(Associated Press) – A notorious Haitian gang known for brazen kidnappings and killings was accused by police Sunday of abducting 17 missionaries from a U.S.-based organization. Five children were believed to be among those kidnapped, including a 2-year-old.
The 400 Mawozo gang kidnapped the group in Ganthier, a community that lies east of the capital of Port-au-Prince, Haitian police inspector Frantz Champagne told The Associated Press. The gang was blamed for kidnapping five priests and two nuns earlier this year in Haiti.
The gang, whose name roughly translates to 400 “inexperienced men,” controls the Croix-des-Bouquets area that includes Ganthier, where they carry out kidnappings and carjackings and extort business owners, according to authorities.
Ohio-based Christian Aid Ministries said the kidnapped group consisted of 16 U.S. citizens and one Canadian, for a total of five children, seven women and five men. The organization said they were on a trip to visit an orphanage….
(USAtoday) North Carolina Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson has doubled down after his comments calling transgenderism and homosexuality “filth” drew widespread rebukes and calls for him to resign.
Robinson, a Republican, made the comments in June at the Asbury Baptist church in Seagrove.
“There’s no reason anybody anywhere in America should be telling any child about transgenderism, homosexuality, any of that filth,” he told the audience. “And yes, I called it filth. And if you don’t like it that I called it filth, come see me and I’ll explain it to you.”
North Carolina Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson says Christians must take control of public schools because children are being abused by being taught "filth": "There's no reason anybody anywhere in America should be telling any child about transgenderism, homosexuality, any of that filth." pic.twitter.com/aXjCPFKTs0
Robinson holds the second-highest office in the state, and he would take over if Gov. Roy Cooper is ever unable to perform his duties.
His words went viral last week after the group Right Wing Watch tweeted a clip of his speech. In recent days, scores of advocacy groups and politicians – from Raleigh to the White House – have denounced…
(End Abortion Now) Since 1973, Americans have murdered over 63 million babies. Protestant denominations took nearly a decade to comprehend what was occurring—and once they did, a strategy called “incrementalism” was adopted.
You are probably familiar with the various legislative proposals that the modern pro-life movement routinely forwards. Most of them work within the perceived parameters of Roe v. Wade to try and “incrementally” end abortion. Heartbeat bills, for example, prohibit abortions for babies with beating hearts. Born-alive protection acts prevent abortionists from killing babies if they survive abortion attempts. Pain-capable acts ban abortions for babies old enough to feel pain.
Many—if not most—members of the pro-life movement have good intentions. However, for the following reasons and many more, these laws—and the movement behind them—are neither biblical in their foundation nor helpful in their application.
The pro-life movement does not establish equal justice.
Apply the logic of a pro-life bill to any other issue of criminal law. Would we ever laud a bill that bans sex trafficking for children between six and eighteen years of age, but greenlights it for children younger than six? Of course not—but that is the logic of the heartbeat bill. Would we ever laud a bill that lets a serial killer drown his victims, but bans him from finishing the act only if they manage to crawl out of the river? Of course not—but that is the logic of the born-alive protection act. Would we ever laud a bill that lets us kill children who cannot yet walk, but bans us from killing them once they can? Of course not—but that is the logic of the pain-capable act.
God calls for His people to “seek justice, correct oppression, bring justice to the fatherless” (Isaiah 1:17). He also proclaims “woe to those who decree iniquitous decrees, and the writers who keep writing oppression, to turn aside the needy from justice” (Isaiah 10:1-2). Pro-life bills are iniquitous decrees because they do not ban murder—instead, they regulate when, how, and why it can happen. They turn our needy preborn neighbors away from justice, failing to uphold the rights of all image-bearers of God.
The pro-life movement wrongly catechizes our culture.
Anyone who has ministered in front of an abortion facility can attest that mothers often raise excuses such as “my baby can’t feel pain yet,” “my baby doesn’t even have a heartbeat,” or “my baby is only ten weeks old.” Where did they learn to speak about their babies like this? From pro-life laws. The result? Their consciences are soothed as they murder their own children.
Because the pro-life movement treats women as “second victims” of abortion, post-abortive mothers and fathers fail to experience forgiveness through the gospel. One can only repent of sin after it is rightly defined by God’s Word. It is never loving to soften a square blow rightly delivered by Scripture—after all, love “rejoices with the truth” (1 Corinthians 13:5).
The pro-life movement is built upon faulty legal premises.
When Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg passed away, we all remember the bouts of intense mourning displayed by the Left. The woman was treated like a deity. But the Right manifested a similar idolatry when President Trump appointed Justice Amy Coney Barrett—there were processions and parades, the Republican establishment mobilized on her behalf, and many placed their hope of salvation into the potential for a conservative Supreme Court.
