Monday’s roundup

Today is the eighth anniversary of the Guantanamo Bay prison, according to anti-torture activists, who are holding a vigil outside the White House today to encourage President Obama to shut down the prison. The U.S. Catholic bishops have sent bulletin inserts and pulpit announcements to 19,000 Catholic parishes urging Catholics to contact their legislators about […]

Today is the eighth anniversary of the Guantanamo Bay prison, according to anti-torture activists, who are holding a vigil outside the White House today to encourage President Obama to shut down the prison. The U.S. Catholic bishops have sent bulletin inserts and pulpit announcements to 19,000 Catholic parishes urging Catholics to contact their legislators about keeping abortion funding out of the health-care bill. Health & Human Services Secretary Sebelius held an event at Nineteenth Street Baptist Church to encourage Americans to get the swine-flu vaccine.

Maj. Nidal M. Hasan’s supervisors voiced concerns over his behavior and strident views on Islam, but did nothing about it, according to a Pentagon review.

The first federal court review of whether the Constitution allows states to ban same-sex marriage begins today in California.


Obama’s former pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, plans to preach an at AME church in Detroit this week. He preached yesterday in Orlando, and, according to the Sentinel “the politically minded pastor peppered his preaching with criticism of the Iraq war and President George W. Bush’s handling of foreign policy. He also encouraged the African-American community to embrace its history.” Sarah Palin said it was “God’s plan” to put her on McCain’s presidential ticket in 2008. A former imperial wizard in the Ku Klux Klan is now an ordained minister in the Church of God in Christ, the country’s largest black denomination.

Pope Benedict XVI criticized world leaders for failing to come up with a plan to combat climate change at their meeting in Copenhagen. He also denounced the clashes between immigrants and natives in Italy last week.

Vietnamese Zen monk Thich Nhat Hanh accused his country’s communist government of hiring goons to evict Buddhist monks from their monasteries. Malaysian leaders roundly condemned the attacks on nine Christian churches, but the attacks were almost certainly triggered by the government’s insistence that non-Muslims be banned from using the word “Allah” to name their God.

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