Ivory Trading Priest Under Investigation
In the wake of revelations about the global ivory business and the Catholic Church, the Vatican has announced that self-confessed child abuser Msgr. Cristobal Garcia is…
Will Religion Finally Kill Off the Elephants?
In Kenya, Christian, Muslim and Hindu leaders stand around a pile of ivory captured from elephant poachers and pray that religion will help “God’s creatures” to…
Animal Sacrifice and the Day of Atonement
It sounds like something out of some weird “primitive” religion in an “underdeveloped” country. But it’s going on right now, as it does at this time every year, in New York City, Los Angeles, Jerusalem and other cities around the world that have orthodox Jewish populations. In the “tradition” known as “kaporos”, you buy a live chicken, tie her up, wave or swing her around your head or someone else’s, and then kill her. This supposedly transfers your sins to the chicken, who then conveniently dies for those sins.
9,000-Year-Old Animal Figurines
Two animal statuettes from the Stone Age have been unearthed by archeologists near Jerusalem. The one above is of a ram; the other is a more…
Pastor Rick Warren Explains the Movie Massacre
There’s so much wrong with this Tweet by Pastor Rick Warren: Where do you start? Just to state the most obvious:
Reconciling Faith with Pessimism
Some noteworthy remarks by Chris Hedges on Bill Moyers weekly “Moyers and Company” show on PBS yesterday. They should resonate with any of us who are…
Of Cults, Crimes and Kittens
Just down the road (about 50 miles) from where I live at Best Friends Animal Sanctuary is Colorado City, a small Arizona/Utah town nestled up against…
When You’re Dead, Are You Really?
Have you ever imagined being dead and buried … and then waking up in a coffin, like in an Edgar Allen Poe story? Or being declared…
When Religion Means Cruelty to Animals
What are the proper limits of religious freedom? Marianne Thieme, leader of the Party for the Animals in the Netherlands, offers this answer: “Religious freedom stops…
Pastor Brings Caged Lion to Church Sermon
The pastor of a Texas mega-church used a live lion in a small cage and a baby lamb in his arms during his Easter Sunday service.…
Buddhism for Cats
Please Buddah, help me to accept humans for what they are…
Angel in Their Midst
Just before the Pope stepped forward to pray at the Western Wall in Jerusalem, and with security as tight as a drum, an intruder appeared out of the crowd and crossed in front of him.
Could Grandma Come Back as a Squirrel?
Aithor Ptolemy Tompkins discusses the views of different religions, particularly Christianity and Buddhism, about whether nonhuman animals have souls and afterlives.
Pets in the Biblical Rapture
If you’re a Christian who believes that the Rapture is coming this weekend, and you love your pets, you have a good news / bad news situation.
Was John Paul II a Saint to the Animals?
John Paul II often spoke of his concern for other animals. In God’s Broker, author Anton Gronowicz wrote about a dream that John Paul recounted to him.
The Cave at Chauvet
The cave at Chauvet became their sanctuary, where they could commune in a more intimate way with the animals, and they could express their own sense of wonder and vulnerability.
Slaughter Makes for Strange Bedfellows
What could bring Orthodox Jews and Muslims together against the government that’s known for protecting religious and social minorities?
Dog Takes Communion (Gasp)
Just a storm in a wineglass, say churchgoers St. Peter’s Anglican Church in Toronto, Canada, doesn’t like turning people away. So when Donald Keith was told…