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As reported earlier this week, the Episcopal Church in the Diocese of Washington, DC, passed a resolution to stop using masculine pronouns for God in future updates to its Book of Common Prayer. The resolution to "avoid the use of gendered pronouns for God" was passed quickly by delegates to the Diocese's 123rd Convention. To be sure, this is not the first group to move in the direction of "gender-inclusive" language when it comes to the deity.

VOL is publishing this story because the UCC is even more progressive than The Episcopal Church and therefore says a lot about the future of The Episcopal Church. The UCC is making big staff cuts, and there is an internal report forecasting an 80 percent decline in membership by 2045! The average age of an Episcopalian is now in the mid-Sixties. There are no millennials coming along to fill either pulpits or pews. Nearly half of all pulpits now cannot afford a full time priest. David Virtue If times are tough for oldline Protestant denominations, they are dire for the...

Yet another megachurch has announced that it will spend millions to officially separate itself from Presbyterian Church (USA), a denomination that has, in recent years, experienced turmoil over what critics decry as an increasingly liberal theology. Nearly 89 percent of the congregation at Highland Park Presbyterian Church in Dallas, Texas, voted in October 2013 to leave the denomination and to join the more theologically conservative Evangelical Covenant Order of Presbyterians — a decision that carries with it a hefty price tag. The church will need to pay $7.8 million in order to officially leave Presbyterian Church (USA) and keep its...

“You’ll find our text this morning in the Old Testament…” I know this is a rare announcement on a Sunday morning, but when you heard it last, what did you think? “Oh no! Not another historical lecture.” “We’re going to get a whipping with the law today.” “Why? I came to church to hear about Jesus.” “What’s Israel and Babylon got to do with my family struggles?” Or maybe you didn’t just think it. You said it or emailed it to the pastor afterwards. And pastors are feeling the pressure. Some surveys put the ratio of Old Testament to New...

Over the last two decades, more than three-fourths of Iraq’s Christians have fled the country, driven out by a combination of Muslim fanaticism and economic and social collapse. Iraq, however, isn’t the only place to experience a mass Christian exodus in recent years. Look at the Presbyterian Church (USA), the 10th largest denomination in this country. But you’d better look fast. The PC(USA), which is the nation’s largest Presbyterian denomination (at least for now), is driving out members through its own brand of leftist fanaticism. From a high of more than 4 million members back in 1965, the Louisville-based PC(USA)...

Is the pulpit brain-washing blacks against supporting Lesbian, Gay, Bi-sexual and Transgendered (LGBT) people? It depends on who you ask. LGBT advocates have different perspectives on why blacks do not align themselves with gay rights causes. To varying degrees, many LGBT rights advocates say that the church is the singlemost influential factor in black opinion on homosexuality. Antonio David Garcia, executive director of Affirmations, a Detroit-area LGBT civil rights group, says what’s worse is that those opinions are often homophobic and go unchallenged. “Everyday we face religious bigotry [from the church],” Garcia says. “They’ve got to start questioning some of...

The effort to normalize homosexual behavior on America’s college campuses continues apace. The Chronicle of Higher Education reports that Elmhurst College in Illinois “has become the first institution to include a question about sexual orientation and gender identity on its undergraduate admissions application.” The reason? “To connect students with campus programs and services.” An applicant’s answer to the question will also help the college determine eligibility for institutional scholarships given to applicants from “underrepresented groups.” A student who declares that he consider himself “to be a member of the LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgendered) community” will be eligible for the...

Who Will Receive the Blessing? Today's Scripture " Who may ascend into the hill of the LORD? Or who may stand in His holy place? He who has clean hands and a pure heart, Who has not lifted up his soul to an idol, Nor sworn deceitfully. He shall receive blessing from the LORD, And righteousness from the God of his salvation" (Psalm 24:3-5, NKJV). Today's Word from Joel and Victoria God wants you to receive every blessing that He has in store for you. In His Word, He tells you about His wonderful blessings, but He also tells...

For the second time in less than a year, the United Methodist General Board of Church and Society (GBCS), an official agency of the denomination, has published an article arguing that sexual relationships outside the covenant of marriage are not necessarily improper. “An Ordained Single Woman and the Discipline,” published June 7 as part of the “Sex and the Church” series in GBCS’ weekly Faith in Action online newsletter, contends that sexual relationships should not be off-limits for unmarried UM clergy. Last August, the controversial series featured an article by Unitarian “sexologist” Debra Haffner who wrote that one can have...

Remember the Jesus Seminar? They were those scholars who voted away all of Jesus’ miracles and much of what He said because it didn’t seem plausible to them. You know, things like the resurrection and that kind of weird stuff. They voted on whether they thought Jesus REALLY said that or did that. Pretty much, miracles and all that oogedy-boogedy stuff were scorned. One of the more well known books coming out of the seminar was the infamously color-coded “The Five Gospels,” which had its own translations of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John from the New Testament but they also...

