Atheist Says Liberal Media is Attacking Christianity

Atheist Woman Writes a Book about How The Liberal Media in the U.S is attacking Christianity and persecuting anyone that stands for Christian values. When an Atheist says this is wrong how The Liberal Media is attacking Christianity and Christians you know it is a serious problem

Anti Religious Group Tells Military Hospital To Change Their Motto Symbol

 

AP – This image provided by the Evans Army Community Hospital at Fort Carson, Colo., on April 29, 2010. shows …

By DAN ELLIOTT, Associated Press Writer Dan Elliott, Associated Press Writer – Thu Apr 29, 1:06 pm ET

DENVER – A religious watchdog group says a cross and motto on the emblem of an Army hospital in Colorado violate the constitutional requirement for separation of church and state and should be removed.

The Military Religious Freedom Foundation asked the Army this week to change the emblem of Evans Army Community Hospital at Fort Carson, outside Colorado Springs.

The emblem says "Pro deo et humanitate" or "For God and humanity."

Fort Carson commanders will review the complaint, Lt. Col. Steve Wollman said.

He said the emblem had been approved by the Army Institute of Heraldry and has been in use since 1969.

Wollman said references to doctors serving God and humanity date to the time of Hippocrates, a pre-Christianity Greek physician.

Wollman said the cross, which has a pointed base, is both an emblem of mercy and a symbol dating to the Middle Ages, when pilgrims carried a cross with a spiked base to mark the site of a camp.

Mikey Weinstein, president of the Military Religious Freedom Foundation, said that's a reference to the Crusades and could embolden U.S. enemies who want to portray the war on terror as a Christian war on Islam.

"This continues to add more fodder to the argument that we are Crusaders," Weinstein said. "It's exactly what fundamentalist Muslims want."

Weinstein's foundation, based in Albuquerque, N.M., last week persuaded the Army to withdraw an invitation to evangelist Franklin Graham to speak at the Pentagon on May 6, the National Day of Prayer.

Weinstein cited comments Graham made in 2001 describing Islam as evil. The Army said it withdrew the invitation because Graham's remarks were "not appropriate."

click to read full article from

The Associated Press

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JMC Ministries Response

So say someone comes along one day and looks at you and says I don’t like the clothes you are wearing go change them and then threatens to take you to court if you don’t is pretty much what is going on today it seems.

These Anti Religious groups are just going around this Country looking for things that they dislike and bully people until they get rid of them. 

What about our Freedoms? What has happened to them?

Why is it the only freedoms that seem to be upheld are the ones trying to take ours away?

This symbol was set into place before this so called separation of church and state was ever set into place. Which is not actually in our original U.S Constitution it is an amendment that was added. So that people like this can try and bully those who seek the freedoms that our Forefathers laid down for us.

But in today's society these freedoms are a dangerous threat to those who dislike the Christian Values our country was founded on.

We are a threat to them and they want to annihilate us into silence and remission.

Iowa high School teacher Honored with 2010 Teacher of the Year Award

Middle School Principal Says Parents need to keep Kids off Of Social Networking Sites

JMC Ministries Response

We  agree with This Principal to an extent but it is up to the parents and yes children need to be monitored at all times when they are using the internet and especially on these social networking sites.

There are a lot of bad people out there just looking for children to attack and Parents need to take control of what their children are doing and being exposed to instead of giving them a tv or computer and say “Ok now go have fun and stay out of my way”

Governor Reverses Policy and Says Troopers Can Pray In Jesus Name

click to read original Article From
World Net Daily

© 2010 WorldNetDaily

Gov. Robert McDonnell

State trooper chaplains in Virginia are being told they can pray "in Jesus name" again just two years after then-Democratic Gov. Tim Kaine affirmed a measure ordering them use only "nonsectarian" prayers or quit.

According to Chaplain Gordon Klingenschmitt of the "Pray in Jesus Name" organization, the new governor, Republican Bob McDonnell, has restored the rights of six state police chaplains "to pray publicly 'in Jesus name.'"

"This victory comes after our two-year campaign for Jesus name," Klingenschmitt said.

He led a 1,000-person rally outside the governor's mansion in 2008, then submitted some 15,000 petitions to reinstate the chaplains' jobs and free speech.

"We faxed voter guides to 2300-plus Virginia pastors last summer, comparing Bob McDonnell, who campaigned for chaplains' rights to pray in Jesus name, to his opponent Creigh Deeds, who voted against Jesus prayers in the Senate. Those pastors helped us move the polls from 47-44 percent before our faxes, to the 59-41 percent victory for McDonnell on election day, because of this issue," Klingenschmitt said.

He said now that McDonnell has lifted the ban, the six chaplains who turned in their badges rather than exclude Jesus from their prayers, including Rex Carter and Mike Honaker, will be invited back to their positions.

According to a political blog at the Washington Post, McDonnell dispatched the state police superintendent, Col. W. Steven Flaherty, to announce the policy change.

"The governor does not believe the state should tell chaplains of any faith how to pray,'' Tucker Marin, a McDonnell spokesman, told the blog. "Religious officials of all faiths should be allowed to pray according to the dictates of their own conscience, and in accordance with their faith traditions, while being respectful of the faith traditions of others."

It also had been Flaherty who announced earlier that chaplains would be allowed to offer only prayers that did not reference Jesus.

The issue arose following a lawsuit against the city of Fredericksburg for banning a councilman from concluding his routine council prayers – offered on a rotating basis among members – "in Jesus' name."

Former Supreme Court Justice Sandra O'Connor concluded in an intermediary court opinion that Rev. Hashmel Turner's prayers were "government speech" and therefore subject to censorship by the city. .

When the rule change was imposed, six of the chaplains resigned their responsibilities rather than be forced to pray without mentioning Jesus. At the time, Kaine said he didn't need the name of Jesus in his prayers.

"It doesn't diminish my ability to worship my God, to pray to the Father or the Lord without mentioning Jesus Christ," he said.

Then a coalition of pastors wrote to Kaine seeking a change in the policy.

"Six chaplains lost their jobs as chaplains, having effectively 'turned in their chaplain badge' in protest over the governor's 'non-sectarian' prayer policy," Klingenschmitt reported at the time. "They are no longer permitted to perform chaplain duties, until they comply with the prayer policy and get reinstated."

Klingenschmitt said the chaplains "were given direct verbal orders to stop praying 'in Jesus name' … [and] faced with a choice between disobeying orders and violating their conscience by publicly denying the name of Jesus Christ, they resigned."

That's exactly what persecution is, he insisted.

Klingenschmitt, whose battle with the military over his use of the phrase remains in court where he's seeking reinstatement, said he "cannot believe we live in a society where government officials literally dictate the content of a chaplain's prayers and dare to punish or exclude chaplains who pray 'in Jesus name.'"

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JMC Ministries Response

We agree with the last statement made by Klingenschmitt saying he “cannot believe we live in a society where government officials literally dictate the content of a chaplains prayers and dare to punish or exclude chaplains who pray ‘in Jesus name’”

What has happened to freedom of Religion and freedom of Speech?

It is frightening how many stories we are hearing this year about these kind of things going on in  supposedly the Freest country in the entire world.

We can only thank This Governor who reinstate these Chaplains and give them back their freedom to pray in Jesus Name. As long as these freedoms are still written in our U.S Constitution we need to continue to fight to have them in the face of persecution and those who seek to take all our freedoms away whether you are Christian or any other Faith. 

Archeologists Say New Noah’s Ark Find is FAKE!

By Joe Kovacs
© 2010 WorldNetDaily

Has the real Noah's Ark spoken of in the Bible truly been found?

At least two seasoned archaeologists who have made numerous expeditions to Mount Ararat in search of Noah's Ark are throwing cold water on this week's claim the Old Testament vessel has finally been discovered, saying it's a hoax involving wood hauled in from the Black Sea region.

