Pope Benedict has arrived in Mexico for a five-day Latin America trip that also will take him to Cuba.

Church bells rang out as the papal plane touched Friday down at Guanajuato International Airport. Mexican President Felipe Calderon and flag-waving guests were waiting on the runway to greet the 84-year-old pontiff.

While on board his plane, the pope told reporters that the Church must do all it can do to prevent young people in Mexico from joining drug cartels. He said a lust for money was behind the country’s drug violence.

He also said that the Catholic Church is ready to help Cuba move away from communism, saying the Marxist ideology no longer corresponds to reality. He said the Church is willing to help Cuba move ahead without “trauma.”  

This is the pope’s first visit to both Mexico and Cuba.

On Sunday, Benedict will preside over a massive outdoor Mass in the central Mexican city of Leon. He is not expected to generate the excitement made by his predecessor, the late John Paul II, who was revered in the predominantly Roman Catholic nation.

The visit also is being overshadowed by the bloody drug war that has left about 50,000 people dead since Calderon launched a crackdown on the drug cartels shortly after taking office in 2006. The Vatican’s diplomatic representative to Mexico, Christopher Pierre, said Benedict will urge the faithful to look beyond the violence that has gripped the country.

”Yes, we speak of violence, as well, we cannot hide it, but I can tell you as representative of the Holy Pope in this country for five years, there is a lot more in Mexico than violence,” said Pierre.

The Church is under pressure from the growing rise of Protestant churches in Mexico, as well as a scandal involving the late priest Marcial Maciel, who founded the prominent Catholic order the Legionaries of Christ. Maciel died before he faced allegations of drug addiction and molesting young boys.

A small crowd of people protested Thursday in Leon against the Church’s handling of the sexual abuse cases that have plagued the Church around the world.

”It is unbelievable that here, the law does not have any effect. In the United States, two years ago, people denounced thousands of abuses and they got paid $450 million for abuses against minors, but here the law does not exist,” said Francisco Rojas.

The pope is expected to meet with Calderon while in Leon. For the Cuba portion of the trip, the pontiff is expected to meet with President Raul Castro and visit Santiago de Cuba and Havana, before leaving for the Vatican on March 28.

Some information for this report was provided by AP, AFP and Reuters.

(RNS) At this point in 2011, 22 state legislatures had either passed or were considering bills to prohibit judges from considering either Islamic law, known as Shariah, or foreign law in their decisions.

What a difference a year can make.

The wave of anti-Shariah legislation has broken in recent weeks, as bills in several states have either died or been withdrawn, raising questions about whether the anti-Shariah movement has lost its momentum.

New Jersey Assemblywoman Holly Schepisi and Minnesota state Sen. David Thompson, both Republicans, withdrew anti-foreign law bills after Muslim and interfaith leaders criticized the measures as anti-Muslim.

“It was never meant to be an anti-Shariah law bill, it was meant to be an anti-foreign law bill,” Schepisi said in an interview, speaking about the bill she withdrew March 12. “But after sitting down with members of the Muslim community, and taking into consideration everything they’d been through in the last few weeks, I didn’t want to create any more tension.”

New Jersey Muslims have rallied in recent weeks against a surveillance program of Muslim businesses and community centers in Newark and elsewhere conducted by the New York Police Department.

Thompson, too, had a change of heart.

“It was never my intent to introduce legislation that was being targeted to any one group,” said a statement from Thompson, who submitted his proposal on March 2, but withdrew it three days later after interfaith leaders criticized him at a press conference.

According to Gavel to Gavel, an online newsletter that tracks state laws affecting courts, similar bills have also recently died or are likely to die in Florida, Georgia, Indiana, Iowa, Mississippi, and New Mexico, although at least a few of them could be revived next year.

Last year, anti-foreign law bills died in the Arkansas, Maine, Texas, and Wyoming legislatures, and were not revived this year, according to Gavel to Gavel.

“There really wasn’t much time or interest in discussing this,” said John Schorg, a spokesman for Indiana’s House Democrats.

