JOS, Nigeria, April 18, 2019 (Morning Star News) – Muslim Fulani herdsmen killed 17 Christians who had gathered after a baby dedication at a church in central Nigeria, including the mother of the child, sources said.

Safaratu John Kabiru Ali, the mother of the baby, was slain in the attack on Sunday (April 14) in Konshu-Numa village, in Nasarawa state’s Akwanga County, which also took the lives of people ranging in age from 10 to 80. The baby’s father, John Kabiru Ali, was shot and is in critical condition, sources said. He is receiving treatment at the Intensive Care Unit of the Federal Medical Centre, Keffi, in Nasarawa state.

The attack took place at about 7 p.m. as Christians in the predominantly Christian community gathered to eat after the child was dedicated that morning at the Ruhaniya Baptist Church in the village.

The massacred Christians were buried on Wednesday (April 17) after a funeral service at the Baptist church.

A resident of Akwanga town who lost relatives in the shooting, Jacob Tantse, told Morning Star News that 17 Christians were killed, including 10 members of the Ruhaniya Baptist Church, five members of Evangelical Reformed Church of Christ (ERCC), one member of the Evangelical Church Winning All (ECWA), and a musician playing for guests.

Tantse identified those killed as Ali Nkene, 80; Gode Kako, 13; Afiniki Kako, 10; Matthew…

Vice President Mike Pence is calling Sunday’s Sri Lankan terrorist attack that resulted in at least 290 deaths and 500 injuries an “attack on Christianity” and religious freedom.

The coordinated attacks on Easter Sunday took place around 8:45 a.m. local time and involved eight bombings on churches and hotels. Among the dead were more than 102 worshipers at St. Sebastian’s Church, a Catholic church in Negombo. Some 1,000 people were attending the Easter service. 

“You can see pieces of flesh thrown all over the walls and on the sanctuary and even outside of the church,” Father Edmond Tillekeratne, social communications director for the Archdiocese of Colombo in Sri Lanka, told CNN.

Sri Lanka is an island nation off the coast of India. It is a predominantly Buddhist country, with Christians comprising only about 7-8 percent of the population.  

“@POTUS and I are monitoring the horrific attacks on those celebrating Easter in Sri Lanka. Our hearts & prayers are with the victims & their families,” Pence tweeted. “This atrocity is an attack on Christianity & religious freedom everywhere. No one should ever be in fear in a house of worship.”

Pence’s comment was posted several hours after Trump posted his own tweet, saying, “The United States offers heartfelt condolences to the great people of Sri Lanka. We stand ready…

The U.S. Supreme Court Monday agreed to hear a major gay rights case that will determine whether federal law bans employment discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity. 

At issue is Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which bars discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex and national origin. Lower courts have disagreed whether “sex” encompasses sexual orientation and gender identity. 

It could be the biggest gay rights decision since the high court in 2015 legalized gay marriage nationwide and could have a major impact on employment practices and, potentially, religious freedom disputes. 

Oral arguments will be held during the next term. 

Congress passed and President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

“These are important policy questions that the people have the right to decide through their elected officials,” said Jim Campbell, senior counsel of the Christian legal group Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF). “Unelected officials – whether bureaucrats or judges – don’t have the power to make these choices for us.”

The Supreme Court agreed to take up three cases, including one involving R.G. & G.R. Harris Funeral Homes, which was sued by a former employee who is biologically male but identifies as female and wanted to dress as a woman at work. That former employee is Aimee Stephens (formerly known…

A woman who says an Uber driver dropped her off near a gas station and refused to continue a trip to an abortion clinic says she is considering a lawsuit.

It’s unclear, though, if she has a solid case.

The unidentified 20-year-old college woman wrote in a now-viral Reddit post that she learned she was pregnant and decided to have an abortion because she is “in no position to care for a child.” Although there is a Planned Parenthood near her Cornell campus in Ithaca, N.Y., she chose to visit an abortion clinic an hour away because it could get her in quicker. 

