Watching the World
CLERGY AFFAIRS WITH PARISHIONERS
A four-year study among clergy in the United States found that 1 out of every 10 parish ministers admits “having had an affair with a member of his or her congregation,” reports Ecumenical Press Service (the news service of the World Council of Churches). According to Professor Karen Lebacqz, a researcher in the study, the clergy explained that “the intimacy of counselling situations led to the sexual relationships.” She advises, therefore, that clergy counsel during the day, in an office. That way, Professor Lebacqz says, ‘some temptations for sexual involvement could be lessened.’ Furthermore, she adds that ‘counselling sessions involving more than one member of the family could also help.’
AIDS SPREADING EASTWARD
With the opening of borders between Eastern and Western Europe, conditions are ripe for a rapid spread of AIDS into Eastern Europe, warns the director of the World Health Organization’s program on AIDS. “You cannot expect the disease to respect national borders, and the movements of people back and forth are going to blur the boundaries,” he notes. He estimates that 500,000 Western Europeans today carry the virus that causes AIDS, and that between 10,000 and 30,000 Eastern Europeans may already be infected with the deadly virus. This includes hundreds of Romanian children infected through unsanitary syringes and transfusions of contaminated blood. According to the International Herald Tribune of Paris, doctors now say that over 95 percent of those receiving AIDS-contaminated blood transfusions will become infected with the AIDS virus.
SMART BABIES
Scientists are becoming more adept at determining the abilities of the newly born, “leading to the recognition of the new-born baby as a ‘competent infant,’” reports The Times, a London newspaper. “Contrary to belief, babies are born with a high degree of intelligence.” Newborns quickly begin to make sense of what they see. One of the researchers, Dr. Alan Slater, of Exeter University, says: “Babies can learn about the world from the moment they are born. The new infant recognizes its mother and others by sight, sound and smell. The evidence also points to a lot of learning in the womb.” The Times notes that a number of international investigations are demonstrating that babies “are not just a bundle of reflexes waiting to be fed” and that at a very early age, infants can carry out a task by planning rather than by trial and error.
GANGES POLLUTION
For Hindus, the 1,500-mile-long [2,400 km] Ganges is the most sacred river in India. Every year thousands of bodies are cremated along the banks on pyres built of wood, and the ashes ritually cast into the river. But because of a shortage of wood and money, tens of thousands of semicremated bodies are now being thrown into the waters. These bodies, along with countless animal carcasses, are causing a serious health risk. As a reporter in Delhi for The Times of London writes: “Bloated bodies, with vultures sitting on them, float by as Hindu pilgrims splash and romp in the foul and holy water.” In an effort to meet the crisis, the Uttar Pradesh government is protecting and breeding the carnivorous turtles native to the river. “The young [turtles] start by eating small carrion and fish. Gradually they will move up to bodies,” claims the chief wildlife warden. But, he says, they will not threaten swimmers.
UNIVERSITY GANGS
Gangs of youths armed with guns, knives, axes, and even acid to hurl at their victims—this may sound like a nightmare from an inner-city slum, but it is not. According to the Nigerian magazine Newswatch, many members of these gangs are college students from upper-class families and are holding “the university system in Nigeria under siege.” The magazine notes that these gangs are associated with college fraternities and that some engage in bizarre and cultlike rituals. University officials charge that many student gang members think they are above the law because of their social standing.
VANISHING WETLANDS
Canada has nearly a quarter of the world’s marshes, swamps, and bogs. Yet, “despite a growing awareness that Canada’s wetlands are an important part of the environment,” they are disappearing rapidly, according to a report in The Globe and Mail of Toronto. Agricultural policies and economics have encouraged farmers to fill in wetlands in order to increase productivity. However, the wetlands are more than a home for wildlife. They function as filters for water pollution and as buffers against soil erosion, and they may even have a positive effect on the weather. Wetlands are said to contribute to greater rainfall.
THE COCAINE PLAGUE
Those who thought that the number of weekly cocaine users in the United States was already alarmingly high at an officially estimated 860,000 were surprised in May 1990. A U.S. Senate report asserted that the actual figure is closer to 2.2 million. That would mean that nearly 1 out of every 100 Americans ranks as a ‘hard-core cocaine addict,’ a label the report’s researchers apply to those who use cocaine at least once every week. New York State, according to the report, tops the list with 1 out of every 40 people a frequent cocaine user. These figures include those who use the potent cocaine derivative called crack.
SMITTEN WITH PLASTIC
“Canadians are smitten with plastic,” noted The Toronto Star, a Canadian newspaper. The Star referred to the steady rise of credit card transactions in Canada as a “love affair with credit.” “About half of all Canadians don’t clear their credit card debt in time to avoid the high charges,” which range from 20 to 29 percent. Such interest charges cost Canadians about a thousand million dollars a year. “Trouble sets in when people are unrealistic about what they can afford. . . . Some people fall into red ink because they buy compulsively to make themselves feel good,” said the Star. The director of a credit counseling service in Toronto usually recommends that such compulsive buyers “seek help from a psychologist.”
TRANSSEXUALS IN GERMANY
“There are between 30,000 and 50,000 transsexuals in the Federal Republic of Germany, but the true figure is not known and could be much higher,” reported the German newspaper Bremer Nachrichten recently. Transsexuals, those who identify with and wish to become members of the opposite sex, frequently opt for surgery to bring them closer to their goal. The waiting period for such surgery at one German hospital is over a year. Bremer Nachrichten also notes that a “substantial” number of these transsexuals are women who wish to become men. While women face more obvious (and insurmountable) obstacles in surgery, the men also face problems. Their beards often continue to grow in spite of surgery and hormone treatments, calling for years of painful hair removal procedures.
ROAMERS’ RIGHTS
The ancient footpaths that lure people to roam over the rolling fields, stone walls, and moors of the English countryside are the focus of an escalating battle between walkers and landowners. Viewed as a common privilege for centuries, traversing private lands on footpaths became an embattled right in England back in the 1930’s when farmers obstructed the pathways crossing their land. Ramblers grouped and protested en masse, and formal laws were passed to protect their right to roam. But the battle continues. Today, the government estimates that two thirds of England’s 108,000 miles [174,000 km] of footpath are obstructed by such obstacles as barbed wire and crops. The Ramblers’ Association employs ‘footpath secretaries’ to expose such infractions. Farmers, for their part, complain that ramblers invade their privacy, upset livestock, and damage crops.