Source: The Muslim News

http://www.muslimnews.co.uk/news/news.php?article=12764

VATICAN CITY, (Zenit.org): The collaboration of Christians and Muslims to promote justice and peace is possible and therefore necessary, says Benedict XVI.

The Pope made these remarks today, during the five-yearly visit of the bishops of Mali.

Of Mali's 11.5 million people, some 90% are Muslim and only 2% are Catholic.

The Holy Father expressed his "...

Source: Hindu Press International

Wire Service: AP

http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2007/05/05/europe/EU-GEN-Vatican-Iran.php

VATICAN CITY: Former Iranian President Mohammad Khatami met with Pope Benedict XVI for talks the Vatican hoped would help heal tensions left from the pope's remarks on Islam and violence, but the Iranian said the wounds were still very deep.

Khatami, a reformist in power from 1997 to 2005,...

Source: News...

Author: Matt Sedensky

Source: Jacksonville.com

Wire Service: AP

http://www.jacksonville.com/apnews/stories/050107/D8ORR2CO2.shtml

MIAMI - A man fighting the opening of a mosque in his suburban neighborhood filed a lawsuit Tuesday to try and halt construction, a move derided by Arab leaders as anti-Muslim.

Rodney Wright claims the relocation of the Islamic Center of South Florida to a new, larger...

Source: Americans United Press Release

Source: International Herald Tribune

Wire Service: AP

http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2007/04/23/europe/EU-GEN-Turkey-Murdered-Missionary.php

MALATYA, Turkey: The story of a quiet and deeply religious German man ended with the sound of rocky dirt being dumped over his grave in eastern Turkey, in a murder case that has drawn attention to the plight of Christians in this Muslim country.

Tilmann Geske, a...

Source: Catholic News

http://www.cathnews.com/news/704/103.php

In a restriction described by a New Zealand party leader as "political correctness gone mad", Kiwi prison authorities have banned the taking of communion wine into prison, saying that they have no legal discretion to grant an exemption.

NZ Catholic reports that United Future New Zealand leader Peter Dunne comments come in response to a story in this week's issue of NZ Catholic, outlining enforcement of a ban on...

Author: Mary Jordan

Source: Chicago Tribune

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-0704170802apr18,1,7622827.story?coll=chi-newsnationworld-hed

SHKODER, Albania -- The Catholic cathedral that communists turned into a basketball arena for two decades is now busier than ever, drawing more than 2,000 people to a single Sunday mass. An ornate Albanian Orthodox church with three grand...

Author: ART GOLAB

Source: Chicago Sun-Times

http://www.suntimes.com/lifestyles/religion/331378,CST-NWS-cross07.article

A 19-foot-tall cedar cross erected on Daley Plaza on Good Friday by several Christian denominations crosses the line between church and state, according to two Chicago Jewish leaders.

"It's totally inappropriate," said Rabbi Ira Youdovin, executive vice president of the Chicago Board of Rabbis.
...

Author: Matt Curry

Source: Houston Chronicle

Wire Service: AP

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/front/4685221.html

DALLAS--A Texas legislator wants to require the state's nearly 1,700 public school districts to teach the Bible as a textbook, "not a worship document."

The House Public Education Committee was set late today to consider a bill by Rep. Warren Chisum, R-Pampa, mandating high schools to offer...

Author: Tom Heneghan

Source: Reuters

http://www.reuters.com/article/scienceNews/idUSL2652676520070326

ORSAY, France (Reuters) - With creationism now coming in Christian and Muslim versions, scientists, teachers and theologians in France are debating ways to counteract what they see as growing religious attacks on science.

Bible-based criticism of evolution, once limited to Protestant fundamentalists in the United States, has...

Author: DAVID VAN BIEMA

Source: TIME Magazine

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1601845,00.html

Miss Kendrick came ready, with props. The day's topic was the Gospel of Matthew. "You can divide all the Beatitudes into two parts," Jennifer Kendrick explained to her teenage audience. "The 'Blessed are the whatevers,' like 'the meek,' and then the reward they will get. So I've made some puzzle pieces here." She passed out...

Author: Michael Schwirtz

Source: The New York Times

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/21/world/europe/21bells.html?n=Top%2fReference%2fTimes%20Topics%2fOrganizations%2fH%2fHarvard%20University%20

MOSCOW, March 20 — The bells of Lowell House at Harvard — so much a part of the university’s tradition that they have their own society of bell ringers...

Author: David Abel

Source: The Boston Globe

http://www.boston.com/news/local/articles/2007/03/21/harvard_to_return_historic_bells_to_russian_church/

Nearly 80 years ago, as an antireligious ideology swept the Soviet Union and destroyed countless religious artifacts, an American industrialist saved 18 towering brass bells from Moscow's Danilovsky Monastery, buying the centuries-old treasures and...

Author: Father John Flynn

Source: The Indian Catholic

http://www.theindiancatholic.com/newsread.asp?nid=6614

ROME (Zenit.org): The presence of Christian symbols in public life is increasingly under challenge. Last October, a cross on the altar of a chapel at the College of William and Mary, in Williamsburg, Virginia, was removed on orders of college president Gene Nichol.

The decision sparked off a fierce debate, culminating in the...