President Obama hosted an Easter prayer breakfast at the White House this morning, and briefly addressed the assembled 130 clergy and faith leaders.
After citing Isaiah 53:5, Obama said: “This magnificent grace, this expansive grace, this `Amazing Grace’ calls me to reflect. And it calls me to pray. It calls me to ask God for forgiveness for the times that I’ve not shown grace to others, those times that I’ve fallen short. It calls me to praise God for the gift of our son — his Son and our Savior.”
House Homeland Security Committee Chairman Rep. Peter King wants to know why the Justice Department squashed a prosecution of Islamic advocacy groups, suggesting it was for political reasons. JTA says that King is playing fast and loose with the facts.
The ouster of a prominent Catholic ambassador to Malta is part of a widespread aversion to religion in Foggy Bottom, RNS reports.
Ralph Reed is denying reports that he has spoken with the Donald about heading his presidential campaign, and CNN spent time with Filipino men who crucify themselves on Good Friday.
Veteran Vatican correspondent John Allen looks at the “rush” to sainthood for Pope John Paul II, whose papacy, some say, was itself a “saint-making factory,” and veteran church-watcher Father Tom Reese examines the Catholic rush to Protestant sanctuaries.
Belgian politicians and prelates are looking to Pope Benedict XVI to help end its crippling sexual abuse crisis, Reuters reports.
The chair of the U.S. bishops’ doctrine committee, under fire for maligning a prominent Catholic thinker, said bishops are like referees who must occasionally throw penalty flags and declare theologians out of bounds.
Gays and lesbians at Christian colleges are demanding a right to proclaim their identities, and refusing to seek help in suppressing homosexual desires, the NYT reports.
A predominantly Seventh-day Adventist town in California is losing its Sunday mail service.
Police in France are searching for a man who took a hammer to a photograph of a crucifix bathed in urine at an art exhibit.
Israel is hoping to attract tourists with a new pilgrimage route that links sites central to the lives of Jesus and his disciples; the Last Supper took place on a Wednesday, says an Oxford scholar.
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Daniel Burke
