Churches across the U.S. use Prison Fellowship’s Angel Tree program to build lasting relationships with families of incarcerated parents. What began as a Christmas outreach expanded into year-round ministry, providing practical support, spiritual care, and community connections that strengthened churches, families and neighborhoods.
Read More(ANALYSIS) Nothing will ever truly replace the voices of the survivors, but I believe teachers and communities can carry on his work by making history feel local and personal. As everything around us seems to show each day, little could be more important than the lessons of these people, their sources and the Holocaust.
Read MoreOnce an evangelical monolith, claiming influence in 30 countries and 16 churches in the U.S., the Australian-based Hillsong Church has — due to leadership scandals — shrunk considerably. Eleven U.S. churches have left Hillsong, bringing the U.S. total to five. And the global church network just lost a country: Russia.
Read More(ANALYSIS) The Maldives, the small South Asian island nation, recently passed a new law to tighten the noose of the media. But this new law also indirectly strengthens the state’s restriction on religious freedom. Under this law, media outlets will be punished if they publish any content that contradicts Islamic principles or that could be seen as offensive to Islamic sentiments.
Read MoreFederal authorities announced arrests after activists disrupted a Minneapolis Southern Baptist church service to protest ICE activities. Civil rights attorney Nekima Levy Armstrong and two others were charged under an 1871 conspiracy statute. Church leaders have condemned the protest, while activists called it a peaceful demonstration.
Read MoreThis past Dec. 18, on International Migrants Day, participants in an interfaith prayer group gathered at Winton’s statue with Jewish children. In freezing weather and amid the noise of passing trains, the refugees were remembered by the people who had helped them.
Read MoreCatholic affiliation is declining across much of Latin America, while the number of religiously unaffiliated adults is rising sharply, according to a new Pew Research Center survey. Despite these shifts, belief in God, prayer and the personal importance of religion remain widespread throughout the region.
Read MoreNearly 175 worshippers were abducted on Jan. 18 from three churches in Kaduna State in Nigeria’s Middle Belt, Christian advocacy groups reported, after at least 35 were killed in separate attacks on villages in the Middle Belt and eastern Nigeria.
Read More(ANALYSIS) Ironically, 2025 was a turbulent year the world over. After so much military aggression in Ukraine, rampant starvation in Gaza and increasing violence of all kinds within the United States, people in many parts of the world were left much more despairing than hopeful for 2026.
Read MoreU.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi says she has spoken to a Minnesota pastor following a disruption by protestors during Cities Church’s morning worship service on Sunday. “Attacks against law enforcement and the intimidation of Christians are being met with the full force of federal law,” Bondi wrote on X late Sunday night.
Read More(ANALYSIS) Spectators reported intense grief and a connection with fellow mourners when they viewed the ceremony. On average, they described their sadness as intense. Most also said they felt a strong sense of unity – not only with people standing alongside them, but even with strangers across the nation who shared in the moment.
Read More(ANALYSIS) When MLK said character should be a goal of education, he presumably meant that moral intelligence should be developed. Everyone (except the psychopath) has a sense of morality. That’s what Jefferson meant when he declared that all men are created equal. But how to develop moral intelligence is much debated.
Read More(ANALYSIS) Religious movements and figures played a central role in early American history. For example, as I have frequently written, Thanksgiving is linked to Protestant religious dissenters we call Pilgrims and Puritans. American myth tells us that those hearty souls braved an ocean crossing and a contest with the “wilderness,” in the words of the Plymouth colony’s governor, William Bradford.
Read More(ANALYSIS) Before Martin Luther King Jr. was killed, he asked several of his friends to continue his life’s work building what he called “beloved community.” One of the people he invited was the Vietnamese Zen Buddhist monk, poet and mindfulness teacher Thich Nhat Hanh. Their shared vision shows how democracy could flourish when citizens practice compassion and peaceful action.
Read More(ANALYSIS) The Bible portrayed many courageous women, yet few appeared as leaders in the New Testament. Early Christian apocryphal texts preserved such figures, including Thecla, who endured persecution, performed miracles, preached the gospel, and inspired debates about women’s authority and leadership in the early Christian world.
Read MoreDuring the Holocaust, concealment was a condition of survival under persecution. Survivors’ testimony illuminates both the ingenuity required to endure such pressure and the emotional costs of erasing parts of oneself. In a moment of rising nationalism, antisemitism and mass displacement, their stories carry renewed urgency.
Read MoreIndia recorded 1,318 in-person hate speech incidents in 2025, averaging more than three each day and overwhelmingly led by Hindu nationalist groups affiliated with the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party. The report supports the inference that a political choice is behind the sustained scale of public incitement, which undermines both the rule of law and the idea of equal citizenship.
Read MoreViolence against Christians has reached an all-time high in 15 countries, with 388 million people facing severe persecution worldwide, Open Doors reported. Nigeria remains the deadliest nation, while Syria saw the largest single-year rise amid instability. Other dangerous parts of the world include North Korea, Somalia and Yemen.
Read More(ANALYSIS) Religious freedom in Hong Kong and Macau seems to be at the mercy of the ruling authoritarian Chinese Communist Party in People's Republic of China. Falun Gong, a spiritual discipline that was banned by the People’s Republic of China in 1999, but remained active in Hong Kong and Macau, has been gradually losing its religious freedom.
Read MoreA Nigerian minister and humanitarian urged the U.S. government to use peaceful methods to address religious persecution during a Jan. 13 USCIRF hearing in Washington. Rebecca Dali said bombing worsened trauma for communities and encouraged intelligence-based cooperation, as witnesses testified about Christian persecution in multiple countries worldwide.
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