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All the national PC(USA) news
"from left to right"
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Comparative Statistics 2002 – Highlights
Why so many vacant pulpits? A look at the numbers
By Jack Marcum, Research Services |
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While the decline in the number of active ministers is likely to continue and may well accelerate, there will be no shortage of ministers for mid-sized and larger congregations.
The situation among very small congregations (100 or fewer members) is more dire. Their ability to attract full-time installed pastors, already weak, will grow weaker as they increasingly must compete with larger congregations (and each other) for pastors from the shrinking pool of ministers.
The problem is not so much a shortage of ministers but a shortage of members.
Related link: List of Tables of the Comparative Statistics 2002
Many numbers, such as: 24 of the 173 presbyteries grew in numbers - by far the greatest increase took place in Korean-American presbyteries: Eastern Korean: 20.24%; Midwest Hanmi: 7.16%, Atlantic-Korean-American: 4.77%; only 3 other presbyteries grew more than 1%. The numbers for 2 presbyteries remained the same. Northern New York lost most: 6.7%.
About 10% of all congregations have at least 20% minority racial/ethnic members. |
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News of and for the wider Church,
in the USA and around the world
plus: opinions, resources
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| Wiesenthal Center urges Mel Gibson to make changes to The Passion |
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"We fully understand that the crucifixion is central to the belief of more than a billion Christians and in no way do we want to impede Mr. Gibson's right to make a film," said Rabbi Hier. "However, we urge that he make some of the changes suggested to him... to help ensure that the Jewish people are not yet again falsely singled out as being responsible for the death of Jesus," Hier concluded.
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| Make your movie, Mel – By Christopher Manion |
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The plain truth, of the Gospels and of the controversy that has surrounded Christianity ever since Christ's death and resurrection, is simple. If a person does not believe the Gospel to be the word of God, the only alternative is to find it offensive. Very offensive. Fundamentally offensive. And for good reason.
It is offensive
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Borrowed sermons roil Washington D. C. congregation
Moderator of the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) is left to explain his liberal use of Thomas Tewell's and other people's sermons |
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 The parish nurse began to unravel the unusual pattern one Sunday in June when she went on the Internet and entered the title of that day's scheduled sermon at National City Christian Church [DC]. The Rev. Alvin O'Neal Jackson [pictured], a charismatic preacher and leader of the denomination The Christian Church (Disciples of Christ), had chosen his subject and titled it "Sorry Mr. President, I Don't Dance."
But the search engine Google revealed that a sermon with the same title had been delivered months earlier by the Rev. Thomas K. Tewell, pastor of Fifth Avenue Presbyterian Church in New York City. The nurse, Kathy McGregor, then went to the landmark church on Thomas Circle NW for the Sunday service, printout in hand...
Related link: Jackson's bio
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Idi Amin is dead – Ugandan dictator dies in Saudi Hospital
Blamed for the murder of tens of thousands of his people in the 1970s |
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A man who expressed admiration for Adolf Hitler, Amin was denounced inside and outside Africa for massacring tens of thousands of people – some estimates say more than 100,000 – under his 1971-79 rule and expelling thousands of Asians.
Ugandans reacted to his death with a mixture of relief at the demise of a tyrant, tinged with nostalgia for a leader who many Ugandans applauded for expelling the Asians who dominated much of the economy in 1972.
He himself was driven from Uganda in 1979 by forces from neighboring Tanzania and Ugandan exiles. Saudi Arabia gave him sanctuary in the name of Islamic charity. |
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| Konrad Raiser calls for WCC shake-up to overcome ‘institutionalism’ |
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Saying the ecumenical movement has been “overcome by institutionalism,” the outgoing general secretary of the World Council of Churches has called a top-level meeting for November that could result in a radical shake-up of the way in which WCC and other ecumenical world communions — such as the Lutherans, Reformed churches or Anglicans – work together.
Many WCC member churches belong to these bodies which Raiser suggested could be integrated into a more tightly bound “common framework” to reduce duplication of efforts. |
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Muscular Christianity's prodigal son, college sports
Remember the Christian roots of college athletics
By Chris Armstrong |
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Inappropriate payments and academic fudging on behalf of college athletes. Rampant performance-enhancing and recreational drug use. Cursing, furniture-throwing coaches. Medically questionable practice regimens that may have contributed to players' deaths. The past decade has not been kind to college sports.
Should a Christian student think twice before getting involved in high-profile college sports like basketball or football? What kind of values will he or she learn in that setting?
During the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, this question would have been unthinkable. Why? Because college sports was imbued with an ideal called "muscular Christianity." |
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| When the Archbishop calls – By Colbert I. King, Washington Post |
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About 15 years ago under the eyes of the archbishop of Canterbury, the "visible symbol of Anglicanism," the assembled clergy decided that a polygamist who joined the church could keep his wives if his community went along with the arrangement, but that he couldn't take on any more – a policy reaffirmed at the 1998 Lambeth Conference.