While the anti-Shariah movement may be losing momentum, it certainly hasn’t gone away. On March 12, South Dakota Gov. Dennis Daugaard signed an anti-foreign law bill, joining Arizona, Louisiana, Oklahoma, and Tennessee in passing such laws.

And in Florida, Democratic state Sen. Nan Rich, the minority leader, acknowledged that practicality, not principles, is what undid the anti-foreign law bill there.

“I wish I could say it died because of an anti anti-Shariah law effort, but unfortunately I think it more came down to the crunch of bills in the last week of (the legislative) session,” Rich said.

While Democrats and some moderate Republicans opposed the bill, most Republicans — including Senate President Mike Haridopolos, who did not reply to requests for comment — favored the bill.

“I doubt we could have stopped the bill if it came to a vote,” said Rich.

At the moment, anti-foreign law bills are alive in 13 states, including Oklahoma, where an anti-Shariah constitutional amendment passed by voters in 2010 has been ruled unconstitutional by two federal courts, prompting Sooner State lawmakers to craft a revised version.

At the federal level, Rep. Sandy Adams, R-Fla., introduced a bill last year limiting judges from considering foreign laws in their decisions, although it has gained little traction since then.

But even in states where the legislation is still alive, anti-Shariah advocates are facing increased criticism. For example, the Philadelphia City Council in February passed a resolution condemning an anti-Shariah proposal being considered in Pennsylvania’s state legislature. The Virginia legislature moved a vote on the issue to 2013, a move that some observers said showed wariness about the legislation.

In New Jersey, Republican Gov. Chris Christie pounced on critics last year who said he was allowing Shariah into American courts after he appointed a Muslim judge to the state’s Superior Court.

“This Sharia law business is crap,” Christie said in his signature blunt style. “It’s just crazy. And I’m tired of dealing with the crazies.”

Sentiments are changing among the electorate, too. According to a February survey by the Washington-based Public Religion Research Institute, 14 percent of Americans said they believed Muslims wanted to impose Shariah in America, down from 30 percent in September.

The anti-Shariah law bills have been undermined mainly by three arguments: that they are discriminatory against Muslims; that they could affect other religious groups such as Jews and Catholics whose religious laws are sometimes used by judges to decide family or property law disputes; and that they could discourage business by invalidating foreign business laws.

“This is aimed at the Muslim community, but it affects all religions,” Rich said.

Despite staving-off anti-Shariah bills this year, at least a few legislators expect to face the same battle again next year.

“As long as there are true believers who see this unfounded menace, they’re going to look for ways to attack it,” said state Rep. Stacey Abrams, the Democratic leader in the Georgia House of Representatives. “But I don’t think that we as a state are inclined to be that xenophobic.”

Rich was similarly resigned, but also optimistic.

“This bill will be back next year, unfortunately,” said Rich. “But maybe by next year, hopefully, people will be more educated about this.”

CLEVELAND (RNS) A pair of scissors transported across state lines has emerged as a controversial element in Ohio’s first case under a landmark 2009 federal law that expanded government powers to prosecute hate crimes.

The case involves a dozen members of an Amish sect in central Ohio who are charged with using the shears — made in New York and brought to Ohio — to forcibly cut the hair and beards of fellow Amish to avenge a religious dispute.

The travel history of the shears may seem like a peculiar point in the peculiar case that has focused national attention on Ohio’s Amish community. But the hate crimes law — like many other federal statutes, including health-care reform legislation — is rooted in Congress’ far-reaching power to regulate interstate commerce.

Enacted in 2009, the Matthew Shepard and James Byrd Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act was named for a gay University of Wyoming student who was beaten and tortured to death by two men in 1998, and a black man who was chained to a pickup truck and dragged to death in Texas that same year.

The act is a historic expansion of a 1968 law that federalized hate crimes directed at people due to their religion, race or nationality. The new law extends protections to people victimized because of sexual orientation, gender or disability.

In the 2009 law, Congress gave prosecutors greater latitude to bring charges in bias-motivated attacks in general, by invoking the commerce connection. The earlier law only protected victims engaged in a federally protected activity, such as going to school.

