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GOD HAS REVEALED HIMSELF

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ReformationTrust.com/World | 800.435.4343 CONTENTS | March 4, 2017 • Volume 32 • Number 4

30 17 40

44 48

FEATURES DISPATCHES 5 News / Human Race / 30 The great tragedy of South Sudan Quotables / Quick Takes The story of how a young republic escaped Christian persecution, then quickly devolved into civil war, is an ongoing drama marked by danger, death, and the staunch determination of the region’s CULTURE Christians and refugees 17 Movies & TV / Books / 40 Pledges of protection Children’s Books / Q&A / Music After fulfilling major campaign promises regarding abortion NOTEBOOK and the Supreme Court, will President Trump stand up for religious liberty? 55 Lifestyle / Technology / Science / Religion 44 Facing the fury What to expect from the Supreme Court confirmation hearings VOICES for Judge Neil Gorsuch 3 Joel Belz 48 Northern migration 14 Janie B. Cheaney Somali refugee resettlement stirs passions in a small town, 28 Mindy Belz with many watching Europe’s cautionary tale 61 Mailbag 63 Andrée Seu Peterson ON THE COVER: South Sudanese civilians flee fighting at a UN base 64 Marvin Olasky in the northeastern town of Malakal on Feb. 18, 2016, where gunmen opened fire on civilians sheltering inside, killing at least five people; photo by Justin Lynch/AFP/Getty Images

Give the gift of clarity: wng.org/clarity NOTES FROM THE CEO

“The earth is the Lord’s and the fullness thereof; the world and those who dwell therein.” Our journalism training division, World Journalism Institute, begins its major —Psalm 24:1 summer program on May 14, 2017. That’s a few months away, but there’s a more Chief Content Officer Nick Eicher urgent deadline looming: the completed application for WJI is due by March 21. Editor in Chief Marvin Olasky Senior Editor Mindy Belz We designed this core WJI program for college students and recent college graduates who plan to pursue a career in journalism. It is boot camp for aspiring Editor Timothy Lamer reporters who hope to work in the newsroom of an online, print, radio, or televi- National Editor Jamie Dean sion news organization. It is serious journalism training. Managing Editor Daniel James Devine Art Director David K. Freeland But it is more than that. Mainstream newsrooms, Associate Art Director Robert L. Patete Washington Bureau Chief J.C. Derrick with only a few exceptions, remain hostile to worldview Reporters Emily Belz • Sophia Lee diversity. WJI’s journalism training helps place East Asia Bureau June Cheng • Angela Lu Story Coach Susan Olasky Christian reporters in the door at major newsrooms Senior Writers Janie B. Cheaney Andrée Seu Peterson • John Piper around the country, but it is WJI’s practical worldview Edward E. Plowman­ • Lynn Vincent Correspondents Sandy Barwick • Megan Basham training that equips them to thrive when they get there. Julie Borg • Anthony Bradley • Bob Brown James Bruce • Michael Cochrane • John Dawson The application process is daunting, and we accept Charles Horton • Mary Jackson • Jill Nelson only a few students to each course. But once a student is Arsenio Orteza • Jae Wasson • Emily Whitten Mailbag Editor Les Sillars accepted, the course is free, thanks to WORLD members Executive Assistant June McGraw Editorial Assistants Kristin Chapman who agree with us that training Christians for the work Amy Derrick • Mary Ruth Murdoch Graphic Designer Rachel Beatty of journalism is important work. Illustrator Krieg Barrie The course is difficult. Our instructors are experienced Digital Production Assistant Arla J. Eicher journalists who understand the rigors of a career in the world of news. Their goal is to help our students succeed in their chosen profession, and by doing so, to Website wng.org Executive Editor Mickey McLean ­glorify God in a difficult place. Managing Editor Leigh Jones After the course, we work hard to place our graduates in internships, and we’ve Assistant Editors Kiley Crossland Lynde Langdon • Dan Perkins been pretty successful at placing our students into newsrooms, including WORLD. Reporters Onize Ohikere • Evan Wilt Correspondents La Shawn Barber • Gaye Clark WJI’s website (worldji.com) contains much more information about the program. Laura Finch • Samantha Gobba • Anna K. Poole Bonnie Pritchett • Julia A. Seymour Direct specific questions to Lee Pitts, WJI’s Associate Dean ([email protected]). Editorial Assistant Whitney Williams But don’t spend too much time on research—that deadline is right around the corner. Website wng.org/radio Executive Producer/Cohost Nick Eicher Senior Producer/Cohost Joseph Slife Senior Correspondent Cal Thomas Correspondents Paul Butler • Kent Covington Jim Henry • Mary Reichard • Sarah Wedel Producers Johnny Franklin • Carl Peetz (technical) Kevin Martin Christina Darnell • Kristen Eicher (field) [email protected] Listening In Warren Cole Smith • Rich Roszel

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explore what the Scriptures might say. There’s little agreement even within any of these camps. That’s why, right now, a few weeks after President Donald Trump’s wildly controversial order limiting USA-bound travel from certain terrorism hotbeds, the nation continues in a messy uproar. There are probably dozens of major reasons why Americans are skeptical and Using the source bewildered when they try to address the matter. For instance, I just heard a serious proposal that the United States should develop a way to material affix a dollar value to everyone who wants to WE CAN AVOID EMBARRASSING SILENCE come and seek a better life here in America. If the applicant is a potential candidate to become ON IMMIGRATION a top-flight neurosurgeon, he deserves a high score. Oddly, if he’s a first-class vegetable picker “I’ll tell you one thing I especially like and is willing to work in California’s hot R about WORLD magazine,” William Central Valley, he too might get a preferential Bennett told me during a visit in his office in rating. But for a thousand occupations in downtown Washington, D.C. “I’m glad for your between—don’t bother! position on immigration. I appreciate your open Or, if you’re running for public office, maybe spirit. It’s rare enough among conservatives.” you’ll measure thoughtfully just how these I was surprised that this former secretary of inbound folks will cast their votes once they education in President Ronald Reagan’s become citizens. Sounds good—but only at first. Cabinet and “drug czar” under President No such crassly self-centered standards fit George H.W. Bush picked that particular aspect too well with Emma Lazarus’ generous message of WORLD’s profile and reputation. on the Statue of Liberty: “Give me your tired, “Well,” I told him, “we don’t really have a Thoughtful your poor, / Your huddled masses yearning to choice in the matter. The Bible is repetitious in breathe free, / The wretched refuse of your reminding us that all of us were once refugees believers will teeming shore. / Send these, the homeless, who needed someone to reach out to us with go back to ­tempest-tost, to me, / I lift my lamp beside the an open hand and a generous spirit.” see what the golden door!” I’ll never forget Mr. Bennett’s slightly face- In other words, your natural impulse—the tious and wry reply: “You Protestants would Bible tells us. God-given inclination of your heart—is not to know that,” he said. “We Catholics aren’t keep finding ways to shut such needy people allowed to read the Bible, you know.” out, but to delight in discovering safe ways to My memory goes blank when I try to recall welcome those who are genuinely needy. the rest of that conversation, which took place In the pursuit of those impulses, you can’t some 25 years ago. But I do remember telling help noticing how President Trump’s broad Mr. Bennett that he was giving us—Protestants policies appear to reverse such generosity. To in general and WORLD editorial people in be sure, you also have to notice how silent his ­particular—way too much credit. Neither at opponents on this issue (especially the that point in our history, nor even now, could Democratic establishment) are when they’re we claim a well-conceived Biblical exegesis to asked to propose some specific policies. ­govern and define our position on the delicate, So you remember Bill Bennett’s inadvertent explosive issues of immigration, refugees, reminder a quarter-century ago. Thoughtful ­globalism, terrorism, and related matters. believers will go back to see what the Bible tells And so much has happened in the quarter- us. That Bible may not offer detailed formulas century since we had that conversation. The advising us just how many refugees to accept world is a much more dangerous place. from each difficult nation around the globe. But So what little coherency we might have An Iraqi Christian living if you do no more than pursue a quick word enjoyed as a grid for thinking about immigration in Lebanon holds a sign study of the term “sojourner,” you’ll learn the lay back then is long since gone. It’s not just that in front of United of the land. And the next time you find yourself Republicans and Democrats disagree on the sub- Nations offices during part of a discussion about immigration (which a sit-in demanding ject; not just that Bible-believing conservatives faster immigration may well be tomorrow), you won’t get caught in

BILAL HUSSEIN/AP differ with liberals who don’t even pretend to processing. an embarrassing silence. A

 [email protected] March 4, 2017 • WORLD Magazine 3

DISPATCHES News / Human Race / Quotables / Quick Takes

The century mark University of Connecticut coaches, including head coach Geno Auriemma (right), celebrate with player Gabby Williams (#15) after the team’s 100th straight victory. The win came on Feb. 13 against South Carolina. The Connecticut women’s basketball team had not lost since Nov. 17, 2014, and prior to that loss (to Stanford) had won 47 straight games. The team has won four straight national titles.

