Revisit our November 2007 Web-only essay on the spiritual and moral pain of war. "My sense is that this is a fundamentally religious issue," says clinical psychiatrist Jonathan Shay, a combat trauma expert.

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A recent expansion of the federal hate crimes law "does not suspend the First Amendment," says New York Times staff writer David Kirkpatrick, "and there's nobody, I think, on either side of the US Senate or House of Representatives that intends to see preachers locked in jail."

Germany has twice as many mosques as the United States, but it still has a long way to go to provide equal opportunities for Muslim immigrants and their children.

There will always be a purpose to monastic life, say the sisters of Mount St. Scholastica, as long as there is a need in the world for silence, prayer, simplicity, and balance.

"Is there anyone here who yearns for life and desires to see good days?" Those stirring words come at the beginning of one of the most durable spiritual guides of all time, the Rule of St. Benedict.

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Watch National Catholic Reporter senior correspondent John L. Allen Jr. and Religion & Ethics NewsWeekly managing editor Kim Lawton discuss the Roman Catholic Church's plan to absorb unhappy Anglicans wishing to become Catholics.

Doctors who pray with patients and family members "puts a sense of comfort in you," says Chris Barkley. "Normally, doctors don't do that, and it probably makes people feel closer to the doctor. You want them to care just as much as you do."

She started a support group for women with emotional problems and histories of sexual abuse, and she wants to earn degrees in social work and theological studies to help others like them.