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The former Bishop of Rochester has warned the international community not to withdraw from Afghanistan.

Writing in the latest edition of Standpoint magazine, Michael Nazir-Ali said any withdrawal from a political, military or even intellectual engagement with Afghanistan would be seen by radical Islamists as capitulation.

He acknowledged many Muslims who reject a radical interpretation of their faith but warned the international community not to “underestimate Islamism’s capacity for disruption and destruction and its desire to remake the world in its own image”.

“In the face of such an ideology, the international community must not lose its nerve,” he said.

“Any withdrawal from a political, military and even intellectual engagement will be seen by the Islamists as capitulation.

“Instead of leading to containment, it will only encourage even greater attempts at the expansion of power and influence of movements connected with this ideology.

“This has already caused and will continue to cause immense suffering to those who do not fit in with an Islamist worldview, including minorities of various kinds, emancipated women and Muslims with views different from those of the extremists.”

Mr Nazir-Ali said radical Islam threatened the independence of nations and communities, as well as the rights of women and non-Muslims.

Jihad in the minds of radicals, he claimed, did not have the meaning of self-defence but rather the recovery of perceived Muslim lands. Radicals, he added, were prepared to act on their beliefs.

“The West’s (particularly Britain’s and America’s) involvement in Afghanistan (and to some extent also in Iraq) must be seen in the light of what has been said above,” he said.

“There should be no facile optimism that al-Qaeda has been disabled and no longer poses a credible threat to Western or other countries.

Mr Nazir-Ali said it was possible al-Qaeda could regain its force, while abandoning Afghanistan at this stage would create “exactly the kind of chaos in which these movements flourish”.

“It will bring about the conditions where the Taliban and its even worse allies will, once again, not only return the country to the darkest night, but also remove any incentive for Pakistan to engage with its own extremist groups, at least in the border areas,” he said.

“Al-Qaeda and its allies will recover their safe haven where they can regroup and plan whatever further atrocities they have in mind.”

Withdrawing from Afghanistan could, he said, lead to fresh attacks on Western targets and give “fresh oxygen” to groups training young people in Afghanistan and Pakistan and radicalising young Western Muslims.

“From time to time, however, the protection of Western interests acquires a ‘defence’ or ‘military’ dimension,” he said. “When it is required, however, there should be no flinching from the focused effort, expenditure and, indeed, sacrifice which may be needed.”

RIA NOVOSTI

A Russian Orthodox priest has been killed in the Moscow Region south of the Russian capital, and two suspects have been detained, police said.

Father Alexander Filippov, 39, senior priest of the Ascension church in the Satino-Russkoye village, was killed late Tuesday in the entrance to the apartment block he lived in. He reportedly reproached the two men for relieving themselves in the street.

“Police officers detained two suspected killers promptly. The suspects are a resident of the town of Podolsk born in 1974 and a resident of Vladimir born in 1981,” Moscow Region police spokesman Yevgeny Gildeyev said.

“The men followed Filippov up, went into the entrance [to the apartment block] and shot him from a handgun,” he said. An investigation is underway.

Archpriest Alexander was married with three daughters.

This was the second murder of a priest in Russia in the past few weeks. Father Daniil Sysoyev, 34, was shot dead in his St. Thomas church in southern Moscow by a masked gunman on November 19. He was known for his active missionary work in converting Muslims and people seeking to quit religious sects into Christianity.

“I believe the events of past months must make us think of the spiritual and moral situation we all live in,” Russian Orthodox Church spokesman Vladimir Legoida said commenting on the latest murder.

The murder of Father Alexander, he said, is an example of how “senseless, inhuman spite terminates a person’s life for no reason at all.”

Cross-Post by Mariano over at the Atheism is Dead Blog

“If there were no God, there would be no atheists”
—G. K. Chesterton (Where All Roads Lead, 1922)

“Where would Dawkins be without Jesus’s
extraordinary impact on the Western world?
Quite a bit poorer, for one thing”
—John Cornwell

Yet, again atheists are complimenting Christianity by exclusively expressing belligerence against Christians.

Ariane Sherine (of the most belligerent atheist money wasting bus ads fame) has edited a book corroborated upon by various atheists. “The Atheist’s Guide to Christmas” seeks to suck the last remnants of Christ from Christmas whilst comforting atheists who choose to reject the Christ of Christmas but still feel lonely or excluded during a time of celebrating Christ.

I am a strong supporter of such endeavors but always end up disappointed. For example, when Dan Brown sought, via The Da Vinci Code, et al, to discredit Christianity I thought that it was great as I could not wait for him to seek to next discredit Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, Atheism, etc. (and no, his new book “The Lost Symbol” is not merely about Freemasonry but about how Christians are actually worshipping an Egyptian god).

