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Every Friday CCFON will bring to you stories of fundamental significance to Christians and our Nation. To equip you to pray and act. To put the hope of Christ at the centre of our Nation. Click on titles for full stories. Donate for Christian Freedoms Please spread the word—forward this to Christians you know and encourage them to sign up to receive their own copy. Highlights, Abortion and Bioethics, End of Life, Religious Freedom,Sexual Orientation, Social and Family, Islam, Events Highlights Bishop Michael Nazir-Ali declares his support for ‘Not Ashamed’ as campaign enters its second week The Not Ashamed campaign has met with a positive and enthusiastic response since its launch last Friday. This week, Bishop Michael Nazir-Ali has declared his support for the initiative. You can watch a short interview with him here. Please continue to spread the word, contacting your church leaders and other Christians and encouraging them to support ‘Not Ashamed’. Sign the declarationhere and shop for Not Ashamed items here. Bishop Michael Nazir-Ali explains his support for Not Ashamed CCFONtv (on YouTube), 30 Oct 10 (5m 32s) Speaking up for the unborn child Wednesday 27th October is the 43rd anniversary of the Abortion Act. We are planning an event on that day to mark the occasion. Further details will be available soon but please mark the date in your diary. Abortion and Bioethics CCFON: Patients prepare to sue, as doctor is struck off for providing unproven stem cell treatments. Associated Press: Study shows progress with stem cell alternative. C-FAM News: Critics call new maternal death report faulty. End of Life Aberdeen Press and Journal: Suicide bill prompts concerns for disabled. BBC News: Manx meeting discusses euthanasia. CBC News: Assisted suicide advert banned in Canada. Herald Sun (Australia): A third of GPs back euthanasia for old people 'tired of life'. Religious Freedom Most parts of the Equality Act 2010 come into force today. The Act is intended to consolidate the many existing strands of discrimination law into one single Act and although the government has repeatedly insisted that the new Act will not change the law, it remains to be seen how the differently worded sections will be interpreted by the courts. Many believe that a ‘clash of rights’ has occurred between Christians who wish to act on the biblical belief that sex is reserved for marriage between a man and a woman, and those who say that such a stance discriminates against their sexual orientation. Several recent cases suggest that rather than the ‘rights’ of different groups being balanced, Christians are being routinely penalised. Examples include adoption agencies being forced to shut, Christians losing their jobs and guest house owners (and even a church) being sued. Financial Times: Discrimination cases set to rise. BBC News: New equality rights in workplace come into force. Daily Telegraph: Commentary: The Equality Act: possibly the worst law in English history. Daily Telegraph: Archbishop of Westminster urges followers to display their faith. Daily Telegraph: I don't believe in God, says Labour leader Ed Miliband. Guardian: Commentary: Labour can't afford not to engage with faith. Spectator: Commentary: Jumping on the bandwagon (or Popemobile). Daily Mail: 'Christian' Easter eggs snubbed by stores claims Church Of England. Islamist Watch: Trend: Christians preach to Muslims, get arrested. CBN News (US): ACLU sues New Jersey City over Lord's prayer. Dakota Voice: 100 US pastors stand for freedom. Daily Telegraph: Barack Obama says he is 'Christian by choice'. Asia News: India: Police arrest Pentecostal pastor beaten by Hindu extremists. News AM: ‘Lord’s Prayer’ is not allowed in Holy Cross Church of Akhtamar. Sexual Orientation CCFON: BBC research prompts calls for greater normalisation of homosexuality on TV and radio. The Times (subscription required): Homosexual bishops are all right by me, says Archbishop. Pink News: Labour’s top homosexual MPs stand for shadow cabinet. CDC (US): Research: Homosexuals account for 48% of all HIV cases in the US. Social and Family The Times (subscription required): Deal struck for £9bn bonfire of the benefits. ConservativeHome: Iain Duncan Smith has won his battle for a universal credit. Daily Mail: Commentary: It was the Seventies that saw an explosion in promiscuity, abortion and pornography. CNN News: U.N. partnering with faith groups. First Things: Commentary: Contraception is not a 'basic human right'. Islam Daily Telegraph: Anti-terror chief tried to secure UK entry for Muslim preacher. Manchester Evening News: No burka ban at Blackburn College. Daily Telegraph: Police apologise for putting 200 CCTV cameras in Muslim area. Daily Telegraph: Catholic school ‘could be run by mosque’. Daily Mail: Top supermarkets secretly sell halal. Guardian: The battle against cyber-jihad. BBC News: Islamic veil ban in Dutch coalition deal. Sydney Morning Herald: Anti-Islam MPs given vital role in Holland. News 24: Anti-Muslim feeling up in Germany. AFP News: Australia's first Muslim MP sworn in on Koran. BBC News: Al-Qaeda terror plot targeting Europe uncovered. Morocco Board: Christians expelled from Morocco. Christian Post: Dozens of Christians beaten by mob in Gujrat, Pakistan. Worthy News: Ethiopian Muslims burn down Christian homes and farms. Events 'Where did you pick that up? - Schools and the sexualisation of our children' A conference in Central London sponsored by Anglican Mainstream tomorrow (Saturday 2nd October). Registration required. Click here for flyer. State of the Nation Speaker: Andrea Minichiello Williams Date & Time: Sunday, 3rd October at 9am and 10.30am Venue: St Lukes Church, 16 St Luke's Road, Maidstone, Kent, ME14 5AW. ‘A defence of the status quo – Why it would be wrong to legalise assisted suicide and euthanasia’ A debate at the Conservative Party Conference in Birmingham on end of life issues. Guest speaker: Rt Reverend David Urquhart, Bishop of Birmingham. Date & Time: Monday, 4 October 2010 at 1pm. Venue: Friends Meeting House, 40 Bull Street, Birmingham, B4 6AF ‘Are Christians the UK’s New ‘Marginalised Minority’?’ Andrea Minichiello Williams will take part in a debate in Cambridge organised by the Woolf Institute. Date & Time: Tuesday, 5 October 2010 at 1pm. Venue: Michaelhouse, Trinity Street, Cambridge. Click here for more information. A list of other upcoming events can be found here. Andrea Minichiello Williams Christian Concern for our Nation http://www.ccfon.org

