Warsaw, 31 August (ENI)--Christian groups have offered support to Patriarch Bartholomeos I, seen by many of the world's Orthodox Christians as their spiritual leader, after he was called to testify in a Turkish court for allegedly violating an order barring him from using his traditional title of "Ecumenical Patriarch". "Please know that amid these troubles you have our firm support in the fulfilment of the Patriarchate's important religious ministries," the Rev. Samuel Kobia, general secretary of the World Council of Churches, said in a letter to the patriarch released on 30 August.

A Turkish court ruled in June that the Istanbul-based patriarchate was authorised to perform religious functions only among Turkey's 6000-strong Greek Orthodox community. It stated that it had no right under Turkish law to call itself "ecumenical", a Greek word meaning "universal". Istanbul was once the Byzantine Christian capital of Constantinople but now belongs to Muslim-majority and politically-secular Turkey. The use of the term "ecumenical" for the Patriarch of Constantinople goes back to the 6th century.

Turkey regards the title as having political overtones that could undermine Turkish sovereignty. The Patriarchate says the term is purely an internal church designation and has no political implications. The Ecumenical Patriarch has what is called a "primacy of honour" among the world's Christian Orthodox leaders. On 21 August, Bartholomeos was summoned to testify before a prosecuting authority after giving a speech at a world conference of Orthodox youth in July, during which he defended his office as "a historical title" recognised by the "whole world".

In his letter to Patriarch Bartholomeos, Kobia said the term "ecumenical" has "a unique and historic importance to the world's 300 million Orthodox believers". The Geneva-based WCC groups 347 Protestant, Orthodox, Anglican and other churches representing more than 560 million Christians in over 110 countries. Support for Bartholomeos has come also from the Conference of European Churches, which referred to the his "pivotal role amongst the Orthodox churches".

"We recall too that the title 'Ecumenical Patriarch' is one which goes back more than 1000 years," CEC's general secretary, Archdeacon Colin Williams, stated in a letter to the Orthodox leader. Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan's Islamic-oriented government has promised to safeguard religious freedom as part of its bid to become a member of the European Union.

Church leaders and human rights groups have expressed concern, however, at recent anti-Christian incidents in Turkey, including the shooting dead of a Roman Catholic priest and the killing of three members of a Protestant publishing house. [427 words]

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Manila, 30 August (ENI)--Roman Catholic bishops in the Philippines say suggestions in a forthcoming book that the late Nobel peace prize laureate Mother Teresa of Calcutta wrestled with doubt about the existence of God demonstrates her saintliness and faith. "The darker the situation, the brighter the victory of living through it," Bishop Carlito Cenzon of Baguio told Ecumenical News International on 29 August. "Mother Teresa may have doubted God's existence, but she showed in her life that she trusted and depended on this very God. This makes her sanctity all the more extraordinary."

Cenzon was reacting to media reports about the book, "Mother Teresa: Come Be My Light", excepts of which have been published by Time magazine. The book contains letters between Teresa and her confessors and superiors over a period of more than 60 years. Time reports they show that for the last decades of her life she felt no presence of God whatsoever. One letter from 1979 has her writing to a spiritual confidant, "Jesus has a very special love for you ... as for me, the silence and emptiness is so great, that I look and do not see."

Mother Teresa was born Agnes Gonxha Bojaxhiu to Albanian parents in 1910 in Skopje, Macedonia. At the age of 18 she left for India, where in 1946 she started working with the poorest of the community in the slums of Calcutta. For this vocation, she received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1979. She died in India in 1997 and in 2003 was beatified by Pope John Paul II, a step that often, but not always, leads to sainthood. The book has been compiled by the Rev. Brian Kolodiejchuk, a member of Mother Teresa's Missionaries of Charity, and the person responsible for petitioning for her sainthood and collecting supporting materials.

