Friday Church News Notes
Oct. 11, 2024 - Volume 25, Issue 41
The Friday Church News Notes is designed for use in churches and is published by Way of Life Literature. Unless otherwise stated, the Notes are written by David Cloud. Of necessity we quote from a wide variety of sources, though this does not imply an endorsement.
Photo credit: David W. Cloud
CATHOLIC COLLEGE OPERATES ON OLD D.L. MOODY PROPERTY (Friday Church News Notes, October 11, 2024, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The vast majority of old fundamentalist churches and institutions have become evangelical over the past 50 years, and many of them have morphed from fundamentalism to evangelicalism to liberalism and Catholicism. This is the fruit of the new evangelicalism with its renunciation of separatism and its tendency to erase “boundaries.” Consider Trinitarian Congregational Church of East Northfield, Massachusetts. It was made famous by the preaching of D.L. Moody and was pastored by C.I. Scofield from 1895 to 1902. In the first few decades of the 20th century, the church rejected fundamentalism for the new evangelicalism. By the mid-20th century it was completely modernistic. In 1961, it joined the ultra-liberal United Church of Christ (UCC), which is a member of the World Council of Churches. Lloyd Parrill, who pastored Trinitarian from 1977 to 2012, said the church’s goal is “to seek justice and peace for all.” But there is no justice or peace apart from salvation through saving faith in the blood of Jesus Christ. In 2018, Trinitarian voted unanimously to become an “Open and Affirming Church,” which means homosexuals are accepted as members without repentance or conversion. (Contrast 1 Corinthians 6:9-11). Consider D.L. Moody’s Northfield School for Girls and Mount Hermon School for Boys. The evangelist’s goal was to educate young people in a gospel-saturated environment to produce Christian soldiers for God’s work. In 1971, the schools merged as one co-ed school, the Northfield Mount Hermon School (NMH). The schools became wishy-washy evangelical and then entirely liberal. “Under subsequent administrations, the schools grew more theologically liberal and ultimately became non-denominational. Today, NMH offers diverse ways to pursue religious studies and personal spirituality” (“Northfield Mount Hermon School,” Wikipedia). “We’re a secular school that affirms religious diversity. After NHM, students move ... into the world with confidence. They are curious, inspired, motivated. They are ready” (nmhschool.org). They are ready for the world, but they are not ready to meet God. In 2017, the Roman Catholic Thomas Aquinas College purchased 3/4th of the property formerly owned by the Moody’s Northfield School for Girls. In 2018, the Catholic school began operation on the property. On March 6, 2022, the old Sage Chapel of Moody’s era was renamed Our Mother of Perpetual Help Chapel. To consecrate the building as a Catholic chapel, Bishop William Byrne conducted a 2.5 hour mass. He sprinkled the building’s walls with holy water, anointed the chapel’s 17 crucifixes with oil, incensed the altar, lit candles, and set up an image of Mary. The ceremony featured a processional in which the bishop and priests carried the relics of St. Thomas Aquinas and St. John Henry Newman for installation in the altars (“Chapel rededicated,” Greenfield Recorder, Mar. 7, 2022). Changes to the building include two mass altars, confessional booths, and Stations of the Cross
SWISS GOVERNMENT FORCEFULLY REMOVES AND TRANSITIONS CHILD (Friday Church News Notes, October 11, 2024, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is excerpted from “Swiss Parents,” Standing for Freedom, Oct. 1, 2024: “Parents across the West must recognize that the left has declared cultural and spiritual war on the family and that they no longer have a choice but to engage in the battle--for what’s at stake is nothing short of the physical well-being of their children and the sanctity of the parent-child bond. Switzerland’s Federal Supreme Court has temporarily suspended criminal charges against a couple who refused to turn over their daughter’s identity documents after she was removed from their home for refusing to transition her. The girl’s father has called it a ‘nightmare’ as he and his wife have had their daughter ‘taken’ away from them by the state. According to the parents, who for the safety of their family remain anonymous, the issue began during the COVID lockdowns when their daughter was 13 years old and spending much of her time alone in her room and on the Internet. Coming out of the pandemic, she informed her parents that she was a boy. ... In a meeting government officials told the parents that they had committed child abuse by seeking alternative treatment and to ‘just accept that you have a son.’ The transgender activist organization told the girl that the psychiatrist her parents had chosen was a ‘transphobe,’ and she immediately stopped treatment. In April 2023, a court order removed the girl from the parents’ home and placed her in government custody. The girl is now in a government home and the state regulates contact between her and her parents. ... Sadly, this story is playing out in countries around the West, including in the United States. In a case that is hauntingly similar to that of the Swiss parents, a Maryland couple, military veterans no less, have filed suit against a Washington, D.C., hospital after the hospital effectively kidnapped their autistic son when they refused to allow him to be transitioned by hospital staff. They have since lost custody of their son.”