"To make a long story short: this is all reported to be a fake," said Randall Price, director of Judaic Studies at Liberty University in Lynchburg, Va.

"This is not Noah's Ark," adds Bob Cornuke of the Bible Archaeology Search and Exploration Institute. "This is a fake. It's a fraud and it's of the highest caliber according to what I can assess from the evidence and talking to eyewitnesses and people from Turkey."

WND reported yesterday that Chinese and Turkish explorers with Noah's Ark Ministries International said they were "99.9 percent sure" they found the remnants of the legendary biblical vessel high up on Mount Ararat in eastern Turkey.

The 15-member team claims it recovered wooden specimens from a structure at an altitude of 13,000 feet and that carbon dating suggested it was 4,800 years old

Several compartments, some with wooden beams, are said to be inside and could have been used to house animals, the group indicated.

"The search team has made the greatest discovery in history," declared Prof. Oktay Belli, an archaeologist at Istanbul University. "This finding is very important and the greatest up to now."

But Dr. Price, who is spearheading efforts to explore two competing locations for Noah's Ark, sent an e-mail dispatch to supporters with his personal take on the alleged find, asserting the structure is a hoax perpetrated by a Kurdish guide and his partners to extort money from Chinese evangelical Christians.

Click to read full story from World Net Daily

U.S Supreme Court Supports WWI Cross Memorial in Mojave California

Click to read original article from Fox News

AP

The Supreme Court said a federal court went too far in ordering the removal of a memorial known as the 'Mojave Cross,' on an outcrop in the Mojave National Preserve, in Calif.

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court said Wednesday that a lower court went too far in ordering the removal of a congressionally endorsed war memorial cross from its longtime home atop a remote outcropping in California.

Signaling support for keeping the cross, the justices ordered the federal court in California to look again at Congress' plan to transfer a patch of federal land beneath it into private hands.

The lower court had barred the land transfer as insufficient to eliminate concern about a religious symbol on public land — in this case, the Mojave National Preserve.

The ruling was 5-4, with the court's conservatives in the majority.

The VFW erected the large cross in the federal preserve more than 75 years ago.

It has been covered with plywood for the past several years following the court rulings. Court papers describe the cross as 5 feet to 8 feet tall.

"Here one Latin cross in the desert evokes far more than religion. It evokes thousands of small crosses in foreign fields marking the graves of Americans who fell in battles, battles whose tragedies are compounded if the fallen are forgotten," Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote.

In dissent, Justice John Paul Stevens agreed that soldiers who died in battle deserve a memorial to their service. But the government "cannot lawfully do so by continued endorsement of a starkly sectarian message," Stevens said.

Six justices wrote separate opinions and none spoke for a majority of the court. The holding itself was narrow, ordering lower courts to look again at the transfer of land from the government to private control.

Lower federal courts previously ruled that the cross' location on public land violated the Constitution and that the land transfer was, in effect, an end run around the constitutional problem.

Kennedy, who usually is in the court's center on church-state issues, suggested there may have been no problem in the first place.

"The goal of avoiding governmental endorsement does not require eradication of all religious symbols in the public realm," Kennedy said.

Justices Samuel Alito, Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas would have gone further than Kennedy and Chief Justice John Roberts, who joined Kennedy's opinion.

Alito said he would allow the land transfer, barred until now, to take effect. Scalia and Thomas said they would not even have allowed the former National Park Service employee who complained about the cross to bring his objection to the transfer into court.

Roberts took a decidedly commonsensical approach to the matter. At the argument in October, a lawyer argued there probably would be no objection if the government took down the cross, sold the land to the VFW, and gave the VFW the cross to immediately erect again.

"I do not see how it can make a difference for the government to skip that empty ritual and do what Congress told it to do — sell the land with the cross on it," Roberts said.

Justices Stephen Breyer, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Sonia Sotomayor also dissented.

Evangelists Claim They Have Found Noah’s Ark

By Joe Kovacs
© 2010 WorldNetDaily

A new claim is being made for the discovery of Noah's Ark, as the French news agency reports evangelical explorers from China and Turkey believe they may have found the remnants of the legendary biblical vessel.

"It's not 100 percent that it is Noah's Ark but we think it is 99.9 percent that this is it," Yeung Wing-cheung, a Hong Kong documentary filmmaker and member of the 15-strong team from Noah's Ark Ministries International told Agence France-Presse.

According to the report which provided no photos and few details, the team says it recovered wooden specimens from a structure on Mount Ararat in eastern Turkey at an altitude of 13,000 feet, and that carbon dating suggested it was 4,800 years old.

Yeung indicated there were several compartments inside, some with wooden beams, that could have housed animals.

Click to read full article from World Net Daily

Franklin Graham Speaks to CNN about being Disinvited to Pentagon For The National Day of Prayer

California Senator Pushes Bill to Prevent Children From buying Violent Video Games

Homeless Man Stabbed After Saving A Woman from Being Mugged

JMC Ministries Response

To watch this video is so disturbing to see how people just pay no attention to a dying man on the side walk and even take pictures with their cell phones.

What have we become as a society here in The U.S when a man dies needlessly because all those people didn’t take the time to use those cell phones they took the pictures of him to call for help or stop and say this isn’t right a man lying on a side walk looking like he may be dead or injured.

Where is the compassion?! Where is the empathy?! For your fellow human man?!

The United States is known for being the first ones to help other Countries when they are attacked or have some terrible disaster happen.  But what about our own People?! How can we help people in other countries when we can’t even help our own people here who are lying on side walks dying because they saved someone's life?

Federal Judge Blasts Arizona City ban on Sound of Church Bells

Click to read full article from World Net Daily

By Bob Unruh
© 2010 WorldNetDaily

Bishop Rick Painter, sentenced for allowing church bells to ring

A federal judge in Arizona has struck down a Phoenix noise ordinance against  sounds generated by religious worship – settling one part of a dispute that erupted when city officials convicted a bishop and sentenced him to a suspended jail sentence and several years of probation because someone complained about the ringing of his church bells.
"Churches shouldn't be targeted and punished for ringing their bells as a public expression of faith that's been done for centuries," said Erik Stanley, senior legal counsel for the Alliance Defense Fund, which worked on the case.
"The federal court has made the right decision by declaring that the city's noise ordinance violates the First and Fourteenth Amendments," he said.
The federal judge, Susan R. Bolton, ruled that the city's ordinance was being used to prohibit "sound generated in the course of religious expression," even while it contained an exemption for ice-cream trucks to blare their promotions.

The case had been brought by St. Mark Roman Catholic Parish, Christ the King Liturgical Charismatic Church and First Christian Church. The court earlier issued a temporary order and today made that permanent.
"It is ordered granting plaintiffs' request for a permanent injunction, and permanently enjoining Defendant City of Phoenix from enforcing the Noise Ordinance … against any sound generated in the course of religious expression," the order said.
"It is further ordered granting plaintiffs' request for a declaratory judgment, declaring that the Noise Ordinance … when enforced against any sound generated in the course of religious expression, violates the First and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution."
The dispute heated up when Bishop Rick Painter of Christ the King was sentenced to jail and probation in June 2009 for violating the ordinance by ringing his church's bells.
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JMC Ministries Response

A Few years ago we heard the story of a pastor who was told not to ring the church bell to let people know that Church was starting. And that if he did he would be fined every time.  

Even being threatened with being fined hundreds of dollars each time he would ring the church bell. The pastor did it every Sunday.  He rang that bell and every time he received a fine for hundreds of dollars in the mail. He some how got the money to pay the fines and still every Sunday he would ring that Bell.

