Jamie Kimmel’s training and prior experience as a hospice chaplain couldn’t have prepared him for the ways this crisis is changing how he works. He’s rationing personal protective equipment and relying on reduced public transportation for his commute. At his hospital, he comforts COVID-19 patients by phone as they grapple with existential questions and the possibility of death, all while separated from loved ones.
Read More
While white evangelicals are the least likely religious group to view global warming as a crisis, there is a growing movement of evangelicals like Michelle Frazer who not only care about the impacts of climate change, but perhaps more significantly, are appealing to conservative Christians in ways that the secular, left-leaning environmental movement hasn’t.
Read More
Dr. Mohammed Elgazzar has served in medical missions to war-torn Sierra Leone, Sudan, Syria and more, saving lives without regard to the beliefs of the wounded. His faith inspires him. “The Quran is not coming from Allah just to be read,” he said. “It is not enough to see pain and feel sad. You have to do something about it,” he said. “That is my religion.”
Read More
A spiritual experience in the desert set Mitch Hescox on a path toward igniting Christians to care for the environment. Caring about environmental issues like climate change and pollution is about caring for the least of these in society, and that’s the only way to be truly pro-life, he argues.
Read More
(TRAVEL) See Rabbi Natan Slifkin’s collection of creatures ranging from locusts to lions at the newly virtually opened Biblical Museum of Natural History in Israel while staying safe at home during quarantine.
Read More
While the latest statistics from the LDS Church show a slight growth in membership worldwide, much of the growth is coming from abroad. Polarization and inflexibility prevent growth more than controversy, religious scholars say.
Read More
The pandemic has exposed a deep rift between Israel’s 1 million ultra-Orthodox Jews and the country’s other 8.25 million Jewish and Arab citizens. Health minister Yaakov Litzman, who is Hassidic, has been accused of breaking his own ministry’s social distancing guidelines and then meeting with the prime minister and other senior government officials, prompting calls for his resignation from secular society.
Read More
Gilead Sciences, which has raised hopes of a drug to treat coronavirus with some early signs of success in clinical trials, is named after an ancient salve used in Bible times.
Read More
Indian Muslims are being targeted in different parts of the country following reports that there was an outbreak of COVID-19 at a mid-March gathering hosted by a Muslim missionary society.
Read More
Combining Buddhism, Haiku poetry and meditative photography, Tyler Knott Gregson offers insight into coping with chaos, loss and isolation experienced during the COVID-19 pandemic through his experiences struggling with autism. He shares his artwork and his journey with more than 350,000 Instagram followers, self-identified “Chasers of the Light.”
Read More
Days after Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi ordered a 21-day countrywide lockdown to combat the spread of COVID-19, the Hindu nationalist-led government ushered in a new residency law for Kashmir, opening up India’s only majority-Muslim region for settlement by outsiders.
Read More
The French Father Choux helped his colleagues in normalization-period Czechoslovakia, a time following the 1968 Soviet invasion of the country marked by secret police and threats to clergy. He died at age 74 on April 10, after suffering with a neurodegenerative disease.
Read More
Tanzania is one of several East African countries still allowing religious gatherings, while this Easter weekend marked the steepest rise in confirmed coronavirus cases so far. Churches have been a foundation of trust between communities and government officials, and some say they are the key to disseminating prevention tips like good handwashing practices. But others are teaching that the virus cannot infect a godly person.
Read More
The coordinated Easter 2019 terrorist attack in Sri Lanka killed 290 people and injured about 500 others at three churches and three hotels. Survivors struggle to pay for their medical treatment and regain financial stability, despite government compensation, and insist their faith in Jesus has grown even stronger.
Read More
With a long-trending decline in the number of Americans who identify as Christian, stay-at-home orders are testing churches’ ability to maintain connections with followers or lose more of their flocks. During Holy Week, many churches report higher views online than can fit in their sanctuaries. Some are even hosting virtual activities like an Easter egg hunt to engage kids.
Read MoreMeet the Christ (pronounced “Crist”) family. They built a tiny chapel to inspire their rural Oklahoma community. In the midst of COVID-19, it’s taken on a deeper meaning.
Read More
Twenty-five years ago, a college junior was raped and murdered. Her parents found peace by sharing Jesus with the men responsible.
Read More
Civil rights activist and Baptist minister Al Sharpton talked to Religion Unplugged about the support for Donald Trump among some black evangelicals. With Trump's opposition to abortion and support for traditional family values, some black evangelicals say they have no choice but to vote for Republicans while others like Sharpton question how a majority of white evangelicals can support Trump. About 80 percent of African Americans have voted Democrat since the 1960s.
Read More
When the Jewish people were slaves in Egypt, God sent ten plagues to trouble Pharaoh, each one more horrible than the last. The last plague was the worst of all — a disease that felled the firstborn of every family, except in Jewish families who marked their door with lamb’s blood. This year, many Jews will rewrite the Passover story from the Book of Exodus to include an eleventh plague — COVID-19.
Read More
Suman Amara Ahmad has always known that her future was not hers to chart. The journey of a waqf-e-nau begins in the womb, when a mother pledges her unborn child to God. At age 15, Amara continued the pledge. “I could be sent anywhere in the world,” she says. “It’s all up to the Khalifa.”
Read More