Religion

In the choppy waters of Port Doha, Qatar, things weren’t looking good. Moesha was midway through a 10-kilometre open water race in the World Championships. This was her chance to qualify for the Olympics. But she was trailing behind a pack of thirty girls and had been for much of the race.

John Andrews and his family decided to cross the ocean against the current of that time. Therefore, many forgotten truths were brought to light, many hopes were reborn, and many dreams came true.

It was the first time most Christians had heard of the Gnostics— communities of Christians who lived between the 2nd and 4th centuries and whose scriptures and spiritual beliefs bore little resemblance to what is now considered traditional Christianity.

Although they are constantly improving their preparedness for crises and disasters, modern societies find themselves powerless in the face of a growing threat: transnational crises.

Up until the Enlightenment, the idea that the miracles recorded in the pages of the Bible happened as the biblical writers described them was widely accepted. With the rationalism of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, an alternative theory emerged: that miracles were not possible in naturalistic metaphysics.

Faith has brought me not only a sense of God's presence, but also evidence that He is answering our requests. Therefore, the other reasons that made me believe have become stronger.

The world of the homeless is the darker side of our world. It is inhabited by vagrants, drug addicts, and the powerless. This world has its own rules, customs, pleasures, and pains, but lacks meaning and peace. And those who enter this world struggle to leave it.

I generally don’t like going to funerals, but they come in many different forms and feels. Some seem sadder than others; some feel more hopeful. But often there’s an unexpected bittersweetness. We are all there because of something good—the life, love and relationship that we are there to remember and honour—that has come to a tragic end, always too soon.

The holidays are a time of generosity, when those forgotten by the world meet those who want to forget that sadness exists and, out of the coexistence of the two needs, something good is born.

I was descending from Omu Peak, in the Bucegi Mountains, with a few dozen young people. It had not been an ideal hike, and we were behind schedule. The forest made the darkness even thicker as it began to cover the mountain, and slowly, our minds as well.

As we know all too well, life can be hard. Even in the best of times, life can be hard. But now this, a pandemic? How are we to cope?

Dr Kendra Haloviak-Valentine, Professor of New Testament Studies at La Sierra University in Redlands, California, comes from a family with a tradition of theology and research.

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?

When I was 20, my spiritual life felt like an exam where I had been given a topic I hadn’t prepared for.

“The newest religious sect has started in Los Angeles. Meetings are held in a tumble-down shack on Azusa Street...and the devotees of the weird doctrine... work themselves into a state of mad excitement...They claim to have the ‘gift of tongues’ and to be able to understand the babel”.