U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson described Iran's majority faith tradition, Shiite Islam, as a 'misguided religion' while discussing the ongoing U.S. strikes against Iran on March 4, 2026.
On Holy Saturday, as Palestinian Christians tried to reach the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, Israeli security forces started attacking and arresting them, demonstrating a clear violation of religious freedoms.
Devon Hase states, 'People are trying desperately to fix, optimize, or escape their way out of relationship difficulty - and suffering more for the effort. Social media has made this worse! We're surrounded by images of perfect partnerships while quietly drowning in our own ordinary struggles.' This highlights the pressure couples feel in the age of social media.
Behind the closed doors of a therapy practice, science and spiritual traditions are not adversaries. In fact, knowing how to ensure that your belief system is compatible with counseling can transform your experience and strengthen your bond.
Psychology researcher and professor Lisa Miller in her book The Spiritual Child explains that spirituality often increases in adolescence. The teenage brain has a larger gap between experiencing and interpreting than in adulthood. As a result, adolescents' feelings are strong, dramatic and oscillate more wildly than the playground swing you so recently used to push them on.
The purpose of everyday practices in ancient contexts is not easy to discern because contemporary, local folk have no need to talk about why they are doing what they are doing. This is perhaps especially true when it comes to attire related to decency.
Part of the answer lies in the visceral nature of the game. Unlike chess, football is physical to the point of absurdity. Grown adults in body armor crash into each other over what is essentially a leather egg. There's drama in every play. You don't need a PhD in physics to appreciate a one-handed catch while somersaulting over a defender like a caffeinated acrobat.
We are living through one of the most disorienting periods in recorded history. The AI race is accelerating toward ever faster, ever more sophisticated automation and optimization. Agentic AI systems are moving from research labs into workplaces, healthcare, and governance. Geopolitical tensions are restructuring alliances faster than institutions can adapt. And planetary systems are signaling, with increasing urgency, that our current trajectory is unsustainable. Amid all this, it is dangerously easy to lose sight of a foundational question: What are we actually optimizing for?
Hundreds of Muslims gathered in New York's Times Square on Friday, Feb. 20, to break their fast and perform Taraweeh prayers during the holy month of Ramadan. The event, organized for the fifth year by social media personality Wayoflifesq, brought together men and women at the busy intersection of Broadway and Seventh Avenue. As the call to prayer marked the end of the day's fast, participants broke their fast with prayers and chants before performing evening prayers in the square.
"No, not yet. I am waiting until I am serious with someone, and until then, I am only doing oral and mutual masturbation. My reply, "That is sex!" This usually gets a response of, "Well, I meant f*cking," which they equate to sex. Nothing else. I have to remind my clients that fellatio and cunnilingus is called "oral sex" for a reason. That is still sex."
I say: "My son hasn't spoken to me for a long time." The response I get is: "It is what it is." I say: "I'm anxious about my blood test results." The response I get is: "It is what it is." I say: "Some part of me regrets never having had children." The response I get is: "It is what it is."
Papers that interrogate the intersections of religion, culture, and happiness, especially from non-Western, decolonial, feminist, or otherwise critical standpoints are welcomed. Possible questions include: How do different religious traditions conceptualize happiness, and what might be the implications for a global ethics? In what ways do colonial histories shape religious understandings of happiness?
I have been in a prayer group for a few years now. I enjoy praying and discussing all the ins and outs of the Bible. However, even though spiritually it's enriching, the people are a bit 'meh' - they are a bit of a letdown.
The Indian and Chinese Religions in Dialogue Unit of the AAR invites panel and paper proposals for the 2026 American Academy of Religion Annual Meeting in Denver. The deadline is Friday, March 6th. Panel and paper proposals covering all Indian and Chinese traditions from diverse theoretical and methodological perspectives are welcomed. Please see below the panel themes already proposed and reach out to the relevant contact person if interested. Proposals of others are welcomed as well. Proposals should be submitted through PAPERS.
On Jan. 28, 2026, Bruce Springsteen released "Streets of Minneapolis," a hard-hitting protest against the immigration enforcement surge in the city, including the killings of Renee Good and Alex Pretti. The song is all over social media, and the official video has already been streamed more than 5 million times. It's hard to remember a time when a major artist has released a song in the midst of a specific political crisis.
