Current Affairs

By Su Bai-da

The International Religious Freedom Act:

After over a year of debate and revisions, the US government has finally reached an agreement targeting current religious persecution in many other countries. On October 9, 1998, the US Senate voted 98 to 0 in favor of The International Religious Freedom Act. The following day the Act was also passed without incident in the House of Representatives. After being signed by the President, the Act will have legal effect.

Targeted at those governments who practice "systematic, continual and unprecedented" religious persecutions, the Act asks the US President to react to those persecutions by choosing from as many as fifteen appropriate responses, including public condemnation, suspension of aid and various degrees of economic sanctions. The Act also appoints an official in the State Department at the level of an ambassador as well as a ten-person special committee, whose sole task is to produce an annual report for each country with regard to their religious freedom. Based on these reports, the President will notify Congress when he is ready to react accordingly. The Act also allows the President to not have to react under special circumstances, provided he specifies his reason for not responding.

In the debating process before this Act's inception, support came mainly from religious organizations including Christianity, Catholicism and Judaism, while opposition was mainly from industrial and financial groups. Both sides went to tremendous effort lobbying Congress and the public media. The decisive resolution of the Act indicates that the industrial and financial sectors are merely small components of the whole spectrum of political forces in the United States. The American people enjoy religious freedom and they also wish people in other countries to have the same freedom. Some churches are concerned that the use of US foreign political power to secure the desired outcome of religious freedom could well backfire. In general, however, most churches approve of the Act and believe it is practical.

It is interesting to note that the US government's concern about religious freedom in recent years has finally manifested itself in legal form. The Act requires the US government to seriously consider a country's practice in relation to religious freedom when defining its foreign policy, thus making possible a more systematic and longer term unification of US foreign policy with its belief in religious freedom. With regard to the foreign governments who have diplomatic relationships with America and yet lack religious freedom, the Act ensures that religious freedom will become a key factor in these countries' relations with America in the long term.

Science and Morality:

Dr. Shapiro, the President of Princeton University, said in a speech given at the University of Georgia that morality had to be an integral part of scientific research. As scientists keep making progress in their ability to alter various aspects of life, moral issues have become a serious responsibility for them. With the development of science, especially in the area of biological chemistry, scientists must enter into serious discussions with other intellectuals. Dr. Shapiro is the chairman of the National Bio-ethics Advisory Commission.

Since the end of World War II, scientific development, including the invention of nuclear weapons and breakthroughs in genetics research, has brought to human beings good news as well as bad. On the surface, our scientific ability has continually improved, and yet our inner moral ability and self-control have deteriorated. Such an intensifying contrast between the two has become a potential threat to human existence and happiness.

The President seeks help from pastors:

In September 1998, President Clinton was forced to admit publicly his inappropriate relationship with a female White House intern. In response to a question at a news conference, he said, "I need God's help." He also sought counseling from three pastors, Rev. Tony Campolo, Rev. Gordon McDonald and Rev. Philip Wogaman, asking to meet with them on a weekly basis. Rev. Campolo said that the three pastors would help the President and strengthen him against temptations. President Clinton also wrote a two-page letter to his home church in Arkansas, expressing his repentance and asking for forgiveness from the pastor and his fellow-Christians. Rev. Horne, the pastor of the church in Arkansas, read Clinton's letter to the congregation during a Sunday service. The pastor did not give the letter to the public media because it was a private letter.

Does science have forbidden zones?

At the recent annual conference of Christian lawyers in Chicago, Dr. Philip Johnson, a law professor at the University of California, criticized the unscientific prejudices of America's mainstream scientific organizations. He pointed out that scientists seemed to hold to the unfair assumption that no matter what scientific research they conducted, they would not be able to prove that there was an intelligent design behind the universe. Johnson said that it was unfair and unscientific to define a forbidden zone in scientific research before scientists were able to prove it. Scientists must seek for knowledge and truth in producing the most appropriate and most logical conclusion based on the results of their scientific endeavours.

Today, a great amount of scientific evidence points to an obvious design, both from macroscopic and microscopic points of view. If intelligent design is a fact, then scientists should not deny the logical conclusion that all these evidences are leading toward. In recent years Dr. Johnson and other scientists have started to assert their claim that the universe was the product of intelligent design. This claim is becoming increasingly influential among American scientists.

The author came from Fujian. He now serves the Lord at China Outreach Ministry, an evangelical organization.