Questions tagged [religion]
Use this tag for questions about religious practices. Do not ask questions about religious beliefs, though. Those are off-topic and there is no tag to use.
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Are all citizens of Saudi Arabia "considered Muslims by the state"?
According to a May 5, 2024 article in Zawia3, a somewhat polemic Egyptian political news source, 2024 source:
accurately determining the religious population composition in Saudi Arabia is ...
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Do people have visions of religious figures from other religions (outside of Jesus)?
New Testament scholars Bart Ehrman and Justin Bass had a debate about the historicity of Jesus. At the 1:09:02 mark Justin Bass makes a claim:
Justin Bass: People, of their own religions, do have ...
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Are the mathematical constants e and π encoded in the Bible?
Some numerologists claim that the mathematical constants e and π are encoded in the Bible via gematria.
For example, blogger Joe Vasta argues that Genesis 1:1 encodes 3.141554508×1017.
The value of π ...
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Is there any explanation for a near-death experience?
One idea I used to hear a lot about was that when people are near-death and saved by medical science that they sometimes see "a light at the end of a tunnel" in a vision.
Today I read about an ...
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Is the pope's headgear adopted directly from a Mesopotamian hat, symbol of worshipping Dagon, as seen in his fish mouth looking mitre?
The Roman bishop of the Catholic church is often wearing a mitre. Countless sites, 'that really know the hidden truth and tell it', make the connection of 'fish mouth' and 'Dagon priest', claiming ...
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Did James Madison say or write that the 10 Commandments are critical to the US nation?
Louisiana (the US state) recently passed a law requiring the biblical Ten Commandments be posted in every single classroom that is part of a school that receives public funding, including universities....
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Is the Greek Orthodox church worth 700 billion Euros?
This Wikipedia list puts the Greek Orthodox church's net worth at 700B Euros in 2011 (about 974B USD), above any branch of the Catholic church or other religion. Its source is France 24, but I am not ...
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Can science explain the anomalous properties of water?
According to proponents of the so-called Intelligent Design (for example, here, here, and here), the unique properties of water that allow for the existence of life cannot be explained by science and ...
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Was there an eclipse when Jesus was crucified?
I've heard it claimed from various people that we have historical records for the darkness that was said to engulf the earth when Jesus was crucified. In the bible, it claims that there was, but I ...
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Do Russian forces now have an official religious prayer to protect against "Devil's Drones"?
It's been shown in some Ukrainian videos [NSFW!] and also claimed on Twitter (quoting the latter) that:
Russian forces now have an official religious prayer to Saint Barbara (who is revered in ...
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Were the Ten Commandments taken from the Egyptian Book of the Dead?
This meme image from Pinterest suggests the Old Testament's Ten Commandments were derived from the Egyptian Book of the Dead.
Does this sound familiar?
Do not curse god
Do not scorn god
Do not ...
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Do 75% of new Muslim converts in the US leave Islam within a few years?
From the Islam-critical site WikiIslam:
However, most individuals who convert rarely choose to study Islam objectively before making such an important decision. Instead they choose to be taken in by ...
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Is this the Oath to become a Master Mason?
In Freemasonry, the third degree that one may obtain is called Master Mason. I found a book claiming to contain the rituals and oath that the Mason has to perform. The book is called "Duncan's ...
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Was Jaco van der Westhuyzen's knee faith-healed by TB Joshua?
Reading in the South Africa newspapers about the awful church building collapse of the popular prophet T. B. Joshua in Nigeria lead me to the claims of Jaco van der Westhuyzen regarding T. B. Joshua's ...
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Did a Father save his son after digging for 38 hours after the Armenian earthquake?
There's an inspirational story that is very popular on God based websites. Here is the version I am familiar with that was forwarded to me on Whatsapp many times before Yom Kippur:
This story is true ...
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Is "Behind The Veil" an accurate representation of secret Mormon rituals?
In the hidden-camera clip Behind The Veil: Never-Before-Seen Footage of Secret Mormon Temple Rituals we supposedly see never-before-seen footage of secret Mormon Temple rituals.
A longer version of ...
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Did the body of Saint Bernadette remain intact after 50 years, despite the conditions it was in?
