Baptist Press Stories for Jan. 18 2013 --------------------------------------- Roe, legalizing abortion in 1973, caused Baptists to embrace life http://www.bpnews.net/BPnews.asp?ID=39549 Immigration reform optimism voiced by Baptist policy group & Chamber of Commerce http://www.bpnews.net/BPnews.asp?ID=39550 2012: God's world in images http://www.bpnews.net/BPnews.asp?ID=39551 College coaches ponder Hall of Fame vote, baseball's steroids era & 'the right way' http://www.bpnews.net/BPnews.asp?ID=39552 In Queens, N.Y., a partnership blossoms http://www.bpnews.net/BPnews.asp?ID=39553 CULTURE DIGEST: Passion propels Tomlin to top of Billboard chart http://www.bpnews.net/BPnews.asp?ID=39554 CALL TO PRAYER: 40 years of abortion http://www.bpnews.net/BPnews.asp?ID=39555 FIRST-PERSON: Teacher fired despite his rights http://www.bpnews.net/BPnews.asp?ID=39556 EDITORIAL: Mantener el Enfoque http://www.bpnews.net/BPnews.asp?ID=39557 --------------------------------------- Roe, legalizing abortion in 1973, caused Baptists to embrace life By Tom Strode Jan. 18 2013 http://www.bpnews.net/BPnews.asp?ID=39549 EDITOR'S NOTE: Sunday, Jan. 20, is Sanctity of Life Sunday in the Southern Baptist Convention. WASHINGTON (BP) -- The U.S. Supreme Court's Roe v. Wade decision not only awakened Southern Baptists eventually to the gruesome reality of abortion but helped power what came to be known as their convention's Conservative Resurgence, two longtime observers say. America will reach the 40th anniversary of legalized abortion Jan. 22. On that date, pro-life advocates will grieve and abortion rights defenders will celebrate Roe, the opinion that –- coupled with a companion ruling, Doe v. Bolton -– had the effect of striking down all abortion restrictions and legalizing the procedure nationwide for virtually any reason at any stage of pregnancy. When the high court issued those decisions jointly in 1973, Southern Baptists were either uninformed or misguided -– and consequently unengaged -- at the grass roots but supportive of abortion rights at the institutional level and through the resolution process, Richard Land and Jerry Sutton told Baptist Press. Now, Southern Baptists are overwhelmingly pro-life. That contrast four decades ago between the grass roots and some denominational leaders produced discord as the massive death toll of unborn babies mounted in the 1970s. Meanwhile, the effort to restore the Southern Baptist Convention's institutions to a belief in biblical inerrancy began in 1979 with the election of the SBC’s first president committed to the Conservative Resurgence. By then, the abortion issue had become a driving force in the movement, Land and Sutton said. The abortion issue "was part of the Conservative Resurgence, and I think that it played a role that the moderates never understood," Land said of those Southern Baptists who disagreed with the effort to reform the convention’s institutions. "I think the moderates, being mostly pro-choice themselves, never really comprehended the moral indignation and outrage of the conservatives that their denomination was being portrayed as pro-choice. Being pro-choice themselves, they just didn't get it. And I think that emotion was one of the factors that fueled people to come to the convention and to vote for pro-life, inerrantist candidates. "Please understand me, the 'sine qua non' for the Conservative Resurgence was the battle over the Bible, but one of the most emotional issues about the Bible and what the Bible said was what the Bible said about abortion," said Land, president of the Southern Baptist Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission (ERLC). Sutton said, "I suspect that had there not been a Roe v. Wade there may not have been a Conservative Resurgence. "I think what happened is the abortion issue galvanized conservatives," said Sutton, who has written books on the Conservative Resurgence and Southern Baptist cultural engagement. Abortion and biblical inerrancy "coupled together gave great emphasis and a unifying factor to the conservative pastors who [were] leading this whole Conservative Resurgence," he said. The conservative pastors "said Southern Baptists as a whole don't believe that taking the life of an unborn child is morally acceptable," said Sutton, a longtime pastor and now vice president of academic development and dean of the faculty at Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Kansas City, Mo. "[W]hat I'm saying is all of this worked in concert together." Supporters of the Conservative Resurgence achieved their goals in the years that followed –- including the 1988 selection of pro-lifer Land as head of the convention's ethics entity, then called the Christian Life Commission (CLC) and now the ERLC. During those years, Southern Baptists became known as committed participants in the pro-life movement. The Southern Baptist Convention is "the most consistently pro-life, major religious denomination in terms of its rank and file, because only about half of people who identify as Catholics agree with the church's position on abortion," Land said. "If you ask people who identify as Southern Baptists, it's somewhere between 80 and 90 percent who are opposed to abortion on demand.... [A]n overwhelming percentage of Southern Baptists are opposed to most of the abortions that take place and think they should be illegal." Four decades ago, however, Southern Baptists were ill-prepared for the 1973 Roe and Doe rulings and the abortion regime they established. Seemingly, Southern Baptists in general, Sutton said, were like he was at the time -- "essentially ignorant." "Our pastors had not preached on it. People had not talked about it for the most part," said Sutton, who was a political science major at the University of South Alabama in 1973. "I probably represented the vast majority of Southern Baptists who were for the most part in the dark about the issues being raised." Based on his personal experience and research, Sutton said, "From what I could tell, most Southern Baptists had not really understood what was transpiring. You know, they knew there was talk about abortion. Most people I knew just thought abortion was murder. You didn't kill unborn babies. But nobody knew the legal ramifications. They had no idea about the substance of Roe v. Wade or Doe versus Bolton. "Everything that I could tell is that Southern Baptists as a whole were pro-life. They had just never articulated it," he said. As a student in 1969-72 at New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary, Land