Following Friday’s news that a Maryland judge dismissed most of the civil lawsuit against Sovereign Grace Ministries (SGM), attorney Susan Burke promised to appeal the dismissal.

“We (the victims and the lawyers) all knew about the statute issue at the outset,” Burke said in a statement posted at The Wartburg Watch, a site critical of SGM. Maryland’s statute of limitations requires that victims file their lawsuits within three years of turning 18. “But fighting for justice means doing so even against known obstacles. We had a conspiracy theory to overcome the statute, but the court rejected it. … [W]e think the court erred, and will be appealing her ruling.”

Update (May 21): Houston-area Methodist minister Josh Hale has written a blog post clarifying some of the ageism claims regarding the Texas Conference's proposed changes for the age of clergy.
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The overall average age of retirement is creeping slowly upward, but one regional United Methodist conference is promoting changes that would limit ordination opportunities for anyone over the age of 45.

An examination of church attenders who regularly tithe reveals some interesting facts about their financial health.

The head pastor of one of America's "10 healthiest churches" has resigned after confessing that he committed adultery three years ago.

David Loveless, head pastor of Discovery Church, relinquished his pastoral duties at the Orlando megachurch this month, according to the Orlando Sentinel.

Editor's note: President Barack Obama recently proclaimed May 2013 as National Mental Health Awareness Month.

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (RNS) -- Frank Page, former president of the Southern Baptist Convention, was getting ready to work in the yard in the fall of 2009 when the phone rang. His daughter was on the line.

Daddy, I love you, she said. Tell Mama and the girls I love them, too.

Then she was gone.

Melissa Page Strange, 32, took her own life just after hanging up the phone with her dad.

“I do not want you to imagine what that is like,” Page said.

For years, Page did not share the painful details of Melissa’s death, fearing that some Christians might speak ill of her if they knew. Mental illness and suicide were taboo topics for many churches, seen as a kind of spiritual failure.

But that may be starting to change.

Editor's note: This post has been updated.

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (RNS) Most songwriters in Nashville want to get their songs on the radio. Keith and Kristyn Getty hope their songs end up in dusty old hymnbooks.

The Gettys, originally from Belfast, Ireland, hope to revive the art of hymn writing at a time when the most popular new church songs are written for rock bands rather than choirs.

They’ve had surprising success.

Update (April 16): Adventist Review reports that Adventist General Conference president Ted N.C. Wilson, told the church members gathered to celebrate the denomination's 150th anniversary that it is a "very sad" anniversary.

“We should have been home by now!" Wilson said. "The Lord has wanted to come long before this. Why celebrate any more anniversaries when we could be in heaven?”
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(RNS) Over the past 150 years, Seventh-day Adventists have built one of Christianity’s most inventive and prosperous churches, all the while praying for the world to end as soon as possible.

Sunday used to be a day reserved by many Christians for attending worship services, but new research indicates the extent to which American churches today are competing against myriad other activities.

The biggest competition? Children's sports.

Approximately 700 former employees of a Catholic-affiliated hospital in New Jersey will continue to receive pension funds, thanks to an unprecedented decision by the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) this week.

Recent research show signs of re-evangelization in New England, America's least religious region.

The majority of U.S. congregations reported increased giving throughout the economic recession, according to a new report from the Indiana University School of Philanthropy. But it's not all good news: Most congregations also reported significant spending increases—and less than half said their revenue kept up with inflation.

More than one-third of Americans say they feel "very connected" to their local church or religious institution, according to a new survey from Rasmussen Reports.

An Assemblies of God church in Indiana recently invited four of its former pastors to return so that the congregation could repent of gossip and other mistreatment that drove the leaders away.

One of America's largest megachurches brings in millions of dollars per year but is facing multiple foreclosure cases.

Living Word Christian Center in Forest Park, Illinois, is known for preaching prosperity, but the suburban megachurch's inner-city bank has failed to become an example.

A new study by Grey Matter Research suggests that both churchgoers and the unchurched largely agree on whether or not Protestant churches should reference their denominational affiliation in their names.

Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) pastors may have a place prepared for them in heaven, but many may not be prepared to vacate their earthly estates quite yet.

(RNS) Atlanta megachurch pastor Bishop Eddie Long is facing a suit from former parishioners who say he encouraged them to invest in a company that was operating an alleged Ponzi scheme.

Twitter buzzed last week with proclamations of Lenten sacrifices, alongside plenty of jokes about what to give up for the 40 days of penance leading up to Easter.

Here's a look at this year's official Top 100, compiled by Stephen Smith of OpenBible.info.

Update (Feb. 19): LCMS president Matthew C. Harrison and Newtown pastor Rob Morris have issued a joint statement of unity:

"By the grace of God, we have worked through a very challenging situation. It has been our deepest mutual concern in dealing with one another to be faithful to Christ, our respective vocations, and to each other as brothers. Our dealings have been marked throughout with patience, kindness, and love. We implore the church to do likewise.

We have mutually forgiven each other where we have fallen short.

We are reconciled.

We are at peace."

(RNS) After causing a "debacle" by asking a local reverend to apologize after praying at an interfaith vigil for victims of the Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre in Newtown, Conn., Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod (LCMS) president Matthew Harrison has sparked a media firestorm with charges that the 2.4 million-member denomination was intolerant, insensitive, or both.

New data from the North American Mission Board (NAMB) indicates that almost 20 percent of congregations in the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) now identify as non-Anglo.

Update (Feb. 5): Our sister blog Managing Your Church has a lengthy interview with Carl Chinn, in which he explains his findings as well as possible solutions churches can pursue.

Update (Feb. 1): ABP has a nice look at how churches are balancing security with ministry post-Sandy Hook.

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Amid national debate over gun control reform, new data from church violence researcher Carl Chinn shows that 75 deaths from attacks at faith-based organizations occurred in 2012—a 36 percent increase over the previous year.

The notion of Sunday mornings being "the most-segregated hour in America" may be longstanding. But recent studies took this idea further and examined how those who attend church most often are least likely to ever have dated or married someone from another race.

Except for one Christian denomination.

Updated (Mar. 7): Associated Press reports that a federal lawsuit filed by Episcopal bishop Charles vonRosenberg, the newly elected bishop of the Diocese of South Carolina, is asking the court to "declare he is the only bishop with authority to act in name of the Diocese of South Carolina."

The suit asks for "a preliminary injunction to stop Mark Lawrence from using the name and marks of the Episcopal Diocese of South Carolina and from representing that his activities are associated with the diocese."
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Updated (Jan. 23): A circuit court judge has granted a temporary restraining order "that prevents The Episcopal Church (TEC) ... from assuming the identity of the Diocese of South Carolina" until a hearing February 1, according to a press release. Full text at bottom of this post.

The diocese reports that 44 of its 71 parishes and missions support its cause, while 16 support TEC and 11 remain undecided.

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Update: George Conger offers a helpful explanation of this interesting development among Anglican church splits, as the Diocese of South Carolina sues The Episcopal Church for, more or less, identity theft. (The diocese formed in 1785, whereas the national denomination formed in 1789; however, the court must assess whether this fact supersedes the denomination's 1979 "Dennis Canon," which says a parish holds its property in trust for the diocese and national denomination.)

Following the Episcopal Diocese of South Carolina's decision to disassociate from The Episcopal Church (TEC) this past October, the diocese—along with 17 local parishes—has now filed a lawsuit against TEC "to protect the Diocese’s real and personal property and that of its parishes."

Who do people regard as the most honest and ethical person in their lives? New data from Gallup indicates that, for most Americans, the answer is not a pastor or clergyman; it's a nurse or pharmacist.

In a recent ruling, the highest court of the United Methodist Church (UMC) ruled against a plan to end tenure for the denomination's 31,000 ordained clergy.

Chuck Smith's Calvary Chapel movement—which faced a day of reckoning and uncertain future in 2007 over concerns about lax moral standards among its leaders—is making headlines once again.

It's not often that a father will sue his own son. But Bob Grenier, pastor of Visalia Calvary Church, says he is tired of his estranged son Alex Grenier's "cyberbullying campaign" against his parents and their church—so the elder Grenier is pressing charges to make his son stop.

In the 16th century, Switzerland's Geneva played host to reformed theologian John Calvin, whose strong following helped the city earn a reputation as the "Protestant Rome." But that was then; this is now—and now Reformed Christians may be abandoning the city due to high operational costs.

The Executive Committee of the World Communion of Reformed Churches (WCRC) announced its decision to relocate from Geneva to Hanover, Germany, by December 2013, citing the high value of the Swiss franc.

Leaders of the Seventh-day Adventist Church on Tuesday (Oct. 16) said recent decisions by two regional bodies to allow ordained female pastors were "serious mistakes," and women who are ordained won't be recognized--at least for now.

"They directly challenge two world Church decisions on the matter of ordination," reads a statement, passed by a 264-25 vote during the Annual Council meeting in Silver Spring, Md. "They create doubts about the importance of collective decision-making as a basic feature of denominational life."

A new survey from LifeWay Research indicates that the vast majority of Southern Baptist pastors observe communion in ways that violate their denomination's guiding faith statement.

Canadian churches in Toronto may face eviction if they fail to pay increased rent to the Toronto District School Board (TDSB) -- even as those payments increase up to 800 percent.

The TDSB announced on August 29 that churches renting space in public schools would no longer qualify for reduced rental rates. Other nonprofits still qualify for subsidized rent, but churches have been removed as the school district seeks to close a sizable budget gap.

Churches have scrambled to determine their options. In some cases, the recent change will result in rent increases of up to 800 percent.

Many people appear to be confused about what it means to be members in their churches -- that is, if they know their church offers membership at all.

A new study from Grey Matter Research indicates that 33 percent of worshipers surveyed believe their church does not offer any sort of membership, while 19 percent said they were not sure. This means that less than half of respondents know about membership offerings in their church.

The United Kingdom has denied entry to Canadian "punching preacher" Todd Bentley, banning him from attending several revival meetings in England, Wales, and Northern Ireland.

After hearing reports that Bentley planned to preach at Portadown Christian Centre in County Armagh next month, U.K. officials said Bentley was "subject to an exclusion order" and would be refused access to the country because his shows are "not conducive to the public good." Bentley, a Canadian citizen with ministry ties to Lakeland, Florida, uses controversial "means of physical force," including choking, kicking and punching, to heal people.

Canada’s largest Protestant church elected its first openly gay moderator at its 41st General Council on Thursday.

After nearly eight hours of voting, the 350 members of the United Church of Canada selected Gary Paterson from a pool of 15 nominees, including three other openly gay candidates. When Paterson begins his three-year term as moderator on Aug. 18, he will become the first openly gay leader of a Christian denomination.

Today’s budding pastors and theologians are entering and exiting seminary with more debt than ever before, according to new research from The Center for the Study of Theological Education at Auburn Theological Seminary.

Auburn research reveals the number of master of divinity graduates who borrow money is surging, as well as the total size of their loans. Debts of $30,000 to $80,000 are now common — with little hope of a high-wage job to repay them, given that Department of Labor statistics estimated a clergyman’s average yearly wage to be about $44,140 last year.

An Oregon church may be penalized by its insurance carrier for being open about having sex offenders in its congregation.

According to Chad McComas, founding pastor of Set Free Christian Fellowship in Medford, the church's insurance carrier, Church Mutual, sent him a letter May 1 with several requirements: first, that he fully disclose the identity of sex offenders to the approximately 100-member congregation; second, that offenders be allowed to attend only one predetermined service; and last, that offenders be required to have an escort.

The proposed requirements may lead to the end of a church founded in 1997 that reaches out to a variety of individuals, including those struggling with addictive backgrounds.

"That's part of who we serve. But that's not all of who we serve," McComas told the Mail Tribune in June. "We know who our members are. We are being careful and diligent. But how often are we going to have to tell the congregation that someone is a sex offender? The congregation changes all the time."

Church Mutual provides coverage for more than 100,000 religious organizations and has covered nearly 5,000 sex-related claims since 1984. Patrick Moreland, vice president of marketing at Church Mutual, says the company’s number one priority is to protect churches and potential victims (i.e., children).

Some believe these restrictions would do more harm than good in a congregation dedicated to healing and fostering authentic community. Pam Shepherd, pastor of the First Congregational United Church of Christ in Ashland, told the San Francisco Chronicle about the importance of running background checks on all Bible school teachers, youth ministers, and others who deal with minors. Though no one in her congregation has disclosed any sex crimes, she said, “if all sex offenders glowed orange, people might be surprised to see who they are sitting next to.”

Christianity Today has surveyed and analyzed how churches today are ministering to “society’s most despised”; examined the pastoral and legal need to balance grace and accountability with sex offenders; reported how a Florida ministry's misstep illustrates the difficulty of outreach to despised groups; and noted the insurance complications when churches house congregants or leaders with criminal backgrounds.

Anthony and Harriet Jinwright, former co-pastors of Greater Salem Church in Charlotte, North Carolina, have returned to prison following an appeals court’s affirmation of a lower court ruling against them in December 2010 for failing to report nearly $2.5 million in taxable income between 2001 and 2007.

“To allow the most clever, inventive, and sophisticated wrongdoers to hide behind a constant and conscious purpose of avoiding knowledge of criminal misconduct would be an injustice in its own right,” the appeals court wrote in its decision last week.

The Jinwrights were convicted of tax evasion in May 2010 following a four-week trial that involved the admission of over 90,000 pages of documentary evidence and the testimonies of more than 70 witnesses, according to the Evangelical Council for Financial Accountability. A majority of the witnesses claimed that Greater Salem “spent lavishly to support the Jinwrights, paying for costs such as luxury cars, vacations, and college tuition for the couple’s daughter,” reports the Charlotte Observer.

In their appeal, the couple argued they did not plan to intentionally defraud the government, as they considered most of their financial gains to be “love offerings” and “gifts” instead of income. The appeal was rejected on all points last week by the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals.

The couple will continue to serve out their sentences in prison, as well as attempt to pay a seven-figure restitution to the federal government.

CT has reported on the confusion over whether love offerings given to pastors are always taxable income.

Update (May 14): City Harvest Church has announced that two suspension orders against Ho Yeow Sun, wife of pastor Kong Hee, have been lifted. According to a statement from the church, "Sun is once again able to exercise her executive powers for City Harvest Church. She is once again an Executive member of the church she co-founded."

The Singapore Commissioner of Charities (COC) also has given the church two extra months to submit representation for eight other City Harvest executive leaders in COC's proposal to remove them from their church roles.

Meanwhile, the corruption trial over whether church leaders inappropriately used building funds to support Ho Yeow Sun's pop music career has begun.

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Update (May 13, 2013): Wednesday will mark the beginning of the trial against six leaders of City Harvest Church, all of whom are accused of embezzling church funds.

According to a statement from the church, at least five church leaders have consented to step down from their leadership roles while the trial takes place. The statement says that Singapore's Commissioner of Charities will permanently remove a total of eight suspended leaders if they do not step down themselves.
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In response to recent allegations, City Harvest Executive Pastor Aries Zulkarnain said in a statement Thursday that the church stands with its accused leaders.

“The people currently in the news are our pastors and trusted staff and leaders who have always put God and CHC first,” Zulkarnain stated. “As a church we stand with them, and I believe fully in their integrity. Pastor Kong is still our Senior Pastor."

Zulkarnain also responded to the charges directly, denying any foul play with funds.

"It has been suggested that the church has been cheated of $50 million. This is not accurate,” Zulkarnain said. “The $24 million, which went to investment bonds, was returned to the church in full, with interest. The church did not lose any funds in the relevant transactions, and no personal profit was gained by the individuals concerned.”

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Singapore's charities commissioner has charged the founder of a 30,000-member megachurch with diverting US$18 million in church funds in order to support the ministry-related singing career of his wife.

City Harvest Church founder Kong Hee, along with four other church leaders, was arrested and charged this week with "conspiracy to commit criminal breach of trust." This is the biggest case involving misconduct at a registered charity in Singapore, according to Singapore Press Holdings' AsiaOne website.

Kong and his wife, Ho Yeow Sun (popularly known as Sun Ho), launched the "Crossover Project" in 2002 to use her secular music as outreach to non-Christians. Allegations that the church was funding her music career first surfaced in 2003, but the church denied it.

The Commissioner of Charities accuses Kong of siphoning off funds to the Crossover Project under the guise of contributions to a sister church in Kuala Lumpur, among other methods.

“These funds were used with the purported intention to finance Ho Yeow Sun’s secular music career to connect with people,” stated the Commissioner of Charities, according to the Wall Street Journal. “There was a concerted effort to conceal this movement of funds from its stakeholders.”

City Harvest posted a statement saying that no charges exist against the church itself and that regular worship activities will take place.

CT has interviewed Singapore theologians on how Asia's religious pluralism can help American Christians respond to relativism, how "missional theology" has not gone far enough, and how to stop cultural drift within the evangelical movement.

NEW ORLEANS (RNS)

Pointing heavenward and wiping away tears, the Rev. Fred Luter was elected Tuesday (June 19) as the first black president of the predominantly white Southern Baptist Convention.

“To God be the glory for the things that he has done,” Luter said moments after more than 7,000 Southern Baptists leapt to their feet, cheered and shouted “Hallelujah” when he was declared their next leader.

Luter, 55, a former street preacher who brought his mostly black New Orleans congregation back from near annihilation after Hurricane Katrina in 2005, will lead the nation’s largest Protestant denomination for at least a year when the two-day meeting ends Wednesday. Most Southern Baptist presidents traditionally serve two one-year terms.

Rather than rally behind a traditional white conservative candidate, white Southern Baptists leaders had urged the nomination and election of Luter for more than a year. Many said it was long time for such a move for a denomination that was born in 1845 in a defense of slavery.

“We have the opportunity to make history, to show a watching world the truth about our savior and ourselves,” the Rev. David Crosby, pastor of the mostly white First Baptist Church of New Orleans, said in his nomination of Luter on Tuesday. “Let’s give our ballots a voice and shout out to the world -- Jesus is Lord! This is our president! We are Southern Baptists!”

Crosby’s church, which sustained less damage after Katrina, shared space with Luter’s remaining congregants after the hurricane.

Members of black Southern Baptist churches – which make up about 8 percent of some the SBC's 45,000 congregations – have hailed the expected election. Some said they were shocked and never thought they’d live to see such an occurrence.

Black Southern Baptists have attended the annual meetings in limited numbers and some have complained when they seldom saw people who look like them speaking from the convention platform. This year, more attended than usual and ushers came from Luter’s Franklin Avenue Baptist Church.

In the months before the election, SBC ethicist Richard Land was embroiled in controversy for saying President Obama and civil rights leaders had exploited the case of Trayvon Martin, the unarmed Florida teen who was killed by a neighborhood watch volunteer. Land, who was reprimanded and lost his radio talk show as a result of the racial tension his remarks caused, was among those immediately cheering Luter’s election.

“Today was as truly a historic moment as Southern Baptist life will ever experience,” said Land, who helped craft the denomination's 1995 statement apologizing for the "deplorable sin" of racism. “Praise God for his redeeming grace.”

Many said before his election that Luter deserved to be elected not because he is black but because of his commitment to the denomination, preaching skills and success in rebuilding his church into one of the largest in Louisiana. A recent survey by the SBC’s LifeWay Research found that the majority of Southern Baptist pastors were ready for a black president.

