Religious Services

Bosnia's Muslim president brought a priceless medieval Passover book to Jewish religious services in Sarajevo on Saturday, dispelling rumors the artifact had been sold to buy weapons. The book is one of the few cultural treasures to have survived three years of war in a city that enjoyed a prewar reputation for ethnic diversity and tolerance.

Labor Day-related religious services were held across the city Sunday as some ministers and priests made an effort to express solidarity with the workers involved in the ongoing Los Angeles hotel labor dispute. Hotel workers were scheduled to speak at services at several churches, including Methodist, Lutheran, Congregational and Unitarian places of worship. The 11 a.m. service at the Holy Faith Episcopal Church in Inglewood featured a special Labor Day litany prayer.

Father Phil De Rea is a priest with a pit pass. At the recent Long Beach Grand Prix, he continuously lapped the garage areas, hospitality trailers and pit road, offering hearty smiles, handshakes and words of encouragement in his role as parish priest to Indy car racing. De Rea is official Catholic chaplain to the Indy car circuit, which spans 17 racetracks from Portland, Ore., to Miami Beach.

In separate actions unanimously adopted Wednesday, the nation's Roman Catholic bishops declared that U.S. agricultural land should be owned by as many small farmers as possible and that black worship styles should be incorporated into more Catholic parishes.

Here are some organizations and synagogues that make a special effort to welcome singles to their religious services and after-service functions. These groups hold services at varying times on Erev Rosh Hashanah Monday evening, Sept. 5, and on Rosh Hashanah day, Sept. 6. Some synagogues also have services for the second day of Rosh Hashanah on Sept. 7. They all hold services again on Yom Kippur Eve (Kol Nidre) on Wednesday, Sept. 14, and throughout the day on Yom Kippur, Sept. 15.

As many as 2,000 regularly scheduled religious services this weekend and next in Southern California will take note of the 40th anniversary of the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in what an official of the Interfaith Center to Reverse the Arms Race has termed "an unprecedented breadth of support in the religious community" for anti-war sentiments.

The Supreme Court on Monday refused to expand the rights of church groups, turning down appeals in a pair of cases. In the first case, the justices declined to hear a free-speech claim from an evangelical minister in Northern California who wanted to hold worship services in a public library meeting room.

Preferably, the Easter service would have been held on the roof so that worshipers could watch the sunrise. But that could have exposed the Marines at this forward base to gunfire and rockets launched by anti-American insurgents, with whom they have been fighting for a week. So Navy Lt.

Michael Jordan's much-publicized life turned very private Sunday as the NBA star and his family said their goodbys to his slain father. Family and friends who gathered for a private service at the Rockfish African Methodist Episcopal Church were urged to remember the way James Raymond Jordan lived and not the way he died.

Every year while the pious seek reaffirmation of their faith, some of the most notorious Southeast Asian gang members in the country seek unofficial sanctuary in Carthage, Mo., at the nation's largest Catholic celebration for the Vietnamese. The administration of holy sacraments and conversions to Christ are occasionally interrupted by the metallic ratchet of stainless-steel handcuffs and the brief litany of Miranda rights.