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DISABILITY STATISTICS -
from: Disabled World
(07 Jan.) Some people are born with a disability, others become disabled due to an illness or injury, and some people develop disabilities as they age. During life almost all of us will have some type of disability.
Disability is a subject you may read or hear about, but not think of as something that may happen to you. However, your chances of becoming disabled are greater than you realize. Today, more people live with disabilities due to our aging societies and improved medical treatment. No one is excluded from joining the world's largest minority group at anytime - including famous people, celebrities, and world leaders. Did you know:
* 33% of 20-year-old workers will become disabled before reaching retirement age.
* Over a billion people, around 15% of the world's population, have some form of disability.
* Over 1 in 4 U.S. adults (61M) have a disability that impacts major life activities - CDC Morbidity & Mortality Report, 2018-8-17.
* There are approximately 3.3 Million wheelchair users in the U.S and the number is increasing every year.
* Rates of disability are increasing due to world population aging and increases in chronic health conditions.
* 93-95% of people with disabilities worldwide do not use a wheelchair, though the universal disability symbol is - a wheelchair. [read more~~]
COMMENTARY: The last statement above may contain a bit of bitter irony, because people with a mobility disability may be too poor to afford a wheelchair, or they may not need a wheelchair - they may have heart failure, or back, or knee problems that keep them from walking more than 50 feet or climbing stairs, but they can still walk a little. In general, though, people with disabilities are "the world's largest minority group" as the article states, and often are the most misunderstood and discriminated-against.
This is because their disabilities are often hidden, such as Asperger's Syndrome, a high form of autism spectrum that can make a person very intelligent but socially awkward, or hearing-disabled persons with whom you have a hard time communicating so you think they're ignoring you or are stupid or don't understand your language. Our goal as Christians, however, is to "go the extra mile" - to go out of our way, out of our comfort zone, to "the poor, the maimed, the lame, and the blind" to care for these people who were the main target audience for Jesus in His earthly ministry and should be our main target audience too!
The above article also points to another factor: 15% of the world's population have a disability, but "Over 1 in 4" or 26% of U.S. adults have a disability. This indicates that people in the U.S. have the luxury of going on disabily income (whether they are truly disabled or simply faking it) because they live in a wealthy society that can afford such programs, whereas people in poor societies must disregard their health problems because they have to work just to survive.
KAZAKHSTAN: 151 ADMINISTRATIVE PROSECUTIONS IN 2019
by Felix Corley: Forum 18 News Service
(9 Jan.) In 151 known administrative prosecutions in 2019, 128 individuals (1 twice), 2 religious communities and 1 company were punished for worship meetings, offering religious literature and items (including online), sharing or teaching faith, posting religious material online, praying in mosques, inviting a child to meetings, or inadequate security measures. Yet an official claimed "We have no problems in the area of freedom of conscience."
However, the true number of such administrative cases is likely to be higher. The 151 known administrative cases in 2019 represent a fall in the rate of prosecutions. In 2018, 171 such prosecutions are known to have been brought. In 2017, 284 such prosecutions are known to have been brought. Punishments included not only fines but temporary bans on activity, a permanent ban on a meeting place for worship, and seizures and destruction of religious literature, according to a review of the known 2019 cases compiled by Forum 18.
Protestants (especially Council of Churches Baptists) and commercial and private sellers were many of the targets of these prosecutions. Council of Churches Baptists refuse to seek state permission to exercise their right to freedom of religion or belief. Fines were the equivalent of between three weeks' and four months' average wages for those in formal work (35 to 200 MFIs [Monthly Financial Indicators], which equal 88,375 Tenge to 505,000 Tenge in 2019). [read more~~]
COMMENTARY: Yerzhan Omar, an "expert" in Kazakhstan's department that monitors these religious persecution cases, stated, "We have no problems in the area of freedom of conscience." Omar may actually believe his country has no problems with "freedom of conscience" as long as people keep those ideas inside their own heads and do not express them to others. The God-given right of religious expression means the freedom to express one's beliefs freely and without fear of governmental ridicule, restraint or fines.
The Council of Churches Baptists are a group that in the 1970s split from the Soviet Union's state-registered "Evangelical Christian-Baptist" denomination by refusing to register their congregations with the state and give the Soviet Religious Affairs Department lists of all members and attendees. They also refused to stop bringing their children to church as the new registration rules required, and they were very active in the underground publishing of New Testaments and other Christian literature, often disregarding international copyright laws. They believe they are justified in ignoring laws that limit their religious freedom.
