Heading into the final week of August 2005, the Rev. Louis Adams had a verse from Nehemiah much in mind. In the passage, the prophet described Jerusalem in ruins, its gates burned by invaders. Then he declared, “Come, let us build up the wall of Jerusalem, that we be no more a reproach.” Mr. Adams and his congregants in the Holy Ground Baptist Church here had spent three years and $125,000 buying and rebuilding a dilapidated church in the Lower Ninth Ward. Once their labors were done, they would no longer have to worship as weekend tenants of the Care Bear Daycare Center. They would no longer be sojourners.

The pews, the altar, the baptismal pool were already installed in their new home. The kitchen and the social hall were complete. All that was left was to lay the cedar planks of the floor, then tack down the carpet. On the third Sunday of September, Holy Ground’s members would march into a sanctuary of their own.

Before then, of course, Hurricane Katrina struck and Holy Ground sat deep in floodwater. A house across the street, which had been swept off its foundation, had smashed into one corner of the church.

And so began a story of destruction and dispossession, of natural disaster and human failure, that has yet to end, even as the third anniversary of the disaster approaches.

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A LEADING Georgian churchman this week described the situation in his country as “appalling”, despite some signs of a Russian withdrawal.

Archbishop Malkhaz Songula­shvili, of the Georgian Evangelical Baptist Church returned to Georgia on Sunday to reports of looting and rape by Russian troops.

He said that the Georgian people feel “humiliated and devastated” by the situation, and he believed many displaced people could die if they did not receive food and shelter before winter.

“I cannot believe what I am seeing on TV footage: Russian soldiers are plundering villages and taking truck­loads of goods, even people’s clothes. They’re taking everything, and there are reports of rape, and people being kidnapped for ransom, by South Ossetians backed by Russian troops.”

The Archbishop estimates that about 60,000 people have fled to the capital Tbilisi, where they are being housed in hospitals and schools, often with little medical or food supplies.

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The first Indaba followed on from the Bible Study which today consisted of only five of us, a Bishop from Connecticut, North America, who is our facilitator, and three Indian bishops. It was a good experience, in which I was encouraged to participate fully. It was humbling to hear the answer to the question – set in the context of the story of Jesus walking on the water and saying to the disciples in the boat, ”˜I am, do not be afraid’ ”“ what are the things that bring fear to Christians in your own context? ”˜Waiting for the church to be burnt for the third time’, ”˜Waiting for an excuse to be attacked.’ And not just for being a minority religion, but for being linked to the West. For these brothers from India expressing faith in ”˜I am’ rather than living in fear was inspiring.

And the Indaba group? Well, so far, it’s what it said on the packing. We set some ground rules and then in quietness answered three questions. We then moved into two conversations in different pairs and then formed a group of five in which we explored in more detail the question, ”˜Who am I as an Anglican bishop?’ At this point I might have felt left out, but not only was I was fully included but the group immediately offered to ordain me to the episcopacy there and then, and were already improvising for a bishop’s staff and Episcopal ring! Of course I resisted. What followed was not significantly different to the conversation I might have with my Team Leader colleagues, or indeed all Regional Ministers.

We then took our one sentence back and with the other small groups within the larger group, shared findings noting points of convergence and divergence.

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Watch it all–very encouraging.

The Sudan Interior Church North and Sudan Interior Church South have reunited to form one convention.

First constituted in 1963, the Sudan Interior Church (SIC) divided during the Second Sudanese Civil War from 1983 to 2005, during which more than two million people died and an estimated four million Sudanese were displaced.

Baptist congregations were founded in several Sudanese refugee camps in Ethiopia and Kenya. “The scattering of the church necessitated the development of a second administrative center based in Nairobi, Kenya.” said Elijah Brown, who has studied the state of the church in Sudan, and who is a member of the Baptist World Alliance Commission on Freedom and Justice. “The installation of SIC-South was a pragmatic attempt to minister to a dispersed church divided by warring factions.”