Kolodiejchuk was reported by the Associated Press as saying that, read in context, Mother Teresa's faith remained. Her unwavering belief that God was working through her showed that while she missed a feeling of connection with God, she didn't doubt his existence, he said. Bishop Arturo Bastes of Sorsogon in central Philippines said in an interview with the Catholic-run Radio Veritas that many saints had doubted the existence of God at some point in the lives. "But such doubt all the more increased their trust and faith in God," he said. [406 words]

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Bangalore, India, 28 August (ENI)--A church education group in the southern Indian state of Kerala has strongly criticised the state's communist-led coalition government, saying it is attempting to curtail the rights of church-run educational institutions. "We will not make any comprise on our stand on the question of our rights," declared the retired Roman Catholic archbishop of Changanacherry, Joseph Powathil, chairperson of the Inter-Church Council for Education, which includes Catholics, Orthodox and Protestant churches as members.

Powathil had made his statement on 19 August at a Catholic youth convention in Chenganacherry after a row between churches and the state government about the management and admission rights of privately-run schools. The Christian community in Kerala accounts for nearly 20 percent of the state's 34 million residents. Kerala has 8000 government-funded private schools, and churches operate more than 3200 of these institutions. Church leaders say plans by the communist-led government to give village and municipal councils a greater say in the running of these schools would affect their rights to manage and control admissions to the educational establishments.

Several Catholic dioceses have issued pastoral letters criticising the Left Democratic Front coalition government's education policy and have held marches to protest against what they describe as a bid by communists to wrest control of the churches' educational institutions. The communist party leadership has told the bishops to withdraw their pastoral letters, while its student wings described the church leadership as "whitewashed tombs".

The Rev. Abraham Mar Paulos, president of the Kerala Council of Churches, which groups 11 Orthodox and Protestant churches, told Ecumenical News International that such comments were "extremely painful" as they "belittled and trivialised" the contribution of the churches in Kerala education.

"Unfortunately, education seems to have become a tool to enhance a political agenda rather than the public interest," said Paulos. The Church in Kerala has played a pivotal role in education for decades, in many areas before government schools were set up. [337 words]

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Colombo, 15 August (ENI)--India celebrates 60 years of independence with its economy booming, but the country's churches have called on the world's largest democracy to pay greater attention to eradicating poverty, a stand that Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has endorsed. "Our economic prosperity has certainly earned us a membership in the global economic club, but it has failed terribly to percolate down to those living on the peripheries of society," India's Catholic Bishops' Conference said in an anniversary message for independence day on 15 August.

As former colonial rulers, Britain left the Indian subcontinent in August 1947 after dividing it into Hindu-majority India and Muslim-majority Pakistan. Despite present-day India's booming economy and democratic structures, Cardinal Telesphore Toppo, president of the bishops' conference, reminded the nation that, "We cannot in all honesty turn a blind eye to the hard realities of our country." Church of North India Bishop D. K. Sahu endorsed this opinion. "We have made much progress. But the lacuna is that the poor have been left out," said Sahu in a telephone interview with Ecumenical News International. The bishop is general secretary of the National Council of Churches in India, a church grouping that includes 29 Orthodox and Protestant churches.

At the dawn of independence, and in an era of poverty and appalling living conditions, Indian life expectancy was 27 years. Today, that figure has leapt to 64 years, and the literacy rate has similarly increased to 65 percent. Yet, while economic progress has created an affluent middle class of over 400 million people, nearly one third of India's 1.1 billion people still continue to live in abject poverty. "We hope the government will change its development strategy to eradicate poverty. The speech of the Prime Minister gives us hope," said Bishop Sahu.

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh mentioned "poverty" 10 times in his independence day message from the historic Red Fort in New Delhi. He particularly emphasised the need to "banish poverty". "India cannot become a nation with islands of high growth and vast areas untouched by development, where the benefits of growth accrue only to a few," the prime minister said. During his speech, he also announced several welfare programmes for the poor, including one to provide assistance to heads of families below the poverty line. Bishop Sahu said, however, "Rhetoric is not enough. There should be concrete action." [404 words]

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Colombo, 14 August (ENI)--Nearly 100 000 members of religious minority communities in Pakistan have marked the 60th anniversary of their country's independence by staging a national solidarity demonstration in Lahore, the capital of Punjab province, says a Christian leader. "This rally was to reiterate our demand for equal rights for the religious minorities, and separation of State and religion," Cecil Choudhury, organizer of the 11 August gathering, said. He was speaking as executive secretary of the All Pakistan Minorities' Alliance.

