Duke Students Boycott 'Pornographic' Reading Assignment

A group of students at Duke University have refused to read a book assigned to all new students, saying the graphic novel's depictions of sexuality "compromised" their religious beliefs.

Fun Home was selected as "shared experience" reading for the Class of 2019 at the North Carolina university.

The novel is an autobiography of Alison Bechdel, a lesbian, whose father was a closeted gay man.

But some have taken issue with the novel's depiction of sex and nudity.

"I feel as if I would have to compromise my personal Christian moral beliefs to read it," student Brian Grasso wrote in a post to fellow students on Facebook.

Other students called the graphic novel, which inspired a Tony-winning musical, "pornographic".

The debate comes as US universities continue to grapple with students who disagree with assignments or lectures because of their religious or political beliefs.

Some activists have pushed for universities to use "trigger warnings" to alert students about provocative content.

Duke's Vice President for Public Affairs and Government Relations Michael Schoenfeld said the assignment is voluntary and the book was selected by a panel of students and staff members.

"Fun Home was ultimately chosen because it is a unique and moving book that transcends genres and explores issues that students are likely to confront," Mr Schoenfeld told the Daily Dot website. But he added that "with a class of 1,750 new students from around the world, it would be impossible to find a single book that that did not challenge someone's way of thinking".

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Flooding, Landslides Hit Vast Area of Burma; Christians Denied Aid

Many villagers in Burma are still afloat in boats ferrying vital supplies for survival amid floodwaters, while others are returning to homes and fields sealed in mud. 

The recent flooding has caused damage across a wider area than 2008's Cyclone Nargis, which killed more than 140,000 people and is regarded as the worst natural disaster in Burma's recorded history. 

"Despite Cyclone Nargis being the worse disaster ever in the nation, it was a localized event in that it only affected the Irrawaddy Delta," said the native director of a ministry based in Burma, David (surname withheld for security reasons). "There is a different face to this flood in that it is spread out almost across the entire western half of the nation. It covers three of the four regions known as the 'rice bowl' of Myanmar." 

Unlike Nargis, the flood from rains beginning in July has been gradual, giving residents time to escape, he said. At least 103 people have died. 

"There are surprisingly low casualties, but huge damage to farmland and animals and properties," he said. 

More monsoon rains are expected, and landslides continue to cut transportation routes and crush homes. Familiar with the submerged terrain and its inhabitants, indigenous missionaries sharing in their pain are in prime position to help. 

"Many of the worst affected regions are where we have worked for the past nine years," David said. "I know the region well, and several of the churches planted are in those areas. In one of our sister congregations, we have 28 families who lost their home either in part or whole." 

Heavy monsoon downpours began swelling rivers and creeks in Burma on July 16. A storm system in the Indian Ocean on July 30 was upgraded to a cyclone – a hurricane in the northern Indian Ocean – and dubbed Komen. Cyclone Komen tore into Burma the first week of August. Some 1.2 million acres of rice fields were destroyed as flooding hit all but two of Burma's 14 states and reportedly destroyed at least 17,000 homes. So far flooding has "critically affected" more than 1 million people, according to the United Nations, which in 2008 said Cyclone Nargis had "severely affected" 1.5 million people. 

Continued, here.

ISIS Enshrines a Theology of Rape

QADIYA, Iraq — In the moments before he raped the 12-year-old girl, the Islamic State fighter took the time to explain that what he was about to do was not a sin. Because the preteen girl practiced a religion other than Islam, the Quran not only gave him the right to rape her — it condoned and encouraged it, he insisted.

He bound her hands and gagged her. Then he knelt beside the bed and prostrated himself in prayer before getting on top of her.

When it was over, he knelt to pray again, bookending the rape with acts of religious devotion.

“I kept telling him it hurts — please stop,” said the girl, whose body is so small an adult could circle her waist with two hands. “He told me that according to Islam he is allowed to rape an unbeliever. He said that by raping me, he is drawing closer to God,” she said in an interview alongside her family in a refugee camp here, to which she escaped after 11 months of captivity.

The systematic rape of women and girls from the Yazidi religious minority has become deeply enmeshed in the organization and the radical theology of the Islamic State in the year since the group announced it was reviving slavery as an institution. Interviews with 21 women and girls who recently escaped the Islamic State, as well as an examination of the group’s official communications, illuminate how the practice has been enshrined in the group’s core tenets.

Continued

Report: ISIS Shifts Gears, Readies To Take More Syrian Cities From Assad

As Turkey and the United States jointly conduct airstrikes aimed at eliminating the influence of ISIS, the terrorist group has begun to relocate its troops in an attempt to capture cities where neither Kurds nor rival jihadi ground troops are a threat– towns still officially in control of the Syrian government.

According to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a UK-based watchdog group, Islamic State jihadis are being moved into Deir Ezzor, a central Syrian city by the Euphrates River far from the Turkish and Iraqi borders. The group’s report claims “large numbers of foreign fighters are weapons” have moved there in order to solidify their hold on the town, with a few neighborhoods still nominally under control of President Bashar al-Assad.

The move follows a weekend in which ISIS appeared to be bouncing back from attacks by a campaign jointly under control of Turkey and the United States. Turkey began conducting airstrikes in Syria and Iraq last month, though the government has been accused of using its force to weaken the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), an enemy terrorist group to ISIS, more than it has fought ISIS itself. The United States begun striking ISIS targets with manned aircraft flying out of Turkey on August 12, the Pentagon confirmed.

Despite this campaign, however, Chinese state news outlet Xinhua reported that a major offensive by the terrorist group resulted in up to 50 Syrian rebels killed in Aleppo province, bordering Syria. The rebels were believed to be aligned with the the al-Shaitaat tribe who, while Sunni Muslims, have resisted Islamic State advances since the terrorist group first arrived in their region.

The Islamic State also took hold of the town of Umm Housh in Aleppo, which Arutz Sheva notes is “along a rebel supply line from Turkey. “ISIS is trying to seize control of these villages from rebels to cut their supply route between Aleppo city and its outskirts, and the town of Azaz,” Rami Abdel Rahman, the head of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, explained.

