Climate alarmists on the left recruit young evangelicals

Cornwall Alliance :: Newsletter :: Newsletter (August 13, 2012): For years, the Cornwall Alliance has been warning that radical environmentalists are infiltrating evangelical churches, “greening” the gospel message, and targeting our youth. A major recent development in that infiltration is the founding of Young Evangelicals for Climate Action. YECA grew out of a meeting convened by the Evangelical Environmental Network (EEN) early this year.

Response from YECA
Recommended Readings on the Global Warming Debate

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Terrific explanation of the human embryo

A Distinct Human Organism : NPR: "Whether produced by fertilization or cloning, the human embryo is a complete and distinct human organism possessing all of the genetic material needed to inform and organize its growth, as well as an active disposition to develop itself using that information. The direction of its growth is not extrinsically determined, but is in accord with the genetic information within it."

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The Golden Rule According to Whom?

The Golden Rule According to Whom? | Dr. Georgia Purdom's Blog: Evolution works by “survival of the fittest,” not “survival of the fairest and kindest.” In fact, many eugenicists (those that promote the birth of the “well-born”) both of the past and present readily acknowledge that helping the sick, poor, and weak impedes the evolution of man to a higher level.

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Is There Life on Mars?

Ask Dr. Rhonda – Life on Mars: A literal reading of Genesis 1 describes a universe with life that is bound to earth.

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Scientists, seminarians debate evolution online

Houston Chronicle: Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary Academic Dean Kenneth Keathley agreed to invite seminary professors to contribute essays describing their disagreements with BioLogos, a nonprofit foundation "committed to exploring and celebrating the compatibility of evolutionary creation and biblical faith," according to its website.

Keathley begins the first essay by noting that the Southern Baptist statement of faith is silent on how God created the universe. But he goes on to say that Southern Baptists' very literal interpretation of Scripture leads many in the denomination to hold the view that God created the world in six, 24-hour days less than 10,000 years ago.

. . . Southern Baptist Seminary President Albert Mohler, a young-earth creationist, has called the attempt to reconcile evangelicals to evolution a "direct attack upon biblical authority." Keathley, meanwhile, calls himself an old-earth creationist who accepts that the universe is billions of years old, but also believes that God directly intervened at certain points in natural history.

In an introductory essay to the series, Keathley lays out several points where he believes Southern Baptists are at odds with the BioLogos model. Among them is whether Adam and Eve were real people who experienced a real fall from grace with God that brought sin into the world. The concept is also central to the idea that Jesus saved the world from sin through his death on the cross.

Falk and two other writers state respond that science tells us "there was never a time when the human population from which all modern humans descended was as small as two individuals." Instead, they suggest the possibility that "God began a covenantal relationship with a real, historical first couple who brought about spiritual death as a result of their disobedience."

Keathley also points out that for some Christians, evolution presents a problem because it implies that suffering and death have been with the world from the beginning, rather than resulting from rebellion against God. "Young-earth creationists ask, 'What does this do to the nature of God if God created the world with pain and suffering from the beginning?'" Keathley said in an interview.

. . . Falk and others say in their essay that the problem of evil is a challenge, but that "Scripture does not take a universally negative view of suffering and death in the present age. Rather it is recognized as being both a tragedy and a creative force."

Editor: Emphasis added. I have to commend the Houston Chronicle for the careful way in which it handled the two sides.

Author of controversial study on gay parenting being investigated by university

Author of controversial ‘gold standard’ study on gay parenting being investigated by university | LifeSiteNews.com: The University of Texas has launched a “scientific misconduct” investigation of UT sociologist Mark Regnerus, after he was accused by homosexual activists of “scientific misconduct” in his recent study. Regnerus’ study, published in the July issue of Social Science Research, found that children of homosexual parents have significantly more social and mental-health problems than children of heterosexual parents. The study raised a tremendous outcry from gay rights activists.

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Prominent embryonic stem cell researchers leaving field

Prominent embryonic stem cell researchers leaving field, dimming prospects | Stem Cell Research Cures: As research progresses and alternatives to killing human embryos arise, the most prominent advocates and pioneers of human embryonic stem cell research are turning away from the field due to the scientific implausibility and monetary impossibility of the cells ever being used in large scale ways to cure diseases.

