We believe Protestant churches are safer. We are wrong.

I know this from personal experience.

Both my youth minister and pastor sexually abused me in my Southern Baptist church near Birmingham, Ala., in the mid 1980s, trapping me with spiritual threats and intimidation.

The lack of concern in Protestant churches rests on the faulty logic that, by virtue of not having a celibate priesthood, Protestants are more protected than our Catholic friends.

This helps pave the wide road by which predatory ministers, staff members, volunteers and members within Protestant churches groom and abuse children.

These abusers are like the Old Testament god Molech, lying in wait with a rapacious hunger for the sacrifice of both children's innocence and their trust in God.

Unchecked crimes of sexual abuse in the Protestant church include red flags and shrugged shoulders that kill the spirit of young believers and damage the cause of Christ.

My youth minister began sexually abusing me when I was 14, after telling me that God was "calling" me to help him in his ministry.

He groomed me, abused me and threatened me for over a year.

When I could not tolerate the abuse any longer, I went to the only other person at my church that I thought could help — my pastor.

My pastor blamed me, fired my youth minister and began abusing me.

The church fired him after discovering his affair with my Sunday School teacher.

These staggering crimes went unreported because of the chokehold of fear the two men held on my life. B

oth men, Molechs themselves, moved on to work in paid, full-time positions at other Southern Baptist churches for years.

With the #metoo and #churchtoo movements in the forefront, the Southern Baptist Convention has moved to try to prevent these crimes.

In June 2019, at its annual meeting in Birmingham, the nation's largest Protestant denomination voted to change its constitution to expel churches that do not report abuse.

It also unveiled the report of the SBC Sexual Abuse Advisory Group, in which I wrote an opening statement. I also told my story during a panel discussion with SBC leaders.

The SBC also rolled out a free curriculum, Caring Well, intended to equip its 47,000 churches to recognize abuse, report predators and care for those who have been abused.

These are first steps to slay the Molechs in our midst.

Yet the danger remains. Recent reports, such as by the SBC advisory group and the series on sexual abuse in the Houston Chronicle, found that sexual predators are drawn toward Protestant churches, especially smaller, less-resourced ones. Continue reading

• Image: Premier

Then again, you may not be welcome to do so, or you could find yourself simply unsure.

This confusing situation, created by a proposed change to the tradition that the Catholic Eucharist was "for Catholics only," leaves German Catholicism caught between its majority's desire for a relaxation of the rules — a view shared by Pope Francis — and the limits to change in the world's largest church.

In February, the German Catholic bishops approved draft guidelines for priests on when they may distribute Catholic Communion to Protestants attending Mass, signaling a new openness.

But the guidelines immediately sparked a tussle between reformers and conservatives and surprising flip-flops from the Vatican.

Since then, some dioceses have reflected the new attitude toward inter-Communion on their official websites.

Other churches hardly post even a passing reference to it. Meanwhile, a debate has gripped the country's Catholic Church, exacerbated by mixed signals from the Vatican.

The question of inter-Communion, which hardly arises in many other countries, is a recurrent one in Germany.

The country's Christians are almost evenly divided between Catholics and Protestants (mostly Lutherans), and many marriages cross denominational boundaries.

As a result, many German Protestants already receive Communion with their Catholic spouses, often with the agreement of their parish priest.

They do so discreetly, however, because the Vatican seemed opposed to it and because many church leaders fear that officially condoning individual exceptions could be a slippery slope toward full doctrinal change.

Apparently Catholicism's ecumenical principles and their inclusive understanding of the church … are still foreign to some people 50 years after the Second Vatican Council," complained Bishop Gerhard Feige, the bishops conference delegate for ecumenical relations and a co-author of the guidelines.

Pope Francis has taken a more flexible approach to interpreting Catholic canon law than his conservative predecessors and has made better relations with other Christians a priority.

Thinking the time was right to tackle the issue, the German bishops conference — led by Munich Cardinal Reinhard Marx, a senior papal adviser — drew up a 38-page "pastoral guide" meant to help priests lead mixed couples to a solution.

The Protestant spouse must share the Catholic understanding of Jesus Christ's real presence in the Eucharist — to which Lutheran doctrine is close — and be in "severe spiritual distress" by being excluded from it, it said.

