Anne Rice, the New Orleans novelist who famously feuded with Al Copeland, famously rededicated her life to the Church to write only about the life of Christ, famously moved out of the Garden District and to La Jolla, Calif. a few years back, famously stopped writing books about sexy vampires and started writing books about sober Saviors (then left the door open for maybe one more sexy vampire book), has announced a new chapter in her life. Via her Facebook page:

For those who care, and I understand if you don’t: Today I quit being a Christian. I’m out. I remain committed to Christ as always but not to being “Christian” or to being part of Christianity. It’s simply impossible for me to “belong” to this quarrelsome, hostile, disputatious, and deservedly infamous group. For ten …years, I’ve tried. I’ve failed. I’m an outsider.

Why? Rice elaborates:

In the name of Christ, I refuse to be anti-gay. I refuse to be anti-feminist. I refuse to be anti-artificial birth control. I refuse to be anti-Democrat. I refuse to be anti-secular humanism. I refuse to be anti-science. I refuse to be anti-life. In the name of …Christ, I quit Christianity and being Christian. Amen.

For English majors and Southern lit fans, this all may sound a bit familiar; it was 1952 when the Southern author Flannery O’Connor wrote Wise Blood, in which one of the characters forms the “Holy Church of Christ Without Christ.” The difference here seems to be that O’Connor didn’t have Facebook, and God only knows what she would’ve thought of the late lamented Straya (now Copeland’s Cheesecake Bistro).

James Carville and Councilwomen Susan Guidry, Kristin Palmer and Jackie Clarkson joined local organization Women Of The Storm this morning at the recently shuttered P&J Oyster Company on Toulouse Street to launch an online video drawing attention to a petition at restorethegulf.com, which Clancy previewed here this morning.

The video was produced by local advertising agency Peter Mayer, and features prominent celebrities with strong Louisiana connections like Sandra Bullock, John Goodman, Bryan Batt, Lenny Kravitz and Dr. John. 5,000 people had signed the online petition at the time of posting this blog, with the site temporarily crashing at one point this morning, presumably because of high demand — a call to Peter Mayer asking about the temporary crash is yet to be returned.

Carville and crowd watch Mad Men star Bryan Batt during an unveiling of the 100-second video at P&J Oyster Company this morning.

“I want you to know Women of The Storm is going viral, and I want you to know, a month ago I thought it was a disease, but now they tell me it’s a good thing,” said Anne Milling, founder of the organization, adding that the online petition was getting 25 signatures a minute this morning. “We’re launching a 21st Century high tech campaign. We’re going to Tweet, we’re going to Twitter, we’re gonna YouTube, blog, email, and Facebook, we’re gonna do it all. We’re going use social media to harness and garner hundreds of thousands, possibly a million signatures for a petition that demands funding for coastal restoration.”

“On the eve of the Battle of Trafalgar, Admiral Nelson said that England expects every man to do his duty,” said Carville. “Well, this is our Trafalgar, and South Louisiana expects every one of us to do their duty, and our duty is to save this land, and this culture, and this way of life for our children and our friends.”

“There’s an old expression, you want to talk about doing something, go to a man. You actually want to do something, go to a woman,” said Carville — praising the effort by Women of The Storm to get the video together.

“It’s the signatures, but it’s also how much hell we raise,” Carville said, when asked how many signatures he thinks it will take for congress to send more assistance to the Gulf region.

Gambit recently interviewed Carville about his feelings on the oil catastrophe, and caught up with him before the unveiling this morning to ask a few more questions. You can watch a quick video of his remarks, after the jump.

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Dear Extreme Greenies:

If you haven’t subscribed to former Alaska governor Sarah Palin’s Twitter account by now, I’m just not sure why. Anyway, she’s got a message for you today:

WWL-TV news guy Rob Nelson — past president of the New Orleans Press Club and the funniest emcee in the city — announced on his Facebook page today that he’s heading to New York City at the end of the month to become coanchor of ABC News’ overnight World News Now. His last day at the station will be May 28.

Nelson, a former Times-Pic reporter, has been working at WWL since 2007, often on the morning news (where he sometimes matched wits with Gambit’s Noah Bonaparte Pais on the Thursday “3-Day Weekend” report).

Nice guy and good newsman. We’ll miss you, Rob, but New Orleans’ loss is New York’s gain. Congrats.

One of the pleasanter aspects of being special sections editor is that every month, I get to pick an exceptionally attractive person (or people, on really good months) to feature as a model for CUE’s fashion spreads. Whether it’s due to some virulent strain of hotness in the swamp water, a serendipitous side effect of miscegenation, or meticulous Southern belle and beau grooming habits, I can’t say, but Louisiana seems to breed hotties at a pace that rivals the reproduction rates of a nutria.

Enter the modeling masterminds at Launch Agency and John Robert Powers New Orleans, who have partnered with CUE to present the Modern Models Search Louisiana. We’ve joined forces to suss out the lithe, the high-cheekboned, the preternaturally tall and the freakishly good-looking from Chalmette to Shreveport. The contest’s winner will appear in a CUE fashion spread and receive a trip to the International Presentation of Performers (IPOP) conference (air fare, lodging and entrance fee paid). Submit your photos and stats to modernmodels@gmail.com by April 30 or check out the Facebook page or latest issue of CUE (on newsstands now) for guidelines.

For your viewing pleasure, I give you Brad Alphonso and Skylar McCartney, two locals who launched their fashion careers at IPOP and have gone on to sign contracts with Wilhelmina Models and NEXT Models International. Home-grown beauty, indeed.