“Sister Missionaries” in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints no longer have to wear skirts while on mission. They can now, thanks to a decree of the Mormon church, wear pants. In particular, they can wear dress slacks, specifically.

Sister Missionaries serve in 407 missions around the world, and up until now, were strictly prohibited from wearing anything but free-flowing skirts or dresses.

The decision was passed down by the First Presidency and is primarily motivated by “safety concerns,” according to Elder Dieter F. Uchtdorf, a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles and chairman of the Missionary Executive Council.

Elder Uchtdorf said, “Adjustment to the missionary dress and grooming standards have changed over time since the beginning of the Restoration of the gospel of Jesus Christ in 1830 and will continue to do so in the future. As we adapt these standards, we are always careful to consider the dignity of the missionary calling to represent Jesus Christ, the safety, security, and health of our beloved missionaries, and the cultural sensitivities of the places where they serve.”

Sister Bonnie H. Cordon, Young Women general president and a member of the Missionary Executive Council, claimed the safety issues were insect-spread illnesses.

“There are a lot of vector-borne diseases because of mosquitoes and ticks and fleas,” said Sister Cordon. “This helps the sisters to prevent any of those bites or at least minimizes them.”

Mormon women still have to wear skirts or dresses at temple and during Sunday worship services, mission leadership and zone conferences, and baptismal services

Steven Anderson, the highly controversial pastor from Tempe – a suburb of Phoenix – is in a heated back-and-forth with Jeff Durbin, a self-styled “hipster pastor” who is best known for booze, tattoos, and Calvinism. Anderson is best known for being tased by the border guards, some pretty insane sermon rants, and being banned from at least four countries due to “hate speech.”

Anderson pastors Faithful Word Baptist Church, an Independent Fundamental Baptist (IFB) church and Jeff Durbin pastors Apologia Church, which is a (non-Confessional) Calvinist church, in Chandler, Arizona – another suburb of Phoenix. Apologia recently added James White as “scholar in residence,” who left his longtime, more subdued (and Confessional), Phoenix Reformed Baptist Church, for the opportunity. The three men have been going back-and-forth in social media over the last few days.

Although the men have been feuding for quite some time (it usually seems started by Anderson, but carried out longer at the insistence of James White), it has reached a fever pitch most recently. The last skirmish began because of a sermon that appears to have been delivered on the Sunday evening of December 23.

In this video, at approximately the 24-minute mark, Anderson claims that Durbin is a homosexual because he has a thumb-ring (he had the congregation google the meaning of a thumb ring during the service), and because Durbin made crass jokes about sodomy.

Then, Anderson claimed that Durbin told his military drill instructor that he was gay (26-minute mark). This led to Durbin’s military discharge. Anderson claims he personally confronted Durbin about this, and Durbin did not deny it. Anderson also claims he has the discharge papers for Durbin that state as much.

James White responded on his Facebook page:

Anderson was “preaching” (I struggle to use that sacred term for the harangues he belches out in front of his captive audience) a slander-filled attack upon Pastor Jeff Durbin all based upon his desperate attempt (and he is not alone in this) to make accusations of homosexuality against Jeff and even myself. Why? Well, it’s not that these folks have a scintilla of interest in truth. Between Jeff and I we have logged 56 years of marriage (to the same women I might add), numerous children and so far at least five grandchildren. No, they don’t care about truth or honor or honesty or integrity or any of those things Christians concern themselves about. Remember it is all about power and control over others. 

Beginning at the 39 minute mark, Anderson begins to speak with more invectives about tattoos. Durbin has tattoos, and James White, who started with a smaller tattoo a few years ago, now sports an entire sleeve. Anderson claims in the video that tattoos were brought to Western culture by sailors who visited pagan “cannibal islands” (there’s a degree of truth to this claim, probably beginning with Captain Cook’s voyage to the Pacific islands and Polynesian people).

Then, it turned from tattoos to Calvinism.

It’s so funny how these Calvinists love all these verses about being chosen…but you guys forgot the part about being chosen to be holy. He didn’t choose you to get a tattoo. He didn’t choose you to drink beer. He didn’t choose you to drink shots of tequilla. He didn’t choose you to be a drug addict. He didn’t choose you to be a derelict. He didn’t choose you to [crossdress]. He chose you to be holy and blameless.

He continued:

No Calvinist can preach the Gospel, because the Gospel is that Christ died for us according to the Scriptures…You can’t even say that if you’re a Calvinist because most people you talk to he didn’t die for.

And again:

I couldn’t endure one service at that Apologia tattoo parlor, beer house, brothel, whatever the hell they have going on down there.

As a special note, Anderson references the Booze and Tattoo debacle of 2017 and was under the impression that a “beer flight” was an air flight in which someone would drink while in transit (this is at the 46:30 mark).

And finally:

I just wish I could press a button and get these Calvinists to stop drinking and tattooing themselves and mutilating their bodies. What button do I have to push to get their women out of pants and dress like women in skirts and dresses. It’s amazing how they’re predestined to look like tramps. It’s amazing how they’re predestined to look like white trash. It’s amazing how they’re predestined to be drunk or to be pierced and tattooed to high Heaven…where’s your repentance you drunken, tattooed, cannibal-looking freak?

In response, White posted on his Facebook account:

Slander (βλασφημία) is one of the sins Christians are commanded to “put away” along with anger, wrath, malice, and abusive speech (Col. 3:8). But slander is the daily milieu of some men who actually claim to be Christians. Steven Anderson, the lead abuser of the poor souls trapped in the Faithful Word Baptist Church of Tempe, Arizona, is a man who is displaying, for all the world to see (purposefully, on his part), the path one takes as you desperately try to build your little kingdom and hold onto the power you have built up over other people. Given the fundamental denials of gospel truths inherent in his beliefs (cultic KJVOism, a rabid denial of the centrality of repentance, a rejection of the Lordship of Christ in salvation, a detestation of the biblical doctrines of grace, combined with the “who cares about history?” attitude that marks so much of IFBism) there does not seem to be any stopping point on the path directly to perdition. But he does not seem to care about how many souls are destroyed or damaged in his wake. It’s all about Steven Anderson and his little kingdom.

Anderson pointed out that White – in his opinion – was playing hard and loose with the Greek, twisting a passage about speaking against God.

White continued his Facebook diatribe by impugning Anderson’s small church and claiming that Anderson is upset that so many people are leaving Independent Fundamentalist Churches because of his and Durbin’s preaching.

Pray for the souls who are trapped in the abusive system that is represented by Anderson and the FWBC (and many others like it). The reason they are going after Jeff and I is simple: they know how many people have left their churches after listening to our videos, watching our debates, and seeing how imbalanced and shallow the preaching and teaching of this “New IFB Movement” really is. They are filled with fear and they cover that fear by lashing out in the style of Anderson, Fannin, etc. Many are simply not aware that there is anything outside of the small, stifling little world of IFB/KJVOism. They have been lied to and need to know the truth.

