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Pope Francis once again championed the notion of 'fraternity' through interreligious action in various ecumenical speeches over the weekend.JUBA, South Sudan (LifeSiteNews) –– Both in his ecumenical “pilgrimage of peace” and in his message for the International Day of Human Fraternity, Pope Francis recently called for religions to “increasingly intertwine” in the “service of brotherhood.” Over the past few days, Pope Francis has once more renewed his oft-spoken calls for increased interreligious dialogue and activity, reawakening concerns that leading prelates have made in the wake of such statements over the years. Religions must ‘increasingly intertwine’ to promote ‘fraternity’The first came...

Rob Bell, who once enraged many evangelicals by questioning hell, is back with a new book that could re-ignite their fury. It’s called “What is the Bible?” And in it, Bell calls for the Bible to be read “literately, not literally.” In these polarized times, many Christians who claim to read the Bible are really more interested in cherry-picking verses to support their political or social points of view, Bell said in a phone interview with the Observer. “You can pull a verse out to justify almost anything,” he said. “When you read the Bible fuller and in-depth, suddenly you...

According to Dr. Joel Mathews, the phrase "In God We Trust" was first printed on our coins in 1864 and on paper bills in 1957. It had been proposed that "Our Country, Our God, Our Trust" be used, but that was shortened to be able to stamp the motto onto coins. Kansas State University Polytechnic's March Civic Luncheon began with Kansas Weslyan University's Dr. Philip Meckley asking: o How can we look at comparative religious traditions? o How can we live with differences for the sake of our human community? Matthews, a K-State Polytechnic instructor, began the lecture by saying...

NASHVILLE (BP) -- The 100th anniversary of Jehovah's Witnesses' prediction that history would end in 1914 presents an opportunity for leading members of the group to faith in Jesus as Lord and Savior, a Southern Baptist expert on Christian sects and cults said. Christians' "first task" in sharing the Gospel with Jehovah's Witnesses is helping them "put [their official publications] away and then deal with the Bible alone," Robert Stewart, professor of philosophy and theology at New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary, told Baptist Press. "What we need is evidence -- evidence that the Watchtower Society [Jehovah's Witnesses' central organization] has...

According to Joel Osteen – Pastor of Lakewood Church in Houston, Texas, these first century apostles are wrong and outdated and he has come out boldly to infer indirectly that Apostles Paul, Peter, and John whom wrote much of the New Testament were wrong and need to be corrected and rebuked.When asked directly if people whom are openly practicing homosexuals are accepted into the Kingdom, Joel Osteen responded with “Absolutely, anybody is.”We all need to listen carefully to the words that this “man of God” speaks as he goes on interviews so we too can find the errors in the...

The joke about Unitarians is that they’re where you go when you don’t know where to go. Theirs is the religion of last resort for the intermarried, the ambivalent, the folks who want a faith community without too many rules. It is perhaps no surprise that the Unitarian Universalist Association is one of the fastest-growing denominations in the country, ballooning 15 percent over the past decade, when other established churches were shrinking. Politically progressive to its core, it draws from the pool of people who might otherwise be “nones” – unaffiliated with any church at all. But within the ranks...

Among the problems posed to one interested in Unitarianism is to explain why it was that Unitarianism evolved out of Presbyterianism in England while it emerged out of Congregationalism in the United States. The problem of the origins of Unitarianism is in this way fashioned into denominational questions. Why did English presbyterianism become Unitarian? What explains the appearance of Unitarianism in New England Congregationalism? The purpose of this essay is to examine the denominational understanding of the genesis of English Unitarianism. In abbreviated form the denominationa argument holds that after the passage of the Toleration Act and the close of...

Please treat this as a serious thread and not to poke fun at anyone. I've looked up many places about what unitarians do believe in and I'm completely confused. If there are any freepers out here who are part of this faith, to help me expand my knowledge, please could you share your beliefs?

Committed to marriage for the masses Polyamorists say they relate honestly to multiple partners Unitarians from Boston to Berkeley have opened another front in the liberal crusade to expand the definition of marriage and family in America. It's the new polygamy, and according to the Unitarian Universalists for Polyamory Awareness, their relationships are at least as ethical as other marriages -- gay or straight. "Polyamory is never having to say you've broken up,'' said Sally Amsbury of Oakland, whose sex and love life openly includes her husband and two "other significant others," known in polyamory parlance as "OSOs." Amsbury serves...

LTJG Eric Johnson, CCPO USNR Unitarian Universalist Military Ministries Skytalides Basket LTJG Eric Johnson, CCPO USNR In the ancient Greek city-state of Sparta the citizen warriors had a custom before going into battle. Each individual Spartan would look about the battlefield for a twig or small stick of wood. They would fashion this into a skytalides, a piece about 6 inches long with at least one side of it scraped flat and free of bark. On this flat side they would scrawl their name on each end of it. During the pre-battle sacrifices and ceremonies they would break the skytalides...

Divinity without Dogma A Look at Progressive Churches by Jonn Salovaara Conscious Choice, September 2001 This article looks at groups associated to varying degrees with Christianity. Other articles have featured, and will feature, outposts of other religious traditions. For thousands of years, churches have formally stated and proclaimed "a body of doctrines concerning faith and morals" -- the dictionary definition of "dogma." Institutionalized belief tends to become dogmatic, even when the belief itself begins as an alternative to an earlier dogma. So it was with early Christianity, starting small and in contrast to Judaism and imperial Roman belief and eventually...