This morning’s page one piece, in which a school principal sought clarification on the wearing of hijab, is now topping our most read and most e-mailed articles of the last 24 hours, showing how much the issue grabs attention. Here is a snippet from the article, by Ruadhán Mac Cormaic:

Correspondence released under the Freedom of Information Act shows the school wrote to then minister for education Mary Hanafin last October, when a Muslim couple asked that their child wear the hijab in class.

Though this contravened the school’s rules on uniform, the principal agreed to the request pending approval by the board of management.

“Our board of management met . . . and after a very extensive discussion of the issues, it was felt that the board should be entitled to guidance from the department,” Mr Sweetman wrote to the minister, adding that this needed to be addressed “with some urgency”.

When no response was received, the school again wrote to the minister in December. In reply, her private secretary advised that it was a matter for the board of management to decide on a school policy, “and it would not be appropriate for the department to direct or advise a school in relation to any aspect of its policy on dress code”.

The minister’s representative pointed to two sections of the Education Act 1998.

The first charges boards of management with a duty to uphold the “characteristic spirit of the school” as determined by the cultural, educational, moral, religious, social, linguistic and spiritual values which inform and characterise it. The second balances this with the requirement to have regard to the principles of a democratic society and “have respect and promote respect for the diversity of values, beliefs, traditions, languages and ways of life in society”.

What section of the Education Act is that? Catch 22?

This has been a touchstone issue in several countries that have dealt with Muslim populations far bigger than ours, and it is seldom resolved in a quiet way. The hijab divides forces people to confront their true feelings on issues such as tolerance, gender, religion, education, liberty and modesty. So, it’s clear why it has proved so popular this morning, why it will be picked up on more over the next few days, and why this would be an issue any Government would prefer to avoid for as long as possible. Never forget that Fianna Fáil’s pre-election broadcast listed all the great changes of the previous decade, but ignored immigration altogether.

As you may be aware by now they’ve dug up Padre Pio, given him a bit of plastic surgery, and stuck him on display.

His face was reconstructed with a lifelike silicone mask of the type used in wax museums because it was apparently too decomposed to show when the body was exhumed.

“He seems like he is sleeping. Even if they had to re-do the face, its better remembering him this way than looking at a slab of cold marble,” said Domenico Masone, deputy mayor of Pietralcina, the town where Padre Pio was born.

You know, people say that Scientology is weird, but when you see something like this you realise it just needs time to settle in and become accepted as being as normal/weird as the older religions.

Although, it’ll have to up its game to corpse-digging levels if it truly wants to compete with the giants.

I’m well-disposed towards Humanism, but the new magazine launched yesterday doesn’t appeal to me. I’m wondering if it’s just because of its title. When browsing the shops, will you really be enticed by a copy of the gleaming Humanism Ireland? They should have appealed to a higher power on this: a brand manager, or PR guru, that sort of person. They would have suggested alternative titles, such as:

- God Is Dead. We Have Killed Him. Yay!
- Hellbound Monthly
- Go God Go

At least one school had a Mass ahead of its Leinster Senior Cup rugby match this week.

It’s interesting to hear that God takes time out from his busy schedule - deciding who lives and dies, triggering natural disasters, fiddling the Republican nomination race - to pay an interest in schools rugby. Maybe he went to a school for fee-paying dieties. Maybe he has a couple of quid on the outcome. Whatever, other schools will now need to up the ante in order to curry his favour. Ritual sacrifice before the match, perhaps.

Seriously, I’m amazed that anyone would think that any God would bother influencing a minor sporting event on this sprawling planet. With the Olympics coming up, he’ll be far too busy trying to decide which God-bothering sprinter should win the 100m.

The questions that Slate’s ‘Explainer’ didn’t answer this year.

Shock news: some, but not all, people Google themselves, and other people

The Onion cuts to the chase on the whole Harry Potter nonsense.

P Diddy’s perfume is called Unforgivable Woman. Rejected alternatives: “Fallen Woman” and “Harlot”.

Time may be running out. Literally.

Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert have had enough of the writers’ strike and are going back on air.

Will Smith’s next movie is I Am Legend (read the book, it’s brilliant). Then it’s a “homeless superhero” flick that’s likely to be pretty terrible.

Dublin looks very well today and this makes it look positively funky (I posted it in July, but I can show it now, so up it goes).

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Should you be looking for film reviews, you should try MovieGuide.org. It’s a hoot. The Christian website views movies on a scale from “Wholesome” to “Abhorrent”, and summarises plots through their supposed theological standpoints (Beowulf: “light, undeveloped Christian worldview with strong pagan elements”.)

Right now, its chief concern is with The Golden Compass, a movie based on the first book in the His Dark Materials trilogy written by Philip Pullman. Or “an avowed atheist”, as MovieGuide.org clarifies. It concludes that: “A society shaped by the materialist and godless ethic promoted by films like The Golden Compass is a society without hope.”

The site’s founder, Ted Baehr, has explained that when the trilogy ends, “All [ the central character] Lyra wants to do in her life at the end of the trilogy is sexually pleasure herself with her friend”. Readers of the book will recognise that as a statement that proves only that there is nothing filthier than the mind of a religious puritan.

Pullman’s reaction? “Oh, it causes me to shake my head with sorrow that such nitwits could be loose in the world,” he told Newsweek. (more…)

Current book is Towards the Light: The Story of the Struggles for Liberty and Rights That Made the Modern West by AC Grayling. Relevant but potentially dry-as-digestives topic given an impressive lightness of touch.

Wired piece on “Gamer Regret”, that shameful realisation that you’ve wasted an enormous chunk of your life on killing non-existent zombies. (more…)

Heart-warming Al-Jazeera clip in which a secular guest takes on Islamic fundamentalism (via Graham Linehan)
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Poster boy of intelligent design writes new book. The New York Times asks Richard Dawkins to review it. Ouch.
Link: The Edge of Evolution

Conservapedia explains the dinosaur. Sample line: “Descriptions of dragons are widespread and match descriptions of dinosaurs, suggesting that dragons were real creatures and were actually dinosaurs.”
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Visit the creationist museum of natural history. “The Bible speaks for itself at the Creation Museum.” It sure does.
Link: Creation Museum

Bishop of Carlisle says British floods are a result of turning away from the Bible. Which is odd, because Gerald Fleming never mentioned it on the weather forecast
Link: Recent Floods are God’s Punishment

Bruce Springsteen sings Thunder Road, live at Hammersmith Odeon, 1975
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- Reading Tim Guest’s Second Lives: Journeys Through Virtual Worlds, and he makes a passing reference to how many people reckon the Burning Man festival is the closest thing real life has to Second Life. Having been at Burning Man, and having spent a little time in Second Life again recently, I’d agree with him. A sense of freedom, of the art of the possible, of the surreal, or re-invention and the ridiculous. Guest also makes direct comparisons between Second Life and the cult he grew up in: not just in the adoption of new identities but also in the preciousness of the creators and some inhabitants, and insistence of rules within supposed freedoms. I’m reviewing the book for the paper, so I’ll be back to this at a later date.

- Listening to (and watching) Bruce Springsteen and the Sessions Band Live in Dublin, and having been at one of the shows my greatest regret in life is not having gone to all three.
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- For all you Troy McClure fans out there, here’s a selection of the late, great Phil Hartman’s finest moments. This includes a sketch featuring both Hartman and John Lovitz, so you might need to sit down for that one.
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