An interesting post in the Times of London about universe-al salvation. The Scriptures say that God so loved “the world” that he gave his only begotten son, that “whosoever” believeth on Him should not perish, but have eternal life.”

But does this love extend to other-worldly life forms? If they exist? That is the question. In a universe with only nine planets, it seems likely that earth may be the only place where intelligent life flourishes. But what if there are 9 billion planets? Or 9 trillion planets? Or — and here’s where it gets really interesting — what if there are limitless planets? If there is other life out there, is God its author and is Christ its savior?

If it tolls on December 15, it’s tolling for greenhouse gas. And it won’t be just bells making a racket, drums and gongs will also be sounding 350 times at locations around the world. For more, click here.

Legislation would make “aggravated homosexuality” a capital crime. According to this article, homosexuality first arrived in Uganda in the 1960s, and lawmakers are convinced they can stamp it out with the help of tough legislation.

Church leaders in Uganda support harsher penalties, perhaps including life imprisonment. But the death penalty is drawing opposition.

A tragedy in El Salvador. Associated Baptist Press has the details.

This is a weird story about a not-very-bright bigot in the Sunshine State.

The Obama administration and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi won the first major vote on health-care reform, by a vote of 220-215. But the legislation only passed because language was added making clear that the government-mandated insurance plans would not pay for abortions except in the cases of rape, incest of where the mother’s life was in danger. Women who want “abortion insurance” can still purchase it, but they’ll have to pay an additional premium. Taxpayers won’t be forced to subsidize the procedure, as House Democratic leaders originally envisioned.

Reuters has all the details here. Sixty-four Democrats sided with Republicans to pass the language.

Megapastor Rick Warren’s magazine, Purpose Driven Connection, will print its final issue later this month. The magazine, which was launched earlier this year, will continue in an on-line only format.

The press release from A. Larry Ross Communications makes it sound like it’s a really positive thing that the magazine is folding its printed product so soon after its launch:

RICK WARREN’S PURPOSE DRIVEN CONNECTION
TO GO ALL DIGITAL AND INTERNATIONAL IN 2010:
Positive, Off-the-Charts User Feedback Prompts Ministry to Transition
And Expand to Interactive Services and Free Content
Lake Forest, Calif., Nov. 4, 2009 – Purpose Driven Connection magazine, produced jointly by Rick Warren, pastor of Saddleback Church in Southern California, and The Reader’s Digest Association, Inc., will move to an expanded, fully Web-based, digital format in January 2010, it was announced today.

“Impressive reader feedback has prompted us to focus all our energies on our digital format, so our content can be expanded, international, interactive and free,” Warren explained. “The positive response from readers was so overwhelming we didn’t want the content to be limited only to Americans who could afford a subscription to a magazine.”

The last print issue will be the Christmas issue, due out in mid-November. Issues in 2010 will be posted free of charge on www.purposedriven.com.

To ensure a successful transition to an all-digital Web magazine, RDA is refunding any unused print subscriptions, and will be working closely with Saddleback Church in hosting the site through the first quarter of 2010.

“Reader’s Digest has been so helpful to us, bending over backwards, and offering expertise, in order to help us fulfill our dream,” said Warren. “From the start, we’ve been amazed by the company’s commitment to us. They believed in this magazine before we did.”

Alyce Alston, President of Emerging Businesses, who developed the project for RDA, said, “We are proud of this venture and are pleased that it is positively touching so many lives. It has been a privilege and delight working with the Saddleback team and Pastor Rick to launch Purpose Driven Connection. The customer satisfaction feedback was off the chart, and is the proof of a successful concept. We are delighted that our creative collaboration has launched a long-term result that will serve the Purpose Driven community.”

Since the launch of Purpose Driven Connection magazine in January 2009, subscribers to Daily Hope, Warren’s free, daily digital devotional has grown to over 400,000 people.

“Our biggest discovery was learning that people prefer reading our content online rather than in print, because it is more convenient and accessible,” said Warren. “Cell phones now allow us to take content everywhere. And, from our viewpoint, an online magazine allows us to minister to people internationally; provide more content and features than we could fit in a print magazine; create interaction and two-way dialogue; and offer it for free.

“So when we heard the feedback and noticed subscriptions to the print magazine lagging behind Internet usage, in spite of strong retail newsstand sales, we jumped at the chance to go all digital,” Warren concluded. “Thankfully, Reader’s Digest was willing to help us make the transition.”

Warren is a pastor, author, global strategist, and theologian, who has been called “America’s Most Powerful Religious Leader” and listed among the “100 Most Influential People in the World” (TIME); “15 People Who Make America Great” (Newsweek); “One of America’s 25 Best Leaders” (U.S. News and World Report); and “America’s Pastor” (“USA Today”). He and his wife Kay founded Saddleback Church in Lake Forest, Calif., with one family in 1980. Today the congregation has over 100,000 names on the church roll, a 120-acre campus, and more than 300 community ministries.

RDA is a global multi-brand media and marketing company that educates, entertains and connects audiences around the world. The company builds multi-platform communities based on branded content. With offices in 44 countries, it markets books, magazines, and music, video and educational products reaching a customer base of 130 million in 78 countries. It publishes 94 magazines, including 50 editions of Reader’s Digest, the world’s largest-circulation magazine, operates 65 branded websites generating 22 million unique visitors per month, and sells approximately 40 million books, music and video products across the world each year. Its global headquarters are in Pleasantville, N.Y.

