Baptist News Global

Teaching and learning dissent: the witness of the minority

Learning dissent is never easy. One person’s prophet is another’s anti-Christ. One person’s conscience is another’s bigotry. Sometimes dissent can get you damned. Sometimes (like now?) silence can too.

‘They won’t take care of the house anyway’: One small transfusion of justice

“If you come and see the people, and talk with them, they don’t talk about how they’re living on less than $12,000 a year. They’re not talking about the fact that they go to bed hungry at night or that they don’t have a hospital. Their focus is on their joy and the things they do have. There is a lot of love.”

Brian McLaren urges churches to get in alignment

Churches must align themselves around spiritual formation and become “studios of love” as they face a time of significant change, author the Rev. Brian McLaren told Christian educators.

James Cone and the liberating spirit of blackness

In his final memoir, Cone’s testimony resounds.

Transitions for the week of 10-19-18

Please submit transitions — including staff changes, ordinations, anniversaries or deaths — to Barbara Francis. This page will be updated weekly. STAFF CHANGES Scott Carter, to First Baptist Church, Fort Wayne, Ind., as pastor. Graham Culbertson, concluding his tenure as…

Church leaders seek closure over trauma in pastor-departure process

Churches and ministers must put as much thought into saying goodbye to pastors as they do to finding and greeting new ones, congregational consultants say. “Closure is a major issue,” said Bill Wilson, director of the North Carolina-based Center for…

Judge dismisses 5 of 8 claims in Pressler lawsuit, citing statutes of limitations

A Texas judge has dismissed most of a sexual assault lawsuit against former Southern Baptist leader Paul Pressler due to statutes of limitation. Houston Judge Ravi K. Sandill signed an order Oct. 15 granting summary judgment in favor of Pressler…

Christianity still has a Kavanaugh problem

For a megachurch pastor, who for millions of Evangelicals represents their religious and political thinking, to go on television and declare that Brett Kavanagh’s ascent to the Supreme Court is a defeat of evil not only smears the story of millions of women and men who have been sexually abused but makes Christianity about a power grab instead of the sacrificial way of Jesus.

Continuing to cast God as male does a disservice to us all – women and men, sons and daughters

With one breath the Church is teaching my daughter that she is created in the image of God and in the next is telling her repeatedly that God is a man. “Daughter, you’re created in the image of God. Just not quite as fully in God’s image as your brothers.”

Russian Orthodox Church severs links with Constantinople

In a major religious split, the Russian Orthodox Church has cut ties with the body seen as the spiritual authority of the world’s Orthodox Christians.

Bill Coates resigned in August due to alleged sexual misconduct, church reports

The Rev. Bill Coates resigned as pastor of First Baptist Church in Gainesville in August following an accusation of sexual misconduct, according to a letter emailed to the congregation from church leaders on Monday, Oct. 15.

The endless work of combatting rural poverty can leave you in the dark, but hope flickers

On many days, the endless work of combatting rural poverty leaves you in the dark, utterly hopeless, Frances Ford says, but as Perry County’s own begin to build it themselves, hope flickers. True asset-based community development is sluggish work, and, at times, maybe impossible work.

Eradicating DEI hasn’t made anything better

How Christian nationalism shows up in patriotic worship services

Dear Trump-supporting Christians, are you really OK with this?

‘Every Student. Every State’ campaign promotes school tax credit