According to this 2019 article in the National Catholic Register, The Marvelous Preservation of St. Bernadette, the body of Saint Bernadette had limited decay, despite:
given the close examinations, ...
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Did Bertrand Russell say, "Religion is something left over from the infancy of our intelligence, ..."?
Religion is something left over from the infancy of our intelligence,
it will fade away as we adopt reason and science as our guidelines.
—Bertrand Russell
Many books and websites attribute this ...
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Did Pope John Paul II perform a miracle?
The catholic church has very recently beatified late Pope John Paul II. As one of the requirements for this, the church required at least one miracle attributed to the candidate. In this case, a nun ...
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Did Yitzhak Kaduri leave a note implying the Jewish Messiah is named Yehoshua?
Yitzhak Kaduri was a renown rabbi who died in 2006.
As explained in the above Wikipedia page, there are claims that he left a note to be opened after his death. The note, when decoded as an acrostic, ...
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Are people receiving spontaneous gold dental prostheses without dentist intervention?
Claims of unexpected and spontaneous fillings or full restorations of teeth with gold are not unheard of in many faith healing services and other religious gatherings. For example, in a video recorded ...
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Do we lose 7 pounds when we die?
I often hear people claim that it is a fact that humans lose seven pounds when they die. Some people believe that this is 'proof' of the existence of the 'soul'. Is there any truth to this claim? I ...
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Have 25% of all Christian Ex-Muslim converts received dreams or visions as a major factor in their conversion?
In an 2009 article, Why do Muslims come to Christ? Five case studies that underline the key factors as Living God in Christ, the living Word, and the living Body of Christ. by Salaam Corniche, there ...
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Did any satanic cult ever commit organised ritual murders or sacrifices?
In Manhattan Beach, CA in 1983 members of the McMartin family were accused of a variety of abuse charges against the children in their care.
It was reported that the children:
"were victimized ...
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Was the 1755 Cape Ann earthquake widely ascribed to Benjamin Franklin’s lightning rod?
Andrew Dickinson White’s book “A History of the Warfare of Science with Theology in Christendom” contains the following anecdote
In America the earthquake of 1755 was widely ascribed, especially in ...
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Did a Jewish rabbi precisely calculate the duration of the full moon cycle 1800 years ago?
Attempting to prove to me that Judaism is the only true religion, a friend of mine read to me from a book titled, The Coming Revolution, that the Zohar (a 2nd/3rd century CE commentary on the Torah ...
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Noah's Ark found in Turkey [duplicate]
Claim: The site designated by the Turkish government in Ararat is the actual Noah's Ark from the bible.
I recently viewed a documentary about how Noah's Ark was discovered in Turkey in the 60's ...
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Is this picture and voice recording of Daniel Radcliffe speaking Hebrew authentic?
This 2010 YouTube video purports to show a picture of actor Daniel Radcliffe wearing tefillin and speaking on Israeli radio about it in Hebrew.
This picture has been picked up on a number of not-so-...
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Does the practice known as MBP cause HSV-1 in infants?
To introduce this question, there is an ongoing lawsuit
in NYC about the religous practice of "metzitzah b’peh".
From the city's info page about it:
Health Department investigations of newborns ...
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Did St. Patrick rid Ireland of druids and other pagans?
I've read that the common story about St. Patrick ridding Ireland of "snakes" is actually a reference to ridding Ireland of druids and other pagans. Some sources say that he accomplished this through ...
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Does this medical study prove that wearing gold is harmful? [closed]
So I have this article that was sent to me by a friend of mine and it pertains to a ruling in the Quran (that declares that silk and gold are forbidden for men to wear). So the article claims that ...
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Has the Catholic Church ever retracted an "ex cathedra" statement?
Question: Has the Catholic Church ever made a proclamation ex cathedra (as in, one which it declares is infallible) that it later retracted?
This could literally be any form of the following:
Some ...
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Was the character of Lilith written out of the Bible?
I came across Lilith in the graphic novel Lucifer, but it seems she is mentioned in Jewish mythology Babylonian Talmud among other texts.
The story goes
Lillith was in the original creational
...
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Did Uganda's president Yoweri Museveni hand the national flag to intercessors in 1997 in the midst of a Christian revival?
World Trumpet Mission, an international revivalist ministry founded in 1988 in the Republic of Uganda by John Mulinde, presents the following historical timeline on their website (emphasis mine):
In ...
