Jack Van Impe, a popular End Times broadcaster, has ended his decades-long run on Trinity Broadcasting Network after a dispute over naming ministers that he accuses of mixing Christian and Muslim beliefs.

Earlier this month, Van Impe named California megachurch founders Rick Warren and Robert H. Schuller as proponents of “Chrislam,” which he defined as “a uniting of Christianity with Islam.” TBN pulled the episode before a repeat broadcast could air.

Michigan-based Jack Van Impe Ministries said its board of directors decided unanimously Thursday (June 17) to no longer work with TBN.

“We would not be able to minister effectively if we had to look over our shoulder wondering if a program was going to be censored because of mentioning a name,” said Ken Vancil, executive director of the ministry, in a statement.

The St. Petersburg Times reports that two former members of the Church of Scientology’s elite Sea Organization leadership group have filed lawsuits in federal court, alleging that the church violated labor laws and forced them to abort two children.

Claire and Marc Headley filed separate actions in January 2009. In addition to the abortions, the Headleys allege that the Church created a working environment that constituted forced labor and violated human trafficking laws.

According to the Times, Claire Headley testified in a May 28 court filing that the church threatened her with “heavy manual labor and … interrogation” if she did not have an abortion after finding out she was pregnant in 1994. In 1996, she became pregnant again, and she alleges that she was not even allowed to contact her husband before having an abortion.

She told the paper, “I'd already promised myself the first time that I would never, ever go through with that again,” but with the church pressuring her and her husband cut off from contact, she felt that a second abortion was “inevitable.”

"I don't remember saying, 'I will' or 'I will not,'” she said. “It was more like the apathetic path of least resistance. I know I never said, 'I want an abortion,' because I did not have the strength to say that.”

The Times report includes video interviews with Headley and other women who say they went through the same thing. Sunshine “Sunny” Pereira, a former Sea Org staffer who says she handled pregnancy cases as part of her job, says she had two abortions of her own in 1994 and 2001.

In her video interview, she told the Times that the church made pregnant Sea Org staffers feel that their work was too important to abandon for a child.

"They put you in this position where you're weighing the lives of all these people you're supposed to be saving against this one little tiny speck of nuisance that's growing inside of you, and make it seem so unimportant," Pereira said.

The Church of Scientology denies that they have ever forced anyone to have an abortion.
Church spokesman Tommy Davis told the Times that people who want to have children “receive assistance from the church, including immediate prenatal care, medical care, financial assistance and even help in finding housing and employment upon departure from the Sea Org.”

Davis released sworn statements from ten women who said Scientology leaders supported them during their pregnancies.

The Church has moved to dismiss the Headley lawsuits. A hearing on the motions is scheduled for July 26.

"Neighbors," shot on location in Jos, Nigeria, examines what happens when segments of a community oppose one another in a standoff that appears to have no solution. This is a story not only of Jos, but of places throughout the world where historical differences of tribe, race, and religion lead to violent conflicts.

Related Elsewhere:
Previous Christianity Today coverage of the January Jos riots includes:

• More Human Smoke Rises in Jos | This week's deadly riots struck home for the academic dean of ECWA Theological Seminary. By Sunday B. Agang (January 21, 2010)
• The Truth About the Religious Violence in Jos, Nigeria | It's not easy to state who started it or how many died. But the horror for those affected is clear. By Craig S. Keener (January 21, 2010)
• 'In Jos We Are Coming Face to Face in Confrontation with Satan' | The Anglican Archbishop of Jos speaks out on last week's deadly attacks and the media coverage that followed. By Benjamin A. Kwashi (January 26, 2010)

Previous Christianity Today coverage of the 2008 Jos riots includes:

• Fault Line of Faith | Six pastors killed, 40 churches razed in Jos's most recent violence (Jan. 15, 2009)
• Diagnosing Jos | Political problems don't always have political solutions. (December 23, 2008)
• Violence Smothers Jos in Smoke | Peace eludes us. (December 3, 2008)

Coverage of earlier violence includes:

• Mutual Mayhem | A plea for peace and truth in the madness of Nigeria. (Nov. 3, 2004)
• Religious Riots in Nigeria Leave Hundreds Dead | Leaders condemn the use of religion as a tool for violence. (Oct. 2, 2001)
• Nigeria On the Brink of Religious War | Northern states adopt Islamic law, increasing Christian-Muslim tensions. (Dec. 16, 1999)

In a groundbreaking case, a Paris court will decide for the first time whether to dissolve the Church of Scientology in France, which is facing charges of organized fraud.

