Nah -- they were just bored. So even though the engaged in an assault on the religious symbols, beliefs and sentiments of the community, they will only get lesser charges.

Four teenagers charged yesterday in the destruction of a 15-foot crucifix at a borough cemetery and the theft of more than 25 infant Jesus figures from manger scenes "wanted to see the baby Jesuses burn," police said.

Police were still digging for information yesterday, but two of the suspects told them they did it out of boredom.

"They were looking for things to do. They told us, "We were going to have a baby-Jesus-burning party,' " said Detective Ken Kelly of the Sayreville Police Department. "The reason they picked (the Jesus figures) was because they looked real."

He recalled another statement by one of the suspects: "We just wanted to see their heads burning."

Nope, no hate there.

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Police are investigating this act of vandalism against a controversial Catholic religious community.

A religious order's plans to build a community in rural McHenry County were greeted with heated opposition from neighbors before approval was granted last summer.

But even they were shocked by what vandals did to statues of Jesus Christ and the Virgin Mary at the Fraternite Notre Dame monastery on New Year's Eve.

Someone spray-painted "Killer," "KKK," "666," "Go away" and "Leave" on the figures. They wrote an obscene message in snow at the base of one statue and stole an American flag.

"It breaks our heart," Sister Mary Valerie said Monday. She is one of a half-dozen priests and nuns who moved into the monastery on the 65-acre site near Marengo last August.

But please notice the downplaying of the incident – whereas if this had been a mosque or synagogue we would be reading about FBI involvement and probable hate crime charges. The same would be true if such vandalism happened at a black church

Bu since this is only an assault on white Christians, I guess it just doesn’t merit such serious treatment.

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Police are investigating this act of vandalism against a controversial Catholic religious community.

A religious order's plans to build a community in rural McHenry County were greeted with heated opposition from neighbors before approval was granted last summer.

But even they were shocked by what vandals did to statues of Jesus Christ and the Virgin Mary at the Fraternite Notre Dame monastery on New Year's Eve.

Someone spray-painted "Killer," "KKK," "666," "Go away" and "Leave" on the figures. They wrote an obscene message in snow at the base of one statue and stole an American flag.

"It breaks our heart," Sister Mary Valerie said Monday. She is one of a half-dozen priests and nuns who moved into the monastery on the 65-acre site near Marengo last August.

But please notice the downplaying of the incident – whereas if this had been a mosque or synagogue we would be reading about FBI involvement and probable hate crime charges. The same would be true if such vandalism happened at a black church

Bu since this is only an assault on white Christians, I guess it just doesnÂ’t merit such serious treatment.

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Are we Western infidels supposed to close our eyes while young girls are beaten and abused to force them into unwanted arranged marriages?

DERBY, England -- Lina, a wide-eyed 18-year-old, is still trying to get the hang of freedom in 3-inch heels.

Until a month ago, Lina had never worn Western clothing. Her parents, immigrants from Pakistan, insisted she wear the jilbab, a head-to-toe covering favored by conservative Muslims.

When she turned 16, her parents informed her that she was "engaged" to her first cousin, a 21-year-old man she detested. When she balked, she said, her parents withdrew her from school and locked her in her room, where they told her she would remain until she consented.

"They put two padlocks on the door and they locked the windows," she said. They also installed spikes along the top of the backyard fence so she couldn't climb over.

Lina's imprisonment lasted nearly two years. The only time she was allowed out of her room was to do housework. There were frequent beatings, she said, and endless mental cruelties.

"My mom threatened me with a knife. They also cut my hair off."

One day, Lina saw an article in a women's magazine about a shelter in Derby for women who were victims of forced marriage. She called, and Jasvinder Sanghera, who runs the shelter, helped her plan an escape.

Lina's story is not unusual. Each year, hundreds of South Asian women living in Britain are forced into marriages. It is a growing problem that authorities have only recently begun to tackle.

This is not new, and happens all the time in the United States. I remember a classmate in college, an attractive Muslim girl who was born and raised in this country, facing a similar situation. After semester break, she simply did not come back to school. Some months later I ran into her again, working as a desk clerk at a local motel. She told me that her family had taken her to visit her father’s brother in Central America. She though nothing of allowing her father to carry her passport and tickets, and he always handled the money. When she arrived at the family home, she was informed that it was agreed she would marry her cousin and stay behind. When she refused, she was marooned by her parents in a foreign country with instructions to marry her cousin if she wished to ever see the United States again. Fortunately, the American Embassy was able to help her get home – but her parent’s refusal to allow her to retrieve any belongings from the house meant she had to drop out of school and take the hotel job.

There must be some way to stop such traffic in unwilling brides – in the western world, if not in countries where such barbaric customs remain.

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Imagine losing your spouse, only to be told that you will have no say in the final disposal of the remains because of an alleged religious conversion.

Imagine legal action being taken by a religious court to force teh burial of you spous's body according to the rites of that other religion -- and not being permitted to testify because you are not of that faith.

Imagine the civil courts declaring themselves powerless to intervene and provide you with the opportunity to present evidence that there was no conversion.

The widow of Malaysian mountaineer M. Moorthy lived exactly that horrific scenario this week.

A Malaysian mountaineering hero will be buried as a Muslim, against the wishes of his Hindu wife, who denied he had converted to Islam before his death.

The decision follows a High Court ruling that it cannot override the country's Islamic courts in matters of religious conversion.

An Islamic court had said the man, M Moorthy, had become a Muslim last year.

Lawyers say the case highlights problems faced by non-Muslims dealing with Malaysia's Islamic justice system.

"So much for good interracial relations," Haris Mohamad Ibrahim, a lawyer representing Malaysia's Bar Council, told The Associated Press.

"The judge has just told the widow and her family to go back and leave the body of their beloved to be buried by strangers."

Moorthy's brother and some of his former army colleagues claimed that he had convertedlast year. But only two months ago, he gave an interview about his preparations for the Hindu religious festival of Diwali. The family was forbidden from providing testimony or evidence before the Sharia court, rendering the proceeding nothing more than a barbaric farce (not that Sharia courts are capable of being other than a barbaric farce). And the civil courts provided no due process or source of redress for the Hindu family.

In dismissing the application by MoorthyÂ’s widow, S. Kaliammal, Raus noted that the main issue brought before him was whether Moorthy had converted to Islam or was still a Hindu.

"The civil court has no jurisdiction to review the Syariah High Court decision," he told a packed courtroom.

Raus also said although there were affidavits filed by Kaliammal, her brother and a friend stating that Moorthy participated in Hindu rituals, the question of jurisdiction to decide the matter still lay with the Syariah court and not the civil court.

For this reason, he said, he could only grant one relief sought by the widow — that she was the deceased’s lawful wife until the time of his death on Dec 20.

Kaliammal, in her originating summons filed on Wednesday, sought a declaration that Moorthy was a Hindu and followed Hindu rituals, a declaration Moorthy was not a Muslim, and a declaration that documents proving MoorthyÂ’s conversion were null and void.

After the judge handed down his decision, M. Manoharan, lawyer for the widow, applied unsuccessfully for a stay of execution for them to appeal to the Court of Appeal.

In other words, the Sharia court had full and unreviewable authority to steal the body over the objections of the family based upon claims of a conversion that not even his Muslim brother claims to have been aware of until after Moorthy's death.

The body was then seized and buried according to Muslim rights, with the Hindu family not attending the funeral which was an affront to their faith and basic decency.

MORE AT: Maobi, Reduced and Recycled, Rajan Rishyakaran, KTemoc Konsiders, Retake Constantinople, Politics 101 Malaysia, Mental Block, Daniel Pipes, The Enemy Is You.

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Muslims demand the right to preach their faith and convert Christians to it. On the other hand, they consider efforts by Christians to convert Muslims -- and the conversion of Muslims to other faiths -- a crime worthy of death. That's why one of the most important books of the last decade has been banned in Muslim countries -- and in some countries with substantial Muslim minorities.

Can you name the book which has the Islamic world in an uproar, and caused the United States government to deny any involvement with it? The book banned in the worldÂ’s most populous democracy? No, not Salman RushdieÂ’s The Satanic Verses, a cause celebre among the literati. The book in question is published by evangelical Christian Arabs, and the American media couldnÂ’t care less about it.

