While Vacation Bible School (VBS) has been a staple of American Protestant churches for decades, these summer religious education programs are now catching on even among synagogues and mosques. The evangelical digest magazine Current Thoughts & Trends (November) reports that VBS is experiencing a resurgence in popularity including interest from non-Christian groups. Over 20 religious publishers compete […]

Churches across the U.S. are starting marital-arts ministries and also raising questions about the limits of  using secular activities to draw converts and new members. The Wall Street Journal (Oct. 28) reports that the growth of karate and similar martial arts groups in churches has helped bring the unchurched teenagers to Christian services. Such ministries as Kicks for […]

The New Age movement will expand in the future because of its strong holistic health thrust, but the amorphous movement also needs to move toward greater social action to have more impact. Those are two of the forecasts made by New Age veterans in the 25th anniversary issue of New Age magazine (November/December). The magazine asked 25 […]

Among the many developments that have taken place within American Protestantism in the last three decades, the changes in the weekly sermon has often been left unstudied. In the journal Books & Culture (September/October), Cornelius Plantinga, Jr. of Calvin College surveys the field by reviewing twenty leading books by homiletics (or preaching) specialists. This leads him to […]

Amidst the widespread popularity of do-it-yourself, spirituality, the phenomenon of religion in the workplace continues to grow and is now filtering down to workers as well as producing positive results in productivity and job satisfaction. An in-depth article in Business Week (Nov. 1) reports that today’s business leaders are a part of a spiritual revival “sweeping across […]

There has long been animosity between law enforcement officials and members of new religious movements, with each viewing the other as either a threat to religious freedom or to public safety. But that chill may be easing up as law enforcement officials are making new attempts to understand and incorporate scholarly insights regarding unconventional religious […]

Aum Shinrikyo, the apocalyptic group that engaged in a terrorist gas attacks in Japan over four years ago, continues to grow, while facing new ostracism in Japanese society. An issue of Millennial Stew notes that the numbers vary on Aum’s membership. The police report that after being disbanded after the attacks, Aum now has 700 followers living […]

A millennial movement is growing rapidly in Peru, tapping into the nation’s tradition of messianic fervor. Millennial Stew (Summer), the newsletter of  Boston University’s Center for Millennial Studies, reports that the popularity of the 200,000-strong Israelites of the New Covenant stems from  the history of both Christian millennialism and existing messianic ideologies in the Andes. Like several messianic […]

In the 1990s, Mormons have especially incorporated images and styles from the popular media into such mass-produced objects (called kitsch) as clothing, plaques, and toys. In the independent Mormon magazine Sunstone (June), Jana Reiss writes that the tension between popular culture and Mormon values are evident in such projects as rings and T-shirts using a “CTR” slogan […]

The numbers of American-Muslim women wearing scarves have increased dramatically in the past few years, reports New Jersey’s Bergen Record newspaper (July 11). One official of the Kentucky-based International Union of Muslim Women says that “In the last year in particular, the number of inquiries we’ve had from women dealing with the issue of whether to wear […]