The head of an Alzheimer’s organization said recently that comments by televangelist Pat Robertson, referring to Alzheimer’s as a type of “death” that may justify divorce, highlights the need for more public education about the ailment.

Eric J. Hall, founder and head of the Alzheimer’s Foundation of America, said the comments Robertson made on the 700 Club only illustrate the need to erase the stigma of Alzheimer’s by helping people to perceive how the brain disorder affects afflicted individuals and their families.

Robertson’s comments infuriated Christians, including leaders and members of the Evangelical community. One comment to a blog in Christianity Today said Robertson gave “horrible advice.” Another comment said the advice was “wretched,” and a third said it was “irresponsible, callous.”

Hall said, “There is no doubt that this heartbreaking disease robs people of their memories and other intellectual functions, but to liken Alzheimer’s disease to, as Mr. Robertson said, ‘a kind of death’ fosters an insensitivity that feeds misperceptions about the disease. It fails to take into account that people with Alzheimer’s disease, although impaired, deserve optimal care and dignity. Love and compassion are the greatest gifts for every human being until their very last breath.”

Robertson made the comment when a caller to the 700 Club told of a friend whose wife has advanced Alzheimer’s, and who had been dating other women. The friend justified his action by saying that his wife, as he knew her, “is gone.”

Robertson replied, “That is a terribly hard thing. I hate Alzheimer’s. It is one of the most awful things because here is a loved one—this is the woman or man that you have loved for 20, 30, 40 years. And suddenly that person is gone. They’re gone. They are gone. So, what he says basically is correct. But I know it sounds cruel, but if he’s going to do something he should divorce her and start all over again. But to make sure she has custodial care and somebody looking after her.”

Overwhelming loneliness

Michael Verde, founder and head of Memory Bridge (which helps Alzheimer’s patients to connect with communities), disagreed with Robertson, and said it would be damaging to leave a spouse who is afflicted with the disease.

Verde, an evangelical Christian, said victims experience loneliness which can be overwhelming. He told The Chicago Tribune, “Ask Pat Robertson: ‘Is there ever a condition in which God would rightfully divorce us?’ The answer is no.”

Robertson McQuilkin, former president of Columbia Bible College and Seminary, left his job of 22 years to care for his wife who was afflicted with Alzheimer’s for 25 years until she died in 2003.

McQuilkin, in a 2004 interview with Christianity Today said he never regretted caring for his wife. “Some people sort of resent the imposition, but those thoughts never came to me. I thought it was a privilege to care for her. She had always cared for me.”

Never an ‘accident’ in marriage

Evangelical speaker Joni Eareckson Tada, founder of Joni and Friends International Disability Center, said on her website, “When a Christian leader views marriage on a sliding scale, what does this say to the millions of couples who must deal daily with catastrophic injuries and illnesses?”

Tada added, “Alzheimer’s disease is never an ‘accident’ in a marriage; it falls under the purview of God’s sovereignty. In the case of someone with Alzheimer’s, this means God’s unconditional and sacrificial love has an opportunity to be even more gloriously displayed in a life together!”

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New churches are booming in New York City today, but they do not cater so much to the unsaved, as to the un-churched, a study said.

The New York City Leadership Center, a nonprofit organization that studies developing Christian ministries, noted that in 1975 only 10 evangelical churches existed in Manhattan. By 2000, four out of every 10 was an Evangelical Christian church, and today there are more than 200.

People going to these churches

Thousands are drawn to these churches on Sundays, catering primarily to Christians who have left their home towns to go to bigger cities like New York, Christianity Today said.

According to the NYCLC website, there are vastly under-churched areas in Greater New York, and millions of people are drawn to the new Evangelical churches to fill their spiritual gaps and rediscover the faith they already have in them. However, there are still many more churches that need to be built to address migration.

David Fitch, associate professor of evangelical theology, Northern Baptist Seminary, agrees with NYCLC. He told Christianity Today that most churches, like the megachurch of Tim Keller, is reaching out to Christians who are pre–churched, but who are new to New York and who need a new place to worship.

Fitch told Christianity Today, “The attractional dynamics that often typif[y] these kinds of church planting depend largely on existing Christianized populations,” he wrote in a blog post in January.”

