“Right now, given the current climate and the political rhetoric, we are a target,” says Olivia Cantu, South Florida director of Emerge USA, a national organization that works to increase Muslim-American engagement in politics. “We are being attacked.”

"Spirituals are, of course, the songs that the enslaved crafted to tell the story of their experience. But more than that, to tell the story of their faith and the understanding of who they were in relationship to God, and who God was in relationship to them, and it became a story of freedom,” ...

How does religious faith influence the lives and the politics of this year’s nominees; A University of Michigan scholar studies what peace means in the words and world of the Quran.

United Methodism, Roman Catholicism, evangelical Christianity, and “the power of positive thinking” have all shaped the politics and personal stories of this year’s candidates for national office.

Peace, says history professor and scholar of the Muslim world Juan Cole, “is very central to the cultures of the Middle East. You greet someone by saying ‘Peace be upon you.’ It has the form of a prayer.”

What’s a Catholic to do on Election Day this year; “How can we pull people out of poverty if we’re not actually making something?”

“Catholics are the perennial swing voters in American politics. Whichever way Catholics go, usually that’s the way the presidency goes. I expect that to be true this election, too,” says Professor Stephen Schneck, director of the Institute for Policy Research & Catholic Studies at the ...

“I was living in the Bay Area. I had a nice salary. I had a very expensive foreign car. I had everything you think that a twenty-some-year-old kid would want. But I realized that without going back to Liberia I’d never really know who I am truly as a person,” says Chid Liberty, social ...

How are religious voters reacting to the latest Donald Trump accusations; Rescuing children who are victims of criminal trafficking is the work of an undercover team led by an American Mormon; A former Los Angeles corrections officer hopes this youth-run … More →

“A lot of evangelicals are doubling down, especially that old-guard religious right, on their support of Trump. Never Trump evangelicals are saying look, this is the last straw. There’s no way any good evangelical can support this guy. The key is you’re seeing some of this showing up in the ...

“We know what a childhood is supposed to be, what innocence is, and if there really are millions of children that don’t have that and that are being abused in the worst way—how can you face your maker and say I did nothing?” That is the question of Tim Ballard, founder of Operation ...

“Now that I know how many kids feel like their life is meaningless and they don’t expect to live to see their 18th birthday, I can’t walk away and not do something about it,” says Teresa Goines, founder of Old Skool Café, a supper club run by at-risk youth in San Francisco.

Can a private, for-profit US company repair the broken school system in this West African nation shattered by war and Ebola; A new movie about Holocaust historian Deborah Lipstadt confronts the meaning of truth and lies; A special annual service … More →

“Let’s see if we can get kids to learn more this year than they’ve ever learned before,” says Josh Nathan, academic director of Bridge International Academies. But the teachers’ union is strongly opposed to partnering with a private, for-profit US company to educate the children of ...

“Facts are facts,” says Holocaust studies professor Deborah Lipstadt, author of “Denying the Holocaust: The Growing Assault on Truth and Memory.” “There are not two sides to every story, and there are certain things that can’t be contested.”

“All of nature spoke to Francis,” says Fr James Gardiner of the Franciscan Monastery in Washington, DC. “The more we learn to reverence all of creation, we might learn to reverence and cherish one another better… I think Francis would approve.”

A new State Department office believes the US ignores the global impact of religion at its peril; In the city of Albuquerque, New Mexico “there is a better way to help the homeless than criminalizing them;” At the experimental Lab/Shul in … More →

“One of the things we discovered very early on in our existence is there was pent up demand both in the United States, but also globally, for various religious actors and communities to come and engage with the State Department, to learn about our foreign policy,” says Shaun Casey, US Special ...

“There’s a lot of dislike for us. We’re just worthless creatures who really shouldn’t be alive,” says John, a homeless man in Albuquerque, New Mexico. So the city started a program called There’s a Better Way, to employ homeless men and women, pay them, and connect them to local services ...

“We are igniting our lives as humans,” says Rabbi Amichai Lau-Lavie, “using the Jewish toolbox to make what we inherited work for today.” Rabbi Lau-Lavie leads New York City’s Lab/Shul in preparations for Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur.