The Vatican raised the possibility Sunday of using behind-the-scenes diplomacy to try to save the life of an Iranian widow sentenced to be stoned for adultery.

In its first public statement on the case, which has attracted worldwide attention, the Vatican decried stoning as a particularly brutal form of capital punishment.

Vatican spokesman the Rev. Federico Lombardi said the Catholic church opposes the death penalty in general.

It is unclear what chances any Vatican bid would have to persuade the Muslim nation to spare the woman’s life. Brazil, which has friendly relations with Iran, was rebuffed when it offered her asylum.

Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani was convicted in 2006 of adultery. In July, Iranian authorities said they would not carry out the stoning sentence for the time being, but the mother of two could still face execution by hanging for adultery and other offenses.

Our view: the death penalty is a barbaric form of punishment that should be rejected by all civilized nations — as should the Shariah. Islamic law is incompatible with Western civilization.

Dozens have filmed and posted clips for My Faith My Voice, telling viewers about their sports teams, hometowns or families. The grassroots effort aims to show that ‘Muslims are like everyone else.’

The videos, which American Muslims are invited to record and upload onto the campaign’s website, mostly follow a script: The speakers introduce themselves, give an “interesting fact” about themselves and then launch into a prewritten message about Islam‘s teachings. They say that Muslims do not want to impose their religion on others and should not be feared.

The grassroots campaign, called My Faith My Voice, grew out of conversations among a number of Muslim professionals about what they felt was a recent rise in anti-Muslim sentiment.

Firefighters have said that it was an “absolute miracle” no-one was killed in an explosion at a Hare Krishna temple.

The blast rocked the building after cylinders of gas powering a large cooker leaked during a festive meal.

About 30 people escaped from the temple in Leicester when the organiser raised the alarm just seconds before the explosion yesterday. A third of the building in Thoresby Street was destroyed in the blast.

Worshippers had been cooking in the kitchen area during the afternoon for a religious festival.

The festivities were organised by Iskcon Leicester – the International Society for Krishna Consciousness – to mark Lord Krishna’s “Appearance Day”.

Note to big companies hoping to tap into France’s lucrative but long-neglected Muslim consumer market: Pitfalls may await, and not only in the form of complaints from the far-right.

As of this week, 22 outlets of popular French fast food chain Quick are serving burgers it says respect Islamic dietary law. And while many Muslims are delighted, the powerful main Paris Mosque complained Thursday that Quick’s criteria aren’t all-encompassing enough, and that the operation is meaningless.

Quick’s meat is certified as halal, but Cheikh Al Sid Cheikh, assistant to the rector of the Paris Mosque, said the burger chain should have had the other ingredients checked as well, from its mustard to buns to fries.

“The rest must be validated too, or else there’s no point,” he told The Associated Press. Quick responded that it has no intention of making any of its restaurants halal through-and-through — beer is still served there, for example, said spokeswoman Valerie Raynal.

Do we really want an intolerant religion to dictate what we eat and drink?

Geert Wilders, the maverick Dutch politician, denounced a Australian Muslim leader’s call for his beheading for denigrating Islam.

Mr Wilders, who lives under perpetual death threat and is the country’s most heavily guarded politician, demanded assurance from the country’s Interior Ministry that the message was been treated seriously.

Sydney-born Feiz Muhammad — a hate criminal — posted a speech on an Internet site in which he condemned Mr Wilders as “this Satan, this devil, this politician in Holland” and called on his followers to “chop off his head” because Wilders “denigrated” Islam.

A report in De Telegraaf newspaper said Muhammad declared that anyone who talks about Islam like Wilders does should be executed by beheading.

Muhammad has gained notoriety for, among other things, calling on young children to be radicalised and blaming rape victims for their own attacks.

Our opinion: anyone who talks about critics of Islam like Feiz Muhammad should be imprisoned and/or committed to a mental hospital. People like Geert Wilders would have no need to talk about Islam if Muslims like Feiz Muhammed did not act like deranged hate criminals.

Bottom line: the inability of hate-filled Muslims to allow others freedom of religion and freedom of speech makes Islam incompatible with modern civilization.

The Archbishop of Canterbury has dismissed the conclusion by Stephen Hawking, the retired Cambridge scientist, that the Big Bang was the result of the inevitable laws of physics and did not need God to create the Universe.

In his latest book, The Grand Design, Prof Hawking claimed that no divine force was needed to explain why the Universe was formed.

“Because there is a law such as gravity, the Universe can and will create itself from nothing,” he wrote.

“Spontaneous creation is the reason there is something rather than nothing, why the Universe exists, why we exist.”

But in an extract of an article in Eureka magazine, which is published in The Times, a series of a religious leaders fight back against the claims.

By the way, while his leap of faith may sell some books, Mr. Hawking fails to answer an important question: “Who created the law of gravity?”

