Bloomberg.com: U.K.: "Actor, film director, playwright and humanitarian Sir Peter Ustinov, 82, has died at his home in Switzerland, his agent, Steve Kennis, said. Kennis confirmed Ustinov's death today in a live interview with the U.K.'s Sky News. Ustinov's family announced his death early today from Switzerland, where he was recovering from an undisclosed illness that followed his return from a trip to Thailand in January, Sky reported. He died at a clinic near the town of Nyon, unidentified friends told Agence France-Presse. London-born Ustinov, who was of Russian descent, won Oscars for his supporting roles in the 1960 film ``Spartacus'' and the 1964 production of ``Topkapi.'' He had been a goodwill ambassador for the United Nations children's agency Unicef since 1971. Ustinov was knighted by the U.K.'s Queen Elizabeth II in 1990. " I never knew about the Unicef involvement. Or maybe I knew in the back of my mind and forgot. I always seem to be finding this sort of thing out about people after they die. Ustinov ``was one of our most special and effective ambassadors,'' Unicef spokesman Damien Personnaz said in a telephone interview from Geneva. ``He had an ability to go into a small village as a stranger and make children laugh one day and then put on a suit and be a serious communicator the next.'' His humanitarian efforts led Ustinov to set up his own foundation in 1999 for the ``betterment of the social, spiritual and emotional circumstances, as well as the health of children and youth.'' The next year, he founded the Ustinov Institutes for research into prejudice and was named honorary president of the Global Harmony Foundation, a charity based in Lausanne, Switzerland, that helps poor children in India, Brazil, Mexico and Central America. Some quotes from Peter Ustinov, found in Positive Atheism's Big List of Quotations: Beliefs are what divide people. Doubt unites them. -- Peter Ustinov, quoted from James A. Haught, 2000 Years of Disbelief The habit of religion is oppressive, an easy way out of thought. -- Peter Ustinov, quoted in Everybody's magazine (1957), quoted from Jonathon Green, The Cassell Dictionary of Cynical Quotations I believe that the Jews have made a contribution to the human condition out of all proportion to their numbers: I believe them to be an immense people. Not only have they supplied the world with two leaders of the stature of Jesus Christ and Karl Marx, but they have even indulged in the luxury of following neither one nor the other. -- Peter Ustinov, Dear Me (1977), quoted from Encarta Book of Quotations There is no question but that if Jesus Christ ... were to come back today, he would find it virtually impossible to convince anyone of his credentials despite the fact that the vast evangelical machine on American television is predicated on His imminent return among us sinners. -- Peter Ustinov (attributed: source unknown) The truth is really an ambition which is beyond us. -- Peter Ustinov, International Herald Tribune (Paris, 12 March 1990) Once we are destined to live out our lives in the prison of our mind, our one duty is to furnish it well. -- Peter Ustinov, Dear Me, Ch. 20 Planetary Consciousness Award Winner 2002 In 1999 he started his own foundation. The aim is to support and maintain the humanitarian ideas, the artistic and spiritual creation of the founder and the objective is to work towards a bettering of the social, spiritual and emotional circumstances as well as the health of children and youth regardless of age, ethnic origin, religious belief. In 2000 he added yet another facet to his life time achievement, when he founded the Ustinov Institutes and the set up of an international network of universities for the research into prejudice. In order to get to grips with this phenomenon, Sir Peter and his colleagues are aiming to establish this as a subject to be studied at universites in many different countries. The vision is a library of prejudice, documenting their origin and ways of working in the different cultures. So far there are two university institutes at the University in Budapest and the University of Durham, England where Sir Peter has been chancellor for more than ten years. Since its foundation in 1993 he is an active honorary member of the Club of Budapest. From a 2003 interview in Time Europe Magazine: Of the current Russian leader, Vladimir Putin, Ustinov opines that "he is still young enough to learn," despite having made an "unholy mess" of Chechnya. Ustinov isn't particularly worried about Putin's KGB origins. "The Bush dynasty has a CIA background. KGB or CIA, it's all the same dirty tricks, but the KGB is a better school. At least Putin speaks German, which helps in his dealings with Schröder. And he was smart enough to align himself with Washington in the fight against terrorism." Slowed by age and arthritic legs, Ustinov appears onscreen less often than the several roles a year he once averaged. But, when not at his home of 30 years in the Swiss wine-growing village of Bursins, he remains in perpetual motion. In addition to his U.N. work he chairs and partially funds the Geneva-based Global Harmony Foundation, whose projects have included a hospital in Niger for victims of Noma, a flesh-wasting disease, and three girls' schools in Afghanistan's Tora Bora region. "For Nepalese landmine victims we turn out wheelchairs in Kathmandu," says Ustinov. "Come to think of it, I could use one myself," he jokes, after a laborious landing in an armchair in his book-crammed living room. Ustinov seems to take comfort in the homey clutter of the room, with its well-read volumes and countless trophies of a long and varied career. He's