said "misinformation and a reluctance to talk about the issue" marked even many of his fellow students. "I found a disturbing number [of other seminary students] to be pro-choice, even conservatives," Land said. "A lot of them tended to see it as a Catholic issue. And they had bought into this idea that life begins when the baby breathes." Land said he "was able to convince a lot of people that this was a human being, this was a baby that deserved protection" as he talked to them about the physiology of the unborn child. Nearly two years before Roe, however, the SBC already was on record in support of abortion for reasons nearly as expansive as those the high court permitted in its 1973 decisions. While grass-roots Southern Baptists were poorly prepared, the CLC and its executive director, Foy Valentine, were not. At the 1971 SBC annual meeting, messengers approved a resolution –- with Valentine's backing, Sutton said -– that urged Southern Baptists to promote legislation that would permit abortion in cases such as "rape, incest, clear evidence of severe fetal deformity, and carefully ascertained evidence of the likelihood of damage to the emotional, mental, and physical health of the mother." Sutton said of that language, "(B)y the time you go through the exceptions, there are no exceptions.... Basically, Southern Baptists, under Foy Valentine's leadership, embraced a pro-abortion posture." Shortly after the 20th anniversary of Roe and Doe, Timothy George described the SBC's '71 resolution as essentially "a strong call for the liberalizing and legalizing of abortion in this country." "[T]wo years prior to the Supreme Court decision of 1973, which opened the floodgates to abortion on demand in the United States, the Southern Baptist Convention was on record advocating the decriminalization of abortion and extending the discretion of this decision into the realm of personal, privatized choice," said George, dean of Beeson Divinity School at Samford University in Birmingham, Ala. "The simple fact is that Roe v. Wade did little more than place a stamp of approval on what America's largest, most conservative Protestant denomination had already agreed to." Baptist Press' own coverage in 1973 of the Roe v. Wade ruling had a significant pro-choice tilt. One BP story at the time said Roe "advanced the cause of religious liberty, human equality and justice." In 2000, the SBC formally adopted a solidly pro-life statement in The Baptist Faith and Message (see Article XV), the position embraced by Baptist Press. Valentine continued to promote abortion rights. In 1977, he joined four Southern Baptist seminary professors in endorsing a document by the then-named Religious Coalition for Abortion Rights that affirmed Roe and government funding of abortions. Southern Baptists increasingly learned about the CLC's position and moved into the pro-life camp as the '70s passed. "The real shift among Southern Baptists and other evangelicals was between '76 and '80, not between '73 and '76," said Land, who returned to the United States in 1975 after three years of doctoral studies in England. "And I think it was outrage over the numbers, the sheer slaughter of millions of babies, that shocked people into looking at this issue in a different way and seeing that it was a profoundly moral issue that we had to deal with." The toll escalated from nearly 750,000 legal abortions in 1973 to about 1.5 million in 1979, according to the Guttmacher Institute. "[T]o find out Southern Baptist people were giving their tithes and offerings to the Cooperative Program, which was supporting among other institutions ... the Christian Life Commission, and then they were using the money that we gave to them to further a pro-abortion posture, this became a great source of tension," Sutton said. SBC messengers finally adopted the first of several pro-life resolutions in 1980. That resolution -- introduced by Larry Lewis, who later became president of the then-named Home Mission Board (now North American Mission Board) -- called for legislation or a constitutional amendment to ban abortion except to save the life of the mother. In 1984, Southern Baptists for Life was started outside the SBC bureaucracy to advance the pro-life cause in the face of opposition at the institutional level. The organization helped place a Sanctity of Human Life Sunday on the denominational calendar each January. Land's 1988 election by a CLC trustee board controlled by conservatives helped further a transformation that proved complete at the national level in the 1990s, when the denominational leadership uniformly became pro-life. The SBC "was still pro-choice at the institutional level and was seen so by the Supreme Court and others until I came to the commission," Land said. "They were listing the Southern Baptist Convention as a pro-choice organization." In 2003, SBC messengers passed a resolution regarding Roe five months after its 30th anniversary. In the measure, messengers said, "[W]e lament and renounce statements and actions by previous Conventions and previous denominational leadership that offered support to the abortion culture." Sutton pointed to two "defining moments" in the ascendancy of the pro-life cause in the SBC: (1) The approval of Lewis' pro-life resolution at the 1980 meeting,and (2) Land's election at the CLC. Land has announced he will retire in October upon the completion of 25 years as head of the convention's ethics entity. He gave the following assessment of Southern Baptists as legalized abortion's 40th anniversary and his retirement near. "I feel good that Southern Baptists are the most pro-life denomination of any size in the country," Land said, "but I don't feel good in the sense that I think we should always be doing more to help people understand the pro-life issue and how it relates not only to abortion but to euthanasia and end-of-life issues, which, of course, are going to become a more and more compelling issue in the immediate decades ahead. "I won't feel 'good' -- in the sense of good with quotation marks around it -- until every Southern Baptist is pro-life," he said, "and honors the Baptist Faith and Message commitment to defend 'the sanctity of all human life from conception to natural death.'" --30-- Tom Strode is the Washington bureau chief for Baptist Press. Get Baptist Press headlines and breaking news on Twitter ([URL=http://www.Twitter.com/BaptistPress]@BaptistPress[/URL]), Facebook ([URL=http://Facebook.com/BaptistPress]Facebook.com/BaptistPress [/URL]) and