MC News
State Journal: We’re about a year into the reign of Pope Francis. He’s charmed a lot of the world. What have you come to admire most about him? Morlino: What I most admire about him — and it’s really God’s gift to him — is his presence to people.
About midway through last month’s Sochi Winter Olympics, Steve McConkey issued a press release as president of 4 Winds Christian Athletics, a Madison-based ministry that works primarily with U.S. track and field athletes. McConkey bemoaned what he called the “pro-homosexual policies” of the U.S. Olympic Committee, noting the committee recently added sexual orientation to the non-discrimination policy that participating athletes must agree to. McConkey said that he could envision a time when Christian athletes who oppose homosexuality will be victims of “reverse discrimination” for their beliefs.
Following in the footsteps of The Passion of the Christ almost exactly ten years ago, another major motion picture about Jesus Christ is opening up in theaters in Madison and across the country this weekend. Like Mel Gibson’s Passion, The Son of God has a full-scale Hollywood promotion blitz behind it. Only this time there’s also a social media campaign.In a promotional video for the movie, movie producers Roma Downey and Mark Burnett state, “This is the first major motion picture on the complete life of Jesus Christ from birth to resurrection since The Greatest Story Ever Told, which was…
An Anglican seminary’s invitation to Episcopal Church Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori, who has been accused of making statements outside of the church’s traditional understanding of Christ, has drawn ire and led to at least one resignation. Dean Edward L. Salmon, Jr., of the Nashotah House’s historic seminary chapel in Nashotah, Wis., invited Schori for the first time to preach on May 1. And what followed was uproar.
The University of Wisconsin-Extension’s Lowell Center in Madison is finding itself at the center of a dispute over whether it should stock Gideon Bibles in its guest rooms. First the UW-Extension agreed to remove all Bibles as of Dec. 1, after the Madison-based Freedom Foundation complained that it was inappropriate for the state-run school to promote a particular religious perspective. Now the organization Alliance Defending Freedom (formerly the Alliance Defense Fund), has fired off a letter to UW and the University of Iowa — which also pulled the Bibles — insisting the removal may violate the First Amendment.
COLORADO SPRINGS — AT 6:45 p.m. on Jan. 23, I was delivered to a Colorado state penitentiary, where I was issued an inmate uniform and a mesh bag with my toiletries and bedding. My arms were handcuffed behind my back, my legs were shackled and I was deposited in Administrative Segregation — solitary confinement.
Traffic was gridlocked on Park Street and Badger Road, cars filled every vacant parking spot in the area and more than 500 people — black and white — made their way to Fountain of Life Covenant Church Saturday afternoon to listen to the Rev. Alex Gee and offer assistance in easing the probmes of racial inequality in the community.
Many Madison area pastors met at Fountain of Life Community Church in Madison today, at the invitation of pastor Alex Gee. Afterwards Gee tweeted: “Hosted an INCREDIBLE fellowship lunch with 40+ #LocalClergy to address racial inequality by collaborating & praying.” The invitation is one follow-up to Gee’s heart-baring column in the Capital Times last November entitled “Justified Anger”, to which we responded that Madison churches had their best opportunity to change the city, if they were willing to listen. It looks like the pastors are listening.
Melissa Taylor stirs a steaming pot of soup atop the stove in her north side kitchen. There are lentils and carrots, tomatoes and celery, a bay leaf that bobs to the surface with each turn of the wooden spoon. It’s a feast, by some standards, famine by others — and a staple for the spiritual journey on which she and her husband, Josh Taylor, will soon embark. Come Monday, the Taylors will begin a 21-day “Daniel fast,” a Biblically inspired period of prayer and relative deprivation, various versions of which have become increasingly popular in evangelical Christian circles.
For the last 75 years, LeEldra Morgan has spent almost every Sunday morning at Parkside Presbyterian Church on Madison’s East Side. She was confirmed there in 1939 at age 15, later married her husband in the sanctuary, and watched as her two children took their confirmation vows there. She recalls decades when the congregation bustled with activity and purpose — “a youth group, a very active couple’s club, three different women’s circles, a men’s association, and an awful lot of mission work.” At one point in the 1940s, the church had 365 adult members, plus scores of children. Those days…