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Dr Edward Green, director of Harvard's HIV Prevention Research Project, who came to the defence of Pope Benedict during last week's international row over condoms in Africa, says his research program at Harvard University has come to an end.

In an extended interview on today's Sunday Sequence, Dr Green told me why he decided to voice his support to Pope Benedict's controversial claim that condom distribution is exacerbating the problem of Aids in Africa. He also challenges the scientific authority of the United Nations Aids organisation, and argues that condoms should be used in Africa as part of a combination strategy to combat Aids. Dr Green says, "I have always been politically incorrect. I have always questioned authority and tried to speak truth to power whatever the consequences." A full transcript of the interview is below the line.

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On tomorrow's Sunday Sequence, we've an exclusive interview with , the Harvard researcher who made news last week when he came to the defence of Pope Benedict. The pope has outraged the medical world by claiming that condoms exacerbate the problem of Aids in Africa. This provoked rebukes from European governments and HIV campaigners around the world. But then a lone voice was heard to suggest that the Pope was in fact right. Dr Green tells me why he decided to speak out on this occasion, responds to scientific criticism of his own controversial analysis, and talks for the first time about the impact of his "politically incorrect" views on his career.

Britain's best-known medical journal, has launched an unprecedented attack on Pope Benedict. The editorial in its current edition accuses the pope of 'distorting scientific evidence' to promote Catholic teaching on the use of condoms. The Lancet editorial is titled "Redemption for the Pope?" Here's the full text:

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This post could just as easily have been titled 'The Theology of Battlestar Gallactica'. As everyone knows, recent science fiction, even before The Matrix, has . But political questions continue to interest science fiction writers. In the re-made Battlestar Galactica, now in its fourth season in the US, "the gods" are on every other page of the script. This is an imagined future world were religious mysticism and ancient sacred texts still have their place.

Benjamin Plotinsky wonders: 'Now that science fiction again has politics to draw on, will it abandon its religious impulses?' He writes:

'The corny 1978 original mercifully died after a single season. Five years ago, however, the franchise was reborn--first as a three-hour miniseries, then as a weekly show--in a compelling new form. As in the original, the show's heroes, the last remnants of a human civilization destroyed by mechanical beings called Cylons, are fleeing their persecutors and seeking Earth, the legendary planet of their origin. But instead of the clunky robots of the 1978 series, the new Cylons are indistinguishable from human beings--a detail that helps turn the show into an ongoing examination of the War on Terror: Is it ethical to torture Cylons, for example? Other questions also echo our current conflict: How should the show's hero deal with members of a (human) fifth column that has tried to sabotage his ship? How much access to sensitive information should he grant to an apparently hostile reporter? The show declines to answer straightforwardly, instead presenting viewers with a world whose politics, like our own, are filled with moral ambiguities and difficult trade-offs.'

Terry Holdbrooks, a former US soldier, who served in Guantánamo Bay, has told the story of his conversion to Islam:

'He developed a strong relationship with the General, whose real name is Ahmed Errachidi. Their late-night conversations led Holdbrooks to be more skeptical about the prison, he says, and made him think harder about his own life. Soon, Holdbrooks was ordering books on Arabic and Islam. During an evening talk with Errachidi in early 2004, the conversation turned to the shahada, the one-line statement of faith that marks the single requirement for converting to Islam ("There is no God but God and Muhammad is his prophet"). Holdbrooks pushed a pen and an index card through the mesh, and asked Errachidi to write out the shahada in English and transliterated Arabic. He then uttered the words aloud and, there on the floor of Guantánamo's Camp Delta, became a Muslim.'

Condoms and abortion continue to make the headlines. This time it's a national debate about whether abortion advice and information on condoms should be broadcast on TV and radio while young people are likely to be watching or listening. One aspect of this story that interests me is the link between health promotion ads and the behaviour of teenagers. that these kinds of ads have influenced the decisions of teenagers in respect of sexual health and wellbeing?

Flicking (or clicking) through ,
I happen upon . Which reminds me. In 1996,

Cycling round Ireland, I found myself in
Glendalough with a newly-minted copy
Of in my backpack.

I took out the book and, standing in sight of
, read Heaney's poem
Aloud. Just as my mouth formed the word

"Blackbird", , a bird
Landed at my feet and stayed there, perfectly still,
Until I'd finished reading.