in your email ([URL=http://baptistpress.com/SubscribeBP.asp] -- End of story -- Immigration reform optimism voiced by Baptist policy group & Chamber of Commerce By Staff Jan. 18 2013 http://www.bpnews.net/BPnews.asp?ID=39550 WASHINGTON (BP) -- The U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the Southern Baptist Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission both regard immigration reform as a priority at the start of a new session of Congress, representatives of the two groups said at a Jan. 17 news conference in Washington. "We do not intend to let this fail," said Barrett Duke, vice president for public policy and research for the ERLC, the public policy entity of the nation's largest non-Catholic religious body. "We will stay on top of this until Washington, D.C., and our country finally [do] what is right by the 12 million who are here looking to us to do something to help resolve their dilemma," Duke said. Tom Donohue, president of the Chamber of Commerce, the world's largest business organization, told reporters at the news conference "a sense of consensus" is growing among people who have been on opposite sides of enacting immigration reform. Americans with widely divergent views have contended for years the federal government's failure to deal with immigration has resulted in a broken system and from 11 to 12 million undocumented, or illegal, immigrants in this country. The National Immigration Forum (NIF) -- which organized the news conference of religious, business and law enforcement spokesmen -- cited three consensus points for broad reform: 1) Recognition of the need for border security and safety in communities; 2) establishment of a just pathway to legal status and citizenship for undocumented immigrants while respecting those who have long awaited naturalization; 3) modernization of the immigration laws that includes worker programs that aid the workforce and economy. Carlos Gutierrez, Commerce secretary under President George W. Bush and now vice chairman of Citigroup, also expressed optimism in his comments at the news conference. "There have been more people coming out in favor," Gutierrez said. "There are people who have moderated their stance on this from six years ago, and I think part of that is just an understanding that [failure to act] is very bad for the country." The optimism comes after the last push for immigration reform in 2007 failed despite Bush's efforts. November's election results, which reform advocates said demonstrated the increased voting power of Hispanics, appear to provide a significant reason for legislative movement. Immigration, however, has yet to reach the level of importance it must for enactment of reform, Gutierrez said, adding gun control has surpassed it as a priority in Washington. "This has to become the No. 1 priority for the president and for Congress. Get people together to say, 'We're going to fix this problem, because it's important enough to be fixed.' And that hasn't happened yet. And I think it has to be a lot more than just a couple of very nice sentences in the State of the Union address," Gutierrez told reporters. Donohue said, "The bottom line on immigration is that the status quo on immigration in our country is a fundamental loser." A super political action committee (PAC) to aid GOP candidates who support such change -- Republicans for Immigration Reform -- is nearing a launch, Gutierrez said. The super PAC will "give cover" to those who publicly advocate immigration reform, he said. Ali Noorani, NIF's executive director, still said the new congressional session is the "best opportunity for broad immigration reform in nearly a decade." Duke pointed to a new reform proposal by Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida and developments among other congressional Republicans as indications of progress. "I think the determination is there at this point" in both parties, he said. The ERLC is visiting with House members and communicating with Southern Baptists and other evangelical Christians regarding immigration reform, Duke said. As part of its efforts, the ERLC joined with an evangelical coalition, the Evangelical Immigration Table, in inaugurating Jan. 14 the "I Was a Stranger" challenge. The initiative -- which can be accessed online at http://evangelicalimmigrationtable.com/iwasastranger/ -- provides a Bible verse for reflection on the issue on each of 40 days. While advocates for immigration reform have various reasons for their support, it is a moral and humanitarian issue for the ERLC, Duke said. In the Bible, God instructs His Old Testament people, the Israelites, to love the stranger among them, Duke said. "[W]hen we read that, we understand that God has an expectation for how a people with power would treat those who are vulnerable and weak in their presence," he told reporters. "It is not possible to respond to the plight of those who are here living in the shadows compassionately without actually speaking to their circumstances in trying to assist them," Duke said. "I don't know how you could have a clear conscience thinking that we're going to in some kind of way consign 12 million people possibly to perpetual poverty and as a perpetual underclass in this country. ... It is simply not the right thing to do. It is certainly not the humanitarian thing to do. It is indeed not the Christian thing to do." Messengers to the 2011 Southern Baptist Convention in Phoenix, Ariz., approved a resolution on immigration reform that called for the advancement of the Gospel of Jesus while pursuing justice and compassion. The measure urged the government to make a priority of border security and holding businesses accountable in their hiring. It also requested public officials establish after securing the borders "a just and compassionate path to legal status, with appropriate restitutionary measures, for those undocumented immigrants already living in our country." It specified the resolution was not to be interpreted as supporting amnesty. --30-- Compiled by Tom Strode, Washington bureau chief for Baptist Press. -- End of story -- 2012: God's world in images By Staff Jan. 18 2013 http://www.bpnews.net/BPnews.asp?ID=39551 RICHMOND, Va. (BP) -- The world pays attention to big, loud things: wars, disasters, spectacles, celebrities, political showdowns. The people of God often are found in quieter places, doing quieter things. Yes, they respond to wars and disasters, especially if they can help relieve suffering and provide comfort to survivors. But they