The demand was made by French prosecutors on Monday (June 15) as they wrapped up their case against the church's Paris headquarters and bookshop. If found guilty, the institutions may also face a nearly $6 million fine.

Six members of the church are also on trial, and may also face heavy fines along with prison sentences if convicted.

The plaintiffs, two former Scientologists, claim the church conned them into spending tens of thousands of dollars in bogus products in the 1990s, including an "electrometer" that the church says can measure energy levels.

But the church, which claims a membership of 45,000 in France, rejects the accusations and claims it is being persecuted.

The plaintiffs, are "apostates who ... want to criticize their ex-religion," Fabio Amicarelli, a European Scientology representative, told French media recently.

While the charges pose the most serious challenge to the French church to date, they are only the latest clash in a nearly two-decade long battle against Scientology. Several fraud cases have already been judged and several members convicted of embezzlement in France, where Scientology is viewed with deep suspicion.

In one case, the head of the church's Lyons chapter was sentenced to 18 months in prison in 1996 for his role in a member's suicide.

Founded in 1954 by late American science fiction writer L. Ron Hubbard, the church is considered a religion in the United States with adherents that include Hollywood stars Tom Cruise and John Travolta.

The French government, however, lists Scientology as a sect, reflecting an official intolerance of unorthodox religions. Indeed, the government even has an official sect watchdog body -- known as MIVILUDES, the Interministerial Mission for Monitoring and Combatting Cultic Deviances.

A government report published in May said the number of religious sects had tripled in France over the past 15 years to at least 600 different movements.

Christianity Today's coverage of Scientology, including a brief explainer of why Christians object to it, dates back to 1969.

Colorado-based Focus on the Family has pulled an online interview with conservative television host Glenn Beck after concerns were raised about Beck's Mormon faith.

Gary Schneeberger, vice president of media and public relations for Focus on the Family Action, said that "differences in the Mormon faith and the historical evangelical faith are not inconsequential."

"We can, and do, gladly cooperate with friends outside of the evangelical heritage on common causes; but in no case do we intend to alter our clear distinction as unwaveringly grounded in evangelical theology."

Beck has appeared on Focus on the Family founder James Dobson's radio program, and has hosted Dobson on his own former CNN show. Beck is scheduled to debut a new program on Fox News on Jan. 19. Both Dobson and Beck advocated for Proposition 8, which banned gay marriage in California.

Beck's interview with CitizenLink.org, Focus on the Family Action's Web site, touched on his Christmas memories and his recent bestselling book, "The Christmas Sweater."

On Dec. 22, Underground Apologetics, a Wisconsin-based group dedicated to helping Christians "defend their faith," criticized Focus on the Family for not mentioning Beck's membership in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in its online interview.

"While Glenn's social views are compatible with many Christian views, his beliefs in Mormonism are not. Clearly, Mormonism is a cult," the press release said.

Schneeberger said the criticism from Underground Apologetics had "nothing to do with our decision to pull the article from publication" but admitted that "some from our base" were concerned that the interview aimed to "signal theological compromise."

"We regret having communicated in a way that has caused some confusion both from some within our evangelical base as well as from our friends, like Mr. Beck, who hold a sincere and devout Mormon faith," Schneeberger said. "We intended no insult; we merely miscalculated on
how best to feature Glenn."

Beck said in a statement, "Whatever your beliefs about my religion, the concept of religious tolerance is too important to be sacrificed in response to special interest groups, especially when it means bowing to censorship."

Beck, who has struggled with drug and alcohol abuse, credits his faith with redeeming him from past misdeeds and saving him from the brink of suicide.

Before short-term missions became all the rage in evangelical global outreach, the standard was career missions, where cross-cultural workers would spend decades learning the language and culture of a people in order to share the gospel. In the 19th century many missionaries to Africa, for example, came with their own coffins, never expecting to leave.

Lucette Lagnado's article in the Wall Street Journal on Judaism's Chabad Movement brought to mind some similarities:

Perhaps the most telling story I've heard about Chabad emissaries is that some will buy burial plots once they arrive at their distant outposts: It is a gesture to the community -- and perhaps also to themselves -- that they have come to stay.