Memory can be a deceptive thing,
But I remember it as a blackbird.

I've been reading by the Bible teacher Derick Bingham, who will be well-known to many listeners to Sunday Sequence. Derick is teaching pastor with t, the author of more books than I can count, and one of the most accomplished communicators I've ever encountered. On Monday 23 February, he was diagnoised with . He says the diagnosis fell on him "like a meteor out of the sky".

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The Vatican is currently working hard at damage-limitation following Pope Benedict's claim that condoms . David Willey, the Â鶹¹ÙÍøÊ×Ò³Èë¿Ú's correspondent in Rome, used the word "doctoring" yesterday, on Sunday Sequence, to describe the text of the pope's comments that's been released by his officials. According to the "official" text of the comments, which were given in answer to a question from journalists on the papal plane en route to Cameroon last Tuesday, the pope said condoms "risk" making the problem worse. The pope's comments , and the recording has the pope saying that the distribution of condoms "".

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In a sense, "plagiarism" gives the wrong impression. or dissertation, then submitting as "original" piece of work as your own. In another sense, it's much worse than traditional plagiarism. And it's big money these days. Some students, particularly in the United States, are paying online companies to write, from scratch.

Perhaps passing off another person's ideas and words seems less like stealing than carrying off their television set. We've had many examples of pastors lifting sermons from the net and presenting them from a pulpit as their own -- relying more an Yahoo than Yahweh. In some cases, those pastors defending their action as somehow less than theft, and certainly not a full-blooded violation of the eighth commandment. Why? Because, well, they're just sentences, items of intellectual property. How could anyone rate that kind of "lifting" as equivalent to lifting a plasma screen? Surely it is a kind of "borrowing" rather than "stealing", or even a kind of intertextuality: using someone else's words within a common tradition of lifting and borrowing and developing a point forward. This is, of course, self-deception. In fact, those who value ideas and regard the sentence (in the words of John Banville) as "humanity's greatest and most distinctive invention", can only consider the theft of someone's writings as a far greater crime.

"HIV/Aids is a tragedy that cannot be overcome through the distribution of condoms, which can even increase the problem." This was Pope Benedict's message to Africa at the beginning of his papal visit to the continent. 22 million people are infected with the Aids virus in sub-saharan Africa, which accounts for nearly two-thirds of infections worldwide. But Pope Benedict believes condoms can exacerbate the problem by encouraging promiscuity.

This is not the first time the Vatican has questioned the effectiveness of condom distribution as a strategy for combating HIV, but the pope's decision to make this statement while visiting the continent most devastated by the Aids pandemic is sure raise yet another worldwide debate about his judgement. At the very least, many will question his understanding of PR implications of an analysis that flies in the face of the consensus view within medical science. At worst, he will face accusations of moral irresponsibility given the weight of influence his words carry in Africa, where 17 per cent of the population is Catholic.

The Times religion correspondent Ruth Gledhill in his direction: "Pope Benedict XVI has re-opened a running sore in the side of the Church and Africa with another scientifically illiterate attempt to justify a policy that is unjustifiable even by faith."

Ruth ends her piece with a defensive coda: "And before any more readers come out and accuse me of yet another 'Paisleyite' attack on the Church, I haven't got it in for the Roman Catholic Church. This latest episode is proof that the Church has got it in for itself."

favourite definition comes from The Devil's Dictionary by Ambrose Bierce: "A saint is a dead sinner, revised and edited." The stories, legends, myths and traditions associated with Saint Patrick are a case in point. We know very little about Patrick of Ireland; we can't even say for sure where he was born. But his story lives on, sometimes as a religious tradition, sometimes as a political tradition, and sometimes as both.

Whether he came from England, Scotland or Wales, we do know that Saint Patrick wasn't from Ireland. This 5th century Roman Briton was apparently abducted at the age of 16 and brought to Ireland by slave-traders. Six years later, he escaped back to the larger island to the right of us, then returned as a missionary priest some years after that. If there are no snakes in Ireland it is because of the Ice Age, rather than Patrick's episcopal crook. But the influence of Christianity on this island, which this legendary figure has come to embody and symbolise, has been immense. Few of Patrick's writings have survived, but we do have two documents, his Confession and his Letter to the Soldiers of Coroticus, which give us a sense of the person behind the legend

We remember him today in Ireland because March 17 is thought to be the day on which he died sometime after AD 460 (ish). His grave is reputed to be outside Down Cathedral in Downpatrick -- which certainly sounds like the place where the saint was laid down to his rest. Down's claim is not undisputed, however Another tradition has it that St. Patrick ended his days in England and was buried in Glastonbury. The Chapel of St. Patrick still exists as part of Glastonbury Abbey.