Islam considers apostasy a crime punishable by death. It is very easy indeed to convert to Islam, but once the requisite phrases have been uttered, exit is not permitted. While Muslims are free to proselytize in most of the world, most Islamic countries refuse to allow Christian evangelists, or evangelists for any other faith for that matter, to operate freely. Severe criminal penalties exist in some states like Saudi Arabia, for inducing a Muslim to leave the faith.

There has never been an adequate translation of the Bible into classical Arabic. Such translations as exist are subject to ridicule by those trained in the poetry of the Quran, which is the standard used to define classical Arabic.

Nevertheless, there are Christian evangelists who wish to bring their religion and the teachings of Christ to Muslims. In 1999, two pseudonymous Arab Christian authors produced a book, The True Furqan (Furqan is another word for Quran), written in classical Arabic, intended as a tool to evangelize Arabs in particular, and Muslims in general. It is written in the style of the Quran, as a series of poetic verses, and contains Arabic verses and an English translation, side by side. But it brings the message of ChristianityÂ’s Good News.

To appease its resident Islamists, India banned The True Furqan in September.

Custom Non-Tariff Notification

No: 78/ NT (07-Sep-05) Govt prohibits import of book titled ‘The True Furqan’, subtitled ‘The 21st Century Quran’ published by USA-based publisher

The Central Government, for the maintenance of security of India, absolutely prohibits import of the book entitled “The True Furqan”, subtitled “The 21st Century Quran” published in the United States of America by Omega, 2000 and Wine Press, including any extract there from, any reprint or translation thereof or any document reproducing any matter contained therein.

Interestingly enough, this decree could be seen as banning the Bible, as much of The True Furqan is quotes from Scripture.

I encourage readers to look at the text of the book at the link above, and to pass it on to Muslim friends.

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1 And it came to pass in those days that a decree went out from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be registered.
2 This census first took place while Quirinius was governing Syria.
3 So all went to be registered, everyone to his own city.

4 Joseph also went up from Galilee, out of the city of Nazareth, into Judea, to the city of David, which is called Bethlehem, because he was of the house and lineage of David,
5 to be registered with Mary, his betrothed wife, who was with child.
6 So it was, that while they were there, the days were completed for her to be delivered.
7 And she brought forth her firstborn Son, and wrapped Him in swaddling cloths, and laid Him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn.
Glory in the Highest

8 Now there were in the same country shepherds living out in the fields, keeping watch over their flock by night.
9 And behold, an angel of the Lord stood before them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were greatly afraid.
10 Then the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid, for behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy which will be to all people.
11 For there is born to you this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord.
12 And this will be the sign to you: You will find a Babe wrapped in swaddling cloths, lying in a manger.”

13 And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God and saying:

14 “ Glory to God in the highest,
And on earth peace, goodwill toward men!

15 So it was, when the angels had gone away from them into heaven, that the shepherds said to one another, “Let us now go to Bethlehem and see this thing that has come to pass, which the Lord has made known to us.”
16 And they came with haste and found Mary and Joseph, and the Babe lying in a manger.
17 Now when they had seen Him, they made widely known the saying which was told them concerning this Child.
18 And all those who heard it marveled at those things which were told them by the shepherds.
19 But Mary kept all these things and pondered them in her heart. 20 Then the shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all the things that they had heard and seen, as it was told them.

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In the 5199th year of the creation of the world, from the time when in the beginning God created heaven and earth;
from the flood, the 2957th year;
from the birth of Abraham, the 2015th year;
from Moses and the going-out of the people of Israel from Egypt, the 1510th;
from the anointing of David as king, the 1032nd year;
in the 65th week according to the prophecy of Daniel;
in the 194th Olympiad;
from the founding of the city of Rome, the 752nd year;
in the 42nd year of the rule of Octavian Augustus,
when the whole world was at peace,
in the sixth age of the world:
Jesus Christ, the eternal God and Son of the eternal Father,
desiring to sanctify the world by His most merciful coming,
having been conceived by the Holy Ghost,
and nine months having passed since His conception
was born in Bethlehem of Judea of the Virgin Mary,
having become man.

The Nativity of our Lord Jesus Christ according to the flesh.

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Confederate Yankee discovered this Christmas outrage while seeking an image for a Christmas post using Google. Guess what came up when he entered the words "baby jesus".

Notice that the top search result is for a sex toy that mocks Jesus.

Other results on this search results page have more link traffic. A quick review of page's code shows no HTML meta information that should give it a favorable ranking. The page itself has a raw relevance ranking (search word divided by total words) of less than five percent. The only conclusion I can draw is that this page position ranking was done manually by a Google staffer.

And who says there is not a war on Christmas and Christianity?

MORE AT: Wizbang, Verum Serum

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After all, we canÂ’t allow a city festival to be hijacked by Christians mentioning Jesus Christ, can we? Folks might be offended.

At the city's annual holiday celebration, a rabbi lighted a menorah. A dance troupe performed a traditional prayer to the gods.

But six young girls were told they they couldn't perform because they were wearing shirts emblazoned with a silver cross and the words "Jesus Christ" on the front.

The "Jesus Christ Dancers," a group of 8-to-12-year-olds who describe themselves as Christian hip-hop dancers, were scheduled to make their citywide debut at the Dec. 3 holiday festival.

Moments before taking the stage, employees from the city's Parks and Recreation Department barred them from performing, saying they did not want to convey a religious message in the show.

According to the group's dance instructor, Lita Ramirez, the dancers was asked to turn their shirts inside out. The group was also asked if its music had a religious message.

"I told him our music says 'You are my God' and 'We will worship You,'" Ramirez said. "I also said I think it mentions Jesus."

So letÂ’s make it clear what the rules are in this country where most folks are (at least nominally) Christian.

Rabbis lighting menorahs – OK.

Prayer to pagan gods – Acceptable.

Hip-hop music with Christian themes and shirts that mention Jesus – Absolutely not.

After all, it isnÂ’t like Christmas is His birthday.

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What else are observers to make of the statements of Jim Wallis and his supporters, given the conflicting statements of organizers of yesterdays protest rally in Washington.

Jim Wallis makes it clear that the rally is based upon their religious faith, to protest a budget that their understanding of Christianity views as immoral.

The group's founder, Jim Wallis, called the event "a revival," adding that, "We're here because of Jesus, because of our faith." The group complained that the federal budget is "immoral" because it cuts spending on social programs.

Not, of course, that they are willing to come out and honestly admit that they want the budget to reflect their religious values.

But when asked by Cybercast News Service whether he was urging the government to promote Judeo-Christian values, Rivera said he was not. "What we're saying is that ... whether you have a religious tradition like many people here do, or just come out of a human tradition, we don't think the country should balance its budget on the back of its most vulnerable citizens."

Rivera said his group believes that "budgets reflect your priorities and church people from all over the country ... are here with their leadership asking that this budget not be passed."

He said tax cuts should be rolled back and that spending billions of dollars on the war in Iraq "while cutting food stamps ... doesn't really reflect moral priorities."

So when it comes down to it, they are not willing to admit that what they want is THEIR interpretation of Scripture codified in the budget. After all, that would be (in the current parlance of the Left) the establishment of a theocracy – so they have to deny their religious motivations.

I think that is called “bearing false witness”.

UPDATE: Bob Ellis of Dakota Voice has a great piece on this issue.

UPDATE 2: I hadnÂ’t seen this article about the different issues taken up by the religious right and religious left. It makes me question the Christian witness of Jim Wallis even more.

"It's not a question of the poor not being important or that meeting their needs is not important," said Paul Hetrick, a spokesman for Focus on the Family, Dobson's influential, Colorado-based Christian organization. "But whether or not a baby is killed in the seventh or eighth month of pregnancy, that is less important than help for the poor? We would respectfully disagree with that."

Jim Wallis, editor of the liberal Christian journal Sojourners and an organizer of today's protest, was not buying it. Such conservative religious leaders "have agreed to support cutting food stamps for poor people if Republicans support them on judicial nominees," he said. "They are trading the lives of poor people for their agenda. They're being, and this is the worst insult, unbiblical."

What Wallis misses, though, is that it is the very conservative Christians he is bashing who do a great deal of the “leg-work” to help the poor through private programs. One can legitimately question the balance of public vs. private involvement in helping the poor without being unbiblical. Indeed, I would argue that it is more biblical to support charitable private action on behalf of the poor than it is to call for mandated involuntary giving through increased taxes, spending, and transfer payments. Indeed, Wallis and his ilk are calling upon government to replace and assume the role of the Church – on the very theocratic model of Old Testament Israel that the Left in this country claims to reject.

