An anti-Christian group threatened to sue the grieving mother of a young man killed in an accident because she placed a cross at the accident site.
AnnMarie Devaney set up the cross after her son, a Christian, was killed when a car struck him as he crossed a street in Lake Elsinore. The memorial included a 5 foot tall cross because her son was a devoted Christian.
The anti-Christian American Humanist Association threatened to sue unless the cross was removed. The letter from the anti-Christianists was sent to the grieving mother a week after a judge backed the group’s suit to stop a veterans memorial in the city that would have a cross on it.
Community members rallied around the family and wanted to deliver a message to the anti-Christianists that their bigotry and intolerance would not be tolerated in their town. Residents created crosses of their own and placed them at the site of the accident saying that the only cross the anti-Christianists demanded removed was the cross of the dead man’s family.
“We did it like a homeschool project to teach (our children) about tolerance and not to be afraid of expressing what you believe,” Holly Alteneder said to the local Press-Enterprise newspaper.
A pair of alumni from Purdue University will now be able to have the inscription on a plaque include the name of their Lord.
Purdue University has backtracked on the prohibition of God’s name being placed on a plaque in memorial to the parents of an alumni who made a $12,500 donation to the School of Mechanical Engineering in 2012.
The inscription requested by Michael and Cindy McCracken was to read “to those who seek to better the world through the understanding of God’s physical laws and innovation of practical solutions. In honor of Dr. William “Ed” and Glenda McCracken.” The school initially refused to post the quote and without telling the donors posted a plaque with only the name of the parents.
On Wednesday the school backed off their claim that putting God in the plaque was an unconstitutional endorsement of religion by a public university.
Amy Noah, Purdue Vice President for Development, said in a statement they never intended to get into a disagreement with a valued donor or inadvertently expose Purdue to a potential legal crossfire.
North Korea is preparing to execute 33 people for being Christians.
The official charge from the government is “attempting to overthrow the government.” In reality, the group was working with a South Korean Baptist missionary to set up underground churches.
Missionary Kim Jung-wook has been jailed and tortured for a year because of his attempts to start underground churches in North Korea. He was presented at a press conference last week where he apologized for his “anti-state crimes” and appealed for his release.
He was also forced to say that South Korea Intelligence services had provided him with information and equipment. The South Korean government said they had no involvement with Kim Jung-wook.
North Korean officials say the 33 people involved with Kim Jung-wook were planning to build a church on the site of a massive statue of North Korea’s founder after they overthrew the government.
Kim Jong-un has been on a murderous rampage including members of his government. His top deputy disappeared last week and some people have speculated that the North Korean leader has killed him.
Islamic terrorists in Syria are forcing Christians to sign documents agreeing to pay hundreds of dollars or be killed for refusing to convert to Islam.
The Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant, an al-Qaeda related terrorist group, has obtained a level of control in parts of Syria that they are giving Christians the options to convert to Islam or pay money to not be killed.
The agreement says that any Christian who doesn’t want to be killed has to pay four gold dinars twice a year, which amounts to about $500 American dollars per six months. The agreement says that middle class Christians will pay half the total and poor pays one quarter of the cost.
The agreement also puts heavy restrictions on Christians regarding their worship. While they will be able to worship, they cannot build new churches or replace any churches that are destroyed by government troops, Islamic terror groups or even ordinary Muslims.
Christians are also prohibited from stopping any Christian from converting to Islam who wishes to do so. They also cannot engage in commerce involving pork.
An anti-Christian group is seeking to have a memorial to men killed during World War I removed because it is in the shape of a cross in a public area.
The American Humanist Association sent a letter threatening a lawsuit if the 40-foot tall Bladensburg Cross is not immediately turn down. The anti-Christianists say that the location of the cross violates the First Amendment of the Constitution.
The 40-foot concrete memorial to 49 Prince George’s County men who were killed in combat during World War I was built by the American Legion in 1925. The monument was initially owned by the state but then deeded to the Maryland-National Capital Park and Planning Commission in 1960.
Steven Lowe, a man from Washington, claims in the complaint that he was “shocked” when he first saw the cross and gets “upset” every time he has to pass it because he is exposed to something that could possibly be Christian. Lowe is trying to perpetuate the myth that the existence of the cross in itself is the state promoting Christianity over other religions.
The town administrator said that the cross has historic and patriotic value and they will not remove it because of the anti-Christian group’s efforts.
The church isn’t violating any rules with the school that hosts their services. They have taken steps to try and accommodate neighbors of the school who are complaining about the traffic in the area on Sundays.
Still, the neighbors of City of God church meeting at Santa Monica elementary school continue to complain and harass the members and leadership of the church. They openly say they don’t want a Christian church in their neighborhood.
“I don’t want anything happening here on Sundays,” said Azin Ehsan, who moved into the neighborhood in 2001. “We have so much noise during the week, we just want it to be quiet. They should find a better venue.”