JESSICA HILL/AP

Manage your membership: wng.org/membership March 4, 2017 • WORLD Magazine 5 DISPATCHES News

has wrongly accreted? My suggestion: one step at a time, with change that is sustainable. The federal government is Remote control rightly in charge of foreign policy, mili- WILL DEMOCRATS NOW SEE WISDOM IN SENDING tary defense, and a few other things. POWER TO THE STATES? by Marvin Olasky Beyond that, we should decentralize, letting states decide which welfare and healthcare programs they want. Kuyper A popcorn thriller film released in to prevent a visitor from speaking. A also laid out what Christians should R June 1994 might give some sense week later in the U.S. Senate, formerly a lobby for: Government must not of the challenges facing the Trump center of civility, one senator called obstruct proclamation of the gospel, administration. In Speed, starring another a racist and received an promote a counter-gospel, or coerce Keanu Reeves and Sandra Bullock, a enforced timeout that she used to raise conscience. ransom-seeking terrorist has placed a big bucks. The likelihood of federal power- bomb on a bus that goes fast over Los What’s a way out of this morass? In seekers choosing to give up power is Angeles freeways. (“Fast” now seems the movie, Reeves finds a way to off- always slim, but the window of oppor- like a mythical tale.) The bomb activates load the hostages onto another bus. In tunity now might be open a sliver. In as the bus gets to 50 mph, and from real life, we need to grasp the wisdom 1995 I met with then-Senate Minority then on will detonate if bus speed of Abraham Kuyper, the editor-­ Leader Tom Daschle and five other drops below 50. theologian who was prime minister of Democratic senators who were com- Five months after the movie’s the Netherlands from 1901 to 1905: plaining about proposed “cuts” in wel- release, Republicans gained a majority Centralized power in Amsterdam (and fare spending. My proposal: maintain in the House of Representatives for the Washington more so) “destroys the nat- spending in return for beginning to first time in 40 years. Bill Clinton ural divisions that give a nation vitality decentralize. They wouldn’t go for it. acknowledged the result by saying “the and … begets a slow process of dissolu- Would Democrats now be willing to era of big government is over.” Sure. In tion that cannot but end in the demor- off-load some programs and start 1771 Jean-Louis de Lolme wrote in The alization of government and people reducing the national debt? Constitution of England that Parliament alike.” That’s unlikely but possible in the had too much power: It could “do How do we off-load to the states Age of Trump, if Democrats see the everything but make a woman a man much of the power that Washington government using power against them. and a man a woman.” Now, gargantuan government in Washington tries to accomplish even that. Another indication of trouble: Our We should decentralize, letting states decide which national debt has quadrupled and is welfare and healthcare programs they want. close to $20 trillion, which is more than our gross domestic product. Fiscally, we’re going faster and faster along a slaveway and can choose between accelerating to a crackup or finding a way to slow down without detonation. And, we’re not in La La Land: Bus pas- sengers turned into hostages in Speed face death, yet panic is minimal, while CAROL M. HIGHSMITH/BUYENLARGE/GETTY IMAGES in today’s reality the passengers are attacking each other. The great 1971 song “American Pie” includes a line, “February made me shiver, with every paper I’d deliver.” February 2017 began with news from the University of California, Berkeley, where the free speech movement started a half-century ago: “150 black- clad anti-fascist radicals” (Rolling Stone’s description) lit fires, smashed windows, and hurled Molotov cocktails

6 WORLD Magazine • March 4, 2017 BY THE NUMBERS

$25,000The monthly amount the California Legislature is paying former Attorney General Eric Holder’s law firm to provide “legal strategies” against the Trump administration.

Kuyper The percentage of Catholic priests in Australia accused of child sex abuse One silver lining in the chaotic cloud of between 1950 and 2010, according to an Australian government inquiry. refugee policy and other rollouts during the initial days of our new administra- 7% tion: Liberals are learning that execu- tive orders and Senate “nuclear options” are not their friends. Democrats in the short term will fight $21.6 billion The potential cost of constructing a U.S.-Mexico border wall, as estimated the imperial presidency that they in a government report leaked to the Reuters news service. applauded when Barack Obama was in the White House, and maybe gain some long-term learning in the process. That’s probably too hopeful, but something to pray for. We might also pray that Washingtonians (and all of us) take to heart this suggestion from Puritan author Jeremiah Burroughs: “If you hear others report this or that ill of you, and your hearts are dejected because you think you suffer in your name, your hearts were inordinately set on your name and reputation.” In the Old Testament, David reacted properly to Shimei, who cursed him, threw The number of overdose calls placed to emergency services in Louisville, Ky., stones at him, and flung dust at him— over 32 hours from Feb. 8 to 10. Most cases involved heroin. because David discerned that Shimei actually was God’s instrument. I’ve been to many East Coast wine- 52 and-cheese parties where journalists whine and share cheesy complaints— but we’re all better off when we listen to criticism. Of course, David in his last words instructed son Solomon to bring y 65The length of Elizabeth II’s reignears as queen of the United Kingdom. Shimei’s “gray head down with blood,” The British monarch’s Sapphire Jubilee arrived Feb. 6.

PUBLIC DOMAIN PUBLIC and Solomon made that happen. A

 [email protected]  @MarvinOlasky March 4, 2017 • WORLD Magazine 7 DISPATCHES Human Race

born Muslim convert, a great dissident, others 30-year prison sentence for called his criticism of supporting a 2015 Islamic Russia excessive.

State terror attack in Navrozov, a Russian SCHAAF PETER • HAUTZIG: HANDOUT • NAVROZOV: AP VIA DEPARTMENT SHERIFF’S COUNTY MARICOPA • KAREEM: GUTFELD OREN AND OLSON L. CASEY • PARCHMENT: IMAGES NJIKIZANA/AFP/GETTY JEKESAI MAWARIRE: Garland, Texas. In 2015, Orthodox Christian, went two friends of Kareem on to write conservative opened fire at a conference pieces for Newsmax and that was exhibiting WorldTribune.com. ­cartoons mocking Muhammad. The two Died friends were killed in a Walter Hautzig, whose police shootout, and later music saved him from authorities discovered probable death Kareem and brought in Nazi- him to trial. occupied Prosecutors Vienna, Released texts. In the new cave, the argued he had died Jan. Pastor Evan Mawarire, who archaeologists found only watched jihadist 30 at challenged the dictator of traces suggesting the one- videos with the age 95. Zimbabwe, has been set time existence of Dead Sea two shooters, Hautzig, free on bail as he awaits manuscripts: a blank scroll, researched travel a Jew, sentence in his native to join ISIS, and had already country. Mawarire became encouraged the Texas been arrested a sensation in Zimbabwe attack. Despite Kareem’s and released once by the after he appeared in an denials, a jury convicted Nazis when he heard online video draped in the him. about a man offering national flag and decrying auditions for music poverty and corruption in Died ­fellowships to the his country. Hundreds of Lev Navrozov, a Soviet Jerusalem Conservatory. thousands of Zimbabweans ­dissident and author, died The fellowships came heeded his call for a Jan. 22 at the age of 88. with exit visas. Hautzig national strike, stoking Navrozov grew up in played a Beethoven ­government displeasure. the Soviet piano sonata and won Mawarire fled to America Union and a fellowship and last year, but this February became a trip to Palestine he returned to Zimbabwe respected on the spot. and was quickly arrested. transla- Later, Hautzig Authorities have charged pieces of parchment tor. But, moved to New him with subversion and ­wrapping, storage jars, in his York and made insulting the flag. If con- and a leather tying string. words, he his American victed, he faces a possible Scholars from The Hebrew and his debut to great 20-year prison sentence. University of Jerusalem family became applause. He said Bedouins probably unsatisfied with became a cultural­ Discovered looted the cave back in the their “senseless existence.” ambassador for the Archaeologists have uncov- 1950s. But they hope the They emigrated to America United States, perform- ered another cave in the discovery will lead to more in 1972 with the help of the ing around the world, Judean desert they believe hidden caves, possibly with Hebrew Immigrant Aid including in Japan after once housed Dead Sea undiscovered scrolls inside. Society. Navrozov smug- World War II and in Scrolls—the first such find gled out his study on the mainland China after the in over 60 years. The Dead Sentenced terror campaigns of 1979 thaw in diplomatic Sea Scrolls, previously A federal judge Lenin and Stalin, relations. Hautzig said ­discovered in a series of 11 has given publishing it in the power of music was caves and dated as early as Abdul Malik the United good for everyone.­ He the 3rd century B.C., Abdul States to mixed did refuse to play for one ­contain some of the oldest Kareem, an reaction: Some audience—a segregated known copies of Biblical American- hailed him as a music hall in Alabama.

