CALIFORNIA
Ruling Upholds Firing on Basis of Religion
The Los Angeles Times
"Religious institutions cannot be held liable for discriminating against employees on the basis of religion, the California Supreme Court ruled unanimously Thursday."

FLORIDA
Man who fought Scientology testifies for church
The Associated Press
"ST. PETERSBURG -- In a stunning reversal, Robert Minton, who has spent an estimated $10 million fighting Scientology and financing lawsuits against the organization, is testifying on behalf of the church."

Muslims strive to shed stigma
St. Petersburg Times
"ST. PETERSBURG -- In his travels since Sept. 11, Imam E. Abdulmalik Mohammed has felt an urgency to intensify his message of peace, tolerance and patriotism and to rectify the image of his faith."

INDIANA
Muslim teen reflects on life since Sept. 11
The Indianapolis Star
"Huma Ansari, 18, is like many American teens. She lives with her parents and younger sister in Muncie, attends Burris Laboratory School on the Ball State campus, and plans to attend Indiana University in the fall, majoring in pre-med and biology."

NEW JERSEY
Wine or Grape Juice: a Communion Conundrum
The Associated Press
"A dentist's invention 133 years ago changed the way millions of Americans worship. He was Thomas Bramwell Welch, an abstemious Methodist who lived in a New Jersey town named, appropriately, Vineland. He cooked up grape juice to make it permanently nonalcoholic, applying the pasteurization process that Louis Pasteur had invented four years earlier to sterilize wine, beer and milk."

NEW YORK
Jehovah's Witnesses to oust critics of policy
The Associated Press
"NEW YORK - Jehovah's Witnesses who publicly criticized how their denomination handles claims of sexual abuse say the religious group has started the process of ousting them from the fellowship."

TEXAS
Spiritual enlightenment for some, cash for others
Indian religion depends on South Texas for peyote
New York Times
"MIRANDO CITY -- The South Texas sun beats on the landscape here like an anvil, turkey vultures circle overhead, and the scent of distant gas wells drifts across desolate plains of mesquite chaparral and sunburned cactus. This is harsh country, but also a land, some say, that offers spiritual enlightenment."

UTAH
Church to Produce Book on Massacre
The Salt Lake Tribune
"A trio of LDS Church historians is producing what they believe will be the definitive account of the infamous Mountain Meadows Massacre in which 120 men, women and children from Arkansas were murdered by Mormon settlers and their American Indian accomplices as they passed through Utah."

New facts on guilt in Mountain Meadows Massacre
Deseret News
"New evidence uncovered by scholars researching the Mountain Meadows Massacre shows that regional leaders of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in southern Utah had greater culpability in the event than previously acknowledged by most LDS authors."

Trouble for Utah atheists
Deseret News
"Utah atheists aren't seeing eye to eye these days about the things they don't believe in. "Evangelical atheists," one side says dismissively about the other. "Pseudo-intellectual," the other group sniffs."

WASHINGTON, D.C.
The Fabric of Their Faith
Since Sept. 11, Head Scarf More Meaningful for Many Muslim Women
Washington Post
"In the panicked months after the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, 24-year-old Lisa Hashem found herself spending more and more time at her neighborhood mosque."

AUSTRALIA
Religious tensions in asylum camps
BBC News
"Minority religious groups in Australia's immigration detention centres are being persecuted and physically assaulted by Muslim asylum seekers, according to Amnesty International, the human rights group."

Dalai Lama arrives in Australia to big welcome
Reuters
"MELBOURNE -- The Dalai Lama, Tibet's exiled spiritual leader, arrived in Australia on Saturday for a nine-day tour that is expected to draw tens of thousands to his talks but he won't be meeting political leaders."

BRAZIL
Brazil gets first female saint
BBC News
"Pope John Paul the Second has canonised Brazil's first female saint in a ceremony in the Vatican. Hundreds of Brazilians, including President Fernando Henrique Cardoso, attended the event in St Peter's Square."

CANADA
Lawyer aims to deter rights abuses
Calgary Sun
"The lawyer for a Jehovah's Witness couple hopes to win damages against the Director of Child Welfare to deter rights abuses in blood transfusion cases."

Sikh wins right to wear dagger
BBC News
"A Quebec court has ruled that a 12-year old Sikh boy should be allowed to wear his ceremonial dagger - known as a kirpan - while he is at school."

CHILE
Chilean Mystery: Clues to Vanished American
A Jewish professor missing since '85 likely was killed by a Nazi sect
New York Times
"AN FABIÁN DE ALICO -The vacationing hiker spent the night under the summer stars, his only companion a local herdsman. The next morning, the traveler, an American mathematics professor named Boris Weisfeiler, made his way toward a spot where two rivers converged, hoping to wade across."

CHINA
Four Falungong adherents jailed for illegal broadcast
AFP
"Four members of the banned Falungong group have been jailed for up to 16 years in China for hijacking a cable television station to broadcast sect propaganda, state press said."

Falun Gong Followers Sentenced
The Associated Press
"BEIJING -- A Chinese court has sentenced four Falun Gong followers to prison terms ranging from seven to 16 years for hacking into a cable television network and broadcasting information about the banned group, state media said."

Falun Gong Activist Repents Suicidal Burning
Xinhua
ZHENGZHOU -- "I want to shout at Li Hongzhi that he is a shark and should stop tricking and deceiving people now," said Wang Jindong, a former Falun Gong follower.
NOTE:: Xinhua is a Chinese state-controlled news agency. The Chinese government is hostile to Falun Gong.

ENGLAND
Experts in Kleasen Case OK Depositions
Salt Lake Tribune
"Robert Elmer Kleasen appeared in a London courtroom Friday for a brief hearing in his ongoing battle against an extradition request by Texas prosecutors. Charged last year with two counts of capital homicide in the 1974 slaying of two LDS missionaries serving in Austin, Texas, Kleasen has vowed to resist attempts to return him to the United States to stand trial."

ITALY
Keeping an Eye on the Heavens
Vatican's Chief Astronomer, a Priest, Sees Room for Religion and Science
The Washington Post
"George Coyne, a Jesuit priest and the Vatican's chief astronomer, has made a career of putting Earth and humanity into a very broad perspective."

JAPAN
Aum Supreme Truth wins 12 residency suits
Yomiuri Shimbun
"Members of the Aum Supreme Truth cult have won 12 cases in a row since December 2000 against local governments that refused to register them as residents, with some gaining residency and compensation as a result."

Nurses called a murder cult
The Toronto News
"TOKYO -- As nurses, they thought they had a prescription for the perfect crime. The evening started, police say, with a pot of curry laced with crushed sleeping pills, fed to the husband of one of the four friends. Then, when he was out cold, they shoved tubes up his nostrils, pumped him with a quart of whisky and injected his veins with water."

MOLDOVA
Moldovan Parliament use psychic mediums to help locate missing colleague
The Associated Press
"CHISINAU -- A parliament panel has hired psychics to try to locate a leading opposition lawmaker who has been missing since March, lawmakers said Saturday."

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