Muslim pilgrims leave Mount Arafat after spending the day there as part of the hajj pilgrimage in Arafat, Saudi Arabia. Photograph by Alaa Badarneh/EPA
Source: Guardian
A student wears a traditional costume while performing during the grand Confucian ceremony of Seokjeon at a shrine in Sungkyunkwan University in Seoul. Seokjeon is a biannual ritual to consecrate Chinese philosopher Confucius and his disciples as supreme teachers at civil temples. Photograph by Kim Hong-ji/Reuters
Source: Guardian
[Look for yourself, and you will find in the long run only hatred, loneliness, despair, rage, ruin, and decay.] But look for Christ and you will find Him, and with Him everything else thrown in.
Muslims wait to break their fast on the first night of the holy fasting month of Ramadan at Jama Masjid in New Delhi, India. Photograph: Kevin Frayer/AP
(via the-bleusky)
Source: theinternationalscholar
In this week’s issue, Adam Gopnik traces the origin of Mormonism and its meanings, and considers what the religion can all tell us about Mitt Romney: http://nyr.kr/OLJr5B
Judaism and the Jews: The Jewish diaspora has come a long way, says David Landau. But there are deep religious and political divisions, mostly centred on Israel
Source: SoundCloud / TheEconomist
A group of boys been attentive to a teacher reading the Qur’an. Photograph by Muhammed Muheisen/AP
Muslim women perform an evening prayer marking the first eve of Ramadan. Photograph by Dita Alangkara/AP
Never trust anybody not of sound religion, for he that is false to God can never be true to man.
Michelle Obama Cites Jesus as Model for Citizenship
First lady Michelle Obama Thursday offered a rare public reflection on her religious faith, telling a conference of the African Methodist Episcopal church that the life of Jesus Christ is a model for democratic organizing.
“It’s kind of like church,” Obama said. “Our faith journey isn’t just about showing up on Sunday for a good sermon and good music and a good meal. It’s about what we do Monday through Saturday as well, especially in those quiet moments, when the spotlight’s not on us, and we’re making those daily choices about how to live our lives.
http://search.yahoo.com/search;_ylt=AlY6fMQcJ2Ld5UsRQXAfHTibvZx4?p=michelle+obama&toggle=1&cop=mss&ei=UTF-8&fr=yfp-t-701
Shaven-headed young boys participate at a service to celebrate Buddha’s upcoming birthday at Jogye temple in Seoul, South Korea. Photograph: Lee Jin-man/AP
Christianity comes not from the head or the gut, but from the soul. It is as meek as it is quietly liberating. It does not seize the moment; it lets it be. It doesn’t seek worldly recognition, or success, and it flees from power and wealth. It is the religion of unachievement. And it is not afraid. In the anxious, crammed lives of our modern twittering souls, in the materialist obsessions we cling to for security in recession, in a world where sectarian extremism threatens to unleash mass destruction, this sheer Christianity, seeking truth without the expectation of resolution, simply living each day doing what we can to fulfill God’s will, is more vital than ever. It may, in fact, be the only spiritual transformation that can in the end transcend the nagging emptiness of our late-capitalist lives, or the cult of distracting contemporaneity, or the threat of apocalyptic war where Jesus once walked. You see attempts to find this everywhere—from experimental spirituality to resurgent fundamentalism. Something inside is telling us we need radical spiritual change.
But the essence of this change has been with us, and defining our own civilization, for two millennia. And one day soon, when politics and doctrine and pride recede, it will rise again.
Source: thedailybeast.com
