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1. Using the PEW Research Religion & Public Life Project, write a news article
from the perspective of a world news journalist attempting to describe the
religious patterns in the world.
Approximately 80% of the worlds population identify with a religious group.
Depending on the religion, there are several trends to be drawn from each religion
and what people practice it. It is very peculiar that several religious groups are
heavily concentrated in the Asia-Pacific region, including the vast majority of Hindus
99%, Buddhists 99%. But the Asia-Pacific region is also count for have a very high
concentration of religiously unaffiliated people. Exactly three-quarters of the
religiously unaffiliated 76%. The number of religiously unaffiliated people in China
alone is about 700 million, which is more than twice the total population of the
United States. The trend you see in this area is that very are either very dedicated
to their religion or do not identify with one at all.
Another tend that was drawn from the census was that majority of religions are
located close together or in a central area, except Christianity. Christianity was the
most dispersed religion of all. Roughly equal numbers of Christians live in Europe
(26%), Latin America and the Caribbean (24%) and sub-Saharan Africa (24%). I
think this is because people feel more comfortable practicing a religion around other
people who feel the same way. This would explain why people tend to clump
together who practice the same religion. It is easier to spend time around people
who have the same views as you, especially if you are really passionate about your
religion.
One website does a great job of depicting these patterns with graphics created
from the finding s of the world wide censuses conducted. To see more visit
http://www.pewforum.org/2012/12/18/global-religious-landscape-exec/ for quality
background information on religion distribution and patterns. All photos analyzed
below were taken from this website.

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This graph depicts the size of major religious groups. The largest and most
dominant religion is Christianity. Which makes sense because as described before it
is also the most spread out inferring that it reaches the most people across the
world. It is interesting that unaffiliated is only slightly higher than Hindu showing
that not identifying with a religion is the third most popular choice.

The median age of people who identify with Hindu is only 23. That is
extremely low in comparison to other religions. The next youngest is 26 which is the
median age of Hindu, which is interesting because they are both similar religions
that obviously connect easily to young people. Jews has the highest median average
of age at 36. 36 is also a central number when it comes to life span so that tells me
that Judaism is a more lifelong religion than any other.

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Christianity is the largest religion that people identify with across the world. Not
only is it the largest but it is also the most distributed across different continents.
Europe, Latin America/Caribbean, and Sub Saharan Africa all have approximately
the same amount of people that practice Christianity. While North America and AsiaPacific are also very similar in their numbers. This is interesting to me because
immediately I think of North America and Europe being the most dominant locations
to practice Christianity but these results prove otherwise.

It is ironic that Asia-Pacific is the most dominant location for several religions,
but is also most evidently the most popular place for unaffiliated people to be
located. People who live in these countries are on two ends of the spectrum of
religion and living in harmony in the same place, this trend is very fascinating and
mind blowing.

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In general, the median age of different locations matches the median age of
people who identify themselves as unaffiliated. That tells me that there is a trend
with middle age people, despite where they are living, feel not connected to a
region towards the middle of their lifespan.

Christianity is the most dominant religion in the majority of countries across

the world. Nothing even competes. As spoken about before we see the trend that
Christianity is very dispersed. Muslim seems to be the group that most bands
together and sticks in one local area. It is also interesting that china is depicted as
being a light purple (mostly unaffiliated) although that is the location that has a
hodge podge of different religions, it is truly the melting pot of religious diversity but
unaffiliated is the most dominant. This tells me that there must be certain locations
that are dominated by one religion and others are more unaffiliated, so coloring
different countries one color does not do it justice.

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6. LetterMining is a tricky topic because different people can take very strong stances
on either side of the argument. As the UN diplomat it is my job to evaluate each
side of the dispute and to try to stretch my mind to see both perspectives. My goal
is to propose ideas as to how to resolve this problem from each point of view so
both sides can be happy in the end.
The first side would be the side of the native people. I cannot even fathom
how difficult and frustrating it must be for people outside from the African public to
come in and steel the natural resources from your land. Despite the anger, violence
is not the answer. It is evident that peaceful resolutions and compromises end the
best for both parties in the end. What once started as a natural resource and mining
conflict has quickly flourished into a religion dispute. I respect that your faith
strongly falls to Christianity but you must respect that different people have
different beliefs. Just because you met one person who was Muslim and they were
not nice, does not mean you should segregate and exile all persons who fall under
the Muslim faith. I know that your land is very underdeveloped and your people are
very poor and desperately need the mines under your power in order to make
money and survive, but a compromise is in order. I believe the majority of mines
should continue to be in your power and all findings should be yours, but a good
idea would be to start to employ the Muslim people as miners. This is a good idea
because the mines continue to stay yours, and you still have possession of all items
mined from the mines, and finally you will obtain more workers that will make the
process of mining much faster and efficient. This makes the Muslims happy because
they will be paid for their labor or get a commission for all items they find in the
mines.
The other side would be the side of the Muslims leaders who are entering
African land to mine in other counties. They must realize first and foremost that
they are intruding on something that does not belong to them and taking things
that should not be taken. Once this is realized they must understand that if the
come to a compromise that gives some benefit to both sides. I understand that
there are mines that have great value close by and you want access to them to
make money but that is not civil or just. As I have proposed to the other side, you
should all be employed to work in the mines. You may not get to keep all your
findings but you still will receive money in return for your labor. In doing this you
would all avoid war and death among both your communities.
I see the anger from both sides, and although it is difficult both sides must
give in order to receive. I feel it is most important to not have a war and save both

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communities from being unsafe and mass amounts of death. Please consider my
proposal.