Indeed, Wallis has to come up with his own personal translation of Isaiah 10:1-2 in order to even find a biblical leg to stand on.

"Woe to you legislators of infamous laws . . . who refuse justice to the unfortunate, who cheat the poor among my people of their rights, who make widows their prey and rob the orphan."

The verses are more commonly translated differently – and the closest thing I could find is the following from the New American Bible.

1 Woe to those who enact unjust statutes and who write oppressive decrees,

2 Depriving the needy of judgment and robbing my people's poor of their rights, Making widows their plunder, and orphans their prey!

But even if you accept the Wallis translation, you would first have to determine that the statutes are “unjust” (does one have, as a matter of justice, a right to the fruits of the labor of others?). Furthermore, you would have to get around the niggling little detail that the second verse is, based upon the original source, dealing with issues of failing to protect the rights of the poor, widows, and orphans in courts, not in terms of legislation. Wallis, I daresay, is clearly reading in to the text what he wants there rather than reading out of it what is there – a clear failure for one who wants to be taken seriously as a judge of what views are “unbiblical”.

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CanÂ’t the dispute between rival groups be resolved so that this Christian treasure can be restored and safe-guarded for the ages?

If pilgrims worshipping in the Church of the Nativity look up at the roof, they will see a battlefield threatening the future of one of Christendom's most holy sites.

Squabbling over crucial roof repairs between the three Christian communities who share custodianship of Jesus's birthplace is endangering the 1,500-year-old basilica.

Large holes in the 500-year-old lead roof have let rainwater flood inside for years. It streams down the walls and threatens to wash away Crusader-era murals and destroy Byzantine mosaics.

A botched repair by the Greeks, in which the roof was given a waterproof lining, has created new problems as condensation now eats into the plaster and rots wooden beams.

The most authoritative survey for decades found that the wood was so badly damaged that a large truss was only being prevented from crashing to the floor by friction.

But while the three communities accept that repairs are needed, mutual suspicion means they cannot agree on how to carry them out.

The impasse means that each year the winter rains destroy more of the church's once magnificent interior.

The situation is a true scandal, in my opinion, an abrogation of the notion of Christian brotherhood, with monks and priests of different Christian sects playing politics over one of Christianity’s holiest spots – the church marking the traditional spot of the birth of Jesus Christ. If anything, the words of one priest and scholar understate the disgracefulness of the neglect of the church.

Fr Michele Piccirillo, a Catholic priest and archaeological expert, said: "The Church of The Nativity should be a symbol of what we are as Christians, not a symbol of disunity and disagreement. The condition of the roof is unbelievably bad and it must be settled not just for the benefit of the church but for all Christianity.'' The church is venerated as one of the oldest continuously used Christian places of worship, surviving earthquakes, floods and military occupations.

Not only does the roof need to be repaired for the benefit of all Christians, it needs to be repaired for the benefit of all humanity. Like the Buddhas destroyed by the Taliban, the Church of the Nativity belongs to the heritage of all people, regardless of their religion. That those charged with caring for it have allowed the structure to fall into monumental disrepair boggles the mind.

From this blogger’s standpoint, the best thing that could happen would be for the care of the structure to be removed from the control of all the groups involved – and to have the Israeli government effect the repair of this cultural treasure which holds an important spot in its tourism industry.

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I guess they thought that the family that slays together stays together.

A FATHER who ordered his two teenage sons to murder a British university student in a so-called "honour killing" because the victim had made the man's daughter pregnant, was jailed for 20 years today.

The sons of Chomir Ali, aged 15 and 19 at the time of the murder were sentenced to minimum terms of 14 and 16 years respectively for killing Oxford Brookes University student Arash Ghorbani-Zarin.

The 19-year old Ghorbani-Zarin was found dead with 46 stab wounds in the front seat a car in Rosehill, Oxford on November 20, 2004.

All four were Muslims. Ali and his sons were of Bangladeshi origin while Ghorbani-Zarin was a British Iranian.

Judge Mr Justice Gross, sitting at London's High Court, sentenced Ali, 44, and his sons to life prison terms for what he described as a "cold blooded intentional killing".

Setting the individual minimum tariffs for all three, he said: "Far from vindicating your family's honour, you have permanently dishonoured your family with the stain of murder."

I can understand wanting to kill the guy who knocked up your daughter, but carrying it out is a bit extreme. Claiming that it restored your family honor is even worse.

And then, it appears, the daughter was coerced into aborting the pregnancy. No doubt the threat of her death was used by her father to get her to kill the unwanted grandchild.

I guess that is just Islamist family values at work.

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And yet we continue to welcome such folks in the Western world.

THE eldest of four Pakistani gang rapist brothers has admitted lying at trial and apologised to his victims but said he thought he had a right to rape the "promiscuous" teenage girls.

MSK, 27, told the NSW Supreme Court yesterday that this was because the girls did not wear headscarves, were drinking alcohol and were unaccompanied when they went to his Ashfield home. MSK also blamed his intoxication, "cultural beliefs" and an undiagnosed mental disorder.

Lock him away for as long as you can -- he is clearly too dangerous to ever return to society.

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The secularist war against Christmas continues.

Our first report is from the Tennessee front.

According to a statement from ADF, the controversy arose when Brandi Chambless, a member of the music ministry at Broadmoor Memphis Church, submitted an announcement for display on the library's community shelves regarding the church's upcoming Christmas show. Library officials accepted the announcement but told Chambless that she would have to remove the "inappropriate" figures of the baby Jesus, Joseph, Mary, and the wise men from an accompanying nativity scene and limit it to farm animals alone.

"Now we've got a bunch of barnyard animals in our display. We've got a sheep, a goat, a cow," Chambless said last night on the Fox News Channel's "O'Reilly Factor." "We just think it's the most ridiculous thing."

Secularist forces scored two victories against pro-Christmas forces in Washington State public schools.

Two suburban school districts have had to do some backtracking over holiday religious issues, one for lunch menus with the words "Merry Christmas" and the other for a "giving tree."

In Federal Way, between Seattle and Tacoma, December lunch menus for all 23 elementary schools were recalled and reprinted with the words "Happy Holidays" at a cost of $494 after a new nutrition services employee mistakenly prepared them with the greeting "Merry Christmas," spokeswoman Diane Turner said.

The 11,500 misworded calendar-style menus were never distributed and were recycled, Turner added.

Using "Merry Christmas" on the menus violated school system policies because "it has a religious connotation for some people," Turner said.

"Our objective is to provide information to the diversity of the people that we have in our district," she said. "We try to respect each individuals point of view."

In tony Medina, east of Lake Washington, a Christmas-style tree bearing mittens labeled with gift ideas was up for about a week at Medina Elementary School before it was removed, office manager Chris Metzger said.

The idea was for pupils to take a mitten, get the listed gift, wrap it and bring it to school to be given to someone at Lake Hills Elementary School in a less well-off section of neighboring Bellevue.

Some parents had put up the spiral, lighted tree with a star at the top, but it was removed Monday after another parent complained that it had religious connotations, Metzger said. The mittens were transferred to a counter in the office so the gift program could continue.

"We covered the star and called it a giving tree. We hoped it would suffice, but it didn't," Metzger said. "Now we just have a giving counter."

Young children were saved from the the mention of the C-word on a school menu and the presence of a seasonal symbol that has been rled secular by the courts.

I'm curious -- how much more of this insanity will the 90% of Americans who mark Christmas take before fighting back against the forces of anti-Christian secularism?

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Am I the only one who thinks this sounds more like a case of fraud than a case of assault?

A college professor whose planned course on creationism and intelligent design was canceled after he derided Christian conservatives said he was beaten by two men along a rural road early Monday.

University of Kansas religious studies professor Paul Mirecki said the men referred to the class when they beat him on the head, shoulders and back with their fists, and possibly a metal object, the Lawrence Journal-World reported.

"I didn't know them," Mirecki said of his assailants, "but I'm sure they knew me."
Messages left by the Associated Press on Mirecki's cell phone were not immediately returned.

Sheriff's Lt. Kari Wempe said Mirecki reported the attack just before 7 a.m.

