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ANCHORAGE, Alaska - Gov. Sarah Palin's church is promoting a conference that promises to convert gays into heterosexuals through the power of prayer. "You'll be encouraged by the power of God's love and His desire to transform the lives of those impacted by homosexuality," according to the insert in the bulletin of the Wasilla Bible Church, where Palin has prayed since she was a child.

Mosul (AsiaNews) - The Iraqi Christian community is again in the sights of Islamic fundamentalists in Mosul: today news came of the death of a 65-year-old doctor, Tariq Qattan, kidnapped recently by a terrorist group. AsiaNews sources say that his family had paid a ransom of 20,000 U.S. dollars. But it was not enough money to free Tariq Qattan, one of the many Christians kidnapped by fundamentalists for extortion. Also in Mosul, two days ago - although the news has just been released today - another Christian, Nafi Haddad, was kidnapped and killed. It is not yet known whether or...

Two young women from a Gospel for Asia Bible college were chased and threatened by 70 anti-Christian extremists after conducting a worship service in Orissa, India. Chunile Wyn and Preeja Sushan are student missionaries serving their internships in Orissa. On Sunday, the extremists entered the building where the women were worshipping with 15 other believers. The radicals carried sticks and stones, but the Christians escaped the church unharmed. However, Chunile and Preeja were still in the building, and the anti-Christians surrounded them and shouted threats. "We will burn you alive like Graham Staines and his children!" they shouted at the...

A row has broken out after a Christian group organised a day of prayer in Oxford about Muslims during Ramadan. The Muslim Education Centre of Oxford (Meco) accused Witney-based Open Doors UK of preaching "evangelical propaganda", after the Christian group held a Call to Prayer day in Oxford yesterday. But Open Doors UK, which held the event at St Aldate's Church, insisted it had been taken out of context, although it "regretted" any offence that had been caused. A spokesman denied the meeting targeted Muslims, and said its aim was to reduce fear of Islam. Meco chairman Dr Taj Hargey...

Britain's 200-year jihadOn my travels for the past few days, I have been reading a book which tells the story of a quite astonishing part of British history of which I was previously unaware. In 'White Gold', Giles Milton records the appalling details -- gleaned,it appears, from a wealth of historical documents including diaries and letters -- of a seaborne Islamic jihad against Britain which lasted for no less than two centuries. From the early seventeenth to nineteenth centuries, thousands of British men women and children were kidnapped by Arab corsairs and sold into slavery in Morocco where they...

<p>"In the 32-year history of Focus on the Family, we have offered > prayer, counseling and resource assistance to tens of thousands of > parents and children in the same situation the Palins find themselves > in. We have always encouraged the parents to love and support their > children and always advised the girls to see their pregnancies > through, even though there will of course be challenges along the way. > That is what the Palins are doing and they should be commended for > once again not just talking about their pro-life and pro-family > values, but in living them out even in the midst of trying circumstances. > > "Being a Christian does not mean you're perfect. Nor does it mean that > your children are perfect. But it does mean that there is forgiveness > and restoration when we confess our imperfections to the Lord. I've > been the beneficiary of that forgiveness and restoration in my own > life countless times, as I'm sure the Palins have." > > "The media is already trying to spin this as evidence that Gov. Palin > is a 'hypocrite,' but all it really means is that she and her family are human. > They are in my prayers and those of millions of Americans."</p>

"My friend was stopped at a checkpoint on the road to Irbil from Baghdad. The people in the car had to show their ID cards to the masked men. "They could see she was Christian from her name. They dragged her from the car, pushed her to her knees and put a gun to her head. "They told her to convert to Islam, or die. She refused and started praying out loud. But they did not kill her, not straight away. They raped her and then she was shot in the head." Pascale (her name and the names of her...

At this point, you almost have to feel sorry for the Christian right. The movement’s most famous leaders are dead or fading from view. It’s stuck with a presidential candidate who barely goes to church. It’s losing gay marriage court cases left and right. Yet still, its ideological opponents are bent on discovering new corners of American life that conservative Christians have single-handedly destroyed. ... There is a “Christian right” as Herzog seems to intend it. These are the minority of evangelicals who attend church at least weekly. These are the people who do save themselves until marriage, who do...

