Who can be excused from class?

Try to imagine what would happen if the following scene took place in a "Religions of the World" class in a public school.

First, the social studies teacher explains the history of Pentecostal Christianity and offers a statistical snapshot of the movement. Then he says that students need to experience Pentecostalism, in order to understand it. So they are told to kneel, lift their hands high and try to join in as he speaks in tongues. Afterwards, the students sing a few choruses of "Jesus, name above all names" and are given an assignment to watch Pat Robertson on "The 700 Club."

What would happen? Many parents -- Catholic, Jewish, Baptist, Presbyterian, agnostic or whatever -- would scream bloody murder. If school officials insisted on spending tax dollars on these lessons, many parents would certainly ask that their children be excused or allowed to attend alternative classes.

This imaginary scene would never take place, of course. Nevertheless, this church-state nightmare is a mirror image of scenes Mathew Staver keeps hearing about at the Liberty Counsel office in Orlando. Parents call and describe classes in which their children are given an overview of various world religions. So far, so good. But some report that their children are then guided into experiential lessons in which they join in rites and prayers totally foreign to the faith practiced in their homes.

The result is one of the tensest standoffs in today's church-state arena, alongside older battles over evolution and sex education.

"One of the main things we keep hearing about is classes where students are told to pretend they're part of some other faith, especially Eastern religions such as Buddhism," said Staver. "They may be shown meditation techniques and asked to take part in simulated rituals -- lighting candles and learning to do certain chants. ... Obviously, some parents feel threatened."

When parents complain, some school officials are cooperative. But some are not.

This raises obvious questions: If it's wrong to spend tax dollars in support of Christianity or Judaism, then shouldn't it be wrong to similarly fund activities that criticize these faiths or that promote other religions and rites? And what happens if millions of parents start asking that their children be excused from all school lessons that are even remotely linked to religion?

Last week, the White House released a revised set of guidelines intended to help ease these kinds of tensions. After all, said President Clinton in his weekly radio address: "Our founders believed the best way to protect religious liberty was to first guarantee the right of everyone to believe and practice religion according to his or her conscience; and second, to prohibit our government from imposing or sanctioning any particular religious belief. That's what they wrote into the First Amendment. They were right then, and they're right now."

Education Secretary Richard Riley noted that these guidelines were virtually unchanged from a 1995 set, which drew support from an unusually broad coalition -- from the American Civil Liberties Union to the National Association of Evangelicals. However, one of the few revisions will affect students seeking relief from objectionable lessons. This change came after the Supreme Court declared the Religious Freedom Restoration Act unconstitutional.

The earlier guidelines said that if officials could not "prove a compelling interest in requiring attendance the school would be legally required to excuse" students from objectionable lessons. The new guidelines, however, state that schools "enjoy substantial discretion" in such cases and that "students generally do not have a Federal right to be excused from lessons that may be inconsistent with their religious beliefs or practices."

Since 1995, said Staver, schools have been doing a much better job of allowing free speech about religion. However, it's hard to predict how state officials will react to this revised excusal clause in the guidelines.

"Students have a right to free speech," he said. "They also have a right not to have to listen to speech they find offensive, even in the classroom. Perhaps students and parents will be able to raise a free-speech objection the next time one of these cases comes up. ... But that's new ground that we haven't plowed yet."

Define 'marriage.' Please.

It was time, once again, for a political leader to step to the microphone and debate the politics of morality with America's most outspoken Roman Catholic prelate.

This time, Cardinal John O'Connor had used his pulpit in St. Patrick's Cathedral to deliver a diplomatic, but forceful, sermon attacking a New York City Council plan to create "domestic partnerships" equal to marriages. After quoting centuries of secular and sacred texts, he stressed that the church believes unconditionally that "no human authority can make any other state of life equivalent to marriage."

To which Mayor Rudolph Giuliani could only respond: There he goes again.

