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Mormons out-give evangelicals by about 3 to 1. Mormons give an average of 7.5% of their income to the church compared to evangelicals 2.5%. Add to this the fact that all but 85 top LDS leaders are volunteers which frees up millions of dollars for their worldwide mission efforts. The average Christian church spends about 60% of it’s budget on staff salaries and benefits. (CT 6/15/98)
Deistic Teens- Researchers with the National Study of Youth and Religion have concluded American teens believe in a combination of works based righteousness, religion as psychological well-being, and a distant, non-interfering god. With no place for sin, judgment, salvation, or Christ; their creed is a far cry from Christianity. The study found they believe: • A god exists who created the world and watches over human life. • God wants people to be nice to each other. • The central goal of life is to be happy and feel good about oneself. • God does not need to be involved in one’s life except when needed to resolve a problem.• Good people go to heaven when they die. (World 6/25/05)
During the past decade the Mormon church grew the fastest in the U.S.—by 19% to 4.2 million adherents. (The Foster Letter 4/10/06)
In the last 10 years, there has been a 42% growth in the number of new Muslim mosques in America compared to a 12% increase in evangelic...
Students Don’t See Western Culture as Superior
Eighty-four percent of college students today do not believe that Western culture is superior to Arab culture according to a newly released poll funded by Americans for Victory Over Terrorism (a project by Empower.org) and former Secretary of Education William Bennett. The story was reported by George Livadas on the Accuracy in Academia website.
According to the poll, 70 percent of American college students would not serve in the armed forces if sent abroad, while 48 percent openly declared that they would evade a draft. Ironically, 79 percent of college students believe that the U.S. "has the right to overthrow" Hussein. Rather than holding terrorists solely responsible for their actions on September 11, college students partially blamed the U.S. government for the attacks, as 57 percent of college students stated that United States policies are "at least somewhat responsible for the September 11th terrorist attacks".
Livadas observes, "Despite the War on Terror and the events of September 11, college students remain adamant in refusing to judge anyone or anything foreign based upon their actions. The once educational and beneficial idea of multiculturalism has been taken to such extreme levels that college students, who formerly studied different cultures to gain a better perspective of their own values and culture, now embrace and praise all societies but their own."
"The disturbing results of the poll show us that not only are most college students today unwilling to fight for true American values and freedoms, but they are unwilling to even acknowledge the great achievements of American society. This tendency for American academics to blame the U.S. for the world’s problems, while praising oppressive foreign cultures simply because they are not our own, will ultimately result in the weakening of our nation." (to read the complete story go to: http://www.academia.org/news/defend.html)
PreachingNow Newsletter, August 6, 2002.
The Global Islamic population is approximately 1,200,000,000, or 20% of the world population.
During the past decade the Mormon church grew the fastest in the U.S.—by 19% to 4.2 million adherents. (Foster Letter 4/10/06)
America’s 25 Most Influential Evangelicals according to Time magazine are: Rick Warren, author of The Purpose Driven Life, and pastor of the 22,000-member Saddleback church. Howard & Roberta Ahmanson, financiers, founders of Fieldstead & Co., a private philanthropic organization. David Barton, author, constitutional scholar, founder of advocacy organization, WallBuilders. Doug Coe, head of Campus Crusade’s Fellowship Foundation, instrumental in the National Prayer Breakfast, disciple-maker among U.S. senators and congressmen. Chuck Colson, author, broadcaster, founder of Prison Fellowship. Luis Cortes, Philadelphia Hispanic Baptist pastor and founder of Nueva Esperanza that builds houses for the poor, offers loans to Hispanic businesses and aids-awareness programs. James Dobson, author, broadcaster, family advocate, founder of Focus on the Family. Stuart Epperson, co-founder of Salem Communications, owner of 104 radio stations in 24 of the top 25 U.S. markets reaching 5 million listeners a week. Michael Gerson, former journalist, now White House speechwriter for President Bush. Billy & Franklin Graham, Father, author, evangelist, founder of BGEA and Son, evangelist and founder of Samaritans Purse. Ted Haggard, president of the NAE, founding pastor of New Life Church in Colorado Springs. Bill Hybels, author and founder of the Willow Creek Community Church in Barrington, IL. T.D. Jakes, author and pastor of Potter’s House, a Dallas area mega-church. Diane Knippers, president of the conservative Institute on Religion and Democracy. Tim & Beverly LaHaye, Him, author and Her, founder of Concerned Women for America. Richard Land, Southern Baptist Convention’s main lobbyist in Washington. Brian McLaren, author, a Maryland pastor, elder statesman of the “emerging church” movement. Joyce Meyer, author, broadcaster, founder of Joyce Meyer Ministries. Richard John Neuhaus, C...
