Word: benediction
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...Pope Benedict XVI's mostly warm but sometimes chilly relationship with the worldwide Jewish community may have just hit a major ice patch. On Thursday, Benedict put his moral weight (though not yet his signature) behind the cause for sainthood for Pope Pius XII, the wartime Pontiff who many Jewish leaders criticize for not having done enough to oppose the Holocaust...
...German Pope's many gestures of goodwill toward Jews during his three-year papacy was to effectively suspend the internal Vatican process that leads to sainthood for Pius, citing a need for a "period of reflection." Now, however, Benedict appears to have finished his own reflecting on the historical virtues of the Italian Pope who reigned from 1939 to 1958. At a special Mass on Thursday marking 50 years since Pius' death, Benedict praised his wartime predecessor's actions to save Jews and called on Catholics to "pray that the cause of his beatification goes forward smoothly." Beatification...
...That Pope Benedict XVI and Ayatollah Khameini of Iran can elicit such differing, intense reactions - for that matter, that even comparing the two might seem incendiary to some Catholics - is one indication how religious belief informs political and social doctrine. Some of that contentiousness has lately seeped into moviegoing. Our texts for today are two indie films, Religulous and Fireproof, that appeal to diametrically opposed audiences. I can't imagine that there'd be a person who could respond to both films the way their makers want. If these movies happen to be playing in adjacent auditoriums at the multiplex...
...photos of Pope Benedict XVI's trip to Brazil here.) (See TIME's pictures of the week here...
...While Benedict continues his efforts to stir Europeans with his ideas, there is also the work to be done on the ground. Georges Kouakou, 50, remembers the Western missionaries when he was growing up poor in his native Ivory Coast. Having emigrated to France, Kouakou, a computer engineer and father of three, regularly attends mass at Notre Dame des Victoires church in central Paris. The pastor to the mostly native French parishioners there happens to be from the Congo. "There's been an evolution," Kouakou says. "Europeans went to evangelize Africans; today it's the reverse, and Africans...