Thursday’s roundup

Thousands of Catholic clergy are in Rome to mark the end of the Vatican’s “Year for Priests,” but the event is being overshadowed by the clergy sex abuse scandal, reports NPR. Vatican Secretary of State Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone said the scandal shows the need for spiritual renewal in the church. Maybe Pope Benedict XVI will […]

Thousands of Catholic clergy are in Rome to mark the end of the Vatican’s “Year for Priests,” but the event is being overshadowed by the clergy sex abuse scandal, reports NPR. Vatican Secretary of State Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone said the scandal shows the need for spiritual renewal in the church.

Maybe Pope Benedict XVI will get a boost from Scottish belter Susan Boyle, who is likely to perform for the pontiff on his tour of Britain later this year. Or, he could ask Newt Gingrich for a peek at the documentary the former House Speaker co-produced on the late Pope John Paul II.


The WaPo takes an in-depth look Islamic charity at the center of the Gaza flotilla raid and finds a dual message: aid and confrontation. The United Nations war crimes tribunal convicted two Bosnian Serbs of genocide and sentenced them to life in prison for the 1995 massacre of 8,000 Muslims in Srebrenica. A New Yorker was sentenced to 15 years in prison for helping supply al-Qaida militants in Afghanistan.

Virginia’s Supreme Court sided with the Episcopal Church, ruling that breakaway parishes do not neccessarily have the right to keep church property; California’s Supreme Court agreed to review a similar case.

Prosecuting polygamist FLDS leader Warren Jeffs would be “impractical,” Arizona officials said, dismissing charges of being an accomplice to sexual conduct with a minor. Jeffs has already served more time in Arizona then he would receive upon conviction and more serious charges are pending in Texas. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints agreed to pay about $5,500 in penalty for not reporting non-monetary contributions used to support California’s Prop 8.

The EPA wants Amish farmers to keep cow manure from washing into streams that feed into the Chesapeake Bay. Four Christian lawyers who said they were on a mission from God to defeat local judges lost their elections – badly. Pat Robertson’s American Center for Law & Justice filed a federal suit against the health care bill, saying that its mandate violates religious freedom. A Florida teacher says she was fired from her Christian school for fornicating.

Ashkenazi and Sephardic Jews share more genes than everybody thought, according to a new study. A pair of gay BFFs were voted prom king and um…queen in a New York high school. The boys said the hardest part was deciding who would be queen. Cher says she’s a Buddhist, and no longer worries about turning back time.

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