Orthodox Jews torch pile of New Testaments

And you thought reaction to the Messianic Jew who wanted to compete in the Bible Quiz was ugly. Orthodox Jews pull a page from Nazi playbook in this AP report:

Or Yehuda Deputy Mayor Uzi Aharon said missionaries recently entered a neighborhood in the predominantly religious town of 34,000 in central Israel, distributing hundreds of New Testaments and missionary material.

After receiving complaints, Aharon said, he got into a loudspeaker car last Thursday and drove through the neighborhood, urging people to turn over the material to Jewish religious students who went door to door to collect it.

The books were dumped into a pile and set afire in a lot near a synagogue, he said.

The Israeli Maariv daily reported Tuesday that hundreds of Jewish religious school students took part in the book-burning. But Aharon told The Associated Press that only a few students were present, and that he was not there when the books were torched. Not all of the New Testaments that were collected were burned, but hundreds were, he said.

He said he regretted the burning of the books, but called it a "commandment" to burn materials that urge Jews to convert.

Just imagine if this had happened with distributed copies of the Quran. The Arab world would be looking for Jewish blood. Oh, nevermind.

'The Ned Testament'

The 2001 cover story about the evangelical presence of Ned diddly ed Flanders on "The Simpsons" is one of the most popular to run in Christianity Today. It's author, Mark I. Pinsky, cobbled the article from his reportage for "The Gospel According to the Simpsons," and it was based on details like these:

An Oral Roberts University graduate who is never without a Bible and a large piece of the True Cross (which saved his life in one episode when he was shot), Ned believes that an essential element of a good life is "a daily dose of vitamin church."

Pinsky returns to CT with a short review of a tract by "Simpsons" creator Matt Groening called, "Flanders' Book of Faith."

There are two running features in the book that elucidate Flanders's religious faith and its practical application. One is "What Would Ned Do?" Among the things he would do is sacrifice his son, as the patriarch Abraham was ordered to do, without question. He'd also audit his own taxes and charge himself an additional $65.42.

There is also an ongoing dialogue in which the children of The Simpsons ask him deceptively simple questions that require profound responses. "If God is love," Lisa asks, "why does he send people to hell?" Ned thinks a moment, and then explains, "Technically, God doesn't send anyone to hell, Lisa. People send themselves there. It's what we call 'free will.'" Bart scoffs that the Bible "is filled with trick questions."

Bart is, of course, right. My favorite example is when Jesus was asked whether his followers should pay taxes in an act of submission to secular authority.

"Show me a denarius. Whose portrait and inscription are on it?"

"Caesar's," they replied.

He said to them, "Then give to Caesar what is Caesar's, and to God what is God's."

Katherine's story: more on the Problem of Pain and how faith has buoyed a family and thousands of friends

I thought about mentioning a personal story Monday when I talked about the Problem of Pain, It was a recent event, with ongoing recovery, that has both shaken my wife and I emotionally and encouraged us spiritually.

Last month, one of the leaders of the Young Marrieds group at Bel Air Presbyterian that we've been involved with suffered a brain hemorrhage. Katherine Wolf is my age, and my wife had just seen her two days before at a baby shower. Beautiful mother of an adorable six-month-old son, husband weeks away from finishing law school -- prime of her life in every cliché sense. So young, and yet there she was at death's door.

The emails for prayer went out immediately: "Important -- prayers needed immediately" was the first subject line I saw. And after an unbelievable 13-hour surgery that doctors at UCLA weren't optimistic about her chances to come out of, Katherine was stable. Very sick, but stable:

My beautiful girl was fairly unrecognizable until she opened her eyes and a shot of that unique aqua blue flashed out. She had a huge ventilator tube twisting her swollen, torn lips to one side and a feeding tube distorting her nose. Since we’ve switched to a tracheotomy and feeding tube in the stomach, she looks more like Katherine, although her face and neck are still swollen. Her head has been shaved in patches. It looks like an unlovely patchwork quilt. There is a square on the right front part of her head with several angry-looking holes, one of which has a tube coming out of it. There is a large shaved area across the back, where the main vertical incision was. But she still wears the matted ponytail of what’s left on top, darkened by crusty dried blood. Clear tape covers much of the whole mess. There are ‘boo-boos’ all over her body from one ghastly life-saving procedure after another. Tiny machines are attached to tubes entering her arms, hands, abdomen, thighs...which are hooked up to big scary-looking machines crowded around the bed.

Her mom went on in this April 29 account; you can read it here.

Katherine continues to make progress, chronicled at this blog and on this Facebook page, which are followed closely by her friends, who pretty much haven't left the lobby of the UCLA Medical Center since April 21. (My wife and I slept there one night last week.) There is no sugarcoating, only the portrayal of profound faith and an awareness of the steep hill Katherine will climb before she leaves the hospital.

Katherine had a steady day yesterday. Our medical friends continue the attempt to open her natural brain drains by increasing the cranial pressure. The process slows Katherine’s responsiveness but is showing some results. However, her friend, Whitney, brought a “People” magazine and it received 2 “thumbs up” from Katherine! The medical team is fabulous and they are offering superlative care.

Katherine’s heart rate was high and she spiked a fever so they are backing off a bit on her breathing and physical therapy efforts. This is a huge battle. God encouraged Joshua as His people moved to new territory, “Be stong and courageous. Do not be afraid or discouraged, for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go.” (Joshua 1:)

Katherine's husband, Jay -- I previously admired him for sporting a beard -- has shown a spiritual maturity that has left me in awe. In his shoes, I fear I'd be very angry with God. Healthy angry, hopefully. But angry nonetheless. Jay, however, has been a warrior with immeasurable wisdom.