Thus, I eagerly await, “The Atheist’s Guide to Ramadan,” “The Atheist’s Guide to Hanukah,” “The Atheist’s Guide to Kwanzaa,” “The Atheist’s Guide to the Solstice,” “The Atheist’s Guide to Halloween,” “The Atheist’s Guide to Zarathosht Diso,” “The Atheist’s Guide to Vasant Panchami,” etc., etc., etc.

For some odd reason, many atheists complain that Christmas is merely a commercial enterprise. Point taken even though 1) that is a personal choice and 2) if Christmas helps our world economy then, you are welcome.

But what is “The Atheist’s Guide to Christmas”? It is about Christmas as an exclusively commercial enterprise finally deprived of any of its original Christ related intent—first besmirch Christ and then rake up your Christmas presents.

While studies consistently show that atheists are the least charitable amongst us or rare occasion they experience what Richard Dawkins would refer to as “misfirings, Darwinian mistakes: blessed, precious mistakes.”[1] This refers to altruistic acts such as the auctioning of a signed poster with proceeds going to a UK HIV charity.

Richard Dawkins, Derren Brown, Simon Le Bon, Ben Goldacre, Charlie Brooker, Simon Singh and other contributors to “The Atheist’s Guide to Christmas” signed an original atheist bus campaign poster, the one reading, “There is probably no God. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life.”

While I certainly say “Mazel tov!” it is rather odd that even whilst being charitable they cannot go without expressing prejudice. Why not sign a poster stating, “We are atheists, here is some money,” or some such words? Perhaps George Costanza’s “The Human Fund: Money for People”?

Why resort to belligerence even whilst being charitable? Well, because atheism, particularly at the popular level of instant celebrity via expressing prejudice, is necessarily premised upon negative assertions—it is atheism as anti-theism.

“If there were no God, there would be no atheists” and no donations to the HIV charity. “Where would Dawkins be without Jesus’s extraordinary impact on the Western world?” he may have to reach into his own pocket in order to be charitable instead of signing a belligerent and fallacious statement and letting other be charitable by purchasing his signature—a cult of personality indeed.

[1] Richard Dawkins, The God Delusion (Boston & New York: Houghton Mifflin Co., 2006), p. 221

Original Source: EZGToons

WND

TEL AVIV – Like clockwork, every year at this time reporters file misleading and, in some cases, outright false reports about the state of Christmas in Bethlehem.

They claim Israeli policies have wrecked havoc on the city’s economy and that Israel is responsible for the massive flight of Christians from Bethlehem. Yet the news media completely ignore Muslim intimidation and get their facts wrong on documented history and the true state of affairs in this ancient town.

A widely circulated Reuters article, for example, laments “Christmas cheer hasn’t spread to all of Bethlehem’s residents,” squarely blaming “an Israeli wall” for the town’s misfortunes. Britains’ Press and Journal also paints a dismal picture of Bethlehem, claiming the city is “divided by a huge wall” and that the “26ft-high security wall completes the isolation of Bethlehem and prevents it from ever expanding.” The piece also wrongly states that about 2 percent of Bethlehem’s population is Christian.

An opinion piece by Austen Ivereigh in the London Guardian, meanwhile, also claims Bethlehem is “shuttered and depressed” by an “Israeli separation wall.”

“I don’t just mean the structure itself – 30 feet high, bristling with watchtowers and formed of grey concrete slabs – but where it is built, deep into the town itself, far into the West Bank, severing Bethlehem from Jerusalem and ensuring the relentless expansion eastwards of Jewish-only settlements built on land seized from Palestinian farmers,” the Guardian piece claims. Regarding the “wall” that “surrounds” Bethlehem: Israel built a fence in 2002 in the area where northern Bethlehem interfaces with Jerusalem. A tiny segment of the barrier, facing a major Israeli roadway, is a concrete wall that Israel says is meant to prevent gunmen from shooting at Israeli motorists.

Israel had good reason to build the wall in that one small area, since terrorists in 2000 and 2001 routinely shot and killed Israeli motorists at the adjacent roadway.

The rest of Bethlehem is not encircled by any wall or fence. Actually, unless one enters the city from the area interfacing Jerusalem, a traveler coming in from any other entrance will not even encounter the barrier.

The barrier, most of which is a fence, was constructed after the outbreak of the Palestinian intifada, or terror war, launched after the late PLO leader Yasser Arafat turned down an Israeli offer of a Palestinian state.

Scores of deadly suicide bombings and shooting attacks against Israelis were planned in Bethlehem and carried out by Bethlehem-area terrorists.

