O! News - English Version

Islam and Free Speech

 Email This Post March 26, 2008 – 12:57 pm

The Netherlands is bracing for a new round of violence at home and against its embassies in the Middle East. The storm would be caused by "Fitna," a short film that is scheduled to be released this week. The film, which reportedly includes images of a Quran being burned, was produced by Geert Wilders, a member of the Dutch parliament and leader of the Freedom Party. Mr. Wilders has called for banning the Quran -- which he has compared to Hitler's "Mein Kampf" -- from the Netherlands.

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Yahoo Backs Google Development Tool

 Email This Post March 26, 2008 – 12:56 pm

Yahoo will support Google's OpenSocial software, which allows developers to put their programs on more social-networking sites. Yahoo, Google and News Corp.'s MySpace said yesterday that they were forming the nonprofit OpenSocial Foundation to promote the technology. OpenSocial, introduced in October, may save developers time and money by letting them create a single application that works on multiple sites.

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Pope Baptizes Prominent Italian Muslim

 Email This Post March 26, 2008 – 12:37 pm

Italy's most prominent Muslim, an iconoclastic writer who condemned Islamic extremism and defended Israel, converted to Catholicism Saturday in a baptism by the pope at a Vatican Easter service.

Religion | 1 Comment »

Saudi King Calls for Interfaith Dialogue

 Email This Post March 26, 2008 – 12:36 pm

The Saudi king has made an impassioned plea for dialogue among Muslims, Christians and Jews—the first such proposal from a nation with no diplomatic ties to Israel and a ban on non-Muslim religious services and symbols.

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Why the BBC thinks Christ did not die this way

 Email This Post March 18, 2008 – 5:46 pm

With his arms outstretched, his legs straight and his hands nailed to the cross, it is the image of Jesus's crucifixion held dear by Christians for centuries. The traditional Christ on the cross, performed at an Easter Passion parade. But now the producers of a BBC drama about Christ's final days have challenged the traditional representation, saying they believe Jesus probably did not die that way.

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Obama denounces pastor’s 9/11 comments

 Email This Post March 15, 2008 – 6:36 pm

Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama on Friday denounced inflammatory remarks from his pastor, who has railed against the United States and accused its leaders of bringing on the Sept. 11 attacks by spreading terrorism.

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Telling His Own Tale of Passions and Piety

 Email This Post March 15, 2008 – 6:33 pm

Anne Rice silenced doubting Thomases when she wrote “Christ the Lord: Out of Egypt,” a novel narrated by Jesus of Nazareth. Whatever that book was, it wasn’t another semi-pornographic vampire story. It was a genuinely stirring display of piety, rich with the fruits of Ms. Rice’s copious research into the Gospels. If her 7-year-old narrator sounded oddly preoccupied with matters of décor and ritual, that 2005 novel was still stirringly sincere.

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NRB: Religious Freedom Under Attack

 Email This Post March 13, 2008 – 11:16 am

The National Religious Broadcasters Association is holding its annual convention this week in Nashville, Tennessee. NRB members are in an uproar over what they call an attack on religious freedom.

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Citing Faith, Bush Defends War Actions

 Email This Post March 13, 2008 – 11:15 am

President Bush delivered a rousing defense of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan on Tuesday, mixing faith and foreign policy as he told a group of Christian broadcasters that his policies in the region were predicated on the beliefs that freedom was a God-given right and “every human being bears the image of our maker.”

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‘Islamophobia’ a threat to world security, say Muslim states

 Email This Post March 13, 2008 – 10:59 am

The world's Muslim countries warned Thursday that an "alarming" rise in anti-Islamic insults and attacks in the West has become a threat to international security. The Organisation of the Islamic Conference (OIC) called on Europe and America to take stronger measures against 'Islamophobia' in a report prepared for a summit of the group's 57 members in Dakar on Thursday and Friday.

Politics, Religion | No Comments »