Sex, sin and surveys

It's becoming more and more dangerous for preachers to use the words "sex" and "sin" in the same sentence.

Consider this question: Is sex outside of marriage a sin?

Say "yes" and millions of believers who are sitting in pews will say "amen." But that same affirmation of centuries of doctrine will offend just as many believers and nonbelievers, giving them an easy excuse to avoid congregations they believe are old fashioned and intolerant.

"We have to recognize that our historic positions on sexual issues are becoming incredibly distasteful to more people in this culture and especially to our media and popular culture," said Ed Stetzer, director of the Southern Baptist Convention's LifeWay Research team.

"The whole 'Hate the sin, love the sinner' thing – people are not getting that anymore. People do not believe that we mean that."

Right now, the gay-marriage issue is making headlines. But for millions of traditional believers in Christianity, Judaism, Islam and many other faiths, this issue is linked to a question rooted in religious doctrine, not modern politics. In a spring LifeWay survey, researchers asked: "Do you believe homosexual behavior is a sin?"

The results showed a culture torn in half, with 48 percent of American adults saying that homosexual acts are sinful and 45 percent disagreeing. Considering the margin for error, this is a virtual tie.

The numbers were radically different in different pews, with only 39 percent of Roman Catholics believing that homosexual acts are sinful, as opposed to 61 percent of Protestants and 79 percent of those who identified as evangelical, "born again" or fundamentalist Christians.

A similar pattern emerged from a hot-button question in the latest results reported from the U.S. Religious Landscape Survey conducted by the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life. Researchers in this massive effort asked participants which of the following statements "comes closer to your own views – even if neither is exactly right. 1 – Homosexuality is a way of life that should be accepted by society, OR 2 – Homosexuality is a way of life that should be discouraged by society."

The question was not stated in strictly political or religious terms. However, with that powerful, more official word "discouraged" in the question, 50 percent of the adults surveyed said that "homosexuality" in general, as opposed to homosexual behavior, should be accepted by society.

Once again, there were sharp differences in various religious groups, with 79 percent of American Jews, 58 percent of Catholics and 56 percent of mainline Protestants calling for acceptance of homosexuality. Meanwhile, only 39 percent of the members of historically black churches, 27 percent of Muslims and 26 percent of the evangelical Protestants affirmed the public acceptance of homosexuality.

These numbers are evidence of great change in the religious and moral views of many Americans, yet they also point toward familiar tensions between traditionalists and progressives. The Pew Forum survey, for example, again demonstrated a reality seen in recent elections. Americans who frequently attend worship services and say that religion is very important in their lives continue to take more conservative stands on hot moral issues in public life.

What about people outside the pews? That is where another set of statistics will prove especially distressing to clergy who sincerely want to defend what Stetzer called the ancient "one man, one woman, one lifetime" doctrine of marriage.

In the LifeWay survey, 32 percent of American adults said that their decision to visit or join a congregation would be "negatively affected" if it taught that homosexual behavior is sin. That number rose to 49 percent among the "unchurched," people who rarely or never attend worship.

The issue of homosexuality does not, of course, stand alone, said Stetzer. It's getting harder for religious leaders to maintain consistent teachings about other acts and conditions that traditional forms of religion have, for centuries, considered sin. This affects preaching on premarital sex, divorce, cohabitation and adultery.

"Ultimately, the modern church has failed to proclaim and explain a biblical ethic of sexuality," he said. "We also need to admit that the church has failed to live out the ethic that it's claiming to be advocating. If we are going to say that we stand for the sanctity of marriage, then we – in our churches and in our homes – are going to have to live out the sanctity of marriage."

Obama prays behind closed doors

Steve Strang knew the ground rules for the recent meeting between Sen. Barack Obama and a flock of evangelical, Catholic and liberal Protestant leaders.

The invitation to the Chicago gathering stated: "This is an off-the-record (no media) time for questioning and listening, with no expectation of endorsement."

But it's one thing to keep Obama's answers off the record. As soon as the two-hour meeting was over, some participants began talking and writing about the questions they had asked.

"I was concerned after three or four general questions that we wouldn't ask the most important questions," wrote Strang, the founder of Charisma Magazine. "So I raised my hand. ... I said, 'Senator, I want to ask a question I'm sure you are expecting regarding your position on abortion. I represent a segment of the church where nearly everyone considers the issue of supporting life to be the most important issue and where nearly everyone would be opposed to abortion. I want to ask what your stand on abortion is and if you believe what I think you believe, how you justify that with your Christian faith."

Strang said Obama offered a surprisingly "centrist," 15-minute answer. Since the evangelical entrepreneur had read the Obama's "Audacity of Hope" memoir, he recognized that the response came from its "Faith" chapter.

