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COUNCIL OF EUROPE REPORT WARNS ABOUT “CREATIONIST FUNDAMENTALISTS” (Friday Church News Notes, July 6, 2007, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - A recent report drawn up by the Council of Europe, which is the continent’s main human rights body, warns strongly of “creationist fundamentalists” and calls them dangerous religious extremists who “could become a threat to human rights” (“Secularist Europe Silences Pro-Lifers and Creationists,” Brusssels Journal, June 23, 2007). The report claims that creationism “was for a long time an almost exclusively American phenomenon,” which is pure nonsense. There are countless Christians throughout the world who believe the Bible’s account of creation. The report identifies “creationist theories” with “all manner of fundamentalism and extremism, synonymous with attacks of utmost virulence on human rights.” The “extremism” this report should be worried about is the Islamic extremism that aims to put all of European under the heel of Islamic law. There is no evidence that creationists have attacked anyone’s human rights or injured anyone in any way, but jihadist Muslims have done all of that. The report says the creationists have a “total rejection of science,” but in fact creationists simply refuse to worship science as infallible, knowing how often it has proven itself to be wrong and changed its opinions. Creationists don’t reject science; they reject “science falsely so called” (1 Timothy 6:20). The Council of Europe report in question was to be voted on Monday, June 25, with the objective of banning creationist and intelligent design views from schools in Europe, but the resolution was sent back to committee for “further study.” Deputies from east European countries, who voted against approving the report, recalled with no fondness that “Darwinian evolution was a favorite theory of their former communist rulers.” The very fact that such a report could be written and given any serious consideration at all demonstrates the very real danger to freedom of speech and religion in Europe today. “O Timothy, keep that which is committed to thy trust, avoiding profane and vain babblings, and oppositions of science falsely so called: Which some professing have erred concerning the faith. Grace be with thee” (1 Timothy 6:20-21).

POPES CALL FOR “UNIVERSAL OWNERSHIP OF GOODS” (Friday Church News Notes, July 6, 2007, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - Since the late 19th century the Roman Catholic popes have been calling for the redistribution of wealth along socialist-communistic lines. This call began with Leo XIII (1878-1903) and has been repeated by Pius XI (1922-39), John XXIII (1958-63), Paul VI (1963-78), John Paul II (1978-2006), and by the current Pope Benedict XVI. John Paul II said, “Private property, in fact, is under a ‘social mortgage,’ which means that it has an intrinsically social function, based upon and justified by the principle of the universal destination of goods” (Encyclical, “Solticitudo Rei Socialis,” Sect. 42). Benedict XVI confirmed this principle in his encyclical entitled “God Is Love,” claiming that a share of the community’s goods is to be guaranteed to each person. The Vatican II Council in the 1960s maintained the same principle: “If one is in extreme necessity, he has the right to procure for himself what he needs out of the riches of others” (“Gaudium et Spes,” Vatican Council II Conciliar and Post Conciliar Documents, para. 69). The Catholic Church has taught the citizens of Mexico and elsewhere that they can enter wealthy countries illegally to obtain their “rightful” share of the wealth and that they should be rewarded for doing so. The Bible, on the other hand, teaches that man is obligated before God to work by the sweat of his brow and that he is worthy of his hire and has the right to keep the fruit of his labor and is then obligated to God to use it responsibly and compassionately, and that to take from another individual forcefully is the sin of stealing and to lust after something that belongs to another is the sin of covetousness. The Ten Commandments thus assume the right to private ownership of property. God’s Word teaches that men should have compassion upon the needy, but that compassion is to be a matter of free will. Under the Law of Moses if a poor man stole because he was hungry, he was not therein justified. He was to restore seven-fold and if he was unable to make restitution he was to be sold for his theft (Prov. 6:30-31; Exodus 22:3). God’s Word also says that he that does not work should not eat, and that those who live in moral debauchery are to be punished and not rewarded. The right to forcefully “redistribute wealth” is a right that governments have taken them themselves in these last days in preparation for the rise of the antichrist, and the government does not use its power to redistribute wealth for godly purposes but often to reward sloth and dissolution. Socialists use the government to do their alleged good deeds with other people’s money. The Vatican, by the way, is hypocritical in this as in most things. If “needy” mobs were to force their way into St. Peter’s and take all of the gold and silver and rare art, the pope would cry foul theft! For more on this see “Papal Promotion of Collective Ownership and Theft,” by former Catholic priest Richard Bennett, http://www.bereanbeacon.org/Papal_Economics.pdf (though we disagree fervently with his idea that the Catholic Church “went apostate at the Council of Trent in 1546”).