The changing trend in church goers is unmistakeable. In 2008 sociologist Scott Thumma of Hartford Seminary studied 400 megachurches and asked where their members came from. One out of five said they had either been un-churched for a long time, or had dropped out of church for several years then came back, Christianity Today said.

Keller, in a comment that he put in Thumma’s blog, noted that the first attendees in his church were indeed largely un-churched people, because there were so few evangelicals in Manhattan at that time (1980s).

Things changed in the 1990s and Keller said, “for every one New Yorker/secular person who came to Christ, we saw 2-3 others join who were coming from other churches. Without that, we would be a quarter to a third the size we are now,” Christianity Today reported.

Churches today in New York start and grow simply by bringing in Christians who are looking for a place where they can worship, rather than by evangelizing. Thumma told Christianity Today, “[A]lmost no one going to megachurches is truly from the ranks of the unsaved, or entirely unchurched.”

Intensify faith

This new trend does not mean that evangelical churches have a diminished purpose nor can it imply that the churches do not exert effort in ministering to unbelievers, Christianity today said.

By drawing in people who are already Christians, there is often the experience of having an intensified faith, a greater love of God. There is a feeling of conversion and a decision made, oftentimes, to become more serious in one’s faith.

Thumma, a co-author of The Other 80 Percent: Turning Your Church’s Spectators into Active Participants, sees this as a good thing and a good purpose for both older churches and newly-planted churches, Christianity Today said.

NYCLC views this as an opportunity to evangelize. Its web site said, “Our research among Christian financial industry leaders in Manhattan indicates that 2/3 of those surveyed are not actively integrating their faith with their vocation. The NYCLC seeks to gather Christ’s followers for fellowship, encouragement and engagement in exercising their faith and influence in every sector of society.”

Social networks

Many people in churches today are marginal, but they can be used by God to reach out to the un-churched, Ed Stetzer, president of LifeWay Research in Nashville told Christianity Today.

Rodney Stark, co-director, Institute for Studies of Religion at Baylor University, says a church needs strong members to grow, as these are the kinds who will invite friends and neighbors to church. He told Christianity Today, “Churches really are social networks.”

The need for leadership training of church members is also noted. NYCLC provides training and resources for ministry leaders who would not have the finances to pay for such training, Christianity Today said.

The circumstance lends room for the opportunity. Reaching the un-churched and empowering them through leadership training to reach non-Christians is an opportunity that is well presented in the current setting of migration.

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Don’t discount Billy Graham just because he is now 92 years old. If anything, the man who has counseled sitting presidents for some 50 years, starting from Truman up to Obama (who visited Graham in his home), still has a lot to say that all of us can benefit from, whether it’s about old age, or citing the most important issues today.

Graham spends most of his time at home, and receives round-the-clock care. His son Franklin Graham, as president and CEO of the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association, is now charged with giving sermons and making public appearances, Christianity Today said.

Billy Graham is having the normal trouble that a 92-year-old man would have with his sight, hearing and overall health. Four years ago his wife, Ruth Bell, died at the age of 87. But son Franklin said his father might preach again on video, although there is as of now no set date, Christianity Today reported.

About aging

The elder Graham did however take time to answer questions from Christianity Today. He acknowledged that being unable to do many things he used to be able to do is not easy, nor is having to depend more on others. At the same time he realizes that physical challenges “will only get worse,” he said.

Graham also said aging is a lonely time with the loss of spouse and friends, and children living independently and having families of their own. “But God has a reason for keeping us here (even if we don’t always understand it), and we need to recover the Bible’s understanding of life and longevity as gifts from God—and therefore as something good,” Graham said.

Noting that the bible often mentions those who died at “a good old age,” Graham told Christianity Today that it’s important to “learn to be content, and that only comes as we accept each day as a gift from God and commit it into his hands. Paul’s words are true at every stage of life, but especially as we grow older: ‘Godliness with contentment is great gain’ ” (1 Tim. 6:6).

Children of aging parents

To children of aging parents, Graham says one should be prepared for this stage of one’s parent’s life and accept it, along with the new responsibilities that go with it. He said the changes will call for patience and sometimes children will have to take charge for the safety of the aging parent, Christianity Today said.

