Ukraine: Humanitarian work comes from many sources. - by joel brown

Many missionaries have left Ukraine. Most have left their cities, gotten their families to safety, and are actively involved with the rescue and relief effort.

They are at the borders helping refugees. They are coming back to rescue people. They are coordinating with people all over the world.

Some are shell-shocked and have returned to their home countries. I don’t blame anyone for leaving.

Read more at: Staying To Serve The “Least Of These” – even in War – Living Water UA

EU - Christian Community Wake-up Call - Trump visit - Join and encourage protests against Trump's visit to the EU and show that Christian revolutionary compasion is still alive and well

Bozo is in town - please give him a "warm" welcome

Many historical scholars will tell us that Jesus Christ can be considered a revolutionary leader, even today. 

In the sense that he refused to be a narrow political leader that would just make Judea (todays Israel) politically powerful.  

His mission was worldwide to benefit all mankind; leveling the importance of power and wealth.

He was equally compassionate and attentive to: women, tax collectors, foreigners inclusing Roman Centurians, Lepers, those crippled, those blind, insane Gentiles, Samaritans, Pharisees (though he brought some of them up short for their hypocrisy), Sinners, Rulers of the Synagogue, and very rich people, including Nobility.

Unfortunately today his doctrine is only given "lip service" in many Christian Churches around the world, in particular  the US and Europe.  

What has happened to the revolutionary Spirit of compassion and involvement Jesus spoke about ? 

Case in point. When in recent weeks the US government’s abusive and widely condemned policy of separating migrant children from their families was publicly criticized, the attorney general Jeff Session of the Trump Administration responded, by quoting the New Testament writer Paul, who in the book of Romans calls on people to obey the laws of the government. Really?.

That this would have ruled out the actions of Jesus himself, was seemingly lost on Sessions, as indeed was the fact that Jesus’s family were forced to escape across borders. 

Or the fact that Psalm 202.28 states: "The children of your servants shall dwell secure; their offspring shall be established before you", and as we read in Mark 9:42: "Whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin, it would be better for him if a great millstone were hung around his neck and he were thrown into the sea".

But the Sessions incident highlighted the problem that Christianity has and the problems that are still being created. 

To put it bluntly: in the 2016 presidential election a majority of practicing Christians in the USA voted for the most racist and misogynistic candidate going, and in so doing helping Donald Trump to the position of the most powerful person in the world. 

Against such a background it’s easy to forget that the movement from which Christianity emerged was one that shared possessions in common, renounced war and at least in some ways modelled more progressive understandings of gender than was generally accepted in those days  To use some words that weren’t around at that time in history; human rights, democracy, pacifismt and pro-feminism.. 

It is easy and quite hypocritical in a way, to externalize modern day problems as happening a long way away, or to personalize them in the name of political leaders; but when injustice is being justified in the name of one of the worlds largest faiths, professed by most of the EU population, it is important for us to voice our protest.

Trump’s ‘America First’ ideology has many similarities with those of  other dangerous nationalist- populists around the world..

Trump has also not attempedt to conceal his admiration for other populist movements around the world. He openly supported the Brexit movement, and populist Marianne Le Pen's campaign in the French Presidential election against President Emmanual Macron. He also hails authoritarian 'strongmen' like Abdel Fattah El-Sisi, and Vladimir Putin.  He obviously, secretly, envies their freedom of action, and probably wonders why the restraints of this "bourgeois democracy" continuously tie his hands behind his back. 

In the relatively short time period the current Trump administration has been in power,Trump pulled the US out from the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), the Paris agreement on climate change and the Iran deal. He also withdrewn the US from the United Nations' top human rights body and plans to end NAFTA -- while his recently announced tariffs affecting the EU, China, Mexico and Canada, are on the verge of starting a global trade war.

These International actions, however, are only the top of the Iceberg, in comparison to the changes his administration has already made on the home front, negatively affecting peoples health, immigration policies, taxes,  and personal freedom.

And now.... Donald Trump has arrived in Europe, arrogant and cocky as ever.

Check out your local press and social media for additional details of the Donald Trump visit to the EU, and where demonstrations will be held in your area---and please attend.

Trump's program which starts this afternoon July 10 in Brussels, where Trump will meet with NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg, before participating in high-level sessions with the 28 allies on Wednesday July 11. and Thursday July 12th at the NATO headquarters.

