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Proposal to ban circumcision of boys scrapped from Finland bill The measure calling to “clarify” Finland’s ban on the genital mutilation of women passed Friday in the Parliament. Amendments would have potentially limited or outlawed the nonmedical
circumcision of boys, Yaron Nadbornik, president of the Central Council
of Finnish Jewish Communities, told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency. His
organization reached out to Milah UK, a London-based advocacy group,
which involved representatives at the Foreign Ministry, Nadbornik said.
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Controversy Continues Over Hate Crime Bill in Scotland The Scottish government introduced the Hate Crime and Public Order
(Scotland) Bill April 23 in response to an independent review of hate
crime laws led by Alastair Campbell, Lord Bracadale, a retired judge.
The government argues the bill modernizes, consolidates, and extends
existing hate crime legislation. It also abolishes the offense of blasphemy.
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Horror! Rastafarian school children sent home Speaking to Malawi24, Nyabinghi council of Malawi publicity secretary Ras Patrick Galawanda said this week alone three children, including two from the same family, have been sent home from school because of negative perceptions against wearing the dreadlocks. He said the students include Faith Chikopa who is a form 3 student
at Mloza Secondary School as well as Ganizani Maxwell and Chipiliro
Maxwell who were denied access to education at Kuchisiyo primary school.
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Former Conroe priest Manuel La Rosa-Lopez heading to prison for child indecency Father Manuel La Rosa-Lopez will serve 10 years in prison on two charges of second-degree felony indecency with a child. The maximum penalty for the charge is 20 years in prison. Last month, La Rosa-Lopez took a plea deal for the charges connected
to two victims, though, the Montgomery County District Attorney's Office
said he committed crimes against a total of four identified victims.
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Jesus portrait at SPD targeted by anti-religion advocates The Wisconsin-based Freedom From Religion Foundation sent a letter to Police Chief Ben Raymond, calling for the removal of a framed portrait of Jesus, as well as poetry about Jesus that's visible in common work spaces at police headquarters. The group says a concerned community member contacted them about it.
A source at SPD tells us that the portrait hangs in a secure area of
the Property Crimes Detective Division. The public would have to be
escorted there to see it.
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Pope’s comments, in Spanish, misinterpreted by media Earlier this week, the Associated Press and other publications ran
with the shocking headline “Pope Endorses Same-Sex Civil Unions” that
is derived from this supposed quote: “What we have to have is a civil
union law; that way they are legally covered.” If this was a real quote
from Pope Francis, then there would probably be a lot of problems. However,
it was not, and it just shows that the Catholic Church will constantly
be misrepresented in the press.
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Americans Who Say Their Religion Is “None” This part of the 21st century will be remembered chiefly, I predict, as the era when supernatural religion died among intelligent western people. I think it will survive mostly as an emotional fringe for lower-brow folks such as those who “speak in tongues.” American adults who say their religion is “none” began to explode in
the 1990s and climbed to one-fourth of the population. Among those under
30, the churchless ratio now is 40 percent.
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Now loving on Jesus IN YOUR OWN HOME could be a 'hate crime' The U.K.'s Christian Institute warns it could restrict Christians' freedom to proclaim Jesus Christ as the only way of salvation or to call people to repent of sin, "even in church." That's because it could offend irreligious or anti-religious people. "Conduct need not be threatening or even intended to stir up hatred
for an offense to be committed. Instead, the bill captures any abusive
behavior deemed likely to stir up hatred. An offense could even be unwittingly
committed in the privacy of your own home," the Christian Institute
said.
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“Please take a moment to thank Jehovah”: Churches distributing USDA food boxes are blurring the boundaries between church and state The box was one of 100 million distributed so far as part of the Department
of Agriculture’s (USDA) Farmers to Families Food Box program, the Trump
administration’s flagship Covid-19 hunger relief initiative intended
to provide emergency food aid to families in need.
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Bank Bans UK Christian Ministry Accounts After 'Mob Rule' Campaign: 'It Will Be Churches Next' The ministry in question, Core Issues Trust, is a Christian nonprofit that supports men and women seeking voluntarily to change their sexual preferences and gender expressions, according to Fox News. Pro-LGBTQ activists began targeting the faith-based group at the end of June. “A coordinated campaign has resulted in our ministry coming under
immense pressure and key service providers canceling their services,
action which we consider to be discriminatory,” CIT executive Mike Davidson
said in a statement.
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Bishops fear owning a Bible could be hate crime offence under new Scots law It has made a submission to MSPs on Holyrood’s justice committee, who have been tasked with scrutinising the reforms. The Bishops’ Conference of Scotland said: “Any new law must be carefully
weighed against fundamental freedoms, such as the right to free speech,
freedom of expression and freedom of thought, conscience and religion.”
With section five of the legislation creating an offence of possessing
inflammatory material, they fear the “low threshold” in the proposed
new laws “could render material such as the Bible ... as being inflammatory
under the new provision”.
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Entire Islamic Relief WorldWide Board Resigns These posts followed the discovery of deeply antisemitic posts by another IRW official last month. The organization already had a long history of ties to terror funding
and the Muslim Brotherhood, an oftentimes violent group.
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Thousands Flock to Sundial Bridge to Worship During a Pandemic Those who couldn’t find parking along Auditorium Drive parked along
Park Marina Drive and walked across the freeway overpass, carrying folding
chairs and children, as if heading for Redding’s annual Freedom Festival
fireworks show.
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Jerry Falwell Jr. will leave behind a very different legacy from his influential father The resignation followed the Liberty board’s decision to put him on an “indefinite leave of absence” after he posted a picture on social media with his arm around a woman who wasn’t his wife, his underwear partially revealed. Falwell Jr. also announced that his wife Becki had an affair with
a former pool attendant, Giancarlo Granda, who was close to the family.
Falwell Jr. said that the affair was short-lived and that the married
couple had reconciled quickly.
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Florida Teen Dies From Virus After Mom Takes Her To Church ‘Covid Party’ Carsyn Leigh Davis died on June 23 at 1:06 p.m. from complications
of COVID-19, two days after her 17th birthday. While her death late
last month was reported by multiple media outlets, the circumstances
of her death were not explained fully until Florida data scientist Rebekah
Jones revealed shocking claims in a medical examiner’s report about
the teen’s death.
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NYC pastor was sexting with teenage boy, FBI says Francis Hughes, 65, was arrested Wednesday and is accused of receiving images from a 15-year-old boy in Westchester and engaging in sexually explicit text communications. During the inappropriate text exchanges, prosecutors say Hughes told
the minor that he was a part-time college professor and a counselor.
Hughes is facing a charge of receipt and distribution of child pornography.
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Jehovah's Witnesses hold global conventions virtually For the first time since 1897, Jehovah's Witnesses are holding their annual conventions online. Last year, the conventions attracted more than 14 million people around the world. The same conventions attracted 45,000 people to Ford Field in 2014. This year, to ensure public health and safety, the conventions are
virtual. The 2020 theme is "Always Rejoice".
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Religious leaders urge Mandalay Bay to remove statues of Hindu, Jain deities and apologize In a joint statement today, five local religious leaders said that “placing highly revered Hindu and Jain deities to adorn a casino night-club was very disrespectful, out-of-line, and could be disturbing to the adherents of these faiths.” These five leaders include Nevada’s Greek Orthodox Christian Priest
Stephen R. Karcher, Hindu statesman Rajan Zed, prominent Buddhist Priest
Matthew T. Fisher, well-known Jewish Rabbi ElizaBeth Webb Beyer and
renowned Jain leader Sulekh C. Jain.
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‘Lion of Judah’ donated by evangelical leaders finds a home in Jerusalem The statue was donated to Israel by a group of evangelical leaders,
but it took some years to find an appropriate location. The stalemate
was resolved after Jerusalem deputy mayor Fleur Hassan-Nahoum ran into
former US congresswoman Michele Bachmann at an event about a year ago,
as Hassan-Nahoum told The Jerusalem Post during the installation of
the monument.
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Trump says he’s ‘best president in history of the Church’ in call with Catholic leaders Trump also pledged support for Catholic schools in light of the global coronavirus pandemic. In an audio recording of the meeting obtained by Crux, the president
repeatedly emphasized his support for the pro-life movement and school
choice, attempting to paint a stark contrast between his administration
and what a Democratic presidency could mean for Catholics.
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Church that defied stay-at-home orders burned to the ground in suspected arson Investigators said they found graffiti on the church property reading: "Bet you stay home now you hypokrites." "I am heartbroken and furious," Governor Tate Reeves tweeted on Thursday,
sharing a photo of the now-destroyed First Pentecostal Church. "In Mississippi,
a church was just burned to the ground. They had been trying to open
services."
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DC Episcopal Bishop: 'I Am Outraged' by Trump Church Visit The Rev. Mariann Budde, whose diocese St. John's belongs to, said she was “outraged” by Trump's visit and noted that he didn’t pray while stopping by the church, a landmark known for its regular visits from sitting presidents since the early 19th century. "He took the symbols sacred to our tradition and stood in front of
a house of prayer in full expectation that would be a celebratory moment,"
Budde said in an interview Monday after her statement on Trump's visit
was posted to the diocese's Twitter account.
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Drunk Hindu priest beheads man in Indian temple as a human sacrifice to goddess who came to him in a dream and said it would end coronavirus Sansari Ojha from the Brahmani Devi Temple under Narasinghpur police station in Cuttack cut off 52-year-old Saroj Kumar Pradhan's head. The Hindu priest from the Bandhahuda area in Odisha killed the man
to appease a goddess, he claimed. He beheaded Pradhan with an axe at
1am in the morning in the temple's shrine after an argument.