The professor said he confronted the men after they were tailgating his vehicle along a road south of Lawrence. "I'm mostly shaken up, and I got some bruises and sore spots," he said.

Now tell me, how many folks stop their vehicles and get out in order to confront a tailgater? Very few – and none with even a modicum of common sense. You make way for them to pass – and call the police if their behavior is particularly outrageous.

No, this sounds like an ersatz “hate crime” designed to discredit Mirecki’s critics and bolster his own standing at a time when he is under fire from all sides.

UPDATE: Looks like I may not be alone inhaving some doubts about this case. Michelle Malkin has some documents related to the case and a few observations. Also commenting are Brainster's Blog, Sean Gleeson, The Moderate Voice, Classical Values, Telic Thoughts, Doc Rampage, Total Drek, Tony's Kansas City

UPDATE -- 12/10/05: More at Hennessy's View (four, in fact) and Michelle Malkin.

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IÂ’d love to find out more about this case, which seems to recognize that the religious freedom guaranteed in the Constitution is at least as important as statutory non-discrimination provisions protecting homosexuals.

A United States appeal court has backed two fertility doctors who refused to treat a lesbian patient because it would have violated their religious beliefs.

The woman, Guadalupe Benitez, sued the doctors after she was turned down for artificial insemination in 1999. She claimed that on her first visit to the women's clinic in a suburb of San Diego, California, one of the doctors, Christine Brody, told her that she would not perform the procedure on a lesbian because of her faith.

She was initially told that another doctor at the clinic would perform the procedure but after nearly a year of being put off, Ms Benitez alleges that Dr Brody told her nobody in the four-person clinic would treat her. The other doctor named in the suit is Douglas Fenton.

The appeal court ruling allows the doctors to use religious liberty as a defence in the anti-discrimination lawsuit. The decision overturned a lower court ruling.
The case has been closely watched across the US - testing as it does the overlapping rights of the increasingly political religious community and the gay community. The California Medical Association and the Christian Medical and Dental Association joined in the doctors' defence.

Now I do have some qualms here.

First, I do not like the way in which the Ms. Benitez was seemingly strung along. The practice should have been up-front about their position on the issue.

Second, I assume that the decision limits the right to refuse treatment to only elective procedures or non-critical treatments. There is a moral duty to protect life that would certainly override any religiously based preference to avoid treating individuals whose lifestyle contradicts one's beliefs.

But the broader point – that professionals do not surrender their rights under the First Amendment by accepting a license to engage in their profession – is an important one.

HERE'S MORE: From How Appealing.

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Thomas E. Dennely hits a homerun with his piece in todayÂ’s Newsday about the ACLU and Christmas.

As the holiday season gets into full swing - and as sure as the sun rises in the east - the American Civil Liberties Union will soon appear on the scene to remind Americans that there should be no display of religious symbols on public property, for to do so is a violation of the separation of church and state.

Presumably believing that the ACLU is the self-appointed guardian of religious freedom within our nation, it sees no inconsistency when the same ACLU legally supports the members of the American Nazi Party and the Ku Klux Klan in using public property to spew their venom. This graphic inconsistency should blow one's mind. It is thoroughly repugnant when the ACLU legally supports such hate mongers in their use of public property, while legally opposing both Christians and Jews doing likewise with Christmas and the Festival of Lights, for example.

Dennely then goes on to point to the many ways in which the very Founders that the ACLU claims would approve their actions took a strikingly different position on the issue of “separation of church and state”. I strongly encourage you to read his column.

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Even the passing on of the Christian faith to children is an offense to the Islamists.

Approximately 30 Christian children fled in panic after a mob of Islamic militants raided and vandalized their Sunday school class, which was being held in a private home last weekend in Curug, Indonesia, according to a Christian group called Voice of the Martyrs (VOM).

The violence came less than a month after three teenaged Christian schoolgirls were attacked and beheaded as they walked through a cocoa plantation on their way to school. One girl's severed head was reportedly placed in front of a church, eight miles from where the bodies were found, in what locals viewed as a stark warning to Christians.

VOM reported that in the most recent incident, the mob "terrorized" the children at the Curug Sunday school class and destroyed several desks and chairs, guitars, a keyboard, organ and fan in the classroom. Voice of the Martyrs is a Christian organization that documents persecution of believers.

The children began to flee in panic, according to VOM, after which the mob then allegedly evicted the remaining adults and children from the home "by force" and "sealed" it by plastering posters denouncing the school over the doors of the building.

When will the government of Indonesia act to protect the human rights of its Christian citizens?

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Let’s set aside the offensive title of the show -- “Merry F#%$in’ Christmas”.

Can you believe that the Comedy Channel is airing and promoting Denis Leary's blasphemous garbage during one of the two most sacred times of the year for Christians?

“Merry Christmas. Tonight we celebrate the birth of the baby Jesus, whose mom, Mary, just happens to be a virgin—even after she apparently gave birth to Jesus. At least that is what the Catholic Church would have you believe.

“Tom Cruise is taking a lot of s--- for belonging to a religion, Scientology, that believes aliens came to this planet 75 million years ago. That is nothing. I was raised Catholic. We believe Mary was a virgin and Jesus ended up walking on water, creating a bottomless jug of wine and rising from the dead. Oh, yeah, and Tom Cruise is crazy.

“Listen, Christmas is built on a line of bulls---. Do I believe there was a baby Jesus? You bet your ass I do. But I believe that nine months before he was born someone sure as s--- banged the hell out of his mom.”

Ask yourself a simple question – would any media outlet air such vile crap about Judaism, Islam, Buddhism, or Hinduism and the core beliefs of any of those faiths at any time of the year – much less during a period that is particularly sacred to the faith in question? I think we all know the answer, hence the absence of Jerry Seinfeld’s “Happy F#%$in’ Passover” or similar “holiday” specials.

Do I believe this idiot has the legal right to say such things? Yes, I do -- just like the Klan and the Nazis have every right to spread their preferred brand of hatred, so do Leary and the Comedy Channel. I do not support government action to punish this speech which I despise.

Do I believe there should be consequences for such rabid anti-Christian blasphemy? Yes, I do – in the form of the destruction of Denis Leary’s career and of the Comedy Channel's economic viability. We believers can make both happen if we are prepared to stand up and flex our economic muscles to support our faith.

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From Jeff Jacoby’s latest column.

''We're trying to be inclusive," says the Boston parks commissioner, explaining why the white spruce that was sent from Nova Scotia under a giant banner reading ''Merry Christmas, Boston" became a ''holiday tree" on her department's website. But suppressing the language, symbols, or customs of Christians in a predominantly Christian society is not inclusive. It's insulting.

It's discriminatory, too. Hanukkah menorahs are never referred to as ''holiday lamps" -- not even the giant menorahs erected in Boston Common and many other public venues each year by Chabad, the Hasidic Jewish outreach movement. No one worries that calling the Muslim holy month of Ramadan by its name -- or even celebrating it officially, as the White House does with an annual ''iftaar" dinner -- might be insensitive to non-Muslims. In this tolerant and open-hearted nation, religious minorities are not expected to keep their beliefs out of sight or to squelch their traditions lest someone, somewhere, take offense. Surely the religious majority shouldn't be expected to either.

As a practicing Jew, I don't celebrate Christmas. There is no Christmas tree in my home, my kids don't write letters to Santa Claus, and I don't attend church on Dec. 25 (or any other date). Does the knowledge that scores of millions of my fellow Americans do all those things make me feel excluded or offended? On the contrary: It makes me feel grateful -- to live in a land where freedom of religion shelters the Hanukkah menorah in my window no less than the Christmas tree in my neighbor's. That freedom is a reflection of America's Judeo-Christian culture, and a principal reason why, in this overwhelmingly Christian country, it isn't only Christians for whom Christmas is a season of joy. And why it isn't only Christians who should make a point of saying so.

Quite correct – the public marking of the Christmas holiday is not discriminatory. Rather, it is demands to mask its celebration in euphemisms that threaten to ultimately destroy religious freedom in America. After all, if the beliefs of the majority must yield to the voices of a few hyper-sensitive individuals demanding "inclusion", how much longer until thoe same restrictions fall upon the practitioners of minority faiths?

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From Jeff JacobyÂ’s latest column.

