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The New York Times recently published a “guide“ to Muslim headscarves. The article intended to illuminate an Islamic concept that promotes modesty, but the associated images showed styles specific to a few countries and all of the silhouettes were faceless. These types of portrayals can contribute to a misperception among some that Muslim women who don the headscarf may lack agency. In today’s political climate, the headscarf has become more than just a spiritual symbol of modesty. At one point, women working in government positions were not allowed to wear it in Turkey. In France, the niqab — a version...

New Haven, Conn., May 7, 2016 / 05:44 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- The future of Christianity in the Middle East remains uncertain, and it is critical that the international community remain engaged, said a Melkite Catholic archbishop from Syria. Archbishop Jean-Clément Jeanbart of Aleppo delivered these comments during a two-day visit to Connecticut that culminated with meetings at the international headquarters of the Knights of Columbus in New Haven. The visit began Sunday night with a talk by the archbishop at St. Mary’s Church, where he recounted Syria’s deep Christian history, including as the place where St. Paul was transformed from...

(Editor's note: This article includes explicit descriptions of violence. Reader discretion is advised.)In a Christian neighborhood inside war-torn Syria, a young boy was waiting to be discharged from a hospital after undergoing surgery. Suddenly the building shook from a bombing. His mother, who was with him, ran out of the hospital to look for help. After she left, a bomb directly hit the building and her son was killed. “She told me ‘My son was already prepared to be in heaven’,” Sister Maria de Guadalupe, a missionary in Syria with the Institute of the Incarnate Word, said of the mother....

LONDON (Reuters) - Sadiq Khan of opposition Labour Party is the strong favourite to win London's mayoral election on Thursday after a contest marked by religious tensions and accusations of racism. Polls show Khan, the son of a bus driver, is as much as 20 percentage points ahead of rival Conservative Zac Goldsmith in the race to run one of the world's top financial centres. If he wins, he will succeed current Conservative mayor Boris Johnson to become the first Muslim to head a major Western capital. London's population of 8.6 million is among the most diverse in the world...

MUMBAI (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - The leader of the only South Asian Muslim community known to practice female genital mutilation (FGM) came under criticism on Friday by campaigners who accused him of urging followers to continue the centuries-old custom. Little is known about FGM in India, where it is carried out in great secrecy by the close-knit Dawoodi Bohra community, a Shi'ite Muslim sect thought to number over 1 million that considers the practice to be a religious obligation. An audio clip of Syedna Muffadal Saifuddin's speech at a mosque in Mumbai, has been authenticated by several members of the...

Italian police officers patrol St Peter's Square (AP) Authorities monitored conversations between the suspects via WhatsAppItalian authorities have arrested six suspects who allegedly received orders from ISIS to attack the Vatican and the Israeli embassy in Rome.The arrests made in Lombardy and Piedmont were the result of a joint operation coordinated by the district attorney of Milan and the Italian anti-terrorism agency.According to the Italian news agency ANSA, authorities arrested Abderrahim Moutaharrik and his wife, Salma Bencharki; Abderrahmane Khachia, and three people who have maintained contact with a couple that left Italy to join ISIS in Syria. All of the suspects...

The Catholic Archbishop of Cologne has slammed Germany's anti-Islam party, Alternative for Deutchsland (AfD). Rainer Woelki posted a video where he ridiculed the right-wing party's claim that Islam is incompatible with the German constitution. The archbishop's intervention comes after the anti-immigration party said it would press for bans on minarets and burqas. "Anyone who denigrates Muslims as the AfD leadership does should realise prayer rooms and mosques are equally protected by our constitution as our churches and chapels," he said. "Whoever says 'yes' to church towers must also say 'yes' to minarets." The AfD has grown in prominence putting pressure...

Our leaders cannot comprehend what is going on, either when a whole Western civilization loses its faith and moral standards or when Islam reawakens to the implications of its own faith and its vision of world conquest. James V. Schall, S.J. Egyptian Christians held captive by Islamic State militants are marched by armed men along a beach said to be near Tripoli, Libya, in this still image from an undated video made available on social media Feb. 15,2015. (CNS photo/Reuters) I. Political realism, long associated with Augustine, constrains us to consider what Machiavelli later recommended to us—namely, to look at...

Most Americans say they believe in God. And around the world, religious Jews, Christians, and Muslims all say they believe in God, as do many people who do not identify with any formal religion. But this statement is actually meaningless. To cite but one example, the God in whose name Muslims cut innocent people’s throats and rape women cannot be the same God as the God of those who believe that God hates such actions. Who, then, argues that all those who say they believe in God believe in the same God? Two groups make this argument. The first consists...

Al Qaryatayn (Syria), April 11, Interfax - The Russian Defense Ministry reports it has realized a unique operation on liberating Syrian town Al Qaryatayn populated by Christians from terrorist band Islamic State (banned in Russia). "From April 1 to April 3, Syrian governmental troops supported by the Russian Aerospace Defence Forces carried out a unique operation on liberating Al Qaryatayn from ISIL militants," the Russian Defense Ministry official major general Igor Konashenkov said. He told that at the first stage divisions of the Syrian Army blocked all the roads leading to the town, then the attack started. The operation is...

