Free Republic

Harold Camping, the California preacher who used his evangelical radio ministry and thousands of billboards to broadcast the end of the world and then gave up public prophecy when his date-specific doomsdays did not come to pass, has died at age 92. Family Radio Network marketing manager Nina Romero said Harold Camping, a retired civil engineer who built a worldwide following for the nonprofit, Oakland-based ministry he founded in 1958, died at his home on Sunday. She said he had been hospitalized after falling. Camping's most widely spread prediction was that the Rapture would happen on May 21, 2011. His...

OAKLAND, Calif. - The radio preacher who predicted "Judgment Day" would come in May 2011 has died in northern California. A statement released late Monday by his Family Radio network says Harold Camping "passed on to glory" at 5:30 p.m. PT Sunday. He was 92. The statement revealed Camping had a fall at his home November 30, but he was in weak health due to a stroke since 2011. Camping gained a national following through the Family Radio network of stations he helped found in 1959. He conducted daily on-air Bible studies and hosted a nightly "Open Forum" call-in show...

link only

Florida Megachurch Pastor Commits Suicide By Heather Sells CBN News Reporter Wednesday, December 11, 2013 News reports indicate that Florida megachurch founder Isaac Hunter has taken his life. Altamonte Springs police discovered Hunter's body Tuesday morning in his home, The Orlando Sentinel reported. Hunter, 36, founded Orlando's Summit Church. The non-denominational church eventually grew to five locations. He resigned from his role as lead pastor last year, after admitting to an affair. Hunter is the son of Joel Hunter, another megachurch pastor in Florida and spiritual advisor to the president. His death marks the second time this year that a...

 Jim Hinch argues in The American Scholar that evangelicalism is on decline in America. This thesis is not new. He’s accessing trends in polling data that evangelicals have been aware of for years. The article focuses on the demise of Robert Schuller and his Crystal Cathedral as a parable of what’s happening in evangelicalism writ large. Hinch then argues that Rob Bell’s flight from the pastorate and from his own megachurch is a leading indicator of where younger evangelicals are trending. In short, they’re leaving the movement. And in Bell’s case in particular, they’re leaving the church altogether. Hinch writes:Yet, like so many...

A Centerville pastor accused of child molestation was released on $25,000 bond Friday. The Houston County jail web site said that Wiley Leverett was released around 8 a.m. His attorney,William Noland, said Leverett will not make any public statements, but will return to work at Solid Rock Community Church and his auto dealership. "He'll be working and taking care of his family and his church," said Noland. "He denies all of the allegations against him, and he denies doing anything inappropriate with anyone. He's going to fight these charges in court." Leverett pleaded not guilty Thursday during a hearing before...

The unbelieving world will always do “cool” better than the Church. When the Church adopts coolness and relevance as its corporate values, it slavishly agrees to follow, lagging always one step behind the world. (This is why Christian music always ends up ripping off the sounds and styles of their secular counterparts, while Christian film always has a cheesy “cringe factor”).

<p>A United Methodist pastor was convicted Monday of breaking church law by officiating his son's same-sex wedding and could be defrocked after a high-profile trial that has rekindled debate over the denomination's policy on gay marriage.</p> <p>The Methodist church put the Rev. Frank Schaefer on trial in southeastern Pennsylvania, accusing him of breaking his pastoral vows by presiding over the 2007 ceremony in Massachusetts.</p>

A Pennsylvania pastor charged under United Methodist law with officiating his son's same-sex marriage is scheduled to go on trial. The Rev. Frank Schaefer, 51, could be defrocked.... "Public opinion has changed very rapidly," said the pastor's son.... ...Schaefer could have avoided a trial if he had agreed never again to perform a same-gender wedding, but he declined because three of his four children are gay.

'I'm not here to be preaching hate, pushing people down' God “absolutely” approves of everyone — including homosexuals — declared one of America’s most well-known evangelical pastors The Houston megapastor and best-selling author Joel Osteen, whose followers include the likes of Cher and Oprah Winfrey, is hitting the talk-show circuit to promote his new book, “Break Out! Osteen, the very visible face of Lakewood Church in Houston since 1999,  talked to the Huffington Post about his thoughts on prayer, the pope and the homosexual lifestyle. HuffPo Live host Josh Zepps quoted from Osteen’s new book: “It doesn’t matter who...

The pastor of a North Carolina megachurch has built a $1.7-million-dollar mansion for himself and his family which he told his congregation at Sunday's sermon is a 'gift from God.' Elevation Church Pastor Steven Furtick, 33, is unapologetic about his ostentatious new seven-and-a-half bathroom, 16,000-square-foot home built on 19 acres in Weddington. He spent the first part of his sermon talking about the controversy surrounding its construction and apologizing to his parishioners for any 'uncomfortable conversations,' they may have been forced to have about it.

