The following is another installment of the Friday Church News Notes:

BRITISH TEACHERS WARN ABOUT HARRY POTTER MOVIE. Friday Church News Notes, November 9, 2001 (David W. Cloud, Fundamental Baptist Information Service, P.O. Box 610368, Port Huron, MI 48061, 866-295-4143, fbns@wayoflife.org) The Harry Potter movie opened this week to widespread rave reviews, while a large teachers' union in Britain issued a strong warning to parents. The Association of Teachers and Lecturers warned of the film's potential to interest children in the occult. Peter Smith, the union's national secretary, said: "Children must be protected from the more extreme influences of the occult and be taught in a responsible and positive way the risks of journeying into the unknown. The premiere of Harry Potter the movie could lead to a whole new generation of youngsters discovering witchcraft and wizardry. The risks are clear."

CHRISTIAN ROCK BAND TEAMS WITH IMMORAL CLOTHING COMPANY. Friday Church News Notes, November 9, 2001 (David W. Cloud, Fundamental Baptist Information Service, P.O. Box 610368, Port Huron, MI 48061, 866-295-4143, fbns@wayoflife.org) The Christian rock band Relient K was featured in a November 2001 advertising campaign for Abercrombie & Fitch (A&F). This company is infamous for its use of scantily clad and seductively posed young people in its commercials and catalogs. Bill Johnson, president of the American Decency Association, rightly criticized Relient K for its association with such an immoral company, saying: "I am very disappointed and very troubled that a Christian band . . . that is naming Jesus Christ in its music and ministry, would in any regard feel comfortable aligning themselves with a corporation so blatant in targeting our youth through sexually erotic images" (Religion Today, Nov. 5, 2001). Wendy Wright, a director with Concerned Women of America, added that the association between Relient K and A&F sends a mixed message: "A young person could easily come to think that you can be a Christian and still promote and be involved in pornography." Christian rock groups claim to be winning the world to Christ; in fact, the world is winning them. As it was with Israel of old, they want Jehovah God and Egypt, too; but it doesn't work that way.

COMMUNIST CHINA PRODUCING VICIOUS ANTI-AMERICAN VIDEOS. Friday Church News Notes, November 9, 2001 (David W. Cloud, Fundamental Baptist Information Service, P.O. Box 610368, Port Huron, MI 48061, 866-295-4143, fbns@wayoflife.org) The communist Chinese government is producing videos that glorify the terrorist attacks of September 11 and that viciously mock and degrade the United States. One of the videos, titled Attack America, combines images of the aircraft crashing into the World Trade Center with scenes from Hollywood movies, such as the 1998 edition of Godzilla, in which a huge ape-like creature destroys New York buildings. As scenes from the rubble of the twin towers is displayed, a Chinese commentator states, "This is the America the whole world has wanted to see. Blood debts have been repaid in blood. America has bombed other countries and used its hegemony to deny the natural rights of others without paying the price. Who until now has dared to avenge the hurts inflicted by unaccountable Americans." Thousands of copies of the videos are being purchased.

MUSLIMS COULD OUTNUMBER ANGLICANS IN ENGLAND IN A FEW YEARS. Friday Church News Notes, November 9, 2001 (David W. Cloud, Fundamental Baptist Information Service, P.O. Box 610368, Port Huron, MI 48061, 866-295-4143, fbns@wayoflife.org) If the current and expected rate of growth continues, practicing Muslims will outnumber practicing Anglicans in England in about 12 years. In the early 1960s there were only 10 Islamic mosques in Britain; today there are almost 700. The projection was made by Christian Research, an organization that collates religious statistics.

CHURCHES ATTACKED IN MALAYSIA. Friday Church News Notes, November 9, 2001 (David W. Cloud, Fundamental Baptist Information Service, P.O. Box 610368, Port Huron, MI 48061, 866-295-4143, fbns@wayoflife.org) At least four church buildings in Malaysia have been attacked by arsonists in recent weeks. Two were burned to the ground, while the other two sustained serious damage. The attacks were carried out by suspected Islamic militants. Malaysia has a majority Muslim population, but it has been known as a moderate nation that does not persecute Christians. Since the September 11 terrorist attacks upon America and its ensuing war against the al-Qaida network, though, militant, violent Islam is on the rise in Malaysia.

