On Thursday, TobyMac (Toby McKeehan) and David Crowder were ready to kick off the fourth week of their “Hits Deep Tour 2022” in Denver, Colorado at Ball Arena, but they had to cancel the show right after the doors opened due to a small fire that started at the venue.
No injuries were reported. According to The Denver Post, the fire broke out in a maintenance area of the arena, causing the entire building to be evacuated.
Denver Fire Department spokesman Captain Greg Pixley said that around 6:15 PM (MST), the building sprinkler system extinguished the fire that had been started by a malfunctioning food warmer.
Denver7 News reported that concertgoers returned to the building after it was safe, but the concert was then cancelled because of the water from the sprinkler system.
McKeehan posted a picture of him leaving the arena with Crowder on Instagram.
“Denver show POSTPONED tonight because of small fire at Ball Arena in a suite 😔,” McKeehan posted. “My Mile High friends…..we will be back, hopefully soon. We will make it happen. What God has put together let no flames put asunder! Glad everyone is safe. Thank you Denver fire department. So bummed but see you soon.”
The announcement of a rescheduled date was made within hours of the show’s cancellation. “We’re so sorry this happened to all of us Denver. But between the arena, the promoter, the bands, the crew and everyone involved, we’re gonna make it happen on March 9th. I’m so grateful everyone worked together to let us return so quickly and do what we set out to do. Thankful no one was hurt and looking forward to being together soon,” McKeehan’s Instagram post read.
Just hours before doors were set to open, McKeehan tweeted, “Pre-show prayer…Where we ask God to allow us to be part of his process in turning a city’s eyes to Him…He doesn’t need us but we always pray, it would be our honor to be a small part of what you’re doing tonight. #HitsDeep2022#HitsDeepTour“
At the NFL Scouting Combine this week, elite-quarterback prospect Malik Willis captured lots of attention for his on-the-field performance. But an action the Liberty University athlete took on an Indianapolis street corner also went viral.
On Twitter Thursday, sports marketer Ryan Lacey posted a video of Willis assisting someone who appears to be experiencing homeless. Lacey writes: “Was having lunch yesterday and saw one of the Combine guys helping out someone on some hard times… @malikwillis being great even when nobody is watching. How can you not be a fan of this guy?”
In the comments, one person writes, “Don’t know who Malik is or who he played for. I won’t forget him now.” Another notes, “I really hope this wasn’t choreographed for the camera,” to which someone replies, “That’s how he was raised. This was not staged. That’s the GOD in him.”
Liberty’s Malik Willis Has High Hopes for NFL Draft
Willis, 22, began his college football career as a backup at Auburn but transferred to—and flourished at—Liberty University. The private Christianschoolin Lynchburg, Virginia, has played football at the FBS level for only a few years, and none of its players has been selected higher than the fourth round. But that will likely soon change.
At the 2022 NFL Draft in April, Willis is projected to go in the first round. And the quarterback, who’s known for humility and quiet confidence, told reporters he should be the first QB selected. At this week’s Combine, where players showcase their skills, Willis admitted he thinks he’s the top QB prospect—but realizes the decision isn’t up to him.
Willis also made headlines for revealing that he didn’t watch football until high school, thinking the sport was boring. That changed, he says, “when I started getting better at it.” The player, who grew up in Georgia, says he realizes how important the quarterback position is at the pro level. “I mean, you’re the face of the franchise, literally,” says Willis. “You’re the face of the city. So you’ve got to…[make] sure you’re doing all the right things.”
QB’s Motto: ‘Thank God for Everything’
At the same time, Willis says he doesn’t play for the approval of other people. “The only one I have to prove [anything] to and respect is God. I’m playing for an audience of one, and I don’t really care too much what [others] say.”
In an interview last fall with Sports Spectrum magazine, Willis describes his faith journey. Although he grew up attending church every week, his personal relationship with God really clicked in ninth grade, thanks to Fellowship of Christian Athletes meetings. Liberty’s message of “training champions for Christ” intrigued Willis, who admits, “I felt like I needed to get closer to [God].”
A little more than a month after a Vanity Fair profile on Jerry Falwell Jr. caused a stir in evangelical circles, it has been announced that Lionsgate Television will adapt the article into a limited scripted series.
The Vanity Fair article, which was written by Gabriel Sherman and published on January 24, chronicled Falwell’s upbringing in the home of famed televangelist and conservative activist Jerry Falwell Sr., his rise to prominence at Liberty University in Lynchburg, VA, a sex scandal involving his wife and a Miami pool boy, along with Falwell’s eventual resignation as president of Liberty University.
One of the more shocking revelations in the article was when Falwell, the former president of a Christian university, said, “Because of my last name, people think I’m a religious person. But I’m not.”
“Nothing in history has done more to turn people away from Christianity than organized religion,” Falwell told Vanity Fair. “The religious elite has got this idea that somehow their sins aren’t as bad as everybody else’s.”
As someone who was the head of one of the largest evangelical educational institutions in the country for over a decade, is the son of one of the founders of the Moral Majority, and had a personal relationship with a United States president, the statement came across as somewhat ironic.
In a response article, director of the Public Theology Project at Christianity Today Russell Moore expressed a lack of surprise at Falwell’s revelation, saying, “In many ways, Jerry Falwell Jr. did not hide from us who he was. He told us [by his actions while president of Liberty University], over and over again.”
Falwell later clarified that while he doesn’t consider himself a “religious person,” he still nevertheless is a Christian.
“The Vanity Fair article made it absolutely clear that, while I didn’t wear my religion on my sleeve to be seen by others, I have nonetheless had a strong faith in Christ and his teachings since college,” Falwell said in a statement. “Other media outlets have twisted Vanity Fair’s words.”
The Lionsgate Television produced show will explore the complexity and the tumult of Falwell’s rise and fall.
(L) Pulso Cristiano, CC BY-SA 2.0 , via Wikimedia Commons (R) Pro-Ukrainian people hold up placards and wave Ukrainian flags as they shout slogans during a protest against Russia's invasion of Ukraine, in Istanbul, Turkey, Wednesday, March 2, 2022. Russia renewed its assault Wednesday on Ukraine's second-largest city in a pounding that lit up the skyline with balls of fire over populated areas, even as both sides said they were ready to resume talks aimed at stopping the new devastating war in Europe. (AP Photo/Francisco Seco)
Saddleback Church’s lead pastor and best selling author, Rick Warren, used his social media accounts to deliver a staunch rebuke towards the U.S. for buying Russian oil, arguing that the nation is funding a murderer.
The pastor’s posts have gone viral on both Twitter and Facebook and have garnered many responses, mostly in agreement with Warren’s statements.
