To: <bprlist@egroups.com>
Subject: [bprlist] Greetings and Prayer Request
From: "Sydney & Frances Drakes"
Date: Sun, 10 Dec 2000 09:25:14 -0400

Hi there!

We haven't communicated since the "ill fated" election. In the midst of our
challenges here we have followed sometimes incredulously the happenings in
the USA since November 07. There hasn't been much on the list about it but
America is the pulse of the world and if such unbelievable fraud, corruption
and deception are openly being displayed in America what hope is there for
the rest of the world? What are your personal comments, reflections about
it? You live there and can relate from a personal perspective what we can
only glean from newswires.

On to the our personal situation, we viewed and decided to rent the house on
November 02. As I mentioned to you it had been a long and arduous search.
On arriving at the house that morning another principal of a school, whom I
happen to be acquainted with was there with the option of renting it. I am
convinced that had we not had the first option (because we had been the
first to call) she would have rented it and therefore we did not have any
time to ponder the situation as a swift decision was required. Now because
of the situation the enemy would cause me to believe that perhaps we moved
too swiftyly. The house is ideally suited to our needs but had been up
until that point in time (the first storey, that is) been used as a garage.
Therefore when we viewed it there were small mini-buses, engines, tires,
grease everywhere all kinds of mechanical junk everywhere -- like a dump.
The landlord assured us that it would all be cleaned up by December 15 --
six weeks away from that point in time. As the time passed and we drove
around from time to time precious little was being done. We have spoken to
him countless times and while work is progressing slowly all the
above-mentioned junk has not been moved and we are leaving this residence on
Wednesday.

I didn't want to bother you with what may seem inconsequential but we are
somewhat disheartened at this point in time. We have received no offers of
help from either parents or staff and so it is Sydney and I at this on our
own. We have hired a general worker to help us when we get to the new
property as the entire building inside and out has to be painted but we
can't start the work until the place has been cleaned and of course we are
on a limited time schedule because school starts again in early January. I
know it is nothing else but satan hindering the work but others praying into
these situations always diffuses the attack. So if it is not too
presumptious please lift Drakes Christian School up in prayer.

The information shared through the list continues to enlighten us. God's
blessings to you all.

Sydney & Frances

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======= To: bprlist@egroups.com
Subject: [bprlist] Church waits for seizure by feds
From: <owner-bpr@philologos.org>
Date: Sun, 10 Dec 2000 14:39:05 -0000

SATURDAY DECEMBER 9 2000

Church waits for seizure by feds
Battle between Temple's members,
IRS raises fundamental questions

By Julie Foster
=A9 2000 WorldNetDaily.com

http://www.worldnetdaily.com/bluesky_fosterj_news/20001209_xnfoj_churc
h_wai.shtml

Ministers and members of the Indianapolis Baptist Temple have
occupied their church property 24-hours-a-day for more than three
weeks in anticipation of seizure by U.S. marshals, as ordered by the
U.S. Circuit Court in Chicago.

What chain of events could have led to this bizarre set of
circumstances? It's a 50-year history that, according to the United
States government, can simply be reduced to the fact that a church
did not pay federal employment taxes. But, from the perspective of
dozens of church ministers and the congregation, their path is one of
repentance that now involves taking a stand for what they believe is
the original intent of America's founding fathers and, more
importantly, the sovereignty of God.

The legal battle began in 1994 when the Internal Revenue Service
filed suit in the U.S. District Court for the southern district of
Indiana against the church for not paying employment taxes. On Jan.
19, 1999, Chief Judge Sarah Evans Barker ruled against the church and
ordered it to pay $3.6 million for taxes owed between 1987 and 1993.
The church appealed to the 7th Circuit but lost and has now filed an
emergency motion in the U.S. Supreme Court. In the meantime, Barker
ordered U.S. marshals to seize the church's property for foreclosure
to pay the taxes in question. Occupants of the property now await
action by law enforcement.

But why didn't the church pay the taxes -- and how could their
reasoning lead to such a dramatic, groundbreaking case?