"You know, we have a division of church and state in the United States and it's a healthy one," the Republican mayor, who is a Catholic, told reporters in a press conference later in the day. "We're all here because people left other places because someone wanted to enforce their religious viewpoint as the view of the state."

And one more thing, noted Giuliani: "Domestic partnerships not only affect gays and lesbians, but they also affect heterosexuals."

Ironically, O'Connor and Giuliani were in totally agreement on this latter point. The cardinal's seven-page homily -- the printed text was provided for reporters -- included no direct references to homosexuality. The closest he came to mentioning this hot-button subject was to say that traditional moralists who have examined the domestic partnership proposal have "understandably raised questions about the morality of extramarital genital relationships, whatever the sex of the parties involved."

When religious traditionalists wade into public debates about sexuality, yet strive to avoid references to homosexuality, gay community leaders often accuse them of trying to hide their homophobia by using an ecclesiastical code. This tension reveals a truth that is rarely discussed during heated sex debates in American pews and public institutions. While it's true that the Bible contains relatively few verses that clearly forbid homosexual activity, it contains page after page of references to marriage and extra-marital sex.

This makes the stakes in public debates over "marriage" even higher than they are in clashes over the legal and moral status of homosexuality. It's impossible for anyone, on either side of the aisle, to discuss one issue without raising the other. All roads lead to a political land mine -- the definition of marriage or any new state of life that takes its place. This then affects the meaning of the word "family."

Looking down from their pulpits, and far into the future, the cardinal and other religious conservatives should be able to do the math -- for every same-sex domestic partnership there will almost certainly be dozens of state-sanctioned semi-marriages for heterosexual couples.

It would be impossible to raise an issue that touches more men, women and children, said O'Connor. As Pope John Paul II has written: "The family is the 'first and vital cell of society.' It is from the family that citizens come to birth and it is within the family that they find the first school of the social virtues that are the animating principle of the existence and development of society itself."

The changes that are sweeping through cities such as San Francisco and New York will inevitably lead to similar disputes elsewhere. Right now, noted the cardinal, marriages performed in New York City are recognized as valid in the rest of the state and in other states. It is natural to ask what status new "domestic partnerships" will have elsewhere. This question then leads to others, such as: What happens when these vague unions end?

"A spouse has a right to support from the other spouse," said O'Connor. "Will a domestic partner have to provide support? A spouse has certain rights with regard to property. What would be the case in domestic partnerships? What would be the legal effect on children? What of the question of filing joint tax returns, pension rights, etc.?"

Out in the pews, others must have been thinking of another question that looms just ahead: What are the rights of domestic grand partners?

Reggie White sacks a purple dinosaur

WASHINGTON -- Whenever a preacher starts getting personal, picky and downright pushy, Bible Belt folks like to say he has quit preaching and "gone to meddling."

A lot of folks have been saying that, and much more, about the Rev. Reggie White lately. The Green Bay Packer legend recently offended legions of people with a sermon to Wisconsin lawmakers that attacked abortion, called homosexual acts sin and offered up a colorful series of ethnic anecdotes, while arguing that all racial groups must see each other as part of God's image.

As if that didn't make enough people mad, this week White stood up in the nation's capital and said God wants to start messing with the ordinary day-to-day sins of people who think of themselves as conservatives. The man that many call the greatest defensive lineman ever even had the audacity to sack a purple dinosaur.

"How many of you wives have a hard time getting your husband's attention when he's watching TV?", he asked, drawing nervous laughter at a luncheon in which he and his wife Sara were honored by the conservative Family Research Council. "How many of you husbands have a hard time getting your wife's attention when she's on the telephone?... How many of us can get our children's attention when they're watching cartoons?

"Why are Barney and Mickey so much more popular than Jesus? Because the world is trying to feed us ... and trying to get us to idol worship."

