Globe Trot: More migrants drown while leaders debate Syria's future

AEGEAN SEA: Migrants continue to perish making the crossing from Turkey to Greece. Six children were among those who died when two separate boatloads capsized Wednesday, including two Iraqi children ages 6 and 2. The Turkish coast guard rescued dozens more Iraqis, Syrians, and Afghans in serious condition. We are looking more into the trafficking aspects of the migrant transit routes: These migrants, typical of many migrant families, paid $2,000 per person for the short but very dangerous passage, while coast guard vessels from a NATO country looked on.

ISLAM: The suspension of a Wheaton College professor was about her statements regarding Islam and Christianity, not about her wearing a hijab. In 2008, the evangelical world debated this controversy—whether Muslims and Christians worship the same God—and WORLD carried an overview and debate between leading scholars Patrick Sookhdeo and Miroslav Volf on the issue.

GALAXY: Star Wars: The Force Awakens hit box-office records in its first-day screenings in international markets, earning $5.2 million in France alone.

GREAT BRITAIN: Was C. S. Lewis a secret agent for British intelligence? I’ve seen a lot of chatter about it on Facebook this week, but I’m not sure the evidence is in.

GERMANY: Advent 1944 found Dietrich Bonhoeffer in a kind of solitary confinement in prison, but he did not languish, smuggling out letters full of poetry and encouragement. Here’s one such passage from the pastor-martyr:

“The world lives by the blessing of God and of the righteous and thus has a future. Blessing means laying one’s hands on something and saying, Despite everything, you belong to God. This is what we do with the world that inflicts such suffering on us. We do not abandon it; we do not repudiate, despise, or condemn it. Instead we call it back to God, we give it hope, we lay our hand on it and say: May God’s blessing come upon you, may God renew you; be blessed, world created by God, you who belong to your Creator and Redeemer.”