On the 13th of July he will be in Britain where he will meet Prime Minister Theresa May, Queen Elizabeth II and business leaders, before heading to the Trump resort in Scotland on Friday evening, where he’s expected to play some golf over the weekend.  

The US president is due to spend his first and only night in London at the US ambassador’s official residence, Winfield House, in Regent’s Park. Over the weekend he will be going to Scotland for some golf and probably stay at his luxury hotel he owns in Ayrshire, the Trump Turnberry  

On Sunday evening July 15, Trump will fly further north to Helsinki, Finland for a one-on-one meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Given the backdrop of international trade tensions following Trump’s tariff increases; the litany of retaliatory measures announced by U.S. allies including the European Union (EU); Trump’s criticism of NATO; and close scrutiny of his administration’s links to Russia — some of these encounters are bound to be less congenial than others.

The role that we as individuals can each play is to join in demonstrations, wherever they may be held in in Europe. 

You might feel this does not add up to much, but together it can add up in disrupting the US president’s hoped-for, and loved media PR opportunity, by showing an alternative to what he stands for. 

But that is only a first step. The bigger job is, after acknowledging the problem, to dismantle the scaffolding of structural racism, and economic inequality,  that allowed Trump to get where he is today, and which allow comparable policies to happen in Europe and around the world. 

If you live or have family or friends in the areas where Trump is visiting please pass this article along and encourage them to demonstrate. 

Make Trump understand his Administrations policies are not acceptable in the EU.

EU-Digest

Christianity: are some Christian NGO's on the payroll of the US Government?

A Christian Church Service in Vietnam

In March 1996 the National Association of Evangelicals (NAE) adopted a resolution at its convention condemning collaboration between missionaries and intelligence agency employees.

In 1977, the CIA was prohibited from the recruitment of journalists, academics, clergy, and missionaries. However, speaking before a Senate intelligence committee, John Deutch, who was the CIA director during that time  testified that the spy agency could waive the ban in cases of "unique and special threats to national security."

The NAE has requested that Congress "correct this intolerable situation" of soliciting religious workers for covert activity. "For intelligence agencies to seek any relationship whatsoever with our religious workers must be unequivocally prohibited," says the  NAE.

Allowing such a loophole, endangers missionaries as well as church, relief, community development, and refugee workers in politically sensitive areas abroad.

The NAE has also urged missions organizations, not to provide information to any intelligence agency, although many already have such restrictions in place.

"Any foreigner living in a foreign culture already comes under a natural suspicion," says the Southern Baptist Convention Foreign Mission Board. "If this policy is reversed, it would totally erode the ministry of missionaries."

Regardless, however, statements by the Baptists or the NAE , a Christian non-governmental organization funded by the Pentagon was used to smuggle spy equipment into North Korea.

Investigative journalist Matthew Cole of the The Intercept has done lots of work in

ferreting out the details, of what must surely be one of the most ill-conceived military intelligence operations of all time, and that is saying quite a lot.

And Congress was reportedly fully briefed on North Korea , though that has been denied by at least one member of the Intelligence Oversight Committee, who accuses the Pentagon of never pausing to consider the potential blowback that it might produce.

NGOs are fair game for infiltration and cover by intelligence organizations, but their exploitation in that fashion is extremely uncommon. That is because it is impossible to control all the unwitting players in an NGO and any such operation would be susceptible to eventual exposure, with the damage derived from potential blowback far exceeding any possible gain. 

The United States government does in fact impose a ban on recruiting certain categories of individuals as spies. Clergymen are off limits partly for ethical reasons, but more because the exposure of such a relationship would be devastating both to the religious organization itself and to the United States government. Use of the U.S. taxpayer-funded Peace Corps is also banned because exploiting it would potentially turn its volunteers into targets for terrorists.

Recruitment of journalists whose reporting potentially might appear in the U.S. media is also forbidden because the distribution of intelligence agency-produced stories could be construed as an attempt to covertly influence opinion and policies inside the United States. Ironically, the federal government officially opposes spy agency disinformation even though it does the same thing through the judicious leaking of information from the White House and Pentagon.

Bottom-line: whatever way you want to look at it, NGO's, including religious ones, which operate overseas still remain one of the best resources for Government intelligence services as a collection point for intelligence information. From the ground level right up to the top political hierarchy.

In order to avoid this from happening, all Christian NGO's, wherever their global headquarters are, should make sure that they include in the preamble of their statement of purpose the wording "to bring the Gospel without any external , political, or foreign interference.

