19 February 2014
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“But if the watchman see the sword come, and blow not the trumpet, and the people be not warned; if the sword come, and take any person from among them, he is taken away in his iniquity; but his blood will I require at the watchman’s hand.” [Ezekiel 33:6]
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“For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.” [Ephesians 6:12]
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Presbyterians Week Headlines
[3] Kazakhstan: Criminal Conviction, Large ‘Moral Damages’, and Possible New Criminal Case
[4] News from the Deepest Recesses of Hell
[5] Articles from LifesiteNews.com
[7] Raging Heathen and Vain Imagining
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A 7 February 2014 Jewish News Service article by Sean Savage titled “Presbyterian Church’s New Arab-Israel Study Guide Blasted As ‘Hateful Document’” reports that the Presbyterian Church (PCUSA)’s new study on the Arab-Israeli conflict titled “Zionism Unsettled: A Congregational Study Guide” has been condemned by the Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting in America (CAMERA) as being a “hateful document” that “promotes the eradication of Israel”.
CAMERA’s Christian Media Analyst Dexter Van Zile commented:
“Every couple of years, in the run-up to the [PCUSA’s] General Assembly, anti-Zionist activists in the denomination put forth a hateful document that assails Israel’s legitimacy and antagonizes Jews in the United States. It happened in 2010, it happened in 2012, and it happened again in 2014 with this document.”
Van Zile additionally said:
“The folks who lead this church in Louisville (site of [PCUSA’s] headquarters) are quite willing to allow a small but vocal minority to demonize Israel and use the church’s brand-name to do it. They have behaved like this since 2004. Most of the denomination’s laity does not support these extremists, but their voice has not proven to be decisive.”
Rabbi Noam Marans, the American Jewish Committee’s Director of Intergroup and Interreligious Relations, said:
“The study guide is reminiscent of medieval Christian polemics against Judaism, with the authors claiming to know better than the Jewish community how Jews define themselves. This is another example of the ongoing effort to demonize Israel by a cadre of people who want to see the dismantlement of the Jewish state.”
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+ Jewish News Service, 214 Lincoln Street, Suite 418, Allston, Massachusetts 02134, news@jns.org
+ Presbyterian Church (PCUSA), 100 Witherspoon Street, Louisville, Kentucky40202, 888-728-7228, Fax: 502-569-8005
+ Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting in America, Post Office Box 35040, Boston, Massachusetts 02135, 617-789-3672, Fax: 617-787-7853, feedback@camera.org
+ American Jewish Committee, 1156 15th Street Northwest, Washington DC 20005, 202-785-4200, Contact Page
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A 17 February 2014 The Crimson White article by Mark Hammontree titled “Ferguson Center Director Apologizes to Student Group over Display Controversy” reports that the University of Alabama’s director of the Ferguson Center, Carl Bacon, sent an email apology to Bama Students for Life (BSL) following the early removal of the group’s informational display from a Ferguson Center display case, and offered to let the display be shown for the two days remaining on the original agreement.
The university, unannounced, removed the display two days early after receiving complaints from students about the “graphic and offensive” images on the display. BSL subsequently retained legal counsel from the Alliance Defending Freedom, and sent a demand letter to Mr. Bacon requesting an apology and for the display to be restored for the remainder of the permit period at the earliest opportunity. The early removal of the display received coverage from state and national media outlets.
Reformed Presbyterian pastor and Director of the Christian Defense Coalition the Rev. Pat Mahoney was originally scheduled to arrive in Tuscaloosa on Wednesday 19 February 2014 for two days of public events and speeches, but now that the issue has been resolved, Mahoney will still be speaking at BSL’s meeting Wednesday night but will also take part in the return of the poster to the display case, most likely to take place Thursday 20 February 2014.
A BSL leader said of Mahoney’s speaking engagement: “I think he’s going to be asking the University to make sure that this never happens again. He will be celebrating this victory for free speech with us by putting the display case back up with us.”
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+ The University of Alabama, Tuscaloosa, Alabama 35487, 205-348-6010, Contact Page
+ Bama Students for Life, Contact Page
+ Alliance Defending Freedom, 15100 North 90th Street, Scottsdale, Arizona 85260, 800-835-5233, Fax: 480-444-0025
+ Christian Defense Coalition, Post Office Box 77168, Washington DC 20013, 202-547-1735, ChristianDefense@gmail.com
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[3] Kazakhstan: Criminal Conviction, Large ‘Moral Damages’, and Possible New Criminal Case
By Dan Wooding
Founder of ASSIST Ministries
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ASTANA, KAZAKHSTAN (ANS) — Retired Presbyterian Pastor Bakhytzhan Kashkumbayev was this afternoon (February 17, 2014) given a four-year suspended prison term in Kazakhstan’s capital, Astana.
