After the commission minister left, Tonya and Charles sat at a table and exchanged their vows to each other. For the remaining three hours of the visit, the newlyweds talked about all the things they wanted to do one day when he got out. He had 18 years left of his sentence.
Read More(OPINION) There’s nothing pious about the modern Olympic Games. The modern version, organized by the International Olympic Committee, is more spectacle than spirit. The looming Winter Games, however, have triggered a reaction among some that has large moral implications — are you a bad person for watching the Olympics?
Read More(OPINION) The man who took a rabbi and three congregants hostage in Colleyville, Texas, on Jan. 15, 2022, believed that Jews control the United States of America.
Read More(OPINION) The start of 2022 has brought many conversations and books that talk about America being led to another Civil War. Americans are more divided than they were during the first civil war, David French, a political and Christian conservative, explains.
Read More(OPINION) As a historian of religion interested in how different cultures make sense of death, Natasha Mikles noticed what appeared to be a momentous cultural shift in happening in America in terms of death rituals as over 850,000 Americans died from COVID-19.
Read MoreToday, more than 70 years after World War II and as the world marks the 18th annual International Holocaust Remembrance Day — 30 years after both the dissolution of Yugoslavia and the end of the Bosnian War — Bosnian Jews are still awaiting restitution for long-gone homes, commercial buildings, places of worship and burial sites.
Read MoreOn July 11, 2021, in Cuba, thousands of people of all kinds took to the streets in the greatest display of the power of civil society ever seen in this totalitarian country. Since then, a persecution has been unleashed against some pastors that has contributed to an increasing number of religious leaders and churches questioning speaking out.
Read MoreLast year saw the highest number of physical attacks against Indian Christians on record, with 486 attacks, a rise of 80% from 2020, according to United Christian Forum, which collects the data from a phone helpline. Meanwhile, Open Doors USA recently ranked India as the 10th most dangerous country for Christians.
Read More(OPINION) The many cases of anti-Catholic vandalism have been documented by me here in recent years. Also well-documented has been the number of professionals in the mainstream media who keep overlooking such criminal activities.These incidents just keep happening, yet they continue to be given little to no mainstream news coverage.
Read MoreIn the 1980s and ‘90s, modest religious dressing in Kenya meant a very restricted wardrobe — one solid color of fabric stitched and sold in select shops run by members of the church. Today, trend-conscious religious millennials are changing the dress code, not necessarily by dressing immodestly but by adding twists of artsy, modern style.
Read MoreUkrainian Christians have experienced death, displacement and loss in conflicts with Russia that date back to 2014. That’s when Russia seized Crimea. And now, Russia has amassed some 127,000 troops along its western border with Ukraine, according to the Ukrainian defense ministry.
Read More(OPINION) Thich Nhat Hanh, the monk who popularized mindfulness in the West, died in the Tu Hieu Temple in Hue, Vietnam, on Jan. 21, 2022. He was 95. In the 1960s, Hanh played an active role promoting peace during the years of war in Vietnam. In his mid-20s, he became active in efforts to revitalize Vietnamese Buddhism for peace efforts.
Read More(OPINION) Polls show that a majority of Americans are very worried about the state of U.S. democracy. As a scholar who researches democratic virtues, Christopher Beem has spent time with the work of Thomas Aquinas, a 13th century Dominican monk whose words are relevant to current times and show what it means to hope.
Americans United for Separation of Church and State has filed a lawsuit against the Tennessee Department of Children’s Services on behalf of a Jewish couple who claim that a state-funded adoption agency refused to provide them with child placement services because they are not Christian.
Read More(REVIEW) Justice John Marshall Harlan was the sole defender of civil rights in a series of 1883 Supreme Court cases. In a new book, Peter Canellos argues that Harlan’s distinctive moral values came from his deeply held religious faith, commitment to the founding ideals and personal experience, including inspiration from his biracial brother.
Read MoreThis week’s Weekend Plug-in highlights the top storylines that have emerged after last weekend’s hostage standoff at a Texas synagogue. Plus, catch up, as always, on all the best reads and top headlines in the world of faith.
Read MoreWith 12 campuses across the California county, Orange County Rescue Mission plays a vital role in combating the homeless crisis. The Village of Hope — set apart from other emergency housing facilities by its commitment to aesthetic design — houses up to 270 men, women and children as part of its residential, back-to-work recovery program.
Read MoreA Chicago circuit court has dismissed an appeal from a former pastor in an Evangelical Covenant-connected church who said he lost his position after the ECC took too long to investigate a sexual abuse claim against him that was eventually dismissed.
Read MoreOf the 7.6 billion people on Earth, 2.4 billion identify as Christian, 1.9 billion as Muslim, 1.2 billion as Hindu and more than 500 million as Buddhist. Those are just the four largest religions. In other words, 310 million in the U.S. do not necessarily constitute the epicenter for all religion in the world. If anything, religion in America is a unique outlier.
Read MoreRabbi Charlie, as friends and congregants call him — one of the four recently held at gunpoint for nearly 11 hours at the Congregation Beth Israel synagogue —teaches with emotion when he tells students in Mark Baur’s Worldviews course at Fort Worth Christian School each spring that antisemitism has destroyed generations.
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