EU-Digest

The Netherlands: Going Dutch; Netherlands Pains To Find New Government And Might Embrace Christian Traditionalists - by Marcel Michelson

 More than three months after indecisive parliamentary elections, Dutch political parties are still at loggerheads to find a government with majority backing in parliament.

Following several permutations, and excluding the ultra-right PVV party of populist Geert Wilders, the next government looks set to become a centre-right coalition with the CHU Christian traditionalists. Perhaps it is wise to name a neutral cabinet instead.

While some people in Britain and France would like to see a more proportional electoral system like in the Netherlands, the Dutch elections resulted in a myriad of 13 elected parties splitting 150 seats out of 28 parties that participated.

The VVD liberals of Prime Minister Mark Rutte lost five percent points of the votes but remained the biggest party with 33 seats, ahead of the PVV that obtained 20 seats, Christian CDA at 19, centrist D66 also at 19 and Green Left at 14 seats, a gain of 10. SP also had 14 seats.

Read more: Going Dutch; Netherlands Pains To Find New Government And Might Embrace Christian Traditionalists

Canada Terrorism: Trump Silent As Quebec Mosque Terrorist Is White Christian Pro-Trump Fanatic - by Colin Taylor

Canadian police have just identified the lone gunman who attacked a Quebec mosque during prayers last night, killing five praying Muslims and injuring eight. Alexandre Bissonnettte, a Quebec native, has been taken into police custody.

Not surprisingly, Bissonnette’s Facebook page  (since taken down) shows that he “likes” Donald Trump and far-right, Islamophobic French politician Marine Le Pen. He also likes the Christian site Reasonable Faith. Here’s a screenshot from Bassinet’s Facebook page, taken before it was deleted, according to Heavy.com:

Bissonnettte is ardently pro-Trump and anti-Islam, according to a former classmate of his from Université Laval, who told Heavy.com that Bissonnettte “has right-wing political ideas, pro-Israel, anti-immigration. I had many debates with him about Trump. He was obviously pro-Trump.”

Furthermore, a Facebook group called “Welcome to Refugees – Quebec City” posted that it was familiar with Bissonnettte, and that he is “unfortunately known to several activists in Quebec City for his pro-Le Pen and anti-feminist identity positions at Université Laval and on social networks.” Le Pen is an ardent anti-Muslim French politician who has been closely linked to Trump in the past.

So let’s recap: one day after Donald Trump bans Muslims from several countries because, he claims, they pose a threat to the West, one of HIS deranged followers shoots up a crowd of Muslims whose only crime was peacefully practicing their faith.

Obviously, religions do not create terrorism, only terrorists do. But will Donald Trump now ban Canadian Christians from entering the United States? This tragic incident perfectly illustrates why blaming entire religions for violence is not only hateful and bigoted, but stupid and counterproductive.

Donald Trump’s Twitter has been uncharacteristically silent since the identity of the gunman was revealed. Hypocrisy, thy name is Donald Trump!
 
Read more: Trump Silent As Quebec Mosque Terrorist Is White Christian Pro-Trump Fanatic

Sweden: Expats flock to Sweden's evangelical churches

Moving to a new country is never an easy task: moving when you might not know a soul, when the language is a mystery and when you are faced with an entirely new culture. All of it can be downright daunting.

Today a growing number of foreigners moving to Sweden are finding that non-traditional churches can offer a home away from home, particularly those offering services in English.

Estimates say about half of regular evangelical churchgoers are foreign-born.

"I was never particularly religious, but moving around in the expat world made me search for a deeper meaning, for both my family and me," one mother and US native tells The Local outside the Charismatic Baptist New Life Church in Stockholm.

"The modern churches give room to explore and the kids enjoy the more exciting atmosphere. We also get to meet people like us, who are foreigners living in a foreign land."

Regular church attendance in Sweden hovers somewhere around 5 percent, while levels of atheism among Swedes are estimated to be as high as 85 percent.

Yet more than half of all weddings in Sweden take place in churches and nearly 90 percent of burials follow Christian rites.

Read more: Expats flock to Sweden's evangelical churches - The Local

Syria’s Collapse Would Reverberate in Mideast

If Assad’s regime is toppled, the ensuing power struggle might bring with it revenge killings by or against his minority Shiite Alawite sect, which controls the military and the economy, said Aaron David Miller, a fellow at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington.

