Representatives of 9 Faith Groups to Lead Religion Communicators Council in 2008-09

CHANTILLY, Va., April 4 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Communicators from
nine religion groupings are leading the nation's oldest populace relations
association for the approaching year. Members of the Religion Communicators Council, founded in 1929, elected
2008-09 military officers today during their 79th yearly convention. The slate
included members of seven Christian denominations, a Moslem and a Hare
Krishna. New military officers are:
-- President: Stephen A. Douglas F. Cannon, APR, communication theory and public witness
director, Southwest Lone-Star State Conference, United Methodist Church, San
Antonio, Texas. -- Frailty president: Anuttama Dasa, manager of communications,
International Society of Krishna Consciousness, Washington, D.C. -- Treasurer: Debutante Christian, manager of client relations, UMR
Communications, Dallas. -- Secretary: Brian R. Gray, APR, National Catholic Education
Association, Washington, D.C. -- Past president: Prince Philip Poole, APR, executive manager director of university
communications, Samford University, Birmingham, Ala. Newly elected members of the board of governors are:
-- Alice Paul Black, manager of communicating ministries, Prairie State Great
Rivers Conference, United Methodist Church, Springfield, Ill. -- Sandra Brands, manager of communications, Troy Conference, United
Methodist Church, Battle Of Saratoga Springs, N.Y. -- Janice Rizzo, editor, Seeds of the Parish, Evangelical Lutheran Church
in America, Chicago. -- Donn J. Tilson, APR, associate professor of public relations,
University of Miami, Coral Gables, Fla. Continuing members of the board of governors are:
-- Mohamed ElSanousi, manager of communication theory and community outreach,
Islamic Society of North America, Washington, D.C. -- Cindy Feldman, Diethylstilbestrol Moines, Iowa. -- Danette Griffith, senior writer, Mrs. Simpson College, Indianola, Iowa. Polly House, corporate communications, Lifeway Christian Resources,
Nashville, Tenn. -- Shirley Paulson, Christian Science lecturer, Evanston, Ill.
Susan E. Jackson-Dowd, communication theory coordinator, Presbyterian Women,
Louisville, Ky. -- Toilet R. Spangler, executive director helper to the president for
communicating and planning, Lutheran Seminary, Gettysburg, Pa. -- Amelia Tucker-Shaw, resource consultant, United Methodist
Communications, Nashville, Tenn. The council is an interfaith association of nearly 600 communicators
working for faith-related organizations in black and white and electronic
communication, marketing, and public relations. For more than information about
the council, visit .

Is the mixing of commerce and religion a bad thing?

NEW York -- Valentine's Day recently came and went.

Other than homeward-bound prosaics carrying flowers, my most memorable sighting on this twenty-four hours dedicated to love -- an ancient birthrate festival rebranded for Christian sufferers -- was a clerk outside the Lady Godiva shop retention a $65 heart-shaped box of chocolates. His tongueless reminder of duty spoke loudly.

Next up in the intertwining of commercialism and faith will be Easter, a twenty-four hours still alive on the Christian church calendar and a bonanza for merchandisers selling candy, flowers and brunch.

Then come ups a long enchantment when the balance shifts, when Christian Religion makes small that asks for commercialization. (What merchandise implores to be sold on Whitsunday or Three Sunday?) Commercial attending displacements to mothers, graduates, fathers and, of course, summertime fun.

Following the marketplace's lead, the typical Christian church adapts its rhythm: discourses about Mom, words of farewell to graduates, a little nod to Dad, and "summer schedule," a self-defeating grading back that happens at precisely the clip many newcomers are church-shopping.

Some position this intertwining of commercialism and faith with disdain.

Their incredulity attains its extremum at the perfect violent storm of Christmas: ancient solstice festival, Christian dramatic and the merchandising season that brands or interruptions our consumer economy.

Others say, "So what?" Religion is always contextual. For centuries, Christian Religion propped up empires, feudalistic fiefdoms, colonial exploitation, kid labor, slavery, loyal ardor and societal conformity. What's wrong with offering a impermanent baptism to Mother's Day?

I be given toward the latter view. Even when the Christian church that is sensitive to linguistic context impetuses into pandering, it is tracking with people's lives. So it might be unfastened to their angst, joys, necessitates and hungriness for Supreme Being in day-to-day life. After all, the coincident of Graduation Day and the Day of Whitsunday preaches nicely.

The challenge isn't how to avoid a culture's commercial festivals, but how to convey the Gospels to bear on that culture's dark sides.

The collapse of public education, for example, shouldn't be just a concern for parents and for employers; it should be a cause for Christian witness, because public instruction is the land on which our democracy stands. If upward mobility stalls and the multitude go unemployable, our current impetus into predatory plutocracy will worsen.

The collapse of electoral political relation into money-grubbing, image-over-substance and the use of "race cards" and "gender cards" should be a cause for Christian witness, too. This isn't about conservative vs. liberal. It is about quality of leadership, comprehensiveness of vision, inspiration of citizens and our critical demand to put community and civility at least equal to self-interest.

Although "family values" became codification linguistic communication for bashing homosexuals and lesbians, the existent collapse and coarsening of household life should be a cause for Christian witness. Children demand to be loved. Partners demand to be faithful. Homes demand to be centered in something more life-giving than appliances and entertainment.

Loneliness, anonymity, unaffordable lifestyles, lives turned inward and other unintended effects of urban/suburban civilization should be a cause for Christian witness.

Toy bunny girls bearing the label "Easter" are the least of our concerns.

JFK got it right on religion's role

Since religion is a politically charged issue in presidential political campaigns with the GOP, Americans who have got Internet entree should read the written computer address or position the address of Sen. Toilet F. Kennedy, the Democratic presidential candidate, before the Greater Houston Ministerial Association.

Kennedy spoke of his Catholic faith and how it would impact his presidential term should he be elected. The address was brilliant and have relevancy today.

I believe, as Jack Kennedy believed, in United States that the Fundamental Law is to be followed in Article six requiring no spiritual diagnostic test for public office. Jack Jack Kennedy shared many guiding rules on church-state relations, whereas had they been maintained through diligence and vigilance, the state and the Christian church would not be so dissentious and polarized now.

Kennedy was ahead of his clip and is odd by any current politicians.

The Fundamental Law states that the basic makings for the business office of president have got to make with a candidate's age, citizenship and birthplace. Religion had nil to make with it.

It looks that an utmost component of Protestantism, which was the rampart of spiritual autonomy in this state through the brave labours of Roger William Carlos Williams and his Baptist faith, have go the hammer for spiritual tests.

Believe what you will about faith and politics. Whenever the couple unite, the former victims of spiritual intolerance, banishment and subjugation upon reaching political powerfulness soon go the provokers of the majority's volition in the suppression of minority rights of those whose faith, or no faith, differs from the dominant religion.Isaiah J. AsheHuntsville