The Lion of Judah
(Volume VI, Issue 5)
December, 2000
[This is an excerpt from an informative article that details the true homosexual agenda. For the full and complete article, please contact the American Family Association Journal, P. O. Drawer 2440, Tupelo MS 38803 or their website:http://www.afa.net.]
Homosexual activists promised that their agenda isn't about promoting a lifestyle, and it certainly isn't about sex. In schools across the country, however, reality is beginning to make a mockery out of their rhetoric.
Since the early 1990s, activists have been arguing vehemently for access to public schools in order to make them a safer place for "gay" and lesbian students. Leading the charge is the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network (GLSEN), the nation's largest homosexual activist group that targets the public school system. Established as a national force in 1994, GLSEN now has over 85 chapters pushing the organization's agenda in communities across the country.
GLSEN's activities are predicated upon a simple claim: homosexual kids are not safe in public schools because of the ignorance, prejudice and hatred of heterosexual classmates. The only answer, it says, is to teach everyone in the K-12 school system -- administrators, teachers, and students -- that homosexuality is normal, natural, and healthy. Those in public schools should be tolerant of the diversity among their members, activists insist.
From tolerance to sex?
Due in large part to GLSEN's tireless efforts, many of the nation's schoolchildren -- as young as kindergarten age -- are being taught to accept homosexuality as a wonderful variation within that lovely mosaic that is human sexuality. Many states have absorbed the organization's message of "safety" as the justification for preaching tolerance and acceptance of homosexuality.
Homosexual teachers themselves are told that they must begin the process of teaching their students to accept "gay" and lesbian sexual orientation. For example, at GLSEN's annual national conference in Chicago this October, teachers were taught how to deftly incorporate their own homosexuality into their daily class time with children.
Teachers in Massachusetts have already been doing just that. In Acushnet, lesbian middle school teacher Christine Hoyle was so proud of her efforts in instructing her students to accept homosexuality that she videotaped her classroom methods and showed them at a state conference at Tufts University, sponsored in part by GLSEN.
In Newton, parents complained when they discovered that first-grade teacher David Gaita had "come out" to his students and told them he was homosexual, and loved men "the way your mom and dad love each other." School Superintendent Jeffrey Young, however, defended Gaita. "Had the teacher at that point said, ‘I'm married and have two kids,' no one would have blinked an eye," he said. "There should not be a double standard for heterosexual and homosexual teachers."
While getting a mouthful of meal about tolerance, parents of public school children in Massachusetts were horrified to discover last Spring that the GLSEN conference at Tufts, which was also funded by the Massachusetts Department of Education, used state tax dollars to present explicit homosexual sex lessons to kids as young as 14. (See AFA Journal, June/July, 2000.)
GLSEN has always insisted that it merely wants "gay" teens to feel safe in schools, and that its agenda does not include talking about sex to impressionable youth. Yet organization representatives were unable to explain the graphic sex talk when tapes of the conference sessions became public. On the tapes, "gay" adult panelists could be heard discussing and even demonstrating hardcore homosexual sex practices to teens.
Sex at State Expense
Due north of the Massachusetts state line, a group called Outright Vermont has also been allowed to push the homosexual agenda in schools in the Green Mountain State -- also at taxpayer expense.
With a three-year grant worth $121,575 from the Vermont Department of Health, Outright targets middle and high school kids. Kathy Hoyt, Vermont Secretary of Administration, proudly asserted that Outright Vermont "developed a training program for public schools that was designed to support diversity and safe schools for Vermont's gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender and questioning youth."
As in Massachusetts, however, "safety" has begun to bleed into "sex." That's the serious charge leveled by Nancy Sheltra, a six-term state representative and founder of Vermont's pro-family organization, Standing Together And Reclaiming the State (STARS). According to documents provided to AFA by STARS, Outright Vermont has gone lightyears beyond the simple purpose espoused by Hoyt.
