Religion Dispatches
…es with women-only mosques, including mu’adhan and imamahs, like China and India. Some countries have fewer restrictions, like Indonesia. It is so good to be in places like this because when it is suppose to be for the worship of Allah then, how is that man can get in the way? But we know the drill. Thanks to all who commented on these and other entries, like Houda, and mairedubhtx. Perhaps when Ramadan is over I can start making my reply on the b…
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…f great moral courage. Drawing from earlier scriptures, the fourth-century Indian Buddhist master Asaṅga speaks of a threefold classification of “giving” that includes giving material goods, spiritual counsel, and life. Of these three, Asaṅga considers offering up one’s life to be the highest form of giving. That said, Indian and Tibetan texts also set forth stringent conditions that must be met before an individual is allowed to offer up his or h…
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…g around a statue of Shiva (a gift from the Department of Atomic Energy of India). A woman in white is brought forward and stabbed, prompting the anonymous cameraman to flee in terror. The Telegraph noted the cameraman’s reflection in the office window suggests that he is also wearing a ritual cloak and likely a co-conspirator. CERN administrators have dismissed the footage as a hoax and opened an internal investigation. But many remain puzzled as…
Read More…y and remembering our true African culture, one that celebrates diversity, promotes equality and acceptance, and recognises the contribution of everyone, whatever their sexuality. Affirming the point of Alimi’s commentary, Ghanaian presidential hopeful George Boateng this week “delivered some frighteningly brutal homophobic promises to the people of Ghana,” reports Joe Williams for Pink News. Speaking on Kasapa radio, the political hopeful said th…
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…ute truth. The loss of farmlands in the Indus River valley in Pakistan and India have led to the displacement of entire generations of young men who have moved to cities like Kurachi where they’re ripe targets for extremism. That group of people who once would have been farming on land they inherited from their grandfather, are not doing that because the land doesn’t exist anymore. So now they’re young men who are lost and without prospects. Clima…
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…Perhaps there would be fire, smoke, and stench. Graham observed that Gary, Indiana, looked a bit like hell if you peered down from an airplane. But perhaps hellfire was metaphorical. Graham mused, “[Jesus] uses the word fire, and I have often wondered if that is a terrible fire within our hearts for God, for fellowship with God, that can never be quenched. We’ve rejected God. We’ve turned our back on God. We can never know God. … [Hell is] the ban…
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…nism. Kasich supports balancing the budget and lowering corporate taxes to promote growth and to encourage companies to bring profits earned overseas back to the U.S. But he also supports training those at the bottom for meaningful work. He wants secure border controls but also a legal means for law-abiding undocumented immigrants to pay a penalty, stay here, and work. To back up this policy, he cites Ronald Reagan, the most popular Republican pre…
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…ecularist prejudices may suggest. Yoga in the West may have emigrated from India as a “religion,” but soon became something else as it took up residence with Occidental bourgeoisie in the suburbs. Yet, as recent protests against yoga classes in public schools by evangelicals in the United States witness, some Americans fear that Yoga’s non-Christian religious character lies hidden within it, ready to ensnare unsuspecting faithful. That yoga instru…
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…: I knew Monsanto sues farmers into oblivion, caused a rash of suicides in India, suppresses negative media coverage, and pays politicians, and scientists to lie on its behalf. But there was one story I didn’t believe, because I knew it wasn’t true: Monsanto hadn’t paid me. So I did what any academic or journalist would do, and started learning more about the company that supposedly had me on its payroll. #2 Confront Death by Avoiding Fritos: The…
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…per that showed the effects of fireworks on air pollution during Diwali in India, “fireworks contain harmful chemicals such as potassium nitrate, carbon and sulphur apart from an array of chemicals such as strontium, barium, sodium, titanium, zirconium, magnesium alloys, copper and aluminum powder to create the colourful effects. On burning they release gases such as carbon monoxide and nitrogen dioxide.” The study concluded that fireworks contrib…
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