To fear one's doubts and to deny them, is to take away the silence from the music and the space from the sculpture, says Jill Segger. As with all untruth, denial demeans, diminishes and eventually destroys.

The last of four major conferences looking into issues regarding equality, human rights and ‘religion or belief’ took place in Cardiff earlier this week

By adding more weight to the debate, the campaigning atheists won’t stop the worry about God, says Mark Vernon. Unless they can stop talking about it, they’ll only succeed in giving the rumour new life.

The Chinese government has given permission for special distribution of booklets of the Gospels, copies of the New Testament and full Bibles during the Olympic Games, but other concerns about freedom of speech and expression remain.

Two leading organisations speaking for the concerns of non-religious people in the UK have challenged a major youth organisation over its exclusion of non-believers, in spite of its repeated claims to be open and inclusive.

Pope Benedict XVI has declared in one of his key Christmas messages that believers facing persecution, torture and death in some parts of the world and those who die forgiving their killers are a sign of hope and faith for humanity.

Despite India remaining the world's most populous and vibrant democracy, freedom of religion is in decline and plural secularism threatened, says a journalist-turned-Christian activist who is now secretary general of the All India Christian Council.