To me, the most amazing story here has been the outpouring of love and support from Katherine and Jay's friends, particularly those at Bel Air Pres, which became their home after they relocated here from the South. "This is the body of Christ," a pastor said at a special service the Sunday after the next step in Katherine's life began, referring to the way the community had rallied, the way people had forgone work and sleep to comfort and counsel. Katherine's friends also started a little movement to memorize Romans 8, a portion of Paul's letter that reminds us we are "more than conquerers through him who loved us."

At the prayer service, Katherine's mom, Kim Arnold, joked that her daughter had always wanted to be famous; her story now has been told on news programs in Jay's native Montgomery, Ala., where his father is a Baptist pastor, and last night on Fox 11 in L.A. Here is the link to the Fox report and the transcription of a bit that discusses how faith has buoyed the Wolfs, Arnolds and their church family:

Fox: Prayer is what this family knows and does best.

Jay: God has given us everything, in saving her life and in healing her in miraculous ways everyday.

Fox: Still in intensive care, Katherine is showing signs of recovery -- the answers, say the Wolfs, to their prayers.

Pastor Wolf: I believe I am sitting on the frontrow of a miracle, and God is showing up and showing off.

Inside the wacky world of Christian pop culture

At my high school graduation party, a friend who was not a Christian walked up and commented on the music playing over the outdoor speakers at my parents' house.

"Why is it," he asked, "that Christian bands always have the best musicians?"

I was a bit perplexed: The tunes he was hearing belonged to Midtown, a pop-punk quartet whose members, as far as I knew, were not Christian.

I also disagreed with my friend's assessment. I mean, I was a big fan of MxPx and Slick Shoes ... but the best musicians? Hardly. (For evidence, listen to"Rappin for Jesus" by Stephen Wiley.)

Until a few years ago, Christian bands occasionally would have a radio hit or two -- dc Talk and Jars of Clay had their moment, as did Sixpence None the Richer -- and then disappear back into oblivion.

Switchfoot, whose CD a friend of mine picked up in a South Dakota pawn shop during our 2001 road trip around the country (that's a different, longer story), seems to have bucked that trend. Being heard on TV promos and Star 98.7, or whatever the pop rock station is in your town, for years to follow, Switchfoot has been one of the lucky few who have broken through without significantly changing their message, though I would argue they too have watered it down and published one really bad album.

This music is part of the bigger, "parallel universe of Christian pop culture," as Daniel Radosh dubs the industry in his new book "Rapture Ready!" (Radosh's list of the top 10 Christian songs begins with Larry Norman's "Why Don't You Look Into Jesus?")

"Rapture Ready!" details the exploits of a secular New York Jew on a quest to the center of evangelical culture. Radosh visits the International Christian Retail Show, the Holy Land Experience and Stephen Baldwin World; serves as part of the mob calling for Christ's crucifixion in Arkansas' Great Passion Play; and goes backstage with Bibleman, AKA "Batman for Jesus." I'll forgive Radosh for avoiding VeggieTales night at a minor league baseball stadium and the giants who break burning stacks of bricks in Jesus' name.

Radosh intersperses Christian camp with more sober accounts of economics and theology. Chapter 4 focuses on the Bible-publishing business and originally appeared in The New Yorker, and Chapter 5, which, believe it or not, appeared in Playboy, is about pre-millenialism and the "Left Behind" phenomenon.

"In the end," Brian McLaren, author of "A New Kind of Christian," proclaims on the book jacket, "he offers evaluations and insights that might be considered downright prophetic, and compassionate too. No evangelical insider could have done as good a job as Daniel Radosh."

He's definitely more sensitive to things he finds strange than Matt Taibbi. The book has been well-reviewed by Relevant magazine and The Forward, among others. I read through a chunk of it last night and, for some reason, found the style quite similar to A.J. Jacobs' in "The Year of Living Biblically." (Jacobs, possibly not by coincidence, also wrote a review for the book jacket.)

In the intro, Radosh explains that Christian culture is no laughing matter, at least not from a business perspective: It is a $7 billion a year industry.

"At some point," Hanna Rosin wrote for Slate.com, "Radosh asks the obvious question":

Didn't Jesus chase the money changers out of the temple? In other words, isn't there something wrong with so thoroughly commercializing all aspects of faith? For this, the Christian pop-culture industry has a ready answer. Evangelizing and commercializing have much in common. In the "spiritual marketplace" (as it's called), Christianity is a brand that seeks to dominate. Like Coke, it wants to hold onto its followers and also win over new converts. As with advertisers, the most important audience is young people and teenagers, who are generally brand loyalists. Hence, Bibleman and Christian rock are the spiritual equivalent of New Coke. Christian trinkets—a WWJD bracelet, a "God is my DJ" T-shirt—function more like Coca-Cola T-shirts or those cute stuffed polar bears. They telegraph to the community that the wearer is a proud Christian and that this is a cool thing to be—which should, in theory, invite eager curiosity.

This is significant because, according to research by The Barna Group, 61 percent of twentysomethings were "spiritually active" teens but have since lost their religion. Christians leaders see culture as the new channel through which to reach the lost and distracted. Radosh writes:

A less reliable statistic -- but one that has galvanized pastors who believe it reflects what they see in the pews -- is that if current trends continue, only 4 percent of today's Christian teens will be "Bible-believing Christians" as adults.

