BTW: Monsoor is a Middle Eastern name. I have an Iranian relative with that name.
At any rate, Michael Monsoor, a Navy SEAL sniper, threw himself on a grenade, thereby saving the lives of his comrades.
For his valiant effort, he has been awarded the Medal of Honor.
Obviously, the math isn’t very good with that site. I KNOW I’ve dropped a few expletives on these pages.
Created by OnePlusYou – Free Online Dating
Looks like LifeWay (Southern Baptist Convention) seems to understand it, even if they aren’t admitting that their seminaries were part of the problem.
About three-fourths of young people quit church. “Tell me something I don’t know,” you say.
Well, Lifeway Research (Southern Baptist) says they know the reasons why 70 percent of 18-year-olds who attended church regularly in high school quit by age 23: they don’t like it. And by age 30, 34 percent still have not rebounded. That means one in four young Protestants has left the church.
On their laundry list of reasons: they wanted a break (27%), church is too judgmental (26%), they moved away to college (25%), busy with work (23%).
On the positive side, the 30 percent who kept attending church cited solid spiritual reasons, including: “it’s vital to my relationship with God” (65%) and church “helps guide my everyday decisions” (58%).
Lifeway’s Ed Stetzer blames the losses on sorry youth ministry: “Too many youth groups are holding tanks with pizza,” Stetzer said. “There’s no life transformation taking place. People are looking for a faith that can change them and be part of changing the world.”
“Unless religious leaders take younger adults more seriously, the future of American religion is in doubt,” said Bowling Alone author and sociologist Robert Wuthnow, whose new book, After the Baby Boomers, was published in September.
The proportion of young adults identifying with mainline churches is about half what it was a generation ago, and evangelicals have barely held their own, Wuthnow said.
Trouble is, many seminary grads–as youth ministers–are doing EXACTLY what they learned in those Christian education classes. It’s too much coffee, donuts, pizza, trips to amusement parks, camp outs, cook outs, car washes…not much real teaching going on.
I remember interviewing for youth ministry positions. They weren’t so much concerned about my teaching skills as they were about what kinds of activities I had in mind.
And don’t get me wrong…I have no stew with having activities. But youth ministry is about discipleship, and any activities need to be lined up with that in mind.
Moreover, as Christina mentioned, there is not much integration into the larger Church Body. This is especially true as the youth transition into adulthood. They often get shoved off into another enclave. If you’re not college/career, you get effectively dropped off the face of the earth.
Let’s assume that you are the youth minister for Anytown Community Church. You have a youth group of about 50 teens.
Most of them are in the public school system. Half of them are in one-parent families. Most have a basic familiarity with the Bible, while some are only vaguely familiar with such things as the Flood account in Genesis. A quarter of them will graduate to adulthood this year.
Let’s say that your teaching largely consists of lessons drawn from the youth ministry curriculum for your denomination. This means that your lessons focus on the here-and-now. As for preparation for adult life and the process for making important decisions–college/professional or vocational paths, adjusting to adult life, choosing a mate, roles of husbands and wives–that is largely nonexistent, even though your church has a “True Love Waits” campaign every year.
Question: If the extent of their preparation for marriage consists of “don’t have sex until you get married,” then what outcomes do you expect?
Steven Milloy writes a nice column exposing how ABC News, using innuendo, teamed up with the Anthropogenic Global Warming nazis to smear one of the top scientists of the last 50 years, all on account of the fact that he is a global warming skeptic.
I’m not surprised at the outcome. Obviously horrible news for the family. Maupin died serving his country. Whatever your thoughts are about the war, I’m glad we have some closure in this case while saddened that we didn’t have a better outcome.
Here’s how it can take form. I have my issues with the Vatican, but when they are on, the are on.
Another sign of how screwed up our society has become.
Can’t have children? Just pay a woman to rent out her womb.
Now don’t get me wrong…I’m a libertarian on this. The technology is out there, and–as long as they’re not killing anyone with it–I’m not sure I like the idea of government diverting law enforcement away from real crimes to police the Rent-A-Womb industry.
On the other hand, you can chalk up another one for feminism. As women continue to marry late, with childbearing years behind them, they will be hard-pressed to find ways to become mothers. This is because–as a general rule–women are hard-wired to want that.
And you know what? The diva of modern feminism–Gloria Steinem–agrees with me.
While romancing Mort Zuckerman, she attempted–without success–to gain the fertility that she blew during her “A woman needs a man like a fish needs a bicycle” days. I’d actually feel sorry for her, except that she caused countless women a load of misery, as they followed her advice of more sex–with abortion as the safegard–and career life, marriage be damned.
I remember that first “test tube baby” in the late 1970s. I was in grade school at the time–and, honestly, didn’t know the first thing about the details of reproduction–but I had a sinking feeling that something wasn’t right about this “test tube baby” stuff.
Now, sexual reproduction has become a free market transaction. While prostitution remains illegal–for now–it is probably only a matter of time before technology develops robots specially-designed for sex. Once that happens, prostitutes will find themselves facing competition. Then again, so will women who will otherwise wish to marry.
Then, not only will reproduction become a free market transaction; so will the sexual act itself.
At this rate, women will become even more irrelevant.
That’s the telos of a feminist, post-Christian society.
Ahhh…but not to worry. The backlash is coming! And it will be sooner rather than later…
Paulson Prescribes More Bad Medicine
Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, apparently oblivious to the utter disaster that federal regulation of banking has handed us, has decided that the answer to these government blunders is more government!
This is further proof as to why we cannot trust either party. In reality, Paulson is doing nothing that a Democrat-appointee wouldn’t do, given the same situation. Ditto for Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke. Rather than take correct action, they take politically-correct action.
And we are paying the price, and will continue to pay the price.