Over the summer, the OPEC cartel could not prevent oil prices from surging to record levels even when its members pumped full out. Now, the producers seem equally unable to stop prices from collapsing as the global economy cools down.

Members of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries left an informal meeting in Cairo this weekend without an agreement to reduce production, but with rising doubts about fraying discipline and tensions within the group that accounts for 40 percent of the world’s oil exports.

So great uncertainty still looms over the market. Have producers managed to draw a line in the sand, or will oil prices keep falling in coming months?

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“World focus on the current economic situation threatens to overshadow the response to the humanitarian crisis unfolding in DR Congo and elsewhere at a time when the message ”˜Peace on Earth’ begins to take centre stage in our thoughts,” declares the Most Rev Dr Idris Jones, Bishop of Glasgow & Galloway and Primus of the Scottish Episcopal Church.

He continues “Over the past few months we’ve all experienced in some way the effects of the global economic crisis. For some the effects are more shattering than for others. More recently shocking reports of the conflicts in DR Congo highlight the massive humanitarian crisis there and the atrocities being carried out on thousands of people. Peace on Earth?

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Almighty God, who didst give such grace to thine apostle Andrew that he readily obeyed the call of thy Son Jesus Christ, and brought his brother with him: Give unto us, who are called by thy Word, grace to follow him without delay, and to bring those near to us into his gracious presence; who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever.

Indian media was itself a major news item as the Mumbai terror attacks came to a conclusion over the weekend.

The country’s broadcasters were summoned Friday by the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting to deal with charges that the live saturation coverage had helped the terrorists. At the same time, however, traditional media were criticized as too slow and inaccurate by legions of “citizen journalists” using Internet services such as Twitter and photo site Flickr.

The deputy commissioner of police argued that the terrorists, who were holed up in two major hotels and became involved in floor-by-floor firefights with police, were gaining tactical information from TV. Using powers under Section 19 of the country’s Cable Television Networks Act, he ordered a blackout of TV news channels.

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A nice piece on the reality of abundance and the illusion of scarcity–watch it all.

More than 425 people have died since the outbreak in August and the number is expected to rise due to poor sanitation worsted by the onset of the rainy season.

Opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai has accused the government of under-reporting the deaths, saying that he believed more than 500 people had died and half a million were affected by cholera.

Zimbabwe’s dilapidated infrastructure has made clean water a luxury, with many people relying on shallow wells and latrines in their yards.

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Colorado Springs police detectives raided Grace Church & St. Stephen’s on Wednesday morning to seize paper financial records and computers as part of a theft investigation launched more than a year ago.

More than 20 officers cordoned off the blocklong church complex at 601 N. Tejon St., evicting its controversial pastor, the Rev. Donald Armstrong, who wandered the sidewalk in clerical garb, a copy of the warrant in his right hand.

The raid focused on records tied to allegations from the Episcopal Diocese of Colorado that Armstrong embezzled $400,000 from Grace Church & St. Stephen’s Parish, the congregation he headed before he and his followers broke away in early 2007 to affiliate with the Convocation of Anglicans in North America.

Colorado Springs police Lt. David Whitlock said officers were searching for evidence of theft and fraud. Police also searched Armstrong’s Colorado Springs home Wednesday.

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A very encouraging piece-watch it all.

The Very Rev. James A. Kowalski has been dean of the Cathedral Church of St. John the Divine for nearly seven years. In all that time, he has never heard its great organ played during a worship service.

On Sunday, he will finally have his chance.

So will countless congregants and visitors as the Episcopal cathedral is formally rededicated. Everyone is invited to the 11 a.m. service, though the cathedral advises the public to arrive at least an hour early to claim passes for unreserved seats. At least 3,000 people are expected to attend.

The rededication signifies the return of the whole cathedral ”” all 601 feet of it ”” to useful life.

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One human-rights activist has described the Congo as “the most dangerous place on earth for women”: a place where rape as a weapon of war, mutilation, gang torture, blinding, and maiming are all inflicted indiscriminately on women and young girls.

