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…
Growing trend: Ministers saddled with seminary debt
When Congress overwhelmingly approved a measure last month to relieve spiraling student debt, churches probably didn’t realize the problem hits closer to home than expected — many pastors are leaving seminary and divinity school with tens of thousands of dollars…
Awkward question: How much to pay the pastor?
It may be one of the most uncomfortable —and sometimes contentious — questions in congregational life: How much should we pay our senior pastor? Ministers struggle between commitments to a self-sacrificial calling on the one hand and providing for their…
OPINION: Reflections from New York: History as song
As the old hymn Blessed Assurance goes, “This is my story. This is my song.” How beautiful a metaphor to understand our faith journey as a song. Throughout this summer at Metro Baptist Church, groups have come to New York…
LETTER: Shariah is threat to American freedoms
Why would any American support using foreign laws by our judicial system [“Political dilemma,” Herald, Aug 12]? That is an affront to all of us who swore to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States. The seminal reference…
OPINION: Proleptic tables and prophetic waters
In my most recent column, I shared a personal reflection from a 2013 Cooperative Baptist Fellowship General Assembly workshop which sought to revisit the place and nature of the Baptist tradition of believer’s baptism in the 21st century. I wrote…
OPINION: Does it ever hurt to heal?
I recently heard and read about some potentially groundbreaking medical news. The basic gist of the news is that researchers at the University of Massachusetts medical school have found a way to essentially turn off the genetic material which causes…
OPINION: Binge watching
The TV show Breaking Bad entered its fifth and final season two weeks ago. Many speculate that “binge watching” is in large part responsible for the growing success of the show. Thanks to Netflix, a subscriber can watch an entire…