August 9, 2005

While Sunday school in Protestant churches remains popular, classes are less likely to be available to the youngest and oldest students, according to a recent analysis of Protestant pastors by the Barna Group.

Although the percentage of churches offering Sunday school has remained virtually constant in the last eight years, the availability of programs for children aged 2 to 5 declined from 94 percent of churches to 88 percent. Classes for high school students showed a similar drop, from 86 percent to 80 percent.

Though the Supreme Court reached different results in two cases challenging government displays of the Ten Commandments, the court’s message was quite clear: in deciding such issues, context is everything.

Gearing up for a battle over the next appointment to the Supreme Court, groups like NARAL Pro-Choice America and the National Organization for Women have been warning of the imminent collapse of Roe v. Wade. Roe hangs by a thread, they assert, and a one-vote shift on the court will dismantle the 1973 ruling that defined abortion as a constitutional right.

Bibles are cheap. In their zeal to make scripture accessible to everyone, Protestants have manufactured Bibles in almost every language and made them available for startlingly small sums. Perhaps in doing so they have unwittingly made the Bible cheap not just financially, but theologically. Whereas Wycliffe and Tyndale devoted their lives to creating a Bible in the vernacular, modern folks have access to plenty of Bibles but are not very interested in reading them.

"Well, well, well, two naughty little children gone. Three good little children left.” So begins a chapter of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Roald Dahl’s 1964 children’s novel that has enticed young readers for over four decades and has also inspired two films—a 1971 version starring Gene Wilder as the crazed chocolate maker, Willy Wonka, and now a nuttier and chewier version featuring Johnny Depp as a younger, more troubled Wonka.