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Youth Pastor Claims He Was Kidnapped By Black Men To Avoid Admitting He Hired Male Prostitute In a news release posted on Facebook on Thursday, the Bibb County
Sheriff’s Office said they began looking into a reported kidnapping/carjacking
that was rumored to have occurred Wednesday at a CVS Pharmacy. Sheriff’s
office investigators said no such incident occurred, but they were working
an incident with Christopher Keys, 56, who said he was robbed of his
wallet, cellphone and keys by two masked men Tuesday at Regency Inn
& Suites in Macon.
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Ministry with Bible allegedly producing oil shuts down, but continues to defend its work At the same time, the church that allowed the ministry to use its space is distancing itself. Last week, the ministry held the final gathering of its weekly event
that would attract hundreds of people to Dalton's Wink Theatre. The
ministry team members, including Jerry Pearce and Johnny Taylor, estimated
they handed out 350,000 free vials of the oil. People reported being
cured of long-term ailments and having profound religious experiences
using the oil.
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Former Pope Benedict attacks gay marriage and accuses his opponents of trying to 'silence' him in new biography Despite leaving office in 2013, the 93-year-old, whose original name is Joseph Ratzinger, has not given up intervening in social debates, and he offers a fresh attack against gay marriage in the new biography. 'A century ago, anyone would have thought it absurd to talk about
homosexual marriage. Today those who oppose it are excommunicated from
society,' Benedict XVI says.
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Are Church Services Considered ‘Essential’? Depends Where You Live The divergent treatment of faith in some states’ pandemic-fighting
orders comes as a few houses of worship across the nation continue to
greet people in person, despite federal public health guidance to avoid
gatherings larger than 10 people and decisions by most religious leaders
to shift services online. While the pandemic has heightened political
tensions, the states including religious exceptions in their orders
designed to combat the pandemic are led by governors in both parties.
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Child molester’s wife sues Mormon church for $9.5 million, says husband is in prison because clergy reported his confession The husband told a local church panel about the molestation in 2016 to “repent for his sins” under the eyes of God and to seek spiritual healing “to bring peace within his life and family,” the lawsuit says. Instead, he was arrested and charged in 2017 and convicted in 2018 of four counts of second-degree sexual abuse. The couple were part of a ward in the Marion County town of Stayton,
home to about 8,100 residents 15 miles southeast of Salem.
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Scientology Chief David Miscavige Is a Coronavirus Denier, Says Top Critic In a March 13 eyes-only memo to his estimated 25,000 to 55,000 members
in the United States, Scientology leader David Miscavige called the
international public-health crisis “the current hysteria, whether you
believe in it or not (and the only thing you can be certain of is that
it is hysteria)” More
Inauguration of Lahun pyramid and Khond Aslabay Mosque after years of restorations in Fayoum The events were attended by Major-General Essam Saad Governor of Fayoum,
General Secretary of the Supreme Council of Antiquities Mostafa Waziri,
along with members of parliament and top officials
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VA Pastor, Musician Dies From Coronavirus He Had Questioned Spradlin lived in Gretna, a small town in Pittsylvania County, about halfway between Lynchburg and Danville. While driving home from New Orleans, Spradlin, who had pastored at
several different churches over the years, started feeling much worse.
He and his wife, Jean Spradlin, stopped in Concord, where he was admitted
to a hospital and diagnosed with pneumonia. He was eventually put on
a ventilator as his condition worsened before he died..
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Oklahoma Pastor Busted Running White Supremacist Prostitution Ring Pastor Walter Eugene Brazington Jr. is “being charged with procuring for prostitution and possession of a firearm while in the commission of a felony,” according to a report from Tulsa World. The Oklahoma pastor was caught running a massage parlor that was being
used as a front for a prostitution ring. His partner in crime was white
supremacist Tiffany Roach, an HIV positive prostitute who calls herself
“Aryan Woman” and professes to have “Whitegirl Pride.”
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Houston pastor pleads guilty in investment scheme Court papers state the pastor and investment advisor Gregory Smith sold nearly $3.5 million in worthless pre-revolutionary Chinese bonds to the elderly and vulnerable investors. Both men face years in federal prison if convicted, and could be forced
to pay back millions and forfeit a home the pastor owns in Houston..
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Calling Out Sexual Abuse in the Jehovah's Witnesses Is a Horrific Struggle Within weeks, cops had arrested Ronald Lawrence, whom McDaniel, 50,
accused of molesting her when she was underage, as Reveal News reported.
At least two other people came forward with similar allegations. According
to the Tulsa-World, Lawrence told prosecutors he had been "disfellowshipped"
(basically excommunicated) from the church over sexual abuse allegations,
that he had admitted misconduct in the past in order to be reinstated,
and that law enforcement had never previously been informed. He has
also denied abusing any Jehovah's Witness children, including McDaniel.
When brought before a judge in 2014, 19 charges of sexual abuse against
him were deemed to have passed the statute of limitations, and he walked
free.
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Uyghur Muslims fear impact of coronavirus on populations in camps in China An estimated one million people of the Ughyr Muslim community have been forced into work camps in China's eastern province of Xinjiang since 2017. Doctors and organizers of the Calgary news conference on Sunday say that population is more vulnerable to the outbreak as there is a lack of access to medical care in the camps. "Possibly if the virus gets to the camp, they are going to contract
it and they are going to die," said Dr. Fozia Alvi, president of the
Humanity Auxilium.
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Missouri church leader tried to pay for sex on Grindr with Arby’s card A Missouri church leader allegedly tried to pay for sex on the gay hookup app Grindr — with an Arby’s card, according to a report. Using the handle “DILF,” Barry Cole Poyner, 57, allegedly tried to bed hot college-age guys by offering to pay for gas, clothes and roast beef sandwiches, police told the Kirksville Daily Express. The Church of Christ elder — who is also a professor at nearby Truman
State University — was busted after a student reported him and a cop
went undercover on the app, according to the paper.
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White: I Saw Trump Riding Golden Horse Alongside Jesus During Armageddon However, fundamentalist Christians, who are among Trump’s staunchest supporters, seem to be encouraging Trump’s warmongering. Many of them, such as Sec. of State Mike Pompeo, believe these are the End of Days and Trump will lead us into an apocalyptic war with Islam. According to spiritual shyster and Trump advisor Paula White, Trump
will have a role in the final battle. “God came to me last night and
showed me a vision of Trump riding alongside Jesus on a horse made of
gold and jewels,” said White in Charisma, a fundie publication. “This
means he will play a critical role in Armageddon as the United States
stands alongside Israel in the battle against Islam.”
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Georgia church to pay off $62K in school lunch debt 12Stone church in Lawrenceville announced that its giving $45,000 to Gwinnett County, where it's based, WSB-TV reports. It said it's also giving $11,000 and $6,000 respectively to Hall and Barrow counties, where it has two other churches. The funds are part of a new church program called Knock Out Hunger.
It's meant to help wipe out the debt racked up since the school year
started as it can take a while for families to be approved for free
or reduced lunch, the station says.
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Priest accused of stealing $98K from church to pay Grindr hookups The Rev. Joseph McLoone, 56, was arrested on felony theft and related charges Wednesday after investigators revealed that he opened a secret checking account in 2011 to deposit donations from parishioners at St. Joseph’s Catholic Church in Downingtown, the Chester County District Attorney’s Office announced. McLoone, of Downingtown, then funneled the donation checks into an
unauthorized “St. Joseph Activity Account” at TD Bank for the next six
years and stole $98,405 in all, according to Chester County district
attorney chief of staff Charles Gaza.
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Singer Ed Sheeran seeking to build multifaith sanctuary on $4.5 million estate The space would to be a retreat for "contemplation and prayer" within the grounds of his $4.5 million estate. The two-story building would feature stained glass windows and a tower, according to The Sun. The plans have been submitted to the local council for approval. "It would address an important need for a private place of retreat,”
a design and access statement prepared by Donald Insall Associates,
said. Along with a refuge for prayer, the “Thinking Out Loud” singer
wants the sanctuary to be used for “celebration of key life and family
milestones, family and social gatherings, marriages, christenings and
so forth."
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Religion in US ‘worth more than Google and Apple combined’ The faith economy has a higher value than the combined revenues of the top 10 technology companies in the US, including Apple, Amazon and Google, says the analysis from Georgetown University in Washington DC. The Socioeconomic Contributions of Religion to American Society: An
Empirical Analysis calculated the $1.2tn figure by estimating the value
of religious institutions, including healthcare facilities, schools,
daycare and charities; media; businesses with faith backgrounds; the
kosher and halal food markets; social and philanthropic programmes;
and staff and overheads for congregations.
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Jehovah's Witnesses Announce Plans to Build Giant Media Center Despite Recent Spotlight on Child Abuse Robert Zick, a Jehovah's Witnesses spokesman, told The Times Herald-Record
that the media center is a response to the general public's growing
increase of interest in the Jehovah's Witnesses' videos, specifically
ones offering parenting advice and how to live a principled life. New
content is planned to be available in multiple languages.
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Robot priests more acceptable to Protestants than Catholics, says professor Everything is instant, yet nothing seems real. The news is apparently as fake as people on the take. Yet we're desperate to believe in someone -- or even something -- that'll
help give our lives meaning. For many -- though, perhaps, a dwindling
number -- religion provides answers. Or merely some comfort.
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15 Religious Swindles That Shame the Holy Name Christian leaders alone stole more than $27 billion in 2009, according to one estimate. Such leaders steal more money than is spent annually on global religious missions. Narrowing it down even more, Utah, arguably the fraud capital of the United States, has a fraud industry “double the size” of its ski industry. If you’re a slippery type, these figures represent a heck of an opportunity.
Indeed, the priests, ministers and thetans below have grabbed this chrysobull
by the horns, perpetrating religious swindles that put the finer tenets
of their theology to shame.
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Pastor wants pole fitness business shuttered Father Mike Erwin, a pastor at Saint Katharine Drexel Parish, wrote
a letter to the new business owner, the mayor, and the city's attorney.