The advances of Turkey and the United States appear to have changed the Islamic State’s strategy from moving closer to Turkey and taking on Kurdish-protected towns directly to attempting to conquer towns held by independent rebels or regions controlled by al-Assad piecemeal. Another development that has served to benefit ISIS is the announcement by the al-Nusra Front, an Al Qaeda subgroup, that they would cease to operate in the “ISIS-free area” Turkey is attempting to create in Syria. Nusra spokesmen objected to the Turkish government’s military advance, accusing Ankara of being more invested in “Turkey’s national security” than in toppling Assad, the Nusra Front’s main objective. Al Qaeda and ISIS are rival jihadi groups.

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Nigeria: Suicide Bomber Kills Six in Church Attack

A suicide bomber killed six people at a church in northeast Nigeria on Sunday at the end of a week in which suspected Boko Haram insurgents killed more than 200 people.

The spate of bloodletting prompted renewed international outrage and French President Francois Hollande said he was ready to hold a summit with regional leaders to coordinate the fight against Boko Haram.

The blast in Potiskum in Yobe state on Sunday came after an attack on the capital of neighboring Borno state on Friday, deadly raids in three towns during the week and suicide bombings along a highway.

President Muhammadu Buhari said the murder of up to 150 Kukawa residents near Lake Chad on Wednesday by Boko Haram was a "heinous atrocity". Several people who attended burials there, including a senior government official, said 147 bodies, including 22 children, had been interred.

Also last week in Borno, about 50 people were shot dead in nearby Monguno, 12 men were killed in a raid on Miringa and two suicide bombers killed another 10 alongside a highway.

"DEVASTATE AND DECAPITATE"
The Defence Ministry said six suicide bombers had blown themselves up during the attack on the outskirts of Maiduguri on Friday, killing a soldier and "scores" of civilians.

The army said it recovered a jeep packed with explosives after repulsing the attack.
New president Buhari vowed to crush Boko Haram when he was sworn in on May 29. But the insurgents have stepped up their attacks, despite losing huge chunks of territory this year to soldiers from Nigeria, Cameroon,Chad and Niger.

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ISIS Massacres Hundreds in Palmyra

Syrian state TV says about 400 civilians were massacred since Wednesday. Other reports say most of the victims were Shabiha militiamen.

The Islamic State (aka ISIS) group has reportedly murdered hundreds of people after seizing the ancient town of Palmyra (Tadmor) last week. The organization seized full control of the town Wednesday.

Syrian state TV has reported that about 400 civilians were massacred by the group since Wednesday, while activists in Palmyra said that ISIS fighters hunted down President Bashar al-Assad's troops and loyalists, killing up to 300 of them.

Nasser, of the Palmyra Media Center – a monitoring group on the ground – told Al Jazeera that most of those murdered were Syrian government troops captured by the fighters after taking over the town.

"Shabiha (a term used to describe a state-sponsored militia), including men and women, were the ones targeted and killed," he said.

Meanwhile, the Syrian military is deploying troops in areas near Palmyra in an apparent preparation for a counter-attack to retake it.

Talal Barazi, the governor of the central province of Homs, which includes Palmyra, confirmed to the Associated Press on Sunday that government forces intend to launch a counter-attack. "There are plans, but we don't know when the zero hour for a military act in Palmyra [sic]," Barazi said.

The capture of Palmyra has stoked fears that ISIS might try to destroy the well-preserved, 2,000-year-old Roman-era city on the town's edge – as they have destroyed other archaeological treasures in Syria and Iraq.

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Muslims Demand Turkey Convert Hagia Sophia Into Mosque

Breitbart.com reports: “A large rally in Istanbul demanded the government change the historic Hagia Sophia church, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, into a mosque. The Humanitarian Relief Foundation (İHH) led the rally through the Sultanahmet district.  Many people carried signs that said, ‘Hagia Sophia needs to be reopened as a mosque’ and ‘Let our lives be sacrificed for Islam.’  The idea to change the church into a mosque begun to gain momentum in April after Pope Francis recognized the slaying of 1.5 million Armenians as genocide. Liam Deacon at Breitbart London chronicled the history of Hagia Sophia. The Ottoman Empire did convert the church into a mosque in 1453. After the empire fell, the new Turkish government transformed it into a secular museum.  ‘Frankly, I believe that the Pope’s remarks will only accelerate the process for Hagia Sophia to be reopened for [Muslim] worship,’ Professor Hizli, a senior government cleric, said in a written statement on April 15th.  He decried the Pope’s comments as a ‘modern reflection of the crusader wars launched in these lands for centuries,’ and suggested that Turkey’s role as a ‘standard bearer’ for the Muslim world provoked criticism from non-Muslims.  The latest blow was using the church to celebrate Islam during Easter holy week…”

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Turkey, U.S. sign deal to train, equip Islamists against Syria

Turkey will provide an equal number of trainers to work alongside their American military counterparts, said an official at the U.S. military’s Central Command.

Reuters said that the agreement is “to train and equip Syrian moderates to fight the Islamic State.” Yet, the same Reuters report said, “Turkey hopes the training will also bolster the weakened and divided Syrian opposition in their war against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.”

It is highly doubtful that these “moderate” Islamists will fight the Islamic State (ISIS). In fact, according to WorldNetDaily,“moderate” Syrian rebels trained in 2012 by U.S. military instructors later joined the Islamic State.

WorldNetDaily was first to report the U.S., Turkey and Jordan were running a training base for the Syrian rebels in Jordan in 2012 and 2013. Again, the same Jordan will train similar Islamists.

Why use an alleged war against ISIS to expand training for Islamists who eventually join ISIS? Reuters said that Saudi Arabia also offered a site for such training. Saudi Arabia is notorious for its total ban on Christianity. In contrast, Syria, whose president the U.S., Turkey and Saudi Arabia want to overthrow, has been known for its tolerance for a Christian community that has existed in Syria for 2,000 years.

U.S.-supported Syrian rebels have been known for atrocities against Christians in Syria.

It seems that a bigger Republican presence in the U.S. Congress has increased pressure to support these “moderate” Islamists fighting Assad.

