Faced with an increasingly secularized culture, every baptized person must become active in the Church's missionary activity, says Benedict XVI.
A secular book about exorcism says that one thing rankles demons. "The devil doesn't like Latin. He (Rome's chief exorcist) prefers to use Latin when he conducts exorcisms, he says, because it is most effective in challenging the devil."
German press...
With the G-8 summit in Heiligendamm just one week away, anticipation is rising in Germany. Will the meeting be a complete failure? Will the summit dissolve in images of protest and violence? German commentators on Tuesday wonder if it's worth the €100 million price tag - or all the fuss in the streets.
German-US relations are cooling off rapidly because of fundamental disagreement on how to tackle global warming. Officials are mounting last-ditch attempts to resolve differences in time for next week's G8 summit in Heiligendamm. But they're no longer holding out much hope.
The head of the Social Democratic Party appealed in an American newspaper for the US to rethink its decision to deploy a missile shield in central Europe - and scrap it if necessary.
Buckle your seat belts...
A best-selling Pakistani author discusses the recent Taliban attacks on NATO troops in Afghanistan and the elusive prospects of lasting peace in the Hinda Kush.
The European Commission next month is to announce plans to establish European political foundations to spice up the tone of political discourse at the EU level and entice voters to ballot boxes after a series of poor turnouts at the European elections. According to an EU official closely involved in the proposal, the idea is to give European parties such as the European People's Party, the European socialists or the European liberals greater ability "to develop networks on European issues."
With just 3 weeks before a decisive EU summit on ending the 2-year constitutional deadlock, Poland is sticking to 3 demands – a new voting system, a clear list of exclusive national competencies and an energy solidarity clause - to be part of the deal.
Almost 2 decades after the fall of communism, a number of Eastern European countries are still struggling to establish stable democracies. From radical right-wingers to authoritarian post-communists, the political landscape lacks a center.
The band of political crisis in Eastern Europe spreads from the Baltic Sea to the Black Sea. Corruption, chaos and extremism are depressingly recurrent themes in Eastern Europe's political scenery.
President Putin warned Tuesday that a planned US missile defense shield would make Europe a "powder keg" and lashed out at his EU critics. Russia's military meanwhile successfully tested a new ballistic missile.
Four decades after the battle, Israeli leaders still refer glowingly to Jerusalem as the "eternal, undivided capital" of the Jewish state. But the mantra is accurate only as myth. Even as they celebrate the 40th anniversary of the war this week, a growing number of Israeli voices are saying the once unthinkable: that Jerusalem may never truly be united. "The story of Jerusalem is a story of decay and deterioration. All these dreams of 1967 were actually illusions."
Veteran Israeli politician Shimon Peres has formally announced that he will stand in June's presidential election.
The EU is "open to consider" new sanctions on Sudan, the bloc's foreign policy chief said Tuesday after President Bush called for more pressure Sudan's government to halt bloodshed in the Darfur region. Javier Solana said the issue would be discussed with foreign ministers at a G-8 diplomatic meeting outside Berlin today.
The Bush administration has failed to capture or kill Osama bin Laden or to win the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. Now, the administration has also missed the chance to maintain a stable Pakistan. Backing Musharraf could create a nuclear-armed Pakistan controlled by radical Islamists. Like the Shah of Iran, Musharraf must use increased violence to put down popular protests, thus further fueling the spreading uprisings. The Shah's Iran and Pakistan have one important difference, however: Pakistan has nuclear weapons. Tragically, the Bush administration may eventually give the world an Islamist bomb.
Iran is planning to build a magnetic elevated train line linking Tehran and an important pilgrimage site. It has asked a Munich-based engineering firm to prepare a feasiblity study.
Iran will not halt uranium enrichment, a key demand of the UN, its chief nuclear negotiator said on the eve of talks with the EU. "Suspension is not a solution to Iran's nuclear issue... Iran cannot accept suspension."
Iran might settle for a security guarantee against an Israeli nuclear strike, but its fears of Pakistani nuclear capability are probably more acute – especially as Al Qaeda, hiding in Pakistan, is dedicated to the destruction of Iran's Shiite-controlled regime and openly calls on the US to bomb Iran's nuclear facilities.
Has Congress given George Bush a green light to attack Iran? For he is surely behaving as though it is his call alone. And evidence is mounting that we are on a collision course for war.
Despite their (Democrat's leadership) collective failure to comprehend the consequences of their action, the sad truth is that the world is now significantly closer to a global "permanent war/permanent revolution" than at any time in the period since the death of President Franklin D. Roosevelt. To properly situate the Cheney impeachment battle and the threat of WW3, it is necessary to spell out some key characteristics of the present global situation.
Houston-based KBR, formerly the engineering and construction subsidiary of Halliburton Co., has a contingency contract in place with the Department of Homeland Security to construct detention facilities in the event of a national emergency.
The Hong Kong Monetary Authority has warned about the dangers posed to the world financial system by the vulnerabilities of the US economy.
Chinese stocks plunged today after the government raised a tax on share trades, trying to cool a market boom amid growing concerns about a possible bubble.
President Bush has chosen Robert Zoellick, a senior diplomat and trade envoy who became a top Goldman Sachs executive last year, to lead the World Bank. Zoellick is continuing the tradition of Goldman Sachs executives' returning to public service under the Bush administration. Before becoming Treasury secretary last year, Paulson was the chief executive of Goldman Sachs; another former Goldman official, Joshua Bolten, is White House chief of staff.
The new president of France, Nicolas Sarkozy, is keeping his country's business elite waiting. The energetic Sarkozy made a big show of his determination to return Airbus, the struggling European plane maker, to its former glory, but other, less glamorous industrial dossiers are piling up on his desk. How he handles them will be a litmus test of Sarkozy's proclaimed pro-market tendencies in a country suspicious of capitalism and with deep traditions of state involvement in the economy.
President Sarkozy has said that his country would veto any World Trade Organization agreement that is not in the interests of France's farming industry.
The super-secret Bilderberg Group, an organization of powerful international elites, is set to meet this week somewhere in Turkey – but even the precise location is a mystery. The meeting begins Thursday and continues through Sunday.
People can attach a thousand different meanings to words like "faith" and "values," yet when it comes to religion and politics, we've been conditioned to understand that they have a narrow and decidedly right-wing tilt.
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