Appallingly, these everyday displays of power and hatred go largely unchecked and ignored by the law. When I was in the South Kivu province, I asked the officer in charge of military justice how many courts dealt with sexual violence against women, and how many men had been convicted. The answer, as I expected, was none.

Goma itself has seen much sexual violence. Yet it has also become a place of hope. A Christian hospital called Heal Africa was set up here, decades ago, by a fearless Congolese surgeon who regularly risks his life to serve his fellows. It trains health professionals and strengthens social activists. Inevitably, the commitment to holistic care has drawn it into treating and combating sexual violence.

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Update: For background on this I strongly recommend taking the time to watch Ben Affleck’s journey to the Congo as shown on Nightline earlier this year: part one is here and part two is there.

From here:

Archbishop Ben Kwashi reports that violence has subsided in Jos City in Northern Nigeria. He and his wife Gloria were able to visit churches in all the archdeaconries and St Luke’s Cathedral. In some churches attendance was down to 25% and in others down to 50%. His message was the same for all: ” There is no battle in which a child of God is involved in which God is not also involved. He is involved in our present conditions.” In the city as a whole military checkpoints have been set up; there are many internally displaced persons and food is scarce, He continues to ask for prayer.

I caught a quote from Archbishop Kwashi on the BBC World Service on the way home from worship today–let us continue to keep the whole region in prayer–KSH

When Donna Campiglia learned recently that a genetic test might be able to determine which sports suit the talents of her 2 ½-year-old son, Noah, she instantly said, Where can I get it and how much does it cost?

“I could see how some people might think the test would pigeonhole your child into doing fewer sports or being exposed to fewer things, but I still think it’s good to match them with the right activity,” Ms. Campiglia, 36, said as she watched a toddler class at Boulder Indoor Soccer in which Noah struggled to take direction from the coach between juice and potty breaks.

“I think it would prevent a lot of parental frustration,” she said.

In health-conscious, sports-oriented Boulder, Atlas Sports Genetics is playing into the obsessions of parents by offering a $149 test that aims to predict a child’s natural athletic strengths. The process is simple. Swab inside the child’s cheek and along the gums to collect DNA and return it to a lab for analysis of ACTN3, one gene among more than 20,000 in the human genome.

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After two days of mob violence, an uneasy calm returned Sunday to this central Nigerian town. Women with plastic buckets ventured out in search of water and many of the dead were buried.

Troops on foot and in armored personnel carriers appeared Sunday to have quelled two days of ethnic and religious rioting that left more than 300 people dead in Jos, apparently ending the worst violence in the West African nation since 2004.

Streets stayed mostly empty, but hunger and thirst forced some residents out of their homes for the first time since the riots began Friday after a disputed election. Hundreds of women and girls, who wouldn’t be considered combatants by soldiers with orders to shoot troublemakers on sight, carried buckets and cans to public water points.

“There’s no water in the house. Our children are crying for water, and all the shops are closed. Even the last food we have, we can’t cook because we have no water,” said Hawa Ismailah, a Muslim housewife with 24 people cowering in her home.

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India’s highest-ranking security official resigned on Sunday, as the government began to reckon with the fallout from a three-day standoff with militants that raised troubling questions about India’s vulnerability to terrorism.

The day after the siege’s end, the official death toll rose to 183. But the police said they were still waiting for the final figures of dead bodies pulled from the wreckage of the Taj Mahal Palace & Tower Hotel, the 105-year-old landmark where the attackers held out the longest. Funerals in this commercial capital were scheduled to continue throughout Sunday, for the second day in a row.

As an investigation moved forward, there were questions about whether Indian authorities could have anticipated the attack and had better security in place, especially after a 2007 report to Parliament that the country’s shores were inadequately protected from infiltration by sea ”” which is how the attackers sneaked into Mumbai.

Home Minister Shivraj Patil, responsible for public safety and internal security as one of the most senior members of the government, resigned on Sunday to take responsibility for the failure of the country’s intelligence services and military to prevent the attacks in Mumbai.

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