Welcome — but don’t affirm
Many people must look on in amazement at the heated debate in the church on homosexuality — particularly in a society like ours, which feels it has moved on.
Last week’s article by Bishop David Russell (“It is time to repent”) was in an appropriate vein — one of humility and prayer. I agree our church doors need to be swung open widely to the homosexual community, and that we need to deal with our bigotry and repent of our past attitudes toward homosexuals. As Christians, we need to stand side by side with them in their quest for equal rights before the law.
However, I do believe we should be welcoming, but not affirming. Let us consider Russell’s argument about slavery.
Christians believe God ordained marriage as a one-flesh relationship between male and female, demonstrated from Genesis through to Revelation. We see the opposite with slavery, which was never an institution ordained by God. When God was breaking down cultural barriers with the power of the Gospel, it was stated that there is “neither slave nor free, Jew nor Gentile, male nor female”. God was showing a better way of overcoming cultural and race issues, slavery and sexism.
However, he did not say “gay nor straight”. Although slavery was practised in both Old and New Testaments, it was highly regulated. The difference between Israel and the surrounding cultures was enormous, as slaves had rights far superior within faith communities than in the surrounding Near East and later Hellenistic cultures, which Russell demonstrated through Paul’s dealing with Onesimus. Throughout the Bible, there is a far more generous attitude toward slaves in faith communities than outside them.
It is the opposite with homosexuality. An accepted cultural practice in ancient Near Eastern culture and the Hellenistic world, it was not seen as God’s ideal within the Church.
The trajectory from scripture with regard to slavery is in the case of homosexuality. Later Christians did not respond to cultural pressures on slavery and change their minds — Christians like William Wilberforce and David Livingstone led the way for the eventual abolition of slavery.
I believe homosexuals deserve equal rights before the law and I would march with them. I also believe they need to be welcomed into our churches and not continually seen as second-class people. However, I believe Christians cannot affirm their behaviour, as our sacred texts do not allow for it.
Civil unions? Absolutely! Marriages (as an institution set up by God and made and sealed before him), no. Gay pastors or priests if they are not practising? Absolutely! If they are practising? No.
I hope this debate will continue in a spirit of humility and mutual learning. — Brian Macallan
One cannot help but feel happy for Russell and rather sad for his [g]od. Sad, because [g]od had so many opportunities in the homosexually rife first century to show his proto-homophilia and tolerance, but instead he blew it by consistently demanding repentance. Happy for the bishop, because now at last he has appeared as an eloquent understudy to tell us [g]od has finally repented, and so should we.
Perhaps we should rather wait to hear from God himself?
Bishop Russell, does your lack of discrimination make you more loving than a God who, because of his Son, refuses men and women self-justification for their evil deeds, and for which they are to inherit an eternity away from his presence? — JB Krohn, Muizenberg
Case for DDT overstated
In his haste to overstate the case for DDT in malaria control (“DDT is the answer”, November 11) Richard Tren misrepresents facts.
It is incorrect that there is no evidence for DDT’s toxicity to humans or the environment. Most natural scientists agree there is much evidence that DDT is harmful to animal life. The evidence for adverse effects on humans is less clear-cut, but studies have demonstrated neurotoxic, developmental and other effects.
In addition, malaria-carrying mosquitoes do not only develop resistance to “the insecticides that replaced DDT” but to any insecticide used over prolonged periods, including DDT.
The claim that “well-paid consultants” who promote policies that keep themselves employed are responsible for the failure to use DDT diatribe also applies to Tren’s organisation. This is funded by corporate foundations and a policy institute that is an outspoken promoter of free-market policies hostile to environmental NGOs.
The point is not that DDT is safe, which it isn’t, but rather that in balancing scientific evidence, the benefits of having DDT as an option for malaria control may be justified by reductions in malaria morbidity and mortality.
However, there are programmes that have achieved sustained reductions in malaria transmission using non-chemical methods. Future developments may result in new methods that obviate the need to have DDT as an option. — Professor Leslie London, School of Public Health and Family Medicine, University of Cape
Tren and Philip Coticelli’s attempt to marginalise activists is a regular industry ploy to justify harmful practices, and should raise alarm bells. And to claim governments banned an industry money-spinner like DDT based on no real scientific evidence is hard to swallow.
In 2001 a landmark study by the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences and three other organisations found a strong relationship between prematurely delivered and low birth-weight babies and mothers’ blood levels of DDE, DDT’s metabolic breakdown product.
The researchers conclude that ties between premature birth rates, a major factor in infant mortality, and blood levels of DDE should lead to the reassessment of the costs and benefits of DDT-based malaria control strategies.
New research also indicates that indoor house spraying puts DDT into the environment and contributes to its build-up in the bodies of residents.
According to the World Wildlife Fund, the resurgence of malaria in Africa stems from insecticide resistance; wars, natural disasters and human migrations; climate changes; and heightened risk associated with the exploitation of remote areas for mining, forestry or agriculture.
Control programmes have also languished because of international donors’ diminished interest in malaria and cuts in national operating budgets as a result of international lenders’ requirements.