We see more and more Courts and even Govt officials starting to stand up and say this is wrong.  This judge ruled that they violated this churches rights to ring the church bell in this article and in our previous post we shared how our U.S Govt is filing an appeal against the Federal Judge's ruling that the National Day of Prayer is Unconstitutional.  

When our own Govt is seeing that this is wrong and taking a stand against it. Obviously it has gone too far the persecution against Christians and anyone who is religious.

U.S Govt to appeal ruling against National Day Of Prayer

Click to read full article from The Associated Press

By RYAN J. FOLEY (AP) – 20 hours ago

MADISON, Wis. — The Obama administration said Thursday it will appeal a court decision that found the National Day of Prayer unconstitutional.
U.S. District Judge Barbara Crabb in Madison ruled last week the National Day of Prayer that Congress established 58 years ago amounts to a call for religious action.
In a notice filed Thursday, the Justice Department said it will challenge the decision in the U.S. 7th Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago. The notice came after about two dozen members of Congress condemned the ruling and pressed for an appeal.
The case was brought by the Freedom From Religion Foundation, a Madison-based group of atheists and agnostics who argue the National Day of Prayer violates the separation of church and state. Its co-president Annie Laurie Gaylor, said she was disappointed in the decision to appeal.
"I would have expected something better from a legal scholar," she said, referring to President Barack Obama's background as a law professor.
Her group planned to launch an online petition Thursday praising Crabb's decision and asking Obama, the principal defendant in the lawsuit, to "leave days of prayer to individuals, private groups and churches, synagogues, mosques and temples."
Crabb ruled the government could not use its authority to try to influence when and whether individuals pray, writing: "In this instance, the government has taken sides on a matter that must be left to individual conscience." She put enforcement of her ruling on hold until all appeals are exhausted.
The administration had argued the law simply acknowledges the role of religion in the United States.
Congress established the day in 1952 and in 1988 set the first Thursday in May as the day for presidents to issue proclamations asking Americans to pray. An Obama spokesman has said the president plans to issue a proclamation for the upcoming prayer day, May 6. Many other state and local officials typically follow suit.
The Justice Department signaled it would appeal not only Crabb's decision on the merits of the case but also her ruling last month that the defendants had the standing to bring the lawsuit in the first place.

Franklin Graham Disinvited by Army to Speak At National Day of Prayer

Click to read full article from World Net Daily
 

By Jeff Schogol, Stars and Stripes
Online Edition, Thursday, April 22, 2010

ARLINGTON, Va. — The Army has disinvited Franklin Graham to speak at the Pentagon on National Prayer Day after a military advocacy group objected because Graham has reportedly described Islam as “evil” and “wicked.”
“I regret that the Army felt it was necessary to rescind their invitation to the National Day of Prayer Task Force to participate in the Pentagon’s special prayer service,” Graham said in a statement on Thursday.
I want to express my strong support for the United States military and all our troops. I will continue to pray that God will give them guidance, wisdom and protection as they serve this great country.”
Graham was expected to speak at the Pentagon on May 6, drawing the ire of the Military Religious Freedom Foundation, a watchdog group focused on religious favoritism in the military.
The group had been prepared to seek a temporary restraining order against National Prayer Day if it were “polluted by someone as hideously Islamophobic as Franklin Graham,” said Mikey Weinstein, head of the group.
In a 2001 op-ed piece, Graham wrote that he does not believe Muslims are evil, but he objects to the treatment of women in Muslim countries and Islam’s historic “persecution or elimination” of other religions.
On Thursday, Graham told Fox News that while he loves Muslims, “I speak out for people that live under Islam, that are enslaved by Islam and I want them to know they can be free through faith in Jesus Christ and Christ alone.”Council on American Islamic Relations spokesman Ibrahim Hooper said it is “completely inappropriate” for Graham to speak in front of a military audience.
“These are individuals who are potentially going to be stationed in Muslim majority nations, and they don’t need to hear from someone spreading hatred of Islam and Muslims,” Hooper said.
“What does that say to those who are going to be asked to serve in these regions and how is that going to affect their interaction with the local population?” Graham is honorary chairman of the National Day of Prayer Task Force, a group that organizes Christian events that was invited to participate in National Day of Prayer by the Pentagon chaplain’s office.
An Army spokesman told the Associated Press the Pentagon’s relationship with the Christian group does not violate Defense Department rules.

Michigan College Students Protest Sexy Ads of American Apparel

Click to read full article from WZZM 13



GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. (WZZM)- Some students at Calvin College in Grand Rapids are boycotting a company because of its provocative clothing ads.  The company, called American Apparel, often shows its models in see-through shirts and underwear.
The clothing is sold globally and is targeted at college students and young adults.  Here in Michigan, there are stores in Ann Arbor and East Lansing.  The clothes can also be found
online.  It's those ads that some of the students say are too sexy.
Calvin College students Abbie Belford and Hannah Whyte call it pornography.  Images show topless women, with bare bottoms.  "It's extreme.  It's disgusting," says Hannah.
The ads can be seen on the American Apparel website.  The company has over 200 retails stores and makes all of its clothing in the United States.  The company also promotes fair labor practices.
The socially conscious business practices impressed leaders at Calvin College.  Abbie says students were given American Apparel t-shirts at orientation.  She was told the college purchased them again this year.  "I was like, oh great, another chance to support a good company and then he said, but don't visit their website.  It's almost pornographic," says Abbie.
That's the first time Abbie and Hannah, who are involved in a student-led group called "Democracy Matters," looked at the website.  They are now boycotting the company.  "I want to see the rest of Calvin, all organizations, sign a petition, saying we will not buy from American Apparel until it changes its advertising techniques."
The women have printed up petitions.  They've also created a Facebook page called "American Apparel: The Bare Facts" to protest the company and its ads.  "We want to let them know that no, we are youth, but we do have morals, we have standards.  This just crosses the line," says Hannah.
Calvin College says it already received the new t-shirts, but says it will support the student-led effort and will likely choose another company next year.  The student group plans to hold a petition drive Wednesday on campus.

Creators Of South Park Gone Too Far

JMC Ministries Response

When Christians have been persecuted on this show a long with Jews. Had our Lord and Savior made fun of and blasphemed we did not want to kill these men who make this cartoon.  We pray for them we forgive the creators of South Park for the horrible things they have done and said to make fun of Jesus Christ, God and our beliefs. Jesus said To love you enemies not kill them and murder them as this Islamist group is saying they want to do.

Obviously the creators of South Park are really just going too far and blatantly attack anyone and they are protected by freedom of speech but when we rise up and say this is wrong and try to make our voices heard many times people try to silence us.

These men and all who are involved in making this South Park show truly need to know the love of Christ because with out love there cannot be compassion and understanding towards you fellow man. Only then will they see that what they do in this cartoon week after week year after year is only hurting people.  That is fragile line between verbally attacking someone or a group of people and having free speech.

We also must pray for those who seek to kill the creators of South Park because killing and violence only causes more hurt and chaos.  Pray that the love of Christ fills their hearts and when they see these men who are using this cartoon series to make fun of people and cause hurt that they feel sorry for them and take pity on them and forgive them.

We live in a world full of hate and it is only growing more day by day we need to kill this hate with love, compassion and forgiveness.

