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Billy Graham’s Grandson Says the Church Must Hold Child Abusers Within Their Ranks Accountable, Not Marginalize Victims to Protect Offenders

Church and Ministry

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Billy Graham’s Grandson Says the Church Must Hold Child Abusers Within Their Ranks Accountable, Not Marginalize Victims to Protect Offenders

(Photo: Courtesy of H. Tchividjian)
Basyle “Boz” Tchividjian, executive director of Godly Response to Abuse in the Christian Environment, known by the acronym of GRACE, and grandson of the Rev. Billy Graham.

Christian Post Report – A grandson of the Rev. Billy Graham says churches must hold child abusers in their ranks accountable for their actions.

Boz Tchividjian, executive director of the group Godly Response to Abuse in the Christian Environment, told The Christian Post in an interview on Monday that “all too often the response of the Christian community is contrary to this beautiful Gospel.”

“This is done when the safety and care of abuse victims is sacrificed in order to protect the reputations of individuals and institutions,” said Tchividjian.

“This sacrifice is most commonly demonstrated through ignoring or marginalizing victims and protecting offenders.”

Tchividjian of GRACE told CP that rather than do this churches should adopt a “Gospel-centered approach” to dealing with incidents of child abuse.

“[Churches] should be the place where children and survivors feel most safe and most loved,” said Tchividjian.

“My prayer is that one day churches will be the place offenders feel the least safe knowing that the church is vigilantly watching over its children and won’t hesitate to report suspected abuse to the God-ordained authorities. I think Jesus requires nothing less of us.”

Chaplains for Children

Tchividjian’s comments to CP come as the GRACE leader is planning to attend a multi-day course event at Viterbo University of Wisconsin titled “Chaplains for Children.”

Sponsored by the Gundersen National Child Protection Training Center and scheduled for June 8-10, the conference will focus on equipping individuals to respond and to recognize incidents of abuse.

“The course discusses in detail the impact of child abuse on a victim’s sense of spirituality and offers concrete suggestions for working with medical and mental health professionals to assist a child in coping with maltreatment,” reads an entry on the Gundersen website. “The course also discusses ideal child protection policies for a faith based institution, including handling a situation in which a convicted sex offender seeks to join a congregation.”

Tchividjian told CP that his involvement in the Chaplains for Children conference will center on “the importance of effectively responding to child sexual abuse disclosures.”

“My experience is that the response to abuse disclosures (inside and outside of the church) is all too often dependent upon the influence, charisma, or wealth of the alleged perpetrator,” said Tchividjian.

“The hopeful outcome of this training will be to help church leaders understand the importance and implications of responding to abuse disclosures with excellence.”

(Photo: Reuters/Brian Frank)

Josh Duggar, former executive director of Family Research Council Action, speaks at the Family Leadership Summit in Ames, Iowa, August 9, 2014. The pro-family Iowa organization is hosting the event in conjunction with national partners Family Research Council Action and Citizens United.

The Duggar Controversy

Sexual abuse in the church has been extensively covered by major media outlets over the past several years.

Over a decade ago, the Roman Catholic Church’s sex abuse scandal made global headlines as it was revealed that numerous Catholic leaders had looked the other way when priests were abusing minors.

Recently Josh Duggar of the conservative Christian family at the center of the popular reality TV series “19 Kids and Counting” was found to have committed child abuse while a minor years ago.

Rather than be legally prosecuted for his actions, Jim Bob and Michelle Duggar sent their son to a Christian group known as the Institute in Basic Life Principles for counseling.

The fallout from the controversy has led TLC to reportedly cancel “19 Kids and Counting,” possibly indefinitely.

Regarding the controversy, Tchividjian told CP that the controversy was “tragic” and showed the need for legal accountability regarding incidents of sexual abuse in the church or in a Christian family.

“The Duggar situation has been a tragic reminder to all of us about the necessity of immediately reporting sexual abuse to the proper authorities, regardless of the age of the offender or whether or not the crime occurred inside or outside of the home,” said Tchividjian.

