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University of Wisconsin-Madison students celebrated Study Day Monday at Blackhawk Evangelical Free Church in Verona, where the congregation opened its doors and hearts to 1,000-plus students in the midst of final exams. They arrived with books, laptops and appetites for free meals, quiet or group study, tutoring, recreational breaks of ping-pong and basketball, Christmas-themed movies and an optional worship service.Read more of this story.
The popular image of fundamentalist faith — whether Jewish, Muslim or evangelical Christian — is humorless, intolerant and angry, unhesitant to cast the first stone, sometimes literally. The words "whimsy" and "orthodoxy" do not often appear in the same sentence. Yet humor is a way of explaining religion — to its adherents and to others. Increasingly, believing members of orthodox faith traditions are able to joke about their foibles and shortcomings before an audience of their community — if only in the safe, sheltered environs of a mosque social hall, an Israeli comedy club or a sold-out Apostles of Comedy…
Sarah Palin’s family will have to attend church in a local school this morning after a fire ripped through her church on Friday evening. The fire, estimated to have caused $1 million in damages to the Wasilla Bible Church, has been labeled “suspicious” by James Steele, chief of the Central Mat-Su Fire Department.Read more of this story.
JOS, NIGERIA (ANS) — Compass Direct News has reported that the murderous rioting sparked by Muslim attacks on Christians and their property on Nov. 28-29 left six pastors dead, at least 500 other people killed and 40 churches destroyed, according to church leaders.More than 25,000 persons have been displaced in the two days of violence, according to the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA). Read more of this story.
LANSDOWNE, VIRGINIA / SAULT STE. MARIE, MICHIGAN (ANS) — Prison Fellowship Founder Chuck Colson has received the Presidential Citizens Medal from outgoing US President George W. Bush in an Oval Office ceremony at the White House.The award was created by President Richard Nixon in 1969 to recognize U.S. citizens “who have performed exemplary deeds of service for their country or their fellow citizens.” Read more of this story.
JERUSALEM — Once a year, usually just before Hanukkah and Christmas, a handful of Jerusalem postal workers leave their dreary letter-sorting station for a few hours and head to the Western Wall.Boxes in hand, they haul the thousands of letters addressed to "God, Jerusalem Israel," "the Almighty," or "the Wailing Wall," among others. At the wall, the second-holiest in Judaism after the adjoining Temple Mount, the workers separate by gender, going either to the men’s or women’s prayer sections. An arm’s length from the wall’s ancient stones, where dozens of people are deep in prayer, they carefully open the envelopes,…
Eight Christian fellowships on the campus of Harvard University are affiliated with (Madison-based) InterVarsity Christian Fellowship, three chapters for undergraduate students and five chapters for graduate students. Those chapters sponsored a campus mission with Anglican Bishop N.T. Wright in mid-November in order to invite the broader campus to a dialogue on the issues of faith, hope and changing the world for the better.Read more of this story.
COMMENTARYNewsweek magazine, one of the most influential news magazines in America, has decided to come out for same-sex marriage in a big way, and to do so by means of a biblical and theological argument. In its cover story for this week, "The Religious Case for Gay Marriage," Newsweek religion editor Lisa Miller offers a revisionist argument for the acceptance of same-sex marriage. It is fair to say that Newsweek has gone for broke on this question.Read more of this commentary.MORE VIEWS:GetReligion.orgChristianity Today
LONDON — A top Roman Catholic cleric in England has accused Disney of corrupting children, encouraging greed and turning its make-believe world into a latter-day pilgrimage site.Christopher Jamison, the abbot of Worth Abbey, in southern England, charges Disney with "exploiting spirituality" and helping to generate a culture of materialism while pretending to provide movie, book and theme park stories with a moral message.Read more of this story.
Two new Bibles targeting a young, hip — even secular — audience are hitting bookstores. One is a slick, illustrated version of the New Testament; the other is an environmentally friendly edition that takes advantage of the popularity of the green movement.Read more of this story.