In Tuesday’s RNS report we announce that associate editor Kevin Eckstrom has been named editor of Religion News Service: Kevin R.E. Eckstrom has been promoted to the position of editor for Religion News Service, effective May 1. He succeeds Mark O’Keefe, who will join the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life as associate director, editorial. Eckstrom spent the last year serving as associate editor for RNS. Prior to that, he was RNS’ National Correspondent, and has focused on the Catholic and mainline Protestant beats and on enterprise reporting. He led

Religion News Service’s coverage last year of the death of Pope John Paul II and the election of Pope Benedict XVI. O’Keefe has served as editor of RNS for nearly two years. Before that, he was a national correspondent covering values and philanthropy for Newhouse News Service, the owner of Religion News Service.

Dru Sefton describes geocentrism, a world view in which the sun revolves around the earth: Get ready for what might be the next theology vs. science dustup: geocentrism. That’s the Scripture-based concept that the sun moves around the Earth, not vice versa; that the Earth is physically at the center of our universe. Geocentrists insist the Bible provides proof. Geocentrism is a lesser-known cousin of the intelligent design movement, which questions

evolution. Both take issue with society’s trust in science, and use religion to explain how we got here-and, in geocentrism’s case, just where “here” is. But geocentrism is also a bane of mainstream scientists.