Christians will be prominent at Darfur rally, but still choosing sides on immigration. Plus: Is Amish shunning illegal? And other stories from online sources around the world.
Today's Top Five1. Rally to Save Darfur as deadline hits
Evangelical groups are among those leading Sunday's Save Darfur Rally to Stop Genocide in Washington, D.C., and other cities. Sunday is also the deadline for Darfur's warring parties to sign an African Union-mediated peace agreementwhich doesn't look likely, says The Christian Science Monitor. More bad news from Darfur: The United Nations World Food Program is cutting its daily rations in half due to funding cuts. Keep your eye on the detailed blog Passion of the Present for frequent Darfur updates.
2. U.S. Christians still divided on immigration
The Family Research Council has posted video of yesterday's three-hour immigration debate with leading Christian leaders and lawmakers. The bottom line from FRC's Connie Mackey in a San Francisco Chronicle front-page story: There's no consensus other than to be "compassionate but firm." "The Christian community is closer on a resolution than we actually think," said FRC president Tony Perkins. Still, The Dallas Morning News says there's plenty of conflict, too:
The testiest moment came after the Rev. Joan Maruskin of Church World Service's Immigration and Refugee Program compared Jesus to illegal immigrants.
"Christ came in as a strangerthe migrant refugee Christ to whom we owe our salvation," she said. If Jesus and his disciples arrived in the United States as 13 bearded men without documents, she said, "they would be put into a detention center, be victims of expedited removal or they'd be sent to Guantánamo."
Immigration-control advocate John O'Sullivan, a senior fellow at the conservative Hudson Institute, decried such "moral bullying."
Describing himself as a rank-and-file Catholic, Mr. O'Sullivan criticized ...