I'm not a betting man, but if I was, my money would be on Wales as the birthplace of Patrick. As for his burial site, your guess is as good as mine; but I'm not prepared to challenge the claim of Down Cathedral.

Incidentally, as this image shows, Patrick is also venerated within the Orthodox Communion, with many examples of icons celebrating his life and work. Ireland, north and south, is now an ethnically diverse island. Patrick should be hailed as the patron saint of the New Irish. He is still our most famous immigrant.

Michael Reiss, the scientist-clergyman who was forced to , six months ago, has spoken about his resignation for the first time on today's Sunday Sequence programme. I asked him if he was "forced to resign" and he replied, "That's a fair summary of what happened."

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The head of Ireland's largest Protestant church says it's time to consider the creation of joint Catholic-Anglican schools. Alan Harper, Anglican Archbishop of Armagh and primate of All-Ireland, has suggested that integrated schools and colleges could be helpful in combating sectarianism in Northern Ireland. He was speaking today on Sunday Sequence, in conversation with Cardinal Seán Brady, the Catholic primate, Presbyterian Moderator Donald Patton, and Methodist President Alan Ferguson. In response, Cardinal Brady explained that single-identity Catholic schools are encouraged to form links with nearby schools from other traditions, but defended the continuing importance of faith-based, single-identity schooling in Northern Ireland.

Here's part of the exchange between Cardinal Brady and Atchbishop Harper, from today's programme:

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On tomorrow's Sunday Sequence, I'll be joined by the leaders of Ireland's four largest churches. On Thursday, the church leaders held a press conference in Belfast, in which they expressed their outrage at the murder of Constable Stephen Caroll and two young British soldiers who were just about to leave Northern Ireland for a tour of duty in Afghanistan. And for the first time, the church leaders issued a joint "pastoral letter" in association with the Evangelical Alliance and the Irish Council of Churches. It is rare, in Northern Ireland at least, for such an inclusive statement to be released by churches and Christian organisations representing so large a constituency within our society. That in itself is worth noting. The statement calls on people to wear ribbons of Lentan purple as a symbol of their determination to look to the future and work for peace.

The full text of the pastoral letter is below the fold.

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The Vatican has done it again -- yet another damaging news story. This time, the Vatican's semi-official newspaper has claimed that the washing machine has done more for women than the pill; thus appearing to imply that the place of women is in the kitchen or the utility room. This was the Vatican's contribution to International Women's Day. The headlines are already multiplying across the world. Take today's , headed "The Vatican says washing machines have done more for women than the pill. What planet are they on?"

Just when the holocaust-denying bishop story has moved to the back burners, they needed this new story like a whole in the head.

Except. Read on. What exactly has the Vatican said about women and washing machines? Well, actually, nothing. The newspaper in question, L'Osservatore Romano, a semi-official publication from within Vatican City, seems to have run a piece which asked questions rather than an article seriously arguing a case. From what I can tell, it is a rather light-hearted comment piece intended to promote a debate about which 20th century advance most contributed to the emancipation of women in the western world. A perfectly reasonably question to ask, and the possible answers, according the Osservatore piece, are many.

I quote: "The debate is still open. Some say it was the pill, others the liberalisation of abortion, or being able to work outside the home. Others go even further: the washing machine." In the context of that conversation, the piece then cites an American feminist, Betty Friedan, who commented that the humble washing machine meant that women were able to "change the sheets on the beds twice a week instead of once".

You can hardly expect the Vatican to celebrate the pill as an advance for women when its official theology regards artificial contraception as sinful. Perhaps I am misreading this, in which case please correct me, but it looks to me like a pretty inoffensive journalistic piece by Osservatore that was intended to raise a conversation amongst its readers about an important issue.

Could you follow this new work plan?

