A New Perspective on Constantine

by Jordan Hilger, Worthy News Correspondent

(Worthy News) – A new public opinion poll found a surprising openness in American adults toward the idea of teaching the Bible in school.

The 2019 PDK Poll found that 58% of the over 2,000 adults it sampled—which included 556 public school teachers and 1,083 parents of school-age children—favored the idea of Bible electives.

Only 38% of the adults surveyed, moreover, said that such classes “may improperly promote Judeo-Christian religious beliefs,” while 6% said that Bible classes should be mandatory.

Moderating the opinion that public school teachers tend to be wholly liberal or secular, the poll also found that the percentage of teachers who identify as evangelical roughly matched that of the general population, with 37% of respondents calling themselves evangelical Christians, compared to 36% of the American public.

The PDK poll of the Public’s Attitudes Toward the Public Schools, formerly associated with Gallup, has collected annual public opinion data on education since 1969.

The post Poll Finds Evangelical Christian Presence in Public Schools, Favorable Attitude to Bible Classes Among Teachers and Parents appeared first on Worthy Christian News.

by Jordan Hilger, Worthy News Correspondent

(Worthy News) – In a discouraging sign, 9 Sudanese pastors originally indicted under Islamist dictator Omar al-Bashir have been brought up on charges again.

7 of the 9 pastors were jailed briefly in Omdurman near Khartoum, the capital, in 2017 after the Ministry of Guidance and Religious Endowments demanded they hand the keys of their church over to a Ministry-appointed committee.

“Police asked if we still maintain our stance on our refusal to acknowledge the committee…and we said yes, because it is not the work of the [government] ministry to appoint committees for the church,” Pastor Kuwa Shamaal, one of the targeted pastors and head of missions for the Sudanese Church of Christ (SCOC), told Morning Star News in 2017.

Moderating hopes that the Transitional Military Council which stepped in after the ouster of the Islamist Bashir in early April would ease the burden on Christians, the case against the pastors was reopened after being dismissed in August of last year, prompted by new false evidence from the same Ministry that the pastors were not the actual leaders of their church.

According to International Christian Concern, the new development in the case is typical of the administrative harassment the men had suffered at the hands of Bashir’s Islamist regime for years.

Sudanese Christians expressed high hopes in early April after the ouster of longtime dictator Omar al-Bashir ignited weeks of pro-democracy protests, with leaders of the Muslim Sudanese Professionals Association even encouraging Christians to join them in calling on the Transitional Military Council to form a democratic government with freedom of religion.

The post Case Against Sudanese Pastors Reopened Amidst Hopes For Democracy, Freedom of Religion appeared first on Worthy Christian News.

by Jordan Hilger, Worthy News Correspondent

(Worthy News) – Three Christians have been arrested in Nepal since June, all on charges of “attempting to convert.”

Bradley Navarro Anagaran, an American, was arrested on June 23rd for possessing discipleship literature sources said was for use only in a church context, and both he and local pastor Hira Singh Sunar were imprisoned for 11 days “in a miserable condition,” according to Religious Liberty Forum Nepal (RLFN).

“The court procedures in Nepal take several years and are tiresome,” Tanka Subedi, chair of the RLFN, told Morning Star News of Anagaran’s dilemma, in which he must stand trial in Nepal after returning to the United States. “I personally don’t know how he will be able to do that, as it is a great financial burden to travel every time for his court date from the United States to Nepal.”

In early August, 73-year-old Korean national Cho Yusang was also released on bail after spending 15 days in prison conditions that led to a deterioration of his health for reportedly distributing Christian leaflets and possessing a trove of Bibles, yielding a medical bill that put a dent in his already modest finances, according to Subedi.

Nepal introduced an “anti-conversion” law in 2017, and upped the prison sentence for proselytizing from 3 years to 5 in 2018, putting Christian evangelists in jeopardy in a country that has risen to 32nd on Open Doors USA’s World Watch List in recent years.

The post American, Korean Christians ‘Treated As Criminals,’ ‘Kept in a Miserable Condition’ In Nepal appeared first on Worthy Christian News.

(Worthy News) – Hillary Clinton operatives fed the FBI false information on President Trump and his aides in the months following his election, according to an analysis of an FBI agent’s interview with a key conduit.

The agent’s interview notes (known as 302s) of Bruce Ohr, then an associate deputy attorney general in the Department of Justice, were obtained by the conservative investigative group Judicial Watch.