Some legal observers at the time took issue with the Congress buttressing the law with the commerce connection. To make the connection, the government must prove the crime involved interstate commerce or affected it. The commerce element allows the federal government to prosecute local crimes where it would otherwise have no jurisdiction.

“Interstate commerce has been interpreted broadly enough to make any garden-variety criminal activity a federal offense,” said Milwaukee defense lawyer David Ziemer, who wrote a critical review of the hate crimes law in 2009 in the Wisconsin Law Journal.

Regarding the interstate travel of the shears in the Amish attacks, Ziemer said, “You can make any barroom brawl into a federal crime if that’s all it takes.”

Though hate crime attackers can face any number of state charges — most states have some version of a hate crimes law — the federal statute generally carries far harsher sentences.

The Amish defendants, including sect leader Samuel Mullet, could have been charged locally with assault and other crimes, but local officials are leaving the prosecution to federal officials. The federal law carries a possible life sentence if prosecutors prove kidnapping was an element of the crime.

Prosecutors contend the attacks were motivated by revenge after a group of Amish bishops rebuffed Mullet’s excommunication of eight families. The Amish believe men should grow their beards and women should let their hair grow after marriage.

Steven Dettelbach, the U.S. attorney for the Northern District of Ohio who previously worked at the Department of Justice, said enforcement of the hate crimes law would be a priority for his office.

Dettelbach’s Amish case is only the seventh brought nationally under the 2009 law.

Asked last week about the commerce connection to the scissors, Dettelbach said federal prosecutors use the same argument in firearms cases. In order to claim federal jurisdiction, they show that guns crossed state lines.

Lawyers for the Amish defendants have filed a motion to have the case dismissed, arguing Congress overreached, and that interstate commerce is not relevant to the case or the law.

Cleveland State University provost Geoffrey Mearns, a former federal prosecutor, said the interstate travel of the shears is a stretch, and the case could be difficult to prove under the federal hate crime law.

Defense lawyers are also challenging whether the law applies to actions between people of the same religion.

Cleveland State law professor Jonathan Witmer-Rich, a former federal public defender, said the case may not fit what is ordinarily considered a hate crime. But the point, he said, is not whether the victims and attackers are of the same religion, or whether the scissors’ travels justify federal prosecution.

The importance of the interstate commerce provision is that Congress believed hate crimes instill profound fear, causing people to alter their lives — their activities, travels and even where they live, he said.

Case Western Reserve University law professor Lewis Katz said he also thinks the interstate travel of the scissors is a tenuous argument. But he said the law does not distinguish between a religious-based attack made by someone from outside or within the religion.

Added Michael Lieberman, a lawyer with the Anti-Defamation League who tracks hate crimes: “It fits squarely into the definition of the statute. The idea that because it’s a co-religion it’s knocked out of the box is not correct.”

(Harlan Spector writes for The Plain Dealer in Cleveland.)

CLEVELAND (RNS) Before a recent prayer service in a shuttered Catholic church in Holyoke, Mass., parishioner Victor Anop stood before 120 people and made an urgent announcement:

“The Vatican has ordered the bishop of Cleveland to reopen 13 closed churches.”

“Everybody broke into applause,” Anop said in a telephone interview. “People are still talking about it. What happened in Cleveland brings us hope.”

Catholics fighting church closings across the U.S. are keeping their eyes on the Catholic Diocese of Cleveland, where Bishop Richard Lennon was overruled by the Vatican for not properly following church law and procedures on closing churches.

Copies of the decrees are circulating throughout the country and even in Canada. Anop and other parishioners of the closed Mater Dolorosa Catholic Church have been holding around-the-clock vigils inside their century-old sanctuary ever since their bishop ordered it closed last June.

In July, the Vatican’s Congregation for the Clergy, the same panel that ordered the reopening of Cleveland’s churches, said Mater Dolorosa should stay closed. But the Holyoke squatters appealed to the Vatican’s supreme court and are awaiting a ruling.

Meanwhile, the news from Cleveland has reinvigorated their fight, Anop said. “Cleveland has led the way,” he said. “And now the people of Cleveland need to keep working to get those churches open right away.”

