Tara Pepper, Newsweek International: "Existing British blasphemy laws cover Christianity. Sikhs and Jews are shielded because they are regarded as distinct races falling under laws prohibiting incitement to racial hatred. Muslim groups have lobbied for similar protection since 1988, with the publication of Salman Rushdie's The Satanic Verses, and they stepped up their efforts after 9/11 out of fear of an anti-Islam backlash. For cri-tics, however, the question is whether any religion should be so protected. 'Any system of ideas that re-quires you to ring-fence it is a mistake,' Rushdie said recently. Many artists in Edinburgh questioned whether his work would even be published under the proposed law. Supporters say such concerns are overwrought.'"

Christian Hartsock in Reality Check: In "James Hir-sen’s...new book, Hollywood Nation: Left Coast Lies, Old Media Spin and the New Media Revolution, [he]... points out that journalists obsessively use the 'conser-vative' label when referring to conservatives, but don’t... use 'liberal' when speaking of liberals. [A] 2003 study ...[that] examined articles published in the New York Times and Washington Post between 1990 and 2002... discovered that over the course of six congressional sessions, both newspapers used the term 'conservative' five times more often than 'liberal.' Hirsen writes that not only are liberals in fierce denial of there being a media bias, they are 'pushing the theory that the media are being controlled by the Right.' When one inquires of a liberal how they plan to back up this claim, they predictably respond by whining about Fox News."

Guardian: "in their desperation to get legislation on to the statute books scientists may have convinced par-liamentarians that therapy for Alzheimer's disease and other conditions might be available in a few years. In fact the natural life cycles of stem cells - 48 hours, or even 72 hours - posed huge problems. Lord Winston said that that length of time might mean the disease overtaking the patient. 'That replication also means there will be faster growing cells in the same culture that will probably swamp the slower growing cells. And those cells that are growing faster are almost certainly not expressing genes in the "normal" way. So I think there is a problem selecting the right cells. I think we are quite properly concerned with increasing caution - but [that] does imply we may have oversold this subject a bit too much.'"

Don Feder in Human Events: "a conservative Jewish activist told me recently of the ADL's National Director and principal spokesman, 'Abe Foxman has a problem with Christianity'—unfortunate in...a country that's over 80% Christian. Foxman's latest foray in political cor-rectness was an attack on Rev. Jerry Falwell when the latter included an 'I Vote Christian' sticker in a fundrais-ing mailing. Falwell's sticker is 'directly at odds with the American ideal, and should be rejected,' Foxman lect-ured. 'Understanding the danger of combining religion and politics, our founding fathers wisely created a polit-ical system based on individual merit and religious in-clusiveness.' Abe has been reading Al Franken's Intro-duction to U.S. History. His is a fantasy version of the American saga soothing to the secular left...."

Christian Post: “The response in terms of donations has been great as Americans have been showing sympathy for the victims. The Salvation Army reported that donations for its organization jumped from $4.4 million to $15.5 million in one day. Organizations have indicated that donating money is more convenient at this point. "Money is what is most needed," said Baptist World Alliance Aid Director Paul Montacute according to Baptist World Alliance. "All agencies are saying this, and we need to avoid the dumping of inappropriate goods that could in fact hinder the relief work." Relief efforts have also been carried out by the local government. This included taking thousands of refugees out of New Orleans in state provided buses.... Convoy of Hope spokesperson Jeff Nene felt the essentials were vital. ”

E. Ray Moore Jr., in The State: "There have been more than a dozen cases since 1947’s Everson case based partially on Hugo Black’s reasoning. This case has prov-en to be one of the most socially, academically and con-stitutionally destructive cases in U.S. history. To use Ms. McCarthy’s terminology, it was Justice Hugo Black who used this then-novel interpretation of the separation of church and state to make an 'end run' around the Consti-tution. This view has been used to make Christians’ be-liefs such as creationism or intelligent design second-class or unworthy ideas in public education. It was also used to exclude prayer and Bible reading in 1962 and 1963 Supreme Court cases. Yes, all Christians believe that the government and church must be administratively distinct, but neither the U.S. Constitution nor the found-ers intended to set up a secular state...."  

Christianity Today: "Last year, U.S. immigration courts completed about 65,000 applications for asylum. Of those cases, about 20 percent of the applicants were granted asylum, the plurality of which came from China. Asylum allows refugees to work in the United States and later ap-ply for permanent residence. To gain asylum, applicants must prove they are refugees escaping persecution be-cause of their nationality, membership in a particular so-cial group, political opinion, race, or religion. 'Ultimately,'
[Dori] Dinsmore [former advocacy director for an interna-tional organization that assists refugees] told CT, the Fifth Circuit's ruling means that many more asylum applicants 'will be deported back into the hands of the people perse-cuting them.' The ruling has broad implications for wor-shipers across the globe....'Essentially, [the court has] removed religion as a basis of gaining asylum.'"

