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Today’s Headlines:

INDONESIAN COURT GRANTS PAROLE TO IMPRISONED PASTOR EVICTED EVANGELICAL CHRISTIANS IN MEXICO DEMAND JUSTICE POLICE FIND BODY OF SOUTH AFRICAN HOUSE CHURCH PASTOR INTERNET EVANGELISM ‘JUST SCRATCHING THE SURFACE’ CHRISTIANS RUSH AID TO HAITI AND FLORIDA AS DEATH TOLL RISES 4 RELIEF WORKERS FROM FLORIDA CHURCH DIE IN PLANE CRASH

Today’s News Stories:

INDONESIAN COURT GRANTS PAROLE TO IMPRISONED PASTOR Rev. Rinaldy Damanik, who has been imprisoned in Indonesian for the past two years, received news on Friday, Sept. 24, that he was to be released on parole in November. Damanik was found guilty in a Palu court in June 2003 on a charge of carrying illegal weapons and sentenced to prison for three years. He has maintained his innocence, but appeals to both the High Court and the Supreme Court were unsuccessful. Damanik’s fortunes began to change when a leading Muslim cleric, Idrus R al Habsy, became good friends with the imprisoned pastor. Idrus, widely respected in Central Sulawesi, has continued to be an advocate for Damanik and recently signed a written guarantee to the Minister of Justice and Human Rights declaring him to be a “man of good character” who “should be allowed to go free.” Damanik received the news of his planned release with subdued excitement, aware that there is a “slim chance that his hopes may be dashed by the legal system.” (Religious News Agency)

* HCJB World Radio worked with local Indonesian partners to establish local Christian stations in Sumba Island and Kupang, West Timor, with help from the HCJB World Radio Engineering Center in Elkhart, Ind. Plans are also being made to establish a station on Roti Island later this year.

EVICTED EVANGELICAL CHRISTIANS IN MEXICO DEMAND JUSTICE Fourteen refugee families from the community of 20 de Noviembre in Las Margaritas, Chiapas, Mexico, have been leading a precarious existence in the corridors of the municipal headquarters building since the end of August, trying to draw public attention to their plight. Seven of the families were expelled from 20 de Noviembre five months ago for practicing their evangelical Christian faith; the other seven were driven out 18 months ago. They are asking Chiapas Gov. Pablo Salazar to intervene to guarantee safe return to their home community. In another incident, a group of 56 evangelical Huichol Indians from Jalisco who were ordered to leave temporary quarters in Tenzompa, Huejuquilla, El Alto, by the end of June, have had their eviction order postponed until Dec. 30. The Huichols were originally expelled from their homes in Mezquitic two years ago and took temporary refuge in Tenzompa. Religious intolerance has been severe in both areas. (Religion Today/Compass Direct)

POLICE FIND BODY OF SOUTH AFRICAN HOUSE CHURCH PASTOR Police found the body of a pastor who died more than two months ago when they finally got a warrant to search a property in Rockville, Soweto, South Africa, Monday, Sept. 27. Capt. Mbazima Shiburi said police were initially refused entry to the house — which was used as a church — 66 days ago, although they suspected there was a dead body inside. The pastor apparently had told his congregation that if he died, he should not be removed because he would “wake up” again in seven days. Police kept the house under surveillance, but were powerless to act until they received anonymous information on Sunday that there was a corpse inside, said Shiburi. When police arrived on Monday with the warrant, the woman at the house “asked for two minutes to pray” before they entered the house. “We found the decomposed body of the pastor, lying on the floor,” he said. Police removed the body amid a crowd of spectators. Shiburi said the case would be “intensively investigated.” (WorldWide Religious News/SA)

INTERNET EVANGELISM ‘JUST SCRATCHING THE SURFACE’ Internet evangelism is just scratching the surface. That’s the conclusion of Christian Internet specialists who attended the annual meeting of the Internet Evangelism Coalition (IEC) in Chicago Tuesday-Wednesday, Sept. 14-1 5. Reports indicate that more and more Internet users are exploring religion with 1 billion people expected to be online worldwide by 2005. Dennis Fierbach, vice president of information technology for Campus Crusade for Christ in Canada, reported that the http://www.TruthMedia.com sites alone attract more than 750,000 visitors a month with some 1,000 people a month making a decision for Christ. Some 350 online volunteers and more than 800 prayer supporters assist the ministry. “The strategy of the Great Commission is not that they come to us, but that we go to them,” said IEC Chair Sterling Huston. He stressed the opportunities that the Internet opens up to take the gospel into the international “digital marketplace.” IEC meeting participants heard from several Internet evangelism practitioners, including Andrew Careaga, who pointed out how the trend toward “blogging” could be used to point people to Jesus. Cheryl Wilhelmi, project manager of Focus on the Family’s counseling site, Troubledwith.com, discussed the importance of offering people help in life crises as well as long-term hope in Christ. (Mission Network News/AgapePress)

