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Welcome to the Friday Five! Every Friday
we share our top five articles, stories, and quotes for you to read
and share with your friends and church families.
1. NCVC: Abby Johnson Interview about NC
Values Celebration Event
Check out this amazing interview with
Abby Johnson as she joins Steve on his show with NC Values' Executive
Director, Tami Fitzgerald, to talk about the impact of Unplanned on
the pro-life movement as well as her upcoming appearance at the NC
Values Coalition dinner on November 18th in Raleigh!
🎟️ Did you know you can hear
Abby Johnson's amazing story in person? Tickets are still available
for the Celebration of Carolina Values event, but are selling fast. To
RSVP and get your tickets visit: https://www.ncvalues.org/celebration
2. NATIONAL REVIEW: The So-Called
Media’s War on Religious Freedom
"Not long after federal court in
Manhattan blocked an HHS rule allowing doctors
to refuse to perform abortions, assisted suicides, and other
procedures for religious reasons, reporters began engaging in
deft-defying acts of rhetorical deception.
It’s been long insinuated that concerns
over religious freedom are merely elaborate schemes cooked up by
bigots and misogynists. One of the ways journalists like to intimate
bad faith is by placing quotation marks around perfectly factual
phrases like “religious freedom” or 'conscience.'"
3. THE HILL: Second federal judge
strikes down Trump 'conscience protection' rule for health care
providers
"A federal judge in Washington
State on Thursday struck down a Trump administration rule intended to
allow health providers to refuse to provide care based on moral or
religious reasons.
The latest ruling marks the second time in as many days
that a judge has ruled against the administration's policy, and
“provides an extra layer of protection against appeal” by the Trump
administration, said Washington Attorney General Bob
Ferguson.
Washington was one of a number of states, cities and advocacy
groups — including New York, California, San Francisco, the American
Civil Liberties Union and Planned Parenthood — that had sued over the
rule, which was scheduled to go into effect Nov. 22."
4. FOX NEWS: Trump reverses Obama-era
policy against faith-based adoption
agencies
"Rolling back a
last-minute regulation put in place under former President Obama, the President Trump administration is being praised by
Christian conservatives for defending religious freedom with
a newly proposed rule from the
Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) that would allow
faith-based foster care and adoption services to receive federal
funding even if they turn away couples because of their religious beliefs.
The new rule, proposed
Thursday, reverses regulations under the Obama administration that
required religious organizations to get a waiver in order to apply for
an HHS grant, unless they include sexual orientation as a protected
trait under anti-discrimination protections."
5. NCSBE: NC Local Elections
Results
Click here
to check out the election results of your local elections.
WEEKLY PRAYER: LIBERTY
LORD, you have blessed us with a spiritual liberty that is so
wonderful and beyond description, that it can only be understood
through experiencing a life-giving relationship with Christ. However,
we also recognize that in your grace, you have blessed our country
with a political liberty that enables us to openly proclaim the
experience of a life lived in the freedom of the Gospel.
In the past 100 years, we have continued to hear the cry of the
martyr and believer whose lives are ravished in countries that rob
them of this natural and fundamental right. We mourn with the brethren
in China and other abusive countries when their churches are
demolished by bulldozers, and their families are imprisoned for the
Christ-focused profession of their lips.
LORD, as individuals and as a nation, may we never take the
inalienable right of religious freedom for granted. Right now our
country has faced a rapid increase in the number of attacks made
against this cherished right. We have seen groups across our public
arena increase in boldness and frequency their smears against
religious liberty. They claim it is bigotry, when we know it is the
security of the greatest of all possible loves.
Be with your people and our country as it continues to protect
the constitutional right protected by our nation's Founders. Be with
legislators and the Supreme Court, as they determine through their
actions the protection of this particular and fundamental freedom. In
particular, we lift up Tom Harris and his family owned funeral
home, where the Court is deciding whether Tom and other employer
across our country can exercise their religious freedom in their
businesses.
“It was for freedom that Christ set us free; therefore
keep standing firm and do not be subject again to a yoke of slavery."
(Galatians 5:1)
"For you were called to freedom, brethren; only do not
turn your freedom into an opportunity for the flesh, but through love
serve one another." (Galatians 5:13)
"Act as free men, and do not use your freedom as a covering for
evil, but use it as bondslaves of God." (1 Peter 2:16)
Amen
Will
you chip in $100, $50, $25, $10, or even $5 to help the NC Values
Coalition continue to fight for your rights? You can donate by
clicking here.
Sincerely,
North Carolina Values Coalition
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