A New Perspective on Constantine

(Worthy News) – An American missionary was killed while trying to bring the gospel to one of the most isolated tribes in the world.

John Allen Chau, 27, took a ride with local fisherman to India’s North Sentinel Island, which is home to a tribe of hunter-gatherers, who are cut off from the outside world.

Chau was reportedly faced a “flurry of arrows” as soon as he stepped on the island.

“He was attacked by arrows but he continued walking. The fishermen saw the tribals tying a rope around his neck and dragging his body,” the source said. “They were scared and fled but returned next morning to find his body on the seashore.”

A source, who asked not to be named, told Reuters that before he was killed, Chau wrote he was “doing this to establish the kingdom of Jesus on the island…Do not blame the natives if I am killed.” [ Source: CBN News (Read More…) ]

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(Worthy News) – A church in Nepal was recently intimidated into shutting down due to harassment by the country’s Brahmin elite.

“Shiv Sena”–a Hindu Nationalist group from India–“has been working among the Nepalese people and radicalizing them,” explained Pastor Tufani Bhar of Pakhluwa Eternal Life Church in Palpa.

The Indian subcontinent has faced a rising tide of Hindu nationalism since the election of India’s new president, Narendra Modi, and his Bharatiya Janata Party in 2014. While Nepal joined the UN Human Rights Council on January 1st of this year and ratified a constitution in 2016 that defined the country as a secular democratic republic, many Nepali Christians fear that the change is only skin-deep.

“This is still a Hindu nation,” claims BP Khanal, General Secretary of the Janjagaran Party. “When we were trying to promote that constitution, there were so many voices…even unnecessary voices that the country should go back and remain as a Hindu nation.”

Four Nepali churches were attacked by arsonists in May of this year alone. The country’s criminal code, signed into law in 2017, still prohibits evangelization under the threat of up to five years of imprisonment, and “forced conversion” is now the charge leveled at outspoken Christians by Hindu zealots.

Before the spread of Hindu nationalism from India, said Pastor Bhar of his 38 years of ministry in Nepal, “there was no persecution” of Christians.

A 2017 report by the Center for the Study of Global Christianity ranked Nepal tenth in its list of the world’s fastest-growing Christian movements.

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(Worthy News) – Democratic House candidates received more than 8.6 million votes than did their Republican counterparts — the biggest such midterm margin for either party in over 40 years.

According to an NBC News report current as of noon Wednesday, Democratic House candidates got 58,990,609 votes to Republicans’ 50,304,975 — a margin of 53.1 percent to 45.2 percent.

With two races still outstanding, that 8-million vote edge translated into a Democratic advantage in the next U.S. House of 234 to 199 — a 38-seat pickup over the partisan split in the current Congress. [ Source: Washington Times (Read More…) ]

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(Worthy News) – The number of abortions in most of the U.S. fell to 638,169 in 2015, according to data released Wednesday from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, a new post- Roe v. Wade low.

The latest number represents a 2 percent drop from 2014 and a 24 percent drop from 2006. The number of abortions reached a peak in the 1980s, following the 1973 Roe Supreme Court decision that legalized abortion in every state, and mostly fell after that.

The data are incomplete, and are reported voluntarily, but shed light on patterns in demographics and public health practices. The latest information represents 49 areas, excluding California, Maryland, and New Hampshire. [ Source: Washington Examiner (Read More…) ]

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(Worthy News) – On Tuesday, the Arizona Supreme Court agreed to hear another case that shares eerie similarities with the recent Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission Supreme Court case. This time, instead of cake, the court will hear about two artists who run a shop called Brush and Nib Studio. Like Jack Phillips, the two women, Joanna Duka and Breanna Koski, are devout Christians. While they are happy to hand-paint artwork for their customers, particularly for weddings, they do not wish to convey messages that violate their religious beliefs. A sweeping law in Phoenix would mean the artists could face fines and jail time if the artists refuse to design messages with with they disagree.

According to Phoenix City Code 18-4(B)(1)-(3), the ordinance prohibits discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex, national origin, marital status, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, or disability. Adopted in 2013, it applies to businesses offering services to the general public. Unlike with Jack Phillips, there has not been a specific instance where the owners of Brush and Nib were asked to create artwork with which they did not agree. However, Alliance Defending Freedom, which represents the artists, believes “Phoenix interprets its ordinance in a way that forces the two artists to use their artistic talents to celebrate and promote same-sex marriage in violation of their beliefs.” The “law threatens up to six months in jail, $2,500 in fines, and three years of probation for each day that there is a violation.” [ Source: Washington Examiner (Read More…) ]

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(Worthy News) – The United States is laying the groundwork for a long-term commitment to eastern Syria that will include “stabilization” after the defeat of Islamic State and also the demand that “Iranian-commanded forces” leave Syria before the US withdraws. Over the last six months, this policy has increasingly crystalized. It was finally spelled out by US special representative for Syria engagement James Jeffrey at the end of last week.

US intervention in Syria to target Islamic State began in September 2014 to stop the extremists from taking the Kurdish city of Kobani. By April 2016, the US support for the Kurdish People’s Protection Units and the Syrian Democratic Forces, the main partner force fighting ISIS, had expanded to include hundreds of US special forces and teams assisting the effort on the ground. The US presence expanded during the battle to liberate Raqqa in the summer and fall of 2017.

Over the summer, rumors and then statements began to emerge that the US presence in Syria would remain until Iran leaves. In September, National Security Advisor John Bolton said, “we’re not going to leave as long as Iranian troops are outside Iranian borders.” [ Source: Jerusalem Post (Read More…) ]

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(Worthy News) – A Palestinian Authority court in Qalqilya on Wednesday sentenced two Palestinians convicted of selling land to Israeli Jews to 15 years of hard labor.

“The court sentenced F.A.E. and A. Kh. M. from Kafr Thulth in the Qalqilya Governorate for the crime of leaking land to the enemy,” a memo on the PA High Judicial Council’s website said, referring to the two convicts by their initials and using the Arabic term to allude to selling land to Israeli Jews. “The court…sentenced the convicts to 15 years of hard labor.”

Palestinian law considers attempting to sell or selling land to Israeli Jews a punishable offense. [ Source: Times of Israel (Read More…) ]

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(Worthy News) – A top Iranian general claimed US military personnel and assets in the Middle East were within range of his country’s missiles Wednesday, amid ongoing tensions between Tehran and Washington.

Amirali Hajizadeh, the head of the air division for the hard-line Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, said improvements to Iran’s missile arsenal had put US bases in Qatar, the UAE and Afghanistan within reach, as well as US aircraft carriers stationed in the Persian Gulf, according to Iran’s Tasnim news agency.

“They are within our reach and we can hit them if the [Americans] make a move,” he said, according to a translation of his remarks carried by Reuters. [ Source: Times of Israel (Read More…) ]

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(Worthy News) – Amid speculation that US President Donald Trump is looking to roll out his administration’s peace plan for Israelis and Palestinians in February, Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked said Wednesday that she would counsel the American leader that any such proposal was “a waste of time.”

“I think that the gap between the Palestinians and the Israelis is much too big to be bridged,” she said in an English-language interview on stage at the Jerusalem Post diplomatic conference.

She added: “I think personally it’s a waste of time. Although I want peace like anyone else, I think I’m just more realistic. And I know that in the current future, it is impossible.” [ Source: Times of Israel (Read More…) ]

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