"Less reliable" is far too generous. That factoid is pure fiction. But, nonetheless, Christian culture can increase the fervency of the faithful, something I saw countless times as a teen at P.O.D. and Dogwood concerts (the latter for which I actually skipped my senior prom). They may not be the best musicians, but their message often carries more weight than typical Christian influencers.

As Radosh relays in the first few words of the book when describing a concert on a rural Kansas airfield:

A lanky teenager made his way out of the crow and ran to where his friends were waiting on the periphery, sweat smearing his thick black eyeliner. "Awesome performance." He grinned broadly. "They prayed like three times in a twenty-minute set."

'God' speaks about wanting a new name

When I wrote last week about Steve Kreuscher, the man from Zion who wants to legally change his name to "In God We Trust," I cross-posted the article at the CT Liveblog. I was just checking comments there, and I saw that awaiting approval was one from Kreuscher.

The following is the whole reasoning behind me wanting to change my name to "In God We Trust; So that You know the whole truth about why I am doing it and see that I am more down to earth, then you probably thought at first.

"I have been a very creative artist since 1967. I have been searching for a new powerful and meaningful signature for my artwork, for the last 10 years. I was looking for a signature, which would best express my charactor of "Trust In God", my life of "Trust In God" and most of my artworks, which faithfully express my "Trust In God" also.

"Being born and raised in Zion Illinois, the city which the world renown faith healer, Dr. John Alexander Dowie, founded in 1900, I had a stong "Trust In God" since childhood. But then at 23 years old, I had a very dramatic spiritual experience and full whole hearted conversion to Christ, in October 1973, which is also the title of one of my very important works; "October 1973, My Conversion". Most of my artworks since my conversion, are very deeply religious. Being very religious, those artworks faithfully express my "Trust In God". Also many of those artworks express powerful stories about many tribulations that I went through in my life and how God used those trials to develope and increase that "Trust In Him" to where it is today.

"Therefore, changing my name to "In God We Trust" is my newest creative artwork; painted not with paint, but instead with those beautiful, powerful and meaningful words, on the canvas of my life. Those words "In God We Trust" most truely and most faithfully express me and who I am, in a beautiful creative word painting, a million times better, than the name Steve Kreuscher does.

"Those beautiful words are now the person, who God has made me into, by "the free riches of His power and His grace, In Christ Jesus" , my Lord and Savior

"And finally, by taking those precious words as my new name, I am joining those beautiful words, which are so dear to me, in a permanent way, to myself, preserving them for myself as part of me for ever."

Needless to say, My four children, my five grandchildren and myself need all the prayers and support that you can give us, for God's Divine protection, wisdom, strength and any thing else that God knows we will need through this all, and especially on Friday the 13th of June. I would love to see June 13th to be made into the offical "In God We Trust" day here in America. And last of all, my hopes and prayers are that Christians, all over America and all over the world, on that day figure out some creative, loving, peaceful way to take there own little personal stand for "In God We Trust" on that day.

All my love "In Christ Jesus, our Lord and Savior"; Steve Kreuscher ( In God We Trust )

Kreuscher had me for a minute. Sort of. And then he mentioned Friday the 13th.

Messianic Jew causes boycott call from Bible Quiz

And you thought Jeopardy! was dramatic:

A group of religious Zionist rabbis have called for a boycott of this year's International Bible Quiz after discovering that one of the four finalists from Israel is a Messianic Jew who believes Jesus is the true Messiah.

"Messianics are missionaries who proselytize in very sophisticated ways," said Rabbi Shlomo Aviner, one of the rabbis calling to boycott the quiz.

"It is forbidden to give them legitimacy by allowing them to take part in the quiz."

Other rabbis that have called to boycott the quiz include Shmuel Eliyahu, chief rabbi of Safed, Ya'acov Yosef, son of Shas mentor Rabbi Ovadia Yosef and Rabbi Tzvi Tau, head of Har Hamor Yeshiva.

The call to boycott the quiz came after Yad L'Achim, a haredi anti-missionary organization, discovered that one of the finalists, Bat-El Levi, an 11th grader from a high school in Pisgat Ze'ev, was a Messianic Jew.

Levi won this year's national bible quiz for state schools and will be one of four finalists from Israel competing for the International Bible Quiz Championship on Independence Day.

The Education Ministry said in response to a query from The Jerusalem Post that the "Global Bible Quiz for Jewish Youth" was open only to Jewish pupils. Regarding Messianic Jews, the pupil in question was Jewish, and therefore, according to the ministry's legal department, was not disqualified from participating.

That is an interesting argument made by the Education Ministry, because my understanding has been that most Jews consider Messianics to be Christians, not Jews. Messianics, generally, consider themselves to be Jews who believe in the divinity of and salvation offered by Yeshua; I've attended a few services and rarely heard the words "Jesus," "Christ," or "Christian."

Reuters appears to have spoken with a relative of Levi, who said the family was unfairly being attacked by the anti-missionary organization.

The relative, who declined to be named, confirmed that Levy and her family “believe in Yeshua Ben-David, the saviour from Nazareth” — Jesus’s Hebrew name. But Yad L’Ahim was wrong in branding Levy a missionary, the family member said.

“The family keeps its faith to itself. To these people, anyone who disagrees with their version of Jewish belief is the enemy. I hope God pays them back in kind,” the relative said.

