Browse Archives
Check out news and opinion posts across the years
Alcohol Policies Complicated and Convoluted
In "The Sound of Music," a group of nuns sings its way through a dilemma with a high-strung novice. "How Do You Solve A Problem Like Maria," asks a series of questions designed to find ways to control her, while...
Quakers Celebrate 350 Years of History
Drive an hour southwest of Knoxville, Tenn., and you come to a community with an interesting name: Friendsville. The name is not intended as a description of the people. Rather it connects them with an international...
The Church: Reluctant Prophets?
Two articles recently crossed my desk, both of which scolded churches and pastors for our relative silence about the Enron scandal. "Are we so numbed by scandal that we don't care anymore?" asked the authors. "Are we...
Bush’s New Ethic Needs a Better Slogan than “Let’s Roll”
President Bush has pronounced a new ethic for America—"Let's roll." "For too long our culture has said, 'If it feels good, do it.' Now America is embracing a new ethic and a new creed: 'Let's roll,'" Bush said in his...
First Baptist Church, Savannah Couldn’t Avoid Civil Rights Debate
Like many congregations in the antebellum American South, First Baptist Church, Savannah, Ga., was composed of white, slave and free black members. At the end of the Civil War, however, most African-American members...
New Book Explores the Intersection of Education and Religion
In his book, Education, Religion, and the Public Good, Martin Marty addresses the intersection of religion and education. This book, and an earlier volume rose out of Marty's work with the Public Religion Project for...
The Heavyweights Are Christians
They'll know we are Christians by our love and by our bulging waistlines. And the larger the middle, the more likely you are to be pastor of a church. Obesity is a growing epidemic claiming some 300,000 lives each...
A Weighty Matter—Heavier American Kids
America is seeing an epidemic increase in childhood obesity according to the Dec. 12 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association. Between 1986 and 1998, overweight (defined as body mass index greater than...
Desire for Freedom in Worship Births A.M.E. Church
Most denominations we know began in response to doctrinal conflict or disagreements over church polity. But in the late 18th century, one of America's great denominations, the African Methodist Episcopal Church (AMEC),...
Celebrities Endorse Evangelical Book in Germany
A private Florida foundation uses European celebrities to promote a 20-year-old evangelical text in Germany, raising concerns among the nation's clerics. The Prince of Prussia, a soccer player, a women's magazine...
IMB Missionaries Must Sign Faith Statement, Texas and Virginia Baptist Leaders Warn of Tragedy
The International Mission Board of the Southern Baptist Convention asked its 5,000 missionaries last week to sign a controversial faith statement. IMB's president, Jerry Rankin, acknowledged that the 2000 Baptist Faith...
BCE Equips Churches to Study Changes in Baptist Faith and Message Statement
In 2000, when the Southern Baptist Convention revised the time-honored 1963 faith statement, it moved away from the historic Baptist commitment of confessions of faith toward creedal religion. One SBC official said...
Harry Potter Series Tops List of Most-challenged Books
The Harry Potter series topped the American Library Association's 2001 list of most-challenged books for the third year running, the ALA reported in January. The popular children's series, penned by Scottish author...
Practicing Good Hospital Etiquette
Visiting the sick has traditionally been a ministry for both clergy and laity. People of faith feel a spiritual responsibility to visit the sick, especially those in the hospital. When Jesus told a story about...
Missionaries will agonize: Conscience vs. continuation
The following editorial was published in the Feb. 4 issue of Baptist Standard. Grief and agony laced the words of a father who called last week. His children live half a world away, where they have devoted their lives...
Statistics Show Women Already Leading the Way in Church
The majority of Americans who attend church and are involved in Christian discipleship are women. The majority of Americans most likely to engage in daily devotions, to pray and to read the Bible are women. Yet some of...
February Is Time to Focus on Black History
Celebrating black history is not a new idea. Americans have been recognizing black history annually since 1926. According to an article by Elissa Haney on Infoplease.com, it started as "Negro History Week," which was...
“A Walk to Remember”
"A Walk to Remember" opened Jan. 25 to cheering crowds of preteen and teenage girls dressed in their best duds, smelling of bubble gum and other sweet fragrances. Teen pop singer Mandy Moore and heartthrob Shane West,...
Super Sunday Pits Pigskin against Playmates
"Who needs football when we've got bunnies?" That's the rhetorical question in a promo for the "Fear Factor" reality show. For it seems Super Bowl XXXVI won't be the only hot TV ticket on Sunday, Feb. 3. That's the...
Bush’s State of the Union Speech Receives Mixed Reviews from Christians
Praise for President Bush as a person, mixed with ambivalence about his ideas, described the way some Christians responded to his State of the Union address Tuesday night. David Wheeler, pastor of First Baptist Church...
911 Ends Christian Fundamentalism, Clouds Future Christian Leadership
Sept. 11 ended the age of Christian fundamentalism. But Christian fundamentalists will only burrow deeper. Be assured that Christian fundamentalism will not disappear. Fundamentalists will burrow deeper into seminary...