Azin Ehsan has rebuffed the church’s efforts to work with her and two other neighbors. They met with school officials to complain about the church’s being allowed in their neighborhood and use of the school.
Another neighbor thinks the reason of the people are complaining is that they have an issue with Christians.
“Nobody complains when John Adams [Middle School] has football games. I don’t hear about people writing letters about what a nuisance that is but suddenly, the church for an hour makes a different noise and the community is in an uproar?” Sidonie Smith asked. “We can’t have a double standard about noise in the community.”
It wasn’t that long ago that most of the winners in major award shows like the Academy Awards would thank God before anyone else. That has faded in recent years.
So it is not surprising that many major media outlets noted that when Matthew McConaughey won Best Actor for his role in “Dallas Buyers Club” Sunday night that they pointed out his strong thank you to God.
“First off I want to thank God, because that’s who I look up to. He’s graced my life with opportunities that I know are not of my hand or any other human hand,” McConaughey said in his speech. “He has shown me that it’s a scientific fact that gratitude reciprocates. In the words of the late Charlie Laughton, who said, ‘When you got God you got a friend and that friend is you.'”
He went on to thank his family with special thanks to his mother and his late father.
Critics immediately pounced on the actor for his speech, slamming his credit to God.
“Just stop the stupid God talk,” wrote one critic quoted by Fox News. “I thought we could get through the Oscars without someone thanking God but no he had to ruin it….”
A German family seeking to escape persecution of Christian homeschoolers fled to America looking for freedom and now will be sent back to Germany by the Obama administration.
The Supreme Court denied to hear the appeal of the Romeike family on Monday clearing the way for the administration to force them out of the country.
The administration claimed that because of the goal of Germany was for an “open, pluralistic society” that forcing children to engage in a government school where their values would not be taught or held up for ridicule would allow them to act as fully functioning citizens.
The Home School Legal Defense Association said this is just another step in the Obama administration’s overall campaign to crush religious freedom in the United States.
“The Obama administration’s attitude toward religious freedom, particularly religious freedom for Christians is shocking,” Michael Farris, HSLDA Chairman, told Fox News’ Todd Starnes. “I have little doubt that if this family had been of some other faith that the decision would have never been appealed in the first place. They would have let this family stay.”
In Germany, where homeschooling is illegal, the family will likely have their children taken away by the government.
Purdue University has banned God.
The University, which in the past has defended the rights of a speaker to blaspheme Jesus on their campus, told a donor they cannot put God’s name on a plaque because it could be offensive.
Dr. Michael McCracken made a pledge to the university’s school of mechanical engineering and Purdue offered the McCrackens a can to name a small conference room in the building according to Fox News.
Dr. McCracken wanted to name it after his father, a Purdue graduate. The plaque would have read:
“To those who seek to better the world through the understanding of God’s physical laws and innovation of practical solutions. In honor of Dr. William ‘Ed’ and Glenda McCracken.”
The University instead installed a God-free plaque without telling the family that only mentioned McCracken’s parents.
Fox News’ Todd Starnes has tried to get University officials to explain why they defended blasphemy of Christ on their campus but deny Christians the right to mention God but officials will not return calls.
A panel of public policy experts has said that the most important issue facing Christians today is how the government is undercutting religious freedom.
The discussion at the National Religious Broadcasters Convention featured many nationally known experts on law such as Jay Sekulow of the American Center for Law and Justice, NRB Chief Legal Counsel Craig Parshall and Rafael Cruz, father of Texas Senator Ted Cruz.
Parshall pointed to the current Hobby Lobby case against the Affordable Care Act as a major example of the government trying to strip away the rights of a Christian to own and operate their businesses in a manner consistent with their Christian values.
Jay Sekulow said that Christians and conservatives need to be careful about putting all their eggs in the Supreme Court’s basket. He pointed to the decision regarding the allowance of the Affordable Care Act by a 5-4 decision where Chief Justice John Roberts, who conservatives believed would follow conservative values, voted with the liberal wing of the Court to give President Obama his signature legislation.
They also discussed the wave of intolerance in much of the major media. Fox News reporter Todd Starnes shared the blessing of working at Fox where Christians are welcome and can openly write about their faith.
“I’ve found those who preach tolerance and diversity are many times the most intolerant. I love those opportunities when I can write a story how a life has been changed by the blood of Jesus Christ,” Starnes said.
Pastor Cruz, who was a Cuban immigrant in 1957 who came to the U.S. with only $100, said that he blames pastors for the loss of religious liberty in America.
“If I can blame anyone for our loss of religious liberty in America, I blame our pastors,” said Cruz. “They are hiding behind their pulpits and 501(c)(3)’s. It’s about time we become biblically correct instead of being politically correct. I would rather go to jail than violate what God is telling me to do.”