Everyman

The first of ten programmes. Luis Palau is an Argentinian evangelist. He's been called 'the new Billy Graham'. Over the past 17 years he has preached to five million people in 37 countries. Now he's arrived in Britain, and this coming June he'll be trying to save souls at the Queen's Park Rangers Stadium, west London, every night for a month. His message is uncompromising: he believes the many compromises the churches have made in recent times to arrest their decline have only accelerated it. His evidence? The thousands who have flocked to the more basic 'evangelical' Christianity that he - and other similar preachers - have offered over the past few years. But does this kind of fundamentalist Christianity really make sense in the 20th century? Can we still believe in the narrow path to Heaven, the broad highway to Hell? In this film Peter France follows Luis Palau through one of his big warm-up meetings at Wembley, examining his message and talking to those who claim it has changed th

The quest for immortality is mankind's oldest dream. Now some scientists believe they are close to understanding why we grow old, and how to slow, or even stop the ageing process. In America this research has spawned the Life Extension movement, whose members follow special diets and consume large quantities of anti-ageing drugs in the hope of living for a very, very long time. Everyman has been to America to film the leaders of the Life Extension movement and to examine the scientific evidence behind their claims. What would be the effect on our lives if we could greatly extend the human lifespan? Is Life Extension an admirable dream coming true -or is it a nightmarish attempt to escape the reality that has always called forth the best in mankind?

In the West, when someone reaches the age of retirement, the hope is for prosperity and comfort, perhaps a bungalow by the sea, carefully-tended roses and a grandchild or two dangling on the knee. A life in which the fruits of past labour can be savoured. But for a devout Hindu in India, the 'fourth stage' is very different. The highest ideal is not to savour the pleasures of life, but to renounce them: leaving behind family, friends and all worldly possessions to become a wandering monk.

The missionary had as much influence on the British Empire as the politician and the soldier; his achievements may well prove more durable. Today, as a result of his success, the great majority of practising Anglicans are black - they are Africans, Indians and West Indians, spread across six continents. Over the last 30 years this challenge - of a multi-racial English church - has come home. How has the Church, so successful at foreign missionary work, reacted to it? Using little-known archive footage, this film traces the story of black Christians and the Church in Britain.

The words 'Maronite' and 'Druze' have become familiar terms in Lebanon's confused carnage, but who are they, and what are they fighting for? In the first of two films, Everyman goes to the Lebanon to explore the underlying beliefs, emotions and antagonisms that fuel Christian and Islamic passions and have caused their warlords and their widows to dominate the world's headlines.

Forces, and Catholic theology student. Since the days of the Crusaders, the Maronites of Lebanon have fought the Christian fight in the Middle East against militant Islam. Today, Western powers again find themselves entangled in the future of this tiny Orthodox Catholic faith, although with considerably more reluctance than Richard the Lionheart. But if Kalashnikovs have replaced sabres and howitzers replaced lances, has the struggle itself changed? How much longer can the warlords defend their faith, while the widows continue to grieve?

Ours is the first era in human history in which man is capable of ending human history. Faced with this ultimate absurdity of technological progress, many have begun to search for new spiritual understandings. In doing so they have popularised a variety of interests - dowsing, leylines, earth zodiacs and many others. Yet many such 'New Age' beliefs are based on ancient wisdoms, buried in our own past. Everyman.travels to a centre of pagan and New Age beliefs in this country - Glastonbury - and examines these wisdoms. What do they really offer us - harmless eccentricity, or an alternative spirituality with which to defuse a dangerous future?

A portrait of Arthur Koestler written and presented by Brian Inghs 'I wish my friends to know that I am leaving their company in a peaceful frame of mind, with some timid hopes for a depersonalised after-life ... beyond our comprehension. This "oceanic feeling" has often sustained me at difficult moments, and does so now'. A year ago one of the great writers of our time - ARTHUR KOESTLER - committed suicide in a pact with his wife Cynthia. This was the end of an adventurous life, in which he took up many of the challenges of our century: he was a Zionist pioneer in Palestine, then a Communist agent; he was sentenced to death in Franco's Spain, and only just escaped the Nazis. He was never satisfied for long with the easy answers offered by dogmatic faiths - in politics, religion or science. BRIAN INGLIS , writer and friend of Koestler, traces his life's journey and explains why he believes it is of vital significance to us all.