“Everyday that the U.S. continues to buy 600,000 barrels of Russian oil A DAY,” Warren wrote, “We are funding the murder of Ukraine. Appalling. Indefensible. Stop it now.”
Two hours later, Warren posted again, saying, “Everyday that the U.S. continues to buy 600,000 more barrels of Russian oil each day, we are funding the murder of Ukraine. Appalling. Indefensible. Stop it now.”
On February 28, Warren encouraged those who are praying for Ukraine to continue to do so and shared a message of gratitude from Ukrainian pastors. “For days I’ve been in contact with many pastors in Ukraine, Russia, and nearby Poland which is accepting refugees,” Warren said. “They’ve all asked me to THANK YOU who are praying for them during this war. Keep praying everybody!”
President Joe Biden announced on February 22, 2022 that the U.S. imposed sanctions on Russia. “Today, I am announcing the first sanctions to impose costs on Russia in response to their actions yesterday. These have been closely coordinated with our allies and partners who will continue to escalate sanctions on Russia,” Biden said.
According to the report from The Wall Street Journal, the U.S. imported approximately 8% of its oil from Russia in 2021, which comes to around 672,000 barrels a day. If each barrel costs around $100, that means that America imports roughly $67 million of oil from Russia a day, or roughly $2 billion a month.
Others Call for the U.S. to Stop Buying Russia’s Oil and Encourage Prayers
Many other Christians would agree with Warren’s call to U.S. leadership to stop purchasing oil from Russia and have questioned why we are still doing so.
Journalist Todd Starnes questioned why the US is still buying oil from Russia, saying, “Why is the United States still buying oil and gas from Russia?” He later said, “Biden simply refuses to stop buying oil from the Russians.”
Former Mars Hill communication director Justin Deanposted, “They don’t care about US sanctions because they are getting what they need from China. And Biden cancelled the Keystone pipeline and we get that oil from Russia now, so it’s us who are dependent on Russia not the other way around.”
L: Screengrab from YouTube / @Cooper Stuff. R: Screengrab from YouTube / @Holy Post
Since declaring war on deconstructionism and “fake Christianity” earlier this year, Skillet frontman John Cooper has faced pushback from people who say he’s angry and judgmental. Now he’s also facing criticism from Phil Vischer’s “Holy Post” podcast, where a panel recently took him (as well as author and Christian apologist Alisa Childers) to task for overreacting and not allowing “nuance” in the deconstruction debate.
Both “sides” acknowledge that differing definitions cause roadblocks in discussions about deconstruction. In their podcast episodes, Vischer and Cooper take deep dives into the terminology and its various connotations. An overview of some main points is below; click on the links to access the entire episodes.
Phil Vischer: Is Deconstruction Universally Bad?
“VeggieTales” creator Phil Vischer, who co-hosts the “Holy Post” podcast with author and pastor Skye Jethani, recently explored Cooper’s war on deconstruction. (Author and divinity Ph.D. candidate Kaitlyn Schiess also joined in.) After saying the Christian musician “kind of likes to be at war,” Vischer implies that Cooper is becoming overly “alarmed” about deconstruction, to the point of calling it “a false religion.”
Vischer refers to a recent article by Alisa Childers, author of Another Gospel: A Lifelong Christian Seeks Truth in Response to Progressive Christianity. In “Why We Should Not Redeem ‘Deconstruction,’” posted on the Gospel Coalition website, Childers warns against viewing the deconstruction movement as “potentially positive.” Based on her research (plus personal experience), she says the movement has “little to do with objective truth, and everything to do with tearing down whatever doctrine someone believes is morally wrong.” The end result of deconstructing, Childers writes, “rarely retains any vestiges of actual Christianity.”
Vischer, Jethani, and Schiess laugh about some of Childers’ points, criticizing her for allowing no room for complexity or nuance. Jethani compares her argument to that of earlier generations of Christians who maintained that alcohol was universally bad, with no exceptions.
Schiess, who disagrees that deconstructionism is always “a way into relativism,” argues that it’s possible to learn some things from people you disagree with—while praying for them. Why? Because the Holy Spirit continues to work in them.
Deconstructing: Should We Use Another Word?
Vischer admits he prefers different terminology altogether. Instead of “deconstructing,” he asks, how about changing the phrase to “re-examining my inherited traditions”? That way it doesn’t sound like you’re “taking a wrecking ball to your faith,” he says.
Jethani, meanwhile, suggests the “more palatable” term of “unbundling,” or untangling from certain political and cultural values we may have grown up with in the church. The entire New Testament, he argues, consists of unbundling from customs that Jesus came to abolish.
Schiess emphasizes the importance of equipping young Christians to be able to ask questions when they encounter other beliefs. It’s also important, she says, to draw the line between which subjects are and are not related to salvation.
UNIONTOWN, Pa. (AP) — A western Pennsylvania Roman Catholic priest who sexually assaulted an altar boy for several years has been sentenced to 2 1/2 to five years in state prison.
The Rev. Andrew Mark Kawecki, of Greensburg will also have to register as a sex offender for 10 years once he’s freed from custody under the sentence imposed Thursday. He had pleaded no contest last October to indecent assault.
Prosecutors said the sexual abuse began in 2004, when the victim was an 11-year-old altar boy, and occurred in a back room of the Saints Cyril and Methodius Church in Fairchance, where Kawecki prepared for services. The repeated assaults continued for three years, until the victim was 14.
Kawecki was removed from the ministry and parishioners were notified after investigators received a tip about Kawecki in May 2019. The state attorney general’s office has said that after he was charged in 2020 another victim made allegations of similar abuse but those claims were too old to be prosecuted under the criminal statute of limitations.
WASHINGTON (BP) – Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron will be able to defend the state’s ban on a particularly heinous method of abortion, a nearly unanimous U.S. Supreme Court ruled Thursday (March 3).
The high court issued an 8-1 opinion that enables Cameron to intervene in defense of Kentucky’s Human Rights of Unborn Children Act, a 2018 law that prohibits dismemberment or D&E abortions on unborn children who are still alive. Only Associate Justice Sonia Sotomayor dissented.
Cameron had sought permission from the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati to defend the law after the secretary of the Cabinet for Health and Family Services declined to continue to do so, but the court denied his request. The attorney general responded by asking the Supreme Court to overturn the Sixth Circuit Court’s decision and permit him to defend the law before the appeals court.
While the high court ruled only on whether Cameron qualifies legally to defend the law and not on the abortion ban’s constitutionality, Baptist leaders at the national and state level still applauded the decision.
“I find myself thankful at any point when an elected official seeks to protect the vulnerable, and that is what Attorney General Cameron is wanting to do here,” said Brent Leatherwood, acting president of the Southern Baptist Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission. “This procedure at issue here is an especially ghastly one and, of course, the predatory abortion industry is challenging any law that might end it.
