Philippines Bishop Bans Visibly Pregnant Brides

BRITISH BROADCASTING CORP., Feb. 25 — Bishop Jose Sorra of Legazpi in the Philippines has made a controversial ruling: He forbade visibly pregnant brides from having public weddings, the BBC reported.

Instead, he asked them to marry privately. The bishop noted that one of his priests had been performing a wedding only to be interrupted when the bride went into labor.

After that, Bishop Legazpi ruled that “brides who are conspicuously pregnant are to be discouraged and disallowed from having public weddings. They may be married in a private ceremony within the parish church or chapel (not in a house unless very sick or bedridden), or may postpone such Church marriage until after having given birth,” the bishop wrote to his priests, noting that pregnancy outside marriage was “a counter-symbol to the purity, chastity and beauty of the bride of Christ, the Church. … A white bridal gown over a conspicuous pregnancy is a contradiction of symbol or a ludicrous confusion of symbols.”

Australian Church Denies Marian ‘Miracle’

AUSTRALIAN BROADCASTING CORP., Feb. 26 — The statue may well weep, but it's no miracle. That was the ruling of the Catholic archbishop of Perth, Australia, who recently declared a so-called “Weeping Mary” statue in nearby Rockingham was not necessarily miraculous.

A Church commission of inquiry has decided that earth-bound explanations for the phenomenon could not be ruled out.

Some thousands had flocked to that city to look at the fiberglass statue after it started shedding oily tears last year. They left behind tens of thousands of dollars in donations, the ABC noted.

“I'm personally satisfied that there was no trickery,” Perth Archbishop Barry Hickey told David Weber of the ABC. “The principal [people] that I deal with regarding the statue are all honorable people, so I don't suspect them.”

The archbishop said the money left behind had been accounted for — it had all been donated to a charity outreach in Bangkok, Thailand.

Vandals Damage Tomb of Old Testament Patriarch

WORLDNETDAILY.COM, Feb. 25 — Israeli officials have reported that one of their sacred sites on the West Bank, under nominal Arab control, has been desecrated by vandals, according to WorldNetDaily.com.

The tomb of the biblical patriarch Joseph — a figure revered by Christians and Muslims as well — was left a pile of rubble last week. Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon said the large stone marking the grave had also been destroyed.

Israeli cabinet minister Natan Sharansky asked the foreign ministry to publicize pictures of the damaged site, which lies in the Palestinian town of Nablus, the biblical Shechem. “If we would have razed the grave site of one of the founders of Islam, billions of Muslims would have taken to the streets,” Sharansky said. “It's inconceivable that the world should not know about this travesty.”

A Jewish scholarly organization that once functioned at the tomb, the Od Yosef Chai Yeshiva, demanded “immediate safeguarding” of the tomb and asked for the Israeli government to reinstate it at the holy site.

The site is named in the Old Testament Book of Joshua, which states that “Joseph's bones, which the Israelites had brought up from Egypt, were buried at Shechem in the tract of land that Jacob bought for 100 pieces of silver from the sons of Hamor, the father of Shechem. This became the inheritance of Joseph's descendents.”