Sign Free Petition To ask President Obama to Reinstate National Day of Prayer

click to read full article from Christian News Wire

MEDIA ADVISORY, April 16 /Christian Newswire/ -- Federal Judge Barbara Crabb ruled in favor of atheist complainers at the Freedom from Religion Foundation, that government recognition of prayer violates the First Amendment. Crabb claimed her decision "carries out the Founders' plan of preserving religious liberty to the fullest extent possible in a pluralistic society," proving she actually believes the Founding Fathers, who prayed to the Judeo-Christian God in Congress, would now suddenly oppose public acts of prayer.
The Pray In Jesus Name Project, led by Chaplain Gordon James Klingenschmitt, has already gathered several thousand paper and electronic petition signatures asking President Obama to defend and reinstate public observance of the National Day of Prayer, which Congress created in 1952.
To sign the FREE petition asking President Obama to reinstate NDOP, visit: http://tinyurl.com/obamapray. Please also help our petition go viral by tweeting these words on Twitter/Facebook: "Sign Free Petition: Ask President Obama to reinstate the National Day of Prayer. http://tinyurl.com/obamapray. Please re-tweet many times."
But thus far, White House officials have not yet agreed to meet with Chaplain Klingenschmitt, or receive his petitions. Please call the White House at 202-456-1111 to leave a comment for Joshua Dubois, leader of Obama's faith initiative.
"As a former Navy Chaplain who was punished for praying 'in Jesus name' in uniform," said Klingenschmitt, "I will be joining thousands of people and scores of national ministry leaders at the MayDay2010.org event on May 1st, to pray at the Lincoln Memorial. I hereby invite President Obama to come pray with us, and receive our petitions in person that day."

Child Survivors of Oklahoma City Bombing 15 years later

Iceland Volcano: Startling Pictures from Iceland and the Enormous Ash Clouds

By Rhianna King

Dark, menacing and showing no signs of abating, this is the apocalyptic-style scene that has simultaneously captivated and terrified locals at the heart of Iceland's volcanic eruption.

As people in Britain and the rest of Europe are caught up with the unprecedented travel chaos caused by the eruption, those in Iceland are living with blankets of ash falling from the sky and fears of volcanic floods.

This stunning series of images shows how the black volcanic fog that has wreaked havoc across Europe has created an eerie spectacle.

It's behind you: Motorists escape the smoke and ash rising up from the Eyjafjallajokull volcano

Enlarge

Darkness falls: A farm is shrouded in black as the volcanic cloud spreads across Iceland

Enlarge

Spectacular: Lightning streaks across the sky as lava flows from a volcano in Eyjafjallajokul

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1267018/Iceland-volcano-Amazing-pictures-apocalpyse-like-scene-sky-immersed-black-fog.html#ixzz0lYUnrbeX

Federal Court Rules U.S National Day of Prayer Unconstitutional

Click to read full article from CNS News

By Melanie Hunter-Omar

(CNSNews.com) – A federal district court in Wisconsin ruled on Thursday that the National Day of Prayer is unconstitutional, a decision that has angered a constitutional law firm that filed an amicus brief defending the National Day of Prayer.

The case was filed by The Freedom From Religion Foundation (FFRF), a Wisconsin-based group that challenged the constitutionality of a 1988 law giving the president authority to designate the first Thursday in May as National Day of Prayer.

"It is unfortunate that this court failed to understand that a day set aside for prayer for the country represents a time-honored tradition that embraces the First Amendment, not violates it," said Jay Sekulow, chief counsel of the ACLJ.

"This decision runs counter to well established legal precedent and we're confident that this flawed decision ultimately will be overturned. We will be filing a brief representing members of Congress challenging this federal district court decision in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit,” Sekulow said in a statement.

“If the appeals court fails to reverse this decision, we're confident the Supreme Court will hear the case and ultimately determine that such proclamations and observances like the National Day of Prayer not only reflect our nation's rich history, but are indeed consistent with the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment," he added.

According to the ACLJ brief, the U.S. has a long history of recognizing a national day of prayer dating back to the late 1700’s with the Continental Congress, recommending that states set aside a day for prayer and thanksgiving. Therefore, “historical evidence establishing a National Day of Prayer as deeply embedded in the tradition and history of this country is indisputable,” the brief stated.

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JMC Ministries Response

If the U.S Supreme Court rules that The National Day of Prayer is unconstitutional that will not Stop Those who want to continue to prayer for our Country. We will continue to pray, we will continue to seek God and pray for our President and all our Govt. Leaders. 


In The Book of James it says, "The prayer of a righteous man availeth much." If God's people will humble themselves and pray he says he will hear our cries. WE MUST continue to pray in spite of the persecution that this FFRF Group tries to throw at us. We must also pray for them as well. When God's People pray Miracles happen.

Dog Stayed With Dying Master Until The End

Click to read full article from WKYC.com
STARK COUNTY -- A golden retriever named "Lady" was a good and loyal dog until the end.
Police and an investigator with the Stark County Coroner's Office believe that Lady stayed by her owner's side in a field just outside of Hartville for almost a week.
Parley Nichols, 81, was found dead there Wednesday night, about a mile from his home.
Nichols had dementia and was reported missing on April 8.
Even though family members passed out fliers and searched for Nichols, his body was only discovered after Lady barked at a passerby.
"This dog would not leave his side," said Stark County Coroner's Investigator Harry Campbell. "No question, she stayed out there on her own volition.
"(Lady) saw another human and started barking and wailing," said Campbell.
The preliminary findings of an autopsy lead the Stark County Coroner to believe that Nichols suffered a natural death due to heart and lung disease.
Campbell said the dog likely drank water from a nearby drainage ditch. But there were no signs of food near Nichols.
Campbell also said that a local newspaper dated April 7 was found with Nichols.
Family members are now caring for Lady.
Mary Nichols believes that Lady was with her relative the whole time he was missing.

Iceland's Volcanic Ash Cloud Shuts Down Most Of Europes Airports

LONDON (AP) — An enormous ash cloud from a remote Icelandic volcano caused the biggest flight disruption since the 2001 terrorist attacks as it drifted over northern Europe and stranded travelers on six continents. Officials said it could take days for the skies to become safe again in one of aviation's most congested areas.
The cloud, floating miles (kilometers) above Earth and capable of knocking out jet engines, wrecked travel plans for tens of thousands of people Thursday, from tourists and business travelers to politicians and royals. They couldn't see the source of their frustration — except indirectly, when the ash created vivid red and lavender sunsets.
Non-emergency flights in Britain were canceled, and most will stay grounded until at least midday Friday.
Authorities in Ireland, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Finland and Belgium also closed their air space. France shut down 24 airports, including the main hub of Charles de Gaulle in Paris, Germany's Berlin and Hamburg were shut Thursday evening, and several flights out of the U.S. had to double back.

Kyla Evans, spokeswoman for air traffic service Eurocontrol, said half of all trans-Atlantic flights were expected to be canceled Friday.

.

At London's Heathrow airport, normally one of the world's busiest with more than 1,200 flights and 180,000 travelers a day, passengers stared forlornly at departure boards on which every flight was listed as canceled.
"We made it all the way to takeoff on the plane. ... They even showed us the safety video," said Sarah Davis, 29, a physiotherapist from Portsmouth in southern England who was hoping to fly to Los Angeles. "I'm upset. I only get so much vacation."
A volcano beneath Iceland's Eyjafjallajokull (ay-yah-FYAH'-plah-yer-kuh-duhl) glacier began erupting Wednesday for the second time in less than a month, triggering floods and shooting smoke and steam miles into the air. Video showed spectacular images of hot gases melting the thick ice, sending cascades of water thundering down the steep slopes of the volcano.
About 700 people from rural areas near the volcano were evacuated Thursday because of flash flooding, as water carrying icebergs the size of small houses rushed down the mountain. Most evacuees were allowed to return home after the floods subsided, but more flash floods are expected as long as the volcano keeps erupting, said Rognvaldur Olafsson of the Civil Protection Department.

Click to read full article from Fox News

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JMC Ministries Response

Since January 2010 we have had massive earthquake in Haiti, One of the larges earthquakes EVER Recorded in Chile', A Earthquake that just hit this week in China killing hundreds, and Now this Enormous Volcano that has erupted in Iceland.   So many disasters in just a few months and to us it just keeps confirming that we are living in the last days. Jesus Said in Matthew Chapter 24 That There would be Natural Disasters, Plagues, and Pestilence as the world has never before seen.  Everything that has been going on definitely can be declared as signs of the end of time.

