Word: religion
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...they say could have more sinister plans. That's led to a series of arrests. Rijad Rustempasic, 34, was raised in a small town in Bosnia and now lives in Sarajevo's old town. During the war he converted to Salafi Islam, a rigidly conservative branch of the religion, and joined a unit composed mostly of Arab foreign fighters, between 500 and 1,500 of whom had gone to Bosnia to support their fellow Muslims. Rustempasic says he has been arrested six times since Sept. 11, 2001. "It's always the same scenario," he says, sporting a long russet beard...
...been as colorful as it has been unusual for Alysa Stanton, 45, America's first-ever female African-American rabbi. Stanton, who was born to a Christian family, was formally ordained on June 6, having completed seven years of rabbinical training at Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion in Cincinnati. Stanton will now assume her new role as the first nonwhite rabbi of Congregation Bayt Shalom, a 60-family synagogue in Greenville...
...Stanton had found a permanent home in Judaism, and formally converted to the religion after a year of study with a rabbi in Denver. Her family and community, however, were skeptical of her defection to the synagogue. There was a sense of betrayal, Stanton concedes, but there was also the reality that Stanton would never quite look like your average American Jew. "I definitely don't blend in," Stanton says. "Worldwide, Jews come in every color and hue, but in America, mainstream Judaism is definitely an Anglo demographic." (See the top 10 religion stories...
...Likewise, it is important for Western countries to avoid impeding Muslim citizens from practicing religion as they see fit - for instance, by dictating what clothes a Muslim woman should wear. We cannot disguise hostility towards any religion behind the pretence of liberalism...
...them. It is easier to blame others than to look inward; to see what is different about someone than to find the things we share. But we should choose the right path, not just the easy path. There is also one rule that lies at the heart of every religion - that we do unto others as we would have them do unto us. This truth transcends nations and peoples - a belief that isn't new; that isn't black or white or brown; that isn't Christian, or Muslim or Jew. It's a belief that pulsed in the cradle...