Christian Action Commission

Land: Christians must battle barbarism

NEW ORLEANS (BP and local reports) — Civilization stands at a fork in the road and will either ascend to greater heights or tumble into barbarism unless Christians reassert the value of all human life and absolute moral truth, Richard Land told a Founder’s Day audience October 6 at New Orleans Seminary.

Land, president of the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention in Nashville, said the future of civilization turns on two fundamental questions: Is moral truth real and knowable or is it merely a preference? A question of human value follows: Is mankind of value because of the essence of mankind, or only for what mankind can do?

These questions are at the heart of policy debates over abortion, embryonic stem cell research, cloning, physician-assisted suicide, euthanasia, and health care reform, said Land, who is scheduled to speak October 26 at …

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Parent-child relationship further weakened with court order

The decision by U.S. District Court Judge Edward Korman of New York to order the FDA to make Plan B, post-intercourse contraceptives available to 17-year-old girls without a prescription from their doctor is one more example of the government believing it has the right to interpose itself between parents and their children. It is shameful that the Obama administration has decided it will not appeal this terrible federal court decision.

Allowing drugs with such powerful physiological and emotional effects to be sold over the counter to adults without a prescription, as has been the case since 2005, has no doubt had significant consequences, none of them good. The decision to allow such drugs to be marketed and sold to underage teenagers without a prescription is absolutely incredible. No good can come out of it.

This decision will certainly lead to increased rates of sexual activity for …

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Being a Pro-Life Church

Is your church pro-life? I mean really pro-life? As a body, are you encouraging each other to not only think in a pro-life way but also act in a pro-life way?

Undeniably, Christians have been the backbone of the pro-life movement since its inception. If more churches would harness their membership and organizational power on behalf of pro-life causes, however, perhaps the tide could be turned in America and we would once again live in a society that values every human life.

Let’s think about some practical ways your church members can be pro-life.

Teach your children

“Impress these words of Mine on your hearts and souls . . . teach them to your children, talking about them when you sit in your house and when you walk along the road” (Deut. 11:18-19).

Explain to your children from an early age why human …

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DOMESTIC VIOLENCE AND THE MEMORIAL TO THE MISSING

How many pennies do we have in the Memorial to the Missing?  The most accurate “guess” is 49,200,000.  Approximately 800,000 more pennies are needed.  Our goal is to have this project completed by the end of August.  So, PLEASE, if you have pennies already collected, get them to us or to your associational missions office and someone from the Baptist Building will pick them up.  You are to be commended for such a splendid response of a very worthy project. The impact of seeing fifty million pennies and knowing what they represent is life changing.

Often I am asked, “What can we do as a church or group that will impact our community and our church?” As I read the August 6th edition of the Clarion Ledger, it became clear to me that Mississippi Baptists must get more involved in an often ignored issue that is present in …

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Lessons from the divorce generation

May 6, 2008

A recent Newsweek cover story, entitled The Divorce Generation Grows Up, chronicles the history of divorce by spotlighting a middle class suburban community. A generation ago, learning that someone was divorced was still a bit shocking. No longer. Back then, divorcing parents reasoned that a split was better for children than conflict in the home. Today, that’s a tough case to make.

Newsweek’s David Jefferson used a captivating device to write his story. He interviewed several of his classmates at Ulysses S. Grant High School in L.A.’s San Fernando Valley to see how the class of ’82 had been affected by divorce.

The divorce rate in 1982 was more than double that of the 1950s. It had grown in the fertile ground tilled by the feminists’ message that “a woman needs a man like a fish needs a bicycle.” Then, in …

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Who shall prevail—the judges or the people?

May 22, 2008

This column originally published at Casting Stones, a blog hosted by Beliefnet.com.

The California Supreme Court has ruled (by a 4-3 vote) in its supposedly “infinite” wisdom that the California state constitution requires that same-sex couples must have the same right to get married as heterosexual couples do. The California Supreme Court did this in spite of the fact that the people of California voted in a referendum in 2000 that marriage was only to be a man and a woman, thus ruling out not only same-sex marriage, but also polygamy.

Californians voted by a 61 to 39 percent margin to define marriage in this exclusive and specific way. When one examined the referendum votes more closely, marriage “as only between a man and a woman” carried every county in the state, including San Francisco. It also carried …

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Nashville Declaration on “Same-sex Marriage”

Mar 9, 2005

Across the country the American people have spoken loudly, clearly repudiating attempts to redefine marriage. In every state in which citizens have been given the opportunity, they have voted to reaffirm the historic definition of marriage as only the union of one man and one woman. Yet activist judges are still in a position to force so-called “same-sex marriage” on the American people, and have already shown a willingness to do so in a number of states. In response to the serious challenge to the traditional biblical definition of marriage, we are compelled to make the following declaration:

1. We affirm the biblical teaching that God designed marriage as a lifetime union of one man and one woman. We deny that the God-ordained institution of marriage is subject to redefinition as merely a civil institution or simply a private matter.

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