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Zakir Naik, preacher charged with inciting hate, now accused of misappropriating funds intended for Muslims’ welfare India’s Enforcement Directorate (ED) is lodging accusations at the
preacher, claiming that assets worth RM113 million (US$28 million) have
been laundered from a fund of donations intended for the social betterment
of the Muslim community, into a series of assets that include, and are
not limited to, 20 flats in cities across India. The units are registered
under both Zakir’s wife and son’s names according to a report from The
Times of India.
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Allegations against priest cause emotional week in Liberty Township Late last month, the archdiocese confirmed the Rev. Geoff Drew, former pastor of St. Maximilian Kolbe Catholic Church in Liberty Twp., was suspended for actions involving teenage boys. Drew previously served as pastor of St. Rita of Cascia Parish in Dayton and parochial vicar at St. Luke the Evangelist Church in Beavercreek. Church officials also said they would change how they handle investigation
accusations of inappropriate behavior against priests because of the
Drew case.
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Calvary Chapel ends support of Potter’s Field Ministries Officials with Calvary Chapel recently announced on the website, phoenixpreacher.com,
that “after prayer, much consideration, and a unanimous decision, Mike
Rozell and Potter’s Field Ministries has been removed from the official
list of affiliated Calvary Chapel pastors and churches. We find that
the Potter’s Field form of discipleship training and methods of ministry
are not compatible with the Calvary Chapel form of ministry taught to
us by Pastor Chuck,” the online post stated.
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Saudi ministry offers Hajj hotline and ‘Fatwa Robot’ service The service covers eight languages, including Arabic, English, French, Urdu, Turkish and Indonesian. Pilgrims can choose to listen to electronic messages about the rites
of Hajj and Umrah, general messages from the ministry and rulings from
the permanent committee of religious researchers. Moreover, they can
speak directly to one of the ministry’s Islamic guidance representatives,
who are available 24 hours a day.
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Harry Potter books removed from St. Edward Catholic School due to 'curses and spells' The seven-book series depicting the magical adventures of a young wizard and his friends was removed from the library because of their content, the Rev. Dan Reehil, a pastor at the Roman Catholic parish school, wrote in an email. "These books present magic as both good and evil, which is not true,
but in fact a clever deception. The curses and spells used in the books
are actual curses and spells; which when read by a human being risk
conjuring evil spirits into the presence of the person reading the text,"
the email states. More
Jehovah’s Witnesses leaders to be sued for sexual abuse under new Child Victims Act John Michael Ewing and Heather Steele, in separate lawsuits that will be filed Wednesday in Brooklyn Supreme Court, said they endured years of rape and molestation at the hands of the group’s elders. Steele, a New York native now living in Florida, said she was just
a toddler when an elder, Donald Nicholson, who was a family friend,
began molesting her in the mid-1970s.
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Former Clermont youth group leader accused of sending nude photos to teen Detectives with the Lake County Sheriff's Office said Kyle Breen sent photos of his penis to a 16-year-old girl he met at church, according to the arrest affidavit. Deputies responded to a juvenile sex complaint earlier this month
in Clermont and spoke to the victim. She told deputies the 21-year-old
would send her the photos through the social media app Snapchat, according
to the arrest affidavit. The two had been messaging for about a month,
according to deputies.
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One Catholic Priest Destroyed the Entire Mayan Written Language Tragically, this decipherment was only necessary because of a one-man Spanish Inquisition, a deliberate, decades-long campaign by a single Catholic priest to destroy the Mayan language and culture. The priest, Diego de Landa, wiped out all knowledge of the written language, and nearly destroyed the spoken language too. Diego de Landa’s one-man inquisition perfectly illustrates the power
of the Intolerance Meme, an idea that evolved in the Jewish religion
a few centuries before the birth of Jesus, and was taken up with a vengeance
by Christians in the third and fourth centuries AD.
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Pastor and 5 Other Christians Killed in Burkina Faso Church Attack The violence took place Sunday in the village of Silgadji, not far from the volatile border with Mali. Urbain Kabore, the communications director for the Sahel region of
Burkina Faso, said Monday that the six people were slain after Sunday
services.
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Saved for the nation: Quaker meeting houses where silence is cherished The Quaker Meeting House in the county town of Hertfordshire is the oldest in the world still in continuous use by the Religious Society of Friends, the proper name for Quakers. The town has grown around it, now with new-build developments housing young families pushed out of London and there’s a proposal for a chain hotel to be built opposite the meeting house. But the building, constructed in 1670, has retained much of its original
character.
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Louis Farrakhan denies antisemitism – then refers to 'Satanic Jews' During the speech on Thursday at a Catholic church on Chicago’s South Side, Farrakhan said people shouldn’t be angry if “I stand on God’s word”. He also said that he knows “the truth” and “separate[s] the good Jews from the Satanic Jews”. Facebook banned Farrakhan, conspiracy theorist Alex Jones and conservative
personality Milo Yiannopoulos, among others, saying they violated its
ban on “dangerous individuals”. The Rev Michael Pfleger subsequently
invited Farrakhan to speak in Chicago.
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Vandals spray paint messages, break windows at SC church The Anderson County Sheriff's Office says someone broke windows and spray painted messages on the side of Midway Presbyterian Church on Midway Road. According to deputies, the windows in the church were over 125 years old. The words "SUBMIT TO GOD THRU ISLAM" and "MUHAMMED IS HIS PROPHET"
were spray pained in black onto the siding of the church.
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Bishop Accused Of Kerala Nun Rape Prays In Church Before Court Appearance Prior to his appearance at the court, the accused bishop prayed at a church, where he was overheard saying, "Help me to abide in God and continue the fight against in justice and lies". The next hearing in the case has been scheduled for June 7 and the
court also accepted the bishop's request to extend his bail.
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Southern Baptist seminary turmoil leaves stained glass artists picking up the pieces Don Young and his wife, Debora, were reminded of that lesson last month with the abrupt cancellation of a lucrative, once-in-a-lifetime commission to produce a series of stained glass windows for the J.W. MacGorman Chapel and Performing Arts Center on the campus of Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary. The project, launched in 2013, was to take a dozen years or more and
could have brought the Youngs, who run a small studio out of their Fort
Worth home, as much as $2 million in income.
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Catholic Churches Are Being Desecrated Across France—and Officials Don’t Know Why Vandals have smashed statues, knocked down tabernacles, scattered or destroyed the Eucharist and torn down crosses, sparking fears of a rise in anti-Catholic sentiment in the country. Last Sunday, the historic Church of St. Sulpice in Paris was set on
fire just after midday mass on Sunday, Le Parisien reported, although
no one was injured. Police are still investigating the attack, which
firefighters have confidently attributed to arson..
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Mormons to allow baptisms for children of LGBTQ parents In a surprise reversal of controversial rules established four years ago, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints announced Thursday that gay marriage will no longer be considered a sin worthy of expulsion. A 2015 policy that deemed those in same-sex relationships “apostates’’
who must be banished from the religion drew strong opposition and condemnation
from the LGBTQ community and its supporters.
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French Cardinal Covered Up Pedophile Accusations Against Priest, Court Says After the ruling, Barbarin said he would offer his resignation to Pope Francis. Separately, his lawyer said he also would appeal the court's guilty verdict. The criminal court in Lyon sentenced Barbarin to a six-month suspended
prison sentence — a decision that shocked many who followed the high-profile
trial. The case's prosecutors had not sought a prison sentence for Barbarin,
and the victims also said they didn't expect a conviction, in part because
some of the crimes in question had lapsed due to the statute of limitations.
More
Houses of Worship are not just for worship anymore So along with worship space, the Washington state congregation’s plans included a ground-level space with a separate entrance that could be used by an outside ministry or nonprofit. Finding the right partner took some time. The building was finished
in 2004, and, for more than a decade, the extra space was used as storage.
Then last month, the church dedicated The Ground Floor, a custom-built
drop-in center for homeless youth, run in partnership with Northwest
Youth Services, a local nonprofit.
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Anti-Semitism is on the rise in France Reuters reported Tuesday that the country saw 500 reported instances of anti-Semitic incidents in 2018, a 74 percent increase from the year before. In one incident, a crowd of protesters reportedly gathered around
well-known Jewish writer and Holocaust survivor Alain Finkielkraut,
demanding that he return to Tel Aviv over his support for Israel, according
to the outlet.
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Abuse of Faith among the Southern Baptists She was 14, she said, when she was first molested by her pastor in Sanger, a tiny prairie town an hour north of Dallas. It was the first of many assaults that Vasquez said destroyed her teenage years and, at 18, left her pregnant by the Southern Baptist pastor, a married man more than a dozen years older. In June 2008, she paid her way to Indianapolis, where she and others
asked leaders of the Southern Baptist Convention and its 47,000 churches
to track sexual predators and take action against congregations that
harbored or concealed abusers. Vasquez, by then in her 40s, implored
them to consider prevention policies like those adopted by faiths that
include the Catholic Church.
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‘Removing your hijab can get you killed – even in the West’
Grand Rapids diocese warns of prayer for money scam Diocese spokesperson Annalise Laumeyer says the caller identifies as someone from “St. Mary’s Prayer Center Ministry” and offers prayer for payment. Laumeyer says some victims are mistakenly associating the scheme with
the Catholic Diocese of Grand Rapids. Laumeyer emphasized in a Thursday
news release that the “prayer ministry” is a scam and it’s not associated
with the diocese, its parishes or schools named St. Mary.
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Oldest Institution of Southern Baptist Convention Reveals Past Ties to Slavery The 71-page report released by the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary
is a recitation of decades of bigotry, directed first at African slaves
and later at African-Americans. Beginning with the founding of the seminary
in Greenville, S.C., in 1859, the report found that the school, with
few exceptions, backed a white supremacist ideology.