Luter closed out the annual pastors’ conference on the eve of the Southern Baptist meeting, and had the audience on its feet as he waved his Bible in a fervent sermon.

“Only the Word of God can change the heart of a racist; only the Word of God can change the desire of a child molester,” he preached. “The Word of God can change a lifestyle of a homosexual. The Word of God is the only hope for America today.”

On Monday, at the conclusion of the SBC’s National African American Fellowship business meeting, the group’s president reminded members to be sure they had their packet of ballots with them for Tuesday’s vote.

“If you never cast a vote before, you need to cast this one,” the Rev. James Dixon urged, drawing laughter and an “Amen.” “If you need a class on it, we will teach you how to do it.”

Dixon said “we’ve been working on this for years,” making sure that African-Americans were considered for elective office, but noted that white leaders made an unusually hefty push for Luter. “In reality, that’s where it needed to come from,” he said.

Anticipation of the vote continued as the meeting opened. “We cannot undo our past, but here in New Orleans you can show the world we are redoing our future,” said Chuck Kelley Jr., president of New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary.

Many have tied Luter’s election to the need for greater evangelism among racial and ethnic minorities as the denomination suffered its fifth consecutive year of membership decline.

Prior to the election, outgoing SBC President Bryant Wright cautioned in his farewell address that Southern Baptists should not get sidetracked in their evangelism efforts by debates over “finer points” of theology.

“If we pride ourselves more on being a traditional Southern Baptist or more on being a Calvinist or a Reformed theologian more than we are thankful that we are Christ-centered and biblically based and known by our fellow man that way,” Wright warned, “then it is time to repent of theological idolatry."

By Adelle Banks - RNS

As Southern Baptists prepare for next week’s annual meeting, LifeWay’s Annual Church Profile indicates that though membership continues to slide and baptisms and churches barely increased, giving saw strong growth.

For the fifth straight year, total membership in the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) declined. Membership fell nearly one percentage point to just less than 16 million members. Baptisms and the number of churches rose slightly—by 0.70 percent and 0.08 percent, respectively. Baptisms hit a 60-year low for the denomination, though still totaled more than 330,000. The denomination planted almost 1,000 new churches, of which 50 percent were non-Anglo; however, the net gain of 37 churches was one of the lowest totals in 40 years.

Meanwhile, SBC members gave $1.33 billion last year, a $26.2 million increase from 2010. That news comes on the heels of a report from the SBC’s International Mission Board, which stated that $146.8 million was donated to the annual Lottie Moon Christmas Offering for International Missions—the fourth-highest total since the offering began 123 years ago (though it was still short of the $175 million goal). The offering helps support nearly 5,000 missionaries worldwide.

LifeWay’s Annual Church Profile follows last week’s report that more than half of SBC pastors do not plan to use the informal name recommended in February by a task force that analyzed a possible name change for the convention.

The task force, established by SBC president Bryant Wright, suggested that the SBC keep its legal name but use "Great Commission Baptists" as an informal option for those who want to use it. Wright set up the task force last fall over concerns that the term “Southern Baptist” was too regional and could potentially impede the convention’s growth.

LifeWay’s report indicated that more than 70 percent of pastors thought the “Southern Baptist Convention” name should continue to be used, though 40 percent of pastors said they haven’t discussed or decided on the issue yet.

SBC messengers will consider the task force’s recommendation during the annual meeting in New Orleans next week. Other proposed resolutions (that have been floated in Baptist media but not confirmed by the resolution committee) include affirming the use of a sinner’s prayer as a “biblically sound” part of evangelism and rejecting the idea that same-sex marriage is a civil rights issue (disagreeing that sexuality and race are equal characteristics).

As the Internet prepares for its biggest-ever expansion of domain names, more than a dozen potential domains revealed this week have religious connections.

On Wednesday, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) posted a list of the nearly 2,000 domain names for which various groups have applied. The new domains would open up website address endings beyond today's common ones such as .com and .net.

At a cost of $185,000 per domain application, many of the applicants were big corporations among the likes of Apple and Microsoft; some, including Amazon and Google, applied for multiple domain names.

But groups like the American Bible Society, the Christian Broadcasting Network, and the Vatican’s Pontifical Council for Social Communications have also paid the fee and applied for domain names (.bible, .cbn, and .catholic, respectively). The Catholic Church additionally applied for the equivalent of .catholic in Arabic, Chinese, and Cyrillic.

Other religiously-affiliated domain names include .christmas, .halal, .islam, .mormon, and .kosher. Three separate groups applied for the domain name .yoga, and two for .church: Holly Fields, LLC and LifeChurch.tv (the group behind the YouVersion Bible app).

Bobby Gruenewald, innovation leader at LifeChurch, told USA Today that LifeChurch’s goal isn’t to profit from its control of the domain fees, but to make online outreach easier—for all groups of similar religious beliefs.

“We’re not trying to define beliefs or doctrine that people would have to agree upon,” Gruenewald said. “This is not an effort to make it exclusive to any type of belief.”

At least one other religious applicant plans to be more exclusive with their domain if their application is accepted. Paul Tighe, secretary of the Pontifical Council for Social Communications, told Catholic News Service that the use of .catholic would be limited to groups with formal canonical recognition, such as dioceses, religious orders, or Catholic institutions like universities and hospitals.

“[Controlling the .catholic domain] will be a way to authenticate the Catholic presence online,” Tighe said.

ICANN has opened a 60-day period for comments and objections on the list of domain names. It anticipates ruling on all 1,930 applications over the next year.

Last year, ICANN approved the creation of an .xxx domain. In February, Christianity Today reported that several Christian colleges joined hundreds of organizations in buying .xxx domains to protect their brands.

Update (Jan. 25): The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reports that the assault charge against Creflo Dollar has been dismissed in return for the pastor completing a program that required him to "enroll an anger management program, report to a probation officer and pay $1,072 in court fees."

Update (April 9): PBS' Religion and Ethics Newsweekly is spotlighting Twitter's faith-outreach efforts. The show notes a recent meeting between top Twitter social innovation strategist Claire Diaz-Ortiz, former White House Office of Faith-based and Neighborhood Partnerships executive director Joshua DuBois, and D.C.-based National Community Church pastor Mark Batterson.

CT previously reported on Twitter's effort to reach out to Christian leaders at the Catalyst conference in 2011.
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A California satellite campus of Mark Driscoll's Seattle megachurch has run afoul of city officials for violating zoning laws.

Mars Hill Orange County meets on Sunday mornings in a concert venue, but Santa Ana officials say the 600-member church must move to a zoning district that allows churches. Driscoll says Mars Hill is investigating whether "we are just getting bullied by a political discriminatory agenda against Christianity and the church," while Santa Ana, noting that two-thirds of its zoning districts allow churches, says Mars Hill Orange County "need[s] to comply with the same rules to which all other churches abide," according to the Christian Post.

CT has reported on the recent trend of multisite churches crossing state lines, as well as a Mars Hill satellite logo dispute and whether churches should trademark their names and logos. CT has also profiled Driscoll's rise to celebrity status.

CT has also reported on the recent increase in church-city zoning battles during the recession.

Update (April 10, 2013): A recent schism at Fremont Presbyterian Church in California isn't keeping the two congregations from sharing space. The Sacramento Bee reports that the congregation, which divided between 'traditionalists' and 'progressives' over the issue of gay clergy, "still [shares] sacred spaces at the church site near California State University, Sacramento."
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Two Presbyterian regional bodies recently lost one-third of their members with surprisingly little acrimony compared to many departures by conservative congregations from the Presbyterian Church (USA) and other mainline denominations.

An Oregon woman’s online critiques of her former church could cost her $500,000.

The pastor of Beaverton Grace Bible Church (BGBC) sued Julie Anne Smith, her daughter, and three other former church members for $500,000 in damages, alleging that Smith’s blog, Beaverton Grace Bible Church Survivors, amounts to defamation.

Smith and her family left the church a few years ago and were subsequently shunned by their church friends, she told KATU News.

"If I went to Costco or any place in town, if I ran into somebody, they would turn their heads and walk the other way," she told KATU. "All we did was ask questions. We just raised concerns. There's no sin in that."

Smith posted critical reviews of the church on Google that were later removed. In February, she started her blog, which accuses BGBC of spiritual abuse and its pastor, Charles O’Neal, of “narcissism in the pulpit,” ABC News reported.

Within days of starting the blog, BGBC filed its lawsuit. The suit goes before a judge later this month, though Smith has filed a motion to dismiss it. Her attorney, Linda Williams, told KGW News that it’s rare for cases like this to go to court.

The church has not made a statement regarding the case. On her blog, Smith wrote she has no plans to back down.

“The story of spiritual abuse needs to be told,” she wrote. “People are being hurt emotionally and spiritually by pastors who use bully tactics and we need a place to learn, to talk freely, and to heal. I will not be silenced.”

In 2010, Christianity Today reported a similar legal tussle between a Baptist church in Florida and its online critics.

Sovereign Grace Ministries (SGM), which has weathered controversy over its leadership and discipline practices, will relocate its offices and pastor-training program to Louisville, Kentucky.

Currently based in Gaithersburg, Maryland, SGM cited the economy as the main factor in its decision. It also hopes to expand its Pastors College and collaborate with Louisville-based Southern Baptist Theological Seminary (SBTS).

“In short, our mission is to serve Sovereign Grace churches, and being located in the DC area was placing limitations on our ability to do so,” John Loftness, chairman of the SGM board, said in a statement.

SGM currently has no churches in Kentucky or Indiana, but Loftness said SGM president C. J. Mahaney will plant a church in Louisville. Albert Mohler Jr., president of SBTS, told The Courier-Journal he welcomed the church plant and SGM’s move.

“I think the Sovereign Grace churches are a demonstration of the revitalization of Christianity in the early 21st century,” Mohler said.

Last July, Christianity Today reported that Mahaney was taking a leave of absence after former SGM pastor Brent Detwiler raised concerns about “various expressions of pride, unentreatability, deceit, sinful judgment and hypocrisy" committed by Mahaney.

That month, SGM installed an interim board of directors and established three separate review panels to determine if Mahaney should remain as president. It reinstated Mahaney in January.

Though Loftness asserted in his statement that SGM had been planning the move to Louisville years before last summer’s conflicts, Detwiler told The Courier-Journal SGM was moving because of its “fractured relationships” with Covenant Life Church, SGM’s flagship congregation where its headquarters is currently located.

During its review of Mahaney, SGM enlisted the services of the Ambassadors of Reconciliation (AOR), a Lutheran conflict mediation group. Early last month, AOR released a report of its findings, citing SGM for, among other issues, overemphasizing sin.

“We recommend that Sovereign Grace Ministries intentionally develop a culture of proclaiming God’s forgiveness to those who express repentance or confess their sins,” AOR said in its report.

In response to the AOR’s recommendations, SGM’s Board of Directors released a statement pledging to “commit by God’s grace to correct the failures identified in this report and to do all in our power to shepherd the precious people of God with grace, patience, humility, and love.”

A Kentucky jury found a church liable for the death of a boy killed in 2009 after a youth minister let the boy drive his vehicle, and awarded more than $2 million in damages to the boy's parents.

Derek Coulter was a youth minister at Big Springs Assembly of God in 2009 when he let Jamie Mitchell, 13, drive after a camping trip that included 10 youth group members. Mitchell lost control of the vehicle and was killed in the crash.

Coulter initially lied to police and said he had been driving; a passenger later came forward and said Mitchell had been driving. Coulter was later convicted of reckless homicide and sentenced to five years in prison.

Mitchell’s parents, Rebecca Coleman and James Mitchell, sued Coulter and the church, arguing the church was responsible for Coulter’s misconduct. Their lawyers argued that a church has a “sacred duty” to protect children and that Big Springs failed in that duty.

The church (which left the Assemblies of God and is now known as Open Door Christian Center) argued that it was not liable because the trip was not an official church trip, and it could not have predicted Coulter would let Mitchell drive.

The church will consider an appeal, a lawyer for the church told the Louisville-based Courier-Journal. J. Dale Golden said there were “inconsistencies” in the verdict, adding that the jury ruled Coulter wasn’t acting in his role of employment but the church was still negligent in supervising him.

Last year, Christianity Today reported on a “chilling verdict” in a similar case. A Florida jury awarded a $4.75 million judgment against Tampa-based Idlewild Baptist Church after a 14-year-old-boy was severely injured on a church-sponsored ski trip in 2003. The case prompted churches to reassess their risk management policies. The jury's decision was later overturned.

The predominantly white United Methodist Church and five historically black denominations -- after more than a decade of discussions -- have entered a full communion agreement.

With an overwhelming vote on April 30 at the UMC General Conference, the leaders of the denominations agreed to recognize each other’s churches, share sacraments, and affirm their clergy and ministries.

The move comes a dozen years after the UMC held a repentance ceremony and apologized to African-Americans for racist policies that led to the creation of separate African-American churches. Some historic black denominations date to the 1700s, started by founders who no longer wanted to be relegated to the balconies of Methodist congregations.

Despite emotional protests and fierce lobbying, United Methodists voted on May 2 to maintain their denomination’s stance that the practice of homosexuality is “incompatible with Christian teaching.”

Two “agree to disagree” proposals were soundly defeated during separate votes by the nearly 1,000 delegates gathered for the United Methodist Church’s General Conference in Tampa, Fla.

One proposal would have replaced the "incompatible" phrase in the Book of Discipline, which contains the denomination's laws and doctrines. Both proposals sought to soften the disputed doctrine by adding more ambiguous statements about homosexuality.

Advocates for gay clergy and same-sex marriage in the UMC viewed the compromise proposals as the best chance to advance their cause at this year’s General Conference, which convenes every four years. On Friday, delegates are expected to debate the church’s bans on noncelibate gay clergy and same-sex marriage.

In a move that will give bishops more flexibility to remove ineffective pastors, the United Methodist Church voted on Tuesday to end guaranteed clergy appointments.

Clergy appointments have been guaranteed since the 1950s, when they were instituted to protect ministers from discrimination or arbitrary abuse, supporters say. But critics say those original goals have helped mediocre clergy retain their posts. A commission studying the appointments said a more "nimble" process was necessary.

We Chang, a Belmont, Mass., pastor, argued unsuccessfully for the UMC reconsider the issue, United Methodist News Service reported.

"We have just done away with the security of appointment," he said, "that allowed us to have much gender and racial justice in terms of our appointments."

But Ken Carter, a district superintendent from North Carolina, thought the vote should stand and the focus should not be on providing guaranteed appointments.

"We want to place the emphasis on the mission -- making disciples of Jesus of Christ for the transformation of the world," he said.

The Study of Mission Commission recommended the change in policy, as the UMC searches for ways to stanch a decades-long decline in U.S. membership.

"We acknowledge the difficulties associated with this vision such as uncertainty, loss of security, caring for those in employment transitions, concern about episcopal authority, and loss of historic protections," the commission wrote in its report to the General Conference. "We feel strongly, however, that this vision is critical for the fulfillment of the church's mission."

Richard Land’s recent comments regarding the killing of Trayvon Martin have given the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) a PR headache months before likely electing its first African American president. Now the denomination's Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission (ERLC) has formed an ad hoc committee to investigate accusations that Land plagiarized his controversial comments.

Land, the president of the ERLC, accused black political leaders, including President Obama, of trying to “gin up the black vote” on his radio show on March 31.

“Instead of letting the legal process take its independent course, race mongers are anointing themselves judge, jury, and executioners,” Land said. “The rule of law is being assaulted by racial demagogues, and it’s disgusting, and it should stop.”

Land also stated a black man is “statistically more likely to do you harm than a white man.”

The comments raised concerns that the SBC’s efforts to improve its diversity would suffer setbacks. Maxie Miller, a church-planting expert in the Florida Baptist Convention, told The Tennessean he was “incredulous” after hearing about the comments.

“I think the [SBC] is doing a great job with diversity … but Land’s comments definitely will make my work harder—encouraging African Americans to be a part of Southern Baptist Convention life,” he told The Tennessean.

Land stood by his comments for more than two weeks before issuing an open letter to SBC president Bryant Wright apologizing for his comments on April 16.

“I am writing to express my deep regret for any hurt or misunderstanding my comments about the Trayvon Martin case have generated,” Land wrote. “It grieves me to hear that any comments of mine have to any degree set back the cause of racial reconciliation in Southern Baptist or American life. I have been committed to the cause of racial reconciliation my entire ministry.”

Fred Luter Jr., a prominent African American pastor expected to become the SBC’s first black president, told Baptist Press in a statement that he had accepted Land’s apology.

Even as membership remains relatively stable in U.S. churches, the effects of the recession have caused contributions to drop by $1.2 billion.

According to the 2012 Yearbook of American & Canadian Churches, the almost $29 billion contributed by church members represented a 2.2 percent decrease in terms of per capita giving.

The $1.2 billion decline in 2010 was nearly three times as large as the $431 million in losses reported in 2009, and "provides clear evidence of the impact of the deepening crises in the reporting period," the Yearbook's editor, the Rev. Eileen Lindner, wrote.

The Yearbook is produced annually by the National Council of Churches and is considered one of the most authoritative sources of church membership. The 2010 figures, released Tuesday (March 20), were collected from 228 U.S. denominations in 2011.

The Roman Catholic Church (No. 1) and the Southern Baptist Convention (No. 2) continued as the nation's largest churches in 2010, and both posted a decrease of less than 1 percent, the fourth year in a row of declining membership for Southern Baptists.

Overall, total membership in the top 25 largest churches declined 1.15 percent, to 145.7 million.

The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, though still in the top 10, reported the sharpest decline in membership, dropping 5.9 percent to 4.3 million members.

Four Pentecostal churches out of the top 25 showed a continuing increase in membership, with the Pentecostal Assemblies of the World, Inc. jumping up 20 percent, the highest out of all reporting churches.

Only six out of the top 25 increased in membership, according to the Yearbook. Some of those growing denominations include Jehovah's Witnesses (up 1.85 percent), Seventh-day Adventist Church (up 1.61 percent) and the National Baptist Convention, USA (up 3.95 percent).

The 10 largest U.S. Christian bodies reported in the 2012 yearbook are:

1. The Catholic Church: 68.2 million, down 0.44 percent.
2. Southern Baptist Convention: 16.1 million, down 0.15 percent.
3. The United Methodist Church: 7.7 million, down 1.22 percent.
4. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints: 6.2 million, up 1.62 percent.
5. The Church of God in Christ: 5.5 million, no membership updates reported.
6. National Baptist Convention, USA: 5.2 million, up 3.95 percent.
7. Evangelical Lutheran Church in America: 4.3 million, down 5.9 percent.
8. National Baptist Convention of America, 3.5 million, no membership updates reported.
9. Assemblies of God: 3.03 million, up 3.99 percent.
10. Presbyterian Church (USA): 2.7 million, down 3.42 percent.

The record number of church foreclosures keeps climbing. Almost 140 American churches were sold by banks in 2011 after defaulting on their loans, Reuters reported. Almost 300 churches have defaulted since 2010 as banks have become more reluctant to refinance.

