Latest Religion News

In Mexico, a Japanese traditional dancer shows how body movement speaks beyond culture and religion
MEXICO CITY (AP) — When music requires her to cry, Japanese traditional dancer Naoko Kihara barely alters her expression. It’s her arms and torso that move like a slow-motion wave. “Expression is minimal because we cry with our body,” said Kihara, wrapped in her white and...

Send-offs show Carlton Pearson's split legacy spurred by his inclusive beliefs, rejection of hell
Before his peers would label him a heretic, the late Bishop Carlton D. Pearson was once one of the best known preachers in the nation. His skilled biblical oration, steeped in the Black Pentecostal tradition and melded with white evangelicalism, helped swell the membership of the...

Pilgrims yearn to visit isolated peninsula where Catholic saints cared for Hawaii's leprosy patients
KALAUPAPA, Hawaii (AP) — Kalaupapa beckoned to Kyong Son Toyofuku. She had long prayed to visit the hard-to-reach Hawaiian peninsula, trapped by its deep-green, sheer sea cliffs and rugged, black rock shores that glisten under the Pacific’s pristine waters. As a daily Mass-going...

Pilgrims yearn to visit isolated peninsula where Catholic saints cared for Hawaii's leprosy patients
KALAUPAPA, Hawaii (AP) — Kalaupapa beckoned to Kyong Son Toyofuku. She had long prayed to visit the hard-to-reach Hawaiian peninsula, trapped by its deep-green, sheer sea cliffs and rugged, black rock shores that glisten under the Pacific’s pristine waters. As a daily Mass-going...

Kenyan cult leader sentenced to 18 months for film violations but still not charged over mass graves
NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) — The leader of a doomsday cult in Kenya was sentenced Friday to 18 months in prison for the illegal distribution of films and operating a film studio without licenses. The senior magistrate in the city of Malindi, Olga Onalo, handed down the sentence for Paul...

AP PHOTOS: Rosalynn Carter's farewell tracing her 96 years from Plains to the world and back
PLAINS, Ga. (AP) — Former U.S. first lady Rosalynn Carter was memorialized this week with three days of public ceremonies and tributes that spanned the breadth of her long life, from her roots in Plains, Georgia, to the White House and across the world through four decades of work as a global...

What to know about the Sikh independence movement following US accusation that activist was targeted
NEW DELHI (AP) — The U.S. has charged an Indian national in what prosecutors allege was a failed plot to assassinate a Sikh separatist at the behest of an unnamed Indian government official. The charges announced Wednesday against an Indian national arrested in June in Europe come...

What to know about Hannukah and how it's celebrated around the world
Hanukkah — also spelled Chanukah or other transliterations from Hebrew — is Judaism’s “festival of lights.” On eight consecutive nightfalls, Jews gather with family and friends to light one additional candle in the menorah — a multibranched candelabra. In Hebrew,...

Pope says he has acute bronchitis, doctors recommended against travel to avoid change in temperature
ROME (AP) — Pope Francis said on Thursday that he is suffering from acute, infectious bronchitis and that doctors recommended he cancel his planned visit to Dubai this weekend to avoid the quick changes in temperature that would be involved. “As you can see, I’m alive,”...

An Indian official plotted to assassinate a Sikh separatist leader in New York, US prosecutors say
NEW YORK (AP) — An Indian government official directed a plot to assassinate a prominent Sikh separatist leader living in New York City, United States prosecutors said Wednesday as they announced charges against a man they said was part of the thwarted conspiracy. U.S. officials...
