20 April 2011
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Presbyterians Week Headlines
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[1] U.S. Transportation Security Administration Under Fire for Molesting Children and Adults, Attempted Pornography Planting by TSA Officer, and Punishing Contrary Opinion (Extended Article)
[2] Grace in the Trenches: Chaplains on the Front Lines of the Repeal of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell
[4] Thirteen-Year-Old Pakistani Christian Girl Reportedly Abducted and Raped by Muslim Man
[5] Muslims Rioting, Burning, and Murdering Christians after Nigeria Elects Christian President
[10] Kuyper Common Grace Translation Project
[11] Avignon, France, “Art” Exhibit Photo of Crucifix in Urine and Blood Attacked with Hammer
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[1] U.S. Transportation Security Administration Under Fire for Molesting Children and Adults, Attempted Pornography Planting by TSA Officer, and Punishing Contrary Opinion (Extended Article)
A 13 April 2011 article by Steve Watson on the Infowars.com website titled “Parents Threatened by TSA Before 6 Year Old was Groped, Girl then Broke Down in Tears” reports that in early April 2011, a U.S. Transportation Security Administration (TSA) officer at New Orleans, Louisiana’s Armstrong International Airport singled out a six-year old Kentucky girl for an enhanced pat down, refusing the girl’s parents’ request to alternatively rescan the child, and implying serious trouble for the parents if they did not allow the molestation to continue.
Mr. Watson commented: “To pick out a six year old child a possible security threat and frisk her for dangerous weapons in an American airport is utterly insane, however it is far from an isolated incident….If anyone else abducted someone’s child and then sexually molested them they would be rightly called a pedophile and locked up for a long time, but when the government does it not only is it deemed acceptable, but it also trains a whole generation of children that being kidnapped by an adult and having their genitals groped is normal.”
A 15 April 2011 article by Heidi Hemmat of KDVR.com titled “Colorado Man Claims He Was ‘Sexually Assaulted’ by TSA” reports that on 5 April 2011, a Colorado man at Denver International Airport waiting to go through a metal detector began to be pushed by a TSA agent who forced the passenger toward a body scanner. The passenger asked the agent why he was being moved out of line, and the agent called a supervisor, threatened to kick the passenger out of the airport, and began what the passenger termed an “inappropriate pat down.” The TSA agent rubbed the passenger’s groin area, buttocks, and stuck his hand down the passenger’s pants. The passenger said: “He was only focused on my private parts.”
A 15 April 2011 article by Mike M. Ahlers and Jeanne Meserve of CNN titled “TSA Security Looks at People Who Complain about … TSA Security” reports that one of the factors TSA agents use when singling out people for extra scrutiny are persons who are “Very arrogant and [express] contempt against airport passenger procedures.”
Michael German, a former Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) agent who now works as legal counsel for the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) commented: “Expressing your contempt about airport procedures — that’s a First Amendment-protected right. We all have the right to express our views, and particularly in a situation where the government is demanding the ability to search you.”
A 13 April 2011 article by Wesley Strackbein on the Vision to America website titled “TSA Officer Admits Plot to Post Porn on Christian Site” reports that a TSA Coordination Center Officer (CCO) at Richmond (Virginia) International Airport who is also an administrator for the Atheists United Facebook page “took part in a coordinated effort to populate pornographic images, extreme profanity, and sexually explicit anti-Christian hate-speech on the Facebook page of Ken Ham, an internationally known Christian ministry leader who serves as president of Answers in Genesis-U.S (AiG) and the popular Creation Museum, located near Cincinnati , Ohio.”
The TSA website lists the core competencies expected of a TSA CCO, including the requirement that a TSA CCO: “…creates a culture that fosters high standards of ethics; behaves in a fair and ethical manner toward others and demonstrates a sense of corporate responsibility and commitment to public service.” When the TSA CCO in question was asked about how spiking Ken Ham’s Facebook page with pornography and profanity is consistent with the website-listed ethical requirements, the TSA CCO said that what he did “is a non-issue for the TSA….[While off duty], I can say anything I [expletive] well please.”
A 15 April 2011 article by Steve Watson on the InfoWars.com website titled ““Outraged and Disgusted” Congressman Introduces Legislation To Bar TSA From Groping Children” reports that Utah U.S. Congressman Jason Chaffetz described the TSA molestation of the six-year old at Armstrong International Airport as a “shocking violation” of TSA protocol, and on has introduced legislation to completely outlaw any form of pat-down on a child by security personnel without the express consent and presence of a parent.
