Is connecting with the local community in January too hard? As the sun rises on 2009, Figtree Anglican Church’s evangelism minister, Stuart Starr admits running anything in the holiday month has its challenges.

Most of us, at some time, find ourselves in a conversation about whether children and young people have particular rights. Some people become quite emotional about the connection between the rights of children and the rights of their parents.

Christmas is a time when the whole community can agree on enjoying themselves. It is a time of family, fun and food. It is the time of giving and receiving presents and messages of goodwill from old friends.

Christmas cards often depict a European winter rather than a Christmas message. They are steadily being de-Christianised - moving from "Happy Christmas" to "Seasons Greeting". And when they do contain a poem it would often be a compliment to call it "doggerel".

Dr Stuart Piggin argues that there are real lessons for evangelism in 2009 from Billy Graham’s Southern Cross Crusade of 1959.

Thank you for your prayerful support last weekend as I spoke at The South Pacific Training Event. December is also the season for us to prepare for Christmas in prayer.

America’s mission to redeem the world took us to Iraq. Does President Obama really offer a new direction?

Many Christian parents worry that Santa is a threat to their kids’ belief in Jesus. And yet the big jolly man in a red suit is such a massive part of Aussie culture he seems impossible to avoid. So we asked five experts in children’s ministry – all lecturers at Youthworks College - to share if they do or don’t ‘do Santa’. And more importantly how they think parents can keep the focus on Jesus.

This week I am speaking to university students in Canberra at the first South Pacific Regional Training Event.

At the Create conference, myself and Russell Powell from Anglican Media Sydney sought to encourage local church leaders to think more strategically about the way they use the media.

At the time of writing Australians await with ambivalence the execution of the Bali bombers. It is widely expected to happen this weekend. Many strong emotions are expressed about this sentence - from outrage that it has taken so long, to indignation that we condone the barbarity of execution.

Archdeacon for Women’s Ministry in the Diocese of Sydney Narelle Jarrett assesses the state of women’s ministry in Sydney Diocese today and charts the way forward.

Jesus was human but that does not mean that he was a sinful, mindless and uncritical proponent of an evil culture. His humanity did not include sinfulness. His capacity to see through the culture of his day, to criticise it publicly and to live quite differently is recorded on most pages of the gospel.

Given increasing multi-culturalism and secularism, Bryan Cowling says it’s time revamp religious education in government schools.