Obama Leaves Church That Drew Wide Criticism

Senator Barack Obama has resigned his membership in Chicago’s Trinity United Church of Christ, which he attended for nearly two decades, following months of controversy about pastors and their political views.

Mr. Obama said he and his wife, Michelle, wrote a letter on Friday to the church’s pastor, the Rev. Otis Moss, explaining that their estrangement from Trinity took root in controversial remarks by the church’s former pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah A. Wright Jr., who once was Mr. Obama’s spiritual guide.

But at a news conference after a town-hall-style meeting here on Saturday, Mr. Obama sounded pained as he confirmed his decision to leave the place he had considered his spiritual home. A sermon by Mr. Wright, a longtime pastor at the church, even provided the phrase — “the audacity of hope” — that became Mr. Obama’s campaign theme and the title of his latest book.

“I make this decision with sadness,” said Mr. Obama, speaking in subdued tones as he stood before a bland background. “This is where I found Jesus Christ, where we were married, where our children were baptized. We are proud of the extraordinary works of that church.”

The church has proven to be a political albatross for Mr. Obama for many months. Earlier this year, television stations began playing an endless video loop of Mr. Wright damning the United States for its sins of slavery and genocide against American Indians.

Do Catholics, Evangelicals share similar views of sin?

By TERRY MATTINGLY
Scripps Howard News Service

One tough challenge that Catholic shepherds face, Pope Benedict XVI said this past Lent, is that their flocks live in an age “in which the loss of the sense of sin is unfortunately becoming increasingly more widespread.”

The pope has consistently described the forces at work as “pluralism,” “relativism” and “secularism.”

“Where God is excluded from the public forum the sense of offence against God — the true sense of sin — dissipates, just as when the absolute value of moral norms is relativized the categories of good or evil vanish, along with individual responsibility,” he told a group of Canadian bishops, early in his papacy.

“Yet the human need to acknowledge and confront sin in fact never goes away. … As St. John tells us: ‘If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves.’”

But there’s a problem at pew level. Many American Catholics who regularly attend Mass simply do not agree with their church when it comes time to say what is sinful and what is not. In fact, according to a recent survey by Ellison Research in Phoenix, if the pope wanted to find large numbers of believers who share his views on sin he should spend more time with evangelical Protestants.

For example, 100 percent of evangelicals polled said adultery is sinful, while 82 percent of the active Catholics agreed. On other issues, 96 percent of evangelicals said racism is sin, compared to 79 percent of Catholics. Sex before marriage? That’s sin, said 92 percent of the evangelicals, while only 47 percent of Catholics agreed.

On one of the hottest of hot-button issues, 94 percent of evangelicals said it’s sinful to have an abortion, compared with 74 percent of American Catholics. And what about homosexual acts? Among evangelicals, 93 percent called this sin, as opposed to 49 percent of the Catholics.

The Catholics turned the tables when asked if it’s sinful not to attend “religious worship services on a regular basis,” with 39 percent saying this is sin, compared to 33 percent of the evangelicals.

The Candidates on Faith

 

The highest profile candidates in the 2008 Presidential race all profess to be Christians. And while some are more expressive than others, they’ve all weighed in on the role faith takes in public life. But who says what? See how well you know the 2008 candidates, and what they say about their Faith, by taking this quiz.

 

Click HERE to take the quiz.

 

What your church can or cannot say

Editor’s Note: The following was a letter written to a pastor from the Christian Law Association.

Question:

What can a pastor say and not say from the pulpit regarding the gay marriage amendment without putting the church at risk?

Answer:

The short answer is that the pastor can say as much as he wishes. Churches are not prohibited from speaking in favor of or in opposition to proposed legislation (which is what the marriage definition amendment is). There is a monetary limitation but that does not affect your ability to preach about it. The following information may provide you with additional understanding.

POLITICAL-LEGISLATIVE GUIDELINES FOR CHURCHES

Supporting or Opposing a Candidate for Public Office

A church may not make statements in support/opposition of political candidates for public office. A pastor personally may make statements in support/opposition of political candidates for public office, but not in his official capacity (which would bar him from making statements during church meetings and in church communications)

A church may not make contributions to a candidate for public office.

A church may not make contributions to Political Action Committees.

A church may not make “in-kind” contributions or expenditures for or against candidates for public office. Such contributions would include use of church mailing list or directory, use of church facilities, and providing of volunteers from the church.

