The final USA Today/Gallup measure of Americans’ voting intentions for Congress shows Republicans continuing to hold a substantial lead over Democrats among likely voters, a lead large enough to suggest that regardless of turnout, the Republicans will win more than the 40 seats needed to give them the majority in the U.S. House.

The results are from Gallup’s Oct. 28-31 survey of 1,539 likely voters. It finds 52% to 55% of likely voters preferring the Republican candidate and 40% to 42% for the Democratic candidate on the national generic ballot — depending on turnout assumptions. Gallup’s analysis of several indicators of voter turnout from the weekend poll suggests turnout will be slightly higher than in recent years, at 45%. This would give the Republicans a 55% to 40% lead on the generic ballot, with 5% undecided.

Read it all. We shall see–it is not over until it is over.

O Almighty God, who hast knit together thine elect in one communion and fellowship, in the mystical body of thy Son Christ our Lord: Grant us grace so to follow thy blessed saints in all virtuous and godly living, that we may come to those indescribable joys which thou hast prepared for those who truly love thee: through the same Jesus Christ our Lord, who with thee and the Holy Spirit liveth and reigneth, one God, in glory everlasting.

[After one gospel gathering]… a single Chinese man remained behind, right at the back of the room. When we went to him,”¦he said, “I am a murderer, an adulterer, and I have broken all the laws of God and man again and again. I am also a confirmed opium smoker. He cannot save me.” We laid before him the wonders of Jesus and His gospel and His power. The man meant business, and was soundly converted. He said, “I must go to the town where I have done all this evil and sin, and in that very place tell the good tidings.” He did. He”¦was brought before the [magistrate], and was ordered 2,000 strokes with the bamboo, till his back was one mass of red jelly, and he was thought to be dead. He was”¦taken to the hospital and nursed by Christian hands, till he was, at last, able to sit up. He then said, “I must go back again to my own city, and preach this gospel.” We strongly dissuaded him, but a short time after he”¦started preaching in the same place. Once more he was brought before the court. They were ashamed to give him the bamboo again, so sent him to prison. But the prison [cell] had small open windows and holes in the wall. Crowds collected, and he preached out of the windows and holes till, finding he did more preaching inside the prison than out”¦they set him free”¦.Such men are worth saving.

–C.T. Studd (1860-1931)

Be gracious to me, O God, for men trample upon me; all day long foeman oppress me; my enemies trample upon me all day long, for many fight against me proudly. When I am afraid, I put my trust in thee. In God, whose word I praise, in God I trust without a fear. What can flesh do to me?

–Psalm 56:1-4

During the Third Reich, Germany’s foreign ministry staff across Europe cooperated in the mass murder of Jews and others, according to a government-sponsored study released Thursday in Berlin.

The report says German diplomats during the Nazi era were far more deeply involved in the Holocaust than previously acknowledged. It also shows how West German diplomats after the war worked to whitewash history and create a myth of resistance and opposition to Nazi rule.

The report is a devastating indictment of Germany’s war-era diplomatic corps, that long cast itself as relatively “clean” of Nazi war crimes and tried to portray any wrongdoing as the result of a few bad actors.

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The rector and most of the members of the former St. Bartholomew’s Episcopal Parish in the Town of Tonawanda, once the diocese’s largest congregation, broke from the diocese in 2008 and now refer to themselves as St. Bartholomew’s Anglican Church.

But Jefferts Schori insisted the Episcopal Church isn’t about numbers but about being a prophetic voice.

“The Episcopal Church has never been large in this country. It’s always been a leader; it’s always included a number of leaders in the wider community,” she said. “Part of that has been our willingness to engage the human condition. We think that’s very important. We’re going to stay engaged in the community, even when it’s messy.”

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It takes an effort these days to recall the thrill that surged through the world when Barack Obama was elected America’s president. It was not only that he was the first black person to assume the globe’s greatest office. He seemed to be preternaturally thoughtful, dignified and decent; a man who could heal America’s wounds at home and restore its reputation abroad. Though too many were swept away in a collective longing to see hope triumph over experience, none of it seemed wholly unreasonable at the time. Yes, many thought, he can.

Two years later, the magnitude of the let-down is palpable everywhere; and at home the president is caught in a vice. To many on the left, he is a cowardly compromiser, whose half-baked plans to get America back to work have done little to help those who voted for him, and whose health-care and financial reforms were gutted at the behest of special interests. To many on the right, he seems a doctrinaire spendthrift who has squandered trillions of dollars on wasteful bureaucracy, mortgaging the future while failing to grapple with the present. To centrists who backed him, including this newspaper, he has been a disappointment, his skills as a president falling far short of his genius as a campaigner.

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Two years after America voted overwhelmingly for change, polls, analysts and an angry election season suggest its voters are about to do so again.

Amid universal expectations of big Republican gains in Congress, Tuesday’s balloting is also likely to tip the scales of power in states across the country, and with them, partisan prospects for the elections of 2012 and the balance of the century’s second decade.

In Pennsylvania, the high-profile, high-spending races for governor and senator have been unavoidable to anyone with a television or radio. Both are at the top of the national parties’ priorities. But in an election in which the GOP needs 39 seats to wrest the speaker’s gavel from Nancy Pelosi, a spotlight has also cast Pennsylvania’s U.S. House contests in sharp relief. In a chamber in which 90 percent of incumbents typically win re-election, nearly half of Pennsylvania’s seats feature competitive contests.

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Radical trust is what it means to be a Christian of the Lutheran flavor even though Lutherans, like everyone else would prefer a cross the t and dot the i system where God had to play by rules we understand and ultimately control. But to trust that God loves with no strings attached, no down payment required, because God’s very nature is love means God’s love is truly free.

–Lutheran Phil Heinze on the Living the Lectionary blog; a very appropriate thought for Reformation Sunday

As the country grapples with its worst economic downturn in decades and persistent unemployment, voters in Oklahoma next week will take up another issue ”” whether they should pass a constitutional amendment outlawing Sharia, or Islamic law.

Supporters of the initiative acknowledge that they do not know of a single case of Sharia being used in Oklahoma, which has only 15,000 Muslims.

“Oklahoma does not have that problem yet,” said Republican state Rep. Rex Duncan, the author of the ballot measure, who says supporters in more than a dozen states are ready to place similar initiatives before voters in 2012. “But why wait until it’s in the courts?”

Some conservative activists contend that the U.S. is at risk of falling under Sharia law. They point to Europe, with its larger Muslim population and various accommodations to the Islamic religious law.

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