Religions Around The World

In the early morning hours, monks can be seen walking on their alms round in Kanchanaburi, Thailand
Showing humility and detachment from worldly goods, the monk walks slowly and only stops if he is called. Standing quietly, with his bowl open, the local Buddhists give him rice, or flowers, or an envelope containing money.  In return, the monks bless the local Buddhists and wish them a long and fruitful life.
Christians Celebrate Good Friday
Enacting the crucifixion of Jesus Christ in St. Mary's Church in Secunderabad, India. Only 2.3% of India's population is Christian. 
Ancient interior mosaic in the Church of the Holy Saviour in Chora
The Church of the Holy Saviour in Istanbul, Turkey is a medieval Byzantine Greek Orthodox church.
Dome of the Rock located in the Old City of Jerusalem
The site's great significance for Muslims derives from traditions connecting it to the creation of the world and to the belief that the Prophet Muhammad's Night Journey to heaven started from the rock at the center of the structure.
Holi Festival in Mathura, India
Holi is a Hindu festival that marks the end of winter. Also known as the “festival of colors”,  Holi is primarily observed in South Asia but has spread across the world in celebration of love and the changing of the seasons.
Jewish father and daughter pray at the Wailing Wall in Jerusalem, Israel.
Known in Hebrew as the Western Wall, it is one of the holiest sites in the world. The description, "place of weeping", originated from the Jewish practice of mourning the destruction of the Temple and praying for its rebuilding at the site of the Western Wall.
People praying in Mengjia Longshan Temple in Taipei, Taiwan
The temple is dedicated to both Taoism and Buddhism.
People praying in the Grand Mosque in Ulu Cami
This is the most important mosque in Bursa, Turkey and a landmark of early Ottoman architecture built in 1399.
Savior Transfiguration Cathedral of the Savior Monastery of St. Euthymius
Located in Suzdal, Russia, this is a church rite of sanctification of apples and grapes in honor of the Feast of the Transfiguration of the Lord.
Fushimi Inari Shrine is located in Kyoto, Japan
It is famous for its thousands of vermilion torii gates, which straddle a network of trails behind its main buildings. Fushimi Inari is the most important Shinto shrine dedicated to Inari, the Shinto god of rice.
Ladles at the purification fountain in the Hakone Shrine
Located in Hakone, Japan, this shrine is a Japanese Shinto shrine.  At the purification fountain, ritual washings are performed by individuals when they visit a shrine. This ritual symbolizes the inner purity necessary for a truly human and spiritual life.
Hanging Gardens of Haifa are garden terraces around the Shrine of the Báb on Mount Carmel in Haifa, Israel
They are one of the most visited tourist attractions in Israel. The Shrine of the Báb is where the remains of the Báb, founder of the Bábí Faith and forerunner of Bahá'u'lláh in the Bahá'í Faith, have been buried; it is considered to be the second holiest place on Earth for Bahá'ís.
Pilgrims praying at the Pool of the Nectar of Immortality and Golden Temple
Located in Amritsar, India, the Golden Temple is one of the most revered spiritual sites of Sikhism. It is a place of worship for men and women from all walks of life and all religions to worship God equally. Over 100,000 people visit the shrine daily.
Entrance gateway of Sik Sik Yuen Wong Tai Sin Temple Kowloon
Located in Hong Kong, China, the temple is dedicated to Wong Tai Sin, or the Great Immortal Wong. The Taoist temple is famed for the many prayers answered: "What you request is what you get" via a practice called kau cim.
Christian women worship at a church in Bois Neus, Haiti.
Haiti's population is 94.8 percent Christian, primarily Catholic. This makes them one of the most heavily Christian countries in the world.

World Religions News

Dr. Kwok Pui Lan to join Episcopal Divinity School as Distinguished Scholar for 2025-2026


NEW YORK — Dr. Kwok Pui Lan, an internationally recognized theologian in  postcolonial theology and Asian and Asian American feminist theology, will rejoin Episcopal Divinity School (EDS) as a Distinguished Scholar starting in January 2025 and concluding in December 2026. In this role, Dr. Kwok will lead a variety of initiatives that support further scholarship, education, and collaborative partnerships around postcolonial theology in the Anglican Communion and beyond. Offerings will include an online course on postcolonial Anglicanism, a mini-conference, and mentorship for a cohort of emerging theologians from the Global South. 

Dr. Kwok has shaped a generation of theological scholarship and formed countless students. Most recently, she served as Dean’s Professor of Systematic Theology at Candler School of Theology at Emory University. Prior to that, Dr. Kwok was William F. Cole Professor of Christian Theology and Spirituality at EDS, where she taught for twenty-five years. This renewed partnership will support new and continued pathways for Dr. Kwok’s visionary leadership in the church and academy.

