"When televangelist Silas Malafaia gathered 40,000 followers outside Brazil's Congress this week, it wasn't just to raise their arms to the sky and praise the Lord.

"The rally was a show of support for lawmakers who oppose abortion and same-sex marriage and a message to other politicians that they should not ignore Brazil's fast-growing evangelical churches if they want to stay in office."

Read more: Anthony Boadle, Reuters

"This year, numerous governors are promoting new limits on abortion -- or have already signed legislation."

Read more: Linda Feldman and Megan Haggerty, The Christian Science Monitor

"I understand where Jennifer Aniston is coming from. Like many of her peers in Hollywood, not to mention scholars and writers opining on fatherhood these days, she has come to the conclusion that dads are dispensable: 'Women are realizing it more and more knowing that they don't have to settle with a man just to have that child,' she said at a press conference a few years ago.

"What this view overlooks, however, is a growing body of research suggesting that men bring much more to the parenting enterprise than money, especially today, when many fathers are highly involved in the warp and woof of childrearing. As Yale psychiatrist Kyle Pruett put it in Salon: 'fathers don't mother.'"

Read more: W. Bradford Wilcox, The Atlantic

"Anyone who’s seen the Aurora Borealis either in pictures, on video or in person knows the beauty these 'Northern Lights' can produce. But they’ve rarely produced anything as beautiful as the time they allowed John Sullivan to reconnect with his long-dead father and try to save his life."

Read more: Tony Rossi, Christopher Closeup, Patheos

"Children of divorce tend to hear this parable not so much as a comforting story of the abundance of God’s forgiveness and love, but as a command to forgive the prodigal parent."

Read more: Dr. Gregory Popcak, Faith on the Couch, Patheos

"The United States has concluded that the Syrian government used chemical weapons in its fight against opposition forces, and President Obama has authorized direct U.S. military support to the rebels, the White House said Thursday."

Read more: Karen DeYoung and Anne Gearan, The Washington Post

"The Supreme Court ruled Thursday that human genes cannot be patented, a decision with both immediate benefits for some breast and ovarian cancer patients and long-lasting repercussions for biotechnology research."

Read more: Richard Wolf, USA Today

"I look in the mirror, and just as I'm lifting my collar to sling my tie around my neck, I laugh. I laugh because it was not my father who taught me how to tie a tie, nor pick out a suit. It was not my father who taught me how to change the oil in my car, drive a six-speed, build a fire, or shave with a straight razor. All that I owe to one website: YouTube."

Read more: Michael Anthony Adams, The Atlantic

"A 10-year-old girl whose efforts to qualify for an organ donation spurred public debate over how organs are allocated underwent a successful double-lung transplant on Wednesday, the girl's family said."

Read more: Maryclaire Dale and Malcolm Ritter, Huff Post Politics, Huffington Post

"Egyptian author and human rights activist Karam Saber has been sentenced to five years in prison, after a court found his writings to have insulted religion, reports the Egyptian news website Aswat Masriya."

Read more: Bill Chapel, NPR.com

"The Southern Baptist Convention approved a resolution Wednesday expressing its opposition to the Boy Scouts of America’s new policy allowing gay Scouts, though it doesn’t explicitly call for churches to drop all ties with the organization.

"While some action against the Scouts was widely anticipated, given the denomination’s very public opposition to the change, the resolution takes a softer tone than many had expected."

Read more: Associated Press, On Faith, Washington Post

"Lawyers for Planned Parenthood and the American Civil Liberties Union filed suit on Tuesday asking a federal judge to block enforcement of a new Alabama law that critics say will force the closure of three of the state’s five abortion clinics on July 1.

The new measure, signed into law in April, requires all physicians in the state who perform abortions to have staff privileges at a local hospital."

Read more: Warren Richey, The Christian Science Monitor