White didn't back down on the issues that caused the Wisconsin firestorm and he drew cheers by saying that journalists keep mangling his religious convictions and images. He also came out swinging at CBS, accusing the network's executives of yanking an on-air job -- which he said was worth $6 million -- when faced with pressure from gay-rights groups. CBS denies this, while the superstar's supporters have begun talking about a lawsuit.

But the ordained Baptist minister focused most of this sermon on subjects closer to pews and family-room couches. He talked about heterosexual sins, how many parents are failing in the moral education of their children and how racial and denominational divisions among believers stunt their public witness. He even blamed the church, in part, for the negative role he believes the news and entertainment media play in American life.

White recently completed a two-week juice fast and, during this time of intense prayer, he said God gave him yet another vision. "I've been ripped because of this," he said, and then spoke to the media personnel in the room. "You've got your cameras on? God spoke to me. He said this. He said that what the enemy does is he communicates his evil message, he distributes his evil message and then he gives the resources to those whom he has influenced to promote his evil message."

In other words, said White, Satan is a media mogul, the "prince of the power of the air," who has mastered the art of communicating through television, radio, music, movies and newspapers. But this doesn't mean mass media are automatically evil or that the church hasn't made it's own media mistakes. Simply stated, religious believers are now suffering the consequences of decades of decisions to flee from the world of mass media.

"We said it was of the devil, when it was of God," he said.

It's time to stop running away and to get involved, said White, noting that Korea's most powerful evangelical church has begun publishing a major daily newspaper. Religious believers need to begin putting more movies, television comedies, radio programs and music into the marketplace and be more aggressive as consumers, he said..

Many of his critics celebrated when his job with CBS fell through. But what this media acid bath taught him, he said, is that it's impossible to ignore the cultural role played by mass media. Now he wants to try to do something positive about that, although he declined to discuss the details of this vision just yet.

But he did issue this challenge: "I'm tired of the devil pushing us around. ... God is trying to give people some guts to speak out on truth.''

Martin Marty remains on call

As the old saying goes, for most American newspapers a front-page religion story has three essential elements -- a local anecdote, new poll data and a quote from scholar Martin Marty.

Need a quote on God and politics? Call Marty. Liberal or fundamentalist demographics? The clout of suburban believers? Hollywood spirituality? Salvation for extra-terrestrials? Conflict in (name any church) pews? Call the University of Chicago Divinity School and anyone who answers will know what to do.

The church historian is, as Time said, America's "most influential living interpreter of religion." He has written 50- plus books, popular and scholarly, 40-plus years of weekly Christian Century columns and his Context newsletter will soon turn 30. Marty has become the one religion expert in many media rolodexes, the undisputed champion of pithy quotes shedding light on a dizzyingly complex subject many would relegate to the shadows of civic life.

"Even religion that aspires to be at home in the public can be in the dark, unless we have trained eyes to see it in the gallery, in the mall, in the university, in the market and all of the other places," he said, in a recent Minnesota Public Radio address.

It is Marty's style to light candles instead of cursing this darkness. Researchers in his current Public Religion Project have one rule -- no whining. The goal is to cheerfully educate religion-impaired media pros, educators and civic leaders instead of griping at them.

Many people are simply afraid, since religion does have a dark side that keeps making bloody headlines around the world, Marty said. As a colleague once told him: "Religion is a lot like sex. If you get it a little bit wrong, it's really dangerous."

Those who don't understand religion's power tend to be more scared than they need to be. They are, said Marty, like Medieval cartographers who filled empty spaces in their maps with beastly images and the warning: "Here be monsters." This fear causes many public leaders to try to tackle some of today's most urgent problems without using all of the positive resources -- such as faith-based volunteer groups -- found in American life.

Meanwhile, many people believe it's OK for others to have private beliefs, so long as they stay out of the public square. This is an old tension. However, today there is a new wrinkle. An increasing number of Americans, said Marty, embrace "spirituality," and welcome its presence in public life, while opposing such a role for "organized religions" they find threatening.

"So many people," he said, "now speak in terms of, 'I'm not religious, but I'm spiritual.' ... Those of us who study religion say that this is just one more of the religions that are out there."