8 WORLD Magazine • March 4, 2017 Visit WORLD Digital: wng.org 2017 lamplighter guild june 25-30

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Visit us at www.lamplighterguild.com or call 570.585.1314 or email [email protected]. DISPATCHES Quotables

‘I don’t think you can do infrastructure; raise defense ‘He can spending; do a tax cut; keep lead a protest; Medicare, Medicaid, and I’m running a Social Security just as they are; country.’ and balance the British Prime Minister THERESA MAY on Labour budget. It’s just Party Leader Jeremy Corbyn’s proposal not possible.’ to revoke President Donald Trump’s state visit invitation. HARNIK/AP ANDREW • COLE: HARNIK/AP ANDREW • SCOTT: IMAGES NGAN/AFP/GETTY MANDEL • TRUMP: IMAGES WIGGLESWORTH/AFP/GETTY MAY: KIRSTY

‘What do you think — our country’s

so innocent?’ U.S. Rep. TOM COLE, R-Okla., a President DONALD TRUMP, in an interview member of the House Budget with Fox’s Bill O’Reilly, when O’Reilly Committee, on the tension between President Trump’s challenged Trump’s “respect” for agenda and Republicans’ long- Russian President Vladimir Putin. time plans to deal with deficits. O’Reilly called Putin a “killer.”

‘If we were animals, perhaps ‘I just wish that we might qualify my friends who call for protection as themselves liberals would an endangered species. But we want tolerance for all are only human Americans, including beings with conservative Americans.’ disabilities, so U.S. Sen. TIM SCOTT, R-S.C., during a floor speech we do not.’ about racist remarks directed at him over his Lord KEVIN SHINKWIN, who support of Jeff Sessions for attorney general. is a disabled member of the House of Lords, on a legal Scott said critics have called him a loophole that allows selective “house negro” and a “disgrace abortions based on disability in to the black race.” the United Kingdom.

10 WORLD Magazine • March 4, 2017 Give the gift of clarity: wng.org/clarity

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The chilliest chapel This winter, a tiny central Russian town finally has a place where local Orthodox Christians can worship. Unlike other churches, though, the new

Sosnovka house of worship will melt when temperatures climb above 32 BARRIE KRIEG • ILLUSTRATION: MONSIVAIS/AP ACT: MARTINEZ PABLO CARE • AFFORDABLE AP VIA CALIFORNIAN BAKERSFIELD BARRIOS/THE A. HENRY • LOGAN: FEOKTISTOV/TASS/NEWSCOM DMITRY CHAPEL: degrees Fahrenheit. Sosnovka resident Alexander Batyokhtin labored for two months this winter to build a 10-foot-tall chapel made entirely out of snow in his remote Siberian village. Using 424 cubic feet of snow, Batyokhtin braved temperatures as low as minus 22 to complete the Back on his feet ­temporary structure. “The main thing is to say a prayer and keep a fast For years, doctors told Roger Logan he was for some time, then just go do it,” Batyokhtin explained. simply too fat. Turns out, that was a misdiagnosis. The 57-year-old Mississippi man is now recovering after doctors in California removed a 130-pound benign tumor that had been growing in Logan’s abdomen for 15 years. Logan had been confined to an armchair because of the tumor and nearly despaired of his life before finding a doctor willing to perform the risky surgery. After the procedure, Logan walked again for the first time in several years. He credited his wife, Kitty, for helping him find the surgeon. “She just kept pushing,” Logan told The Bakersfield Californian. “She wouldn’t let me quit.”

Obamacare and confusion With an attack on the Affordable Care Act on the horizon, some congressmen might look to political polling to determine Flight risk? which way the public mood is blowing. But If the weapon had belonged to anyone else, airport what’s a lawmaker to do if the public security officials might have been less amused. A doesn’t know what the act does, or bronze-handled cane set off the X-ray machine at what it even is? A Morning Consult Myrtle Beach International Airport in South poll published in The New York Carolina, and when TSA officials took a closer look Times Feb. 7 revealed that 35 at the object, they discovered a sword hidden ­percent of respondents either inside. The owner turned out to be an 80-year-old believed or weren’t sure whether woman who was intending to carry her walking the Affordable Care Act and stick aboard her plane. Asked about the hidden Obamacare were different poli- weapon, the elderly woman gave a simple cies. President Barack Obama explanation: She had no idea there was a blade signed the Affordable Care Act, inside the cane, which her son had given to her as nicknamed Obamacare by critics, into a gift years before. After giving up the dangerous law in March 2010. cane to TSA officials, the woman caught her flight.

12 WORLD Magazine • March 4, 2017 Chunk of change Some people find enough change in their couch to buy a soda. And then there’s Jonathan Humbert. The British auctioneer found more than $37,000 worth of precious metals, including gold coins and silver bars, in a suitcase under a sofa on Jan. 25 in a home he was preparing to auction off. “I went to pick it up and I almost pulled my shoulder out of its socket, it was so heavy,” Humbert told the BBC. “So I had to drag it out uncere- moniously.” The ­treasure’s proceeds went to the unnamed Northamptonshire homeowner. Honor student After playing hooky for more than six decades, Norm Johnson finally has his diploma. In 1950, a judge in California gave Johnson, now 83, a choice: sign up for the military or stop skip- ping classes at San Diego High School. The 17-year-old Johnson chose the Air Force. In the ensuing years, Johnson served as a bodyguard for Gen. Douglas MacArthur, took community college classes, and became a newspaper writer. On Feb. 8, Johnson got an honorary diploma from the San Diego County Office of Education. “I was surprised that it actually does matter to me this much,” Johnson told the Los Angeles Times.

Acquaintance and accomplice Greg Kreiser thought he was being neighborly by offering a ride to a man he met at a Columbia, Pa., tavern on Jan. 30. Before long, Kreiser said, the stranger, identified as Dance-free zoning Shannon Steckbeck, began making Residents of Henryetta, Okla., were looking forward to a local unusual requests. First he wanted to Valentine’s dance this year. That is, until they realized attending stop for cigarettes. Next Steckbeck the event would be illegal. An obscure town ordinance long on wanted to personally inspect the books forbids dancing within 500 feet of a house of worship— Kreiser’s car. Before long, Kreiser which meant the scheduled dance at Rosie LaVon’s Marketplace found himself waiting outside a local wouldn’t be lawful. “It’s never been enforced my entire life,” said bank unaware while Steckbeck was Henryetta Mayor Jennifer Clason of the ordinance, according to inside robbing it. The 58-year-old KTUL. “But I’d never looked at it because it never came up.” ­former letter carrier said he dropped While the town police chief confirmed he had no intention of Steckbeck off after the bank heist a few miles down the road, breaking up illegal shindigs, the organizer of the Valentine’s dance and only grew suspicious when he saw police cars racing past canceled the event anyway. That’s largely because the organizer’s him toward the bank. That’s when Kreiser returned to the bank, husband is the city attorney. “He said his oath is to uphold the law,” informed police of his suspicion, and led officers to Clason explained. The City Council planned to discuss abolishing Steckbeck, who was promptly arrested. the ordinance at a February meeting.

Flag bill Does this mean Nebraska needs a new flag? For 10 days, the flag of Nebraska flew upside down over the state Capitol in Lincoln without anyone noticing. State Sen. Burke Harr revealed the faux pas in February when he introduced a resolution to redesign the state’s flag. The North American Vexillological Association ranks the current Nebraska flag, which features a detailed

COINS: SWNS.COM• STECKBECK: HANDOUT • DANCE: HANDOUT • JOHNSON: HOWARD LIPIN/ZUMA PRESS/NEWSCOM• FLAG: AYZEK/ISTOCK state seal on a blue background, among the worst state flags in the nation.

Manage your membership: wng.org/membership March 4, 2017 • WORLD Magazine 13 VOICES Janie B. Cheaney