For the Church at South Las Vegas, which sparked debate when it stopped paying its mortgage last May and filed for Chapter 11 protection in July, a financial benefactor has stepped in and prevented the congregation from facing foreclosure.

The Las Vegas church, which owed nearly $8 million on property now worth only $2.4 million, had enough money to make its monthly mortgage payments but believed it was bad stewardship to have tithes keep going into a "black hole" of debt instead of toward its mission. The unusual move sparked debate over Christian ethics.

But last month, Canadian businessman and philanthropist Ron Fehr, a friend of church board member Jude Fouquier, pledged to provide $3 million to help the church, the Las Vegas Review-Journal reported. The church contributed $1 million from its own funds to complete the package and pay off its mortgage lender. (Court documents did not disclose exactly how much the bank accepted as payment for the money owed.)

Founder and pastor Benny Perez told CT that the church was discharged from its Chapter 11 status on March 6. Despite its financial difficulties, the congregation is growing and plans on expanding its facilities, he said, adding, “Our church has flourished in the midst of all things.”

Update (May 7, 2013): The Miami Herald reports on the trend of Baptist churches changing their names and "quietly moving away from their denomination’s historic namesake—worried that it conjured up images of pipe organs, narrow-mindedness or stuffy, formal services."

Recent research suggests that the decision to drop denominational references in church names is a double-edged sword.
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The task force appointed to study a possible name change of the Southern Baptist Convention is recommending the convention maintain its legal name but adopt an informal, non-legal name for those who want to use it: Great Commission Baptists.

The report Monday night ended weeks of speculation by Southern Baptists and fellow evangelicals as to what the task force would do. The convention was formed in 1845, and a name change was first proposed in 1903, although one was not adopted then, or since.

The task force was appointed by Southern Baptist Convention President Bryant Wright.

"This is an issue that just won't die," task force chairman Jimmy Draper said in presenting the task force's recommendation to the Executive Committee, which will consider it Tuesday.

The name "Southern," Draper said, is a barrier to the Gospel in some regions of the country.

If the Executive Committee approves it Tuesday, then convention messengers will consider it in New Orleans in June at the SBC annual meeting.

The recommendation would mean that the legal name of the convention would remain "Southern Baptist Convention" and could be used by any church which wishes to use it. But other SBC churches could call themselves "Great Commission Baptists" if they wish.

"We believe that the equity that we have in the name Southern Baptist Convention is valuable," Draper said during the task force's recommendation. "It is a strong name that identifies who we are in theology, morality and ethics, compassion, ministry and mission in the world. It is a name that is recognized globally in these areas."

Draper continued: "We also recognize the need that some may have to use a name that is not associated with a national region as indicated by the word 'Southern.' We want to do everything we can to encourage those who do feel a name change would be beneficial without recommending a legal name change for the convention. We believe we have found a way to do that."

The trustees of LifeWay Christian Resources unanimously voted to continue selling 2011 New International Version (NIV) Bibles in its chain of bookstores, even though the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) at its annual convention last June asked the publishing organization not to do so.

CT reported that the SBC passed the resolution criticizing the NIV update as an "inaccurate translation of God's inspired Scripture," largely because the translation avoids using male terms in passages where context suggests that both genders are intended (except where the pronoun in question has messianic allusions).

In the resolution, convention delegates asked LifeWay, which is owned and operated by the convention, not to sell the Bibles.

At LifeWay’s February trustee meeting, both a task force in charge of following up on the SBC’s resolution and the trustee executive committee recommended that LifeWay continue to sell the Bibles, Baptist Press reported.

Committee chairman Adam Greenway emphasized that the decision was not an endorsement of the NIV 2011.

"It is not that we are endorsing the 2011 NIV," Greenway told Baptist Press. "We endorse what we publish, and the translation we publish is the Holman Christian Standard Bible. That is the translation that we endorse. … We are not giving a stamp of approval. ... We are simply saying from a retail perspective, we do not believe that we should cease carrying and make available to the public the 2011 NIV. … We do not believe the 2011 NIV rises to the level to where it should be pulled or censored or not carried in our retail chain."

Greenway said both Albert Mohler Jr. and Russell Moore of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, along with several others, supported the continued sales of the 2011 NIV.

During that same meeting, LifeWay president Thom S. Rainer addressed the company’s decision to end its relationship with Susan G. Komen for the Cure because of its relationship with Planned Parenthood. (CT reported last month on LifeWay’s decision, as well as Komen’s brief split from Planned Parenthood.) Rainer said LifeWay was reviewing options for the use of the special pink Bibles it had already produced for Komen, but that the Bibles would not be destroyed.

Breaking news update:

The full New York Senate has approved the bill (S6087) that would allow houses of worship to rent from schools in connection with worship services.

According to the Office of State Senator Fernando Cabrera, "Despite heavy and unprecedented lobbying from the Bloomberg Administration, the New York State Senate overwhelmingly approved Senate Bill S6087 which amends education law in relation to authorizing religious meetings and worship in school buildings and school sites.

"When asked to comment on the bill, one of its leading supporters, Pastor and New York City Council Member Fernando Cabrera responded by saying: “Today was a real testament to the power of bipartisan leadership but now, we need the same leadership and bipartisan example showed by the Assembly. We now call on speaker Silver to follow the example of the Republican lead senate, to stand for houses of worship poor communities.”

Christianity Today will update this story as needed.

As protests continue over New York City’s plans to evict churches that meet in school buildings, the state’s legislature took a key step toward allowing those churches to stay.

Last Friday, the Senate Education Committee approved an amendment to New York’s education laws that would allow churches to meet at schools outside school hours. Only one member of the 18-member committee voted outright against the bill, though six voted for it "with reservation."

There has been no word on when the full Senate might vote on the legislation, but the New York City Council will reportedly hold a hearing on it tomorrow morning. Council member Fernando Cabrera has introduced a resolution supporting the state bill.

About 60 New York City congregations are scheduled to be evicted from the school buildings February 12.

CT reported in December that the Supreme Court had declined the Bronx Household of Faith’s appeal of the city’s ban on worship services in public schools. The Second Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in June that the NYC Department of Education had the legal right to bar churches from renting school facilities for worship services.

Many protests have been staged throughout the city. On Sunday, thousands of protestors marched across the Brooklyn Bridge. Dimas Salaberrios, pastor of Infinity New York Church, held a 24-day hunger strike; he was forced to end it after experiencing chest pains. January protests at the city’s Law Department and at Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s State of the City address led to dozens of arrests.

Image from NYCReligion.info. Used with permission.

Six months after CT reported that C.J. Mahaney was taking a leave of absence from his role as president of Sovereign Grace Ministries (SGM), the organization announced Wednesday it has returned Mahaney to his role.

In a July 6 statement, Mahaney said he was taking leave because Brent Detwiler, a former SGM pastor, had raised concerns about “various expressions of pride, unentreatability, deceit, sinful judgment and hypocrisy” committed by Mahaney. SGM installed an interim board of directors that same month and established three separate review panels to determine if Mahaney should remain as president.

“After examining the reports of these three review panels, we find nothing in them that would disqualify C.J. from his role as President, nor do they in any way call into question his fitness for gospel ministry,” the Board said in a statement. “Therefore the Board has decided unanimously to return C.J. to the office of President, effective immediately.”

CT’s original report noted that Detwiler accused Mahaney of resisting correction and accountability at times, being heavy-handed in his leadership, and dealing unfairly with other leaders who disagreed with him.

"[SGM] has been a wonderful organization committed to planting Gospel-centered churches in the United States and parts abroad," Detwiler wrote in an e-mail to CT. "There are many outstanding pastors and people in the denomination. But temptation and sin come with rapid growth and recognition.

"That was especially true for C.J., and we did not serve him well by allowing him to play by a different set of rules—a double standard. We certainly share the blame for his fall. But C.J. genuinely loves the Lord and people, so I am confident he will respond to God's discipline in his life."

The Board noted that it has been a “trying season” for SGM and Mahaney, writing, “Our hope and prayer is that all of us evaluate these matters humbly, apply the forgiveness that comes through the gospel appropriately, and relate to one another about these matters graciously as we work together to reform what needs reforming, reaffirm the goodness of God in our midst, and continue to plant and build local churches with our chief aim the glory of God through the gospel.”

Update (February 6): The ECO held its first national synod last week, numbering 28 member churches thus far. The Institute on Religion and Democracy reports "another 48 churches are in the process of transitioning to ECO, and over 75 more are discerning a possible dismissal to ECO."

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Conservative Presbyterians launched a new denomination last week, saying that the Presbyterian Church (USA) is too consumed by internal conflicts and bureaucracy to nurture healthy congregations.

The Assemblies of God, one of the nation's largest Pentecostal denominations, opened more than a church a day last year.

In all, 368 new churches opened in 2011, the denomination said. That total marks the second highest number of church starts since it began keeping reliable statistics in 1965.

Factoring in church closures, there are now 12,595 Assemblies of God congregations in the country, the highest ever recorded.

"One of our strategic values is to vigorously plant new churches," said Assemblies of God General Superintendent George O. Wood, who was quoted by his denomination's news service. "Our goal was to plant a church a day in 2011. It was exciting to see how God helped us meet -- and then exceed -- that goal."

He hopes more than 400 U.S. churches will be started in 2012, and ultimately, at least 500 annually.

Denominational officials reported that 230 churches closed in 2011. Wood said there were only two years in the last decade when the denomination saw fewer than 230 church closures.

"Overall, we had a net gain of 138 churches," Wood said. "That stands as our 11th highest net gain of churches."

The denomination, which includes 3 million U.S. members, has a "Church Multiplication Network" that supports church planters with training and funding.

Crystal Cathedral officials have endorsed an offer from a nearby California university to purchase the glass-walled megachurch and end its bankruptcy crisis.

Despite their decision, church leaders say they are still hoping for a miracle that will prevent the sale, which could move forward in mid-November.

"Nothing is final until November 14!" said Sheila Schuller Coleman, senior pastor of Crystal Cathedral, in a Wednesday (Oct. 26) statement.

"We continue to pray ... even though our board has had to reluctantly vote to accept a plan due to the deadlines required by the court."

Chapman University said the sale could be advantageous for both organizations.

"We are hopeful that the final decision will favor Chapman, because that outcome would provide the Crystal Cathedral Ministry with the opportunity to go forward using their highly distinctive campus, while providing Chapman with vital space to expand our health sciences programs," the school said.

In July, the university offered Crystal Cathedral $46 million for the 35-acre campus with a leaseback program that would allow it to continue worship services. In its statement endorsing the university's offer, the cathedral noted that it also provides the opportunity for the ministry to repurchase the buildings.

Cathedral officials had hoped to raise more than $50 million through a "miracle faith" campaign that started in July, the Los Angeles Times reported, but had raised only $172,775 by September.

If accepted, the deal with Chapman would seem to end hopes of Catholic officials to buy the iconic church to serve as a cathedral for the Roman Catholic Diocese of Orange.

At the Willow Creek Association's Global Leadership Summit this afternoon, senior pastor Bill Hybels confirmed that Howard Schultz withdrew over an online petition calling the Illinois megachurch anti-gay and threatening a boycott. Hybels said the association let the Starbucks CEO out of his contract and he encouraged the summit's attendees (an estimated 165,000, between the main South Barrington campus and 450 other locations) to write encouraging notes to the company and to buy Starbucks coffee and Schultz's new book on leadership. Hybels said he is also trying to meet with the creators of the petition. The full text of his remarks after the video below.

In the last seven days an online petition was started to boycott Starbucks if Howard Schultz did not cancel his signed contract to this event. The issue driving this petition, which so far has been signed by 717 people, is homosexuality. The petition claims that Willow Creek Community Church is anti-gay. Therefore, if the president of Starbucks speaks here, then Starbucks should be boycotted, or so the thinking goes. Now, Howard and his leadership team had a tough decision to make. [Willow Creek Association president] Jim Mellado and I spent 45 minutes in a very constructive conversation with the leadership at Starbucks, explaining to them in no uncertain terms that Willow is not anti-gay. But at the end of the day, they decided that the downside business risk was just too high for them, so Howard and his team decided to cancel and we decided to let him out of his contract without any penalty.

Now, this whole thing is sad to me on a number of different levels. First, if the organizers of this petition had simply taken the time to call us, we would have explained to them (as we have to many others ) that not only is Willow not anti-gay, Willow not anti-anybody.

Our church was founded on the idea that people matter to God. All people. All people of all backgrounds, all colors, ethnicities, and sexual orientation. The mat at every door on this campus has always read “Welcome.” And for over 35 years we have flung the doors of this campus open to the widest array of humanity I have ever witnessed in the global church. And thousands--tens of thousands--have come to learn the teachings of Jesus. So to suggest that we check sexual orientation or any other kind of issue at our doors is simply not true. Just ask the hundreds of people with same-sex attraction who attend our church every week.

Now what is true is that we challenge homosexuals and heterosexuals to live out the sexual ethics taught in the Scriptures--which encourages full sexual expression between a man and a woman in the context of marriage and prescribes sexual abstinence and purity for everybody else.

But even as we challenge all of our people to these biblical standards, we do so with grace-filled spirits, knowing the confusion and brokenness that is rampant in our fallen world. And at Willow we honor the journey of everyone who is sincerely attempting to follow Christ. So it’s unfortunate that we could not have explained this to those called us anti-gay and started this petition.

Second, what’s further saddening to me is the growing trend, specifically in the United States culture, to throw stones first and ask questions later. We see this in our political system and it’s rapidly making our country ungovernable. Jesus taught and modeled a better way: to treat everybody with respect, to believe the best about others, to seek to understand other we might disagree and if we must disagree then attempt to do so respectfully.

Leith Anderson, the president of the National Association of Evangelicals (NAE), will step down as senior pastor of Wooddale Church at the end of this year.

Anderson, who will assume the title of pastor emeritus of the church in Eden Prairie, Minnesota, is author of many ministry books, including Leadership That Works and Dying for Change.

Anderson has led the NAE on two separate occasions. He is credited for saving the association from financial ruin during his 2001-2003 interim presidency. He also took over leadership of the organization after former president Ted Haggard resigned in November 2006. He also served as interim president of that Denver Seminary in 1999.

Wooddale, the church that GOP candidate Tim Pawlenty attends, is one of the largest in the Minneapolis area.

Even before the Southern Baptist Convention elected the Rev. Fred Luter to national office, there was already widespread speculation that Luter is poised to become the denomination’s first African-American president.

Representatives of 16 million Southern Baptists overwhelmingly elected Luter first vice president on June 14 at their annual meeting in Phoenix.

By the time Baptists gather again next summer in Luter’s backyard, many expect the pastor of this city’s 5,000-member Franklin Avenue Baptist Church — one of the largest Southern Baptist churches in the state — to clinch the top post.

“Many of us are thinking this is the first step toward him being elected president next year,” said Danny Akin, president of Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary in Wake Forest, N.C., who nominated Luter for the vice presidency.

“I haven’t talked to a person who hasn’t affirmed that, including the present president, Bryant Wright, the past president, Frank Page” and others, Akin said. “There’s tremendous interest and excitement about that.”

Luter’s election comes at a moment that the nation’s largest Protestant denomination confronts evidence that it has plateaued in numbers — even declined slightly.

Moreover, some leaders of the predominantly white, socially conservative church say they are concerned that their ranks — and especially their leaders — do not look like the nation as a whole.

Southern Baptists on Wednesday called hell an "eternal, conscious punishment" for those who do not accept Jesus, rebutting a controversial book from Michigan pastor Rob Bell that questions traditional views of hell.

Citing Bell's book "Love Wins," the resolution urges Southern Baptists "to proclaim faithfully the depth and gravity of sin against a holy God, the reality of hell, and the salvation of sinners by God's grace alone, through faith alone, in Jesus Christ alone, to the glory of God alone."
Several leaders during the Baptists' two-day meeting in Phoenix coupled warnings about hell with pleas for evangelism -- especially in areas where there are no churches or missionaries.

"Is hell real? Is hell forever? Did God really say sinners would perish in eternal torment forever and ever?" asked pastor and author David Platt of Birmingham, Ala. "Oh, readers of Rob Bell and others like him, listen very carefully be very cautious, when anyone says, `Did God
really say this?"'

Bell's book, released in March, criticizes the "misguided" view that "select Christians" will live forever in heaven while the rest of humanity will suffer eternal torment in a punishing hell.

Earlier this year, the Southern Baptist-affiliated Lifeway Christian Stores quietly removed warning labels from certain books -- including Bell's -- that "could be considered inconsistent with historical evangelical theology."

"At the center of the Christian tradition since the first church has been the insistence that ... hell is not forever, and love, in the end, wins," Bell wrote in "Love Wins: A Book About Heaven, Hell, and the Fate of Every Person Who Has Ever Lived."

Southern Baptist Convention President Bryant Wright prayed that Southern Baptists would take to heart the statement they passed on hell.

"Father, because the reality of hell is so real, the permanent separation from you is so real, and our hours here on this earth are so limited, we pray that you will give us a fresh sense of conviction of preaching the gospel of Jesus Christ," he prayed right after the resolution was adopted.

On Tuesday, Baptists elected a black pastor from New Orleans as first vice president, the highest office in the denomination ever held by a black man. Pastor Fred Luter of New Orleans is already being talked about as a prime candidate for SBC president next year.

Southern Baptists meeting in Phoenix adopted a plan Tuesday (June 14) to try to boost minorities in their top leadership posts as they face continuing reports of stagnant baptism rates and declining membership.

Members of the nation's largest Protestant denomination backed the recommendation for intentionally including minorities as nominees for positions, speakers at the annual meeting, and staff recruited for its seminaries and mission boards.

Before the vote, Executive Committee President and CEO Frank Page acknowledged the need for "measurable information" to help Southern Baptists evaluate their progress on ethnic relations.

"I believe we are living in a day and time where there will be increased ethnic involvement and increased sensitivity to ethnic diversity within our convention," Page pledged to the more than 4,000 Baptists at the Phoenix Convention Center.

"In the principle of honesty, I tell you we have not done as we ought."

The move toward greater diversity comes as the predominantly white denomination grapples with a 2010 baptism rate that was down 5 percent from 2009 and a 0.15 percent drop in membership -- the fourth consecutive year of decline.

The recommendation was the result of two years of study after a Korean pastor from Boston requested an examination of how ethnic churches and their leaders could be more actively involved.

On the convention floor, delegates (known as messengers) defeated a move to change the language of the statement to appoint convention leaders "who are the most Gospel-minded regardless of their ethnic background."

"If we keep the Gospel as the center, everything else will follow and take place," said Channing Kilgore, the Tennessee delegate who offered the amendment.

Others countered that the intentional language was necessary.

"We cannot any longer be a convention that is basically a white convention that anybody can come to," said Pastor Jim Goforth, who leads a multicultural church in Florissant, Mo. "We must intentionally be a convention that reaches out to everyone, and until the stage looks like we want the pew to look like, it won't be that way. It doesn't happen by accident."

SBC President Bryant Wright noted after the vote that the denomination was founded for two reasons -- "one was bad, one was great" -- the defense of slavery and sharing the Gospel.

"It took us 150 years to come to our senses ... and seek the forgiveness of God and to apologize with our African-American friends and to ask their forgiveness for the strain of racism all through our history," he said. "But there's a noble reason for which we were founded, and that is for the propagation of the Gospel of Jesus Christ."