At one point during a period of just 30 days in 2002, at least 14 shootings were perpetrated by Bethlehem cells of Arafat’s Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades terrorists, killing two Israelis and wounding six.

Many times Muslim gunmen in the Bethlehem area reportedly took positions in civilian homes in the hilltops of Christian Beit Jala, which straddles Bethlehem. Beit Jala afforded the terrorists a clear firing line at southern sections of Jerusalem and at a major Israeli highway below, drawing Israeli military raids and the eventual building of the security barrier there.

Another popular theme of the mainstream media in recent years is that Bethlehem’s Christian population is dwindling because of the “barrier.”

Amazingly, Ivereigh’s piece in the Guardian falsely claimed: “Bethlehem is shuttered and depressed not because of Koran-wielding thugs but because the wall has smashed its economy. The town has become a ghetto, severed from lands to the north and west by the wall, and to the south and east by settler-only roads and a forest of checkpoints, leaving it barely able to trade.”

Simple demographic facts disprove this contention entirely. Israel built the barrier seven years ago. But Bethlehem’s Christian population started to drastically decline in 1995, the very year Arafat’s Palestinian Authority took over the holy Christian city in line with the U.S.-backed Oslo Accords.

Bethlehem was more than 80 percent Christian when Israel was founded in 1948. But after Arafat took control, the city’s Christian population plummeted to its current 23 percent. And that statistic is considered generous since it includes the satellite towns of Beit Sahour and Beit Jala. Some estimates place Bethlehem’s actual Christian population as low as 12 percent, with hundreds of Christians emigrating each year.

As soon as he took over Bethlehem, Arafat unilaterally fired the city’s Christian politicians and replaced them with Muslim cronies. He appointed a Muslim governor, Muhammed Rashad A-Jabar, and deposed of Bethlehem’s city council, which had nine Christians and two Muslims, reducing the number of Christians councilors to a 50-50 split.

Arafat then converted a Greek Orthodox monastery next to the Church of Nativity, the believed birthplace of Jesus, into his official Bethlehem residence.

Suddenly, after the Palestinians gained the territory, reports of Christian intimidation by Muslims began to surface.

Christian leaders and residents told this reporter they face an atmosphere of regular hostility. They said Palestinian armed groups stir tension by holding militant demonstrations and marches in the streets. They spokes of instances in which Christian shopkeepers’ stores were ransacked and Christian homes attacked.

They said in the past, Palestinian gunmen fired at Israelis from Christian hilltop communities, drawing Israeli anti-terror raids to their towns.

In 2002, dozens of terrorists holed up inside the Church of the Nativity for 39 days while fleeing a massive Israeli anti-terror operation. Israel surrounded the church area but refused to storm the structure. Gunmen inside included wanted senior Hamas, Tanzim and Al Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades terrorists reportedly involved in suicide bombings and shooting attacks. More than 200 nuns and priests were trapped in the church after Israeli hostage negotiators failed to secure their release.

Some Christian leaders said one of the most significant problems facing Christians in Bethlehem is the rampant confiscation of land by Muslim gangs.

“There are many cases in which Christians have their land stolen by the [Muslim] mafia,” Samir Qumsiyeh, a Bethlehem Christian leader and owner of the Beit Sahour-based private Al-Mahd (Nativity) TV station, told WND in an interview in 2007.

“It is a regular phenomenon in Bethlehem. They go to a poor Christian person with a forged power of attorney document, and then they say we have papers proving you’re living on our land. If you confront them, many times the Christian is beaten. You can’t do anything about it. The Christian loses, and he runs away,” Qumsiyeh told WND, speaking from his hilltop television station during a recent interview.

Qumsiyeh himself said he was targeted by Islamic gangs. He said his home was firebombed after he returned from a trip abroad during which he gave public speeches outlining the plight of Bethlehem’s Christian population.

One Christian Bethlehem resident told WND her friend recently fled Bethlehem after being accused by Muslims of selling property to Jews, a crime punishable by death in some Palestinian cities. The resident said much of the intimidation comes from gunmen associated with PA President Mahmoud Abbas’ Fatah organization.

A February 2007 Jerusalem Post article cited the case of Faud and Georgette Lama, Christian residents of Bethlehem who said their land was stolen by local Muslims, and when they tried to do something about it, Faud was beaten by gunmen.

One religious novelty store owner recently told WND that Muslim gangs regularly deface Christian property.

“We are harassed, but you wouldn’t know the truth. No one says anything publicly about the Muslims. This is why Christians are running away.”