Note: Anderson’s Faithful Word Baptist Church is larger than both Apologia Church and Phoenix Reformed Baptist Church combined.

[Editor’s Note: Pulpit & Pen has reached out to Durbin for clarification regarding his military discharge, and he has not responded at the time of publication. Pulpit & Pen has also reached out to Steven Anderson for clarification on this point, and he sent the discharge papers for Durbin that show an 18-day military service; the reason for the discharge is not specified on this particular form.

]

Tom Chantry, son of famed Reformed Baptist, Walter Chantry, is now a disgraced former-pastor who rests behind bars for a string of child molestations. Chantry stood trial in July for five counts of child molestation and three for assault. He was found guilty of two cases of assault (the molestation charges received a mistrial), but was soon charged with an additional 9 new cases of abuse in September, re-arrested, and was held on one million dollars in bond.

As sad as this story is, it’s even sadder for many in the Reformed Baptist Community, who knew Tom and respected him as a colleague and peer. He wrote and commented often at Pyromaniacs and was a constant voice in conservative Reformed Baptist social media.

Unfortunately, the consequences for Chantry’s denomination – the Association of Reformed Baptist Churches of America – are dire.

Accusations against Chantry began coming in as early as 1995. ARBCA chose a three-person panel to investigate the findings. This panel included Mike McKnight, Pastor Tedd Tripp, and Pastor Richard Jensen. The results of that investigation found wrong-doing on the part of Chantry, but the document were sealed from view and Chantry was not properly dealt with. This has lead several ARBCA churches to sever their ties with the denomination.

Pastor Jeff Crippen of Christ Reformed Church in Tillamook, Oregon, was one of them, writing in a letter, “I have spoken to people who do in fact know the facts about the Chantry coverup. Yes, there was certainly a coverup by ARBCA although most of us had no idea the situation even existed. Those who served on the investigative committee that looked into the allegations at Miller Valley against Chantry VERY MUCH need to come right out in the public view and tell the world that in fact there was a recommendation for the charges against Chantry to be announced to the entire association. If myself and others are wrong about that, then I ask the members of the investigative committee to say so publicly. But I believe you will find that this recommendation was squashed by some of the very same bullying individuals who still hold power in the association.”

Christ Reformed Church certainly wasn’t the last church to leave ARBCA over the mishandling of the incident.

The Christ Reformed Baptist Church Hales Corner, Wisconsin, was scuttled this month and its property put up for sale. This was Tom Chantry’s former church.

This church received an envoy from ARBCA leaders Don Lindblad and Steve Martin in January of 2017 in an attempt to dispell the controversy or perhaps explain it to mitigate the fallout, but the attempt seems now to have been unfruitful.

Likewise, Redeeming Grace Baptist Church in Matthews, Virginia, has left ARBCA and posted their resignation letter online. Their reason was the mishandling of the Chantry molestation incidents.

They write:

The letter, written by pastor Van Loomis, was dated December 12, 2018.

ARBCA seems to have made a number of mistakes with Chantry. First, is not reporting the issue to the legal authorities as soon as they were aware of any criminally inappropriate behavior. And second was their error in admitting a church into ARBCA years later, of which Chantry was a pastor, when they knew of the issues involved.

The latter is reportedly explained by ARBCA leadership as not wanting to “tip off” Chantry to a criminal investigation by denying his entry to ARBCA and having to explain why, perhaps under some misguided fear of Obstruction of Justice (it’s a bad excuse, but at least it’s something). There appears, however, to be no excuse for the former.

Let this be a lesson to all denominations or churches who seek to maintain their viability and integrity in the midst of a scandal; report sexual or abuse crimes to law enforcement.

[Editor’s Note: HT Wartburg Watch; this HT is not an endorsement of the theology of Wartburg Watch]

[Conservative Review] Another child has died while in government custody at the border, and yet again, the open-borders crowd is using the death to score political points against the Trump administration.

In this most recent tragedy, an eight-year-old boy from Guatemala died early Christmas day at a New Mexico hospital, after a Border Patrol agent noticed that he and his father looked ill. According to a DHS spokesman on Wednesday, the father declined further medical care for the son after the boy was initially discharged from a hospital, but later became more ill.

Earlier this month, a seven-year-old girl from Honduras died in custody after she and her father were apprehended trying to illegally cross the southern border.

Both deaths are being used by left-wing politicians to attack the Trump administration and others in favor of more by-the-book immigration enforcement — regardless of the facts.

To continue reading, click here.

[Editor’s Note: This article was written by Nate Madden and first published at Conservative Review]

[HuffPo] The level of trust Americans have in clergy members has dropped to a record low, a recent Gallup survey suggests.

The polling organization found that only 37 percent of 1,025 respondents had a “very high” or “high” opinion of the honesty and ethical standards of clergy, according to a report published on Thursday. Forty-three percent rated clergy’s honesty and ethics as “average,” while 15 percent had low or very low opinions.

The 37 percent positive rating is the lowest Gallup has recorded for clergy since it began examining views about religious leaders’ ethical standards in 1977.

Currently, only 31 percent of Catholics and 48 percent of Protestants rate the clergy positively, according to Gallup.

John Fea,  a professor of American history at Messiah College in Pennsylvania, 
told HuffPost he believes the prominence of the Roman Catholic Church’s sexual abuse scandal this year may be contributing to a lack of trust in the clergy. 

In July, Theodore E. McCarrick, the former archbishop of Washington, resigned from the church’s College of Cardinals amid allegations that he had sexually abused children and adult seminarians over decades. And in August, a Pennsylvania grand jury identified 301 predator priests and more than 1,000 victims in a landmark report into sexual abuse in the state. The report has inspired other attorneys general across the U.S. to start similar investigations into the cover-up of sexual abuse in Roman Catholic dioceses. 

“Men and women turn toward clergy in some of the most intimate moments of their lives,” Fea told HuffPost in an email. “The kinds of scandals and authoritarian leadership that we saw this year among the clergy undermines the trust we place in them.” 

Stephen Prothero, a professor of American religions at Boston University, told HuffPost that along with Catholic Church’s sex abuse crisis, there’s another factor at play. Prothero wrote in an email that he believes the increasing entanglement of evangelical Protestants and key evangelical leaders with the Republican Party has led many to view Christianity as a right-wing political movement “more concerned with getting people like President [Donald] Trump elected than with saving souls.”

“The overwhelming majority of American clergy are neither sexual predators nor right-wing political hacks,” Prothero told HuffPost. “But this is one of those cases of a lot of bad apples spoiling the whole bunch.”