COLLEGES REFUSE TO ALLOW WOMEN’S TEAMS TO PLAY AGAINST “TRANSGENDER” (Friday Church News Notes, October 11, 2024, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is excerpted from “Unscientific American,” PowerLineBlog, Oct. 6, 2024: “[I]t has cheered me in recent days to note that three colleges [Boise State, Southern Utah, and the University of Wyoming] have now refused to allow their women’s volleyball teams to play against San Jose State (choosing to forfeit instead), which has a transgender male playing for the team. Some background: Blaire Fleming is an outside and right-side hitter for San Jose State University who’s made headlines in recent days after another San Jose player, Brooke Slusser, joined a lawsuit to sue the NCAA over Fleming’s inclusion on the Division I team. Slusser alleges in the lawsuit that Fleming is a male, and that Fleming’s inclusion on the women’s volleyball team poses an unfair advantage and safety hazards. ‘Brooke estimates that Fleming’s spikes were traveling upward of 80 mph, which was faster than she had ever seen a woman hit a volleyball,’ says Slusser’s addition to the lawsuit complaint, proposed this week in the U.S. District Court for Northern Georgia. ‘The girls were doing everything they could to dodge Fleming’s spikes but still could not fully protect themselves.’”
TEACHER WINS LAWSUIT AGAINST SCHOOL THAT FIRED HIM OVER REFUSAL TO USE TRANSSEXUAL “PRONOUNS” (Friday Church News Notes, October 11, 2024, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is excerpted from “VA school district settles lawsuit with teacher over pronouns,” American Family News, Oct. 7, 2024: “A public school district has been ordered to pay more than a half-million dollars to a terminated high school teacher to settle his 2019 lawsuit over transgender pronouns and compelled speech. West Point Public Schools, located in East Virginia, agreed to pay fired teacher Peter Vlaming $575,000 in damages and attorneys’ fees. Vlaming, who taught French, was terminated in a 5-0 school board vote ... The student, a female who said she was male, was accommodated by the school but not by Vlaming, who cited his conscience and his Christian faith, and refused. Vlaming agreed to call the student by his new male name, but he refused to use ‘he’ to refer to what he knew is a biological female. ... The settlement was announced by Alliance Defending Freedom, the religious liberty law firm that has represented Vlaming since he filed a federal lawsuit. After the teacher sued, the school district appeared to win its case after a circuit court judge dismissed the lawsuit. ADF appealed the case to the Supreme Court of Virginia, which overruled the lower court and ordered the lawsuit to proceed. In the state high court’s ruling, it agreed Vlaming had been terminated because the school district compelled him to do something that violated his religious beliefs. Caleb Dalton, senior counsel at ADF, says the case is not only about free speech but also about being compelled to knowingly lie.”
COAL-FIRED POWER GROWING (Friday Church News Notes, October 11, 2024, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is excerpted from “The Future of Energy Is ... Coal,” PowerLineBlog, Oct. 7, 2024: “In the midst of all the ongoing cheerleading for ‘net-zero’ and the fabulous ‘energy transition,’ a reality check is in order. Coal-fired power is still growing very fast. And guess where? China and India are behind almost all new coal plant proposals. China consumed 56% of the world’s coal in 2023. For 2024, China proposed 38.13 GigaWatt of new coal-fired plant, while India proposed 23.48 new plants (Global Energy Monitor).
BUTTERFLY PHYSICS AND STEALTH (Friday Church News Notes, October 11, 2024, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) The following is from CreationMoments.com, August 28, 2024: “One would not think that a brightly colored, relatively slow butterfly has much of a chance against a bird moving in for lunch. But you would be surprised. Scientists were. Some butterflies are protected by distinctive, bright markings that indicate they are poisonous. But what about those butterflies that are bright and tasty? Tropical birds that eat butterflies are usually fast and very agile fliers. They often have long, pointed beaks well designed to catch butterflies. It would seem that butterflies wouldn’t have a chance against faster-flying birds. In truth, it’s the bird that has the greatest disadvantage. The muscles that control the tasty butterfly’s wing are relatively stronger in terms of lifting power than a bird’s muscle. In addition, tasty butterflies have about 50 percent more flight muscle than the poisonous butterflies that birds avoid. Since butterflies weigh so much less than birds, they can change direction more rapidly. So even though a bird can fly much faster than a butterfly, by flying in a tight, darting, erratic pattern, a skillful butterfly can easily escape. Not only is the butterfly wonderfully designed, it’s designed in view of the birds that might eat it. Notice how God carefully countered the bird’s advantage of speed by giving the butterfly stronger muscles and a more maneuverable body. Darwinism can only pretend to explain that! Notes: James H. Marden, ‘Newton’s Second Law of Butterflies,’ Natural History, 1/92, pp. 54-60.”
