Defense Department Analyst, Former Boeing Employee, 2 Chinese Immigrants, Arrested in 2 Spy Cases
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,330320,00.html
A Defense Department analyst and a former engineer for Boeing Co. were charged Monday in separate spy cases for allegedly handing over military secrets to the Chinese government, the Justice Department said.
Additionally, two immigrants from China and Taiwan accused of working with the defense analyst were arrested after an FBI raid Monday morning on a New Orleans home where one of them lived.
The two cases — based in Alexandria, Va., and Los Angeles — have no connection, and investigators said it was merely a coincidence that charges would be brought against both on the same day.
The arrests mark China's latest attempts to gain top secret information about U.S. military systems and sales, said Assistant Attorney General Kenneth Wainstein. He described China as "particularly adept, and particularly determined and methodical in their espionage efforts."
"The threat is very simple," Wainstein said at a Justice Department news conference in Washington. "It's a threat to our national security and to our economic position in the world, a threat that is posed by the relentless efforts of foreign intelligence services to penetrate our security systems and steal our most sensitive military technology and information."
An official at the Chinese Embassy did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
In the first case, prosecutors said weapons systems policy analyst Gregg W. Bergersen, 51, of Alexandria, Va., sold classified defense information to a New Orleans furniture salesman. In return, the salesman, a Taiwan native identified as Tai Kuo, a 58-year-old naturalized U.S. citizen, forwarded the information to the Chinese government.
The data outlined every planned U.S. sale of weapons or other military technology to Taiwan for the next five years, prosecutors said.
It's not clear how much money Bergersen received for the classified information, or if he was even aware it was intended for the Chinese government. Court documents portray him as nervous during at least one meeting when he handed over a diskette of documents to be recorded, asking Kuo to keep their deal a secret.
"I'd go to jail, I don't wanna go to jail," Bergersen said in a conversation taped by the FBI.
"I'd probably go to jail too," Kuo responded. Prosecutors described him as chuckling.
A third alleged conspirator in the case, Chinese national Yu Xin Kang, 33, served as the go-between for Kuo and the People's Republic of China, prosecutors say.
Kuo and Bergersen, who worked at the Defense Security Cooperation Agency in Arlington, Va., were arraigned before Magistrate Judge John Anderson at the federal courthouse in Alexandria. Bergersen was charged with conspiracy to deliver national defense information to a person not entitled to receive it. He faces a maximum of 10 years in prison.
Bergersen, who was arrested at his home early Monday, wore a long black T-shirt and blue shorts. His wife, who identified herself only as Ofelia, told reporters Bergersen was innocent and the charges "came out of the blue."
Tai Kuo was charged with conspiracy to deliver national defense information to a foreign government. He faces life in prison if convicted. Kang was to appear in federal court in New Orleans, facing the same charges as Kuo.
In the second, unrelated case, former Boeing engineer Dongfan "Greg" Chung, 72, was arrested on charges of working as an unregistered agent for the Chinese government who stole trade secrets from the defense contractor. The stolen data largely focused on aerospace programs, including the Space Shuttle, prosecutors said.
Chung, a naturalized U.S. citizen, was indicted last week on espionage, conspiracy and obstructing justices charges that were unsealed Monday. He has been the subject of an FBI investigation for nearly a year as part of an inquiry into another Chinese-born engineer who was convicted in 2007 of stealing military data for the Chinese government.
As early as 1979, prosecutors said, Chinese officials were tasking Chung to collect data on U.S. aviation, including the Space Shuttle and various military and civilian aircraft. At one point, Chung responded in a letter that he wanted to "contribute to the motherland," according to the Justice Department.
Over an 18-year span, Chung traveled to China many times to deliver lectures on the Space Shuttle and other programs, and he allegedly met with Chinese government officials there to discuss how to transfer U.S. data.
Chung, who has a security clearance, worked for contractor Rockwell International from 1973 until 1996, when Boeing acquired Rockwell's defense and space firm. He retired from Boeing in 2002 but returned the next year as a contractor. He ultimately left Boeing in 2006.
U.S. Navy Intercepts Russian Bombers Flying Near Ships
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,330362,00.html
U.S. fighter planes intercepted two Russian bombers flying unusually close to an American aircraft carrier in the western Pacific during the weekend, The Associated Press has learned.
A U.S. military official says that one Russian Tupolev 95 buzzed the aircraft carrier USS Nimitz twice, at a low altitude of about 2,000 feet, while another bomber circled about 50 nautical miles out. The official was speaking on condition of anonymity because the reports on the flights were classified as secret.
The Saturday incident, which never escalated beyond the flyover, comes amid heightened tensions between the United States and Russia over U.S. plans for a missile defense system based in Poland and the Czech Republic.
Such Russian bomber flights were common during the Cold War, but have been rare since.
The bombers were among four Russian Tupolev 95s launched from Ukrainka in the middle of the night, including one that Japanese officials say violated their country's airspace over an uninhabited island south of Tokyo.
U.S. officials tracked and monitored the bombers as two flew south along the Japanese coast, and two others flew farther east, coming closer to the Nimitz and the guided missile cruiser USS Princeton.
As the bombers got about 500 miles out from the U.S. ships, four F/A-18 fighters were launched from the Nimitz, the official said. The fighters intercepted the Russian bombers about 50 miles south of the Nimitz.
At least two U.S. fighters trailed the bomber as it came in low over the Nimitz twice, while one or two of the other U.S. fighters followed the second bomber as it circled.
The official said there were no verbal communications between the U.S. and the Russians, and the Pentagon has not heard of any protests being filed by the United States. Historically, diplomatic protests were not filed in such incidents because they were so common during the Cold War era.
This is the first time Russian Tupolevs have flown over or interacted with a U.S. carrier since 2004.
Huckabee Hopes for Tuesday Miracle
http://www.cbn.com/CBNnews/320571.aspx
CBNNews.com - VIRGINA BEACH, Va. -- In a scene reminiscent of a Sunday sermon, Mike Huckabee took the good news that his candidacy would press on to a packed house at a Holiday Inn, Monday afternoon.
Before a crowd of about 350, with people yelling the occasional "preach it," Huckabee said he was going to fight until the end.
"I decided that until someone gets 1,191 delegates by the rules that have been designed by the very party bosses who now want to shut it down, they said that's what it took to win ladies and gentlemen," Huckabee said.
"Until someone gets that we are in this race for you and every other conservative American who wants a choice," he said.
Huckabee is hoping to pick up some much needed momentum after his surprise wins in the Kansas and Louisiana caucuses this past weekend.