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Question: "Who am I in Christ?"

Answer: According to 2 Corinthians 5:17, “If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!” There are two Greek words which are translated “new” in the Bible. The first, neos, refers to something that has just been made, but there are already many others in existence just like it. The word translated “new” in this verse is the word kainos, which means “something just made which is unlike anything else in existence.” In Christ, we are made an entirely new creation, just as God created the heavens and the earth originally—He made them out of nothing, and so He does with us. He does not merely clean up our old selves; He makes an entirely new self. When we are in Christ, we are “partakers of the divine nature” (2 Peter 1:4 KJV). God Himself, in the person of His Holy Spirit, takes up residence in our hearts. We are in Christ and He is in us.

In Christ, we are regenerated, renewed, and born again, and this new creation is spiritually minded, whereas the old nature is carnally minded. The new nature fellowships with God, obeys His will, and is devoted to His service. These are actions the old nature is incapable of doing or even desiring to do. The old nature is dead to the things of the spirit and cannot revive itself. It is “dead in trespasses and sins” (Ephesians 2:1) and can only be made alive by a supernatural awakening, which happens when we come to Christ and are indwelt by Him. Christ gives us a completely new and holy nature and an incorruptible life. Our old life, previously dead to God because of sin, is buried, and we are raised “to walk in newness of life” with Him (Romans 6:4).

If we belong to Christ, we are united to Him and no longer slaves to sin (Romans 6:5-6); we are made alive with Him (Ephesians 2:5); we are conformed to His image (Romans 8:29); we are free from condemnation and walking not according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit (Romans 8:1); and we are part of the body of Christ with other believers (Romans 12:5). The believer now possesses a new heart (Ezekiel 11:19) and has been blessed “with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus” (Ephesians 1:3).

We might wonder why we so often do not live in the manner described, even though we have given our lives to Christ and are sure of our salvation. This is because our new natures are residing in our old fleshly bodies, and these two are at war with one another. The old nature is dead, but the new nature still has to battle the old “tent” in which it dwells. Evil and sin are still present, but the believer now sees them in a new perspective and they no longer control him as they once did. In Christ, we can now choose to resist sin, whereas the old nature could not. Now we have the choice to either feed the new nature through the Word, prayer, and obedience, or to feed the flesh by neglecting those things.

