Prayer

CINCINNATI - The Rev. Chris Beard is a theological conservative, make no mistake about it. He believes the Bible is the word of God. He believes the Holy Spirit speaks to him directly. He believes, as an article of faith, that abortion and same-sex marriage are wrong. Still, when a group of religious leaders in Ohio held two days of meetings in Cincinnati recently to talk about economic and racial justice, issues usually associated with the political left, there was Beard, a fourth-generation Pentecostal preacher with a disarming smile, a shaved head and a set of convictions that knock holes in the stereotypes about white evangelical Protestants.

CINCINNATI - The Rev. Chris Beard is a theological conservative, make no mistake about it. He believes the Bible is the word of God. He believes the Holy Spirit speaks to him directly. He believes, as an article of faith, that abortion and same-sex marriage are wrong. Still, when a group of religious leaders in Ohio held two days of meetings in Cincinnati recently to talk about economic and racial justice, issues usually associated with the political left, there was Beard, a fourth-generation Pentecostal preacher with a disarming smile, a shaved head and a set of convictions that knock holes in the stereotypes about white evangelical Protestants.

The call to prayer is a pervasive, comforting echo across the Middle East, but a prominent Islamic cleric has urged Muslims to spend less time prostrating and more time working. Sheik Yusuf Qaradawi said people often use prayer to slip away from their jobs longer than they should. "Praying is a good thing . . . 10 minutes should be enough," according to a fatwa, or edict, posted on Qaradawi's website. The sheik's opinion is shared by many clerics and highlights the predicament between economic productivity and religious devotion in a part of the world where piety is prized.

Televangelist Pat Robertson was making headlines Tuesday for two vastly different reasons. Reason No. 1: He wants to decriminalize marijuana. Reason No. 2: He says the tornadoes that have devastated parts of the Midwest could have been prevented if enough people had prayed. As a result, Robertson found himself in the unusual position of being both mocked and cheered in the online world at virtually the same time. Robertson made both comments during recent airings of his "700 Club.

A small wooden cabinet went up for auction on EBay. Inside were two locks of hair, one granite slab, one dried rosebud, one goblet, two wheat pennies, one candlestick and, allegedly, one "dibbuk," a kind of spirit popular in Yiddish folklore. The seller, a Missouri college student named Iosif Nietzke, described the container as a "haunted Jewish wine cabinet box" that had plagued several owners with rotten luck and a spate of bizarre paranormal stunts.

Saturday's baccalaureate at Duarte High School will be moved off campus so that for the first time in four years, graduating students can pray at the ceremony. School district officials announced the move Tuesday, a day after more than 150 students at the San Gabriel Valley high school walked out of classes, carrying signs that said, "No Prayer, No Class." The students returned to class after Duarte Unified School District Supt.

Backed by some of the most powerful members of the Senate, a little-noticed provision in the healthcare overhaul bill would require insurers to consider covering Christian Science prayer treatments as medical expenses. The provision was inserted by Sen. Orrin G. Hatch (R-Utah) with the support of Democratic Sens. John F. Kerry and the late Edward M. Kennedy -- both of Massachusetts, home to the headquarters of the Church of Christ, Scientist. The measure would put Christian Science prayer treatments -- which substitute or supplement medical treatments -- on the same footing as clinical medicine.

"Lost in the Taiga" is one of the most remarkable stories to emerge from the smoke and rubble of the former Soviet Union, a shining saga of survival in the Siberian wilderness that also serves as a kind of parable about the function of faith and tradition in the history and destiny of Russia. The story begins in 1978, when a party of Soviet geologists was surveying a remote stretch of wilderness by helicopter in search of iron ore deposits. To their astonishment, they observed a rough-hewn cabin and a cultivated garden in an otherwise pristine and wholly inaccessible portion of the vast coniferous forest known as the "taiga."

Given what President Bush is doing to the separation of church and state, a prayer is about all our Constitution is going to have left. GARY GARSHFIELD Irvine

Can prayer boost the odds of recovery from physical ailments? Studies on the question have yielded no clear-cut answers, although one well-known, 2006 study of people who prayed for others from long distances concluded that prayer had no effect on healing. A new study, however, found dramatic healing effects for people who were prayed over by someone in close physical proximity and who believed that this kind of prayer could heal them. This type of prayer, which often includes the healer laying hands on the patient, is practiced by some Pentecostal Christian groups.

A Rhode Island teen is learning that it pays to deny the existence of God: Prominent atheists plan to present Jessica Ahlquist with a scholarship of at least $44,000 -- and possibly more. It seems they were impressed with the way Ahlquist, 16, handled herself amid a roiling controversy that began in July 2010, when she complained about a prayer banner hanging in the auditorium at Cranston High School West that referred to "Our Heavenly Father. " School authorities brushed off her complaint, saying the banner was artistic and historic, as it had been hanging there for decades.