"An interesting thing has been happening since last week," he told the audience. "The national media has been trying to say the election is over…Somebody didn't tell the people in Kansas, and someone forgot to tell the people in Louisiana."
Another Big Endorsement
Huckabee is also hoping that a new endorsement from Paul Weyrich, a big name in conservative circles, will help, despite polls showing Huckabee well behind Sen. John McCain.
When CBN News asked Huckabee if he wished the endorsement had come earlier, he responded by saying "I'm just personally grateful for it even if it didn't mean something for the campaign, I think it does, it's something for which I'm personally grateful."
According to the latest Associated Press count, McCain has 719 delegates while Huckabee trails with only 234.
Tuesday, voters in Maryland, Virginia, and Washington, D.C., will cast their votes, and Huckabee is praying that he will be victorious.
"Tomorrow you're going to go vote, and the whole country is going to watch Virginia, and D.C., and they're going to ask if this race is still on," Huckabee said. "And you're going to prove that it is."
Archbishop of Canterbury's Endorsement of Islamic Law an Unprecedented Appeasement
http://news.christiansunite.com/Religion_News/religion06857.shtml
WASHINGTON -- On February 7, Archbishop of Canterbury endorsed the concept of permitting Islamic (Sharia) law in civil disputes in the United Kingdom. Rowan Williams' comments to the BCC have drawn fire from many sources, including British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, who pointed out that British law should be based on British values.
The Institute on Religion & Democracy expressed dismay over Williams' comments and criticized the idea of elevating a legal system that does not share British values.
Ralph Webb, Director of IRD's Anglican Action Program, commented:
"Only a few months ago, Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams angered people on both the left and the right with his harsh, sweeping attack on American foreign policy. Now he has angered people by proposing that there should be some way of accommodating elements of Sharia law in British society.
"At a time when the Anglican Communion is in danger of fragmenting, Williams' comments are not helpful and run the risk of alienating some Anglicans who live under Sharia law.
Faith J.H. McDonnell, IRD Religious Liberty Program Director, commented:
"Allowing Sharia law in Britain is an act of tolerance for something that practices none of its own. We're concerned for British Muslims that have fled the intolerance of their own countries, only to find it gaining a foothold in Britain.
"Those who argue that accommodating Sharia law would be contingent upon the agreement of both parties in a dispute don't understand that there is no individual choice in Sharia law, especially for women.
"Archbishop Williams is going in exactly the wrong direction with his comments supporting Sharia law. He should be supporting Bishop Michael Nazir-Ali who has warned against the encroachment of Islamic fundamentalism in Britain, not attempting to buy off Muslim groups with appeasements."
The Institute on Religion and Democracy, founded in 1981, is an ecumenical alliance of U.S. Christians working to reform their churches' social witness, in accord with biblical and historic Christian teachings, thereby contributing to the renewal of democratic society at home and abroad. www.TheIRD.org
Anglican Archbishop Supports Sharia Law in U.K.
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,330347,00.html
The Anglican archbishop of Canterbury, Rowlan Williams, recently proposed the United Kingdom to establish separate courts, based on Sharia Law, for British Muslims. He says it will promote “social cohesion” and will free Muslims from being forced to choose between "the stark alternatives of cultural loyalty or state loyalty."
The archbishop’s rogue proposal and subsequent rationale should serve as a warning for all Western countries, including the United States, where immigration influx is challenging cultural identity.
In an interview with BBC News, Archbishop Williams nuanced his proposal by saying religious courts could limit themselves to civil judgments about marital and financial disputes, for example, and would not necessarily fall into human rights abuses. "Nobody in their right mind would want to see in this country the kind of inhumanity that's sometimes been associated with the practice of the law in some Islamic states; the extreme punishments, the attitudes to women as well."
His caveat is unconvincing on more than one level.
Apart from my incredulity regarding a Western country successfully moderating Sharia Law (especially given the contradicting interpretations of its various forms even among Muslim scholars), I find particularly disquieting the archbishop’s implied thesis that society cannot create a secular justice system that respects religious plurality and the rights of all of its citizens. It would seem the archbishop gives his blessing to the idea that a Western state is incapable of creating just laws applicable also to Muslims.
Archbishop Williams explained his view in this way: "[In the United Kingdom] there's one law for everybody and that's all there is to be said and anything else that commands your loyalty or allegiance is completely irrelevant in the processes of the courts — I think that's a bit of a danger."
What? The very purpose of civil law is to order society for everyone. This order always implies freedom of religious practice. When civil law and religion are both based on truth, they are not in conflict. Good law makes possible the practice of good religion. If they clash, one is disordered, and should be amended.
Archbishop Williams is correct in alerting us to the danger of civil law that infringes on religious liberty, including a church’s right to regulate its internal affairs. But in the absence of such liberty, the solution is to rectify the civil system, not to set up separate religious courts.
Perhaps we can best understand the archbishop’s preference for parallel courts if we accept a Muslim worldview that Islam should control every aspect of society, including the courts and the halls of government. The archbishop’s implicit support for this Islamic tradition is consequence, I would suggest, of a false understanding of cultural inclusiveness. We should never accept traditions, even religious traditions, as good simply because they are different from ours, or because they have long been attributed to God’s will by some people.
Even further, if a cultural tradition is in conflict with the dictates of reason — like this example of suppressing a state’s right to certain independence from religious authority — it can’t be in accordance with God’s will and we do a disservice to its adherents by pretending it may be.
The object of true faith is one and the same as the creator of human reason.
When we deny this, or forget this, we open the door to fundamentalism and are left with nothing with which to defend against radical, pseudo-religious propositions.
Here is the crux of the issue, as I see it: if a Muslim in the United Kingdom is being forced to choose between “the stark alternatives of cultural loyalty or state loyalty," as the archbishop has suggested, it is fair to conclude either a sector of Muslim culture in the United Kingdom or the British state itself is intrinsically flawed and should be changed.
Moderate Muslim scholars should be the first and loudest voices to reject the Anglican archbishop’s proposal as bad for Islam, bad for the United Kingdom and as a terrible precedent for the prospects of cultural integration worldwide.
God bless, Father Jonathan
Huckabee Intends to Stay In
http://www.newsmax.com/politics/huckabee/2008/02/11/71701.html
WASHINGTON -- Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee is resisting calls from some Republicans for him to abandon his presidential campaign.
Huckabee, who is trailing Sen. John McCain substantially in the hunt for delegates, said Monday that "the goal is to win, and nobody has 1,191 delegates yet."
