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Some 4,700 people attended this year's Unitarian Universalist Association's annual convention in Long Beach, Calif. Gay marriage was strongly endorsed by representatives of the 225,000-member, Boston-based religious organization. Delegates also flocked to two workshops on polyamory, the controversial notion it is morally acceptable to have multiple love partners.

'Say yes to the transforming power of love,' said Doug Walters of Portland, Ore., one of four polyamorists leading the workshops. 'Is it safe to be openly supportive of polyamory in your congregation?'

- Religion News Service

Swedish Pentecostal guilty of incitement

A Swedish court has sentenced a pastor belonging to the Pentecostal movement in Sweden, Ake Green, to a month in prison, under a law against incitement, after he was found guilty of having offended homosexuals in a 2003 sermon. Green had described homosexuality as "abnormal, a horrible cancerous tumor in the body of society." Soren Andersson, the president of the Swedish federation for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender rights (RFSL), said on hearing Green's jail sentence that religious freedom could never be used as a reason to offend people.

- Ecumenical News International

Pope preaches conformity

Pope John Paul II told visiting American bishops that U.S. church institutions - universities, schools and hospitals - must be 'genuinely Catholic' and conform to official teaching on 'respect for human life, marriage and family and the right ordering of public life.'

John Paul told bishops from Oregon, Washington and Alaska that it was of 'utmost importance' that Catholic institutions remain 'Catholic in their self-understanding and Catholic in their identity.'

He said all those working at such institutions, including non-Catholics, 'should show a sincere and respectful appreciation of that mission.'

Colleges 'are called to offer an institutional witness of fidelity to Christ and to his word as it comes to us from the church,' he said. Health care facilities need firm policies 'in complete conformity with the church's moral teaching,' he added.

- The Associated Press

African thumb piano catches on

A traditional musical instrument commonly associated with ancestor worship in some African ethnic groups is gaining popularity in Zimbabwe's Christian churches among gospel musicians who use it in praise and worship music. So popular is the mbira - or the thumb piano as it is known to western musicologists - that one musical band which experimented by recording a praise song with mbira instrumentals last year earned a place in the pop charts on local radio.

- Ecumenical News International

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