Thus, it's likely that the presumptive Democratic nominee retold the story of the University of Chicago doctor who gently challenged a statement on a U.S. Senate campaign website pledging that Obama would fight "right-wing ideologues who want to take away a woman's right to choose." The doctor's email said he wasn't asking Obama to oppose abortion, but to begin addressing "this issue in fair-minded words."

Obama told his staff to drop the offensive language, in recognition of the fact that many abortion opponents want sincere, sober discussions instead of more shouting. About that time, a member of a polite, pro-life family protesting outside an Obama rally called out: "I will pray for you. I will pray that you have a change of heart."

Thus, Obama wrote: "Neither my mind nor my heart changed that day, not did they in the days to come. But I did have that family in mind as I wrote back to the doctor and thanked him for his email. ... I said a prayer of my own – that I might extend the same presumption of good faith to others that the doctor had extended to me."

After the Chicago meeting, online reports by Strang and others said the leaders discussed a wide variety of issues, from the Iraq war to same-sex marriage, from genocide in Darfur to religious liberty issues here at home. A spokesman for the Rev. Franklin Graham said that the head of the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association asked if Obama "thought Jesus was the way to God, or merely a way" – but did not report the response. There were conflicting reports about whether Graham and Obama exchanged a hug or a handshake.

But abortion remains a high hurdle in an era when several U.S. Supreme Court justices are near retirement.

Is change possible? In "The Audacity of Hope," Obama noted that many opponents of abortion are willing to "bend principle" in cases of rape and incest. Meanwhile, the willingness of "even the most ardent" of pro-abortion-rights advocates to "accept some restrictions on late-term abortion marks a recognition that a fetus is more than a body part."

The key, stressed Strang, was that the Chicago meeting even took place, allowing frank discussion of such bitterly divisive issues.

Rather than merely talking to the religious left, Obama's staff offered him a chance to talk and pray with a variety of evangelical and Pentecostal leaders – such as author Max Lucado of San Antonio, Rich Cizik of the National Association of Evangelicals, Bishop T.D. Jakes of Dallas and many others.

"Obama seemed to have the support of at least half of the 43 leaders who attended the Chicago meeting," noted Strang. "In my opinion, he 'made points' with the rest."

David Brody of the Christian Broadcasting Network was even more blunt about the meeting's political implications.

"Folks, this is an important development," he said. "It shows that the game has changed. Old rules don't apply. We're in uncharted territory. John McCain's religious outreach team has to now step to the plate and work hard for faith voters."

'No go' zones in UK – again

The alleged crime took place at the corner of Alum Rock and Ellesmere roads in Birmingham, England, where an officer spotted two missionaries distributing "God's Bridge to Eternal Life" tracts.

The controversial pamphlets contained comments such as, "Throughout history individuals have tried many ways to gain or earn eternal life, but every attempt has been unsuccessful." There were Bible verses, such as, "Not by works of righteousness, which we have done, but according to His mercy He saved us. Titus 3:5a."

What happened next has reopened a painful debate about so-called "no go zones," areas that may as well be off limits to British citizens who do not heed Islamic laws.

According to a statement by the Rev. Arthur Cunningham, the "police community support officer" told him "you're not allowed to preach ... here. This is a Muslim area. He said, 'You know, you guys are committing a hate crime here with what you're doing. I'm going to have to call you in and take you in.' Then he took his radio and he said something like, 'There's a hate crime in progress here. I need assistance.' "

This occurred three months ago, but legal actions by Cunningham and the Rev. Joseph Abraham have created a wave of new coverage. Both men carry American passports, although Abraham was born a Muslim in Egypt and then converted to Christianity.

While declining to discuss details, West Midlands Police officials have released statements saying their investigation found that the officer acted "with the best of intentions" and that "the PCSO has been offered guidance about what constitutes a hate crime and advice on communication style."

Another statement: "We would like to assure all communities that there are not any 'no go' areas in the West Midlands Police area and we will defend the rights of the individual to freedom of expression and religious faiths."

The "no go zone" debate began in earnest when Anglican Bishop Michael Nazir-Ali of Rochester, who was raised in Pakistan in a family with Christian and Muslim roots, expressed fears that England is splintering into segregated communities of citizens living "parallel lives."

"It is critically important to all that the freedom to discuss freely and perhaps to have our views changed, whether in politics, religion or science, be encouraged and not diminished," wrote Nazir-Ali, in a newspaper essay that led to death threats against him.

Christianity and Islam are both evangelistic faiths, which creates sparks when their traditional, growing forms collide. However, Christian evangelism is banned in many Muslim lands and some Christian converts have faced death sentences as apostates.