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Gallup has been asking Americans to rate the honesty and ethical standards of various professions for 42 years. The company has asked the question about the clergy’s honesty 34 times over that time period. 

Trust in clergy hit a historical high of 67 percent in 1985. A sharp drop occurred in 2002, the year the Boston Globe’s Spotlight investigative team first started reporting on the Catholic Church’s sexual abuse crisis. Positive views about clergy have been steadily declining since 2012, Gallup stated.

Fea said American religion has always existed in a “consumer society,” where individuals “shop” for the churches that best meet their needs. Fueled by a general distrust in the authority of the clergy, Americans have been finding other sources for their spiritual nourishment, he wrote.

“With Internet churches and other kinds of on-line social media offering spiritual advice and counsel, coupled with the sex abuse scandals, the clergy does not seem to be as important any more as people seem to place their trust in other places,” Fea said.

Americans viewed clergy as less honest than police officers, accountants, and funeral directors, Gallup’s December report states, but more trustworthy than bankers, lawyers, business executives and telemarketers.

To continue reading, click here.

[Editor’s Note: This article was written by Carol Kuruvilla and first posted at the Huffington Post]

[The Blaze] A YouTube search for the word “abortion” has been significantly wiped clean of top results with pro-life videos after a writer for Slate contacted the company and complained.

April Glaser tweeted about complaining to YouTube about the pro-life videos and their response.

“Search for ‘abortion’ on YouTube last week and the top results were a horrifying mix of gore and dangerous misinformation,” she tweeted.

“YouTube changed the results after I asked,” she added.

Glaser wrote that the search results showed too many videos that showed how gruesome the operation is, and she objected to the lack of pro-abortion videos as top results for the search.

“If, until recently, you did the same over on Google-owned YouTube, it felt like you were searching in a whole other universe,” Glaser wrote in her Slate piece, apparently referring to a universe where people object to abortion.

“Before I raised the issue with YouTube late last week, the top search results for ‘abortion’ on the site were almost all anti-abortion—and frequently misleading,” she added, without explaining where videos had misled viewers.

Instead, Glaser worries that the search results could lead viewers to videos like the one from Ben Shapiro that highlights the experience of a woman who regretted aborting her child.

To continue reading, click here…

[Editor’s Note: This article was written by Carlos Garcia and published first at The Blaze]

“So Joshua took the whole land, according to all that the Lord had spoken to Moses, and Joshua gave it for an inheritance to Israel according to their divisions by their tribes. Thus the land had rest from war.” Joshua 11:23

This post is the twenty-second in a series that addresses a list of “40 Harmful Effects of Christianity” that originated on the American Atheists Facebook page and has since made its way around the internet. In this post, I examine the following “harmful effect” from the list:

Harmful Effect #22: Holy wars – followers of different faiths (or even the same faith) killing each other in the name of their (benevolent, loving and merciful) gods.

Harmful Effect #22 is further evidence that the author(s) of this list didn’t give particular attention to Christianity but rather opined upon what they saw as the harmful effects of religion in general. If, for example, followers of Islam and polytheistic paganism warred against one another, this would not be a negative effect of Christianity; nor would it be detrimental to Christianity if followers of Sunni and Shia Islam warred against one another. Yet, both of these hypothetical situations (which have also been real situations in history) qualify as “harmful effects of Christianity” according to this list.

From a Christian point of view, God is (as this harmful effect points out) “benevolent, loving, and merciful.” Therefore, any war sanctioned by God would be just because it would flow from His perfect nature. An example of such warfare would be the expulsion of the Canaanites by the Hebrews from the Promised Land after the iniquity of the Canaanites had become full. Any warfare carried out in the name of God but not sanctioned by God, by Christian standards, is sinful. The very problem with such religious warfare is that it is a rejection of the desires of God. To be specific, religious wars are not inherently disadvantageous, unjust religious wars are.

Of course to declare the net effect of a war, religious or otherwise, as “harmful” is to engage in subjective judgment. Those who win a given war might not deem its prosecution unwarranted, on the whole. To declare a war objectively unjust requires an objective standard of morality, which atheism can’t provide. As a contrast, Christian theism can provide such a standard. The Christian theist can, for example, deem the Crusades unjust. These wars were religious in nature but prosecuted in an unjust way which violated the desires of God.

Religious wars, it should be considered, are the minority of recorded historical warfare. Philip and Axelrod’s three-volume Encyclopedia of Wars, chronicles some 1,763 wars that have been waged over the course of human history. Of those wars, the authors categorize 123 as being religious in nature, which is an astonishingly low 6.98% of all wars. However, when one subtracts out those waged in the name of Islam (66), the percentage is cut by more than half to 3.23%. War exists in plentiful supply without religious motivation. Even wars which are overtly motivated by religion, such as the Crusades, are arguably motivated by other factors such as nationalism, greed, or a lust for power (the same factors which underlie “non-religious” wars). The counterfactual, “Religious wars would have been prosecuted for reasons other than religion if religion didn’t exist” can’t be proven, but it’s arguably plausible. History shows that people have a tendency towards violence, therefore religious motivations are hardly needed to bring about war.

Harmful Effect #22 falls flat along with an atheist worldview. The Christian worldview provides, at the very least, an explanation for why wars exist and which ones are just. Furthermore, where there is death, war, and carnage, Christians can take comfort in the blessed hope of eternal life promised to them by the Lord Jesus as revealed in the Holy Bible.

In my next post in this series, I’ll address the following:

Harmful Effect #23: The destruction of great works of art considered to be pornographic/blasphemous, and the persecution of the artists.

*Please note that the preceding is my personal opinion. It is not necessarily the opinion of any entity by which I am employed, any church at which I am a member, any church which I attend, or the educational institution at which I am enrolled. Any copyrighted material displayed or referenced is done under the doctrine of fair use.

[Reformation Charlotte] The gospel, or “good news,” is essentially the revelation of Jesus Christ to the world for the purpose of reconciling God’s people to Himself. Sadly, there is much perversity masquerading as the gospel, yet it’s designed to lead man away from the truth, and into a false sense of relationship with the Creator. Many cults and false religions have arisen contrary to the faith that was once for all delivered to the saints (Jude 1:3), but there are far more subtle attacks on the biblical gospel that, in many cases, go unnoticed, and are poisoning the church today. Let’s review 5 telling marks that a gospel being preached is false.

I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting him who called you in the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel—not that there is another one, but there are some who trouble you and want to distort the gospel of Christ. –Galatians 1:6-7

1.) The gospel exalts man. This may sound like an obvious one, but sadly, so many preachers today preach a gospel that exalts man. Arminianism is perhaps the most notorious of these. Man is said, contrary to Scripture, to have within himself some level of “goodness” to be able to “choose” God. Scripture teaches that man cannot choose God (Romans 3:11) because we are dead in our trespasses and sins (Ephesians 2:1).

