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Religion & Spirituality

Heart and Soul

by BBC World Service
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Latest episodes

  • The Church's slave plantation: Part one

    April 21, 2023 · 27 min

    What are the consequences of the Church of England's historic slave plantations in Barbados today? Theologian Robert Beckford considers why and how the Church's missionary arm, the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel, got involved in…

  • Sikhism’s lost song

    April 14, 2023 · 27 min

    In the heyday of the Sikh Empire, Kirtan - Sikh hymns - were performed using stringed instruments such as the sarangi, rabab and taus. The rich, complex tones these instruments create are said to evoke a deeper connection to Waheguru…

  • Clergy in cartel land

    April 7, 2023 · 27 min

    Mexico has become the most dangerous country in the world to be a Catholic priest. In the past 15 years, 50 were killed in narco-related violence. And the young men who enter the priesthood in the region of western Mexico known as Tierra…

  • Purity to nudity

    March 31, 2023 · 27 min

    Gwen was brought up as a strict evangelical Christian. She was taught that women needed to control the way they dressed and acted to control the behaviour of men. When she was sexually abused, she believed it was her fault. But when she…

  • My hijab or my sport

    March 24, 2023 · 26 min

    It took Salimata Sylla three hours to get to the away fixture she was due to play with her basketball team mates from the Parisian suburb of Aubervilliers. But it was only a few minutes before the match started that she learned she was…

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  • An instrument speaking to the infinite

    March 17, 2023 · 28 min

    The organ has always been a vehicle for truly cosmic ideas - for atheists and believers alike. Acclaimed Latvian organist Iveta Apkalna explores the idea that the instrument is simply a vehicle for Christian worship digging deeper into how…

  • Two Rabbis, worlds apart in Israel

    March 15, 2023 · 26 min

    When we think of division in the Middle East, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict normally comes straight to mind. But there’s a new and dangerous tension in Israel – between its own Jewish people. The country now has its most right-wing…

  • Coming out of the Ifá closet

    March 2, 2023 · 26 min

    Almost 10 years ago, Peter MacJob’s life changed forever. Born and raised a devout Christian like so many of his fellow Nigerians, he fell out of love with the Church and discovered the traditional Yoruba religion of his ancestors. Other…

  • Stripped of my spirituality

    February 17, 2023 · 26 min

    Aged four, Mary was playing in her parents’ front yard, when she was grabbed by “the government people” and taken to a Catholic boarding school to be turned into a Christian. She’s just one of thousands of Native Americans who were…

  • The cost of being an atheist in Nigeria

    February 10, 2023 · 26 min

    When Mubarak Bala posts criticism of Islam on social media, it sparks a landmark legal case and leaves him facing 24 years in jail. Raised in a Muslim family, Mubarak is the son of an Islamic scholar in the religiously conservative Kano…

  • The Right Thing: Framed by my brother

    February 3, 2023 · 27 min

    In July 2000 Floyd Bledsoe was convicted of the murder of his 14-year-old sister-in-law in the small Kansas town of Oskaloosa. His older brother Tom had originally confessed to the killing, but later changed his story, accusing Floyd of…

  • The Right Thing: Opposing sexual violence as a weapon of war

    January 27, 2023 · 28 min

    **Contains graphic details of sexual violence against women and children** As a young boy, Nobel Peace Prize laureate Denis Mukwege witnessed his father, a Pentecostal pastor, praying for a sick child. It made him want to help people who…

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About the show

Heart and Soul is a weekly half-hour programme that has the scope and understanding to explore different experiences of spirituality from around the world. Whether examining religious faith or any other belief-system, the programme talks to believers and non-believers, and tries to get beyond superficial notions of spirituality and religion.