TBC NewsWatch

WHEN I WAS AN ATHEIST I HATED PEOPLE

ChristianPost.com, 1/9/14, “‘When I Was an Atheist I Hated People, Especially People That Talked About God,’ Says Former Flyleaf Singer Lacey Sturm” [Excerpts]: Lacey Sturm, an author and former lead singer of the multi-platinum selling band Flyleaf, recently spoke to CP Voice about her time as an atheist and how she felt about Christians during that period.

“When I was an atheist I hated people, especially people that talked about God... I thought that they were naïve. It wasn’t a good thing to tell people about God and make them feel like they’re safe and that He’s going to take care of them when bad things happen.” However, her perspective on that changed drastically when she embraced God as a Christian.

“Now that I do have faith in God and did have a miraculous encounter with God [I learned] that God is big, bigger than I could ever understand, good in a way that I could never comprehend, He knows what He’s doing and that’s just enough to help you have faith of your own.”

(http://goo.gl/8W246i)

MORE STUDENTS TUNE OUT FAR-LEFT PROFESSORS

OneNewsNow.com, 1/2/14, “Hope for new year: More students tune out far-left professors” [Excerpts]: Charles Angeletti, a history professor at the Metropolitan State University of Denver, has his students read a “New Pledge” that mocks the “Pledge of Allegiance.”

The professor’s version reads: I pledge allegiance to wrap myself in the flag of the United States against anything un-American and to the Republicans for which it stands, two nations, under Jesus, rich against poor, with curtailed liberty and justice for all except blacks, homosexuals, women who want abortions, communists, welfare queens, tree-huggers, feminazis, illegal immigrants, children of illegal immigrants, and you, if you don’t watch your step.

Angeletti has been distributing the material, and requiring students to recite it, for more than 20 years.

Cultural analyst Janice Crouse says it’s an “open secret” among students that your classroom grade will suffer if your opinion differs from the professor, who is an avowed Republican-hating atheist and socialist. But if you go along with his “diatribes” in the classroom, “then you’re fine,” she notes.

OneNewsNow has reported on Dr. Mike Adams, a criminology professor who was punished for his beliefs by the University of North Carolina-Wilmington. A jury found that Adams was unjustly denied a promotion by the university and a federal court upheld the decision.

Angeletti and his “New Pledge” were uncovered by Campus Reform, which included a response from the professor for its online story. “We’re very racist, we’re very repressive, we’re very Christian oriented, we don’t tolerate other kinds of thinking in this country,” Angeletti told the website.

Crouse says she hopes that many students are rejecting the biased rhetoric and that eventually the left-dominated climate on college campuses will turn around.

(http://goo.gl/SphFFF)

A THOUSAND CHURCHES DESTROYED IN NIGERIA

FrontPageMag.com, 1/6/15, “A Thousand Churches Destroyed in Nigeria” [Excerpts]: In just two months, from August to October, nearly 200 Christian churches were destroyed by the Islamic organization Boko Haram and its Muslim allies after their capture of towns and villages in the north-eastern states of Borno and Adamawa.

In 2011, hundreds of Christians were killed and 430 churches destroyed or damaged in Nigeria by Boko Haram. In 2012, 900 Christians were slaughtered and an unknown number of churches destroyed. In 2013, 612 Christians were slaughtered and approximately 300 churches destroyed (suggesting that in the last four years alone, approximately 1,000 Christian churches have been destroyed...according to [a] Human Rights Watch report, Boko Haram has so far [killed] 2,053 people in 2014...likely [exceeding] the previous four years).

A typical church attack in Nigeria was reported as follows: “Armed Muslim extremists stormed two churches in Taraba state on Sunday (Oct. 19) and killed 31 people as they worshipped....Two pastors, one pastor’s son, and 28 other Christians were slain in the attacks.” According to the Rev. Caleb Ahema, president of the Christian Reformed Church of Christ in Nigeria, “The attack on Christians in Taraba state is a planned genocide against Christians by Islamic insurgents who have invaded the southern part of the state, inhabited mostly by Christians, since February.”

The Center for the Studies of Global Christianity in the United States concluded that “about 100,000 Christians die every year because of their religious beliefs, that is to say one every five minutes. In addition, in many countries, many other religious minorities suffer violence and persecution. Just to name a few...Iraq, Syria, Nigeria, Cameroon, Sudan, Pakistan, Somalia and Egypt....

(http://goo.gl/2ejosK)

550 MILLION YEARS OF NON-EVOLUTION

ICR.org, 11/26/14, “550 Million Years of Non-Evolution” [Excerpts]: A strange, new, mushroom-shaped species discovered alive on the deep seafloor near Australia—more than 3,000 feet below sea level—may be a record-breaking living fossil. Researchers investigated the anatomy of this phenomenal animal and published their finds in the online journal PLoS ONE. The creature has a pharynx running down the center of a central stalk, leading to “gastrovascular branches” that look like leaf veins running through a soft disc-like body part. It’s not a jellyfish, sea squirt, or sponge.

Because it doesn’t fit current categories of biology, the search is now on to find out what this creature is, and if or how it might relate to other animals—such as its basic phylum. Every phylum includes a very broad group of creatures. For example, phylum Cnidaria includes all forms of jellyfish, but excludes all other creatures. But so far, this new mushroom-shaped species “cannot at present be placed in an existing phylum.” It does, however, have a genus: Dendrogramma.

The study authors noted how close their big discovery resembles certain fossils found in Ediacaran rocks. Only rarely are fossils found in these layers beneath the Cambrian strata. In contrast, Cambrian fossils abound with diversity and contain representatives of almost every living phylum, including fish from Chordata, the phylum for vertebrates.

This newly discovered sea creature also challenges evolutionary interpretations of biology. If this really is a “living fossil”—a creature with ancient fossil representatives yet still alive today—that can be found in the Ediacaran rocks, then how will secular biologists explain that evolution had no effect on it over the course of 550 million years?

If future research confirms that these living Dendrogramma represent Ediacaran animal forms, then none of these challenging questions confront biblical creation. Instead, finding solid answers will be simple: God created these creatures to reproduce more of their own unique kind, not evolve into some other phylum.

These new Dendrogramma species might confront evolutionary ideas by setting the record for the longest-surviving, unevolving life form.

(http://goo.gl/1ZC1zq)