I don’t know where I’ve been the last couple of weeks, but someone should have notified me about France’s nosedive into third-world politics. A ban on head scarves exists in Singapore, Turkey, and Egypt in various forms, but the implementation of President Jacques Chirac’s ban on religious garb, in my mind, can only be viewed...

As I plant myself down with the goal of unleashing some preconceived thoughts about The Passion of The Christ on my unwitting audience, Catholic, Jewish, and Protestant voices claw at one and other inside my head and insist that I do no such thing; but what’s really stopping me? The film, which is set to...