However, for the vast majority of the past five decades—even during Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood v. Casey—the Supreme Court has maintained a solid conservative majority. Republican-appointed Justices have perpetuated abortion—because they are equally as devoted to the ideology of judicial precedent as their Democrat-appointed counterparts. Nevertheless, the Republican political machine uses the prospect of judicial appointments as a grift to drive votes; in election years, we always seem to require only one more Supreme Court seat to finally end abortion.
Abortion does not need to end with the overturning of Roe v. Wade. It is not the law of the land—which is why President Biden explicitly campaigned on the promise of codifying it at the federal level. Justice Clarence Thomas himself argued in June Medical Services v. Russo that “the Constitution does not constrain the states’ ability to regulate or even prohibit abortion.” The judicial branch does not make law, and it has no power to legislate from the bench. Nevertheless, all fifty states—even the ones that still have laws on the books outlawing abortion—bow to its will.
The pro-life movement delays actual abolition.
For the past few years, Christians have begun to recognize the above truths—and innumerable others—about the pro-life movement and its legislative strategies. In response, these Christians have been proposing bills of abolition—which outlaw abortion from conception, include no exceptions, establish equal justice by criminalizing abortion as murder, nullify Roe v. Wade, and repeal all other statutes that permit abortion.
The response—especially in states with Republican governors and Republican legislative supermajorities—is always the same. The abolition bill is suppressed; then, a pro-life bill is adopted and marketed to voters as a landmark legislative victory.
Pro-life bills allow civil magistrates to avoid their biblically-defined duty—as articulated by the doctrine of interposition—to protect their constituents from tyrants who overstep their boundaries.
To Americans who know their history, this phenomenon should sound eerily familiar. Slavery endured for decades after the American Revolution because of anti-slavery gradualists. Indeed, Christian abolitionists—such as Harriet Tubman and William Lloyd Garrison—were the ones who truly brought about the end of slavery. We remember the cowardly gradualists as villains—but we remember the bold abolitionists as heroes.
The pro-life movement is not rooted in the biblical worldview.
Politicians, activists, and intellectuals in the pro-life movement—even the ones who are evangelical Christians—set aside their Bibles and argue against abortion from the grounds of philosophy or science. The Bibles they set aside, however, explain that men “by their unrighteousness suppress the truth” (Romans 1:18). Do philosophy and science have their place in Christian apologetics? Absolutely—but they only confirm what Scripture authoritatively declares.
The problem for the person who partakes in abortion is not a lack of evidence—it is love of sin and rebellion against their Creator. Neglecting the Word of God in the name of pragmatism—which, by the way, is also the reason that most churches in America are currently filled with false converts—is rooted in unbelief in the power of God.
In short, the pro-life movement does not hold the gospel of Jesus Christ as central—but abolitionism does. The pro-life movement does not stand upon the solid ground of God’s Word—but abolitionism does. The pro-life movement does not acknowledge that the wisdom of the world is foolishness to God—but abolitionism does.
It is time for Christians to open their Bibles and their history books to see how the Church of Jesus Christ has fought injustice through the ages. It is time for Christians to repent of abortion apathy and to seek justice for their preborn neighbors. It is time for bad ideas to die and for righteous ones to take their place.
It is time to be biblical, even if it means being unpopular.
It is time to love God and our neighbors.
It is time to abolish abortion.
Editor’s Note. This op-ed was published by Ben Zeisloft on EAN. Reposted in full with permission.
(Reformation Charlotte) A 38-year member of McLean Bible Church, Sal Cordova, who has been doing extensive work exposing the underhanded shenanigans perpetrated by the elders of the Church, says that he was threatened with arrest this past weekend for attending service.
“The church I’ve been a part of, McLean Bible Church, for the last 38 years,” he said in a video published on his YouTube Channel, “had threatened me with arrest and jail time for attending their worship services.” He continues, “I was threatened with arrest and jail time if I ever returned to the properties.”
Cordova is also who exposed another campus pastor, Mike Kelsey, for blatantly stating that he finds it difficult not to “torch all white people” in reference to the Black Lives Matter movement.
(Reformation Charlotte) Brandan Robertson has been in the headlines quite a bit in the last year or so as he is an openly gay, self-described “pastor” who opposed traditional, biblical theology while installing himself as a biblical scholar and theologian. Robertson is an advocate for sexual immorality and teaches that premarital sex is “good” and “healthy.” Of course, conservative Bible-believing Christians would never consider Robertson’s claims to Christianity valid, but the world sees things like this and brings reproach upon Christ.
Robertson made the news earlier this year when he claimed that Jesus used a “racial slur” in Mark chapter 7 during the account of the Syrophoenician woman. Robertson said that the woman essentially bucked up to Jesus causing Jesus to “repent” of his racism and then “do the work” he was supposed to do. Obviously absurd.
