2 FAITH focus FAITH WATCH


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 EXPANDS Continued from page 1B Roughly the same percentage lives


Peggy Railey dies decades after attack Peggy Railey, 63, former wife of a United Methodist minister accused of trying to strangle her, died on Dec. 26 in East Texas, nearly 25 years after she was attacked. She never recovered from an assault at her Dallas-area home in April 1987 and remained in what doctors called a vegetative state. Walker Railey, her husband at the time of the attack, was then pastor of Dallas’ First United Methodist Church. He was acquitted in 1993 of attempted murder.


Watchdog group wins survival vote The U.S. Commission on In- ternational Religious Free- dom was kept open by Congress in a last-minute reauthorization vote on Dec. 16. “We can get back into the business of doing what we do best, which is monitoring conditions for religious freedom around the world,” said USCIRF chairman Leonard Le. The bipartisan commission is- sues an annual report on religious rights abuses.


Bin Laden death ranked top story Members of the Religion Newswriters Association voted Osama bin Laden’s killing and the reactions that it produced among people of faith as the top religion news story of 2011. The second ranked story was the series of congres- sional hearings on the al- leged radicalization of Muslims in the United States. In third was the charging of Catholic Bishop Robert Finn of Kansas City, Mo., with failure to report the suspected abuse of a child.


Greek church plans to expand donations The Greek Orthodox Church says it will pick up the pace in providing free meals to the needy, given the country’s expanding fi- nancial crisis. Archbishop Ieronymos said the church already hands out 10,000 portions of food a day in greater Athens.


—Compiled by Sam Hodges


in sub-Saharan Africa, and about one- eighth of the Christian population lives in Asia and the Pacific.


Brazil vs. Italy Demographic changes and the


spread of Christianity account for some of the study’s more intriguing findings. For example, Nigeria now has double the number of Protestants as Germany, where the Protestant Ref- ormation was born. Brazil has more than twice as many Catholics as Italy. Of the 10 countries with the largest


Christian populations, three are in Africa (Nigeria, Democratic Republic of the Congo and Ethiopia) and two in Asia (the Philippines and China.) Pew’s researchers acknowledged


the difficulty of getting a good esti- mate in China, where underground “house churches” abound, in addition to congregations that are registered with the communist government. But the researchers felt confident


enough to estimate that there are 67 million Christians in China, represent- ing about 5 percent of the population. Given its massive overall population, China ranks third among countries in number of Protestants, with 58 mil- lion, according to the study. “Thirty years ago, researchers


weren’t even sure if religion had sur- vived the [Chinese] Cultural Revolu- tion,” said Brian Grim, senior researcher and director of cross-na- tional data for Pew. Russia ranks first in number of


Orthodox Christians, followed by Ethiopia, Ukraine, Romania, Greece


and Serbia. The United States far out- paces other countries in number of Christians. The Pew Study found that about 90


percent of Christians live in countries wherein Christians are in the majority. But it also determined that the


Middle East and North Africa, where Christianity began, now has the lowest concentration of Christians (4 percent of the region’s population) and small- est number (13 million) of any major geographical region. “It is disturbing to note the further


decrease of Christians in the Middle East,” said Thomas Kemper, top exec- utive of the UMC’s General Board of Global Ministries. “We must reach out in solidarity with Christians in these places and try to be a source of peace and hope.”


Implications for UMC The study found that the United


States, Brazil and Mexico are the na- tions with the largest Christian popu- lations, and in that order. As with other mainline Protestant


groups, the UMC has seen a long slide in membership in the United States. But the denomination’s worldwide membership topped 12 million for the first time in 2009, thanks largely to growth in Africa. “The global shift in Christianity


reinforces the need to go beyond our traditional northern-centric mission models,” Mr. Kemper said. “At Global Ministries today more than 40 per- cent of our missionaries come from countries in Asia, Africa or Latin America, reflecting the changes in


UNITED METHODIST NEWS SERVICE FILE PHOTO BY PHILEAS JUSU


Bishop John Yambasu of Sierra Leone is seen here in 2009 addressing a gathering of United Methodist students in that country. Christianity has grown rapidly in Africa, a new Pew Study confirms.


world Christianity but also in the United Methodist Church demo- graphics.” Bishop Jones, whose committee


has proposed legislation for the 2012 General Conference, agreed that the denomination must adjust. “This new reality requires that we


continue moving toward a more in- clusive church that is deeply con- nected globally with more equitable sharing of power and greater mutual respect and understanding,” he said. The Pew Study estimated that


about half of the world’s Christians are Catholic, with Protestants ac- counting for 37 percent, Orthodox for 3.8 percent, with the rest—including


the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter- day Saints (Mormons), Jehovah’s Wit- nesses and the Christian Science Church—falling into the category “other.” The United States ranks first in Protestants, who account for about 51 percent of the population, or 160 million people. The study also deals with Chris-


tian movements, and estimates the worldwide population of Pentecostal and charismatic Christians together at 584 million. For the study, Pew drew on 2,400 data sources, and counted all individuals or groups that self-identified as Christians.


shodges@umr.org Clinton hosts summit on religious freedom


BY JOSEF KUHN Religion News Service


WASHINGTON—Secretary of


State Hillary Clinton recently held a summit with international leaders to explore specific steps to combat intol-


erance, discrimination and violence on the basis of religion or belief. The closed-door meeting on Dec.


14 was the first of an ongoing series called “The Istanbul Process.” Repre- sentatives came from 30 countries and international organizations, including


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JANUARY 6, 2012 | UNITED MET HODI S T REPORTER


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Egypt, Indonesia, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan. “We are working together to pro-


tect two fundamental freedoms—the right to practice one’s religion freely, and the right to express one’s opinion without fear,” Ms. Clinton said in her closing remarks. The goal of the Istanbul Process is


to produce a list of best practices for preventing religious discrimination and violence. Ambassador Michael Kozak, a deputy assistant secretary of state, acknowledged that the list would be helpful primarily for coun- tries that already have the political will to protect religious freedom but need practical guidance to do so. Nevertheless, Mr. Kozak said, it


could also put pressure on repressive regimes to loosen up. “By itself, this isn’t going to change


their minds. But . . . the more coun- tries you get starting to do things in a good way, the more isolated the others become, and then movements develop


in their own countries,” Mr. Kozak said.


The Istanbul Process grew out of a


resolution adopted by the United Na- tions Human Rights Council in March and then by the U.N. General Assem- bly in November. Resolutions in the previous 10 years had supported legal measures restricting the “defamation of religions.” The more recent Resolu- tion 16/18, however, broke with that tradition by calling for concrete, posi- tive measures to combat religious in- tolerance. “It is important that we recognize


what we accomplished when this reso- lution ended 10 years of divisive de- bate where people were not listening to each other anymore. Now we are. We’re talking,” said Ms. Clinton. The new resolution has faced criti-


cism from conservatives who think it amounts to a concession to Islamic countries, and will result in the cur- tailing of any speech that is critical of Islam.


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