“They [elderly parents] may resist, and you need to put yourself in their shoes and realize the turmoil these changes can cause them. But they need to realize that you’re doing it because you love them and want what’s best for them,” Graham told Christianity Today.

Graham also said children should pray for the aging parent, “that they will experience God’s peace and comfort as they grow older,” Christianity Today reported.

Most important issue today

Billy Graham has had an insightful experience into politics, having counseled so many sitting presidents, but he said if he had it to do over again, he would have kept away from politics, according to Christianity Today.

Instead, he says the most important issue today is not economic, social or political, but rather moral and spiritual. He told Christianity Today, “Our calling is to declare Christ’s forgiveness and hope and transforming power to a world that does not know him or follow him. May we never forget this.”

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The gypsy people are being viewed as fertile ground for ministry, with potential to make great strides in spreading Christianity in Europe.

Gypsies are largely populated in Romania and Bulgaria. However in their own countries they face harsh discrimination that has lasted through centuries, causing many of them to migrate to other countries in Europe, Christianity Today said.

But in other European countries things are no better. Recently, France evicted thousands of gypsies and sent them back to imminent poverty in their own land. In Romania, many gypsies have no birth certificates and no marriage licenses, CBN News said.

Beni Lup, an attorney and regional director of Walk Thru the Bible Ministries told Christianity Today that the emerging vastness of Christian witness among the gypsy population, however, can be a significant source of change in a continent that had long rejected them.

The fact that they are mobile also poses possibilities for Christian gypsies to evangelize wherever they are. Lup said, “I think the Romani witness that is emerging—as it gets written down [and] people understand what is going on—[will be seen as] a moment in world religion,” Christianity Today reported.

Europeans have long viewed gypsies as thieves and deceivers, Lup said. Many gypsies as they turn to Jesus become hopeful that their testimony will affect others, even as their own lives change, according to Christianity Today.

No upward mobility in Romania

Kevin Hoy, founder of The Smile Foundation, has worked in Romania for a decade. He said the ethnic group has no chance of upward mobility even after living in their country for up to 20 years, CBN News reported.

Some 500 gypsies for example live in the village of Salard, one of Romania’s poorest neighborhoods where homes are made of mud bricks that crumble easily. Hoy attributes their situation to prejudice just as much as lack of education opportunities, CBN News said.

And yet such seeming hopelessness has led many gypsies to turn to Jesus. In 2009 the “Toflea miracle” occurred, where 500 gypsies—the largest baptism in Romanian history—took place, CBN News said.

The following year hundreds more from the village turned to Christ, CBN News said.

Hoy’s first project in Romania was in Tileagd village where he helped to set up a school, a neighborhood store and a church where many gypsies received Jesus, CBN News said.

Preaching without words

Hoy says in Romania the gospel is best shared without talking. He told CBN News, “In an educated society preaching the word is fundamental. But many of the people we are dealing with here are uneducated. We could talk to them all day long and they would not be able to grasp what we are trying to say. Practical evidence of God’s love is what the people need.”

Gypsies are usually Orthodox or Catholic, depending on which country they are born in. However, they don’t practice their faith. Pentecostals and evangelicals are making great inroads as a result, Christianity Today said.

Thomas Acton of the University of Greenwich in the U.K. specializes in Romani studies. He told Christianity Today that gypsies have “nativized” the gospel. “It’s not a foreign ideology; it’s the gospel that has taken on Romani colors. When you hear [a] Romani translation of the Bible, it sounds like it was written yesterday.”

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A Christian author said recently that most young adults leave the Christian faith because of experiences they had inside the church, rather than any lures from the outside world.

Drew Dyck, author of the book Generation Ex-Christian: Why Young Adults Are Leaving the Faith….and How to Bring Them Back, said that although those he interviewed often cited intellectual doubts, further probing revealed underlying reasons related to unpleasant experiences they had inside their church, Advance Internet said.

Dyck, who is an editor of Christianity Today online said, “Deconversions were precipitated by what happened inside rather than outside the church. In other words, it was more push than pull,” AI reported.

