PERSEGUIO ANTICRIST

NOS

EUA

MOSTRURIO DE NOTCIAS
JAMAIS PUBLICADAS NO

BRASIL

Compiladas por

Olavo de Carvalho

24 de dezembro de 2004

NDICE GERAL
Perseguio anticrist nos EUA ......................................................................................................................... 1 Mostrurio de notcias jamais publicadas no Brasil ........................................................................................... 1 Bush White House's Christ-less Christmas ........................................................................................................... 5 Bush supports cross-hating movement ................................................................................................................ 7 Anti-Christmas district hit with federal lawsuit ..................................................................................................... 8 Pastors guilty of hating Muslims .......................................................................................................................... 9 Judge told: Islam illegal religion .......................................................................................................................... 11 Officials reverse decision to bar Christmas trees ................................................................................................ 12 School Bus Driver Bumped For Protest Fliers ................................................................................................... 13 Nativity removed to avoid ACLU ...................................................................................................................... 15 Radicals Host Anti-Family Conference in China ................................................................................................ 16 Study: TV Show Negative Image of Religion ..................................................................................................... 17 Christians Face 47 Years in Prison for Reading Bible at 'Gay Pride' Event ......................................................... 18 School drops some Christmas songs from concert ............................................................................................. 20 Prosecutor: Bible is 'fighting words' ................................................................................................................... 22 Schools to observe Ramadan holiday? ................................................................................................................ 23 Justice opens probe into school district .............................................................................................................. 24 Schools prohibit Christmas colors ...................................................................................................................... 26 Christmas censors .............................................................................................................................................. 28 The War Against Christmas - Phase 2 ................................................................................................................ 30 Killing Christmas ............................................................................................................................................... 33 The Impending Death of Christmas? Part I ....................................................................................................... 35 The Impending Death of Christmas? Part II ...................................................................................................... 37 French Thought Police Ban 'Christian' Chocolate .............................................................................................. 39 ACLU Scrooges Get an Earful of Christmas Carols ........................................................................................... 40 N.J. School Reverses 'Silent Night' Ban .............................................................................................................. 41 'Emboldened' Christians Celebrate Christmas .................................................................................................... 42 Vatican presses the UN to recognise 'Christianophobia' ..................................................................................... 44 Secular forces 'pushing God to margins'............................................................................................................. 45 Atkinson defends right to offend ....................................................................................................................... 47 School's Carol Rule for the Grinch? ................................................................................................................... 49 Teacher takes 'Christmas' out of carol ................................................................................................................ 50 Christmas CD banned for mentioning Jesus ...................................................................................................... 51 'No Christian symbols at Christmas' ................................................................................................................... 52 School bans saying 'Christmas' ........................................................................................................................... 53 Christmas card with 'Jesus' banned .................................................................................................................... 55 Ban on Christmas leads to court fight ................................................................................................................ 56 When Christmas becomes illegal ........................................................................................................................ 58 Christmas in Americabecomes battleground ...................................................................................................... 60 IRS: Churches can't pray for Bush victory .......................................................................................................... 67 Satanism gets OK from British navy .................................................................................................................. 68 Vet sues to save mountaintop cross ................................................................................................................... 70 Boca principal under fire for making references to God ..................................................................................... 73 Federal Court Rejects Prayers at School Staff Meetings ...................................................................................... 75 Devil of a lawsuit: MIT lab worker claims colleagues persecuted him for being Christian ................................. 76 Campers murdered due to Christianity? ............................................................................................................. 77 Google bans Christian ad ................................................................................................................................... 78

In Iraq, it's war on Christians ............................................................................................................................. 80 Library policy: No religious people allowed ........................................................................................................ 82 Democrats back church IRS probe .................................................................................................................... 83 Kansas group monitors sermons ........................................................................................................................ 85 Afraid To Say What We Think ........................................................................................................................... 87 NAACP censored pro-lifers? ............................................................................................................................. 89 Man tortured for preaching Christianity ............................................................................................................. 90 Christians claim torture by Saudis ...................................................................................................................... 92 Los Angeles name too godly for U.S.?................................................................................................................ 94 Taliban come to Los Angeles ............................................................................................................................. 96 Same Judge OK'ed Muslim Prayer ..................................................................................................................... 98 Persecuted Vietnamese win freedom in U.S. ...................................................................................................... 99 Persecution of hill tribes intensifies .................................................................................................................. 101 Believers tortured to abandon Christianity ....................................................................................................... 105 Christians sentenced for prayer, worship .......................................................................................................... 106 New film mocks Christianity ............................................................................................................................ 108 Christian churches running on empty? ............................................................................................................. 109 Jewish evangelism case dismissed ..................................................................................................................... 111 Pray for Barry Lynn ......................................................................................................................................... 112 Hans Zeiger ..................................................................................................................................................... 112 Nonbelievers hold own rally ............................................................................................................................ 114 ACLU warns La Mesa to stop religious invocations ......................................................................................... 115 Guided by God, or Guided by his Gonads? ..................................................................................................... 116 Homosexual leader vows to 'torture' opponents ............................................................................................... 118 112 Killed in South Thailand Gunbattles ......................................................................................................... 119 Sudanese Boy "Crucified" ................................................................................................................................ 121 Christians defend faith from 'The Da Vinci Code' ............................................................................................ 122 Not Norman's Psycho ..................................................................................................................................... 124 Homeschoolers barred from religious materials ............................................................................................... 133 'Gay Militia' storms Christian meeting .............................................................................................................. 135 'Bible as hate speech' author admits stealing ..................................................................................................... 136 'Bible as hate speech' bill passes ....................................................................................................................... 138 Med student flunks for saying no to abortion ................................................................................................... 140 Textbooks for Jihad ......................................................................................................................................... 142 The Beleaguered Christians of the Palestinian Authority .................................................................................. 147 Believers tortured to abandon Christianity ....................................................................................................... 159 Christians charged for revealing crackdown ..................................................................................................... 160 Students consider faith-based leadership requirement 'discriminatory' .............................................................. 161 A cover-up of biblical proportions ................................................................................................................... 163 Catholic professor punished for views ............................................................................................................. 164 Teacher told: Ditch the Star of David .............................................................................................................. 165 Suspension for 'anti-gay' opinion upheld .......................................................................................................... 166 State snubs Christian teen ranch ...................................................................................................................... 168 Christian soldier, Muslim soldier ...................................................................................................................... 169 The 'Offensiveness' of Christianity ................................................................................................................... 171 General Muzzled After Describing War on Terror as Battle With Satan ........................................................... 173 Appeals panel: Decalogue unconstitutional ...................................................................................................... 175 The global war on Christians ........................................................................................................................... 187 On my mind .................................................................................................................................................... 190 Christian Persecution Comes to America ......................................................................................................... 192

China behind Christian persecution in S.E. Asia ............................................................................................... 194 Christian Persecution: Saudi Arabia.................................................................................................................. 199 Christian persecution on rise in Iraq ................................................................................................................ 201 Judge rules Islamic education ........................................................................................................................... 202 Islam studies required in California district ....................................................................................................... 204 Exploding the myth of church-state separation ................................................................................................ 206 Evangelist's 'tone incited hatred of Muslims' .................................................................................................... 208 Law of the land ................................................................................................................................................ 210 Syrian-Produced TV Series Questions Israel's Right to Exist ............................................................................ 217 Brave new schools ........................................................................................................................................... 219 NYC district denies birth of Jesus? .................................................................................................................. 220 Christmas in America becomes battleground ................................................................................................... 222 School bans Christmas, but OK with Halloween.............................................................................................. 229 Judge: Witches can pray at county meeting ....................................................................................................... 231 America: Falling from Grace ............................................................................................................................ 232 Videos of Hate ................................................................................................................................................ 236 A Jew in Anti-Christian America ...................................................................................................................... 238 Are You Experiencing Anti-Christian Bigotry on Campus? .............................................................................. 247 Europe's Anti-Christian Attitude ..................................................................................................................... 248 Christians and Children's Services .................................................................................................................... 250 Anti-Christian Mood Seen In Texas Killings .................................................................................................... 251 Federal Judges Are Anti-Christian .................................................................................................................... 255 Responding to Louis Farrakhan's anti-Christian propaganda ............................................................................ 258 Organized humanism produces a growing Anti-Christian society ..................................................................... 263 Feds Fuel Anti-Christian Bigotry in Schoolchildren .......................................................................................... 268 Examples of Anti-Christian Persecution .......................................................................................................... 270 Catholics in crossfire again ............................................................................................................................... 273 Mary Jo Anderson is a contributing.................................................................................................................. 276 A New Century of Martyrs: Anti-Christian Intolerance .................................................................................... 278 The Anti-Christian Liberal Union .................................................................................................................... 280 Wonder whose side the ACLU will take then? ................................................................................................. 282 Pol Pot's Nazi-style experiments ...................................................................................................................... 284

Bush White House's Christ-less Christmas

Official commemorations emphasize Santa, Rudolph over Jesus in 2004 Posted: December 21, 2004 1:00 a.m. Eastern 2004 WorldNetDaily.com Santa Claus joins President and Laura Bush in singing carols at the White House WASHINGTON What's virtually missing from the White House commemoration of Christmas this year? Jesus. The little baby in the manger. The reason for the season. While President Bush was re-elected last month in an election victory many attributed to an outpouring of support by evangelical Christians impressed with his candid outspokenness about his faith, some Americans notice the White House website lacks even a single mention of Jesus, whose birth is celebrated by hundreds of millions worldwide Dec. 25. The official White House site proclaims this as the "Season of Merriment and Melody" not the birth of the Savior of the world. "Throughout the world, the holiday season is greeted by joyful music that brightens hearts and evokes wonderful memories," reads the message. "This year's theme brings to the White House the magic of holiday songs that have been favorites for generations of Americans." Among the website's many photographs of secular decorations is a shot of a creche, or Nativity, displayed in the East Room, but the baby Jesus is virtually invisible. The White House has not responded to WND's request for comment. The White House residence, the site proclaims is decorated with "delightful vignettes illustrating many of the best-loved songs of the season." White House decorated like a winter wonderland Not one of those songs is a traditional spiritual carol or hymn. Instead, the songs listed include "We Wish You a Merry Christmas," "Here Comes Santa Claus," "I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus," "All I Want for Christmas Is My Two Front Teeth," "Upon the Housetop," "Blue Christmas," "Jingle Bells," "Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree," White Christmas," "Frosty the Snowman, "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer" and "Marshmallow World." In fact, even the word Christmas is only used in song titles and as an adjective such as before the word tree. At the lighting of the National Christmas Tree Dec. 2, Bush remarked: "Tonight we begin a joyous season, and the city of Washington is never more beautiful than during the holidays. At Christmas time we celebrate good tidings first announced two thousand years ago, and still a source of great joy in our world. Laura and I are always happy to join in the Pageant of Peace, and we thank you all for coming this evening. "The season of Advent is always the season of hope," Bush continued. "We think of the patient hope of men and women across the centuries who listened to the words of the prophets and lived in joyful expectation. We think of the hope of Mary, who welcomed God's plan with great faith. We think of the hope of the Wise Men who set out on a long journey guided only by a slender promise traced in the stars. We are reminded of the hope that the grandest purposes of the 5

Almighty can be found in the humblest places. And we embrace the hope that all the love and gifts that come to us in this life are the signs and symbols of even a greater love and gift that came on a holy night. The old carol speaks of a 'thrill of hope, the weary world rejoices, for yonder breaks a new and glorious morn.' And every year at this time we feel the thrill of hope as we wait on Christmas Day." Bush went on to remember troops serving in foreign wars this Christmas season. It has been noted that the Bushes' holiday card this year includes a Scripture verse. But, again, it does not mention Jesus. This card has a line from Psalms, 95:2: "Let us come before him with Thanksgiving and extol him with music and song." First lady Laura Bush supervises the card selection. She also picked cards with Bible verses when her husband was Texas governor. The Republican National Committee paid for production and distribution. On Dec. 9, Bush participated in a special menorah lighting ceremony at the White House. "Hanukkah is a festive holiday that celebrates a great victory for freedom," he said. "We remember the liberation of Jerusalem and a miracle witnessed in the holy Temple 2,000 years ago. For eight days the oil burned, and the light of freedom still burns in Jewish homes and synagogues everywhere. We are honored to celebrate the miracle of Hanukkah in the White House this evening." Likewise, Bush issued a Hanukkah proclamation Dec. 7. "I send greetings to all those celebrating Hanukkah, the festival of lights," he said. "On the 25th day of Kislev on the Hebrew calendar, Jews around the world commemorate the rededication of the Temple in Jerusalem more than 2,000 years ago. During this time of darkness, the Temple had been seized, and Judaism had been outlawed. Judah Maccabee and his followers fought for three years for their freedom and successfully recaptured Jerusalem and the Temple. Jewish tradition teaches that the Maccabees found only one small bottle of oil to be used for temple rituals, but that oil lasted eight days and nights. The miracle of this enduring light, remembered through the lighting of the Menorah, continues to symbolize the triumph of faith over tyranny." He continued: "The bravery of the Maccabees has provided inspiration through the ages. We must remain steadfast and courageous as we seek to spread peace and freedom throughout the world. This holiday season, we give thanks to God, and we remember the brave men and women of our Armed Forces and their families. We also pray that all who live under oppression will see their day of freedom and that the light of faith will always shine through the darkness. Laura joins me in wishing you a blessed and Happy Hanukkah." In 2001, Bush issued a Kwanzaa greeting from the White House, and repeated it in 2002 and 2003.

Bush supports cross-hating movement

President's father also praises work of Rev. Moon-linked clergy group Posted: December 21, 2004 2:10 p.m. Eastern 2004 WorldNetDaily.com Both President Bush and his father have expressed their support for a group of mostly black church leaders that endorses the practice of throwing the cross into the trash literally. According to an online column by John Gorenfeld, the American Clergy Leadership Conference sponsored a nationwide "Tear Down The Cross" day for Easter 2003 during which pastors led ceremonies where traditional sanctuary crosses were tossed into dumpsters. Over 100 crosses reportedly were trashed. Writes Gorenfeld, "This [cross removal], movement leaders said, cleared the way for a new age and second messiah." Last week, the movement's leaders presided over a Washington prayer breakfast featuring messages of thanks from both Bush presidents. Though ACLC's website says part of its purpose is to "promote through fellowship the unity of the body of Christ," it also aims to "foster cooperation and understanding among all religions." That cooperation is evidenced by the involvement of the Rev. Sun Myung Moon, the founder of the Unification Church who was dubbed the king of peace at a coronation ceremony in the Dirksen Senate Office Building earlier this year. The organization also works closely with both Muslim and Jewish clergy. Two sponsors of last week's breakfast, the International and Interreligious Federation of World Peace and the American Family Coalition, are both affiliated with Moon. "One series of photos found on Moon's website, but purged after receiving unfavorable attention earlier this year from evangelicals, shows Massachusetts preacher John Kingara taking down the cross from his church, hauling it behind the old brick building and hoisting it into a dumpster," writes Gorenfeld. "Another shows a ritual in Israel disposing of the cross in the earth. Pastor John Kingara of Worcester, Mass., throws his church's cross in the dumpster. "Kingara, embracing the ACLC's new gospel, declared in remarks found in the Unification News, 'The fact that the cross is a symbol of division, shame, suffering and bloodshed prove that it is not of God but Satan.' He continued, 'On this 18th day of April 2003, we are beginning a new history. Pastors, please, help me to bring the cross down, because it is not of God but the devil.'" Moon was the keynote speaker at the Washington breakfast last week. Writes Gorenfeld: "In Moon's teachings, God himself is shedding tears over mankind's obsession with the cross, which prevents us from recognizing the real 'returning lord': Moon himself. It's no secret. This is something he's patiently explained to many audiences of congressmen and former Republican presidents over the years, in Washington pageants that hardly ever make the news." The columnist says Bush sent a "warm letter" of support presented at the breakfast by a state senator, in which the president and first lady sent best wishes to the sponsors -- and thanked them for rallying his "armies of compassion."

Anti-Christmas district hit with federal lawsuit

School officials banned carols, even for instrumental groups Posted: December 20, 2004 5:00 p.m. Eastern 2004 WorldNetDaily.com The New Jersey school district that banned Christmas music, even by instrumental groups, from its holiday concerts has been hit with a lawsuit claiming officials have demonstrated hostility toward religion. Thomas More Law Center filed a federal lawsuit Friday on behalf of Michael Stratechuk and his two children, who are students in the South Orange/Maplewood School District. According to a statement from Thomas More, the suit claims the district's action is unconstitutional. As WorldNetDaily reported, this year the district expanded its no-Christmas music policy to include instrumental music. Instead of tunes about Jesus, and even Santa Claus, the 40-member Columbia High School brass ensemble will be limited for the first time to seasonal selections such as "Winter Wonderland" and "Frosty the Snowman." The group's holiday concert is scheduled for tomorrow night. "This is another example of the anti-Christmas, anti-religion policy infecting our public-school system," said Richard Thompson, president and chief counsel of the law center, in a statement. "The Constitution does not require our public schools to become religion-free zones. Forcing students to strip all religious content from music is like asking them to study art history while excluding paintings from the Renaissance because they contain religious subjects." The civil-rights lawsuit argues that the school district's total ban on religious music conveys the "impermissible, government-sponsored message of disapproval of and hostility toward religion." The lawsuit further argues that because the religious music is banned from the public schools, students are denied the ability to learn about and listen to music that has influenced the social, cultural and historic development of civilization. Last week, WND reported that Bogota, N.J., Mayor Steve Lonegan, a Republican candidate for governor, has organized what he calls an "illegal" night of caroling tomorrow before the Columbia High School concert to draw attention to the school district's ban. Lonegan has invited his rivals to join him outside the school to sing songs that were deleted from the concert's program.

Pastors guilty of hating Muslims

Tribunal judge rules church seminar vilified Islam Posted: December 18, 2004 1:00 a.m. Eastern 2004 WorldNetDaily.com A state tribunal in Australia yesterday found two evangelical Christian pastors who conducted a church seminar on Islam guilty of inciting hatred against Muslims. Danny Nallliah (Photo: Catch the Fire Ministries) Daniel Nalliah and Daniel Scot of Catch the Fire Ministries were tried under Victoria's new race and religion hate laws after the the Islamic Council of Victoria filed legal action, charging Scot called Muslims demons, liars and terrorists Transcripts of the seminar in Melbourne show Scot, born in Pakistan, was quoting verses from the Quran to make his points, but three Australian converts to Islam who attended part of the seminar brought their notes to the Islamic Council. The decision [pdf file] came as 100 supporters and members of Catch the Fire Ministries sang Christian songs outside the tribunal. The Islamic Council's complaint also said Scot told the congregation Muslims were training to take over Australia and Islam was an inherently violent religion. In the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal yesterday, Judge Michael Higgins found that throughout the seminar Scot had made fun of Muslim beliefs and conduct. "It was done, not in the context of a serious discussion of Muslims' religious beliefs," the judge said, according to The Australian "It was presented in a way which is essentially hostile, demeaning and derogatory of all Muslim people, their god, Allah, the prophet Muhammad and in general Muslim religious beliefs and practices," he said. The judge also found a website article and newsletter published by Catch the Fire Ministries to be breaches of the religious vilification legislation. Higgins will hear submissions from lawyers in January to decide on fines. There is no limitation on the amount of fines, The Australian said. The ruling was an important victory for the Muslim community, Islamic Council president Yasser Soliman told the paper. "We are not their enemies, we are fellow Australians," he said. "We don't want to be positioned as an enemy or painted as one." Soliman said "vilification" is a "tool that is sometimes used by extremists" that is meant to "hurt." Nalliah and Scot indicated they will consider an appeal. "Freedom of speech is one of our fundamental values in Australia and this case is not over," Scot said, according to the Australian paper. "We cannot let freedom of speech be taken away from us; religion cannot be legislated. Scot said the purpose of the seminar, just months after 9-11, was to increase understanding of Muslim culture. Nalliah insisted there was "no hate speech at all."

"It was teaching and understanding of what we knew of what the holy book of Islamic faith says," he explained. "And I believe we, in a free and democratic society, should have the freedom to speak up." As WorldNetDaily reported in February, Catch the Fire Ministries turned the table on its accuser, arguing in court that Christianity in Australia has special protection under the constitution. Lawyer David Perkins asserted that if Victoria's Racial and Religious Tolerance Act of 2001 curbs the teaching of Christian doctrine, it is invalid. He further claimed Australia's blasphemy law was intended to protect only Christianity. The law refers to "lawful religion," which disqualifies Islam, because it preaches violence, Perkins emphasized. "The Quran contradicts Christian doctrine in a number of places and, under the blasphemy law, is therefore illegal," he said.

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Judge told: Islam illegal religion

Christian group prosecuted under 'tolerance act' turns tables Posted: February 20, 2004 1:00 a.m. Eastern 2004 WorldNetDaily.com A Christian group prosecuted under an Australian state's new religious hatred law told a court Islam is an illegal religion because it preaches violence against Christians and Jews. Turning the tables on its accuser, defenders of Catch the Fire Ministries argued in court that Christianity in Australia has special protection under the constitution, reported The Age daily newspaper of Melbourne. Lawyer David Perkins told a civil tribunal if the state of Victoria's Racial and Religious Tolerance Act of 2001 curbs the teaching of Christian doctrine it is invalid. He further claimed Australia's blasphemy law was intended to protect only Christianity. The law refers to "lawful religion," which disqualifies Islam, because it preaches violence, Perkins emphasized. "The Quran contradicts Christian doctrine in a number of places and, under the blasphemy law, is therefore illegal," he said. The case began two months after the tolerance act became law in January 2002 when Islamicstudies scholar Daniel Scot conducted a seminar in Melbourne on Islam, sponsored by Catch the Fire Ministries. Transcripts show Scot, born in Pakistan, was quoting verses from the Quran to make his points, but three Australian converts to Islam who attended part of the seminar brought their notes to the Islamic Council of Victoria. The Islamic Council made a formal complaint of vilification against Scot and Catch the Fire Ministries pastor Danny Nalliah. Perkins asserted the reference in Australia's constitution to the people "humbly relying on the blessing of Almighty God" referred to Christianity only. Australia's blasphemy law takes precedence over the state act, he argued. He pointed to the Choudhury case in England, involving Salman Rushdie's book "The Satanic Verses," which held the blasphemy law protected only Christianity, not Islam. Judge Michael Higgins, however, said a motion claiming the seminar was exempt as a religious activity would fail, prompting Perkins to withdraw it. The law is not based on the intent of the accused but rather on how their actions or words affected the hearers. Higgins said after hearing a tape of the seminar it was "strongly open" that it breached the act. Higgins said the seminar described the attitudes of a small group of fundamentalist Muslims who "lack association with those Muslim people who live and work peacefully in this community."

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Officials reverse decision to bar Christmas trees

Letter from Christian legal group prompts immediate action http://www.nbc5.com/education/4006771/detail.html Posted: December 18, 2004 1:00 a.m. Eastern 2004 WorldNetDaily.com County officials in Florida reversed a decision that banned display of Christmas trees in public facilities, including libraries, recreation centers and community centers. Christmas tree at Arkansas public library Pasco County, north of Tampa, made the reversal 24 hours after the American Center for Law and Justice sent a letter [pdf filed] to officials. "We are pleased that the county admitted its mistake and reversed its legally flawed decision removing Christmas trees from county facilities," said ACLJ chief counsel Jay Sekulow. "The law is very clear about this issue -- the display of Christmas trees is constitutional and the county had no legal basis in removing them." Officials ordered the trees removed because they were considered religious symbols, said Dan Johnson, assistant county administrator for Public Services. Sekulow has argued five cases at the Supreme Court involving issues of religion in public life. He advised that "before taking such drastic measures in the future, it would be beneficial for county officials to get a clear and accurate understanding of the law." The ACLJ's letter cited a 1989 decision in which the high court said: "The Christmas tree, unlike the menorah, is not itself a religious symbol. Although Christmas trees once carried religious connotations, today they typify the secular celebration of Christmas." Furthermore, the Supreme Court and numerous lower courts have held that Nativity scenes and menorahs may be displayed on government property without violating the Constitution. This season, the ACLJ also helped reinstate the display of a Nativity scene in a senior center in Missouri operated by the federal government's Department of Housing and Urban Development. Meanwhile, an atheist couple is demanding that the Seattle suburb of Bellevue, Wash., remove a decorated tree from its City Hall, even though it isn't called a Christmas tree. Sidney and Jennifer Stock say the "giving tree," which has generated nearly $25,000 worth of donations, is offensive, reports KOMO-TV in Seattle. "There are a lot of people who've come to this country, maybe have been here for years, who don't feel freedom to say anything," said Jennifer Stock. "So we feel we're saying it for those people. Not just for ourselves."

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School Bus Driver Bumped For Protest Fliers

Driver, Mother Objects To 'Anti-Christ' Song POSTED: 2:15 pm CST December 17, 2004 UPDATED: 2:55 pm CST December 17, 2004 CHICAGO -- A suburban school bus driver claims she was pulled from her route because she objected to an "anti-Christ" song listed in the school's holiday program. The Herald News reported Friday that Plainfield's Central School officials say the driver was taken off the route because she passed out unauthorized fliers along her route criticizing the program. Carmen Brown said she was reprimanded by the First Student Bus Company for handing out unapproved fliers she had made up encouraging people to boycott the school's holiday program because it included the song, "I Hate This Holiday." SURVEY Should a bus driver have been pulled from her route for distributing fliers protesting a holiday song in a school program? Yes No Results | Disclaimer Brown, who has a son in Central's third grade class, said she passed out the fliers on Monday as she drove her route. On Tuesday afternoon, her supervisor informed her that school Superintendent John Harper had asked that she be taken off the Plainfield bus route. "They took my school bus job away from me because I protested my child singing an anti-Christ song," Brown told the newspaper. Brown said First Student did not, in fact, fire her, but offered her a choice of available bus routes which were too far away for her to be able to get home when her son gets home from school. "I'm a churchgoer. I believe in Jesus and believe Christmas is a Christian holiday," she's quoted as saying. "But when they hand my child a piece of paper to learn a song that says, 'I hate the holidays and everything it stands for,' my son is confused." Central School Principal Linda DiLeo said the song was not inappropriate in the context of the play the students presented. "We have Jewish children, we have children who celebrated Ramadan a couple weeks ago," DiLeo said. "We take into account that we aren't all celebrating the same holiday and try to put on programs that everyone can celebrate." "I am furious that they took my job," said Brown, who stood outside the school Thursday handing out protest fliers. The Herald reported that Harper said the decision to pull Brown off the bus route had to do with her handing out fliers that were not approved first. "In a very general sense, District 202 does not permit our bus drivers to distribute literature of any sort to students without first obtaining administrative approval," he said. "The issue at hand ... focuses more on the distribution of materials than the content of materials." Brown said some parents on her block kept their children out of school Thursday in protest of the program, but DiLeo said only Brown's son was absent for that reason. "The sad thing is I think it could have been avoided, had someone come in (earlier) and asked 13

about the program," DiLeo said. "No one asked what it was about. The kids were caught in the middle. People were jumping to conclusions." Special thanks to Herald reporter Janet Lundquist. Copyright 2004 by NBC5.com. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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Nativity removed to avoid ACLU

County officials previously had run afoul of group Posted: December 18, 2004 1:00 a.m. Eastern 2004 WorldNetDaily.com Fearing they would run afoul of the ACLU, county officials in Pennsylvania pulled a Nativity display that had adorned a public park for several weeks. Nativity display deemed illegal by county officials in Pennyslvania. (Courtesy Beaver County Times) Beaver County officials said the group that set up the display before Thanksgiving did not get permission, but if they had asked, they would have been rejected because the county soliciter has determined it violates the U.S. Constitution, the Beaver County Times reported. The county commissioners chairman, Dan Donatella, told the paper the commissioners disagree with the interpretation but are obligated to obey it, citing two previous instances in which the ACLU has threatened lawsuits over creches. The county removed one in the courthouse and another in the jail. Organizers of the county's annual Festival of Trees fund-raiser, which benefits children served by the county's Children and Youth Services, placed the scene of Mary, Joseph, Jesus, the star of Bethlehem and two lambs at the entrance to Bradys Run Park. "Had [festival organizers] consulted with us, they would have been informed that they could not put that Nativity set on county property," Donatella said. "Under law, we're not allowed to do that." Vic Walczak, legal director for the Pennsylvania ACLU, told the Beaver County paper religious symbols arbitrarily erected on public property are unconstitutional because they endorse a particular religion, and government must represent people of all faiths. "If Beaver County is putting up that creche, what's the message they're sending to residents: We promote, support and endorse Christmas and Christianity?" he said. "Does that mean Christianity is better than the other religions?" Walczak said it would meet constitutional requirements if the park entrance allowed all groups to display religious messages on a first-come, first-served basis. "We have kept peace in this country largely because government and religion remain separate," he said. "The big difference between us and places like Bosnia and the Middle East is separation of church and state, along with the right to practice individual religion." A federal judge ruled Wednesday a Florida town must allow a display of the Nativity this season, granting a temporary restraining order based on the substantial likelihood of successful speech and equal-protection claims in an on-going case. The town allowed the display of Jewish menorahs but rejected a woman's Nativity display, even if she paid for it herself.

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Radicals Host Anti-Family Conference in China

NewsMax Wires Friday, Dec. 17, 2004 http://www.newsmax.com/archives/articles/2004/12/16/233457.shtml Following close on the heels of the pro-life and pro-family Doha (Qatar) International Conference on the Family, the pro-abortion forces met in a similar four-day conference in Sanya, China last week in what some see as an attempt to counteract the Doha platform. The World Family Summit was sponsored mainly by the Chinese government and organized in part by China's National Population and Family Planning Commission. The U.N. also played an unofficial but active role in organizing the conference, and many representatives of feminist, gay and pro-abortion movements participated. Like the Doha Conference, this Summit also claimed the role of observing the tenth anniversary of the International Year of the Family. However, unlike the Doha Conference, which was welcomed by the UN General Assembly as an official commemoration of that anniversary, this Summit was neither recognized nor sanctioned by the UN. Moreover, the Summit opened on December 6, the very day that the UN officially ended its yearlong celebration of the International Year of the Family with a consensus resolution that recognized the Doha Declaration, co-sponsored by 149 countries, as an outcome of that celebration and did not mention the Summit. The participants of the Summit adopted the Sanya Declaration, which is subtitled the "World Declaration for a Global Family Policy." In contrast to the Doha Declaration, which called upon states to "ensure that the inherent dignity of human beings is recognized and protected through all stages of life," the Sanya Declaration states the need for a reduction in "unwanted pregnancies" through the increased availability of "reproductive health services, especially family planning." Further, while the Doha Declaration called upon countries to "uphold, preserve and defend the institution of marriage," the Sanya Declaration says that families are "as different as alike," and "various forms of the family exist in different social, cultural, legal and political systems," and insists that "respecting their diversity and peculiarity is mandatory." The Sanya Declaration also calls upon states to "encourage the participation of adolescents in the design, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of...health programmes that include sexual and reproductive health," while the Doha Declaration asked nations to "reaffirm and respect the liberty of parents...to ensure the religious and moral education of their children in conformity with their own convictions." The Summit also hosted several exhibitions by Chinese companies involved in the research and manufacturing of contraceptive, abortive and sexual enhancement products, including the China Family Planning Association, a full member of the International Planned Parenthood Federation (IPPF). Copyright 2004 - C-FAM (Catholic Family & Human Rights Institute).

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Study: TV Show Negative Image of Religion

2/16/2004 18:02:57 EST By DAVID BAUDER AP Television Writer http://kevxml2adsl.verizon.net/_1_2T2VTO102S7R27N__vzn.dsl/apnws/story.htm?kcfg=apart &sin=D871188O0&qcat=entertain&ran=29579&passqi=&feed=ap&top=1 NEW YORK - Television entertainment programs mention God more often than they did in the mid-1990s but tend to depict organized religion negatively, a study released Thursday said. The Parents Television Council watched every hour of prime-time on the broadcast networks during the 2003-04 season and logged 2,344 treatments of religion. They judged 22 percent of the mentions positive, 24 percent negative and the rest neutral. The conservative group's last study, released in 1997, found far fewer mentions of the topic - an average of once per hour compared to three times per hour last season. But any mention of a religious institution or member of the clergy was at least twice as likely to be negative than positive, the council said. "Ninety percent of the American people believes in God," said Brent Bozell, the council's president. "It is an important issue to most people. Hollywood is attacking the very thing that they consider important in their own lives. Perhaps Hollywood ought to be changing its world view." Negative examples varied widely: from comic Jimmy Kimmel joking on the American Music Awards that winners should resist thanking God, to a Catholic priest admitting on "The Practice" that he had had sex with a woman who was later murdered. Well-publicized scandals about pedophile priests made Catholics particularly vulnerable, the council found. "Catholicism is in the bulls-eye of the entertainment medium," Bozell said. His group singled out NBC, saying its mentions of religion were nearly 10 time more likely to be negative than positive. "Law & Order" episodes, which tend to have stories ripped from the headlines, helped skew those numbers, the group said. Bozell noted, however, that one of the negative NBC examples the PTC cited - Karen on "Will & Grace" quipping, "let's go by that historic church and turn it into a gay bar" - reflected as poorly on the character as on religion. An NBC spokeswoman, Shannon Jacobs, said the network hadn't seen the study but rejected its conclusion. NBC's programming reflects the diversity of its audience, she said. "It is never our intention to appear, nor do we accept the notion that we are, anti-religious," she said. Among the positive examples, the PTC cites a "JAG" episode where a character prays to God to say hello to her dead mother, and an "American Dreams" episode where an actor playing a medical student says a surgery is partially in God's hands. Bozell said he's not suggesting that all television programming "ought to be about St. Teresa" or even be all positive about religion, but that Hollywood should keep in mind the overall picture it presents to viewers. Copyright 2004 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

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Christians Face 47 Years in Prison for Reading Bible at 'Gay Pride' Event
Randy Hall, CNSNews.com Friday, Dec. 17, 2004 Four people who were arrested during a confrontation at an annual homosexual pride event in Philadelphia could spend up to 47 years in prison for public reading of Scripture, an attorney for a pro-family organization said Thursday. Brian Fahling, senior trial attorney for the American Family Association (AFA) Center for Law and Policy, is representing the group in court. He claims the Christian activists are being persecuted simply for exercising their constitutional rights. "They were exercising their First Amendment rights in a public forum, and we have videotape that demonstrates that," Fahling said. The case began on Oct. 10, when Repent America Director Michael Marcavage and 10 other persons preached and read verses from the Bible during an annual "gay pride" event known as "Outfest" in Philadelphia. Fahling said that a video of the confrontation showed Marcavage speaking through a bullhorn while he and his supporters were "being shouted down by irate gay activists." However, city officials told the Philadelphia Inquirer that the video did not show the start of the confrontation, when they said Marcavage tried to interrupt an onstage performance with his preaching and then disobeyed a police order to move to the perimeter of the "block party" to avoid the potential for violence. 'Dangerous' "They were not prohibited from preaching," said Karen Brancheau, a lawyer for the district attorney's office. "A reasonable request was made to prevent a situation from becoming dangerous to their own safety, as well as the safety of the participants." Charges were later dropped against seven people in the "Philadelphia 11" because they were not seen quoting Scripture on a videotape of the incident. However, the remaining four individuals have been ordered to stand trial on three felony counts criminal conspiracy, ethnic intimidation and riot - and five misdemeanor charges. If convicted, Fahling said, they could face up to 47 years in prison. 'Fighting Words' Charles Ehrlich, the city prosecutor in the case, has called the Christian protesters "hateful" and referred to preaching the Bible as using "fighting words." Philadelphia Municipal Court Judge William Austin Meehan has banned the protesters from doing any type of evangelism within 100 yards of any "gay and lesbian event." This past week, U.S. District Judge Petrese B. Tucker denied emergency relief from prosecution despite video footage Fahling calls "undisputed evidence" that the group cooperated with police and were continually harassed by members of a homosexual organization called Pink Angels. Then on Tuesday, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit turned down a similar appeal. Since the federal courts did not intervene, the last route for the group to avoid trial would be an appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court, Fahling said. "First, symbols of Christianity are removed from the public square; now, Christians are facing 47 years in prison because they preached the gospel in the public square. Stalin would be proud,"

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Fahling concluded. Copyright CNSNews.com

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School drops some Christmas songs from concert

Parents say change ignores tradition A student complains that the program is too Christian, but move prompts more concern. By Pamela Perez Palm Beach Post Staff Writer http://www.palmbeachpost.com/localnews/content/local_news/epaper/2004/12/16/s1b_NOD RUMMER_1216.html Thursday, December 16, 2004 Chris and Judy Franklin will be disappointed tonight when the holiday choral performance at their daughter's school ends a few minutes before schedule. Their 12-year-old daughter Erica won't be performing The Little Drummer Boy, after it was cut from her Jupiter school's concert program because of its religious nature, according to her parents. "What are we coming too?" said Judy Franklin. "Where do we draw the line when we're trying to be so politically correct? I think we're losing our freedom of speech." School officials at Independence Middle School have omitted some traditional Christmas songs from the program days before the concert after concerns they didn't comply with the annual holiday guidelines. "We didn't just pull one, we pulled three or four (songs)," said Gwendolyn Johnson, school principal. "I think there's a good cross-section. As long as you have a variety of groups, your music should reflect that." The other songs cut from the program were Shepherd's Spiritual, On a Cold Christmas Day and a medley of three songs: Angels We Have Heard on High, How Great Our Joy and Ding Dong Merrily on High, according to school officials. Johnson acknowledged that the songs were cut for religious reasons. The change happened when interim chorus director Lisa Pontbriand asked Johnson to double check the program after a female Jewish student complained all the songs were "Christian." The principal had the program reviewed by the district's secondary education fine arts specialists, according to district spokeswoman Vickie Middlebrooks. School officials decided to pull the four Christian-themed songs and replace them with three traditional Hanukkah songs: One Special Night, Bashana Haba'ah and S' vivon, the latter two performed in Hebrew. Some Christian-based songs stayed on the program, including Born Born in Bethlehem. Other songs on tonight's program include God Bless Us All, Deck the Halls, Singing at Santa's Place and Feliz Navidad. "Now there is a greater showing of different faiths," Pontbriand said. The Franklins, who are not Christian or religious, say the change worries them because of how stealthily it came about. "Now the minority has a voice and the minority is getting their way," Judy Franklin said. "We don't say anything because we want to be politically correct, but they're hurting our feelings. They don't care about our feelings. It wouldn't offend me if they sing the dreidel song. It wouldn't offend me if they're singing the Kwanzaa song because it's part of a tradition. The Little Drummer Boy is tradition. It's something that has been a part of our country." The Little Drummer Boy was just part of the ripple effect, Pontbriand said.

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Last month, the student chorus held a concert in honor of Veteran's Day. The concert had no lastminute changes, according to school officials. The Anti-Defamation League has worked closely with the Palm Beach County Schools District to develop guidelines during the holiday season, according to Mark Medin, Florida regional director for the Anti-Defamation League. "The December holidays should not be about religious division and exclusion, but rather a time to bring communal good will, respect and mutual understanding among the various religious and ethnic groups in our society," Medin said. The league believes public schools have a duty to censor themselves to teach students about respect. "We think it's very important for the school district to have guidelines," Medin said. "When it comes to government institutions, such as public schools, there needs to be a higher level of sensitivity." In New Jersey, a school district slashed the traditional Christmas song Silent Night from E.H. Slaybaugh Elementary School's holiday concert program after a parent, who is an attorney, objected to the song because of its religious nature, according to news reports. On Monday, the unidentified parent withdrew the complaint, but it is still under review by the board of education. "One day we'll wake up and there won't be any Christmas," Chris Franklin said. "They're taking it way from us - one song at a time."

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Prosecutor: Bible is 'fighting words'

4 who protested at Philly homosexual event ordered to stand trial, face 47 years in prison Posted: December 16, 2004 5:00 p.m. Eastern 2004 WorldNetDaily.com Four Christian protesters who demonstrated at a Philadelphia homosexual event face a possible 47 years in prison if convicted of felony charges filed against them, while a prosecutor referred to Scripture verses they read as "fighting words." The four are part of 11 demonstrators who went before the Philadelphia Municipal Court in a preliminary hearing this week. Judge William Austin Meehan Tuesday ordered four of the Christians to stand trial on three felony and five misdemeanor charges. If convicted, they could a maximum of 47 years in prison. As WorldNetDaily reported, on Oct. 10, the group was "preaching God's Word" to a crowd of people attending the outdoor Philadelphia "OutFest" event and displaying banners with biblical messages. After a confrontation with a group called the Pink Angels, described by protesters as "a militant mob of homosexuals," the 11 Christians were arrested and spent a night in jail. Eight charges were filed: criminal conspiracy, possession of instruments of crime, reckless endangerment of another person, ethnic intimidation, riot, failure to disperse, disorderly conduct and obstructing highways. None of the Pink Angels was cited or arrested. A video of the arrest, provided by the American Family Association's Center for Law & Policy can be seen here [Windows Media]. "First, symbols of Christianity are removed from the public square; now, Christians are facing 47 years in prison because they preached the gospel in the public square. Stalin would be proud," Brian Fahling, AFA Center for Law and Policy senior trial attorney, said in a statement. A federal appeals court in Philadelphia denied emergency relief earlier this week despite video footage Fahling calls "undisputed evidence" that shows the Christians cooperating with police and being harassed by the Pink Angels. Fahling's group says the Philadelphia city prosecutor in the case, Charles Ehrlich, attacked the defendants as "hateful" and referred to preaching the Bible as "fighting words," a characterization, the law group says, with which Judge Meehan agreed. Charges were dropped against the remaining seven Christians, apparently because they were not seen quoting Scripture on the videotape. The ethnic intimidation charge stems from Pennsylvania's "hate crimes" law to which the newest "victim" category of "sexual orientation" was recently added.

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Schools to observe Ramadan holiday?

Muslims seeking student day off asking board to adjust calendar Posted: December 16, 2004 1:00 a.m. Eastern 2004 WorldNetDaily.com A group of Muslims in Florida is hoping school officials add at least one day off to the calendar so students can observe Islamic holidays. The Tampa chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations made its case to the Hillsborough County School Board this week, looking for Nov. 4, 2005, to be made a non-student day in honor of Eid al-Fitr, a holy day marking the end of Ramadan. "How can you continue to ignore our needs, our holidays, our interests? 16-year-old Mariam Osman, asked the board, according to the Tampa Tribune. Another holy day, Eid al-Adha, is also being sought for recognition in January 2006. "Our holidays go unnoticed, Ahmed Bedier, director of Tampa CAIR, said, as he noted Muslim students watch classmates of other faiths enjoy their respective holidays. He said the request for recognition is coming at this time because "we're organized now. The Tribune reports the superintendent said that no religious holiday is officially recognized, though some days off for students happen to fall on religious holidays. Ken Otero, assistant superintendent for the administration, told those in attendance families had to provide a note from leaders of their faith to be excused from classes on religious holidays. "Why do they need a note? I'm a Christian and I take Christmas off, board chairwoman Candy Olson asked. CAIR claims some 30,000 Muslims live in the Tampa area, though it did not provide a figure on the number of Islamic students in public schools. The board held off on voting on a new school calendar until January, as it instructed the district to look into the request.

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Justice opens probe into school district

Federal attorneys look into allegations officials censoring Christmas, squelching religious rights Posted: December 16, 2004 2:09 p.m. Eastern By Ron Strom 2004 WorldNetDaily.com The U.S. Department of Justice has opened a preliminary investigation into a Texas school district that was sued yesterday for allegedly infringing on the rights of students and parents to exercise their Christian faith on school property. As WorldNetDaily reported, lawyers filed suit on behalf of 20 students and parents of the Plano Independent School District, claiming the district's policies and practices which include a ban on candy cane distribution when a religious card is attached, a ban on parents giving religious-oriented items to one another on school property, a ban on criticizing school board members or administrators on campus, and the barring of any colors but white at a school "Winter Break" party are unconstitutional. "It is great to have a Justice Department that cares about religious freedom," said Hiram Sasser, director of litigation with Liberty Legal Institute, one of the groups representing the plaintiffs. A letter from the Justice Department to Liberty Legal [a .pdf document] requested information that might assist federal attorneys in researching whether or not action against the district is warranted. Meanwhile, Richard Abernathy, the attorney representing the Plano district, released a statement painting attorneys involved in the lawsuit as "trial lawyers" who want to "feed at the trough of the taxpayers' pockets." It further states that Liberty Legal Institute has refused to dialogue with the district about specific matters and instead has "chosen litigation over dialogue." Kelly Shackelford, chief counsel of Liberty Legal Institute, contested Abernathy's version of their relationship. "We've talked them probably over 40 times in the last two years trying to get them to do the right thing," Shackelford told WND. He says last year when working on behalf of a student who wanted to pass out candy canes with a religious message, Shackelford called Abernathy directly. Explained Shackelford: "I told him, 'Do not do this. Just let Jonathan hand out his candy canes.' And Abernathy's response to me was, 'We can't do it. It's against school policy. We're not going to allow it.'" Abernathy's statement included criticism of Liberty Legal over the cost of litigation to the district. "In this time of great financial stress on all public school districts in the state of Texas," it read, "the Plano ISD is disheartened by Liberty Legal's apparent attempt to further deplete and misdirect funds needed for the education of students." Shackelford said that was his "favorite" part. "It's unbelievable hypocrisy," he told WND. "This is a guy who gets paid by the taxpayers. In fact, the producing of the press release itself he gets paid for. Meanwhile, the attorneys on this side are all donating their time to protect religious freedom. Now, who is feeding at the taxpayer trough?" The U.S. District Court in Sherman, Texas, is expected to rule today on a request for a temporary

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restraining order, which would suspend school-district policy so children and parents could distribute religious material at tomorrow's white-only "Winter Break" party. The Alliance Defense Fund is also involved in representing the Plano students and parents in the litigation. SPECIAL OFFER: The December edition of WND's acclaimed Whistleblower magazine is one of the most stunning journalistic exposes ever done on the American Civil Liberties Union. Titled "EXTORTION: How the ACLU is destroying America using your money," it not only reveals the hidden agenda and destructive deeds of the group, but shows in a groundbreaking investigative report exactly where the group gets most of its money from you! Right now, for a limited time, subscribe to Whistleblower, renew your subscription, or give a gift Whistleblower subscription and receive absolutely FREE eight powerful Whistleblower issues! They are: "THE MYTH OF CHURCH-STATE SEPARATION," "THE NEW WORLD REORDER," "THE END OF MARRIAGE?," "AMERICA DEFENSELESS, "INVASION USA!," "THE NEWS MAFIA," "GREEN WITH ENVY" and "ABORTION: The 30-Year War." Offer good in the U.S. only and while supplies last.

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Schools prohibit Christmas colors

District targeted with lawsuit after officials require white-only supplies for 'winter' party Posted: December 15, 2004 6:50 p.m. Eastern By Ron Strom 2004 WorldNetDaily.com First it was schools that banned the singing of Christmas carols. Then another banned carols played only by instruments with no lyrics being presented. Now a school district has banned the colors red and green from a "Winter Break Party," requiring parents to bring only white plates and napkins. In response to the party policy, as well as many other rules a group of parents and students believe to be rank censorship, a lawsuit has been filed against the Plano Independent School District in Texas to fight back against its "religious hostility," as one attorney puts it. Other policies cited in the suit, filed today in U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas, Sherman Division, include a ban on candy cane distribution when a religious card is attached, a ban on parents giving religious-oriented items to one another on school property and a ban on criticizing school board members or administrators on campus. "This lawsuit includes a large amount of evidence that demonstrates the pervasive religious hostitlity in Plano ISD," said Hiram Sasser, director of litigation for Liberty Legal Institute, which, along with Alliance Defense Fund, is representing about 20 clients in the suit. Kelly Shackelford, Liberty Legal Institute's chief counsel, noted the suit was purposely filed before Friday, when the white-only Winter Break party is scheduled to occur. "We asked for a temporary restraining order today to provide protection by this Friday," he told WorldNetDaily. Shackelford says if the order is issued by Friday, at the party the students would be allowed to pass out religious items, parents would be able to do the same, and the ban on criticizing school officials would be lifted. "These policies are a blatant violation of religious freedom and free speech," he said. "These are school officials who have lost all common sense." One item included in the suit is the case of a girl student who was forbidden to invite her friends to an Easter event at her church, according to the law firm. "We've even got a mom who went to the school asking if her daughter at her birthday party could hand out a pencil with 'Jesus' on it," Shackelford told WND, "and the principal got so upset with her that he called the police. "It's just unbelievable stuff. We've been collecting these things for a year or two. This is a pervasive, district-wide problem of political correctness in the extreme." Shackelford said the families' attorneys worked with the district's attorney, Richard Abernathy, to try to get the officials to back down on some of the policies, but they did not. "We filed the federal lawsuit hopefully to put an end to all this nonsense," Shackelford said. Shackelford said he didn't mind if the district engaged in its "silly pretense" that there is no Christmas, but he says it cannot violate the rights of students and parents in the process.

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Said Shackelford: "There's a huge difference between the school putting a sign out that says, 'We endorse Jesus,' and telling students and parents that they can't live out their faith." Commenting on the white-only policy for party supplies, Shackeford quipped, "I guess nobody has told them white could symbolize the purity of Christ. They'd probably ban white!" He says parents have been verbally told the reason for the color restriction was to shun traditional Christmas red and green. Last week, a note went home with students asking parents to bring certain items for the party. Two items listed that some were asked to supply were: "One package small white plates" and "One package white napkins." Food being requested included a dozen sugar cookies and a bag of Hersey's kisses. Liberty Legal Institute says the parents were told not to include any colored icing on the cookies, while Alliance Defense Fund reports children were told not to wear red and green clothing to the party. Shackelford said the complaint is over 150 pages "just fact after fact." "We are confident that the courts will uphold the fundamental law that school officials may not suppress or exclude the speech of citizens simply because their speech is religious or includes religious content," Shackelford said. Gary McCaleb is senior counsel with Alliance Defense Fund. "The U.S. Supreme Court has never ruled that public schools must prohibit the distribution of candy canes or Christmas cards," he said in a statement. "They have never ruled that you can't say 'Merry Christmas' in the public schools. These attempts to stifle all religious expression and sanitize Christmas of all religious content are tiring to the overwhelming majority of Texans and all Americans." The lawsuit is known as Jonathan Morgan, et al., v. the Plano Independent School District, et al. A request for a response from attorney Abernathy's office had not been fulfilled by press time.

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Christmas censors
John Leo (archive) December 13, 2004 | http://www.townhall.com/columnists/johnleo/jl20041213.shtml The annual assault on Christmas comes in many forms. First, there is the barrage of litigation by the American Civil Liberties Union, which is reliably offended by almost any representation of Christianity in the public square. Small towns, facing the prospect of expensive litigation over religious displays on public property, often cave in simply out of fear. Part of the intimidation is that if the towns lose, they must pay the legal fees of the ACLU. But now religious-liberties legal groups provide attorneys to stand up to the ACLU. The Arizona-based Alliance Defense Fund won in federal court last month in a suit filed by the ACLU against the city of Cranston, R.I. Cranston allows religious and secular displays of all kinds on the front lawn of City Hall.The ACLU argued that this was a church-state violation, but U.S. District Judge William Smith ruled that nothing in the evidence reveals or even remotely supports an inference that a religious purpose was behind the creation of the limited public forum. Another standard anti-Christmas maneuver is to argue that all references to Christmas in public schools are suspect, while references to Hanukkah or Kwanzaa, for whatever reason, are not. The policy of the 1,200 New York City public schools is that no purely religious symbols are allowed, only ones that have a secular dimension, such as Christmas trees, menorahs, and the star and crescent. But the star and crescent is hardly secular. It is the symbol of Islam. And the menorah, though now losing some of its religious significance, is the symbol of an intervention by God to save the Jewish people. The Thomas More Law Center filed suit on behalf of a Roman Catholic mother of two public-school students, saying, in effect, that if the citys public schools are allowing brief and educational use of religious symbols for Muslims and Jews, then the Christian crche should be permitted, too. Last February, U.S. District Judge Charles Sifton ruled for the school system. The case is under appeal. The crche, for now, remains banned. Like New Yorks schools, Bay Harbor Islands in Florida refuses to allow a Nativity scene on public property but has menorahs and the Star of David on lampposts and permitted a local synagogue to erect a 14-foot-high menorah on public land. A fairly new tactic in the Christmas wars can be called the sensitive persons veto. In 2000, the city of Eugene, Ore., banned Christmas trees on public property, then allowed firefighters to put up a tree on Christmas Eve and Christmas, with the provision that if one person objected, the tree had to come down. The next year, Kensington, Md., banned Santa Claus from a tree-lighting ceremony because of two complaints. So the citys most sensitive person was, in effect, allowed to make policy. The sensitivity argument - that any reference to Christmas at all might make someone feel bad - is responsible for the spread of the anti-Christmas campaign from religious symbols to the purely secular and harmless trappings of the season, including red poinsettias, red-and-green cookies, holiday lights, and Rudolph the reindeer. Santa Claus, originally based on a Christian saint but no more religious than Kermit the Frog, is considered much too divisive and hurtful to non-Christian students in many schools. The principal of Braden Middle School in Florida said, You wont see any Christmas trees around here. We keep it generic. Some principals and teachers around the country even ban the word Christmas. In Rochester, Minn., two girls were reprimanded for saying Merry Christmas in a school skit. And though Christmas trees are considered secular when they are useful in warding off Nativity scenes, the word Christmas is often removed by panicky officials, thus producing multicultural trees, holiday trees, community trees, care trees, and giving trees. The White House still has a Christmas tree, but Congress has a Capitol Holiday Tree. Accommodating

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all traditions is a worthy goal. But a broad movement to erase the word Christmas is an extraordinary development in a culture that is more than 80 percent Christian. How much more of this is the public willing to tolerate? William Donohue, head of the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights, points out that an elementary school in New Hampshire declared that December is a gift-giving month but couldnt explain why or how it got to be a giving time of year, since it refused to use the word Christmas. The South Orange/Maplewood, N.J., school district banned religious Christmas songs, even in instrumental versions. In Florida, an elementary school concert included songs about Hanukkah and Kwanzaa but offered not a single note of Christmas music. A recent winter parade in Denver looked very much like a Christmas event, except for one small thing: Every reference to Christmas was banned. Unless believers and religious-liberties groups begin to push back, the anti-Christmas trend will prevail in the public square.

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The War Against Christmas - Phase 2

Phil Brennan Wednesday, Dec. 8, 2004 What began as a campaign to prevent any mention of the religious aspect of Christmas and moved forward to ban any mention of it, has now progressed into an all-out war against the very faith that observes this solemn remembrance of the birth of Jesus Christ. Phase two of the war against Christmas is a war against Christianity itself. Story Continues Below As we begin the month that ends with this holiest of religious holidays, a barrage has been launched by two of the nation's leading news magazines, Time and Newsweek, against the legitimacy of Christianity itself. In the Newsweek Cover Story, the magazine's editor Jon Meachem examines the biblical story about the birth of Jesus, and gives legitimacy to the views of dissenting scholars, raising doubts about the Virgin birth, even to suggesting that Jesus was the illegitimate spawn of a Roman soldier and his mother Mary who was tossed out by her husband Joseph because of her adulterous relationship. Wrote Meachem: "In later years Christians had to contend with charges that their Lord was illegitimate, perhaps the illicit offspring of Mary and a Roman soldier. Now, at the beginning of the 21st century, some scholars treat the Christmas narratives as first-century inventions designed to strengthen the seemingly tenuous claim that Jesus was the Messiah." Seemingly? In other words many of the "scholars" including those members of the so-called "Jesus Seminar" Meachem relies upon for much of this lengthy article, are questioning the very validity of Christianity which, in their wisdom, they view as largely a myth concocted by the authors of the four gospels and foist upon us gullible believers for the last 2,000 years. If this article were merely Meachem's first thinly-disguised attempt to pour cold water on the faith of tens of millions of Christians it could be looked upon as a tentative gesture of respect to the paganistic elites whose good opinions he, like the rest of his liberal journalistic colleagues, lust after. But it's not. This is not Meachem's first flank attack on the religion he professes to be his own. On Friday, February 13, 2004 I wrote a NewsMax.com piece about his first foray into anti-Christian propaganda which I now repeat. It tells you a lot about Meachem, where he's coming from, and where he's headed, and suggests why he chose the beginning of the Christmas season to launch this misleading piece of Scrooge-like propaganda. "Newsweek Peddling Gibson Foes' Revisionist Claims" Newsweek magazines cover story about Mel Gibsons "The Passion of the Christ," carries the byline of one Jon Meachem, but anybody the least bit familiar with the recent statements and articles by Boston colleges Paula Fredericksen, Sr. Mary Boys and the other dissident members of an ad-hoc committee of the U.S. Catholic Bishops Conference interfaith group will immediately recognize where Meachem got his material. This group of Catholic and Jewish scholars has a very clear agenda to, in effect, rewrite the Gospels to conform to their opinions of what their study of history reveals about the life and times of Jesus Christ. What has been accepted for 2,000 years as the inspired word of God is, in their view, more myth than fact.

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To put it bluntly, what Christians have accepted as unerrant, is in the scholars opinion, full of errors. Heres what Newsweek had to say: "Though countless believers take it as the immutable word of God, Scripture is not always a faithful record of historical events; the Bible is the product of human authors who were writing in particular times and places with particular points to make and visions to advance." In other words, the Bible is not the work of apostles guided by the Holy Spirit and therefor incapable of error. Its simply the work of four fallible human beings with an ax to grind. "Gibson set out to stick to the Gospels and has made virtually no nod to critical analysis or context." In other words, Mel Gibson didnt consult the self-styled "experts" or pay any attention to their "analysis." "The writers of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John shaped their narratives several decades after Jesus' death to attract converts and make their young religion - understood by many Christians to be a faction of Judaism - attractive to as broad an audience as possible." Matthew Mark, Luke and John, it seems were not evangelists inspired by the Holy Spirit, but merely four hucksters peddling their young religion. "We can also see why the writers downplayed the role of the ruling Romans in Jesus' death. The advocates of Christianity - then a new, struggling faith - understandably chose to placate, not antagonize, the powers that were. Why remind the world that the earthly empire which still ran the Mediterranean had executed your hero as a revolutionary?" The Gospel writers slanted their biblical accounts to curry favor with the Romans who persisted in killing them anyway. "And many scholars believe that the author of Matthew, which is the only Gospel to include the 'His blood be on us' line, was writing after the destruction of the Temple in 70 and inserted the words to help explain why such misery had come upon the people of Jerusalem. According to this argument, blood had already fallen on them and on their children." Just where did the "scholars" obtain that inside information? "John's point in putting this line in Jesus' mouth is almost certainly to take a gibe at the Temple elite. But in the dramatic milieu of the movie, it can be taken to mean that the Jews, through Caiaphas, are more responsible for Jesus' death than the Romans are - an implication unsupported by history." St. John put words in Jesus mouth? St. John, the " beloved apostle" lied?" "Clear evidence of the political nature of the execution - that Pilate and the high priest were ridding themselves of a "messiah" who might disrupt society, not offer salvation - is the sign Pilate ordered affixed to Jesus' cross. The message is not from the knowing Romans to the evil Jews. It is, rather, a scornful signal to the crowds that this death awaits any man the pilgrims proclaim the king of the Jews." If that is true, why did the Temple authorities go to Pilate and demand that he change the wording to say that Jesus "claimed" to be King of the Jews. And how do they explain Pilates scornful rejection of their demand " Scripsi, Scripsi" (What I have written I have written). Or did the gospel authors make that up too? "It was as the church's theology took shape, culminating in the Council of Nicaea in 325, that Jesus became the doctrinal Christ, the Son of God who for us men and our salvation,' the council's original creed declared, 'descended, was incarnate, and was made man, suffered and rose again the

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third day, ascended into heaven and cometh to judge the living and the dead." In other words Jesus was not believed to be who he said he was for about 300 years after his death. That would have come as a surprise to the tens of thousands of martyrs who died because of their belief in his divinity. These "teachings" are the teachings of the so-called "scholars" which are at odds with official Catholic doctrine and the teachings of the majority of Protestant and evangelistic biblical scholars. And going to them and the likes of the Jesus Seminar for guidance about Christianity is like going to Saddam Hussein for guidance on how to prevent torture. What's next Jon? Got a Christian or two you can feed to the lions? Phil Brennan is a veteran journalist who writes for NewsMax.com. He is editor & publisher of Wednesday on the Web (http://www.pvbr.com) and was Washington columnist for National Review magazine in the 1960s. He also served as a staff aide for the House Republican Policy Committee and helped handle the Washington public relations operation for the Alaska Statehood Committee which won statehood for Alaska. He is also a trustee of the Lincoln Heritage Institute and a member of the Association of Former Intelligence Officers. He can be reached at phil@newsmax.com

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Killing Christmas
by Alan Caruba December 14, 2004 http://www.canadafreepress.com/2004/caruba121404.htm Its a curious thing. Mel Gibsons film, The Passion of the Christ, broke box office records this year, but as we move closer to Christmas, the date designated as the birth of Jesus, one can hardly look anywhere without reading or hearing about a politically correct retreat from the simple fact that it was, it is, and it will always be a religious holiday. Indeed, the word holiday is a retraction of holy day. For 61 years, I lived in a lovely northern New Jersey suburb that was so picture-perfect a Meryl Streep movie was once filmed there. It is Maplewood and, earlier this year, I sold my home and moved to the Gaslight Commons, one town over in South Orange. Imagine my surprise to discover that the combined Maplewood and South Orange school system was suddenly making national news because its official policy was to ban Christmas carols; even songs about Santa Claus are subject to the ban. It is useful to know that, while attending school in Maplewood in the late 1940s and early 1950s, we kids all sang Christmas carols and other holiday songs. A lot of us were Jewish. The Jewish kids loved the Christmas carols and when references to Jesus or Christ came up, they would politely fudge a bit and keep on singing. I dont recall any Hanukah songs, but I do recall visits to the homes of the Jewish kids where their parents would explain what the Festival of the Lights was about, along with its traditions. Suffice it to say, come Christmas morning, most of the Jewish kids were greeted with gifts by the fireplace. It never occurred to them not to expect them and it never occurred to them that this was some great act of assimilation. It was just Christmas! Well, actually, it was the birth date of Mithras, an ancient Middle Eastern pagan god whose birthday continued to be celebrated during the early years of the Christian church. Church fathers simply took over the date, proclaiming it the birth of Jesus and, voila, Christmas! Like the clich says, Its the thought that counts. And my thought is that no Jewish kid I know ever converted to Christianity because of a couple of Christmas carols and no Christian kid ever converted to Judaism because he learned to sing, Dreidel, Dreidel, Dreidel. Indeed, despite all the blandishments of Christmas holiday celebrations, the world is still home to millions of Hindus, Buddhists, Muslims and others for whom Christmas has no religious meaning whatever, unless you check out the shopping centers in Tokyo, Bombay, and, who knows where else. So why did the superintendent of schools conclude that Christmas carols were inappropriate to the Christmas season? He told a local daily newspaper that they had been banned since the early 1990s. Because a few Grinches had complained this year, he felt obligated to comply. Rather than try to respond to all the various religions and try to balance them, its best to stay away from that and simply have a nonreligious tone to them and have a more seasonal tone. How to you have a seasonal tone during Christmas without Christmas carols and Christmas songs? The answer is, you dont! How the heck do you get to be a superintendent of schools without understanding that? In fact, the New Jersey School Boards Association says its policy is that performance of songs from various ethnic or religious groups actually helps broaden students awareness, but that it allows districts to impose tighter restrictions. The Maplewood-South Orange district policy was spelled out in an October 29 memo by Nicholas Santoro, the chairman of the districts Fine Arts Department, who said that songs like Winter

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Wonderland or Frosty the Snowman are fine, but apparently those horrid songs about Jesus were not. Just in case no one got the message, he added that printed programs for holiday concerts (theres that word again!) must avoid graphics which refer to the holidays, such as Christmas trees and dreidels. So, in essence, the lesson the district wants to convey to the children in its care is that Christmas is NOT about a religious event of great importance to Christianity and, please, lets have no reference either to Hanukah, a holiday possibly celebrated by the Jewish Jesus and his Jewish apostles. This anti-religion craze has seized schools from coast to coast and shows up in heated debates over whether to publicly display a crche or a menorah during the holidays. It is so viscerally unAmerican that it is profoundly offensive to anyone with a shred of knowledge about our nations history. The phrase America is a Christian nation may offend some people, but historically and demographically it is accurate. The nation was founded by people seeking to freely express their religious beliefs concerning the practice of Christianity. Religion and its free practice were so important that America became the first nation not to institute an official state religion. When the Bill of Rights was written, freedom of religion was deemed so important it was incorporated into the First Amendment. Playing it safe by avoiding anything religious as part of the educational process is just part of the on-going dumbing down of the students who pass through it. All that talk about diversity is a sham. The population of the world is diverse. Any street in any town in America is diverse. Will someone be offended by a Christmas carol? You can bet on that. Christmas is about sharing a hope for peace on Earth and Hanukah celebrates the purification of a synagogue reclaimed from pagans. It doesnt get more religious than that! The effort to kill Christmas, to drive images of the Ten Commandments out of public buildings, and, in general, undermine any understanding or practice of religious faith of any kind is the real offense. Rise up, America! Sing those carols! Spin those dreidels! Tis the season! The National Anxiety Center maintains an Internet site at www.anxietycenter.com. Caruba writes a weekly column, "Warning Signs", posted on the site and excerpted widely on many others. In 2003, a collection of his columns was published by Merril Press.

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The Impending Death of Christmas? Part I

Jerry Falwell Wednesday, Dec. 8, 2004
Part One of a Two-Part Series

The spiritual Grinches in our nation are accelerating their war against Christmas as never before. And they are tragically convincing growing numbers of our fellow citizens - primarily those in our nations public schools and public administration - that Christmas should be publicly shunned, replaced by nebulous substitutes designed to avoid offending those who are all-so-easily outraged. But adherents of this colossal effort to create a secular utopia have forgotten two significant realities: 1. Our Founders were men who explicitly embraced Judeo-Christian principles in the founding of this nation. Even those who were Deists openly recognized the need for the citizenry to fall to their collective knees and beseech Gods favor. They understood the need to recognize God in our Constitution, in our courts and in our schools. 2. Our fellow citizens do not want a spiritual sanitization effort to sweep out all vestiges of Christianity from the public square. One need look no further than an AOL poll this week. An astounding 89 percent of respondents (as of Wednesday afternoon) answered in the affirmative to the question, Should religion be included in public holiday celebrations? The so-called mainstream media often portray radical secularists as reasonable individuals, but the people at the American Civil Liberties Union, Americans United for the Separation of Church and State, and other such groups are practitioners of an extremist movement that would completely outlaw God, Christianity and any remnant of such from the public arena. And they are, in many cases, winning this war. Thats why this week the student members of the Columbia High School brass ensemble in Maplewood, N.J., were told they could not play any Christmas-related songs - not even instrumental versions. (You wouldnt want some student or parent to get offended by a wordless tune, would we?) This is the milieu of outright censorship that many students face today. Their teachers and administrators have become convinced (primarily through fear campaigns by leftist groups) that even the most blurred mention of Christmas would be an outright constitutional offense. They are wrong. Disastrously wrong! Other anti-Christmas strategies have gained headlines recently: * TARGET will not allow the Salvation Army to collect funds at their stores, meaning that the Army will lost about $9 million this year; * Macys and Bloomingdales have prohibited the phrase Merry Christmas; * Denvers Parade of Lights, which has outlawed religious expression, is now considering not even allowing a Christian group to participate in the event; * New York Mayor David Bloomberg now refers to the giant Christmas tree in the city as a holiday tree. Other examples abound as a few Americans attempt to oust Christmas from the public vernacular. Leaders of religious freedom-based legal groups around the country tell me that during this time of year they see a hefty incursion of anti-religious expression cases. One of those organizations is the Orlando, Fla.-based Liberty Counsel (which now has a divisional

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office on the Liberty University campus), which is involved in hundreds of cases each year wherein attorneys protect the rights of Americans to express their faith. Christmas Remains Legal Mathew Staver, founder and general counsel at Liberty Counsel, says that publicly sponsored Nativity scenes on public property are, in fact, constitutional as long the display includes a secular symbol. The government may publicly exhibit depictions of Mary, Joseph and Jesus or a Menorah if such scenes incorporates the image of Santa Claus or Frosty the Snowman. In addition, public school students may sing Christian Christmas carols such as Silent Night as long as they also sing secular songs, such as Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer. Furthermore, schools may not prohibit access to religious books, because to do so discriminates against the religious viewpoint of the message contained in the book. Public employers may not discriminate against staff by prohibiting Christmas celebrations. Mr. Staver also says that privately sponsored nativity scenes erected and displayed by citizens or groups in a public area are constitutional and require no secular symbols to be included. This nation was founded by people who sought to freely exercise their religious liberties, Mr. Staver said. We have no intention of letting these liberties fall by the wayside or be chilled every holiday season by uninformed or hostile government officials. Mr. Staver tells me that all 600 of his attorneys are available to provide free legal aid to students or employees around the nation who face religious discrimination. Visit the organizations Web site (www.lc.org) for more information on Liberty Counsel. Other similar religious freedom legal groups are actively working to protect Americans rights to express their faith. The task is daunting because leftist organizations are aggressively attempting to redefine America in their own Godless image. They seek a national mandate. While I celebrate the fact that men like Mat Staver and others are standing up for American values, it is imperative that parents and grandparents ensure that their children understand the JudeoChristian ancestry that is undeniable. We must also make certain that our childrens schools are not gagging their rights to live out their faith in the classroom. The effort to preserve our religious heritage and future requires the diligence of us all. May we, through Gods grace, faithfully safeguard the wonderful Christian birthright of America.

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The Impending Death of Christmas? Part II

Jerry Falwell Friday, Dec. 10, 2004 Part Two of a Two-Part Series I wrote yesterday of the hastening effort by secularist organizations to terminate Christmas from the American public square. I wish to look back now through the annals of history to substantiate the fact that this great nation has historically been involved in religious pursuits and that our government, under the guidance of Thomas Jefferson, even got involved in evangelization and church building. Story Continues Below When recognizing that Mr. Jefferson - who the Left wants only to remember for authoring the phrase the separation of church and state - was interested in advancing religion, it becomes readily apparent that our Founders never intended government to be hostile toward Christianity or menacingly unreceptive to religious expression. Congressional Funds for Church Building On December 3, 1803, the U.S. Congress, following the request of President Jefferson, ratified a treaty with the Kaskaskia Indians. This treaty was significant because Congress, recognizing that most members of the tribe had become Christians, deemed to give an annual subsidy of $100 for the support of a priest during a seven-year period. That priest, as the Congress noted, was to perform the duties of his office, and... instruct as many... children as possible. The treaty, signed by President Jefferson, stated: The United States will further give the sum of three hundred dollars to assist ... in the erection of a church. You read that right. The U.S. Congress of 1803, at the request of President Thomas Jefferson, allocated federal funds for the salary of a minister and for the construction of a church. The Congress of 1803 was not hostile to Christianity. The members understood the value of imparting Judeo-Christian values among the Indians. They also recognized the need for advancing biblical values among the citizenry of the young nation. Congress Agrees to Print Bibles In 1777, with war plaguing the land, the Rev. Patrick Allison, chaplain of the Continental Congress, petitioned that body for a specific need - the printing of the Holy Bible. After America had declared its independence, the Revolutionary War had interrupted the supply of Bibles. Printed Bibles had previously come to America from England and Holland but at this time of war we were often cut off from the rest of the world. As a result, Bibles were in short supply. The committee which received Rev. Allisons petition then submitted it to Congress on September 11, 1777. The report stated: The use of the Bible is so universal and in importance so great, that your Committee refer the above to the consideration of Congress, and if Congress shall not think it expedient to order the importation of types and paper, the committee recommends that Congress will order the Committee of Congress to import 20,000 Bibles from Holland, Scotland, or else where, into the different parts of the States of the Union. That mandate for 20,000 Bibles never went into effect, though, because publisher Robert Aitken printed the New Testament in Philadelphia. After successful print runs of this Bible, in 1781, Mr.

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Aitken petitioned Congress to aid in the printing of the entire King James Bible. The Congress responded with this resolution: Resolved, That the United States in Congress assembled, highly approve the pious and laudable undertaking of Mr. Aitken as subservient to the interest of religion as well as the progress of the arts in this country, and being satisfied from the above report, of his care and accuracy, in the execution of the work, they recommend this edition of the Bible to the inhabitants of the United States, and hereby authorize him to publish this recommendation in the manner he shall think proper. Mr. Aitken then published the only Bible ever recommended by Congress and it is today a rare treasure. The Lies of the Left We rarely hear of men like Robert Aitken and Rev. Patrick Allison today because the left wants to sweep their stories under a rug. Many liberals purposely disregard and disrespect our nations religious heritage so that they can bring about their own godless version of this nation. But their vision is deceitful and fraudulent. Today, school children are barred from singing Christmas carols on the school bus (Lake County, Ill.), school bands are prevented from playing carols (Maplewood, N.J.) and school productions of Charles Dickens A Christmas Carol are halted (Kirkland, Wash.). These are just the most recent examples of the growing hostility toward Christianity that is transpiring in schools across our nation because groups like the American Civil Liberties Union and Americans United for the Separation of Church and State have fallaciously convinced educators that even the most rudimentary mention of Christmas (or Christ) is illegal. These organizations thumb their noses at our nations palpable heritage of respect and appreciation of Christianity. Their agenda to purge God from America is a national crime! The ACLUs and AUs Scrooge-like war on the public expression of faith is nothing but a deceptive and dangerous charade that has no historic merit. Through their lies, they are effectively spitting in the faces of Thomas Jefferson, George Washington, Benjamin Franklin and numerous other Founders who took great pains to ensure that religion had a prominent place in American life. This Christmas, may the spirit of our Founders ring in our hearts as we accelerate our efforts to reclaim our religious freedoms. Merry Christmas to all (even the ACLU and AU)!

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French Thought Police Ban 'Christian' Chocolate

Monday, Dec. 13, 2004 1:48 p.m. EST http://www.newsmax.com/archives/ic/2004/12/13/135700.shtml France's latest attack on freedom of religion: The thought police have outlawed Christmas chocolates in the government school monopolies. "It's an unhealthy political affair. Absolutely regrettable," said Andre Delattre, mayor of Coudekerque-Branche, which has shipped traditional chocolates shaped like crosses and St. Nicholas to schools for 11 years. "What's the point? It's the children who are being penalized for this difference of opinion," he said. "They've been deprived of a festive moment." Bruno Frappat, editor of the Catholic daily La Croix, wrote: "In 1968, the slogan was, 'It's forbidden to forbid.' In 2004,it 's, 'Forbidding is a must.' And one of the phobias most in vogue is Catho-phobia." This most recent assault on Christmas is part of "Jackass" Chirac's war on religious symbols, including Christian crucifixes, Muslim head scarves, Sikh turbans and Jewish skullcaps.

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ACLU Scrooges Get an Earful of Christmas Carols

Wednesday, Dec. 8, 2004 4:07 p.m. EST http://www.newsmax.com/archives/ic/2004/12/8/162709.shtml It wasn't a silent night for the Scrooges, Grinches and Mr. Potters at ACLU, but for a nice change it was a holy night. Christian Wire Service today reported glad tidings: The conservative group Public Advocate of the United States, "not dissuaded from 'bah, humbugs' to groups like the Boy Scouts of America and pro-family Americans in general," sang traditional religious Christmas carols in front of the Washington office of American Civil Liberties Union. Story Continues Below Some Grinchy hearts apparently grew three sizes that day, because even a few ACLU staffers chimed in. For those who have a hard time conjuring up real Christmas songs, try to recall "O Holy Night" and "Hark! The Herald Angels Sing," not that awful "Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer" and "Jingle Bell Rock" junk. Quoth CWS: "The event highlighted the ACLU's continuing disregard for the rights of their many pro-family targets, including the rights of young men in the Boy Scouts of America to maintain their morally straight principles. Recently they have even been putting pressure on the Pentagon to get Scout troops kicked off of military bases. By singing Christmas carols in front of the ACLU, Public Advocate brought attention to these serious issues in a light and festive manner true to the Christmas season." 'Obscure Liberal Minority' The organization describes itself thusly on its Web site: "We live in a time when too many liberal politicians, lobbyists and activists are pushing legislation that represents the whims and fancies of an obscure liberal minority, often at the direct expense of timeless American traditions, values, beliefs - and taxpayer dollars. At Public Advocate, we provide a determined, united and uncompromising platform for the millions of American families eager to put a halt to these breaches and abuses of liberal political power." Public Advocate President Eugene Delgaudio said at the festivities: "Public Advocate hopes that the spirit of the Christmas season will fill the members and employees of the ACLU and that they will embrace the morals and principles of groups like the Boy Scouts and renounce their efforts to destroy traditional values in America. "It is exciting to see all these people singing Christmas carols, including the ACLU staff members that have joined us today. Regardless of our differences, we are all proud to be Americans this Christmas, and may God bless those that are currently in harm's way to bravely protect our freedoms. We must remember that the Boy Scout troops in danger of being kicked off these military bases are made up of the sons of those brave soldiers, sailors and Marines."

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N.J. School Reverses 'Silent Night' Ban

Tuesday, Dec. 14, 2004 10:51 a.m. EST http://www.newsmax.com/archives/ic/2004/12/14/105319.shtml A New Jersey talk radio host has succeeded in forcing the Egg Harbor Township board of education to reverse its ban on the Christmas classic "Silent Night," which had been dropped from the school district's holiday program based a single parental complaint. Last night's 7-0 vote by the panel means that "Silent Night" can now be included in this week's Holiday Singalong at the E.H. Slaybaugh Elementary School, where the controversy first erupted. Story Continues Below The complaining parent, an attorney who has not been publicly identified, asked that the holiday carol be dropped from the program, even though songs about other religious holidays, such as "The Dreidel Song" and "Kwanzaa's Here," were included. The controversy erupted last Wednesday after WOND Atlantic City radio host Jeff Whitaker received a tip about the Christmas music ban. "I had on the air the lawyer for the school district, Will Donio, who advised them to do away with 'Slient Night,'" Whitaker told NewsMax. The Atlantic City talker said he was deluged with calls as the controversy percolated through the week, including requests for more information from local pastors. As a result, "four of five pastors wrote to the local school board," Whitaker said, prompting district officials to rethink the ban. After Egg Harbor educrats voted to reverse the ruling in a special session on Monday, Whitaker declared victory, posting a message to his Web site crediting his audience with the success. "The credit in this turn of events goes to the listeners of our radio show, the outrage and stand taken by many of Egg Harbor Township parents and the prayers of people all across the region," he said.