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Religion has no role in government: Smriti Irani She said the Sabarimala temple issue, where became a matter of national debate after the Supreme Court allowed entry of women of menstrual age into the famous hill shrine into Kerala, is being used as a "political tool". The Union Textiles Minister was speaking at the 48th edition of IIT
Bombays annual cultural festival 'Mood Indigo' here.
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Pastor John Gray returns to Lakewood Church after Lamborghini lambasting Broadcasting it for the world to see, Gray shared a now-deleted video
of occasion on social media in a post that went viral. Gray has since
apologized via social media and addressed the matter with his Redemption
church members.
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Indonesian Christian Flogged Over Selling Alcohol, Violating Sharia Law Simbolon was arrested in October for selling illegal alcohol and sentenced to 36 lashes with a rattan stick. A doctor checked the convicts' health after 10 stokes, before allowing the punishment to continue. Simbolon was one of 10 people, including eight men and two women, convicted after Friday prayers for crimes that included pimping, prostitution and gambling. An unmarried couple received 10 strokes for having physical contact
deemed too close and seen as a prelude to sex.
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China forbids Christmas decorations as Xi Jinping ramps up war against religion and foreign culture Officials in at least four cities and one county have ordered restrictions on Christmas decorations, with at least ten schools asked to curtail their Christmas celebrations, The Associated Press (AP) reported on Monday. Like many other Asian countries, China does not officially mark Christmas
a public holiday, with workers given days off on to celebrate events
like Chinese New Year instead. Many Chinese businesses tend to use Christmas
to encourage people to go shopping instead.
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Google Hosts 'Sharia' App Helping Indonesian Muslims Report Blasphemy, Heresy The free-of-charge app, which has been downloaded over 1,000 times, was developed by the Jakarta prosecutor’s office and claims to provide users with an opportunity to report religious beliefs they consider misguided. “The objective… is to provide easier access to information about the
spread of beliefs in Indonesia to educate the public and to prevent
them from following doctrines from an individual or a group that are
not in line with the regulations”, a spokesman for the prosecutor’s
office told AFP.
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Ibrahim’s Historical Reconquista: New Book Reveals Christendom’s 1400-Year Struggle Against Jihad Published in full during 1830, John Quincy Adams’ frank, timeless
ruminations on the theologically based conflict between Muhammad’s Islam
and the Christianity of Jesus should be mandatory reading for all contemporary
U.S. diplomats and politicians:
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Former Pastor Sues Ohio Televangelist Ernest Angley Over Sexual Abuse Last January, Miller recounted the events of the assault and abuse to the Akron Beacon Journal, which he says took place on and off for nine years from when he was 18 until he turned 27. Miller resigned in July 2014 after telling his family that, despite
his deep love for the Cuyahoga Falls church, he simply could no longer
deal with Angley’s continued abuse. Upon resignation, Miller moved to
South Carolina to try and start anew, but he said Angley's actions have
followed him no matter where he goes.
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The Emerging Crazy Christian Trend Of Grave Sucking Grave sucking involves laying across a grave of a holy figure. That could mean a preacher, evangelist, or saint. By laying across the grave you “suck” up the power of the Holy Spirit that the person had. You know, like the stealing the power of the dead from the Highlander movie/television franchise. The theological explanation is that God gives away the power of the
Holy Spirit to unique individuals to help carry on His work. When that
person dies, the power remains in the corpse, which wastes the ability
to carry out the power of God. No explanation on what happens to the
cremated. People who participate in grave sucking believe that once
they suck up the mantle they can pass it on, even through YouTube videos
to help cure individuals of maladies.
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Omotoso rape trial: 'We continue to support the man of God', says church The trial against Omotoso is set to continue in the Eastern Cape High Court in Port Elizabeth on Thursday. Omotoso was nabbed in April last year in a dramatic arrest operation at the Port Elizabeth International Airport. His two co-accused, Lusanda Sulani and Zukiswa Sitho, were arrested months later. Omotoso and his two co-accused are currently facing 63 charges and
34 alternative charges which include rape, sexual assault and racketeering.
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Pastor Who Thought God Would Save Him From a Rattlesnake Bite Gets a Painful Surprise A lot of people learned some hard lessons about the fact rattlesnakes hate being bothered on Sunday mornings and heeded them. The preacher is Cody Coots, from Middlesboro, Kentucky. He's the head
pastor at Full Gospel Tabernacle in Jesus’ Name, a Pentecostal house
of worship tucked away in the woods. The doc follows Coots and spotlights
those nail-biting moments when he's jamming out with local rattlers.
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How Islamophobia Is Entering The Law And Becoming Increasingly Acceptable In America Or what if someone under consideration for a top White House job had
written an admiring foreword for a book by Holocaust denier David Irving
or perhaps one by the psychologist and alt-right sympathizer Kevin MacDonald,
who describes Jews as “a hostile, adversary elite” conducting “ethnic
war” against Christianity and “traditional institutions of European-American
culture”? Would such an endorsement keep him from being named as the
president’s national security advisor?
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Archaeologists uncover 1,600-year-old ‘revolutionary’ clues to life in ancient Jewish village The team, led by professor Jodi Magness, discovered mosaics in an ancient village in Israel that contradict widespread views about Jewish settlement in the region during the early fifth century. “The size and rich decoration of the synagogue indicate that this
Jewish village continued to flourish in the centuries after the Roman
Empire became a Christian empire, and these Jews came under Christian
rule, which many scholars today view as having been oppressive to the
Jews,” said Magness, a Kenan distinguished professor of early Judaism
in the department of religious studies at the UNC-Chapel Hill College
of Arts and Sciences.
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Crocodile kills vicar during mass baptism in Ethiopia An 80-strong congregation looked on in horror as the reptile struck at Docho Eshete, a protestant clergyman in the town of Arba Minch, while he conducted a mass baptism in the shallows of Lake Abaya on Sunday. “He baptised the first person and he passed on to another one,” a
local resident at the service, Ketema Kairo, told the BBC’s Amharic
language service. “All of a sudden, a crocodile jumped out of the lake
and grabbed the pastor, pushing aside the person he was baptising.”
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Sex abuse survivors allege coverup by Jehovah's Witnesses for failing to report assaults Christmas ended months ago, but the young Calgary couple can’t bring themselves to take the decorations down just yet. And it’s because they’ve only celebrated four Christmases in their entire lives. The same goes for birthdays, Valentine’s Day and Thanksgiving. In fact, pretty much every holiday is a new experience. Until four years ago, Christian and Katja were Jehovah’s Witnesses
— a Christian sect with a very strict set of rules to live by — including
not celebrating holidays.
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Shadowy Cell in France Plotted to Kill Muslim Civilians, Authorities Say Police cracked the cell over the weekend, with prosecutors saying it had already begun testing explosives. The group was planning to kill veiled women, imams and recently released Islamist prisoners, and wanted to attack mosques and halal grocery stores, according to French news media. Authorities charged the group — nine men and a woman — with terrorist
conspiracy and pointed to its literature, which claimed that it was
“fighting the Islamic peril.” The group was led by a former police officer.
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Kirk Cameron Launches Website The Courage to Help Families Build Traditional Faith Values "The Growing Pains" star has created TheCourage, a website that he says will provide encouragement and enlightenment for families amid today's culture war. "TheCourage is a digital destination meant to inspire, give hope,
and call people to something better, especially in the areas of faith,
family, and culture," the website's description reads.
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Lightning strikes 186-year-old New Hampshire church, sparking fire WMUR-TV reports a staffer at a day care center next door called 911 on Tuesday after hearing a loud crack, then seeing a flash and flames. No one was inside the Crosswords Community Church in Bow at the time.
Sixty firefighters from 12 towns responded. Crews had the fire under
control within 40 minutes and saved the church.
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Judge rules First Church of Cannabis cannot use weed as religious sacrament On Friday, Marion County Superior Court Jude Sheryl Lynch ruled that the church could not smoke marijuana as a religious sacrament. The church’s officials filed a lawsuit against the state in 2015, just days after becoming a recognized church in the state, saying that Indiana’s Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA) should allow for a religious exemption from state and federal laws related to marijuana. The RFRA is intended to protect individuals from government infringement
on the practice of religion unless the government can demonstrate a
compelling reason for doing so.
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Obon Festival honors memory of Japanese ancestors But the centuries-old celebration on North 5th Street was just as much for the dead as it was for the living. The Obon festival — one of Japan’s largest and most significant religious
events — is a Buddhist custom honoring the spirits of one’s ancestors.
The joyous event is marked by family gatherings, Japanese dishes and
a traditional dance known as bon odori.
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Mpumalanga pastor and teacher to appear in court on separate charges of rape The 66-year-old pastor’s appearance stems from an alleged rape of a 45-year-old woman that took place in April. “According to information at police disposal‚ the victim arrived [in]
Volksrust at the time and had no place to stay. She then reportedly
approached the pastor for a place to stay. He accommodated her in one
of the rooms in his place and after three days he reportedly called
her to his bedroom where he allegedly raped her‚” the police said. “The
victim only reported the matter now‚ reportedly due to interventions
by fellow church members.”
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Church Is Taking Appearance Of Gigantic Marilyn Monroe Statue In Stride The 26-foot “Forever Marilyn” statue by artist Seward Johnson captures the Hollywood actress in an iconic scene from the movie “The Seven Year Itch” in which a gust from a subway grate sends her white skirt billowing up. The statue’s back faces the First Congregational Church of Stamford. The 30,000-pound sculpture is part of a summer arts series in downtown
Stamford that showcases Johnson’s work in public places. It was installed
in a Latham Park, a city-owned green space, which is when the church’s
senior minister, the Rev. Todd Yonkman, first heard of it.
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Chile's bishops resign en masse over church sex abuse cover-up The bishops announced at the end of an emergency summit with Pope Francis that all 31 active bishops and three retired ones in Rome had signed a document offering to resign and putting their fate in the hands of the pope. Francis can accept the resignations one by one, reject them or delay a decision. It marked the first known time in history that an entire national bishops conference had offered to resign en masse over scandal, and laid bare the devastation that the abuse crisis has caused the Catholic Church in Chile and beyond. Konchinsky's suit alleges that the officers' actions violated her First
Amendment right to freedom of speech.
