Muslims now exceed Catholics in number, though not Christians in general. Sad day. I'd editorialize on this but I hiked seven miles in the snow today and have to get to bed.
(Thanks to Gary for this one)
News Clips: March 2008 Archives
Those Filipinos a bit overenthused with Lenten penance are being advised to check the whips they use to flagellate themselves and make sure they are clean. (God forbid you should get hurt whipping yourself.) In general the Filipino Catholic Church looks down on the Lenten custom of re-enacting the Crucifixion but there is no stopping some people.
This has got to rank among the weirdest of customs among Christians. (I won't even dignify it by calling it a "Christian custom.") I think it is seriously misguided and I sure wish the church there was more vigorous in their opposition to it. But hey, maybe this year there will be less tetanus ...
Amsterdam has announced that it will no longer try to stop gays from having sex in public parks so long as it is away from playgrounds, condoms are cleaned up, and it is not done during the day. They claim a restriction can't be enforced. (Although they are restricting it during the day, so obviously they don't truly believe that as a reason to not forbid it.) Will somewhere in America be next?
This news is a few days old since I sat on it hoping that Zenit would publish the news, as I try to get Catholic-based versions of news like this instead of secular wire stories, but they have not published anything on it. The head of the Apostolic Penitentiary listed various "new" sins in an interview in L'Osservatore Romano, such as genetic manipulations and other experiments. He mentioned as well drugs, pollution, and the gap between the rich and the poor, though I think these things have already been cited as sins.
Naturally I found several errors in the wire story, such as attributing it to "the Vatican" when it was merely a Vatican official cited in an interview.