In the Alum Rock case, the missionaries freely admit they were seeking converts. Abraham and Cunningham insist that they were told they would be physically attacked if they dared to return.

"The actions and words used by the officers were intimidating and were calculated to warn and-or frighten our clients and to have the effect of deterring our clients from lawfully expressing their opinions and manifesting their beliefs and to have a chilling effect on the exercise by them of their right to manifest their beliefs," according to a document prepared for police by activists at the Christian Institute. "Our clients were left with the understanding that they could not express their religious beliefs in Alum Rock Road without committing a hate crime."

Meanwhile, the Daily Mail has reported that the officer involved in this incident is active in the local branch of the National Association of Muslim Police. The West Midlands police force also made recent headlines when it accused a BBC Dispatches program – entitled "Undercover Mosques" – of distorting Muslim statements about terrorism.

All of this has led to heightened tensions about how to balance Muslim concerns with British laws.

"Freedom is not, of course, absolute. It is only possible in the context of the Common Good, where the freedom of each has to be exercised with respect for the freedom of all," according to a new essay by Nazir-Ali, in Standpoint magazine.

"Freedom of belief, of expression, and the freedom to change one's belief are, however, vitally important for a free society, and the onus must be on those who wish to restrict these in any way to show why this is necessary. Nor can we say that such freedoms apply in some parts of the country and of the world and not in others."

Tony Blair does God

No doubt about it, Tony Blair's press secretary delivered a memorable sound bite when a pushy journalist kept asking about faith, politics and the prime minister.

"We don't do God," said Alastair Campbell.

The nosey British press knew better. They knew Blair's staff was discreetly finding him a Catholic pew on Sundays, no matter where his duties took him. Reporters heard insider reports about Blair reading his Bible every night at bedtime, even as he followed a culturally liberal drummer – pro-abortion rights, pro-gay rights – in the public square.

But, Blair knew what he was doing, while leading a post-Christian nation next to an even more secular continent. He knew that he couldn't discuss his faith.

"You talk about it in our system and, frankly, people do think you're a nutter," he told BBC after leaving office.

Things have changed since last week's opening of the Tony Blair Faith Foundation dedicated to promoting cooperation among Christians, Muslims, Jews, Hindus, Buddhists and Sikhs. The former prime minister offered a vivid defense of his new work during a recent speech at Westminster Cathedral.

The bottom line: It's impossible to talk about how the world works without facing the power of religion.

"I ... argue that religious faith is a good thing in itself, that so far from being a reactionary force, it has a major part to play in shaping the values which guide the modern world and can and should be a force for progress," he said. "But it has to be rescued on the one hand from the extremist and exclusionary tendency within religion today; and on the other from the danger that religious faith is seen as an interesting part of history and tradition but with nothing to say about the contemporary human condition."

In a follow-up speech, Blair stressed that there is no evidence faith is fading in most of the world. When asked, "Is religion an important part of your life?" between 80 and 90 percent of citizens in Muslim nations say "yes." About 70 percent of Americans agree. What about Europe? A study by the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life offered blunt numbers. In Great Britain, 33 percent of those polled said religion was "very important," compared with 27 percent in Italy, 21 percent in Germany and 11 percent in France. In other words, Europe is abnormal.

At Westminster, Blair cited several reasons for modern prejudices against faith.

Many Europeans, for example, think believers are weird – period. They believe politicians who are religious "engage in some slightly cultish interaction" with God before making key decisions. They also assume that believers want to impose their beliefs on others, while pretending that they are "better than the next person," said Blair, who made headlines late last year when he became a Roman Catholic, joining his wife and four children in the church.

"Worst of all," he added, skeptics are convinced believers are "somehow messianically trying to co-opt God to bestow a divine legitimacy" on their politics.

The problem is that it's hard to debate people on the fringes – religious extremists and militant secularists – without blurring the lines between faiths that have sharply different beliefs. Blair said that it's crucial to argue that religious believers can tolerate and respect each other without surrendering their own doctrines.

"Let me be clear," he said. "I am not saying that it is extreme to believe your religious faith is the only true faith. Most people of faith do that. It doesn't stop them respecting those of a different faith or indeed of no faith. ... Faith is problematic when it becomes a way of denigrating those who do not share it, as somehow lesser human beings."

Still, it's hard to argue for justice without some core belief that some things are right and some things are wrong. This is one reason, Blair concluded, that very few people want to live and raise their children in a faithless world.

"Faith corrects, in a necessary and vital way, the tendency humankind has to relativism. It says there are absolutes – like the inalienable worth and dignity of every human being – that can never be sacrificed. It gives true moral fiber. We err, we do wrong, we sin, but at least we know it and we feel the compunction to do better and the need to seek God?s forgiveness."