The surprise of Pope Benedict who we have long called the "Pope who will surprise" is that there are two of him. We are speaking, of course, of public perception. One of the images is Cardinal Ratzinger, the persona everyone thought they knew. The other image, the second Benedict persona, was the one who issued an encyclical on love -- as his first major piece of writing.
The "Together for Europe" initiative that has come to life through the good ecumenical intuition of Roman Catholic, Protestant, Orthodox and Anglican groups, associations, movements and communities seeks to underline the need to re-affirm together faithfulness to the Gospel in a Europe that risks losing its original values and giving up on its Christian roots.
Benedict XVI's message to the general conference of the episcopate of Latin America and the Caribbean combined a spiritual message with the realities of modern times, says the Vatican spokesman.
Benedict XVI told Latin American bishops that their priority is proclaiming Christ, says the director of a think tank that focuses on the Church's social doctrine. "It is very important that the [pope] mentioned the Compendium of the Catechism of the Catholic Church and The Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church, inviting a real 'social catechesis and adequate formation in the social doctrine of the Church.'"
The Vatican tried Saturday to draw a line under a conspiracy theory that has dogged the Catholic Church for decades – that it was harbouring details of the predicted apocalypse.
Investors are increasingly looking for ways to link their money to ethical principles. The Gospel needs to be proclaimed in the complex worlds of today, including those of business and finance, observes the Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church.
Here is a translation of the Italian-language commentary by Capuchin Father Raniero Cantalamessa, preacher of the Pontifical Household, on the book "Inchiesta su Gesù" (An Investigation on Jesus).
So what - they're nothing!...
Germany's Neo-Nazis are using anti-capitalist rhetoric and are mobilizing to protest against the upcoming G-8 meeting in June. Police fear that there could be clashes between the extreme-right NPD and radical far-left groups also gathering to protest against the summit.
Chancellor Merkel wants nothing to disturb the seaside harmony at the G-8 summit in northern Germany next month. But nationwide raids last week have upset leftist protesters of every stripe - and set the stage for an unwanted showdown on the Baltic Sea.
Britain's "thick wall of prejudices against Germany" is only natural for a country that considers Victoria Beckham to be classy, a German magazine has said. The best diplomatic efforts had failed to dethrone WW2 as the focal point of British attitudes to Germans.
For good reason, many show contempt for public policy. But sometimes leaders show courage, renewing our faith in public life. Recent examples, both good and bad, can be found in Germany and Romania.
Former president of Germany Roman Herzog wrote in January: "By far the largest part of the current laws in Germany are agreed by the Council of Ministers and not the German parliament...Therefore the question has to be asked whether Germany can still unreservedly call itself a parliamentary democracy."
The EU's new member states have attacked Germany for tabling weakly-worded EU objectives for the EU-Russia summit, amid close-to-zero prospects of launching talks on a new EU-Russia treaty when Vladimir Putin meets German chancellor Angela Merkel in Samara on 18 May.
Germany's Foreign Minister is to make an unscheduled visit to Russia to diffuse growing tensions ahead of this week's EU-Russia summit.
European politics are suddenly moving forward at a dizzying pace, making room for tectonic changes in trans-Atlantic relations that will in turn force Washington to reassess how it looks at its European friends, not-so-friends and foes.
The future shape of Europe is at stake in Romania's power struggle.
European and Arab foreign ministers meeting in Brussels Monday said that the Arab peace initiative must be given a chance to succeed and that efforts to set up a new Palestinian fund are close to being finalized. After the talks, the EU and the Arab League agreed to cooperate more closely to push ahead the Arab peace initiative which offers Israel full recognition in exchange for its withdrawal from all the lands it occupied in 1967.
Jordan's king warned visiting Dick Cheney that time was running out to use an Arab peace plan to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, according to a royal palace statement. King Abdullah II also called for a diplomatic solution to Iran's nuclear standoff with the West.
Forty years after the city was unified, it remains split into Arab and Jewish enclaves.
In their first test since the Second Lebanon War, IDF generals and political leaders gathered in the underground war bunker at the Kirya military headquarters in Tel Aviv on Monday to drill their performance and interaction in a war game simulating an all-out regional war. While the IDF refused to reveal details of the war game, defense sources said all military commands were participating in the weeklong exercise that included war on all of Israel's fronts - Lebanon, Syria, Gaza and the West Bank. The drill not only is testing Israel's defensive posture in response to an Arab attack, but also simulates an Israeli offensive against Syria.
The Taliban leader who was killed during an American helicopter attack in Afghanistan's Helmand Province was training both Americans and Brits to carry out suicide terrorist attacks on their homelands, according to a report from ABC. "We will be executing attacks in Britain and the US to demonstrate our sincerity to destroy their cities as they have destroyed ours."
