Christians From All 50 States Praying in Nation’s Capital for ‘Spiritual Shift’ in America

-
0
Christians From All 50 States Praying in Nation’s Capital for ‘Spiritual Shift’ in America

[ad_1]

(Photo: The Christian Post/Brandon Showalter)Christians sing and worship at the Arkansas tent, one of 58 tents set up at the National Mall during America’s Tent of Meeting sponsored by Awaken the Dawn, Washington, D.C. on October 7, 2017.
(Photo: The Christian Post/Brandon Showalter)Christians sing and worship at the Texas tent, one of 58 tents set up at the National Mall during America’s Tent of Meeting sponsored by Awaken the Dawn, Washington, D.C. on October 8, 2017.
(Photo: The Christian Post/Brandon Showalter)Christians sing and worship at the Delaware tent, one of 58 tent camps set up at the National Mall during the America’s Tent of Meeting sponsored by Awaken the Dawn, Washington, D.C. on October 7, 2017.
(Photo: The Christian Post/Brandon Showalter)Fifty-eight tents representing all 50 states and eight regions line the National Mall where Christians from all walks of life are coming together to sing, worship, read scripture and pray together during America’s Tent of Meeting sponsored by Awaken the Dawn, Washington, D.C. on October 7, 2017.
(Photo: The Christian Post/Brandon Showalter)Christians sing and worship inside the Virginia tent, one of 58 tents set up at the National Mall during the America’s Tent of Meeting sponsored by Awaken the Dawn, Washington, D.C. on October 7, 2017.

of

WASHINGTON — Tens of thousands of Christians from every state in the U.S. have assembled on the National Mall this weekend to sing and worship in dozens of tents and pray for a “spiritual shift” in America.

America’s Tent of Meeting, is sponsored by Awaken the Dawn and several other partner organizations for the express purpose of focusing on Jesus and to pray for a nation in crisis. ATM began Friday night with a call to repentance on the main stage where an estimated 30,000 people were in attendance park police said, according to an and event organizer.

“I see Awaken the Dawn as part of a bigger story that God is telling,” said Michael Beardslee of Phoenix, Arizona, in an interview with The Christian Post outside the New Mexico prayer tent. Beardslee works for a nonprofit volunteer engagement agency and has just begun doctoral studies at Grand Canyon University.

“There is a story that the enemy is telling in our nation, and he likes a lot of attention and he gets the attention a lot of the time,” he said. But it’s God’s story that will prevail, he added.

Beardslee has been praying and fasting for revival to sweep the nation for the past 20 years. He is a member of New Promise Christian Fellowship, a nondenominational church in Phoenix, which hosts the Phoenix House of Prayer, a weekly regional prayer meeting.

“I don’t know what God’s going to do and how He’s going to do it, but I know He works in mysterious ways.”

He was inspired by the vision of ATD, calling people from all 50 states to come and worship on America’s front yard in front of the Capitol, and he took time off work to make the journey with his parents.

Tens of thousands more are expected to attend over the course of the weekend, with various evangelistic equipping sessions planned and round-the-clock prayer in the tents until the event concludes Monday morning. Fifty-eight prayer tents, one for each state and eight regional tents are stationed all along the National Mall grounds. Speaker include Mike Bickle of the International House of Prayer, Francis Chan of We Are Church, Heidi Baker of Iris Global, Shawn Bolz of Expressions 58 and several others.

The vision for all 50 states to gather around the worth of Jesus and exalt Him, as articulated by The Prayer Furnace’s David Bradshaw in an interview with CP, was what inspired Christy Holt to make the trip to Washington from Pensacola, Florida, to participate.

“I came because there is unity when all gather together and when they said there were going to be 50 tents on the mall. I love D.C. and I love the fact that every state is represented in our union,” Holt told CP in an interview outside the Smithsonian.

“With our country and the mess that it’s in and the disunity, I thought ‘Lord Jesus, thank you that somebody got a vision of unity and of what that would look like.'”

