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An evangelical church under construction in the northern Iraqi city of Dohuk was damaged in mid-September by a mob of stone-throwing Muslims. After the attack, four armed men reportedly came back and threatened to kill the Iraqi pastor if he did not leave Kurdistan immediately. Since then, pastor Yusef Matti and his family have been in hiding. This was one in a series of attacks and threats made against the church and Matti over the past year and a half. Although the government, led by the Kurdistan Democratic Party, has pledged to allow religious freedom to all its citizens it has not offered support to Matti and his family. The Chaldean Catholic Church has
demanded that the evangelical church be closed down, and this appears to have given the Muslims free rein to attack the Dohuk congregation.
Compass Direct
Voices For Non-Violence is offering an Advocacy Training Workshop in Winnipeg Nov. 21-23. This will
equip individuals to serve as advocates for survivors of abuse. A Responding To Abuse course will be offered one Thursday morning a month from October to May for individuals interested in learning how to respond in a compassionate manner to those who have been hurt by abuse. Voices For Non-Violence can be reached at 204-269-8555.
Voices For Non-Violence
The United States failed in its attempt to add exceptions to the comprehensive land mines treaty being spearheaded by Canada. The treaty will be signed in early December in Ottawa with or without American support. Over 100 countries are expected to sign the reaty to ban land mines weapons that claim a victim every 22 minutes, mostly civilians, often children.
MCC
Revenue Canada revoked the charity status of 260 churches and Christian organizations this summer. Many of the cases are due to a failure to file income tax returns or other easily avoidable mistakes.
ChristianWeek
About 300 people from nearly 50 French, English and ethnic churches paraded through Olympic Stadium before a Montreal Expos baseball game on Sept. 5. A Christian choir, Kairos, sang "O Canada" and Christian Direction director Glenn Smith threw out the first pitch. Christian Direction and Pentecostal Assemblies of Canada sponsored the game. A portion of the ticket sales bought through the two organizations will go to local teen ministries.
ChristianWeek
Friends of the Lubicon (FOL) are being taken to court by Daishowa Inc., a major paper-products firm, for organizing a consumer boycott. The citizens group is protesting the company's intention to log on disputed native land in Alberta. They are asking for a commitment from Daishowa to not log on the land until a land settlement is negotiated between the Lubicon Nation and the Canadian government. Daishowa, in response, is seeking permanent court injunction halting FOL's boycott. Mennonite Central Committee Canada has written a letter in support of the FOL and is urging others to do the same. A court decision in favour of Daishowa would have significant ramifications as it would likely discourage the use of boycotts to sway public opinion.
MCC
The number of reported crimes in the past 6 years has risen only 12% while the cost of police and punishment has risen by 34%.
The population in federal prison has risen 25% in the past four years. When polled, Canadians over-estimate the extent of violent crime by at least 200%.
Accord, as reported by the Globe and Mail
Since 1960, India's economic growth rate has nearly tripled. The percentage of poor people, however, has only gradually improved. In 1947, when the country was founded, 55% of the people lived below the poverty line. In 1993, 37% did. More than 300 million people are impoverished in India, a figure little changed from 1973.
Pulse
What if, for 24 hours, no guns are fired? There is a movement afoot to make Jan. 1, 2000, "One Day In Peace",
a day when whoever happens to be at war on Dec. 31, 1999 would agree that for one whole day no guns would be fired. Organizers also hope to make it a day when television programmers of the world would agree not to air programming with violent content. One of the organizations leading the campaign is Paxton Ministries, whose phone number is 717-236-5508.
Paxton Ministries
Churchgoers, on average, give less than 2.5% of their after-tax income, according to the authors of Behind the Stained Glass Window: Money Dynamics in the Church. Evangelical and conservative church members tend to give more than those in other denominations, but all denominational averages fall short of 10 percent, and all giving is declining as a percentage of income.
Evangelical Press News Service
Penalties for church arson hae been increased in California under a law signed by Gov. Pete Wilson. The bill makes it a
hate crime to burn a place of worship, adding up to three years to the sentence of a convicted arsonist.
EPNS
Pope John Paul II has ruled out any special measures to speed up sainthood status for Mother Teresa. The Pope told reporters that the standard five years would elapse before canonization of Mother Teresa could begin.
EPNS
44% of evangelical church attenders would be committed to reconciling with an unfaithful spouse. This is according to an Angus
Reid poll, which also suggested that 39% of Catholics and 29% of mainline church attenders would pursue reconciliation. Only 20% of non-attenders claim to be committed to such a course.
ChristianWeek
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