A large majority of the bishops present — 47 out of 60 — voted in February to publish the document, titled "Walking with Christ —  Tracing Unity," in the near future.

A month later, seven dissenting bishops led by Cologne Cardinal Rainer Maria Woelki asked the Vatican to rule whether the guidelines violated Catholic doctrine and the unity of the worldwide church. Continue reading

• Image: RNS

According to draft guidelines approved by the German Bishops' Conference in February, Protestant spouses may receive Communion after making a "serious examination of conscience".

The Bishops' Conference says they must also affirm "the faith of the Catholic Church", and wish to end "serious spiritual distress" and a "longing to satisfy hunger for the Eucharist". Read more

The US$500 million museum's aim is to entertain and educate visitors about the Bible's history and significance.

Cardinal Donald Wuerl, the Israeli Ambassador to the United States and the museum's co-founder, evangelical businessman Steve Green, were at the opening.

Wuerl spoke on behalf of Pope Francis.

Through Wuerl, Francis sent his "fervent hope that ... through its extensive collections and exhibits [the museum] will promote a better understanding ... of the rich and complex history of the biblical text".

He hoped the "enduring power of the museum's message" would "inspire and shape the lives of individuals and peoples of every time and place."

Francis also said he hoped that through engaging with scholars of various traditions the museum would help advance inter-religious understanding and cooperation.

Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu also sent a message.

He said "the Jewish people are known as the people of the book because of the centrality of the Hebrew Bible in our faith, our history, and our lives.

"Our roots in the land of Israel as described in the holy scriptures stretch back nearly 4,000 years, but it was only 70 years ago after millennia of exile that we were finally able to reconstitute our nation and home at the Holy land..."

"...By featuring Jewish, Protestant, Catholic and other faith traditions, the museum highlights our shared values and beliefs as well as the history and development of the Judeo-Christian culture over the centuries."

The Israeli Association for Antiquities sent a number of artifacts including a large stone from the Western Wall in Jerusalem.

Visitors are encouraged to touch the stone.

A whole floor includes an interactive exhibit featuring "The World of Jesus of Nazareth".

It includes replicas of homes and what food in Nazareth might have looked like in the time of Jesus.

Although the museum is supposed to be non-sectarian, there are few Arabic script exhibits apart from temporary items on loan from Jerusalem.

One of the permanent features in Arabic is a translation of a psalm engraved on a window.

It is set alongside 15 other panels in various languages in the entrance's main atrium.

There are also a couple of texts in Judeo-Arabic, varieties of Arabic spoken by Jews and written in the Hebrew script.

Arabic's absence elsewhere - including the 10-language digital guide - has raised questions about the museum's goals and target audience.

Source

• Town Hall
• The Atlantic
• Aljazeera
• Catholic News Service
• Image: Our Community Now at DC

For most of Church history, worshipers stood during the celebration of Mass.

There did exist a few scattered benches for the elderly to sit on, but in general the nave of the church was entirely void of places to sit.

This made practical sense, especially when kneeling became a common posture of the laity.

Additionally, in medieval churches the pulpit was typically placed in the middle of the church, apart from the sanctuary.

This meant the laity had to physically walk over to the pulpit to listen to the priest's very brief homily.

There was so much movement during Mass that no one, including the priest, ever had a chance to sit down.

Protestants introduced church pews

Pews were essentially non-existent until the Protestant Reformation.

In most Protestant churches the emphasis during worship services was not the many liturgical movements, but the sermon given by a preacher.

The interpretation of the Bible by the local pastor was a chief focus of Protestant liturgies and led to long discourses at the pulpit.

Pews were gradually introduced over time and were especially popular in English churches.

On account of the expensive nature of pews, individuals and families would purchase pews and guard them with their lives.

In some cases they even constructed "pew boxes" to protect them, locking them up so that nobody else could use them. Unfortunately there even arose various legal battles over pews as individuals regarded their seats as personal property.

With the advent of pews, homilies became longer in Catholic churches.

Later on when churches could afford the installation of pews, they still relied on parishioners for additional income and began to "rent" pews.

This practice was brought over to the United States from England and was adopted by the Catholic Church.

Pew rentals were very common in Catholic churches and even authorised by the Third Council of Baltimore as a type of fundraiser.