The church cannot engage in any fund-raising for candidates for public office. For example, the church may not allow a candidate for public office to take an offering during a church meeting or service.

A church may allow a candidate for public office to appear at a church meeting or service as long as it is not for campaign purposes. If it is for campaign purposes, all candidates for that elective office must be afforded the same opportunity.

A candidate for public office may be introduced to the congregation during a church meeting or service.

A candidate for public office may preach or read scripture as long as the candidate for public office does not “preach” about his campaign or solicit volunteer workers or finances for the campaign.

A church may conduct non-partisan voter registration programs and get-out-the-vote campaigns.

A church may distribute neutral voter information materials stating the positions of the candidates for public office on the issues of the campaign.

Novel seeks to allegorize the trinity doctrine

 

Editor’s Note: In William P. Young’s best selling book, The Shack, the author seeks to allegorize the doctrine of the trinity. In his book, each person of the trinity becomes a character. The Father is Papa, a deliberately peculiar name for an African American woman. Jesus, true to reality, is a man from the Middle East. And the Holy Spirit is Sarayu, an Asian woman. Many Christians feel that this book adds confusion to the trinity. Note: The writer of the following article supports the belief in a trinity. AR does not support the trinity doctrine. Click HERE to see our Apostolic Doctrine Statement.

The following is an excerpt from an article posted today on Christianitytoday.com:

 The Trinity: So What?

For book endorsements, you couldn’t top what Eugene Peterson said about The Shack by William P. Young. “When the imagination of a writer and the passion of a theologian cross-fertilize the result is a novel on the order of The Shack,” wrote Peterson, professor emeritus of spiritual theology at Regent College. “This book has the potential to do for our generation what John Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress did for his. It’s that good!”

Bunyan’s masterpiece didn’t just invigorate his generation. Pilgrim’s Progress is an all-time best-seller, an English-language classic. So Peterson’s praise for The Shackis impressive indeed. Both books employ allegory to convey core convictions. Whereas Bunyan allegorized the journey of faith, Young tackles the question, “Where is God in a world so filled with unspeakable pain?”

Allegory is a notoriously tricky literary device. Many attempt it. Few succeed. Bunyan’s central character, Christian, experiences the doubts and temptations that believers endure.Young is more ambitious. Each person of the Trinity becomes a character in The Shack. The Father is Papa, a deliberately peculiar name for an African American woman. Jesus, true to reality, is a man from the Middle East. And the Holy Spirit is Sarayu, an Asian woman.

When authors experiment with allegory, they risk only failure and ridicule. Christian history, on the other hand, is littered with theologians who experimented with new conceptions of the Trinity. All they got for their efforts was the lousy title of heretic. To be fair, the Bible does not provide a finished formulation of the doctrine. It took a succession of ecumenical councils over the course of centuries to finally articulate the biblical view of the Trinity.

What is the orthodox Trinitarian doctrine of God? Along with the Hebrews, Christians believe that God is one (Deut. 6:4, James 2:19). Yet Christians also teach that God is three persons: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit (Phil. 2:6, Heb. 1, Acts 5:3-4). Finally, Christians affirm that each of these three persons is God (Matt. 28:19-20, 2 Cor. 13:14). The Council of Nicea in 325 was especially crucial for the church’s understanding of the Trinity.

Apostolic Church in Myanmar is in Urgent need

Editor’s note: This letter came from the United Pentecostal Missionary to Myanmar, Brother Robert Frizzell. 

My Dear Friends and Fellow Laborers of the Gospel,
May the riches of the Lord Jesus be in you and upon you in these days of revival.

I am communicating to you on behalf of our brothers and sister in Myanmar (Burma).
There was a devastating cyclone on May 3, which was the topic of the news wire for some weeks.

The Burmese government granted me a visa to enter into the nation when they kept others out.
This was a blessing to the Church in Burma and to me as well.

What I saw was too much to comprehend and absorb within a few days.
I took over 1500 pictures because there was so much devastation I could not decide what to photograph at the time. As Bro Buai said repeatedly, “This is too much, this is too much.”

Here are some pictures of the damage.

This cyclone damaged our church buildings in the Lower Myanmar District and in the city of Yangon (Rangoon) and destroyed some of the homes of our church people.
The headquarters compound suffered a lot of damage and they are in the process of reconstruction presently.

Many Pastors ‘on their own’ for Health Insurance

Jennifer Riley
Christian Post

Many pastors in America are left to figure out their own health coverage with little or no help from their church or denomination, found a survey released this week.