Source : Christian Post

Not the Bait but the Bite

Opinion

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Christian Post Report – “No one here has more authority than I do. He has held back nothing from me except you, because you are his wife. How could I do such a wicked thing? It would be a great sin against God.”
— Genesis 39:9

Sometimes after we have had a little success, after we have come through the adversity, after we have climbed the social ladder, we are more vulnerable than we were before. There was a time we trusted in God because we had to. We trusted in God because if He didn’t come through, we weren’t eating that night. We trusted in God because if He didn’t come through, the rent wouldn’t get paid. If God didn’t come through, we weren’t going to make it through the week.

(Photo: rever Hoehne for Harvest Ministries)
Greg Laurie, senior pastor of Harvest Christian Fellowship in Riverside, California and Harvest Orange County in Irvine, California, shares the Gospel with a sold-out crowd of 19,000 for Harvest America at the American Airlines Center and Victory Park in Dallas, Texas, Oct. 5, 2014.

But now maybe we have a nice amount of money in savings and investments. Maybe we have done very well at work. Maybe we’re not as dependent upon God. Maybe we’ve lowered our guard just a little bit. Know this: greater success leads to greater times of vulnerability.

We see this in the life of Joseph. He was a total success in Potiphar’s house. And then came the temptation. Along came Potiphar’s wife. It must have been very flattering for her to pay attention to him and talk to him about how attractive he was. He had, for a time, been saturated with Egyptian values, and those values that came from his parents might have seemed very worn-out and archaic. He could have rationalized it and said, “Well, if I give in to her, I will move to the top more quickly.” But here is what Joseph knew: God was there, and God was watching. So Joseph refused her advances.

Joseph recognized that temptation isn’t a sin; it is a call to battle. He wasn’t made of stone. He was vulnerable in this area. Yet he resisted her.

You may think that if you’re really spiritual, you won’t be tempted. But it is not the bait that constitutes the temptation. It is the bite.

Copyright © 2015 by Harvest Ministries. All rights reserved.
Unless otherwise indicated, Scripture taken from the New King James Version. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved. Bible text from the New King James Version is not to be reproduced in copies or otherwise by any means except as permitted in writing by Thomas Nelson, Inc., Attn: Bible Rights and Permissions, P.O. Box 141000, Nashville, TN 37214-1000
Used with Permission

Source : Christian Post

Hundreds of Jewish Protesters Block Christians From Visiting King David’s Tomb, Site of Jesus’ Last Supper

World News

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(Photo: Screengrab/ B’Hadrei Haredim )
Christian Post Report – Hundreds of Jewish protesters block a group of Greek Orthodox Christians from entering the site of King David’s tomb on May 31, 2015.

Hundreds of Jewish protesters blocked a group of Greek Orthodox Christians from entering the site in Old Jerusalem that Jewish tradition believes is where King David is buried and where Christians believe Jesus held his infamous Last Supper on Sunday.

The protesters held a mass prayer service and study while attempting to block access to the building. Israeli Police managed to ensure the Christians access to the site where they held a religious ceremony to celebrate Pentecost, according to a spokesman for the department.

20 Yeshiva students returned early Monday morning to protest and block another Christian group from entering, but were removed by police, according to The Jerusalem Post.

“The Christians called police to remove them and units arrived at the scene immediately to allow the representatives to go into the area,” said Police spokesman Mickey Rosenfeld. “The group was peacefully dispersed and no arrests were made.”

No arrests were made on either day, according to authorities.

The Jewish protesters were there “to prevent the desecration of King David’s tomb by an idolatrous ceremony of the Greek Church,” according to protest organizer Yehudah Puah.

Jerusalem Municipality council member Arieh King expressed his support for the protests to Jewish publication B’Hadrei Haredim stating “we have gathered here to sanctify God’s name. The debasement of this holy place will not be allowed to take place.”

The protesters included Jews from various sectors, but was comprised mostly of one branch of the Breslov Hassidic community.

A current status-quo arrangement allows Christians to pray at the site on specific holidays. The Vatican is lobbying the nation of Israel to give Christians more access to it which is strongly opposed by Israeli Jewish fundamentalist groups.

