Author: Gordon Govier

Madison is not perceived as a city with a thriving Christian culture. But that may be changing. The Grand Opening Open House at The Upper House, 235 Campus Mall, drew a standing room only crowd this evening to the University of Wisconsin campus.

Madison’s police chief wrote Monday, “I unapologetically confess to praying harder than ever,” as the city awaits a prosecutor’s decision on whether to file criminal charges against the officer who fatally shot an unarmed young black man last month.

This week, the most tangible and ambitious project of the Stephen and Laurel Brown Foundation, a religious gathering spot called UpperHouse, officially opens at 365 East Campus Mall. It is a soaring, aesthetically stunning space in the heart of the UW-Madison campus, in a former food court on the second floor of the University Square development. This is where the Browns hope to create a legacy, though the legacy’s exact nature is still evolving.

Crisis-trained Billy Graham Rapid Response Team chaplains were deployed to Madison, Wisconsin, March 9-13, to offer emotional and spiritual care after a deadly police shooting jolted the community and sparked protests. “The protests have been peaceful,” said Al New, manager of deployment and operations for the Billy Graham Rapid Response Team. New said the chaplains met with law enforcement officials and community leaders in an effort to help maintain the peace.

It’s not as if Robin Roberts doesn’t already know how to build or remodel a church or put an addition on one. He’s overseen more than 170 such projects in and around Dane County since 1981, when he formed his commercial building company, Roberts Construction.

Madison-based InterVarsity Christian Fellowship, one of the largest evangelical organizations in the country, has outgrown its administrative building and will be moving to larger quarters in the city next month. The nonprofit organization currently employs 156 people at 6400 Schroeder Road on the city’s Southwest Side. It has purchased a three-story building two miles away on the city’s West Side, at 635 Science Drive in University Research Park. The newly purchased building, which had sat empty for a couple of years, is being renovated. Mid-May is the tentative move-in goal.

After Chris Hodge retired as principal of Allis Elementary School in Madison in the spring of 2006, she lounged around exactly zero days before throwing herself into her next project. Three months later, she was back educating children, this time as founder of a free after-school academic program at Mt. Zion Baptist Church on the city’s South Side. “Education is a religious calling to me, because I feel God gave me this talent and I need to use it, not just sit around,” said Hodge, 73, who has led the program without pay for nine years.

LOS ANGELES — Wisconsin had just defeated North Carolina in the Sweet 16 when Traevon Jackson began to credit whom he always credits for his achievements: God. If there’s a microphone in his face, then there’s probably a faith-inspired message rolling off his tongue. Not in a fiery, traveling Southern Baptist evangelist manner. But in a way that suggests the gravity of it all. Jackson’s life is governed by a higher power. And he’s not shy about professing that to anyone, including his teammates.

MADISON, Wis. – As the current common council met for the last time Tuesday, members unanimously voted to make discriminating against atheism, and others who do not believe in God, illegal. “This is important because I believe it is only fair that if we protect religion, in all its varieties, we should also protect non-religion from discrimination. It’s only fair,” ordinance sponsor District 18 Alderwoman Anita Weier said.

Liz Drilias was about 3 years old when she came home with a small palm plant from Sunday school at St. Jude the Apostle Parish in Wauwatosa. That day, like today, was Palm Sunday. Though her memory of this event is fuzzy, Liz has been told the plant was in a foam coffee cup of dirt. “I really remember after it was split into four plants and they were around 2 feet tall. I later went to Sunday school at St. Bernard’s, so I’m not sure if any of the other kids at St. Jude still have their plants,” said…