Friday News Roundup for June 12, 2009

Have you had a Jehovah’s Witness knock on your door? Here’s an interesting piece from the LA Times headlined For Jehovah’s Witnesses, it’s all about spreading the word .

“Church members say their door-to-door preaching is akin to a search-and-rescue operation. Sometimes they feel down after being rebuffed, but they believe the message is too important to give up.”

Alysa Stanton became the first female African American rabbi. Slate asks Is Jewish the New Black?

From Alysa Stanton to, um, Charles Taylor, Judaism is winning ever more black converts. Maybe Sammy Davis Jr. had it right.

Heroic guard gives his life to protect visitors at the Holocaust Museum in Washington DC from 88-year old anti-Semitic white supremicist.  From the New York Times: In Note, More Clues to Holocaust Museum Killing.  The Religion News Service points out that the Department of Homeland Security was right on when it warned last April of a rising tide of right-wing extremism.

Adelle Banks of the RNS reports on the Southern Baptist Convention’s efforts to turn things around…

Decades of painful conservative-moderate fights. Stagnant baptism rates. Membership malaise. Surveying the state of the Southern Baptist Convention, seminary president Danny Akin can sum it all up in just six words. “Business as usual,” he said, “is not working.” (Via Pew Forum)