More from the State of the Union:

“…the number of children born to teenage mothers has been falling for a dozen years in a row.”

That’s a good thing. But there’s still a marriage crisis, and part of it is related to birth rates among unmarried women: Births to unmarried mothers reached a record high of almost 1.5 million and made up 35.7% of all births in 2004. Unmarried births made up the majority of Black (69.2%) and American Indian (62.3%) births, nearly half (46.4%) of Hispanic births, and 23.5% of Caucasian births. Source: Marketing to Women (Kaplan, 2006), p.3.

Read more on The Rest of the Story…

The Feb. 6 edition of NEWSWEEK features a story on the debate program at Liberty University, in a bit by Susanna Meadows, “Cut, Thrust and Christ: Why evangelicals are mastering the art of college debate.” The story trots out a number of tired old formulas, with the lede referencing the fact that fundamentalists (used interchangeably with the term evangelicals) view of the imminence of the second coming: “When you believe the end of the world is coming, you learn to talk fast.”

Read more on A ‘Salt’ Assault…

Amy Welborn’s blog has a post on the January 21 conference Acton held in Rome and links to Jennifer Roback Morse’s recent Acton Commentary article.

Welborn’s post and comments can be read here. Roback Morse also wrote about the conference here.

Read more on More Debate on “A Catholic Alternative to Europe’s Social Model”…

From the State of the Union:

“Yet the destination of history is determined by human action, and every great movement of history comes to a point of choosing.”

And all along I’ve been thinking it was divine providence.

Read more on Silly Me…

I was reminded recently that Jesus repeatedly underscored the high value of seemingly very small things. The signficant results of small mustard seeds and lost coins made his parable points well but, as a mom, the story of one lost sheep made me quickly leap to the incalculable value of one lost person. On a planet of billions, many of whom live and die with scarcely any notice, Jesus says God notices … and cares. And He calls us to care.

Read more on Amazing Stories of Effective Compassion…

The math and science skills of American high schoolers and college students continue to erode. Michael Miller looks at the implications for U.S. economic competitiveness and offers some suggestions for fixing what ails the schools.

Read more on Why Johnny Can’t Compete with Sanjay…

A brief opinion from yours truly, featured in the February issue of The Banner, the denominational magazine of the Christian Reformed Church in North America: “Building on the Tithe.”

With an eye towards Christians in other parts of the world, I observe, “In North America the conflict we face is largely between spending our leisure or disposable income on ourselves and spending it on others.” Check out the rest.

Read more on Building on the Tithe…

From the Washington Post, a snippet from Hugo Chavez, discussing Bolivia’s recently elected president, Evo Morales:

“We have to create, one, two, three Bolivias in Latin America, in the Caribbean,” [Chavez] said echoing a quotation from Argentine hero Ernesto Che Guevara. “Only aiming for power can we transform the world.”

Why do I get the idea Chavez didn’t do so well in his history classes?

Read more on What Was That Saying About Power?…

The human person, by virtue of being created imago Dei, is an independent being, individually unique, rational, the subject of moral agency, a co-creator, and inherently social. Accordingly, human persons possess intrinsic value and dignity, implying certain rights and duties with respect to the recognition and protection of the dignity of themselves and other persons. These truths about the human person’s dignity are known through divine revelation, but are also discernible through reason.

Kony Kim, Master of Arts student in Theological Studies at Westminster Seminary California, took first place with the essay titled, “Imago Dei: The Transcendent Basis of True Liberty and Just Authority.” Read Kim’s essay and all of the other finalists at the competition homepage.

Read more on Created Imago Dei…

PBS stations across the country will be airing Bonhoeffer, “an acclaimed dramatic documentary about theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer. The documentary “tells the story of the young German pastor who offered one of the first clear voices of resistance to Adolf Hitler and the rise of the National Socialist (Nazi) Party.”

Read more on Celebrating Bonhoeffer…