It is a scary time we live in today but we also can rejoice because we know that everyday that passes we are getting closer and closer to going home to heaven and living with Jesus Eternally. We must Rejoice the Lord in the face of the disasters that are happening, rejoice when we are persecuted, Because Jesus is coming soon.

San Antonio Opens Homeless Haven

Russia Stops Adoptions To U.S

Click to read full story at Fox News

MOSCOW -- Russia has suspended all adoptions to U.S. families until the two countries can agree on procedures, the Foreign Ministry said Thursday -- a week after an American woman sent her 7-year-old adopted son back to Russia on a plane by himself.

The boy's return -- without supervision or explanation aside from a note he carried from his adoptive mother saying he had psychological problems -- incensed Russian authorities and the public, and prompted aggressive media coverage of foreign adoptions.

A U.S. delegation will visit Moscow "in the next few days" to discuss a possible bilateral adoption agreement, ministry spokesman Andrei Nesterenko said.

"Russia believes that only such an agreement which will contain effective tools for Russian and U.S. officials to monitor the living conditions of adopted Russian children will ensure that recent tragedies in the United States will not be repeated," Nesterenko said in a televised briefing.

The Tennessee woman who sent back her adopted Russian son last Thursday claimed she had been misled by his Russian orphanage about his condition.

Russians were outraged that no charges were filed against her in the United States.

"How can we prosecute a person who abused the rights of a Russian child abroad?" Russia's children's rights ombudsman, Pavel Astakhov, said in a televised interview Wednesday. "If there was an adoption treaty in place, we would have legal means to protect Russian children abroad.

Some 3,000 U.S. applications for adopting Russian children are now pending, according to the Joint Council on International Children's Services, which represents many U.S. agencies engaged in international adoption.

But the numbers have declined sharply in recent years -- with only 1,586 U.S. adoptions from Russia last year, compared with more than 5,800 in 2004.

Russia itself has been a big factor in the drop-off, adoption experts said, citing a perception that many children from Russian orphanages can present special challenges, due to such conditions as fetal alcohol syndrome.

Russian lawmakers for years have nevertheless suggested suspending such adoptions, after other cases of abuse and even killings of Russian children adopted in the United States.

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JMC Ministries shared this story about the woman who put this little boy on a plane and basically did a “return to sender” and abandoned her son. To read the this article click

Russia to put Freeze on Adoptions After U.S woman Returns Adopted Son

US: Govt Calls preaching Clear and Present Danger

Evangelist Arrested for Preaching Near Liberty Bell from Repent America on Vimeo.

Click to read full story from World Net Daily

By Bob Unruh
© 2010 WorldNetDaily
Liberty Bell engraving that states: "Proclaim liberty throughout the land unto all the inhabitants thereof."

A panel of judges at the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals today heard arguments that free speech should be allowed on public property at the site of the famous Liberty Bell, which itself quotes from the Bible in stating, "Proclaim liberty throughout the land unto all the inhabitants thereof."

The arguments came in a case involving Michael Marcavage, a minister whose work includes street preaching. He was fined and put on probation for preaching to the public on a sidewalk outside the Liberty Bell center after a trial in which government prosecutors described his message and actions as a "clear and present danger."

The case began in October 2007 when Marcavage, director of the Repent America ministry, was arrested by supervising U.S. Park Ranger Alan Saperstein.

Marcavage ultimately was charged with violating a so-called "verbal permit" and "interfering with agency functions."

It was Assistant U.S. Attorney Richard Goldberg during the June 2008 trial who argued Marcavage's peaceful preaching presented a "clear and present danger." Goldberg asked the judge to send a message not only to Marcavage but to anyone who would stand on public property and share their beliefs without government permission.

According to Marcavage, Independence National Historical Park Law Enforcement Specialist Donald Reed recently reaffirmed that free speech activities are banned on any of the public sidewalks surrounding the park that align city streets without first obtaining government permission. Even with a permit, the activities must be confined to a designated "free speech zone."

"In Philadelphia, the birthplace of American freedom, at the site of the Liberty Bell and Independence Hall, freedom is under attack by the very government that was established here to protect it," Marcavage said.

"The blessings of liberty that God bestowed upon our nation continue to be lost while the Gospel of Jesus Christ is silenced," he continued. "If the 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals upholds the ruling and finds that the federal government can ban Americans from speaking to others on matters that are important to them in the public forum or without advanced government permission, then this could very well be the final nail in the coffin of our freedoms."

Marcavage told WND that based on their questioning, the three appellate judges – Michael Fisher, Thomas Hardiman and Robert Cowen – appeared to wonder about the prohibition of a Gospel message when other protesters with another message were left untouched. He noted commercial speech also was taking place in the same area where he was arrested.

"We obviously hope that what they revealed through the very hard questioning will be favorable toward freedom," Marcavage told WND.

He said it is "absurd" that Americans have to fight for the right to speak freely on a public sidewalk near Independence Hall, where much of the work writing the U.S. Constitution was done, and adjacent to the exhibit of the Liberty Bell, one of the best-known symbols of freedom in the world.

Repent America is an evangelistic organization based in Philadelphia whose leaders "know that there is a literal hell and a lake of fire where the unsaved will burn for all eternity; therefore, we act upon this truth without reservation and GO OUT into the communities of America declaring the Word of God and proclaiming the Good News."

WND reported earlier when Marcavage brought, with the help of private practice attorney C. Scott Shields, a complaint against the government over the speech infringement. That case is on hold while the current case is on appeal.

Marcavage was restricted from preaching even though Komen Breast Cancer walkers were "utilizing the same sidewalk as a forum for expressing their opinions and viewpoints," court records reveal.

"However, Mr. Marcavage was told that he couldn't stand on the … block and express his viewpoint and was instead given a verbal permit to express his viewpoint in another part of the Independence Mall, far away from where the Breast Cancer walkers were expressing their viewpoint," court records said.

6.9 magnitude Earthquake Hits China

BEIJING -- A series of strong earthquakes struck a mountainous Tibetan area of western China on Wednesday, killing at least 400 people and injuring more than 10,000 as houses made of mud and wood collapsed, officials said. Many more people were trapped and the toll was expected to rise.

The largest quake was recorded by the U.S. Geological Survey as magnitude 6.9. In the aftermath, panicked people, many bleeding from their wounds, flooded the streets of a Qinghai province township where most of the homes had been flattened. Students were reportedly buried inside several damaged schools.

Paramilitary police used shovels to dig through the rubble in the town, footage on state television showed. Officials said excavators were not available and with most of the roads leading to the nearest airport damaged, equipment and rescuers would have a hard time reaching the area. Hospitals were overwhelmed, many lacking even the most basic supplies, and doctors were in short supply.

Downed phone lines, strong winds and frequent aftershocks also hindered rescue efforts, said Wu Yong, commander of the local army garrison, who said the death toll "may rise further as lots of houses collapsed."

With many people forced outside, the provincial government said it was rushing 5,000 tents and 100,000 coats and blankets to the mountainous region, at around 13,000 feet (4,000 meters) -high and where night time temperatures plunge below freezing.

Workers were racing to release water from a reservoir in the disaster area where a crack had formed after the quake to prevent a flood, according to the China Earthquake Administration.

The Wednesday quake, which struck at 7:49 a.m. local time (2349 GMT, 7:49 p.m. EDT), was centered on Yushu county, in the southern part of Qinghai, near Tibet, with a population of about 100,000, mostly herders and farmers.

The USGS recorded six temblors in less than three hours, all but one registering 5.0 or higher. The China Earthquake Networks Center measured the largest quake's magnitude at 7.1. Qinghai averages more than five earthquakes a year of at least magnitude 5.0, according to the official Xinhua News Agency. They normally do not cause much damage in the sparsely populated province.

