A sociologist of religion explains how atheist churches are helping people find meaning and community – serving many of the same purposes as religious churches.
The natural world is an important part of Pagan practice.
Louise OLIGNY/Gamma-Rapho via Getty Images
Practitioners of Pagan religions no longer need to go into a forest to find an object for their altars. Commercialization means that sacred objects are available online.
A confirmation class in 1924 in St. Paul, Minnesota.
Jewish Historical Society of the Upper Midwest/Wikimedia Commons
England and Wales remain outliers in Britain when it comes to modernising weddings legislation. Couples are looking for laws that accommodate more personal ways of finding meaning.
Parents and relatives of abducted students demanding the release of their families who had spent 55 days in captivity as at March 12, 2021.
Photo by Kola Sulaimon/AFP via Getty Images
Many Balinese believe COVID-19 cannot be fought with health measures alone, and requires ritual offerings and prayer. But collective ritual places people at more risk.
Moms and dads have better physical and mental health when they dine with their children – despite all the work of a family meal.
Thomas Barwick/DigitalVision via Getty Images
All that planning, shopping, prepping, serving and cleaning can pay off with better physical and mental health for all members of the family.
Prisoners are forced to play music as they lead a fellow prisoner to his execution at the Mauthausen concentration camp in Austria.
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Formal ceremonies and rituals can trigger psychological signals that command people’s attention and strengthen the perceived importance of those moments.
Preparing food is an important ritual in providing care and comfort.
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Saudi Arabia is barring international visitors for the hajj. A scholar explains a long history of disease, politics and war that have previously prevented people from making the journey to Mecca.
Reading the poem Eurydice to her students unleashed surprising emotions for Stephanie Trigg. But literature works in mysterious, unpredictable ways, highlighting the impossibility of trigger warnings.
Coming together for a solstice feast in ancient Peru.
Robert Gutierrez
How did civilization emerge from small groups of hunter-gatherers? Some archaeologists focus on cooperation as the vital ingredient – and find evidence for it in the form of feast-related artifacts.
Senior Research Fellow, Muslim Philanthropy Initiative at IUPUI and Journalist-fellow, Religion and Civic Culture Center, USC Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences