Occupy Wall Street protesters are on the move in Manhattan and elsewhere, and clashes with police are being reported.
A banker-turned-Hindu monk says his OWS comrades need to meditate, not excoriate:
“Anger won’t solve anything,” Rasanath Das, a former New York investment banker, tells Reuters. “We have to work from the heart… there is so much distrust now.”
Rod Dreher has a thought experiment: What if NY Mayor Michael Bloomberg had evicted the bankers, and issued a statement similar to the one he put out this morning?
“During the operation this morning, the bankers were told that they could return to the economy after it had been thoroughly cleaned, which it has not been since the 1930s.”
So a debate was held this week in Manhattan on the proposition: “The World Would Be Better Off Without Religion.” Shockingly, the audience in the end agreed with the atheists, who had an unfair advantage: British accents.
Anyway, that was easy. I guess we should just turn out the lights at RNS. But if by chance anyone is still be interested…
The only battle between religions in Southern California is a bidding war for the Crystal Cathedral. Chapman University has upped its bid for the bankrupt Crystal Cathedral to $59 million, almost $2 million more than the Roman Catholic Diocese of Orange, according to the Los Angeles Times.
The winner may be decided today. The losing bidder might consider a cheaper option, but just as cool: a “snow church” like the one residents in a Bavarian village hope to build – when the snow arrives, which it probably won’t in Orange County.
The “ice church” planned for the remote mountain village of Mitterfirmiansreut (that’s the artist’s rendering above) is to commemorate the event 100 years ago, when villagers fed up with walking 90 minutes to attend Mass – and upset the bishop wouldn’t build them a parish church – erected one out of snow during Christmas 2011.
It will seat 190 and cost about $135,000.
Meanwhile, U.S. churches are increasingly going in for rock ‘n roll over Rock of Ages: “The Bible does not have an official soundtrack,” Rick Muchow, music pastor for the Saddleback Church, tells USA Today.
On the other side of the spectrum, Saudi Arabia’s Committee for the Promotion of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice says Saudi women with sexy or “tempting” eyes may be forced to cover them up. Bette Davis would not approve.
The Vatican did not approve of clothing retailer Benetton’s photoshopped ad featuring Pope Benedict XVI kissing a Muslim cleric (on the lips!) and pulled it.
“We reiterate that the meaning of this campaign is exclusively to combat the culture of hatred in all its forms,” a Benetton spokesman said.
And is the image of Silvio Berlusconi kissing anyone something we need to see? Keep up the pressure, Vatican.
Cornel West is moving back to New York, to Union Theological Seminary.
A Dutch euthanasia advocacy group has recommended creating teams of “mobile” doctors who will travel to homes of terminally ill folks who want to commit assisted suicide but don’t want to leave home.
So you finally get doctors to make house calls, and it’s for this?
– David Gibson