Even though Obama, the Republicans and the mainstream media insist on calling these Islamic rebels “moderate,” Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan was forthright:“The term ‘moderate Islam’ is ugly and offensive — Islam is Islam.”

Actually, if the Syrian rebels were “moderate,” Saudi Arabia would never support them. William Murray, president of the Religious Freedom Coalition, said“the only way to stop the tide of Islamic terror in the Middle East and the world is to shut down the funding state of that terror, Saudi Arabia.”

Turkey would never train Syrian rebels to fight ISIS. According to WorldNetDaily, Turkey backs ISIS to eliminate Assad. And Pat Buchanan, a former Reagan adviser, told in WorldNetDaily: “Depose Assad, welcome Muslim Brotherhood.”

Because of the extreme violence, rapes and slaughters against Syrian Christians by Syrian rebels, CBNNews said in a headline: “Syrian Christians: “Why Is America at War with Us””

You can ask on behalf of these Christians:

Why Is Obama at War with Syrian Christians?

Why Are Republicans at War with Syrian Christians?

If the U.S. were serious about a real war against ISIS, it would not be helping Turkey and Saudi Arabia to overthrow Assad, the only Islamic dictator in the Middle East who is fighting ISIS and protecting Christian minorities.

If the U.S. were serious about a real war against ISIS, it would be helping to overthrow Islamic dictatorships in Turkey and Saudi Arabia.

The U.S.-Turkey agreement to expand training of Islamists in Syria will only expand persecution against Christians.

What can you do? If you are an American Christian, you have a responsibility to speak up, because your tax money is being used to fund U.S. military trainers and their Islamist trainees against Syria. Because of these wicked policies, there is blood in the hands of American taxpayers. The Obama administration, with Republican assistance, makes your tax-money an accessory to the murder of Christians.

Contact right now your representative and senator and say: “I do not want my money shedding Christian blood in Syria! Please, stop it!”

Because this is an international crisis involving Syrian Christians and their families, international Christians can also help by contacting the members of U.S. Congress to condemn Turkey for its support for ISIS and Syrian rebels and condemn Saudi Arabia for its blatant anti-Christian ban.

You can contact the U.S. House of Representatives: http://www.house.gov/

You can also contact the U.S. Senate: http://www.senate.gov/

The U.S. Congress should also be encouraged to praise the Syrian government for being the Muslim government that most protects Christian minorities in the Middle East.

If the U.S. wants to defeat ISIS, it should sign an agreement with Syria. If the U.S. wants nothing to do with Syria, it should do as President James Madison said, “To cherish peace and friendly intercourse with all nations having correspondent dispositions; to maintain sincere neutrality toward belligerent nations and to exclude foreign intrigues and foreign partialities.”

If it is hard for a Christian America to support Syria for the sake of persecuted Christians, it should be impossible for her to support Turkey or Saudi Arabia.

Turkey was responsible for the worst genocide against Christians in the 20th century.

Saudi Arabia has a total ban on Christianity.

America should have a total ban on agreements with both radical Islamic nations.

 

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Judicial Watch: Defense, State Department Documents Reveal Obama Administration Knew that al Qaeda Terrorists Had Planned Benghazi Attack 10 Days in Advance

(Washington, DC) – Judicial Watch announced today that it obtained more than 100 pages of previously classified “Secret” documents from the Department of Defense (DOD)and the Department of State revealing that DOD almost immediately reported that the attack on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi was committed by the al Qaeda and Muslim Brotherhood-linked “Brigades of the Captive Omar Abdul Rahman” (BCOAR), and had been planned at least 10 days in advance. Rahman is known as the Blind Sheikh, and is serving life in prison for his involvement in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing and other terrorist acts. The new documents also provide the first official confirmation that shows the U.S. government was aware of arms shipments from Benghazi to Syria. The documents also include an August 2012 analysis warning of the rise of ISIS and the predicted failure of the Obama policy of regime change in Syria.

The documents were released in response to a court order in accordance with a May 15, 2014, Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit filed against both the DOD and State Department seeking communications between the two agencies and congressional leaders “on matters related to the activities of any agency or department of the U.S. government at the Special Mission Compound and/or classified annex in Benghazi.”

Continued

Iraqi Christian Leader Denied US Visa

Religious freedom activists are calling on the US State Department to reverse its decision to deny a visa to an influential Iraqi Christian leader, Sister Diana Momeka, who planned to visit the US this spring to advocate for persecuted Christians in the Middle East.

Today, Johnnie Moore, co-chair of the 21 Martyrs Campaign, and Samuel Rodriquez, president of the NHCLC/CONEL, a large association of Hispanic Christians, issued the call after the organization's conference in Texas this week. Momeka was to be a member of a delegation of Iraqi religious leaders visiting Washington, DC.

“Sister Momeka is a gift to the world and a humanitarian whose work reminded me—when I met her in Iraq—of Mother Teresa,” said Moore, author of Defying ISIS and a key partner with the 21 Martyrs Campaign, created following the beheadings of 21 Coptic Christians in Libya earlier this year. "It is incomprehensible to me that the State Department would not be inviting Momeka on an official visit to the United States, as opposed to barring her from entry.”

Nina Shea of the Hudson Institute was also critical of the decision. In an online commentary, she wrote, “Earlier this week, we learned that every member of an Iraqi delegation of minority groups, including representatives of the Yazidi and Turkmen Shia religious communities, has been granted visas to come for official meetings in Washington—save one.

“The single delegate whose visitor visa was denied happens to be the group’s only Christian from Iraq. Sister Diana Momeka of the Dominican Sisters of Saint Catherine of Siena was informed on Tuesday by the US consulate in Erbil that her non-immigrant-visa application has been rejected.” Shea said the nun told her that her status as a displaced person was the reason she was given for the visa denial.

Chris Seiple, head of the Institute for Global Engagement, had hoped to assist Momeka during her US visit. Seiple posted on Facebook, “In the same week that the State Deptment says it will take the engagement of religious leaders seriously (as announced in its quadrennial review two days ago), it refuses a visa to a persecuted Christian nun who has fled ISIS, Sister Diana.”

