Ron Csillag
Ron Csillag is an author at Religion News Service.
All Stories by Ron Csillag
Arctic Christians get first complete Inuit Bible
By Ron Csillag — May 3, 2012
TORONTO (RNS) Later this spring, an entire Bible in Inuktitut, the language of Inuit people and the most widely spoken aboriginal tongue in Canada's Arctic, will be dedicated at an igloo-shaped church in Nunavut, an autonomous region carved out of the Northwest Territories in 1999. By Ron Csillag.
Group says ‘Titanic’ film gets ‘women and children first’ doctrine all wrong
By Ron Csillag — April 13, 2012
(RNS/ENInews) A Texas-based Christian ministry says James Cameron's 1997 film still delivers a decidedly un-Christian message: That "class warfare" aboard the doomed Titanic resulted in the disproportionate deaths of poor, female and young passengers. By Ron Csillag.
Maybe Indiana Jones should have looked in Ethiopia …
By Ron Csillag — July 2, 2008
c. 2008 Religion News Service AXUM, Ethiopia _ “And they shall make an ark of acacia wood; two and a half cubits shall be its length, a cubit and a half its width, and a cubit and a half its height.” Such was God’s commandment to Moses in the book of Exodus after delivering the […]
Canada apologizes for abuse at church-run schools
By Ron Csillag — June 12, 2008
c. 2008 Religion News Service TORONTO _ For the second time in a decade, the Canadian government has apologized to the country’s aboriginal peoples for the its role in abuse at church-run residential schools. In a 10-minute address to Parliament on Wednesday (June 11), Prime Minister Stephen Harper issued an historic apology for the mistreatment […]
Ontario wrestles with place of the Lord’s Prayer
By Ron Csillag — March 20, 2008
c. 2008 Religion News Service TORONTO _ The premier of Ontario has dropped a political hot potato with his recent announcement that the daily recitation of the Lord’s Prayer in the provincial legislature should be dropped. “It’s time for us to ensure that we have a prayer that better reflects our diversity,” Dalton McGuinty, a […]
10 Minutes with … Jody Myers
By Ron Csillag — December 20, 2007
c. 2007 Religion News Service (UNDATED) The international Kabbalah Centre has drawn high-profile praise and ire. Pop stars like Madonna have darkened the center’s doors in Los Angeles, but some traditional Jews say the center peddles New Age snake oil. “Kabbalah and the Spiritual Quest,” by Jody Myers, a professor of religion at California State […]
10 Minutes With … Yvonne Ridley
By Ron Csillag — October 4, 2007
c. 2007 Religion News Service TORONTO _ Just 17 days after the 9/11 attacks, British journalist Yvonne Ridley was captured by the Taliban in Afghanistan while covering the war on terror for the Sunday Express. She spent 10 days in captivity, and was released after promising her captors that she would read the Quran. Now […]
10 Minutes With … Stephan Jones
By Ron Csillag — March 15, 2007
c. 2007 Religion News Service TORONTO _ Experts are still picking over the events of Nov. 18, 1978, when more than 900 members of the People’s Temple _ nearly 300 of them children _ died in the jungles of Guyana on orders of their charismatic, messianic, drug-addled leader, Jim Jones. Jonestown disintegrated when U.S. Rep. […]
10 Minutes With … Chris Hedges
By Ron Csillag — February 15, 2007
c. 2007 Religion News Service TORONTO _ A hard-core minority of evangelicals is actively working to create an American theocracy and to eliminate non-believers. Mainstream Christians _ even some evangelicals _ governments and the media stand by and watch in the name of tolerance. So says Chris Hedges, a former New York Times correspondent, who […]
10 Minutes With … Karen Armstrong
By Ron Csillag — September 14, 2006
c. 2006 Religion News Service MONTREAL _ For years, she was tagged the “runaway nun,” the rebellious ex-Catholic with outspoken ideas about religion _ comparing, for example, Pope John Paul II to a Muslim fundamentalist. Karen Armstrong’s first book, “Through the Narrow Gate,” described her seven years as a nun in a Roman Catholic order, […]
10 Minutes With … Karen Armstrong
By Ron Csillag — September 14, 2006
c. 2006 Religion News Service MONTREAL _ For years, she was tagged the “runaway nun,” the rebellious ex-Catholic with outspoken ideas about religion _ comparing, for example, Pope John Paul II to a Muslim fundamentalist. Karen Armstrong’s first book, “Through the Narrow Gate,” described her seven years as a nun in a Roman Catholic order, […]
NEWS DIGEST: Religion in Canada
By Ron Csillag — September 16, 2004
c. 2004 Religion News Service Studies Show Contrasting Portraits of Canada’s Religiosity OTTAWA (RNS) Two new studies show vastly divergent views of Canadians’ religious faith. A September survey published by the Centre for Research and Information on Canada shows that the nation is among the world’s most secular countries, with only 29 percent of Canadians […]
NEWS DIGEST: Religion in Canada
By Ron Csillag — September 2, 2004
c. 2004 Religion News Service Muslims Divided Over Sharia Tribunals TORONTO (RNS) A prominent Muslim organization is opposing the establishment of private judicial tribunals in Ontario that would allow Muslims to settle disputes according to Islamic sharia law. Tarek Fatah of the Muslim Canadian Congress said the use of sharia to settle legal matters is […]
NEWS DIGEST: Religion in Canada
By Ron Csillag — August 19, 2004
c. 2004 Religion News Service Fix System, Not Sanctuary, Church Leaders Urge TORONTO (RNS) Canadian church leaders have condemned remarks of federal immigration and citizenship minister Judy Sgro, who earlier this summer called on churches to abandon the time-honored practice of providing sanctuary to people under the threat of deportation. In the wake of several […]
Religion in Canada
By Ron Csillag — July 15, 2004
c. 2004 Religion News Service Jews May Erect Sukkahs on Condo Balconies, Court Rules OTTAWA (RNS) Freedom of religion includes the right of Orthodox Jews to erect religious ceremonial huts on the balconies of their condominiums even if the structures violate ownership agreements, the Supreme Court of Canada ruled late last month. In a 5-4 […]
