For other countries, a second-round World Cup match is a big step. For the United States, Saturday’s game against Ghana is so much more.

The television audience back home could top the U.S. national team record of 13.7 million, set during the 1994 World Cup loss to Brazil.

With a victory, the Americans would advance to a quarterfinal matchup versus Uruguay or South Korea on July 2 and match the farthest the U.S. team has advanced since the first World Cup in 1930. Confidence is soaring.

“If we continue to build on the successes so far, we can go to the end,” coach Bob Bradley said Friday.

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Kevin Rudd may be happy about at least one thing: he can avoid Toronto this weekend.

Nothing against Canada’s business capital, but by stepping down suddenly as Australia’s premier, Rudd got himself out of a much-hyped gathering with virtually no chance of putting the world economy on a more even keel.

Why is that? We are suffering from a chronic leadership vacuum, one starkly underlined by Rudd’s untimely departure. The Group of 20 will go through the motions and consider the burning issues of our day. Yet the list of pressing problems is a daunting one….

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The Episcopal Standards Commission will take no action against Ballarat Bishop Michael Hough, who was the subject of misconduct allegations made two years ago.

The Episcopal Standards Commission (ESC) was this week notified that the Anglican clergy and lay people withdrew their complaints.

Thirteen clergy and lay people withdrew their complaints after they entered into a confidential deed of settlement between their group, Bishop Hough and the Ballarat diocese.

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Recently I was in Richmond, Va. for continuing education. Since my course spanned two weeks, I found myself in a strange place on Sunday morning. When I’m out of town on Sunday, I like to look for unique places to worship. So this Lutheran pastor when to St. Johns Episcopal Church in one of the oldest sections of the city. In this very sanctuary, Patrick Henry spoke his famous words ”“ give me liberty or give me death. With great anticipation I was looking forward to being in that sacred space that was instrumental in our nation’s fight for independence.

As something of a history “buff,” I love worshiping in historic houses of worship. There is something exciting for me to attend old churches: A delight to sing the old hymns in old spaces; a pleasure to confess ancient words of faith as others have in different centuries; a joy to partake in the meal from aged vessels that have fed generations.

As much as I look forward to worshiping in old churches, if the truth is to be told, my experience hasn’t been always satisfying….

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Manute Bol, who died last week at the age of 47, is one player who never achieved redemption in the eyes of sports journalists. His life embodied an older, Christian conception of redemption that has been badly obscured by its current usage.

Bol, a Christian Sudanese immigrant, believed his life was a gift from God to be used in the service of others. As he put it to Sports Illustrated in 2004: “God guided me to America and gave me a good job. But he also gave me a heart so I would look back.”

He was not blessed, however, with great athletic gifts. As a center for the Washington Bullets, Bol was more spectacle than superstar. At 7 feet, 7 inches tall and 225 pounds, he was both the tallest and thinnest player in the league. He averaged a mere 2.6 points per game over the course of his career, though he was a successful shot blocker given that he towered over most NBA players.

Bol reportedly gave most of his fortune, estimated at $6 million, to aid Sudanese refugees. As one twitter feed aptly put it: “Most NBA cats go broke on cars, jewelry & groupies. Manute Bol went broke building hospitals.”

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Far from rebounding, the Golden State, with a $1.8 trillion economy that’s larger than Russia’s, is sinking deeper into its financial funk. And it’s not alone.

Even as the U.S. appears to be on the mend — gross domestic product has climbed three straight quarters — finances in Arizona, Illinois, New Jersey, New York and other states show few signs of improvement. Forty-six states face budget shortfalls that add up to $112 billion for the fiscal year ending next June, according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, a Washington research institution. State spending is 12 percent of U.S. GDP.

“States are going to have to cut back spending and raise taxes the same way Greece and Spain are,” says Dean Baker, co- director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research in Washington. “That runs counter to stimulating the economy and will put a big damper on the recovery in the latter half of this year.”

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After more than a year of work and two weeks of negotiations, lawmakers early Friday finished melding different versions of Wall Street reform.

The final bill won’t be ready for a few days, but here’s CNNMoney.com’s breakdown of key provisions that aim to protect consumers, prevent firms from getting too big to fail and crack down on risky bets that leave taxpayers on the hook.

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“It’s a great moment. I’m proud to have been here,” said a teary-eyed Sen. Christopher J. Dodd (D-Conn.), who as chairman of the Senate Banking Committee led the effort in the Senate. “No one will know until this is actually in place how it works. But we believe we’ve done something that has been needed for a long time. It took a crisis to bring us to the point where we could actually get this job done.”

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There’s little that shouts “seriously rich” as much as a little island in the sun to call your own. For Sir Richard Branson it is Neckar in the Caribbean, the billionaire Barclay brothers prefer Brecqhou in the Channel Islands, while Aristotle Onassis married Jackie Kennedy on Skorpios, his Greek hideway.