“The Commercial Appeal,” Memphis, TN Tues., Sept. 12, 2006. Study asks: In what God do we trust? Baylor University in Waco, Texas researchers found we may be "one nation, under God," but Americans actually worship at least four versions of the Lord (according to the Baylor Religion Survey released Monday).
The study asked 1,721 Americans more than two dozen questions about God’s character and behavior. They perceived of God in one of four ways:
Authoritarian God: God is highly involved in their personal lives and in world affairs.
They give the Deity credit for their decision-making, and they feel God is angry and is punishing the wicked.
Benevolent God: God is mostly a force for positive influence in the world.
These believers also think God is very active in their daily life, just not as wrathful.
Critical God: God is not meddling in world affairs but is nonetheless looking on in disapproval.
These people tend to believe that divine justice is not of this world.
Distant God: Distant God is not active in humanity’s affairs, and is not especially angry, either.
Believers consider God more of a cosmic force setting laws of nature into motion.
Which of the God models you follow is an accurate predictor of several things, including race, political stances, even where you live, said Paul Froese, a Baylor sociologist who worked on the project.
For example, Women tend toward the Authoritarian and Benevolent versions, while men tend toward the less engaged and are more likely to be atheistic.
More than half the black respondents said they believe in the Authoritarian God. None said they were atheist.
Lower-income and less-educated people were more likely to worship the Authoritarian or Benevolent God, while those with college degrees or earning more than $100,000 were more likely to believe in the Distant God or be atheists.
Geography also seemed to correlate:
Easterners disproportionately seem to believe in a Critical God.
Southerners tend toward the Authoritarian God.
Midwesterners worship the Benevolent God.
West Coast residents contemplate the Distant God.
Other findings: Catholics, Jews and mainline Protestants (Episcopal, Methodist, Presbyterian, United Church of Christ) are more apt to see God as distant.
Evangelical and black Protestants lean toward the Authoritarian God.
You can get an idea by those divisions about which people are more intent about running their own lives, versus those who are giving some thought to what God expects from them.
In an interview with TIME magazine, Bill Gates is quoted as saying:
“Just in terms of allocation of time resources, religion is not very efficient. There’s a lot more I could be doing on a Sunday morning.”
Bill Gates has a net worth of 56 billion dollars. To put that in perspective, there are 181 countries listed in the International Monetary Fund. If we called Bill Gates a country and labeled his 56 billion dollars as his Gross Domestic Product (GDP), he would rank 58th, with more revenue than Bahrain, Jordan, and Iceland combined. At what point is enough finally enough?
But Bill is the pinnacle of wealth. Most of us are nowhere near that. In fact, many of us are just getting by. At least by our standards. You see, when I was retiring from the Navy a few months ago, we learned an interesting statistic that has stayed with me. We learned that 50 percent of the people in the world do not have a toilet.
This basic item of subsistence that we take for granted, is a luxury that half the people in the world can’t afford. So you are doing better financially, than at least 3 billion other people. By their standards, we are incredibly wealthy.
But we look at it based on our own standard of materialism, and we decide, like Bill Gates, that we don’t yet have enough.