less sanguine about the current state of global housekeeping. "It's a messy world today," he says. "It's like being thrown back in an age when people didn't understand what was happening and just left their fate to the gods. There are no great leaders these days." Like most Europeans, Ustinov considers Saddam Hussein a scoundrel, but not worth a war that "could set the whole Middle East ablaze. If that happens, I'd suggest Ms. Rice change her name to Condolenza." But Ustinov isn't about to give into pessimism now. "I'm a strong believer in humanity and human rights — moral courage prevailing over military might. In that sense I have faith in the common sense of the American people. Let's hope we can keep the Middle East on a even keel." More from the interview: The empires are very similar. That's why Americans make the best Roman films. Q&A What do you think of President Bush? If the American people are really happy with George Bush, Clinton was a man of unnecessary brilliance. What about Putin? The Russians have never known democracy, so transformation will take a long time. Putin cannot escape decentralization. Take Chechnya. The only solution is autonomy for the regions. A unitary state with Moscow or St. Petersburg as its capital is utter nonsense. Your latest project is the study of prejudice. Why such an abstract idea? It's not abstract at all. Prejudice is the destructive root of most human conflicts. Conflicts can be sorted out at the conference table or tackled on the battlefield, but you cannot solve them as long as there's prejudice. The humiliation of the Palestinians is a case in point. What do you think of the Israeli leadership? Sharon is a terrible bully. There's no glory in subduing the Palestinian people and in that respect Washington is not exactly even-handed. I hope that Labor leader Amram Mitzna will be elected. What is the role of humanitarian organizations in international affairs? I put more faith in nongovernmental organizations than in state governments, rogue or otherwise. The Red Cross, Amnesty, Oxfam, Human Rights Watch — no national politician would ever get a mandate to create such an institution, because they're all external. There are hundreds of NGOs and there are some very good ones among them. They're our best hope for the future From a delightful 2002 interview in The Guardian: I ask him how he feels about being a genuine old man. "I enjoy getting older enormously ." He wears his trousers even higher these days. He looks down at his pouch and his stick. "I prefer this to any alternative, put it this way," he says. "And I thought I'd be very depressed by the fact that I couldn't drive any more because I loved the freedom of being able to drive on country lanes. I thought I'd be depressed at not being able to walk properly. Absolutely not. I couldn't care less. That has really surprised me. How quickly one adapts to new circumstances." What's the biggest drawback? "Well, people are very, very helpful to you, and what's debilitating is their insistence on helping you when you have that infantile reaction of, 'Let me do it alone, it's good for me, it's good for me to pull myself out of a chair. I don't need your help.' And you suddenly see yourself as an irascible old man." His French wife Hélène, walks in. He married her after a bitter divorce from his second wife, in which he won custody of his three children. Ustinov looks animated when he sees her. " He-llo. Oh, Margaret. This is my wife. She's been to the hairdresser and she always looks like Margaret Thatcher the moment afterwards. Hahahaha!" They enjoy a quick giggle before she disappears in to the bedroom. Thatcher, whom he despised, awarded him a knighthood. I ask him if it is important to him. "Who?" The knighthood? "Oh, I don't mind telling you - Hélène's tickled to death by it. She loves it." Because she can call you Sir Peter? "No, no because she can be called lady. She loves it because it's very un-French. She is, anyway, the daughter of a marquis, but she prefers lady because it's much more exotic." More about Ustinov's charity work, and his motivation: Throughout his career, he has championed worldwide charities, UNICEF being an early beneficiary. Over the years his involvement in similar fields have become a major concern. "Possibly," he speculates, "as a result of what we call 'the actor's conscience'." This constantly reminds him that he is paid for doing something pleasurable. Among the countless academic honours that have been bestowed on him is that of Chancellor of Durham University, a role which he has conscientiously - and innovatively - fulfilled, liaising with other European seats of learning to promote aid work and even to inaugurate his own charitable foundation - the Ustinov Foundation. "This assists people in deprived areas - West Africa, for example, where we fund a children's hospital, in South America where people are shown practical ways of earning a living, or Afghanistan where education (especially female) is being addressed." The academic side of the scheme pioneers research, by examining the roots of prejudice and its global effect. This is quite some achievement for one who never chose the higher education route, although Sir Peter has no regrets about that. "I have learnt more at Durham, now, than I would have then. During my acceptance speech in the cathedral, I mentioned that my father would have been gratified to see that 1 had managed to struggle into a university at last - then squinted into the dark at all those professors wearing baffled expressions." There is a pause (and a twinkle) before the perfectly timed afterthought: "Of course, it was too late then."

