Opposition to illegal immigration is gaining a new place on the agenda of the Christian right, reports The Public Eye (Summer), a newsletter of the Political Research Associates, a left-oriented group monitoring conservative groups. Judging by 2007 Values Voters Summit, which is sponsored by such key Christian right groups as the Family Research Council, proposals […]

A new survey by the Paul Henry Institute for the Study of Christianity and Politics at Calvin College shows continuing divisions within as well as between faith traditions on political preferences. The survey, based on a sample of 3,002 respondents and funded by the Lynne and Harry Bradley Foundation, found that evangelical Protestants continue to […]

While there has been a growth of Catholic and Protestant retreat centers, the impact of religious individualism and experiential spirituality is challenging their traditional functions. The National Catholic Reporter (April 27) notes that in the case of the Catholics alone, there are over 600 retreat centers in the U.S. and Canada. But they are facing new competition […]

Two Islamic banks, Cham Bank and Syria International Islamic Bank, launched their services to the public in Syria in 2007, and more banks are set to start operating this year, John Dagge reports in The Middle East magazine (March). Islamic banking started to blossom in the 1970s and has been enjoying wider recognition in recent […]

The recent disaster caused by a cyclone in Burma has once again highlighted the repressive nature of the regime: facing such circumstances, some Buddhist monks have felt justified to join violent resistance, Anna Sussman and Jonathan Jones report in the online magazine Inthefray (April 6). The two reporters visited 67year old monk Saw Wizana, who […]

Cult controversies are enduring in France, and it is likely that the state will continue to be involved, but there are signs of a possible change on this issue, reported French sociologist Véronique Altglas, currently a research fellow at the University of Cambridge, at the recent INFORM/CESNUR conference in London (April 16– 19). Some changes […]

The New Age movement has faced many obituaries over the past few decades, but if anything, this movement of disparate spiritual therapies, techniques and teachings is becoming more consolidated thanks to a unique publishing strategy. One publisher is rarely that influential in the fortunes of a religious movement, but Hay House has managed to create […]

Pentecostalism is seen as one the most dynamic expressions of religion in the contemporary world, but this general impression should be qualified by a variety of contrasting developments from one country to another, as attested by several papers presented at the INFORM/CESNUR conference on new religious movements in London (April 16–19), which RW attended. In […]

The close working relationship between the Vatican and the U.S. government since the 1980s, known as the “Holy Alliance,” may be coming to an end or significantly changing as it faces a new era of world power relations, reports Inside the Vatican magazine (April). The alliance was born when President Ronald Reagan and the Vatican […]

Sufi groups in India are currently engaged into efforts to establish a network around the country in order to try to prevent terrorist attacks, reports Farzand Ahmed in India Today magazine (Jan. 28). The idea behind this civic organization is to create a “Sufi corridor of peace” connecting some 400 Sufi centers across India. The […]