Posts tagged Baptists
‘Souls To The Polls’: Harris Highlights Her Faith In Bid To Connect With Voters

With two weeks left until Election Day, Vice President Kamala Harris has made visiting churches an integral stop along the campaign trail, urging voters to cast early ballots as part of her “souls to the polls” campaign. The push comes as Harris attempts to motivate Black Christians who have traditionally been a part of the Democratic Party’s voter base.

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Post-Pandemic Church Revitalization In Full Swing Across The US

The pandemic was brutal on churches, but even the year before, the number of Protestant congregations in the U.S. had gone backward by approximately 1,500. The Southern Baptist Convention lost more than 1,000 churches in 2020, 2021 and 2022 each. Although the 2024 ACP survey also reported a loss, it was a significantly lower figure at 292.

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‘Hope For Springfield’: Churches And Civic Leaders Unite To Help Immigrants

Tensions rose in the Ohio city after the Republican presidential ticket spread claims on social media and during the presidential debate that immigrants in Springfield were eating people’s pets. Bomb threats forced the closure of city buildings, schools and hospitals. It also made the city the subject of national and international news for a week or more.

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📰 He’s Fired! No, He’s Not! Behind The Scenes Of The Week’s Craziest Religion Story 🔌

News doesn’t happen on a 9-to-5 schedule. Particularly during the 24/7 era of social media, journalists find themselves on the clock pretty much all the time.

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Missionary Explorers Search For Isolated People In The Amazon

“Our small Cessna bobbled lower and lower until its wheels made contact with the gravel runway, slicing through its many puddles,” Devon Faulkner wrote in a blog entry. After deplaning, Faulkner and his partner walked off the landing strip and into the jungle. Faulkner serves as a Project 3000 missionary explorer with the International Mission Board.

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Southern Baptist Disaster Relief Units Ramp Up In Response To Hurricane Beryl

Southern Baptist Disaster Relief units have deployed in and around Houston up into Texarkana in response to Hurricane Beryl, which made landfall early Monday morning, July 8. Units with the Southern Baptists of Texas Convention (SBTC), Texans on Mission, Arkansas and Alabama are providing meals, showers and chainsaw work to survivors.

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Southern Baptist Leaders Take Aim At RNC’s Potential Abortion Shift

A release of the Republican National Convention’s (RNC) platform reveals a potential shift in the party’s focus on a federal abortion ban. The announcement came hours after the RNC’s platform committee met on Monday.

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Cuban Christians’ Cry For Religious Freedom Comes As Pastor Lingers In Jail

The Alliance of Christians in Cuba (ACC) denounced the country’s human rights and religious freedom violations at its 2024 meeting, the third time it has done so since its 2022 founding and the latest in a string of such statements internationally. The ACC, a multi-denominational group of about 60 Christian leaders, called for the immediate release of religious prisoners and prisoners of conscience, the protected legal right for new churches to organize and function, and other rights included in Article 18 of the International Bill of Human Rights and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

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Ukraine Baptists Seek One-On-One Church Partnerships To Rebuild

The Ukraine Baptist Union grew from 900 churches to more than 2,000 within a decade or so, Bandura told Baptist Press, and amid the current war comprises 2,300 congregations. This time around, members hope individual Southern Baptist congregations will partner with Ukraine Baptist churches to help congregations rebuild after the war.

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Baptist Families Forced To Flee Homes And Churches In Mexico

Nearly 150 Baptists have fled their homes in Mexico after village leaders persecuted them because of their faith, cutting essential services and blocking entry, CSW reported. The 139 Great Commission Baptist Church members, residents of Coamila and Rancho Nuevo villages in Hidalgo, left their homes April 26 after village leaders cut off their electricity, vandalized and blocked access to some of their homes and the church, and posted guards at village entry points.

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LifeWise Academy Teaching The Bible During Public School Days Grows Nationally

LifeWise Academy founder Joel Penton was on Bluetooth, driving a vibrant red and yellow school bus fashioned into a camper, heading from Ohio with his wife and five school-age children to the newest academy sites in Arkansas, Tennessee and Georgia.

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Historic Texas Church Experiences Growth Through Evangelism

Mulberry Springs Baptist Church, about 15 miles northeast of Longview, doesn’t see a lot of traffic on a typical day. Yet the rural congregation, founded in 1892, is building a new worship space to seat nearly 800 people. Nearly two decades ago, attendance was a little over 100 and the discouraged congregation had moved back to its older, smaller meeting space. These days, the place is packed.

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Evangelicals Urge Biblical Response To Immigration Reform

Evangelicals’ nuanced views on immigration should encourage faith leaders to offer biblical responses to all concerns, key evangelical leaders said upon the release of a new Lifeway Research study sponsored by the Evangelical Immigration Table. Both the compassionate care of immigrants and border security rank high among evangelicals, the poll showed.

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📝 Jesus Didn't Lie On His Resume, But This Top Southern Baptist Official Did 🔌

This week’s Weekend Plug-in covers the resignation of a top Southern Baptist Convention official for lying on his resume. Plus, as always, catch up on all the best reads and top headlines in the world of faith.

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Touch, Prayer And The Role Of Clergy At Executions: SCOTUS Weighs Religious Freedom

(ANALYSIS) This week’s Weekend Plug-in highlights the upcoming U.S. Supreme Court hearing on a death row inmate’s spiritual rights at his execution. Plus, as always, catch up on all the week’s best reads and top headlines in the world of faith.

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The Oldest Black Church In Alabama Is Driving Voters To The Polls

St. Bartley Primitive Baptist Church is celebrating its 200-year anniversary as the first Black church in Alabama, a state that both played a big part in the Civil Rights movement and also continues to stir controversy around claims of voter suppression. The St. Barley’s congregation is weighing in on the presidential election by volunteering to drive members in need to the polls and encouraging them to vote.

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The real story of America's bloody struggle for religious freedom

We talked with Steven Waldman, founder of BeliefNet and author of the new book Sacred Liberty, about America’s battles for religious freedom— how the notion that the US was founded with religious liberty in mind is wrong— our current challenges for preserving it, and much more.

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