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Today’s News Headlines:

TYPHOON DAMAGES TRANS WORLD RADIO’S FACILITIES IN GUAM IMPRISONED CHINESE PASTOR FACES TORTURE, APPALLING CONDITIONS GEORGIAN COURT GIVES PARTIAL VICTORY TO PROTESTANT CHURCHES AUTHENTICITY OF INSCRIPTION ON ANCIENT BURIAL BOX DEBATED PHILIPPINE PEOPLE GROUP GETS FIRST BIBLE PORTION IN LOCAL DIALECT NEW BOOK TO HELP TRAIN FOREIGN CHRISTIAN RADIO PROGRAMMERS

Today’s News Stories:

TYPHOON DAMAGES TRANS WORLD RADIO’S FACILITIES IN GUAM The Pacific island of Guam is still reeling after being hit head-on by a devastating typhoon this weekend. With sustained winds of up to 150 miles per hour, Trans World Radio’s equipment collapsed under the storm’s battering. “Three of our five antennae curtains which operate shortwave to Asia were completely shredded,” says TWR’s Rich Greene. “We are now off the air, trying to repair the other two antennas in order to, Lord willing, be in a limited way back on the air broadcasting the good news of Christ by Thursday.” Greene says the two surviving antennas provide service for China and Southeast Asia. “We need prayer that the Lord would enable our staff, all of whom are safe, to be able to give them the strength to weather this devastating time.” (Mission Network News)

IMPRISONED CHINESE PASTOR FACES TORTURE, APPALLING CONDITIONS Chinese authorities, angry about the leaking of information about the appalling conditions faced by detained pastor Gong Shenliang, have denied his right to appeal. Shenliang is serving a life sentence on rape charges based on the forced confessions of four women prisoners — confessions they later recanted. Bob Fu, executive director of the Committee for Investigation on Persecution of Religion in China, says that Shenliang began a hunger strike on Nov. 14 in protest. “He did this because the prison in Jingmen City, Hubei province, where he is detained confiscated two documents he wrote after the second trial in October,” Fu said. “I was told that pastor Gong’s health has been very fragile even before the hunger strike due to the torture he has been subjected to, and now he is not able to stand up at all.” The four women prisoners also have been denied their right to appeal. On Dec. 16 Lorne Craner, the U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Democracy, Human Rights and Labor, will head the resumed human rights dialogue with China in Beijing. It is unclear whether he will address Shenliang’s well-publicized case. It is also hoped that he will discuss the case of South Korean missionary Choi Bong-il and six other North Korean and Chinese citizens who are on trial in China on charges of smuggling 70 North Korean refugees into China. Joseph Choi, a Korean-American missionary, also has been imprisoned in Yanbian since May on charges of assisting North Korean refugees. (Assist News Service)

GEORGIAN COURT GIVES PARTIAL VICTORY TO PROTESTANT CHURCHES Zaali Tkeshelashvili, pastor of Grace Church in Tbilisi, Georgia, is celebrating a partial victory as Georgia’s Constitutional Court overturned two articles of the law on meetings and demonstrations that local police used in 1999 to break up and ban outdoor meetings by his church. “After a three-year struggle to achieve official recognition of the infringement of our rights on the part of the state, the highest legal body of the country, the Constitutional Court, has satisfied the church’s claim,” he said on Nov. 26 after receiving the court’s written judgment. Lawyer Shota Grigalashvili explained the court’s ruling, saying that the articles “violated the constitution which guarantees the right to demonstrate. This is a great victory for all the population.” However, others were less optimistic about the victory. “The Constitutional Court merely abolished two insignificant articles of the law that were never enforced,” said Levan Ramishvili of the Liberty Institute, a Tbilisi-based human rights group. (Keston News Service)

* HCJB World Radio works with a local partner ministry to produce Christian programs in the Georgian language and broadcast them to the region each week. HCJB World Radio also worked with Hosanna and local partners to produce the dramatized New Testament in Georgian through a project called Faith Comes by Hearing.

AUTHENTICITY OF INSCRIPTION ON ANCIENT BURIAL BOX DEBATED Apparent differences in the handwriting in the inscription on the limestone box believed to be the most significant biblical archeological discovery since the Dead Sea Scrolls have led critics to suggest that a forger could have added the phrase about Jesus. The inscription appears to be written in two different hands, the critics say. The first phrase, “James, son of Joseph,” was written in a formal script while the second, “brother of Jesus,” is a more free-flowing cursive style, reported The New York Times. Experts discussed the validity of the inscription at a conference of biblical and archaeological researchers in Toronto. Andre Lemaire, the French specialist in Aramaic who first proposed the inscription’s connection to Jesus, defended its authenticity at the conference. The limestone box is set to return to Israel at the conclusion of its exhibition at the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto at the end of December. (Religion Today)

PHILIPPINE PEOPLE GROUP GETS FIRST BIBLE PORTION IN LOCAL DIALECT A small people group in the northern Philippines now has a portion of God’s Word in their own language. Roger Hanna of the Seed Company says staff members have been working with a translation committee to make the Bible available in the Majukayong language. “We’re excited to see that the Gospel of Mark has now been completed,” he says. “We’re praying that God would bless His Word so that all who read it would turn away from their worship of evil spirits and worship the true God.” This is what the elders prayed at a recent celebration to inaugurate the new translation, Hanna says. Meanwhile, Bible translation work continues. “There are needs for financial partners and prayer partners for this project. The committee is working on Acts, and they’re making progress on that.” (Mission Network News)

NEW BOOK TO HELP TRAIN FOREIGN CHRISTIAN RADIO PROGRAMMERS A new book published by Miami-based Latin America Mission (LAM) aims to help Christian individuals and churches that have obtained radio stations or programming time in developing countries but aren’t sure what to do with them. “Proclaiming the Gospel; Guidelines for Local Christian Radio,” written by former HCJB World Radio missionary broadcaster Ken MacHarg, is a guidebook designed to help Christian radio programmers outside of North America develop compelling, quality broadcasts. “The Christian broadcaster who rushes into the development of a new program or the programming of a new station without proper planning is bound to run into difficulties,” MacHarg said. “You must fully answer the question, ‘What does God want me to say to whom?’ Once you have determined that, all of the other pieces fall into place.” MacHarg developed the idea for the book after speaking at a Christian writers’ conference in Temuco, Chile, several years ago. “I found many Latin Americans who were getting into radio, or wanted to, but who had absolutely no resources to help them,” he said. “In a seminary library in Temuco I was not able to find one book or pamphlet that gave guidance on how to develop quality Christian programming.” The English version of the book will be available from LAM in March 2003, and a Spanish version will be published later in the year. (LAM News Service)

* * * * * * * * * * * * * James A. Ferrier HCJB World Radio U.S. Ministries Communications Director E-mail: Phone: 1-719-590-9800 Fax: 1-719-590-9801 Web: http://www.hcjb.org http://www.beyondthecall.org * * * * * * * * * * * * *

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