One of the Scientology cult’s most vocal critics, Tampa lawyer Ken Dandar, is in a pickle.

Six years ago, he settled a wrongful death case against the church on behalf of the family of Lisa McPherson, who died in 1995 after 17 days in the care of cult members in Clearwater.

Part of the settlement agreement, approved by a judge in state court, required Dandar to never again represent anyone suing the Scientology cult.

But last year, Dandar took on another wrongful death case against the church’s Flag Service Organization — in federal court.

Subsequently Senior Circuit Judge Robert Beach in June 2009 ordered Dandar to withdraw from the new case.

But on April 12, U.S. District Judge Steven Merryday told him he cannot get out of it. The reason: No other attorney wants to take on Scientology. It is, after all, a cult known for its hate- and harassment campaigns against critics.

So Dandar is stuck between a state judge telling him to leave Scientology alone and a federal judge telling him he can’t.

A judge wants to review more information before deciding whether to dismiss charges against four missionaries accused of inciting a crowd while videotaping themselves evangelizing at the Dearborn Arab International Festival in June.

Judge Marks Somers of 19th District Court in Dearborn heard arguments Monday after Robert Muise, attorney for the missionaries, filed a motion questioning the constitutionality of the charges. If the motion is denied, a trial is to be held Sept. 20.

“My clients should not stand trial for exercising their First Amendment rights,” Muise said.

Nabeel Qureshi of Virginia, Negeen Mayel of California and Paul Rezkalla and David Wood, both of New York, were charged in July with disorderly conduct after police said they received a complaint from a Christian volunteer working at the festival who said he was harassed by the group. Mayel also was charged with failure to obey a police officer’s order.

The missionaries, members of a Christian group called Acts 17 Apologetics, said they did not harass anyone.

Plans by a group to hold a “satanic exorcism” at the Oklahoma City Civic Center Music Hall prompted citizens to telephone and e-mail the city, a spokeswoman said Tuesday.

In Tuesday’s Oklahoman, Civic Center officials confirmed that the Church of the IV Majesties has booked one of the smaller rooms at the Civic Center for a meeting on Oct. 21. The group’s leader said they will perform a parody of a Roman Catholic exorcism.

Unification Church founder Sun Myung Moon is regaining control of the Washington Times after allies of the South Korean cult leader agreed to acquire the paper for just $1 and assumption of most if its debts, according to an internal memo.

The memo contradicts rumors that a feud among the Moon’s sons over control of the Washington Times prompted the father to buy it back for tens of millions of dollars.

The deal is financially similar to the one the Washington Post cut in selling its money-losing Newsweek to businessman Sidney Harmon.

Paul Bedard details the deal — and the internal feuding in the Moon family — in U.S. News & World Report. Mind you, he also writes that Moon “started the newspaper in 1982 as a conservative and Christian voice in Washington.” Theologians know that the Unification Church is, at best, a cult of Christianity. As such, it is impossible for the paper to provide a “Christian voice.”

A French fast food chain announced on Tuesday it would almost triple its line of halal hamburger restaurants because sales had doubled in a trial that sparked a heated debate about the integration of Muslims.

The Quick chain of 358 restaurants around France said it would boost its halal-only outlets to 22 on Wednesday after the trial in eight areas with a strong Muslim population also saw a doubling of customers and a rise in the amounts they spent.

Quick, which is a challenger to the U.S. hamburger chain McDonald’s (MCD.N) and runs franchises in seven other countries including Belgium, Russia and Algeria, said the move was purely commercial.

Many non-Muslims object to halal food because the associated method of animal slaughter is considered to be cruel to animals.

The prosecution said Monday the founder of the U.S. branch of an Islamic charity accused of trying to smuggle $150,000 to Muslim fighters in Chechnya took extreme steps to leave no paper trail.

But the defense countered tax-form mistakes key to the prosecution’s case were made by the charity’s accountant, not the defendant.

Pete Seda, also known as Pirouz Sedaghaty, is in U.S. District Court on charges of conspiracy, tax fraud and failing to report sending $150,000 out of the country. He has pleaded not guilty, contending the money was for refugees, not Muslim fighters trying to overthrow the government of Chechnya.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Chris Cardani told jurors in opening statements that Seda, an Iranian immigrant and naturalized U.S. citizen, became the boss of the U.S. chapter of Al-Haramain Islamic Foundation Inc., a charity based in Saudi Arabia. Cardani said the foundation was based on a radical form of Islam that distributed Qurans calling for holy war, and was dedicated to helping Muslim fighters battling the Russian Army in Chechnya.

“One of the things you can’t do if you are a charity in the United States is fund acts of violence,” Cardani said. “The government is not accusing Mrs. Sedaghaty of being a terrorist.”

