"When we’ve had that political will to reduce poverty, we’ve been able to do it in our country, and that’s what we need to mobilize now," says Reverend David Beckmann, president of Bread for the World.

"They don’t believe that either change is possible there or that their money, or their resources, what they give, will actually translate into something different on the ground. That’s the crisis that we’re seeing," says American Refugee Committee president Daniel Wordsworth.

"The houses are not just 'given' to the families," says Dr. Brenda Williams, "They have to work for it. They have to earn it." She and her husband have been using their own money to provide homes to disadvantaged families.

Watch Kevin Eckstrom, editor of Religion News Service, and Kim Lawton, managing editor of Religion & Ethics NewsWeekly, compare what happened at Penn State and the long-running sex abuse scandal in the Catholic church.

"Something like happiness, it sound frivolous, but it’s not frivolous. The purpose of society is to create a better quality of life for all the people. It’s not to create the highest amount of aggregate wealth," says international business consultant and author David Rothkopf.

“There’s a fundamental misunderstanding that says religion needs to be serious all the time and gloomy and dour,” says Rev. James Martin, S.J., author of Between Heaven and Mirth, who believes humor is good for one’s spiritual health.

Rev. James Martin, S.J., author of Between Heaven and Mirth and chaplain for comedian Stephen Colbert, tells some of his favorite jokes.

Some chaplains have seen and ministered to so many dying or badly wounded soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan they themselves have become casualties.

"Religion isn’t bad, but until religion becomes actual spiritual experience, it is just religion," says this sometimes controversial Franciscan priest and author.

There is a proposal on the ballot in Mississippi that would say human life begins at conception. If the measure passes, every fertilized human egg in Mississippi would be defined as a person, and that could make abortion, for any reason, murder.

"I feel the young people and children, adolescents, all of them, they all need an opportunity...they need a good education," says Sister Judith Lupo, head of a Catholic social services agency called Bom Parto.

"Pilgrimages are undertaken because people want to move beyond their normal, mundane life," says Virginia Raguin, a professor at the College of the Holy Cross. Raguin is also the curator of a traveling exhibit on pilgrimages in Buddhism, Christianity and Islam.

“He’s very open about his faith and that seems to be genuine, but he’s going to make mistakes,” says Cathleen Falsani, author of the new book Belieber!.

A new survey finds that Catholics in the US are making up their own minds about social and moral concerns. As one of the authors of the survey, William D’Antonio, said, American Catholics like being Catholic but they like to do it on their own terms.

"We are here to provide a religious presence. We are here to listen to people, to hear what’s on their hearts. And we’re here to pray with people...because people are in crisis and that’s why we are all here." says protest chaplain Erica Richmond.

Watch excerpts of interviews with people of faith who are supporting the Occupy Wall Street protests.

Many Latinos observe what they call the Day of the Dead, when it's believed the spirits of the departed return to Earth. There are different traditions for this across Latin America, and Hispanics in the U.S. are celebrating as well.

Evangelicals are a key Republican constituency, especially in the primary season, and they still appear to be up for grabs.

Watch excerpts of three leading Republican presidential candidates talking about religion.

The Claremont School of Theology, the Islamic Center of Southern California, and the Academy for Jewish Religion California are partners in a new effort to educate leaders for churches, synagogues, and mosques in shared classes.