Catholics, primarily in England and the United States, introduced pews in their churches after Protestants started using them.

Homilies became longer in Catholic churches and sitting was more common during various parts of the Mass. Continue reading

• Philip Kosloski is a husband and father of five, and staff writer at Aleteia. He also writes for The Pope's Worldwide Prayer Network (Apostleship of Prayer).

That's because the Anglicans and Presbyterians had their St Andrew's Awatere Christian Joint Venture Church, in Seddon, destroyed by the jolt.

And, in the spirit of Christianity, the Catholic community opened their doors to their wandering neighbours.

Awatere Christian Joint Venture committee chairman Rob Cameron said the two religions had always been comfortable together in the Awatere.

"Out there, community is stronger than denomination," he said. "It's been really helpful for us, if we didn't have that place, we would be moving around every week. The Catholics worship at 8am and have a cup of tea after their service. We join them for that and when they go home, we have our worship."

The committee was still waiting on an engineer's report to see if their church would be salvaged or demolished, Dr Cameron said.

"It's [still] out of bounds but that's how we came to worship with the Catholics. It's very harmonious and celebrated on both sides."

Dr Cameron was speaking at a church service for former Awatere and Flaxbourne residents in Blenheim last week.

They hold an annual service to keep up-to-date with life in the region.

Dr Cameron showed the group a slideshow of quake-damaged buildings, including the Awatere Christian Joint Venture church.

Former vicar Miriam Taylor held the service at the Church of Nativity and said the new relationship between Catholics and Protestants was a wonderful outcome of the earthquake.

"There has always been a wonderful unity of spirit between the churches anyway but this has been particularly special," Reverend Taylor said. "It's sad to see the church like that but it reminds people that the church is not the building, the church is the people."

Source:

• Stuff.co.nz
• Image: Stuff.co.nz

"Protestants can be very arrogant when pointing to Catholics," said Boz Tchividjian, a grandson of evangelist Billy Graham and executive director of Godly Response to Abuse in the Christian Environment (GRACE).

Too many Protestant institutions have sacrificed souls in order to protect their institutions, he said. "We've got the Gospels backwards."

Continue reading

Imagine you arrived at an unfamiliar church just as the service was starting and you heard: "Almighty God, unto whom all hearts be open, all desires known, and from whom no secrets are hid…" Right, you'd think, CofE, Book of Common Prayer.

But this is the beginning of a Catholic Mass, a Roman Catholic Mass.

It is a liturgy approved by the Pope, and it takes lumps of the Holy Communion service from the 1662 Prayer Book. I find the general effect pleasing but distinctly unsettling.

Two questions arise, depending on the direction from which one is coming. A member of the Church of England might wonder why Catholics should want to use the Book of Common Prayer compiled by Archbishop Cranmer (pictured here in 1546). A Catholic might ask: but is it the Mass?

The Catholics who already use it were once Anglicans and, since the beginning of 2011, have joined the Ordinariate of Our Lady of Walsingham. About 80 have been ordained priests, and there are more than 1,000 lay people. Not many.

It is remarkable that the Vatican should have approved the service. (This is not technically a rite. It is, I think, a "use" of the Roman rite.) But on the question of its validity, it is to be noted that the "Eucharistic Prayer" is not the one in the Book of Common Prayer. It is a translation of the Roman Canon, but a different one from that in force in Catholic parish churches. Continue reading

Samoa's motto says: "Samoa is founded on God" and the locals' strong religious beliefs are etched everywhere in day-to-day life.

Christianity was informally introduced to the islands by travellers in the late 1700s. When Methodist missionary Peter Turner arrived there in 1828 he discovered there were already Methodists on the islands.

Methodists had established a mission in Tonga and the religion had spread to Samoa.

John Williams of the London Missionary Society arrived at Sapapalii on his ship Messenger of Peace in 1830 with eight teachers. Hymn and prayer books were then printed in Samoan and in 1848 the first Samoan version of the New Testament was published. This was followed by the Old Testament in Samoan seven years later.

In 1848 two French Catholic priests established followers in the village of Sale'aula and this has been followed by many other denominations.

And the missionary work continues - young Mormons regularly cross the islands on their bikes - fully rigged out in their usual sartorial splendour.

