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# 8/16/10 Liveprayer's Bill Keller Upset Pres. Obama Endorses "victory mosque" but not his Christian Center
The leader of LivePrayer.com an internet ministry that has over 2.4 million subscribers worldwide reading his Daily Devotional, responds to President Obama's endorsement of the new Islamic ground zero "victory mosque," yet refuses to acknowledge his new 9-11 Christian Center at Ground Zero
August 16, 2010—St Petersburg, Fla. Bill Keller, leader of the world's largest interactive Christian website for 11 years, Liveprayer.com, has harshly criticized President Obama's endorsement of the "ground zero victory mosque," while refusing to acknowledge the opening of his new 9-11 Christian Center at Ground Zero. Keller states, "This President has endorsed a memorial being built by Muslims to their greatest military victory in the 1400 years of Islam, 9/11/2001, yet we have sent numerous correspondence to the White House asking for him to bless our new 9-11 Christian Center at Ground Zero."
Keller goes on, "This is a President who refused to hold any services in the White House for the National Day of Prayer, or any other Christian holiday, yet holds a dinner to commemorate Ramadan? But why would anyone be surprised. After all, the Obama administration is paying for the "ground zero victory mosque" Imam, Feisal Abdul Rauf to go to the Middle East on the US taxpayers dime to raise the $110 million he needs for his "victory mosque!"
On Sunday, September 5th, Keller will open this September the 9-11 Christian Center at Ground Zero as a Christian response to the mosque the Muslims are building just blocks away. Keller said that rather than hold a protest that people will forget an hour after it is over, he wanted to take an ongoing stand against this new mosque in a bold, visible, and meaningful way.
Keller stated that he sees this as an incredible opportunity to take a stand for Christ within a block of the hallowed ground where the World Trade Center Towers once stood, and give people a place where they can come to pray and find true peace and hope at a time when so many lives are in turmoil.
Keller is no stranger to conflict with Islam. In 2007, under pressure from the extremist Muslim group CAIR, Keller's highly rated nightly TV program that ran for 4 1/2 years on a CBS owned station in Tampa, Florida, was canceled by CBS because he refused to stop telling his viewers that "according to the Bible Islam is a 1400-year-old lie from hell, and that history clearly shows Mohammed was a murdering pedophile who propagated his false religion through hatred, violence, and death."
Keller also has numerous fatwas (sentences of death) issued against him for a video he sent in 2006 to Osama Bin Laden that was played worldwide in which Keller encouraged Bin Laden to "renounce the lies of Islam" and come to faith in Jesus Christ.
In asking Keller about what he hopes to accomplish with the new 9-11 Christian Center, he said, "If the Muslims can without conscience build a mosque to propagate their religion of violence and hated a block away from where their Muslim brothers perpetrated the greatest act of terror on US soil, killing 3,000 innocent souls in the process, we can open a place where people can come to hear the truth of the Bible and learn about the peace, love, and saving grace of Jesus Christ"
Keller's 9-11 Christian Center will begin holding services Sunday, September 5th in the ballroom of the New York Marriott through the end of the year. They will move into their permanent facility on January 1st.
About LivePrayer: In August, 1999 Bill Keller launched LivePrayer.com; it has gone on to become the most successful online faith ministry in the history of the internet. LivePrayer is now providing a daily devotional written by Bill Keller for its over 2.4 million e-mail subscribers, while his team of retired pastors responds with personal replies to over 40,000 emails a day, over 70 million in the nearly 11 years since LivePrayer signed on. Information on the ministry is available at www.LivePrayer.com
When Does Religion Become
an Unhealthy Covering for Many People Who Suffer Real Problems?
Kansas
City, KS—We’ve all heard people say, "I’m a very spiritual person so why do I
feel so bad? Or, "I don’t think
religious people are supposed to feel bad or down. We’re supposed to feel good
all of the time, right”?
Not true, according to certified professional counselor Dr. Helen B. McIntosh,
author of Messages To Myself: Overcoming a Distorted Self-Image (Beacon
Hill Press, Kansas). As she counsels individuals one thing has become clear. People
sometimes use religion as a crutch and cover for what is going on inside their
hearts.
Says McIntosh, "They mask over difficult issues and real problems such as depression
and anxiety and use religion as a way to hide what is really going on. They
consider themselves ‘religious’ or ‘spiritual’ but they aren’t taking care of
the real needs of their hearts and the way they think about themselves and how
they talk to others.”
