August 2002 Vol.5, No. 7 Contents by Cecil E. Maranville by Darris McNeely by Melvin Rhodes by Darris McNeely by Cecil E. Maranville, John Ross Schroeder and Jim Tuck This Is the Way...Getting Underneath the Skin by Robin Webber In Brief...World News Review Blair Pushes for a European Superpower Britain's Prime Minister Tony Blair has challenged Europe to stop complaining about the United States and instead bring together its military resources to become a superpower on the same level with America. In a broad interview reported in a recent issue of the political magazine Prospect, Blair said there was "a certain scratchiness" in European Union's relations with the United States, an apparent reference to countries, including France and Germany, that have expressed concern at U.S. talk of overthrowing Iraqi president Saddam Hussein. Blair was quoted as saying, "My challenge to Europe is this: if we want to have greater sway and greater power, then instead of complaining about America, we've got to face up to what we need to do. That means developing a coherent defense capability and a set of institutions to allow Europe to speak strongly." The United States says Saddam is a sponsor of international terrorism and seeks nuclear weapons. But allies have shown little appetite for a military campaign to oust him without hard evidence that Iraq had a role in the Sept. 11 attacks on the United States. The prime minister, a strong U.S. ally, said if the time comes for action against Iraq, "people will have the evidence presented to them" to show that Saddam "is trying to acquire weapons of mass destruction, in particular a nuclear capability." Blair said some European criticism of America "comes from an irritation with their huge superpower status. If we pool our sovereignty in a way that gives us a strong voice and, if we improve our defense capability, we will be the strategic partner that America needs and wants." European allies spend about 1.8 percent of their gross domestic product on defense, compared with the United States' 3 percent. Plans to create a European defense force with up to 60,000 soldiers in a rapid-reaction peacekeeping unit have stalled because Greece objects to a deal that would allow Turkey to veto deployment in its region. Turkey is a member of NATO but not the EU. Sources: The Associated Press, ABC.com. Fears That Saudi Arabia Could Fall to al Qaeda Saudi Arabia may be dangerously close to collapse, fueling concerns of an extremist takeover of one of the West's key allies in the war on terror. Antigovernment demonstrations have swept the desert kingdom in the past months in protest of the pro-American stance of the de facto ruler, Prince Abdullah. Saudi sources said the Pentagon had recently sponsored a secret conference to look at options if the royal family fell. The British Foreign Office believes that the failure of Abdullah's recent Middle East peace plan could have terminally undermined his position. British officials are fearful that Prince Abdullah could face a palace coup from elements within the royal family sympathetic to al Qaeda. Demonstrations across the kingdom broke out in March, triggered by a fire in a girls' school in which 14 pupils died after the religious police stopped them from escaping. Unrest in the east of the country rapidly escalated into nationwide protests against the royal family that were brutally suppressed by the police. The tensions between the royal factions will intensify with the death of King Fahd. The condition of the king, in the hospital in Switzerland, is "unstable," doctors said. British-based Saudi dissident Dr. Saad al-Fagih said: "There is now an undeclared war between the factions in the Saudi royal family." Sources: Guardian Unlimited, The Observer. Calculating Obesity Last month World News and Prophecy ran an article on the worldwide health crisis of obesity. How can you know if you are overweight or obese? There have been many divergent opinions on what constitutes a healthy or unhealthy weight range. The formula that is more and more being accepted as the standard is your Body Mass Index (BMI). Here's the formula for calculating it. Determine your height in inches and then multiply that figure by itself. Then, take your weight in pounds and divide it by the square of your height in inches. The result should be a low figure, such as .03543279. The last step is to take that number and multiply it by 703. The answer should be a two-digit number. A number less than 25 is considered to mean that the person is not overweight. A person with a BMI of between 25 and 29 is considered overweight. And a person with a BMI of 30 or more is considered obese. Before you panic, we would like to explain that the formula is imperfect, because it does not consider the difference between fat and muscle. "Mass" does not distinguish between them. Illustrating the shortcomings of the formula, Sammy Sosa and Arnold Schwarzenegger are obese by that standard! And Brad Pitt and Michael Jordan are overweight. Nonetheless, the formula can give one a general guideline of a healthy weight range. Sources: George F. Will, "Supersize Menace," The Washington Post, Feb. 28, 2002; Kathleen Parker, "In War on Fat, It's the Food's Fault," Jewish World Review, July 31, 2002. People Who Divorce to Be Happy Are Likely to Be Disappointed For decades, marriage and family therapists counseled people who were unhappy in their marriages that their children would be better off if they divorced. Extensive research has subsequently proved that to be a myth. Divorce is much worse for children than living in an unhappy home. Also, counselors encouraged