After a long delay, the Reformed Church in America’s General Synod meets this week. Charting a way through its gridlock over LGBTQ affirmation is on the agenda.
Church Worldwide
After 40 years of lapsed church attendance, Canadian singer-songwriter Bruce Cockburn found the church he ‘was waiting for’ and even a place in the worship band.
Across the United States, congregations like Immanuel Presbyterian Church are finding practical ways to partner with refugee resettlement agencies as they assist Afghan evacuees about to settle into new homes.
A letter from seven different Christian groups, including the Christian Reformed Church’s Office of Race Relations, supports the formation of a federal commission on historic Indian boarding school policy.
Governments in more than 80% of the represented countries harassed religious groups in some way, though use of force was less common, a new Pew study found.
Faced with declining revenues and empty buildings, some churches have looked for ways to make a virtue of unused space.
The popular hymn prompted a movement to revive congregational singing and launched the careers of songwriters Keith and Kristyn Getty.
The idea for an Indigenous Bible translation first came to Wildman nearly 20 years ago in the storeroom of the church he pastored on the Hopi Reservation in Arizona.
The ministry of Disability Concerns, a partnership of the Christian Reformed Church and the Reformed Church in America, featured speakers with a focus on inclusion in its 2021 training.
After a study by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and others estimated more than a million children orphaned as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, supportive agencies are calling Christians to action.
At its General Conference on July 9, the African Methodist Episcopal Church resolved to appoint a committee of 40 members to make recommendations to the denomination about matters of human sexuality, including how they relate to people who are LGBTQ.
The gathering’s organizers said the internationally focused event provides a rare example of bipartisan support in an era known for partisan rift.
“Officers in the Presbyterian Church in America must be above reproach in their walk and Christlike in their character. Those who profess an identity ... that undermines or contradicts their identity as new creations in Christ ... are not qualified for ordained office.”
A Lifeway Research study, which analyzed church data from 34 Protestant denominations and groups, found that 4,500 churches closed in 2019, while about 3,000 new congregations were started.
At its Covenant Annual Connection on June 25 the Evangelical Covenant Church became the latest Protestant denomination in the United States to repudiate the doctrine that provided a theological justification for the “discovery” and domination by European Christians of lands already inhabited by Indigenous peoples.
Justices of the U.S. Supreme Court have unanimously sided with a Catholic foster care agency that says its religious views prevent it from working with same-sex couples.
Religious colleges and universities that offer programming within correctional facilities have found ways to stay connected despite pandemic restrictions.
A 1957 plaque honoring missionaries Jim Elliot, Ed McCully, Nate Saint, Roger Youderian and Pete Fleming who were killed while attempting to share their Christian faith with the Waorani people in Ecuador contains language now seen as offensive.
Refugee resettlement groups say they welcome the announcement of an increase to the number of refugees allowed into the U.S. The cap is now 62,500 for the remainder of the federal fiscal year.
The Religious Exemption Accountability Project filed a lawsuit March 29. It says the Dept. of Education is complicit in “abuses and unsafe conditions thousands of LGBTQ+ students endure at hundreds of taxpayer-funded, religious colleges and universities.”
An estimated 5,000 people demonstrated in support of Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders on Sunday, in rallies organized in 14 American cities by the Asian American Christian Collaborative.
A Collaborative that formed just about a year ago denouncing anti-Asian racism at the outset of the COVID-19 pandemic, has released its second statement. “We call Christians and church leaders to make a clear and urgent response condemning this heinous act of hate.”
Passed by the U.S. House of Representatives on Feb. 25, the Equality Act aims to provide protection against discrimation for LGBTQ people, but many seek more clarity for protection of religious freedom within the anti-discrimination bill. The Equality Act is now before the Senate.
The Vatican’s orthodoxy office, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, issued a formal response Monday to a question about whether Catholic clergy can bless gay unions. They cannot.