Minor explained how he won a major grant – some $317,742 -- from the federal government, despite the fact that his church is small. “I applied for it.” His church has approximately 100 members. The church kitchen carries a sign reading, “No Fry Zone.” Minor said, “It’s a symbol, especially with people of color. You’ve got to rally around symbols.” Minor says he has built a network of 75 to 100 navigators and counselors to work the Obamacare system. “We feel like once you get people in churches and families, they will become de facto navigators,” Minor explained.

“He was telling me to get on the ground, but that's when I pulled my weapon and said, 'no, you get on the ground….I told him don’t move, put your face down on the ground, don’t even look at me right now. And I just told him ‘this is out of love,’” Sanders stated.

NORTH HAMPTON, Ohio — A self-described militant atheist with a criminal past faces multiple charges after an attack on a pastor who, after his sermon, had asked the man's girlfriend if she felt safe. James Maxie, 28, of Springfield, Ohio, is charged with second-degree felonious assault and misdemeanor resisting arrest after an incident Sunday at The Bridge Community Church in North Hampton. Police Chief Jarrod Campbell said in his 11 years with the department, he's rarely dealt with "an incident this brutal." The Rev. Norman Hayes, 57, said he feared for his life and begged for the attack to stop....

UPDATED AT 6:40 P.M. CLEVELAND,Ohio -- The Rev. James McGonegal,pastor of a West Side Cleveland Catholic church,was charged today with soliciting sex while being HIV-positive. He had been arrested Friday in Edgewater Park. In the incident report released today,an off-duty Cleveland Metroparks ranger said McGonegal offered the ranger $50 to help him “get off,” then exposed himself and masturbated,all while sitting inside his late-model Jeep SUV. The report said McGonegal had three sex devices in his Jeep when he was arrested around 12:45 p.m. The priest,68,was released on personal bond from Cleveland City Jail this morning other media reports said....

“It’s awfully hard to actually suggest abortion,” said Smith. “But, you know, I’m sure that, uh, in a case like this where the life expectancy is just, you know, is so bleak, and all, that I’m sure that the Lord would not condemn her if she went ahead and had an abortion at this early stage of the development of the fetus.”

(CHRISTIANITY TODAY) Chuck Smith, the evangelical pastor whose outreach to hippies in the 1960s helped transform worship styles in American Christianity and fueled the rise of the Calvary Chapel movement, died Thursday, Oct. 3, 2013, after a battle with lung cancer. He was 86. Diagnosed in 2011, Smith continued to preach and oversee administration at Calvary Chapel Costa Mesa (California), where he’d been pastor since 1965. In 2012, he established a 21-member leadership council to oversee the Calvary Church Association, a fellowship of some 1,600 like-minded congregations in the United States and abroad. Smith was known for expository preaching as...

Chuck Smith, the evangelical pastor whose outreach to hippies in the 1960s helped transform worship styles in American Christianity and fueled the rise of the Calvary Chapel movement, died Thursday, Oct. 3, 2013, after a battle with lung cancer. He was 86. Diagnosed in 2011, Smith continued to preach and oversee administration at Calvary Chapel Costa Mesa (California), where he'd been pastor since 1965. In 2012, he established a 21-member leadership council to oversee the Calvary Church Association, a fellowship of some 1,600 like-minded congregations in the United States and abroad.

A Louisiana pastor was shot to death while preaching in church, and the suspected gunman was arrested after surrendering to police, authorities said on Saturday. Woodrow Karey, 53, faces a charge of second degree murder in the slaying late on Friday of Pastor Ronald J. Harris Sr. at the Tabernacle of Praise Worship Center in Lake Charles, Louisiana, Calcasieu Parish Sheriff's Office spokeswoman Kim Myers said. Lake Charles is 190 miles west of New Orleans. Karey walked into the church, shot Harris twice with a shotgun and then fled, Myers said. About 50 to 60 people were in the church...

31 year old Brent Girouex was arrested on 60 counts of suspicion of sexual exploitation by a counselor or therapist. The former youth counselor told police he did it to “help with homosexual urges by praying while he had sexual contact with [them]." He claimed the acts would give his victims "sexual purity." Making matters even worse, Girouex has four children of his own and now his estranged wife Erin is speaking out against him now. Girouex admitted having sexual relations with at least four young men but as many as eight have now stepped forward claiming abuse. The man...