Christian Post: "A Christian youth group in Northern California can now meet freely on school grounds, thanks to a lawsuit filed against the Chico Unified School District in April. Last month, the school district repealed a procedure that had forced the Good News Club—a branch of the national Child Evangelism Fel-lowship—to pay for using school facilities. The District charges higher facilities usage fees to religious groups than to secular groups. When CEF requested to use rooms after school hours for youth gatherings, the District advised the elementary school to charge fees that other youth groups—such as the boys and girl’s scouts—are exempted from. Although the CEF briefly paid the fees, the higher costs eventually forced the Good News Club to stop meeting."

Breakpoint: "The contrast between the [Baptist and Islamic] schools left [author Irshad] Manji convinced that the problem with Islam is not that the religion has been 'hijacked' by extremists, as many said following Sept-ember 11. Rather, it’s that the extremists, the Koranic literalists, comprise what she calls 'the intellectually atrophied and morally impaired mainstream' of Islam. Which brings me back to Saudi Arabia. In her book, Manji asks a question that infuriates mainstream Mus-lim groups: 'Who is the real colonizer of Muslims— America or Arabia?' According to Manji, many of main-stream Islam’s worst features, like its treatment of wo-men and its 'deep-seated anti-Semitism,' are the pro-duct of 'Arab Imperialism. Within the Islamic world, be-ing a 'real' or 'good' Muslim means being more Arab.'”

Terry Mattingly: "'The purpose of our lives is to reveal God to men,' [the Pope] said....'And only where God is seen does life truly begin....We are not some casual and meaningless product of evolution. Each of us is the result of a thought of God...' That sounded innocent. But a direct statement about evolution later inspired outrage when it appeared in the sacred pages of the NY Times. Cardinal Christoph Schönborn of Vienna, a member of the Vatican's Congregation for Catholic Education, said he was trying to stop...media attempts to plant Rome firm-ly in the Darwinist camp. 'The Catholic Church, while leaving to science many details about the history of life on earth, proclaims that by the light of reason the hu-man intellect can readily and clearly discern purpose and design in the natural world,' he wrote.'"

Jay Tolson in USNews: Austrian Cardinal Christoph "Schönborn concludes that 'scientific theories that try to explain away the appearance of design as a result of 'chance and necessity' are not scientific at all, but as John Paul II put it, an abdication of human intelligence.' That may be too harsh a view of the work of scientists who do not share Schönborn's faith and convictions. But it is true that positing the nonexistence of order and design to the universe is no less a matter of faith–a very different faith–than positing such an order and design to the universe. Science, whether it will ever confirm either faith, [explains] the causes of phenomena. And as long as scientists do not ignore the method or fudge the findings, they will continue to do the science that may, or may not, confirm their ultimate beliefs."

Richard A. Oppel Jr.: "One major turning point... came when a person embittered by [Al Queda]...murders of family members disclosed the identities of several dozen insurgents....After that, and the bust-up of a cell of Syr-ian fighters, the villagers became convinced the Ameri-cans were gaining the upper hand.... Villagers, fed up with constant raids, began providing information. 'They began to divorce themselves from [insurgents]'....An-other crucial event came...when a man showed up say-ing he was the town police chief and could organize dozens of officers. The Americans were skeptical, but that afternoon they went to the police station...and were shocked to find themselves heavily outnumbered by policemen, some of them in uniform. 'I thought I had walked into an ambush,' Captain Burke recalled."

SiliconValley.com: "Both sides of [the stem cell] quar-rel have something vital to defend, for not only themselves but all of us. No decent society can afford to be callous to human suffering or indifferent to the need to seek cures. No decent society can afford to treat human life, at whatever stage of development, as a mere natural re-source to be mined for the benefit of others. Neither side is going to go away, nor should it....Yet it would be a pity if our only options were either a political victory for one side that would seriously alienate the losers, or a contin-uing political stalemate. Fortunately, there is a third way. A growing number of reports...suggest that science may find a way around the impasse: a method of producing the same kind of cells, but without destroying embryos."  

In Town Hall: "the notion that a murderer must give up his life is one of the central values in the Old Testament. Indeed, taking the life of a murderer is the only law that is found in all Five Books of Moses (the Torah). That is particularly remarkable considering how few laws there are at all in the first Book, Genesis. When God creates the world, He declares a fundamental value and law to maintain civilization: 'Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed; for in the image of God He created him.' And the law is repeated in Exodus, Le-viticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy. When all murderers are allowed to keep their lives, murder is rendered less serious and human life is therefore cheapened. That is
not only the Judeo-Christian biblical view. It is common sense. The punishment for a crime is what informs society how bad that crime is.”