(9 Jan.) Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew expressed his condolences over today's crash of the UIA plane, the death of passengers and crew members. The corresponding statement was posted on the Ecumenical Patriarch's Facebook page, UKRINFORM reports.
"We extend our sincere condolences and support of the Mother Church, praying to Almighty God for the repose of the souls of the victims from seven countries," the message reads. This message of the Ecumenical Patriarchate was also sent to the President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky.
On Wednesday, January 8, approximately at 6:00 Tehran time (about 4:30 Kyiv time), the Boeing-737 of the Ukrainian Airline UIA, flight PS752, operating the route Tehran-Kyiv crashed shortly after the takeoff from Imam Khomeini Tehran airport. According to the National Security Council, 176 people were on board the plane: 167 passengers and 9 crew members, all of them died. [read more~~]
COMMENTARY: We mourn the deaths of the 176 passengers and crew on this aircraft. Today, 11 January, the Iranian government admitted that the aircraft was shot down by a Russian anti-aircraft missile that was sold to Iran in 2008. This tragic mistake is very similar to the Malaysian Airline jet shot down six years ago by another Russian anti-aircraft missile. Commercial airliners transmit signals identifying themselves so these sorts of things shouldn't happen. But putting deadly weapons into the hands of trigger-happy and poorly-trained military personnel has led to such tragic but avoidable events.
ROC CALLS FOR PROTECTION OF RIGHTS OF ORTHODOX CHRISTIANS IN MONTENEGRO
from: Interfax-Religion
(30 Dec. 2019) The Moscow Patriarchate has spoken in defense of the Serbian Orthodox Church in Montenegro, calling the recent adoption in the country of a law on religion a cynical blow to it. "We are calling on the global community to prevent encroachments on the rights of religious communities in Montenegro," stated an address adopted at a remote session of the Synod of the Russian Orthodox Church on December 28, which was published on Monday.
On December 27, Montenegro's parliament adopted a bill on freedom of religion and convictions and the legal situation of religious communities. The bill envisages the seizure and transfer into state property of facilities and land used by religious communities if they belonged to the state before December 1, 1918 or if there are no documents certifying that they were church property (most old holy sites do not have such documents).
The legislation applies to more than 650 holy sites. Voting on the bill was accompanied by an altercation between deputies from the ruling majority and the opposition. Protesting the debated document, residents of Montenegro took to the streets and blocked motorways and bridges. The Moscow Synod also called on all regional Orthodox churches to support the canonical church in Montenegro. "None of us should perceive the danger faced by it as far and foreign. What they are trying to force on believers in Montenegro now could happen to any church tomorrow," the address said.
The synod said the European Commission for Democracy through Law earlier made serious remarks on Montenegro's new law on freedom of religion. [read more~~]
COMMENTARY: The above headline should read: "ROC CALLS FOR PROTECTION OF RIGHTS OF SERBIAN ORTHODOX IN MONTENEGRO" because the ROC [Russian Orthodox Church] is being used by the Russian government as an instrument of Russia's Pan-Slavic foreign policy. Montenegro is across from Italy on the Adriatic coast, north of Albania, east of Kosovo, and south of Bosnia-Herzegovina. The Serbian government inherited the largest chunk of former Yugoslavia and tried to retain Montenegro along with Bosnia and Kosovo, but Montenegro and other territories decided to align with the West. Montenegrins are ethnically and linguistically different than Serbs, so Russia is stirring up the Serbian minority in Montenegro by throwing its support to them, upholding their claims to ancient church real estate. It is sad that so many of the quarrels over doctrine and religious rights really boil down to some people trying to take control of other people's real estate.
INCREASED HARVESTING OF ORGANS FROM EUTHANASIA SIGNALS WORSE HORRORS TO COME: EXPERTS
from: LifeSite News
(9 Jan.) 'You’ll never get better organs than you would by this process [euthanasia]', said one of its top lobbyists in Canada. News that organ harvesting from Canadians killed by lethal injection is on the rise in Ontario has euthanasia opponents warning more horrors and assaults on human life are to come.