In Afghanistan, an odd, new alliance of Mujahedeen, old communists, and royalists is threatening President Karzai's leadership. But can the motley crew solve the country's problems?
A Pakistani opposition strike virtually shut down Karachi and other major cities on Monday after nearly 40 people were killed and about 150 wounded in Pakistan's worst political street violence in two decades.
A powerful bomb blast in a hotel in the centre of the north-western Pakistani city of Peshawar has killed at least 24 people, police and officials say. Latest reports say part of the hotel has collapsed, trapping people inside. The bomb is reported to have gone off in the lobby.
As militias in the Niger Delta renew attacks on the country's foreign oil installations, some analysts forecast outside intervention to secure oil assets, while others say that is only a remote, and dangerous, possibility.
Japan took a big step towards rewriting its postwar pacifist constitution, a key priority for Shinzo Abe, the Prime Minister, as the country seeks a larger global role. Parliament approved a Bill outlining a referendum on the first revision of the constitution imposed by the US in 1947, in which Japan forever renounces the right to wage war.
An Al-Jazeera television crew was ordered out of a press conference to be held by visiting Iranian President Ahmadinejad on Monday. Officials from the Iranian embassy in Abu Dhabi asked the team from the Arabic-language Al-Jazeera and its sister channel Al-Jazeera English to leave the hall ahead of the press conference. A member of the Iranian delegation said the ban was related to an Al-Jazeera programme which was deemed insulting to Iraq's Shiite Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani.
President Bush met privately with James Dobson and approximately a dozen Christian right leaders last week to rally support for his policies on Iraq, Iran and the so-called "war on terror."
Silently, stealthily, unseen by cameras, the war on Iran has already begun. Despite the disaster in Iraq, there is no indication that Bush has given up the idea of attacking Iran. This is part of his vision of a "third world war" against "Islamic fascism," an ideological war that can end only in complete victory.
We now live in a country in which the president wields the power to send the entire nation into war on his own initiative, without the congressional declaration of war required by the Constitution. We live in a country in which the president wields the power to ignore any law passed by Congress simply by signing a statement, in his military capacity as a commander in chief, indicating an intention to ignore the law. How did it all come to this? How did a country that once prided itself on being the freest nation in history end up with a ruler who wields such omnipotent powers?
Two of Washington's best-informed men confirmed it so it must be true. President Bush and his consigliere Karl Rove bet on who had read the most books in a year.
Passionately pro-European and Atlanticist, Tony Blair sought good relations with both the EU and the US, although his pragmatic successor Gordon Brown is more likely to achieve both.
Jerusalem was both "shocked" and "disappointed" by French President-elect Nicolas Sarkozy's reported selection of Socialist Hubert Vedrine as his foreign minister over the weekend. Vedrine is a well-known and not-much-beloved personage in Jerusalem. The appointment seemed to fly in the face of expectations in Jerusalem that Sarkozy's election would usher in a significantly warmer period in Israeli-French ties.
Put a group of politicians together, anywhere in the world, and they will always smell like over-ripe cheese. Still, it is fun saying wicked things about Frenchmen to a group of mostly Anglo-Saxon readers. Americans and Brits have a petty disregard for the French, which expresses itself in asinine ways. They imagine the French are devious and snobbish...which is true, but irrelevant.
Oil prices rose in Asian trading today as traders watched ongoing refinery woes and weighed uncertainties over whether US gasoline inventories can meet summer driving demand.
The average price for a gallon of gas in the US has surpassed the $3.00 mark and is currently at $3.07 per gallon. The sharp rise in gas prices has contributed to record high profits of the major oil companies.
Chrysler is being sold to a group of financial speculators who have no experience and, in fact, little interest in the production of cars. The $24 billion investment firm specializes in buying money-losing companies for a pittance, "restructuring" them, i.e., slashing jobs and benefits and stripping assets, in order to re-sell them at an enormous markup.
(IHT: A test for UAW in US)
Consumer spending has been the powerful and dependable engine of the current economic expansion. Americans have continued to shop through boom-time borrowing, high oil prices, on-and-off job growth, uncontrolled medical costs, rampant trade deficits, hurricanes, and war. Until last month, that is. Major American retailers reported April sales declines that were among the worst on record.
As with most faulty economic doctrines, the claim that economic growth causes price inflation isn't just wrong, it's exactly backwards.
Country walks can help reduce depression and raise self-esteem according to research published today, leading to calls for "ecotherapy" to become a recognised treatment for people with mental health problems. Ecotherapy: the green agenda for mental health is the first study looking at how "green" exercise specifically affects those suffering from depression.
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