Now Greece is making it easier for the rich and famous to fulfill their dreams by preparing to sell, or offering long-term leases on, some of its 6,000 sunkissed islands in a desperate attempt to repay its mountainous debts.

The Guardian has learned that an area in Mykonos, one of Greece’s top tourist destinations, is one of the sites for sale. The area is one-third owned by the government, which is looking for a buyer willing to inject capital and develop a luxury tourism complex, according to a source close to the negotiations.

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The clash of civilizations wears the mask of the battle of the sexes. Reading atrocity stories about the Taliban’s treatment of women on the front pages, and Ayaan Hirsi Ali’s reminiscences of growing up a Muslim girl in the back, it’s hard not to think of the U.S.-led coalition in Afghanistan as the expeditionary force of the Women’s Movement.

Given this ambiance, it’s surprising to hear a well-informed speaker tell the European Parliament that Turkish women are “some of the most militant, and spearhead the effort to Islamicize Turkey today.” Hmm. Why would women spearhead the resurrection of a theocratic state that, whatever it may do for men, only rolls things back to the Dark Ages for women? Why would the sophisticated women of Turkey, who can become prime ministers if they like (and have), spearhead a system that doesn’t let their Saudi sisters drive a car? It sounds counterintuitive.

All the same, one doesn’t dismiss an observation made by Efraim Halevy, former head of the Mossad, Israel’s sage intelligence agency (call it sagency to save a syllable.) Halevy, who headed Mossad between 1998 and 2002, is a scholarly spook whose memoir, Man In The Shadows, tells fascinating tales about his region without telling any tales out of school….

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Four in 10 Americans believe Jesus Christ will return to earth by 2050, while a slightly larger portion (46 percent) don’t believe they’ll see a Second Coming by mid-century, according to a new survey.

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Christians should seek to draw those of other religious traditions to faith in Christ, a new Church of England report says.

The report, Sharing the Gospel of Salvation (GS Misc 956, £9, from Church House Bookshop), states that there is nothing new or abnormal about the Church of England’s witnessing to other faiths, and offers examples of how this can be done sensitively in a multifaith society.

The report was commissioned by the Bishops after they were asked by the Synod to set out their understanding of the uniqueness of Christ in a multifaith society, and to offer examples of good practice in sharing the gospel. This followed the debate in February 2009 of a private member’s motion from Paul Eddy about evangelism among people of other faiths.

The report, drafted by a small group led by the Bishop of Willes­den, the Rt Revd Pete Broadbent, the Bishop of Southwell & Nottingham, the Rt Revd Paul Butler, and the Bishop of Birmingham’s adviser on interfaith relations, the Revd Dr Toby Howarth, was commended by the House of Bishops’ meeting in May.

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For the past two years, high schools in the town of Enfield, Conn. have preferred the indoor comforts of a church for their graduation ceremonies. But lawyers are now moving to stop the practice after it left some students feeling increasingly out in the cold.

A federal suit filed in May alleged that the public schools had violated the U.S. Constitution, which restricts government entities such as public schools from endorsing a particular religion, the latest flash point in a growing national debate on whether graduations have become too entangled in religion.

Enfield High School and Enrico Fermi High School, cited in the complaint, have decided to hold their ceremonies Wednesday and Thursday in their campus fields after a judge issued an injunction temporarily barring them from holding commencement in First Cathedral Church, in Bloomfield, Conn.

It is unclear if schools are holding more graduations in church or whether individuals are becoming more active in asking courts to stop them. But in recent years, school districts in Wisconsin, Florida and Maryland have also faced suits or threats of litigation over decisions to hold graduations in church.

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The Council of Europe human rights watchdog said on Wednesday it opposed an all-out ban on full face veils, under consideration by some European states, but also urged Muslims to reject customs that deny women equal rights.

The Council’s Parliamentary Assembly unanimously passed a resolution saying all-out bans on full veils in public would deny a basic right to women who wanted to cover their faces.

It qualified that right by saying veils, also known as burqas and niqabs, could be banned when public security or professional obligations required women to show their faces.

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This raises an intriguing question: To what extent should we view the future versions of ourselves as different people from ourselves today?

To be sure, most parents have no trouble restricting a child’s decisions on the grounds that doing so is in the young person’s best interest. Few teenagers are farsighted enough to fully incorporate the interests of their future selves when making decisions. As parents, we hope that someday our grown-up children will be grateful for our current restrictions on their behavior.

But people do not suddenly mature at the age of 18, when society deems us “adults.” There is always an adolescent lurking inside us, feeling the pull of instant gratification and too easily ignoring the long-run effects of our decisions. Taxes on items with short-run benefits and long-run costs tell our current selves to take into account the welfare of our future selves.