Others may teach that God has chosen to save man, not solely according to the purposes of His own will (Eph 1:11), but because of some inherent value in us. Sure, we have some value to God–we are created in His image. We were also created to glorify Him. But Scripture clearly teaches that it is not because of any value or goodness in us that God has chosen to save us, he chose to save us to display His own glory (Romans 9:23).

This mark of a false gospel places our hope in something false–a hope in something other than Christ alone. It places our hope in something within ourselves, and God will not share His glory with any other.

2.) The gospel teaches that you are saved from temporal afflictions. This is mostly found in the Prosperity, Health and Wealth, and Word of Faith movements. Essentially, it teaches that when you are saved, you no longer have to suffer from worldly calamities such as poverty, sickness, and disease. Further, it teaches that if you do suffer from these things, that your faith simply isn’t strong enough. Often, your level of faith is purportedly reflected in how much money you give to the organization propagating this false teaching.

This teaching can certainly lead people astray, giving some who are not truly born again a false sense of security in practices such as tithing and seed-faith offering. Once again, Christ as the sole object of our faith is diminished and our faith is placed in our good works and is evidenced by our prosperity.

The apostle Paul teaches worldly struggles are not only likely but that God uses them for His glory, in which our purpose is to glorify God.

But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong…” –2 Corinthians 2:10-11

3.) Emphasis is placed on the Holy Spirit more than Jesus Christ. Many charismatic churches teach a gospel that emphasizes the work of the Holy Spirit more than the work of Christ. Certainly, the Holy Spirit, equal with the Father and Christ, is worthy of our acknowledgment. But the Work of the Holy Spirit is always to point to Christ and not to Himself (John 16:14-15). Yet these charismatic churches, in many ways, teach that the Holy Spirit is the primary end of our salvation and that it is manifested through signs and wonders performed by those who have “received Him.” This often results in aberrant teachings such as that speaking in tongues is a necessary evidence of salvation.

Jesus Christ, however, is the primary ends of our salvation. As stated in 2 Corinthians 2:10-11 above, His grace is sufficient. Seeking for signs and wonders, Christ said, is evidence of a wicked and adulterous people (Matthew 16:4).

Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. –Philippians 2:9-11

4.) It is attractive to the world. Another sign that a gospel being preached is false is that it is attractive to the world. Many false gospels contain half-truths and, even in some ways, may sound very much like the gospel. But the world is impatient with the inward work of regeneration and sanctification through Christ. They seek fulfillment through entertainment and other carnal means which give them a false impression of their own piety. The message of Christ’s bloody death on the cross and his endurance of God’s wrath is watered down to the point that it is meaningless, while rock bands, laser light shows, and music devoid of any theological substance are echoed throughout the churches that teach this way. In other words, if the world is not offended by the gospel message being preached, it is false.

Scripture teaches that Christ is offensive, even calling Him the “rock of offense (1 Peter 2:8),” and that the gospel is foolish to the world.

For the word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. –1 Corinthians 1:18

5.) The gospel is not derived from Scripture. Many false churches teach that Scripture is insufficient to receive the knowledge of the grace of God. This is most prevalent in the Roman Catholic and Orthodox churches. Most cults have some form of this aberrant teaching as well, however, there are plenty of other churches, “evangelical churches,” that have strayed from the doctrine of Sola Scriptura (Scripture Alone) as well. We have seen in recent years pastors like Andy Stanley stray away from the authority of Scripture as well. This opens the door to all sorts of error, most of it significant and eternally damning.

The Scriptures themselves are the testimony of Christ and His plan of redemption. They are the complete revelation of Jesus Christ sovereignly preserved by the Holy Spirit to teach, reprove, and equip the saints for everything necessary in this life. There is nothing else that we need to be made complete in Him.

All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness,that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work. –2 Timothy 3:16-17

Yet, false gospels that are not derived from Scripture always end up being a teaching that is contrary to the biblical gospel. It always ends up being a gospel of meritorious works as opposed to grace, or a gospel of some other (co)savior and (co)redeemer as opposed to Christ alone. It always minimizes the exclusivity of Christ as the only Lord and gives many a false hope in other beliefs and religions.

It is Christ alone who saves and it is Christ alone who is King. If your church is teaching another gospel or if you notice any of these signs of a false gospel in your church, it may be time to move. Don’t just sit there and put up with it.

For if someone comes and proclaims another Jesus than the one we proclaimed, or if you receive a different spirit from the one you received, or if you accept a different gospel from the one you accepted, you put up with it readily enough. –2 Corinthians 11:4

[Editor’s Note: This article was first published at Reformation Charlotte]

Jax Taylor is an actor and model and currently stars in a Bravo reality television series entitled Vanderpump Rules. Taylor has modeled for the cover of Trump Magazine, Cosmopolitan, Esquire, and Cosmo Girl. He’s also done ads for major retailers like Target, Macy’s, JC Penney’s, Old Navy, Nordstrom’s, and Abercrombie and Fitch. Most recently, he’s been known as the boyfriend of Brittany Cartwright, another reality star.

Taylor also attends Hillsong Church in Los Angeles and has some interesting reasons for attending the congregation.

He is just one of many celebrities who are drawn to the lights, glitz and glamor of the Christianity-lite worship experiences of the Charismatic Hillsong, the quickest growing church on the planet. The question is why do so many celebrities – especially those known for their carnality, worldly behavior, and apparent lostness – attend Hillsong?

Taylor told The Daily Dish, a Bravo publication, “Well I’ve been starting to go to church a lot. So when I started [dating] Brittany who’s obviously very Christian and goes to church a lot. And I wasn’t anti-church — I grew up going to church — I just never went. I just felt like I didn’t need to go again.”

Taylor continued, “I don’t really go to a really churchy-type of church … Like the Kardashians always sit in front of me, or Justin Beiber’s next to me all the time. Recently, I took her for the first time and she was just like [‘This is crazy’… ‘Literally there in front of me [is] Hailey Baldwin and Justin’].”

Why are they all there?

Taylor said, “But it’s actually a fun church. It just relates God to today and what you’re going through today. It’s not really in the book with Moses and all that stuff; it’s just kind of dealing with today.”

He continued, “It’s more spiritual; it is a Christian church and we go every Wednesday night. [Judah Smith] flies in from Seattle. He’s just really good. He’s just amazing. He’s funny and I need it. It’s like my recharge for the week. I look forward to it. It’s gotten to the point where it’s like, ‘Brittany, let’s go,’ where she was the church one at first. But now I am.”

Are these celebrities turning to Christ? Are they experiencing worship in Spirit and in Truth? Is it really Chritianity if it doesn’t include “the book with Moses and all that stuff?”