Momeka was displaced from her home at the hands of ISIS. Some 50,000 other Christians from the Iraqi city of Qaraqosh were also forced to flee. The State Department typically does not comment publicly on individual visa applications. She has visited the United States before, including a trip to Chicago to deliver a commencement address at the Catholic Theological Union in 2012.

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Muslim Congressmen Try to Boot Islam Critic Geert Wilders

WND.com reports: “As one of the world’s most prominent critics of Islam, Dutch lawmaker Geert Wilders doesn’t go anywhere without his security detail of as many as six plainclothes police officers, and he rarely crosses international borders without causing political uproar, having already been banned in Britain at one time.

So it was of little surprise that three U.S. congressmen urged Secretary of State John Kerry and Secretary of Homeland Security Jeh Johnson to deny him a visa ahead of his planned visit to the U.S. this week, due to his alleged ongoing ‘participation in inciting anti-Muslim aggression and violence.’

Reps. Keith Ellison, D-Minn., and André Carson, D-Ind., who both are Muslim, along with Rep. Joe Crowley, D-N.Y., wrote a letter April 23 citing ‘the International Religious Freedom Act which allows the Department of State to deny entry to a foreign leader who is responsible for severe violations of religious freedom.’

Nevertheless, Wilders – who insists he doesn’t hate Muslims but believes Western civilization is threatened by adherents of the Islamic supremacy taught in the Quran – showed up on Capitol Hill Wednesday and spoke at two events at the invitation of Reps. Louie Gohmert, R-Texas, and Steve King, R-Iowa…”

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Islamic State: Militants 'kill 300 Yazidi captives'

BBC News reports: “Several hundred Yazidi captives have been killed in Iraq by Islamic State (IS) militants west of Mosul, Yazidi and Iraqi officials say.

A statement from the Yazidi Progress Party said 300 captives were killed on Friday in the Tal Afar district near the city.

Iraqi Vice-President Osama al-Nujaifi described the reported deaths as ‘horrific and barbaric’.

Thousands of members of the religious minority group were captured last year.

It is not clear how they were killed, or why this has happened now, says the BBC's Middle East editor Alan Johnston.

Many are reported to have been held in Mosul, the main stronghold of IS after the militants swept through large areas of northern and western Iraq, and eastern Syria in 2014.

Yazidis, whose religion includes elements of several faiths, are considered infidels by IS…”

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You're Free to Toke Up. But Don't.

With the recreational use of marijuana now legal in Colorado and Washington (and the Obama administration disinclined to enforce federal laws against it), it's only a matter of time before it is completely legal coast to coast to toke up. This is a great opportunity—not to use pot, but to reflect on the true nature of Christian freedom.

We at Christianity Today believe Christians are absolutely free to use marijuana (where legalized). And, when it comes to pot in our particular cultural context, we think it would be foolish to use that freedom.

Those who grew up with unhealthy legalism in their communities need to hear the apostle Paul's message: Strictures about what to consume or not consume are a sign that we are weak in faith, not that we are strong (Rom. 14:1–12). The one whom the Son sets free is free indeed.

So all things are permitted. But not all things are helpful (1 Cor. 6:12). The Christian's freedom is a gift that leads to serving others, with care, attention, skill, and singleness of heart. It's a freedom that willingly sacrifices easy pleasures in order to serve. And by that standard, it's hard to imagine that pot will be helpful any time soon.

Most ethical decisions, certainly those about food and our bodies, are made not in isolation but in the midst of culture and history—in a community of persons, and within a story. Consider alcohol, a toxic substance for which the human liver serves as a poison control center. Alcoholic beverages are part of many cultures, partly because before modern refrigeration, alcohol's toxicity to bacteria made such beverages far safer to drink.

But alcoholic drinks do not function the same way in every culture. If you are Jewish, you are part of a community with a low propensity to alcoholism. And you are blessed with a rich history into which is woven the gift of wine, one of the glories of human beings' cultivation of the world over millennia. If you are Russian, you are part of a community with a devastating, tragic history of addiction to vodka. What is permitted for a Christian in both cases may be the same. But what is helpful may be radically different.

In our North American context, what is the function of pot? It is associated with superficially pleasant disengagement from the world. It connotes a kind of indolence and "tuning out" that is not an option for people who want to become agents of compassion and neighbor love, not to mention its association with all kinds of immaturity. Are these the eternal truths of pot, the only possible way marijuana can be used? No. But these cultural realities are still relevant for the discerning Christian.

Then there is the question of how Christians' use of marijuana would affect those most susceptible to the idolatries of our culture. A great inequality of our time is between those whose affluence provides plentiful buffer zones for indulging in minor vices without major consequences, and those who are most vulnerable to consumer culture at its worst, tempted to depend on substances to numb the pain of lives robbed of dignity and meaningful work.

Why should Christians flaunt their freedom in matters of such grave consequence for the poor? It is hard to imagine a more direct application of Paul's admonition to the Corinthians: "Be careful, however, that the exercise of your rights does not become a stumbling block to the weak" (1 Cor. 8:9).

Christians despise no created thing. The marijuana plant is a part of a world that was declared good by its Maker every step along the way. But enjoying the world's delights, including its panoply of aromas, flavors, sights, and sounds, must always remain subordinate to image bearing lest it become idolatry. Image bearing involves relationship, so our use and enjoyment of creation should foster relationship. Image bearing invites us to deeper knowledge and mastery of the world, so our use and enjoyment should lead to deeper capacities and competence. Image bearing offers us gifts of attention and skill, the capacity to contribute to "the glory and honor of the nations" (Rev. 21:26).

Is marijuana a cultivated celebration of the created world, one that enhances and sharpens image bearing in all its dimensions? Or does it merely substitute for the consolations and comforts of life lived truly and honestly before God and other people? In our cultural context, the answer seems pretty clear, and the way to true freedom is clear as well.

Andy Crouch is CT executive editor.

Source: Christianity Today

With Children in Foxholes

   

 

In America, I mocked politicians who plundered for votes by shaking hands and plopping kisses on baby’s plump cheeks. Who do they think they’re fooling? Now, after more than a decade of working in Sudan and South Sudan, I’d take those friendly baby-kissing politicians in a heartbeat.