Residents fled as the ground shook, toppling houses made of mud and wood, as well as temples, gas stations, electric poles and the top of a Buddhist pagoda in a park, witnesses and state media said. The quake also triggered landslides, Xinhua said.

"Nearly all the houses made of mud and wood collapsed. There was so much dust in the air, we couldn't see anything," said Ren Yu, general manager of Yushu Hotel in Jiegu, the county's main town. "There was a lot of panic. People were crying on the streets. Some of our staff, who were reunited with their parents, were also in tears."

More than 100 guests of the hotel, which was relatively undamaged, were evacuated to open spaces such as public squares, Ren told The Associated Press by phone. After transporting guests to safety, hotel staff then helped in rescue efforts in other buildings, Ren said.

"We pulled out 70 people, but some of them died on the way to the hospital," Ren said, adding other survivors were put in tents in the hotel yard while they awaited assistance.

The death toll rose to about 400 by afternoon, according to China Central Television. Emergency official Pubucairen, who goes by only one name, was quoted as saying that the number of injured has risen to more than 10,000. The official said rescuers were treating the injured at hospitals, race tracks and sports stadiums.

President Hu Jintao sent a vice premier to supervise rescue efforts and more than 5,000 soldiers, medical workers and other rescuers were mobilized, joining 700 soldiers already on the ground, Xinhua said. A message of sympathy also came from the Dalai Lama, the exiled spiritual leader of the often fervently Buddhist Tibetans who is reviled by Chinese leaders.

Click to read Full Story from Fox News

Christian Singer Song writer Jennifer Knapp Announces She Is Gay

 Jennifer Knapp is a lesbian. Kind of. She resists the label, insisting that it feels unnatural and foreign, that she’s just the Jennifer Knapp she’s always been, just with a significant relationship with a woman. As Knapp sings on “Inside,” the track from Letting Go that “I play when I get angry,” what Knapp fears the most is that “I know they’ll bury me / Before they hear the whole story.” Her sexuality is certainly part of why Knapp left music and dropped out of sight to the other side of the world for nearly a decade. She fell in love with her girlfriend (whose name she chooses to not reveal), and after eight years together, there’s no denying that anymore. But there were also conflicts with her business partner (with whom she had a hand in the early Christian music career of Katy Hudson, who has gone on to kiss her own girls as Katy Perry). Music had become about work instead of about joy. And then there was the rift between her faith and her sexuality. “I thought I had to exchange one for the other,” she says.

It’s a struggle familiar to most gay people, even those who haven’t had to make room for sex and God, often uncomfortable bedfellows. Choosing to come out can still mean choosing away from family and friends who just can’t accept us as well as making institutions like marriage and parenthood exponentially more difficult to access. For Knapp, the process of bringing faith and sexuality into a coherent self required her to step away from her life and career in the U.S. The music that had spoken through her voice and hands became completely alienating. “I would think, I don’t even have a right to sing a song I wrote, because I am a hypocrite,” she says. Knapp spent her first three years as “a PlayStation guru,” and, when she tired of that, spent four years working at everything but music. She didn’t even pick up a guitar until her last year in Sydney. “I was building something new, starting something fresh,” she says. “I had to go someplace that would completely redefine my perspective of who I was in the universe.”

Knapp no longer feels like being gay and being Christian are in opposition, even if others do. “I’m quite comfortable to live with parts of myself that don’t make sense to you,” she says. She acknowledges that such peace is hard-won in her community. “I keep running across people living closeted, who have literally chosen one or the other,” Knapp marvels. And she knows she risks losing some of her biggest fans when word of her sexuality goes public. “I think it’s going to be shocking and feel like a betrayal to some people who live their spiritual lives through the music they listen to,” says Knapp. That’s part of why she’s decided to come out in advance of the record — she doesn’t want people to love her music and then discover that their own values won’t let them sing along full-throated.

This is just a piece of an interview that Jennifer did with ADVOCATE.com.  It is very sad that some who call themselves Christians are living their lives against the teachings of the bible and believe that there is nothing wrong with it. Then in turn spreading this false teaching that God accepts anything that you do and it is not a sin to just live your life as you choose with no consequences. But there are.....

^{Leviticus 18:22}

²² " 'Do not lie with a man as one lies with a woman; that is detestable.

1 Corinthians 6:9, 10

⁹Do you not know that the wicked will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: Neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor male prostitutes nor homosexual offenders ¹⁰nor thieves nor the greedy nor drunkards nor slanderers nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God.

^{Romans 1:24-28}

²⁴Therefore God gave them over in the sinful desires of their hearts to sexual impurity for the degrading of their bodies with one another. ²⁵They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator—who is forever praised. Amen. ²⁶Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural relations for unnatural ones. ²⁷In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed indecent acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their perversion.  

  

If it is OK to live this kind of lifestyle then why are these scriptures in the bible? Why was Sodom and Gomorrah destroyed if this kind of lifestyle is not sinful in the eyes of God?

It is said that people who practice homosexuality (especially men) have a higher risk of contracting HIV and AIDS. If this lifestyle is OK then why are there more chances to catch a life threatening disease and die from it than a normal man and woman relationship?

Because you are taking out of the context of what God created it for and they are using it for their own selfish desires. Ms. Knapp believes that being Gay and having a relationship with God can go hand in hand. How can this be, when God cannot even look upon sin? So how can you be hand in hand with him? 

We brothers and sisters in Christ need to lift Jennifer Knapp up in prayer, and that she see that what she is living is a lie and that she is being deceived by Satan. Not just pray for Jennifer but also Ray Boltz another Christian Artist that just in the past 2 years came out that he was Gay and he believes the same as Jennifer that it is ok and that God loves us and accepts us no matter what. We are sure that there are many more out there who are believing the lies like Jennifer and Ray are. And WE must pray for them and ask in Jesus name that the veil of deception be torn from their eyes and that they see the TRUTH For The TRUTH will Set you Free.

Jews Honor Holocaust Victims and the tragic death of Poland’s President

click to read original article from Fox News

WARSAW, Poland (AP) — Thousand of young Jews and Holocaust survivors are marching at the former Nazi death camp of Auschwitz to remember those who perished in the Holocaust and honor Poland's late president.

Some 10,000 people from around the world are walking between the Auschwitz and Birkenau sections of the death camp where the Nazis killed more than 1 million people, mostly Jews, during World War II.

Many marchers are wearing black armbands, and black ribbons top their white-and-blue Israeli flags, in memory of Poland's President Lech Kaczynski and his wife Maria who were killed Saturday with other top officials en route to WWII-era observances in western Russia.

Reports of of Anti-Semitic incidents against Jews doubled last year

Click to read original article from Fox News

JERUSALEM (AP) — Violent attacks against Jews worldwide more than doubled last year, fueled by a Muslim backlash in Europe in the aftermath of Israel's invasion of Gaza, according to a report released Sunday.

The Tel Aviv University study reported 1,129 anti-Semitic incidents last year, ranging from vandalism and arson against Jewish targets to beatings of Jews. The figure, up from 559 incidents the previous year, was the highest since the survey began more than 20 years ago.

The steepest increase in anti-Semitic violence occurred in Western Europe, especially Britain and France, where protests and anger by Muslim residents boiled over after Israel's invasion of Gaza in December 2008, said the report, compiled by the university's Stephen Roth Institute for the Study of Contemporary Anti-Semitism and Racism.

The Israeli invasion, launched in response to years of Palestinian rocket attacks, killed some 1,400 Palestinians, including hundreds of civilians, according to local officials and human rights groups. Thirteen Israelis also died in the fighting.

