Religion & Ethics NewsWeekly

“There is no way you can talk about, discuss or even acknowledge the contribution of African-American history without acknowledging the very real presence and power of faith as a part of that history,” says Rex Ellis, associate director of curatorial affairs at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History and Culture.

“Not only are the people here benefiting and becoming stronger communities, but the [volunteers] from the states are learning about the people here. They’re learning about each other, and it’s very uplifting,” says Paula Claussen, founder and president of Project Mercy, a nonprofit that replaces the shanties and lean-tos of poor residents in Tijuana with real homes.

“It is considered the time in the prayer service where we are most open spiritually, and we’re really ready to talk to God,” says Rabbi Shira Stutman, senior rabbi at Sixth & I Historic Synagogue in Washington, DC.

"What we're saying is yes, God, I'm in my personal relationship with you, but I'm also in a relationship with all these people around me."

“This is a silent revolution that’s transformed health care so that every person can have their inner life, their spirituality addressed as an integral part of their care,” says Dr. Christina Puchalski, founder and director of the George Washington University Medical School’s Institute for Spirituality & Health.

“Relationship is what matters,” says Dr. Christina Puchalski, director of the George Washington Institute for Spirituality and Health and professor of medicine at George Washington University. “My relationship with my patient—that’s where healing occurs. It’s within that relationship, and that’s what needs to be supported.”

“So much of spirituality is about sanding ourselves down, smoothing ourselves out so that we’re nice and shiny. But the fact is the jagged edges of our humanity are what actually connect us to God and to one another,” says Nadia Bolz-Weber, the tattooed founding pastor of The House for All Sinners and Saints in Denver.

“You can be deeply embedded and enriched by a religious community and still be excited about collaborating with people who are of a different faith community,” says Rabbi Yehuda Sarna, co-leader of New York University’s Global Center for Academic and Spiritual Life.

“Around the world humanitarian financing is at the breaking point. Humanitarian appeals for South Sudanese and Burundian refugees in Uganda are severely underfunded,” says Charles Yaxley, spokesman for the UN High Commissioner for Refugees in Uganda. “That leaves real gaps in our humanitarian response.”

At Dar Al-Hijrah Islamic Center in Falls Church, Virginia, Muslim children sit in tents, pray, throw stones, and make seven circuits around a replica of the Ka'ba as part of a mock hajj, the traditional pilgrimage to Mecca.

"When a monk gives his life to God, he has to express that in a physical way, not just an intellectual way, and singing involves the whole body and the mind and the soul, and so it’s a wonderful way of keeping this relationship between God and the monk," says Father Cassian, prior of the Benedictine monastic community in Norcia, Italy that was damaged extensively in Central Italy's recent earthquake.

“I am an usher because God has given me that talent, and he also has given me a blessing to be a blessing to others,” says Charles J. Brown. a senior usher at the Hemingway Memorial AME Church in District Heights, Maryland.

“Stereotypes lose their power because they’re replaced by true, authentic relationships,” says Rev. Josh Graves, pastor of the Nashville megachurch Otter Creek Church of Christ, describing his project of engagement between Christians and Muslims. “It’s very hard for people to care about people they don’t know. That’s just true of humans wherever you are on planet earth.”

"I am very, very spiritual but I am not religious. I believe in the existence of God, and before I start an operation I pray to God, and after the surgery I again pray to him for taking me through the operation."

A growing new spiritual practice combines the breathing techniques of yoga with laughter. Practitioners say it helps them achieve joy and spiritual well-being. At a laughter yoga session at Washington National Cathedral, we talk with instructor Diane Cohen, who says laughter yoga releases “that inner essence that we don’t always let out.”