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2018-06-01T11:20:03-04:00

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

Is Western Europe Still Christian?

Last updated on: June 1, 2018 at 11:20 am By Andrew Chesnut

By Dr. Jakob Egeris Thorsen* The Pew Forum has published a report focusing on the role of Christianity in Western Europe. The overall results show a region that is ‘non-practicing Christian’ with low levels of church attendance and adherence to key Christian beliefs and doctrine. Furthermore, both church-going and ‘cultural’ Christians are more skeptical than ‘nones’ toward migrants and Islam, which is the dominant religion among recent migrants. In this commentary, I will focus on the some of the survey... Read more

2018-05-29T09:31:39-04:00

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

The Kiss of Death – Eros and Thanatos in a Barcelona Cemetery

Last updated on: May 29, 2018 at 9:31 am By Andrew Chesnut

This piece was supposed to be about the Virgin of Montserrat, the Black Matroness of Catalonia whose majestic shrine I visited last week. But just as Mexican skeleton saint, Santa Muerte, seduced me into contemplating her instead of the Virgin of Guadalupe, the ‘Kiss of Death’ diverted my attention away from the Black Madonna. El Petó de la Mort (Kiss of Death in Catalan) is a stunningly gorgeous marble statue of a winged skeletal Angel of Death embracing and kissing... Read more

2018-05-23T16:46:54-04:00

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

Catholic UFOs?

Last updated on: May 23, 2018 at 4:46 pm By Andrew Chesnut

By Dr. Diana Walsh Pasulka, Professor and Chair, Department of Philosophy and Religion, University of North Carolina, Wilmington The Catholic Church is well known among scholars of religion for its syncretism, that is, its ability to meld indigenous and local religious practices, as well as gods and goddesses, with its own saints and devotions. Intentional or not, this strategy is successful and there are hundreds of cases of indigenous deities that carry on the tradition of pre-Christian religious practices... Read more

2018-05-23T20:35:58-04:00

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

From Kitchen Saint to Skeleton Saint Rey Pascual – The Bizarre Case of Pascual Bailon

Last updated on: May 23, 2018 at 8:35 pm By Andrew Chesnut

Co-authored by Dr. Andrew Chesnut and Dr. Kate Kingsbury* Guatemalan folk saint Rey Pascual’s foundation myth is a fascinating account of Catholic and Mayan syncretism in which the original Spanish saint, Pascual Bailón, morphs into the skeletal folk saint who is venerated today in Olintepeque and also Tuxtla Gutiérrez, the capital of Chiapas, Mexico’s southernmost state. A canonized saint whose feast day is May 17, Pascual Bailón was a Franciscan friar from Aragón who lived during the second half of... Read more

2018-05-09T19:42:22-04:00

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

Our Lady of the Bullet as Flak Jacket for Femicide

Last updated on: May 9, 2018 at 7:42 pm By Andrew Chesnut

Surpassed only by Syria in the number of violent deaths in the past decade, Mexico is a country where supernatural protection is in great demand. Now in its second decade the drug war has claimed most of the lives of the more than 200,000 Mexicans who have suffered violent deaths over the past ten years. If leftist presidential candidate Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador (AMLO) is nearing a double-digit lead over his rivals it is in part due to rejection of... Read more

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2018-05-23T12:51:25-04:00

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

Latin American Millennials Question Pope Francis’s Handling of Sexual Abuse Cases

Last updated on: May 23, 2018 at 12:51 pm By Andrew Chesnut

Co-authored by Dr. Kate Kingsbury* and Dr. Andrew Chesnut Recent figures reveal that the Catholic Church is losing followers in Latin America at an accelerated rate. Contrary to pundits’ predictions, Pope Francis rather than proving popular and precipitating a proliferation in numbers of the faithful is losing support. What explains the shrinking Latin American flock? And what can the Catholic Church do to conciliate and captivate their congregants in Latin America anew? Bad Publicity Many assumed that a Latin American... Read more

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2018-04-30T20:40:16-04:00

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

Pope Francis Endorses Exorcism as Tool for Combating the Devil

Last updated on: April 30, 2018 at 8:40 pm By Andrew Chesnut

Co-authored by Dr. Kate Kingsbury* and Dr. Andrew Chesnut For those of us who’ve been closely following Pope Francis’s spirited papacy, his latest endorsement of exorcism as a powerful spiritual tool for combating the Devil and his minions comes as no surprise. Just a few months into his pioneering pontificate, in 2013, the Argentine pope performed an informal exorcism, known as a prayer of deliverance from evil, on a young man in a wheel chair. The Mexican priest who brought the... Read more

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2018-05-22T15:24:02-04:00

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

Exorcising the Demons of Africa

Last updated on: May 22, 2018 at 3:24 pm By Andrew Chesnut

Co-authored by Dr. Kate Kingsbury* and Dr. Andrew Chesnut One of the major novelties at the 13th annual course for exorcists taking place this week at Regina Apostolorum University in Rome is a section on witchcraft in Africa. Witchcraft is so pervasive in parts of Africa that in 2006 the Catholic bishops of Southern Africa, comprising Bostwana, Swaziland, and South Africa, issued a pastoral letter prohibiting their priests from moonlighting as soothsayers and witch doctors! With the future of... Read more

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2018-04-12T10:27:50-04:00

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

Is There a “Francis Effect” in the United States?

Last updated on: April 12, 2018 at 10:27 am By Andrew Chesnut

A new poll by Gallup reveals that it is not only the pope’s native Latin America that has not experienced a “Francis effect” but also the U.S., home to the world’s fourth largest Catholic population. During the first couple years of his controversial papacy there were many anecdotal reports of his charisma and popularity leading to greater mass attendance in parishes across the globe, especially in the Americas. However the new Gallup survey shows that if there is any Francis... Read more

2018-03-29T07:18:17-04:00

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

Holy Week with Brother Francis and Sister Death at the Shrine of the Black Christ of Esquipulas

Last updated on: March 29, 2018 at 7:18 am By Andrew Chesnut

During the 19th century in the mountain towns of New Mexico and southern Colorado, Mexican-American Catholics personified death as a female figure known as Doña Sebastiana. Holy Week processions organized by the Penitentes, Catholic brotherhoods originating in Spain and known for their public displays of penance, included death carts with life-size effigies of the skeletal Doña Sebastiana. Along with acts of self-flagellation on the part of the Penitentes, the Grim Reapress symbolized not only the agony and death suffered by... Read more

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