She made a point to say that everything that happens in the nation’s capital trickles down into the rest of the country and she wanted to come to intercede for her home state and to pray against the bitter division operating in the country.

Marcie Lowe, a friend of Holt’s, who was born in Ohio but is now based in Florida and is currently working in North Dakota, told CP with a chuckle, “I’m tent-hopping, I really am.” She is taking the time to pray and worship in several states’ tents.

“My heart is for so many states in the union, but first and foremost for the United States of America. If you don’t stand for something, you’ll fall for anything. And we’re taking a stand for Jesus,” Lowe said of their presence in Washington.

“The whole world sees that we need Jesus. The whole world sees that we need to make a move for faith, for justice, and for liberty for all. It’s time right now. It’s [2 Chronicles] 7:14 ‘if my people who are called according to my name.’ We need to humble ourselves and we need to seek His face, and pray. And we need to do it right now. We need to show God that we are on His side once and for all.”

Likewise, Angel Sweazy traveled to the District from Nevada. She is a member of Horizon Christian Church, a nondenominational evangelical congregation in Reno. With her husband she is pioneering a YWAM base there and believes the timing of America’s Tent of Meeting is significant given the recent horror in her home state.

Last Sunday, gunman Stephen Paddock murdered 58 people attending a country music festival in Las Vegas, using high-powered firearms from his 32nd floor Mandalay Bay hotel room.

“The enemy overplayed his cards this time, because what he planned for evil, the Lord has just come in and said, ‘But I can make good out of everything,” Sweazy said.

As CP reported earlier this week, a man who said he was an atheist told CNN that the only way he escaped was with God’s help, and he’s now a believer.

A “major spiritual shift” happened Friday night as thousands have begun praying, Sweazy continued, noting that she could sense the change in the air.

And God “is speaking through each one of these 50 tents,” she said, remarking on how God’s people are all uniquely praising Him.

Although the darkness is intensifying and Revelation 12-like events are happening, she said, “this is the time for us [as Christians] to stand up and say, ‘Yes. Yes and amen to what God has planned and we don’t need to be afraid at all because, as a city and as a nation, we can see this is really bad but He told us this was going to happen,” and that He has great plans in store for America.

“He is coming, and there is so much excitement in the air knowing that,” she emphasized.

Awaken the Dawn will conclude on Monday, Oct. 9.

Follow Brandon Showalter on Facebook: BrandonMarkShowalter

Follow Brandon Showalter on Twitter: @BrandonMShow

[ad_2]

Source link

قالب وردپرس

Pioneering research hopes to equip churches to respond better to domestic abuse

-
0
Pioneering research hopes to equip churches to respond better to domestic abuse

[ad_1]

Restored, an international Christian domestic abuse education charity, and Churches Together in Cumbria, which delivers domestic abuse training to churches across Cumbria, connected with the institutions to launch a survey on Wednesday.

The researchers want to hear from anyone who attends a church in Cumbria, to ask them their views about whether and how their church is responding to domestic abuse.

The Crime Survey in England and Wales found that approximately one in four women and one in seven men have experienced domestic abuse since the age of 16.

Researchers added that in Cumbria alone police are called to, on average, 17 incidents of domestic abuse each day.

They said it’s the first major survey research into churchgoers and domestic abuse in the UK, and hope it will lead to a major national study.

Dr Kristin Aune, Senior Research Fellow at Coventry University and the project’s lead researcher, told Premier: “Organisations like Restored are working to try and train churches about how to deal with domestic abuse and sometimes churches say ‘well it’s not an issue for us’, so this research is going to show if it is an issue, which we sadly think it will be.”

Experts at Coventry University are also investigating the prevalence of the issue within families who go to church. They’re concerned domestic abuse remains a hidden problem at church.

Paula, a survivor of abuse, told Restored: “Many Christian women who are victims of domestic abuse end up having to leave their church.

