"Once you have empowered a disabled person artistically, you have in fact empowered a disabled person,” says this Georgetown University chaplain who ministers to wounded combat veterans and amputees through the theater.

As Hanukkah, the Festival of Lights, is celebrated, watch this wildly popular singer talk about spiritual searching, Jewish mysticism, and why "my life is not separate from my music."

Light, says the reggae-loving rocker, "is really a central theme in my music in general, in the story of Hanukkah, and in the spiritual process in general."

Those who feel lonely and sad at this time of year may also feel "that grief is permanent and hope is fleeting," says the University of Richmond's associate chaplain, Kate O'Dwyer-Randall, "but it’s actually the other way around."

"It is much easier for God to get through our defenses when we're in a wilderness," says John Lionberger. He leads kayak and canoe trips that he says "get to the transcendent through the physical."

Listen to this week's show.

Go behind the scenes at Washington National Cathedral and watch the Cathedral Choir prepare for a recent performance of Handel's "Messiah."

The head of the Episcopal Diocese of Los Angeles says leadership in his church is open to all, including gays and lesbians.

Watch John Carlson, associate director of Arizona State University's Center for the Study of Religion and Conflict, talk about President Obama's Afghanistan speech and the ethical implications of a new Afghanistan strategy.

In judging the conduct of the war in Afghanistan "one has to constantly analyze the probability of success," says scholar John Carlson, whose field is religion, ethics, and public life.