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'Emboldened' Christians Celebrate Christmas

NewsMax.com Wires Tuesday, Dec. 14, 2004 http://www.newsmax.com/archives/articles/2004/12/14/160048.shtml Emboldened by their Election Day successes, some Christian conservatives around the country are trying to put more Christ into Christmas this season. In Terrebonne Parish, La., an organization is petitioning to add "Merry Christmas" to the redlighted "Season's Greetings" sign on the main government building and is selling yard signs that read, "We believe in God. Merry Christmas." And a Raleigh, N.C., church recently paid $7,600 for a full-page newspaper ad urging Christians to spend their money only with merchants who include the greeting "Merry Christmas" in ads and displays. 'Revival' "There is a revival taking place in our nation that is causing Christian and right-minded people to say: `Wait a minute. We've gone too far,'" says the Rev. Patrick Wooden Sr., pastor of the Raleigh church. "We're not going to allow the country to continue this downward spiral to the left." In California, a group called Committee to Save Merry Christmas is boycotting Macy's and its corporate parent, Federated Department Stores, accusing them of replacing "Merry Christmas" signs with ones wishing shoppers "Season's Greetings" or "Happy Holidays." The organization cites "the recent presidential election showing political correctness is offending millions of Americans." (Federated, for its part, says that it has no ban on such greetings and that its store divisions can advertise as they see fit and store clerks are free to wish any customer "Merry Christmas." Macy's says its ads commonly use the phrase.) The push from the religious right troubles Barry Lynn, executive director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State. "This mixing of secular and religious symbols ought to be seen as a bad thing, not a good thing, for Christian believers," he says. "Unfortunately, some of the Christian pressure groups seem to have it backwards." He adds: "I think it's fair to say it's a mistaken notion that they have a mandate to put more nativity scenes up because George Bush was elected." The battle over the manger on the city hall lawn is nothing new. People expect the annual tussle. 'Agitated' But the "keep the Christ in Christmas" contingent is particularly agitated this year over what its members see as a troubling trend on Main Street: Target stores banning Salvation Army bell ringers; UPS drivers complaining to a free-speech group that they have been told not to wish people a "Merry Christmas" (an accusation UPS denies as "silly on its face and just not true"); and major corporations barring religious music from cubicles and renaming the office Christmas bash the "end-of-the-year" party. "I think it is part of a growing movement of people with more traditional values, which make up the majority of people in this country, saying enough is enough," says Greg Scott, a spokesman for the Arizona-based Alliance Defense Fund. Amid stories of schools banning the singing of carols on buses, Scott's group has distributed to more than 5,000 schools a seven-point legal primer citing 40 years of case law that says it is OK to mention Christmas in public places. And the group has about 800 lawyers waiting in the wings in case that notion needs to be reinforced. 42

'Secular' Birth of Christ To that same end, the Virginia-based Rutherford Institute, which says it received the complaints from UPS drivers, has reissued its "12 Rules of Christmas" guide to celebrating the birth of Jesus. "I think the businesses and the schools have just gone too far; this is the final straw," says Institute president John W. Whitehead. "It's supposed to be a time of, what, peace and freedom and fun. And they've kind of made it into a secular ... kind of gray day." Conservative radio and TV talk show hosts have chortled over some recent incidents of what they consider political correctness run amok. Censor That 'Christmas Tree' In Kansas, The Wichita Eagle ran a correction for a notice that mistakenly referred to the Community Tree at the Winterfest celebration as a "Christmas Tree." And the mayor of Somerville, Mass., apologized after a news release mistakenly referred to the Dec. 21 City Holiday Party as a "Christmas Party." But to many, the threats and demands that stores put up "Merry Christmas" signs are no laughing matter. "Why not simply require stores owned by Jews to put a gold star in their ads and on their storefronts?" the Rev. Jim Melnyk, associate rector of St. Mark's Episcopal Church in Raleigh, wrote in a letter to the editor. 2004 Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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Vatican presses the UN to recognise 'Christianophobia'

By Jonathan Petre, Religion Correspondent (Filed: 07/12/2004) http://news.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2004/12/07/wphob07.xml The Vatican is pressing the United Nations to recognise "Christianophobia" as an evil equal to that of anti-Semitism or "Islamophobia". Archbishop Giovanni Lajolo, the Vatican's foreign minister, said anti-Christian feeling had increased, exacerbated by the war on terrorism. He said Christianity was often mistakenly seen as being inextricably linked with Western political policy, and had suffered as a result in the backlash against the West. His comments, at a conference in Rome, were primarily aimed at Middle Eastern countries such as Iraq, where insurgents have bombed a number of churches. But he also echoed Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, a leading contender to be the next Pope, who said last month that parts of Europe were so now secular that Christianity was being pushed into the margins. Archbishop Lajolo disclosed that Vatican diplomats were discreetly attempting to persuade the UN and other bodies to recognise the previously almost unheard of term "Christianophobia". "It should be recognised that the war on terrorism, even though necessary, had as one of its sideeffects the spread of 'Christianophobia' in vast areas of the globe," he told the conference. The UN General Assembly in New York is to debate the issue later this month. Speaking to reporters after his speech, the archbishop said anti-Christian and anti-Catholic sentiments were not only to be found in Muslim countries. Hostility existed in states where Church-sponsored schools or charities were perceived as thinly-veiled attempts at proselytism. The Vatican is pressing its case despite failing to persuade the European Union to include a reference to the continent's Christian heritage in its new constitution. The Vatican campaign has provoked a mixed reaction, with some Christian human rights activists arguing that it could prove counter-productive. Alexandra Aula of Franciscans International, a Catholic pressure group based in Geneva, said: "Obviously we have seen many countries where Christian minorities are in danger, but we don't think this is the appropriate way to really ensure protection. "What we fear is that this is the way to start eroding universal human rights. You will then have Sikhs and Buddhists and all the others coming and claiming rights. Where does it end?" But Vatican officials said privately that they could not stand aside while Judaism and Islam got special attention at the UN. The organisation demands regular reports from member countries on issues officially recognised as international concerns.

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Secular forces 'pushing God to margins'

By Bruce Johnston in Milan and Jonathan Petre (Filed: 20/11/2004) http://news.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml;sessionid=MDBMXYDS44HEVQFIQMFSM5OA VCBQ0JVC?xml=/news/2004/11/20/wchurch20.xml A leading contender to become the next Pope launched a fierce attack on the forces of secularism yesterday, arguing that they were fostering intolerance in Europe and forcing Christianity underground. Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, 77, one of the Vatican's most powerful figures, issued a rallying cry to the faithful, saying that the liberal consensus had now evolved into a "worrying and aggressive" ideology. Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger As a result, "Catholic and Christian religion" had been pushed out of the public debate and was being "driven into the margins". The warning, in a long interview in La Repubblica, Italy's Left-leaning newspaper, comes as the Bavarian-born cardinal, who is the Pope's doctrinal chief, is being viewed as an important late entry for the papacy. Coming shortly after MEPs refused to approve the Italian politician Rocco Buttiglione as European justice commissioner because of his strong Catholic views on gays and women, his statements may be seen by some as something of a manifesto. The cardinal was speaking against a backdrop of rapidly declining priestly vocations in Europe which is worrying Church leaders. Describing the development of a "secular ideological aggression" across the continent as "cause for concern," the cardinal said: "In Sweden, a Protestant minister who preached about homosexuality on the basis of an excerpt from the scriptures was put in jail for a month. "Secularism is no longer that element of neutrality, which opens up space for freedom for all. It is beginning to change into an ideology which, through politics, is being imposed. "It concedes no public space to the Catholic and Christian vision, which as a result runs the risk of turning into a purely private matter, so that deep down it is no longer the same. "In this sense a struggle exists and so we must defend religious freedom against an ideology which is held up as if it were the only voice of rationality, when instead it is only an expression of a 'certain' rationialism." In contemporary society, said the cardinal, who is the Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, God had been pushed "very much into the margins". "In politics, it seems to be almost indecent to speak about God, almost as it were an attack on the freedom of someone who doesn't believe," he said. The cardinal added: "A secularism which is just, is a freedom of religion. The state does not impose a religion, but rather provides free space to those religions with a responsibility to civil society." The society in which we now lived was one where there was a great deal of transformation. "Negative birth rates and immigration are changing Europe's ethnic make-up. Above all we've gone from being a Christian culture to one of aggressive secularism which at times is intolerant."

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He said that even though "churches were emptying" and people were "no longer able to believe," Christian faith was "not dead". He said he remained convinced of hope's inner strength, even if the future of the Church lay more in "other continents" than Europe. Cardinal Ratzinger, once viewed as the likely papal "kingmaker", is now believed to stand a good chance himself precisely because of his advanced years. Vatican watchers maintain that long-serving popes tend to be succeeded by short-lived "interim" papacies. Despite his arch-conservative popular image, the cardinal often reveals a frankness and readiness to discuss even the most delicate subjects. . He admitted that the gulf between the Church and its faithful over sexuality was a matter for "further reflection". He said that the Pill had "separated sexuality from fertility and so has deeply changed the concept of life itself. "The sexual act has lost its meaning and purpose. . . to the point that all kinds of sexuality have become the equivalents of each other. The main consequence is the placing of homosexuality and heterosexuality on equal terms."

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Atkinson defends right to offend

By Toby Helm, Chief Political Correspondent (Filed: 07/12/2004) http://news.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2004/12/07/natkin07.xml Rowan Atkinson defended the right of comedians to poke fun at other people's religion last night as he joined the campaign against Government plans to create a new offence of incitement to religious hatred. The star of the BBC's Blackadder television series lined up with leading barristers, writers and politicians to oppose the proposed law. 'There should be no subject about which you cannot make jokes' Ministers say the Bill will protect faith groups - particularly Muslims. Under the Serious Organised Crime and Police Bill, which will have its second reading in the Commons today, anyone judged to have stirred up religious hatred through threatening, abusive or insulting behaviour, would be liable to a maximum of seven years in prison. But opponents of the measure say that while it is well intentioned, stopping the right to criticise other religions would end centuries of tolerance and could stoke tensions between religious groups rather than ease them. Speaking at a press conference in the House of Commons, Atkinson said the proposals would destroy one of society's fundamental freedoms - the right to cause offence. It would also threaten the livelihoods of all those whose job it is "to question, to analyse and to satirise". These included authors, academics, writers, actors, politicians and comedians. There was a "fundamental difference" between cracking a joke about someone's religion and being offensive about their race which was, rightly, already an offence, he said. "To criticise a person for their race is manifestly irrational and ridiculous but to criticise their religion - that is a right. That is a freedom," he said. "The freedom to criticise ideas - any ideas even if they are sincerely held beliefs - is one of the fundamental freedoms of society. "And the law which attempts to say you can criticise or ridicule ideas as long as they are not religious ideas is a very peculiar law indeed. "It all points to the promotion of the idea that there should be a right not to be offended. But in my view the right to offend is far more important than any right not to be offended. "The right to ridicule is far more important to society than any right not to be ridiculed because one in my view represents openness - and the other represents oppression." He was joined by the newspaper columnist Joan Smith, officials from Christian groups, the Barnabas Fund, the Lawyer's Christian Fellowship and politicians from the three main parties. Paul Cook, the advocate manager of the Barnabas Fund, said: "There is a real danger that this law could be used by extremists to silence organisations like ourselves from highlighting the persecution of Christians and other human rights abuses which occur within some religious communities." The law will be opposed by the Liberal Democrats and the Conservatives. Several Labour MPs including Alice Mahon, the member for Halifax, are expected to vote against.

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Dominic Grieve, the shadow attorney general and a Church of England church warden, said people in the United Kingdom had "thrived on" the ability to "ridicule and caricature other people's views". The Liberal Democrat MP Dr Evan Harris, who chaired the meeting, said: "There is a great deal of concern about these proposals across political parties. "There are already enough laws to deal with incitement to violence and to deal with disorderly behaviour based on religious grounds." A Home Office spokesman defended the Bill, insisting that it would not interfere with the right to free speech. She said: "There is a clear difference between criticism of a religion and the act of inciting hatred against members of a religious group. "The incitement offences have a high criminal threshold and prosecutions require the consent of the Attorney General." Mr Atkinson said comedians should be able to make jokes about whatever they wanted. If they went over the top, people would not find their jokes funny. "There should be no subject about which you cannot make jokes."

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School's Carol Rule for the Grinch?

Tuesday, November 30, 2004 http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,140037,00.html MAPLEWOOD, N.J. - There won't be any herald angels singing or little drummer boys drumming at schools in Maplewood this holiday season. Last year, when students in the chorus sang Christmas (search) songs at holiday concerts, a few people complained that lyrics about the baby Jesus or angels made non-Christians feel left out. So, the music director for the New Jersey district issued an edict that all songs representing any religion (search) were to be avoided. But at a school board meeting this month, many parents argued the ruling is more Grinch than goodwill. Those that read the actual school policy say it's being misinterpreted since the policy permits "the inclusion of religious literature, music, drama, (etc.) provided ... it neither inhibits nor advances any religious point of view." "To ban music a month before a scheduled concert is hostile to all who have been preparing and probably would be inspired and supportive to our students," said parent Tom Reingold. "To think you can remove all references to the sacred and still present an experience of beauty in this season is to be intolerant." But one parent is singing a different tune, arguing that songs like "Come all Ye Faithful" and "Silent Night" silence diversity.

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Teacher takes 'Christmas' out of carol

2nd-graders will sing 'winter' instead at upcoming concert Posted: December 6, 2003 1:00 a.m. Eastern 2003WorldNetDaily.com A parent of an elementary school student is upset with a teacher who replaced "Christmas" with "winter" in a carol to be performed during an upcoming concert. Mark Denison, music teacher at Clover Creek Elementary in Tacoma, Wash., revised the lyrics of Dale Wood's "Carol from an Irish Cabin" to read: "The harsh wind blows down from the mountains, and blows a white winter to me," the Tacoma News Tribune reported. Darla Dowell, the parent of a 7-year-old student, thinks the move is "absurd," especially since the children will sing a Hanukkah song referring to the "mighty miracle" of Israel's ancient days. School officials will allow Denison to lead students in singing the song without "Christmas," although they acknowledge he might have pressed too hard in an attempt to not offend, the Tacoma paper said. "In the past, there has been a lot of sensitivity to not giving preference to one religion over the other," Mark Wenzel, spokesman for the Bethel School District, told the News Tribune. Mike Sandner, director of arts education for the district, says Bethel allows students to perform both sacred and secular songs during the holiday season. As WorldNetDaily reported, a civil-liberties legal defense organization has launched a nationwide campaign to prevent blatant religious discrimination by bringing lawsuits against any governmental agency that eliminates public displays of religious songs or symbols. Conversely, says the Florida-based Liberty Counsel, it will defend any governmental entity that abides by the Constitution and allows the equal expression of religious views. "We are resolved to stop the Grinch from stealing Christmas," declared Mathew Staver, the group's president and general counsel. Staver said public school students may sing Christian Christmas carols, such as "Silent Night, Holy Night" so long as they also sing secular songs, like "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer." At Clover Creek Elementary, officials said they did not want to make it more difficult for the children after they had practiced the song a certain way for a month, the News Tribune reported. On Tuesday, Denison allowed the second-graders to vote on which word to use, and they chose "winter" by a 23-18 margin. But Dowell still is upset. "I've never made a stink about anything in my life," she told the Tacoma daily. "But I feel very strongly about this."

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Christmas CD banned for mentioning Jesus

'It could cause offense to those who are not Christian' Posted: December 22, 2003 1:00 a.m. Eastern 2003WorldNetDaily.com In a move that many might consider ironic at the least, a charity Christmas CD has been banned from distribution because it mentions the baby Jesus. The decision by the Royal Hospital for Sick Children in Edinburgh, Scotland, was instituted because of fears it could offend people who belong to a faith other than Christianity. "We could not just hand out the CD," a hospital spokeswoman told the Scotsman newspaper. "If it went to every child it could cause offense to those who are not Christian." Royal Hospital for Sick Children in Edinburgh (The Scotsman) Many see the measure as the latest attempt to "de-Christianize" Christmas, and at least one prominent Muslim leader in Scotland ridiculed the ban. "If somebody doesn't want to listen to this, they don't have to. This is political correctness gone mad," Bashir Maan told the Scotsman. "It is going too far and it is going to be counterproductive. "This is Christmastime and the overwhelming majority of the people in this country are Christians. If people want to celebrate then they should have the right, as should minority groups. But if the freedom is only one-sided, then the majority will be offended." The artist who recorded the CD to raise money for the Marie Curie Cancer Care was equally shocked. "To think that something as innocent as a Christmas CD could be considered offensive I just can't believe it," said singer Jane Butters. "Ironically, they said it would be OK to hand out these CDs at their carol concert on Monday." A hospital spokeswoman told the paper: "We couldn't just hand out this CD to everyone, but if people chose to go to a carol service, they could pick one up there." Just last month, the Scottish Parliament banned traditional Christmas cards due to similar fears of offending other religions. Officials said "Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year" could not appear on government cards, as the wording was not deemed to be "socially inclusive." As WorldNetDaily has reported, controversy over Christmas traditions in America has been growing in recent years, even to the point where some Christians say Jesus should not be included in any part of the celebration, due to purported pagan origins of the holiday.

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'No Christian symbols at Christmas'

Red Cross stores bar religious decor fearing it might be offensive Posted: November 18, 2003 1:00 a.m. Eastern 2003WorldNetDaily.com Fearing they might offend someone, Red Cross stores in Britain have taken the Christian out of Christmas this year, banning any display of overtly religious decorations. At a shop in Ipswich, England, for example, Christmas cards are on display but none of them depict the classic Christian images of the birth of Christ, Joseph and Mary, and Bethlehem, the Evening Star newspaper of Ipswich reported. Instead, the store carries only cards with wintry, non-religious scenes. Its window display shows snowmen and tinsel. "We are a non-religious organization, but personally I think it has gone too far," a volunteer in the store told the newspaper. "I don't think Muslims are offended by Christmas." The charity's official explanation, however, is that it must appear neutral because of international aid efforts. A leaflet at the store reads: "Our neutrality is as important on the UK [main] street as it is in a conflict zone. We simply cannot put it at risk," the British paper said. "This is why, during Christmas and any other religious festivals, our volunteers are welcome to display and sell seasonal decorations and goods, including Christmas trees and cards, but not anything overtly religious." Impartiality, particularly in restricted-access countries, is vital for an international organization that treats people in areas of conflict, the British Red Cross says. The Red Cross's full name actually accommodates Muslim nations, the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement. The cross symbol comes from the flag of the group's country of origin, Switzerland.

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School bans saying 'Christmas'

Veteran teacher dumbfounded by order precluding mention of holiday Posted: December 13, 2002 1:00 a.m. Eastern By Joe Kovacs 2002WorldNetDaily.com At a time when Americans of many faiths and even no faith gear up to celebrate Christmas this year, a first-grade teacher in Sacramento Co., Calif., says she's been ordered by her principal not to utter the word "Christmas" at school. The 24-year education veteran, who wishes to keep her name and the school anonymous at this time, claims she and two fellow instructors were told that use of the word "Christmas" in the classroom or in written materials was now prohibited. "She was dumbfounded!" says Karen Holgate of the Capitol Resource Institute, a pro-family public-policy center based in Sacramento. "This is the first time you can't use the word." The ban apparently only affects teachers, not students. The instructor contacted CRI, to find out if the school had the right to prohibit its mention. According to Holgate, the second-year principal's "out of the blue" mandate was handed down Monday during the discussion with three first-grade teachers. One of them didn't agree with the policy, but agreed to go along with it. Another stated that Christmas should not be discussed in class anyway. But the third teacher was stunned by the pronouncement, as she's been delivering a "Christmas around the world" program for more than two decades. The teacher also explains to children how Hanukkah and other holidays are celebrated in other nations. "She's so discouraged now," says Holgate, "she doesn't know if she wants to keep on teaching. ... People need to stand up to all these wackos. It's nuts!" The CRI says California standards not only allow for the Bible and religious topics to be mentioned in the classroom, but teachers are encouraged to discuss their social and cultural relevance. As WorldNetDaily previously reported, other schools in the Golden State are having students pretend to be Muslims, simulating jihads with a dice game, while others pupils celebrate the "Day of the Dead" by creating altars to honor deceased loved ones or family pets. The San Juan Unified District, which serves over 50,000 students in 85 schools, is where the alleged Christmas ban is centered. Its director of communications, Deidra Powell, tells WorldNetDaily she's heard nothing about the principal's purported action, but doesn't think the district's policy on religious matters would preclude the mentioning of holidays. "You can say 'Christmas,' you can say 'Hanukkah,'" she stated. "It is nowhere written in any policy; I don't think our board of education or superintendent would prohibit that." Powell says the policy is designed to protect all students and make them feel safe in their environment, adding "not everybody is a Christian. We're using public funds, [so] we can't endorse [Christmas]." The United States Justice Foundation was requested by CRI to research the law on the matter, and responded with an open opinion stating any ban on using the word "Christmas" is an "abject violation" of the California Education Code.

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"Christmas and other holidays are an integral part of this nation's heritage and cultural identity," writes litigation counsel Richard Ackerman. "Because of this fact, references to religious holidays, of cultural significance, have a protected place in the classroom. Schools are absolutely allowed to observe holidays and to reference the existence, date of, and cultural activities associated with the holiday." The teacher plans on showing the USJF opinion to the principal and fellow instructors today, and will take it to the district's superintendent, if the campus remains a "no-Christmas zone." Crackdowns on Christmas have made national news elsewhere this week. As WorldNetDaily reported Tuesday, a public-interest law firm filed suit in federal court alleging that a "Holiday Displays" policy for New York City public schools is discriminatory against the Christian religion. In its suit, the Thomas More Law Center said the district's policy "unlawfully discriminates against Christians" because it "prohibits the display of [Christian] Nativity scenes" in public schools during Christmas, while it "expressly permits and encourages" the display of the Jewish Menorah and the Islamic Star and Crescent during certain religious holidays and observances. Meanwhile in Yonkers, N.Y., a superintendent who reportedly directed school officials to limit holiday decorations to generic season's greetings, has now clarified his order. According to the White Plains Journal News, interim Superintendent Angelo Petrone had issued a memo last week stating that "decorations in the schools should be limited to 'Happy Holidays' or 'Season's Greetings.'" Staff at 12 of 42 city schools tore down bulletin boards and scrapped lesson plans tied to the holidays based on what Petrone said was a misinterpretation of the previous memo, which also stated that it's difficult to decorate buildings to accommodate all the different cultures and asked officials not to promote "any particular religious tenor." "My expectation was that they use common sense," he said. "It did not mean holiday decorations needed to come down. I just wanted them to have sensitivity to the diversity in this district." Editor's note: COMING THIS WEEKEND: Have a holly, "pagan" Christmas. As Christmas comes under attack in the news this week, WorldNetDaily takes an in-depth look at the holiday's history, current trends, and why some Americans even fundamentalist Christians abstain from its celebration while others joyfully take part.

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Christmas card with 'Jesus' banned

Mother suing after son's offering confiscated, sent to superintendent Posted: February 10, 2004 1:00 a.m. Eastern 2004 WorldNetDaily.com Kindergartners at a public school in Oregon were invited to bring cards to a Christmas party, but a teacher barred one student from distributing his holiday greeting because it mentioned Jesus Christ, prompting a lawsuit filed yesterday. The Gresham-Barlow district near Portland said Justin Cortez could not distribute the Christmas card because it would violate district policies prohibiting school officials from promoting one religion over another and advocating a particular religious position. The Virginia-based American Center for Law and Justice filed the case on behalf of 6-year-old Justin and his mother Julie Cortez. The ACLJ said the suit contends Justin's card is student speech and part of a broad, balanced Christmas party where other students distributed candy canes, cards and other gifts. The suit also contends the school district violated one of its own policies designed to protect the religious beliefs of students. One policy states "[c]are must be taken to ensure that students do not experience exclusion because of their religious beliefs or practices." Stuart J. Roth, senior counsel of the ACLJ, called the school district's barring of a Christmas card with a religious reference "absurd." "The facts of this case are clear: The school district not only violated the constitutional rights of this student but also ignored its own policy designed to ensure that the religious beliefs of students are protected," Roth said. Justin, who attends North Gresham Grade School in Gresham, Oregon, brought his card to a Dec. 19 Christmas party. The students were invited, without any restrictions, to bring cards and gifts for their classmates. The card selected by Justin had a candy cane ornament attached to the front and included a story. The story read: "The Meaning of the Candy Cane: Many years ago, a candy maker wanted to make a candy that symbolized the true meaning of Christmas Jesus. The hard candy was shaped like a 'J' to represent Jesus' name. The color white stands for the pureness of Jesus. The color red represents the blood Jesus sheds for us." When Justin's teacher noticed the word Jesus on Justin's card, she forwarded it to the principal who then passed it on to the superintendent. The lawsuit which names as defendants the Gresham-Barlow School District, the school board, the superintendent and assistant superintendent contends the school district violated Justin's rights under the First and Fourteenth Amendments. The ACLJ is asking for a permanent injunction to ensure "the discriminatory policies of the school district are halted." The public-interest law firm also wants the court to declare the policies unconstitutional.

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Ban on Christmas leads to court fight

Education halls get decked with legal action for alleged discrimination against Christians Posted: December 10, 2002 5:00 p.m. Eastern By Jon Dougherty 2002WorldNetDaily.com A public-interest law firm has filed suit in federal court alleging that a "Holiday Displays" policy for New York City public schools is discriminatory against the Christian religion. In its suit, the Thomas More Law Center said the district's policy "unlawfully discriminates against Christians" because it "prohibits the display of [Christian] Nativity scenes" in public schools during Christmas, while it "expressly permits and encourages" the display of the Jewish Menorah and the Islamic Star and Crescent during certain religious holidays and observances. Officials at the Ann Arbor, Mich.-based law center said the suit was filed today in the U.S. District Court for eastern New York on behalf of Andrea Skoros, who has two children in the city's public school system. Skoros and her children are Roman Catholics. Last year, a public school attended by Skoros' son displayed the Jewish Menorah and the Islamic Star and Crescent, but no Nativity scene. School officials dismissed requests for display of the Nativity scene, said Brian Burch, a spokesman for the law center. The suit names the City of New York, Department of Education Chancellor Joel I. Klein, and "another school official" who was not identified by the law center. The center said NYC education officials claim the goal of the policy is "to promote understanding and respect for the diverse beliefs and customs relating to our community's observance of the winter holiday." Published accounts said the school district's written policy allows only "secular holiday symbols." "Such symbols include, but are not limited to, Christmas trees, Menorahs, and the Star and the Crescent," the policy states, according to CNSNews.com. "Holiday displays shall not appear to promote or celebrate any single religion or holiday. Therefore, any symbol or decoration which may be used must be displayed simultaneously with other symbols or decorations reflecting different beliefs or customs." NYC education officials did not respond to requests for comment before press time. Richard Thompson, lead attorney for the Thomas More Law Center, said the policy shows an "indifference" and "hostility" to Christians during their most holy season. "The policy relegates Christians to second-class citizens," said Thompson. "Forcing schools to only allow secular symbols for Christmas while allowing religious symbols for other religions' holiday observances shows a callous indifference and hostility toward Christians during one of their holiest seasons." The center's legal action follows criticism of the policy leveled against NYC schools last year by the Catholic League, the nation's largest Catholic civil-rights group. In December 2001, Catholic League President William Donohue criticized a memo issued by Dr. Fran Levy, principal of the Thomas Jefferson Magnet School of Humanities in Flushing, N.Y., directing teachers to bring religious symbols to school that represent Kwanzaa and the Islamic and Jewish religions.

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The memo did not include Christian symbols, with the exception of a Christmas tree, which Donohue said was a secular symbol. "It is outrageous that New York City public-school officials allow some religious symbols in the schools every December while banning others," Donohue said in a statement yesterday. "Catholics are sick and tired of being discriminated against by bureaucrats who tell us we should be satisfied with a Christmas tree in the schools. "All we want is parity with Jews and Muslims," he added. The Catholic League maintains that the Jewish Menorah and the Islamic Star and Crescent are religious symbols rather than secular displays, and therefore the school district should permit displays of the Christian Nativity scene, which depicts the birth of Jesus. Thompson said the scope of the Christian religion in the U.S. merits attention, especially during this season. "It is ironic that a religion enjoying the largest following in this nation is consigned by the city of New York to a least-favored status," he said. "It's a shame that we have reached a point in our nation's history that 'respect for diverse beliefs and customs' has come to mean discrimination against Christians at Christmastime, no less."

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When Christmas becomes illegal

Posted: December 14, 2002 1:00 a.m. Eastern 2002WorldNetDaily.com Merry Christmas everyone! Oops, did I say Christmas? I meant to wish you Happy Holidays or a Cheerful Winter Season. Christmas, you see, contains that dirty little word | Christ. If you don't believe me, just ask the veteran first-grade teacher who was informed this week that she could not mention the word "Christmas" in her Sacramento public-school classroom. Imagine that: Christmas banned in a public school classroom. This interdiction is actually quite predictable because the word Christmas and the concept of a holiday bearing the name of Christ contradicts the situational ethics that pervades many publicschool classrooms. If there is no true right and wrong, there must not be a notion of a Savior or the need of a Savior. However, such a ban is nothing less than religious persecution. In order to promote "diversity," these types of policies actually target individuals for their beliefs. It is systematic discrimination that is unconstitutional and illegal. Tragically, the ACLU and similar groups have convinced many public school officials that the mere mention of Christ or a biblical reference is barred by law. Nothing could be further from the truth. In the Harry Potter series, the evil character Voldemort is so feared that his name must never be mentioned. Similarly, real-life religious antagonists today are creating an environment that virtually prohibits the mention of Christ in public school classrooms or in the public square. By twisting the meaning of the Constitution, they have produced an atmosphere of fear regarding Christ and Judeo-Christian teachings. Across the nation, school and city officials are banning Christian themes. Nativity scenes have been barred in some New York schools. A New Jersey middle school cancelled a field trip to attend a performance of a play based on Charles Dickens' "A Christmas Carol." In Lewistown, Pa., a Christian church was denied tax exemption because it distributes food to needy families (the activity was deemed not to be religious worship). In Cleveland, Tenn., missionaries have been barred from placing religious literature on cars (even though other groups frequently do so). The Ten Commandments the very foundation of American law have been banned in many public arenas. (Thank God that Alabama Supreme Court Chief Justice Roy Moore is leading the defense of the Commandments by legally defending his erection of a Ten Commandments monument in the rotunda of his courthouse.) These alarming actions are part of a diabolical scheme by anti-religion devotees to create distinctive and unfair rules for religious Americans. These individual cases will eventually add up to a national climate of overt hostility toward Christianity (and Christians). It's really quite a frightening scenario, but we are literally watching it unfold before our eyes. We have seen a federal court panel rule that the mention of God in the Pledge of Allegiance is unconstitutional. Atheists are now attempting to seek the ban of congressional chaplains. Barry Lynn of Americans United for Separation of Church and State has admitted that he wants the word God erased from American coins. These people literally want a godless society, a concept that dramatically conflicts with the God-centered nation our founders created and nurtured. The agenda is clear. Christians must be prepared to stand ready to fight for their rights. It is

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apparent that our adversaries who wish to stifle us will not rest until they have silenced every last one of us. Rev. Jerry Falwell, a nationally recognized Christian minister and television show host, is the founder of Jerry Falwell Ministries and is chancellor of Liberty University in Lynchburg, Va.

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Christmas in Americabecomes battleground

As holiday traditions draw national controversy, believers, pagans grapple over Jesus' inclusion http://www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=29995 Posted: December 14, 2002 1:00 a.m. Eastern By Joe Kovacs 2002WorldNetDaily.com Every December, a call goes out from the nation's pulpits to "put Christ back into Christmas," but growing numbers of Americans including fundamentalist Christians are claiming Jesus Christ had nothing to do with the holiday, and news items from across the country this week indicate that the U.S. has become the new battleground for Christmas. Cases in point: * A first-grade teacher in Sacramento Co., Calif., says her principal has prohibited instructors from uttering the word "Christmas" in class or in written materials; * A school superintendent in Yonkers, N.Y., banned, then unbanned, holiday decorations that contained religious themes more than the generic "season's greetings"; * New York City schools are being sued for alleged discrimination against Christians; * and atheists reposted their vandalized winter solstice sign in the Wisconsin Capitol, as they declare "Christians stole Christmas" from ancient pagans. All this comes on the heels of a national survey indicating just over a tenth of Americans today believe Jesus Christ of Nazareth is the focus of Christmas, with almost nine out of ten people saying the holiday has become less religious. Are atheists correct that the very day set aside by hundreds of millions across the world to honor the birth of their Savior is merely a relic of sun worship? And if it is, why would some schools ban it? And even if today's holiday traditions have their roots in heathen practices, should Christians who wish to be true to their faith take part? Sign of the times "The real reason for the season is winter solstice," proclaims Annie Laurie Gaylor, co-founder of the Madison, Wis.-based Freedom From Religion Foundation which re-erected its atheistic message Monday in the rotunda of the state seat of government. After six years on display, her placard had been damaged last December by an unknown assailant, and has since been repaired. Atheists' winter solstice sign at Wisconsin Capitol The front of the sign states: "At this season of the winter solstice may reason prevail. There are no gods, no devils, no angels, no heaven or hell. There is only our natural world. Religion is but myth and superstition that hardens hearts and enslaves minds." The back reads: "State/Church: Keep them separate," and carries a little caveat, advising "Thou shalt not steal." The 23-by-30-inch billboard was OK'd as part of Wisconsin's seasonal display which also features menorahs, angels, and what appears to be a giant Christmas tree more than two stories tall. "We call it a 'holiday' tree," said Brian Hayes, deputy secretary for Wisconsin's department of

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administration. "We're trying to be sensitive to [the public]." That politically correct terminology comes despite the dismissal of a lawsuit last year where the message content of items adorning the state tree had been challenged, yet it's indicative of the thought-conscious age of the 21st century. Banned in the USA The fact that atheists view Christmas with disdain is not astonishing, since they've attempted to remove the phrase "under God" from the Pledge of Allegiance and "In God we trust" from U.S. currency, as well as Ten Commandments displays from numerous publicly owned places. What may be surprising, though, is that some devout Christians, many dating all the way back to the days of Jesus, never celebrated the birth of Christ, nor sought to. America's early colonists banned observance of Christmas, and still today, there are many Christians abstaining from what millions more of their brethren joyfully celebrate as God's coming in human form. The Catholic Encyclopedia states, '"the word for Christmas in late Old English is Cristes Maesse, the Mass of Christ, first found in 1038, and Cristes-messe, in 1131." It explains "Christmas was not among the earliest festivals of the Church," pointing out "first evidence of the feast is from Egypt" around A.D. 200 with attempts by theologians to assign not only the year of Christ's birth, but also the precise date. Historians agree that through the subsequent centuries, traditions from ancient pagan (nonChristian) religions became intertwined with those of Christianity, and depending upon one's point of view, either paganism became Christianized, or Christianity became paganized. In 1644, the English Parliament outlawed the holiday, compelling shops to be open that day, and condemning plum puddings and mince pies as "heathen." In his Pulitzer Prize finalist, "The Battle for Christmas," historian Stephen Nissenbaum at the University of Massachusetts documents the American development of the holiday now ensconced in popular culture. "In New England, for the first two centuries of white settlement," writes Nissenbaum, "most people did not celebrate Christmas. In fact, the holiday was systematically suppressed by Puritans during the colonial period and largely ignored by their descendants. It was actually illegal to celebrate Christmas in Massachusetts between 1659 and 1681 (the fine was five shillings). Only in the middle of the nineteenth century did Christmas gain legal recognition as an official public holiday in New England." Nissenbaum agrees with other historians that the first recorded observance since the New Testament recounted Christ's birth took place hundreds of years after Jesus' resurrection. "It was only in the fourth century that the Church officially decided to observe Christmas on Dec. 25. And this date was not chosen for religious reasons but simply because it happened to mark the approximate arrival of the winter solstice, an event that was celebrated long before the advent of Christianity. The Puritans were correct when they pointed out and they pointed it out often that Christmas was nothing but a pagan festival covered with a Christian veneer." Christmas in America saw huge growth during the 19th century, starting with Washington Irving's 1820 book "The Keeping of Christmas at Bracebridge Hall." A week before Christmas in 1834, Charles Dickens published "A Christmas Carol," and in 1860, American illustrator Thomas Nast created Father Christmas, also known as Santa Claus, based on European stories of St. Nicholas, the patron saint of children. Spirit of the rising sun Today, followers of ancient paganism strive to remind the public about the heathen origins of

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traditions that many may never have questioned. They've published books, given speeches, and created websites proffering a heathen history of modern customs. CircleSanctuary.org is among the Internet addresses run by nature-worshipping pagans. Author Selena Fox discusses the state of being pagan and celebrating the lengthening of days during the Northern Hemisphere's darkest time of year. "Yule, the winter solstice, is a festival of peace and a celebration of waxing solar light. I honor the new sun child by burning a[n] oaken yule log in a sacred fire. I honor the great goddess in her many great mother aspects, and the father god as Santa in his old sky god, father time, and holly king forms. I decorate my home with lights and with holly, ivy, mistletoe, evergreens and other herbs sacred to this season. I ring in the new solar year with bells." Fox even provides a list of suggestions on how 21st century citizens can take part in the ancient rituals, to "re-paganize" Christmastime: * Have gift exchanges and feasts over the course of several days and nights as was done of old * Adorn the home with sacred herbs and colors; decorate in druidic holiday colors of red, green and white * Hang a sprig of mistletoe above a major threshold and leave it there until next yule as a charm for good luck throughout the year * Have family/household members join together to make or purchase an evergreen wreath * If you choose to have a living or a harvested evergreen tree as part of your holiday decorations, call it a solstice tree and decorate it with pagan symbols * Reclaim Santa Claus as a pagan godform by decorating him with images that reflect his various heritages ranging from the Greek god Cronos (father time) to Odin, the Scandinavian all-father riding the sky on an eight-legged horse * Place pagan mother-goddess images around your home, possibly including one with a sun child, such as Isis with Horus * Honor the new solar year with light light candles, burn a yule log and save a portion for the following year, put colored lights outside your home, and with the popularity of five-pointed stars, consider displaying a blue or white pentagram. The greatest story never told? The pagan connections to Christmas are not news to the likes of Garner Ted Armstrong, a Christian evangelist and political commentator based in Tyler, Texas. Armstrong has been proclaiming such information for the past 46 years on a peak of 135 television and 360 radio stations, stating "it is impossible to 'put Christ back in Christmas,' since He was never in Christmas in the first place!" "None of the apostles of Christ ever heard of the term; not one of them ever celebrated Christ's birthday," writes Armstrong in his booklet "Christmas ... The Untold Story." "The words Christmas, holly wreath, mistletoe, Rudolph, Santa Claus and Christmas tree do not appear anywhere in the Bible." Armstrong is among Christians who believe God's plan of salvation for mankind is more accurately depicted through holidays which are frequently mentioned in Scripture, such as Passover and the Day of Atonement. If anything, he thinks Dec. 25 would most likely be Jesus' conception day, thus placing his birth in the autumn, possibly during the Feast of Tabernacles, symbolizing God's "tabernacling" that is to say, dwelling with mankind. Like-minded preachers say the Bible warns extensively about adopting pagan customs, pointing to the 10th chapter of Jeremiah to specifically cite the practice of tree decoration, which some

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historians date back to ancient Egypt and Babylon: "Thus saith the Lord, Learn not the way of the heathen, and be not dismayed at the signs of heaven; for the heathen are dismayed at them. For the customs of the people are vain: for one cutteth a tree out of the forest, the work of the hands of the workman, with the axe. They deck it with silver and with gold; they fasten it with nails and with hammers, that it move not." (Jer 10:2-4) Armstrong says the pagan celebrations, including winter's Saturnalia, or feast of Saturn in ancient Rome, crept into ostensible Christianity over many years, and some writers began urging a celebration at the same time as the secular events "for the simple reason that so many pagans were already accustomed to 'joyous,' sometimes 'riotous' orgies of feasting at the time of the winter solstice." "It would be a sin for me [to celebrate Christmas], but it doesn't mean it's the unpardonable sin," Armstrong told WorldNetDaily, stressing he doesn't feel at all threatened by the holiday. "I have no more difficulty walking through Beijing at the Chinese New Year and seeing the dragons and fireworks. It doesn't affect me. ... [the Apostle] Paul says the idol is nothing." While Armstrong teaches against the observance of Christmas, he adds that most people who celebrate it are doing so with good intentions, simply unaware of the facts regarding its origins, and they should neither be judged nor condemned by fellow believers in Jesus. He encourages people to type words like "origins of Christmas" into Internet search engines to find out for themselves the background on the customs. Angels in the outfield For millions of Christians, the story of Christmas in the Bible is among the most beloved, and is one of their foundations of faith that God came to dwell as a man and offer eternal life to mankind. It is both simple enough to be understood by young children, and has majestic meaning to provide adults with inspiration and awe. The events surrounding the birth of Christ are recorded in the Gospels of Matthew and Luke, which give an almost play-by-play description: And there were in the same country shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. And, lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the Lord shone round about them: and they were sore afraid. And the angel said unto them, Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord. And this shall be a sign unto you; Ye shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger. And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and saying, Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men. (Luke 2:8-14) The shepherds subsequently found the child in the manger, but unlike depictions on many modern holiday cards and Nativity scenes, there were no wise men present at the birth. The Gospel of Matthew says the Magi arrived at a house, not the manger. And as for the tradition of three wise men, the Bible never mentions their number only the three gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh. Those gifts were presented to Jesus, not exchanged with other people. The accounts don't mention a tree evergreen or otherwise nor do they specify the time of year. Some analysts theorize that since the shepherds were still out in the fields by night watching their flocks, the event could not have been in winter, due to plunging temperatures. Still others think Dec. 25 has a valid claim on the actual event. Spirit of the rising Son "I believe the celebration of Christmas is a wonderful opportunity to honor Christ and share the gospel," says Rev. Jerry Falwell, chancellor of Liberty University in Virginia and one of America's

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best known ministers. Falwell is a staunch defender of the holiday he's celebrated for every one of the 69 years he's been alive. "And I plan to celebrate it on the 'other side,'" he tells WorldNetDaily. Falwell acknowledges that many of the customs associated with the observance are not found in the Bible, but he doesn't have a problem with that. "The Christmas tree and Santa Claus don't bother me," he said. "If we can use anything to get people under the sound of the gospel, without violating Scripture, it's a good thing." While there are some unknowns such as the exact date of birth, Falwell stresses "we do know He was born virgin-born as the Son of God." Yet over 2,000 years after that history-changing event, most Americans think Christ is fading from the Christmas picture, at least according to a recent poll. When the Scripps Survey Research Center at Ohio University asked if "most people focus on the birth of Jesus at Christmas time, or has the holiday become less religious than it used to be?" only 11 percent said they believed Christmas was still about Jesus, with 87 percent responding "less religious." Close to half of adults 45 percent say they personally know someone who doesn't believe in God, but still will celebrate the holiday this year; 62 percent say they'll attend a religious service on Christmas Eve or Day; and 81 percent plan to put a decorated tree in their home this year. "Do I put up a tree? I have in the past; this year I won't," says Jose Negron, a 34-year-old Christian minister at the Stonehouse Church to the Nations in Toano, Va. Even without the tree, he still plans to celebrate Christmas. "I grew up in America. It's an historical constant," Negron said. President Franklin Roosevelt dedicated the National Christmas Tree in 1940 Indeed, trees and their decoration have played a role in American history, even in the nation's darkest hours. In 1942, just a year after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill came to Washington to join President Franklin Roosevelt in lighting the National Christmas Tree, a tradition started by Calvin Coolidge in 1923. "Against enemies who preach the principles of hate and practice them, we set our faith in human love and in God's care for us all men everywhere," said Roosevelt. Thousands of citizens turned out for the event, which was broadcast nationwide on radio in the grips of World War II. "Let the children have their night of fun and laughter," proclaimed Churchill. "Let the gifts of Father Christmas delight their play. Let us grown-ups share to the full in their unstinted pleasures before we turn again to the stern task and formidable years that lie before us, resolved that, by our sacrifice and daring, these same children shall not be robbed of their inheritance or denied the right to live in a free and decent world." The tree-lighting ceremonies continue to this day, with President George W. Bush having two dedications under his belt. The history of mankind's fascination with trees long antedates World War II, the founding of America, and even the Middle Ages. Historians have found evidence of tree decoration and tree worship in places such as ancient Rome and Egypt. The Old Testament also records God's displeasure with his own people for following pagan practices involving trees: * "And the children of Israel did evil in the sight of the Lord, and forgat the Lord their God, and served Baalim and the groves." (Judges 3:7)

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* "For the Lord shall smite Israel ... because they have made their groves, provoking the Lord to anger." (1 Kings 14:15) * "For they also built them high places, and images, and groves, on every high hill, and under every green tree." (1 Kings 14:23) In the 1800s, Alexander Hislop, a noted historian of antiquity, examined the origins of customs such as the Christmas tree and date of celebration. Writing in "The Two Babylons," Hislop maintains the practice derives from the worship of pagan deities. The Christmas tree, now so common among us, was equally common in pagan Rome and pagan Egypt. In Egypt that tree was the palm tree; in Rome it was the fir; the palm tree denoting the pagan Messiah. ... The mother of Adonis, the sun god and great mediatorial divinity, was mystically said to have been changed into a tree, and when in that state to have brought forth her divine son. If the mother was a tree, the son must have been [recognized] as the "Man the branch." And this entirely accounts for the putting of the yule log into the fire on Christmas Eve, and the appearance of the Christmas tree the next morning. ... Therefore, the 25th of December, the day that was observed at Rome as the day when the victorious god reappeared on earth, was held at the Natalis invicti solis, "The birthday of the unconquered sun." Now the yule log is the dead stock of Nimrod, deified as the sun god, but cut down by his enemies; the Christmas tree is Nimrod redivivus the slain god come to life again. The 2001 National Christmas Tree took on patriotic colors in the wake of the Sept. 11 terror attacks "I can count about a hundred trees, wreaths, poinsettia displays, lights, everywhere I look [in my office] complex," says Bob Sipsky, of Stuart, Fla. "Christmas gorge-as-much-food-as-you-can eat-aramas every day for two weeks. Enough already." Sipsky is a Bible believer not affiliated with any organized church. He celebrated Christmas for 35 years before abandoning it, now thinking it an insult to God. "There are clearly explained festivals that God tells us to observe, which teach how to have peace on earth, and what the true Savior requires of us," Sipsky says, "yet mankind ignores these, and prefers to make up his own festivals and traditions. Christmas is based in deception: its origins; lying to small children about Santa Claus; talking about having peace on earth while ignoring God's instructions on how to achieve it; saying it is biblical, while 99 percent of it is all about commerce and other selfish objectives. Myths and traditions do not please the God of the Bible, a right way of living does. Deception is at the top of the list of what He hates." That anti-Christmas view is echoed by Tom Moniz of Hobe Sound, Fla. "Being a God-fearing man, I cannot honor a lie, nor do I think adopting a pagan holiday and calling it his birthday does any honor to him." "Most of these people are killjoys," says Rev. Falwell regarding those who attack the celebration of Christmas. "Most of these tightwads just don't want to [spend] cash. ... I don't take my children or grandchildren near them." To many Christians, Christmastime is among the most sacred times of the year, and they look to keep it that way. "It's the reason for being a Christian, because we believe Jesus is God," says Louis Giovino, director of communications for the New York-based Catholic League, the nation's largest Catholic civil-rights organization. With recent controversies surrounding Christmas in the public arena, the league has issued a list of guidelines to help people understand what kind of religious expression is permissible at this time of year.

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Giovino admits the observance has picked up some pagan customs over the years, but says they've been "baptized" by the Church. He notes by the time of Dickens in England, the holiday took on a more raucous tone, with drinking parties and violence, and says the Protestant legislation to outlaw Christmas was in direct response to the riotous revelry. "The Puritans weren't into celebrating anything," he said. Giovino stresses the important part of Christmas is the larger picture of the Christian message, the belief that "the Word became flesh." "It's not like saying 'Happy birthday, Jesus!'" he exclaimed. "I think personally Christmas is ridiculous without Christ. Otherwise, we might as well celebrate the winter solstice as pagans." The baby with the bathwater? With the extremes on Christmas observance ranging from total holiday indulgence to complete abstention, there are plenty of people who seek middle ground. Pastor Richard Bucher of the Trinity Lutheran Church in Clinton, Mass., is one of them, asserting celebrating Christmas is not pagan. "It's laudable that certain Christians care so much about pleasing God to ask the question if it's right," Bucher told WorldNetDaily, "but a lot of arguments they're making are just not sound. They end up placing guilt on Christians celebrating Christmas and do a real disservice." On his church website, Bucher addresses examples such as the tree decorated with silver and gold in Jeremiah's 10th chapter, and explains upon close examination, it does not refer to anything like a Christmas tree. "The very next verse, 10:5, goes on to say, 'Like a scarecrow in a melon patch, their idols cannot speak; they must be carried because they cannot walk. Do not fear them; they can do no harm nor can they do any good.' This passage and the passages that follow make it crystal clear that the 'decorated tree' that Jeremiah was talking about in 10:3-4, was a tree that was cut down and made into an idol, a very common custom in the ancient world." "Just because heathens took something God has created for good," he asks, "does that mean such things are off limits [to Christians] permanently?" He says many have invented sin where God has not said that something is sinful, and adds the issue boils down to what exactly is meant by "Christmas." "Is it thanking God for the birth of the Savior, or everything that people do associated with it? People just lump everything together." Despite all the conflict, some believers have little problem with the controversies over Christmas; in fact, they rejoice in them. "Those who would attempt to take Christ out of Christmas are fighting a losing battle," says Joan Driscoll of Ft. Lauderdale, Fla. "The harder they try, the stronger the holy message and meaning of Jesus' birth becomes. The heavenly voices of the angels singing 'Alleluia' will easily drown out the guttural tones of the dissenters."

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IRS: Churches can't pray for Bush victory

Ruling says tax-exempt groups prohibited from asking God to intervene Posted: October 28, 2004 1:00 a.m. Eastern By Ron Strom 2004 WorldNetDaily.com In a letter of clarification requested by a traveling minister, the Internal Revenue Service has declared people gathered in tax-exempt churches can't pray for President Bush to win the election on Tuesday. The ruling comes in response to a request by the Christian Defense Coalition, which is in the midst of a 15-day prayer tour through Ohio and Pennsylvania. The Rev. Patrick J. Mahoney, director of the organization, had planned to lead in prayer for a Bush victory during evening services in each town. Though he had hoped to hold the services in churches, Mahoney says he has used American Legion halls, hotels and other venues pending a clarification from the IRS. The American Center for Law and Justice wrote the letter to the IRS on behalf of the Mahoney's group, explaining that the pastor planned to "offer prayer during the evening services in the churches he visits that God grants President Bush four more years as president and that Senator Kerry does not become president." "This is rank censorship," Mahoney told WND. "If churches felt compelled to pray for Senator Kerry, they should be able to do that, too. "Now we have the IRS not only limiting what can said behind a pulpit in terms of electioneering, but churches aren't even allowed to pray the dictates of their consciences." Mahoney said he would consider legal action against the IRS, saying churches that had considered hosting the tour were unable to do so. He also said he considers his First Amendment rights to have been violated. Reaction to the IRS ruling, Mahoney predicts, will include "massive anger" in the Christian community. "Our organization, along with the American Center for Law and Justice, is going to make this a major issue," he said. Mahoney considers the ruling a "much greater leap into censorship" than the prohibition on endorsing candidates from church pulpits. "You hear people talk about the separation of church and state," he said. "This is a massive violation of the separation of church and state from the standpoint of the government intruding on the private dictates of churches." Under IRS regulations, churches that are tax-exempt organizations cannot openly advocate for candidates for office and can only use a small percentage of their budgets on political activity. As WorldNetDaily reported, an concerted effort is under way to get the IRS to crack down on churches that might push certain candidates or parties. In July, Americans United for Separation of Church and State, headed by Barry Lynn, filed a complaint with the IRS against Ronnie Floyd, pastor of the First Baptist Church of Springdale, Ark., accusing him of preaching a sermon promoting President Bush's re-election July 4.

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Satanism gets OK from British navy

Officer now allowed to perform rituals on board to worship devil Posted: October 24, 2004 5:26 p.m. Eastern 2004 WorldNetDaily.com With headlines conjuring up "the devil and the deep blue sea," a non-commissioned officer in the Royal Navy has become the first registered Satanist in the British armed forces, leaving some veterans and politicians stunned. Chris Cranmer, 24, from Edinburgh, Scotland, has been officially recognized as a Satanist by the captain of the HMS Cumberland, according to the London Telegraph. The designation gives him permission to perform Satanic rituals aboard, and have a funeral carried out by the Church of Satan if he's killed in action. "From a military perspective, I believe in vengeance," Cranmer told the paper. "I don't consider Satan to be an intelligently external force in my life; instead I consider it an empowering internal force. If I were asked if I were evil, I would say yes by virtue of the common definition. However, if you asked my family and friends you would hear a resounding 'no'. I get a massive amount from my career, while sacrificing little." Founded in San Francisco in 1966 by Anton LaVey, author of the Satanic Bible, the Church of Satan has its followers live by the Nine Satanic Statements, including "Satan represents vengeance, instead of turning the other cheek," "Satan represents all of the so-called sins, as they lead to physical, mental or emotional gratification," and "Satan represents indulgence, instead of abstinence." The idea of putting a ship into devil worship is raising some red flags among Britain's war veterans. Admiral Sir Sandy Woodward, the former commander of the South Atlantic Task Groups in the Falklands War, said that Satanism would be "terribly undesirable" on a ship. "My immediate reaction is 'Good God, what the hell's going on?' " he said. "When I was serving, you were either Church of England or Roman Catholic, but I never heard of any Satanists. This sounds pretty daft to me." The decision is sparking political outrage as well. "I am utterly shocked by this," Tory former minister Ann Widdecombe told ITV. "Satanism is wrong. Obviously the private beliefs of individuals anywhere including the Armed Forces are their own affair but I hope it doesn't spread. "There should be no question whatsoever of allowing Satanist rituals on board any ship in Her Majesty's Royal Navy. What they believe and do in their own home is one thing, what they do at work is the business of their employer. "The navy should not permit Satanist practices on board its ships. God himself gives free will, but I would like to think that if somebody applied to the navy and said they were a Satanist today it would raise its eyebrows somewhat." Members of the Royal Army and Air Force need to swear an oath of allegiance to the queen as head of the armed forces, but such an oath is not required of naval recruits. "We are an equal opportunities employer and we don't stop anybody from having their own religious values," a navy spokesman told the Telegraph. "Chris Cranmer approached his captain and made a request to be registered as a Satanist. This involved a formal stand-up approach, made

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in front of an audience, saying that he wanted to register as a Satanist and to practice his religious beliefs. "The Royal Navy allows this kind of approach because it is clearly in line with current regulations. We are not aware of any other individuals who want to be registered as Satanists. Our policy is that, wherever practical, reasonable requests for time and facilities that do not impact on operational effectiveness or the welfare of other personnel, are met. The captain said that this decision was entirely up to the individual and that he is a good lad, a good worker on board. Nobody is suggesting there is anything at all dark about this."

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Vet sues to save mountaintop cross

Association made compromise with ACLU to remove it Posted: September 9, 2004 1:00 a.m. Eastern 2004 WorldNetDaily.com A former Navy fighter pilot is battling a compromise legal settlement with the ACLU that would remove a giant, mountaintop cross honoring war veterans. Mt. Soledad cross and veterans memorial above San Diego (soledadmemorial.com) To settle the 15-year-old lawsuit, the Mt. Soledad Memorial Association made a private agreement with the American Civil Liberties Union to remove the 43-foot cross that has stood atop Mt. Soledad in San Diego for 50 years. The Thomas More Law Center has filed a brief in federal court on behalf of the pilot, John F. Steel, and other veterans suing to block the agreement. "I am shocked by the Memorial Association's surrender to the ACLU and the forces of atheism that are embarked on a campaign to remove every vestige of religion from the public square," said Richard Thompson, chief counsel of the Thomas More Law Center. On its website, the Association says it "believes the proposed resale strategy will put the cross, and possibly even the Veterans Memorial Walls, at risk. On the other hand, the Settlement Agreement has a strong chance of ending the litigation and preserving the cross by relocating it to private property." The Association says it wants to move the cross to the Mt. Soledad Presbyterian Church, about 1,000 yards south of its current location. The battle began in 1989 when Phillip Paulsen, an atheist, filed suit, and a court ordered the city to remove the cross. San Diego responded by placing the property up for sale, with the approval of 76 percent of voters. But the subsequent sale was ruled unconstitutional after Paulsen objected, arguing the sale had the effect of preserving the cross. Paulsen argues that the cross is a violation of the First Amendment's ban on government establisment of a religion In 1998, the city sold the property to the Mt. Soledad War Memorial Association, which again was challenged in court. The sale originally was upheld but later ruled unconstitutional by the full panel of the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco and remanded back to district court to work out a remedy. During its brief period of ownership, the Memorial Association made significant improvements, including extensive landscaping and the addition of more than 3,000 plaques honoring military veterans. The court now is faced with the issue of who owns the land. The Thomas More Law Center's brief argues that a "determination that the city still has title to the land should completely remove any power of the Association to remove the cross." The cross was erected in 1954 and today honors veterans of World War I and II and the Korean War. "The long and complicated struggle to remove the cross now involves hundreds of donors and owners of plaques purchased to honor our nation's veterans," said Charles S. LiMandri, West

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Coast regional director of the Law Center. "These individuals were promised that the cross would stay as a part of the memorial atop Mt. Soledad," he continued. "It is a sad day when we are faced with the prospect of withholding a promise made to those who wish to honor our nation's veterans, and instead surrender to the demands of a hypersensitive atheist who is set on destroying one of San Diego's most treasured landmarks." The Memorial Association privately agreed to to remove the cross under the threat of legal fees. The Law Center's brief argues that if the Memorial Association is considered the rightful owner of the property, the cross would no longer violate the Constitution because it is a private entity. Moreover, the group says, the Association would not be permitted to remove the cross without violating the rights of the owners and donors of plaques who were promised the cross would stay. If the land is returned to the city of San Diego as expected, the Law Center says, a new hearing must be held on the matter because the Association has made extensive improvements to the property, thereby incorporating the cross into a war memorial. The Law Center says a new hearing would determine whether the changed circumstances no longer create a constitutional violation in the form of the government's endorsement of a religion. Police question man in beach slayings Wednesday, August 25, 2004 Posted: 2:39 AM EDT (0639 GMT) http://www.cnn.com/2004/US/West/08/24/crime.counselors.ap/index.html SANTA ROSA, California (AP) -- A 21-year-old Wisconsin man contacted police Tuesday and was questioned in the mysterious shooting deaths of two Christian camp counselors. Sonoma County detectives sent out a statewide alert Tuesday seeking Nicholas Edward Scarseth, of Chippewa Falls, Wis., as a "potential witness" in the killings. When Scarseth heard about that from media reports, he got in touch with authorities, Sheriff's Lt. Dave Edmonds said. "We have located him and we are speaking with him," Edmonds said. "We want to question him to determine what he knows about this case. He has not been charged. This is consensual contact. We're not holding him." Edmonds would not say why detectives are interested in Scarseth but described him as a "person of interest" in the slayings of Lindsay Cutshall, 23, and her fiance, Jason Allen, 26. They were found shot through the head last week as they slept on a beach near Jenner, in Northern California. "We have information that suggests that a person matching that description was in Jenner during the time frame of the killings," Edmonds said. Scarseth's mother, Karen, said her son has a drinking problem but is not violent. "He's just roaming around," she said. "If he ran into those people, he would have befriended them." However, she also said her son harbors anger toward religious people. "He brings up religion and politics to irritate people. He likes to stir people up," she said. Cutshall and Allen were reported missing Aug. 16 after they failed to show up at a Christian adventure camp in Coloma, about 40 miles east of Sacramento. Their bodies were discovered Wednesday. Chippewa Falls Police Capt. Wayne Nehring said Scarseth was being sought on two misdemeanor warrants valid only in Wisconsin. One was for misdemeanor theft of a bottle of liquor and another

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was for disorderly conduct, he said. Scarseth's mother said she heard from her son last week, when he phoned from California to say he had gotten a hotel room through a voucher from a "church woman." Scarseth had been stopped on Friday by police in Fort Bragg -- about 100 miles north of Jenner. Fort Bragg Police Sgt. Rogelio Orozco said Scarseth was stopped because he was skateboarding downtown, which is prohibited. Officers ran Scarseth's name through a statewide database, which turned up nothing, Orozco said. Copyright 2004 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

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Boca principal under fire for making references to God

By Lois K. Solomon Education Writer Posted August 25 2004 http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/palmbeach/sflpmckee25aug25,0,3216178.story?coll=sfla-news-palm Boca Raton -- When he speaks, Principal Geoff McKee says, he presents his true self: a man who prays to God. But to the dismay of several teachers, McKee has spoken of God at staff meetings at least three times since he became Boca Raton High School's principal a year ago. His attempt to start a Bible class for students also has made some parents question his devotion to religion-free public education. Earlier this month, McKee told teachers he asked God to help him find a foreign-language instructor and, sure enough, she appeared. He knew the story might offend some on the staff. But he said he feels compelled to present himself honestly. "I don't think there's anything wrong or unconstitutional with acknowledging God in public," he said. "The president talks about God frequently. I believe it is appropriate for public officials to make references to God as long as a particular church is not being promoted or put down." McKee called public education "God's work" and made other references to God at teacher meetings last year. He also tried to start a class this year called Introduction to the Bible. The class is approved by the state, but he canceled it because of a lack of student interest. He said he might try again next year. Parent Vickie Capitena complained to McKee about the course and has since been monitoring his performance. She said she asked him why he thought it was important that public-school students learn the Bible. "He said it was the greatest book ever written and, to me, that shows some prejudice," said Capitena, a Roman Catholic. "I'm not anti-religion in any way. But if I wanted my children to have a religious education, I would have sent them to Pope [John Paul II High School]." A small group of teachers, too, is criticizing the principal, who came to Boca High from Spanish River High in Boca Raton. They say his religious references make them uncomfortable. "There should be freedom from religion in the workplace," said Hege Holm-Johannesse, who teaches art. "He's crossing the boundary all the time." The line between religion and public education enshrined in the First Amendment seems simple. But in practice, the line is less clear, said Michael Carr, spokesman for the National Association of Secondary School Principals. He said a key factor is how much religion the community is willing to tolerate. "He can go as far as he wants until a parent decides he's gone far enough," Carr said. "There's nothing out there that says you can't say x or y. It's a judgment call on the parents' part." Area Superintendent Carole Shetler, McKee's boss, said she thinks he has crossed no ethical boundaries. Teachers and principals are not allowed to proselytize for their religions but are free to talk about them, she said. Shetler said she often tells staffers that she prays every morning. "Sharing something about yourself personally doesn't mean you're unduly using your influence," Shetler said. "If a principal and a teacher, were, for example, struggling with an issue and the

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principal said, `Let's pray together' or `You should seek spiritual guidance,' that's the kind of thing that would be unethical." McKee, 41, a father of four who attends First Baptist Church of Boca Raton, sees himself as a progressive, open-minded man struggling with a perception of Christians as intolerant. He says he has to prove to teachers and parents that he is not biased against other faiths. "I don't believe my role is to condemn or judge others," McKee said. "I know there are people who view themselves as Christians who disagree with me on this." McKee said he approaches public education with a missionary's zeal. He considers it a "spiritual endeavor" that God has called him to. He grew up Catholic but began attending evangelical churches with his students as an after-school-program coordinator in inner-city Miami. He said the Baptist churches warmly welcomed the students, who mostly were black and poor, and that impressed him. He teaches Sunday school at First Baptist but does not embrace all the tenets of the faith. Evangelicals believe non-Christians will go to hell if they don't believe in Jesus Christ, he said, but no one knows for sure. He rejects evolution because he believes God created the world. But, he says, students must learn about Darwin's theories in order to be well educated. He is an active participant in Schoolife, a West Palm Beach-based Christian ministry to public-school personnel. Schoolife sponsors a monthly luncheon for 30 to 40 school district principals who listen to Christian speakers and pray for the success of their schools. Peggy Daniels, principal of South Olive Elementary in West Palm Beach and a Schoolife board member, said she prays with teachers and employees once a week before school but does not mention God during talks to teachers or students. "I never thought it to be appropriate," she said. McKee said anger from teachers and parents about his comments has forced him to think hard about the intersection of his faith and his work. But he still thinks he should present his authentic self to his constituents. "I pray to God almost continually throughout the day," he said. "I don't have a passion to make others believe like I do. But I am living a God-centered life, and I want to model that." Lois Solomon can be reached at lsolomon@sun-sentinel.com or 561-243-6536. Copyright 2004, South Florida Sun-Sentinel

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Federal Court Rejects Prayers at School Staff Meetings

NewsMax.com Wires Tuesday, Aug. 24, 2004 LITTLE ROCK, Ark. A school district may not offer prayers at mandatory staff meetings, regardless of whether the teacher who complained about them is present, a federal appeals court ruled Tuesday. The 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said the U.S. District Court in Little Rock was right to issue an injunction against prayers during staff meetings at the DeValls Bluff School District, but did so for the wrong reasons. The St. Louis-based appeals court said an injunction benefiting Steve Warnock, an art teacher and school bus driver, should have been granted because the DeValls Bluff School District endorsed a religion, not just because Warnock was offended. "We believe that prayers at mandatory teacher meetings and in-service training conveys ... a decisive endorsement," the appeals court wrote. "It is the government's endorsement of a particular religious message that constitutes the constitutional violation here, not the effects of official prayers on Mr. Warnock's psyche," the court wrote. Warnock sued the district in 1999, saying it openly promoted Christianity and that district officials harassed him. The appeals court did agree that that Superintendent Charles Archer, teachers and pupils could wear religious jewelry and T-shirts under First Amendment rights to free speech and free exercise. The appeals court upheld a $1,000 award to Warnock, rejecting the teacher's claim that he should receive more money because he was harassed after complaining. It said other "perceived slights and personal fears" did not rise to a constitutional violation. 2004 Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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Devil of a lawsuit: MIT lab worker claims colleagues persecuted him for being Christian
By J.M. Lawrence Sunday, August 22, 2004 http://news.bostonherald.com/localRegional/view.bg?articleid=40887 A devout Christian working at MIT claims co-workers wore phony clerical collars, called him Jesus and blasted the Rolling Stones' Sympathy for the Devil during a 15-year campaign of harassment and ridicule against him. In a discrimination lawsuit pending in federal court, machinist Mark A. Peterson contends supervisors at the school's Lincoln Lab in Lexington joined the harassment, openly telling jokes about God and refusing to reprimand workers who spit in his coffee and left a noose on his workbench. Peterson, who began work in the lab in 1982 and is now on disability leave, declined comment yesterday when reached at his home in Milford. His attorney David O. Scott also would not comment. Employees and/or supervisors at MIT Lincoln Lab have harassed Peterson because of his religious beliefs (Christian), including assaulting him with a chemical, vandalizing and stealing his property, tampering with the machines he was working on and making verbal threats, the suit says. The nine-page lawsuit filed earlier this month also names Peterson's union, the Research Development and Technical Employees' Union, claiming leaders took part in the harassment and did not represent him properly in grievance procedures in 2003. Peterson claims the trouble began in 1987 when he and another Christian employee began meeting during breaks to read and discuss the Bible. He says he was told not to bring his Bible to work again. When he complained about workers playing radios in the lab in 1988, one man retaliated by placing a radio in front of him playing the Stones' song (incorrectly listed in the lawsuit as Symphony for the Devil). His own boss responded by turning up his own radio and later paraded around in a phony clergyman's collar, according to the lawsuit. A fake gift certificate to him from suicide doc Jack Kevorkian was posted on the lab bulletin board and a tomato was smashed on his work station. By 1995, another supervisor routinely called him Jesus, God and Moses, Peterson says. The suit cites actions of harassment by four named employees, including one worker who allegedly sprayed Peterson in the back of the head with a caustic substance. Lab spokesman Roger Sudbury said he could not comment on pending litigation.

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Campers murdered due to Christianity?

Police say hate crime among possibilities in shooting deaths of young evangelicals Posted: August 22, 2004 4:55 p.m. Eastern 2004 WorldNetDaily.com Police in Sonoma County, Calif., are now looking at the possibility that two evangelical Christians murdered on the beach as they slept were victims of a hate crime killed because of their religious beliefs. Investigators were "pursuing any and all leads" in the deaths of two camp counselors on weekend leave from their jobs at a religious outdoor adventure camp, a Sonoma County Sheriff's Department spokeswoman said. (photos courtesy WOOD-TV, Grand Rapids, Mich.) An autopsy concluded that Lindsay Cutshall, 23, and her fiance Jason Allen, 26, had been shot in the head at close range while they slept in their sleeping bags, with "no other signs of trauma," Lt. Dave Edmonds, who heads the county investigations unit, said in a statement. "From all indications, the victims were very upstanding citizens, they were very honorable people. They had an absolute absence of enemies." Some 25 detectives have been called into the investigation. Among possibilities they are considering is that the killing might have been a hate crime, Edmonds told reporters. The two were evangelical Christian camp counselors with plans to marry and open a Christian camp of their own. Investigators at the scene along the rugged Sonoma County coast had found no evidence that robbery, sexual assault or suicide had occurred. Cutshall, of Fresno, Ohio, and Allen, of Holland, Mich., had spent the summer leading whitewater-rafting trips at a religious youth adventures camp in the foothills of the Sierra Mountains. They had taken the weekend off to visit San Francisco and the coastline north of the city. When they did not return to work after the weekend, camp officials called in a missing persons report to local law enforcement officials.

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Google bans Christian ad

Anti-homosexual remarks considered 'hate' content Posted: August 17, 2004 1:00 a.m. Eastern By Ron Strom 2004 WorldNetDaily.com Google has banned a Christian organization's advertisements promoting its stance against homosexuality, saying the group promotes "hate." Stand to Reason, a nonprofit apologetics organization, says its "AdWord" advertisement on Google recently was pulled down. Specific AdWord ads are listed in the right-hand margin of search results on the popular site when key words an advertiser submits match with those put in by a Net user. A company promoting hats, for example, could have their site displayed when a user searches for information about hats. Melinda Penner, director of operations for Stand to Reason, says the organization placed four ads on Google. Three of the ads remain on the system, but one leading Net surfers to a Q&A about same-sex marriage was taken down after running for two or three weeks. "Google's objections had to do with other articles on our website pertaining to homosexuality," Penner told WND. "They claimed that their specialist had deemed us a hate site and that their policies didn't allow people to have ads that discriminated against certain groups, which include sexual orientation." Penner said she asked Google what specifically it thought was "hate speech." "The things they cited were all moral judgments from our religious perspective about homosexuality, that it's wrong," she explained. "The irony is that in one of the articles they cited, we have an admonition that one of our moral perspective is that we treat homosexuals respectfully and kindly." The Stand to Reason website has a special page with articles on homosexuality issues. Penner says she has asked Google for its definition of "hate," saying Stand to Reason's positions are not hateful based on dictionary definitions. When it comes to "discrimination," she says, it is actually Google that is discriminating by disallowing Stand to Reason's ads. An e-mail Penner received from "Kristie" at Google used the "H" word, saying, "Google AdWords policy never permits ads or keywords promoting hate, violence, or crimes toward any organization, person or group protected by law," including those distinguished by their "sexual orientation/gender identity." Penner countered via e-mail: "Your suspension of our advertisement illegitimately excludes one side of the [same-sex marriage] debate. If you deem the issue itself off limits, then consistency would require you to suspend all searches of the issue. Instead, your search criteria return links to sites strongly advocating same-sex marriage. |" Kristie responded by reiterating the company's verdict that the Stand to Reason website includes "unacceptable content." In the same e-mail, she said, "Google believes strongly in freedom of expression. We therefore offer broad access to content across the Web without censoring results. Please note that the decisions we make concerning advertising in no way affect the search results we deliver."

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Penner noted that Google, which is in the midst of an IPO, or Initial Public Offering of stock, takes pride in its company motto: "Don't be evil." "If that's your company motto then there must be some things that you don't want to do," she told WND, "and if your definition of 'hate' is calling something 'evil,' then aren't you a hate group?" According to Penner, no anti-homosexuality ads currently are coming up in the right-hand ads; they are all pro-homosexual. "I'm sure there must be some homosexual advocacy groups behind this," she said. Penner says she contacted a religious legal group and was told because Google is a private organization, there is really no legal action that can be taken. The other three Stand to Reason ads that are still running on Google have to do with evolution, Christian apologetics and abortion. Though the organization's pro-life ad is still running on Google, another advertiser's pro-life ad was removed. In June, Google took down pro-life T-shirt ads a clothing company, Run2316, had run for a time in 2003 without a problem, the firm's operations administrator, Christopher Clay, says. In an e-mail to Clay, Google said, "At this time, Google policy does not permit the advertisement of websites that contain 'religion and abortion or contraceptive content.' As noted in our advertising terms and conditions, we reserve the right to exercise editorial discretion when it comes to the advertising we accept on our site." Clay believes Google's IPO has caused the company to clamp down on advertising it finds distasteful. Google might begin trading its stocks as early as tomorrow on Nasdaq, according to news reports. A spokesman from Google was reluctant to go on the record with WND either about the specific instances mentioned or the company's "hate speech" policy. He explained that the company does not allow advertising from organizations that speak negatively of a so-called "protected group." The spokesman would not talk about the pro-life issue or the reason one group's pro-life ad might be acceptable and another group's ad would not. Google's online guidelines for AdWord advertisers say nothing about homosexuality or protected classes of people. It does have, however, include a prohibition against advertising for casinos. So is Google becoming more aggressive combating "hate speech" to coordinate with its IPO? Since the company is in a "quiet period" in conjunction with the public offering, the spokesman could not address the issue.

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In Iraq, it's war on Christians

Car bombs rip through 5 churches, killing 12, in coordinated jihad attack Posted: August 1, 2004 1:00 a.m. Eastern 2004 WorldNetDaily.com In the latest and most dramatic evidence an all-out jihad has been declared against Iraq's minority Christian population, car bombs exploded outside at least five Christian churches today, killing more than a dozen people and wounding scores more in an apparently coordinated attack timed to coincide with evening prayers. "We are expecting a huge number of casualties," an Interior Ministry source told Reuters, saying there had been four blasts at churches in Baghdad and two in the northern city of Mosul. Police in Mosul said they knew of just one church attack there. In the worst attack, a suicide car bomber drove into the car park at a Chaldean church in southern Baghdad before detonating his vehicle, killing at least 12 people as worshippers left the building, witnesses said. A U.S. military spokesman said three of the four attacks in Baghdad were known to be suicide car bombings. An explosion at the Armenian church in Baghdad shattered stained glass windows and hurled chunks of hot metal. Another bomb exploded about 15 minutes later outside the nearby Assyrian church, where medics dragged a man from a car, his arm almost torn off. An ambulance driver told Reuters that two people were killed in the explosion at the Assyrian church and several wounded. U.S. Colonel Mike Murray of the 1st Cavalry Division said at least 50 people had been wounded at the church, some seriously. In Mosul, officials said at least one person was killed in a blast at a church and 15 wounded. No one knows with certainty how many Christians live in Iraq because they were not part of census statistics kept by Saddam Hussein. However, estimates run as high as 10 percent of the 25 million population. The U.S. military says a computer disk captured earlier this year contained a letter from Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, a Jordanian militant allied to al Qaeda, calling for attacks on Iraqi Shi'ites to try to spark sectarian conflict in Iraq. Though news reports today characterized the attacks as the first against Christian churches in Iraq, they were not. WND has chronicled the increasing persecution experienced by Iraqi Christians since the country was liberated. Christians and churches have received letters in Arabic threatening that if they don't follow Islamic practice and support "the resistance," they will face the consequences: "torture, and burning or exploding the house with the family in it," says Elizabeth Kendal, researcher for the World Evangelical Alliance Religious Liberty Commission. Mandaean Christians, who follow the teachings of John the Baptist, have been receiving the same threats and suffering the same violence, Kendal says. The unchecked Islamic aggression is forcing the Christians to flee, she states, citing some

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examples. On June 7, four masked men drove into the Christian Assyrian Quarters of the Dora district of Baghdad and opened fire on Assyrians going to work. Four were killed and several others wounded. In the afternoon, the same day, three Assyrian women were killed in another drive-by shooting as they returned home from working at the Coalition Provisional Authority. On 22 March, an elderly Assyrian couple was murdered in the Assyrian district. The wife was beaten to death and the husband had his throat cut. As WND previously reported, Ken Joseph Jr., an Assyrian who directs Assyrianchristians.com, says several developments that "bode ill for Christians in Iraq are causing believers to flee the nation." Kendal says the Assyrian Christians greatly fear that the history of abandonment and massacre of their minority group is about to repeat itself. Historians regard the Assyrians as the indigenous people of Iraq. In biblical times, their homeland was centered around the Nineveh plains in Upper Mesopotamia, now northern Iraq, where they were visited by the prophet Jonah. The Assyrian Church of the East was founded in AD 33. Some 600 years later Arab invaders put the Assyrians under Muslim domination. Invasions over the centuries nearly eliminated them. The Assyrians fought for the Allies in World War I and were promised autonomy in their homeland upon victory. But they were abandoned to the mercy of the Ottoman Turks when the British mandate was lifted in 1932, resulting in the massacre of two-thirds of the population. In Saddam Hussein's secular state, the Assyrian remnant suffered severely under his discriminatory ethnic policy of Arabization.

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Library policy: No religious people allowed

Christian ministry barred from using public meeting room Posted: July 31, 2004 1:00 a.m. Eastern 2004 WorldNetDaily.com A Christian ministry filed a federal civil rights lawsuit after being barred from meeting at a library due to the facility's policy of forbidding use for "religious purposes." "The library flagrantly violated the ministry's constitutional rights," said Joshua Carden, counsel with the Alliance Defense Fund, which brought the suit against the Contra Costa County, Calif., Board of Supervisors and several library officials on behalf of Faith Center Church Evangelistic Ministries. "It's unbelievable that, after years of equal access litigation in this country, a library would exclude Christians from a public forum," Carden said. Hattie Hopkins, leader of Faith Center Church Evangelistic Ministries, a Christian outreach ministry based in Sacramento, asked her coordinator to reserve a free public meeting room at the library branch in Antioch for May 29 and July 31 The library accepted the reservations, and about a dozen people showed up for the first meeting. But after conclusion of the meeting, two library staff members told Hopkins that religious groups were not allowed. They presented Hopkins with the library's policy, which states "library meeting rooms shall not be used for religious purposes." But Carden contends a public library cannot restrict access to public meeting rooms based on the beliefs of the people who want to meet there. "Such open hostility to religion must not be tolerated," Carden said. Hopkins contacted the Christian Law Association, which wrote to inform the library of Faith Center's rights. The library never responded, and Florida-based CLA transferred the case to Alliance Defense Fund for litigation. "We are asking the court to declare the library's policy unconstitutional and prevent the library from continuing to enforce it," Carden said. "A place that exists as a public repository of ideas is strangely hypocritical, as well as acting outside the law, when it attempts to be the 'thought police' of its patrons," he added. The case has been filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California.