“The Supreme Court has said Cameron may defend the law and, by extension, the preborn lives it may end up saving. That was the proper decision, and we pray this allows Kentucky to take one more step to become a state that protects life.”
Todd Gray, executive director-treasurer of the Kentucky Baptist Convention, told BP in written remarks, “Kentucky Baptists are thankful for Attorney General Daniel Cameron and his convictional protection of the unborn. We rejoice over this ruling from the Supreme Court, pray for the attorney general as he takes this case back to the court of appeals, and anticipate the day when legalized abortion will be part of our past.”
Describing the Supreme Court’s opinion as “a victory for the rule of law,” Cameron said in a written statement, “The members of the General Assembly, pro-life advocates, and countless Kentuckians have championed this law at every turn, and we are incredibly grateful for their support. While the legal challenge to this law is not over, we will do what is necessary to defend it.”
The American Civil Liberties Union, one of the parties in the lawsuit against the ban, said on Twitter it would “continue the fight to prevent this law from going into effect.”
Abortion providers typically use in the second trimester of a pregnancy what pro-life advocates refer to as the live dismemberment method – in which an unborn child is torn apart piece by piece. The Kentucky ban on the procedure is considered a humane effort to reduce the pain an aborted child would experience.
Evan Clark, left, and Christine Jones of Atheists United take down illegally placed religious materials from public streets in Los Angeles, Feb. 19, 2022. RNS photo by Alejandra Molina
LOS ANGELES (RNS) — Standing atop an approximately 8-foot-high ladder, Evan Clark tugged at a sign tightly nailed to a utility pole on the intersection of Echo Park and Bellevue avenues, just beyond the 101 freeway ramps.
The sign quoted John 14:6, and as Clark spun and pulled it to loosen it from the pole, a man in a car shouted, “The way. The truth. The life!,” quoting the words from the Bible verse emblazoned on the placard Clark was trying to take down. The man, Clark said, likely assumed he was placing the sign, not removing it.
“People put a lot of passion behind these signs and their messages and ideas about Jesus and God,” Clark said. “I don’t like to be confrontational about any of that. I just wanted to do this as a casual thing to keep our streets secular.”
Clark is part of the Atheist Street Pirates, a team of lookouts who track and occasionally take down illegally placed religious material on public streets and overpasses around the city of Los Angeles and neighborhoods in the county. They’re a subset of the LA-based Atheists United, a nonprofit that’s been in the city for nearly 40 years and that seeks to “empower people to express secular values and promote separation of government and religion.”
The idea for the street pirates first emerged as a joke during an Atheists United meeting where members bantered about what to do with religious signage they encountered across the city. Calling it “religious rubbish removal,” the alliteration inspired the Atheist Street Pirates. That led to Clark creating a public Google map database where they upload photos and locations of the signage they encounter during their commutes. The map currently shows about 70 signs across LA County, including material taken down by the pirates or others. They’ve been officially active since 2021.
If signs are “illegally marooned, our pirates will report or plunder,” Atheists United declares on its website.
Christine Jones, of Atheists United, loads illegally placed religious material from public streets in Los Angeles into a car after removing them, Feb. 19, 2022. RNS photo by Alejandra Molina
Since 2019, Clark, who identifies as an atheist and humanist, has served as the executive director for Atheists United. He sees the organization as a space to build community for atheists. “The question of whether God exists can be left to the theologians and philosophers,” he said. Atheists United hosts a “recovering from religion” support group and an addiction recovery program that’s an alternative to Alcoholics Anonymous. The group also holds a monthly food bank and recently took a stargazing trip to Death Valley.
“Just because you don’t have a belief in God doesn’t mean you should lose access to community,” said Clark, 33. “We’re going to go at it uniquely because we live in a Christian society and we happen to not be believers in God.”
That includes their latest initiative to clear city streets of religious propaganda.
Street pirates don’t mind paid billboards or signage on church property since that’s within separation of church and state, Clark said. It’s the explicitly religious signs on public land that they take issue with. There’s a difference, Clark notes, between people standing on a highway overpass holding a sign and posters left behind as public nuisance.
It’s unknown where these signs come from, whether they are part of organized church efforts or individuals doing this on their own, but Atheist Street Pirates has collected about 30 signs that range in size and design.
Some banners are several feet wide with the words “TRUST JESUS.” Others are bright yellow and declare “REPENT … or Hell” or “Jesus is coming!” Then there are signs with stencil letters that read “JESUS IS COMING R U READY” and “Ask Jesus for Mercy.” Instead of throwing the signs away, the group is seeking creative ways, possibly an art exhibit, “to show the scope of the signage to the general public.”
Christine Jones, center, of Atheists United, displays illegally placed religious material that the group has removed from public streets in Los Angeles, at the group’s offices, Feb. 19, 2022. RNS photo by Alejandra Molina
To Clark, it’s not about getting “into an arms race over religious signage.” If that were the case, they’d place atheism signs to counter religious posters. The point, Clark said, is “to reinforce our commitment to a secular society.” Most of the signs they’ve documented proselytize a specific religion, and he said, it’s almost always Christianity, essentially becoming “free religious marketing for one religion on our highways.”
The greater Los Angeles area is home to residents who represent a wide range of faiths: Catholics, Pentecostals, Jews, Buddhists, Mormons, Scientologists, Self-Realization Fellowship members, Hindus and Muslims. And religion in Southern California, wrote a group of University of Southern California sociologists and anthropologists, is being reinvented “as religious ‘nones’ create new forms of purposeful community.”
Clark said he’s yet to encounter religious signage about Islam, Judaism or Hinduism.
“How unique would that be?” Clark said, adding that if he were to see an atheist sign, he’d take it down. ”It would be hypocriticalnot to.”
“I don’t know how Jewish people, or Muslims, or Hindus, or atheists are supposed to feel welcome in Los Angeles if the only religious signage they see are Christian signs on highways,” he added. “If the city is not going to take those signs down, we feel like it’s our responsibility to take action.”
United Methodist bishops and delegates gather together to pray at the front of the stage before a key vote on church policies about homosexuality on Feb. 26, 2019, during the special session of the General Conference of The United Methodist Church, held in St. Louis, Mo. RNS photo by Kit Doyle
(RNS) — The United Methodist Church has delayed its General Conference meeting for a third time due to the continuing COVID-19 pandemic. In response, some conservative United Methodists have announced they will preemptively leave the denomination rather than wait for the long anticipated meeting.
Delegates to the General Conference were expected to take up a proposal to split the denomination over disagreements on the full inclusion of its LGBTQ members at the meeting of its global decision-making body scheduled for Aug. 29 to Sept. 6 in Minneapolis.
