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Pope Francis accepted the resignation of Bishop Robert Shaheen, 76, leader of the Maronite Eparchy of Our Lady of Lebanon, headquartered just south of downtown St. Louis, in a pastoral center next to St. Raymond's Maronite Catholic Parish. Canon law requires bishops to submit their resignations at age 75. The pope named the Rev. Abdallah Zaidan, 50, rector of Our Lady of Mt. Lebanon-St. Peter Maronite Cathedral in Los Angeles, to succeed Shaheen. The Maronite Catholic Church, an ancient Eastern Rite branch of Catholicism, is based in Lebanon. St. Raymond's is the seat of one of two eparchies, or dioceses,...

Barnes & Noble CEO William Lynch has resigned. His resignation is effective immediately. Michael Huseby will now be the CEO of NOOK Media and president of Barnes & Noble. Allen Lindstrom has been promoted and will serve as the company's new CFO. The news isn't a huge surprise. Barnes & Noble has largely failed to adapt to the growing tablet and e-reader market. And although its Android-based Nook tablets have received decent reviews, they haven't been selling very well. In May, Barnes & Noble made a quiet admission that its Nook tablets weren't selling as well as it had hoped...

The office of the new Palestinian prime minister says he has submitted his resignation after just two weeks on the job because of a conflict over authority, though it remains unclear whether he will actually step down. Former university dean Rami Hamdallah took office June 6 after being picked by President Mahmoud Abbas to replace internationally known Salam Fayyad. …

Chad Pergram ‏@ChadPergram 2m Deputy CIA Director Mike Morell resigns.

Presidential aides are privately admitting to a growing frustration inside the White House with Attorney General Eric Holder’s political ineptness in the press leak investigations and are hoping the embattled appointee will resign from office, The New York Times reports. “The White House is apoplectic about him, and has been for a long time,” said an anonymous Democrat source, identified only as a former government employee who acknowledged the White House staffers in question are his friends. President Barack Obama’s advisers are frustrated with Holder’s inability to foresee problems arising from his approval of a subpoena naming a Fox News...

Haaretz's Barak Ravid reports that US Secretary of State John FN Kerry has given Israeli and 'Palestinian' negotiators something upon which they can agree. About one thing, thereÂ’s no disagreement between Jerusalem and Ramallah: Kerry has a lot of good intentions and a real sense of mission; he truly wants to make peace in the Middle East. But despite his good intentions, Kerry so far looks like a naive and ham-handed diplomat who has been acting like a bull in the china shop of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Or as former Foreign Minister Moshe Dayan once put it, heÂ’s a good...

They were men of the cloth. But their cloth of preferance must have been silk -- as in lingerie. Lead Pastor David Loveless, who has been married for 33-years and was recognized as "one of the top 20 Christian leaders in the US to watch," has resigned from the Discovery Church in Orlando after admitting to having an affair, reports the Orlando Sentinel. Loveless is the third pastor of a major Orlando-area church to resign within the past six-months because of an affair.

As per rumors first reported in the overnight summary article, the Cypriot finance minister has joined the other rats dumping the sinking island: CYPRUS FINANCE MINISTER SARRIS SAYS HE RESIGNSSARRIS SAYS RESIGNS DUE TO ONGOING INVESTIGATION IN CYPRUSSARRIS SAYS CYPRUS PRESIDENT ACCEPTED RESIGNATION Investigation? Did he also funnel cash into London ahead of Confiscation Day? But fear not, all shall be well, the now ex-finmin promises: SARRIS SAYS CAPITAL CONTROLS WILL BE EASED GRADUALLY Surely, if this great news doesn't send the S&P to new all time highs, nothing will.From Sigma Live:His resignation, submitted by the Minister of Finance...

TALLAHASSEE -- Lieutenant Gov. Jennifer Carroll has turned in her resignation to Gov. Rick Scott. The governor's office confirmed Carroll submitted her resignation Tuesday. Scott will hold a presser on the resignation this afternoon. Carroll was the first female elected as lieutenant governor in Florida and the first African-American elected statewide.