In the book, published by Moody Publishers, Dyck cites one woman who blamed intellectual doubts for her deconversion. Further probing however revealed that she left the church after she felt ostracized and betrayed by it. Dyck said, “More often the head follows the heart,” according to AI.

Jump in numbers

Equally alarming is the jump in the number of young adults who leave. The 2009 American Religious Identification Survey said 22 percent of those aged 18-29 claimed to have no religion—an 11 percent increase from 1990. Most of them came from religious homes, AI said.

Larger rates are cited by political scientists Robert Putnam and David Campbell who said, “young Americans are dropping out of religion at an alarming rate of five to six times the historic rate (30 percent to 40 percent have no religion today, versus 5 percent to 10 percent a generation ago),” AI reported.

Categories of leavers

Dyck categorized those who leave according to their reasons for leaving. They are the postmodern leavers (who reject the church’s moral absolutes as too confining), recoilers (abused by a spiritual authority), modernists (wiccans, earth worshipers), spiritual rebels (value autonomy, want to behave in ways that conflict with their faith), and drifters ( gradually lose value for God), the AI said.

Dyck said the factors that lead people to stray are the same factors that keep them from going back. He also cites pluralism in post-Christian America as a factor that hinders former Christians from returning to the faith, AI reported.

He told AI that churches need to emphasize more on discipleship and catechism; and parents need to show more passion in their faith. A plus factor, he said, is the rise of global Christianity in South America, China and Africa.

The downward trend of Christianity in Europe and the U.S. is regrettable, he says, noting, “If this decline continues, the future could look very different.” However, he also cites the providential element to AI.

“Two thousand years ago Jesus promised to build his church. Not even the gates of hell, he promised, would be able to stand against it. Two thousand years later nearly a third of humanity claims to follow the Carpenter from Nazareth. More than any studies or statistics, I place my faith in him,” Dyck told AI.

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Christians are not expecting any improvement in their human rights in North Korea with any change in leadership, the head of a church coalition said recently.

Sam Kim, executive director of the Korean Church Coalition for North Korea Freedom said a transference of leadership from Kim Jong-il to his son Kim Jong-Eun may even, in the short term, auger worse persecution of Christians, Christianity Today said.

Kim told Christianity Today that although Jong-Eun was educated in Switzerland and may have some western influence, he still lacks the respect of North Korea’s communist party leaders, Christianity Today said.

It is more likely that Jong-Eun will be a figurehead and the true leader will be his ruthless uncle, Chan Sung Taek, Kim told Christianity Today. “In the short run, the succession can be viewed as a bad thing for Christians in North Korea. Borders are likely to be tightened, the activities of the few scattered aid workers will likely be more closely monitored, and many may even be expelled,” Kim said.

Last Monday, Jong-Eun, 27, was appointed four-star general. The following day, he was made vice chairman of the Workers Party of Korea’s central military commission, despite having no experience in leadership and the military, Christianity Today reported.

Many other Christian leaders are calling for Christians globally to pray for North Korean believers. Andy Dipper, CEO of Release International, urged the faithful to pray and express solidarity with N. Korea Christians, Christian Today reported.

Dipper said Release will hold a conference on Nov. 6 for persecuted Christians globally. One of their speakers will be a North Korean Christian defector who will talk about the difficulties of Christians in the North, according to Christian Today.

Dipper told Christian Today, “The eyes of the world are currently on North Korea – one of the world’s worst abusers of religious freedom. Up to three generations of Christian families are rounded up and thrown in prison camps to try to eliminate the faith.”

A 2009 U.S. State Department report estimated that some 150,000 to 200,000 political and religious prisoners are in North Korea. A 2010 U.S. Commission on International Freedom report that said some 40,000 religious inmates are treated worse than other prisoners, Christianity Today said.

Open Doors ranked North Korea No. 1 in its World Watch List of the worst persecutors of Christians. (For details, go to http://theundergroundsite.com/index.php/2010/09/north-korea-ranks-no-1-for-deadliest-persecution-of-christians-13638).

Open Doors USA president Carl Moeller said, “We need to continue to not only pray, but also advocate for those brave Christians who live under brutal and nightmarish conditions with no basic freedoms,” Christianity Today reported.