Phillip Penna, who is trying to reopen his church, Corpus Christi in North Bay, Ontario, about four hours north of Toronto, has read a couple of the Cleveland decrees.

“We think our bishop made similar errors,” said Penna. “What’s happening in Cleveland is monumental. It’s really emboldened us. We’re ready to go.”

Many believe Rome is unhappy with U.S. bishops closing hundreds of churches over the last decade — especially century-old structures that are architectural gems and elaborately appointed with priceless art. Many were old ethnic churches in inner-city neighborhoods.

“I’m wondering if Rome is saying, ‘Enough is enough,’” said Michael Dunnigan, a canon lawyer at the St. Joseph Foundation, a parishioners advocacy group in San Antonio.

“I’m no mind reader,” he said, “but I imagine that Vatican officials looking at America must wonder to themselves: ‘How can the bishops of such a wealthy country close so many churches, abandon their great cities and exile to the suburbs the great Catholic witness in both flesh and stone?’”

Dunnigan, who has been representing parishioners for 14 years, said overturning a bishop’s closing of a church was unheard of.

“We’ve been in the wilderness for ages with cases like this,” he said. “It’s been almost impossible to win, to prevail against a bishop. But now there’s hope.”

The 13 Cleveland churches — out of 50 that Lennon closed between 2009 and 2010 in a finance-driven downsizing — had appealed to the Congregation for the Clergy, saying they were self-sustaining parishes that should not be closed.

While the cases were under appeal, the diocese was prohibited from selling the properties, so they have been sitting empty and padlocked. Word got out March 7 that the Congregation ruled in favor of all 13 parishes.

“I couldn’t believe it when I saw the news,” said Joe Fuisz, a parishioner fighting to reopen St. Joseph Catholic Church in Bethlehem, Pa. “I thought, ‘No, the press must be mistaken.’

“Up until now, we had no real success stories to look to. Now, going forward, people are looking to Cleveland.”

Lennon has 60 days to appeal the reversals of his closing orders; the bishop said in a statement that his advisers were reviewing the rulings.

Peter Borre, a Boston activist who represents 24 parishioner groups in 11 dioceses throughout the country, said Lennon erred both in procedure and substance of church law when he “suppressed” parishes — which means he dissolved them — and shuttered the church buildings.

“This is a tectonic shift in Vatican parish policy,” said Borre. “This is not just idiosyncrasies of a few odd cases here and there.”

(Michael O’Malley writes for The Plain Dealer in Cleveland.)

ST. LOUIS (RNS) Wading into sensitive church-state territory, a Missouri judge has ruled in favor of an independent-minded Catholic church that claims ownership of its property and autonomy from the Archdiocese of St. Louis.

Judge Bryan Hettenbach's 50-page ruling in favor of St. Stanislaus Kostka Catholic Church is unusual for the strong interjection of a civil court into internal church matters.

In a statement, St. Louis Archbishop Robert Carlson promised to appeal the judge's opinion “all the way to the Supreme Court.”

Hettenbach was careful to point out in his ruling that civil courts have no business wading into theological or ecclesiastical issues, or interpreting church law.

But he also acknowledged that the case brought by the archdiocese had given him no choice but to grapple with the Catholic Church's internal canon laws.

St. Stanislaus' lawyers believe Hettenbach succeeded. On Thursday (March 15), Richard Scherrer, one of the church's attorneys called the judge's opinion “unassailable,” and a “correct finding of law.”

“I don't see any way that a court of appeals is going to disturb this brilliant job by a fine jurist,” Scherrer said.

The ruling upholds St. Stanislaus' ownership of its property and its right to craft bylaws that limit the authority of the Roman Catholic Church over its governance.

Hettenbach relied on so-called “neutral principles of law” — secular documents like deeds, constitutions and bylaws that govern individual churches as organizations. In using the neutral principles approach, Hettenbach rejected the traditional approach of civil courts deferring to the internal legal mechanisms of a church.

