WASHINGTON (ABP) — Massachusetts legislators gave initial approval March 29 to an amendment that bans gay marriage, but explicitly authorizes identical benefits for same-sex couples. However, the amendment cannot take effect until November 2006, at the earliest. So until then,…
Mission-sending agencies asking hard questions about personnel safety
DALLAS (ABP) — When missionaries answer what they believe is Christ's call, a growing number also may hear echoes of the martyred German pastor Dietrich Bonhoeffer who wrote 60 years ago: “When Christ calls a man, he bids him come…
CBF teaming up with World Vision, Kenyan convention to address AIDS
NAIROBI, KENYA (ABP) — The Cooperative Baptist Fellowship is entering into a ministry partnership with two other groups to aid children orphaned by the AIDS epidemic in Africa. The Atlanta-based moderate Baptist group will participate in the Hope Child Sponsorship…
Senate approves ‘unborn victims’ bill decried by abortion-rights advocates
WASHINGTON (ABP) — The Senate has given final approval to a bill that treats violence against a pregnant woman as two separate crimes — against her and the fetus she is carrying. Opponents of the Unborn Victims of Violence Act…
Gay-marriage supporters file suit in Oregon, as Iowa rejects amendment
WASHINGTON (ABP) — A civil-rights group has filed suit against the state of Oregon on behalf of a group of gay couples, and Iowa legislators have rejected an anti-gay-marriage amendment to that state's constitution — the latest salvos in the…
Women’s ministry group relocates to Atlanta
ATLANTA (ABP) — Baptist Women in Ministry, started in 1983 to support Southern Baptist women serving as ministers, will move its offices to Mercer University's McAfee School of Theology in northeast Atlanta. The group celebrated its 20th anniversary last summer…
Baptist leader testifies as House examines faith-based programs
WASHINGTON (ABP) — A March 23 congressional hearing designed as a celebration of President Bush's faith-based initiative served as a platform for a Baptist lawyer to recite the dangers she believes it poses to religious freedom. Several religious-freedom experts and…
Suspected arson thwarts reopening of black church in Louisiana
CYPREMORT, La. (ABP) — March 12 was the day 100 former members of Mount Olive Baptist Church near Cypremort Point planned to gather for their first service since the church closed its doors five years ago. However, an arsonist set…
High court hears arguments in Pledge of Allegiance case
WASHINGTON (ABP) — In hearing arguments on whether the Pledge of Allegiance's reference to God is constitutional, the justices of the Supreme Court seemed concerned not only with Michael Newdow's case, but also with his right to make it. Newdow,…