A 15 April 2011 article by Hawaii State Senator Sam Slom in the Hawaii Reporter titled “Hawaii, Other States, Form Caucus to Oppose TSA Intrusions” reports that a bipartisan legislative caucus called ‘United States for Travel Freedom’ has been formed by legislators from states including Hawaii, Alaska, Michigan, Montana, New Hampshire, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Texas, and Washington, to work together for common goals to oppose what is perceived as an ever growing threat to liberty by the TSA. Each of the lawmakers involved have introduced legislation in their state to curb what they, and their state’s citizens, believe to be excessive power by the TSA.
+ Infowars.com, Post Office Box 19549, Austin, Texas 78760, 512-291-5750, writers@infowars.com
+ FOX 31 News KDVR, 100 East Speer Boulevard, Denver, Colorado 80203, 303-595-3131, news@denvernewshd.com
+ CNN, One CNN Center, Atlanta, Georgia 30303, 404-878-2276, Fax: 404-827-1995
+ Answers in Genesis, 2800 Bullittsburg Church Road, Petersburg, Kentucky 41080, 859-727-2222
+ Christian Worldview Communications LLC, 457 Nathan Dean Boulevard, Suite #105-373, Dallas, Georgia 30132, Contact Page
+ U.S. Department of Homeland Security, Washington DC 20528, 202-282-8000, Contact Form
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[2] Grace in the Trenches: Chaplains on the Front Lines of the Repeal of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell
by Dr. Michael A. Milton
(CHARLOTTE, NC) – 19 April 2011 – The senior chaplain came to me for counseling, struggling with how he would face the repeal of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell (DADT). I put my hand on his shoulder and looked him square in the eyes, “Chaplain, this nation needs you to stand strong for your convictions now more than ever. It is not time to retreat, but to minister as the pastor to our military that God has called you to be.”
While budget battles rage in DC, radiation leaks in Japan, and the Middle East rumbles with uncertainty, the U.S. military has quietly but dutifully began following orders to train for the probable repeal of DADT, the policy which disallows military service to avowed homosexuals.
The repeal of DADT (which cannot be initiated until 60 days after the President, Defense Secretary and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs certify that lifting the ban won’t hurt the military’s ability to fight) remains a decisive story. But the 24-hour news cycle on this one is up. Our soldiers, sailors, airmen, Marines and guardsmen are on their own. Yet this story is not over. At the center of the story are now chaplains.
Chaplains are the unheralded heroes of the military. They are, to use Army language, “force multipliers.” Providing religious services is only one important task they do. Chaplains are there to counsel all military members, guide the commander about world religions, and ensure that all have the opportunity to follow their religion, even when it is different from their own.
Asking chaplains to minister biblical truth to what the Bible condemns is nothing new. Asking chaplains to keep quiet about what the Bible condemns is. So far no agency is trying to stop chaplains from preaching the doctrines their denominations ordained them to teach, or obstructing them from counseling homosexuals (or adulterous heterosexuals, for that matter) according to their confessions. Yet will there be pressure applied tomorrow by militant homosexual activists to change that?
If challenged, evangelical chaplains I know will not capitulate. They will preach the truth in love. They will minister to homosexuals in the same way they minister to all, in the love and grace of Jesus Christ whose commands are life. However they will call sin a sin, and offer forgiveness and salvation. Let’s pray that the chaplains’ freedoms continue, for our freedoms rest on the moral foundations they seek to build.
Let’s pray they stand strong. For if ever we needed our chaplains, it is now.
Michael Anthony Milton (Ph.D., University of Wales) serves as the chancellor/CEO elect of Reformed Theological Seminary (one of the largest accredited seminaries in the country), a U.S. Army chaplain and the James M. Baird Jr. chair of pastoral theology at RTS/Charlotte. He is an author, songwriter, singer, ordained minister, former pastor of First Presbyterian Church in Chattanooga, Tenn., and he previously served as the president of RTS/Charlotte. Dr. Milton also hosts a national Bible teaching television program, Faith for Living, broadcast on the NRB Television Network, and a radio program broadcast on several stations in the southeast. For 16 years he served in the business world and has also served as a top-secret Navy linguist.