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Democrats back church IRS probe

Decry 'politically involved religious leaders,' while pastor stands firm on his July 4 sermon Posted: July 24, 2004 1:00 a.m. Eastern 2004 WorldNetDaily.com WASHINGTON The local Democratic Party is supporting an Internal Revenue Service investigation of an Arkansas pastor who is accused of delivering a pro-Bush sermon July 4. The Washington County Democratic Committee issued a statement affirming a complaint filed by Barry Lynn, executive director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State, against Ronnie Floyd, pastor of the First Baptist Church of Springdale. The Democrats say the sermon should be "investigated thoroughly." The party, the statement said, "looks forward to the day when all citizens may vote their conscience without their political beliefs being dictated to them by politically involved religious leaders, regardless of denomination." Americans United for Separation of Church and State filed a complaint with the Internal Revenue Service against the pastor's July 4 sermon, suggesting it endorsed the re-election of President Bush and therefore violated the conditions of the church's tax-exempt status. "American democracy is rooted in the principle of the separation of church and state," the Democratic committee's statement said. "The Washington County Democratic Party remains committed to maintaining this value and belief if only in our small corner of the state." Associate Pastor Alan Damron of First Baptist replied in a prepared statement: "Contrary to the statement by the Washington County Democratic Party, 'separation of church and state' is not in the United States Constitution. Our Constitution guarantees the right for all to speak on political, social, moral, and biblical issues. The Constitution includes pastors and churches. There have been American religious leaders past and present who did not and have not withheld their opinions about social issues or moral issues and/or politicians who supported or opposed various American rights. If the pastors or churches are not protected by the First Amendment, then neither are professors, or non-profit, tax-exempt educational institutions. The July 4th sermon of Pastor Ronnie Floyd exemplifies the best of our American tradition of freedom and democracy. The message did not violate any IRS provision by any stretch of the imagination, and is most assuredly protected by the First Amendment, that protects us all, even those who may disagree with us." The church itself issued a statement yesterday: "The alleged letter of complaint to the Internal Revenue Service from Mr. Barry Lynn of the 'Americans United for the Separation of Church and State' is nothing more than a threat to pastors and our churches in America, attempting to intimidate the church into silence. This threat 'to take away our tax-exempt status' based on a July 4 presentation has no credence at all. Pastor Floyd did not violate any laws, nor did he or the church endorse a particular candidate. An attorney who specializes in First Amendment issues and political activity of non-profit organizations has viewed the message presented on July 4 and calls Mr. Lynn's accusations unfounded. Mr. Lynn attempts to intimidate pastors and churches by baseless allegations during every election cycle." The statement pointed out that the Internal Revenue Service has not taken away the tax-exempt status from any church in the history of our nation for political reasons. "It appears that some people have two rule books, one for liberal, and one for conservative

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politics," the statement continued." The fact is that history does not support the baseless threats hurled against conservative churches. Since 1934, when the lobbying restriction was added to the Internal Revenue Code (IRC), not one church has ever lost its tax-exempt status." Lynn's letter to the IRS reads, in part: "The pastor's description of the candidates' stands and their personal religious beliefs was obviously aimed at encouraging congregants to cast ballots for Bush. The church is known for its stands on social issues and its opposition to legal abortion and gay rights. By lauding Bush's stands on these and other issues and attacking (Sen. John) Kerry's, Floyd was plainly telling his congregation to be sure to vote for Bush. "I have enclosed a videotape that includes the entire sermon as well as a partial transcript. About 45 minutes into the message, Floyd begins to discuss the differences between Bush and Kerry. Please note that even the imagery employed by the church is designed to promote Bush. A huge photo of Bush is projected onto a screen that shows the president next to an American flag. By contrast, small photos of Kerry are used that show him as one person in a larger crowd. In addition, Bush is shown signing a ban on late-term abortions, an act most church members will laud, while Kerry is shown as one of a group of senators who opposed a law banning same-sex marriage, a stand most church members will likely oppose." Americans United for Separation of Church and State is one of two organizations in the news for monitoring political statements delivered from America's church pulpits. In Kansas, monitors from the Mainstream Coalition are being accused of creating a "chilling effect" on the sermons in that state's churches. Last month, the Mainstream Coalition announced it would send volunteers into area churches to see whether pastors were abiding by federal laws governing political activity by non-profit institutions. While the group maintains it is non-partisan and objects across the board to all kinds of politicking in the pews, the organization's website shows the Mainstream Coalition has a strong political agenda of its own. Policy statements posted include the following: * strong support of Roe v. Wade * strong support of late-term abortions * strong support of sex education * strong support of human cloning * strong support of hate-crime laws * strong support of gun control * strong support for teaching of evolution * strong opposition to prayer in schools * strong opposition even to the wearing of religious symbols on government property Some might question just how mainstream those positions are. Would such a group, for instance, object to the use of churches to promote politicians who support such an agenda? Currently, Mainstream has about 100 volunteers monitoring churches mostly in the Kansas City suburbs. Americans United, meanwhile, filed another complaint this month with the IRS against the Rev. Jerry Falwell over a column endorsing President Bush on his ministries' website. Falwell, who also writes a column for WND, said the group was waging a "scare-the-churches campaign."

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Kansas group monitors sermons

WND, July 24,2004 OVERLAND PARK, Kan. (AP) - A recent Sunday found Tina Kolm changing her morning routine. Instead of attending a Unitarian Universalist service, she was at the Lenexa Christian Center, paying close attention to a conservative minister's sermon about the importance of amending the U.S. Constitution to ban gay marriage. Kolm is one of about 100 volunteers for the Mainstream Coalition, a group monitoring the political activities of local pastors and churches. The coalition, based in suburban Kansas City, Kan., says it wants to make sure clergy adhere to federal tax guidelines restricting political activity by nonprofit groups, and it's taking such efforts to a new level. The 47-year-old Kolm, from Prairie Village, Kan., said keeping church and state separate is important to her. She doesn't want a few religious denominations defining marriage - or setting other social policy - for everyone. "What it's all about to me is denying some people's rights," she said. But some local clergy think the Mainstream Coalition is using scare tactics designed to unfairly keep them out of the political process. "Somebody is trying to act like Big Brother when there's no need for Big Brother," said the Rev. James Conard, assistant pastor at the First Baptist Church of Shawnee. "It's obviously an intent to intimidate." Kansas isn't the only place in this election year where church-state separation has become a hot issue, but the Mainstream Coalition's efforts are more intense than most. Americans United for Separation of Church and State filed a complaint this month with the Internal Revenue Service against the Rev. Jerry Falwell over a column endorsing President Bush on his ministries' Web site. Falwell said the group was waging a "scare-the-churches campaign." Barry Lynn, executive director of Americans United, said local chapters have sent volunteers to church services the Sunday before an election, but he said the Mainstream Coalition's efforts are more sustained. Some conservatives are upset. "These people will stop at nothing to silence churches," said Andrea Lafferty, of the Washingtonbased Traditional Values Coalition, which says it represents 43,000 churches. The catalyst for the Mainstream Coalition's campaign in Kansas was the debate over gay marriage. In May, the Kansas House rejected a proposed amendment to the Kansas Constitution to ban gay marriage. Dozens of pastors then joined a statewide effort to register 100,000 new voters and elect more sympathetic candidates - a move similar to one in Washington state, where an Assembly of God pastor is leading an effort to register 60,000 new voters and re-elect Bush. Charles Haynes, a senior scholar with the nonpartisan First Amendment Center in Arlington, Va., said Mainstream's tactics only added to the tension in Kansas. "If we want to escalate a cultural war, this is a good way to do it," he said. But Mainstream's executive director, Caroline McKnight, said her organization is only trying to make sure that churches follow federal law. The group has not yet filed any complaints, she said. McKnight said Mainstream Coalition volunteers visit houses of worship of all types.

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Said Jay Sekulow, chief counsel for the conservative American Center for Law and Justice, of Virginia Beach, Va.: "Who deputized this group and its members to be thought police in Kansas or elsewhere?"

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Afraid To Say What We Think

by Carey Roberts 29 June 2004 http://www.intellectualconservative.com/article3560.html Earlier this month the Senate approved the benign-sounding Local Law Enforcement Act, which broadens the scope of the existing federal hate crime laws to include gender and sexual orientation. Some persons may get a chuckle out of the term. But Political Correctness is an implacable force that we must come to terms with, or else accept the reality that our First Amendment freedoms may become irrevocably lost. Political Correctness has its roots Cultural Marxism. Cultural Marxists know that democratic capitalism cannot be overthrown by external force. So they seek to undermine Western society like a cancer attacking from within. The politically correct view all of history through the prism of power. For example, radical feminism teaches that in the past, men had all the power. That made men the unrelenting oppressors of women. So now men are obliged to make up for their past transgressions. Experience proves that Political Correctness is difficult to counter because it is always justified by sentimental appeals to fairness and sensitivity. The purveyors of PC began 20 years ago by discouraging the use of demeaning stereotypes and epithets directed against any racial, ethnic, or gender group. Who could argue with that? An exception was made, however, for males, who were considered fair game for the crudest forms of denunciation. Soon, campus speech codes began to sprout. In the workplace, speech codes became subsumed under the rubric of sexual harassment. If a boss called his secretary honey or a doctor referred to a patient as dear, that could get him into trouble. The next step in the unfolding PC campaign was the passage of hate speech legislation. In 1999, the National Organization of Women and other groups unveiled the Hate Crimes Prevention Act, which aimed to expand the scope of the existing hate crime laws to include gender and sexual orientation. When it floundered in committee, they changed the name of the bill to the benign-sounding Local Law Enforcement Act -- the LLEA. Earlier this month, five years of hard work paid off. The Senate approved the LLEA by a 65-33 vote. If the House of Representatives approves the bill and President Bush signs off, the LLEA soon will become the law of the land. So what would happen if someone writes a book that portrays a protected group in a negative light? Could that be construed as a hate crime? Actually, I didnt make that example up. On June 10, legendary actress Brigitte Bardot was convicted in France and fined $6,000. Her offense? Including passages in her best-selling book, A Cry in the Silence, about the growing Islamic influence in Europe. The sections in question allegedly incited racial hatred against Moslems. However, a review of the passages in question reveals them to be provocative, but certainly not hateful. Or what would happen if a person did a critique of feminist ideology -- not attacking feminists as a group, just analyzing their philosophy? Could that get a person into hot water?

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Again, that is not a hypothetical question. Because just last year, the Canadian government published a report entitled School Success by Gender: A Catalyst for the Masculinist Discourse. The report concluded, We also recommend that consideration be given to whether legal action can be taken under section 319 of the Criminal Code. And what is section 319 of the Criminal Code? Why, thats the Canadian hate crimes law. And what are the crimes of the accused? According to the indictment in the Executive Summary, The results of our analysis of the masculist discourse reveal an ideology that aims to challenge the gains made by women and discredit feminism. Exactly who are the perpetrators of this ideological crime? The report lists persons like Christina Hoff Sommers, author of the expose, Who Stole Feminism? Accusing a woman of being hateful to other women -- apparently the irony of that was lost to authors of the report. And if youve been following the story about the Affirmative Action Bake Sales on college campuses, you know that the move to ban certain forms of political expression has gained a solid foothold in the United States, as well. First Cultural Marxism. Then Political Correctness. And now the LLEA. Take me to my grave, but Im going to stoutly resist anybody telling me what I can say and what I can think. Carey Roberts is a regular contributor to NewsWithViews.com, and has been published in The Washington Times and LewRockwell.com, among others. Email Carey Roberts Saturday, July 10, 2004

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NAACP censored pro-lifers?

Local chapter barred from anti-abortion resolution Posted: July 10, 2004 1:00 a.m. Eastern 2004 WorldNetDaily.com An NAACP chapter says it was barred from submitting a resolution to the national convention spelling out the toll abortion has taken on African Americans. The Macon, Ga., chapter of the civil rights group claims it was told the resolution would not be accepted because the chapter didn't file its required financial reports. "That's absurd," charged Loretta Grier, the Macon chapter president. "I checked with our secretary and she assured me that the report was filed well before the cut-off date," Grier said. "Even if resolutions are rejected, they are usually printed for delegates to view. The resolution wasn't even given that due process; I am deeply troubled by all this." The proposed resolution came in response to the NAACP's recent endorsement of abortion rights. Grier also is a member of Life Education And Resource Network, or LEARN, a pro-life AfricanAmerican group which charged the NAACP with censorship for barring the resolution. "Each day 1,452 Afro-American women are victimized by the abortion industry -- 81 percent of those women register some type of psychological complaint, said Rev. Clenard H. Childress, Jr., director of LEARN. "The NAACP's refusal to allow this resolution is nothing less than censorship. The present leadership is charting a course without a moral compass." Childress said the NAACP has "made decisions without consensus or caucus." A recent poll by Black Enterprise Magazine showed nearly 60 percent of African Americans disapproved of the NAACP's decision to endorse the pro-choice position, LEARN points out. African-American women make up 13.7 percent of the U.S. population of women of childbearing age, yet the abortion rate among black women is three times higher than of white women, the group says. For every five African-American women that get pregnant, three will abort. LEARN says since the U.S. Supreme Court handed down the Roe vs. Wade decision in 1973, more than 14 million black infant's lives have been terminated by abortion. "The NAACP needs to be held accountable for their irresponsible endorsements and behavior that only diminishes their great legacy," Childress said. "It is obvious that the present leadership is out of touch with the NAACP membership and the Afro-American families they represent."

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Man tortured for preaching Christianity

Catholic imprisoned by Saudi Arabia's religious police http://www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=38951http://www.wnd.com/news/articl e.asp?ARTICLE_ID=38951 Posted: June 15, 2004 1:00 a.m. Eastern 2004 WorldNetDaily.com Saudi Arabia's religious police have imprisoned a Catholic foreign worker for "preaching Christianity" and allegedly selling drugs. Brian Savio O'Connor's family in India and Catholic officials, insist, however, the drug charges are trumped up and his only "crime" was to be seen praying, according to the Compass Direct news service. Brian O'Conner The Indian citizen, who was arrested March 25, would face the death penalty for both accusations, but he has not been formally charged. Catholic officials say O'Conner, 36, has been tortured and threatened with death if he does not renounce his faith and convert to Islam. Compass Direct said O'Conner, a cargo agent for Saudia Airlines, was accosted by a religious police agent near his home in Riyadh, who harshly asked him, "Why did you not attend 'Salah' [evening prayers]?" O'Conner showed the man his ID card, indicating he is a Christian, when another three men came up and tried to grab it. The men chased him into a shop where he was beaten, the news service said. The Indian Christian told friends who visited him in prison he then was dragged to a religious police office where his legs were chained and he was hung upside down. For the next seven hours, his captors alternately kicked and beat him in the chest and ribs, O'Conner claimed. According to International Christian Concern, a U.S.-based advocacy group that first reported O'Connor's arrest, he was "whipped on his back and soles of his feet by electrical wires," causing intense pain. O'Connor said at one point he was gasping for breath and moaning from the blows when a religious police officer placed a call to one of O'Conner's Saudi bosses. Laughing loudly, according to Compass Direct, the captor held the phone to O'Connor's mouth so the man on the line could hear the Christian's groans. The Indian Bishop's Conference inquired about O'Conner in an official letter to the Saudi embassy in New Delhi but was ignored. The U.S. State Department's annual report on human rights states bluntly "religious freedom does not exist" in Saudi Arabia. The kingdom forbids all public expression of religion, except for its strict Wahhabi interpretation of Islam. No church buildings are allowed, and religious police have cracked down at times on worship in private homes. Saudis are forbidden by law from converting to another religion. Like O'Conner, some foreign Christians have been imprisoned in squalid conditions and tortured, and

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some have been beheaded. The Saudi religious police reportedly allowed 15 Saudi girls to burn to death two years ago in Mecca when their school caught on fire. The police forced the female children to remain in the burning building rather than run outside without proper Islamic attire. The Center for Religious Freedom at Freedom House in Washington, a human rights advocacy group, said seven Saudi Muslims who advocated human rights and religious tolerance were arrested in March and remain in a Riyadh prison. One of the prisoners, lawyer Abdul-Rahman Alahim, was jailed the day after he appeared on the Arab news channel Al-Jazeera to urge his government to free political prisoners and implement political reform.

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Christians claim torture by Saudis

'Each of us were flogged 80 times with a flexible metal cable' http://www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=26265http://www.wnd.com/news/articl e.asp?ARTICLE_ID=26265 By Art Moore 2002WorldNetDaily.com Three Ethiopian Christians detained for the past six months without charges claim they were severely beaten and tormented this week under the authority of a Saudi prison official in Jeddah. "Being suspended with chains, each of us were flogged 80 times with a flexible metal cable and also severely kicked and beaten with anything that came into their hands," said a letter from the Ethiopians obtained by Washington, D.C.-based International Christian Concern. "This was witnessed by over 1,000 deportees." The Christians are among 14 foreigners who were detained last summer by Saudi Arabia for their Christian activities. Eight were deported to their countries of origin earlier this month and another was booked on an outbound flight last night. The Saudi Ministry of Interior arrested the men after receiving reports in June of their participation in Christian gatherings that included Saudi converts to Christianity. Saudi law applies the death penalty to citizens who choose to abandon Islam. None of the Christians were formally charged, however. The three Ethiopians Tinsaie Gizachew, Baharu Mengistu and Gebeyehu Tefera say their treatment was in retaliation for a petition they sent to the Ethiopian Consulate in Jeddah. The Ethiopians said in the letter obtained by ICC that on Monday "by order of the Bremen Prison Commander Major Bender Sultan Shabani and with no hearing, trial, or process of law, we were illegally subjected to severe punishment and physical abuse. "Our bodies are wounded, swollen, terribly bruised and with great pain," the men said. "Baharu's kidney may have been damaged and he is passing blood with his urine. When we reported to the prison hospital for treatment, we were slapped and told to come back after we were dead. It seems as if we were brought to Bremen Deportation Prison to be tortured and tormented to death." The men said that about one month ago the regional authority, Governor Prince Abdul Majid, decided to deport them after "much pressure from several governments and international human rights organizations." The Ethiopians noted that they believe the governor had no knowledge of their recent beating and needs to be informed. "The room we are in is only 11.5 x 30 meters, with at times up to 1,800 men of all nationalities crammed into this tiny space," the Ethiopians said. "There is no furniture no space to lie down except for short naps taken in shifts on the floor. About 80 percent of the inmates, including us, have been infected with contagious diseases. Some have AIDS. The toilets are overflowing. The food is not clean. When we complain, we are chained and handcuffed as punishment." Mengistu is scheduled to leave Saudi Arabia on Saturday with his wife, who is in her eighth month of pregnancy. "We hope there will not be a delay because of this flogging and our present condition," the letter said. ICC reported that one of its representatives confronted an Ethiopian Consulate official in Jeddah

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by phone on Tuesday. Since then the Ethiopian vice consul and his assistant have made several visits to the prison and arranged with Saudi prison officials to take Mengistu to a hospital for treatment. Mengistu, however, according to an ICC statement, has "refused medical treatment, fearing it may be a convenient place for them to finish him off and blame it on medical complications." Some medication has been sent to him by friends from the outside, ICC said. According to London-based Christian Solidarity Worldwide, two other Christians also await deportation, Filipino Dennis Moreno (in some reports listed as Dennis Morello) and Ismail "Worku" Abubaker, another Ethiopian, who was transferred to a prison in Mecca on Jan. 8 in order to "settle his affairs." On Jan. 12, authorities deported Kebrom Haile, an Eritrean. On Jan. 18, Afobunor Okey Buliamin of Nigeria, Iskander Menghis of Eritrea and Ethiopians Mesfin Berhanu, Mubarek Hussain Keder and Genet Haileab flew home. Joseph Girmaye of Eritera and Beferdu Fikre of Ethiopia were deported last weekend. CSW said that Prabhu Isaac of India was booked on an outbound flight scheduled Wednesday night, according to a spokesman at the Indian Consulate in Jeddah. Isaac was refused exit at the airport twice this month. On Jan. 17, the airport computer mistakenly registered his wife as still being in Saudi Arabia and on Jan. 27 he was found to have an outstanding traffic penalty.

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Los Angeles name too godly for U.S.?

Some constitutional experts think reference to 'angels' spells trouble Posted: June 13, 2004 6:22 p.m. Eastern 2004 WorldNetDaily.com The city of Los Angeles may have to change its name. Also, cities like San Francisco, San Diego, and Santa Barbara could be looking for new monikers. The reason? They all have religious meaning in their names. Los Angeles refers to the "City of Angels," while the others refer to names of saints. In fact, the official name of Los Angeles is "The Town of Our Lady the Queen of Angels of the Little Portion." According to the Los Angeles Daily News, a strong legal argument could be made to force municipal name changes, based on the argument the names violate the so-called separation of church and state. The issue is being raised in the wake of the decision this week by Los Angeles County to remove a small cross from its official seal, as reported by WorldNetDaily. "That's absolutely right," Joerg Knipprath, a professor of constitutional law at the Southwestern University School of Law, told the Daily News. "The cross is a minor symbol on the county seal whereas Los Angeles is the 'City of Angels.' San Clemente, Santa Monica, Sacramento, San Francisco, etc., are all religious references. It's farfetched at this point. I don't think it's going to happen in the next ten years. But if somebody said ten or 20 years ago that we were going to challenge the Pledge of Allegiance or this tiny little cross on the county seal, the argument would have been that was far-fetched too." L.A. County seal Ironically, the most prominent image in the L.A. County seal is one of Pomona, the pagan Roman goddess of fruits and nuts, though the American Civil Liberties Union did not object to the goddess in its push to have the cross removed. Douglas Kmiec, a constitutional law professor at Pepperdine University School of Law, told the News based on its history, the ACLU or others will likely challenge the mention of religion at graduations and the names of cities with religious identification. "The logic of the ACLU's reasoning would suggest that Santa Monica should be renamed Monica, San Diego should be renamed Diego and on down the line," he said. "Los Angeles is a similar reference to angels. The full title of Los Angeles is a distinctly religious name." The ACLU stresses it only becomes involved in issues when contacted by someone about a potential problem, and doesn't expect the names of metropolitan areas such as Los Angeles to become an issue. "That has got to be one of the most ridiculous things I've ever heard," ACLU spokesman Tenoch Flores said. "Nobody is considering suing to change city names. If anybody were to bring such a suit, it would be laughed out of court and rightfully so. We don't go around looking for things, but we certainly don't back down in the face of criticism if it's determined that a constitutional issue is at stake."

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Jay Seculow of the Virginia-based American Center for Law and Justice told the paper last week's fight over the county seal is merely part of a growing trend. "[The goal is to] purge all religious observances and references from American public life. Will [opponents] try to get the name of Los Angeles changed? Sure. Why not, if they can get the cross removed from the seal?"

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Taliban come to Los Angeles

Dennis Prager Posted: June 8, 2004 1:00 a.m. Eastern 2004 Creators Syndicate, Inc. As a graduate student at Columbia University's Russian Institute, my field of study was totalitarianism. I learned that a major characteristic of Soviet and other totalitarian regimes was their frequent rewriting of history. As a famous Soviet dissident joke put it: "In the Soviet Union, the future is known it's the past which is always changing." Given the relationship between changing the past and totalitarianism, there is reason to be amply frightened by the current decision of the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors to change the seal of Los Angeles County. Solely because of a letter from the American Civil Liberties Union threatening a lawsuit against Los Angeles County, the Board voted three to two to remove a tiny cross from the seal. To some people, this is not an important issue. These people do not understand what is at stake. But the ACLU knows what is at stake the removal of religion, specifically Christianity, from American history; and the replacing of Judeo-Christian values with leftist ones. That is why it threatened a lawsuit and gave the Board of Supervisors almost no time to deliberate. Those with radical aims do not like exposure and public debate. To understand the gravity of this issue and the intent of the ACLU and the three county supervisors, it is necessary to understand what the seal of Los Angeles County depicts. There are six small panels, three going up and down each side of the central figure of the seal, which takes up the entire length of the seal. The top left panel depicts engineering instruments; the panel below that a Spanish galleon; and the bottom left panel contains a tuna representing the fishing industry. On the right side, the top panel contains oil derricks; the next panel depicts the Hollywood Bowl, along with two stars representing the movie industry and a small cross depicting, in the official words of the county, "the influence of the church and the missions of California." The lowest right side panel contains a prize cow. By far the largest object is the Goddess Pomona, the Roman goddess of gardens and fruit trees, who is depicted from top to bottom in the middle of the seal. The cross, as this description makes clear, is the smallest object in the seal. Actually seeing the seal makes its smallness even clearer. When I first looked at the seal, I didn't even see it. The cross represents the Christian history of Los Angeles County. It no more advocates Christianity than the Goddess Pomona advocates Roman paganism or the cow promotes Hinduism. It is therefore a lie to argue Los Angeles County is pushing Christianity on its citizens. As for the argument put forth by the ACLU's Ramona Ripston that the tiny cross makes nonChristians feel "unwelcome," as a Jew I find the comment equally absurd and paranoid. I have spoken to Los Angeles County rabbis of every denomination, and not one felt the cross should be removed, let alone felt "unwelcome." By the same logic, vegetarians should feel particularly unwelcome in Los Angeles County, given that two panels depict animals as food. The third dishonest argument is that of the three supervisors: They don't want to spend county money on a legal defense that will probably lose. First, the ACLU's argument is so specious that it will lose in courts where judges are not fellow leftists. Second, plenty of law firms and individual lawyers have volunteered to take the case pro bono. Third, one fights a good fight. Giving in to the ACLU's threat is an act of cowardice unless, of course, Supervisors Gloria Molina, Yvonne 96

Brathwaite Burke and Zev Yaroslavsky agree with the ACLU aim of expunging Los Angeles County's Christian past. What we have here is an American version of the Taliban. The ACLU and the supervisors are leftist versions of the Taliban attempting to erase the Christian history of America just as the Muslim Taliban tried to erase the Buddhist history of Afghanistan when they blew up ancient Buddhist sculptures in their country. Los Angeles County is the largest county in America. If it allows its past to be expunged by a vote of three to two, America's past is sure to follow. If you want to know what happens after that, ask any student of the Soviet Union. Dennis Prager, one of America's most respected and popular nationally syndicated radio talk-show hosts, is the author of several books and a frequent guest on television shows such as Larry King Live, Politically Incorrect, The Late Late Show on CBS, Rivera Live, The Early Show on CBS, Fox Family Network, The O'Reilly Factor and Hannity & Colmes.

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Same Judge OK'ed Muslim Prayer

Tuesday, June 1, 2004 11:04 p.m. EDT http://www.newsmax.com/archives/ic/2004/6/1/230708.shtml The same San Francisco federal judge who just overturned a federal law banning partial-birth abortions also approved of Muslim prayer in schools when federal rulings ban all other denominational prayers and activities. In a December 2003 decision, U.S. District Judge Phyllis Hamilton decided that it was lawful for a California middle school teacher to require students to recite Muslim prayers, get down on their knees and role-play as Muslim adherents. As part of the class students were told to recite: "In the name of Allah, the Compassionate, the Merciful. Praise be to Allah, Lord of Creation, The Compassionate, the Merciful, King of Judgment-day! You alone we worship, and to You alone we pray for help, Guide us to the straight path." The Byron County 7th-grade world history teacher was sued by the parents of one of the students, who claimed that their child had been coerced to engage in a religious practice. Hamilton, in a summary judgment, ruled that the teacher's actions were legal. The teacher prepared a student guide which said that as part of the study of Islam "you and your classmates will become Muslims." According to court documents, the teacher also read the Koran and Muslim prayers out loud in class and required students to recite lines of Muslim prayers in class as well. Students also were told to recite Islamic prayers as they exited the class, including the Muslim refrain "In the name of God, most merciful, most gracious." The teacher also assigned students to fast or give up something like TV for a day to experience Islam's month of Ramadan and one of its pillars of faith. At the end of their Islamic studies, students also were required to write an essay on Islam. But, but the teacher instructed her students, "BE CAREFUL HERE If you don't have something positive to say, don't say anything!!!" In her ruling, Judge Hamilton threw out the parents' case, saying the religious role-playing was not tantamount to the exercise of religion and the school activities were not of a devotional or religious nature

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Persecuted Vietnamese win freedom in U.S.

24 Montagnards receive asylum after fleeing to neighboring Cambodia http://www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=22415 By Anthony C. LoBaido 2001WorldNetDaily.com As 24 American military personnel were released from captivity in China this week, 24 members of the Montagnard hill tribe of Southeast Asia, long a U.S. anti-communist ally, received their own ticket to freedom. Earlier this week, the U.S. State Department welcomed a step by Cambodian Prime Minister Samdech Hun Sen -- a former leader of Pol Pot's Khmer Rouge -- toward the resettlement in America of 24 ethnic minority Montagnards who had fled their homes in Vietnam. The 23 men and one woman were arrested in remote northeastern Cambodia nearly a month ago and have been held at military police headquarters in Phnom Penh since March 24. The decision by the U.S. drew a strong protest from the communist Vietnamese dictatorship. Vietnam called the granting of asylum interference in Vietnam's domestic affairs that would encourage illegal border crossings and regional instability. Why did the 24 Montagnards flee their own nation and travel through jungle, valleys and landmined fields on their way to Cambodia? The Vietnamese government has been persecuting the Montagnards, many of whom are evangelical Christians, for over a quarter century. Vietnamese dissidents in exile have long accused the communist government of brutality repressing Christians and Buddhists, saying hill-tribe people were attacked and tortured to death after recent protests in the Central Highlands. The Unified Buddhist Church of Vietnam, Buddhist Hoa Hao, the Catholic Church and Protestants of the Central Highlands have all been repressed by the government. The Buddhist church, banned since 1981, has been severely persecuted. Patriarch Thich Huyen Quang has been detained in his pagoda without trial for 20 years. "Actually, the Vietnamese dictators want the Montagnards trapped inside Vietnam so they can control them and kill them," said Don Scott, who works with the hill tribes of Southeast Asia and acts as the American representative for the exiled anti-communist Prince of Laos. The State Department praised Hun Sen -- whose son graduated from West Point last year. Hun Sen was placed in power by the Vietnamese when they invaded Cambodia on April 17, 1979, to overthrow Pol Pot and his genocidal regime. The U.S. and UK responded by arming the Khmer Rouge cadres in western Cambodia to act as a buffer to keep the Vietnamese from invading Thailand -- a key U.S. and UK ally. By granting asylum to the 24 Montagnards, America's relations with Vietnam could be strained. One of the Clinton administration's last acts in office was to establish formal trade ties with Vietnam's Marxist government. "We ... welcome the decision by Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen to allow processing for thirdcountry resettlement those persons determined by the U.N. to be refugees," State Department spokesman, Philip Reeker, said in a statement. The Vietnamese were livid. "We protest the granting of permission for these people to settle in the United States," Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Phan Thuy Thanh said in a statement urging their return to Vietnam.

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Earlier this week, U.S. ambassador to Cambodia Kent Wiedemann said officials of the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service were due in Phnom Penh to start processing the group for resettlement in the United States. Over 50 members of Congress have signed a letter urging democratic reform in Vietnam. The European Parliament has also pushed the letter, which will be delivered by Buddhist Monks to Vietnams communist government. Wiedemann dismissed Hanoi's complaint of interference. "It's a humanitarian issue, not interfering in Vietnam's affairs," he said. "These people came into Cambodia ... and we interviewed them based on the claim that there was a good chance they would face persecution if they returned." As for the Montagnards fleeing Vietnam, they said they fled their homes to escape Vietnam's crackdown on recent unrest. Thousands of ethnic minority farmers took part in anti-government protests in Vietnam in early February, the biggest for years in the communist country. Recently, the Montagnards engaged in a march in Washington, D.C., to call attention to their persecution in Vietnam. Some marchers also demanded that Americans boycott Vietnamese coffee and Nestle products. The latter has ingredients from the communist state. The U.S.-based Montagnard Foundation, which represents the mountain tribes, wants to see trade and foreign aid cut from the Western nations to Vietnams regime. Kok Ksor, executive director of the South Carolina-based group, told a working group at the U.N. Commission on Human Rights that his people were executed, arrested and jailed under growing persecution. Three members survived being crucified by Vietnamese authorities in December, but a Montagnard Christian named Y-Jan Eban was tortured to death by electric prods in March, he said. "Right now in the Central Highlands of Vietnam, there are armed soldiers and tanks patrolling our villages all the way from Kontum to Dalat. Helicopters are buzzing our villages and the entire Central Highlands. Our ancestral homelands are under martial law," Ksor said. "In the last eight weeks, hundreds of our people have been attacked, arrested, beaten and tortured with electric prods by Vietnamese authorities. Some of our people have died from torture already." Ksor went on to say that the communist rulers' goal in Vietnam was to "eliminate our race -- not only because we were allied with the Americans but because our homelands have vast forests and natural resources which they want to exploit. I plead to the international community to protect our race and put an end to the last 26 years of genocidal practices. Further, I ask the international community to consider whether they should trade or give aid money to Vietnam, which continues to brutally violate an indigenous race of people."

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Persecution of hill tribes intensifies

Christian Hmong fight for freedom in Stalinist Laos By Anthony LoBaido 2000WorldNetDaily.com Editor's note: Having traveled extensively throughout Southeast Asia during the past year, WorldNetDaily international correspondent Anthony C. LoBaido filed several groundbreaking stories on the betrayal by the U.S and U.N. of the Hmong hill tribes -- staunch allies of the U.S. during the Vietnam war. This is his latest report. By Anthony C. LoBaido 2000, WorldNetDaily.com, Inc. VIENTIANE, Laos -- The Stalinist regime currently ruling Laos refer to the Hmong hill tribes as "Meo" -- meaning "less than human." As WorldNetDaily has reported previously, Laos' Hmong tribesmen -- including former CIA Special Forces soldiers who fought side-by-side with American soldiers during the Vietnam war -have been the object not only of great persecution by the communist governments of Laos and Vietnam, but also of betrayal by their former allies -- the United States government and the United Nations. The Hmong's forced repatriation into Laos from Thai refugee camps, sanctioned and encouraged by the U.S. State Department, has put the Hmong in danger for their lives. The Pathet Lao government despises the "Meo" doubly -- for their having helped the "enemy," America, during the Vietnam war, and for their growing embrace of Christianity. Recently, the ongoing persecution of the Hmong by the government of Laos has heated up: * The abduction and suspected murder of two Hmong-Americans by the Pathet Lao has brought down the wrath of the FBI and State Department on the Lao government. * The Pathet Lao's total lack of cooperation with the FBI and its ongoing persecution of Christians has led conservatives in the U.S. Congress to block normalization of trade with the Loatians. * The continued forced repatriation of the Hmong by the United Nations, Thai military and U.S. State Department has caused a major expansion of the shooting war in Laos. Indeed, the Hmong Resistance Movement has formed a guerrilla "War Party" to take the action to their oppressors after a 25-year retreat. The celebrated eclipse a few months ago was regarded by the native hill tribes as a portent of great changes that would soon befall the Greater Mekong Delta Region, formerly known as Indochina. In recent months, the birth of an unblemished white ox, or "Kwai," as well as the fantastic eclipse that made global headlines have been regarded by the Hmong as a sign of great changes that are coming in regard to their plight and destiny. Who are the Hmong? Rugged mountain people who served in the CIA Special Forces during America's war in Vietnam, the Hmong were recruited by the U.S. to fight the Viet Cong. The Hmong soldiers, many of whom were just children, fought and died to take out Russian and communist Chinese supplies on the infamous Ho Chi Minh trail. The Hmong intercepted almost half of these supplies, which were sent to kill American, Australian and South Korean troops fighting in Southeast Asia. Historically, the Hmong tribe was hunted and killed in more than 75 military expeditions by bloodthirsty Chinese warlords and emperors between the 14th and 17th centuries. In 1800, an estimated 500,000 Hmong were killed by Chinese warlords. In the 20th century, communism and

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Soviet biological weapons have combined to enact a genocide against the Hmong. Since World War II, the whole of Southeast Asia has been plagued by war and genocide. Pol Pot's ubiquitous "Killing Fields" -- in which 1.7 million Cambodians were murdered without the use of guns -- is most prominent. Lesser known genocides include the Hmong, as well as the Karen of Burma (a key ally of the U.S. and Great Britain in fighting the Japanese during World War II). Some even see the drug-induced decimation of much of Thailand's population by the Chineseproduced amphetamine Ya Baa (or "Crazy Medicine") as a form of genocide. As for how all of this killing could have unfolded without the intervention of the U.S, NATO or the United Nations, Dr. Michael Korpi, a Baylor University Film Professor who has worked extensively with the Hmong says, "Sadly, during the mid 1970s, the liberals in America were on the side of the communists in Vietnam. They thought it would be a good idea if America and the West were pushed out of Indochina. This led directly to the Killing Fields of Cambodia, the Pathet Lao and the rape and murder of the Montagnards (Hmong) in Vietnam." This communist Chinese propaganda poster, circa the late 1940s and early 1950s, depicts America as a "paper tiger." Today, China directs the persecution of Christian hill tribes like the Hmong of Laos, the Montagnards of Vietnam and the Karen of Burma/Myanmar. The persecution of the Hmong, who today number around 13 million, is not limited to Laos. In fact, it is more vicious in communist Vietnam. The Christian Hmong (or "Montagnards," the French word for "mountain people") of Vietnam are hunted by the Vietnamese military. Many thousands of Hmong have had to flee the razing of their churches and walk over 1,000 kilometers into the central highlands of Vietnam seeking safety. This persecution takes place because the Hmong, even at gunpoint, will not renounce their Christian beliefs. All the while, the Clinton administration pushes for the normalization of trade ties with communist Vietnam, despite the fact that the Vietnamese military is in virtual control of the Vietnamese economy. Show Me The Money The European Union, which engages in a variety of work projects within Laos, is heavily involved in subsidizing the Pathet Lao government. Of course there is a financial element to the persecution of the Hmong. A project known as the Greater Mekong Development Plan or "East-West Corridor" -- funded by U.S. and Japanese multinational corporations -- is rapidly progressing with the explicit goal of linking Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, Thailand, Burma and Southern China into a single economic regional entity. As such, the hilltribes of Burma and Laos are standing in the way of the new roads and railways that will be built to link the region. FBI and State: The Loatian connection Recently, U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Stanley Roth, on a trip to Bangkok, told the international media that Laos was unlikely to get "Most Favored Nation" status and its accompanying trading privileges from the U.S. Congress if the Pathet Lao government doesn't start cooperating in finding Hua Ly and Michael Vang. The two men were reportedly abducted and, some believe, murdered by the Pathet Lao government. "The FBI dispatched two agents to Laos to ascertain the whereabouts of Hua Ly and Michael Vang -- real American patriots," said U.S. Army General Albion Knight Jr. (ret). Knight served in both Vietnam and with NATO, focusing on nuclear issues. Ly, a 56-year-old from Wisconsin, and Vang, a 38-year-old who had been living in California, were trained by the CIA to fight as Special Forces against the Viet Cong. Moreover, Vang is the nephew of Vang Pao, the pre-eminent leader of the Hmong resistance -- both during the Vietnam war and today. And Hua Ly rescued countless downed American pilots behind enemy lines in Laos during the Vietnam war.

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According to U.S. Army Maj. Carl Bernard (Ret.), who was the point man on the CIA's "Operation White Star" which trained the Hmong Special Forces, "Men like Hua Ly are well trained and motivated. He knows the terrain of Laos like the back of his hand." The Bangkok Post and The Nation -- the major English-language news organs in Thailand -- have written numerous articles on Ly and Vang, stating the two men "bragged" about the money and guns they were smuggling into Laos from Thailand. The money and guns, claim the reports, were to be used for fighting the Pathet Lao. Consequently, the story circulating in the newspapers, and at the American embassy for that matter, is that Ly and Vang were lured into Laos by ordinary Loatian criminals and subsequently murdered. No chance, says Bernard. Searching for POWs/MIAs in the Laos countryside is no easy task. "Why would two CIA-trained operatives talk openly to strangers -- or even the Lao secret police -about a clandestine intelligence operation?" asked Bernard. For his part, Roth said, "Unfortunately, I think that until we can resolve the matter of the two disappeared [men], it's going to be virtually impossible to envision Congress extending MFN status." "Furthermore, if it becomes apparent the authorities in Laos are either not cooperating with the investigation, or are impeding it, I think that could have a spilled-over effect to other aspects of the relationship. The burden is really on the government in Laos," said Roth. The Pathet Lao for its part claims it knows nothing of Ly and Vang's whereabouts. And it has blamed the Hmong community in America for the media attention paid to the two missing men. Furthermore, Western diplomats based in Laos and Bangkok tell WND the Pathet Lao also blames Hmong allies like author Jane Hamilton-Merritt, Maj. Bernard, Vang Pao -- and WorldNetDaily.com for its extensive news coverage. Attempts to reach the two FBI agents who have searched in Laos for Ly and Vang have been unsuccessful. Fighting back The Hmong are fighting once again in a shooting war against the Pathet Lao. On March 27, the Hmong rebels in Laos, known as the "Chao Fa," engaged in hit-and-run operations in Xieng Khouang province, Bolikamsay province in the rugged Karst mountain region and also in nearby Xaysomboune. In response, the Pathet Lao has responded by ferrying in helicopters and government troops to attack Hmong villages in the region. Last month, WorldNetDaily visited some of these villages. The Hmong people interviewed by WND remain resolute in their willingness to take on the Pathet Lao. "Many people are protesting the government. Their economic policies have ruined the country. Their days are numbered, not ours," said a Hmong woman from the burned ruins of one such village. Confusion in the press Some of the establishment press in the U.S., taking State Department press briefings as gospel, question the allegations of a Hmong genocide. A March 27 Associated Press article reported, "The vociferous American-Hmong lobby has accused the regime of a genocide of hundreds of thousands of Hmong since 1975, but has come up with no evidence to support such a claim." Dr. Korpi, an award-winning filmmaker who has produced a video on the Hmong entitled "City of Refuge," counters the AP's characterization: "There is so much documented evidence on the

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genocide of the Hmong it could fill a small library," he says. "The Internet is filled with many such sites. Hundreds of thousands of Hmong are either dead or living in exile. Proof of biochemical war against the Hmong has been well documented. To deny the Hmong genocide is ludicrous." Adds Claire Roy, a French missionary working with the Hmong in Laos and Thailand, "Like a mirror in a fun house, the media distorts the truth about so many areas of the world where anticommunist Christians are persecuted. This is especially true in Laos. But we can only challenge the lies and duplicity of the establishment press by speaking the truth," said Roy. "It gives me great joy to say that the Pathet Lao's murderous regime is breaking apart, slowly," she added. Forced repatriation The reason the Hmong are fighting once again after a quarter-century lull is simple. Many of the Hmong forced to repatriate back to Laos from Thai-based refugee camps have been required to live in the lowlands of Laos rather than in their traditional mountain homes. This is because the Pathet Lao wants to keep an eye on them. A young Hmong girl holds up her handicrafts for sale. Some Hmong sent back to Laos have been executed for helping the CIA and U.S. Special Forces during the Vietnam war. Fran Keck, a Georgia native who, along with his wife, has been working with the Hmong in Thai refugee camps, told WorldNetDaily, "My wife and I are currently working with many Hmong folks through a Baptist Mission in Winder, Georgia. We have worked in the Phraphutta Baht refugee camp in Saraburi, Thailand. It is my understanding that these 30,000 people have to leave this camp by year's end." He added, "There is supposed to be some kind of program for them to move to villages in northern Thailand. The reports we are getting from the camp are not good. If the people can't raise the money to leave, they probably will be dumped into Laos. You know better than most people what awaits them there." Keck described what he observed in the Phraphuttha refugee camp as a "crime." "I still have terrible dreams of how these people live, and yes, even die," Keck said. "The villages are a little better, but in one village we visited, an American doctor that we work with examined the refugees and said he believes that only half the children will live to be teenagers." One seemingly small, but positive, development from the Hmong's perspective is that the episode, "The Spirit of Liberty Moon," from the CBS hit series, "Touched by an Angel," has been copied and delivered to Hmong leaders and also other resistance fighters worldwide. The episode deals with the horrendous persecution in communist China of religious and political dissidents. The delivery of the videotapes was made possible through the efforts of public relations specialist Lara Moore-Jones. "America and her allies can still be saved. It can be done quickly and without a lot of money being spent," Knight told WorldNetDaily. "Let's not trade with or aid the perpetrators of genocide in Vietnam or Laos."

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Believers tortured to abandon Christianity

Communist regime using painful drug injections, says report http://www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=37586 Posted: March 16, 2004 1:00 a.m. Eastern 2004 WorldNetDaily.com Vietnam's communist government is torturing Christians of the ethnic Hmong minority into abandoning their faith, according to documentation by a Washington, D.C.-based human-rights group. A letter written by Zong Xiong Hang, a Hmong Christian, describes the use of painful drug injections administered by Vietnamese military personnel to force Hmong in Na Ling village in northwestern Lai Chau province "to not believe in Jesus," according to the Center for Religious Freedom at Freedom House. "We all got sick and it was different from any kind of sickness we had ever had before," Zong wrote. "Everyone who got sick had chest pains and pain in their forehead. Our legs and arms were cold and numb; it felt like our blood was not going through." The Jan. 30 letter said Christians in Na Ling village faced expulsion if they did not abandon their religious beliefs. "This shocking form of torture has been used in some of the world's most sinister regimes, including Nazi Germany and the USSR," said the center's director, Nina Shea. The allegations follow a pattern of reports of an anti-Christian wave of persecution in Lai Chau province, according to the center. Police and soldiers monitor and harass Christians, pressuring them to sign statements recanting their faith and pledging to re-establish ancestor worship. Zhong said he is a "person the authorities really hate, because I am teaching others to lead the church and I take Christian materials to the believers." Vietnam's policy, according to Zong, is to recognize as Christians only Hmong who converted before 1954 when French rule ended and communist forces under Ho Chi Minh took control of the North. Zong's village, which converted after 1954, has made a number of requests to be classified as Christian, but all have been denied. "The government forced us to leave our village if we would not deny Christ," Zhong wrote. "They would not let us to stay in our village in Lai Chau province. They say that wherever we want to go, to just go there. We can go to America or wherever there are believers. We should go stay with them because we are no longer welcome in our home village." Vietnamese authorities allow a greater degree of religious freedom than in the 1990s, but the government still keeps all religious institutions in its control under the umbrella of the Communist Party's Fatherland Front. Members of unsanctioned groups -- particularly minorities such as the Hmong -- frequently suffer harassment, arrest and imprisonment, and the state-approved organizations face many restrictions, including limitations on training and ordination of clergy. Other ethnic minorities facing persecution are Degar, Mien and Montagnard Christians. Members of the latter group, in the Central Highlands, have been executed by injection, say human-rights groups such as Britain's Jubilee Campaign.

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Christians sentenced for prayer, worship

Imprisoned 2 to 3 years for Sunday meetings held at home http://www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=38550 Posted: May 19, 2004 1:00 a.m. Eastern 2004 WorldNetDaily.com Four Vietnamese Christians who organized and led weekly worship services in a house church were sentenced to prison for "disturbing public order." The Christians, members of the heavily persecuted Hmong ethnic group, were handed terms of 26 to 36 months in late March 2004, according to a report released yesterday by the Center for Religious Freedom at Freedom House, a Washington, D.C. human-rights group. The four are among 10 Christians reported last month to be in custody because of their faith. They now are being held under harsh conditions, the Center for Religious Freedom said. The men, arrested in November and December of 2003, were accused in connection with meetings of 50 or 60 people that took place over six consecutive Sundays, according to a document obtained by the center. The arrests are part of a wave of anti-Christian persecution under way in the ethnic Hmong areas of Vietnam, the center reported. The four are residents of Giap Trung Village, Thang Tin Commune, Ha Giang province, which has become the scene of an intense anti-Christian campaign by Vietnamese officials. The Christians sentence are: * Ly Chin Sang, age 60, a Christian since 1991, sentenced to 36 months. His wife is Giang Thi Ca, and they have a 19-year-old son living at home. * Ly Sin Quang, 28, son of Ly Chin Sang, a Christian since 1991. He and his wife, Vang Thi Da, have four young children. [No length of sentence given.] * Vang Chin Sang, age 56, sentenced to 36 months and a Christian since 1999, is married to Ma Thi Pang. They have a 13-year-old son at home. * Vang My Ly, age 24, has been a Christian since 1991. He was sentenced to 26 months. His wife is Ma Thi Di and the couple has three small children. The Washington-based group says letters from families describe the prisoners' hardships. Three additional letters written in March by Christians in Xin Man District, Ha Giang province, detail the confiscation of Vietnamese Bibles, an electronic keyboard, numerous personal effects and cash. The authors also describe being threatened with fines unless they agree to abandon Christianity and reestablish an altar to their ancestors. The Center for Religious Freedom says due to international pressure, Vietnamese authorities recently have begun to avoid referring to Christianity when making charges against believers, using the term "illegal religion" instead. The government recognizes as legitimate only clans of Christians who were believers before the 1954 communist revolution. The center reported earlier this month the Vietnamese military has used drug injections in Lai Chau Province in its campaign to pressure Hmong Christians to sign statements recanting their

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faith. In November, the center reported the extradition of a key Hmong church leader, Ma Van Bay, from the southern province of Binh Phuoc. A trial in his case was announced for April 28, although the charges are not known. Center director Nina Shea describes persecuted Hmong Christians as "truly forgotten people, living up in the highlands, speaking their own language, and lacking influential contacts in the outside world." Hmong Christians, she says, "are twice victims, both as Christians and as members of a disfavored minority. Behind the friendly faade of normality that the Vietnamese government shows to investors and tourists lies a more sinister reality." Vietnamese authorities allow a greater degree of religious freedom than in the 1990s, but the government still keeps all religious institutions in its control under the umbrella of the Communist Party's Fatherland Front. Members of unsanctioned groups particularly minorities such as the Hmong frequently suffer harassment, arrest and imprisonment, and the state-approved organizations face many restrictions, including limitations on training and ordination of clergy. Other ethnic minorities facing persecution, according to human-rights groups, are Degar, Mien and Montagnard Christians. Members of the latter group, in the Central Highlands, have been executed by injection, say human-rights groups such as Britain's Jubilee Campaign. Related stories: Communist regime holding 10 Christians Believers tortured to abandon Christianity Priest imprisoned for urging freedom Priest imprisoned for urging freedom Persecuted Vietnamese win freedom in U.S. The 'Million Montagnard March' Persecution of hill tribes intensifies Laos' Hmong tribe faces death in forced repatriation Congress acknowledges debt to Hmong China behind Christian persecution in S.E. Asia 'Killing fields,' mines and martyrs Fear and loathing in Vietnam Related offers: "Their Blood Cries Out" Christian persecution: Learn the TRUTH from Voice of the Martyrs

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New film mocks Christianity

Media expert: SAVED!' is a hateful, politically correct movie' Posted: May 13, 2004 1:00 a.m. Eastern http://www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=38468 2004 WorldNetDaily.com A noted movie critic says the new film "Saved!" is a sad, bigoted, anti-Christian movie that mocks the Christian faith. Ted Baehr, the founder of the Christian Film & Television Commission ministry has come out swinging against the MGM movie, according to Assist News Service. The film is slated to be released May 28. "'SAVED!' is a hateful, politically correct movie," Baehr declared. "It is being heavily marketed to the community it mocks to lead Christian youth astray and make them resent their own faith." The movie, which stars Mandy Moore and Macaulay Culkin, tells the story about self-righteous Christian youths in an uptight Christian school. Baehr urges religious leaders, including Jews and Muslms, to warn their constituents about the movie. "The one character who tries to preach the Gospel in the movie is actually the villain," Baehr noted. "The heroine Mary, played by Jena Malone, has a vision that Jesus tells her to fornicate with the school hunk in order to save him from homosexuality. At the end, Mary learns that her only true friends are Cassandra, a irreverent Jewish girl who claims to have been a stripper, and the villain's brother, who denies being a Christian and lusts after the stripper." The movie's website includes phrases alternately shown on the homepage, including: "Got passion? Get Saved! 5:28," a Scripture-like reference to the film's release date. Other phrases are "Let's kick it Jesus style," and "Prayer works, it's been medically proven." Baehr added: "Cassandra is the real heroine who turns Mary away from the uptight Christian students who believe in faith, values and the power of prayer. Imagine if this movie were set in an Orthodox Jewish school with faithful Jewish children cast as the villains and a Christian girl shows how legalistic the Jewish girls are. Or, what if it were set in an Islamic school with faithful Muslims cast as the villains and a Christian or Jewish girl exposes how legalistic the Muslims are? The outcry in the press would be tremendous! Not to mention the righteous outcry from Jews or Muslims! "Looking at it from the point of view of other faiths highlights how bigoted the movie 'SAVED!' is and reveals how MGM is marketing it to Christian children to try to divorce them from their faith!" Brief audio snippets from the film featured on the website include one female character angrily shouting at another: "I'm filled with Christ's love!"

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Christian churches running on empty?

Research indicates number of Americans who don't attend services nearly doubling Posted: May 6, 2004 1:00 a.m. Eastern 2004 WorldNetDaily.com Despite a 15 percent rise in the U.S. population, a new survey shows the number of Americans who don't go to church has nearly doubled in the past 13 years, rising from 39 million to 75 million. The report by the Barna Group, a California-based consulting firm following trends related to faith, culture and leadership in the country, says the percentage of adults that is "unchurched" has risen from 21 percent in 1991 to 34 percent today. The group defines "unchurched" as not having attended a Christian church service other than for holiday services like Christmas or Easter, or for special events such as a wedding or funeral at any time in the past six months. The annual church-attendance tracking survey is based on telephone interviews with a nationwide random sample of 1,014 adults conducted in late January and early February of this year with a margin of error of 3 percentage points. In a demographic breakdown, the survey revealed four dimensions: 1. Men dominate the ranks of the unchurched. Although they comprise slightly less than half of the national population, men constitute 55 percent of the unchurched, and they represent only 38 percent of the public which refers to itself as "born again." 2. The unchurched are younger than the norm. The median age of U.S. adults is 43, but it's just 38 among the unchurched. 3. Unchurched people are more likely than others to be single and to never have been married. Whereas one-quarter of American adults (26%) are single-never-married, nearly two-fifths of the unchurched fit that definition (37%). 4. The unchurched are also attracted to the coastal regions of the country. Although just four out of ten adults (42%) live in the Northeast or West, more than half of the unchurched (51%) live there. In fact, the two most populous states in the nation California and New York contain 18% of the nation's residents, but one-quarter of its unchurched adults (23%). The study also found significant religious differences when comparing churchgoers to nonchurchgoers. In a typical week, unchurched people are less likely than all adults to read the Bible (19% compared to 44%) and to pray (63% vs. 83%), and they are less likely to have embraced Jesus Christ as their savior. On a surprising note, while about half of the churched population has accepted Jesus as their savior, one of every six unchurched adults (17%) has done so as well. Interestingly, says the report, if the minority of unchurched adults who are born again were connected to a church, the resulting increase would be nearly 13 million new people more than have joined the nation's churches in the past decade combined. Among the theological differences uncovered were that unchurched adults are less likely than others to believe the Bible is accurate, that Jesus was sinless, that Satan is real, that salvation is through the grace of God, and that God is the creator and present-day ruler of the universe.

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"The unchurched are more likely than others to be somewhat isolated from the mainstream activities of the society in which they live," explained author and researcher George Barna. "They see themselves as outsiders and often take refuge in that status. Evidence of this arms-length approach to life, beyond their refusal to participate in church life, includes lower levels of voter registration, less money donated to non-profit organizations, fewer non-profits supported, lower levels of media usage, and less engagement in community service activities." Additional distinguishing characteristics include the independence of the unchurched and what Barna calls their non-committal nature. "You can see this emotional and intellectual distancing of themselves through their more moderate ideology, their more ambiguous theological perspectives, a lower likelihood of embracing terms used to describe oneself (such as 'generous,' 'friendly' and 'deeply spiritual'), a substantially lower level of self-professed commitment to their faith of choice, and their rejection of the idea of responsibility for nurturing other people's faith," he said.

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Jewish evangelism case dismissed

Woman claimed defamation for newsletter account of 'conversion' Posted: May 6, 2004 1:00 a.m. Eastern 2004 WorldNetDaily.com A Florida judge dismissed a lawsuit against Jews for Jesus prompted by a woman who complained she was defamed when the group called her a "Jewish believer" in its newsletter. The newsletter's "Praise Report," written by the woman's stepson, Bruce Rapp, claimed Edith Rapp had asked Y'shua, Jesus, to be her savior. Bruce Rapp was an employee of Jews for Jesus. His stepmother filed suit Dec. 11, complaining the stated account was fictitious and that Jews for Jesus knew the account was false when it published the newsletter. The complaint said Jewish people harbor extreme animosity towards Jews for Jesus and the group seeks the "end of the Jewish religion and the Jewish faith." Florida-based Liberty Counsel filed a motion to dismiss the case, arguing it was not defamatory to call someone a Christian. A defamatory statement, the group said, must be highly offensive to a reasonable person. Circuit Court Judge Catherine Brunson agreed, dismissing the suit Tuesday. Simply calling someone a Christian in America is not highly offensive to a reasonable person, nor should it be, Liberty Counsel said. The group noted the motion argued that allowing the case to go forward would give effect to religious prejudices by recognizing and approving the prejudices that some individuals may have against Christian organizations such as Jews for Jesus. At the hearing, Edith Rapp's attorney argued that calling Edith a member of Jews for Jesus was the same as calling a Christian a member of al-Qaida or the Nazi party. Mathew Staver, president and general counsel for Liberty Counsel, insisted the lawsuit in essence was "an attack against Jews for Jesus as an organization because of its outreach to Jewish individuals," pointing out the suit even sought an injunction against the group's evangelism activities. "Jews for Jesus has a right to free speech and a right to seek to evangelize Jewish individuals regardless of whether some individuals harbor animosity about those activities." Staver said. "The law should not give a voice to prejudice, whether it be racial, or, as in this case, religious prejudice," he continued. The newsletter in question, published in July 2002 for supporters, was Bruce Rapp's recounting of his visit with his father and stepmother, "Edie," before his father died. It read: "Edie began to ask me questions about Jesus | when I asked her if she would like to ask God for forgiveness for her sins and receive Y'shua she said yes! My stepmother repeated the sinner's prayer with me praise God!" The newsletter included a prayer request urging prayer for "grace and strength for new Jewish believer Edie and salvation for her husband, Marty."

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Pray for Barry Lynn Hans Zeiger

Posted: May 6, 2004 1:00 a.m. Eastern 2004 WorldNetDaily.com http://www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=38365 This will make Barry Lynn even more incensed than he is now: Pray for him on Thursday. Lynn is president of the Americans United for Separation of Church and State, and he has declared war on the National Day of Prayer. The National Day of Prayer is Thursday, May 6, and Lynn is enraged that it has been taken over by the "Religious Right." Lynn's biggest complaint with the National Day of Prayer is not that he thinks it violates the Constitution, rather that "Religious Right forces are using the National Day of Prayer as a vehicle to promote a controversial religious and political agenda." By controversial, he means those who believe in the Bible. It just so happens that the "Religious Right" is the only significant religious group in America that is really dedicated and interested in praying to God. That isn't to say there aren't folks who occasionally pray to false gods or demons or themselves in various corners of the Religious Left, but they don't tend to be the prayer-warrior types. Frustrated with the fact that the bulk of people involved in the National Day of Prayer actually believe in God, Lynn and his left-wing atheist-secularist-ecumenist allies are holding their own counter-events this year. The Left has chosen a new strategy for dealing with the Right rather than simply filing frivolous lawsuits. This time, they've somewhat diminished the First Amendment arguments and they've decided to compete for prayer space with the Religious Right. Unitarians, mainstream Baptists, Muslims, Jews, Buddhists, members of the "Military Pagan Network" and other watered-down ecumenists will hold an "Interfaith Day of Prayer and Reflection" on the steps of the Oklahoma State Capitol Thursday to pray to the generic god. A group called Stop Theocracy in Oklahoma Policy planned the multi-faith reflection service as a protest of the simultaneous "Religious Right" Day of Prayer event. "The south steps of the state Capitol have no relation to the kingdom of God," says Bruce Prescott, the organizer of the STOP protest. Yet prayer to the God of the Bible is an important American tradition in government. Every state legislature opens its sessions in prayer, as do both houses of Congress. Most presidents have declared days of prayer, thanksgiving, and even fasting. President Lincoln famously called for a day of "humiliation, fasting and prayer" in the midst of the Civil War. President Harry S Truman proclaimed an annual prayer day in 1952 following a joint resolution by Congress. And in 1988, President Ronald Reagan established the first Thursday of May as the official National Day of Prayer. None of that mattered after Barry Lynn's Web surfers discovered a link to the National Day of Silence on the Florida Juvenile Justice Department website and demanded the link removed. The link was promptly deleted last week. "Florida has no business promoting prayer events for the National Day of Prayer on any of its official websites, any more than it should be promoting an atheist event." Maybe there's some inconsistency on the Left, but it does seem that atheists believe it to be OK for their events to be sponsored on public property. Atheists in Alabama are demanding state

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sponsorship for their protest of the National Day of Prayer, just yards from the Alabama judicial building where a monument of the Ten Commandments was ordered removed by a federal judge last summer. When the atheists sought access to indoor state facilities for their rally in case of rain, they went to Rep. Jay Love for sponsorship. Love refused, prompting Larry Darby of the Atheist Law Center to curse Love, accusing him of unfair treatment and calling him an "idiot." Some elected officials are going along with the wave of secularism. The city council of Belvidere, N.J., refused to pass a late April resolution in support of the National Day of Prayer after the town attorney and Mayor Charlie Liegel suggested that such a resolution would violate the separation of church and state. "I don't think government has the right to do something like this," said city council member Ben Ritter. Even a Catholic priest was quoted in a Florida newspaper in opposition to the National Day of Prayer. Father Phil Egitto of Our Lady of Lourdes Catholic Church in Daytona Beach, Fla., refuses to participate in his local National Day of Prayer celebration because he considers it "extremely offensive" to Jews, Muslims and other religious minorities. Egitto is disappointed that the National Day of Prayer looks more like a "fundamentalist rally" than a hippie love fest. But consider this Father Phil: The significant difference between the kumbaya sessions and interfaith vigils and atheist protests of the Religious Left and the Bible studies and prayer circles of the Religious Right is that our God is real. Barry Lynn's godless America doesn't stand a chance against one nation under God. Hans Zeiger is an Eagle Scout, president and founder of the Scout Honor Coalition, a student at Hillsdale College in Michigan, and author of a forthcoming book about the Boy Scouts in the culture war. His columns have been featured in the Seattle Times and other Internet websites.

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Nonbelievers hold own rally

Protest government endorsement of event By JENNIFER GISH Dispatch/Sunday News May 05, 2004 - 12:13:09 PM EST http://www.yorkdispatch.com/Stories/0,1413,138~10023~2129098,00.html If it were up to Steven Neubauer, the steps of the state Capitol would be empty tomorrow. There would not be a government-endorsed National Day of Prayer rally there, nor would there be the National Day of Reason counter-rally that his own Pennsylvania Nonbelievers Inc. plan for 1 p.m. on the same steps. But as long as people gather at the Capitol to pray, Neubauer said, his group will come together to say that elected officials should not be encouraging it. "It isn't up to the government to endorse these things," said Neubauer, an East Manchester Township resident and president of Pennsylvania Nonbelievers Inc., a 400-member group of atheists, agnostics and secular humanists. The group meets in York and Harrisburg and produces its own hourlong program called "The Freethought Forum," which appears monthly on York Community Access Television. Equal access: Congress established the National Day of Prayer in 1952, and in 1988 specified it be observed the first Thursday in May. Gov. Ed Rendell has issued a proclamation noting tomorrow is a National Day of Prayer but has refused Neubauer's request to also recognize the National Day of Reason. For a second year, Neubauer's group will conduct an hour-long rally to discuss the need for a greater separation between church and state and the power of human reason to overcome struggles. Lancaster County musician Dave Holt will lead the group in singing "This Land is Your Land" and John Lennon's "Imagine." The group also will recite the pre-1954 version of the Pledge of Allegiance, which does not mention God. Carl Silverman, a capital-area director for the Pennsylvania Nonbelievers, said he expects it to be a peaceful day. "We don't have anything against the Christians," Silverman said. "As long as we have equal access, we don't have any problem with that." -- Reach Jennifer Gish at jgish@yorkdispatch.com .

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ACLU warns La Mesa to stop religious invocations

http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/metro/20040505-1551-aclu.html 3:51 p.m. May 5, 2004 LA MESA The American Civil Liberties Union sent a warning letter to the La Mesa City Council today, urging the panel to discontinue invocations that include specific references to Christianity. The letter asks Mayor Art Madrid and members of the council to adopt a policy ensuring that future invocations are non-sectarian, according to the ACLU of San Diego and Imperial Counties. "A person's religious beliefs should not be a barrier to participating in government activities," said ACLU attorney Watson Branch. "When the council sends the clear message that Christianity is the preferred religion in La Mesa, it also sends the message that non-believers and people of other faiths are unwelcome outsiders." Madrid acknowledged the constitutional violation. "There was some definite sectarian prayers being expressed by one of our council members and another council member who was on the border," Madrid said. "This was in spite of the fact that for the past three years our city attorney has given us plenty of advice on the dangerous grounds we were treading." The ACLU said Councilwoman Ruth Sterling has used the name of Jesus Christ and other language unique to Christianity during the invocation prior to council meetings. According to the ACLU, Sterling has expressed her intention to continue despite the advice of the city attorney. Sterling was not immediately available for comment. The U.S. Supreme Court banned sectarian invocations prior to legislative meetings in 1989. "What we are really doing is mortgaging the future of this city when we get sued," Madrid said. If the city continues to allow sectarian invocations, the ACLU will "take appropriate steps to remedy the situation, which could include taking the matter to court," the civil rights organization stated. Madrid said he would support banning the invocation outright. "I would propose perhaps eliminating the invocation from future council meetings," he said. The matter will be discussed in closed session May 11, Madrid said. The conclusions from that meeting will be disclosed at a public meeting later that afternoon.

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Guided by God, or Guided by his Gonads?

By David Horowitz FrontPageMagazine.com | May 3, 2004 The Jesus Factor, which aired on Monday, is an hour documentary on the role that religion plays in the mind of President Bush. It was produced by the leftwing series Frontline for PBS, which has been a subsidiary of the Democratic Party since its creation nearly forty years ago. Predictably, The Jesus Factor was a not-so-subtle election year effort to scare the PBS audience into believing that the President is a religious fanatic, hostage to faith-driven and (therefore) mindless evangelicals. The Presidents thinking on the issue of war and peace, according to the producers, is guided not by his assessment of Americas enemies, but knee-jerk, delusional Christian beliefs. In this production, the featured critic of the Presidents God-talk on the war was the Reverend Jim Wallis, who explained that calling the enemy evil was bad theology and in effect un-Christian. Use of the term evil derived from precisely the kind of religious delusion that characterized Christian fanatics generally, becoming when it entered the vocabulary of a war President. To regard the war with Islamic jihad as a religious war was itself bad theology in Wallis view. The Frontline documentary failed to mention that Wallis is a liberation theologian (in other words, a Marxist) with a long history of support for Communist causes. The one good thing one could say about this documentary was that the spokesmen for the evangelicals were articulate and one of them did point out that refusing to recognize evil in this world is a hallmark of the political left. He was too gracious to add the reason for this, which is that the left has so often been (and in the war on terror so obviously is) itself in bed with evil. Watching the program I couldnt help thinking of Bill Clinton, a president guided not by his God, but by his gonads. I couldnt help remembering how fiercely the same liberals who made The Jesus Factor and who are positively phobic about Bushs Christian faith defended virtually to a man the most irresponsible human being ever to occupy the White House. While Clinton was setting his sights on confused and vulnerable female interns, Osama bin Laden and his fellow Islamic fanatics were actively carrying out their war against American citizens. In 1993, Islamic terrorists blew up the World Trade Center, an act which Clinton dismissed; in 1995 the mastermind of the World Trade Center bombing was captured in the Philippines with plans to blow up eleven airliners and fly a plane into the headquarters of the CIA, a fact which Clinton disregarded as he let Osama bin Laden slip through his heands; in 1996 an American military barracks was blown up by al-Qaeda in Saudi Arabia, while Clinton did nothing. Through eight years of terrorist attacks, Clinton focused on himself rather than on the nations security. In 1998 two American embassies were blown up in Africa, an act of war. Clinton was too preoccupied focus on the implications. He was preparing his appearance before a grand jury and designing the lies he would tell to cover up the lies he had told for the previous eight months, choosing to paralyze the office of the commander-in-chief rather than own up to what he had done and be accountable for his acts. A man who has no moral conviction, who cant hold himself accountable for what he has done, can hardly be expected to hold the murderers of innocents accountable for their deeds either. Yet PBS liberals everywhere have no problem with that. Nor do they seem to have a significant problem with the actual religious fanatics who blow up innocents believing that Allah will reward them with 72 virgins when they get to heaven. To focus attention on their religion would be bigotry and racial profiling. But liberals do have a big problem with decent, law-abiding American Christians, and their problem judging from The Jesus Factor -- is evidently their religious faith. They do have a problem with a President whose personal faith has focused him on his responsibility to protect us and who has in fact protected us from terror 116

attacks for more than two and a half years. Watching The Jesus Factor on PBS I could only think: God bless George Bush, a man responsible to the millions of people all over the world whose fates have been entrusted to him, and whose faith reminds him that he is accountable to them all. God help liberal bigots who have no faith but themselves and whose prejudice and hatred is reserved for those who defend them.

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Homosexual leader vows to 'torture' opponents

Has plans to 'go in and terrify' officials who oppose 'gay' agenda Posted: April 30, 2004 1:00 a.m. Eastern 2004 WorldNetDaily.com The head of a national homosexual organization is vowing to politically "punish," "terrify" and "torture" activists who oppose his organization's agenda on "gay" rights which he says would give him "endless satisfaction." Matt Foreman, executive director of the National Gay & Lesbian Task Force in Washington, D.C., made the comments in yesterday's edition of Between the Lines, a Detroit area homosexual newsmagazine, the American Family Association of Michigan points out. In addition to declaring his desire for retribution against "local legislators and leaders" who oppose the homosexual agenda, Foreman expressed a goal beyond securing legal same-sex marriage, that is gaining other means besides marriage by which homosexuals could access public and private financial benefits. Foreman told the interviewer of his plans to go after his opponents. "I'm | interested in going after, politically, local legislators and leaders that have launched these anti-gay initiatives," he explained. "'We beat you, now we're gonna go back and we're going to affirmatively punish you' people who launch this stuff, so that they understand not only that they're not going to win, but that there are consequences to it. "We would set up a [political action committee] and go in and terrify them with a credible challenge. ... So we go in, for a modest investment of money and torture these people, which would give me endless satisfaction. And the word would go out very quickly, 'You know what, this really isn't worth it.'" Foreman was asked: "Is getting the right to marriage for same-sex couples something the Task Force is interested in?" He responded: "We want full equality under the law, which, right now, means the freedom to marry. But we're also hopeful that we create different ways in which people can form relationships and families that don't come with all the baggage and the downsides of marriage. One of the great things about where we're going is that we are creating new ways for people to relate, new ways for people to obtain rights and benefits." According to Between the Lines, Foreman is scheduled to be the keynote speaker at the annual Triangle Foundation Dinner on May 2 in Detroit.

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112 Killed in South Thailand Gunbattles

Email this Story Apr 28, 9:29 AM (ET) http://apnews.myway.com/article/20040428/D827R3LO0.html By ALISA TANG (AP) Thai-Muslim villagers run away from an unexploded bomb Thai soldiers found at Krue Se mosque in... Full Image Police gunned down machete-wielding militants who stormed security outposts in Thailand's Muslim-dominated south Wednesday, killing at least 112 people in one of the bloodiest days in the Southeast Asian kingdom. The attackers were mostly teenagers - some wearing red head bands - and were intent on stealing weapons. They were poorly armed and apparently unaware that police had been tipped off in advance and were lying in wait for them. The eight hours of mayhem ended when police fired tear gas and rocket-propelled grenades into a mosque, killing 32 militants who, witnesses said, were sheltering inside after running away from an earlier battle. "Maybe the insurgents underestimated the preparedness of security forces. They used machetes to steal guns and when we fought back they suffered big losses," Yala Gov. Boonyasit Suwanarat said. (AP) Scores of teenage militants armed with little more than machetes attacked security outposts across... Full Image It was the worst violence in a region that has seen dozens of people killed in near-daily attacks this year. The government has blamed Islamic separatists seeking for decades to carve out a homeland in the Muslim-majority south of this predominantly Buddhist country. Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra said the killings would halt the simmering separatist struggle in the Muslim-dominated south. "After this, it will be hard for them to do these kind of bad things again," Thaksin said. The raids were linked to a Jan. 4 attack on a military camp in the nearby province of Narathiwat, which triggered an upsurge of violence in the area this year, Thaksin said. Four soldiers were killed and hundreds of guns stolen in that raid. "The masterminds of this movement were in such high spirits after they raided the army camp, and they believed that they could do it again. But they were wrong," Thaksin said. (AP) A Thai soldier walks under the broken roof of a building behind Krue Se mosque in Pattani province,... Full Image He denied the attackers had connections to international terrorists, saying "most of the insurgents are youths from the southern provinces." The attacks began before dawn, when insurgents stormed more than 15 police bases, village defense posts and district offices in a bid to steal weapons, said Lt. Gen. Proong Bunphandung, the chief of police for the south.

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However, security forces had been tipped off and were waiting for the assailants, most of whom carried only machetes, Proong said. Television news reports showed the bodies of insurgents lying in pools of blood, some of them in front of police stations clasping machetes and wearing camouflage. Gunfire could be heard in the background as armored personnel carriers drove down deserted village streets and commandos ran through the forest. Policemen and soldiers, carrying automatic rifles, ran across streets and ditches. Army chief Gen. Chaiyasith Shinawatra said 107 insurgents were killed and 17 were arrested. He said three policemen and two soldiers also were killed. No group claimed responsibility for the highly coordinated assault. Nimu Magajae, deputy chairman of Yala Islamic Council, said he was told the attackers were drug addicts. "This is the first time in my life that I have seen so many Muslim youths killed in one day. But if they were drug addicts we do not regard them as religious followers," he told The Associated Press. Nimu demanded that authorities hand over the dead so they could be buried within 24 hours, in line with Islamic custom. Many parts of the region have been under martial law for months. Security was tightened Wednesday along the border with neighboring Malaysia, which in the past has denied allegations of harboring militants. Thaksin said the attackers arrived at the target point with brand new motorcycles, which he said proved they were funded by "influential figures, including politicians and drug gangsters." Muslims have long complained of discrimination in jobs and education in Pattani, Yala and Narathiwat - Thailand's only Muslim majority provinces. They also say their culture and language are being subjugated by the Buddhist Thais, and cite as an example the state schools, which teach in Thai language. Muslims in the south speak Yawi, a dialect of Malay, spoken in neighboring Malaysia. The alienation caused by the central government's policies has been the source of a decades-old separatist struggle, which subsided after an amnesty in the late 1980s before exploding with the army arsenal raid in January. The military also crushed pro-democracy uprisings in 1973, 1976 and 1991, killing dozens.

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Sudanese Boy "Crucified"

Newsmax, Apr. 28, 2004 Damare, a small Sudanese boy was taken as a slave and forced to tend camels after his village was attacked by radical Muslims. One day Damare, who had been raised in a Christian home, snuck away from his master to attend a church service. When he returned, his Muslim master was waiting for him and accused of committing a deadly act, "meeting with infidels." The master then dragged Damare into a field where he nailed his feet and knees into a large board while the boy cried out in agony. Damare was miraculously rescued and has told The Voice of the Martyrs that just as Jesus was nailed and forgave, he forgives also. What bold faith from a simple Sudanese boy! If you want to know what's really going on in over 40 countries where Christians are facing persecution, subscribe to The Voice of the Martyrs FREE monthly newsletter. This award-wining newsletter is sure to inspire and challenge like no other. Click here to subscribe now. Update The boy in the article above, Damare, has now received some assistance from workers with The Voice of the Martyrs. His wounds are still open and additional medical attention as well as some rehabilitation is still needed. (VOM is looking into further assistance.) Damare is not alone in the persecution he has endured. The Muslim government of Khartoum in the North has declared a jihad, or holy war, against the mostly Christian South. Omar Hassan alTurabi, an Islamic leader, has stated that anyone who opposes Islam has no future. Since 1985, approximately two million have perished due to the genocide. Families in the South are terrorizedfathers killed, mothers raped, and children sold into slavery. Yet in the midst of these atrocities, the Christians in Sudan remains strong, worshiping their Savior and leading others to Him. Thankfully, in recent months the onslaughts have begun to subside and peace talks are on the table. For nearly 10 years The Voice of the Martyrs has been active in Sudan delivery Bibles, medical supplies, refugee kits, and developed a Blankets of Love campaign allowing families in the USA to send good used blankets to families in south Sudan. Since the program initiated, nearly 250,000 have been delivered. Want to stay informed? If you are not currently receiving The Voice of the Martyrs monthly newsletter, you may request a free subscription. Each month you will learn about Christians like Damare in over 40 restricted nations who stand strong in the face of persecution and often inspire our own faith. You will also learn practical ways you can get involved. Click here for your FREE subscription to The Voice of the Martyrs monthly newsletter.