order and deliver it to his desk. Some of these actions have been hasty and ill-executed; others make conservatives cheer. To the opposition, it doesn’t matter—if it’s Trump, it’s outrageous. They’ve been sowing this wind for years. Here comes the whirlwind. During the George W. Bush years, a new ail- ment was identified: BDS, or Bush Derangement Angry days Syndrome. A razor-thin election that had to be decided by the Supreme Court didn’t help, but WHEN MAD ABOUT DONALD TRUMP after eight years of Clinton, Democrats chan- BECOMES MADNESS neled their frustration into routine outrage. With the election of Barack A few days after the inauguration, a friend Obama it was the right’s turn R posted on Facebook, “Anybody else glad to contract ODS, especially it’s over?” Meaning a tumultuous election, as the years dragged on and nights of protest, and a massive nationwide a Republican-majority march led by women in pink headgear. I had to Congress failed to do any- respond, “It’s not over.” thing about Obama’s over- Take that women’s march. I understand that reach. By now it’s common the pink headgear referred to crude sexist com- knowledge that growing fury ments by now-President Trump, recorded some on the right swept (or 10 years ago by Access Hollywood. Those com- pitched) Donald Trump into ments make me angry too, but not in-your-face, office, and now everybody’s crank-it-up-to-eleven mad. The women mad. About everything. reminded me of bitter wives with a husband Our new We’re reaching a point, if we haven’t already, who just won’t listen: every stupid comment he where anger is its own justification. It almost makes reminds them of every other stupid president is doesn’t matter what the issue is; anger is virtue. comment, not to mention every slight, oversight, not like any When President Trump announced his choice and mistake. They find themselves married to a other. To for the next Supreme Court justice, protesters boor, and they want a divorce, now. were already on the court steps with signs read- As I write, college campuses are exploding everyone’s ing #Stop ______, with space below to write in over scheduled appearances by Milo surprise, he’s the nominee’s name. Participants at the women’s Yiannoupolos, who’s touring with a new book. doing what march were unable to cohere around a single Yiannoupolos, a gay, Trump-loving, flame- Trump policy (or promised policy, since his throwing, Greek-British import, spent the last he said he presidency was one day old) they were most few years infuriating the conservative estab- would do. upset about. It was enough that they were upset. lishment as an alt-right gadfly for Breitbart His executive order on immigration threw News. Provocateur is one of the nicer ways to red meat to the opposition: finally something to describe him, but what may have riled the left sink their teeth into! But not to talk about; rather more than anything (besides his stumping for to march and yell and break things about. The Trump) were insulting comments about the immigration order could have opened up useful female stars of the Ghostbusters remake. To dialogue about mercy vs. safety and how to help keep him off their campus, protesters at refugees who can’t move in next door. But anger Berkeley smashed windows and started fires, is not conducive to constructive solutions. reminiscent of the good old days of 1964. What Instead of flooding relief organizations with were students protesting back then? Oh yes: much-needed funds, protesters flooded the ALEX MILAN TRACY/SIPA USA VIA AP VIA USA TRACY/SIPA MILAN ALEX being denied the right to promote controversial ACLU with $24 million for a futile effort to sue causes and speakers while on campus. the government. If the White House seems like a china closet Now bureaucrats in the executive depart- after the bull has been let loose, that’s mostly ment are vowing to undermine their own boss, perception. But yes, our new president is not who threatened to “drain the swamp.” “A house like any other. To everyone’s surprise, he’s doing divided against itself cannot stand,” but now what he said he would do, not like a politician we’re looking at a government divided against but like a CEO: no compromise, no debate, no itself. How long will that stand? Oval Office addresses; just write up the executive These are perilous times. Pray hard. A

14 WORLD Magazine • March 4, 2017  [email protected]  @jbcheaney Serve Seattle is a short term Urban Missions Institute where young adults can grow in Christ, serve the poor, the homeless and the marginalized. If you're ready to gain a vision for your future and do something that matters, apply now.

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STANISLAV HONZIK/TWENTIETH CENTURY FOX  [email protected] R makers basedthemovie on and SouthAfrica.Thefilm across England,Botswana, sprawling historical epic the bare outlinesofa lovely movie only crams in But itisn’t. Infact,this cinematic itseemsfake. MAKES FOR AN EPIC FILM COLONIALMARRIAGE IN BOTSWANA STORY TRUE THE AWIDELY OF OPPOSED troubles Royal Movie United Kingdom The story behind CULTURE  @emlybelz is so isso A Movies &TV ­ early 1950s, thefilm relates series ontelevision. have easilybeenamini­ happened. Thisstory could to learnmore aboutwhat began reading andreading after thecredits scrolled, I by Susan Williams, and the biography Set inthe1940s and

by Emily Belz Emily by / Books Books Colour Bar / Children’s Books

midceremony. Thetrue attempt togetmarried cials haltedtheirfirst British government offi Not includedinthefilm: government—they married. Botswana, andtheBritish uncle whowas leading Williams’ parents, Khama’s Against thewishesof Pike), awhitewoman. Ruth Williams (Rosamund love withaclerknamed in England,Khamafalls Botswana. Whileinschool protectorate thatisnow Bechuanaland—a British heir tothethrone of Khama (David Oyelowo), the history ofSeretse / Q&A Q&A ­ / Music March 4, 2017 4, March role Winston Churchill Most shocking isthe that hewas unfitforduty. his own country, saying Britain exiled Khamafrom ried toawhitewoman. the border whowas mar an Africanleaderacross South Africadidnotwant introduced apartheid. Africa, whichhadjust in neighboringSouth upset thepoliticalpowers couple becausetheirunion opposed theinterracial flourish ortwo. have aminorahistorical than themovie, whichdoes story iseven more cinematic The Britishgovernment • WORLD Magazine WORLD ­ 17 CULTURE Movies & TV

played in this ugly business. give a rare African perspec­ “The biggest effects of tive to a story about Movie colonialism in Botswana colonialism. that I found is the fact that “I grew up around black very few people know this men who were very self- Lego Batman story,” Oyelowo told me. possessed, who loved their For anyone like me tioning police system “In Botswana they know families—my father being R who suffers from a rather than just relying on more about David one of them, my uncles, my condition I’ve started to the Bat-Signal will have Livingstone than they do cousins,” he said. “My dad think of as ESF—extreme parents rolling in the aisle. about Seretse Khama.” is from a royal family, so superhero fatigue—a That said, while the The weakness of the that bearing, that dignity— movie that centers on a manic, inside jokes never movie is the romance of the that kind of man, I grew up caped crusader could stop and practically beg beginning: Ruth and with. But they are never provide a surprising anti- Seretse’s meeting, court­ talked about. Whenever dote. The Lego Batman ship, and wedding go by in you talk about an African Movie, the sequel to a twinkling, before the leader, someone in that 2014’s surprise hit The Lego Movie, skewers the viewer can understand why kind of role, I’ve found it to self-aggrandizing, tor- exactly they are insepara­ be negative—leaders who tured dramatics that ble. Loving, last year’s film are corrupt.” have come to character- about the couple at the The real-life Seretse ize the genre. ­center of the landmark U.S. Khama (Seretse means “the Having vanquished Supreme Court case legal­ clay that binds together”) all his enemies, izing interracial marriage, ushered in Botswana’s Batman (a hilarious Will smartly began after the independence, kept the Arnett) discovers his couple was already in love, country from the racial last, greatest nemesis saving the filmmakers time strife of its neighbors, and resides in his own to explore the interplay watched the country grow heart—his fear of for repeat viewings, Lego between politics and their in prosperity after the dis­ becoming part of a Batman doesn’t quite relationship. Fortunately, in covery of diamonds. The ­family again. This same match the brilliance of its the following parts of A government, which has subtext has played a part predecessor, one of the United Kingdom (rated remained politically stable in other Dark Knight best and most delightful incarnations, but never children’s movies of PG-13 for minimal language through elected leaders has a film mined it for so recent years. including racial epithets since Khama, steered clear many laughs. Even Joker From its incorporation and brief sensuality of corruption. He and Ruth (Zach Galifianakis) feels of everyday household between the married remained married until the sting of Batman’s items like the “Kragle,” to ­couple), the marriage and their deaths—and now their emotional unavailability. its wild combination of political intrigue are story has the cinematic “I would say I don’t cur- characters and back- engrossing. ­telling it deserves. A rently have a bad guy,” drops, to the father-and- Pike and Oyelowo are an The Dark One son framing device that excellent pair, both carry­ shrugs to the bookended the plot, The ing an air of royalty. BOX OFFICE TOP 10 Joker’s vast heart- Lego Movie was a practi- Oyelowo, who did a Golden FOR THE WEEKEND OF FEB. 10-12 break. “I’m fighting cally perfect representa- according to Box Office Mojo Globe–nominated turn as a few different tion of childhood people.” imagination and the joy of Martin Luther King Jr. in CAUTIONS: Quantity of sexual (S), violent­ (V), Selma, is at total ease in the and foul-language (L) ­content on a 0-10 scale, A couple of play. So it’s no surprise with 10 high, from kids-in-mind.com role of a charismatic, prin­ crude bits notwith- that while it’s a ton of fun, S V L standing, this kind the sequel, which focuses cipled leader. Oyelowo `1 The LEGO Batman of smart PG-humor on the much smaller sub- grew up in the United Movie* PG...... 1 3 2 characterizes the ject of why we’re drawn Kingdom but spent several `2 Fifty Shades Darker R...... 10 4 5 entire movie. A to superheroes, doesn’t WARNER BROS. PICTURES BROS. WARNER years of his childhood in `3 John Wick: Chapter 2 R...... 4 9 5 press conference reach the same heights. Nigeria. The director of the `4 Split* PG-13...... 4 7 5 where the cute new The Lego Movie was a film, Amma Asante, is `5 Hidden Figures* PG...... 1 3 3 Commissioner kids’ movie for the ages. British but of Ghanian `6 A Dog’s Purpose* PG...... 2 4 1 Gordon (Rosario Lego Batman is a smart, descent. Oyelowo said that `7 Rings PG-13...... 4 6 3 Dawson) argues for cheeky movie for right having Africans leading `8 La La Land* PG-13...... 3 2 5 establishing a func- now. —by MEGAN BASHAM the film allowed them to `9 Lion* PG-13...... not rated `10 Sing* PG...... 1 2 1