Terry Mattingly, Scripps Howard Syndicate: "re-searchers from the Democracy Corp in Washington, D.C., found that voters in Middle America are worried about Iraq and they are mad about rising health costs. That's good for Democrats. Many of them fiercely op-pose abortion on demand and gay marriage. That's good news for Republicans. But the researchers also mapped a political fault line that cuts into the soul of Middle America. 'Regardless of voters' attitudes on the role of religion in public life or their position on touchstone is-sues such as abortion and gay marriage or even their personal religious faith, they all see Republicans as a party with a clear and consistent position on cultural is-sues and an abiding respect for the importance of faith and traditional social norms," said the researchers, in sobering document released earlier this month...."

Kate Spence in Herald, Glasgow: "The Burrell Col-lection, Glasgow, has changed the BC (Before Christ) and AD (Anno Domini) labels on its exhibits to BCE (Before Common Era) and CE (Common Era), although the numerical dates remain the same. Peter Kearney, spokesman for the Catholic Church in Scotland, des-cribed the move as "outrageous double standards" and "yet another attack on Christianity by unrepresentative people". After a visitor wrote to complain about the change, Simon Eccles, the museum's senior curator, replied: "The reason for our current use of these terms is that we prefer not to impose a Christian dating term-inology on pre-Christian and non-Christian cultures, out of respect for their beliefs and values. The terms before the common era and common era are simple to under-stand...." 

The Reality Check: "Attorneys with the Alliance De-fense Fund filed a lawsuit against officials with Ulster [NY] County Community College for violating the free speech rights of a man who wanted to speak about his faith and hand out religious literature on campus in a nondisruptive manner. 'This is simply another example of overzealous school officials attempting to marginalize people of faith,' said ADF's Nate Kellum. School officials told Greg Davis...he needed to file a...permit application in order to speak...in a public grassy area on campus... When he did so, the application was denied because the school claimed that his desired religious expression does not constitute a 'cultural,' 'educational,' 'social,' or 'recreational' activity. 'The Constitution does not say that speech is only free if it meets certain arbitrary categor-ies developed by public officials,' said Kellum."

Jerusalem Post: "'Is Christian life liable to be reduced to empty church buildings and a congregation-less hierarchy with no flock in the birthplace of Christianity?' asks Daphne Tsimhoni in the Middle East Quarterly. It is hard to see what will prevent that ghost-like future.... One factor that could help prevent this... would be for mainline Protestant churches to speak out against Pal-estinian Muslims for tormenting and expelling Palestin-ian Christians....The Episcopalian, Evangelical Luth-eran, Methodist and Presbyterian churches, as well as the United Church of Christ, have ignored the problem. Instead, they pursue...venting moral outrage against the Israeli bystander and even withdrawing their investment funds from it. As they obsess over Israel but stay silent about Christianity dying in its birthplace, one wonders what it will take to awaken them."

Christian Post: "To remedy the problem, the National Association of Evangelicals (NAE), Christianity Today, and the New York Divinity School are hosting the semin-ar meant to educate the press in New York City on Thursday, Sept. 8. Although this is the fourth seminar since February, concerns have grown recently after Pat Robertson's statements suggested that the U.S. should 'take out' the Venezuelan president. 'When Pat Robert-son spoke, many thought that he spoke for all evangel-icals,' said Bob Wenz, V.P. of National Ministries of the NAE and one of the primary organizers of the event. According to Wenz those who are often associated with the 'religious right' (otherwise known as fundamentals), such as Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson, do not fully represent the entire evangelical body."

BBC News: "Russian President Vladimir Putin has visited the monastic community of Mount Athos in Greece, one of Orthodox Christianity's holiest sites. He was the first Russian leader to visit the male-only community, on a narrow, rocky peninsula east of Thessaloniki, Russian TV reported. The trip was part of Mr Putin's two-day visit to Greece. He has openly em-braced the Orthodox faith, despite having served the atheist Soviet regime as a KGB officer.... 'This is a very special place for Orthodox Christians and the whole Christian world. In Russia, we always held the monks who lived here in great admiration and respect,' he was quoted as saying. Some 1,500 monks live in the semi-autonomous monastic community, which is also known as Holy Mountain."

Barna Research: "About half of all adults (54%) claim they make moral choices on the basis of specific princi-ples or standards they believe in. Other common means of making moral choices include doing what feels right or comfortable (24%), doing whatever makes the most people happy or causes the least conflict (9%), and pur-suing whatever produces the most positive outcomes for the person (7%). Among those who claim to make mor-al decisions based on specific principles, a wide variety of sources were listed....Three of every 10 people nam-ed the Bible as the sources of those princi-ples. Overall, then, just one out of every six adults (16%) claim they make their moral choices based on the content of the Bible....six out of ten evangelicals (60%) rely on the principles contained in the Bible [20% of] nonevangelical born again adults do the same...."

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