In an op-ed published Thursday evening by Christianity Today, the Evangelical magazine – founded by the late preacher Billy Graham – called for the removal of President Trump from office.

According to the Washington Post, upon publishing this op-ed, the Christianity Today website momentarily crashed from the volume of traffic on the site.

From Christianity Today’s editor in chief https://t.co/NVdQjg4odC

— Christianity Today (@CTmagazine) December 19, 2019

The op-ed, written by the publications Editor-in-Chief Mark Galli, starts off by citing its mission to help evangelicals interpret the news through the lens of their faith. The CT editor noted that while they typically steer clear of inserting their own opinions on political matters, in the case of this impeachment, they found it necessary. “We take pride in the fact, for instance, that politics does not dominate our homepage. That said, we do feel it necessary from time to time to make our own opinions on political matters clear—always, as Graham encouraged us, doing so with both conviction and love.

“We love and pray for our president, as we love and pray for leaders (as well as ordinary citizens) on both sides of the political aisle,” Galli wrote before highlighting the partisan nature of the impeachment process against Donald Trump.

“Let’s grant this to the president: The Democrats have had it out for him from day…

Donald Trump became the third president in U.S. history to be impeached Wednesday when the House of Representatives passed two articles along party lines, although his removal from office in the Senate is highly unlikely.

One article, on abuse of power, alleges he solicited the interference of a foreign government, Ukraine, in the 2020 presidential election. The second article, on obstruction of Congress, says Trump directed the “unprecedented, categorical, and indiscriminate” defiance of subpoenas issued by the House.

Trump joins Andrew Johnson and Bill Clinton as the only presidents to be impeached. But like his predecessors, he likely won’t be removed from office during a trial in the Senate, which is controlled by Republicans. 

The U.S. Constitution requires a two-thirds vote in the Senate – 67 votes in the current body – to remove a president. Republicans have 53 seats. 

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) on Thursday criticized House Democrats for opposing Trump before he even took office. 

“[Impeachment] was the predetermined end of a partisan crusade that began before President Trump was even nominated, let alone sworn in,” McConnell said on the Senate floor. “For the first time in modern history, we’ve seen a political faction in Congress promise from the moment … a president election ended, they would find some way to overturn it.”

Senate Minority Leader…

A 23-year-old man in California has been charged with several felonies—including first degree murder— after he allegedly forced his pregnant ex-girlfriend to take pills at gunpoint that caused a miscarriage, according to the Christian Post.

A family member of the woman reported to police earlier this week that the man, Jagmeet Sandhu, broke into the woman’s apartment after she ended their 10-month relationship over her refusal to get an abortion. The man then forced her to swallow 11 unknown white pills while holding a gun to her head over the course of three hours. The woman became very ill and went to a hospital, where she was told she had miscarried.

“Officers conducted additional follow-up and were able to locate items during several search warrants that linked Mr. Sandhu to this crime further,” said the Public Information Officer for Bakersfield Police Department, Nathan McCauley.

In addition to murder, Sandhu faces five other felony charges, including first-degree burglary, assault with a firearm, and inflicting injury on a spouse or cohabitant, according to NBC News. Bakersfield also reported that he faces another charge of threatening with intent to terrorize. He has plead not guilty in court while being held on a $1 million bail.

The Alliance Against Family Violence said that situations of this type are common for many women.

“Unfortunately, women are…

A 73-year-old man who knows the painful chill of a Christmas without heat has paid off 36 families’ overdue utility bills.

Mike Esmond, a resident of Pensacola, Florida, remembers a Christmas 36 years ago when he and his three daughters celebrated the holiday without heat and power, according to the Pensacola News Journal. “That year, we didn’t have any heat and it was the coldest recorded temperature [in December] Pensacola has ever had,” Esmond said. “We had icicles hanging off our windows.” Temperatures dipped to a chilling 9 degrees in the tropical state.

But he found success later in life with his pool company, Gulf Breeze Pools and Spa. This year, when he saw that his utility bill would be due on Dec. 26, he was transported back to that cold day and decided to help other residents facing a similar situation. He asked the city of Gulf Breeze for a list of all the households with utility accounts that were past due and at risk of having their power and heat turned off. The city produced a list of 36 families, totaling approximately $4,600 in overdue bills.

“I wanted to do something that I felt would really help people at Christmas time who are trying to decide between paying bills and maybe having something cut off, or buying presents for their family,” he said.

The city wanted to reward the man’s act of kindness and sent out Christmas cards to the lucky 36…

New Jersey’s Senate did not take a vote on a bill that would have ended religious exemptions to vaccine requirements for students in the state.