18 WORLD Magazine • March 4, 2017 *Reviewed by WORLD Documentary of powder cocaine (used mainly in the suburbs by whites). 13th 13th is still breathtak- If you’re white and ingly biased, and some- R become uncomfort- what scattered. It often able watching Netflix’s relies on emotion—news new Oscar-nominated clips, rap music, or the documentary, 13th, that’s occasional movie clip— probably as it should be. where it could have used “No one who is white thoughtfully chosen understands what it is like ­statistics for a stronger being black in America,” argument. explains Newt Gingrich in For example, it fixates the film. on the influence of the Filmmaker Ava conservative American Stevens and Keller DuVernay traces a large Legislative Exchange story arc: the overcrimi- Council—one of hundreds nalization of black men in of D.C. nonprofits—on Television when he loses his cool, media and politics, and private prison legislation, chaos breaks loose: He therefore, in American as if ALEC invented the unintentionally kills life, since Reconstruction. idea of giving draft bills Legion someone, escapes the The film is most to legislators or is solely If superhero films institution, and attracts ­effective when exploring responsible for poor R had high-school the attention of mysteri- the facts across U.S. his- prison conditions affect- cliques, FX’s anti-super- ous agencies. Meanwhile, tory and policy: Slavery ing all races. hero show Legion would he’s madly in love with a was an economic system, Fortunately, the docu- be the eccentric rebel— fellow patient (Rachel and when it collapsed, mentary also features the weirdly dressed but Keller) who shuns all the economy of the Craig DeRoche, a vice cool kid who dishes out physical touch, but also South collapsed too. president at Prison quirky quips and philo- wonders if he’s making Criminalizing blacks by Fellowship. DeRoche says sophical insights while everything up: After all, arresting them for very the film portrayed his con- popping neon-pink he’s mentally ill … or is he? minor crimes, like loiter- tribution accurately but ­bubble gum. This show being an ing, allowed Southerners that there are a number To watch this widely X-Men spinoff, the answer to continue enslaving of structural and socio- anticipated new show (at should be obvious, but them for labor. economic barriers to heal- least the first available Legion keeps viewers Today, we see racial ing America’s damaged episode, which premiered guessing: What’s real, disparities play out in the criminal justice system. Feb. 8) is to take a wacky and what’s not? That’s justice system in areas “This movie does ride into the heavily part of showrunner Noah like mandatory sentenc- shine a light on the ­medicated mind of David Hawley’s mad-filmmaker ing for drug offenses, debate,” said DeRoche. Heller (Dan Stevens). brilliance: He uses a non- where possession of just “To the extent that it David is a disturbed, linear narrative to disori- 1 ounce of crack cocaine does that, it’s important ­earnest young man who’s ent viewers’ sense of time (used in the inner cities, that America says let’s go been diagnosed with par- and realism, then further mainly by blacks) carries ahead and talk about this, anoid schizophrenia and disturbs the senses with harsher penalties than and not sweep it under has lived in a psychiatric hyperkinetic choreogra- possession of 100 ounces the rug.” —by LAURA FINCH institution since his last phy, bizarre aesthetics, nervous breakdown. His and mood-altering colors. only friend, Lenny Legion, which has (Aubrey Plaza), is a some swear words in its twitchy chatterbox who first episode, is not for nibbles Twizzlers while everyone: Some may staring at other dribbling complain it dishes out patients. If that isn’t more question marks trippy enough, David pos- than entertainment. But sesses strange powers— for Marvel fans who want he can fling things (and fewer skyscraper explo- human bodies) around sions and more psycho- with his mind and create logical puzzles, Legion other terrifying havoc— could be a refreshing which he doesn’t under- break from the main- Gingrich and stand or know how to stream superhero assem- DuVernay control. In one incident bly line. —by SOPHIA LEE LEGION: FX • 13TH: NETFLIX

See all our movie reviews at wng.org/movies March 4, 2017 • WORLD Magazine 19 CULTURE Books Democratic discontent WHEN SMALLER IS SMARTER by Marvin Olasky

Jason Brennan’s placing “more decisions CIA, and the Rise of when it comes to crime and R Against Democracy under the control of the America’s Secret Government punishment … American (Princeton, 2016) is the market, civil society, and (HarperCollins, 2015) often education embraces and exception to the rule that decentralized political connects dots in ways that enforces poverty … how “you can’t tell a book by its institutions.” go beyond the evidence. lies turned isolated deaths cover.” Brennan’s cover Stephan Haggard and Cop Under Fire (Worthy, into national scandals … depicts a ballot box with a Robert Kaufman’s Dictators March 2017) by Milwaukee black lives matter­ less to big X over it, and that’s and Democrats: Masses, County Sheriff David Clarke BLM than lies and leftist essentially what Brennan Elites and Regime Change has vigorous writing and ­politics … the ­second argues: Democracy today is (Princeton, 2016) says coun- chapter titles that don’t pull amendment isn’t just for government by the ignorant. tries need strong civil soci- punches: “I’m colorblind white people anymore.” And yet, Brennan’s last ety institutions to avoid chapter, “Civic Enemies,” falling into tyranny—but suggests the real problem is much of the writing is tur- not democracy but govern- gid. Elizabeth Hinton’s ment power. He appreciates From the War on Poverty to BOOKMARKS the freedom to buy “wood- the War on Crime (Harvard, If you have a coffee table and dollars to decorate it, fired Neapolitan pizzas at 2016) brings together two Jerusalem: 1000-1400: Every People Under Heaven, Pizzeria Orso” rather than Goliath programs often edited by Barbara Boehm and Melanie Holcomb “yucky” Pizza Hut pizzas. If assessed in isolation and (Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2016), is beautiful, and we had to choose one pizza- shows how the Johnson Joseph Koerner’s Bosch & Bruegel maker for everyone, though, administration offered mixed (Princeton, 2016) brings out parallels probably everyone would messages a half-century ago. in paintings that seem so different. I mentioned last year the death of have to eat Pizza Hut—so, Tyler Cowen, a George Kenneth Bailey and praised his books the fewer winner-take-all Mason University professor on understanding the Middle Eastern choices the electorate has to who runs an insightful background of the Bible. I’ve just make, the better. ­website titled Marginal reread his book from 2005, The Ilya Somin’s Democracy Revolution, sprinkles per- Cross & the Prodigal: Luke 15 and Political Ignorance ceptive comments through Through the Eyes of Middle Eastern (Stanford, second edition his just-published The Peasants (IVP), and want 2016) makes similar points, Complacent Class (St. to recommend it to anyone who’s teaching but goes deeper by giving Martin’s, 2017). Both rich about the prodigal son parable. the reasons “why smaller and poor are complacent: Derek Cooper’s Introduction to World government is smarter.” Poor people who switch Christian History (IVP, 2016) has good Somin shows that most neighborhoods or cities information on Christianity’s advance ­citizens are ignorant but usually improve their eco- under fire throughout the world. Rod says political ignorance is nomic situation, but few Dreher’s The Benedict Option (Sentinel, rational behavior for most want to move. Social justice 2017) assumes Christian regress in the Western world and says conservative citizens, since the chance of advocates tend to disparage Christian political activists are “as ineffective only one vote affecting an bankers and financiers, but as White Russian exiles, drinking tea from samovars election outcome is slight: It Samuel Gregg’s For God and in their Paris drawing rooms. … One wishes them well makes more sense for indi- Profit(Crossroad, 2016) but knows deep down that they are not the future.” viduals to invest time in shows how they can serve Dreher says a thousand-year flood is coming and “the what they can control, such the common good. best way to fight the flood is to … stop fighting the as what kind of car to buy. David Talbot’s The Devil’s flood.” Stop piling up sandbags. Build an ark.—M.O. Somin rightly proposes Chessboard: Allen Dulles, the