CONCLUSION: The Friday Church News Notes is designed for use in churches and is published by Way of Life Literature’s Fundamental Baptist Information Service. Unless otherwise stated, the Notes are written by David Cloud. Of necessity we quote from a wide variety of sources, but this obviously does not imply an endorsement. We trust that our readers will not be discouraged. It is God’s will that we know the times (1 Ch. 12:32; Mat. 16:3) and that we be as wise as serpents and harmless as doves. The News Notes remind us that the hour is very late, and we need to be ready for the Lord’s coming. Are you sure that you are born again? Are you living for Christ? “And that, knowing the time, that now it is high time to awake out of sleep: for now is our salvation nearer than when we believed. The night is far spent, the day is at hand: let us therefore cast off the works of darkness, and let us put on the armour of light. Let us walk honestly, as in the day; not in rioting and drunkenness, not in chambering and wantonness, not in strife and envying. But put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make not provision for the flesh, to fulfil the lusts thereof” (Rom. 13:11-14).
SWISS GOVERNMENT FORCEFULLY REMOVES AND TRANSITIONS CHILD (Friday Church News Notes, October 11, 2024, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is excerpted from “Swiss Parents,” Standing for Freedom, Oct. 1, 2024: “Parents across the West must recognize that the left has declared cultural and spiritual war on the family and that they no longer have a choice but to engage in the battle--for what’s at stake is nothing short of the physical well-being of their children and the sanctity of the parent-child bond. Switzerland’s Federal Supreme Court has temporarily suspended criminal charges against a couple who refused to turn over their daughter’s identity documents after she was removed from their home for refusing to transition her. The girl’s father has called it a ‘nightmare’ as he and his wife have had their daughter ‘taken’ away from them by the state. According to the parents, who for the safety of their family remain anonymous, the issue began during the COVID lockdowns when their daughter was 13 years old and spending much of her time alone in her room and on the Internet. Coming out of the pandemic, she informed her parents that she was a boy. ... In a meeting government officials told the parents that they had committed child abuse by seeking alternative treatment and to ‘just accept that you have a son.’ The transgender activist organization told the girl that the psychiatrist her parents had chosen was a ‘transphobe,’ and she immediately stopped treatment. In April 2023, a court order removed the girl from the parents’ home and placed her in government custody. The girl is now in a government home and the state regulates contact between her and her parents. ... Sadly, this story is playing out in countries around the West, including in the United States. In a case that is hauntingly similar to that of the Swiss parents, a Maryland couple, military veterans no less, have filed suit against a Washington, D.C., hospital after the hospital effectively kidnapped their autistic son when they refused to allow him to be transitioned by hospital staff. They have since lost custody of their son.”
COLLEGES REFUSE TO ALLOW WOMEN’S TEAMS TO PLAY AGAINST “TRANSGENDER” (Friday Church News Notes, October 11, 2024, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is excerpted from “Unscientific American,” PowerLineBlog, Oct. 6, 2024: “[I]t has cheered me in recent days to note that three colleges [Boise State, Southern Utah, and the University of Wyoming] have now refused to allow their women’s volleyball teams to play against San Jose State (choosing to forfeit instead), which has a transgender male playing for the team. Some background: Blaire Fleming is an outside and right-side hitter for San Jose State University who’s made headlines in recent days after another San Jose player, Brooke Slusser, joined a lawsuit to sue the NCAA over Fleming’s inclusion on the Division I team. Slusser alleges in the lawsuit that Fleming is a male, and that Fleming’s inclusion on the women’s volleyball team poses an unfair advantage and safety hazards. ‘Brooke estimates that Fleming’s spikes were traveling upward of 80 mph, which was faster than she had ever seen a woman hit a volleyball,’ says Slusser’s addition to the lawsuit complaint, proposed this week in the U.S. District Court for Northern Georgia. ‘The girls were doing everything they could to dodge Fleming’s spikes but still could not fully protect themselves.’”
TEACHER WINS LAWSUIT AGAINST SCHOOL THAT FIRED HIM OVER REFUSAL TO USE TRANSSEXUAL “PRONOUNS” (Friday Church News Notes, October 11, 2024, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is excerpted from “VA school district settles lawsuit with teacher over pronouns,” American Family News, Oct. 7, 2024: “A public school district has been ordered to pay more than a half-million dollars to a terminated high school teacher to settle his 2019 lawsuit over transgender pronouns and compelled speech. West Point Public Schools, located in East Virginia, agreed to pay fired teacher Peter Vlaming $575,000 in damages and attorneys’ fees. Vlaming, who taught French, was terminated in a 5-0 school board vote ... The student, a female who said she was male, was accommodated by the school but not by Vlaming, who cited his conscience and his Christian faith, and refused. Vlaming agreed to call the student by his new male name, but he refused to use ‘he’ to refer to what he knew is a biological female. ... The settlement was announced by Alliance Defending Freedom, the religious liberty law firm that has represented Vlaming since he filed a federal lawsuit. After the teacher sued, the school district appeared to win its case after a circuit court judge dismissed the lawsuit. ADF appealed the case to the Supreme Court of Virginia, which overruled the lower court and ordered the lawsuit to proceed. In the state high court’s ruling, it agreed Vlaming had been terminated because the school district compelled him to do something that violated his religious beliefs. Caleb Dalton, senior counsel at ADF, says the case is not only about free speech but also about being compelled to knowingly lie.”