Religious faith is, in fact, a force that is almost impossible to pigeonhole, said Marty. It doesn't just spring to life on Sunday morning or Friday at sundown. The secular blends with the sacred. City skylines contain steeples as well as skyscrapers and chaplains carry Bibles and holy oil in hospital hallways. No one should find it strange that people act on convictions born in 3 a.m. meditations on death and eternity. It's perfectly normal for prayers and mysticism to affect people's actions in daily life -- even in politics.

In recent years there has been increased public debate about the proper and improper uses of religion, said the historian. The roots of these tense exchanges go back 200 years or more, to a time when enlightened cultural leaders decided that religion's days were numbered.

"We got into our systems the notion that every time we looked out the window there would be less religion than there was the last time we looked and ...that whatever form of religion survived, it would be quiet, passive, reconciled, dialogical, ecumenical and interfaithy," he said. "Instead, every time you look out the window there's more, not less, and the prospering forms are extremely intense."

This makes many people nervous and they ask: Is it good or bad for religion to play a prominent role in public life?

The answer, said Marty, is "yes."

Get used to it.

Rich Mullins -- Enigmatic, restless, Catholic

Father Matt McGinness had never heard the song playing on his car radio, even though "Sing Your Praise to the Lord" was one of superstar Amy Grant's biggest hits.

"Gosh, I really like that song," the priest told a musician friend that night back in 1995. "Well, thanks," responded Rich Mullins. This mystified the priest, who asked what he meant. "I wrote that," said Mullins.

McGinness hadn't realized that Mullins was that famous. The priest simply knew him as another seeker who kept asking questions about doctrine, history and art and was developing a unique spiritual bond with St. Francis of Assisi. At the time of his death in a Sept. 19 car crash Mullins was taking the final steps to enter Catholicism.

"Rich had made up his mind and he wasn't hiding anymore," said McGinness, chaplain of the Newman Center at Wichita State University. "But I really don't think it's fair to make him the poster child for Catholic converts. ...The key to Rich is that he was searching for a deep, lasting unity with God. He was such a reflective man and that quality brought him both peace and a great deal of anxiety."

Even friends described Mullins as "enigmatic" and "eccentric" and there was much more to him than hit songs, led by the youth-rally anthem "Awesome God." Grant summed up his legacy during last month's Dove Awards in Nashville, in which Mullins received his first "artist of the year" award.

"Rich Mullins was the uneasy conscience of Christian music," she said. "He didn't live like a star. He'd taken a vow of poverty so that what he earned could be used to help others."

McGinness said Mullins often said he felt called to a life of chastity and service, while staying active in music. It was hard to predict his future. His final recordings are slated for release on June 30 as "The Jesus Record."

"Rich didn't know for sure if he was called to ministry, which in the Catholic context would be the priesthood," said McGinness. "He also feared that converting to Catholicism could mean losing his audience. ... He knew there might be rough days ahead."

It's crucial to remember that Mullins grew up surrounded by fiercely independent brands of Protestantism such as the Quakers and the Churches of Christ, said his brother David Mullins, minister at the Oak Grove Christian Church in Beckley, W. Va. This taught him to fear formality and hierarchies, while also yearning for a faith that united people in all times and places - - with no labels.

"Rich had a very low view of church structures, but he had very high ideals about what the church could be," said his brother. "He was sincerely drawn to Catholicism, but he also wondered where he would fit in the Roman Catholic Church."

Nevertheless, Mullins' recent music was steeped in Catholicism, from his autobiographical album "A Liturgy, A Legacy & A Ragamuffin Band" to his "Canticle of the Plains" musical about a Kansas cowboy he called St. Frank. His greatest-hits set was filled with photos of Celtic churches, crucifixes, nuns and statues of Mary. He quoted G.K. Chesterton and Flannery O'Connor, defended the pope and told one interviewer: "I think that a lot of Protestants think that Pentecost happened and then the church disappeared until the Reformation. So there is this long span of time when there was no church. That can't be if Jesus was telling the truth."