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Christians defend faith from 'The Da Vinci Code'

THE NEW YORK TIMES April 27,2004 Fearing that the best-selling novel "The Da Vinci Code" may be sowing doubt about basic Christian beliefs, a host of Christian churches, clergy members and Bible scholars are rushing to rebut it. In the past 13 months, readers have bought more than 6 million copies of the book, a historical thriller that claims Christianity was founded on a cover-up - that the church has conspired for centuries to hide evidence that Jesus was a mere mortal, married Mary Magdalene and had children whose descendants now live in France. Word that director Ron Howard is making a movie based on the book has only intensified the critics' urgency. More than 10 books are being released, most in April and May, with titles that promise to break, crack, unlock or decode "The Da Vinci Code." Churches are offering pamphlets and study guides for readers who may have been prompted by the novel to question their faith. Large audiences are showing up for "The Da Vinci Code" lectures and sermons. "Because this book is such a direct attack against the foundation of the Christian faith, it's important that we speak out," said the Rev. Erwin W. Lutzer, author of "The Da Vinci Deception" and senior pastor of Moody Church in Chicago, an influential evangelical pulpit. "I don't think it's just an innocent novel with a fascinating plot," said James L. Garlow, co-author of "Cracking Da Vinci's Code" and pastor of Skyline Wesleyan Church in San Diego. "I think it's out there to win people over to an incorrect and historically inaccurate view, and it's succeeding. People are buying into the notion that Jesus is not divine, he is not the son of God." Among "The Da Vinci Code" critics are evangelical Protestants and Roman Catholics who regard the novel, which is laced with passages celebrating feminism, anti-clericalism and pagan forms of worship, as another infiltration by liberal cultural warriors. They also say the book exploits public distrust of the Catholic Church in the aftermath of the clergy sexual abuse scandal. The debunking books range from large scholarly hardcovers to slim study guides. Among the publishers are well-known Christian houses like Tyndale and Thomas Nelson, as well as lessfamiliar outfits. Since most of the books have either appeared in stores very recently or have not yet been published, it is too early to say how they are selling. The critics and their publishers are also hoping to surf the wave of success of "The Da Vinci Code," which has been at the top of The New York Times hardcover fiction bestseller list for 56 weeks. There are 7.2 million copies of the book, published by Doubleday, now in print. Of the 10 new Da Vinci-related books, eight are by Christian publishers. One evangelical Christian publisher, Tyndale House, which hit gold with the "Left Behind" books, is about to issue not one but two titles rebutting "The Da Vinci Code." Dan Brown, the former schoolteacher who wrote "The Da Vinci Code," is declining all interview requests, his publisher says, because he is at work on his next book. But Brown says on his Web site that he welcomes the scholarly debates over his book. He says that while it is a work of fiction, "it is my own personal belief that the theories discussed by these characters have merit." The plot of "The Da Vinci Code" is a twist on the ancient search for the Holy Grail. Robert Langdon, portrayed as a brilliant Harvard professor of "symbology," and Sophie Neveu, a gorgeous Parisian police cryptographer, team up to decipher a trail of clues left behind by the murdered curator at the Louvre, who turns out to be Neveu's grandfather. The pair discover that the grandfather had inherited Leonardo da Vinci's mantle as the head of a

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secret society. The society guards the Holy Grail, which is not a chalice, but is instead the proof of Jesus and Mary Magdalene's conjugal relationship; Langdon and Neveu must race the killer to find it. Along the way they learn that the church has suppressed 80 early gospels that denied the divinity of Jesus, elevated Mary Magdalene to a leader among the apostles and celebrated the worship of female wisdom and sexuality. The book portrays Opus Dei, a conservative worldwide network of Catholic priests and laity, as a sinister and sadistic sect. In the book, an albino Opus Dei monk assassinates four people who guard the secret about the union of Jesus and Mary Magdalene. The real Opus Dei has posted a lengthy response to "The Da Vinci Code" on its Web site, warning, "It would be irresponsible to form any opinion of Opus Dei based on reading 'The Da Vinci Code."' Contact the Omaha World-Herald newsroom

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Not Norman's Psycho

Edmund Cohen's Psychological Conspiracy Theory of Christian Origins James Patrick Holding http://www.tektonics.org/JPH_NNP.html [Introduction] [Calvinism vs. Arminianism] [Is the Bible Anti-Intellectual?] [The Good Samaritan Parable] [Seven Psychological Devices] [Conclusion] "What is the proper answer to the assertion that two and two make four?" "The proper answer is, 'You only say that because you are a mathematician.' " - loosely paraphrased from memory from C. S. Lewis, The Pilgrim's Regress One of my favorite entertainments is reading attempts by skeptics and critics of Christianity to "psychoanalyze" Christians and explain their belief by way of supposing that some mental and/or psychological and/or emotional deficiency lies behind their conversion. I find these entertaining because they invariably never apply to me. This is not to say that some people have not become Christians because of fear, emotion, etc. playing some role (or at least seeming to, by way of correspondence with such things; we may argue that the Holy Spirit uses such things to move people to repentance). But there is also no denying that some people become skeptics, New Agers, etc. for the same reason. I think we have given enough examples on this page of people who think they came to their beliefs rationally but obviously, by virtue of their demonstrated incapacity to think clearly, did not. The point is that psychologizations of belief, of any kind of belief, are merely a type of genetic fallacy. How someone comes to believe something is less important than whether or not what they believe is true. With that in mind, I have pursued this analysis of one such enormous example of the genetic fallacy in practice, in the place of Edmund D. Cohen's The Mind of the Bible Believer (Prometheus Books: 1986). Note well the publication date. Cohen's book was written at the height of the Reagan era, in the days of yore when Pat Robertson ran for President (and incidentally, his most fervent supporter whom I knew personally was a Republican who was also a staunch atheist), when televangelists with slicked-back hair were all the rage and the butt of jokes, when the likes of Margaret Atwood and Molly Ivins inspired fearmongering of their own with visions of "fundamentalists" spearheading a political coup that would send us spiralling back to the Stone Age when men dragged women around by the hair after knocking them senseless with clubs. It is quite clear that Cohen is one of those sorts who was part of the Reagan backlash; but such things as he says that have to do with politics we will not address here. What is more important to us here is Cohen's religious views. In that regard, he confesses to have progressed from non-interested Judaism to liberal Christianity to evangelical Christianity to apostasy. At the same time he has also hopped professions, from psychologist to psychiatrist to attorney. No settled mass is this writer. Nor is he unlearned, except (no surprise here, in spite of a year he spent taking classes at Westminster Theological Seminary [377]) in the important area of Biblical exegesis and analysis; his only sources in a very short section on the historical background of Christianity are four books by Hugh Schonfield, three books on Gnosticism (where he uncritically accepts the Pagels "maybe the Gnostics were real Christians" line), and a couple of general-history books. Beyond that, he considers Harold Camping to be "the most intellectually competent and honest Bible expositor" [370] he knows of -- which, with due respect to Camping, frankly tells us little other than that Cohen's scholarship level is rather low! What Cohen presents as his thesis, correspondingly, is not surprising, while incredible to accept: that the Bible "is a psychological document" put together by "brilliant men", of whose work, he says, "the psychological acumen and artfulness with which (the NT) was done is unsurpassed." [4] The Bible, then, is "history's most successful psychological manipulation", a work of "superb craftsmanship", "achieving with uncanny facility what

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motivational researchers and psychological warfare experts of our day have only dreamed of." [7] In case you missed it, read it again. Cohen is arguing that the NT was in essence a massive psychological conspiracy. In fact he avers this directly, alleging that NT Christianity was "deliberately contrived and field-tested over a few eventful decades" [7] before reaching final form. "It must have been through experience that the Bible authors learned just what combination of terrifying threats, illusory promises, arcane symbolism, and double talk would best manipulate the people and manage the cult." [138] How this conspiracy was plotted and planned among so many people over a given time period; why their failures did not catch up to them while they were building "experience" in such a tenuous and difficult enterprise; what benefit they derived from this conspiracy, is never explained. Not that it needs to be: The notion is of course absurd on its face. But where does Cohen, a man who clearly has retained no Biblical education beyond Sunday School level in spite of that seminary down time, get this from in the first place? I will close this introduction with my own "psychologization" by way of possible ("conveniently nondisprovable", as Cohen puts it) explanation. Cohen admits to having been one of the faithful, but is now clearly ashamed of having been "taken in". He speaks of a time when he heard a speech by Francis Schaeffer: "For the duration of that long, lost weekend I spent under Evangelical mindcontrol, my normal critical faculties were kaput." [11] It's not my fault I was a believer; I was under mind-control, that's the ticket. Add to this a dash of grandiose delusion: Cohen states, for example, that he hopes his book will make him the next Feuerbach. (No hint of Cohen's name in lights yet after all these years, though.) What do we have? We have someone who considers himself to be of above-average intelligence, and may well be; yet how will he then explain that he was "taken in" by Christian faith without looking extremely un-intelligent? Cohen's out is to claim that he was duped by men even smarter than he was; so smart that they have fooled us all for almost two millennia. Who can fault Cohen for being deceived by such clever monsters as the Galileean fishermen? It's an ideal way to both have your cake and maintain your integrity at the same time. I am being facetious here, of course. Cohen was not fooled by anyone, other than perhaps himself. Nor was there any great psycho-conspiracy, although Cohen will attempt with great straining effort to find it hidden in the Bible's pages, to find "manipulative biblical misstatements about human psychology" [139] under every rock, for he supposes that his very integrity rests upon proving that this is so, to show that it was not his fault he was duped by such masterful, mind-mashing orchestrators. Let us now move forward and look at some of these attempts to turn the authors of the NT into fantastic psycho-manipulators. | Calvin vs. Arminius on WWF One of Cohen's central hinge points is the assertion that the Bible unquestionably teaches the doctrines that match with today's Calvinism; from this conclusion he draws many others, so that an examination of this foundational element will address many further woes. I will begin by noting that my own study in this matter of Calvinism vs. Arminianism is here. Cohen thinks he has the job done (where hundreds of years of scholarly interchange has not), and how has he done this? He tells us that he has "carefully read the New Testament" [19] and figured out which verses support the Calvinist position only, and which support the Arminian position only. (That there might be some truth between these two extremes is not even thought of.) His conclusion: There are 133 verses in favor of Calvinism, and only 23 in favor of the Arminians. Not that we are told how he came to this conclusion for each verse. (The resulting contradictions, even within a few verses of each other, Cohen explains as "essential to the psychological effect." [20]) He does offer a footnote listing the verses, and quite frankly, the best response to many is, "Huh?" One is hard-pressed to see how verses like Matthew 2:6, 10:5-6, and 11:25, 27 support Calvinism. |

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Check Your Intellect Here In a section titled "What the Bible Really Teaches About Social Issues", we might expect to find a rundown of teachings, but don't hold your breath. One of the few topics actually addressed here is slavery. As usual let me refer the reader to Glenn Miller's excellent article on that subject before continuing by asking whether Cohen is even aware at all of the important social and cultural differences between slavery then and that in our own sordid history. Is he? It's hard to tell. He notes that some churches explain "offensive" passages (such as those which do not condemn slavery, but implicitly accept it as status quo) as "simply reflecting the prejudices of the times and localities" of the Bible authors. [53] So far, half good: One must indeed understand the text in context, and draw thereby appropriate lessons for today. But next does Cohen take a wrong turn: Such effort to understand is not correct, but is rather a method of "picking and choosing" in order to render offensive passages innocuous! Lest there be any doubt, Cohen affirms that an operative principle of interpretation is to take the Bible as it is in its entirety, "and to the exclusion of other sources." [57] (!) Hello, is Dennis McKinsey there? This is far, FAR from how the Bible should be understood, and I think that Cohen fails to realize that if this is true, then we are not even permitted to use our dictionary to check the meaning of Biblical words -- much less a Strong's concordance! And yet, Cohen supposes that the NT does indeed teach this sort of vague "anti-intellectual" interpretive scheme. How so? Let's take a close look at his analysis of the Bible in this regard, for it will serve to undermine a cornerstone of his case. Cohen asserts [57] that the Bible teaches that the understanding of Scripture "is clearly declared to transcend reason, and the believer is put on notice that if his views on the Scriptures are too clear and pat, or are not mystifying enough, he runs the risk of being a false teacher." By now you may wonder what Bible Cohen finds this in; as it happens he offers four citations. 1. 1 Cor. 2:12-14. I need not quote these verses, because I have dealt with them before. These verses are in the midst of a passage that have to do not with reason or transcending it, but with rhetorical ability and its supposed relation (in that social context) to spiritual power. Read without context as Cohen would have us do, they may be seen as in opposition to critical thinking, but with context, such an interpretation is a flight of fancy. 2. 1 Cor. 13:9-10, 12 "For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when perfection comes, the imperfect disappears...Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known." -- If there is any proof needed that Cohen is context-impaired, this will serve well enough. The whole of 1 Cor. 13 is devoted not to reason, but to love, and in context these verses (which are probably part of a Christian hymnal selection) express direction for behavior and attitude, and offer a commentary upon the inscrutable nature of love itself -- which I daresay Cohen might suppose to be explicable by chemical reactions, but that's another story! Bottom line: These verses have nothing to do with discernment of the Scriptures by the intellect. 3. 2 Thess. 2:11. "For this reason God sends them a powerful delusion so that they will believe the lie" -- This verse is apparently interpreted as supporting the Calvinist notion that grace is irresistible to the elect; that the intellect cannot comprehend Scripture, and that "God takes full responsibility for the inability of the nonelect to understand them." [57] Once again context helps: Paul refers here to a specific future-historical moment at a time after people have clearly rejected Christ. This verse cannot be used as an interpretive key for the overall picture...much less does it say anything about the intellect. 4. Rom. 14:23 "But the man who has doubts is condemned if he eats, because his eating is not from faith; and everything that does not come from faith is sin." -- Cohen interprets this as saying that "the Scriptures put in the category of sin everything that is not part of the religious program" - including, he supposes, intellectual exercise. How much more context-impaired can Cohen get?

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Romans 14 is concerned with the moral debate over whether or not Christians can eat idol meat sold in the market, and matters of conscience in your behavior before fellow believers --- moral, personal, interactional and theological issues that hardly commend themselves to detailed and straightforward intellectual analysis of the sort Cohen has in mind. True, some have "universalized" this advice from Paul in principle (Augustine was the first), but then again, the latter part of the verse has the structure of a maxim, not absolute advice. Whatever the case, the chapter has nothing to do with rejection or acceptance of the intellect at all. (And we are not even getting into the thorny problem of having "faith" in one's own God-given intellect, or the potential corruption, incapacity, or bypassing of the intellect -- nor, for that matter, the interrelation of intellect and will, especially as seen by the ancients. Cohen's presentation would gain a lot more credibility if he understood this aspect!) We see then that Cohen has no grounds for finding an anti-intellectual undercurrent in the Scriptures. They are the product of his own imagination. True, the NT writers make no clear appeal to their readers to "reason it out" directly, but to demand this in any context of the NT writings is itself unreasonable. The presentation of "reasons to believe" would have been made long before in the context of missionary preaching (see Acts), not this long afterwards in Paul's "problem" letters. | Samaritan Shenanigans We move now to an example of Cohen's manifest incompetence in the field of biblical exegesis: His interpretation of the parable of the Good Samaritan. Commentators have widely recognized this parable as illustrating Jesus' teaching that all men are to become our "neighbor"; Cohen, however, smells conspiracy. Here is his own exegesis of the parable: That (the Samaritan) is "half-dead," when salvation is consistently symbolized by bringing to life one who is fully dead, may well indicate the robbery victim to be one of the elect... The Samaritan goes into debt, for the ministry to the robbery victim to be carried on in his absence, imitating the redemptive atonement and identifying Jesus as the Samaritan. Otherwise, we are left to infer that going into debt for charitable purposes is morally better than paying cash for them, that philanthropies are more godly if put on the American Express card. Needless to say, such wildly irresponsible exegesis is supported neither by the text nor by any socially- and historically-informed commentator, and is more in line with McPherson's interpretation of the vision of the elders of Israel as "God" riding in a helicopter. The "half-dead" description is just that; it is not "fully dead" at all and can not be seen as some veiled reference to salvation. If this is what it is, what do the thieves represent? Wasn't the man alive ("saved") before being beaten and robbed? At the same time, the Samaritan does not go into debt; he leaves money behind and indicates that he will pay more, if it was needed, when he returns, and there is no way to derive lessons relative to anachronistic methods of charity and financial exchange from this passage. At any rate, if this is meant to be Jesus, what does the money left behind represent, and if this is the atonement, why and how is any possible "debt" paid after the return? And who is the owner of the inn supposed to be? The Ferengi Grand Exchequer? Cohen continues by commenting that the scribe "never gets a straight answer from Jesus. A politician or used-car salesman should envy the adroitness of his evasion." [60] It is strange how generations of scholars have managed, in spite of this "evasion," to derive the lesson we have noted previously; and how only now Cohen has seen the light. The answer is of course quite clear, albeit couched in typical rabbinic format, in which answers were often given in the form of asking questions. (I believe that Cohen is aware of this, but does not care: He rather chauvinistically refers to the "oriental mind-game of sorting out the passages". [61] I gather that Socrates and Confucius would be accused of psycho-manipulation under Cohen's rubric as well.)

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So what is going on here? Cohen's purpose in manipulating this parable is quite simple: He wishes to use it to claim that the Bible teaches that ministry is "meant to be of ultimate benefit only to the elect." [61] Having failed to derive this reading by normal means, our subject resorts to strained analogy. It isn't taken from the text; but it finds its source elsewhere: Cohen tells us also: "Speaking from personal experience, intense Bible study does tend to wean believers away from concern with charitable works." (!) Personal experience? Does this belong here? No more so than it did when Dan Barker told us that he "remembered" his church passing around plastic feed-the-hungry loafs and he compared it to the work of upper-level charitable organizations. | Seven Deadly Devices? Much of Cohen's book is devoted to explaining seven psychological "devices" used by Evangelical Christianity to draw in the unwary. In a few cases we find that Cohen makes a good point: The first device, "The Benign Attractive Persona of the Bible" [171ff] refers to the "colossal bait-andswitch sales pitch" used by ministers who use the Bible in ways that do not fit the context -- here, Cohen hints at the "health and wealth" sort of preachers, but I am not sure what else he intends, and needless to say, he says nothing about critical-historical readings of the Biblical texts. The second device, "Discrediting the World", is simply a case of an immensely begged question: Cohen condemns the "us vs. them" attitude inherent in Christian belief -- though of course, if Christianity is true, then the "attitude" has something genuine behind it! (In this section he also complains of potential converts being regarded as merely "objects of evangelism" -- totally ignoring commands and historical patterns that require discipleship. Cohen is perhaps reading too much of today's "get 'em out" pseudo-crusades into the Biblical text.) It is with the third device, "Logocide", that things get into some detail. Here Cohen accuses Christians of misusing Biblical texts, and the Biblical authors of intentionally using "crossed meanings and contrived ambiguities" [185] to confuse and control their readers (the "psychoconspiracy"). Surprisingly enough Cohen realizes that there are some genuine literary devices, like hyperbole and emphasizing paradox (twinged as they are with Eastern flavor) that fall into this category but are not of the nature of his "manipulations" at all; what is also surprising is that he fails to recognize many other similar instances and decrees them to be manipulations. He supposes rather that NT writers committed "logocide" by making sure that a new convert was "weaned away from the ordinary meaning" of a given term and switched to the newer, deeper, more "manipulative" meaning. This obviously requires that most Christians be particularly dense, and Cohen has no trouble asserting this, and calling upon his own experience (again!) as proof [184]: Every deeply indoctrinated believer I have known has shared the experience of finding the Bible hard to read, with passages studied many times before seeming unfamiliar and surprising...The believer ascribes this quality, which distinguishes the Bible from other writings in ancient languages, to the process of understanding coming through the intervention of the Holy Spirit, qualitatively unlike the way earthly ideas are understood. Well, perhaps that was Cohen's problem, and that of others. I find very, very few Bible passages hard to read, unfamiliar, etc. -- and what few I do find difficult (I have found none to be "unfamiliar"), I ascribe to simply not knowing enough about the social, literary, historical, etc. context: We have not yet discovered the Rosetta Stone for some passages, and may never do so. That's how it is often with a text out of time we men have failed to keep up with. Other than that, where does Cohen suppose he has found examples of "logocide"? A chief and featured example relates to the use of the words "life" and "death" in the NT. In addition to the "normal" (physical) meanings of these words, Cohen accuses the NT writers of creating "new, alternate meanings" [198] related to the spiritual (which Cohen signifies in his text by adding a hash mark ['] after the "original word"). So, it is supposed, the missionaries preached

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about "life" and "death", and people converted on that basis; but: "Little did the believer know when he was first recruited that the Christians were talking about eternal life', not eternal life." Of course Strong's already tells us that the word here for life, zoe, carries both a figurative and literal sense; but even so, I find this claim of conspiratorial term-switching rather puzzling. Cohen is apparently suggesting that Christian missionaries went around preaching "eternal life" without telling anyone that they did not mean physical, earthly immortality, and only later, after a convert had been "caught", was it explained that "eternal life" was spiritual in nature and involved immortality only in the sense that there was a hereafter. All right -- so where is the proof that the converts were not aware of the supposed difference in the term from the very beginning? Doesn't "life" today also have a dual meaning -- that both of physical "life" and of a more ethereal, perhaps spiritual "life"? If I walk up to you today and say, "Try Hare Krishna and learn how to live life!" does that imply that you were walking around physically dead like some sort of zombie prior to now? Cohen apparently fails to perceive that this dual meaning of "life" was in fact nothing new at all. It appears in Genesis 3 in regards to the way Adam and Eve "died" (Later [262], he cites this very passage, but explains it away by saying that "God already had [the alternate meaning] in mind."[!] Looks like the psycho-conspiracy was at work even in the Garden!), and there is no indication anywhere in the NT or in recorded history that the church purposely confused these terms to win converts. If they did, why is there no indication that some dropped out when they found out that "life" did not mean physical immortality, as some surely would have? This is an argument from silence, but it is a significant one, because such easily falsified claims would have been incredible fodder for the likes of Celsus. Not that it matters, since here Cohen offers the original silence argument in the first place. Perhaps he, the brilliant one, was confused by these terms, but there is no evidence that any of the early converts were -- and neither was I. Another instance involves the Christian keyword agape. Cohen tells us that this word is "unknown prior to New Testament times and was apparently invented for it." [205] It is not love at all, he says, but "a very strict and obsessive species of self-discipline." [206] The claim is a larger part of Cohen's overall argument (later made in Device 5) that Christian belief requires having "psychologically inauthentic, false and maladaptive" attitude [293] in which one, for example, denies one's true feelings (especially anger), so that the Christian is "full of bottled up tensions induced by the hobbling Christian constraints" [300] of keeping one's feelings in check. In this case, it is said, "Being out of touch with one's feelings and emotions will prove to be a prerequisite of agape." The reader may wonder where and how Cohen reached these foolish conclusions. I cannot be certain, but perhaps they are derived from a very poor reading of Cohen's one useful source in the matter: William Barclay's New Testament Words. Cohen uses an extensive quote from page 21 of that book explaining that agape is an act of the will. Barclay also reports that agape is indeed not found -- in the form of a noun -- in any of the classical works of literature of the period [18]. It is found in a noun form in the LXX (where it is used 14 times, oddly enough, of sexual love in Jeremiah, and twice in Ecclesiastes as an antonym for "hatred"); in Jewish wisdom literature to refer to the love of God and the love of wisdom; in the Letter of Aristeas it is described as a gift of God; in Philo it is linked to the word "fear" (phobos) as a kindred feeling, both of which characterize one's attitude towards God. The verb form of our word, agapan, is however found in classical literature. It is used to describe great affection, the love of money or jewels, affection towards a lap-dog -- and it clearly does not involve the type of "warmth" that another word, phileon, involves. It is, as Barclay describes it (but as Cohen apparently ignored for his purposes) a type of affectionate gratitude -- not an emotion, but an act of will, as Cohen does acknowledge. Here is a classical use of both words that Barclay cites: You loved (phileon) him as a father, and you held him in regard (agapan) as a benefactor.

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But in fact Cohen's incompetence goes further. He is, and has been, applying modern, Westerm psychological categories to the Bible, and he is quite far off to start because whereas our culture is centered on the individual, ancient Biblical society (and 70% of societies today) are group-centered. What is good for the group is what is paramount. Hence when the NT speaks of agape it refers to the "value of group attachment and group bonding" [Malina and Neyrey, Portraits of Paul, 196] and can have nothing to do with self-discipline -- which is also a concept foreign to a grouporiented society, in which behavior was controlled by groupo relations and honor and shame rewards and sanctions -- not by individualized and internalized norms. The bottom line here is that Cohen is far off base (and also reveals himself as a very poor reader and researcher) when he thinks that Christians "invented" the term agape and that he can apply modern psychological categories to the Bible. I want to stress this, because it seems to me to be a key point in his entire case. If the Christians did not invent the word, then he can hardly say that it is part of their whole-cloth conspiracy. Nor can he claim it to be merely a form of obsessive selfdiscipline: This may indeed be how Cohen understood the matter as an alleged believer, but it seems fairly clear that he is anachronistically applying modern psychological categories to the NT text -- as well as making an overall generalization that whatever we feel to express is good to do! Even so: When the believer is told to "repress" (or "put off") things like anger, malfeasance, etc. there is no indication of the need for outright suppression and hypocrisy -- that could hardly be the case, first because no such psycho-categories existed at the time; second and mainly because that would amount to the sin of hypocrisy, which is condemned as well! Nor would such "suppression" eliminate sin in one's heart as Jesus advises. Rather -- to use anger as an example -- one is told (in this and other contexts) to recognize one's place and one's brother as one whom Christ died for. Those who do this cannot logically remain angry with their brother; if they do remain angry, they do sin, and they do not "answer the argument" -- they persist in being irrational, which is an act of the will. "Suppression" of ill will and "emotion" is done by logical extension, not by self-coercion, and I hardly think Cohen can find fault with that; or else most behavioral modification psychology is out the window! (In that sense, one might compare agape today to a form of respect.) Bottom line: Cohen has badly misunderstood what agape is and how it works -- and has probably foisted his own personal, confused experiences upon the interpretation. The fourth of Cohen's devices, "Assaulting Integrity", involves "inducing the believer, for the sake of obedience, to affirm teachings that are inherently incredible, not germane to, and in discord with, the rest of the Bible" [240-1] thus forcing the believer to violate his conscience when he/she "stifles the still, soft inner apprehension he has that he is doing something shameful." [241] A self-portrait by Cohen, perhaps, but due entirely to his own tendency to read into passages things that simply are not there. Thus, for example, what he calls the "most extreme integrityassaulting passage" in the NT, Luke 18:1-8 -Then Jesus told his disciples a parable to show them that they should always pray and not give up. He said: "In a certain town there was a judge who neither feared God nor cared about men. And there was a widow in that town who kept coming to him with the plea, 'Grant me justice against my adversary.' "For some time he refused. But finally he said to himself, 'Even though I don't fear God or care about men, yet because this widow keeps bothering me, I will see that she gets justice, so that she won't eventually wear me out with her coming!'" And the Lord said, "Listen to what the unjust judge says. And will not God bring about justice for his chosen ones, who cry out to him day and night? Will he keep putting them off? I tell you, he will see that they get justice, and quickly. However, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on the earth?" Here, we are told, "God is likened to a wicked judge, who is lazy or infirm, and tires easily. The believer is exhorted to pray for completely selfish reasons." [241] Let us reply in unison: "Huh??" Such an interpretation is completely off the beam. The point - made in typical rabbinic "how much more" fashion (v. 7 -- that is, if the lesser case is valid, then the greater one must be valid also) -- is

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that if this is what even the most wicked judge will do for the most annoying petitioner, how much more will God take care of His own whom he loves and who have trusted Him? But this escapes Cohen completely, and that is why he thinks that "the believer's critical mind must be shut off for him not to wonder why his general notions about the perfection and faithfulness of God, and the selflessness the believer is to strive for, are stood on their head." [241] Nay: One must turn the historical-critical mind on, Mr. Cohen, and recognize the parable in its context. Other than this, Cohen furthers his conspiratorial speculations by supposing that such "integrity assaulting" passages were used "as a test of candidates for inner circle membership, on whom one would have to depend not to betray those circles to the persecuting authorities." [ibid.] Of another passage into which he reads "defensiveness" about the lack of a Second Coming, he says: "If the novice receiving instruction in the passage showed no sign of caviling at its incongruency but instead dropped unhesitatingly to his knees and went into fervent, wailing prayer, then the church father knew he could be trusted." [242] This scenario and others like, Cohen admits to be "conveniently nondisprovable." And let it be said again that this also "conveniently nondisprovable" point: What we have here is less likely a sound historical theorem, and more likely a reflection of Cohen's own walk. Device #5, "Dissociation Induction", offers us Cohen's most long-winded and tedious explanation of all. This device, which he says is "at the core" and the key to "explaining the Bible's power over people" [259], reads at first as very difficult to discern in nature. After several pages of stale and rehashed objections, reading things into texts and out of their social contexts, and venomous bile, we finally get to an exposition on Matthew 14:22-33, which we are told provides "the central psychological paradigm of the Bible." [284] To set the background first: Immediately Jesus made the disciples get into the boat and go on ahead of him to the other side, while he dismissed the crowd...During the fourth watch of the night Jesus went out to them, walking on the lake. When the disciples saw him walking on the lake, they were terrified. "It's a ghost," they said, and cried out in fear. But Jesus immediately said to them: "Take courage! It is I. Don't be afraid." "Lord, if it's you," Peter replied, "tell me to come to you on the water." "Come," he said. Then Peter got down out of the boat, walked on the water and came toward Jesus. But when he saw the wind, he was afraid and, beginning to sink, cried out, "Lord, save me!" Immediately Jesus reached out his hand and caught him. "You of little faith," he said, "why did you doubt?" And when they climbed into the boat, the wind died down. Of this passage, Cohen writes [285]: The biblical moral of the story is that failing to have one's mind obsessively on Jesus will rapidly and disastrously result in the deterioration of "faith", in the letting down of the "shield" that "faith" represents. The practical moral of this exotic exegesis is that Cohen, during his "Christian" tenure, had one too many snootfuls of the health-and-wealth homiletic. I suppose one can legitimately draw from this story that if we are looking to do things normally impossible (like walking on water) that it is a very good idea to have one's mind "obsessively" on Jesus (and then, note well, only with direct permission -- and one might as well then say that a rock climber has his mind "obsessively" on rope), but to draw any further specific conclusions is simply ridiculous -- Cohen's temptational, Lloyd Grahamish claim of the "incomparably artful camouflage job that has so long kept the true meaning" of this story "suppressed" notwithstanding. It's frankly just too bad that Cohen apparently fell for a line of this sort once, but that's hardly any reason to universalize his experience and make it the rule of law. Cohen's sixth device, "Bridge Burning", is like the second an immensely begged question: Assuming Christianity to be untrue, Cohen criticizes the separation from the past it commands. The final device, "Holy Terror", is little more than the old rehash about the Bible using hell to

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scare people, with the implicit assumption that it is so horrible that this proves it must have been invented. What happens here, however, is that Cohen ends up revealing far more about himself than he does about the Bible. Basically, we see here another example of the complex of the mindrebel working out his problem with Sister Mary whacking him on the knuckles with a ruler in Catholic school, and now taking revenge by being obnoxious towards all things religious. To wit: "I formed the opinion that the bluff that God's mighty rewards and punishments ought to terrify me into compliance with the pedagogues' stupid little rules" [347]; "The bottom line is that getting people to dance to its tune of fear is what Christianity is all about. All else is evasion and obfuscation. Every other issue turns from what is first expected into arcane, abstruse dizzying stuff as the believer's indoctrination progresses." [349] "I can almost imagine (the NT writers) sitting together in the shade of a fig tree, asking themselves what would be the most horrible outcome imaginable, with which to threaten people." [354] Finally: "The believer prays more, turns Family Radio up louder to drown out the doubts, goes to a church service to get peer reassurance, reads the Bible to reinforce the allegorical suggestions of separation of the realms, etc." [359] As one who prays minimally and only for the sake of thanks; as one whose exposure to Family Radio has been limited to 10 minutes of static-filled air time while on a trip to California and who finds almost all radio preachers boring and irrelevant (R. C. Sproul and Ravi Zacharias are major exceptions); as one who does not go to peers for counsel, and as one who never reads the Bible without serious study, I find Cohen's interpretation ridiculous at best and totally inapplicable to my own life. I say this in conclusion: Edmund Cohen's paranoia is nothing more than the blind, foaming-at-the-mouth hatred typical of apostates carrying wounded pride. When Cohen commends Christianity for "its intricately contradictory nondisprovability" [360] he describes nothing less than his schizophrenic conspiracy theory of the NT writers gathering together and plotting a new world religion that would serve as an opiate to control the masses in their favor. There was a conspiracy, he says, but it leaves no historical record; and if you try to prove that Christianity is true, you are simply fostering the delusion further (for example, Cohen puts of the study of Biblical languages as "an additional layer of irrelevancy to keep the conscious minds of the seminarians busy, lest unwanted insight intrude." [377n]). How much faster can you chase your own tail in a circle? | Conclusion The Mind of the Bible Believer closes -- with a series of self-confessionals, mea culpas, complaints and insults towards Christians (re: "the rigid, vacant demeanor of the people...extreme, offensive, meanly reactionary social views", etc. [377]), and a final revelation. What changed Cohen's mind about Christianity finally was not anything intellectual, but "an extraneous thought powerfully intruded" that said in his head: "The door to paradise stands open, and now I'm going to close it." [378] That was the hinge point! I'm surprised there weren't any of Wayne Harrington's purple clouds flying around. But somehow after this voice in the head spoke up, Cohen "understood how badly I had been had by the Bible manipulation, and was literally ashamed of myself." [382] And so we also come full circle, with shades of Dan Barker and Robert Price wafting over us. A Christian of different temperament might suppose that Cohen's voice was a demon and that his book is demonically inspired. It may well be for all I know. But I'm satisfied to say that it is extremely unlikely. Satan has a reputation and kingdom to uphold and wouldn't be caught dead being involved in something as shamelessly outrageous and absurd as what is found in the mind of Edmund Cohen.

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Homeschoolers barred from religious materials

Government issues order after luring parents into district program Posted: April 24, 2004 1:00 a.m. Eastern 2004 WorldNetDaily.com Homeschooling parents in a Canadian province have been ordered to stop using religious-based materials or other "unofficial" resources when they teach their children at home. Pamela Nagle, a Christian, is one of many angry parents in British Columbia who say they will not abide by the order, according to the Vancouver Sun. "They can't tell me what to do in my own home," said Nagle, whose son is homeschooled but attends a public school one day a week. Nagle told the paper the materials she uses should not matter as long as her son's education meets British Columbia's standards. "I don't like the fact that they believe they know what's best for my child," she said. But Nagle is one of many parents lured into the public school system by a distance-education program, the Sun said. Through the program, she received about $600, Canadian, from the Langley school district in suburban Vancouver, which supplements the hundreds she spends of own money. About 6,800 children are in the program after it started as a pilot project with just 2,200. The parents say they enrolled in distance education after being promised they could continue as their children's primary teacher. The availability of teacher expertise, as well as funds, was the attraction for the parents, while the school district saw benefit from the increased accountability. The children in the program also graduate with a provincial certificate, unlike the estimated 3,000 homeschoolers with no ties to the government's education system. Meanwhile the district receives the same amount of per-student funding for the homeschoolers as it does for regular students, $5,408, Canadian. But many parents now appear set to quit. Anita Kosovic, with two-children in Langley's UConnect program, said she's finished. "I'm definitely not going back and I don't know anyone who is," she told the Sun. Her family is not religious, she explained, but she does not want to be forced into using the province's approved materials, some of which she says are awful. "I don't think anyone should be able to tell me what I can do in my own home and that's what they're telling us," she told the Vancouver paper. The British Columbia Education Ministry insists the order is merely a "clarification" of the rules it laid out in September 2002, which said distance-education students had to follow the same rules as regular students. "If a district receives full funding for a student, the student is not being home-schooled," the ministry stated. With regard to faith-based resources, it stated: "Districts must ensure that students are not using religious materials or resources as part of the educational program and that parents are not being 133

reimbursed for using religious materials or resources with students." A Langley school district spokesman said the district is concerned about the directive, but Education Ministry spokeswoman Corinna Filion said parents who want religion in education should go to the independent school system.

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'Gay Militia' storms Christian meeting

Convention was discussing bill that could make Bible 'hate literature' Posted: April 22, 2004 1:00 a.m. Eastern 2004 WorldNetDaily.com Masked members of a group called the "Gay Militia" stormed into a meeting of Christians discussing a bill that would criminalize certain opposition to homosexual behavior in Canada. A videotape [requires RealOne player] of the incident shows the intruders with bandanna-covered faces bursting into a meeting room at the Coast Plaza Hotel in Calgary, Alberta, where the Concerned Christian Coalition Inc. was holding its national convention Saturday night, the Calgary Sun reported. "Right-wing bigots go away, Gay Militia is here to stay," the intruders chanted. The Calgary paper said about seven females and one male from the homosexual group were in the room as about 25 members of the convention held hands and prayed aloud. The female Gay Militia members unfurled a banner that read: "Liberation: Queer Invasion." Calgary police are reviewing several videotapes of the meeting and an investigation is underway, according to police Const. Doug Jones, the hate-bias crime coordinator for the police cultural resource unit. "What we are looking at, if we can identify [the protesters] is mischief charges, disturbing a peaceful assembly kind of stuff," he told the Sun. Jim Blake, a member of the Christian group, told the paper he was "dumbfounded at the fact that the Gay Militia would storm into a private meeting where we were praying and discussing Bill C250, a bill that will affect our freedom as Christians to discuss certain beliefs." The controversial bill, which passed the House of Commons last September, adds sexual orientation as a protected category in Canada's genocide and hate-crimes legislation, which carries a penalty of up to five years in prison. As WorldNetDaily reported, opponents fear if it becomes law, the Bible will be deemed "hate literature" under the criminal code in certain instances, as evidenced by the case of a Saskatchewan man fined by a provincial human-rights tribunal for taking out a newspaper ad with Scripture references to verses about homosexuality. The bill now is in the Senate, where it has overwhelming support, but two amendments were introduced April 1, delaying a vote. The Senate has recessed until April 20, when a vote is scheduled. "The CCC feels that all groups have a right to freedom of speech, freedom of religion and the freedom to assemble and protect their deeply held personal and moral beliefs," Blake told the Calgary paper. The Sun said the Gay Militia would not comment. Editor's note: The current edition of WND's acclaimed monthly Whistleblower magazine, titled "SEXUAL ANARCHY," is devoted entirely to the explosive issue of homosexual marriage, and shows -- contrary to popular opinion -- that same-sex marriage may very soon become the law of the land in America. The issue also shows, perhaps for the first time, how same-sex marriage can be stopped dead in its tracks, regardless of the actions of activist judges.

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'Bible as hate speech' author admits stealing

As bill nears final vote, puts career on hold after tearful confession Posted: April 16, 2004 1:00 a.m. Eastern 2004 WorldNetDaily.com The author of a Canadian bill opponents say will criminalize public expression against homosexual behavior stunned supporters yesterday by admitting he stole an expensive ring at a public jewelry sale. Party colleague Libby Davies comforts Svend Robinson at his news conference yesterday (CBC News) Svend Robinson, a Parliament member from British Columbia who has declared he is homosexual, struggled, amid tears, through a statement to a nationally televised audience. "Something just snapped in this moment of total, utter irrationality," he said, according to the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. "While attending a public jewelry sale, I pocketed a piece of expensive jewelry," Robinson said, as he described what happened on Good Friday. "I did this despite knowing full well | that the entire area was under electronic surveillance." Robinson, 52, who said he's undergoing therapy for severe stress, is now under criminal investigation. A member of Parliament since 1979, having won seven consecutive elections, he temporarily has stepped down as the New Democratic Party's nominee for his seat. "As you can imagine, this has been a nightmare," he said. "I cannot believe that it has happened, but I am human and I have failed. "I await the decision of Crown counsel and will not seek to in any way avoid full responsibility for my actions should charges be laid in these circumstances." Robinson's controversial bill, which passed the House of Commons last September, adds sexual orientation as a protected category in Canada's genocide and hate-crimes legislation, which carries a penalty of up to five years in prison. As WorldNetDaily reported, opponents fear if Robinson's bill becomes law, the Bible will be deemed "hate literature" under the criminal code in certain instances, as evidenced by the case of a Saskatchewan man fined by a provincial human-rights tribunal for taking out a newspaper ad with Scripture references to verses about homosexuality. The bill now is in the Senate, where it has overwhelming support, but two amendments were introduced April 1, delaying a vote. The Senate has recessed until April 20, when a vote is scheduled. A chief opponent of the bill, the Canada Family Action Coalition concedes if a vote takes place, the bill certainly will pass, but intends to keep up pressure against it, noting if the prime minister calls an election before then, the bill will die. "We are thankful for the delay and hopefully the complete failure of Bill C-250," the group said in a statement. "Freedom of speech and religion have not yet been oppressed by Bill C-250, and we remain optimistic." The coalition's director, Brian Rushfeldt, told WorldNetDaily he did not think Robinson's current

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predicament would have any effect on the bill. "If it was not as far along as it is, it may have," he said. "In one sense, it really shouldn't have an effect. It was a personal thing." But, he added, "It will certainly have ramifications for his credibility. That is fair criticism." Robinson has insisted his bill protects religious expression, but opponents note recent court cases in which judges have favored homosexual rights when they clash with the rights of religious believers. Some members of Parliament called it a "dangerous" law that muzzles free speech, including Liberal Party member John McKay, who dubbed it a "chill bill." "Anybody who has views on homosexuality that differ from Svend Robinson's will be exposed rather dramatically to the joys of the Criminal Code," McKay said last fall. Robinson has said fears that freedom of speech and religion will suffer are "a mask for homophobia for people who don't want to be honest about the real reason why they don't want to include sexual orientation in the law."

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'Bible as hate speech' bill passes

Sponsor: 'It's been a good week for equality in Canada' Posted: September 18, 2003 9:00 a.m. Eastern By Art Moore 2003WorldNetDaily.com Canada's House of Commons passed a controversial bill yesterday opposed by religious believers and free-speech advocates who say it will criminalize public expression against homosexual behavior. The bill, passed 141-110, adds sexual orientation as a protected category in Canada's genocide and hate-crimes legislation, which carries a penalty of up to five years in prison. Svend Robinson "It's been a good week for equality in Canada," said the bill's sponsor, Svend Robinson, an openly homosexual member of Parliament. The vote came just a day after MPs narrowly defeated a nonbinding motion reaffirming marriage is between a man and woman only. As WorldNetDaily reported, opponents fear if Robinson's bill becomes law, the Bible will be deemed "hate literature" under the criminal code in certain instances, as evidenced by the case of a Saskatchewan man fined by a provincial human-rights tribunal for taking out a newspaper ad with Scripture references to verses about homosexuality. "I was not surprised it passed, because we have a morally bankrupt government which cannot see past its bizarre liberal ideology," Brian Rushfeldt, executive director of the Canada Family Action Coalition, told WorldNetDaily. The bill now goes to the Senate, which usually rubber stamps the House's legislation. Rushfeldt said he hopes the Senate will at least debate the issue and bring up "inherent dangers" in the bill not discussed in the House, but thinks that is not likely. The legislation then is signed into law by the governor general, who represents the queen. Robinson insisted an amendment protects religious expression, but opponents note recent court cases in which judges have favored homosexual rights when they clash with the rights of religious believers. Some members of Parliament called it a "dangerous" law that muzzles free speech, including Liberal Party member John McKay, who dubbed it a "chill bill." "Anybody who has views on homosexuality that differ from Svend Robinson's will be exposed rather dramatically to the joys of the Criminal Code," he said, according to the Edmonton Sun. Rushfeldt contends one of the law's dangers is the term "sexual orientation" is not defined. He noted the American Psychiatric Association lists 24 behaviors under "sexual orientation." They include polygamy, bestiality and pedophilia. "So if in fact the term does include pedophilia, the law protects it [from 'hate speech']," he said. Robinson said fears that freedom of speech and religion will suffer are "a mask for homophobia for people who don't want to be honest about the real reason why they don't want to include sexual orientation in the law," according to the Toronto Globe and Mail.

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He said he regularly receives hateful e-mails, the Toronto paper said, and his Burnaby, B.C., office was trashed in 1988 when he became Canada's first openly homosexual member of Parliament.

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Med student flunks for saying no to abortion

University senior denied degree because of Christian, pro-life stand Posted: March 23, 2004 1:00 a.m. Eastern 2004 WorldNetDaily.com A student in his senior year at a Canadian medical school will not be permitted to graduate because of his Christian, pro-life stand against abortion. According to Toronto-based LifeSiteNews.com, the student, who has requested anonymity, was given a failing grade in obstetrics and gynecology because he refused to perform abortions or to refer patients out for any abortive procedure. Three different appeals to the Medical School over the past six months have failed to have the student reinstated. The most recent challenge, said the report, was March 3, when the student appeared before faculty of medicine's highest appeal committee. Friday, the student learned his appeal had been turned down. WND contacted the university's dean for the medical faculty, Dr. Brian K.E. Hennen, for comment, but as of publication no response had been received. The university's associate dean, Dr. Brian Magwood, told Winnipeg's CJOB Radio News the school's policy requires students to inform patients of all treatment options within the medical standard of care, said LifeSiteNews. Carolee Neufeld, a family friend handling media calls, said the student has always maintained high grades and high approval ratings from clinical supervisors, the report added. Training the next generation In a special edition on abortion last year, WND's monthly Whistleblower magazine profiled several medical doctors who explained why they quit doing abortions. One of them, David Brewer, M.D., who performed abortions for 10 years as a military physician in Ft. Rucher, Ala., described his medical-school abortion training this way: I can remember | the resident doctor sitting down, putting the tube in, and removing the contents. I saw the bloody material coming down the plastic tube, and it went into a big jar. My job afterwards was to go and undo the jar, and to see what was inside. I didn't have any views on abortion; I was in a training program, and this was a brand new experience. I was going to get to see a new procedure and learn. I opened the jar and took the little piece of stockingette stocking and opened that little bag. The resident doctor said, "Now put it on that blue towel and check it out. We want to make sure that we got it all." I thought, 'That'll be exciting hands-on experience looking at tissue.' I opened the sock up and put it on the towel, and there were parts of a person in there. I had taken anatomy, I was a medical student. I knew what I was looking at. There was a little scapula and an arm, I saw some ribs and a chest, and a little tiny head. I saw a piece of a leg, and a tiny hand and an arm and, you know, it was like somebody put a hot poker into me. I had a conscience, and it hurt. Well, I checked it out and there were two arms and two legs and one head and so forth, and I turned and said, "I guess you got it all." That was a very hard experience for me to go through emotionally. Here I was with no real convictions, caught in the middle. And so I did what a lot of us do throughout our life. We don't do anything. I didn't talk with anybody about it, I didn't talk with my

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folks about it, I didn't think about it. I did nothing. And do you know what happened? I got to see another abortion. That one hurt too. But again I didn't do anything, and so I kept seeing abortions. Do you know what? It hurt a little bit less every time I saw one. Then I got to sit down and do an abortion. Well, the first one that I did was kind of hard. It hurt me again like a hot poker. But after a while, it got to where it didn't hurt. My heart got calloused. I was like a lot of people are today -- afraid to stand up. I was afraid to speak up. Or some of us, maybe we aren't afraid, but we just don't have our own convictions settled yet. One particular abortion changed Brewer's life. I remember an experience as a resident on a hysterotomy (a late-term abortion delivered by caesarean section). I remember seeing the baby move underneath the sack of membranes as the caesarean incision was made, before the doctor broke the water. The thought came to me, "My God, that's a person." Then he broke the water. And when he broke the water, it was like I had a pain in my heart, just like when I saw the first suction abortion. And then he delivered the baby, and I couldn't touch it. I wasn't much of an assistant. I just stood there, and the reality of what was going on finally began to seep into my calloused brain and heart. They took that little baby that was making little sounds and moving and kicking, and set it on the table in a cold, stainless steel bowl. And every time I would look over while we were repairing the incision in the uterus and finishing the Caesarean, I would see that little person kicking and moving in that bowl. And it kicked and moved less and less, of course, as time went on. I can remember going over and looking at that baby when we were done with the surgery and the baby was still alive. You could see the chest was moving and the heart beating, and the baby would try to take a little breath like that, and it really hurt inside, and it began to educate me as to what abortion really was. As for the University of Manitoba senior being failed for trying to "opt out" of abortion, he is reportedly considering an appeal to the school's senate. He is also receiving the public support of several Manitoba doctors. One of them, Dr. Frederick Ross, told CJOB radio that many doctors have sworn to protect human life "from the moment of conception" when they've taken the Hippocratic Oath, according to LifeSiteNews.com. Ross urged the university to be flexible enough to give the student a "conscience" exemption from its policy. SPECIAL OFFER: Get the most acclaimed journalistic expose available of the abortion industry, WND's special Whistleblower issue titled ABORTION: THE 30-YEAR WAR."

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Textbooks for Jihad

By Lee Kaplan FrontPageMagazine.com | March 19, 2004 http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=12645 Militant Islamists in the United States and their allies have set their sights on our American children. They seek to provide an education similar to that taught in the controlled regimes of the Arab world. So far, American textbook suppliers are more than willing to accommodate them. It is well known that the Palestine Authority, Saudi Arabia and the rest of the Arab world use propaganda in their schools to support Islamic hegemony and stir up sentiment against Israel and the West. Students in the Middle East are taught to distrust Christians and Jews and are then taught to apply those lessons to opposing the free and democratic - and non-Muslim - nations of the world. These lessons serve to buttress the dictatorships of the Arab world. But now, prestigious American textbook publishers such as Prentice-Hall, Simon and Schuster, TCI and others are educating your child to the Arab point of view and its aspirations of world domination through what the Islamic world calls Dawa, a means of proselytizing unbelievers to the faith. They are doing this no matter how much that point of view may be distorted, farfetched or, in some extreme cases, outright lies. The U.S. textbook publishing industry is a $4 billion-dollar-a-year business providing materials for over 45 million elementary, middle and secondary students in U.S. public and private schools.At the collegiate level, Congress has recently stepped in to create oversight on U.S. taxpayer funding in our universities of Middle East Studies centers. Influxes of Saudi and Palestinian money, frequently matched by U.S. taxpayer dollars, have financed teaching material that demonizes Israel and the United States. But even before students reach college, American students are now indoctrinated with falsehoods. Legislators and administrators have, so far, ignored the curricula offered in grammar, middle and high schools. What goes on even before students reach college years is being completely ignored on the federal and state levels to a frightening degree. Gilbert T. Sewell of the American Textbook Council, a non-profit that reviews history textbooks, recently submitted a report that reviewed the teaching of Islam in most of our childrens history textbooks. He discovered that sections concerning Islam in books distributed by the main U.S. publishers/providers have been sanitized. In general, current or past events about Islam are not reported accurately for the sake of political correctness. Arab and Palestinian political goals are also strongly promoted. The Councils report included the following world history textbooks, one of which your child in grades 7 through 12 might be using right now: Human Heritage, by Greenblatt and Lemmo. Glencoe Publishing, 2001 Across the Centuries by Nash, Armento, de Alva, Wilson and Wixson. Houghton-Mifflin, 1994 A Global Mosaic by Ahmad, Brodsky, Crofts and Gay. Prentice-Hall, 2001 Patterns of Interaction by Beck, Black, Krieger, Naylor, Shabaka. McDougal Little. 1999, 2003 Connections to Today by Ellis and Esler. Prentice-Hall, 2001, 2003 The Human Experience by Farah and Karls. Glencoe Publishing, 1999 Continuity and Change by Hanes, Holt Rinehart and Winston, 1999 One publisher not mentioned in the American Textbook Council report was Teachers Curriculum Institute in Mountain View, California. The content of TCIs book and resource material for its Modern Middle East curriculum unit is blatantly anti-Israeli. High school teachers are instructed to require class exercises designed to pit some students in roles as advantaged Jews against other

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students as disadvantaged and unfairly treated Palestinian Arabs. The teachers, representing a world power, are instructed to intentionally and unfairly side against Arabs to suggest the existence of favoritism to Jews. The course material is quite shocking and clearly biased. Furthermore, the TCI material turns Middle East history on its head. It does not present the history of Arab terrorism against Israel much less outline its extent over the last 55 years. The theme is constantly implied, stated and reiterated that Israel is a foreign entity that stole the Palestinians country. There is no mention that more than half of Israels population is indigenous to the area or victims of Arab pogroms. In fact, any Arab violence discussed at all is couched as being done in self-defense against Jewish persecution or terrorism against Arabs in the region. The same distortions are taught in Saudi and Palestinian schools where they help raise the next generation of Islamic terrorists and suicide bombers or their sympathizers. This is the same type of educational system in the Arab world that roils and intensifies the Middle East conflict. It works over there, so why not here? In addition, a comparison of lesson plans matches materials in Palestinian classrooms as outlined in reports by the Center For Monitoring the Impact of Peace (November 2001-2003). In 1993, Palestinian propaganda ministries tried to portray Palestinians as descendents of the Philistines, a Minoan culture, in order to suggest they predated Jewish presence in Israel. In the Arab world, Ph.D.'s even claim that Israel had no Jewish population before the modern Zionist movement began in the late 19th century. They simply ignore a Jewish presence of 3,200 years - and considerable available archaeological evidence from the Biblical period, as well as the Bible itself. This tale has since been abandoned for the new lie that the Palestinians are the Canaanites. Nevertheless, TCI materials still allude to the canard of Palestinians being the ancient Philistines. As this article went to press, although TCI had earlier insisted its material was academically sound for 9th to 12th graders, the textbook publisher announced plans to revise its course material to include documentation provided by local Jewish organizations and scholars. TCI estimated it will take two years to implement. But what those revisions will actually look like remains to be seen. TCI has also chosen not to eliminate some of the scholars responsible for the current material. Meanwhile, some California school districts like Santa Rosa are still using the materials at the individual teachers discretion, despite news reports that falsely claim the contrary. In a telephone interview, TCI President and CEO Bert Bower was asked which consulting professor inserted the tale of Palestinians being the ancient Philistines and what the other scholars had to say about this. Despite numerous calls giving him the chance to reply, he still has not answered. This is most likely because Middle East Studies departments funded by the Saudis at our universities have produced academics who, when they are hired as sources or consultants, might push a certain political agenda affecting the content of such textbooks. An overview of the list of professors used by TCI to put together its texts and interactive materials tells us probably why Mr.Bower has not replied. The list is headed by Joel Beinin of Stanford and includes Kamran Aghaie from UCLA, Betsy Barlow from the University of Michigan, Glenn Perry of Indiana University and Abraham Marcus at the University of Texas at Austin - none of whom could be classified as pro-Israel with the exception of Marcus, who might be considered lukewarm to the only democracy in the Middle East. Beinin, a former head of MESA, the trade group for Middle East studies professors, also helped choose all the other panelists for TCIs books and materials. He wants Israel dismantled and has organized violent and noisy demonstrations at Stanford against pro-Israel scholars like Daniel Pipes or former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak to prevent them from speaking on campus. Aghaie, of Iranian descent, specializes in Islamic studies, not the Israeli-Palestinian issue, and has emphasized the Arab perspective over Americas since 9/11; Barlow once reportedly invited a known terrorist to speak at a Middle East academic function and is a well-known, extremely vocal pro-Palestinian activist. She frequently supports and disseminates false Arab propaganda at Palestine solidarity conferences. She advocates using educational institutions to advance Palestinian 143

goals and is a big proponent of divestment from Israel. Perry likewise follows the anti-Zionism creed so prevalent at MESA functions. In discussions on the Middle East, even Marcus inexplicably ignores pogroms against Jews prior to and after Israels creation in the Middle East in his commentaries. Over 800,000 Middle Eastern Jews were driven from their homes in Arab Muslim lands. Such events led to Israels creation as much as the European Holocaust. Yet Marcus suggests Middle Eastern Jews lived relatively unharmed, even though they were dhimmis, or second-class citizens in a Muslim world. This ignores countless murders of the Jews who were hung in the streets of Baghdad for entertainment or murdered in anti-Jewish riots in Cairo and other capitals of the Arab world. TCI material lacks balance from esteemed Middle East scholars like Pipes, Bernard Lewis or Martin Kramer. The TCI materials show no effort to present a pro-Western viewpoint. TCI also claims in choosing its scholars to prepare its course materials on the Middle East it made sure to use a wide variety of perspectives. But some would call TCIs panel, headed by Beinin, a stacked deck. But besides prejudice and unprofessional academics, the real driving forces behind the textbook and course bias now infesting our public schools are obscure organizations such as the Council on Islamic Education (CIE). Located in southern California, CIE has taken upon itself the task of lobbying publishers to present a limited Muslim religious point of view in our public school textbooks. These organizations have been working quietly behind the scenes to indoctrinate the upcoming generations to support Arab/Islamic goals like those practiced back in the Middle East. CIE has managed to make such inroads with the major textbook suppliers that some even cite them as a reference for their books. According to Munir Shaikh, the Executive Director, and on its website, it is a non-profit and receives no funds from Saudi Arabia, only the local Muslim community. Yet when asked for details over the phone of its non-profit status, Shaikh admitted it has not been a non-profit since being founded and only recently applied for such status. Its founding director, Shabbir Mansuri, has been quoted in the past as boasting he is able to vet public school textbooks by threatening charges of racism and xenophobia against publishers who dont meet CIE standards. Despite Shaikhs denial of any Saudi connection, he mentioned that CIE started out as part of the International Islamic Educational Institute that does have ties to overseas Islamic organizations and funding. Another organization known as Arabic World and Islamic Resources (AWAIR) also provides resource materials to further enhance the educational experience for free to high school teachers where Islam is concerned. Some of the resource materials teachers use inside the classroom, but that parents never see, show their handiwork. Displayed prominently on the website, AWAIR provides supplemental resource and books also that tend to sanitize Islam and speak of occupation by Israel. A photo of Ghada El Turk on their website reveals a lot. Ms. El Turk is a prominent pro-Palestinian proponent in the American Library Association who has been pushing books and films in libraries across the U.S. supporting Palestinian goals without telling the Israeli side. She has been padding library collections nationwide with Palestinian propaganda books, films and events while virtually shutting out valid information on Israel. There is nothing wrong with public school textbooks including sections on Islamic culture. To be sure, its a major part of world history. But the activities of organizations like CIE and AWAIR seek to glorify historical Islam while ignoring Islamic historical tenets that even survive today and are affecting our world. Jihad is virtually ignored in many of the texts or sweetened to mean a personal internal struggle. Bernard Lewis, one of the most prominent Middle East scholars, has stated in the past that jihad has always referred to Muslim conquests in military terms in Islamic culture and to claim otherwise is a diversion. Lewis states, The object of jihad is to bring the entire world under Islamic law. The Muslim concept of the Dar El-Salamm , the Muslim world, and the Dar Al-Harb (the rest of the world to be conquered and converted by war) is also left out.

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It is true that these tenets are carried to the extreme by militant Islamists today in our present world and not all Muslims. But to ignore this important historical background information in the light of 9/11 smacks of censorship, or denial. The term holy war, which is the rallying call for Osama Bin Laden, gets transformed into a harmless example of self-improvement, thus denying such students a true historical perspective of how things got to be the way they are. Patterns of Interaction by Houghton-Mifflin makes no mention of jihad at all. Prentice-Hall in their textbooks quotes the meanings of Islamic words verbatim to what CIE has on its website. While Arab suicide bombers actually chant the Arab battle cry Allahu Akhbar, in this textbook it is merely an expression of joy. Jerusalem is defined as Islams third holiest city despite no mention of it in the Koran. It was the PLO that started to make that claim in their propaganda by creating a non-existent Koranic discussion of Jerusalem. This was done to justify Arab demands for the city to counterbalance thousands of years of identification of Jerusalem as being the capital of world Jewry. Also left out are issues involving Muslim women. While textbooks have made strides including the status and participation of women in history, these textbooks and resource guides gloss over or ignore the misogynyof the Arab world. Women are known to be treated as chattel in most of the Islamic world and live under the veil. The course materials attempt to present this as a pleasure for women and neglect to mention that even today women have been imprisoned or killed for refusing to wear the veil. Arranged marriages where women are sold as a commodity are portrayed in supplemental materials as cute customs. Subjects such as when and how to beat ones wife and daughters, honor killings for losing virginity or female circumcision might be too graphic for younger students, but definitely should be included in resource materials; even though they are not part of the Koran, they are widely practiced in the Islamic world. Prentice-Halls Connections to Today even names the Council on Islamic Education as an editorial revisionist. And it shows. In addition to sanitizing Islam in the textbook, the resource material accompanying the textbook for classroom exercises (which parents usually never see) are outright Arab propaganda against Israel: A handout 3.2b given to students about the Intifada accuses Israel of collecting taxes from Palestinians for unemployment and health care in the 1980s, then not providing services. In the 1980s, Israel provided universal health care to Palestinians in the territories; the Palestinian Authority stopped it when given autonomy despite substantial funding. The sheet further implies Jewish persecution of Arabs by Israel but mentions nothing of 40 years worth of terror attacks by the Arab world in order to wipe Israel off the map. The Israelis are presented as using military weapons against only rocks, which is hardly true, and Palestinian civilian casualty figures falsely include terrorists who were killed by Israelis in self-defense or who killed themselves as suicide bombers as victims. The handout concludes by asking a leading question to choose which of several responses addresses the concerns of all involved. All the responses listed are solutions pushed by the PLO propaganda machine in the world arena. None are those proposed by Israel or the United States. Prentice-Halls passion for pushing this agenda may even extend to violating California state law according to one Santa Rosa attorney alarmed by what he saw in his childrens textbooks. A parent who asked to remain anonymous, he resides in Santa Rosa, California, and has been advocating such textbooks be banned from his local school district because they violate state laws against indoctrination. He has been divulging to the public what is going on in his childrens textbooks regarding CIEs involvement with all the publishers in this situation. California state and federal laws through the U.S. Department of Education require that publishers like Prentice-Hall log all complaints against their textbooks and make such complaints available to the public and authorities. Prentice-Hall has yet to provide examples of complaints against their books. This parent has found his work cut out for him. Another parent, attorney Paul Vogel, also filed a complaint against Ukiah High School in nearby Mendocino County, when it hosted a

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propaganda tour by PLO activists all day on school grounds during school hours. Back in Santa Rosa, the school board has even approved a required humanities course for all high school students. Taught only to students attending at Maria Carillo High School and entitled The Middle East Conflict According to the Palestinians, the instructor has defiantly refused to allow parents to audit or see any of the course materials for the class. Those materials most likely were supplemented by AWAIR and approved by the CIE. One parent was incensed enough to file complaints with the Santa Rosa school board over A Global Mosaic. Sentiment became serious enough that the Jewish Community Relations Council prepared a 23 page analysis of TCIs textbooks and materials which clearly showed TCIs presentation of the Israeli- Palestinian issue as being almost a verbatim repeat of PLO propaganda. The result? The Santa Rosa school board refused to find fault with the Prentice-Hall book at all. While they found major problems with the TCI book in eliciting opinions against Israel, they refused to remove the book and materials from the curriculum. Its business as usual in the classroom. If the use of false history and propaganda to promote the goals of our enemies overseas becomes commonplace in our textbooks here, how long before those goals are achieved in our next generations? Our schools and children have become targets of militant Islam and its apologists. Congress did right by insisting on oversight of Title VI funds in our colleges. It is time now they take an equally hard and long look at the textbooks being used to indoctrinate our children still in grades K through 12. Lee Kaplan is a contributing editor to Frontpagemag.com.

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The Beleaguered Christians of the Palestinian Authority

By David Raab Jewish Viewpoints | March 16, 2004 http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=12551 The Christian community in the areas administered by the Palestinian Authority (PA) is a small but symbolically important one. About 35,000 Christians live in the West Bank and 3,000 in Gaza,1 representing about 1.3 percent of Palestinians. In addition, 12,500 Christians reside in eastern Jerusalem. This population is rapidly dwindling, however, and not solely as a result of the difficult military and economic situation of the past two years. Rather, there are numerous indications that the Christian population is beleaguered due to its Christianity. Taken in context of the condition of Christians in other Middle Eastern countries, this picture is especially credible and troubling. A Second-Class People Under Islam, Christians are considered dhimmi, a tolerated but second class who are afforded protection by Islam. Dhimmitude is integral to Islam; it is a "protection pact" that suspends "the [Muslim] conqueror's initial right to kill or enslave [Jews and Christians], provided they submitted themselves to pay tribute."2 However, the reality of Christianity under Islam has often been difficult. "Over the centuries, political Islam has not been too kind to the native Christian communities living under its rule. Anecdotes of tolerance aside, the systematic treatment of Christians...is abusive and discriminatory by any standard....Under Islam, the targeted dhimmi community and each individual in it are made to live in a state of perpetual humiliation in the eyes of the ruling community."3 As described by a Christian Lebanese president, Bashir Gemayil: "a Christian...is not a full citizen and cannot exercise political rights in any of the countries which were once conquered by Islam."4 Palestinian Christians have suffered as dhimmis for centuries. An English traveler in the Holy Land in 1816, for example, remarked that Christians were not permitted to ride on horseback without express permission from the Muslim Pasha.5 Other European travelers to the Holy Land mentioned the practice whereby "a dhimmi must not come face to face with a Muslim in the street but pass him to the left, the impure side," and described how Christians were humiliated and insulted in the streets of Jerusalem until the mid1800s. The British consul in Jerusalem wrote that in the Holy Land, particularly in Jerusalem until 1839, Christians were pushed into the gutter by any Muslim who would swear: "turn to my left, thou dog." They were forbidden to ride on a mount in town or to wear bright clothes.6 In the early 1900s, sporadic attacks on Christians by bands of Muslims occurred in many Palestinian towns.7 During the Palestinian Arab revolt in the late 1930s, which involved very few Christians, if Christian villagers refused to supply the terrorist bands with weapons and provisions, their vines were uprooted and their women raped. The rebels forced the Christian population to observe the weekly day of rest on Friday instead of Sunday and to replace the tarboosh with the kaffiyeh for men, whereas women were forced to wear the veil. In 1936, Muslims marched through the Christian village of Bir Zayt near Ramallah chanting: "We are going to kill the Christians."8 In the early 1900s, with the Jewish return to the area, Palestinian Christians began to band with the Muslims to oppose Jewish immigration, at least in part as a way to deflect Muslim hostility away from themselves. As Sir John Chancellor, British High Commissioner in Palestine, put it in 1931: "Christian Arab leaders, moreover, have admitted to me that in establishing close relations with the [Palestinian] Moslems the Christians have not been uninfluenced by fears of the treatment they

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might suffer at the hands of the Moslem majority in certain eventualities."9 From 1953 until 1967, Jordan undertook to Islamize the Christian quarter in the Old City of Jerusalem by laws forbidding Christians to buy land and houses....It ordered the compulsory closure of schools on Muslim holidays and authorized mosques to be built near churches, thus preventing any possibility of enlargement.10 Regional Repression of Christians The current Christian reality in many Middle Eastern countries is also difficult. In Egypt, "Muslim, but not Christian, schools receive state funding....It is nearly impossible to restore or build new churches....Christians are frequently ostracized or insulted in public, and laws prohibit Muslim conversions to Christianity....Islamic radicals have frequently launched physical attacks on [Christian] Copts."11 Saudi Arabia "is one of the most oppressive countries for Christians. There are no churches in the whole country. Foreign workers make up one-third of the population, many of whom are Christians. For their entire stay, which may be years, they are forbidden to display any Christian symbols or Bibles, or even meet together publicly to worship and pray. Some have watched their personal Bibles put through a shredder when they entered the country."12 An official Saudi cleric, Sheik Saad Al-Buraik, pronounced in a Riyadh government mosque, "People should know that...the battle that we are going through is...also with those who believe that Allah is a third in a Trinity, and those who said that Jesus is the son of Allah, and Allah is Jesus, the son of Mary."13 In Iran, "the printing of Christian literature is illegal, converts from Islam are liable to be killed, and most evangelical churches must function underground."14 Christians are not allowed to testify in an Islamic court when a Muslim is involved and they are discriminated against in employment. A 1992 UN report cites cases of imprisonment and torture of Muslims who converted to Christianity and of Armenian and Assyrian pastors, the dissolution of the Iranian Bible Society, the closure of Christian libraries, and the confiscation of all Christian books, including 20,000 copies of the New Testament in Farsi.15 In Israel, too, Muslim fundamentalists seek to assert dominance over Christian Arabs. "Attacks against and condemnation of Christians are also often heard in mosques, in sermons and in publications of the Muslim Movement."16 In Nazareth, a significant clash developed in recent years when Muslims sought to build a grand mosque next to the Basilica of the Annunciation, the dominant Christian landmark in the town.17 Official PA Domination of Christians Islam is the official religion of the Palestinian Authority.18 In addition, fundamentalist Hamas and Islamic Jihad have promoted Islamic influence on Palestinian society. Officially, the PA claims to treat Palestinian Christians equally and pointedly seeks to display this publicly. Christmas is an official holiday. Arafat has stated as his mission "the protection of the Christian and Muslim holy places,"19 and several Christians have held prominent PA positions. Occasionally, however, contrary messages slip through. In a Friday sermon on October 13, 2000, broadcast live on official Palestinian Authority television from a Gaza mosque, Dr. Ahmad Abu Halabiya proclaimed: "Allah the almighty has called upon us not to ally with the Jews or the Christians, not to like them, not to become their partners, not to support them, and not to sign agreements with them."20 In addition, no PA law protects religious freedom.21 While asserting that all Palestinians' "liberty and freedom to worship and to practice their religious beliefs are protected," a PA Information Ministry statement also stresses that: "The Palestinian people are also governed by [Islamic] Shari'a law...with regard to issues pertaining to religious matters. According to Shari'a Law, applicable 148

throughout the Muslim world, any Muslim who [converts] or declares becoming an unbeliever is committing a major sin punishable by capital punishment...the [Palestinian Authority] cannot take a different position on this matter."22 In attempting to assuage Christians, the statement goes on to say that capital punishment for conversion "has never happened, nor is it likely to happen" in the Palestinian territories, but that "norms and tradition will take care of such situations should they occur." The PA's judicial system also does not ensure equal protection to Christians. For example, an Israeli government report noted the failure of the judicial system in Bethlehem to provide protection to Christian land-owners. The Comtsieh family (a Christian family) has a plot of land with a building that serves as a business center in the city. Several years ago a Moslem family from Hebron took possession of the building and started to use it without permission. The Comtsieh family filed a claim with the judicial system and after long and arduous court hearings, the court ruled in the claimant's favor. However, the verdict was never enforced by the police and representatives of the family from Hebron later appeared with a new court verdict (signed by the same judge who ruled in the claimants' favor previously), canceling the previous verdict and ratifying the Hebron family's ownership of the property.23 An Israeli government report in 1997 asserted more direct harassment of Christians by the PA. In August 1997, Palestinian policemen in Beit Sahur opened fire on a crowd of Christian Arabs, wounding six. The Palestinian Authority is attempting to cover up the incident and has warned against publicizing the story. The local commander of the Palestinian police instructed journalists not to report on the incident.... In late June 1997, a Palestinian convert to Christianity in the northern West Bank was arrested by agents of the Palestinian Authority's Preventive Security Service. He had been regularly attending church and prayer meetings and was distributing Bibles. The Palestinian Authority ordered his arrest.... The pastor of a church in Ramallah was recently warned by Palestinian Authority security agents that they were monitoring his evangelistic activities in the area and wanted him to come in for questioning for spreading Christianity. A Palestinian convert to Christianity living in a village near Nablus was recently arrested by the Palestinian police. A Muslim preacher was brought in by the police, and he attempted to convince the convert to return to Islam. When the convert refused, he was brought before a Palestinian court and sentenced to prison for insulting the religious leader.... A Palestinian convert to Christianity in Ramallah was recently visited by Palestinian policemen at his home and warned that if he continued to preach Christianity, he would be arrested and charged with being an Israeli spy.24 Another report in 2002, based on Israeli intelligence gathered during Israel's Defensive Shield operation, asserts that "The Fatah and Arafat's intelligence network intimidated and maltreated the Christian population in Bethlehem. They extorted money from them, confiscated land and property and left them to the mercy of street gangs and other criminal activity, with no protection."25 Similar findings were reported in the Washington Times following the PA takeover of the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem in April 2002. Residents of this biblical city are expressing relief at the exile to Cyprus last week of 13 hard-core Palestinian militants, who they said had imposed a two-year reign of terror that included rape, 149

extortion and executions. The 13 sent to Cyprus, as well as 26 others sent to the Gaza Strip, had taken shelter in the Church of the Nativity, triggering a 39-day siege that ended Friday. Palestinians who live near the church described the group as a criminal gang that preyed especially on Palestinian Christians, demanding "protection money" from the main businesses, which make and sell religious artifacts. "Finally the Christians can breathe freely," said Helen, 50, a Christian mother of four. "We are so delighted that these criminals who have intimidated us for such a long time are now going away."26 Adding insult to injury, during this reign of terror, the PA's Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades (declared a terrorist organization by the United States) sent a letter to the Bethlehem municipality "requesting" aid in the form of monetary contributions for military operations. Cynically adding a symbol of Christianity to their extortion demand, the letter was signed "Fatah/Al Aqsa Martyrs (and Church of) Nativity Brigades" [emphasis added].27 PA Disrespect for Christian Holy Sites The PA has shown contempt for certain Christian holy sites, and there has been significant desecration as well. For example, without prior consent of the church, Yasser Arafat decided to turn the Greek Orthodox monastery near the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem into his domicile during his visits to the city.28 On July 5, 1997, the PLO seized Abraham's Oak Russian Holy Trinity Monastery in Hebron, violently evicting monks and nuns.29 After the outbreak of Palestinian violence in September 2000, the PA's Tanzim militia chose the Christian town of Beit Jala to shoot at Jerusalem over other locations from which they could have similarly targeted communities built on land captured in 1967. They specifically positioned themselves in or near Christian homes, hotels, churches (e.g., St. Nicholas), and the Greek Orthodox club, knowing that a slight deviation in Israeli return fire would harm Christian institutions or homes.30 At one point, Andreas Reinecke, head of the German Liaison office to the PA, protested: I would like to draw your attention in this letter to a number of incidents which occurred at "Talitakoumi" school in Beit Jala...which is funded mainly by the Protestant Church in Berlin. Over the last few days the school staff noticed attempts on the part of several armed Palestinians to use the school premises and some of its gardens for their activities. If they succeed in doing this, an Israeli reaction will be inevitable. This will have a negative impact on the continuation of the functioning of the school, in which no less than 1,000 [Christian] Palestinians study....You cannot imagine the kind of upheaval which will be provoked among the supporters of this school [in Germany] should they discover that the school premises are used as a battle ground.31 The most glaring example of PA disregard for the holiness of Christian shrines, however, was the April 2002 takeover of the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem by PA forces and their taking over 40 Christian clergy and nuns as hostages. As confirmed by a senior Tanzim commander, Abdullah Abu-Hadid, "The idea was to enter the church in order to create international pressure on Israel....We knew beforehand that there was two years' worth of food for 50 monks. Oil, beans, rice, olives. Good bathrooms and the largest wells in old Bethlehem. You didn't need electricity because there were candles. In the yard they planted vegetables. Everything was there."32 The PA Takeover of the Church of the Nativity On April 2, 2002, as Israel implemented its Defensive Shield operation to combat the Palestinian terrorist infrastructure, in Bethlehem "a number of terrorists took over St. Mary's Church grounds and...held the priest and a number of nuns there against their will. The terrorists used the Church as a firing position, from which they shot at IDF soldiers in the area. The soldiers did not return fire toward the church when fired upon [emphasis added]. An IDF force, under the command of 150

the Bethlehem area regional commander, entered the Church grounds today without battle, in coordination with its leaders, and evacuated the priest and nuns."33 That same day, "More than 100 Palestinian gunmen...[including] soldiers and policemen, entered the Church of the Nativity on Tuesday, as Israeli troops swept into Bethlehem in an attempt to quell violence by Palestinian suicide bombers and militias."34 The actual number of terrorists was between 150 and 180, among them prominent members of the Fatah Tanzim. As the New York Times put it, "Palestinian gunmen have frequently used the area around the church as a refuge, with the expectation that Israel would try to avoid fighting near the shrine" [emphasis added].35 And in fact this was the case. The commander of the Israeli forces in the area asserted that the IDF would not break into the church itself and would not harm this site holy to Christianity. Israel also deployed more mature and more reserved reserve-duty soldiers in this sensitive situation that militarily called for more agile, standing-army soldiers.36 On the other hand, the Palestinians did not treat it the same way. Not only did they take their weapons with them into the Church of the Nativity and fire, on occasion, from the church, but also reportedly booby-trapped the entrance to the church.37 On April 7, "one of the few priests evacuated from the church told Israeli television yesterday that gunmen had shot their way in, and that the priests, monks and nuns were essentially hostages....The priest declined to call the clergy 'hostages,' but repeatedly said in fluent English: 'We have absolutely no choice. They have guns, we do not.'"38 Christians clearly saw the takeover as a violation of the sanctity of the church. In an interview with CWNews, Archbishop Jean-Louis Tauran, the Vatican's Undersecretary of State and the top foreign-policy official, asserted that "The Palestinians have entered into bilateral agreements [with the Holy See] in which they undertake to maintain and respect the status quo regarding the Christian holy places and the rights of Christian communities. To explain the gravity of the current situation, let me begin with the fact that the occupation of the holy places by armed men is a violation of a long tradition of law that dates back to the Ottoman era. Never before have they been occupied - for such a lengthy time - by armed men."39 On April 14, he reiterated his position in an interview on Vatican Radio.40 On April 24, the Jerusalem Post reported on the damage that the PA forces were causing: Three Armenian monks, who had been held hostage by the Palestinian gunmen inside Bethlehem's Church of the Nativity, managed to flee the church area via a side gate yesterday morning. They immediately thanked the soldiers for rescuing them. They told army officers the gunmen had stolen gold and other property, including crucifixes and prayer books, and had caused damage.... One of the monks, Narkiss Korasian, later told reporters: "They stole everything, they opened the doors one by one and stole everything....They stole our prayer books and four crosses...they didn't leave anything. Thank you for your help, we will never forget it." Israeli officials said the monks said the gunmen had also begun beating and attacking clergymen.41 When the siege finally ended, the PA soldiers left the church in terrible condition: The Palestinian gunmen holed up in the Church of the Nativity seized church stockpiles of food and "ate like greedy monsters" until the food ran out, while more than 150 civilians went hungry. They also guzzled beer, wine, and Johnnie Walker scotch that they found in priests' quarters, undeterred by the Islamic ban on drinking alcohol. The indulgence lasted for about two weeks into the 39-day siege, when the food and drink ran out, according to an account by four Greek Orthodox priests who were trapped inside for the entire ordeal.... The Orthodox priests and a number of civilians have said the gunmen created a regime of fear.