In Boston, Freedom & Life for All North Koreans organized a prayer vigil and conference. The group was cofounded by Robert Park, an American who was imprisoned for 43 days in North Korea, and Jo Sung-rae, head of Pax Koreana, a leading Christian website in South Korea, The Boston Globe reported.

Sung-rae told The Boston Globe, “Our end goal is not just reunification, but the right to worship God in public. Since they (N. Korea government) recognize how powerful the gospel is, they’ve been trying to create fissures in the Christian groups.’’

Nonetheless Sung-rae expressed hopefulness in the knowledge that South Koreans, North Koreans, defectors and Americans can come together for this cause, The Boston Globe said.

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Millions of students all across the nation and from many other countries gathered together last Wednesday for the 21^st celebration of See You At The Pole under this year’s theme, “Be still, and know that I am God.”

See You At The Pole is an annual tradition every September, where students from 20 countries, and throughout the U.S., congregate at their schools’ flagpoles to pray for their families, friends, schools, classmates, neighborhoods and countries; and to seek God’s guidance, healing and protection, Christianity Today reported.

Since its inception, a number of other nations have launched their own SYATP movements including Australia (which celebrated it on May 20), Korea, Japan, Turkey, the Ivory Coast and Canada (which followed the same date as the U.S.), according to their website.

SYATP was initiated by students in Ft. Worth, Texas in a suburb called Burleson in 1990. That year, on Sept. 12 over 45,000 teenagers in four states met at their school flagpoles to pray before the start of school, Seacoastonline said.

The intent was to ask God to bring a spiritual and moral awakening to schools and countries. Paul Fleischmann, president of the San Diego-based National Network of Youth Ministries, which coordinates with SYATP said, “Every year, it offers a fresh challenge for [students] to minister to their friends,” the website reported.

Every school determines how they will celebrate prayer on SYATP. Some sing, others include Scripture, but all pray.

In Jacksonville, Texas, high school student Lauren Eyre told the Jacksonville Daily Progress,Jacksonville Daily Progress “Every year I look forward to the chance to gather with fellow Christians to pray for our school and our country. I am so thankful to have the freedom to be able to join in with other believers on our school campus and simply cry out to God for revival to break out in our school.”

In fact, students took the event (which usually takes place before classes) one step further and spent the whole morning praying renaming it, Saw You At The Pole. Another high school student, Hannah Earle told the Jacksonville Daily Progress, “I just think it’s cool how what one person says or prays can make a difference in so many lives.”

In Florida, a group of students from Winnacunnet High School prayed for their teachers and schoolmates. They prayed for their school “to come together as a community,” and asked for healing and “a general sense of wellness over the school,” Seacoastonline reported.

Other prayer requests were for the WHS Student Council and Class of 2010, that they would provide good leadership for underclassmen and provision of finances for their college studies in the future, Seacoastonline said.

Peter Kimball, a leader of the Fellowship of Christian Athletes told Seacoastonline, “I thought it [SYATP] went really well. There was a lot of participation from the students, and kids really got involved in the prayer.”

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An online move to declare September 20 as “Everybody Pray for Hitchens Day” has come and gone, and Christopher Hitchens, deemed the voice of the atheists, had warned well in advance that he wouldn’t be there, and has overall indicated indifference.

A Facebook page was made for people to commit to pray for the atheist leader, who is stricken with esophageal cancer. Catholic priest Fr. Robert Barron of the Archdiocese of Chicago endorsed it in a CNN essay, as did Fixed Point Foundation head Larry Taunton in a video, Christianity Today said.

But Hitchens, who is now going through chemotherapy treatments, said he will not be there, and he does not believe that prayer will have any affect on his health, healing or death, NPR reported.

The author of “God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything” also said that followers and critics need not expect an epiphany from him, and if there is a deathbed conversion he warned in advance it would likely be delirium, Christianity Today said.

In a recent debate in Alabama, Hitchens also said that the most harmful teaching of Christianity is “The idea of vicarious redemption is a disgusting moral teaching . . . it abandons moral responsibility. Faith is a refuge in cowardice,” Christianity Today reported.

Hitchens’ most recent book, Hitch-22 is his memoir where he says, “I suppose that one reason I have always detested religion is its sly tendency to insinuate the idea that the universe is designed with ‘you’ in mind or, even worse, that there is a divine plan into which one fits whether one knows it or not. That modesty is too arrogant for me,” according to Christianity Today.

