2007 Archives - Page 83 of 116

WASHINGTON (ABP)—With many Republicans concerned their party’s leading presidential candidates are not sufficiently conservative on social issues, Democrats have what may be their most faith-friendly crop of candidates in recent years.

According to experts in politics and religion, a handful of faith-savvy Democrats—including two who speak fluent “evangelicalese” —may be able to woo religious voters in ways previous Democratic nominees have not.

04/18/2007 - By John Rutledge

GOP presidential race again features faith, but new dynamics

Posted: 4/16/07

GOP presidential race again
features faith, but new dynamics

By Robert Marus

ABP Washington Bureau

WASHINGTON (ABP)—With Democratic front-runners talking openly about evangelical-style conversion experiences and Republicans lamenting that none of their top-tier candidates are bona fide social conservatives, experts say the 2008 presidential campaign may rewrite political playbooks on the role of faith.

“Of course this could all change, but right now there’s no candidate out there that really energizes evangelical voters the way that (President) Bush did” in the 2000 and 2004 elections, said Barry Hankins, a religion and politics expert at Baylor University.

04/18/2007 - By John Rutledge

Faith-based positions of presidential hopefuls compared

Posted: 4/16/07

Faith-based positions of
presidential hopefuls compared

By Robert Marus

ABP Washington Bureau

WASHINGTON (ABP) — Perhaps the only thing more mind-boggling than the quantity of presidential hopefuls in 2008 is the array of faith-based views represented among the candidates themselves.

Consider profiles of the top candidates in each major party. The profiles include notes about their faith background, their perception among conservative religious voters and their positions on selected major issues that interest religious voters of all ideologies.

Compare the Candidates:
Republicans
John McCain
Mitt Romney
Rudolph Giuliani

Democracts
Hillary Clinton
Barack Obama
John Edwards

• View as a graphical chart

See Related Stories:
• Faith-based positions of presidential hopefuls compared

• Democratic presidential race features more faith than usual

• GOP presidential race again features faith, but new dynamics

04/18/2007 - By John Rutledge

Blogger-activist pastors to press SBC to deal with sexual abuse

Posted: 4/16/07

Blogger-activist pastors to press
SBC to deal with sexual abuse

By Hannah Elliott

Associated Baptist Press

ARLINGTON (ABP)—With increasing national attention on Baptist churches’ problems with clergy sex abuse, two pastors with an Internet following have said they intend to push for more comprehensive ways to address the problem in the 16-million member Southern Baptist Convention.

Oklahoma pastor Wade Burleson and Texas pastor Benjamin Cole intend to present a motion and resolution regarding the abuse problem at the annual SBC meeting, set for June 12 and 13 in San Antonio. The two have gained convention-wide attention in the past year for their blog-driven efforts to reform the denomination.

04/18/2007 - By John Rutledge

TV news magazine investigates sexual abuse in Protestant churches

Posted: 4/18/07

TV news magazine investigates
sexual abuse in Protestant churches

By Hannah Elliott

Associated Baptist Press

NEW YORK (ABP)—ABC’s 20/20 examined the problems with clergy sexual abuse in the Southern Baptist Convention April 13, warning that some convicted “preacher predators” remain on an SBC’s list of ministers available for employment.

Featuring interviews with Southern Baptist Convention president Frank Page and clergy sex-abuse-survivor-turned-activist Christa Brown, the program investigated how denominations without hierarchical authority can protect vulnerable parties from abuse by ministers.

See Related Articles:
• TV news magazine investigates sexual abuse in Protestant churches

• SBC response to ABC 20/20 segment on sexual predators in ministry

• Blogger-activist pastors to press SBC to deal with sexual abuse

04/18/2007 - By John Rutledge

SBC response to ABC 20/20 segment on sexual predators in ministry

Posted: 4/16/07

SBC response to ABC 20/20 segment
on sexual predators in ministry

By D. August Boto

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (BP)–Unfortunately, the 20/20 report last Friday had the effect of misleading at least some of its viewers to believe that the Southern Baptist Convention somehow condones, hides or denies sexual offenses committed by ministers in SBC-affiliated churches. The convention does none of those things. Quite the contrary.

The report included accurate assertions, certainly. For instance, it is true that Southern Baptist ministers have been charged and/or convicted of sexually abusing children. It is true that in some of those instances, abuse had occurred earlier at churches where those men had been previously employed. It is apparently true that at least in one case a church previously employing a sexual predator and the church employing the offender at the time of his ultimate arrest, did not communicate with each other in a way that disclosed any earlier indication of moral failure. It may be true that other churches have similarly failed to communicate.

