Friday, March 05, 2010
Friday’s roundup
The former COO of Catholic Charities in Washington said the decision to end spousal benefits for employees is "devastating" and will hurt the agency's ability to recruit quality employees. The Iowa teacher who refused to let a student build a Wiccan altar in shop class has been suspended; he's not happy about it. A federal judge in Arizona has said two churches can keep ringing their bells, at least for now, because Phoenix's noise ordinance is too vague.
On Capitol Hill, Democratic leaders trying to round up the troops are wooing a dozen anti-abortion Democrats whose support may be crucial for passing health care reform; the group, led by Michigan's Bart Stupak, don't like the Senate's abortion language and would prefer their own, tighter restrictions put back in.
The president of a Wyoming college says he's sorry for promoting his school to exclusively Mormon high school students. The Chicago Sun-Times has a peek at the new star-studded Word of Promise Audio Bible. Focus on the Family is claiming credit in cutting in half the number of Colorado children in foster care.
After telling a United Methodist church it couldn't sponsor church services for the elderly at a public housing complex, housing officials in Dallas have changed their mind.
Conservative Catholics are apparently all atwitter over the decision to have Lake Wobegon's Garrison Keillor address next month's National Catholic Educational Association meeting. Others are trying to read the tea leaves after Cardinal William Levada -- the highest-ranking American at the Vatican -- flew to the most conservative diocese in the country to dedicate a chapel at a seminary that only practices the old Latin Mass.
There's a slight case of agita developing in Rome over the brewing sex scandal at the Vatican, although the folks involved seem to be pretty C-list names. However, in a case that's a bit too close for comfort, a former member of the boys choir in Regensburg, Germany -- whose director for 30 years was the current pope's brother -- is claiming abuse. It's not totally clear whether the alleged abuse occurred on Georg Ratzinger's watch.
Chelsea Clinton's upcoming wedding to a nice Jewish boy is prompting all kinds of questions about interfaith weddings -- and more to the point, whether a rabbi will preside under the chuppa at Clinton's nuptials.
So much for rolling out the red carpet: Muslim students in Indonesia are denouncing President Obama as an enemy of Islam, and throwing shoes at pictures of Obama's head, ahead of his March 20-22 visit to the world's most populous Muslim country.
As officials investigate the cause of Thursday's stampede that killed more than 60 people at a Hindu shrine, an (alleged) sex scandal of a Hindu holy man is roiling the waters in India. And, just because it's Friday, the Hamas movement that controls the Gaza Strip has said men may no longer work in women's hair salons.
Posted by Kevin Eckstrom at 10:10 am
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