| Show Saturday May 11999 T1 E Promise Keepers to make Ogden stop 10000 Christian men to hold ao assembly at Dee Events Center 14 fGl DPt1® By MEUSA ANN WILSON r§i COJ rte reo wwwstandardnet Standard Examiner staff of thousands men Hooded the the hundreds By 7T Mall in Washington DC in 997 for "Stand in the Gap: A Sacred Assembly of Men" organized by the '7S L 1 Ab 16 GTI co"d 7JJ tTI 81 1 rG Jt longer right for me to just sit around and just be a passive Christian I need to be active and I need to reach out” ' Iverson and at least 1 1 other Wasatch for more coverage j Front men are reaching out From the J' combined efforts of "Common Ground” and the Utah Men of vision Task Force a Promise Keepers group in Utah the Read the Promise Keepers mission Men’s Conferences of 1997 and statement seven promises and statements 1 998 were bom of faith Now they are expanding the event codirector Scott Acton said They are calling 1 Keepers conference in 993 The Denver it "Share the Vision ’99: lie is Lord!” The event was the first since the movement conference will move from area churches football an filled entire 1990 that began in to the large arena on Weber State Universtadium It changed his life sity’s campus “In some cases some people don’t “I came away from there saying it’s no Promise Keepers - the million-ma- n march This year a group of organizers are hoping a similar event will bring about 10000 to the Dee Lvents Center in Ogden May 14 and 15 Dave Iverson first attended a Promise Inter-mounta- in want to go to another person’s church In an arena event there is much more common ground” The conference is open to all men regardless of denomination It will cost S22 and start May 14 at 6 pm with opening ceremonies May 15 it will run from 8 am to 5:30 pm with lunch provided The Ogden event is not directly a Promise Keepers event but is supported by the national group and both founders will be speaking Promise Keepers is a national group of Christian men who vow to their God to live lives of integrity and faithfulness See PROM1SE4E SE &' sC ro is 'ZOo ?ai rG xr tow ruTS 4354 dr ffer Pass the virtual collection RU o red jed 22 News Service vices? “And automatic electronic transfer does ensure that the ministry of the Lord doesn't get leftovers It is important to understand that this isn't just a slick way to make sure the church gets money from people and I don’t view it that way at all” Since Pederson's church began ’ offering the program in I ebruary 16 out of 850 families have chosen the option “One of the things that has to happen is you See VIRTU AL3E Greek word "martyria” meant “witness” throughout the books and letters that became the New Testament Believers witnessed both in w ord and deed Then came persecution By the time the drama of the early church reached the Book of Revelation of St John with its image of the Whore of Babylon “drunken with the blood of the saints and with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus” the word “martyr” had changed forever “I'm not even sure we can understand what ’martyr’ used to mean” said Fred Norris of the Emmanuel School of Religion in Llizabethton Term He is the for The )R COPY ROY - Reverend Glenn Garrison Assemblies of God missionary to the Philippines will be the featured speaker at Calvary Christian Center in Roy Sunday at 10 30 a m Glenn and his wife Nancy Garrison began their ministry in Asia in 1984 on the island of Taiwan The Garrisons first went to the Philippines in 1989 They taught at the Immanuel Bible College and established two new churches as well They founded the Happy Honzons Children's Ranch which currently cares for 44 abused and abandoned children Garrison said the ranch is part of a plan for helping “street kids” conservative Nancy Ammerman professor Saints poses with a model of the Nauvoo Temple Gordon B Hinckley president of the Church of Jesus Chnst of Latter-Da- y Lake City office A portrait of Brigham Young who helped build the Mormon temple hangs behind The church plans to rebuild the temple LDS PROPHET: overlooking the in his Salt Mississippi River in Illinois Hinckley oversees LDS temple surge Church president has seen a huge increase in ‘ places of worship The Associated Press LAKE CITY church President B Hinckley his father's attempt 60 years ago to persuade church leaders to rebuild the Nauvoo Temple overlooking the Mississippi River “The church didn't have a lot of money in those days That was just coming out of the DeThey declined it” pression said Hinckley overseer of a uilding program unprecedented in the history of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints He never forgot his father's desire is a Chicago mission president to rebuild the temple SALT temple-b- amid the Illinois farmlands about 1 50 miles upriver from St Louis The gleaming edifice was nearing completion in 1 846 w hen Brigham Young led the Mormons on their exodus to the West Their welcome in Illinois had worn out amid complaints about Mormons’ theocratic views and about polygamy then practiced by some members The temple was set afire after they left In his surprise announcement on Easter Sunday that Nauvoo would regain its temple Hinckley was fulfilling his late father’s wish He also was striking a chord of longing within the Utah-base- d church to right a historical wrong “The rebuilding of the Nauvoo Temple will bring back a clear and vivid reminder of what Nauvoo was Nauvoo was a prosperous and great city” Hinckley said in a recent interview noting that the new temple will closely resemble the grand original As president of the 104 -member church since 1995 Hinckley has worked to double the number of temples w here Mormons in good standing perform sacred ordinances considered essential to the faith's concept of eternal progression Indeed Hinckley's innovation to build smaller-scal- e temples in more places means most Mormons won’t have to travel daunting distances to a temple So far the church has 57 operating temples and 55 in some stage of planning or construcare of the tion Forty-seve- n smaller type “Every temple that this church has built has in effect stood as a monument to our belief in the immortality of the human soul that this phase of million- mortal life through which we part of a conpass is but one tinuous upward climb so to speak And that as certain as there’s life here there will be life there” he said The temple Hinckley said serves as a bridge between mortality and immortality As envisioned by church founder Joseph Smith in Nauvoo temple rituals would embrace “the ancient order of things for the first time in these last days” Springing nimbly from his chair Hinckley who will turn 89 in June retrieved a small model of the Nauvoo Temple from atop a cabinet in his office and placed it before a