Indianapolis Baptist Temple was founded in March 1950 by Pastor Greg
J. Dixon. In October of that year, the church incorporated as a 501(c)
(3) not-for-profit organization, as many churches do in America.
Churches are not required to incorporate as not-for-profits, but many
choose to do so as it streamlines the process of obtaining tax
exemptions. As a 501(c)(3), a church must comply with federal
employment taxes -- it must match the employees' taxes for Social
Security and Medicare and it must withhold the employees'
contributions to those programs as well as normal income taxes. Such
churches -- and all 501(c)(3) organizations -- are liable for both
the taxes imposed directly on them and the taxes they are required to
withhold from employees. Churches not incorporated under the statute
are known as "unincorporated religious societies" and are still
required by the IRS to pay applicable employment taxes.

IBT, as the church is referred to in court documents, complied with
the regulations applying to its not-for-profit corporation status
until 1983 -- a pivotal year in the case. At that time, said IBT's
attorney Al Cunningham, church members "got down on our knees and
repented" for placing the church under the authority of a civic
government, which it had done by incorporating as a 501(c)(3)
organization.

"When you form a legal entity, what you are actually doing is
establishing an entity under the law. And when you do that, you place
yourself under the law. So you have two entities that exist
simultaneously. You have the Church and the legal entity," Cunningham
explained. "The Church is authenticated by the holy Bible," not civic
laws, he added

"The Church is established under Jesus Christ, and he is sovereign,"
he continued. By allowing IBT to be subject to any kind of taxation
or government regulation, the church was separating itself from Jesus
Christ, he said. "The purpose of the First Amendment is to deny
government that access to religion."

So, in 1983, the church repented of its actions and began operating
as a "New Testament church." It also rejected the characterization of
being an "unincorporated religious society," since that term carries
legal significance. Cunningham describes the switch in operation as
a "divorce" of sorts. The not-for-profit corporation and the Church
are separate entities, but the church had not made the distinction
between itself and the corporation, he said.

"It's like divorce. A man and wife are two individuals, but there's a
union," Cunningham illustrated. That union was renounced by IBT.

Cunningham also claimed the church's beliefs are consistent with the
First Amendment.

"Our forefathers recognized in the First Amendment that God is
sovereign over man and that man cannot tax God," he said. "If you say
now that government can tax a church, you're saying that government
has placed itself as a sovereign over a church. ... That's the rub
here."

The attorney pointed out that while he believes government does not
have the right to regulate churches, it does have the right to
regulate legally incorporated entities.

"The government has the authority, and I will acknowledge this, that
government has the authority to tax and to regulate a legal entity,"
he said. Being a 501(c )(3) "means they're getting a government
subsidy -- the Supreme Court said so. Since the government is
subsidizing that entity, they have the right to regulate it," he
explained.

IBT then limited the use of its 501(c)(3), renamed after 1983 to "Not
a Church, Inc.," to handle financial obligations and legal
responsibilities not assumed by the church until the corporation was
administratively dissolved by Indiana's secretary of state in July of
1989.

But while the church focuses on making the distinction between itself
and the corporation, the district court ruled the difference between
a "New Testament church" and religious organizations subject to
specific taxes is "a distinction without a difference."

Indeed, in the 7th Circuit's ruling of IBT's appeal, the court
rejected the church's argument that the First Amendment excludes it
from taxation and other forms of government regulation.

"The Free Exercise Clause absolutely protects the freedom to believe
and profess whatever religious doctrine one desires," wrote Judge Ann
Williams. "It also provides considerable, though not absolute,
protection for the ability to practice (through the performance or
non-performance of certain actions) one's religion."

Williams cites a 1990 Supreme Court case -- Employment Division,
Department of Human Resources v. Smith -- in which the nation's
highest tribunal ruled that "neutral laws of general application that
burden religious practices do not run afoul of the Free Exercise
Clause."

In other words, imposing employment taxes that apply to all
employers, regardless of employers' religious beliefs or purposes, is
an acceptable government practice under the First Amendment.

Williams also rejected IBT's claim to protection under the federal
Religious Freedom Restoration Act, which says laws that substantially
burden the free exercise of religion cannot be enforced unless the
burden furthers a compelling government interest and is the least
restrictive means of furthering that interest. Since IBT's religious
tenets preclude the church as a whole from paying taxes to a civic
government, Cunningham cited RFRA in IBT's defense.

The court disagreed, emphasizing RFRA's exception for "compelling
government interests."

"The Supreme Court and various courts of appeals concluded both that
maintaining a sound and efficient tax system is a compelling
government interest and that the difficulties inherent in
administering a tax system riddled with judicial exceptions for
religious employers make a uniformly applicable tax system the least
restrictive means of furthering that interest," the circuit court
wrote. "We find this authority persuasive and see no reason to reach
a different conclusion" than the lower district court, the ruling
continues.

