Wade Burleson is calling for the Southern Baptist Convention to investigate “manipulation” and “coercion” by his fellow trustees of the International Mission Board. But the Oklahoma pastor backed down from his threat to publish details of those alleged abuses on…
Executive Committee amends target
The Southern Baptist Convention Executive Committee has amended a recommendation that the convention encourage the election of SBC officers “whose churches give at least 10 percent of their undesignated receipts to the Cooperative Program.” According to a May 26 Baptist…
CBF general assembly to answer Vestal’s challenge for social justice
This year's general assembly of the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship promises to answer the challenge Coordinator Daniel Vestal gave at last year's meeting—a challenge to face head-on the issues of poverty, social justice, diversity and mercy. According to Bo Prosser, the…
New N.C. policy would oust churches that tolerate gays
Leaders of the North Carolina Baptist State Convention have beefed up a policy designed to oust local churches that affirm homosexuality or even tolerate gay church members. Meeting in Asheboro, N.C., the convention's executive committee and board of directors both…
EDITORIAL: A great partnership
Partnership: (pärtnr-shp) — A relationship between individuals or groups that is characterized by mutual cooperation and responsibility, as for the achievement of a specified goal. Throughout our 178-year history, the Religious Herald has been in partnership with Virginia Baptists. The…
A vision fulfilled
Last week this column told the background of assemblies in Virginia Baptist history. The column managed to get as far as the critical meeting of the Baptist General Association of Virginia in November 1950 when “Eagle's Eyrie”—a large expanse of…
Da Vinci hype?
I agree that Dan Brown's page-turner of a book is a work of fiction, but he makes a very disturbing declaration on the very first page, that there are certain facts of history (like Opus Dei and the Priory of…
Mocking Jesus
I am responding to the letter of Raylene Harton from the May 25, 2006 issue of Religious Herald. She says that she is not upset about the book or movie “The Da Vinci Code.” She says that, “God does not…
ANOTHER VIEW: Would you run?
What would you do if a group of hooded strangers walked into your church service and asked who would be willing to take a bullet for Christ? This is the premise of a popular internet parable. In the parable, most…
‘Nevaeh’ soars in popularity
Spell heaven backwards and what do you get? The 70th most popular name for American baby girls. Nevaeh, usually pronounced nuh-VAY-uh, cracked the top 100 names for newborn baby girls for the first time in 2005, with 4,457, according to…
News about Virginia Baptists and their ministries for June 8, 2006
STAFF CHANGES Jim Graham, to Wallers Church, Partlow, as interim pastor. Susan Harvey, to Mount Ararat Church, Stafford, as children's minister. Connie Scruggs, to Rivermont Church, Danville, as part-time minister to children. Retirements Frank W. Casper Sr., pastor of Calvary…
Virginia Baptist is state’s teacher of the year
When the members of the Virginia Senate rose to their feet and applauded earlier this year to honor Debi Goforth as Virginia's teacher of the year, the elementary school librarian's thoughts turned to a small pouch she had been carrying…