"Take this cup."

The Anchoress meditates on the Pope’s speech and proposes that, when it comes to the Church, there is always more there than meets the eye:“While governments ‘think as human beings,’ Benedict, the Bishop of Rome, the man who sits on the Throne of Peter (whom Jesus advised to ‘think as God does,’) is perhaps uniquely qualified to deliver to these supernaturally-focused people something they cannot fail to understand, a supernatural challenge.”

by The Anchoress

Catholics who attended mass on Sunday, September 17 heard a reading from the Gospel in which Jesus admonishes St. Peter, “you are thinking not as God does, but as human beings do.”

It was an interesting admonishment in light of Pope Benedict’s Regensburg speech and the swift conflagration it ignited within an Islamic world that seems increasingly more tinderbox than spiritual refuge.

Philippe Karsenty- founder of Media-Ratings

Nidra Poller concludes her coverage … for now … of the Al-Dura Trial in Paris with a blow-by-blow account of the trial with analysis of the proceedings.
Paris 18 September 2006

Disclosure: I make no pretense to objectivity in my reports on this trial. Philippe Karsenty is a friend and colleague; we have often discussed this case that was brought against him but aimed at all of us who share a commitment to destroying the al-Dura blood libel.

Studio 60: The West Wing with Punchlines

Catherine Seipp finds that NBC’s Sorkinesque “Studio 60” is a drama about about a comedy about “Characters of proper liberal moral clarity making rousing speeches to each other while the swelling soundtrack tells viewers what to feel.” No laughtrack.

Conventional wisdom has it that Aaron Sorkin’s “The West Wing” was a liberal fantasy about what the White House might have been with Martin Sheen’s fictional president in charge rather than Bill Clinton. But after watching “Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip,” Sorkin’s new NBC drama about a “Saturday Night Live”-like comedy series, I suspect “The West Wing” was actually an Aaron Sorkin fantasy about the White House with Sorkin in charge rather than of Bill Clinton.