Victory Today's Scripture "But thanks be to God, Who gives us the victory [making us conquerors] through our Lord Jesus Christ" (I Corinthians 15:57, AMP). Today's Word from Joel and Victoria God wants to pour out His favor on you so that you can live in victory in every area of your life. The scripture says He always causes us to triumph through Christ Jesus! That means, no matter what you may be facing today, God wants to make you more than a conqueror. Are you battling sickness? God wants to give you healing. Are you struggling with a...

Make Way for Victory Today's Scripture "But thanks be to God, Who gives us the victory [making us conquerors] through our Lord Jesus Christ (I Corinthians 15:57, AMP). Today's Word from Joel and Victoria God desires that you live in victory in every area of your life. The scripture says He always causes us to triumph through Christ Jesus! No matter what you may be facing today, God wants to make you more than a conqueror. Are you battling sickness? God wants to give you healing. Are you struggling with a broken relationship? God wants to give you restoration...

Hold On to Your Dream Today's Scripture "Let us hold unswervingly to the hope we profess, for he who promised is faithful" (Hebrews 10:23, NIV) Today's Word from Joel and Victoria At some point in life we all face hardships. It may be something physically or emotionally challenging. Or it may be a dream or an opportunity that we missed out on. Whatever your difficulty is, don't let it discourage you from believing in God's best. The enemy wants to keep you focused on everything negative that's happened, but don't let him steal the dreams God has given you....

Where did the idea of “millions of years” come from? All of our media outlets push evolution and “millions of years” ideas on the public. Even children’s cartoons reflect evolutionary philosophy! In an episode of the cartoon SpongeBob SquarePants, entitled “SpongeBob B.C.,” the narrator begins: “Ah, dawn breaks over the primordial sea. It is here that millions of years ago, life began taking its first clumsy steps out of the darkness, opening its newly formed eyeballs to stare into the blinding light of intelligence.” Unfortunately, large segments of the church have swallowed the millions-of-years evolutionary history hook, line, and sinker....

Usually, when a journalist is censored in a Western nation, American news organizations respond with collective outrage. But as a major attack on press freedom unfolds in Canada, America's mainstream media are silent. Neither the TV networks nor the major newspapers have reported on hearings last week at what amounts to a Stalinesque show trial in Vancouver, British Columbia. Mark Steyn, a Canadian journalist who now lives in New Hampshire and whose column appears in National Review magazine as well as several U.S. and Canadian newspapers, is facing charges before British Columbia's Human Rights Tribunal. His crime? Spreading "hatred." The...

And on the homosexuality issue, at least one church is calling the ball on the underlying issue of Scriptural interpretation. Presiding Bishop Mark Hanson, leader of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, called for a global, ecumenical council on the Christian interpretation of Scripture. In his report Aug. 9 at the 2005 Churchwide Assembly of the ELCA Hanson called for the Pope, the Ecumenical Patriarch in Istanbul, and the Anglican and Lutheran Communions to come together to address a church identity crisis due to the dominance of a "fundamentalist-millenialist-apocalypticist reading of Scripture." Blaming one interpretation or another for the Church...

In a season that lots of Americans associate with "God and country," the head of the Church Council of Greater Seattle recently marked Independence Day by insisting that symbols of the two remain separate -- for the good of both. "After all these years of secrecy, I'm now ready to make a confession: I am a serial flag remover," the Rev. Sandy Brown,executive director, wrote in July's edition of The Source, the council's newspaper. "I've removed the American flag not just from one church I served as pastor, but from all three," wrote Brown. Such a confession is risky in...

At the risk of further provoking the brilliant George Will, I must say that the national Democratic Party's approach to Christians is analogous to an abusive husband in complete denial, seeking reconciliation when it suits his purposes, but otherwise engaged in a pattern of abuse. Just like certain abusive spouses, the party can't live with Christians but can't live without them (politically). No matter how distasteful some may find our chronicling of it to be, the systematic abuse is demonstrable, as I documented in my book. Nevertheless, significant confusion persists over these issues, among many on the Left and the...

OK, I have had it with the ECUSA. It was the church that brought me to Christ, but now I believe it has abandoned Christ. I have moved away from my original parish anyway. I do not wish to be a Catholic or Orthodox Christian. I need to find a church that allows the involvement of women in the priesthood and deaconate, but not practicing homosexuals. One that frowns on divorce and supports the pro-life movement. I like to dance and drink, so Southern Baptist is out. I'm not a pacifist so I cannot be a Quaker. Your advice is...

URL: http://www.ird-renew.org/News/News.cfm?ID=757&c=4 New Clergy Group to Push Liberal Causes Mark Tooley November 21, 2003 Frustrated that they continue to be overshadowed by conservative religious leaders, a new association of politically liberal clergy was announced in Washington, D.C. on November 21. Mostly comprised of old National Council of Churches (NCC) types, the Clergy Leadership Network (CLN) will focus on opposing U.S. military action and fighting for a larger federal welfare state, while criticizing religious conservatives. Several of CLN’s leaders were also formerly leaders in the Interfaith Alliance, another liberal religious group founded ten years ago with the nearly identical purpose of...