The Dude Abides

Last updated on: October 27, 2006 at 2:17 pm By Cathleen Falsani

GODSTUFF: GOING NUDE ON ALL SAINTS DAY: LOOKING PAST THE HALOS TO THE GRACE In honor of All Saints Day next week, I intend to hoist a couple dozen stiff drinks, start a bar brawl, sucker-punch a co-worker, walk around the neighborhood nude and maybe rob a bank. What? That’s what some of the officially recognized, church-sanctioned saints did. Sticklers for truthiness that I know my readers to be, in fairness, most of the saints did those things before their... Read more

Last updated on: October 24, 2006 at 3:19 pm By Cathleen Falsani

KIRSTEN POWERS AT HUFFINGTON POST: ON BARACK AND THE GOD FACTOR Our friend political strategist, pundit and all-around smart cookie Kirsten Powers gives The God Factor and God Girl’s interview with Barack Obama a shout out in today’s Huffington Post. Here’s what KP had to say: Obama and The God Factor There is much talk about Sen. Barack Obama saying he’s weighing a White House run. People talk of his good looks, charisma, brains and moderation. But there has been... Read more

Last updated on: October 23, 2006 at 1:38 pm By Cathleen Falsani

THE AUDACITY OF HOPE: OBAMA ’08? A few years back, about a week after he’d handily won the Democratic primary in Illinois — long before he gave that famous keynote address at the 2004 DNC and looooooong before the rest of the country knew his “funny” name — I had the opportunity as the religion reporter for the Sun-Times to interview Barack about his spirituality, an interview that eventually made its way as a chapter unto itself in my book,... Read more

Last updated on: October 21, 2006 at 8:24 pm By Cathleen Falsani

WHEREIN ORTHOPRAXIS MEETS HETERODOXY: ‘This is an occasion for genuinely tiny knickers’ — Bridget Jones WELLINGTON, New Zealand (Reuters) — A vicar has come to the rescue of a small New Zealand town that has run out of women’s underwear. A group of women at the local Anglican church revealed the crisis caused by the only clothing shop in the small town of Inglewood, about 280 km (175 miles) north west of the capital Wellington, no longer stocking women’s underwear.... Read more

Last updated on: October 20, 2006 at 4:03 pm By Cathleen Falsani

GODSTUFF: THE RUNNING RINPOCHE:FULLY PRESENT, NOT UNLIKE THE WIND IN CHICAGO Big runner, the lama — long. “It’s a matter of staying calm, not overreacting,” Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche, a 42-year-old Tibetan Buddhist lama, was telling me earlier this week, by way of describing his strategy for finishing the last, grueling seven or eight miles of the Chicago Marathon that he’s in town to run on Sunday. This weekend’s marathon will be the eighth for the boyish-looking, Indian-born lama from Boulder,... Read more

Last updated on: October 19, 2006 at 5:47 pm By Cathleen Falsani

POPE JOHN PAUL II, THE CARTOON:I PREFER SPONGEBOB, BUT THIS IS NICE, TOO VATICAN CITY (Reuters)—No one expects it to replace Alice in Wonderland or Cinderella, but the Vatican has turned to a talking pen and pigeons in a new cartoon movie to teach children about the life of the late Pope John Paul.The film, called John Paul II, the Friend of Humanity, was unveiled at a news conference yesterday and its producers hope it will be a big hit... Read more

Last updated on: October 17, 2006 at 4:09 pm By Cathleen Falsani

TWO HOLY MEN AND . . . A CAT If, as Annie Lamott says, “laughter is carbonated holiness,” Steve Carrell is surely a holy man. Read more

Last updated on: October 17, 2006 at 2:56 pm By Cathleen Falsani

AWNOTHEYDI’IN’T!! Holy cracker sandwiches! Chrismukkah is coming and the folks at Cracked Magazine have chosen their cover boy. Feh. Read more

Last updated on: October 17, 2006 at 11:41 am By Cathleen Falsani

CHINESE MONK-EY BUSINESS:Instant karma’s gonna get you JIANGXI, China — Chinese police, disguised as tourists visiting a mountain temple, have arrested a suspected embezzler dressed up as a monk, state media said. Chen Boshi, a manager in the eastern province of Jiangxi, was suspected of embezzling $126,500 from his power company and fled to the temple in the neighboring province of Hubei last October, Xinhua news agency said Monday. After a tip-off, police searched several temples in the Henggang Mountain... Read more

Last updated on: October 17, 2006 at 11:03 am By Cathleen Falsani

B & A & O: Don’t Give Up, Africa My Irish bruthafromanuthamutha was in Chicago last week to launch Product Red’s American campaign, and before shooting an INSPI(RED) shopping spree with the O down Michigan Avenue (in a freakish mid-October snow storm), a long, late lunch at NoMi, and an impromptu meeting with W on Marine One, Bono sang his wonderful adaptation of the Peter Gabriel/Kate Bush song, “Don’t Give Up” with Ms. Alicia Keys during the a.m. taping at... Read more