Moammar Gadhafi was buried at dawn this morning, “somewhere in the desert” of Libya. Libyan officials want to keep the location secret to prevent his tomb being desecrated or turned into a pilgrimage site.
The burial comes after the corpse of the late Libyan dictator was put on public display in a supermarket meat locker for four days. His son Muatassim and a top aide were buried with him, with a few relatives and officials in attendance. Islamic prayers were reportedly read over the bodies.
Should Christians be glad that Gadhafi is dead? An “On Faith” blogger wants to know. One game maker is already turning the saga of Gadhafi’s demise into a video game. They are not waiting for an investigation to find out what really happened.
In Tunisia, the birthplace of the Arab Spring, a moderate Islamist political party emerged as the leader in elections for a constitutional assembly and began talks to form a unity government with a coalition of liberals. Party leaders are calling it an inclusive model for newly-liberated Arab countries, writes The New York Times.
Conservative Catholics continue to trash the Vatican’s new document calling for global financial regulation: “Rubbish, rubbish, rubbish,” says George Weigel of the liberal embrace of the document. [Corrected thanks to Matthew Schmitz at First Things, which rounds up the various exegeses on the right.]
Not that George loves the document itself. “A bureaucratic curial note,” sniffs Kathryn Lopez. “Not a papal doctrinal decree.”
Catholic conservatives may have more in common with their liberal counterparts than they’d like to think, as a sweeping new survey finds that both right, left and center tend to pick and choose which church teachings they’ll adhere to. The cafeteria is getting crowded, as National Catholic Reporter details.
Martyrdom is the fast track to sainthood, and fans of born-again Denver Broncos quarterback Tim Tebow say he’s been crucified by secularist “Christophobes.” Others say no, Tebow is just an overrated, overhyped player on a bad team who barely beat a really awful team, and on a Sunday, no less.
But wait, Protestants don’t believe in saints. So does that make Tebow an idol?
The Amish fight over them, Sikhs require them, Jesus is always shown wearing one. What is it about beards and religion? Slate explains it for you here. Short answer: “Because it’s manly.”
Speaking of the Amish, an Ohio man charged with defrauding fellow Amish in 29 states out of nearly $17 million wants to plead no contest on religious grounds. Amish traditionally avoid involvement in the court system. His lawyer says that’s not a good idea in this case.
The late Apple founder Steve Jobs increasingly mused about theology in his final months, according to biographer Walter Isaacson:
“Sometimes I believe in God, sometimes I don’t,” Jobs told Isaacson. “I think it’s 50-50 maybe. But ever since I’ve had cancer, I’ve been thinking about it more. And I find myself believing a bit more. I kind of – maybe it’s cause I want to believe in an afterlife. That when you die, it doesn’t just all disappear. The wisdom you’ve accumulated. Somehow it lives on.”
My iPhone4S is due to arrive today. Make of that what you will.
Reverberations continue from the BBC story about the legacy of “stolen babies” in Franco’s Spain — hundreds of thousands of infants taken from parents considered morally suspect or otherwise undesirable, often with the complicity of Catholic clergy and religious.
The Franco era also gets today’s walkaway: it’s the birthday of Pablo Picasso, who was born in 1881. In 1981, on the centenary of his birth, his landmark depiction of war, “Guernica,” [detail above] was returned to Spain after four decades in exile.
— David Gibson
