Zach Sobiech, the Christian teen whose song "Clouds" recently reached 3 million YouTube views, died yesterday surrounded by family at his home in Lakeland, Minnesota. He was 18.

Sobiech was diagnosed with an aggressive form of bone cancer at age 14. In 2012, after being told he had months to live, he recorded and released his song about facing death, which caught the attention of People, a New York record label, and Soul Pancake, Office actor Rainn Wilson's YouTube channel. Earlier this month, Wilson led a group of celebrities in a lip-synching tribute.

"I want to be remembered as a kid who went down fighting and didn't really lose," says Sobiech in a short documentary, "My Last Days," produced this month by Soul Pancake. "You don't have to find out you're dying to start living."

"It is with heavy heart that we announce the passing of our son Zachary David Sobiech," his family said in a statement yesterday. "Our family has been blessed not only by his amazing presence in our lives, but also by the love and support of our family and friends and by so many people in the community. In particular we'd like to thank those people who listened with their hearts and helped Zach bring his message and his music to the world."

Tributes have poured in from Japanese high schoolers and the PS22 Chorus, and digital sales of "Clouds" and Sobiech's other songs have raised more than $100,000 for the Children's Cancer Research Fund.

According to an extended profile in the Twin Cities Pioneer Press, the Sobiechs are devout Catholics. "When Zach was first diagnosed, I remember thinking: 'God can see us. We're not just plugging along, living our lives,' " mother Laura Sobiech told the Pioneer Press. "I told God, 'You can have him, but it had better be good. It had better be something big.' "

Laura Sobiech told radio station KTIS:

“It’s been a gut-wrenching and heart-breaking walk, but you know, so was Christ’s life. I have just really tried to hang on to how Christ showed us to suffer and just meditate on that….and continually pray for God’s grace. And I know that’s what it is. It’s all of these prayers of people out there holding us up.”

Update (April 19): Rapper Shai Linne defended his characterization of Paula White as a "false teacher" in a lengthy letter to her son and manager, who complained about her mention in his latest song.

"My song was not about you, your financial status, the genuineness of your faith, your mother’s prayers for you or the good things that Paula White Ministries does. The song was about the false doctrine that Paula White and others have publicly taught for many years and continue to teach," he wrote. (Full text of his response is posted on the Wade-o-Radio website.)

In his argument, Shai Linne said that White falsely teaches elements of the prosperity gospel, including that "physical healing and financial abundance in this life are provided for in the atonement of Christ."

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Update (Mar. 19:): The Christian Chronicle points out that Charisma's list is missing Church of Christ member Paul Jolley, although it does include fellow contestant Janelle Arthur.

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'American Idol' may have gotten a bad rep last spring when producers reportedly asked contestant Colton Dixon to "tone down [his] devotion to Jesus Christ" on the show.

But Christians apparently aren't shying away from the 'Idol' stage this season. Charisma reports that 8 of the top 10 finalists of Season 12, including favorite Angie Miller, are professing Christians. (And the Christian Chronicle says there's a ninth.)

Mumford and Sons has skyrocketed to popularity as of late, winning the 2013 Album of the Year at the Grammy's and selling out their tour. But the buzz this week is all about frontman Marcus Mumford, who told Rolling Stone magazine that he wouldn't call himself a Christian.

Update (April 23): Entertainment Weekly reports that producer Mark Burnett has good news for anyone who was a fan of History Channel's miniseries The Bible: He has re-cut the series to create a movie version that will be released in the fall—and he's also working on a follow-up to the show.
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Update (April 8): History Channel’s miniseries The Bible ended just last weekend, but the show is already available on DVD—and sales are through the roof.

According to Broadway World, The Bible’s home entertainment launch is the “biggest selling TV [show] on DVD in the last 5 years and the biggest miniseries of all time on Blu-ray, Digital HD and DVD in its first week of release … with 525,000 units sold.”

“According to the Association for Christian Retail (CBA), The Bible is the fastest pre-selling faith based title in its 60-year history,” Broadway World states. “The Bible also ranked #1 across digital stores including iTunes, Amazon, VUDU, Xbox, PlayStation, CinemaNow, and GooglePlay.”
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Update (Mar. 12): In its second week, zombies managed to beat the Bible for viewers. The Bible miniseries drew 10.8 million viewers Sunday night, versus 11.46 million for the Walking Dead. However, as Baptist Press reports, Burnett-Downey miniseries still placed second on cable for the night, and has garnered more than 50 million cumulative viewers (according to a press release).
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According to a new survey from Barna Group, faith determines a person's theater-going habits more than almost any other demographic factor except age—especially if you're an evangelical Christian.

Broadway may love scandal, but it did not love "Scandalous: The Life and Trials of Aimee Semple McPherson," a Foursquare Church-backed production that recently flopped on stage.

Update (Mar. 11): CNN has profiled worship leader Chris Tomlin, calling his songs the "most widely sung music on the planet today."

Not convinced? Christian Copyright Licensing International (CCLI) CEO Howard Rachinski has done the math. "CCLI estimates that every Sunday in the United States, between 60,000 and 120,000 churches are singing Tomlin’s songs. By extrapolating that data, Rachinski says, 'our best guess would be in the United States on any given Sunday, 20 to 30 million people would be singing Chris Tomlin's songs.'"
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The Amish aren't exactly known for mob-style antics: drinking, gambling, blackmail, and so on. But the Discovery Channel's newest show, "Amish Mafia," purports to offer viewers "a first-ever look at the men who protect and maintain peace and order within the Amish community in Lancaster."

The problem? Leading Amish experts say this "Amish mafia" doesn't exist.

Following the November 6 election, media commentators buzzed about election coverage from Fox News and MSNBC and the networks' respective conservative and liberal biases. But does recognition of such biases drive viewers away?

Probably not, according to a new poll by LifeWay Research. The survey of nearly 2,000 U.S. adults conducted after the election indicates that evangelicals may actually support Fox News more strongly now than they did before the election.

Fans of Christian artist TobyMac may remember him from his days as a member of DC Talk. In the late 1990s, DC Talk notched five appearances on the Billboard 200, the main U.S. album chart.

Now TobyMac has landed at the top, earning his first appearance in the No. 1 slot of the Billboard 200 this week. His latest album, "Eye On It," is only the third Christian album ever to reach the top spot.

Aronofsky gave USA Today the first look. The newspaper wrote that the director "has taken to his Twitter feed to give daily updates on Noah for his followers, including casting news—confirming Anthony Hopkins as Noah's ageless grandfather Methuselah, for example—and teasing to the existence of angelic Nephilim in the film."

Aronofsky wrote on one recent tweet, "Nephilim wuz here," while another included a picture of a puffin; no word yet on whether puffins will actually board the ark.

The film is slated to release in the spring of 2014.

Country music veteran Randy Travis, who has been outspoken about his Christian faith in the last decade, was arrested late Tuesday night in Texas, charged with driving while intoxicated and retaliation or obstruction, according to an Associated Press story. He was held overnight and released Wednesday on $21,500 bond from the jail in Sherman, about 60 miles north of Dallas.

A recent survey suggests that white evangelical Protestants are "significantly more likely than other major religious groups to use technology for religious purposes." The Public Religion Research Institute (PRRI) study also suggests that few Americans use social media to interact with faith communities online, though critics say the survey does not accurately measure online religiosity. Case in point: evangelical dominance of Twitter engagement.

DreamWorks Animation has purchased Classic Media, the parent company of Big Idea and the VeggieTales brand. Big Idea will celebrate its 20th anniversary next year.

Jars of Clay frontman Dan Haseltine is resting at home in Nashville after undergoing a procedure “to correct a coronary issue after experiencing a cardiac event” on July 25, according to the band’s Facebook page. “He is doing well and recovering.”

Christian concert promoter LMG Concerts recently filed suit against Salem Communications, accusing the owner and operator of approximately 100 radio stations of using "monopoly control" to dominate Portland’s market for live music.

The lawsuit by Vancouver, Wash.-based LMG alleges that Salem "repeatedly has used its size and clout to coerce artists ... to use Salem Communications to promote their concerts or else risk losing airplay and other on-air promotional support," as well as that "The Fish" (KFIS 104.1 FM), Portland’s only CCM radio station and owned by Salem, “[denies] airplay, advertising, and other on-air promotional support for LMG concerts and artists,” according to ABC News. The concert promoter claims that Salem's practices "threaten to drive LMG and others from the marketplace.”

"LMG's ability to promote its local concerts on Salem Communications' stations -- and the artists' ability to secure airplay of their music on those stations -- can and does determine the financial success (or failure) of LMG, the artists and their concerts," states LMG’s complaint, according to Courthouse News. Jars of Clay frontman Dan Haseltine explained to CT in April how touring is a crucial component of artists' livelihoods that won't be going away anytime soon.

Christian musicians TobyMac, Third Day, Steven Curtis Chapman, Jeremy Camp (pictured above), Matthew West, Kutless, and Peter Furler are all currently promoted by Salem, but each worked with LMG “prior to Salem Communications using its market dominance to undermine LMG's ability to compete," claims the lawsuit. (Read more on the Christian music industry's male dominance here).

CT ran a cover story on Salem's transformation of Christian radio and examined how Salem makes its money. The company published CCM magazine from 1999 until closing it in 2008.

Cornerstone Festival, the long-running Jesus People USA festival described as "Jesus' Woodstock," has announced that this July's festival will be its last, citing "changes in the market and a difficult economy."

Christianity Today profiled the festival's rise to prominence after drawing 5,000 people to its first festival in 1984.

The granddaughter of Trinity Broadcasting Network founders Paul and Jan Crouch has accused some of the network’s directors of illegally distributing “charitable assets” worth more than $50 million for their personal use.

Brittany B. Koper, the daughter of Paul Crouch Jr., was TBN’s chief financial officer until last September. She says she was wrongfully fired after she refused to cover up the alleged distribution scheme.

The allegations are not against TBN itself, but against Koper’s former attorneys from Davert & Loe, who have also done legal work for TBN. She has accused them of breach of fiduciary duty, professional negligence, and other transgressions.

“Her assertions are outright fiction and wholly without merit,” Douglass S. Davert, one of the attorneys named in the suit, told The Orange County Register. ”The allegations are defamatory and to the extent they get printed we are going to defend ourselves vigorously.”

Colby May, spokesperson for TBN, told Pat Robertson’s CBN News that the assertions are “a bold faced lie.” The fact is that Ms. Koper has confessed several different times to embezzling money, he said. "She and her husband, basically, in the dark of night up and moved to New York [after leaving TBN].

The Orange County Register reported that Davert & Loe had filed a similar lawsuit against Koper and her husband last October. They accused the Kopers of forging documents and misappropriating nearly $400,000 in funds, but the suit was dismissed without settlement in January. Tymothy MacLeod, Koper’s attorney, said the suit was a preemptive attempt to discredit Koper.

“It’s kind of a sordid affair,” he told the paper. “Many layers. But at the heart is the wrongful termination. She was terminated for insider whistle blowing.”

Additionally, the suit claims TBN officials threatened Koper at a hearing regarding the reasons for her firing. “When questioned about the grounds for termination, Matthew Crouch, a director at Trinity Broadcasting, began tapping the firearm he had brought to the meeting and asked Ms. Koper what she thought would happen when she wrote a memo to the board critical of Matthew Crouch’s financial improprieties,” the suit says. “Matthew Crouch continued tapping the gun he was holding to ensure that Ms. Koper recognized the lethal threat being made.”

