Rituals

The mysterious and often shocking religious rites of Australasia are rarely filmed. But priest and faith expert Peter Owen Jones intrepidly ventures into the Australian outback where he witnesses a baby smoking ceremony and explores the phenomenon of Aboriginal Dreaming. In Indonesia he witnesses the elaborate funeral of a woman who died 20 years ago and attends a sword-stabbing ritual.

In his quest to uncover the most extraordinary global rituals, Peter Owen Jones explores the exotic and inscrutable religions of the Far East. From the anarchic Buddhist Naked Man and Shinto Fire festivals in Japan, he witnesses ceremonies that are both bizarre and revered. Along the way he encounters the biggest church in the world before giving his money to a mother goddess.

In the continent where all human life began, rituals are strange, grueling and deeply spiritual. Priest and writer Peter Owen Jones witnesses a Voodoo ceremony in Benin that questions his own deeply held religious convictions. In South Africa, he meets devotees who believe the world is about to come to an end, while in Ethiopia, he encounters an emotional church service that moves him to tears.

All the world's major religions intersect in the Middle East, often leading to rancor and conflict. But Peter Owen Jones tries to find a different side to a region scarred by religious strife. In Israel he meets African-Americans who live by the principles of the Old Testament - including polygamy. And in Iraq he tracks down the ancient Yazidi sect, who have a curious reputation for devil worship.

The US is considered the most religiously diverse country in the world. Peter Owen Jones encounters its extremes as he gets slightly too close to serpent handlers in the Appalachians, before taking his seat at a table-tipping seance. In Utah, he seeks out religious outlaws who take many wives, suffers in a traditional Navajo sweat lodge and visits a sect where mummification is alive and well.

From the Himalayas to the south of India, the religions of the subcontinent are imbued with mystery. Peter Owen Jones travels the region and takes part in a colorful Durga Puja festival before meeting the Agori who live amongst the dead. In Rajasthan he finds a Hindu sect ready to walk on fire or even die for their gurus and then encounters a dung-slinging festival - with inevitable results.

This exploration of world faiths takes a bizarre turn in Latin America. Peter Owen Jones smokes cigars with Saint Death in Mexico, meets a terrifying underworld god in a Bolivian mine and takes a mind-expanding natural hallucinogen in the forests of Brazil. And Peter's further disturbed at a UFO-worshipping community, where he encounters a dark and frightening presence from the spirit world.

Rather than being comforted by the familiar, Peter Owen Jones unearths surprising and shocking rituals in his home continent, Europe. He witnesses huge underground New Age temples in Italy, shamans in Norway, and Europe's only Buddhist republic.