“It’s Your Body … Do What You Want:” Woman Has Drain Cleaner Dropleted in Her Eyes to Become Blind

Christian News Network reports:

A North Carolina woman recently appeared on the television shows “The Doctors” and “Dr. Phil” to explain that she had a psychologist droplet drain cleaner in her eyes out of her desire to be blind. “It’s your body,” Amber “Jewel” Shuping said. “You should be able to do what you want to do with it.” Shuping outlined that as a child she was considered legally blind without eyeglasses, and began thinking that she should have been born blind.

“It got to the point where I felt that I shouldn’t be seeing at all,” she said. “I felt imprisoned by my sight.”

View article →

Cash-Strapped Missionaries Get a New Calling: Home

According to The Wall Street Journal:

Peter and Jennie Stillman felt a divine calling to preach the gospel abroad. So the Southern Baptist couple left Texas with their three young daughters 25 years ago and became missionaries in Southeast Asia.

Now, the Stillmans are responding to a new call: early retirement. They are among hundreds of Southern Baptist missionaries working abroad who are being summoned home in a move to slash costs, after years of spending to support missionary work around the world led to budget problems.

View article →

U.S. Supreme Court to Hear Challenge to Obamacare Abortion Pill Mandate

Christian News Network reports:

The U.S. Supreme Court has agreed to hear a challenge from several religious groups to what has been dubbed the “abortion pill mandate” in the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare, marking the second time the court has deliberated opposition to the law.

The Becket Fund for Religious Liberty had filed an appeal on behalf of the Roman Catholic group Little Sisters of the Poor, Houston Baptist University, East Texas Baptist University, South Nazarene University, Geneva College, Priests for Life and the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Washington.

View article →

46,471: Drug Overdoses Killed More Americans Than Car Crashes or Guns

CNS News reports:

“Drug overdose deaths are the leading cause of injury death in the United States, ahead of motor vehicle deaths and firearms (deaths),” the Drug Enforcement Agency announced on Wednesday.

In 2013, the most recent year for which data is available, 46,471 people in the United States died from drug overdoses, and more than half of those deaths were caused by prescription painkillers and heroin.

That compares with the 35,369 who died in motor vehicle crashes and 33,636 who died from firearms, as tallied by the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

View article →

“Prophetic Prayer” Claims God Has Given Donald Trump “Anointing for Mantle of Government”

From Berean Research:

Here we go again. As you can see by the headline, one of the New Apostolic Reformation (NAR) “prophets” has uttered a prophecy for a presidential candidate. Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain! Why? Because the majority of NAR prophets’ predictions never come to pass. For example, on September 28, 2009 the “prophets” declared that Texas governor Rick Perry would have a leadership role beyond Texas. Following is an excerpt from a piece entitled “Rick Perry’s Army of God”:

On this day, the Lord’s messengers arrived in the form of two Texas pastors, Tom Schlueter of Arlington and Bob Long of San Marcos, who called on Perry in the governor’s office inside the state Capitol. Schlueter and Long both oversee small congregations, but they are more than just pastors. They consider themselves modern-day apostles and prophets, blessed with the same gifts as Old Testament prophets or New Testament apostles.

The pastors told Perry of God’s grand plan for Texas. A chain of powerful prophecies had proclaimed that Texas was “The Prophet State,” anointed by God to lead the United States into revival and Godly government. And the governor would have a special role.

View article →

Court exonerates mother in newborn’s death, rules child not a person

Live Action News reports:

InfantJennifer Jorgensen, the Long Island, New York, woman who was convicted of manslaughter in the 2008 death of her six-day-old daughter, has won her appeal by arguing that her daughter was not yet a person.

Jorgensen was speeding, intoxicated, and not wearing a seatbelt when she crashed her car while she was eight months pregnant. Jorgensen’s blood alcohol level was .06 and the anti-anxiety medication Clonazepam was in her system.

Doctors had to deliver her baby, Ashley Jorgensen-Kaiser, via C-section in an attempt to save the child’s life. However, the premature infant died as a result of her injuries six days later.

View article →

UWM offers “voice feminization therapy” to help students “live their gender identities”

According to Campus Reform:

The University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee is offering “voice feminization therapy” for male students claiming to be transgender women.

