Jefferson County Pastor Arrested For Disorderly Conduct During Church Eviction

The church was evicted today after years of running behind on debts.

A foreclosure was completed on the building in September 2007 after the church defaulted on payments, according to Jefferson County court filings. The church then reached a lease agreement but fell behind on payments.

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Catholics Reel As A Diocese Whittles Its Parishes

Most Holy Redeemer Parish will offer its final Sunday Mass. After that, the building will go mostly unused, reflecting an era of dwindling churchgoers and vanishing priests.

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Church Of England Congregations Fall Again, And Half Are Pensioners

The Church of England has been hit by a new slump in its congregations, with the latest figures showing its fifth year-on-year decline.

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Average age of churchgoers now 61, Church of England report finds

Stuyvesant Town gamble costs Church of England

Catholics Cry Foul As Celebrity Cruises Drops Priests From Voyages

Celebrity Cruises this month quietly ended its long tradition of carrying Catholic priests on ships in a move that has some Catholics crying foul.

The Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights in New York has issued a statement of protest saying the line has given in to "bigots" that had complained about the presence of priests on ships.

The Catholic League cites a letter Celebrity sent to priests affected by the change that said the line had received "a great deal of negative feedback pertaining to the selective support" of one particular religion.

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Haiti And The Hypocrisy Of Christian Theology

We know what caused the catastrophe in Haiti. It was the bumping and grinding of the Caribbean Plate rubbing up against the North American Plate: a force of nature, sin-free and indifferent to sin, un-premeditated, unmotivated, supremely unconcerned with human affairs or human misery.

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Haitian preachers speak of fire and brimstone after disastrous quake

Haiti earthquake: voodoo high priest claims aid monopolised by Christians

Between God And A Hard Place

In the 18th century, the genre of "earthquake sermon" was good business. Two small shocks in London, in 1750, sent the preachers to their pulpits and pamphlets. The bishop of London blamed Londoners' lewd behavior; the bishop of Oxford argued that God had woven into his grand design certain incidents to alarm us and shake us out of our sin. In Bloomsbury, the Rev. Dr. William Stukeley preached that earthquakes are favored by God as the ultimate sign of his wrathful intervention.

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Problem of evil and religion's double standard

Idaho Baptist Adoption Suspects Planned to 'Gather' 100 Haitian Orphans, Cross Border

(ChattahBox) -- Kidnappers for Jesus? A group of Evangelical church folk from Idaho, led by personal shopper Laura Silsby, Executive Director and Founder of New Life Children Refuge, descended upon the earthquake ravaged country of Haiti last week, to snatch and grab 100 orphans off of the streets and from orphanages. The Baptist group's mission statement was to "share God's love with these precious children, helping them heal and find new life in Christ." However, they were only able to "gather" up 33, some of whom weren't even orphans. The evangelical do-gooders became alleged kidnappers and child traffickers when they loaded the Haitian "orphans" on a bus and attempted to take them across the border to the Dominican Republic to the New Life Refuge orphanage, with no documents from the Haitian government. Well, the so-called orphanage turns out to be a 45-room hotel at Cabarete, a beach resort in the Dominican Republic that the group was renting.

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Haiti: U.S. Baptists Knew They Were Wrong

Baptists Offered Kids Pool, Tennis Courts

Scientologists 'Heal' Haiti Quake Victims Using Touch

PORT-AU-PRINCE -- Amid the mass of aid agencies piling in to help Haiti quake victims is a batch of Church of Scientology "volunteer ministers", claiming to use the power of touch to reconnect nervous systems.

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How to Spend $150,000 on Scientology: The Larry Anderson Story

Scientology defector tells all

Joan Of Arc 'Relics' Confirmed To Be Fake

The so-called "relics of Joan of Arc," overseen by the Archbishop of Tours in Chinon, France, do not contain the charred remains of the Catholic saint.

Rather, the artifacts consist of a mummified cat leg bone and human rib, both dating to the 6th-3rd century B.C., according to a new study.

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Global Atheist Convention - Sold Out!

Tickets for The Rise of Atheism, 2010 Global Atheist Convention are now sold out! The Convention, to be held at the Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre 12 - 14 March 2010, has attracted substantial Australian and international interest and tickets have sold out more than five weeks before the Convention starts.

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Italy Appeals School Crucifix Ruling

Italy has appealed against a European rights court ruling that displaying crucifixes in Italian schools breached the rights of non-Catholic families, the court says.

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117 In Hospital After Drinking Holy Water

MOSCOW -- Authorities in Siberia say more than 100 Russian Orthodox believers have been hospitalized after drinking holy water during Epiphany celebrations in the eastern city of Irkutsk.

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Attack By Militant Group Leaves 12 Dead In Somalia

(CNN) -- A militant Islamist group associated with al Qaeda attacked areas controlled by government troops and peacekeepers in Somalia early Friday, leaving 12 dead and scores injured, witnesses said.

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Somalia Islamist group bans video games

Christian-Muslim Violence In Nigeria Warrants Probe, Rights Group Says

Lagos, Nigeria (CNN) -- Reports of at least 150 Muslims killed in recent religious clashes in Nigeria should be investigated, a human rights group urged Saturday.

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Rapist Spared, Victim Lashed

Bangladesh -- Eight months after being raped, a 16-year-old at Khargor of Kasba upazila in Brahmanbaria had to receive 101 lashes as "punishment".

A village arbitration found her guilty and issued the 101 lashes fatwa (religious edict) but amazingly left alleged rapist Enamul Mia, 20, untouched.

The arbitration also fined the victim's father Tk 1,000 and issued another fatwa that her family would be forced into isolation if he failed to pay up.

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Malaysia Charges Three Over Allah Row Church Fires

Prosecutors in Malaysia have charged three Muslim men with firebombing a church in the capital, Kuala Lumpur, earlier this month.

They are the first suspects to appear in court in connection with a series of attacks on Christian places of worship.

The violence began when a High Court judge ruled that a Roman Catholic newspaper had the right to use the word Allah to refer to the Christian God.

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Iran Puts 16 On Trial After December Riots

Five of those on trial, including two women, were accused of "moharebeh" -- or defying God -- a charge that could carry the death penalty, the semi-official ISNA news agency reported.

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Female Suicide Bomber Kills 54 In Iraq

A female suicide bomber detonated her explosives inside a way station for Shiite pilgrims Monday, killing 54 people and rattling security officials who are struggling against a possible rise in violence before key elections next month.

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Iraq suicide blast at eatery kills 3, wounds 25

Car bomb kills 18, injures dozens in Baghdad

Blasts near hotels kill 36 in Baghdad

Al Qaeda-linked group claims Iraq bombings

Suicide car bomber strikes Baghdad police forensics office

Coalition Soldiers Killed In Afghanistan

(CNN) -- Two British soldiers and a Spanish soldier were killed in separate incidents in Afghanistan, the British and Spanish Defense Ministries said.

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Taliban claims 25 dead in attack near U.S. base

Insurgents kill 3 Afghan women

U.S. intelligence briefing: Taliban increasingly effective

Insurgents Stage Comeback In Pakistan Tribal Area

KHAR, Pakistan - Pakistani troops killed eight Islamist militants Tuesday in an Afghan border region where insurgents are staging a comeback after a military operation there was declared a success, a local official said.

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12 killed in suicide attack in Pakistan