LYNCHBURG, Va. — Virginia Baptists’ 2012 ministry budget will be almost $1 million less than their current one, if they adopt a proposal next month at the annual meeting of the Baptist General Association of Virginia. The proposed $12.4 million…
Virginia Baptists to consider renewed ties with Averett University
LYNCHBURG, Va. — Virginia Baptists will consider in November a proposal to renew ties to Averett University, a 152-year-old school in Danville, Va., whose relationship with the state’s Baptists was severed in 2005 in a dispute over homosexuality. The Virginia…
UPDATED: Leland Center moves to church complex in Arlington
ARLINGTON, Va. — The John Leland Center for Theological Studies moved at the end of August to new quarters in the busy Clarendon section of Arlington, about three miles from central Washington, D.C. The 10-year-old Baptist seminary will be housed…
OUT LOUD
“Sadly, the constituency for human rights and religious freedom issues is growing smaller and smaller in Washington and in this Congress. These issues have become second-class citizens in this Congress and in this town.” Rep. Frank Wolf The Republican congressman…
Pairing ministers and churches has never been easy, say observers
More an art than a science, matching a minister's skills with a church's needs has tested the limits of generations of pastoral search committees. And for Baptists — fiercely committed to local church autonomy and resistant to outside influences —…
OUT LOUD
“In our era of creeping moral relativism, one of the best contributions of Christians in American culture has been that some of us still believe in objective truth and real right and wrong. But that rigorous moral code was all…
Richmond churches offer showers, laundry to neighbors still in dark
RICHMOND, Va. — Two churches in the Richmond, Va., area are offering showers, laundry facilities and ice to thousands in the city still without electricity in the wake of Hurricane Irene. First Baptist Church of Richmond and Bon Air Baptist…
NORTH CAROLINA BRIEFS
N.C. Men preparing response. North Carolina Baptist Men is preparing to respond to a possible landfall by Hurricane Irene on the state’s coast. “We are planning for a response, mobilizing and preparing our equipment and volunteers to be available in…
VIRGINIA BRIEFS
Chaplain service releases new DVD. The Chaplain Service Prison Ministry of Virginia has released a new DVD describing the agency’s ministry to 32,000 adult prisoners in 31 state prisons and three juvenile correctional centers across Virginia. The DVD includes comments…