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Is the Bible (Christian and Hebrew) the first one to suggest that the Earth is a sphere?
This website claims that the bible is the first to suggest that earth is a sphere way before the Greeks.
A literal translation of Job 26:10 is “He described a circle upon the
face of the waters, ...
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Did China destroy a Guanyin statue in Hebei province?
From Mongolia live:
It was not the Taliban who exploded the stone carvings, but the Chinese Communist Party
A 57.9-meter-tall cliff stone-carved vertical Guanyin statue in Pingshan County, ...
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Was Alberto Rivera formerly a Jesuit priest?
"Chick tracts" are a series of comic books by cartoonist Jack Chick. The publisher estimates that is has printed over 800 million tracts since its founding.
An issue in this series from 1981,...
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Do dramatic cases of body shaking and trembling in religious settings have supernatural causes? [closed]
There are many examples of people experiencing dramatic body shaking and trembling in religious settings, such as the ones below:
Example 1
Example 2
Example 3
Example 4
Example 5
Example 6
Example 7
...
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Muslim couple provocatively pictured on beach — true holiday photo or fake (i.e. staged/set up)? [closed]
Recently I found a very provocative picture circulating in anti-Islam communities. It shows a presumably Muslim man, who is wearing a very small bathing suit and is standing next to a fully clothed ...
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Was Pierre Teilhard de Chardin a defender of eugenics? [closed]
Pierre Teilhard de Chardin was a French philosopher and Jesuit Catholic priest who was mentioned in the Royal Wedding of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle.
Dangerous Tendencies of Cosmic Theology: The ...
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Do church congregations attract sex offenders?
On page 34 of their 2008 report Licensed to Hug: How Child Protection Policies Are Poisoning the Relationship Between the Generations and Damaging the Voluntary Sector, authors Frank Furedi & ...
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Is "Islamic fasting" healthy?
I live in a mostly Muslim country (Morocco). Now we are in the month of Ramadan.
First, I had to define Ramadan:
Is 30 days (or 29) where practicing Muslims can neither eat or drink or having sex, ...
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Could the Ark of the Covenant have killed by acting as a capacitor?
In the biblical account of Uzzah, he touches the Ark of the Covenant on the road from Gibeah to Jerusalem; this irks the god of Israel, who knocks him out on the spot.
A 2014 Gizmodo article quotes ...
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Must churchgoers be registered with the government in Kansas City?
According to this article and to this Reddit thread, linking the article in fact:
Kansas City, Missouri, officials are now requiring every church to submit a list of members and attendees along ...
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Is the story of a divine miracle at Mt. Sinai, witnessed by a national audience, unique among cultures or religions?
There is a claim, made by Rabbi Lawrence Kelemen in his books (such as Permission to Receive) and lectures (such as this "The Veracity of Torah" lecture on TorahCafé), that the story of a divine ...
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Did Ohio pass a law granting students the right to give scientifically wrong answers consistent with their religious beliefs?
The Patheos blog and WKRC local12 report:
The Ohio House on Wednesday passed the "Student Religious Liberties Act." Under the law, students can't be penalized if their work is scientifically wrong ...
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Was Tulsi Gabbard in a "cult"?
As late as 2015, Tulsi Gabbard considered Chris Butler (Siddhaswarupananda Paramahamsa) to be her guru. Numerous people claim that Butler's group is a cult, while others say it isn't.
Does the ...
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Was Sun's distance mentioned correctly in "Hanuman Chalisa", the 16 th century poem?
I found many sites stating that the Sun's distance was mentioned accurately in the "Hanuman Chalisa" hymn written in the 16th century.
Even Wikipedia has a mention of this.
juga sahasra jojana ...
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Did the Miracle of Lanciano turn bread and wine into flesh and blood?
The story of the Miracle of Lanciano is that, in 700 AD, a monk in Lanciano reported that:
During the Mass, when he said the Words of Consecration [...], with doubt in his soul, the priest saw the ...
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Is this cow urine study published in NCBI valid? [duplicate]
The cow is regarded as a sacred animal in Hinduism, and as expected, there are a lot of people in India (including very prominent religious leaders and politicians) who want to show that even its ...
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