"What you are seeing is not quite a civil war, but kind of a civil skirmish within the US church about what it means to be Catholic."

It is a painful rite of passage for girls in many African and Middle Eastern countries, but in Senegal there has been a remarkably successful campaign to change people's attitudes towards female circumcision in an effort to eliminate the practice altogether.

“There’s a yearning in them, and that all wants to be expressed in terms of the sacred and the holy and within the context of God’s presence,” says Rev. Ann Abernethy, a United Church of Christ pastor and retirement community chaplain.

Watch more of our interview about religious ceremonies of commitment with UCC minister and retirement community chaplain Anne Abernethy, who says, “One of the great gifts of being a clergy person is that we are really invited into people’s lives at a time of blessing.”

In a video inspired by the Buddhafest Short Films Showcase, watch everyday people saying what they believe it means to be “awake.”

"There seems to be a theme in the album, not intentional, and it’s funny because for somebody who is not a religious person, God comes up a lot in my songs," says legendary singer/songwriter Paul Simon.

"To know that someone is there, that someone that comes from home to take care of you makes a tremendous difference for our warriors," says Judith Markelz, director of the Warrior and Family Support Center in San Antonio.

Catholic groups filed lawsuits in federal courts on May 21 to stop the Obama administration from implementing a mandate that would require them to cover contraceptives in their health plans.

"To have a situation in which we recognize the full equality of women changes everything,” says Union Theological Seminary president Serene Jones.

“There is a whole historical world of women who have risen as leaders in religious communities because they were called to do it, not because someone said they could,” according to the first woman president of Union Theological Seminary.

The Supreme Court is expected to rule soon on sentencing juveniles convicted of murder to life in prison with no possibility of parole. Justice Scalia reminded the Court that many states allow it and “the American people…have decided that’s the rule.” But Justice Ginsburg suggested such ...

The nation's largest Protestant denomination, the Southern Baptist Convention, is expected to elect its first African-American president at its annual meeting this June in New Orleans. His name is Fred Luter, and he says the SBC has "a heart for reaching people in difficult times."

Activist groups should bring about a greater awareness of worker rights issues and add a moral voice to global economic matters, says David Schilling of the Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility.

World Vision’s Vice President for Advocacy and Government Relations says the leaders attending this weekend’s G8 summit in Washington should invest in agricultural and nutrition programs to lift people out of poverty because “it’s the right thing to do, it’s the moral thing to do, and ...

This award-winning economist is credited with bringing down Thailand’s HIV infection rate, lowering its high birth rate, reducing poverty rates, and championing sustainable development ideas that work in rural settings.

“The message is that the Buddha is within and moving about in very mysterious ways,” says James Ulak, senior curator of Japanese art at the Smithsonian Institution’s Freer and Sackler Galleries.

In the wake of White House counterterrorism advisor John Brennan’s speech this week on drone ethics and targeted killing, we talk to Yale Law School professor Stephen Carter, author of The Violence of Peace: America’s Wars in the Age of Obama.

"The administration says that the drone is the smallest amount of force that we could use. They say it's accurate and therefore it discriminates perfectly."

In this territorial dispute between India and Pakistan in what may be the world’s most militarized region, there are direct links between water availability, rising terrorism, and religious extremism among Hindus and Muslims.

Generations of African slaves found a powerful way of singing through suffering in spirituals that were rooted in biblical stories and images.