Today on Kresta - January 13, 2010

Talking about the "things that matter most" on Jan. 13

4:00 – Port-au-Prince archbishop among dead in earthquake
The archbishop of Port-au-Prince, Monsignor Joseph Serge Miot, died in the Haiti earthquake along with unknown thousands of victims. Meanwhile, Pope Benedict XVI today urged generous international aid for the victims of Haiti's earthquake and has pledged concrete help from the Catholic Church. International efforts to help Haiti in the wake of yesterday's 7.0 magnitude earthquake are under way, with governments across the world and aid agencies mobilizing search and rescue teams and aid supplies. Although the full scale of the disaster has yet to emerge, it is clear that it will pose a huge challenge. Haiti is the poorest country in the western hemisphere and is still struggling to recover from devastating hurricanes in 2008. We talk to Dr. Britt Marshall who has spent time in Haiti doing mission work.

4:20 – To Judge or Not to Judge?
“Do not judge, so that you may not be judged. For with the judgment you make you will be judged, and the measure you give will be the measure you get.” (Matt. 7:1–5) For two reasons we have difficulty reading this text. Both have to do with the fact that we inevitably read it as modern people and hardly suspect that there is yet another way to hear these words. We talk with Paul Thigpen about when to judge and when not to judge.

5:00 – Abortion and the Justification Defense
A Judge could create a legal justification for politically tinged violence if he allows a man who admits shooting dead a leading abortion doctor to argue for conviction on a lesser charge than murder, prosecutors said. Scott Roeder, 51, is charged with first-degree murder in the May 31 shooting death of George Tiller, one of a handful of doctors in the US to perform abortions into the third trimester of pregnancies. The trial began today. We look at abortion and the justification defense with long-time pro-life advocate Monica Miller.

5:40 – Miep Gies – Protector of Anne Frank – Dies at Age 100
Miep Gies, the office secretary who defied the Nazi occupiers to hide Anne Frank and her family for two years and saved the teenager's diary, has died. She was 100. Gies was the last of the few non-Jews who supplied food, books and good cheer to the secret annex behind the canal warehouse where Anne, her parents, sister and four other Jews hid for 25 months during World War II. After the apartment was raided by the German police, Gies gathered up Anne's scattered notebooks and papers and locked them in a drawer for her return after the war. The diary, which Anne Frank was given on her 13th birthday, chronicles her life in hiding from June 12, 1942 until August 1, 1944. We talk to Jack Polak, director emeritus of the Anne Frank Center, who knew Miep personally.