Assad’s closest allies, Iran and Russia, would be the likely losers if power shifts to Assad’s rivals. Lebanon, Jordan and Israel would benefit if Syria’s new leadership ceases to provide a conduit for arms and assistance from Iran to terrorist groups in Lebanon and along the Israeli border, officials and analysts said. 

Whoever the winners, the major concern is, “When is the retribution going to come?” Miller said.
Many Sunnis will want to take revenge against Alawites and Christians who backed Assad, said David Schenker, director of the program on Arab politics at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.

“You can have a violent and bloody situation at home that creates continued refugee flows into Jordan and Turkey, and instability and sectarian tension in Lebanon,” where the Shiite Hezbollah militia, long backed by Syria and Iran, will face an emboldened Sunni and Christian population.

Read more: Syria’s Collapse Would Reverberate in Mideast - Businessweek

Dutch right-winger lawmaker Geert Wilders brings his crusade against Islam to conservative conference in Colorado

Right winger Dutch parliamentarian Geert Wilders brought his crusade against the Islamic religion to Denver last weekend, warning an audience at the Western Conservative Summit that Europe and the United States are vulnerable to an insidious takeover by what he termed a “dangerous, totalitarian ideology” masquerading as a religion.

“If we do not stop the Islamization, we will lose everything: our identity, our culture, our democratic constitutional state, our freedom, and our civilization,” Wilders told an audience of roughly 1,000 gathered in the main ballroom at the downtown Hyatt Regency Denver on Saturday. The annual summit, in its third year, is sponsored by the Lakewood-based Colorado Christian University’s Centennial Institute and had an estimated 1,300 attendees over three days.

While the reaction to Wilders was mixed — he received repeated standing ovations during his 45-minute talk, but perhaps a third of the audience members remained planted in their seats throughout — one Colorado lawmaker said Americans should take the Islamic threat seriously and consider prohibiting the construction of mosques in the state.

Read more: Dutch lawmaker brings his crusade against Islam to conservative confab | Colorado Statesman

Attempts to revive language spoken in Jesus' time

Two villages in the Holy Land's tiny Christian community are teaching Aramaic in an ambitious effort to revive the language that Jesus spoke, centuries after it all but disappeared from the Middle East.

The new focus on the region's dominant language 2,000 years ago comes with a little help from modern technology: an Aramaic-speaking television channel from Sweden, of all places, where a vibrant immigrant community has kept the ancient tongue alive.

In the Palestinian village of Beit Jala, an older generation of Aramaic speakers is trying to share the language with their grandchildren. Beit Jala lies next to Bethlehem, where the New Testament says Jesus was born.

And in the Arab-Israeli village of Jish, nestled in the Galilean hills where Jesus lived and preached, elementary school children are now being instructed in Aramaic. The children belong mostly to the Maronite Christian community. Maronites still chant their liturgy in Aramaic but few understand the prayers.

Read more: Attempts to revive language spoken in Jesus' time - CBS News

Music Industry: Hillsong United's Christian music finds broad appeal around the world

Christian rocker Larry Norman once cheekily sang, "Why should the devil have all the good music?" He also could have asked, "Why can't Christian music get more respect?"

Take Hillsong United, for instance, an eight-piece Australian rock band doubling as musical teacher, using songs to "connect people to God" and promote "love, freedom and grace for all people," said Joel Houston, the band's frontman and son of Hillsong founders Brian and Bobbie Houston.

Its February album, "Aftermath," topped Billboard's Christian albums chart in the U.S., but more impressively debuted at No. 17 on the Billboard Top 200, sandwiched between Jason Aldean and Justin Bieber.

Hillsong United is not only popular enough to have toured the world since 2007, it's also playing in arenas all over Europe and the US, including the Bradley Center, where the group will make its Milwaukee debut on Monday with the first show of Hillsong's latest North American tour. They will also be playing at the spectacular American Airlines Arena, home of the Miami Heat, on August 6.

Hillsong has been around since 1999, spun off from the youth music ministry of the popular Sydney-based Pentecostal mega-church, Hillsong.


EU-Digest

FoxNews: Florida Investigation Finds No Credible Threat to Teen Christian Convert

For the complete report from FOXNews.com click on this link

Florida authorities' investigation into a teenager's claims that her life is in danger for converting from Islam to Christianity found no credible threats to 17-year-old Rifqa Bary, according to a newly unsealed report. The high school student is in foster care in Orlando after fleeing to Florida from her home in Ohio because, she said, she feared being killed by her family for switching religions.