Lagnado opens a window to a fascinating and important development in today's Judaism.

For the last 11 months, Christians in India's Orissa state and elsewhere have been the objects of hateful persecution. A report by internationnal human-rights investigators, lays out the mistreatment and abuse in unsettling detail.

-

In Orissa State, 65 identified people have been killed and 85 are still unaccounted for.
Among those killed were one man buried alive near the village of Rudangla; several
people burnt to death and others cut into pieces.
- 117 churches of all Christian denominations destroyed. Not a single Hindu temple has
been destroyed – despite allegations of retaliation by Christians.
- Approximately 5,000 homes destroyed.
- An unspecified number of Christian businesses destroyed, with the loss of livelihood for
their owners.
- 54,000 people displaced from their homes, forced to take shelter in 14 State-sponsored
Relief Camps in Kandhamal District; together with many hundreds living in non-State
camps, including 2 ‘camps’ in densely overcrowded buildings in Cuttsack town.
4
- It is estimated that about 20,000 are still living in the jungle or have fled to big cities.
Some may be living with relatives elsewhere.
- In addition to the violence in Kandhamal District, 2 other Districts, Japati and Baragras
District, have also experienced similar atrocities, including killings, looting and burning
of churches and homes. 2 Relief camps have been established for approximately 2,700
people who have had to flee their homes.

Click here for the full report. Warning: Some of the descriptions are disturbing. See CT's November editorial here.

On the final morning of the Muslim-Christian conversation held last week at Yale, Christian participants eagerly anticipated what Christian speakers would have to say. Several Christian speakers had grounded their messages in explicitly Christian teachings, such as the doctrine of the Trinity. But there was a general sense that Muslim speakers had more pointedly articulated their beliefs during the nearly three days of meetings. (See earlier reports here and here.)

Early in the conference, reports circulated that when Regent College theologian John Stackhouse had used the parable of the Good Samaritan to present a clearly Christian viewpoint during the closed-door pre-conference workshop, some Muslim leaders had complained that Stackhouse was trying to evangelize them. Perhaps other Christian speakers were instinctively treading more softly.

During coffee breaks, several Christian participants told me they felt the Muslim speakers had been more carefully chosen to represent Islamic views. A Wednesday morning session which featured two famous preachers intensified this feeling.

Tuesday was the first full day of the "Loving God and Neighbor" conference that is bringing together Christian, Muslim, and (a few) Jewish leaders on the campus of Yale University.

The day's meetings were kicked off by two articulate and compelling Muslim speakers.

First was the remarkably articulate and charming Prince Ghazi bin Muhammad bin Talal of Jordan (who attended Princeton for his undergraduate work and holds a Ph.D. from Cambridge). Prince Ghazi characterized the "Common Word" document issued in 2007 by 138 Muslim scholars and clerics as "our extended global religious handshake." This was not a concession to Christians, he said. The statement was "about equal peace and not capitulation."

The first item on his list of tension-producing factors between Muslims and Western Christians was "the question of Jerusalem and Palestine" and during a break in the meetings he re-emphasized the issue of the control of and access to Jerusalem as a factor that would have to be resolved before any lasting d?tente could be achieved.

Did Ghazi go over the top when he claimed that hostility to Muslims in Western countries was at a high enough level to warrant worries about internment camps - or even concentration camps - in the near future?

Filed: 7:05 AM, July 30, 2008

Senator John Kerry kicked off the "Loving God and Neighbor in Word and Deed" conference (also known as the "Common Word" conference) Monday night with a largely unsurprising, but welcome speech. He was, after all, preaching to the choir: Christian and Muslim leaders from around the world who want to find a way to live together peacefully.

Kerry began by telling his roughly 150 listeners that the meeting they were attending at Yale University "can help change the world," while warning that pessimism about future relationships between the Muslim world and the West hands demagogues who play to pessimism about the inevitable violent clash of cultures and religions. "You have placed yourselves among those who are on the right side of the debate," he told them. "We must love one another or die."