The circuit court's ruling affirmed the district court's decision by
Barker, who also shut down the church's First Amendment argument
based on the Establishment Clause. Barker noted that tax
systems "must have a secular legislative purpose, its primary purpose
must neither advance nor inhibit religion, and it must not foster an
excessive entanglement with religion."

Barker also referenced the Supreme Court case "Jimmy Swaggart
Ministries v. Board of Equalization of California," in which the
court held "it is undeniable that a generally applicable tax has a
secular purpose and neither advances nor inhibits religion." Another
important aspect of the Swaggart case was the court's observance
that "carving out an exception to account for conflicting religious
beliefs would result in the very entanglement that IBT seeks to
prevent, since it would necessarily require the IRS to examine the
sincerity of a person's religious beliefs."

U.S. Attorney Douglas Snoeyenbos could not comment on the case, nor
could the Justice Department's office of public affairs. However, a
47-page brief filed by U.S. attorneys to the appeals court outlines
the government's case against the church, including Barker's case
references previously mentioned.

"The district court was correct when it stated that prior Supreme
Court precedent makes resolution of this case rather
straightforward," said U.S. Attorney Robert Metzler at the May 11
appeal proceeding. According to a transcript of the proceeding made
by the church from a court-provided audio recording, Metzler
stated, " ... the position of Indianapolis Baptist Temple which, as
we understand it, basically says that it allows no government
regulation unless it voluntarily submits to it, is simply an
untenable position in society."

The circuit court agreed with Metzler on Aug. 14. As a result, IBT
was required to comply with Barker's earlier ruling. The church again
refused to pay based on its religious convictions and, on Nov. 14,
Barker entered judgment against IBT, awarding the United States $5.3
million plus interest and penalties and ordering foreclosure and sale
of two parcels of real estate owned by the church.

IBT asked for a stay of the order all the way up to the Supreme
Court, but it was denied by each jurisdiction, including by Chief
Justice William Rehnquist, said Cunningham. The church is attempting
to appeal to the Supreme Court, but Cunningham admits, "It'll be
there for a while."

On Nov. 14, the same day Barker issued final judgment, the parsonage
of Pastor Emeritus Greg J. Dixon was seized. The parsonage sits on
IBT's 22 acres, which includes a sanctuary capable of seating 2,000,
a cafeteria and gymnasium, a baseball diamond, soccer field,
maintenance garages, a two-story school building and other
structures. Dixon now lives in the basement of the senior pastor's
home -- one of three parsonages on the estate. Dixon's son, Greg A.
Dixon, is the current senior pastor.

Penalties on such a judgment can be up to 25 percent of the amount
awarded. Combined with interest, the total amount owed could end up
being more than double the $5.3 million. But the church stands by its
convictions, saying the property belongs only to God. However, what
individuals choose to do with the money they receive from the church
is their own decision, Cunningham indicated.

The church's lawyer said the IRS audited approximately 60 of the
church's ministers and found they had all filed their own tax forms
and paid all taxes due, including the total amount of their FICA
taxes. Therefore, the taxes in question had already been paid, the
church claims. Nevertheless, IBT says the IRS sent half of the FICA
taxes back, saying the church should have collected and remitted them
instead of the individuals who paid them.

"The church isn't taxed, but individuals are," Cunningham
conceded. "So some people go ahead and pay it."

So, what happens now? Today marks 25 days the church has been
occupied by ministers, members and sympathizers from around the
country. They are waiting for U.S. marshals to come seize the
property, though they do not know when a seizure will take place.

U.S. Marshal Frank Anderson was quoted in the Indianapolis Star as
saying he respects the church's beliefs but he must do what the law
tells him to do. He did not indicate when the next seizure would take
place.

While the church waits, anywhere from 40 to 60 people camp out on the
carpeted auditorium floor and many more people occupy the church
during the day. Church membership is around 3,000, and teachers at
the 500-student school for children from kindergarten through high
school continue to teach.

Cunningham and Pastor Emeritus Dixon say the church is standing for
religious liberty.

"We are in the same place in America as our forefathers were before
the First Amendment was adopted," Cunningham remarked. "The religious
liberties of every individual in America are at stake right now."

