As the Senate takes up the health-care reform bill, an influential Catholic bishop says “we’re going to work very hard to speak to senators.” One ear the bishops may be bending belongs to Sen. Bob Casey of Pa., one of the country’s most prominent anti-abortion Democrats. Right now, though, Casey wants to talk about anything but abortion, according to the NYT.
After the sinking of same-sex marriage in Maine, gay rights have lost momentum, according to the AP. Legislators in NY and NJ have failed to take up gay marriage bills, despite earlier expectations that they would pass this year. But the Episcopal Bishop of Massachusetts, where gay marriage is legal, on Sunday authorized priests to perform same-sex marriages.
The state dinner for Indian Prime Minister Singh last week featured an all-vegetarian menu to accommodate Hindus, President Obama sent hajj greetings to Muslims, saying that it, and the Eid al-Adha holiday, “serve as a reminder of the shared Abrahamic roots of three of the world’s major religions.” Practitioners of another of the world’s major religions, Buddhism, are wondering why Obama has been leaving them out of speeches and advisory groups.
U.S.-based survivors of clergy sexual abuse are calling for church leaders in Ireland who transferred abusive priests, according to a recent report, to be punished.
One of America’s oldest churches (and birthplace of The Power of Positive Thinking) is apologizing for decimating Native Americans 400 years ago, a skeptical Yale librarian now agrees that Reinhold Niebuhr did, in fact, write the Serenity Prayer, and the gifts of the “Twelve Days of Christmas” will cost you a whopping $87,000 this year. That’s up 1.8 percent from 2008. Wouldn’t ya know it, the nine dancing ladies, at $5,500 per performance, are the most expensive item. A Massachusetts woman says Jesus has appeared in her iron. I guess the devil would be in the decals. Sorry.
British Columbia’s Supreme Court ruled that a breakaway Anglican parish’s property belongs to the diocese. Switzerland has banned the construction of minarets in an attempt to fight “fundamentalist developments.” Five people died of swine flu during the hajj, according to Saudi Arabian officials. Human rights groups want to stop Saudi Arabia from executing a Lebanese witch.
Ultra-orthodox Jews and other Israelis are fighting about businesses closing on the Sabbath, an Italian paper accuses PM Berlusconi of diverting public funds to the Catholic Church in exchange for forgiveness of his sexual indiscretions. And they say indulgences are dead.
Rabbi friends of the Jewish meat-packing plant manager convicted of money laundering tried to put up Torah scrolls as collateral. The judge said no.
Photo is of the Jesus iron.