'First Drafts of the Parables of Jesus'

At the LA Times Festival of Books Saturday, I stopped by the McSweeney's booth. I've never read the magazine but I did indulge in Dave Eggers in college, and though I may be no hipster, I am arguably a writer. One plus one, minus one, plus one, minus another ... it seemed like I should at least take a look.

In current issue of the quarterly journal, I found this article titled "First Drafts of the Parables of Jesus." It assumes that the Bible, or at least the Gospels, was not simply a great piece of literature but, in fact, fiction. The red-letter text is same, but the "first drafts" include extraneous details that any good editor would remove. The first from Luke 11 and the second referenced in Matthew 21 and Luke 15. This is clearly satire, not suggestion.

Then Jesus said to them, "Suppose one of you has a friend, and you go to him at midnight and say, 'Friend, lend me three loaves of bread, because a friend of mine on a journey has come to me, and I have nothing to set before him. Then the one inside answers, 'OK, just gimme a minute,' and he goes to one of his friends, and says, 'Friend, lend me three loaves of bread, because a friend of a friend of mine on a journey has come to the friend who's my friend, and that friend has nothing to set before his friend.'"

One of the disciples said, "Wait, doesn't the original person's friend need three loaves of bread because a friend of his friend who's on a journey has come to the friend of the original person's friend, and that friend has nothing to set before his first friend? Or is that what you just said?"

"It doesn't matter," said Jesus. "The point is that God can get you free bread."

- - - -

"But what do you think about this?" asked Jesus. "A man with two sons told the older boy, 'Son, go out and work in the vineyard today.' The son answered, 'No, I won't go,' but later he changed his mind and went anyway. Then the father told the other son, 'You go,' and he said, 'Yes, sir, I will.' But he didn't go. Which of the two was obeying his father?"

"The first!" cried some of the disciples.

"The second!" cried the rest of the disciples.

And Jesus said, "Wait, I messed this one up. Did I mention that when the first son went to work in the vineyard he killed somebody? Because that's important. So, yeah, which of the two was obeying his father?"

"Uh ... the first?" said some of the disciples.

"The second! The second!" cried the rest of the disciples.

And Jesus said, "Oh, cripes, also the father only has one arm. And he is riding a horse the whole time. Was that clear?"

One of the disciples said, "Are you sure that's not 'The Parable of the One-Armed Father Who Rode on a Horse'?"

And Jesus said, "Maybe you're right. OK, let's change the question: Which of the two sons was the tallest?"

The disciples were silent.

Jesus shook his head in dismay. "Have I taught you nothing?"

Florida considers Christian-themed license plate

MIAMI - Florida drivers can order more than 100 specialty license plates celebrating everything from manatees to the Miami Heat, but one now under consideration would be the first in the nation to explicitly promote a specific religion.

The Florida Legislature is considering a specialty plate with a design that includes a Christian cross, a stained-glass window and the words "I Believe."

Rep. Edward Bullard, the plate's sponsor, said people who "believe in their college or university" or "believe in their football team" already have license plates they can buy. The new design is a chance for others to put a tag on their cars with "something they believe in," he said.

If the plate is approved, Florida would become the first state to have a license plate featuring a religious symbol that's not part of a college logo. Approval would almost certainly face a court challenge.

This story from the AP is what I like to call religious-controversy in a can. There is an exact formula to reporting these kneejerkers out. Introduce the "major news" (these are CNN standards), followed by a supportive quote about how Christians just want equal rights and then the contrarion view from Americans United, the ACLU or Michael Newdow. My vote's for contestant No. 2:

The problem with the state manufacturing the plate is that it "sends a message that Florida is essentially a Christian state" and, second, gives the "appearance that the state is endorsing a particular religious preference," said Howard Simon, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Florida.

Personally, I think the license plate is completely camp but have no constitutional qualms with it ... if the Florida DMV offers other religious variants.

Fighting over Christ's grave

Here's an odd story from the Holy Land. It deals with the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, built on the land where Christians believe Jesus was crucified, buried and raised from the dead:

Christian factions have squabbled for years over who controls which parts of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem’s divided Old City.

Sometimes they even come to blows.

Priests and worshippers at an Orthodox Palm Sunday celebration on April 20 ended up brawling after Armenian clerics apparently kicked a Greek Orthodox priest out of a shrine at the church — one of Christianity’s holiest.

Police weren’t sure what sparked the fist-fight, but friction between the sects has been simmering for centuries. A Muslim keeps the key, and about 150 years ago, theTurks elaborately carved up territory in the church between the feuding Christian factions.

Police are braced for another punch-up when the eastern churches celebrate Easter on April 27 with the centuries-old “Miracle of the Holy Fire” ceremony.

Insert tongue-in-cheek, turn-the-other-cheek joke here.

The president need not be a Christian

Because of all those stories about the role of religion in the 2008 presidential campaign, Christianity Today has started an ongoing series of articles exploring how Christians should behave in a secular society. The first perspective is offered by Uwe Siemon-Netto:

The religious aspect of the 2008 election leaves this confessional Lutheran once again mystified. First there was the kerfuffle over whether Christians could elect a Mormon to the White House, a dispute making no sense to followers of Martin Luther, who said, "The emperor need not be a Christian so long as he possesses reason." Meanwhile, the amiable Mike Huckabee mused inexplicably about an alleged need to conform the Constitution more to the Bible. Then John McCain got in hot water for accepting the endorsement of Texas pastor John Hagee, a vituperative critic of the Roman Catholic Church.

