Word: secularize
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...Bhutto union would bring about the systemic change that Pakistan so desperately needs. Both leaders represent Pakistan's failed past, a history defined by close ties between the ruling élite and the military, recurrent corruption and the creeping Islamization of a country whose original vision was a more secular Muslim state...
...Teresa's communication with Jesus, so vivid and nourishing in the months before the founding of the Missionaries, evaporate so suddenly? Interestingly, secular and religious explanations travel for a while on parallel tracks. Both understand (although only one celebrates) that identification with Christ's extended suffering on the Cross, undertaken to redeem humanity, is a key aspect of Catholic spirituality. Teresa told her nuns that physical poverty ensured empathy in "giving themselves" to the suffering poor and established a stronger bond with Christ's redemptive agony. She wrote in 1951 that the Passion was the only aspect of Jesus' life...
...letters are full of inner conflict about her accomplishments. Rather than simply giving all credit to God, Gottlieb observes, she agonizes incessantly that "any taking credit for her accomplishments - if only internally - is sinful" and hence, perhaps, requires a price to be paid. A mild secular analog, he says, might be an executive who commits a horrific social gaffe at the instant of a crucial promotion. For Teresa, "an occasion for a modicum of joy initiated a significant quantity of misery," and her subsequent successes led her to perpetuate...
...most unusual figures in Iraqi politics is Mithal Alussi. He is Sunni - a major handicap in the Prime Ministerial stakes - but is widely viewed as secular and independent. He earned the wrath of Sunni insurgent groups when he visited Israel in the fall of 2004. There have been several attempts to assassinate him; his two sons were killed in one such attack. His Democratic Party of the Iraqi Nation is tiny, but Alussi has a high profile because of his frequent appearance on TV news shows, where he rails against sectarianism and government corruption. This has earned him the respect...
...Like Alussi, deputy Prime Minister Barham Saleh is seen as upright and secular. But he's a Kurd, which would make him unacceptable to the country's Arab majority. Besides, the Kurds already have the presidency (Jalal Talabani), and several important ministries...