Even when hit between the eyes with the truth of Obama's extreme views on abortion, he still has much of the black Christian vote. I am amazed at the 'kill the messenger' anger at me from fellow black Christians for bringing up the subject. It is as if putting a black in the White House in 2008 trumps morality and Christian values. Consider the sin of idolatry of “race”. In Illinois, when a baby is born alive surviving abortion, it STILL has no right to life. Some infants are denied medical assistance and left to die. One death took almost...

The group that has led opposition to gay marriage says it will not participate in a petition drive to block out-of-state, same-sex couples from being married in Massachusetts. The Massachusetts Family Institute said "there is no winning on this issue" because thousands of marriages will have taken place before the proposed ballot question could go to voters in November 2010. A group called MassResistance is organizing the petition drive to reinstate a 1913 law that bars the state from marrying a couple if the marriage is illegal in their home state. First, organizers must collect 33,297 signatures from registered voters...

Our Islamic "allies" continue to show their true face to us. The centuries long persecution of the Coptic Christians of Egypt continues, but Muslims do not say a word about it. They only want to silence those that do speak out against this persecution. As for our leaders.....Bush, Condi.....any comments? I thought not. At the end of the article I have posted a video showing just how badly the Christians in Egypt have it.

Arab Racism According to the literal Arabic translation of Sura 3:106, 107, on Judgment Day, only people with white faces will be saved. People with black faces will be damned. http://www.bible.ca/islam/islam-koran-fairy-tales-dr-morey.htm  Arabs are the chosen people of Allah; Allah resembles an Arab.–ibn Sa’d, vol.1, p.2. Allah favours Arab racism—prophet is to be of Quraysh stock and of white complexion (ibn Sa’d, vol.1, p.95-96, Sahih Muslim, 20.4483. http://frontpagemag.com/Articles/Read.aspx?GUID=2297E37D-87C3-492E-8E5D-1808AF77F703  The Quran and hadiths all say kill non muslims. Sura 8:12 says cut off the heads and Sura 9:1-30 says kill them. Sura 8:60 says Jews and Christians are apes and pigs....

... Next, Harrison looks at definitions of fascism. The phenomenon is not confined to the political Right, since the USSR was as fascist as the Third Reich. Nor is it absent in the Third World. The inability to distinguish between people and their leaders is a fallacy often made by patronising Western intellectuals. As for the [racist Arabs'] accusation that Israel is a "racist, apartheid" state, the author argues that it is instead a nearly textbook example of a multicultural society. There are Black Israelis and Arab Jews and anyone can convert to Judaism. In Israel the holy places and...

Arab Muslim Palestinians' Persecution of Christians DHIMMITUDE, ISLAMIC APARTHEIDArab "Palestinian" Christians have been suffering and STILL suffer from Arab "Palestinian" Muslim majority.Just like the Arab Christian Lebanese in "Damour" (Yasir Arafat´s Planned Christian Genocide http://www.chretiens-et-juifs.org/article.php?voir%5B%5D=594&voir%5B%5D=3532 , Hobeika - Damour http://www.free-lebanon.com/LFPNews/hobeika_damour/hobeika_damour.html), where "Palestinian" Muslims massacred Christians senselessly, which brought the reprisal by Arab Christians upon Arab "Palestinian" Muslims in Sabra & shatila. The Islamization of Bethlehem that has started by Yasser Arafat has forced Christians out.The "Palestinian" Christians are forced to join the senseless criminal violence against Israeli victims, otherwise they are threatened. Some Arab "Palestinians" that might be Christian won't...

Pressure Intensifies for Gaza Christians - Christian World News ...Aug 1, 2008 ... Islamic extremists are continuing efforts to eradicate Christians and their institutions.

