The editorial staff at WORLD has assembled another outstanding issue, and it’s available this morning online. Plus, you can now receive the magazine’s content through your favorite news reader by subscribing to our RSS feed.

Here are some highlights from the April 19 issue:

Cover story: In this special “Cities” issue, discover why helping to shape cities is an increasingly important Christian calling.

Campaign 2008: Rebecca Miller reports on how Barack Obama’s supporters are chipping away at Hillary Clinton’s lead in Pennsylvania.

Interview: Megan Basham talks to Ben Stein, whose new documentary Expelled gives macro-evolutionary theory a deserved hard time, but he plans to have fun with it along the way.

Religion: Alisa Harris previews Pope Benedict XVI’s visit to the United States this month, especially how security issues in a post-9/11 era make it difficult for him to reach out and touch the masses.

Thoughts: Insightful columns by Joel Belz, Gene Edward Veith, Janie B. Cheaney, Mindy Belz, Andrée Seu, and Marvin Olasky.

For all you non-subscribers out there, we’d love to have you join our family of readers and not miss out on all WORLD has to offer. Click here for more info. (Subscriptions make great gifts, too!)

And don’t forget to subscribe to the new RSS feed.

The editors of WORLD have put together another great issue, and it’s now available online. Here are some highlights:

Cover story: Mark Bergin, Jamie Dean, and Lynn Vincent on how soaring foreclosure rates are devastating some communities and raising questions about how much imprudent lenders and borrowers should lose, how much taxpayers should pay, and what churches can do to help.

Campaign 2008 Special Report: Warren Cole Smith on the inability of the religious right’s leaders to unite behind a GOP candidate, and how they face a wilderness road to the White House. Plus, Jamie Dean and Marvin Olasky take a look at Barack Obama’s historic speech, which has not silenced all critics or lifted all polls.

Religion: Richard N. Ostling on the unending debate over gays, as mainline denominations prepare for a new round of potential standoffs and more dissatisfaction on all sides.

Entertainment: Megan Basham on how filmmaker Tyler Perry is taking Hollywood with loud themes of redemption.

Thoughts: Insightful columns by Joel Belz, Gene Edward Veith, Janie B. Cheaney, Mindy Belz, Andrée Seu, Marvin Olasky, and Andy Obrochta, who writes on obeying God from prison.

For all you non-subscribers out there, we’d love to have you join our family of readers and not miss out on all WORLD has to offer. Click here for more info. (Subscriptions make great gifts, too!)

If you’re not a subscriber of WORLD — or if you are one and just can’t wait until it arrives in your mailbox — head on over to WORLDMag.com to check out the March 22/29 issue, hot off the server. Here’s just a mere sampling of what you’ll find in this HUGE 100-page issue:

Cover story: Marvin Olasky asks: What is campaign ’08 revealing about American culture? Plus a sidebar on Barack Obama’s church.

Abortion: WoW’s Alisa Harris on how faith is the motivating factor for pro-life volunteers.

Environment: Mark Bergin discusses the double standard in global-warming alarmism.

Military: Former hostage Kurt Muse shares with Lynn Vincent the story of the faith that lit the fire that freed the nation of Panama.

Thoughts: Insightful columns by Joel Belz, Gene Edward Veith, Janie B. Cheaney, Mindy Belz, Andrée Seu, and Marvin Olasky.

For all you non-subscribers out there, we’d love to have you join our family of readers and not miss out on all this magazine has to offer. Click here for more info. (And subscriptions make great gifts!)

In my Saturday “Sports” post, I mentioned that one of the redeeming qualities of NASCAR was the fact that it often has preachers pray in the name of Jesus Christ prior to the races. Now that NASCAR has become more mainstream and popular, it should be no surprise that these prayers have started rubbing some people the wrong way. Case in point: a letter to the editor sent to The Washington Post this week:

“I was dismayed that a blessing given before the Daytona 500 on Sunday invoked Jesus Christ by name. … It is time for non-Christians to admit what we all know — what we see happening is no battle for freedom of religion. It is a battle for the establishment of Christianity as the official religion of the United States.”

So if we’re to believe this letter writer, having the name of Christ invoked at a sporting event run by a non-government entity means we’re headed down the path to a Christian theocracy. C’mon. Apparently secular America increasingly wants to apply the “God-free” rules of government to the private sector. Look at the example of stores that banish the word “Christmas” at Christmastime. As Gene Edward Veith writes on his blog, “People evidently see the government as so all-encompassing that government standards should be applied to EVERYTHING.”

. . . . Christian kids were better educated than everyone else? In this week’s WORLD, Ed Veith discusses the cultural ramifications in film and television.