Church attendance is very high - some estimate up to 95 per cent of the Samoan people are regular churchgoers. Sundays on the islands are special, with the locals seen walking to and from their churches - often wearing white to represent purity and clutching their Bible.

I slipped into one of these services at a church in Fagali'i-Tai, about 5km east of Apia. There didn't seem to be any strict timetable of worship and people seemed to be arriving at all different times, but I got lots of big Samoan smiles of welcome.

Another Kiwi tourist who was drawn into a church service by the beautiful singing was treated to a sermon translated into English - the pastor did it especially for her. Continue reading

Sources

• Robyn Yousef in The New Zealand Herald
• Image: Everywhere

Robyn Yousef is an Auckland writer.

In Andrei Molodkin's "Catholic Blood" exhibition, freshly donated human blood from a pharmaceutical refrigerator is pumped through a replica of the rose window adorning the façade of the British Houses of Parliament.

In an adjoining room in Londonderry art gallery is a similar acrylic sculpture with a replica of the rose window at Westminster Abbey.

Molodkin, who sees the rose windows as Protestant symbols, created the sculptures specifically for the context of Derry and Northern Ireland.

He describes his works as a commentary on the Catholic Relief Act of 1829 and a clause of the British constitution that forbids a member of Parliament who is a Catholic from advising the sovereign on ecclesiastical matters.

The artist says this implies that no British prime minister could ever be Catholic — an interpretation disputed by an expert in constitutional affairs, Dr Bob Morris of University College London.

"Yes, but there have been no Catholic prime ministers," Molodkin responds. "Perhaps when we talk about it, we will get one."

Molodkin, who describes himself as a utopian thinker, formerly served in the Soviet Army, delivering oil and transporting missiles in Siberia.

During this time he began sketching with military-issue ballpoint pens. Now he still uses ballpoint pens to make precise drawings on gigantic canvases.

His work has been exhibited in several major art museums in Europe and the United States, and in 2009 he represented his country in the Russian pavilion at the Venice Biennale.

Sources:

BBC

Demotix

Derry-Londonderry

Image: BY Gallery

Catholic and Protestant churches formed the Christian Association of Nigeria to promote Christian unity and to speak with one voice on national issues.

Catholic leaders have now decided to pull out because they believe the current president, Ayo Oritsejafor, a Pentecostal pastor, has made the association too cosy with the government and too confrontational with Muslims in response to continuing attacks on Christians.

In a letter listing their grievances, the Catholic bishops alleged that the association was "being dragged into partisan politics, thereby compromising its ability to play its true role as conscience of the nation and voice of the voiceless".

They also alleged that the association's interfaith mission was "not given a priority attention to promote peace and unity in the nation", but instead the organisation was being used as "an army put in place to defend Christians against Muslims".

Catholic bishops have also accused Oritsejafor of personal opulence and inappropriate public comments on national issues.

Things deteriorated last November, when Oritsejafor received a multi-million-dollar private jet from unnamed members of his church. Some defended the jet as essential to the travel required by his ministry; others criticised it as a bad pastoral example when half of Nigerians still live on less than US$1 per day.

The Catholic bishops frowned at the gift, even insinuating that President Goodluck Jonathan, who belongs to Oritsejafor's tribe, facilitated the gift and is backing Oritsejafor in his bid for re-election this July.

Catholic leaders have pressed Jonathan's government to dialogue with Boko Haram, the Islamist sect responsible for violence in northern states that has killed hundreds of Christians. Oritsejafor views the group as terrorists that should be crushed by Nigeria's military.

Sources:

Christianity Today

Image: Waterbanks

Jillette, part of the Penn & Teller illusionist team, is the author of Every Day is an Atheist Holiday and God, No!

Morgan, former editor of British national newspapers including the Daily Mirror, hosts Piers Morgan Tonight on CNN.

During their discussion on the CNN show, Morgan listed some Catholic rulings that are not spelt out in Scripture, such as priestly celibacy, no remarriage for divorced Catholics, and no female priests.

He said none of these actually came from Jesus Christ's mouth, prompting Jillette to respond by saying that Morgan sounded like a Protestant.

"That was Martin Luther saying that an individual…could interpret the Bible themselves," Jillette said. "The idea, as I understand it, of the Catholic Church is that it's not interpreting the Bible yourself. You have somebody who is actually able to do that….