Pakistan celebrated its 60 years of independence from Britain on 14 August with special events and military ceremonies. "We have presented a 30-point charter before the nation and the government as Pakistan celebrates 60 years of independence," Choudhury told Ecumenical News International on 13 August from Lahore. "We are treated as second class citizens in this country." During its period of decolonising, Britain left the Indian subcontinent after dividing it into Hindu-majority India and Muslim-majority Pakistan.

More than 95 percent of Pakistan's 164 million people are Muslims. Christians number little more than three million. Hindus and followers of other faiths account for the rest of the population. The 30-point charter includes demands for proportional representation of religious minorities in the national and provincial legislatures, and the abolition of a blasphemy law that can result in the death penalty. The charter also calls for the enrolment of religious minorities in the security forces, as well as in the judiciary and foreign ministry, and separate cells for minorities in jails to enable them to practise their faith.

Meanwhile, the National Council of Churches of Pakistan, a grouping of four major Protestant churches, has expressed alarm at fresh death threats against Christians in the tribal regions that border Afghanistan. The church council said a distributed pamphlet had read, "All of you are invited to abandon Christianity and become Muslims in order to have a place in paradise." Later, the text read, "We will attack your houses and colonies, and our suicide bombers will destroy you. Consider this as a death warning."

The latest threats to the minority Christians by Islamist groups in border areas follows local reports of increased fighting between US-led forces and the Taliban in Afghanistan, and a US threat to enter Pakistan in hot-pursuit of Taliban forces, with or without Pakistan's permission. "Any action in the West against Muslims has repercussions for Christians in Muslim countries, especially in Pakistan," said Victor Azariah, the National Council of Churches' general secretary in a council press statement. [420 words]

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Geneva, 6 August (ENI)--Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Archbishop Desmond Tutu and other global church leaders and campaigners have welcomed a ruling from the Chennai High Court that dismissed a challenge to the constitutionality of India's patent law from Swiss pharmaceutical giant, Novartis AG. "This legal ruling reflects what we know in our hearts - that our society's priority must be people's health, not extra profits from patents for rich corporations," said Tutu in a 6 August statement released by the Geneva-based Ecumenical Advocacy Alliance, which campaigns for trade justice.

Novartis had filed its petition with the high court after the Indian Patent Controller's Office refused to grant a patent for the company's cancer medicine, Glivec. The court rejected the Glivec patent application on the grounds that the medicine is a new form of an old medicine with a trivial change, and that this is something that cannot be patented under Indian law. "We disagree with this ruling, however we likely will not appeal to the Supreme Court," said Ranjit Shahani, managing director of Novartis India Limited. In a statement, Novartis said it went ahead with the case because it believed it was "the right thing to do for patients. Effective patent systems ensure incentives are in place that stimulate long-term research and development efforts critical for medical progress."

Bishop Yvon Ambroise of the Commission for Justice and Peace of the Catholic Bishops' Conference of India noted, "This ruling rightly upholds the principle that trivial changes made to a drug which do not make it more effective, do not warrant additional patent protection. The decision puts people's access to affordable medicines first, over additional corporate profits on non-essential changes." The Ecumenical Advocacy Alliance worked to get church leaders to campaign against the Novartis case in India, and has claimed that the verdict is an important victory for global public health.

The Chennai High Court on 6 August said it had no jurisdiction over deciding whether Indian law contradicts international trade rules by denying patents for minor improvements of existing drugs. In rejecting Novartis' challenge to Indian patent law, the court noted it also had no jurisdiction to rule on the compliance of Indian law with the intellectual property rules of the World Trade Organization. After the court's decision, campaigners said a different outcome could have affected the generic manufacture of thousands of other medicines in India. They said the country has made essential medicines available not only to those in India who cannot afford branded medicines but also to those in a similar position elsewhere in the world.

