godlatest news & developments
Dysfunctional: Infrastrccture failure and lack of repair and upgrade, seen on a road at a taxi rank in Emfuleni. The muicipality is in a complete state of failure. Photo: Delwyn Verasamy

Only God can save municipalities as collapse deepens

With only 16% of municipalities passing audits, South Africans face failing water systems, roads and governance. The coming elections test not only politics but morality, highlighting a growing call for divine restoration

  • Library
5 min read
Faith: Chairperson of the Cultural, Religious and Linguistic Rights Commission, Thoko Mkhwanazi-Xaluva. Photo: Supplied

The church must grow up 

Christians being treated as cows to be milked is not an insult. It is an observation. The monetisation of fear, blessing, prophecy, oil, water, soil and access has turned pulpits into kiosks

  • Library
4 min read
At the crack of dawn ardent believers hit the tarmac and, about halfway, the pain diminishes and enlightenment takes hold. (File photo)

The God Edition | The runner’s high is the smug hill on which I’ll die

We runners, like good churchgoers, are a community, we follow rituals, we try to convert everyone and, best of all, we finally enter the zone

  • Des Erasmus
5 min read
Then Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa and Professor Lee Berger hold a replica of the skull of a Homo naledi during the unveiling of the discovery. (File photo)

The God Edition | Searching among the bones for Homo naledi’s soul

Drew Forrest uses one of South Africa’s most important hominid discoveries to debate the paradoxes and contradictions inherent in the religious doctrine of ‘ensoulment’

  • Des Erasmus
6 min read

The God Edition | Secularism is the bridge to harmony and democracy

Religious organisations, political leaders and citizens all have a role to play in defending the principle of secularism

  • Umamah Bakharia
4 min read
Gathering in harmony: Young women of the Evangelical Presbyterian Church in South Africa’s Sedibeng Youth Choir get together for church practice.

Finding home in clap and tap music

Clap and tap music offers a welcoming sanctuary for individuals navigating the complexities of faith and spirituality

  • Eyaaz
3 min read
Neverending fight: Albert Camus, author of La Peste, uses a plague to explore humanity and belief in God in fighting a catastrophe. Another layer of meaning may be the plague is a symbol of Nazi Germany’s occupation of France in World War II. Photo: Keystone-France/Gamma-Rapho/Getty Images

‘Salvation is too big a word for me’

Drew Forrest examines the battle between dogmatic faith and practical humanism in French master Albert Camus’ finest novel, ‘The Plague’

  • Eyaaz
6 min read
Shot to hell: An unknown artist, c 1840, depicts hell in the painting Purgatory as a place of eternal torture. Photo: Heritage Art/Heritage Images/Getty Images

God edition: Why I reject the hellfire doctrine

Does a God of love really torment people’s souls for all eternity in a place of flames?

  • Umamah Bakharia
6 min read
Sign of the times: Political leaders sometimes inspire fanatical devotion. Former president Jacob Zuma at the St John Apostolic Church in Johannesburg is flanked by Reverend John Molefe Moloi and Archbishop Daniel Mathe. (Lucky Morajane/Gallo Images)

The fallacy of politicians as saviours

They are as weak and flawed as the rest of us, so why do so many look to them for salvation, asks Des Erasmus

  • Des Erasmus
6 min read
Faith-baiting: Flowers are laid to respect the victims of the Crocus City Hall terrorist attack in Krasnoyarsk, Russia, for which Isis has claimed responsibility. Photo: Contributor/Getty Images

Let’s make a worthy God in our own image

If we make God in our image, let it not be the genocidal maniac worthy only of contempt but rather a God of kindness, worthy of our worship

  • Douglas White
4 min read
Two by two: A 17th-century print shows Noah, his family, the animals and birds enter the ark. Did Adam and Eve’s serpent (or its descendants) slither on too? Photo: Universal History Archive/Universal Images Group/Getty Images

God edition: Religion’s hard to believe in, I swear

But the full range of words linked to religion and godly figures have vastly improved our ability to express surprise, anger, shock and even hatred

  • Umamah Bakharia
7 min read
Suffering: Iman al-Masri, a displaced Palestinian, gave birth to quadruplets in a shelter at a school in the Gaza Strip on 25 December. Photo: Majdi Fathi/Getty Images

The vulnerable experience of childbirth during war

When Hamas attacked Israel from the Gaza Strip on 7 October, I was nine months pregnant … what if I had been there?

  • Umamah Bakharia
4 min read
Pregnant with meaning: Pontsho Pilane’s memoir Power and Faith: How Evangelical Churches Are Quietly Shaping Our Democracy explores the churches and how their beliefs affect everyday lives. Photo: Stephane de Sakutin/AFP

Should we ‘be fruitful and multiply’?

This edited extract from Power and Faith by Ponthso Pilane explores the issues of religion, pregnancy and abortion

  • Eyaaz
9 min read
A huge crowd of South Africans celebrates the victory of Nelson Mandela in the 1994 Presidential election. (Photo by David Turnley/Corbis/VCG via Getty Images)

Faith helped build a free South Africa

Liberation theology helped shape the political discourse in our country, not only during apartheid but also in South Africa’s transition to democracy, writes Shipokosa Paulus Mashatile

  • Eyaaz
4 min read
Footloose: Whether it’s whirling dervishes or stadiums filled with people dancing to their favourite bands, movement is joyful medicine . Photo: Mireya Acierto/Getty Images

Lose yourself in dance and music to heal

People often rely on antidepressant medicine alone, when the power of collective song and dance is a neglected channel for increased endorphins, dopamine and lowered cortisol

  • Eyaaz
4 min read