**Agreed**...thank you Mr. Meacham.

Quoted: The founders wanted faith to be one thread in the country’s tapestry, not the whole tapestry.

Quoted: The Indian government withdraws a report questioning the existence of Hindu god Ram.

Quoted: Afghans accuse US troops of insulting Islam after footballs bearing the name of Allah are handed out.

Don't Afghanis have better things to do with their time than fret over a football? I don't cry everytime Lord Krishna is painted on a lunch box and used as a commercial product.

Quoted: Her secret letters show that she spent almost 50 years without sensing the presence of God in her life. What does her experience teach us about the value of doubt?

Wow, I had no idea Mother Teresa experienced so much personal turmoil. I wonder why she decided to continue the work that she did til her dying days.

Quoted: The BBC's Soutik Biswas examines the plight of Indian Muslims as the country marks 60 years of independence.

this quite true and i like that the article doesn't hold back criticism of the Indian government's poor attempts to provide equality to its largest minority group. I find it intriguing that Indian Muslims in South India are actually better off in a socio-economic sense, considering South India traditionally is home to more orthodox Hindus. So what's going wrong in North India? Of course if you look at the overall socio-economic backgrounds of some of the states mentioned, Bihar, Gujrat, etc...they have traditionally been on the poorer end.

Quoted: Rowling's work is so familiar that we've forgotten how radical it really is. Look at her literary forebears. In The Lord of the Rings, J.R.R. Tolkien fused his ardent Catholicism with a deep, nostalgic love for the unspoiled English landscape. C.S. Lewis was a devout Anglican whose Chronicles of Narnia forms an extended argument for Christian faith. Now look at Rowling's books. What's missing? If you want to know who dies in Harry Potter, the answer is easy: God.

interesting reflection on religion in Harry Potter...but is leaving out the "sacred" and re-enforcing the idea of "love" necessarily a bad thing, especially considering the youth who are engaged by these novels? if Rowling did indeed leave out God, what about Sirius, Harry's Godfather?

Quoted: Dangerous tensions in Punjab

Quoted: Female genital mutilation, commonly associated with parts of Africa and the Middle East, is becoming a growing problem in Britain despite authorities' efforts to stamp it out.

this is a major problem in many African countries. I remember when I traveled to Kenya, these young girls were telling us of their experiences, and it was painful to hear of such atrocity. I can't believe that people would bring these practices to foreign lands.

Quoted: Why not teach all religions at school? To help out with this dilemma, we present a list of those Creation Myths that helped define civilizations both past and present.

this is really cool--it goes through a bunch of world religions (some of them i had never heard of til now) and shows how each religion believes mankind was created! it's crazy how many of them have so much in common, even though they were created in different times, often far away from each other.