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Today's Top Five

1. Sacks: Divestment vote "could not have been more inappropriate"
It's clear that Britain's chief rabbi, Jonathan Sacks, is upset about the Church of England's General Synod vote to divest "from companies profiting from the illegal occupation" of Palestinian territory. In an article for the Jewish Chronicle, Sacks calls the vote "ill-judged even on its own terms. The immediate result will be to reduce the church's ability to act as a force for peace between Israel and the Palestinians for as long as the decision remains in force. … The church has chosen to take a stand on the politics of the Middle East over which it has no influence, knowing that it will have the most adverse repercussions on a situation over which it has enormous influence, namely Jewish-Christian relations in Britain. The Church could have chosen, instead of penalizing Israel, to invest in the Palestinian economy. … The church's gesture will hurt Israelis and Jews without helping the Palestinians." Given the Iranian president's call to wipe Israel off the map and the anti-Semitic tone of recent Muslim demonstrations, Sacks says, "The timing could not have been more inappropriate." Israel, he says, "needs support, not vilification."

2. Baptists united
There's a great piece in today's Wall Street Journal that you probably can't read without a subscription. That's too bad, because summarizing it like this—church burnings have brought black and white Baptists together in Alabama—doesn't do it justice. That's because the relatively short story is inspiring and informative without softening the edges. The Alabama Baptist Convention State Board of Missions has distributed checks for "at least" $5,000 to all 10 of the burned churches—including the black churches outside its denomination—and black and white Baptist church leaders met last Monday to discuss the details of rebuilding. Those are interesting facts, but Journal reporter Sally Beatty also gets a revealing reaction from the convention's Gary Farley, who organized the meeting: "We are trying hard to stay away from paternalism," he said. "It's not our place to tell them what to do. But that is the kind of thing you always worry about—lack of sensitivity on our part."

"But old tensions die hard, and some black church leaders struck a measured tone in applauding the generosity of the Southern Baptists," Beatty writes. She quotes William Shaw, president of the National Baptist Convention USA: "It would be difficult for them to reach out to white churches and not to respond to black churches." But Southern Baptists don't have an obligation to fund churches outside their denomination, do they?

3. Happy clappy evangelicals
In the U.K. and elsewhere, evangelicals are often called "happy clappys." A new survey suggests that they're at least happy. As The Washington Post reports this week, a new study from The Pew Research Center for the People and the Press finds Americans very happy, with (self-described) evangelical Christians being the happiest people of all. "White evangelical Protestants (43%) are more likely than white mainline Protestants (33%) to report being very happy, but this difference goes away after taking frequency of church attendance into account," the survey summary says. The more detailed report (see p. 19) explains, "White evangelical and mainline Protestants who attend church at least weekly are not significantly different on happiness [49% of evangelicals, 44% of mainliners]; both groups are happier than those who attend services less often." Actually, for those attending monthly or less, mainliners are more happy: 35% vs. 31% of evangelicals.

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February (Web-only) 2006, Vol. 50