LUTHERAN LEADER HITS 'GAY PRIDE' DECREE—Dr. A.L. Barry, president of the 2.6-million-member Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod, is "concerned and disappointed" by Pres. Clinton's proclamation making June "Gay and Lesbian Pride Month." (6/28 C. News) He said: "I think it's the president's use of the word 'pride,' more than anything else, that gives me pause….In invoking the notion of 'pride,' he is publicly advocating homosexuality as an appropriate, even a commendable, orientation for one's life." His own SBC sharply rebuked him at its Atlanta meeting. One SBC pastor said: "The president is proclaiming a sinful lifestyle not only as moral and acceptable but that we ought to have pride in it."

UNITED RELIGIONS BY NEXT JUNE—Episcopal Bishop William Swing is working hard to set up a united body of world religions, paralleling the United Nations (see 4/1 CC). At a recent interfaith conference in Jerusalem he attended, along with Tibetan Buddhist leader the Dalai Lama, he said: "…[R]eligions have to meet on a daily, permanent basis. The problems, among religions and in religions, are everyday problems, and they are not going to be solved…or helped, until we finally have some kind of 'United Religions,' that will parallel the United Nations, so that we can carry out negotiations." (6/28 Christian News) Swing believes the Catholic Church will cooperate with, though not join, a body of world religions. His goal for the UR is next June.

IBFNA RESOLUTION ON THE PROTECTION OF THE SECOND AMENDMENT (Paraphrased excerpts)—The liberal media seeks a scapegoat on which it can blame school shootings and other bizarre and malicious acts, and scorns our Second Amendment right to bear arms. The Bible says it was not Cain's weapon, but Cain who murdered his brother. It does not condemn inanimate objects such as guns for the violence in our sin-sick country, but rather the individuals with depraved sin natures. Old Testament saints rebuilt Jerusalem's walls with a sword in one hand and a tool in the other, and the New Testament recognizes the right to own and bear arms (Lk. 22:36-38). Armed citizens are a deterrent to crime.

ABC EXPELS HOMOSEXUAL CHURCHES—The recent convention of American Baptist Churches USA ended with deep division caused by the decision to cast out four California churches for their pro-homosexual leanings (7/5 Chr. News). The liberal ABC-USA and the SBC are members of the apostate Baptist World Alliance.

JUBILEE 2000: FORGIVE THIRD WORLD DEBT?—A debt-relief plan to bail out the world's poorest nations calls for rich nations to cancel the $127-200 billion debt. The World Council of Churches at its eighth meeting in Zimbabwe last Dec. noted "the urgent need" to cancel the debts to enable poor countries "to enter the new millennium with a fresh start." Forced redistribution of wealth (steal from haves and give to have-nots) is communism. Some of the poor nations are/were led by dictators and thugs who borrowed heavily to finance Marxist revolutions.

WORLDLY MUSIC—Gordon Sears (6/25 Sword of the Lord) says: "It is surprising to me how many Christians ask 'what do you mean by worldly?' when speaking of today's music. Only a few years ago Christians didn't ask that question—they knew exactly what worldliness meant. The entrance of Contemporary Christian Music has brought a great amount of confusion as to what worldly means….Worldly simply means 'of or like the world.' Satan is called 'the god of this world.' It is his purpose to blind the minds of people so that they do not understand nor receive the truth of the gospel of Christ."

WCF RESOLUTION ON CLINTON ADMINISTRATION—We, the delegates of the 1999 World Congress of Fundamentalists strongly deplore and detest the abominable personal conduct and immorality of President William Jefferson Clinton. We believe that such behavior, left unchecked, will bring the judgment of God on America. The President, in repeatedly lying to the citizenry and dragging the nation through degradation has significantly diminished international respect for the United States of America. His designation of June 1999 as Gay-Lesbian Pride Month has further opened the door for God's judgment. We deplore his appointment of Ambassador Hormel, a self-confessed sodomite, to represent the U.S. in Luxembourg. We believe that, if he has compromised American national security by dealing inappropriately with the Chinese government to gain personal political advantage, he has betrayed us all. Incredibly, these are the actions of a President posing as a professing Christian believer. In spite of our embarrassment and shame in the President's conduct and performance we sincerely implore every Bible-believing Christian to pray for his soul and for his conversion to Christ.

POPE WELCOMES CHARISMATIC RENEWAL—The Catholic Church has a long history of support for the charismatic movement dating back to Vatican II (1965). Since 1967 an estimated 10 million Catholics have been touched by charismatic renewal, though it has died down in many RC churches since the 1970s. Last year Pope John Paul II said he welcomes this "renewal" in the Catholic Church. The 7/99 Charisma says the Presentation BVM Catholic Church near Philadelphia is having a "charismatic revival," a step beyond "renewal." It features tongues-speaking, holy laughter, a worship band, dancing nuns, and visitors lying prone on the floor.

