Presbyterians Week Headlines
[1] Warning – Rated “PG-13” (at the very least) - Transportation Safety Administration Agents at U.S. Airports Fondling Women’s and Children’s Breasts and Genitals During Searches of Persons Opting Out of “Naked Body Scan” X-rays
[2] Al-Qaeda Announces Christians Everywhere Are Legitimate Targets the Day After Fifty-Eight Killed at End of Siege at Baghdad, Iraq, Assyrian Catholic Church
[3] United Church of Christ Proposal Gives General Minister and President Leadership in Determining UCC Theological Perspectives
[4] PCUSA Committee Writes Off Additional US$315,000 in 2009 Per Capita Assessments as Uncollectable for Total 2009 Per Capita Write-Off of US$915,000
[5] Adultering Church of Scotland Minister’s Two-Year Suspension Halved after Apology for Not Being “Christ-Like”
[6] Book Review of Getting The Reformation Wrong by Dr. James Payton Published on Chuck Colson Center for Christian Worldview Website
[7] Trinity Foundation Announces 2010 Christian Worldview Essay Winners
[8] Latvian Reformed Website Begins Operation
[9] World’s First Scratch ‘n’ Sniff “Holy Card” Provides Whiff of Cologne Used by 19th Century Pope Pius IX
[10] Weston, Missouri, Townspeople Block Westboro Baptist Church Members from Disrupting Funeral of Soldier Killed in Afghanistan
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[1] Warning – Rated “PG-13” (at the very least) - Transportation Safety Administration Agents at U.S. Airports Fondling Women’s and Children’s Breasts and Genitals During Searches of Persons Opting Out of “Naked Body Scan” X-rays
In a 6 November 2010 video on LewRockwell.com titled “Expect Federal Fondling If You ‘Opt Out’ of the Naked Airport Scanners,” Lew Rockwell reports that during a recent visit to the San Jose, California airport, after he had gone through the security station, Mr. Rockwell watched for twenty minutes from a nearby coffee shop as Transportation Security Administration (TSA) agents put four lanes of women and children in strollers through “naked body scan” x-rays where an effectively-nude picture of the person is taken and recorded, and watched male TSA agents perform “enhanced pat-downs” of women and children opting out of the “Naked Body Scans,” where the TSA agents fondled the breasts and genitals of the women, and of girls as young as three years old.
Mr. Rockwell continued the video by interviewing a woman on his customer service staff who recently travelled through the Denver, Colorado, airport with the woman’s twenty-month-old and eight-year-old daughters. The woman “opted out” of the naked body scan for her and her children, as the mother did not want to expose the three of them to the X-ray radiation. The woman was then subject to a full-body search by “enhanced pat down,” where the male TSA agent felt over the woman’s entire body, including the thorough fondling of her breasts and genitals. The woman refused to let the man fondle her children, so a female TSA agent was called in to examine the two girls.
Mr. Rockwell says the TSA is training a “Gestapo cadre to teach you that it is normal and natural” to endure the invasive molestation at the security gate, and Rockwell says that if the TSA can get people to consider these procedures as normal, then the TSA will be able to convince people to do anything that is asked of them. Rockwell considers the naked body scans and body molestations to be egregious violations of the Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which forbids the U.S. Government from performing unreasonable searches and seizures.
Mr. Rockwell said that the TSA on 29 October 2010 announced that the TSA will begin to use the fronts of their hands to conduct more thorough body searches of all air passengers whether opting in or out of the Naked Body Scans. Rockwell said that the TSA agents he witnessed in San Jose before the 29 October announcement were already using the fronts of their hands for body searches.
+ LewRockwell.com, Post Office Box 1189, Auburn, Alabama 36831, lew@lewrockwell.com
+ U.S. Department of Homeland Security, Washington DC 20528, 202-282-8000, Contact Form
[2] Al-Qaeda Announces Christians Everywhere Are Legitimate Targets the Day After Fifty-Eight Killed at End of Siege at Baghdad, Iraq, Assyrian Catholic Church
Al-Qaeda front group The Islamic State of Iraq (ISI) on 2 November 2010 claimed responsibility for the 31 October 2010 attack and siege of the Our Lady of Salvation Church (Holy Apostolic Catholic Assyrian Church of the East) in Baghdad, Iraq, in which fifty-eight persons were killed when security forces ended the siege 1 November 2010, and additionally stated that “all Christian centres, organisations and institutions, leaders and followers” are “legitimate targets.”