Appearing in an interview on CNN, he said he won't step aside "as long as my guys are still waving the pom-poms."
Huckabee told NBC's "Today" show that "it's not a healthy thing for our party to sort of become lethargic, say it's (the presidential race) is over, have a coronation."
Huckabee Looks Ahead but Questions Wash.
http://www.newsmax.com/insidecover/huckabee/2008/02/10/71636.html
Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee is crying foul after John McCain's apparent victory in the Washington caucuses on Saturday.
Huckabee's campaign released a statement Sunday saying it will be exploring all available legal options regarding the "dubious final results." Arizona Sen. McCain was announced as the victor in the caucuses with 26 percent of the vote to Huckabee's 24 percent.
But Huckabee's campaign chairman, Ed Rollins, said Luke Esser, Washington's Republican Party chairman, chose to call the race too quickly for McCain.
Rollins said Huckabee was losing by 242 votes with 87 percent of the vote counted. He said there were another 1,500 or so votes that were apparently not counted.
"That is an outrage," Rollins said.
Rollins said the Huckabee campaign's lawyers will be on the ground in Washington soon to see why the count took so long, and why the vote-counting was stopped prematurely.
"It would be a disservice to every voter in Washington state to not pursue a full accounting of all votes cast," Rollins said. "... As I said, we are prepared to go to court, and we are also prepared to take our case all the way to the Republican National Convention in September."
Esser said Sunday, "If they can provide me with anything of substance to ask about, we'll be happy to inquire."
The former Arkansas governor on Saturday won all 36 delegates at stake in Kansas and narrowly held on to win Louisiana's primary. He's hoping those results will give him momentum going into Tuesday's elections in Maryland and Virginia.
However, he badly trails McCain, the likely nominee, in the overall race for delegates. Some say he should even step aside as a way to help the GOP maintain resources for the general election.
Huckabee described such talk as "total nonsense."
"The Democrats haven't settled their nominee either, so for us to suddenly act like we have to all step aside and have a coronation instead of an election, that's the antithesis of everything Republicans are supposed to believe," he said on "Meet the Press" on NBC. "We believe competition breeds excellence and the lack of it breeds mediocrity."
Huckabee said even he was surprised by Saturday's results. Huckabee won Kansas' delegates, but fell short of 50 percent in Louisiana, the threshold needed to claim the 20 delegates that were available. Instead, they will be awarded at a state convention next weekend.
He has pledged to stay in the race until a candidate earns the 1,191 delegates needed to secure the nomination. During one of the three Sunday talk shows he appeared on, it was noted that his prospects for getting to that magic number were virtually impossible.
"This country was built on the impossible. It's impossible that I'm still in the race. That's what most people would've said a few months ago," he said on "Face the Nation" on CBS. "In politics so many things can happen that can change the landscape overnight. A candidate can say something, do something, and everything can change."
He continued to deflect talk of interest in being McCain's choice for vice president.
"I'm not going to be asked. I think it's pretty evident that there would be a whole lot of people on the list long, long before me, and one of them would say 'yes,'" Huckabee said.
Told that McCain was heavily favored to win the primaries in Maryland and Virginia on Tuesday, Huckabee said he would do better than expected.
"I think we'll get a nice little bump out of what happened in Kansas," Huckabee said.
Huckabee spent part of Sunday at services at the late Rev. Jerry Falwell's church in Lynchburg, Va. The candidate steered clear of politics, but was welcomed as a "dear friend" by the Rev. Jonathan Falwell, who became pastor of Thomas Road Baptist Church after his father died last year.
Huckabee was escorted by Jerry Falwell Jr., chancellor of Liberty University, who had endorsed him in November.
Rabbis Worried About Catholic Prayer
http://www.newsmax.com/insidecover/catholic_prayer/2008/02/11/71722.html
Changes in a Good Friday prayer calling for the conversion of the Jewish people, meant to mollify criticisms by some Jews, has sparked even more criticisms with conservative Judaism’s international assembly of rabbis, the Rabbinical Assembly.
The organization is due to vote on a draft resolution (next week at a meeting in Washington) that warns the change could result in setting back relations between Catholics and Jews. The group is “dismayed and deeply disturbed to learn that Pope Benedict XVI has revised the 1962 text of the Latin mass, retaining the rubric, ‘For the Conversion of The Jews.’ ”
The new version of the payer to be recited in the revived traditional Tridentine Latin liturgy for Good Friday petitions God to enlighten the hearts of Jews “so that they may acknowledge Jesus Christ, the savior of all men.” Most Catholics worship in the vernacular, according to The New York Times and their prayers will not be affected. But last year, the Pope made it easier for traditionalists to celebrate the Latin Mass that was the norm before Vatican II.
The Times reported that the draft resolution warns that the prayer would “cast a harsh shadow over the spirit of mutual respect and collaboration that has marked these past four decades, making it more difficult for Jews to engage constructively in dialogue with Catholics.”
Prior to the Second Vatican Council, the Good Friday mass in Latin prayed for the conversion of Jews, referring to their “blindness” and calling upon God to “lift a veil from their hearts,” The Times recalled, adding that the newly revised prayer asks “Let us pray for the Jews. May the Lord Our God enlighten their hearts so that they may acknowledge Jesus Christ, the savior of all men.”
The changes have not satisfied lay Jewish groups with Rabbi Joel H. Meyers, executive vice president of the Rabbinical Assembly, the conservative rabbis’ group, telling the Times that leaders from the Reform and Reconstructionist movements had also been in touch with him about issuing a joint statement on the papal revision.
“We have been very much involved in interfaith activities and dialogue for years, and relationships with the Catholic Church are really quite good,” the rabbi told the Times, “I think it really turns back the clock a bit and reverts to some sense that the church is pulling back from the positions it took in Vatican II.”
In Rome, Cardinal Walter Kasper, described by Ha'aretz as "the top Vatican cardinal in charge of relations with Jews," told Corriere Della Sera, a leading Italian newspaper, "We think that reasonably this prayer cannot be an obstacle to dialogue because it reflects the faith of the Church and, furthermore, Jews have prayers in their liturgical texts that we Catholics don't like. I must say that I don't understand why Jews cannot accept that we can make use of our freedom to formulate our prayers. One must accept and respect differences."
Kasper made the cooment the day after world Jewish leaders warned the new prayer could set back inter-religious dialogue for decades.
Speaking to Vatican Radio, Kasper said: "The Holy Father wanted to say 'yes, Jesus Christ is the savior of all men, including the Jews, but this does not mean we are embarking on a mission [to convert Jews]. We are giving witness to our faith."