Last October, Paul Crouch Jr. left his role as vice president and chief of staff at TBN to join The World Network as director of project development.

Last Wednesday, Anne Rice posted a short message on her Facebook page:

"For those who care, and I understand if you don't: Today I quit being a Christian. I'm out. I remain committed to Christ as always but not to being 'Christian' or to being part of Christianity. It's simply impossible for me to 'belong' to this quarrelsome, hostile, disputatious, and deservedly infamous group. For ten years, I've tried. I've failed. I'm an outsider. My conscience will allow nothing else."

Rice, author of Interview with a Vampire and other novels, returned to her Catholic upbringing in 1998, a decision she went public with in 2005; CT interviewed her about the decision shortly thereafter. She even went on to write some books reflecting her love of Jesus, including Christ the Lord: Out of Egypt.

But upon closer look at her blog posts and comments, has Rice really quit Christianity? Five minutes after that initial Facebook post, Rice then added this:

"As I said below, I quit being a Christian. I'm out. In the name of Christ, I refuse to be anti-gay. I refuse to be anti-feminist. I refuse to be anti-artificial birth control. I refuse to be anti-Democrat. I refuse to be anti-secular humanism. I refuse to be anti-science. I refuse to be anti-life. In the name of Christ, I quit Christianity and being Christian. Amen."

Okay. I count myself among many Christians who'd agree with many of those statements, to varying degrees. (Don't we all refuse to be anti-life?). The next day, July 29, Rice seemed to soften her stance just a bit more, writing:

"My faith in Christ is central to my life. My conversion from a pessimistic atheist lost in a world I didn't understand, to an optimistic believer in a universe created and sustained by a loving God is crucial to me. But following Christ does not mean following His followers. Christ is infinitely more important than Christianity and always will be, no matter what Christianity is, has been, or might become."

Well, amen to that. Isn't that what a Christian IS? A Christ-follower, not someone who merely follows Christians? So, did Anne Rice really renounce her faith, or just the ugly things of how Christians sometimes behave?

Rice told NPR today that the final straw was when she realized the lengths that the church would go to prevent same-sex marriage. "I didn't anticipate . . . that the U.S. bishops were going to come out against same-sex marriage, that they were actually going to donate money to defeat the civil rights of homosexuals in the secular society. When that broke in the news, I felt an intense pressure. And I am a person who grew up with the saying that all that is needed for evil to prevail is for good people to do nothing, and I believe that statement."

Rice also told NPR that she doesn't consider herself an atheist. "Certainly I will never go back to being that atheist and that pessimist that I was," she says. "I live now in a world that I feel God created, and I feel I live in a world where God witnesses everything that happens. ... That's a huge change from the atheist I was when I wrote the vampire novels."

So, she says she "quit being a Christian," but did so "in the name of Christ," clarifying that she only wants to follow Jesus, and not his followers. And that she's definitely not an atheist, but that her "faith in Christ remains central to my life."

Rice said, on her Facebook page, that she's received many responses to her decision: "Many posts about quitting Christianity have brought in a lot of mail. Most of it is positive; a small amount is negative. But one thing is clear: people care passionately about belief. They care about living lives of meaning and significance. And that is a beautiful and reassuring thing. I'll have more on the subject the future." (Presumably that included her chat with NPR today.)

There have been many public responses to Rice's announcement, but perhaps the most well-thought-out one I've read comes from Justin McRoberts, a Christian musician, in "An Open Letter to Anne Rice." McRoberts writes:

"I feel you, Anne. I really do. I’ve had similar thoughts and even expressed them publicly. I don’t mind at all the desire or even the need to stand at some distance from the label of Christianity. It may well have been worn through. But I take issue with the notion that you must disassociate yourself from ‘Christian’ people. I mean sure, we’re a motley lot. Belonging to this family can often feel like you’ve adopted a few thousand drunk uncles. It’s incredibly embarrassing at times and frustrating at least as often. I get it. But I also read that you’re making your move 'in the name of Christ' and that presents a rather perplexing dilemma for someone who wants to quit on people. You see, Christ hasn’t quit on us and if you choose to align yourself with Him, then neither can you."

We'll keep watching for more updates.

Advisors to a small media company that acquired the large multi-faith website Beliefnet include evangelicals such as Jay Sekulow of the American Center for Law and Justice and T.D. Jakes, pastor of Potter’s House in Dallas.

Last week, BN Media LLC purchased Beliefnet from Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation, which also owns The Wall Street Journal and Fox News. Steve Halliday, president of BN Media, said the company plans to create further cross-promotion between Beliefnet and its subsidiaries.

The for-profit company owns Affinity4, which specializes in channeling 10 percent of consumer spending to charity, and Cross Bridge, which creates video content. Halliday says the editorial control will be left to the discretion of Beliefnet editors. Sekulow and Jakes serve as Affinity4 board members and Cross Bridge advisors, but Halliday says the company will create a separate multi-faith advisory board for Beliefnet.

“We like what Beliefnet does,” he said. “We’re simply looking to add tools to that to make the user experience even broader.”

Halliday says that Beliefnet pages will have cross-promotion where the company feels it is appropriate.

“You could be watching a video on Beliefnet where T.D. Jakes is talking about water wells for Africa, and at the end, it would say ‘Click here to go to Affinity4 to give to the effort,'” Halliday said.

Terms of the transaction were confidential, Halliday said. News Corp. laid off several Beliefnet employees during the transition, but Halliday declined to say how many.

Halliday sees video content as part of the key for success in online publishing.

“If you take YouTube and Hulu as two examples, you can see phenomenal growth,” he said. “It’s better than a Kindle reader: you have things to read, you can push a button, and take action in one place.”

Beliefnet has an average of 3 million unique visitors per month to its website, which hosts blogs written by several Christian writers, including Scot McKnight, Ben Witherington, and Rod Dreher.

Dreher, director of publications at the John Templeton Foundation and former columnist for the Dallas Morning News, said he is moving his blog off of Beliefnet later this summer when Templeton launches an online magazine.

Several weeks ago, she updated her official website, which had been stagnant for years. And her MySpace page has, for several weeks, included notice of a single show coming up next Friday in Los Angeles with another CCM veteran, Phillip LaRue.

Knapp's management confirmed to CT recently that she was making music again. "After a well needed hiatus, Jennifer has started writing/recording again and playing select shows," said her manager, Dave Hopper. CT's requests for an interview with Knapp were denied, though Hopper said she might grant one later.

This afternoon, Knapp made her first official statement on the matter on her website, starting off a brief entry with the words, "Yes, it’s true. I am the REAL Jennifer Knapp and I’ve been doing a little music lately."

Knapp wrote that she keeps running into old friends who are asking all sorts of questions about her "comeback." "We've been flooded with e-mails and phone calls simply by putting up a humble little homepage. So much for my little holiday. It’s looking very much like it may be over."

She didn't say why she left music in the first place (in 2004, she told Relevant that she was tired of touring one record while recording the next, and "it got to where I was just doing shows to support the record, rather than having a record support the heart of the people I was supposed to be serving"), but she did say she spent much of her time away "traveling mostly."

She wrote: "I have wasted too many days sulking about how strange life is and many more discovering just how truly beautiful people can be. My experiences have been both wildly exotic and extraordinarily mundane. But mostly I will say that I have had a chance to get my feet under me. I took that time to discover more about myself and my own faith without the veil of expectations to a cause. Without writing a novel at this point, I’ll just say that I’m starting to think that I might actually be a songwriter, musician, or artist of some kind . . . So, maybe I should do something about it?

"I know that many of you have persisted at hope that I would return to music. Why you have wanted or even cared has been one of the greatest mysteries to me, at the same time, a complete and utter blessing as it has always been. Thank you for your support. I can only hope to repay you with what you have waited for . . . music."

And to whet fans' appetites, Knapp has posted a new song, "Letting Go," on her MySpace page.

Personally, I'm thrilled about this news, and am somewhat bemused that Knapp is surprised that people "even cared" about her absence. I think she's one of the best things to have happened to Christian music in the last 15 years, and her albums are among my favorites. And I had the privilege of getting to know her a bit back in the 1990s when we worked together on a regular column (a few samples) for what was then Campus Life magazine (the now-defunct Ignite Your Faith), and have always enjoyed her honest, direct, sometimes even in-your-face approach to life. (A lot like me!) That outlook came through loud and clear in her music, which was as honest and confessional as anything you'd hear on Christian radio. Her music has always been good for the soul, and her return is good for it too.

An 18-year-old female who had lost her unborn child in a weekend collision with MercyMe's tour bus has also died, bringing the total number of fatalities to four. LiveBlog had reported on the accident on Monday; the young woman, Kara Klinker of Fort Wayne, Indiana, died Tuesday afternoon.

MercyMe, a popular Christian rock band, released this statement on Wednesday after learning of the woman's death: "Our hearts continue to break for these families and all those who knew them. We continue to pray and ask your prayers for everyone affected by this accident, that God would bring healing, comfort, peace and understanding at a time when they are desperately needed."

Read more about the accident here, here, and here.

The legendary singer/songwriter has apparently already recorded “Must Be Santa,” “Here Comes Santa Claus,” “I’ll Be Home For Christmas," and “O Little Town of Bethlehem.”

The story reports that the inclusion of "O Little Town" may "fuel speculation about Dylan's religious beliefs that have swirled ever since he publicly converted to Christianity in 1979, recorded explicitly religious material on three subsequent albums and for a time refused to play his old songs. Religious references on subsequent recordings became less overt after 1981's Shot of Love."

Upon receiving the news that Walter Cronkite had died on Friday, evangelist Billy Graham released this statement from his home in Montreat, N.C.:

"Walter Cronkite was one of the closest friends I had in journalism. He was an icon. I doubt if anybody will replace him in the hearts and minds of Americans. I respected his views on so many subjects."

"I will never forget Walter's narration of a documentary film produced about my wife, Ruth. May God bless his family during these days." (Cronkite also narrated an audiobook about Ruth.)

In his 1997 autobiography Just As I Am, Graham wrote about meeting Cronkite during his famous 1957 New York Crusade:

"I went to be interviewed by Walter Cronkite for his CBS television news show, recorded for broadcast the following night. He was an amiable host, and we had a great time, sitting together in a room overlooking Times Square. He asked the kind of leading questions I love to answer, about our work, our objectives, the message we preached, and what we had to offer New York.

"The news staff then screened some film clips that they had taken around Times Square and Broadway, and Walter asked me to comment on them. I observed that thousands of frustrated and bewildered people there who were searching for reality, could find it if they would give their lives to Christ."

As for Cronkite's own religious beliefs, here's what Wikipedia says, FWIW:

"Cronkite's family was Protestant and changed their denomination three times while he was a child. Cronkite himself joined the Episcopal church as a youth explaining in a 1994 interview: 'I got into a Boy Scout troop that met in an Episcopal church. The church had a wonderful minister who was also the scoutmaster. And I suppose you can say he proselytized me. At any rate, I was much involved with the church, and became Episcopalian — and an acolyte. Later, when I worked for a paper in Houston, I was church editor for a while. The Episcopal House of Bishops met in Houston one year, and I became intrigued by the leaders of the church — fascinated by their discussions and their erudition.'"

