Religion

“It was as if I were living in a fairy tale. And the most wonderful part was that I knew—hard as it may be to believe—that the story was true. None of the hardships of imprisonment touched me. The fear of the unknown no longer unsettled me, nor did the fact that, three days after my arrest, no one had yet called me...

“Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign: The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and will call him Immanuel” (Isaiah 7:14).

Forgiveness is the central idea in Christianity that sets it apart from other religions.

When the Scottish reformer John Knox, Calvin’s disciple, wrote in 1560 in favour of the death penalty for heretics, he was attacking Sebastian Castellio in particular. John Knox did not know then that he was attacking the father of the idea of ​​religious freedom in Christianity.

The Protestant Reformation was a tumultuous river, the flow of which began to become visible in 1517. A significant contribution to this eruption was made by its tributaries, the (pre-) Reformation movements: the Waldenses, Albigensians, Lollards, Hussites, etc.—true springs of the main Protestant current, which took over their force in its flow through history.

As a media and communications graduate, I love stories in all their forms, but I’ve always held a special place in my heart for science fiction. Exotic planets, alien races, unique extrapolations of scientific theory and bizarre visions of the future of our world—no other genre captures my imagination in quite the same way.

The words God is not listening! He is not answering! are the essence of one of our most troubling complaints. Is there an answer to it powerful enough to pull us from doubt’s darkness?

Written in Latin by a 26-year-old Frenchman in less than a year, it is a book of 516 pages. Published in Switzerland and dedicated to the French king from whom he was fleeing, it is the most important theological work of the Reformation.

According to Google’s online search trends, the most popular religious topic among Romanian internet users in 2019 was prayer. [1]

It could be a perfunctory ritual, passed down through generations; a mechanically recited poem. But equally, the mealtime prayer can be a genuine spiritual exercise.

To be a good Christian, they say, you must not swear, steal, lie, cheat or speak ill of anyone.

Classmates nicknamed him “the dumb ox” because of his massive physique and quiet nature. But his brilliant mind and passion for study impressed the famous professor Albert the Great, who defended him: “When this Ox roars, the whole world will hear it.” He was talking about Thomas Aquinas.

In the most difficult moments of his life, Franz Hasel prayed: “Lord, if I am attacked, I will have no way to defend myself. I must trust in You to be my protector. My life is in Your hands.”

The idea of hell takes up a dark corner in most of our minds, whether we think about it or not.

In Dante Aligheri's Divine Comedy, written in the early 14th century, hell is described as a "city of woe" and a place of "eternal pain"—metaphors of endless suffering.