FRC held a Family Policy Lecture yesterday featuring Pastor Steven Khoury, who offered his firsthand account of Christian ministry in Bethlehem and Jerusalem. You can listen to Pastor Khoury’s remarks below.
Persecution of self-identified Christians has become a pandemic in the developing world. For Catholics, Evangelical Protestants, Copts and others, making the simple assertion that they follow Jesus Christ can lead to abuse, eviction, disfigurement, and far too often death.
Today at FRC, we heard a remarkable and very probing lecture by Dr. Patrick Sookhdeo, a profound theologian and himself a former Muslim, about the way the church is responding to the threat of radical Islam both abroad and here in the United States.
Dr. Sookhdeo drew a striking parallel between the church in Germany during the rise of Nazism and the way Christians should be responding to the Islamists who would undermine the very foundations of representative self-government and religious liberty.
Christians are called to love and minister to Muslims and also stand against an agenda which is inherently oppressive and even violent. Dr. Sookhdeo offered wise counsel about how we can do both. You can watch his lecture here.
In addition, there are excellent summaries of anti-Christian persecution worldwide in The Catholic Thing and the Voice of the Martyrs newsroom.
ProLifeCon is only two days away. Throughout this week, I have featured Ryan Bomberger, Lila Rose, Rep. Chris Smith, Michael Clancy, and Samuel Armas. You can still register for ProLifeCon, and join other pro-life online activists throughout the country to hear our amazing lineup of speakers.
Collin Raye, country music superstar and spokesman for the Terri Schiavo Life & Hope Network, will be one of our featured speakers at ProLifeCon. Raye has sold over eight million albums and has been nominated five times as country musics Male Vocalist of the Year. In 2001, he was presented with the Humanitarian of the Year award by country music legend, Clint Black.
Raye, in his role as spokesman for the Terri Schiavo Life & Hope Network, is focused on helping families and loved ones who are in the same situation as Terri Schiavo was in 2005. Rayes family has had their own experience with end-of-life issues, when his granddaughter died of an undiagnosed neurological condition in 2010.
There is no doubt that Raye will empower the audience with his story and the work of the Terri Schiavo Life & Hope Network.
On Monday, ProLifeCon will be taking place at FRC. We have a pretty awesome lineup of speakers, and there is no doubt that you will not want to miss this event. You can host ProLifeCon on your blog as well. Just copy the code below the line, and you will be able to share ProLifeCon with your readers.
**The stream will be available on Monday, January 23rd beginning at 8:20 a.m. and the live stream will end at 11:30 a.m.**
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ProLifeCon is only three days away. Throughout this week, I have featured Ryan Bomberger, Lila Rose, Reps. Chris Smith and Vicky Hartzler. You can still register for ProLifeCon, and join other pro-life online activists throughout the country to hear our amazing lineup of speakers.
We are fortunate to have Michael Clancy, photographer of the famous Hand of Hope picture, and the baby featured in that photo, Samuel Armas, who is now twelve years old, and his mother, Julie Armas. The Hand of Hope picture was captured in 1999, during a spina bifida corrective surgical procedure. Samuel Armas was only 21 weeks in utero during that picture. While Clancy was documenting this surgery for a USA Today feature, he had the opportunity to capture Samuel Armas reach his hand out into the world from the womb. It is a powerful picture that has stirred emotion all over the world.
Clancy is the author of Hand of Hope: The Story Behind the Picture, which will be available for purchase and signing at ProLifeCon.
ProLifeCon is only five days away. We have an exciting lineup of speakers, and one of the goals is to empower online activists to bring awareness to the policies impacting the pro-life community in Washington.
We are excited to have Rep. Chris Smith from New Jersey as one of our speakers. As co-chair of the Congressional Pro-Life Caucus, Rep. Smith has been instrumental in advocating for pro-life legislation in the House of Representatives. Rep. Smith has also been a strong voice against human trafficking, and as co-chair of the Congressional Caucus on Human Trafficking, he has successfully written and passed into law The Trafficking Victims Protection Act of 2000.