USAToday: "In a letter sent two years before becoming pope, Benedict XVI expressed concern that the Harry Potter books 'erode Christianity in the soul' of young people, a German writer says. The comments came in an exchange of letters between then-Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger and Gabriele Kuby, a Bavarian-based Roman Catholic sociologist who penned a book criticizing J.K. Rowling's blockbusters. In a letter dated March 7, 2003, the text of which could be seen Thursday on Kuby's Web site, Ratzinger thanked her for sending him a copy of 'your informative book. It is good that you are throwing light on Harry Potter, because these are subtle seductions that work imperceptibly, and because of that deeply, and erode Christianity in the soul before it can even grow properly,' the letter added."

RNS via Lakeland Ledger: "when UCC delegates in Atlanta voted on Independence Day to become the first mainline Protestant church to support civil marriage for gay couples, some might have wondered...Are other mainline churches likely to follow the UCC's indepen-dent example? The answer, for a number of reasons, is probably not. Demographics: For one, the UCC rank-and-file tend to be more liberal than U.S. Christianity in general. The 'marriage equality' resolution at the UCC's General Synod meeting passed overwhelmingly, while most other churches are sharply divided, if not more conservative, on gay issues.... Decentralization: The beauty—and frustration—of the UCC is that any state-ment made by the national church is simply advisory."  

Variety: "Disney had to commit to stringent distribution terms. Stepping up to finance his second straight direc-torial effort puts Gibson is league with George Lucas, who bankrolled his 'Star Wars' prequels and made a deal with Fox to distribute them. Gibson will not star in 'Apocalypto'...which is set in an ancient civilization some 3,000 years ago. The title is a Greek term which means 'an unveiling' or 'new beginning.' Consistent with such Gibson films as 'Braveheart' and 'Passion,' the script depicts abundant action and violence. Gibson has already begun pre-production; he is setting locations and has already begun casting..... Gibson had some cash laying around: 'The Passion of the Christ,' which cost Gibson $25 million to make, grossed just north of $600 million worldwide to become the most successful indie ever."

David Yount via Scripps Howard: "The problem (if it is a problem) is confined to the Protestant denomina-tions that have been part of American history and cul-ture since colonial times - Episcopalians, Lutherans, Methodists, and Presbyterians notable among them. Social commentators whom I respect suggest that their steady decline in membership signals the demise of denominational Christianity. I disagree. There are ex-planations for the shrinkage....The sharp growth in churchgoing following World War II may simply have been a blip in religious enthusiasm, with current num-bers being more sustainable....The mainline denomin-ations' attempts to accommodate the social upheaval of the 1960s undoubtedly cost them some members..."

Michael Crowley: "around Jan. 17, 1986, Hubbard suf-fered a catastrophic stroke. A week later he was dead. Scientology attorneys...sought to have [his body] cre-mated immediately. They were blocked by a county cor-oner, who, according to Scientology critics, did an au-topsy that revealed high levels of a psychiatric drug (Vis-taril). That would seem an embarrassment given the church's hostility to such medications (witness Tom Cruise's recent feud with Brooke Shields), but it didn't stop the church from summoning thousands to [memor-ial services]. There they were told that Hubbard 'willingly discarded the body after it was no longer useful to him' .... Perhaps it would be more accurate to say that Hubbard's ultimate success lay in convincing millions of people he was something other than a nut."

David Brody reports: "It’s all a fine juggling act for Academy chaplains like Phillip Guin, a Methodist chap-lain. He recognizes that when you wear the uniform, witnessing becomes a little tricky. 'We have to be care-ful when we go out and share our faith with others. However, that doesn't mean we can't share our faith with others....I think that's what's getting lost in all of this.' But he stated that while any incidents of religious insensitivity need to be dealt with, he admitted it is a fine line. 'I feel very comfortable right now with the steps that are being taken....[But] if it becomes much more restrictive religiously, I don't know how comfortable I'll feel as a chaplain.'¶ 'Nobody is suggesting that we cleanse the Air Force Academy of all references, cad-et-to-cadet conversations about religion,'" Barry Lynn, a spokesman for leftist causes said.

AP via MSNBC: "A media watchdog group on Friday denounced the maker of the hugely popular video game 'Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas' over graphic sexual content that allegedly exists in the game and can be unlocked with an Internet download. The game's plot is already objectionable to many people: Its main charac-ter carjacks for fun and profit and picks up women along the way. But some say its content becomes sexually explicit if players download and install a modification to the game—one of many so-called 'mods' available on Web sites maintained by video game enthusiasts....The mod's author...told The Associated Press on Friday that his code merely unlocks content already included in the code of each off-the-shelf game. 'If Rockstar Games denies that, then they're lying'" he wrote via email.

A Christmas gift from Xnmp—The "gift" is a tip. Add the Google toolbar to your computer's Internet Explorer browser. It zaps popup ads on news websites, which is great, but even better, its search option to "search this site" is awesome. It's virtually an index of any site, including this one. Try it—go to the web address below, click "download," and it automatically installs itself if your computer is WIndows XP. And Merry Christmas!
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