News
A man is silhouetted near logo of the U.S. National Security Agency (NSA) in this photo illustration taken in Sarajevo March 11, 2015. REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/File Photo
The controversial decision came in the wake of the House rejecting bipartisan efforts to enforce privacy limits on the NSA, as well as contradictory tweets by President Donald Trump on Thursday morning, hours before the vote.
Image via Sojourners
Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents detained immigrant rights activist Ravi Ragbir on Thursday after a routine check-in in New York City. Ragbir is the executive director of the New Sanctuary Coalition of New York and has been nationally recognized for his work.
Chairman Ajit Pai drinks coffee ahead of the vote on the repeal of so called net neutrality rules at the Federal Communications Commission in Washington. REUTERS/Aaron P. Bernstein
Senator Ed Markey (D-MA), along with the support 40 co-sponsors, have amassed the 30 votes necessary to seek to reverse the net neutrality repeal through the Congressional Review Act.
A nurse listens to nine month old Marion Burgess's heartbeat at the Dornbecher Children's hospital in Portland, Oregon, U.S. December 6, 2017. Burgess suffers from a chronic heart condition. Picture taken December 6, 2017. REUTERS/Natalie Behring
The stall in funding for CHIP, federally-funded program that covers moderately low-income children in the U.S., leaves nearly nine million children and their families in a worrisome limbo.
Image via World Vision/Kari Constanza
During his tenure, World Vision grew to collect $1 billion in annual revenue in 2017, making the 67-year-old ministry No. 15 on Forbes’ list of the nation’s largest charities. The agency’s statement on Stearns cites its “two million supporters, child sponsors, and partners and says it is on track to serve 30 million children by 2022.”
That track was nearly derailed in March 2014, however, with a blowup in Christian evangelical circles over how World Vision would deal with LGBT employees.
Image via Faithleaks.org/RNS
For would-be whistleblowers, the attraction of FaithLeaks is its security features. The site uses a software platform designed to receive documents from anonymous sources, meaning those documents cannot be traced back to the sender, its founders say.
Image from the 2018 World Watch List.
Open Doors USA, a ministry that works with persecuted Christians around the world, released its 25th annual World Watch List at the National Press Club Wednesday in Washington, D.C. The list, a compilation of field interviews and aggregated data from other agencies, ranks the 50 most dangerous countries in the world for Christians. Dangers include religious militancy, organized corruption, Islamic extremism, among other factors.
“In the midst of the critical national conversation now taking place on issues of sexual harassment and assault, this survey shows that young Americans in their teens and early twenties see serious negative consequences flowing from traditional depictions of masculinity,” Robert P. Jones, CEO of PRRI, said. “Young women, in particular, are worried that these expectations carry within them the seeds of sexually aggressive or even violent behavior.”
DACA rally in front of the White House Sept. 5, 2017. REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque
A U.S. judge in San Francisco temporarily barred President Donald Trump's administration on Tuesday from ending a program shielding young people brought to the United States illegally by their parents from deportation.
Image via Karen Gillerman Harel / Shutterstock
But with Holocaust Memorial Day coming up on Jan. 27, the anniversary of the 1945 liberation of Auschwitz, her Christian Democrats have decided to wait no longer. They want the Bundestag, the German parliament, to pass a resolution calling for migrants who promote hatred of Jews to be expelled.
Image via Rahmeek Rasul / RNS
“There’s a lot of intergenerational trauma in our community — a lot of issues that come up that have gone unaddressed: depression, marital issues, suicide among youth, LGBT sexuality,” she said. “Our community is suffering.”
Salvadoran immigrant Mirna Portillo, following the announcement to end TPS Jan. 8, 2018. REUTERS/Andrew Kelly
The Department of Homeland Security announced on Monday that it would terminate the temporary protected status for Salvadorans living in the U.S. beginning September 2019, putting 200,000 of them at risk of being sent back to a country with one of the highest murder rates in the world.
Image via Paul Drinkwater/NBC/Handout/Reuters
The night belonged to Oprah.
U.S. ambassador to the Holy See Callista Gingrich and her husband talk with Pope Francis during the traditional exchange of the New Year greetings in the Regal Room at the Vatican January 8, 2018. REUTERS/Andrew Medichini/Pool
"Nuclear weapons must be banned," Francis said, quoting a document issued by Pope John XXIII at the height of the Cold War and adding that there is "no denying that the conflagration could be started by some chance and unforeseen circumstance".
1. I Wanted to Do a Good Deed. I Talked Myself Out of It Because I Thought of All the Ways I Might Get Killed
“I almost pulled up to the house right then, but I decided to drop off my daughter first. Should something go awry, I do not want my daughter there.
Should something go awry.”
2. How to Survive a Bomb Cyclone
A very practical how-to for those of us on the East Coast.
Pastor Charles Stoker looks over damage to Hi-Way Tabernacle Assembly of God Church after Hurricane Harvey in Cleveland, Texas. Photo courtesy of Becket Law Firm
After lawsuits and a Supreme Court decision, the Federal Emergency Management Agency has issued a new policy extending disaster relief to churches, synagogues and other congregations.
FILE PHOTO: Policemen inspect the site of attack on Mar Mina church, Egypt, Dec. 29, 2017. REUTERS/Amr Abdallah Dalsh
The incident took place just days after attacks on a Coptic church and another Christian-owned shop also south of the Egyptian capital that killed more than 10 people, as security forces braced for attacks against the Arab world's largest Christian minority ahead of Orthodox Christmas celebrations.
Pope Francis arrives to lead a mass to mark the World Day of Peace in Saint Peter's Basilica at the Vatican Jan. 1, 2018. REUTERS/Max Rossi
Pope Francis described migrants and refugees as the world's "weakest and most needy" on Monday, using his traditional New Year's address to "give voice" to people he has urged leaders to do more to help.
Image via Osservatore Romano/Handout/Reuters.
Francis, leader of the world's 1.2 billion Roman Catholics, urged people to see the defenseless baby Jesus in the children who suffer the most from war, migration, and natural calamities caused by man today.
Image via Reuters/Marvin Gentry
“I am so pro-protest and call-out and raising hell. I feel it coming,” one Auburn graduate and Alabama native, who recently moved to Minnesota, told me.
"I think the opportunities to act on these convictions for the good of others will continue opening. I hope they do. I’m ready for them.”