By Bob Allen The Baptist World Alliance has sent $25,000 in emergency financial aid to help rebuild a Baptist-run school at a refugee camp along the Thai-Burmese border destroyed by fire in April. The money sent through Baptist World Aid…
Pastor says gays should be put to death
By Bob Allen A Baptist pastor in Kansas is taking heat for suggesting the government should execute homosexuals in an audio clip from his Sunday sermon making the rounds on the Internet. Curtis Knapp, pastor of New Hope Baptist Church…
Pastor defends NAACP marriage stance
By Bob Allen A Baptist minister and board member of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People said May 26 it would have been hypocritical for the 103-year-old civil-rights organization not to pass its recent resolution supporting marriage…
Baptist leader endorses Catholic campaign
By Bob Allen Southern Baptists’ top spokesman for religious-liberty concerns voiced support May 26 for Catholics across the country gearing up for a “Fortnight for Freedom,” a two-week national campaign of special liturgies, prayer services and other events leading up…
BTSR grants first honorary doctorates
RICHMOND, Va. — Baptist Theological Seminary at Richmond granted its first honorary doctorates May 26 during an annual commencement ceremony in which 22 graduates also received degrees. BTSR president Ron Crawford (left) congratulates Elmer West, recipient of the honorary doctor…
Pakistanis’ life terms for ‘blasphemy’ dropped
LAHORE, Pakistan (BP) — A court has acquitted a Christian couple of blasphemy charges, overturning their life sentences. The couple's lawyer, Chaudhry Naeem Shakir, told Compass Direct News that Justice Mazhar Ali Akbar Naqvi of the Lahore High Court accepted…
NC network has eyes to see region’s poor
By Jeff Brumley The demographics of Halifax County, N.C., are appalling. Unemployment is above 13 percent and one resident in four earns income below the poverty line. The county is part of the fourth poorest congressional district in the nation….
Border violence keeps mission teams home
By Jeff Brumley Steadily declining mission trips to Mexico due to drug violence has left many Mexicans feeling abandoned just when their anxiety levels are peaking, missions experts in Texas say. “It’s unprecedented,” said E. Daniel Rangel, director of River Ministry…
Reading the Bible in pink and blue
By Vicki Brown Does God have prescribed roles for men and women, and does he require those roles to be filled in specific ways? Many evangelicals, including Baptists, are divided into two camps on this issue – “complementarian” and “egalitarian.”…
Women seek God’s will at home, church
By Vicki Brown Married nearly five years, Courtney Fenton of Hannibal, Mo., wanted to be married but wasn’t sure she wanted to have children. But the day she married, “something switched” in her brain and the desire for little ones…
Women protest army rapes in Burma
By Bob Allen Leaders of a ministry for women and girls in American Baptist churches called on the United States to insist on human-rights reforms – including ending the use of rape as a weapon of war – before moving…
Longtime prof Wayne Ward dies
By Bob Allen Wayne Ward, a longtime theology professor at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Ky., died May 23 after suffering a stroke earlier in the week. He was 90. In 1951, Ward was elected instructor in theology and…