Free Republic

A few months ago we looked at a survey that showed that the vast majority of Americans have no idea whatsoever what percentage of the population is gay.Mainstream studies indicate that percentage is somewhere in the low single digits, but Americans believed — on average — that 25 percent of the population is gay. Yes, 25 percent. This includes data showing that 35 percent of Americans think that more than 25 percent of the population is gay.I’ve long wondered why it is that Americans are so wrong on this, but I can’t help but think that the mainstream media plays...

Islamic extremists have attacked an Anglican Church in Mardan Pakistan and an adjoining school. Some believe the stimulus was the government announced day of protest against an anti-Islam film. The attack occurred on Sept. 21. According to a news release from the British Pakistani Christian Association (BPCA), protesters set the church and school on fire and looted the premises, taking everything from computers to chairs and whatever else seemed valuable from the school. The BPCA said that Muslims desecrated Bibles and religious artefacts, especially many of which were used in ceremonies within the Anglican church. Many were brought out into...

The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America officially allows homosexual marriages, so says the “number two man” in the denomination, David Swartling. At the 2012 Southwestern Washington Synod Assembly it has been reported that, “(I)n response to a query from the floor of the assembly, Secretary of the ELCA David Swartling, at the assembly as the representative of the national church, said that the marriage of same-gender couples in states where that was legal was neither endorsed nor precluded by ELCA policy. Marriage in those circumstances was at the discretion of pastors and congregations.” (read here) One of the duties of...

Violence in Egypt, Libya, elsewhere condemned by ELCA presiding bishop 12-62-MRC CHICAGO (ELCA) -- In letters to Coptic Orthodox, Islamic and Muslim leaders across the United States, the Rev. Mark S. Hanson, presiding bishop of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA), denounced the hate video "Innocence of Muslims" and shared his commitment to speak against the violence and hate demonstrations that have erupted in Egypt, Libya and elsewhere. In his Sept. 19 letters, Hanson expressed sadness about what has unfolded in recent days, especially the tragic deaths of Ambassador Christopher Stevens and others. He lifted up the importance of...

Ellen Painter Dollar extends an invitation to young evangelicals exhausted and frustrated by their community: While I am sympathetic to those who wish to bring reforms, of feminist and other natures, to the evangelical movement, I also want to remind those who are fed up with how women and their voices are welcomed (or not) in evangelical churches, publications, and conversations that there are many churches (that is, movements, denominations, and congregations) where women and other marginalized groups (such as LGBT Christians) donÂ’t have to fight for respect, equality, and a voice. I think many frustrated evangelicals would be amazed...

According to some people, the state of Missouri last week began a determined slide back to the “Dark Ages.” The Dark Ages of 2011, that is. The legislature overrode a veto by Gov. Jay Nixon of Senate Bill 749, which exempts employers from providing reproductive services to their employees on the basis of religious scruples. The vote was decisive: 109-45 in the House and 26-6 in the Senate. Here’s the key paragraph of the summary of the bill: “No employer, health plan provider, health plan sponsor, health care provider, or any other person or entity shall be compelled to provide...

A local church will close its doors after a final worship service on Sept. 30, less than two years away from its 100th anniversary. Oakland Presbyterian will join at least 28 other mainline protestant churches that have been disbanded or consolidated in Clark County since 1980, according to data from the Association of Religious Data Archives. The loss of mainline protestant congregations in Clark County mirrors trends at the national level, where rolls dropped by more than 7 million members between 1980 and 2010. Gloria Sesslar has been a member of the Oakland congregation since 1980. She said many current...

TOWAOC — It’s been 19 years since Bud Rousset began ministering to members of the Ute Mountain Ute tribe. But the ministering goes both ways, as Rousset (pronounced Roo-say) would say. He conducts services at 6 p.m. on Wednesdays and Sundays at the Ute Mountain Presbyterian Church in Towaoc. Rousset, 62, is actually a United Methodist pastor. He was invited to minister on the Ute Mountain Ute Reservation by the tribe and his church organization’s regional presbytery back in 1993. “I believe in eternal glory, but I’ve also learned about ‘redemptive moments,’” he said. Once a young girl came to...

Preaching magazine editor Michael Duduit takes on the challenging task of naming the most important preachers from the recent past. When Preaching magazine was launched in 1985, a look at our list of contributing editors gave you a sense of who would be listed among the most influential preachers in America. That original group included Stuart Briscoe, Maxie Dunnam, Jim Henry, David Allan Hubbard, John Huffman, D.E. King, James Earl Massey, Calvin Miller, Lloyd John Ogilvie, Stephen F. Olford, Haddon Robinson, J. Alfred Smith, John Wesley White and William Willimon, along with several more.Thankfully, many of those preachers are still...

Mitt Romney has an evangelical problem. Or so we’ve been told by everyone from The New Yorker to The Huffington Post to The Daily Beast. The national media have perpetuated this narrative throughout the election season, and political pundits aplenty have assumed its reliability in their columns and commentary. But there’s one glaring problem with the storyline: It’s not true. [SNIP] There are at least two explanations for why Romney’s Mormonism matters so little among this powerful voting bloc. First, evangelicals seem to care more about political ideology than orthodox theology as far as voting is concerned. Polls show that...