20 WORLD Magazine • March 4, 2017 FOUR RECENT NOVELS reviewed by Susan Olasky

THIN AIR Ann Cleeves Cleeves writes crime stories rooted in family and community AFTERWORD secrets rather than bad language and graphic violence. Her I can anticipate the objec- Shetland mysteries feature detective Jimmy Perez. Here he’s tions to Very Married by grieving over the murder of his girlfriend and investigating the Katherine Willis Pershey death of a London filmmaker who had visited an isolated far (Herald Press, 2016). She’s a north island for a wedding celebration. Cleeves depicts a tight- female pastor in a very lib- knit community that doesn’t readily open up to outsiders. Her eral denomina- atmospheric setting—the furthest-north tip of the United tion and, no Kingdom, dense fog, and summer nights that never get dark— surprise, favors provides the perfect­ setting for murders that seem to connect same-sex mar- to a ghost story of a young girl’s drowning decades earlier. riage. But her book on mar- SONG OF THE LION Anne Hillerman riage, told in the The Navajo Nation hosts a “mediation”—inviting tribal representa- form of memoir, tives, environmentalists, developers, adventure guides, archaeolo- gets much right— gists, and government officials—to discuss development of a and it might be resort on tribal land near the Grand Canyon. Before the mediation the perfect book for some- begins, a bomb blows up the mediator’s car, killing a Navajo youth. one who’s more theologi- Then the electricity and heat go out at the conference center cally liberal. Of marriage vs. meeting location. Navajo police duo Bernadette Manuelito and her premarital sex, she writes, husband Jim Chee must protect the mediator and solve the bomb- “The covenant of marriage— the vows to love now and ing. Anne Hillerman transforms her father Tony’s taut Navajo mys- forever—changes teries into aimless, talky fare by elevating Bernie to a starring role. everything.” Baby boomers raised THE INVOICE Jonas Karlsson kids without being con- This Swedish novel begins when the unnamed protagonist stantly online, so it’s hard receives an invoice from W.R.D. (World Resources Distribution) for for us to imagine 5,700,000 kronor (about $633,000), a sum he can’t possibly pay. the experience of He works part time in a video shop, lives alone, and has few digital natives. In friends. But his optimistic nature has earned this film buff a high What Falls From “experienced happiness” rating. “Being alive costs,” the person on the Sky the other end of the phone tells him. In 200 pages, Karlsson paints (Zondervan, a humorous picture of bureaucracy run amok and ponders the 2016), millennial question of what makes for happiness in a godless world. Caution: Esther Emery Brief nongraphic affair and several obscenities. goes offline for a year: no Facebook, no blog, TO THE BRIGHT EDGE OF THE WORLD Eowyn Ivey no internet. The initial In 1885, a small expedition sets off from Portland to explore the withdrawal shocked her: interior of Alaska. Mission leader Allen Forrester leaves behind his She missed the constant pregnant wife, Sophie, not knowing if he’ll ever see her again. Ivey affirmation, the speed of tells a fictional story through old photos, letters, and diary entries email, and her online that recount a treacherous journey up the Wolverine River. In ­community. She learned to Portland, Sophie learns photography and waits to hear if her appreciate stillness, ­husband has survived. Ivey’s characters search for adventure, knowl- returned to church, gar- edge, forgiveness, and enlightenment. They encounter strange things dened, baked, and enjoyed that defy explanation. The book straddles a line between historical her children and husband in

HANDOUT fiction and fantasy and will appeal to fantasy-lovers. new ways. —S.O.

To see more book news and reviews, go to wng.org/books March 4, 2017 • WORLD Magazine 21 CULTURE Children’s Books By giving clean water, you also open doors to share the Gospel. You can help quench their thirst for the Living Water. Growing pains Vernon Brewer | President, World Help FOUR GRAPHIC NOVELS FOR KIDS reviewed by Lynde Langdon

DIARY OF A WIMPY KID: DOUBLE DOWN Jeff Kinney The Wimpy Kid franchise celebrates its 10th anniversary this year, yet somehow author Jeff Kinney manages to deliver fresh chuck- les. In this installment, unlucky middle schooler Greg Heffley wants to show his parents he can be responsible, but he must first accept their guidance and discipline. Of course he often doesn’t, leading to a series of laugh-out-loud escapades. The book AFTERWORD doesn’t glorify defiance, though, and Greg repeatedly pays the Raina Telgemeier launched consequences of his self-centeredness. Maybe in the next book her best-selling, semi-­ he’ll finally learn, but here’s hoping he doesn’t grow up too fast. autobiographical trilogy in 2010 with Smile (Graphix). MOON GIRL AND DEVIL DINOSAUR: BFF For grade-school girls, Amy Reeder & Brandon Montclare ­owning the teal paperback with a smiley face embla- As a ponytail-wearing, science-loving genius, Lunella Lafayette, aka zoned on the cover became “Moon Girl,” has a lot of appeal for young readers. But in her first story, Marvel Comics pairs her with a recycled, uninspiring charac- almost as essential as having ter from an obscure 1970s series. Moon Girl doesn’t need the Devil scented lip gloss or bedaz- Dinosaur as a sidekick; she’s got enough grit and genius to stand on zling sneakers. Telgemeier’s her own two roller skates. Comic-loving boys and girls might enjoy book offers charming, the drawings of a 9-year-old riding a stomping dinosaur through vibrant depictions of real New York City, but likely won’t understand what the characters are life, capturing in detail the trying to accomplish. Parents, beware: Like many Marvel stories anxiety and uncertainty of (especially X-Men), this one preaches evolution as gospel. adolescence through normal experiences like family road CLEOPATRA IN SPACE: SECRET OF THE TIME trips and orthodontist TABLETS Mike Maihack appointments—but her ­stories fail to assign mean- Imagine an ancient Egyptian princess travels to a long time ago in ing and purpose to a galaxy far, far away … The plot of Secret of the Time Tablets those experi- borrows heavily from the story of Luke Skywalker and his friends, right down to the shocking unmasking of a robotlike villain at the ences. Characters end. The story has few details about ancient civilizations but learn that life can plenty about ray guns and spaceships. The artwork is refreshingly be cruel, and simple and appropriate for younger audiences. Maihack, a pro- momentary hap- fessing Christian, seems to be out to provide youngsters with a piness is the best fun adventure and relatable characters, which he does, though we can hope for. not as well as George Lucas. In Ghosts (Graphix, 2016), she takes that mes- SECRET CODERS: PATHS & PORTALS sage to a macabre extreme, Gene Luen Yang & Mike Holmes exploring how a young girl The Secret Coders series teaches students to think and code with cystic fibrosis looks like a real computer programmer. The comic-strip illustrations ­forward to living on as an show ordinary kids using the computer language Logo and apparition after her death. ­having fun doing it. In this attempt to make coding seem like an adventure, Yang has given the characters rebellious ten- Telgemeier says the book dencies that make them disrespectful to adults at times. But helped her process her own MARION VITUS CAN PROVIDE CLEAN WATER AND SAVE A LIFE with the right adult oversight, this series could be a great tool losses. The result is an empty YOU FOR JUST $15! for teaching elementary and middle-school students the basics message with a brightly col- of programming.­ As a bonus, the Secret Coders website has ored sugar coating: junk Learn more and give: hands-on coding lessons. food for young minds. —L.L. worldhelp.net/water

22 WORLD Magazine • March 4, 2017 To see more book news and reviews, go to wng.org/books By giving clean water, you also open doors to share the Gospel. You can help quench their thirst for the Living Water. Vernon Brewer | President, World Help

YOU CAN PROVIDE CLEAN WATER AND SAVE A LIFE FOR JUST $15!

Learn more and give: worldhelp.net/water CULTURE Q&A

RANDY GULIUZZA The impossible improbable A CONVERSATION WITH YOUNG-EARTH CREATIONISTS by Marvin Olasky

Randy Guliuzza of the Institute for genomes and finding out information R Creation Research is the author of from the genome, age is somewhat Made in His Image: Examining the important because we know that Complexities of the Human Body and ­mutations happen and most mutations Clearly Seen: Constructing Solid are not lethal: If they happen in your Arguments for Design. He holds a B.A. germ cells, they get passed on to your from the Moody Bible Institute, an offspring and tend to accumulate in the M.D. degree from the University of human population. Minnesota, and a Master of Public What’s the effect of that? As best Health degree from Harvard. as we can see (and, of course, there’s a Guliuzza was a lieutenant colonel in lot of variability in this), they accumu- the U.S. Air Force, serving as the 28th late at a specific rate. When we try to Bomb Wing Flight Surgeon and Chief extrapolate the rate backward at which of Aerospace Medicine. I interviewed mutations are accumulating in popula- him and three other young-earth tions (not just the human population ­creationists (see sidebar) in front of but in various populations), we see that How do you apply the Bible to students at Patrick Henry College. Here over a long time the human population ­difficult questions of interpretation? are edited excerpts. would have been completely destroyed My hermeneutic boils down to what Some evolutionists say: “Unless a by mutations. one of my Moody professors said: graduate student believes in evolu- Why is evolution not only improba- “Give words their normal meaning in tion, he can’t do biology. I don’t want ble but impossible? We define “living their normal context.” If you allow a him in my graduate program.” Is that things” as organisms that grow, adapt, religious authority to tell you that silly? That’s extremely silly. I suppose it metabolize, and reproduce, but which Scripture is mystical, hard to under- would depend on what your graduate of these fundamental mechanisms stand, with elusive meanings, then you program is, but if you’re going to do came first? How can you reproduce need a special class of people to inform something useful like medicine (sorry, until you have energy? And you can’t you of what Scripture says, and you are other graduate programs) it is irrele- get energy until you metabolize, which in bondage to those people. vant. If evolutionists say nothing makes means you need systems that extract 2017 is the 500th anniversary of sense in biology except in the light of energy from the environment. Martin Luther’s revolt. We had a evolution, why do so many biologists in A which-came-first, chicken-or- Reformation to free us from that kind their practice ignore evolution? Why do egg scenario? It’s very hard to explain of bondage. Now the church is facing a

so many in medical fields ignore the origin of metabolism unless it all threat of going into another type of PHOTOS FONG/GENESIS GARY evolution? comes as a unified functioning system. bondage where scientific authorities What everyday practical differ- It’s clearly hard to explain reproduc- (replacing the religious authorities) tell ences does the age of the earth make tion unless organisms can reproduce. us what to believe. This bondage is not to people working as medical doctors You have to have all of these systems physical. It’s a type of bondage that we or in genome sequencing? In the even for single-celled organisms. And submit to, with someone telling us ­practice of medicine, evolution is how do you get adaptation until you’re what Scripture says rather than letting ­completely irrelevant. In sequencing adaptable? Scripture tell us.