go far beyond the countries that dominate the headlines to spread Christ's light and life anywhere people live in darkness. It might be on the streets of Zambia or on India's railways, where Christian workers aided children in need of shelter and schooling. Or in a south Asian village, where the only Christian family saw their home burned four times by persecutors. It might be on the border of Syria, where Christians helped a heartbroken Muslim widow fleeing the horror of civil war. Perhaps it means noticing people most others ignore: migrant workers in Thailand who need to hear about Jesus or nomadic herders in Mongolia who need access to clean water. Southern Baptist workers and their ministry partners did all those things in 2012. Click [URL=http://commissionstories.com/photos/view/2012-pictures-of-the-year]here[/URL] to see photos of their works of love taken by IMB photographers. --30-- -- End of story -- College coaches ponder Hall of Fame vote, baseball's steroids era & 'the right way' By Tim Ellsworth Jan. 18 2013 http://www.bpnews.net/BPnews.asp?ID=39552 NASHVILLE (BP) -- Baseball writers made their statement about steroids when it was announced that nobody was elected to the Hall of Fame on this year's ballot –- despite the eligibility of such superstars as Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens and Sammy Sosa. Baseball coaches at Baptist-affiliated universities said they can understand why the writers chose to keep suspected steroid users out of the Hall of Fame. "The people who vote, they can't wrap their hands around, 'What do we need to do here?'" said Beauford Sanders, baseball coach at Campbellsville University in Kentucky. "Maybe this will hopefully get something done -- an official admittance or policy from Major League Baseball." Sanders said the powers in Major League Baseball, such as owners and the commissioner, chose to look the other way when it came to steroid suspicions because the increased offensive output translated into better ratings and higher profits. "Now the chickens have come home to roost, because this is the first year where all these guys who put up some phenomenal numbers are eligible," Sanders said. "It's a mess." Sanders said he wishes MLB Commissioner Bud Selig and team owners would have the courage to come forward and say, "We made a terrible mistake by not working to nip this in the bud earlier." To be elected to the Hall of Fame, players must receive 75 percent of the votes cast by the Baseball Writers Association of America. Craig Biggio led this year’s voting with 68.2 percent, following by Jack Morris with 67.7 percent and Jeff Bagwell with 59.6 percent. Clemens received only 38.8 percent of votes while Bonds tallied 36.2 percent and Sosa collected 12.5 percent. Reggie Reynolds, baseball coach at North Greenville University, said the sad part about the voting, which was announced Jan. 9, is how those players who likely didn't cheat may have been overlooked because of the emphasis on others. "Curt Schilling put up great numbers for a lot of years and had one of the gutsy playoff performances in the history of baseball," Reynolds said. "By all accounts he never used performance enhancing drugs, but his name might have gotten slightly overshadowed by some voters who were caught up with whether or not to vote for guys who with high probability used performance enhancing drugs." Reynolds also included players like Craig Biggio and Dale Murphy in the same category as Schilling. "I believe the mistake came by MLB as a whole when it didn't crack down soon enough with doping policies," Reynolds said. "The reward far outweighed the risk for players, which trickled down to almost every level of baseball, including high school." The problem with baseball's lack of a suitable doping policy, Reynolds said, is in determining the fate of players like Bonds or Clemens who would have been Hall of Fame-worthy whether they used performance enhancing drugs or not. "There's no easy solution, but I hope that guys who by all accounts didn't cheat won't continue to be passed over or overshadowed," Reynolds said. "I don't think that will be case, but this particular class of first-time nominees had some very notable and controversial names." Brent Fronabarger, baseball coach at Union University, said as a traditionalist and a fan who appreciates pitching and defense, the home runs and power numbers were always a bit suspicious. And while the future for the suspected steroid users may be uncertain, Fronabarger said he thought the voters did the right thing this year. "Whether they ever end up in the Hall of Fame or not, I don't think they deserve to be first-ballot Hall of Famers," Fronabarger said. Percentages of votes and whether players make it into the Hall of Fame on the first ballot are a marker of distinction among current Hall of Famers, Fronabarger said, so keeping out this year's class is a way of bestowing greater honor on Hall of Famers like Hank Aaron who, by all accounts, "did it the right way." --30-- Tim Ellsworth is editor of BP Sports and director of media relations at Union University. Get Baptist Press headlines and breaking news on Twitter ([URL=http://www.Twitter.com/BaptistPress]@BaptistPress[/URL]), Facebook ([URL=http://Facebook.com/BaptistPress]Facebook.com/BaptistPress [/URL]) and in your email ([URL=http://baptistpress.com/SubscribeBP.asp] baptistpress.com/SubscribeBP.asp[/URL]). -- End of story -- In Queens, N.Y., a partnership blossoms By Melissa Lilley Jan. 18 2013 http://www.bpnews.net/BPnews.asp?ID=39553 QUEENS, N.Y. (BP) -- Every time she went to work at the laundromat on 48th Avenue in Queens, N.Y., Trinidad couldn't help but notice Iglesia Bautista Nueva Vida across the street. As often as she came and went to work, she finally decided to visit the church. "The Lord brought her that Sunday. She was at a point when she needed the Lord. She had reached the point that she didn't know what to do," Walter Valencia, Nueva Vida's pastor, said. That Sunday, Trinidad prayed to receive Jesus Christ as her Lord and Savior. "Since the day she came to the Lord she hasn't stopped inviting people to church. She never hesitates," Valencia said. "Even though she's a new Christian, she's been an example to others." Earlier this year Trinidad invited her friend Elizabeth to church. That morning, Elizabeth came to know Jesus Christ and has now become a Sunday School teacher. Valencia is praying God will raise up more leaders like Trinidad and Elizabeth to help Nueva Vida reach the surrounding