In recent decades, the convention has passed 11 resolutions seeking "greater ethnic participation" -- including a 1995 resolution apologizing for past defense of slavery -- but church leaders deemed them insufficient.

"In spite of the Convention's frequent affirmations expressing its desire to see greater ethnic involvement and participation in SBC life, the Convention has not adopted a consistent means by which it can ascertain participation of ethnic churches and church leaders in Convention life," reads the report that led to the recommendation.

C. S. Lewis said that Christianity was about achieving perfection in God, not happiness. Even so, a survey in this month's American Sociological Review (ASR) suggests that a "high rate of life satisfaction" is at least a byproduct of the Christian life.

Researchers Chaeyoon Lim, sociologist at the University of Madison-Wisconsin, and Robert Putnam, author most recently of American Grace and most famously of Bowling Alone, found that people who frequently attend church and other places of worship are happier than those who attend less frequently. Lim and Putman say respondents' happiness comes from building friendships in a close-knit social circle around common religious beliefs — not necessarily from the content of said beliefs. “Our evidence shows that it is not really going to church and listening to sermons or praying that makes people happier, but making church-based friends and building social networks there,” Lim said.

Lim and Putnam surveyed some 3,000 Americans from 2006 to 2007. A majority of participants were evangelical and mainline Protestants and Catholics. About one-third of participants who attend church frequently and have at least 3-5 close friends there said they were "extremely satisfied" with their lives. That percentage jumps to 40 percent for frequent churchgoers who report having 11 or more close friends at church. Tragically, 15 percent of frequent churchgoers reported having not one close friend at church. According to the survey, friendless churchgoers are less happy than those who are not religious and do not attend church at all, as well as those who are very religious but do not attend church.

Crystal Cathedral Ministries, which owes about $7.5 million to unsecured creditors, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy this morning, according to the Orange County Register.

Earlier this year, the megachurch founded by television evangelist Robert H. Schuller slashed several programs and laid off 50 employees to cut $4.9 million from its $20 million annual operating budget. The Register reports that Senior Pastor Sheila Schuller Coleman said the bankruptcy filing was a necessity because of lawsuits.

A committee of creditors who were working with the church for the last six months declared an impasse, foreshadowing the bankruptcy. Church board member and Schuller's son-in-law, Jim Penner, said Friday that the cathedral's intention is to repay all vendors 100 percent.

Among the long-time vendors for the "Glory of Christmas" pageant still waiting to get paid are Oliver, who supplied camels, horses and sheep for the pageant; wardrobe manager Juliet Noriega; dry cleaner Bruce Johnson, who cleaned the actors' costumes; props manager Sharon Crabtree, and Carin Galletta, whose public relations firm provided publicity for the pageant.

At least two creditors, including equipment financing company PNCEF LLC., have sought and obtained court-ordered writs of attachment.

Earlier, CT covered the church's apology for its debts, Sheila Schuller Coleman's new leadership, and interviewed Robert A. Schuller about his departure from the church his father founded.

In March I wrote my “Past Imperfect” column about two denominational start ups: the Anglican Church in North America (ACNA), which formed in 2009, and the North American Lutheran Church (NALC), which formed in 2010—indeed, yesterday.

On Friday, 1100 Lutherans, rightly and righteously disaffected from the once gigantic, now shrinking Evangelical Lutheran Church, formally adopted a constitution at a meeting in Columbus, Ohio.

Here is a key statement from the NALC’s detailed press release:

‘The NALC will embody the center of Lutheranism in America. The NALC will uphold
confessional principles dear to Lutherans including a commitment to the authority of the Bible and the Lutheran Confessions. Members and congregations of the NALC will have direct involvement in the decisions and life of the NALC,’ said the Rev. Mark Chavez of Landisville, Pa., director of Lutheran CORE.

The issue of authority surfaces three ways in Chavez’s statement: (1) the role of the Bible (as contrasted with culture and the “bound conscience” of the autonomous self), (2) the role of the creeds and confessions (as contrasted with contemporary conventional wisdom), and (3) the role of the constituent churches (as opposed to bodies composed by quota systems).

On Thursday, I asked spokesman David Baer how many congregations would be part of the NALC at the beginning. He explained that under ELCA rules, congregations couldn’t leave unless there was another group for them to join. Despite those rules, 18 congregations had already held congregational votes to join the NALC. Once the constitution was adopted, Baer said, the NALC “would be open for business.” Over the next year, he expected those 18 congregations to grow to about 200.

Amid ongoing debate over the vitality or usefulness of denominations today, CT has observed that many denominational meetings of late have debated the merits of reinforcing denominational distinctives vs. loosening them in favor of focusing on evangelism.

CT columnist Mollie Ziegler Hemingway sent a brief report on the latest case study, this time at the ongoing Lutheran Church – Missouri Synod convention:

The Lutheran Church – Missouri Synod (LCMS) elected as its new president the leader of the church’s World Relief and Human Care division. Matthew Harrison received 54 percent of the vote, defeating incumbent Gerald Kieschnick, who received 45 percent of the vote in his third re-election attempt.

The 2.3-million member LCMS is holding its triennial convention in Houston, where over 1,200 delegates are electing new officers and debating whether to restructure the synod.

While the conservative denomination does not face conflict over many hot-button cultural issues, the election of Harrison represents a shift from the Kieschnick administration’s support of evangelical programs and style to a more traditional Lutheran identity. While 54 percent – 50 votes more than the 593 votes needed to win – was not a huge mandate numerically, Harrison was elected on the first ballot at a convention that saw most issues narrowly won after lengthy debate.

“I realize this is a tumultuous change in the life of our synod,” Harrison said in his acceptance speech immediately after the vote. He asked delegates for forgiveness and prayers as he prepares to lead the synod through a new restructuring that streamlines operations at the national headquarters.

The Kieschnick administration, which served for the past nine years, encouraged congregations to adopt praise teams, coffee house worship and small group ministries. It had also overseen the cancellation of Issues, Etc., the synod’s only nationally syndicated broadcast ministry. Harrison’s first post-election interview was with the program, which re-launched outside the denominational structure.

Harrison, leader of the LCMS mercy arm and possessing multiple degrees from the denomination’s Concordia Theological Seminary, was also the preferred candidate of those in the church body that favor a return to traditional Lutheran identity of liturgical preaching, hymns that teach doctrine, and the placement of ordained missionaries overseas.

“There was a great deal of division on the direction things were going. Harrison has an opportunity, in a pastoral way, to bring back unity in [the LCMS] so that we can have stronger service in missions and outreach of the gospel,” said delegate Jeffrey Horn from Garrett, Indiana.

Harrison’s 643 votes yielded the largest margin of victory in a synodical presidential election since 1998.

Just before breaking for lunch today, the 219th Presbyterian Church (USA) General Assembly approved a radically revised version of the report from its Middle East Study Committee (known in procedural code as 14-08). The vote was 558 affirmative, 119 negative, 7 abstaining. The revised report can be found here.

Jewish leaders had complained about the initial report’s anti-Israel and anti-Jewish bias. See, for example, this March 15 release from the Jewish Council on Public Affairs.

The original report also met resistance from key leaders within the PC(USA). In mid-June, eight former moderators of the General Assembly circulated a critical letter. Then, yesterday, following sustained negotiations, the eight moderators issued a public statement calling for support of the heavily revised document. As a result, General Assembly debate referred repeatedly to the work of the Holy Spirit in bridging differences.

After major surgery, the report no longer gives a general endorsement to the Palestinian Christian Kairos document, which had accused Israel of practicing apartheid. It also no longer calls for Israel to lift its blockade on Gaza but now asks Israel and Egypt to “limit their blockade to military equipment and devices and to guarantee adequate levels of food, medicine, building supplies and other humanitarian supplies…” The controversial theological and historical sections of the document are now to be received as a rationale for the recommendations, but not to be adopted as policy. In addition, an unmistakably clear recognition of “Israel’s right to exist as a sovereign nation within secure and internationally recognized borders in accordance with United Nations resolutions” has been added.

Unofficial communication reports that the American Jewish leadership is welcoming the changes in the document and considers today’s action as the foundation for future dialogue.

UPDATE: The Jewish Council on Public Affairs and 12 other Jewish organizations have now released a joint response to the PC(USA) vote.

Hours after voting in favor of permitting practicing homosexuals to serve in the clergy, the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church (USA) decided to keep their definition of marriage "as being between a man and a woman," the Associated Press reports.

The Minneapolis Star-Tribune wrote early this morning that the Assembly voted to allow the church two more years to study the proposal. (Corrected)

Had the proposal passed, the PCUSA could have become the largest US denomination to permit same-sex marriage, the Baptist Press reported earlier this week.

Update: James Berkley, designated pastor at Seattle's Bethel Presbyterian Church, explains the decision.

The business on marriage was byzantine and bizarre, but what happened is that both the majority and the minority reports of the special committee on same-sex unions will go out to the churches to study. None of the efforts to change constitutional language from “a man and a woman” to “two people” even got debated. They got “answered” as a batch by the actions on sending out the study. I wouldn’t have bet a plug nickel that that would have happened.

Update (9:15 a.m.): Carmen Fowler, the president of the Presbyterian Lay Committee, spoke with CT this morning.

"I would say that I was surprised," Fowler said of the decision, "and I will just openly admit that. The assembly acted very faithfully in terms of what Scripture says and in terms of the heritage of the church...that's great. It was a wonderful way for the assembly to respond to very, very controversial business that certainly many in the church would have responded to disfavorably."

Fowler attributes the surprise decision to "a genuine movement of the Spirit."

"I don't know how else to account for it," she said. "There were some very compelling arguments made on the floor of the Assembly. I would say the most compelling ones came from racial/ethnic commissioners."

Several in the General Assembly noted yesterday that Presbyterians in the Global South have strongly conservative views on homosexual issues.

"We do try to listen in the Presbyterian Church to voices other than just an Anglo culture," Fowler said. "I think that moderates are not used to hearing those voices spoken in a conservative manner."

She also points to an "incredible" ecumenical greeting from the Orthodox Reverend Siarhei Hardun of Belarus.

"He just made all the right points," Fowler said. "If you're going to be instructed at a church gathering by a faithful witness from another part of the world, it does have the power to change minds and change hearts."

The General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church USA voted today in favor of changing ordination standards to remove language requiring ministers "live either in fidelity within the covenant of marriage between a man and a woman, or chastity in singleness."

The question will now be sent to local presbyteries for further consideration. A majority of the 173 presbyteries must approve the constitutional amendment by July 10, 2011, in order for the new ordination standards to stick. (Corrected)

Efforts to remove chastity requirements from gay PCUSA clergy had met defeat last year during an eventful summer which saw the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America vote in August to allow gays and lesbians in committed relationships to serve as clergy, following the Episcopal Church's reaffirmation in July of its openness to noncelibate gay priests. Meanwhile, the United Methodist Church voted against structural changes that would have opened church membership to homosexuals.

Update (7:35 p.m.): An initial reaction from James Berkley, designated pastor at Seattle's Bethel Presbyterian Church, writing from the General Assembly in Minneapolis:

Today a slight majority of a skewed sample of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) voted by a narrow margin to overturn the enduring moral guidance Presbyterians have always upheld. Other than gaining attention, however, the vote changes nothing. A majority of 173 regional presbyteries must also approve the church constitutional amendment before it takes effect, and their votes will occur throughout the next twelve months.

The vote today was a disgrace, in that it drags Presbyterians away from the will of God for our sexual expression. We are to obey Scripture, not re-imagine God-defiling teachings.

The vote today was tragic, in that it offers cold comfort for those caught in sin. We are to proclaim Scripture's message of hope, not bend its message to prevailing error.

The vote today was divisive, in that once again, congregations and presbyteries, friendships and families will be strained by the process of defeating yet another General Assembly-produced error in doctrine and practice.

We profess in the Westminster Confession of Faith that "all synods or councils ... may err; and many have erred." The General Assembly erred today, but that will not be the final word. Faithful Presbyterians will not let this stand.

Update (8.54 a.m. Friday) The Presbyterian Coalition, a conservative organization within the PCUSA, released a statement in response to the decision.

We grieve the decision today by our General Assembly to recommend removing the moral standard for our ministers and officers that rightly requires fidelity within the covenant of marriage between a man and a woman or chastity in singleness. The action was adopted by a narrow margin. Nevertheless, it marks a separation from the teaching of the universal Church on holiness of life.

The decision is the first step toward removing this standard for ordination from our church's constitution. The action must be approved by a majority of our presbyteries to be enacted.

Our 173 presbyteries have voted four times in 15 years on this same section of our constitution. Presbyterians in our churches and presbyteries have repeatedly stood with the Church Universal in refusing to make any change in this moral standard that is rooted in the will of God expressed in Scripture.

The Church knows its mind on this matter. This General Assembly's action continues to roil the Presbyterian Church (USA). The effect of the Assembly's actions to require presbyteries to vote again and again on the same matter is to tire and frustrate Presbyterians.

We commend those commissioners who by their witness and by their votes upheld the Church's biblical and historical standard. We pray to God for mercy as we call on our churches and presbyteries to respond with renewed determination, to see this action as another opportunity to bring a witness to God's truth by your perseverance. Let us follow the Savior's call not to be weary in well doing.

Update (9:12 a.m. Friday): Carmen Fowler, the president of the Presbyterian Lay Committee, spoke with CT this morning: "In my view, the strike-and-replace that's being proposed would eliminate, basically, the sexual standards that the church has expected of her leadership throughout all generations."

Fowler says that with a simple 53% majority, "it's not as if that's going to go to the church as a mandate from the General Assembly."

"The closer you get to the pews, the more conservative people get," Fowler said.

Southern Baptists issued a veiled but sharp critique of the nation's oil companies on June 16, saying "all industries are ... accountable to higher standards than to profit alone."

Members of the Southern Baptist Convention, meeting in Orlando, Fla., said the massive BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico was a timely reminder that "our God-given dominion over the creation is not unlimited, as though we were gods and not creatures."

The resolution, passed as the two-day assembly concluded, urged churches to pray for an end to the catastrophe and asked businesses and governments to work together to prevent future accidents.

The nonbinding statement comes as various religious groups are struggling to determine how best to respond to the spill and those whose livelihoods hang in the balance.

"We call on Southern Baptists to be ready to assist the communities and churches of the Gulf Coast through the clean-up process with the same generosity of spirit that Southern Baptists exhibited after Hurricane Katrina of 2005," it reads.

Baptists also adopted statements stemming from their opposition to homosexuality, opposing the proposed Employment Non-Discrimination Act and plans to allow openly gay members to serve in the military.

Atlanta-area pastor Bryant Wright was elected as president of the Southern Baptist Convention during its annual meeting in Orlando today. Wright replaces Johnny M. Hunt, who was elected in 2008.

Messengers at the convention also voted to approve the Great Commission Resurgence recommendations, which Wright had supported.

Wright won in a runoff with Florida pastor Ted Traylor, 55.11 percent to 43.97 percent, according to the Baptist Press, which posted the rest of the results. He initially faced Traylor, Alabama pastor Jimmy Jackson, and Minnesota-Wisconsin convention leader Leo Endel.

The Baptist Press and the Florida Baptist Witness posted interviews with Wright.

Pennsylvania Governor Ed Rendell has signed a bill into law which protects church bake sales, potlucks and similar events from sanction by state food inspectors, according to WHTM.

Pennsylvania church leaders—and, no doubt, church bake sale cooks—welcomed what became known as the “Pie Bill.”

“Everybody likes pie,” pastor Mike Greb told The Philadelphia Inquirer this week. His own St. Cecilia’s Catholic Church has been at the epicenter of the recent controversy. ""These fundraisers are our survival," Greb said. "In tough economic times, they keep the doors open and the lights on."

In early 2009, an inspector from the Pennsylvania Department of Agriculture shut down a St Cecilia’s Lenten bake sale.

Since the food was coming from a non-state-inspected kitchen, the state government considered it a “potentially hazardous substance.” Freshman State Senator Elder Vogel decided to introduce a bill—his first in the legislature, according to the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review—allowing nonprofits to sell home-cooked food at fundraisers.

Concerned citizens sweetened the deal by inundating their legislators with plates of cookies, the Inquirer reports. The bill passed the House and Senate unanimously last week.

In 2005, Christianity Today reported on several states which had various degrees of restriction of what churches could and could not do with baked goods.

Image via lcarsdata/wikimedia

Update (April 19, 2013): The Virginia Supreme Court has ruled that The Falls Church, a "3,000-member congregation [that] voted in 2006 to leave the Episcopal Church did not have the right to keep the sprawling property known as the Falls Church."

The ruling, which came yesterday, affirmed a lower court’s decision in favor of the denomination, but also "said some of the nearly $3 million in church coffers belongs to the Falls Church Anglican congregation."
----

(Note: If you're coming here from Google News or a similar link: My apologies for the posting of a very incorrect headline, based on some initial news reports. The Virginia Supreme Court did not say that Episcopalians own the Virginia churches. Read on for what it did say.)

The Supreme Court of Virginia has ruled in favor of the Episcopal Church in the state's much-watched dispute over church property. But it's just the latest ruling in what will continue to be a long fight.

Reversing a lower court's ruling, the Virginia Supreme Court said that the Anglican churches cannot use the Virginia "Division Statute" (the state law governing property when "a division has heretofore occurred or shall hereafter occur in a church or religious society") to file their claims.

But the actual answer to who owns the property is still a long way off.

Legal details after the jump...

Southern Baptists reported a 2.2 percent increase in baptisms in 2009, stemming a four-year decline, but membership in the denomination fell and the sagging economy led to a drop in missions giving, according to the Annual Church Profile (ACP) compiled by LifeWay Christian Resources in conjunction with Baptist state conventions.

Baptisms last year totaled 349,737, up from 342,198 in 2008, a year in which Southern Baptists recorded the fewest baptisms since 1987. Total membership fell 0.42 percent to 16.16 million, and Sunday School enrollment dropped 0.04 percent to 7.75 million.

While the baptism numbers are encouraging, they do not necessarily signal a reversal of fortune for the nation's largest Protestant denomination, said Thom Rainer, LifeWay's president and CEO.

"Every baptism is a celebration of another person finding new life in Jesus Christ," Rainer said. "The fact that more people were baptized this year than last year gives us a reason to hope we're on the right path. At the same time, we as Southern Baptists continue to show signs of drifting from our historic commitment to evangelism, as reflected in the fact that it still takes 46 Southern Baptists to lead one person to faith in Christ."

Baptism symbolizes believers' identification with Jesus in His death, burial and resurrection; their new life in Christ; and their anticipation of the day in which Christ will raise them from the dead, demonstrating His victory over sin and death. Therefore, the number of baptisms is a key measurement of Southern Baptists' effectiveness in evangelism.

Rainer continued, "The decline in membership across our denomination, along with the drop in Sunday School enrollment, indicate that Southern Baptists continue to be distracted from -- or indifferent toward -- the command of Jesus to make disciples. I pray that these discouraging numbers sound a wake-up call to all of us."

ACP data revealed a slight rise (0.36 percent) in the number of Southern Baptist churches, to 45,010, and an increase of 0.37 percent in primary worship attendance, to 6.21 million.

