Tidings

>The filmstrips were part of a sex education course prepared by the Unitarian Universalist Association, but that cut no ice with the district attorney of Waukesha County, Wis. The strips included scenes of a nude couple having intercourse, of masturbation and of the behavior of homosexuals. D.A. Richard McConnell told the Unitarian Church West in the Milwaukee suburb of Brookfield that if it showed the strips without first establishing "ground rules" with him, "prosecution could be the result." The 345 members of the congregation, convinced that the course was suitable for their twelve-to 14-year-old children, voted to go ahead with it. They also brought a federal suit to prevent McConnell from prosecuting. The court issued a temporary injunction. Last week the course began. Interference with it. warned Judge John W. Reynolds, would violate "three of the most fundamental rights an American has--freedom of religion, freedom of parents to educate their children, and freedom of speech."

> The name of the game is names in the newly renamed Zaire Republic, formerly Republic of the Congo. When President Joseph Mobutu announced a "return to Zaire authenticity" last month and changed his name to one with a more African sound, Mobutu-Sese-Seko (TIME, Jan. 24), many of Zaire's citizens loyally followed suit. But then came a word of caution to the nation's 8,000,000 Roman Catholics from Joseph Cardinal Malula. 54, Archbishop of Kinshasa and one of Africa's three black cardinals. Malula, though long an advocate of African culture, balked at Christians giving up their baptismal names, and said so in an article in the Catholic weekly magazine, Afrique Chretienne. Roman Catholic Mobutu promptly bounced the cardinal from his government-owned residence and suspended the magazine for six months. At a rally. Mobutu said that his onetime close friend Malula "must no longer be Archbishop of Kinshasa." Last week the situation seemed to ease somewhat. Zaire's ruling party ordered that African names are henceforth required, but noted that new identity cards would also carry the bearer's baptismal name in small print. Meanwhile, the Vatican announced a new rite for adult Christian baptism that provided that future converts could keep their indigenous names rather than take those of saints.

>When Pope Paul promised in a "pastoral instruction" last summer to improve the often sluggish flow of Vatican news. Press Spokesman Father Edward L. Heston insisted that the Holy See would practice what it preached. Heston, 64, an American priest of the Congregation of Holy Cross, was soon named president of the Pontifical Commission for Social Communications. Since then, Rome newsmen have noted an improvement in the release of Vatican information. Yet Heston observed recently: "Often a sergeant is capable of doing as good a job as a general, but he can't because he doesn't have the stars on his shoulders." Now Heston has his stars. Consecrated an archbishop last week by the Pope in St. Peter's, Heston took his elevation as proof that "the Holy Father is not entirely displeased" with his work.

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