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By Tanaisha Shaw – Channel 3000.com – MADISON, Wis. — 2024 marks 20 years of the Fall Gospel Fest in Dane County. Organizers host the event at different churches and venues across the county. “The thing that we wanted to do, we wanted to close that gap.” “In terms of having artists actually stop in Madison as opposed to going to the larger surrounding cities so people don’t have to travel to see those artists, and they can actually see those artists right here in Madison and Dane County.” said the director the festival, Clyde Gaines. Read more of this…

Madison, Wis. (RNS) — As two dozen pastors, poll chaplains and other leaders gathered for a pre-election press conference outside of First United Methodist Church in Wisconsin’s capital Wednesday (Oct. 30), they got a taste of what life is like in a battleground state. As Paul Raushenbush, president of the Interfaith Alliance, a national nonprofit whose leaders were on a pro-voting tour, stepped to the microphone, some young hecklers drove by in a green SUV, flipping the faith leaders the bird and shouting, “Vote Trump.” Raushenbush waved to the hecklers and then got back to business — spreading the message…

MADISON, Wis. (WMTV) -Good Shepherd Lutheran Church partnered with Westwood Christian Church for its 14th annual ‘Trunk or Treat’ event on Saturday. Three-hundred monsters, princesses and more gathered in the parking lot of Good Shepherd Lutheran Church. Around 20 cars decorated their trunks and gave out candy. Read more of this story.

COMMENTARY – Reading the Opinion Page Essay in Sunday’s Wisconsin State Journal on the epidemic of male loneliness, I was reminded of my own journey through that dark valley several decades ago. I was fortunate that my church at the time, Madison Gospel Tabernacle, initiated male accountability groups. Pastor Roger Olsen called them Men Of Vision and Encouragement (MOVE) groups. We joked about another acronym, Men Opposed to Virtually Everything. We joked about a lot of things, we were guys after all. But our discussions were also very serious. I ended up in a fellowship that met at one guy’s…

By Michael Foust – Crosswalk.com – The backup quarterback who led Green Bay to a victory Sunday says he is “thankful for another opportunity to glorify God” and is eager to support the team in the future however needed — whether on the field or from the bench. Packers QB Malik Willis, filling in for injured starter Jordan Love, completed 12 of 14 passes for 122 yards and one touchdown and ran for 41 yards in his team’s 16-10 victory over Indianapolis at Green Bay. The Packers evened their record at 1-1. “It feels awesome,” Willis told a national television…

Jenny Czerkas has dedicated her life to uplifting some of Madison’s most vulnerable communities. As the co-founder and operations director of Extended Hands Pantry, Jenny helped fill bellies and increase hope for countless low-income households, particularly for immigrants and refugees, who rely on the pantry for critical support.   Jenny started a 100% mobile food pantry during the pandemic to address the increasing food shortages faced by families. What began as an emergency response soon blossomed into an essential service. Read the rest of this story at Daily Points of Light.

This was year four of Madison’s collaborative week of service, and do we ever have the stories to back up the momentum and value of this experience! Over 300 volunteers from 24 Madison churches contributed 898 volunteer hours of work at 12 public schools and other sites around Madison. Most folks volunteer at one site: the site their church is working at, the site that works best for their schedule, or the one closest to their neighborhood. And with so many volunteer sites and different shifts, it’s hard to get the full view of this event. So, we gathered leaders…

On a clear day, from the tower of the Holy Hill Basilica and National Shrine of Mary Help of Christians, you can see the skyline of Milwaukee, 30 miles away. Madison is 65 miles in the other direction. Perched atop the highest eminence in southeastern Wisconsin, its presence is stunning, especially in the fall when the leaves of the surrounding hardwood forests are at peak color. As the name suggests, it could be described as one of Wisconsin’s holiest sites. It is a minor basilica of the Roman Catholic church, proclaimed by Pope Benedict XVI in 2006. It’s also on…

Charles Yu, a pastor on the staff of Madison’s Blackhawk Church, is among a broadly diverse group of Christian leaders featured by the National Association of Evangelicals in a video which explains that evangelical is a religious term and not a political term. An email from NAE explains: Political, social and cultural trends have changed the public perception of evangelicalism, particularly in the United States. Many people now assume that evangelicals are white, American and Republican. While some evangelicals are those things, millions of self-identified evangelicals are not. This new video from the National Association of Evangelicals addresses what it…

By Fred Grossenbach – Backpack drives are taking place all over the city as school openings approach.  This year Lighthouse Christian School and Church partnered with Christ Church Madison to “take it up a notch” to bless the community in multiple ways. Christ Church provided over 300 backpacks. Assisted by a generous grant from the Madison Christian Giving Fund, Lighthouse provided free school supplies.  Pencils, pens, notebooks and calendars were available for free on a first come first served basis. But there was more: a bouncy slide and face painting for the kids, a taco truck, music and the Extended…