Past Programs
History - 2004
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The Quest for the True Cross
26/12/2004
Carsten Pieter Thiede is well known for his "discovery" of the earliest known fragment of the Gospel of Matthew in the Bodleian Library. Now he's found a piece of the true cross in a church in Rome, the Santa Croce in Gerusalemme.
Early Pioneers of the New Age
12/12/2004
Today's New Agers owe a great deal to some early thinkers who attempted to unify science and religion, such as Swedenborg, Mesmer and Helena Blavatsky.
Missionaries of the Sacred Heart
05/12/2004
A hundred years in Australia and 150 years since its founding,
the MSC (Missionaires du Sacre-Coeur)is dwindling in the West but growing elsewhere.
The Crosses of Kerala
07/11/2004
The 10 million Christians in Kerala, South India, believe their faith was brought by St Thomas, 20 years after Jesus' death.
Mandorla Religious Art Award
31/10/2004
Unlike the Blake Prize, the Mandorla Art Award specifically promotes Christian art. Well-known artists like John Coburn and Julie Dowling are past winners.
General Sir John Monash
01/08/2004
Monash was an Australian Jew whose victories in France at the end of World War I broke the 4-year stalemate of trench warfare.
Genghis Khan
04/07/2004
In his homeland of Mongolia he is the revered father of his nation and is worshipped as a demi-god.
Was There Religion in the Greco-Roman World?
20/06/2004
The classical world knew gods and goddesses, cults, and sacrificial rites, but it did not know 'religion'.
I Was a Teenage Catholic in Belfast
06/06/2004
Malachi O'Doherty reflects on the religious upbringing of Catholics and Protestants in Belfast during the 1950s.
Church and Crown
30/05/2004
The future of the Church of England as the Established Church is untenable, argues Theo Hobson.
God's Wife
02/05/2004
The belief in only one God was a long time coming among the ancient Israelites.
Originally God had a wife and her name was Asherah. Biblical archaeologist,
Diana Edelman tells the story of "Mrs God" and why she was banished from the Temple.
The Mortara Affair
18/04/2004
In 1858 the abduction of a Jewish child by the Catholic Church became an international incident involving Pope Pius IX, Napoleon III and the Mortara family of Bologna. Edgardo Mortara became a symbol of the struggle in Italy between the Papal states and the secular forces of unification and religious liberty.
The Quest for the True Cross
04/04/2004
Carsten Pieter Thiede is well known for his "discovery" of the earliest known fragment of the Gospel of Matthew in the Bodleian Library. Now he's found a piece of the true cross in a church in Rome, the Santa Croce in Gerusalemme. He tells Rachael Kohn why he's sure it's authentic.
Three Letters From Oxyrhynchus Read Transcript
28/03/2004
In 1897 Oxyrhynchus in Egypt was a treasure trove of antiquities and ancient documents written on papyrus. The discovery of Christian texts identified the region as important for the early church. Macquarie University has just acquired 3 valuable papyri from the 4th and 5th centuries and papyrologist Don Barker explains their significance.
John Locke 1632-1704
15/02/2004
Locke was a Puritan during England's tumultuous religious revolution, the Civil War. He wrote 'A Letter Concerning Toleration' (1689) during his exile in Holland, when the Catholic James II sat on the English throne. Locke's theory included the religious freedom of pagans, Muslims and Jews. It lead to the Toleration Act of 1689, the first major step toward statutory religious freedom.
God's Wife
28/01/2004
The belief in only one God was a long time coming among the ancient Israelites.
Originally God had a wife and her name was Asherah. Biblical archaeologist,
Diana Edelman tells the story of "Mrs God" and why she was banished from the Temple.
The Exodus Miracles - Fact or Fiction?
21/01/2004
Did the Red Sea really part before the Israelites? Why didn't the fire consume the Burning Bush? What was the Manna in the Wilderness? Distinguished British scientist, Colin Humphreys, examines the evidence and provides a remarkable account of "what really happened".