When we are in Christ, “we are more than conquerors through Him that loved us” (Romans 8:37) and can rejoice in our Savior, who makes all things possible (Philippians 4:13). In Christ we are loved, forgiven, and secure. In Christ we are adopted, justified, redeemed, reconciled, and chosen. In Christ we are victorious, filled with joy and peace, and granted true meaning in life. What a wonderful Savior is Christ!

Recommended Resource: Who am I in Christ by Neil Anderson.

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What's new on GotQuestions.org? Why did Jesus tell the rich young ruler he could be saved by obeying the commandments? I am in the process of getting a divorce. Can I start dating, or do I have to wait until the divorce is final? What is Progressive Christianity, and is it biblical? If the penalty for our sins is eternity in Hell, how did Jesus' death pay our penalty if He did not spend eternity in Hell? What are some of the signs of genuine saving faith? What did Jesus mean when He said “I am the way and the truth and the life” (John 14:6)? What does the Bible say about MLM (multi-level marketing)? What did Jesus mean when He spoke of living water? What is the value in attending a Christian camp? Is the concept of Christian camping biblical? What does it mean that we are not to cause others to stumble?

Analysis: Tensions on the Turkish-Iraqi border

By JONATHAN SPYER
JerusalemPost.com - 10/01/2010 04:05

If the Turks increase attacks against PKK bases in northern Iraq, a Kurdish counterstrike can dangerously escalate.

Talkbacks (8)

The monthlong cease-fire declared unilaterally by the PKK (Kurdish Workers Party) for the Ramadan period is set to finally expire this week. As it does so, the prospects for renewed violence are very real.

PKK guerrillas, based in their stronghold in the Qandil mountain range in northern Iraq, have carried out a series of successful operations since abandoning their earlier ceasefire this year.

The most daring of these was a mine blast along the Kirkuk- Ceyhan oil pipeline on July 21. The explosion claimed two lives, temporarily halted the flow of oil along the strategic pipeline, and served notice of the PKK’s undimmed abilities to strike at their Turkish enemy.

The “Triangle” border area between Iraq, Turkey and Iran is becoming one of the region’s most volatile flashpoints. More than 80 Turkish soldiers have been killed by the PKK this year.

Turkish Interior Minister Besir Atalay was in Erbil, the capital of the semi-autonomous Kurdish zone in northern Iraq, this week, to discuss the issue of the PKK with Massoud Barzani, president of the Kurdish Regional Government.

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyep Erdogan, for his part, has promised that rebels will “drown in their own blood.”

PKK leaders have told this writer that Turkey is seeking to prepare the diplomatic ground for a major incursion against the movement’s stronghold in the mountains. They fear that Erdogan seeks to impose what they call a “Sri Lankan-style” solution on his Kurdish enemies.

What can be stated with some certainty is that any initial hopes aroused by Erdogan’s initiatives toward the Kurds have been dissipated.

The AKP leader, unencumbered by Turkish secular nationalism’s traditional suspicion of any manifestation of Kurdish identity, last year promised reforms to end the second-class citizen status of Turkey’s Kurds. To encourage this process, the PKK announced a formal ceasefire in April 2009.

The Turkish military ignored the declaration of cease-fire. Instead, it demanded that the PKK unconditionally disarm and surrender. The promised reforms failed to materialize. Turkey’s AKP government struck at the legal pro-Kurdish Democratic Society Party, arresting a number of its representatives on suspicion of links to the PKK.

151 Kurdish politicians and activists, including eight elected mayors, are on trial in southeast Turkey on suspicion of links to the PKK.

Kurdish disillusionment regarding the possibility of peaceful reform in Turkey is leading to increased support for the guerrillas across the border.

The PKK, meanwhile, is seeking to maintain pressure on the Turkish government, without providing a pretext for a large military incursion into the mountain area.

Founded in 1978, the PKK began its armed campaign against the Turkish authorities in 1984.

