The holiday is a rare opportunity in the religious calendar to reflect on death. By ROB MOLL Note: This article originally appeared Oct. 29, 2010, in The Wall Street Journal. For many churches this week, there won’t be any Styrofoam grave stones, skeletons or spooky signs of death and decay. Instead of morbid celebrations of… [Read more…]
November 4, 2010
Reuters reports that Christians in Iraq are being targeted by militants who seek their expulsion from the country. “With al-Qaeda declaring war on Christians in Iraq and no end to political instability in sight, Catholic experts on the Middle East fear the fate of the minority Christian community there will only worsen.” The country is… [Read more…]
November 3, 2010
Following Sunday evening Mass at Our Lady of Deliverance in Baghdad, a Roman Catholic church, a group of militants entered the church and after a standoff with police left 41 Christians, including 2 priests, dead Another 17 police and bystanders were also killed. The Associated Press reported: “It was a massacre in there and now they… [Read more…]
June 30, 2010
Women are at the forefront of one of the most fundamental transformations of the 21st century. For the first time in human history, the number of people older than 65 will be larger than those under age 5. Demographers say that the fastest growing age group is those older than 85. One study found that… [Read more…]
June 23, 2010
I first met Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove when I was reporting on the New Monastic movement for Christianity Today. At the time, he was just finishing up his first book while also participating in an intentional community, completing his divinity degree, and doing lots to organize the new monastics. Since then he’s written a number of books… [Read more…]
June 7, 2010
Listen in today at 5:10pm Eastern as Rob discusses “A Culture of Resurrection” on WORD-FM in Pittsburgh. Read more about developing a resurrection mindset in your church here.
March 9, 2010
Marge Schaffer is a nursing professor at Bethel University. As a Fulbright Scholar, she studied end of life issues among terminal patients in Norway. Schaffer is the author of Being Present: A Nurse’s Resource for End-of-Life Care. I spoke with Schaffer a couple years ago about how churches can better care for the elderly and… [Read more…]
March 7, 2010
The Third Meditation: Confined to the sick bed We’re proud that we don’t crawl around like animals, that we walk upright on two legs. We like to stand tall and think lofty thoughts. We may walk around proudly, as though we’re kings and queens, but it only takes a fever to land us flat on our backs.… [Read more…]
March 2, 2010
by Clarissa Moll As young girls, my sisters and I sang “Abide with Me” when performing Barbie funerals. With all of our Barbie dolls lined up in rows, we’d intone the most somber hymn we knew. It was a hymn sung at our church during sad occasions – the Challenger explosion and the bombing of the… [Read more…]
February 28, 2010
The Second Meditation: As the body begins to shut down When the young shepherd David approached king Saul, he knew who was in charge (I Samuel 16:14-23). Years later, when Mephibosheth, Jonathan’s crippled son, entered David’s chambers, he acknowledged David as king (2 Samuel 9:6). Nevertheless, David spoke face to face with Saul, and Mephibosheth… [Read more…]
November 19, 2010
0