In the U.S. The Anti-Defamation League described the revision to the prayer "cosmetic revisions," adding that the prayer is still "deeply troubling" because of its call to convert Jews. "The language is better but it's still troubling," Abe Foxman, the national director of the Anti Defamation League told Reuters on Wednesday, Feb. 6.
The Rev. James Massa, executive director of the secretariat of ecumenical and interreligious affairs of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, told the Times that the prayer would be heard by “a tiny minority of Catholics and they will hear it in Latin.”
“The publication of the prayer and its interpretation by some of our partners in the Jewish community does lower the temperature a bit,” Father Massa said, “but we have persevered other controversies in the past and at the end of the day we are all at the table of dialogue.”
Rabbis di Segni (the Chief Rabbi of Rome) and Rosen [chairman of the International Jewish Committee on Interreligious Consultations), said that Jewish groups were disappointed and "had hoped the prayer in the [Tridentine] rite would be the same as that of the universal Catholic liturgy known as there Novus Ordo in use since 1970."
Global Warming Debate Is Not Settled
http://www.newsmax.com/metcalf/ice_age/2008/02/11/71736.html
“It is difficult to believe that even idiots ever succumbed to such transparent contradictions, to such gaudy processions of mere counter-words, to so vast and obvious nonsensicality . . .”
--H.L. Mencken
I recently interviewed Mark Lynas, author of "Six Degrees Could Change The World." He was promoting the two-hour world premier on the National Geographic Channel of the documentary based on his book. I watched the DVD he had sent along with his book and was incensed to hear Alec Baldwin announce “the debate is over.” BULLFEATHERS!
The debate is not over. The sycophant supporters of Al Gore’s "the sky is falling" rhetoric just flat out refuse to discuss any and all facts or evidence that contradicts their preconceived opinions, prejudices, and gospel.
Scientists, real scientists, continue to debate the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats of global warming and specifically the significance (or insignificance) of man’s contribution to impacting the planet.
Investor’s Business Daily is far from being a fringe rag. “Founded in 1984 . . . IBD editorials are rigorously researched, presenting under-reported — or simply unreported — facts that give you a better insight into the truth behind the headlines.
A recent IBD editorial http://ibdeditorial.com/IBDArticles.aspx?id=287279412587175 underscores the reality of the ongoing debate. Notwithstanding Lynas and Baldwin proclaiming “the debate is over,” not every scientist is part of the mythical "consensus."
In fact, scientists worried about a new ice age are seeking funding to better observe something bigger than all the Al Gore hype — the sun.
A 1991 study by the Danish Meteorological Institute using data that went back centuries showed that global temperatures closely tracked solar cycles. Hell-o!
The solar cycle’s data is (within the scientific community) accepted as hugely convincing. Also, the data indicates there is a potential danger threatening the planet . . . but it’s not global warming. It is global cooling.
Gee, now maybe Time can say they were supporters of the global cooling theory http://amazing.deter.com/content/Politics/Time%20-%20Another%20Ice%20Age.pdf before they were against it?
Twenty years before the Danish report, and before their trendy conversion to the global warming crowd, Time wrote, “The changing weather is apparently connected with differences in the amount of energy that the earth's surface receives from the sun.”
Maybe they should have stopped postulating in 1974?
I have interviewed a gaggle of scientists who refute the Gospel According to Gore. Dr. Fred Singer http://www.geoffmetcalf.com/qa/19633.html, a decade ago, told me “Whenever the solar activity peaks . . . you would expect the atmosphere to warm.”
However, he also told me, “The sun has an 11-year cycle and you can clearly see this in some of the temperature records.”
The above referenced Danish study underscores Singer’s claim. Solar activity fluctuates in an 11-year cycle. However thus far in the solar cycle, the sun has been abnormally quiet, historically atypical.
The lack of increased activity “could signal the beginning of what is known as a ‘Maunder Minimum,’ an event which occurs every couple of centuries and can last as long as a century.”
The Maunder Minimum happened in the 17th century and the slowed down solar hibernation resulted in bitter cold that started around 1650 and hung on with sporadic ups and downs until 1715. The resultant “frigid winters and cold summers . . . led to massive crop failures, famine, and death in Northern Europe.”
Experts report there has been no change in the magnetic field of the sun in this cycle and that if the sun stays quiet for another year or two, it may indicate a return to that period of dramatic cooling which would result in massive snowfall and severe Northern Hemisphere weather. Then again it may not.
Despite the wailing and gnashing of teeth by the U.N., Gore and the greenies, German researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Solar Research in Germany “report the sun has been burning more brightly over the last 60 years, accounting for the 1 degree Celsius increase in Earth's temperature over the last 100 years.”
Gosh-oh-golly, go figure . . . the sun burns brighter than normal for six years and the earth’s temperature increases over the last century 1 degree Celsius. Hmmmmmmmm.
Alex Baldwin trumpets Gore/Lynas to announce “the debate is over” but R. Timothy Patterson, professor of geology and director of the Ottawa-Carleton Geoscience Center of Canada's Carleton University, claims (and he is not the Lone Ranger) that "CO2 variations show little correlation with our planet's climate on long, medium, and even short time scales."
Patterson says, "I and the first-class scientists I work with are consistently finding excellent correlations between the regular fluctuations of the sun and earthly climate. This is not surprising. The sun and the stars are the ultimate source of energy on this planet."
"Solar activity has overpowered any effect that CO2 has had before, and it most likely will again," Patterson says.
As Dr. Singer told me years ago, “there is a debate going on — and the public is entitled to know that there is a debate and that the debate is not finished.”
AP to give Christians subsidy to visit Israel
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/India/AP_to_give_Christians_subsidy_to_visit_Israel/rssarticleshow/2774999.cms
HYDERABAD: Always eager to offer sops to minorities, the Andhra Pradesh government of chief minister Y S Rajasekhara Reddy on Monday decided to dole out subsidies, on the lines of the Haj scheme, for Christians who want to visit holy sites in Israel.
Governor N D Tiwari in his address to the joint budget session of the Assembly and Council said, "My government has decided to extend the Haj pilgrim scheme to Christian minorities also for their religious visits to Christian Holy Lands in Israel."
The sop to Christian pilgrims by the chief minister, himself a Christian, is seen as another move by the Congress government to woo minorities ahead of the general and assembly elections scheduled for early next year.
"Unlike the Haj, which is a protected environment and which sees thousands of pilgrims from all over the world every year, holy sites in Israel including disputed Jerusalem, are located in a virtual war zone and it is unlikely that more than a few Christians from India and the state will want to visit," said an opposition leader. Christians comprise about 1.5% of AP's eight crore population.