What do you get when you put a Muslim imam, a Greek Orthodox priest, a rabbi, a Buddhist monk and 10 atheists in the same room? Penitents Compete, a new reality TV show in Turkey, in which contestants from those religions try to convert atheists to their faith.

Those behind the program say they want to promote religious belief while educating Turkey's mostly Muslim population about other faiths.

"The project aims to turn disbelievers on to God," the station's deputy director, Ahmet Ozdemir, told the Hürriyet Daily News and Economic Review.

For the whole story, check out this piece in The Guardian.

JUNE 30 UPDATE:
The Bully! Pulpit, a pop culture news blog, reports that rumors that Michael Jackson accepted Christ may have been false. Jackson, who died of cardiac arrest last week at the age of 50, was rumored by some to have become a Christian just weeks before his death.

Gospel singer Andrae Crouch and his twin sister, singer and minister, Sandra, apparently visited Jackson recently at the pop star's request, and they did pray together. But exactly what they prayed depends on whom you ask.

Last Friday, gospel duo Mary Mary blogged on their Facebook page that Jackson "prayed with Sandra and Andre and accepted Christ into his heart. Now he's singing in the heavenly choir! Our hearts rejoice!"

But the Bully! Pulpit reported that that wasn't the full story, or even fully accurate.

Religious stereotyping was at play at a recent video-game trade show where a game company hired 13 people to protest the upcoming game "Dante's Inferno."

A group of protesters claiming to come from a church held signs such as "Hell is not a Video Game" and "Trade in Your PlayStation for a PrayStation" in front of the nation's biggest video-game trade show last week. They pretended to fight Electronic Arts' new game "Dante's Inferno," loosely based on the first part of Dante's Divine Comedy.

Ben Fritz from the Los Angeles Times originally offered this report:

The protesters, who came from a church in Ventura County, held signs with slogans such as "trade in your playstation for a praystation" and "EA = anti-Christ" as they marched and handed out a homemade brochure that warns, "a video game hero does not have the authority to save and damn... ONLY GOD CAN JUDGE. and he will not judge the sinners who play this game kindly."

Matthew Francis, one of the protesters, said he and his fellow church members were particularly upset that Dante's Inferno features a character who fights his way out of Hell and uses a cross as a weapon against demons.

The Associated Press clears it up by talking to a spokeswoman, who said the stunt was arranged by a viral marketing agency hired by EA.

Granted, it doesn't look like a kid's game. But lest you think Christians shun Dante, check out this Christian History issue.

Someone in Smolensk, Russia published a bogus newspaper using the logo of the evangelical periodical Protestant. It appeared in mailboxes around the city. Using fake quotes attributed to real people, the paper portrays Baptists as morally loose, financially dependent on the U.S., and obsessed with taking over the world.

The paper contains a made-up interview with the president of the Russian Union of Evangelical Christians-Baptists (RUECB), Yuri Sipko:

"All Baptists pay money into our account in Zurich. But that is still much less than the amount paid by Western churches . . . The dollar was, is, and for a long time probably will remain the primary helpmate of the Russian Union of Baptists." All Baptists express gratitude for the donations of Western supporters ? "including the American government."

The paper seems to have been created to doom a political candidate by associating him with the Baptists. A smear campaign like this may be very effective in a region where many are suspicious of Protestants.

RUECB's director of external church affairs responded,

Political con-artists are trying to turn the respected, 140-year history of Baptists in Russia into a horror story in hopes of helping and hurting certain political parties. They are sowing hatred between the confessions. Do they not understand that thousands will be hurt by this pitiful rag? This is ugly and totally unacceptable.

One of the top buzz words on Twitter today is Lent as people are announcing what they're giving up for the season. Not to be left out, The Church of England is offering tweets for Lent, which begins tomorrow.

Twitter is a social network and micro-blogging site that allows people to send and read followers' updates (or tweets), which are posts of up to 140 characters. Episcopal Cafe asks, "What Would Jesus Tweet?"

Others are abstaining from another social network. Stephanie Simon writes in The Wall Street Journal about how parents are going on Facebook fasts for Lent.

Lenten sacrifices are meant to honor and in a small way reenact the 40 days Jesus is said to have wandered the wilderness, fasting and resisting temptation. Abstaining from Facebook for the 40 days of Lent was the rage among college students last year. This Lenten season -- which starts next week on Ash Wednesday -- the cause has been taken up by a surprising number of adults. The digital sacrifice won't be easy, they say, but it may help them reclaim their analog lives.

Even CNET joins in by giving some tips on how to give it up without losing "friends."

p.s. You can follow Christianity Today on twitter here.

When Disney announced on Christmas Eve that it would no longer fund the Chronicles of Narnia movies, some wondered if the franchise was dead as Walden Media was left holding a very expensive ball--essentially all dressed up with no place to go (and not enough money to spend).

Various stories have circulated about exactly why Disney bailed--everything from economic reasons to disagreements with Walden founder/funder Phil Anschutz--but the big question still remained: Would any major studio pick up the ball? Because Walden didn't have the money to move forward without any help.

That question was answered Wednesday when several publications--Variety, the LA Times, and the Hollywood Reporter--all ran stories saying that 20th Century Fox will pick up the tab to co-finance the third Narnia film, Voyage of the Dawn Treader.

Variety reports that Fox and Walden "are still working out budget and script issues, but the hope is to shoot the film at the end of summer for a holiday 2010 release through the Fox Walden label." (Fox and Walden have partnered on most of Walden's other releases; only the Narnia films--The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe and Prince Caspian--were released through Disney.)

The Variety article also notes that while Caspian didn't earn nearly as much money as LWW, Caspian is also "considered the least commercially appealing of the seven C.S. Lewis Narnia novels" but nonetheless "ranked No. 10 in global box office performance last year. Dawn Treader is considered to be a more family film-friendly book, and the goal is to get back to the magical aspects present in the first Narnia pic but mostly absent from Prince Caspian."

Last night my wife, Christine, and I were guests of WYLL-AM, a Christian radio station in Chicago, at a compelling performance of The Screwtape Letters at the city's historic Mercury Theater. The show, which has garnered critical acclaim, stars Max McLean and reprises the classic tale by C.S. Lewis. McLean, who is profiled by Mark Moring in the coming March issue of Christianity Today, greeted WYLL, on-air host Sandy Rios, and playgoers afterwards during a celebration of WYLL's 20th anniversary. For some photos from the reception, check here later.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, Disney has decided, for "budgetary and logistical reasons," not to co-produce and co-finance The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, the next film in the Chronicles of Narnia series.

Disney had partnered with Walden Media for the first two films, 2005's The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe and this year's Prince Caspian.

As recently as a few weeks ago, two Walden Media employees had told CT Movies that plans for Dawn Treader were moving forward, with filming to start in the spring. Neither employee hinted that the plug might be pulled.

Walden, which owns the film rights to the Narnia stories, can still move forward with the films, but with production budgets approaching $200 million per film, it will be a difficult task. If Dawn Treader is to happen, Walden will likely have to partner with a studio willing to put up some hefty cash. They'll probably first look to Fox, its production and distribution partner on every other Walden film.

Talent for Dawn Treader--including director Michael Apted and star Ben Barnes, who plays Caspian--were already in place and ready to roll. It is too early to speculate what might, or might not, happen with the film, or if the rest of the series is to be scrapped altogether.

Walden Media has had a hit-and-miss record at the box office, with its latest release, City of Ember, bombing, prompting industry observers to wonder if Walden might be in trouble. Some have speculated that Fox might end its partnership with Walden, which would surely put the studio in a difficult position.

For more details, read the whole story in The Hollywood Reporter. CT Movies will stay on top of the story as it develops.

Hollywood Elsewhere's Jeffrey Wells isn't alone in his dislike for the recent remake of The Day the Earth Stood Still. He's also not alone in his disdain for Christians.

But Wells might be alone in saying that the new movie isn't very good because it was made by a Christian.

In a recent blog post titled "Thou Shalt Not," Wells writes, "On top of his other allegiances, The Day The Earth Stood Still director Scott Derrickson is an avowed Christian. Which has clouded his vision."

Huh? Wells is certainly free to question Derrickson's vision; that's what movie buffs and film critics do. But to blame it on the guy's faith? Wow.

J.R.R. Tolkien once told C.S. Lewis, "Christianity works on us like any other myth, with the difference that it is actually true."

What Tolkien didn't tell Lewis was that myths also make the best movies . . . whether the myths are true or not. There is a better, even a best, way to make a film, and it starts with a great myth -- and not with an agenda.

I just read a wonderful essay by Dwight Longenecker (posted at Spero News) on this very topic, reiterating the things many of us already know to be true . . . but it's good to read the occasional reminder:

Story. Is. Everything.

Agenda is always secondary at best. Telling a great story matters most.

As Longenecker notes, "Titillation, pyrotechnics and gore only entertain [audiences] so long. If the film isn't driven by a powerful and compelling story line, even the most immature audience will yawn."

The essay notes that Hollywood story consultant Christopher Vogler has "outlined the formula for a good story . . . [b]asing his ideas on the work of the mythologist Joseph Campbell . . . a model which is as old as human communication itself. It is a structure which is woven through all the great myths, fairy tales, sagas and folk tales of humanity in every culture and every age."

He illustrates how this pattern is evident in Scripture, where "the spiritual journey requires a departure from our comfort zone to step out into a world of unknown realities. . . . This story line is reflected in all the Old Testament sagas. Abraham, Jacob, Moses, Joseph, and Joshua all have to step out in faith and leave their old world to follow God's promise."

Even Jesus had to step out of the comforts of heaven to walk among us, arguably the most powerful mythic story of all time -- a true myth.

Author Longenecker says that a prime example of myth-telling comes in Disney's animated The Jungle Book , which he recently watched with his young children. At the climax, Baloo the Bear sacrifices his life to save Mowgli, and as he lies seemingly dead, Bagheera the panther quotes Scripture: "No greater love has any man than he lay down his life for his friends." Of course, Baloo was faking his death, and then winks and wakes up.

Writes Longenecker, "Professional theologians and high brow Christians may throw up their hands in horror at such a trivialisation of theology, but when Baloo woke up my four-year-old said, 'That's what Jesus did.'"

Myth as truth. Truth as myth. A formula for great stories, and great movies.

For the latest coverage on films, check out Christianity Today Movies.

Update: Friday, 17 October 2008, noon, cdt

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If you follow popular culture, you know that the new feature film, "Fireproof," the related book, "Love Dare," and the TV series "Jon & Kate Plus 8," (and the related new Zondervan title), are hot media properties.

This weekend may be the third in the row that 'Fireproof' makes it into the all-important list of Top Ten grossing films. The plot-device book 'Love Dare' also is topping best-seller lists in the how-to and advice categories. "Jon & Kate Plus 8," broadcast on The Learning Channel with new episodes airing on Mondays, is now in its fourth season. The program follows a couple (who are Christians, but don't make a big deal out of it) as they raise 8 kids.

All three of these media entities are crossing beyond the typical boundaries for a low-budget film, yet another marriage-saver title, or a cable TV show. The one thing they seem to have in common is the obvious reality that:

Keeping a marriage healthy in today's America is near impossible.

But why has the Christian angle on traditional marriage captured the popular imagination? This is the bigger question in my mind. Has Christian marriage come full circle and now become cool enough to be counter-pop cultural? What are the other appealing elements, for example, for a program such as "JK+8"?