“Thousands of pastors and churches are among the millions of Americans without health insurance,” said Leith Anderson, president of the National Association of Evangelicals, based on responses to the May Evangelical Leaders Survey.

The monthly survey asks the NAE board of directors questions based on relevant issues in society. The NAE board of directors includes the CEO’s of 60 church denominations, and representatives of a broad array of evangelical organizations including missions, universities, publishers and churches.

In the latest survey, the majority of respondents expressed that they had little or no help from their national denominations when it comes to securing health insurance.

Many pastors replied that they either received health insurance benefits through their spouse’s employer, a second job, or go without insurance.

“Well over 80 percent of our pastors get health insurance outside the life of the church,” reported one unnamed denominational CEO, according to NAE.

He said that about 10 percent of the pastors in his denomination receive coverage from Medicare or Medicaid.

However, he noted that his denomination did previously offer a health insurance plan, but stopped because younger and healthier ministers could obtain cheaper individual coverage than the national denominational plan that included coverage for older and more difficult to insure pastors.

Update: Subway Apologizes

We at SUBWAY restaurants place a high value on education, regardless of the setting, and have initiated a number of programs and promotions aimed at educating our youth in the areas of health and fitness.

We sincerely apologize to anyone who feels excluded by our current essay contest. Our intention was to provide an opportunity for traditional schools, many of which we know have trouble affording athletic equipment, to win equipment. Our intent was certainly not to exclude homeschooled children from the opportunity to win prizes and benefit from better access to fitness equipment.

To address the inadvertent limitation of our current contest and provide an opportunity for even more kids to improve their fitness, we will soon create an additional contest in which homeschooled students will be encouraged to participate. When the kids win, everyone wins!

Original Story: Subway Bans Homeschooled Kids

Full Story

Experience in Pentecostal churches fired a love of music many early rockers couldn’t shake

Editors Note: The following is an excerpt from the article.

“A host of first-generation rock ‘n’ rollers who grew up in Pentecostal denominations later gave much credit to church music. They would also claim that the unrestrained style of the sanctified, tongues-speaking faith had a lasting impact on them.”

“Little Richard summed it up best: “Of all the churches, I used to like going to the Pentecostal church because of the music.”

“Speaking to an Associated Press reporter about Pentecostal music, Presley said: “We used to go to these religious sing-ins all the time. There were these singers, perfectly fine singers, but nobody responded to ‘em. Then there were these other singers—the leader wuz a preacher—and they cut up all over the place, jumpin’ on the piano, movin’ every which way. The audience liked ‘em. I guess I learned from them singers.” Uninhibited Pentecostalism gave young Elvis ideas about music and performance. He was sometimes called the “evangelist” by his inner circle of friends.”

Full Story

Holy City Rejects Movie Advertisement

The municipality of Jerusalem has refused to display billboards for the new box office hit, Sex and the City, a Hollywood movie based on a television series.

According to Maximedia, the advertising company, Jerusalem officials were concerned about “offending public sensitivities” by printing the word “sex” on a billboard.  Consequently, no advertisements for the film that employ the printed word will appear in Jerusalem or Peta Tikva, a town near Tel Aviv with a large ultra-Orthodox Jewish population.

Click here to read the full story.

Unique New Book Offers Real Stories of Those Changed by Abortion

Their stories draw you in, and their voices speak of familiar expectations, confusion, and grief. They are husbands and boyfriends, parents and grandparents, friends — and each has wrestled with the difficult decision to end a pregnancy. But ultimately, the real people who share their abortion experiences in Michaelene Fredenburg’s new book Changed: Making Sense of Your Own or a Loved One’s Abortion Experience offer readers the hope that comes with the kind of frank, compassionate, and open dialogue people should have about this most sensitive of topics.

Changed: Making Sense of Your Own or a Loved One’s Abortion Experience, is designed as a handbook for beginning healing. The first half of the book, titled “Voices”, features the true stories of those whose lives have been touched by abortion. For the men and women who have experienced abortion, the stories communicate that they are not alone. For those who haven’t had an abortion, these stories are an invitation to listen and empathize with experiences and emotions that are rarely talked about. The remainder of the book, “Healing Pathways”, is dedicated to equipping readers with therapeutic tools to begin to explore the range of emotions and reactions many feel after an abortion experience.