For example, Outright used taxpayer money to provide "safer sex activities" and "parties" for teens. These events included, according to Outright's own documents, "demonstrations, guided practice & skill evaluation" for the use of condoms as well as other sexual aids. Outright Vermont distributed a mind-boggling 5,000 condoms to teenagers.
Outright also spent monies on youth retreats, including the "recruitment of youth participants," which utilized mailing lists and youth-related meetings to stir interest in the gatherings. Kids who expressed an interest in attending were transported -- again using state money -- to the retreat site, where youth and adult staff again taught kids how to engage in homosexual sex practices.
Other social events for lesbian, "gay," and transgendered youth were paid for by Outright, and included dances, movie nights, bowling, picnics, etc. At one such event, the Emerald City Ball, Outright says there were 60 teens and 80 adults in attendance.
Tarnishing the buckle of the Bible Belt
Fresh off its success in New England schools and elsewhere, GLSEN has decided that the nation's Bible Belt is far too straight for its own good. The organization is preparing to send trained activists south of the Mason-Dixon Line to repeat its achievements in Massachusetts and Vermont.
In a press statement released this summer, GLSEN said it had trained 15 "Southern activists" from its fifth annual Leadership Training Institute held in College Park, Maryland. The training of representatives from six Southern states -- Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, North Carolina, Tennessee and Texas -- was aimed at "increasing the ability of chapter leaders to organize effectively in hometown schools and communities."
Brenda Barron, who holds the title of Assistant Director for Southern Organizing, said it was necessary for GLSEN to "create strong chapters with a strategic and highly-localized approach" in order to combat what she called "anti-gay bias" in Southern schools. GLSEN's press release said schools throughout the South scored well below the "national failure rate" "protecting and serving" homosexual, bisexual and transgendered students.
What protect and serve means to GLSEN, however, and what it means to parents, are evidently two different things.
By Jeff Taylor
No one should ever have to see what 9-year-old Marlan Pontah saw. While attending a youth retreat on Indonesia's Ambon Island, Marlan and his friends — more than 100 Indonesian Christians — were attacked and herded together by fanatical Muslim villagers on a murderous rampage. But for Marlan, the worst was yet to come.
He noticed his older brother, Roy, had been singled out for questioning. "Who are you?" an angry villager asked.
"I am a soldier of Christ," Roy said, barely able to control his fear. The villager slashed Roy's left arm with a machete and asked again, "Who are you?"
"I am a soldier of Christ," Roy replied with renewed courage. The villager hacked. Roy's right arm, yelling, "Allahu Akbar!"
"Jesus Christ is the only Lord," Roy said, just before he was stabbed in the stomach. "I am a soldier of Christ," he whispered with his last breath. Roy was beheaded, and his body was thrown into a gutter. Marlan fled into the bush.
Christian persecution did not stop with the death of the Apostles. It has continued through the centuries and grown dramatically in recent decades. From a spiritual viewpoint we should not be surprised. The devil still "prowls around like a roaring lion, looking for someone to devour" (1 Peter 5:8). He still seeks to snuff out the life of Jesus in all who call upon His name.
Yet persecution's visible causes are varied. The attacks can be indirect and subtle, or violent and deadly. But make no mistake: Christian persecution is increasing, and one way or another it affects us all.
Growing Concern
It's estimated that more than 200 million Christians worldwide currently suffer persecution and discrimination for their faith. Interestingly, it is a Jew, Michael Horowitz, a senior fellow at Washington's Hudson Institute, who is often credited with initiating increased awareness of this persecution.
"It may have been easier for me than for many of you [Christians] to see the eerie parallels between what is happening to Christian communities today and what happened to my people during much of Europe's history," Horowitz said in a 1997 address. "I saw the vulnerable Christian communities fast becoming the scapegoats of choice of the world's thug regimes, and knew what that meant in my very bones."