But General Conference organizers announced Thursday evening (March 3) they are postponing that meeting to 2024 because of the continuing COVID-19 pandemic.
Obtaining vaccines and travel visas remains a challenge for delegates traveling outside the United States, according to the Commission on General Conference.
“We engaged in a fair, thorough, integrity-filled discussion of the alternatives,” said Kim Simpson, chairperson of the Commission on General Conference.
“The visa issue is a reality that is simply outside our control as we seek to achieve a reasonable threshold of delegate presence and participation. Ultimately our decision reflects the hope that 2024 will afford greater opportunity for global travel and a higher degree of protection for the health and safety of delegates and attendees.”
But one group of theologically conservative United Methodists said Thursday it is not willing to wait any longer to discuss a split and announced plans, through its Transitional Leadership Council, to launch the Global Methodist Church on May 1.
“Many United Methodists have grown impatient with a denomination clearly struggling to function effectively at the general church level,” said the Rev. Keith Boyette, chairman of the Transitional Leadership Council that has been guiding the creation of the Global Methodist Church for the past year and president of the Wesleyan Covenant Association.
“Theologically conservative local churches and annual conferences want to be free of divisive and destructive debates, and to have the freedom to move forward together. We are confident many existing congregations will join the new Global Methodist Church in waves over the next few years, and new church plants will sprout up as faithful members exit the UM Church and coalesce into new congregations.”
Meantime, the Reconciling Ministries Network, which advocates the full inclusion of LGBTQ United Methodists, said Thursday it supports the commission’s decision to once again postpone the General Conference.
“Let us be honest here: holding a pandemic-era General Conference with myriad barriers to safe and equitable participation would not have been a Christ-like way to be the Church,” the group said in a written statement.
No one experiences the success of leadership without also knowing leadership pain.
It’s up to each individual leader if they will press through the pain and grow or quit leading.
The principle is that strong.
Too many of my friends and colleagues have quit leading. They may still have a position in the church, but after enough pain for too many years, they pull back to a safe zone and maintain.
The trouble with retreat is that it brings its own pain.
Dr. Chand has served as a pastor, is the former President of Beulah Heights Bible College, the author of 15 books, Change Strategist and Leadership Consultant.
Sam is a good friend, and my post today gives you an overview of just a little of Sam’s wisdom and insights on this little talked about but so important topic of leadership pain.
There are many different examples and kinds of pain leaders experience. Jesus can help you walk through the pain, but growing from it is key.
Here are a few examples of leadership pain:
1) The pain of being misunderstood.
You can do everything right and be completely misunderstood.
You can pray fervently to make the right decision, or work hard to communicate the plan in just the right way, and still be misunderstood.
2) The pain of people leaving your church.
The people you help the most are often the first to complain and leave.
It’s difficult not to take this personally. We know the Kingdom of God is bigger than any one of our churches, but when you’re honest, this can still bring pain.
And different than in most businesses, those who attend your church are not customers, they are part of the church family, so it’s different when someone leaves.
3) The pain of deep disappointment.
Your ministry isn’t turning out like you thought or hoped.
This may be the most common leadership pain of all. Disappointment is a chief enemy to spiritual leaders.
Big dreams and bold vision are a healthy part of any leader’s life.
No one ever heard a conference speaker, blog writer, or author say, “Dream small and keep your vision manageable.”
The truth is, however, that God never promised everything would work just as you dreamed and planned. But He has called you to be obedient and faithful anyway.
Growing and leading though that pain is not easy, but essential. Don’t let the Enemy win.
4) The pain of a staff member leaving and taking others with them.
You chose them, hired them, paid them, encouraged them, loved them, trained them, and they leave without honor.
This point here is not meant to include the many normal and healthy staff transitions. That’s part of life. This pain comes from staff transitions that become difficult and sometimes even hurtful.
Youth Ministry Scandals: How to Avoid Becoming a Statistic
The last few years have been filled with news of famous ministry leaders who are falling morally, abusing finances and leading by intimidation. I can’t think of a time, other than the Swaggert/Bakker scandals of the 1980s, where more ministry leaders have fallen in some swirl of ethical disgrace.
But, for every leader that falls morally, there are 10 who burn out emotionally and spiritually. I’ve seen far more ministry leaders leave the ministry out of discouragement than disgrace.
So how do we keep from being another ministry statistic? How do we finish well?
Although my race is not yet completed, God has blessed me to have been in ministry for 30 years. This week marked the 30-year anniversary of a church I co-planted and co-pastored for 10 years before launching into Dare 2 Share full-time. Over the last three decades of starting a local church as well as a global ministry, God has given me a few insights into some of the keys to longevity in ministry.
Here are four of them:
1. Take care of your body.
I know this may seem like “carnal” thinking, but taking care of our bodies is vastly underestimated by many ministry leaders. After all your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit according to 1 Corinthians 6:19,20. For the first five years of my ministry experience I had allowed the temple God had loaned me to become a mess.
By the time I was 28 years old I had ballooned to almost 225 pounds of mostly mushy fat weight. Not only did I have a weight problem, I also had a “wait” problem. I thought I’d just “wait” to get in shape when I had more time. Besides, I was too busy taking care of important “spiritual” matters to address the “worldly” focus of my own personal fitness.
But one day I realized that my lack of health was impacting my ability to work hard over a sustained period of time. I had to take what I came to nickname “fat naps” during the day and was often crabby to my wife at night. Concerned friends confronted me and, finally convinced me to do something about it. Over the course of several months, through hard work and exercise, I pushed my weight below 200 pounds.
By God’s grace (and through a ton of sweat-drenched exercises) I now weigh 185 pounds and am probably in the best shape of my adult life. As a result I have the energy to do the work of a traveling evangelist with a relentless schedule.
So, as I challenge you to do something about your own personal fitness, I want you to know I relate. And I know the challenge before you…because that same challenge was/is before me. Eat healthy, sleep well, drink water and work out. Take care of the temple. It will help make you more fit for the ministry challenges ahead.
2. Take care of your soul.
Are you spending consistent time in the Word and prayer? Do you listen to music and podcasts that minister to your soul? Are you walking in a day-by-day, moment-by-moment declaration of dependence on the Holy Spirit? Do you take time to reflect and to rest?
Even though I’ve traveled for decades I’m hitting the road more now than ever. I have been touring with Winter Jam this Winter and YPS this Spring. Suffice it to say I know what busy looks like.
But, in the midst of the busyness, I find time to get away to pray, to read Scripture and to meditate on God’s truth. Without this time I couldn’t operate. Without this time I would burn out.