An ancient monastery adjacent to where, according to Christian tradition, Jesus ate the Last Supper, has turned into a legal battleground for Catholics and Jews. Last week the High Court of Justice issued a temporary restraining order halting construction work by a Jewish organization in a Franciscan monastery on Jerusalem's Mount Zion adjacent to the Cenaculum, the Latin term for the room where the Last Supper was held. The court also issued an order preventing the Jewish organization - the Institute for the Study of the Family and Family Laws in Israel - from moving people in to live in...

Brigitte Gabriel, a Lebanese Christian immigrant to the United States and author of an anti-Muslim tirade "They Must Be Stopped", is the latest example of a publishing phenomenon that digs up women from Middle Eastern backgrounds or Muslim countries who know how to wear cocktail dresses and uses them as mouthpieces for racist and xenophobic beliefs that don't get much of a hearing when spouted by angry white men.

JAKARTA, Indonesia — Hundreds of Christian theology students have been living in tents since a mob of angry Muslim neighbors stormed their campus last month wielding bamboo spears and hurling Molotov cocktails.

On Sunday (August 17) a Muslim mob stormed a church service in Cipayung, East Jakarta, forcing Christians to flee and then erecting banners in the street declaring a ban on “churches and religious services.” As about 20 church members were celebrating the nation’s Independence Day at the service, the angry assailants arrived at the Pentecostal Church of Indonesia in Pondok Rangon village, Cipayung, at 9:30 a.m. shouting “Allahu Akbar!” or “God is greater!” Some in the mob were neighbors, but the majority were not local residents, according to pastor Chris Ambessa. Church members tried to close the gate leading into...

The same California Supreme Court that created a "right" to homosexual "marriage" earlier this year has now ruled that the state may force healthcare professionals to provide services that support an immoral and physically dangerous lifestyle. California's highest court was unanimous in its decision on Monday that Christian doctors may not refuse to perform artificial insemination for homosexual patients. (See "California court says no religious exemption for doctors") Attorney Brad Dacus, president of the Pacific Justice Institute (PJI), reacts to the ruling. "This is a clear violation of the fundamental rights of individuals to live and practice their faith," he...

Editor’s Note: Stephen Bloom is a Christian attorney with more than 20 years experience in private practice. He is a frequent media guest, speaker, and writer on Christianity and the law, a Lecturer in Management and Business at Messiah College, and a Consultant to the United Methodist Stewardship Foundation of Central Pennsylvania. He is a legal columnist for Good News Daily, former host of the "Practical Counsel - Christian Perspective" radio program, and founder of the Estate Planning Council of Cumberland County. Bloom has been actively involved in the leadership of numerous community and ministry organizations, including his church, where...

Islam is using the ideological approach to acculturate its belief system into main stream America. Of course, like most ideologies, Islam is using America’s public schools as its springboard for indoctrinating America’s children. By introducing Islam to students in their mandated curriculums, the next generation of Americans could possibly be pro-Islam in their belief system. However, since Islam is a religion and a political ideology, why is the United States government permitting this indoctrination to occur in America’s public schools? Even though some people promote the idea of the separation of church and state in America, the concept is not...

San Francisco calls the Catholic Church's teachings hateful, defamatory and insensitive.The liberal 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals will decide whether a scathing anti-Catholic resolution from the San Francisco Board of Supervisors is unconstitutional. The resolution, passed unanimously in 2006, accused the Vatican of operating as a "foreign country" and called the Church's teachings "hateful," "defamatory," "insensitive," "ignorant" and "insulting to all San Franciscans." It was issued in response to the Church's requirement that adoptive children be brought up by families with a mom and dad. "They’re condemning the Catholic Church as 'hateful' and 'harmful,' and that is clearly a...

The recent headlines about the legalization of gay marriage in California and the efforts to reverse that decision have left me dismayed. I may be in the minority among my fellow Christians, but I find myself increasingly ashamed by the words and actions of the leaders of the religious right. Why are so many squandering precious time in an attempt to outlaw gay marriage? We could be putting our efforts for God to much better use! There are far more pressing issues the world is facing today. It should not be the priority of so many to prevent two men...