In welcoming the Indian court's decision, Bishop Mark Hanson, presiding bishop of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, said, "Even more important than this decision on a particular case is the principle it sets. Patents must be granted in a way that balances public health and real innovation." However, Paul Herrling, head of corporate research at Novartis, said, "It is clear there are inadequacies in Indian patent law that will have negative consequences for patients and public health in India." He added, "Medical progress occurs through incremental innovation. If Indian patent law does not recognise these important advances, patients will be denied new and better medicines." [545 words]

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Hong Kong, 3 August (ENI)--Asian church organizations are preparing to train future ecumenical leaders for the region at a September gathering of the School for Ecumenical Leadership Formation, which will be held in Sri Lanka. "There is much to learn and share from our Christian faith in the ecumenical spirit, and from ecumenism, as an effective way to address the issues of fundamentalism and the growing tendency of faith communities to disintegrate," said Chang Chung Chih, executive secretary for ecumenical formation at the Christian Conference of Asia.

The youth section of the CCA, a regional body representing 16 national church councils and more than 100 denominations, is organizing the next leadership seminar in cooperation with the Asia-Pacific office of the World Student Christian Federation. The event, from 2 to 22 September, will take place in Colombo, the former Sri Lankan capital and the country's largest city. The School for Ecumenical Leadership Formation meets every two years, and this time will present youth leaders, aged from 22 to 32, with biblical and theological perspectives on current issues, such as globalisation, militarisation, the "war on terror", justice, peace, ecology and feminism.

Under the theme, "Young people working towards wider ecumenism in a pluralistic society", participants will attend modules on the make up of the ecumenical movement, and explore theological positions on issues related to Asia and the rest of the world. A series of exposure programmes in the host country will also be on offer. Chang explained that the tradition of producing ecumenical leaders from student Christian movements in the region has weakened. She said that a major reason for this was that inter-denominational church youth organizations were unable to provide a challenging platform for training.

Acknowledging that the search for church unity is weak among Christians in his own country of Hong Kong, Ang Wing Fai, a theological student, told Ecumenical News International on 2 August, "Most of the Christians in Hong Kong come from an evangelical background. They are not concerned with ecumenism. Even with some mainstream churches, ecumenism is not a topic at the local level." Ang, a Lutheran, is already part of an eight-week local ecumenical training programme co-organized by the Hong Kong Christian Council and the Student Christian Movement.

"The programme helps me to reach homosexuals, sex workers and organic farmers. It widens my eyes and shapes my future pastoral practice," he said. The leadership seminars have been held since 2001, and have trained 66 young leaders, many of whom now work in their local churches and national movements. [433 words]

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Bangalore, India, 31 July (ENI)--A Christian council in India has appealed to the governor of the state of Andhra Pradesh to halt legislation that would ban non-Hindu religious activity around the Hindu temple town of Tirupati. "This order is in total violation of both the letter and spirit of the Indian constitution," the Global Council of Indian Christians said in its appeal to the governor, Rameshwar Thakur, on 26 July.

The council said the legislation to ban all religious activity except that connected to Hinduism around the shrine of Tirumala is "likely to be misused to harass the adherents of other faiths who happen to be the residents of the temple town". The council asserted that the legislation could be used "to justify the violation of freedom of faith and worship, and the freedom of association of Christians". The state government has already passed provisional legislation to make the 110-square-kilometre area around the shrine an exclusive Hindu zone. The Tirumala temple attracts Hindus from around the world and some reports say it is the most visited religious place on Earth.

The Christian council urged the governor to withhold approval of the law "to restore our faith in the rule of law and the supremacy of the Indian constitution". The governor, who is appointed by the federal government, has to approve state legislation. "This is simple appeasement of vocal [Hindu fundamentalist] groups at the cost of the docile Christian community," Sajan George, the council's president, told Ecumenical News International on 30 July.

George added that the legislation "defeats the very existence of the Republic of India, and this is 'Talibanising' communities". Among incidents of religious persecution reported in Andhra Pradesh recently, Hindu fundamentalists and police are said to have beaten a pastor in June for conducting prayers in a residential area. Christian evangelists have reported being beaten for distributing leaflets at bus stands and other public places around Tirumala, and have alleged that this is part of a current campaign against Christians.

"We are shocked by the fact that this legislation has been moved by a secular party headed by a Christian," said Sajan George. Y.S. Rajasekhar Reddy, who is the chief minister of the Congress Party-led government of Andhra Pradesh, is a member of the Church of South India. [392 words]

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