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--snip-- Global Warming One of the most common refrains about the environment from the news media goes something like this: [insert disaster here] is coming if we don’t stop [insert bad thing some scientists claim we’re doing to destroy the earth]. Recently, most of these reports are somehow tied into global warming. While some of the evidence suggests that the earth has warmed recently (see sidebar for information), many scientists build their conclusions upon a faulty view of earth’s history. If we start with the Bible, we know how old the earth truly is, what happened in history (e.g., the...

10. Gross, not net—as usual! 9. Hush Money 8. Casino winnings! 7. For voice lessons for worship team!

A powerful alliance of Evangelical Christians and other religious groups is challenging traditional views of environmental activism by promoting a documentary about global warming in churches across America. The group aims to convince congregations of all denominations that damage to the environment is a moral and spiritual rather than political issue that requires urgent action at every level. The Great Warming, a Canadian production narrated by Keanu Reeves and Alanis Morissette, is being pitched in particular at the powerful conservative Christian constituency, which was credited with helping to re-elect President George W Bush in 2004. Its release is timed to...

As Christians, we should be concerned about our effect on our environment. God appointed man to be the steward of this world (Genesis 1:28), not the destroyer of it. However, we should not allow environmentalism to become a form of idolatry, where the “rights” of an inanimate planet and its non-human creatures are held in higher esteem than God (Romans 1:25). With global warming, as with any other topic, it is crucial to understand what the facts are, who those facts come from, how they are interpreted, and what the spiritual implications should be. A careful look at global warming,...

Evangelicals, Scientists, Environmentalists Fight for Endangered Species Act Saturday, Mar. 11, 2006 Posted: 7:26:22AM EST As the Senate prepares to take up revisions to the Endangered Species Act this month, evangelicals, scientists, environmentalists, and environmental-evangelical-scientists launched a nationwide effort to raise awareness among their supporters about the threat to the landmark law and to urge policymakers to preserve scientific protections in the act. The Noah Alliance, an interfaith group of Evangelical Christian, Protestant and Jews, began running about $200,000 of advertisements on hundreds of radio, print and television media since Mar. 8. Organizers hope the ads, which will run through...

Green Evangelicals Stand Against Global Warming Thursday, Feb. 9, 2006 Posted: 12:58:40PM EST WASHINGTON – Evangelicals are newly rising up to the good-old, biblical commandment to be stewards of God’s creation by joining the environmentalists’ call to stop global warming. “Love of God, love of neighbor, and the demands of stewardship are more than enough reason for evangelical Christians to respond to the climate change problem with moral passion and concrete action,” states a document recently signed by 86 top evangelical leaders and representatives. The document, aptly entitled “The Evangelical Climate Initiative,” was released on Wednesday at a press conference...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A group of 85 evangelical Christian leaders on Wednesday backed legislation opposed by the White House to reduce carbon dioxide emissions, kicking off a campaign to mobilize religious conservatives to combat global warming. The group which included prominent pastors, Christian college presidents, religious broadcasters and writers, also unveiled a full-page advertisement to run in Thursday's New York Times and a television advertisement they hope to screen across the country. "With God's help, we can stop global warming for our kids, our world and our Lord," the television spot declared. The launch of the campaign represented a possible...

The National Association of Evangelicals (NAE) is no longer the organization it was only a few years ago. Its Washington office has been trending green. Risk Policy Report wrote on October 25 that NAE had been planning soon to release a policy statement on global warming that would call for mandatory greenhouse gas controls. There is now more reason to hope that reason and NAE traditional values – rather than unproven science – will win the day. NAE president, the Reverend Ted Haggard, commented in March 2005 to Laurie Goodstein, a reporter for the New York Times: "The question is,...

In their long and frustrated efforts pushing Congress to pass legislation on global warming, environmentalists are gaining a new ally. With increasing vigor, evangelical groups that are part of the base of conservative support for leading Republicans are campaigning for laws that would reduce carbon dioxide emissions, which scientists have linked with global warming. In the latest effort, the National Association of Evangelicals, a nonprofit organization that includes 45,000 churches serving 30 million people across the country, is circulating among its leaders the draft of a policy statement that would encourage lawmakers to pass legislation creating mandatory controls for carbon...

Cashiers resident John Edwards still fumes when he recalls how a developer cut more than 100 trees from the mountainside above his home, a woodsy grove where he once walked his dog daily. “He left absolutely no living thing on the lot, no mountain laurel, no rhododendron. It is a gross abuse of God’s creation,” Edwards said. “Natural resources are to be used but they are to be used wisely and replenished when possible and protected from abuse.” Edwards — both a conservative and a Christian — is breaking the mold that increasingly pairs “environment” with “liberal” and “moral” with...