He’s also claimed that Jesus doesn’t desire our worship because “only the Gospel of John” says he does.
(Capstone Report) ERLC WHISTLEBLOWER OUTLINES RUSSELL MOORE’S POLITICAL HIT ON SBC POLITICAL ENEMIES.
A whistleblower exposes how Russell Moore with the cooperation of the ERLC trustee chairman David Prince lied to ERLC trustees to perpetrate a political hit job on Dr. Moore’s political enemies.
Whistleblower warns Executive Committee to act carefully and weigh the facts before taking any risky action.
Whistleblower explains how lifelong Democrat Russell Moore used a leaked letter as the SBC-equivalent of an October Surprise.
An ERLC whistleblower alerted the Southern Baptist Convention to how lifelong Democrat Russell Moore exploited sex abuse allegations for political ends. The 12-page whistleblower letter by ERLC trustee Jonathan Whitehead outlined how the ERLC chairman David Prince and former ERLC President Russell Moore concealed allegations about the SBC’s response to sex abuse from the ERLC trustees for months and revealed the allegations in the SBC equivalent of an October Surprise just prior to the SBC Annual Meeting.
“Dr. Russell Moore and Dr. David Prince (the ERLC Board Chair) consciously concealed the claims in Dr. Moore’s February 2020 letter from the ERLC Trustees, until it was leaked by an ERLC trustee…”
(Washington Examiner) California Gov. Gavin Newsom signed two bills on Wednesday relating to abortion rights, with both helping children hide medical information from parents.
The first bill, AB 1356, will create new offenses arising from recording or photographing patients or providers within 100 feet of the entrance to a reproductive health services facility. The other, AB 1184, will keep patient information confidential for patients who are not the primary policyholder for their health insurance. Healthcare services that patients can keep confidential include “reproductive health care and gender-affirming care,” according to the governor’s statement .00:36/01:16
“California has been a leader in protecting access to sexual and reproductive rights, but as we’ve seen recently with unprecedented attacks on these rights, we can and must do more. I applaud the establishment of the California Future of Abortion Council and look forward to its important work to advance our state’s leadership on this vital issue. I’m proud today to sign these two bills that demonstrate our dedication to strengthening and further protecting access to reproductive health care services in California.”
(Capstone Report) The leadership of Kenwood Baptist Church, which includes Dr. Jim Hamilton and Dr. Denny Burk, called on Ed Litton to resign as SBC President. The call for Litton to resign came in a letter to the congregation delivered via email Thursday.
“We believe that Dr. Litton would do well to resign voluntarily. His credibility as a leader and a preacher has been too compromised for him to continue. He may choose to muddle through the next convention or two, but we believe that would be a mistake. He should resign,” the pastors said in the congregational letter.
The pastors argue that Litton has disqualified himself from leadership because of plagiarism.
“In spite of the fact that Dr. Litton had permission to use Greear’s sermons, what he did still constitutes plagiarism,” according to the email.
The email letter to the church detailed the plagiarism allegations against Ed Litton.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., speaks during a news conference on Capitol Hill in Washington Sept. 24, 2021, about the Women's Health Protection Act, which establishes a legal right to abortion in all 50 states under federal law. The measure passed in a 218-211 vote. (CNS photo/Kevin Lamarque, Reuters)
(CNBC) House Democrats on Friday approved wide-ranging legislation to protect abortion rights, a swift but mostly symbolic response to the Supreme Court’s refusal to block a Texas law banning most abortions.
The bill, which passed 218-211, is principally a show of solidarity, given that the bill, the Women’s Health Protection Act, will face steep opposition from Senate Republicans and is not expected to advance through the chamber.
Democrats believe the bill would guarantee the right to abortion through federal law and cement the decision of Roe v. Wade, the landmark 1973 Supreme Court decision that established a constitutional right to the procedure.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., worked quickly to schedule action on the bill after the high court earlier this month refused to block a controversial Texas law that prohibits abortions after roughly six weeks, before most even realize they are pregnant.
(Christian Post) After hours of debate this week, Southern Baptist Convention leaders declined for the time being to allow a third-party firm access to communication with its lawyers as part of an investigation into how top denominational leaders handled sex abuse allegations.
On Tuesday, the SBC’s Executive Committee rejected a proposal that would have allowed Guidepost Solutions, the firm investigating the committee’s handling of sexual abuse claims, to review materials involving the executive committee and its attorney.
Instead, the EC voted to take another week to negotiate whether or not to waive attorney-client privilege. It adopted a temporary measure to move the sexual abuse review forward and agreed to fully fund the upcoming investigation up to $1.6 million….
