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Kilari Anand Paul may be the world's most influential spiritual leader. But he suffers from anonymity in the United States. And apparently, "suffer" is the right word; he longs for more exposure for his Global Peace Initiative and, reportedly, for himself. A recent cover story in The New Republic, intended to introduce Paul to an American audience, portrayed him as a relentless self-promoter whose heart nonetheless seems to be in the right place, ministering to the people who most need a minister. An Indian-born Christian, Paul has counseled warlords and leaders throughout war-torn regions of the world, from Ivory Coast and Pakistan to Haiti—where he laid hands on and prayed with rebel leader Guy Philippe, convincing him to pursue peace—and Liberia, where he helped urge president Charles Taylor to step down and go into exile. He's met with Slobodan Milosevic and Saddam Hussein. To Paul, "sermonizing to armed goons has become almost commonplace," the New Republic's Michelle Cottle writes. So has preaching to crowds—he draws tens of thousands to rallies in Africa and India, including a 2001 rally in Lagos, Nigeria, which GPI claims drew three million people.

But even though he and his family now live in Houston, Paul is a nobody among American evangelicals, Cottle says. To try to change that, Paul has hooked up with Manhattan p.r. firm Rubenstein Associates and former heavyweight champion Evander Holyfield, and has twisted his share of arms in Washington. But so far, his name awareness hasn't budged. As Cottle tells it, American evangelicals would rather listen to a white televangelist rant about abortion than an Indian man preach about global poverty. Cottle, as with most of the news media, seems too eager to put a risible face on American evangelicalism and greatly exaggerates the popularity of Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell. But she does acknowledge that part of the problem is the reportedly confrontational and ego-swollen Paul himself. His "reflexive self-promotion borders on parody," she writes, adding that "he can come across as either a liar or a crank." Still, it's hard to argue with the importance of his mission, which Cottle calls a "peculiar specialty as spiritual adviser to the scum of the earth."

From Reuters:

YORK - Researchers have sent up a mini-airship inside one of Britain's most ancient cathedrals to inspect stained-glass windows and inaccessible stonework. The metre-long radio-controlled craft carried digital cameras to allow staff to monitor the condition of the cathedral's 14th-century windows, all of which survived a 1984 fire that gutted the south transept. "Compared to the cost of erecting scaffolding it is very cheap," said York Minster Collections Manager Louise Hampson on Tuesday. "It's remarkably unobtrusive," she added. "Because it's almost silent, it's been possible to have services in the side chapel while it has been flying around." Small electric motors control the fine movement of the craft, while wires from the ground dictate its height.

From the BBC:

The largest particle detector in Mexico is being built inside a pyramid in the ancient settlement of Teotihuacan. The equipment will detect muons, tiny particles that are created when cosmic rays bombard the Earth's atmosphere. Dr Arturo Menchaca and colleagues from Mexico's National Autonomous University hope that by tracking the muons through the pyramid, they can find cavities. This could indicate whether the kings of the ancient people who built the site are also entombed within it. "Down we go—and mind your head," Dr Menchaca says, as he adjusts his yellow hard-hat, and lowers himself down the rusting iron steps in to a dark 2,000-year-old tunnel running beneath the Pyramid of the Sun. It is a 100m walk along the cramped tunnel to the team's new laboratory, a plastic shed set up in a cavern in the bowels of the structure.

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