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Even in the Roman Catholic areas of the complex there was evidence of disregard for religious norms. Catholic priests said that some Bibles were torn up for toilet paper, and many valuable sacramental objects were removed. "Palestinians took candelabra, icons and anything that looked like gold," said a Franciscan, the Rev. Nicholas Marquez from Mexico.42 A problem that arose during the siege again shows Christian fear of Muslim domination. Two Palestinian gunmen in the church were killed, and the PA wanted to bury them in the basilica. "With two Muslim bodies inside the Church of the Nativity, Christianity could be facing an absolute disaster in Bethlehem," said Canon Andrew White, the special representative of the Archbishop of Canterbury in the Middle East. "It would be catastrophic if two Muslim martyrs were buried in the church. It could lead to a situation like that in Nazareth," he said.43 Only after intensive mediation efforts were plans to bury the bodies inside abandoned. The PA and Jerusalem Christians Despite having no legal standing in Jerusalem, PA officialdom has acted similarly there. The PA, in fact, denies historic Jewish - and thus Christian - ties to Jerusalem. Walid M. Awad, Director of Foreign Publications in the Palestinian Ministry of Information, asserted: "The location of the [Jewish] Temple on the Temple Mount is in question....There are scholars who say that it might be in Jericho or somewhere else 4 kilometers outside of Jerusalem." Asked "The New Testament talks of Jesus going to the Temple in Jerusalem. Are you suggesting that Jesus went to Jericho rather than Jerusalem?" he responded, "It depends on what temple you think he went to."44 U.S. Ambassador Dennis Ross asserted: "The only new idea [Arafat] raised at Camp David was that the temple didn't exist in Jerusalem."45 A Christian leader, Father Marun Lahham, worries, "Frequent Muslim declarations that...Jerusalem is [an] Islamic [city] trouble Christians."46 The PA has begun to interfere with Jerusalem Christians: [T]he Palestinian Authority-appointed Waqf (Moslem religious property) authorities attempted to break through into the Church of the Holy Sepulcher from the adjacent al-Hanaqa Mosque. [They] decided to install a latrine on the roof of the Church. According to a May 11, 1997, report in Ha'aretz, "A Waqf internal report, written two weeks ago by the Waqf's Jerusalem engineer, 'Isam 'Awad, confirms many of the Christians' claims in the conflict that has emerged adjacent to the Holy Sepulcher Church regarding construction in the Church. The Church's claim [is] that the Waqf has harmed the historical and architectural substance of the Holy Sepulcher, as a result of a construction addition to the courtyard of the 'Hanaqa,' which leans on the wall of the Holy Sepulcher and even darkens it by its height." Israel attempted to calm down the conflict after the Churches complained and issued a work stoppage order against it, which was promptly ignored. The same Ha'aretz story reported that "The Jerusalem district archeologist in the Antiquities Authority, John Zeligman, wrote to the Waqf director, 'Adnan Husayni, pointing out to the Waqf the damage to a site that is declared to be an antiquity and threatens to go to law if work is not halted immediately." Finally, the illegal construction was halted due to Israeli and world pressure, but we can be certain that without such pressure the desecration would have continued.47 The PA-appointed Waqf is also working feverishly to convert the Temple Mount, a site holy to Christians and Jews, into a mosque and erase any traces of the Temple. In June 2000, Ha'aretz reported that "the Islamic Movement in Israel has a master plan to build a fourth mosque on the eastern side of the Temple Mount" and that, in fact, according to a head of the movement, "the entire area of the Temple Mount is an inseparable and integral part of the Al Aqsa Mosque."48 The Wakf made a mockery of the laws of the State of Israel. Wakf officials [had] requested and received a permit to open an emergency exit in the new mosque in Solomon's Stables. [But], in fact, the Wakf tried to break through four of the underground arches in the northern part of

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Solomon's Stables. To do so, it dug a huge hole 60 meters long and 25 meters wide in the earth of the Temple Mount...6,000 tons of earth [were] removed. Some of it was scattered at dumpsites. Some was dumped in the Kidron River. Antiquities dating back to [the first and second Temple eras] were tossed on garbage heaps.49 Israel Antiquities Authority Director-General Shuka Dorfman affirms "categorically" and "in an unequivocal manner, that there is archeological damage being done [by the Waqf] to antiquities on the Temple Mount."50 Under the "guardianship" of the Waqf, "Palestinian pirates are brazenly digging up Jewish artifacts from the holy Temple Mount site and trying to sell them on the black market for as much as $1 million."51 More recently, since the start of the Palestinian violence, the Waqf has precluded Christians from visiting the Temple Mount, despite the fact that no security considerations whatsoever are involved. Reduction of Christian Political Power Historically, not only has Bethlehem been a Christian city governed primarily by Christians, but, with its sister towns of Beit Jala and Beit Sahur, it has been the largest enclave of Christians in the West Bank. Since assuming control in 1995, however, the PA has been Islamizing Bethlehem. The city's municipal boundaries were changed to incorporate 30,000 Muslims from three neighboring refugee camps, severely tipping the demography. The city also added a few thousand Bedouins of the Ta'amra tribe, located east of Bethlehem, and encouraged Muslim immigration from Hebron to Bethlehem. The net result is that the area's 23,000 Christians were reduced from a 60 percent majority in 1990 to a minority by 2001. Also, defying tradition, Arafat appointed a Muslim from Hebron, Muhammed Rashad A-Jabari, as governor of Bethlehem. He fired the existing Bethlehem city council that had nine Christians and two Muslims, replacing it with a 50:50 council. While the mayor is a Christian, the top bureaucratic, security, and political echelons, and the lower levels as well, have been drained of Christians.52 Furthermore, "according to the new local council elections' regulations designed by the PA - but not yet put into effect, however - mayors will be nominated by the council members in their towns. Christians fear that these new regulations will open the way to the nomination of Muslim mayors to the traditional Christian towns."53 While six out of the eighty-eight seats in the Palestinian Legislative Council have been reserved for Christians,54 representing more than double their proportion in Palestinian society, the Council is a fairly powerless entity. Similarly, no Christian holds a position of power in the Palestinian government. Harassment of Palestinian Christians by Palestinian Muslims Palestinian Christians are perceived by many Muslims - as were Lebanon's Christians - as a potential fifth column for Israel. In fact, at the start of the recent violence in 2000, Muslim Palestinians attacked Christians in Gaza, as confirmed by Fr. Raed Abusahlia, chancellor of the Latin Patriarchate in Jerusalem.55 Anti-Christian graffiti is not uncommon in Bethlehem and neighboring Beit Sahur, proclaiming: "First the Saturday people (the Jews), then the Sunday people (the Christians)."56 The same has often been heard chanted during anti-Israel PLO/PA rallies. Accused of wearing "permissive" Western clothing, Bethlehem Christian women have been intimidated. Finally, rape and abduction of Christian women is also reported to have occurred frequently (especially in Beit Sahur), as was the case in Lebanon.57 Christian cemeteries have been defaced, monasteries have had their telephone lines cut, and there have been break-ins at convents.58

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In July 1994, the Wall Street Journal reported that Palestinian Muslims would not sell land to Christians and that Christian facilities and clubs had been attacked by Muslim extremists. Christian graves, crosses, and statues had been desecrated; Christians had suffered physical abuse, beatings, and Molotov cocktail attacks.59 Continuing the Islamic tradition of Saladin - who constructed two mosques contiguous to and taller than the Church of the Holy Sepulcher - mosques have mushroomed adjacent to and usually taller than churches. Loudly amplified Muslim sermons have been aired during Christian services, including the Pope's April 2000 address in Nazareth, which had to be halted until the Muslim call to prayer was concluded.60 In February 2002, Palestinian Muslims rampaged against Christians in Ramallah, and the Palestinian Authority failed to intervene. As reported by the Boston Globe, The rampage began after Hanna Salameh, a member of a wealthy Christian family, allegedly killed Jibril Eid, a Muslim construction contractor from the Kalandia refugee camp, after the two men argued at the Israeli army's Kalandia checkpoint....A few hours later, hundreds of men poured out of the refugee camp and went to Ramallah, where they burned Salameh's house and store. They then burned his brother's store, damaged several businesses owned by Christians not related to the Salamehs, and torched the exercise room and terrorized more than 100 children at Sariya, a scouting and youth center. Palestinian police did nothing to stop this destruction, according to numerous witnesses, but drew the line as the mob moved toward Christian churches, whose leaders the Palestinian Authority is cultivating for international support in its struggle with Israel. While officials of the Palestinian Authority and of Fatah insisted that the incident was simply about revenge and anger, many in Ramallah said otherwise. "The truth is this is a problem between Christians and Muslims," said one Christian businessman. "There is no security for us. Everyone is taking the law in his own hands....This [accused] man's brother, they burned his house, his shops, his cars, and the police of Ramallah stood by and watched. This is the democracy of Palestine?" "The chief of security at Kalandia was in charge of this rampage," said a Muslim shopkeeper. "The mayor of Ramallah came, saw what was happening, and withdrew. I am a Muslim, but I condemn this. These are savage people."61 Similar attacks have occurred in eastern Jerusalem. Over the weekend, a gang of Moslem youths ransacked a pool hall near the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, which is frequented by Christian youths. Four of the Christians were stabbed and lightly wounded; one of them required hospitalization. Witnesses said about fifty Moslem youths marched through the Christian Quarter to the pool hall Saturday afternoon, chanting anti-Christian slogans. They attacked the Christians inside, and broke chairs, tables, and other objects....Old City police chief Dep. Cmdr. David Givati confirmed that there have been a number of attacks by Moslems on Christian targets recently.62 The Palestinian Christian Response Under the Oslo Accords, between 1995 and 1997 the Palestinian Authority was given civilian control over 98 percent of the Palestinian population of Gaza and the West Bank. Instead of embracing PA jurisdiction in the spirit of Palestinian self-determination, however, Palestinian Christians are fleeing. Palestinian Christians have fled Islamic rule in the past. In the final census conducted by the British mandatory authorities in 1947, there were 28,000 Christians in Jerusalem. The census conducted by Israel immediately after the Six-Day War in 1967, which ended the 19-year Jordanian control of the eastern portion of the city, found just 11,000 Christians remaining. Some 17,000 Christians (61 154

percent) left during the days of Jordan's rule over Jerusalem.63 True, there has been a steady outflow of Christians from the Holy Land for some time. Daughter communities in North and South America had already outnumbered their mother communities by 1948.64 But this outflow has accelerated since the rise of PA control. Between the 1993 signing of the Oslo Accords and the 1995 transfer of Bethlehem to the PA, Palestinian Christians lobbied Israel against the transfer. The late Christian mayor, Elias Freij, warned that it would result in Bethlehem becoming a town with churches but no Christians. He lobbied Israel to include Bethlehem in the boundaries of Greater Jerusalem, as was the Jordanian practice until 1967.65 In December 1997, the London Times reported: "Life in (PA-ruled) Bethlehem has become insufferable for many members of the dwindling Christian minorities. Increasing Muslim-Christian tensions have left some Christians reluctant to celebrate Christmas in the town at the heart of the story of Christ's birth."66 The situation has become so desperate for Christians that, "during his visit to Bethlehem, Pope John Paul II felt it necessary to urge Palestinian Christians already in March 2000: 'Do not be afraid to preserve your Christian heritage and Christian presence in Bethlehem.'"67 On July 17, 2000, upon realizing that then Prime Minister Barak was contemplating repartitioning Jerusalem, the leaders of the Greek Orthodox, Latin, and Armenian Churches wrote to him, President Clinton, and Yasser Arafat, demanding to be consulted before such action was undertaken. Barak's proposal also triggered a flood of requests for Israeli identity cards by thousands of eastern Jerusalem Arabs. (This, plus the fact that Israel's own Christian population is actually growing, refutes any claim that emigration is a result of Israel's treatment of Christians.) Despite their beleaguerment, Palestinian Christians do not speak out about their situation. "Out of fear for their safety, Christian spokesmen aren't happy to be identified by name when they complain about the Muslims' treatment of them...off the record they talk of harassment and terror tactics, mainly from the gangs of thugs who looted and plundered Christians and their property, under the protection of Palestinian security personnel."68 In fact, the Christians' silence may be precisely because they are a beleaguered minority with a long history of dhimmitude. As Lebanese Christian Habib Malik describes: This sentiment is motivated primarily by a desire for a unified position vis-a-vis Israel. But it also stems from a deeper dhimmi psychological state: the urge to find - or to imagine and fabricate if need be - a common cause with the ruling majority in order to dilute the existing religious differences and perhaps ease the weight of political Islam's inevitable discrimination. The history of Palestinian Christianity has, for the most part, been no different from that of dhimmi Christianity throughout the Levant.69 One Christian cleric in Jerusalem interviewed by this author compared the behavior of Christian dhimmis to that of battered wives or children, who continue to defend and even identify with their tormentor even as the abuse persists. Palestinian Christians "internalized this dependence on the Muslim majority as a social characteristic that persisted even after the Ottoman reforms of the nineteenth century abolished these rules....The Christians worried that Muslim religious emotions aroused against the Jews might subsequently be turned against them."70 *** Notes 1. Daphne Tsimhoni, "The Christians in Israel, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip," Middle East Quarterly, Winter 2001.

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2. Bat Ye'or, Islam and Dhimmitude: Where Civilizations Collide (Teaneck, NJ: Fairleigh Dickenson University Press, 2002), p. 41. 3. Habib C. Malik, "Christians in the Land Called Holy," First Things: A Journal of Religion and Public Life, January 1999. 4. Bashir Gemayel, Liberte et Securite (Beirut, 1983), pp. 37-38, cited in Bat Ye'or, p. 248. 5. James Silk Buckingham, Travels in Palestine (London, 1821), cited in Bat Ye'or, p. 98. 6. James Finn, as cited in Bat Ye'or, p. 100 and n. 65. 7. Yehoshua Porath, The Palestinian Arab National Movement, 1929-1939: From Riots to Rebellion (London, 1977), p. 109, cited in Bat Ye'or, pp. 160-161. 8. Porath, pp. 268-70. 9. Yehoshua Porath, The Emergence of the Palestinian Arab National Movement, 1918-1929 (London, 1974), p. 303, cited in Bat Ye'or, p. 160. 10. Bat Ye'or, p. 235. 11. Jonathan Adelman and Aggie Kuperman, Rocky Mountain News, December 22, 2001. 12. "Muslim Countries Becoming Bolder in Persecuting Christians," Battle Cry Magazine, September/ October 2001. 13. "Saudi Telethon Host Calls for Enslaving Jewish Women," from the Saudi Information Service, as reported in the National Review Online, April 26, 2002. 14. Adelman and Kuperman. 15. Bat Ye'or, p. 225. 16. Raphael Israeli, Green Crescent Over Nazareth: The Displacement of Christians by Muslims in the Holy Land (Frank Cass: London, 2002), p. 60. 17. Serge Schmemann, "Israelis Bar Mosque on Site in Nazareth," International Herald Tribune, March 4, 2002. 18. Tsimhoni. 19. Ibid. 20. MEMRI Special Dispatch No. 138, October 13, 2000. 21. U.S. Department of State, International Religious Freedom Report: Israel and the Occupied Territories, October 26, 2001. 22. Palestinian Authority Ministry of Information, December 1997, as reported in http://www.lawsociety.org/Reports/reports/1998/crz4.html. 23. Danny Naveh (Israeli Minister of Parliamentary Affairs), The Involvement of Arafat, PA Senior Officials and Apparatuses in Terrorism against Israel, Corruption and Crime, 2002, http://www.mfa.gov.il/mfa/go.asp?MFAH0lom0. 24. The Palestinian Authority's Treatment of Christians in the Autonomous Areas, Israeli Government, October 1997, translated to English by IMRA. 25. Naveh. 26. Sayed Anwar, "Exiled Palestinian Militants Ran Two-Year Reign of Terror," Washington Times, May 13, 2002. 27. Naveh.

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28. The Palestinian Authority's Treatment of Christians in the Autonomous Areas. 29. Associated Press, as reported in Yoram Ettinger, "The Islamization of Bethlehem by Arafat," Jerusalem Cloakroom #117, Ariel Center for Policy Research, December 25, 2001. 30. Ibid. 31. Letter from Andreas Reinecke to Colonel Jibril Rajoub, Head of the PA Preventive Security Apparatus in the West Bank, May 5, 2002, from IDF Spokesperson, May 12, 2002. 32. Yediot Ahronot on May 24 as reported in Daily Alert, Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, May 30, 2002. 33. IDF Spokesperson, April 3, 2002. 34. Serge Schmemann, "Israeli Military Sends Tanks into Largest West Bank City," New York Times, April 3, 2002. 35. "Sharon Proposes Arafat's Exile While Israeli Forces Shell His Compound," New York Times, April 2, 2002. 36. Amos Harel, "IDF Declares: We Won't Forcefully Enter the Church of the Nativity Holy to Christians," Haaretz, April 5, 2002. 37. Baruch Kra, "IDF Maintains Cautious Approach in Bethlehem," Haaretz, April 10, 2002. 38. Paul Martin, "Arafat Tells Gunmen to Refuse Deal," Washington Times, April 8, 2002. 39. "Top Vatican Official Speaks on Bethlehem Crisis," CWNews, April 10, 2002, http://www.catholicexchange.com/vm/index.asp?vm_id=31&art_id=13065. 40. "Vatican Proposes Independent Force to Halt Mideast Violence," Worldwide Faith News website, http://www.wfn.org/2002/04/msg00201.html, April 15, 2002. 41. Margot Dudkevitch, "Gunmen Stole Gold, Crucifixes, Escaped Monks Report," Jerusalem Post, April 24, 2002. 42. "'Greedy Monsters' Ruled Church," Washington Times, May 15, 2002. 43. Ori Nir, "Arafat's Terror in Church: Armed PA Security Forces Keeping 50 Youths Hostage in Church of the Nativity Cellar," Haaretz, April 22, 2002. 44. Interview with Independent Media Review and Analysis (IMRA), December 25, 1996. 45. Interview, Fox News Sunday, April 21, 2002. 46. Al-Quds, June 18, 1999, as reported in MEMRI, Special Dispatch No. 41, August 2, 1999. 47. Murray Kahl, "Yasser Arafat and the Christians of Lebanon," January 13, 2002, http://christianactionforisrael.org/prsecutn/yasser.html. 48. Nadav Shragai, "Islamic Movement Planning Fourth Mosque for Temple Mount," Haaretz, June 18, 2000. 49. Andrea Levin, "Desperately Seeking the Temple Mount," Jerusalem Post, July 11, 2000. 50. Etgar Lefkovits, "Antiquities Authority: Wakf Damaging Temple Mount," Jerusalem Post, March 22 2001. 51. Uri Dan, "Temple Mount Artifacts Looted," New York Post, April 22, 2001. 52. Ettinger. 53. Tsimhoni. 54. Ibid.

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55. Margot Dudkevitch, "Church Denies Christians Fleeing PA Areas," Jerusalem Post, October 26, 2000. 56. Andre Aciman, "In the Muslim City of Bethlehem," New York Times Magazine, December 24, 1995. 57. Ettinger. 58. The Palestinian Authority's Treatment of Christians in the Autonomous Areas. 59. Bat Ye'or, p. 244. 60. Tsimhoni. 61. Charles Radin, "Mob Fears Grow in West Bank," Boston Globe, February 6, 2002. 62. Bill Hutman, "Concern Over Moslem Attacks on Christians in Old City," Jerusalem Post, July 18, 1994. 63. The Palestinian Authority's Treatment of Christians in the Autonomous Areas. 64. Tsimhoni. 65. Ettinger. 66. Reported in Adelman and Kuperman. 67. "Yasser Arafat, Christmas, and the PFLP," Jerusalem Issue Brief, Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, Vol. 1, No. 13, December 25, 2001. 68. Hanan Shlein, Ma'ariv, December 24, 2001. Translated from the Hebrew by Palestinian Media Watch. 69. Malik. 70. Tsimhoni. David Raab is a strategy consultant who writes frequently on the Middle East. He is the author of "Understanding American Christian Attitudes Regarding Jerusalem," Jerusalem Viewpoints #484, (August 15, 2002).

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Believers tortured to abandon Christianity

Communist regime using painful drug injections, says report http://www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=37586 Posted: March 16, 2004 1:00 a.m. Eastern 2004 WorldNetDaily.com Vietnam's communist government is torturing Christians of the ethnic Hmong minority into abandoning their faith, according to documentation by a Washington, D.C.-based human-rights group. A letter written by Zong Xiong Hang, a Hmong Christian, describes the use of painful drug injections administered by Vietnamese military personnel to force Hmong in Na Ling village in northwestern Lai Chau province "to not believe in Jesus," according to the Center for Religious Freedom at Freedom House. "We all got sick and it was different from any kind of sickness we had ever had before," Zong wrote. "Everyone who got sick had chest pains and pain in their forehead. Our legs and arms were cold and numb; it felt like our blood was not going through." The Jan. 30 letter said Christians in Na Ling village faced expulsion if they did not abandon their religious beliefs. "This shocking form of torture has been used in some of the world's most sinister regimes, including Nazi Germany and the USSR," said the center's director, Nina Shea. The allegations follow a pattern of reports of an anti-Christian wave of persecution in Lai Chau province, according to the center. Police and soldiers monitor and harass Christians, pressuring them to sign statements recanting their faith and pledging to re-establish ancestor worship. Zhong said he is a "person the authorities really hate, because I am teaching others to lead the church and I take Christian materials to the believers." Vietnam's policy, according to Zong, is to recognize as Christians only Hmong who converted before 1954 when French rule ended and communist forces under Ho Chi Minh took control of the North. Zong's village, which converted after 1954, has made a number of requests to be classified as Christian, but all have been denied. "The government forced us to leave our village if we would not deny Christ," Zhong wrote. "They would not let us to stay in our village in Lai Chau province. They say that wherever we want to go, to just go there. We can go to America or wherever there are believers. We should go stay with them because we are no longer welcome in our home village." Vietnamese authorities allow a greater degree of religious freedom than in the 1990s, but the government still keeps all religious institutions in its control under the umbrella of the Communist Party's Fatherland Front. Members of unsanctioned groups -- particularly minorities such as the Hmong -- frequently suffer harassment, arrest and imprisonment, and the state-approved organizations face many restrictions, including limitations on training and ordination of clergy. Other ethnic minorities facing persecution are Degar, Mien and Montagnard Christians. Members of the latter group, in the Central Highlands, have been executed by injection, say human-rights groups such as Britain's

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Christians charged for revealing crackdown

China says they gave 'intelligence to overseas organizations' http://www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=37571 Posted: March 13, 2004 1:00 a.m. Eastern 2004 WorldNetDaily.com Three Christians will appear in a Chinese court Monday for revealing details of China's crackdown on unsanctioned churches. Liu Fenngang, Xu Yonghai and Zhang Shengqi have been charged with "providing intelligence to overseas organizations" and will faced charges in in the Zhejiang provincial capital of Hangzhou, reported Voice of the Martyrs Police detained Liu in October while he was researching a crackdown on Christian groups in Hangzhou's Xiaoshan district. Xu and Zhang were active members of Liu's house church, said VOM. Authorities detained Xu, a psychiatrist, in Beijing last November. Zhang, an Internet writer, was arrested in Jilin province the same month. The Hangzhou court only recently gave the men official notification of the charges. VOM sources said a verdict likely will be announced days, or possibly weeks, after the hearing. "The world is watching," said VOM spokesman Todd Nettleton. "Will these Christian men be given a fair and open trial? Is there any justice in China for those who refuse to register their religious activities with the government? These men revealed no state secrets. Their only crime is telling the world how China's communist government treats Christians." A report last month by the evangelical magazine Christianity Today said more than 50 Chinese Christians, including three prominent Protestant leaders, have been arrested in a new crackdown that followed the release of a video and book in the United States documenting the massive growth of the unregistered, or "underground" church. China has more than 15 million Christians in government-sanctioned churches but as many as 80 million in unregistered congregations branded by the communist regime as "illegal cults," though estimates vary widely. In January, police arrested three prominent Protestant leaders from Henan province, Qiao Chunling, 41, Deborah Xu Yongling, 58, and Zeng Guangbo, 35. Guangbo escaped two days after his arrest and remains in hiding, CT said. The Chinese government considers all Protestant churches outside the official governmentcontrolled Three-Self Patriotic Movement to be subversive. The official churches are restricted, to varying degrees around the country, in their doctrine and practice. Catholics also are restricted to a government-controlled church, which is not allowed to recognize the authority of the pope. As WorldNetDaily reported, a video recently was smuggled out of China documenting the destruction of an unregistered church in Zhejiang Province, according to VOM. In November, Chinese officials closed 125 places of worship, affected 3,000 Christians Catholic school rejects Christian group

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Students consider faith-based leadership requirement 'discriminatory'

http://www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=37524 Posted: March 11, 2004 1:00 a.m. Eastern 2004 WorldNetDaily.com A private Catholic law school's Student Bar Association has rejected two Christian groups on campus because it considers a requirement that leadership be Christian "discriminatory." The Spokane, Wash., Jesuit school's SBA won't recognize the local chapter of the Christian Legal Society and last fall it also rejected the Christian Pro-Life Caucus, according to the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education, or FIRE, a group promoting religious liberty on campuses. FIRE says Gonzaga University's president, the Rev. Robert J. Spitzer, has not intervened on behalf of either group despite the law school's promise to be a "welcoming environment for students of all religious backgrounds or secular moral traditions." "Gonzaga owes its very existence to the constitutionally guaranteed right to organize around its religious identity, but it is allowing the SBA to deny these same fundamental rights to its students," said Greg Lukianoff, FIRE's director of legal and public advocacy. Christian Legal Society leaders said the university's vice president for student affairs, Sue Weitz, assured the group in an e-mail message it had "university recognition." But the group argues this is not the same as SBA recognition, which would have conferred a set of important benefits, including university funding. Even the one benefit conferred by "university recognition" was lost in February, according to CLS leaders, when the group's SBA account was closed. The CLS said it was informed the SBA no longer would manage the funds of "unrecognized" clubs. The Christian Pro-Life Law Caucus had similar difficulties last fall, said FIRE, when SBA leaders ruled the Christian leadership requirement was improperly "discriminatory." That determination was made despite the advice of the law school's dean, Daniel Morrissey, professor David DeWolf and university counsel Mike Casey, who determined the requirement was permissible. In a letter last November, FIRE asked Spitzer to overrule the SBA's decision. "The great irony here is that by denying the caucus the right to be led by Christians, the SBA is engaging in not preventing religious discrimination," FIRE said. "The school of law's SBA both shows contempt for basic freedoms any public university would have to recognize under the Constitution of the United States and exhibits fundamental intolerance towards Catholic doctrine itself." Gonzaga issued a statement claiming "the administration is not willing to force the SBA to restrict the promise of participation to all students in SBA-sponsored activities." That policy differs from the leadership requirements of other Catholic schools, such as Boston College and Notre Dame, which have officially recognized CLS chapters. "If the SBA were truly opposed to discrimination, it would welcome a wide variety of religious and political groups and let students choose which ones to be part of," said FIRE's Lukianoff. "If students find no groups that suit them, they should be free to start their own organizations without being subject to intrusive SBA interference with their beliefs."

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FIRE said last October it convinced the university to reverse a decision to censor a student flier as "hate speech" because it contained the word "hate." The said such misunderstandings of religious liberty are commonly held by students and officials on campuses across the nation, citing its Religious Liberty on Campus Survey.

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A cover-up of biblical proportions

Judge puts cloth over plaque of Ten Commandments during murder trial Posted: March 11, 2004 1:00 a.m. Eastern http://www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=37525 2004 WorldNetDaily.com A copy of the Ten Commandments hanging in a North Carolina courtroom has been covered up after the attorneys for an admitted killer on trial claimed the Sixth Commandment, "Thou shalt not kill," might sway jurors against their client. Andre Edwards is on trial for killing a young mother, Ginger Hayes, and has admitted to the crime, reported WTVD-TV in Durham, N.C. His lawyers convinced Judge Clinton Sumner to put a beige cloth over a plaque of the Decalogue that hangs in the courtroom. According to the report, the attorneys argued the prohibition against killing might prejudice the jurors toward giving Edwards the death penalty. Since the judge's decision, hundreds of people have protested the action. "To me, it's offensive," Charles Dudley, pastor of Nashville Church of God, told the station. "To me, it is as if saying that what God set down no longer stands." Edwards allegedly raped and murdered Hayes before leaving her infant son to die in scorching 90degree heat, WTVD reported. Linda Hart is collecting hundreds of signatures on a petition against the judge's decision. "Why should we give up our rights for him to have all the rights? Why should that young girl that got killed her rights, nobody thinks about her. She's not here to speak for herself," Hart said. Besides circulating the petition, which will be delivered to the judge, Christians have planned to stage a protest outside the courthouse in Nash County where the trial is taking place.

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Catholic professor punished for views

College removes man from classes after he expresses religious beliefs Posted: February 5, 2004 5:00 p.m. Eastern 2004 WorldNetDaily.com http://www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=36964 A college professor in Ohio has been punished for refusing to hide his religious identity from his students. According to the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education, or FIRE, officials from Lakeland Community College removed Dr. James Tuttle from his philosophy classes and threatened him with dismissal because he made statements on his syllabi and in class that disclosed his traditional Catholic religious faith and how that shaped his personal philosophy. "Asking a philosophy professor to divorce his deepest philosophic views from his teaching is both outrageous and absurd," said Greg Lukianoff, director of legal and public advocacy for FIRE. "To say that a philosophy professor cannot discuss religious ideas is to render him incapable of meaningful discussion of some of the greatest minds in the history of his field. Feminists are not forced to veil their feminism, and Catholic philosophers should be free to be Catholic philosophers." FIRE says last March, Tuttle was the target of a student complaint that contended he mentioned his Catholic beliefs too often. The student suggested the professor undergo "counseling for tolerance." In an effort to address this issue, Tuttle added "disclaimers" to the syllabi of two of his classes saying that the professor was "a committed Catholic Christian philosopher and theologian," thereby hoping to inform students in advance about his perspective. The statement also encouraged any students who felt uncomfortable with Tuttle's views or methods to feel free to talk to him outside of class. On April 21, the college's Dean James L. Brown wrote a letter to Tuttle, saying he was "more bothered by [Tuttle's] disclaimer than by anything I read in [the student]'s complaint." Brown suggested Tuttle "would be happier in a sectarian classroom." Besides reducing Tuttle's class load, Brown subjected him to classroom monitoring by a fellow professor. In December, FIRE says, Tuttle was given the last pick of classes for the upcoming semester with a selection of courses that the group says administrators knew he did not wish to teach. FIRE, a nonprofit educational foundation, has gone to bat for Tuttle by contacting Morris W. Beverage, the college's president, on his behalf. The organization now is asking supporters to contact the college to express their views on the treatment of the professor.

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Teacher told: Ditch the Star of David

Officials say small piece of jewelry could provoke Muslim students Posted: February 6, 2004 1:00 a.m. Eastern 2004 WorldNetDaily.com A teacher in Norway has been told to stop wearing the Star of David he normally hangs around his neck because it might provoke the many Muslim students at the school where he works. According to a report in the Aftenposten newspaper of Oslo, officials from the Kristiansand Adult Education Center, a government institution, told Inge Telhaug he could no longer wear the 0.6inch-wide piece of jewelry. "I can't accept this. It is a small star, 16 millimeters, that I have around my neck, usually under a Tshirt. I see it as my right to wear it," Telhaug told Norwegian Broadcasting. Although Telhaug is not Jewish, he said he sees the Star of David as "the oldest religious symbol we have in our culture, because without Judaism there would be no Christianity." Telhaugh, who teaches immigrants Norwegian language and culture, said the restriction violates his free-speech rights. Kjell Gislefoss, principal of the school, was especially concerned about the symbol offending Palestinian immigrants at the school. "The Star of David would be a symbol for one side in what is perhaps the world's most inflamed conflict at the moment. Many have a traumatic past that they have escaped and then we feel that if they are going to learn Norwegian then they can't sit and at the same time be reminded of the things they have traveled from," Gislefoss said, according to the Aftenposten report. Telhaugh has hired an attorney to help him fight the restriction. The head of the Education Association in Kristiansand, Heidi Hauge Uldal, called the school's decision "unacceptable," saying her group did not want to go the way of France and forbid all religious symbols in schools.

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Suspension for 'anti-gay' opinion upheld

Teacher's letters-to-editor 'poisoned' classroom environment Posted: February 5, 2004 1:00 a.m. Eastern 2004 WorldNetDaily.com http://www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=36939 A teacher suspended because he wrote published letters critical of homosexual behavior was properly punished with a one-month suspension, the British Columbia Supreme Court ruled. As WorldNetDaily reported, Chris Kempling of Quesnel, British Columbia, was found guilty of unbecoming conduct by the B.C. College of Teachers. The panel asserted his letters to the editor, a research paper and other correspondence contained "discriminatory and derogatory statements against homosexuals." Teacher Chris Kempling (Vancouver Sun) Though none of the statements in question were made in class, the panel said the writings indicated the veteran teacher's attitude could poison the class environment. One Kempling letter cited by the panel said: "Gay people are seriously at risk, not because of heterosexual attitudes but because of their sexual behaviour, and I challenge the gay community to show some real evidence that they are trying to protect their own community members by making attempts to promote monogamous, long-lasting relationships to combat sexual addictions." Justice Ronald Holmes of the B.C. Supreme Court ruled Tuesday Kempling's comments were discriminatory and could reasonably cause disruption to the school system. In a letter to supporters yesterday, Kempling said, "It is a black day for religious freedom in Canada." According to Kempling, Holmes implied homosexual students would be unwilling to speak to him in his role as a school counselor, asserting the published comments reduced his credibility as a teacher in the eyes of students and the public. "There was no evidence presented that this was true," Kempling said. "No evidence of a disrupted school environment was found. There were no complaints from students, parents or my supervisors." He noted all of his former administrators wrote letters stating his public comments had no discernible impact on the operation of the school. According to its rules, the teacher's panel does not need to find direct evidence of a poisoned school environment to determine that a member is guilty of conduct unbecoming. The panel said, "It is sufficient that an inference can be drawn as to the reasonable and probable consequences of the discriminatory comments of a teacher." The teachers said they were disturbed by Kempling's statements that homosexual relationships are unstable, 'gay' sex poses health risks and many religions consider homosexuality immoral. In his letter yesterday, Kempling pointed out three former students interviewed by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation at the University of British Columbia said they were not even aware that there was a controversy at that time. He insists Justice Holmes ignored evidence that homosexual students received impartial service from him.

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"In fact, a prominent homosexual interviewed by college investigators offered no opinion that what I had written publicly was upsetting to homosexual people," Kempling said. He argued that the fact he was appointed to be chair of the Community Health Council by the Minister of Health during this period showed his credibility as a teacher and community leader were not impaired. The post is the highest non-elected appointment in his city, with responsibility for over 500 employees and a $22 million budget. Kempling said the ruling "means that teachers who happen to be Christians or who belong to other religions proscribing homosexuality may not comment publicly on this issue." "It means that disciplinary bodies do not need to provide any evidence of impairment or harm at a professional's workplace if they exercise their right to free speech in their off-the-job capacity," he said. "Inference of harm is sufficient to remove a teacher from his job. It is a serious blow to freedom of speech and freedom of religion." Kempling said he will appeal the decision to the B.C. Court of Appeal, although the four-year battle has been tough on him and his family. "But I am determined to see this through," he said. "I am a Christian first and a teacher second, and I will not compromise my faith or keep silent about what I believe." Kempling appealed to the B.C. Supreme Court on the grounds that the decision violates Canadian Charter of Rights protections of freedom of expression and religion. He argued no professional regulatory body had ever punished members for off-site conduct that had no demonstrable impact on their work. Kempling insists a one-month suspension was particularly harsh since teachers convicted of threats, assault, theft and flashing have received only letters of reprimand.

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State snubs Christian teen ranch

Stops referring troubled youth to facility due to religious teaching Posted: January 30, 2004 1:00 a.m. Eastern 2004 WorldNetDaily.com The state of Michigan has stopped referring troubled teens to a Christian residential program because of the religious teaching to which the young people are exposed. According to a statement from the Alliance Defense Fund, a legal group assisting the organization, Teen Ranch has "an extremely low recidivism rate." The nonprofit organization helps teens recover from abuse, abandonment and delinquency. ADF says in November, the Michigan Family Independence Agency decided to stop referring young people to Teen Ranch because of "vague allegations of teens being exposed to unwanted religious instruction." The religious-liberty group sent the agency a demand letter last week saying the state opens itself up to legal action if it doesn't reverse the decision. "This state action hurts Teen Ranch, but the most serious harm is to the abused and hurting youth who have been denied the love and hope that Teen Ranch offers," said Gary McCaleb, senior counsel with Alliance Defense Fund, saying "the agency misread state law: Michigan statute prohibits direct state funding of specific religious activities, but there is no prohibition of religious activities themselves." Added McCaleb: "The agency's refusal to place residents at Teen Ranch violates a multitude of constitutional principles. The key question is whether the government may single out a religious program in the course of distributing government funds to serve its valid, secular public interests and discriminate against it. Under statutory and well-settled case law, the answer is 'no.'" ADF was involved in a similar case where a faith-based halfway house was approved for government referrals as long as a secular option was also available to offenders. "No one forces (teens) to go to Teen Ranch, as opposed to another organization," Mick Koster, a spokesman for the facility, told Family News in Focus. "We're very clear about who we are before they even get there." Koster added that kids are allowed to opt out of religious activities if they choose. Family News reports since the state's decision, Teen Ranch, which has provided foster-care services for 37 years, has seen its census numbers cut by two-thirds and been forced to lay off 35 employees. The organization is willing to file a federal lawsuit if the state does not change its policy.

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Christian soldier, Muslim soldier

Michelle Malkin (archive) October 1, 2003 | Print | Send http://www.townhall.com/columnists/michellemalkin/mm20031001.shtml There's something terribly wrong when an American soldier overseas can't receive Scriptures in the mail, but a Muslim chaplain can preach freely among al Qaeda and Taliban enemy combatants at Guantanamo Bay. This is a story of two soldiers, one Christian, one Muslim. It's a cautionary tale that suggests how religious double standards and politically driven hypersensitivity threaten not only our troops, but us all. Six months ago, Jack Moody tried to send his son, Daniel, a care package containing a Bible study and other Christian religious materials. Daniel is a 21-year-old Army National Guardsman serving in the Middle East. He had written home requesting spiritual support while he risked his life abroad. The literature his dad packed included Christian comic books. But when Daniel's dad approached the post office in the family's hometown of Lenoir, North Carolina, he was told he would not be allowed to send the items. According to U.S.P.S. postal bulletin 22097, section E2, Moody was forbidden from sending "any matter containing religious materials contrary to Islamic faith or depicting nude or seminude persons, pornographic or sexual items, or non-authorized political materials." The postal clerk informed Moody that the Christian contents of the package might be considered offensive to some Muslims overseas. The policy was initiated during the first Gulf War. "My son is in the military, and he's overseas fighting to free this country from tyranny, and to protect our rights and our freedoms, and here our government has a rule on the books that's limited his freedom. I just couldn't believe it," Moody told the Voice of America news service. Even more unbelievable was the apathetic reaction of Moody's elected representatives. According to John Whitehead of the Rutherford Institute, a staunch defender of religious liberty, Sen. Elizabeth Dole's staff brushed Moody off. So did Dan Gurley, GOP Congressman Cass Ballenger's chief of staff. According to Moody, Ballenger refused to get involved, insisting that the matter should be left to the courts. And there's where Moody's case -- which is included in the devastating new book "Persecution," best-selling author David Limbaugh's searing indictment of anti-Christian intolerance -- remains today. The Rutherford Institute filed suit against the U.S. Postmaster General in defense of Moody's rights to freedom of speech, free exercise of religion, and equal protection under the law. The group's motion for summary judgment is pending. Whitehead explains: "The First Amendment prohibits our government from establishing a religion by favoring one over another. By stating that no material can be mailed if it is contrary to the Islamic religion, the U.S. Post Office has clearly shown deference to Islam above all other religions -- and this definitely violates our Constitution." Contrast Daniel Moody's treatment with that of Capt. James Yee. The Muslim convert, who studied in terror-sponsoring Syria and attended an Islamic cultural center run by the terror-friendly Saudi government, was given free rein by the U.S. Army to administer to the souls of al Qaeda and Taliban enemies at Guantanamo Bay. Yee brought the detainees prayer beads and religious books, facilitated prayer services, and assisted them with Muslim food preparation. And he received lavish, fawning profiles in the "diversity-" and "tolerance-" obsessed mainstream press. Now, he has been charged with sedition, aiding the

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enemy, spying, espionage and failure to obey a general order. Treason charges may be added. Yee exploited our bent-over-backwards solicitude toward Muslims in the military by allegedly using his access to smuggle out diagrams of the detainees' cells and lists of the names of the detainees and their interrogators. More than half of the armed forces' Muslim chaplains were trained by a terrorlinked, Saudi-subsidized institute while military leaders blindly sung the praises of multiculturalism. Islamist Fifth Columnists are benefiting from the very guarantees of religious freedom being denied to devout Christian soldiers such as Daniel Moody who are risking their lives for the War on Terror overseas. This dangerous deference to radical Islam -- rooted in a cowardly fear of offending -- is not only a threat to our soldiers' constitutionally protected rights, but to our national security. 2003 Creators Syndicate, Inc.

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The 'Offensiveness' of Christianity

David Limbaugh Friday, Dec. 5, 2003 It amazes me that people can still, with a straight face, deny that Christians are the subjects of systematic discrimination in this country. Every time I turn around there's more evidence. Since my book "Persecution" was released I've seen enough additional examples to give me a good start on a sequel not that I've decided to write one at this point. But I continue to encounter liberals who pooh pooh the idea that it is even possible to discriminate against a majority group. No matter how much proof you show them, they wave their hands dismissively and say, "Those are just loony examples of kooks out there that certainly aren't representative of any widespread discrimination." Well, if that's the case, why do we keep seeing these cases in the news? Of course, it's not the case. There is an intrinsic bias in our popular culture against Christianity, and it's getting worse. The only thing that isn't clear to me is whether the liberal secularists who deny it are oblivious to the discrimination or are being deceitful. I actually think there is some of both. Remember, there are numerous aspects to this phenomenon. It's not just the scrubbing away of Christian symbols and expression from the public square, including public property, public schools, universities, efforts to muzzle Christian officials, the anti-Christian litmus test applicable to presidential appointees and anti-Christian discrimination in zoning regulations. No, it's not just about "separation of church and state," because the bias has now infected the private sector as well such as dress codes prohibiting the wearing of Christian jewelry, and the antiChristian bias among the liberal media, Hollywood, and the cultural elite including their profane, anti-Christian art. Besides, if it were a matter of separating church and state, secularists wouldn't be twisting the government's arm to endorse anti-Christian values, from "comprehensive" sex education to pornography to homosexuality to New Ageism to Secular Humanism to the values of other major religions. And let's just dispense with this lie that the secularists are motivated by a desire to promote religious freedom and tolerance. Their constant barrages against Christian religious freedom and Christianity itself dispel that myth outright. Just one day this week I ran across three more examples and I wasn't even looking. The first involves the Meriden Public Library in Meriden, Conn., which banned five paintings of Jesus Christ, not because they were blasphemous or disrespectful, and not even because of ludicrously exaggerated concerns over church/state interaction. The images were disallowed under a policy that prohibits "inappropriate" and "offensive" fare. That's right: Jesus is offensive. Library officials were concerned that children might be disturbed by these images. What kind of mindset is it that sees offensiveness in portraits of the One who embodies pure love, and wholly ignores the egregious intolerance of those who want to ban them? You can't simply brush this off as a silly little incident. It represents an increasingly common attitude in the culture that Christianity, on its face, is offensive. That's a completely different proposition from saying that government shouldn't endorse religion. In the second example, the Supreme Court is about to hear a case concerning Northwest College in Kirkland, Wash., denying student Joshua Davey a $3,000 scholarship because he wanted to use it for the study of divinity. Thankfully the Bush administration is not infected with the anti-Christian virus. U.S. Solicitor General Ted Olson pointed out that the denial of the scholarship shows a 171

government bias against religion (the Christian religion). This isn't an isolated example. I document a similar case in my book, involving Michael Nash, whose academic scholarship was originally denied by Cumberland College in Williamsburg, Ky., when he declared that he would be majoring in philosophy and religion. The third example involves Islamic indoctrination in California public schools a subject also addressed in my book. Seventh-grade history students at Royal Oak Intermediate School in Covina, Calif., didn't just learn about Islam. They practiced the religion, by fasting to celebrate the Muslim holy month of Ramadan. The school clearly endorsed the religion: The teacher enticed students to participate by offering extra credit. It's one thing for Christians to argue that they should rejoice in their persecution that's even biblical. But it's an entirely different matter for us to stand by idly as our culture, of which we are supposed to be the majority component, institutionalizes the notion that our Savior is anathema. When is enough going to be enough? When are complacent Christians going to fight back? COPYRIGHT 2003 CREATORS SYNDICATE, INC. David Limbaugh can be reached at doclim@charter.net.

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General Muzzled After Describing War on Terror as Battle With Satan

NewsMax.com Wires Friday, Oct. 17, 2003 WASHINGTON A top general has said he will tone down his rhetoric after being criticized for casting the war on terror as a religious battle, Pentagon officials said today. But Defense Department lawyers, public affairs officials and others were meeting today to try to figure out whether that would be enough to calm the storm of criticism surrounding Army Lt. Gen. William G. Boykin, who has said the counterterror war is a battle with Satan. His comments came in speeches, some made in uniform, at evangelical Christian churches. Boykin, the new deputy undersecretary for intelligence, has said he will curtail his speechmaking, officials said. But he has not been put forward by the Pentagon to make a public statement, a development officials said they might try to orchestrate later today. Boykin said of a 1993 battle with a Muslim militia leader in Somalia: "I knew that my God was bigger than his. I knew that my God was a real God, and his was an idol." He did not respond Thursday to a request for comment. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said Thursday he had not seen Boykin's comments, but he praised the three-star general as "an officer that has an outstanding record in the United States armed forces." Despite repeated questions at a Pentagon press conference, Rumsfeld declined to condemn Boykin's statements or to say whether he would take any action. Gen. Richard Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said he had spoken in uniform at prayer breakfasts, adding he did not think Boykin broke any military rules by giving talks at churches. "There is a very wide gray area on what the rules permit," Myers said. "At first blush, it doesn't look like any rules were broken." But Sen. Lincoln Chafee, R-R.I., said that if media reports accurately quoted Boykin, the general's comments were deplorable. A Muslim group called for Boykin to be reassigned from his job, which includes overseeing the hunt for al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden, Iraq's deposed President Saddam Hussein and other Muslim figures. "Putting a man with such extremist views in a critical policy-making position sends entirely the wrong message to a Muslim world that is already skeptical about America's motives and intentions," said Nihad Awad, executive director of Council on American-Islamic Relations. Awad's statement noted that a verse in the Quran says Muslims believe in the same God as Jews and Christians. Boykin's church speeches, first reported by NBC News and the Los Angeles Times, cast the war on terrorism as a religious battle between Christians and the forces of evil. Appearing in dress uniform before a religious group in Oregon in June, Boykin said Islamic extremists hated the United States "because we're a Christian nation, because our foundation and our roots are Judeo-Christian. ... And the enemy is a guy named Satan." Rumsfeld on Thursday repeated the Bush administration's position that the war on terrorism is not a war against Islam but against people "who have tried to hijack a religion." The defense secretary said he could not prevent military officials from making controversial

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statements. 2003 Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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Appeals panel: Decalogue unconstitutional

Court rules 10 Commandments unlawful even when displayed with other docs Posted: December 18, 2003 7:00 p.m. Eastern 2003WorldNetDaily.com By a 2-1 vote, the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals today upheld a lower-court ruling that said three Kentucky counties could not display the 10 Commandments in public buildings, even when the Decalogue is accompanied by other historical documents. Liberty Counsel, the civil-liberties defense organization representing the counties in the action, reports the case involves two courthouses in Pulaski and McCreary counties which displayed the Ten Commandments, the Declaration of Independence, the Magna Carta, the Bill of Rights and other historical documents and Harlan County, where the school board created a similar display. The Harlan exhibit includes a limited public forum where the community can post additional historical documents. The displays began with the Ten Commandments alone. They later were changed to include some historical documents with excerpted religious quotes. The displays then were altered to include other historical documents in their entirety. Because the displays originated with only the religious document, however, Judges Eric Clay and Julia Smith Gibbons agreed they were unconstitutional. They contend the original religious purpose was not altered by later adding historical documents. Senior Judge James Ryan dissented, Liberty Counsel said, stating court precedent established that displays could be altered to include a broader education purpose even if the original purpose was solely religious. He also argued the displays were constitutional, and he criticized the court for not taking seriously the school exhibit, which allows the community to post any historical document. Mat Staver, president and general counsel of Liberty Counsel, said in a statement, "To rule that government may not modify its actions to include an educational purpose is nonsensical. Due to the bizarre aspect of this ruling, we believe the full panel of judges will rehear this matter. This case is far from over, and we believe that in the end, justice will prevail and these displays will be upheld. The past cannot dictate the future." Liberty Counsel will ask the entire panel of 6th Circuit judges to rehear the case. Symposium: The Muslim Persecution of Christians By Jamie Glazov FrontPageMagazine.com | October 10, 2003 Thewidespreadpersecution of Christians is an increasingphenomenon in the Islamic world. Aside from its obvious tragic and horrifying ingredients, what is the significance and meaning of this persecution? Why is it almost never mentioned in the Western media? How is it connected to the conflict between the West and militant Islam? Why should America be concerned? To discuss these and other issues with Frontpage Symposium today, Frontpage Magazine welcomes Bat Yeor, the author of three major books on dhimmis, jihad, and dhimmitude (www.dhimmitude.org and www.dhimmi.org). On May 1, 1997-- after the publication ofThe Decline of Eastern Christianity under Islam. from Jihad to Dhimmitude (1996) -- she testified ata Hearing of the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Subcommittee on Near Eastern and South Asian Affairson 'Religious Persecution in the Middle East' ("An Historical Overview of the Persecution of Christians under Islam. PAST IS PROLOGUE: The Challenge of Islamism Today"). Her latest 175

study is Islam and Dhimmitude. Where Civilizations Collide (2002); see Eurabia: The Road to Munich. National Review Online, October 9, 2002; "European Fears of the Gathering Jihad." FPM, Feb. 21 2003; Paul Marshall, a Senior Fellow at Freedom House's Center for Religious Freedom. He is the author and editor of twenty books, including Religious Freedom in the World: A Global Survey, and the best-selling Their Blood Cries Out. His latest books are Islam at the Crossroads(2002)and God and the Constitution: Christianity and American Politics (2002); Habib Malik, who holds a doctorate in modern European intellectual history from Harvard and currently teaches history and cultural studies at the Lebanese American University in Lebanon.He has published a book on the early reception of Kierkegaard's thought and another book entitled Between Damascus and Jerusalem: Lebanon and Middle East Peace.He has also written widely in both English and Arabic on the Christians of Lebanon and the Middle East, on human rights in the region, and on Islam's relations with non-Muslim minority communities native to Muslimmajority countries; and Walid Phares, Professor of Middle East Studies and Religious Conflict at Florida Atlantic University and a Senior Fellow with the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies. He is an analyst with MSNBC and a board member of the Human Rights Coalition in the Muslim World. He testified to the US Senate on the "Christians in the Middle East: The policies of Ethnic Cleansing," (1997) and conducts congressional briefings on "Jihad and Human rights, " (1998-2003). Interlocutor: Welcome to Frontpage Symposium ladies and gentlemen. Lets begin with the question that will build a foundation to this discussion: how widespread is the persecution of Christians in the Islamic world? Marshall: Very widespread, thereare few Muslim countries where it does not occur. It takes four forms. First. there are direct, violentattacks by extremists on Christian communities. These occur in Egypt, Algeria, Iran, Yemen, Pakistan, Bangladesh, the Phillipines, Nigeria, Indonesia (the list is not exhaustive). In most of these cases the Government is either unable or unwilling to stop the attacks. Second, there is civil war and communal violence where the Christian community has resisted the spread of radical varieties of Islam. Since the National Islamic Front (formerly the Muslim Brotherhood) took power in Sudan in the late 1980's two million people have been killed, mostly Christians and animists. In Nigeria some 11,000 people have been killed in the last three years over the introduction of Islamic sharia law. There is a similar death tollin eastern Indonesia, whereparamilitary militant organizations such as Laskar Jihad, allied to international terrorists, have slaughtered local populations. Third, there is widespread discrimination against Christians in Muslim countries. They are frequently at a disadvantage in marriage, custody and inheritance cases, are forced to subsidize Islam through taxes, are severly restricted in building and repairing churches, and are often excluded from government positions. This happens inmost Muslim countries. In some cases, as in Pakistan or Iran or Nigeria, the testimony of a Christian counts less in a court case. Fourthly, blasphemy and apostasy laws disproportionately target minorities. In Saudi Arabia, Christianity is entirely forbidden. Bat Ye'or: The persecution is difficult to assess for several reasons. (1) The situation is not the same in all the Muslim countries, there are more dramatic cases in countries that apply the shariah, like Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Iran, etc.-- or acknowledge, like Egypt, that the shariah is the source of jurisdiction. Sometimes the government is more liberal, but the population is intolerant and harass the Christians. (2) The Christians themselves are reluctant to speak either because, as dhimmis, they are not conscious of being discriminated against, since it is the only condition they have known for centuries (dhimmitude); or because they fear Muslim reprisals.(3) The Western media and Western governments usually overlook the discrimination against Christians to avoid irritating

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Muslim governments, but also to protect Christians from more attacks, since they were often massacred by Muslim mobs under the pretext that they were protected by the infidels. Phares: Let's refine our definitions. First we're addressing the cases of persecution of Christians in the Muslim world, which specifically means the countries with either a Muslim majority or under an Islamist regime. So, we are addressing all cases where Christian communities or individuals are under any form of suppression as a result of their identification as non-Muslims -and in this case as "Christians"- by regimes or organizations within the confines of these above countries. Second, there are two types of persecution of Christians in the countries with Muslim majority or regimes. One is religious persecution of Christians per se, which would be the most severe, the other is political oppression of Christian communities. Both types are against Human Rights and should be sanctioned by international law. a) Religious persecution was obviously practiced in Afghanistan, but is now institutionalized in Saudi Arabia for example, where by law you cannot be Christian to start with, nor convert to the Christian faith. Following the Wahabi teachings, Islamists around the Muslim world have conducted a variety of documented aggressions against Christians (and other Muslims as well) such as in: Egypt, Pakistan, Indonesia, etc. b) Community persecution is a wide spread phenomenon. It takes the shape of ethnic oppression, examples: Lebanon, Sudan, Iraq, Syria, Iran, etc. but also Egypt and Indonesia. In sum, the suppression of Christians in the Muslim world is an international problem. Malik: In very few spots throughout the Islamic world where Christians live in Muslim-majority states do we find them enjoying an equal status with their Muslim counterparts. They are more often than not reduced to second-class status, or dhimmi status. In the Arab world, for example, the only place where native Christians have managed for centuries to avoid the dhimmi humiliation is in Lebanon. But even here matters have been deteriorating since the war in the country, which began in 1975 and since Syrian occupation and Islamist resurgence. All other Middle Eastern Christian communities (Copts, Palestinians, Syrians, Iraqis, etc.) are quintessential dhimmis. So if dhimmitude represents a recipe for slow and gradual liquidation of the targeted community, then this is the most subtle and most insidious form of persecution and it is quite widespread. Interlocutor: Is Muslim persecution of Christians something new or the continuation of an old pattern and Islamic tradition? Marshall: There has nearly always been discrimination, and often violence, but we are now seeing an upsurge of persecution in the Islamic world. Bat Ye'or: It is certainly not new. Jews and Christians ('People of the Book') in Muslim countries shared a same destiny: that of dhimmis, - native populations conquered and subjected to the laws of jihad. Islamic laws regulating their status were the same, whereas other native populations like the Zoroastrians in Persia were more discriminated against. The oppression of Christians started from the beginning of the Muslim conquest of their lands. It is attested in the narratives before these rules became codified in laws from the 8th century. It covers all aspect of life and imposes vilification and insecurity. It has often included slavery, deportations, forced conversions and mass killings, although Christians like Jews are 'protected' by Islamic law providing their submit to their inferior and humiliating status. Those rules are inscribed in the shariah, and with the reIslamization of the Muslim state, the traditional thirteen-century-old pattern is being reactivated, after its suppression by the European colonization of Muslim countries in the 19th and 20th centuries. Christians are persecuted also because they are secularists and oppose the return of the shariah. Phares: First let's understand that there is a battle over this History. While many Muslim historians and a number of sympathetic historians in the West affirm that persecution has never (or almost never) existed, most Middle East Christian Historians and a growing number of Muslim humanist intellectuals affirm clearly that this oppression has existed since the 7th century. But facts from the history of the Middle East are difficult to deny. One, there is a whole debate about the real attitude

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of the theology of Islam towards the infidels (or Kafir). The answer varies between moderates and radicals. It will remain a debate in the realm of theology and linguistics till a reform occurs. On the other hand, historical accounts of persecution are undeniable. Since the establishment of the Dhimmi status as of the 7th century AD/CE the Caliphate and the various other Islamic states have discriminated against Christians and Jews. Other powers -including Christians- throughout history have been discriminatory as well but later on, future generations have admitted this behavior. The problem nowadays lies in the fact that most mainstream historians of Islamic Politics still deny the past -and worse the present-existence of these discriminations. Malik: Ever since the earliest Islamic conquests dating back to the 7th century AD when Invading Muslim armies overran neighboring communities, many of them Christian, there has been systematic persecution of Christians. Setting aside the anecdotes of tolerance that adorn so much of the specialized (and romanticized) literature on Islamic history, the real story is a sordid one of the systematic reduction of vanquished peoples and members of other religions to second-class status at best - mainly reserved for Christians and Jews - and physical elimination at worst. So this is quite an old story indeed. Interlocutor: Is there an ingredient within Islam itself that makes it an oppressor of other religions? Is it possible for Islam to be tolerant of a religion like Christianity? Marshall: Dhimmi status has led to continuing discrimination against Christians into the modern age, and in the last century, Christian rebellion against Dhimmi status has led to mass murder. Apostasy and blasphemy laws have often required that any Muslim who wants to change his religion, or any Christian who talks to them about Christianity, be executed. Bat Ye'or: The Qur'an and the hadiths, the sacred Scriptures for the Muslims, make the jihad and the domination of Islam over all other religions, mandatory. Muslims invokes some verses which call for tolerance and pluralism. However according to the classical views of Muslim jurists and theologians, these verses have been abrogated by later ones that are more intransigent. In relation to Christianity and to Judaism, Muslim doctrine preaches that all the biblical persons from Adam, including Jesus, were Muslim prophets who preaches Islam. Hence, the theological conflict goes to the very heart of the three religions. Islam does not recognise the link between Christianity and Judaism, since Jesus is considered to be a Muslim. Moreover, according to some hadith, at the end of time the Muslim Jesus will return and destroy Christianity. Phares: All religions make a distinction between believers and non-believers. The issue is about the "treatment" of the others not their theological identification. That the texts of Islam divide humanity in two groups is not the question at hands. It is about the stipulations in the text that prescribes a legal and political behavior vis-a-vis the infidels, and particularly Christians. As most experts in Islamic politics have concluded, you can find verses that allows collective punitive action against them as well as verses that calls for special treatment. The ingredient you're looking for would be the use of these collective action texts from the 7th century, by political forces in modern times, to promote oppression of Christians nowadays. Any religion can be used for oppression and any religion can be used with tolerance. The Jihadists of the 21th century -in the absence of a historical reformation- are using those references from the texts to perpetuate the state of mind of the original conquests and Caliphate in the present context of international relations. Malik: Malik: The Koran contains verses about members of other religions, specifically the People of the Book (Christians and Jews), that lend themselves to adverse interpretations possibly leading to violence. As the undisputed very words of Allah (God), there is little room to ameliorate some of the more outspokenly violent verses. Schools of interpretation within the broad Islamic traditions have often differed on the emphases and nuances and on when and how to apply an extreme antagonistic interpretation to any particular verse. Regarding Christianity, for instance, the

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problem of shirk arises - i.e. the accusation that Christians associate two other figures with the one supreme deity to produce the Trinity. This is condemned in the Koran as a form of idolatry. It is difficult to see how Islam can peacefully coexist with a religion like Christianity that is perceived as idolatrous in its essence. Interlocutor: Why do you think the persecution of Christians by Muslims in Arab countries is almost never spoken about in the Western media? Marshall: It's not only Arab countries, but in non-Arab Muslim countries as well. It's hard to cover--it often happens in remoter areas too far from the bars and receptions where journalists and diplomats like to hang out. The question of persecution of anybody outside the west gets little coverage anyway. But beyond these general reasons, I think journalists are often unsympathetic to third world Christians, assuming they are going to be little Jerry Falwells. They also tend not to take religion seriously and so don't examine it closely: they assume it's 'economic' or 'political' or 'ethnic' or whatever is the flavor du jour in American social science thinking. Finally, there is little knowledge of history, hence an attitude that sees Christians in these countries as foreigners, American offshoots, imperialist transplants and the like, often in stark ignorance of the fact that Christian communities in most of these countries are far older than the Muslim communities I had an international correspondent ask me what Christians were doing in Egypt "don't they know it's a Muslim country." I had to explain that the Egyptian church dates from about the year 54, and that the Bible says Jesus grew up there. Bat Ye'or: The Western media is obsessed by the Palestinian problem and prefers to ignore most of the other dramatic situations in the Muslim world. This is a deliberated policy. We didn't hear too much of the horrors perpetrated by Saddam Hussein and his sons against the Iraqi people before the destruction of his regime. The media contributes to project a falsified picture of the Muslim world by focusing only on Israel. Criticizing Muslim countries might involve many dangers, both physical and professional. There is also an ignorance on this subject, deliberately maintained. In recent articles, I have examined the European Union's policy with the Mediterranean Arab world over the past 30 years, leading to a future "Eurabia", that is the spreading of a culture of dhimmitude. Phares: There is a myriad of reasons. One is ignorance. Western media has an educated membership but little knowledge of the oppression of minorities in general and Christians in particular in the Muslim world. It has even skipped the struggle of humanist, liberal and democratic individuals and forces from Morocco to Afghanistan. Who should you blame? Obviously those in charge of the education, i.e, university scholars. Which brings us to the second reason. As of the 1970s a flow of funding coming from the oil producing regimes in the Arab and Muslim world mostly authoritarian ones- sunk on Western campuses, paralysing the process of information and education. These regimes blocked the circulation of knowledge as a way to avoid an international investigation of human rights and religious freedom in these countries. The direct result was that an army of scholars in the West participated directly in hiding the truth of persecutions, not only against Christians, but also against enlightened Muslim intellectuals. Malik: For nearly 30 years now I have been writing and speaking out and trying hard to awaken Western sensitivities to the plight of Middle Eastern Christians, specifically those of Lebanon, the Sudan, and the Copts, but with very little by way of concrete results. The reasons, I think, have to do with a number of related factors. Europe, which traditionally was intimately involved in the affairs of the Near and Middle East, is no longer the influential player it used to be historically. Also, the general secularizing trend in the West has lessened the sensitivity there to questions pertaining to the persecution of specific religious groups in the Islamic world. Moreover, oil and other strategic interests compel policy makers in the West, particularly in Washington, to overlook such violations so as not to displease or embarrass their Arab friends. Israels bittersweet experience in 1982 in Lebanon also has caused the Israelis to distance themselves from Lebanons

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Christians and look to an accommodation with Damascus. All these factors have come together to make it difficult for such issues as Muslim persecution of Christians to hit the headlines and stir sympathetic sentiments. Interlocutor: Well, the Muslim persecution of Christians is clearly a widespread and horrifying phenomenon. Can anything even close be said in reverse? Please tell me, where in our modern world do Christians persecute Muslims for their faith? Where are Muslims persecuted and live in fear because Christians are trying to force the New Testament on them? And what does the answer to this question mean? Malik: Frankly, I cant think of a situation around the world today where Christians are actively persecuting Muslims. Perhaps an argument can be made about the misbehavior of the Serbs towards Balkan Muslims in the 1990s, or the Russians towards the Chechens, but this sort of thing has been widely condemned by the international community including other Christians. Crusading against the Muslim infidels is no longer part of the worldview of Christians, and in fact never was since it was Christendom (essentially a political entity), not Christianity, that perpetrated such abuses in the past. Christian theocracies are not in evidence any more. The combination of church and state violates Christs insistence that what is Caesars should be left to Caesar and what is Gods to God, i.e. separation of the two realms. Besides, in the case of the Serbs or Russians, the issues were mostly political and nationalistic, not religious. That is to say no one was trying to forcefully convert Muslims to Christianity by forcing the New Testament upon them. Forcing the Islamic sharia on Christians, however, is happening all the time in places like Sudan, Nigeria, the southern Philippines, Sabah Island in Indonesia, and elsewhere. If Christians in the modern world have largely desisted from such practices, the same unfortunately cannot be said about Muslims. Marshall: There are no examples that I know ofof Christians actually "trying to force the New Testament" in any explicit way, but there are examples where Christians have targeted Muslims as Muslims. When Milosevic ruled Serbia he (a former communist apparatchik) wrapped himself in the cloak of Orthodox as a means of whipping up a religious Serbian national identity against Muslims. He succeeded and thousands of Bosnian Muslims were killed because they were Muslims. In Russia, the war in Chechnya is often portrayed by officials as a war of Christianity against Islam, or Wahhabism and Russia's brutal conduct of that war is often seen by Muslims as oppression by Christians. There is discrimination against Greece's Muslim minority, largely used as a bargaining chip by Greece to get parallel concessions from Turkey in its treatment of its Christian minority. Muslims have also suffered discrimination in the Philippines. So Christian persecution of Muslims does exist, but sporadically. There is no parallel to the widespread pattern in the Muslim world. Bat Ye'or:Muslims are not persecuted by Christians for their faith, but there are bloody political conflicts like inex-Yugoslavia and in Chechnya. This is the legacy ofa past, when for centuries Muslims were filling their harems, their troops, and their civil administration with Islamized Christianchildren abducted in the Balkans, particularly Serbia,and the Caucasian region. In Western Europe, where millions of Muslims have legally emigrated in the last 30 years, they enjoy the same rights asothers. European politicians have welcomed this immigration, vaunted the superiority of the Islamic civilization over their own,andthe greatness of its religion.European glorification of Islam is such thatconversions to Islam from Christianity abound. What does this mean?The European Union hopes to keep its good relations with the Muslim countries at any cost --for economic and political reasons and for fear of terrorism.In a wider perspective, one can say thatWestern states have secular institutions which impose equality of rights,of gender and civil liberties, whileMuslim countries often have the shariah law which rejectsequality between men and

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women, and betweenMuslimsand non-Muslims -- and link religion with politics. Phares: Many Muslim and a number of Western scholars nowadays raise the issue of past persecutions of Muslims at the hands of Christian powers as an equivalent to the oppression by today's Islamist regimes and organizations of Christian communities. This comparison is academically inaccurate. For in comparative methods you either compare in diachronic, that is the same institution or culture over time, or synchronic, i.e. two institutions or cultures at one time. That is not the case. Indeed, Crusaders and Spanish inquisition persecuted Muslims in Palestine and Spain. That should be compared to the global persecution of Christians under the Caliphate from the Atlantic to the Indian oceans. Such comparison is sound and should be analyzed. In recent, Islamist scholars identify the "ethnic cleansing" of Muslims in Bosnia and Kosovo as an example of contemporary Christian persecution of Muslims, assuming that the Milosevitch regime was "Christian." The latter regime was not claiming "Christian" identity in the same way the regimes in Sudan, Saudi Arabia, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Egypt and others were either claiming or referencing to religious law, in their suppression of Christians in their midst. Although all repressions are reprehensible and must be stopped, there is no such thing as "Christian-based" persecution of Muslims as a doctrine nowadays. Muslim ethnic communities are in uprising against Governments in several countries where Christians form a majority. But to be academically correct, on the other hand, there are many cases nowadays where Christians are persecuted on the basis of religion (i.e Sharia), in addition to ethnic oppression. As for the numbers, statistics are clear: Roughly more than a 120 million Christians live under various forms of oppression versus 15 million Muslims enduring political suppression. Interlocutor: In light of these realities, it appears that there truly is a War of Civilizations taking place, does it not? Malik: Im always struck by a fascinating phrase in Samuel Huntingtons famous book: Islams Bloody Borders. I do have serious reservations about the Huntington thesis of civilizational clashes, but when it comes to Islams bloody borders I have to pause and reflect. It appears that wherever Islam meets non-Islam there is blood being spilled: Kashmir, Mindanao, Chechnya, the Balkans, Sudan, Nigeria, Israel/Palestine, Lebanon, and many other places of contact. Is the blood Huntington talks about purely the result of anti-Muslim conspiracies from the outside directed at the Muslim world? Part of it may be that. But I suspect a deeper analysis will reveal serious problems Islam as a creed has with the different other, the inhabitant of the House or Abode of Islam, also referred to by Muslims as the abode of war and confusion. There is today a war taking place between the radical Islamists a la Bin Laden who have hijacked Islam and intimidated any voices of moderation on the one hand, and the rest of the civilized world on the other. You cant really call this a clash of civilizations; it is more like a war between civilization at large and barbarism or piracy (we call it terrorism). Muslims are often as much the victims of this barbarism as non-Muslims. Marshall: I would not say a "war of civilizations." The world is too varied. I think Huntington's phrase'a clash of civilizations' (which he wants to avoid becoming a war) is more accurate.We have a 'clash,' tension,'thathas erupted into war or lower level violence in several places, which may get more widespread. Bat Ye'or: It has always been there, although it is politicallyincorrect to say it. It is a fight of ideas, of ideologies, with many Muslims on the Western side. It encompasses the character of the society: secular, openand modernist, or religious and jihadist;equality of gender;universal human rights,civil and political freedoms; independance of the judiciary; due process replacing individual retribution; respect for pluralism, political and moral accountability, self-criticism. And in international relations, the confrontation between the jihad ideology and the legitimacy of sovereign nonMuslim states.Because of an unofficial censorshipwithpolitical-correctnesscriteria, the West is notprepared for this ideological war whose basic components involving the very nature of human

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rights have been obfuscated. Phares: I have authored back in 1979 three books dealing with the "Clash of Civilizations."Two were about a "fault line," that is Lebanon and one was about the worldwide encounter of Civilizations. This book, "al-Taadudiya al-Hadariya fil aalam" (Civilizational Pluralism in the World) was out 14 years before the famous article by Professor Samuel Huntington in Foreign Affairs in 1993. In that essay, I argued that Civilizations collide and co-exist as states do. They have international relations and internal affairs. I proposed a categorization of their membership etc. And one of my findings was that wars between Civilizations are as frequent as wars between nation-states. There were two problems with my book. One was time: It was under the Cold War and no one paid attention to that theory. Two was language" It was in Arabic, therefore not bale to make it through the international press. In a sum, yes, there is a clash of civilization taking place. It is so obvious and clear, at least in the mind of one party: The Jihadists. The latter have declared that war, are conducting it and think in its terms. However, clashes of civilizations is not always in a form of military war, and doesn't have to engulf all civilizations, nor does it mobilize the entirety of a particular civilization. The Jihadists are waging a war of Civilizations even if the overwhelming majority of Muslims are not. Interlocutor: What is the best tactic that we can employ in helping persecuted Christians in the Islamic world? Malik: Shine the spotlight of publicity on their plight. Get the mainstream media in the West to become interested. Insist on the principle of reciprocity with the Muslim world, i.e. Islamic states ought to offer non-Muslims living in their midst at least the same civil and political benefits that Muslims enjoy when they go to live in the West. Pointing to the Patriot Act and the policies of John Ashcroft as being anti-Muslim and a rejection of Western freedoms is really no argument because these exceptional measures are nowhere as severe as some of the mistreatment and grave abuses that non-Muslims are exposed to in Muslim-majority states. Active political, moral, and material aid to beleaguered Christians enduring Islamic persecution ought to be seriously contemplated, as well as sanctions imposed on abusing states or regimes that condone persecution or simply look the other way. Marshall: The tactics will vary from situation to situation. First is making people aware of what is happening. Even apart from anybody else, the American Christian community is largely asleep on this issue. The war on terrorism will also help. In the shorter term it may lead to increased attacks on Christians, as in Pakistan--6 massacres last year. But if the US succeeds in defeating or severely weakening Islamist terrorists, then this will ease the plight of these communities. We have already seen this in Indonesia: after the crackdown following the Bali bombing, Laskar Jihad, which had been slaughtering and forcibly converting Christians in the eastern areas, largely disbanded. In other cases we need to support governments fighting the growth of radical Islam, and support moderate Muslims throughout the world, who are themselves often attacked, and who are frequently intimidated. Look at what has happened to Irshad Manji--and she lives in Canada. Imagine the difficulty of raising critiques of reactionary Islam while in Sudan or Pakistan. The United States should also not be afraid of voicing its support for these communities around the world. It is often more reticent to speak about them than it is oppressed Muslims. Bat Ye'or: None are good because their situation is very insecure.The culture of jihad and hate which is developing increases the dangers.But certainly the worst tactic is just tohide the truth and remain silent. It is bad for the victims and bad for the oppressors who willcontinue with impunity. It is, in fact, the continuation of the old ways, when the life of Jews and Christians was cheap and could be shed without retribution,their possessionsstolen, their testimony refused,andinsecurity prevailed. We ought to rediscover the rights of the indigenous peoples, Jews and

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Christians,eliminated in their own Islamized countries by the ethnic and religious cleansing institutionalized through the laws of jihad and dhimmitude. As long as this subject will remain taboo,the jihadist culture of terror and impunity willprevail. Europe has decided to ignore it andprefersto promotejihad values infunding the Palestinian Authority,supportingthe delegitimization of Israel and by deflecting the causes of terrorism onto America and Israel. In this sense, Europe -- or rather its officialpolitical bodies -- are financially allied with, and morally responsible for jihadist terror,and are eroding the very principles of Europe's freedoms.This policy initiated by France three decades ago through the European Community has had a snowball effect andwould nowappear irreversible. Phares: Actually, before adopting tactics, allow me to suggest a strategy. At first the international community must acknowledge that there is a "problem of persecution" of a particular type, in the same way anti-Semitism, Apartheid and Ethnic Cleansing have been recognized. The persecution of millions of Christians is and should not be a "Christian" problem, but a human one. The United Nations must move on that level in the same way it did in South Africa and in the Balkans. But in order to get the issue in front of the UN, it must become a Foreign policy issue here in the US. There are some significant legislation in Congress and the executive branch has developed some initiatives over the past few years. But it is not yet an "American issue in Foreign Policy." After September 11, one can see that the capacity of the American public to understand that persecution and identify with it has reached a level allowing national mobilization. So, time is ripe. But it is also important to solicit the endorsement of Muslim intellectuals, seculars and humanists. Their contribution to the acknowledgment of this problem is highly important. And on that level as well, we can see the emergence of intellectual dissidence around the world at slow pace, but nevertheless significant. Interlocutor: What does the Muslim persecution of Christians mean to you? If someone were to ask you why this issue is important,what would you say? Malik:As a Christian, I find such persecution to be revolting and utterly unacceptable. But as a human being and a human rights activist, I cannot sit silently while any form of persecution against any group is going on. No group should have to endure persecution because of the creed to which they adhere. This is a direct violation of the UN Charter, of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (in the formulation of which my late father, Charles Malik, had a major hand), and of all accepted norms of decency, not to mention that the major religions of this world all abhor such behaviour in their teachings - at least the moderate interpretations of such teachings. What can be more important than the freedom of belief and conscience that Article 18 in the UDHR speaks about? Marshall: First it is a major human rights issue, the widest pattern of religious persecution in the world. It affectsover a hundredmillion people Second, it is a marker of Islamic radicalism--many of the groups now in the newsI have known for years not because I am a terrorism expert but because they have been engaged in domestic terrorism against Christians and other minorities for years. The groups who carried out the Bali bombings had already bombed dozens of churches at Christmas eve 2000 (with many bombs wrapped as Christmas present so that children would pick them up). Where this persecution occurs you will usually find terrorism associated or following. It is the canary in the midshaft. Third, The conflict between Israel and the Palestinians has, on the Palestinian side,moved from largely nationalist to largely Islamist rhetoric giving the conflict a religious caste that makes it even more intractable. if persecution continues to drive out Christians from the Middle East (where they were a quarter of the population a century ago) then conflict will be largely Israeli/Jew vs Arab/Muslim with no intermediates. Fourth, while there are exceptions, Christians throughout the world tend to be agents of free

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markets and democracy (Huntington believes that changes in the Catholic Church in the Second Vatican Council were a major factor in democratization in Latin America, Eastern Europe, Portugal, Spain and the Philippines. Hence defending Christian communities also help promote democracy. Bat Ye'or: It means a lot to me. First, because as a Jew, I have myself beenpersecuted in Egypt, and have, therefore, experienced the trials of the Christians -- hence I strongly identify with them. The recent jihadist terror attack in Haifa deliberately targeted both Israeli Jews and Maronite Christians together. Families were wiped out. This illustrates our historical common destiny as "the People of the Book" (the Bible) inthe civilization of dhimmitude.Besides, there is something terribly abject and revolting to see people persecuted for their faith, their color or what they are; to seetheir identity, their history usurped and their dignity denied. It is also a Jewish history.I have read extensively on these Christians trials throughout dhimmitude. I think that the denial of human dignity and the gratuitous suppression of life are the most revolting aggression,against a fellow human being and onthe values on whichcivilization rests. This dehumanisationis at the verycore ofdhimmitude. Phares: Obviously it is first and foremost an issue of Human Rights. Christians do not suffer differently from others. Ironically, one can say: They are human too, no? On that ground alone, there must be a serious address of that crisis. Second, not acknowledging the reality of the persecuted leads to human tragedies such as in Sudan, Nigeria, Pakistan, Indonesia, Lebanon and Egypt, to name some. Thirdly, those living outside the realm of this persecution are not eternally safe from it. For the very permissive attitude by the West which lead to these persecutions is the most encouraging phenomenon to Jihad Terrorists to proceed to the "Infidel world" (dar el Harb) after the elimination of the "minorities" within what they perceive as the "Muslim world" (dar elIslam). If you thoroughly study the historical reasons behind September 11, you'd understand that the Usama Bin laden of this world have interpreted the abandonment of the Christians by the West as a signal of moral decline. All you have to do is to watch the famous/infamous al-Jazeera aired video tapes of al-Qaida and realized why you were paid visits in New York and Washington. Then you'll understand the importance of addressing all oppression worldwide, and of course Christian persecution included. Interlocutor: Thank you Mr. Phares. So, in terms of your last point, we see that the persecution of Christians by Muslims is very much connected to 9/11 and the War on Terror. So let's finish the discussion with this question: why should America be concerned about the fate of Christians in the Islamic world? Malik: As a first principle, America should be concerned about the persecution of any group in the world and, given its vast resources and power, it ought in every instance to try and put a stop to such persecution if it can. When America and the world were not paying attention in 1915, nearly 2 million Armenians were brutally massacred, or rendered homeless, by Turks and Kurds. Again during the Second World War America and the world did little to stop Hitler's systematic destruction of European Jewry--six million of them perished in the Holocaust. More recently we witnessed the horrifying atrocities of Pol Pot in Cambodia, those of the Serbs in Bosnia, and the carnage in Ruwanda. America cannot be the world's policeman, but as the only superpower it can certainly demonstrate greater sensitivity in its foreign policy to such persecutions on a grand scale. It is particularly crucial that religious persecution be acknowledged and faced head on wherever it occurs. This is because such persecution runs counter to the deepest and most cherished values of personal liberty upon which America was founded. In the current world climate defined after 9/11 by the ongoing war against Islamist terrorism ignoring the persecution of Christians or any other religious group by Muslims simply conveys to the terrorists the impression that the West, especially America, is weak, irreligious, decadent, and ultimately vulnerable to similar terror. Looking the other way while Christians around the world are subjugated, robbed of their

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freedoms, tortured, dispossessed, and killed by fanatical Muslim groups or regimes feeds the warped ambitions of the forces of terror and emboldens them to attempt other outrages against Weastern, specifically American, targets. Allowing such religious persecutions to happen, or remaining silent about them when they do occur, are clearly not in the national interests of the United States or the freedom-loving civilized world. Such irresponsible neglect will come back to haunt those guilty of it. Marshall: This needs to be a major concern for Americans, not because we value the life of one type of believer above any other, or any non-believer, but because religious freedom is the first right mentioned in the first amendment of the Bill of Rights. It is often, and properly, called "The First Freedom," the right from which historically and analytically, other rights have sprung. If the U.S. cares, as it does and as it should, about human rights, then a major component of our human rights policy must be religious freedom. This is also an issue that effects our policies on Islamist terrorism, conflicts in the Middle East, and the promotion of democracy. A defense of religious freedom, especially for the most beleagured religious community, can advance our goals in these areas as well. Phares: America should be concerned with the persecution of Christians under Islamic regimes or by Jihadist organizations for a variety of reasons. First, on the level of principles. The US have shown tremendous concerns for abuse of Human Rights around the world under the cold war and since the collapse of the Soviet Union. It intervened in many cases. 1) Christians suppressed by Communist regimes in Eastern Europe and the USSR, Christians oppressed by military regimes in Latin America, Muslims under threats in mostly Christian countires such as in Bosnia and Kosovo, as well as Muslims oppressed by other Muslims such as the Kurds of Iraq. But one single category remained untouched by our Foreign Policy, that is precisely Christians oppressed or persecuted under Islamic regimes. And that is wrong. Singling out the persecution of Christians as the only category that will be allowed to suffer endlessly under Islamic regimes is not just. Another reason is Terrorism. If the US doesn't help to stop that persecution it would sending a message to the Jihad Terrorists to escalate their ethnic cleansing of Christians worldwide, which has been happening increasingly in the 1990s. The logical next step would be to strike at what the Jihadists perceive as Judeo-Christian societies and hence conduct Terror attacks in the West. We've seen this happening on September 11. Bat Ye'or: The persecution of Christians in Muslim lands should concern Americafor several reasons. The main one is human solidarity and the alleviation of suffering for all; another is the enforcement of universal human rights in Muslim countries. Here we have two conflictual interpretations of human rights: one is found in the UN's 1948Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and the 'International Bill of Human Rights'; the other is the 1990 'Cairo Declaration of Human Rights in Islam', approved by theOrganization of the Islamic Conference (OIC),which conforms to Islamand the Shariah. This ambiguity derails the UN's so-called "international legality" since56 Muslim member states abide to Muslim, and therefore to religious-political principles-- in contradiction to Western secular laws. But certainly the most important element relates tothe meaning revealed by this persecution, solidly entrenched in thirteen centuries of traditional practice, for itconfirms the persistence of a religious pattern that discriminates and demonizes the infidels as a collectivity.In this sense, itthreatens all non-Muslim countries. Eastern Christians sometimes think that the West's alignment on Arab/Muslim policies will help them. They are used as a channel for the Islamization ofthe West and tobring it to legitimisejihadist ideologies.This policy has beensuccessfulin Europe in many ways and is the source of the West's weakness,of the subversion of Europe's values, and of an Atlantic drift. Interlocutor: Walid Phares,Bat Ye'or, Paul Marshall andHabib Malik, we are out of time.It was a great pleasureto have you all on this edition of Frontpage Symposium. Take care for now.

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I welcome all of our readers to get in touch with me if they have a good idea for a symposium. Email me at jglazov@rogers.com. PREVIOUS SYMPOSIUMS: What About Syria? Guests: Alex Alexiev, Nir Boms,Bassam Haddad and David Kaiser. Leftist Anti-Semitism. Guests: Phyllis Chesler, Sol Stern, David Rosen and Roger S. Gottlieb. Jihad in Iraq. Guests: Michael Ledeen, Cliff May,Charles Kupchan and Daniel Brumberg. G.I. Janes. Guests: Tammy Bruce, Lory Manning, David Gutmann and Anthony Mirvish. Jamie Glazov is Frontpage Magazine's managing editor. He holds a Ph.D. in History with a specialty in Soviet Studies. He is the co-editor (with David Horowitz) of the new book The Hate America Left and the author of Canadian Policy Toward Khrushchevs Soviet Union (McGillQueens University Press, 2002) and 15 Tips on How to be a Good Leftist. To see his previous symposiums and articles Click Here. Email him at jglazov@rogers.com.

