Religion

A bicycle trip around the world led two young Americans to the mistaken conclusion that "people are good."

Dr Denise Dunzweiller, of Walla Walla University in the north-west of the United States, has emerged as a passionate advocate of inclusive education, a technical term for education systems in which children with disabilities are educated alongside other children in mainstream schools, rather than in special classes.

Let me paint you a picture of Esther Moo’s life, one of approximately 1959 Karen refugees who migrated to Australia between 2009 and 2010.

Should we be optimistic or pessimistic about our future? This is a question even specialists are concerned with, and it cannot be answered easily. It is difficult to predict what the future holds.

To nothing else is the name of God so often linked in our human discourse as to suffering and deliverance. This locus is a huge and complicated intersection of our existence.

Hendel Butoy was born in Brazil and raised in southern California. He studied at the California Institute of the Arts, and was then offered a position as an animator at Walt Disney in 1979.

Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, […] who correctly handles the word of truth. (2 Timothy 2:15)

Of all the decisions we've ever had to make, it's easy to identify those that have changed our lives and tested our character. For Eric Liddell, one such decision was to give up an Olympic race for his faith.

When we think of gratitude and a lack of gratitude, the biblical scene that comes to mind is the healing of the ten lepers, of whom only one, a Samaritan, returned to thank the Saviour, worshiping and praising God in a loud voice (Luke 17:15-16).

In cell number 8 of the prison in Pyongyang, a few frozen and emaciated prisoners had to endure an additional torture: the pungent smell and wild screams of an untamed creature.

"We keep on being told that religion, whatever its imperfections, at least instills morality. On every side, there is conclusive evidence that the contrary is the case and that faith causes people to be more mean, more selfish, and perhaps above all, more stupid." (Christopher Hitchens) 

I doubt there’s a person who hasn’t heard of the Boston Marathon bombing, which took the lives of three people. As runners entered the home straight, with the finish line in sight, first one then another explosion ripped through the happy, watching throng.

I am not an expert on the phenomenon of death. But like all of us, I have to live in its shadow, and watch the restlessness and greed it causes. The same gloomy reports that circle the planet also reach me. I feel especially conscious of this as COVID-19 claims its first victims in my country.

I thought to myself: Is there an alarm or is it an end of day signal?

The Passion and Resurrection of Jesus Christ—or the Christian Easter—stand out distinctly in the crowded landscape of global religious beliefs and ideas. No other religious tradition contains the concept of a divine person offering Himself as the unique and sufficient mediator through whom God draws near to humanity, and humanity draws near to God.