Friday, November 13, 2009
Friday’s religion round-up
Federal prosecutors sought to confiscate four U.S. mosques and a New York City skyscraper owned by a Muslim group in what is believed to be one of the largest counter-terrorism sieges in U.S. history. Self-proclaimed 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheik Mohammad will be tried in a federal court in New York, not a military commission, a federal official said Friday. Accused killer Maj. Nidal M. Hasan was charged with 13 counts of murder and was reportedly coherent during his first meeting with his defense lawyer.
The White House is expected to name a new special envoy for combating global anti-Semitism.
The Washington D.C. District Council is calling the Archdiocese of Washington's bluff after it threatened to cancel its social service contracts with the district council-members approved gay marriage. Catholic bishops nationwide and their dioceses contributed tens of thousands of dollars to defeat gay marriage in Maine last week. The AP looks at the ongoing saga between the Bishop of Rhode Island and Rep. Patrick Kennedy, D-R.I., over abortion, health care, and the Catholic faith.
Several of Tony Alamo's child "wives" are expected to testify against the sect leader in Arkansas on Friday, and disgraced evangelical pastor Ted Haggard said people came to his prayer meeting because they believe in resurrection -- his and Jesus'. "People love a good comeback story," Haggard said. The former manager of a kosher slaughterhouse in Iowa was found guilty of 86 counts of financial fraud and faces a second trial on 72 immigration charges.
Scott Roeder's lawyers are trying to move the court venue out of Wichita, and the ACLU and Planned Parenthood plan a legal challenged to a Nevada law that would define a person as "everyone possessing a human genome." What about people who share the same genome? Are they half a person?
Several months after forgetting to Google a Holocaust-denying bishop, the Vatican is getting Internet lessons from executives from Google, Wikipedia, and Facebook. French President Sarkozy said there's no place for full-face and -body burqas in France. "Becoming French means adhering to a form of civilization," he said. So get out your scarves and Gauloises, mes amies.
Australian animal rights groups are criticizing a decision to allow Jews and Muslims to ritually slaughter animals without stunning them. An Italian monk said the devil made him a celebrity, so he's giving up singing heavy-metal music.
Reuters photo of "Brother Metal," Cesare Bonizzi.
Posted by Daniel Burke at 10:22 am