In 1891, the members of St. Stanislaus formed a corporation under Missouri law in order to secure a loan for a new church building. The civil corporation, called Polish Roman Catholic St. Stanislaus Parish, existed alongside the parish itself. The lay board overseeing the corporation would be allowed to control the property and assets while the archbishop would appoint the board members and pastor.

The corporation's original articles of agreement, signed by the pastor and five parishioners, said the “purpose” of the corporation was, in part, “to maintain a Polish Roman Catholic Church.”

Hettenbach's decision rested on his interpretation of whether St. Stanislaus has remained true to that purpose. Specifically, the judge needed to decide if the church's original mission had been undermined by recent revisions to its bylaws.

Those changes stemmed largely from a request in 2003 by then-Archbishop Justin Rigali that the church undergo a legal restructuring. When Rigali sent a vicar general to carry that message, his methods served only to deepen the church's resolve to be independent.

The next year, the board rewrote its bylaws, eliminating the archbishop's authority. Then-Archbishop Raymond Burke responded by pulling the parish pastors, declaring several board members excommunicated and announcing that the church was no longer Roman Catholic.

Ignoring the archbishop's authority, the board hired its own pastor, who was, in turn, suspended, excommunicated and eventually defrocked. In the archdiocese's view, St. Stanislaus was no longer a Catholic church.

That position was central to its argument before Hettenbach. Using the neutral principles of law approach, the archdiocese argued that the St. Stanislaus corporation had cast away the church's Catholic status, ignoring Vatican directives, and had broken its original agreement to “maintain a Polish Roman Catholic Church.”

Or as the archbishop said in a press conference after the ruling, the corporation had “transformed St. Stanislaus into an entity which has no resemblance to a Roman Catholic parish.”

Hettenbach, however, interpreted things differently.

In his ruling, the judge proceeded methodically through each bylaw change that the archdiocese argued violated canon law. If those bylaw changes didn't “expressly contradict the 'purpose' of maintaining a Roman Catholic Church,” Hettenbach determined it was not in conflict with the corporation's originating documents.

But he steered clear of determining whether St. Stanislaus has actually fulfilled its chartered mission of maintaining a Catholic church to the satisfaction of higher church authorities. To do so, he said, would inappropriately insert the court into church disputes over which it has no jurisdiction.

“Whether or not Defendants are adhering to the standards required by the Catholic Church is clearly a theological controversy,” the judge wrote.

In the end, Carlson said, the judge “has substituted his own analysis of church law.”

Frank Ravitch, law professor at Michigan State University, said Hettenbach's ruling “might be the unique, rare case” that shows that even in the face of voluminous canon law, an individual church may have sufficient legal documentation to exert its independence.

And that should put centralized religious organizations like the Catholic Church on notice. “If you're a hierarchical church, make sure your titles are clear,” Ravitch said.

(Tim Townsend writes for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch in St. Louis.)

CANTERBURY, England (RNS/ENInews) The British government on Thursday (March 15) launched a 12-week consultation that is widely expected to lead to the legalization of same-sex marriage in England and Wales, despite strong opposition from Catholics and some Anglicans.

“Should two people who care deeply for each other, who love each other and who want to spend the rest of their lives together be allowed to marry?” Home Secretary Theresa May wrote in The Times of London.

“That is the essential question behind the debate over the government'splans to extend civil marriage to same-sex couples.”

The coalition government led by Prime Minister David Cameron and his deputy, Nick Clegg, has made it clear that it wants to see a same-sex marriage law before the next general election in 2015. It is also supported by the New Labour opposition leader, Ed Miliband.

The consultation will also include an option of retaining the status quo and that has met with the approval of senior church figures, as well as a number of Conservative lawmakers.

The plan for same-sex weddings only covers civil marriages; religious buildings would only be used where church, temple, mosque or synagogue leaders wished to offer that ceremony.

The reform would also only affect same-sex couples in England and Wales, not Northern Ireland or Scotland. Last year, the Scottish Government held its own consultation process and received more than 50,000 responses.

The decision to launch the consultation was taken despite fierce opposition from Christian leaders. The (Anglican) Church of England said it will study the government's consultation and respond in due course.

