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-Baylor survey finds millions of Americans don't identify strongly with one denomination- Bill Daniel says he would "never in a million years" identify himself as a Baptist. The 50-year-old CEO and his wife attend Lake Hills Church, a fast-growing, high-energy congregation in West Austin focused on evangelism and a strong relationship with Christ. But even though Lake Hills has a nondenominational feel, it's technically a Southern Baptist church — a detail Daniel didn't notice until about a year after he started worshipping there. "I wouldn't say I'm a Southern Baptist," he said. "I would say I'm a Christian." Daniel is...

by Fr. Paul Scalia Other Articles by Fr. Paul Scalia Truth or Consequences 08/26/06 Our Lord’s beautiful Bread of Life discourse does not end on a happy note. In response to His teaching, many “of [His] disciples who were listening said, ‘This saying is hard; who can accept it?’” (Jn 6:60). It is the only instance in the Gospels of people rejecting our Lord’s teaching in such large numbers. “Many of His disciples returned to their former way of life and no longer accompanied Him” (Jn 6:66). They left because they could not accept our Lord’s teaching on the Eucharist. More...

VATICAN CITY, JULY 20, 2006 (Zenit.org).- Here is the report "Catholics and Pentecostals: A Historical Overview," by Father Juan Usma Gómez, official of the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity. *** An April 2005 meeting in Los Angeles, U.S.A., commemorated the first centenary of the Pentecostal Movement. The chronicles recount that at the beginning of the 20th century, a group of believers was expelled from the Second Baptist Church of Los Angeles because of its constant insistence on the need for a spiritual revival. The search for these revivals, a practice that has been more or less widespread in Protestant...

The National Council of Churches' have just reported church membership for the 2006 yearbook. It's quite an interesting picture: The Catholic Church is the largest and numerically fastest growing church in America, with 67.8 million members, a growth of about 563,000 members. Many non-denominational churches, not listed in the report, have been growing rapidly in the recent past. Proportionally, the fastest growing church in America is the Assemblies of God, (10th largest) growing at a 1.81% rate, by adding 50,000 members. That's over twice the growth rate of the Catholic church, but 1/10th of the increase in members of the...

Dear Friend,“You will be like God, knowing good and evil.”1 Surely that is a lofty and commendable ideal—to be like God. How could there be anything wrong with that? Yet in the mouth of Satan—manifesting himself in the form of a serpent—it enticed Adam and Eve into a disaster, the evil consequences of which have affected all their descendants. What was the undetected snare to which Adam and Eve fell prey? It was the motive—unstated,but implied—the promise of independence. Once you know good and evil, you will be free to make your own decisions. You will no longer be dependent on...

Ok all, I need some help....please advise

I have a question - If there are more than 500 Christian denominations in America alone, and thousands of religions and truths throughout the world...how can humanity ever survive? Even Jesus once said that a kingdom divided cannot stand. What is the goal of religion? How can one people believe they alone are God's children? And why do we exploit the poor for ideaology? I have discovered a major key to why we are all divided. Besides the interpretation of texts which I do not encourage, but also the grand scheme behind confusion...the author of sin. Let us all decide...

Guest Column: Politics, religion work better sans parties, sects Samuel G. Dawson John Kanelis, in his excellent March 20 column, "Donkeys, elephants not allowed at City Hall," declares that partisan politics doesn't belong in city government or the election of judges, tax assessor, county clerk, etc., because all these offices deal with "the nuts and bolts of what's good for the residents." At the conclusion, he states with no evidence whatsoever that "partisanship has its place on Capitol Hill or on Congress Avenue." Why is federal partisanship acceptable? Is it because the federal government deals with matters less important that...

"Jesus And Religious Confusion"Sewell Hall  When God gave His law by Moses to Israel, He made no provision for the division of His people into sects and parties. But by the time Jesus came into the world, division was well entrenched. There were the Pharisees, the Sadducees, the Essenes, and doubtless others. It was assumed that all who were serious about religion would be associated with one of these. But to which of these parties did Jesus belong? Of course, He belonged to none of them. He maintained His independent, non-sectarian relationship with God to the very end. For this...

I think President Bush's use of "coalitions of the willing" as a replacement for rigid treaties and lines of demarcation between allies and enemies makes an interesting application to our Christian cooperation with each other. This is particularly true in the sense that modern believers in Christ have factionalized themselves with their own rigid and outdated creedal "treaties," whether written or unwritten.

The following list is useful, but there there are some difficulties with it. The short reviews are a handy reference, especially on some of the early heresies. The author does not seem to be a friend of catholicism, and I'm sure the Romans Catholics will reject his explanation of their history, but the other categories outweighed his few snide comments, imo. Phase I: to 1054 The first phase begins with the church as founded by the Apostles to the end of the "catholic" church in the division of 1054. A large number of the denominations that began in this period...

Due to popular request and to the ongoing distortion of figures from uninformed Roman Catholic apologists writing on this issue, I am posting the following excerpt from my forthcoming book, Upon This Slippery Rock (Calvary Press, 2002). Throughout this book we have examined the Roman Catholic apologist’s primary argument against sola Scriptura and Protestantism; namely, that sola Scriptura produces doctrinal anarchy as is witnessed in the 25,000 Protestant denominations extant today. We have all along assumed the soundness of the premise that in fact there are 25,000 Protestant denominations; and we have shown that—even if this figure is correct—the Roman...

There's a debate amongst some church denominations over a possible U.S. war against Iraq. The nation's two largest Protestant denominations are on opposing sides. It's not just Congress that's struggling with the question of whether or not to attack Iraq and remove Saddam Hussein from power. The same debate is going on in the Church. Most of us have heard the catch phrase, "What Would Jesus Do?" When it comes to removing the Iraqi leader, some factions of the Church are split. Jim Winkler, a spokesman for the United Methodist Church, said his church's position is that Jesus would be...

What Church Should Be Constitutionally Separated from the State?Samuel G. Dawson This article examines the meaning of the word "church" in the phrase "separation of church and state." It is a particularly timely subject because of movements to restrict the expression of religion and morality in our society based on the "Constitutional Separation of Church and State." Examples of these ever-increasing restrictions are the recent 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ruling that the pledge of allegiance to the flag of the United States is unconstitutional because the words "under God" violates the separation of church and state. Earlier the same...