TWENTY-FIFTH ANNIVERSARY OF FEMALE ORDINATIONS IN CANADA. Friday Church News Notes, November 9, 2001 (David W. Cloud, Fundamental Baptist Information Service, P.O. Box 610368, Port Huron, MI 48061, 866-295-4143, fbns@wayoflife.org) Two denominations in Canada are celebrating the 25th anniversary of the ordination of females. The first woman was ordained in the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Canada on October 21, 1976; and the Anglican Church in Canada followed suit on November 30 of the same year. This is blatant disobedience to the Scriptures. God's qualifications for pastors are plainly listed in 1 Timothy and Titus, and it is required that the pastor be the husband of one wife. It is very difficult for a woman to fit that divine requirement.

SOUTHERN BAPTIST PASTOR CALLS FOR END TO DIALOGUE WITH ROME. Friday Church News Notes, November 9, 2001 (David W. Cloud, Fundamental Baptist Information Service, P.O. Box 610368, Port Huron, MI 48061, 866-295-4143, fbns@wayoflife.org) Official dialogue between Southern Baptists and Roman Catholics have been conducted since 1970. The September 1982 issue of The Commission, the official SBC missions publication, featured articles pertaining to this dialogue. It stated, "For 12 years the Southern Baptist Home Mission Board's Interfaith Witness Department has fostered dialogue at every level." The most recent dialogue at the national level was held in September at the Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary. Southern Baptist Pastor Jerry Moser of Bayou DuLarge Baptist Church in Theriot, Louisiana, has been a vocal critic of this dialogue. In a recent newsletter, he wisely warned: "Over the past few years, each time the SBC/RCC conversation has met, it has been followed with a statement posted by RCC leaders. Consistently, these statements have advanced the false impression that Southern Baptists and Roman Catholics recognize each other as Christian communities, and as such are gradually moving toward reconciliation. Typically, SBC participants have allowed this public misinformation to go unchallenged in the public arena. Thus, incrementally, many Southern Baptists have been influenced into accepting something that contradicts the gospel we profess to believe. . . . We Southern Baptists have already published what we believe, and Roman Catholic officials have published what they believe. These publications have been officially approved by each body. No amount of private 'conversation' with individuals will change these published beliefs. So, what's the point of being involved in any more meetings?"

SALVATION ARMY GIVES BENEFITS TO HOMOSEXUALS. Friday Church News Notes, November 9, 2001 (David W. Cloud, Fundamental Baptist Information Service, P.O. Box 610368, Port Huron, MI 48061, 866-295-4143, fbns@wayoflife.org) The Salvation Army in the western part of the United States has decided to give benefits to the "partners" of homosexual employees. In 1998, the city of San Francisco forbade the organization to receive public money unless it would grant benefits to same-sex couples. At the time, the Salvation Army refused to go along with these ungodly terms and gave up $3.5 million in public assistance, rightfully observing that the law conflicts with the organization's Christian beliefs. Now they have done an about face on the issue and have put money before moral conviction.

LOW CASTE HINDUS CONVERT TO BUDDHISM. Friday Church News Notes, November 9, 2001 (David W. Cloud, Fundamental Baptist Information Service, P.O. Box 610368, Port Huron, MI 48061, 866-295-4143, fbns@wayoflife.org) Between 50,000 and 100,000 low caste Hindus, called Dalits, converted in masse to Buddhism at a rally in New Delhi on November 4 in order to escape the oppressive caste system. Thousands, perhaps even hundreds of thousands, of others were prevented by Indian authorities from boarding trains and buses to travel to the site. Dalits, also called "untouchables," are at the bottom of the social and economic ladder. According to Hinduism, people are born into certain castes because of what they did in past lives. Thus those in the lowest castes allegedly are paying for wrongs done during earlier cycles of reincarnation. Some Indian Christian organizations had attempted to raise funds for an expected mass conversion and baptism of millions of Dalits to Christianity, but this did not materialize. People do not become true Christians by changing religions but by being born again through repentance and faith in Jesus Christ (John 3). Baptism does not make one a Christian; it is merely the external testimony of one's inner faith in Christ and is a witness of the death, burial, and resurrection of Christ through the symbolic burial in water.