The philosopher Peter Singer has gotten under my skin again. He's that kind of thinker: not content to remain in an ivory tower reflecting on questions that have little connection to ordinary lives, Singer is a real-world philosopher who asks discomfiting questions. In a new book, he returns to a subject he has written and campaigned about since he was a student in the 70s: our moral obligations to the poor.

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Bishop John Magee, the Newry-born Catholic Bishop of Cloyne, ". Dr Magee faced many calls for resignation for failing to properly address allegations of clerical sex abuse within his diocese. As recently as last week on Sunday Sequence, Ian Elliott, the Irish Catholic Church's child protection watchdog, described Dr Magee's initial response to his investigation as "obstructive" and was unwilling to say that he had confidence in the bishop.

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Last month, the American Philosophical Association (APA) held a debate about the compatibility of science and religious belief which featured two of the world's most important living philosophers. Let me introduce them.

is one of the most well-known Christians working in contemporary philosophy. In a series of important books, he has defended the rationality of belief in God. It would not be an overstatement to say that he has revitalised the debate about religious belief within philosophy; his contributions make him one of the most significant philosophers of religion since the Scholastic period.

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h suggests that "God isn't going away, and atheism will always be a hard sell" partly because of the way the human brain works. None of this adds up to an argument for or against the existence of God; but it does offer one explanation for the resilience of belief in God across the world.

I was about at the launch of the , having a hastily-consumed lunch of something vaguely vegetarian with my old(er) friend and colleague Rick Hill, when Rick exclaimed, "Moochin?" Whereupon I was introduced to John , who has been chronicling the strangely ordinary and inordinately strange features of our life in Northern Ireland and using the photo sharing site Flickr. John may well be the Samuel Pepys of our day. He has been combining the viewfinder of a 1940's (i.e., ) with a digital camera to create a ranging from portraits to more conceptual pieces, all documenting aspects of daily life in Northern Ireland. , taken last October during the Belfast Festival at Queen's, is now part of his online collection. I hope it's catalogued in the portraiture collection, and not under conceptual art.

I'm not sure they've ever met, but n. While interviewing Johnny Ball on Talk Back today about the fact that today is a square root day (think about it), it emerged (in the way that journalistic news tends often to "emerge") that the TV legend was a keen supporter of our environment minister. He's been following Sammy Wilson's recent comments -- without the help of Twitter -- and thinks we should rally to the minister's side on the . Sometimes a news story just falls into your lap.

I am the newest citizen of the growing kingdom of tweeters. And that's "tweeter", not "tweater", apparently. Not that I expect anyone to take the faintest interest in the speedily-composed marginalia of my daily life. But within a day of joining this new utility that is said to be revolutionising our lives, I have people "following" me. They are not stalkers: they are just accompanying my every comment with mild interest.

On Friday evening at the Belfast Book Festival, the novelist Toby Litt talked about the hyper-connectivity of contemporary life and suggested that this is a significant challenge for today's writers. How do novelists map, on a page, the many ways in which their characters can communicate with each other pretty much continuously throughout the day?

There are moral and cultural issues in this for all of us. How do these new technologies change our public debates and the conversation we have with each other about the values that shape our lives? How does hyper-connectivity affect our conversation with ourselves -- for want of a better word, our "spirituality"?

(If you, too, are a citizen of Twitterdom, drop me a line @williamcrawley)

We always suspected that Northern Ireland has more creationists than any other part of the UK, but now we have the figures. Research commissioned by the religious thinktank Theos reveals that 25 per cent of the adult population of Northern Ireland believe in some version of creationism. The research also presents interesting findings the UK population's understanding of evolution.

According to , "only 25% of British adults think that evolution is "definitely true", with another quarter thinking it is "probably true". The remaining 50% are either strongly opposed or simply confused about the issue. Around 10% of people consistently choose (Young Earth) Creationism (the belief that God created the world some time in the last 10,000 years) over evolution, and about 12% consistently prefer Intelligent Design or "ID" (the idea that evolution alone is not enough to explain the complex structures of some living things). The remainder of the population, over 25%, are unsure and often mix evolution, ID and creationism together."

Read the full report .

No-one will be particularly surprised by the Northern Ireland figures, but they still cry out for some explanation. Yes, Northern Ireland has a more religious culture than the rest of the UK, but does that alone explain these figures?