Archbishop of Canterbury Dr Rowan Williams, spiritual head of the world's 77 million Anglicans, has endorsed a strong statement against religiously sanctioned violence by Pope Benedict at an inter-faith peace conference in Naples this weekend.

To be a member of the pacifist Society of Friends (Quakers) and a member of the South African Communist Party may seem contradictory to some of her compatriots. But Nozizwe Madlala-Routledge, until recently South Africa's deputy health minister, sees no anomaly.

At the root of death-dealing religion and ideology is fear, says Simon Barrow. The biggest challenge we face today is how to challenge cultures of death from within, replacing the logic of the sword with an invitation to life.