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Mitt Romney Calls Robert Jeffress a 'Bigot' for Comments on Jews, Mormons, Muslims and Hell Jeffress and a number of major evangelical pastors have hit back against Romney, however, positioning that Jesus Christ being the only way for salvation is a view in line with Christian belief. "Robert Jeffress says 'you can't be saved by being a Jew,' and 'Mormonism
is a heresy from the pit of hell.' He's said the same about Islam. Such
a religious bigot should not be giving the prayer that opens the United
States Embassy in Jerusalem," Romney, who is also a Utah Senate candidate
and a Mormon, tweeted on Sunday.
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Genesis Prize Cancels Ceremony After 2018 Winner Natalie Portman Says Won’t Visit Israel On Thursday, the Genesis Prize Foundation, which awards what it calls the “Jewish Nobel,” said it was “very saddened” that the Israeli-American actress would not take part in the ceremony. The foundation said that Portman’s representative notified it that
“[r]ecent events in Israel have been extremely distressing to her and
she does not feel comfortable participating in any public events in
Israel” and that “she cannot in good conscience move forward with the
ceremony.”
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Iceland law to outlaw male circumcision sparks row over religious freedom A bill currently before the Icelandic parliament proposes a penalty of up to six years in prison for anyone carrying out a circumcision other than for medical reasons. Critics say the move, which has sparked alarm among religious leaders
across Europe, would make life for Jews and Muslims in Iceland unsustainable.
One in three men globally is thought to be circumcised, the vast majority
for religious or cultural reasons. Many Jews and Muslims fear the issue
of circumcision could become a proxy for antisemitism and Islamophobia,
pointing to similar tensions over religious dress and the ritual slaughter
of animals for meat.
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Ex-Jehovah's Witnesses break silence on shunning: 'My mother treats me like I'm dead' She was watching cartoons on the living room floor of her Mississippi home when she heard the bang. She went to investigate and found her 21-year-old sister, Donna, dead in her bed. She had shot herself in the heart with their father’s hunting rifle weeks after being excommunicated by their church for getting engaged to a non-Jehovah’s Witness. For Sawyer — who sat on the bedroom floor near her sister's body for
hours that day, waiting for her mother to come home from her door-to-door
missionary work — it was the beginning of a long, painful journey that
would one day tear her family apart.
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People who think about leaving religion but don’t are more likely to feel depressed and hopeless “Social scientists give a lot of attention to the nonreligious because of this group’s recent and rapid growth, but even more people consider dropping out of religion and do not actually leave,” said study author Matthew May, an assistant professor of sociology at Oakland University. “My goal was to understand how these people (stayers) differ from the
people who leave (leavers) and the people who do not consider dropping
out of religion (stable affiliates).”
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Can Watching Military Videos Stop A Christian’s Porn Addiction? The Conquer Series is a series of DVDs created by Dr. Ted Roberts, a pastor and former marine fighter pilot. The videos are an odd hybrid of low-budget action movie, recruitment advertisement, and small group therapy session. Each video uses military language and imagery to stop sex and internet
porn addiction. With sections titled “the mission” and “strongholds
of the enemy” the videos seem to be designed for men to talk about something
embarrassing with the most masculine images that Dr. Roberts could create.
With 68% of Christian men using internet porn on a regular basis, there
seems to be some need.
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Leaked anti-gay Jehovah’s Witnesses video to be shown to 7 million people The video starts in a board room meeting where a group of men are brainstorming experiences which they can share – and one of the pinpoints “Sally”. ? The clip then cuts to a young woman walking around what appears to be a market. She see’s women wearing rainbow bracelets, with rainbow posters showing
two stick-figure women holding hands.
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Pope says ‘fake news’ dates to Adam and Eve Disinformation and “manipulative use of social networks” can have “dire consequences” and the world must embark on a “profound and careful process of discernment,” he said in a speech marking World Communications Day. His speech was themed around the biblical verse: “The truth will set
you free.” The pontiff also described journalism as "not just a job;
it is a mission."
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Tech Bro Guru: Inside the Sedona Cult of Bentinho Massaro He’s truly one of a kind. What makes him stand out? It’s not his identity
or looks. He’s a typical twenty something founder; white, handsome,
charismatic and tech savvy. It’s also not because he built a successful
company from nothing. That’s common these days. What makes him particularly
unique is that he brilliantly used startup principles to create a legitimately
dangerous, real life, 21st century cult. In Sedona. In 2017. Tech bro
Guru has arrived. The OS has been upgraded. Cult 2.0 is upon us.
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Hindus upset at Toyota Super Bowl ad for belittling Hinduism This commercial; in Super Bowl LII football championship played in Minneapolis on February four; depicts Christian, Muslim, Buddhist and Jewish religious figures. How could you possibly showcase “We’re All One Team” by turning your
back to 1.1 billion Hindus and thus slighting world’s oldest religion?
Hindu statesman Rajan Zed asked in a statement in Reno (Nevada) today.
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Victim Cries as Pastor Accused of Sex Assault Is Applauded “Do you remember?” the subject line read. “Do you remember that night that you were supposed to drive me home from church and instead drove me to a deserted back road and sexually assaulted me?” Woodson wrote. “Do you remember how you acted like you loved me and cared about me in order for me to cooperate in such acts, only to run out of the vehicle later and fall to your knees begging for forgiveness and for me not to tell anyone what had just happened?” The message landed in the inbox of Andy Savage, a pastor at Highpoint
Church, an evangelical Memphis mega-congregation that draws more than
2,000 Sunday worshipers.
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Scamming Trump Pastor Demands One Month's Salary From Followers Now White is raising eyebrows with a new scheme that involves asking her followers to send her up to a full month’s salary — or else face “consequences.” Via The Christian Post, White has launched a “First Fruits” campaign
on her website that asks her followers to ring in the new year by sending
her a significant chunk of money this month.
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San Jose moves to shut down two churches selling marijuana In an email, Davis said that the city attorney’s office “is preparing to take court action to shut down both illegal dispensaries.” She was referring to Coachella Valley Church at 2142 The Alameda and Oklevueha Native American Church of South Bay at 265 Meridian Ave. “It’s a priority for me, so I will be doing everything I can to shut down illegal pot clubs, regardless of whether they call themselves churches or not,” Davis said. For the past few years, the city has allowed only 16 cannabis clubs
to operate as long as they have permits and pay sales and business taxes.
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Mom Beats, Chokes Daughter For Being Unable to Recite Bible Verses Police filed child endangerment charges against Rhonda Kemp Shoffner, 41, of the first block of Genesis Court, following the incident on March 14. The victim, who is under the age of 13, told police the assault occurred just after she awoke from a nap in her mother's home about 3 p.m. Shoffner, who the victim said had been drunk for three days straight,
told her daughter to call multiple family members, police said. When
they didn't answer the calls, police said, Shoffner ordered her daughter
to get on her knees in the bathroom.
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Indian film Padmavati sparks protests over 'Hindu-Muslim romance' The Indian government is being asked to intervene to delay the release
of Padmavati, a film based on an epic 16th-century poem, starring Deepika
Padukone as the titular character. Uttar Pradesh officials said on Thursday
that due to elections and a Muslim holiday they would not be able to
provide enough police to secure cinemas for the film’s scheduled release
on 1 December.
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Evangelical pastor Robert Jeffress thinks the Catholic Church is a 'cult-like pagan religion' Dr. Robert Jeffress, a Southern Baptist pastor, says that the Roman Catholic Church is the result of the Babylonian cult system founded by the Book of Revelation in a video posted on YouTube by RWW Blog. Twitter slammed and mocked the southern baptist pastor for making the comments on the religion. "This idea is widespread in RW Born-Againism. They only tolerate Catholics
because of anti-abortion stance. Their bigotry just under surface,"
tweeted one user.
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Only a flaky Christian would get annoyed by Greggs’ sausage roll Jesus Yes, the story of the nativity is quite a scandal – the almighty creator of the universe appearing on Earth mewling and wailing in a trough in a shed shared with some farm animals. Glory, splendour, majesty? Yeah, right. Yet despite being reminded of this palpable absurdity every year,
some of us Christians still find something supposedly irreverent to
get irate about each time Christmas comes around. If it’s not spurious
stories about wintervals and prayers, it’s tales of the desecration
of the festival by commercial interests. And this ignoble tradition
shows no sign of dying out, for this year we have the sausage roll in
place of Jesus in order to flog some greasy bakery products. He’s not
the Messiah – he’s some flaccid pastry filled with processed meat..
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ISIS bride-turned-Texas Christian: Racism radicalized me The former bride of ISIS’s highest-ranking American member has described for the first time how she fled the extremist group in Syria and has settled down with her four kids in a suburb of Dallas, according to a new article from The Atlantic. Tania Georgelas, 33, who became radicalized as a teen in England and later moved to Syria with Texan husband John Georgelas, explained how she and her hubby planned to raise their kids into jihadi fighters. “Our dreams were to have land of our own, raise a family and train
them be assassins or whatever, soldiers, and then eventually go join
the jihad,” she said.
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Alabama pastor defends Roy Moore by saying 'some 14-year-olds ... could pass for 20' The Southern Baptist and other evangelical Christian leaders who support
Moore are vocal about it, but the ones who don't, for a variety of reasons,
are "reticent," says New York Times religion reporter Laurie Goodstein,
who spoke to many of them. And of the ones who are vocal about their
support, Earl Wise, a pastor from Millbrook, wins the prize for worst
defense of Moore, so far.