[Ethics Daily] The second meeting of the third phase of international ecumenical conversations between the Baptist World Alliance (BWA) and the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity took place Dec. 10-14 in Rome at the Domus Internationalis Paulus VI.

The Baptist delegation was led by co-chair Frank Rees, associate professor and chair of the academic board at the University of Divinity in Australia; the Catholic delegation was led by co-chair Bishop Arthur Serratelli, bishop of Paterson, New Jersey.

The meeting took up the theme of the “Context of Common Witness.” This discussion reflected on the global cultural context in which common Christian witness is being conducted today in six continents of the world.

This sub-theme helps to illuminate the overall theme of the third phase of dialogue, “The Dynamic of the Gospel and the Witness of the Church.” The Baptist-Catholic group will meet annually through 2021 for this third phase of conversations.

Included in the week of ecumenical conversations was a meeting with Pope Francis during the general papal audience on Dec. 12. The following day, the participants visited a local Baptist church in Trastevere.

The Baptist-Catholic group will convene for its third round of the current phase of conversations on Dec. 9-13, 2019, in Warsaw, Poland, hosted by the Baptist Union of Poland at the Baptist Theological Seminary in Warsaw.

To continue reading, click here.

[Editor’s Note: This article was written by Steven Harmon and Avelino Gonzalez-Ferrer and first posted at Ethics Daily. This HT is not an endorsement of Ethics Daily]

Today’s College Football Playoff features four of the nation’s most heralded quarterbacks: Tua Tagovailoa of the University of Alabama, Trevor Lawrence of Clemson University, Ian Book of Notre Dame, and Kyler Murray of the University of Oklahoma. There is a good chance that, when the dust settles and a champion is crowned, one of these young men will be thanking God on national television.

That’s exactly what happened last year when Tagovailoa brought yet another national title to Tuscaloosa. Tagovailoa, who wears cross-shaped eye black in each game, is famously outspoken about his faith.  After he, as a true freshman and halftime substitute for the struggling Jalen Hurts, led his team to a dramatic overtime victory over the University of Georgia, Tagovailoa went out of his way to publicly thank Jesus in his post-game interview:

First and foremost, I’d just like to thank my Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. With him, all things are possible. That’s what happened tonight.

Earlier this month, Tagovailoa went down with an injury against the University of Georgia in the Southeastern Conference Championship Game.  He was replaced at the quarterback position by former starter Jalen Hurts. Hurts led the Crimson Tide to yet another comeback victory over the Georgia Bulldogs. Like Tagovailoa before him, Hurts made it a point to recognize God in his postgame interview. His fate, Hurts said, had been in “God’s hands” all along.

Tagovailoa and Hurts are the odds-on favorites to repeat as national champions. If they don’t, however, another quarterback may be thanking God on the big stage. Kyler Murray, who edged out Tagovailoa to win the Heisman Trophy, will face Alabama on the field in the 1st Round of the Playoffs. Murray’s church affiliation is not widely known but he did thank God in his Heisman Trophy acceptance speech. Ian Book of Notre Dame is the longest shot to win the title. His church affiliation is also not widely known but Notre Dame is a Roman Catholic University. The school’s campus famously features a giant mural known as “Touchdown Jesus” which overlooks its football field.  

Of all the quarterbacks who may be thanking God during a national title on January 7th, Trevor Lawrence has the best shot to do the same on NFL Sundays. Clemson’s true freshman quarterback is a sure-fire 1st round draft pick. He gives the Tigers an excellent chance to avenge last year’s playoff loss to Jalen Hurts and the Crimson Tide. Like Tagovailoa Lawrence is outspoken about his faith.

pic.twitter.com/rM5SbMvKVz

— Trevor Lawrence (@Trevorlawrencee) July 13, 2018

Lawrence has been clear that, despite his national fame as am elite NFL prospect, his “identity is in Christ”.

The Cartersville native is a member of Tabernacle Baptist Church, a southern Baptist congregation which proclaims the gospel and adheres to biblical innerancy. To contrast, Tagovailoa is a member of Message of Peace Church in Ewa Beach, Hawaii which is a member of the Hawaii Conference of the United Church of Christ . The United Church of Christ is notoriously liberal and has endorsed homosexual marriage rights and acted to protect “access to abortion” as a matter of “reproductive justice.” According to a pew research survey, 46% of United Church members don’t believe in Hell. Despite his public displays of Christian faith, Tagovailoa’s church is undeniably apostate. The same can be said for the Roman Catholic Church of the University Notre Dame. Though it is socially conservative with regard to sexuality and the sanctity of life, it proclaims a false gospel of works.

The truth is that many of these public figures are being dangerously misled by apostate churches and are in need of fervent prayer and a true Christian witness. Thank God for churches like that of Lawrence where the gospel is faithfully proclaimed and the Bible is reverently respected as God’s inerrant word.

As a reminder, the gospel is the story of the good news of Jesus Christ. Jesus came according to the scriptures and died a substitutionary death on the cross to atone for sin. All who repent of their sins and trust in the risen Lord for forgiveness will be saved, through faith by grace and not of works, from the wrath of God. All who do not will suffer an eternity in Hell.

As football season comes to a close and Christian football fans celebrate hard-fought championships and lament crushing defeats, they need to remember the primacy of the gospel and the Kingdom of God. When the lights dim and last year’s champions are forgotten, Christians should remain faithful to proclaiming the gospel with more regularity than they proclaim the greatness of their favorite teams and players.

Former Texas Longhorns quarterback nation championship runner up Colt McCoy, provides a good perspective:

*Please note that the preceding is my personal opinion. It is not necessarily the opinion of any entity by which I am employed, any church at which I am a member, any church which I attend, or the educational institution at which I am enrolled. Any copyrighted material displayed or referenced is done under the doctrine of fair use.

Challenging the lexicon of progressive thought, Pulpit & Pen founder JD Hall once wrote, “There is no such thing as a ‘gay community.’ Communities are built around shared values, not shared deviancies. We would not classify pedophiles, necrophiles, or murderers as a ‘community.'” Despite Hall’s challenge to their rhetoric, progressive churchmen continue to cater and pander to a particular group of people who identify with their sin at least as much as they identify with Christ. Yesterday, The United Methodists of Arkansas published an article entitled “Council of Bishops’ letter to the global LGBTQ community.”

The article contains a letter addressed to the United Methodist Church’s “Global LGBTQ Kin in Christ.” In the letter, United Methodist bishops apologize to those who both identify as homosexual and Christian for “demeaning and dehumanizing comments and attacks on LGBTQ persons in conversations” related to the denomination’s debate over the morality of homosexuality. Absent from the letter is any scriptural citation of why homosexuality is sinful and a call for professing homosexual Christians to repent of lusting after members of the same sex or engaging in homosexual practices.