IF this is indeed the best argument for “sin” taxes, as I believe it is, we are led to vexing questions of political philosophy: To what extent should we use the power of the state to protect us from ourselves? If we go down that route, where do we stop?

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Chrystal Johnson didn’t think there was anything unhealthy about her all-consuming fixation with “The Twilight Saga” ”” until she discovered it was sucking the life out of her marriage.

“I found poems my husband had written in his journal about how I had fallen for a ‘golden-eyed vampire,’ ” says Johnson, a 31-year-old accountant from Mesa, Ariz., who became so enthralled by the blockbuster series of young adult novels and movies that she found herself staying up all night, re-reading juicy chapters and chatting about casting news and the are-they-or-aren’t-they romance between the stars of the films, Kristen Stewart and Robert Pattinson.

” ‘Twilight’ was always on my mind, to the point where I couldn’t function,” Johnson says.

Anyone who has ever peeked inside a comic-book convention or gone to a late-night screening of “The Rocky Horror Picture Show” knows that some pop-culture fans aren’t exactly known for their moderation. But there are some key differences distinguishing “Twilight” groupies and their seemingly bottomless obsession from that of other entertainment junkies.

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For the LORD will build up Zion, he will appear in his glory; he will regard the prayer of the destitute, and will not despise their supplication.

–Psalm 102: 16,17

Lift up our souls, O Lord, to the pure, serene light of thy presence; that there we may breathe freely, there repose in thy love, there may be at rest from ourselves, and from thence return, arrayed in thy peace, to do and bear what shall please thee; for thy holy name’s sake.

–E. B. Pusey

What a day. Who would have thought they would live to see a female prime minister sworn into office by a female governor-general? And not only that. The man Julia Gillard vanquished for the top job, Kevin Rudd, declared that God was a goddess, too.

“To the great God and creator of us all, I thank him ”“ or her ”“ as well,” Rudd said during a poignant, at times tearful, valedictory speech to the nation.

Gillard, 49, said before going to visit Quentin Bryce at Yarralumla she was well aware of being the first woman to become prime minister.

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Debt is as powerful a drug as alcohol and nicotine. In boom times Western consumers used it to enhance their lifestyles, companies borrowed to expand their businesses and investors employed debt to enhance their returns. For as long as the boom lasted, Mr Micawber’s famous injunction appeared to be wrong: when annual expenditure exceeded income, the result was happiness, not misery.

For a long time debt in the rich world has grown faster than incomes. As our special report this week spells out, it is not just government deficits that have swelled. In America private-sector debt alone rose from around 50% of GDP in 1950 to nearly 300% at its recent peak. The origins of the boom go even further back, reflecting huge changes in social attitudes. In the 19th century defaulting borrowers were sent to prison. The generation that lived through the Great Depression learned to scrimp and save. But the wider take-up of credit cards in the 1960s created a “buy now, pay later” society. Default became just a lifestyle choice. The reckless lender, rather than the imprudent debtor, was likely to get the blame….

Rich-world countries now face two sets of problems. The most pressing is how to pay off their debts. Many people who have cut back their credit-card spending and firms which have seen their credit lines slashed would be horrified to see how little the rich world’s overall burden has fallen. Much of the debt has merely moved from the private to the public sector as governments have correctly stepped in to support banks and save the economy from falling into depression. And in the future, even more money will have to be raised, because of governments’ lavish promises of pensions and health care for the retiring baby-boom generation.

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World Cup winning…[Italian coach Marcello] Lippi made no excuses.

“I take all responsibility, there are no excuses because when a team comes to a match as important as tonight’s with terror in their legs, their heads and their hearts, and don’t manage to express themselves, it means that the coach hasn’t prepared them in the right way,” an ashen-faced Lippi told a news conference without even being prompted by a question.

“I didn’t think we could win the World Cup but I thought we would do better.”

In a strikingly honest assessment of what went wrong, Lippi pummelled himself verbally for 15 minutes.

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A U.S. Senate bill to extend aid to states, unemployment benefits and a host of tax provisions appears likely to fail today, potentially blowing an $850 million hole in Gov. Ed Rendell’s budget.

At a Washington news conference this afternoon, Senate Democratic leaders said they do not have assurances that their latest version of the American Jobs and Closing Tax Loopholes Act will garner the needed 60 votes for cloture today. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., said if the vote fails, he will move onto another bill rather than continue to revise a measure Senate leaders have tinkered with for weeks.

The House of Representatives passed a version of the bill that did not include the state aid sought by Mr. Rendell and other governors, an extension of Medicaid reimbursements that originated in the stimulus bill. If the Senate passes nothing at all, it would throw Pennsylvania’s budget into additional turmoil.

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…the bottom line is Home prices remain too high: There can be no doubt that home prices have moved way down from the 2005-06 peaks. How did I reach the conclusion that, even after a 33% decrease in prices?

