Source: The Courier-Journal

On August 9, 2000, The Courier-Journal published an article entitled, "Fast-growing church meets in Indianapolis," in which it reported on the World Assemblies of God Conference.

Source: The Times-Picayune

On August 9, 2000, The Times-Picayune reported that as "jail and prison rolls grow, local and state governments are turning to faith-based prison ministries as an alternative to reform criminals and reduce recidivism. And that means an increase in the spiritual load for prison ministries, including the one at the Jefferson Parish Correctional Center, which employs two full-time ministers for nearly 700 inmates...'The research is there that it can make a difference,' said Jannitta Antoine, deputy secretary for the Louisiana...

Source: The New York Times

On August 7, 2000, The New York Times reported that on a recent Sunday "hundreds of people, dressed from head to foot in white cotton dresses or slacks and shirts" were baptized by fire hose on 115th Street between Lenox and Fifth Avenues. "Each August since 1937, the United House of Prayer for All People, a nondenominational Pentecostal church with three million members in 28 states," has used a fire hose to baptize hundreds of people. "Baptism is a faith thing and has nothing to do with the actual water," explained Apostle H....

Source: Star Tribune

On August 7, 2000, the Star Tribune reported that St. Paul Archbishop Harry Flynn is asking "prospective priests to learn enough Spanish so that they can, at a minimum, celebrate the mass in that language... Only 30 of the 233 active priests in the archdiocese are bilingual, and 11 parishes celebrate weekly masses as well as other sacraments, such as marriage, in Spanish." While Hispanics were once believed to be "cradle to grave" Catholics, they are no longer being taken for granted by the American Catholic church. The national...

Source: The New York Times

On August 6, 2000, The New York Times reported that "[n]early 10 years after many educators had written them off for dead, Roman Catholic schools in America are in the midst of an extraordinary revival. Enrollment is up across the nation. Hundreds of new schools have opened. And more than 40 percent of all Catholic elementary and secondary schools have waiting lists for admission...More remarkably, Catholic schools, once staffed primarily by nuns, priests and brothers from various religious orders, are nearly devoid of clerics...

Source: The Times-Picayune

On August 6, 2000, The Times-Picayune reported that George W. Bush's religious views "could have an impact on all Americans if he is elected come November...For Bush, faith and politics are intertwined, and favorite phrases like "armies of compassion" are rooted in a Christian lexicon that comes easily to a man who talks more openly and fervently about his Christian faith than any other presidential nominee since Jimmy Carter...This "compassionate conservatism" that Bush repeats like a mantra is a catch-all phrase that is as much...

Source: The Washington Post

On August 5, 2000, The Washington Post published an article entitled, "GOP Reaches Out to Catholics; At Convention, Party's Drive for Diversity Includes Religion." It reported that Roman Catholic Cardinal Anthony Bevilacqua of the Archdiocese of Philadelphia closed the GOP convention with a final prayer. "In the same way Republicans spent four days showing they could be politically inclusive and diverse, GOP leaders showed religious diversity in selecting a cardinal for the closing prayer...On Sunday, before the convention...

Source: Los Angeles Times

On August 4, 2000, the Los Angeles Times reported that George W. Bush is all but certain to win the evangelical vote back that the GOP lost in 1996. While Bill Clinton won 37% of the evangelical vote four years ago, Bush is "using his own religious experience and the language of evangelicals to energize conservative Christian activists as well as to win the ear of more moderate evangelicals and open the door to African American evangelicals...In a survey of 4,000 Americans taken earlier this year by the Bliss Institute, Bush won...

Source: Los Angeles Times

On August 2, 2000, the Los Angeles Times reported that "A short pilgrimage through the downtown area honoring the Catholic and Latino icon Our Lady of Guadalupe will begin at 5 a.m. Sunday...Hundreds of people are expected to walk with an image of Our Lady of Guadalupe, singing traditional mananitas, or "morning" songs, to celebrate one of the most important figures in modern Catholicism. Bishop Jaime Soto of the Diocese of Orange said Our Lady of Guadalupe is an appropriate symbol of the ethnic diversity of Catholics in the area...

Source: The Houston Chronicle

On July 31, 2000, The Houston Chronicle reported that an influential Houston black pastor, Rev. Kirbyjon Caldwell, was recently asked to make what is "among the most high-profile appearances on the [Republican] convention podium: introducing Texas Gov. George W. Bush to accept the GOP presidential nomination Thursday night. 'When they called back and said the governor wanted me to introduce him the night he accepts the nomination, I almost dropped the phone,' Caldwell said. 'In fact, I did.'" While Caldwell has what he...

Source: The Detroit News

On July 31, 2000, The Detroit News published an article entitled "Religious Calling May Come Online; Fewer Monks and Nuns Results in Bold Recruitment."

Source: St. Louis Post-Dispatch

On July 30, 2000, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported that, "Women can become ordained ministers of the Church of God under a provision the governing body of the Pentecostal denomination adopted Saturday at the Trans World Dome...The change in church laws was approved by a show of hands of the majority of the 20,000 members" who recently attended the 68th General Assembly in St. Louis. "The general council of 3,000 ordained ministers had forwarded the measure, said Mary Ruth Stone, church spokeswoman. General Assembly...

Source: The Houston Chronicle

On July 29, 2000, The Houston Chronicle reported that, "When a Mormon enters the temple, his faith's most sacred space, he is taught that he leaves the world behind and comes as close to God as is possible in this life. So the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, the Mormon church's formal name, builds its temples according to the strictest standards. As the church prepares for the opening next month of the world's 96th Mormon temple - the Houston Texas Temple in Spring - the final touches are being made to an edifice...

Source: Star Tribune

On July 29, 2000, the Star Tribune published an article entitled "Christianity's Ancient Face; By Honoring and Preserving the Oldest and Most Mystical Elements of the Faith, Orthodox Christianity is Finding Converts Among People who Rebel Against Modern Trends that Seem Too Fluid." Allison Blomberg, grew up Lutheran and later attended an Evangelical Covenant church. Later, Blomberg was introduced to Orthodox Christianity, and found it was just what she had been looking for. "I wanted to find a church that stood the test of time,...

Source: Los Angeles Times

On July 28, 2000, the Los Angeles Times reported that a replica of El Salvador's "sacred image of Jesus Christ, Divine Savior of the World," the country's patron saint, arrived in Los Angeles. The original statue "resides in the Catholic cathedral of San Salvador and serves as a source of nationalism and religious devotion for Salvadorans." The 10-day journey of the statue ended when it arrived at its new home, the Dolores Mission Roman Catholic Church in Boyle Heights. "In El Salvador, this is one of our most important...