Religion

Teens are more than possible risk factors and test scores. In an effort to create a well-rounded picture of Minnesota teens today – what they think about, hope for, and how they communicate – ThreeSixty Journalism and the Minnesota Historical Society are calling teens to fill out an online survey.

By Mary Meehan

When Anne Judine Knudsen, 56, saw the engraved names of her two babies lost through miscarriage on the “Unborn Memorial” wall in Delano, Minn., she cried.

By Zamzam Abdirahman

I never believed that people at my high school would start to look at me as the Somali girl, and not Zamzam anymore. But that’s what happened when the Somali population at school more than tripled in five years.

By By Mai Ker Hang, 17, Harding Senior High School

Kamolchai Hang, 12, of St. Paul, could become the next shaman in his Hmong family, continuing a religious tradition of more than 1,000 years.

By Amolak Singh

The services at Urban Jerusalem Four Square Church in north Minneapolis may look and sound like a club with lights and bumping beats, but when you listen to the music, the lyrics of the songs are about God and Jesus Christ.

By Grace Pastoor

When Ready Htoo tried his first hot dog in America he loved it – until he found out what it was called.

By Victoria Turcios

Minnesota teens have many reasons they give for why they wait to have sex.

By Iman Jafri

When their Islamic belief in modesty conflicted with being able to go to school prom, a group of Muslim women decided to host a dance just for girls so they could let their hair down, glam up in gowns, and dance the night away — no boys allowed.

By Mary Meehan

When 81-year-old Jim Burns was celebrating Christmas as a kid, it was the only time of year he received a present.

By Minnesota teens

This spring, the government will attempt to count every single person living in the United States in the 2010 Census. ThreeSixty, the St. Paul Pioneer Press and Minneapolis Star Tribune asked teenagers how they count to America. Their essays were published in both papers, and online on April 1. Check them out!

By Teddy Woodward

The most likely reason why the history of Valentine’s Day isn’t well known is because it involves beheadings – not exactly romantic – and there are so many versions of how the holiday originated, and took on a romantic connotation, that no one can agree on the truth.

According to Alban Butler’s “Lives of the Saints,” Valentine, or Valentinus, was a priest who gave aid to Christians under the persecution of the Roman emperor, Claudius II. In the third century in Rome, Christianity was illegal. The Romans apprehended Valentine and tried to make him renounce his faith. When he refused, he was beheaded.

By Tiffany Trawick, Safia Hirsi, Falastin Mohamed, Shibre Tefera Ligdi, Sadiyo Mohamed and Manal Ali

Every fall, ThreeSixty runs a six-week workshop at an area library to teach interested teens about journalism. This fall, an incredible group of mostly immigrant Muslim Somali and Ethiopian Minneapolis teens, as well as one Pentecostal American teen, worked hard on stories that deepen understanding of their experiences in the Twin Cities, as well as their communities here.

The reporters investigate topics like balancing religious beliefs with fitting in at school, the struggle immigrant women go through to free themselves from domestic abuse, worry about a brother who chew’s khat, a stimulant, a sister’s potentially lethal disease, Sub-Saharan African women finding new educational opportunities when many of them never enter high school in their home countries, and what it’s like to adjust to life in America as a high school freshman who doesn’t know a single word of English.