A Muslim advocacy group filed a federal discrimination lawsuit Monday over an Illinois State Police decision to revoke the appointment of the agency’s first Muslim chaplain.

Kifah Mustapha, a Chicago-area imam, was named a chaplain in December along with chaplains of other faiths. He underwent training, passed a background check and was issued state identification. But shortly after, the appointment was criticized by the Washington-based Investigative Project on Terrorism, which said Mustapha was a “radical fundraiser” and alleged he had links to Palestinian militant group Hamas.

Mustapha hasn’t been charged with any crimes and denied wrongdoing.

According to the lawsuit filed on his behalf by the Council on American-Islamic Relations‘ Chicago office, Mustapha was then told by Illinois State Police that he had passed only a preliminary background check and another should have been conducted before the training. Mustapha was asked to submit paperwork for another check.

In June, the police department revoked his appointment, citing only information revealed during a background check.

According to the lawsuit, Mustapha was told by a police employee that articles by the investigative think tank prompted the second background check.

The lawsuit claims the think tank is known for “anti-Muslim views” and alleges religious, national origin and racial discrimination on the part of police. Mustapha is a Lebanese Muslim of Palestinian descent. It also alleges Mustapha was denied his First Amendment right to freedom of association, which prohibits the government from imposing guilt by association.

The suspected gunman in the fatal shooting of a Mormon church official in Central California was mentally ill and believed the church had wronged him when he was a member in the 1980s, family members said Monday.

Kenneth James Ward, 47, would go through delusional spells when he blamed the Mormon church for his troubles, according to his younger brother, Mike Ward.

“When my brother had one of his episodes, he conjured up in his mind that he thought that the Mormons were sending him to hell. He would tell me that,” Mike Ward, 44, said in a phone interview from his home in Bakersfield.

Saudi Arabia’s most senior religious leader has ordered a conservative cleric to stop giving unauthorized edicts after his call for boycotting a supermarket chain that employs women as cashiers.

Sheik Youssef al-Ahmed had urged people not to shop at Panda Supermarket because women there work in jobs that allow for the mingling of the sexes. Al-Ahmed says this is a violation of Islamic law.

RNB: Can you believe that story is datelined August, 2010?

From our Religious Insanity file: An armed Christian organization, Right Wing Extreme, will protect a church that is planning to host an “International Burn a Quran Day” on the ninth anniversary of September 11, the church’s pastor said on Tuesday.

The Dove World Outreach Center, in Gainesville, Florida, says it is hosting the event to remember 9/11 victims and to take a stand against Islam. With promotions on its website and Facebook page, the nondenominational church invites Christians to burn the Muslim holy book.

Dove World Outreach Center Pastor Terry Jones has accepted the support of Right Wing Extreme, which he said offered to come to the church with between 500 and 2,000 men on September 11. He described the organization as an armed civilian militia group.

“There is a need for this protection. It is absolutely necessary in light of the death and terror threats we have received,” Jones said in an e-mail to CNN.

Muslims and many other Christians, including some evangelicals, are fighting the church’s plan to burn the Quran.

We can be sure of this: ‘Pastor’ Terry Jones might as well burn his Bible — since he either has not read it or does not intent to obey its teachings.

The British government and the Roman Catholic Church colluded to protect a priest suspected of involvement in a 1972 bombing in Northern Ireland that killed 9 people, an official report said on Tuesday.

The Police Ombudsman’s report revealed that an Irish cardinal was involved in transferring Father James Chesney out of British-ruled Northern Ireland, highlighting again the role of the Church hierarchy in protecting priests against allegations of criminal activity.

Justice must be served for nine people killed in NI bombings who were “failed” by a cover-up of a priest’s suspected role, victims’ relatives have said.

African Anglican bishops voiced their strong disapproval of homosexuality at a meeting in Uganda Tuesday attended by Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams, as the issue continues to divide Anglicans.

“Homosexuality is incompatible with the word of God,” said conference host and Ugandan Archbishop Uganda Henry Luke Orombi.

“It is good Archbishop Rowan is here. We are going to express to him where we stand,” he added.

Head of the Anglican church worldwide, Williams is struggling to keep the communion together amid disagreements over the ordination of female bishops in Britain, and of openly gay bishops in the United States.

“There is already a break. It doesn’t need to be announced,” said Orombi.

Today, August 24, Hindus celebrate Raksha Bandhan, the festival of brotherhood and love. “Raksha Bandhan” means a thread for protection.

Also on this day Zoroastrians who follow the Shenshai calendar celebrate the birthday of Zoroaster. Also known as Zarathushtra, the Iranian prophet and philosopher founded the Zoroastrian religion.

On August 23, 1973, a bank robbery-turned-hostage-taking began in Stockholm, Sweden, AP writes. The four hostages ended up empathizing with their captors, a psychological condition now referred to as “Stockholm Syndrome.”

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