It is past the time for any bible-believing members left in the United Methodist Church to come out from among them. Knowing the United Methodist Church is still debating the place for homosexuals in Christ’s church nearly 2,000 years after the Apostle Paul wrote:

Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived; neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor homosexuals, nor thieves, nor the covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers, will inherit the kingdom of God. ¹Such were some of you; but you were washed, but you were sanctified, but you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and in the Spirit of our God.

1 Corinthians 6:9-11

For the time being, the United Methodist Church continues to recognize the sinfulness of homosexuality in its official book of discipline. However, it’s current stance is tenuous and its recognition of the sinfulness of homosexuality is largely influenced by its more conservative international bishops. American bishops tend to be more liberal. It is these liberal bishops who have been driving the United Methodist Church towards full affirmation of a homosexual lifestyle. For the United Methodist church to pen a letter from “conservative, centrist, progressive” bishops to apologize to the LBGTQ despite the biblical truth that homosexuality is clearly a moral issue signifies the church’s drift towards apostasy and compromise with the world.

*Please note that the preceding is my personal opinion. It is not necessarily the opinion of any entity by which I am employed, any church at which I am a member, any church which I attend, or the educational institution at which I am enrolled. Any copyrighted material displayed or referenced is done under the doctrine of fair use.

Is discernment biblical? Watch JD Hall at the Judge Not Conference, and share this powerful video.

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On this episode of Polemics Report for, JD discusses the bruhaha between Steven Anderson and James White/Jeff Durbin. Then, he goes on to discuss godly separation and MacArthur inviting Social Justice Warriors to ShepCon. He emphasizes like 5 million times that he still loves MacArthur and the Dallas Statement signers.

Hear More Archived Episodes of The Pulpit & Pen Daily Updates & Polemics Report – HERE

Visit JD Hall’s Polemics Report Page – HERE

Visit JD Hall’s Pulpit and Pen Page – HERE

Check Out Other BTWN podcasts – HERE

JD Greear is the President of the Southern Baptist Convention and the pastor of The Summit Church, a nine campus church based in North Carolina. This Sunday, his church won’t be meeting. Greear has encouraged his congregation to worship at home.

There are no services at our campus locations this weekend. This is a great chance to worship at home with your family! https://t.co/YfB5WmRpJ3 pic.twitter.com/XeKxXl97EM

— J.D. Greear (@jdgreear) December 28, 2018

The Sundays before and after Christmas are typically low attendance Sundays at any given church. This is mostly due to the holiday travel schedules of congregants, who are often out of town visiting family (or hosting family from out of town). The army of volunteers (childcare workers, parking lot attendants, security volunteers, Sunday School teachers, greeters, etc..) necessary for a megachurch to “put on its face” can’t be counted on to work on the Sundays closest to Christmas. Should this be a reason to cancel worship on the Lord’s Day?

Absolutely not, but lack of labor and customers is a good reason to close a business. Such holiday shutdowns, which are typical among megachurches and factories alike, demonstrate very clearly the nature of megachurches like Summit – they are businesses. How tragic it is that a church of the Lord Jesus Christ would shut its doors on any given Sunday, especially one that offers family members who live in different towns the opportunity to worship together! That the Summit Church knows its people and their families generally won’t show up on the Sunday after Christmas says a lot about the health of that body and the pastoral leadership of the president of America’s largest protestant denomination.

Personally, I plan to attend church this Sunday. The church which I regularly attend will not have childcare for children under 2 but will meet in a family integrated service. It will be a little different than usual – a few songs and a short Bible reading, but it will be a gathering of the Lord’s people on the Lord’s Day…and that is something that should never be canceled due to lack of interest.

It’s worth noting that the web page at the Summit Church which announces the cancellation of services, reminds church members that they “can make a tax-deductible year-end gift at summitrdu.com/give before midnight, Dec. 31, or mail it to The Summit Church (address below), postmarked by Dec. 31.”

*Please note that the preceding is my personal opinion. It is not necessarily the opinion of any entity by which I am employed, any church at which I am a member, any church which I attend, or the educational institution at which I am enrolled. Any copyrighted material displayed or referenced is done under the doctrine of fair use.

Franklin Graham, the famous evangelist and son of the late Billy Graham, is as well-known for his political activism as he is for his Christian ministry. In the course of that activism, Graham made a Facebook post about North Carolina’s infamous “bathroom bill,” which required people using public bathrooms to use that bathroom which corresponded to their God-assigned birth gender. Graham made that post in 2016. This week, some two years later, the post was removed by Facebook and Graham was banned from the site for 24 hours. According to an article published in The Charlotte Observer:

A member of Facebook’s content review team — the team has 15,000 members — had mistakenly decided the post violated Facebook’s policy that bans “dehumanizing language” and excluding people based on sexual orientation, race and other factors, according to the spokesperson and Facebook’s written policy.

Graham, who has over 7 million followers on Facebook, expressed his frustration on Friday:

After receiving negative publicity from a very popular man, Facebook quickly apologized and restored the post. Nevertheless, proponents of transparency and free speech, Christian and non-Christian alike, should be alarmed by the censorship activities of the world’s most powerful social media outlet. At the time of publication, the owner of this very website remains banned from Facebook for daring to refer to Bruce Jenner, as a man named Bruce Jenner instead of a woman named Caitlyn.

Call me frustrated.

*Please note that the preceding is my personal opinion. It is not necessarily the opinion of any entity by which I am employed, any church at which I am a member, any church which I attend, or the educational institution at which I am enrolled. Any copyrighted material displayed or referenced is done under the doctrine of fair use.

[NewsPunch] In his traditional Christmas speech, Pope Francis urged Christians to reject sovereignty and embrace globalism in order to make the world a better place

Addressing the rise in populism and increasing hostility about illegal immigration among westerners, Pope Francis warned:

Our differences are not a detriment or a danger; they are a source of richness. As when an artist is about to make a mosaic: it is better to have tiles of many colours available, rather than just a few,” the Pope told a large audience in the Vatican.

The experience of families teaches us this,” he said, “as brothers and sisters, we are all different from each other. We do not always agree, but there is an unbreakable bond uniting us, and the love of our parents helps us to love one another. 

Voiceofeurope.com reports: Among other things, the Pope also talked about materialism and its side effects:

“An insatiable greed marks all human history, even today, when, paradoxically, a few dine luxuriantly while all too many go without the daily bread needed to survive,” he said.

[Editor’s Note: This article was written by Sean Adi-Tabatabai and originally published at NewsPunch]

Recently, the Times of India reported that the Ahmedabad-based cult, Swaminarayan Gadi Sansthan has bought a 30-year-old church in Portsmouth, Virginia with plans to convert it into a Swaminarayan temple of pagan worship. The Portsmouth church is not the first to be converted into a Hindu center of pagan idolatry. This seems to be the start of a troublesome trend among failing churches in the United States.