McIntosh
says that it’s not always recognizable because they act like religious people
in front of others but they are in great pain. "I think there is a real problem
in the faith community in how individuals treat themselves, their families and others
around them. There is an expectation that those in the faith community should
have it all together. But some individuals use religious principles like mechanical
"sticky notes” pasted on their foreheads and unfortunately it becomes a
covering. How can we stand out and
not blend into the culture by the way we that treat our own hearts? What kind
of impact could we have on our families if we owned up to our difficulties
rather than pretend we’re okay?
McIntosh
believes there is an undercurrent of thought that church and an individual’s problems
should be kept apart. She believes that many individuals don’t want others,
including those they go to church with, to know they are struggling with some
very personal issues, maybe even those that the church wouldn’t "approve of.”
She believes they may not feel like sharing due to a lack of emotional safety
in churches.
But oddly, outside the church, celebrities proudly talk about how their
psychologist or psychiatrist has helped them through rough times. Why don’t
those of the faith talk about this openly as well? Would they see more healing
and wholeness in their lives?
Dr.
McIntosh’s work is not limited to those of the faith. She has worked in the
public school system with students and parents as well as faculty. She believes
better and healthier lives come from a unique way to clarify our thought life.
Her life work and book is counseling-based and she offers expertise to people
who are confused, hurting, and ready to give up on parts of their life. Dr. McIntosh has often been called a
"language coach,” helping people learn messages for their own hearts as well as
for their relationships.
Boston—The Committee for Accuracy In
Middle East Reporting in America has been paying close attention to the events
at the Presbyterian Church (USA)'s General Assembly in Minneapolis, with a
particular emphasis on the report submitted by the Middle East Study Committee
(MESC). The original version of this report offered a highly partisan and
distorted view of the Arab-Israeli conflict.
This is not what the PC(USA)'s General Assembly asked for
when it created the Middle East Study Committee in 2008.
CAMERA is heartened by the General Assembly's efforts to
perfect the report. The General Assembly's committee on Middle East Peacemaking
engaged in a good-faith effort to correct the problems with the MESC report.
Problems remain, but if PC(USA) leaders follow the process outlined in the
overture passed by the General Assembly today, the church will embark on a
process by which it can arrive at a comprehensive—and factual—understanding of all the factors contributing to the continued existence of
this tragic conflict.
This is what the PC(USA)'s General Assembly asked for in
2008.
CAMERA hopes that this is what the church will receive in
the years ahead.
Andrea Levin
Executive Director
CAMERA (Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting
in America)
www.camera.org
For more information, contact:
Andrea Levin, CAMERA Executive Director, 617-789-3672
Dexter Van Zile, CAMERA Christian Media Analyst, 617-851-0912
###
5/24/2010 Every Moment Counts: New Writing Contest Invites Readers to Appreciate
Life
The Last 72 Invites Public to Send in Stories
Somerset, NJ—What would you do if
you were told you had only 72 hours to live?Not an easy question to answer, but that's exactly what
participants in "The Last 72” Writing Contest must do.Currently run and
sponsored by the Emmy award-winning Everest Production Company and The Fountain:A Magazine of Scientific and Spiritual Thought, the
competition invites writers to describe what it would be like if they suddenly
had to live out three days as though they were their last.
The Last 72 rises from the premise that life is a
gift, and that most people take for granted the amount of time they have on
this earth.As The Fountain's editor Hakan Yesilova
explains, "We all have things about our past or present that we'd like to set
right.But what changes would we
make today if we realized the
opportunity called life were running out?”
In addition to having their work published and
winning up to $5,000 in cash prizes,
finalists will also have the chance to star in an upcoming television program
called THE LAST 72.Part social
experiment, part soul-stirring docu-series, the show will follow a new person
each week as they race against the clock to live out what truly matters to them
most.And to those who think death
is too gloomy a topic for TV, think again."This is about uplifting people. By acknowledging their own
mortality, they'll be equipping themselves to appreciate just how precious life
is," says Everest's Nasuhi Yurt, executive producer for the series.
So, how should writers submitting to The Last 72
seize the judges' attention?Contest organizers stress, zoom in on your real life and be
specific.According to Yesilova,
"We're not looking for bucket list fantasies. Who do you need to forgive?Will your family be taken care of? What
actions would allow you to look back and say 'I'm finally at peace with how I've
led my life.'”
Yurt frames it this way, "As you describe what you
would do for your own Last 72 and why, get personal. How would those things
change your actual life?And
imagine what we would see if our cameras were right there filming you accomplish
it!”
