Author: Gordon Govier

COMMENTARY Over the last few days, I have been besieged with calls from Christian friends in deep despair over the election. I understand the feeling. The President-elect, along with his newly strengthened allies in Congress, opposes almost every pro-life and pro-family position conservative Evangelicals and conservative Catholics have fought for so hard.Read more of this commentary. Conservative Christians Reject Racism Label in Obama Vote – Associated Press

Nearly 200 people packed the sidewalk and street in front of Madison’s East Side Planned Parenthood Sunday night for a candlelight prayer service that wrapped up this fall’s 40 Days for Life prayer vigil.

Evangelist Billy Graham, who turns 90 today, is frail from multiple falls and ailments, far from the strapping revivalist who roamed the globe for six decades. Yet before Graham retired in 2005 to his mountainside log cabin in Montreat, N.C., he preached to 215 million people — and changed the course of American Protestantism. Read more of this story.

WASHINGTON (BP)–Democrat Barack Obama made history Nov. 4 by becoming the first African American elected to the U.S. presidency, but the victory left many evangelical Christians and other social conservatives concerned his administration will undermine pro-life and pro-family policies.Read more of this story.Associated Press AnalysisA Mountain-top Moment for the Black Church – Religion News ServiceMORE ELECTION COVERAGE FROM CHRISTIANITY TODAYWill Evangelicals Learn to Work with an Obama Administration?Jim Wallis on Holding Obama AccountableHow Evangelicals VotedMORE ELECTION COVERAGE FROM BAPTIST PRESS’Historic’ campaign scored Prop 8’s win in CalifObama administration could radically change U.S. landscape on social issues Calif. passes Prop 8, a…

Columbia Records recently released Tell Tale Signs, the eighth installment of their official "bootleg" series of Bob Dylan rarities. The album includes two discs of outtakes, soundtrack cuts, live recordings, and general leftovers from the past two decades of Dylan’s recording career—and it’s a recording that finds Dylan, at the age of 67, to be just as cagey, elusive, and utterly inscrutable as ever.Read more of this review. How Bob Dylan Found Christ – ASSIST News Service

Jesus did teach us to be good citizens, and to work for a better world. The people of His day couldn’t do much to change their world, but He said they should do whatever they could – and so should we.Read more of this story. PHOTO: Green County farmer Dave Harris had a message for commuters on Madison’s beltline at the Nakoma Road overpass this morning: "Vote for God Everyday."

Rev. John Nunes, president and CEO of Lutheran World Relief, and others (me included) attempt to explain how well-intended government programs developed during the “war on poverty” initiatives help to destroy the urban black family, community, and especially low-income black men. Nunes also explains from the New York Times Magazine how there is no evidence that any government program made any improvement in any urban area anywhere. As a matter of fact, the welfare programs of the 1960s made matters worse in the black community.Read more of this story.

About 300 men and women, representing more than one dozen area churches, gathered at Bethesda Christian Fellowship on East Washington Avenue last evening for a Solemn Assembly. The gathering was called by Tom Flaherty, pastor of Mad City Church, who had introductory remarks at the beginning of the program (shown above).

WASHINGTON — When the medieval church wanted to communicate the biblical narratives to a largely illiterate society, it used stained glass windows to illustrate the stories. So as the modern church looks for ways to reach a generation unfamiliar with the Bible, the most obvious medium, they say, is movie theaters."Theaters are our 21st century stained glass," said Joel Schmidgall, one of the pastors of National Community Church, a congregation that meets in four campuses — three movie theaters and a church-owned coffeehouse– around Washington.Read more of this story.

KHIRBET QEIYAFA, Israel — Overlooking the verdant Valley of Elah, where the Bible says David toppled Goliath, archaeologists are unearthing a 3,000-year-old fortified city that could reshape views of the period when David ruled over the Israelites. Five lines on pottery uncovered here appear to be the oldest Hebrew text ever found and are likely to have a major impact on knowledge about the history of literacy and alphabet development.Read more of this story.