Bhaskar Sunamajhi, Buddhadev Nayak, Durjo Sunamajhi, Sanatan Badamajhi and Munda Badamajhi were granted bail by India’s Supreme Court last week.

The men were sentenced to life imprisonment for the assassination of Hindu leader Laxmananda Saraswati and four of his associates in 2013, despite a local communist group allegedly taking responsibility for the crime.

The murder sparked a series of violent attacks against the Christian community which killed some 160 people and resulted in the destruction of nearly 300 churches.

The men from the Odisha region, who have always maintained their innocence, were granted bail last week following six years of pending appeals for their convictions.

A ruling by the Court found no evidence of their involvement in Saraswati’s murder.

The men are due to be released this week.

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Faith-based company Shields of Strength (SoS), has been instructed it is no longer permitted to print scriptures on its army products following concerns raised by the president of the Military Religious Freedom Foundation (MRFF).

According to Fox News, Mikey Weinstein said the use of the military emblem on its products was “poison” to the “constitutionally-mandated separation of Church and State”.

Following Weinstein’s comments, military branches have threatened to revoke trademark licenses issued to Shields of Strength.

In an email from the Army Trademark Licensing Program, SoS founder Kenny Vaughan was told he was “no longer authorised” to put biblical verses on his army products and was instructed to remove “ALL biblical references”.

Vaughan’s legal representatives, First Liberty Institute issued a letter to the licensing director Paul Jensen on Tuesday, calling for the license to be reinstated on the grounds of “unconstitutional discrimination”.

“Your directive that SoS remove all Biblical references from its Army-licensed products is unconstitutional and violates RFRA,” the letter argues.

Vaughan, who has produced over 4 million Christian themed tags says he doesn’t understand why the action has been taken when military units have said the products have had a positive impact on thousands in combat.

The armed forces…

A lessons learnt review will take place into the alleged harm caused by conservative evangelical pastor Jonathan Fletcher.

In June this year, reports came out that claimed Fletcher, the vicar of Emmanuel Church Wimbledon from 1982 until 2012, used physical discipline on other men when mentoring targets weren’t met and received massages from people he had oversight over.

He responded to the reports at the time as well. 

Emmanuel Church immediately set up a website for potential victims to come forward, with the Church’s safeguarding officer explaining that they heard about the first allegations in 2017, after he had retired.

His permission to officiate was then withdrawn by the Diocese of Southwark.

Christian charity thirtyone:eight has now been commissioned by Emmanuel Church Wimbledon to undertake an independent lessons learnt review concerning Fletcher and the church, which will start immediately.

The review will take place over the next six months, with a report of the findings to be published by May 2020.

Thirtyone:eight said in a statement: “We have been commissioned to undertake a robust and comprehensive exploration of both good practice and failings in culture and safeguarding practice at Emmanuel Church Wimbledon from 1982 to the present.”

It will be trying to build a comprehensive picture of Fletcher’s activities, whether any of it was known to anyone…

The universities regulator turned down Spurgeon College’s registration application in August because it didn’t meet a financial sustainability test.

The OfS said Spurgeon’s was forecasting deficits, cash outflows from its core activities and weak liquidity. In addition, the OfS’s view was that the college did not have sufficient financial resources to be sustainable.

The regulator considered that the college’s plan to address these issues was not credible and was insufficient to resolve the OfS’s concerns about financial viability and sustainability.

Back then, Spurgeon’s said it did have enough money to operate and that it “fundamentally disagrees with this financial assessment and believes it has been made on seriously flawed assumptions”.

Surgeon’s applied again in October with new information about its financial position and has now passed the test.

OfS said the second application contained new information, including evidence of changes relevant to the college’s financial position.

Spurgeon’s College said in a statement: “We are delighted that following this decision we can continue with increased vigour on our core mission to train men and women for Christian ministry.

“This decision comes off the back of considerable effort from our staff, Governors and wider family. We would like to thank everyone including our friends in Parliament, the House of Lords and the…

The proceeds will be split 50/50 between builder Don Crawley, who unearthed the pennies at the site of a forgotten Saxon church in Suffolk, and the landowner.

The 50-year-old, from Bucklesham near Ipswich, was visiting the farmer’s field for the first time when he made the discovery in 2017.

Auctioneers Dix Noonan Webb said the unnamed landowner did not want to reveal further details of the location of the find.

The coins had a pre-auction estimate of between £30,000 and £50,000.

They sold for £90,000 in Mayfair in London on Wednesday.

“I am totally amazed at today’s auction and loved every minute,” said Mr Crawley. “I will probably never experience anything like this again.”

Mr Crawley also found the remains of human bones at the farmer’s field.

The coins were examined at the British Museum and experts said they dated back to the reign of King Ethelred II, known as Ethelred the Unready, who ruled England from 978 to 1016.

Auctioneers say the coins may have been buried by a pilgrim around 999 as penitence, due to worries about the “impending apocalypse of the Millennium”.

The British Museum considered buying the coins but decided to disclaim them, the auctioneers said.

Nigel Mills, Dix Noonan Webb’s antiquities specialist, said: “This is a fantastic result for Don, and shows how the prices realised at auction for a newly found hoard can exceed everyone’s expectations.”

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Bishop John Fang Xingyao, the bishop of the Diocese of Lanyi (a city near the east coast in Shangdong province), was speaking at the Political Consultative Conference on Religions – a Communist Party sponsored meeting last week discussing religion in China.

Bishop Fang is also the president of a state-sponsored Catholic group, the Chinese Catholic Patriotic Association. The group was on one side of a disagreement between China and the Vatican about the presence of the Roman Catholic Church in China.

In 2018, the Vatican-China agreement was made which, apart from being mostly secret, aimed to bring together the state-sponsored group and the underground Catholic Church.

It allowed the Pope to veto bishops approved by the Communist Party of China.

Bishop Fang was first appointed a bishop by the Chinese government in 1994.

However, those who do not attend state-sponsored Catholic (and Protestant) churches are frequently reported to face more persecution.

This week, a Protestant pastor in China was sentenced to four years in prison, charged with “illegal business operations.”

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Around the world, the verse most engaged with on the app is Philippians 4:6: “Don’t worry about anything; instead, pray about everything. Tell God what you need, and thank him for all he has done.”

YouVersion founder Bobby Gruenewald said it’s a good sign to see that people are turning to the passage in tough times.

He said: “We’re encouraged to see so many people turning to the Bible in response to their worries, remembering what God has done in their lives, and choosing to trust in His faithfulness.”

YouVersion’s annual report showed it was a record-breaking year for how much people engaged with God’s word on the app.

People read and listened to the Bible 30 per cent more this year compared to last year. In total, YouVersion saw 5.6 billion chapters listened to and 35.6 billion chapters read in 2019.

People also made 2 billion highlights, bookmarks and notes to mark meaningful verses and more than 478 million verses were shared.

“What we are seeing in global engagement is exciting to us because with every verse highlighted, plan day completed or audio chapter listened to, that’s a person who is being transformed by knowing God more intimately through spending time in the Bible,” Gruenewald said.

“We’re humbled by the opportunity to see lives changed in every country around the world.”

The Bible App saw global increase in both installs and engagement this year. In…