'The Five Wounds' causes the reader pain. Call it compassion. Call it empathy. Call it the Christian experience of being heart-stretched.

My parents instilled in me the lesson that no matter what life threw at me, God would always be there to guide me.

With her new book 'Beyond,' Catherine Wolff mixes well-written impressionistic summaries of various religious perspectives with personal anecdotes to answer the age-old question of what lies beyond the grave.

In Latin American immigrant communities, lay faith leaders adapt a ritual of mourning that builds community amid isolation.

I am told that at the last moment, my mother sat up, looked towards heaven and fell back to her pillow. I chose to believe Mary came to her, took her and is with her still.

Washington, Colorado and Oregon are now among the U.S. states that have legalized the process of converting human bodies into soil, a procedure the Catholic Church said fails to show “respect for the body of the deceased.”