Friday’s Religion News Roundup: Kosher for Passover, Muhammad cartoons, Russian Orthodox bling

We never knew there could be so much debate on what's kosher for Passover. Yes: Cannabis Cookies. No: 56,000 closets full of crackers and crumbs, and a $30,000 watch in Russia. Maybe: bugs and insects.

Warm wishes for a blessed Good Friday and a Happy Passover to our Christian and Jewish friends out there …

You know it must be Good Friday when the photos emerge from the Philippines of devotees submitting themselves to modern-day crucifixions. Catholic officials, as in years past, discourage the practice but say there's little they can do to stop it.

And you know it must be Passover because there's yet another cheesy Passover video (who knew the ancient Egyptians knew how to vogue?). For a less cheesy version, POTUS offers holiday greetings.


An Israeli entrepreneur who's invented cannabis cookies (a kind of edible medical marijuana) has won his fight to get them certified kosher for Passover. Bet they're better than matzo. Just someone please save some haroseth for me.

And, from the Dept. of Who Knew?, there's apparently a running Jewish debate about whether bugs and other crawly things on vegetables are kosher for Passover and need to be wiped away (or not). And a man in St. Louis has become the temporary owner of 56,000 or more closets full of leavened goods that are definitely not kosher for Passover.

The Forward catches up with the world's oldest living Holocaust survivor (she's 108).

Keeping with the Passover theme of bondage in Egypt, a 17-year-old Coptic Christian got three years in jail for posting cartoons to Facebook that were deemed offensive to the Prophet Muhammad. Over in Tunisia, two young men got seven years for the same offense.

The New Jersey pastor who's offering sanctuary to Indonesian refugees says Holy Week is giving him a new perspective on his fight with the feds: “We know about facing crosses and we know about the hope that's found on the other side of crosses, so we walk with confidence toward crosses,” says the Rev. Seth Kaper-Dale.

In an apparent Holy Week miracle, church officials in Russia managed to make a $30,000 watch disappear from the wrist of Patriarch Kirill I in a photo. Perhaps that's too much bling even for the Russian nouveau riche.

A Missouri judge refused to drop charges against the first U.S. Catholic bishop to face prosecution for failing to report suspected abuse by a priest.


From the Dept. of the Bizarre, an editor at Time magazine asked S.C. Gov. Nikki Haley if she gives big tips to Sikh cab drivers (Haley's family is Sikh, but she's now a Protestant). She apparently laughed it off.

Ben Witherington, a respected evangelical scholar and theologian, confronts his “crater of grief” after his 32-year-old daughter died unexpectedly from a blood clot. “God never promised us a rose garden,” Witherington says.

The Gray Lady reviews “Habemus Papem” (“We Have a Pope”), an Italian flick about an old man who doesn't really want to be pope. More Times coverage of the film here.

— Kevin Eckstrom

image from “Breakin' Free” by The Fountainheads

 

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