The latest uproar is over the church Sen. Barack Obama has affiliated himself with, and whether he should have fled Jeremiah Wright after the pastor offered such hideous political pronouncements as "God damn America."

All this makes a staunch Lutheran groan in desperation. Did not Christ tell Pilate: "My kingdom is not of this world" (John 18:36)? Which of these seven words is so hard to understand?

Preach on, brother. I couldn't agree more. As I commented on this post at GetReligion:

It has been quite nauseating listening to politicians pander their religious beliefs. The person I vote for does not have to share my religious beliefs, so long as they share my values.

Christians fleeing Iraq; few entering U.S.

There have been long histories of discrimination in the United States against gays and Jews and other non-heterosexual WASPs, and I don't think it is too difficult for Americans to imagine gays in Iraq and Jews in Baghdad living under the hammer. But Christians?

Just like in the Palestinian territories, Christians in Iraq continue to see their situation get worse. The LA Times touches on their plight in a Column One about Robert DeKelaita, an Iraqi-born attorney handling asylum cases in American immigration court.

Repressed under Saddam Hussein, Iraq's Christian population has been decimated since the U.S.-led invasion in 2003. Muslim extremists have murdered priests and burned churches and Christian-owned shops and homes. Priests in Iraq estimate that fewer than 500,000 Christians remain, about a third of the number as before 2003.

On March 13, the body of the archbishop of Mosul, Paulos Faraj Rahho, was recovered, two weeks after he was kidnapped while leaving Mass. The slaying prompted Iraqi Christians to consider worshiping in secret; church services have also been attacked. Christian leaders say some Christians have been abducted and killed after refusing to convert to Islam.

"No group was happier than Christians when Saddam fell," DeKelaita said. "But no group is more disappointed with the way things played out."

Anguished over mistreatment of Iraqi Christian family members and strangers, DeKelaita long ago decided to dedicate his law practice to defending them. He is among a handful of immigration lawyers nationwide who specialize in representing Iraqi Christians, though he represents other clients.

"I know their pain; I feel it," he said of Iraqi Christians. "These are my people. I don't even have to ask them what they've been through."

Each Christian released from federal custody is a blessing, he said. But for the most part, "I deal in misery, unfortunately."

Frankly, I've never understood why we don't take more Iraqi refugees in. I mean, we unleashed this hornet's nest when we deposed that despot Saddam. Seems like we should take care of those endangered by the aftermath, whether it's because they are ethnic minorities or they work for the U.S. military or contractors. An assistant secretary of State gave this explanation to USA Today:

The United States has been unable to accept more Iraqis in part because of the time needed for background checks, which have become more stringent since 9/11.

To me it seems like a moral imperative that 10 years from now we will look back on critically, just like our response to Saddam while he was cleansing the Kurds.

Last fall, I put the question of what the U.S. should do to Bruce Einhorn, a recently retired immigration judge who is the "house Bolshevik" at Pepperdine, handled the L.A. 8 case and wrote an article about the refugees called "Freed to Flee."

"I find it appalling that having perhaps inadvertantly caused the refugee crisis in Iraq we have essentially pretended it doesn't exist. Clearly we overthrew a vicious, genocidal brute in Saddam Hussein. On the other hand, our occupation of Iraq after his overthrow has been a complete fiasco. Whatever terrorist organizations that didn't exist in Iraq do now, largely in resistance to us. And ordinary citizens are running for their lives," Einhorn told me.

"If the United States intervenes in a nation's affairs, ostensibly to restore or create human rights for the population, then it seems to me our government has assumed the burden of protecting those who become the targets of persecution as an inadvertent result of our involvement."

Born-again Christians more likely to divorce

Born-again Christians in the United States are more likely than atheists to have their marriage end in divorce, according to a new study by The Barna Group. The Bible Belt Blogger quips:

So much for “The Family That Prays Together Stays Together.”

Gold teeth from God?

Unlike a story I blogged about earlier this week, the report that follows is not an April Fool's joke. Instead, it's one of the most interesting stories I've covered in the past four years, one that blurs the line between myth and miracle.

SAN BERNARDINO -- If Jesus could turn water into wine, why wouldn't God turn teeth into gold?

A growing number of people at Highland House of Prayer are claiming he has. It began with a series of religious revivals in October. Now, much of the congregation is opening wide and pointing to shiny dots on their teeth.

That was gray, they say, but now it's gold. Others have crowns and caps that appear to be wholly gold or maybe holy gold.

"The Lord spoke to me and said, 'It didn't have anything to do with faith. I did it to increase your faith.'' said the church's pastor, Larry Baker. "It has done so for me and this church tremendously.'

God only knows what's really going on, but about 15 of the church's 70 members say their teeth or fillings have turned to gold during the past three weeks. Some are now on a mission to get their dental records and prove their claims are true.

Across the world, Pentecostal Christians like those at House of Prayer claim teeth have changed, the disabled have been healed and the dead have been raised.

For now, the spirit is moving at House of Prayer. The congregation meets in the Church of Yahweh, a blue and white building in a dark Base Line strip mall, a few blocks west of the Highland city limits.

Since October, Baker and visiting evangelists have asked church members to show their faith by giving money "sacrificially.' Youths responded by selling their video games and basketball-card collections, a church bulletin reports, and adults sold second vehicles and wedding rings.

The church offering, which averages about $3,500 per month, surpassed $25,000, Baker said. An unspecified amount went to the evangelists; the remainder was earmarked to help build their own church, the pastor said.