Even the secular media listened. The New York Times ran a cover story on Nov. 9, 1998,. headlined, "Churches Find New Focus in Opposing Persecution." Portland's The Oregonian sent its religion editor to five restricted countries over nine months and ran an excellent series of persecution-related articles.
The State Department sent its first "Annual Report on International Religious Freedom" to Congress on Sept. 8, 1999, saying, "Too much of the world's population still lives in countries in which religious freedom is restricted or prohibited. Totalitarian and authoritarian regimes remain determined to control religious belief and practice."
Concern for persecuted Christians is growing dramatically, and more and more individuals, churches and even politicians are trying to help.
The visible causes of persecution, however, are not always easy to recognize. Even the experienced persecution-watcher is often confused by their complexity.
Persecution's Causes
Rebecca Mathok and her three sisters were abducted by Arab slave traders in southern Sudan.
‘The raiders descended on our village and destroyed everything. They burnt all our houses and seized cattle and property," she told a team from Christian Solidarity Worldwide. "My slave owner told me that I was his slave because the Dinka refused to follow Islam, and they therefore abducted the Dinka children."
Rebecca was forced to practice Islam for more than a year and a half before she was "redeemed," a controversial practice of purchasing freedom for captured southern Sudanese, which some say encourages more abductions.
Rebecca has a different perspective. "It is now wonderful to be back where I am free to choose to be a Christian," she said.
Religious Extremism. Christians in South Sudan are victims of "religious extremism," one of today's major sources of Christian persecution. Sudan has suffered under a devastating 16-year civil war between the Arab Muslim North (the National Islamic Front) and the predominately Christian and animist South. Reports of slavery and the ethnic cleansing of Christians have been consistently verified, including the North's policy of forced conversion to Islam.
Saudi Arabia ranks as the world's most restrictive Islamic state. The Saudi government strictly forbids any non-Muslim worship meetings, even among expatriates, and no Christian religious literature may enter the country. A Saudi who converts to Christianity invites, at worst, death at the hands of his family, at best, estrangement and deportation.
Pakistan's small Christian minority suffers discrimination because of a growing movement to impose Islamic law on the nation. One of the most frightening tools of intolerance is the country's "blasphemy law," that makes it a crime to blaspheme the prophet Muhammad or insult the Qur'an.
Countries influenced by Hinduism, which has historically been tolerant of other religions, have recently seen their share of religious extremism. In India, growing incidents of anti-Christian violence have been spurred by the rise to power of Hindu-nationalist political parties. The world was shocked by the burning death on Jan. 23, 1999, of Australian missionary Graham Staines — who had spent 30 years in India working primarily with leprosy victims — and his two young sons. Hindu extremists surrounded the vehicle where the three were sleeping, doused it with gasoline and set it ablaze.
Remnant Communism. Another major source of Christian persecution is "remnant communism." While the Iron Curtain's fall and the dissolution of the Soviet Union sounded the death knell for communism, it continues in some countries and their rulers' need to control the populace has not lessened. China's ruling elite, finally realizing they could never eradicate the church, decided to put on a new face that outwardly purported freedom of religion, but inwardly sought to make it subservient to the state.
The past three to four years in China have witnessed a frenzied government registration drive to force unofficial house churches — where most of China's Christians worship — to come under the wing of China's official church structure. Failure to register, which is the choice of most house churches, can result in harassment, fines, temporary jailings and even imprisonment of church leaders.
In North Korea, most Christians fled to the South during the Korean War. An unknown number of underground Christians still live in the North, but the quasi-religious personality cult built by longtime dictator Kim II Sung, and now carried on by his son, continues its attempts to eradicate the church.
Cuban Christians have fared much better, at least recently. Their treatment seems to ebb and flow with the country's economic situation. Unprecedented open-air evangelical meetings were allowed in 1999 from May 30 to June 20. The four Sunday services were even televised nationally. The Christians there, however, have seen doors open and shut before. Either way, the situation is far from free.
