Daily briefs of the top news stories impacting Christians around the world.
In today's edition:
- Faith-Based Organization to Help Veterans, Families Cope with PTSD
- Poll: Mississippi Personhood Amendment in Dead Heat
- Somali Muslims Cut, Beat Christian Unconscious in Kenya
- Attack on Kenyan Church Compound Kills Two, Wounds Three
Faith-Based Organization to Help Veterans, Families Cope with PTSD
Base Camp Hope, a new nonprofit, Christ-centered organization in Minnesota, is being developed to help veterans and their families address the growing problem of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), ASSIST News Service reports. The organization, which will provide centers in the Twin Cities of Minneapolis-St. Paul and in St. Cloud, Minn., is currently in the process of fundraising and searching for two counseling directors, and it is being supported by several local groups. "Base Camp Hope will be a unique response to PTSD because we will integrate spiritual healing along with mental and physical therapies, plus we will be one of the few facilities that addresses the needs of the families of the traumatized veterans," said founder and executive director Diane Kinney, who served in the U.S. Army in the 1970s. "I have seen too many veterans with PTSD whose needs are not being met." The goal is to provide comprehensive treatment for PTSD and enable troubled veterans to readjust to home, Kinney said. The facilities will be open 24/7 and provide a safe place for any veteran or family member.
Poll: Mississippi Personhood Amendment in Dead Heat
As citizens in Mississippi go to the polls today, a new survey indicates a dead heat in a ballot initiative that would make the state the first to amend its constitution to define all human life as beginning at conception, according to Baptist Press. The poll of 796 likely voters, conducted over the weekend by Public Policy Polling, has Initiative Measure 26 leading, 45-44 percent, with 11 percent undecided. "Right now it looks like it could go either way," Public Policy Polling said Monday in an analysis. Initiative 26 is a direct challenge to Roe v. Wade, the 1973 Supreme Court ruling that legalized abortion nationwide, and if passed, it would end abortion in Mississippi. Colorado voters rejected a similar proposition in 2008 and 2010, but Mississippi's more conservative voter makeup gives such an amendment more of a chance for success.
Somali Muslims Cut, Beat Christian Unconscious in Kenya
A Somali Christian in Kenya is nursing injuries after young Muslim men from his country beat him with iron rods, wooden clubs and knives, then left him unconscious and naked at a church doorway, Compass Direct News reports. Hassan, a 25-year-old refugee from Somalia who has been a Christian since age 7, says he was beaten because Muslims regarded him as "an apostate deserving of death." Police have arrested two of his attackers, but four are still on the loose. Hassan and his mother, a convert from Islam, fear justice will not be done because of area hatred for "apostates," and they said they are considering relocating with their other eight family members. "In spite of what happened, I don't feel I'm losing my Christian faith," Hassan said. "I still need to fight for the Christian faith, in spite of what I'm feeling now."
Attack on Kenyan Church Compound Kills Two, Wounds Three
Suspected Islamic extremists with Somalia's al Shabaab militia threw a grenade into the home of a church guard who lives near the gate of an East Africa Pentecostal Church congregation compound in Garissa, Kenya, killing his 8-year-old daughter and another 25-year-old church member, Compass Direct News reports. Three other members of watchman Patrick Mutinda's family were injured in the Saturday night attack -- his 12-year-old son, 10-year-old son and their grandmother all suffered severe burns but remain in stable condition. Al Shabaab activity near the Somali-Kenya border, including Garissa in northeast Kenya, has increased since Kenya began air strikes on al Shabaab-held territory in southern Somalia last month in retaliation for the rebel group's kidnapping and murdering of foreigners in Kenya. Pastors in Garissa have requested additional police security for churches after receiving recent threats from al Shabaab, such as one text message that read: "Christians will see war. Don't take it so lightly. We are for your neck."
Publication date: November 8, 2011