Audio Bibles Go to College
http://news.christiansunite.com/Religion_News/religion06856.shtml
DALLAS -- At a chapel service Wed., Feb. 6, more than 1,300 students from Dallas Baptist University here, committed 28 minutes a day to listen through the entire New Testament in 40 days. This volunteer Bible listening campaign, called You've Got The Time DBU, is using Audio New Testaments from Faith Comes By Hearing, the world's leading Audio Bible ministry.
According to Dr. Bob Garrett, a DBU graduate program director and You've Got The Time DBU organizer, every attendee of the chapel service received a free New Testament on MP3 disc. He said the chapel students will listen from Matthew 1 to Revelations 22 starting now and going until Easter.
"It was our goal to bless the students; giving them the dramatized Audio Bible was really great. The students' response was really positive," Garrett said. "One girl kept saying, 'I want one (Audio Bible) so bad,' and then we gave them out. The students loved getting the Word of God in this format and want to make this a part of their worship time," he added.
"There is quite a buzz here," Garrett said, who preached from Romans 10 on how "Faith comes by hearing" at Wednesday's chapel service. "We have already started listening groups in the dorms and afterward we will discuss what we've heard and encourage one another."
In order to increase participation, campus leaders are heavily promoting Audio Bible listening to the student body, which started with the campaign announcement at the chapel, then will follow through with daily emails. DBU also has posted downloadable MP3 Bibles on the university website and hung posters and flyers in dorms, hallways and other common areas.
"We want to help young people draw closer to God by hearing His Word," Garrett said. "We also want them to help others get closer by sharing His Word. The Bible is not just for us, it's for the nations, and we want the students to have an international agenda," he said.
Currently, Faith Comes By Hearing has Audio Bible recordings available in more than 275 languages. These Audio New Testament language recordings are available for free download at FaithComesByHearing.com.
Leaders at Faith Comes By Hearing say they are praying that "the international students at DBU will take God's Word back to their families overseas." About 10 percent of DBU's students are international students and DBU officials say that most of them do not come from a Christian background.
Jerry Jackson, Faith Comes By Hearing Founder and President, said he is also praying that "God's Word will help grow the faith of not only the students but also the whole college community."
"I am very excited about this historic university teaming up with Faith Comes By Hearing to promote God's Word in audio and influence the next generation of Christian leaders," said Jackson.
Garrett said Audio Bibles are a natural fit for today's college students. "This is a good program because so many students are auditory learners now. They all have iPods, and they listen everywhere -- while they're working out, going between classes and traveling. It's hard for students to be disciplined enough to read every day. This is a great way to pour the Word of God into their hearts, minds and lives," he said.
DBU's Bible listening campaign will also serve as a model for Faith Comes By Hearing's future efforts on Christian campuses nationwide.
Fr. Pavone Calls for Pro-life Lent and Support of '40 Days for Life'
http://news.christiansunite.com/Religion_News/religion06855.shtml
WASHINGTON -- Fr. Frank Pavone, National Director of Priests for Life, called upon pro-life activists today to make this Lenten season a time of increased pro-life prayer and activism nationwide.
"If we are going to repent of sin, we have to start with the sin of abortion," Fr. Pavone will declare today at a major speech in Oklahoma. "Repentance begins in our Churches and then continues as we come outside of the Church and into the streets in massive, peaceful protest against abortion."
Fr. Pavone and the entire Priests for Life organization are major supporters of the "40 Days for Life" campaign and will visit cities across the nation where this effort is being carried out. "I look forward to working with activists where 40 Days for Life is being implemented, as well as with other communities where similar efforts are underway."
Fr. Pavone, who travels to four states a week, also observed, "Pro-life activists are ready to be mobilized as never before. We experience this with the clergy, with youth groups, and also with veterans of the movement who have been intervening at abortion mills for decades. The entire Priests for Life team will foster this momentum in thousands of Churches and communities in the coming weeks through its ongoing training seminars for clergy and laity, and its television and radio programs which reach tens of millions of Americans."
Priests for Life is the nation's largest Catholic pro-life organization dedicated to ending abortion and euthanasia. For more information, visit www.priestsforlife.org.
Kansas Supreme Court Stays Order to Produce Abortion Records
http://news.christiansunite.com/Religion_News/religion06854.shtml
TOPEKA, Kansas -- The Kansas Supreme Court today issued a stay on the production of 2,000 abortion records that George R. Tiller had been ordered to hand over to a Sedgwick County grand jury that is investigating him for committing illegal late- term abortions. The stay was signed by Chief Justice Kay McFarland, a well-known and avid abortion supporter. No decision will be made before February 25, 2008.
Operation Rescue president Troy Newman issues the following statement concerning the latest delay in the grand jury investigation:
"This delay only heightens concerns that when the abortion records are finally produced, that the grand jury will be given records that have been tampered with or altered in some way so as to keep incriminating evidence out of the hands of the grand jury. We are painfully aware that the tampering of abortion records has already occurred in another illegal abortion case involving Planned Parenthood, which has ties to Tiller.
"Every time law enforcement or a legal investigation gets close to the truth, Tiller runs to the Supreme Court. We strongly urge the Supreme Court to stop interfering with the ability of law enforcement and other legally instituted entities to fully investigate crimes that Tiller and his cohorts may be committing. Chief Justice Kay McFarland needs to out of the business of covering for Tiller."
About Operation Rescue
Operation Rescue is one of the leading pro-life Christian activist organizations in the nation. Operation Rescue recently made headlines when it bought and closed an abortion clinic in Wichita, Kansas and has become the voice of the pro-life activist movement in America. Its activities are on the cutting edge of the abortion issue, taking direct action to restore legal personhood to the pre-born and stop abortion in obedience to biblical mandates.
Lawyer for Human Rights and Democracy Activist, Peng Meng, Files for Medical Parole
http://news.christiansunite.com/Religion_News/religion06853.shtml
HUBEI, China -- China Aid has learned that the health condition of human rights activist Peng Ming has continued to decline in recent months. On December 24, 2007, defense Attorney Chen Shangzhu from the Mingsheng Law Office of Hubei, filed for medical parole for Peng Ming based on his degenerating health condition. Peng Ming continues to suffer from serious kidney, heart and other diseases while serving his sentence in Hanyang Prison.
