World News for Feb. 8, 2007

February 7, 2007

Reading: World News for Feb. 8, 2007
Print This Article


  • The National Association of Evangelicals (NAE) is facing a new “public embarrassment” following the moral failure of its head, Ted Haggard. The organization is in disagreement over who has the right to speak for it on public issues. The debate is major, since there are 52 member denominations in the conglomeration. Specifically, the main issue currently causing the disagreement is whether global warming is real. The NAE vice president for government relations, Rich Cizik, believes it is, but others in the organization don’t buy it, and last year the NAE noted “the lack of consensus among the evangelical community on this issue.” Joel Belz, commenting in World, called the push “the same steamroller approach to this discussion that has so characterized the mainstream media and academia. The assumption by most of them is that the discussion is over and that it’s time for action—expensive government action. Those of us who think otherwise should be prepared to be run over.”

  • A number of organizations and individuals are lamenting that the recent Washington rally protesting the war in Iraq involved anti-war protesters desecrating government property by spray painting the Capitol with anarchist symbols. Some members of congress blamed the Capitol police for not stepping in to stop the spray painting. U.S. Senator Wayne Allard (R.-Colo.), ranking member of the Legislative Branch subcommittee to the U.S. Senate Committee on Appropriations, stated, “I was absolutely dismayed by the vandalism and the blatant disregard for respect of property that occurred at our Nation’s Capitol.” Allard requested a meeting with the Capitol police chief to discuss the facts of what went on in defacing the Capitol.
  • A no-spanking bill is going ahead in California, as parents react angrily to the proposal. Some citizens, though not condoning spanking, are against government interference. Said one, “I sure do not need some media-grubbing politician to tell me how to raise my kids.” California Assemblywoman Sally Lieber is at the forefront of the bill, but some observers believe she will be hard-pressed to get support from Republican lawmakers, who are typically wary of expanding governmental role in family life.
  • Persecution in North Korea is expanding and worse than ever. The country is once again the number-one religious freedom violator in the world, according to an annual list. Many Christians were tortured and killed. One martyr was distributing Korean New Testaments.
  • Authorities in Azerbaijan have launched a crackdown on a church movement of ex-Muslims, which grew from 40 to 18,000 members since the former Soviet republic gained independence in 1991. Authorities have begun to put known Christians under police surveillance or to harass them, said Open Doors. Several new believers have been arrested or dismissed from jobs under pressure from the government and state-controlled media. Family members and employees reportedly also pressure converts to return to Islam.
  • A Christian university, Spring Arbor in Michigan, has dismissed a transgender professor who began appearing as a woman on campus, wearing dresses and a wig. The school is affiliated with the Free Methodist denomination. The professor has filed a discrimination claim with the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity agency.
  • A political scientist at the University of Toronto has come out arguing that as Canadian “charter values” and Christian values drift further apart, churches should either adhere to and promote the state ideology or lose the financial support they enjoy through their tax-free status. Janice Gross Stein equates “Canadian values” with “charter values,” which are those formulated and championed by the Liberal Party of Canada after Pierre Trudeau’s “leftist revolution.” Stein stated that a “resurgence of orthodoxy in Christianity, Islam and Judaism” is a threat to the peaceful coexistence of cultures. She noted that Catholics’ practice of allowing only men to have vocations in the priesthood should be regarded as discrimination against women and that, therefore, Catholics should not have charitable tax status.
  • An appeals court in Michigan has ruled against gay benefits. The three-judge panel said that a 2004 voter-approved ban on homosexual marriage also applies to same-sex domestic partner benefits.
  • “Athletes in Action celebrated its 19th annual Super Bowl Breakfast with Tony Dungy as the first-ever Super Bowl coach to appear in person a day before the most pivotal juncture in his coaching life,” reported BP Sports. “We usually have special team practice and meetings the day before a game,” Dungy said, “but because I’m the boss, I can set the schedule. So we just pushed everything back today to be here.” Dungy gave credit to the Lord after the Colts won the Super Bowl and believes that doing things “the Lord’s way” counts.
  • An Awana bus driver was killed amid Palestinian fighting in Gaza.