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+ Christian News Wire, 2020 Pennsylvania Avenue Northwest, Washington DC 20006, 202-546-0054, newsdesk@christiannewswire.com
+ Reformed Theological Seminary, 2101 Carmel Road, Charlotte, North Carolina 28226, 704-366-5066, Fax: 704-366-9295
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The World Evangelical Alliance (WEA) has condemned in the strongest possible terms both the burning of the Koran by a minuscule splinter group in the USA as well as the murder of UN workers in Afghanistan. As the General Secretary of the WEA, the Canadian Geoff Tunnicliffe communicated in a statement, a detestable act which has nothing to do with the Christian faith could never be used to justify an even more detestable act. Tunnicliffe expressed his deepest condolences to the family members of the UN workers and called upon Muslim leaders around the world to calm those prepared to commit acts of violence and to make it clear that the burning of the Koran had been condemned by all Christian churches.
The Chairman of the Theological Commission of the World Evangelical Alliance, Thomas Schirrmacher, declared that the burning of the Koran is an act that occurred against the clear will of Jesus, who prohibited his disciples from using the sword against others as well as calling down fire from heaven. With their act, the congregation in Gainesville, in the presence of Terry Jones, sullied the name of Jesus Christ before the entire world. Terry Jones pointed to the fact that the WEA had repeatedly expressed massive opposition to the Koran burning and in the USA had closed ranks with Muslim leaders on this issue.
Schirrmacher also pointed out that the WEA had warned Jones and others repeatedly that the price for the madness was not to be paid by Jones and others in the safety of America but rather by innocent people around the world. Precisely that has now happened, as little as the burning of a book could justify the murder of people.
The fact that in the attack Hindus and non-religious people were murdered shows, according to Schirrmacher, that Islamism is not only directed against Christianity, but rather that it is a mobilizing agent against all of those who think differently. Peace loving people of all religions and world views have to corporately direct themselves against such a thing. Religious freedom, peace, and justice are indivisible.
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+ World Evangelical Alliance, 74 Trinity Place, Suite 1400, New York, New York 10006, 212-233-3046, Fax: 646-957-9218, Contact Form
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[4] Thirteen-Year-Old Pakistani Christian Girl Reportedly Abducted and Raped by Muslim Man
Jawad Mazhar, Special Correspondent for Assist News Service, reported 17 April 2011 that a thirteen-year-old Christian girl in Faisalabad, Pakistan, was abducted 8 April 2011 by a Muslim man on a motor bike that grabbed the girl from in front of her home, drove the girl to his residence, and raped her. The girl’s father found out from neighbors what had happened, went to the locked residence of the abductor, broke into the locked home, and found his daughter with her abductor. The abductor fled the scene, threatening to kill the father and to implicate him in police cases, telling the father that he “would face dire consequences.” The father subsequently registered a charge of rape against the abductor, who remains at large.
A local journalist who heads a new Christian rights organization called for the arrest of the abductor-rapist, and stated that Pakistani Muslims are “domineering Christians like their slaves” because Christians are “socially and financially weaker than Muslims.”
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+ Assist USA, Post Office Box 609, Lake Forest, California 92609, 949-380-1558, danjuma1@aol.com
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[5] Muslims Rioting, Burning, and Murdering Christians after Nigeria Elects Christian President
Open Doors USA reported 19 April 2011 that in the wake of Nigeria’s election of President Goodluck Jonathan, a Christian politician of the ruling People’s Democratic Party, that Muslims across the northern states of Nigeria have burned down sixty Christian churches, torched the homes of Christians, and have murdered pastors and church workers.
Muslims in northern Nigeria murdered approximately 2000 Christians in 2010.
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+ Open Doors USA, Post Office Box 27001, Santa Ana, California 92799, 949-752-6600, Fax: 949-752-6442, usa@opendoors.org
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Colin Atkinson, a fifteen year employee of the private, non-profit Wakefield District Housing (WDH) in Yorkshire, England, had for eight years discretely displayed an eight-inch palm cross on the dashboard of his work van, until a complaint was lodged by a tenant that the cross might cause offense to those of other faiths. WDH management then told Mr. Atkinson to remove the cross because allowing display of the cross favors Christianity and may be offensive to others.
Mr. Atkinson refused to remove the cross, citing the fact that the WDH allows members of other faiths to wear the headdresses, beards, and turbans, which are distinctives of their faith. He is now under investigation for alleged failure to comply, and will soon find out whether or not he will face disciplinary action.
Andrea Minichiello Williams, CEO of the Christian Legal Centre, said: “Colin Atkinson is a decent and hardworking man, yet after many years of service he has been told that he cannot continue to have a small palm cross in his van. This smacks of something deeply illiberal and remarkably intolerant. Freedom of expression now needs to be robustly defended. When a man can’t display a palm cross in his van in a historically Christian country, it should give people serious pause for thought. Is this the kind of society that the British public want to live in?”