Vatican Observatory iPhone App Features Doubleday
Religion Author
The Vatican Observatory has launched its first iPhone
app aimed at the 1.5 billion Catholics worldwide and all others seeking access
to daily inspirational and devotional messages. This app from the
Vatican-chartered institution is called Daily
Sermonettes. It comes loaded with daily and weekly audio and video
inspirational and devotional content delivered by prominent Catholic television
personality and Doubleday Religion author Father Michael Manning, an ordained
and papally recognized Catholic priest. Each video session is approximately
five minutes long and the app includes bonus transcripts, scripture references,
insightful commentary, the capability to star favorite sermons for quick recall
and the ability to send emails and questions directly to Father Michael.
Introduction of the Vatican Observatory iPhone app
follows on Pope Benedict XVI’s recent encouragement of all parts of the Vatican
to reach people worldwide through new technology.
Father Michael Manning is the author of Fifteen Faces of God: A Quest to Know God through the Parables of
Jesus (Doubleday
Religion, 3/16/2010, $18.00), as well as founder and president of Wordnet
Productions. His television program, The Word in the World, is seen
weekly on the Trinity Broadcasting Network, putting his message into more than
200,000 households across the country. He has also served as high school teacher, vocation
director, provincial, prison chaplain, and pastor. Visit his website at
www.WordNet.tv.
For
publicity inquires on Father Michael
Manning or his book Fifteen Faces of God, please
contact:
Johanna Inwood, Marketing Manager and
Publicist for Doubleday Religion
1/12/10 Left-wing lesbian author comes out as a Jesus freak and claims power to feed the hungry, heal the sick and raise the dead
San Francisco, Calif.—In the arguments among
Christian evangelicals and emergents, mainlines and non-denominationals,
conservatives and liberals, there are prophets who point to something truly
fundamental: Jesus. Few are better messengers than writer Sara Miles, whose
midlife conversion transformed her from an atheist into a Jesus-loving activist
feeding thousands of hungry people a week. A "free-range Christian,” less interested
in doctrine than in doing, Miles takes literally the commission given to Jesus and
his followers, and gives others hope that, as she writes, "this thing is real.”
Releasing this February, JESUS FREAK: Feeding *
Healing * Raising The Dead (Jossey-Bass,
a Wiley imprint),tells the gritty,
sometimes funny, always moving stories of those who courageously respond to
Jesus’ call to feed the hungry, heal the sick, cast out demons, cleanse the
ritually unclean, forgive sins, and even raise the dead. "It doesn’t take a
special kind of person,” she writes, "– the selfish and obtuse are welcome,
too. It doesn’t take a lot of equipment, or training – little kids can lead.
Jesus is still with us, which means we can say yes to God’s call, without
knowing what the outcome will be.”
Miles,
author of 2007’s widely praised memoir, Take
This Bread, shows, in vivid, heartbreakingly honest prose, how the ordinary
people around her are transformed by taking up God’s work in the world. Publishers Weekly raves, "Miles’s obvious
homiletic gifts infuse the narrative: startling metaphors (Jesus as promiscuous
Boyfriend "who’ll go with anyone”) combine with honest self-reflection and a
wry sense of humor, prodding the reader to take ownership of Christ’s commands
to serve, feed, and heal.”
A
guide for everyone who yearns for "life, abundant,”, JESUS FREAK offers readers an inspiring and empowering reading of
the Gospel, and a glimpse of what is possible when Jesus’ teachings are acted
upon.
Sara
Miles is the founder and director
of The Food Pantry, and serves as Director of Ministry at St. Gregory of Nyssa
Episcopal Church in San Francisco. Her other books include Take This Bread:
A Radical Conversion, and her writing has appeared in the New York Times
Magazine, the New Yorker, and on National Public Radio. She is
available for commentary on poor people who are sick of charity, church people
who are sick of church, and gay people who love Jesus. Her
website is: www.saramiles.net.
To request an interview or
complimentary review copy of the book, please contact publicist Erin Lane Beam
by telephone at (415) 782-3213 or by email at ebeam@wiley.com.
Media Contact: Erin Lane Beam, (415)
782-3213 / ebeam@wiley.com
###
11/16/09 Medical Doctors Confirm "Divine Healing" Cases at the 6th International Christian Medical Conference The 6th International Christian Medical Conference was held at the President Hotel on October 30 and 31, 2009 under the auspices of Ukraine Organizing Committee of WCDN (World Christian Doctors Network), whose founder and board chairman is Dr. Jaerock Lee, an evangelical pastor and the author of many Christian titles including "The Power of God"(978-1554522576).