Woodside community in Queens with the Gospel. Meanwhile, North Carolina churches like Dublin First Baptist Church are playing a role in Woodside and other parts of metro New York through partnerships with churches and church planters there facilitated by the Baptist State Convention of North Carolina's Office of Great Commission Partnerships. Nueva Vida's Woodside community in Queens is a predominantly Hispanic area with a good representation of Asians and Eastern Europeans as well. Across the street from the church are a Nazarene church and a Roman Orthodox church. Just around the corner are Greek Orthodox and Pentecostal churches and a mosque. "Many influences are here, and that's a challenge," Valencia said. "If we present Christianity as just another religion, it will not work. We have to show people that we know their need for real life; for eternal life." Valencia wants to help Woodside-area residents understand that while religion is about what they must do to get to heaven, the Gospel teaches that they enter heaven because of what Jesus Christ did for them. A native of Colombia, South America, Valencia has lived most of his life in New York on Long Island. He is a bivocational pastor investing many hours each week in the congregation while working full-time doing auto body repair. When Nueva Vida's former pastor retired about two and a half years ago, the congregation seemed to retire with him, and something had to change. "They just got discouraged. What keeps the congregation alive is sharing the Gospel. God has entrusted this ministry to us. If you don't share, it's like burying a talent," Valencia said. Valencia came once a month to preach and before long, after encouragement from a mentor who is also a fellow pastor and church planter, began serving as Nueva Vida's pastor. This is Valencia's first pastorate, and although he lacks formal theological education, he knows God placed him in this role and he wants to be obedient. "I don't see myself doing anything else," he said. Valencia is helping his congregation of about 20, mostly women, build relationships with families in the Woodside community. He is especially focused on reaching children and young adults, with a long-term goal to start a daycare at the church. Enter Dublin First Baptist. The North Carolina congregation sent their first team to partner with Nueva Vida last April and have since sent four teams to the Woodside community. Church volunteers have helped with repairs to the church building and served alongside Nueva Vida in sports ministry, playground ministry and street ministry. The partnership also has helped First Baptist Dublin shift from being self-focused to Kingdom-focused. "Throughout the years we became extremely inward focused," First Baptist pastor Cameron McGill said. "We were trying to grow our church and our programs." Now the church is reaching out to lost people in Dublin and is in the process of partnering with a congregation in the Eastern European country of Moldova. This year a women's team from First Baptist will help Nueva Vida with a women's conference, following a women's ministry mission trip last September to New York in which McGill's wife Tiffany participated. As Nueva Vida's outreach grows, drug use continues to be among the foremost challenges in the Woodside community. Once, while the church was hosting Vacation Bible School, drug dealers decided to hang out in front of the church. Another challenge: ministering to people who often work two or three jobs, keeping unusual work hours and to a transient community where families frequently move in and out. "People don't trust other people here," Valencia said. "Many don't have true friends. We want to help them find long-term relationships with brethren through Jesus Christ." Valencia is grateful for the partnership with Dublin First Baptist. "Their partnership humbles me and it has transformed my heart. We have felt loved," he said. --30-- Melissa Lilley is research/communications coordinator for the Baptist State Convention of North Carolina. To learn more about North Carolina Baptists' outreach in metro New York, visit ncbaptist.org/gcp. -- End of story -- CULTURE DIGEST: Passion propels Tomlin to top of Billboard chart By Staff Jan. 18 2013 http://www.bpnews.net/BPnews.asp?ID=39554 NASHVILLE (BP) -- Chris Tomlin has become the fourth Christian music artist ever to garner the number one position on the Billboard 200. Tomlin's "Burning Lights" sold 73,000 copies in its opening week, fueled in large part by Passion 2013 in Atlanta. The conference for college-aged Christians, where the singer-songwriter led worship, had 60,000 attendees and more than 100,000 online viewers. According to Billboard, 40 percent of the figures tracked by the music trade magazine were sales related to Passion or churches. Tomlin's album, topping the Jan. 26 chart, follows tobyMac, who last September became the first Christian artist in 15 years to take the peak position with his latest album, "Eye on It." "Burning Lights" was also Tomlin's fourth album to sit atop Billboard's Christian Albums chart. The debut was the largest ever for Tomlin and the largest sales week for any Christian album since Casting Crowns' "Come to the Well" in 2011. NATIONAL CATHEDRAL TO ALLOW SAME-SEX MARRIAGE -- Evangelical policy groups are not surprised by the Washington National Cathedral's announcement that same-sex wedding ceremonies would be allowed at the 106-year-old church. "The Episcopal Church has been increasingly out of touch with Christian orthodoxy and the rest of the Anglican Communion worldwide for some time, and this only adds to that," Peter Sprigg of the Washington-based Family Research Council said. Last November, Maryland voters approved a same-sex marriage ballot initiative, joining the neighboring District of Columbia in legalizing such unions. In the wake of the Maryland ballot result, National Cathedral officials decided to start hosting such ceremonies effective immediately, they announced Jan. 9. "As a kind of tall-steeple, public church in the nation's capital, by saying we're going to bless same-sex marriages, conduct same-sex marriages, we are really trying to take the next step for marriage equality in the nation and in the culture," Gary Hall, the cathedral's dean, told the Associated Press. The cathedral is the seat of the Episcopal Church and its 2 million members in the United States. But it also serves as a place of celebration and mourning for the nation's larger faith community. It is where the national