Rifqa ran away from her parents' house in suburban Columbus in July after her parents, Sri Lankan immigrants Mohamed and Aysha Bary, learned she had been baptized a Christian without telling them.She has said she is afraid of becoming the victim of an "honor killing" if she stays with her father and mother. Her parents have said they have no intention of harming their daughter. The girl fled to the home of the Rev. Blake Lorenz, pastor of the Orlando-based Global Revolution Church — whom she befriended on Facebook. Her father says he believes Rifqa has been brainwashed by fundamentalist Christians.

Boston Heral.com: US economy - Pat Robertson predicts U.S. will embrace socialism, economy will recover in ’09 - by Steven G. Vegh

For the complete report from the BostonHerald.com click on this link

US economy - Pat Robertson predicts U.S. will embrace socialism, economy will recover in ’09 - by Steven G. Vegh

Citing information he says is from God, Christian broadcaster Pat Robertson said Friday that America is headed for veritable socialism as well as an economic rebound under President-elect Barack Obama in 2009. "What the Lord was saying, the people are willing to accept socialism to alleviate their pain," Robertson said on a broadcast of "The 700 Club." Robertson hosts the program, which is aired from the Christian Broadcasting Network studios in Virginia Beach.

Alternet: Confessions of an Evangelical Tree Hugger - by Matthew Sleeth

For the complete report of AlterNet click on this link

Confessions of an Evangelical Tree Hugger- - by Matthew Sleeth

It took us a thousand years to prove this biblical truth: that trees are, indeed, the breath of life. The transfer of life-giving gas from tree to human is not intuitive. Only in relatively recent human history was it discovered that oxygen comes not from rocks but from trees and photosynthesis. God is not subtle about his feeling for trees. “I love the tall cedars,” saith the Lord. Abraham plants an oak. The symbol of Christ’s birthday is a conifer. We decorate them and sing, “O Christmas tree.” Essays are made by fools like me, but only God can make a tree. The kingdom of heaven is “like a tree,” Jesus said. So, yes, call me a tree hugger. So was my Lord.

Interchurch families: CHRISTIAN-MUSLIM MARRIAGES

For the complete report from Interchurch families click on this link

CHRISTIAN-MUSLIM MARRIAGES

Gé Speelman of Utrecht University in the Netherlands spoke on Christian-Muslim marriages during the Graz European Ecumenical Assembly in 1997. By clicking on the above link you can read a shortened version of her paper. The Muslim partner is often confronted with what most people around him think is natural, obvious, self-evident; he/her is the other, the one who has to prove him/her self. Many Muslim partners find they have to defend their faith against attacks which associate Islam with intolerance, backwardness and irrationality. In reaction, many Muslims become very much aware of their cultural and religious heritage. As one Muslim man said: “I would never have known so much about Islam if I had stayed at home and married an Egyptian girl.”

Another factor is that interfaith partners are seen as representatives of their communities. The Turkish Muslim represents the “terrible Turks” who have shaped the history of so many Eastern European countries. The German wife is the “imperialist European” whose community has been responsible for so much repression and bloodshed. Many problems in an interfaith marriage are exactly the same as those experienced by many other couples. But in their case, family and friends are looking out for problems; when they occur, they are defined as arising from differences in culture. A Dutch woman said she did not want to recognize the serious communication problem in her relationship because she was determined to prove to those who said it would never work that her marriage was fantastically successful. The partners had put off talking about their problems until it was too late.

Loved ones want to be more than merely “that Christian”, or “that Muslim”. Of course, they are also “a Christian” and “a Muslim” – much of what we are ties up with our religious traditions. German theologian Ulrich Dietzfelbinger, who described, in a lecture he gave in 1989, his relationship with his Turkish Muslim wife. He describes his tendency to reduce the differences in their beliefs to minor points, the pull to reduce their faith to the lowest common denominator. “After all, we both believe in Almighty God.” In the end, he recognizes that this way of reducing their differences is a way of denying them, leaving both partners with very little faith at all. What he learns is that one should not try to make the other the same as oneself. With new eyes he looks at the doctrine of incarnation. It is strange that God has community with a human being (and therefore with all human beings) in such a way that God is in his/her utmost being qualified by that humanity, while at the same time human beings are not deified and God remains God. Is there not in this strange incarnation something analogous to his marriage, where only love is the guarantor that he respects his partner as being inalienably other, different, and yet at one with himself? Maybe we should just let this question stand.