“These new Bruce Ohr FBI 302s show an unprecedented and irregular effort by the FBI, DOJ, and State Department to dig up dirt on President Trump using the conflicted Bruce Ohr, his wife, and the Clinton/DNC spies at Fusion GPS,” said Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton. [ Source: Washington Times (Read More…) ]

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(Worthy News) – As California Democrats try to keep President Trump off the state’s Republican primary ballot next year, Republicans in other states are pondering plans to cancel or modify their own 2020 presidential nominating contests and essentially affirm the party’s support for Mr. Trump before voters head to the polls.

A new California law requiring candidates to disclose five years of tax returns has raised fresh legal and constitutional questions on ballot access, while nascent proposals to scale back Republican nominating contests in states such as South Carolina and Nevada have drawn criticism from William F. Weld, the most prominent Republican challenging Mr. Trump in 2020.

Shawn Steel, a Republican National Committee member from California, called his state’s law a “political farce” and predicted it would be struck down “by Christmas, if not sooner.” [ Source: Washington Times (Read More…) ]

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(Worthy News) – Authorities say a man was killed during a shooting at a small northeast Mississippi church.

The Daily Journal reports that Ripley Police Chief Scott White said the shooting occurred Sunday at West Ripley Church of Christ. White says a constable for Tippah County, Keith Bullock, and another church member were involved in the shooting. [ Source: Washington Times (Read More…) ]

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(Worthy News) – The U.S. Supreme Court will start its next term after a summer punctuated by mass shootings that left more than two dozen dead, heightening the impact of pending cases that focus on when civilians can carry weapons in public.

The most immediate matter involves a New York City ordinance that placed severe limitations on transporting handguns that are locked and unloaded. The high court agreed in January to take up the dispute between three residents and the city government, marking the first time since 2010 — when it struck down Chicago’s handgun ban — the Supreme Court would hear a Second Amendment case.

The measure permits a handgun owner with a so-called “premises license” to take the firearm to one of seven shooting ranges located within the city, but forbids carrying it beyond the five boroughs, even to second homes or ranges. [ Source: Washington Examiner (Read More…) ]

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(Worthy News) – A ban on the enforcement of three new state laws that restrict abortion, including one that was expected to shut down the sole clinic providing surgical abortions in Arkansas, was extended indefinitely Tuesday by a federal judge.

Fourteen days earlier, U.S. District Judge Kristine Baker temporarily blocked the laws from being enacted on the eve of their effective date. But the temporary restraining order was set to expire at 11:45 p.m. Tuesday in the absence of the preliminary injunction Baker signed at 5 p.m.

The laws affected by the injunction are Act 493 of 2019, which bans abortions at 18 weeks of pregnancy; Act 619 of 2019, which prohibits abortions based solely on the likelihood of fetal Down syndrome; and Act 700 of 2019, which requires all abortion providers in Arkansas to be board-certified or board-eligible in obstetrics and gynecology. [ Source: Arkansas Online (Read More…) ]

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(Worthy News) – Saudi Arabia and Qatar on Sunday joined a chorus of condemnation of Israel for using force against Palestinians at the Al-Aqsa Mosque, the Jerusalem holy site known to Jews as the Temple Mount, after clashes erupted there between the Israel Police and Muslim worshipers earlier in the day.

A Saudi Foreign Ministry source denounced the “Israeli occupation forces’ storming of Al-Aqsa Mosque and attacking worshipers on the first day of Eid Al-Adha,” according to the Saudi Press Agency.

“The source expressed the Kingdom’s rejection of the continuation of Israeli violations against the Palestinian people, calling on the international community to protect the Palestinian people from various Israeli aggressive practices that provoke the feelings of Muslims and violate the rights of the Palestinian brethren,” it said. [ Source: Times of Israel (Read More…) ]

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(Worthy News) – Riots erupted on the Temple Mount on Sunday, as Muslims celebrating Eid al-Adha (“Festival of Sacrifice”) attempted to prevent Jews from entering. Police ultimately pushed back against the protesters to allow a record-breaking number of Jews to visit the site.

Hundreds of Jews lined up to visit the Temple Mount on the morning of Tisha B’Av, the day on which Jews mourn the destruction of the Temples in Jerusalem, as well as a series of calamities which befell the Jewish people throughout history on the same date.

However, local Islamic authorities on Friday had urged Muslims to converge on the site on Sunday in the hope of preventing Jews from praying there. [ Source: JNS (Read More…) ]

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