The Turkish military responded with ferocity. In the 1984-99 period, around 30,000 people lost their lives in the conflict.

The capture of PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan in 1999 led to a sharp downturn in the movement’s fortunes.

Turkish governments failed, however, to address Kurdish grievances following the capture of Ocalan. As a result, from its bases in the impenetrable Qandil mountains, the PKK slowly rebuilt itself.

The current situation in Qandil is volatile in the extreme. Turkish aerial attacks have recommenced.

But the Turkish air force is not the only peril with which the inhabitants of the Qandil area must contend. Iranian bombardment and incursions are also a common occurrence.

The PKK’s “sister organization” among the Iranian Kurds – PJAK – is also headquartered in Qandil and uses the area as its base for operations against the Iranian armed forces and Revolutionary Guards.

Iranian news media reported that the Iranian security forces killed 30 Kurdish fighters in an incursion last weekend, though the Kurds dismissed this claim.

But the threat is real enough.

PKK leader Murat Karayilan, in an interview with this writer, noted a recent visit by Iranian First Vice President Mohammad Reza Rahimi to Turkey, in which, in a joint statement with Prime Minister Erdogan, he announced the launching of a joint strategy to develop economic relations.

Karayilan suggested that such a strategy would help Iran bypass the economic embargo against it. It would also serve as a basis for joint action against the twin Kurdish guerrilla organizations present in the Qandil mountains.

Erdogan is currently preparing for general elections in 2011. Any moves toward reconciliation with the Kurds are unlikely to go down well with his support base.

Offering a freer hand to the military to strike at the PKK in Qandil, by contrast, could serve to burnish Erdogan’s credentials in the eyes of secular nationalists.

The latter suspect that the AKP is seeking to destroy the power of the Turkish army.

A controlled escalation against the PKK might help to lessen such suspicions – which have been raised further in recent weeks because of the arrest of a number of senior military officers for allegedly planning a coup against the AKP government.

This scenario is not yet a certainty.

The Kurdish issue in southeast Turkey is ultimately a political matter, not a military one. As such, it cannot be solved by military means.

Nevertheless, Erdogan’s stated aims suggest that in the coming months, the prospect is for increased Turkish cross-border attacks into the Qandil mountains in northern Iraq.

This would inevitably bring in its wake a counter-escalation in PKK actions in southeast Turkey and perhaps beyond.

Policy-makers across the region will be carefully observing developments.

Jonathan Spyer’s full interview with PKK leader Murat Kurayilan will be published later this month.

SHABBAT SHALOM!

Ben-Gurion’s legacy on Jerusalem under assault

By DORE GOLD
JerusalemPost.com - 09/28/2010 21:55

A response to former prime minister Ehud Olmert from a former Israeli ambassador to the UN. Today, he says, Israel must reestablish that red line.

Talkbacks (12)

Right after the War of Independence, prime minister David Ben-Gurion faced inexorably difficult pressures over the future of Jerusalem.

The UN planned to press its case for internationalization. Its grounds were General Assembly Resolution 181, adopted in 1947 and known as the partition plan, which not only advocated the establishment of Jewish and Arab states in former British Mandatory Palestine, but also recommended putting Jerusalem under UN control as a corpus separatum, or separate entity.

True, the resolution was not legally binding; it had been forcibly rejected by the Arab states. Moreover, the UN never established the special regime for Jerusalem that it proposed. In fact, it failed to dispatch any forces to save the Old City when reports streamed in that its ancient synagogues were being systematically destroyed. Nevertheless, even after the war ended, leading diplomatic players in the UN, including the US government, came back and insisted on resurrecting the idea of international control.

Ben-Gurion stood in the Knesset on December 5, 1949 and, in no uncertain terms, rejected the demand for internationalization. He looked back at what had happened during the War of Independence, explaining that the UN “did not lift a finger” when invading Arab armies tried to destroy the holy city. It was only because of the efforts of the newly created IDF that the siege of Jerusalem had been lifted and the rest of its Jewish population saved. Ben-Gurion declared that Israel no longer viewed Resolution 181 as having any further “moral force” with regard to Jerusalem.

Four days later the General Assembly responded, again insisting that Jerusalem “should be placed under a permanent international regime.”