Peng Ming was sentenced to life in prison on December 15, 2005 on suspicion of organizing and heading a terrorist organization. Since his incarceration, advocacy efforts have been made on his behalf from China Aid Association and others to secure his medical release. The United Nations Working Group for Arbitrary Detention concluded that Peng Ming is an official refugee with asylum status within the US. The group also declared Peng Ming to be held against his will and detained arbitrarily. Members of the US Government have also appealed to Chinese officials to release Peng Ming, based on his medical history and health condition.
This will be the second time legal representatives have filed for Medical Parole for Peng Meng. The fact that Peng Ming has suffered for years behind bars without proper medical attention is a prime example of how the PRC is ready to neither embrace human rights nor become a respectable leader in the international community. We urge the Chinese Government to release Peng Ming and allow him to be reunited with his family in America, in time for the Chinese Lunar New Year.
To voice your concern, please contact:
Chinese Embassy in Washington DC
Address: 2201 Wisconsin Avenue, N.W., Washington D.C. 20007
Tel: (202) 338-6688, (202) 588-9760
Fax: (202) 588-9760
Egypt court recognises reversion to Christianity
http://www.christiantoday.com/article/egypt.court.recognises.reversion.to.christianity/16785.htm
In a landmark case, an Egyptian court ruled on Saturday that the state must recognise the right of Christians who convert to Islam to change their minds and revert to Christianity, court sources said.
Until now, Egyptian courts have upheld a traditional reading of Islamic law in such cases, prohibiting the conversion from Islam to any other faith, regardless of the convert's original religion.
While Egyptian law is largely secular and modelled on the French legal system, personal status issues such as conversion, marriage and divorce are governed by the religious laws of the relevant community. Egypt is primarily Muslim, but has a substantial Coptic Christian community as well.
Saturday's ruling by the Supreme Administrative Court said 12 people who had converted to Islam from Christianity and then back again could have their reversion to their original faith stated on their government identity papers.
Authorities had allowed the 12 to change their religious status on their identity documents when they converted to Islam, but had so far refused to allow them to change it back.
"This opens the door of hope to hundreds of Copts who converted ... and were then unable to return," said Mamdouh Nakhla, a human rights lawyer.
Nakhla said there were around 450 similar cases currently in litigation, and that estimates of the number of people who wished to revert to Christianity from Islam ranged to up to several thousand.
The court ruling, which cannot be appealed, overturned a lower court decision in April which said the state had no obligation to recognise a convert to Islam's decision to revert back to his original faith because it violated Islam's ban on apostasy.
The higher court's decision now obliges Egypt's ministry of interior to issue the plaintiffs with birth certificates and identity papers identifying them as Christians.
But the paperwork will note their previous conversion to Islam - a caveat one human rights activist said was an invitation to discrimination.
"This may solve some procedural issues, but ... will open the door to discrimination against those citizens by extremist officers or civil servants when they see in the entry that they left Islam," said Gamal Eid, head of the Arabic Network for Human Rights.
The Koran does not explicitly prescribe a penalty for apostasy, but considers it one of the gravest sins. However, traditions of the Prophet Mohammed and some of his companions call for the death penalty in some cases of apostasy.
Saturday's ruling comes less than two weeks after a court for the first time granted members of Egypt's tiny Baha'i community the right to obtain government identity papers - largely denied them for several years - as long as they omit their faith, since it is not officially recognised in Egypt.
But the same court that ruled in favour of the Baha'is also dismissed a case by a man who sought to have his name and religion changed on his identity papers to reflect his conversion from Islam to Christianity.
It said the ministry of interior had issued no administrative decision rejecting Mohamed Hegazy's request but noted it was "not correct" for a Muslim to convert.
Barak reacts: We're preparing for Gaza offensive
http://www.jnewswire.com/article/2327
The Israel Defense Forces have been ordered to prepare for a ground invasion of the Gaza Strip as terrorism from the "Palestinians" there continues unabated.
So said Defense Minister Ehud Barak in a meeting of the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee Monday as anger boiled over in the Negev town of Sderot following a week of intensive Kassam rocket attacks which left a number of residents wounded, some seriously.
"The residents of Sderot and the Gaza periphery are in the midst of a severe trial," Barak said, according to The Jerusalem Post.
"The cry and the pain are difficult and understandable, and it is the duty of our government - in conjunction with the military and defensive effort - to assist them in every way."
Cynics wondered whether the minister's threat of a Gaza invasion was made simply to pacify citizens' anger.
Israelis have been calling with increasing stridency for effective action to defend the south. While the IDF has upped its targeted killings of Hamas and other "Palestinian" terrorists, however, the attacks have only increased in intensity and efficiency.
Some commentators questioned the wisdom of sending the IDF into the Gaza Strip on the ground.
In its editorial Monday, The Jerusalem Post said the terrorists would in fact welcome such a move.
"Hamas would be happy if many Palestinians and Israelis were killed in such an operation, which as things stand now, would not permanently weaken the organization unless Israel reoccupied Gaza or shut down the weapons flow into Gaza," wrote the paper.
More effective would be a decision to stop treating Hamas’ so-called political leaders as immune from targeted attack.
"It is Hamas' 'political' leaders, not the terrorists in the field, who decide whether to continue shelling Sderot. ... For all their talk of 'martyrdom,' the record shows that Hamas leaders are not interested in losing their own lives and will stop attacking Israel to save themselves. This is what happened after their leaders Ahmed Yassin and Abdel Aziz Rantisi were successfully targeted by Israel," the Post continued.
While those assassinations had been "roundly criticized internationally," they had proved effective.
Clearly what little patience is left is rapidly running out.
Reacting to the wounding by rocket fire of two Sderot boys Saturday evening, Interior Minister Chaim Sheetrit told journalists the IDF should pick out a single neighborhood in the Gaza Strip, warn the Arabs there to get out, and then "wipe it off the map."
Even the far left daily Ha'aretz opined that restraint was no longer possible.
"If the limited military actions Israel is undertaking ... will not bring an end to the shooting; if the moderate states, and first and foremost Egypt and Jordan fail to contain Hamas - Israel will have no option but to embark on a broad military operation. The Israel Defense Forces raison d’être is to protect the country's citizens from attack. Even if the success of a military operation is not guaranteed, that concern must not prevent the government from doing what is necessary in order to protect the lives of its citizens and the state's border."
Operation Lifeshield: Trying to Protect Israel
http://www.cbn.com/cbnnews/320204.aspx
The town of Sderot sits on the front lines of rocket attacks from the Gaza strip.
Since 2001, it's been a city under siege and nearly a quarter of the residents have fled.
But Christian organizations are trying to protect residents there.
