THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Wednesday, October 18, 1995 TAG: 9510180001
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A14 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Editorial
LENGTH: Short : 47 lines
For some ardently faithful and evangelical Christians, there is no time and place inappropriate to proselytizing. But in Virginia Beach, whose residents are primarily Christian but more and more diverse, the annual Neptune Festival Prayer Breakfast is less and less a forum for any one religion, much less one branch of one religion.
At the same time, being more sensitive to members of a minority faith should not require being insensitive to members of a majority faith.
As has happened many times in the long history of the Neptune Festival, the speaker this September, Pat Williams, was provided by Pat Robertson's Christian Broadcasting Network. CBN is a major force in the community, spiritually and otherwise. Mr. Williams, general manager of Orlando Magic and an ardent spokesman for the Christian faith, drew a standing ovation from many in the crowd.
But the ``revivalist'' tone of his presentation also caused consternation among Rabbi Israel Zoberman and other Jewish leaders present. ``We need clear and specific assurances that what happened will not happen again,'' Mr. Zoberman told this newspaper. ``If it happened again, it would create a schism of major proportions.''
Let's hope no schism develops. Neptune Festival officials have apologized for offending Jewish participants, and Rabbi Zoberman has been included on the breakfast planning committee. That's good.
But the focus of the committee should be inclusion, not exclusion. Like many other cities, for example, Virginia Beach has a growing Moslem community. Better that the committee invite speakers from the many representative religious groups within the community to share their inspirational words than that any committee member have either a veto over other speakers or the authority to insist that they water down their message or fudge the source of their inspiration. That, too, is offensive, and insensitive.
This Neptune festival gathering, let's not forget, is not a theological seminar or threshold for the politically correct. It is a prayer breakfast. People will always and ever need comfort and inspiration, and billions find it through their respective religion. Virginia Beach, and everywhere else, should be able to celebrate that without giving, or taking, offense. by CNB