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Pastor Bakhytzhan Kashkumbayev |
According to Felix Corley of Forum 18 News Service (www.forum18.org), he was convicted of harming the health of a church member, even though that church member has repeatedly insisted to state authorities that her health was not harmed.
He also has to pay his alleged “victim” large “moral damages” of 2 Million Tenge (about $10,800 US Dollars).
Lyazzat Almenova, the only person whose heath the state claims was harmed told Forum 18 in July 2013 that Kashkumbayev is “totally innocent and has not harmed my health at all”. She had earlier written to Astana Prosecutor’s Office to say she is psychiatrically healthy, that a 2012 assessment of her was conducted illegally, and calling for the case to be abandoned.
Prosecutors for reasons they did not explain dropped four other criminal charges levied during the two year investigation. Forum 18 notes that on one of the charges a new criminal case could be launched. The state Agency of Religious Affairs (ARA) has also stated that Grace Presbyterian Church’s legal status may be under threat.
“In my experience as a lawyer, this is one of the strangest cases I have seen in terms of legality”, Pastor Kashkumbayev’s lawyer Nurlan Beysekeyev told Forum 18 News Service after the verdict was handed down orally.
“It was not just strange, but from the standpoint of the law, all types of violations occurred, when the case was opened, when it was being investigated and during the trial.”
Corley said that Kashkumbayev will appeal against the verdict. Other violations of freedom of religion or belief continue, including ongoing raids on meetings for worship without state permission.
“The retired Pastor’s Grace Presbyterian Church has long been a target of state hostility. For example, after an October 2012 police raid on the Church, detained church members noted that police questioning displayed a curious lack of interest in the alleged harm they were supposedly investigating,” said Corley.
The sixty-seven-year-old retired Pastor Kashkumbayev was freed in the court room after eight months’ imprisonment, but will live under at present unclear restrictions. He will challenge the conviction.
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A Kazakhstan Church |
The case against Pastor Kashkumbayev, who led Astana’s Grace Church until his retirement in October 2011, originated in 2011 amid claims he had harmed the health of church member Almenova, and the criminal case was formally lodged on February 11, 2012. The defense has strongly contested the legality of the trial.
New Criminal Case?
Felix Corley went on to say that by the time the case reached court on January 22, 2014, prosecutors had added accusations that retired pastor Kashkumbayev had harmed the health of another church member, had committed two counts of “religious extremism” and leading a religious organisation that harms individuals’ health.
However, during the trial Prosecutor Olzhas Shalabayev withdrew all but one of the charges with no explanation. The specific accusation of harming another named church member was handed back to prosecutors, the lawyer Beysekeyev told Forum 18. “A new criminal case could be launched against Pastor Kashkumbayev,” he warned.
Atheist writer Aleksandr Kharlamov, who has like Pastor Kashkumbayev also been subjected to arrest, detention and forcible psychiatric examination, welcomed Kashkumbayev’s release from prison. “They shouldn’t have violated his rights,” he told Forum 18 from Ridder in North Kazakhstan Region on February 17. “I’m glad he’s now been released.”
Like Kashkumbayev, Kharlamov spent one month’s forced detention in a psychiatric hospital in Almaty in 2013, a doctor telling him that he had been sent to the psychiatric hospital “because you are an inconvenient person for the authorities”.
Kharlamov is still facing criminal charges for articles he wrote in defense of atheism. He is alleged to have broken Criminal Code Article 164 Part 1 by allegedly “inciting religious hatred”.
Other Violations of Freedom of Religion or Belief Continue
“The conviction of Kashkumbayev came as the criminal investigation against New Life Pentecostal Church in Almaty may have been behind the exit ban (since removed) which prevented Pastor Maksim Maksimov and his wife Larisa from leaving Kazakhstan on February 13, 2014,” said Corley.
Raids on meetings for worship continue, most recently with a raid on a Baptist Sunday service on February 9, in Aktobe. On this occasion, about 10 police officers and at least one Prosecutor’s Office official raided the local congregation of the Council of Churches Baptists. They refuse to apply for state registration in all the formerly Soviet states where they operate. In 2014 alone four Baptists have been jailed for exercising freedom of religion or belief without state permission.
“Officers arrived soon after the service had finished,” one church member told Forum 18 from Aktobe on February 17. “They filmed us for about an hour and a half, took books from our library and from individuals – one copy of each title – and checked the identity documents of six church members. The usual type of thing.”
Corley said that Council of Churches Baptists are frequent victims of police and prosecutor’s office raids. Over 150 people from many faiths, including members of the Aktobe church, were fined after such raids in 2013.
