Sojourners CEO Jim Wallis says that God is “sad and mad” about the Gulf of Mexico oil disaster. No arguments from me, but I think that reality is probably a little more complex. I figure God is also “glad” that there was a $20 billion fund set up to compensate victims of the spill. Concerning the President’s handling of the crisis, Wallis said, “The White House is trying their best, I am sure of it.” I appreciate that Jim is giving the President the benefit of the doubt here. (I personally think some conservatives are being too critical of President Obama.) But I don’t remember Wallis showing this kind of grace to President Bush during the days and weeks following Hurricane Katrina. Is there a double standard here?

Former United Methodist pastor Mark Rutland has completed his first year as the president of Oral Roberts University. The Tulsa World has published a profile of Rutland, his path to the presidency of ORU and his time there so far.

The charismatic movement is flourishing in Ethiopia, but the established Ethiopian Orthodox Church has resisted it for the most part. As a result, dissatisfied young people have been defecting to Pentecostal churches. Recognizing an opportunity to meet a need (and grow its ranks) the more charismatic-friendly Catholic Church has announced that it is launching initiatives to reach out to this group. This looks like a shrewd move on the part of the Catholics and hopefully it serves as yet another reminder that the division between charismatic worship and liturgical is a false dichotomy.

A pro-gay group in Australia has filed a complaint against a Christian denomination for refusing to rent them a camping facility. I’m not going to attempt to speak to Australian law here or even to the issue of homosexuality and the church. But I do have a problem with a government deciding how a church should run its ministry or use its property. These kinds of complaints and lawsuits are almost always a double-edged sword. Before you support government intervention in church affairs on this particular issue, think really hard. You’ll probably be able to picture another scenario where this kind of precedent could come back to bite.

Remember the old joke about UCC (United Church of Christ) being an abbreviation for “Unitarians Considering Christ?” Well, it’s not as much of a joke as it used to be– a Unitarian seminary has now joined forces with a UCC theological school. The best part of the article is where the Chicago Tribune states the obvious: “[Meadville-Lombard president Lee] Barker expects inevitable conflicts and tension as the program develops. There are, after all, irreconcilable differences between religious traditions on matters such as salvation and the Middle East conflict.” Hmmm… you think?

The Presbyterians voted to rebuke Caterpillar for not doing more to make Israel stop using its bulldozers to “build walls and destroy Palestinian homes”, but overwhelmingly decided to hang on to more than $10 million of the company’s stock. Maybe the PCUSA has finally figured out that boycotting and divesting probably wouldn’t have the desired effect on Israeli policy.  Besides, if the Presbyterians sell their stock, they’ll really lose their influence. This isn’t rocket science.

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