She then scheduled an Uber ride to the clinic. After about five minutes in the car, the driver asked, “Are we going to a Planned Parenthood?” She said “no” – the clinic isn’t a Planned Parenthood – but the driver was persistent and asked a few minutes later, “Is it an abortion clinic?” 

She remained quiet. The driver then mentioned that his wife was pregnant, and he told her, “You’re going to regret this decision for the rest of your life,” according to her Reddit post. He also described abortion in detail and said, “There is so much they don’t tell you.”

“After we were about halfway to the destination, he suddenly pulls over with no warning. There was a gas station and a closed antiques store, and around us was farmland and forest,” she wrote.

The driver…

CHICAGO (RNS) — The Evangelical Council for Financial Accountability, a Christian financial watchdog group, has terminated the membership of Harvest Bible Chapel.

The council pointed to “significant violations” of several of its financial standards in a written statement released Wednesday evening (April 17).

“ECFA continues to champion integrity in God’s Kingdom,” ECFA President Dan Busby said in the statement. “We are committed to applying our standards rigorously and consistently.”

The group had suspended the Chicago-area megachurch last month after church leaders admitted “a lack of financial control and oversight” under Harvest’s former pastor, James MacDonald.

“In addition, we have identified there was a separate budget for the Senior Pastor’s office over which there was not sufficient controls and oversight,” according to the most recent update from the church’s Harvest 2020 team, formed in the wake of MacDonald’s firing.

In March, ECFA said that “new information” led the watchdog group to investigate whether the church has violated ECFA’s financial standards.

ECFA requires member organizations to demonstrate compliance with its Seven Standards of Responsible Stewardship.

Its investigation found Harvest violated its standards regarding governance; financial oversight, which requires member organizations to “prepare complete and…

(RNS) — Most Americans still say they believe in God, but their involvement in organized religion continues to wane.

A new Gallup report found that only half of Americans say they belong to a church or other religious body, down from 69% two decades earlier.

Most of the decline is tied to the rise of the so-called “nones” — those who claim no religious affiliation. Gallup found that the share of Americans who claim a religious identity declined from 90% to 77% in recent decades.

But even those who claim a faith tradition may not belong to a religious congregation or community, according to the report, which compared data from 1998-2000 to data from 2016-2018.

At the turn of the century, Gallup said, 73% of religious Americans belonged to a house of worship. That’s dropped to 64% today.

“The still-sizable proportion of religious Americans also contribute to declining church membership, as fewer in this group belong to a church than did so two decades ago,” the report states.

Being part of a house of worship is no longer necessary for a growing number of religious Americans, said Tim Carney, author of “Alienated America.”

“This data confirms what we’ve been seeing for decades: American life is becoming deinstitutionalized,” Carney said. “Americans are less likely to belong to anything. In America, historically, the thing most…

JOS, Nigeria, April 22, 2019 (Morning Star News) – At midnight on April 14, I received a phone call about an attack in Konshu village, confirming my fear that it was only a matter of time before Muslim Fulani herdsmen atrocities in Nigeria reached my native home area of Akwanga, Nasarawa state.

In the course of investigating anti-Christian violence throughout Nigeria, I have seen things that drove me to tears. I have entered rooms and houses that were covered with blood. I have seen bodies that were shot and butchered; corpses of pregnant women who had their stomachs ripped opened, the bodies of unborn babies strewn about; homes destroyed; mass graves.

In some of these attacks, entire families were killed. In a visit to one state in northern Nigeria, I went to 13 villages that were desolate as a result of herdsmen attacks. In another state, I visited eight churches that were bombed in one day, and in one town I saw the only four Christians who survived a Boko Haram onslaught. They were in hiding after all other Christians fled.

I met with kidnapped girls from Chibok, Borno state who escaped from captivity, and hearing tales of how they were taken to the Sambisa Forest made my heart bleed. I met widows whose husbands were shot or butchered to death. I met orphans who lost their parents to herdsmen or Boko Haram assaults.

My blood pressure, which has shot up as a result of these…