When countries are in turmoil or their people are impoverished, many choose, or are forced, to look for a better life, and so become refugees. Australia is an attractive place to seek refuge. Because we are an island nation, many refugees make the often dangerous journey by boat, and increasingly, many perish in the attempt. […]
“You can tell a lot about a place by the way they treat their own …. The way they treat their own deserters.” David Bridie, ‘The Deserters’ Statistics (see below) show that a significant number of people, active church members and apparently believers, are leaving their churches and in many cases leaving the faith. In […]
Mike has questioned the point of my last post (Christians and Chick-fil-a), about when and how christians should speak out in the public arena, and when and how we shouldn’t. So I thought I would clarify in a new post.
I read a news report today, in the wake of the horrifying cinema shootings in Denver, about statements made by members of the Westboro Baptist church. I don’t live in the US, so I don’t know a lot about this church, but the statements were hateful and insensitive to those mourning the trauma and loss […]
I’ve never used Twitter. I’m not really interested, and I doubt anyone would want to read my tweets anyway. But many christians use it, especially well-known ones – writers, leaders, entertainers and bloggers. But I’m beginning to wonder whether a lot of this christian tweeting is counter-productive.
In Barriers to belief I reported that the biggest barrier to non-believers was the many much-publicised cases of sexual abuse within the church. How should christians respond to this?
A short time ago, I posted on poverty and the growing world population (Christians and world poverty), and about the challenge of deciding how to respond (How much to save the world’s poor?). Let’s start with something small which most of us can do this week, or this year.
The past six years, I’ve spent a lot of time on the internet, making comments on blogs and discussing on forums. The two most common subjects I’ve discussed have been web design and God. The people I’ve met discussing web design have almost always been friendly and helpful. I wish I could say the same […]
A recent survey of American religion reveals some interesting facts Robert Putnam (Harvard) and David Campbell (Notre Dame) undertook extensive research of religious attitudes in the US, and late last year published the results of their research in American Grace: How Religion Divides and Unites Us. I haven’t read the book, but I’ve seen an […]
Felicity Dale at Simply Church has posted some interesting accounts in Does prayer make a difference? Two groups of christians prayed for non-believers, with very striking results: A church in the US identified 160 homes, and prayed for 80 of them for 90 days. Then they approached all homes with the offer to visit and […]