"Everybody says, 'Well, it can't get any lower than it is,' but we'll get lower than it is, because every time you break a new ethical barrier, it opens up a new question," Alex Schadenberg, executive director of the Canada-based Euthanasia Prevention Coalition, told LifeSiteNews.
"There is growing evidence that coercion plays a substantial role for many vulnerable people with regards to so called physician-assisted death. Conflating this decision with organ donation further complicates the issue of coercion," echoed John Smeaton, chief executive of the U.K.-based Society for the Protection of Unborn Children (SPUC).
"We need to acknowledge the unsettling reality that many vulnerable people who have been euthanized without consent, may also have had their organs harvested without explicit consent," Smeaton added in a Wednesday statement.
Trillium Gift For Life Network, which administers organ and tissue donation in Ontario, harvested 18 organs and 95 tissue donations from 113 people euthanized in the first 11 months of 2019 (December figures were not available), the Ottawa Citizen reported this week. [read more~~]
COMMENTARY: This article describes the horrific thinking process of people who have accepted the secular-materialist ideology that humans are merely "meat-machines" with parts that can be swapped with other, more valuable "meat-machines" that need those parts. Organ harvesting has been reported in Communist China and other Asian countries, but it has now reached North America. And nine U.S. states have now legalized euthanasia.
If a rich person can find a willing organ donor, that person can get the needed "part" at a price. But now the donor needn't be willing, just declared terminally ill or mentally incompetent. As the article states, Canada's laws are changing so that persons who are not terminally ill can themselves choose euthanasia, or if they are considered mentally incompetent someone else can decide to euthanize them in order to harvest their organs. It's a truly Orwellian world we're living in now, folks.
U.S. CONGRESS WEIGHS RENEWAL OF PROGRAM THAT MOVES PEOPLE OUT OF INSTITUTIONS
from: Disability Scoop
(12 Dec. 2019) After years in limbo, advocates say a deal is in the works to permanently renew a popular federal program that moves people with disabilities from institutions to the community.
A bipartisan proposal in the U.S. Senate would reauthorize Money Follows the Person. The Medicaid program gives states funding to pay for employment supports, housing and other services so that people with disabilities can transition from nursing homes and other institutional facilities to homes in the community.
Money Follows the Person [MFP] officially expired in 2016 and has been teetering on collapse since then as Congress passed a series of short-term extensions, the latest of which runs out this month [December 2019].
Under the new plan, however, the program would have no end date and it would be funded at $450 million annually for the next 10 years. The proposal is tucked inside a larger bill known as the Prescription Drug Pricing Reduction Act of 2019.
"If this MFP measure passes, it could be one the decade's most significant legislative victories for community inclusion and the providers who make it possible," said Barbara Merrill, chief executive officer at the American Network of Community Options and Resources, or ANCOR, a trade group representing community-based services providers across the country.
Disability advocates are cautiously optimistic that Congress will approve the plan before the end of this year [2019]. They are urging supporters to contact their lawmakers during a national call-in day Monday designed to pressure Congress to follow through. [read more~~]
COMMENTARY: We will try to follow up on this bill to see if it passes in Congress. Stay tuned! Our hope is that it is not just another way to save money by pushing people out of nursing homes and into the community, as happened when people with psychological or developmental disabilities were moved out of institutions and into the community, which sometimes resulted in those people receiving a substandard level of care. This is an area where Christians need to become trained and involved in providing compassionate care.