This latest conversion of the Portsmouth church is only one of five other recent conversions from a Christian church to a pagan temple here in the United States by the Hindu cult Swaminarayan Sansthan. Other converted churches are in California, Louisville, Pennsylvania, Los Angeles, and Ohio. This troubling trend is not limited to only here in the United States; it is happening abroad as well.  Swaminarayan Gadi Sansthan has converted other churches internationally, one in London and another near Bolton in Manchester UK.  Additionally the group is working on an acquisition of a church in Toronto, Canada.

There is an ever-growing number of pagan Hindu worshipers in the United States. For example, Virginia has a population of more than 10,000 Gujaratis. While we as Christians should be alarmed at the conversion of churches to pagan Hindu worship centers, we need to remember that this can present an opportunity to reach the lost. This prospect of hope comes in Christ and readily provides a mission field to preach the Gospel to those lost in the pagan cult of Hinduism.

While the field is ripe for the harvest the question has to be asked, why are these supposed “Christian” churches selling their buildings to pagan entities? Where are these churches Christian ethics and morals? While yes, a church may be failing, does that make it right for a church to sell to just anyone who offers the right amount of money? No, churches should not be selling to anyone who is willing to buy. Just because your churched failed and you need to sell does not mean you forsake your moral and spiritual commitment to the body of Christ at large or your duty to honor God.

These churches that are selling to this pagan Hindu cult are inviting the devil into there backyard to play and shake hands with their community. Even in selling, these churches owe it to the community, the body of believers, and above all to Christ to do the right thing and not sell to groups or businesses that openly are against Christianity.  

James White, the “Scholar in Residence” at Apologia Church and host of The Dividing Line podcast, had some tough words for the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention. He posted the following on his public Facebook page.

He wrote…

I received an email soliciting donations for the Southern Baptist ERLC (The Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission). I found it quite interesting. It was signed by Brent Leatherwood, “Director of Strategic Partnerships.” It was brief, and began with a paragraph noting how the ERLC had gone to the “next level of gospel ministry” in 2018. There were three ways in which this had happened. Each was given a single sentence summary. The first was, “This year alone, we placed five life-saving ultrasound machines in pro-life pregnancy resource centers across the country.” Well, that’s a good thing, as I imagine those are not inexpensive units. The third was rather vague, since numerous groups (for example, Alliance Defending Freedom) are involved in this area, but the summary was, “And we successfully fought for religious liberty and pro-life speech in U.S. Supreme Court legal briefs.” Definitely need folks involved there.

But the second of the three was encapsulated in this sentence: “We helped the church better understand that racial unity is a biblical calling for Christians by hosting thousands in Memphis at our biggest conference ever.” I am assuming this is in reference to the MLK50 conference held April 3-4, 2018 in cooperation with The Gospel Coalition. So the second of the three accomplishments was how the ERLC “helped the church better understand racial unity.”

I was reminded of some of the presentations from that gathering, and in particular, the presentation by Pastor Eric Mason (author of the book, “Woke Church” which came out later in the year) in which he not only insisted that racial unity today *demands* we be backward looking, that is, that we define the relationships between believers upon their historical ethnic groupings and hence live in the light of past sins rather than present redemption, but in which he referred to “non-qualified blacks” that he described as “black on the outside but Angloid on the inside.” Of course, that is a phrase that could not be uttered by anyone with any ethnic heritage other than African, and, I would argue, should not be accepted by anyone in any context, no matter what the speaker’s ethnic heritage or skin color, for it is not only biased and prejudiced and unfair, it is based upon a set of presuppositions that have no place in a serious gospel context. This was the same conference in which one Preston Perry threw Dr. Voddie Baucham under the bus in a “spoken word” presentation regarding Mike Brown.

A few days ago Russell Moore, the head of the ERLC, promoted a New Yorker piece that glowingly presented the thought of Thomas Merton. Merton is not a name most evangelicals know, and the only reason I know it is because I went to a seminary significantly to my left, theologically speaking. Merton’s spirituality was an eclectic mix of all sorts of traditions, many well outside the Christian faith, and the final form of his understanding did not include the necessary, definitional truths of the gospel. I have seen many down through the years wander slowly out of the faith, and often they did so under the guise of reading the “spiritual authors” that had no fealty to the gospel itself. And I was left wondering, with all the deep, wonderful, orthodox material out there that is part of our history, why promote Merton? Then I realized, so much of that deep material is now stigmatized by the evil that is “intersectionality” and the constant paradigmatic emphasis upon “oppressor/oppressed.”

I know many in the SBC. I hear them talking. I think if someone would stand up, someone with some history, some standing, and say, “Enough of this,” there would be a major revolution. Might it be too late? Possibly. The major denominational structures are already heavily compromised when it comes to embracing “intersectionality” in all its grotesque manifestations. But there is a lot of common sense left, and while it is still there, the possibility does exist to see a change. I’m hearing a lot about refusing to give CP (Cooperative Program) funds if those funds will be used to promote leftist causes and political movements. But is even that already too late, in light of the influx of funds from other sources, sources that plainly want to see the SBC, and other conservative Christian organizations, turned into “progressive” powerhouses? We will see in just a matter of years, given how fast things move today. Till then, I can hardly question the motivations of the concerned members of a Southern Baptist church who feels tremendous conflict upon receiving the email I did. Ultrasound machines? Great! Religious liberty briefs at the Supreme Court? Wonderful! Neo-Marxist worldview concepts like intersectionality being promoted in local churches? Not so much.

[Editor’s Note: Brent Leatherwood, mentioned above, is the one who had him Thomas Littleton – a credentialed reporter – removed by police from the SBC annual meeting for asking about ERLC support for the pro-gay Revoice Conference. We might also add that ultrasound machines and the support for religious liberty are fine things, but are not – as the ERLC says – “Gospel ministry.”]

[One News Now] Goodluck Jonathan, the former president of Nigeria who is a Christian, has charged former President Barack Obama with facilitating the persecution of Christians by intervening in the nation’s politics so that he was replaced by the African nation’s current president, Muhammadu Buhari – a Muslim under whom mass carnage has been waged against believers.

Jonathan – who served as Nigeria’s president from 2010 to 2015 – alleges in his new book, My Transition Hours, that Obama went out of his way to meddle in Nigerian politics so that he was deposed and succeeded by his Muslim rival, who has gone after Christians with a vengeance.

“On March 23, 2015, President Obama himself took the unusual step of releasing a video message directly to Nigerians all but telling them how to vote,” Jonathan wrote in his book, as quoted in AllAfrica.com. “In that video, Obama urged Nigerians to open the ‘next chapter’ by their votes. Those who understood subliminal language deciphered that he was prodding the electorate to vote for the [Muslim-led] opposition to form a new government.”