As part of the university’s “Transitioning at UWM” resource, the university encourages students to utilize “voice feminization therapy for male-to-female transgender clients” offered by the UWM Speech and Language Clinic, which claims to treat “voice disorders in adults and children.” Elsewhere on the UWM website, the university claims voice feminization therapy is a “non-medical option” that allows transgender students to “live their gender identities.”

Michelle Johnson, the Media Content Manager at UWM, told Campus Reform that the school provides the voice feminization therapy “in compliance with nondiscrimination policies established by the university and the American Speech Language Hearing Association.”

View article →

Presidential Candidate Ben Carson: Seventh-Day Adventists Should “Ordain” Women

There are a number of problems within Seventh-day Adventistism. In fact, many consider it a cult for the reason that some Seventh-day Adventists believe Jesus is Michael the Archangel and that Saturday is the proper day of worship. Discover more of their teaching by visiting CARM.

Now to Christian News Network’s report.

Republican presidential candidate Ben Carson told reporters on Friday that he believes Seventh-Day Adventists should ordain women, expressing disagreement with current prohibitions against female headship.

“I don’t see any reason why women can’t be ordained,” he said, opining that it was a “huge mistake” for Adventist leaders to vote against female ordination.

View article →

U.S. officials believe ISIS planted bomb on Russian plane

CNN has the full report:

The latest U.S. intelligence suggests that the crash of a Russian passenger jet in the Sinai over the weekend was most likely caused by a bomb on the plane planted by ISIS or an ISIS affiliate, according to a U.S. official familiar with the matter.

But the official stressed a formal conclusion has not been reached by the U.S. intelligence community.

“There is a definite feeling it was an explosive device planted in luggage or somewhere on the plane,” the official, who is familiar with the latest U.S. intelligence analysis of the crash, told CNN.

Other U.S. officials also told CNN that the analysis is pointing toward the cause being a bomb.

View article →

Houston Equal Rights Ordinance fails by wide margin

Chron reports:

Houston’s controversial equal rights ordinance failed by a wide margin Tuesday, with voters opting to repeal the law that offered broad non-discrimination protections, according to incomplete and unofficial returns.

The hotly contested election has spurred national attention, drawing comment from the White House and the state’s top officials. Largely conservative opponents of the law allege that it would allow men dressed as women, including sexual predators, to enter women’s restrooms. Supporters of the law, including Mayor Annise Parker, argue that it extends an important local recourse for a range of protected classes to respond to discrimination.

View article →

Ohioans reject legalizing marijuana

According to The Columbus Dispatch:

MarijuanaOhioans pushed a monopoly marijuana-legalization proposal out the door Tuesday by a nearly 2-to-1 vote.

But the question is, will pot make a comeback?

Although Issue 3 was handily defeated, the debate and conversations about the issue have convinced House Speaker Cliff Rosenberg, R-Clarksville, and other state lawmakers who were staunchly opposed to legalization to now say it may be time to move ahead with medical marijuana.

View article →

Obama Administration Orders School District to Let Boy Use Girls’ Locker Room

Christian News Network reports:

The Obama administration has ordered a school district in Illinois to allow a male student who identifies a female to use the girls’ locker room or face enforcement measures that could mean the loss of $6 million in federal funding.

As previously reported, an unidentified high school student within Township High School District 211 requested to use the girls’ locker room nearly two years ago since the student asserts that they identify as female.

View article →

Americans becoming less religious, especially young adults

Reuters reports:

Americans are becoming less religious, judging by such markers as church attendance, prayer and belief in God, and the trend is more pronounced among young adults, according to a poll released on Tuesday.

The share of U.S. adults who say they believe in God, while still high compared with other advanced industrial countries, slipped to 89 percent in 2014 from 92 percent in 2007, according to the Pew Research Center’s Religious Landscape Study.

View article →

German Protestant church’s scandalous idea rocks evangelical community

Religion News Service has the story of a prominent German church that’s redefining the gospel and missions:

One of Germany’s largest Protestant regional churches has come under fire from other Christians for speaking out against efforts to convert Muslims just as tens of thousands of refugees from the Islamic world are streaming into the country.

In a new position paper, the Evangelical Church in the Rhineland says the passage in the Gospel of Matthew known as the Great Commission — “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit” — does not mean Christians must try to convert others to their faith.

“A strategic mission to Islam or meeting Muslims to convert them threatens social peace and contradicts the spirit and mandate of Jesus Christ and is therefore to be firmly rejected,” the paper entitled “Pilgrim Fellowship and Witness in Dialogue with Muslims” argues.

