Morning missives sent to me from the outside world...

The New York Times reported in June that overworked Catholic clergy in
the U.S., Canada and Europe are outsourcing certain ritual prayer
requests from their parishioners over to Catholic clergy in India.
Priests said such a practice is not new, but that a priest shortage
might have caused a bump in numbers. Indian priests said the requests
are typically accompanied by US$5 to $10 (much more than they are
offered for domestic prayers). [New York Times, 6-13-04]

Several parents walked out of a holiday program by the Glassport (Pa.)
Assembly of God when the actors on stage began whipping the Easter bunny
and breaking its eggs, which church officials said was an attempt to
move past the benign symbols of the holiday and focus on the suffering
of Christ. As children in the audience cried at the beatings, actors
chanted, "There is no Easter bunny." [Pittsburgh Post-Gazette-AP, 4-7-04]

<>As usual in the hundred-year-old Easter festival on the Greek isle of
Chios, townspeople from two churches in Vrodandos stockpiled small
rockets (an estimated 25,000 in all) and fired them at each other's bell
on Easter morning while parishioners were inside for services (although
the windows had been boarded up in anticipation). As in previous years,
misguided rockets started fires in nearby houses, but unlike in some
years, there were no deaths. [BBC News, 4-12-04]

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