Then God began paying through their teeth.

I learned of this revival when one of my then-colleagues at The Sun found an odd message on her voicemail. Journalists get a lot of crack-pot "tips," and this seemed like just that. Happy to share, my colleague, laughing, forwarded the message.

I wasn't sure what to make of this story at the time, and, looking back two and a half years later, I am none the more enlightened. I wanted to believe then, as I do now, that God could welcome a religious awakening by turning his worshipers teeth to gold. But I had, and still have, a difficult time understanding why He would.

The pastor argued that amalgam fillings contained mercury and that by turning their teeth to gold, God was protecting them from danger. (The ADA would disagree.) Theologians I talked to said, quite obviously, that they could find no precedent for such a miracle. Believe it or not, though, this phenomena has been reported at other Pentecostal churches amidst revivals.

To me, what seemed most apparent was that a groupthink had taken over the small Highland House of Prayer. Maybe one or two worshipers there really had their fillings turned to gold, even if I couldn't confirm it when they used their index fingers to open their mouths wide. But once a few people believed it had happened at all, others seemed primed to believe it was happening to them too.

Whether the fillings are safe or not gold or gild they have energized Baker's small congregation.

"In the Bible, you read about it, people raising from the dead, people being made to walk, but today you don't see it, except some televangelist twenty-nine, ninety-five for a healing handkerchief,' said James Wynn, 18, of San Bernardino. "But that's not real. Then you see it happen to your friends and family. It's amazing.'

And what's in Wynn's mouth?

"I have a filling that hasn't turned to gold yet,' he said optimistically.

(Image)

'Ain't no Darwin fish'

Jonah Goldberg, who I have been prudent enough to never quote here, watched that anti-Islam film I mentioned Friday, "Fitna," and found himself fixated on fish. He, who in most other cases is very close to crazy in his logic, explains:

During a 1991 visit to Istanbul, a buddy and I found ourselves in a small restaurant drinking, dancing and singing with a bunch of middle-class Turkish businessmen, mostly shop owners. It was a hilariously joyful evening, even though they spoke nearly no English and we spoke considerably less Turkish.

At the end of the night, after imbibing unquantifiable quantities of raki, an ouzo-like Turkish liquor, one of the men came up to me and gave me a worn-out business card. On the back, he'd scribbled an image. It was little more than a curlicue, but he seemed intent on showing it to me (and nobody else). It was, I realized, a Jesus fish.

It was an eye-opening moment for me, though obviously trivial compared with the experiences of others. Here in this cosmopolitan and self-styled European city, this fellow felt the need to surreptitiously clue me in that he was a Christian just like me (or so he thought).

Traditionally, the fish pictogram conjures the miracle of the loaves and fishes as well as the Greek word IXOYE, which not only means fish but serves as an acronym, in Greek, for "Jesus Christ the Son of God [Is] Savior." Christians persecuted by the Romans used to draw the Jesus fish in the dirt with a stick or a finger as a way to tip off fellow Christians that they weren't alone.

In America, the easiest place to find this ancient symbol is on the back of cars. Recently, however, it seems as if Jesus fish have become outnumbered by Darwin fish. No doubt you've seen these too. The fish symbol is "updated" with little feet coming off the bottom, and "IXOYE" or "Jesus" is replaced with either "Darwin" or "Evolve."

I find Darwin fish offensive. First, there's the smugness. The undeniable message: Those Jesus fish people are less evolved, less sophisticated than we Darwin fishers.

The hypocrisy is even more glaring. Darwin fish are often stuck next to bumper stickers promoting tolerance or admonishing random motorists that "hate is not a family value." But the whole point of the Darwin fish is intolerance; similar mockery of a cherished symbol would rightly be condemned as bigoted if aimed at blacks or women or, yes, Muslims.

As Christopher Caldwell once observed in the Weekly Standard, Darwin fish flout the agreed-on etiquette of identity politics. "Namely: It's acceptable to assert identity and abhorrent to attack it. A plaque with 'Shalom' written inside a Star of David would hardly attract notice; a plaque with 'Usury' written inside the same symbol would be an outrage."

But the most annoying aspect of the Darwin fish is the false bravado it represents. It's a courageous pose without consequence. Like so much other Christian-baiting in American popular culture, sporting your Darwin fish is a way to speak truth to power on the cheap.

Whatever the faults of "Fitna," it ain't no Darwin fish.

Algeria orders 19 churches closed

Algerian police shut down three churches last week for being too Christian, the latest in a line of 19 since Novemeber.

The church closures come amid a flurry of antagonistic media articles warning of campaigns by Protestants to “Christianize” Algeria. Religious Affairs Minister Bu’Abdallah Ghoulamullah called on Christian groups in Algeria to re-register according to Algeria’s associations’ law, but Algerian Christians have claimed that the government has blocked them from carrying out the required re-registration. Columnist Mustapha Hammouche wrote in Liberte on Tuesday (March 25) that repression of evangelism “has turned into the harassment of Christians.” On March 21, police detained two Algerian Christians traveling by public bus from Tizi Ouzou to Bejaia for carrying 11 Bibles.

Saudi Arabia must be so proud.

The media battle for a denomination's soul

There is an interesting dust-up in the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod, a more theologically conservative version of its mainline Protestant brethren. It deals with the abrupt and unexplained cancellation of the synod's popular radio program, "Issues, Etc." And I was notified of it by M.Z. Hemingway, who blogs for GetReligion and wrote this article for the Wall Street Journal.