“This happened to me and I still grieve for the fellowship that I was part of for years.”

Dr Aune told Premier: “People put on their nice clothes for church, put a smile on their face and someone asks them ‘are you okay?’. They say ‘I’m fine’ and they [other people] have no idea what’s actually happening at home and the abuser could even be someone who goes to church too.

“Of course, it’s a sensitive thing to have to talk about but until we actually address as a church these really difficult problems that are in our midst, we can’t move forward and work for change.”

[ad_2]

Source link

قالب وردپرس

Malala Yousafzai ‘So Excited’ After Being Accepted Into Oxford University

-
0
Malala Yousafzai ‘So Excited’ After Being Accepted Into Oxford University

[ad_1]

malala-yousafzai-oxford

Malala Yousafzai says she is “so excited” after being accepted to study at the world famous University of Oxford.

The 20-year-old Pakistani activist who rose to prominence after being shot in the head and neck by the Taliban while on her way home from school in 2012, has won praise for her campaigning and advocacy surrounding the rights of girls to receive education.

Already a Nobel Peace Prize winner and the youngest ever UN Messenger of Peace, Malala will now hope to complete the prestigious Philosophy, Politics and Economics degree at Oxford.

Announcing the news on Twitter, Malala wrote: “So excited to go to Oxford!! Well done to all A-level students – the hardest year. Best wishes for life ahead!”

She joins some of the most famous leaders in the world in studying PPE at Oxford including former Pakistani President Benazir Bhutto, former US President Bill Clinton, Ex-British Prime Minister David Cameron and leader of Myanmar Aung San Suu Kyi.

Click here to read more.

SOURCE: CNN
James Masters

[ad_2]

Source link

قالب وردپرس

Why I Agreed to Speak at the 2018 Christ at the Checkpoint Conference — Charisma News

-
0
Why I Agreed to Speak at the 2018 Christ at the Checkpoint Conference — Charisma News

[ad_1]

Dr. Michael Brown
Dr. Michael Brown (AskDrBrown/Facebook)

Why did I agree to speak a conference that I have blasted in the past for being anti-Zionistic and perhaps even anti-Semitic? Why am I participating in an event that has been used to propagate what I have branded “a deadly anti-Israel theological error”? (I meant the word “deadly” quite literally.)

In a 2014 radio broadcast, I suggested that the Christ at the Checkpoint (CATC) conference that was about to be held would be “anything but constructive” and, in some cases, “anything but from above”—meaning, from the Lord and His Spirit. (The relevant comments begin about one hour and six minutes into the show. For my comments on the 2016 CATC conference, which I said would be “biased” and “hostile” to a pro-Israel position, go here.)

When I first saw the 2010 video With God on Our Side, I branded it an “anti-Semitic hit piece.” Yet that video reflects the perspective of many CATC participants (although the official CATC statement rejects anti-Semitism). Why then would I participate in such an event in 2018, perhaps as the only speaker espousing my position? Why allow my name to be used to grant further legitimacy to the event, as critics have already asked me?

The answer is simple.

Palestinian Christian leaders have invited me to speak at the conference because of my deep disagreement with their positions. To quote the invitation I was sent, “We want to challenge and be challenged! In other words, we are inviting you because we disagree, and we want you to present your point of view and articulate it with your own words, and then someone who represents a different point of view (either a Palestinian Christian or an international) will respond and then [be] followed by a small conversation.”

And what if I wanted to address radical Islam, the real culprit in the oppression of Palestinians? I was assured I had complete freedom to do so.

Looking at the list of conference speakers, I already know that I have some profound and deep differences with them (and they with me). But that’s the very reason I’ll be there: I get to voice my disagreements in the clearest possible terms, without compromise, excuse, or equivocation. Then I get to hear them do the same. Then we get to challenge each other. Isn’t this exactly what followers of Jesus should do?

