A New Perspective on Constantine

(Worthy News) – The Fort Indiantown Gap National Guard north of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania has reversed course on its initial decision to ban a Christian scouting group from touring its training facility.

Troop PA-2717, part of the Trail Life USA alternative to Boy Scouts that, according to its website, teaches “timeless values derived from the Bible…set in the context of outdoor adventure,” originally requested to tour the National Guard facility in February before having its application denied in April.

“After researching the organization online, it was quickly discovered that the organization restricted membership to certain persons,” a National Guard spokesperson told Radio Host Todd Starnes, who investigated the matter.

“Army values and policy prevent discrimination against gender or sexual orientation within our ranks, which in turn led to the first-level reviewer denying the request,” the spokesperson elaborated of the Guard’s initial decision.

Trail Life was finally allowed to tour the facility, but only after contacting First Liberty Institute and the Independence Law Center, specializes in religious liberty cases, who penned a letter to the National Guard challenging it to abide by its First Amendment obligations and threatening legal action.

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(Worthy News) – Rhode Island governor Gina Raimondo signed into law the most recent in a slew of bills designed to protect or expand abortion rights on June 19th, following bills in Maine, Vermont, Illinois, Nevada, and New York.

The new bill, entitled the Reproductive Privacy Act, will allow for abortions to take place after doctors have determined a fetus to be viable, or capable of surviving outside the womb following birth, as long as the birth presents substantial risks to the mother’s health.

“Women and their families across Rhode Island will be free from the fear that the reproductive health care they need today will be illegal tomorrow,” said Raimondo, who acknowledged that the bill constituted somewhat of an insurance policy in light of the Supreme Court conservative majority that may allow for the overturning of Roe V. Wade.

Despite the passage of the bill, a poll taken by the Susan B. Anthony List found that 73% of Rhode Island voters opposed third-trimester abortions, which the bills in New York, Illinois, and Vermont also effectively legalized by permitting doctors to perform abortions after viability, or around 24 to 28 weeks.

“Rhode Islanders should not be fooled by the smokescreen of ‘compromise’: This law expands abortion on demand through the moment of birth,” said Susan B. Anthony List President Marjorie Dannenfelser.

On the other end of the spectrum, seven states—Alabama, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, and Ohio—passed laws this Spring preventing abortions after a fetal heartbeat is detected, or around 6 weeks, which conservatives feel may provide the final push in overturning the 1973 Supreme Court decision that made abortion a constitutional right under the privacy clause of the 14th Amendment.

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(Worthy News) – Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told Russian President Vladimir Putin’s top security adviser on Monday that Israel will do “anything it takes” to ensure Iran does not obtain nuclear weapons.

“I’m certain that Russia understands what it means for us when a regime calls for our annihilation, and acts on a daily basis to achieve that aim,” Netanyahu said in a meeting at his Jerusalem office with Russia’s National Security Council Secretary Nikolai Patrushev.

The meeting comes ahead of a first-ever trilateral summit Tuesday between the Russian, Israeli and American national security advisers — Patrushev, Meir Ben-Shabbat and John Bolton, respectively. [ Source: Times of Israel (Read More…) ]

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(Worthy News) – Giving to houses of worship, denominational bodies and religious television and radio declined in 2018 after years of growth as individual Americans donated about $3 billion less than they did in 2017 under a new federal tax code, according to a new study.

The Giving USA Foundation, an arm of the Giving Institute, released its 2019 annual report on philanthropy in the U.S. conducted by the Indiana University Lilly Family School of Philanthropy on Tuesday.

The study is the longest-running and most comprehensive report on charitable giving in the United States. [ Source: Christian Post (Read More…) ]

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(Worthy News) – With more than 800,000 followers on Facebook, Chicago-based internet preacher and U.S. Army veteran, Marcus Rogers, has an audience on social media that’s much greater than popular established churches like Rick Warren’s Saddleback Church, and is just about 300,000 shy of Joel Osteen’s Texas-based Lakewood Church’s 1.1 million followers.

“I am just a nobody trying to tell everybody about somebody who can save anybody! His name is Jesus,” Rogers, who turns 33 next month, boldly declares in the introduction to his page which you must follow in order to get the latest updates.