Out with Christianity, in with Islam

A news report published four years earlier in 2011 indicated that Obama was well-aware of the Islamic violence that would be ushered in if the Christian president left office.

“The current wave of [Muslim] riots was triggered by the Independent National Election Commission’s (INEC) announcement on Monday [April 18, 2011] that the incumbent President, Dr. Goodluck Jonathan, won in the initial round of ballot counts,” an April 2011 ABC News report announced. “That there were riots in the largely Muslim inhabited northern states where the defeat of the Muslim candidate Muhammadu Buhari was intolerable, was unsurprising.”

Nigeria, which is dominated by Muslims in the northern half of the nation and by Christians in the southern half – had more promising and peaceful years ahead with the Christian president taking power, but militant Nigerian Muslims did all they could to threaten his leadership and make his presidency as rocky and unstable as possible.

“Northerners [Muslims] felt they were entitled to the presidency for the declared winner, President Jonathan, [who] assumed leadership after the Muslim president, Umaru Yar’Adua, died in office last year and radical groups in the north [Boko Haram] had seen his [Jonathan’s] ascent as a temporary matter to be corrected at this year’s election,” the ABC News report added. “Now they are angry – despite experts and observers concurring that this is the fairest and most independent election in recent Nigerian history.”

Obama’s trend of putting militant Muslims in power

Removing America’s allied powers abroad and working toward replacing them with Islamic terrorist-supporting regimes was nothing new under Obama, as one must only look back at the so-called “Arab Spring.”

“That the Obama administration may have imposed its will on a foreign country’s politics and elections is hardly unprecedented,” Breaking Israel News reported (BIN). “Recall the administration’s partiality for the Muslim Brotherhood during and after 2012 presidential elections in Egypt; or its unsuccessful efforts to oust Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu with U.S. taxpayers’ money; or its efforts – with an admittedly unverified ‘dossier’ – to prevent then-presidential candidate Donald J. Trump from being elected, or by discussing an ‘insurance policy’ in the event that Trump won. Moreover, texts by Peter Strzok revealed that Obama ‘wants to know everything we’re doing.’”

After having his way in the Middle East and essentially handing the region over to Islamic terrorist supporting and harboring leaders, Obama took his pro-Muslim crusade further south to the middle of the Supercontinent of Africa.

“So, in Nigeria, the Obama administration, it seems, sought to right the apparently intolerable wrong of having a duly elected Christian president in a more than 50 percent Christian nation,” BIN’s Raymond Ibrahim asserted. “Two questions arise: 1) Is there any outside evidence to corroborate Jonathan’s allegations against the Obama administration? 2) Is Buhari truly facilitating the jihad on his Christian countrymen?”

He went on to present evidence of the pro-Islamic/anti-Christian foreign policy touted and administered by the Obama administration.

“Former Nigerian President Jonathan’s newly published accusations appear to correspond with the former U.S. administration’s policy concerning Muslims and Christians in Nigeria,” Ibrahim noted. “To begin with, the Obama administration insisted that violence and bloodshed in Nigeria – almost all of which was committed by Muslims against Christians – had nothing to do with religion. This despite the fact that Boko Haram – which was engaging in ISIS-type atrocities: slaughter, kidnap, rape, plunder, slavery, torture, before ISIS was even born – presented its terrorism as a jihad.”

No such thing as jihad?

Just as Obama rejected calls to associate ISIS with Islam – despite the fact that the terrorist group’s official name is Islamic State – he would not link Boko Haram to the Muslim religion.

“In one instance, [Boko Haram] even called on President Jonathan to ‘repent and forsake Christianity’ and convert to Islam as the price for peace,” Ibrahim pointed out. “The Obama administration, however, refused to designate Boko Haram as a foreign terrorist organization until November 2013 – years after increasing pressure from lawmakers, human rights activists and lobbyists.”

The Obama administration’s reluctance to tie Islam to terrorism was also evident on Easter in 2012, when Obama’s Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs Johnnie Carson tried to disassociate Islam from an attack on a Nigerian church that was destroyed by a bombing that killed 39 worshippers.

“I want to take this opportunity to stress one key point, and that is that religion is not driving extremist violence [in Nigeria],”Carson stated, according to CNS News.

Former President Bill Clinton was also in the habit of deflecting blame away from Islamic terrorists.

“Instead, ‘inequality’ and ‘poverty’ – to quote Bill Clinton – are ‘what’s fueling all this stuff] (a reference to the jihadi massacre of thousands of Christians),” Ibrahim recounted.

In addition to manipulating elections and influencing politics, Obama used taxpayer money to make sure that jihad was alive and well in the central African nation.

“Apparently to prove that it believed what it was saying, the Obama administration even agreed to allocate $600 million in a USAID initiative to ascertain the ‘true causes’ of unrest and violence in Nigeria, which supposedly lay in the socio-economic – never the religious – realm,” the Israeli daily noted.

Besides discounting – or outrightly refusing to acknowledge – Islam’s role in mass killings, Obama and his administration have candidly rebuked Christian government officials for protecting themselves and fellow citizens from jihadists.

“Also telling is that, although the Obama administration offered only generic regrets whenever Christians were slaughtered by the dozens – without acknowledging the religious identity of persecutor or victim – it loudly protested whenever Islamic terrorists were targeted,” Ibrahim explained. “When, for instance, Nigerian forces under Jonathan’s presidency killed 30 Boko Haram terrorists in an offensive in May 2013, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry – who is also mentioned in unflattering terms in Jonathan’s memoirs – ‘issued a strongly worded statement’ to Jonathan.”

Kerry – who brokered the failed Iran nuclear deal – played a major role in defending and siding with Nigeria’s most notorious jihadists and condemning those who brought them to justice and an early end.

“We are … deeply concerned by credible allegations that Nigerian security forces are committing gross human rights violations,” Kerry scolded Nigeria’s Christian president at the time, according to Reuters.

The Obama administration’s alliance with Islam and opposition to Christianity in Nigeria was also evidenced the following year.

“In March 2014 – after the United States Institute for Peace invited the governors of Nigeria’s northern states for a conference in the U.S. – the State Department blocked the visa of the region’s only Christian governor, Jonah David Jang, an ordained minister,” Ibrahim recalled.

At the time, Emmanuel Ogebe, a human rights attorney, called the Obama administration out for discounting – or outright denying – the fact that Islamic militants incessantly orchestrate and wage violence specifically against Christians throughout Nigeria.

“After the [Christian governor] told them that they were ignoring the 12 Shariah states who institutionalized persecution … he suddenly developed visa problems,” Ogebe asserted, according to WND. “The question remains – why is the U.S. downplaying or denying the attacks against Christians?”

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[Editor’s Note: This article was written by Michael Haverluck and first posted at One News Now]