Source PUNE, INDIA, June 26, 2011: Over 10,000 warkaris from the southern states of Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu are attending the wari this year. Some have been a part of this centuries-old tradition of Maharashtra for the last several years by studying the works of Sant Tukaram and Sant Dnyaneshwar, and encouraging their friends and family to be…
Source PITTSBURGH PENNSYLVANIA, June 24, 2011: An arangetram is the solo debut of an Indian classical dancer. It is the culmination of years of study and a family gathering of such importance that hundreds often attend, including relatives from overseas. The dancing and preparation have become a way for parents and teachers to pass down culture and tradition, particularly in…
Source [HPI Notes: Oduvars are singers who offer songs of praise to the temple deity during ceremonies.] TIRUCHY, INDIA, June 20, 2011: “I am satisfied with being an oduvar in this temple and want to be the same until my death,” declares S Angayarkanni (29), a dalit, the only woman oduvar in Tamil Nadu. With her devotion to God and…
Source KALAKKAD, THIRUNELVELI, INDIA, July 7, 2011: The Sri Satya Vageeswarar temple has a wealth of inscriptions, sculptures, murals, music pillars and a towering rajagopuram with about 1,500 stucco figures. The temple has features that go back to the Chola period and so could be more than 800 years old. For its upcoming kumbabishekam later this month, the temple has…
Source INDIA, July 2011: A fierce debate brewed about what to do with billions of dollars worth of treasures in a popular 16th-century Hindu temple in southern India, even as the trove of newly revealed riches was growing. Inside the Sree Padmanabhaswamy Temple, investigators were counting the staggering hoard. But the legal position seems to be very clear on this…
Religion News Service UNITED STATES, June 2011: A UFO sect that believes human beings were created by extraterrestrials will host World Swastika Rehabilitation Day on Sunday (June 26) in an attempt to reclaim the swastika from the Nazis as an emblem of peace. Raelians, whose symbol consists of a swastika that intertwines with two overlapping triangles to form a star,…
Source BANGALORE, INDIA, July 4, 2011: Yoga is no longer a traditional fitness workout. The National Institute of Mental Health and Neuro-Sciences (Nimhans) not only has a 45-minute yoga package to treat psychiatric disorders like depression and schizophrenia, but has started comparing its curative effects with general medicine. Doctors at Nimhans say their studies reveal evidence of biological changes in…
Source LANHAM, MARYLAND, June 25, 2011: Sacred Spaces is a series on the Belief Blog. In this installment you are taken inside the Sri Siva Vishnu Temple near Washington, DC. On a cool spring evening just outside Washington, a steady stream of worshipers arrive at Sri Siva Vishnu Temple for prayers. The temple brings together the burgeoning Hindu population near…
Japan Making a Better Use of Ayurveda VARANASI, INDIA, July 2011: According to Dr. U.K. Krishna, who has been practicing and popularizing ayurveda in Japan for the past two decades, the country is already on its way to accept ayurveda, the traditional Indian medicine system, as holistic medicine system. “The past two decades have witnessed the spread of ayurveda from…
Source The son’s duty to his father is to make the world ask, “by what great austerities did he merit such a son?”— Tirukkural