I’ve also found creative ways to combine taking care of my soul with taking care of my body. For instance, I often work out while listening to podcasts from great preachers like Chuck Swindoll and Charles Spurgeon. I can build my soul muscle, my brain muscle and my body muscles all at the same time.
For me, my time alone with God usually begins at 5 a.m. It’s my quiet time. Before my wife and kids I get up because, for me, it’s my best time to dive into the Scriptures, reflect on life and pray.
Of course, when I’m on the road I make adjustments. If I get to bed late then I’ll make sure I get enough sleep (if possible) but I always try to keep my time with God (as well as my exercise routine) consistent.
Take care of your soul. Never forsake your time with God. Improvise, adapt and overcome if your schedule is hectic, but prioritize it. If you want to keep from burning out then take time to care for your soul by spending time with the only One who can energize it with divine energy (Colossians 1:29).
3. Take care of your relationships.
This has not always been easy for me. My early years of ministry were defined by marital conflict and relational frustration. I often left my wife high and dry emotionally during my ministry travels and this led to tons of arguments and tension.
In the early years of my marriage I subconsciously assumed that because I was out “saving the world” that gave me some sort of pass on being an emotionally present husband. After being confronted in a Bible study 25 years ago or so, I broke down…hard. And God used that time to mark a long road of relational recovery.
With the help of godly men and women in our church we fought through to break through as a couple. Sure, we still have tension from time to time, but we are a couple who loves each other deeply from the heart. Thank God for the power of the Gospel to redeem marriages!
But it’s not just marriage relationships that need redeemed. It’s the relationships between fathers and sons, moms and daughters, brothers and sisters, friends and enemies (remember that according to Matthew 5:43-48 we’re supposed to love our enemies?).
Are you walking in bitterness or unforgiveness toward anyone? These become closed shades in the windows of our hearts that keep the light of Christ from shining in. Walking in this brand of self-imposed darkness can rob us of the spiritual Vitamin D that we need from basking in the presence of the Son.
And that can lead to burn out.
Take care of your relationships. And, finally…
4. Take care of your ministry.
“But you, keep your head in all situations, endure hardship, do the work of an evangelist, discharge all the duties of your ministry.” 2 Timothy 4:5
These are some of the last words of Paul to his protoge Timothy. He is reminding him to take care of all the duties of his ministry. This includes implementing ministry values like teaching God’s Word, building a culture of intercessory prayer and raising up leaders who are leading in all the right ways.
When Paul told Timothy to “do the work of an evangelist” what exactly did he mean? We know from Ephesians 4:11,12 that God raises up evangelists “to equip his people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up.” An evangelist doesn’t just evangelize. An evangelist equips others to evangelize.
Are you equipping your teens to evangelize? Are you modeling this with your life? Are your student and adult leaders setting the pace for your youth group?
For help in building this type of Gospel Advancing ministry check out Gospeladvancing.org then go to your favorite podcast platform and subscribe to the Gospelize with Greg Stier podcast. It will be your monthly infusion of Gospel spiciness that can keep you energizing, mobilizing and Gospelizing your teenagers.
How does taking care of your ministry (in a Gospel advancing way) help you not become a ministry statistic? The answer is simple. When you are equipping teenagers to reach their friends and watching them step out in faith you can’t help but be energized for the tough times in ministry.
Just like hate and hurt became Adam Sandler‘s fuel in The Waterboy, evangelistic momentum and disciple multiplication can become our tackling fuel in ministry. It gives us the courage and determination to keep pounding through all the problems. Typical youth ministry done in the typical away doesn’t come close to giving you the emotional horsepower you need to keep driving through the all challenges of youth ministry.
Refuse to become a ministry statistic! Don’t burn out, fall in sin or fade away!
Take care of your body, your soul, your relationships and your ministry. Do the work of an evangelist. Gospelize your youth ministry! And, in the power of Christ, finish well!
In the last seven weeks, God has moved in beautiful and profound ways in the church I am honored to serve as pastor. We have seen nearly 500 people stand and declare “I Believe” in public gatherings…which I realize needs a bit of explaining.
Every church I have served has invited people to “repent and believe” (repent of trusting in themselves and believe the good news of Jesus) in different ways. If we believe that Jesus brings forgiveness to people in the moment one turns from trusting oneself to trusting Christ, and that at the moment of salvation the person is crossing from spiritual death to spiritual life, then this is clearly the most important moment in a person’s life. It is quite truly a matter of spiritual life or spiritual death. The moment of receiving God’s grace, of becoming His, of being “born again” into His family impacts this life and the life to come.
Some churches invite people to pray and ask Jesus for forgiveness, perhaps letting the church know by way of a communication card. Other churches invite people to come forward during a song after the message and talk to someone. I am great with all of the approaches. We don’t see a prescriptive formula in the Scripture of how to lead the moment of people receiving Christ at a church service, but we certainly should be inviting people to turn to Jesus and receive Him.
Here is how we handle the moment of inviting people to receive Christ at Mariners Church. We simply ask people to stand and publicly confess their faith in Jesus. The one teaching/preaching will explain the gospel and then invite those who are ready to believe in Jesus and receive Him as Saviorand Lord to stand and declare “I believe.” There is no music playing in the background. The room is usually really quiet. And one-by-one people stand and confess, “I believe.” After the sacred time has passed, we celebrate through singing and we invite those who have received Christ to come forward and receive prayer with some of our pastors and elders.
The moment is sacred. In those moments you know that God is bringing people to Himself, wooing people to Himself. Even the awkward silence as we wait for people to stand is a holy and sacred silence. It reminds us of the moment Christ saved us, of the time when Christ won us to Himself. It is epic.
A few weeks ago, I was leading this moment at one of our weekend services. And someone massively disrupted the moment. On purpose. Disruptions happen but the vast majority are not on purpose (someone forgets to silence their phone, an emergency happens, etc.). But this guy stood up, as if he was going to say “I believe” and yelled out a critique, framed as a question — like many critiques are. He yelled, “When are you going to bring the cross back?”
I had just finished preaching a message where I taught that Jesus experienced hell for us on the cross so we can experience heaven with him. The auditorium he walked into has a massive cross hanging above the entrance. We typically have a cross on the side of our stage, but it was moved during the stage transition after our Christmas services and was unintentionally not moved back. Instead of talking to one of us pastors on the patio (we are super accessible) or emailing or calling, he chose to stand up and disrupt the most sacred moment in one’s life – a moment that impacts eternity.
I had no idea what he was even talking about when he said it. I thought he was saying I need to preach the cross more. By God’s grace, I quickly answered with “I am preaching the cross of Jesus right now,” and by God’s grace people continued to stand and place their faith in Jesus. We sang as people came forward for prayer and God did what God does – He brought people to Himself.