A group of Christians in Iraq have formed their own militia to protect people from the so-called Islamic State group. The leader of the Babylon Brigade says they were left with no choice but to take up arms when IS fighters targeted Christians. There's a striking picture on the wall. It shows an untarmacked road, scorched by sunlight, leading to a small village with a mountain range behind it. And all along the side of the road there are crosses every 100m - taller even than lamp posts. "Christian village," a guard mumbles. "Near Mosul." We are in the Baghdad...

The Muslim sovereign has sent a donation to the Greek Orthodox Patriarch of Jerusalem as a contribution towards the costs. This is another of the Jordanian royal family's expressions of support to Christians. It is also a political move that aims to underline Amman's prerogatives over Jerusalem"His Majesty King Abdullah II has issued a Royal Benefaction (makruma) to provide for the restoration of Jesus' Tomb in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem, at His Majesty's personal expense." The news was announced by Jordanian press agency Petra, which says that the Hashemite Court sent an official letter to the...

Maaloula, April 11, Interfax - Russian parliamentarians visited the Syrian city of Maaloula. "This is the first time we can come to this city as pilgrims," Federation Council member Dmitry Sablin told Interfax on Monday. He is a member of the Russian parliamentary delegation, which also consists of State Duma deputies Alexander Yushchenko and Sergey Gavrilov. The parliamentarians visited the Thekla Monastery, which had been damaged and desecrated by the terrorists. "It is hard to describe what we have seen here. The holy places are destroyed, and the churches are burned by fires. A fire was deliberately started at the...

When Muslims are involved in recommending a reformation they come across to me as heretics and apostates that can't abide by the religion they were born into. Instead of leaving Islam they want to change it to make it more palatable to modern thinking and take out the murderous parts of Islam, and to tone it down to where, as Rodney King would say , where we could all get along regardless of our religious beliefs or non-beliefs. Having read a lot about the fundamentals of Islam I am of the conclusion it can't be reformed to make it less...

An Italian bishop has clashed with a pair of priests who want to invite Muslims to pray inside their churches in a bid to promote tolerance in a diocese in Tuscany. “The deserved, necessary and respectful welcome of people who practice other faiths and religions does not mean offering them space for prayers inside churches designed for liturgy and the gathering of Christian communities,” Bishop Fausto Tardelli of Pistoia said in a statement reported on Saturday (March 19). “They can very well find other spaces and places,” Tardelli said. The bishop was responding to pledges by two local priests, the...

The following piece is a discussion from a Christian perspective of the spiritual vacuum that is being filled by Islam as the muhajirun begin their conquest of Europe. Many thanks to JLH for translating this article from the German-language site Katholisches.info: 90% Would Convert to Islam, if the Islamic State Came — A Generation With No IdealsApril 1, 2016[Photo captions: And if the Islamic State is at the gate? 90% would convert to Islam The martyrs of Otranto, murdered by the Turks in 1480. The Coptic martyrs murdered by the Islamic State in February 2015. ]ROM: 90% would not hesitate...

St Elian monastery, in the recaptured town of Qaryatain, was bulldozed by the terrorist group last summerThe bones of a saint have reportedly been discovered among the ruins of a monastery in the Syrian town of Qaryatain, which was recaptured from ISIS on Sunday. Photographs taken of the ruins of the Mar Elian (St Julian) monastery appear to show a destroyed sarcophagus containing a skull and bones. The photographs, taken by Channel 4 News reporter Lindsey Hilsum, show bones laying on the ground amid rubble. The remains are thought to be those of St Julian, who was martyred in 284...

In addition to being Good Friday for Western Christians, last Friday was March 25, the Feast of the Annunciation of the Archangel Gabriel to the Virgin Mary, recounted in the Gospel according to Luke (1:24-38). This event is pivotal, marking the beginning of the Incarnation and God’s plan of salvation. From Luke’s Gospel: Now in the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent by God to a city of Galilee named Nazareth, to a virgin betrothed to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David. The virgin’s name was Mary. And having come in, the angel said...

I recently wrote about some of the "Startling Similarities (and Contrasts) Between the Bible and the Quran." Here are six more important differences between the holy books of the world's two largest religions: 1. Conversion Stories As I have been reading the Bible for the past 40 years, I've noticed that its message first and foremost is the story of God extending grace to rescue fallen mankind. There are many stories of ordinary people and "great" prophets, all struggling in their faith. There are also several conversion stories. For example, in the Old Testament, Manasseh is a diabolically murderous...

A Pakistani descendant of the Islamic prophet Muhammad who was nearly stabbed to death by radical Muslims and brought back to life by the power of Jesus Christ, has released a new book detailing the life-threatening extremism he escaped and his life on the run. Ali Sayed Husnain Shah, who comes from a prominent Shia Muslim family with direct genealogical connection to Muhammad, details in new book, The Cost: My Life On a Terrorist Hit List, how he went from being a member of one of the most prestigious Islamic families in Lahore to an infidel being forced to move...