Israel’s Minister of Education created a firestorm when he advocated for conversion therapy for gay teenagers. Rafael Peretz, who is also an orthodox rabbi, made the comments in response to a question during an interview with Channel 12’s evening news on Saturday.

The interviewer asked if he believed a gay person’s sexual orientation could be changed and he responded, “I think it is possible. I can tell you I have a very deep familiarity with this type of education and I have done this.” He then told the story of a student he counseled with, saying, “First I hugged him and uttered very warm words – let’s think, let’s learn, let’s contemplate,” the New York Times reports.

Reaction to Peretz’s comments was swift. According to the Jerusalem Post, MK Yair Lapid, a leader in the Blue and White party, said, “I do not know how to explain an education minister who talks about conversion therapy, who opposes joint IDF service for men and women or who honestly says he has no problem with apartheid. For the first time since I can remember, the State of Israel has a government that I am ashamed of.”

Lapid also called for Peretz to be removed from office. He said, “Until Rafi Peretz undergoes conversion therapy for his regressive and wild opinions, he cannot continue to serve as education minister.”

Gay conversion therapy has been…

The Ontario Office of the Chief Coroner recently released updated data and statistics on euthanasia and assisted suicide in the province. Since being legalized on June 17, 2016, there have been 3,302 euthanasia deaths and 1 from assisted suicide.

The data for MAiD (Medical Aid in Dying) showed that the number of deaths from euthanasia and suicide is rising in Ontario. There were 189 assisted deaths in 2016, 841 in 2017, 1,499 in 2018 and 774 in the first six months of 2019. If the trend for 2019 continues, there will be more than 1,500 this year, LifeSite News reports.

Alex Schadenberg of the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition reported that assisted deaths in all of Canada rose more than 2018. 2018 saw 4,325 assisted deaths versus 2,704 in 2018.

MAid statistics for Ontario showed the difficult reasons that people choose euthanasia or assisted suicide. 63% of deaths were cancer related, while 16% were related to circular and respiratory conditions and 12% to neurodegenerative disorders. The remaining 9% were listed as others.

The statistics also revealed that 48% of deaths occurred in hospitals while 43% of those choosing euthanasia and assisted suicide died at home.

The youngest reported assisted suicide in Ontario was a 22-year-old and the oldest was 106. The average age for euthanasia and assisted suicide deaths in Ontario is 74.

Schadenberg said that…

President Donald Trump is lauding Republican unity after a House resolution condemning tweets alleged to be racist passed along party lines, while Democrats are quietly claiming the so-called “Squad” of four played right into the President’s hands. One lawmaker went so far as to say defending the squad in light of their own behavior “makes people’s skin crawl.”

Tuesday’s vote was in response to tweets Trump made over the weekend that targeted four minority congresswomen by saying, “go back and help fix the totally broken and crime infested places from which they came.” 

Even before the House vote, Trump was still tweeting, urging his party not to fall prey to what he termed was a “con game,” CBN News reported.

“…I don’t have a racist bone in my body! The so-called vote to be taken is a Democrat con game,” he tweeted.

The resolution declared that the House “Strongly condemns President Donald Trump’s racist comments that have legitimized and increased fear and hatred of new Americans and people of color.” It passed 240-187 with four Republicans in support and a single Democrat dissenting.

“Every single member of this institution, Democrats and Republicans, should join us and condemn the president’s racist tweets,” House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said on the floor. “To do anything less would be a shameful…

A large chain of abortion and family planning clinics in Maine says it will not follow a new Trump administration pro-life rule and will lose $2 million in annual federal funds.

Maine Family Planning is an association of 18 clinics across the state that provide abortion and family planning services, such as pregnancy tests and contraception. Its Augusta office is the only one that offers surgical abortions, although every clinic across the state provides medical abortions.  

The Trump administration this week began enforcing a new Department of Health and Human Services rule that prevents Title X federal funds going to clinics that “perform, promote, refer for, or support abortion as a method of family planning.” Next year the department will begin enforcing another part of the rule that requires abortion providers to financially and physically separate their abortion services from their non-abortion services. 

It has been dubbed the “Protect Life Rule,” although critics call it the “gag rule.” Title X is a $300 million federally funded program. 

Maine Family Planning receives about $2 million from the program each year. That money comprises roughly 30 percent of its budget, according to the Bangor Daily News. The organization is dipping into an emergency fund, although it doesn’t know how it will make up for the lack of funds long-term. 

Abortion…

The Christian medical doctor who contracted the Ebola virus in Africa while treating patients with the deadline disease says he’s returning to the continent to continue God’s work.

Kent Brantly made national headlines in 2014 when he nearly died after contracting the virus in Liberia. He was flown back to the United States, where he recovered. 

Brantly and other Ebola doctors were Time’s persons of the year in 2014. He was on the magazine’s cover. 

Later, Brantly’s story was featured in the movie Facing Darkness. 

Brantly, his wife and their two children (ages 8 and 10) will move to Zambia this fall to serve at Mukinge Mission Hospital, a 200-bed facility that’s “100 miles from the nearest supermarket,” according to the Christian Chronicle, a Churches of Christ newspaper.

Although he regained his physical strength within a few months, it took him longer to recover emotionally and spiritually, he said.  

“It’s been five years of emotional healing and spiritual healing and growth,” Brantly, 38, told the Christian Chronicle. “I think we’ve grown and been equipped in ways during this (sic) five years that we were not before we went to Liberia.”

Zambia is in the southeast region of Africa. Liberia is on the northwest corner. 

“We’ve spent time praying and fasting and talking together about it … and…