Other Causes. What often makes dealing with the visible source of Christian persecution difficult is that other factors — society, culture, ethnicity, economics — are usually involved.
Indonesia's ongoing and spreading. Muslim-Christian clashes are not driven solely by religious extremism. Other considerations include ethnicity and economics. Many Indonesians affected by high unemployment blame ethnic Chinese Indonesians for their poverty. The Chinese, who represent only five percent of the population, control 70 percent of the economy. A natural scapegoat during difficult times, half of them are Christian.
Then there are countries such as Colombia, possibly the world's most violent nation. Church leaders and members are caught in the crossfire of an ongoing warfare between government troops, rebel soldiers, para-military groups and narcotics traffickers. If a church shows allegiance to God alone and refuses to take sides, it becomes the enemy of all. Last year, Colombia's evangelical community denounced the killing of 36 pastors and the forced closure of more than 300 churches in areas where fighting is heaviest. Another 55 pastors were forced to abandon their churches and homes.
When Egypt's President Hosni Mubarak visited Washington, D.C., last July, he was confronted with examples of his country's religious rights violations. Of primary concern were events surrounding the Coptic Christian village of El-Kosheh, in Upper Egypt.
In August 1998, hundreds of Copts were arrested and tortured during a "murder investigation" of two Coptic men. Freedom House's Center for Religious Freedom presented a list to President Clinton containing the names of 1,014 men, women and children who had suffered at the hands of Egyptian police during the investigation.
"A firm insistence on respect for human rights and democratic institutions by the administration could make an enormous difference in a country like Egypt that receives $2 billion per year in American aid," said Nina Shea, director of the center.
Egypt's account of the incident was amazingly different. A report by the Egyptian Embassy said only 35 Coptic Christians were involved and that there was no evidence of torture. The police officers were exonerated.
Unfortunately, tension in El-Koshek exploded on New Year's Eve, when a dispute between a Christian shop owner and his Muslim customer resulted in three days of rioting, killing and destruction. By the time Egyptian security forces took control, at least 21 Coptic Christians had been killed and 34 were hospitalized. Fifty Christians' homes and businesses were destroyed, along with one village church.
Persecution's Paradox
Oddly enough, such severe difficulties have led to blessings for the church.
Who would consider Chairman Mao a church-growth catalyst? Yet his repressive policies forced the Chinese church to depend solely on God. Mao also simplified and unified the language, then broke down cultural barriers, making the spread of the gospel easier. In 1949, there were between one to two million Christians in China. Today, a conservative estimate would be 40 million. Many China-watchers estimate 60 to 80 million believers.
"Some house church leaders believe that despite persecution, the church has been ‘free' enough to spread the gospel," wrote John Chang, an experienced China watcher. "They believe it has been one of the most ‘ideal' environments because the church, after going through long trials, has grown through painful experiences; believers became enthusiastic for evangelism and carried the gospel to remote and rural areas."
If the growth rate is maintained, by the year 2025, Chinese Christians could number more than 300 million — more than in any other country.
A few years ago, a church leader in Iran was asked how he felt about the Ayatollah Khomeini, whose return to Iran in 1979 initiated a harsh Islamic regime under which the church continues to suffer.
"He was the best thing that ever happened to the church in Iran," the pastor replied, matter-of-factly.
One of his stunned listeners shot back, "How can you say that?"
"Many in Iran had put their hope in an Islamic state," he explained. "But under Khomeini, their hope soon turned to hopelessness. They began to look elsewhere for answers, and they are finding the only answer, Jesus Christ."
"If One Part Suffers,.."
Discrimination, slavery, torture, sexual abuse, estrangement, prison and death face Christians daily in many of the world's most restricted areas. For the body of Christ to function effectively, Christians who have opportunity must come to their aid.
"We have to go back to the book [Bible] and acknowledge the body of Christ worldwide," says Brother Andrew of Open Doors. "The body of Christ cannot survive partially. We take care of the whole body, or the whole body goes under."
