What about organized religion?!...
Benedict XVI called for widespread initiatives in Naples to help curb the prevalent "mentality" of violence in the city, and slammed in particular the organized crime of the Camorra. "What is needed is an intervention that involves everyone in the struggle against every form of violence, beginning with the formation of conscience and transforming everyday mentalities, attitudes and conduct."
The president of the Pontifical Council for Inter-religious Dialogue, Cardinal Tauran, warned this week of the difficulties posed by inter-religious dialogue with Muslims. He said that currently inter-religious dialogue can take place "with some religions, yes. But with Islam, not at this time. Muslims do not accept discussion about the Koran, because they say it was written under the dictates of God. With such an absolutist interpretation, it's difficult to discuss the contents of the faith." He also noted that Benedict XVI "has explained that we share with Muslims and Jews a common treasure which is the Ten Commandments."
The interreligious event under way in Naples is the type of meeting that may help the world avoid the clash of civilizations, says the founder of the Community of Sant'Egidio. He said that Samuel Huntington's book on the feared clash of civilizations is "something to be taken very seriously." "It has impressed me that the book sold well in the Arab world. And it has even gained approval in certain fundamentalist environments, because perhaps it says that which many want to hear: Our situation is this clash? What happened on Sept. 11 is proof that Huntington was right? I believe that we are within a framework of difficulties, but within this framework, we have the responsibility of finding a model or bringing ourselves out of this situation, and this model - I believe - is a civilization of coexistence."
The Kaczynski brothers have spent 2 years in Warsaw making other Europeans uncomfortable. Now leaders from the EU and commentators in Germany hope for a fresh start with a new prime minister.
Prominent Temple archeologists here accused the Israeli government today of attempting to cover up its alleged failure to properly supervise a dig in which Islamic Authorities were accused of destroying Temple Mount antiquities. Experts believe the discoveries included a wall from the Second Temple. The archaeologists claim the government's release this week of some First Temple-period relics it says were found during the Islamic dig was part of the purported cover-up. The government's move followed a Supreme Court case charging Israel failed to stop massive destruction of Temple antiquities.
Arch-enemies Israel and Hezbollah came together last week for a landmark prisoner exchange that has raised hopes that 2 Israeli soldiers captured in July 2006 may be released. The deal was brokered by a German intelligence officer known as "Mr. Hezbollah."
President Mubarak said that if a US-sponsored Middle East summit ends without a concrete result it could have serious consequences, according to a newspaper interview. "It would have serious consequences for the Middle East and further afield. The region cannot sustain a fresh failure to peace efforts."
The US has opened a diplomatic "full court press" to urge Turkey not to invade northern Iraq, as tensions between the 2 countries soared following an ambush by rebel Kurds that killed 12 Turkish soldiers and left 8 missing.
Ali Larijani has quit as Iran's chief nuclear negotiator but the Iranians are insisting the reshuffle won't change their policy. German commentators, though, are worried that the shift means Iran is less willing than ever to reach a nuclear compromise.
Ambassador to the US Sallai Meridor declared that Israel should always be prepared "to preempt, to deter, to defeat if we can" when speaking about the threats facing the country. Chief among those threats was Iran, said Meridor, who called for a unified international as well as domestic American front to counter the Islamic Republic's nuclear ambitions. He said "very little time" remained to keep Iran from getting a nuclear weapon and to avoid the worst-case scenarios outlined by President Sarkozy of an Iranian bomb or a war with Teheran.
"Israel's security is not open to discussion," French Prime Minister Fillon told Prime Minister Olmert in a meeting in Paris Monday. "Such a statement from the French prime minister is very impressive. I could not have hoped to hear more positive things about the Iran issue from him," Olmert said following the meeting.
The Russian President's trip to Tehran - the first of a Russian head of state since the 1943 Tehran conference of war-time powers - was geared to register his government's commitment to prevent a new war in the region, at all costs. Putin's participation in the summit, especially, his extensive personal meetings with President Ahmadinejad and Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei, constituted a spectacular gesture manifesting Russian support for war-avoidance factions in the Iranian government, in their showdown with Cheney's neocon war party.
As one Iranian political source put it, Putin's visit was tantamount to saying to Washington: If you want to start a war against Iran, then you have to reckon with me, and that means, with Russia, a nuclear superpower. His Iran visit was, as one Arab diplomat told me, a message to the warmongers in Washington, that Russia is still (or again) a superpower, and is treating the Iran dossier as a test for its status as a great power. The point to be made is that Putin - unlike his European interlocutors - has grasped the fact that what the Cheney crowd is threatening is world war.
