Magic Statistics

In an address earlier this week to 6000 gathered for a general audience, Pope Benedict XVI pointed to New Testament saints as proof that holiness does not entail perfect agreement or flawless perfection.  He drew from the lives of St Paul and his companions to argue that, above all else, holiness requires the capacity to convert and repent.

The Pope said that Barnabas was one of the first Christians who dedicated himself to evangelisation in Tarsus and Antioch and almost “returned” Paul to the Church. He went on mission with the apostle for what came to be known as the first missionary trip of the apostle of the peoples.

“They were together at the so-called Council of Jerusalem, where the apostles decided to separate circumcision from the Christian identity”, thus opening the Church to the pagans.

Paul and Barnabas “quarrelled however during their second missionary trip” over which comrade to bring along.

For Benedict XVI this shows that “even among the saints there were disagreements” and this is “comforting”.

To say that's “comforting” is a major understatement.

“Holiness does not come from the capacity of not making mistakes;” instead, it grows from “the capacity to convert and repent, to start all over. [. . .] The capacity for reconciliation and forgiveness makes us saints,” he repeated.

Europe’s most restrictive religious registration system has just been instituted in Romania.

Despite the fact the country’s constitution guarantees freedom of religion, the new system requires minority groups to meet certain standards –- like membership amounting to at least 0.1 percent of the country’s population -– in order to be recognized by the government.

A religious group must therefore have at least 23,000 members before it can be considered for registration.

The 2005 International Religious Freedom Report released by the U.S. State Department noted minority religious groups in Romania complained about lengthy delays in obtaining construction permits and local authorities preventing activities for which groups had been issued permits.

h/t: Big News Network.com - Breaking Religious News

Translation of the Old Testament into Inuktitut is almost complete.  Publication is expected in 2008.  The translation project is a partnership between the Anglican Diocese of the Arctic and the Canadian Bible Society.

Since the draft version was completed in 2002, a team of Inuit Anglican ministers has been double-checking every word of the translated Old Testament — all 577,000 of them, [Raymond] Ningeochiak told CBC News this week.

He is thrilled with the project because at present unilingual Inuit are not able to read the Old Testament.

The team of translators is also working on a study guide for the Old Testament, also in Inuktitut.

The New Testament translation was completed in 1992.

Another dispute has arisen in the Anglican world.  Anglicans in Istanbul are up in arms at The Rt Rev Dr Geoffrey Rowell, Bishop in Europe, following his disagreement with Canon Ian Sherwood, the senior Anglican priest in Turkey.  Canon Sherwood and his church council objected to what they perceived as the fast-track ordination of Deacon Engin Yildirim who is to minister to an Anglican flock in Turkey.  Based on the story in The Times of London, the main objection to Deacon Yildirim appears to be that he is believed to be an evangelist.

A London bishop has suspended the most senior Anglican priest in Turkey, who opposed the fast-track ordination of a Turkish evangelist. The dispute highlights a potential clash of cultures between the hands-off approach of the expatriate Anglicans and the missionary zeal of Turkish Protestant converts.

Istanbul Anglicans have branded the bishop “bullying”, “crazy”, “un-Christian” and “a scandal and a menace”. Their colourful language stems partly from the popularity of Canon Ian Sherwood, the Irish cleric at the centre of the battle.

Trey Farmer, a member of the church council, which has also been suspended, illustrated the strength of feeling. “We are not here to convert anyone, but to support what exists,” he said. “If anyone wants to engage in missionary work in Turkey they are going to have to do it over our dead bodies. I don’t want to get shot for going to church.”

Recent events show that Christians in Turkey face intimidation and danger.  Mr Farmer’s fears are well-founded.  Still, the New Testament contains words like these:

• [W]hoever does not take his cross and follow me is not worthy of me.
• Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness' sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
• [A]ll who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted.

Jesus calls his church to make disciples of all nations, baptising and teaching them.

I live in a country where the physical safety of all citizens is protected.  I hope I never have to face the perils that Mr Farmer and other Christians do in Turkey, but, if I did, I would hope and pray to remain faithful to the calling of Jesus, and I would hope and pray the same for my rector and fellow parishioners.

Dr Rowell has written a letter to The Times, correcting some details and defending the new deacon.

Deacon Engin Yildirim has behaved with the utmost integrity, compassion and forbearance under sustained, unjustified and unprovoked personal attack. I regret that those who have so cruelly maligned this most Christian and gentle man seem to have so little regard for his welfare or that of his young family. In his dignity and refusal to malign those who have abused him he has given an example that others would do well to follow. His fellow countrymen can be justly proud of this young yet wise Turkish pastor.

Deacon Yildirim may well be at even greater risk than other Anglicans in Turkey, for he was born in Turkey of Muslim parents and converted to Christianity as a young adult.  He received a Master of Theological Studies from Wycliffe College, Toronto, in 2005.

Previous related posts:

• Protestant church in Turkey vandalised
• Hagia Sophia occupied to protest Pope's visit to Turkey

Chinese New Year is set for 18 February.  2007 is supposed to be the Year of the Pig on the Chinese calendar, but the government just put a huge damper on the whole thing.  The Chinese government doesn't want to offend fastidious touchy sensitive adherents of a certain religion—the one that, as Mark Steyn likes to put it, starts with "Is-" and ends with "-lam".

China's ruling Communist Party has banned images and mention of pigs in television advertisements aired over the lunar new year to avoid offending the country's Muslims, an advertising agency said on Friday.