A similar protest was held at the site last May by Orthodox Jews looking to thwart a visit from Pope Francis who planned on holding a mass at the place where Jesus held the Last Supper.

Jewish leaders argued at the time that the mass being held there would denigrate the Jewish religion. The mass was held last June.

Contact: [email protected]; follow me on Twitter @vinfunaro

Source : Christian Post

ISIS Isn’t Wrong About Being Able to Get Nuclear Weapon From Pakistan, India’s Defense Minister Says

World News

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(Photo: Reuters/Stringer CD/PN)
Christian Post Report – India’s junior foreign minister Rao Inderjit Singh addresses the media during a media conference in Havana, Cuba, September 6, 2005. Singh said Cuba has given India’s state-owned Oil and Natural Gas Corp two blocks of its Gulf of Mexico waters to explore for oil. Singh also said ONGC is negotiating a 30 percent share in blocks contracted by Spain’s Repsol YPF oil major.

After a recent Islamic State English magazine article claimed that the terrorist group could buy nuclear arms from Pakistan, India’s defense minister warned last weekend that ISIS does have the connections and resources needed to purchase nuclear weapons from Pakistan.

At a security conference in Singapore last Saturday, Rao Inderjit Singh, India’s Minister of State for Defence, said he’s “afraid” that ISIS could possibly gain nuclear capabilities, Bloomberg reported.

“With the rise of ISIS in West Asia, one is afraid to an extent that perhaps they might get access to a nuclear weapon from states like Pakistan,” Singh asserted.

The 64-year-old’s comments come a week after an ISIS Dabiq article — allegedly written by British hostage John Cantlie — stated that ISIS is “infinitely” closer to purchasing a nuclear weapon from Pakistan and added that the group was capable of smuggling it into the United States.

“The Islamic State has billions of dollars in the bank, so they call on their wilayah [province] in Pakistan to purchase a nuclear device through weapons dealers with links to corrupt officials in the region,” the article claims.

The ISIS article further explained that once the group acquired a nuclear weapon, it could transport it to West Africa, ship it over to South America and then smuggle it up to the U.S. border, where militants would blend in with the millions of other illegal immigrants trying to get into the U.S. through the porous southern border.

“Perhaps such a scenario is far-fetched but it’s the sum of all fears for western intelligence agencies and it’s infinitely more possible today than it was just one year ago,” the article states. “And if not a nuke, what about a few thousand tons of ammonium nitrate explosive? That’s easy enough to make.”

Although Singh thinks it is plausible for ISIS to acquire a nuclear weapon from Pakistan, Anthony Glees, director of University of Buckingham’s Centre for Security and Intelligence Studies, said last week that it makes little sense for Pakistan to sell ISIS nuclear weapons.

“It would be suicidal for Pakistan to supply them and suicidal for ISIS to seek to acquire them — it would lead to immediate military intervention,” Glees said. “However, it is possible that ISIS might try to acquire nukes from somewhere, but if so, all western intelligence agencies would be on the highest alert to prevent this.”

Singh’s comments could be an attempt to take the international community’s eyes off of the security concerns of India’s own nuclear program.

According to Bloomberg, India has been the subject of criticism over its nuclear security, as the Washington-based think tank Nuclear Threat Initiative cited concerns last year over the quantity of India’s nuclear material and corruption among government officials.

Source : Christian Post

For King & Country Takes Home Top K-Love Fan Award: ‘We Stand Before You As Men Who Truly Believe in the Name of Jesus’

Entertainment

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(Photo: Twitter/ for King & Country)
Christian Post Report – for King & Country attended the 2015 K-Love Fan Awards.

Contemporary Christian pop duo for King & Country, boldly declared they are true believers in the name of Jesus after taking home the night’s top honor at the K-Love Fan Awards in Nashville, Tenn. on Sunday.

Comprised of Australian-American brothers Luke and Joel Smallbone, for King & Country took home three major K-Love Fan Awards, including the most coveted Artist of the Year award.

During an emotional acceptance speech, Luke Smallbone addressed his continued health problems with ulcerative colitis – a condition that causes inflammation in the digestive tract that took the musician off the road for months in 2013.

