The View co-host Meghan McCain recently called Elisabeth Hasselbeck’s comments about praying amid the coronavirus outbreak “dangerous.”

According to The Christian Post, Hasselbeck, who herself is a former host of The View, appeared on the show in early March, before stay-at-home orders were put in place.

“I think there can be a fine line between what is taking precaution, and what is panic,” Hasselbeck said while speaking about the coronavirus outbreak. “Yes, we’re going to take precautions, we’re going to Purell, pray that God’s got us in our tomorrows. We pray that this coronavirus is extinguished, that it stops in its tracks,” she said.

Hasselbeck also noted that she would not let the coronavirus “rule” her.

She said, “I think we should prepare, I think we should pray. I’m not going to let coronavirus rule me and let it be an idol,” she said, “and I do think our leadership right now is pointing us to say, ‘Hey, this is not a panic situation.’ This is a precautionary situation, we’re going to use Purell, wash our hands — we’re going to be okay, guys.’”

Then last week, McCain appeared on Watch What Happens Live, saying she respected Hasselbeck but disagreed with her.

“I took this virus seriously from the very beginning, and I thought a lot of this rhetoric was really dangerous,” McCain argued. “I don’t need to co-host with her again, and…

Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron this week urged the state’s governor to rescind the ban on in-person church gatherings and said he would file a lawsuit if nothing is done.

Cameron, a Republican, alleged that a March 19 order by Gov. Andy Beshear and state officials unconstitutionally targets faith-based gatherings. The order bans mass gatherings, including faith-based ones, but carves out at least eight exceptions, including ones for factories and grocery stores.

“The First Amendment provides the citizens of this country with the specific, enumerated right to practice their religious beliefs, free from targeting and discrimination,” Cameron said Tuesday. “By specifically banning faith-based mass gatherings while allowing other secular organizations and activities to continue operation, Gov. Beshear has deliberately targeted religious groups.”

The targeting, Cameron alleged, “continued when the Governor ordered state police to track the license plates of those who attended a faith-based gathering on Easter Sunday, and it continues even this week as he allows some businesses to resume operations.”

The March 19 order allows certain businesses to remain open provided they “maintain appropriate social distancing.” Yet it “provides no such exemption or accommodation for faith-based gatherings,” a press release from Cameron’s office said. 

“Kentucky…

Christians across Africa are facing extreme persecution and discrimination amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

According to Christian persecution watchdog Open Doors, Christian minorities in Nigeria are facing government discrimination as they are only receiving one-sixth of the food rations allotted for them, unlike their Muslim counterparts.

Particularly, one Christian family of four only received a single packet of noodles and one packet of uncooked rice. Meanwhile, others feel like they have been “shunted to the back of the queue for aid and forgotten.”

While Nigeria currently has over 1,500 cases of COVID-19, experts predict an infection surge in Africa within the next several months, Faithwire reports.

“We are only at the dawn of the unfolding of this pandemic in this part of Africa,” spokesperson Jo Newhouse said, according to The Express.

“There are many causes for concern for Christian minorities, like the economic impact of continued violence against Christians amid lockdowns, marginalization of Christians, especially [converts], and Christians being blamed to have caused the virus.”

Christians worldwide have experienced increased persecution with some radical groups even blaming Christians for the virus’ spread.

In Somalia, the Muslim community has been receiving false rumors from native Islamic terror group al-Shabaab that COVID-19 is being spread “by the…

The United States Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) has listed India as a “Country of Particular Concern” (CPC) in its 2020 Annual Report.

This is the first time the USCIRF has included India in this particular list since 2004; it joins several other countries who are known to oppress and violate the religious freedoms of their citizens, including Burma, China, Eritrea, Iran, Nigeria, North Korea, Pakistan, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Vietnam.

In response to the damning designation, The External Affairs Ministry in India immediately rejected the report’s findings, calling it a “new level of misrepresentation” and lambasting it as “biased.”

