TAKING A STAND ON PUBLIC POLICY ISSUES

Drug Laws, Environmental Problems Among Denominations' Concerns

Religious organizations and watchdog groups recently have passed
resolutions, written letters or issued statements on a variety of public
policy issues. Here are some notable actions:

* The war on drugs: The Unitarian Universalist Association, at its General
Assembly last weekend in Quebec City, passed a "statement of conscience"
calling for the legalization of marijuana and the end to criminal penalties
for most drug offenses.

The denomination, representing more than 1,000 congregations and 200,000
members in the United States, declared: "We do not believe that drug use
should be considered criminal behavior."

The Boston-based denomination said that "the consequences of the current
drug war are cruel and counterproductive" and called for "alternatives that
regard the reduction of harm as the appropriate standard by which to assess
drug policies."

Specific proposals include selling, taxing and regulating marijuana in the
same manner as alcohol; dropping criminal penalties for drug possession and
use except for abusers who commit such crimes as assault, burglary or
"impaired driving"; and making all drugs available by prescription.

* Coal-burning power plants: The Presbyterian Church (USA), at its annual
General Assembly in Columbus, Ohio, last weekend, endorsed a call to clean
up coal-burning power plants that were grandfathered by the Clean Air Act
of 1990.

Believing that utility companies would retire their oldest and
least-efficient units, Congress did not require the companies to install
pollution controls at those facilities unless they were to be modernized,
according to the Southern Environmental Law Center in Charlottesville.

Today, many of those plants are still in use and can pollute air up to 10
times as much as newer coal-fired power plants, the center said.

Lynn Cameron, co-author of the Presbyterian resolution and mission leader
for the Trinity Restoring Creation House Church in Harrisonburg, Va., said
the denomination "believes more can and should be done to protect the air
we all breathe."

* Environmental ethics: Leaders of Roman Catholic and Greek Orthodox
churches in the United States issued a joint statement supporting a
declaration on environmental ethics that was signed June 10 by Pope John
Paul II and Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I of Constantinople.

John Paul is head of more than 1 billion Catholics worldwide; Bartholomew
is the spiritual leader of the world's 250 million Orthodox Christians.

"It is on the basis of our recognition that the world is created by God
that we can discern an objective moral order within which to articulate a
code of environmental ethics," John Paul and Bartholomew said. Society has
been "making decisions, taking actions and assigning values that are
leading us away from the world as it should be . . . away from all that is
essential for a healthy planet and a healthy commonwealth of people. A new
approach and a new culture are needed."

Bishop Wilton D. Gregory, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic
Bishops, and Archbishop Demetrios, head of the Greek Orthodox Church in
America, urged Catholic and Orthodox believers to collaborate "with others
of good will" in fulfilling the patriarchs' call "to heal and care for
God's creation."

* Cross at Ground Zero: The organization American Atheists has taken aim at
plans to leave a "miracle debris" cross at the World Trade Center site,
saying that a permanent Christian memorial would violate the separation of
church and state and be insensitive to those victims who had no religious
beliefs.

The Lower Manhattan Development Corp., which has received more than $2
billion from the government to rebuild at the site, has been asked to
include a cross made of debris found by a construction worker in the
redevelopment plans for the area, the New York Daily News reported.

Ed Malloy, a board member of the development group, asked the agency to
incorporate the steel cross into the design of a planned Sept. 11 memorial.
He also requested that the cross not be moved.

"We hope it's going to stay right where it is," Malloy said of the steel
girders, which were found in the rubble of Building 6 in the shape of a cross.

Ron Barrier, national spokesman for American Atheists, said that Muslims,
Hindus and other non-Christian believers also died in the attacks.

"What about them? Are we going to turn the site of the WTC into a religious
shrine with competing religious slogans, symbols and displays?"

A spokesman for the Port Authority, which owns the site, said there are no
immediate plans to move the cross.