Good evening, and welcome to this week's retrospective. Looking back, we find this to be a somewhat curious week, as the constrictor plot thickens about the asphyxiating Copts, the Catholic Church continues to get its act together, Pakistan demonstrates how its justice system is anything but, and a new world record on calculating the number of digits in Pi (mmm... delicious).
Headlining the Retrospective tonight, the Copts of Egypt continue to demand justice from the military that murdered their compatriots, the television station that inflamed opinion against them, and the Muslims who have consistently targeted them and the symbols of their faith. While I personally hold little hope of proper justice and restitution based on past form, I would be very happy to be wrong on this one.
While on the matter of Islamic justice, we also now see that Pakistan has removed the judge who presided over Mumtaz Qadri's trial. Qadri was a bodyguard of Salman Taseer, the Governor of Punjab and an outspoken supporter of Asia Bibi, until he was murdered by Qadri. Judge Pervez Shah was moved by the Lahore High Court under pressure from Islamic puritans, and it would also appear that Qadri may yet be acquitted, or be forced only to pay blood money to the Taseers rather than forfeit his life. Words fail me to look at this injustice.
It would also appear that Sudan is now preparing to become Africa's first Islamic State, with the northern part of the country already moving to demolish churches now that the South of the country has decided to leave. I should not be surprised to see Sudan fall even further behind its southern offshoot with this development (given that's where a lot of the oil is).
And now we have two tails from Islamic Indonesia. The first involves, once again, Muslim intolerance, as a Muslim mayor prevents Christians from finishing a church that federal courts have given approval of and committing libel in the process. The second, far happier story, is about Flores, and the possibility of conversion out of Islam without any repurcussions. If only all Muslims were so. For more information on Flores, you can start with Wikipedia.
To end our look at the Islamic news tonight, we shall look at a story with a salient lesson for ourselves. A crash in the BlackBerry network in the UAE has seen the number of car accidents drop by 40%. The lesson here is not to text and drive, lest one be caught a twit and send your face into space.
In Catholic news, the bishop of Kansas City has been indicted on misdemeanors regarding a slow response to allegations of child abuse by a priest in his parish. The bishop has vowed to fight the charge, though I have enough faith in the American justice system to trust its judgement. It's certainly better than Pakistan.
Additionally, this year's Peace Pilgrimage to Assisi, led by Pope Benedict XVI, will end the practice of John Paul II who had celebrated a combined prayer service at the events in 1986 and 2002. And it's a good thing too, as far as this Catholic is concerned. To do otherwise is to give far too much credence to moral relativism, and if there's one thing Papa Benny hates, it's relativism.
In news of science and nature, the previously polluted river Koshon in Israel is to be turned into a nature reserve and a clean waterway. It has also been suggested that the Himalayas could become the Saudi Arabia of solar energy.
And in two new records, the world's population has or is about to reach 7 billion souls. Considering that two people have calculated the value of Pi to 10 billion digits, I'd say we'll have enough slices to go around for a little while yet.
And that is the end of the News.
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