Twenty-one years ago, Scott Anderson had a choice. He could continue to serve as a Presbyterian minister but hide his identity as a gay man. Or he could leave the ministry and live, as he says, "with a sense of integrity" about who he is.
LOUISVILLE, Ky. (PNS) Top leaders of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) have called on the Iranian government to release the Rev. Yousef Nadarkhani, a 33-year-old minister of the Church of Iran and pastor of a 400-member congregation in the city of Rasht, who was sentenced to death in November 2010 by a state court for apostasy (abandonment of a religion) and evangelizing Muslims.
New York (ENI) Partisan politics has disrupted the role of the U.S. religious community in debates about the nation's future, says a prominent broadcast journalist and former White House communications director.
The first candidate for moderator of the 2012 General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) has been announced. The Presbytery of Elizabeth has endorsed Neal D. Presa, a teaching elder and the pastor of Middlesex Presbyterian church in New Jersey since 2003.
GENEVA (ENI) The World Council of Churches (WCC) has launched the first online digital library covering theology and ecumenism, called GlobeTheoLib, saying it will help close the information gap between North and South.
KOTA KINABALU, Malaysia (ENI) Speakers at an international Christian-Muslim dialogue conference organized by the Lutheran World Federation (LWF) say religious groups need to do more to combat greed in the global economy.
WELLINGTON, New Zealand (ENI) A suicide bomber blew himself up on the porch of an Indonesian church packed with hundreds of worshippers on Sept. 25, injuring 28 people, some critically.
BERLIN (ENI) Pope Benedict XVI's visit to Germany on Sept. 23 featured an ecumenical worship service in the town of Erfurt that was meant to reach out to German Protestants, but for many it felt like a missed opportunity.
EDINBURGH, Scotland (ENI) The Scottish government has drawn fire from Catholic church leaders for launching a 14-week public consultation, starting Sept. 2, on the question of legalizing marriage for gay couples.
Bangalore, India (ENI) A pastor's wife was killed and churches and schools destroyed in the Sept. 18 earthquake that killed more than 100 people in several countries in the Himalaya mountains north of India.
Washington (ENI) The U.S. State Department has designated eight nations as the most serious violators of religious freedom, naming the same countries as the Bush administration.
Berlin (ENI) Pope Benedict XVI's meeting with Germany's Jewish community on the first day of his four-day state visit to his homeland was marked by both good will and honest criticism.
Washington (ENI) The release of U.S. hikers Shane Bauer and Josh Fattal from an Iranian prison on Sept. 21 "affirms the importance of the role of religious dialogue and its end product in this case, public diplomacy, as we seek ways to define common ground between our two countries," said Episcopal Diocese of Washington Bishop John Chane, who returned from a weeklong visit to Iran on Sept. 19.
LOUISVILLE, Ky. – The General Assembly Mission Council of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) is considering changing its name – something it needs to do to comply with the denomination’s new Form of Government, which reserves the use of the word “council” for actual governing bodies.
LOUISVILLE – The Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) continues to feel the international rumblings from its controversial decision earlier this year to allow the ordination of sexually-active gays and lesbians.
The Presbytery of San Francisco did not commit any doctrinal errors when it voted to allow the ordination of Lisa Larges, and it does not need to conduct another examination of her, the Permanent Judicial Commission of the Synod of the Pacific has ruled.
Berlin (ENI) Pope Benedict XVI, on his first state visit to his native country, arrives in Berlin on Sept. 22 in what many see as a unique opportunity for increased understanding between Catholic and Protestant churches.
Nairobi, Kenya (ENI) As a new international initiative seeks to stop child marriages, church-based centers in southern Kenya are an example of faith organizations providing a haven for girls and educating communities about the issue.
LOUISVILLE – A special committee is poised to recommend restructuring General Assembly meetings in ways intended to allow the assembly to blend worship more fully into its work and to focus more energy on fewer items of business.
The old wisdom: The more educated you are, the less likely you will be religious. But a new study says that, rather than driving people away from God, education gives them a more liberal attitude about who’s going to heaven.
LOUISVILLE, Ky. (General Assembly Mission Council) The Rev. Mienda Uriarte will begin duties this month as coordinator of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)’s mission work in Asia and the Pacific.
LOUISVILLE, Ky. (Office of the General Assembly) Picture it: A candidate for ordination as a teaching elder (minister of the Word and Sacrament) taking all of the standard ordination exams online on a flexible schedule and receiving the results in a matter of days.