In a region where armed forces drop bombs on the sick and helpless, the leaders don’t clean up their acts and put on a smiling face for elections, which took place last week in Sudan.

President Omar al-Bashir and the governing National Congress Party declined dialogue with the opposition, and he has shown no sign of ceasing the kind of violence that resulted in a 2009 indictment by the International Criminal Court (ICC) for allegedly directing a campaign of mass killing, rape, and pillage against civilians in Darfur. He’s the first sitting president to face such charges.

Al-Bashir has continued his bombing campaign against the rebels, who say their recent offensive is an effort to support election boycotts. Verified attacks in February and March killed 10 people and injured 61 more, including 16 children.

I recently returned from a month-long trip to the Nuba Mountains region of Sudan, where the organization I lead, Make Way Partners, supports an orphanage for 450 children. In my 30 days on the ground, we only had three without bombs.

The day before I left, the kids gathered to sing one last round of songs to celebrate our time together. When they finished, they waited for me to give a final address, reminding them to obey their teachers, do their lessons, and open their hearts to the goodness of God.

Just as they settled down under their school tree to sit and listen, they shot right back up, whirring past me like dervish dust devils. I hadn’t even detected the sound before their stampede, but in the distance, the thunder of Antonov AN24s rolled toward us. The planes sucked up the blue space of sky over our orphanage.

I helped four-year-old Kaka up from being trampled by the bigger kids. I spotted 10-year-old Rabi, whose right leg was blown off by one of these same machines the year before. His single crutch propelled him up the hillside. The staff directed each child into a foxhole, where we stayed as Antonovs circled us for more than an hour.

When they passed out of sight, we called the children out to take shade under nearby trees. When the planes returned, we didn’t have to tell them to dive back in, the thunder told them for us. We had no water, and the 130-degree heat took its toll.

More Martyrs: ISIS Executes Dozens of Ethiopian Christians in Libya

Once again, ISIS has orchestrated and filmed the dramatic mass killing of African Christians who refuse to deny their faith.

This time, the approximately 28 men targeted by the Libya affiliate of the self-proclaimed Islamic State (also known as Daesh) were Ethiopian Christians. In February, the killing of 21 mostly Egyptian Christians drew widespread horror and fears of future massacres, but also led to Egypt's largest Bible outreach.

Describing the 30-minute propaganda video released Sunday, Christian Solidarity Worldwide (CSW) explained:

The exact numbers of victims in the latest incident cannot be confirmed. The video of the executions, entitled “Until there came to them clear evidence”, switches between a scene on a beach in eastern Libya, where an estimated 15 men in orange boiler suits are beheaded by masked militants in camouflage, and a scene in a desert area in southern Libya where similarly dressed Daesh members execute a similar number of men in black boiler suits by shooting them in the head. A subtitle refers to both groups of victims as "worshippers of the cross belonging to the hostile Ethiopian church."

The video also includes scenes depicting the destruction of churches in Syria and Iraq and condemns the doctrine of the Trinity as a form of apostasy. Prior to the executions, an English-speaking masked narrator dressed in black warns that "the nation of the cross" must either embrace Islam, pay the jizya tax or face death.

The New York Times reports more details on the video, as does CNN. Regarding how Mosul Christians were told to convert to Islam or pay a protection tax, the speaker in the video says, "The Christians never cooperated."

 

Continued

US Planes Uploading Arms Supplies at ISIS-Controlled Airports?

Top commander of the Iranian Armed Forces said the US military planes are making regular flights to and from airports ISIS-controlled cities to supply the terrorist group with weapons, money and foodstuff.

“We have received reports that the US planes visit the ISIS(-controlled) airports,” Chief of Staff of the Iranian Armed Forces Major General Hassan Firouzabadi told reporters on the sidelines of military parades held in Tehran on Saturday morning to mark the Army Day.
“The US shouldn’t supply weapons and money to ISIS and then apologizes and says that it has done a mistake. The Americans say that they want to confront the ISIS (but) we haven’t seen any practical measure but reconnaissance and surveillance operations,” he added.
Predicting that a cruel wave of terrorism will sweep Europe, the US and all mankind in the near future, Firouzabadi said all the world people, including those in the US and Europe, should try to fight against terrorism in defense of the right of living instead of providing them with weapons and huge sums of money that has made ISIS the best paid militant and armed group in the world.
“If the US is honest in its statements that it has not created the ISIS, it can fight against it easily and we hope that the US and British governments will fight against the ISIS even for the sake of their own nations,” he added.
In relevant remarks on Tuesday, Supreme Leader’s top adviser for international affairs Ali Akbar Velayati underlined that extremist groups, including the ISIS, were born and nurtured by the US.
“Today, we see extremist groups like ISIS which are the protégés of the Americans and do not see any difference between various Muslim sects and group and massacre everyone. They claim to be supporters of Islam but their behavior and actions are against their words,” Velayati said in a meeting with Secretary General of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) Abu Ahmad Fouad in Tehran.
He said the interesting point was that the members of the ISIS terrorist group showed no enmity towards the Zionist regime.
Also in March, Chairman of the Iranian Parliament’s National Security and Foreign Policy Commission Alaeddin Boroujerdi said the recent capture of the US military advisers who were aiding the ISIS in Northern Iraq was a compelling proof that Washington had created the Takfiri terrorist group.
“The capture of the American advisers by the Iraqi army leaves no doubt that ISIS has been created by the US,” Boroujerdi told reporters.
He underlined that the American people who would never forget the beheading of their journalists by ISIS now blast Washington officials as the main culprits in the crime.
Last month, Iraqi Special Forces declared that they had apprehended several foreign military advisors of ISIS, including American, Israeli and Arab nationals, in an operation in Mosul in the Northern parts of the country.
The Iraqi forces said they had retrieved four foreign passports, including those that belonged to American and Israeli nationals and one that belonged to the national of a Persian Gulf Cooperation Council (PGCC) member-state, from ISIS’s military advisors.
The foreign advisors were arrested in a military operation in Tal Abta desert near Mosul city.