"There's only one lawgiver," added Dixon, "and the biblical nature of
the church has to coincide with the legal nature of the church.
They're saying that our belief system can be biblical, but our
practice must be legal as they determine legality."

Dixon says the issue is one of control. Since the taxes have been
paid by individuals, there was no financial reason for the IRS to
target the church.

IBT's demand of the government, as Cunningham puts it, is
simple: "You just get out and let us worship our God in peace."

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======= To: bprlist@egroups.com
Subject: [bprlist] Tattoos lose their taboo in Australia
From: <owner-bpr@philologos.org>
Date: Sun, 10 Dec 2000 15:08:02 -0000

Tattoos lose their taboo in Australia

http://www.timesofindia.com/081200/08wrap7.htm

SYDNEY: In Australia it was the dads that had the tattoos, Now its
the sons and daughters. Among adolescents, one in four males and one
in five females has a tattoo.

Why tattooing among young people has gone from deviant to de rigeur
in just one generation is a question that has exercised the mind of
Australian National University sociologist Ian McAllister.

He reckons there's been a ''social renaissance'' with young men
taking the needle as a confirmation of identity and young women
throng so as a form of gender rebellion.

To be sure, tattooing has jumped a social divide with bankers as
likely to embellish their bodies as bricklayers.

But some things haven't changed all that much. Professor McAllister,
going through the results of a survey of more than 10,000
Australians, found that a quarter of young men were full of alcohol
when they entered the tattoo parlour.

And it's still true that tattooing has its greatest appeal to those
on the dangerous fringe of society.

Drug addicts tattoo and pierce their bodies at nine times the rate of
ordinary citizens and half of prisoners with a tattoo acquired it
while inside.

Trish McDonald, who recently put on an exhibition of body art at
Sydney's Australian Museum, that tattooing is perfectly normal and at
some time and place has been the norm rather than the exception.

''It's a common human trait and something that distinguishes us from
other animals, the fact that we do things to modify our bodies,''
McDonald says.

What she can't explain is why so many youngsters are expressing their
individuality in just the same way, with girls overwhelmingly going
for humming birds, roses and Celtic crosses while the boys line up
for barbed wire, floral patterns and geometric designs.(DPA)

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======= To: bprlist@egroups.com
Subject: [bprlist] "The church is dead, long live the reformation"
From: <owner-bpr@philologos.org>
Date: Sun, 10 Dec 2000 15:23:15 -0000

The church is dead, long live the reformation
by Jack Spong
Saturday December 9, 2000

http://www.guardianunlimited.co.uk/comment/story/0,3604,409027,00.html

The Christian church is spiralling towards an apparent death. And to
the degree that Christianity has been identified with the structure
of the church, so the death of the church raises the spectre of the
death of Christianity itself.

This assessment comes not from someone hostile to the faith, but from
one who has spent 21 years of his life as a priest, and 24 years as a
bishop. Nor is it a conviction arising out of bitterness or
disillusionment; it is rather a statement born in reality and honesty
out of the experience of facing things as they are.

The signs of death are everywhere. The people in the developed world
who do engage the church's life are fewer and older as each year goes
by; a profound clergy shortage marks the Roman Catholic church; other
traditions, which have padded their ordained ranks with the inclusion
of women, are awakening to a similar shortage.

More telling than anything else is the fact that an increasingly
unbelievable, pre-modern mentality still grips the traditional
Christian proclamations, and ancient prejudices, generally dismissed
by secular society, are still clung to passionately in Christian
circles. Indeed, the only place where church growth is experienced
today is among those who proclaim a primitive, superstitious kind of
Christianity that has not yet confronted the intellectual revolution
of modernity.

Three of Christianity's basic tenets have been made inoperative by
the advance of secular knowledge. The first is the Christmas story; a
narrative in which stars are said to wander, virgins conceive,
foetuses salute each other out of their respective mothers' wombs,
and angels sing to hillside shepherds, is hardly the stuff of
reality.

The moment the world discovered that women had an egg cell which
contributed 50% of the genetic code of every new-born life, all
virgin birth stories died as literal biology. If Mary is Jesus'
mother, and the Holy Spirit the paternal agent, then Jesus would be a
half-human, half-divine monster, hardly the claim the church
intended.