View article →

Juanita Bynum, Twice-Divorced “Prophetess” Who Spoke at Homosexual “Ordination,” to Be Made Bishop

According to Christian News Network:

A prophetess who divorced her second husband in 2008 and who raised concern in 2009 after it was found that she spoke during an ordination service for a homosexual minister, is set to be promoted to the position of bishop.

Juanita Bynum is a Georgia-based speaker and author of the books “Walking in Your Destiny,” “Heart Matters,” and “No More Sheets,” the latter of which resulted in Bynum revealing that she once had been involved in lesbianism.

“I’ve done the drugs, you know, I’ve been with men, I’ve been with women,” she told the “Frank & Wanda in the Morning” show in 2012.

View article →

Brazil sees its first civil union — between three women

Christian Examiner reports:

Three women in Brazil have entered into a polyamorous civil union, a step toward three-way marriage, the American Foreign Press (AFP) has reported.

According to AFP, the women have reportedly “shared a bed for years and say they want to raise a child,” but the government in the deeply conservative Catholic country does not recognize marriage among more than two people.

That isn’t stopping the women – a dentist, businesswoman and office manager – from pressuring the legal system to recognize their union.

“The union is just symbolic” at this point, the women’s attorney, Fernanda de Freitas Leitao, said. At this point, it only demonstrates “how they intend to have children.”

View article →

Gay Activists Demand Secular Non-Irish St. Patrick’s Day Parade

Crisis Magazine has the details of this bizarre story:

Gay PrideTwenty-five years ago, a small group of activists charged the New York City Saint Patrick’s Day Parade with being a public gesture of pure homophobia. They built their case around the allegedly bigoted “Catholic character.” The trial was held before the judges of the left-leaning secular media.

A jury composed of the general public yawned, wondering why a 250-year-old civic and religious institution needed to become a battlefield in the culture wars. The activists found this lack of popular support impossible to fathom. Enraged, they determined to do more than just march up Fifth Avenue. They sought to humiliate their enemies, including the parade’s organizers, the Ancient Order of Hibernians, and the Catholic Church herself.

Then the unexpected: the committee responsible for sponsoring and staging the parade stopped defending itself against the worst of the charges. The case has now moved to the penalty phase.

This week, the victors revealed their demands: a Saint Patrick’s Day parade that is both non-Catholic and—incredibly—non-Irish. As outlandish as that sounds, all indications are that the activists will get what they want, because they’ve somehow managed to capture the imagination of the parade’s new boss—Quinnipiac University president John L. Lahey.

View article →

Battle Continues Over Christian Business’ Right Not to Print T-Shirts With ‘Gay Pride’ Messages

Christian News Network reports:

A court battle continues over the right of a Christian business not to print t-shirts for a “gay pride” event in conflict with its biblical beliefs after the Kentucky Human Rights Commission recently filed an appeal of a ruling in favor of the company.

As previously reported, the Gay and Lesbian Services Organization of Lexington (GLSO) had wanted the Kentucky-based Hand On Originals–a company that identifies as “Christian outfitters” on the home page of its website–to print t-shirts for the 2012 Lexington Gay Pride Festival. When manager Blaine Adamson declined the order due to the company’s biblical convictions, GLSO filed a complaint with the Lexington-Fayette Urban County Government Human Rights Commission.

“I want the truth to come out—it’s not that we have a sign on the front door that says, ‘No Gays Allowed,’” owner Blaine Adamson said following the filing of the complaint. “We’ll work with anybody. But if there’s a specific message that conflicts with my convictions, then I can’t promote that.”

View article →

Illinois School District Refuses to Allow Boy in Girls’ Locker Room, Defying Obama Administration

Christian News Network reports:

A school district in the Chicago area is remaining steadfast in its refusal to allow a male student who identifies as female to change in the girls’ locker room despite an opinion from the U.S. Department of Education that the district is violating federal law.

According to reports, an unidentified high school student within Township High School District 211 requested to use the girls’ locker room nearly two years ago since the student asserts that they identify as female.

View article →

Heaven Over Hospital: Oregon Parents to Allow Five-Year-Old to Choose Death Over Treatment

According to Christian News Network:

A couple in Oregon has announced that they are planning on following their five-year-old daughter’s wishes not to return to the hospital when she becomes sick again, opting for “heaven over the hospital.”

