“This is a very dire time for human rights in Russia,” according to the Russia programme director for Human Rights Watch, Tanya Lokshina, speaking ahead of the start of the 2018 Football World Cup, which kicked off in Moscow earlier today.

Since Vladimir Putin became Russia’s president again in 2012 there has been a “staggering human rights clampdown”, she told the Australian Associated Press last week.

“What we see in Russia today, as far as freedom of expression is concerned, is just devastating,” she said. “Every year it is just getting worse.”

“There is no sign that … persecution of religious minorities and foreign missionaries is coming to an end.”

However, she said the World Cup may at least shine a light on the abuses: “Russia being in the spotlight, so many fans coming from all around the world, so many media publications… It’s all going to make people focus on the profound human rights crisis in Russia.”

Among the challenges facing Russians is the clampdown on religious freedom since the introduction two years ago of the so-called “anti-missionary law”.

Under this law, prosecuted individuals face heavy fines, up to six years in prison, and, for foreigners, deportation.

An…

The Rev. Thomas Littleton, a veteran Southern Baptist pastor and writer, said he was “physically handled” by a staff member of the SBC’s Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission and removed from the Southern Baptist Convention’s annual meeting in Dallas Tuesday for asking questions about the ERLC’s ties to Revoice, an upcoming conservative Christian conference for those struggling with same-sex attraction.

The Revoice 2018 conference, which takes place next month, is aimed at “supporting, encouraging, and empowering gay, lesbian, same-sex-attracted, and other LGBT Christians so they can flourish while observing the historic, Christian doctrine of marriage and sexuality.” Some critics insist that the conference is trying to push an LGBT agenda on conservative evangelical churches but those involved say there is a lot of misinformation out there.

In a series of tweets beginning Wednesday, Littleton, who is an evangelist with over 38 years’ experience, claims he was…

A woman who says she is a former lesbian is rallying with others in California against a law that would ban “conversion therapy.”

LGBT activists say they want the measure passed because it would ban licensed counselors from practicing “conversion therapy.” Under the proposed law, bill AB 2943, the practice would be a violation of consumer fraud.

But Elizabeth Woning says she was a lesbian in her 20s and even served as a youth pastor advocating for LGBT rights. Then, she became a Christian.

“AB 2943 would seek to block me inviting other people to go on that same journey that I went on,” she said. “My faith journey involved questioning my sexuality as a lesbian, and so this bill would seek to block any kind of invitation, or any kind of encouragement from me, to another person to do the same.”

Woning became the co-founder of Equipped to Love, an organization that helps those who want to “walk out of homosexuality” and see sexuality “through the lens of redemption offered by the Gospel.”

Woning said she hopes to get a copy of the organization’s book, Changed, to every California legislator. The book is a compilation of stories of people who have left homosexuality.

Critics of the bill are also worried because the bill forbids “sexual orientation change efforts,” the proposed law could also outlaw the sale of books that claim sexual…

Southern Baptists, grappling with some #MeToo-aided falls from grace among their leaders, have called for affirming women, showing compassion for the abused and expecting “moral and sexual purity” of their leaders.

A resolutions committee recommended a total of 16 nonbinding statements to express the sentiments of Southern Baptist delegates, known as messengers, and all were adopted Tuesday (June 12) by more than 7,000 Baptists gathered at their annual meeting.

The raft of resolutions came after the May termination of Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary President Paige Patterson, who had counseled against divorce even in cases of domestic abuse and was accused of mishandling seminary students’ allegations of rape. Two months earlier, Frank Page, the president of the denomination’s Executive Committee, resigned suddenly after what was described as a “morally inappropriate relationship in the recent past.”

On Wednesday, after a lengthy debate, messengers voted against a request to remove the members of the seminary executive committee that decided to fire Patterson.

“It was clear to us that the convention wanted to speak to those themes,” resolutions committee Chairman Jason Duesing told reporters after the adoption of the statements. “We felt that three separate resolutions allowed us to do that best.”

“Biblical headship blesses,…

There are few spots around the world where parents don’t have to drag their young adult children to worship: Ghana, a predominantly Christian county is one; Chad, a predominantly Muslim country, is another.

In both African nations, younger adults are 3 percentage points more likely to identify with their faith than their elders, according to a new study by the Pew Research Center of religious feelings among older and younger adults.

The study, which finds that younger people the world over are generally less religious than their elders, determined that the pattern is generally reversed where prosperity and life expectancy lag. Life expectancy in Chad and Ghana is among the lowest in the world.

The survey of 106 nations, drawn from 13 studies undertaken over the past decade, shows that nearly everywhere else, young adults are drifting away from the faith commitments of their elders. The gap appeared to be widest in most economically developed countries.

“We’re not able to say, ‘This is the law of religious change that we can deduce from this evidence,” Conrad Hackett, the lead researcher for the Pew study, said. “It’s rather, ‘These are the general patterns we see.’ There are exceptions for sure.”

In the overwhelming number of countries, said Hackett, the difference is quite small. “The average gap is modest in size, but the size of…