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I Desire Mercy Not Sacrifice
Experiencing the mercy of God in our lives
Ready & Faithful
Looking to Jesus for help now and hope in the future
Why Suffering?
Help your church understand God's plan in pain
Direct Mail Rules: A recent Pitney Bowes survey shows that consumers prefer snail mail to e-mail when it comes to maintaining relationships. 34% say paper direct mail is the best medium for achieving this. Next is prints ads, 30%; television, 25%; and radio, 5%. E-mail ...read more
Tags: Communication General
Donors Want to Know: Most donors would like to receive more financial information about the ministries they support, plus information on what their past gift ...read more
Tags: Giving General
70% of American adults favor allowing religious organizations applying for federal funding to provide social services. ...read more
52% of all U.S. churches are located in small town or rural areas. (Foster Letter ...read more
Tags: Church General
Mega-churches (1,000+ members) account for between 5% and 10% of all U.S. churches and attract between 2 and 5 million attenders. ...read more
Top 4 states for Mega–church attendance are: California—364,000; Texas—268,000; Georgia—130,000; Florida—113,000. ...read more
Companies lose 50% of their employees every 4 years. (Foster Letter ...read more
Where Are The Young Clergy? The numbers of young pastors have been steadily declining in recent years. In ’75, about 24% of Presbyterian ministers were under 35—today its just 7%. Episcopal priests under 35 have dropped from 19% to 4% over the same period. For Roman Catholic priests the rate has ...read more
Among adults who say they had given 10% or more of their income to churches and related ministries in the past year, 63% lied about their ...read more
Pastors Perceptions: Barna Research has recently completed an extensive survey of Senior Pastors in America. 83% describe themselves as "evangelical Protestant and 81% say they are "theologically conservative." 37% claimed to be Wesleyan or Arminian and 32% are Reformed or Calvinist in their ...read more
How Do They Do It? Although most of the country’s Protestant churches average an attendance of fewer than 100 adults, 80% of those have a full-time, paid Senior Pastor. Unbelievably, the median annual budget of those ...read more
Charitable Fundraising Hazards: While its laudable to donate a portion of sales to a charity, otherwise known as “cause marketing,” it’s a highly regulated and complex practice that poses numerous traps for the unwary. Prudent businesses will seek ...read more
Giving Cannibalized: All around the nation, charities and other nonprofit organizations are confronting the same stark reality. More than $1 billion flooded into more than 100 funds set up to aid victims of the terrorist attack, those that serve ...read more
New Megachurch Research A major new study of megachurches shows that 93% of churches with an average weekly attendance of at least 2,000 are found in the South, the West and the Midwest. The states with the largest concentration are California, Texas, Florida and Georgia. Dr. Scott Thumma, faculty ...read more
Denominational Loyalty has remained unexpectedly strong among those who attended church as children. The church preferences of the adults who did not attend a Christian congregation when young are more likely to attend Baptist churches and not mainline Protestant or Catholic churches. Barna ...read more
Churched-As-Children individuals are twice as likely as the unchurched-as-children niche to be born again Christians (44% vs. 24%), and significantly more likely to hold an orthodox view of God’s nature (74% vs. 54%). A minority of both groups believes in the existence of the Holy Spirit and of ...read more
1 out of every 6 theological students in the U.S. is enrolled in a Southern Baptist seminary. (Foster ...read more
In ‘99, 52% of students in theological school were 35 or over, up from the ‘91 figure of 45%. (Foster ...read more
Church Attendance Surge Over: For the last three decades, Gallup Poll has found the percentage of Americans who attend church or synagogue weekly to hover between 39% and 43%. In May ‘01, the figure was 41%, in the 10 days after 9/11, it climbed to 47%—a noticeable rise, but no more than what is ...read more
Private Help: A yearlong study finds that more Americans now depend on private food kitchens and pantries than use the federal food stamp program. The survey, paid for by America’s Second Harvest, a network of food banks, shows food pantries, kitchens and emergency shelters provided for more than ...read more
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