06/30/2023
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Curated for you byCP Editors
Good afternoon! It's Friday, June 30, and today's headlines include the Supreme Court's ruling in 303 Creative LLC v. Elenis, reactions to two other highly-anticipated Supreme Court rulings, and a Lutheran pastor's prayer to "nonbinary God."
The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled 6-3 that Lorie Smith, a Christian website designer in Colorado, cannot be compelled by state civil rights law to make websites that go against her sincerely-held religious beliefs. In authoring the majority opinion in the case of 303 Creative LLC v. Elenis, Justice Neil Gorsuch wrote, "Under Colorado's logic, the government may compel anyone who speaks for pay on a given topic to accept all commissions on that same topic—no matter the underlying message—if the topic somehow implicates a customer's statutorily protected trait." Full Story.
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Numerous LGBT pride events have exposed children to nudity, pornographic messaging and what critics consider to be indoctrination. In this article, CP details four such events in 2023, including in Seattle, Wash., and New York City. Read more.
A 13-year-old boy died at Camp Cherith, a Christian summer camp in Minnesota, last week after a spinning boat propeller struck him during a tubing accident. Benjamin Rennie is being remembered as a believer who touched the lives of many and shared uplifting content on social media. A memorial fund has been set up in his honor. Read more.
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CP Executive Editor Dr. Richard Land reflects on the magnitude of American Independence and why we should know our history, teach our history, and continue to make America the land our Founding Fathers desired it to be. "We should all be proud of our American heritage, and we should be inspired by it. I know I am," he writes. Read more.
Parenting is as tough as it is rewarding. In this op-ed, William Wolfe offers several Bible verses for weary Christian parents, including passages from Deuteronomy, Proverbs, and 1 John. Read more.
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The U.S. Supreme Court ruled on Thursday that the admissions policies of Harvard and the University of North Carolina could not include race as a factor in student acceptance. Democrat and Republican presidential hopefuls were quick to react to the news, with President Joe Biden expressing his disagreement while former Vice President Mike Pence stated, "There is no place for discrimination based on race." Read more reactions here.
The U.S. Supreme Court released a unanimous decision in Greg Groff v. Louis DeJoy on Thursday, vacating an earlier lower court ruling against a Christian postal worker who quit his job because he was forced to work on Sundays. Leaders across the political spectrum praised the ruling. However, various secular organizations slammed the decision, including American Atheists' Geoffrey T. Blackwell asserting it expanded "loopholes ... and 'rights' for the religious while shifting more burdens onto atheists." Read more.
With the 2024 presidential election slightly more than a year away, former President Donald Trump and President Joe Biden are seen as the frontrunners to receive the Republican and Democratic nominations for president, respectively. However, several other individuals have declared their bids for the White House. This article from CP highlights eight lesser-known candidates running for president in 2024. Read more.
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Elevation Church, the North Carolina megachurch led by celebrity preacher Steven Furtick, has withdrawn its affiliation with the Southern Baptist Convention after more than 20 years. A copy of a letter sent to the SBC Executive Committee did not explain why the church left the denomination, but some believe it could be due to messengers at the SBC Annual Meeting voting to ban women from serving as a "pastor of any kind." Read more.
Anna Helgen, co-pastor of Edina Community Lutheran Church in Minnesota, has gone viral for leading her congregation in a "sparkle creed" prayer in honor of LGBT pride month in which she described God as "nonbinary" and Jesus as having "two dads." Video of the prayer sees Helgen declaring, "I believe in the nonbinary God, whose pronouns are plural. I believe in Jesus Christ, their child, who wore a fabulous tunic, and had two dads and saw everyone as a sibling child of God." Read more.
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