The Associated Press has learned that the Homeland Security Department official in charge of the agency's immigration enforcement and removal operations has resigned after hundreds of illegal immigrants were released from jails because of government spending cuts.

Just hours after Pope Benedict XVI‘s surprising Feb. 28 resignation, bookmakers have already started placing odds on his successor. Quickest off the mark was the Irish bookmaker Paddy Power, which has already gone through three favorites for the position, starting off with Nigerian Francis Arinze, before shifting to Ghanaian Cardinal Peter Turkson and then to Canadian Marc Ouellet — who at the time of this writing is the most favored option, with odds of 11 to 4. A rival bookie, Ladbrokes, currently has Turkson as the slight favorite at 3 to 1, followed by Arinze (7 to 2) and then...

On Feb. 28, Pope Benedict XVI will become the first pope to resign in almost 600 years. That’s not just tradition — it’s dogma. The Washington Post’s Debbi Wilgoren cited a theological expert in explaining, “Most modern popes have felt that resignation is unacceptable except in cases of an incurable or debilitating disease — that paternity, in the words of Paul IV, cannot be resigned.” But Benedict XVI’s resignation is even more curious when compared to the handful of others who have left the powerful office willingly. In the past 1000 years, only four other popes have resigned. Here are...

Pope Benedict XVI blesses Cardinals during a consistory at the Vatican February 11, 2013, in this picture provided by Osservatore Romano. Pope Benedict XVI told a gathering of cardinals Feb. 11 that he no longer has the strength to carry out ministry and will resign on Feb. 28. “I have convoked you to this Consistory, not only for the three canonizations, but also to communicate to you a decision of great importance for the life of the Church. “After having repeatedly examined my conscience before God, I have come to the certainty that my strengths, due to an advanced age,...

Michelle and I warmly remember our meeting with the Holy Father in 2009, and I have appreciated our work together over these last four years.

Pope Benedict XVI 'is to resign' Breaking news The Pope is to resign at the end of this month in an entirely unexpected development, reports from the Vatican say.

No pope has resigned in almost 600 years. But Pope Benedict’s surprise announcement is not entirely unprecedented. More than 260 men have reigned as Pope since Saint Peter was martyred in Rome in the third decade after the death of Christ, and at least four of them have resigned. We spoke to medieval historian Doctor Donald Prudlo, Associate Professor of History at Jacksonville State University in Alabama, about the history of papal resignations. Listen: Vatican Radio: It’s been centuries since a Pope has resigned the See of Peter. Can you tell us about the last Pope to resign? Dr....

Dear Brothers, I have convoked you to this Consistory, not only for the three canonizations, but also tocommunicate to you a decision of great importance for the life of the Church. After having repeatedly examined my conscience before God, I have come to the certainty that my strengths, due to an advanced age, are no longer suited to an adequate exercise of the Petrine ministry. I am well aware that this ministry, due to its essential spiritual nature, must be carried out not only with words and deeds, but no less with prayer and suffering. However, in today’s world,...

WASHINGTON — Energy Secretary Steven Chu, who won a Nobel Prize in physics but came under questioning for his handling of a solar energy loan, is stepping down. Chu offered his resignation to President Barack Obama in a letter Friday. He said he will stay on at least until the end of February and may stay until a successor is confirmed. Chu’s departure had been widely expected and follows announcements by Interior Secretary Ken Salazar, Environmental Protection Agency chief Lisa Jackson and Jane Lubchenco, head of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, that they are leaving.

Assistant Attorney General Lanny Breuer, the head of the Department of Justice’s Criminal Division who played a critical role in lying to Congress about Operation Fast and Furious, plans to resign soon, the Washington Post reports, citing anonymous sources. “It is not clear when Breuer intends to leave his post, nor what he plans to do once he departs, but it is certain that the prosecutor’s days in office are winding down, according to people who were not authorized to speak publicly about the matter,” the Post wrote. When asked for a comment on the Post’s report, and to verify...

<p>The Obama administration's chief environmental watchdog, EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson, is stepping down after a nearly four-year tenure marked by high-profile brawls over global warming pollution, the Keystone XL oil pipeline, new controls on coal-fired plants and several other hot-button issues that affect the nation's economy and people's health.</p>