Search Results for: eastern lightning

China, already the world’s most populous country, could someday rival the United States in global economic, military and diplomatic influence as well. But will the emerging China be stable, open-minded and constructive, or inward-looking and dangerously nationalistic? Much depends on the country’s burgeoning Christian minority, according to “Jesus in Beijing” (Regnery), a clear-eyed, well-reported and thoroughly fascinating account, probably the best on this topic in many years. Author David Aikman, a lay Episcopalian, was a Hong Kong and State Department correspondent and the Beijing bureau chief for Time magazine. In mainland travels during recent decades, Aikman collected information about churches

Despite Crackdowns, Protestant Religious Groups Flourishing in China Washington Post, Dec. 24, 2002 http://www.washingtonpost.com/ By John Pomfret WENZHOU, China — “Jesus Saves!” Zhang Conghua exclaimed. “Believing in Jesus, you have to pay a price, but don’t be afraid!” he intoned, throwing open his arms in a wide embrace. Zhang’s audience sat in rapt attention: Ten girls in ponytails on one side of the aisle, six boys in near crew cuts on the other. Bibles were stacked neatly, two by two, on their desks. “Amen,” they replied. Outside was Communist China, clanging with the sounds of mom-and-pop workshops that ring Zhang’s

BEIJING (Reuters) – China sentenced three members of a local Christian sect to death for the murder of followers of a rival group and ordered likely life sentences for three other members of the controversial underground religion. The court in Shuangyashan in northeast China’s Heilongjiang province ordered the execution of Xu Shuangfu, the 60-year-old founder of the “Three Grades of Servants,” or Church of Truth, and members Li Maoxing and Wang Jun. Three others were given death sentences with a two-year reprieve, a sentence that usually leads to life in prison. Eleven other followers received prison sentences from three to

GAZA (Reuters) – Palestinian youths tried on Saturday to storm the European Union office in Gaza in protest over the printing by European newspapers of cartoons of the Prophet Mohammad that has whipped up fury across the Islamic world. The leaders of Muslim-majority Indonesia and Malaysia added their voices to the chorus of condemnation of the cartoons of the Prophet Mohammad, one with a turban resembling a bomb, in a face-off between freedom of speech and respect for religion. Inserting itself into the dispute that has become a lightning rod for anti-European sentiment in Muslim countries, the United States attacked

Essenes not about losing weight, but strengthening faith in God PATAGONIA – The philosophy of the Essenes – disciplined Jewish worshippers who lived by the Sea of Galilee during Jesus’ life – is attracting a worldwide following in this small town southeast of Tucson. The Tree of Life Rejuvenation Center sits on 172 acres of picturesque grasslands alongside a canyon at the base of the Patagonia Mountains. It was founded by Dr. Gabriel Cousens, a 62- year-old physician who espouses a raw-food diet and “spiritual fasting” that he says is part of a modern Essene way of life and a

Discovery of an African boy’s headless and limbless body in River Thames leads to arrests of 21 syndicate members The Straits Times (Singapore), Aug. 4, 2003 http://straitstimes.asia1.com.sg/world/story/0,4386,202856,00.html By Alfred Lee LONDON – It was a nightmarish and gruesome find: the body of a young boy with his head, arms and legs all chopped off and missing, floating in the River Thames near London’s famous Tower Bridge. Scotland Yard police could only guess that the boy was aged between four and seven and given the name Adam. The torso, which had deep knife wounds, was clad in only a pair of

The New York Times, Dec. 31, 2002 http://www.nytimes.com/ By SUSAN SACHS As evangelical Christian emissaries have spread throughout the Muslim world, their presence has increasingly proved to be a lightning rod for anti-American sentiment while provoking the anger of native Christian sects and Islamic clerics. The murder of three American missionaries yesterday at the hospital where they worked in Yemen, and the killing of another American missionary in southern Lebanon in November, underscored the dangers of working at the intersection of religion and politics. The negative reaction is not limited to Muslim countries, but has been seen in Hindu-dominated nations

The Virginian-Pilot, Dec. 8, 2002 http://www.pilotonline.com/ By EARL SWIFT, The Virginian-Pilot It seemed a partnership forged in heaven: An old boom town, its prosperity fled, and a private college with big dreams and a niche that all but guaranteed its success. The school bought up the campus of a failed women’s college on the city’s edge, and six years later has survived a hand-to-mouth infancy to earn preaccreditation. Its athletic teams have snared several national championships. Its students eat at the town’s restaurants, rent rooms by the score from local landlords, fill the streets with youthful vigor. But amid all

War & remembrance Controversy is a constant for memory researcher Elizabeth Loftus, newly installed at UCI. The Orange County Register, Nov. 3, 2002 http://www2.ocregister.com/ By AMY WILSON Academics can debate anything. It’s healthy. It’s what, among other things, they are paid to do. They can also go to war. Which is something different altogether. War has casualties. It also produces gladiators. Elizabeth Loftus is a cognitive psychologist whose research into how memory works is so deep and so wide and so highly regarded that the April issue of The Review of General Psychology ranked her 58th among the top 100

Against stuff competition, Mormon missionaries win hearts and converts in West Africa The Boston Globe, Oct. 27, 2002 http://www.boston.com/dailyglobe2/300/focus/Out_of_Utah+.shtml By Matt Steinglass, 10/27/2002 Through the three days it took me to buy a used car in the Lebanese-run auto-sales lots of the West African port of Lome, I was pursued by a muscular Togolese fellow with tribal scars on both cheeks, intent on performing any service which would enable him to claim a cut of the transaction. Finally, my would-be assistant accompanied me out of the lot, still trying to build a relationship. ”Let me ask you something,” he said.