Despite the claims of the literalisers, the virgin-birth story was
never anything but the stuff of mythology. Perhaps the church's
traditional voices failed to notice that only two of the five major
New Testament writers seemed to think it worthy of mention. Paul and
Mark appear never to have heard of it; John appears to have dismissed
it, since, on two occasions, his gospel refers to Jesus as the son of
Joseph. The story of Jesus' miraculous entry into this world is
simply no longer believable.

Neither is his exit story. The account of Jesus' cosmic ascension,
told by Luke, assumed a three-tiered universe with the earth at its
centre - a concept rendered nonsensical by the Copernican revolution.
As space-age people, we know that if Jesus rose far enough into the
sky, he did not get to heaven; he either got into orbit or sank into
the infinite depths of space.

B ut perhaps most troubling of all, the traditional way Christians
have told the story of salvation, which focused on the saving act
that occurred on the Cross, has become unbelievable to post-modern
ears. It is a bizarre concept that turns God into an ogre who
requires a blood sacrifice before being able to forgive.

The idea that there was ever a good creation, from which a fall into
sin occurred, is a strange concept, given our knowledge of evolution.
Darwin's suggestion that life began as a single cell, before
journeying into complex self-consciousness, is hardly a fall.

When these realities are added to the fact that the church has
repeatedly used its power to defend prejudices long abandoned by the
world, the death of this institution becomes all but indisputable. No
one today salutes the divine right of kings, the idea that the sun
rotates around the earth, the acceptability of such institutions as
slavery, apartheid or the second-class status of women. Yet the Bible
was used by the church to defend each of these horrors. Likewise, the
debate about homosexuality has become simply one more opportunity for
the church leadership to make public fools of themselves.

I, for one, am no longer willing to defend the institutional church;
its demise is of no great import to me. I am eager, however, to free
Christianity from the shackles of its past, so that it might live in
a new form into the future.

This involves conceiving of God beyond the traditional definitions of
the theistic deity, and seeing the Christ not as the incarnation of
that theistic deity but as a doorway into the fullness of life. We
must see the Christ as a god presence erupting within humanity,
inviting us into the experience of living fully, and having the
courage to be all that each of us is capable of being.

It is to see our willingness to be disciples of this Jesus not in
terms of winning converts to a dying institution, but in terms of
living in such a way as to create more opportunities for all people
to live, love and be all that they can be. It is to take seriously
the words attributed to Jesus by the fourth Gospel that his, and thus
Christianity's, purpose was to give life - and to give it abundantly.

I want to be part of a Christianity that does not think it honours
God by denigrating humanity, that does not manipulate people with
guilt and a sense of duty, and does not confuse education with
propaganda. I want to be part of a church that, rather than answering
our questions, dares to question our answers.

I believe that Christianity stands on the verge of a great
transformation, in which the power of Christ will be separated from
the institution that calls itself the body of Christ. The
Christianity that cannot change will surely die. The choice is to
bring on the reformation or stand by in pious inertia. I cast my vote
for reformation.

=95 Jack Spong, the former Episcopalian Bishop of Newark, New Jersey,
is author of Why Christianity Must Change Or Die and A New
Christianity For A New World, to be published next year

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======= To: bprlist@egroups.com
Subject: Re: [bprlist] "The church is dead, long live the reformation"
From: MMoody4922
Date: Sun, 10 Dec 2000 12:53:04 EST

If this is the same Bishop Spong who is promoting full acceptance of
practicing homosexuals into the church and advocating abortion, then I am
sorry that you distributed this article without some disclaimer. A clerical
title does not mean that you are a minister of the Good News. I am writing
as one who has read some of Bishop Spong's work. I am also speaking as one
who is a seminary graduate, and it is my opinion that Bishop Spong's work has
the a form of godliness but lacks the power of it. When addressing social
injustices is done at the omission of preaching everyone's need of salvation
and that only through the shed blood of Jesus Christ, those efforts then are
only philanthropic endeavors. When Jesus' death, resurrection from the dead,
ascension into heaven, the empowerment of believer with the Holy Spirit, the
current day ministry of Jesus where He is seated at the right hand of the
Father interceding for His followers and His one day return is not preached
in love, then church is just another social club.

Bishop Spong's message cannot be separated from the fruit of his ministry.
It is not a message that brings people to a decision for God, but in fact it
is trying to rewrite His word to fit the signs of the times. No, the church
is not perfect, in fact far from it. However, through Bishop Spong's
proposals, he is appearing as an angel of light. This is not a message of
good news but heretical error that is only fit to line the bottom of garbage
cans.

[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

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