''We're trying to be inclusive," says the Boston parks commissioner, explaining why the white spruce that was sent from Nova Scotia under a giant banner reading ''Merry Christmas, Boston" became a ''holiday tree" on her department's website. But suppressing the language, symbols, or customs of Christians in a predominantly Christian society is not inclusive. It's insulting.

It's discriminatory, too. Hanukkah menorahs are never referred to as ''holiday lamps" -- not even the giant menorahs erected in Boston Common and many other public venues each year by Chabad, the Hasidic Jewish outreach movement. No one worries that calling the Muslim holy month of Ramadan by its name -- or even celebrating it officially, as the White House does with an annual ''iftaar" dinner -- might be insensitive to non-Muslims. In this tolerant and open-hearted nation, religious minorities are not expected to keep their beliefs out of sight or to squelch their traditions lest someone, somewhere, take offense. Surely the religious majority shouldn't be expected to either.

As a practicing Jew, I don't celebrate Christmas. There is no Christmas tree in my home, my kids don't write letters to Santa Claus, and I don't attend church on Dec. 25 (or any other date). Does the knowledge that scores of millions of my fellow Americans do all those things make me feel excluded or offended? On the contrary: It makes me feel grateful -- to live in a land where freedom of religion shelters the Hanukkah menorah in my window no less than the Christmas tree in my neighbor's. That freedom is a reflection of America's Judeo-Christian culture, and a principal reason why, in this overwhelmingly Christian country, it isn't only Christians for whom Christmas is a season of joy. And why it isn't only Christians who should make a point of saying so.

Quite correct – the public marking of the Christmas holiday is not discriminatory. Rather, it is demands to mask its celebration in euphemisms that threaten to ultimately destroy religious freedom in America. After all, if the beliefs of the majority must yield to the voices of a few hyper-sensitive individuals demanding "inclusion", how much longer until thoe same restrictions fall upon the practitioners of minority faiths?

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Once upon a time, Great Britain was a Christian country.

Today it seems that it has become simply one more province of Eurabia.

After all, why else would a case like this ever come to pass?

An eye specialist has accepted undisclosed damages after claiming that he was forced out of his job by Muslim colleagues.

Joseph Erian took the United Lincolnshire Hospitals Trust to an employment tribunal, stating that he was made to resign from the ophthalmology department of Pilgrim Hospital, Boston, after staff there discovered that he was a Christian. The tribunal, which started earlier this month, ended when the trust offered an out-of-court settlement and admitted that the problems surrounding Dr Erian’s case “were not his fault”.

And lest you think this was not really a case of the hospital conceding guilt, consider this.

United Lincolnshire Hospitals NHS Trust initially denied all the allegations. But the tribunal was halted when the TrustÂ’s lawyers agreed to pay undisclosed damages.

In other words, they saw that they were losing.

You might ask how he was forced to resign. It turned out that a short time after Dr. Erian's colleagues discovered that he was a Coptic Christian from Egypt, his job was suddenly and without warning advertised as being available. What's more, at least two other physicians from the same hospital are pursuing cases against it.

Dr. Erian's case is only the sixth successful one brought in the UK under the religious discrimination statute.

MORE AT: Western Resistance

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Liberals used to support the right of people to say that which is unpopular. Now they try to shut down speech with which they disagree. So it comes as a real surprise that Ake Green was found not guilty of violating hate speech laws in Sweden for preaching a very traditional sermon about homosexuality.

Sweden's highest court on Tuesday acquitted a Pentecostal pastor accused of hate speech for having denounced homosexuality as a "cancerous tumor" in a sermon.

Ake Green's contentious sermon in 2003 was protected by freedom of speech and religion under the European Convention on Human Rights, the Supreme Court said in a 16-page ruling.

Green, 64, became the first clergyman convicted under Sweden's hate crimes legislation, when a lower court found him guilty of inciting hatred against homosexuals. An appeals court overturned the ruling earlier this year, but Sweden's chief prosecutor appealed the acquittal to the Supreme Court.

Green said the Supreme Court ruling was a relief both for him other preachers.
Sweden's highest court on Tuesday acquitted a Pentecostal pastor accused of hate speech for having denounced homosexuality as a "cancerous tumor" in a sermon.

Ake Green's contentious sermon in 2003 was protected by freedom of speech and religion under the European Convention on Human Rights, the Supreme Court said in a 16-page ruling.

Green, 64, became the first clergyman convicted under Sweden's hate crimes legislation, when a lower court found him guilty of inciting hatred against homosexuals. An appeals court overturned the ruling earlier this year, but Sweden's chief prosecutor appealed the acquittal to the Supreme Court.

Green said the Supreme Court ruling was a relief both for him other preachers.
The trial ended earlier this month, but the verdict was not issued until Tuesday.

The decision cited European human rights laws to uphold the right to preach the Gospel unmolested by government interference.

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Absolutely unbelievable! Cultural sensitivity for the foreigners among us -- but none for the majority of Americans!

Look at this sign in Lowes in Austin, Texas (the official loony liberal reservation here in the Lone Star State)

As the battle over Christmas continues across America this year, consumers are taking notice for themselves.

In Austin, Texas, for instance, a banner was displayed this weekend at a new Lowe's home-improvement store.

In English, the sign reads: "Now Here! Fresh Cut Holiday Trees."

But in Spanish, the sign reads: "Now Here! Fresh Cut Christmas Trees."

"It's OK to offend all the English-speaking Christians, but no, not the Spanish speakers. They may be just visiting," a WorldNetDaily reader in Austin said.

"By the way," the reader noted, "they only had 'Christmas' tree stands for their fresh cut 'Holiday' trees. P.S. Merry Christmas."

But even up in the Dallas area, there are still those out to suppress any possible hint of what the major December holiday celebration is in this country.

"Attorneys with the Alliance Defense Fund and Liberty Legal Institute filed a federal civil rights lawsuit today against the Plano Independent School District for a discriminatory policy that censors the Christmas religious expression of students and their parents."

With that, all believers cheer forth a holy AMEN.

"Christmas colors, school officials have prohibited students from exchanging candy canes and pencils with religious messages on them, using reindeer symbols, or writing ‘Merry Christmas’ on greeting cards to U.S. soldiers because the phrase might ‘offend someone.’ The district has even applied its policy to parents involved in school activities, barring them from exchanging ‘religious’ Christmas items with other parents."

This surely will bring much protest from the Bible belt Texans. Particularly the Baptists should rise up en masse, sending those school "educators" a truck load of Merry, Blessed Christmas cards, all pictured with baby Jesus and prayers for repentance on the part of those who are into devilment decision making.

"’The district’s policy is what is offensive. It is offensive to the 96 percent of Americans who celebrate Christmas,’ McCaleb said. ‘If the district truly wants to avoid offending someone, then they will change their incredibly restrictive and unconstitutional policy.

"’The U.S. Supreme Court has never ruled that public schools must prohibit the distribution of candy canes or Christmas cards. They have never ruled that you can’t say ‘Merry Christmas’ in the public schools. These attempts to stifle all religious expression and sanitize Christmas of all religious content are tiring to the overwhelming majority of Texans and all Americans.’"

That we have to resort to litigation to recognize the cultural traditions of the majority is an absurdity and an obscenity. I'm all for protecting the rights of the minority -- but when will the rights of the overwhelming majority be given anything akin to equal respect?

UPDATE: Christmas wins!

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1 It's fun to see the right get all shook up about how persecuted they are. Happy Holidays, and Season's Greetings!

Posted by: Dan at Mon Nov 28 16:57:14 2005 (aSKj6)

2 About the Spanish sign: There is NO other way in Spanish to name a Christmas tree but one: Christmas tree, árbol de Navidad. So, if there's no other way to name such thing in Spanish, that means we're vaccinated against anti-Christian trash from start, I guess. Down here in Mexico everybody in society, the media etc., are talking about Christmas, Navidad, not holidays or what-have-you, mainly, because there is no other form of naming the Celebration of the Birth of Our Lord. I think we are lucky ¡Feliz Navidad! Merry Christmas to you all!

Posted by: Miguel at Mon Nov 28 22:10:24 2005 (gJztD)

3 Dan -- the only thing that is even liberal/conservative about this issue is the fact that one side is trying to engage in cultural cleansing in the name of protecting the tender feelings of a small minority of Americans.

Would anyone consider banning blue and silver (or blue and white) during the month of december to ensure that no non-Jew was offended by a reference to Haunukah? How quickly would such a ban be challenged as a sign of an anti-Semitic agenda?