A decorated Marine who was fatally shot by an Orange County sheriff's deputy in a high school parking lot was described Thursday as a deeply religious man who regularly went to the campus track with his young daughters for early-morning prayer walks. Sgt. Manuel Loggins Jr. was shot to death during the predawn hours Tuesday under largely unexplained circumstances in a parking lot at San Clemente High School. Loggins' daughters, 9 and 14, were sitting nearby in the family SUV at the time of the shooting.

President Obama outlined a moral case for some of his economic policies on Thursday, saying that his religious values drive his decision to push for tougher regulation, economic equality and changes to the healthcare system. "We can't leave our values at the door," Obama told a group of lawmakers and other Washington figures at the annual National Prayer Breakfast in Washington. "If we leave our values at the door, we abandon much of the moral glue that has held our nation together for centuries and allowed us to become somewhat more perfect a union.

As Los Angeles County faces an influx of state prisoners and Sheriff Lee Baca grapples with scandals in his department, Gov. Jerry Brown made a show of support for the sheriff at a gathering of clergy in South Los Angeles on Saturday. Brown, a powerful ally of Baca's, is the first sitting governor to appear at his annual multi-faith prayer breakfast, now in its 11th year. At the gathering, Baca spoke in support of the governor's prison realignment plan and touted his own education programs in the jails, while Brown made a pitch for his proposed tax increase, which will go before voters in November.

Bill Maher's tweet mocking Denver Broncos quarterback Tim Tebow's faith might be rebounding. Although the "Real Time With Bill Maher" host would not be the first celebrity to poke fun at the outspokenly religious Tebow, his comment on Twitter after the Broncos lost to the Buffalo Bills this weekend -- "Wow, Jesus just f----- #TimTebow bad! And on Xmas Eve! Somewhere in hell Satan is tebowing, saying to Hitler 'Hey, Buffalo's killing them'" -- is gaining attention for perhaps being the crudest.

One thing I've always admired about Patti Smith is her refusal to be characterized. Rocker, poet, artist, mother: She seems to inhabit each of these roles almost effortlessly, moving among them as if the only difference was in our heads. And why not? For Smith, they all come out of the same impulse, a kind of ecstatic self-engagement, in which the line separating life and creativity, the mundane and the mystical, is an illusion, a border we create to bound ourselves. "Oh, God, I fell for you," she sings at the end of her 1979 song "Dancing Barefoot," and since the first time I ever played that record, I've heard this as a prayer, a benediction, as if it were God she had fallen for. Such a sensibility - fluid, visionary, risky - marks the 11 pieces in "Woolgathering" (New Directions: 80 pp., $18.95)

Bill Maher's tweet mocking Denver Broncos quarterback Tim Tebow's faith might be rebounding. Although the "Real Time With Bill Maher" host would not be the first celebrity to poke fun at the outspokenly religious Tebow, his comment on Twitter after the Broncos lost to the Buffalo Bills this weekend -- "Wow, Jesus just f----- #TimTebow bad! And on Xmas Eve! Somewhere in hell Satan is tebowing, saying to Hitler 'Hey, Buffalo's killing them'" -- is gaining attention for perhaps being the crudest.

Small cities in California are facing high unemployment, drained treasuries and now what some residents see as an assault on the only sacred moment in municipal affairs: the invocation at the start of city council meetings. Turlock, Tracy, Tehachapi, Lancaster -- all have been threatened in the last few months with lawsuits claiming that prayer at meetings breaches the wall between church and state. Nowhere has the ensuing debate played out more dramatically than in Lodi, where, after a tumultuous five-hour meeting this week, the City Council voted not only to continue invocations but also to allow phrases such as "in Jesus' name."

From San Diego -- The premise that a higher being doesn't really care about football games continued to be challenged Sunday. Tim Tebow won another one. He led the Denver Broncos to a tie in regulation and a win in overtime. We aren't sure whether he is magical or mystical. We don't know when, or if, he will start multiplying loaves and fishes. Right now, we just know he wins. This time, at the end of five quarters of National Football League action — well, that's too strong a word, but more on that later — it was the San Diego Chargers who had to genuflect before him. These days, when Tebow takes a knee, it isn't a football term.

Can you imagine Chris Berman's Thanksgiving plate? Must look like Google Earth photos of Zurich. Over here, mountains of potatoes; over there, fast-moving rivers of gravy bordered by big zeppelins of bread. All I can say is watch your cheesehead today. Berman's got a fork. Football crazed as we all are, is it no coincidence that the centerpiece of today's feast is shaped like a down lineman in a four-point stance? Look at that giant bird, down on its haunches, awaiting the snap. The Steelers' Casey "Big Snack" Hampton comes to mind, and certainly the Packers' B.J. "The Freezer" Raji.