News reports and televised images of suffering by South Asia tsunami victims or hurricane-ravaged Gulf Coast residents prompted Americans to reach deep into their pocketbooks to give last year. Americans gave more than $2.7 billion to aid Gulf Coast hurricane…
Va. Senate approves marriage amendment
Virginia legislators have moved the state one step closer to adopting a constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage. The Virginia Senate voted 28-11 Jan. 24 to follow Virginia’s lower legislative chamber, the House of Delegates, in approving the proposed amendment. The…
Mercer leaders ponder role as national Baptist university
By John Pierce and Greg Warner Associated Baptist Press Can Baptists build and sustain a national Baptist university? It hasn't been done yet, said top leaders at Mercer University, but Mercer has as good a chance as anyone. “Mercer may…
Camp Alkulana receives grant
Camp Alkulana, a ministry of the Richmond Baptist Association, has been awarded a $25,000 matching grant by the Mary Morton Parsons Foundation, a Richmond family foundation. The grant was offered as a challenge to alumni and friends of Camp Alkulana…
IMB trustees tried power of press to silence dissent, Burleson says
By Greg Warner Associated Baptist Press A new staff policy, which gives trustees of the Southern Baptist Convention's International Mission Board power to censor news stories about their work, reportedly was used Jan. 11 to try to persuade a trustee…
Jim Vaught named to Mission Board post
By Dee Whitten Jim Vaught has been selected as the new church-minister matching specialist and a field strategist for the Virginia Baptist Mission Board’s empowering leaders team. Vaught has been co-pastor of Manassas Baptist Church in Manassas since 2003. In…
N.C. agency to elect its own trustees
The Baptist Retirement Homes of North Carolina has adopted bylaw amendments that allow the corporation's trustees to elect their own successors. Previously the bylaws called for trustees to be elected by the Baptist State Convention of North Carolina, which also…
Bluefield students respond to victims of hurricanes
"The devastation is unbelievable, but the opportunity to help is even greater,” says Bluefield College sophomore Myra Bankert, one of four BC students who recently returned from a mission trip to the Gulf Coast to help the victims of Hurricane…
N.C. panel taps consensus candidate
Leaders of the Baptist State Convention of North Carolina have nominated a candidate with support from both moderates and conservatives to the fractious statewide body's executive post. The convention's board of directors voted, without opposition, Jan. 24 to recommend Milton…
Doing whatever it takes — at Beale Memorial in Tappahannock
Our church is in a capital campaign. The goal was $700,000. Two weeks ago we were about $5,000 short of meeting it. I told the congregation that if we met the goal by a certain Sunday, I would sing Hail…
Raceway Ministries set and ready for 2006 NASCAR racing season
By Roger Marsh Raceway Ministries In a matter of days, race fans all over the United States-some 70-75 million of them-will be eagerly anticipating the drop of the green flag for the 2006 NASCAR racing season. Each year the Daytona…
EDITORIAL: Beyond tragedy
Editorial for February 2, 2006 By Jim White On January 25, Ed Scott, chairman of deacons at the Ochwilla Baptist Church in rural Hawthorne, Florida, learned that seven grandchildren, aged 20 months to 15 years, the children of his two…