Photos of the Week

Each week Religion News Service presents a gallery of photos of religious expression around the world. This week’s gallery includes Christian Holy Week, Jewish Passover and, in a new feature in partnership with the Presbyterian Historical Society, a selection of RNS archival photographs. See more archival images at the Presbyterian Historical Society. Photos […]

(RNS) — Each week Religion News Service presents a gallery of photos of religious expression around the world. This week’s gallery includes Christian Holy Week, Jewish Passover and, in a new feature in partnership with the Presbyterian Historical Society, a selection of RNS archival photographs. See more archival images at the Presbyterian Historical Society. Photos from the archives will now regularly be included in the Photos of the Week feature.

Our Lady of Sorrows Catholic Church is silhouetted against the rising sun in Kansas City, Mo., Wednesday, April 8, 2020. With Easter Sunday in several days, many churches are looking for ways to celebrate the occasion in accordance with stay-at-home orders and restrictions on gathering in an effort to slow the spread of the new coronavirus. (AP Photo/Charlie Riedel)


The Rev. John Weaver, O. F. M., of St. Joseph’s Church, leads children in prayer that their town, already badly damaged by Hurricane Diane, would be spared by the latest hurricane, Ione, in August 1955, in Winsted, Connecticut. Ruined streets still littered with debris from Hurricane Diane are seen in the background, with reconstruction going on. Hurricane Ione changed course, veering east out to sea, and missed Winsted. RNS archive photo. Photo courtesy of the Presbyterian Historical Society

Wearing a face mask, a devotee of the “Nazareno de San Pablo” holds a cross as she watches a statue of Jesus pass by in a vehicle during Holy Week commemorations in Caracas, Venezuela, Wednesday, April 8, 2020. The annual procession, in which pilgrims normally take to the streets, was not allowed this year due to quarantine laws to help contain the spread of the new coronavirus, so the Catholic Church is driving the religious icon around the capital for people to see from their homes. (AP Photo/Ariana Cubillos)

The congregation of the Bole Medhane Alem Ethiopian Orthodox Cathedral practices social distancing to curb the spread of the new coronavirus as they attend an outdoor Sunday Mass in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia Sunday, April 5, 2020. (AP Photo/Mulugeta Ayene)

Jessica Choe checks her “seder to go” kit, packed and left with dozens of others outside a local cafe, ahead of her family’s Passover meal Wednesday, April 8, 2020, in Seattle. With physical distancing guidelines in place because of the coronavirus pandemic, Jewish communities are being forced to scale back or cancel traditions and rituals marking Passover, the holiday celebrating Israelites’ freedom from Egyptian bondage and referencing biblical plagues. The week-long festival began Wednesday night with the Seder, a large meal that retells the Exodus story. (AP Photo/Elaine Thompson)

A Jewish man wears a face mask to curb the spread of the coronavirus as he reads from a Torah scroll at the Western Wall, the holy site in Jerusalem’s old city, Friday, April 10, 2020. (AP Photo/Sebastian Scheiner)

Rabbi Shlomo Segal, right, holds a laptop on which his daughter Rayna, 8, left, dressed as the prophet Elijah is shown performing during a virtual Passover Seder, Wednesday, April 8, 2020, in the Sheepshead Bay section of Brooklyn, New York, as the coronavirus outbreak and social distancing rules continue. According to Jewish tradition, Elijah will arrive as an unknown guest to herald the advent of the Messiah. During the Seder dinner, biblical verses are read while a door is briefly opened to welcome Elijah, who, it is believed, will appear and usher in the era of the Messiah. The Seder commemorates Jews’ historical redemption from Egyptian bondage, but also foretells their future redemption. (AP Photo/Kathy Willens)

Using social distancing due to the coronavirus pandemic, the Rev. Pat O’Brien of St.Pius X Catholic Church leads a Eucharistic procession through a neighborhood near his church in San Antonio, Monday, April 6, 2020. San Antonio is under stay-at-home orders and most churches are closed to the public due to the COVID-19 pandemic. (AP Photo/Eric Gay)


A peace march held in Atlanta on Easter Sunday, April 6, 1969, honored the first anniversary of the Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s death (April 4, 1968) and to call for an end to the Vietnam War. RNS archive photo. Photo courtesy of the Presbyterian Historical Society

Bishop William Joensen proceeds down the main aisle at the conclusion of Holy Thursday Mass in a near empty St. Ambrose Cathedral, Thursday, April 9, 2020, in Des Moines, Iowa. (AP Photo/Charlie Neibergall)

A priest peers from a window in the door of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, where Christians believe Jesus Christ was buried, before Archbishop Pierbattista Pizzaballa’s arrival during a lockdown following government measures to help stop the spread of the new coronavirus, during Holy Thursday in Jerusalem’s Old City, Thursday, April 9, 2020. The traditional Holy Thursday procession took place inside the church without public attendance this year due to restrictions imposed to contain the spread of the coronavirus. (AP Photo/Ariel Schalit)

Russian Orthodox Church Patriarch Kirill, center, conducts a service celebrating the Annunciation, on the eve of Orthodox Easter, during a live broadcast from the almost empty Christ the Savior Cathedral in Moscow, Russia, Tuesday, April 7, 2020. As the coronavirus outbreak picked up speed in Russia, authorities cancelled public events and ordered residents in most regions to stay home except to shop for food, go to pharmacies or take out trash. Eastern Orthodox churches, which observe the ancient Julian calendar, celebrate Easter later than Western churches. (Oleg Varov, Russian Orthodox Church Press Service)

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