Again, I’ve been told for several years now that to participate is to legitimize. I’ve been warned that the whole conference is an elaborate propaganda machine designed to undermine the State of Israel. To speak at the conference, then, is to be a useful idiot in someone else’s agenda.

I understand those concerns, and I appreciate them being raised. But there are cogent responses to those concerns.

[ad_2]

Source link

قالب وردپرس

Why Dying Churches Should Have Hope

-
0
Why Dying Churches Should Have Hope

[ad_1]

SUBSCRIBE TODAY: iTunes • RSS • Stitcher • TuneIn Radio • Google Play

In this debut episode of Revitalize & Replant, Mark Clifton joins us to explain why dying churches should be hopeful about their future.

Today’s Listener Question:

FROM RICHARD

I pastor a dying church. There is little to no evangelistic effort – no new non-churched members over the past 5 years. Any growth over the past 3 years has been transfer growth. The majority of our congregation is in denial about the path our church is on without change. The opponents are preserving the church to the point of death. How can I lead our church to understand there is hope for the future, and that we need to change in order to see fruit from our efforts?

Episode Highlights:

  • Members of dying churches often don’t recognize that reality.
  • “Your church does not have to die.”
  • There is often a sense of shame in a dying church.
  • “Christ has a plan for His Church.”
  • “If you pastor a dying church, focus on getting your church members to love Jesus more than they love their church.”
  • “Dying churches are often holding on to idols in the church that give them comfort and security.”
  • “Want what Jesus wants for your church.”
  • “God is under no obligation to resource your plans for His church.”

The three reasons for hope that we cover in this episode are:

  1. Dying churches have a real possibility to have a future
  2. Healthier churches have an opportunity to make a greater Kingdom impact
  3. Church replanters have an opportunity like never before

Resources mentioned in this episode include:

Revitalize & Replant is sponsored by the North American Mission Board and ChurchReplanters.com. More than 10% of churches in North America are at risk of closing and the North American Mission Board is committed to reversing this trend by decreasing the death rate of existing churches while simultaneously increasing the birth rate of new churches. To learn more about what it means to become a replanting pastor or to explore resources for replanting and revitalization in your own church, visit ChurchReplanters.com.

Submit Your Question:

Do you have a question about church revitalization or replanting for us to use on the podcast? Visit the podcast page to submit your question. If we use it on the show, you’ll get a copy of Autopsy of a Deceased Church and Reclaiming Glory.

[ad_2]

Source link

قالب وردپرس

What this Nobel Prize winning economist can teach us about evangelism

-
0
What this Nobel Prize winning economist can teach us about evangelism

[ad_1]

That people are going to act like people shouldn’t be an earth-shattering revelation for any of us. We don’t have to look far for bountiful evidence of the fact that, despite our best efforts and intentions, we are often going to act in ways that are both irrational and counter to our greater good. Richard Thaler, however, has spent the vast majority of his career attempting to get economists to understand that very basic principle and was recently awarded the Nobel Prize in economics for his efforts.

Why was building a career on such an obvious premise worthy of that lofty award? For most of the twentieth century, economists worked under the basic belief that people would generally act in rational ways when it came to the decisions they made regarding money. While it all sounded good in theory, Thaler gradually came to see that it wasn’t how people actually lived. This revelation put him at the forefront of the study of behavioral economics, a growing movement that looks at the irrational ways people spend their hard-earned resources and seeks to find patterns to develop a model that accounts for those faults.

For example, most people are “loss averse” to some extent. That means we experience “more pain from loss than pleasure from gains” and often miss out on opportunities to better our situation. As a result, people would often rather have a decreased chance of immediate loss than an increased chance of long-term gain. It’s why most basketball coaches, when down by two points with time running out, will go for a two-point shot to tie rather than a three to win. Statistics show that the latter option actually gives the team a greater chance at victory since overtime games are generally a fifty-fifty proposition, but most coaches would rather lose in overtime than in regulation, even though it doesn’t make any difference on the final ledger

Another good example is the way that most people have a strong propensity to maintain the status quo, even if doing so limits or hurts them. This understanding prompted the government to pass a law about ten years ago that encouraged companies to make enrolling in a retirement savings plan the default option in a worker’s contract. People can still opt out of the program, but having participation as the status quo increased annual savings by an estimated 7.6 billion dollars between 2006 and 2011.