Related:
Human bones grown from fat in laboratory
First success for CIRM involves adult stem cells
Amniotic fluid offers alternative stem cell source
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Despite Attempts to Explain it Away, Human Life Begins at Conception Not Birth

Despite Attempts to Explain it Away, Human Life Begins at Conception Not Birth | LifeNews.com: To use the word "fertilization" to describe the beginning of a human being is neither precise nor proper. Conception is precise and proper to describe that the life of a person is now manifest in the conceptus, known in Comparative Embryology as the zygote.

We know from experience, precision, and accuracy that once the zygote is present within the body of his/her mother, it can be factually known that this person has newly arrived and is manifested. This is prior to implantation; conception ought not to be falsely labeled as implantation.

Procreation is a special word with precise signification and reference to the human person’s generation.

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The Oral Contraceptive as Abortifacient: An Analysis of the Evidence

Dennis M. Sullivan, Perspectives on Science and Christian Faith: Pro-life Christian ethicists and medical practitioners have been united in their opposition to abortion, but have sometimes been divided in their ethical approach to hormonal contraception. Even though many Christians believe that birth control may be a moral option, some claim that the “Pill” acts, at least some of the time, as an abortifacient. If true, Christians who hold that human personhood begins at conception would be morally opposed to the use of combined oral contraceptives.

This article examines the scientific evidence for an abortifacient effect of such contraceptive agents, and concludes that such an effect is yet unproven. Some of the ethical arguments are also examined, and the author suggests that further research on early pregnancy factor (EPF) may help to resolve this controversial issue.

For what it's worth, some Natural Family Planning websites:

• Couple to Couple League
• American Pregnancy Association
• Creighton Model Fertility Care System
• Cycle Beads

Important new study on the effects of same-sex marriage

Important new study on the effects of same-sex marriage : Turtle Bay and Beyond – International Law, Policy, and Institutions: Children with a parent in a same-sex relationship “underperform” in almost every category. Some of these differences may be relatively benign — whether one voted in the last presidential election, for example — but most are decidedly not.

Read the study -- How different are the adult children of parents who have same-sex relationships? Findings from the New Family Structures Study
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Alzheimer's Treatment: Scientists Turn Skin Cells Into Brain Cells

Alzheimer's Treatment: Scientists Turn Skin Cells Into Brain Cells - ABC News: A team of scientists has discovered what could be a novel source for researching and potentially treating Alzheimer's disease and other conditions involving the destruction of brain cells.

Related:

• Stem cells may preclude hip replacements
• UCLA stem cell researchers grow bone from fat cells
• Doctors Transplant Vein Grown from Patient's Own Cells
• Stem Cells From Corpses? Living Cells Can Be Harvested From Bodies Weeks After Death, Study Shows
• Heart disease linked to newly discovered type of stem cell

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Global Warming Hysteria: Greenland Melted in 1930s

Wesley J. Smith: Recently unearthed photographs taken by Danish explorers in the 1930s show glaciers in Greenland retreating faster than they are today, according to researchers. After the expedition returned the photographs were used to make maps and charts of the area, then placed in archives in Denmark where they lay forgotten for decades. Then, in recent years, international researchers trying to find information on the history of the Greenland glaciers stumbled across them. It now appears that the glaciers were retreating even faster eighty years ago: but nobody worried about it, and the ice subsequently came back again.

Gospel confusion in Christian environmentalism

World magazine: Both Joel Garreau, a professor of law, culture, and values at Arizona State University, and Paul H. Rubin, a professor of economics at Emory University, have written articles titled “Environmentalism as religion,” pointing out how environmentalists tend to borrow from other established faiths.

. . . But while many now regard environmentalism as a separate religion, it is its growing influence on Christianity and its intentional infiltration of churches—targeting youth especially, through organizations like Interfaith Power & Light—that should gain our attention. And it’s not only liberal Christians who are becoming religious environmentalists—some professed evangelicals are also joining their ranks.