24 WORLD Magazine • March 4, 2017 YOUNG AND OLD

Three others affiliated with the Institute for Creation Research—astro- physicist Jason Lisle and geologists Marcus Ross and Tim Clarey—were also on the panel. Lisle responded to an audience question: Do viruses evolve? The virus question represents a classic case where the word “evolution” is being used in two different senses. “Evolution” can just mean “change.” Everyone knows viruses change, but that doesn’t mean they become something that’s not a virus. They don’t change in a way that would be an evolutionary change, the kind of change that would make particles-to-people evolution hap- pen. What were they? Viruses. What are they now? Viruses. That’s not evolution. That’s just “viruses.” Clarey spoke about tendencies to avoid hard questions: Professors at secular schools taught about the thorny questions for creationists, but they avoided teaching us the things that don’t fit in their worldview. In geology, more problems aren’t explained than are explained, but you don’t really realize that until you get to the research level yourself and start doing graduate work. Then you realize all the things they glossed over at the undergraduate level. Ross replied to my question about the debate between young-earthers ‘If you allow a religious authority to tell and old-earthers: What about those who believe in creation but not a you that Scripture is mystical, hard to young earth? Are they allies? If they are brothers and sisters who affirm understand, with elusive meanings, then Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior, they’re my allies. They might be my you need a special class of people to debate opponents. They might even inform you of what Scripture says, and seem adversarial, and I might seem adversarial to them, but we are one in you are in bondage to those people.’ Christ. Are they correct? I don’t think so. Am I wrong on some theology? Yup! They are my friends. They are my broth- Some people go to graduate school ­systems in physiology that made man- ers. They are my sisters. in biology or medicine and become made systems look absolutely simple. Are evolutionists enemies? Lisle believers in evolution. What was your And those systems go through said: The Bible does refer to those in experience? As I sat in med school, microevolution but not macroevolu- rebellion against God as “enemies.” But at the same time we understand that we listened to lectures on anatomy and tion? I learned about change in all were once enemies of God and if it physiology, and took notes feverishly, kinds of creatures, including human weren’t for God’s grace, we would be in inside I was praising the Lord over beings: We are able to adjust. We all live exactly the same boat as the people who and over again because I saw things so on a dynamic planet that is constantly are still. The attitude we need to have as complicated yet so precisely designed changing, so any good designer would Christians is: They’re rebelling against that, as an engineer, I knew humans have to put that ability into them: God, but so am I. God stepped out and couldn’t even come close to designing Otherwise, they could never live on a saved me, and I pray He’ll do the same anything like this. I learned about dynamic planet. A thing for this person. —M.O.

 [email protected]  @MarvinOlasky March 4, 2017 • WORLD Magazine 25 CULTURE Music

His lyrics, however, remain direct, plain-spoken, and grounded in his favor- ite topics: the demands and rewards of wanderlust (“Planes, Trains, Automo­ biles,” “The Journey Is Beautiful”), the mendacity of the media and the mili- tary-industrial complex (“No More”), and the relevance and truth of Scripture. “Love Is 7” paraphrases 1 Corinthians Chapter 13. “Journey of a Spruce Tree Part 2” takes its refrain from James 2:20. James’ equation of genuine faith with just treatment of one’s neighbors permeates Walsh’s worldview. On 7, “Standing Bear’s Song” adds mistreat- ment of Native Americans to the roll call of national transgressions (the ­waging of unjust wars, the bombing of Words along the way Hiroshima and Nagasaki) that Walsh WANDERLUST AND SCRIPTURE MAKE APPEARANCES has decried in song. IN ORION WALSH’S LATEST ALBUM by Arsenio Orteza That such sentiments are often associated with the political left doesn’t bother Walsh. “I personally do not like Orion Walsh began attracting “I first asked Christ into my heart to be put in categories with political R attention in 2002 as the lead when I was a young boy,” Walsh told beliefs,” he said. “I think anything that is singer of Slow Coming Day, a melodic me, “but after a long period of based in love is of God, and anything that alternative-rock band signed to Tooth backsliding in my 20s, I decided to is based in hate I am not interested in. & Nail Records. The label meant the recommit my life to Christ.” It’s very simple what we are called band was branded “CCM” even though He was rebaptized in to do: love others and love God.” its songs contained few clues as to the 2012. That same year he As for Walsh’s wanderlust members’ spiritual pedigree. When the released his fourth solo vignettes, they’re based on his expe- group vanished from the radar in 2004, effort,First by Water Then riences of performing­ for his grow- so did Walsh. by Fire. He has since ing European audience. In March, But he resurfaced in 2008 as an released three more. The he’ll play Finland for the first time. acoustic-guitar-strumming, harmonica- ­latest, appropriately titled 7 “Traveling to other countries,” blowing folk singer-songwriter of (and available for $7 at Bandcamp), he said, “has really opened my thinking uncommonly in-your-face candor. finds Walsh diversifying his sonic port- and heart to the fact that, no matter About his pedigree this time there’d be folio with slower tempos and subtle where you live, human beings are very no question. instrumental embellishments. similar.”

LYRICAL SISTER in 1975. Ignored at the time, it’s now regarded as one of Maggie Roche, the eldest of the three sisters who from the stronger Roche-family efforts. 1979 to 2007 performed as The Roches, died in January at The trio’s sales declined in the ’90s, but Maggie’s skills age 65. Often categorized as “folk” because of their pre- didn’t. Her song “My Winter Coat,” which concludes The dominantly acoustic instrumentation, deadpan humor, and Roches’ 1995 album Can We Go Home Now, spreads 33 intricate vocal harmonies (Maggie was the meticulously descriptive coat-centric couplets ­contralto), The Roches nevertheless avoided tra- over eight minutes without overstaying its ditional material and were generally marketed ­welcome or turning into a joke. The longer it as a pop act. goes, the more serious it gets. The more serious Alone or in collaboration, Maggie composed it gets, the longer you want it to last. over a third of The Roches’ material and nearly “No ideas but in things,” wrote William all of Seductive Reasoning, the album she and Carlos Williams about crafting verse. Maggie HANDOUT her sister Terre recorded for Columbia Records Roche knew exactly what he meant. —A.O.

26 WORLD Magazine • March 4, 2017  [email protected]  @ArsenioOrteza RECENT FOLK ALBUMS reviewed by Arsenio Orteza

LIVING IN THE SHADOWS Bert Jansch With Disc 4’s previously unreleased content obviously intended to tempt people who already own the rest of this box (three of Jansch’s four 1990s albums), it’s newcomers who’ll feel they’re getting the better bargain. They’ll also kick themselves for not investigating sooner Jansch’s tart ENCORE Scottish baritone singing and his ability to pluck to life on Prior to the release last his acoustic guitar the melancholy melodies that he had no November of her latest trouble finding or writing. “She Moved Through the Fair” album Lodestar (Domino), has never sounded crisper (or sadder). “Sweet Talking the English folk singer Lady” even rocks. Shirley Collins hadn’t recorded for over 30 years due to the dysphonia that PENNY’S FARM Jim Kweskin & Geoff Muldaur robbed her of her voice The premise: Two alumni of the 1960s Northeast folk scene after her second marriage reunite (again) for a rambunctiously sprightly romp through ended. Now 81, she no their folk, blues, and Dixieland favorites. And, if you know as ­longer sings with the much about those genres as the aforementioned folk alumni enchanting soprano airiness do, there’s a good chance that their favorites are yours too. that characterized her youth- In other words, Kweskin and Muldaur offer little in the way of ful way with a traditional revelation. Still, they’ve chosen an interesting version of “The ballad. Instead, she inhabits Cuckoo.” And the increasing similarity between Kweskin’s a grandmotherly alto range voice and Willie Nelson’s must surely count for something. and comes on like the voice of experience. Make that experience TROLLING FOR DREAMS John McCutcheon and dread. Accompanied One occupational hazard of specializing in both children’s only by acoustic, medieval- music and traditional folk is that the sentimentalism of the sounding instrumentation, former can bleed into attempts at composing material her delivery of the peniten- inspired by the latter. Indeed, many of McCutcheon’s latest tial “Awake musical character sketches could’ve been penned by Dan Awake”—­ particularly the Fogelberg or Harry Chapin. There are, however, differences, lines “There’s the most obvious of which is the affection with which never any man McCutcheon portrays folks who attend church and who so stout, / nor study (and obey) the Bible. In “Waltz ’Round the Kitchen” man nor woman he practically translates Norman Rockwell into song. goes gay, / but death will rot your bones / CHAIM TANNENBAUM Chaim Tannenbaum and your flesh will melt away”—is positively chill- Best known for accompanying Loudon Wainwright III, ing. It’s surpassed only by Tannenbaum has also spent decades as a philosophy pro- her delivery of Gibbons’ fessor. And although “professorial folk” may be too stuffy a “The Silver Swan,” which tag to hang on his anything-but-stuffy solo debut, he clearly begins, “The silver swan, knows what he’s professing: gospel, Harold Arlen, public- who living had no note, / domain copyrights, and how to sing like Pete Seeger while when death approached, still sounding like himself. “Brooklyn 1955,” meanwhile, is a unlocked her silent throat.” baseball lover’s dream. And not only did Tannenbaum write Autobiography doesn’t get it, but he also holds a 4.23 average score (out of 5) at more succinct, or more

DOMINO RECORDS DOMINO ratemyteachers.com. chilling, than that. —A.O.