Dina Porat, the report's editor, said protests against the war often led to incitement, which in turn erupted into physical violence. "The political goals are imbued with anti-Jewish sentiment, equations of Jews to Nazis," she said.

She said the study tracked only instances of physical violence against Jewish targets. "Verbal violence is violence of course, but we don't count it. Violence we regard as physical, and here we have clear indications."

For the first time in the report's history, incidents carried out by Muslims eclipsed those by right-wing extremists in cases where the perpetrator was identified, the report said.

Incidents in Britain shot up to 374 from 112 in 2008, and to 195 from 50 in France.

The United States registered only a slight increase, according to the study.

Moshe Kantor, president of the European Jewish Congress, which sponsors the report, said that the rise of anti-Semitic sentiment in Western Europe can be blamed on forces outside the region.

"This new phenomenon is financed and organized by pro-Islamic, pro-terrorist organizations and states," Kantor said.

The university issued its report on the eve of Israel's annual memorial day for the 6 million Jews killed in the Nazi Holocaust.

West Virginia Coal Mine Tragedy of 2010

COMFORT, W.Va. (AP) — Time stopped five days ago for the families of 29 coal miners killed in the devastating explosion at Upper Big Branch mine.

As thousands waited, hoping for any word someone might have survived Monday's blast, life in coal country chugged on, men trudging underground day and night to fill the trucks and trains that haul away coal around the clock.

Mining is a way of life here. So is death.

Just miles from where families gathered to wait for news, a peddler of mining gear did brisk business and tired miners covered in coal dust picked up pizzas at the end of their shifts. In the quiet, humble neighborhoods that hug the Big Coal River, the work never stopped.

"When the World Trade Center was bombed, the world didn't shut down," said James Lipford, 38, a miner from Seth who was driving to the V-Mart convenience store early Saturday when he heard the last four bodies had been found deep inside Massey Energy Co.'s mine in Montcoal.

He knew three of those killed and worried all week, but never thought about quitting. After all, he says, coal company shareholders still expect profits. Homeowners expect to be able to turn on their lights with electricity generated by coal. His family expects him to bring home a paycheck so they can buy groceries.

"We go with a heavy heart," he said, "but you have to go."

It was the worst U.S. coal mining disaster since 1970, when an explosion killed 38 in Hyden, Ky.

Seven bodies were pulled from Upper Big Branch immediately after Monday's blast, but dangerous gases forced rescue crews out and it took days for them to get back in. They hoped four miners they had not accounted for might somehow have made it to a refuge chamber stocked with food, water and oxygen, but word came early Saturday that all had been found dead.

Crews realized late Friday they had walked past the four bodies that first day, but could not see them because the air was so smoky and dusty. The massive blast left the inside of the mine a mess of twisted tracks, boulders and debris. Two other miners were injured and one remains hospitalized.

Twenty-eight of those killed worked for Virginia-based Massey and one was a contract worker for the company, which has been under scrutiny since the explosion for a string of safety violations at the mine. CEO Don Blankenship, who was with the families when they learned the miners were dead, has strongly defended the company's record and disputed accusations from miners that he puts coal profits ahead of safety.

Officials have not said what caused the blast, though they believe high levels of methane gas may have played a role. Massey has been repeatedly cited and fined for problems with the system that vents methane and for allowing combustible dust to build up.

President Barack Obama said Saturday that steps must be taken to make sure such an explosion does not happen again.

"We cannot bring back the men we lost," he said in a statement. "What we can do, in their memory, is thoroughly investigate this tragedy and demand accountability."

A team of federal investigators will arrive Monday, but for now the focus is on burying the dead and removing the remaining bodies, a grim process that started Saturday.

A complete list of victims has not been released, but most of the names are public knowledge. In the hollows studded with blooming redbuds, everybody knows everybody, and word spreads fast.

Four funerals were held Friday, with more scheduled for the weekend. Nearly two dozen will follow in the weeks ahead.

At Jarrell's General Merchandise in Dry Creek, clerk Lavon Collins thought about her friends and neighbors and the three dead men she knew, all from the small communities along Clear Fork Road.

"You'll never, ever forget, but you have to go on," Collins said.

Rock Creek barber Mark Aliff came into Jarrell's to buy spray paint and nails so he could add to the hundreds of handmade signs supporting the miners that dot yards, porches and fences across the valley. He knew some of the victims, too, young men whose hair he has cut for nearly 25 years.

"I watched them grow into the coal miners they were today," said Aliff, who woke to blaring ambulance sirens around midnight Friday and nudged his wife awake.

"They got somebody out alive and they were getting him an ambulance is what I was hoping," he said, his voice trailing off.

Aliff hauled the red paint to his shop to write a message aimed at not just the miners' families, but the larger family of the coalfields.

"It's going to say 'God Bless Our Coal Miners and Families' to include everybody else that's not a coal miner but has a friend or somebody that's in the mines," he said. "I want to include everyone."

Here, mining and logging are the most reliable and lucrative ways to earn a living. Coal mining pays well and the work is relatively stable, an attractive option for young men not interested in college.

"A lot of people look at mining as a job for the uneducated, for the impoverished," said Jonathan Word, 21, whose great-grandfather died in a mining explosion decades ago. "But it's just a job, and they've got to support themselves."

Rob Lemon, who works at a mine up the road from Upper Big Branch, thinks about the risks every day. This week has made him think about his wife and daughters, and how it would be for them to live through a disaster like this, waiting a week to learn whether he had lived or died.

"It reminds you of how dangerous it is and it can be," Lemon said. "But we still all have a job to do."

In Whitesville, there is only one restaurant amid the boarded-up stores. And two funeral homes.

Just about everyone in town has a story about a miner who narrowly escaped death underground.

Sticking to the semblance of a routine helps them cope with the latest tragedy.

Click to read full article from Fox News

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JMC Ministries Response

Written by Miranda Caverley

As the great Granddaughter of a Coal Mine worker, my heart goes out to all who lost loved ones in this tragedy.

My Great Grandpa worked in the coal mine for years and barely made enough money to provide for his family. He stood over 6 feet tall but due to the constant bending and being hunched over working in the mines he eventually became permanently hunched over.  My Great Grandpa was a coal mine worker, a preacher and a wonderful man of God. He worked hard just like these men still do to provide Americans electricity and necessities of life. This is one of the most dangerous jobs in our Country and day after day these people go to work in spite of the health risks and the dangers to provide for their families and also for us the U.S citizens.

Let us not forget what has happened not only this past week but all the other mining tragedies that have happened through out the years. They should NOT Be forgotten.

We salute you and thank you the U.S Coal Miner. May God Bless you and keep you safe.

Westboro Baptist Church Is A Cult Spreading a Message of Hate

Click to read original article at Christian News Wire

CHARLESTON, W.V., April 9 /Christian Newswire/ -- On Thursday, April 8, the Westboro Baptist Church showed up in Charleston, West Virginia to protest. They said the Upper Big Branch Coal Mine accident happened because God is punishing America for homosexuality.
One flier said, "God hates WV! The dead miners are in Hell!" Signs proclaimed: "America Is Doomed," "Thank God for Dead Miners," "God Hates Your Tears," "God Hates West Virginia" and "God Hates You."
The Westboro Baptist Church is a cult and is not an evangelical church. They are a cult because they say they speak for God and they do not -- they are false prophets.
It is good to protest on various issues, including homosexuality. However, it is not good to say that God is saying something when He is not.
Whenever people speak, the message must line up with the Bible. We know that the Bible speaks against homosexuality. This is not even a debate.
However, the problem with the Westboro cult is that they personalize their messages against innocent individual soldiers or miners who were just doing their jobs.
Westboro uses the word 'hate' too loosely. They do not talk about forgiveness. Frankly, we are all doomed without the forgiveness of the Lord, even if we are not practicing some big sin.
The innocent miners and soldiers probably do not endorse homosexuality, however, Westboro vilifies them. Also, the miners and soldiers may be fellow Christians.
Steve McConkey, ChristianInvestigator.com President, says "There are definite judgments coming on the United States if we do not repent, especially in regards to America allowing abortion to run rampant. However, the Westboro cult does not speak for God as they individualize their false prophecies against innocent people. If they want to protest homosexuality, go to cities that promote homosexuality, but stay away from innocent victims."
The Westboro Baptist Church has the right to free speech despite their hate-filled speech. They are being used by Satan to make Christians look like false prophets. Also, they give ammunition for anti-Christian forces who are trying to limit Christian free speech.
ChristianInvestigator.com is the new name for UndergroundNews.us. ChristianInvestigator.com, a branch of 4 WINDS, is a news and apologetics ministry located in Madison, Wisconsin. Steve McConkey is the President and works with Olympic track and field athletes.

