» 2007 » May

John Hammett has written An Ecclesiological Assessment of the Emerging Church.

Emerging church

Jesus made himself the friend of “tax collectors and sinners”. Ever wondered who those “sinners” were?

Eckhard Schnabel has done the research and come up with a list of Jewish tradition occupations and people designated as “sinners” because they could not fully keep the Law:

donkey drivers
camel drivers
coachmen
bargees
shepherds
shopkeepers
doctors
butchers
goldsmiths
flax hecklers
sharpeners of stones of handmills
peddlers
weavers
hair cutters
cleaners
bath attendants
tanners
gatherers of dog [...]

Jesus and the woman taken in adultery — Paul Gustave Doré, 1865

According to the Age a record numbers of Australians—assume this is true for Americans, Chinese, Nigerians, Estonians ie human beings on the planet—are visiting pornographic websites on the internet, including sexually explicit dating sites.

We all know it’s a man’s problem but now kids are [...]

Make sure you read Joel Carpenter’s article on Philip Jenkin’s New Faces of Christianity. A passionate, biblical faith is winning the day in the global South and making its way to the global North.

A recently rediscovered religious text is making huge waves in the world today. With stunning power, it is driving the largest [...]

Rembrandt: The Little Children Being Brought to Jesus

What’s your view on crowds?

One stream of missional thinking writes them off. The other adores them. One stream rejects “attractional” ministry as a denial of discipleship. The other measures success by growing numbers—people and offerings.

The funny thing is both streams look to Jesus to validate their position. How [...]

Pope Benedict is touring Brazil this week, where one of the major topics of concern was what, if anything, the Catholic church in Latin America can do to stem the rise of Pentecostalism.

Here’s an edited version of the Religion Report on the changing faith of Latin America.

Forty-million people left the Catholic church in Latin America [...]

The tremendous figure which fills the Gospels towers in this respect, as in every other, above all the thinkers who ever thought themselves tall. His pathos was natural, almost casual.

The Stoics, ancient and modern, were proud of concealing their tears. He never concealed His tears; He showed them plainly on His open face at any [...]

Here’s Seth’s Godin’s entry in the worst CEO slide ever contest.

That post led me back to his Really Bad Powerpoint. A must read for any would-be masters of the art of change.

The most startling piece of advice? No more than six words on any slide. EVER.
PowerpointSeth Godin

Last post we looked at the expansion of Christianity in Africa and the corresponding decline in Europe.

I took the photo above in 1998. It’s a Englishman born C of E, preaching Islam at Speakers’ Corner in Hyde Park.

But according to historian Philip Jenkins it’s not all bad news in Europe.

I read everything he writes. His [...]

foto

The facts of the expansion are beyond dispute.

In 1900 Africa was firmly under the control of the colonial powers with a population of 108 million, of whom 8.7 million (9%) were Christian.

The majority of those Christians were Coptic and Ethiopian Orthodox.

They were outnumbered by 34.5 million Muslims. A ratio of 4:1.

By 1962, when Africa had [...]