Ted and Gayle Haggard, who began holding prayer meetings in their Colorado Springs home last November, have incorporated to become a church, reports The Colorado Springs Gazette. Becoming St. James Church brings with it a tax structure that helps “keep the accounting in order," said Ted; the couple has been giving paid talks at U.S. churches for the past 18 months.

But noting the turnout at last year's prayer meetings, the first of which had 110 attendees, Haggard hinted that St. James might end up functioning as a traditional church: "Sometime, somewhere we will do some type of ministry," he told the Gazette. The church Ted started in the couple's basement 25 years ago became the 14,000-member nondenominational New Life Church.

The Haggards' talks have detailed their recovery from Ted's public scandal in 2006, when he confessed to sexual immorality and purchasing drugs, stepping down as president of the National Association of Evangelicals and as senior pastor of New Life. Gayle detailed her own recovery in Why I Stayed: My Choice to Love, Hope, and Forgive, released this January, and in a related CT interview.

Southern Baptist leaders, grappling with several years of declining baptisms, unveiled a proposal Monday challenging members and mission leaders to commit to new approaches to evangelism.

The report calls for individuals to increase financial support beyond the current average of 2.5 percent of annual income, and for its International Mission Board to evangelize foreign populations within U.S. borders.

"When the Southern Baptist Convention was founded, the world was rather easily divided into `home' and `foreign' missions," states the report from the Great Commission Resurgence Task Force. "Now, with revolutions in transportation and the movement of peoples, the world has come to North America."

The proposal calls for a "refocused" North American Mission Board that will prioritize starting new churches and working in regions where there is not a high concentration of Southern Baptists.

The report suggests that individual Southern Baptists strive to give at least 10 percent of their income to their churches, and that families use vacation time for mission trips. It also seeks greater giving from churches and state conventions to the denomination's central funding program to aid missions work.

The report will be voted on at the annual June meeting of the Southern Baptist Convention in Orlando, Fla.

Francis Chan, the high-profile California pastor profiled by CT last October, announced Sunday that he is preparing to leave his Cornerstone Church in order to pursue something new. Many will be interested to see what shape his new vision takes.

A Florida girl who went missing last Friday was found alive yesterday by a man who attends her family's former church.

In an early version of the Orlando Sentinel story, a pastor's wife said that the man who found Bloom had been praying in tongues. About three dozen members of Metro Church in Winter Springs had searched for the girl, who was lost in a wooded swampland. CNN reports that King and Nadia's family at one time attended Metro Church but they did not know one another.

In an ABC story, James King credits God with finding the 11-year-old girl who has an autism-related disorder called Asperger's syndrome.

"He [God] directed my path," volunteer searcher James King told "Good Morning America" today. "When you're in a swamp, there's no good-looking way. He led me directly to her. ... I would be praying and calling out Scriptures and at one point I called out, 'Nadia,' and I heard, 'What?'

"That's a huge swamp. It was strictly the Lord. There was no mathematical calculations. It was the Holy Spirit directing me to where he knew she was the whole time," he said.

Mac Brunson and the leaders of First Baptist Church Jacksonville didn’t much care for FBC Jax Watchdog, one of many Baptist watchblogs.

No surprise there: Brunson was a frequent target of the anonymous blogger’s critiques. The surprise is that the church asked one of its members, a police officer (who is also a Brunson bodyguard) to find out who the blogger was. The officer got assistant state attorney Stephen Siegel to subpoena records from Comcast and Google to unmask the blogger as longtime church member Tom Rich—whereupon the church leadership immediately barred Rich and his wife from ever coming near the sanctuary again.

The inevitable lawsuits followed, and on March 31 United States District Judge Marcia Morales Howard denied Siegel’s efforts to claim immunity. “The limited record before the court does not support a finding that Siegel had any legitimate law enforcement interest in issuing the investigatory subpoenas,” Howard said. In addition, she said, Siegel’s reported actions “appear to violate the very essence of the First Amendment.”

But Howard did dismiss Rich’s complaint against Siegel’s supervisor, then-state attorney Angela Corey, who was acting in her official capacity and is thus protected by 11th Amendment to the Constitution.

Rich is also suing the police officer and the church.

(Sources: Associated Baptist Press, Jacksonville Times-Union, and Religion Clause.)

Crystal Cathedral leaders met with vendors and creditors on Friday to discuss debt payments after businesses filed lawsuits against the California megachurch, alleging that it owes $2 million in unpaid services.

"The purpose of the meeting was to gather all these vendors, suppliers and friends into one place and apologize for the delinquency of the accounts that we currently have with them," Shiela Schuller Coleman, daughter of Cathedral founder, Robert H. Schuller, said in a statement.

The Orange County Register reports that church officials asked that creditors not resort to legal action for 90 days so they could resolve the issues.

Among those who have not yet been paid are Kristina Oliver, who supplied camels, horses and sheep for the Christmas pageant; Juliet Noriega, who was the wardrobe supervisor; Sharon Crabtree who did the props for the show; and Bruce Johnson, the drycleaner who is still holding the pageant's costumes in lieu of payment.

Vendors who attended Friday morning's meeting said they had no idea there were so many creditors. When asked, cathedral administrators told them that there are as many as 185 creditors waiting in line to be paid.

CT reported earlier about how the church cut $4.9 million from its $20 million budget and interviewed Robert A. Schuller about his departure from the church his father Robert H. Schuller founded.

As expected, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America adopted the following resolution:

"Resolved, that the ELCA commit itself to finding ways to allow congregations that choose to do so to recognize, support, and hold publicly accountable life-long, monogamous, same gender relationships."

The vote was 619-402.

Update: Late this afternoon, the assembly also voted 559-451 to allow "people in such publicly accountable, lifelong, monogamous, same-gender relationships to serve as rostered leaders of this church."

Much of the debate was not over sexual orientation but rather on sexual relationships and activity.

Delegate Al Quie, the former governor of Minnesota, had offered a resolution earlier in the day: "Rostered leadership of this church who are homosexual in their self understanding are expected to abstain from homosexual sexual relations and practicing homosexual persons are precluded from rostered leadership in this church." (That resolution was defeated.)

"We are today part of a church denomination that is changing, and it will make possible sexual moral standards that are contrary to the Bible — which is what brings Jesus closer to us," Quie said (he was quoted by the Associated Press).

There's another vote tonight on a resolution outlining some of the specifics in which the church will make allowances for members and clergy "in a publicly accountable, lifelong, monogamous, same-gender relationship." But given the outcome of the other votes this week, it's sure to pass.

United Methodists have defeated amendments that would have made church membership open to all Christians regardless of sexual orientation and furthered the creation of a new, U.S.-only governing body, according to the denomination's news service.

Delegates at the United Methodist Church's General Conference last year approved the sexual orientation amendment, as well as several others that would have changed how the international church is governed. But the amendments failed to gain support from two-thirds of the denomination's annual conferences, as required by church law. The conferences voted in May and June.

Twenty-seven of the 44 regional conferences that reported voting results rejected the amendment that would have made membership in local churches open to "all persons, upon taking vows declaring the Christian faith, and relationship in Jesus Christ," according to United Methodist
News Service.

Many mainline Protestant churches still struggle to fill the pews, as evidenced by a multi-million dollar advertising campaign from the United Methodist Church and the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America.

People drop away from church attendance. Young people are not interested.

So how can church improve? What can the church do for you? Or maybe it’s not the church’s problem.

Actually, it may be our own fault.

Think the churches in your neighborhood don't get along? Then, this should put things in perspective: The pastor of Rubaga Miracle Centre in Kampala, Uganda, has accused the pastor of Omega Healing Centre of trying to destroy his reputation by 1) kidnapping and torturing his personal aide and 2) bribing the aide to accuse him of sexually abusing boys.

Omega Healing Centre's pastor, Michael Kyazze, denies he was involved in kidnapping:

I have never been engaged in as nefarious and criminal an act of kidnapping. My struggle has been and will continue to be the fight for the increasing number of victims of sodomy in our society. If it has been interpreted as an effort to discredit Pastor Kayanja, then it is both unfortunate and a dangerous insinuation.

This comes soon after an assistant pastor of Omega Healing Centre was arrested while trespassing at Rubaga Miracle Centre, allegedly while trying to investigate Kayanja .

The aide is currently recovering in a Kampala hospital.

Uganda’s New Vision reported the story and says it highlights growing tension among competing Pentecostal churches. The Daily Monitor says "Cases of alleged homosexuality in churches have now become common." New Vision says rival pastors also accuse each other of witchcraft.

This week's Gospel Coalition Conference - the second one open to the public - was packed out. About 3,400 registered participants meant breakout sessions and the main assemblies overflowed, with people sitting on the floor and peeking in from the hallways.

And these participants were overwhelmingly young men. I tried counting from my seat and came up with about 20 men per woman - not too surprising in a mid-week conference for pastors with Calvinist and complementarian views. Don Carson estimated that 80 percent were under forty.

The theme was based on 2 Timothy, a letter from a pastor near the end of his life to a young pastor. It was clear, especially in John Piper's sermon and the panel discussion at the end, that TGC see themselves in that role of pastoring pastors.

As far as the conference itself goes, clearly it's come a long way since 2007, when Trinity Evangelical Divinity School was able to fit everyone on their campus. The lineup of speakers continues to represent a very broad range of styles (John Piper, Mark Driscoll, Tim Keller, among others). Nevertheless, it's also a place where someone can say "peculiar unction" and be understood by all.

But it's no longer just a conference. One of the few non-sermon events was an introduction, led by Keller and Don Carson, to forming official chapters of the Gospel Coalition. Those will have a virtual existence on The City (a social networking site developed at Mars Hill). They're also expected to facilitate face-to-face meetings and conferences. On three separate occasions, people told me TGC seemed like a nascent denomination.

Some sessions are well worth listening to: Keller on contemporary idols, Driscoll on dealing with difficult people, Ajith Fernando on preaching the uniqueness of Christ in a pluralistic society (there doesn't seem to be an available audio file on this), and the second half of the panel discussion, where Keller, Piper, Ligon Duncan, and Crawford Loritts talk about suffering (also not online).

Books & Culture Editor John Wilson likes David Dark's new book, The Sacredness of Questioning Everything, but he has some searching questions for the author. Here's the podcast of his discussion with Stan Guthrie.

Some observers point to the new American Religious Identification Survey (ARIS) as evidence that religion is finally in decline in the United States. However, John Micklethwait and Adrian Wooldridge say the nation's free-market principles of innovation and competition help keep religion vibrant.

Religion, no less than software or politics, is a competitive business, where organization and entrepreneurship count. Religious America is led by a series of highly inventive "pastorpreneurs" -- men like Bill Hybels of Willow Creek or Rick Warren of Saddleback. These are far more sober, thoughtful characters than the schlock-and-scandal televangelists of the 1970s, but they are not afraid to use modern business methods to get God's message across.

The authors, who this week are releasing their book God is Back: How the Global Revival of Faith is Changing the World (Penguin), have nothing to say in their Wall Street Journal article about how the forces of capitalism may affect orthodoxy for good or ill. But it is probably fair to say that reports of religion's death have been greatly exaggerated.

A pastor was shot and killed during his sermon today at a church in a village in Illinois, the Associated Press reports. The pastor deflected the first round of bullets with his Bible, which the 150 congregants initially thought was a skit.

The gunman strode down the aisle of the sprawling First Baptist Church shortly after 8 a.m. and briefly spoke with The Rev. Fred Winters, then pulled out a .45-caliber semiautomatic pistol and began firing until it jammed, Illinois State Police Director Larry Trent said. Churchgoers wrestled the gunman to the ground as he waved a knife, slashing himself and two other people, Trent said.

The pastor was standing on an elevated platform to deliver his sermon about finding happiness in the workplace before the shooting happened, the AP writes.

Authorities didn't know whether Winters, a married father of two who had led the church for nearly 22 years, knew the gunman. Police described the gunman as a 27-year-old from nearby Troy but would not release his name pending possible charges.

This evening, the congregants gathered for prayer, as the pastor's colleague urged mourners to be resilient after the "attack from the forces of hell."

One of the last shootings in a church took place at New Life Church in Colorado Springs, where a man opened fire in a parking lot.

The general secretary of the Assemblies of God has resigned after admitting to ethical misconduct, the denomination announced February 13.

The resignation of John M. Palmer, who served in the position since November 2007, was immediate.

General Superintendent George O. Wood, the denomination's chief executive officer, said Palmer "confessed to a one-time incident that involved ethical misconduct and an inappropriate interaction with a woman that did not involve any physical intimacy," reported the church's News and Information Service.

The general secretary maintains information about the denomination's ministers and churches, oversees the chartering of churches and credentialing of ministers and keeps official statistics about the Pentecostal religious organization based in Springfield, Mo.

In a statement, Wood said he was "deeply saddened" about "this failure" and asked for prayers for Palmer and his family.

"John has had a sterling record in the Assemblies of God as a church planter, pastor, and national leader," said Wood. "This failure on his part is an aberration from a lifetime of faithful service to the Lord, his family and our fellowship."

Wood expressed hopes that, after a "period of rehabilitation yet to be determined," Palmer would be able to return to ministry.

The executive presbyters, who serve as the board of directors for the denomination, are expected to appoint an interim replacement for Palmer to serve until the General Council, the major biennial meeting of the Assemblies of God, in August.

The pastor of Willow Creek Chicago, megachurch Willow Creek Community Church's city campus, resigned and admitted to "sexual impurity," according to Chicago breaking news.

In 2006, the Rev. Steve Wu began leading Willow Creek Chicago, launching Willow Creek's fifth campus. Willow Creek is the second largest megachurch in the United States with more than 20,000 members, according to a database by the Hartford Institute for Religion Research.

According to the article, a church elder read a statement to the Willow Chicago congregation on January 25 announcing Wu's resignation, saying the pastor "admitted to sexual impurity and has taken full responsibility for his sin. He has expressed a desire to participate in a restoration process." The statement also said that Todd Katter has agreed to serve as interim campus pastor while the church searches for Wu's replacement.

I've been suffering for CT at the National Pastors Convention in, uh, San Diego. Yet despite the gorgeous locale and weather, there is, as usual, palpable angst here. The place is full of pastors who are either exhausted, burnt out, frustrated, or missional. They all amount to the same thing: a simmering anger about the church.

For most pastors that anger is directed at stupid lay people, stubborn church boards, or indifferent church bureaucrats. But "the church," and especially "the Western church" or "the American church," is the object of a myriad of derisive and sarcastic comments.

The anger is understandable. Pastors are an idealistic lot, having entered the ministry because they had the mistaken idea that they could make a difference in the world. And the church is standing in their way. I know. I was once a pastor. It's the way this works. I had great ideas for ministering to the community and the world. And all sorts of church people, from laity to church bureaucrats, got in the way. What I could have done in a church without people!

What occurs to very few pastors--I only heard it from Will Willimon and Larry Osborne--is the difficult passion to love the church. To be sure, love can be tough. But love should also be tender.

Not a lot of tender comments about the sheep that these shepherds are responsible for. Lots of desire for transforming the world, becoming a missional outpost, and enough social justicing to make mainline liberals drool with envy. But not much tender love for those people, as Willimon put it, whom Jesus loves and calls into community with him.

As I said, this is understandable. This is a place where pastors need to get their frustrations off their chests. I went to similar conferences when I was a pastor and found them to be blessed weeks of healing and renewal precisely because we talked frankly about our frustrations with our churches. I just wish that at NPC, more of the presenters would not have fed the anger with calls for revolutionizing this and transforming that, which only puts more guilt and even more unrealistic expectations on the shoulders of men and women in pastoral leadership who are trying to love the people for whom Jesus died.

CT's Senior Managing Editor Mark Galli is running around the National Pastors Convention in San Diego, talking to people like Rob Bell, pastor of Mars Hill Bible Church, and A.J. Jacobs, author of The Year of Living Biblically.

He's also using CT's Twitter, that social network that allows you to do some reporting from your phone. The fun part is that Mark has only 140 characters.

Using the #npc09 symbol, Mark will give updates and wants your feedback. What do you want to know about the convention?

I've posted some of his tweets below:

#npc09 Interviewing Rob Bell later today. What ? do you have for him? Tweet markgalli.

#npc09 interviewing AJ "living the Bible literally" Jacobs later. What ? should we ask him?

#npc09 best undiscovered author: Shane Hipps. Has done lots of wise thinking about technology and the gospel.

#npc09 William Willimon preached. Key idea: pastors are called to love the infuriating people that Jesus loves and dies for: the laity

#npc09 Rob Bell: Great interview on his latest book. Thanks especially for the question about putting the gospel in a tweet. He tried :-)

#npc09 AJ Jacob interview: I can see why this guy is so compelling/attractive. He's pretty humble and gracious. Puts some Xians to shame

Open Doors has released its list of countries where Christians are most persecuted. Their 50-question survey asks both about Christians' legal status and what actually happens to them.

North Korea is at the top of the list for the seventh year in a row. It scored a 90.5, putting it in a category by itself, 32.5 points beyond Saudi Arabia and Iran. "The North Korean regime believes that it will collapse if it fails to stop the spreading of Christianity," Open Doors explains.

They list Saudi Arabia, Iran, Afghanistan, Somalia, Pakistan, Iraq, Mauritania, Algeria, India, Nigeria (North), Indonesia, Bangladesh and Kazakhstan as countries where Christians' freedom has deteriorated.

Countries that improved include Bhutan, China, Turkmenistan, Vietnam, Azerbaijan, Sudan (North), Zanzibar Islands, Cuba, Turkey, and Colombia.

The Rev. Robert J. Marshall, who led the former Lutheran Church in America and helped lay the groundwork for the church's merger with two other denominations to form the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, died Dec. 22. He was 90.

Marshall, a dedicated ecumenist, was elected president of the Lutheran Church in America, the largest Lutheran denomination in the U.S., in 1968, according to the ELCA.

He served as president for a decade, helping prepare the LCA to merge with the American Lutheran Church and Association of Evangelical Lutheran Churches in 1987 to form the 5 million-member ELCA.

Current ELCA Presiding Bishop Mark Hanson recalled Marshall as a steady soul who led Lutherans through turbulent times.

"To God we give thanks for the service of the Reverend Dr. Robert James Marshall, who himself became one of those giants among Lutheran leaders who served in the 20th century," Hanson said in a statement.

Sunday Adelaja has been a controversial figure in Kyiv church life for some time. The senior pastor of Embassy of God megachurch has drawn criticism for allegedly overreporting attendance, preaching a prosperity gospel, exaggerating his role in the Orange Revolution, and for his church's relatively flamboyant cultural engagement.

But this time, he faces allegations of criminal misbehavior. Charisma ran a long article about accusations that Adelaja was at the center of a scam that bilked investors - many of them congregants - of $100 million.

Pentecostal leaders allege Adelaja encouraged church members to invest in King's Capital,

But last month, several church members went to authorities saying they were unable to recover the money they invested, which left many of them bankrupt. Police later arrested one of King's Capital leaders, Aleksandr Bandurchenko, on suspicion of fraud.

So far, it's unclear whether King's Capital was a legitimate venture that failed, as Adelaja claims, or a pyramid scheme.