unhappy people to think of themselves. Divorce was supposed to free them from their unhappiness. Now, new research done by the Institute for American Values is showing that this also is a myth. "According to the survey conducted by a team of family researchers, unhappily married adults who divorced were no happier five years after the divorce than were equally unhappy marrieds who remained together. And two-thirds of unhappily married people who remained married reported that their marriages were happy five years later. Even among those who had rated their marriages as 'very unhappy,' nearly 80 percent said they were happily married five years later. These were not merely bored or dissatisfied whiners. They had endured serious problems, including alcoholism, infidelity, verbal abuse, emotional neglect, depression, illness, and work and money troubles." The divorced sample also showed slightly more depressive symptoms and more alcohol consumption than the married group. The results of the studies show that 64 percent of unhappy couples that stay together will be happily married in five years. By contrast, only 19 percent will be happy in five years if they divorce and remarry. It's worth noting how unhappy couples turned their relationships around. Of course, it required effort. The study highlighted three successful techniques: enduring (taking one day at a time and working through problems); assertively tackling the problems (setting aside private time with each other, seeking counseling from clergy or professional marriage counselors, getting help from relatives and even threatening divorce); seeking personal happiness (individuals found other ways to improve their happiness, which lessened the impact of shortcomings in their marriage relationship). "The capstone of this research is (a) New Yorker cartoon: A man stands with his arm around his wife's shoulders and explains to another couple, 'Our divorce wasn't working.'" If you are unhappy in your marriage, don't be taken in by the misconception that divorce is the solution. You can find a lengthy summary of the Institute for American Values study in a press release posted on their Web site at www.americanvalues.org. Source: Mona Charen, "Happy Marriages and Unhappy Divorces," Jewish World Review, July 19, 2002. New Archbishop Amid Controversy Recently Queen Elizabeth II, supreme governor of the Church of England, formally approved the nomination of Rowan Williams, age 52, as the new archbishop of Canterbury after a meeting with Prime Minister Tony Blair. When he is enthroned (probably early next year) as the 104th archbishop, it will be at a time when secularism threatens the spirituality of Britain as never before. Public interest in mainstream Christianity is at an all-time low. Although Dr. Williams (currently archbishop of Wales) is said to "read scripture seriously" and to be orthodox in his basic beliefs, some of his public statements seem to run contrary to what is said in Scripture. Fellow Church of England clergyman William Taylor, rector of St. Helens Bishopgate in London, takes public issue with him. He said of the newly appointed archbishop: "Some of his views in the area of gender and sexuality are in conflict with the Bible. He has labelled those who disagree with him as adopting an 'abstract fundamentalist' use of scripture and of applying 'narrow and crude' criteria . . . My hope is he will make a clear statement to the effect that his previous statements were ill-advised" (The Independent on Sunday, July 28, 2002, emphasis added). According to the same article, William Taylor's congregation "represents a strain of evangelical belief that has been openly critical of Dr. Williams's support for the gay clergy." Christians around the world may find some of Dr. Williams' previous public declarations rather disturbing. Consider his lecture principally about homosexuality titled "The Body's Grace" (1989): "The worst thing we can do with the notion of sexual fidelity . . . is to 'legalise' it in such a way that it stands quite apart from the ventures and dangers of growth and is simply a public bond, enforceable by religious sanctions . . .  "An absolute declaration that every sexual partnership must conform to the pattern of commitment or else have the nature of sin and nothing else is unreal and silly . . . If we are looking for a sexual ethic that can be seriously informed by our Bible, there is a good deal to steer us away from assuming reproductive sex is a norm, however important and theologically significant it may be" (quoted in The Guardian, July 25, 2002). An unusual view of the Bible's teachings! The new archbishop faces several challenges within the Church of England itself. Two publicly-acknowledged gay clergymen in same sex relationships would like to see a significant increase in their numbers. But the conservative Anglo-Catholic wing of the Anglican Church speaks in terms of "we may have to walk" when they hear serious talk of the possible proliferation of gay clergy and women priests. Also, the Church of England has almost lost 1 billion pounds on ill-advised stock market investments and may face a radical financial restructuring when Rowan Williams assumes office. The words of Times columnist William Rees-Mogg ring in English ears: "Will this be the man to bring us to our knees?" Sources: The Times, The Sunday Times, The Independent on Sunday, The Guardian (all London). Contributors: Cecil E. Maranville, John Ross Schroeder and Jim Tuck wnp - Send any comments / changes regarding this page to webmaster@churchofgodtwincities.org © 2002-2022 United Church of God, an International Association