'We were told by the CCTV (China Central Television) censorship team that the CCTV advertising department announced a new regulation on pigs in its internal document,' an executive at the Shanghai-based Mindshare agency told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa by telephone.

The ban also applies to cartoons and traditional paper-cut images of pigs, and to slogans such as 'golden pig brings you fortune' and 'wish you a happy pig year,' the executive said.

China, a nation with over 1.3 billion people, has about 21 million Muslims.

OneManBandWidth, an American professor blogging from China, points out that the ban risks offending Buddhists.

So, how are the Buddhists, who think that the animals were chosen after Buddha himself summoned them all to a meeting in which he would designate the first 12 animals as rep’s, going to feel?

Buddhists may not like it, but they have a reputation for self-immolation, not other-immolation.

In related news, Qatar has censored pictures of Piglet in children’s books.  As Kathy Shaidle suggests, the "Free Piglet" campaign needs to be revived.

h/t: Global Voices Online

Previous related posts:

• Is there anything these people are not offended by?
• Are dogs next?
• Now they’ve gone too far

Gregory Setser, the guy whose sentencing hearing was prolonged by the revelation that he thought he would be sprung by a UN commando operation, has finally been sentenced.

A federal judge on Wednesday sentenced a former Canton ceramics salesman to 40 years in prison for swindling millions from hundreds of Christian investors.
. . .
[US District Court] Judge [Barbara] Lynn gave little weight to some surprise evidence that the government introduced at Mr. Setser's sentencing hearing last month. It involved an odd series of taped phone calls that prosecutors say Mr. Setser engaged in while in custody at the Seagoville federal prison.

In the approximately 500 calls, recorded over a six-month period ending only a few weeks ago, Mr. Setser appears to be plotting with his wife, Cynthia, and a man who described himself as a U.N. diplomat to bribe an unknown judge and arrange for a U.N.-backed band of 19 armed commandos to travel from Europe to bust him out of prison.

Mr Setser’s attorney maintains that his client actually believed that the UN was working on his behalf.  Seems rather credulous for a con man.

Setser is 50 years old and in poor health, so his sentence is effectively a life term.

h/t: Religion News Blog

Previous related post: Swindler wanted UN commandos to bust him out of the slammer

Incredible, indeed.

Before you install Microsoft’s ballyhooed new operating system Windows Vista, you’d better read the fine print.  By installing Vista, you cede ultimate control of your computer to the much-loved software behemoth.  Michael Geist, holder of the Canada Research Chair of Internet and E-commerce Law, Faculty of Law, University of Ottawa, spells it out for you.

Vista's legal fine print includes extensive provisions granting Microsoft the right to regularly check the legitimacy of the software and holds the prospect of deleting certain programs without the user's knowledge.  During the installation process, users "activate" Vista by associating it with a particular computer or device and transmitting certain hardware information directly to Microsoft.

Even after installation, the legal agreement grants Microsoft the right to revalidate the software or to require users to reactivate it should they make changes to their computer components.  In addition, it sets significant limits on the ability to copy or transfer the software, prohibiting anything more than a single backup copy and setting strict limits on transferring the software to different devices or users.  

Vista also incorporates Windows Defender, an anti-virus program that actively scans computers for "spyware, adware, and other potentially unwanted software." The agreement does not define any of these terms, leaving it to Microsoft to determine what constitutes unwanted software.  Once operational, the agreement warns that Windows Defender will, by default, automatically remove software rated "high" or "severe," even though that may result in other software ceasing to work or mistakenly result in the removal of software that is not unwanted.

For greater certainty, the terms and conditions remove any doubt about who is in control by providing that "this agreement only gives you some rights to use the software. Microsoft reserves all other rights."

What does that mean?  Well, check this out, for instance.  Vista’s licence gives it the right to disable your computer if it believes that your use of the operating system is unauthorised or if it determines that you have altered the system software to circumvent Vista’s ability to monitor your computer and the software installed thereon.

Experience with Windows XP shows that validly licensed computers are often mistakenly flagged as invalid; the difference is that Vista shuts down.

Dr Geist also points to a paper by computer scientist Peter Gutmann that reveals technical limitations Microsoft built into Vista at the behest of the motion picture industry.

Vista intentionally degrades the picture quality of premium content when played on most computer monitors.

Gutmann's research suggests that consumers will pay more for less with poorer picture quality yet higher costs since Microsoft needed to obtain licenses from third parties in order to access the technology that protects premium content (those license fees were presumably incorporated into Vista's price).  Moreover, he calculated that the technological controls would require considerable consumption of computing power with the system conducting 30 checks each second to ensure that there are no attacks on the security of the premium content.

Microsoft caves in yet again to pressure from the entertainment industry.

Regular readers of this blog will know that I’m a convinced Mac enthusiast.  But, seriously, IMHO, this is beyond the pale.  I honestly cannot understand why a user would install Vista on his or her PC, knowing what Dr Geist and other experts have publicised about Vista’s licencing agreement.

Sony tried this nonsense in 2005 and got sued.  Sony’s mistake, apparently, was not informing customers that company software was spying on them.  Microsoft is telling its customers up front (at least, those that read the fine print).  For some reason, though, that doesn't seem to make it any more palatable.

Is this the real reason Windows development chief Jim Allchin said he’d buy a Mac?

Dr Geist’s column has now been picked up by BBC and United Press International.

Previous related posts:

• Bill Gates: “Just rip it”
• Microsoft executive: “I would buy a Mac”
• Microsoft “dead in the water”
• Microsoft is “going to get eaten alive”