“I’m not 100 percent healed from this illness, but I know the man that can heal me,” said the singer through tears after accepting the award for Artist of the Year. “We stand before you [as] men who truly believe in the name of Jesus.”

With songs such as “The Proof Of Your Love” and “Fix My Eyes,” for King & Country had previously garnered two Grammy Awards and a Dove Award. In a past interview, the pop rock musicians explained their mission to combine spiritual truths with their music in order to reach listeners.

“The power of music can impact our mood, emotions, our day,” said Joel Smallbone, according to CrossRhythms.com. “But when you merge the strength of music with the heart, hope and passion of the Gospel… it has the ultimate power not only to change someone’s day, but to impact them for eternity. This is why we write music and sing songs – we hope that people will be moved, encouraged and stirred to live a life for someone greater than themselves.”

(Photo: Courtesy of The Media Collective)
Kirk Cameron and Elizabeth Hasselbeck co-hosted the 2015 K-LOVE FAN AWARDS on May 31, 2015.
(Photo: courtesy of The Media Collective)
for King & Country accepts the 2015 K-Love Artist of the Year Award on May 31, 2015.

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Meanwhile, the K-Love Fan Awards are the only fan-voted awards show in Christian music history. The ceremony is presented annually by the Christian music radio network K-LOVE, which operates more than 400 stations across the country, and this year’s show was hosted by actor Kirk Cameron and “Fox & Friends” news anchor Elizabeth Hasselbeck.

In addition to for King & Country, the 2015 K-Love Fan Awards recognized leading Christian artists such as Chris Tomlin, who won Male Artist of the Year, and Female Artist of the Year winner Francesca Battistelli. Other K-Love Fan Award winners included Lauren Daigle, and Newsboys.

The 2015 awards ceremony also saw performances by Crowder, Matthew West, Colton Dixon, TobyMac, Kari Jobe, Tenth Ave North, Plumb, Danny Gokey and many more. Presenters included “Do You Believe” star Brian Bosworth, Natalie Grant, Benjamin Watson, and Steven Curtis Chapman, among others.

The night also honored the late Andrae Crouch as well as Billy Rae. Steven Curtis Chapman performed “To God be the Glory” and “Soon and Very Soon” in Crouch’s memory.

Source : Christian Post

UN Agency Hits Back Against Accusations It’s Pushing Abortions on Nigerian Rape Victims, Says It Abides by Law

World News

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(Photo: Reuters/Afolabi Sotunde)
Christian Post Report – A woman reflects while feeding her baby at a registration centre in Geidam stadium, Nigeria, May 6, 2015. Niger has evacuated Nigerians living around Lake Chad, military and aid officials told Reuters on Tuesday, as the armies of four west African nations battle to quash the Islamist militants. A six-year insurgency by Boko Haram in Nigeria has seen thousands killed and displaced about 1.5 million people in the country. Nigerians who fled to the Nigerian border said they had been called out of their homes, lined up and brutally hurried out with no supplies. Some were picked up in trucks at the border town of Mainé-Soroa and taken to two camps in Geidam in Nigeria’s Yobe state, set up in a primary school and a small stadium. Others walked the whole way or got rides for part of the way.

The United Nations Population Funds has hit back against accusations that it’s pushing abortions on Nigerian rape victims who are pregnant, stating that it always abides by the government’s laws, and promotes voluntary family planning instead.

“The U.N. is made of governments. It is not an NGO. All UNFPA work is at the request of governments, in line with their national priorities and plans. Its programmes are designed and implemented by and with the government of Nigeria and respect the nation’s sovereignty and laws,” Azza Karam, senior adviser at UNFPA, told the World Evangelical Alliance in an email conversation shared with The Christian Post.

“If governments allow abortions by their own laws, they agreed internationally at Population Conferences that their health systems are to make them safe and accessible. UNFPA does not promote abortion as a method of family planning in any of the more than 150 countries where it works, including Nigeria. It promotes voluntary family planning, so women can exercise their human right to determine freely the number and spacing of their children. This helps reduce unintended pregnancies and recourse to abortion,” Karam argued.

