Photos of the Week: NYC deadly fire, Orthodox Christian New Year

By Kit Doyle · January 14, 2022
 (RNS) - Each week Religion News Service presents a gallery of photos of religious expression around the world. This week’s photo gallery includes the aftermath of a deadly fire in New York City, Orthodox Christian New Year and more. Men unload the bodies of victims of a building fire from a trailer into a funeral home in the Queens borough of New York, Thursday, Jan. 13, 2022. Many of the victims of New York City's deadliest fire in decades are still awaiting burial after funerals began with services for two children killed by Sunday's blaze in a Bronx apartment building. Community leaders have been huddling to make arrangements for the 17 dead. They included eight children. The vast majority of the dead had ties to the West African nation of Gambia. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig) Members of the Masjid Ar Rahman pray, in the Bronx borough of New York, Wednesday, Jan. 12, 2022, a place of worship for some of the residents of the building which suffered New York City's deadliest fire in three decades. (AP Photo/Mary Altaffer) People hold candles during a candlelight vigil outside the apartment building which suffered the city's deadliest fire in three decades, in the Bronx borough of New York, on Tuesday, Jan. 11, 2022. (AP Photo/Yuki Iwamura) People hug after viewing a memorial for the victims of an apartment building fire near the site of the fire in the Bronx borough of New York, Thursday, Jan. 13, 2022. Many of the victims of New York City’s deadliest fire in decades are still awaiting burial after funerals began with services for two children killed by Sunday’s blaze in a Bronx apartment building. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig) A medical helicopter outside the Drexel Hill United Methodist Church after it crashed in the Drexel Hill section of Upper Darby, Pa., on Wednesday, Jan. 12, 2022. Authorities say the pilot crash landed the medical helicopter without casualties in a residential area of suburban Philadelphia, miraculously avoiding a web of power lines and buildings as it hit the street and slid into bushes outside the church. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke) A Hindu devotee offers prayers at the Sangam, the confluence of three rivers — the Ganges, the Yamuna and the mythical Saraswati, to take a ritualistic bath during Makar Sankranti festival that falls during the annual traditional fair of Magh Mela festival, one of the most sacred pilgrimages in Hinduism, in Prayagraj, India, Friday, Jan. 14, 2022. Tens of thousands of devout Hindus, led by heads of monasteries and ash-smeared ascetics, took a holy dip in the frigid waters on Friday despite rising COVID-19 infections in the country. (AP Photo/Rajesh Kumar Singh) Hindu devotees take ritual dips in the Sangam, the confluence of three rivers — the Ganges, the Yamuna and the mythical Saraswati, during Makar Sankranti festival that falls during the annual Magh Mela, one of the most sacred pilgrimages in Hinduism, in Prayagraj, India. Friday, Jan. 14, 2022. Tens of thousands of devout Hindus, led by heads of monasteries and ash-smeared ascetics, took a holy dip into the frigid waters on Friday despite rising COVID-19 infections in the country. (AP Photo/Rajesh Kumar Singh) Fireworks illuminate the sky over St. Sava Temple in Belgrade, Serbia, Friday, Jan. 14, 2022. Orthodox Christians in Serbia celebrate New Year on Jan. 14, according to the Julian calendar. (AP Photo/Darko Vojinovic) President Joe Biden touches the flag-draped casket of former Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada, as he lies in state in the U. S. Capitol Rotunda, Wednesday, Jan. 12, 2022, in Washington. (AP Photo/Mariam Zuhaib) Tamil women greet each other as they cook special food to celebrate the harvest festival of Pongal in Dharavi, one of the Asia's largest slums, in Mumbai, India, Friday, Jan. 14, 2022. This Hindu celebration marks the beginning of the sun's northward movement and is considered to be auspicious. (AP Photo/Rafiq Maqbool) Archival Photos Twin brothers — the Rev. Joseph Blaney, and the Rev. James Blaney — in a procession to the church with their pastor, Msgr. Patrick Waters after being ordained in South Boston's St. Brigid Church by Cardinal Richard Cushing, Archbishop of Boston, in May 1965. The newly ordained priests spent many years of their youth at the jail where their father was a deputy warden. They completed studies for the priesthood at Oblate College in Washington, D.C. RNS archive photo by C. M. Buckley. Photo courtesy of the Presbyterian Historical Society. About 500 white and Black youths come forward to make "decisions for Christ" in answer to a call by evangelist Billy Graham during his interracial crusade in Montgomery, Alabama, in June 1965. The evangelist held two youth nights during his eight-day campaign in Cramton Bowl. He praised the "march of hundreds of men and women, of both races," to the front of the speaker's stand every night to commit their lives to Christ. The march, he said, was "even more significant, more constructive and more revolutionary than the other marches we have read about in other parts of the country." RNS archive photo. Photo courtesy of the Presbyterian Historical Society.
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