And wanna bet that no one is trying to keep black kids from emtnioning Kwanza?

Posted by: Rhymes With Right at Mon Nov 28 23:03:00 2005 (1TCsY)

4 To be more balanced, I agree that the Plano School Board has gone overboard, if the reporting is accurate (never a strong point for anything involving the Alliance Defense Fund, whose motto is "Christianity except for that nonsense about bearing false witness"). But two mistakes, (one not involving any state action) coming from one of the most screwed-up state in the union, doesn't justify the persecution complex being fanned by people like O'Reilly and rest of the "War on Christmas" whiners.

Posted by: Dan at Tue Nov 29 00:22:16 2005 (aSKj6)

5 Most screwed up state in the union?

You'll need to go back and re-red my examples -- neither o one involves California or Massachusetts (the two states that pridefully vie for that title, with Massachusetts currently in the lead). These are Texas cases.

Posted by: Rhymes With Right at Tue Nov 29 12:43:04 2005 (4PJN4)

6 You might have a point with California . . .

Posted by: Dan at Wed Nov 30 04:27:14 2005 (D+DIf)

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The spiritual leader of Ohio's largest mosque has been detained pending deportation for his ties to Islamist terrorist organizations, including raising funds for the groups.

Imam Fawaz Damra, the spiritual leader of Ohio's largest mosque, was convicted in June 2004 of concealing ties to three groups that the U.S. government classifies as terrorist organizations when he applied for U.S. citizenship in 1994.

That conviction was upheld in March, clearing the way for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement to begin deportation proceedings.

Damra, 44, was arrested early Friday without incident, the immigration office said.

"It is clear that this person, Mr. Damra, believed in terrorism, supported terrorism," said Brian Moskowitz, an agent with Immigration and Customs Enforcement's office in Detroit. "This is not a man of peace or a man of God."

Unfortunately, while I agree with the characterization of Imam Damra set forth above, it appears that he is a typical man of Islam, given the fact that his mosque continues to support him.

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Proving once again that he worships his sexual orientation more than he worships God, New Hampshire Episcopal Bishop Gene Robinson spoke out today against the new Vatican document regarding homosexuals and the priesthood. But what he doesn't realize is that his words support the Vatican position more than they refute it.

Robinson said there were probably many Roman Catholics like himself.

"There are plenty of gay men who have faithfully served the Roman Catholic Church, who know themselves to be gay and who are faithful to their vow of celibacy. To exclude them from the ordained ministry is a real mistake," he said.

"It appears that being celibate is not good enough."

Well, Gene, let's unpack that statement.

You cheated on your wife, dumped her and the kids, and took up with your lover, with whom you live in a relationship that you concede is not celibate. You are willing to disregard the Word of God and fracture the Anglican communion for the greater glory of Gene Robinson. That seems to me to be exactly the opposite of what a good priest should be.

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I've been interested in the current hub-bub about the Vatican's position on admitting homosexuals to the presthood. It isn't just because it is an interesting theological or cultural phenomenon. Rather, I am intrigued because of my own experience of having spent four years in a major seminary (graduate school), departing one year short of ordination and eventually marrying a woman I adore. As such, I am familiar with many of the questions involved.

The Vatican is ordering seminaries to bar candidates for the priesthood who "practice homosexuality," have "deeply rooted homosexual tendencies" or support "gay culture," according to a document published Tuesday by Adista, a Catholic news agency in Rome.

The long-awaited instruction to seminary directors was scheduled for official release next week. It has been the subject of numerous leaks that have sparked intense debate and led some Catholic leaders, including the president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, to defend the place of celibate gay priests in the church. But until Tuesday, a full text had not been published.

"The church, while deeply respecting the people in question, cannot admit to the seminary and the sacred orders those who practice homosexuality, present deeply rooted homosexual tendencies or support so-called gay culture," said the five-page document, which a Vatican official said appeared to be the authentic, final version.

***

The document does not call for the removal of gay men who are already serving as priests, and it does not flatly bar the ordination of anyone who has ever acknowledged a same-sex attraction. It says men whose homosexuality is "a transitory problem" may be ordained as deacons -- a key step toward the priesthood -- if they have lived in celibacy for at least three years.

Now let's break this down.

1) There is no place in the semnary or priesthood for those sexually active homosexuals.

2) There is no place in the seminary or priesthood for those with a strong homosexual orientation.

3) There is no place in the seminary or priesthood for those who adopt lifestyle and cultural choices that seek to normalize homosexuality.

4) Those with a homosexual tendency who demnostrate the ability to live a celibate life with integrity may be ordained.

Frankly, I think the document gets it just about right. Two of the points are so basic that I don't think they can even be argued.

The first point is basic common sense. The sexually active have no place in the celibate priesthood.

The third point is equally obvious. Those attached to a philosophy or lifestyle antithetical to the teachings of the Church are not fit candidates to be pastors and teachers. Afte all, they will not be able to uphold Church teachings with integrity.

Point two, regarding theose with a strong orientation, takes a little more thought to understand. It strikes me as being something along the lines of minimizing the possibility of lapses in celibacy. Given that a seminary is an all male community and that a priest often finds himself living in a house with another priest, there are intimate non-sexual relationships that develop between these men. I'll be honest -- such bonds are necessary to preserve one's mental well-being and prevent isolation. But if there is a sexual attraction -- either solitary or mutual -- in such reliolation of celibacy OR will splinter due to the strsses the attraction causes. I have seen both happen, and the results can be tragic for those involved.

The fourth point, though, seems to be teh most important one. If a man can live the celibate life with integrity for an extended period of time, then it that man is acceptable as a candidate for priesthood. In the context of this document, we are talking about homosexual asexual activity, but I think that the rule will be applied to all candidates, regardless of orientation. After all, a priest is committing to live a celibate life for the next 30-50 years -- shouldn't he be expected to demnonstrate that he can do so for a short period before making the permananet commitment?

Now there ae some comments regarding pedophilia that i would like to take up.

"There are people on the right wing who from the beginning saw this document as a kind of magic wand that would remove the taint of the sex abuse scandal," said the Rev. John A. Coleman, a Jesuit sociologist at Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles. "I think that's wishful thinking -- and pretty stupid."

Actually, Father Coleman, it is you who are stupid. You are intentionally ignoring what the data show about the scandal -- that most of the cases did not involve pedophilia, which would have required that the victims be prepubescent. That data shows that many of the victims were adolescent males, which is a sign that the perpetrator was not acting upon an attraction to children but upon a sexual attraction to young men -- precisely the sort of glorification of young men as sexual objects that is found in the homosexual community (not dissimilar to the objectification of young women among heterosexual males). I realize that this is an inconvenient fact in the examination of the abuse scandal, but it is a fact.

Ultimately, I don't see this document as making a great difference. Most of the homosexual seminarians I knew (about 25% of my classmates, and a higher percentage of those who were ordained) would be acceptable under these guidelines. And the shrinking priesthood will continue to shrink as long as celibacy is retained as a Church-imposed (not divinely mandated) rule.Until the celibacy issue is thoroughly reexamined, there will continue to be a shortage of men to fill the role of priest within the Catholic Church.

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Just to remind folks about the "high value" placed upon women by Islam under sharia law, I link you to this story. Women are nothing more than a commodity, to be turned over unwilling to satisfy family feuds, and to be raped or murdered if they refuse to cooperate.

A village council in Pakistan has decreed that five young women should be abducted, raped or killed for refusing to honour childhood "marriages".

The women, who are cousins, were married in absentia by a mullah in their Punjabi village to illiterate sons of their family's enemies in 1996, when they were aged from six to 13.

The marriages were part of a compensation agreement ordered by the village council and reached at gunpoint after the father of one of the girls shot dead a family rival.

The rival families have now called in their "debt", demanding the marriages to the village men are fulfilled.

The case is becoming a cause célèbre in Pakistan, pitting tribal mores against a group of modern-minded, educated women. Amna Niazi, the eldest of the five at 22, is taking a degree in English literature, while both her sisters want to attend university.

Their fathers are supporting them and have refused to hand them over, leading to a resumption of the blood feud, with two relatives shot recently and 20 people arrested, while promises of further retribution and murder abound.