For the first time since 1980, the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) will have a one-term president, as current SBC president Ed Litton announced earlier this week that he would not seek a second term at June’s upcoming annual meeting in Anaheim, California.
The pastor of Redemption Church in the Mobile, Alabama made the announcement by video, sharing that God has called him to devote the next five to ten years to pursuing racial reconciliation within the local church—an initiative that will be shared more during the annual meeting.
Litton won 2021’s presidency by only a few hundred votes in a run-off with pastor Mike Stone of Emmanuel Baptist Church in Blackshear, Georgia. Litton’s year of service will be remembered for his appointing of a task force to oversee a third-party review of the SBC Executive Committee’s alleged mishandling of sexual abuse claims requested by its messengers at their 2021 annual meeting.
In addition to the task force, Litton’s presidency has also be clouded by multiple sermon plagiarism allegations regarding sermons that he preached prior to his being elected as SBC president.
“It’s no secret that this has been a difficult year,” Litton said in his video, “as we fought to emerge from two years of a pandemic. Many of our pastors and churches are struggling. We’ve also navigated some painful conflicts and intense discussions right now. I want to speak as plainly as I can—as I’ve previously stated—I take responsibility for my own failures and shortcomings, for mistakes I’ve made in the preparation and delivery of particular sermons.”
Litton told the SBC that he believes we are in a critical moment and believes “that nothing should distract us from what lies ahead.” During the annual meeting in Anaheim, the sexual abuse task force will present a full report with recommendations. “The messengers from our churches must be prepared to act upon the recommendations they bring forth,” Litton said.
Controversy Surrounding Litton’s Presidency
A video released days after Litton was named the new president of the SBC shows side-by-side clips of the pastor practically reciting word-for-word one of J.D. Greear’s sermons as his own. Litton apologized for not giving credit to Greear, sharing that he had Greear’s permission to use a collection of sermons he inquired about.
Days later, another set of videos were released depicting Litton using the same prayer, sermon points, sub points, and analogies. The allegations led to the deletion of over 100 sermons that his church had posted on YouTube. Litton was also accused of plagiarizing Tim Keller.
Robert H. Schuller’s Crystal Cathedral Ministries had widespread influence and an attendance of thousands before it eventually filed for bankruptcy. Author and professor Dr. Gerardo Martí believes one key lesson church leaders should take from Schuller’s story is to beware of allowing a need for growth to drive their ministries.
“What Robert Schuller seemed to have solved,” said Martí, “was how to have a stable and strong church that you would be able to count on being there for generations. And the surprising aspect of this ministry that influenced thousands of other church leaders is how quickly it imploded.”
Crystal Cathedral: A Key Lesson for Church Leaders
In 1955, Robert H. Schuller founded what became Crystal Cathedral Ministries (CCM) in Garden Grove, Calif. Part of the Reformed Church in America, the church eventually grew to have an attendance in the thousands. In 1977, construction began on a building with a groundbreaking design that allowed for walk-in and drive-in services. The construction of the Crystal Cathedral cost $18 million. It now seats 2,800 people, features 10,000 windows and allows for 1,000 musicians.
Schuller eventually started a television program called “The Hour of Power,” which is still running today. His grandson, Bobby Schuller, now hosts the program, which is one of the longest-running and most-watched television programs in the world. The cathedral’s famed pipe organ, made famous on “The Hour Of Power,” recently returned to its home after nearly 10 years away and $3 million in renovations.
Yet Crystal Cathedral Ministries filed for bankruptcy in 2010. The Roman Catholic Diocese of Orange bought the famous building in 2011 and changed its name to “Christ Cathedral.” CCM is now Shepherd’s Grove Church and part of the Presbyterian Church (USA); Bobby Schuller is lead pastor.
“[Robert H.] Schuller shifted our understanding of the management of church,” said Martí. “He didn’t just say, ‘Look, we just need to trust Jesus and pray together.’ He really believed that you needed to have a strategic plan and to think further out. But I think what he got caught in was that he believed that people gave only when things look good. And so he created visions of things that were not yet accomplished, things that were in the future.”
Martí explained that Schuller got “caught in a cycle of having to make that vision bigger and bigger, more and more ambitious.” As he did so, the vision became “harder and harder to achieve. And you are straining the people under you to make that happen. You’re asking for more volunteer hours, you’re asking them to double their tithing, you’re asking for more and more…Schuller really believed that he was building the modern pyramids.”
A 14-year-old Miami student is suing Mater Academy for alleged religious discrimination. The student, who is a Christian, says that he has been mocked by both teachers and students for his religious practice and was even the target of a shooting threat hoax, an incident for which he was exonerated after being suspended for 10 days.
According to the suit, which has been filed by the conservative Dhillon Law Group, the school has failed to take the student’s claims of harassment seriously.
The student specifically claims that a science teacher openly mocked him in front of other students for being a Christian and that he has been the subject of ridicule from other students for carrying a Bible with him to school.
Earlier this year, the student was also subject to a police investigation after an active shooter threat was made on the school. Other students singled out the student who is now suing the school, alleging that he was planning a shooting.
According to Fox News, the police initially took the threat very seriously but eventually concluded that the student had been the subject of a prank.
While the student served a 10-day suspension during the investigation following the incident, Dhillon Law Group has pointed out that no students have received punishment for falsely accusing him. According to Dhillon Law Group partner Matthew Sarelson, the student has continued to receive online harassment from numerous parents of students at the school, even though his name has been cleared by police.
This is the second time Mater Academy has come under fire this year, as an outcry regarding the actions of a teacher at another Mater school located in Cutler Bay, FL made headlines last month.
Concerns arose when an audio recording began circulating wherein a teacher can be heard suggesting that students who don’t apply themselves in her class will eventually need to “steal or sell your bodies, be a whore” to earn a living.
The teacher’s remarks were apparently in response to a number of students not having completed an assignment. “Not submitting your work that we did in class is wrong. It’s lazy,” the teacher could be heard saying.
Pope Francis touches his right knee during his weekly general audience at the Vatican, Wednesday, March 2, 2022. (AP Photo/Gregorio Borgia)
ROME (AP) — Pope Francis is planning to visit Congo and South Sudan in July, fulfilling a wish to minister to the faithful in the African countries that have sizeable Catholic populations and long histories of conflict. The Archbishop of Canterbury will join him for the South Sudan leg in the latest ecumenical effort to solidify peace in the young country, officials said Thursday.
Francis is scheduled to visit the Congolese capital, Kinshasa, and the eastern city of Goma on July 2-5, and plans to be in Juba, South Sudan, from July 5-7, the Vatican said.