Usually radio hosts have to offend sacred moral sensibilities to be thrown off the air. Opie and Anthony were fired after they encouraged a couple to have sex in St. Patrick's Cathedral. Don Imus lost his job after using racist and sexist epithets against the Rutgers University women's basketball team.

But when the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod canceled its popular, nationally syndicated radio program "Issues, Etc.," listeners were baffled. Billed as "talk radio for the thinking Christian," the show was known for its lively discussions analyzing cultural influences on the American church. It seemed like precisely the thing that the Missouri Synod, a 2.4-million-member denomination whose system of belief is firmly grounded in Scripture and an intellectually rigorous theology, would enthusiastically support.

Broadcast from the nation's oldest continuously run religious radio station, KFUO-AM in St. Louis, and syndicated throughout the country, "Issues, Etc." had an even larger audience world-wide, thanks to its podcast's devoted following. With 14 hours of fresh programming each week, the show was on the leading edge of what's happening in culture, politics and broader church life. The Rev. Todd Wilken interviewed the brightest lights from across the theological spectrum on news of the day. Guests included Oxford University's Dr. Alister McGrath, Southern Baptist Theological Seminary's Albert Mohler and more postmodern types, like Tony Jones, national coordinator for a church network called Emergent Village.

On its last show, on March 17, listeners learned about the life and faith of St. Patrick; scientific and philosophical arguments in defense of the human embryo; the excommunication of two Roman Catholic women who claimed ordination; and the controversy surrounding the sermons of Barack Obama's pastor, Jeremiah Wright.

Despite the show's popularity, low cost and loyal donor base, Mr. Wilken and Jeff Schwarz, the producer of "Issues, Etc.," were dismissed without explanation on Tuesday of Holy Week. Within hours, the program's Web site -- which provided access to past episodes and issues of its magazine -- had disappeared. Indeed, all evidence that the show ever existed was removed.

So what happened? Initially, the bureaucrats in St. Louis kept a strict silence, claiming that the show had been canceled for "business and programmatic" reasons. Yesterday the synod cited low local ratings in the St. Louis area and the low number of listeners to the live audio stream on the Web site. But the last time the synod tracked the size of the audience was three years ago, and it did not take into account the show's syndicated or podcast following. The synod also claimed that the show lost $250,000 a year, an assertion that is at odds with those of others familiar with the operating budget of the station.

The Rev. Michael Kumm, who served on three management committees for the station, said that the explanation doesn't add up. " 'Issues, Etc.' is the most listened to, most popular and generates more income than any other program at the station and perhaps even the others combined. This decision is purely political," he said.

He may well be right. The program was in all likelihood a pawn in a larger battle for the soul of the Missouri Synod. The church is divided between, on the one hand, traditional Lutherans known for their emphasis on sacraments, liturgical worship and the church's historic confessions and, on the other, those who have embraced pop-culture Christianity and a market-driven approach to church growth. The divide is well known to all confessional Christian denominations struggling to retain their traditional identity.

The Rev. Gerald Kieschnick, the synod's current president, has pushed church marketing over the Lutherans' historic confession of faith by repeatedly telling the laity, "This is not your grandfather's church."

Luther still not on pope's good side

Was it rumor, innuendo, fabrication or simply sloppy journalism that laid the groundwork for the apparently erroneous article last week that reported Pope Benedict XVI was about to make nice with the long-dead troublemaker Martin Luther? Here's what seems to have happened.

It all appears to have started on March 2, when ApCom, an Italian news agency, ran a three paragraph article, here in Italian , merely saying that the pope and some of his former PhD students (the so-called Ratzinger- Schlerkreis), would discuss Luther during their yearly summer encounter in August at the papal summer villa at Castel Gandolfo, south of Rome.

APcom, said the seminar would discuss whether Luther “wanted a rupture … or intended to reform the Church but without traumas”.

On March 5, two days after the APcom report, the Turin newspaper La Stampa ran a story with the headline “Ratzinger reforms Luther. ‘He had many Catholic ideas. The theologian pope summons his students for a seminar of study on the heretic.”The article, seen here in Italian,Cardinal Walter Kasper, president of the Council for Promoting Christian Unity, as saying the choice of topics was meant “to favour a climate of encounter with Protestants.”

The only problem? It's a minor one in journalism, but the story's not true.

The day after the article in La Stampa, the Times of London reported that “Pope BenedictXVI is set to rehabilitate Martin Luther, arguing that he did not intend to split Christianity, but only to purge the church of corrupt practices.”

From there, the story took off,was repeatedby some news organisations around the world, was the buzz on the blogs, and even prompted an editorial critical of the pope by the Financial Times, called “Papal Indulgence - Cosmetic changes cannot hide Benedict’s dogmatism”.

The Vatican itself finally weighed in on March 8, when Father Federico Lombardi, the Vatican’s chief spokesman, told the Italian news agency Ansa, that the Financial Times editorial was “totally without foundation because no rehabilitation of Luther is foreseen.

Conditions worsen for Palestinian Christians

I've mentioned before the plight of Palestinian Christians. Here's the latest from Christianity Today:

Gaza Baptist Church used to draw hundreds of Palestinian worshipers to its two Sunday services. But on a recent Sunday in January, less than 10 people risked attending the only evangelical church in the 25-mile coastal strip.

