At 72 years of age, Lee Strobel is a long way from writing, printing and delivering a neighborhood newspaper out of his childhood basement in Arlington Heights, Illinois.
At 72 years of age, Lee Strobel is a long way from writing, printing and delivering a neighborhood newspaper out of his childhood basement in Arlington Heights, Illinois. Back then, Lee was more than just an aspiring teenage journalist. In fact, in addition to running his own paper, he wrote for several others and was possibly America’s youngest scribe in the business.
Now founder of the Lee Strobel Center for Evangelism and Applied Apologetics at Colorado Christian University, the New York Times best-selling author is still writing, including his latest book: Is God Real? Exploring the Ultimate Question of Life.
Yet, on this day, I had the privilege of talking with Lee about not just his life, but also one of the primary passions of it. Since his runaway bestseller, The Case for Christ, Reverend Strobel has analyzed and studied a broad range of claims related to the faith. A one-time atheist, the pastor and apologist originally started out to disprove the Resurrection. He thought he could wrap up the task in a weekend.
On Tuesday, the United States Supreme Court heard oral arguments in the much-anticipated case, Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine v. U.S. Food and Drug Administration, involving the abortion pill, mifepristone.
As previously reported by the Daily Citizen, this case involves the removal of safety regulations on chemical abortion drugs by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA).
Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF), the public interest law firm representing the Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine, alleges that the FDA unlawfully removed crucial safety standards for pregnant women who use the abortion drug mifepristone — the first of two pills used in a chemical abortion.
The case has been making its way through the legal system since the initial complaint was filed by ADF in November 2022.
In May, Focus on the Family joined 27 other pro-life groups and individuals in filing a brief with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, urging it to block the FDA’s approval of the abortion pill.
Most recently, the U.S. Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals issued a ruling in August that would have required the FDA to restore critical safeguards on the abortion pill. The Biden Administration immediately appealed the decision, and the Supreme Court agreed to take the case in December.
Indiana Governor Eric Holcomb has signed a bill strengthening an existing law protecting the right of parents to briefly excuse their child from school to receive religious instruction.
Gov. Holcomb signed the law (HB 1137) on Mar. 13. It “requires a principal to allow a student to attend religious instruction conducted by certain entities following the principal’s receipt of written notice from the student’s parent.”
The legislation passed the Indiana House of Representatives overwhelmingly in a 69-25 vote on Mar. 7. The Indiana state Senate then approved HB 1137 by a large 32-16 margin.
In a statement on the law, the Indiana Family Institute, a Focus on the Family-allied state family policy council, said HB 1137,
“[I]s a promising bill that would require principals at public schools to allow students to attend religious classes during the school day, provided the classes are off school property, privately funded, and parent-permitted.”
The organization added:
“This concept is protected by a 1952 U.S. Supreme Court ruling but was never brought to fruition in Indiana law. We believe HB 1137 revolutionizes Indiana schools for the better and positively impact countless lives.”
Additionally, Alliance Defending Freedom issued a press release lauding the bill after Gov. Holcomb signed HB 1137 into law.
Think Big America, the non-profit Illinois governor J.B. Pritzker created to support pro-abortion legislation nationwide, is funneling millions of dollars into pro-abortion campaigns in Nevada and Arizona — a grim harbinger of contentious battles for life to come.
Pro-abortion coalitions in 11 states have proposed measures protecting or broadening access to abortion. But putting an initiative on the ballot in November is an expensive venture.
“To put a measure on the ballot using this method, organizers must collect a certain number of signatures based on state law,” the Daily Citizen’s pro-life expert Nicole Hunt explains.
“The majority of successful campaigns hire professional signature gatherers, which is quite costly.”
Pritzker’s ideology and estimated $3.5 billion fortune make him the perfect cash cow for pro-abortion campaigns. To date, Think Big America has donated at least two million dollars to support three pro-abortion ballot measures.
Pritzker ($500,000) and Think Big ($250,000) first contributed $750,000 to support Issue 1 in Ohio, an amendment to the state’s constitution making abortion and other “reproductive freedoms” protected rights. All told, the successful campaign cost a whopping $53 million.
Now, Think Big is supporting pro-abortion campaigns in Arizona and Nevada, both of which have proposed ballot measures making abortion a constitutional right in their respective states.
A new Gallup poll reports, “LGBTQ+ identification in the U.S. continues to grow, with 7.6% of U.S. adults now identifying as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer or some other sexual orientation besides heterosexual.”
“The current figure is up from 5.6% four years ago and 3.5% in 2012, Gallup’s first year of measuring sexual orientation and transgender identity,” the report states.
The increase in those identifying as “some other orientation besides heterosexual” comes largely from younger adults – Generation Z and Millennials, Gallup explains:
“Overall, each younger generation is about twice as likely as the generation that preceded it to identify as LGBTQ+. More than one in five Gen Z adults, ranging in age from 18 to 26 in 2023, identify as LGBTQ+, as do nearly one in 10 millennials (aged 27 to 42).”
The percentage drops to less than 5% of Generation X, 2% of baby boomers and 1% of the Silent Generation.
Women tend to identify as “LGBTQ+” more than men, at 8.5%. Only 4.7% of men say they are one of these sexual identities.
This holds true, with higher percentages, in younger generations, as Gallup explains:
“Women are more likely than men to have an LGBTQ+ identification in the three youngest generations, especially in Generation Z and the millennial generation. Close to three in 10 Gen Z women, 28.5%, identify as LGBTQ+, compared with 10.6% of Gen Z men.”
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