prayer service for this month's presidential inauguration will occur, and it has hosted the state funerals for former Presidents Ronald Reagan and Gerald Ford. With hundreds of thousands of visitors to the National Cathedral each year, pro-gay marriage groups herald the decision as a symbolic victory for their movement. The National Cathedral will offer a new rite of marriage for gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender members that the Episcopal Church's House of Bishops authorized last year. The decision to use the new rite and the performing of same-sex marriage ceremonies is left to the discretion of the bishops overseeing each diocese within the larger church. The bishop of Washington, in charge of a diocese that covers the District of Columbia and four counties in Maryland, decided in December to allow the new expanded marriage rite. Last year, the bishops also voted to allow the ordination of transgendered persons. Such decisions have led some conservative Episcopal congregations to leave the denomination. The move by the National Cathedral comes one month after the first same-sex wedding was performed at Cadet Chapel at the U.S. Military Academy in West Point, N.Y. In November, voters in Maine and Washington joined Maryland to become the first three states to approve a ballot initiative legalizing gay marriage. While same-sex marriage is now legal in nine states and the District of Columbia, the U.S. Supreme Court is scheduled to hear cases on the issue in March. "We still have voter referendums in 30 states, including North Carolina last year, that define marriage as between a man and a woman," Sprigg said. "That's a very strong statement of public policy that will not be overturned anytime soon." EVERS WIDOW FIRST LAYWOMAN TO GIVE INAUGURAL INVOCATION -- Myrlie Evers-Williams, the 79-year-old widow of slain civil rights leader Medgar Evers, will be the first laywoman to deliver the invocation at a presidential inauguration when she does so at President Obama's Jan. 21 swearing-in. "I hope to express feelings that are true, that are honest, that are open and maybe a wee bit insightful in terms of what is happening in America today and in the world as a whole," Evers-Williams said of her upcoming prayer. Evers-Williams was to share the podium with evangelical pastor Louie Giglio, whose selection to deliver the inaugural benediction was derailed after the pro-gay community objected to a biblical sermon he delivered on homosexuality nearly 20 years ago. The Presidential Inaugural Committee has replaced Giglio with Luis Leon, an Episcopal priest who ministers at a Washington, D.C., parish that has openly gay, non-celibate priests and announced this summer it would bless same-sex partnerships and ordain transgender priests, according to news reports. Evers-Williams, who told Religion News Service she has worshipped God at times as a Baptist, Methodist and Presbyterian, expressed joy that she's still on the inaugural program. "I'm simply delighted that I was not so controversial that I would step down or be asked to step down," Evers-Williams said. The scholar at Alcorn State University in Mississippi also is an author and civil rights and political activist. "I have been on the lecture circuit since the day Medgar was assassinated. I delivered my first speech that night," she said in a Huffington Post article. "I have never been shy in mentioning my relationship with what I call God, a Spirit, and there certainly have been times over the years that I have called on him -- or her, if you wish -- in public. I deeply believe that there is a Supreme Being that sees us through." PTC HAILS AX OF 'ALL MY BABIES' MAMAS' -- The Parents Television Council is applauding Oxygen Media's decision to nix production of the "All My Babies' Mamas" reality TV special, a program the council had called "grotesquely irresponsible and exploitive." "We applaud the decision by Oxygen to shut this project down. It's the right thing to do. But the reality is that we never, ever, should have gotten to this point in the first place," PTC President Tim Winter said. "Those in the executive suites at Oxygen, and at its parent companies NBC Universal and Comcast, need to take a serious look in the mirror and question how such an abject program could ever be considered for air." The show was to feature African American rapper Carlos "Shawty Lo" Walker and the 10 women with whom he has fathered 11 children. Oxygen was developing the show as a one-hour spring special and had indicated it might become a reality series. The PTC objected to the show in early January, following the launch of a Change.org petition calling for the show's cancellation, which had garnered more than 37,000 signatures, as well as a petition by the civil rights group ColorOfChange.org that also drew around 40,000 supporters. Winter said programmers should learn from the experience. "Not only should this serve as a shot across the bow for Oxygen; indeed it should serve as clear notice for every cable and broadcast programmer in the country that the children of America deserve better. Americans are becoming more united against content that only serves to undermine our children and our society," Winter said. "The entertainment industry simply must do better." Winter thanked PTC members and leaders who worked to end the show. "We applaud the unrelenting and laser-focused efforts of a coalition of activists whose determined efforts resulted in the death knell of this program even before it aired," Winter said. The PTC, a non-partisan education organization advocating responsible entertainment, has 1.3 million members and 56 chapters nationwide. STANFORD ADDS ATHEIST TO OFFICE OF RELIGIOUS LIFE -- Although it may sound like a contradiction in terms, Stanford University has appointed an atheist "chaplain" to serve its non-believing students. Stanford's independent Humanist Community technically employs John Figdor, but he is an officially recognized chaplain under Stanford's office of religious life. As reported by the San Francisco Chronicle, the Harvard Divinity School graduate Figdor explains his work by saying that "atheist, agnostic and humanist students suffer the same problems as religious students -- deaths or illnesses in the family, questions about the meaning of life, etc. -- and would like a sympathetic nontheist to talk to." Scotty McLennan, the dean for religious life at Stanford, who is a Unitarian Universalist minister and the author of books including "Jesus Was a Liberal," eagerly