls to "lose their sense of security and safety. Also, it destroys their feeling of being loved and nurtured. It causes them a lifetime of psychological problems and severe depression."

All AboutSaudi Arabia


Find this article at:
http://www.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/meast/04/12/saudi.child.marriage/index.html?eref=rss_topstories

Thursday, April 09, 2009

What’s a Baptist to do on Maundy Thursday?

Opinion:
By Benjamin Cole
Thursday, April 09, 2009

(ABP) -- One of the unfortunate realities about being Baptist is that you seldom understand or observe the Christian festival calendar. In fact, many who are reading this column will not know what a "festival calendar" is. For most Baptists, a festival is one of those anti-Halloween parties that churches throw to get the little gremlins and goblins to the Family Life Center for apple-bobbing and beanbag-tossing.

But the larger Christian tradition marks the calendar year with festivals designed to draw believers to reflect on significant moments in the life of Christ and his church. Sure, we Baptists know of Christmas and Good Friday and Easter. We even celebrate July 4th, Memorial Day, and Thanksgiving, having transformed them into quasi-religious holidays complete with banners and musicals and dinner on the grounds. But we know little of Epiphany, Lent, Holy Wednesday or the day on which this is being published, Maundy Thursday. This, of course, is to our detriment.

On this Thursday before Good Friday, Christians of all colors and stripes celebrate three events on the last night our Lord spent with his apostles before the Crucifixion: the washing of the disciples’ feet, the suffering in the Garden of Gethsemane and the betrayal of Judas Iscariot. The English word “maundy” is derived from the Latin word mandatum, which is the Vulgate’s translation of Jesus’ words in John 13:34: “A new commandment I give unto you, that you love one another.”

So during this Holy Week, I’ve been trying to think more intentionally about the events of Christ’s Passion than I have in recent years. To be honest, this is the first year that I’ve celebrated Maundy Thursday. But hopefully that’s going to change.

On the night that Jesus called his disciples to the Upper Room for the institution of the Last Supper, he knelt down and washed their feet. It wasn’t as if he hadn’t been serving them for the previous three years. Doubtless, he had fed them, comforted them and ministered to them in ways they knew and didn’t know. But on that night as they gathered around a table to share this last meal, Jesus took a simple cloth and a basin of water and started to wash their feet.

I don’t think many of us know how humbling that must have been: to have the Lord of glory on his hands and knees washing our feet; to know that he was concerned about the dust between our toes, about our ceremonial cleanness and about our need to serve one another. As Jesus prepared them for this last meal, he washed them as if they were priests who were ordained to prepare a sacrifice. How little did they know that’s exactly what they were about to do.

As they left the supper, Jesus took them to the Garden of Gethsemane, where he asked them to watch and pray while he went further into the garden to be alone with the Father. It was there that he sweated the great drops of blood. It was there that the disciples slept, unaware of the cross that their Lord was to soon bear on their behalf.

There’s a mystery to the Garden of Gethsemane, something holy and silent and unseen. Like Abraham of old, the Father took his Son to a secret place where he prepared him for the slaughter. Except this time, there was no substitute. The cup could not pass to another. It was his and his alone to drink, and he drank it deeply.

And then there is the betrayal of the Christ by Judas Iscariot. The Gospel writers are careful to give us foreboding hints that we might identify the disciple who from his birth was ordained to such apostasy. In art and literature from every generation of Christian history, Judas is Kingdom enemy number one (or perhaps number two).

In Dante, it is Judas that occupies the lowest level of hell. In Rembrandt, a woeful Judas bows broken and rejected before the Sanhedrin as the coins of silver litter the ground. He is the dark shadow among the fellowship of the saints, a fly in the ointment of the redeemed. And yet, we find that our Lord is kind even to him, never hostile or bitter. We are forced to conclude that if Jesus is able to treat Judas like that, then surely we can treat men of lesser crimes with equal kindness and grace.

So on this Maundy Thursday, I have determined to celebrate with believers of more festive traditions as together we look toward the cross of Good Friday and the open tomb of Easter morn. And while the nation wonders if the economy will rise again or the various conflicts around the world will come to a resolution, I’m reminded of the One who rose from the grave and defeated the infernal foe, even death, to give men not what we deserved, but what we didn’t.

-30-

-- Benjamin Cole is a former Southern Baptist pastor who now works on public-policy issues in the nation’s capital.

Comments (3)Add Comment
My Baptist church observes Maundy Thursday
written by Dr. J, April 09, 2009
I was surprised when I joined a Baptist Church in MO to find the pastors and members observed many church festivals. Tonight the church will observe Maundy Thursday. It is always a wonderful church experience.
...
written by m, April 09, 2009
great article, but why use the word "men" to describe both men and women? How about "humanity" or something similar?
Maundy Thursday
written by tenor1, April 09, 2009
Just returned from our (First Baptist Church, Asheville, NC)Maundy Thursday service. We sang, prayed, observed communion and reflected on the meaning of this season of observance. What a glorious day will dawn on Sunday!

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