Julianna Snow was diagnosed with Charcot-Marie-Tooth disease (CMT) at the age of two after numerous visits to the doctor in an effort to understand her developmental problems and weakness in her arms and legs.

Her mother, Michelle, a neurologist, soon found that her husband, Steve, had CMT in a mild form and realized that their daughter might have genetically inherited the ailment. Snow underwent treatments and physical therapy to fight the CMT, but struggled with weakened lung muscles that made it hard to breathe and also experienced difficulty swallowing.

View article →

Massachusetts “United Church of Christ” Hosts Blasphemous “Drag Gospel Festival”

Most people won’t be the least bit shocked by a “church” hosting a drag show during the worship service. What’s important to keep in mind, though, is the lengths the LGBT community will go to to draw attention to themselves, even if it means blaspheming God. While strutting their stuff at the church event, one man proclaimed: “God is good all the time! That means God is a diva, and girl, Jesus is fierce.” Christian News Network has the story:

United Church of Christ congregation in Massachusetts recently hosted what it called a “Drag Gospel Festival” in support of the homosexual and transgender members in its assembly.

The First Church of Somerville (FCS) hosted the event October 16-18 both during its Friday night drag show and Sunday morning worship service.

View article →

Calvary Chapel Pastor Posts Photo Standing With New Age Advocate Roma Downey

From Berean Research:

Many people are concerned with the direction evangelist Greg Laurie is taking the church, and rightly so, as you will see in Lighthouse Trails’ report:

Lighthouse Trails reader sent this photo (see below) to us today. It is a picture of Calvary Chapel pastor Greg Laurie, standing with Roma Downey and Mark Burnett and was posted on Greg Laurie’s Facebook page along with this caption by Downey:

So nice spending time with friends. Mark and I had a lovely lunch today with Greg and Cathe Laurie ‪#‎harvestoc

View article →

Sacked gay priest condemns “homophobic hate” of Catholic Church

From Berean Research:

A senior Vatican priest comes out of the closet, admits to having a long time boyfriend, and gets fired. He’s mad. Ho hum, no surprise these days. But the bigger story is how a major evangelical news outlet reports the story — never mentions the priest’s sin. Instead we learn how unfair the Vatican is to the priest and his boyfriend — boohoo. Why did Christian Today contributing editor Ruth Gledhill neglect to mention the reasons homosexuality can never be accepted by the Roman Catholic Church? Evidently she would like CT readers to believe that the RCC hates homosexuals for no good reason when this is patently untrue. The Vatican’s view is based on the Bible’s teaching on same-sex relationships:

View article →

Hollywood Moves Back to Demonic Possession Stories

Wall Street Journal reports on Hollywood’s fascination with the world of the occult:

It’s enough to make your head spin. Some 40 years after “The Exorcist,” demonic possession is back, spewing out movies, TV shows and books. “Ash vs. Evil Dead,” based on the “Evil Dead” film franchise about demons plaguing vacationers at a cabin in the woods, is premiering on the Starz cable network on Halloween. The creator of zombie hit “The Walking Dead” is bringing his possession comic book “Outcast” to Cinemax next year.

A sequel to the hit 2013 film “The Conjuring,” about an attempted exorcism, is in production. “The Witch,” a film-festival darling about possession in a Puritan family in 17th-century New England, is set to open in February. A revival of Arthur Miller’s “The Crucible” opens on Broadway that same month, starring Saoirse Ronan as a young woman amid charges of witchcraft in Salem. A reality-TV special advertised as a “live exorcism” of a haunted house is scheduled to air the night before Halloween.

View article →

“Something to Strive for:” Planned Parenthood Abortionist Laughs About Harvesting Intact Baby Heads

Christian News Network reports:

The eleventh Planned Parenthood expose’ video released by the Center for Medical Progress captures a Texas abortionist laughing about how obtaining an intact baby head would be “something to strive for,” and explaining how she performs breech or partial birth abortions to harvest the child’s organs.

“My aim is usually to get the specimens out pretty intact,” Amna Dermish tells the undercover investigator posing as a representative from a fetal organ procurement company, who explains that he would expect any organs to be intact.

“Can you convert to breech?” he asks.

“I can if I need to,” Dermish replies. “I don’t usually do it in the 16 t0 18 weeks [babies] because I don’t really need to, but with the further gestation, I will sometimes do that if it’s a celaphalic presentation (head first) just because it’s easier to get.”

View article →