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The global war on Christians

by Ralph Kinney Bennett, Reader's Digest, August 1997 In China's Henan Province, 36 year-old Zhang Xiuju was dragged from her home one night by police. When the police returned her lifeless, battered body, they claimed Xiuju had died accidentally when she jumped from a car. In Pakistan, Munir Khokher was wounded by a gunshot when he tried to stop the destruction of a Christian cemetery by Muslim mobs. In Bangladesh, when Marzina Begum and her family would not celebrate a Muslim holiday, the villagers beat her husband, breaking his leg. You haven't heard of these people. They are but drops of water in a vast sea of victims - men, women and children who have been tortured, imprisoned and executed. Their crime? They are Christians. Never before have so many Christians been persecuted for their beliefs. An estimated 200 million to 250 million Christians are at risk in countries where such incidents occur. "We are not talking about mere discrimination," says Nina Shea, director of the Puebla Program on Religious Freedom, "but real persecution - torture, enslavement, rape, imprisonment, forcible separation of children from parents." Until recently, such cases were given scant attention by the news media and were largely ignored by most human-rights organizations, the federal government, even U.S. churches. But now, two important new books are helping to force the issue into the open" Nina Shea's In the Lion's Den and Their Blood Cries Out by Paul Marshall, a senior fellow at the Institute for Christian Studies in Toronto. Other examples of persecution: In China, thousands have been sentenced to "re-education camps" for attending prayer meetings or Bible Lessons. Catholic Bishop Su Zhimin, 64, who had already spent 15 years in prison for his priestly activities, was re-arrested last spring by authorities apparently intent on preventing a pilgrimage, which he helped organize, in honour of the Virgin Mary. He is now missing. The British newspaper The Observer reported that in Cairo, Egypt, a teen-age Coptic Christian girl was kidnapped by Muslim extremists who forced her to fast, pray and memorize parts of the Koran. During her ninemonth captivity, she was raped repeatedly. Her captors poured sulfuric acid on her wrist to obliterate a tattoo of the cross, and threatened to pour it on her face if she removed the Islamic veil they forced her to wear. Terrorized, she signed papers of conversion to Islam, then escaped and was sheltered by a group called Servants of the Cross. Marshall notes that, contrary to perceptions held by secular and Christian Americans alike, "most Christians are not white. Christianity was in Africa before Europe, India before England, China before America. Three-fourths of all Christians live outside the West. It may be the largest Third World religion." Both authors examine in detail the two most implacable foes on Christianity: Muslim Militants. In some Islamic countries, such as Jordan, officials are tolerant of other religions. But in others,

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Islam's Shari'a laws, derived from the Koran and sometimes part of the legal code, "are used to invoke discrimination, repression and outright persecution against Christians." Marshall says. No nation illustrates this more brutally than the Sudan. Since 1989 the Sudanese government has been engaged in a wholesale war against Christians, who constitute roughly one-fifth of the population. Marshall reports that the goal of the ruling National Islamic Front led by Hassan Al-Turabi - who some consider the country's de facto leader - is to "eradicate non-Islamic religion." In the North, Al-Turabi's forces control the necessities of life. "Non-Muslims are given the choice of converting to Islam or being denied food, clothing and shelter," Marshall says. Thousands of women and children have been sold into slavery to Muslim masters who force them to convert to Islam. Sudan's Nuba Mountains, where Christian have lived since the sixth century, are now a wasteland of mass graves, destroyed villages and camps filled with starving women and children. Half a million Nuba Christians, virtually all men, have been killed in the past decade. "The word genocide is thrown around too frequently," says Marshall. "In the case of Sudan, however, it is a factual description." American ally Saudi Arabia is another country where, Shea says, "freedom of religion simply does not exist." All citizens must be Muslims. Expressions of Christianity - wearing a cross, reading a Bible or uttering a non-Muslim prayer - are prohibited. The Mutawwa'in, the Saudi religious police, search out hidden church services among the millions of Filipinos, Koreans, Indians and other foreign workers. In December 1992 two Filipino Christians, allegedly arrested for preaching Christianity, were sentenced to death on Christmas Day. After an international outcry, the sentence was commuted to deportation. Communist Oppressors. The collapse of the Soviet Union and its Eastern European client states shook China's leaders, who noted the church's role in fostering the collapse. According to a Puebla Program report, China's state-run press, referring to Christianity, proclaimed, "If China does not want such a scene to be repeated in its land, it must strangle the baby while it is still in the manger." This chilling pronouncement ignores the fact that Christianity has been rooted in China since the seventh century. It survived even Mao Zedong's 27 years of fierce repression, which culminated in the Cultural Revolution of 1966-76, when countless Christians and other believers were executed. "It was probably one of the largest intense persecutions of Christians in history," Marshall writes. Many of China's estimated 40 million Christians still worship in fear. They rise on Sunday at 3 a.m. to make their way to secret worship centres in the homes of evangelists. Police roam the countryside seeking out these "house churches." In Xinjiang Province, police bust in and found 17 worshippers. When five women admitted they were the leaders, they were detained, beaten and tortured. Life for China's Christians has taken a turn for the worse since 1995, when Ye Xiaowen, whom Marshall describes as "a prominent atheist and Communist hard-liner," was placed in charge of the government's Religious Affairs Bureau. Last year a Catholic priest, the Rev. Charles Guo Bole, was convicted of illegal evangelical work, including "organizing Bible classes" and "establishing underground evangelical church centers." He was sentenced to two years of imprisonment at a laogai, a reform-through-labour camp. Four Catholic bishops are also being held in the Chinese laogai. The Shea and Marshall books are helping to rouse a growing chorus to join what had been a handful of voices raised on behalf of persecuted Christians. Chief among those early voices was a

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Jewish lawyer, Michael Horowitz, senior fellow at the Hudson Institute, a think tank based in Indianapolis and Washington, D.C. "Why a Jew? Why me?" Horowitz is quick to answer his own questions: "It may be easier for me to see the eerie parallels between what is happening to Christian communities today and what happened to my people during much of Europe's history," he says. And he is grateful for the way American Christians joined with the Jewish community in the campaign to free Soviet Jews. That's why he was shocked by the silence of U.S. Christians in the face of worldwide persecution. "I didn't understand how the American Christian community, so vociferous, so committed to ending the suffering of Jews in the Soviet Union, could have been so mute, so tongue-tied, on behalf of its own." Then Horowitz realized that some people had never heard the message. And some in the humanrights community and among the intellectual, media and political elites had such a misinformed view of Christianity that they were blind to the problem. The U.S. government has also shown a lack of understanding. Nina Shea recalls when she and others briefed the Clinton Administration's new ambassador to China, former Tennessee Sen. James Sasser. he revealed extensive knowledge of human-rights problems in China. But when asked about the perilous situation of Christians meeting in secret house churches throughout China, the puzzled ambassador responded, "What's a house church?" Shea says, "China is the litmus test. If our government means to take the assault on Christians seriously, it must deal with China." But she isn't hopeful. Despite several Congressional proclamations bemoaning the persecution, the China lobby - pushing for increased trade - has thus far proved too powerful. The White House answered Christian human-rights activists by forming the Advisory Committee on Religious Freedom Abroad. "it is a slow and cumbersome mechanism," says Shea, who was named to the panel. But there are signs that the government is reacting to growing grassroots pressure as more Americans become aware of the persecution. Legislation has been introduced by Sen. Arlen Specter (R., Pa.) and Rep. Frank Wolf (R., Va.) that would create a White House position to monitor levels of religious persecution and have the power to impose sanctions against offending countries. A board of Christian leaders is organizing an International Day of Prayer for the Persecuted Church, set for November 16. "If tens of thousand of churches engage in an interdenominational effort," Horowitz says, "we'll send the world's tyrants a message they can't ignore. And Washington won't be able to ignore it either."

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On my mind
By A. M. ROSENTHAL September 3, 1999 When Is It News? http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Agora/3518/rosenthalsudan.html After a lifetime in daily journalism, I still worry when real news is treated as no news at all. Journalists write about what interests them and, they hope, a slice of their particular audiences large enough to keep their newspaper or TV station a daily habit. In free countries, the variety of journals and broadcasts guarantees information on every subject that touches on what is important in human life, with large dollops of what is deliciously unimportant. Together they are life colors, separating free people from the dreadful dirty-gray of despotism. Every subject -- but not quite. Sometimes journalists decided some subjects were not news -- like the Communist slaughter of millions of Soviet citizens, the Holocaust, poverty and racial hatred in our own country, or certain universal essences like religion and sexuality. Next Tuesday, in a United Nations committee room, delegates of 19 countries will meet on a subject not mentioned on the agenda -- slavery: not slavery yesterday, but today, and by all signs for a lot of tomorrows. It is a subject that with shockingly few exceptions is evaded by journalism and democratic political leadership. I do not know just why. Perhaps, in journalism, it is because in its magnitude it is too complicated and varied for our poor minds to deal with. And anyway, there are no real spot slavery stories -- just ongoing horror and misery, and who needs more of that? Maybe it is because mostly slavery befouls third-world countries that are the current favorites of so many Western journalists, intellectuals, "statesmen" and businessmen. In some of its forms, slavery enchains the bonded child workers of India and Pakistan, and prostitutes in sexual playgrounds like Thailand. These varieties do not grab much journalistic or diplomatic attention. The slavery involved in the U.N. meeting is the kind that free people thought had disappeared with Abe Lincoln -- living bodies captured by slave traders and bought and sold like meat, as in Sudan. Sudan's slaves come from the south of their country. They are trapped in the three-decade-long civil war between the Muslim north and the largely Christian and animist south. Khartoum sends armed raider-trains southward, to take and sell slaves, and grab food sent to war victims by international organizations. The slaves live slave lives -- murderous labor, rape, hunger, torture, the totality of degradation. They are said to be worked harder, fed less, beaten more than were even the slaves of the American South and Caribbean, because they are cheaper. Fifty dollars buys a slave, so it really does not matter how long they survive before their bodies are thrown into some river. The U.N. committee will discuss penalties -- not against Sudan but against Christian Solidarity International (C.S.I.), one of the foreign organizations fighting for the suffering in Sudan's war of starvation and enslavement.

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One of the 19 nations complained that C.S.I., which has supporters worldwide, had sponsored a Sudanese rebel to speak at a committee session in Geneva. But it had not clearly identified him or used the proper letterhead. The country was Sudan. C.S.I. apologized for these offenses, but the committee decided to lift its credentials as a nongovernmental organization with the privilege of speaking, but not voting, at meetings. The U.N. Economic and Social Council then found that the committee itself had violated the rules of procedure and ordered the whole vicious comedy repeated. One of the reasons Sudan singled out C.S.I. for attack was its support in America, which gives its work particular attention. The U.S. voted against Sudan, alone. The roster of voters with Sudan included Cuba, China, Lebanon, India, Pakistan, Russia, Senegal and Algeria. This piece of nastiness is not about procedural technicality. It is about permitting a slave-taking nation to stifle an organization that struggles for slave-freeing. If its credentials are lifted, Christian Solidarity International will not be able to speak at the U.N. anymore. But it will continue to work in Sudan at even greater danger. And it will continue to get the help of those who believe that slavery is news, wherever and whenever. Home Volume 2, Issue 5, May 2000

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Christian Persecution Comes to America

2000 Discerning the Times Digest and NewsBytes http://www.discerningtoday.org/members/Digest/2000Digest/May/Christian%20Persecution.ht m A little 7 year old girl enters second grade with innocent anticipation. Her initiation into the public school system after 2 years of Christian school will be a rude awakening. Although the teacher is visibly annoyed upon learning that her new student is a pastors child, it isnt until October that major problems begin to unfold. The student is forced to draw witches and ghosts against the parents expressed wishes, and the teacher insists on reading horror stories that are a constant source of nightmares. After learning that their daughter has been routinely humiliated in front of her classmates, the parents remove her from the school only to discover that all of her schoolwork has been mysteriously "lost". The year was 1992, and the little girl was mine. That was our first taste of the persecution that many more would soon come to know. Since that time, Christian discrimination and persecution have had many faces. We hear heartwrenching stories from overseas about families who are severely tortured for their faith in Christ. According to Voice of the Martyrs "More Christians have been killed for their faith in the 20th century than have been martyred in the total history of Christianity." That should be a wake up call for the sleeping Christians in America who have taken their freedom for granted for too long. A 10-year-old Filipino girl was beaten to death by her father after she professed Christ. Before she died, she held the bloody dress she was wearing when she was beaten and told the missionary, "I just want Jesus to know that I was willing to bleed for him." In another recent case a missionary family in the Middle East was forced to watch as the father was brutally murdered in front of them; the young daughter was kidnaped as a mistress for the soldiers; and the mother was raped, beaten, and left in the forest - after cutting off both her breasts so that her baby would starve to death. Few of us in America have faced the types of suffering that Christians in other countries have endured. When persecution happens on the other side of the world, we tend to close our eyes and make it magically go away. But what about when it begins to happen closer to home? Police in Wedgewood Baptist Church on 9-15-99 following an attack by a gunman who apparently hated Christians. "Yes, I believe in God." These were the last words of Columbine student, Cassie Bernall, before she was shot and killed during a murderous rampage in which several other Christian students were stalked and executed by fellow classmates. In another incident that received very little media coverage, 150 teenagers were attending a youth prayer rally at Wedgewood Baptist Church in Fort Worth, Texas, when a gunman burst in and began firing into the crowd. Witnesses say he was loudly ridiculing their religious beliefs. Seven people were killed, and seven more injured before he turned the gun on himself. The tide is turning against Christians - spurred on by the media, politicians, and even our school systems. As our religious rights are being eroded deeper and faster than ever before, Christians are being portrayed as hate-filled menaces to society; the cause of the worlds problems rather than the solution. The homosexual rights issue appears to be the weapon of choice to demonize Christians and deny them of their fundamental rights to practice their beliefs. The Boy Scouts of America (BSA) organization has been especially hard hit. The Supreme Court is now considering Dale vs. BSA, in which former leader James Dale claims that his rights were violated when his membership was revoked after it became known that he was a homosexual. Though the media has turned this into a homosexual rights case, the real issue on trial is the constitutional right of private groups to express

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their religious freedom as they choose. Tufts University stripped the Tufts Christian Fellowship of their official "student organization" status after being charged with violating the schools anti-discrimination policy by refusing a leadership position to an avowed homosexual. The groups funding and status were finally restored on May 16, but only after the issue received national press. In a similar case now before the Canadian Supreme Court, Trinity Western University in British Columbia (TWU) was denied accreditation because it will not allow homosexuality on its campus. The schools policy is that enrolling students must sign a "community standards statement" thereby agreeing to abstain from premarital sex, adultery, homosexual behavior, porn, alcohol, tobacco and drugs. This puts the college in direct conflict with Canadas Charter of Rights and Freedoms which protects homosexuality as a fundamental human right. Since TWU infringes on that right, the school may no longer certify government teachers, according to a decision passed down by the British Columbia College of Teachers. Christianity in America is under attack. Satan has us in the cross-hairs, and we are walking blindly toward the lions den. We, like the prophet Daniel, need to be firmly rooted in a relationship with the Lord in order to withstand the coming assault. "Then you will be handed over to be persecuted and put to death, and you will be hated by all nations because of me....but he who stands firm to the end will be saved." Matthew 24:9,13 ??bm

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China behind Christian persecution in S.E. Asia

Communist superpower directs crackdowns in Laos, Vietnam, Burma By Anthony LoBaido 2000WorldNetDaily.com Editor's note: WorldNetDaily roving international correspondent Anthony C. LoBaido has been reporting in Southeast Asia for several months, and filed this report on the Christian persecution taking place in communist Laos. By Anthony C. LoBaido 2000, WorldNetDaily.com LUANG PRABANG, Laos -- The West is well aware of the brutality of communist China. Issues like forced abortion and sterilization, forced organ harvesting of prisoners, Protestant and Catholic priests in gulags (sometimes working to make toys and machine tools while standing in vats of acid), the rape of Tibet, the gendercide against female babies as old as two years of age -- most of these atrocities have made headlines worldwide. Add to that the bullying of Taiwan, the export to the West of massive amounts of heroin, and even the threatened launch of nuclear weapons against the U.S., and Americans have much to be concerned about with respect to China. Yet, there is one more chapter in the China book the West has not yet seen. According to Western diplomats based in Laos, Communist China controls, orchestrates and directs the crackdown against Christians in Stalinist Laos, in Vietnam, in Burma -- indeed, throughout most if not all of Southeast Asia. China directs the ongoing genocide against the Hmong hill tribes of Laos and Vietnam (known as "Montagnards" in Vietnam -- the French word for "Mountain people"), according to the sources. Additionally, China is reportedly arming the fascist Burmese regime in its genocidal campaign against the Christian Karen hill tribes of eastern Burma. As first reported by WorldNetDaily, the Vietnamese Montagnards must trek over a thousand kilometers to escape the machine guns of the communist Vietnamese government. These Montagnards are ethnic Hmong hill tribes who are currently turning to Christianity in droves. Last week, U.S. Secretary of Defense William Cohen traveled to Vietnam in an effort to seek "engagement" with its military, which almost exclusively controls the Vietnamese economy. Not unexpectedly, Cohen said nothing in defense of the persecuted Christian Hmong of Vietnam. Much to the chagrin of the Clinton administration, the U.S. has virtually no influence in the Indochina region -- better known these days as the "Greater Mekong Subregion." One of the last unspoiled, natural habitats on earth, the region is currently being carved up by Japan, China and the European Union while America sits on the sideline. "In the past, America bravely fought against communism in Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia. Today, the Marxists and communists in those nations are still in power and are consolidating that power," said Ray Billingsly, a former British SAS officer who served in Cambodia. "It's ironic that the pro-communist Vietnamese types like Clinton have their hands tied now when it comes to influencing Indochina. Europe, China and Japan never opposed communism in Southeast Asia, and thus they are welcomed by the communist nations as economic partners." In Stalinist Laos, the ethnic Hmong hill tribes have suffered a horrendous genocide at the hands of the ruling Pathet Lao government. This genocide, which continues to this day unabated, includes

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the use of Russian-made and exported biochemical weapons, forced repatriation of Christian Hmong from refugee camps in neighboring Thailand, and the imprisonment of Hmong citizens engaging in simple Bible studies. Reminiscent of past genocidal nightmares, the Pathet Lao have bashed the heads of Hmong babies against trees, impaled women and thrown them off high cliffs and other horrible acts too terrible to recount. Incredibly, all of this has happened under the nose of the United Nations and the U.S. State Department, which deny the existence of these documented atrocities. China's crackdown begins "I first noticed China's involvement in controlling dissent in Laos after the U.S. bombed the Chinese embassy in Belgrade in April of 1999," said a Western diplomat in a secret interview with WorldNetDaily. The diplomat asked that his name not be used, in fear that it would hinder his ability to help persecuted Laotian Christians in the future. "About 1,500 Laotians protested the bombing in front of the U.S. Embassy here in Vientiane. The Pathet Lao ordered a media blackout of the event, at the request of the Chinese government. You would think that China would be happy about the protest. But they weren't. The Chinese thought it might be a stamp of approval for all sorts of public expression. That would destabilize their puppet regime here in Laos." The diplomat then explained the next massive crackdown, which occurred on October 26, 1999. During WorldNetDaily's first investigative journalism trip to Laos, this reporter, along with other foreigners in Laos, witnessed a grand celebration of the culmination of Buddhist Lent held on the shores of the Mekong River. Yet not far away, only a few blocks in fact, an equally impressive display was unfolding as the Laos Secret Police Intelligence Unit was arresting a group of anti-Stalinist protestors in front of the presidential palace. The Vientiane-based Western diplomat told WorldNetDaily, "The Pathet Lao's secret police had arrested at least 50 protestors, some of whom are still in prison, including 10 students," as of this writing. "Then there is the well-documented arrest of Christian missionaries from America, France and Thailand," he added, referring to the 44 Christians imprisoned in Laos in 1998 from the Evangelical Church of Christ. Most of the 44 were members of the Little Rock, Arkansas-based "Partners in Progress" group. Those imprisoned in this case were officially charged with "creating social division." "What concerns me more is that China has ordered the Pathet Lao to increase the amount of time that government employees must spend in communist political indoctrination training. You see, it is totally inevitable that more persecution is coming against Christians. And also inevitable that more protests of the government will erupt due to Laos' failing economy." Other diplomats and sources interviewed by WorldNetDaily in Vientiane, Luang Prabang and Ponsavan said that 46 Christians are being held in Laos without trial. Most of those imprisoned are being held in very harsh conditions. A European diplomat told this reporter, "There is a connection between the 1997 Asian meltdown and the current crackdown against dissent in Laos. The Pathet Laos saw the protests against the governments in South Korea, Indonesia and Thailand after the '97 crash." "The Pathet Lao fear massive protests against their regime. The crackdown on Protestant Christian groups appears related to religious crackdowns in China and Vietnam, which are close allies of the communist leadership in Laos," he said. "Certainly the Pathet Lao keep a special eye on these events [protests and religious meetings] and

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are briefed by the Chinese secret police, PLA and also the Vietnamese government at special bilateral meetings on controlling Christians." Why are Christians so hard to control? "Because they have a long-term view of life, believe in heaven and freedom and they are not afraid to die for their faith," says Intelligence analyst Don McAlvany in his McAlvany Intelligence Advisor. Keeping score on the persecution A representative of a Bangkok-based non-governmental organization, or NGO, told WND that 11 Christians are currently being held in Attapeu province in Laos. Three Christians are currently in jail in Luang Prabang (WorldNetDaily had the chance to visit them), 15 in Saavannakhet, four in Udomsay, seven in Xieng Khouang and six in Houaphan. The source believes the persecution of Christians in the southern Laotian city of Savannakhet began in November and December of 1998. At that time, Nouhak Phoumsavan, the ex-president of Laos, visited the region and declared it to be a "Christian-free zone." Phoumsavan ordered the arrest of Evangelical Church leader Pa Tood, who had been arrested twice previously. Pa Tood's relatives told WorldNetDaily he had been "kept in solitary confinement day and night, with his legs in a wooden stockade. The Pathet Lao offered him bail if he would only renounce Jesus Christ as the Son of God and say that Jesus had no healing powers, and never did rise from the dead." The Pathet Lao government's charges against the groups, shown to WorldNetDaily by European diplomats, said the Christians had been detained because they had a "belief in Jesus religion," and "tried to use the Bible as a means of propaganda for conversion against the [Communist] Party." Most of those detained belong to the Lao Evangelical Church. These Christians are farmers from the Hmong ethnic hill tribes, although Oy and Bru hill tribes are also represented in those currently in prison for their faith. The Loatian foreign ministry denies the detentions, especially those of a religious nature. A top-level Japanese trade official in Vientiane told WND, "Christians may well be made the scapegoats for Laos' economic problems. I am not a Christian, but I am saddened to see any peaceful group persecuted. It's a terrible thing. But this is the world we live in. And today the world revolves around trade and money. Everything else is just conversation." And the Chinese involvement in the crackdown? "Between 1990 and the October 26th incident of 1999, there was not a single incident of protest against the Pathet Lao. I can tell you why. In 1990, three ex-government officials in Laos passed around a petition calling for economic reform. The officials were all imprisoned at the request of the Chinese government. The officials were sentenced to 14 years in prison. One of them died while in custody. After that, the people in Laos knew that civil disobedience in even the smallest respect was impossible." For its part, while China's demand that India surrender the teenaged Buddhist Karpama Lama back to Beijing had made global headlines, away from the limelight communist China has been increasing its persecution of evangelical Christians. For example, in December of last year, Beijing outlawed several major evangelical organizations (whose membership reach as high as 3 million) as "evil groups." In that month alone, over 100 evangelical leaders were arrested across China. In Hunan province, six evangelical Christian leaders were sentenced to gruesome logai gulags for leading the "evil cults." Other Protestants have been sent to the gulags for simply organizing a Bible study and/or posting the meeting on the Internet.

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Rabbi David Saperstein, the chairman of a U.S. congressional commission to monitor religious freedom and persecution around the globe, has said of China's increasing persection, "In the last few months there has been a clear pattern of escalation." "China is the largest holder of America's foreign debt. As such, they are America's bank. There is persecution and marginalization of Christians in America going on right now, so we can't expect the U.S. government to help our brothers and sisters being persecuted in China now, or in Laos and Vietnam," says Eunice Xu, of the Hong Kong-based China-Indochine Christian House. Xu was educated in France, and maintains close ties with Christians in Cambodia, Laos, Vietnam as well as mainland China. "If the West believes it can use money, trade and development as a carrot to end the persecution of Christians in Asia, they are very mistaken," added Xu in an interview with WorldNetDaily. An economic disaster Laos was admitted over two years ago to the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, or ASEAN, erected in the 1960s as an anti-communist alliance. Yet today it includes Stalinist Laos, communist Vietnam, Marxist Cambodia and fascist Burma. According to the American Embassy in Laos, the Kip -- Laos' official currency -- has lost 87 percent of its value since July of 1997. June of 1997, some will recall, marked the beginning of the Asian economic meltdown, which began in Thailand. In September of 1999, Laotian finance minister Khamphoui Keoboulapha instituted an International Monetary Fund plan to create an artificial shortage of the Kip. This boosted the Kip's value to 7,600 Kip to one U.S. dollar. However, instead of going along with the IMF plan, almost all Laotians switched to using U.S. dollars and Thai baht for their everyday financial transactions. Yet, the Laotian financial meltdown rolled on. Wages worth $100 in July of 1997 are today worth no more than $30. Inflation is growing at 130 percent per year in the Stalinist paradise of Laos. Direct foreign investment is down from a peak of $1.2 billion in 1995 to a mere $150 million today. For its part, Thailand had given Laos almost 45 percent of its total amount of foreign investment, but given Thailand's economic meltdown, that figure has shriveled considerably. Even the World Bank has cut back its feeding orgy of the Pathet Lao. World Bank aid reached a high of $50 million in 1995, but has now been cut in half. Having driven its Western-educated middle and upper classes abroad since the 1975 communist takeover of the nation, the Laos government suffers under gross macroeconomic mismanagement. The Politburo, led by Khamtay Siphadone, is exclusively composed of communist military cadres who have no training or education in market economics. One German diplomat said, "We are scaling back our loans to the Pathet Lao. The one-party system in Laos, Stalinist as it is, can't bring reform to the economy." Germany has been the second largest bilateral donor of aid to Laos, ranking just behind Japan. "Inflation is now over 300 percent in Laos since the mid to late 1990s. This is the highest in all of ASEAN," added the diplomat. Prince Soulivong Savang, the 36-year-old exiled crowned leader of Laos, currently residing in France (Laos' former colonial ruler) has repeatedly said that the "Pathet Laos are a human rights disaster." The prince has tried to get the U.S. to negotiate a return to democracy in Laos. "If I had a chance to go back to Laos, the first thing I would bring is freedom. But this is not going to be an easy task. Democracy has to be learned, and people have to learn their rights. In light of the disastrous economic situation in Laos right now, and the fact that Laotians abroad are 197

successful, we can go back and help rebuild the country," said the prince, who has been trying to gain access to meet with top officials at the U.S. State Department. Unless a radical and totally unexpected transformation occurs in Laos, it appears that economic depression, public outcries for political and monetary reform, and religious persecution of Christians will continue to go hand and hand for the next decade, and possibly into the next generation. Related Stories: Apocalypse Now for the Hmong 'Killing fields,' mines and martyrs Fear and Loathing in Vietnam Viet 'Reds' in the black James Rubins white lies, damned lies 12-year-old twins lead jungle army Anthony C. LoBaido is an international correspondent for WorldNetDaily. E-mail to a Friend Printer-friendly version

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Christian Persecution: Saudi Arabia

FLASH NEWS from COMPASS DIRECT Global News from the Frontlines SAUDI ARABIA STARTS DEPORTING EXPATRIATE CHRISTIAN PRISONERS First of Released Christians Arrive in Manila, Amsterdam by Barbara G. Baker http://www.leaderu.com/common/saudiarabia.html ISTANBUL, July 14 (Compass) -- Five of some 20 expatriate Christians arrested in Riyadh last month were deported by the Saudi Arabian government to their home countries today. Four Filipinos and a Dutch national were believed to have been expelled for involvement in Christian activities, which are strictly forbidden in the Muslim kingdom. At least eight other Filipinos arrested in the police crackdown on suspected Christian worshippers have reportedly been transferred out of detention cells, in preparation for their imminent deportation later this week. Riyadh sources also confirmed that Saudi authorities had promised to return the confiscated passport of Yolanda Aguilar, enabling the young mother to apply for an exit visa to return with her month-old baby daughter to the Philippines. After Aguilar's husband Rufino fled Saudi Arabia on June 11 to avoid arrest, his nine-month pregnant wife was detained and interrogated by Saudi police several times. She has remained under semi-house arrest at the hospital compound where she gave birth. Filipino Christians Ariel Ordona, Angelito Hizon, Ruben Aguirre and Gali Afurong arrived shortly before noon today in Manila on a direct Saudia Air flight. They were met by relatives and members of their home churches. According to a church leader who talked personally with three of the four men, all the prisoners had been surprised when they were told suddenly that they were being released and deported without a formal trial. The released Christians said they expected more of the former prisoners to arrive on the next flight to Manila from Riyadh tomorrow. "Only one of the men I talked with was harmed physically while under arrest," the church leader said. From Holland, Dirk den Hertog confirmed that his brother Wim den Hertog arrived early Tuesday morning on a direct flight from Riyadh to Amsterdam's Schiphol Airport. The 35-year-old Dutch businessman was reunited with his wife and three children 31 days after his arrest. During his detention he was held incommunicado from any diplomatic access. His family was eventually allowed to speak with him three times by telephone. "We have not been informed officially about the charges, nor were we given any access to visit him while he was in prison," spokesperson Bridget Tazelaar confirmed from the Dutch Foreign Ministry in The Hague today. "According to (Wim den Hertog)," Tazelaar told Compass, "he is not allowed to go back. But I cannot confirm that." A Dutch friend who spoke with den Hertog today told Compass that he said he had been treated well. "Every day he got vegetables and all kinds of fruit, and he didn't have any physical abuse, only psychological pressure," the source said. Contrary to earlier reports that the Dutch citizen had been arrested by the "muttawa" (religious police), den Hertog stated that his case had been handled by the Ministry of Interior. 199

The Dutch Christian said he was kept in solitary confinement for the first two days, and questioned for many hours during the initial 17 days of his detention. "But he told me that last weekend there came a sudden change in the attitudes of people who were handling his case," the source told Compass. After his transfer to another cell, he said one inmate tried to convert him to Islam so he could "preach Islam in the Netherlands." When the newly installed government of Philippines President Joseph Estrada failed to comment on the arrest of its citizens, the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines made a public appeal for presidential intervention on July 9. Most of the half-million Filipinos working on contract in Saudi Arabia and other Arab Gulf nations are Roman Catholic. On behalf of the bishops, spokesman Monsignor Pedro Quitorio told Agence France Press that some of the prisoners had been tortured to reveal the names of other Filipinos living in Riyadh who were practicing Christians. According to the Vatican news service Fides, one of the Filipino prisoners carried marks of physical torture when he was released after 14 days of interrogation. Gaudencio Lorenzo "suffered several broken bones and multiple wounds," Fides reported. Another source, who had spoken with a Christian living in Riyadh, said Lorenzo had been forced to convert to Islam before his release. Reportedly at least one prisoner admitted he had been released under the condition that he not discuss his detention. "We were treated fairly, given food and soap, and a doctor checked my blood pressure," one Filipino Christian told a close friend in Riyadh after his release. Although a high-level member of the royal family insisted publicly for the first time last year that Saudi government policy allows private non-Muslim religious worship within homes, foreign Christians continue to report police investigation and harassment of such worship services. In March 1997, Filipino Christian Donato Lama was deported after being subjected to 17 months in prison and 70 lashes. He was arrested when police discovered a photo album snapshot of him leading a Catholic communion service in a private home. "Freedom of religion does not exist," the U.S. State Department's 1997 Human Rights Report on Saudi Arabia states. "Islam is the official religion, and all citizens must be Muslims. The government prohibits the public practice of other religions." END Copyright 1998 Compass Direct Compass Direct Flash News is distributed as available to raise awareness of Christians worldwide who are persecuted for their faith. Articles may be reprinted by active subscribers only. For subscription information, contact: Compass Direct P.O. Box 27250 Santa Ana CA 92799-7250 USA TEL: 949-862-0314 FAX: 949-752-6536 E-mail: compassdr@compuserve.com

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Christian persecution on rise in Iraq

Report: Believing women forced to wear veil, shop owners killed Posted: June 14, 2003 1:00 a.m. Eastern 2003WorldNetDaily.com Christians and other minorities are coming under increasing attacks by Islamists in Iraq, Assist News Service reported, prompting a human-rights group to appeal to U.S. forces for tighter security. "At least two Christian shop owners were shot dead by Shari'ah vigilantes" last month "and there are unconfirmed reports of another owner and a Christian bystander also being killed," said Christian Forum in Support of Persecuted Religious Minorities Worldwide, according to ANS. "In some areas women are being forced to wear the veil and have been spat upon, vilified and even refused treatment at hospitals when they failed to do so." The new service reports Christian leaders in Turkey near Iraq's border say some believers there have been accused by Muslim extremists of supporting U.S. military action. Christian Forum reported that some Christians fear the new government in Iraq will be dominated by hard-line Muslims who will inhibit Christians' rights to practice their religion. "During recent weeks several prominent leaders amongst Iraq's Shia Muslim population have publicly called for the creation of an Islamic state governed according to Islamic law Shari'ah," the group said in a statement. Christian Forum says in southern Iraq "there are reports of Shari'ah (law) being imposed at street level. Over 100 shops selling alcohol have been burned down in Basra. Under Saddam Hussein's regime only Christians were permitted to sell alcohol although the shops had good customers amongst both Christian and Muslims," the organization said. Basra appears to have the highest level of persecution. "Christian girls in some parts of the city are now afraid to go to school in case they are kidnapped," and "some Christian families have already begun to leave Basra to the country's Christian heartland around Mosul" ANS quotes Christian Forum as reporting. There are approximately 1 million Christians in Iraq.

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Judge rules Islamic education

OK in California classrooms Dismisses suit opposing requirement students recite Quran, pray to Allah http://www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=36118 Posted: December 13, 2003 1:00 a.m. Eastern 2003WorldNetDaily.com Requiring seventh-grade students to pretend they're Muslims, wear Islamic garb, memorize verses from the Quran, pray to Allah and even to play "jihad games" in California public schools has been legally upheld by a federal judge, who has dismissed a highly publicized lawsuit brought by several Christian students and their parents. As WND reported in July of last year, the suit was filed by the Thomas More Law Center against the Byron Union School District and various school officials to stop the use of the "Islam simulation" materials and methods used in the Excelsior Elementary School in Byron, Calif. In her 22-page ruling announced Wednesday, U.S. District Judge Phyllis Hamilton said Excelsior is not indoctrinating students about Islam when it requires them to adopt Muslim names and pray to Allah as part of a history and geography class, but rather is just teaching them about the Muslim religion. When WorldNetDaily first reported the story in January 2002 shortly after the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks committed by 19 Islamist terrorists major controversy ensued nationwide. The World History and Geography class in question is part of a curriculum being taught to seventh-graders all over the state, and is included in the state's curriculum standards required by the state board of education. Although the standards outline what subjects should be taught and will be included in state assessment tests, they don't mandate how they're to be taught. In the three-week course, Excelsior teacher Brooke Carlin had students assume Islamic names, recite prayers in class, memorize and recite verses from the Quran, and had them simulate Ramadan fasting by going without something for a day. The final test required students to critique Muslim culture. The Islam simulations at Excelsior are outlined in the state-adopted textbook "Across the Centuries," published by Houghton Mifflin, which prompts students to imagine they are Islamic soldiers and Muslims on a Mecca pilgrimage. The lawsuit also alleges students were encouraged to use such phrases in their speech as "Allah Akbar," which is Arabic for "God is great," and were required to fast during lunch period to simulate fasting during the Islamic holy month of Ramadan. Nevertheless, the judge ruled the program was devoid of "any devotional or religious intent," and as therefore educational, not religious in nature. 'Double standard' decried However, Richard Thompson, chief counsel for Thomas More, points to what he calls an obvious double standard. "While public schools prohibit Christian students from reading the Bible, praying, displaying the Ten Commandments, and even mentioning the word 'God,' students in California are being indoctrinated into the religion of Islam," he told WND on filing the lawsuit. "Public schools would never tolerate teaching Christianity in this way. Just imagine the ACLUs outcry if students were told that they had to pray the Lord's Prayer, memorize the Ten Commandments, use such phrases

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as 'Jesus is the Messiah,' and fast during Lent," he added. According to Thompson, "Although it is constitutional for public schools to have an instructional program about comparative religion or teach about religion and utilize religious books such as the Bible in courses about our history and culture, the Byron Union School District crossed way over the constitutional line when it coerced impressionable 12-year-olds to engage in particular religious rituals and worship, simulated or not." However, Byron Superintendent Peggy Green defended the program: "Dressing up in costume, role-playing and simulation games are all used to stimulate class discussion and are common teaching practices used in other subjects as well." And Excelsior Principal Nancie Castro maintained, "At no point do we teach or endorse religion; we teach about religions' impact from a historical context. ... This is the state-approved curriculum, using state-adopted textbooks and has been part of the instructional program in California for over a decade." Appealing to the 9th Circuit? Yesterday, Thompson told WND that his legal team believed from the start that, regardless of who won the first round, this case would go to appeal and that is exactly where he wants it to go. With some irony, Thompson points out that the appeal would go to the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals. "This is the court that said, in the 'Under God' Pledge case, that the mere expression 'One nation under God' [recited in a public school] violates the Constitution," said Thompson. "It will be very interesting to see how they deal with this Byron School District case where students are basically required to become Muslims for three weeks!" While the Thomas More Law Center is intent on appealing the case, it is awaiting word from the plaintiffs as to their intent. Related stories: District sued over Islam studies Publisher responds to book criticism Islam studies spark hate mail, lawsuits Islam studies required in California district

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Islam studies required in California district

Course has 7th-graders memorizing Koran verses, praying to Allah 2002WorldNetDaily.com In the wake of Sept. 11, an increasing number of California public school students must attend an intensive three-week course on Islam, reports ASSIST News Service. The course mandates that seventh-graders learn the tenets of Islam, study the important figures of the faith, wear a robe, adopt a Muslim name and stage their own jihad. Adding to this apparent hypocrisy, reports ANS, students must memorize many verses in the Koran, are taught to pray "in the name of Allah, the Compassionate, the Merciful" and are instructed to chant, "Praise to Allah, Lord of Creation." "We could never teach Christianity like this," one outraged parent told ANS. Elizabeth Christina Lemings, a teacher in the Byron, Calif., Union School District, was unaware of the course until her seventh-grade son brought home the handouts. Obtained by ANS, the handouts include a history of Islam and the life of Mohammad, its founder. There are 25 Islamic terms that must be memorized, six Islamic (Arabic) phrases, 20 Islamic proverbs to learn along with the Five Pillars of Faith and 10 key Islamic prophets and disciples to be studied. "We can't even mention the name of Jesus in the public schools," Lemings laments, "but ... they teach Islam as the true religion, and students are taught about Islam and how to pray to Allah. Can you imagine the barrage of lawsuits and problems we would have from the ACLU if Christianity were taught in the public schools, and if we tried to teach about the contributions of Matthew, Mark, Luke, John and the Apostle Paul? But when it comes to furthering the Islamic religion in the public schools, there is not one word from the ACLU, People for the American Way or anybody else. This is hypocrisy." ANS reports that students are to pretend that they are Muslims, wear Muslim clothing to school, stage their own jihad via a dice game and pick out a Muslim name (to replace their own) from a list of 30. When asked what they thought about the course, students described it as "fun," while others described Islam as "a pretty culture." Joseph Lemings, 12, told ANS, "the jihad was like playing a video game." The "fun" description disturbs Elizabeth Lemings, who sees the course as a tool, not only to engender sympathy and support for the Muslim cause, but for recruitment. "This is not just a class of history of examining culture," she said. "This course is entirely too specific. It is more about indoctrination." Nancy Castro, principal of Intermediate-Excelsior School of Byron, told ANS that the Islam course (included within "History of Culture") reflects California educational standards. Castro maintains the course "is not religion, but ancient culture and history. We do not endorse any religion; we just make students aware." Castro further emphasized the course textbook is in use throughout California. The textbook used for the Islamic course, "Across The Centuries," is published by HoughtonMifflin and has been adopted by the California school system. In it, according to ANS, Islam is presented broadly in a completely positive manner, whereas the limited references to Christianity are "shown in a negative light, with events such as the Inquisition, and the Salem witch hunts highlighted in bold, black type." ANS notes the portrayal of Islam leaves out word of "the wars, massacres, cruelties against Christians and other non-Muslims that Islam has consistently perpetrated over the centuries."

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Asked if there was any response from parents about the Islam course, Castro told ANS, "Oh, a couple of parents called to express concerns, three to be exact."

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Exploding the myth of church-state separation

WHISTLEBLOWER MAGAZINE New WND blockbuster ultimate expose of judicial hijacking of First Amendment Posted: November 4, 2003 1:00 a.m. Eastern http://www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=35420 2003WorldNetDaily.com * In Texas, a U.S. District judge decreed that any student uttering the word "Jesus" at his school's graduation would be arrested and locked up. "And make no mistake," announced Judge Samuel B. Kent, "the court is going to have a United States marshal in attendance at the graduation. If any student offends this court, that student will be summarily arrested and will face up to six months incarceration in the Galveston County Jail for contempt of court." * In Missouri, when fourth-grader Raymond Raines bowed his head in prayer before his lunch in the cafeteria of Waring Elementary School in St. Louis, his teacher allegedly ordered him out of his seat, in full view of other students present, and sent him to the principals office. After his third such prayer "offense," little Raymond was segregated from his classmates, ridiculed for his religious beliefs, and given one week's detention. * In New York, kindergartner Kayla Broadus recited the familiar and beloved prayer "God is great, God is good. Thank you, God, for my food" while holding hands with two students seated next to her at her snack table at her Saratoga Springs school early last year. But she was silenced and scolded by her teacher, who reported the infraction to the schools lawyer, Gregg T. Johnson, who concluded that Kaylas behavior was indeed a violation of the "separation of church and state." "The constitutional separation of church and state" a reference to the First Amendment in the Bill of Rights is a phrase Americans hear literally every day from the news media, from legal organizations, from politicians and pundits, and especially from zealous attorneys and judges. "Separation of church and state" was used by the ACLU to demand that a banner proclaiming "God bless America," erected outside a school shortly after Sept. 11, 2001, to honor the 3,000 murdered Americans, must be taken down. "Separation of church and state" was used to deny a little, handicapped girl the right to read her Bible on the bus on the long trip to school. "Separation of church and state" was used to take Justice Roy Moore's 10 Commandments monument out of the Alabama Judicial Building, and it is being used right now to challenge the words "under God" in the Pledge of Allegiance. The phrase is repeated so often and with such assurance, one would think it is the keystone phrase of the U.S. Constitution. And yet the words "separation," "church," or "state" are not found in the First Amendment, nor in any other founding document for that matter. In fact, the entire "constitutional separation of church and state" is a recent fabrication of activist judges who have ignored the Constitution's clear meaning. Indeed, says U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice William Rehnquist, in the stunning November issue of WND's Whistleblower magazine, "There is simply no historical foundation for the proposition that the Framers intended to build the 'wall of separation' [between church and state]."

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Titled "THE MYTH OF CHURCH-STATE SEPARATION," this special edition, says WND Editor Joseph Farah, is "a definitive, once-and-for-all, legal and historical refutation of the fiction that the Constitution was intended to prohibit or infringe on freedom of religious expression whether at home, church, school, or in the public square." "It's a myth," said Farah, "and this issue of Whistleblower slam-dunks the case proving that's all it is." Starting with the famous 1801 letter written by the Baptists of Danbury, Conn., to newly elected President Thomas Jefferson and Jefferson's brief response, in which he coined the phrase "a wall of separation between church and state" to assure his constituents that the new Constitution would not establish a national church or otherwise infringe on their religious liberties this special Whistleblower edition attacks the church-state issue from every conceivable angle. Contents include: * An overview of the church-state debate by Joseph Farah * "How courts invented church-state 'wall of separation'" by David Barton, showing how, after 150 years of honoring the Founding Fathers' intent, activist judges took a radical new direction. * "Where it all started" allowing readers to read the actual letters between the Danbury Baptists and Thomas Jefferson * "The war on Christianity in public schools," a jaw-dropping excerpt from David Limbaugh's best-selling new blockbuster, "Persecution." In this exclusive and in-depth (8,000-word) article, Limbaugh shows how a decades-long legal assault on religious expression in America has paved the way for outright persecution of Christians. * "Rehnquist: U.S. not founded on church-state separation," a dazzling opinion in which the U.S. Supreme Court's current chief justice, William Rehnquist, makes it crystal clear how the high court ignored history, legal precedent and the constitutional framers' clear intent in its landmark decision banning prayer from public school. * "Separation of atheism and state" by Bob Just, showing how citizens can reconnect America with her Judeo-Christian roots by going on the offensive * "What you can do" by David Kupelian, with more ways Americans can bring God and country back together again These and many other articles make the November Whistleblower the most devastating journalistic expose yet of the fraudulent "separation of church and state." "You will positively cheer when you read this issue," said Farah. "It is the silver bullet people have been waiting for, that will finally shoot down this insidious charade that has been destroying every last vestige of our Christian heritage from America. Maybe this edition of Whistleblower will finally help turn things around." Subscribe to Whistleblower and receive 12 powerful monthly issues, beginning with "THE MYTH OF CHURCH-STATE SEPARATION."

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Evangelist's 'tone incited hatred of Muslims'

TV programs pulled, station apologized to Islamic activist group http://www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=35432 Posted: November 5, 2003 1:00 a.m. Eastern By Art Moore 2003WorldNetDaily.com An American evangelist's television series on Islam in America was canceled by a Canadian station after the first program because Muslims complained his tone and demeanor was an incitement of hatred. San Antonio-based pastor John Hagee's "tone in his comparison of what Christians believe according to the Bible and what Muslims believe according to the Quran" violated the code of ethics of Toronto station CTS, said Program Manager Rob Sheppard in a letter of apology to a Muslim activist group. Sheppard told WorldNetDaily he believes Hagee's primary intent was not to preach from his religious convictions but to incite hatred. "It was a tonal thing," he said. "You could see what he was trying to do by his tone and body language." It wasn't so much his exact words, Sheppard said, but Hagee's purported inference Muslims cannot be loyal Americans. CTS pulled the final two of three programs in the series titled "Islam in America," scheduled to run in August on "John Hagee Today," which continues in its regular time slot, albeit under closer scrutiny, according to Sheppard. The program manager said his station's actions a letter of apology to Muslims and a warning to Hagee's group was prompted by 50 to 100 letters of complaint from viewers, followed by contact from the Council on American-Islamic Relations Canadian branch in Ottawa. Judging by the names, Sheppard said he believes most of the letters were from Muslims. In his apology to CAIR Canada, an affilate of Washington, D.C.-based CAIR, a group with ties to Hamas, Sheppard wrote, "I trust you will understand that we are very sorry for this incident and we are very aware of the effect it has had on the Muslim community. We have made it very clear that he must follow our code of ethics and any program that does not meet our standard will be rejected." Sheppard said, "Once we were made aware of complaints made by viewers | we responded immediately." Charles McZety, Canadian representative for John Hagee Ministries, told WorldNetDaily this is not the first time complaints of this kind have been lodged against the pastor's program. He contends the charges in this instance are too vague. "When you get down to talking about tone, the tone of one's voice, then there is nothing to talk about," he said. "It's too subjective." Hagee, who is traveling in Israel, was not available for comment. Sheppard acknowledged the judgment against Hagee is based on subjective criteria, but said it was the response from viewers that precipitated pulling the remainder of the three-part series.

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"I listened to the people who contacted us, and they perceived his tone to be demeaning," Sheppard said. "It is subjective, but there were a lot of people who contacted us who were upset." CTS, or Crossroads Television Systems, which positions itself as a "family friendly" inspirational station, reaches 6.5 million people in the Toronto area, Sheppard said, and many more across the nation via satellite. It features programming from a variety of religions. McZety said complaints about program content related to Islam was a longstanding problem on the previous Canadian carrier of Hagee's program, the multi-faith Vision TV network, which censored each one of the shows for 12 years. A program in which Hagee played video of Muslim imams in both the United States and overseas preaching hatred and violence against Jews and Israel upset Muslims and resulted in complaints filed with the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission, the equivalent of the U.S. Federal Communications Commission, or FCC. That action forced Hagee Ministries to pull the rest of the programs in that series. On another occasion, programs about Iraq also were pulled. Finally, this summer, Hagee Ministries decided to part ways with the Vision network after it produced a documentary series comparing the U.S. to the Hitler regime. Vision's six-part series charged the U.S., in collaboration with its "CIA-trained partner" Osama bin Laden, planned the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks as a pretext for attempts to gain world dominance. The U.S. is going about this, Vision said, in much the same way Nazi brownshirts torched the Reichstag, or parliament, in Berlin in 1933 and blamed it on Adolf Hitler's enemies to provide a pretext for a crackdown propelling Hitler into power. Vision, which reaches nearly every Canadian home and has a virtual monopoly on religious broadcasting, was founded by members of the United Church of Canada. Another American evangelist ran afoul of Canadian standards last year when a leading Islamic group prepared to take legal action under the country's hate-crimes laws. Canadian Islamic Congress President Mohamed Elmasry told WorldNetDaily he believed criminal charges could be brought against Rev. Jerry Falwell and CBS television for the minister's assertion in a "60 Minutes" interview Islam's prophet Muhammad is a "terrorist." Canada's genocide and hate-propaganda law bars a public statement that "willfully promotes hatred" against groups "distinguished by color, race, religion or ethnic origin." The code has an article that excuses statements expressed in "good faith," including religious expression, but judges have ruled against defendants deemed to have intentionally incited hatred. It also has a defense if the accused establishes that the statement in question is true. Violators of the law are subject to a prison term of up to two years. Critics of the controversial statute say its vague wording can be used to criminalize legitimate public dialogue. The House of Commons passed a bill this year adding "sexual orientation" as a protected category of people, creating a scenario in which the Bible or Quran could be considered "hate literature" for its condemnation of homosexual behavior. Related stories: Muslims press criminal case against Falwell Punishment includes Islam indoctrination

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Law of the land

Punishment includes Islam indoctrination Canadian to resume hate-crimes sentence under Muslim direction Posted: October 31, 2002 1:00 a.m. Eastern By Art Moore 2002WorldNetDaily.com An Ontario man convicted of promoting hatred against Muslims says his community-service sentence has included indoctrination into Islam. After losing an appeal to Canada's Supreme Court on Oct. 17, Mark Harding must resume his sentence of two years probation and 340 hours of community service under the direction of Mohammad Ashraf, general secretary of the Islamic Society of North America in Mississauga, Ont. Harding, 47, said he had one session under Ashraf in 1998 before an appeal process stayed the sentence. Ashraf, according to Harding, said that instead of licking stamps and stuffing envelopes, "it would be better if you learned about Islam." The cleric made it clear, Harding recalled in an interview with WorldNetDaily, that during the sessions nothing negative could be said about Islam or its prophet, Muhammad. "He said he was my supervisor, and if I didn't follow what he said, he would send me back to jail," recounted Harding, who had been prevented from speaking publicly about his case under a gag order. Harding was convicted in 1998 on federal hate-crimes charges stemming from a June 1997 incident in which he distributed pamphlets outside a public high school, Weston Collegiate Institute in Toronto. Harding who said that until that point he spent most of his time evangelizing Muslims was protesting the school's policy of setting aside a room for Muslim students to pray during school hours. In one of his pamphlets, Harding listed atrocities committed by Muslims in foreign lands to back his assertion that Canadians should be wary of local Muslims. The pamphlet said: "The Muslims who commit these crimes are no different than the Muslim believers living here in Toronto. Their beliefs are based on the Quran. They sound peaceful, but underneath their false sheep's clothing are raging wolves seeking whom they may devour. And Toronto is definitely on their hit list." "The point I was trying to make is you shouldn't have a violent religion like Islam allowed in a school when Christianity or Hinduism or Buddhism is not allowed," he told WND. Harding, an evangelical Protestant, insists he has love rather than hatred toward Muslims and wants to see them go to heaven. A lawyer for Harding, Jasmine Akbaralli, says she is trying to obtain permission for her client to serve out his sentence in an Islamic community closer to his current home in Chesley, Ont., north of Toronto and about a three-hour drive from the Islamic Society of North America. The plea is based on humanitarian grounds, she said, due to her client's poor health. Harding said he has suffered four heart attacks since 1997, and he and his wife and two children are penniless because his health has prevented him from maintaining his trade as a cabinetmaker.

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Akbaralli said she would not comment on Harding's previous experience with Ashraf, noting that she was not representing him at the time. Calls to Ashraf and others at the Islamic Society of North America on Tuesday and Wednesday were not returned. Understanding Islam During his 1998 session with Ashraf, Harding was told to read a book called Towards Understanding Islam, by Sayyid Abul A'la Maududi. On page 12 of the book, Harding noted, it gives a description of a "kafir," or infidel, a person who does not follow Islam. "Such a man ... will spread confusion and disorder on the earth," the book says. "He will without the least compunction, shed blood, violate other men's rights, be cruel to them, and create disorder and destruction in the world. His perverted thoughts and ambitions, his blurred vision and disturbed scale of values, and his evil-spelling activities would make life bitter for him and for all around him." "It was obvious that he intended to make sure I understood that I was a kafir," Harding said of Ashraf. Harding's 1998 conviction on three counts of willfully promoting hatred was commended by Canadian Muslims. "The verdict sends a message to Christians, Muslims and Jews that personal views of that nature can't be allowed in a public forum," said Shahina Siddiqui, coordinator of community relations and social services for the Manitoba Islamic Association, in a report by the Canadian evangelical publication Christian Week. "There's a fine line between freedom of expression and hatred. Harding crossed that line." Mohamed Elmasry, president of the Canadian Islamic Congress, said after the verdict that "spreading hate is against Canadian values and against Canadian law, and it doesn't matter the group that is victimized." The verdict was not a suppression of free speech, Elmasry insisted, according to Alberta Report magazine, arguing that he would not consider scholarly books in the library that criticize Islam to be hate literature. Harding "is just trying to stereotype and put out hate literature, and he was found guilty by the courts," he said. Harding asserted at the time that he meant to criticize only Islamic terrorists, not all Muslims. But he added that faithful Muslims will always engage in jihad, or holy war, against non-Muslims because it is required by Islamic teachings. Many Muslim scholars in North America argue that jihad essentially means "struggle" and is not necessarily violent. But Harding said that after his case became public, he no longer felt safe, due to threats from Muslims. When he entered court for the first time for his trial, he required police protection as a large crowd of Muslims gathered, with some chanting, "Infidels, you will burn in hell." Harding said he received many death threats among more than 3,000 hate-filled calls that came to his answering service in 1997. Similar calls were received by police and the Ontario attorney general, he said. "I had a call from someone who said they were from (Louis) Farrakhan's (Nation of Islam) group, and they were going to break my legs," he said. "Another caller said he would rip out my testicles." The Islamic Society of North America in Canada, where Harding is required to fulfill his community service, describes itself as a "broad-based unity of Muslims and Islamic organizations committed to the mission and movement of Islam: nurturing a way of life in the light of the

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guidance from the Quran and Sunnah for establishing a vibrant presence of Muslims in Canada." The organization shares facilities with the Canadian Council on Islamic Relations, an affiliate of the controversial Council on Islamic-American Relations, or CAIR, in Washington, D.C. CAIR spokesman Ibrahim Hooper indicated in a 1993 interview with the Minneapolis Star Tribune that he wants to see the United States become a Muslim country. "I wouldn't want to create the impression that I wouldn't like the government of the United States to be Islamic sometime in the future," Hooper told the Star Tribune. "But I'm not going to do anything violent to promote that. I'm going to do it through education." Hate crimes Judge Sidney B. Linden's 1998 ruling against Harding was based on Canada's genocide and hatecrimes law. The judge determined he was guilty of "false allegations about the adherents of Islam calculated to arouse fear and hatred of them in all non-Muslim people." The law bars a public statement that "willfully promotes hatred" against groups "distinguished by color, race, religion or ethnic origin." The code has an article that excuses statements expressed in "good faith," including religious expression. But the trial judge found that Harding had either "tried to incite hatred or was willfully blind to it," according to lawyer Akbaralli. Canadian Christian groups are fighting a bill reinstated this month by a homosexual parliament member that would add "sexual orientation" as a protected category in the hate-crimes statutes. Known previously as bill C-415, it is now registered as C-250. Evangelicals have supported Harding in principle, though many have signaled their opposition to his aggressive tactics or have expressed reservations. Harding said he's received support from Christians who immigrated to Canada from Muslim countries, where minority religions experience discrimination and persecution. "I have a lot of Pakistani and Egyptian friends helping me through this because they understand what Islam is all about," he said. "When they heard about me in the news, they called to offer their support." Related story: The Bible as 'hate literature'? The Bible as 'hate literature'? Canadians advance bill that chills speech about homosexuality Posted: October 21, 2002 1:00 a.m. Eastern By Art Moore 2002WorldNetDaily.com A prison sentence for quoting the Bible in Canada? Holy Scriptures treated as "hate literature"? That could happen if a proposed bill is passed by Parliament, according to opponents who believe it would criminalize public expression against homosexual behavior. A self-described homosexual member of the House of Commons, Svend Robinson, is expected this week to reintroduce bill C-415, which would add sexual orientation as a protected category in Canada's genocide and hate crimes legislation. Christian groups lined up against the bill admit they can easily be misunderstood for opposing a measure apparently designed to protect people.

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"We don't want to promote hatred against anyone and are opposed to violence for whatever reason," said Bruce Clemenger, head of the Evangelical Fellowship of Canada's Centre for Faith and Public Life. "Our concern, though is that ... courts have not distinguished between the identity of the person and the activity. So sexual orientation refers to both the sexual disposition as well as the activity." But homosexual activists contend such a distinction cannot be made with homosexuals any more than it can with matters of race or ethnic origin. "The argument of separating the person from the behavior is their concept," insisted Kim Vance, president of Ottawa-based EGALE, Equality for Gays and Lesbians Everywhere. "In reality they are the same thing," Vance said in a WND interview. "That's language that they use to justify [opposition], but it's language that we don't agree with." The bill's backers argue that statements against homosexual behavior for religious reasons are exempted in the current law. In a letter Robinson sends to inquirers, he quotes Alberta Attorney General Dave Hancock, who insists protecting gays from hateful propaganda has nothing to do with endorsing homosexuality. "There are appropriate ways to discuss issues in our country ... and you don't need to put forward hateful literature," Hancock said. "It doesn't matter what you believe about sexual orientation." But opponents point out that the law addressed by Robinson's amendment spells out three different types of actions or speech considered criminal, and only one can be excused by a religious defense. And even that one, opponents maintain, has not always held up in court, because its vagueness leaves wide discretion to judges. The most dangerous aspect of this amendment is that "hate" and "hate propaganda" are not defined, says Brian Rushfeldt, executive director of the Canada Family Action Coalition in Calgary, Alberta. "I would have no way of knowing I'm conducting a criminal act until I'm charged with it, because there is no clarity in the law," Rushfeldt told WND. "Sexual oriention" also is not defined in the law. Prime Minister Jean Chretien, when he was justice minister, told a constitutional parliamentary committee in 1981 that "sexual orientation" should not be in the Canadian constitution because it is too "difficult to interpret, to define." Religious defense? No religious defense is contained in section 318 of the current law, which has a sentence of up to five years in prison for advocating "genocide," nor in section 319(1), prohibiting public incitement of "hatred" against an identifiable group that is "likely to lead to a breach of the peace." Section 319(2), which prohibits a public statement that "willfully promotes hatred" against a protected group, does have an article that excuses statements expressed in "good faith," including religious expression. Clemenger, however, points to a 4-3 Supreme Court decision in which the minority opinion, written by current Chief Justice Beverley McLachlin, expressed deep reservations about whether these defenses are of any use. "What they are saying is, that if you willfully promote hatred, you can use this defense, but no one in good faith would promote hatred," Clemenger said. "So that 'good faith' clause almost eliminates the defense." Rushfeldt and his allies note that provincial human rights commissions, which already include sexual orientation as a protected category, have penalized people for actions motivated by their conscientious objection to homosexual behavior.

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A Saskatchewan man recently was fined $5,000 for buying a newspaper ad that quoted verses from the Bible condemning homosexual behavior. Two years ago, the Ontario Human Rights Commission penalized printer Scott Brockie $5,000 for refusing to print letterhead for a homosexual advocacy group. Brockie argued that his Christian beliefs compelled him to reject the group's request. Robinson's amendment would make both of these men criminals, opponents contend. Rushfeldt also recalled instances in which the Canadian Broadcast Standards Council rules have been used to censure programs addressing homosexuality. In 1997, the council ruled that the airing of a James Dobson "Focus on the Family" program, called "Homosexuality: Fact and Fiction," violated the requirement that opinion, comment, and editorializing be presented in a way that is "full, fair, and proper." The rules are "so vague," said Rushfeldt, "that if somebody says something that hurts feelings it can be considered a violation of the broadcast standards." In a current case, a British Columbia teacher could lose his job for making "derogatory and demeaning" statements against homosexuals, according to the judgment of a teachers association panel. Though none of the statements in question were made in class, the panel cited letters to a newspaper that indicated veteran teacher Chris Kempling's attitude could poison the class environment. One Kempling letter cited by the panel said: "Gay people are seriously at risk, not because of heterosexual attitudes but because of their sexual behaviour, and I challenge the gay community to show some real evidence that they are trying to protect their own community members by making attempts to promote monogamous, long-lasting relationships to combat sexual addictions." The Vancouver Sun reported Sept. 25 that the panel does not need to find direct evidence of a poisoned school environment to determine that a member is guilty of conduct unbecoming. The panel said, "It is sufficient that an inference can be drawn as to the reasonable and probable consequences of the discriminatory comments of a teacher." In June, Sweden passed a constitutional amendment that adds sexual orientation to groups protected against "unfavorable speech." The amendment must be voted on again this fall, and if passed, would be enacted in January. In effect, it outlaws any teaching that homosexuality is wrong, carrying a sentence of up to four years in prison. U.S. opponents of this kind of legislation fear that the United States is heading in the direction of Canada and Sweden as battles continued to be waged over the addition of sexual orientation as a protected category in hate crimes laws and employment discrimination. "I think the U.S. is not far behind Canada," said John Paulk, gender and homosexuality specialist for Focus on the Family in Colorado Springs. Canadian pro-family activists also are concerned about challenges to the definition of marriage, especially after an Ontario court ruled earlier this year that restricting marriage to a man and a woman is unconstitutional and discriminatory. 'Hate literature' In an "action alert" distributed last week, Rushfeldt wrote that if C-415 becomes law in Canada, "the following consequences will result, especially once hate crime charges are brought before the courts": * The Bible, at least certain portions of the Bible, may be declared "hate literature." * Churches will not be able to mention certain Scriptures. * Clergy may be subjected to criminal charges if they refuse to marry homosexuals.

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* Parents may be subjected to criminal charges if they refuse to allow their children to attend classes that teach about and promote homosexual behavior. * Expressing disagreement with homosexual behavior or the homosexual agenda, either verbally or in writing, would be considered hate propaganda. * Educators, including those at private religious schools, will not be able to refuse to teach homosexual curriculum. * Religious institutions will not be allowed to teach anything non-supportive of homosexual sex. * Canadian Blood Services will not be allowed to screen risk-behavior donors. * Governments (including local municipalities) will be prevented from passing (even debating) sex standards laws. In his letter to constituents, Robinson defends the necessity of the bill by using the example of American Fred Phelps, known for his website "www.godhatesfags.com." Robinson said that when Phelps wanted to come to Canada to "pursue his campaign of hatred against gay and lesbian people," Canadian police lamented that there was nothing in the criminal code to stop him. Robinson quotes Sgt. Pat Callaghan, head of the hate crimes unit of the Ottawa-Carleton Police Department: "If we had that legislation, we wouldn't have to put up with his nonsense | . We could have told him, 'If you show up and start spreading this hate, we'll arrest you.'" Opponents point out, however, that Phelps, pastor of Westboro Baptist Church in Topeka, Kan., bases his views on religious grounds, which contradicts Robinson's claim that he does not intend to shut down religious discussion. EGALE's Vance told WorldNetDaily that she believes, however, that religious speech must be limited. "There's a huge difference between someone being allowed to practice their religion and taking out ads in the newspaper saying that gay and lesbian people are sick and immoral," said EGALE's Vance. "There is a line there, and it's been crossed." Responding to concerns about free speech, Robinson said the law has an additional protection in that no criminal proceeding can be instituted without the consent of the provincial attorney general, which "will prevent frivolous or trivial prosecutions." Clemenger said, however, that provincial law officials across the country have expressed support for the bill and have shown deference to homosexual activists in their decisions. Robinson said the Canadian Association of Police Boards adopted a resolution in support of C-415 at its annual general meeting Aug. 23, "noting that equal protection and treatment of all citizens is fundamental to a fair justice system." Not a dead issue Robinson's bill passed a "vote in principle" in the House of Commons in May with just 16 MPs present and must pass a final vote before submission to the Senate, where opponents say it likely would be rubber stamped. Bills that become law pass a final formality of "royal assent" from the queen's representative, the governor general. Some Canadians mistakenly have believed that the bill is a dead issue, according to opponents, because when a new session of Parliament convenes, all legislation from the previous session dies. But according to the rules, if Robinson resubmits the bill within 30 days of the Sept. 30 "Speech from the Throne" which outlines Parliament's plans for the year the legislation will continue on its track from the same position it had before. Bill Siksay, Robinson's assistant at his Burnaby, B.C., office, said Robinson was unavailable for

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comment. He told WND, however, that the MP has indicated his intent to reintroduce the bill this week. Patrice Martin, clerk of the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights for the House of Commons, which would handle the bill, said he expects C-415 to be reactivated. Martin's committee then would prioritize the bill among other submissions by government and members of parliament. The committee could either delay C-415 a private members bill or send it back to the House for a "third reading" and final vote, possibly with amendments. Enough votes Vance believes that based on the voting pattern of MPs, enough votes are there to pass C-415. She notes passage of a law that added sexual orientation as a factor in sentencing for crimes motivated by hatred. "Our sense is there is very strong support for [C-415]," she said. "To me, this is just a natural extension of the sentencing law. If you agree that sexual orientation is a motivating factor for hate crimes, then it's logical to have it for speech." Her group is preparing a brief for the justice committee and plans to submit a petition that it circulated in the summer. The issue has received little attention in the Canadian press, says opponent Jim Enos, vice chairman of the Hamilton-Wentworth Family Action Council in Ontario. "We're asleep as a nation," said Enos. "Outside of families who are made aware through the churches, you never hear anybody talking about it." "I don't think people are all that politically minded as a whole, unless they are closely linked to a church," Enos added. "They're more concerned about the price of a VCR or DVD."

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Syrian-Produced TV Series Questions Israel's Right to Exist

Julie Stahl Jerusalem Bureau Chief http://www.crosswalk.com/news/1229311.html Jerusalem (CNSNews.com) - A Syrian-produced television series airing during the Muslim month of Ramadan is even worse than an anti-Semitic Egyptian production that drew international condemnation last year, an Israeli official said on Wednesday. Ash-Shatat (The Diaspora) is a purportedly historical drama based on the Protocols of the Elders of Zion . It details the development of the Jewish national movement, Zionism, and the creation of the State of Israel. The Protocols of the Elders of Zion , a fabricated booklet from the early twentieth century, describes an alleged plot by Jewish leaders to take over the world. Historians have debunked it as a political forgery written by Russian Czar Nicholas II's secret police in an attempt to make the Jewish people a scapegoat for the country's problems. The first of the program's 26 segments began airing during prime time last week at the start of Ramadan, when Muslims fast all day and feast at night. The program has come under harsh criticism from both Israel and the U.S. "We are condemning it. We are taking it in a very harsh way," said Israeli Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Amira Oron. "Besides being anti-Semitic, [it calls into question] the legitimacy of the State of Israel, [saying] that the State of Israel was born in sin," Oron said. "It is sad to see countries producing [programs] with such hostility and anti-Semitism, denying Israel's right to exist." "My impression is that it is even worse [than the Egyptian program last year]," Oron said. The Egyptian miniseries, Knight (or Horseman) Without a Horse, was also based on the Protocols of the Elders of Zion and it aired during Ramadan last year. The U.S., Israel and other countries condemned it as anti-Semitic. State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said earlier in relation to this year's series that the U.S. was "strongly opposed to any and all displays of anti-Semitism" and viewed as "unacceptable" programming that recognized the so-called Protocols of the Elders of Zion, which he labeled an "anti-Semitic forgery." Boucher, who said Washington had been in touch with Lebanon and Syria regarding the series, said that the programs "do not contribute to the climate of mutual understanding and tolerance that the Middle East so desperately needs." The programs are being aired on the al-Manar satellite channel, which is owned by the terrorist organization Hizballah, based in Lebanon. It is available to viewers with satellite dishes (a common convenience) throughout the Middle East. But the film's credits give "special thanks" to various Syrian government ministries, including the security ministry, the culture ministry, the Damascus Police Command and the Department of Antiquities and Museums, said the Anti-Defamation League, which is monitoring and summarizing the Arabic-language programs from Jerusalem. Syria has been at odds with Washington since President Bashar Assad refused a U.S. demand to close the offices of terrorist organizations headquartered in his capital and allowed the flow of weapons and fighters cross the border into Iraq to fight U.S. and allied forces there.

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On Sunday, al-Manar aired a promotion for the program dealing with American and Israeli criticism of the series, the ADL told CNSNews.com. The promo shows scenes from the series with a caption in Arabic, which says, "We are standing in front of a campaign aimed at legitimatizing the Jewish religion and land in the Arab and Muslim land." Earlier, al-Manar, which gained its reputation in the Arab world from showing footage of Hizballah attacking Israeli targets, said in a statement that the series offered the channel's view of "the stages of the Zionist movement...how it was able to affect the decision-making centers in Europe and establish the Zionist entity in Palestine by criminal and dirty means." According to the Anti-Defamation League, which is monitoring and summarizing the Arabic programs from Jerusalem, the episode opens with a message being typed into a typewriter that says: "Two thousand years ago the Jewish Rabbis established an international government aiming at maintaining the world under its control and suppressing it under the Talmudic [Jewish Biblical commentary] commands, and totally isolating them from all of the people. "Then the Jews started to incite wars and conflicts, while those countries disclaimed them. They falsely pretended to be persecuted, awaiting their savior, the Messiah, who will terminate the revenge against the Goyim [gentiles] that their God, Jehovah, started. "In the beginning of the 19th century, the international government decided to increase the conspiracies and the Jewish international secret government was established, headed by [international banker Baron] Rothschild." As the music of Israel's national anthem, HaTikva (The Hope) is played, viewers are told that the series is based on more than 250 historical sources and Jewish documents connected to the Protocols as well as other sources including the Torah (the first five books of the Bible), Jewish commentaries and the memoirs of Theodore Hertzl, the founder of modern Zionism. The program begins in Frankfurt, Germany in 1812, with a Jewish man on his deathbed telling his sons that the Jewish people control the world through their "money, knowledge, politics, murdering and sex." He tells them that the Messiah will not come until every non-Jew is extinct and the Jews rule the world and advises them to infiltrate into foreign governments and disseminate their views. During the first seven episodes Hertzl is portrayed as a conspirator who will do anything to accomplish his goal. Another figure in the program is Alfred Dreyfus, portrayed as a Jewish infiltrator in the French army, who was sentenced to death for spying but sent to jail instead. (In reality, Dreyfus, a Jewish officer in the French army, was unjustly accused of treason, primarily because of the prevailing climate of anti-Semitism in France. He was later acquitted. And Herzl, as a young journalist covering the trial, witnessed mobs chanting "Death to Jews" and resolved that the only solution was the establishment of a Jewish state.) Various other portrayals of Jews include a diseased Jewish prostitute who asks her Jewish madam not to give her Jewish clients, implying that she didn't want to infect them but it was all right to infect non-Jews; and her father who is a traitor that the Rabbi orders be tortured before he is killed in the synagogue. ADL's National Director Abraham Foxman said his organization is "greatly concerned about the program's potential to foment anti-Semitism at a time when anti-Jewish sentiments are rampant in the Arab world."

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Brave new schools

Christian dad protests devil mascot Threatens to sue if items containing image not removed Posted: November 9, 2003 1:00 a.m. Eastern 2003WorldNetDaily.com Kenneth Locklear had no idea when he enrolled his daughter at Roosevelt Middle School in West Palm Beach, Fla., for its math, science and technology magnet program that the school was also the home of the devils. Locklear was horrified when his daughter showed him a band T-shirt depicting Roosevelt's devil mascot complete with horns, pointy ears and a thick mustache. Roosevelt Middle School's devil mascot (Photo: Sun-Sentinel/Ken Locklear) Locklear, a Christian, wants the school board to establish a ban on devil symbols and says he's willing to pay the school with his own money to get rid of all its devil-related items. It is a hideous portrayal of the devil, he tells the South Florida Sun-Sentinel. Three other schools in the district have devil mascots. Officials say no one else has objected, and each school has a right to pick its own symbol, according to the paper. A spokeswoman for the Palm Beach County School Board says members of a local church have been conducting meetings in Roosevelt's gym, where the devil image appears on the floor, and they too have voiced no objections. Locklear insists his appeal is a matter of separating church and state, and he's considering suing if the school district doesn't give in. What if this was a cross? he asked the paper. Because it is the devil it doesn't seem to be recognized as a religious symbol. That will change. Susan R. Garrett, author of the book, "The Demise of the Devil," says public objections to devil mascots are common but says the devil is a religious symbol that has lost its biblical connection in modern society, according to the Sun-Sentinel. Legal challenges to devil mascots are common around the nation, but they have failed so far. In 1996 three public school students in Ohio filed a federal suit against their high school for using a Blue Devil mascot, a symbol they thought to be satanic. A federal court ruled against the students, and an appeals court upheld that decision, reports the paper. According to the Associated Press, high schools in Devil's Lake, Mich., and Devils Lake, N.D., voted in 2002 to replace long-held team names "the Satans" because of concerns

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NYC district denies birth of Jesus?

Creche barred as not 'historically accurate representation of an event' Posted: November 12, 2003 1:00 a.m. Eastern 2003WorldNetDaily.com In a dispute over display of holiday symbols, New York City schools are allowing Jewish menorahs and Islamic crescents but barring Christian nativity scenes, alleging the depiction of the birth of Christ does not represent a historical event. In pleadings with a federal court in defense of the ban, New York City lawyers asserted the "suggestion that a crche is a historically accurate representation of an event with secular significance is wholly disingenuous." The Jewish and Islamic symbols are allowed, the district says, because they have a secular dimension, but the Christian symbols are "purely religious." Robert J. Muise, who will challenge the school policy at a federal court hearing tomorrow in Brooklyn, told WorldNetDaily be believes most Americans don't see it that way. "The birth of Jesus is a historical event which serves as the basis for celebration of Christmas," Muise stated. "It's of importance for both Christians and non-Christians." Muise's Michigan-based Thomas More Law Center filed a motion to temporarily restrain the city from enforcing its ban on nativity scenes. The center asserts New York's policy "promotes the Jewish and Islamic faiths while conveying the impermissible message of disapproval of Christianity in violation of the U.S. Constitution." The Michigan group says one public-school principal issued a memo encouraging teachers to bring to school "religious symbols" that represent the Islamic and Jewish religions, but made no mention of Christianity. Jewish menorahs adorned the halls of the school as part of the authorized displays, the More Center said, but students were not allowed to make and similarly display nativity scenes A parent who wrote a letter of complaint to her son's teacher received a copy of the school's "Holiday Displays" policy in response. Kate Ahlers, communications director for New York City's law department, says schools can use things that are secular like menorahs, stars and snowflakes, but the crche is considered religious. "There is a separation of church and state that is part of the Constitution," she claimed. "It's a clear belief that people try to follow in schools and public office, and schools are saying they adhere to that belief." The point of schools, she added, "is not to debate religion; the point of schools is to teach children." The federal civil-rights lawsuit was filed on behalf of Andrea Skoros and her two elementaryschool children against the city of New York and several school officials. Skoros and her children are devout Roman Catholics. "Can Christianity be erased from a public school?" Muse asked in a statement. "Can 'Christ' be removed from Christmas? We will soon find out." Related stories:

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Christmas in America becomes battleground School bans Christmas, but OK with Halloween School bans saying 'Christmas' Ban on Christmas leads to court fight Editor's note: "THE MYTH OF CHURCH-STATE SEPARATION" - the special November edition of WND's acclaimed monthly Whistleblower magazine - documents conclusively that the modern legal doctrine of "separation of church and state" is the work of activist judges, and has utterly no basis in the Constitution.

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Christmas in America becomes battleground

As holiday traditions draw national controversy, believers, pagans grapple over Jesus' inclusion Posted: December 14, 2002 1:00 a.m. Eastern By Joe Kovacs 2002WorldNetDaily.com Every December, a call goes out from the nation's pulpits to "put Christ back into Christmas," but growing numbers of Americans including fundamentalist Christians are claiming Jesus Christ had nothing to do with the holiday, and news items from across the country this week indicate that the U.S. has become the new battleground for Christmas. Cases in point: * A first-grade teacher in Sacramento Co., Calif., says her principal has prohibited instructors from uttering the word "Christmas" in class or in written materials; * A school superintendent in Yonkers, N.Y., banned, then unbanned, holiday decorations that contained religious themes more than the generic "season's greetings"; * New York City schools are being sued for alleged discrimination against Christians; * and atheists reposted their vandalized winter solstice sign in the Wisconsin Capitol, as they declare "Christians stole Christmas" from ancient pagans. All this comes on the heels of a national survey indicating just over a tenth of Americans today believe Jesus Christ of Nazareth is the focus of Christmas, with almost nine out of ten people saying the holiday has become less religious. Are atheists correct that the very day set aside by hundreds of millions across the world to honor the birth of their Savior is merely a relic of sun worship? And if it is, why would some schools ban it? And even if today's holiday traditions have their roots in heathen practices, should Christians who wish to be true to their faith take part? Sign of the times "The real reason for the season is winter solstice," proclaims Annie Laurie Gaylor, co-founder of the Madison, Wis.-based Freedom From Religion Foundation which re-erected its atheistic message Monday in the rotunda of the state seat of government. After six years on display, her placard had been damaged last December by an unknown assailant, and has since been repaired. Atheists' winter solstice sign at Wisconsin Capitol The front of the sign states: "At this season of the winter solstice may reason prevail. There are no gods, no devils, no angels, no heaven or hell. There is only our natural world. Religion is but myth and superstition that hardens hearts and enslaves minds." The back reads: "State/Church: Keep them separate," and carries a little caveat, advising "Thou shalt not steal." The 23-by-30-inch billboard was OK'd as part of Wisconsin's seasonal display which also features menorahs, angels, and what appears to be a giant Christmas tree more than two stories tall. "We call it a 'holiday' tree," said Brian Hayes, deputy secretary for Wisconsin's department of administration. "We're trying to be sensitive to [the public]."

