U.S. Supreme Court hears Muslim travel ban arguments
The U.S. Supreme Court has so far had little to say about Donald Trump’s time as president, even as the nation has moved from one Trump controversy to another. That’s about to change.
Historian doesn’t want Civil War soldier’s story lost
It’s such a small, unremarkable headstone for such a remarkable life. In an age when the average male life expectancy barely topped 40, 56-year-old Peter Williams enlisted with the 29th Regiment, U.S. Colored Infantry, to fight for the Union in …
Yvonne Staples of Staple Singers fame dies at 80
Yvonne Staples, whose voice and business acumen powered the success of the Staple Singers, her family’s hit-making gospel group that topped the charts in the early 1970s with the song “I’ll Take You There,” has died. She was 80.
President Carter talks ‘Faith’ in book
In his 32nd book, titled simply “Faith,” former President Jimmy Carter looks at how belief in God and others has shaped his 93 years.
Former First Lady Barbara Bush dies
A private funeral for former First Lady Barbara Bush, the only American woman to see her husband and son both sworn in as president, will be held on Saturday, April 21, at a Houston church where her family has been …
Atlanta March on Monday marked route of MLK funeral 50 years ago
Relatives of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. led more than 1,000 people on a march Monday in downtown Atlanta, where large crowds gathered 50 years earlier for the slain civil rights leader’s funeral procession as a mule-drawn wagon pulled his …
Liberty president censors student newspaper over critics
Liberty University President Jerry Falwell Jr. stifled an effort by the school’s newspaper to report on an event last weekend organized by his critics, said a student editor.
Mom uses stun gun to wake son for church
A Phoenix woman shocked her teenage son with a stun gun to wake him for church services on Easter, authorities said.
Catholic diocese apologizes for display of figure hanging in tree
The Catholic Diocese of Richmond apologized last Friday for the “insensitive” hanging of a homemade mannequin in a tree outside Our Lady of Lourdes Catholic Church in Henrico County.
‘Mother of South Africa’ dies at 81
Winnie Madikizela-Mandela, who emerged as a combative anti-apartheid campaigner during her former husband Nelson Mandela’s decades in jail but whose reputation was later tarnished by allegations of violence, died on Monday, April 2, 2018, at the age of 81.
Gospel music stars shine at 33rd Stellar Awards ceremony
Gospel singer, composer and choir director James “JJ” Hairston was the top winner last weekend at the 33rd Annual Stellar Gospel Music Awards, winning six awards.
Annie Giles, community activist, dies at 81
As a minister’s daughter, Annie Marie Turner Giles felt driven to help others overcome problems and challenges in the Whitcomb Court public housing community in the city’s East End.
Journalist Les Payne, a founder of NABJ, dies at 76
Les Payne, an intrepid Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist who helped pave the way for another generation of African-American journalists as one of the founders and a former president of the National Association of Black Journalists, died on Monday, March 19, 2018. …
‘Rethinking Incarceration’
The problems in the United States’ criminal justice system go all the way back to slavery, according to Dominique DuBois Gilliard, who directs racial reconciliation work for the Evangelical Covenant Church. Both slavery and incarceration are means of racial and …
Dr. Marshall Banks, retired urologist and Roman Catholic deacon, dies at 78
Dr. Marshall D. “Billy” Banks devoted his life to ministering to people as a physician and as a deacon at Cathedral of the Sacred Heart near Virginia Commonwealth University.
