Ep. 155: MinistryWatch List of Top 10 Stories of the Year 2021

On today’s program, we take a look at the top stories of the year, as identified by you, our MinistryWatch readers and listeners.  These are the stories that got the most page views on the MinistryWatch website this year.  We’ll present the top 10, mention a few others, and provide a bit of commentary along the way.  To see a longer list – a list of the 15 most viewed stories – go to MinistryWatch.com. MinistryWatch published nearly a thousand stories this year, and whether you think these are the most important stories of the year or not, I do think the fact that these 10 received the most page views does tell us something about the state of evangelicalism these days.  What we care about, and how we behave.  That’s why I think such list are important.  And I also want to thank everyone who read our stories this year, and engaged with us.  We ended up with more than 2.25 million page views on our site, and our podcast listenership doubled this year.  So thank you for joining us in our quest to bring transparency and accountability to the evangelical church. I also want to share with folks that this will be our last regular podcast of the year.  We’re going to take off next Friday, New Year’s Eve, from our podcast schedule, though we will be posting stories on the website this week. That said, I hope you’ll therefore allow me to make a special appeal to those of you who like the podcast to give us a year-end gift.  MinistryWatch is unique, even among Christian media outlets, in that we don’t take advertising, we don’t take money from the ministries we cover.  We are completely independent.  We serve our readers, our listeners, and donors who want to be more informed and effective stewards of the resources God has entrusted to them. If we have served you in this way, we hope you will consider a small gift to help us keep going in the new year.  Our year-end goal is $68,000, and as of this moment, we have raised more than $40,000, but that means we still have a ways to go between now and Friday night. As always, we want you to give to your local church first, to carefully researched Christian ministries second, but if we have helped you in your own journey of generosity, please consider a gift to us, too.  To donate, just go to MinistryWatch.com and hit the DONATE button at the top of the page. The producers for today’s program are Rich Roszel and Ben Warwick. We get database and other technical support from Cathy Goddard, Stephen DuBarry, Emily Kern, and Casey Sudduth.  Writers who have made significant contributions to MinistryWatch this year include Anne Stych, Christina Darnell, Shannon Cuthrell, Kim Roberts, Steve Rabey, and Bethany Starin. Until next year, may God bless you.