Iraq: One year later by Jim Wallis Nearly 600 American soldiers have died in Iraq - six more just last weekend. More than 3,000 have been wounded or maimed. Reliable accounts say more than 10,000 Iraqi civilians have lost their lives. No weapons of mass destruction have been found in Iraq. U.S. weapons inspector David Kay has reported that they probably weren't there, and that the U.S. government should honestly admit that it was mistaken. They haven't. President Bush and his administration now repeatedly say the fact that the principal argument for going to war with Iraq has turned out to be false doesn't matter. There was no "imminent" or "urgent" threat from chemical or biological weapons and Iraq wasn't developing a nuclear threat, as was claimed before the war. The best explanation is that intelligence was manipulated and selectively reported to justify a worst-case scenario previously arrived at on political grounds. The worst is that the case was fabricated. Either way, the president of the United States misled the American people into going to war. A new book based on documents from former Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill makes clear that this administration decided to go to war with Iraq even before Sept. 11, and the "facts" were never the decisive factor. CIA Director George Tenet has virtually said that his agency's efforts to prevent the Bush administration from "overstatement" on Iraq were a failure. Iraq remains chaotic and unstable. Divided factions threaten any political solution, and the largest faction - the Shiites - may not support a new provisional government. In July, the United States plans to turn over sovereignty to a new Iraqi government that does not yet exist, a transition that would clearly not be happening if there were no American election in the fall, again a purely political calculation. It is indeed a good thing that the brutal regime of Saddam Hussein is over. But that worthy goal should and could have been accomplished, over time, in much better ways than a pre-emptive and largely unilateral war that has proven to be both unnecessary and unjust. Iraq is now a big mess with no clear or responsible exit strategy in sight and is likely to remain so for a very long time.

Interesting. I don't know if I will ever get around to reading The Da Vinci Code--I have a pretty long "one of these days" list. But I like that there is more interest in Mary Magdalene these days, and that more people are questioning the "Mary Magdalene was a prostitute" myth. Da Vinci Code Spurs Debate: Who Was Mary Magdalene? The supposed secret? Jesus Christ was married to Mary Magdalene, they had a child, and their descendants walk among us today. It's an intriguing contention. Not that it's necessarily true. Many scholars scoff at Brown's appeals to scholarship, arguing that the bloodline theory has been around for centuries and thoroughly discredited as a fraud. But the phenomenal success of the novel—more than six million copies have been sold, and a movie is already in the works—has cast light on controversial and forgotten Christian texts, some of which challenge the traditional narrative laid out in the Bible. More specifically, The Da Vinci Code has resurrected an old debate about one of the most elusive figures in Christianity: Mary Magdalene. Depicted by the Church as a prostitute, Mary Magdalene was an intimate disciple of Christ. She is described by all four Gospels in the New Testament as being present at both the Crucifixion of Jesus and the empty tomb on the morning of his resurrection. Yet the Bible doesn't reveal much about her. But additional clues about Mary Magdalene can be found outside the Bible, in the controversial gospel of Mary. Apparently written in the second century by a Christian sect, it is the only existing early Christian gospel written in the name of a woman. The gospel of Mary is generally accepted as authentic, even by the Church, though its veracity and importance are very much up for debate. According to Karen King, a history professor at Harvard University's Divinity School and one of the world's leading authorities on the subject, Mary Magdalene and Jesus Christ never married—for one thing, no text identifies them as man and wife. But Mary was actually an apostle to whom Jesus revealed deep theological insights, and she may have played an important role in the development of early Christianity.