Life & Culture
‘The Chosen’ announces release of Season Four, parts ways with Angel Studios
By Kathryn Post — May 29, 2024
(RNS) — Series creator Dallas Jenkins told RNS The Chosen LLC and Angel Studios had ‘different ideas of how to interpret both the contract and what’s going to sustain us in our future.’
Playwright Tom Block aims to tell ‘two equally righteous narratives’ of Israel, Palestine
By Ambar Castillo — May 16, 2024
Queens, NEW YORK (RNS) — In 'Oud Player on the Tel,' playwright Tom Block, who is Jewish and identifies with Islamic mysticism, envisions a friendship between two displaced people in 1947.
How the anime Demon Slayer films are driving ‘pop religion’ in Japan
By Bruce Winkelman — May 14, 2024
(Sightings) — The recent anime film both draws inspiration from Japanese religions and functions as a source of inspiration for religious practices.
Jesuit scientist who bridged faith and science recounted in PBS documentary
By Thomas Reese — May 13, 2024
(RNS) — It is not surprising that Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, an eminent paleontologist, got himself in trouble with church officials and his Jesuit superiors.
Thousands replaster Mali’s Great Mosque of Djenne, which is threatened by conflict
By Associated Press — May 13, 2024
DJENNE, Mali (AP) — Djenne’s mosque requires a new layer of mud each year before the start of the rainy season in June, or the building will fall into disrepair.
Joan Nathan on cooking to remember, mourn and discover who we are
By Beth Kissileff — May 9, 2024
(RNS) — Both the new and the traditional are served in the Jewish cooking expert’s new dishes.
Artists created images of Christ that focused not on historical accuracy but on reflecting different communities − a scholar of religious history explains
By Virginia Raguin — May 7, 2024
(The Conversation) — Images of Christ often represented prevailing cultural beliefs, allowing onlookers to connect in a deep and meaningful way.
Turkey formally opens another former Byzantine-era church as a mosque
By Associated Press — May 7, 2024
ANKARA, Turkey (AP) — Turkey formally converted The Church of St. Saviour in Chora, known as Kariye in Turkish, into a mosque in 2020, soon after it similarly turned Istanbul’s landmark Haghia Sophia into a Muslim house of prayer.
Damaged in war, a vibrant church in Ukraine rises as a symbol of the country’s faith and culture
By Jill Lawless — May 3, 2024
LYPIVKA, Ukraine (AP) — It’s one of 129 war-damaged Ukrainian religious sites recorded by UNESCO, the United Nations’ cultural organization.
How a beloved worship song became the theme song of Christian nationalism
By Bob Smietana — May 1, 2024
(RNS) — ‘How Great Is Our God’ has long been one of the most popular worship songs in Christian churches. Since 2020, it’s also become a theme song for Christian nationalist protesters.
The biblical character who goes ‘down the rabbit hole’ into an alternate reality − just like Alice in Wonderland
By Ryan M. Armstrong — May 1, 2024
(The Conversation) — The Book of Job and ‘Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland’ both make fun of preachy know-it-alls and resist conventions of their genres.
Pope visits Venice to speak to the artists and inmates behind the Biennale’s must-see prison show
By Paolo Santalucia and Nicole Winfield — April 29, 2024
VENICE, Italy (AP) —Francis traveled to the lagoon city to visit the Holy See’s pavilion at the Biennale contemporary art show and meet with the people who created it.
In ‘Rift,’ author Cait West talks breaking free from Christian patriarchy
By Kathryn Post — April 24, 2024
(RNS) — As a stay-at-home daughter, West was told what to wear, whom to court and how to serve her future husband.
Why you might have heard Paul Simon’s ‘The Sound of Silence’ at Spanish Mass
By Aleja Hertzler-McCain — April 23, 2024
(RNS) — ‘The Sound of Silence’ version of the ‘Our Father’ has been widespread throughout Latin America and U.S. Latino communities for the last few decades.
Taylor Swift’s ‘TTPD’: Religious imagery for a spiritually syncretic era
By Kathryn Post and Madeline Macrae — April 23, 2024
(RNS) — ‘The Tortured Poets Department’ speaks of good Samaritans and Jehovah’s Witnesses, altar sacrifices and prophecies.