Here's what my journalist colleague Corrie Cutrer (now a mom of 2 in South Carolina) had to say on the topic of the Gosslin family in particular:

As a sometimes-harried parent of two young children, I was not initially hooked on The Learning Channel's (TLC) reality show Jon & Kate Plus Eight. My sister, also a young mom, had suggested I watch the program, which features the day-to-day chaos of a couple in their early thirties parenting eight (yes, eight) children as the result of fertility treatments: a set of twin girls (age 8) and four-year-old sextuplets (three boys and three girls).

Religulous, the new anti-religion documentary by TV talker Bill Maher, is neither funny nor insightful, according to Biola's Craig Hazen:

Maher is pitching this film as mavericky - telling the truth about religion that everyone else is afraid to address. But Religulous is nothing more than filthy, nudie, druggie, and obtusey. There is little to laugh at and nothing to learn (except maybe that if you quit being religulous you get to act like Caligulous).

Nor is it all that profitable, grossing just under $4 million so far. This trails by far Fireproof, an unabashedly religious flick that has raked in about $13 million (albeit entering theaters a week earlier).

Now that's funny.

Ray Boltz, who sold about 4.5 million records before retiring from Christian music a few years ago, came out of the closet Friday to announce that he's gay.

In an interview with the gay magazine The Washington Blade, Boltz said he came out to his family and some close friends in December 2004, but only now decided to go public with the news.

"I'd denied it ever since I was a kid," Boltz, 55, told the magazine. "I became a Christian, I thought that was the way to deal with this and I prayed hard and tried for 30-some years and then at the end, I was just going, 'I'm still gay. I know I am.' And I just got to the place where I couldn't take it anymore — when I was going through all this darkness, I thought, 'Just end this.' "

One reason Boltz decided to come out now might be because he's performing Sunday at Jesus Metropolitan Community Church in Indianapolis, and then next Sunday, Sept. 21, at the Metropolitan Community Church of Washington, D.C. Both congregations are a part of a denomination that embraces the LGBT (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender) community.
Boltz is perhaps best known for his song "Thank You," about a dream in which a Christian thanks the Sunday school teacher who led him to Jesus. It was the GMA song of the year in 1990. Other Boltz hits include "Watch the Lamb," "The Anchor Holds," and "I Pledge Allegiance to the Lamb."

Boltz also told The Blade that he doesn't want to get into debates about Scripture and has no plans to "go into First Baptist or an Assembly of God church and run in there and say, 'I'm gay and you need to love me anyway.' "

For him, the decision to come out is much more personal.

"This is what it really comes down to," he says. "If this is the way God made me, then this is the way I'm going to live. It's not like God made me this way and he'll send me to hell if I am who he created me to be — I really feel closer to God because I no longer hate myself."

Earlier, Boltz had alluded to the issue on his official website, saying that if people "knew who I really was, I would never be accepted."

A few days ago, I received a press release for GodblogCon, the annual gathering of Christian bloggers. The September 20-21 meeting in Las Vegas (it is scheduled to coincide with the mainstream BlogWorld and the New Media Expo) will feature several prominent Christian bloggers, like Tall Skinny Kiwi's Andrew Jones, La Shawn Barber, and ScrappleFace satirist Scott Ott.

But at the top of the list, the press release mentioned that a key speaker would be "Joe Carter, the Christian blogosphere's very own Bono." Carter, formerly of Family Research Council, World Magazine, The Center for Bioethics and Human Dignity, the Mike Huckabee campaign, The East Texas Tribune, and the U.S. Marine Corps, is perhaps best known as the creator of EvangelicalOutpost.com.

The five-year-old site became one of the most prominent evangelical blogs and was in many ways as influential on its own as several of the organizations on Carter's resume. (Not too many Christian bloggers' views on bioethics have been profiled by The Washington Post.)

But there's a new wrinkle. Carter is no longer speaking at GodBlogCon, and is no longer blogging at EvangelicalOutpost.com.

And according to a farewell post on Evangelical Outpost, Carter wonders about the future of independent sites like his.

"The future of the new media, in my opinion, is moving away from personal sites toward online collectives that are focused on particular interests," he wrote. "The political left has been doing this for years (see: DailyKos) but the other areas of the blogging community have been slow to follow this approach. ? [T]he future of online activity will move to ?planned communities' rather than, for example, the ?ghettos' that Christian bloggers have been trying to break out of for years."

I wonder how that will go over at GodBlogCon, where the emphasis in recent years has been on personal sites rather than corporate blogs. (Carter has some more thoughts in an interview at Justin Taylor's hugely popular independent Christian blog, Between Two Worlds.)

Carter isn't giving up on blogging, though. His new outpost is one of those "planned communities" and "online collectives." Carter is managing editor of Culture11.com, launched by former White House staffers Bill Bennett and David Kuo with David Gelernter. And he's blogging with Kuo. (Though the title of the new blog, "Kuo & Joe, may be a massive misnomer: Carter's posts significantly outnumber those from Kuo, who says he's keeping his Beliefnet blog alive.)

Evangelical Outpost will stick around, too. Carter handed the keys off to Biola University's Torrey Honors Institute, which is the main sponsor of GodBlogCon.

All Music Guide
Just as the movie industry has IMDb.com, so the music biz has an Internet encyclopedia of its own. Spanning nearly every genre, AMG offers bios, discographies, and even reviews searchable by artist, album, song, or classical work. The site's design doesn't allow easy cross-referencing, but AMG nonetheless offers seemingly limitless information at your fingertips.

Billboard
The standard for insider news, exclusive interviews, and the hallowed charts by which industry success is gauged. It costs $300 a year for a magazine subscription or for full access to the site, but free limited access still gets you most news stories, and I, for one, can settle for the week's Top 100 albums over the full list of 200.

Entertainment Weekly
Want to know what's hot and buzz-worthy in music without having to keep up on everything? EW does a great job of reviewing only what you need to know with writing that is concise, astute, and sometimes humorous. Plus, its writers provide plenty of news tidbits, download suggestions, and the occasional interview.

Paste Magazine
For those who prefer to immerse themselves in the new, Paste is the magazine for music lovers. The magazine excels at keeping up with all manner of artists, including independent, underground, and classical. Every issue comes with a sampler CD, and the website has plenty to complement the publication. While Paste has a number of Christians among its staff and contributors, the magazine is not a "Christian magazine" as such.

CCM Magazine, CM Central, Christian Music Planet
Most of the Christian music sites and publications are now owned and operated by Salem Communications. Their acquisitions have been positioned to specialize in rock (CCM), pop (CM Central), and adult contemporary (CMP), offering a variety of articles, blogs, and boards, depending on the site

A nine-year legal dispute between the producers of the Left Behind movies and Tim LaHaye, who co-authored the books, came to an end last week when a settlement was reached between both parties.

Cloud Ten Pictures announced that the agreement ends a dispute that began in 2000.

According to The Christian Post, LaHaye had filed a lawsuit against Cloud Ten, claiming that the producers made a lower quality film than the contract demanded. Still, the first Left Behind film sold almost 3 million copies before its theatrical release in 2001, and earned $2.1 million on opening weekend. LaHaye was also reportedly dissatisfied with Cloud Ten's distribution strategies for the three Left Behind movies made so far.

The settlement gives LaHaye the right to remake the first three films based on his books, but if he doesn't exercise his option to remake the films, Cloud Ten will retain its current rights to make sequels.

"We are thrilled to finally have this behind us," said Andre van Heerden, CEO of Cloud Ten. "While we received repeated judgments from the courts that validated our rights, we were unable until now to finally put this lawsuit behind us."

LaHaye and co-author Jerry Jenkins told the Los Angeles Times in 2006 that they had naively sold the movie rights too early, ending up with what Jenkins called "church basement movies," with Kirk Cameron in the lead role. (Cameron, coincidentally, is starring in Fireproof, another Christian film coming in September from the makers of Facing the Giants.)

While the three films--Left Behind (2000), Tribulation Force (2002) and World at War (2005)--have enjoyed big sales and popularity in the Christian market, most critics would agree with Jenkins' assessment, usually giving the films low marks.

Cloud Ten producer Peter Lalonde told CT Movies in 2005 that he expected mainstream critics "to hammer us just because of the [Christian] message. . . . Of course, Hollywood sends messages every day, but they have always had this mindset toward Christian films, and frankly I think they still do."

The Left Behind series of books have sold a whopping 65 million copies. The 16th and final book released in April, 2007.

Randall Wallace, best known for his Oscar-nominated script for Braveheart, has signed on with Disney to direct Secretariat, a film about the 1973 Triple Crown-winning racehorse and owner Penny Chenery.

Variety reports that Mike Rich, screenwriter for The Nativity Story, The Rookie and Finding Forrester, is writing the script for Secretariat.

Wallace and Rich, both Christians, have never worked together on a film, though Wallace did have a bit role as "Texas Oilman" in 2002's The Rookie. They have both spoken to CT Movies about their faith and work.

Disney hopes to start production on the film in early 2009.

According to Variety, Chenery knew little about horses when she took over her ailing father's horse farm in Virginia. After her father died, she was pressued to sell the farm and she was hit with a multimillion-dollar inheritance tax. But she saved both the farm and a young horse named Secretariat, who went on to become the first thoroughbred to win the Triple Crown in 25 years. Chenery became known as the "first lady of racing."

Wallace, a graduate of Duke University where he majored in religion, teamed up with Mel Gibson on Braveheart (Gibson directed and starred), and paired up with Gibson again for 2002's We Were Soldiers (Wallace wrote and directed, Gibson starred). Wallace recently finished a script for Atlas Shrugged, based on the novel by Ayn Rand and scheduled for a 2009 release.

Rich recently finished a script for Manhunt, the story of Colonel Everton Conger leading the hunt for Abraham Lincoln's assassin.

TIME recently highlighted its "100 Olympic Athletes To Watch." As Olympic coverage cranks up, you'll be hearing more and more about them, although current reports seem mostly to have to do with the athlete's ages, injuries, and drug use.

Press agency AMP is working with the USOC and NBC to highlight other aspects of the athletes' lives. They've told CT about a number of confessing Christians among the American athletes most likely to medal. A large proportion of them mention Philippians 4:13 in interviews and on their blogs: "I can do everything through him who gives me strength."

Allyson Felix, a sprinter, has a section about her faith on her blog that says, "If we can help you with your faith journey, and help you learn more about God, contact us." She's also one of the few athletes involved in USADA's Project Believe, which puts athletes through extensive drug testing. She wants everyone to know she's clean. After all, she's being compared to Marion Jones as well as Wilma Rudolph.

Tyson Gay has made a lot of news, for his hamstring injury, for being dubbed "Tyson Homosexual" by American Family Association's autoreplace, and now for being exceptionally polite. "When I raise my hands in the air it is to give God praise," he told a fan on Ask Tyson.

Prison guard and world marathon champion, Catherine Ndereba, aka Catherine the Great, is also on TIME's list as a Kenyan athlete to watch. This year's civil unrest in Kenya made training a lot scarier than it had been before, but Ndereba is back to winning again. Just over a week ago, she placed first in New York City's half-marathon.

Entertainment Weekly
Informative, investigative, and intelligently written, EW is the standard bearer of entertainment magazines. If you want all of the inside scoop, go to Variety, but if you just want most of it, presented in a fun way without being gossipy or "fanboy," EW has the write stuff - especially now with the sharp-witted Diablo Cody, Oscar winner for Juno's script, as a back-page columnist.