“The Church of England is committed to the traditional understanding of the institution of marriage as being between one man and one woman,” a statement said Thursday.

On March 11, Catholic priests read a pastoral letter signed by two leading clerics, Archbishop of Westminster Vincent Nichols and Archbishop of Southwark Peter Smith, that warned “changing the legal definition of marriage could be a profoundly radical step. It's consequences should be taken seriously.”

Earlier, Cardinal Keith O'Brien, the leader of Scotland's estimated 500,000 Roman Catholics, described as “grotesque” plans for same-sex weddings. If passed, the new law would “shame the United Kingdom in the eyes of the world,” he said.

Anglican Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams has cautioned that laws should not be used as a tool to bring about social change, while other religious groups — Quakers, Reform Jews and Unitarians — have welcomed it.

Civil partnerships were introduced in the United Kingdom in 2005, giving same-sex couples the same legal rights as married couples.

Question: “What does the Bible say about Christian tithing?”

Answer: Many Christians struggle with the issue of tithing. In some churches tithing is over-emphasized. At the same time, many Christians refuse to submit to the biblical exhortations about making offerings to the Lord. Tithing/giving is intended to be a joy and a blessing. Sadly, that is sometimes not the case in the church today.

Tithing is an Old Testament concept. The tithe was a requirement of the law in which all Israelites were to give 10 percent of everything they earned and grew to the Tabernacle/Temple (Leviticus 27:30; Numbers 18:26; Deuteronomy 14:24; 2 Chronicles 31:5).

In fact, the Old Testament Law required multiple tithes which would have pushed the total to around 23.3 percent, not the 10 percent which is generally considered the tithe amount today.

Some understand the Old Testament tithe as a method of taxation to provide for the needs of the priests and Levites in the sacrificial system. The New Testament nowhere commands, or even recommends, that Christians submit to a legalistic tithe system. Paul states that believers should set aside a portion of their income in order to support the church (1 Corinthians 16:1-2).

The New Testament nowhere designates a percentage of income a person should set aside, but only says it is to be “in keeping with income” (1 Corinthians 16:2). Some in the Christian church have taken the 10 percent figure from the Old Testament tithe and applied it as a “recommended minimum” for Christians in their giving. The New Testament talks about the importance and benefits of giving. We are to give as we are able.

Sometimes that means giving more than 10 percent; sometimes that may mean giving less. It all depends on the ability of the Christian and the needs of the church. Every Christian should diligently pray and seek God’s wisdom in the matter of participating in tithing and/or how much to give (James 1:5).

Above all, all tithes and offerings should be given with pure motives and an attitude of worship to God and service to the body of Christ. “Each man should give what he has decided in his heart to give, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver” (2 Corinthians 9:7).

Recommended Resource: Giving and Tithing by Larry Burkett.

Israeli postal workers outside Tel Aviv are refusing to deliver thousands of copies of the New Testament and other Hebrew-language Christian materials.

Israel media reported Tuesday (March 6) that dozens of religious and secular Jewish mail deliverers jointly informed their supervisors that disseminating the materials goes against their religious beliefs.

The workers, who deliver mail in Ramat Gan, assert that delivering the items would be tantamount to proselytizing and therefore a violation of Jewish law.

It was not immediately clear who is mailing the materials.

Proselytizing is a sensitive issue among Jewish Israelis, who feel the Jewish people have already lost too many adherents to the Spanish Inquisition, the Holocaust and other times of Jewish persecution.

Israel’s anti-missionary law prohibits offering people monetary incentives in order to convince them to adopt another faith. It also bans proselytizing to minors. It does not prevent the dissemination of written material.

The Israel Postal Company told Ynet News that it is “a governmental company operating in accordance to the Postal Law, which obligates us to distribute any mail it receives. The Israel Postal Company has no right or ability to choose what it can or cannot distribute. Therefore, the mail will be distributed according to the law.”

Pinched by the global recession and tough-love budget demands of the European Union, the Italian government is looking for extra revenue, and has its eyes set on commercial properties owned by the Roman Catholic Church.