Hitchens also speculated that if he did survive his cancer, the “pious faction” may interpret it as answered prayer. “That would somehow be irritating,” NPR reported.

Patrick Archbold, co-founder of Creative Minority Report wrote however in The Washington Post, “I pray that he [Hitchens] will pray. I pray that among all the moments of doubt, he will have a moment of humility, a moment of love. I pray that before the end, he will commit a useless act of love in the eyes of men. For in the eyes of the Father, there is no useless act of love.”

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In 2003 Don Miller, then a freelance writer, published his first book, “Blue Like Jazz”—and became an instant celebrity. Now a movie is being made based on his biographical essays.

Blue Like Jazz by Donald Miller

The bestseller has led some to dub Miller “The voice of a new generation of evangelicals.” Brian McLaren, who wrote A New Kind of Christian said evangelicals have a “profound starvation for honesty,” and Miller responds to that, CNN said.

Miller co-wrote the screenplay with Taylor and Ben Pearson, the movie’s website says.

It is being directed by Steve Taylor, whose also helmed the  film, The Second Chance, starring Michael W. Smith, Christianity Today said.

Blue Like Jazz, the movie, will not be a  strict representation of the book, but will convey the author’s experience and retain the book’s feel. The story is about a young man from Houston who is raised as a Christian, but begins to feel disillusioned. When he goes to college he tries to become the opposite of everything that he had left behind, Christianity Today says.

It is a common Christian dilemma, but the forthright quality of the author is what spells the difference. In his book Miller talks about his experience as a bed wetting ten year old, adolescent angst, dating, shoplifting, and breaking into homes. As he grew older Miller developed a keen dislike for authority and believed only “the intellectually naive” became Christians, CNN said.

But Miller is equally forthright about his Christianity. A popular speaker in the Christian church and conference circuit, he is still unconventional. When a fan asks what inspired Miller to write the book he says, “I needed to pay the rent,” CNN said.

Miller also created “The Mentoring Project,” for children who are growing up without fathers. CNN said, “The Mentoring Project has attracted so much attention that Miller was asked by the White House to join a presidential task force on fatherhood.”

But the verbal gems are what make Miller inspiring to so many young people. He says, “Some people associate Sunday morning with God. One of the things I associate with God is a sunrise. How many sunrises have you missed over the years, and God created that?” CNN said.

Miller places higher priority on devotion to Jesus than adhering to dogma. His church, Journey IFC (Imperfect Faith Community) is a cozy place where people sit on sofas instead of pews, and where the mission statement is the golden rule, CNN said.

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Next season, the hit TV show Glee will introduce a new character, a Christian, TV Guide says.

Ryan Murphy, the show’s creator said, “We’ve taken a couple jabs at the right wing this year, so what I want to do with this character is have someone who Christian kids and parents can recognize and say, ‘Oh, look—I’m represented there, too!’ If we’re trying to form a world of inclusiveness, we’ve got to include that point of view as well,” TV Guide said.

The character has not been cast yet, but it will be someone who is outspoken and respected. She will be part of New Directions and will object to some sexually suggestive musical numbers, TV Guide said.

Columnist Cathy Grossman of USA Today mentioned misgivings about Murphy’s assumption that a Christian is “right wing.” She writes, “…the overarching theme of the show is everyone’s in the same club — jocks and divas, gays and straights. The new character…opens the possibility that by joining in the show choir — creating normal, friendly respectful relationships with her fellow singers — the branded official Christian will be shown accepting what her elders reject. Statistics show young adults hold more accepting attitudes on race and on homosexuality.”

Christianity Today’s Laura Leonard wrote, “I anxiously await Glee’s interpretation of the American Christian teenager, having been one myself and knowing many who currently choose to identify themselves with Christ in the halls, and playing fields, and choir rooms, of their schools. If she can demonstrate Christ’s love in her relationships with others without giving up the values and beliefs that form her identity, it will be a great success indeed—even if she hangs a Kirk Cameron poster in her locker or greets her fellow Glee Clubbers with a side hug.”

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