Earlier in May, the Foundation for African Heritage, a coalition of non-governmental organizations in Nigeria, accused the U.N. of pushing for the scores of women and girls raped by Boko Haram militants to be allowed abortions, which is illegal in most cases under Nigerian law.

The pro-life group Society for the Protection of Unborn Children additionally argued that UNFPA is using “counseling” outreach to women to cover-up for offering abortion advice.

“UNFPA is one of the leading international groups promoting abortion in the developing world. It is sending huge numbers of reproductive health kits to displacement camps in Nigeria where women rescued from Boko Haram have been taken,” the group said.

“The term ‘reproductive health’ is used to cover a range of interventions including abortion. SPUC fears that these emotionally vulnerable, malnourished women will be pressured into aborting their babies.”

Karam said, however, that UNFPA works extensively with faith-based groups, and would not endanger those relationships.

“We are the only U.N. agency/office that actively built and convenes a global Interfaith Network of more than 500 faith-based organizations worldwide. We are the only U.N. agency that convenes the entire UN system to engage systematically and deliberately with faith-based organizations — and we have been carrying that banner faithfully for decades, also as mandated by member states who demand that we respect every nation’s cultural and sovereign terrains,” she continued.

UNFPA’s representative in Nigeria, Ratidzai Ndhlovu, affirmed in a separate statement that the agency does not promote abortions as a method of family planning.

“UNFPA is committed to delivering a world where every pregnancy is wanted, every child birth is safe and every young person’s potential is fulfilled. Its mandate was determined by United Nations members, including Nigeria,” Ndhlovu said, according to Vanguard.

“All UNFPA-supported interventions are approved, owned and implemented by Nigeria and respects the nation’s sovereignty, laws and priorities.”

The representative stated that the agency supported more than 16,000 safe deliveries in North East Nigeria in 2014 alone, and has reached out to over 2.6 million women and girls who have been affected by the conflict in North East Nigeria.

The Nigerian army has managed to successfully push back Boko Haram from a number of its hideouts in the past few months, rescuing hundreds of women and girls taken by the jihadists in the process. Many of these girls have been impregnated by the militants, however, and require humanitarian assistance at the rescue camps.

Source : Christian Post

Bishop of Aleppo Says Beheading of ISIS Militant by Syrian Christian Is a Rumor; ‘Only Revenge We Know Is Forgiveness’

World News

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(Photo: Reuters/Mohamed Azakir)
Christian Post Report – Assyrians hold banners as they march in solidarity with the Assyrians abducted by Islamic State fighters in Syria earlier this week, in Beirut, Lebanon, February 28, 2015. Militants in northeast Syria are now estimated to have abducted at least 220 Assyrian Christians this week, a group monitoring the war reported. The banner (R) reads, “We are not afraid of whom kills the flesh, we are not afraid of who destroys the stone. Assyrians and victorious.”

Bishop Georges Abou Khazen, the Apostolic Vicar of Aleppo in Syria for the Catholics of the Latin rite, denied reports that a Syrian Christian fighter beheaded an ISIS terrorist for revenge, accusing the U.K.-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights of spreading rumor based on “unreliable and unverifiable” information.

“The manipulation of information is also one of the means used to multiply the violence and horrors of this conflict,” Bishop Abou Khazen told the Catholic Fides news agency. “We know that more than 230 Assyrian Christians abducted in the villages of Khabur are still held hostage by jihadists.”

The bishop said British media picked up the story despite it being “unreliable and unverifiable.”

The Observatory reported that a Christian fighter from the minority Assyrian community, who was not identified, executed an Islamic State militant Thursday in the village of Tal Shamiram in Syria’s Hasakeh province.

Islamic State, also known as ISIS or ISIL, holds large areas of the countryside in the area.

“He took him prisoner and when he found out he was a member of IS, the Assyrian fighter beheaded him in revenge for abuses committed by the group in the region,” Observatory chief Rami Abdel Rahman told Agence France Presse.

