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• 'Divided' Darfur rebels blamed | Chad has blamed rebels groups in Sudan's Darfur region for the breakdown in talks with the Sudan government. (BBC)
• Sudan says U.S. armed Darfur rebels - Egypt paper | The United States helped train and arm rebels from west Sudan who rose up against the Sudanese government last year, Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir said in remarks published on Thursday. (Reuters)
• Sudanese unrest grounds Minnesota charities' aid | A group of Minnesota charities postponed a mission to send 35 tons of food and relief supplies to Sudan because of political unrest in the African country. (Associated Press)

Christians in Pakistan:

• Pope meets with Pakistani president | Pope John Paul II met Thursday with Pakistani President Gen. Pervez Musharraf, encouraging him to press ahead with a "spirit of dialogue and tolerance" in his turbulent region. (Associated Press)
• Christian minorities in Pakistan: little freedom and rising Islamic pressure | The law on blasphemy, forced conversions to Islam, democratization and education: Pakistani Christians are looking to the government for reform and to President Musharraf for his commitment on these thorny issues. (AsiaNews, Italy)

Persecution in India:

• Mother Teresa nuns attacked in Kerala | Attacks on priests and nuns from Mother Teresa's old order in the southern state of Kerala have spotlighted the controversy surrounding Christian missionary work in India. (The Independent, UK)
• Communal thuggery in Kerala | Most of the earlier incidents of communal violence in Kerala had their roots in disputes over ownership of land or access to resources. In contrast, the violence in Pantherankkavu stands out as unadulterated hate politics, in motive as well as execution. (Editorial, The Hindu, India)

Religious freedom & persecution:

• Nonprofit is sued by EEOC | A Queens woman who is an evangelical Christian has sued a West Harlem nonprofit agency, claiming the group denied her a job because of her religion. (Newsday, NY
• Two U.S. Christians 'hit' by Jewish settlers | Two U.S. Christian pacifists said they were severely beaten yesterday by Jewish settlers in this southern West Bank town. (Agence France-Presse)
• United Egyptian Copts appeal for end to persecution | Egyptian Coptic leaders from around the world have urged the government of President Hosni Mubarak to initiate 'Special Legislation' designed to end 'long and enduring persecution' of Christians in Egypt. (Press Release)
• Church altar burned in southern India | Assailants broke into a church and torched the altar overnight in Kerala, days after an attack in the southern Indian state on nuns from Mother Teresa's order, police said. (Agence France-Presse)

War & terrorism:

• Church plea over child soldiers | Rowan Williams, the Archbishop of Canterbury, last night called for international cooperation to end the use of child soldiers in war zones, claiming that their exploitation was the equivalent of repeated Beslan massacres. (The Guardian, UK)
• Of God and war | Your version of Christianity supports and blesses preventive war. What relation is this to the Christianity preached by the pope and by mainstream Protestants who oppose preventive war? (Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr., New York Times)
• Christians must love even their battlefield enemies, says Yale scholar | Stephen L. Carter, an ever-interesting professor at the Yale University Law School, has emerged as a notable novelist and an author on morals and on religion in society Rarer yet, he's also a black Episcopalian and at the same time a columnist for America's leading evangelical magazine, Christianity Today. His latest column contemplates the ongoing combat in Iraq and these remarkable words from Jesus Christ's Sermon on the Mount (Associated Press)

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September (Web-only) 2004, Vol. 48