“I am delighted to help EDS connect with theological educators and grassroots leaders in the Anglican Communion, particularly from the Global South,” reflected Dr. Kwok. “EDS can be a lively hub for discussing the future of a decentered and polyphonic Anglican Communion.”

The Very Rev. Lydia Kelsey Bucklin ‘15, President and Dean of EDS, said of the partnership, “I am thrilled to welcome Dr. Kwok Pui Lan back to the EDS community as Distinguished Scholar. For decades, Dr. Kwok has been a leader in postcolonial and feminist theology and a beloved teacher. Her work with EDS will be a gift to the entire church.”

This announcement comes less than two months after President Bucklin’s installment as President and Dean in October 2024. President Bucklin has since articulated that EDS is in a season of boldly reimagining this storied institution and the next iteration of theological education to meet the changing needs of the church and world.

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Episcopal Divinity School (EDS) is dedicated to nurturing moral leadership through theological education, spiritual formation, and community transformation. EDS remains committed to its bold and inclusive vision of social justice. The school aims to equip future leaders in The Episcopal Church with the necessary skills and mindset to lead their communities in an ever-changing world. EDS strives to meet the growing demand for Episcopal theological education and ensure broader access to innovative programs. EDS strengthen partnerships, provides theological education for lay and clergy leaders, and fosters meaningful conversations on Christianity and social justice.

Dr. Kwok Pui Lan was Dean’s Professor of Systematic Theology at Candler School of Theology, Emory University, and a past president of the American Academy of Religion. Before that, she taught theology and spirituality at the Episcopal Divinity School. She has authored and edited numerous books on Asian and Asian American feminist theology, biblical interpretation, and postcolonial criticism. She is the author of The Anglican Tradition from a Postcolonial Perspective and editor of Transpacific Political Theology. She received the Lanfranc Award for Education and Scholarship from the Archbishop of Canterbury in 2021.

Contact:
Mary Grace Puszka
Episcopal Divinity School
(646) 337-2799
This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of RNS or Religion News Foundation.

Santa’s tomb? Coffin of St. Nicholas may have been found — but there’s a catch

St. Nicholas, by Jaroslav Čermák (1831-1878). / Credit: Galerie Art Praha via Wikimedia (public domain)

CNA Staff, Dec 18, 2024 / 06:00 am (CNA).

After years of excavation work, the leader of an archeological expedition at the Church of St. Nicholas in Demre, Turkey, announced this week that her team has found a sarcophagus that may contain the body of St. Nick — a discovery that could muddy the conventional wisdom about the true resting place of the saint’s relics, which is currently believed to be Italy.

In a recent interview, the leader of the expedition, Professor Ebru Fatma Fındık, said that sources point to Turkey’s southern Antalya Province as Nicholas’ resting place after his death, which took place in the 340s. 

She said that after an earthquake in the region in 529, archeologists believe the Church of St. Nicholas, long a popular pilgrimage site, especially for Russian Orthodox Christians, “may have been built near the burial place of the saint.”

In another interview, Fındık speculated that the sarcophagus, “the first sarcophagus unearthed in the church” after drilling work began in 2022, could have been covered by gravel and sand from a flood or tsunami, which she says is why it is so well preserved.

Turkish claims to the resting place of St. Nicholas are not new — in fact, Turkish officials have admitted for years that if they can prove that St. Nicholas is buried there, “tourism will gain big momentum.” The present excavations at the church were initiated by Turkey’s Ministry of Culture and Tourism.

“We have been carrying out excavations in the church for months … During our drilling work in the two-story building that borders the courtyard of the church from the south, we came across a sarcophagus” that they believe belongs to St. Nicholas, Fındık said. 

“Geologists related to this subject will come soon, and they will actually investigate and examine it,” she said. 

Who was St. Nicholas?

Nicholas was an early Christian bishop born in the third century in Asia Minor, modern-day Turkey, at a time when Christians suffered sporadic but often brutal persecutions under the Roman Empire. He was ordained a priest and later ordained bishop of Myra, an ancient port city that corresponds to the modern-day Turkish city of Demre. 

There are numerous legends about Nicholas, who was known for his generosity; perhaps the most famous of which is that he once dropped three bags of gold through an open window or down the chimney at a house in Myra to pay the doweries of the three women who lived there, ultimately saving them from a life of prostitution. This is likely the explanation for why the modern Christmas character of Santa Claus clandestinely brings gifts for children. 