Remember those open-exchange letters last fall between Muslim and Christian leaders? The first, "A Common Word Between Us and You," was signed by 138 Muslim scholars and clerics and called for a new level of engagement between the two faith groups based on what they said was the "common ground" between Islam and Christianity: love of God and love of neighbor.

The response, "Loving God and Neighbor Together," was penned by scholars at Yale Divinity School and heartily affirmed the need for deeper understanding between the two faiths (though that letter focused more on relational bridge-building and less on theology). Some 500 Christian leaders signed the document, including pastors Bill Hybels and Rick Warren, missions expert Jonathan J. Bonk, National Association of Evangelicals' president Leith Anderson, theologian John Stott, and CT editor in chief David Neff. (The letter was also met with criticism from prominent evangelical leaders.)

Now the two letters seem to be bearing their intended fruit, as next week Yale will be hosting a three-day conference bringing together 150 Christian and Muslim leaders for workshops and panel discussions on global interfaith relations. The conference was planned by the drafters of "Common Word" and the Yale Center for Faith & Culture's director Miroslav Volf, who will be teaching a Yale course on religion and globalization this fall with Tony Blair.

The conference is one in a series intended to promote relational ties and peacemaking initiatives. The other conferences will be held at Cambridge (October), the Vatican (November), Georgetown (March 2009), and the Royal Aal al-Bayt Institute in Jordan (October 2009).

Next week's conference and those following it will likely inspire similar disagreements as did the original letters about whether Christianity and Islam share as much "common ground" as the first letter suggested, and what our faithful response should be to calls for interfaith understanding. (Evangelism? Separation? Peacemaking? All of these in different contexts?) Fortunately, the evangelicals attending - David Neff, Nigerian pastor Tokunboh Adeyemo, Robert Schuller, and Warren Larson, director of the Zwemer Center for Muslim Studies at Columbia International University, among others - have already been thinking biblically about the implications of the letters, and should be able to translate the conference's outcomes to those of us eager to see its results.

See CT's prior coverage of the letters:

Foreign Correspondence | by Jocelyn Green
Muslim and Christian leaders seek common ground in conciliatory letters.

Speaking Out: The Peacemaking Process | by J. Dudley Woodberry
A call to evangelicals to respond to a significant Muslim overture.

Wheaton College Administrators Remove Names from Christian-Muslim Statement | by Ted Olsen
'My eagerness to support the statement's strengths caused me to move too quickly,' president Duane Litfin tells student newspaper.

Evangelizing persons of other faiths, or even committed atheists, agnostics, or freethinkers, is tricky business in our pluralistic and increasingly politicized religious landscape. In Western cultures where tolerance is preeminent among public virtues, such efforts are generally met with scorn, chastisement, and much journalistic gnashing of teeth. In other parts of the world, interfaith gospelers are subject to far worse than a tongue-lashing from the cultural gatekeepers. Such activity may win them spots in jail, or cost them and their families their livelihood, if not their lives.

One scholar's answer makes that question seem like a trick. It can be found in the new issue of the Atlantic Monthly, which follows the November issue of The Economist and asks the question, "Which Religion Will Win?" Inside are articles on "The Contest for Africa," which Rob Moll discussed here, "America's Evangelical Future" and "The Coming Religious Peace."

The last piece is what really caught my attention. I wondered, How could this be? How could we be primed for religious peace after a history of warfare, from David collecting the foreskins of 200 slain Philistines to the 500-year-long and mostly bloody war between Catholics and Protestants to the hatred between Sunnis and Shiites (and Kurds for that matter) preventing Iraq from creating a cohesive society?

The answer, according to scholar and scribe Alan Wolfe, is simple: None.

The Wheaton College student newspaper, The Record, reports today that the influential evangelical college's president, provost, and chaplain have removed their names from a letter to Muslim leaders that has attracted criticism in some quarters.

"Loving God and Neighbor Together" was published in the November 18, 2007, New York Times as a response to an October statement from 138 Muslim scholars and clerics calling for interfaith cooperation. Wheaton College president Duane Litfin and provost Stanton Jones were among the signatories, along with pastors Rick Warren and Bill Hybels, National Association of Evangelicals president Leith Anderson, Youth With a Mission chairman Lynn Green, Frontiers mission founder Greg Livingstone, theologians Miroslav Volf and John Stott, and Christianity Today Media Group editor-in-chief David Neff.