The trip would be one of Francis’ longest in years and his third to sub-Saharan Africa. He visited Kenya, Uganda and the Central African Republic in 2015, and Mozambique, Mauritius and Madagascar in 2019. Francis also visited Egypt in 2017 and Morocco two years later.
The trip will certainly test the 85-year-old pontiff’s stamina and mobility. He had 33 centimeters (13 inches) of his large intestine removed and spent 10 days in the hospital last July. This week, the pope canceled two events because of acute pain in his knee that makes walking and standing painful. The Vatican said his doctors had prescribed rest.
The only other foreign trip the Vatican has confirmed for this year is an April 2-3 visit to Malta.
Francis has wanted to visit South Sudan for years, but security concerns have always prevented him from going, including for a planned joint visit with the Archbishop of Canterbury. A spokesman for Archbishop Justin Welby told The Associated Press on Thursday: “I can confirm that the Archbishop of Canterbury will join the pope in South Sudan.” Also expected is the moderator of the Church of Scotland, Rev. Jim Wallace, to represent the main Christian faith groups in the country.
In 2019, the pope invited South Sudan’s rival leaders to the Vatican for an Easter summit, stunning onlookers when he knelt down and kissed their feet in a humble plea for peace.
One Juba resident, Garang Deng, said the pope’s visit should renew the political will of South Sudan President Salva Kiir, who is Catholic, and his longtime rival Riek Machar.
The pope’s visit will bring new energy to the search for peace, the Rev. Samuel Abe with the Catholic archdiocese of Juba told The Associated Press on Thursday.
“We are very happy and excited. Such a visit is unusual,” he said. “So we expect blessings from him.”
South Sudan, which has existed as a nation for just over a decade after winning independence from Sudan, could use them. International impatience has been rising with the government’s slow implementation of a 2018 peace deal ending a five-year civil war, including the crucial work of merging and deploying the once-rival armed forces. An estimated 400,000 people were killed in the civil war, and hundreds still die in intercommunal violence around the country.
In the 1960s, someone who was not active in church might get up, go out to pick up the newspaper, and feel a little guilty watching neighbors heading off to worship. Today it would be just as uncommon for someone checking their news feed to feel any guilt about not attending church.
In Parts 1, 2, and 3 of this series we looked at biblical literacy and ways to communicate effectively. In this article I want to address one of the challenges pastors have to confront today: inconsistent church attendance. While the extent and pace of decline depends on who conducts the study and their metrics, the fact of the matter is that the majority of churches are experiencing a drop in weekly attendance.
Shifts in Church Attendance
The pandemic impacted church attendance like nothing in our lifetime, and most churches have not recovered fully from its impact. But even before the pandemic there were troubling statistics about attendance. In 2019, Lifeway Research reported, “Six in 10 Protestant churches are plateaued or declining in attendance and more than half saw fewer than 10 people become new Christians in the past 12 months.” A Pew research study from 2017 revealed several reasons U.S. adults who “attend religious services a few times a year or less” do not attend on a more consistent basis:
I practice my faith in other ways (37%)
I am not a believer (28%)
No reason is ‘very important’ (26%)
I haven’t found a church/house of worship I like (23%)
I don’t like the sermons (18%)
I don’t feel welcome (14%)
I don’t have the time (12%)
I’m in poor health/difficult to get around (9%)
There isn’t a church for my religion in my area (7%)
Today the perception of “regular attendance” has dropped from attending weekly to attending monthly. According to a Pew Research study in 2015, only 36% of U.S. adults “say they attend religious services at least once a week.” This tells us that there has been a marked shift in modern American priorities and cultural expectations. The pandemic only accelerated this trend. You can add to that what I call the Great Sort, where many people in 2020 changed churches—often churches they had attended for many years—because of disagreements over current issues from masks to political views. Others stopped attending altogether.
Our natural inclination may be to berate people for missing church, but instead, we should point people to the reason we attend church: God.
I appreciate how Eugene Peterson says it in A Long Obedience in the Same Direction:
One of the afflictions of pastoral workhas been to listen with a straight face to all the reasons people give for not going to church…There was a time when I responded to such statements with simple arguments that exposed them as flimsy excuses. Then I noticed that it didn’t make any difference. If I showed the inadequacy of one excuse, three more would pop up in its place. So I don’t respond anymore. I listen (with a straight face) and go home and pray that person will one day find the one sufficient reason for going to church, which is God.
We know that you can’t love Jesus and despise his wife, the church. But the shift of people attending monthly rather than weekly greatly affects ministry in the church. Many children’s ministers find they need two people to staff what was previously a one-person role because of irregular attendance patterns due to travel, sports, or no particular reason at all. Many churches have started asking members to commit to serving two Sundays each month in response to this trend.
Impact on Preaching
This shift brings implications for preaching as well. Scott Slayton writes, “We think we can change people by simply appealing to their wills. Let’s show them all, all the reasons why attending church less is bad for them.” He adds, “This type of approach might change people for a season, but it will not alter the love of their hearts and produce lasting change.” Think about eating healthy: we know it is good to eat well but many of us don’t regularly get that many servings of fruits and veggies.
Logos for #ACCtoo, left, and the Anglican Church of Canada. Courtesy images
(RNS) — In 2021, Cydney Proctor had spent more than a decade seeking justice for the repeated sexual misconduct she alleges she experienced at the hands of three leaders in the Anglican Church of Canada in the dioceses of Brandon, Ontario, and Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island beginning when she was 17. For years, she tried to go through formal church channels, reporting the allegations to several bishops and ACC leaders, but had gotten nowhere.
“I didn’t need to name names, but I wanted to do something in my power to change the broken policies within the church and its disciplinary system,” said Proctor, now 31 and living in Nova Scotia.
In January 2021, Proctor began talks with the Anglican Journal — the ACC’s national newspaper — about an article that would share how the church had mishandled her allegations, as well as the allegations of two other survivors.
Not long after, a draft of the story was leaked to the institutions and dioceses implicated in the survivors’ stories.
The breach of trust sparked the creation of ACCtoo, a group of anti-abuse advocates who were stirred by Proctor’s story to take up her cause. On Feb. 17, 2022, ACCtoo published an open letter to ACC leaders asking the church to repent for harming Proctor and the other survivors and asked for signatures. As of Wednesday (March 2), 228 individuals, including a bishop, three archdeacons and a significant number of other ACC clergy, had signed the letter.
Cydney Proctor. Courtesy photo
The Rev. Heather Liddell, rector at St. Peter’s Anglican Church in Edmonton, Alberta, told Religion News Service that her ordination vows meant that not signing the letter wasn’t an option. She pointed to the Anglican Church in Canada’s history of repentance for its Indigenous residential schools as evidence that the ACC is capable of genuine repentance for wrongdoing.