BEIJING, China (CNN) -- Four members of a Christian group from the United States are refusing to leave an airport in China after authorities confiscated their 300 Bibles, the group's director said Monday. The four members of Vision Beyond Borders -- based in Sheridan, Wyoming -- arrived in the southwestern Chinese city of Kunming on Sunday. Customs officials discovered the Bibles during an X-ray scan of their luggage, said Pat Klein, director of the group, which supplies Bibles and other Christian material to people in China and other countries. Under Chinese law, it is illegal to bring printed religious material...

CASTEL GANDOLFO, Italy — Pope Benedict on Sunday decried the rise of racism in some countries and urged Christians to help society combat intolerance toward foreigners."One of humanity's greatest conquests has been, precisely, the overcoming of racism," Benedict told pilgrims and tourists at his summer residence in Castel Gandolfo, near Rome."Unfortunately, however, in several countries new, worrisome displays" of racism are manifesting themselves, the pontiff said.Benedict said that while racism is "often tied to social and economic problems," those factors "can never justify contempt or racial discrimination."The Pope didn't cite any country by name. Instead, he urged Christians to help...

Chinese customs officials confiscated more than 300 Bibles on Sunday from four American Christians who arrived in a southwestern city with plans to distribute them, the group's leader said. --snip-- "I heard that there's freedom of religion in China, so why is there a problem for us to bring Bibles?" Klein said. "We had over 300 copies and customs took all of them from us."

Solzhenitsyn's Warning The faculty of Harvard University admired Alexandr Solzhenitsyn for his literary achievements, so they were thrilled that he agreed to deliver the university’s 1978 commencement address. But almost as soon as he began to speak, the professors changed their minds: too late. As I wrote this month in Christianity Today, they realized that Solzhenitsyn was charging them with complicity in the West’s surrender to liberal secularism, the abandonment of its Christian heritage, and of all the moral horrors that followed. For example, describing the Western worldview as “rationalistic humanism,” Solzhenitsyn decried the loss of “our concept of...

Mosab Hassan Yousef is an extraordinary young man with an extraordinary story. He was born the son of one of the most influential leaders of the militant Hamas organization in the West Bank and grew up in a strict Islamic family. Now, at 30 years old, he attends an evangelical Christian church, Barabbas Road in San Diego, Calif. He renounced his Muslim faith, left his family behind in Ramallah and is seeking asylum in the United States. The story of how his life unfolded is truly amazing, whether you agree or disagree with his views. Below is a transcript on...

West Virginia started Friday keeping driver's license photos out of a computer database for members of a small religious group who believe digital storage is a "mark of the beast" that evokes biblical prophecy. State Division of Motor Vehicles Commissioner Joseph Cicchirillo said the group of about 50 or 60 Christians, who are not affiliated with a particular church, contacted the agency two or three years ago to object to their pictures "being on a database that can be exchanged throughout the world or hacked into." One of the group members is Phil Hudok, who made headlines in 1999 when...

A moment before beginning his supper, Masab, son of West Bank Hamas leader Sheikh Hassan Yousef, glances at the friend who has accompanied him to the restaurant where we met. They whisper a few words and then say grace, thanking God and Jesus for putting food on their plates. It takes a few seconds to digest this sight: The son of a Hamas MP who is also the most popular figure in that extremist Islamic organization, a young man who assisted his father for years in his political activities, has become a rank-and-file Christian. "I'm now called Joseph," he says...

At approximately 11 AM local time, three American Christians were arrested in Tiananmen Square. The three arrested are Rev. Patrick J. Mahoney, Director of the Washington DC based Christian Defense Coalition; Brandi Swindell of Boise Idaho, National Director of Generation Life; and Michael McMonagle, of Philadelphia, national Catholic pro-life activist and founder of Generation Life. The same three Americans were also arrested yesterday while holding a banner and speaking out against China's religious persecution. While in custody Rev. Patrick J. Mahoney, Director of the Christian Defense Coalition, said, "We were in Tiananmen Square publicly praying for the people of China...