ISI is demanding the release of two women in Egypt, the wives of Christian Coptic Orthodox Church of Egypt (CCOCE) priests, of whom the ISI claims one converted to Islam and the other wants to convert to Islam, and that both are being held against their will in CCOCE churches.
+ Barnabas Aid, 6731 Curran Street, McLean, Virginia 22101, 703-288-1681, Fax: 703-288-1681, usa@barnabasaid.org
+ Holy Apostolic Catholic Assyrian Church of the East
+ Christian Coptic Orthodox Church of Egypt
[3] United Church of Christ Proposal Gives General Minister and President Leadership in Determining UCC Theological Perspectives
The Unified Governance Working Group of the United Church of Christ (UCC) on 30 September 2010 published and on 15 October 2010 presented to the UCC Executive Council: “A Proposal for Unified Governance of the National Setting of the United Church of Christ,” which includes the following provision in lines 268 – 271 of the report:
“The General Minister and President [GMP] shall be the principle leader in interpreting the theological perspectives of the United Church of Christ. In consultation with the Collegium, the GMP will develop the foundation of United Church of Christ theological values as guided by the General Synod”
Serious concerns about the proposal are being expressed by several UCC laity and clergy members, concluding that the proposal concentrates too much power into the hands of the GMP and other denominational executives. One UCC member stated: “…the attempt to create some kind of UCC Pope is consistent with the rest of the proposal, which seeks to turn the UCC on its head so that it is run completely from the top down, with authority and power expressly concentrated in a few selected people.”
+ United Church of Christ, 700 Prospect Avenue, Cleveland, Ohio 44115, 216-736-2100, ogm@ucc.org
[4] PCUSA Committee Writes Off Additional US$315,000 in 2009 Per Capita Assessments as Uncollectable for Total 2009 Per Capita Write-Off of US$915,000
The Presbyterian Church (PCUSA)’s Committee on the Office of the General Assembly (COGA) at its 29 October 2010 meeting voted to write off an additional US$315,000 in uncollectable 2009 per capita assessments, in addition to the US$600,000 in per capita assessments for 2009 already written off by the COGA, for a total write off of uncollectable 2009 per capita assessments of US$915,000.
The per capita rate for 2009 was set by the PCUSA 2008 General Assembly (GA) at US$6.15 per church member. The PCUSA 2010 GA set the per capita rate for 2011 at US$6.50 per church member.
+ Presbyterian Church (PCUSA), 100 Witherspoon Street, Louisville, Kentucky 40202, 888-728-7228, Fax: 502-569-8005
[5] Adultering Church of Scotland Minister’s Two-Year Suspension Halved after Apology for Not Being “Christ-Like”
A 6 November 2010 article by Kevan Christie in The Daily Record titled “Reverend's Pulpit Ban Halved after Apology for Not Being ‘Christ-Like’” reports that Church of Scotland minister Mike Erskine, suspended from the pulpit for two years in August 2010 for adultery with a widow in the minister’s church, has had the two-year suspension halved after apologizing for not being ‘Christ-Like’.
Erskine, the father of two adult children, left his wife of twenty-three years in March 2010, after beginning an adulterous relationship with the widow in late 2009. The widow’s husband died from a brain tumor in late 2008.
+ The Daily Record, 67 Hope Street, Glasgow, Scotland, 0141-309-3251, reporters@dailyrecord.co.uk
+ Church of Scotland, 121 George Street, Edinburgh EH2 4YN, Scotland, 0131-225-5722
[6] Book Review of Getting The Reformation Wrong by Dr. James Payton Published on Chuck Colson Center for Christian Worldview Website
A review by Christian Observer Associate Editor Chuck Huckaby of the book Getting The Reformation Wrong by Dr. James Payton was published 3 November 2010 on the Chuck Colson Center for Christian Worldview website at the following link:
http://worldviewchurch.org/suggested-books/283-getting-the-reformation-wrong-correcting-some-misunderstandings
+ Christian Observer, Post Office Box 1371, Lexington, Virginia 20110, christianobserver@christianobserver.org
+ Chuck Colson Center for Christian Worldview, 44180 Riverside Parkway
Lansdowne, Virginia 20176, 877-478-0100, Contact Page
[7] Trinity Foundation Announces 2010 Christian Worldview Essay Winners
On Reformation Day, 31 October 2010, The Trinity Foundation announced the winners of the 2010 Christian Worldview Essay Contest.
The First Prize of US$3000 plus fifteen books went to Meghan Leigh Rader of Suffolk, Virginia, for her essay "A House Never Shaken."
