Photos of the Week: Shavuot, praying for rain

By Jessi Dodge · June 10, 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 Shavuot, Buddhist prayers for rain and more. Members of the ancient Samaritan community pray during the holiday of Shavuot on Mount Gerizim near the West Bank town of Nablus, Sunday, June 5, 2022. Samaritans descended from the ancient Israelite tribes of Menashe and Efraim but broke away from mainstream Judaism 2,800 years ago. Today, the remaining about 700 Samaritans live in the Palestinian city of Nablus in the West Bank and the Israeli town of Holon, south of Tel Aviv. (AP Photo/Majdi Mohammed) A man painted as a local folklore ghost participates in a ceremony to invoke rain amid the rice planting season in Pring Ka-ek village, northwest of Phnom Penh, Cambodia, Thursday, June 9, 2022. Local residents Thursday held the annual Buddhist ceremony to pray for the rain to grow rice as their main crop. (AP Photo/Heng Sinith) A Hindu priest performs an evening prayers at Sangam, the confluence of the Rivers Ganges, Yamuna and the mythical Saraswati, on the occasion of Ganga Dussehra festival in Prayagraj, Uttar Pradesh state, India, on Thursday, June 9, 2022. Hindus across the country are celebrating Ganga Dussehra, devoted to the worship of the River Ganges. (AP Photo/Rajesh Kumar Singh) Indian Muslims shout slogans as they block a road in Kolkata, India, Friday, June 10, 2022. Thousands of Muslims emerging from mosques after Friday prayers held street protests and hurled rocks at the police in some Indian towns and cities over remarks by two officials from India’s ruling party that were derogatory to the Prophet Muhammad. (AP Photo/Bikas Das) Vice President Kamala Harris, second from right, speaks during a roundtable discussion with faith leaders in Los Angeles, Monday, June 6, 2022. Harris discussed challenges, including women's reproductive rights and the rise of hate. (AP Photo/Jae C. Hong) Exiled Tibetan Buddhist monks construct a mandala, a traditional motif, at Tsuglakhang temple in Dharmsala, India, Friday, June 10, 2022. (AP Photo/Ashwini Bhatia) Women protest at a market, following Sunday's church attack at the St. Francis Catholic Church in Owo,Nigeria, Tuesday, June 7, 2022. Before the church attack, Ondo had been considered one of Nigeria's most peaceful states. But now Owo, a small town of traders and government workers located 50 kilometers (31 miles) from the state capital of Akure, is reeling from the violence of the church attack. (AP Photo/Sunday Alamba) Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama laughs during a special prayer session at the Tsuglakhang temple in Dharmsala, India, Wednesday, June 8, 2022. (AP Photo/Ashwini Bhatia) Pilgrims walk in the Donana National Park on their way to the shrine of El Rocio in Almonte, Spain, on Friday June 3, 2022, during the annual pilgrimage in which hundreds of thousands of devotees of the Virgin del Rocio converge in and around the shrine. After a two-year hiatus forced by the pandemic, tens of thousands of pilgrims – many of them outfitted in tiered flamenco dresses, crisp riding suits and wide-brimmed Cordoba hats – descended on the tiny Spanish village of El Rocío to take part in the riotously colorful and ancient festival, la Romería del Rocío, or the Rocío virgin pilgrimage. (AP Photo/Joan Mateu Parra)
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