While all of this is interesting, what’s most pertinent for us today is how Thaler has shown that understanding the ways people are prone to act irrationally and adjusting our approach accordingly can yield impressive results.

In 1 Corinthians 9, Paul describes how he purposefully tailored his approach to sharing the gospel to better fit the needs of the lost around him, concluding with the statement that “I have become all things to all people so that by all possible means I might save some” (1 Corinthians 9:19–23). To do that, however, we must first understand those we’re trying to help. More specifically, we need to know how they see God.

Are they apathetic about the idea of Christianity? Have they had some personal experience that has fundamentally shifted how they view the Lord? Does belief in Christ or of God in any form simply seem unreasonable because of a different set of beliefs they hold dear?

While some explanations are more reasonable than others, at the heart of the matter we serve a God who welcomes our questions and doubts while standing ready to help us understand why it is perfectly reasonable to believe in him. Understanding the impediments that prevent others from coming to that same conclusion is the first step in allowing God to use us to help them move beyond those barriers to genuine faith.

Fallen people are going to act like fallen people, often in ways that are relatively easy to predict. That’s good news because it means that what has worked in economics can work just as well in evangelism.

Jesus knew the hearts and minds of those around him, and the Holy Spirit stands ready to help us to do the same. Will you let him?

[ad_2]

Source link

قالب وردپرس

Sports Commentator: Youth Football Should be Banned Due to Serious Health Risks

-
0
Sports Commentator: Youth Football Should be Banned Due to Serious Health Risks

[ad_1]


Sports Commentator: Youth Football Should be Banned Due to Serious Health Risks


A report published over the summer revealed that 99 percent of deceased former NFL players whose brains were analyzed suffered from Chronic traumatic encephalopathy, known as CTE. This shocking report has led many, including sports commentator Gregg Easterbrook, to question the popularity of football in America.


In a post for his Tuesday Morning Quarterback column, posted at the Weekly Standard, Easterbrook specifically questions allowing children to play football.


More reports and studies are showing that the harsh impact football has on the body is leading to early dementia, anxiety, depression, and other health consequences.


Forensic pathologist Bennet Omalu, on whose life the 2015 Will Smith film Concussion is based, believes contact sports should be banned for minors and should be treated for those below the age of 18 much like cigarettes and alcohol.


Easterbrook agrees with Omalu that adult NFL players should be allowed to participate in the sport at their own risk, but youth are a different matter. Plus, he notes, there are many, many more youth athletes than there are NFL athletes (roughly 700 to one).


“Youth players are too young to consent to risk, and their adolescent brain cases and necks are more vulnerable than those of adult athletes. Society does not allow cigarettes to be marketed to 10 year olds. Yet the NFL actively markets tackle football to the very young,” he writes.


“Looking at the big picture,” he continues, “football is not especially dangerous—except to children. That’s a problem that can be solved by banning youth tackle leagues.”


 


Photo courtesy: ©Thinkstock/Big-John


Publication date: October 11, 2017

[ad_2]

Source link

قالب وردپرس

Franklin Graham Reveals Which Bible Verse Billy Graham Has Pinned All Over His House

-
0

[ad_1]

(Photo: Reuters/Robert Padgett)Evangelist Billy Graham speaks at the dedication of the Billy Graham Library in Charlotte, North Carolina, May 31, 2007.

Evangelist Franklin Graham has revealed that his father, world-renowned North Carolina preacher Billy Graham, has one Bible verse displayed in large letters all around his house, and he calls it his “life verse.”

