The defeat of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party in India signals the loss of political power of Hindu nationalism as well as renewed Christian hopes of relaxed restrictions against evangelization. The victory of the secularist Congress Party and the marginalization of the BJP primarily means the loss of political influence of Hindu nationalism, reports India Abroad newspaper […]

Despite divisions among themselves, Iraq’s Shi’a will shape Iraq’s future, and Iraq will be the first Arab country to become openly Shi’a, according to an article by Vali Nasr in the Summer issue of the Washington Quarterly, published by the Center for Strategic and International Studies. The Shi’as number around 130 million people globally, most of […]

Christian universities are multiplying worldwide and represent a new stage in the development of Christianity in the Third World, writes Joel Carpenter in the Lutheran magazine The Cresset (Trinity, 2004). He writes that in the three years he has been researching the rise of the new Christian universities in Latin America, Africa and Asia, their numbers have […]

Buddhism is “enjoying an unprecedented boom in Germany,” reports the German newspaper Deutsche Welle (June 9). The number of Buddhist groups is rising along with Eastern religious teachings being popularized by best-selling books and even in the secular media. Although the German government does not keep statistics on Buddhism, the German Buddhist Union estimates that there are […]

Books and movies on world religions and their ancient texts are drawing individuals and groups into study and dialogue between different faiths, reports the e-newsletter Religion Bookline (June 1). Feeding much of this interest are productions such as Mel Gibson’s The Passion of The Christ, as well as semi-scholarly and popular books by Karen Armstrong, Dan Brown (author […]

A growing apologetic movement in Mormonism is helping to create a more “progressive” wing of the church that increasingly seeks intellectual respectability, according to the independent Mormon magazine Sunstone(May). Groups seeking to intellectually defend Mormon teachings, such as the Foundation for Ancient Research and Mormon Studies (FARMS) and the Foundation for Apologetic Information and Research (FAIR), […]

Religion will likely be an issue in the upcoming U.S. presidential campaign, but it still remains to be seen if candidate Senator John Kerry and his fellow Democrats can address such concerns in a persuasive way, particularly gaining the support of Catholic voters. Writing in Commonweal magazine (June 4), Amy Sullivan notes that Kerry and other liberal […]