If you are a federal employee, you might notice more religious conversations at work. That's because these discussions are now sanctioned by the government. The Trump administration has announced new guidance for religious tolerance in federal workplaces as part of what it calls an effort to stop religious persecution at job sites. The guidance dictates a series of religious actions that should be allowed without any discipline occurring, and it marks the latest attempt by the White House to increase the role of religion in daily life.

What does this new guidance allow?
The new guidance was established in a memo from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management (OPM), which runs the country's federal civil services. It provides a guideline for "protecting and enforcing each federal employee's right to engage in religious expression in the federal workplace," said the memo. 

The most notable part of the memo is guidance for religious talk and proselytizing at work. Federal employees "may engage in conversations regarding religious topics with fellow employees, including attempting to persuade others of the correctness of their own religious views." These employees can also "encourage others to participate in religious expressions of faith, such as prayer, to the same extent that they would be permitted to encourage co-workers to participate in other personal activities."

What has the response been?
While the OPM has provided religious guidance in prior presidential administrations, the Trump memo "presents a substantial shift in that it encourages employees to express their religious beliefs in the workplace," Stefanie Camfield, the associate general counsel and director of human resource services at Engage PEO, said to The Washington Post. 

The types of conversations around religion "have a way of turning into arguments," Camfield said to the Post. Sometimes, this "leads to outright hostility, which makes it more likely that an employee will feel singled out and discriminated against for their beliefs."

Critics of the White House have "accused the Trump administration of pursuing policies that corrode the separation of church and state in the U.S. while elevating Christianity over other religions," said Al Jazeera. Trump has also signed an executive order aimed at "eradicating anti-Christian bias."

China has begun construction on the world's largest hydropower dam — a project so massive that Premier Li Qiang has called it the "project of the century." But the dam could also create a big problem for China's next-door neighbor India.

The Motuo Hydropower Station on the Yarlung Tsangpo River in Tibet could eventually "generate three times more energy" than current champion Three Gorges Dam, said the BBC. But the $167 billion project has "attracted criticism" because of its potential to affect "millions of Indians and Bangladeshis" living downstream who rely on the waterway for irrigation, hydropower and drinking water. 

The new dam is an "existential threat" to India, said Pema Khandu, the chief minister of the state of Arunachal Pradesh. China could use the hydropower station "as a sort of 'water bomb.'" 

What did the commentators say?
China's "megadam" project could "reshape Asia," said Riley Callanan at GZERO. The hydropower station is expected to produce 60 gigawatts of electricity, "10 times as much" as the Grand Coulee Dam in Washington state. That could "stimulate the Chinese economy." 

The danger is that the project will spark a water arms race of sorts, with China and India engaging in "competitive dam-building throughout the Himalayas." And it would not be the first time that water has been weaponized. India suspended a decades-old water-sharing treaty with Pakistan during armed skirmishes in May. So the new dam adds "another layer of complexity" to the relationships between regional "neighbors competing for the same resources."

The dam is "less a beacon of progress" and more a "harbinger of cascading crises," said Khedroob Thondup at The Sunday Guardian in India. And the dangers are more than geopolitical. The dam is located in one of the "most seismically active zones on Earth," not far from the location of the 1950 Assam-Tibet earthquake that killed an estimated 4,800 people. So while China's "pursuit of renewable energy is commendable," the world's climate future should not be "built on fault lines, literal and political." 

What next?
India may start its own dam-building, said Bloomberg. Officials are "working with local communities to build support" for a new dam downstream of the Tibet project. China has "already started their dam construction, and we cannot sit idle," said Ojing Tasing, a minister in the state government.