The press release on Embassy of God's website sends some mixed messages, quoting Nehemiah 6:3 ("I am carrying on a great project and cannot go down"), John 8:7 ("If any one of you is without sin, let him be the first to throw a stone at her"), and Micah 7:8 (Do not gloat over me, my enemy! Though I have fallen, I will rise). But Adelaja denies he had anything "to do with the King's Capital management, administration, and moreover finances."

The Rev. Robert A. Schuller has resigned as senior pastor of the Crystal Cathedral in Southern California after his father, the Rev. Robert H. Schuller, said his son would no longer be the sole preacher on the church's "Hour of Power" television program.

In October, the elder Schuller said differences between the two men over the "direction and the vision" of the megachurch and its related television broadcast had led them to "part ways." At that time, the younger Schuller remained as the church's senior pastor while the elder Schuller hosted the broadcast and invited a range of guest speakers to the pulpit.

A statement on Crystal Cathedral's Web site says its executive team has accepted the younger Schuller's resignation and he remains a member of the Reformed Church in America, the denomination with which the church is affiliated.

"It is expected that Robert will make an announcement soon regarding plans for his new ministry," reads the statement. "The leadership and congregation wishes him all the best as his plans unfold."

The Rev. Juan Carlos Ortiz, founder of Crystal Cathedral Hispanic Ministry, has been named interim senior pastor.

Crystal Cathedral spokesman John Charles said the elder Schuller's role has not changed at the ministry. The pulpit is being filled by a rotation of pastors around the country, he said.

As of Monday (Dec. 15), Charles said the younger Schuller had not yet announced his future plans.

The Boston Globe has a great story and video about a company it calls "Microsoft of altar bread."

Mark Arsenault writes about the Cavanagh Company in Rhode Island, which makes 25 million Communion wafers each week and boasts of an 80 percent market share in the United States. Even in a recession, the company's CEO says that sales are up as much as 5 percent this year.

The company noticed a dip in Catholic Church attendance reflected in lower sales in the early part of this decade after the church sex abuse scandal broke.

"We're cautiously optimistic that the numbers have bottomed out and are on the way back up," he said. He thinks the increases may be due to the economy. He also cited the pope's US visit last April, in which the pontiff expressed regret for the scandal.

The Cavanagh Co. also provides wafers for other denominations, such as Lutheran and Episcopal churches, the family said. They bake an entirely different style of altar bread for Southern Baptist churches. Those breads are small white squares. "They probably would double as a great soup cracker," said Andy.

In that spirit, the family revealed last week that they are experimenting with a new, semisecret product line - a secular cracker. Not for dipping in wine, this cracker would be dipped in dip.

Here's a video by the Globe's Scott LaPierre:

Looking to get into the wafer business? The company sells a box of 1,000 standard wafers at $12 or more, twice the wholesale price.

(h/t Michael Paulson)

In light of tightening financial times, and the heightened scrutiny of household spending that follows, some churches are making it easier for congregants to follow the money. Waterfront Community Church in Schaumburg, Illinois, gives 100% of its offerings each week to local households identified by a partnering Christian agency. This practice allows a church member, in pastor Jim Semradek's words, to "see a face on the other side that you're blessing."

How does the church take care of its own operating costs? Eight sponsors cover rent and salaries, freeing it to use all of its offering in this way. The model is an attempt to restore trust in local churches and return mission to the core of their identity. Its mission-minded sponsors believe freeing Waterfront from concerns about its own expenses does just that.

Waterfront is, of course, not alone among local churches experimenting with new budgetary models as it rethinks mission.

Old news is not interesting. Unless it keeps repeating itself. And then, like a defective CD that keeps sticking at the same place, it's time to do something.

An article from the Minneapolis Star Tribune announces:

Here's the steeple; open the door, and where are the young people?
A survey finds that many youths draw a line between being spiritual and participating in an organized religion.

The story is based on the release of a survey conducted by the Minneapolis-based Search Institute, in which nearly 7,000 people were queried about their attitudes towards religion and spirituality.

"Spirituality is bigger than religion," said Peter Benson a co-directors of the Institute's Center for Spiritual Development in Childhood and Adolescence. "One of the things we have to focus on now is disentangling spiritual development from religious development."

And this Colorado Springs, in a story about a new congregation called Amplify Church:

The church also ignores traditional Christian rites and rituals in favor of an ultracasual atmosphere. It's just young adults with Bibles, hanging out to rap about their faith.

"Churches have become corporations," [The Rev. Dan] MacFadyen said. "We are trying to take away the corporate baggage and be real."

Being real apparently amounts to meeting in a bar, sitting "at bar tables in near darkness while blinking lights bathed the musicians in bright hues," "where Miller Lite and Budweiser posters, not crosses, hang on the walls," and where the pastor is "forgoing suit and tie in favor of worn jeans, sandals and T-shirt."

Again, not much new or creative here, and yet it speaks to an ongoing distrust among many people (and not just youth) of the church. Then again, we know from other stories, there is a counter-movement towards traditional churches with rich and even complex liturgies.

Actually both movements--away from mere religion and toward liturgy--may be driven by the same thing, something the Minneapolis survey tries to quantify: "The good news for faith communities is that 93 percent of the young people surveyed believe there is a spiritual aspect to life."

Despite rumors to the contrary, we don't live in a secular age. People remain hungry to know God. To me it is silliness to abandon the rich history and tradition of the church. At the same time, it is foolishness for churches to carp at the shallowness of so much spiritual searching.

The Board of Emergent Village announced a new direction for the network last Thursday, which includes the decision "to streamline, decentralize, and reduce expenses by discontinuing the role of National Coordinator."

This move comes in response to feedback from more than 2,000 friends of Emergent given in a survey sent out this past summer. Thursday's announcement reports that "nearly everyone [survey respondents] agreed that emergent is a grass-roots relational network" and that friends of Emergent are wary of "institutionalization" -- becoming "another large nonprofit religious organization building a big budget and staff."

Jones will continue in his role of National Coordinator on a part-time basis through the end of the year and will, according the announcement, "stay actively involved as a passionate participant in this conversation and friendship."

More to come.

I've been attending the second annual REVEAL Conference at Willow Creek. At the first one, Willow announced that a survey called REVEAL had shown them that a lot of their members had stalled out in their spiritual growth. This was a surprise to Willow leaders, though many long-term critics of Willow shook their heads and said, "We told you so!"

Whatever one's views of seeker-sensitive or market-driven ministry or studies (like REVEAL) that claim to be able to statistically measure spiritual growth, this much is clear: Willow is not the only church that is desperate to learn whether it is being a good and effective servant. The auditorium is filled (I'm guessing 2,000 in attendance) with pastors and staffs from hundreds of churches, and churches of all sizes and shapes.

The conference attendees are mostly white, suburban males, but the presenters have been a healthy mix of suburban/urban, white/black/multicultural churches. Some years ago, Hybels had committed his church to a more multicultural friendly direction, and he has done so, at least from what is presented from the front.

What is more striking, however, is the passion that exudes from the audience as they participate in worship, and applaud or laugh with speakers. This is a leadership group that is desperate to know and follow Jesus, and to lead their congregations and communities into deeper knowledge of God and larger concern for neighbors.

In an age time when many evangelicals seem ambivalent about evangelism, here is a larger group whose hearts burn within them to share the gospel message. In a time when nuanced and sophisticated discussion of hermeneutics abound, here is a group that is more interested in obeying biblical commands we do understand than writing articles on the verses we don't understand. In a time of postmodern doubt and narcissistic self-questioning, here is a group who knows whose they are and what they are called to do in his name.

It's not hard to find things to criticize at a conference based on a survey that traffics in marketing language and the latest business maxims. Really, do we, as one speaker said, "need to completely reinvent spiritual formation" - as if the desert fathers and medieval saints and reformation heroes hadn't already taught about spiritual practices that are supposedly being rediscovered by a contemporary marketing survey?

To argue about method, though, would be to fall into cultural mindset that St. Paul seems to reject: The point is the longing to spread the good news of Jesus Christ. And that longing is palpable here.

(For more of a play-by-play look at this conference, check out the Out of Ur blog from our sister publication, Leadership.)

A judge ruled that a church property in Oklahoma belongs to the Presbyterian Church USA after a two-year fight with the congregation, Tulsa World reports.

Kirk of the Hills left the Presbyterian Church USA two years ago, expressing concerns that the denomination was drifting from its biblical foundation, reporter Bill Sherman writes. It has continued to meet in the building and plans to appeal the decision.

Nationally syndicated columnist Kathleen Parker released a book this summer that may prove an unlikely ally for those concerned about the lack of engaged men in American churches. In Save the Males: Why Men Matter, Why Women Should Care, Parker identifies our cultural moment as one in which it's acceptable to portray men as dumb, violent, sex-crazed, or irresponsible husbands and fathers. (Movies and TV shows like Everybody Loves Raymond, Two and a Half Men, and Knocked Up, to name but a few, typify this depiction.)

Parker, who frequently writes on families and sexuality, believes cultural "male-bashing" in part comes from the mainstreaming of a feminism that assumes men must be devalued so that women may rise to a place of equal treatment politically and professionally. What is refreshing about Parker's argument is that it's rooted not in shrill, anti-feminist rhetoric (she calls herself a feminist), but in Parker's personal history and current family situation: She was raised by a single father after her mother died, and now has three young boys. Her adolescence was marked by the realization that men are, well, human. Here's how she described it to Karen Spears Zacharias:

Each day after school, I joined [my father] at his law office where I did my homework until he finished up. Once home, we convened in the kitchen where he cooked while I perched on a wooden stool peeling potatoes. We talked.
In that ritualized communion, I learned many useful lessons about the opposite sex. I learned that men like to talk while doing something else. . . . I learned that fathers adore their children and will sacrifice anything to help them succeed. I learned that fathers will lay their lives down for their children. I learned that men are capable of honor, valor, compassion and courage and that they are essential to instilling those virtues in their sons and daughters.

Given Parker's thoroughly personalized vision of men and subsequent sensitivity to male-bashing, some of the antidotes to American churches' lack of men offered by David Murrow, author of Why Men Hate Going to Church and ChurchforMen.com, strike me as ironic. Could it be that Murrow's solutions -- shorter, to-the-point sermons, action-oriented worship songs like "Onward Christian Soldiers," ministries that feature cars or extreme sports -- play on the very caveman stereotypes that belittle men instead of help them utilize their gifts through full participation in church life?

Gary B. Trudeau's Doonesbury, which newspapers publish either with the comics or the editorial cartoons, just wrapped up a series about Iraqi Christian refugees. Roland (in this series a Fox News correspondent) is trying to cover the story of an Assyrian family in a way that is flattering for the Surge. Doonesbury treats the imaginary Iraqis with a great deal of dignity. Fox News doesn't fare so well.

Fox News actually did run an Associated Press story about "Christians Fleeing Violence in Iraq" in early May, which brings up the matter of ransoms most Christians pay for "protection."

The background--not in the comic strips, although alluded to--is that Iraq's Christians, the largest non-Muslim religious group in Iraq , are represented disproportionately in the refugee population (although it should be mentioned that the Assyrian diaspora dates back to World War I). It's such a huge drain that some churches in Iraq have no members left. Christians can be identified by their names and ID cards, and they are often targeted for violence. The Assyrian International News Agency (AINA) is calling it genocide. So, many Assyrians leave as soon as they can. Others, like the family in Doonesbury, wait until something unbearable happens.

Ministries headed by evangelists Joyce Meyer and Benny Hinn are both changing the way they operate even as a Senate probe into alleged lavish spending by six prominent ministries continues, Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, said Monday, July 7.

"Both Joyce Meyer and Benny Hinn have indicated that they are instituting reforms without waiting for the committee to complete its review," said Grassley, the ranking Republican on the Senate Finance Committee, in an update on the investigation he began last year.

"Self-reform can be faster and more effective than government regulation."

Roby Walker, a spokesman for Joyce Meyer Ministries in Fenton, Mo., confirmed that changes are being made but could not release details on Tuesday.

Don Price, a spokesman for Benny Hinn Ministries in Grapevine, Texas, also declined to comment in detail but said "reforms and improved governance practices" were being shared with Grassley's office.

Grassley's update noted instances of "whistleblower intimidation" where former employees "have received phone calls reminding them of their confidentiality agreements and threatening lawsuits if the agreements are breached."

Jill Gerber, a spokeswoman for the committee, would not disclose which ministries were involved in such calls, and declined to elaborate on the changes planned at Hinn's and Meyer's ministries.

Grassley's update described the responses from Hinn and Meyer as "in good faith and substantively informative," but said the others are "incomplete" or "not responsive."

Broadcaster Kenneth Copeland has reportedly said his Texas-based ministry will not respond even if a subpoena is issued. Grassley's memo said staffers are "consulting with Senate attorneys about next steps."

In other cases, staffers continue to contact ministry lawyers and officials in hopes of further cooperation.

"Sen. Grassley still very much wants to avoid subpoenas and hopes that those ministries will agree that subpoenas would be an unnecessary step," Gerber said.

The other ministries under investigation are: Bishop Eddie Long's New Birth Missionary Baptist Church in Lithonia, Ga.; Creflo Dollar Ministries in College Park, Ga., and Randy and Paula White, who co-pastored Without Walls International Church in Tampa, Fla.

I was wrong. The election of Johnny Hunt as president of the Southern Baptist Convention did not actually generate much analysis in the Baptist blogosphere. Instead, almost all the discussion is about a resolution on church membership numbers.

Numbers were a key theme of the meeting this year, and none were good news:

• 9,500: Expected number of "messengers" (delegates) at the convention.
• 7,200: Actual number of messengers.
• 419,342: Baptisms in Southern Baptist churches in 1999.
• 345,941: Baptisms in 2007.
• 5.5%: Drop in baptisms between 2007 and 2006.
• 3: The number of consecutive years in which baptism numbers have dropped in the SBC.
• 22: Number of years that outgoing president Frank Page says it will take, given current trends, for the SBC to lose half its churches (from about 44,000 to 20,000).
• 39,326: Drop in membership Southern Baptist Convention between 2006 and 2007.
• 10: Years since the last drop in membership.
• 2: Number of years SBC membership has declined since 1926.
• 16,266,920: Members in 2007.
• 6,148,868: Southern Baptist members who in 2007 attended a primary worship service of their church in a typical week.

Those final two statistics really drove the resolution "On Regenerate Church Membership and Church Member Restoration."

Johnny Hunt, senior pastor of First Baptist Church in Woodstock, Ga., has been elected the new president of the Southern Baptist Convention.

It's not a huge surprise: he's a megachurch pastor with a lot of support among the SBC leadership. It is a bit of a surprise that he won by so much. With 3,100 votes, he had more than twice as many as the next candidate, fellow Atlanta-area megachurch pastor Frank Cox of North Metro Baptist Church in Lawrenceville, Ga. With six candidates for the position -- the most since 1979, when the conservative resurgence in the denomination began -- many expected the vote to go to a runoff .

What does Hunt's presidency mean for the SBC? So far, it's hard to tell, though I'm sure the Baptist bloggers will be full of analysis tonight. Hunt's main emphases were preaching and missions (he was particularly vocal about finding new ways of funding missions). But his stances on controversies within the denominations may have had an effect as well.

It's clear that Hunt is no fan of the growing Calvinist movement within the Southern Baptist Convention. He's hosting a major conference to refute Calvinism at his church in November. But most of the candidates were not friendly to Calvinism, and Hunt has given indications that he's not out to purge the denomination of Reformed influences.

"I am not overwhelmingly concerned about Calvinism," Hunt told Baptist Press two weeks ago. "I am concerned about hyper-Calvinism, simply being defined as those that take election to the point that they feel that the Gospel should not even be shared with the whole world. ... I trust that Calvinists, and those who love Jesus of other persuasions, would come together for the common cause of making Jesus Christ known to the nations. There is plenty of room for all of us in this Baptist family."

It's worth noting that Frank Page, the current SBC president was also highly critical of Calvinism (even writing a book titled Trouble with the Tulip) but had an irenic spirit that won him support among Calvinists and Arminians alike.

Things may have gone quite differently had Al Mohler, the Calvinist president of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, stayed in the race (he suffered health complications).

Hunt was actually a leading candidate during the last SBC presidential election, but dropped out a month before the vote.

Cathy Lynn Grossman's recent USA Today article on William Young's surprise bestseller The Shack is her second in a month, this one shifting attention to the long-developing and growing backlash against the book coming from a number of influential voices concerned about the book's implicit theological claims.

Several conservative Protestant heavyweights--Al Mohler, Chuck Colson, Mark Driscoll, and influential blogger Tim Challies--have sounded off on the dangers of The Shack's vision of God, salvation, and the Church, creating a quartet of caution for the casual Christian reader. These strong cautions are all the more notable in light of the over-the-top endorsement from one of evangelicalism's most respected spiritual sages, Eugene Peterson, which is featured on the book's back cover.

My friend Dean's list of interests on his facebook profile reads as follows: "Interests: You Name It. The World Is An Interesting Place." I tend to share Dean's expansive interests, which partially explains why on a day when I could have blogged about yesterday's ruling allowing gay marriages in California, the global food crisis, continued gnashing of teeth regarding the Evangelical Manifesto, or the critical response to the latest Narnia film that opens this weekend, I'm instead drawn to this Houston Chronicle story about Lone Star Cowboy Church in Montgomery, Texas.

I'm admittedly a latecomer to the cowboy church phenomena, which was reported on in the pages of our magazine some five years ago. And upon reading that Lone Star has its own rodeo arena, which was built almost as soon as the tent church that served the congregation for the first two years, it's tempting to dismissively file the whole movement under news of the weird, as an odd bit of cultural ephemera spun out of American evangelical subculture machine. Yet the Chronicle article also indicates that Lone Star has over 1300 members, and that there are more than 100 churches linked with the Baptist General Convention's Texas Fellowship of Cowboy churches alone. (I highly recommend you take a look at this map, which plots cowboy churches in the Fellowship.)

Evangelizing persons of other faiths, or even committed atheists, agnostics, or freethinkers, is tricky business in our pluralistic and increasingly politicized religious landscape. In Western cultures where tolerance is preeminent among public virtues, such efforts are generally met with scorn, chastisement, and much journalistic gnashing of teeth. In other parts of the world, interfaith gospelers are subject to far worse than a tongue-lashing from the cultural gatekeepers. Such activity may win them spots in jail, or cost them and their families their livelihood, if not their lives.

I don't pick up The Chronicle Review--an insert in The Chronicle of Higher Education--expecting to be spurred to reflection on the emerging movement. And I'm quite sure that was not what author and UCLA history professor Russell Jacoby intended. Nevertheless, his intriguing article, "Not to Complicate Matters, But...," collided with other reading from my week to produce that rare but welcome guest--a helpful insight. In short, Jacoby is frustrated with scholars' growing penchant to "complicate," "problematize," or "complexify" issues and think in so doing that their work is complete. To make his point, Jacoby cites mock and actual examples that will sound familiar to anyone who's laid their hands on a peer-reviewed academic journal in the last decade:

"I hope today to complicate our notion of cahiers - grievances - and the role they played in the States-General of 1789." The professors and graduate students at the symposium nod appreciatively. They have heard or read similar justifications untold times before. The author explains that he or she will "complicate" our understanding of some event or phenomenon. "In this article," writes an ethnic-studies professor, "I seek to complicate scholars' understanding of the 'modular' state by examining four forms of indigenous political space." Everyone seems pleased by this approach. Why? The world is complicated, but how did "complication" turn from an undeniable reality to a desirable goal? Shouldn't scholarship seek to clarify, illuminate, or - egad! - simplify, not complicate? How did the act of complicating become a virtue?