OTHER NEWS HEADLINES:
HUNGARY TO OFFER FREE GOVERNMENT IVF TO REVERSE DECLINING POPULATION
from BioEdge
TELEMEDICINE: NEWS AND INFORMATION REGARDING MODERN e-HEALTH
from Disabled World
AUCCRO CALLS UPON UKRAINIAN GOVERNMENT TO STOP IMPLANTING GENDER IDEOLOGY IN EDUCATION
from Religious Information Service of Ukraine
CHINESE PASTOR WANG YI SENTENCED TO 9 YEARS IN PRISON WITHOUT PUBLIC TRIAL
from Mission Network News
CASSATION COURT POSTHUMOUSLY ACQUITS RUSSIAN ORTHODOX DISSIDENT SHCHIPKOVA 40 YEARS AFTER SENTENCING
from Interfax-Religion
ANNIVERSARY OF THE TOMOS. FULL INDEPENDENCE OF ORTHODOX CHURCH OF UKRAINE IS A YEAR OLD
from Novaya Gazeta
PRESIDENT OF RUSSIA VISITS PATRIARCHAL CATHEDRAL OF OUR LADY OF THE DORMITION IN DAMASCUS
from Russian Orthodox Church - Moscow Patriarchate
UKRAINIAN MONASTERY VANDALIZED FOR THIRD TIME IN A YEAR
from Orthodox Christianity
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NOW, OUR VIEWS:
Disability Impacts All of Us: CDC
61 Million adults in the United States live with a disability -- that's 26%, or over 1 in every 4 people. (Click on the above photo from the Center for Disease Control to see all six parts of this infographic. You can also download it as a PDF.) The second part of the infographic shows us the percentages of adults with functional disability types: 13.7% - mobility, 10.8% - cognition, 6.8% - independent living, 5.9% - hearing, 4.6% - vision, and 3.7% - self-care. These often overlap, but mobility issues make up over half of all disabilities.
Why don't we know about disabilities? It's because we literally don't see most of them: people with mobility or self-care, cognition, and independent living problems can't get out easily to public places like shopping, church, restaurants, etc.: we don't see them because they're not there, so - "Out of sight, out of mind" - we assume they don't exist! Also, we likely have an unconscious bias against disability: it reminds us of our own mortality, so we would rather not think about it.
Then there are the "invisible disabilities": you see the person but you don't see their disability, such as heart, back, or knee problems that limit a person's ability, for example, to carry over 15 pounds or walk more than 50 or 100 feet or a block or two so you think they're lazy; or hearing loss that may make you think the person is ignoring you or is sort of stupid or doesn't understand English. (I have a bad back and shouldn't carry heavy stuff; I also have severe hearing loss - even with hearing aids I often can't understand speech, especially in a noisy environment. . . although I like to meet people, have a doctorate degree, and know several languages.)
This is an urgent issue for Christians to address: we are ignoring 26% of the people in the world! And these are the very people to whom Jesus Christ directed most of His ministry - "the poor, the maimed, the lame, and the blind." The Gospel teaches us "love your neighbor as yourself," but if we don't see them, we don't have to love them, right?
Wrong! The Russian verb "to hate" literally means "to not look at" or "to not see" -- if we look the other way in the presence of a disabled person or ignore a beggar or a person who can't hear very well and it's hard to hold a conversation, we do not love them -- we "do not look at" them -- we passively hate them. It's not easy to overcome these prejudices that we've built up over a lifetime but we must try. We must change. Change is hard, but change we must.
Yours sincerely,
"Dr. Bob"
Robert D. Hosken, M.Min., D.Min.
You might have noticed there's a change in our Hosken-News format starting this new year: we've changed the background colors to match our Agape Restoration Communities web-pages, and we're placing our commentary on each news article right after that news article so that you don't have to link back and forth between them. We are also increasing our emphasis on news about people with disabilities because it's an area related to discrimination against religious belief and practice: people with disabilities are the largest minority group in the world and are often discriminated against, either actively or passively by neglect. As Christians, we are called to minister to "the poor, the maimed, the lame, and the blind" as our Lord Jesus did!
Russian President Putin and Assad met recently to discuss recent developments in the region and plans to "eliminate terrorism" in Syria's Idlib region. Putin and Assad discussed recent developments in the region and plans to "eliminate terrorism" in Syria's Idlib region. "I think Putin is there to reinforce the Russian position in Syria . . . especially as Iran's position has been indelibly weakened," an expert on Syria said, according to this article in The Moscow Times newspaper.
You may wonder: why are Putin, who ought to be excommunicated from the Orthodox Church because he dumped his wife and is living with his girlfriend, and Assad, who is a Muslim and a mass-murderer of his own Syrian people because they don't like him, lighting candles in an Orthodox church in Syria? Because it's a great photo-op: this warm-fuzzy religious setting with icons and candles somehow lends a measureof moral justification to their "realpolitik" behaviors.
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Every Man Did That Which Was Right In His Own Eyes
In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit! Glory to Jesus Christ! Glory forever!