After playing telephone tag for a week, McGinness and Mullins talked one last time the night before the fatal accident. Mullins was going to Mass weekly, if not more often. He was ready to say his first confession and be confirmed. They set a meeting in two days. Others said Mullins was aiming for Oct. 4, the feast of St. Francis.

"There was a sense of urgency," said the priest. "He told me, 'This may sound strange, but I HAVE to receive the body and blood of Christ.' I told him, 'That doesn't sound strange at all. That sounds wonderful.' ... Of course, I'll always remember that conversation. Rich finally sounded like he was at peace with his decision."

A great man from Africa

It was easy to hear Wilfred Kwadwo Sewodie's voice each night as he moved through the quiet Dallas Theological Seminary hallways, scrubbing baseboards, collecting trash and doing his janitorial duties.

Sometimes he would dissect New Testament passages in Greek or meditate out loud on big questions inspired by his studies. Faculty members working late learned that, when they heard his voice, they could expect a visitor seeking answers. But most of the time the African simply sang hymns with a voice that was joyful, powerful and, ultimately, inspiring. His favorite was "Love Divine, All Loves Excelling" and he especially loved the second verse.

"Breathe, O breathe Thy loving Spirit, into every troubled breast!", he would sing, often repeating phrases for emphasis. "Let us all in Thee inherit, Let us find the promised rest. Take away our bent to sinning; Alpha and Omega be. End of faith, as its beginning, set our hearts at liberty."

Sewodie, 33, had one year left in seminary. He had one more year to envision his Tutukpene village school, to plan evangelistic crusades, to struggle to pay for long-distance calls to his young disciples in Ghana. It was nearly time to go home.

That isn't going to happen, at least not in the way everyone expected. Two weeks ago, he was killed when a driver who was being pursued by police ran a stop sign and struck his car. The other driver was charged with intoxication manslaughter. Now Sewodie's friends and professors are asking old, old questions.

"Why? Why would God bring a gifted Christian leader from Ghana to Dallas, take him through three quarters of the way through his degree program only to have his life suddenly snatched away?", asked New Testament professor John Grassmick, in an emotional farewell service. "What is God's purpose in all of this? How will He be glorified in all of this?"

Speaker after speaker concluded that God would redeem this tragedy. Another African student, Sewodie's cousin Evans Odei, said his kinsman's vision would live on if others were inspired to take his place.

"Yes, I think this will this be a testimony," said Odei, gazing down at the casket. "I think the body that is going home will be a testimony. It will be the word of the Lord. He died while he was preparing to witness to his own people. ... They are waiting for a body over there. But they are also waiting for us, in the future. ... Will you go?"

Sewodie was the third of 11 children in a poor rural family. He was the first child to finish secondary school and then earned a bachelor's degree in English and linguistics. He wanted to go into politics, but a powerful conversion experience steered him into ministry. While in college he helped translate the New Testament into his tribe's language. Last summer, he married his college sweetheart -- by proxy, since neither could afford an intercontinental plane ticket. Sewodie was weeks away from having enough money to bring Cynthia Odemo, a nurse, to Dallas.

Now, his friends face questions that aren't answered in seminary texts. How can they raise the money necessary to handle the many steps it takes to get a body from Dallas to Ghana? What can anyone say to the 5,000 mourners expected to gather today (May 2) for Sewodie's funeral in his home village?

Fellow student James Samra said he would offer the same message there that he struggled, through waves of grief, to deliver in Dallas. Sewodie's intensity, dedication and, above all, humility taught many Americans that there is more to ministry than big budgets and an impressive resume.

"If I could tell him one thing, ...it is that I know his heart's desire was to be a great man of God," said Samra, who is helping create a Sewodie memorial fund at the seminary (www.dts.edu). "We confuse greatness with popularity, with fame and prestige. ... But that is not what God necessarily considers great. I feel privileged and unworthy to go back to his home country with his body and tell his people what a great man he was."