CHRISTIANS RUSH AID TO HAITI AND FLORIDA AS DEATH TOLL RISES Christian aid workers were rushing against time Monday, Sept. 27, to ease human suffering in Haiti after Tropical Storm/Hurricane Jeanne left more than 1,650 people dead, 800 missing and some 300,000 homeless. “Another 100 were killed in neighboring countries, and hundreds of thousands have been left homeless across the region,” reported Christian Aid, part of the Action for Churches Together (ACT) alliance that is involved in rebuilding and humanitarian aid efforts.

While local churches are helping, they’re being supported by Food for the Poor. The agency has used a helicopter to deliver more than 2,000 pounds of food to people in the Gonaives area. Trucks are standing by ready with additional medicine and emergency relief supplies. These shipments are in position to move whenever area roads are passable.

The city of Cap-Haitien escaped major damage, but it wasn’t immune to fire which recently damaged the city’s hospital. As a result of the blaze, more people are coming to a medical clinic operated by a ministry called For Haiti with Love. While the influx of patients has opened new opportunities to share the gospel, administrators say the clinic is running out of supplies to meet people’s physical needs.

Christian organizations are also involved in humanitarian aid across Florida’s Atlantic coast where Jeanne tore a fresh path of destruction as it marched up the already storm-ravaged state, killing at least six people. News reports said the fourth hurricane in six weeks shut down much of the state and prompted recovery plans on a scale never before seen in the nation. Baptist volunteers backed by the Red Cross were among those distributing food and other supplies to people living in hard-hit areas.

Bob Bland, president of Teen Missions International, says the ministry’s campus on Merritt Island, Fla., suffered nearly $100,000 in damage. “We have 11 new roofs that we have to put on our buildings. We were able to get one of those roofs on our printshop. We’ve lost a lot of trees on the Lord’s boot camp and we’re trying to temporarily patch up the roofs until we can actually put new roofs on the buildings.” Since the facilities are in a hurricane zone, the damage isn’t covered by insurance. Bland is requesting work groups to help with cleanup and repairs.

Earlier, more than 1,500 Southern Baptist disaster relief volunteers from 25 states have been cooking meals, cutting up fallen trees and providing childcare in six states in the path of destruction left by Hurricane Ivan from the Florida Panhandle to the Midwest, Baptist Press reported. U.S. President George W. Bush declared Florida a “major disaster area” which allows for increased federal financial aid. (BosNewsLife/Mission Network News/Reuters)

* Staff members from the HCJB World Radio Engineering Center in Elkhart, Ind., are working with OMS International to establish a satellite radio network based at 4VEH outside the city of Cap-Haitien that will deliver programs to FM stations nationwide. Downlinks have been installed in Tortue Island, Pignon and Beaumont, and at least two more are planned. HCJB World Radio also helped partner World Gospel Mission with a small station in Port-au-Prince.

4 RELIEF WORKERS FROM FLORIDA CHURCH DIE IN PLANE CRASH Pace (Florida) Assembly of God, which has been helping with relief efforts since Hurricane Ivan swept through western Florida, lost four longtime church members when the small plane they were flying in crashed shortly after takeoff at about 10 a.m. Friday, Sept. 24. All four persons aboard the plane died, including pilot Travis Neff and passengers Bill Walther, Daniel Wesley and Wesley’s fianc ©e, Cristy King. The group was part of the church’s hurricane relief outreach — preparing to fly over the area to help the church identify communities that may need assistance. Senior Pastor Glyn Lowery was to be on the flight, but he canceled after having to speak to an insurance adjuster. Wesley took Lowery’s place on the plane. The Pensacola News Journal reported that the plane’s engine sputtered during takeoff and was apparently trying to make it back to Peter Prince Field when it crashed. No one on the ground was injured, and the cause of crash will be investigated. (Assemblies of God News & Information Service)

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