“We are a church that repents and that turns back to God,” said Liddell. “I need us to still be that.”
“Without transparency and accountability, the credibility of the Anglican Church of Canada and the Anglican Journal cannot be repaired,” the letter says.
The Anglican Church of Canada, rooted in the Church of England, was until 1832 the established church of the country. Today its 30 dioceses, which include roughly 360,000 members, according to 2017 data, are part of the worldwide Anglican Communion’s 44 churches. The ACC has long supported the ordination of women, and some of its dioceses have recognized same-sex marriage.
In spring 2021, preparation of the Anglican Journal article was going according to plan. To protect survivors from backlash, Anglican Journal staff agreed that the article wouldn’t name the people or institutions implicated in their stories and would use pseudonyms for two of the three survivors. The newspaper also told survivors they could review the story before publication.
Matthew Townsend was editor of the Anglican Journal at the time. “I thought that we could be of service to church and to victims of sexual misconduct and violence,” he told RNS.
As journalist Joelle Kidd drafted the story, Townsend was on parental leave for the birth of his daughter. It wasn’t until he returned to the office on May 10 that he realized something had gone wrong.
FILE - The Monastery of the Caves, also known as Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra, one of the holiest sites of Eastern Orthodox Christians, is seen in Kyiv, Ukraine, Wednesday, Oct. 10, 2007. As the capital braces for a Russian attack in 2022, the spiritual heart of Ukraine could be at risk. (AP Photo/Efrem Lukatsky, File)
Kyiv, bracing for a potentially catastrophic Russian attack, is the spiritual heart of Ukraine.
Among the sites at risk in the Ukrainian capital are the nation’s most sacred Orthodox shrines, dating back nearly 1,000 years to the dawn of Christianity in the region.
The sites, along with other landmark shrines in Kyiv, are religiously significant to both Ukrainian Orthodox and Russian Orthodox. They also stand as powerful symbols in the quarrel over whether the two groups are parts of a single people — as Russian President Vladimir Putin has claimed — or are distinct but related Slavic nations.
The landmarks include the golden domed St. Sophia’s Cathedral and the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra, a sprawling underground and above-ground complex also known as the Monastery of the Caves. Others include the multi-towered St. Michael’s Golden-Domed Monastery and St. Andrew’s Church.
On Tuesday, Ukrainian officials said Russian forces damaged another monument — Ukraine’s main Holocaust memorial, Babi Yar — prompting international condemnation.
“What will be next if even Babi Yar (is hit)” asked Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Wednesday. “What other ‘military’ objects, ‘NATO bases’ are threatening Russia? St. Sophia’s Cathedral, Lavra, Andrew’s Church?”
There is no indication the Russians intentionally targeted Babi Yar. Nor is there any confirmation that the Russians plan to target any of the sacred sites in Kyiv. But civilian buildings have already been hit in other cities, and Kyiv’s major shrines sit in elevated locations that could leave them especially vulnerable.
Case in point: The Assumption Cathedral in Kharkiv, Ukraine‘s second-largest city, was damaged in the recent attacks, reportedly with stained-glass windows broken and other decorations damaged. The cathedral, which is under the Moscow-affiliated Orthodox church, was Kharkiv’s tallest building until sometime in the 21st century.
The risk is even greater in Kyiv.
“We’re talking about a very old city,” said Jacob Lassin, a postdoctoral research scholar at the Arizona State University’s Melikian Center for Russian, Eurasian, and East European Studies. “The center part is densely packed. Even if you’re trying to hit one thing, you could easily hit something else.”
The symbolic value of the shrines is powerful even to people who don’t share the religious faith they commemorate.
“The idea that the main symbol that stood in your city for 1,000 years could be at risk or could be destroyed is very frightening,” Lassin said.
The symbols matter not only to the Ukrainian people but to Putin, too. He justified the invasion with baseless claims he was countering “neo-Nazism” in Ukraine — this in a country with a Jewish president.
Friar Marek Viktor Gongalo, from Ukraine, reads in Polish Pope Francis' message during the weekly general audience at the Vatican, Wednesday, March 2, 2022. The Pope spoke about the elderly parents of Friar Gongalo saying his heart is with them as they hide in an underground refuge near Kiev. Speaking at the end of the weekly audience, the Pope thanked the Polish people for opening their borders, hearts and homes to Ukrainians. (AP Photo/Gregorio Borgia)
VATICAN CITY (RNS) — Pope Francis praised practical and spiritual efforts to promote peace on Wednesday (March 2), encouraging people to dedicate prayers and fasting to ending the conflict in Ukraine as the church season of Lent begins, and thanked countries that are welcoming migrants from the war-torn country.
“Let’s keep the memory of this people in our hearts,” he said.
Ash Wednesday, the opening of Lent, will be commemorated at the Vatican in a day of prayer and fasting for peace in Ukraine.
“For us Catholics, Ash Wednesday is already a day of prayer and fasting,” said Cardinal Kurt Koch, who heads the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity, speaking to Vatican media on Tuesday. Public prayer may also “appeal to the conscience of all those who have power over war and peace,” he added.
Addressing Polish Catholics during his general audience on Wednesday, Francis praised them for being the first “to support Ukraine, opening your borders and your hearts and the doors to your homes to Ukrainians fleeing war. You are generously offering them all that is necessary to live with dignity despite the dramatic moment.”
“I am deeply grateful and bless you from the heart!” he added.
Francis advocated on behalf of immigrants and refugees since the beginning of his pontificate, which has seen millions seek shelter from strife in the Middle East. As a half million people are now fleeing the war in Ukraine, Europe faces a new migratory wave.
The pope’s message to Poland was read to the audience by a Ukrainian Franciscan friar whose family lives near Kyiv. “His parents are right now in underground bunkers to protect themselves from bombs,” the pope said, “and he’s here performing his duty with us.”
Francis said that by accompanying the friar “we accompany all the people suffering from the bombings” and show support for the many elderly people hidden in bunkers.
Ukrainian and Russia representatives engaged in the second day of negotiations on the Belarus border on Wednesday, but both parties reported little progress. Vatican Secretary of State Cardinal Pietro Parolin on Monday offered the mediation of the Holy See to resolve the conflict.
The conflict has complicated Francis’ pursuit of ecumenical relations with the Eastern Orthodox Christian hierarchy after meeting with Patriarch Kirill of Moscow in Havana in 2016. The Vatican had hoped for a second encounter this spring, but the war has exacerbated the estrangement of the Moscow Orthodox Church and its satellite church in Ukraine from a newly recognized patriarchate based in Kyiv.
Joby Martin joins “The Stetzer ChurchLeaders Podcast” to discuss what happens when a church leader has truly been run over by the “grace train" and understands the profound love and grace of God.