Source: Fars News

MAHDI TO RETURN BY 2016, FOLLOWED BY JESUS? Mainstream Muslim Website Makes Official Announcement

It’s not only evangelical Christians who are sensing that something has changed in the world, and that we may be entering the very last days.

Muslims are also eagerly awaiting their messiah.

In the latest evidence of this messianic fervor, a mainstream Sunni Muslim website has decreed that the Islamic messiah, called the Mahdi, will appear this year or in 2016 and that the Muslim Jesus will return in 2022 to conquer the world for Islam.

DiscoveringIslam.org and the End Times Research Center have calculated that the “first phase” of the end of time will begin soon and lead to the “Day of Judgment” in seven years.

The estimates were derived from “the latest research” into numerical analysis of the Quran, Hadith, Arabic words and historical events,” according to DiscoveringIslam.org.

“The Messenger of Allah [sallallahu 'alayhi wa-sallam] informed the Companions of everything that would occur until the Day of Resurrection,” the website reports.

“Based on our numerical analysis of the Quran and Hadith, the official beginning of the End of Time and the coming of the Imam Mahdi will most likely be in 2015 (or 2016) and Jesus Christ (p) will come down from Heaven to Earth in 2022, in-sha Allah (if Allah is willing),” the website reported.

The Quran and the Bible put forth end-times narratives that are similar but opposite. The Bible’s antichrist, for instance, resembles Islam’s messiah while Muslims view the Jesus of the Bible as their antichrist or “Dajjal.” The Quran teaches that Jesus returns to earth but for a very different purpose – to “break the cross” and convert the world’s Christians to Islam.

Bible teacher Joel Richardson underscores the inverted end-time views of the two faiths in his New York Times-best-selling book, “The Islamic Antichrist,” and his documentary film, “End Times Eyewitness.”

Richardson is an expert in eschatology, or the order of end-times events, as presented in Christianity, Judaism and Islam. He points to Jesus’ warnings in Matthew 24 and Mark 13 that false teachers and false prophets would arise in the last days to deceive many.

Richardson believes Muhammad is one of those false prophets. But the religion he founded, Islam, must be taken seriously because 1.4 billion people believe in its teachings, which are apocalyptic and getting more so, Richardson said. In fact, it’s impossible to understand what inspires and motivates Islamic radicals such as ISIS or al-Qaida if you aren’t familiar with their eschatology.

But it’s not just the radicals who believe in the Islamic teachings about the apocalypse, he said.

“It is frequently claimed that those who believe these things are but the tiny minority of radicals,” Richardson told WND. “But what the (Discovering Islam) article reveals, is that even many mainstream Muslims now believe that the last days are upon us.”

What is this Shemitah business all about? Sign up for WND’s free e-book primer on the significance of the seven-year biblical cycle that affects the world’s economies, the rise and fall of empires and more.

Many Muslims across the globe see the unfolding events in Syria and Iraq as proof that the prophetic traditions of Islam are coming to pass and will soon lead to the return of the Muslim Jesus and the Mahdi.

As previously reported by WND last October, an influential Turkish Muslim media personality and prolific author, Adnan Aktar, said he expects the Mahdi to appear in Istanbul.

Aktar said the Mahdi will communicate with spirit beings called the djinn, who will help Muslims prevail throughout the world.

ISIS expects a major battle to occur near the Syrian city of Dabiq between the soldiers of Allah and the “Romans,” who are seen as the leaders of the infidel Western powers fighting alongside apostate Muslims. Some analysts have said ISIS could be trying to hasten this battle by goading the U.S. into putting boots on the ground in Syria.

According to the Islamic view the soldiers of Allah will win this battle, ushering in a period marked by the destruction of the Jewish State of Israel and the dominance of Muslims globally.

Check out Joel Richardson’s two ground-breaking books, “The Islamic Antichrist” and “Mideast Beast,” which have won acclaim from Bible scholars the world over and led many to reconsider the view that the Antichrist will arise out of Europe.

“Even if none of these things are true, there is power in prophecy, and the sense of divine endorsement that this empowers many with will have horrific consequences in the days ahead,” Richardson said. “When Christians think about Jesus warning of the rise of false prophets in the last days, we often think of false voices within the church. No doubt, we have plenty of such voices, shouting ‘peace and security,’ ‘all is well,’ ‘thrive and prosper,’ etc. But rarely do many Christians think of the false prophetic traditions of Islam that are misleading a large segment of mankind.”

As novelist and filmmaker Joel C. Rosenberg recently noted, the greatest danger to the world is not merely radical Islam, but apocalyptic Islam.

“In Tehran, our own president has just agreed to allow the single most apocalyptic regime in the earth to attain nuclear weapons,” Richardson said. “Never before has the term ‘existential threat’ been so real.”

Read more at here

'ISIS Destroyed Christian Civilization and the World Watches'

Israel National News reports: “Waiting in an aid line outside Lebanon's capital Beirut, Assyrian Christian Francie Yaacoub remembers the well-stocked home she left behind in Syria as she fled advancing Islamic State (ISIS) group jihadists.

‘We left behind a house full of everything. Why do we now have to stand at the church door?’ she asked quietly as she waited to receive aid at the Assyrian diocese of Sid al-Boushriyeh, reports AFP.

She is one of hundreds of Assyrian Christians who have arrived in Lebanon in recent weeks after ISIS jihadists stormed their villages in Syria's northeastern province of Hasakeh.

Members of Lebanon's Assyrian community, many of them related to those who fled Hasakeh, are doing their best to welcome the new refugees, but the displacement has left them traumatized.

Yaacoub, in her fifties, now lives in a small house with her son, husband and five other Assyrian refugees. Her family fled their village, Tal Nasri, during a terrifying ISIS bombardment last week.

‘We left in our pajamas. My son walked barefoot, we left without our shoes on,’ she said. ‘The shells were falling all around us...We had to flee because the safety of your children is the most important thing.’

Yaacoub's family was not alone - thousands of Assyrians have been forced to abandon their villages along Hasakeh's Khabur river since ISIS jihadists began an attack there in February.