"I signed the statement because I am committed to the business of peace-making and neighbor-love," Litfin wrote in The Record. "I did not savor the document's unnuanced apology section, but swallowed that in order to be a part of reaching out a hand to these Muslim leaders who had courageously taken the initiative. Though the statement was not written in the way I would have written it, it seemed to me that I could sign it without compromising any of my Christian convictions."

But in the last month, the statement has been sharply criticized by several other evangelical leaders, including Southern Baptist Theological Seminary president Al Mohler, pastor John Piper, and Focus on the Family's CitizenLink newsletter.

CT received a press release a few minutes ago from the Global Country of World Peace announcing that their leader, the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi died Tuesday evening at his headquarters in the Netherlands. The New York Times and other outlets are also reporting the story tonight. The founder of the Transcendental Meditation movement, known as the Giggling Guru, was catapulted to world fame when the Beatles sought his spiritual advice at his ashram in 1968. Other celebrities followed, including Donovan, the Beach Boys, and Mia Farrow.

The Global Country of World Peace press release was headlined "Maharishi Welcomed into Heaven." That, or wherever John Lennon is right now.

That headline reminded me of another entrance into heaven--one created to welcome someone who didn't think world peace could be achieved by meditation or levitation, but who labored diligently to better the lives of the poor and to bring them to Jesus. If you haven't read "General William Booth Enters Heaven," click here to savor the robust American poet Vachel Lindsay's tribute to the founder of the Salvation Army. This is poetry to be read aloud, passionately, to the accompaniment of the bass drum, banjo, flute, and tambourine. And the music isn't "Imagine," but "Are You Washed in the Blood of the Lamb?"

Hindu nationalists began burning churches and Christian houses in the east Indian state of Orissa on Christmas Eve. The violence continues, although today it seems to have abated somewhat.

Dozens are injured, many buildings have been destroyed, and the death toll is at 4 (three Hindus killed by police as they burned down the police station, and one Christian killed in the riots).

Compass Direct is reporting higher numbers than those confirmed by the police:

Jacob Pradhan, a Christian leader in Kandhamal district, told Compass that at least four Christians have been killed and more than 50 churches and 200 houses razed or damaged.

Telephone outages and VHP roadblocks made confirming reports "extremely difficult."

The Associated Press reported that,

On Thursday a mob of Hindus defied a curfew and burned down the house of Radhakant Nayak, a member of India's upper house of parliament and a Christian leader in the area, Nayak told the CNN-IBN news channel.

Also, 11 churches were ransacked and burned in Kandhamal district of Orissa state, the Press Trust of India quoted unnamed police officials as saying.

Meanwhile, in the village of Brahmangaon, a group of Christians burned down several Hindu homes in an apparent retaliation for the attack on churches. Angry Hindus then burned down the village police station, complaining of a lack of protection, a local police official said, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to reporters.

At least 25 people - both Christian and Hindu - have been arrested so far, and the federal government has announced that it will send in paramilitary troops.

The perpetrators claim that they were defending a Hindu leader who heads an anti-conversion campaign; Christians in Orissa say the attacks were to prevent a Christmas Eve performance that could have led to conversions; AP says it boils down to controversy over thousands of conversions to Christianity in the past few years, "Hindu groups have long charged Christian missionaries with trying to lure the poor and those who occupy the lowest rungs of Hinduism's complex caste-system away with promises of money and jobs."

The Orissa government has ordered a judicial probe into the attacks, in response to claims that the violence was not spontaneous but sponsored by saffron activists.

Time warns against chalking it all up to religion:

As with most communal violence in India, this latest explosion of hatred is the result not only of religious differences but of a tangled intersection of political power, communal prejudice and the injustices of Hinduism's archaic caste system.

However, in a place where religion permeates everything, it's not helpful to try to separate religion from political power, prejudice, or the caste system - especially as the hard-line Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is gaining power. Orissa is currently governed by a BJP ally.

One of the most startling images from the Viet Nam war was the self-immolation of Buddhist monk Thich Quang Duc. On June 11, 1963, the monk burned himself to death at a busy Saigon intersection. (You can see Malcolm Brown's famous news photo here and read part of David Halberstam's eyewitness report for the New York Times halfway through this Wikipedia article.)

