Monday, March 06, 2017

• WEEK OF PRAYER: Canadian pastor finds new flock with The Gathering

  by Jim Burton, posted Monday, March 06, 2017 (7 years ago)

  

  Photo by Gary Gnidovic/NAMB

  WINDSOR, Ontario (BP) -- John D'Antonio's family knew that his four-year battle with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), or Lou Gehrig's Disease, would soon be over. Many of his Italian-Canadian family and friends had gathered in his Windsor hospital room to say goodbye to the 30-year-old father and husband.

  Just before John's diagnosis four years earlier, his family had moved next door to Garth and Patty Leno. Leno was the pastor of one of Windsor's largest churches, and John's mother, Italian immigrant Elena, was a faithful member. On this most difficult of days, the family called Leno. Read More

• High court vacates pro-transgender ruling

  by Tom Strode, posted Monday, March 06, 2017 (7 years ago)

  

  Image: iStock/license purchase required

  WASHINGTON (BP) -- The U.S. Supreme Court set aside Monday (March 6) a ruling in favor of a transgender high school student and returned it to a lower court for reconsideration in light of the Trump administration's recent withdrawal of a directive issued under President Obama.

  The justices issued the order returning the case to the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond, Va., barely three weeks before they were to hear oral arguments in the matter. The arguments were scheduled for March 28. The high court's one-sentence order came after the Departments of Education and Justice ... Read More

• CP escrow study set to begin

  by David Roach, posted Monday, March 06, 2017 (7 years ago)

  

  Photo by Morris Abernathy

  NASHVILLE (BP) -- With an ad hoc committee of the Southern Baptist Convention Executive Committee set to begin its study of churches' escrowing Cooperative Program money, EC chairman Stephen Rummage says the study was occasioned in part by the notable volume of contacts the EC has received regarding the Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission. Read More

• Jack B. Johnson, last RTVC president, dies at 82

  by Art Toalston, posted Monday, March 06, 2017 (7 years ago)

  

  HENDERSON, Nev. (BP) -- Jack B. Johnson, the last president of the former SBC Radio and Television Commission, died Sunday (March 5) in Henderson, Nev. He was 82.

  Johnson was the RTVC's president from 1990-97, when the broadcast ministry became part the new North American Mission Board in a restructuring of the SBC.

  Before his election as RTVC president, Johnson had been executive director/treasurer of the Arizona Southern Baptist Convention for 11 years. Read More

• 'Preppers' event equips for catastrophe, eternity

  by Morgan Collier/Southern Baptist TEXAN, posted Monday, March 06, 2017 (7 years ago)

  

  Photo by Morgan Collier

  ORANGE, Texas (BP) -- Many may think of "preppers" as doomsday prophets who live off the grid with gas masks and a three-year supply of food rations waiting for the apocalypse. However, one Southeast Texas church sees value in emergency preparedness while using this niche as a mission field among the "preppers" community.

  Little Cypress Baptist Church in Orange, Texas, hosted their seventh annual "Crisis Preparation and Sustainable Living Expo" Feb. 18 to train members of the community on planning for natural disasters or major catastrophes, while also ... Read More

• Attack on religious liberty focus of NRB panel

  by Tom Strode, posted Monday, March 06, 2017 (7 years ago)

  

  ORLANDO, Fla. (BP) -- Three clients of Alliance Defending Freedom described their battles for religious liberty March 2 at National Religious Broadcasters' convention, Proclaim 17, in Orlando. A wedding cinematographer, preschool director, and former fire chief shared about their legal efforts in a public policy session sponsored by ADF at the Orlando World Center Marriott.

  Their cases and others likely will determine the future of religious freedom in America, ADF Senior Counsel Erik Stanley told the audience. Read More

• FIRST-PERSON: Fresh perspective

  by Jeff Iorg, posted Monday, March 06, 2017 (7 years ago)

  Jeff Iorg recounts a young Asian woman's gratitude to God despite the challenges and sorrow she has faced -- an outlook that "jolted me to a new level of gratitude and appreciation for God's blessings." Read More