This phrase, "Every Man Did That Which Was Right In His Own Eyes," appears five times in the Old Testament's Book of Judges: starting in 1:6; then 17:6; 18:1; 19:1; and ending in the last chapter - 21:25. Usually, it is prefaced by - "In those days there was no king in Israel" meaning there were no strong leaders who also carried moral authority because they lived according to the Law of Moses. When leaders are either wishy-washy weaklings or openly immoral, the people quickly learn that they can do whatever they think they can get away with. Story after story in the Book of Judges tell how the Israelites, who had received God's revelation of the Law through Moses, chose instead the path of "Situation Ethics" and moral relativism.
Just a few years before the era of Judges, as Joshua was reaching the end of his life, he challenged the Israelites - "If it seem evil to you to serve the Lord, choose you this day whom you will serve; whether the gods which your fathers served that were beyond the River, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you dwell: but as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord" (Joshua 24:15). The people replied - "we also will serve the Lord; for he is our God" (v. 18b). But it didn't take long after Joshua died for them to turn away from serving the true and living God, the Lord, and begin serving idols.
The birth of Jesus Christ ushered in a new era for mankind: the Incarnation signaled God's in-person revelation to us humans, setting us free from the bondage to sin. Later, however, with the Age of Reason, the notion arose that human reason can understand everything that exists, the earth, sun, moon, and stars, and this led to the notion that if an idea couldn't be grasped rationally or by our five senses, it wasn't real - it didn't exist: materialism. This period of time was accompanied by the notion of religious and political toleration: we should "live and let live," accepting other people whose beliefs differ from ours if they will also tolerate our beliefs.
But if beliefs can't be broken down into rational, logical steps, then rationalism and materialism would conclude that they aren't real, they're just imaginary. So toleration easily morphs into relativism: it doesn't really matter what you believe or even if you believe, it's merely a matter of personal preference and choice. If this is correct, then there are no moral absolutes, no right or wrong, no good or evil, simply what works for you - "whatever turns you on."
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In the last 75 to 100 years, the U.S. has changed from a nation where nearly everyone believed in Christianity and attended church regularly to being a place where the majority has no morals and no absolutes: "Every Man Does That Which Is Right In His Own Eyes." In the 1950s, when "In God We Trust" was stamped on our coins, President Eisenhower infamously said something to the effect - "Everyone should believe in the God of his choice, and it doesn't matter which one." But if truth and error, right and wrong really exist, then it does matter very much which God we choose to serve.
The past century has also witnessed the struggle between Western Judeo-Christian beliefs and atheistic socialism/communism. Thirty years ago when the Iron Curtain came down and the Soviet Union collapsed, it seemed that the West had won. But had Judeo-Christian beliefs really won? Or had harsh socialism merely morphed into a honey-coated secularism?
While the state provides you with food, housing, education, transportation, medical care, etc., you're lulled into thinking - "This is all fine with me, so why fight the system? Why not just go along to get along?" There's a saying - "You can catch more flies with honey than with vinegar." But we're not flies, are we... or are we still rational creatures with free will that can resist the enticements of "free stuff" in order to hold fast to our beliefs in God, in truth and righteous, holy living.
As we're beginning to see, those who modern society deems deplorable or too troublesome or undeserving to take up space in nursing homes or too expensive to keep alive, the elite can pass laws that let them make a decision to eliminate by means of euthanasia: simply administer an injection or give them a pill, and it's over and done with.
As Christians, we must stand firm in the faith, be watchful and vigilant. Jesus said - "The thief only comes to steal, kill, and destroy. I came that they may have life, and may have it abundantly" (John 10:10). A robber steals by assaulting you with brute force, but a thief uses stealthy means to steal from you without your being aware of it. The devil is such a thief: he often uses honey instead of vinegar to entrap us with excesses in food, sex, drugs, love of money, leisure, etc. Then we're trapped, we're hooked in compulsive-addictive behaviors. We've lost our faith and our freedom to resist.
St. Peter wrote - "Be sober and self-controlled. Be watchful. Your adversary, the devil, walks around like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour" (1 Peter 5:8). Satan's power over mankind was broken by the Incarnation and the Resurrection, but we're still fighting little skirmishes, wiping-up operations with his demons. Stay strong and keep fighting!
In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit! Christ is among us! He is and ever shall be!
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Please remember to pray for Christians in socialist countries, and for ~~
Your fellow-servants,
Bob & Cheryl
p.s. Family values: "He who does not engage in propagation of the race is as though he had shed blood." - the Talmud