Prominent theologian and Christianity Today senior editor J. I. Packer has made no secret of his break with the Anglican Church of Canada's Diocese of New Westminster. More than five years ago, he wrote a Christianity Today article explaining why he left the diocese.

The story has developed a bit since then. Earlier this month, his Vancouver church, the largest Anglican congregation in Canada, voted to leave the Anglican Church of Canada to join the Province of the Southern Cone, which is based in Argentina.

Now New Westminster Bishop Michael Ingham has sent Packer and seven other clergy members a "notice of presumption of abandonment of the exercise of ministry." He says he wants them to declare "whether they have left the ministry of the Anglican Church of Canada, and if they are seeking admission into another religious body outside Canada."

Seems like Packer and the others have been awfully clear on that point.

The news that Ingham may suspend Packer is getting a lot of buzz in the Anglican blog world. As always on these Anglican news bits, see TitusOneNine and Stand Firm, though the lead on this story came from the Canadian site LambethConference.net.

Frankly, this story isn't terribly newsworthy in the traditional sense. It's predictable, and any suspension would be irrelevant. Packer will continue his ministry just as he has been doing since he left the diocese.

But as Nicholas Knisely notes on the left-leaning Episcopal Cafe (the official blog of the Episcopal Church's Diocese of Washington, D.C.), Packer's name will give the story attention it might otherwise not have received.

[While] Packer's teaching and writing is not commonly encountered the Episcopal Church, it is widely known and respected by Evangelicals in the Anglican Communion. The possible suspension of Packer may create a bit of a problem for both the Archbishop of Canada and the Archbishop of Canterbury given the reaction that could be expected from many parts of the Communion.

It also has potential to make non-Anglican evangelicals worldwide more interested in the Anglican crisis. If you're one of those who has been skipping the coverage until now, start with Packer's story. More CT coverage is available here.

The parents of the man who shot and killed four people on two Colorado church grounds in December spoke about their son for a radio broadcast that aired today.

The Associated Press reports that the shooter, Matthew Murray, had attention deficit hyperactivity disorder and was bitter for being an outcast, but he gave no indication of his violent plans.

The parents spoke in an interview to be broadcast today and Friday on James Dobson's Focus on the Family radio program.

Murray, 24, killed two people and wounded two at a YWAM training center on the grounds of Faith Bible Chapel in a Denver suburb. Murray then slept in his own bed at his parent's house; 12 hours later and 60 miles away, he killed two sisters in the parking lot New Life Church in Colorado Springs before he killed himself.

According to the AP, Loretta Murray said her son called his cousin in Utah shortly before the training center shooting, "pouring out his heart" about how depressed and lonely he was.

The cousin called Loretta Murray just before midnight to tell her about Matthew's emotional state and she asked her husband to call him, the AP writes. Matthew told his father on his cell phone at 1:15 a.m. that he was eating at a restaurant with friends and was coming home. He had just shot and killed two people at YWAM.

Matthew appeared fine the next morning, and his mother told him to be careful driving in the snow, according to the AP. The same morning he shot two sisters and their father at New Life.

The AP reports that Murray dabbled in the occult, briefly joined the Mormon church and turned against charismatic Christianity. The Murrays said on the show that their son felt rejected and was unable to forgive people who he believed to be tormentors.

"The lesson is that unforgiveness leads to this bitterness and then opens you up to the spirit of Satan, to the spirit of whatever, and when that occurs, it becomes a power that people cannot control," said Ronald Murray, a neurologist.

Murray said that neither he nor Loretta Murray knew he owned weapons and that his son "had never expressed a desire for violence toward anybody."

On the program, the Murrays met David and Marie Works, the parents of two sisters who their son had killed.

David Works said on the program that forgiveness was simply part of the Christian walk.

"Without forgiveness," Ronald Murray said, "I don't think we could have moved on."

Previous CT coverage includes:
Five killed in New Life Church, YWAM center attacks | Police think two separate shootings may be related.
Arming in the Aftermath | Shooting spree at two churches prompts pastors to rethink security plans.
Securing the Faithful | What New Life Church did right when a gunman showed up in its parking lot.

While Bruce Gierson’s article, "An Atheist in the Pulpit," in the most recent issue of Psychology Today often devolves into a spiritual travelogue of clergy de-conversion, it does alert us to some of the personal and practical dilemmas raised when persons involved in professional ministry come to realize they doubt their beliefs.

Given that Gierson is writing for Psychology Today, it should come as no surprise that the story focuses on the "deeply inauthentic" feelings and accompanying "psychic stress" that results from a disconnect between a minister's public preaching, pastoral care, or performance of the liturgy, and his or her private doubts or disbelief. His clergy characters are often cast as heroes who live by Shakespeare's line--"to thine own self be true"--and uphold the "inviolability of the individual conscience." Better to be true to self than keep one's commitments, however far removed they now seem.

The board that oversees New York's 71 remaining OTB (off-track betting) parlors has voted to close them, according to an article in the New York Times. Apparently, they are no longer profitable for the city of New York.

People are already mourning the demise of OTBs because of the unique social atmosphere they provide. (The article is strong on atmospherics.)

Here's the quote caught my eye in that article. A regular at the OTB on Seventh Avenue at 38th Street told the Times reporter:

Michael Lindsay has, through extensive interviewing, tapped into a feature of American evangelicalism that's both fascinating and frustrating: two distinct social tiers. He identified these as the "populist" and "cosmopolitan" groups, which he wrote about in Faith in the Halls of Power. But there's another way of looking at evangelicals that divides them - much along the same lines - into elite and non-elite Christians.

The separation is fairly deep, it seems. So deep that they don't really go to church together. In fact, Lindsay writes in Monday's USA Today, many of the evangelical elite (including George W. Bush) hardly go to church at all:

I spent the past five years interviewing some of the country's top leaders - two U.S. presidents (George H.W. Bush and Carter), 100 CEOs and senior business executives, Hollywood icons, celebrated artists and world-class athletes. All were chosen because of their widely known faith. Yet I was shocked to find that more than half - 60% - had low levels of commitment to their denominations and congregations. Some were members in name only; others had actively disengaged from church life.

Everybody loses out, Lindsay says: "Community is a virtue for most religious traditions, but evangelicals have excelled at it. Declining church commitment among these leaders, therefore, is ripping at the very fabric that has distinguished American evangelicalism."

He addresses the reasons for this (frustration with the way churches are run) and the issue of where these elites do have Christian fellowship (exclusive Bible studies, parachurch ministry boards), and takes them gently to task for elitism.

But he doesn't give them the assignment of solving the problem - in this article, that's meted out to clergy.

Organized religion is perhaps the one factor that could motivate people to bridge the gap between rich and poor, especially now as more of the faithful move into the halls of power. To turn the tide, clergy around the country must engage and draw in these leaders. Otherwise, affluent believers will continue to leave their congregations - and their fellow believers - behind in their ascent, creating a gated community of the soul.

Lost in the media storm preceding and following Super Tuesday, and the actual storms that debilitated or devastated much of the US that same day, was media coverage of the start of Lent, arguably the most recognized of the exclusively Christian seasons on the Church's liturgical calendar. In reviewing English-speaking coverage of this turning of the seasons, I was struck by the difference between US media reports and those issuing from across the pond in the UK.

Lent 2008 starts incredibly early this year. If you don't wish to give up chocolate this Lent, consider a Carbon Fast. Two top clerics in the Church of England are endorsing this concept.

The globally known group, Tear Fund, notes on its website:

Bishops of London and Liverpool join to launch the Carbon Fast. Two of the Church of England’s most senior Bishops are urging people to cut their carbon rather than give up chocolate this Lent. Bishop of Liverpool and Vice President of Tearfund, James Jones and Bishop of London, Dr Richard Chartres, are joining with development agency Tearfund in calling for a cut in personal carbon use for each of the 40 days of Lent.

At the same time a Tearfund survey reveals that three out of five adults in the UK are willing to take an energy saving action this Lent. Tearfund and the Bishops have launched the fast because of the urgent need to reduce carbon emissions, and to protect poor communities around the world who are already suffering from the ravages of climate change.

Bishop of Liverpool and Vice President of Tearfund, James Jones said, `Traditionally people have given up things for Lent. This year we are inviting people to join us in a Carbon Fast. `It is the poor who are already suffering the effects of climate change. To carry on regardless of their plight is to fly in the face of Christian teaching.

`The tragedy is that those with the power to do something about it are least affected, whilst those who are most affected are powerless to bring about change. `There’s a moral imperative on those of us who emit more than our fair share of carbon to rein in our consumption.'

The Carbon Fast is a 40 day journey through Lent, towards a lighter carbon footprint, with a simple energy saving action per day. Actions include:

* snubbing plastic bags
* giving the dishwasher a day off
* insulating the hot water tank
* checking the house for drafts with a ribbon and buying draught excluders

Participants are asked to begin the Carbon Fast by removing one light bulb from a prominent place in the home and live without it for 40 days - as a constant visual reminder during Lent of the need to cut energy.

With a lighter carbon footprint, the Western church would save money while saving the world in the name of Christ.

We reported last November on the raids on Grace Church, a network of Korean Presbyterian church-plants, in Kazakhstan. The country’s secret police (formerly KGB, now KNB) are back at it, Forum 18 reports. Last weekend they raided the Grace Church in Almaty, the largest city in Kazakhstan.

Leaks through the media allege that church members are engaged in spying, appropriating church members' property, failing to file financial information, inciting inter-religious enmity and holding illegal drugs, even though no-one has ever been brought before a criminal court.

Vyacheslav Kalyuzhny, the Deputy Human Rights Ombudsperson, says the Church has not complained to his office. "People are not persecuted on religious grounds in Kazakhstan," he claimed.

The claim, while absurd, has worked in the recent past. In November, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) elected Kazakhstan to be the chair, beginning in 2010:

Minister Tazhin also emphasized that religious tolerance is highly valued in Kazakhstan, and that the country "enthusiastically supports the establishment of the three CiO personal representatives on religious tolerance: for Anti-Semitism, Muslims, and for Christians and Other Religions."

In 2009, Kazakhstan will host the third Congress on World and Traditional Religions in Astana.

Kazakhstanis are wonderfully welcoming and friendly people (I lived there for a couple years), and Central Asia has a long tradition of tolerance going back to the Silk Road. But the government has pretty much scrapped that tradition. It seems far more worried about Borat than the possibility of censure from the international community over degenerating religious rights.

The cover story of The Wall Street Journal's weekend section begins:

On a quiet Sunday morning in June, as worshippers settled into the pews at Allen Baptist Church in southwestern Michigan, Pastor Jason Burrick grabbed his cellphone and dialed 911. When a dispatcher answered, the preacher said a former congregant was in the sanctuary. "And we need to, um, have her out A.S.A.P."

The 71-year-old Karolyn Caskey was arrested and put in jail for returning to the church where she had recently been expelled for spreading "a spirit of cancer and discord" after questioning the pastor. Caskey had tithed regularly during her nearly 50-year membership at the church.

"It was very humiliating," says Mrs. Caskey, who worked for the state of Michigan for 25 years before retiring from the Department of Corrections in 1992. "The other prisoners were surprised to see a little old lady in her church clothes. One of them said, 'You robbed a church?' and I said, 'No, I just attended church.' "

The Journal reports that this "ancient practice" of church discipline is making a comeback. "The revival is part of a broader movement to restore churches to their traditional role as moral enforcers, Christian leaders say. Some say that contemporary churches have grown soft on sinners, citing the rise of suburban megachurches where pastors preach self-affirming messages rather than focusing on sin and redemption."

But I wonder if it isn't just an excuse for heavy-handed leadership. "Last week, the pastor of a 6,000-member megachurch in Nashville, Tenn., threatened to expel 74 members for gossiping and causing disharmony unless they repented. The congregants had sued the pastor for access to the church's financial records."

About 10 - 15 percent of churches discipline in this way, according to the article, but there's no proof to the claim that the practice is rising. It does seem, however, that lawsuits following church discipline may be increasing.

In 2005, CT published a cover package on church discipline, which included the article "Keeping the Lawyers at Bay."

The Wall Street Journal today interviewed Charles Zech, director of the Center for the Study of Church Management at Villanova, which has just launched an M.B.A. program for clergy. The degree is geared specifically for Catholics priests, following the clergy-abuse scandal and, more recently, a church embezzlement crisis. "Our center on church management surveyed chief financial officers of U.S. Catholic dioceses in 2005 and found that 85% had experienced embezzlements in the previous five years," Zech said. He continued:

There clearly are serious questions about internal financial controls at the parish level, and we are now doing research on parish advisory councils and asking questions about such things as who handles the Sunday collection and who has check-writing authority. Does the same person count the collection, deposit the money and then reconcile the checkbook? Obviously, you're just asking for problems if it's the same person; you can imagine the temptations.

Evangelical colleges and universities have launched M.B.A. programs, which can be financially attractive to CCCU schools who are often very dependent on tuition-paying students. But a church M.B.A. I don't think even the Leadership Network has thought of, though evangelical churches are not immune to fraud.

Last summer, Brotherhood Mutual Insurance Company denied the West Adrian United Church of Christ in Michigan insurance because its denomination supports same-sex marriage and the ordination of practicing homosexuals. Wall Street Journal reporter M. P. McQueen writes,

"Based on national media reports, controversial stances such as those indicated in your application responses have resulted in property damage and the potential for increased litigation among churches that have chosen to publicly endorse these positions," Marci J. Fretz, a regional underwriter for Brotherhood Mutual -- one of the nation's largest insurers of religious institutions -- wrote in a letter to the church last summer.

McQueen writes that churches have sometimes been denied or have had coverage revoked because of specific acts of violence. "Some churches in the South reported cancellations after a wave of arson attacks in the mid-1990s." But this would be the first instance of the denial of a claim due to fears that a controversial stance would provoke a violent backlash.

Founded in 1917 as a mutual-aid organization by evangelical Mennonites, Brotherhood Mutual is now the largest provider of insurance to churches in the country. A spokesperson "didn't have any examples of violence attributable to a church's support for gay clergy or same-sex marriage," McQueen writes. She did note that disputes over gay marriage have led to church splits and resulted in costly lawsuits.

Michigan banned same-sex marriage in 2004. The church has not specifically endorsed the denomination's position on same-sex marriage and ordination of homosexuals. The article says that as long as insurance companies abide by non-discrimination and other laws, they are free to set their own guidelines for accepting or rejecting applications.

A couple of things to note: Brotherhood Mutual rejected the church's application not because of moral or religious opposition to the church's stance, but because the stance might increase risk to the insurer. So this is not precisely a religious freedom issue. One wonders if the company didn't want to do business with supporters of same-sex marriage and risk seemed a better explanation for its refusal. But are churches that support same-sex marriage really more prone to being victims of vandalism? The article says there is no evidence one way or the other. The story doesn't mention any other ways in which Brotherhood Mutual does business with supporters of same-sex marriage. Does it screen its investments of companies that offer benefits to partners of employees? Presumably, if/when same-sex marriage and homosexual ordination became less controversial, Brotherhood Mutual would then accept applications from churches that supported that stance.

Also, there is no lawsuit. West Adrian didn't sue Brotherhood Mutual over the denial, so the situation would set no legal precedent in regards to religious freedom. If same-sex marriage does gain national legal acceptance, there will probably be exceptions for clergy and churches to discriminate according to their religious teaching. The real test, however, will lie with for-profit companies like Brotherhood Mutual.

With megachurches come mega crowds, mega money, and increasingly, mega security concerns.

The crowds -- anywhere from 2,000 to 20,000 worshippers each weekend -- can be an attractive target for a deranged shooter. Overflowing offering plates are tempting to thieves, and well-known preachers can become high-profile targets.

Sunday's shootings at New Life Church in Colorado Springs and a missionary training facility in Arvada, Colo. -- which left five people dead, including a gunman -- reflect the security nightmares facing some of the country's largest churches. Many of those churches now employ armed guards to protect human, financial and physical "assets."

The full article is available here.

Five people were left dead after shooting sprees at two Colorado megachurches Sunday. Five others were wounded.

Two people were killed and two wounded at the YWAM training center on the grounds of Faith Bible Chapel in Arvada, a Denver suburb. A man walked into the center around midnight and after about 30 minutes of talking with staff members, he asked to spend the night there. The receptionist at the center told him no, that no unauthorized person were not allowed. The man reportedly said, "Then this is what I've got for you," pulled out a gun and began shooting.

About 70 miles away and 12 hours later, three people were killed after a man in similar dress opened fire at New Life Church in Colorado Springs.

Sisters Stephanie Works, 18, and Rachael Works, 16, died from gunshot wounds. Their 51-year-old father, David Works, was shot twice in his abdomen and groin area and is in fair condition. Also wounded were Judy Purcell, 40, and Larry Bourbannais, 59. They were treated and released.

Witnesses told the Gazette in Colorado Springs that a man in a black trench coat opened fire in the parking lot setting off a smoke grenade before blasting cars and church members. Police said that the gunman was shot and killed by a plainclothes security guard with a law enforcement background and who is a member of the church.

New Life's senior pastor, Brady Boyd, said that after the YWAM shooting the church called in more than the usual number of security volunteers and "because of the extra precautions we saved many lives yesterday."

"They came to church with their families to worship, and what happened today was a tragedy," Boyd said at a press conference. "As a pastor, my heart is broken today for people that lost their lives."

Another Colorado Springs megachurch, Woodmen Valley Chapel, is providing grief counseling for New Life members, pastor-at-large Tim MacDonald told Christianity Today.

"We're in a sense of disbelief and surrealism that this would take place. We're still dealing with shock and after effects of what has taken place," he said. "We are so saddened by what's taken place, but we're helping in whatever way we can."

MacDonald said the shooting creates concerns for Woodmen's level of security.

"Our security plan is being scrutinized at this very moment," he said. "We're looking at what we need to do to have security without drawing away from the reason that people have come to church and that is to worship Christ."

The two dead victims at the YWAM center were identified as Tiffany Johnson, 26, of Minnesota and Philip Crouse, 24, of Alaska. Youth With a Mission leases property on Faith Bible Chapel's property.

George Morrison, the church's senior pastor, told Christianity Today that Crouse had put up Christmas lights at his house just two weeks ago. "It was tragic," Morrison said. "He was a young man that had a vision for his life and wanted to be involved in missions in Kazakhstan."

Morrison said church members were concerned and questioning, especially after hearing reports of the shooting at New Life. "These things happen in malls, in churches and in the world we live in, it's sad that we live with this. It's sobering that this could happen anytime, anywhere, to any person," he said. "We just have a sense that you have to move on."

The choir at Faith Bible Chapel had planned to kick off Sunday's service with "Joy to the World."

"We couldn't do it, Phil Waters, a member of the church choir, told The Denver Post. "There was no joy this morning."

The choir instead sang a piece about bringing offerings to God, he told the Post.