Spring cleaning at the religion desk

The advertisement featured a photo of Stonehenge, with dawn's rays summoning worshippers to embrace old mysteries.

Who was invited? "Reformed Druids, Born-again Celts, Pentecostal Pagans, Recovering Christians, Christians seeking comfort from the storms of church bureaucracies and politics, lapsed Christians, committed Christians whose commitment is beginning to wane, Spiritual Desperados, folks looking for solace, seekers, rebels, rakes, the luckless, the abandoned, the forsaken, the vague and the clueless. Dress comfortably...." It wasn't an off-the-rack church ad, admitted the Rev. Canon Christopher Platt of St. Augustine's Episcopal Chapel at the University of Kentucky. But it didn't jolt people as much as one noting that if they didn't feel like going to Mass, they could always send money.

"We try to be an equal-opportunity offender," he said.

It's time once again for spring cleaning at the religion desk, when I pick through my extraneous e-mail and snail mail. I don't make this stuff up.

* Ads are getting spiritually stranger. The creators of the new VW Beetle note: "If you sold your soul in the 80s, here's your chance to buy it back." This echoes recent ads claiming that Volvos "can save your soul." No offense intended, a Volvo spokesman told the Washington Times. "We're using the term soul in the metaphysical sense, in the secular sense, before the religious meaning, before the Christian meaning."

* Someone sent me a junk e-mail ad for holy water. Price: $25 for a 1.4-ounce jar, with delivery in four to six weeks. The big question: Where did these entrepreneurs get it?

* "The squeal of electric guitars calls the faithful to prayer," began a Los Angeles Times feature. "The ballplayer- turned-pastor hugs people streaming off shuttle buses. ... As a microphone-waving singer at the altar ... sways to a tune titled 'My Life in You, Lord,' collection plates fill with checks." It's Sunday at the Yorba Linda Friends Meeting House -- the Quakers.

* Bill Gates III's Catholic wife has offered him a deal. If he returns to church, he can take their daughter to the pew of his choice. Gates told Time he would prefer one with "less theology and all," such as the United Church of Christ. But, "in terms of the allocation of time resources, religion is not very efficient. There's a lot more I could be doing on a Sunday morning."

* Try to picture this odd couple. The scene is a protest rally near the White House, during Chinese President Jiang Zemin's visit. Religious Right strategist Gary Bauer of the Family Research Council taps actor Richard Gere on the shoulder. The veteran Tibet activist turns around and, according to Fred Barnes of the Weekly Standard, exclaims: "Gary! My main man!"

* Here's a candid quote from pundit Andrew Sullivan on why he opposes Catholic teachings on homosexuality: "I know I'm telling the truth about who I am. I know that the people around me are telling the truth. If we're telling the truth, then the church's position has to be wrong." Meanwhile, Episcopal Church spokesman Jim Solheim offered this explanation for why traditionalists are so upset: ``What really bothers them is relativism in sexuality, the ordination of gays and lesbians and the blessing of gay unions. They are convinced that biblical standards of morality must be enforced." Yes, that would explain a lot.

* Here is this year's best ecclesiastical light-bulb joke. "How many United Methodists does it take to change a light bulb? This statement was issued: 'We choose not to make a statement either in favor of or against the need for a light bulb. However, if in your own journey you have found that a light bulb works for you, that is fine. You are invited to write a poem or compose a modern dance about your personal relationship with your light bulb (or light source, or non-dark resource), and present it next month at our annual light-bulb Sunday service, in which we will explore a number of light bulb traditions, including incandescent, fluorescent, three-way, long-life, and tinted -- all of which are equally valid paths to luminescence.' "

* A British bookseller has struggled with clergy stealing his wares. Thus, he posted this prayer: "For him that stealeth a Book from this Library, let it change into a serpent into his hand and rend him. Let him be struck with Palsy, and all his Members blasted. Let him languish in Pain crying aloud for Mercy and let there be no surcease to his Agony till he sink in Dissolution. Let Bookworms gnaw his Entrails in token of the Worm that dieth not, and when at last he goeth to his final Punishment, let the flames of Hell consume him for ever and aye."

