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Talking to reporters Tuesday, Pope Benedict XVI had strong words about the abuse scandals that have plagued the church, saying, “sins inside the church” threatened Catholicism, and that “forgiveness does not substitute justice.” The notion that penance is different from justice is significant as the church sees a clash between those who want to protect priests those who are fighting for more transparency.

Today is Good Friday. Christians believe that on this day, Jesus Christ was crucified on the cross. This Easter Sunday Christians worldwide will celebrate Christ's resurrection. The Catholic Church may very well be hoping for a minor healing miracle of its own as a decades-old sex abuse scandal continues to plague church leaders in the U.S. and abroad.

The BBC reports that the Vatican called the attacks "ignoble" and that there is no cover up.

Hundreds of sexual abuse cases against Catholic priests have been surfacing in Ireland over the past weeks and the Pope said he will address the crisis in a repentance letter tomorrow.

But his efforts could be undermined by a scandal of his own. Last week, a senior church official said when the Pope was Archdiocese of Munich, he made “serious mistakes” in handling one specific priest accused of molesting boys back in the early 1980s.

Jim here (the web editor), writing the newsletter on a day that only an Irishman should.

This morning’s news about the $76 million in prescription drugs that were stolen from an Eli Lily warehouse in Connecticut caught our attention for one main reason: Why were the thieves going after anti-depressants? The black market for painkillers might be a more obvious target, given the drugs' recreational use, but who knew illicit sales of Prozac and Zyprexa could drive this kind of heist? We’ll find out more about this on tomorrow’s show.

UPDATE: We booked the White House's drug czar, Gil Kerlikowske.