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‘It will help future generations’: Muslim schools in north India set to modernise The move was announced by Laxmi Narayan Chaudhary, state minority welfare minister for Narendra Modi’s Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata party (BJP), which won a landslide victory in India’s most populous state earlier this year. Uttar Pradesh has an estimated 19,000 faith schools, or madrasas,
but most teach only Islamic theology. Even madrasas that do teach these
subjects – many are trying to modernise their curricula – make them
optional at secondary school.
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Florida church changes sign after message misinterpreted as sexual The sign outside the Bella Villa Baptist Church read: "Forgiveness is swallowing when you want to spit." Representatives from the church say the sign was "completely innocent"
and was "intended as encouragement to forgive." However, many interpreted
the sign in a salacious manner.
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'It's a revolution': polygamist sect loses power over Utah town for first time Three non-fundamentalist council members are reported to have won against incumbents loyal to the sect “by a landslide” in Hildale, southern Utah, on Tuesday night. And, in a closer race, an all-but-official majority of voters have
chosen a new mayor, who also ran as an “outsider” to challenge the authority
of the fringe religion over the isolated community.
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UN expert says most of world lacks real religious freedom Ahmed Shaheed told the General Assembly's human rights committee that religious intolerance is prevalent globally — and rising around the world. He said over 70 countries currently have anti-blasphemy laws that can
be used to suppress dissenting views, in violation of international
human rights standards.
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Inside the sex scandal that brought down a multi-million dollar televangelist empire Jim and Tammy Faye Bakker were famous in the 1980s for their successful TV ministry PTL (Praise the Lord) Club, later called The Jim and Tammy Show. But the Christian conglomerate was all but destroyed after a local newspaper unearthed a shocking scandal - that Jim Bakker had paid $279,000 to Jessica Hahn, a church secretary. That thread quickly unraveled an even bigger scandal after the Charlotte
Observer found that Hahn had allegedly been paid the cash as hush money,
after she was allegedly raped by Bakker in a hotel room in 1980 when
she was 21.
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Lakeside Church Shocked by $9,500 Electric Bill “The Pastor brought it to me and I was like, I don’t know what’s going on,” church elder Eric Bryant said. Eric is talking about the church’s June electric bill from San Diego Gas and Electric (SDG&E). The bill was for over $9,500. “I was incredulous,” Eric said.
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London commuters ran onto the tracks after a man began reciting Bible verses out loud The BBC reports that passengers became scared when a man began quoting Bible passages such as “death is not the end” out loud, causing them to flee the train outside Wimbledon station at 8.30am Monday morning. One man who was on the train said the Bible reading caused a “crush”
and a “commotion”, before someone asked the reader to stop “as he was
scaring people”.
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Pope's psychoanalyst visits show his struggle in Argentina's 'dirty war' The news that he visited a psychoanalyst every week for six months may cast some light on this question. At the time of his therapy, he was 42 and Argentina was two years
into the terrible struggle between a military junta that killed about
30,000 people and tortured many more, and the left, which included everyone
from urban guerrillas to unarmed priests. Fr Bergoglio, as he then was,
found himself in the middle as the head of the Jesuit order.
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Who is David Meade? Christian numerologist who believes the world will end on September 23 His theory was given a boost this year when NASA discovered a new planet in the solar system, which they named Planet Nine. Meade’s prediction is largely based on the Bible passage Isaiah, Chapter 13 9-10, it reads: “See, the Day of the Lord is coming – a cruel day, with wrath and fierce anger – to make the land desolate and destroy the sinners within it. “The Stars of Heaven and their constellations will not show their
light. The rising Sun will be darkened and the Moon will not give its
light.”
More Christian parents 'to sue school' because boy in son's class was allowed to wear dress They raised concerns with the head after a six-year-old boy arrived at the unnamed school dressed as a boy one day and wore girl’s clothes on another. But the school defended its behaviour, stating: “The refusal to acknowledge a transgendered person’s true gender” was ‘transphobic behaviour’.” Today, Mr Rowe, 44, from the Isle of Wight, said: “I’m shocked that
just because we question the notion that a six-year-old boy can really
become a girl, we are transphobic.
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'Agnostic' Jeremy Corbyn upsets Catholics by taking Holy Communion The Labour leader, who has never practiced Catholicism, took wine and wafers during the funeral of the former GMB Union president Mary Turner, who died in July. The Diocese of Westminster, which is responsible for the church Mr
Corbyn was attending at the time, responded by saying that it expected
celebrants to be "in full communion with the Catholic Church" in order
to receive Communion. The left-wing New Statesman magazine reports that
Mr Corbyn queued for Communion with his Mexican wife Laura Alvarez during
the service at Sacred Heart Church in Kilburn, north London.
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They kept us as slaves: AP reveals claims against church Trapped in a foreign land, he said he was forced to work 15 hours a day, usually for no pay, first cleaning warehouses for the secretive evangelical church and later toiling at businesses owned by senior ministers. Any deviation from the rules risked the wrath of church leaders, he said, ranging from beatings to shaming from the pulpit. “They trafficked us up here. They knew what they were doing. They needed
labor and we were cheap labor — hell, free labor,” Oliveira said.
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Christian multi-universe theories Church-imposed censorship of the free inquiry and the untrammeled
life of the mind that are at the heart of the university! So some would
consider it. But a line of research today, detailed in the article linked
after the jump, argues that Tempier’s list had the effect of liberating
Western thought from Aristotle’s scientific teachings. And this, in
turn, was an important factor in the rise of modern science.
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What U.S. Evangelists Did To Poison A Country When the law passed in 2014, reports of anti-gay incidents increased
tenfold. In May 2014, SMUG issued a report detailing attempted lynchings,
mob violence, home torchings, blackmail, firings, arrests, evictions
and suicides. Tabloid newspapers also joined in the fray, publishing
29 stories outing hundreds of LGBT individuals, which led often to further
violence and familial shunning.
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Pastor allegedly sleeps with General Overseer, rapes daughter The incident caused serious crisis in the church after allegation of adultery and rape was leveled against Pastor Uzor. According to P M.Express, the alleged sex scandal has put the entire
congregation in disarray as some members have left in annoyance because
the church’s General Overseer, Prophetess Udeh was in the thick of the
whole scandal.
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Black female Episcopal bishop of Indy diocese breaks stained glass ceiling Cars flipped upside down, buildings with shattered windows, ash coating everything. These were the features of the hellish streetscape a few blocks from Ground Zero. In that moment, the North Tower of the World Trade Center came crashing
down. Someone urged her group, which had been huddled in a stairwell
during the attacks, to run for a nearby ferry terminal. Baskerville-Burrows,
who grew up in a housing project on Staten Island, knew the way. Soon
a ferry was carrying her away from the smoking city. Back in the building
where she'd lived as a child, she knocked on doors she hadn't visited
in years, seeking refuge from terrorism where she had once only feared
the gunfire outside.
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Complaint Filed To Close Sex Club Posing As Church The filing made Thursday in General Sessions court, states that a permit had been issued to operate a church at 520 Lentz Ave in Madison, but instead the owners have been operating a sex club. The complaint states that Freedom 4 All, Inc. is "maintaining a public
nuisance by permitting acts of lewd conduct" and is in violation of
city ordinances and state law which prohibit operation of the club within
1,000 feet of a school.
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Sikh Man Heads To Pentagon As A Soldier After Long Struggle To Join U.S. Forces Shaking with nerves, Singh approached the microphone in a camouflage turban. "I want to understand," the young man from Waltham asked. "What can
we do to ensure anyone who's passionate and patriotic can serve without
them having to give up on their religious beliefs?"
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Church loses labour case The congregation dragged the Social Security Commission to court in May 2016 after the Commission refused to deregister the church as a company and employer. “The congregation is trying to evade its obligations under the SSC Act and this court cannot allow employees to be unprotected in the event they fall ill, become pregnant or die,” explained Judge Petrus Unengu. The congregation approached the High Court, stating that its followers
are not employees and thus the congregation cannot be regarded as an
employer and it does not regard itself as one.
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'Mother' should not be used to describe a bomb, Pope says The U.S. Air Force dropped such a bomb, officially designated as the GBU-43 Massive Ordnance Air Blast (MOAB) on suspected Islamic State fighters in eastern Afghanistan last month. The nickname was widely used in briefings and reporting on the attack. "I was ashamed when I heard the name," Pope Francis told an audience
of students. "A mother gives life and this one gives death, and we call
this device a mother. What is happening?"
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Scientology Social Media Celebrates L. Ron Hubbard’s Dianetics on its 67th Birthday Given the fact that the very same L. Ron Hubbard would later go on
to start the always-in-the-news religion of Scientology, it may surprise
you to know if unaware, that ‘Dianetics’ was a secular, nonreligious
180,000 word work supposedly written in only 6 weeks, according to Wikipedia.
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Adventist pastor comes out as bisexual, resigns her church “Through study and prayer, I’ve come to a point of complete disagreement with the Adventist Church on their teachings about LGBT people,” Alicia Johnston said in a video posted on Facebook on April 22. “I also myself am bisexual so I’ve come to an awareness of that and have realized I just can’t live my life with integrity anymore without being honest about that.” The Arizona Conference Corporation of Seventh-day Adventists issued
a statement calling Johnston a “gifted theologian and pastor” and noting
its determination to abide by the stances of the church.
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Exhibit shows how Passover was artistically reinvented through the years . Indeed, many know parts of the Passover manual they will be reciting — called a “haggadah” — by heart. But the images used to illuminate this ancient text, embellished with hymns, songs and prayers, tell an additional story. It is the story of Passover told visually through the ages. Dozens of such books, spanning the 14th to the 21st centuries, are
on display at a Duke University gallery and they showcase the artistic
imagination used in the service of Passover, which is probably Judaism’s
most widely observed holiday.