Democratic presidential hopeful Rep. Dennis Kucinich criticized President Bush, claiming that he is trying to start WW3. In a statement, the congressman from Ohio said that by raising the specter of a possible WW3 predicated on Iran's nuclear energy ambitions, "the White House rodeo cowboy has gone dangerously too far and precipitously too close to igniting the war he claims to be trying to avoid. You can worry about the apocalypse, or, you can ensure it by manipulating intelligence and, with pre-meditation, put your finger on the trigger that will make Iran the next deadly domino in the President's irresponsible and irrational approach to the complex and sensitive political issues that make the region a more volatile tinder box than ever before."
Don't worry, the White House is telling us. The world's most powerful leader was simply making a rhetorical point. WW3 ... that is certainly some rhetorical point, especially coming from the man singularly most capable of making such an event reality. The processes which compelled Bush to speak of a WW3 are intentionally not transparent to the American people. The president has much to explain, and it would be incumbent upon every venue of civic and public pressure to demand that such an explanation be forthcoming in the near future. The stakes regarding Iran have always been high, but never more so than when a nation's leader invokes the end of days as a solution.
To hear the US secretary of state and the British foreign secretary speak about their countries' relations, Winston Churchill's "special relationship" most definitely still exists. They just do not use the words.
The jury in the landmark Holy Land Foundation terrorism financing trial dealt the Justice Department's anti-terrorism efforts a major setback Monday, largely acquitting one defendant of charges that he supported overseas terrorism and forcing a mistrial on the rest of the case. One juror who spoke publicly about the case said the panel was overwhelmed by the complex evidence, some of which was years old and came from sources he said had hidden agendas, such as an unnamed Israeli agent. "There were so many gaps in the evidence, I could drive a truck through it."
Where is Congress? It's way past time for members to stand up. Historic matters are at stake. The Constitution is being trampled, the very form of our government is being perverted, and nothing less than American democracy itself is endangered - a presidential coup is taking place. While the BushCheney regime continues to establish a supreme, arrogant, autocratic presidency in flagrant violation of the Constitution, members of Congress largely sit there as idle spectators - or worse, as abettors of Bush's usurpation of their own congressional authority.
US Representative Bobby Jindal has won the Louisiana gubernatorial election to become the nation's youngest governor and the first non-white to hold the governorship in Louisiana since Reconstruction. The governor-elect also is a strong Catholic who has authored pamphlets on Catholicism that have drawn the ire of some Protestants. He converted from Hinduism to Catholicism in his teens. A 36 year-old Republican, Jindal is the son of Indian immigrants and was educated at Oxford.
Britain's economic resurgence over the last 15 years has been driven by record levels of household debt and a public spending spree that cannot continue, according a German-led team of economists. In a damning new report "More Mirage than Miracle" published by the free-market think tank Policy Exchange, the analysts said Britain was relapsing into high-tax and high-regulation sclerosis just as the rest of Europe begins to shake itself out of statist lethargy. The British are resorting to a Faustian Pact that leaves many of them with an ever greater debt burden.
President Felipe Calderón of Mexico is delivering a grim message: The largest oil producer in Latin America is running out of crude. "Our oil reserves have been consistently falling," and the decline is "severely threatening" government finances.
Your appendix, long touted by doctors to have no apparent purpose, turns out to be good for something after all. Surgeons and immunologists from Duke University Medical School believe your appendix produces and protects the good bacteria in your gut. There are more bacteria in your body than cells, and much of it is used to help you digest food. However, if your good bacteria dies, as the result of cholera or dysentery for instance, your appendix appears to restore good bacteria to your gut. Your appendix acts like a "bacteria factory" that "cultivates good germs."
This week's full Moon is the biggest full Moon of 2007. It's no illusion. Some full Moons are genuinely larger than others and Thursday night's will be a whopper. Why? The Moon's orbit is an ellipse with one side 30,000 miles closer to Earth than the other. The full Moon of Oct. 25-26 is located on the near side, making it appear as much as 14% bigger and 30% brighter than lesser full Moons we've seen earlier in 2007. In the language of astronomy, the two ends of the Moon's orbit are called "apogee" and "perigee." Apogee is the farthest point, perigee the nearest: diagram. This week's full Moon is a "perigee Moon" with extra-high "perigean tides."
How old is the world? Most people would say: "Nobody knows." But the author of the book frequently described as the greatest history book ever written, said the world was created Oct. 23, 4004 B.C. – making it exactly 6,010 today. Ussher's arrival at the date of Oct. 23 was determined based on the fact that most peoples of antiquity, especially the Jews, started their calendar at harvest time. Ussher concluded there must be good reason for this, so he chose the first Sunday following the autumnal equinox. Although the autumnal equinox is Sept. 21 today, that is only because of historical calendar-juggling to make the years come out right.
(WP: Ussher chronology)
(FGL: Errors in quoting Ussher)
(FGL: Archbishop James Ussher)
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