This 6th Conference was attended by 400 doctors and medical professionals from 30 nations including USA and Italy, and was represented by many medical doctors from Azerbaijan, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and many other Russian-speaking nations.
During the Conference, an Australian Doctor Irene Jacovou presented a healing case of a 68-year-old man, as the most outstanding case presented. In 2003, he was diagnosed to have severe emphysema, asthma and alpha 1 anti-trypsin deficiency, and had a bilateral lung transplant and received immunosuppressive therapy. In 2008, he noticed a skin lesion on the top of the right shoulder, which was later found to be a malignant tumor. He was diagnosed with skin cancer and was surgically treated, but it recurred. In October, 2008, cancer cells metastasized to chest and lungs, and he was sentenced to live just a few months longer because of this cancer. In winter of that same year he attended a Christian healing prayer meeting and tumor regression started. All the tumors in his skin were gone through fervent prayers, and the CT scan showed that lung metastases disappeared.
A Ukrainian Doctor Larisa presented the case of healing of hepatitis C, confirmed by the person of the case appearing at the conference firsthand and testifying to his healing. Another Australian doctor Mieke Kuiper presented the case of healing of eclampsia and subarachnoid hemorrhage by prayer. Two Korean doctors presented the cases of healing of the infected cystic mass in the submandibular area and the retroperitoneal necrotizing fascitis due to perforated acute appendicitis, with scientific and medical data confirming the healing cases. In addition, many cases of the healing of various diseases including schizophrenia, pancreonecrosis, and AIDS were presented at the conference.
Dan Wooding, Founder and International Director of Assist News Ministry said, "At the same time that Ukrainian candidates are battling each other for votes in the upcoming Presidential election, Christian doctors gathering in Kiev, the country’s capital for a "Spirituality and Medicine” conference, have already cast their vote–for "miracles.”
WCDN was organized to medically analyze divine healing cases performed by God, clarify the data before and after the healing and testify with that data as to existence of God and the authenticity of the Bible. WCDN aims to work with intellectual people including medical doctors and scientists. They have held annual international Christian medical conferences in Seoul, Korea, Chennai, India, Cebu City, Philippines, Miami, USA, Trondheim, Norway, Kiev, Ukraine. www.wcdn.org
11/4/09 The long-awaited—and completely impartial—biography of the leading voice in Evangelicalism
Rick Warren is arguably the most
influential man in American religion today. Megachurch pastor, friend of world
leaders, and trend-setting spiritual entrepreneur, he is widely recognized as
the new public face of evangelical Christianity in America.
Now,in thishighly anticipatedbiography, Prophet of
Purpose: The Life of Rick Warren(Doubleday Religion, on sale November 3, 2009), award-winning author and
journalist Jeffery Sheler traces the roadWarren has traveled, the influences in his life,
his trials and tribulations, and the opposition he has encountered along the
way.
Sheler, who had unprecedented
access to Warren and those closest to him, presents an intimate andobjective portrait of Warren as a
man of faith and vision but also of flesh and blood and human foibles–a pastor,
communicator, philanthropist, and family man who is driven by a sense of divine
purpose.
Unlike any book before it,Prophet
of Purpose brings Warren and his mission to life and provides
a provocative glimpse into the potential future of Christianity in America.
"A compelling read about a man in
the middle of so many of the issues of our time.”
—Senator
John F. Kerry
"Prophet
of Purpose is essential for anyone who wants to understand America’s most
prominent pastor and the tectonic shifts on the religious landscape he
represents.”
Print Page
Kansas
City, KS—We’ve all heard people say, "I’m a very spiritual person so why do I
feel so bad? Or, "I don’t think
religious people are supposed to feel bad or down. We’re supposed to feel good
all of the time, right”?
Somerset, NJ—What would you do if
you were told you had only 72 hours to live?
San Francisco, Calif.—In the arguments among
Christian evangelicals and emergents, mainlines and non-denominationals,
conservatives and liberals, there are prophets who point to something truly
fundamental: Jesus. Few are better messengers than writer Sara Miles, whose
midlife conversion transformed her from an atheist into a Jesus-loving activist
feeding thousands of hungry people a week. A "free-range Christian,” less interested
in doctrine than in doing, Miles takes literally the commission given to Jesus and
his followers, and gives others hope that, as she writes, "this thing is real.”
The 6th International Christian Medical Conference was held at the President Hotel on October 30 and 31, 2009 under the auspices of Ukraine Organizing Committee of 