"We are really close to these kids," he said. "It was tough to be out there (singing) and not have tears running down your face."

More coverage includes:

• Colo. church gunman had been kicked out (Associated Press, most recent AP version)


• Shooter was seeking revenge, court papers say (The Gazette)


• A gunman's bloody trail: from hate mail to mass murder (Rocky Mountain News)


• Pastor tells of horrific day | The New Life Church attacker refused a guard's order to drop his weapon and fired before he was shot to death (Rocky Mountain News)


• Church members find comfort in groups, prayer (The Gazette)


• Church members await news, ask why (The Gazette)


• Gunman defied guard's order | The New Life Church attacker refused a guard's order to drop his weapon and fired before he was shot to death. (Rocky Mountain News)


• Gunman sent 'hate mail' to Arvada missionary center (Rocky Mountain News)


• Church gunman "hated Christians" (The Denver Post)


• Arvada investigators believe attacks linked | Gunman among 5 dead in assaults at center, church (Rocky Mountain News)


• Deadly attacks at mission, church may be linked | "Reason to believe" in connection (The Denver Post)


• 7,000 at church when shots fired | When bullets started flying, security officers locked the doors and people crowded into the basement (The Denver Post)


• Gunman fires on parishioners | Two members of New Life Church are killed and three are hurt. A security guard shoots and kills the attacker (The Denver Post)


• A commitment to overcome tragedy | First a wayward pastor, then a gunman in the parking lot. (The Gazette)


• 'Last place' for a deadly attack | Thousands were at one of state's largest churches (Rocky Mountain News)


• Danger and death in Arvada | Missionaries were training to serve in violent regions (Rocky Mountain News)


• Arvada missionary workers gunned down (The Denver Post)


• Group targeted in shooting has far reach | Begun in 1960 after a 20-year-old college student said he experienced a vision from God, Youth With a Mission has grown into one of the world's most formidable Christian missions groups (Associated Press)


• No general alert sent after center shootings | Deputy Chief Gary Creager said Sunday night that detectives had no indication the gunman was headed anywhere in particular and were given only a sketchy description that would have been useless to other law enforcement agencies (Rocky Mountain News)

On the victims:

• Slain Springs sisters were active in Arvada missionary group (Rocky Mountain News)


• Philip Crouse had undergone transformation (Rocky Mountain News)


• Tiffany Johnson was known for her smile, her love of children (Rocky Mountain News)


• Charlie Blanch involved with YWAM for 2 years (Rocky Mountain News)


• Dan Griebenow has group rooting for his recovery (Rocky Mountain News)


• Young missionaries caring, forgiving | One victim had turned away from gangs; one was called "an angel" (The Denver Post)


• Police ID teens killed in New Life shootings (The Gazette)


• Vietnam vet among Springs wounded | Larry Bourbannais, 59, was eating a hamburger in the cafeteria on the church campus when he heard gunfire, said his daughter(The Denver Post)


• Teen sisters killed in Springs (The Denver Post)

On church shootings and security:

• Attacks force churches to boost security | Some of the nation's estimated 1,200 megachurches have been quietly beefing up security in recent years, even using armed guards to protect the faithful (Associated Press)


• Church security can be tricky | Some already employ armed, professional security officers, while others rely on volunteer church members (The Gazette)


• At a glance: violence at churches (The Denver Post)

From our sister publications:

• Leader's Insight: Security Against Shooters | A police officer's advice on how to prevent, or react to, a gunman at church. (Leadership, June 11, 2007)

Dozens of churches and groups have left the Episcopal Church in recent years. Today is the first time that an entire diocese has voted to officially split from the national body. The votes weren't close: the clergy in California's Diocese of San Joaquin voted 70-12 to withdraw, and laity voted 103-10.

"We have leadership in the Episcopal Church that has drastically and radically changed directions," diocesan spokesman Van McCalister told the Associated Press. "They have pulled the rug out from under us. They've started teaching something very different, something very new and novel, and it's impossible for us to follow a leadership that has so drastically reinvented itself."

The diocese, which has 47 parishes, 48 church buildings (including its headquarters), and 8,800 members, will affiliate with the Anglican Province of the Southern Cone, headquartered in Buenos Aires. As it removed all references to the national Episcopal Church body in its constitution, the diocese added a clause describing itself as "a constituent member of the Anglican Communion and in full communion with the See of Canterbury."

The New York Times notes that the diocese "has long been different from the rest of the Episcopal Church":

It is one of three dioceses that does not ordain women priests. It stopped sending money to the Episcopal Church budget after the consecration of Bishop Robinson. Its cathedral runs a ministry for those struggling "with sexual brokenness," Bishop Schofield said, which includes homosexuality.

Episcopal Church Presiding Bishop Katherine Jefferts Schori refused to acknowledge that the diocese is leaving.

"The Episcopal Church receives with sadness the news that some members of this church have made a decision to leave this church," she said in a press release. "We deeply regret their unwillingness or inability to live within the historical Anglican understanding of comprehensiveness. We wish them to know of our prayers for them and their journey. The Episcopal Church will continue in the Diocese of San Joaquin, albeit with new leadership."

Anglican superblogs like TitusOneNine and Stand Firm will have comprehensive links, but here are a few news stories:

• Diocese Secedes | In a historic vote, the conservative Diocese of San Joaquin becomes the first in the nation to split from the more liberal Episcopal Church in a debate over the role of gays, women in the church (The Fresno Bee)
• Diocese will leave Episcopal Church | San Joaquin 1st in nation to make dramatic move (The Modesto Bee)
• Diocese votes to split from church | Talk of schism heated up after gay bishop was installed in 2003 (The Bakersfield Californian)
• Episcopal fold loses 1st diocese -- in valley (San Francisco Chronicle)
• Church votes to secede | Episcopal Diocese of S.J. to join more conservative group (The Stockton Record, Ca.)
• Episcopal diocese secedes in rift over gays | The Diocese of San Joaquin in Central California is the first to break from the U.S. church over its relatively liberal views on homosexuality and biblical authority (Los Angeles Times)
• Episcopal Diocese Secedes over Role of Gays (All Things Considered, NPR)
• Diocese splits from Church in gay row (The Telegraph, London)
• US Church splits over gay rights (BBC)
• Historic split for U.S. Episcopals (Reuters)
• What would Jesus rue? | The scriptural basis for homophobia is thin, culturally difficult to translate and open to interpretation. Yes, ordaining gays is controversial. But is it apostasy? (Michael Fitzgerald, The Stockton Record)

The AP is reporting that Benny Hinn is following on the heels of Creflo Dollar in telling the Senate Finance Committee to take a hike. Reporters Eric Gorski and Rachel Zoll write:

Benny Hinn of World Healing Center Church Inc. and Benny Hinn Ministries of Grapevine, Texas, said in a statement to the AP on Thursday that he will not respond to the inquiry until next year.

A lawyer for preacher Creflo Dollar of World Changers Church International in suburban Atlanta had said Wednesday that the investigation should be referred to the IRS or the Senate panel should get a subpoena for the documents.

Last year, according to BBC, 244 women and 234 men were ordained to the Anglican priesthood and now women make up a quarter of the Anglican clergy in Britain. Without this increase in the ordination of women, BBC reports that Anglican puplits would become "depopulated."

However, this does not mean that controversy over gender has ceased within the church. According to the TimesOnline,

The Synod is now locked in contentious debate over whether women should be ordained bishop, an issue that insiders fear could be as divisive as that of homosexual ordination, even though some provinces such as the US and Canada already have women bishops.

The General Synod first voted to ordain women in 1992, but some say that despite the increase in female priests, women have had very little impact on the church since then because, according to the University of Manchester, the church is still "far from being an equal opportunity employer."

The Reverend Rosemary Lain-Priestley, secretary to the National Association of Diocesan Advisers in Women's Ministry, said, "Many women priests feel that until women can become bishops they will not be taken seriously in other senior roles, despite the success of women deans and archdeacons."

Trustees of a Southern Baptist Convention agency voted to censure Oklahoma pastor Wade Burleson and banned him from active participation on the board for at least the next four trustee meetings, the Associated Baptist Press reports.

The ABP reports that the International Mission Board board said Burleson violated two recently adopted policies barring individual trustees from criticizing actions of the board or reporting on any private conversations between trustees about IMB business.

As previously reported in CT, the pastor has used his weblog to criticize two policy changes the IMB trustees approved in November. Burleson defended his right to dissent, and still plans to be at the meetings.

Burleson's blog cricism stemmed from the IMB's decision to bar new missionary candidates who practice a "private prayer language" or tongues from serving on the mission field. The trustees also mandated that a candidate be baptized in a church that teaches believers' security and practices only baptism by immersion.

Only messengers to an SBC annual meeting can fully eject Burleson from its membership. Two years ago, a majority of IMB trustees voted to ask messengers to eject Burleson but later rescinded the action.

The New York Times shows a healthy respect for its readers' interest in church rock by posting an 8-minute documentary on "The Worship Rock Scene."

Why? Because megachurch bands "now provide one of the major ways that Americans hear live music." The video also points out that churches can be a steady gig for bands in places where they would otherwise have few performances.

High Desert Church in Reno, whose bands the NYT focuses on, has nine rotating bands for three age groups: 18 ? 30, 30 ? 55, and "the classic community" ? those who are 55 and over and, presumably, partial to West-Coast folk rock.

"Each band is carefully calibrated toward the pop culture disposition of each age group," reports Jigar Mehta.

"We have to communicate the gospel in a way that is entertaining so we can tell them the story," says Jeff Crandall, the church's music director and former drummer for the Altar Boys (for a flashback to the '80s, go to minute 5:15).

Steve Wilber, who leads Harbor, the 30 ? 55 worship service, explains that he chooses the music and keeps it up-to-date so that the transition from secular to church music styles isn't jarring.

The video and the accompanying article, while premised on music, linger on prayers. Almost a full minute of the video is footage of the 18-30 band in pre-service prayer.

Dressed in a faded black T-shirt, jeans and skateboard sneakers, [Mike Day] bent his shaved head. "God," he said, "I hope these songs we sing will be much more than the music. I know it's so difficult at times when we're thinking about chords and lyrics and when to hit the right effect patch, but would you just help that to become second nature, so that we can truly worship you from our hearts?"

The largest state Baptist convention in the nation elected its first female president yesterday, the Associated Press reports.

Joy Fenner, a former missionary to Japan, narrowly defeated Texas pastor David Lowrie, 900 to840. The Dallas Morning News reports that Fenner's will begin her presidency in a time of trouble for the BGCT, including a budget shortfall, layoffs and a scandal involving church starting funds.

Fenner is not the only "first" for the convention. The AP reports that the convention elected its first Hispanic president in 2004 and its first black president in 2005.

Tom Butler represented the Church of England at a House of Lords consultation on organ donation in the European Union yesterday. He presented the church's position that organ donation is a very Christian thing to sign up for, BBC news reports.
"Giving oneself and one's possessions voluntarily for the well being of others and without compulsion is a Christian duty of which organ donation is a striking example," the Church of England's statement says. It also says Christians have "a mandate to heal" - but they're not talking about miracle working.
The Church of England is supporting a switch from an opt-in (to organ donation) to an opt-out system, hoping to help Britain overcome a chronic organ shortage, which can be an ethically tricky problem to solve. Their statement addresses a few of the issues, such as selling organs for profit, making sure the donor is dead, and respect for the body and the bereaved.
"What is done with the body matters," the Church of England affirms. "The body at its burial or cremation should ideally be recognizably the body of the person who has died."

A new study out of Norway suggests that cancer doesn't make divorce more likely--unless the diagnosis is for testicular or cervical cancer. According to a report in the Chicago Tribune:

In research presented Thursday at a meeting of the European Cancer Organization, Norwegian experts found cancer patients were no more likely to get divorced than people without cancer, except for those with cervical and testicular cancer. The divorce rate actually dropped slightly in the years following diagnosis for most cancers, they said.

But the study showed women with cervical cancer had a 40 percent higher chance of getting divorced than other women. Men with testicular cancer were 20 percent more likely to get divorced than similar men without cancer. Both types of cancer are curable and are diagnosed at younger ages than other cancers.

A number of reasons are suggested: (1) the marriages are younger and not as established; (2) the diagnoses can interfere with couples' sexual lives, which further undercuts their emotional bonding; and (in the case of cervical cancer) such diagnoses may lead to suspicions of infidelity.

The good news is (1) cancer is not usually a marriage-killer, and (2) the divorce risk for these two forms of cancer seems to decline with age:

Women with cervical cancer had nearly a 70 percent greater risk of divorce at the age of 20, a level that fell to 19 percent at 60. For testicular cancer, the divorce risk was 34 percent at 20 and 16 percent at 60, it said.

Something for Christians to keep in mind when cancer comes to church. The attack comes not just against our bodies, but against our marriages. Ministry to families facing cancer should thus be holistic, encompassing body and soul.

Update: Now that the Episcopalian bishops have rejected Anglican leaders' call to repentance and orthodoxy, Wednesday's lectionary readings are fascinating too.

I hate the double-minded, but I love your law. ... You spurn all who go astray from your statutes, for their cunning is in vain. (Ps. 119)

But my people did not listen to my voice; Israel would not submit to me. So I gave them over to their stubborn hearts, to follow their own counsels. Oh, that my people would listen to me, that Israel would walk in my ways! I would soon subdue their enemies and turn my hand against their foes. (Ps. 81)

I wrote to you in my letter not to associate with sexually immoral people - not at all meaning the sexually immoral of this world, or the greedy and swindlers, or idolaters, since then you would need to go out of the world. But now I am writing to you not to associate with anyone who bears the name of brother if he is guilty of sexual immorality or greed, or is an idolater, reviler, drunkard, or swindler - not even to eat with such a one. For what have I to do with judging outsiders? Is it not those inside the church whom you are to judge? God judges those outside. "Purge the evil person from among you." (1 Cor. 5)

There are some readings especially relevant for orthodox Anglicans meeting in Pittsburgh today, too. Among the issues on their mind is whether to fight for property as they leave the Episcopal Church.

When one of you has a grievance against another, does he dare go to law before the unrighteous instead of the saints? ... To have lawsuits at all with one another is already a defeat for you. Why not rather suffer wrong? Why not rather be defrauded? (1 Cor. 6)

"You have heard that it was said, ?An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.' But I say to you, Do not resist the one who is evil. But if anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also. And if anyone would sue you and take your tunic, let him have your cloak as well. ... If you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax collectors do the same? (Matt. 5)

(Yesterday's readings after the jump)

We've covered sermon stealing several times, as have our sister publications. But we haven't seen this before: The Valley Morning Star of Harlingen, Texas, reports, "Rev. Dori Zubizarreta had to improvise her sermon a few weeks ago after thieves took the written sermon from her office."

Zubizarreta told the paper, "I was going to use that sermon for the 8 o'clock morning Mass, but I had to wing it. By the 10:30 (a.m.) Mass, I had already worked it out."

A cynic might say the same thing happens every week in many Protestant and Catholic churches -- only without the stealing part.

A suburban Chicago church sought leadership from Rwanda amid theological disputes with the Episcopal Church. This week, it found itself in conflict with its leaders over Rwandan politics.

All Souls Anglican Church had invited Paul Rusesabagina, whose life was featured in the 2004 movie Hotel Rwanda, to speak during Sunday morning services. The Wheaton, Illinois, church, a member of the Rwandan-led Anglican Mission in America, invited him as part of a fundraiser to build a school in Gashirabwoba, Rwanda.

On Thursday, however, Emmanuel Kolini, the Anglican archbishop of Rwanda, asked All Soul's pastor J. Martin Johnson to rescind the invitation.

The rest of this article has been moved to the main Christianity Today site.

If your church's Vacation Bible School leaders need an encouraging pat on the back, or if you want your church to consider investing time and effort in a VBS, an article on today's Taste page of the Wall Street Journal is worth forwarding to them.

Boston-based writer Jennifer Graham offers a positive perspective on the 119-year-old institution. The efforts are clearly evangelistic, but they are low pressure (often just follow-up postcards with participating unchurched families). They are effective (the impetus for 26% of the year 2006 baptisms in the Southern Baptist Convention), but they are also expensive (one of the highest-funded programs at Chapel Hill United Methodist Church in Chapel Hill, Tennessee). And it's big business for curriculum publishers, with 3 million participants in Southern Baptist VBS programs alone and another 24,500 United Methodist Churches offering Vacation Bible School.

Thanks to the Journal for an encouraging article.

"As a result of seeking the Lord as to His will for my continuing to serve out the remaining two years of the present term, I have reached a decision to step down as general superintendent of the Assemblies of God," Thomas Trask announced yesterday.

The Assemblies of God site and the News-Leader of Springfield, Missouri, have more coverage.

Conservative Episcopalians received some stunning news this week when a California appeals court ruled the Episcopal Diocese of Los Angeles is within its legal rights in retaining ownership of church property.

The defendants, three dissident churches now linked to the Anglican Church in Uganda, expect to decide soon on whether to appeal to the California Supreme Court.

The worldwide Anglican Communion continues to grapple with the fallout from the consecration of Gene Robinson, an active homosexual, as bishop of New Hampshire in 2003. But increasingly, the civil courts in the US are being drawn into this fight as local, diocesan, and national leaders fight over real estate. It's no small dispute, potentially involving billions in real estate, related assets, and other property.

Of course, national church leaders are overjoyed by the court ruling:

John R. Shiner, Chancellor for the Diocese and its attorney in the litigation, called the ruling a "decisive decision" for the Episcopal Church. Shiner, a partner of Holme Roberts & Owen, LLP, noted, "Yesterday's decision contains the most thorough analysis yet of church property law in California, and should dispel any notion that local congregations of a hierarchical church may leave the larger church and take property with them."

On the conservative side, there are many more cases making their way through the courts. But conservatives, meanwhile, are somewhat encouraged that the Canadian branch of Anglicanism, meeting in General Synod, voted to forbid priests from blessing same-sex unions.

This week I attended the inaugural one-day conference of the Gospel Coalition. This consortium of more than 50 evangelical pastors have united around a common confessional statement and theological vision of ministry. Organizers hope this short conference, hosted by Trinity Evangelical Divinity School in Deerfield, Illinois, and attended by 500+ pastors and other ministry leaders, will propel a long-term effort to renew and reform evangelical thought and practice. D.A. Carson, a New Testament scholar at TEDS, and Tim Keller, senior pastor of Redeemer Presbyterian Church in New York City, organized the group, which has met privately for three years now. Other speakers and workshop presenters included Crawford Loritts, Phil Ryken, Mark Driscoll, and John Piper.

I thought a couple statements stood out in the Gospel Coalition's founding document:

According to LifeNews.com, Catholic politicians are deeply offended that Pope Benedict wants the church to be the church. Benedict recently said that Catholic politicians who vote for policies that support abortion automatically excommunicate themselves. In response, a group of these politicians said, the penalty of excommunication "offend(s) the very nature of the American experiment and do(es) a great disservice to the centuries of good work the church has done."

God forbid that the church would do anything to question the American experiment.

Michael Gerson has launched his semi-weekly Washington Post column with a piece on the Nigerian Archbishop Peter Akinola's recent Virginia trip and the Anglican dispute.