Lastly, a main news media contention this year has asserted that the “wall” in Bethlehem has devastated the city’s economy. But last year scores of mainstream news reports documented how Bethlehem’s economy had its best year since 1999.

This year’s economic downturn in Bethlehem is largely due to the reliance of the city on tourism, which is down worldwide due to a global economic crisis – a fact not mentioned in a single news report that WND reviewed about Bethlehem’s woes.

Last year, even the New York Times was forced to admit Bethlehem’s economy was doing well. A Times article datelined Bethlehem was titled “Palestinians work to jolt West Bank back to life.”

The piece allows, “Both Israeli and Palestinian officials report economic growth for the occupied areas of 4 to 5 percent and a drop in the unemployment rate of at least three percentage points. The improved climate has nearly doubled the number of tourists in Bethlehem and increased them by half in Jericho.”

The Times quotes Victor Batarseh, the Palestinian mayor of Bethlehem, triumphantly declaring: “It has been the best year since 1999.”

“Our hotels are full, whereas three years ago there was almost nobody. Unemployment is below 20 percent,” he said.

Church Executive

The growing prevalence of the prosperity gospel around the world, and particularly in Africa, has prompted a group of theologians to release a statement of concern and a call for further reflection.

While recognizing that “there are some dimensions of prosperity teaching that have roots in the Bible,” the Lausanne Theology Working Group says its overall view is that “the teachings of those who most vigorously promote the ‘prosperity gospel’ are false and gravely distorting of the Bible.”

The statement was released this month through Christianity Today and is derived from a number of papers that were discussed at the group’s meetings in October 2008 and September 2009.

The theology group, which includes the Revs. Dr. Chris Wright and Dr. John Azumah, makes clear that its intent is not to be “exclusively negative” regarding the health and wealth gospel and recognizes the social realities within which the teaching flourishes. But the group finds the overall impact of the teachings on churches pastorally damaging, spiritually unhealthy and may even deflect people from the message and means of eternal salvation.

“We … request the Lausanne movement to be willing to make a very clear statement rejecting the excesses of prosperity teaching as incompatible with evangelical biblical Christianity,” the statement reads.

Prosperity gospel, as defined by the Lausanne theologians, is the teaching that “believers have a right to the blessings of health and wealth and that they can obtain these blessings through positive confessions of faith and the ‘sowing of seeds’ through the faithful payments of tithes and offerings.”

Pentecostal churches are largely associated with the teaching. In a 2006 Pew Forum survey, majorities of Pentecostals in the 10 countries surveyed said they believe God will grant good health and relief from sickness to believers who have enough faith; and in nine of the countries, most Pentecostals say that God will grant material prosperity to all who have enough faith. Higher majorities of African believers were found to embrace the teachings.

The prosperity gospel, however, is a phenomenon that cuts across denominational barriers, the Lausanne group acknowledges, and can be found in charismatic as well as mainstream Protestant churches.

Among some of the prosperity teachings the theologians reject is the notion that “God’s miraculous power can be treated as automatic, or at the disposal of human techniques, or manipulated by human words, actions or rituals.”

They also “deplore the clear evidence that many of them have in practice moved away from key and fundamental tenets of evangelical faith, including the authority and priority of the Bible as the Word of God, and the centrality of the cross of Christ.”

While recognizing the phenomenal growth of the numbers of professing Christians and the testimonies of those who have been positively impacted by prosperity teachings, the group observes equally the many people who have been “duped” by the teachings into false faith and false expectations.

The Lausanne group also points out the flamboyant lifestyle and manipulative behavior of many leaders who promote prosperity teachings as unethical and idolatrous.

While the prosperity gospel enriches those who preach it, multitudes of people, particularly the poor, are left no better off than before and with the added burden of disappointed hopes, the statement adds.

The statement notes that much of the teaching comes from North American sources.

In the United States, six ministries that promote the prosperity gospel are being investigated by Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) following media reports and allegations of opulent spending and possible abuse of nonprofit status. They have been asked to submit financial records and answer questions regarding organizational and personal spending. The ministries being probed include Joyce Meyer Ministries, World Healing Center Church, Without Walls International Church, New Birth Missionary Baptist Church/Eddie L. Long Ministries, Kenneth Copeland Ministries, and World Changers Church International/Creflo Dollar Ministries.

The Lausanne Theology Working Group serves the Lausanne Movement, a Christian movement focused on world evangelization.

Audrey Barrick
Christian Post Reporter

From the Rosh Pina Project:-

Read Michele Chabin’s report in the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life

Associated Press

VATICAN CITY — To put it as the devout Ned Flanders would, the Vatican’s newspaper thinks “The Simpsons” are an okely dokely bunch.

