One Street, Five Faiths

June 14, 2007

Author: Pamela Miller

Source: Star Tribune

http://www.startribune.com/614/story/1234200.html

Drive down Central Avenue in northeast Minneapolis (carefully, please -- traffic lurches and flows according to secret rules known only to the locals) and you'll see them: storefront signs you might spot in Delhi, Karachi, Mexico City, Jerusalem, Lagos, Hanoi. Walk the busy sidewalks, and you'll hear languages from all over the world.

And if you look carefully, you'll see signs of faith -- many faiths. Note the sidewalk preachers, the men hurrying to prostrate themselves in prayer, the bus-stop daydreamers fingering prayer beads, the cashiers who keep icons and talismans near their registers.

Religious diversity is growing on Central, as it is on many urban avenues in the United States. Read more about the people whose faiths flourish along this vibrant, gritty street in the Holland neighborhood.