[An expanded version of this article was originally published in the May/June 2000 issue of Moody. Jeff Taylor is the managing editor of Compass Direct News Service.]
Intercede, November, December 2000
Christian News
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November 9, 2000 (David W. Cloud, Fundamental Baptist Information Service, 1701 Harns Rd., Oak Harbor, WA 98277, fbns@wayoflife.org)
On October 30, the Baptist General Convention of Texas (BGCT) voted to reduce funding to the Southern Baptist Convention by $5 million beginning in January. They will reduce funding of the six Southern Baptist Convention seminaries by $4.3 million. They will also withhold all but $10,000 of the roughly $735,000 previously given annually to the SBC Executive Committee. The money diverted from the seminaries will be given to three liberal Baptist schools in Texas, including Truett Seminary at Baylor University.
The BGCT will continue to give some $18 million toward SBC national and international missions and $1 million to the national seminaries.
The action was taken in protest against the national SBC Convention's conservative stand of recent years. In particular, the majority of BGCT representatives do not want strict conservative doctrinal control over Baptist schools and institutions. They do not agree that the Bible is the infallible Word of God, and they do not want to require teachers and other denominational leaders to believe this. They protest against making the SBC statement of faith, the Baptist Faith & Message, into an "instrument of doctrinal accountability."
The action will probably have only minimal effect. The Southern Baptist Convention closed this fiscal year with a surplus of $18 million, and conservative congregations in Texas have pledged to try to make up the loss by increased giving. The BGCT allows churches to use five different giving plans, so they can elect to continue to channel their giving to the SBC Convention as before. BGCT Treasurer Roger Hall explained that no church will be forced to give in a manner it finds objectionable ("Texas Baptists affirm change in funding SBC," Baptist Standard, November 6, 2000).
Furthermore, the Southern Baptists of Texas Convention (SBTC), a group of more conservative Southern Baptist congregations, has pledged to increase its giving to the Cooperative Program.
The action by the BGCT dramatically proves that modernistic thinking has permeated the Southern Baptist Convention. For a half-century and more, Southern Baptist seminaries and colleges have spewed out unbelieving heresy to generation after generation of students. The hundreds of thousands of graduates who have been infected by modernistic doctrine have assumed positions of leadership in Southern Baptist churches. Things have gotten better in recent years at the national level of the convention, but little has changed at the state and grassroots level. Though conservative Southern Baptists have succeeded in purging the six seminaries of most of the blatant modernism that existed in the 1960s, '70s, and '80s, plenty of heresy remains even in the seminaries (see our report "A Visit to a Southern Baptist Seminary," February 3, 2000, in the SBC section of the End Times Apostasy Database at the Way of Life website or in the Fundamental Baptist CDROM Library). Furthermore, the Southern Baptist state colleges are as modernistic as ever.
The Bible does not call false teachers "moderates," it calls them heretics, "wolves in sheep's clothing," false prophets, and other more serious labels. God's prescription against unbelief and heresy is separation (Romans 16:17; 2 Cor. 6:14-18; 2 Tim. 2:16-21; 3:5, etc.) and church discipline (Titus 3:10,11), not denominational politics. I am glad for everything conservative Southern Baptists have done in their attempt to preserve the truth, but if they are really concerned about modernism, let them obey the Bible and separate themselves from it unequivocally. 2 Timothy 2:16-21 demands that the believer take the initiative in dealing with false teachers. We are not to wait and hope that the false teachers will depart from us, we are to depart from them. Separation is the only thing that can protect the believer from the leaven of error, a little of which, if left alone, "leaventh the whole lump."
Those who remain within the Southern Baptist Convention remain yoked together denominationally with odernists [sic], members of secret pagan lodges, ecumenists, "Christian" homosexuals, and such like.