There exist methods of control that eliminate DDT and reduce insecticide dependence such as Integrated Vector Management, which reduces use of and reliance on chemical pesticides. — Andrew Taynton, Linkhills
Right back then, wrong now
In a normal society, a man who needs a secretary to deliver R700 to Durban Airport so he can buy a newspaper and a cup of coffee would be considered unfit to manage the local McDonald’s. But in South Africa he is viewed by a significant number of people as the best person for the highest office in the land.
The African National Congress rank and file should see that different leaders are required for different circumstances. The right person during the anti-apartheid struggle, is not automatically the right person to lead the country. Moses was the correct leader during the Israelites’ long wanderings in the wilderness, but the wrong leader for the Promised Land. — Michael Brett, Hartebeeshoek
Your editorial of last week and Inga Chagi’s letter conclude that the solution to the conflict between Thabo Mbeki and Jacob Zuma is for both men to disappear from the leadership radar. This would set the precedent that when our leaders conflict, we should dispense with them and look for new others.
Mbeki and Zuma are significant members of the ruling party. Their contribution to the country has been enormous. If they want to continue playing a significant role, they must be allowed to do so — provided such aspiration is democratically and constitutionally backed. — Professor Tuntufye S Mwamwenda, University of KwaZulu-Natal
Zuma has really never been a darling of the hacks at your newspaper, which has done a demolition job on him. The rape claim became yet another a handy cannon in your arsenal of weapons of Zuma-destruction.
We all know the M&G‘s glorious and principled stance against apartheid. The same cannot be said of your current sensationalist and alarmist coverage. Is it a desperate effort to increase sales? — Molebatsi Masedi
Kasrils right to speak out
Claims by a so-called former intelligence officer that the Minister of Intelligence, Ronnie Kasrils (MP), has broken the law by discussing sensitive operational matters in public are not true.
The minister is fully conversant with the laws governing the Intelligence Services.
For the record, it was the media and not the minister who first reported on the National Intelligence Agency’s (NIA) surveillance of Saki Macozoma. The story was out in the public domain and Macozoma, when contacted by the media, confirmed that he had been a target of NIA surveillance.
When approached for comment, the minister confirmed that the report by the Inspector General of Intelligence found that the said NIA surveillance was unlawful and illegitimate. That confirmation is not information of an operational nature as claimed by the letter writer.
The minister’s acknowledgement of the inquiry and its findings demonstrated a commitment, shared by this government, to act decisively against any irregularities or abuse of state power.
To suggest that defamatory e-mails, which at face value were manufactured to sow division and confusion, should have been ignored is irresponsible and would amount to a failure of duty on the part of the minister.
For the writer to suggest that the minister keeps quiet in the face of widespread media reports on allegations against an institution over which he is responsible, is to suggest that he should act against the constitutional principles and the public interest.
Our history is littered with examples of how former apartheid security operatives engaged in crimes against humanity; comfortable in the knowledge that their actions, however immoral and unjustifiable, would be protected under the veil of secrecy.
The writer’s discomfort with the level of public accountability displayed by the minister is probably because of a lack of appreciation of the need for transformation of our intelligence services in our young democracy.
The minister will continue to act in the best interest of all South Africans and will ensure that our intelligence services do likewise. — Lorna Daniels, spokesperson for the minister for intelligence services
We need more goodwill stories
My heart was warmed by last week’s article by Chris McGreal about the Palestinian boy shot by Israeli soldiers whose organs were donated to sick Israelis (“Ahmed’s gift of life”). One can almost see a rainbow of hope for humankind.
Last year, I accompanied Carte Blanche to Israel/Gaza to film the story of an extraordinary man named Dr al Jameer.
This Palestinian doctor lives in Hebron and works at Hadassah Hospital in Jerusalem, which means he has to go through the humiliation of roadblocks and delays to and from work. However, Hadassah is training him to be a plastic surgeon so that he can go back to the hospitals in Hebron and Bethlehem and help his people.
What I learned at Hadassah and from al Jameer is that there is extraordinary goodwill at grassroots level between most Palestinians and Israelis, and that a lot of cooperation is happening. What is terribly sad is that the media picks up on the bad and ugly.
It has been heartbreaking for me as a Jewish woman to see the Mail & Guardian feature story after story on the ugly aspects, and rarely pay attention to the good that is being done on both sides.
I hope more goodwill stories will come from your newspaper. The one-sidedness of the Israel/ Palestine coverage polarises Jewish and Muslim South Africans and results in a flood of hate mail, which further incenses people. — Gill Katz
Disgusted
Anti-culling groups should visit the Kruger National Park if they wish to experience it as it once was.
Visiting the park with overseas clients, we were disgusted by the downfall of the area close to Pafuri, with its unique fever tree forest. It looks as if major combat has taken place, with many of the oldest trees demolished by unruly elephants.
It our duty to manage fenced-in animals for the benefit of all the Earth’s inhabitants.
At last Kruger park’s management and the Department of Environmental Affairs and Tourism have had the guts to go ahead with long-needed action. — Mari Roelvert, specialist tourguide, Kruger National Park