ChristianInvestigator.com was started for athletes, but the vast number of readers are now non-athletes.

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JMC Ministries Response

This so called “church” only has one purpose: to harass people and spread hate, and it isn’t just adults doing this these people even get young children to participate in picketing U.S soldiers funerals and now  with the West Virginia Coal Mine Tragedy.

They even went as far as suing one Fallen Soldiers father after they picketed his funeral forcing the father to pay their court costs because the Father Tried Suing this “church” for what they did at his sons funeral.

Jesus never sat out on streets or went to peoples funerals and said they burn in hell. Or even that He God hates West Virginia, or even the soldiers that have lost their lives for the freedom those people use so wrongly to spread their hate speech. NO Jesus never did this. He came and showed love, compassion and forgiveness.

This is clearly an example of what Jesus called as false prophets and false teachings. We must pray for these people and the children that are caught up in this hate and damnation judgment of others pray they find the truth  because the TRUTH sets us free.

7 year old boy Returns Stolen Money

Click to read original Story from Fox 59

RICHMOND, IN - A seven year-old boy found a folder full of stolen money cashed from security checks at a local non-profit agency. He knew he couldn't keep it, he said it was the right thing to return the money to its rightful owners.
A seven year-old boy made a huge discovery on the side of Interstate 70 in Richmond. Gregory Payne III, who lives in Catlettsburg, Kentucky was visiting his grandmother in Richmond, Ind. for spring break when he noticed something beyond her backyard.
He said he was cleaning, when he spotted folders beyond the fence near the interstate.
"I thought it was somebody's homework," said Payne.
Inside the folders he found documents and $1400 in cash.
"What would be the right thing to do?" his mother asked.
Gregory told his mom he felt he should return the money. The folders had been stolen from a safe at the non-profit Achieva Resources just a few blocks away. Achieva provides assisted living for the developmentally disabled and helps children with disabilities.
"I would have loved to have kept it but I wanted to do the right thing," said the soft spoken young man.
"The first thing I thought was a seven year-old old boy to be that honest it was amazing," said Dan Stewart, CEO of Achieva.
The money had just been cashed from eight of the disabled residents social security checks. Stewart said some of the money had been deposited in the bank but the cash was meant for spending money for things like food and clothing.
Achieva held a special celebration to thank Gregory for his selfless act returning the money and gave him a $100 reward.
His mom, Stephanie Mann, was extremely proud.
"These people really have very little, so to take anything away from them was so sad, but to be able to give it back was even sweeter," said Stephanie Mann.
Her son clearly felt good about his decision.
Gregory's lesson: "Always do the right thing."

Copyright © 2010, WXIN-TV, Indianapolis

Indiana School Students Fight to Keep Prayer at Graduation

An Indiana public school board is not giving up its school prayer without a fight.

In a rare decision, Greenwood High School is fighting to keep its years-long tradition of holding a student-led prayer during graduation ceremonies.

"For us to just kowtow and just say, 'Yes, sir. Sorry, sir,' well, we're not going to do that," said school board president Joe Farley. "This board is prepared to take on the courts."

In September, members of Greenwood's senior class gathered in the auditorium to vote on whether to include a prayer in their graduation ceremony. The majority of students voted in favor of the prayer. Eric Workman, this year's top-ranked student and expected valedictorian, voted against it.

Last month, hoping to quash the tradition permanently before his May 28 commencement, Workman, now 18, filed a lawsuit with the backing of the Indiana branch of the ACLU against the school district and the high school principal.

This is just one of many similar instances of school-prayer-related controversy unfolding in districts across the country; in almost every case, prayer in school has come up short.

• In 2000, the Supreme Court ruled that students at a Texas public high school could not vote to approve holding student-led prayers over the public address system during school football games.

• In 1992, a Supreme Court ruling outlawed prayers by clergy at public school graduations.

• Non-denominational prayer has also been deemed unconstitutional.

"A lot of these schools, to avoid lawsuits or fights, will settle or change their practices," said Charles Haynes, senior scholar for the Freedom Forum First Amendment Center in Washington, D.C., referencing a case in Florida last year in which a complaint by a student immediately resulted in an apology and reversal in school policy district-wide.

Last month, student-led prayer offered daily through the public address system at Alabama's Alexandria High School stopped after a student questioned its legality.

"A lot of school districts take the path of least resistance," Haynes said.

The Greenwood school board president says he's well aware of what has transpired in other districts. But he said the board, with the support of the community, is prepared to spend tens, perhaps hundreds of thousands of dollars to get a formal ruling from the courts. The school is expected to present its arguments in Indiana's federal Southern District at the end of the month.

"I think one of the reasons why people go along with the flow is you're dealing with a student and taxpayers' money. Then the ACLU gets involved and they're expecting the school to pay for everything, and you don't want to put the funds at risk.  But there just comes a time when you just have to stand up," Farley said.

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Atheist Still Trying to Get “Under God” Out of Pledge Of Allegiance

By Chelsea Schilling
© 2010 WorldNetDaily

At least 40 members of Congress and more than 80,000 Americans are urging a federal appeals court to uphold the constitutionality of the Pledge of Allegiance, including the phrase "under God," according to a constitutional law group.

The American Center for Law and Justice, or ACLJ, filed an amicus brief with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit today. According to the group, the Freedom From Religion Foundation is appealing a lower-court decision that the pledge shouldn't be removed from New Hampshire schools because it embraces patriotism, not religion.

"There is absolutely no legal reason to strike the words 'under God' from the pledge and reject this time-honored tradition," said Jay Sekulow, chief counsel of the ACLJ, which filed an amicus brief in the initial case in federal district court. "Once again this is nothing more than another futile attempt to rewrite history – a legal challenge that has no merit and should be rejected by the appeals court."

The ACLJ filed the amicus brief on behalf of 42 members of Congress: Sens. Sam Brownback and James Inhofe and 40 members of the U.S. House of Representatives: Reps. Robert Aderholt, Todd Akin, Rodney Alexander, Gresham Barrett, Roscoe Bartlett, Rob Bishop, Marsha Blackburn, Roy Blunt, Ken Calvert, Tom Cole, John Abney Culberson, Mario Diaz-Balart, Jeff Flake, Randy Forbes, Trent Franks, Scott Garrett, Phil Gingrey, Jeb Hensarling, Wally Herger, Peter Hoekstra, Walter Jones, Steve King, Jack Kingston, John Kline, Frank Lucas, John McHugh, Donald Manzullo, Jim Marshall, Gary Miller, Jeff Miller, Sue Wilkins Myrick, Mike Pence, Joseph Pitts, Pete Sessions, John Shadegg, John Shimkus, Mark Souder, John Sullivan, Lee Terry and Joe Wilson.

More than 80,000 Americans have signed on to the ACLJ's Committee to Protect "Under God" – including parents of children who attend public schools and wish to recite the Pledge of Allegiance in its entirety.

click to read full article from World Net Daily