When religious conflict flared in Maluku, Indonesia from 1999 to 2002, thousands of Christians were slaughtered by Muslims, and multiplied thousands of children were left parentless and alone. Many of these orphans were severely traumatized after seeing their parents murdered, often brutally. Varinia Lewerissa, a Christian in Maluku, heard stories of children who had witnessed their parents’ gruesome deaths, and decided to start a counseling Life to help them deal with their emotional scars. “I soon learned, however, that monthly counseling sessions were inadequate to help them recover,” said Varinia. In 2003, two years after starting her counseling Life, Varinia […]

Millions of Christians from dozens of denominations are preparing to unite this October for the sixth annual Day of Prayer for the Peace of Jerusalem (DPPJ), a highly regarded prayer effort gaining momentum in recent years – amid the threats, terrorist attacks and international pressure rising against Jerusalem from many sides. Driven by more than 1,000 major global church leaders, organizers say that the day of prayer, which this year falls on Sunday, Oct. 4, is happening in local churches all around the world, joined spiritually through simultaneous prayer in more than 175 nations. “As the Bible declared it would, […]

The United Nations’ refugee agency for Palestinians does not intend to include the Holocaust in the curriculum at schools it runs in the Gaza Strip, a U.N. spokesman said following criticism by Hamas about the purported plan. While Hamas’ objections to including information on the Holocaust in school lesson plans was not particularly surprising, some Jewish organizations have taken issue with the U.N. for apparently backtracking in the face of the criticism from the terrorist group that rules Gaza. The U.N. Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), operates more than 600 schools in the Gaza Strip, the West Bank, Syria, Jordan […]

Produced by Michael W. Smith, ‘Kabul 24’ is a film about eight Western aid workers  who were held hostage by the Taliban in 2001 – and escaped. Weeks before their attack on the World Trade Center, the Taliban and Osama bin Laden captured eight Western aid workers in an attempt to hold back a military response to what soon would come to be known as 9/11. Pawns of a brutal regime, the well meaning aid workers from Shelter Now were subjected to punishing interrogations, a mock trial before the Taliban Supreme Court and the eventual bombing of Kabul, where they […]