The primates of the Anglican Communion bought the argument... that it would be unkind for new converts to Christianity to discard their extra wives; that putting away the extras would cause social deprivation and be regarded as rejection of African culture. I can imagine trying out that argument on Gwen, my wife of 42 years.
Ah, but the growing cultural acceptance of gays and lesbians in some Western communities and in Episcopal parishes cuts no ice with our African brothers.
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| Tutu dismisses uproar over gay American bishop |
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Former South African archbishop Desmond Tutu said Sunday that he did not see what "all the fuss" was over appointing a gay bishop, but he urged homosexual clergy to remain celibate.
"For us, that doesn't make a difference, the sexual orientation," Tutu told Reuters Television in South Africa's sprawling Soweto township.
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| Real-life raiders hunt Ark of the Covenant – Relic searchers dig near Jesus' crucifixion site in quest for chest holding 10 Commandments |
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Some 30 explorers from the U.S., Australia, Norway and Estonia have been in a cave system north of the city's Damascus Gate to try to determine if the Ark is indeed located there.
The group is trying to verify the claim made by relic hunter Ron Wyatt who said he actually saw the Ark there two decades ago after tunneling through a small passageway.
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| Judge blocks Colorado Pledge of Allegiance |
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A federal judge Friday blocked a Colorado law requiring public school students and teachers to recite the Pledge of Allegiance, calling the law discriminatory and divisive.
In issuing a temporary injunction, U.S. District Judge Lewis Babcock said the law discriminates against teachers by allowing students to opt out with a note from their parents. Teachers cannot opt out.
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| Alabama legal officials rebel from Ten Commandments chief justice |
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Attorney General Bill Pryor said Thursday he would refuse to help Moore violate the court order, which could result in contempt fines of about $5,000 a day against the state. He declined to say what specific action he would take.
At the same time, Moore's colleagues on the state Supreme Court met to discuss whether they can invoke a state law that lets a majority of the nine justices overrule an administrative action by the chief justice.
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Robbing Peter to please Jesus
By Kyle Williams, WorldNetDaily |
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Does [Alabama governor Bob] Riley have a point? After all, didn't Jesus actually speak of taking care of the least among us?
Of course, but did He teach us that as long as we're doing good, it also OK if we commit evil? Socialism is theft. How do Riley's "Christian ethics" square with that? It's an undeniable truth that theft is wrong. Socialism is legalized plunder; government forcefully taxes you to pay for what Riley deems "much needed" social programs.
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| Evangelical extravaganza – By Dale Buss, Wall Street Journal |
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"Our motto is that we believe God gave the arts to the church – and it's time that we begin to use the arts more effectively to exalt our God so that people will be touched and their lives affected," says the Rev. Jeff Lawrence, worship and music pastor at First Baptist, which typically hosts about 2,500 worshipers at three services on a Sunday morning
Such a performance ethic also is in full swing at most other evangelical churches, especially large ones such as Kensington Community Church, which actually operates a live-arts academy on its 40-acre campus in Troy, Mich. In Munster, Ind., Family Christian Center has spent millions of dollars on video and sound systems and other production equipment to support Sunday-morning worship as well as periodic big-budget Christian musicals.
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| Black youths more likely to attend church than their white peers |
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Almost 45 percent of Black high school students reported going to church every week, compared to just 31 percent of their White peers.
Perhaps more surprisingly, the percentage of Black youths attending church has risen steadily since 1995. Meanwhile, church attendance among White youth has held steady.
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| A divided Episcopal Church? |
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From 1974 to 1997, church attendance among Episcopalians increased by more than 31 percent, and financial giving also rose.
The authors of the new study claim that focus groups and individual interviews with Episcopalians in more than 200 locations revealed not decline and stagnation in these congregations but "pervasive vitality."
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Learning from interim pastors' lives
By Ken Garfield, Charlotte Observer |
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A 2001 clergy survey for Duke Divinity School found that full-time, mainline Protestant pastors spend 20 percent of their workweek administering to the congregation and attending meetings. By comparison, they spend 13 percent of their work week teaching and training people for ministry.
Here's my thought:
If an interim pastor feels free to dispense with meetings and focus on what he believes is most important, why can't a permanent pastor?
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| Letters from readers |
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Derek J Simmons "...Consensus decision making within the church is fine for fixing the color of the pew cushions or opting to have only decaf for the fellowship hour..." |
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Bruce M. Williams "One of the saddest signs of the disarray in our church today is that a signficant statement by the new Bishop Robinson of the Episcopal Church has gone largely unremarked. He said, in effect, that God was on his side..." |
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Jon Evans has found the sources for his contention that partial-birth abortions are not needed to save the life of the mother. |
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Edward Koster responds to Rob Harrison: "...The generalizations I made were intended to raise particular issues. That they all apply to both edges of the church is certainly true, which only underscores my thesis that these two edge groups function in identical ways." |
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Edward Koster "Mr. Evans responds to my statement to Mr. Apel: "The shame is that so far the provision has been used to filter out only self-affirmed practicing homosexual persons."
"He claims that the statement is untrue...
"I was wrong. The statement was incorrect. I retract it and assert the following..." |
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