religion

The place to go this year is Istanbul: along with the Ruhr Valley and Pécs, Hungary, it's one of the three European Capitals of Culture. Mike Pilewski takes us to the megacity on the Bosporus in a land caught between East and West, between tradition and modernity.

Ayaan Hirsi Ali teamed up with Dutch film director Theo van Gogh to make Submission, a film about the mistreatment of women in Islam. Van Gogh was murdered on an Amsterdam street in 2004 by an extremist. Hirsi Ali now lives in Washington, DC.

The word "Christmas" means "Christ's Mass". It comes from the Middle English Christemasse and Old English Cristes mæsse. "Cristes" is from the Greek Christos, and "mæsse" is from the Latin missa. "Xmas" is often used as an abbreviation for Christmas.

There are 4.1 births every second, 245 every minute, or 14,698 per hour. This means that 352,755 people are born every day, 10,759,033 every month and 129,108,390 every year. The world population is expected to reach 9.1 billion in 2050.

The English National Opera is staging a modern interpretation of Handel's 18th-century masterpiece. Avant-garde director Deborah Warner takes the religious oratorio and gives one of the world's greatest stories powerful new relevance.

David Headley has a Pakistani wife, who lives with their children in Chicago. He also has an American girlfriend in New York. And he's an Islamic fundamentalist suspected of involvement in last November's attacks on Mumbai that left 170 people dead.

Simon Boswell, Stefano Mainetti and Nour Eddine were asked to write a soundtrack around three elements: Gregorian chant sung by the Choir of the Philharmonic Academy of Rome, London's Royal Philharmonic Orchestra and the voice of Pope Benedict XVI.

This is not a trip to Disneyland. It is a journey to the edge of civilization. Visiting Afghanistan is like visiting another century, when people lived in a very different way. You may have warm water, internet access and electricity, or you may not.

To some, India is an emerging superpower with a growing middle class — but it's also a poor, rural state with huge problems. These worlds are in much closer proximity to each other than in other countries, says Birgit Roberts; her photos capture the paradoxes.