According to recently publicized files from the Estonian KGB, Patriarch Alexei II, head of the Russian Orthodox Church, was an agent for the USSR's intelligence and internal security agency, The Irish Times reports. Allegedly recruited in February 1958, thirty years later he received the agency's Certificate of Honor. Though rumors have been circulating for years, the Keston Institute, an Oxford-based religious rights watchdog monitoring Russia and Eastern Europe, says it is sure that the "Agent Drozdov" could be no one else. ( The Washington Times has a follow-up story.)

"We believe that lawsuits will eventually shut this drug down, but that will take years, and many women's lives will be affected before then," Jenny Biondi of the Right to Life League of Southern California tells the Los Angeles Times. The Federal Drug Administration approved the abortion pill yesterday.

Two days before the U.S. presidential elections, Pope John Paul II will reportedly name Thomas More, the chancellor of England (1529-1532) who was beheaded for refusing to recognize Henry VIII as head of the Church of England, as patron saint of politicians. He will be "a model and intercessor for all those who consider their political commitment as a choice of life." Clifford Davies, history fellow at Oxford's Wadham College, tells The Telegraph, "In standing up for his principles he did quite a lot of nasty things including torturing heretics. He was a lawyer and he did use every trick in the book to try to avoid the consequences. Actually, he was quite an adept ...