Israel's security minister called daily life in Sderot and southern Israel "Gaza roulette." Day by day, Israeli mothers and fathers and their children face death or injury when they go to school, catch a bus or go out to play.
Police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld explained to reporters death comes from just down the street.
"The distance from the Gaza Strip, the north end of the Gaza Strip to Sderot is just 800 meters to the industrial zone and one kilometer to the center of town. So even the smallest of rockets, the 60 millimeter rocket can land and has caused and killed innocent civilians."
When Israel completely pulled out of Gaza in 2005, Israeli leaders believed it would bring peace.
"Well, unfortunately, we've experienced just the opposite and what has taken place is that there's been a larger number of rockets; in fact, four times as the number of rockets have landed since 2005 until the end of 2007," Rosenfeld said.
These rocket attacks have killed 13 people, wounded several hundred, and put thousands more in a state of shock.
In order to help the people of Sderot and southern Israel, several Christian groups pooled their resources to purchase portable bomb shelters.
"I think what we're doing today is a perfect example of how we as Christians can stand practically at the side of Israel. What we are doing here is providing shelters for people who are standing at bus stations or in the neighborhood of their city and they can run immediately to one of those protected areas which we are providing with the help of Christians from all over the world," Yurgen said.
Earl Cox is the international spokesman for Operation Lifeshield.
"We can't bring peace but we can bring peace of mind to the people of Sderot, the people of Asheklon, those people who live in southern Israel," he said.
Six bomb shelters were recently put in place with a final goal of 57 in all. The idea for Operation Lifeshield came during the second Lebanon war by its founder Josh Adler
"We saw the need for providing shelter, safety, protection, life saving protection to these people in these open public areas, along the main streets, in the parks, in the sports fields and that's how Operation Lifeshield was born," Adler said.
According to a recent survey, 60 percent of Americans know little or nothing about these rocket attacks.
"It's very difficult for people who live in a place like the United States of America where there are no such things as rockets falling out of the sky. To realize what it's like walking down the street and suddenly a siren goes off and you've got thirty seconds to find shelter. Well we came over. We saw that and we talked to the people and I was hooked," Ben Kinchlow said.
A major debate now rages within Israel over why the government can't protect its own citizens.
In the meantime, the number of rocket attacks has recently increased, which means these portable bomb shelters might be more needed than ever.
Gaza terrorists tear leg off Israeli boy
http://www.jnewswire.com/article/2326
An eight-year-old Israeli boy lost his leg after being wounded by a Kassam rocket in an attack on the Negev town of Sderot at the weekend.
Osher Tuito and his older brother Rami (19) were wounded when the missile slammed into the street where they were walking during the Sabbath.
They were hospitalized together with another two members of their family who suffered from shock after seeing the boys bleeding and screaming in the road.
The rocket that ripped into the Tuito boys was one of nearly 50 fired by Arabs in the Gaza Strip at the end of a week of non-stop attacks.
Most news networks abroad ignore this daily "Palestinian" aggression, with especially the ongoing United States election drama keeping all but the most sensational news off American screens.
For the residents of Sderot and, increasingly, for Israelis elsewhere in the land, however, tensions here are ratcheting steadily towards what looks like a showdown between the IDF and Gaza's Arabs.
Hamas terror chiefs scurry for cover
http://www.jnewswire.com/article/2328
They urge their followers to lay down their lives for Allah in 'martyrdom' attacks against Jews, but the brave leaders of the "Palestinian" terror groups Hamas and Palestine Islamic Jihad have gone into hiding to save their own skins in the face of threatened IDF retaliation for their cowardly attacks on Israeli civilians.
And from the shadowy recesses where they now skulk in their caves, these killers continue to direct dire warnings in Israel's direction. Hurt our leadership, they said Monday, and we will bring terrible havoc to your people.
"Our response to attacks on Hamas leaders will be unprecedented," a Hamas spokesman said, according to Israel's Army Radio.
Israel is believed to be contemplating targeting these "political" leaders for assassination in a bid to effectively stem the unrelenting rocket attacks from the Gaza Strip.
Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh, who was overwhelmingly voted prime minister of the Palestinian Authority before his group seized control of Gaza last year, has gone underground to escape Israel's assassination campaign, according to the daily Arab newspaper Al-Quds al-Arabi. He has told only those closest to him of his whereabouts.
Only Holocaust Survivor in Congress Dies
http://www.cbn.com/CBNnews/320217.aspx
WASHINGTON - Rep. Tom Lantos, who as a teenager twice escaped from a Nazi-run forced labor camp in Hungary and became the only Holocaust survivor to win a seat in Congress, has died. He was 80.
Spokeswoman Lynne Weil said Lantos, a Californian, died early Monday at the Bethesda Naval Medical Center in suburban Maryland. He was surrounded by his wife, Annette, two daughters, and many of his 17 grandchildren and two great-grandchildren.
Annette Lantos said in a statement that her husband's life was "defined by courage, optimism, and unwavering dedication to his principles and to his family."
Battled Cancer of the Esophagus
Lantos, a Democrat who chaired the House Foreign Affairs Committee, disclosed last month that he had been diagnosed with cancer of the esophagus. He said at the time that he would serve out his 14th term but would not seek re-election in his Northern California district, which takes in the southwest portion of San Francisco and suburbs to the south including Lantos' home of San Mateo.
President Bush praised Lantos in a statement as "a man of character and a champion of human rights."
"After immigrating to America more than six decades ago, he worked to help oppressed people around the world have the opportunity to live in freedom," Bush said. "As the only Holocaust survivor to serve in Congress, Tom was a living reminder that we must never turn a blind eye to the suffering of the innocent at the hands of evil men."
Flags were lowered to half-staff at the White House and U.S. Capitol.
'A True American Hero'
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said, "Tom Lantos was a true American hero. He was the embodiment of what it meant to have one's freedom denied and then to find it and to insist that America stand for spreading freedom and prosperity to others."
Speaking to reporters at the State Department, she said, "He was also a dear, dear friend and I am personally quite devastated by his loss."
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., said that Lantos "used his chairmanship of the Foreign Relations Committee to empower the powerless and give voice to the voiceless throughout the world."
The timing of Lantos' diagnosis was a particular blow because he had assumed his committee chairmanship just a year earlier, when Democrats retook control of Congress. He said then that in a sense his whole life had been a preparation for the job - and it was.
'An American by Choice'
Lantos, who referred to himself as "an American by choice," was born to Jewish parents in Budapest, Hungary, and was 16 when Adolf Hitler occupied Hungary in 1944. He survived by escaping from the labor camp and coming under the protection of Raoul Wallenberg, the Swedish diplomat who used his official status and visa-issuing powers to save thousands of Hungarian Jews.