More than one out of every three women will have had an abortion by age 45. Partners, family members, and friends can also be affected by a loved one’s decision to abort. It is rare not to know someone who has been touched by abortion.

That realization compelled Michaelene to launch a unique nationwide outreach, Abortion Changes You(TM), that aims to help not only those who’ve had an abortion, but also those who love them. The outreach uses dynamic resources, including the book Changed (www.changedbook.com), an interactive Web site (www.AbortionChangesYou.com), various multimedia tools and resources (available at www.AbortionChangesYouResources.com), and connections to local counseling resources, including after abortion healing resources.

www.changedbook.com

Christian Newswire

In Memoriam: Reverend Paul Kearnye

Reverend Paul Kearnye, 84, of South Amherst, died Tuesday, May 27, 2008 at Amherst Manner Nursing Home following a brief illness. He was born April 13, 1924 in Wellsburg West Virginia and has resided in Lorain county for many years.

Reveend Kearney served as Pastor at Abundant Life Christian Center for 28 years before retiring in 1989. He continued to serve as Pastor Emritus after retiring. He was ordained with the United Pentecostal Church International. He also served as the Northern Ohio Presbyter for 20 yeasrs, until becoming Honary Presbyter in 1989.

 

Click here for the complete article.

 

‘08 race has got religion. Is that good?

There was Mitt Romney’s speech to try to dispel concerns about his Mormon faith. There was Barack Obama’s denunciation of certain beliefs of his longtime pastor. Last week it was John McCain’s turn to cut himself off from two controversial preachers whose endorsements he had once sought. And throughout the presidential primary season, there have been candidate forums on religious beliefs, plus eager courting of evangelical Christians, Catholics, and other faith groups.

Are religion and faith playing an appropriate role – or an inappropriate one – in the 2008 presidential campaign? So far, it’s some of both, say those who’ve been monitoring the campaign.

There’s no arguing that religious speech is more prominent than ever this election season. That’s in part because Democratic candidates, traditionally reluctant to discuss religious views out of privacy concerns, have warmed to the topic in recognition that many voters want an understanding of how a president’s religious convictions might influence him or her in office.

Whether this focus on candidates’ religious views is helpful or detrimental depends, say political observers, on how the political parties, faith groups, and the news media handle faith issues in coming months.

Jane Lampman – The Christian Science Monitor

Click HERE for full story.

Field Poll: Majority of Californians now support gay marriage

Signaling a generational shift in attitudes, a new Field Poll on Tuesday said California voters now support legal marriage between same-sex couples and oppose a state constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage.

By 51 to 42 percent, state voters believe gay couples have the right to marry, according to a May 17-26 poll of 1,052 registered voters.

However, the same poll revealed a California electorate that remains sharply divided over gay marriage – split by age, political affiliation, religion and the regions where they live.

The poll was taken after the May 15 California Supreme Court decision overturning a state ban on same-sex marriages. The results marked the first time in more than 30 years of state polling that a majority of Field Poll respondents favored making gay marriage legal.

Peter Hecht – The Sacramento Bee

Click HERE for full story.

Internet Plays Significant Role in Keeping Churches Connected

In our most recent Tuesday Tech Tip we discussed some of the more popular social networking sites. However, there are many pastors and leaders who are troubled by the content and danger of some of these social networking sites. What if you could set up your own social network on the Internet? It is completely possible to have your very own private social network just for your church’s community.

The Internet is fast becoming one of the best ways to strengthen the Body of Christ by keeping people connected in a safe online environment. Having your Church’s own social network can be a great way for church leaders to communicate, or even for church youth to fellowship without the danger of other social networking sites. Oikos(TM) is one way for small groups to connect and share. Oikos beta has been available since September 2007, and today’s release marks the fully-enhanced version with many new features.

“People desire deeper personal connections with one another, and are constantly looking for ways to accomplish this within their busy lifestyles,” says Mike Simon, President of Simon Solutions Inc., developer of Oikos. “The Internet is becoming the number one method of Christians to stay connected to their small groups, encourage and support Christian relationships, and draw others to Christ.”

According to The Barna Group’s recent technology update, “One out of every four Protestant churches (26%) now has some presence on one or more social networking sites (such as MySpace).” More and more people have begun using these social networking sites and there are now a myriad of different Christian networks out there to connect people; however, these networks are open to outsiders and paid for by advertisers and do not provide a secure way to communicate privately. Oikos is like having your very own private social network just for your church’s community.