Author: Joe Mozingo

Source: The Los Angeles Times

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-beliefs27-2009apr27,0,2546661.story

In his quest to have students experience firsthand how people around the world worship, Varun Soni, the dean of religious life at USC, did not start up some expensive study-abroad program. He just ventured a few blocks from campus.

Within a square mile, he and his staff discovered 67 places of...

Author: Meredith Heagney

Source: The Columbus Dispatch

http://www.columbusdispatch.com/live/content/local_news/stories/2009/04/27/pewforum.html?sid=101

A new report released today explores how and why Americans move from one faith to another, from religion to no religion, and sometimes, back again.

Most people raised without a religious affiliation now belong to a religion, according to the Pew...

Author: Paola Dellafiora

Source: Watford Observer

http://www.watfordobserver.co.uk/news/4323903.School_celebrates_world_religions/

Hinduism, Islam and Judaism were just some of the religions celebrated by an Abbots Langley school last week.

Youngsters at Divine Saviour School in Abbots Langley learnt about various religions and cultures as part of their world-faith week.

On Tuesday year six pupils...

Author: Staff Writer

Source: Media for Freedom

http://www.mediaforfreedom.com/ReadArticle.asp?ArticleID=15589

Rajan Zed, acclaimed Hindu statesman; and Rabbi Jonathan B. Freirich, prominent Jewish leader in Nevada and California in USA; in a joint statement, said that syllabus of subject “Christian knowledge and religious and ethical education”, taught in Norwegian primary and lower secondary schools, was firmly based in the...

Author: Staff Writer

Source: Indian Catholic

http://www.indiancatholic.in/news/storydetails.php/11947-1-10-Parish-hosts-Buddhist,-Hindu-new-year-celebrations

A Catholic parish recently organized a celebration of the Hindu and Buddhist new year to foster religious harmony among villagers.

“It is unusual that Hindu-Buddhist celebrations are organized on the premises of a...

Author: Staff Writer

Source: BBC News

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/8011615.stm

Muslims in India's Gujarat state who bore the brunt of religious riots in 2002 say they have been abandoned by the political parties. The BBC's Soutik Biswas met some riot victims ahead of the general election in the state.

The acrid smell of burning oil singes your nose and eyes as you walk into Bombay Hotel, a sprawling ghetto of Muslim-owned homes on...

Author: Isaiah Potts

Source: The Minnesota Daily

http://www.mndaily.com/2009/04/26/student-group-promotes-unity-among-different-religions

From April 26-24, the Panoramic Interfaith Effusion hosted a conference focused on interfaith training for students of different religious backgrounds.

The different religions included Baha’i , Catholicism, Baptist, Judaism and Islam. The religious groups...

Author: Tamer Abo Asood

Source: Islam Online

Author: Hamza Hendawi

Source: The Washington Post

Wire Service: AP

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/04/26/AR2009042601249.html

In this village in northern Yemen, where a kosher butcher slaughters chickens and the school bus carries young boys in side curls along a dirt track to their Hebrew studies, one of the oldest Jewish communities in the Arab world is...

Author: Nicole Frail and Andrew Seaman

Source: The Beacon

http://www.wilkesbeacon.com/news/college-experience-tests-students-faith-1.1733046

As a practicing Muslim, Silvia Silvi is expected to pray five specific times each day and fast during certain times of the year. However, since beginning college at Wilkes University in 2006, Silvi has admitted to skipping prayers due to classes and other school-related obligations...

Author: John A. Torres

Source: Florida Today

http://www.floridatoday.com/article/20090425/NEWS01/904250319/1006

Organizers of a festival Sunday said they can't remember an event that showcased Muslims, Hindus, Jews, Baptists, Catholics and other faiths working together for one cause.

Organized by the Brevard Interfaith Coalition and sponsored by the Brevard County Department of Housing and Human Services and the United Way of...

Author: Peggy Fletcher Stack

Source: The Salt Lake Tribune

http://www.sltrib.com/faith/ci_12209648

Jordan Dez loved worshipping at her big, white-steepled Connecticut church. She felt embraced by the liberal United Church of Christ congregation of her youth. It felt natural and right and fit in with her sense of God's love. She was baptized at 13 because, as she says, everyone around was a Christian.

That was her religious cocoon.

Yet, like...

Author: Staff Writer

Source: BBC News

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/8014025.stm

Malaysia has banned the religious conversion of children without both parents' consent, local media reports.

The announcement by new Prime Minister Najib Razak is being seen as a major step in easing ethnic tensions in the predominately Muslim country.

It follows a string of legal rows in which converts to Islam changed their children's...

Author: Jerome Taylor

Source: The Independent

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/jews-and-muslims-succeed-in-bid-to-avoid-postmortems-1672110.html

Bereaved families will be allowed to pay for pathologists to perform body scans on their loved ones to establish cause of death if they object to post-mortems for religious reasons, the Government announced yesterday.

Jewish...

Author: Victor G. Mimoni

Source: The Queens Courier

http://www.queenscourier.com/articles/2009/04/22/news/regional/northeast/doc49ef8cdd49af9950669315.txt

Queens is so diverse, there is nothing unusual about an imam giving a talk on “The Essence of Islam.” Unless it’s in a Synagogue, at a Holocaust memorial service, that is.

Rabbi Michael Weisser of the Free Synagogue of...