visitor “This building was the finest in Illinois It was the crowning phase of their belief the crowning objective of their worship and there were many people See TEMPLES3E of the North American Patristics Society for scholars who study the early church fathers “Sacrifice doesn't mean much in this culture i So we use ‘martyr’ in a w ay that's quite silly We say ‘Oh she’s acting like a martyr’ and we don’t even mean it as a compliment” There was more to being a martyr than dying a tragic death and the word certainly didn’t imply that someone had a death wish The key said Norris was thaf the believer refused in the face of terror and torture to deny the faith Thus a martyr’s death was a public witness Today the word “martyT” is highly relevant in Uganda China Iran Indonesia Sudan and elsewhere And last week in Littleton Colo the story of mer president r- wHLJPi m old Cassie Bemall inspired many young believers to embrace the true meaning of the word In the days since the massacre her story has spread worldwide through news reports and the Internet The details may vary but no one challenges the heart of the story Classmates other Christians and four members of her own West Bowles Community Church youth group witnessed her death in the Columbine High School library As the killers in the black trench coats approached Cassie clutched her Bible and dove under a table After playing cruel jokes on other victims one gunman asked Cassie "Do you believe in God?” She paused Some w itnesses said the smoking gun already was aimed at her of sociology and religion at Hartford (Conn) Seminary said the most visible change was last year's amendment to convention beliefs that women should “submit graciously” to their husbands Joe Hough dean of the Vanderbilt University Divinity School in Nashville said the drop is very small considering the Southern Baptists’ membership and “considering the amount of turmoil in their denomination” y Priest leaves $1 million to diocese NC - Forty years ago Monsignor James E McSweeney earned $25 a month But by the time he died at 74 in early April he had amassed nearly $1 million The James E McSweeney Endowment Fund will be used by the Roman Catholic Diocese of Raleigh to help educate prospective priests and to allow ordained priests to earn advance degrees During the day McSweeney celebrated mass performed baptisms and heard confessions At night his friends said he scrutinized the stock market and developed the skills of a shrewd investor RALEIGH y Catholic Bible to be published Reclaiming the word ‘martyr’: A definition of sacrifice By TERRY MATTINGLY Scnpps Howard News Service missionary to speak Records show membership dropped to 157 million Baptisms were down by about 4800 but attendance at Sunday morning services and Sunday school were up by 174052 and 7832 respectively and offerings and other gifts came to more than $69 billion up 4 percent Convention observers cite many factors that may be behind the drop in membership Among them: some individuals' decision to drop their affiliation with any particular denomination the growth of the megachurch and the advent of alternative churches as the convention's leadership became more Praise the Lord and pass the virtual collection plate With Lutherans leading the way an increasing number of churches are using electronic funds transfers to turn good intentions into the golden reality of dependable donations Do your church envelopes hide in forgotten corners at home? Forget your checkbook in the rush to get the kids dressed? fall hopelessly behind in your stewardship pledge when you go on vacation or skip Sunday ser- ts Church founder NASHVILLE Tenn -Membership in the Southern Baptist Convention the nation's largest Protestant faith slipped 1 percent in 1998 the first loss in 72 years Churches are turning to electronic fund transfers to raise money Or maybe you secretly cherish these adult versions of “the dog ate my homework” excuse Salvation from such short comings and hassles in church leaders' views may lie in cyberspace About 670 Lutheran congregations nationwide are offering their members the option of having donations automatically transferred from their bank accounts into church accounts on a weekly semimonthly or monthly basis according to Royce McEw-e- n an assistant vice president at Lutheran Brotherhood's national offices in Minneapolis "This fits very well into our theology of stewardship and by that I mean we're committed to first-fruigiving” said Duane Pederson pastor of First Luther an Church Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (LLCA) in Lau Claire Wis “First fruits means simply giving the best of what we have and the first of what we have as a thanks for all of the blessings we’ve received from God Update Baptists lose members plate Scnpps-Howar- d RELIGION “Yes I believe in God” she said The gunman laughed and said “Why?” Then he killed her Other witnesses told Time magazine that Cassie who a few years earlier considered suicide and bathed in the occult also said: “There is a God and you need to follow along God's path’Then the killer said “There is no God” and pulled the trigger Cassie’s story is especially poi- gnant because of this confrontation her public affirmation of faith and its immediate consequences said Norris This resembles the legal trials of martyrs who faced Roman judges In this case the believer was tried and executed by a peer who represented in some bizarre way a youth culture steeped in violence and death face-to-fa- At least one other student Valeen Schnurr faced this question She also answered “yes” and was shot She suffered nine bullet and shrapnel wounds - but lived Others escaped the killing zone with their own physical emotional and spiritual wounds “The early church had a different word for someone who was wounded or tortured and refused to renounce the faith” noted Norris “This people were called ’confessors’ and their wounds served as a witness to their faith This gave them a special authority and they also served as an inspiration to others” Only the spiritually blind have missed the symbolism in Cassie’s death as Vice President A1 Gore th See MARTYR2E GRAND RAPIDS Mich -- A major Protestant house will publish a Bible designed for Catholics An agency of the national Catholic bishops’ conference granted Zondervan Publishing House permission to use the New American Bible text in its Catholic Serendipity Bible The New Amencan Bible is the official version of the US Catholic Church “Serendipity” refers to a popular series of Bible publications for personal and study developed by Lyman Coleman who edited the Catholic edition's notes and comments small-grou- - p Standard-Examine- r staff and wire services Eye on Religion L Web Forum w httpsrZwwwttandardtict |
