News
Charonne and Kevin Ganiere never really pictured themselves as foster parents. They’d always talked about adopting, maybe when their two small sons were older. But they couldn’t envision bringing children into their lives, loving them as their own and then letting them go — back to their biological parents or an adoptive family. It just seemed too painful. That was then. Today, the Ganieres are parents to five children younger than 10, including three toddlers welcomed through the local foster care system, with no guarantees that they will be able to adopt them. Devout Christians, the Germantown couple see their…
Madison’s Brat Fest, billed as the World’s Largest Brat Fest, is growing into a regional Memorial Day attraction. Among the developments announced today was the addition of a Christian music stage for the 2014 festival and a Sunday morning commmunity worship service.Brat Fest director Tim Metcalfe met with about 50 local pastors and Christian business leaders for breakfast this morning and unveiled details of a number of developments that will make Brat Fest a much larger annual celebration for the Memorial Day weekend. Of highest interest was the connection to the mid-July Christian music festival that has been held at…
Thrivent Financial released its new logo Monday, dropping “for Lutherans” as the tradition-bound organization undergoes a seismic shift to open membership to all Christians. The updated logo also simplifies what was a twisting heart-shaped symbol to more clearly depict a red heart with a cross in it. The new tagline: “Connecting faith & finances for good.”
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.