TODAY IN GOD:
RELIGION NEWS BITES FOR YOUR SNACKING PLEASURE
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‘Bleeding’ Jesus portrait draws crowds of worshipers, curious

PORT BLAIR, India — Thousands of people are flocking to a policeman’s house in India’s remote Andaman Islands to pray in front of two portraits of Jesus Christ, which are said to have been “bleeding” for the past two weeks, police and witnesses said.

Eric Nathaniel, a police radio operator, found red fluid trickling down a portrait of Jesus in his house two weeks ago which he believed was blood.

“We lit candles and prayed all night and a little later the blood dried but it soon started trickling down from the hands and heart of another portrait in the house,” Nathaniel told Reuters in the islands’ capital Port Blair on Wednesday.

Officials said red paint used in the portraits could be melting in the extreme humidity, but islanders and priests were coming in boats from remote parts of the Andaman and Nicobar archipelago to pray.
FOR THE FULL STORY (REUTERS) CLICK HERE

Money Looms in Episcopalians’ Rift With Anglicans

As leaders of the Anglican Communion hold meeting after meeting to debate severing ties with the Episcopal Church in the United States for consecrating an openly gay bishop, one of the unspoken complications is just who has been paying the bills.

The truth is, the Episcopal Church bankrolls much of the Communion’s operations. And a cutoff of that money, while unlikely at this time, could deal the Communion a devastating blow.

The Episcopal Church’s 2.3 million members make up a small fraction of the 77 million members in the Anglican Communion, the world’s third-largest affiliation of Christian churches. Nevertheless, the Episcopal Church finances at least a third of the Communion’s annual operations.

Episcopalians give tens of millions more each year to support aid and development programs in the Communion’s poorer provinces in Africa, Asia and Latin America. At least $18 million annually flows from Episcopal Church headquarters in New York, and millions more are sent directly from American dioceses and parishes that support Anglican churches, schools, clinics and missionaries abroad.
FOR FULL STORY (NY TIMES) CLICK HERE
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Will Chicago Priest Admit To Abuse Allegations? (DEVELOPING – Stay Tuned)

A Chicago priest accused of sexually abusing young boys is due in court on Wednesday. CBS 2 has learned he could be ready to talk to prosecutors about a deal.

A source tells CBS 2 that Rev. Daniel McCormack might be ready at least to “talk” about a guilty plea. The source said a request might be entered at a status hearing in court Wednesday to allow McCormack’s attorney and Cook County assistant state’s attorneys to begin the talks.

Plea bargaining raises the potential for a guilty plea, but there is no guarantee.

Rev. McCormack is the subject of two separate criminal cases. In one case, is accused of abusing two boys in the North Lawndale neighborhood, where McCormack worked as a teacher. The boys were 10 and 11 at the time of the alleged abuse.

Last year, McCormack pleaded not guilty to charges that he molested a total of five boys between September 2001 and December 2005 at St. Agatha and Our Lady of the Westside School.
FOR THE FULL STORY (FROM WBBM RADIO AND CBS/2 CHICAGO) CLICK HERE OR HERE

Update: According to the Sun-Times and the Tribune, McCormack did begin plea negotiations on Wednesday, but no deal was reached. The process will continue at another meeting scheduled by the judge for May 1.

Motion filed in suit against Joel Osteen’s wife

The attorney for a flight attendant whose lawsuit accuses the wife of Lakewood Church pastor Joel Osteen of assault wants to photograph the inside of the plane where the incident occurred.

The lawsuit, filed in September, accuses Victoria Osteen of pushing Sharon Brown, a Continental Airlines flight attendant, and elbowing her in the chest.

Brown says the confrontation occurred as Osteen approached the cockpit and demanded to speak with someone in charge.
FOR THE FULL STORY (HOUSTON CHRONICLE) CLICK HERE

Satanism rumors cost four from Amway millions

Cincinnati — Procter & Gamble Co. has won a jury award of $19.25 million in a civil lawsuit filed against four former Amway distributors accused of spreading false rumors linking the company to Satanism to advance their own business.

The U.S. District Court jury in Salt Lake City on Friday found in favor of the Cincinnati-based consumer products company in a lawsuit filed by P&G in 1995. It was one of several the company brought over rumors alleging a link with the company’s logo and Satanism.

Rumors had begun circulating as early as 1981 that the company’s logo – a bearded, crescent man-in-moon looking over a field of 13 stars – was a symbol of Satanism.
FOR THE FULL STORY (AP) CLICK HERE