Nicholas was imprisoned for a time under the persecution of Emperor Diocletian, only released when Constantine the Great came to power and made Christianity the official religion of the Roman Empire. Nicholas later participated in the Council of Nicea in 325 and fervently defended the Church against heretics such as Arius. 

He died on Dec. 6, which is the day his feast is celebrated in the Roman Catholic Church. He is deeply revered in the East as well, especially in the Russian Orthodox Church. 

Where are Nicholas’ relics?

The location of St. Nicholas’ mortal remains is already a matter of some dispute, and the discovery of the additional sarcophagus, depending on what it contains, will likely muddy things further. 

Churches across the world — including in Germany, Russia, and even Virginia — claim to possess relics of him. But the Basilica of St. Nicholas in Bari, in Italy’s southern region of Puglia, has perhaps the strongest claim to St. Nicholas’ final resting place today. 

Amid the takeover of the Turkish region by the Muslim Seljuks, Nicholas’ bones were purportedly moved by merchants from Myra to Bari in 1087 — and a few bones reportedly made their way to Venice — not long after the Great Schism between Catholics and the Orthodox in 1054. 

A desecrated sarcophagus located in the Turkish church was previously thought to contain Nicholas’ body until it was taken — either for pious or opportunistic reasons, depending on whom you ask — to Italy.  

Pope Francis has visited Bari twice during his papacy, and during both the 2018 and 2020 visits, he stopped in the basilica’s crypt to venerate St. Nicholas’ relics. In the crypt where St. Nicholas is purportedly buried, there is an altar for the celebration of Orthodox and Eastern Catholic liturgies, making it an important ecumenical site. 

In 1953, scientific studies confirmed that bones from both Bari and Venice belonged to the same individual, though whether they were both from St. Nicholas remains inconclusive, Archeology Magazine reported.

Today is an ember day. What’s that?

null / Credit: udra11/Shutterstock

CNA Staff, Dec 18, 2024 / 04:00 am (CNA).

Wednesday, Dec. 18, is a special day in the Catholic Church, though relatively few Catholics probably realize it. 

This Wednesday — along with the following Friday and Saturday, Dec. 20 and 21 — is an ember day, a day traditionally set aside for fasting and abstinence from meat. These three upcoming ember days are the last ones of 2024. 

But what are ember days, and why do they exist?

Ember days are tied to the four seasons of the year. The reason “ember” is associated with these days seems to be that the word is a corruption of the Latin phrase “quatuor tempora,” meaning four seasons. 

Each of the four seasons of the year contains three ember days. The 12 total ember days throughout the year are:

  • The Wednesday, Friday, and Saturday after Ash Wednesday

  • The Wednesday, Friday, and Saturday after Pentecost

  • The Wednesday, Friday, and Saturday after the feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross (Sept. 14)

  • The Wednesday, Friday, and Saturday after the feast of St. Lucy, which is Dec. 13 

Ember days appear to be a very early Christian practice, first attested to as part of apostolic tradition by Pope Leo I in the fifth century. The purpose of their introduction, according to The Catholic Encyclopedia, was to thank God for the gifts of nature (hence their tie to the natural seasons), especially the crops used to make bread and wine for the Eucharist; to teach people to make use of those gifts in moderation; and to assist the needy. 

Ember days also served as a response to the pagan festivals of Rome; the days encouraged Christians to counter the excesses and debauchery of those festivals by, instead, fasting and praying. At first the Church in Rome had fasts in June, September, and December, but the exact days were not fixed. The first record of the fasts for all four seasons being decreed comes in the writing of Pope Gelasius at the end of the fifth century. 

After Gelasius, the practice spread beyond Rome. Gelasius also started the practice of permitting the conferring of ordinations on ember Saturdays, which were formerly given only at Easter, The Catholic Encyclopedia records. That tradition of holding ordinations of ember Saturdays also continues today, and in addition, ember days have traditionally been days of prayer for vocations.

The observance of ember days was later prescribed for the entire Latin Church by Pope Gregory VII (1073–1085). So, ember days were a big part of Catholic life for quite a while. 

Though canon law no longer requires the observance of fasting and abstinence on ember days, they remain important for Catholics in many countries, and their continued observance by Catholics everywhere is certainly not discouraged. And in fact, some bishops in the United States have explicitly encouraged their Catholics to observe ember days and pray for specific intentions. 

Ember days are a fascinating and ancient tradition of the Catholic Church that has been largely forgotten, at least in the United States. Though certainly not required, consider observing the last ember days of the year, thanking God for nature and for the gifts he brings us through it.

This story was first published Dec. 17, 2022, and has been updated.

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