See Related Articles:
• TV news magazine investigates sexual abuse in Protestant churches

• SBC response to ABC 20/20 segment on sexual predators in ministry

• Blogger-activist pastors to press SBC to deal with sexual abuse

It is not true, however, that the Southern Baptist Convention has qualified or endorsed any minister a church has chosen. There is an explicit statement saying as much on the same page the interviewer used to locate the ministers he named. So it is the local churches which do the qualifying, not the SBC. 20/20 referred to the list of ministers as "the list of available ministers." It would have been more accurate to refer to it as the "list of serving ministers." The convention merely shares information provided by its affiliated churches.

04/18/2007 - By John Rutledge

Volunteers provide relief when tornado hits North Texas

Posted: 4/16/07

Texas Baptist Men chainsaw team volunteers Joel Bachman (left) and Ken Hullperch precariously atop a Haltom City home damaged by a tornado, seeking to remove a tree limb.

Volunteers provide relief
when tornado hits North Texas

By Barbara Bedrick

Texas Baptist Communications

HALTOM CITY—As tears streamed down her face, Ruth Gunson found relief after a tornado, thanks to volunteers from Texas Baptist Men Disaster Relief and Victim Relief Ministries.

Gunson and her family are trying to pick up the pieces after a tornado uprooted trees and sent limbs more than five-feet in circumference into her house, leaving two gaping holes in its roof.

04/18/2007 - By John Rutledge

The Well Community singular in goal to work with mentally disabled

Posted: 4/18/07

The Well congregation has provided individuals with mental disabilities a place to worship and fellowship. (Photo courtesy of The Well)

The Well Community singular in
goal to work with mentally disabled

By Vicki Brown

Associated Baptist Press

DALLAS (ABP)—Joel Pulis, a Baylor University graduate now living in Dallas, recently was featured in People magazine for leading his church in a relatively new and singular mission—to reach poor people with mental disabilities.

Pulis, 33, refers to his flock of 50 at The Well Community not as a congregation but as a community of believers. His says his ministry focuses on being “a family, a people” for those suffering from brain dysfunctions like bipolar disorder and schizophrenia.

04/18/2007 - By John Rutledge

Virginia Tech students gather for prayer at Baptist campus center

Posted: 4/18/07

Virginia Tech students gather
for prayer at Baptist campus center

By Jim White

Virginia Religious Herald

BLACKSBURG, Va. (ABP)—As the sun began to set and the wind continued to howl over a wounded campus and city April 16, Virginia Tech students gathered for prayer, comfort and counseling at the school’s Baptist student center.

Blacksburg, the small city that houses the university’s 26,000-plus students, was even quieter than usual the night after a massacre unprecedented in American history. The gunman, who police said shot 32 students and professors and then took his own life, had also silenced the usually bustling activity on the commercial strips around the sprawling campus’s edges.

04/18/2007 - By John Rutledge

Texas Baptist Forum

Updated: 4/16/07

Texas Baptist Forum

God & Allah

Please let me add my two cents’ worth to the discussion concerning God and Allah.

Letters are welcomed. Send them to marvknox@baptiststandard.com; 250 words maximum.

“Our humanity is diminished when we have no mission bigger than ourselves. … We discover who we are in service to one another, not the self.”
Bono
U2 frontman, urging aid and debt relief for Africa (Time)

“Many evangelicals are boarding a new train. It runs along tracks defined by the broad demands of their faith, not by some party’s political agenda.”
E.J. Dionne
Washington Post columnist, writing about how some evangelicals are in the midst of a “New Reformation” that separates them from partisan politics (RNS)

“Every politician says, ‘God bless America.’ But do you really mean that? If you don’t, maybe we should start saying, ‘Have a good day,’ or something like that.”
J. Randy Forbes
U.S. congressman, R-Va. (Washington Times/RNS)

To me, it’s quite simple. In Exodus 3:6, God identifies himself to Moses: “I am the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob.”

Do Muslims worship this God? Clearly, they do not, because they worship the God of Ishmael, not Isaac.

I can accept the idea that Christians and Jews worship the same God. Most Jews simply don’t yet recognize Jesus as God the Son, the Messiah. But Christians and Muslims do not worship the same God. Allah is not God.

04/16/2007 - By John Rutledge