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An $8,000+ Vatican Book and a New Mandala for the Dalai Lama

October 12th, 2007 by Menachem Wecker

  • The San Diego Natural History Museum has a great two for one deal–or eleven for one more exactly. Viewers can see not only the Dead Sea Scrolls exhibit, reports the San Diego Union-Tribune, but also the oldest known Ten Commandments, 2,000 year old, Hebrew Deuteronomy manuscript.

  • Calling all Da Vinci Code junkies. If you can come up with $8,377, you can get one of 800 copies of a book out from the Vatican of newly discovered heresy trial documents about the Knights Templar, reports Beliefnet. Only 799 are up for sale, and Pope Benedict XVI gets the 800th copy (presumably gratis) of the 300-page “Trial against the Templars” (Scrinium).
  • Is Giorgio Armani the patron saint of the Sydney Theatre Company, wonders the Guardian. “What galvanising news for both fashion and the arts, two industries that - you could argue - haven’t worked in tandem to the degree one might have assumed.”
  • A new mandala is in the works at Auburn Theological Seminary in NYC to welcome Dalai Lama, courtesy of his personal monks from India, reports PBS’ Religion & Ethics NewsWeekly. Hopefully, they will ban children, or else we might see a repeat of this.

  • “Banning anti-gay music will achieve nothing,” reads Richard Smith’s provocative title in the Guardian. Moneyquote: “To paraphrase George Orwell, when I see an actual flesh-and-blood pop star in conflict with his natural enemy, a police officer or a politician, I don’t have to ask myself which side I’m on. It’s also the legal equivalent of your mum saying she’s going to go down your school to have a word with the bullies; all very nice and well-meaning, but totally counterproductive.”
  • The Bronze Door (b. 1617) leading from St. Peter’s Square into the apostolic palace is back after two years, and the Pope inaugurated it and expressed joy it was “returned to its place and function, under the beautiful mosaic of the Madonna and Child with Sts. Peter and Paul,” reports Catholic World News. The Pope also thanked restorers and the “Knights of the Holy Sepulchre and the the Credito Artigiano Bank, for funding the work.”
  • Doris Lessing (pictured, IHT) has won a Nobel Prize in literature, reports the IHT. The Dallas Morning News Religion blog reports in a great post on the Sufi mysticism angle. See the interview here:

    You know, there’s a Sufi bandwagon now, a Sufi craze. Everyone wants a quick fix. I am constantly sent books that purport to be about the Sufi way, and they never are. It’s not something you can find in a book. You don’t discover the Sufi message from a writer. Sufism is something you experience on your own. It’s the same for Buddhism. You can’t read a book and receive enlightenment.

    •    Post in Christianity, Buddhism   

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