On Feb. 15, the government of Prime Minister Mario Monti announced it wants to revise rules on the tax-exempt status of church-owned commercial property. Though the exemption also applies to other not-for-profit entities, such as trade unions, political parties and religious groups, the Catholic Church is its largest beneficiary.

“Such a move would have been unimaginable six months ago,” said Francesco Perfetti, a history professor at LUISS University in Rome. “After all, no matter whether you are a believer or not, the church is an integral part of Italy’s culture.”

The exemption, introduced in 1992, has sparked a heated debate, especially after the Euro crisis and Italy’s staggering debt forced the government to introduce sweeping austerity measures, including a sharp rise in the pension age.

Critics say the current rules give church-owned businesses, such as hotels and restaurants, an unfair advantage over their competitors.

Church officials respond that purely commercial church businesses must already pay taxes in full, and that the exemption is aimed at helping social institutions like schools and hospitals, not at giving the Catholic Church an unfair advantage.

“We don’t ask for preferential treatment but just to be treated as other not-for-profit entities,” Cardinal Angelo Bagnasco, president of Italy’s bishops conference, said in January.

In fact, Italian church officials cautiously welcomed the government’s announcement, saying it would help “clarify” the situation.

In a reflection of the sensitivity surrounding every issue related to the Catholic Church, Monti took the unusual step of personally explaining the sense and scope of the new rules in a speech to a Parliament committee on Feb. 27.

In his statement, Monti avoided any explicit reference to the church, and stressed that the government “holds in high esteem the not-for-profit sector’s contribution to society.”

Monti, a trained economist, said the new norms would clarify which commercial properties qualify as not-for-profit, in order to avoid possible sanctions from the European Union.

Not everyone, however, was convinced by the prime minister’s reassurances.

The Salesians, a large religious order, said they would be forced to close many of the thousands of private schools they operate throughout Italy if forced to pay property tax on them. Other church-affiliated bodies voiced similar concerns.

Yet, despite the consternation the new law provoked, it might not change things dramatically.

According to a government-mandated study, the current tax exemption costs the government about 100 million euros ($131.9 million) in lost revenue, a tiny amount compared to Italy’s public debt of 1.9 trillion euros ($2.5 trillion).

Mario Staderini, secretary of the Italian Radicals party, which is highly critical of the church, said that, despite the promises, the new norm won’t deliver much: “Its effects will be small.”

For him, property tax exemptions are just the start of the conversation.

“Italy’s whole system of public funding for the church, which amounts to 1 billion euros per year, must be overhauled,” he said.

For the church, too, the main result of the government’s initiative may be little more than a clarification of today’s somewhat obscure norms. Since it was first passed in 1992, the law has been modified many times by bylaws and government regulations, further muddling up the picture.

That has led to a steep rise in the number of court cases in recent years, said Patrizia Clementi, a tax expert with the Milan diocese who also consults for the Italian bishops conference on the issue.

A clearer law might also lead to a decline in tax evasion: In the city of Rome alone, greater scrutiny of church-owned properties has brought nearly 11 million euros ($14.5 million) in extra tax revenues since 2005.

“Right now there are gray areas,” she said. “We hope the new norms will clarify the situation.”

Evangelist Franklin Graham apologized tonight to President Obama for questioning his Christian faith and said religion has “nothing to do” with Graham’s decision not to support Obama’s re-election.

Graham’s apology came after a group of prominent black religious leaders criticized the evangelist for saying he did not know whether Obama is a Christian and suggesting that Islamic law considers him to be a Muslim.

Graham, president of the relief organization Samaritan’s Purse and the son of famed evangelist Billy Graham, said he now accepts Obama’s declarations that he is a Christian.

“I regret any comments I have ever made which may have cast any doubt on the personal faith of our president, Mr. Obama,” he said in a statement.

“I apologize to him and to any I have offended for not better articulating my reason for not supporting him in this election — for his faith has nothing to do with my consideration of him as a candidate.”

Graham said he objects to Obama’s policy stances on abortion and same-sex marriage, which Graham considers to be in “direct conflict” with Scripture.