While researchers writing on Buddhism in the West often—and correctly—distinguish between “ethnics” and “converts” as two different types of practitioners in Buddhist organizations in the West, there are also tensions “between those who value the traditional authority located within the lineage and those who value the rational authority located within the wider western culture,” writes […]

Available first in German, the long-awaited new catechism of the New Apostolic Church (NAC) was officially released on Dec. 4, 2012 and signals important developments in this largely European denomination, reports German Protestant theologian Kai Funkschmidt in the journal Materialdienst der EZW (January). Although the church maintains its belief in the special mission of its […]

Communications technology, including mobile phones and the Internet, are gradually making themselves felt on Mount Athos, the spiritual and monastic center of Eastern Orthodoxy, although it does not seem to be affecting monastic life. The monks living in the 20 monasteries and 12 other church communities (known as brotherhoods or “sketes”) on the “holy mount” […]

While the Catholic Church has experienced growing disaffiliation and disaffection in much of Europe, Catholicism shows a measure of growth and vitality in the largely secularized societies of Scandinavia, reports Britain’s The Tablet (January 19). Fredrik Heiding reports that while the numbers of seminarians and new vocations to the priesthood are modest—producing 31 seminarians out […]

The Catholic Church in France “has returned vigorously to the public scene” after decades of invisibility, according to an article in the magazine Inside the Vatican (January). Opposition to a law on same-sex marriage and gay adoption is being led by the archbishop of Paris, Cardinal Andre Vingt-Trois, who started a controversy when he publicly […]

Quakerism is growing at its conservative and liberal edges, but showing decline at its moderate center, according to an analysis of Quaker denominational membership figures by Richard H. Taylor. In a paper presented at the November meeting of the Society for the Scientific Study of Religion, Taylor looked at the history of the various Quaker […]

A movement of American Buddhists, mostly converts, who are seeking to create an alternative to the predominant white Buddhist community is emerging. The Huffington Post (December 11) reports that Buddhists from native American, Hispanic and African-American backgrounds have organized separate faith communities or “sanghas” in various cities in this fledgling movement. Known as People of […]

The strongly conservative economic and political tone of conservative evangelical colleges, particularly those most active in Christian Right causes, are taking the emphasis off politics and concentrating more on theology, reports Christianity Today (December). The change is most evident at The King’s College in New York, which appointed conservative writer and speaker Dinesh D’Souza as […]

The idea of the afterlife is being reconfigured through the New Age culture of personal well-being. Extraordinary experiences claimed by proponents of near-death experiences and lucid dreaming provide material to support this redefinition, eliding questions of salvation and traditional notions of heaven and hell, writes Raymond L.M. Lee in the Journal of Contemporary Religion (Vol. […]