Brown said SIC “leaders insist that the church itself was not split, but administratively rearranged for a limited timeframe to further effective ministry.”

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Perhaps the only thing worse than Al Gore’s tedious 90-minute slide presentation on global warming is the same presentation interspersed with slides quoting from Scripture. But that’s just what the audience of 2,500 at the Celebration of a New Baptist Covenant paid $35 a head to see on Jan. 31.

Mr. Gore, a featured speaker at the gathering here, was introduced as a “prophet.” Like all prophets, he “is not welcome in his hometown,” at least according to Robert Parham, executive director of the Baptist Center of Ethics in Nashville. Mr. Parham noted with disappointment that the people of that city failed to “recognize” Mr. Gore’s recent Nobel Prize victory. Talk about a cross to bear.

Mr. Gore’s presentation was officially closed to the media, because, according to a Covenant spokesman, the former vice president didn’t want the slides of those Bible passages “getting out on the Internet.” What would his friends in the secular blogosphere think about the fact that he said “In the beginning, God created Heaven and earth” as a picture of our planet from space was displayed? Or that he used the story of Noah to explain why we should work to save more endangered species?

But in Atlanta, Mr. Gore was preaching to the converted. Welcome to what might have been the largest gathering yet of the so-called religious left. A self-described “informal alliance of more than 30 racially, geographically, and theologically diverse Baptist organizations,” the three-day celebration demonstrated how difficult it will be for religious liberals to unite, let alone get under the same tent with secular liberals and become a political force.

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Religion and Hollywood normally don’t sound like mix well — but a Baptist church in Shreveport hopes it will be a good fit.

And Summer Grove Baptist — which built its sanctuary out of an old shopping mall — doesn’t always go by the book.

The church is thinking about selling part of its property to a new film institute and studio. They would exist side-by-side — with the film studio making “family friendly” films with a Christian message.

The congregation votes on the idea next Sunday.

Summer Grove, which moved into the old South Park Mall three years ago, is considering a proposal by the Louisiana Film Institute and Fountain Bridge Studios to buy part of the mall. It’s talking about paying the church approximately $2 million a year over 30 years.

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After the fourth death in a week, Keith Troy decided enough was enough.

Midway through Sunday services on Nov. 25, he looked out at his congregation and made an announcement.

Would all the men please rise.

Would the deacons and associate ministers please assemble in the aisles with paper and pencil.

Would every man write down his name and a phone number where he could be reached.

Too many church men were dying of preventable illnesses related to poor health, Troy told the stunned congregation at New Salem Missionary Baptist Church, a predominantly black church of about 4,500 members, including about 900 men.

So their pastor of 24 years issued a simple order: every man in the congregation will see a doctor in the next three months. If they can’t afford it, the church will help pay. If transportation is a problem, someone from the church will drive them.

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When he climbed out of the car at Fort Robinson that morning in June 1972, Mike Huckabee found himself surrounded by 1,200 other high school juniors, each a leader in his Arkansas home town, each primed for an election. Several were carrying posters touting their platforms. Others were handing out cards.

Then as now, Huckabee didn’t have the campaign apparatus of his peers. The 16-year-old arrived at Boys State, a prestigious and civic-minded youth camp run by the American Legion, from the small southwest Arkansas town of Hope with nothing but a suitcase and a gift for oratory.

By week’s end he was its brightest star, elected governor in a landslide. He left Boys State with a network of high-achieving new friends who were eager to hitch their futures to his. And he’d soon have a letter from Gov. Dale Bumpers encouraging him to consider a career in public service.

It was a heady triumph for a teenager who already harbored big ambitions. But it wasn’t enough — not yet — to lure him from his chosen path: preaching the word of God.

