Religious Broadcasters Hold Convention

The National Religious Broadcasters, opening a four-day convention today at the Anaheim Convention Center, expects the association’s largest registration ever for its 54th annual meeting.

About 5,000 broadcasters and related professionals, many from the Christian evangelical fold, are expected to register, said Michael Glenn, vice president of the association.

The group will have 100,000 square feet of floor space for its 210 booths at the convention center, the largest amount of exhibit space ever used by the Manassas, Va.-based organization.

“Major equipment manufacturers have a renewed interest in the NRB convention,” Glenn said. “Religious broadcasters continue to stay abreast of ever-increasing technological advances.”

Evangelical luminaries such as evangelist Franklin Graham, best-selling author Max Lucado, bandleader Ralph Carmichael and the singing group Point of Grace are on the convention program, which officially begins tonight with a session featuring Wellington Boone of Atlanta, a frequent speaker at Promise Keepers rallies.

The only event open to the public is the music-filled worship session at 9:30 a.m. Sunday with a sermon by the Rev. John MacArthur Jr., pastor of Grace Community Church in Sun Valley. MacArthur is also heard on his radio program, “Grace to You.”

During the convention, the association will induct into its hall of fame the late Paul E. Freed, founder of Trans World Radio, of Cary, N.C., and veteran radio producer Al Sanders of Ambassador Advertising Agency, Fullerton. Years ago, Sanders convinced psychologist-author James Dobson of Focus on the Family to launch a daily radio program, a vehicle that later made Dobson an influential social critic within conservative Christian circles.

Among groups receiving awards this year is the Jesus Film Project, a San Clemente-based arm of Campus Crusade for Christ. The President’s Award will be given to the project that manages the evangelistic use of the film “Jesus,” which has been dubbed in more than 400 languages.

CONFERENCES

The influence of religious convictions on U.S. civic and political life will be discussed next week at Pasadena’s Fuller Theological Seminary in a conference co-sponsored by the American Jewish Committee. Fuller President Richard J. Mouw will speak at the opening dinner at 6 p.m. Monday.

Panels on Tuesday will deal with the separation of church and state, Christian and Jewish views of religious pluralism and social justice, and the role of media in treating the mix of religion and politics. Other speakers include Ronald Thiemann, dean of Harvard Divinity School; Rabbi James Rudin, director of inter-religious affairs for the American Jewish Committee, and political scientist Stephen Monsma of Pepperdine University. $40 for all sessions. Registration: (818) 584-5203.

* The New York-based National Center for Jewish Healing will hold its first Western regional conference Monday and Tuesday at the Sheraton Gateway Hotel near Los Angeles International Airport. An introductory overview will be presented Monday at 8:30 a.m. and will include workshops on spiritual counseling and meditation by Rabbi Jonathan Omer-Man of Los Angeles, who is executive director of the Jewish Healing Center at Metivta, a co-sponsor of the conference. $150 for both days. (310) 477-5370.

* Relationships between theology and ecology will be analyzed in a lecture series at California Lutheran University in Thousand Oaks on Wednesday and Thursday. Larry L. Rasmussen, who teaches social ethics at Union Theological Seminary in New York, will give talks on the Reformation-era ecological views of Martin Luther. Rosemary Radford Ruether of Garrett-Evangelical Seminary and Northwestern University will give two lectures on “ecofeminism.” The two will engage in a dialogue Wednesday evening. Costs vary. (805) 493-3228.

DATES

The differences and similarities of Judaism, Islam, Catholicism and Protestantism will be examined at a daylong study seminar Feb. 2 at the University of Judaism campus in the Sepulveda Pass. The speakers will be Rabbi Elliot Dorff, philosophy professor and rector at the host university; physician Maher Hathout, spokesman for the Islamic Center of Southern California; Father Gregory Coiro, media relations director of the Los Angeles Catholic Archdiocese, and the Rev. Kapp L. Johnson, senior pastor of St. Stephen’s Lutheran Church in Granada Hills. $60. (310) 476-9777, Ext. 246.

* A seven-week UCLA Extension class on “Buddhism in the Modern World,” which starts Thursday night, will be led by B. Alan Wallace, author of “Choosing Reality: A Buddhist View of Physics and the Mind” and “Tibetan Buddhism from the Ground Up.” Guest speakers will include the Venerable Havanpola Ratanasara, who heads the Buddhist Sangha Council of Los Angeles; the Rev. Tetsuo Unno of the Japanese Shin tradition, and the Venerable Geshe Tsultim Gyeltsen, a Tibetan teacher. $135 (credit); $95 (noncredit). (310) 825-2301.

FINALLY

Most of Mahatma Gandhi’s ashes were spread in the sacred rivers of India after the widely admired icon of nonviolent resistance was assassinated in 1948. Now, news reports say that some of Gandhi’s ashes that had been in an Indian bank vault since 1949 have been returned to his great grandson, Tushar Arun Gandhi. He said he would scatter the ashes over the Ganges River.

Only one other portion of Gandhi’s remains are outside of India and they are not far away.

A portion of his ashes are enshrined in a 1,000-year-old Chinese sarcophagus in the Mahatma Gandhi World Peace Memorial, dedicated in 1950 at the Self-Realization Fellowship Lake Shrine. The Sunset Boulevard facility is visited by tens of thousands of people annually.

The ashes were given to the Fellowship’s late founder, Paramahansa Yogananda, by publisher V.M. Nawle of Poona, India, who “knew of the deep spiritual bond between the two great men,” said a Fellowship spokeswoman.

Notices may be mailed to Southern California File, c/o John Dart, L.A. Times, 20000 Prairie St., Chatsworth, CA 91311, or faxed to Religion desk (818) 772-3385. Items should arrive about three weeks before the event, except for spot news, and should include pertinent details about the people and organizations with address, phone number, date and time.

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PEOPLE

Cardinal Roger M. Mahony on Friday night will honor the achievements of a retired bishop, a veteran public relations man, a longtime volunteer, a much-honored conductor and three sisters who are Sisters.

The 1997 Cardinal’s Award, to be bestowed at a Beverly Hilton Hotel banquet, will go to Bishop John Ward, an auxiliary bishop in Los Angeles for a third of the 20th century; William Rivera, longtime spokesman for the Los Angeles Unified School District and for the Los Angeles Roman Catholic Archdiocese; volunteer exemplar Helen Guho (food for the poor, school libraries, Meals on Wheels, etc.); Los Angeles Master Chorale Music Director Paul Salamunovich, who still directs the choir at St. Charles Borromeo parish in North Hollywood, and three Doherty sisters.

Sisters Mary Enda, 95; Mary Michael, 94, and Eileen, 87, are three of five sisters in their family who entered religious life while their one brother became a priest. The nuns belong to the Immaculate Heart order.

* The Rev. John Buchanan, a Chicago pastor who is the current moderator of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) General Assembly, will give the keynote address at a regional stewardship and mission rally next Saturday at Bel Air Presbyterian Church, 16221 Mulholland Drive. The rally, which will start at 7:30 a.m., is the largest annual event of the Presbyterians’ Synod of Southern California, usually drawing 1,000 clergy and lay people.

Buchanan, elected to the one-year moderator’s post last June, will also give the sermon Feb. 3 at a 3 p.m. service at Knox Presbyterian Church, 5840 La Tijera Blvd., in the Ladera section of Los Angeles. The service marks the 100th anniversary of that congregation, whose pastor is the Rev. Mark Buchanan, a cousin of John Buchanan.