Thich Quang Duc was protesting the anti-Buddhist discrimination of Ngo Dinh Diem's regime. But the disturbing image of his sacrifice seared itself into the brains of people around the globe. At the time, I didn't understand the logic of self-immolation, but I was deeply moved.

Today Buddhist monks are once again taking to the streets of a South Asian nation, risking their bodies in nonviolent protest against an oppressive regime. This time the country is Myanmar (or Burma, as most Americans still refer to it).

Michael Glatze, former head of Young Gay America, says he's no longer interested in a "gay identity" and has been healed from homosexual desires. He also says he was baptized into the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (the Mormons) earlier this year.

The Christian Post, a website affiliated with the World Evangelical Alliance, this week published an editorial saying that its rejoicing over the former outweighs its concern over the latter.

"The story of change should be used by believers to open the eyes of others like him and to lead them out of the homosexual lifestyle into a more godly one. And doing so is not an endorsement of the Mormon church," the publication said. "Glatze should be accepted for who he is -- not the result of Mormon conversion, but one of the latest and most prominent examples of former homosexuals who came to acknowledge homosexuality as sin and made the decision to turn away from the sinful lifestyle. And because Glatze's conversion is more likely to pull people away from homosexuality than draw people towards the Mormon church, believers should be more concerned about Glatze returning to homosexuality than him joining the Mormon church."

Ex-Gay Watch's Eugene Wagner says the Christian Post is essentially telling its readers the ends justify the means. "One wonders if ex-gay Scientologists would receive a similarly warm welcome," he writes.

While tens of thousands of kids head out to Christian camps, Camp Quest is offering an alternative for those who take their summer recreation without God. About 150 young people attend Camp Quest programs in Ohio, Michigan, Minnesota, California, and Ontario, according to an article in the Chicago Tribune.

The founder, Edwin Kagin, is legal director for the group American Atheists. He said the atheist camp was founded after the Boy Scouts barred atheists and gays from leadership roles during the 1990s. "We wanted a camp not to preach there is no God," said Kagin, "but as a place where children could learn it's OK not to believe in God."

The Tribune interviewed several young campers in Ohio about their beliefs, or lack thereof. I don't think Christians have a lot to worry about. Here is a sampling:

"[Sophia] Riehemann notes that a secular perspective takes away childhood joys other kids have, such as Christmas. But that doesn't bother her. 'They have Santa Claus,' she said, 'and we have Isaac Newton.'"

Actually, Sophia, I hate to break this to you, but you have Santa Claus, and we have Isaac Newton.

Then there is Allison Page, who is described as a 9-year-old only child. Reflecting on the biblical story of Cain and Abel, Allison opines, "It just doesn't make sense. A brother wouldn't kill his brother."

Ah, the innocence of children. Just wait until you have siblings, Allison.

One of the most frequent reader responses to David Neff's article on Knocking, the PBS documentary on Jehovah's Witnesses, is that it did not address the allegations against church officials of abuse and coverups.

It really wasn't relevant to a discussion of this particular documentary, but yes, we are aware of the cases. In fact, we covered them before the rest of the media.

And now there's a big development: silentlambs, a Jehovah's Witness-focused victims rights organization similar to the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP), discovered that the Jehovah's Witnesses recently settled 16 abuse lawsuits. The organization says other abuse suits are still pending, but doesn't know how many.

One odd personal anecdote:

Wiccans seem to feel discriminated against, despite the fact that in my local bookstore carries as many shelves of books on the subject as it has shelves for mainstream religions. But, The New York Times reports that Wiccans are afraid of even telling their families about their religious beliefs.

Among the most popular religions to have flowered since the 1960s, Wicca - a form of paganism - still faces a struggle for acceptance, experts on the religion and Wiccans themselves said. In April, Wiccans won an important victory when the Department of Veterans Affairs settled a lawsuit and agreed to add the Wiccan pentacle to a list of approved religious symbols that it will engrave on veterans' headstones.

But Wicca in the civilian world is largely a religion in hiding. Wiccans fear losing their friends and jobs if people find out about their faith.

Interestingly, it seems that one of the fears of those who opposed children reading the Harry Potter books were well founded. "Wiccans face less backlash now than in the past. The Internet provides information about Wicca, and the popularity of the Harry Potter novels has made magic seem a force for good, scholars and Wiccans say. "