Alexander Solzhenitsyn's anti-Sovietism was heroic and influential, but its other side became clearer upon the Union's collapse. The death of the literary colossus and anti-Soviet dissident has, quite rightly, been greeted with an outpouring of praise for his principled and brave unmasking of the horrors of the Soviet regime. His literary achievements, closely connected with his dissident activities, have also justifiably received much attention. But there is another side to Solzhenitsyn – one which most obituaries have mentioned only in passing, if at all. Solzhenitsyn's analysis of Soviet communism was based on the notion that the Bolsheviks imposed a totalitarian...

MILLVILLE - It was something she felt was remarkable at the time, as she and the rest of the congregation filed in behind him in the small church and left the general public standing on the lawn waiting for him to emerge again. When Alexander Solzhenitsyn visited Millville and the St. Nicholas Old Russian Orthodox Church in 1976, his message, delivered in Russian to a crowd of between 50 and 70 congregants, was about culture, pride in religion and maintaining the existence of that which was threatened by the Western world. The Nobel Prize-winning author who provided firsthand accounts of...

Christian leaders gathered in Denver Tuesday in opposition to an anti-Christian censorship law that could open the door to censoring the Bible. Colorado Gov. Bill Ritter signed the state bill, SB 200, which aims at silencing all publications that discriminate against homosexuality. "Section 8 of Senate Bill 200 is a wide open door for any judge to censor anything that condemns homosexuality, including Scripture," Colorado State Rep. Kevin Lundberg said. Many Christians fear that one day the Bible will be considered illegal in America. "I do believe that the Bible is banned, under the plain language of this new statute,"...

W ho is a Christian? It seems like a simple question, but when I typed my inquiry into Google earlier this week, the answer came back in 20 million hits, each of them a little different from the other. I've always understood a Christian to be someone who believes Jesus was who he said he was and tries to live the way Jesus said to live. Period. But there are many people who find that answer lacking, apparently. What got me thinking about this question was a recent commentary by the syndicated columnist Cal Thomas, based in part on an...

More than a dozen Christians in Saudi Arabia who were accused by government officials of worshipping in their homes have been ordered deported. According to a report from International Christian Concern, the Christians will be expelled tomorrow for one specific home worship service in Taif in April.

..the closest AP's Douglas Birch came to mentioning the late Alexander Solzhenitsyn's Christian faith was by remarking how the bearded author and Soviet dissident looked like a religious icon: In a 1978 speech at Harvard ** Solzhenitsyn denounced the Western view that liberal democracy was fated to triumph in non-Western civilizations, which he called "worlds" unto themselves. ..in that speech-"A World Split Apart"-Baptist theologian Albert Mohler argues, that Solzhenitsyn famously diagnosed secularism as a disease corrupting the West and, what's more, he did so thoroughly anchored in his Orthodox Christian faith (emphasis mine): *** Solzhenitsyn railed against the secularism and...

Obama cynically criticize White Christian groups helping in the Katrina rebuild. Obama implies white Christian aren't good enough to help and says there is a difference between Christians based on their skin color.

During lunch 18 months ago, Dr. Ben Johnson had an epiphany as Dr. Aisha Jumaan, a Muslim, spoke to him about her faith and her experience of God. "It came to me that this woman loves and worships the same God I do," says Johnson, a Christian. "I had this sharpened awareness that in that moment she was in touch with God, just as I was. It was a dawning and an awakening, and it was liberating because it liberates you from standing on a pedestal and looking down on someone else." It also inspired Johnson to take on a...

Thank you. Deacon Jones said I would cry. You bet your life I'm going to cry. You bet your life I'm going to cry. You bet your life, I will. That's my boy. That's my boy right there. It ain't this in that. It's that [son]. Thank God. What a great day. What a great day. I want to thank the committee, the selection committee, the ones who put me up here, some men and women that watched my career over those 20 seasons and said he should be here and he should be here now. Thank you, guys, and...

