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Critic of Pope Launches Rebellion vs. the Vatican

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, New York Times

Critic of Pope Launches Rebellion vs. the Vatican

On the final day of Pope Francis’ mission to Ireland, as he issued wrenching apologies for clerical sex abuse scandals, a former top Vatican diplomat claimed in a letter published Sunday that the pope himself had joined top Vatican officials in covering up the abuses and called for his resignation. The letter, a bombshell written by Carlo Maria Viganò, the former top Vatican diplomat in the United States, seemed timed to do more than simply derail Francis’ uphill efforts to win back the Irish faithful. Its unsubstantiated allegations and personal attacks amounted to an extraordinary public declaration of war against Francis’ papacy.

New Leader of Australia Appoints His Cabinet

Australia’s new prime minister announced his Cabinet on Sunday, replacing the foreign affairs minister and redistributing responsibility for two of the most divisive issues for his party and conservative politics: immigration and climate change. Scott Morrison, 50, who became prime minister Friday after a feud inside the governing Liberal Party toppled Malcolm Turnbull, said his “new generation team” would “begin the process of healing.” But even as Morrison promised some continuity, it was clear from his appointments that the rift — which produced Australia’s sixth prime minister since 2010 — is far from resolved and will continue to shape the country.

North Korea to Expel a Japanese Tourist

North Korea has decided to expel a Japanese man accused of committing a crime while visiting the isolated country on a tourist visa, the country’s state media reported. The man, Tomoyuki Sugimoto, has been held in North Korea for an investigation of “his crime against the law,” the Korean Central News Agency said late Sunday. It did not provide details of the alleged crime. Japan’s Kyodo News agency reported earlier that a Japanese videographer on a group tour appeared to have been detained in North Korea after shooting footage of a military facility while visiting Nampo, a port city south of Pyongyang, North Korea.

Shrinking Swiss Town Hopes to Lure Visitors

The Swiss village of Corippo has only 12 full-time residents, with an average age of 75. The village’s demographic decline is part of a broader problem and debate over how to halt the drop in Europe’s rural population and how to keep younger people in farming villages like these. In July, officials agreed to allow a local foundation to turn a handful of the village’s 30 abandoned houses into a hotel. The hotel has received a lukewarm response from residents, some of whom criticize the focus on tourists rather than on their own basic needs, like addressing a deficient water supply system.

Gloom in World’s ‘Happiest’ Nations

Finland, Norway, Denmark and Iceland led the 2018 ranking of the World Happiness Report, and Sweden wasn’t far behind, placing ninth. But in the five Nordic countries, an average of 12.3 percent of the population is “struggling” or “suffering,” according to a report by the Nordic Council of Ministers and the Happiness Research Institute in Copenhagen. “Something doesn’t rhyme,” said Michael Birkjaer, an analyst with the Happiness Research Institute and an author of the report, titled “In the Shadow of Happiness,” referring to the uneven distribution of happiness across the Nordic countries. “It’s the youth driving the inequality to the highest degree.”

In Brazil, ‘Queer Museum’ Is Censored, Then Celebrated

After nearly a year of arguments, the “Queer Museum" exhibition — which included a painting of the Virgin Mary cradling a monkey, and sacramental wafers with words like “vagina” and “penis” written on them in neat cursive — reopened this month in Parque Lage, a public park in Rio de Janeiro. As Gaudêncio Fidélis, the curator, stepped to the podium to preside over the opening ceremony, he looked ebullient as he flashed a victory sign. The opposition, however, has no intention of surrendering the fight to close the contentious exhibition, which has cast a spotlight on the battle over gay and transgender rights in Brazil.

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