Ben-Gurion nonetheless stood his ground and declared on December 13, 1949 that the Knesset and the rest of the government would be transferred from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.

LOOKING BACK 60 years, internationalization was a complete failure. And yet it now appears it is coming back.

Former prime minister Ehud Olmert has put forward a proposal in this paper (“The terms for an accord,” September 24) for the Old City of Jerusalem, including the Temple Mount and the Western Wall, in which this area will be overseen by “an international trusteeship.”

According to Olmert, Israel would be expected to renounce its sovereignty over the holiest sites of the Jewish people, like the Temple Mount and the Western Wall, located in an area called “the Holy Basin” by negotiators in the past, and which extends beyond the Old City to the ancient Jewish cemetery on the Mount of Olives.

How is it that an idea which spelled disaster to the country’s founders can suddenly be put back on the political agenda? What happened? Does this readiness come from a sense that with the reunification of Jerusalem as a result of the 1967 Six Day War, Israel has less right to sovereignty there than it did in 1949? Such a view has no basis.

The Jewish people had restored their majority in the Old City already in 1863, according to the British consulate at the time – well before any other place in modern Israel. And after 1967, international lawyers such as like Stephen Schwebel, who would become president of the International Court of Justice in The Hague, pointed to the fact that while Jordan occupied east Jerusalem after a war of aggression in 1948, Israel captured the very same areas in a war of self-defense, and as a result its title was stronger than that of other claimants at the time.

Moreover, by its actions since 1967, Israel has proven that it was the first protector of Jerusalem to truly defend the interests of all three monotheistic faiths.

Perhaps some of its political elites have forgotten what was axiomatic for Abba Eban and Chaim Herzog, but that does not diminish its historical rights.

It could be that today there is a naive belief that internationalization might work, since the UN in 2010 will be better than the UN in 1948. But there is no basis for such a conclusion. In the past 20 years, international oversight of areas of conflict has ended with one disaster after another. In 1994, a UN force in Rwanda, made up of mostly Belgian paratroopers deployed to oversee implementation of the Arusha Peace Accord, withdrew and abandoned the Tutsi tribe to acts of genocide by Hutu supremists. The UN Security Council delayed any effective action to stop the killing, which resulted in 800,000 deaths.

A year later, UN peacekeepers in Bosnia abandoned the Muslims they were supposed to protect in the town of Srebrenica. As a result, the Bosnian Serb army slaughtered more than 8,000 innocent people.

Since 2003, the UN has been unable to take decisive action and put an end to the genocide in Darfur by the Sudanese regime, given the interests of the Arab states and the Chinese. Multilateral machinery, whether based on the UN or on a consortium of states, remains notoriously slow.

In short, there is no recent international development that might lead one to believe that “an international trust,” rather than Israel, might actually work and protect Jerusalem.

How is it possible to explain the difference between Ben-Gurion and the leaders who put forward from time to time the idea of internationalization? Israel at the time of Ben-Gurion was actually much weaker than it is today; its population in 1948 was a little more than 800,000. But it had something which unfortunately has been lacking in many who would renounce its sovereignty over the Old City: Israel in 1948 had a deep conviction in the justice of its cause – a rare commodity today in many influential circles.

Those putting forward the idea of internationalization are completely divorced from the sentiments of the people. Poll after poll in the past decade indicate that Israelis are not prepared to concede Jerusalem, and especially the holy sites of the Jewish people.

The problem is that when one of Israel’s leaders suggests that the Old City be put under an international regime, international diplomats begin to think the government may entertain such proposals. Ben-Gurion was able to stand up to the UN General Assembly in 1949 because the world understood that Jerusalem represented a red line from which neither he nor any other representative of Israel was prepared to retreat.

Today, Israel must reestablish that red line clearly, for the impression left by these proposals badly weakens its ability to defend itself. They imply that it has lost its will and might be prepared to concede what has been – and will remain – one of the identifying core values defining the identity of the Jewish people.

The writer served as ambassador to the United Nations between 1997 and 1999 and as foreign polcicy advisor to Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu during his first term. He is the author of The Fight for Jerusalem (Regnery: 2007).