Belmont’s musical theater department will bring stories from scripture to life though song in the Troutt Theater. Premiering the 1971 off-Broadway original on a Belmont stage Friday, “Godspell” tells a story of rebuilding a community using parables from the Bible’s New Testament. It will be the first Belmont musical directed by a faculty member outside of the musical theater department. Director Sean Martin, an adjunct instructor of theater at Belmont, attributes the mileston

Christianity and Islam in the Middle East may seem inherently at odds, but a Catholic bishop Wednesday morning dispelled this notion and pleaded for peace and unity in a region desperately lacking both. “Peace is possible, but it takes hard work,” said Bishop Gregory Mansour. “It takes a little bit of defiance, and it takes young people like you to get old people like me to move forward.” Mansour and the organization he leads, Christian Arab and Middle East Churches Together,