In addition to the sentence on the women, the village council has sentenced to death Jehan Khan Niazi, the father of three of the women, and the fathers of the other two for failing to honour the supposed bond with men whose identities they are not even certain of.

The women have said they will commit suicide if their fathers obey the council.

That such abuse of fundamental human dignity is countenanced under Islamic law is disgusting. That the Pakistani government still fails to take strong action to end such attrocities is even worse.

Is it necessary for the civilized nations of the world to forcibly suppress Islam and its barbarous customs in order to ensure basic human rights for half of the human race?

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This is fascinating.

Thousands of pilgrims are pouring into the dense jungle of southern Nepal to worship a 15-year-old boy who has been hailed as a new Buddha.

Devotees claim that Ram Bomjon, who is silently meditating beneath a tree, has not eaten or drunk anything since he sat down at his chosen spot six months ago.

Witnesses say they have seen light emanating from the teenager's forehead.

"It looks a bit like when you shine a torch through your hand," said Tek Bahadur Lama, a member of the committee responsible for dealing with the growing number of visitors from India and elsewhere in Nepal.

He has not moved from his spot in six months, has taken no nourishment, and has survived a snakebite.

He sks, though, that he not be called a Buddha.

After five days it was opened and he spoke. "Tell the people not to call me a Buddha. I don't have the Buddha's energy. I am at the level of rinpoche [lesser divinity].

"A snake bit me but I do not need treatment. I need six years of deep meditation."

Yes, fascinating indeed.

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I guess I don't see how this can be anything other than a violation of the First Amendment of the US Constitution -- and of the relevant sections of the New York Constitution as well.

A U.S. District Court judge has dismissed a lawsuit by a Staten Island clergyman who claimed his civil rights were violated when two billboards he ordered denouncing homosexuality were ordered covered up.

It was the second time that the Rev. Kristopher Okwedy has had his case dismissed. After Judge Nina Gershon originally threw out the case in 2003, Okwedy went to a state Appeals Court which ordered the case revisited.

This week Gershon again dismissed the case.

Okwedy was attempting to sue former Borough President Guy V. Molinari and PNE Media of violating his First Amendment rights when Molinair ordered the removal of two billboards.

Okwedy had paid PNE $2,500 for two signs that quoted biblical passages condemning homosexuality.

Molinari said at the time that the billboards violated the city's human rights ordinance protecting gays from discrimination and that he feared the billboards would inspire anti-gay violence. PNE complied.

Judge Gershon ruled that Okwedy had failed to prove that the human rights law was unconstitutional as applied to him because it collided with his religious and free speech rights.

Hold on.

A government official, acting under color of law, ordered that the religiously based speech of an American citizen be suppressed on the basis of a local ordinance and vague, unsubstantiated fears of possible violence?

Have freedom of speech and freedom of religion been eviscerated in this country because of the hyper-sensitivity and political clout of the sodomy lobby?

And if so-called "human rights ordinances" require the suppression of those freedoms, is it not entirely appropriate to refer to such measures as conferring "special rights" upon homosexuals while conferring second class citizenship upon those who fail to accept the "gay is OK" mantra of the Left?

Oh, and for those who have always said that such measures are no threat to freedom of religion, and that quoting Scripture could never be deemed to be a violation of any law in this country, think again. This is the billboard in question.

The suppressed material was almost exclusively a quote from the Book of Leviticus -- sacred to both Christians and Jews. Have religious believers really been stripped of their civil liberties in America?

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In the run-up to the visit of President Bush, the Red Chinese have arrested and imprisoned more of those who minister to GodÂ’s people.

Chinese authorities have arrested a priest and 10 seminarians from that nation's underground Roman Catholic Church, a Vatican-affiliated news agency said Friday.

President Bush, who is due to visit China as part of an eight-day trip to Asia, called on China's leadership this week to give the public more religious freedom and other liberties.

The Rev. Yang Jianwei and the seminarians were detained Nov. 12 in Xushui City in Hebei province, a traditional stronghold of Catholic sentiment in northern China, AsiaNews reported.

Six of the seminarians were released later, but Yang and the four others remain in police custody, it said.

Calls to local police seeking confirmation of the report went unanswered late Friday.

What will it take to get the world to speak out against the continued violation of human rights by the atheistic Communist regime in Beijing?

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Remaining faithful to the Catechism of the Catholic Church and to the writings of Pope John Paul the Great, American bishops have taken a stand against the use of the death penalty.

The US Conference of Catholic Bishops yesterday overwhelmingly approved a new statement of opposition to capital punishment, asserting that it contributes to a culture of death and violence in the United States.

It was the bishops' first comprehensive statement on the death penalty in 25 years, and coincided with the debate in the Massachusetts House of Representatives on a proposal to reinstate capital punishment in the Bay State. Massachusetts is one of 12 states in which the death penalty is prohibited.
The bishops, who are holding their annual meeting in Washington, said their longtime opposition to capital punishment is being renewed and strengthened by new teachings and new support for abolition of the death penalty growing out of the Gospel of Life encyclical issued by the late Pope John Paul II.

Citing John Paul's teachings, the bishops declared that ''the death penalty is not intrinsically evil, as is the taking of human life through abortion or euthanasia," but ''in contemporary society, where the state has other, nonlethal means to protect its citizens, the state should not use the death penalty."

Archbishop Sean P. O'Malley of Boston, who has strongly opposed the restoration of capital punishment in Massachusetts since Governor Mitt Romney proposed reinstating it last year, said in an interview that a ''sea change" is occurring among Catholics, who in the past have shown strong support for the death penalty.

''I think the abortion issue raised this up," O'Malley said. ''As people began realizing that the dignity of human life was being diminished by abortion, it caused them to consider other ways in which the dignity of human life was being diminished."

Bishop Nicholas DiMarzio of the Diocese of Brooklyn, who led the effort to formulate the new bishops' statement on the death penalty, told the assembly in Washington that the statement ''is a call to reject the tragic illusion that we can demonstrate respect for life by taking life, that we can teach that killing is wrong by killing those who kill others."

He and other bishops argued that polling results, recent declines in executions, and parallel decreases in death sentences are evidence that public and political sentiments are turning against capital punishment. He said the exoneration of more than 100 people who have been proven innocent after being condemned to die was bringing home to the public the flawed and biased nature of capital punishment.

The bishops drew a strong distinction between the church's stance on capital punishment and its absolute opposition to abortion and euthanasia, stating that the death penalty was an issue on which ''people of good will can disagree."

Now notice what is being said here – support for the death penalty is consistent with Catholic teaching. There is room for disagreement by those who remain in union with Rome, for the death penalty for the guilty is recognized as being permissible though discouraged. This stands in opposition to the teaching on abortion, as the intentional taking of innocent life is never permissible. Bear that in mind when pro-abortionists insist that support for abortion and support for the death penalty are equally in opposition to Catholic teaching – for they are explicitly lying when they make that statement.

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Remaining faithful to the Catechism of the Catholic Church and to the writings of Pope John Paul the Great, American bishops have taken a stand against the use of the death penalty.

The US Conference of Catholic Bishops yesterday overwhelmingly approved a new statement of opposition to capital punishment, asserting that it contributes to a culture of death and violence in the United States.

It was the bishops' first comprehensive statement on the death penalty in 25 years, and coincided with the debate in the Massachusetts House of Representatives on a proposal to reinstate capital punishment in the Bay State. Massachusetts is one of 12 states in which the death penalty is prohibited.
The bishops, who are holding their annual meeting in Washington, said their longtime opposition to capital punishment is being renewed and strengthened by new teachings and new support for abolition of the death penalty growing out of the Gospel of Life encyclical issued by the late Pope John Paul II.

Citing John Paul's teachings, the bishops declared that ''the death penalty is not intrinsically evil, as is the taking of human life through abortion or euthanasia," but ''in contemporary society, where the state has other, nonlethal means to protect its citizens, the state should not use the death penalty."

Archbishop Sean P. O'Malley of Boston, who has strongly opposed the restoration of capital punishment in Massachusetts since Governor Mitt Romney proposed reinstating it last year, said in an interview that a ''sea change" is occurring among Catholics, who in the past have shown strong support for the death penalty.

''I think the abortion issue raised this up," O'Malley said. ''As people began realizing that the dignity of human life was being diminished by abortion, it caused them to consider other ways in which the dignity of human life was being diminished."