MovieWeb, ComingSoon
Want to know what's coming down the pike - not just in the next few months, but even a couple years from now? I rely on these two sites to keep me informed on upcoming releases - when they're due, who's directing, who's starring, what's the latest news on each, images, trailers, and so on.

IMDb
The Internet Movie Database has just about everything you could possibly want to know about any movie ever made. Want to know if 1961's The Guns of Navarone won any Oscars? (It did: Best Special Effects.) Or who played Juror No. 11 in 1957's 12 Angry Men? (It was George Voskovec.) It's all here.

Looking Closer
Jeffrey Overstreet was the first critic on the CT Movies team when we launched in 2004 (he'd been writing Film Forum for CT for a while), and I've always appreciated his insights into the movies. I've learned more about how to watch a movie from Jeffrey than from anyone. His Looking Closer blog keeps me abreast of what's happening in film, music, and more, and his thoughtful commentary goes the extra mile.

FilmChat
If I only went to one website a day to find out what I had to know that would be relevant to CT readers, Peter T. Chattaway's FilmChat blog would be that one-stop shop. It's comprehensive, but especially zeroes in on films, themes, and news relevant to a Christian audience. Bookmark it.

Andrew Sullivan has written an unusually honest and reflective column for The Guardian on the intellectual tradeoffs of living in a one-click-away world.

A veteran of the blogosphere now publishing at a rate of 300 posts per week, Sullivan rhapsodizes over the transformations this has worked on his brain functioning:

I process information far more rapidly and seem able to absorb multiple sources of information simultaneously in ways that would have shocked my teenage self. In researching a topic, or just browsing through the blogosphere, the mind leaps and jumps and vaults from one source to another.

Tonight at 9pm Eastern, PBS's Frontline/World will air a documentary (a joint project with the Tribune) on Christianity in China.

The Chicago Tribune today published its second cover story in a row on "Jesus in China." Their articles this week hit on many of the recent issues in Chinese Christianity, including the rapid rise in attendance, the compromises of membership in the Three-Self Patriotic Movement (the state church), and the fact that this wave of Christianity is not led by foreign missionaries.

Evan Osnos, the Tribune's Beijing bureau chief, draws a lot of material from Zion church in the first installation, "Jesus in China: Christianity's rapid rise":

Rev. Jin Mingri peered out from the pulpit and delivered an unusual appeal: "Please leave," the 39-year-old pastor commanded his followers, who were packed, standing-room-only on a Sunday afternoon, into a converted office space in China's capital. "We don't have enough seats for the others who want to come, so, please, only stay for one service a day."

A choir in hot-pink robes stood to his left, beside a guitarist and a drum set bristling with cymbals. Children in a playroom beside the sanctuary punctuated the service with squeals and tantrums. It was a busy day at a church that, on paper, does not exist.

The piece also gets into some of the Chinese church's cultural aspirations, such as encouraging basically ethical behavior.

"Jesus in China: Life on the edge" began by showing Christians taking the offensive in claiming religious rights in China. "Christians form a diverse lobby that is rare in a nation split by class, opportunity and geography" and are often inspired by the American Civil Rights movement, Osnos reports. (CT covered this movement - and its admiration for Martin Luther King Jr. - in 2006) One non-Christian rights advocate even called Christianity "China's largest non-governmental organization."

The Tribune also posted videos on church life and China's "Bible Empire."

Our recent coverage of China includes a May cover story on urban Christianity.

N.T. Wright will be on The Colbert Report tonight (11:30 p.m. eastern, 10:30 central). To whet your appetite, head over to CatholicColbert.com for some of the show's best clips on religion (well, on Catholicism, anyway).

Unfortunately, CatholicColbert.com has slowed down lately - the last post was April 22, and there's no mention, for example, of the following week's religion-heavy episode with Anne Lamott, the religion-filled May 27 episode with bits on John Hagee and a brutal interview with guest Tony Perkins, or Rick Warren's visit earlier this year.

Last night, Colbert continued his commentary on Obama's church resignation by launching "Barack Obama's Church Search." The first installment had Hindu Temple Society of North America President Uma Mysorekar on whether Obama should convert to Hinduism.

If Colbert's so-many-layers-of-irony-he-might-be-sincere shtick doesn't appeal to you, set your TiVo to record PBS's "Jesus in China," a Frontline/World documentary with Chicago Tribune China correspondent Evan Osnos. It airs on PBS stations Tuesday night.

If both shows appeal, you can watch Osnos on Colbert. PBS and Comedy Central will have their respective programs available online after they air.

Update: The Wright video is below. But it turns out that Colbert's other guest beat the bishop to the punch in quoting Scripture. Cookie Monster paraphrased Deuteronomy 8:3: "One cannot live on cookies alone."

In a short, short news story, The Grand Rapids Press reported that

Christian publishing giant Zondervan on Tuesday announced it was cutting 18 jobs as part of a restructuring effort.

Among those who lost their job was Executive Vice President and Publisher Scott Bolinder, who had been with the company for 19 years.

The company, owned by media conglomerate News Corp., has about 325 employees in Cascade Township and 35 at offices in Miami and San Diego.

The jobs that were cut represent about 5 percent of the positions at Zondervan, and included 5 executive positions. The publishing house hired Moe Girkins as its new president and CEO last winter.

Publishers Weekly reported that, "Parent company HarperCollins has said that Zondervan has been a soft spot in the overall performance of HC."

In recent years Zondervan had annual title output in the high-500 to low-600 range. Powers confirmed the reorganization would lead to a reduction in titles, but said the company would not release specifics now.

Since 1988, Zondervan has been part of HarperCollins, which is a subsidiary of News Corporation, which is run by Rupert Murdoch. The publisher’s first huge break was the NIV Bible, which in 1986 overtook the King James Version. A more recent one was The Purpose Driven Life.

At my high school graduation party, a friend who was not a Christian walked up and commented on the music playing over the outdoor speakers at my parents' house.

"Why is it," he asked, "that Christian bands always have the best musicians?"

I was a bit perplexed: The tunes he was hearing belonged to Midtown, a pop-punk quartet whose members, as far as I knew, were not Christian.

I also disagreed with my friend's assessment. I mean, I was a big fan of MxPx and Slick Shoes ... but the best musicians? Hardly. (For evidence, listen to"Rappin for Jesus" by Stephen Wiley.)

Until a few years ago, Christian bands occasionally would have a radio hit or two -- dc Talk and Jars of Clay had their moment, as did Sixpence None the Richer -- and then disappear back into oblivion.

Switchfoot, whose CD a friend of mine picked up in a South Dakota pawn shop during our 2001 road trip around the country (that's a different, longer story), seems to have bucked that trend. Being heard on TV promos and Star 98.7, or whatever the pop rock station is in your town, for years to follow, Switchfoot has been one of the lucky few who have broken through without significantly changing their message, though I would argue they too have watered it down and published one really bad album.

This music is part of the bigger, "parallel universe of Christian pop culture," as Daniel Radosh dubs the industry in his new book "Rapture Ready!" (Radosh's list of the top 10 Christian songs begins with Larry Norman's "Why Don't You Look Into Jesus?")

Never underestimate the power of an Oprah endorsement. Ever since she branded German-born spirituality guru Eckhart Tolle's A New Earth: Awakening to Your Life's Purpose the 61st Oprah Book Club selection in January 2008, the book has sold 3.5 million copies. Over the past several weeks Oprah and Tolle have hosted unprecedented free "webinars," on which Oprah-Tolle discuss a chapter from the book each week and field live questions from the online audience. That audience grew to 2 million people.

Tolle's message is based largely in Eastern spirituality, though he draws from Christian language and imagery (such as the book's title). Tolle defines the human problem as a false self - what he calls "egoic mind patterns," which can be overcome by acknowledging oneness with ultimate reality, or "God." Here's how Greg Boyd, senior pastor at Woodland Hills Church in St. Paul, Minnesota, summarizes it:

Tolle espouses a rather typical Eastern metaphysics in which the true "you" is not the "you" that is distinct from other people, but the (alleged) "you" that is one with the universe. To grasp this, imagine waves on an ocean. Your individual ego is one such wave, but the true "you" in the Eastern religious worldview is the ocean itself - as it is for me and every other "wave." The wave-"you" is limited and temporary, but the ocean-"you" is unlimited and eternal.

Oprah's website reports that she and Tolle will be offering another webinar session beginning June 16.

Boyd aside, seemingly few evangelicals have taken the time to engage A New Earth and offer a thoughtful, biblical response - perhaps because, as Peter Jones, writing for Christian Science Monitor puts it, A New Earth's missteps are rather old:

For Tolle, "knowing self and knowing God become one and the same." The millions who've turned to Tolle might naturally conclude: I am the "I Am." Sound familiar? It should. According to the Bible, such "knowledge" springs from the oldest error of all: man's desire to be "as gods."

Stay tuned to CT for our upcoming analysis of the Oprah-Tolle craze in the next two weeks.

Related coverage:
Greg Boyd's review of A New Earth at his blog, "Random Reflections"

The Real Secret of the Universe | Why we disdain feel-good spirituality but shouldn't. (May 2007)

The Church of O | With a congregation of 22 million viewers, Oprah Winfrey has become one of the most influential spiritual leaders in America. (April 2002)

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ABC's report of Wheaton College professor Kent Gramm's resignation was an example of sloppy journalism and weak analysis.

The original headline was simply false: "Professor Fired for Getting a Divorce." Gramm was not fired. He resigned because he declined to talk with the college about his divorce. (The image to the right is a screen shot of an earlier version)

Later today, ABC changed the headline to "Professor Loses Job Over Divorce." The headline is still not quite accurate. To lose your job generally indicates that someone took it away from you. However, Gramm voluntarily resigned. And according to the Chicago Tribune, the college offered him another year of employment while he searched for another job.

Also, student Emma Vanhoozer's name was misspelled. Most journalists are extremely careful about getting basic facts like these correct. But reporter Russell Goldman bypassed whatever fact-checking system ABC has set up, if they have one.

Not only are there factual errors, but Goldman imposes his own strange analysis on the situation.

"If the school is free to impose its beliefs on divorced family members where does the law draw the line? Could the school just as easily impose arranged marriages?" Goldman writes.

Yes, that's the big looming threat here: forcibly arranged marriages. Someone has been reading too much coverage of the raid on the polygamist sect's ranch in Texas.

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The eight American Idol finalists sang "Shout to the Lord" Wednesday night to end its charity event "Idol Gives Back." The song included one alteration: "My Jesus" was changed to "My shepherd" to begin the song. The show averaged 17.6 million viewers, featuring celebrities like Brad Pitt, Bono, and Eli and Peyton Manning.

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He played roles that were larger than life - calling down plagues upon Egypt and parting the Red Sea in one film, surviving slavery and an electrifying chariot race in another, and even making contact with an advanced civilization of talking apes in still another.

Charlton Heston, star of The Ten Commandments, Ben-Hur, and Planet of the Apes, died Saturday night in his Beverly Hills home at the age of 84.

The actor was "known for his chiseled jaw, broad shoulders and resonating voice, and, of course, for the roles he played," Heston's family said in a statement. "No one could ask for a fuller life than his. No man could have given more to his family, to his profession, and to his country."