The Second Prize of US$2000 plus ten books goes to Samantha Young of St. Paul, Minnesota, for her essay "The Philosophy of Christianity: Coherency and Comprehensiveness Defended."
The Third Prize of US$1000 plus five books goes to Erik Guichelaar of Walker, Michigan, for his essay "The Superiority of Biblical Presuppositionalism: Demonstrated by Way of an Examination of Four Major Problems in the Philosophy of Religion."
All contest entrants read the book Religion, Reason and Revelation by Dr. Gordon H. Clark, and wrote an essay about the book.
The 2011 Christian Worldview Essay Contest features the same cash prizes as in the 2010 contest, and deals with the topic of the book Introduction to Christian Philosophy (“The Wheaton Lectures”) by Gordon H. Clark. Each person who enters the contest must read this book and write an essay about it. The book is included in Christian Philosophy and in Clark and His Critics (as “The Wheaton Lectures”) and is available for US$15.00 for either book (retail price: US$21.95 for trade paperback) per copy, postpaid to U.S. addresses.
Contest rules and other information are available at:
http://www.trinityfoundation.org/2011EssayContest.php
+ The Trinity Foundation, Post Office Box 68, Unicoi, Tennessee 37692, 423-743-0199, Fax: 423-743-2005, tjtrinityfound@aol.com
[8] Latvian Reformed Website Begins Operation
A new Latvian Reformed Website called “Luxmundi” has begun operation at www.luxmundi.lv, and exists to translate, promote, distribute, and encourage the writing of reformed literature in the Baltic States.
+ Carl and Becky Chaplin, c/o 112 Long Meadow Road, Brandon, Mississippi 39042, 601-724-5728, radch5@gmail.com
[9] World’s First Scratch ‘n’ Sniff “Holy Card” Provides Whiff of Cologne Used by 19th Century Pope Pius IX
Cologne marketer The Pope’s Cologne (TPC) announced 9 November 2010 that TPC has created the world’s first scratch ‘n’ sniff “holy card”, which provides a whiff of the cologne used by 19th century Roman Catholic (RC) Pope Pius IX, which is recreated by Excelsis Fine Fragrances and sold by TPC from the rediscovered private formula of the cologne worn by the 19th century pontiff.
TPC writes: “The idea of scented holy cards is nothing new. Religious cards flourished after the invention of the printing press in 1450, and it was common for people to add scents to their holy cards as they did to their fine linens, handkerchiefs and note paper. What is new here is the “scratch and sniff” technology, a 20th century innovation, which delivers an instant and authentic experience of The Pope’s Cologne along with the portrait of the pontiff.”
Pope Pius IX is notable for the First Vatican Council, for defining as RC dogma the [unscriptural] doctrine of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary, and for defining the [unscriptural] RC dogma of Papal Infallibility.
+ Christian News Wire, 2020 Pennsylvania Avenue Northwest, Washington DC 20006, 202-546-0054, newsdesk@christiannewswire.com
+ Excelsis Fine Fragrances, 11 Sandstone Court, San Rafael, California 94903, 888-357-3957, Fax: 415-507-9557, customerservice@thepopescologne.com
+ The Vatican, Città del Vaticano, Rome, Italy, 39-6-69-88-35-11, Fax: 39-6-69-88-54-47, Contact Page
[10] Weston, Missouri, Townspeople Block Westboro Baptist Church Members from Disrupting Funeral of Soldier Killed in Afghanistan
A 7 November 2010 Fox News article titled “Supporters Block Funeral Protest in Weston” reported that hundreds of residents of Weston, Missouri, and people from as far away as California and Australia came together 6 November 2010 to block access to protesters from the Westboro Baptist Church of Topeka, Kansas, who had come to disrupt the funeral of U.S. Army Sgt. First Class C.J. Sadell, who died 24 October 2010 from injuries sustained in action in Afghanistan on 5 October 2010.
Half of the townspeople and other supporters lined up at a nearby intersection while the other half created a human shield at the funeral home. The Westboro protesters left quickly after they saw the supporters of the deceased soldier.
Sgt. First Class Sadell, thirty-four, is survived by his wife and two sons.
+ Fox News, 1211 Avenue of the Americas, New York, New York 10036, 888-369-4762, Fax: 212-462-6127, yourquestions@foxnews.com
+ Westboro Baptist Church, 3701 West 12th Street, Topeka, Kansas 66604, 785-273-0325, Contact Page
Wednesday, November 10, 2010
10 November 2010