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Police arrest ex-church volunteer accused of sexually abusing nursery children during evening prayer Francisco Guevara, 65, was arrested on two charges of continuous sexual abuse of a child and one charge of indecency with a child. According to police, Guevara volunteered at the St. John the Apostle
Catholic Church nursery, where two of the offenses occurred. The offenses
occurred up to 7 years ago, when the victims were between 4 to 7 years
of age.
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Hindu Temple, Previously A Jewish Synagogue, Will Become the First in Rhode Island Temple Am David has been in receivership since November, and it is
expected to be turned over to a new faith, who are its new owners. The
temple’s temporary receiver, Theodore Orson, of Orson and Brusini Ltd,
a Providence law firm, said RIHTS signed a purchase and sale agreement
in June for $400,001, which was approved in July by Kent County Superior
Court.
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Did Jehovah's Witness elders fail to report sexual abuse? Her goal in filing the suit, besides personal justice, is to remove the secrecy within the denomination that allowed her abuse to continue after it was reported to church elders, her attorney, Jeffrey Fritz, said Monday. "Her main motivation is exposing that the policies of the Watchtower
and the Jehovah's Witnesses are not following mandatory reporting laws
in Pennsylvania," he said Monday. "That's what led to this happening
to her, and continuing to happen to other victims within the religion,
as well."
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Aliso Viejo pastor gets 6 years in child sex assaults Brandon Ernis Lee McDade of Mission Viejo, 31, pleaded guilty to a
count of committing lewd acts on a child younger than 14, two counts
of committing lewd acts on a child between 14 and 15, all felonies,
and a misdemeanor count of child annoyance, according to the Orange
County District Attorney's Office. McDade was also ordered to register
as a sex offender for the rest of his life.
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Pilgrim nation: The Householder God Yes, for most people, it is the only temple in India where Krishna
is worshipped with his siblings, the elder brother Balarama and the
younger sister, Subhadra. But for the locals, the enshrined deity is
to be simultaneously identified with Vishnu, the preserver of the world,
and is often called Ananta Vasudeva, the embodiment of infinity. His
consort is neither Radha nor Rukmini, but Lakshmi herself. All the while,
the priests will tell you that different people see the deity differently:
the triad is different forms of Tara to the Shaktas, different Bhairavas
to the Shaivas, embodiment of Buddhist ideas to the Buddhists, embodiment
of Jain principles to Jains.
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Arrested Houston pastor accused in $200K theft of church donations Russell Thompson Jr., 55, had been with the City of Refuge Presbyterian Church, located in the 3100 block of Yellowstone near Old Spanish Trail. He resides in Pearland. Thompson was indicted March 13 and arrested early last week, charged
with theft. He is currently free on $30,000 bond and his next court
date is April 14, according to court records.
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Jehovah's Witnesses charity drops attempts to block abuse inquiry The Charity Commission launched an inquiry into safeguarding at the religion’s main UK charity in May 2014 after receiving allegations that survivors of rape and sexual abuse, including people abused as children, were forced to face their attackers in “judicial committees”. The Jehovah’s Witnesses, however, resisted the investigation into
the Watch Tower Bible Tract Society of Great Britain (WTBTS), which
oversees the UK’s 1,500 congregations and is believed to play a key
role in deciding how claims of abuse are handled.
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Hindu Priest Arrested in Possible Love Triangle Murder Plot While the crime, a vicious stabbing, according to witnesses, is alarming enough, the fact that the latest alleged murderer is a Hindu priest is sending shock waves through the Hindu community. Ashok Kumar was killed in August in his home on Grandstaff Drive. A month later Sacramento police arrested Tiwan Greenwade, Vicky Rainone
and the victim's wife, Rohini Kumar, for murder.
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Trump’s Election Win in Church of Scientology’s East Hollywood Neighborhood But while nearly all of the surrounding region voted for the Democratic former secretary of state, one little chunk of Hollywood best known for the Church of Scientology’s “Big Blue” complex went red, picking the Republican billionaire instead. The precinct, wedged between Hollywood Boulevard and Fountain Avenue,
tipped to Trump by just three votes, 347 to 344. It marked the first
time since at least 2000 that the area went Republican. In 2012, President
Barack Obama defeated Gov. Mitt Romney by 81 votes, 316 to 235.
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Pastor, Wife Arrested in $1,200,000 Congregation Fraud Scheme According to the report, Terry Wayne Millender, who serves as pastor for Victorious Life Church in Alexandria; his wife, Brenda; and a friend, Grenetta Wells, who is also affiliated with the church, were all recently indicted by a federal grand jury on charges of conspiracy to commit wire fraud and money-laundering conspiracy. Authorities say the charges stem from an investment scam in which
the Millenders and Wells convinced congregations to invest in their
company, Micro-Enterprise Management Group, which allegedly helped poor
people in developing countries through the provision of small, short-term
loans to start or build up existing businesses by working with a network
of established microfinance groups.
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Zimbabwe priest held over Mugabe death prophecy Gift Mtisi said Pastor Patrick Mugadza was arrested at the magistrate’s court in Harare where he was appearing on separate charges of wearing the national flag and charged over the prophecy made last week about Mugabe's demise. "He was appearing at the court on a different matter when police arrested him during a break and charged him over the prophecy," Mtisi told AFP. "He was initially charged with undermining the authority of the president
and the charge was later changed to insulting people of a certain race
or religion."
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Sex, drugs and ancient scrolls: Scientists claim religion has same impact on brain as lovemaking, ecstasy and music Scientists from the University of Utah in the U.S. enlisted 19 church-going teenagers to take part in an hour long "exam" with four parts for the study. The scientists recorded their reactions and studied the parts of the
brain stimulated. This included six minutes of rest, six minutes of
a video detailing their church's membership statistics, eight minutes
of quotations by Mormon and world religious leaders, eight minutes of
reading familiar passages from the Book of Mormon, 12 minutes of church-produced
video of family and Biblical scenes and another eight minutes of quotations.
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Investigation Into Death of Jehovah’s Witness During Childbirth She never came home. Dupuis began to hemorrhage while in labor and required a blood transfusion, which she allegedly refuse. She then died. According to the CBC, the child survived and is in good health. See this news story for more information. Dupuis’ death, however, has now prompted an investigation by the coroner’s
office, to see if medical mistakes were made and to note if she did
indeed refuse a blood transfusion through an informed decision. The
news article above states that Dupuis’ aunt and a group of her friends
expressed concern that the family of Dupuis may have been the ones to
pressure the medical staff into withholding blood, something forbidden
among Jehovah’s Witnesses.
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Could ‘Harry Potter’ give rise to a new religion? A Cambridge podcast treats the boy wizard’s story as holy and reflects on life’s big questions using the seven-book series by J.K. Rowling as a guide. The online show, “Harry
Potter and the Sacred Text,” currently holds the number one spot
on iTunes’s religion and spirituality charts, ahead of best-selling
author and televangelist Joel Osteen. Launched in May, the 25-minute
Potter-cast draws about 100,000 listeners a week.
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Scientologists demand A&E Network pull former disciple Leah Remini’s exposé from air A lawyer acting for the Scientologists tried to get the show, which threatens to reveal details about the church, pulled before it airs on cable channel The Arts & Entertainment Network. The former Kings of Queens star was blacklisted after walking away
from Scientology in 2013, criticizing officials’ treatment of their
followers. Since then the 46-year-old has gone public with her disdain
for the religion and is to reveal details about the church and former
members of the religion in her series Scientology and the Aftermath,
which debuts on November 29, 2016.
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13-Year-Old Jain Girl Dies After 68 Days of Fasting After the first week of fasting, she became withdrawn and lost interest
in studies. Back at her home in Kot Market, she watched TV, lay around,
drank more boiled water for dinner, and went off to sleep. From the
26th day of her fast, Aradhana stopped going to school altogether.
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West Helena pastor charged with rape, sexual grooming of 15-year-old Pastor Bishop Michael Jenkins is charged with rape and sexual grooming of a minor, police said. Just after 1 p.m., police and FBI agents went to Jenkins' home on South 7th Street. He works at the Church of the Living God. "The 15-year-old said that she was actually raped by this local pastor
inside of the trailer," said HWHPD Chief Virgil Green. Police say that
trailer was parked right in front of the pastor's house.
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Young Priests 'Too Scared' To Perform Exorcisms "I told the bishop that I can't find anyone willing to do this," 79-year-old Father Vincenzo Taraborelli told the BBC. "Many of them are scared. Even priests can be scared. It's a difficult life." Fr Taborelli has been performing exorcisms – the expulsion of evil spirits from a person or place – for almost three decades, and sees up to 30 people a day at his church in Rome. The Catholic Church downplayed the reality of Satan and demonic forces
after the liberalising Second Vatican Council in the 1960s. However,
the conservative Pope John Paul II was clear about his belief in the
occult and Pope Francis has also reminded Catholics that "Satan is real".
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Utah Jehovah’s Witnesses church forced woman to listen to audio of her rape The woman filed the lawsuit Wednesday in 2nd District Court, accusing the Kingdom Hall of Jehovah's Witnesses church in Roy — as well as naming the alleged perpetrator, several church leaders and the Watchtower Bible and Tract Society (the religion's headquarters located in New York) — of knowingly allowing the "unfit" instructor to rise to a position of authority without warning members of his "dangerous propensities" and past sexual transgressions. No representative of the Roy church, 1950 W. 4400 South, responded
to a voicemail from The Salt Lake Tribune requesting comment Thursday.
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How did the Star of David come to be? The earliest notable use of the star was decorative purposes according
to Alec Mishory, a historian. The star was used to mark ancestry on
printed work by Jewish printers in a bid to distinguish themselves from
their competition. The hexagram was also used for Kabbalistic purposes
from as early as the third century CE on tombstones, tables and other
locations and traditional items.
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Man who claimed God punishes gay people with natural disasters sees his own home destroyed by floods Tony Perkins - the leader of Family Research Council - might be regretting that statement after becoming another victim of the Louisiana flood crisis. The disaster has seen several people killed and thousands left homeless.