In 1984 both Amnesty International and the British Council of Churches are to mount major campaigns highlighting what they call a world-wide 'epidemic' of torture. This film uses both drama and documentary techniques to tell the story of Michalis Petrou , one of the chief torturers of the Greek Colonels' regime (1967-1974). Petrou is probably unique in film history: in this programme he explains how he became a torturer, and admits how far he was prepared to go in tormenting fellow humans to serve a political system. The film shows how Petrou was trained, and also includes interviews with some of his victims. Yet it is not just about what happened in Greece during a certain period in its history. It is an account of the training that could make a torturer of the ordinary young man anywhere - even your neighbour's son.

How did the universe begin? According to Genesis, God created the world in six days. According to science, the universe was born about 15 billion years ago in a moment of cataclysmic creation -the big bang. But this theory leaves open the question: how did the bang happen in the first place? It is here that science has seemed to leave room for God - at least in the role of lighting the blue touch paper. But very recently some scientists have claimed that they can answer the ultimate question - how the universe appeared all on its own, out of nothing. Is this true? And what would be the implications if it is? In this film Everyman uses advanced computer graphics to explain the latest developments in the scientific understanding of the creation, and talks to leading scientists, both religious and atheist, about the consequences of these developments for belief in God.

E. R. Sethuram is a successful newspaper editor in southern India. Approaching retirement, he is more and more attracted by the Hindu tradition of 'Sannyas' - renouncing the pleasures of life, leaving behind family, friends and all worldly possessions, to become a wandering monk. But how will his family react? And does he really want to embrace poverty and anonymity? Everyman follows Sethuram as he wrestles with his decision, from his home in Bangalore, via a remote monastery in the hills, to the banks of the Ganges. 'In India, old age has always been a time for spiritual journeys. Not a time for just ruminating on the past, but something more challenging - new beginning.'

The Iranian Revolution was one of the most important world events in recent decades. It radically shifted the balance of power in the Persian Gulf, and it has acted as a focus for a resurgence of confidence throughout the vast Islamic world. Yet the causes, meaning and basic facts of the situation in Iran remain largely unknown to outsiders. In two films Everyman shows scenes from all levels of Iranian society, and gives a unique insight into the state of Iran today. In this, the first part, an examination of the religious beliefs that inspired the revolution -and still sustain it.

From the outside the one thing that seems clear about Iran's Islamic Revolution is that people have died in their thousands, both for and through it. This programme concentrates on one Iranian family - the Afrasaibis - who have lost four sons since the revolution, and one of whose surviving sons is a revolutionary guard.

God's call to the priesthood can come at any time, insists Andrew, whose own call came when he was six. He went to Upholland College last year at the age of 11. Upholland is the Roman Catholic Church's last remaining junior seminary in England and Wales. Its aim is to train schoolboys for the priesthood. But many Catholics feel that a vocation should be tested in the family and in the parish, and that Upholland is a relic of the past. So is it an institution for brainwashing idealistic teenagers, or is it a place where a responsible decision for or against the priesthood can be made?

A woman's husband has been missing for over a year; an actor faces a law suit which could ruin his career; a maharajah wants to purchase a new car; a rickshaw driver has a row with his child who tries to kill himself; a girl's engagement is suddenly broken off. In times of crisis these people have one thing in common: they turn to their astrologer. Following them through the bustling alleyways of Benares in India, Everyman explores their problems and their search for a solution. Today in the West astrology as a major influence is virtually dead, but in India most people still consult an astrologer before taking vital decisions - after Mrs Gandhi 's assassination many Indian astrologers claimed to have predicted the event. By looking at the part astrology still plays in India today one can catch a glimpse of the crucial role it has played in civilisations throughout the world, for thousands of years.

When Adolf Hitler came to power he seemed to millions of Germans the answer to prayer. And from the first he played on these longings, presenting Nazism as a religion, with himself as Messiah. But the religion of Nazism had to compete with another, older faith - Christianity. Fifty years ago this week the Nazis took their first legal step against Christianity, passing the so-called Conspiracy Law, which was used to suppress Christian activities. In this film, made by a young German director, Everyman examines the response of contemporary Christian writers and poets to the dilemma posed by organised evil - how far should one submit to Caesar, how far to God?