A judge has denied bail to a young Christian man charged with desecrating the Quran under Pakistan’s controversial blasphemy laws despite the lack of evidence against him, sources said. Police in Shahdara, near Lahore, had arrested 23-year-old Khuram Masih on Dec. 5 and charged him with desecrating the Quran after his landlord, Zulfiqar Ali, alleged [...]

From Maine to Arizona to southern Louisiana, Catholic churches across the country echoed with scorn for a new federal rule requiring faith-based employers to include birth control and other reproductive services in their health care coverage. Dozens of priests took the rare step of reading letters from the pulpit urging parishioners to reach out to [...]

A 67-year-old woman with a criminal record for theft has been charged with siphoning $1 million in donations while working in a finance office of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of New York, church officials announced Monday (Jan. 30). The archdiocese said it did not conduct a criminal background check when the employee, Anita Collins, was [...]

The Euclid Avenue Church of God and the former Episcopal Church of the Transfiguration sit empty on this city’s former Millionaires’ Row, remnants of a heyday when mansions marched east from downtown. Their congregations have fled. And historic preservationists fear that both churches will disappear, too, swallowed up by the nearby Cleveland Clinic’s appetite for [...]

The Republican presidential candidates competing for the affections of Florida voters have plenty of labels with which to tar each other: Influence peddler. Failed politician. Cayman Islands account holder. Aspiring polygamist. But perhaps the worst smear they could lob at an opponent would be to call him a “compassionate conservative.” There’s no place for compassion [...]

“Black people are so lazy. They need to get off the welfare and food stamps and get jobs.” Though that sounds like something Archie Bunker would’ve said back in the day, it’s actually the kind of stuff Gingrich people are accusing Republican presidential candidate hopefuls Rick Santorum and Newt Gingrich of saying on the campaign [...]

Millie Campbell slipped the transmission into reverse and backed her blue Chevrolet away from her spotless brick home. “Oh God,” she said, “we thank you for the blood of Jesus.” Then the 76-year-old cranked the wheel straight, put the car into drive, and headed slowly up Frenchmen Street, one hand on the wheel, the other [...]

A counseling student who declined to advise a gay client might have been expelled from her university because of her faith, a federal appeals court ruled on Friday (Jan. 27). Citing her evangelical Christian religion, Julea Ward disagreed with professors at Eastern Michigan University who told her she was required to support the sexual orientation [...]

I met Candice on a Florida sidewalk while walking to the beach. She was a young, blonde, attractive woman, and she was hovering close behind me as if she had something to say. She had something to say alright – I haven’t been the same since hearing her story. My Florida congregation, where I once [...]

Question: “What is predestination? Is predestination biblical?” Answer: Romans 8:29-30 tells us, “For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the likeness of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. And those he predestined, he also called; those he called, he also justified; those he justified, he also glorified.” Ephesians 1:5 and 11 declare, [...]