‘What is wrong with us?” It’s a question we’d better start asking. It reads like a work of twisted fiction rather than a factual account: “Bored” teens decide to kill somebody for the fun of it. Three boys, aged 15,…
As new film draws attention, Washington church recalls real butler as quiet man of steady faith
WASHINGTON (RNS) — Eugene Allen served eight presidents as a White House butler, and his legendary career is the inspiration for Lee Daniels’ The Butler, a film starring Oprah Winfrey, Jane Fonda and a host of A-list Hollywood talent. But…
Photo
Eugene Allen, the man who inspired the title role of The Butler, is pictured in a 2006 photo from the 126th anniversary program of his church’s usher board. He is the farthest left person in the third row from…
As new film draws attention, Washington church recalls real butler as quiet man of steady faith
As new film draws attention, Washington church recalls real butler as quiet man of steady faith Adelle M. Banks WASHINGTON (RNS) — Eugene Allen served eight presidents as a White House butler, and his legendary career is the inspiration for…
Matching-gifts campaign smoothing the way for BTSR’s move to new location
RICHMOND — Baptist Theological Seminary at Richmond’s recently-launched Forward Together campaign is helping the school make the move from its historic Brook Road campus several miles north to Villa Park. A group of BTSR supporters created the $1 million matching…
New book by Wake Forest divinity school professor recounts church gardening as peacemaking ministry
BREVARD, N.C. (RNS) — Fred Bahnson’s first bit of advice when he started planning a church garden eight years ago came from an elderly tobacco farmer who grabbed a handful of soil, rolled it around in his fingers and shook…
HERITAGE: My dear Doctor Mac
In 1979 when I began my work at the Virginia Baptist Historical Society, I discovered several large wooden packing crates, full of crumbling file folders. They were the papers of George White McDaniel, a prominent minister — pastor of First…
HeraldBeat: Tracking Baptists across the Mid-Atlantic
Accepted a new call? Been ordained? Church celebrating an anniversary? Mission trip or project that you would like highlighted on the HeraldBeat page? Send info to HeraldBeat editor Barbara Francis at [email protected]. Transitions ON THE MOVE Darrell Boggs, to First…
Study connects views on race, church size
By Jeff Brumley Christians who worship in “very large” congregations see racial inequalities differently from those who attend smaller churches, a joint Baylor University and University of Southern California study has found. Members of the bigger institutions “do not tend…
SBC leader: Bible Belt collapsing
By Jeff Brumley Russell Moore has been making the rounds of national media outlets, telling his secular interviewers of the collapse of the Bible Belt and how it is bad for America but good for the church. Moore, president of…
Egyptian Baptists evoke spirit of founders
By Jeff Brumley In a letter describing the Islamist persecution of Christians in Egypt, a Baptist minister in Cairo provides a disturbing warning against the entanglement of religion and politics. And portions of the letter, two U.S. church scholars say, are…
Lawsuit fights Ten Commandments display
By Bob Allen The executive director of Mainstream Oklahoma Baptists is lead plaintiff in a lawsuit seeking removal of a Ten Commandments monument on the State Capitol grounds in Oklahoma City. Bruce Prescott, an ordained Baptist minister and member of…