Hundreds of protestors rallied in front of the New Jersey statehouse Monday, celebrating when the Senate adjourned without voting on the proposal.

“They can cheer all they want. We’re not walking away from it,” Senate President Stephen M. Sweeney said, according to the New York Times.

“It’s just remarkable how people are looking at this and not trusting the science on it at all. They’re trusting the internet,” he added.

According to the Christian Post, the bill would allow only children with verified medical conditions to be exempt from vaccine laws to attend public or private schools.

The New Jersey Assembly passed the bill 45-25 with six abstentions, according to NBC10, but the Senate passed on the scheduled vote as opponents shouted, “We do not consent” and “In God we trust.”

If the bill is approved, New Jersey would be one of a few states to remove religious exemptions for vaccines. About 45 states and the District of Columbia all allow for religious exemptions for vaccines.

Critics of the bill say it takes away the parents’ right to decide what’s best for their children.

“There is a religious element to vaccines,” said Avi Schnall, the New Jersey director of Agudath Israel of America. “And for the…

A routine traffic stop ended in prayer earlier this week when State Trooper Ross Bates heard that the couple had experienced a death in the family.

According to KHOU, Lanell James, a middle school teacher, was driving from Conroe to Dallas with her husband, Lamar to be with family after Lamar’s brother died unexpectedly. As they drove through a small town, Bates pulled them over for a non-speeding violation.

Bates asked where they were heading, and she told him about her brother-in-law’s passing.

“He said, ‘Oh, I’m sorry to hear that, do you know where he is?’” Lanell explained. “My husband answered, ‘Yes, at the morgue,’ and [Bates] responded, ‘No, he is now in his heavenly home.’”

His reaction caught the couple off-guard. When he returned with a warning, the state trooper asked if he could pray with Lanell and Lamar and then removed his hat and held their hands while he prayed.

“I have never had this happen before, but it was everything that we needed in that moment,” Lanell said. “Thank you so much, Trooper Bates, for praying with us. There’s just so much in the news with the negativity and the police killings and the racial tension—it’s a lot.”

Early Sunday, Lanell & her husband were driving to Dallas. Her brother-in-law was killed in a crash.@TxDPSSoutheast Trooper Ross Bates pulled her over.
She explained situation.
He gave her a warning… and a…

Some 35 child psychologists have resigned from the UK’s juvenile gender-identity clinic over the past three years after becoming concerned by the ease with which medical professionals were diagnosing young people with “gender dysphoria.”

According to Sky News, many of the former staff claimed that they were unable to properly assess patients out of a fear that they would be labelled “transphobic.”

Other clinicians expressed anxiety over the potential health risks associated with hormone treatment. “Our fears are that young people are being over-diagnosed and then over-medicalized,” one anonymous psychologist explained. “We are extremely concerned about the consequences for young people… For those of us who previously worked in the service, we fear that we have had front row seats to a medical scandal.”

Another psychologist insisted that they felt pressured to prescribe hormone medication, even if it wasn’t necessarily in the patient’s best interest. “The alarm started ringing for me… I didn’t feel able to voice my concerns, or when I did I was often shut down by other affirmative clinicians,” the staffer told the Telegraph. “Looking back there are young people who I now wouldn’t necessarily put on medication.”

In an interview with the Christian Post, endocrinologist Michael Laidlaw warned that the effects of many U.S.-based…

The average church sermon in the United States is 37 minutes long, although the length differs significantly depending on the specific Christian tradition, according to a new Pew Research Center study.

Catholic sermons are the shortest, at an average of 14 minutes, while sermons in historically black Protestant churches are the longest, at an average of 54 minutes. The average sermon length in mainline Protestant congregations (25 minutes) and evangelical Protestant congregations (39 minutes) falls in the middle.  

Pew examined the transcribed texts of 49,719 sermons posted online that were preached between April 7 and June 1, 2019. The sermons came from 6,431 churches.

Pew also examined the sermons for words and phrases that were more frequently used by certain traditions than others. 

The study found that the following Christian traditions had unique phrases that were distinctive and used more than in other traditions:

• Evangelical: “eternal hell,” “lose … salvation,” “trespass … sin,” “home … heaven” and “absent … body.”
• Catholic: homily, diocese, Eucharist, paschal and parishioner.
• Mainline Protestant: “always … poor,” “house … Thomas,” “gospel … lesson” and “disciple … betray.”
• Historically black Protestant: powerful hand, “hallelujah … come,” “neighbor … tell,” “hand … praise” and “praise … got.”

… Read More

Click here to read the rest of the story from our content source/partners – Christian Headlines.

قالب وردپرس