Three days after Boys State, Huckabee and two buddies from Hope piled into a car and headed to the Cotton Bowl in Dallas, where they joined 80,000 other teenagers at Explo ’72, the first worldwide gathering of evangelical youth. Time magazine dubbed it “the Jesus Woodstock.” There, Huckabee spent six days learning from the Rev. Billy Graham and Bill Bright, founder of Campus Crusade for Christ, how to lead others to the Lord.

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In August 1980, as the conservative Christian movement was first transforming American politics, Ronald Reagan stood before a Dallas stadium full of 15,000 foot-stomping, hand-clapping evangelicals and pledged his fealty to the Bible. “All the complex and horrendous questions confronting us at home and worldwide have their answer in that single book,” said Mr. Reagan, the Republican presidential nominee.

Assisting with logistics for the event was a young seminary dropout named Mike Huckabee. “It was the genesis for the whole movement,” Mr. Huckabee recalled of those early days.

Now Mr. Huckabee is running for the 2008 Republican presidential nomination, his campaign shaped by his two decades as an evangelical pastor and broadcaster. While he says he is running based on his career in the Arkansas governor’s mansion, not the pulpit, he has grounded his views on issues like abortion and immigration in Scripture, rallied members of the clergy for support, benefited from the anti-Mormon sentiment dogging a political rival and relied on the down-to-earth style he honed in the pulpit to help catapult him in the polls.

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In 2005, a Republican state senator named Jim Holt introduced a bill to deny public benefits to Arkansas’ soaring population of illegal immigrants. Holt, a Southern Baptist minister, figured it was a rock-solid conservative idea — a matter, he said, “of right and wrong.”

Arkansas’ governor at the time was also a professed conservative, and also a Southern Baptist minister. But Mike Huckabee had only scorn for his fellow Republican’s proposal.

Huckabee called the bill “race-baiting” and “demagoguery,” and argued that the denial of health services could harm innocent children. The bill, Huckabee said, did not conform with his take on Christian values.

“I drink a different kind of Jesus juice,” Huckabee said.

Today, Huckabee is seeking the Republican nomination for president, and voters nationwide are getting to know a different kind of candidate: He is the Southern preacher who favors droll wit over brimstone sermonizing, a rock ‘n’ roll bass player who believes in creationism, with an Oprah-ready story about a 110-pound weight loss that probably saved his life.

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The more telling SBC statistic is baptisms, which have been declining. And the SBC annual meeting, held in June in San Antonio, drew the same kind of relatively small, definitely graying crowd that the more moderate BGCT drew in Amarillo.

One problem struggling denominations have in common is infighting. Whether it’s over gay clergy (United Methodists, Presbyterians, Episcopalians, Lutherans), or biblical inerrancy and women in the pulpit (Baptists), it’s still fighting.

Fighting ”” especially when it seems to be as much about power as principle ”” is lousy advertising.

Another shared problem is competition from the many independent churches that have sprung up, unencumbered by denominational requirements or politics, and often offering stirring worship and relevant programming for young families.

Baptists, with their loose organizational structure, face the added problem of post-denominationalism within the ranks.

Many Baptist churches have dropped “Baptist” from their name, seeing it as a turnoff to potential members. And some bigger churches are doing for themselves what Baptist churches have traditionally done together through state conventions and the denomination

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Westboro Baptist Church, the Topeka, Kan., congregation recently slapped with a multimillion-dollar judgment by a Baltimore jury for picketing the 2006 funeral of Marine Lance Cpl. Matthew Snyder, has been disavowed by leading Baptists around the country.

Although the 75-member church led by the Rev. Fred Phelps uses the name “Baptist,” it is an independent congregation not affiliated with any known Baptist convention or association.

“It’s a little bit frustrating,” said a ministry official at First Baptist Church of Topeka, who asked that his name not be used.

“People want to know why Baptists allow it,” the First Baptist official said. “Every church is locally autonomous, and anybody can call themselves ‘Baptist’ if they want to.”

Speaking of the Westboro congregation, he said, “Their views don’t reflect anything at all of our church.”

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