COAL-FIRED POWER GROWING (Friday Church News Notes, October 11, 2024, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is excerpted from “The Future of Energy Is ... Coal,” PowerLineBlog, Oct. 7, 2024: “In the midst of all the ongoing cheerleading for ‘net-zero’ and the fabulous ‘energy transition,’ a reality check is in order. Coal-fired power is still growing very fast. And guess where? China and India are behind almost all new coal plant proposals. China consumed 56% of the world’s coal in 2023. For 2024, China proposed 38.13 GigaWatt of new coal-fired plant, while India proposed 23.48 new plants (Global Energy Monitor).
BUTTERFLY PHYSICS AND STEALTH (Friday Church News Notes, October 11, 2024, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) The following is from CreationMoments.com, August 28, 2024: “One would not think that a brightly colored, relatively slow butterfly has much of a chance against a bird moving in for lunch. But you would be surprised. Scientists were. Some butterflies are protected by distinctive, bright markings that indicate they are poisonous. But what about those butterflies that are bright and tasty? Tropical birds that eat butterflies are usually fast and very agile fliers. They often have long, pointed beaks well designed to catch butterflies. It would seem that butterflies wouldn’t have a chance against faster-flying birds. In truth, it’s the bird that has the greatest disadvantage. The muscles that control the tasty butterfly’s wing are relatively stronger in terms of lifting power than a bird’s muscle. In addition, tasty butterflies have about 50 percent more flight muscle than the poisonous butterflies that birds avoid. Since butterflies weigh so much less than birds, they can change direction more rapidly. So even though a bird can fly much faster than a butterfly, by flying in a tight, darting, erratic pattern, a skillful butterfly can easily escape. Not only is the butterfly wonderfully designed, it’s designed in view of the birds that might eat it. Notice how God carefully countered the bird’s advantage of speed by giving the butterfly stronger muscles and a more maneuverable body. Darwinism can only pretend to explain that! Notes: James H. Marden, ‘Newton’s Second Law of Butterflies,’ Natural History, 1/92, pp. 54-60.”
CONCLUSION: The Friday Church News Notes is designed for use in churches and is published by Way of Life Literature’s Fundamental Baptist Information Service. Unless otherwise stated, the Notes are written by David Cloud. Of necessity we quote from a wide variety of sources, but this obviously does not imply an endorsement. We trust that our readers will not be discouraged. It is God’s will that we know the times (1 Ch. 12:32; Mat. 16:3) and that we be as wise as serpents and harmless as doves. The News Notes remind us that the hour is very late, and we need to be ready for the Lord’s coming. Are you sure that you are born again? Are you living for Christ? “And that, knowing the time, that now it is high time to awake out of sleep: for now is our salvation nearer than when we believed. The night is far spent, the day is at hand: let us therefore cast off the works of darkness, and let us put on the armour of light. Let us walk honestly, as in the day; not in rioting and drunkenness, not in chambering and wantonness, not in strife and envying. But put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make not provision for the flesh, to fulfil the lusts thereof” (Rom. 13:11-14).
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Distributed by Way of Life Literature., publisher of Bible Study Materials and reports for Fundamental Baptists and other fundamentalist, Bible-believing Christians. Established in 1974, Way of Life Literature is a fundamental Baptist preaching and publishing ministry based in Bethel Baptist Church, London, Ontario, of which Wilbert Unger is the founding Pastor. Brother Cloud lives in South Asia where he has been a church planting missionary since 1979. OUR GOAL IN THIS PARTICULAR ASPECT OF OUR MINISTRY (REPORTS AND FRIDAY NEWS) IS NOT DEVOTIONAL. IS TO PROVIDE INFORMATION TO ASSIST PREACHERS IN THE PROTECTION OF THE CHURCHES IN THIS APOSTATE HOUR.
David Cloud, Way of Life Literature, P.O. Box 610368, Port Huron, MI 48061, 866-295-4143, fbns@wayoflife.org
The Way of Life Literature preaching and publishing ministry is based at Bethel Baptist Church, London, Ontario, of which Wilbert Unger is the founding Pastor. A mail stop is maintained in Port Huron, Michigan.
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