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Religion

Essays and videos on social issues, history, political life and the future

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Photo of a person in white walking along a cliffside path near a stone structure with a scenic landscape view.

videoArchitecture

Steep climbs lead to sacred spaces carved high into the cliffs of Ethiopia

9 minutes

Black and white photo of Adolf Hitler greeting two clergymen surrounded by a crowd in front of a Gothic building.

essayReligion

An unholy alliance

In the 1930s, the rise of Nazism brought centuries of animosity between Europe’s Catholics and Protestants to an end. Why?

Udi Greenberg

Ancient Chinese painting of a man under a tree with a trail of smoke coming from his mouth containing scenes of various figures, surrounded by miniature figures.

essayReligion

Demonology

By turns benign and malign, powerful and vulnerable, earthbound and aerial, daimons across the world resemble one another

David Gordon White

Traditional Indian painting of a deity reclining on a serpent on water with another figure on a lotus against a red background.

videoStories and literature

Two variants of a Hindu myth come alive in an animated ode to Indian storytelling

14 minutes

Photo of a person sitting in a dimly lit church with stained glass windows and sun rays filtering through.

videoSpirituality

Through rituals of prayer, a monk cultivates a quietly radical concept of freedom

4 minutes

A speaker on stage addressing a large audience in an indoor venue with screens displaying his image.

essayReligion

Prosperity versus liberation

How Pentecostalism’s prosperity gospel replaced Catholic liberation theology in Latin American life

Elle Hardy

Vintage sepia photo of a Black man in a buttoned coat against a plain background with decorative border.

videoHistory

From Afghanistan to Virginia – the Muslims who fought in the American Civil War

22 minutes

People in a church with raised hands in worship, expressions of joy and devotion on their faces.

essayNations and empires

Utopia brasileira

Within less than a decade, Brazil will have as many evangelicals as Catholics, a transcendence born of the prosperity gospel

Alex Hochuli

Black and white photo of a group of people standing outdoors on a slope by a pond with trees and bushes in the background.

essayReligion

The script creator

Pau Cin Hau dreamt of an alphabet for a language that had never been written down. So began the religion of Laipianism

Bikash K Bhattacharya

Close-up photo of a wooden mask with fur eyebrows, hollow eyes, a rounded mouth opening and long black hair against a dark background.

essayAnthropology

Witches around the world

The belief in witches is an almost universal feature of human societies. What does it reveal about our deepest fears?

Gregory Forth

Photo of colourful light reflections on a dark tiled floor, possibly from a stained glass window in a dimly lit interior space.

essayValues and beliefs

My leap across the chasm

After years of debate and contemplation, I’ve come to think a heretical form of Christianity might be true. Here’s why

Philip Goff

A walking figure made of black shapes, with a pink ticket for “The Moviegoer” by Walker Percy as its body, on a yellow background.

videoMeaning and the good life

‘Everydayness is the enemy’ – excerpts from the existentialist novel ‘The Moviegoer’

2 minutes

Photochrom image of a narrow street lined with Middle-Eastern buildings; people are walking down the middle of the street and some are holding umbrellas.

essayNations and empires

The paradoxes of Mikha’il Mishaqa

He was a Catholic, then a rationalist, then a Protestant. Most of all, he exemplified the rise of Arab-Ottoman modernity

Peter Hill

A bustling 19th-century cityscape featuring a wide street with construction activity, carriages and pedestrians. Hills and a bridge are also visible under a cloudy sky.

essayReligion

Conscientious unbelievers

How, a century ago, radical freethinkers quietly and persistently subverted Scotland’s Christian establishment

Felicity Loughlin

Illustration of a female group in white togas and red headbands, standing with arms raised before a flaming brazier in a Roman temple with columns.

videoThe ancient world

The six priestesses who kept the flame of ancient Rome alight at risk of death

5 minutes

A portrait of a man with glasses and a cap, adorned with garlands of flowers, and surrounded by strings of marigolds and leaves.

essayReligion

Inventing Hindu supremacy

Vinayak Savarkar ridiculed Gandhi, preaching that anti-Muslim violence was the only means to unite India into a nation

Mihir Dalal

Person holding a painting of Jesus Christ amid a rubble-strewn landscape with damaged buildings and trees in the background.

essayReligion

There was no Jesus

How could a cult leader draw crowds, inspire devotion and die by crucifixion, yet leave no mark in contemporary records?

Gavin Evans

A woman with grey hair lies down, partially covered with a colourful, patterned blanket against a textured wall.

videoHuman rights and justice

Witch hunts persist as a horrifying, deadly reality in pockets of rural India

24 minutes

Marble statue depicting Apollo and Daphne, set against a detailed, ornate ceiling in a classical style room. Daphne is reaching upward with flowing hair.

videoArt

The overlooked polymath whose theatrical oeuvre made all of Rome a stage

30 minutes

Men are seen in a nondescript office type rooma against sunlight streaming through the window, their hands raised in devotion

essayReligion

Indomitable Sufis

Once a centre of Afghan culture, Sufism seems to have disappeared in the maelstrom of war and upheaval. But still it survives

Annika Schmeding

Medieval illustration of a crowned figure, holding a sceptre, wearing a blue cloak over an intricately patterned robe, seated against a parchment background.

videoReligion

Hear from blasphemes, sceptics and free-thinkers in this ‘tour of medieval unbelief’

52 minutes

Two fashionably dressed women in modern style hijabs descend steps beneath a blue sky

essayReligion

Secularism in Iran

Postcolonial intellectuals and Iran’s rulers agree that secularism is just Western imperialism in disguise. They are wrong

Patrick Hassan & Hossein Dabbagh

Ancient bronze statue of a winged figure with raised hand, displaying a humanoid form and detailed feathered wings, set against a dark background.

videoThe ancient world

Meet the absentee gods and nefarious spirits of ancient Mesopotamia

6 minutes

A black and white photo showing a group of men in traditional Middle Eastern attire, with two men seated in the foreground and several standing behind.

essayReligion

Praying in shoes

The Sunni movement of Salafism was born at the beginning of the 20th century, with the goal of modelling life on the 7th

Aaron Rock-Singer