Same-sex couples are taking advantage of Hawaii’s newfound aloha for gay weddings. Six couples at a Waikiki resort tied the knot early Monday, exchanging vows side-by-side with one another in front of a few hundred guests shortly after midnight, while even more couples watched and waited their turn. LINK

Reports out of Rome say the Pontiff will visit Israel in late May, and his meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu this morning seemed to encourage such speculation. As NCR reports, Netanyahu gave Francis a book his father wrote on the Spanish inquisition. Thanks, I guess. But it had a nice inscription: “To his holiness, Pope Francescus, a great shepherd of our common heritage.” From the Israeli government photo, it looks like Francis also got a nice menorah in time for the holidays.

Conservative radio talk show host Rush Limbaugh slammed Pope Francis’ stance on social justice in his apostolic exhortation “Evangelii Gaudium,” calling the document “pure Marxism” on his show. LINK

“Your Holiness, beloved brother in Christ, this is the first time that I address you on the occasion of the feast of the Apostle Andrew, the first-called. I take this opportunity to assure you of my intention to pursue fraternal relations between the Church of Rome and the Ecumenical Patriarchate,” he said on Nov. 30.  LINK

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A prominent atheist organization states that it plans to sue an Alabama city that was recently in headlines surrounding the launch of a new program that unites area pastors and police in reaching the hurting in the community. LINK

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On November 26, 2013, two days before America’s celebratory day of Thanksgiving for the freedoms our Founding Fathers gave this Great Nation, Pope Francis I issued from the Vatican a 50,000 word “apostolic exhortation” (an 84 page Papal opinion). His opposition to capitalism and support for liberation theology was made quite clear. LINK

Roman Podbrezova, 65, had gone for a morning walk when he saw the drastic change to the river which runs through the centre of the town. ‘I just could not believe my eyes,’ he said. ‘The river was dark red. It was like something from a horror film. Blood cascading through the centre of town.’ LINK

The Lost Years is based on an original idea by Kosar who developed it with Roth and Newman. All three have strong horror pedigree — Kosar co-wrote The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, The Amityville Horror and The Crazies, and Roth and Newman jointly produced The Last Exorcism franchise in addition to their other horror credits. LINK

A wintry storm pushing through the western half of the country is bringing bitterly cold temperatures that prompted safety warnings for residents in the Rockies and threatened crops as far south as California. LINK

Mark Ciavarella Jr, a 61-year old former judge in Pennsylvania, has been sentenced to nearly 30 years in prison for literally selling young juveniles for cash. He was convicted of accepting money in exchange for incarcerating thousands of adults and children into a prison facility owned by a developer who was paying him under the table. LINK