The group has seized at least 11 of the 33 Assyrian villages in the region, and kidnapped more than 200 members of the ancient Christian sect, which numbered around 30,000 in Syria before the war…”

Source

UN Report: ISIS May Have Committed Genocide

Israel National News reports: “Islamic State terrorists may have committed genocide in trying to wipe out the Yazidi minority in Iraq, the UN said Thursday in a report laying out a litany of atrocities, according to AFP.

ISIS ‘may have committed all three of the most serious international crimes - namely war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide,’ the United Nations human rights office said in a statement.

The agency published a horrifying report detailing killings, torture, rape, sexual slavery and the use of child soldiers by the group.

All of these crimes, it said, were violations of international human rights and humanitarian law, and some may amount to ‘crimes against humanity’ and ‘war crimes.’

The report, which is based on interviews with more than 100 witnesses and survivors of attacks in Iraq between June 2014 and February 2015, especially highlights brutal ISIS attacks on ethnic and religious groups, including Yazidis, Christians, Turkmen, Kurds and Shia.

ISIS, which controls a swathe of territory in Iraq and neighboring Syria, launched ‘a series of systematic and widespread attacks’ on the Yazidi minority's heartland in the northern Nineveh province last August.

According to the report, the attacks appeared intended ‘to destroy the Yazidi as a group,’ which ‘strongly suggests’ ISIS is guilty of ‘genocide’ against the Yazidi.

In numerous Yazidi villages, men and boys over the age of 14 were rounded up and shot, while the women and girls were abducted as the ‘spoils of war.'…”

Source

Malaysia Under Pressure to Implement Sharia Law Including Impalement and Crucifixion

ChristianToday.com reports: “Calls by Malaysia's Islamist opposition party for strict Islamic law that includes amputations and stonings is symptomatic of a drift to more conservative Islam in politics and could further strain relations in the multi-ethnic country.

The push by the Islamist Parti Islam se-Malaysia (PAS) for the laws, known as hudud, also threatens to split a fragile opposition coalition that has been challenging the long-ruling Muslim party and its allies.

The disparate three-party opposition alliance that includes PAS won the popular vote for the first time in Malaysia's history in a 2013 election.

While the ruling United Malays National Organisation (UMNO) and its partners still won the most seats, they are more determined than ever to hold on to power which they have enjoyed since independence in 1957.

In February, the opposition alliance's leader, Anwar Ibrahim, was jailed for five years on a sodomy charge he said was cooked up to finish him politically and foil the opposition challenge…’

Source

The Drop Box: The Compelling Story of Saving Babies

The Drop Box, released by Focus on the Family and showing in various cinemas nationwide, is a stunning, compelling true story about Pastor Lee Jong-rak of South Korea who saves babies.

Together with his wife - and with the help of other loving Christians - Pastor Jong-rak works tirelessly day and night to take care of the abandoned babies that are dropped off in what is called "The Baby box" - a drop box where birth-mothers can place their babies and know they will be cared for and loved.

Jong-rak's journey begun through the birth of his own and his own handicapped son who, in essence, becomes the icon and centerpiece of the entire story.
Many of the babies who are dropped off are handicapped in some way of other, whether Downs syndrome, physical handicaps, or premature, they share complex issues.
But those issues do not hinder the outpouring of love and care Pastor Jong-rak and his team give them.

Pastor Lee with children. They quickly become members of a large family where love reigns.
Focus-on-the-Family partnered with Kindred Image and Arbella Studios to bring us The Drop Box with the purpose of not only sharing a beautiful true story, but of hopefully touching hearts to the core to choose life and to care for children.

The film highlights the need for global orphan care, adoption, and post-adoption support.
The Drop Box also shines a light on the deep love of God, the love that never forgets any child, the love that compels those who are open to it to act radically so others may see the Light.
Pastor Jong-rak is such a person - one who acts with radical love, no matter what it costs him.

Look for the film in a local theater, and be sure to bring a large box of Kleenex. You'll need them. The film is not the best cinematic production - some cartoon drawings interspersed in the documentary and a lot of sub-titles to read - but the story is so powerful, so life-changing, you hardly notice.

See more at: here

We Are More Than '21'

*Please note that the video referenced in the article is extremely violent, and should only be viewed by adults.*

Last week I saw something gruesome, but then something beautiful.

I forced myself to watch the execution of 21 Coptic men by ISIS members in Libya. It was one of the most nightmarish things I have ever witnessed. I did not do this because I relish violence in any way, but because I felt it was important to be reminded of what true persecution is. Contrary to the conception that I often hold, persecution is not when someone scoffs at my beliefs or smirks when I pray before a meal. That is “aggravation.” “Persecution” is someone pressing a knife to your throat because you follow Christ. And as much as it hurt my soul to watch that video, I needed that reminder.

But over the week that followed, I witnessed something truly beautiful take place. First, the Coptic church stood quickly in solidarity with their fallen sons. The men wereofficially canonized by the church as martyrs. One slain man’s brother thanked ISIS for including their final cries to Jesus in the video, saying that by doing so, ISIS had inadvertently “strengthened our faith.”

But these tributes were not limited to the Coptic church. From all around the world, Christians from diverse traditions stood in solidarity with those 21 men. Facebook and Twitter profile pictures were changed to the number “21,” honoring the 21 lives that were lost. Many Western evangelicals voiced their support, including Russell Moore and Ed Stetzer. Ann Voskamp wrote a powerful tribute and initiated a prayer campaign for persecuted Christians around the world. And Pope Francis gave this stirring statement:

“The blood of our Christian brothers is a witness that cries out. If they are Catholic, Orthodox, Copts, Lutherans, it is not important: They are Christians. The blood is the same: It is the blood which confesses Christ.”

What I found so moving about these tributes was that so few questions had to be asked. Coptic Christianity is not familiar to many, especially here in the United States. Few people can say they know anything about Coptic theology, have attended a Coptic church service, or personally know a Copt. In all honesty, a person who holds a Coptic understanding of salvation might not be allowed membership at many American evangelical churches. But none of that mattered, not this time. Despite our unfamiliarity with Copts and their beliefs, we all knew deep within our souls that they were our brothers.