"It seems like you either agree or you don't," Jillette argued. "You either say, like Martin Luther, I'm going to have a direct relationship with the word of God, or I'm going to go through a conduit of God on earth, which would be the pope."

Earlier the atheist magician asked Morgan, "You call yourself a Catholic. Don't you follow everything?"

Morgan replied, "No, that's the point. I have become increasingly like many young Catholics, I think, really disgruntled by the failure of successive popes and the Vatican to move at all with the times when society is changing so fast."

Jillette responded: "I would say on my side that if you have someone who is a conduit to God and is speaking God's word, even if you can't understand exactly what God's plan is, even if you do see suffering that you consider unacceptable, or any suffering is unacceptable, that still doesn't mean you get to vote on what God actually believes."

Source:

Christian Post

Image: Knowledge Video

"A majority of Hispanics in America continue to identify as Catholic, although the Catholic percentage among Hispanics appears to be decreasing and the youngest Hispanics in America today are less likely to be Catholic than those who are older," Gallup said.

"Additionally, those Hispanics who are Catholic are much less religious than those who are Protestant."

The poll had a sample of 28,607 Hispanics in all 50 US states.

Compared with a poll five years earlier, the number identifying themselves as Protestant remained largely the same (27 per cent in 2008 versus 28 per cent in 2012), but those identifying themselves as Catholic fell from 58 per cent to 54 per cent.

The poll showed that more than 60 per cent of Hispanic Protestants considered themselves very religious, while only 43 per cent of Hispanic Catholics could say the same.

Thirty-one per cent said they were not religious at all, consistent with national trends showcasing the rise of secularism in America.

Around 60 per cent of Hispanics aged 50 or more said that they belong to the Catholic Church. But Protestant churches had the greatest numbers of Hispanics aged 18-29, with 29 percent.

The Gallup report said: "Overall, the finding that younger Hispanics are proportionately more Protestant and that all Hispanics are becoming proportionately more Protestant over time suggest that the percentage of Hispanics who are Catholic may continue to slip in the years to come."

Another research organisation, the Barna Group, found similar results in 2011.

"You cannot help but notice the changing relationship between Hispanics and the Catholic Church," commented the group's founder, George Barna. "While many Hispanic immigrants come to the United States with ties to Catholicism, the research shows that many of them eventually connect with a Protestant church."

Sources:

Christian Post

Christianity Today

Image: Jazz201college

"These buildings are simply too opulent, too empty and too expensive to maintain, something akin to an aging grandmother still living in a mansion when just one room would do," said a report on Spiegel Online.

There are churches standing empty even in staunchly Catholic Bavaria — the home of Pope Benedict XVI, the report said, and one has been closed even in the famous pilgrimage site of Telgte, near Münster, which has a shrine of the Blessed Virgin Mary.

The situation for Catholic churches is particularly bad in the Ruhr region of western Germany and in northern Germany, places that saw an influx of refugees from the former German lands of Silesia and East Prussia after the Second World War.

Now many of these regions' small Catholic churches, often built in an unappealing modern style, are at high risk of being demolished.

In Hildesheim diocese, one out of every two churches is on the endangered list, while in Essen diocese 83 churches are slated for demolition and another 13 have already been torn down. The situation is the worst in Wilhelmshaven, where six out of nine Catholic churches are slated to be destroyed.

The archdiocese of Berlin is offering for sale on eBay "a church in a popular residential area" in the city of Brandenburg, and websites have sprung up to market unwanted pulpits and altars.

Yet many church properties do not find a buyer. Most churches have cold floors and high ceilings, and lack kitchen facilities, so even give-away prices are often not enough of an incentive. The Maria Goretti Chapel in the small northeastern city of Demmin, for example, costs just $NZ31,500, but no one wants to buy it.

Thomas Begrich, head of finances for the Evangelical Church of Germany, the country's largest federation of Protestant churches, said it closed 340 churches between 1990 and 2010, and "it may be necessary to give up an additional 1000 buildings".

Source:

Spiegel Online

Image: Spiegel Online

The discussion will include "unity and diversity in the Church, and the origins and current interpretations of ministry and ordination, and the nature and role of authority and the episcopacy", the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops said in a press release.

