Religious leaders across different faiths joined together with Open Doors, a ministry that serves persecuted Christians around the world, on Monday to call attention to the systematic "extermination" of Iraqi Christians.

Freshly-published cables from the US mission to the Vatican have shed light on the inner workings of Europe's most secretive diplomatic corps, including the Pope's opposition to Turkey's EU membership, hopes for Polish influence inside the EU and church ideas on how to undermine the Castro administration in Cuba.

Pope Benedict XVI lamented that the Vatican acted "slowly and late" in a scandal surrounding the Legionaries of Christ, and a Vatican official called Tuesday for an investigation into who covered up for the conservative order's disgraced founder.

The Jewish Agency for Israel urged the government on Monday to provide adequate housing solutions prior to the expected arrival of over 7,800 Ethiopians of Jewish ancestry in the country

"If the church is not on their mobile device, it doesn't exist," he said, likening social media to a "new digital continent" waiting to be evangelized.

On the twenty first anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall, the respected Institute for Cultural Diplomacy invited the Chairman of Iman, the global counter-extremism foundation, to deliver a keynote speech on pluralism and the Middle East.

The signatories below and I welcome the many initiatives that are underway among governments, in civil society, and within the religious community to expand areas of cooperation between the Muslim community and other actors. President Obama's trip to Indonesia this week is an important example of the high-level attention that must be given to these relationships.