Free Republic

It is almost a quarter of a century since she first sang Like A Prayer. But it seems the intervening years have done little to help Madonna decide exactly who she’s praying to. For it appears the queen of re-invention may be on the verge of one of her most startling changes yet, after she revealed she was studying the Koran. The 55-year-old was raised a Roman Catholic, but for the past 17 years she has been a devout follower of Kabbalah, a mystical offshoot of Judaism. Now the singer, whose current partner is a Muslim, has begun investigating Islam....

The star’s much-lauded effort to help girls in the African nation of Malawi just imploded. In this week’s Newsweek, Wayne Barrett asks: Is Kabbalah to blame?Late last month, it was reported that Madonna’s Raising Malawi foundation, one of the most visible celebrity-driven charity efforts in the Third World, one that pulled in major donations from around Hollywood and elsewhere, was abandoning its planned mission: to build a $15 million girls’ academy in Malawi, one of the poorest countries in the world. A report by the Global Philanthropy Group, which Madonna brought in to represent her as trouble developed in the...