The bishops said the last topic is a direct response to Pope John Paul II's 1995 encyclical Ut Unum Sint, in which he invited other Christian leaders to help the Pope think about the ministerial role of the bishop of Rome.

"We now have the opportunity to reflect together on what it means to be the Church, Christ's body in and for the world," said a joint chair of the dialogue, the Rev. Cynthia Campbell of the Presbyterian Church (USA).

"I know that this will be an opportunity for spiritual growth for the participants, and we pray for the Church as a whole."

The agreement on baptism between the Catholic Church, the Presbyterian Church (USA), the Christian Reformed Church in North America, the Reformed Church in America and the United Church of Christ was the result of six years of study and consultation by scholars during the Catholic-Reformed dialogue that began in 1965.

It marked the first time the Catholic Church in the United States has ever signed such an agreement, although Catholic bishops' conferences elsewhere in the world have done so.

The five denominations agreed to recognise each other's baptisms when water and the Trinitarian formula of "Father, Son and Holy Spirit" are used.

In 1993 the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity called for ecumenical agreements about baptism, so that "the various Churches and ecclesial Communities arrive as closely as possible at an agreement about its significance and valid celebration".

Sources:

Catholic News Service

United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (study on the Church)

United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (agreement on baptism)

Image: Journey into the Son

Continue reading

The country is now only 48 per cent Protestant, with one in five of the population saying they no longer adhere to any religion or denomination, according to the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life.

However, the study by the Washington-based thinktank found America still remains a deeply religious country and that church attendance appears to have risen in the last five years. Continue reading

Researchers from the University of Warwick in England analyzed data from Prussia in the 19th and 21st centuries, as well as modern data from the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development.

"We used the 19th century data because at this time virtually everyone adhered to a religious denomination and religion pervaded virtually all aspects of life. In Prussia, both Protestants and Catholics were non-minorities living together in one state and the two religions give a basis for comparison," lead author Sascha Becker said in a press release.

"The results were quite striking, in the 19th century suicide rates among Protestants in Prussia were roughly three times as high as among Catholics."

The study, released on Tuesday showed that unlike last century, the Christian population has moved from Europe to Africa, Asia and the Americas. Only about 25% of Christians now live in Europe, down from 66% in 1910.

Brazil has twice as many Catholics as Italy, while Nigeria has more than twice as many Protestants as Germany, where the Protestant Reformation began.

With 2.2b believers, Christianity remains the lagest faith group. Muslims come in second, with 1.6b adherents.

As well as being geographically disparate, the report identifies that Christianity is theologically diverse too. Catholics (50%), constitute half of those identifying as Christian, Protestants (37%) and Orthodox Christians (12%), while other Christians such as Mormons and Jehovah's Witnesses make up the remaining 1%.

Countries with the largest number of Christians are the United States, Brazil, Mexico and Russia. Christians comprise nearly 80 percent of the U.S. population, and about 74 percent of Russian citizens.

About 5 percent of China's residents, or 67 million people, are Christian, according to the study's authors. However, accurately estimating China's Christian population is notoriously difficult, due to the mix of government-sanctioned churches and grassroots house churches that operate illegally underground.

The study is based on demographic and opinion data from 232 countries and territories. It does not measure practice or belief, merely counting as Christian anyone who says they are.

Around 13%, or one-in-eight Christians are found in Asia and the Pacific.

Sources

• CNN
• The Guardian
• Image: ICEJ

Australian trucking magnate Lindsay Fox's shared his perspective on population at a media appearance for charity on Wednesday, saying everyone should have six kids.

Fox was asked about a report published by Leadership Management Australasia that says baby boomers are more of a headache for managers rather than Generation Y.

"No, we need all the babies we can get so we can populate Australia," he told reporters.

"I was a careless Protestant, my wife was a good Catholic, and we had six kids in seven years and I'd endorse that to everyone."

"So I'd encourage everyone to go home and make love tonight and create another baby for Australia.

After his procreation promotion, the supply chain specialist, Mr Fox urged governments to build more roads, bridges and railways.

"(Inadequate) infrastructure is a big problem," he said.

Also at the same gathering, was Victorian Premier Ted Baillieu.

In reply, and in reference to the infrastructure question, Baillieu said, "The increasing cost of construction was a serious problem throughout the nation."

Source

• Image: Finda
• Herald-Sun