“The cross is a profound symbol of God’s love for all of us. We should not be embarrassed about it, and the historic Christian character of this nation should be retained for the benefit of all.”
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+ Assist USA, Post Office Box 609, Lake Forest, California 92609, 949-380-1558, danjuma1@aol.com
+ Christian Legal Centre Limited, Post Office Box 655, Hayward Heath, West Sussex RH16 9AT, England, 07712 591164, info@christianlegalcentre.com
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A 16 April 2011 article by Halle Stockton in the Herald-Tribune titled “Local member of Tuskegee Airmen Has Died” reports that Yenwith K. Whitney of Sarasota, Florida, died 12 April 2011 at the age of eighty-six.
Mr. Whitney enlisted in the U.S. Army Air Corps in 1943, and as a member of the all-black Tuskegee Airmen, was a pilot in the 332nd Fighter Group whose responsibility was to guide bombers from Italy to their targets in Germany. Following World War II, Whitney graduated from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology with a degree in aeronautical engineering.
Mr. Whitney and his first wife Muriel Johnson, now deceased, served for ten years as missionaries in Cameroon, West Africa, where Mr. Whitney taught math and physics. When the Whitneys returned from missionary service, Mr. Whitney became an executive for the Presbyterian Church (PCUSA) and earned a doctorate in education from Columbia University. Dr. Whitney remarried in 1979 to Lorenza “Lori” Washington, and they moved to Sarasota, Florida, in 1998, where Dr. Whitney became a Ruling Elder at First Presbyterian Church (PCUSA). The second Mrs. Whitney died in 2008.
A funeral service was held 18 April 2011 at First Presbyterian Church. Dr. Whitney is survived by two daughters, Sandra Curry and Karen Whitney; step-son Earl Tucker; son-in-law Donald Curry; grandson Peter Curry; a sister, Ada Robinson, and many nieces and nephews.
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+ Herald-Tribune, 1741 Main Street, Sarasota, Florida 34236, 941-953-7755, Fax: 941-361-4880, advocate@heraldtribune.com
+ Presbyterian Church (PCUSA), 100 Witherspoon Street, Louisville, Kentucky 40202, 888-728-7228, Fax: 502-569-8005
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A 17 April 2011 article by Charley Honey in The Grand Rapids Press titled “Former CRC Leader Says He Was Forced Out by Board, ‘Did Not Know it Was Coming’” reports that at a 5 April meeting, trustees of the Christian Reformed Church in North America (CRCNA) abruptly asked CRCNA Executive Director the Rev. Jerry Dykstra to resign from the position he had held since 2006.
Dykstra speculated that during his tenure as CRCNA Executive Director, his focusing more on churches and less on denominational agencies “created some tension in the system. Certain folks didn’t think that’s where I should be spending my time.”
CRCNA Board of Trustees President the Rev. Mark Vermaire remarked: “Jerry has been and remains a member in good standing in the CRC[NA].”
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+ The Grand Rapids Press, 155 Michigan Street Northwest, Grand Rapids, Michigan 49503, 616-222-5818, dgaydou@grpress.com
+ Christian Reformed Church in North America, 2850 Kalamazoo Avenue Southeast, Grand Rapids, Michigan 49560, 616-241-1691, Fax: 616-224-0803 crcna@crcna.org
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A 16 April 2011 article by Paul R. Kopenkoskey in The Grand Rapids Press titled “Reformed Church in America General Synod to Vote on New Leader” reports that the Rev. Tom De Vries of Fair Haven Ministries in Hudsonville, Michigan, was chosen in March 2011 by the Reformed Church in America (RCA) General Synod Council to be the next general secretary of the denomination. The final decision will be made by the 240 voting delegates at the 16-21 June 2011 RCA General Synod.
Current RCA General Secretary Rev. Wes Granberg-Michaelson in 2010 announced his retirement after seventeen years of service.
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+ The Grand Rapids Press, 155 Michigan Street Northwest, Grand Rapids, Michigan 49503, 616-222-5818, dgaydou@grpress.com
+ Reformed Church in America, 4500 60th Street Southeast, Grand Rapids, Michigan 49512, 800-968-6065, questions@rca.org
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[10] Kuyper Common Grace Translation Project
GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. (19 April 2011)—The Acton Institute and Kuyper College are collaborating to bring for the first time to English-language readers a foundational text from the pen of the Dutch theologian and statesman, Abraham Kuyper. Kuyper’s three-volume work, Common Grace (De gemeene gratie) appeared from 1901-05, during his tenure as prime minister in the Netherlands.