For more about liberalism within the Southern Baptist Convention see my 97-page book HAS THE SOUTHERN BAPTIST CONVENTION BEEN RESCUED FROM LIBERALISM, Way of Life Literature, 1701 Harns Rd., Oak Harbor, WA 98277, (360) 675-8311 (voice). See also the articles in the Fundamental Baptist CD-ROM Library.]
Christian News
3277 Boeuf Lutheran Rd.
New Haven MO 63068
Friday News Notes, November 3, 2000 (David W. Cloud, Fundamental Baptist Information Service, 1701 Harns Rd., Oak Harbor, WA 98277, fbns@wayoflife.org)
In spite of Bill Clinton's immorality and public deceit, his support for abortion and homosexuality, and other witnesses to his vile, unbelieving condition, many Christian leaders have praised him. Daniel Vestel of the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship recently described Clinton as "obviously a person of faith and a committed Christian." Ed Dobson, pastor of Calvary Church in Grand Rapids, Michigan, told Christianity Today in 1994 that Clinton is "more deeply spiritual than any president we've had in recent years."
After a meeting with the president at the White House in 1993, Jack Hayford, pastor of a Foursquare Pentecostal church and popular writer and speaker, said that he knows Clinton is a brother in Christ. After the same meeting, Roberta Hestenes, then president of Eastern College, said, "I'm absolutely convinced of his deep and sincere faith." James Dunn, then executive director of the Baptist Joint Committee on Public Affairs, told the Washington Post in 1994 that Clinton "has an intensely personal faith" and "has a Christian baseline from which he operates."
Bill Hybels, pastor of Willow Creek Community Church and church growth guru, faced Clinton on inauguration day in January 1997 and praised "the wisdom and the leadership and the vision in your life the past four years" and lauded "the development of your heart, your increasing desire to know God, and to live for him."
In 1993, Billy Graham told U.S. News & World Report that he was impressed with Clinton's charisma and "some of the things he believes." Graham said: ">From a biblical point of view, we should be headed in the direction of goodness and righteousness, away from crime and immorality and towards one's neighbors who are in need. I'm encouraged by the emphasis President Clinton and Hillary are putting on that." Robert Schuller, pastor of the Crystal Cathedral and one of the most popular preachers in America, said in 1997 that Clinton is a "pastor to the nation, not a politician."
The root of America's ills is its apostate church leader.
Christian News
3277 Boeuf Lutheran Rd.
New Haven MO 63068
During the ongoing debates about the 2000 Presidential election, many political commentators refer to the United States as a Democracy, where "one man, one vote" is supreme. That's not the view of the Founding Fathers and it simply isn't true. The Founding Fathers were opposed to Democracy. That's why they gave us a Republic.
What's the difference?
One of the most accurate definitions of Democracy and Republic, come from a War Department Citizenship Training Manual, published in November of 1928. Here's what was traditionally known to be the true definition of Democracy: "A government of the masses. Authority derived through mass meeting or any other forms of ‘direct' expression. Results in mobocracy. Attitude toward property is communistic -- negating property rights. Attitude toward law is that the will of the majority shall regulate, whether it be based upon deliberation or governed by passion, prejudice, and impulse, without restraint or regard to consequences.
A Republic, on the other hand, is defined this way: "Authority is derived through the election by the people of public officials best fitted to represent them. Attitude toward property is respect for laws and individual rights, and a sensible economic procedure. Attitude toward law is the administration of justice in accordance to fixed principles and established evidence, with a strict regard to consequences. A greater number of citizens and extend of territory may be brought within its compass. Avoids the dangerous extreme of either tyranny or mobocracy. Results in statesmanship, liberty, reason, justice, and commitment and progress. Is the ‘standard form' of government throughout the world." It is known as a representative form of government. The power base is not at the top but at the local electoral level.
Most of our Founding Fathers were God-fearing Christians and believed that authority was designed by God through the people and therefore must never be usurped or misused.
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