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The Weekly News In
Review
Newsletter is a
compilation of the news articles that have appeared
on the Understand The Times website during the
previous week.
This newsletter is for the last week of May and the first
week of June. It will
be back to weekly soon.
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May 28 - Alpha for Catholics
Article: Roman Catholic Church And The Last Days
For
"established" Catholics:
Drink from the Wells of the Church
by Fr. Raniero Cantalamessa, Preacher to
the Papal Household
7 talks including:
- How to Read God's Word
- The
Eucharist Makes us Holy
- Charisms and Sacraments
- Mary, our Model
Fr.
Cantalamessa spoke warmly of the Alpha
course,
describing it as, "a return to the
fundamental things of the Christian
faith" during an address at a large
inter-church conference in Germany in
May 1999.
Further details are available from
the Alpha for
Catholics Office.
Read More ....
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May 28, 2007 - Pope Benedict XVI upgrades Vatican's relations with Islam
Article: Roman Catholic Church And The Last Days
VATICAN
CITY:
Pope Benedict XVI has decided to restore
the power and prestige of the
Vatican department that oversees
dialogue with Islam.
Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone said in
an interview during the weekend with La
Stampa newspaper that the Pontifical
Council for Interreligious Dialogue would
again become "a separate
department."
In March 2006, Benedict
downgraded the office by putting it under
joint presidency with the
Vatican's culture ministry and removing its
president, Archbishop Michael
Fitzgerald, a Briton.
Both Catholics and Muslims in
inter-faith dialogue criticized the move, with
many saying that it sent a
negative signal to the Islamic
world.
Vatican sources said Monday that
Bertone's comments meant the
department would again soon get its own
director. "This would be a very
positive thing for Muslims," said a senior
Muslim official long active in inter-faith
dialogue.
Read More ....
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May 29 - Russia Says New ICBM Can Beat Any System
Article: Signs Of The Last Times
MOSCOW (AP) -
Russia tested new missiles Tuesday that
a Kremlin official
boasted could penetrate any defense
system, and President Vladimir
Putin warned
that U.S. plans for an anti-missile shield in
Europe would turn the region
into a "powder keg."
First Deputy Prime Minister Sergei Ivanov
said Russia
tested an intercontinental ballistic missile
capable of carrying multiple
independent warheads, and it also
successfully conducted a "preliminary"
test of a tactical cruise missile that he said
could fly farther than
existing, similar weapons.
"As of today, Russia has new
tactical and strategic complexes that are
capable of overcoming any existing or
future missile defense systems,"
Ivanov said, according to the ITAR-Tass
news agency. "So in terms of defense
and security, Russians can look calmly to
the country's future."
Ivanov is a former defense minister
seen as a potential Kremlin favorite
to succeed Putin next year. Both he and
Putin have said repeatedly that
Russia would
continue to improve its nuclear arsenals
and respond to U.S. plans to deploy a
missile defense system in Poland and
the Czech Republic - NATO nations that
were in Moscow's front yard during
the Cold War as Warsaw Pact
members.
Read More ....
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June 3- Strumming to the Third Temple
Article: Israel And The Last Days
Shoshana and Micha Harari, an American
Israeli couple are building an
ancient harp to be used in the Third
Temple.
Harari received the sum of $25,000
from the Temple Institute to fund the
construction of the musical
instrument.
As Shoshana strums the harp in their
workshop at Moshav Ramat Raziel, Micha
explains the importance of harp music and
its benefical effect to the mood
and
spirituality.
While millions of dollars have
been invested into the building plans of
the Third Temple, the main concern
will be when the time comes, where to
build it as the compound where the
temple once stood houses the two most
holy shrines in Islam, the Dome of the
Rock and the Al Aksa Mosque.
Read More ....
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May 31, 2007 - Caution Urged Regarding Guadalupe Report: No Basis for Certainty That Event Occurred, Official Says
Article: Signs And Wonders
MEXICO CITY, MAY 31, 2007 (Zenit.org).-
An
Internet presentation is
claiming that the image of Our Lady of
Guadalupe moved during a
Mass for aborted children, but a Church leader
urged caution about the
claims.
"Miracle in the Basilica of
Guadalupe" has been
widely distributed on the
Internet. It claims that during a Mass in the
basilica in Mexico City, the
faithful saw the image of Mary move and a
light came from her womb.
Some claim to have photographs of the image.
Monsignor José Luis Guerrero
Rosado, canon of the basilica and director
of the Superior Institute of
Guadalupan Studies, spoke of the
presentation.
"It is moving and
respectable that devoted people see signs of the
divine in daily life, given that
even the nature that surrounds us
speaks to us of God and of his
love for us," he said. "However, in his
providence it is unusual, and
not the fruit of his desire, that
supernatural signs abound.
We recall that Jesus defines as blessed
'those who have not seen and
have believed.'"
Read More ....
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May 31, 2007 - Upright walking 'began in trees'
Article: Creation/Evolution - Misc.