. . . As Martin Luther long ago taught in launching the Reformation, the grammar of the gospel is indicative—it states what God has done. The grammar of the law is imperative—it states what God requires us to do. “Take good care of the Earth” is imperative. It’s a true obligation, but that’s precisely what makes it law, not gospel. “Christ died for our sins, was buried, and rose again from the dead” is indicative. It’s gospel.

Unabridged version here

Related:
Cornwall Alliance
Mayor who called pro-lifers ‘forces of darkness’ tells seminarians to ‘save the earth’

Bone grown from human embryonic stem cells

Bone grown from human embryonic stem cells: The study, published in the early online edition of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences during the week of May 14th, is the first example of using bone cell progenitors derived from human embryonic stem cells to grow compact bone tissue in quantities large enough to repair centimeter-sized defects. When implanted in mice and studied over time, the implanted bone tissue supported blood vessel ingrowth, and continued development of normal bone structure, without demonstrating any incidence of tumor growth.

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Exchanging the Truth of God for a Lie

Cornwall Alliance: “In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.” That short sentence is the bedrock of the whole of Biblical faith. Grant it, and all else follows: God’s ownership of all things (“The earth is Jahweh’s, and the fullness thereof, the world and those who dwell therein, for he has founded it …”—Psalm 24:1–2), and thus His rule and judgment over all things (“Jahweh is our Judge, Jahweh is our Lawgiver, Jahweh is our King”—Isaiah 33:22), and His right to make of anything precisely what He wills (“Has the potter no right over the clay, to make out of the same lump one vessel for honored use and another for dishonorable use?”—Romans 9:21).

God as Creator, the heavens and the Earth, and everything in them, as His creatures, under His rule and judgment—that is the starting point of Biblical faith and, because life follows from faith, of Biblical life.

Deny that, and all else falls—all else in faith, and all else in life. If God is not Creator of all, then He is not owner of all; He is not Judge, Lawgiver, or King over all; He has no right to make of anything what He wills; and no one, nothing, has any obligation to do as He wills.

That is why the unbelieving world cannot live with the first three chapters of Genesis. It wants autonomy. It wants, as the Serpent tempted Eve in the Garden, to be its own judge, lawgiver, and king.

"Some people are going to get hurt"

Churches step up environmental activism

Washington Times: Stewardship of the Earth is hardly a new concept in Christian thought — it’s mentioned in Genesis — but a growing school of theological thought leaders are getting out of the pew, marching on the picket line, and becoming specific-issue activists. The movement has also led to a rift among Christians, as some high-profile leaders fear that churchgoers are letting themselves be used by secular activists.

D.A. Carson: Adam in the epistles of Paul

Gospel Coalition: "If Paul's insistence on the historicity of Adam . . . be allowed to tumble into disarray, the foundations of Christian theology (not just Pauline theology) are threatened. . . . For it has pleased God to reveal himself along the historical line from the first Adam to the last, and we can know little of God apart from that revelation."

Scientists use artificial womb for research into embryos

The Engineer: Scientists at Nottingham University have developed an artificial womb to aid research into how early embryos develop. The new device is effectively a soft polymer bowl that mimics the tissue of a mammal’s uterus in order to grow mouse embryos outside the body for long enough to observe the embryo developing in the vital first eight days of life.

Research leader and professor of tissue engineering Kevin Shakesheff said studying the way the body generates new cells at an early stage could lead to treatments for otherwise untreatable conditions. ‘There are a lot of diseases that involve adult patients losing the functions of certain tissues, for example, after a heart attack and, as adults, we can’t repair that spontaneously. ‘But everybody did grow those tissues themselves when they were an embryo in a matter of a few weeks. We want to know what’s happening in the embryo better and see if we can use that as a way of growing adult tissue from adult stem cells.’

Editor: What happens to the embryos when they've completed their observations?

Stem Cell Discovery Could Put Cloning on the Fast Track

LifeNews: Researchers at Massachusetts General Hospital have announced they have found stem cells in ovaries that may be able to generate egg cells. It was previously thought that women are born with all the eggs they will ever have in a lifetime. But this research suggests that more eggs can be made by extracting these stem cells from ovaries. . . . this discovering has much greater ramifications than simply slowing a woman’s biological clock. If successful, this technique may put the push for cloning back on the fast track.