By using traditional metrics. Whether we are looking at US housing stock as a percentage of GDP or Median income vs home prices or even ownership vs renting costs, prices remain elevated. Indeed, we see prices remain above historic mean.

Consider price relative to income. From 1977 to 2010, the median US home price was 4.1 times median household income. But as the chart below shows, Home prices are still above that mean. Oh, and that mean is artificially elevated due to the 2002-07 boom. Same with home prices relative to rentals, or housing value as percentage of GDP.

Further, we should not assume that prices will merely mean revert back to historic levels. In most markets, a near 3 standard deviation price move is resolved not by reverting to the mean, but by by careening far below it.

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The Anglican churches in Australia and New Zealand are hosting Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori for an informal two-week visit to the two provinces.

“I’m to speak with people there about their conversations around human sexuality and also about their missionary development work — not in the sense of finances but in the sense of leadership development and theological education,” Jefferts Schori told members of Executive Council during their June 16-18 meeting in Maryland. “We’re also going to have a conversation about the work that they’re doing around the Millennium Development Goals, and, obviously, our relationships within the Anglican Communion.”

Neva Rae Fox, the Episcopal Church’s program officer for public affairs, said the trip, which has been in the planning stages for more than a year, is all about building relationships.

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Belgian authorities have raided the headquarters of the Belgian Catholic Church during an investigation into child sex abuse claims.

A spokesman for the Brussels prosecutors’ office confirmed that the palace of the archbishop of Mechelen-Brussels had been sealed off.

Police also raided the home of retired Archbishop Godfried Danneels.

Belgium is one of several countries in which a stream of abuse claims have shaken the Church.

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Americans are more pessimistic about the state of the country and less confident in President Barack Obama’s leadership than at any point since Mr. Obama entered the White House, according to a new Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll.

The survey also shows grave and growing concerns about the Gulf oil spill, with overwhelming majorities of adults favoring stronger regulation of the oil industry and believing that the spill will affect the nation’s economy and environment.

Sixty-two percent of adults in the survey feel the country is on the wrong track, the highest level since before the 2008 election. Just one-third think the economy will get better over the next year, a 7-point drop from a month ago and the low point of Mr. Obama’s tenure.

Amid anxiety over the nation’s course, support for Mr. Obama and other incumbents is eroding. For the first time, more people disapprove of Mr. Obama’s job performance than approve. And 57% of voters would prefer to elect a new person to Congress than re-elect their local representatives, the highest share in 18 years.

The results show “a really ugly mood and an unhappy electorate,” said Democratic pollster Peter Hart….

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Confusion and scepticism greeted the latest plans to introduce women bishops, as the Archbishops of Canterbury and York announced another possible compromise to keep the Church together.
Ahead of July’s General Synod in York, which will be dominated by a 24-hour debate on women bishops legislation, the Archbishops have indicated that the Revision Committee’s proposed legislation will fail to keep the Church intact. The Archbishops have devised amendments which they “believe might provide a way forward”.

The Archbishops have described possible ”˜co-ordinate’ jurisdictions where the diocesan bishop would supposedly be legally entitled to exercise any episcopal function, but in practice would allow a nominated bishop to step in when requested.

This would secure the status of women bishops with no derogation of their powers while also appeasing those who do not want the oversight of someone whose authority depends on a woman bishop, the Archbishops claimed.

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[Paul] Krugman also told Handelsblatt he wouldn’t rule out sanctions against Germany if it continued to rely on its export-driven model. “If the euro falls to parity with the dollar, the Europeans are going to be surprised by the demands that will come out of the U.S. Congress, and I would support that,” he said.

That fiscal and economic policy critique probably won’t gain any more traction in Germany than his monetary policy one. Germans see their government finances and trade competitiveness as an example to be followed by Greece, Portugal and other troubled countries in Europe. And they clearly don’t see the U.S. model as one worth chasing.

Wolfgang Franz, who heads the German government’s economic advisory panel known as the Wise Men, tore into Krugman ”” and the US ”” in an op-ed in the German business daily Wednesday, titled “How about some facts, Mr. Krugman?”

“Where did the financial crisis begin? Which central bank conducted monetary policy that was too loose? Which country went down the wrong path of social policy by encouraging low income households to take on mortgage loans that they can never pay back? Who in the year 2000 weakened regulations limiting investment bank leverage ratios, let Lehman Brothers collapse in 2008 and thereby tipped world financial markets into chaos?” he wrote.

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A new billboard is going up in Raleigh and five other North Carolina cities with a seemingly innocuous slogan superimposedon an image of the American flag: “OneNation Indivisible.”

It’s what the slogan doesn’t say that may bother some people.

Since 1954, the Pledge of Allegiance has split those three words to include two others: “under God.”

But this billboard was paid for by N.C. Secular Association, a coalition of nonbelievers and agnostics. Their message: We’re Americans, too.

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