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NOTE TO EDITORS: For more information about Rick Warren, please visit www.RickWarrenNews.com. To arrange an interview with Brian Bird, editor of Purpose Driven Connection, please contact media@rickwarrennews.com.

The Episcopal Church’s Diocese of Northern Michigan, whose choice for bishop was vetoed by a majority of dioceses around the country, is preparing for a new bishop search.

Last time, the Rev. Kevin G. Thew Forrester, the so-called “Buddhist bishop” was the only candidate. Next time, the rules will allow for multiple candidates to be nominated.

Douglas LeBlanc, editor-at-large for The Living Church, has the details.

The San Francisco Chronicle reports that roughly 53 percent of Mainers voted to reject same-sex marriage, adding: “Tuesday’s battle pitted Mainers’ ‘live and let live’ values against the moral power of the Catholic Church, which was at the forefront of the Stand for Marriage Maine campaign to repeal the law.”

The Episcopal Church has posted a new message on its home page, and I’m a bit baffled about it.

This line struck me as peculiar:

“We believe in amendment of life, the forgiveness of sin, and life everlasting.”

“Forgiveness of sins” sounds familiar. So does “life everlasting.” But what is “amendment of life?” The phrase doesn’t exactly roll off the tongue. I did a Google Book search and stumbled upon several references to “amendment of life” but it’s a fairly obscure turn of phrase. “Amendment of life” is often mentioned in connection with the word “repentance.”

In “A History of Auricular Confessions and Indulgences in the Latin church, Volume 2″, Henry Charles Lea, writes the following: “In the early Church, as we have seen, repentance was held to imply conversion of heart and amendment of life…”

The welcome statement appears to be the work of a committee. My hunch is that “amendment of life” wasn’t in the original draft.

Perhaps it originally said something a bit more poetic [and traditional] such as: “We believe in the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sin, and life everlasting.”
(more…)

An Arizona man killed his own daughter recently. The 48-year-old father said his 20-year-old daughter had become too Westernized, and had brought shame on family, USA TODAYreports.

Specifically, the daughter had married a man in Iraq and then left the marriage, returning to the United States and moving in with a boyfriend.

It’s a horrible case and it doesn’t make Iraq or Islam look very good. But this case says more about fundamentalism than it does about mainstream Islam in the U.S..

1.) In this country, thousands of Muslims (and Methodists, Moravians and Mennonites) have children who bring dishonor on their families. Typically, these cases lead to heartache, embarrassment, estrangement and tears — not murder. Honor killings, in the U.S., are a rarity.

2.) Honor killings are not unique to Iraq — or Islam. Founding father Alexander Hamilton died in a duel with Vice President Aaron Burr. And duels were common enough in Kentucky, at one time, that the state’s lawmakers must swear not to have participated in one. And Southern lynch mobs frequently tried to portray their crimes as “honor killings.” Further more, the Old Testament not only condones honor killings, it mandates them in some instances.

Take a look at Exodus 21:17: “And he that curses his father, or his mother, shall surely be put to death.”

Or Leviticus 20:10: “And the man that committeth adultery with another man’s wife, even he that committeth adultery with his neighbor’s wife, the adulterer and the adulteress shall surely be put to death.”

According to Leviticus, the Arizona dad behaved righteously by killing his daughter. But he dropped the ball by sparing the life of the daughter’s boyfriend.

Maryana Iskander, a top Planned Parenthood executive, will be speaking at the Clinton School in Little Rock on November 9. The surprisingly blunt title of her speech: “How to Get Rich with Public Service.”

It’s debatable whether running a chain of abortion clinics qualifies as “public service.” But it’s clearly a good way to get rich — or at least well-to-do. As Planned Parenthood’s chief operating officer, Iskander makes about $270,000 per year, according to IRS 990 forms.

First Baptist Church in Dallas is asking its members to dig, dig, dig, dig deep.

The Texas congregation, with average attendance of 3,200, just announced a new $130 million fundraising campaign, according to Sam Hodges of the Dallas Morning News.

That works out to $40,625 per worshipper.

Churchgoers need to fork over wheelbarrows-full of the Almighty dollar because “The finest facility in this area should be one that glorifies almighty God,” says Pastor Robert Jeffress.

The $130 million is on top of the $48 million churchgoers shelled out to complete another recent building project in 2006.

First Baptist already has plenty of seats. And the building, as far as I can tell, has glorified Almighty God rather satisfactorily over the past century. The church today is a fraction of the size it was (or claimed to be) when W.A. Criswell and George W. Truett served as pastor. But the new 3,000 seat auditorium and classroom buildings “will make room for hundreds or even thousands more worshipers and Sunday School attendees…”

Yep: $130 million spent to make room for “hundreds” (at least) more people. And this massive amount of spending, we’re told, will make God look good.

To find out precisely how this mammoth project will glorify God, you can visit the church’s building project Web site by clicking here.

This particular temple is located in Arlington, Texas and cost $1.2 billion. It’s the new Texas Stadium and I’ll have seats way up high. I’ll let you know if the stadium lives up to the hoopla.

As a lifetime Dallas Cowboys and Seattle Seahawks fan (mom was from Texas and I grew up in the Pacific Northwest), I’ve dreamed of seeing a Seahawks-Cowboys contest for nearly 35 years.

There’s a hole in the stadium roof so that God (and mom, unfortunately) can watch their favorite football team on Sundays. I’ll be watching the game with my son, who shares my enthusiasm for NFL football and great barbecue.

P.S. I’ll be rooting for the Cowboys.