On a small so-called Lutheran college campus in northern Minnesota, a national battle for the soul of America is being played out in microcosm. In response to the left’s cancer that has plagued America’s institutions, where fealty to leftist Pagan values is now a virtue, and the hostile intolerance of all other values a requirement, a courageous young lady has decided to lay down her own very small gauntlet against the oppressive and Orwellian indoctrination of the left. In her world, that indoctrination starts early, via the insidious and not-so-subtle “Coming Out” week, where Pagan propaganda is not only celebrated,...

There have been 16 public polls conducted in swing states within the last week and there is an alarming statistic, consistent in all the polls regardless of the pollster party bias, that should have the Romney camp more than a little worried and possibly perplexed. The numbers are clear that self-described conservatives are not supporting Governor Romney in sufficient numbers to win the election. Additionally there is anecdotal evidence that Evangelicals and Tea Party supporters are not embracing the Romney-Ryan ticket at levels that would be expected. Looking at the crosstabs of the polls conducted in Colorado, Florida, New Hampshire,...

This tablebelow is based on interviewing conducted Aug. 1-Sept. 16 among registered voters. I’m using this large sample period in order to get adequate sample size of some of the smaller religious groups. Jewish and Mormon voters, for example, are just about 2% of the population each, with “other non-Christian” identifiers coming in at about 3%. This expanded period of interviewing means, of course, that any shifts as a result of recent news events -- such as those in the Middle East -- would only be minimally reflected in these data. [SNIP] Protestants (basically those who identify with a Christian...

According to Grey Matter Research, Americans think our country is far more religiously diverse than it actually is. In a survey of 747 adults the research and consulting firm found that most underestimated the size of Christianity and over-estimated the size of atheists, Muslims, and other religious minorities. “The typical American adult pegs religious affiliation in the U.S. as follows:  24% Catholic, 20% Protestant, 19% unaffiliated, 9% Jewish, 9% atheist or agnostic, 7% Muslim, 7% Mormon, and 5% from all other religious groups. In reality, according to the 2008 U.S. Religious Landscape Survey from the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life, Americans...

It’s been five years in the making and this morning the Cathedral of the Incarnation in Orlando, Florida will become Catholic.At a Mass of Reception at 10:15 a.m. Sunday, September 16, the Cathedral of the Incarnation, which was formerly associated with the Anglican Church of America, will become the Parish of Incarnation—joining about twenty other former Anglican or Episcopal congregations to be accepted in the Personal Ordinariate of the Chair of St. Peter, the personal ordinariate established as a home for Anglican converts to Catholicism in the US and Canada.Monsignor Jeffrey N. Steenson, a former Episcopal bishop who now leads...

There shall be circumstantial differences in exchanges between the Holy Ones now and in this convening ALL things shall be made "NEW" in that a "ONENESS" shall be "Made Known" and become obvious to ALL in TRUE UNITY of and for The Kingdom of Heaven on Earth . John 5:32 New King James Version (NKJV) 32 There is another who bears witness of Me, and I know that the witness which He witnesses of Me is true.

A recently released study by a Christian research organization shows that most churchgoers do not read or study the Bible on a daily basis. The findings of the Transformational Discipleship Assessment released by LifeWay Research noted that 19 percent of respondents report reading or studying the Bible outside of church "every day." By contrast, 36 percent of respondents said that they either engage the Bible "once a week," "once a month," or "a few times a month." Eighteen percent reported rarely or never reading or studying the Bible outside of worship. Scott McConnell, director of LifeWay Research, told The Christian...

Hobby Lobby Stores, Inc., a privately held retail chain with 22,500 employees led by a Christian family, filed a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Oklahoma, opposing the Health and Human Services "preventive services" mandate, the company announced Wednesday. The company becomes the largest and only non-Catholic-owned business to file a lawsuit against the government's contraception mandate. The company's CEO and founder, David Green, said Wednesday that the mandate would force the Christian-owned-and-operated business to provide, without co-pay, the "morning after pill" and "week after pill" in their health insurance plan, or face crippling fines...

Pittsburgh Presbytery is poised to vote on a plan that would allow congregations to leave the Presbyterian Church (USA) with their buildings if they first engage in an open discernment process and negotiate a settlement with the presbytery. [SNIP] Over the past decade the Presbyterian Church (USA) has lost 195 theologically conservative congregations in disputes over biblical interpretation and sexual morality. Up to 600 are estimated to be in process to follow them, according to The Presbyterian Lay Committee, a conservative group. The denomination has 1.9 million members in 11,000 congregations. In 2007 Pittsburgh Presbytery lost three congregations to the...

Profound changes are about to come upon My Bride and body of Christ in a universal manner as never before . Worship shall ascend to a higher level "and must" to continue the work of the Gospel and to implement Kingdom Regime as My Father has intended it to be " on Earth as it IS in Heaven " for the Latter Rain is about to descend and ascend together "AS ONE" in places I ordain "as the Body of Christ " and it shall flow "AS ONE BODY" no matter where My Children reside and nothing I say "NOTHING"...