by Sam Rainer | Feb 3, 2010 | Uncategorized
The fastest growing area of poverty in the United States is in the suburb. The Brookings Institute released a report in January that details the change in the U.S. poor population by community type. Here’s one of many findings in their report: Between 2000 and 2008,... 
by Sam Rainer | Jan 27, 2010 | Uncategorized
Pastors can have two personas: one the congregation sees and one the staff sees. While the goal is to be the same person around everyone, it often does not play out. The reality is you act differently around staff you work with for hours on end each day, compared to... by Sam Rainer | Jan 21, 2010 | Uncategorized
Stats are like still photographs—they reveal something about a specific place and time. One of the greatest sources for stats in the United States is the Statistical Abstract, published annually. It’s been around a long time (since 1878), and it is often used as a... by Sam Rainer | Jan 3, 2010 | Uncategorized
The Pew Research Center will begin a large project in 2010 involving the millennial generation (according to them, this generation represents those born between 1981 and 2000). It’s one to watch—I’m sure many of the results will reveal important insights into the next... 
by Sam Rainer | Dec 28, 2009 | Uncategorized
The Pew Forum on Religion in Public Life has ranked each state according to how religious it is. While they recognize the difficulty in defining the term “religious,” they have provided four separate measures for the ranking system—the importance of religion in... 
by Sam Rainer | Dec 26, 2009 | Uncategorized
Researcher George Barna recently offered a synthesis of his research in which he reveals four major themes of 2009. The first theme is not a surprise: Increasingly, Americans are more interested in faith and spirituality than in Christianity. People say they have...