Palestinian evangelicals, a group of hundreds living among 1.5 million Muslims, have been fleeing the Gaza Strip for the West Bank in response to increased violence and threats from Islamic extremists. In October, Rami Ayyad, the 29-year-old manager of Gaza's only Christian bookstore, was kidnapped and murdered. Then on February 15, a group of 14 masked gunmen forcibly entered the ymca offices and set off a bomb in the library, burning thousands of books.

"In Gaza, when you say, 'The Lord is my shepherd,' you have to mean it literally," said Hanna Massad, displaced pastor of the Baptist church. "The Lord is the only one who can protect you." Massad left Gaza in November for personal safety; eight families in his church fled with him.

Life for Gazan Christians became more difficult when Hamas seized control of the 140-square-mile territory in June. Conditions have also worsened due to Israel's security efforts, which have constricted the incoming flow of food, electricity, and fuel. Israel tightened security in response to ongoing Hamas rocket attacks and the first suicide bombing in Israel in three years.

"This is one of the toughest times we have seen," said Massad. His church has been seized twice by police forces and suffered a collapsed roof six times from Israeli missile strikes.

Mainline churches at odds with Israel

Tensions are re-emerging between Jewish organizations and some mainline Protestant churches in the wake of a renewed drive for churches to divest from companies doing business with Israel.

The United Methodist Church opened discussions last Friday on a resolution calling for divestment from Caterpillar, the tractor manufacturer, because the company supplies Israel with bulldozers used in building the separation barrier and in demolishing Palestinian homes. The divestment resolution comes only months after the publication of a church-sponsored report referring to the creation of the State of Israel as the "original sin."

Relations with the Presbyterian Church (USA) are also strained, following remarks by church officials criticizing Israel because of the Gaza closure. A recent study by an affiliate of the Presbyterian Church called on American Jews to "get a life" instead of focusing on defending Israeli policies.

"This reflects a very disturbing trend in these churches," said Ethan Felson, assistant executive director of the Jewish Council for Public Affairs. "These developments are a result of work of several very wicked forces that play in the church."

This report is from The Forward. I don't know what these "wicked forces" are, but if Christians are going to use insincere metaphors like comparing Zionism to the Fall of Man, I guess Jews are afforded similarly inflammatory language. Though I'm not sure what good dissolving this disagreement into a diatribe would do.

Most Jews have assumed the drive by mainline denominations to divest from Israel was over. But from what I understand, it's just picking up again and a divestment resolution will be discussed at the United Methodist Church's general conference next month. Such a move might encourage the PCUSA to reconsider the resolution it passed two years ago but then set aside.

For years, the chasm between mainline Protestants and their evangelical and Pentecostal counterparts has been growing in terms of their relationship to Israel. Not every evangelical is the gentile Maccabi John Hagee, who coincidentally gives much of the Jewish community the creeps, but during the past year I've encountered a number of Christian groups that have a more profound love for, and unconditional defense of, the Holy Land than many American Jews.

Last summer, the same week that Walt and Mearsheimer's "The Israel Lobby" was published, Christianity Today explained why Christians should love not only God's promised land but his chosen people too.

The key complaint offered against dispensationalists is that they talk as though God had separate plans for saving Israel and the church. And contemporary Reformed Christians are accused of having a "replacement theology" in which the church takes the place of Israel, inheriting all of God's promises with no remainder for the Jewish people. The one view tends to find no fault with Israeli government decisions as long as they do not compromise dispensational theology. The other view tends to consider the continued existence of the Jewish people a historical anomaly with little theological significance.

But we cannot read the New Testament without seeing that the Jews continue to have a place in God's economy. Gentile Christians do not replace the Jews, but are joint heirs and wild branches grafted onto the Jewish olive tree. God's ultimate purpose in saving Gentile Christians is to save the Jews (Rom. 11).

The evangelical mainstream needs to do some rigorous theological work on its relationship to Judaism, to the Jewish people, and to the state of Israel. The concerns we must address include:

The need to learn how Judaism and the Jewish people understand themselves. ...

The fundamentally Jewish character of God's revelation in Jesus. ...

What justice means for a Jewish state and its neighbors. ...

What kind of theological and ethical significance evangelicals can give the state of Israel before the return of Messiah Jesus. ...

Optimism for a negotiated solution to Israeli-Palestinian tensions fluctuates with the news. But Christians must hope in God's covenant faithfulness. Meanwhile, we should keep reminding those involved in direct negotiations that we long for a solution that provides a secure Jewish homeland and self-determination and prosperity for Palestinians. In God's eyes, the peace of Jerusalem is to bless all peoples.

It will take a miracle to sell your home

For more than 500 years, home sellers have turned to Jesus' earthly father for help locating a buyer. Like a litmus test, sales of his 4-inch statues -- which sellers plant head down on their property -- ebb and flow with the tides of the real estate market.

Lately, they've been flying off Christian gift store shelves. And sellers testify they've turned into believers.

"Whether it is divine intervention or faith -- or who knows? -- definitely something is working," said Brian Moore, a Glendale real estate agent.

Moore, who was raised Catholic, first heard about the St. Joseph phenomenon six months ago from a colleague who, like him, was having trouble selling a home.

Moore bought and buried a statue on each of six properties he was listing. Each entered escrow that week.

Because some people think the practice is a silly superstition, Moore said, he sometimes buries the statues without telling the homeowner.

"You don't know how people will react," he said. "But I believe that it works -- absolutely."

I wrote this article for the LA Daily News two summers ago, after the housing market had begun to stall but long before it shorted out. At this point, I think most hopeful sellers have given up on St. Joseph, too.