welcomed Figdor as a campus chaplain, saying the hire made sense because Stanford itself had been founded on inclusive principles. The Stanford family, who founded the university in 1885 in California, did explicitly prohibit the school from aligning with any particular denomination. But Stanford's founding grant also called for the university to teach students the doctrines of "the immortality of the soul, the existence of an all-wise and benevolent Creator, and that obedience to His laws is the highest duty of man." And the family established the campus' Memorial Church for nonsectarian worship and so that "all those who love Our Lord Jesus Christ may partake of the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper." Figdor originally entered Harvard Divinity School with the aim of becoming a religion journalist, but along the way he met Harvard's own humanist chaplain and became his assistant. Stanford's Humanist Community hired Figdor in July. He recently led students through a program he calls "The Heathen's Guide to the Holidays" in which he suggested alternatives to celebrating Christmas or Hanukkah. Among the options was singing John Lennon's "Imagine" and observing "Festivus," the holiday "for the rest of us" made famous in an episode of TV's "Seinfeld." --30-- Compiled from reports by Aaron Earls, a writer in Wake Forest, N.C.; Edward Lee Pitts and Thomas Kidd of World News Service; and Diana Chandler of Baptist Press. Get Baptist Press headlines and breaking news on Twitter ([URL=http://www.Twitter.com/BaptistPress]@BaptistPress[/URL]), Facebook ([URL=http://Facebook.com/BaptistPress]Facebook.com/BaptistPress [/URL]) and in your email ([URL=http://baptistpress.com/SubscribeBP.asp] baptistpress.com/SubscribeBP.asp[/URL]). -- End of story -- CALL TO PRAYER: 40 years of abortion By Barrett Duke Jan. 18 2013 http://www.bpnews.net/BPnews.asp?ID=39555 NASHVILLE (BP) -- On Jan. 22, our nation reaches the 40th anniversary of the horrific Roe v. Wade decision that legalized abortion-on-demand. For 40 years, our nation has sanctioned the killing of more than 1 million unborn children every year, resulting in more than 55 million abortions, with no end in sight. This is a tragic milestone that should cause us to repent and weep. These unborn children are the most vulnerable human beings among us, yet they are afforded no protection by society. They are deemed the property of their mothers, with no rights except what their mothers choose for them. At the moment of conception, a human being comes into existence. This is a person created in the image of God, possessing a soul and deeply loved by God. We are well beyond the days when anyone can claim ignorance of the individual personhood of the unborn. Unborn babies have their own circulatory systems, oftentimes with a blood type different from their mother's. Within months of their conception, they are even making personal decisions. Unborn children move in the womb to get more comfortable and in response to pain. Given the opportunity, these unborn people could join us in this world, live lives filled with meaning and purpose, and come to know the God who created them. Psalm 139 reminds us of God's involvement with the unborn. The psalmist declares, 'I am fearfully and wonderfully made.' Yet every year in our country more than a million of these lives of promise are mercilessly killed. There are those, even in the Christian community, who believe that the abortion issue is a settled issue and that we ought to just accept it as a national practice and move onto things that aren't as divisive. We must never allow ourselves to accept abortion-on-demand as the new normal. Abortions kill innocent unborn people, wreak havoc on the women who have them, desensitize our culture to the value of human life, and subject our nation to the judgment of God. As the 40th anniversary of Roe v. Wade approaches, I hope you will join me in prayer for the unborn, the mothers and fathers who suffer through the effects of abortion, and our nation. God wants us to respect all human life as sacred. He will lead us to end this horrific practice if we will let Him. I hope you will also help save the unborn from the abortionist's knife by supporting pro-life legislation and practices. Contact your congressman and senators and insist that they make ending abortion-on-demand a top priority in the new 113th Congress. Also, please consider supporting pro-life ministries, like crisis pregnancy centers. The ERLC's Psalm 139 Project raises money to put ultrasound machines in crisis pregnancy centers. More than 90 percent of the mothers considering abortion who view their unborn babies on ultrasound decide against abortion. I encourage you to visit Psalm 139 Project's website ([URL= http://psalm139project.org]psalm139project.org[/URL]) to learn more about this life-saving ministry. A baby is aborted every 25 seconds in America. This is nothing to celebrate or accept. It should drive us to our knees in repentance and supplicating prayer for our nation. Let's join together to put an end to these anniversaries. Let's start a new anniversary, one that commemorates the day the Lord brought Roe v. Wade to an end. --30-- Barrett Duke is vice president for public policy and research for the Southern Baptist Convention's Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission, and also serves as director of the commission's Research Institute of the ERLC. Read more of his work [URL=http://erlc.com/erlc/archive/author/BarrettDuke/]here[/URL]. He is also a regular contributor to the 'For Faith and Family' radio broadcast. Listen to the audio of this commentary [URL=http://erlc.com/audio/20130111-duke-resolutions.mp3]here[/URL]. Get Baptist Press headlines and breaking news on Twitter ([URL=http://www.Twitter.com/BaptistPress]@BaptistPress[/URL]), Facebook ([URL=http://Facebook.com/BaptistPress]Facebook.com/BaptistPress [/URL]) and in your email ([URL=http://baptistpress.com/SubscribeBP.asp] baptistpress.com/SubscribeBP.asp[/URL]). -- End of story -- FIRST-PERSON: Teacher fired despite his rights By Kelly Boggs Jan. 18 2013 http://www.bpnews.net/BPnews.asp?ID=39556 ALEXANDRIA, La. (BP) -- A New Jersey school board terminated a longtime substitute teacher on Jan. 15 because he shared a Bible verse in the course of a conversation with a student. After sharing the verse, the teacher offered the student a New Testament, which the student accepted. The Phillipsburg School Board contends it fired Walter Tutka for violating school policies that