Religion

An ordinary wooden chair is a metaphor that’s often used to talk about the key dynamics of faith. But it’s worth exploring further. Perhaps we could describe this as a process of developing the theory of a chair.

One of the surprises of the twentieth century when it comes to religious freedom was Dignitatis Humanae Persona, the first declaration of religious freedom officially promulgated by the Roman Catholic Church in 1965, at the end of the Second Vatican Council.

I notice people, and passionately collect their stories. My favourite stories include those small cracks that allow one to peek inside another soul, those moments when their voice is almost imperceptibly altered, the eyes light up for a reason I do not know, and their gestures are unexpected.

Religious people believe in the positive results of their faith in God. There is a common expectation that faithful people will lead good, healthy lives, while bad people will experience trouble, illness and punishments. The reality, however, is much more complex and often contradicts such expectations. How useful is religious faith when it comes to health, or the healing of the sick?

I don’t remember ever doubting that, beyond the limits of the ensnaring, visible world, there is another reality that can only be accessed by those who speak the language of faith.

I spent the end of high school in the Scandinavian school system. There, the teenager is confronted with the great questions of mankind in the context of social disciplines

Jesus's words could not have been foreign to the Jewish people of His day. In an eminently oral culture, narratives, stories, parables and metaphors occupied an important place.

Jessica was 19 when she had to tell her parents, both practicing Christians, that she was pregnant. That moment generated a real earthquake in the young woman’s family who, together with her boyfriend at the time, had been strongly involved in the purity movement, an ideology that promotes sexual abstinence until marriage, for religious reasons.

Noemina is a graduate of the University of Hertfordshire, UK, where she majored in health care. She is working in her field as of 2012. The journal excerpt she sent to us reflects her week-long experience at the epicentre of the battle with the new coronavirus in the intensive care unit, where serious cases are admitted.

Courage is not the opposite of fear, nor of caution. True courage is what you do right in the midst of fear.

Hudson Taylor undertook eleven journeys between Europe and China, and his mission prospered. He had one of the most complex and successful visions for evangelism.

More than a collection of information, beyond its role as a guide, the Bible is where we have a redemptive encounter with the One who holds the keys to eternal life.

Professor Bailey V. Gillespie, from La Sierra University's Department of Theology and Christian Character in California, impressed me with both the diversity of his interests and his prestigious achievements, particularly in the field of young people's religious experience.

After Jesus was born—that is, in the era we call Anno Domini (AD)—the history of mankind was different from that of Christianity. As it is known, the latter was not the history of a triumphant march of Christianity towards its universalization and the unification of the human race. On the contrary, this history can rather be characterised as a manifestation of “the great...

Traces of the ancient kingdom of Israel occasionally emerge from the dust of the Holy Land. These discoveries are immediately and inevitably followed by fierce controversies among archaeologists. As amateur spectators, Christians are eyewitnesses to these debates and, in one way or another, their faith is shaped by them.