Heston was also known for his conservative politics and served as president of the National Rifle Association, an outspoken advocate of gun rights.

President Bush hailed him as a "strong advocate for liberty," while John McCain called Heston a devotee for civil and constitutional rights. Heston was one of Hollywood's first actors to speak out against racism and was actively involved in the civil rights movement.

Expelled, a new documentary that argues the case for Intelligent Design from a Judeo-Christian perspective, has been in the headlines lately, prior to its April 18 theatrical release.

The film, hosted and narrated by Ben Stein, has been screened to invitation-only audiences at churches and for various Christian groups. But several critics have worked their way in to some of the screenings, most notably Roger Moore of The Orlando Sentinel, who recently trashed the movie in his blog.

A critic of another kind "crashed" a screening in Minnesota on Thursday night--Richard Dawkins, author of The God Delusion and arguably the most outspoken critic of Intelligent Design and Creationism. Dawkins himself appears in the documentary--but claims he was duped into believing it was going to be an objective account of Darwinism vs. ID.

Jeffrey Overstreet, a film critic for CT Movies, broke the news on his own blog Thursday night after receiving an e-mail from a college student who was at the screening.

Stuart Blessman, the University of Minnesota-Twin Cities student, told Overstreet in the e-mail that Dawkins' appearance "was quite a surprise" to both the audience and associate producer Mark Mathis, who fielded questions afterward.

Blessman reported that Dawkins asked several questions, and complained that "any statement he made in the film was in fact under the assumption that he was being interviewed . . . for a film that was to take an even-handed look at the Intelligent Design/Evolution controversy."

It's not the first time Dawkins and other Darwinian experts say they were duped by the filmmakers. The Guardian reported last fall that Dawkins said, "At no time was I given the slightest clue that these people were a creationist front," he said. And The New York Times quotes Dawkins and other atheists who appeared in the film under a "deceptive invitation."

Blessman also wrote that "the Q&A then proceeded pretty uneventfully, with several of the questions addressed to Dawkins himself. Mathis and Dawkins also clearly had spoken on numerous occasions and appeared to continue an argument that they had started previously."

Blessman also reported that Dawkins complained that a colleague of his was turned away even though he (Dawkins) was admitted to the screening. That colleague, PZ Myers, a biologist and prof at the University of Minnesota-Morris, is actually featured in the film. Myers later blogged his own account of what happened here and here.

Myers wrote that he caught up with Dawkins and friends after the film, "which I hear is not only boring and poorly made, but is ludicrous in its dishonesty. Apparently, a standard tactic is to do lots of fast cuts between biologists like me or Dawkins or Eugenie Scott and shots of Nazi atrocities. It's all very ham-handed. The audience apparently ate it up, though. Figures. Christians have a growing reputation for their appreciation of dishonesty."

Read more about Expelled in earlier editions of Reel News at CT Movies.

3/26 UPDATE: There has been much discussion about the use of the word "crash" to describe how Dawkins got into the screening. Since this story posted, CT has learned that the screening was not an "invitation-only" event, but that attendees had simply signed up on a website--that it was open to anyone who signed up in advance. Tickets were not needed. CT regrets the choice of the word "crash" in the title and in the story, because neither Dawkins nor Myers were trying to "crash" the event, but had legitimately signed up for the screening as did everyone else who attended.

For people who frequent YouTube, Facebook, and Google, net neutrality is a hot topic. For Christian and conservative groups, it became a divisive topic today.

While the Christian Coalition supports net neutrality, 12 politically conservative and Christian conservative groups today began lobbying against net neutrality, according to U.S. News & World Report.

Net neutrality means that Internet service providers, such as Comcast, would not be able to discriminate in the service they provide. All traffic would transfer at the same speed over the network, regardless of the nature of the content or who provides it.

The issue primarily is on whether the providers can charge Web sites like YouTube or Google more money to deliver their content faster. The Christian Coalition argues that this fee would hurt grassroots organizations.

However, the 12 groups want the Internet providers to be allowed to block content such as pornography from some sites, a block that could be otherwise be prohibited under net neutrality proposals. Signers included David A. Keene, chairman of the American Conservative Union and Gary Bauer, president of American Values.

Part of their letter states: "We write to you to warn of the dangers of net neutrality. Now is not an appropriate time for the FCC to act. Network management is not some insidious method of stifling voices on the Internet; network management is critical to stop pornographers and pedophiles from having unfettered access to consumers' Internet connections."

The Christian Coalition has long supported net neutrality, listing it at second for its legislative agenda for 2008.

The coalition writes: If "Net Neutrality" legislation does not pass, consumers will have to pay an additional fee to have a website. The cable/telephone monopoly will be dividing the Internet into a "fast track" and "slow track." Our grassroots, who cannot afford the additional fees, will have to be on the slow track, which will mean that many of our websites will be passed by because the general public will not have the patience to go on the "slow track".

The Federal Communications Commission became interested in the issue because of a recent case involving Comcast's filtering of sites. Chairman Kevin Martin is arguing for greater fairness and transparency by Internet providers.

Christian music legend Larry Norman died Sunday of heart failure, according to his brother Charles Norman. He was 60.

Norman, a blonde, long-haired rocker who is often called the father of Christian rock music, was a giant in the Christian music industry, Chris Willman, senior music writer for Entertainment Weekly told Christianity Today.

Read the full obituary.

Wolfe is the editor of Image: A Journal of the Arts and Religion, and author of Malcolm Muggeridge: A Biography.

Arts & Faith
The largest and most dynamic online bulletin board on the subject of the intersection between art and faith, this site covers all art forms, but its literary section alone contains over 500 illuminating discussions of every sort of writing.

Image
In nearly two decades of publication, Image has become one of America's leading quarterlies, featuring original fiction, poetry, and creative nonfiction, along with interviews, book reviews, and essays on other art forms. Contributors include Annie Dillard, Kathleen Norris, Bret Lott, and Mary Oliver. Its website offers exclusive features, an online forum, and blog.

The Master's Artist
This site is an excellent example of a group blog, a true community of like-minded but highly individual writers. As they put it, they are "united by the blood of Christ and a love for language." Topics range from the state of Christian publishing to craft issues to lyrical meditations on writing as a spiritual discipline.

Nimble Spirit Review
Nimble Spirit Review is the lengthened shadow of Michael Wilt, who has spent many years working in the publishing business. A voracious reader, Wilt has posted dozens of short, graceful reviews of classic and contemporary books in all literary genres, including children's literature. On the site you can also find poems, essays, and interviews by a number of other writers, including Luci Shaw.

Stonework
Based at Houghton College and edited by poet John Leax, Stonework is an online literary magazine that publishes semiannually. Stonework has become a gathering place for such distinguished poets, essayists, and storywriters as Diane Glancy, Robert Siegel, and Julia Kasdorf.

CT received a press release a few minutes ago from the Global Country of World Peace announcing that their leader, the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi died Tuesday evening at his headquarters in the Netherlands. The New York Times and other outlets are also reporting the story tonight. The founder of the Transcendental Meditation movement, known as the Giggling Guru, was catapulted to world fame when the Beatles sought his spiritual advice at his ashram in 1968. Other celebrities followed, including Donovan, the Beach Boys, and Mia Farrow.

The Global Country of World Peace press release was headlined "Maharishi Welcomed into Heaven." That, or wherever John Lennon is right now.

That headline reminded me of another entrance into heaven--one created to welcome someone who didn't think world peace could be achieved by meditation or levitation, but who labored diligently to better the lives of the poor and to bring them to Jesus. If you haven't read "General William Booth Enters Heaven," click here to savor the robust American poet Vachel Lindsay's tribute to the founder of the Salvation Army. This is poetry to be read aloud, passionately, to the accompaniment of the bass drum, banjo, flute, and tambourine. And the music isn't "Imagine," but "Are You Washed in the Blood of the Lamb?"

CleanFlicks, once popular with Christians and families for its video "sanitizing" service, is working overtime to distance itself from a sex scandal involving a Utah man who apparently claimed he once worked with the company.

On Friday, CleanFlicks filed a federal lawsuit again Daniel Dean Thompson, who was recently arrested for allegedly paying a 14-year-old girl for sex. According to a press release, CleanFlicks is seeking damages for "harming the firm by illegally claiming a business relationship with the firm and infringing its trade name and trademarks."

According to CleanFlicks, Thompson "was not a founder of CleanFlicks, LLC or CleanFlicks Media, Inc., nor was he ever a partner, officer, affiliate, dealer, franchisee, collaborator, consultant or representative of any CleanFlicks entity in any capacity."

Several reports of Thompson's Jan. 24 arrest - on two charges of forcible sexual abuse and two charges of forcible sexual activity with a 14-year-old - had referred to him as a "co-founder" of CleanFlicks. Other reports said Thompson had owned and/or operated one or more CleanFlicks dealerships - which offered edited DVDs to customers - in Utah.

But CleanFlicks says none of it is true. Its Friday press release says the business "has uncovered data it believes proves that Thompson has knowingly lied about his relationship with CleanFlicks and that such activity has caused great harm to the company," and thus the lawsuit, which seeks over $1 million in damages.

Note: CleanFlicks has disputed much of the initial media reports cited here. See our update.

The co-founder of CleanFlicks, a video editing service once used by many Christians, has been arrested in Utah for allegedly paying a 14-year-old girl for sex.

Daniel Thompson, who ran CleanFlicks till the courts shut it down in 2006, had more recently operated Flix Club, a family-friendly edited-movie video business in Orem, Utah. He was arrested last Thursday on two charges of forcible sexual abuse and two charges of forcible sexual activity with a 14-year-old. Thompson is out on bail.

A USA Today headline: Barnes brings sexy back to 'Narnia'

Sheesh. I don't want sexy in Narnia. I just want Narnia the way Lewis imagined it.

And what do they mean "back" to Narnia? Did I miss the sexy the first time around? Did it leave? Was Mrs. Beaver really hot?

I'm already getting nervous -- and hoping that if it's not too late, director Andrew Adamson has read this..

The April 2008 issue of the Christian music magazine CCM will be its last, Salem Communications announced late yesterday.

"CCM Magazine readers tell us they want more information and want it faster than can be delivered in a monthly printed magazine," Jim Cumbee, Publisher and President of Non-Broadcast Media said in a press release. "Accordingly, we will discontinue the printed version of CCM Magazine to put increased energies toward the continued growth and enhancement of our comprehensive Christian music and entertainment online network."

In the May 2007 issue of the magazine, editor Jay Swartzendruber announced that CCM no longer stood for "Contemporary Christian Music." The acronym, he said, stood for "Christ ? Community ? Music," and the magazine would shift away from covering Christian music by its label or distribution in an effort "to raise the profile of independent and general market artists of faith."

Perhaps as part of trying to find common ground, Iranian filmmaker Nader Talebzadeh’s Jesus is as blonde as anyone’s, but the ideas behind his film pretty much undercut the Jesus of the Bible, who insisted on his deity, authority, death, and resurrection.

Jesus, the Spirit of God won an award at the 2007 Religion Today Film Festival in Italy.

As it turns out:

1. The Archbishop of Canterbury didn't actually call the nativity "a legend."

2. The Pope didn't actually call The Golden Compass "godless."

3. Fred Thompson wasn't actually endorsed by "an umbrella group for 40 million conservative Methodists across the U.S."

4. Mitt Romney's dad didn't actually march with Martin Luther King Jr., and neither did he.

5. I didn't actually find five stories in this vein. But here's my favorite media criticism artifact of all time.

The Left Behind Games name change caught my attention, but I almost missed another interesting Christian media story this week. Social networking site BigChurch.com, which has apparently always been one of the sketchier Christian dating sites, has a new owner.

