Word: schisms
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...prevailed by votes of roughly 2 to 1. That kind of majority is satisfying in electoral politics, but alarming in groups that regard themselves as constituting the body of Christ. Mainline Evangelicals and some gay-rights advocates have threatened to abandon their denominations, and the specter of full-blown schism looms in the future. Even in the bosom of the relatively unruffled Episcopal Church, whose representatives will meet in Denver on July 14, the issue can wreak havoc. When a Seattle-area rector told his 300-person Episcopal congregation some time ago that he was a celibate...
...WHITE: THE LURE OF SCHISM...
Call it the great mouse schism. Last week 16,000 delegates of America's largest Protestant denomination, the Southern Baptist Convention, kept very busy in Orlando, Fla. They elected the 16 million-member Convention's first baby-boomer president, James Merritt, 47. They announced a couple of headline-grabbing conservative policies: support for the death penalty and an explicit ban on women pastors. But for all its productivity, the meeting was awfully quiet. This was because most of the usually rancorous, relatively liberal opposition sat it out. The rebels, who call themselves the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship, will also meet...
...moderate state conventions (including those in Texas and Virginia) will continue to squirm, Van Biema predicts, as the national convention slides irrevocably toward a more right-wing philosophy. And while moderate Southern Baptists are unlikely to execute a complete break from the national leadership, there are signs of internal schism, culminating in quietly defiant practices among moderates. "Many Southern Baptists view their affiliation with the church as primarily cultural, rather than religious," says Van Biema. This deep connection with the church, he explains, makes it much less likely that there will be a massive, formalized exodus. Only time will tell...
...Chen, who only garnered 39 percent of the vote, probably needs to take a wait-and-see approach as well. Chen's victory, which displaced the only ruling party Taiwan has ever known, was a product of timing - he was able to capitalize on a schism that emerged in the Nationalist party in the months before the election. What's more, concerns about a Chinese attack were softened by the fact that Beijing hopes to win both permanent Most Favored Nation status with the U.S. and membership into the WTO in the coming weeks, and is leery of any acts...