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From Christianity Today, this fascinating bit of news: While the ballroom sessions of the first day of the Evangelical Theological Society meeting had more attendees, no session was as packed as J.P. Moreland’s “How Evangelicals Became Over-Committed to the Bible and What Can Be Done About It.” While the average breakout session seems to be attended by fewer than 50 people, easily more than 200 packed the room to hear Moreland’s talk, with dozens standing and more listening outside the door. ... “In the actual practices of the Evangelical community in North America, there is an over-commitment to Scripture in...

Catholics should celebrate when anyone enters the Church. After all, we have it on good authority that the angels in heaven do. But when a prominent Protestant converts, we might not just feel like celebrating; we might feel like doing a victory dance in the end zone.We should fight the urge.Francis Beckwith was president of the Evangelical Theological Society until he quit the post to return to the faith of his childhood. The story of Beckwith’s conversion to Catholicism has much to teach us. The first lesson is this: The human attempt to build a version of Christianity without the...

Until a few weeks ago, Francis Beckwith served as president of the Evangelical Theological Society, an association of 4,300 Protestant theologians. That was until he made the announcement on the Right Reason blog of his return to the Catholic faith of his youth. Beckwith returned to the Church after 32 years as an evangelical. The online “storm” that followed led Beckwith to resign as president of the prestigious society. He serves as associate professor of church-state studies at Baylor University. He spoke recently to Register senior writer Tim Drake from his home in Waco, Texas. It’s been a while...

The return of Dr. Francis Beckwith, now the former president of the Evangelical Theological Society, to the Catholic Church, has, understandably, created a bit of a furor among some Evangelicals. I emphasize some because it is clear, in reading the now several dozens of comments left on Dr. Beckwith's post explaining his decision, that many non-Catholics are responding graciously and charitably to the news. It's equally clear that some are not; in fact, quite a few of the remarks are not simply harsh, but are even nasty and churlish. And some are, in my estimation, insulting. Perhaps most surprising to...

Dr. Francis Beckwith explains his reasons for returning to the Catholic Church. (He was raised Catholic and received the sacraments of initiation as a child and young person).  Most of the post centers on the tussle over ETS matters and leadership, (he has resigned from the presidency) but: There is a conversation in ETS that must take place, a conversation about the relationship between Evangelicalism and what is called the “Great Tradition,” a tradition from which all Christians can trace their spiritual and ecclesiastical paternity.  It is a conversation that I welcome, and it is one in which I hope...

Smoking cigarettes is a clear health risk, as most everyone knows. But lately, people have begun to worry about the health risks of secondhand smoke. Some policymakers and activists are even claiming that the government should crack down on secondhand smoke exposure, given what "the science" indicates about such exposure. Last July, introducing his office's latest report on secondhand smoke, then-U.S. Surgeon General Richard Carmona asserted that "there is no risk-free level of secondhand smoke exposure," that "breathing secondhand smoke for even a short time can damage cells and set the cancer process in motion," and that... --snip-- In addition,...

THE first men to walk on the Moon reported seeing a UFO, a new TV documentary reveals. Astronaut Buzz Aldrin, the second man to walk on the Moon's surface after Neil Armstrong, says space agency bosses covered up their sighting. And the Apollo 11 astronauts were also careful not to talk about it openly. He said: "There was something out there, close enough to be observed, and what could it be? "Now, obviously the three of us weren't going to blurt out, 'Hey, Houston, we've got something moving alongside of us and we don't know what it is, you know?...

Colleges across the country are reporting a drop in SAT scores this year. I've been tutoring students in New York City for the SAT since 1989, and I have watched the numbers rise and fall. This year, though, the scores of my best students dropped about 50 points total in the math and verbal portions of the test (each on a scale of 200 to 800). Colleges and parents are wondering: Is there something wrong with the new test? Or are our children not being taught what they should know? Before 1994, the verbal section of the SAT was about...

The year 2010 will mark the 50th anniversary of humanity's strangest scientific quest: the use of giant radiotelescope dishes to listen for radio messages from alien beings in space. So far, the search has been a complete bust. The radioastronomers keep listening, but the stars aren't talking to us -- not yet, anyway. Oddly, the failure of the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence, or SETI, has been largely ignored by the general public, journalists and Hollywood filmmakers. They continue to be enchanted by (and, in Hollywood's case, to commercially exploit) the hope that intelligent life is sprinkled across the galaxy like...

A STUNNED Italian actor had to stub out the cigarette he had lit up on stage after a spectator complained, forcing the theatre to change the script of an Arthur Miller play to make it smoke-free. "This had never happened to me in more than 300 performances," the actor, Sebastiano Lo Monaco, said. Italy has banned lighting up in all enclosed public places since January this year. Lo Monaco was smoking, in line with the script, while playing the main character in Miller's A View from the Bridge at a theatre in the northeastern city of Mestre, when a woman...

Mission Considers Banning Smoking In Public Places City To Hold Public Forum On Proposal MISSION, Kan. -- Should citizens be prohibited from smoking in public places? That's the question being considered in Mission. The City Council is considering making it illegal to smoke tobacco in bars, restaurants and any other public area.

The bolding of certain comments is mine. JaJMoments before the Maine House of Representatives voted on a bill that outlawed smoking in bars and pool halls, state Rep. John Eder told lawmakers about Charles Greer. Eder, a Green Party member who represents a piece of Portland, said Greer was an Old Orchard Beach teacher so beloved that classes were canceled the day of his funeral. He said Greer “was very dear to the students whose lives he had touched.” And he said Greer moonlighted for 20 years in a Portland tavern. “The cautionary tale here,” Eder told fellow lawmakers last...

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