A Nashville-based research group found that the Bible Belt is still fertile ground for church planting. Of the 800-plus new churches surveyed by the organization for a 2015 survey, nearly half of them were founded in the South.
The Post and Courier's arts and culture expert describes his ascent along the Portico di San Luca in Bologna, Italy.
Does “fake news” ever fool you? Or do you count yourself among the discriminating folks who know the difference between fake and real?
Several local churches offer gluten-free bread during Holy Eucharist to accommodate parishioners with celiac disease and other sensitivities.
Submissions qualify for a drawing for a free ticket to this year's annual Prayer Breakfast on Oct. 18.
I have good news for all of you. Most of you, that is. I’m not dead. Apparently, a few of my readers thought, as evidenced by the voicemail I received this past week, that I was singing in the celestial choir.
The sighting of the new moon at sunset on Sept. 11 will mark the first day of Muharram — the first month on the Muslim calendar. The new year honors the Prophet Muhammad's hijrah, or migration, from Mecca to Medina when he fled persecution to found the Islamic faith.
Southern Jewish history soon will no longer remain a discipline limited to a few institutions in the South.
Burkes, now an avid reader, said he didn't start to read whole books in earnest until he turned 43.
The nonprofit, which was reorganized in 2013 under the Charleston Jewish Federation, consists of three staff members and a handful of volunteers trying to "repair the world."
On a Sunday afternoon, my wife, Becky, and I visit the Crimson Tattoo Parlor in Auburn, Calif. We are not looking to get a painful heart-shape tattoo but rather to help alleviate the spiritual pain of suicide.
Churches typically use the start of the school year to reengage families who missed church for beach getaways and leisure time on the boat.
Congregation Dor Tikvah started in 2012 as a small group of Orthodox Jewish worshipers determined to spend the Sabbath in West Ashley, where most of them lived. They met at the Jewish Community Center, and sometimes at a private home.
Last month, my wife, Becky, and I were moving into our new home in Auburn, Calif., when her sister, Melissa, stopped by to help us unpack. A few hours into the job, Becky put down her boxes and started making sandwiches for us.
In a survey of thousands of Americans who attend and do no attend religious services, researchers found that most non-attenders are believers.
Two weeks ago, I invited you to go with me to Honduras in 2019 to create children’s libraries through my daughter’s nonprofit, Chispa Project.
With Pope Francis' latest pronouncement against the death penalty, South Carolina Catholic leaders are once again stirred to action after decades of protest and prayer. Will the state listen to their pleas for mercy?
Hoping to play a part in bridging the racial divide in education, a North Charleston church is planning its first national conference this week.
The chaplain writes that he has met many people who have "given up on God" because of their distaste for organized religion.
Nearly 30 years later, the church can finish that essential detail, thanks to an anonymous $160,000 gift, according to Jack McGovern, director of stewardship at Blessed Sacrament.
Last winter, my wife and I went to Honduras for three months to help our daughter in a small, grassroots nonprofit called the Chispa Project. One night as we left a restaurant, a man followed us to our car. “Por favor,” he said, handing my daughter a note. “PLEASE, can you help me get to America?” the note said. It was signed with a name and phone number. Do you ever wonder what makes them take the risk?
One denomination, in particular, is determined to reach as many people as possible who are deaf and blind.
Cecil Williams' photography exhibit at the Charleston County Public Library includes a tribute to the Charleston Hospital Strike of 1968-69.
Call them the Gullah Power Couple and they squirm, but Ron and Natalie Daise do more than most to inform people about Gullah-Geechee culture and history.
If you saw the 1983 movie “WarGames,” you’ll remember the moment the young hacker David Lightman (played by Matthew Broderick) cracks a Pentagon computer called The War Operation Plan Response (WOPR).
Dozens of South Carolina churches and nonprofits are beginning to voice concern that parts of the recently enacted federal tax reform could hurt them, and even make many of them pay taxes for the first time.
Second Presbyterian Church is one of Charleston's oldest, and has a mostly white congregation. This summer, it decided to reach out to children in nearby African-American neighborhoods and invite them to Vacation Bible School.
While gay marriage has gained greater acceptance across American society, many churches and faith communities struggle to welcome openly gay parishioners.
What does a chaplain tell a young couple whose faith in God has been rocked by a miscarriage? Sometimes, it's better just to listen than to talk.
Mepkin Abbey hosts monastic guests
A protest resulted in the founding of Emanuel AME Church, whose first leaders, including the Rev. Morris Brown, promptly ran afoul of the white authorities for asserting their independence and attempting to educate members of the black congregation.
Rural Mission, the faith-based charity located on Johns Island that rehabilitates homes for low-income residents and works with migrant farmers, now is scrambling to rebuild its operation before the 49-year-old nonprofit is forced to close its doors.
Have you ever done the right thing, but your heart said, “I’m just not feeling it?"
A new Christian book club launched this month by 1Charleston aims to further racial reconciliation in the church. Its first book? Plantation Jesus.
As a chaplain, I find no greater meaning for Independence Day than in our constitutional right to freedom of worship.
Do you want to try camping, but don’t own equipment? Or maybe learn a new language? Do you have toys or furniture you’d like to give away?
The young residents of Carolina Youth Development Center, separated from family and under the watchful eye of social services bureaucrats, often can feel diminished, ignored, invisible.
Earlier this month, I met a man wearing a shirt from Belgium.
The arms of congregation members at two West Ashley churches have gotten longer in recent years. They now reach as far as a half-mile along Ashley River Road and into the sanctuaries of their sister churches.
On June 11, Sessions removed asylum protections for domestic abuse and gang violence victims arriving at the border.
Have you ever noticed a resemblance between the church hypocrite and gym hypocrite?
The loved ones of all nine victims are trying to forge new paths and find their new voices, ones that hold memories tight but also lead to meaningful futures.
What happens to a church when its church is gone, at least for some time?
Everything is spinning or circling, or both. The moon goes round the Earth, the Earth goes round the sun, the sun goes round the galaxy, the galaxy goes round the universe.
Almost three years have passed since a racist gunman entered Emanuel AME Church's Bible study and gunned down nine black worshippers. A wide range of events, from dialogues about race to events that promote kindness, are scheduled to honor their lives.
The Baylor freshman two rows in front of me asked our English composition instructor only one question, “Do you accept late term papers?”
Shortly before the sun set on a recent Friday evening, cars pulled off King Street and into the parking lot of the Central Mosque of Charleston.
Peril can lurk around the corner for LGBTQ youth. As they come to terms with their sexual identity, some find themselves adrift, often endangered.
You may have seen the news last month about the white woman in Rialto, Calif., who waved at three black women carrying suitcases from a neighbor’s home.
A time-weathered building that sat abandoned for more than half a century in a blighted area of St. George could soon become upper Dorchester County’s newest historic building.
All they ask of us is that we will never see war as inevitable nor ever accept their deaths as routine.
Children in foster care suffer even more trauma and upheaval after their removal from biological families because the state is woefully short of quality foster homes to house them.
Advocates and journalists have paid critical attention to children in foster care. But once those children become adults and age out, they go largely forgotten, often cast into the world with little more than traumatic memories and mistrust to guide them.