“Still today, my father Billy Graham has a Bible verse pinned up on the wall in his bedroom, printed in VERY large letters. In fact, it’s in the dining room, his bathroom, and several other spots around the house! Back before his 95th birthday, he was working on a sermon based on this key Scripture. It was his passion to memorize it, to saturate his heart and mind with it. He made it his life verse,” Graham said in a Facebook post on Tuesday.

He revealed that the verse is Galatians 6:14, which reads: “But God forbid that I should boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world.”

Graham called it “a great verse for us to live by.”

Back in July, the president of the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association and Samaritan’s Purse shared another update about his 98-year-old father, saying, “While he is doing well, he does have the physical challenges that come with his age.”

“He enjoys visits from family members, including his sister who is his only remaining sibling. Grandchildren and great-grandchildren also come by more frequently in these summer months,” he added.

He noted that his father’s Pastor, Don Wilton from Spartanburg, South Carolina, continues to visit him on a weekly basis, which “means so much.”

A January 2013 post on the Billy Graham Library website noted that the evangelist identified John 3:16 as his favorite Bible verse back in 1995, which reads: “For God so loved the world that He gave his only begotten Son that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.”

Billy Graham said at the time that it’s the one verse he always preaches on his evangelistic crusades.

“It has only 25 words in the English translation of it, but it is the Gospel in a nutshell. Someone has called it a miniature Bible,” he said.

He has also urged Christians to make an effort to understand the Bible, which he said is more important than any other book.

When offering advice on how to begin exploring the Bible, he said in 2016 that first-time readers can start with the Gospel of John.

“I suggest you begin with the Bible’s center or focal point, which is Jesus Christ. All the Old Testament points forward to Him, and all the New Testament tells us about Him. He came down from Heaven to forgive us and make us part of his family forever — and through the Bible we discover this great truth,” Graham wrote, adding a reference to John 20:31 that states the Holy Book was “written that you may believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name.”

In September it was revealed that evangelist Will Graham will play the role of his famous grandfather in the next cinematic installment of Olympian and POW Louie Zamperini’s life, titled “Unbroken: Path to Redemption.”

Follow Stoyan Zaimov on Facebook: CPSZaimov

[ad_2]

Source link

قالب وردپرس

Thousands of Women to Repent for Racial Sins of America in Worship Rally on National Mall

-
0

[ad_1]

(Photo: Pulse)Thousands of Christians gathered on the National Mall in Washington, D.C. for Together 2016 on July 16, 2016.

This weekend’s worship festivities on the National Mall will culminate on Monday in the form of a day-long women-led worship rally in which people from all across the United States will be called to pray for a “Jesus Movement” to sweep the nation and foster racial reconciliation, gender equality, and for an end to abortion.

Thousands of women are expected to gather in Washington, D.C. for “Rise Up,” a worship-focused revival calling on Americans to repent for the country’s history of racial and gender-based injustices and for the country’s embrace of abortion.

The women’s worship rally comes just over 20 years after hundreds of thousands of Christians gathered on the National Mall on Oct. 4, 1997, for the male-centered Promise Keepers’ Stand in the Gap rally.

Organized by Lou Engle’s The Call, Rise Up will occur as Christians from all 50 states set up tents on the National Mall for three days over the weekend to hold prayer and worship at America’s Tent of Meeting sponsored in-part by Awaken the Dawn.

“Rise Up is sort of the culminating event for that three days of prayer and worship,” Rise Up organizer Kristina Sabestinas told The Christian Post. “We would like to see another Jesus Movement birthed for a new generation and believing supernaturally that the presence of God would move across this nation and draw people to Him. We believe prayer is a really important part of that.”

With the call for women to “rise up” being the central theme of the event, those who gather on Monday will be called to follow the biblical examples of women like Deborah, the only female judge in the Bible who told that God Commanded Israel’s troops to attack the forces of the oppressive King Jabin, and Esther, who saved her people from possible genocide.