L’Osservatore Romano on Tuesday congratulated the show on its 20th anniversary, praising its philosophical leanings as well as its stinging and often irreverent take on religion.

[.....]

Religion, from the snore-evoking sermons of the Rev. Lovejoy to Homer’s face-to-face talks with God, appears so frequently on the show that it could be possible to come up with a “Simpsonian theology,” it said.

Homer’s religious confusion and ignorance are “a mirror of the indifference and the need that modern man feels toward faith,” the paper said.

It commented on several religion-themed episodes, including one in which Homer calls for divine intervention by crying: “I’m not normally a religious man, but if you’re up there, save me, Superman!”

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New York Times

BAGHDAD — As a priest led prayers for a few dozen worshipers inside St. Joseph Chaldean Church here on Sunday, Iraqi police officers stood guard outside. They blocked the street to traffic and frisked those who entered for explosive belts.

At churches in Baghdad this week, Christians are being asked for identification to determine if they have names that security force members recognize as Christian. Some churches around the northern city of Mosul are digging in, surrounding their buildings with giant earthen berms to prevent car bombers from getting too close.

For Christians in Iraq, this will be a year of canceled holiday celebrations and of Christmas Masses spent under the protective watch of police officers and soldiers because of a spate of threats by extremist groups to bomb churches on Christmas Day.

“I’m very sad that we are not able to have our rituals for Christmas this year and not have a sermon, but we do not want any Christians to be harmed,” said Edward Poles, a Christian priest at Sa’a Church in Mosul, which was bombed last week, though no one was killed.

In Baghdad, Christians said they are as fearful as they have been since 2006, when the outbreak of sectarian warfare forced many to leave their neighborhoods for months at a time.

“There will be no celebration or anything of that sort,” said Duraid Issam, a 41-year-old clerk. “We will keep it quiet because things are really bad. We are not targeted only at churches, but even in our houses because they will plant bombs outside our homes as well.”

There are no dependable figures on the number of Christians in Iraq, but the community had been estimated to number about 750,000 before the United States-led invasion in 2003.

Since then, they have become targets of killings and kidnappings, leading thousands to flee.

Many who remain are frightened and have taken precautions to conceal signs of their faith. Celebrations this year will be even more low key because Christmas coincides with the Muslim observance of Ashura, a time of mourning for Shiite Muslims.

“Our celebrations will not be open and will be restricted to going to the church in the morning,” said Naeil Victor, a 58-year-old teacher in the southern city of Basra. “My children are upset because they have been waiting for this Christmas for a year now, but my wife and my father understand what is going on around them.”

Some churches have dozens of soldiers and police officers positioned around them after the government placed security personnel on high alert because they received the names of churches that extremist groups said would be bombed on Christmas Day. Other churches have received individual threats.

In Mosul, during the past month, three churches have been bombed, killing a baby and wounding 40 other people. Last week, a Christian man in Mosul was shot dead as he walked down a street.

At least one church there has decided to relocate its Christmas Mass from Mosul to a small town about 30 miles north because parishioners feel it will be safer for them.

“We have moved the rituals for Christmas to the town of Qereqush, fearing that the Christians might be harmed in this insecure and unsafe city,” said the Rev. Behnam Asaad of Qahira Church. “We have distributed cards and fliers to the Christian families of this church informing them about the time and place where we will have the celebration, but we fear that assassinations might take place even after Christmas.”

Father Asaad said that he had received letters as recently as Monday from armed groups threatening to blow up churches and monasteries, including his own, if they celebrated Christmas.

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Good!

JTA

TORONTO (JTA) – The Canadian government has cut its longtime funding to a Christian ecumenical group after accusing it of being anti-Semitic.

In announcing a cut to the group Kairos of $7 million in public funds – half of the total annual budget of the group - Immigration Minister Jason Kenny accused the organization of “taking a leadership role in the boycott” of Israel, and that cutting its funding was one of the steps Ottawa was taking to combat anti-Semitism.

Kenney made the announcement in Jerusalem last week at the Global Forum for Combating Anti-Semitism.

Toronto-based Kairos, the social justice arm of Canada’s Roman Catholic and major Protestant faiths, has received funding from the federal government for 35 years. It represents 11 Christian churches and organizations, and promotes “liberation theology” through advocacy, education and research programs around the world.

In a statement issued from Jerusalem, Kenney said his staunchly pro-Israel government “is working to dismantle the client relationship that existed between the government of Canada and organizations whose priority is seemingly to advocate for the legalization of banned terrorist organizations like Hamas and Hezbollah, as well as deny the Jewish people’s right to a homeland.”

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