The bishop stressed that Christians do not seek revenge. “We Christians do not justify any revenge or violence with religious issues. The only revenge we know is forgiveness, in order to also be a sign of light for all. Vendettas only deepen the wounds, and lengthen the spiral of hatred.”

Abou Khazen added all Christians, “especially in the simplest, who live suffering like lambs among wolves,” are “the first to say that the vicious circle of violence and revenge must be interrupted by someone, and this is the only way not to succumb and open paths to reconciliation.”

ISIS has executed 2,618 people, including 1,511 civilians, since last June, when it declared its “caliphate,” according to the Observatory, which documented at least 464 executions over the last two months alone.

The overall executions included those of 23 children and 32 women. The executions were carried out mostly by beheading, shooting or stoning. ISIS has also executed 139 of its own members for “exceeding the limits in religion and spying for foreign countries,” mostly after they were trying to go back to their homes.

ISIS is an offshoot of al-Qaeda and wants to establish a caliphate in the Levant region and beyond. It has gained control over large swathes of territories in Syria and Iraq.

Islamic State’s main targets are religious minorities, including Christians.

Source : Christian Post

Should God Be Called ‘She?’ Anglican Women Priests Say God Is ‘Both Male and Female,’ but Church Only Speaks of Him as Male

Church and Ministry

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(Photo: Reuters/Phil Noble)
Christian Post Report – Woman clergy take photographs of the first female bishop in the Church of England Libby Lane following her consecration service at York Minster in York, northern England, January 26, 2015.

A group of female priests within the Church of England is calling for more gender-neutral language to be used when referring to God in church services, in what it says is a campaign for equality between men and women in the church.

“Orthodox theology says all human beings are made in the image of God, that God does not have a gender. He encompasses gender — He is both male and female and beyond male and female. So when we only speak of God in the male form, that’s actually giving us a deficient understanding of who God is,” said Rev. Jody Stowell, a member of Women and the Church group, according to The Guardian.

The Rev. Emma Percy, chaplain of Trinity College Oxford and a member of WATCH, added that both male and female language should be used in church services, in order to distance the church from “the notion that God is some kind of old man in the sky.”

Percy argued that there has been a growing support for more modern language to be used during church service.

“In the last two or three years we’ve seen a real resurgence and interest in feminism, and younger people are much more interested in how gender categories shouldn’t be about stereotypes. We need to have a language about God that shows God can be expressed in lots of diverse terms,” she said.

Hilary Cotton, chairman of WATCH, added that the idea has been discussed with a Lambeth Palace committee exploring the experiences of women in the Church.

“We have conversations among that group and we are working toward working with those who are involved in liturgy in the Church of England,” Cotton said, according to The Daily Mail.

“We are at a very, very preliminary stage in terms of shifting the language of worship,” she added. “The question of how might we rewrite the services of the Church of England in a way that broadens our understanding of God is a difficult question over which we will wrestle for a number of years. This has arisen now because of a change in gender culture.”

Ann Widdecombe, a former Conservative member of parliament who left the Anglican Church after it started ordaining female priests, said that the entire suggestion of using female pronouns for God was “plain silly” and “the work of lunatics.”

The Church of England also ordained its first female bishop in January, breaking hundreds of years of tradition. The change was supported by the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Most Rev. Justin Welby, including most others in the CofE leadership.

Stowell, who is a vicar at St Michael & All Angels Church in Harrow, told the BBC, however, that the campaign is not arguing that God is a woman.

“This is not about making God a woman. This is about creating those proper, biblical images of God,” she said.

Stowell argued that the Bible sometimes describes God using female terms.

“We have images of God as a mother bear, so very ferocious, protecting her cubs,” she said.

“We have God as a woman baking and kneading the bread, so this forming God. We have God as a nursing mother.

“We’re not restricted to understanding God with one gender. I would encourage people to explore those kinds of images. They’re wholly biblical. They’re wholly traditional within the Christian faith.”

Source : Christian Post

Should God Be Called ‘She?’ Anglican Women Priests Say God Is ‘Both Male and Female,’ but Church Only Speaks of Him as Male

World News

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