These works are based on a series of newspaper editorials intended to equip common citizens and laypersons with the tools they needed to effectively enter public life. The doctrine of common grace is, as Kuyper puts it, “the root conviction for all Reformed people.”
“If the believer’s God is at work in this world,” says Kuyper, “then in this world the believer’s hand must take hold of the plow, and the name of the Lord must be glorified in that activity as well.”
Dr. Stephen Grabill, director of programs at the Acton Institute, serves as general editor of the project. He points to the contemporary need to understand Kuyper’s comprehensive and cohesive vision for Christian social engagement. “There are a host of current attempts to try to describe how evangelicals should be at work in the world,” Grabill said. “Kuyper’s articulation of the project of common grace shows how these efforts must be grounded in and flow naturally from sound doctrine.”
Placing social engagement, particularly within the context of business activity, in the broader context of sound theology is a large part of what led Kuyper College to partner in this translation project. “Abraham Kuyper’s project in Common Grace helps provide a reliable and engaging theological basis for our new business leadership program,” said Kuyper College president Nicholas Kroeze.
John Bolt, professor of systematic theology at Calvin Theological Seminary and author of A Free Church, a Holy Nation: Abraham Kuyper’s American Public Theology, will serve as a theological advisor to the project. He describes Kuyper’s work as intended “to challenge the pious, orthodox, Reformed people of the Netherlands to take seriously their calling in Dutch culture and society. His basic argument was: God is not absent from the non-church areas of our common life but bestows his gifts and favor indiscriminately to all people.”
The translation and publication project will cover a two year period, and the three volumes total over 1,700 pages in the original. Dr. Nelson Kloosterman of Worldview Resources International and translator of numerous Dutch works will oversee the translation of the texts. The completed translation will be published by Christian’s Library Press, the recently acquired imprint of the Acton Institute. Volume one of Common Grace is scheduled to appear in the fall of 2012.
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+ The Acton Institute, 161 Ottawa Avenue Northwest, Suite 301, Grand Rapids, Michigan 49503, 616-454-3080, Fax: 616-454-9454, info@acton.org
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[11] Avignon, France, “Art” Exhibit Photo of Crucifix in Urine and Blood Attacked with Hammer
An “art” exhibit called “I Believe in Miracles” at the modern art museum Collection Lambert in Avignon, France, featured a 1987 photograph by American “artist” Andres Serrano of a crucifix immersed in urine and blood which the artist calls “Immersion ([Expletive] Christ).”
A 17 April 2011 visitor destroyed the photograph with a hammer, and inadvertently damaged another of the “artist’s” photographs in a struggle with a guard. The hammer wielder escaped with the help of an accomplice.
Christian activists staged a 16 April 2011 demonstration at the gallery, characterizing “Immersion” as blasphemous and demanding the photograph be removed from the exhibition. The group General Alliance Against Racism and for the Respect of the French and Christian Identity has a 20 April 2011 court date where the organization will ask for the court to order “Immersion” be removed from the exhibit. The organization says that “Immersion” “insults and injures Christians at the heart of their faith.”
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+ Comcast Corporation, One Comcast Center, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19103, 800-266-2278, Contact Form
+ L’Alliance Générale contre le Racisme et pour le respect de l’Identité Française et chrétienne, 70 Boulevard Saint Germain, 75005 Paris, France, 0140469631, agrif@wanadoo.fr
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Covenant Reformed Church (United Reformed Churches in North America (URCNA) of Carbondale, Pennsylvania, pastor the Rev. William Boekestein has written a study guide to “Getting the Message: A Plan for Interpreting and Applying the Bible” by Daniel M. Doriani, which is available in PDF format for free download at:
http://www.covenantrc.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/Getting-the-Message-Study-Guide.pdf
Pastor Boekestein uses “Getting the Message” as a text for teaching biblical interpretation at a lay level, out of a desire to give church members the practical tools necessary for better understanding God’s Word.
+ Covenant Reformed Church, 47 South Church Street, Carbondale, Pennsylvania 18407, 570-282-6400, info@covenantrc.org
+ United Reformed Churches in North America, c/o the Rev. Bradd Nymeyer, 227 1st Avenue Southeast, Sioux Center, Iowa 51250, 712-722-1965, statedclerk@urcna.org
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