(RNS) Israel today grapples with profound existential questions of its national identity, including how Jewish the Jewish state can be. More than three-quarters (76 percent) of Israeli Jews believe their country can be both Jewish and democratic, a view rejected by majorities of Israeli Muslims and Christians, according to a comprehensive […]
thehindu.com: After New Delhi denied visas to members of the USCIRF for the seventh year, State Department spokesman John Kirby backs the commission. The United States on Monday expressed disappointment over India denying visas to members of the United States Commission of International Religious Freedom (USCIRF). A USCIRF team was […]
Guardian: Great convoy w studio execs in LA. Good to hear their perspectives & ideas of how to counter #Daesh narrative,” tweeted John Kerry on 16 February, along with a photo of himself in a Hollywood meeting lounge with executives from Universal, Warner, Fox, Disney, Sony, Dreamworks and other big […]
Source: Daily Times By Jonathan Power: Who has been a foreign affairs columnist for the International Herald Tribune for 20 years and author of the much acclaimed new book, Conundrums […]
Source: Huffington Post By Rose Deighton; PhD Student in Islamic Studies at Emory University, Writer, Contemplative The world we live in is fast and whirling. We run for work and […]
تحریر:انعام الحق فروری میں میں نے ممتاز قادری کی پھانسی پر عوام کے ردِ عمل کو دیکھتے ہوئے ایک تحریر لکھی جس کا عنوان تھا ’’قادری کے جنت میں جانے […]
Source: Los Angeles Times In China, it’s not easy to become a “living Buddha.” First come the years of meditation and discipline. Then comes the bureaucracy. “The highest level of […]
Source: Associated Press BEIJING (AP) — Communist Party officials in China’s far western Xinjiang region say religious extremism is waning, but the government plans to step up border controls with […]
Source: The Daily Beast By Dean Obeidallah Think Muslims would have it hard under Trump? Latinos? Try being both. Yep, they do exist. And they’re pretty nervous. Think your life […]
By Harriet Alexander, New York 5:52PM GMT 06 Mar 2016 Memoir: Love, Loss and What We Ate Sir Salman Rushdie needed consoling every year he did not win the Nobel Prize for literature, and their marriage was marred by jealousy and insecurity, according to an explosive autobiography by his former wife Padma […]
By Ann O’Neill, CNN Salt Lake City (CNN) These are dark days for the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, the reclusive polygamous sect led by imprisoned prophet […]
Source: BBC Panama’s Isla Coiba bears all the hallmarks of a perfect desert island: gin-clear water, powdery white sand, a fringe of palm trees against a backdrop of dense, unexplored […]
Source: BBC Just south of Sardinia’s world-famous Costa Smeralda, the lonely island of Tavolara rises wildly from the cerulean sea like a jagged mountain. There are no roads or hotels, […]
Epigraph: And We have enjoined on man to be good to his parents. His mother bears him with pain, and brings him forth with pain. And the bearing of him […]
Source: BBC Talking about the “at” sign is much more interesting if you’re not speaking English. The Wikipedia entry for @ lists names for it in over 50 other languages, […]
Source: BBC We’ve all done it. Run upstairs to get your keys, but forget that it is them you’re looking for once you get to the bedroom. Open the fridge […]
Source: The New York Times Mark Mattson, a neuroscientist at theNational Institute on Aging in Maryland, has not had breakfast in 35 years. Most days he practices a form of […]
By Julia Baum JBaum@community-newspapers.com POSTED: 02/17/2016 Members of Ahmadiyya Muslim Community Silicon Valley last week held an exhibition on the Holy Quran and other Islamic readings in an effort to unite and educate others. Dozens of neighbors turned up at the three-hour event on Feb. 12 at the Pearl […]
Epigraph: “As often as we approach the Quran, it always proves repulsive anew; gradually, however, it attracts, it astonishes, and, in the end forces admiration.” — Johann Wolfgang von Goethe Source: […]
LOCAL DEMOCRACY MAR 2, 2016 – Lieli and Oberwil are part of a village outside Zurich. It has attracted many affluent residents but the local council is not keen on accommodating asylum seekers (Ester Unterfinger/swissinfo.ch) The town hall assembly of Oberwil-Lieli last November might go down in the history of […]