A discussion of the principal sources for the study of medieval urban churches, and the uses and limitations of those sources, is followed by a survey of a number of English towns which have been selected to provide a context for the detailed studies of the churches of Hereford, Shrewsbury and Chester which are the core of this dissertation. The survey summarises the present state of knowledge of the ecclesiastical history of each town, with particular attention to recent advances, and is also intended to introduce the problems and the avenues of inquiry subsequently pursued. For each of the towns of Hereford, Shrewsbury and Chester, accounts of the evidence for the history of individual ecclesiastical institutions are followed by detailed inquiry into their exercise of parochial rights and discussion of the development of the parish boundaries. The early political and economic history, and the topography, of each town are also considered in some depth to enable the fullest possible discussion of the history of the churches and parishes. Finally, aspects of the ecclesiastical history of the three towns are compared.

Of the estimated 6 000 African independent churches in Africa, approximately 3 000 are to be found in Southern Africa. Most of these are in the Republic of South Africa, where the history of the independent church movement goes back nearly a hundred years. The greatest concentration of independent churches in South Africa is to be found in the urban complexes round the cities of Johannesburg and Pretoria in the Southern Transvaal. Soweto, the complex of townships to the south-west of Johannesburg which houses about one million people, has about 900 of these independent churches. This study deals with independent churches in Soweto, and their relationship to their urban environment.

Submitted to the Faculty of Arts in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the Department of Psychology at the University of Zululand, 1994. / The need for a psychology that addresses problems of all racial groups in South Africa has long been documented. Studies have indicated that modern health care services are inadequate and not accessible to all population groups in this country. The needs and problems in South Africa are too complicated to be treated by Western therapies alone. What seem to have been a viable alter¬native are the services rendered to Blacks by traditional doctors, diviners, faith healers and the African Independent Churches. The aim of this study was an exploratory psychological investigation into the nature of helping human relations in an African Independent Church. A sample of 18 respondents was randomly selected from members of the St. John's Apostolic Faith Mission Church, Harrismith. The phenomenological research methodology was used to elicit descriptions from the subjects regarding their experiences and meaning of being members of that particular church. The descriptions of the respondents were tape recorded, transcribed and dissected into natural meaning units which were blocked into themes. The natural meaning units and the themes of each subject were synthesised into a general concise description in psychological language. This descriptive statement, which was referred to as situated structure, disclosed the unique and es¬sential meaning the phenomenon had for each individual. Those themes that were expressed and shared by the majority of the sub¬jects were grouped into a general structure of six categories, namely, spiritual helping, prayer healing, holy water, cohesive-ness, existential assistance and catharsis. The researcher validated the descriptions by going back to respondents and asking them whether his synthesis accurately revealed their experiences. Each respondent commented on the general structure by stating on a subjective eleven point scale (0-10) the degree to which the general structure reflected his/her experiences. The respondents' ratings indicated that the general structure was a fairly accurate reflection of their experiences as members of this particular church. There was sig¬nificant agreement among the eighteen respondents in ranking the six categories. This means that there was significant agreement¬about what the subj ects generally experienced as members of the St. John's Apostolic Faith Mission Church and about their ex¬periences . In view of literature review of other African Independent Churches the researcher could generalize that human helping rela¬tions in the African Independent Churches exist essentially in the aforementioned six main forms. It was recommended that similar research be conducted in other African Independent Churches such as the ZCC, Church of Nazarites and the Mahon Mission. The practices of the AIC's could be in¬cluded in the curricula of the training of mental health care workers, clients could benefit from cross referrals between West¬ern practitioners and the healers of the African Independent Churches.

At the turn of the Century, in the rural areas of the deep south, a small group of fundamentalists adopted the practice of confirming their faith by handling venomous snakes. Today the cult has spread to at least twelve different States, despite the fact that since 1947 snake handling has been prohibited by law in all states except one. The cult-members, however, regard the legislation as being a violation of their fundamental right to worship as they please. Fatalities occur, the leaders spend time in prison, but still the cult flourishes, with various congregations quite openly flouting the law. In addition to handling snakes, the cultists also drink poison and handle fire, according to their interpretation of the Bible.

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This research analyzed the factors contributing to the decline of protestant churches in metropolitan centers. Houston, Texas, was named as the metropolitan center. The research concern is that there is a lack of current and recent knowledge of factors leading to the decline of Protestant churches in metropolitan centers. The purpose of this study was to identify the biblical and theological, leadership and organizational, cultural, and demographic factors contributing to the decline of Protestant churches. Precedent literature reviews the literature written in the area of church growth and decline. Five areas are researched: Church growth specialists is a review of leading contributors to the church growth movement. Biblical and theological concerns is a review of God's loving relationship with his people and the people's rebellion and decline. Leadership and organizational concerns is a review of the effects of leadership and organization on the churches today. Cultural concerns is a review of the effects of culture on the church today. It reviews both Christianity in culture and culture in the church. And, demographic concerns is a review of how demographic changes have affected the church. It reviews the contextual factors leading to church decline and the life-cycle of the church. The methodological design of the study was a survey of Protestant churches in Houston, Texas. The sampling of 542 churches was taken from 842 Protestant churches of nine major denominations. A Likert response scale survey was created based on the research found in the precedent literature. Two surveys were created and distributed: an electronic response survey the pastors responded to online and a paper survey mailed out to the churches. The analysis of findings reviewed the one hundred churches that responded to the survey. In all, nineteen factors within the areas of concern were researched and analyzed. The results demonstrate that biblical and theological concerns illustrate no differences between growing and declining churches. Leadership and organizational concerns, cultural concerns and demographic concerns all demonstrate a difference between growing and declining churches. The conclusion was that there are many factors that contribute to church decline. The declining churches had numerous factors that were contributing to the decline. Decisive actions must be taken for the churches to turn into healthy and productive growing churches. / This item is only available to students and faculty of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. If you are not associated with SBTS, this dissertation may be purchased from <a href="http://disexpress.umi.com/dxweb">http://disexpress.umi.com/dxweb</a> or downloaded through ProQuest's Dissertation and Theses database if your institution subscribes to that service.