So there.

* Thus spake Homer Simpson: "The answer's to life's problems aren't found at the bottom of a bottle, they're found on TV."

Ten years of reporting on a fault line

Back in the 1980s, I began to experience deja vu while covering event after event on the religion beat in Charlotte, Denver and then at the national level.

I kept seeing a fascinating cast of characters at events centering on faith, politics and morality. A pro-life rally, for example, would feature a Baptist, a Catholic priest, an Orthodox rabbi and a cluster of conservative Methodists, Presbyterians, Episcopalians and Lutherans. Then, the pro-choice counter-rally would feature a "moderate" Baptist, a Catholic activist or two, a Reform rabbi and mainline Methodists, Presbyterians, Episcopalians and Lutherans.

Similar line-ups would appear at many rallies linked to gay rights, sex-education programs and controversies in media, the arts and even science. Along with other journalists, I kept reporting that today's social issues were creating bizarre coalitions that defied historic and doctrinal boundaries. After several years of writing about "strange bedfellows," it became obvious that what was once unique was now commonplace.

Then, in 1986, a sociologist of religion had an epiphany while serving as a witness in a church-state case in Mobile, Ala. The question was whether "secular humanism" had evolved into a state-mandated religion, leading to discrimination against traditional "Judeo-Christian" believers. Once more, two seemingly bizarre coalitions faced off in the public square.

"I realized something there in that courtroom. We were witnessing a fundamental realignment in American religious pluralism," said James Davison Hunter of the University of Virginia. "Divisions that were deeply rooted in our civilization were disappearing, divisions that had for generations caused religious animosity, prejudice and even warfare. It was mind- blowing. The ground was moving."

The old dividing lines centered on issues such as the person of Jesus Christ, church tradition and the Protestant Reformation. But these new interfaith coalitions were fighting about something even more basic -- the nature of truth and moral authority.

Two years later, Hunter began writing "Culture Wars: The Struggle to Define America," in which he declared that America now contains two basic world views, which he called "orthodox" and "progressive." The orthodox believe it's possible to follow transcendent, revealed truths. Progressives disagree and put their trust in personal experience, even if that requires them to "resymbolize historic faiths according to the prevailing assumptions of contemporary life."

That's what I was seeing at all of those rallies and marches. And that's why, whenever I covered separate meetings of Catholics, Jews, Baptists, Episcopalians or whatever, I almost always found two distinct camps of people fighting about the same subjects.

About the same time Hunter began "Culture Wars," I began writing this column for the Scripps Howard News Service. The column turns 10 years old this week and, almost every week, I have seen evidence that Hunter has found a fault line that runs through virtually every set of pews in contemporary religious life.

Ask any big question and this issue looms in the background. Is the Bible an infallible source of truth? Is papal authority unique? Do women and men have God-given roles in the home and the church? Can centuries of Jewish traditions survive in the modern world? Can marriage be redefined? Is abortion wrong? Can traditionalists proclaim that sex outside of marriage is sin? Are heaven and hell real? Do all religious roads lead to the same end? Is there one God, or many? What is his or her name or names?

Many in the orthodox camp disagree on some of the answers, but they are united in their belief that public life must include room for those who insist eternal answers exist. Meanwhile, progressives are finding it harder to tolerate the views of people they consider offensive and intolerant. This is not a clash between religious people and secular people, stressed Hunter. This is a battle between two fundamentally different approaches to faith.

"We may soon reach the point when religious conservatives will long for the time when real, live, secular humanists ran the show," he said. "At least those people believed in something specific. At least they believed in reason and universal principles."

