Tanya Tyler’s Punchbuggy blog

New blog alert! Tanya Tyler, a talented contributing writer for DisciplesWorld who lives in Lexington, works for the Herald-Leader, is a graduate of Lexington Theological Seminary, and is a part-time pastor… has added another ‘hat’ to her collection. She’s now a blogger.

Tanya’s Punchbuggy blog is part of the BluegrassMoms.com site. Her most recent post, “It’s Perfectly Biblical” begins this way:

Is your young adult child driving you crazy?

Go ahead and stone him.

As the mom of a young adult son, she had me at “driving you crazy.”

DW contributor featured in reports on SBC and environmentalism

Jonathan Merritt, who has been writing news articles for us for a little less than a year, was featured in several national news reports today including an Associated Press article on our website, for his leadership in rallying Southern Baptists to vow to do something about climate change  (same story appears on MSNBC, a different one in the New York Times). A number of Southern Baptist leaders have signed on to the Southern Baptist Declaration on the Environment & Climate Change – and Jonathan is the spokesperson for the initiative.

As such, Jonathan wrote an op-ed in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution yesterday defending the initiative and clarifying what it is, and is not.  Chances are he’ll be doing more of this in the days to come, and he’s obviously (at least from his AJC piece) up to the task.

Meanwhile, the Southern Baptist Convention appears to be creating some distance between itself and the Climate Change Initiative, or at least clarifying the difference between an SBC action and a grassroots action by Southern Baptists. Headline on the SBC website: “Climate Change project is not SBC’s”. 

SBC President Frank Page released a statement today noting that he supports the initiative but perhaps diffusing some controversy over the language in the declaration, particular this part:

We believe our current denominational engagement with these issues have often been too timid, failing to produce a unified moral voice. Our cautious response to these issues in the face of mounting evidence may be seen by the world as uncaring, reckless and ill-informed. We can do better. To abandon these issues to the secular world is to shirk from our responsibility to be salt and light. The time for timidity regarding God’s creation is no more.

We probably should hesitate to read ‘conflict’ into this though. The SBC’s polity is similar enough to the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) that we can recall having to clarify to the media and the rest of the world the difference between an action by a group of Disciples, or by our General Minister and President, as opposed to an action by the General Assembly - and that in neither case does one speak for all Disciples.

Mostly, we’re just proud to say we know Jonathan, and we encourage him to continue to rally Southern Baptist and Christians in general to care more for God’s creation. We could all learn much from him. As the declaration says, “We can do better.” That’s true for we Disciples too.

Burbank’s Little White Chapel featured in LA Daily News

The Little White Chapel is a Disciples of Christ congregation in Burbank, Calif., but it looks like the type of church you’d see out on a Midwest country road.  According to this article in the LA Daily News, this attracts people who yearn for a simpler time and place.

From the article: “When people get the nerve or courage to come through our doors, I know they are looking to recapture feelings, emotions, from a simpler time,” said the Rev. Ron Degges, who has been with the Little White Chapel since April 1996.

In the article, Degges explains the basic Disciple beliefs and practices - the emphasis on Christian unity, weekly Communion, baptism by immersion, and the freedom for individual interpretation of Scripture. “We are a thinking man and woman’s church. It’s a learning place and a place to be challenged,” he says.

UCC gets Sirius with pre-Easter radio ad campaign

Beginning on March 10, the United Church of Christ will be running a two-week radio ad campaign on Sirius satellite radio. Accoring to a report on the UCC’s website the ads are part of the UCC’s “Stillspeaking” initiative and will include a new 60-second spot called “Telephone Tree.” The ads will air on CNN, Fox News, Sirius Left, and OutQ channels, among others.

UCC Communications Director J. Bennett Guess described the ads as “laugh-out-loud funny” — you can listen to “Telephone Tree” on the UCC website and decide for yourself. It takes a lot to make me laugh out loud (and then it’s usually something less cerebral, like a Will Farrell or Chris Farley comedy, or when the talking baby spit up during the E-Trade Super Bowl commercial) but I have to admit, I chuckled at toward the end of the Telephone Tree spot, when the recorded telephone voice says “Have a NICE day!” 

CTS President Ed Wheeler talks about his big break

In the Indianapolis Star’s Sunday business-section, Christian Theological Seminary President Edward Wheeler gives a first-person account of how one teacher’s intervention made a difference during a tough time in his life. At age 14, Wheeler’s family moved from New York state to Atlanta. The year was 1960 so this meant going to a segregated school in the South. Read more here.