EVANGELICALS AND CATHOLICISM—WCC leaders for several decades have declared the pope of Rome to be the natural head of the united church. Recent statements (e.g., ECT 1 and ECT 2) by noted new evangelicals, have recognized Roman Catholics as Christians. Jack Van Impe has gone even further, positively declaring that Pope John Paul II is a fundamentalist [Dr. Bill Jackson]. Other Protestant leaders more recently voiced similar opinions. The World Congress of Fundamentalists, July 5-8, 1999, Greenville, SC passed the following excellent resolution regarding "ROME," warning of this apostasy: "Whereas there have been recent declarations by so-called Protestant church leaders concerning their proposed acceptance of the Pope of Rome as head of the universal church, And, whereas this preparedness to accept the Pope's authority as a 'gift' to all the churches reveals how deceived the professing church has become since the Roman church clearly has not changed its pernicious doctrines, its idolatrous practices or its blasphemous services, The delegates to this congress deplore this apostasy, rejecting the Pope who is a usurper and deceiver, and reaffirm belief that the Lord Jesus Christ is the only true Head of the church. Our allegiance is to Him, and we seek only to obey Him." [David Cloud's new 350-page book titled Evangelicals and Rome: The Ecumenical One-World "Church" traces the evangelical world's journey to Rome and prophecies of end-time apostasy and a one-world harlot "church." (Fund. Baptist Infor. Service, 1701 Harns Rd., Oak Harbor, WA 98277, $15.95+$4 s/h)]

ANGLICANS: POPE TO HEAD GLOBAL CHURCH—A document entitled The Gift of Authority, the Archbishop of Canterbury and a joint Anglican-Roman Catholic Int'l Commission call all Anglicans to recognize the Pope as the supreme authority if a new global church were created (6/99 CRN Newsl.). The document describes the Pope as a "gift to be received by all the churches." The statement (not currently binding), released by Lambeth Palace in May, accepts that in a new united church it would be the Bishop of Rome who would exercise a universal primacy.

WCF RESOLUTION ON 'NON ISSUES WITHIN FUNDAMENTALISM'—While agreeing that whatever the Bible says is so, and maintaining that the Bible is clear in its declaration of the Fundamentals of the Christian Faith, we recognize that there may be well-intentioned differences between ourselves on some doctrinal and practical issues. We reaffirm historic Fundamentalism's practice of according liberty to one another on matters about which the Scripture does not bind the believer's conscience inflexibly. It behooves us all to hold our positions firmly while endeavoring "to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace," and…abstaining from the censorious spirit which condemns where Scripture does not, and on the other hand, from "despising" or making light of one another or failing to forgo graciously the exercise of our liberty when to practice it becomes an occasion for a brother's stumbling. We encourage each to be strict with himself but charitably generous toward others.

NCC CHIEF APOLOGIZES TO CASTRO—National Council of Churches Gen. Sec'y Joan Brown Campbell, at an outdoor rally in Havana with Fidel Castro on the front row, said: "It is on behalf of Jesus the liberator that we work against this embargo [against Communist Cuba]." She added, "We ask you to forgive the suffering that has come to you by the actions of the United States." (7/5 Chr. News) The NCC co-sponsored, along with the Baptist World Alliance and other liberal Protestant and Catholic entities (6/28 CN), an Ash Wednesday litany service (that had no mention of Christ) at the UN chapel in New York.

F.F. BRUCE, A LIBERAL 'EVANGELICAL'?—Scottish scholar F.F. Bruce, who died of cancer in 1990, was highly touted as an evangelical but had many liberal views (see 11/15/90 CC). He viewed Karl Barth, the father of neo-orthodoxy, as "a servant of Christ" on par with Luther, Calvin, and Wesley. He said Barth's God is the God of the Bible. He accepted some destructive higher criticism of the Bible, and said Paul didn't limit women's leadership roles. Bruce had "no fault to find with the inclusivism for which neo-evangelicals are criticized, as seen for example, in the Billy Graham crusades." The 6/86 Moody Monthly praised F.F. Bruce as an "evangelical" leader.

PK USED CHARISMATICS—Charisma publisher Stephen Strang, in a "Pentecostal-Charismatic Trends" editorial (7/99), said "Promise Keepers exploded on the scene in the early 1990s and utilized some charismatic speakers as well as charismatic-style praise and worship music."

CHURCH MARKETING—Last month a World Congress of Fundamentalists resolution warned of certain pastors who use worldly marketing strategies [e.g., Hollywood movies, rock music] to reach the unchurched and attract "seekers." It said: "[T]hese same men, particularly Ed Dobson, label Fundamentalists and Separatists as being legalists…." It said this marketing methodology was spawned in America through the influence of men such as Bill Hybels and Rick Warren but is rapidly spreading throughout Evangelicalism worldwide. The WCF resolution said Fundamentalists should follow the Church worship pattern in Acts 2:41-47 and heed the warning of I John 2:15-17. A watered-down, feel-good "gospel" is powerless to save. A "lite gospel" cannot replace the gospel light.

RESOLUTION ON GENDER-NEUTRAL TRANSLATIONS—"We the delegates of the 1999 World Congress of Fundamentalists unite in opposing and denouncing the recent efforts of the International Bible Society, the New International Version's Committee for Biblical Translation, and Zondervan Publishing House to produce unisex language versions of the Bible. We hold that such deliberate replacing of nouns and pronouns which are gender-specific in the inspired text with those which are gender-neutral in contemporary translations contradicts the Scripture's clear teaching of its own verbal-plenary inspiration and amounts to nothing less than an unholy falsifying of the sacred text of God's inerrant words."

WORLD CONGRESS OF FUNDAMENTALISTS—Over 1,300 registered delegates from 50 countries assembled on the campus of Bob Jones University for the World Congress of Fundamentalists, July 5-8. Over 2,000 attended evening services. Fifteen resolutions were passed unanimously, on such topics as: Rome, Moral Decay, Gambling, Religious Persecution, No. Ireland, Globalism, Clinton Administration, Gender-Neutral Translations, Music, Support of Previous WCF Resolutions, Ecumenical Movement, and Old Guard (Jones, Parker, Cedarholm, Van Gelderen, Weniger, and Bumpus) who died since the last WCF. [See 6/1 CC for more info about the WCF]

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