But people are viewing the destruction of his property as a glimmer
of good news after what he has previously stated as fact. The group
leader had to flee his flooded home in a canoe and now faces six months
living in a camper van to mull over those words.
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Churches hope to attract youth with Pokémon GO The game has certainly caught the attention of Church leaders. It
has the potential to increase Church attendance. However, as of now,
churches looking to draw in youth with the help of the game are not
be able to register as a Gym or a PokeStop. What the Church leaders
can do is turn their churches into a “charging station” for the players.
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Islamic State Issues Fatwa Against Children with Down Syndrome, Murders 38 Disabled Infants According to the Iraqi activist blog Mosul Eye, sharia judges have
ruled that ISIS followers are authorized to kill infants with Down Syndrome
or congenital deformities. Already since the religious decree (fatwa)
was issued, militants have killed at least 38 children between one week
and three months old by lethal injection or suffocation.
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Inside the world of Mormon porn After she invites him in, he sits down on her bed. “So I hear you like elders,” he says to the older, married woman. “Where did you hear that from?” she asks (knowing exactly where). “My companion was feeling really guilty and told me all about it. You
both could get in a lot of trouble for this—unless you let me in on
the action,” he warns. Sister Rose barely hesitates before, well, letting
him in on the action. She seductively peels off her patterned dress,
but something is amiss. She’s wearing what appears to be pajamas under
her dress—a white tee and fitted shorts. She then removes his clothes,
and the young man is wearing the same tee and shorts set.
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Pro-Trump pastor whitewashes history of pastors during Jim Crow—including the history of his church “When you look at American history, whenever there was a need for a great change, it was pastors who led the way,” Jeffress said in a video message. Jeffrees said pastors were the leaders during the American revolution and the fight for the abolition of slavery. “And it was pastors who were at the forefront of the civil rights
movement. What if pastors back then had said, ‘I’m not getting involved’?
We would not have a country today,” Jeffress said.
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Bill Nye visits Noah’s Ark theme park And it was “like the debate all over again but more intense at times,” according to a blog post by Ken Ham, president and CEO of Answers in Genesis. Ham also posted on social media about Nye’s visit, which occurred on Friday (July 8). “Bill challenged me about the content of many of our exhibits, and I challenged him about what he claimed and what he believed,” Ham said on Facebook. “It was a clash of world views.” “I chose to visit the Ark Encounter to see for myself the extent of
its influence on young people,” Nye said Monday in a written statement.
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Turkey Pursues Cleric Living in U.S., Blamed as Coup Mastermind Now, Mr. Erdogan says that many thousands of Turkish citizens — soldiers, policemen, bureaucrats, teachers, judges, lawyers and many more professions — are all part of the cleric’s movement and must be punished. Tens of thousands of people have already been arrested or suspended from their jobs in the four days since the coup failed, after a night of violence that plunged the country into chaos. Mr. Erdogan and the cleric, Fethullah Gulen, have been adversaries in recent years, and Turkey has said before that Mr. Gulen must be extradited by the United States. Now, though, Mr. Erdogan appears determined to get him back, a matter that threatens to aggravate relations between the two NATO allies. But who is Mr. Gulen? And is it possible he is behind such a vast
conspiracy?
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Western Wall Prayer Protest Turns Violent The Reform and Conservative Jewish worshippers were shoved, pushed,
and spat upon by the Haredi Jews. A few of the Haredi Jews, in order
to avoid looking at the women worshippers while pushing them, covered
their faces with their hats. There were a dozen uniformed policemen
present at the scene. However, they did not intervene, they just looked
on. The Reform and Conservative Jews refrained from responding to the
abuse.
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Church and state group takes aim at Hondo's 'God's Country' signs The two iconic signs on Highway 90 greet drivers with the message "This Is God's Country - Please Don't Drive Through It Like Hell." Acting on complaints from two unidentified Texans, the Freedom From
Religion Foundation sent Hondo Mayor James Danner a letter last week
asking that the city of Hondo remove the signs from public property.
Foundation co-president Annie Laurie Gaylor wrote the "This Is God's
Country" message violates the First Amendment's clause against the establishment
of a religion.
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Jehovah's Witness video under fire for homophobic message The animated video titled ‘Lesson 22: One Man, One Woman‘ continues an ongoing series by the Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society of Pennsylvania, featuring a young girl learning the ways of Jehovah through her mother. In this video, the little girl asks her mother about a school friend who has “two mommies.” “My teacher says that all that matters is that people love each other and that they’re happy,” the little girl says. To which the mother replies “Well people have their own ideas about
what is right and wrong. But what matters is how Jehovah feels. He wants
us to be happy and he knows how we can be happiest. That’s why he invented
marriage the way he did.”
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Lady Gaga to join Dalai Lama in Indy this weekend The 14th Dalai Lama of Tibet is slated to give the conference's keynote
address urging local action to build kind and compassionate cities.
The address starts at 10:30 a.m. Sunday at the J.W. Marriott Grand Ballroom.
Afterward, Lady Gaga will join him for an onstage conversation, moderated
by journalist Ann Curry. The panel also will be joined by businessman
and philanthropist Philip Anschutz.
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"Is the Pope Catholic?" suddenly a serious question “A catastrophe,” one traditionalist blogger called the apostolic exhortation, “Amoris Laetitia,” or “The Joy of Love,” which was released by the Vatican on April 8. Francis “departs from Church teaching” in the exhortation, wrote another. “Suddenly the rhetorical question, ‘Is the pope Catholic?’ doesn’t
seem so rhetorical anymore,” Claire Chretien wrote in a pointed critique
at the conservative Web outlet The Federalist.
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‘The prophet will never lead the LDS Church astray,’ and other Mormon heresies Some Mormons use it to comfort themselves when the Church has done something that just doesn’t feel right, whether it’s prohibiting the baptism of children of same-sex couples or denying the priesthood to blacks: “This must be God’s will despite what my conscience is telling me, because the prophet will never lead the Church astray.” Others use it to bludgeon people who can’t fall in line behind whatever policy the Church has supported: “You must be apostate, because the prophet has spoken, and we have been taught that the prophet will never lead the Church astray. So either get with the program or get out.” The problem with this understanding of prophets is that it contradicts
one of the bedrock doctrines of Mormonism: agency.
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Could religion help you live longer? The study, published online by JAMA Internal Medicine, does not prove a cause and effect relationship, but the researchers say the association appears to be strong. "The results suggest that there is perhaps something about the communal religious experience that is very powerful," study author Tyler J. VanderWeele, Ph.D., of the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public, told CBS News. For the analysis, VanderWeele and colleagues pulled data from a long-running
national health study of female nurses to examine attendance at religious
services and subsequent death in women.
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Prince's Life as a Jehovah's Witness: His Complicated and Ever-Evolving Faith "He declined because of my homosexuality and the fact I'm half-Jewish," said Melvoin. She was told he wanted her to give a press conference denouncing her homosexuality and announcing that she was converting to Jehovah. "I was like: I guess we'll never hear from him again." But just six years later, she stood beside Prince onstage in London,
playing for millions of viewers at an awards show. In matching white
suits, Melvoin and Prince hammered shoulder to shoulder on their guitars,
him lustily singing "Purple Rain." Coleman was on piano. The early acceptance
of the gay couple -- and then the rejection and acceptance all over
again -- is an example of the puzzling contradiction that Prince acted
out in his attitudes toward sexuality and religion.
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Who Was Mary Magdalene? Yet she was only elusively identified in Scripture, and has thus served as a scrim onto which a succession of fantasies has been projected. In one age after another her image was reinvented, from prostitute to sibyl to mystic to celibate nun to passive helpmeet to feminist icon to the matriarch of divinity’s secret dynasty. How the past is remembered, how sexual desire is domesticated, how
men and women negotiate their separate impulses; how power inevitably
seeks sanctification, how tradition becomes authoritative, how revolutions
are co-opted; how fallibility is reckoned with, and how sweet devotion
can be made to serve violent domination—all these cultural questions
helped shape the story of the woman who befriended Jesus of Nazareth.
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The Church Collection Plate Goes Digital A typical service, Ciamacco says, opens with a band that would fit
in at the Coachella festival, were it not for the Jesus lyrics: “What
a savior, my Redeemer/Friend of sinners, one like me.” (In one podcast,
a pastor, sermonizing about society’s obsession with markers of achievement,
uses an Internet-approved term of endearment to channel his audience,
asking, “When am I going to get my own bae?”) At the end, a member of
the “worship team” will call on parishioners to tithe and pass the collection
plate. But not all people reach into their wallet. Many take out their
phone instead.
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Is the end of days looming for fundamentalist sect in Utah? But if a certain group of polygamous religious extremists in a lonely corner of southern Utah are to be believed, this Wednesday the walls will split open and fall when one of their leaders, Lyle Jeffs, appears before the judge in a major fraud case, according to former followers of his sect. Simultaneously, an earthquake will apparently cause the walls of a
prison in Texas to crumble and Lyle’s brother, Warren Jeffs, the group’s
“prophet” and supreme leader, will also walk free – despite the fact
he has been serving a sentence of life plus 20 years in that state since
2011, convicted of having sex with underage girls as young as 12 that
he took as polygamous wives.
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Dead for 48 minutes, Catholic Priest claims God is female The 71-year-old cleric Father John Micheal O’neal claims he went to heaven and met God, which he describes as a warm and comforting motherly figure. Father John Micheal O’neal was rushed to the hospital on January 29 after a major heart attack, but was declared clinically dead soon after his arrival. With the aid of a high-tech machine called LUCAS 2, that kept the blood flowing to his brain, doctors at Massachusetts General Hospital managed to unblock vital arteries and return his heart to a normal rhythm. The doctors were afraid he would have suffered some brain damage from
the incident, but he woke up less than 48 minutes later and seems to
have perfectly recovered.
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