Today, secularism just doesn't sell in the marketplace. This approach to life has been tried and found wanting. People hunger for spirituality, miracles and a sense of mystery. But the core question remains: Should believers defend eternal truths or follow their hearts?

"The momentum is toward experience and emotions and feelings," said Hunter. "People are saying, 'I feel, therefore I am.' This is how more and more people are deciding what is real and right and true."

Communion: Drawing doctrinal lines?

As President Bill Clinton recently discovered, there is no more complex and emotional issue in Christendom than Communion.

This issue is even more divisive than church issues linked to sexuality, which always grab headlines. The reality is that today's doctrinal earthquakes about sex are only important to the degree that they crack the rock on which altars stand. Churches argue about sex. Churches split over issues linked to Communion.

Cardinal John O'Connor of New York urged his listeners to see the big picture, as he explained why President Bill Clinton, a Southern Baptist, and Hillary Rodham Clinton, a United Methodist, should not have received Holy Communion in a Catholic parish in South Africa.

"The Eucharist is the sum and summary of our faith," said O'Connor, speaking on Palm Sunday at St. Patrick's Cathedral. "Holy Communion means not only our union with Christ in the Eucharist, but our union with other Catholics holding the same beliefs. ... To receive Holy Communion in the Catholic Church means that one believes one is receiving, not only a symbol of Christ, but Christ Jesus Himself."

When it comes to Catholic teachings about sacraments, he said, there is a controlling legal authority that gets to make and interpret the laws. Except under extreme circumstances, Communion is reserved for those who faithfully follow the teachings of the Roman Catholic Church. This high standard, noted O'Connor, should be a hurdle for millions of unrepentant and unorthodox Catholics, as well as non-Catholics.

This issue lurks behind many bitter squabbles. Many ask the obvious question: Are all of these Catholics really in Communion with one another and with Rome?

Catholics are not alone. Many United Methodists wonder if they should be in Communion with bishops and pastors who reject church teachings that sex outside of marriage is a sin. In the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), some liberal administrators and educators wonder if they should stay on board after the defeat of a law offering more flexibility for gays and lesbians. Many Episcopalians wonder if they should remain in Communion with bishops who embrace or refuse to condemn rites that honor gods other than the God of the Bible or who reject or redefine core doctrines such as the resurrection. The list goes on and on. These days, even Southern Baptists face occasional fights over sexuality.

Can anyone draw doctrinal boundaries in an age that welcomes spirituality, but not doctrine? President Clinton became a symbol of these disputes as he knelt to receive Communion in a church whose teachings he often actively opposes.

Meanwhile, it remains unclear exactly what happened on March 29 at Soweto's Regina Mundi Church. White House officials insist that they asked in advance whether the Clintons could receive Communion and were assured that they could, because of a "more ecumenical" policy adopted by the South African Conference of Bishops. The president's staff said the priest, Father Mohlomi Makobane, gave his blessing beforehand.

But the priest -- whose sermon in this Mass focused on the sin of adultery -- remembers the encounter differently. The result is a confusing "they said, he said" conflict. Father Makobane said he was told that the president probably would not receive Communion. The priest told reporters he was surprised when the Clintons came forward to receive the sacrament.

"Here you have the most powerful man in the world, and I can't embarrass Mr. Clinton by saying, "No, you go and sit down,' " he said.

The Vatican appears to be seeking clarity about what South African bishops have or have not said. But O'Connor and others have stressed that this is irrelevant, because regional bishops cannot override centuries of church tradition and explicit Vatican directives.

Meanwhile, embattled White House spokesman Mike McCurry this week faced a barrage of challenging questions about sin, grace, confession, Catholic law and, yes, Communion.

McCurry said the Clintons received Communion in the spirit of the prayer by Jesus recorded in John 17:21. This New Testament passage reads: "That all may be one, even as thou, Father, in me and I in thee, that they also may be one in us, that the world may believe that thou hast sent me."