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That politically correct terminology comes despite the dismissal of a lawsuit last year where the message content of items adorning the state tree had been challenged, yet it's indicative of the thought-conscious age of the 21st century. Banned in the USA The fact that atheists view Christmas with disdain is not astonishing, since they've attempted to remove the phrase "under God" from the Pledge of Allegiance and "In God we trust" from U.S. currency, as well as Ten Commandments displays from numerous publicly owned places. What may be surprising, though, is that some devout Christians, many dating all the way back to the days of Jesus, never celebrated the birth of Christ, nor sought to. America's early colonists banned observance of Christmas, and still today, there are many Christians abstaining from what millions more of their brethren joyfully celebrate as God's coming in human form. The Catholic Encyclopedia states, '"the word for Christmas in late Old English is Cristes Maesse, the Mass of Christ, first found in 1038, and Cristes-messe, in 1131." It explains "Christmas was not among the earliest festivals of the Church," pointing out "first evidence of the feast is from Egypt" around A.D. 200 with attempts by theologians to assign not only the year of Christ's birth, but also the precise date. Historians agree that through the subsequent centuries, traditions from ancient pagan (nonChristian) religions became intertwined with those of Christianity, and depending upon one's point of view, either paganism became Christianized, or Christianity became paganized. In 1644, the English Parliament, outlawed the holiday, compelling shops to be open that day, and condemning plum puddings and mince pies as "heathen." In his Pulitzer Prize finalist, "The Battle for Christmas," historian Stephen Nissenbaum at the University of Massachusetts documents the American development of the holiday now ensconced in popular culture. "In New England, for the first two centuries of white settlement," writes Nissenbaum, "most people did not celebrate Christmas. In fact, the holiday was systematically suppressed by Puritans during the colonial period and largely ignored by their descendants. It was actually illegal to celebrate Christmas in Massachusetts between 1659 and 1681 (the fine was five shillings). Only in the middle of the nineteenth century did Christmas gain legal recognition as an official public holiday in New England." Nissenbaum agrees with other historians that the first recorded observance since the New Testament recounted Christ's birth took place hundreds of years after Jesus' resurrection. "It was only in the fourth century that the Church officially decided to observe Christmas on Dec. 25. And this date was not chosen for religious reasons but simply because it happened to mark the approximate arrival of the winter solstice, an event that was celebrated long before the advent of Christianity. The Puritans were correct when they pointed out and they pointed it out often that Christmas was nothing but a pagan festival covered with a Christian veneer." Christmas in America saw huge growth during the 19th century, starting with Washington Irving's 1820 book "The Keeping of Christmas at Bracebridge Hall." A week before Christmas in 1834, Charles Dickens published "A Christmas Carol," and in 1860, American illustrator Thomas Nast created Father Christmas, also known as Santa Claus, based on European stories of St. Nicholas, the patron saint of children. Spirit of the rising sun Today, followers of ancient paganism strive to remind the public about the heathen origins of traditions that many may never have questioned. They've published books, given speeches, and created websites proffering a heathen history of modern customs. 223

CircleSanctuary.org is among the Internet addresses run by nature-worshipping pagans. Author Selena Fox discusses the state of being pagan and celebrating the lengthening of days during the Northern Hemisphere's darkest time of year. "Yule, the winter solstice, is a festival of peace and a celebration of waxing solar light. I honor the new sun child by burning a[n] oaken yule log in a sacred fire. I honor the great goddess in her many great mother aspects, and the father god as Santa in his old sky god, father time, and holly king forms. I decorate my home with lights and with holly, ivy, mistletoe, evergreens and other herbs sacred to this season. I ring in the new solar year with bells." Fox even provides a list of suggestions on how 21st century citizens can take part in the ancient rituals, to "re-paganize" Christmastime: * Have gift exchanges and feasts over the course of several days and nights as was done of old * Adorn the home with sacred herbs and colors; decorate in druidic holiday colors of red, green and white * Hang a sprig of mistletoe above a major threshold and leave it there until next yule as a charm for good luck throughout the year * Have family/household members join together to make or purchase an evergreen wreath * If you choose to have a living or a harvested evergreen tree as part of your holiday decorations, call it a solstice tree and decorate it with pagan symbols * Reclaim Santa Claus as a pagan godform by decorating him with images that reflect his various heritages ranging from the Greek god Cronos (father time) to Odin, the Scandinavian all-father riding the sky on an eight-legged horse * Place pagan mother-goddess images around your home, possibly including one with a sun child, such as Isis with Horus * Honor the new solar year with light light candles, burn a yule log and save a portion for the following year, put colored lights outside your home, and with the popularity of five-pointed stars, consider displaying a blue or white pentagram. The greatest story never told? The pagan connections to Christmas are not news to the likes of Garner Ted Armstrong, a Christian evangelist and political commentator based in Tyler, Texas. Armstrong has been proclaiming such information for the past 46 years on a peak of 135 television and 360 radio stations, stating "it is impossible to 'put Christ back in Christmas,' since He was never in Christmas in the first place!" "None of the apostles of Christ ever heard of the term; not one of them ever celebrated Christ's birthday," writes Armstrong in his booklet "Christmas ... The Untold Story." "The words Christmas, holly wreath, mistletoe, Rudolph, Santa Claus and Christmas tree do not appear anywhere in the Bible." Armstrong is among Christians who believe God's plan of salvation for mankind is more accurately depicted through holidays which are frequently mentioned in Scripture, such as Passover and the Day of Atonement. If anything, he thinks Dec. 25 would most likely be Jesus' conception day, thus placing his birth in the autumn, possibly during the Feast of Tabernacles, symbolizing God's "tabernacling" that is to say, dwelling with mankind. Like-minded preachers say the Bible warns extensively about adopting pagan customs, pointing to the 10th chapter of Jeremiah to specifically cite the practice of tree decoration, which some historians date back to ancient Egypt and Babylon: "Thus saith the Lord, Learn not the way of the heathen, and be not dismayed at the signs of

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heaven; for the heathen are dismayed at them. For the customs of the people are vain: for one cutteth a tree out of the forest, the work of the hands of the workman, with the axe. They deck it with silver and with gold; they fasten it with nails and with hammers, that it move not." (Jer 10:2-4) Armstrong says the pagan celebrations, including winter's Saturnalia, or feast of Saturn in ancient Rome, crept into ostensible Christianity over many years, and some writers began urging a celebration at the same time as the secular events "for the simple reason that so many pagans were already accustomed to 'joyous,' sometimes 'riotous' orgies of feasting at the time of the winter solstice." "It would be a sin for me [to celebrate Christmas], but it doesn't mean it's the unpardonable sin," Armstrong told WorldNetDaily, stressing he doesn't feel at all threatened by the holiday. "I have no more difficulty walking through Beijing at the Chinese New Year and seeing the dragons and fireworks. It doesn't affect me. ... [the Apostle] Paul says the idol is nothing." While Armstrong teaches against the observance of Christmas, he adds that most people who celebrate it are doing so with good intentions, simply unaware of the facts regarding its origins, and they should neither be judged nor condemned by fellow believers in Jesus. He encourages people to type words like "origins of Christmas" into Internet search engines to find out for themselves the background on the customs. Angels in the outfield For millions of Christians, the story of Christmas in the Bible is among the most beloved, and is one of their foundations of faith that God came to dwell as a man and offer eternal life to mankind. It is both simple enough to be understood by young children, and has majestic meaning to provide adults with inspiration and awe. The events surrounding the birth of Christ are recorded in the Gospels of Matthew and Luke, which give an almost play-by-play description: And there were in the same country shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. And, lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the Lord shone round about them: and they were sore afraid. And the angel said unto them, Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord. And this shall be a sign unto you; Ye shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger. And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and saying, Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men. (Luke 2:8-14) The shepherds subsequently found the child in the manger, but unlike depictions on many modern holiday cards and Nativity scenes, there were no wise men present at the birth. The Gospel of Matthew says the Magi arrived at a house, not the manger. And as for the tradition of three wise men, the Bible never mentions their number only the three gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh. Those gifts were presented to Jesus, not exchanged with other people. The accounts don't mention a tree evergreen or otherwise nor do they specify the time of year. Some analysts theorize that since the shepherds were still out in the fields by night watching their flocks, the event could not have been in winter, due to plunging temperatures. Still others think Dec. 25 has a valid claim on the actual event. Spirit of the rising Son "I believe the celebration of Christmas is a wonderful opportunity to honor Christ and share the gospel," says Rev. Jerry Falwell, chancellor of Liberty University in Virginia and one of America's best known ministers. Falwell is a staunch defender of the holiday he's celebrated for every one of the 69 years he's been alive.

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"And I plan to celebrate it on the 'other side,'" he tells WorldNetDaily. Falwell acknowledges that many of the customs associated with the observance are not found in the Bible, but he doesn't have a problem with that. "The Christmas tree and Santa Claus don't bother me," he said. "If we can use anything to get people under the sound of the gospel, without violating Scripture, it's a good thing." While there are some unknowns such as the exact date of birth, Falwell stresses "we do know He was born virgin-born as the Son of God." Yet over 2,000 years after that history-changing event, most Americans think Christ is fading from the Christmas picture, at least according to a recent poll. When the Scripps Survey Research Center at Ohio University asked if "most people focus on the birth of Jesus at Christmas time, or has the holiday become less religious than it used to be?" only 11 percent said they believed Christmas was still about Jesus, with 87 percent responding "less religious." Close to half of adults 45 percent say they personally know someone who doesn't believe in God, but still will celebrate the holiday this year; 62 percent say they'll attend a religious service on Christmas Eve or Day; and 81 percent plan to put a decorated tree in their home this year. "Do I put up a tree? I have in the past; this year I won't," says Jose Negron, a 34-year-old Christian minister at the Stonehouse Church to the Nations in Toano, Va. Even without the tree, he still plans to celebrate Christmas. "I grew up in America. It's an historical constant," Negron said. President Franklin Roosevelt dedicated the National Christmas Tree in 1940 Indeed, trees and their decoration have played a role in American history, even in the nation's darkest hours. In 1942, just a year after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill came to Washington to join President Franklin Roosevelt in lighting the National Christmas Tree, a tradition started by Calvin Coolidge in 1923. "Against enemies who preach the principles of hate and practice them, we set our faith in human love and in God's care for us all men everywhere," said Roosevelt. Thousands of citizens turned out for the event, which was broadcast nationwide on radio in the grips of World War II. "Let the children have their night of fun and laughter," proclaimed Churchill. "Let the gifts of Father Christmas delight their play. Let us grown-ups share to the full in their unstinted pleasures before we turn again to the stern task and formidable years that lie before us, resolved that, by our sacrifice and daring, these same children shall not be robbed of their inheritance or denied the right to live in a free and decent world." The tree-lighting ceremonies continue to this day, with President George W. Bush having two dedications under his belt. The history of mankind's fascination with trees long antedates World War II, the founding of America, and even the Middle Ages. Historians have found evidence of tree decoration and tree worship in places such as ancient Rome and Egypt. The Old Testament also records God's displeasure with his own people for following pagan practices involving trees: * "And the children of Israel did evil in the sight of the Lord, and forgat the Lord their God, and served Baalim and the groves." (Judges 3:7) * "For the Lord shall smite Israel ... because they have made their groves, provoking the Lord to anger." (1 Kings 14:15)

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* "For they also built them high places, and images, and groves, on every high hill, and under every green tree." (1 Kings 14:23) In the 1800s, Alexander Hislop, a noted historian of antiquity, examined the origins of customs such as the Christmas tree and date of celebration. Writing in "The Two Babylons," Hislop maintains the practice derives from the worship of pagan deities. The Christmas tree, now so common among us, was equally common in pagan Rome and pagan Egypt. In Egypt that tree was the palm tree; in Rome it was the fir; the palm tree denoting the pagan Messiah. ... The mother of Adonis, the sun god and great mediatorial divinity, was mystically said to have been changed into a tree, and when in that state to have brought forth her divine son. If the mother was a tree, the son must have been [recognized] as the "Man the branch." And this entirely accounts for the putting of the yule log into the fire on Christmas Eve, and the appearance of the Christmas tree the next morning. ... Therefore, the 25th of December, the day that was observed at Rome as the day when the victorious god reappeared on earth, was held at the Natalis invicti solis, "The birthday of the unconquered sun." Now the yule log is the dead stock of Nimrod, deified as the sun god, but cut down by his enemies; the Christmas tree is Nimrod redivivus the slain god come to life again. The 2001 National Christmas Tree took on patriotic colors in the wake of the Sept. 11 terror attacks "I can count about a hundred trees, wreaths, poinsettia displays, lights, everywhere I look [in my office] complex," says Bob Sipsky, of Stuart, Fla. "Christmas gorge-as-much-food-as-you-can eat-aramas every day for two weeks. Enough already." Sipsky is a Bible believer not affiliated with any organized church. He celebrated Christmas for 35 years before abandoning it, now thinking it an insult to God. "There are clearly explained festivals that God tells us to observe, which teach how to have peace on earth, and what the true Savior requires of us," Sipsky says, "yet mankind ignores these, and prefers to make up his own festivals and traditions. Christmas is based in deception: its origins; lying to small children about Santa Claus; talking about having peace on earth while ignoring God's instructions on how to achieve it; saying it is biblical, while 99 percent of it is all about commerce and other selfish objectives. Myths and traditions do not please the God of the Bible, a right way of living does. Deception is at the top of the list of what He hates." That anti-Christmas view is echoed by Tom Moniz of Hobe Sound, Fla. "Being a God-fearing man, I cannot honor a lie, nor do I think adopting a pagan holiday and calling it his birthday does any honor to him." "Most of these people are killjoys," says Rev. Falwell regarding those who attack the celebration of Christmas. "Most of these tightwads just don't want to [spend] cash. ... I don't take my children or grandchildren near them." To many Christians, Christmastime is among the most sacred times of the year, and they look to keep it that way. "It's the reason for being a Christian, because we believe Jesus is God," says Louis Giovino, director of communications for the New York-based Catholic League, the nation's largest Catholic civil-rights organization. With recent controversies surrounding Christmas in the public arena, the league has issued a list of guidelines to help people understand what kind of religious expression is permissible at this time of year. Giovino admits the observance has picked up some pagan customs over the years, but says they've been "baptized" by the Church. He notes by the time of Dickens in England, the holiday took on a

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more raucous tone, with drinking parties and violence, and says the Protestant legislation to outlaw Christmas was in direct response to the riotous revelry. "The Puritans weren't into celebrating anything," he said. Giovino stresses the important part of Christmas is the larger picture of the Christian message, the belief that "the Word became flesh." "It's not like saying 'Happy birthday, Jesus!'" he exclaimed. "I think personally Christmas is ridiculous without Christ. Otherwise, we might as well celebrate the winter solstice as pagans." The baby with the bathwater? With the extremes on Christmas observance ranging from total holiday indulgence to complete abstention, there are plenty of people who seek middle ground. Pastor Richard Bucher of the Trinity Lutheran Church in Clinton, Mass., is one of them, asserting celebrating Christmas is not pagan. "It's laudable that certain Christians care so much about pleasing God to ask the question if it's right," Bucher told WorldNetDaily, "but a lot of arguments they're making are just not sound. They end up placing guilt on Christians celebrating Christmas and do a real disservice." On his church website, Bucher addresses examples such as the tree decorated with silver and gold in Jeremiah's 10th chapter, and explains upon close examination, it does not refer to anything like a Christmas tree. "The very next verse, 10:5, goes on to say, 'Like a scarecrow in a melon patch, their idols cannot speak; they must be carried because they cannot walk. Do not fear them; they can do no harm nor can they do any good.' This passage and the passages that follow make it crystal clear that the 'decorated tree' that Jeremiah was talking about in 10:3-4, was a tree that was cut down and made into an idol, a very common custom in the ancient world." "Just because heathens took something God has created for good," he asks, "does that mean such things are off limits [to Christians] permanently?" He says many have invented sin where God has not said that something is sinful, and adds the issue boils down to what exactly is meant by "Christmas." "Is it thanking God for the birth of the Savior, or everything that people do associated with it? People just lump everything together." Despite all the conflict, some believers have little problem with the controversies over Christmas; in fact, they rejoice in them. "Those who would attempt to take Christ out of Christmas are fighting a losing battle," says Joan Driscoll of Ft. Lauderdale, Fla. "The harder they try, the stronger the holy message and meaning of Jesus' birth becomes. The heavenly voices of the angels singing 'Alleluia' will easily drown out the guttural tones of the dissenters." If you'd like to sound off on this issue, please take part in the WorldNetDaily poll.

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School bans Christmas, but OK with Halloween

Despite massive promotion of October holiday, district reverses approval of talk on Jesus' birth Posted: December 19, 2002 1:00 a.m. Eastern By Joe Kovacs 2002WorldNetDaily.com 'Twas the week before Christmas and all through the class, a storm was stirring over Christmas present, and Christmas past. The rhyme may sound trite, but the complaint is real from a San Diego mother who has been told by school officials she can no longer read a Christmas story to her daughter's class, despite having the green light in recent years. "I'm very upset with it," Patrice Reynolds told WorldNetDaily. "I feel that my kids and other kids are being cheated and deceived. This is history, just like George Washington." For the past several years with the consent of the Del Mar Union School District, Reynolds has been going into one of her four children's classes to read and discuss how her family celebrates Christmas at home. She brings a Nativity scene, and sometimes a children's Bible or storybook to aid in discussing family traditions. But when she called to schedule a presentation this year in her daughter Grace's fourth-grade class at the Sage Canyon School, she was rejected, with the teacher telling her even instructors were not permitted to wear jewelry with a Christmas theme. "They didn't say you can't do it because it's a religious topic, but that's their basis," said Patrice's husband Rob, a civil litigation attorney. "Not allowing anyone to talk doesn't promote diversity, it promotes intolerance. Schools promote and talk about alternative lifestyles that are damaging, then are intolerant of your point of view." Sage Canyon School, serving kindergarten through sixth grade, opened in September 2000, and has an enrollment in its third year of approximately 600 students in 29 classes. Sage Canyon School's 'kinder team' dressing up as witches for Halloween On its website, it shows both teachers and students participating in another well-known holiday with religious connotations Halloween. Kindergarten teachers are dressed up as witches in one photograph, and costumed students are shown listening to a classroom reading in another. Children in costume for Halloween at Sage Canyon School "You can't allow discussions of certain holidays and ban discussion of others," says Gary Kreep, executive director of the United States Justice Foundation, a conservative legal-action foundation which is reviewing this case. "It's a violation not only of California law, but also the U.S. Constitution." Neither Sage Canyon's principal, Jeff Swenerton, nor the district superintendent, Tom Bishop, returned repeated requests for comment, but the district did provide a fax of its policy regarding recognition of religious beliefs and customs. According to the policy: * Special school events, assemblies, concerts and programs must be designed to further the boardapproved curriculum and may not focus on any one religion or religious observance; * School employees are permitted to teach about religious holidays but are not permitted to

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celebrate religious holidays during school hours; * School employees may not endorse, advance, or inhibit a specific religion; * The use of religious symbols is permissible as a teaching aid or resource. Religious symbols may be displayed on a temporary basis provided that the symbols that are displayed are examples of the cultural and religious heritage of the holiday. "It's perfectly acceptable to discuss holidays," Kreep said, "just not in a proselytizing fashion. Many school districts believe they're above the law; their arrogance just amazes me." The San Diego case comes on the heels of several Christmas-related battles across America last week involving government venues: * As WorldNetDaily was the first to report, a first-grade teacher in Sacramento Co., Calif., said her principal has prohibited instructors from uttering the word "Christmas" in class or in written materials; * a school superintendent in Yonkers, N.Y., banned, then unbanned, holiday decorations that contained religious themes more than the generic "season's greetings"; * and a federal lawsuit was filed against New York City schools claiming the district's policy "unlawfully discriminates against Christians" because it "prohibits the display of [Christian] Nativity scenes" in public schools during Christmas, while it "expressly permits and encourages" the display of the Jewish Menorah and the Islamic Star and Crescent during certain religious holidays and observances. Rob Reynolds is now considering whether any legal action is necessary after his wife's denial in southern California. "This is starting to annoy me," he said. "It's the straw that broke the camel's back, I'm not gonna let it go." Meanwhile, in yet another anti-Christmas incident, the city of Tillamook, Ore., has ordered the removal of a lighted Nativity display from a drive-up coffee outlet, because the business' property is leased out by the city. "It appeared to be a conflict between church and state," City Manager Mark Gervasi told the Headlight-Herald newspaper. Gervasi was acting on a citizen's complaint, and figures of Mary, Joseph and the baby Jesus were gone by the next day. Cheryl Hall, the owner of High Tide Espresso Drive-Thru, won't fight the decision, stating she chooses her battles carefully. She had posted the display in memory of her infant grandson who died last February. Hall acknowledged the principle of separation of church and state on the city-owned property, but told the paper "this isn't a church. This isn't a government office. It's a drive-through espresso stand." She finds it ironic her other holiday decor including lights, a candy cane and wreath are acceptable, just not the Nativity. "If I'd put a 50-foot snowman outside, no one would've said a word."

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Judge: Witches can pray at county meeting

ACLU hails federal decision as victory for non-majority religions Posted: November 15, 2003 1:00 a.m. Eastern 2003WorldNetDaily.com Witches, or practitioners of the Wicca religion, can pray at a county's board meeting, a federal judge ruled. Officials in Chesterfield County, Virginia, discriminated against Cyndi Simpson, a Wiccan, when they barred her from being on a list of clergy who can open the board of supervisors meetings with prayer, said U.S. District Court Judge Dennis W. Dohnal, according to the Chesterfield ProgressIndex newspaper. The lawsuit was filed by the American Civil Liberties Union of Virginia and Americans United for Separation of Church and State. Wicca is regarded as a natural religion, "grounded in the earth." Followers of its many different forms generally believe all living things, as well as stars, planets, and rocks, have a spirit. In a letter of explanation to Simpson, County Attorney Steven L. Micas said, "Chesterfield's nonsectarian invocations are traditionally made to a divinity that is consistent with the JudeoChristian tradition," the paper reported. But the judge ruled the board violated Simpson's constitutional right of equal and free expression of her religious beliefs. Meanwhile, Dohnal argued, Christians are allowed to express their religious beliefs by delivering the "legislative prayer" allowed by the U.S. Supreme Court. Expressing delight with the outcome, Simpson, 47, said she believed the decision would bring credibility to witchcraft as a religion, the paper reported. The ruling was a victory for non-majority religions, said Kent Willis, executive director of the ACLU. It demonstrated why church and state should remain separate institutions, he contended. "As the framers of the Constitution understood from their own experiences, when the state uses its vast power to endorse religious activity, it will always make losers of some faiths and winners of others," said Willis, according to the Chesterfield daily. "That jeopardizes religious freedom." Editor's note: "THE MYTH OF CHURCH-STATE SEPARATION" - the special November edition of WND's acclaimed monthly Whistleblower magazine - documents conclusively that the modern legal doctrine of "separation of church and state" is the work of activist judges, and has utterly no basis in the Constitution.

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America: Falling from Grace

Henry Lamb Posted: November 15, 2003 1:00 a.m. Eastern 2003WorldNetDaily.com It might have been that day in 1959, when 13-year old Bill Murray stood up in class and announced that he would not recite the Lord's Prayer and the Pledge of Allegiance. Normally, in most every school in the country in 1959, such a stunt would have been rewarded with a paddling at school, and whipping at home. Bill Murray was not a normal kid. How could he be normal; his mother was Madalyn Murray O'Hair. It could have been June 17, 1963, the day the Supreme Court decided O'Hair's lawsuit, Murray v. Curlett. That's the day prayer in public schools became "unconstitutional." It probably actually started long before either of these two events, but since these events, American has been spiraling in a free-fall from Grace. On Mother's Day in 1980, Bill Murray renounced his mother's atheism and became a Christian. He later wrote: "In the three decades since this landmark case, the nation has lost its moral center. Violent crime has increased from 16.1 to 75.8 incidents per 10,000 population. Juvenile violent crime arrest rates have increased from 13.7 to 40 per 10,000 population. Teen pregnancy has almost tripled from 15.3 to 43.5 per 1,000 teen-age girls. Almost half of these pregnancies end in abortion. For a startling 28 percent of all live births in America today, the mothers are unwed. The teen-age suicide rate has increased 400 percent since 1963." Michael Newdow, another atheist, did not want his daughter to be exposed to the Pledge of Allegiance because of the words "under God." The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled "unconstitutional" the 1954 law which inserted the phrase into the Pledge. How can a law be constitutional for nearly 50 years, and then, suddenly, become unconstitutional? Neither the Constitution nor the law changed. But something did. Judge Roy Moore, a devout Christian, was elected Chief Justice of Alabama by an overwhelming majority of his constituents, largely because of his defense of the Ten Commandments in his lower courts. As custodian of the Justice building, he chose to install a granite sculpture of the Ten Commandments and other significant writings on which our system of law is founded. But no. Again, anti-God forces went to federal court where the monument was found to be "unconstitutional." Since 1935, a sculpture of the Ten Commandments has guarded the East entrance to the Supreme Court Building. Is this building now "unconstitutional"? Congress, as well as the Supreme Court, begins each session with a prayer to God. Is this practice now "unconstitutional"? "Congress shall make no law respecting the establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free expression thereof. ..." This nation is in the throes of deciding whether we are, in fact, one nation under God. Until 1963, we were one nation under God. We certainly were not a nation of one religion under God. We were a nation that recognized the existence of God, man's dependence upon God and man's individual freedom to recognize, define and worship God or not. The spate of court decisions since 1963 reflect, not a change in the Constitution, nor in the laws that authorize the words "under God" in our Pledge and "In God We Trust" on our currency, but a change in our attitude about, understanding of, and belief in God. 232

Our founders recognized that God is much more than any particular doctrine or religion and that man's individual sovereignty is endowed by God: that no government has the right to dictate the particulars of any man's relationship to his God. The federal government cannot force any particular doctrine or religion on anyone. Nor can it prohibit the free expression of any particular doctrine or religion by anyone unless the people allow it to do so. School prayer and the Pledge of Allegiance should be the business of the parents of the local school children, not the Supreme Court. How Judge Moore decides to furnish the building he was elected to be responsible for is a matter for the people of Alabama, not the Supreme Court. These and several other recent Supreme Court decisions go well beyond the plain language of the Constitution. By these decisions, the Supreme Court is changing the Constitution to guarantee freedom "from" religion, rather than the "free expression thereof." In so doing, they are driving our society away from the knowledge of God. God is not diminished by these decisions; America is diminished by the absence of knowledge of God. Why we are falling from Grace God is not affected by decisions of the United States Supreme Court. As different as all the great religions of the world may be, they all come together on this basic belief: God is that force which causes all life to be. God is personalized in the hearts and minds of all who acknowledge that life is a gift from an external power. Worship is an attempt to demonstrate appreciation for that gift, and it is expressed differently by individuals and cultures around the world. Over time, patterns of worship have evolved that are differentiated as "religions" with labels such as Christianity, Islam, Buddhism and countless others. In America, Christianity has long been the dominant religion. Although there are hundreds of different doctrines within the Christian religion, all share a few common elements. Among these is the belief that each person is a sovereign being, that man is the crowning jewel of God's creation, who has dominion over the earth. This belief is no longer acceptable to a growing number of people. In every religion, and particularly within Christianity, man's perception of God changes over time. As sovereign beings, men have no problem redefining the God they worship, casting off old beliefs and adding new ones. God is changeless the force that causes all life to be is also the force that governs the continuation of life. Regardless of what man perceives God to be, or how God may be described, or what rituals may be devised, or what laws may be constructed in the name of God, God continues changeless. The belief that man is a sovereign being who has dominion over the earth is in direct conflict and, indeed, is incompatible with another belief system that has swept the world over the last halfcentury. This belief system has evolved over time, but has not yet achieved the status of a recognized religion. This belief system sees man to be but a part of a much bigger whole, with no special value or status; not a sovereign being, but a subject of a single sovereign government that has dominion over all men and the earth. In order for this new belief system to prevail, Christianity has to be abolished or transformed. Supreme Court decisions that ban recognition of God in public life have the effect of abolishing Christianity in public life and discrediting Christianity in private life. These Supreme Court decisions are driven by organizations such as American Atheists, the group founded by Madalyn Murray O'Hair in 1963, the American Civil Liberties Union and many others. Transformation of the Christian Church is driven by organizations such as the National Religious Partnership for the Environment, the Earth Charter Campaign, and a host of other organizations around the world. 233

While there are hundreds of different doctrines within this new, emerging, yet-unnamed religion, there are a few fundamental, common elements by which it is being defined: All species of life are of equal intrinsic value; Human activity must be managed for the common good; and Authority for managing human activity must be universal. At the heart of this new, emerging religion, is the gaia hypothesis, the belief that the earth itself is the giver of life, not created by an external God. In this belief system, God is extraneous, a distraction, an obstacle to be overcome, either by re-education, ridicule or Supreme Court decision. To fit this new hypothesis, man's role has to be redefined. Dr. Robert Muller has articulated this new role for humans most effectively. Muller, assistant secretary-general to three secretaries-general at the U.N., believes that every human being is a cell in the organic body of earth. Like individual cells in the human body, each person has a specific function to perform in sustaining the life of the living earth. He believes that the gaia hypothesis is an enlightenment, an evolution of knowledge. He believes that the creation of the United Nations reflects the evolution of the earth's brain, and the people who work at the U.N. are the individual cells of the earth's brain. ( Robert Muller, "A Cosmological Vision of the Future," World Goodwill Occasional Paper, October, 1989.) Few of the forces working to expel God from American life will admit, or perhaps even recognize, the source of this new belief system. The new belief system, and all that it implies, cannot prevail in the face of Christianity or the God Christianity worships. This is why America must fall from Grace. God remains unaffected by this foolishness. God is changeless; it is the people who suffer when individual worship and pursuit of understanding is commandeered by the group, or by the government, and forced into yet another mold fashioned by the newly enlightened. Henry Lamb is the executive vice president of the Environmental Conservation Organization and chairman of Sovereignty International. Court bans religious gifts to classmates By Julia Duin THE WASHINGTON TIMES http://www.washingtontimes.com/national/20030921-124437-4267r.htm Kindergartners and first-graders may not distribute to their classmates gifts that bear a religious message, according to a ruling by a federal appeals court. The 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals recently ruled in favor of a New Jersey elementary school in forbidding a boy from giving out pencils with the message "Jesus loves the little children" with a heart symbol substituted for the word love. The classroom is not a place for student advocacy, wrote Chief U.S. Circuit Judge Anthony J. Scirica, speaking for the court in Walz v. Egg Harbor Township Board of Education. The school, he said, has a "legitimate area of control" regarding speech within school confines. And the younger the student, "the more control a school may exercise," he added. But the Charlottesville-based Rutherford Institute, which is representing Daniel Walz, now 9, plans to appeal the case to a full bench of 12 judges of the 3rd Circuit, and, if necessary, to the U.S. Supreme Court. The recent unanimous ruling, which was handed down Aug. 27, was made by three judges. At stake, said Rutherford President John Whitehead, is constitutionally protected speech. He called

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the 3rd Circuit ruling "a dangerous trend." "I call it the 9/11 fallout," he said. "The court says the schools have complete authority to decide what they want said. If they do not like a kid's religion, they can pick on the kid. Or if a black kid says Martin Luther King was the greatest person alive, if a teacher didn't like that, he could just kick the message out. "This idea that we have to watch everything and give the authorities power contradicts a long line of Supreme Court cases," Mr. Whitehead said. "Even if the First Amendment is involved, the 3rd Circuit is saying control, control, control" goes to the schools. The case began in April 1998 when Daniel, then 4, and his pre-kindergarten classmates attended a party at school. All of the children brought treats to share. Daniel came with the pencils, which the teacher confiscated. Daniel's mother, Dana Walz, who was in the classroom at the time as a chaperone, immediately appealed the matter to the principal. The principal, assistant superintendent and superintendent said Daniel could distribute the pencils only during noninstructional time because they did not want the school to be held responsible for endorsing Christianity. In December 1998, when Daniel and his kindergarten classmates had another party at school, Mrs. Walz contacted the school's lawyer beforehand to obtain permission for Daniel to distribute candy canes with a Christian-themed story attached to it. She was informed that Daniel could do so only outside the building during his free time. In December 1999, Mrs. Walz informed the school that her son wanted to distribute more candy with a Christian message attached to it. Again, she was turned down. The child ended up giving out the candy in the hallway. In May 2000, the Rutherford Institute filed a suit on behalf of the child, saying his First Amendment rights had been violated. In February 2002, U.S. District Court Judge Jerome B. Simandle, a federal judge based in Camden, N.J., sided with the school district, blaming the mother for being "the driving force behind the distribution of these items and this lawsuit." It was "highly unlikely," he wrote that then-4-year-old Daniel was "able to independently read and advocate the dissemination of the message on the pencils." Joe Betley, the lawyer representing the Egg Harbor Township School District, also said the mother's influence was a problem. "The parents were using the classroom to proselytize," he said. "There is a difference between a kid's ability to understand the difference between what's endorsed by the school and what's allowed because the school is taking a neutral position. "If the school board wants to publicize a prayer meeting with a disclaimer, a high schooler can understand that, but a kid in kindergarten does not." Daniel was given the option of distributing the pencils and candy during recess or before and after school, he said. Judge Scirica made a similar point, saying that schools can restrict speech in class or during schoolsponsored events but should hold off when the speech occurs in hallways between classes or during free time.

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Videos of Hate
Columbine killers harbored anti-Christian prejudice. http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2000/002/10.21.html By Steve Rabey | A combination of simmering rage, resentment of fellow students, and a desire for celebrity spurred Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold to gun down a dozen students and one teacher at Columbine High School in Colorado last April. But, according to recently released videotapes the two killers made in the weeks before America's most deadly high-school shooting, they also shared an intense hostility toward Christianity. Their anti-Christian comments did not appear in the controversial 20-page Time magazine cover story in December that reignited debate about the massacre. "What would Jesus do?" asks Klebold, yelling and making faces at the camera. "What would I do?" Then he points an imaginary shotgun at the camera, takes aim, and says, "Boosh!" "Yeah, 'I love Jesus. I love Jesus.' Shut the f - up," Harris says on the same tape, made on March 15. "Go Romans," Harris says later. "Thank God they crucified that a - hole." Then the two teenagers both chant, "Go Romans! Go Romans! Yeah! Whoo!" Klebold, who reportedly had a crush on Christian student Rachel Scott, singles her out for particular disdain, calling her a "godly whore" and a "stuck-up little b - ." Darrell Scott, who says his daughter Rachel was the only victim singled out in the tapes, believes the killers felt a deep antipathy for the things of God: "There seemed to be an extra element of hatred and vengeance there." Scott, a former pastor who has crisscrossed the country speaking to church groups about the spiritual dimensions of the Columbine tragedy, says he and other parents were blindsided by Time's report on the tapes. Only after the article appeared did the sheriff's office offer parents a chance to see the tapes for themselves. Scott says he could only bear to watch one of the five videos. "To sit there and listen to them use foul language for several hours was more than I could handle." Rachel Scott was a devout Christian who wrote voluminous journals about her spiritual life, including mystical premonitions of her own death. "She attended class with Dylan Klebold and Eric Harris, she witnessed to them, and she confronted them about the violent videos they were making at the school," Scott says. "She wasn't the kind who would wear Christian T-shirts, but she did try to walk her talk." Scott, who says the city of Littleton plans to erect a Columbine memorial "with no religious symbols," is making plans to create his own memorial to the 13 victims. Meanwhile, parents and relatives of some Columbine victims filed suit in October against the Jefferson County School District and its officers. The lawsuit claims that the school unconstitutionally prohibited relatives from using Christian imagery in memorial ceramic tiles that members of the Columbine community were invited to create, and which were to be installed at the school. "Only religious symbols and/or religious messages were excluded," says the suit. Defendants filed a motion to dismiss the suit in November, claiming that "religious speech that may be acceptable in other settings is clearly unacceptable in the school setting." The motion for dismissal adds: "had the school not imposed these limitations, the hallways might

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have been filled with hundreds of crosses and other indicia of religious faith, creating a setting so dominated by religious symbols that it took on the appearance of a parochial school."

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A Jew in Anti-Christian America

Midge Decter Copyright (c) 1995 First Things 56 (October 1995):25-31. http://www.firstthings.com/ftissues/ft9510/articles/decter.html To speak of something called "Christian America," as both the advocates and the opponents of this idea are nowadays at high levels of passion wont to do, is by itself evidence of how unChristian the country has become. Many Christian activists, especially the most innocent and highminded among them, seem not to understand the true nature of their underlying predicament. We are, for instance, constantly being reminded by those who have an interest in declaring the robustness of Christianity in America today that such-and-such a high percentage of Americans are to be found in church each Sunday and that an even higher percentage profess to believe in God; and while such numbers surely do not mean nothing, the very fact that the Christian party so often needs to invoke them is evidence that the religious enterprise, for all its vaunted majority status, is in a deeply defensive mode. When I was young-which, at least as history reckons these things, is after all not all that long a time ago-everyone, Jew and Christian alike, would in fact have been puzzled by the term "Christian America," puzzled in much the same sense as a fish might be puzzled by the idea of "ocean." What other America was there? Christians did not think about it, and Jews imagined no alternative. (Islam, of course, and Buddhism were in those years strictly the Arabian Nights to most Americans: for one thing, oil was cheaper than water, so who really cared about Islam? and the fascination of the young of the 1960s with exotic spirituality was still quite beyond imagining.) There were only two religious possibilities, Christianity and Judaism, and no honest person on either side of this divide was in any doubt about the status of the latter as a minority on sufferance. On the whole benignly treated, to be sure, but in need of tolerance nonetheless. Back in the period I am talking about, the 1930s and 1940s, Jews living in the major population centers of American Jewish life-New York, Philadelphia, Chicago, and so on-might at least in some part of their daily lives have experienced a sense of cultural dominance: in their neighborhoods, on their blocks, most people lived as they did, and spoke as they did, and viewed the world as they did. Thus the shock of recognizing their status as a drop in a bucket might have come to them a bit later than to others of their fellow Jews living more scattered throughout the country. In any case, for the timid and the wounded of the ghettoized big-city Jewish community, the home enclave could always be a safe haven to remain in; and indeed many then did (and to this day some still do) remain there. But for many other Jews, who, like me, grew up in what has come to be called the American heartland-namely, small to medium cities in the Middle West-there was never a safe haven; as children we pretty much sank or swam, socially speaking, among the majority. At least, that is, until some point in middle-to-late adolescence, when thoughts of marriage began to intrude-in those days most people married at a sensible early age before too much consciousness set in-and one way and another Jewish boys and girls, whether by instinct or external pressure, joined together in a kind of separate social entity. (I do not speak here about Jews in the South, who lived perpetually between the hammer and the anvil and who must have been so constricted by the experience that to this day not a single serious Jewish novelist has risen from that literature-soaked land to tell us about it.) For us as children, Christmas and Easter, to take only the gaudiest and most public examples, were not only major events in school, undertaken with full and unself-conscious panoply-and, be it noted, without even a hint of a glance at Hanukkah and Passover-but even more important, they were events in the households of all those among whom we lived day to day, our neighbors and our neighbors' neighbors, as well. Christian observances were part of our street life and part of the civic life of our communities. 238

My own home town, St. Paul, was a predominantly Catholic city, with a sizable minority of Scandinavian Lutherans. Just across the river was our "twin" city, Minneapolis, which back then touted itself among other things as the capital of the Bible Belt and whose radio stations, in earnest of this claim, carried a more than modest number of fundamentalist preachers. (You might have thought that the Bible Belt was actually somewhat to the south of Minnesota, but that didn't bother the Minneapolitans, who staked their claim all the same, just as travelers to my own city across the river were greeted by a sign that read "Welcome to St. Paul, Gateway to the Great Northwest.") I offer these data about the respective religious compositions of the two cities with the consciousness of now; back then distinctions of this kind would have largely escaped me and, I think, most of my fellow twin cities Jews as well. In other words, they, the others, Catholics, Protestants, were truly one big "they"-some more agreeable than others; some truly one's friends, some not-and it was unmistakably their terrain on which we were living. If all this added up to certain kinds of discomfort that would have seemed somewhat peculiar to our Eastern big-city cousins-childhood friendships, for example, that unspokenly and mysteriously evaporated in adolescence-in some respects we were also far more at ease than they. A few years ago someone published a book about Brooklyn in the early years of the century, and in this book is to be found a positively gripping photograph: a group of Jewish boys and girls, say about eight or nine years old, from their dress clearly the children of immigrants, standing in a line that stretches down what looks to be a whole city block. They are waiting, the photo caption tells us, to get into . . . the neighborhood public library. How much venturing away from the warm comforts of home and into the far-off precincts of American, and beyond American, Western, civilization that photograph speaks of-how much fearful striving, how much passion, how much longing to get out and get away, are these children to be letting themselves in for! (For some, of course, there would be reward beyond measure; and for others, there would be only a lifetime of a kind of chronic, low-grade disaffection.) But we out there in our heartland cities, we did not have to venture to find America-we were living totally, if not without a certain self- consciousness, in it. And because we were not driven, so to speak, to find our way to the library, like most of the middle Americans among whom we lived we tended to be a little smug and more than a little provincial. The boosterism once so grossly though alas not altogether unrecognizably caricatured by Sinclair Lewis was no less a besetting sin of St. Paul's Jewish than of its Christian inhabitants. And as for provinciality, that is a quality of being best illustrated for me by the story of my introduction to Mr. Roy Wilkins (for many long years, before its descent into shame, the wise and sturdy leader of the NAACP). We met at a dinner party, and as we sat sipping martinis and seeking, as people do, some way into conversation, we discovered that we had grown up in the same city. He was quite a bit older than I, and when I sought to discover if we nevertheless had any acquaintances in common, I asked him what street he had lived on. He told me the name of the street and of the school he had gone to, and when he did so, I realized that I had never once in all my life set foot on that street or laid eyes on that school-this in a city whose population when I lived there was not much more than 200,000! Meanwhile, as the old song has it, back in the jungle-which was in this case a land called Germanythere were Hitler and his minions, revving up among other things to alter the course of Jewish history forever. In the comfort of our American existence we were aware that Hitler was doing evil things to Jews, first in Germany and next in Central and Eastern Europe; we would not for a few years-in some cases not till the end of the war in Europe-know just exactly how evil, but what we already knew by the late 1930s was bad enough. Now, though our lives were pleasant, we were not, of course, growing up entirely ignorant of the experience of anti-Semitism. The preachments wafted through the airwaves from Minneapolis, for instance, were more than liberally salted with reminders of Jewish malfeasance, some of which I found rather difficult to grasp (and do to this day, I might add). There was Father Coughlin of Detroit, to whom we sometimes listened and whose accusations against us were considerably less

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arcane than those of our fundamentalist radio interlocutors. And then, of course, there were the boys from Nativity school, just a block from our own, who would now and then spice up their boyish tauntings on our common way home with the charge that I had murdered their Lord and other such pleasantries. But public humiliations, beatings and dispossessions, and unspeakable concentration camps-all this certainly had nothing to do with us and seemed more akin to those old stories of Eastern Europe offered in explanation of why our forebears came here to this promising land in the first place. There was, however, one difference between the fate of our parents and grandparents and that of those 1930s and 1940s Jews of Europe: and that is, that the doors of the United States were no longer wide open. Some of the Jews of Germany and Austria got out while the getting was good and one way and another were taken in here. But when the Blitzkrieg moved East, engulfing in its murderous maw not only millions of innocents but a whole rich, thick, various, and teeming Jewish culture- "hurling into silence," as Harold Rosenberg once put it in an essay on Adolf Eichmann, "so many of the subtlest and most humane minds of Europe"-there would be no escape. (But what would we do with a million Jews? was the response of the British foreign office when an intermediary brought an offer from Eichmann to exchange the lives of a million Jews for some trucks and materiel.) So though the war would be over before we knew, or admitted to ourselves, just how bad things had been with our European cousins, we were not for a moment permitted to be unmindful that the world had become a murderous place for a large proportion of its Jews. I realize that I am here touching upon what has become to our friends the most nagging and tiresome of all Jewish points of reference, namely, the Holocaust. But it is impossible to understand what has become of America's Jews, culturally as well as politically, without understanding our experience of those immediately prewar and wartime years-without, to put the case in far too crude but convenient shorthand, understanding the role played by Franklin D. Roosevelt in our communal fantasy life. Though the New Deal was itself certainly of major importance to the political formation of what has come to be known as the organized Jewish community, for many if not most Jews Roosevelt's greatness lay not so much in the fact that he was a liberal in opposition to conservatives as it did in the fact that in the face of Nazi Germany he was an interventionist in firm and successful opposition to the isolationists. The isolationist party, best known by the name of America First, was in fact a jumble of people with a whole variety of agendas: there were those who believed that the United States should have no truck with Europe and its wars, there were socialists who found nothing to choose among the imperialists on both sides, and there were those who believed that Germany's was not necessarily the wrong side to be on, this latter group itself being a kind of odd amalgam of Anglophobes, anti-Semites who said that the war against Hitler was merely a Jewish war, and immigrant German patriots. Except for a tiny handful of, to put it mildly, deracinated radicals, American Jews knew World War II to be overridingly a moral war and they were entirely certain that Roosevelt knew it too. There were of course other sources of the Jews' loyalty to Roosevelt: primarily, I think, that Jews, even those originally from the remotest villages in Eastern Europe, were in their inmost cultural being an urban people, and Roosevelt was the President of the cities: patrician and alien of background though he might be, he somehow managed to create the illusion for the teeming city folk that he spoke their language. But most of all, Roosevelt was to the Jews one of the major heroes of that great and good war. And when the war was over, not only was their fealty to the Democratic party now graven in stone, anything that smacked of the old order or of the forces of America First was simply unthinkable- out of the question-anathema-to them. At war's end, something would begin to happen to the rest of America, too: something that would take more than a decade to manifest itself but that had probably been brewing-as Norman Mailer might say, in the American psychic underground-since the first heady days of victory. And that was the acquisition of a newfound sense of vast power and unending possibility. To be sure, the war 240

against the Axis, followed almost immediately by the Cold War, had introduced a new recognition of evil, with its concomitant sense of human limitedness and imperfectibility, into American political-philosophical discourse. This new understanding was, of course, an inherently religious one, and was most prominently associated with the influence of Reinhold Niebuhr. (It ought to be remembered, however, that Sigmund Freud, too, had a hand in it, through the offices of some of the influential intellectuals who had subjected themselves to his much misunderstood and much distorted discipline.) But in the culture at large, such a view of the human condition could not stand for long against the almost overwhelming tide of wealth and innovation and freedom of movement and the sensation of moving toward . . . sheer limitlessness. In my own life, this new sense of possibility was given its first expression by my leaving home and moving to New York City. I would not have thought of it-and would not to this day quite think of it-as leaving Christian America, but I was certainly getting away from what felt to me to be the prospect of a restricted and over-prescribed life. (In any case, as it would turn out, Christian America was itself coming to manifest signs of leaving home: Minneapolis, for example, quondam self-styled capital of the Bible Belt, was growing far more dedicated to art and theater than to preachments and country music, both of which had just about disappeared from local radio. Indeed, Minneapolis was plighting its troth to metropolitanism, with all the high pretension and low adventure that implied. And the same process would, though somewhat later and with considerably less success, also overtake my own home town, as it would, at least superficially, just about every American city of more than minimal size.) As a Jew in the newly post-Holocaust period, and as someone who had come with adulthood to loathe the Soviet government and its apologists, I too for a time, that much-libeled time known as the fifties, professed to derive my ideas of the world from a deep commitment to the doctrine of human imperfectibility. But though I would never cease to harbor the altogether illiberal belief in the existence of unmitigated evil, something else, which continued as always to lie in wait for American intellectuals, was also lying in wait for me. Before I begin to describe what this something else was, it is important to understand that the postwar transition years-the years, say, from 1945 to 1965-were very good years for American Jews. For after the shock of discovering just how completely the entire civilized world had averted its gaze from what was happening to their fellow Jews in Europe, they would find not only that they were now being welcomed to hitherto restricted precincts but that all the traditional expressions of hostility to Jews had been banished from polite, and even largely from impolite, society. Beyond this, in some considerable degree as a result of the primary system, Jews began to exercise a new degree and new kind of political influence. And above all, Jews were now at ease culturally: not only were they being let in, but what they were being let into was more and more losing any definable character as Christian. Now, what I have referred to before as the something, the force, just waiting to spring on the American Zeitgeist would in the early sixties be given throaty articulation by the courtiers surrounding John F. Kennedy, who, while clearly doing little more than making rhetorical gestures, nevertheless managed to hit the cultural nail squarely on the head. What I am talking about is summed up in the famous question of Robert Kennedy: "Why not?" The question "Why not?" requires as its first premise great wealth and even greater expectationsconditions that for the American educated middle class came to be ever more taken for granted as the postwar years wore on. Beyond that, as we know, this question is and has ever been the introduction to sweet and irresistible seduction. "Why not?" turns out to be the means by which virtuous societies no less than virtuous ladies are led in pleasure down the path of self-destruction. To be sure, many influences beyond sheer wealth led to the sense of being unshackled, prominent among them a number of literary and intellectual ideas and attitudes whose power over the country's culture was being vastly increased by the massive spread of higher education. In addition

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the country was beginning to experience a burst of just plain old political restlessness, the outgrowth of boredom-ever a possibility in the life of any democracy. Be these influences as they may, the sense of open-endedness came upon me and, I would say, a decisive number of my contemporaries with the force of a new revelation: life need no longer be constrained. It was not so much that we actually lived our day-to-day lives according to this revelation; our households and our work proceeded pretty much as they would have had we still been living in the old society in which we had been brought up. We worked hard, for instance, and were for the most part and perforce reasonably prudent. We led fairly steady lives, and if there were certainly much more libertinism and many more divorces among us than there had been, say, in our parents' generation, they tended still to be very costly and painful and for the most part not light- mindedly undertaken. When it came to politics, asking "Why not?" led us to disdain the old- style liberals, who for all their declared intention to make the country a more expansive place were in our view too smug of spirit and too banal of mind to be truly open to the new. Thus many of us declared ourselves to be radicals; but despite a few feeble efforts in the direction of play-acting at social transformation, our radicalism was to be found not in our lives, not even our political lives, but in our heads. And in our heads was precisely the place where the radicalism of "Why not?" could, and did, do the maximum amount of damage, primarily to our own children. For if our 1930s nervous systems did not permit us, as they say, to "act out" the liberation of our minds, our children were to become its perfect foils. One of the things that to this day few people understand about the famous young of the 1960s is that far from rebelling, most of them were in fact being deeply obedient to the demands and expectations of their elders. That these demands and expectations were largely unspoken is little to the point. The sixties generation's inordinate self-regard; their demand to be given, without striving for it, all the goodies their society had to offer, including, of course, easy sex; their recourse to the instant and unearned sense of power and comfort supplied by drugs; their refusal to serve their country; their general ingratitude, expressed most of all in their declared intention to lead lives in no respect like those of their forebears-all these were translations of the hubris that, partly unconsciously but entirely influentially, constituted the basic underpinning of their upbringing. And if "Why not?" proved in the end to be an invitation to sin against one's children-not to speak of an invitation to one's children to do some further considerable sinning against themselves-this question carried in its wake a second, even more lethal, one. That second question was, "So what?"-two words that in combination have the power to wither growing things on the vine. In our own time, for instance, this question is the intellectual shrug that lies behind the institution of multicultural education, the social shrug that lies behind a race-based double standard of conduct, and the moral shrug that lies behind the permission to teach techniques of anal and oral sex to schoolchildren. In any case, these two questions-"Why not?" and "So what?"-would in the end prove to be among the most lasting legacies of our escape from the bounded, and limiting, view of life that had been our natural birthright, Jews and Christians, separately and together. Obviously, neither serious Judaism nor real Christianity can cohere with a sense of life that has banished all need for prayer, humility, and submission- three things that depend precisely on the recognition of human frailty and finitude. "Why not?" in its arrogance and "So what?" in its nihilism were thus to set the stage for a kind of nationwide drama of moral paralysis. Many people who are shocked and repelled by the decadence that has so widely overtaken Western societies are now prepared to join the theorists who have traced our troubles all the way back to the Enlightenment. Theirs is a view of things that can be, and indeed has been, most persuasively argued, but it seems to me at once too convenient and too iniquitously ungrateful for either a Jew or a Christian to entertain. For Jews, certainly, the Enlightenment was the beginning of the hope, if

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not at all times and all places the reality, of liberty-a hope that it would be criminal for people like me to dare to make light of. And I would presume to say that the same is true for Christians: freedom of choice has after all been given to us by God, as have the mighty and humane benefits of science and technology. This is, let us remember, His universe, constituted as He has seen fit to constitute it and offering itself up to our scrutiny and management as He has chosen to offer it. The same goes for the currently far too careless animadversions against humanism on the part of many conservatives. We are after all the heirs of giants who have lived on earth through the ages, many of whose ideas we may reject but whose genius and whose arts, be they of thought and language or of color and representation, both inspire and civilize us. Surely it was not meant for us to cut ourselves off from such an inheritance. So rather than calling on ancient and modern history- illuminating as they may be-to provide us with the source of our present threatening condition, let us just in all simplemindedness agree to recognize that our deepest troubles are of our very own making. They do not stem from enlightenment or from humanism; they are the troubles of our very own, very contemporary, self-generated atheism, the atheism, precisely, of "Why not?" and "So what?" But to return to my story: there is no more efficient way to recover from the ungodly temptations of radicalism than to become conscious of the traps it has set for one's children. For if we, as I indicated before, still had moral and emotional capital to draw on from that other, that earlier, call it Judeo-Christian (a usage I am not crazy about) world, our children had only our reserves of "Why not" and "So what" to depend upon. I don't have to go into all the characteristics of the failure of that particular account; it can most aptly be summed up by the fact that in the late sixties and especially the early seventies there was a marked and sudden increase in the adolescent suicide rate. (That rate, by the way, persists, and may if anything have increased in recent years.) In any case, there were basically two ways to respond to the admission, which became harder with each year to evade, that the young were in deep trouble. The first of these, the liberal way, was to assert that the sorrows of the young arose from the fact that the revolution had not yet been completed. Their demands for freedom and justice were still a long way from being met: there was as yet, for example, no justice for blacks or women or homosexuals; and as for freedom, regardless of how much of it was being wrested from courts and legislatures, no one had yet succeeded in putting an end to the continuing pressure from a group of the so-called "troglodytes," mainly small-town Christians, who, it was said, wished to return the country to the dark ages of censorship and intolerance. Not to mention the persistence of yet a different group of "troglodytes," in this case more sophisticated ones, who with their invention of the Cold War were constantly endangering the country and its young citizens with their longing to engage in jingoistic military exercises. No wonder, said the liberals, "the kids" were restless and unhappy. (I have referred to this reading of the young as liberal rather than radical because by the mid-seventies the former had in fact become entirely interchangeable with the latter.) The second way was the way that came, not without considerable resistance, to surrender to the sobriquet neoconservative. Neoconservatives came with varying degrees of alacrity to see that it was the revolution itself and not the basically just and free country against which this putative revolution was being made that was responsible for the social ill-health of the young-responsible in one sense for the indisposition of the privileged among them and in another, far more permanently damaging, way for the ever more inescapable pathology of young blacks in the inner cities. What we had here, then, was no mere difference of opinion, but rather a deep, and to this day ever deepening, schism. What had once been the liberal community was now split asunder; the metaphor of civil war would not be an entirely exaggerated one. In any case, the neoconservatives believed that justice and freedom as defined by the young and their middle-aged camp followers were at best caricatures and at worst outright perversions of those terms, properly understood. Properly understood: there's the rub. From whence such proper understanding? Lenin once

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declared that he who says a must say b. Despite what happened to be the murderous nature of his own particular a, Lenin was of course right. The neoconser-vatives came to a new recognition of freedom (I do not, of course, mean to suggest that this recognition was in any sense theirs aloneGod forbid-it's just that it happens to be their story I am telling here), and this view of the nature of freedom had, for the reasons I have cited and others, ceased to be the ersatz liberation of "Why not?" It had become rather the freedom meant by the term "free will"-which is to say, the taking of responsibility for what one does and what one is. There you have the essential neoconservative a. And the b? The b-what else can it be?-is God. Beyond that, as the old Jewish saying has it, the rest is commentary. Rationalists find it interesting to debate whether or not God exists. Theologians seek to understand His attributes. But for Jews the real questions are not, or rather ought not to be, does He exist, and if so, who is He, but rather only, what is it that He wants of us? He has, to be sure, answered this question, not only in his Scripture but in the very constitution of our natures: to choose life, to be fruitful and multiply, and to walk in his ways, which means among other things to understand that life makes sense and that human fulfillment resides in resisting the ever-present temptation to return to tohu vavohu-the primordial chaos and void. Such an understanding, of course, goes beyond politics and can never be satisfied by politics, but it does inevitably have a political dimension. It requires one to renounce the arrogant rejection of God's world that many liberals, particularly young ones, call by the name of idealism. What follows from this is one's commitment to a whole host of ideas and proposals which, despite the fact that they represent a major departure from what has been the dominant American ethos for more than half a century, are called conservative. (Alas, so far have things gone that many of the things that conservatives say they are out to conserve will in fact have to be rebuilt from scratch.) The slowly dawning process of realization that brought the neoconservatives from a to b-the discovery or in some cases perhaps rediscovery of God-was for most of us more like a long climb up a steep hill than like a flash of lightening. And among other things it was to bring us into a new and largely unfamiliar community of conservative fellows. It would be hard to say who was more surprised, nonplussed, and possibly to some extent also amused by this new association, the old conservatives or their new neoconservative allies. Now, most of the journalists who have assigned themselves the task of trying to describe or explain-or simply give vent to their hostility toward-this new development called neoconservatism have identified it as being primarily a Jewish phenomenon. This is most certainly not the case; many neoconser-vatives are Christian. Nevertheless, this misapprehension does make a certain perverse sense. For Christians in America, however far and for however long they may have strayed, the journey from liberal culture to conservatism is essentially a journey back home, where, so to speak, there are a multitude of loving arms to enfold them. For the Jews involved in this phenomenon, the case is rather different: conservatism for them represents an estrangement from not one but from two of their former communities, from the Jewish community as well as from that of the liberal intellectuals. Thus they have found themselves in a kind of no-man's-land where they have been engaged in constructing for themselves a cultural home for which there has been neither precedent nor blueprint. In an alliance with Christian conservatives against the atheism that has made a sick and paltry joke of each of their respective and joint traditions and that has begun like a swarm of termites to eat away the underpinnings of this democratic republic, the new Jewish conservatives have come to understand that any alienation they felt as children in Christian America is as nothing compared with the danger they sense to themselves and their progeny, along with their uncomprehending coreligionists, in atheist America. Even less than others, they know, can America's Jews afford to indulge themselves and others in the reckless endangerment represented by the various movements that have swept unresisted through liberal society: prominent among them, the movement for a woman's right not to be a woman; the movement for homosexuals to 244

be considered merely heterosexuals with a somewhat different erotic taste; the movement to dehumanize blacks by exempting them from ordinary moral demands. School prayer? This is what organized Jewry finds threatening? As it happens, I am no devotee of school prayer, on the ground that it is a distraction, a kind of trivializing surrogacy for truly weighty issues this society must find the courage to face and deal with. Nevertheless, there is something unholy in the Jewish argument that the reintroduction of the acknowledgment of God into the schools will in some way be discriminatory of and psychologically harmful to their children when these schools as they are represent so many real dangers to them: the danger of the coarsening of their sensibilities, for one, and of the snuffing out of their normal youthful longing to grow up, as well as the danger of leaving them utterly cynical about their society and their country and the rightful demands on them of both. Prayer, indeed; it is Jewish liberals, more than children, who should be doing the praying. There are other unholinesses as well. One need not spell out each and every aspect of the participation of the organized Jewish community in the liberal culture. It is enough to say that that participation involves a kind of heedless assurance of being in the right that sits particularly ill on people whose very existence depends on a mere stroke of luck-the luck of someone's having immigrated to the United States. Such people ought to be the first rather than the last to be found each day on their knees in gratitude to God. And such people ought to be the first rather than the last to understand the anxieties of the devout Christians-evangelicals, fundamentalists, orthodox Catholics and Protestants-about, precisely, the growing chaos in a country from whose public life religion has not so much disappeared but been banished. Thus have the neoconservative Jews sought-so far, to put it mildly, with mixed success-to convince their mainstream fellow Jews that the growing political strength of Christian believers is not a danger to them, that, on the contrary, in the long run it will conduce far more to the security and well-being of their children and grandchildren. And yet, and yet . . . While the new Jewish conservatives may quarrel with their fellow Jews about conservatism and Christianity, there are occasions, too, when they wish they could make their Christian fellow- conservatives a little slower to temper against Jewish liberal stiffneckedness. It is true that the mainstream American Jewish community has egregiously, and I believe suicidally, conflated liberal atheism-radical feminism, gay rights, promiscuous abortion-with the Jewish interest. And it is true that the mainstream Jewish community, priding itself on its concern for social justice, has on the whole been almost professionally insensitive to the many valid complaints of social injustice on the part of believing Christians, particularly the evangelical fundamentalists. But now and then those of us who wish to turn our fellow Jews from the path of liberal suicide come up against a certain crackpottedness-and sometimes worse-from the right that appears to be reminiscent of that old 1930s Bible Belt, Coughlinite, America First damnation of the Jews. And when that happens, it is not ideas we are left to deal with but nervous systems. The late Lucy Dawidowicz, distinguished historian of the Holocaust, declared that there should be a moratorium on the very use of the word "Holocaust"-that it has become a crutch and an excuse and a cheapener of memory-and what she said is undeniably right and healthy. Moreover, if the twentieth century witnessed a horror beyond all the horrors of Jewish history, it also witnessed a new redemption, the return to our ancient land. Still, we remain testy about our security, in the United States as well as in the ever-threatened Israel-testy in a way that others perhaps do not understand. The "Why not?" and "So what?" of present-day liberalism are thus a special temptation to Jews, who entertain themselves with the idea that they can escape what has for so long been God's seemingly difficult, and for them often particularly cruel, decree. And if anything, these questions are proving more dangerous to Jews than to anyone else, undermining as they do the foundations of the kind of free society on which the twentieth century has taught them that they must depend for their very continuation. As between the old Christian America, which did, it cannot be denied, 245

visit the Jews with certain discomforts, and the new atheist America, which goes straight for the jugular of their children and their children's children, how can America's Jews feel there is even any choice? And yet, of course, they do most unsentiently continue to feel exactly that. Still, there are many Christians, too, who suffer from that age-old Hebraic malady that the Lord once diagnosed as stiffness of the neck and who, I like to think, cause Him a certain worry, as they do me. Let me explain. Last year I sat one evening in late spring on a veranda in Jerusalem, looking across at Mount Zion, from whose wonderfully lighted nightscape loomed the dome of the Dormition church. It was a beautiful evening, balmy, heavy with the scent of jasmine. And as I sat there I thought: Why do not the world's Christians celebrate the return of the Jews to this city? They have tended it so lovingly, burnished its ancient beauty, planted it with flowers and trees, made it so pleasant and been so tender and so mindful of its holiness. For nineteen years the eastern half of Jerusalem, including the much hallowed Old City, languished under the Jordanians, who not only desecrated Jewish holy places and graveyards but left the whole area in a dirty and threadbare condition. Why, then, do the Christians not celebrate the salvation of Jerusalem made possible by the Israeli military victory in 1967? Why do Christian institutions take part in pressuring the Israelis to place themselves once again in mortal danger and throw the history- and faith- laden parts of the city back into wretchedness? The answer is that the evangelicals do indeed celebrate, both the return of the Jews to the holy land and their rescue of old Jerusalem. But others, many, many others, do not-for reasons that, no matter how often they are articulated, simply make no sense to me. In any case, as I sat there that evening, I understood with my senses instead of merely with my head how truly dependent on one another Jews and Christians nowadays really are-in a world in which they are both so dangerously surrounded by barbarians, Christian and Jewish barbarians among them. The little girl from St. Paul has come a long way and so, I keep hoping and believing, have at least some of the boys from Nativity. Midge Decter recently retired as Distinguished Fellow of the Institute on Religion and Public Life. This essay originated as the 1995 Erasmus Lecture, which is sponsored by the institute.

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Are You Experiencing Anti-Christian Bigotry on Campus?

Americas Leading Christian Public Interest Legal Alliance 15333 N. Pima Road, Suite 165 Scottsdale, Arizona 85260 http://www.google.com.br/search?q=cache:I5FeIF6FKsJ:www.alliancedefensefund.org/PDF/campus_ad.pdf+Anti-Christian&hl=ptBR&ie=UTF-8 Deliberate discrimination against Christians is now the official - or unofficial, but actual - policy at an increasing number of publicly funded colleges and universities. Dictates leadership standards, including requiring leadership positions be open to students who dont believe in your groups mission (think of an atheist Bible study leader!). Restricts where or when your group can meet or engage in expressive activities, but places no such limitations on other groups that, for instance, advocate radical feminism or abortion. Enforces a speech code that limits you or your groups right to speak disapprovingly of extramarital sexual, homosexual, or other behaviors. ? Restricts how or where your group can advertise (i.e. speech zones), or censors the ads content but places no such requirements on other student groups ads. ? Mandates diversity training that attempts to force you to affirm behavior or viewpoints that violate your faith or conscience. ? Applies one set of rules for Christian groups seeking access to the student fee funding pool, and other rules for secular student organizations. In the name of diversity and tolerance, schools are systematically violating the rights of students who follow Jesus. Are you or a campus Christian group to which you belong being singled out for unfair treatment? The answer may be yes if your school: Does any of this sound familiar? If so, dont sit back and allow it! Legal remedies may be available. Call the Alliance Defense Fund for free legal help today! As Americas leading Christian public interest legal alliance, with more than 600 trained volunteer attorneys working with more than 20 allied legal groups, the Alliance Defense Fund is actively defending Christian students and student-led Christian groups whose constitutional rights have been violated. We want to help you and stop the anti-Christian bigotry that may exist on your campus. Call toll free 1-800-TELL-ADF now and ask for our Student Legal Office, or E-mail campusspeech@alliancedefensefund.org.

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Europe's Anti-Christian Attitude

http://www.saviorquest.com/news1/antichristian.htm Now I know the anti-Christian attitude of the ungrateful Europeans would not dare connect the answer to these questions to the influence of the prevailing Christian faith of the majority of Americans. But whether they like it or not, that is the basis of why we were willing to spill our blood and consume our resources in the pursuit of righting the aggressions that nearly destroyed and enslaved all of Europe. It was the willingness to sacrifice in order to do the right thing the determination to set people free and stamp out the forces of tyranny. Those actions did not come out of the natural selfishness of human nature, but from the influences of the teachings of Jesus Christ and the Bible. And now the majority of the Europeans we set free are upset by President Bushs frequent references to God and faith the very factors that motivated us to save them. Just look at what was reported by Reuters, The religious overtones in President Bushs speeches increasingly grate on many ears in Europe, where leaders invoking God in times of war are widely suspect of misusing faith for political purposes. No less than the German president, French prime minister and Belgian foreign minister have joined religious leaders in expressing concern about Bush's beliefs and the place of religion in U.S. politics. It is my opinion that one of the reasons God allowed such terrible judgments to fall upon Europe is because of their perversion and rejection of true Christianity. The Theologians of Europe in the 18th century are the ones who began a sophisticated rejection of the Bibles authenticity and authority. They are the source of the so-called Liberal and Neo-Orthodox Theological movement. This God-cursed movement is based upon the rejection of the Bible as the literal and infallible Word of God. It is interesting that German Theologians began this insidious movement. I believe that this is the reason most Germans fell for the Godless teachings of Adolf Hitler and National Socialism. These teachings were based upon many occultic concepts, which a Bible believing Christian would have immediately recognized and rejected. It is these apostate Protestant Religious leaders who are the source of the thinking expressed in this quote from Reuters, Media commentators, especially in northern European countries with Protestant heritages, have branded Bush's evangelical views as Christian fundamentalism, with some even comparing them to the Islamic fundamentalism of Osama bin Laden. Christian Fundamentalism believes that the Bible is the infallible Word of God and should be believed literally, unless the context clearly indicates it is a parable or an allegory. Now if a Christian does that, he believes that we are to proclaim the good news of Gods salvation and forgiveness, purchased by Christs death for our sins. He believes that this is a gift and tries to get people to receive it but not through violence. He believes that in inter-personal relationships, we should treat others, as we would have them treat us; that we should not represent the Gospel with violence. But Christian Fundamentalist also believe Romans 13:1-10. This passage recognizes that there will always be those who are violent and seek to take the life, liberty and property of others. This applies to both person-to-person and nation-to-nation crimes. God tells us that He has established duly formed government to keep peace, security and order. To those who violate the law, the Bible warns, For rulers hold no terror for those who do right, but for those who do wrong. Do you want to be free from fear of the one in authority? Then do what is right and he will commend you. For he is God's servant to do you good. But if you do wrong, be afraid, FOR HE DOES NOT BEAR THE SWORD FOR NOTHING. HE IS GOD'S SERVANT, AN AGENT OF WRATH TO BRING PUNISHMENT ON THE WRONGDOER. Therefore, it is necessary to submit to the authorities, not only because of possible punishment but also because of conscience. (Romans 13:3-5 NIV) Many of the first believers in Jesus Christ in the New Testament were Roman military officers and soldiers. They were never told to quit the military, but simply urged to do their duty honestly and justly. In the passage quoted above, it says that government agents such as policemen and soldiers 248

do not bear the sword for nothing. Now you dont spank people with swords. It is a symbol of deadly force. This is why Christians have often been the best soldiers and policemen. They carry out their duty with faith and justice. King David was one of the greatest warriors to strap on a sword. David writes in the Psalms that it was God who taught his hands how to fight. God called him a man after His own heart. This is because David sought to fight in the will and purpose of God. On the other hand, a Muslim Fundamentalist literally follows the Koran and the example of Mohammad. This teaches him to spread Islam with the sword. They are commanded to kill the infidel because he does not believe the Prophet Mohammad and the Koran. It teaches Muslims to have no tolerance for any other religion. It teaches Holy War or Jihad to spread Islam over other nations. Here are a few quotes from the Koran to illustrate this: Those who disbelieve in our communications [i.e. from the Koran], we shall make them enter fire; so oft as their skins are thoroughly burned, we will change them for other skins, that they may taste the chastisement; surely Allah is Mighty and Wise. (Surah 4:56) So when the sacred months have passed away, then slay the idolaters wherever you find them, and take them captive and besiege them and lie in wait for them in every kind of ambush &ldots; (Surah 9:5) O you who believe! Do not take the Jews and the Christians for friends; they are friends of each other; and whoever amongst you takes them for a friend, then surely he is one of them; surely Allah does not guide these unjust people. (Surah 5:51) The very least we can say is that the more Fundamental a Christian becomes, the more just and loving he will become; but the more Fundamental a Muslim becomes, the more violent and intolerant he will become. This is the reason why Islamic Fundamentalism is almost synonymous with terrorism. Not all Muslims are terrorists, but almost all terrorist today are Muslim. From the foundation of the United States of America, our leaders have invoked the guidance and blessing of God, especially in the wars we have fought. George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Harry Truman, to name a few, all sought Gods protection, guidance and blessings as they sent our soldiers into war. They did this because this country was founded on faith in God and the Lord Jesus Christ by the majority. They also did this because we only went to war when the majority of Americans believed it was a just war. It was our faith in God that motivated us to come to the aid of Europe particularly France and Belgium in World Wars 1 and 2. So President George W. Bush is not acting in aberrant way from our history when he seeks Gods guidance and blessings. No, he is following the very essence of what made this country what it is. We have fought with fury against aggressors, but been merciful to the vanquished. We have not kept any of the lands we liberated. We helped even our enemies to rebuild. This behavior is rooted in our faith in the Bible. If we drift from this faith, we too will be destroyed. So you ungrateful Europeans who criticize public appeals to God for His help just shut up! You may need our help again. BACK Author: Hal Lindsey

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Christians and Children's Services

http://www.childprotectionreform.org/policy/spanking/antichristian.htm Christians believe Man is inherently sinful, God is inherently sinless, and the only way to achieve communion with God is through faith in God's son, Jesus.Christians believe Jesus came about 2,000 years ago to teach Man the way of righteousness, and to die as a sinless sacrifice in exchange for the lives those who know and love him.Christian culture includes a belief in the infallibility of Scripture, in duty to God above duty to self, and in striving (however imperfectly) to follow God's word at all times. As late as the 1950s, a clear majority of Americans were active, practicing Christians.Today, only 10% - 30% of America's population are active Christians. Christian belief in a Higher Authority can bring conflict with those who worship the State, and who believe the State is the ultimate arbiter of right and wrong.Increasingly, Christians are treated as pariahs, idiots, or evildoers.Part of this animosity is reflected in state laws regarding child abuse. Examples from Oregon state law may be found elsewhere on this website. Children's Services denies an anti-Christian bias, but....let's get real: "Not all child abusers are Christian and not all Christians are child abusers. But a surprisingly high number of cases of reported child abuse occur in Christian families." Marie Fortune, Director, Center for Prevention of Sexual and Domestic Violence, Seattle, WA.Quoted in Profane Justice, by Suzanne Shell; p. 6 "My daughters called me, were hysterical, and said, `Mama, they (public school officials) took our Bibles and called them garbage and threw them in the garbage and then threatened to call Child Protective Services,'" Deborah Bedenbender, 37, a Texas homemaker, as reported in Worldnet Daily; Saturday, May 27, 2000. "Teaching your children that homosexuality is wrong is child abuse!" - a multicultural liberal (revealing the Left's version of open-mindedness) in a Corvallis, Oregon supermarket, May 25, 2000. "They're treating you like you're the Branch Dividians and you have David Koresh in your basement"- a Catholic mom whose child was taken over a spanking, talking about caseworker attitudes toward her faith.Listen to the streaming audio file "Visits with my children were reduced to two hours, supervised, once a week, after I invited my pastor to attend a visit and pray with my children. The caseworker has threatened to stop all visits if I read the Bible or pray during my visits." - Lisa in California "I have been a social worker for over ten years. Some people think it preposterous that Christian beliefs are seen as a threat to children, but we were taught in school that one risk factor for incest is parents who have strong Christian beliefs.Christianity was belittled time and again in what I call the "indoctrination process" even as professors said that social workers should be "nonjudgemental". - Karen in New Jersey. God's word, revealed in scripture, plainly tells Christians to physically discipline their children.

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Anti-Christian Mood Seen In Texas Killings

By Andrea Billups THE WASHINGTON TIMES September 17, 1999 http://www.mcsm.org/bias.html A "virile and fertile" anti-Christian sentiment is growing around the country, religious groups said Thursday, a day after a gunman spouting blasphemous rhetoric burst into a youth service at a Fort Worth Baptist church and fatally shot seven persons. "I believe there is a growing climate of hostility that is directed against Christians . . . who find themselves as the targets of a great hostility in this culture," said William Merrell, a spokesman for the Southern Baptist Convention. A "disturbing double standard" is evident in the way attacks on Christians are viewed compared with crimes against other groups, a spokesman for the Family Research Council said. From the Matthew Shepard murder in Wyoming last year to the shootings last month at a Jewish community center in California, the media and many politicians moved swiftly to label those episodes of violence "hate crimes," said Robert Regnier, a cultural studies writer at the FRC. In the Texas church shootings, he said, "I just don't see any of that." Republican presidential candidate Gary Bauer urged the Justice Department "to determine if a pattern of crimes against men and women of faith exists" in such crimes as Wednesday's shootings at Wedgwood Baptist Church in Fort Worth. Citing the 1997 shootings of a high school prayer group in Paducah, Ky., and the April murders of Christian students at Columbine High School in Colorado, Mr. Bauer said Americans are "witnessing a disturbing pattern." Attorney General Janet Reno warned reporters that it was too early to characterize the Fort Worth shooting as a "hate crime," but said law enforcement authorities on the scene would uncover the facts. "We must get answers and must move carefully to make sure that we understand exactly what happened so that we can take the most effective action possible," she said. "We should not jump to conclusions." In recent years, politicians and others have frequently blamed "hatred" for headline-making crimes. After the April 1995 bombing of a federal building in Oklahoma City, President Clinton named G. Gordon Liddy among the conservative talk-show hosts he called "purveyors of hatred and division," saying they were "encouraging violence." Concerned over arson attacks on black churches in 1996, civil rights leader Joseph Lowery accused the Christian Coalition of fostering an "extremist climate." Gay-rights advocate Joan M. Garry suggested last fall's murder of Mr. Shepard, a homosexual university student, was the result of a conservative anti-homosexuality campaign she said "fuels the fires of bigotry." Anti-Christian bias as a crime motive is routinely ignored by the news media, said Brent Baker, vice president of research and publications for the Media Research Council. "The media were very quick in August to draw the conclusion that the shooter at the Los Angeles Jewish community center was motivated by anti-Semitism," Mr. Baker said, but with Wednesday's shootings at the Texas church, reporters are "being much more hesitant to assign a motive." When 14-year-old Michael Carneal killed three students praying at a Paducah high school, religious

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bias "was never a theme raised on TV networks, that this guy was anti-Christian," Mr. Baker said. Instead, reporters focused on Carneal's parents and the influence of violent entertainment, he said, although "it became quite clear later on that [anti-religious sentiment] was the motivation." "When it is a particular minority group that's attacked, the media assume that's the reason for the attack," Mr. Baker said. "When it happens to Christians, the media don't assume that at all." Mr. Merrell of the Southern Baptist Convention agreed that crimes committed against Christians often are treated differently. "It does not pass our notice that there are many who appeal to the populace for hate crimes legislation when certain groups are targeted, but remain curiously silent when other groups are," he said, adding that the "virile and fertile culture" of hostility to Christians is "growing rapidly." The Rev. C. Welton Gaddy, executive director of the Interfaith Alliance Foundation, said he doubts there is a climate of violence directed at religious groups, but fears some people will use episodes like Wednesday's shootings "to try to politicize yet another tragedy." "I don't think we're seeing a concerted effort of attack on people of faith," said Mr. Gaddy, who used to live near the Fort Worth church where the shootings occurred. He blamed "a high level of anger, frustration and mental illness among people in our society who have a ready accessibility to weapons" for the killings. Others, however, have compared increased suspicion toward Christians to the Roman Empire's persecution of the early church. Harold O.J. Brown of the Howard Center for the Family, Religion and Society wrote in March that he saw a "similarity between the way the Roman authorities charged Christians of that era with "odium humani generis" [hatred of the human race] and the way the political and media establishment charge the Christians with creating a "climate of hate." David Overstreet, national director of field ministries for the National Network of Youth Ministries, said Christians have endured persecution throughout the ages. As evidenced by the targeting of Christians in the Columbine and Paducah shootings, however, "there is a heightened potential for prejudice on school campuses," he said. Mr. Overstreet blamed a collapse of moral standards for producing what he called "a growing culture of violence." Teacher Sued for Possession ... Of The Bible! http://www.reclaimamerica.org/PAGES/fastfacts/antixnbigotry.html Fifth grade public school teacher Kenneth Roberts of Berkley Gardens Elementary School in Denver, Colorado, was sued by his principal, Kathleen Madigan, the ACLU and the AntiDefamation League. Why? He kept a Bible on his desk, and read it during his students' silent reading time. They wanted him to remove it from the classroom even though he never read it to his students, or told them they had to read it. - ACLU, The Devil's Advocate, by F. Lagard Smith "(Christians) are largely poor, uneducated, and easy to command." - Michael Weisskopf, Washington Post, February 1, 1993. "Christians are 'bozos,' and Christianity is a religion for losers." - Ted Turner, 1991. "The Christian Coalition was a strong force in [Nazi] Germany. It laid down a subtle scientific, theological rationale for the tragedy in Germany. The Christian Coalition was very much in evidence there." - Reverend Jesse Jackson, Washington Times, Dec. 18, 1994.