According to USCIRF, a CPC is a country in which the government “engages in or tolerates particular ‘severe violations’ of religious freedom.”

“Severe violation” refers to the “systematic, ongoing, [and] egregious violations…, including violations such as torture or cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment or punishment; prolonged detention without charges; causing the disappearance of persons by the abduction or clandestine detention of those persons; or other flagrant denials of the right to life, liberty or the security of person,” according to the report.

Despite the Indian Constitution enshrining protections for the right to religious practice, in reality,…

About one in five churches across the United States during the spring of 2019 heard a sermon mentioning abortion, according to a new Pew Research Center survey that showed a disparity between evangelical and mainline churches on the issue.

Nineteen percent of churches heard at least one sermon mentioning abortion, with evangelical Protestant (22 percent), Catholic (19 percent) and historically black Protestant churches (18 percent) being the most likely to include a sermon on abortion during the study period and mainline churches (10 percent) the least likely.

Most sermons were in opposition to abortion, Pew said.

Overall, 4 percent of all sermons in U.S. churches mentioned abortion during the study period, including 4 percent of evangelical sermons, 5 percent of Catholic sermons and 3 percent of sermons in historically black Protestant churches. Two percent of sermons in mainline Protestant churches mentioned abortion.

The survey examined online sermons from more than 6,400 U.S. churches between April 7 and June 1, 2019. The survey period did not include what often is called Sanctity of Human Life Sunday or Pro-Life Sunday, an annual day in January when sermons on abortion are more common.

“While the database is not representative of all U.S. Christian sermons, it offers a window into what many Americans hear each week from the pulpit,” Pew’s Dennis Quinn wrote in an online analysis.

Meanwhile,…

COVID-19 patients given the drug Remdesivir in a government-funded placebo-controlled trial recovered faster and likely had a lower mortality rate, Dr. Anthony Fauci said at the White House Wednesday.

The trial of more than 1,000 individuals was sponsored by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases – which Fauci heads – and involved patients in multiple countries, including the United States, the United Kingdom, Germany, Denmark, Spain and Greece. 

The average time of recovery for coronavirus patients who were given Remdesivir was 11 days, compared to 15 days in the placebo group. The mortality rate in the Remdesivir group was 8 percent compared to 11 percent in the placebo group – a difference that has “not yet reached statistical significance” but still “trended towards being better,” Fauci said. More data needs to be analyzed to determine if Remdesivir has a statistically significant lower mortality rate, Fauci said.

Overall, the trial produced positive results, Fauci said. Gilead is the manufacturer.

“The data shows that Remdesivir has a clear-cut, significant positive effect in diminishing the time to recovery,” Fauci said. “This is really quite important for a number of reasons. … What it has proven is that a drug can block this virus.”

Remdesivir works by “blocking an enzyme that the virus uses,” Fauci said.

The results of the trial,…

A recent virtual conference highlighted the divide that still exists among some evangelicals about supporting President Trump in his bid for reelection. 

Relevant Magazine reports that at Q2020, which featured talks from popular evangelicals such as Tim Keller, Priscilla Shirer, Ann Voskamp, Andy Crouch, Francis Chan, and Lecrae, Eric Metaxas and David French took part in a dialogue about evangelical backing of the President. Gabe Lyons, the founder of Q, hosted the conversation.

Lyons first asked Metaxas, host of a Christian radio program and author of books on Martin Luther and Deitrich Bonhoeffer, to explain his support for the President and why he feels “like that’s been important during this last election cycle and even moving into a re-election cycle.” Metaxas said that he “despised” Trump when he was running during the primaries, going so far as to write a piece for the New Yorker mocking Trump’s biblical illiteracy.

Metaxas explained that he was turned towards Trump by “the viciousness of the left toward him,” commenting that he has “never seen anything like it in my life.” He referenced the infamous “hot mic moment” behind the scenes on Access Hollywood, which took place in 2005, but became public in October 2016, just weeks before the election. After watching the 11-year-old tape surface, Metaxas said, “that level of…