Neither did we ask any questions about the men and their individual lives, their motivations, or their piety. We did not ask if they had been walking with God, or their political persuasions, or their stance on one issue or another. Again, none of that mattered. With their lips, these men cried out the name “Yeshua!” And that is all that any of us needed to hear, the only requirement that needed to be fulfilled for us to lament their death and identify ourselves with them.

Seeing the church stand up in solidarity with these men reminded me that we are one family in Christ. Yes, a broad, diverse, and incredibly fractious and quarrelsome family, but family nonetheless. There are surely significant and important differences among us, but persecution and suffering has a way of putting those differences into perspective and allowing us to recognize, even if momentarily, that what ties us together as Christ followers is far stronger stuff than we thought. And what binds us is nothing less than the name of Jesus, the name above all names, the name that these men uttered before they died as martyrs.

But perhaps there is a larger lesson we might glean from this. Our response to the death of the 21 clearly demonstrated that we share a profound connection with other believers despite the considerable geographical, cultural, and theological gaps between us. We have proven that we do not need to be in complete alignment with other followers of Christ to stand with them in their pain. We made a bold declaration that we are the “21” and have claimed Copts as our own brothers in Christ.

But why only “21”? Could we not make that number higher, and expand the circle further to include believers who are closer to home? What about the plight of undocumented people from Mexico and Latin America, so many of whom follow Christ faithfully but are faced with the prospect of being deported and having their families torn apart? Yes, many of us might be different from them in terms of our culture, language, and understanding of civil law. But is their “illegal” status more important to us than their status as “faithful and Spirit-led Christ followers”?

And what about our faithful brothers and sisters in the black church who cry out in lament for the death of children like Tamir Rice? Yes, for many of us there are sizable cultural and political differences between our communities. But are these differences greater than the name of Christ that we both honor? Do any of us truly believe that? Can we not simply say, as we do with our own biological family, and as we are commanded in Romans 12:15, “You are my brother and sister, and so no matter our differences, your suffering is my own”?

To be quite honest, we share far more in common with Latin American and African American believers in this country than we do with the Coptic church. Our theologies are more aligned, and we are physical neighbors with one another. So if we can rightly offer our full-throated support for the “21,” then I implore us to also stand with believers in our own country, not because we are culturally or politically identical to them, but because we are spiritually connected with them. In truth, we are not just the “21.” We are the “22” and the “23,” the “100” and the “100,000,000”. Persecution reminds us that the eternal family of Christ is unified not by uniformity, but by the name of “Jesús,” “Yeshua,” “예수,” the name which we hold above all other names. We should never forget this important, and costly, lesson.

Source

Report: 200,000 Christians “At Risk Of Slaughter” As Islamists Prepare Massive Assault In Nigeria

Nigerian Bulletin – “US intelligence officers say that the Boko Haram sect looks to be planning an attack on Maiduguri, a city with 2 million people in North-East Nigeria. This, it says, could mean 200,000 Christians could be at ‘risk of slaughter.’
J. Peter Pham said: ‘An attack on Madiguri is very likely,’ and he and a couple of experts believe that the terrorists have put ‘sleeper cells’ among refugees who have fled areas where the group attacked.
He also hinted that the sect may be planning to hoist its black flag over Maiduguri, which he says would be a big blow to the Nigerian government.” Source – Nigerian Bulletin.

John 16:2b, “… the time is coming when those who kill you will think they are doing a holy service for God.”

Flashback: Nigeria: Islamists Pull Over Bus Near Maiduguri, Kill All Christian Passengers, Embark On Door-To-Door ‘Islamisation Campaign’ At Gunpoint – “Release partners are reporting targeted violence against Christians in the northern state of Borno this weekend. Stefanos Foundation says that gunmen pulled over a bus near Maiduguri on Saturday, demanded passengers declare their faith and then killed the six people who said they were Christian. Meanwhile, in Gwoza, also in Borno state, Islamists are reported to have embarked upon an ‘Islamisation campaign’. Stefanos reports that gunmen are going from door to door demanding people profess allegiance to Islam at gunpoint.” Read more.

Flashback: Nigeria’s Christian President Warns That The Current Massacre Of Christians Means The End Times Is Upon Us – “In another deadly move portraying Nigeria’s Borno state as a killing field for Nigerian Christians, attackers have stormed a church service in Kiyak village in the outskirts of Chibok, killing another set of 15 worshippers. It was the second major killing of Christians in the Chibok area. Early in December, 10 Christians were also killed in the area… News of the killings emerged after President Goodluck Jonathan questioned whether deadly Islamist attacks on churches in his country and other violence worldwide could be signs of coming ‘end times’… The attack followed another gruesome killing Friday that saw attackers slit the throats of 15 Christians in a pre-dawn raid in Musari …” Read more.

Flashback: Nigeria: Boko Haram: Our Goal Is To Eliminate Followers Of Christ – “Terrorist organisation Boko Haram has issued a statement making clear that its goal is to eliminate followers of Christ from Nigeria and establish an Islamic state. ‘The Nigerian state and Christians are our enemies and we will be launching attacks on the Nigerian state and its security apparatus as well as churches until we achieve our goal of establishing an Islamic state in place of the secular state … We are responsible for the suicide attack on a church in Jos and also another attack on another church in Biu,’ a spokesman for the group, Abul Qaqa, is said to have told reporters in the northeastern city of Maiduguri over the phone.” Read more.

More Than 100 Killed by Boko Haram in Cameroon

Boko Haram fighters have killed more than 100 people in the north Cameroon town of Fotokol, murdering residents inside their homes and a mosque, a local civic leader said on Wednesday.

The massacre comes amid a major regional offensive against the Islamic group, which has kidnapped hundreds and killed thousands in neighbouring northern Nigeria and has mounted increasingly bloody cross-border raids.

"Boko Haram entered Fotokol through Gambaru early in the morning and they killed more than 100 people in the mosque, in the houses and they burned property," said the civic leader Abatchou Abatcha, reached by telephone.

The militants shot and killed one of his sons during the raid, he added.
Many of the dead were found with their throats slit, according to Cameroon's L'Oeil du Sahel newspaper.

Continued