"The WAR on error"
Antichrist on Christ...
Here is a translation of excerpts from the Preface of the first volume of the book "Jesus of Nazareth," which Joseph Ratzinger-Benedict XVI will publish next spring.
"Serious obstacles" continue to divide Roman Catholics from Anglicans, Pope Benedict XVI and the Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, said after meeting yesterday. But the two men, separated less by belief than by history and more recent issues, pledged to work together on problems like poverty, the environment and finding peace in the Middle East.
Benedict XVI pleaded for an "autonomous and ever more fraternal" Lebanon in a message read during the funeral of slain Christian politician Pierre Gemayel.
When Pope Benedict XVI visits Ephesus next Wednesday to celebrate mass, he may well spend time at a modest stone house, perched high on a hill some eight kilometres away. It is here, millions believe, that the Virgin Mary spent the final days of her life, having been escorted here in AD 37 by St. John the Evangelist.
Chancellor Merkel is considering pushing for a transatlantic free trade zone when Germany takes on the European Union presidency next year. The idea could gain momentum when Merkel’s conservative Christian Democrats votes on it next week. Despite scepticism in some European capitals, the vote at a CDU party congress in Dresden may trigger a new drive by Berlin for a notion long cherished by some conservatives keen to improve relations with Washington.
More than 60 years after their defeat in WW2, Japan and Germany appear finally to be shedding an abiding legacy of the conflict. Public signals from leaders in Tokyo and Berlin in the past few weeks suggest both are moving towards developing military forces that reflect their global economic clout.
The icon of Rome's foundation, the Capitoline she-wolf, was crafted in the Middle Ages, not the Antiquities, according to a research into the statue’s bronze-casting technique. The discovery quashes the long-prevailing belief that the she-wolf was adopted as an icon by the earliest Romans as a symbol for their city.
Billionaire financier and political activist George Soros advised a major European Union policy group this week that the EU should scrap its plan to form a constitution and, instead, embrace his vision for a "global open society."
The European Union failed to unite and adopt a common front ahead of a meeting Friday with the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, after Poland refused to rescind its veto of talks on a new cooperation accord between Brussels and Moscow. The Polish veto Thursday represented an embarrassment for the 25-member bloc, which had hoped to speak with one voice.
If the EU is serious about reducing its dependency on Russian gas, then it needs to look quickly at Russia’s biggest gas rival – Iran.
“I am very afraid of the consequences of an imposed solution. It will strengthen the hands of the [ultra-nationalist] Radicals. This is my nightmare.”
Last week, Kofi Annan gave the Middle East a history assignment. Speaking in Istanbul, the UN secretary general identified the competing historical narratives of Palestinians and Israelis as central to the Middle East crisis and the alleged clash of civilizations between Muslim and Western worlds. A report concluded that political interests rather than religious fanaticism lay at the heart of the conflict, and recommended grounded historical research as an antidote.
German press
Tens of thousands marched through downtown Beirut yesterday to mourn the death of Gemayel. Meanwhile, the battle for control of the fragile nation intensifies. Lebanon has become a crucial element in the struggle for control of the Middle East.
The New York Times ignores such rudimentary considerations and instead falls in behind the campaign being waged by the Bush administration to blame Syria for the killing. In its own way, the New York Times acknowledges that the assassination serves the interests of Washington and its allies in the Siniora government.
The struggle for political power has begun. The events played out on Wednesday were most likely only the forerunner to a wave of unrest that could soon turn Lebanon's fragile stability on its head.
NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer said Thursday he was counting on Germany to operate in any volatile part of Afghanistan in case of need, and not just in the more peaceful northern sector.
Sudan's minister for foreign affairs says an existing agreement to form a special AU patrolling unit between Sudan and Chad and the Central African Republic, must be activated to monitor arms trafficking and stabilize the borders.
Ethiopia has made preparations for a conflict with the Islamists who control much of southern Somalia, Prime Minister Meles Zenawi has told MPs.
Iran's ambassador to Russia called proliferation of atomic weapons in the world as a tragedy and repeated Iran's stance on not believing in nuclear and mass destruction weapons.
Kissinger speaks...
The negotiating forum the world has put in place for the Iranian nuclear issue is heading for a deadlock, probably irresolvable - except in a wider geopolitical context.
Many of the people who helped dump America into Iraq think the U.S. must attack Iran. The mind recoils at the likely consequences. Iran is larger, more populous, and possesses a more effective military than Iraq. Tehran has dispersed and hardened its nuclear sites, making destruction of its nuclear program more difficult. Bombing might not be enough; an invasion would be a true horror show.
Premier Paranoid Protestant Prophecy Propagandist...
This year, as I reflect on our remaining blessings, I mourn those blessings that are systematically being withdrawn by a God-hating few in this country.
[WAR: The blessings are being withdrawn by God himself - not by a few God-haters! (How could they have the ability to withdraw blessings?!) And they're being withdrawn because of all the sin and the hypocritical and anti-Messiah religion called Christianity - with all these false prophets at the top-of-the-list.]
After Ségolène Royal was elected last week as the Socialist Party candidate in France's 2007 presidential elections, she said a striking thing: "Don't be afraid." Royal's victory was instantly taken as an event of importance, more in French society's evolution than in politics, but possibly of major political importance as well.
Is the London Stock Exchange really worth $5 billion? Or $6 billion? A number of investors, particularly hedge funds, are piling into the shares of the London exchange on expectations that Nasdaq's pursuit of the exchange will lead to a rich buyout.
Americans' purchasing power now depends almost entirely on the up and down of energy prices. The coming holiday shopping season will be the true test of consumer resiliency. But the modesty of recent purchases - in the face of the best real wage growth in eight years - does not bode well.
Most people go through life in a kind of fog, confident that the experts back in Washington, D.C., know what they’re doing. Even among those more sophisticated groups of investors, who have heard of the Federal Reserve System and who know that it is a central bank, few people actually monitor these statistics on a regular basis. They, too, are confident that experts at the FED know what they’re doing. But what if this confidence is misplaced?
The time between Thanksgiving and New Year's Day is traditionally known as "the holidays." But, face it, it's actually "the annual willpower challenge."
Astronomers have voted for the best pictures taken by Hubble in its 16 years in orbit. Hubble's Top Ten are shown here, and they illustrate that our universe is not only deeply strange, but also almost impossibly beautiful.
When a Web site dies, it goes to Web heaven - Archive.org. The Internet generally has complete disregard for keeping records or charting its past. Once a Web site it gone, it seems to disappear into the digital ether. Internet libraries have become necessary to maintain the public's "right to remember".
This month in Scripture
"In the 11th year in the 8th month, the temple was finished in all its details according to its specifications." (1Kings 6:38)
"In the 8th month of the 2nd year of Darius, the word of YAHWEH came to the prophet Zechariah son of Berekiah, the son of Iddo..." (Zech 1:1)
Be a WARrior and support the WAR effort by:
* Clicking on the ever-changing and news-related ads at the top.