“When her nation was in a time of crisis, there was a statement that said, ‘I Deborah arose as a mother for her nation.’ And we are really calling on women to step up and rise up on behalf of their children and the coming generation, and pray that God would move in our country,” Sabestinas said. “Although in Esther it doesn’t mention God specifically, she is a model of someone who used her influence to help other people.”

The worship gathering, which will last from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m., will be broken into various worship segments and prayer segments.

“There will be different themes throughout the day and one of the themes is racial reconciliation and healing. We will be praying and repenting for the oppression of minorities in our nation and asking for forgiveness and believing for reconciliation to be part of what happens in that day,” Sabestinas added. “We will also be praying on behalf of the oppression of women in our country and how they have treated women and how women have sometimes been marginalized and thought that they can’t lead.”

“Also, a key part of what we are doing with Rise Up is drawing attention to the abortion issue and asking women to use their influence to take a stand for life and make a public stand for life,” Sabestinas added. “We draw a lot from Esther because she did take a stand for people who were appointed to die.”

Sabestinas asserted that women in America can have an impact just as Esther did.

“Her whole people were potentially facing genocide,” she continued. “We see similarities in believing that women can actually be a voice on the [abortion] issue and not be afraid to stand up and say we want to see Roe v. Wade overturned — that we want to take a stand for life, we want to see an adoption movement start in our nation and be an answer and a resource to women in crisis and not continue this pattern of killing off the next generation.”

A number of pro-life activists are scheduled to speak at the event, including Concerned Women for American’s Penny Nance and the Susan B. Anthony List’s Marjorie Dannefelser.

Regardless of how many turn out for the Rise Up gathering, Sabestinas told CP that she knows the event will make an impact one way or another.

“When you dream about something like this, we just want the masses to show up. But we believe that even if there is 100 or a 1,000 or 10,000 women there that our prayers are going to make a different and matter and God takes that seriously,” she said. “He hears the cry of the people who will humble themselves before Him and pray.”

Follow Samuel Smith on Twitter: @IamSamSmith
Follow Samuel Smith on Facebook: SamuelSmithCP

[ad_2]

Source link

قالب وردپرس

Internet guiding majority, not prayer

-
0
Internet guiding majority, not prayer

[ad_1]

A poll conducted by ComRes concluded people in Britain are far more likely to consider loved ones (77 per cent) or the internet (51 per cent) their first or second go-to source of guidance.

creative commons

 

Professor Stephen Bullivant from the Benedict the Sixteenth Centre for Religion and Society at St Mary’s University in Twickenham pointed out the results do not mean most people shun prayer entirely.

He said: “It’s quite possible that several of the people who say ‘I’d talk to my friends and family, and I’d Google it’ might also pray, but [in] every survey we do we see the vast majority of British people aren’t terribly religious.”

The study was commissioned by Christian journalist Ruth Gledhill ahead of her speech during the Ebor Lecture event in York on Wednesday.

 

She said: “I was terribly surprised by how few people use prayer, or a book such as the Bible or a religious source such as a priest as their first or second choice to turn to for advice.

Twenty-three per cent of respondents answered that they would consult an expert, four per cent social media and two per cent a priest.

Ruth Gledhill added: “I think these findings represent both a challenge and opportunity for the churches. The challenge is for the local vicar to become seen as one of those friends that we turn to.”

 

Professor Bullivant suggested not all decisions necessarily hinge on prayer. He added: “Whether to remortgage the house or get a second car, these just aren’t the sort of things that even highly-committed religious people do.

“Getting a loft extension is not the kind of issue that we’re [my wife and I] going to talk to our priest about or even necessarily feel comfortable about taking to our Lord in prayer.”

Click here to listen to Premier’s Eno Adeogan speaking with Professor Stephen Bullivant:

[ad_2]

Source link

قالب وردپرس

1...2,9522,9532,954...3,893Page 2,953 of 3,893