Rep. Vicky Hartzler from Missouri will also be joining ProLifeCon as a featured speaker. Rep. Hartzler was elected to serve the Fourth District of Missouri in 2010, and she has been a tireless advocate for pro-life issues. She supported H.R. 3, No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act, which was sponsored by Rep. Chris Smith. Rep. Hartzler is also a member of the Congressional Pro-Life Caucus and Congressional Caucus on Human Trafficking.
ProLifeCon has more exciting speakers who will be featured throughout this week. Click here to register today and learn how you can spread the pro-life message to others.
This years ProLifeCon promises to be another exciting time to unite pro-life activists from across the country to become active online and bring awareness to the sanctity of life. We have an exciting line-up of speakers, who will not only educate you on emerging technologies to help spread the message, but make you aware of the issues impacting the pro-life community in 2012.
We are grateful to have Ryan Bomberger, Chief Creative Officer of The Radiance Foundation as a speaker at this years ProLifeCon. Ryan will no doubt inspire you with his story, as well as with his vast knowledge on utilizing the internet to educate the community on adoption.
Ryans story is also inspiring. His biological mother was raped, but chose to continue her pregnancy and gave him life. He was adopted as a baby and grew up in a loving Christian family. Ryan has won an Emmy Award for his work. He founded The Radiance Foundation, along with his wife, Bethany, and has been active with the pro-life community with the TooManyAborted.com billboard/web campaigns, which advocates for adoption within the black community.
You dont want to miss ProLifeCon, as there are many more exciting speakers who will be featured throughout the week. Click here to register today and learn how you can spread the pro-life message to others.
In Saturdays New York Times, Columbia professor Jeffrey D. Sachs made the rather audacious claim, that [t]he young people in Zuccotti Park and more than 1,000 cities have started America on a path to renewal. [emphasis added]
To give Sachs and the entire Occupy movement the benefit of the doubt, we might try to view the chaos, mayhem, rape, murder, and general slovenliness as unfortunate distractions from this intended renewal.
Hypothetically, Ivy League professors, Occupyers, and conservative policy makers should be able to agree on a few points: Our great country needs renewal. We can tangibly mark American renewal or decline by measuring things like high school graduation rates and childhood poverty.
But our suggested paths towards renewal differ. Sachs calls for a vast influx of spending on education and other domestic programs. Occupiers held up a myriad of signs calling for jobs, justice, education… and weed.
But the facts seem to lead us down a different patha path that values family stability, over government-funded programs. The FRCs Marriage & Religion Research Institute is poised to release its Second Annual Index of Family Belonging and Rejection, this Thursday. The Index delves into the statistical details behind the bold claim that family structure actually matters to a childs education and success.
Robert Frost once wrote about two paths in a yellow wood. Our paths towards renewal obviously diverge. At the moment, the path toward family stability is the one less traveled by. Taking it could make all the difference.
To attend Thursdays event, please register here.
Is American higher education soon to be federalized? We know that diversity of choice in higher education is lacking? One independent study of the Social Science division at the University of Oregon found one registered Republican on the Faculty. Join us for a Family Policy Lecture on Wednesday, May 11, 2011, as we focus on the destructive potential of new “state authorization” regulations that are key aspects of the Obama Administration’s higher education reforms. What else is likely to be imposed on American higher education? And what will the GOP’s response be? Is doing nothing better than something?
The featured speakers include:
This event will take place at our headquarters in Washington, DC, and lunch will be provided.
Click here for more information or to register.
On April 11, 2011, Family Research Council will be hosting a Family Policy Lecture about how socialists are reshaping Spain. Ignacio Arsuaga will be the featured speaker, and will also be releasing his new book, The Zapatero Project: Chronicle of an attack on society. This lecture should be particularly interesting, considering Arsuaga’s work in defending human rights through his work as President of HazteOir.org.
You can register for this lecture, which will also be available by webcast, by clicking here.