The ancestors of humans began
walking upright while they
were still living in trees - not out on open
land, according to a new
theory.
The traditional view is of bipedalism
evolving gradually from the
four-legged "knuckle-walking" displayed by
chimpanzees and gorillas
today.
Now, a study published in the journal
Science disputes this idea.
The British authors of the study say that
upright walking was always a
feature of great ape behaviour.
Humans inherited it without ever passing
through a knuckle-walking
phase.
Read More ....
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June 07, 2007 - Marian shrine in Madhu to become 'peace zone'
Article: Romam Catholic Church And The Last Days
by
Melani Manel Perera
Colombo (AsiaNews) -
Catholics, Buddhists and
Hindus, Tamils and Sinhalese, have all welcomed
the statement by Sri Lanka's
President Mahinda Rajapakse in which he
said that a 'peace zone' would
be established around the country's most
famous Marian shrine in
Madhu at least during the main annual
celebrations dedicated to Our
Lady. The Catholic Church had made
the proposal following the
escalating conflict in the area between the
Sri Lankan army and Tamil
Tiger rebels. The shrine is located in a
forest in the diocese of
Mannar, about 220 kilometres north of the
capital in a region currently
under rebel control and so off-limits to
pilgrims.
If the 'peace zone' could set up
quickly thousands of pilgrims
might come to the Madhu Shrine for the
annual pilgrimage on August
15, Feast of the Assumption.
The ancient statue of Mary
that is preserved in the shrine
is an object of deep devotion.
Following the 2002 cease-fire
between military and rebels, hundreds of
thousands of people began
visiting the shrine for the main celebrations
in July, August and
October.
Read More ....
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May 24, 2007 - California State Senate Passes Transsexual-Bisexual-Homosexual Indoctrination Bill
Article: Perilous Times
Sacramento,
California --
Radical legislation mandating
that schoolchildren as young as
kindergarten learn about and
support transsexuality, bisexuality and
homosexuality has passed the
California State Senate.
SB 777
requires textbooks,
instructional materials, and school-sponsored
activities to positively portray
cross-dressing, sex-change operations,
homosexual
"marriages," and all aspects of
homosexuality and
bisexuality, including so-called
"gay history." Silence on these sexual
lifestyles will not be
allowed.
..."The
notion of forcing children to
support controversial sexual lifestyles is
shocking and appalling to
millions of fathers and mothers," Thomasson
said. "Parents don't want
their children taught to become homosexual or
bisexual or to wonder whether
they need a sex-change operation. SB 777
will shatter the academic
purpose of education by turning every
government school into a
sexual indoctrination center."
Authored by lesbian Senator Sheila Kuehl,
SB 777 adds an unnatural
definition of "gender" to the Education
Code:
"Gender"
means sex, and includes a person's gender identity
and
gender related appearance
and behavior whether or not stereotypically
associated with the person's
assigned sex at birth.
Read More ....
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May 18, 2007 - New technology killing off cash
Article: Technology For A Global Monetary System
By
Jane Croft in London
Conrad Chase, British co-owner of the
VIP
Baja Beach Club in Barcelona,
makes an unlikely human debit card.
Mr Chase and almost 100
other clubbers have opted to
have tiny data chips implanted surgically
under their skin. When they
want to buy a drink, they simply wave their
techno-enabled arms across
the counter.
The chip, made by the VeriChip
Corporation, is only the size of
a grain of rice but can transmit an ID
number to a scanner allowing
money to be taken from clubbers' bank
accounts.
Mr Chase may be an extreme example
but he
demonstrates a wider point:
Britons are rapidly
embracing the cashless
society. The Association for Payment
Clearing Services, the UK
industry body, forecasts that in less than a
decade fewer than half of all
payments will be made by cash.
...Those who cling stubbornly to pounds
and pence may even pay a
price for their intransigence. Some utility
companies have already
started to penalise households who settle their
bills by cash or cheque. BT
has introduced a £4.50 charge for the
millions who do not pay by
direct debit.
But the international experience suggests
that Britain can expect even
more striking developments in the future. A
"pay-by-mobile"
system already operates in Japan. In Texas, 500
people
are taking part in a trial using a
MasterCard PayPass to buy items from
7-Eleven stores via Nokia
mobiles. Customers tap their pass or phone on
to a specially equipped
merchant terminal.
Read More ....
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June 8, 2007 - Patent sought on 'synthetic life'
Article: Cloning And Genetic Engineering
Scientists working to build a life
form from scratch have applied
to patent the broad method they plan to
use to create their
"synthetic organism".
Dr Craig Venter, the man who led
the private sector effort to sequence the
human genome, has been working for
years to create a man-made organism.
But constructing a primitive
microbe from a kit of genes is a daunting
task.
Dr Venter says, eventually, these
life forms could be designed to make
biofuels and absorb greenhouse gases.
The publication of the patent
application has angered some
environmentalists.
Read More ....
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We hope the Weekly News In Review has been a
blessing to you.
In Jesus,
Roger Oakland
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