Bishop Nicholas DiMarzio of the Diocese of Brooklyn, who led the effort to formulate the new bishops' statement on the death penalty, told the assembly in Washington that the statement ''is a call to reject the tragic illusion that we can demonstrate respect for life by taking life, that we can teach that killing is wrong by killing those who kill others."

He and other bishops argued that polling results, recent declines in executions, and parallel decreases in death sentences are evidence that public and political sentiments are turning against capital punishment. He said the exoneration of more than 100 people who have been proven innocent after being condemned to die was bringing home to the public the flawed and biased nature of capital punishment.

The bishops drew a strong distinction between the church's stance on capital punishment and its absolute opposition to abortion and euthanasia, stating that the death penalty was an issue on which ''people of good will can disagree."

Now notice what is being said here – support for the death penalty is consistent with Catholic teaching. There is room for disagreement by those who remain in union with Rome, for the death penalty for the guilty is recognized as being permissible though discouraged. This stands in opposition to the teaching on abortion, as the intentional taking of innocent life is never permissible. Bear that in mind when pro-abortionists insist that support for abortion and support for the death penalty are equally in opposition to Catholic teaching – for they are explicitly lying when they make that statement.

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I rarely agree with the ACLU on cases involving religion, but I have to support them on this one.

A retired Atlanta librarian and a Sandy Springs bookshop owner are challenging a state law that grants a sales tax exemption for purchases of the Bible and other books pertaining to "Holy Scripture."

Their lawsuit, filed Monday in U.S. District Court in Atlanta, said if such works are exempt from sales and use taxes, other philosophical, religious and spiritual works should be as well.

"The law is written in such a way that minority religions don't get the same tax exemption as better-known religions such as Christianity and Judaism," said Maggie Garrett, a lawyer with the American Civil Liberties Union of Georgia, which represents the two plaintiffs.

State law exempts from sales tax all "Holy Bibles, testaments and similar books commonly recognized as being Holy Scripture." The decades-old law also exempts "any religious paper ... when the paper is owned and operated by religious institutions and denominations," but it does not define religious paper.

Frankly, the argument is a reasonable one – though I might be willing to take it a bit further and raise the issue of why books and periodicals are taxed at all, given that the tax can be seen as inhibiting the communication of ideas and favoring religious speech over non-religious speech.

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HeÂ’s at it again. IsnÂ’t there a judicial rule about the filing of frivolous lawsuits?

A Sacramento County man says he will file a federal lawsuit in the coming week demanding the U.S. Treasury remove the words "In God We Trust" from American currency.

Michael Newdow is the same man who led a legal effort to ban the recitation of the pledge of allegiance in public schools because of the phrase "under God."

Newdow says the words "In Good We Trust" on currency is an unconstitutional endorsement of religion. He adds it, "excludes people who don't believe in God."

The U.S. Supreme Court refused to hear Newdow's challenge of the pledge of allegiance because he's not the custodial parent of a student forced to say the prayer. The activist has since recruited other families who also oppose the pledge to re file the suit. It is now pending in the federal appeals courts.

Newdow says he has little patience for those who say the references to God are appropriate because of the country's history.

"It's not the history that counts. It's not the patriotism. What it is, is these people want to get their religious views in our government," he said.

And you want yours there, Michael – whether or not the rest of America agrees.

Oh, and by the way, the Supreme Court just let stand the dismissal of a suit exactly like yours.

A U.S. appeals court ruled that the lawsuit failed to show that the display had no legitimate secular purpose, that it has the effect of endorsing religion or that it has resulted in an excessive entanglement of government and religion.

The appeals court said Congress first authorized the phrase "In God We Trust" on coins in 1865, and Congress made it the national motto in 1956. It is inscribed above the speaker's chair in the U.S. House of Representatives and above the main door of the U.S. Senate chamber.

Attorneys for the two lawyers asked the justices to set aside the appeals court's ruling and send the case back for reconsideration in view of the Supreme Court's decision in June that Kentucky courthouses violated church-state separation by putting copies of the Ten Commandments on display.

The high court rejected the appeal without any comment or recorded dissent.

So I guess that you will just have to deal with being oppressed by all of the majority who find that phrase inoffensive. Head out to North Korea, Cuba, or Red China if you want official atheism.

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It must be hard to be Abe Foxman. After all, it must be difficult to live with such a high level of paranoia untreated by medication.

"Today we face a better financed, more sophisticated, coordinated, unified, energized and organized coalition of groups in opposition to our policy positions on church-state separation than ever before. Their goal is to implement their Christian worldview. To Christianize America. To save us!"

As Hillel Halkin points out, his paranoid rambling is filled with rank hypocrisy, since the ADL and other Jewish groups have done the same thing for years. What is Foxman really afraid of – the imposition of religious values through legislation, or simply the imposition of someone else’s values?

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Once again, Bishop Julius Jia has been imprisoned for his faith. It is the eighth time in two years that the spiritual leaders of Catholics loyal to the Pope in the Diocese of Zheng Ding has been arrested.

The Chinese authorities have arrested a bishop belonging the underground Roman Catholic Church, a US group says.

The Cardinal Kung Foundation said Julius Jia Zhiguo was taken from his home in the northern city of Zhengding.

Two priests from his diocese - Li Suchuan and Yang Ermeng - were arrested on Monday.

In China, there is a state-sanctioned church for Roman Catholics, but there is also a bigger, unofficial church that is loyal to the Pope.

The foundation said the bishop had refused to cut links with the Vatican and affiliate himself with the state-controlled church.

Sanctions are a must in this instance. I urge the US government to end most favored nation trading status with the Red Chinese government. Furthermore, I join with the Cardinal Kung Foundation in urging that the International Olympic Committee move to cancel the 2008 Beijing Olympics, and to relocate the games to a free nation not under the thumb of a repressive dictatorship. The Communist regime in Beijing must be forced to respect the human right to freedom of religion.

Please offer your prayers for Bishop Jia, and also for Father Li Suchuan and Father Yang Ermeng, priests of Bishop JiaÂ’s diocese, who were arrested the previous day and are believed imprisoned with their bishop.

May God strengthen them in this time of persecution, and may He hasten the day when all Chinese people may worship freely and without coercion from their atheistic overlords.

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The exercise of severals human right has resulted in the imprisonment of a Chinese pastor.

A prominent pastor in Beijing's underground Protestant church was sentenced Tuesday to three years in prison for illegally printing and distributing Bibles and other religious books, in a case that has attracted attention from Christian groups in the United States and elsewhere.

The Beijing People's Intermediate Court handed down the sentence immediately after it convicted Cai Zhuohua, 34, of conducting "illegal business practices," said his attorney, Zhang Xingshui. Two co-defendants were also convicted and sentenced to prison, he said.

Why such outrageous conduct by the Chinese government?

"Objectively speaking, religion is a breakthrough point for Western anti-China forces to Westernize and split China," said Ye Xiaowen, director of the State Bureau of Religious Affairs. But he said that did not mean all religious problems should be considered "infiltration," adding "there is no so-called persecution of religious people" in China.

The silence of the Left is deafening. I guess they are too busy wailing and gnashing teeth over Gitmo Islamists to be troubled by the persecution of Christians for engaging in crimes that would generally be recognized as freedom of speech, freedom of the press, and freedom of religion in civilized countries.

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The exercise of severals human right has resulted in the imprisonment of a Chinese pastor.

A prominent pastor in Beijing's underground Protestant church was sentenced Tuesday to three years in prison for illegally printing and distributing Bibles and other religious books, in a case that has attracted attention from Christian groups in the United States and elsewhere.

The Beijing People's Intermediate Court handed down the sentence immediately after it convicted Cai Zhuohua, 34, of conducting "illegal business practices," said his attorney, Zhang Xingshui. Two co-defendants were also convicted and sentenced to prison, he said.

Why such outrageous conduct by the Chinese government?

"Objectively speaking, religion is a breakthrough point for Western anti-China forces to Westernize and split China," said Ye Xiaowen, director of the State Bureau of Religious Affairs. But he said that did not mean all religious problems should be considered "infiltration," adding "there is no so-called persecution of religious people" in China.

The silence of the Left is deafening. I guess they are too busy wailing and gnashing teeth over Gitmo Islamists to be troubled by the persecution of Christians for engaging in crimes that would generally be recognized as freedom of speech, freedom of the press, and freedom of religion in civilized countries.

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