(1) Coca-Cola joins coalition fighting for LGBT equality (Atlanta Journal Constitution)
Coca-Cola is a member of the newly formed Business Coalition for the Equality Act, a group of 60 prominent employers that are officially backing the Human Rights Campaign’s efforts to add federal protections for the LGBT community. Coke joins other notable giants such as Apple, Nike, Target, Google, Amazon, Best Buy and Coke’s beverage industry rival Pepsi in the coalition. HRC said coalition members represent 4.2 million employees, have combined revenue of $1.9 trillion and have operations in all 50 states.
(2)Â Another Senator Calls for Action on Social Media Abuse of Nursing Home Residents
…The chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee is asking the U.S. Justice Department for information about how aggressively it pursues elder abuse in nursing homes, particularly cases in which workers share degrading photos or videos of residents on social media.
(3) ”Holy” Cow: Donald Trump’s Bible Belt Power” by David Brody (CBN)
…Tuesday’s big wins by Donald Trump prove once again that he has staying power with evangelicals and that without the, he does not win many of the states that he has secured. But it goes beyond that. It bears taking a closer look.
(4) Courageous Leadership Is Needed to Reverse Secular Trends (Crisis Magazine)
…It is thus clear that something has changed in America for the worse. This begs two questions: what should be done and is there any hope?
First, we need to acknowledge that there is a problem. Too many Church leaders have been blind to the troubling rise of secularism. …If secularism is not first recognized as a threat, it cannot be overcome.
Second, this should be the time for evangelical radicalism. Both in North America and in Europe, the mainline Protestant churches have experienced the most severe declines in membership. Quite simply, the salt has lost its taste, and, for example, the Episcopalian Church here or the Lutheran national churches in Scandinavia have become indistinguishable from the broader post-Christian culture. In our own Church, the American Jesuits—who for decades have actively worked to make Catholicism a mainline Protestant denomination—have lost more than two-thirds of their members since 1965. People yearn for a Church that goes against the current.
(5) Exit polls and the evangelical vote: A closer look (Pew Research Center)
…As Donald Trump has racked up big wins among self-described “born-again or evangelical” Christians in many of the early primaries and caucuses, some religious leaders, political analysts and researchers have questioned whether many of these self-described evangelicals actually are evangelical Christians. Specifically, some analysts have expressed disappointment that the exit polls in some states have included only a single question about religion: “Would you describe yourself as a born-again or evangelical Christian?”
(6)Â The Theology of Donald Trump, by Michael Horton (Christianity Today)
(7) Laura Ingalls Wilder’s unflinching faith in America
…”I wanted the children now to understand what made America,” Wilder told an audience in 1937. “It seemed to me that my childhood had been much richer…than that of children today. Children clamored for more stories.” Wilder’s publisher, Harper Collins, urged her on; she finished her series at age 76. The saga concluded with her 1885 marriage to Almanzo Wilder, whose story she told in “Farmer Boy.”
In 1894 the Wilders, with their only child Rose, settled on Rocky Ridge Farm in Mansfield, Missouri. Again they struggled against the elements, establishing a farm and building their home. Almanzo and Laura took pride in their work ethic. “It was a good and pleasant life,” Wilder declared: “What we accomplished was without help from anyone.” She infused her Little House stories with subtexts of self-responsibility and hard work, calling them “homely virtues.”
…Would Laura Ingalls Wilder be amazed at her continuing popularity? Probably not. She had an unflinching faith in America. In a message to her young readers, she said: “As long as Americans are free, they will never cease to make our country ever more wonderful.”
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