(Morning Star News) – In an audio recording revealed yesterday, kidnapped Christian schoolgirl Leah Sharibu appeals to the government of Nigeria to win her release from Islamic extremist group Boko Haram, according to several published sources.

 

Boko Haram released more than 100 schoolgirls about four weeks after kidnapping them on Feb. 19 but held Leah, 15, because she refused to convert to Islam, Morning Star News revealed on March 26.

 

In the audio recording obtained by a journalist for Nigerian online news outlet The Cable, Leah says in her native Hausa that she wants the government and “people of goodwill” to rescue her.

 

“I am begging you to treat me with compassion, I am calling on the government, particularly, the president, to pity me and get me out of this serious situation,” she says on the audio.

 
CNN today reported that her father, Sharibu Nathan, confirmed that the voice is that of his daughter.

  

Boko Haram, which seeks to impose Islamic law (sharia) throughout Nigeria, kidnapped the girls from a boarding school in Dapchi, the Government Girls Science Technical College, in nothereastern Nigeria’s Yobe state.

 

President Muhammadu Buhari’s spokesman, Garba Shehu, told CNN that intelligence personnel were analyzing the voice recording, and that officials would issue a statement after studying…

Megachurch Pastor Andrew Stoecklein was at work inside the Inland Hills Church his father founded in Chino, California, when he attempted to take his life last Friday, which ultimately led to his death a day later, local police have revealed.

Church officials who announced the pastor’s passing late Sunday did not previously disclose that Stoecklein attempted suicide in the church.

When contacted by The Christian Post for further details on what may have triggered the suicide attempt, a church official who identified himself only as Pastor Chris, told The Christian Post that he was unable to immediately discuss the situation.

Tamrin Olden, crime prevention supervisor with the City of Chino Police Department declined giving any detailed specifics from the formal police report but told CP late Tuesday that police received a call from the church about Stoecklein’s suicide attempt at about 11:08 a.m. last Friday.

“Someone called in and said that they’d seen him or discovered him at the church. I don’t know the details of where he was at,”…

WASHINGTON (RNS) — The White House hosted a dinner Monday night (Aug. 27) for about 100 evangelical Christian leaders and senior-level officials, honoring evangelicals, as one participant explained, “for all the good work they do.”

Calling America “a nation of believers,” President Trump said at the event that they had gathered to “celebrate America’s heritage of faith, family and freedom.”

“As you know, in recent years the government tried to undermine religious freedom, but the attacks on communities of faith are over,” the president said. “We’ve ended it. We’ve ended it. Unlike some before us, we are protecting your religious liberty.”

Trump also took the opportunity to press evangelicals to turn out their supporters on Election Day later this year, according to an audio recording of the event leaked to The New York Times.

“I just ask you to go out and make sure all of your people vote,” Trump told the crowd, according to the Times. “Because if they don’t — it’s Nov. 6 — if they don’t vote we’re going to have a miserable two years and we’re going to have, frankly, a very hard period of time because then it just gets to be one election — you’re one election away from losing everything you’ve got.”

Trump then appeared to claim that if Democrats win, they “will overturn everything that we’ve done and they’ll do it quickly and violently.”

Attendees such as Paula White, a Florida pastor who serves as one of Trump’s closest spiritual advisers, said the event followed an afternoon of…

Evangelical leaders who signed onto a statement reaffirming traditional Christian teaching on sexual ethics and gender have reaffirmed their support at a symposium held on the anniversary of its release.

Known as the Nashville Statement, the declaration was released in August 2017 and signed by more than 20,000 evangelical leaders, activists, and theologians.

Notable signatories included: Denny Burk, president, Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood; John Piper, founder of Desiring God and chancellor of Bethlehem College & Seminary; Dr. James Dobson, former head of Focus on the Family and founder of Family Talk; Karen Swallow Prior, professor at Liberty University; Fred Luter, the first African-American president of the Southern Baptist Convention; and David French, columnist with the National Review.

The Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood, which organized the statement, held a symposium on Saturday that featured notable evangelicals reflecting on the impact of the statement.

Answering criticism about his attendance at the White House evangelical dinner, Southern Baptist Convention president J.D. Greear says he attended“ in order to listen and meet other leaders and offer perspective where asked.” 

Critics questioned why Greear attended the dinner in Washington, D.C. The SBC President has said the church should not say what political policy God has. 

“I received an invitation from the White House to attend a dinner in which the administration would address faith leaders. I weigh every decision carefully and consulted with a number of leaders across the political spectrum,” Greear said in a statement. “In this case, I chose to attend in order to listen and meet other leaders and offer perspective where asked.” 

He added that he is “as committed as ever to decoupling the Church from partisan politics.” 

“[M]y desire for the SBC remains what it always has been — promoting a culture in which the Gospel is above all,” he wrote. “Sometimes we have to step out of our comfort zones for the sake of the Gospel.” 

President Donald Trump and first lady Melania Trump were given a Bible signed by evangelical leaders that said: “History will record the greatness that you have brought for generations.” 

Greear said he did not sign the Bible. 

In a piece for the New Yorker he said: “One person said to me,…

This Spring the Department of Education released a document outlining the results from the Civil Rights Data Collection survey (CRDC). In the document the Department of Education included the number of school shootings that happened in the U.S. during the 2015-2016 school year, reporting, “Nearly 240 schools (0.2 percent of all schools) reported at least 1 incident involving a school-related shooting.”

In an effort to verify this data, National Public Radio (NPR) began to reach out to the schools that reportedly had one or more incidents involving a school shooting.

Over the course of three months NPR repeatedly reached out to the schools to ask them about what they reported and if the results of the survey were accurately representing them. Of the 240 shooting related incidents recorded in the document, NPR was only able to confirm eleven, finding that most of the shootings never happened.  

NPR was not able to contact every school despite repeated efforts, however, in 161 cases, they found that representatives from schools or school districts confirmed that nothing happened and if something regarding a firearm did happen, it was not within the government’s definition of a shooting. A school shooting as defined by the government is, “any discharge of a weapon at a school-sponsored event.” 

It is unclear how this error occurred. This was the first year…