1. World missions: The movie

    Convention here taps into students' interest in film as tool for missionary work

    ST. LOUIS-Three hundred evangelical Christian college students sat in a dark, packed downtown hotel ballroom Monday, the projected glow of a movie the only source of light. At least that's the way it looked to an observer. The students in the room would have argued that the real sources of light were the movies' subjects: missionaries bringing the Gospel to what they believe to be the darkest corners of the world for Christians-China, Burma, India, Africa.


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  2. Prayer or inoculation? H1N1 is newest dilemma

    Members of religious groups who forgo vaccines may put neighbors at risk

    Most of the world's religions share a version of the Golden Rule, conveyed in the book of Leviticus as, "Love your fellow as yourself." The notion of treating one's neighbor as you'd wish to be treated was important to the theology of Mary Baker Eddy, who founded The Church of Christ, Scientist in 1879. But a central feature of Eddy's theology-the belief that healing prayer renders medical care unnecessary-can be in conflict with the Golden Rule when it comes to infectious diseases such as pandemic flu.


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  3. B.C. vs. B.C.E.: Debate is on in Rockwood

    "Keep the Faith" column

    CLARKSON VALLEY-Dean Mandis, insurance executive and father of two students in the Rockwood School District, stood before the district's superintendent and seven School Board members Thursday night at Crestview Middle School. He had three minutes to broach an issue that had been bothering him for a month or so.


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  4. St. Louis Archdiocese gave $10,000 to fight gay marriage law in Maine

    Carslon tapped discretionary fund to join nationwide Catholic fight

    The St. Louis Archdiocese contributed $10,000 to a voters' initiative that overturned a Maine law last week legalizing gay marriage, campaign finance records show. Only two other dioceses in the country-Phoenix and Philadelphia-contributed more ($50,000 each). The dioceses of Newark, N.J., and Youngstown, Ohio, also contributed $10,000.


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  5. Festus church choir spreads racial harmony

    All-white group performs a black gospel classic.

    DETROIT-Things were going badly at Faith Celebration Choir's final rehearsal before its big national showdown here Saturday. Choir director Michael Nickelson stood in front of the 85 members of his choir on Faith Baptist Church's stage in Festus on Wednesday night, trying to figure out which alto was responsible for the sloppy diction he heard.


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  6. Pentecostals split over 'tongues'

    Church leaders reaffirm glossolalia, but younger pastors put less emphasis on it

    STEELE, Mo.-At the beginning of an evening worship service at the First Assembly of God church, the Rev. Ryan Harris pitted teens against adults in a trivia game called Battle of the Generations. Wednesday Night Alive is the church's outreach service to a swath of the city's troubled teenagers here in the southernmost tip of Missouri's Bootheel. After a few more games, worship began in a style typical of evangelical churches.


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  7. Conservative pastors fear new hate crime law restricts freedom of speech

    "Keep the Faith" column

    The Rev. Bruce McCoy sees answers in nuance. McCoy, pastor of Canaan Baptist Church in St. Louis, was re-elected president of the Missouri Baptist Convention this week, the same week that President Barack Obama signed into law a new hate crime bill.


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  8. Vatican outreach to Anglicans creates buzz ... bewilderment

    "Keep the Faith" column

    News this week that the Vatican would carve out space for Anglicans to join the Roman Catholic Church, while retaining some of their own liturgy and traditions, elicited starkly different reactions from journalists and church leaders.


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  9. KFUO-FM sale is about evangelism

    "Keep the Faith" column

    News this week of the demise of classical music radio in St. Louis brought tears of grief and anger to fans of Beethoven, Brahms and Bach. But fans of evangelical Christianity reacted to the same news with tears of joy.


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  10. Return of Torah scroll doesn't solve mystery

    Jewish holy object was donated to prison in 1964

    On a spring day in 1964, the leaders of Congregation B'nai Amoona approached Isadore Katz with some trepidation. Katz, 83, was the synagogue's shammash, or sexton, in charge of maintaining its religious objects. He had been B'nai Amoona's shammash for more than half a century, and the rabbis had come to ask which of the congregation's Torah scrolls could be donated to a federal prison in Springfield, Mo.


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