Source: www.laprovincia.es CANARY ISLANDS, June 30, 2009: At the end of June, fifty members of the Hindu community of Spain’s Canary Islands ceremoniously handed over 7,000 kilos of food to the Catholic diocese of the Virgin del Pino, patroness of the Canary Islands, to be distributed to the needy. The country is mostly Catholic, and Hindus are willing to help…
Source: timesofindia.indiatimes.com INDIA, July 24, 2009: Modern science has substantiated the extraordinary healing power of turmeric. A team of scientists led by Ayyalusamy Ramamoorthy , an IIT Kanpur alumnus and a professor of chemistry and biophysics at the University of Michigan, has deciphered the exact functioning of curcumin, a major ingredient of turmeric powder, in curing wounds, infections and other…
Source: news.bbc.co.uk INDIA, July 26, 2009: Environmental campaigner Bianca Jagger has called on the Church of England to rethink its investment policy. At issue is the Church’s $4.1m investment in a company which intends to mine a mountain in India that is considered sacred by the tribe that lives there. “I appeal to the Church of England to realize that…
Source: www.hinduismtoday.com Religious worship is not directed to images in themselves, considered as mere things, but under their distinctive aspect as images leading us on to God incarnate. The movement toward the image does not terminate in it as image, but tends toward that whose image it is. Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274), Catholic philosopher, theologian
Source: www.nytimes.com MUMBAI, INDIA, July 20, 2009: Like many Indians who came of age in the 1980s, Samir Patil grew up on the comic books published by Amar Chitra Katha. Made up of Indian-style religious parables and biographies of historical figures, they taught him about the great, and lesser-known, stories of India in a didactic format meant for young audiences.…
Source: news.bbc.co.uk BALI, July 26, 2009: Balinese food is exquisite. It is a blessing to be shared with the Gods, and never taken for granted. All over the island, even on taxicab dashboards, one sees little woven baskets called banten jotan containing tiny colorful offerings of rice, fruit and flowers to the Gods. Ritual worship interwoven with daily life is…
Source: www.mywtxchatter.com MIDLAND, TEXAS, USA, July 26, 2009: “If your parents ever advised you to avoid conversations about religion and politics, well, I hope you didn’t listen to them” is what a witty advertisement for the My West Texas, a newspaper, says. Intent on engaging the diverse local community, it created a religion page on its website to ” give…
Source: www.hinduismtoday.com What I feel right now is just bliss. Daily life tires the soul as well as the body. This one day, this one bath, is like a new birth for my soul. Vivek Ananda Shastri, 28, teacher, after bathing at the January 2001 Kumbha Mela
Source: http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/msid-4804229,prtpage-1.cms NEW DELHI, INDIA, July 21, 2009: The Supreme Court on Tuesday frowned upon the imposition of the native mother tongue as a compulsory medium of instruction in educational institutions, which is happening in many states. It warned that the change could go against the interests of students struggling in the present competitive world dominated by English language. A…
Source: HPI KAUAI, HAWAII, July 26, 2009: Hinduism Today is trying to find out how many Hindu temples are under government administration in each state of India. We know for Tamil Nadu that 38,465 temples (including 17 Jain temples), 56 mutts (ashrams) and other endowments are under the administration of the Hindu Religious and Charitable Endowment Board. Altogether 478,000 acres…