“We expected they’d choose the more contemporary options, but they were clearly more drawn to the aesthetics of the Gothic building than the run-of-the-mill, modern church building.”Ed Stetzer, director of LifeWay Research, which found that unchurched people between the ages of 25 and 34 were nearly twice as likely as those over 70 to prefer ornate, Gothic church exteriors. (Source: LifeWay Research)
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“I know you can’t endorse me, but I endorse you.”Sen. Barack Obama, in a meeting with about 30 Christian leaders, repeating Ronald Reagan’s 1980 statement at the National Affairs Briefing. (Source: CBN)
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“There’s over 2,500 verses in the Bible that deal with the issue of helping the poor, the sick, the hungry. God set it up that we are to address this issue and that he works through us. His Plan B? Well, I don’t know what Plan B is. Plan A is the way he set it up.”Tony Hall, former U.S. ambassador for humanitarian issues, on the global food crisis. (Source: Religion and Ethics Newsweekly)
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“We think it means that congregations are a type of organization that has ways to stay alive even when they are very weak.”Mark Chaves, sociologist at Duke University, on whether his published finding that 1 percent of congregations shut their doors each year means churches are more healthy than other organizations. (Source: Religion News Service)
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“Our forefathers and the church are conscientiously opposed to install the sewage method accordingly to the world’s standards.”Andy Swartzentruber and Sam Yoder, Pennsylvania Amish men (of Swartzentruber sect) who are fighting convictions for illegal outhouses and sewage dumping. (Source: Tribune-Democrat)
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Earlier Quotation Marks columns are available from the June 2008, May 2008, April 2008, March 2008, February 2008, January 2008, December 2007, November 2007, October 2007, September 2007, August 2007, July 2007, June 2007, May 2007, and earlier issues of Christianity Today.