“Send regards to Israel, I miss it. I respect Israel and admire it as a country,” - these words are not something you would expect to hear from a Palestinian, let alone someone who grew up in the family that has led the radical and terrorist Islamic ideology of Hamas. But these are the words coming from non other than Masab Yousef - son of one of the leaders of Hamas in the West Bank, Sheikh Hassan Yousef. Masab Yousef - a Christian convert now living in California - in an interview with Israeli newspaper Ha’aretz talks about the “bottom...

Evangelicals: Change of Heart toward Catholics Evangelicals have been going through a major change of heart in their view of Catholicism over the past 15 years or so. In the 80’s when I was in college I lived in the Biblebelt and had plenty of experience with Evangelicals–much of it bad experience. The 80’s was the height of the “Are you saved?� question. In Virginia, the question often popped up in the first 10 minutes of getting to know someone. As I look back, Isurmise that this was coached from the pulpit or Sunday school as it was so well...

As I surf the net I see many Christians standing up for the ideology of Islam. Most of them have not done any research on Islam. They have been told by Muslims, that Islam is a religion of peace. Well if that were true then why are Christians and Jews being persecuted across the Islamic world?

Barack Obama wanted the world to know that he can pray like a Christian. Thus, he penned a ‘note to God' on stationery from the King David Hotel in Jerusalem, and he generously gave a copy to the "international media even before he put in the Kotel, a short time after he wrote it at the King David Hotel." Thus says the Ma'ariv spokesman in defense of his newspaper, which may be the subject of a criminal investigation for publishing the ‘note to God' which Obama gave to the paper. For, interestingly, not only Ma'ariv was a recipient of Obama's...

I'll be the first to admit it: evangelicals can be gullible. That's odd given the Good Book's admonition to trust no man. "Beware lest anyone cheat you through philosophy and empty deceit, according to the tradition of men," writes Paul (Colossians 2:8, NKJV). That verse appears to have fallen on deaf ears when it comes to Barack Obama. Mesmerized by the kid from Honolulu, some evangelicals, particularly young "moderates," are tempted to break ranks and defect to the Obama bandwagon. At least, that's what media pundits would have us believe. Polls still show that conservative Christians favor McCain, but Obama...

Israel’s Ministry of Interior has decided to reinstate an old regulation that is threatening to cripple, if not shut down, several Christian ministries by limiting the time volunteers can spend serving in Israel to 27 months. The ruling was as sudden as it was drastic. The effects began to be felt earlier this month when three volunteers from Christian Friends of Israel, assuming their visas would be renewed at the Interior Ministry under the previous five-year agreement, were instead told they had two weeks to pack up and leave the country.

Iraq's Christians have taken up arms and formed new militias in a desperate effort to defend their beleaguered communities from an onslaught by Islamic extremists. link: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/religion/2463208/Iraqs-Christians-form-new-militias-to-combat-Islamic-extremists.html

Iraq's Christians have taken up arms and formed new militias in a desperate effort to defend their beleaguered communities from an onslaught by Islamic extremists. In the five years since the Anglo-American invasion of 2003, murders and abductions have driven about half of the 800,000 Christians who once lived in Iraq to flee the country. Checkpoints manned by civilians armed with heavy machine guns and assault rifles have received official backing in Christian villages on the Ninevah plain in northern Iraq, where their presence dates back to the missions of St Thomas the apostle. Father Yusuf Yohannes combines the duties...

Textbook Terrorism: Islamofascism INVESTOR'S BUSINESS DAILY Posted 7/24/2008 Islamofascism: A new study confirms our "ally" Saudi Arabia is still poisoning young Muslim minds with anti-Western textbooks. So? Its hate-filled graduates are enrolling at our colleges. ...despite promised reforms, the kingdom still teaches students to "hate the infidels." The texts assert that it's "permissible" for a Muslim to kill an "apostate," an "adulterer," a "homosexual," as well as non-Muslims practicing "polytheism," or Christianity. The violent ideology is introduced in a religion textbook in the first grade and reinforced and developed in following years of the public education system, culminating in the...