Penthouse Media Group.

Forget the moral issues for a moment -- Kind of makes you wonder how good at compatible matchmating the site is, doesn't it?

The much-criticized videogame company has a new board of directors and now has a new name, Inspired Media Entertainment. It's the second name change for the company, which used to be Bonanza Gold, Inc.

It also has a new deal with Tyndale House Publishers. "The company's Left Behind license term and fees, due December 31, 2007, of $250,000, has been reduced to smaller payments of $21,000 each quarter for the next three years," the company said in the same filing that announced its intent for the name change.

The company saw a bit of additional bad press in October when it threatened critical bloggers with legal action. But the company seems to have dropped that campaign.

One indication that Rob Bell's Nooma videos are extremely popular and influential? Check out all of the spoofs on YouTube. Most are overly long, no one has quite nailed their Bell impersonation, and few are able to parody both the style and substance of the videos. But it's significant that there are so many, and that several come from outside the U.S. You won't find parodies of Rick Warren, John Piper, or Billy Graham, but Bell has more than a dozen.

Nearly two weeks before its arrival to American cinemas, one film has managed to draw cries of complaint from both the Catholic League and the National Secular Society in recent weeks. The Golden Compass, which premieres in the U.S. on December 7 and is based on Philip Pullman's fantasy trilogy of the same name, has been accused of being both anti-God and not anti-God enough.

The Catholic League, a conservative U.S. anti-defamation group, launched an official boycott of the film in early October, citing the books' negative depiction of the church (what Pullman names "the Authority"). League president Bill Donohue says Pullman, who is an outspoken atheist, wrote the stories "to promote atheism and denigrate Christianity, especially Roman Catholicism." Donohue is concerned that though it is toned down in its anti-God rhetoric, the upcoming movie will nonetheless act as "bait for the books."

Meanwhile, the U.K.-based National Secular Society is disappointed that the movie doesn't feature more explicit attacks on the church. According to the BBC, the society's president, Terry Sanderson, said, "We knew from the beginning that the producers of this film intended to leave out the anti-religious references. We think that is a great shame. The fight against the Magisterium (Pullman's thinly disguised version of the Catholic church) is the whole point of the book."

The Golden Compass premiered last night in the U.K. at London's Leicester Square, and received a lukewarm review from The Times - not for any real or perceived anti-God themes, of course, but for apparently sloppy storytelling compared to the books, which won the esteemed Whitbread Literary Award in 2002.

The movie is expected to do well in the U.S. during the approaching holiday-movie rush. This week's Newsweek delves deeper into director Chris Weitz's struggle of framing the stories' controversial subject matter, while the December issue of Christianity Today features the thoughtful critiques of some Christian writers who notice some surprising "Christian-y" themes in Pullman's books.

In a couple weeks, we'll see how the movie fares with the American audience, most of which doesn't fit easily into the extremes of today's religious culture wars that the Catholic League and the National Secular Society epitomize.

See Also:
Christianity Today Movies has been following the controversy surrounding the film. CT Movies' readers shared some initial thoughts on The Golden Compass's release.

Jarrell McCracken, founder of Word Inc., one of the world's largest makers of religious recordings and publications, died Wednesday.

"Whatever people think of Christian music today is owed largely to Jarrell McCracken," Baylor University journalism professor Robert Darden told the Baylor Lariat.

The Waco Tribune-Herald reports that the recording company boasts of names like Amy Grant, Sandi Patti, and George Beverly Shea. Billy Graham, Ruth Carter Stapleton, and UCLA basketball coach John Wooden were published through Word.

Piers Bateman, who worked for McCracken at Word for more than 20 years, told the Tribune-Herald that McCracken created an industry.

"The gospel music, the religious music industry, did not exist before him and the religious publishing of books was a very small aspect of publishing before he got involved in it. He was always out front, maybe a little further out in front of the industry than it wanted him to be, which is not uncommon of entrepreneurial, visionary people."

A press release from Strang Communications:

New Man, SpiritLed Woman Shift Emphasis to Internet to Respond to Changing Market

Lake Mary, FL--New Man magazine, started during the excitement of the early Promise Keepers movement, is shifting from print to the Internet after 13 years.

At the same time, the publisher--Strang Communications--is also shifting SpiritLed Woman to an Internet version.

Subscriptions to both magazines will be fulfilled by either Charisma or Ministry Today, which will add articles of interest to both men and women each issue for the new readers, also giving advertisers the editorial environment they want in print. The added circulation will boost Charisma's paid circulation.

But most of the emphasis will shift to the Web for both magazines. In addition to carrying a variety of feature articles, which were the focal point of both print magazines, the online versions of each - found at newmanmag.com and spiritledwoman.com - will also include teaching from a biblical perspective, news, blog posts, podcasts, daily devotionals, and video clips of interviews with influential Christian men and women.

"The market has changed, so we're changing," said Stephen Strang, publisher and founder of New Man, and co-owner of Strang Communications with his wife, Joy, who founded SpiritLed Woman 10 years ago.

"We've tried to be flexible in responding to opportunities and changes in the market. That's how we've built our company over the years," he said. "But the men's movement isn't what it used to be, and the Internet was hardly around when we started New Man. Now it's the wave of the future."

In 1994, Strang Communications agreed with Promise Keepers to have New Man be the organization's "official magazine" for a three-year period. From the time of the agreement to the publishing of the first issue was only 105 days.

Strang remembers the circulation growing to 400,000 at one point, with eight issues a year. New Man had cut back to six issues a year and printed 100,000 copies, with about 80,000 paid circulation.

SpiritLed Woman grew out of large Charisma Women's Conferences that were held for 10 consecutive years and reached an attendance of about 9,000. Strang said the Lord directed the company to end the women's conferences in 2004.

"We think these are important brands and important audiences we intend to serve," Strang said.

"We just will serve them differently. Plus, we can now focus our company's resources more on the Internet," he said, adding there are major Internet opportunities for the company that will be announced shortly. ...

The November/December 2007 issue of New Man will be the final issue in print. The December/January 2008 issue of SpiritLed Woman will be the final one in print. Advertisers in these publications were notified of the shift in emphasis on Oct. 19.

GodTube, which inspires headlines like "The Big Guy Goes Online," launched in August and promptly became the fastest-growing web property in America. Yesterday, GodTube announced the "Video Police" and the "GodCaster", components of its new social network.

The Los Angeles Times reports that

GodTube's claim that it has become the most trafficked Christian website on the Internet is trumped only by a second boast: that by the sheer volume of video watched by its users -- 1.5 million hours last month -- it is now the world's largest broadcaster of Christian video.

Note: In case anyone is under the impression that "Christian video" is all about God, there is at least one tic-inducing video of a singing squirrel. All the videos are screened for family-friendliness before they are allowed to go live on the site. Which leads me to wonder whether someone cute reading Genesis 38, for example, would make the cut.

The singing squirrel-watching demographic and the child-reciting-Bible-verses-adoring demographic, as well as other GodTube users, are customers for a lucrative business, reports the LA Times.

Despite its partnerships with nonprofit religious organizations, GodTube is not a church. It is a media company with a thoroughly planned business model. That model includes selling both religious and secular advertising, charging subscription fees to ministries that want to broadcast more frequently and selling anonymous demographic data "off the back end" -- allowing marketers and media producers a clearer picture of who's watching their programming.

What, besides the fact that GodTube is new, could explain its fast growth? In their press release published online by the Wall Street Journal, CEO Chris Wyatt says

GodTube.com's success is proof positive that Jesus 2.0 is the wave of the future. Our entire culture is becoming internet focused. Today, people use the internet to search for practically everything they need in life -- Why not their faith?

Past statements from GodTube imply that their site could partly solve the problem of declining church attendance. The LA Times, responding to that idea, asked communications professor Heidi Campbell, "What can you get on your laptop that you can't get from the pew? The answer, according to Campbell, is more sustained and satisfying personal interaction." Which seems oddly backwards.

However, with the GodCaster's technology that enables seemingly face-on-screen to face-on-screen interaction, she may be right. Vnunet.com reports that "In its initial beta launch, the GodCaster will be available to churches and ministries around the world to stream their service online, hold a virtual Bible study, or even start an online congregation."

The front page of The Wall Street Journal yesterday explored an interesting facet of Hutterite life. Like the Amish, they're anabaptist, live communally, separate from the rest of society, and often reject modern conveniences. Unlike the typical Amish, Hutterites allow technological advances when it benefits their agricultural work or otherwise helps their communities, though they reject technology when it's deemed harmful.

Cellphones offer an interesting glimpse into deciding whether a technology is beneficial or harmful. They're indespensible to business. But some find the temptations of a cell phone too compelling.

In Martinsdale, [Montana] cellphones are dividing families. Ms. [Elsie] Wipf says that she sent more than 150 text messages in the first two days after she got her phone -- much to the consternation of her father. His opinion matters greatly: He is the head preacher of the colony. "It's against our rules," Ms. Wipf explains. ...

The array of available devices with different accessories goes against the communal colony dynamic. Features such as cameras and Internet access -- which are banned or severely restricted in nearly all colonies -- open up a tantalizing window to the outside world.

The community owns six phones for colony business. Use of those phones is regulated. But from the outside, phones are easily obtained. Relatives and friends who have left the colony often offer to pay the monthly expense for those back home. They keep in touch regularly, even though the colony elders worry that constant texting will cut into the farm's productivity.

The article shows us that technology is not necessarily morally neutral. While cell phones can be used for good business purposes, they are also a constant temptation. The Hutterites efforts to weigh the good and the bad and regulate harmful cell phone use is an helpful reminder that Christians who aren't living communally need to do the same. Incorporating technology into everyday life changes it. Sometimes it's unavoidable. Sometimes the technology should be adopted, sometimes not. But always it changes us.

P.S. The WSJ has postes some beautiful photos of the community.

Illegal immigrant marks year of hiding in church | Arellano not budging: 'If I leave here, it'll be ... legally.' (Today's Chicago Sun-Times)

Immigration activist to leave sanctuary | A woman who has come to personify the struggles of illegal immigrant parents says that for the first time in a year she will venture beyond the walls of the church that has protected her from deportation. (Today's Associated Press)

(For more on Arellano and the recent revival of sanctuary, see "Asylum vs. Assistance.")

Today's nonsensical headline from Reuters: "New evangelist leader plans to avoid politics"

Reuters still doesn't get the difference between an evangelical, an evangelist, and a pastor. When the story finally does get around to using the word evangelical, it's to explain, "American evangelical Christians, who number 60 million, believe that many of the country's social ills stem from high divorce rates and teenage pregnancies."

The Christianity Today cover story: "Gospel Riches: Africa's rapid embrace of prosperity Pentecostalism provokes concern--and hope."

The Christian Century cover story: "Expecting miracles: The prosperity gospel in Africa."

Let a thousand conspiracy theories bloom.