stipulate a teacher must remain neutral when discussing religious materials and is prohibited from distributing religious literature on school grounds. If the story being told by Tutka and others is true, then it seems that the teacher was terminated for nothing more than the free exercise of his religion. According to a variety of reports, Tutka was substituting at the Phillipsburg middle school sometime near the beginning of the new school year. He was holding a door for students and said to a straggling student, "Just remember, the first will be last and the last will be first." The student, according to Tutka, asked the teacher the origin of the phrase. "I believe it's from the Book of Matthew," Tutka replied. "If I get a chance I'll take a look and see and get back to you." The next time he served as a substitute, Tutka said, the student sought him out and again inquired about the quote, but the teacher had forgotten to look up the verse. "Well, this occurred several times, until I finally said, 'Look, I'm writing it down and I'll get back to you, which I did,'" Tutka told Phillipsburg School Board members, as reported on lehighvalleylive.com, the website of The Express Times of Easton, Pa. According to Tutka's recollection, he was reading his personal copy of the New Testament at lunch on Oct. 12 when the persistently inquisitive student again approached him and asked about the quote. He showed the student the verse. When the student indicated that he did not have a Bible, Tutka said he offered his New Testament. "I looked at him and said, 'Listen, this is my personal copy. I want to gift it to you.'" The student accepted the New Testament and, according to Tutka, seemed happy. Some reports indicate that the student later returned the New Testament to Tutka. The Phillipsburg School Board was adamant that Tutka had flagrantly violated its policies, terminating him as a substitute teacher for the remainder of the school year. The policies Tutka was fired for violating, one would assume, were adopted in an effort to comply with the board's understanding of the U.S. Constitution's First Amendment, which is, at best, misguided. The First Amendment states very clearly, "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof...." Thus, the lawmaking body of the United States is forbidden from enacting any legislation that would restrict an individual's practice of his or her religion. A law, quite simply, does one of two things. It mandates that a citizen must do something or it stipulates a citizen cannot do something. If a citizen does not do what he or she "must" or if the citizen does what he or she "can't," then the citizen risks some level of consequence. For example in the state in which I reside, Louisiana, the law mandates that certain passengers in an automobile "must" wear seat belts. If the "must" is violated, then the driver of the vehicle risks a consequence. The same is true for the "can't" aspect of a law. Traffic laws stipulate that a driver "can't" exceed a road's posted speed limit. If a driver does not comply with the "can't," he or she risks a consequence. The religious clause of the First Amendment states that the government is forbidden to enact legislation that says a citizen "must" adhere to, acknowledge or practice any specific religion. At the same time, it also says the government is prohibited from saying a citizen "can't" freely exercise his or her religion. If anyone is violating the First Amendment in the situation in New Jersey, it is the Phillipsburg School Board. However, reality doesn't seem to hold much sway these days. If sharing phrases derived from the Bible and offering a New Testament as a gift to one student is really interpreted as a violation of the First Amendment and enough to have a teacher terminated -- and if it is upheld by a court -- there is no question that the public square is overtly hostile to Christianity. --30-- Kelly Boggs is a weekly columnist for Baptist Press and editor of the Baptist Message (www.baptistmessage.com), newsjournal of the Louisiana Baptist Convention. Get Baptist Press headlines and breaking news on Twitter ([URL=http://www.Twitter.com/BaptistPress]@BaptistPress[/URL]), Facebook ([URL=http://Facebook.com/BaptistPress]Facebook.com/BaptistPress [/URL]) and in your email ([URL=http://baptistpress.com/SubscribeBP.asp] baptistpress.com/SubscribeBP.asp[/URL]). -- End of story -- EDITORIAL: Mantener el Enfoque By Fermín Whittaker Jan. 18 2013 http://www.bpnews.net/BPnews.asp?ID=39557 NOTA DEL EDITOR: La columna First-Person (De primera mano) es parte de la edición de hoy de BP en español. Para ver historias adicionales, vaya a [URL=http://www.bpnews.net/espanol]http://www.bpnews.net/espanol[/URL] FRESNO, Calif. (BP) -- Durante estos días, es difícil mantener el enfoque. Eventos mundiales, problemas nacionales y sociales, ocupan mucho de nuestro tiempo. La radio y televisión claman 24 horas y 7 días por nuestra atención. Muchas noticias no inspiran. Al contrario, nos deprimen. Tengo el placer de escuchar buenas noticias de muchas personas quienes comparten las bendiciones de Dios en sus vidas y ministerios. Creo en el poder transformador de Dios. Este poder no solamente transforma almas, también cambia comunidades. Cuando los cristianos compartimos el evangelio, siempre hay personas que tarde o temprano reciben a Jesús como Salvador. El poder del evangelio es tan impactante hoy como fue en los días de los apóstoles. Es importante tomar tiempo y compartir noticias de victorias en nuestras vidas y ministerios. Recientemente mas de 100 estudiantes recibieron a Jesucristo en un evento juvenil, el año pasado se reportaron 129 iglesias nuevas en California, y nuestras iglesias sirvieron 601,149 comidas a familias en California. Obviamente, todos tenemos buenas noticias que compartir. Al comenzar este año de 2013 les invito a compartir algunas buenas nuevas con otras personas. Diariamente al leer la Palabra de Dios, escuchemos Sus promesas. Celebremos el poder y la presencia de Jesús, compartiendo con familia, amigos y otros el gozo que recibimos al saber del poder transformador en personas que conocemos. --30-- Fermín Whittaker es el director ejecutivo de la Convención Bautista del Sur en California. Los materiales en español publicados por esta convención se encuentran en http://www.csbc.com/languageresources. -- End of story -- Copyright (c) 2013 Southern Baptist Convention, Baptist Press 901 Commerce Street Nashville, TN 37203 Tel: 615.244.2355 Fax: 615.782.8736 email: bpress@sbc.net