BAGHDAD CHRISTIANS TERRORIZED, FLEEING (Friday Church News Notes, July 6, 2007, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is excerpted from a report in the Jewish World Review, June 14, 2007, entitled “Is Islam Incompatible with Democracy, Decency?” The report uses the term “Christian” to describe any type of Christian, and the groups that predominate in that part of the world are Roman Catholic and Greek Orthodox: “An al-Qaida-affiliated insurgent group is giving Christians in Baghdad a stark set of options: Convert to Islam, marry your daughters to our fighters, pay an Islamic tax or leave with only the clothes on your back. A U.S. military official said American force became aware of the threats only last month and now have erected barriers around the largest Christian enclave in Baghdad’s Dora neighborhood in an effort to protect its residents. Christians in Baghdad refuse to discuss the threats for fear of retribution. But in Syria, where thousands of Iraqi Christians have fled, tales abound of families that were killed or driven from their homes because they either refused or couldn’t afford to pay the jizya, a tax usually levied on non-Muslim men of military age ... Iraq long had been home to thriving Christian communities, primarily Assyrians and Chaldean Catholics, who trace their roots to ancient Mesopotamia. Some of Saddam Hussein’s closest confidants were Christian, including his foreign minister, Tarik Aziz. Christian communities were prominent in many major Iraqi cities, including Mosul in the north and Basra in the south. Baghdad had major Christian enclaves in the central neighborhood of Karada, the eastern mostly Shiite neighborhood of New Baghdad and nearby al-Ghadir and the notorious Sunni-dominated Doura in the capital’s south. As Iraq has descended into chaos, however, many Christians have fled, joining an estimated 2.2 million exiles, including 1.4 million Iraqis now estimated to be living in Syria. ... A Christian Iraqi legislator estimated Tuesday that a half-million Christians have fled Iraq since 2004.”

VINEYARD CHURCHES ON THE ENVIRONMENTALIST BANDWAGON (Friday Church News Notes, July 6, 2007, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - Vineyard churches have jumped on the environmentalist bandwagon with both feet. A Tending the Garden conference held last July at the Vineyard church in Boise, Idaho, focused on “environmental stewardship.” Speakers included Calvin DeWitt, co-founder of the Evangelical Environmental Network, and Peter Illyn, director of Restoring Eden. Tri Robinson, senior pastor of the Vineyard church at Boise, is the author of “Saving God’s Green Earth.” Also speaking at the conference was Bert Waggoner, national director of the Association of Vineyard Churches. The Vineyard churches are also at the forefront of rock worship and produce much of the music used in interdenominational contemporary praise. The Lord Jesus Christ emphasized the Great Commission in Matthew 28, Mark 16, Luke 24, John 20, and Acts 1, and there is not a hint in this Commission about environmental stewardship. The book of Acts records the ministries of the Lord’s apostles, and their concern was for the saving of souls rather than the saving of the earth. What incredible spiritual blindness has taken over modern “evangelicalism”!

NEW R-RATED CHRISTIAN MEN’S MOVEMENT (Friday Church News Notes, July 6, 2007, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is from Foundation magazine, January-March 2007: “Called GodMen, the movement attempts to ‘create a worship place for men that looks nothing like church,’ in which men can come together and discuss their questions and struggles in a safe environment without being judged or feeling condemned. Hosted by comedian, author and actor Brad Stein, each GodMen event, according to promotional material, is ‘more powerful, raw, and real than any other men’s event; a place to explore issues like fear, isolation, numbness, aimlessness, pornography, passivity and more; an opportunity to discuss sensitive subjects without using sugar coated or safe church language; a chance to celebrate the masculine spirit.’ The GodMen website explains the difference between GodMen and Promise Keepers, an alternative movement for men: ‘We’re very different. We include elements that are deemed dangerous and even wrong by traditional standards.’ Another difference between GodMen and Promise Keepers is the age-restricted nature of GodMen. All GodMen events are restricted to men at least 15 years old (some require a 17-year age limit) due to the explicit and mature subject matter often discussed. In 2007, GodMen events are scheduled to convene in six U.S. cities and include preachers, comedians, rock bands, illusionists and authors.”

THE LAW OF THY MOTHER (Friday Church News Notes, July 6, 2007, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - “My son, keep thy father’s commandment, and forsake not the law of thy mother” (Proverbs 6:20). Both the father’s and the mother’s law is to be heeded. Both parents should be involved in the training of children, and they should be in harmony before the children as far as instruction and discipline, and both should be honored. Mothers should not be despised, neither by children nor by fathers nor by churches. They have an important role in the training of the next generation. Timothy’s mother and grandmother trained him in the Scriptures (2 Tim. 1:5; 3:15). The mother is mentioned 14 times in Proverbs, and the last chapter concludes with a mother’s prophecy (Prov. 31:1). Children that do not honor their mothers and keep their Bible-based laws are foolish children. It is the foolish son who despises his mother (Prov. 15:20) and causes her heaviness (Prov. 10:1) and chases her away (Prov. 19:26) and curses her (Prov. 20:20) and robs her (Prov. 28:24) and does not bless her (Prov. 30:11). The mother is not to be despised even when she is old (Prov. 23:22), and those who despise their mothers will be judged (Prov. 30:17). “When the mother was grown old we may suppose the children to be grown up; but let them not think themselves past being taught, even by her, but rather respect her the more for the multitude of her years and the wisdom which they teach. Scornful and insolent young men and women will make a jest, it may be, of the good advice of an aged mother, and think themselves not concerned to heed what an old woman says; but such will have a great deal to answer for another day, not only as having set at nought good counsel, but as having slighted and grieved a good mother” (Matthew Henry).