The Christian Century
Wasn't CT founded as an evangelical alternative to the Century? Yes, but while differences remain, the dividing lines have grown blurrier. For example, senior editor Richard Kauffman, who presides over the Century's excellent books coverage, was formerly at CT. See the May 1 issue - the spring books issue - for a good sampling, starting with Bill Placher on the concluding volume of Gary Dorrien's The Making of American Liberal Theology. You'll find enough that's familiar to make the reading congenial and enough that's different to keep it interesting. Because the Century is published biweekly, you will also encounter a lot more reviews. Value added: The magazine regularly features poetry, selected by poetry editor Jill Pel?ez Baumgaertner.

First Things
Catholic at its core, ecumenically orthodox in its scope, with friendly visitors from the Jewish community (David Novak, for example), First Things routinely features substantial essay reviews as well as shorter pieces and a handful of mini-reviews. Richard John Neuhaus's back of-the-book feature "The Public Square," where most readers turn first, often comments on books and their authors, always with wit and penetration, occasionally with withering scorn. And like the Century, First Things has poetry in every issue.

The Atlantic
This was already the best general-interest magazine on the market. Several years ago, its books section was beefed up and otherwise improved to match the rest of the menu. I miss the hand of longtime editor Cullen Murphy, who left when the magazine moved to Washington, D.C., forsaking its ancestral home in Boston. But the coverage of books remains superb. Literary editor Benjamin Schwarz leads off every section with a delightfully unpredictable "Editor's Choice" column (the June issue focuses on books that show "how a revolution in American domestic architecture put women in command"). Another regular is Christopher Hitchens, an atheist who's often provocative and never boring.

(This originally appeared on p. 59 of the July 2007 issue of Christianity Today.)

Wal-Mart is about to start selling toys based on the Bible, according to a story in USAToday. The giant retailer will sell "a set of 3-inch figures based on Daniel in the lion's den for about $7. A 12-inch talking Jesus doll is about $15. And 14-inch Samson or Goliath action figures are about $20."

Why do corporations such as film studios, publishers, and big-box stores target Christians? Because that's where the money is--or at least a lot of it. USAToday notes,

"It's the first time the world's largest retailer has carried a full line of religious toys. 'We're seeing interest from parents in faith-enriching toys,' says Melissa O'Brien, a Wal-Mart spokeswoman.

"Religious products have become a multibillion-dollar business, and the toy move comes as it targets a younger audience. Fox recently created FoxFaith, a 20th Century Fox unit to distribute family movies with Christian themes. In January, Universal Pictures will release The Pirates Who Don't Do Anything - A VeggieTales Movie, based on the spiritual characters by Big Idea."
...
"About one-sixth of Wal-Mart's 3,300 stores will carry the One2believe line, which will get 2 feet of toy aisle shelf space, says O'Brien.

"One way Wal-Mart decided where to carry them, she says: Stores that sell a lot of Bibles will carry the new line.

"'We view this as an opportunity to reach that audience,'" she says."
...
"Since 9/11, there's been a surge in faith-based products, says Bob Starnes, vice president of licensing at Big Idea, the firm behind VeggieTales. That's because most Americans have a 'faith perspective,' he says.

"Laurie Schacht, president of The Toy Book, a toy industry publication, says some parents also are dissatisfied with toys from conventional toymakers: 'There are a lot of wild things out there. Parents want to give kids wholesomeness.'"

Call me an old curmudgeon, but I'm tired of being pandered to as just another market segment. Yes, I appreciate the fact that some of this culture's movers and shakers have finally noticed us Christians, and I'm all for "wholesomeness" (as long as we remember that this was not Jesus' first concern). But let's not forget that our Christian faith is a whole lot more than a mushy "faith perspective."

And have you ever seen what kids do with their action figures? I'm not sure I want to see Samson beating up Jesus.

Prickly Theologian
stackblog.wordpress.com
Friends of historian and theologian John Stackhouse (Regent College) know how sharp-tongued and entertaining he can be. Recently, in blogging about the termination of a female professor of Hebrew at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, Stackhouse called the school's president a "wuss" for not sticking to principle and barring all female influence on future pastors. Prickly, prickly. But that's the blogosphere.

Stackhouse responds:
I am delighted that my long-time friend David Neff noted my blog as one of his favorites.I regret, however, that he happened to single out the one blog entry I have yanked! Gender issues, which were at issue there, provoke pain, sadness, and anger from many, and I remain unhappy about the subject of my post. But I also am unhappy with myself for aggravating the situation by writing as I did. The blogosphere certainly doesn't need my little quotient of intemperance! I trust that visitors to my blog now will find it--well, perhaps not Happy Valley, but also not as "prickly" as David found it.

Quirky Scholar
netbloghost.com/mouw
Richard Mouw, president of Fuller Theological Seminary, interacts with currents in theology and society, but his take is often quirky. Consider, for example, his recent claim that anyone who believes in the God of the Bible is a theocrat. (Saying you're a theocrat, according to Mouw, sounds almost like admitting you're a pervert.) Since Mouw speaks and writes so prolifically, you wonder how he has time for blog entries. Well, these are sometimes outtakes: He recently had to shorten a lecture on Abraham Kuyper, for instance, and turned the leftovers into a commentary on the difference between Anabaptist and Dutch Calvinist thinking on politics. Anabaptist thought predates democracy, so its stance is mainly cautionary. Today, Anabaptists are part of the body politic, and some have asked the Calvinist Mouw how to engage at the local level.

Blogger With Bite
generousorthodoxy.org/blog
Fleming Rutledge is an Episcopal priest, an itinerant preacher, a wife of 45 years, and a grandmother. She is also a blogger with bite, who regularly responds to the mainstream media from the perspective of a rock-ribbed orthodoxy. Recent posts have noted how the overly violent Pan's Labyrinth beat the movie The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe at evoking a parallel reality, why liberals are wrong to resist the idea of a "judgmental" God, and the irony of evangelical enthusiasm for Wilberforce when we can't quite manage good race relations ourselves.

(This originally appeared on p. 75 of the June 2007 issue of Christianity Today.)

The streets of Sao Paulo are packed with demonstrators. Why are they there?

The Associated Press headlines its coverage of Brazil's March for Jesus with "Evangelicals pack Sao Paulo despite arrest of church founders."

AFP doesn't mention those church founders, Estevam Hernandes Filho and Sonia Haddad Moraes Hernandes (who, by the way, pleaded guilty today to charges of money smuggling) in its coverage of the March for Jesus. It's headline: "One million anti-gay evangelicals march in Brazil. The Associated Press coverage didn't mention anything about homosexuality.

The Christian Post suggests that the march is largely aimed not at homosexuality but at Catholicism -- or that it is at least an indication of a "flood of [Catholic] believers in Latin America turning to evangelical churches."

So are these three news services seeing different rallies, or are they casting about for what "the real story" is behind the March for Jesus? Here's a tip for next year's coverage: Not every story needs a conflict angle. Sometimes rallies aren't negative. Want to know what the March for Jesus is about? There's a clue in the last two words of its title.

A federal appeals panel struck down Federal Communication Commission rules that regulate indecent speech broadcast on American airwaves. "If President Bush and Vice President Cheney can blurt out vulgar language, then the government cannot punish broadcast television stations for broadcasting the same words in similarly fleeting contexts," reports The New York Times. "Although the case was primarily concerned with what is known as "fleeting expletives," or blurted obscenities, on television, both network executives and top officials at the Federal Communications Commission said the opinion could gut the ability of the commission to regulate any speech on television or radio."

Naturally, the broadcasters are thrilled. "We are very pleased with the court's decision and continue to believe that the government regulation of content serves no purpose other than to chill artistic expression in violation of the First Amendment," said Scott Grogin, a senior vice president at Fox.

Journalist Studs Terkel (Working) turns 95 today. Studs is a liberal in the old-fashioned populist sense: committed to labor and the working person.

Terkel's journalism was based on interviews. Listening to real people talk about their lives. As an outsider to religion, he would nevertheless pay attention to religion on occasion because it was part of the working class landscape and a vital part of people's lives. One of my favorite Studs Terkel radio shows was his classic interview with gospel singer Mahalia Jackson. Chicago's WFMT used to replay it every Good Friday. And you could hear the pained longing in Terkel's voice as he listened to her talk about Christ's sacrifice and sing "Were You There?"

Here's a snapshot of Studs and me from September 2002. Christianity Today hosted Studs for some in-service education with our editors and writers. What a storyteller!

Sorry the photo doesn't show Terkel's signature red socks. The red-and-white checked shirt is just as much a part of his trademark, though.

Jay Swartzendruber, editor of CCM, says, "We're going to start mixing indie and general market Christians such as The Fray, Mary J. Blige and Sufjan Stevens in with artists with traditional Christian label affiliation. Rather than define ?Christian music' just by its label or distribution, we're now defining it as Christian worldview music."

As if the genre weren't confused enough, this is going to clarify things?

Next, the press release touting the new CCM says:

As the grassroots contemporary Christian music scene mushroomed into a billion dollar industry, "Christian music" became widely regarded as an actual genre, even though it included rock, pop, hip-hop, punk, hardcore metal and other styles of music. As a result, many artists of faith who are reluctant to have their music defined by the Christian market have chosen to bypass it altogether. With this expanded view of "Christian music," CCM Magazine now celebrates the full spectrum of faith-fueled music and musicians.

I always thought that bands avoided the CCM label because some people think most CCM music is not worth listening to. With this expanded view of CCM, won't bands made of Christians who want to avoid the CCM scene only work harder to avoid it?

Newsweek had Rick Warren vs. Sam Harris.

Beliefnet had Harris vs. Andrew Sullivan.

Next week, ABC’s Nightline has Kirk Cameron and Ray Comfort vs. the BlasphemyChallenge.com guys.

No. Really. Nightline has tapped Kirk Cameron to be fidei defensor.

I suppose we could have asked Cameron, too. Or maybe Lisa Whelchel, Mr. T, Willie Aames, Justine Bateman, or Gavin McLeod.

Instead, we’d rather hear from Douglas Wilson, author of the new book, Letter from a Christian Citizen (American Vision). Wilson is senior fellow of theology at New Saint Andrews College and minister at Christ Church in Moscow, Idaho. He is also the editor of Credenda/Agenda magazine and has written (among other things) Reforming Marriage and A Serrated Edge: A Brief Defense of Biblical Satire and Trinitarian Skylarking. His Blog and Mablog site inevitably makes for provocative reading.

Wilson will be corresponding with Christopher Hitchens, author of the new book, God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything (Twelve Books). Hitchens is a contributing editor to Vanity Fair and a visiting professor of liberal studies at the New School. He is the author of numerous books, including Thomas Jefferson: Author of America, Thomas Paine's "Rights of Man," Letters To a Young Contrarian, and Why Orwell Matters. He was named, to his own amusement, number five on a list of the "Top 100 Public Intellectuals" by Foreign Policy and Britain's Prospect.

You'll enjoy the discussion regardless of whether you're already familiar with Wilson and Hitchens. But if you are familiar with their work, you'll know that it promises to be anything but boring.

There are bands that have been around a long time, and then there's the Dixie Hummingbirds. James B. Davis, who died April 17, formed the gospel group at age 12 with members of his church choir.

That was in 1928.

Davis retired in 1984, but the group -- one of the greatest black gospel groups of all time, if not the greatest -- continues. (Some of the other greats, like the Swan Silvertones' Claude Jeter, actually got their start in the Dixie Hummingbirds.)

Most folks know the group's work from Paul Simon's 1973 "Loves Me Like a Rock." I prefer "Christian Automobile."