DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. (ABP) — A group of Florida children with cuts and bruises stood by an overturned bus June 29 watching paramedics try unsuccessfully to save the life of their 6-year-old friend. The children, from a church-affiliated day-care center…
UCC becomes first major denomination fully to support same-sex marriage
ATLANTA (ABP) — The leaders of one of America's most historic Christian denominations voted overwhelmingly July 4 to endorse same-sex civil marriage and encourage their local congregations to extend religious marriage to gay couples. Meeting July 4 in Atlanta, about…
Wilmer C. Fields says ABP must continue as ‘strong force’
GRAPEVINE, Texas (ABP) — With the takeover of the Southern Baptist Convention by fundamentalists, the devil won a clear and sweeping victory like never before in Southern Baptist history, pioneer Baptist journalist Wilmer C. Fields told Associated Baptist Press supporters…
Time is right for biblical leaders, pollster George Gallup says
GRAPEVINE, Texas (ABP) — “This is the time that is right for an explosion of biblical leaders,” Pollster George Gallup Jr. told a Texas audience June 30. Gallup received the John Newport Foundation Annual Leadership Award for his years of…
College ministers offer advice for keeping students connected
GRAPEVINE, Texas (ABP) — “Churches need to do better jobs connecting with college students and keeping them in the denomination,” said former college minister Ryan Clark during a Cooperative Baptist Fellowship workshop July 1. “Students often go to college and…
Hispanic involvement growing within Fellowship ranks
GRAPEVINE, Texas (ABP) — The Hispanics are coming to the United States in droves — and in response the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship plans to plant Hispanic churches in droves. The CBF's Hispanic Initiative aims to start 400 new Hispanic congregations…
CBF, Buckner will partner to combat AIDS in Africa
GRAPEVINE, Texas (ABP) — The Cooperative Baptist Fellowship and a Texas Baptist charity have begun a partnership to help combat the growing AIDS crisis in sub-Saharan Africa. The partnership with Buckner Orphan Care International was announced during CBF's annual general…
Stories, statistics motivate Global Women to action
GRAPEVINE, Texas (ABP) — There are 1.3 billion people in the world considered “absolute poor,” according to information provided by Global Women. Of these, 70 percent are women. Two-thirds of the world's illiterate people are women. One woman a minute…
Leonard says Baptists should learn from ‘generic’ Christian churches
GRAPEVINE, Texas (ABP) — The popular “generic Christianity” represented by nondenominational churches holds promise for Baptists if they reclaim the importance of rituals, recapture the individual and communal aspects of church life, and respond to the challenges of secularism and…