Evangelical leader to retire from pastorate. Evangelical leader Leith Anderson has announced plans to retire as senior pastor of his megachurch in Eden Prairie, Minn. Anderson will end his 35-year pastoral leadership of the 5,000-member Wooddale Church—an interdenominational congregation affiliated with the Baptist General Conference—at the end of the year. He will continue his role as president of the National Association of Evangelicals. Anderson, 66, will become pastor emeritus and minister-at-large at Wooddale, which has established nine other congregations in Minnesota. In February, he was named to the White House’s advisory council on faith-based programs. Republican presidential candidate Tim Pawlenty is a member of Wooddale Church, but Anderson told the Star Tribune newspaper his retirement had been planned for a year and did not relate to Pawlenty’s campaign. “I don’t have any role in the Pawlenty campaign, and I don’t foresee having any role in the campaign,” he said.
No vote for Crystal Cathedral founder. Robert Schuller, founding pastor of the Crystal Cathedral, has been removed from a voting position on the governing board of the megachurch ministry he started in Southern California five decades ago. He has been named honorary chairman of the board emeritus, a nonvoting position on the Crystal Cathedral Ministries board of directors. A public statement from Crystal Cathedral Ministries noted Schuller, 84, will continue to speak in the church’s pulpit and on its Hour of Power television broadcast and participate in “creative and vision-casting meetings” with staffers. The transition comes after the cathedral, long embroiled in family and financial problems, put its campus up for sale after filing for Chapter 11 bank-ruptcy protection last October. At the time, it owed $7.5 million to creditors and had cut back staff, halt-ed flagship holiday pageants and reduced airtime. The Roman Catholic Diocese of Orange, Calif., has expressed interest in purchasing the cathedral campus. Other prospective buyers—including a development company and nearby Chapman University—plan to offer the cathedral a leaseback program that would allow it to continue worship services in the renowned glass-walled edifice.
Pentagon ordered to uphold DOMA. The House of Representatives voted 248-175, in an amendment to a larger Defense Department funding bill, to order the Pentagon to uphold the 1996 Defense of Marriage Act that defines marriage as between one man and one woman. A majority of the House voted to restrict the Pentagon from granting same-sex couples the same rights or benefits as married couples. The amendment also is aimed at keeping military chaplains from officiating at same-sex weddings. The move occurred as the Pentagon appears poised to lift the ban on gays and lesbians serving openly in the military. The House has yet to act on another amendment, sponsored by Rep. Tim Huelskamp, R-Kan., that would prohibit the Pentagon from implementing a chaplain-training program on the repeal of the Don’t Ask/Don’t Tell policy.
We seek to connect God’s story and God’s people around the world. To learn more about God’s story, click here.
Send comments and feedback to Eric Black, our editor. For comments to be published, please specify “letter to the editor.” Maximum length for publication is 300 words.