OUR COLUMNISTS Is Your Jesus Homogenous? Commentary by Matt Friedeman If the West, especially America, wants to play a major role in the massive expansion of the gospel across the globe in the decades to come, we will need to shuck the homogeneity that bedevils our conception of Christ and begin to grow in our thinking. NARAL: The Finer Points of Vulgarity Commentary by Jane Jimenez What better way to let the public know what NARAL stands for than to throw a party and invite everyone you know to "Screw Abstinence." Live Stronger Commentary by Brad Locke Lance Armstrong's ex-wife once told him that his recovery from cancer was a work of God's grace, but Armstrong scoffed at that. I suppose he thought men alone -- himself and the doctors -- were responsible for his regained health. Amnesia Commentary by David Sisler What would it be like to wake up and not remember the evil that you had done, the people you had hurt, the sins you had committed? What would you pay for a little selective amnesia? Preaching a 'Celebrity Gospel' Commentary by Mark Creech A "celebrity gospel" is when a preacher compromises the gospel of Christ in order to achieve or sustain a celebrity status. Columnist Mark Creech offers two examples of preachers he says are proclaiming a celebrity gospel of late.

...A tent pole touching a power line appears to be what caused the electrocution of four Boy Scout leaders in Virginia at the Scouts' national jamboree. The deaths of the leaders from Anchorage, Alaska, came on the first day of the gathering of Scouts from around the world at the Army's Fort A.P. Hill. A source tells The Washington Post the tent pole touched an overhead power line while the leaders were setting up camp. One other leader and two contract workers were hospitalized in stable condition. All of the 80 Scouts from the group were okay and were relocated to another part of the camp. Chaplains and grief counselors have also been brought in. The Boy Scout Jamboree's website has issued prayers and sympathies for the families of the victims. Meanwhile, a Boy Scouts spokesman says he expects a federal judge's ban on Pentagon support for future Boy Scout Jamborees to be appealed by the government and overturned. More than 40,000 scouts, leaders and volunteers are meeting this week at Fort A.P. Hill, the Virginia base where they have held their jamborees every four years since 1981. Judge Blanche Manning ruled in March that the Pentagon cannot financially support the event in the future since the Scouts require members to swear an oath of duty to God. Scouts spokesman Bob Bork says that does not make the Boy Scouts a church or a religion. He adds that the military hosts and supports the jamboree as part of a training exercise in crowd control. President Bush is to visit and speak at the Boy Scout Jamboree on Wednesday evening. [AP]

...For the first time in a decade, the San Diego City Council filed to approve a measure supporting the annual "gay pride" festival -- but a Southern California Christian activist says problems still remain. James Hartline, a former homosexual, decried the Mayor Pro-Tem, Toni Atkins, for placing a measure to support Gay Pride Week on the docket for Monday's meeting. The San Diego event has come under fire from local and national media since it was discovered two convicted pedophiles are working for it as volunteer staff. After pressure from Hartline and a local church, Atkins -- who herself is a lesbian -- removed the item from the docket before Monday's meeting because she did not have the votes to pass it. However, Hartline says no one has removed the pedophiles from the festival. "It is against the law for any non-profit organization -- the Gay Pride organization, believe it or not, is a non-profit organization -- that has children coming in [to] have pedophiles working within that organization," he explains. Hartline says Monday's success in turning away the council's support of the homosexual event is the first step in removing San Diego from its long-term relationship with homosexual activists. [Mary Rettig]

...Meanwhile, San Diego voters are deciding today whether a 43-foot-cross atop Mount Soledad, and the land on which it sits, should be given to the federal government as a veterans memorial. But a judge has ruled that a simple majority is not enough, because the city charter requires a two-thirds vote on any change in the use of city parkland. San Diego has been embroiled in a 15-year legal battle with the American Civil Liberties Union, which maintains that the cross violates separation of church and state. The city has tried twice to sell the property to the Mount Soledad Association, but courts have blocked the sales because they said the transactions favored a buyer who would preserve the cross. [AP]

...At least one Democratic member of the Senate Judiciary Committee is willing to admit she will likely apply a litmus test to Supreme Court nominee John Roberts during the pending confirmation hearing. After a one-on-one meeting with the nominee, California Senator Barbara Boxer described Roberts as being humble, modest, and "apparently ... very precise in his writing, his judging, his ability to put cases together." And Roberts, she said, gives her the sense that he "really grapples with the law and the interpretation of the law rather than any extraneous points of bias." But on the issue of abortion, Boxer is not so complimentary. She tells Associated Press it would be "very difficult" for her to support Roberts' nomination if she determines he would vote to overturn Roe v. Wade. Two years ago, Boxer voted for Roberts when he was nominated for the DC Court of Appeals. During those hearings, Roberts acknowledged that because abortion was the law of the land, he would apply that precedent. However, in a legal brief he co-authored for a Supreme Court case, he wrote that Roe was "wrongly decided and should be overruled." [Jody Brown]

...While senators on the Senate Judiciary Committee might be unclear on Judge John Roberts' stand on the issue of abortion, there is no doubt how Mrs. Roberts feels about it. For more than a decade, Jane Sullivan Roberts has been associated with the pro-life group Feminists for Life, both as a legal counsel and as a member of the group's board of directors. According to LifeNews.com, she currently does pro bono work for FFL on trademark issues and contracts for employees. Serrin Foster, president of FFL, describes Mrs. Roberts as "a brilliant attorney" -- and cautions that the views of the nominee's wife do not necessarily have a bearing on the judge's philosophy. "In today's world, people know that spouses do different things," says Foster. "He's not associated with FFL. Her work and what she does should stand alone." LifeNews.com points out that while Mrs. Roberts was on the FFL board, the group joined other feminist groups in supporting passage of the Violence Against Women Act, fought for enhancing enforcement of child support, and battled against child exclusion provisions in welfare reform that would have encouraged abortions. [Jody Brown]

...The U.S. House of Representatives is asking the Federal Trade Commission to launch an investigation into how a popular video game snuck through the ratings process, despite the fact it has hidden pornographic content. The game, "Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas," which already carries an "M" rating (for mature audiences, 17 and older), is manufactured by Rockstar Games, which is owned by Take Two Interactive Software, Inc. But a special program allows players to download modifications to the game that reveal sexually explicit scenes. Congressman Fred Upton of Michigan is calling for the manufacturer to be punished appropriately. "If that company purposely hid that information or material to make a sham of the ratings, it is nothing less than deceptive advertising, and should be punished, in this case severely," Upton tells Associated Press. Last week, Take Two admitted for the first time that the explicit scenes had been built into the retail version of the game for personal computers as well as for Xbox and PlayStation2 consoles. Earlier the company had claimed the scenes were not part of the retail version, but had been created by third parties. The game now carries an "AO" rating (adults only), which has prompted several retailers -- among them Wal-Mart, Target, Best Buy, and Circuit City -- to pull the game from their shelves. News reports indicate Rockstar no longer produces the alterable version of the game and is preparing a more secure version that will qualify for an "M" rating. [Jody Brown]

© 2005 AgapePress all rights reserved.

E-mail this page to a friend

Printer-Friendly Version

Read all of our current headlines