"We didn't create this Earth," President George W. Bush said at his abbreviated Earth Day visit to East Tennessee last week, "but it is our obligation to protect it." Quite the contrast with conservative icon Ronald Reagan's pronounce-ment, "Trees cause more pollution than automobiles do." Bush's words grabbed me when I heard them over the radio while sitting in Cades Cove last Friday watching the weather wash away the president's visit. When the most conservative president in 25 years talks about protecting the environment, times have obviously changed. It's not just the compassionate conservative from Crawford, Texas, talking about the...

"If you chance to come upon a bird’s nest, in any tree or on the ground, with young ones or eggs and the mother sitting upon the young or upon the eggs, you shall not take the mother with the young; you shall let the mother go, but the young you may take to yourself; that it may go well with you, and that you may live long." -- Deuteronomy 22:6-7, RSV This admonition explains the evangelical view of Creation. (In the secular world we say "environment," which, as best I can tell, means "Creation minus people.") On the one...

The Beast in the Garden,by environmental issues writer David Baron is a true story,which presents the background of the first (known)fatal human/cougar encounter,which took place in the Boulder,Colorado area in 1991. The incident was pretty much "buried" by the national media,because the First Gulf War had just begun,but even the local newspapers relegated it to the inside pages. The residents of Boulder-one of the most liberal cities in the United States-valued wildlife so much,they let deer roam their streets and strip their gardens.When the presence of so many deer brought cougars,they rejoiced ! When the cougars began hunting in the...

Voters in November leapt before they looked when approving Proposition 71, an initiative that creates a $3 billion California stem cell research institute headed by a 29-member oversight committee. In coming days, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and other elected officers will finish appointments to the committee. Those picks could determine whether this landmark research effort ends up financing medical breakthroughs or boondoggles. Called the Independent Citizens Oversight Committee, this panel will have tremendous power but little accountability. It will be the final grant maker on $3 billion in research and building funds over 10 years. The committee - which meets Dec....

What you will be doing each day of this thread is an ancient form of praying the Scriptures. The first reflection of the day has somethings to do with the general topic. The second reflection of the day may be a reflection on the Readings for that day. (I am pre-dating these and will post several each day so that the dates will coincide with the Gospel readings. Sorry about this -- I just got the materials yesterday.) We simply read slowkt=y until something catches us. We takj to God about it for as long as it lasts. Then we...

Al Gore, billionaire Socialist George Soros, and John McCain have hatched a plan which according to Americans For Balanced Energy Choices is designed to: - Decrease your disposable income by as much as 30% - Increase unemployment by as much as 9% and, - Increase Inflation by as much as 27% This is no folk tale. It's a very real and imminent threat called the McCain-Lieberman Climate Stewardship Bill. This bill contains many of the dangerous and disastrous provisions of the international climate treaty negotiated in Kyoto years ago that the Senate rejected by a 95-0 vote. And -- like...

Preaching abundant living The Rev. Della Reese Lett teaches lessons of material success and personal empowerment in her own church. Della Reese, who played a down-to-earth heavenly being on "Touched by an Angel" isn't acting as she stands in front of a congregation on Sundays in West Hollywood. She's preaching — in her own church. And her message has no mention of sin, no mention of good and evil and no endorsement of sacrifice if it means doing without. She talks about abundant living, not in the hereafter but in the here and now.

June 23 — Is there virtue to investing in vice? For some people it can be either a lifestyle, or an investment philosophy. ...in Australia, investors have legally gotten in on the world’s oldest profession. The Daily Planet Bordello began trading publicly last month, with Hollywood madam Heidi Fleiss on hand. Shares have nearly doubled since the debut. And, flush with cash, the company says it now wants to build a theme park in Las Vegas. But though he’s the manager of the Vice Mutual Fund, Dan Ahrens doesn’t see much potential in brothels. “We’re not looking for bad areas,”...

Forest Plan Involves Timber Co. Contracts Sat Mar 8, 8:53 AM ET By MATTHEW DALY, Associated Press Writer WASHINGTON - The Bush administration is confident it has found a novel, inexpensive way to clear overgrown forests and prevent catastrophic wildfires. Critics say it's a blatant giveaway to timber companies. The plan, approved last month as part of a giant spending bill, allows logging companies to cut large, commercially valuable trees in national forests in exchange for clearing smaller, more fire-prone trees and brush. Known as "stewardship contracting," the approach allows the U.S. Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management (news...

This is our own corner of Free Republic where homeschoolers can discuss what curriculum we use, vent when needed, share our successes, compare notes, alert each other to things we find on the internet, and vent some more. Homeschool Forum Thread #1Homeschool Forum Thread #2 Free Republic links to education related articles (thread#8)