News
Poll: Most Americans are Christian M
ore than three-quarters of Americans identify themselves
as Christian, Gallup reports. Poll- sters found that 78 percent of Amer- icans identify with Christianity. Overall, more than 82 percent of
Americans have a religious iden- tity, with this breakdown: • Protestant/other Christian: 52.5 percent. • Roman Catholic: 23.6 percent. • Mormon: 1.9 percent. • Jewish: 1.6 percent. • Muslim: 0.5 percent. • Other non-Christian religion: 2.4 percent. • None/atheist/agnostic: 15
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Ranger’s Lutheran ties Margaret Kritsch Anderson, 34, the park ranger shot in the line of duty in Washington state on Jan. 1, was a member of Bethany Lutheran Church, Spanaway, Wash. Her father, Paul Kritsch, is pastor of Redeemer, a Lutheran Church–Missouri Synod congregation in Westfield, N.J. Kritsch Anderson was shot while try- ing to stop a gunman from entering Mount Rainer National Park. Jayne M. Thompson, an ELCA campus pastor, filed a blog for The Lutheran on Jan. 2 about Kritsch Anderson’s involvement in Lutheran Campus Ministry at Kansas State University in Manhattan (
www.thelutheran.org/ blog). A memorial service for Kritsch Anderson was held Jan. 10 at Pacific Lutheran University, Tacoma, Wash.
Pope challenges Europeans Europe’s economic and financial woes are the consequence of an “ethical crisis” and a “crisis of faith,” resulting in the triumph of selfish- ness over social responsibility, Pope Benedict XVI said in his Christmas message to the Vatican’s central
10 The Lutheran •
www.thelutheran.org
where Eve got the needle and thread to sew the leaves together.”
percent. • No response: 2.5 percent. The findings fit the trend of an
increasing percentage of Ameri- cans who don’t embrace a formal religious identity. In 1951, 1 per- cent of Americans didn’t have a religious identity, compared to 24 percent identifying as Roman Catholic and 68 percent claiming a non-Roman Catholic Christian faith. Earlier in 2011, Gallup found that
92 percent of Americans say they believe in God, which suggests that a lack of religious identity is not necessarily linked to atheism.
administration. Acknowledging that “such values as solidarity, commit- ment to one’s neighbor and respon- sibility toward the poor and suffer- ing are largely uncontroversial,” the pope added that the “motivation is often lacking ... to make sacrifices.”
Cosby finds Bible nuggets
For more than 50 years, comedian Bill Cosby has had audiences roaring at his observations about nuggets from the Bible, such as imagining poor Noah struggling to build his ark with pairs of animals and cubits of wood. At 74, he’s tackled the Bible again. In I Didn’t Ask to Be Born (But I’m Glad I Was) (Center Street, 2011), Cosby devotes a lengthy chapter to what he calls “The Missing Pages” of the story of Adam and Eve. He asks how the couple managed to use leaves to cover themselves: “There have to be some missing pages, because the writers don’t say anything about
Quote Heaven looks a lot like New Jersey.
Singer Jon Bon Jovi, holding a sign in a photo posted on his Facebook page after false reports circulated that he had died.
A tree for Kazakhstan Yuri Novgorodov, bishop of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Kazakhstan, said his planting of a linden tree in the Luther Garden in Wittenberg, Germany, in Decem- ber represents the bond between his church and Mecklenberg, Germany. “The [former] Soviet regime didn’t like the Christians inside the Soviet Union to have any connection with the churches outside,” he explained. “But the Lutherans in Astana (the capital of Kazakhstan) found a help- ing hand from the church in Meck- lenburg. … For me, the planting of this tree is a symbol of our com- ing back into the family of all the Lutheran churches in the world.”
Russia: Church vs. corruption Tens of thousands of citizens and many Russian Orthodox priests dem- onstrated in Moscow in December, protesting alleged election fraud in Russia’s parliamentary elections. Fyodor Lyudogovsky, an instructor at the Moscow Theological Academy and Seminary, said the election was “a very rare model of lies and hypoc- risy” that “Christians should not and cannot tolerate.” Another priest, Aleksei Pluzhnikov, reported groups of priests being told to encourage parishioners to vote for a particular party. The Russian Orthodox Church called for stricter controls over the election process.
Grief in Dadaab
Two peace and security leaders for Lutheran World Federation-run refugee camps in Dadaab, Kenya,
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