With one click his latest words of wisdom for Christian living are delivered in written posts and videos which often rack up millions of views. [ Source: Christian Post (Read More…) ]

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(Worthy News) – The testimonies of Palestinians who suffered torture at the hands of the Palestinian Authority because they collaborated or were suspected of collaborating with Israel are due to be presented to the International Criminal Court at The Hague on Monday.

Two years ago, Jerusalem District Court Judge Moshe Drori ruled that the PA was responsible for abuses against 52 Israeli and Palestinian citizens from Judea and Samaria that included murder, abduction, imprisonment, torture and rape.

The ruling described horrific violations: the victims were subjected to electric shocks, hung upside down for long periods, had molten plastic poured on them, had their fingernails and teeth pulled out, were sterilized, denied sleep and food. [ Source: Algemeiner (Read More…) ]

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(Worthy News) – The United States military and partners from 19 countries are getting set to kick off a massive series of war drills in Ukraine amid rising threats from Iran and Russia, according to the Defense Department.

From July 1 to 12, American military assets will join with “19 nations, 33 ships, 26 aircraft, and over 3,000 troops to participate in a maritime, air, and land exercise that will enhance capabilities, improve interoperability and build upon decades of partnership and friendship,” according to information provided by the Defense Department.

The drills, an annual exercise known as Sea Breeze that is now in its 19th year, are set to begin at a tense time for the Trump administration, which is seen as on the brink of war with Iran after it downed an unmanned American drone and threatened greater attacks on U.S. forces in the region. Russia also has been increasing its threats, with new reports indicating Moscow will begin conducting “observational flights” over America. [ Source (Read More…) ]

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(Worthy News) – Missouri’s Department of Health and Senior Services did not allow the state’s last remaining Planned Parenthood clinic to renew its license to perform abortions.

The state allowed the clinic’s license to lapse at the end of May due to concerns stemming from an earlier investigation that found health violations at the clinic, the St. Louis American reported. Officials cited the clinic for 30 health violations in the past year, according to a May 2019 report, with four violations involving failed abortions. Two of the failed abortions resulted in patients being hospitalized.

State officials insisted on investigating health violations further, but were stonewalled by physicians at the clinic, who cited patient confidentiality. [ Source: Washington Free Beacon (Read More…) ]

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by Jordan Hilger, Worthy News Correspondent

(Worthy News) – Mike Pompeo is in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia this week to “build out a global coalition…prepared to push back against the world’s largest state sponsor of terror,” following the downing of a $160 million unmanned U.S. drone by Iran on June 20.

The tour of U.S.-allied Gulf Arab states by the U.S. Secretary of State will begin in Jeddah and end in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, before Pompeo heads to India, South Korea, and Japan, as the U.S. and its Middle East Sunni allies circle the wagons against Shi’ite Iran’s aggression.

In a press conference Sunday ahead of his trip, Pompeo warned of a “significant set of new sanctions” against Iran to be announced this week designed to curb the Islamic Republic’s ability “to foment terror, to build out their nuclear weapons system, [and] to build out their missile program,” the U.S. has blamed Iran for a series of attacks on international vessels in the region’s oil transport waterways over the last month.

Simultaneous to Pompeo’s meetings with Gulf Arab leaders, John Bolton, Meir Ben-Shabbat, and Nikolai Patrushev, representing the security concerns of the U.S., Israel, and Russia respectively in the evolving Iran crisis, met in Jerusalem Monday to begin a two-day summit Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called “a very important summit for ensuring stability in the Middle East during turbulent times.”

Despite continually holding out the olive branch to Iran contingent upon the abandonment of its nuclear weapons program, Trump said in an NBC interview aired Sunday that conflict with Iran would mean “obliteration like you’ve never seen before” for the Islamic Republic.

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(Worthy News) – Twenty Democratic presidential candidates attending a Planned Parenthood forum on Saturday vowed to defend abortion rights under nearly any circumstance while largely ignoring nuances around the issue that have already roiled their party heading into the 2020 election.

The event sponsored by Planned Parenthood Action Fund – the group’s political arm – was the first of the election season centered on abortion. It came on the sidelines of the South Carolina Democratic Party’s state convention, a pivotal gathering of the party faithful in the South’s first primary state.

The candidates were united in decrying a series of tough, recent abortion restrictions approved by Republican-controlled legislatures around the country geared to ultimately provoke a Supreme Court case that could overturn the landmark Roe v. Wade decision. [ Source: Washington Times (Read More…) ]

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