Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, November 6, 1993 TAG: 9311090302
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: C9 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE:
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
David Benoit, a well-known lecturer on the occult, satanism and New Age religious movements, will conduct a series of seminars at Lakeside Baptist Church, 447 Dalewood Ave., Salem, Nov. 13-15.
Benoit will speak on such topics as "Spiritual Warfare" and "Excuse Me, Is this Hollywood or Babylon?"
Saturday and Monday meetings begin at 7 p.m.; Sunday's times are 9:45 and 10:55 a.m. and 6 p.m. Additional information is available by calling the church at 986-0062. -Staff report
\ Baha'is pick Roanoker
James A. Williams of Roanoke recently was elected delegate for Southwest Virginia Baha'is at their annual convention.
Williams was picked in silent balloting to represent the region at the Baha'i National Assembly in the spring.
The Southwest Virginia region extends west from Harrisonburg, Lynchburg and Danville.
-Staff report
\ Organ concert
Elizabeth and Raymond Chenault will perform on the newly renovated organ at Calvary Baptist Church in Roanoke on Nov. 14 at 3 p.m.
The couple - organists and choirmasters at All Saints Church in Atlanta - have received acclaim for their duo performances across the country.
The concert is being used as part of the dedication of a new $76,000 console built for the organ in the last year.
The concert is free. -Staff report
\ Waiting on love
The Roanoke Valley Association of Southern Baptists is participating in a sexual abstinence program called, "True Love Waits." Designed by the education department of the Southern Baptist Convention to elevate sexual activity from promiscuity to fidelity to one partner, it encourages discussion of sexual values between parents and teens.
Churches then provide a study on the subject and on a particular Sunday a commitment service is held when youth take a vow to avoid sexual activity until marriage.
A youth council for churches of the Roanoke Valley Association decided that each congregation should establish its own pattern for the study. The associational commitment service has been scheduled for May 15 at a time when family life is celebrated.
-Staff report
\ Graham to Japan
MINNEAPOLIS - Evangelist Billy Graham plans to hold a four-day series of evangelistic meetings in Japan in January.
"Mission 94" will be held January 13-16 at the 40,000-seat Tokyo Dome and transmitted by satellite to more than 70 locations across the country, the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association said.
The association said Graham, who has held five previous crusades in Japan in 1967 and 1980, was invited by the leaders of more than 800 churches in Tokyo.
"At this moment in history, while enjoying material prosperity and international leadership, we have been told that the Japanese people are increasingly aware of an emptiness in their hearts and a spiritual void which material prosperity alone cannot fill," Graham said.
-Associated Press
\ Baptist records
NASHVILLE, Tenn. - The Baptist Sunday School Board is starting a record label for contemporary Christian music.
Genesis Records will release its first albums by February, said Mark Blankenship, director of Genevox Music Group. Genevox is the Southern Baptist board's trade music publishing division.
Artists signed to the label include adult contemporary singer Amy Roth and Friends IV, a quartet featuring Terry Blackwood of the Imperials.
The label is part of the board's push to reach evangelical Christians through Christian book and record stores, Blankenship said. It is the board's first recording label.
-Associated Press
\ Reunion amid arson
JELLICO, Ky. - An arson fire in October that gutted the 107-year-old St. Boniface Catholic Church didn't spoil a reunion of descendants of Italian settlers who built the structure.
Nearly 200 people from as far away as Michigan and Massachusetts crowded into a tiny fellowship hall just north of the Kentucky-Tennessee border on Sunday to celebrate Mass. A few yards away stood the charred remains of the building their ancestors constructed.
The fire on Oct. 19 left the 40-member parish without a sanctuary, but the gathering Sunday was especially touching for the four children of Alexandro "Sandre" Rassega, one of many Italians who immigrated to Bell, Harlan and Whitley counties to work in coal mines at the turn of the century.
Rassega, who came to the United States in 1923, died on Aug. 20. His funeral Mass three days later was the last funeral in the white-framed church before it was set afire.
While the fire destroyed most of the building, including the pews and balcony, a heavy cast-iron cross was still standing atop the church.
"I don't know how that cross is still standing," said the Rev. Robert Damron, pastor of St. Boniface. "But it is. And it has become our symbol of hope for the future."
-Associated Press
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