Lantos' mother and much of his family perished in the Holocaust.
That background gave Lantos a moral authority unique in Congress and he used it repeatedly to speak out on foreign policy issues, sometimes courting controversy. Lantos was outspoken on human rights in Sudan, Myanmar and elsewhere, and in 2006 was one of five members of Congress arrested in a protest outside the Sudanese Embassy over the genocide in Darfur.
Strong Israel Supporter
He joined the Bush administration in strong support of Israel and was a lead advocate for the 2002 congressional resolution authorizing the Iraq invasion, though he would become a strong critic of President Bush's handling of the war.
Lantos was a frequent visitor to Hungary, meeting with political leaders and holding recurrent news conferences which were widely covered in the Hungarian press. He was widely recognized there for his calls for the respect of the human rights of the millions of ethnic Hungarians living in neighboring countries, especially Romania and Slovakia, whose cultural identity was a common target of those countries' communist regimes.
"Tom Lantos deserves that the millions of people in Central-Eastern Europe think about him for a moment and guard his memory," Prime Minister Ferenc Gyurcsany said in parliament.
Founded Congressional Human Rights Caucus
Lantos, who was elected to the House in 1980, founded the Congressional Human Rights Caucus in 1983. In early 2004 he led the first congressional delegation to Libya in more than 30 years, meeting personally with Moammar Gadhafi and urging the Bush administration to show "good faith" to the North African leader in his pledge to abandon his nuclear weapons programs. Later that year, President Bush lifted sanctions against Libya.
In October 2007, as Foreign Affairs chairman, Lantos defied administration opposition by moving through his committee a measure that would have recognized the World War I-era killings of Armenians as a genocide, something strongly opposed by Turkey. The bill has not passed the House.
Tall and dignified, Lantos never lost the accent of his native Hungary, but his courtly demeanor belied the cutting comments he would make in committee if the testimony he heard was not to his liking.
"Morally, you are pygmies," he berated top executives of Yahoo Inc. at a hearing he called in November 2007 as they defended their company's involvement in the jailing of a Chinese journalist.
"This is about as believable as Elvis being seen in a Kmart," was his retort to a witness testifying before a subcommittee he headed in 1989 that led a congressional investigation of Reagan-era scandals at the Department of Housing and Urban Development.
First Came to Congress in 1980
Lantos was elected to Congress after spending three decades teaching economics at San Francisco State University, working as a business consultant and serving as a foreign policy commentator on television. He challenged GOP incumbent Rep. Bill Royer in 1980 and won narrowly, subsequently winning re-election by comfortable margins.
"It is only in the United States that a penniless survivor of the Holocaust and a fighter in the anti-Nazi underground could have received an education, raised a family and had the privilege of serving the last three decades of his life as a member of Congress," Lantos said upon announcing his retirement last month. "I will never be able to express fully my profoundly felt gratitude to this great country."
Lantos came to the United States in 1947 after being awarded a scholarship to study at the University of Washington in Seattle. In 1950 he married Annette, his childhood sweetheart, with whom he'd managed to reunite after the war. The couple moved to the San Francisco Bay area so Lantos could pursue a doctorate in economics at the University of California, Berkeley.
The first major bill Lantos passed in Congress was to give honorary American citizenship to Wallenberg, whom he called "the central figure in my life." But Lantos sometimes shied away from talking about his experiences in the war. When he joined a lawsuit in 1984 to seek Wallenberg's release from the Soviet Union - Wallenberg was captured and imprisoned by Soviet troops after World War II - Lantos told The Associated Press that he "didn't want to dwell on the details" of the dangers he faced from the Nazis.
Lantos Didn't Think He Would Survive the Holocaust
Lantos joined the Hungarian Underground after the Nazi occupation but was captured and sent to a forced labor camp 40 miles north of Budapest, according to the biography on his congressional Web site. He was beaten severely when he tried to escape, but feeling he had nothing to lose he made another attempt. This time he made it back to Budapest and to one of the safehouses that Wallenberg had established.
Lantos credited Wallenberg's protection, his own Aryan appearance - blond hair, blue eyes - and a good measure of luck with helping him survive the war. But he said that at the time he didn't think he had much of a chance of staying alive.
"I was sixteen, but I was very old," he said in an interview for "The Last Days," the 1999 book accompanying the Steven Spielberg documentary of the same name that focused on the experience of Hungarian-American survivors.
"The bloodbath, the cruelty, the death that I saw, so many times around me during those few months between March of 1944 and January of 1945 made me a very old young man."
Lantos and his wife had two daughters, Annette and Katrina, who between them produced 18 grandchildren, one of whom died young. According to Lantos, his daughters were following through on a promise to produce a very large family because his and his wife's families had perished in the Holocaust.
Teen Mania Holds Rally in Times Square
http://www.cbn.com/cbnnews/320177.aspx
Hundreds of Christian teen-agers filled Times Square over the weekend.
They came to take a stand against a popular culture they say wants to destroy their generation.
Some 300 teens filled Times Square for Teen Mania's Re-Create '08 -- a rally that showcased young people who, instead of complaining, are out to re-create entertainment, fashion, the arts and the Internet.
They say it's all about building up their generation -- not tearing it down.
"It's our responsibility," a young teen said. "It's time for us to rise up and say we want our generation to be the one to make a difference."
Ron Luce, Teen Mania Founder, was on site encouraging the youth.
"What we're doing is first of all, standing against a lot of the stuff we're looking at right here in Times Square where there's sexualization happening on media. I mean like every hour, eight times an hour on MTV, you see a sexual scene, nine times an hour you see some kind of profanity," he said.
"So Re-create is a movement of young people that say listen, we want to stand up and create a generation -- something that's pure, something that's right, stand up for what's true and what's wholesome for our generation."
The rally featured musical groups, testimonies -- and a list of eight top teen concerns that will be sent to the presidential candidates.
They included: youth exposure to internet pornography; the AIDS pandemic; media glamorization of drugs, sex and alcohol; abstinence education; and human trafficking of sex slaves.
The rally also featured interviews with teens who are making positive changes in their communities, including three girls from Arizona who took a stand against a major retailer that was selling pornographic Christmas ornaments. After alerting local media and civic leaders, the ornaments were removed from the store.
"That was our hope. We didn't know what to expect because it was just a small group going up against a large corporation, but God just reminded us that we had Him on our side. so, that's all we needed," she said.
Proof that young people can make a difference if they take a stand.
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