Blogging for God: Priests and nuns should learn to blog and use the Internet in order to spread the word of Jesus, Pope Benedict XVI said this week. “Priests can rightly be expected to be present in the world of digital communications as faithful witnesses to the Gospel,” the 82-year-old pope declared, through means such as “images, videos, animated features, blogs, and websites.” At the same time, he cautioned clergy not to get so involved in new forms of communication that they become better known “for their media savvy than for their priestly heart.” The pope is already leading the way: He has launched the site Pope2you.net, which includes an iPhone application. He also has a Facebook page, though he doesn’t use Twitter.
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Jackal guards his image: Convicted terrorist Ilich Ramírez Sánchez, better known as Carlos the Jackal, has filed a lawsuit to demand control over the final cut of a forthcoming documentary about his life. Ramírez’s wife and lawyer, Isabelle Coutant-Peyre, says the documentary being shot for France’s Canal Plus network blames Ramírez for terrorist attacks in the 1970s and ’80s for which he was never formally charged. The Venezuelan-born Ramírez, 60, was linked to a string of sensational terrorist attacks in the name of Palestinian liberation, including the hostage-taking of 11 OPEC oil ministers in 1975. Since 1994, he has been serving a life sentence in France for killing two French agents. Documentary producer Daniel Leconte called the claim that the film would hurt Ramírez’s image “stupefying.”
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