“The church was raided because it was meeting without state registration, the Regional Prosecutor’s Office said in a February 17 statement on its website,” he continued. “About 70 people, including children, were present at the church. It said forty-three seized books were being sent for “religious expert analysis”. It said cases were being considered against church members under Article 374-1 of the Code of Administrative Offences.”
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+ Assist USA, Post Office Box 609, Lake Forest, California 92609, 949-380-1558, danjuma1@aol.com
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[4] News from the Deepest Recesses of Hell
— Girl Scouts U.S.A. Threatens LifeNews after Reporting Its Link to Planned Parenthood
— Quebec College of Physicians Already Pushing to Allow Lethal Injection for Children
— Belgium Surprised by Criticism of New Law to Allow Doctors to Euthanize Children
— Euthanasia Campaigner Calls for New Zealand to Follow Belgium’s Lead on Child Euthanasia
— North Korea’s Kim Jong-un Forces Women to Drown Their Babies, Have Abortions
— Teenager Will Lose His Virginity in a Live Performance at Art Gallery
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+ LifeNews.com, Post Office Box 270841, Fort Collins, Colorado 80527, news@lifenews.com
+ LifeSiteNews.com, Incorporated, 4 Family Life Lane, Front Royal, Virginia 22630, 888-678-6008, Contact Page
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[5] Articles from LifesiteNews.com
Articles from the past week from LifesiteNews.com:
— Obama Calls Homosexuality One of Our ‘Fundamental Freedoms’ in Statement Slamming Ugandan Bill
— Toronto School Trustee Called ‘Homophobic’ For Questioning Nudity At ‘Family Friendly’ Pride Parade
— Judge’s Ruling That Kentucky Must Recognize Foreign Gay ‘Marriages’ May Open Door to Polygamy
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+ LifeSiteNews.com, Incorporated, 4 Family Life Lane, Front Royal, Virginia 22630, 888-678-6008, Contact Page
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+ THEBLAZE.COM LLC, 1270 Avenue of the Americas, 9th Floor, New York, New York 10036, contact@theblaze.com
+ The Christian Post, National Press Building, 529 14th Street Northwest, Suite 420, Washington DC 20045, 202-347-7734, info@christianpost.com
+ Independent Journal Review, Contact Page
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[7] Raging Heathen and Vain Imagining
Articles from the past week regarding kings and rulers setting themselves against the LORD and against his anointed:
— Colombia, South Carolina Policy Requiring a Fee and Permit to Feed Homeless Begins
— Obama’s U.N. Treaty Requires U.S. to Hand Over American Gun Registrations
— Obama Lays Groundwork to Confiscate Your 401k and IRA
— U.S. Feds Want to Track Your DNA like a License Plate
— Judge Claims Same-Sex Marriage Valid in Virginia
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+ Examiner.com, 555 17th Street, Suite 700, Denver, Colorado 80202, contactus@examiner.com
+ Tea Party, 1300 Pennsylvania Avenue #190, Suite 428, Washington DC 20004, 714-796-1776
+ American Vision, 3150-A Florence Road, Suite 2, Powder Springs, Georgia 30127, 800-628-9460, Fax: 770-222-7269, Comments@AmericanVision.org
+ American Life League, Post Office Box 1350, Stafford, Virginia 22555, 540-659-4171, Fax: 540-659-2586, info@all.org
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Articles from the past week about the religion of peace:
— Islamist Terror Enclave Discovered in Texas
— Egypt: Entire Christian Family Savagely Stabbed to Death, Throats Slit in their Home
— Interfaith Outreach in Nigeria: Chanting “Allahu Akbar,” Muslims Murder over Fifty Christians
— ‘Syria’s Jihad Death Toll Now Exceeds 140,000?
— Christians in Iraq Worse Off Now Than under Saddam
— Jihadists Stone Syrian Girl to Death for Having a Facebook Account
— Pakistan: 500 Women and Girls Murdered in Islamic Honor Killings Each Year, Many More Go Unreported
— Iran Proposes Joint Naval Exercise with Russia
— National Security Heavyweights Allege Muslim Brotherhood Ties to U.S. Republican Party
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+ Clarion Project, Inc., 255 West 36th Street #800, New York, New York 10018, 646-308-1230, info@ClarionProject.org
+ Atlas Shrugs, writeatlas@aol.com
+ The Christian Post, National Press Building, 529 14th Street Northwest, Suite 420, Washington DC 20045, 202-347-7734, info@christianpost.com
+ Jihad Watch and Dhimmi Watch
+ Newsmax, Post Office Box 20989, West Palm Beach, Florida33416, 561-686-1165, Fax: 561-686-3350
+ Now the End Begins, Contact Page
+ Breitbart.com, 149 South Barrington Avenue #401, Los Angeles, California90049
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