Winter Family Tournament

CINCINNATI, Ohio--Everybody is invited to the 10th annual Winter Family Tournament in Lexington, Ky., announced organizer Jim O'Brien.

"The Winter Family Tournament was first conceived in the late '70s in Amarillo, Texas," Mr. O'Brien said. "We revived the idea in Cincinnati in 1997 as a place for families to meet and connect with other Christians with similar beliefs in a warm and friendly atmosphere."

In 1997 Mr. O'Brien's congregation was affiliated with the United Church of God.

"It was a risk financially [in 1997] since it was entirely subsidized by the local congregation," he said. "The risk paid off as the tournament rapidly outgrew the facilities and we were forced to move to Lexington, Ky., in 2002."

Since 2002, when Mr. O'Brien's congregation, the Church of God Cincinnati, became no longer affiliated with the UCG, both the congregation and the UCG have sponsored similar activities on the same weekend in December.

The Lexington schedule will include fellowship, inspirational messages, basketball, dances and "cheap food."

See www.cogcincinnati.org/pages/tournament.html for more information, including registration forms, schedules and photos from last year.

LCG baptisms

ARROYO GRANDE, Calif.--The operator of the cogwriter.com Web site says the television and radio efforts of the Living Church of God have significantly added to that church's membership numbers.

The Tomorrow's World broadcast of the LCG, based in Charlotte, N.C., is on about 195 television and 17 radio stations around the world, announced Robert Thiel, an LCG member who operates cogwriter.com.

As of August, television has added more than 400 members to the church in the United States and Canada. These are people whose first contact was the telecast over the past seven years who were subsequently baptized.

Another 400 people, who were members of other Church of God groups, joined with Living as a result of the telecast.

About one out of each 600 TV viewers added to Living's mailing list is coming to baptism, Dr. Thiel said.

For TV viewers who have been on the church's subscription list for seven years, an average of one person out of 200 is being baptized.

Back in the pre-1986 Worldwide Church of God, only one out of each 1,000 TV viewers on the mailing list was baptized, Dr. Thiel said. From January 1999 to the present, a total of 1,550 individuals have been baptized in the Living Church of God from all sources.

AmbassadorUniversity.com enrolls 1,000 members

PHOENIXVILLE, Pa.--Darwin Sanoy's AmbassadorUniversity.com Web site has reached 1,000 members, Mr. Sanoy reports.

"Today I approved member number 1,000," he told The Journal Sept. 20. "It has been a great experience to see the community grow so quickly."

The site is a nonprofit effort to help Ambassador College and Ambassador University alumni--graduates and other former students--keep in contact with each other. The site opened its virtual doors back in January.

"I have heard estimates of the total student count of Ambassador being around 20,000," Mr. Sanoy said. "If we've tapped 5 percent in months, that is excellent and I would think more than enough to find all grads who are active on the Internet via friend-of-a-friend-of-a-friend relationships."

The best part of his job is hearing stories of former Ambassador students "finding long lost friends or discovering a friend already lives close by or connecting with friends when traveling to other places."

Former AC and AU students may register for membership on the site at AmbassadorUniversity.com. Write Mr. Sanoy at 146 Forge Hill Ln., Phoenixville, Pa. 19460, U.S.A.