miracles

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Entering year 35 with 'On Religion' -- Demons, martyrs, violence, miracles in Colombia

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Entering year 35 with 'On Religion' -- Demons, martyrs, violence, miracles in Colombia

In one of her first encounters with violence linked to the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), Deann Alford heard, or felt, a bullet pass and slam into a door frame, with shrapnel striking a nearby woman and child.

The future journalist was both shocked and inspired by her contacts with Christians caught in that land's toxic climate of paramilitary warfare, narcotrafficking and kidnappings. She struggled to grasp how someone like pilot Russell Martin Stendal, after years held for ransom, could forgive his kidnappers and then start a missionary effort to convert them.

"Without his months as their hostage, I'm convinced he never could have reached the FARC," wrote Alford, in "Victorious: The Impossible Path to Peace," her blunt memoir about religious freedom in Colombia.

Stendal, she added, "has forgiven all. But I have not. ... In my quarter-century as a journalist, I've written dozens of articles about Colombian guerrilla groups' crimes against Christians, ranging from extortion to murder. Many of these stories regard crimes of the FARC, typically threatening and abducting church workers, missionaries and pastors, extorting them with offers they could not refuse."

Eventually, Alford realized that it wasn't enough to cover Colombia with telephone calls, faxes and Internet connections. She would have to put "boots on the ground" and return. "But I didn't. I was afraid. No, that word is too mild. I was terrified. I let the risk of being killed and kidnapped keep me away."

Alford's bottom line: "I told the Lord I would go anywhere for him but Colombia."

But she returned and, over years of contacts, her fears mixed with frustration. After working in secular newsrooms, as well as Christian publications and wire services, she couldn't understand why more people -- journalists and religious leaders -- could not see the importance of the faith stories unfolding, decade after decade, in Colombia.

This is another example of an important theme woven into my work with this "On Religion" column, with this week marking the start of my 35th year. Simply stated, many journalists do not "get" religion, in terms of grasping the role faith plays in many important events and trends stories.

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A lingering Theophany mystery: The 'holy water flowers' that refused to fade

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A lingering Theophany mystery: The 'holy water flowers' that refused to fade

After the Christmas season and before Lent, Orthodox priests have -- for centuries -- rushed to visit church-members' homes to bless them with prayers and splashes of holy water flung about with a foot-long brush or handfuls of basil.

Droplets of blessed water end up on beds and bookshelves, TVs and toys, potted plants and paintings, along with everything else.

"It's a chance to start over," said Father John Karcher of St. Nicholas Orthodox Church in Portland, Oregon. "We clean out the cobwebs of sin. … Then we make mistakes and muck it all up again. But we do this every year because God doesn't give up on us."

These rites flow out of the Feast of Theophany, which many Orthodox churches in America celebrate on January 6, or on January 19th for those using the ancient Julian calendar year-round. In addition to house blessings and liturgies, Orthodox clergy bless bodies of water -- rivers, lakes and oceans. In some parts of the world this requires man-sized holes cut into ice.

The feast's central message, said Karcher, is that "when Christ was baptized, he went into the waters and the waters didn't cleanse him -- it was the other way around. He blessed the waters and through them all of creation. … It's a beautiful thing. God responds to our prayers that he sanctifies the waters -- again."

In one rite, priests pray that the blessed water will provide "a fountain of incorruption, a gift of sanctification, a loosing of sins, a healing of sicknesses, a destruction of demons" so that worshippers will experience "the cleansing of souls and bodies, for the healing of sufferings, for the sanctification of homes and for every useful purpose."

The mysterious nature of these rites hit home a decade ago when Karcher led St. Innocent Orthodox Church in the Bay Area in northern California.

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Dick Cavett, Eric Metaxas talk miracles on Manhattan's Upper West Side

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Long ago, back in Sunday school in Nebraska, something happened that changed how television talk legend Dick Cavett would think about faith forever.

When he was a boy, his mother got breast cancer. Then a "seemingly helpful old lady said, 'Dickey, if you pray your mother will get well,' and," he said with a long pause, "she didn't."

This anecdote was highly relevant, during a recent New York City forum, because Cavett was interviewing author Eric Metaxas about his new book, "Miracles: What They Are, Why They Happen, and How They Can Change Your Life."

In other words, young Cavett prayed for a miracle, it didn't happen and that certainly did shape his life.

"That didn't help either my attitude toward religion or helpful old ladies," he said, drawing sad laughter from the live audience during this "Socrates In The City" webcast. "I felt that I did it wrong, of course. I didn't do it right and I was partly responsible."

Metaxas, founder of the "Socrates" series, added: "Is this old lady still alive? Because I would like to give her a piece of my mind."