The weekly Resurgence Roundup brings together some of the most interesting content we’ve found online, as it pertains to the church and the people God has called us to reach. Keep in mind, we don’t endorse or agree with everything you’ll see included in the roundup.

Half Of Americans Say God Plays A Role In Super Bowl Winner

Huffington Post:
Half of American sports fans say they believe God or a supernatural force is at play in the games they watch, according to a new survey. That percentage includes Americans who pray for God to help their team (26 percent), think their team has been cursed (25 percent) or more generally believe God is involved in determining who wins on the court or in the field (19 percent).

The world’s most ancient Christian communities are being destroyed—and no one cares

The Week:
Throughout the Middle East the pattern is the same. Christians are murdered in mob violence or by militant groups. Their churches are bombed, their shops destroyed, and their homes looted. Laws are passed making them second-class citizens, and the majority of them eventually leave. . . . And yet the Western world is largely ignorant of or untroubled by programmatic violence against Christians.

Who’s ‘godless’ now? Russia says it’s U.S.

Washington Times:
At the height of the Cold War, it was common for American conservatives to label the officially atheist Soviet Union a “godless nation.” More than two decades on, history has come full circle, as the Kremlin and its allies in the Russian Orthodox Church hurl the same allegation at the West.

Florida Man Who Tricked Girlfriend Into Taking Abortion Drug Sentenced to Nearly 14 Years in Prison

Christian News Network:
A Florida man was sentenced to nearly 14 years in prison on Monday for tricking his girlfriend into ingesting an abortion-inducing drug last year. . . . John Andrew Welden, 29, accepted a plea deal in September after admitting to giving his girlfriend, 27-year-old Remee Jo Lee, the pill Cytotec (misoprostol) to induce an abortion.

Disney Channel features its first gay couple on ‘Good Luck Charlie’

Entertainment Weekly:
As a Disney Channel spokesperson told TV Guide back in June, when the episode was first announced, the storyline was developed “under the consultancy of child development experts and community advisers. [And] like Disney Channel programming, it was developed to be relevant to kids and families around the world and to reflect themes of diversity and inclusiveness.” 

Court affirms Mass. murderer’s right to get sex change in prison

Fox News:
A federal appeals court on Friday upheld a judge’s ruling granting a taxpayer-funded sex change operation for a transgender inmate serving a life sentence for a murder conviction, saying receiving medically necessary treatment is a constitutional right that must be protected “even if that treatment strikes some as odd or unorthodox.”

The U.S. Puts ‘Moderate’ Restrictions on Religious Freedom

The Atlantic:
Religious freedom was clearly a legal priority of the men who drafted the Bill of Rights. Yet, 225 years later, the Pew Research Center’s Religion and Public Life Project has said the United States places a “moderate” level of restrictions on religious practice compared to the other countries in the world. 

Highly Educated, Highly Indebted: The Lives of Today’s 27-Year-Olds, In Charts

The Atlantic:
In the spring of 2002, the government’s researchers began tracking a group of roughly 15,000 high school sophomores—most of whom would be roughly age 27 today—with the intention of following them through early adulthood. . . . In 2012, the government’s researchers handed their subjects an enormous survey about their lives in the real world. 

The Great Decline: 60 years of religion in one graph

Religion News Service:
During the post-war, baby-booming 1950s, there was a revival of religion. Indeed, some at the time considered it a third great awakening. Then came the societal changes of the 1960s, which included a questioning of religious institutions. The resulting decline in religion stopped by the end of the 1970s, when religiosity remained steady. Over the past fifteen years, however, religion has once again declined. But this decline is much sharper than the decline of 1960s and 1970s.