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"Are any of the school board members in your school district known or suspected to be proponents of the radical right?" - Ohio Education Questionnaire, Dec. 1994. "It is politically correct to hate Christians." - Picket Fences (CBS TV drama), 9/23/1994. Anti-Christian bigotry could soon become law! In 1998, the California State Legislature introduced two bills which, had they become law, would have had severe consequences for Christians. AB257, which actually passed both State Assembly and Senate (only to be vetoed by outgoing Governor Pete Wilson) would have allowed individuals to sue, at tax-payer expense, any Christian schools or radio stations that refer to homosexuality as abnormal or inferior. Any organization found guilty would be subject to a fine of up to $50,000. Also considered was AB310, which would have brought churches under state regulation, and possibly forced them to hire homosexuals. The new California Governor, Gray Davis, could sign these bills into law! "Bring Back The Lions!" Silencing the Opposition! Recently, Ron Greer, the pastor of Trinity Evangelical Fellowship, was met by protestors outside of his Madison, Wisconsin, church. According to World Magazine, "...they (the members of his church) were outnumbered more than 10-1, both inside the church and outside. Jeers and shouts overpowered anyone who tried to speak from the pulpit. From outside, a new chant came, 'Bring back the lions! Bring back the lions!'" - WORLD, 3/22/98 What Are They Afraid Of? "...I can periodically understand the frustration and general fatigue that compelled the Romans to throw select Christians to the lions. It's not just that the lions were hungry; it was that the Romans were tired of listening to the self-righteous babbling of the Christians who claimed to be experts on everything, and had egos the size if ... well ... God." - Reggie Rivers, Rocky Mtn. Times 8/4/1994, p A-6. Public Schools Are No Place For God! Joshua Burton, a ten year-old fourth grader at Columbia Elementary School in Orange County, Florida, was forced to stand in a corner, and was later scolded by his principal for violating the "separation of church and state," because he brought a Bible to school. - The Liberator, April 1995, and The Gates of Hell Shall Not Prevail, p.111. In June of 1998, public school teacher Mildred Rosario prayed with her class over the death of one of her students. Later that week she was fired. In December 1998, fifth grade instructor Simpson Gray was fired from the same Bronx school district where Rosario had taught. His crime? He brought a Bible to school, and he made Christian resources available to his students upon their request. - New York Post, 12/12/98. It is unconstitutional for students to see the Ten Commandments posted at a public school because their effect would be to "induce the schoolchildren to read, meditate upon, perhaps to venerate and obey, the Commandments." - (Stone vs. Graham, 1980) Original Intent, by David Barton. RESOURCES Hollywood vs. America, by Michael Medved. The Gates of Hell Shall Not Prevail, by D. James Kennedy and Jerry Newcombe. Original Intent, by David Barton. ORGANIZATIONS

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Alliance Defense Fund P.O. Box 54370 Phoenix, AZ 85078-4370 Phone: (602)953-1200 or (800) TELL-ADF American Center For Law and Justice P.O. Box 64429 Virginia Beach, VA 23467 Phone: (757) 226-2489 Why is it done? "What's the Christian-bashing all about? Simple. A struggle for the soul of America is under way, a struggle to determine whose views will serve as the basis of law." - Pat Buchanan, Washington Times, 6/15/1994. Who can help bring change? "The networks make a mockery of Christians, the Christian faith and Christian values with nearly every show they air. Greed, materialism, violence, sexual immorality are standard fair. Program after program, movie after movie contains anti-Christian episodes and plots. News articles condescendingly refer to the 'fundamentalists, right-wing Christians.' Those who speak out for the sacredness of life are branded as extremists. And 300,000 pulpits are silent." - Dr. D. James Kennedy in his sermon, "Will the Church Forget

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Federal Judges Are Anti-Christian

By Dorothy Anne Seese: 02.14.02 http://www.sierratimes.com/02/02/14/dorothy.htm When will federal judges learn what the Constitution says and apply it correctly? For the past thirty-eight years, the federal judiciary and politically-correct state judges have consistently ruled that Bibles in schools, or teaching Bible classes is "unconstitutional" in a perverted, twisted and irrational interpretation of the First Amendment, which has nothing to say about the so-called "separation of church and state." That phrase is not in the Constitution. Where it was used by the founders, it specifically applied to what the Constitution forbids and that is the creation of a state religion like the Church of England. In spite of the open and unchallenged teaching of Islam and the Koran in at least one public school in Brentwood, California, and the protests of Christian parents, the federal judiciary apparently doesn't see fit to intervene in Muslim affairs. Isn't Islam a religion? Ask the Muslims if it is. But it's a different story in Rhea County, Tennessee, in the town of Dayton which is about 40 miles north of Chattanooga. United States Judge Allan Edgar ordered the three elementary schools to discontinue their 51-year old practice of holding 30-minute Bible classes daily for children from kindergarten through 5th grade on the grounds that "the government may not teach, or allow the teaching of a distinct religious viewpoint." Judge Edgar wrote in his order that such Bible classes "violate the First Amendment's clause calling for separation of church and state." Sorry, Judge, the First Amendment does not say that. I know it and I'm not a lawyer or a judge, and you know it too. The suit was filed by one couple with two children, and an additional plaintiff was the Freedom >From Religion Foundation. Is there a chapter of the Freedom From Religion Foundation in Los Angeles? If so, why aren't they suing on behalf of Christian parents objecting to their children being taught Islam, particularly in light of the high-profile case of the "American Taliban" John Walker Lindh? For those of you who have forgotten the First Amendment, I keep it handy in my computer files for occasions such as this, which are growing more numerous: "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances." Judge Edgar, you and the federal judiciary, including the Supreme Court, are doing exactly the opposite of what the Constitution directs. You are prohibiting the free exercise of religion, and the Christian faith in particular. This is anti-Christian discrimination being conducted by the government in contravention of the plain language of the Constitution, and it began with the Supreme Court decision in June of 1963 that tossed the Ten Commandments out of schools, based on a laborious misconstruction and tortured interpretation of the plain language of the Constitution which has never been amended as to freedom of (not from) religion. You and other members of the judiciary, Judge Edgar, are doing what Congress is specifically forbidden from doing. May I remind you that the Senate has a Chaplain? A Christian Chaplain? How do you suppose that came to be, if there can be no religious activity in government? How about our president's prayer breakfasts? Are those unconstitutional? No one need consult the Senate Chaplain, and one may decline the president's prayer breakfast. Likewise, any children whose parents in Dayton, Tennessee, objected to the teaching were not compelled to attend those Bible classes, they were optional, not mandatory. Judge Edgar, you have supported the anti-Christian religious platform of the New World Order. You and your fellow members of the judiciary are hypocritical and discriminatory in singling out

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the Christian faith for persecution in America, while ignoring the much-protested teaching of Islam in our public schools. You have also furthered the cause of abrogating the Tenth Amendment rights of states. It is impossible even to teach the correct history of America, the Pilgrims, Puritans, the Mayflower, Plymouth Colony, and the early days of Colonial and Independent America without teaching their beliefs in the Christian faith. The revisionists are certainly going to have to construct a whole new platform of historical mythology to eradicate Christianity from this nation's history. A note to the Christians who are being discriminated against by the very government that is supposed to defend everyone's freedom of religion: Acts 5:29 should be put into practice. It isn't clear whether the Christians are really ready to take a stand for the Lord whom they profess, or whether they clearly comprehend what forces are mounted against them in this nation. "Novus ordo seculorum" isn't just a Latin phrase on the back side of the one dollar bill, it is a program of taking down the Christian faith in America in preparation for its assimilation into the one-world religion, as well as abrogating the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. Every small victory in a small town is also a precedent for another victory against the Church everywhere in the United States. Court decisions such as this, in flagrant violation of our Constitution, are very irritating to those of us who are strict constructionists. They are a judicial harassment of one particular faith in favor of other faiths that enjoy the First Amendment rights as written even when the adherents of that faith are illegal aliens from Arabic or other Islamic nations. It's not only time for the Supreme Court to review the tortured logic of Roe v. Wade but also the 1963 case brought by the late Madalyn Murray O'Hair and her son. We need our constitutional freedoms and protections restored, not further abrogated. The only purpose being served is to weaken the underpinnings of our nation and the faith of our fathers. Christians have a right to be offended as much as anyone else (who believes in anything else) at the loss of their constitutional rights. When we no longer have a meaningful Constitution and Bill of Rights, we are no longer a sovereign nation! National Public Radio is a Source of Anti-Christian Bigotry NPR Calls for "Evaporation of Four Million Christians" http://www.christiancommunitychurch.us/dovenet/cultanti.htm In a commentary on Nation Public Radio's "All Things Considered" aired December 19, 1995, Andrei Codrescu said: "The evaporation of four million (people) who believe in this (Christian) crap would leave this world a better place." Mocking a call for an apology, Codrescu later said he apologizes "for the language but not for what I said." NPR also refused a request of Christian Coalition executive director Ralph Reed for two minutes of air time on "All Things Considered" to offer an opposing view. Codrescu's commentary was three minutes long. In a letter to Delano Lewis, president of NPR, AFA president Donald F. Wildmon asked that NPR immediately fire Codrescu, who works under a contract with NPR. "Christians are forced to pay nearly $300 million a year to help promote this anti-Christian bigotry," Wildman said. "Had Mr. Codrescu referred to Jews, blacks, women or even homosexuals in a similar vein, he would no longer be employed by NPR. It is time for Congress to stop funding this anti-Christian bigotry." He said that all tax support for public broadcasting should be ended and that public broadcasting stations should have to raise their own funds as over 1000 Christian stations do. In a December 14 interview on "All Things Considered" musician David Massengill talked about his new album, "The Return." Massengill has a song on the album about Jesus in an insane asylum. 256

He escapes and is chased by a sheriff who is about to shoot Jesus, but Santa Claus comes in and saves Jesus. In another incident, NPR's Nita Totenberg commented on Senator Jesse Helms' belief that government spends too much on AIDS research. She said: "I think he ought to be worried about what's going on in the Good Lord's mind, because if there is retributive justice, he'll get AIDS from a transfusion, or one of his grandchildren will get it." -- AFA, Feb, 1996

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Responding to Louis Farrakhan's anti-Christian propaganda

By Don Richardson, author of "Peace Child" http://members.ozemail.com.au/~dbates/islam2.htm About four years ago CNN's Larry King interviewed Louis Farrakhan, head of The Nation of Islam, on Larry King Live. King asked Farrakhan why he advises Christian Afro-Americans to turn from Christianity to Islam. Larry King had not done his homework. He was unprepared to ask Farrakhan questions which could have made the interview far more lively, not to mention embarrassing for Farrakhan. Around that time, my son Paul took a course in African history at Cal State Fullerton -- a course taught by a Muslim Professor from Kenya. The Professor leveled the same charge: Christianity consistently abetted the enslavement of black Africans; Islam traditionally opposed the heinous practice. Paul later told me, "As the only Christian in the class, I was embarrassed. I didn't know what to say. Was he right?" Meanwhile more and more Muslim teachers worldwide are spreading a triumphal claim that a majority of black people in America have already converted to Islam. Descendants of the very people Christians took to America as slaves, they assert, have by Allah's mercy become the means whereby America is as last being drawn to Islam. The King of Saudi Arabia recently invited Louis Farrakhan to a palace in the heartland of Islam and gave him a sizable financial reward for his success in converting Afro-Americans to Islam. Flashbulbs popped as Muslim news media prepared to announce Farrakhan's success across the Islamic world. Indeed, some black pastors in America have grieved to see an occasional young black man leave the church to join Farrakhan. The Nation of Islam continues, meanwhile, to match what Christians have often done by serving black communities across America with inner city development projects. Because of the amounts of Muslim oil money funneled to Farrakhan, the Nation of Islam can often exceed the scale of Christian humanitarian aid. The Nation of Islam also ingratiates itself to black communities by its zealous rehabilitation of black men incarcerated in prisons and by gestures such as paying the legal expenses of the black men who were accused of beating Reginald Denny in the recent Los Angeles riots. Millions of black people in America have long regarded Abraham Lincoln, a Christian, as a virtual "saint" -- a deliverer of the black race. Louis Farrakhan is not pleased to hear a Christian thus commended. In his address carried nationwide by CNN on the occasion of the Million Man March in Washington D.C., Farrakhan sneeringly referred to Abraham Lincoln as "our supposed deliverer". How should Christians, especially black pastors, respond? They may begin by reading the Apostle Paul's first letter to his protege, Timothy, chapter one, verses 9-11. This message proves, contrary to popular hearsay, that the New Testament does condemn slave-trading as sinful. They could then read the Encyclopedia Britannica's piece on the history of slavery. There we learn that slave in English derives from the word Slav. The Romans, in a time when slavery was practiced worldwide, brought captives from Slavic Europe and sold them as slaves in the Roman Empire. Procedures for caravanning safely over the formidable Sahara to bring slaves from distant, unmapped black Africa were still unperfected. After Islam spread across North Africa in the 600's, Muslim entrepreneurs in the 700's charted routes from oasis to oasis and proved that if large numbers of slaves were brought from below the

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Sahara, enough would survive to assure a profit. Slaver caravans from Muslim regions now known as Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Libya and Egypt struck out on dire southward journeys. For practical reasons Muslim slavers themselves did not raid for slaves among the northernmost black tribes such as the Hausa and the Fulani. Instead they coerced the Hausa, Fulani and others to be the ones who actually dirtied their hands as slave raiders. Muslims needed only to supply the most northerly black tribes with the chains, manacles and swords they needed to efficiently kidnap people from tribes living further south. Muslim slave traders paid the northernmost black tribes a wholesale price for those seized. Slaves surviving the long march to North African cities were sold there at retail prices. Other Muslim slavers from Arabia and Egypt sailed down the East African coast and formed a slave-gathering base on an island called Zanzibar. Equipping mainland black tribes adjacent to Zanzibar as slave raiders, they too saw their profits grow. Muslim slavers soon brought teachers of the Koran to convert, not just any subSaharan black tribe, but only those that agreed to kidnap and sell their neighbors to the south. Islam thus established itself along the 4,000 mile southern edge of the Sahara from Senegal to Somalia, and among coastal tribes near Zanzibar. Question! Why did Islam not spread much, much further across subSaharan Africa? Alas, this is where the Encylcopedia Britannica's otherwise excellent history of slavery falters. It fails even to ask, let alone answer, such an intriguing question. Understandably, Islamic missionaries brought to subSaharan Africa by Muslim slavers could not convert more southerly Africans tribes. People harried by Muslim-induced slave raids were far from eager to convert to the religion of the raiders. Muslims who ventured to victimized tribes, even for peaceful purposes, would meet vengeance. Further, Islamic law forbids Muslims to enslave Muslims, hence converting tribes which were the source of slaves would interfere with slave-trading profits. Christians in Europe thus unwittingly granted Islam a 1000 year headstart in altering the destiny of subSaharan Africans. Yet Muslim missionaries, by siding with Muslim slavers instead of opposing them, forfeited the enviable advantage that 1000 year headstart afforded. Had they opposed slavery instead of condoning it, Muslim missionaries could have spread Islam all the way from the Sahara to Africa's southern tip. Teaching the Koran, building Mosques and founding Islamic schools with not a hint of contest from Christians, they could have Islamicized an entire continent. Christian missionaries, arriving belatedly in the early 1800's, would have had to struggle to win even a tiny beachhead anywhere in black Africa. Planting churches in Zimbabwe and Zululand would have been as difficult as planting churches in Algeria and Libya. Muslims in those days little dreamed that a later century would bring scores of woefully late but zealous Christian missionaries from Europe and America to the very tribes Muslim missionaries had consigned as prey for Muslim slavers. Had such a premonition crossed Muslim minds, Islam might have ended its complicity with the slave industry. All of black Africa as far as Cape Good Hope would then have been Islamicized with relative ease centuries before the first Christian incursion. Instead, though they arrived ruefully late in black African history, a relative handful of Christian missionaries have caused 250 million black Africans in subSaharan Africa to be categorized today as Christian! Yes, Christian missionaries opposed slavery everywhere they encountered it. In Uganda, David Livingstone often found himself looking into the muskets of Muslim slavers who were incensed at a Christian who urged them to end something they had been doing with impunity for a millennium. But on the coast of Nigeria, missionary Mary Slessor found herself opposing her fellow-Europeans who were slavers. The Encyclopedia Britannica names Roman Catholics from Spain and Portugal as the first Christians to begin taking slaves from black Africa, beginning in the 1600's. Ill-advisedly 259

following the by then 900-year-old example of Muslims across all of North Africa and Arabia, they sailed around the great bulge of West Africa, taking slaves from areas closer to the coast. Later other European nations and eventually the southern American colonies joined the evil practice. The northern colonies and Canada, my own home country, refused to legalize slavery and even gave sanctuary to slaves fleeing from the southern colonies. An important question must be asked: Which group among the actual slave-owning societies first began to manifest twinges of conscience over the horrors of slavery -- Christian slave-owning societies or Muslim slave-owning societies? Slavery was not declared illegal in Saudi Arabia, the main guardian of Islamic purity, until 1965. Nor was slavery declared illegal in Muslim Sudan until 1991. Six years ago, a TIME cover story entitled "Slavery in the Twentieth Century" documented slavery as a nominally illegal but still common practice across Muslim areas of Saharan Africa. READER'S DIGEST, in its March 1996 issue, published an article entitled "Slavery's Shameful Return to Africa". It focuses on Muslim enslavement of several thousand black Christians abducted from the southern Sudan. Africa Rights, based at 11 Marshalsea Road, London SE1 1EP England, recently published a book entitled "Facing Genocide: the Nuba of Sudan". Slavery is one of the weapons of that genocide. Most recently, THE ECONOMIST (9/21/1996) published a piece entitled "The Flourishing Business of Slavery". I quote: ...The American embassy [in Sudan] acknowledges as "credible" reports that [Christian] Dinka and Nuba children from southern Sudan are being sold on into Libya .... London based Christian Solidarity International ... has ransomed 20 Sudanese slaves. The going rate for a woman is 5 cows. The Sudanese government flatly denies that slavery exists there. It is lying. Evidence from human rights organizations, exiles, traders and former slaves is overwhelming. Louis Farrakhan...occasional guest of the Libyan and Sudanese governments, has rebuffed assertions of slavery in Sudan as Zionist claptrap. Last March, he challenged journalists to go to Sudan and find it. Two reporters from the BALTIMORE SUN did just that, and published their findings in June, sparking a lively debate among black Americans about how they -- and black Muslims in particular -- should respond to the plight of enslaved black Africans. Why do Muslim nations "renounce" slavery nominally and then deny its existence when it persists? Quite obviously they are disinterested in the moral issue. Two persuasions have proved effective: 1. Muslim governments sensitive to international peer pressure from predominantly Christian nations in Europe and the Americas had to "end" slavery, at least on paper, or be viewed as barbarian. 2. Muslim nations indifferent to world opinion may have a reason given in an item boxed with the ECONOMIST article quoted above: "To appease western aid donors"! Successive Christian revivals in northern Europe, coupled with a series of Christian renewals in America, finally inspired many Christians to apply an already acknowledged but undertaught Biblical idea to the problem of slavery. That was the belief that God created all men in his own image, and thus has endowed them with 'certain inalienable rights' which must be respected as surely as God must be obeyed. William Wilberforce, James Chamberlain and Abraham Lincoln were three among many aroused Christians who strove tenaciously until slavery was abolished in Great Britain, all British colonies and the southern United States. Their cause was aided by several hundred Christian missionaries. Arriving among that large majority of black Africans who by design had been left as non Muslims, Christian missionaries not only opposed slavery in Africa itself but also influenced public opinion across Europe and America with letters graphically describing the brutality of both Muslim and Christian slave-gathering. The hymn Amazing Grace was penned by one slave trader who renounced his former ways as criminal even if "legal". His recounting of slaver cruelty also helped 260

arouse public opinion in Christian countries. In the United States, southern insistence on condoning slavery and northern determination to abolish it triggered a bloody civil war that killed 600,000 white men and wounded 2 million others. This century's 10-year war in South Vietnam took 56,000 American lives, yet 53,000 Americans died in just one 3-day battle of the Civil War -- the battle at Gettysburg. Some may object that the northern colonies should have insisted on the abolition of slavery at the time of the union in 1776. Had they done so, the southern states would have refused to join the union. They would have formed a separate nation, in which case there would have been no federal government with a legal right to take southern states to task later. Let us dare to ask a question the Encyclopedia Britannica tactfully avoids: In which Muslim nation has there been even a minor civil disturbance of conscience over slavery, let alone a civil war? Not one. Surely some Muslims wealthy enough to own slaves have declined on principle to buy them. Yet there seems to be no record of any entire community or sect within Islam that has -- prior to this century -- opposed slavery and actively worked for its abolition. Yet Farrakhan gives the northern states no credit for their costly stand. He tars all Christians as abettors of slavery, while conspiratorially hiding Islam's 900-year headstart in the enslavement of black Africans. He ignores North African and Arabian Muslim responsibility for seducing not all, but some Christian nations, into following their vile example. There is one more point: Nearly 30 mission descendants of slaves brought to America live in America today. Yet vastly greater numbers of blacks were taken as slaves to Muslim North Africa and the Middle East over a much longer time. Why do we not find perhaps 100 to 300 million of their descendants living in North Africa and the Middle East today? Some Blacks across subSaharan Africa remember the reason. It is a reason the Encyclopedia Britannica overlooks: Muslim slavers commonly castrated black males lest they pose a sexual threat to Muslim women in North Africa and Arabia. Those who are descended from black slaves, like Mauritania's 1 million Haratin, tend to be descended from black female slaves sexually exploited by Arab masters, not from male and female black slaves. Muslim slave owners saw no need to breed slaves. Supplies were plentiful. Prices were reasonable. So they inhumanely denied their male slaves not only wages and freedom, but even worse, the rights of marriage, sex and parenting. While TIME, READER'SDIGEST and the ECONOMIST have exposed at least the most recent links between Islamic governments and the practice of slavery, another widely read periodical largely fails to balance its historical reports on slavery. Every few years, NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC publishes another major article on the Euro-American slave trade. Are NG editors unaware that for every slave taken from black Africa by Christians, at least twenty were abducted by Muslims? Yet the Islamic slave trade hides unnoticed. Now, ironically, Muslim teachers across West Africa combine NATIONALGEOGRAPHIC articles on Christian involvement in slavery with Islamic antiChristian diatribes. They use Farrakhan's "spin" to turn Africans against Christianity in the very nations where Muslims began to enslave black Africans nine centuries before Christians became involved, and where Christian missionaries helped to turn the tide against slavery in general. Bear in mind that several generations have passed since the British and other European colonial powers banished both European and Muslim slave-trading from subSaharan nations such as Nigeria, Ghana and Cameroon. Non-Muslim people in such areas remained illiterate prior to European colonial intervention, so they had no written record of their own precolonial history -until Muslim scholars gave them a record with Islamic villainy erased and Christians alone featured as slavers. Lessons repeated in school soon seem more real than memories of a long-dead great granddad's tales of a curse that for ages came by a caravan from the north, and only more recently 261

by ships from the west. In the interest of fairness, the Encyclopedia Britannica invited a few Muslim scholars to contribute to its history of slavery. Unable to present facts to improve Islam's bad image in that history, they nevertheless got in one parting shot in the closing paragraph. Acknowledging that Muslims owned slaves, they added a claim that Muslim slave owners rarely forced their slaves to do hard physical labor out-of-doors. Christian slave-owners on plantations in the southern states, on the other hand, forced their slaves to "tote that barge and lift that bale" in any kind of weather. Lack of massive irrigation projects rendered North Africa and Arabia incapable of supporting large cotton plantations in previous centuries. Groves of date palms near oases were probably the largest agricultural enterprises in the region. If vast fields of cotton could have been planted across North Africa and the Middle East, who believes sympathy would have kept Muslim slave owners from sending their chattels outdoors to do the harder kind of labor? My son Paul, armed with the above insights, returned to Cal State Fullerton the next week. He spoke up in the next African history class taught by the Muslim professor. Politely, he corrected the one-sided view of the history of slavery the professor had given. Cornered and awed, the professor admitted Muslims' prior and much longer involvement in the enslavement of the black race. Then he repeated the same closing comment that the Muslim contributors had added in the Britannica's closing paragraph: Muslims did not force their slaves to perform hard outdoor labor. Instead they assigned only menial household tasks to them. Paul was ready with an answer on that issue as well. In summary, Christianity's record re black African human rights, in spite of horrifying chapters, still far outshines Islam's record re the same. Let Africans, Afro-Americans and Christians everywhere give answer to Mr. Farrakhan's propaganda. Islam has no hymn like "Amazing Grace", but we do. Let us sing it reverently, as a deep-felt testimony from our hearts. Let us rejoice because that amazing grace enabled many who follow Jesus to alleviate the suffering of millions who perhaps would still be slaves today, had not that grace moved within our ranks. Don Richardson

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Organized humanism produces a growing Anti-Christian society

Robert L. Waggoner1[1] http://www.biblicaltheism.com/organhuman.htm For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in heavenly places. Therefore take up the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand. (Ephesians 6:12-13, N-KJV). Introduction Many Christians realize were in the midst of a philosophical and cultural anti-Christian revolution. However, most Christians do not understand how to fight against the forces producing this revolution primarily because most do not understand their philosophical enemy. When the philosophical enemy is identified and understood, then the means of resistance can be more readily determined. The primary philosophical enemy confronting Christians today is humanism. Humanism has had growing influence since the Renaissance, although most of that time it was not an organized movement. However, during the last century, humanists have organized themselves. Through their organizations, humanists have been able to produce a thoroughly anti-Christian cultural revolution. Because of their organized efforts, the influence of humanism is now regarded by many as greater in the western world than that of any other religious group or of any combination of other religious groups. [2] Since humanism has become so extremely influential through its many and varied organizations, Christians should become much better informed, not only about humanism, but also about its many organizations. What follows is an attempt to chronicle some of the major historical developments in the founding of humanistic organizations in this country. Early Organizational Efforts One of the first efforts toward organizing humanism in America was made by Dr. Felix Adler, a former rabbi. He is responsible for organizing the Society for Ethical Culture in New York City in 1876. This was the first of some thirty autonomous societies for ethical culture to be organized. These were eventually unified by the American Ethical Union (established by Dr. Adler in 1889) and the International Humanist and Ethical Union (established in 1952). Dr. Adler also founded the Ethical Movement in 1893 and it was organized internationally. The Philosophy Club of Faculty was founded by Dr. Adler in 1904 at both Columbia University and Union Theological Seminary. At later dates, John Hopkins, Princeton, and Yale also had a Club of Faculty organized on their campuses. In addition, other organizations were established either by Dr. Adler, by persons of similar values, or were eventually spawned by organizations which Dr. Adler had founded earlier. Among these were Free Kindergartens, Neighborhood Guild, the Good Government Club (now known as the City Club), Settlement Houses, Child Study Associations of America, Legal Aid Society, National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, American Civil Liberties Union, and Planned Parenthood centers. [3] Among other organizations whose leaders have strong ties with these humanist organizations are the National Committee for a SANE Nuclear Policy (SANE), the Fabian Socialist Movement, World Federalists, USA (formerly the United World Federalists), Americans for Democratic Action (ADA) and various agencies of the United Nations.[4] Major Organizational Growth In the 1920s and 1930s In 1920, the American Civil Liberties Union was established by Roger Baldwin in New York City.

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It had previously existed as American Union Against Militarism, and as National Civil Liberties Bureau. The ACLU is actually a carefully decentralized grassroots network of fifty-one separately incorporated affiliates, over four hundred local chapters, and approximately five thousand volunteer lawyers from coast to coast. [5] It is the worlds oldest, largest, and most influential association of lawyers, political activists, and social reformers. [6] While the ACLU does not promote itself as a humanistic organization, its values are generally consistent with those of humanism. It has had great success in transforming Americas legal system by removing Christian values as the foundations for law and replacing them with humanistic ones. In 1929, Charles F. Potter, having preached formerly for a Baptist church and then for the Unitarians, founded the First Humanist Society of New York, as a religious society. In 1930, he wrote a book entitled, Humanism: A New Religion, [7] in which he declared in the first sentence of the preface that the purpose of this book is to set forth . . . the main points of the new religion called humanism. The early harbingers of humanism were followed in 1933 by the publication of the first Humanist Manifesto. It was signed by thirty-four influential national leaders the first and the most notable of which was John Dewey. This document rejected traditional Christian beliefs in favor of naturalism, materialism, rationalism and socialism. It also declared that the purpose of humanism is to evaluate, transform, control, and direct all institutions and organizations by its own value system. In short, this was a declaration that humanists intended to produce a cultural revolution by removing Christianity from its foundational underpinning of American society and by substituting humanistic religious beliefs in its place. Later major documents that would further specify humanistic ideologies and goals include Humanist Manifesto II (1973), A Secular Humanist Declaration (1980), and A Declaration of Interdependence: A New Global Ethics (1988). Other Major Organizational Advances The Humanist and Free Inquiry Magazines Major advancements in humanistic efforts were achieved in 1941 with the coming of The Humanist magazine, the founding of the American Humanist Association and the establishment of Planned Parenthood Federation of America. The Humanist magazine claims (on its frontispiece) to present a non-theistic, secular, and naturalistic approach to philosophy, science, and broad areas of personal and social concern. It focuses on humanistic ideas, developments and revolutions. This publication actively promotes a cultural revolution. Humanistic revolutions are underway in religion, education, health care, family structure, civil liberties, housing, institutional care, racial equality, treatment of animals, birth control, ecology. These are most evident in the westernized nations. [8] While there are many humanistic magazines, another major humanistic journal began, in the winter of 1980/81, with the publication of Free Inquiry magazine, edited by Paul Kurtz, the best known if not the most influential humanistic philosopher in the United States. The American Humanist Association The American Humanist Association was founded in Illinois as a tax-exempt organization for educational and religious purposes. The Bylaws of the American Humanist Association, amended in 1968, reflect that the Association has a legal status as a religious organization. The roots of AHA go back to 1927. University of Chicago professors and students then began publication of a mimeographed sheet called The New Humanists. This group became the New Humanist Association and organized the Humanists Press Association. In 1934 they changed their name to the American Humanist Association. [9] When it was incorporated in 1941, the AHA became the formal representative of Humanists in the United States and Canada. [10] The organization was derived largely from Unitarians who considered themselves religious humanists. Planned Parenthood Federation

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The roots of Planned Parenthood go back to 1916 when Margaret Sanger founded the first birth control center in the United States. Birth control leagues soon spouted up all over the country. They were united first under the name of National Birth Control League then the name was changed to American Birth Control League. In 1941 the American Birth Control League became the Planned Parenthood Federation of America. Then in 1963 this group became affiliated with World Population Emergency Campaign. Planned Parenthood has probably done more than any other group in the world to promote pre-marital and extra-marital promiscuity, abortion, and condom distribution. Its founder, Margaret Sanger was named Humanist of the Year in 1957. United Nations and Its Agencies In 1945, the United Nations was established. Some persons connected with the United Nations might object to it being designated as a humanistic organization. However, its charter is consistent with humanistic precepts, and several of its agencies, such as World Health Organization (WHO), United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), have usually been directed by leading humanists. Moreover, these agencies generally have policies that mirror humanistic goals and objectives. The Aspen Institute for Humanistic Studies In 1949, a major humanistic training institute, The Aspen Institute for Humanistic Studies, was founded in Aspen, Colorado. Although its central office is in New York City, the Aspen Institute has major centers of activity in many places, including Tokyo, Hawaii and Berlin. Probably the most important is located in Maryland, just outside Washington, D. C., where it is most accessible for training national leaders. Its purpose is to conduct advanced seminars in global ideology and humanistic studies. It trains leading officials of the Trilateral commission, the White House, the Ford Foundation, the Rockefeller Foundation . . . the World Bank, the Council on Foreign Relations . . . etc. [11] Through The Aspen Institute, humanist have a plan of action by which trained national humanistic leaders seek to implement the revolutionary values of humanism into cultural structures. International Humanist and Ethical Union In 1952, the influence of international humanism again accelerated with the establishment of the International Humanist and Ethical Union. This super federation of over thirty-five humanistic groups and associated organizations, including American Humanist Association, now claims over 4,000,000 members in twenty-four countries. It is linked to the United Nations as a nongovernmental organization on a consultative status. Sex Information and Education Council of the United States In 1964, Dr. Mary Calderone, a member of Planned Parenthood, and five others, established the Sex Information and Education Council of the United States (SIECUS) to promote sex education in public schools. While its articles of incorporation claim it has a religious purpose, its religion is definitely humanistic. Since 1964, the SIECUS orbit has expanded to envelope publishing houses, film producers, governmental and private agencies, foundations, medical societies, educational institutions, and religious bodies. This massive network of interlocking organizations is the power structure through which SIECUS operates to exert pressure on local schools and an unsuspecting public to adopt its sex education program. [12] The Council for Democratic and Secular Humanism In 1980, The Council for Democratic and Secular Humanism (CODESH) was founded by Paul Kurtz, who serves as its chairman. CODESH seeks to demonstrate the viability of a thoroughly secular, humanistic way of life. It sponsors several organizations, such as The Academy of Humanism, Secular Organizations for Sobriety, and The Secular Humanist Aid and Relief Program. Among its many publications are Free Inquiry magazine and The Secular Humanist Bulletin. It also sponsors annual lecture conferences to explore controversial topics of interest to 265

humanists. Public Schools, NEA, and other Educational Agencies A less obvious but highly successful attempt to organize humanistic values into American culture was the effort made by John Dewey and others in the late nineteenth century. They captured public schools and incorporate humanistic values (although not generally designated by that name) into curriculum content and teaching methodology in every classroom in America. Through educational agencies (such as the National Education Association (NEA) and its various state affiliated organizations) and through educational courses in teacher training colleges and universities, humanistic values have been successfully preached to our nations teachers (generally without teachers being aware of it). Teachers have then passed those values on to their students. Humanism has also entered the school classroom through school textbooks. Modern educational philosophy and psychology is thoroughly humanistic. The result, declared by a humanist back in 1930 but only recently realized by some Christians, is that every American public school is a school of Humanism. [13] And this is not likely to change, because humanists fight to keep the public school as an institution through which its ideas may be imparted to our nations children. Through public schools, children are humanized. Then, they then grow up to assume positions of responsibility and leadership in every possible vocation, whether in the arts, politics, or profession. And they carry their humanistic values with them from the schools to their professions. As a result, humanistic values permeate every facet of our culture. A Growing Anti-Christian Society Humanistic ideas are little known by Christians. Those ideas are reinforced by organized efforts to implement them through public policies that restructure all social, political and cultural institutions. When those organizations (including public schools) which implement humanistic ideas are not recognized to promote values contrary to those held by Christians, then Christians generally have mixed reactions when those organizations began to achieve their objectives. On the one hand, some Christians are confounded - not understanding whats happening nor why. On the other hand, some Christians have been so weakened in their convictions by humanistic ideals that they are simply not concerned - they have no will to resist. Most Christians are therefore simply not prepared to deal with the humanistic cultural revolutions now facing us. Christian leaders must therefore initiate educational programs to inform Christians not only about humanistic ideas, organizations and tactics, but also about appropriate measures to defend themselves and their families, and to take offensive measures to overthrow these anti-Christian cultural revolutions. The growing influence of humanism has already produced a loss of Christian freedoms and a growing anti-Christian sentiment in this country. Unless Christians get more understanding of humanism and its many organizations, objectives and processes, and until Christians effectively resist these organized efforts, Christian freedoms will continue to decrease and Christians will be everywhere out maneuvered in efforts to mold public opinion and shape public policies in keeping with Christian values. Notes: [1] Copyright by Robert L. Waggoner. Permission is granted to reproduce and distribute this document for non-commercial educational purposes provided it is unaltered and copyright and authorship are given. [2] A James Reichley, Religion in American Public Life, Washington , DC: The Brookings Institute, 1985, 47, with quotation from Leo Pfeffer, The Triumph of Secular Humanism, Journal of Church and State. Vol. 19, Spring, 1977, 211.

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[3] See Claire Chambers, The SIECUS Circle: A Humanist Revolution, (Belmont, Mass.: Western Islands, 1977), 60-61. [4] Same source, 61. [5] George Grant, Trial and Error: The American Civil Liberties Union and Its Impact on Your Family, (Brentwood, TN: Wolgemuth & Hyatt, Publishers, Inc., 1989), 29. [6] Same source, 23 [7] New York: Simon and Schuster. [8] Lloyd L. Morain, The Humanist, July/August, 1984. [9] Allan Turner, Organized Humanism, Humanism: Devotion to Man, (Tampa, FL: Florida College Bookstore, 1985), 100. [10] Claire Chambers, 65. [11] Michael Loyd Chadwick, Global Ideology, Humanistic Studies and the Aspen Institute, Freeman Digest, 1979, 1. [12] Claire Chambers, same source, Forward, xiii. [13] Charles F. Potter, Humanism: A New Religion, (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1930), 128.

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Feds Fuel Anti-Christian Bigotry in Schoolchildren

Wes Vernon Newsmax, May 26, 2001 http://www.restoringamerica.org/archive/education/feds_fuel_anti-christian_bigotry.html The practice of Hitler, Stalin and every other tyrant of encouraging children to "inform on their parents is quietly slipping into the United States. H.R. 1, the education bill that recently passed the House, promotes a host of left-wing agenda items, many of which NewsMax.com described in an article May 17. What is equally disappointing to cultural conservatives is what the measure does NOT do. It does nothing to eradicate federally sponsored anti-Christian bigotry. That program is left over from the Clinton administration. Conservatives are urging the Bush administration to move against it. Urging Children to Spy on Parents Traditional Values Coalition (TVC) cites a Justice Department Web page featured in the Clinton years that admonished children to monitor their homes for "bigotry and to report infractions to teachers and others. The program was begun during the publicity on violent crimes in schools against minorities, which sparked a congressional stampede to promote so-called "crime prevention programs. TVC says the program goes way beyond preventing any crimes. By "labeling Christianity as the root of violence, warns the Washington-based values organization, "the federal government has attacked the very foundation of decency| Programs funded by federal departments "embrace and teach an anti-Christian message to societys most vulnerable - our children. Although the national juvenile crime prevention program purports to address the evils of bigotry based on such characteristics as ones skin color, ethnicity, religion, gender, sexual orientation or disability, in fact, "they establish a pervasively political program that targets the religious views and beliefs of school children and their families, alleges TVC, The teacher is instructed to identify hate in its "broadest sense. "Hate prevention training turns out to be little more than what Traditional Values calls "indoctrination of a liberal, anti-Christian, pro-homosexual political view. The goal is to teach children that all "lifestyles are equally acceptable and that believing otherwise is "the root of hate. TVC cites another chapter in the federally supported curriculum that implies that those who speak out against the promotion of the organized homosexual agenda are Nazis. One illustration of anti-Christian bias in the curriculum is the story of a white supremacist youth who attended a Baptist and a Pentecostal Church and was taught the "battle of Armageddon would be a race war. The manual "Preventing Youth Crimes recommends a "partnering with homosexual advocacy groups. What upsets the TVC is that the current education bill has done nothing to eliminate what the group calls "anti-Christian bigotry. TVC Executive Director Andrea Sheldon Lafferty told NewsMax.com Friday that her group has urged conservative lawmakers to change the bill in conference committee negotiations between House and Senate lawmakers. She believes the Senate version is even worse than the House

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provision, allowing the "hate crimes section to continue. She has also urged the Bush White House to nudge the lawmakers by saying that the "hate crimes section could make the bill vetobait. Of course, it would be politically difficult for President Bush to veto legislation that has been touted as a cornerstone of his own agenda. But TVC says the so-called "crime prevention section is "a very real step toward the regulating of speech within the schools, homes, and the workplace. That is why Lafferty thinks the White House may want to take preventive action so as to avoid being put in precisely the position of vetoing his own bill or allowing these dangerous provisions to survive. The cultural Marxist ethic of "political correctness that has manifested itself on college campuses with a vengeance in recent years now is being thrust on younger children. If nothing else works, conservative lawmakers are being urged to fight back by eliminating federal dollars in appropriations bills that would fund the curriculum.

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Examples of Anti-Christian Persecution

http://www.libertocracy.com/Webessays/religion/persecution/Anti-Christian_Persecution.htm Many Christians believe there is a rising tide of anti-Christian bigotry in our culture. Southern Baptist Convention spokesman William Merrell observes, "I believe there is a growing climate of hostility that is directed against Christians ... who find themselves as the targets of a great hostility in this culture." "In late September, presidential candidate Gary Bauer cited the shootings at Wedgewood Baptist Church in Forth Worth, Texas, the targeting of Christians at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colo. and the shootings of praying students in Paducah, Ky., as examples of a "disturbing pattern." In fact, there has been almost no media coverage pointing out that these were anti-Christian acts of violence against sincere believers." "House Majority Leader Dick Armey in a Sept. 29 speech, said: "We are witnessing a rising level of bigotry against people of faith, especially Christians," said Armey, who mentioned comments by Barry Lynn, of Americans United for the Separation of Church and State, on CNN's May 21 Crossfire. Frank York(1) said: "Lynn criticized the acclaim given to Cassie Bernall, a young girl who was shot at Columbine when she said she believed in God." According to Lynn, "I think that what we've done here is to take this one victim, turned it into an example of martyrdom, and then used it to become the springboard for even more exploitation of this tragedy by people with a religious, political agenda." "Armey observed that, after the memorial service for slain Columbine students, the Denver Post editorialized May 1 against what it called the "disenfranchising" nature of the memorial service. The editorialist noted: "While the service deftly satisfied the needs of fundamentalist Christians, it estranged too many others who came in search of healing." The Post urged that future services be more "inclusive, not divisive," York wrote.(1) CNSNews.com reported: "After protests by a legal watchdog group, [Pacific Justice Institute] a California state agency reversed a policy prohibiting its workers from having any religious items displayed at their workplace. In April, state officials told Hyung John Kang, an employee at the Department of Financial Institutions, that he would have to remove a Christian calendar from his work cubicle because it was "inappropriate and offensive." Portions of the Bible banned on Canadian Radio and TV Focus on the Family founder Dr. James Dobson reports: "In Canada, certain portions of Scripture can no longer be read on radio or television. If broadcasters chose to elaborate on Romans 1, for example, or other Scriptures that address the subject of homosexuality, they would be charged with unethical practices because officials would interpret the comments as hateful. Focus couldn't even cite certain medical information related to AIDS on a recent broadcast because, again, it might have offended the homosexual community." Frank York(1) reported: "In September, a Roman Catholic priest was killed in India for his "illegal" attempts to convert Hindus to Christianity. But that's just the beginning. In the Sudan, Islamic forces have force-starved an estimated 1.5 million "infidels" in recent years. Muslim gangs in Java have ransacked hundreds of churches. In China, police continue to arrest members of underground Protestant churches." Open Doors, a religious freedom group founded by Brother Andrew, reported in "Turkmenistan, a pastor spent 12 days in prison before being freed and fined one month's wage for holding unsanctioned meetings. In Indonesia, 30 Christians were massacred by soldiers on the island of Ambon. In Chechnya, Russian Orthodox priests are being kidnapped and in Turkey, 40 Christians have recently been arrested for worshipping in an "illegal" church."

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Frank York(1) wonders if "attitudes toward Christianity have changed in America in recent decades, a parallel shift seems to have occurred worldwide. What about the future of Christianity in America? Will evangelism be chilled, or even silenced -- or perhaps just neutered -- due to an evermore-intolerant culture? Will it end up as an underground movement as it is in many corners of the world?" In Afghanistan, in August 2001, several foreign (including some Americans) Christian humanitarian aid workers were arrested and charged with "illegal proselytizing" after police found them in possession of Christian religious literature and films. In Afghanistan, the punishment for attempting to convert a Moslem to any other religion, is death. The Christians were expelled from the country a few days later after protests from Western officials. Christians arrested by Taliban 24 relief workers accused of propagating belief in Jesus --Associated Press U.S. asks to meet with jailed Christians The Clinton Justice Department put out an anti-Christian propaganda directive designed to, on one had, persecute religious belief and on the other hand to in indoctrinate children into politically correct dogma. The plan is called "Healing the Hate", a middle school curriculum, "which suggests to school counselors that children may be dangerous if they grow up in a "very religious" home." says Frank York. The Justice Department says one of the curriculum's goals is to "reshape attitudes and beliefs" of middle school students."...The "Healing the Hate" curriculum begins with this quote from President Clinton: "Prejudice and contempt, cloaked in the pretense of religious or political conviction, are not different ... they fuel the fanaticism of terror." Bill Clinton knows the fanaticism of terror well, as it is his career. He is a professional terrorist who is guilty of mass murdering innocent people in the Sudan, Iraq, Somalia, Bosnia, Yugoslavia, Columbia and Waco. He is with his bigoted, intolerant, hateful remarks fueling the fanaticism of other religious persecutors who will use his inciteful directives to terrorize people of faith. Zachary Hood, a first-grader at Haines Elementary School in Medford, N.J., was sent to the principle's office for reading a passage from the Bible in class after the teacher asked students to choose their own material to read aloud. He was told that the story was "inappropriate." At an earlier time, a teacher removed his hand-drawn Thanksgiving poster from a hallway display because he was "thankful for Jesus." After Zachary's parents sued the school district, the U.S. appeals court split 6-6 on the case, leaving in place a lower court ruling that upheld the censorship.(2) A man burst into Wedgewood Baptist Church in Fort Worth, Texas, cursing God as he mowed down seven worshipping Christians. This massacre didn't even rate on the serious meter of the mainstream media as highly as John Rocker's preference for not associating with "foreign" looking people or the death of just one "gay" person. Lets see, according the the media, one homosodomite is worth more than a whole church of Christians? The FBI refuses to classify the massacre as a hate crime.(2) After a Christian physician challenged the Louisville, Ky ordinance that forces him to reward the practice of sodomy with a job, on religious grounds, he received death threats.(2) Prosser (Wash.) High School freshman Andrea Lawyer was threatened with suspension if she didn't turn her T-shirt inside out in order to censor the message printed on it. The message was: ABORTION IS HOMICIDE You will not silence my message.

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You will not mock my God. You will stop killing my generation. ROCK FOR LIFE Thomas Altman, Ken Yackly and Kristen Larson were punished by the Minnesota Department of Corrections, in 1997, for reading their Bibles during a "Gays and Lesbians in the Workplace" indoctrination session. Other employees of the same Dept. reported in a 700 Club CBN report that they were ordered to remove family pictures of their children because homosodomites felt discriminated against because of their own choice to reject normal human sexuality and family life. Judge lifts ban on home prayer meetings City schemes to re-impose it Conn. Zoning commission bans prayer meeting in private home Anti-Catholic intolerance, Pro-Abortionists try to boot Vatican out of U.N. Mary Jo Anderson WorldNetDaily School sued for 'trashing' Bibles --WorldNetDaily 1999: Year of Persecution by Rev. Jerry Falwell --WorldNetDaily.com Hateful Hypocrisy Silencing the faithful and stopping those who want to help homosodomites to recover. --Liberation Journal; Aug, 23, 2001 (21/9/5001)by Gregory Flanagan 1 - Is Christianity a 'hate crime'? - Frank York; WorldNetDaily: Dec 3, 1999 2 - Hate crimes also target Christians - Ninie O-Hara; Lexington Herald-Leader: October 8, 2000 Copyright 2000 (5000) Liberation Journal and Gregory Flanagan. All rights reserved.

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Catholics in crossfire again

Abortion-rights groups try to boot Vatican out of U.N. By Mary Jo Anderson 2000WorldNetDaily.com http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=17451 Republican National Committee Chairman Jim Nicholson is demanding that Vice President Al Gore repudiate two "anti-Catholic" groups that are calling for the eviction of the Holy See from the United Nations. The National Abortion Rights Action League and the Women Leaders Online, both groups enthusiastically endorsing Gore for president, are supporting "See Change," a campaign to oust the Vatican from the United Nations. Since 1964, the Vatican has had "permanent observer" status at the U.N. -- enabling it to play an active role and vote with other countries at U.N. conferences, but not in the General Assembly. Representatives of various nations are gathered at the United Nations in preparation for June's "Beijing +5" Special Session of the General Assembly, entitled, "Women 2000: Gender Equality, Development and Peace for the Twenty-First Century." In the midst of deliberations over how to globally implement its "Platform for Action" -- which had stalled over language that would make abortion and sexual orientation universal human rights - the abortion advocacy group Catholics for a Free Choice held a press conference outlining its "See Change" campaign to have the Holy See lose its status as a Non-member State Permanent Observer. NARAL and Women Leaders Online are enthusiastically supporting Catholics for a Free Choice's denunciation of the Vatican. The term Holy See stands for the central authority of the Roman Catholic Church, which includes the tiny sovereign State of Vatican City. "As a Catholic, I am appalled that Al Gore has courted the support of two groups trying to throw the Vatican out of the United Nations," Nicholson said. "See Change's anti-Catholic goal is to evict the Vatican from the U.N., to silence the voice of Pope John Paul and to prevent one billion Catholics from speaking up for morality and justice at the world's most prominent international forum," Nicholson said. "Does Al Gore agree with these anti-Catholic goals? If not, why does he refuse to stand up and repudiate them? Why doesn't Gore reject the endorsements of these anti-Catholic groups? "The pattern here is disturbing," Nicholson added. "First, Al Gore and Hillary Clinton insulted Jewish Americans by kissing the ring of Al Sharpton, a racist and anti-Semite whose words and deeds have led to the deaths of Jews, blacks and others. Then Gore accepts the endorsement of NARAL, a group trying to diminish the Vatican." As one of the nation's most powerful pro-abortion special interest groups, NARAL's endorsement of Gore was expected, especially since Gore continues to support the controversial practice of partial birth abortion -- called "infanticide" by Democratic Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan. In an election year that has witnessed several attempts to claim the Catholic vote, the response of candidates to the attempt to remove the Vatican is being closely watched. Tuesday, at the U.N. headquarters in New York, under the sponsorship of the United States mission to the U.N., Catholics for a Free Choice spokeswoman Frances Kissling claimed she had gathered the signatures of 400 organizations to be given to the U.N. Anika Rahman, of an associated abortion rights group, Center for Reproductive Law and Policy, 273

said the Vatican's position at the United Nations was analogous to giving a U.N. seat to the Politburo. Rahman contends the Vatican does not qualify as a sovereign state in international law and therefore is not entitled to its deliberative status -- even though it is recognized as a sovereign state by 177 nations, issues passports, has its own postal system, legal territory and resident citizens. Territorial size is not a factor in determining sovereignty, counter Vatican supporters. "In the context of the international meetings sponsored by the United Nations to promote women, the Holy See has taken positions that are antithetical to women's rights," a press release from the Center for Reproductive Law and Policy stated. Critics of the "See Change" campaign point out the obvious -- that the real target is not to determine the sovereignty of the Vatican, but to silence its pro-life voice in the U.N. Addressing the press at the U.N. on Wednesday, Focus on the Family, Mary Ellen Bork, Family Research Council and Rabbi Yehuda Levin of Jews for Morality all expressed their support of the Vatican's presence at the U.N., and denounced Kissling's "See Change" coalition calling for U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan to demote the Vatican to a Non-Governmental Organization. Rabbi Levin compared the assault on the Catholic Church to the assault on the Jews. "Half a century ago, my family was the victim of a movement which wanted to rid the world of Jews, and Jewish teachings and Jewish values. Today, the extremists seek to disallow and disenfranchise the Catholic community and their ideas. Often it is the Catholic presence which reflects our traditional Jewish teaching on respect for life and family. I call upon the U.N. and her members to reject this censorship, reject the bigotry, and reject this hate of the Vatican and of the Jewish pro-life and family [traditions] it expresses. Sixty years ago our people asked, 'Where were you for the Jews?' Today we ask the world, 'Where are you for the Catholics?'" Catholics for a Free Choice graphically counters these arguments: "From opposing condoms to halt the spread of AIDS, to decrying the use of emergency contraception for refugee victims of rape, the Holy See misuses its special status to erect real obstacles to the promotion of women's health and well-being, despite the contention of resolutions introduced in the U.S. Congress. The resolutions, introduced by several anti-choice members of Congress ... oppose any effort to review the status of the Holy See at the U.N. and laud the role played by the Holy See at the U.N." Austin Ruse, president of Catholic Family and Human Rights Institute, announced vigorous support for the resolutions before the U.S. House and Senate calling for U.S. endorsement of the continued presence of the Holy See at the UN. "These will be historic documents," noted Ruse, pointing out that it will be the first ever U.S. resolution in support of the Vatican. Ruse found a ready ally when he approached Sen. Rick Santorum, R-Pa., about sponsoring a resolution. Sen. Bob Smith, R-N.H. and Rep. Chris Smith, RN.J. have joined the sponsorship of the resolutions. Ruse distributed to the press a "Declaration of Support of the Holy See at the United Nations" written by Princeton Professor, Robert George and William Saunders of the Family Research Council. The declaration has been signed by 1,015 NGOs from 44 countries --overwhelming support for the Vatican as the voice of traditional Western morality, family values and civic standards. Robert L. Maginnis, director of national security and foreign affairs for the Family Research Council, pointed out that the U.S. State Department, in a 1998 report, praised the Catholic Church for its human rights efforts. "The drive to expel the Vatican from the U.N. is obviously intended to intimidate pro-life delegations (to the Beijing +5 conference)," said Maginnis. "If any offensive move to oust the Vatican delegation from the U.N. succeeds, Family Research Council will call upon Congress to 274

reassess American participation in the world organization." Mary Ellen Bork, wife of Judge Robert Bork and Director of the Catholic Campaign for America, said, "Kissling is a letterhead organization funded by the Playboy Foundation." Kissling has long quarreled with the Catholic Church's teaching on abortion. Her funding is drawn from population-control interests and abortion rights foundations, including Playboy and Ted Turner Foundations. Her group, Catholics for a Free Choice, is an NGO at the U.N. And even though the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops has said that no group promoting abortion is entitled to use the term "Catholic" in its name, the United Nations declined the Vatican's request that the U.N. ask Kissling to delete "Catholics" from her organization's name in its application for NGO status at the U.N. Abortion rights groups are openly frustrated with the Vatican's defense of national sovereignty, the family, parental rights, and the pre-born during the Beijing +5 "PrepCom" now in progress. They claim the Holy See is "obstructing" the implementation of abortion and sexual orientation as a "universal human right" which activists want codified in international law. Although the Beijing "Platform for Action" is theoretically non-binding on nations, the U.N. is calling for "international monitoring" of the progress nations are making in implementing the provisions of the "Platform." Members of Congress who sit on the advisory board of the Women Leaders Online include Rep. Nita Lowey, D-N.Y., Rep. Carolyn Maloney, D-N.Y., Rep. Louise Slaughter, D-N.Y. and former Rep. Geraldine Ferraro, D-N.Y.

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Mary Jo Anderson is a contributing

Libertarian Party Press Releases December 29, 2000 Town tries to 'snob-zone' God by banning prayer meetings in home http://www.lp.org/press/archive.php?function=view&record=173 WASHINGTON, DC -- A town in Connecticut that has banned a family from holding prayer meetings in its home is improperly using zoning laws to squash religious liberty, the Libertarian Party charged today. "No American town should be able to snob-zone God out of existence," said the party's national director, Steve Dasbach. "If zoning laws can be used as an excuse to ban organized prayer in a private home, then the First Amendment's protection of religious liberty doesn't, well, have a prayer." In late November, the New Milford Zoning Commission ordered Robert and Mary Murphy to immediately stop holding weekly prayer meetings and Bible studies in their single-family home. The Murphys had been conducting the meetings -- which were attended by two dozen or fewer people -- since 1995. But the Zoning Commission said it had determined that such gatherings were prohibited under the town's zoning laws, and threatened to take legal action against the Murphys if the meetings did not stop. In December, the American Center for Law and Justice filed a lawsuit against the Milford town government, charging that the action violated the First, Fifth, and Fourteenth Amendments -- and infringed on the Murphys' constitutional rights of free speech, religious expression, and freedom of assembly. However, American families shouldn't need lawsuits to protect their right to pray in their own homes, said Dasbach. "In America, you should have the absolute right to pray in your own home, and to invite your neighbors over to share in your prayers, without having to get permission from local government bureaucrats," he said. "In fact, a zoning board should have no more control over when and where you pray than they should over which God you pray to. "The only exception to that rule would be if the prayer meeting directly infringed on the property rights of the Murphys' neighbors -- and that does not seem to be the case here." Unfortunately, the incident in New Milford is just one more example of how local zoning boards try to micromanage peoples' property, said Dasbach. Some other zoning law outrages over the past few years: * Highland Park, New Jersey fined a rabbi for having a typewriter in his home. (It violated a ban on home offices.) * Floosmoor, Illinois banned pickup trucks from private driveways. * Alexandria, Virginia threatened to condemn 22 homes unless the owners fixed chipped paint on their windowsills and doorframes. * Coral Gables, Florida mandated Spanish tiles for the roofs of any children's playhouses in families' backyards. * Laguna Beach, California prohibited a family from moving into their new home because it was painted the wrong shade of white. The city also prosecuted a woman for building a picket fence that was six inches too high.

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In each case, the problem is the same, said Dasbach: Zoning laws gave local government bureaucrats vast power over homes and properties -- and that power was inevitably used to violate peoples' rights. "The problem is not that zoning boards abuse their power; it's that they have the power to abuse," he said. "As long as these bureaucrats have such power, incidents like the one in New Milford are bound to occur." What's the solution? "Take away zoning boards' power to micromanage the use of private property," suggested Dasbach. "That would strip them of their power to violate property rights -- and their power to violate people's religious liberty. Then, no American would ever be banned from practicing religion in the privacy of their home, as happened in New Milford. "The fact is, the power of local zoning bureaucrats should never be stronger than the right of private property, the power of the U.S. Constitution, or the importance of prayer in people's hearts."

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A New Century of Martyrs: Anti-Christian Intolerance

Chuck Colson Chairman of Prison Fellowship Ministries http://www.crosswalk.com/news/1143210.html On June 6, Martin Burnham, an American missionary, died in a battle between his Islamic kidnappers and Filipino troops sent to rescue him. Burnham, thus, becomes the newest member of what the Te Deum, an ancient hymn, calls "the white-robe army of the martyrs" -- an army that, according to a recent estimate, is a staggering 70 million strong. But what's even more staggering is that, according to the same estimate, 45 million, or two-thirds of all Christian martyrs, died in the twentieth century. These estimates are contained in a new book, The New Persecuted: Inquiries into Anti-Christian Intolerance in the New Century of Martyrs. It's written by an Italian journalist, Antonio Socci. The estimates are derived from sources such as Oxford's World Christian Encyclopedia. Many of the martyrs died in places like the former Soviet Union and Nazi Germany. But there are others, lesser known places where Christians were killed for their faith, like Turkey, where 1.5 million Armenian Christians were murdered. And the killing continues. Socci estimates that an average of 160,000 Christians have been killed every year since 1990 in places like Algeria, Nigeria, Sudan, and Pakistan. Socci writes that the "global persecution of Christianity is still in progress but in most cases is ignored by the mass media and Christians in the west." What's not being ignored is his book, which has many critics up in arms. For writing about persecution and identifying Islamic extremism as the "main danger" to Christians worldwide, Socci has been accused of promoting anti-Islamic prejudice and other transgressions. Other critics question Socci's figures, saying that many of those he's calling martyrs died in "conflicts that had little to do with religion." Even if Socci were off by two-thirds -- and I don't think he is -- that still leaves 15 million martyrs this past century, more than enough to warrant the label "persecution." How many Christians have to die before the world takes notice? Others argue that by portraying the twentieth century as a century of massacres, Socci diminishes the significance of the Holocaust. But as Ted Olsen of Christianity Today noted, talking about the millions of Christians killed for their faith doesn't diminish the evil of the Holocaust anymore than noting "the millions who died during Stalin's purges." What's really bothering many of Socci's critics is the idea of Christians as victims instead of victimizers. Like commentator Tommaso Debenedetti, they see the book as part of a "right wing plot" to "deflect accusations of intolerance" away from Christians. For some of these critics, even if there is persecution, Christians had it coming. That's why Olsen is right when he asks, "How long until people start arguing that the murder of millions of Christians worldwide isn't that big a deal because of the Crusades and Inquisitions?" Well, Martin Burnham's death is definitely a big deal, as are those of other Christians who have died for their faith. For the sake of our suffering brethren, we must arouse public opinion and the power of civilized governments against all Christian persecution: the kind that prompts the killing and the kind that prompts the willingness to turn a blind eye. For further reading: * Rory Carroll, "New book says Christians suffered most," The Guardian (London), 4 June 2002. 278

* Ted Olsen, "Weblog: Anti-Persecution Book Said to Denigrate Holocaust, Muslims, and Immigrants," Christianity Today, 4 June 2002. * Ted Olsen, "Martin Burnham Went Out Serving with Gladness," Christianity Today, 10 June 2002. * Visit the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom's website. You can read its annual report on religious persecution. (requires Adobe Acrobat Reader). * Vincent Carroll and David Shiflett, Christianity on Trial (Encounter Books, 2001). Copyright 2002 Prison Fellowship Ministries. All Rights Reserved.

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The Anti-Christian Liberal Union

by Jennifer King, Managing Editor August 19, 2002 http://www.american-partisan.com/cols/2002/king/qtr3/0819.htm "The Heretical Housewife" As noted in a Wall Street Journal editorial this week, the ACLU appears to finally have found a religion it can tolerate. The organization is jumping into the fracas at the University of North Carolina, where incoming freshmen are mandated to read the Koran - or, at least part of it. Objectionable parts, like those used by Wahhabi madmen to justify mass murder, have been delicately excised. The students are also given liturgical CD's and asked to contemplatively reflect upon Islam and its teachings. Can anyone doubt the hysterical reaction of the atheistic Left if Bible study was a required course? Especially if accompanied by CD's of Gregorian chants and songs extolling Jesus Christ. On the surface, at least, it appears a tad odd that the ACLU - which files suit at a whiff of Christianity - should side with the University on mandated Islam. The alignment of the Left with the Islamists is really not a strange one, though, because they share a defining characteristic - a virulent hatred of America and the West. Although President Bush keeps assuring us that Islam is a religion of peace, everywhere we look we find evidence to the contrary. Palestinians pour out into the streets, frenziedly dancing and throwing candy exuberantly to youngsters every time an Israeli grandmother or infant is killed by an Islamakazi murderer. Arab children, in an odd travesty of summer camp, were photographed last week wearing matching Tshirts and camouflage face paint while proudly brandishing automatic weapons. Other photographs showed the children painstakingly demolishing a replica of an Israeli settlement, and burning a trumped-up American flag - with stars of David replacing the usual ones. The same week, at a support rally for Saddam Hussein held near Nablus, ranting participants pledged to kill every American. On the 9th of August, Sanaa Republic of Yemen Television broadcast a sermon live from the Grand Mosque in Sanaa. Shaykh Akram Abd-al-Razzaq al-Ruqayhi prayed to Allah, O God, destroy the Jews|; O God, destroy the Christians|.freeze the blood in their veins. On the same day, in Saudi Arabia, Saudi TV carried a different sermon - this time from Shaykh Usamah Abdallah Khayyat. Khayyat prayed, O God, help the mujahidin in Palestine, Kashmir and Chechyna. O God, destroy the tyrant Jews. In Quatar, the official TV station carries yet another sermon, delivered live from the Umar Bin-al-Kattab Mosque in Doha. Shaykh Anwar al-Badawi prayed to his God, Islam does not know terrorism|.it encourages martyrdom against aggressors|O God, destroy the Jews; O God, pour out your anger on them. O God, destroy the usurper Jews and the vile Christians. Dont these words resound with love and goodwill towards their fellow men? Dont they bespeak a willingness to live tolerantly with people of other faiths? Whats more, the words and the open actions bespeak a kind of mental disconnect with the real world. Dont the Palestinians realize that the bloodthirsty celebrations at the murder of noncombatants look positively bestial to civilized people? Even the Nazis tried to cover up their atrocities, realizing that the wholesale machine gunning of unarmed naked women and children might just be considered a wee bit savage. Apparently, they dont teach that etiquette at terrorist summer training camp. In many ways, it appears the West has failed to plumb the depth of the fanatical hatred directed towards it. The Reverend Franklin Graham recently asked a serious question about why - if the terrorists view of Islam is wrong and they are indeed hijacking the religion - there arent more

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Shaykhs speaking out about it. For this, Graham was excoriated by those on the Left. But Graham is right. The silence from the Muslim world on atrocities perpetuated in the name of Islam has been deafening, even before 9/11. After the intention murder of 3,000 American citizens, many of whom were immigrants and a group of whom were Muslims, it stands in stark relief. There are some who postulate that the Arab behavior is geared towards provoking the West into waging war against it - thereby igniting Osamas wished for worldwide conflict. Nevertheless, todays civilization cannot stand back and let a bunch of crazed fanatics take over the world and kill all the Jews anymore than its predecessor could in the 1940s. Anyone who poses a threat to freedom, peace and worldwide stability must be deprived of the power to do so. Perhaps then, a message of tolerance and peace - rather than hatred and divisiveness - can be preached from the mosques and madrassahs.

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Wonder whose side the ACLU will take then?

2002 Jennifer King The Fate of Persecuted Christians A talk by Resurrection parishioner, Patricia McRannolds on the occasion of the International Day of Prayer for Persecuted Christians, November 16, 1997. http://www.serve.com/sonrise/silence/intro.htm 160,000 believers were martyred in 1996 . . .not 160,000 in this century, but in 1996. Countless others were subjected to unimaginable horrors. More Christians were martyred in the 20th century than in the previous 19. Sudan, China, Ethiopia, Kuwait & Egypt are just a few of the many countries in which atrocities have been documented. When Michael Horowitz, a Jewish scholar and columnist for the Wall Street Journal was asked why he is working so hard to help Christians in far-flung corners of the world, he said: "There is a man living with us who is the embodiment of Christian Faith, . . . and I am in awe of it. He is from the Ethiopian Evangelical church where he is the senior pastor. He is trying to get asylum into the U.S. and is neeting every possible roadblock you can imagine. Here is a man who has been jailed over 25 times for his faith and he's been tortured. On one occassion, he was hanged upside down and hot oil poured on his feet. This is a man of abiding faith who will be tortured again and murdered if he is sent back to Ethiopia. But do you know what happened when we petitioned for asylum? The State Dept. sent a letter to the Immigration Service and said,"There is no persecution of Christians in Ethiopia." When Michael Horowitz's original article, regarding this issue, was published in the Wall Street Journal, he expected an outpouring of support from outraged believers. There was hardly a whisper. He then wrote a letter to the 150 leading Mission boards in the U.S. He said to them, "If I had written a story about anti-semitism, I would have been overwhelmed with support from the Christian Community. But when Christian persecution was involved, the Christian community seemed tongue-tied and embarassed. What a disgrace!! In some places it amounts to mass murder. Nina Shea, author and international human-rights lawyer who has investigated the persecution of Christians for over ten years, has documented the abduction and death of more than one million Sudanese at the hands of the country's Islamis Fundamentalist government. In her book, In the Lion's Den, she wrote: Millions of American Christians pray in their churches each week oblivious to the fact that Christians in many parts of the world suffer brutal torture, arrest, imprisonment and even death . . .for no other reason than that they are Christian. The shocking untold story of our times is that more Christians have died this century, simply for being Christian, than in the first nineteen centuries after the birth of Christ. They have been persecuted and martyred before an unknowing, indifferent world and a largely silent Christian community. Jeff Jacoby, an syndicated columnist for the Boston Globe, human rights activist and also a Jew, in describing the scope of the tragedy wrote .....the Nuba mountians in Sudan, which have had a Christian population since the 6th century, are littered with mass graves. Nuba women are systematically raped by Arab soldiers in order to produce non-Nuba offspring. There are reports, including from Catholic bishops, of crucifixions of Christians by the army. Muslim troops from northern Sudan have sold tens of thousnads of Christian children and women into slavery. Many have been branded or mutilated to prevent escape, many more have been tortured, brainwashed or starved until they convert to Islam. Pakistan's 1986 blasphemy law makes it a capital crime to insult the Prophet Mohammed by any imputation, innuendo or insinuation. The law has been used repeatedly to justify a reign of terror against Pakistani Christians.

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This has been a century of unmatched Christian martyrdom. It began with the mass murder of Christians in Armenia, it is ending with the mass murder of Christians in Sudan. Then as now, the world looked away, even as it looked away during the most unspeakable mass murder of all .... the Holocaust. Why has there been so much apathy among deeply committed believers? Many do not know about it. I found out because an article I read, in this past August's Readers Digest, disturbed me so much I decided I had to research it. As information came to me from many sources, reports of the atrocities my Christian brothers and sisters were suffering were so terrible I couldn't read the reports all the way through at first. Then I got mad!! I decided I had to get involved if only to help educate people about the situation. I talked about it in my faith sharing group and we all decided to get involved. Many of our leaders, including some church leaders, have chosen to either ignore this issue or claim it doesn't exist. Some spiritual leaders label the situation, "politcal". Therefore, we, the believers, should not be concerned because in this country we believe in separation of church and state. Another reason why Christians may be unconcerned,is some believe that harsh suffering, even death, are inevitable for those who live and worship God in dangerous places. Perhaps persecution goes with the territory, so to speak. Despite the overwhelming evidence of atrocities, the attitude of the U.S. Govt. has been that the persecution of Christians doesn't exist. Through the work of Horowitz and others the truth is beginning to penetrate, attitudes are beginning to change. Members of Congress are becoming alarmed about reports of brutality and murder on foriegn soil. A House Resolution passed the fourth week of Sept. 1996 stating, more Christians have been martyred in the 20th century than in the past 19 combined. Michael Horowitz help draft the Wolf-Specter bill, which was introduced in Congess on May 20, 1997. The bill, sponsored by Rep. Frank Wolf and Senator Arlen Specter, is called the "Freedom from Religious Persecution Act of 1997". It imposes sanctions, including an end to all non-humanitarian aid, on regimes that either engage in or allow the persection of Christians and other religious minorities. The congressional debate was suppose to take place this fall. To date nothing has happened and Congress is "on vaction" until after the first of January!!! We live in the world's most dominant country, one which could exercise tremendous pressure on other nations to bring an end to injustice. It will not act unless we force it to address these issues. We must remember, our government emanates from the people. Collectively, we are the government. If it implements evil policies, each of us is partially responsible for them. We are obligated to raise our voices when injustice is being condoned and encouraged. There is no greated injustice than when elected officals reward and support brutal regimes which kill and torture innocent people. The International Day of Prayer for Persecuted Christians has a primary focus, to call people of all faiths to agree together in prayer to uphold those who are persecuted and to pray for the repentance and conversion of those who persecute. OUR GREATEST TOOL IS PRAYER!!!! In addition letters need to be sent to our politcal representatives telling them how you feel about this issue and telling them that, as your representative, you expect them to support the WolfSpecter bill.Letters need to be sent to the editors of our local media urging improved coverage on this issue. I pray that, in some way, we all join together to SHATTER THE SILENCE!!

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Pol Pot's Nazi-style experiments

The nightmare legacy of the Killing Fields continues Editor's note: Dispatches contributing editor Anthony C. LoBaido journeyed into the dark heart of Cambodia recently. His first person account of the Killing Fields revisited is featured in the June issue of the magazine, the sister off-line publication to WorldNetDaily. LoBaido has worked as a correspondent in Mexico, South Africa, Australia, Korea, Thailand and Cambodia. By Anthony LoBaido 1999WorldNetDaily.com http://www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=17096 PHNOM PENH, Cambodia -- It is a scene as eerie as Hitler and Eva Braun's final moments inside a Berlin bunker a half-century ago. On Jan. 7, 1975, the clock strikes high noon at the notorious Tuol Sleng "S-21" prison. The invading communist Vietnamese have sacked Phnom Penh. Kaing Kek Iev, Pol Pot's chief executioner at S-21, paces frantically around the prison -- a former high school converted by the Khmer Rouge into a house of horrors. The sound of gunfire and artillery fill the air. Outside, silent flashes of lightning light up the dark afternoon sky. As Yeats once wrote, "The center does not hold." In one room, Kaing Kek Iev, (whose nom de guerre is "Duch") looks over a giant macabre stack of human skulls. In another room lay mountains of records -- notes Duch meticulously took down during the Khmer Rouge genocide enacted between 1975 and 1979. Scattered around the prison in dank cells are a few unlucky prisoners chained to their beds. Duch pours gasoline on as many of the records as he can and lights them on fire. He then executes the last remaining prisoners. These poor souls will not be among the 500,000 Cambodians the Khmer Rouge will force to march to the Thai border in a hasty and mass retreat in the wake of the invading enemy. The survivors will be put into Khmer-run camps until 1991. Top Khmer Rouge leaders will head to the rural town of Pailin, where they will soon garner a fortune mining rare jewels. But Duch has other plans, and he heads for the Cardamom Mountains of Western Cambodia. The top administrator of S-21 soon passes undetected into Thailand, carrying with him a dark secret that remained unknown for over 20 years. But the truth is often difficult to keep buried forever and works to break apart even the heaviest of monoliths -- like the steady eroding power of water, wind and ice on the great mountains of the earth. In the case of Pol Pot's Nazi-style experiments, the truth only recently emerged from five handwritten pages which survived the gasoline and matches of Duch's poor counter-intelligence work at S-21. The dark secret Kaing Kek Iev ran off with so long ago has now come full circle. Duch reappeared this past May in Western Cambodia where he had been serving as a volunteer aid worker after becoming a born-again Christian. And although change is not always visible, the changes in Duch's personal morality have led him to identify the chain of command in Pol Pot's killing machine at S21 and the Cheung Ek Killing Fields. Moreover, Duch has brought something far more horrific into the light for examination -- the Nazi-style experiments he and his cohorts performed on the internees at S-21. Kaing Kek Iev has been many things in his life -- a professor, Khmer Rouge soldier, prisoner under the anti-Communist Cambodian King Sihanouk, administrator/executioner at S-21 and fugitive from justice. Now Duch has embarked on a new and perhaps the final phase of his life as the star witness in the upcoming Khmer Rouge genocide trails.

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The trials will be conducted by the present Cambodian government. It is a government staffed by many Khmer Rouge defectors who still control loyal, private guerrilla armies deployed in the field. Recent revelations show the Nazi-style experiments conducted at S-21 to be so barbaric, cruel and medieval in nature so as to make Dr. Josef Mengele shudder in horror. "Dr. Mengele would give lollipops to small Jewish children before injecting their eyes with blue dye. Pol Pot's henchmen were not so polite," says Loyal Gould, the former chairman of the Baylor University Department of Journalism. Dr. Gould is the only English-speaking journalist in the world to have covered the Auschwitz Trials from start to finish. "Certainly this kind of cruelty is the epitome of evil." According to five of the 100,000 pages of forced "confessions" and prison records Duch accumulated while running S-21, the Nazi-style, pseudo-scientific human experiments included the following: "A. A 17-year-old girl with her throat cut and stomach slashed, put in water from 7:55 p.m. until 9:20 a.m., when the body begins to float slowly to the top, which it reaches by 11 a.m." "B. A 17-year-old girl bashed to death, then put in water as before, for the same period, but the body rises to the top at 1:17 p.m." Most of the 17,000 Cambodians tortured and killed at S-21 were loyal Communist party cadres falsely accused of being CIA spies. They included the scientific, political, religious and educational elite of Khmer society. S-21 served mainly as a torture chamber, while most of the final liquidation occurred at the Killing Fields of Cheung Ek outside of Phnom Penh. In addition to running S-21, Duch (who is half-Chinese and half-Khmer), served as the head of SANTEBAL, the National Security machine of Pol Pot's Khmer Rouge regime. Duch took over SANTEBAL in 1975 after the Khmer Rouge seized the government from the pro-U.S. Lon Nol. He immediately took 154 prisoners kept in a Phnom Penh chapel and transferred them to S-21. Tuol Sleng could hold up to 1,500 prisoners, and this served the grand paranoia of Pol Pot frighteningly well. Pol Pot was obsessed with "enemies," both real and imagined, on the scale of Stalin. Says one former Khmer Rouge soldier, "Pol Pot was afraid of a spider, so he shot at anything with more than two legs. He saw a CIA operative or collaborator hiding under every rock." By 1977 Tuol Sleng had hired over 100 wardens, most of who were in their late teens and early twenties. These wardens tortured and executed women, children and babies with cruel efficiency. For example, On July 1, 1977, Duch held "Women's Day" at S-21, killing 114 women. July 2, 1977 was "Children's Day," and saw 31 boys and 43 girls tortured and slaughtered. In October of that same year, S-21 set an all time single-day record by executing 418 people. (Pol Pot referred to these victims as the refuse of the "Old Society." Upon seizing power in 1975, Pol Pot emptied Phnom Penh in seven days. He called the evacuees "New People" of "The Year Zero." His Maoist agrarian style restructuring of Cambodian society sought to raise up the poor or "base people.") The murderous experiments and killings rolled on. In 1978, Duch oversaw the liquidation of 300 disaffected Khmer Rouge soldiers. The soldiers were not even interrogated -- they were summarily put to death to soothe the whims of Pol Pot. Some of the soldiers were hung upside down and had their heads placed in buckets of water. In addition to running S-21, Duch controlled all the security prisons in Cambodia. He was especially brutal, yet clever -- often promising to release prisoners if they would confess their

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"crimes." Those who refused to talk to interrogators had their fingernails pulled out with pliers. Female prisoners were often stripped naked and then tortured. Some of them were raped, though the wardens who raped them were summarily put to death for this "breach of discipline and protocol." In another strange twist, Nuon Chea, Pol Pot's second in command, (known as "Brother Number Two") ordered Duch to personally kill eight Westerners unlucky enough to have been sent to S-21. Duch obliged his superior. The killing of the Westerners -- hailing from the U.S., Australia and several European countries -- means that Duch could be extradited to any of those nations where he might face murder charges. Duch was also personally required to kill several top Khmer Rouge leaders who had fallen into disfavor with Pol Pot. One of them, Von Vet, was killed and then buried by Duch. Soon after, Nuon Chea asked Pol Pot to exhume the body and photograph it for evidence that Von Vet had indeed been killed. Not surprisingly, some of Duch's superiors worried about his meticulous note-taking skills. They asked him to cut back on the paper trail, as well as to save money on bullets in the execution process. "We killed them [the S-21 prisoners] like a chicken," Duch said recently in an interview with the Far Eastern Economic Review. "We simply slit their throats." Iem Chan, a sculptor who was recruited by the Khmer Rouge to work at Tuol Sleng between 1977 and 1979, recalls Duch as "an educated man and a nice talker." Iem Chan was required to make several sculptures of Pol Pot before being asked to turn his talents towards producing instruments of torture at S-21. Speaking of the men who ran S-21, and the pain and death they inflicted on the prisoners there he says, "If I ever met them again I would tear them to pieces." Speaking of the dark goings-on at S-21, Dith Pran, the central character of the hit Hollywood film "The Killing Fields," says, "It is a challenge to investigative journalism to research and document the activities of the Khmer Rouge. We must tell America and the world what happened under Pol Pot." Adds Loyal Gould, "The unrepentant Nazi doctors had two mantras at the Auschwitz Trials. Either 'I was just following orders,' or 'Progress demands sacrifice and our experiments changed the world.' In the dying days of World War II, the U.S. and Soviet troops both raced to Berlin in a quest to capture top Nazi doctors, scientists, advanced weapons and high altitude test data collected on the poor Jewish victims put in pressure chambers. "Some of the Nazi scientists and doctors escaped justice at the Nuremberg and Auschwitz trials, and were given sanctuary in America. They would go on to work for NASA and the space program during the Cold War under a program called 'Operation Paper Clip.' But what was the madness behind Pol Pot's Nazi-style experiments?" Pol Pot is sometimes compared to Adolf Hitler for a plethora of reasons. Both were hypochondriacs who once worked with their hands. Both were failed soldiers who liked small children. Both penned an epic book -- Hitler's "My Struggle" and Pol Pot's "Monarchy or Democracy?" Both committed suicide under murky circumstances. Both were said to have cast a "hypnotic effect" on all who heard them speak. Both accused Napoleon of acting "without moral feeling." Yet in the light of recent evidence unearthed by Duch's written records, the ultimate link between Pol Pot and Hitler may well be the Khmer Rouge's Nazi-style human experiments at S-21. According to Son Nim, a former Khmer Rouge soldier and technician at S-21 now living as a semirecluse on Koh Phi Phi (a tropical island in the Gulf of Thailand), the revelations of Duch's writings at S-21 are only the tip of the proverbial iceberg. "There's a lot more to this story than meets the eye. People need to start asking questions about

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the CIA's MK-Ultra Mind and Population Control experiments and their role in Pol Pot's regime," he says. "We know now that even in the early 1990s, Pol Pot was flying around Thailand and Cambodia in state of the art helicopter gunships, inspecting Khmer Rouge strongholds in Western Cambodia and preparing to retake power in Phnom Penh when the proper time made itself known. What scares me even more is that even today the Nazi agenda of cloning, eugenics, euthanasia, and population control continues -- both in Cambodia and in the West." As for his own role in the Khmer Rouge's Nazi-style genocide, Duch turns to his newfound Christian faith for the courage to tell the world what really happened at S-21. "It is OK," he says. "They [Khmer Rouge loyalists and the Cambodian and international courts] can have my body. Jesus Christ has my soul. It is important that this history be understood." Special offer: Order a subscription to Dispatches magazine, including the June issue with Anthony LoBaido's expansive, 10,000-word cover story, "Holiday in Cambodia." You can also sample Dispatches and the June issue for only $3. Anthony C. LoBaido is an international correspondent for WorldNetDaily.

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