To see more music news and reviews, go to wng.org/music March 4, 2017 • WORLD Magazine 27 THE NEW BOOK BY ART RAINER VOICES Mindy Belz

when they appear neutered by a bombastic president. The executive order on immigration, we are seeing, is causing confusion and chaos in an area where we most need order, and rule tightening. Even Muslims in the Middle East will say so, and few I met in Iraq argued against the temporary travel ban, only the way in which it was carried out. Yet to argue for the middle This uneven ground ground, these days, wins you no friends. For too long, in the words of writer K.A. ARE WE FIT FOR THE DAY AT HAND? Ellis, “some Christians have felt pressured by THE MONEY MOSUL, Iraq—There’s a lot to watch out R for in a country like Iraq, a place long torn asunder by war and terrorism. One is the stair- CHALLENGE ways. Houses are constructed using concrete and rebar, not traditional framing you’d see in the United States. For a long time there was no standard on the rise and depth of a stair tread. This became a life-or-death problem for U.S. Marines fighting in Anbar province at the height CREATED TO BE USED BY CHURCHES, FAMILIES, OR – of the Iraq War. Imagine storming a home of suspected al-Qaeda snipers in the dark, sprinting INDIVIDUALS, THE NEW BOOK BY ART RAINER EXPLORES to the rooftop wearing night-vision goggles, ­carrying 70 pounds of protective gear and weap- HOW THE GOSPEL SHAPES THE WAY WE THINK ABOUT OUR onry, gun at the ready—and stumbling or falling simply because the fifth stair rose 2 inches FINANCES AND CALLS US TO GIVE GENEROUSLY, SAVE higher than the fourth. To compensate, some units actually ran drills on Anbar’s staircases. At home in the political right to trust the state to restore a WISELY, AND LIVE APPROPRIATELY. On my recent trip to Iraq, I spent several cultural utopia that, arguably, was dystopia for hours in security training. Not all areas liberated America, I many. The left pressured others to entrust the from ISIS in recent months have been cleared find this new state with building a utopia that’s impossible on The Money Challenge is a hopeful, of IEDs and other hidden explosives. Rubble is political era this side of eternity—and proven historically gospel-oriented primer on using everywhere to be navigated. Massive networks also to end in dystopia.” Finding our primary fi nances for the sake of the of ISIS tunnels threaten building structures. I unsettling, identity in the transformational power of Christ, kingdom. Everyone can benefi t learned how to recognize an IED poking out jarring like she argues, can free us from the quest for domi- from the biblical wisdom here, from the ground. I drilled with others how to an uneven nance and help us live boldly for the truth. regardless of fi nancial or social exit a car without touching the ground in a We can reject, for example, the notion of background. potential minefield. I did not practice the stairs. staircase. American carnage to see that America remains Visiting front-line areas takes security or a land of opportunity and plenty. One worth military escort. It’s work. Staying several days preserving so that more of the world’s down- - Russell Moore, President, Southern with an intrepid aid group in a vacant house trodden may come. Baptist Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission mostly lacking electricity and running water Being caught off balance is a signal to recali- poses challenges. But it was taking the stairs at brate and toughen up. The Marines had to take night to the rooftop that almost did me in. in the whole stairway before taking the first At home in America, I find this new political step. Our times call for a wider lens too, and it I can’t wait for you to read Art’s era unsettling, jarring like an uneven staircase. doesn’t have to require going to a war zone. book. It is so good. Art encourages

Judging by the new amount of mail and mes- Deep searching of Scripture and deep love for IMAGES SCOTT PETERSON/GETTY and equips you in The Money sages I receive, others are finding the same. neighbors, for others, may be first steps. Challenge. Not only will you learn Many of you, like me, are wondering what to It takes fresh stamina to scale rough ground. a lot, but you will also enjoy his do about the disconnect we feel and the way Aid workers I was with approached their day captivating writing style. politics now suffuses our waking days. like Marines, up before dawn to run on a desert I find it harder than ever to plant my feet road or do extra hospital rounds. I came back beneath the noise and the charged atmosphere. from a war zone oddly renewed, wanting to be - Derwin L. Gray, Lead Pastor, One moment I’m heartened to see smart politi- fit in mind, body, and soul for whatever ascent Transformation Church, Indian Land, SC cal appointments, only to be disappointed lies ahead. A

28 WORLD Magazine • March 4, 2017  [email protected]  @mcbelz THE NEW BOOK BY ART RAINER THE MONEY CHALLENGE

CREATED TO BE USED BY CHURCHES, FAMILIES, OR – INDIVIDUALS, THE NEW BOOK BY ART RAINER EXPLORES HOW THE GOSPEL SHAPES THE WAY WE THINK ABOUT OUR FINANCES AND CALLS US TO GIVE GENEROUSLY, SAVE WISELY, AND LIVE APPROPRIATELY.

The Money Challenge is a hopeful, gospel-oriented primer on using fi nances for the sake of the kingdom. Everyone can benefi t from the biblical wisdom here, regardless of fi nancial or social background.

- Russell Moore, President, Southern Baptist Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission

I can’t wait for you to read Art’s book. It is so good. Art encourages and equips you in The Money Challenge. Not only will you learn a lot, but you will also enjoy his captivating writing style.

- Derwin L. Gray, Lead Pastor, Transformation Church, Indian Land, SC FEATURES

30 WORLD Magazine • March 4, 2017 THE GREAT TRAGEDY OF SOUTH SUDAN Years of suffering and violence led to the creation of South Sudan in 2011. Now more fighting threatens to kill it. The story of how a young republic escaped Christian persecution, then quickly devolved into civil war, is an ongoing drama marked by danger, death, and the staunch determination of the region’s Christians and refugees. by JAMIE DEAN

Steven, a young orphaned boy who lost his family during fighting, stands outside the St. Theresa church in Juba, South Sudan.

CHARLES ATIKI LOMODONG/AFP/GETTY IMAGES

March 4, 2017 • WORLD Magazine 31 Part I: Land that I love Just two years later, political infighting among leaders of the new nation returned the country to war. This time, On a foggy day in late January, John Chol Daau sat next to a brother fought against brother. wide window overlooking the Atlantic Ocean near Charleston, It’s been a tragic plot twist: After an epic struggle to S.C., not far from the site of the opening salvo of the Civil War. return, more than a million South Sudanese citizens have fled The South Sudanese pastor was visiting the United States the country and are filling overcrowded refugee camps in to attend a conference for Anglican clergy, but another civil surrounding nations. It’s one of the worst humanitarian war weighed on his mind: the battle raging for the future of ­crises in the world. “I thought we had learned so much,” says his own country. Daau. “But the country is falling apart again.” More than 25 years ago, Daau fled his village in southern How did South Sudan devolve so quickly? Could the Sudan, as forces from the Islamic north invaded the predomi- United States have done more to nurture the infant nation it nantly Christian and animist south. helped deliver to birth? And will a new administration under Daau survived the onslaught and eventually witnessed a President Donald Trump help? series of remarkable events: Southern forces persisted in It’s a complicated tale whose outcome may hinge on their 20-year defense against the north, and they secured a another important question: Will politicians and international peace deal to end the war in 2005. Thousands of southerners diplomats recognize the country’s best hope may lie in the began returning to their homeland after decades in exile. Christian churches still standing despite decades of travail? In 2011, nearly 99 percent of citizens from the south voted for independence from the north. The nation of South Sudan was born. The United States played a key role: Evangelicals Part II: Lost and found had pressed for American influence to relieve persecuted Christians. President George W. Bush pushed hard to help. Daau remembers his last morning in his childhood village in Tens of thousands of celebrants flooded South Sudan’scapital ­ southern Sudan. The sun was rising, and he drank milk from city of Juba to rejoice on their a hollow gourd. He and his brother soon left to join their Daau, a former Lost Independence Day on July 9, 2011. father in the cattle field. His mother washed laundry by hand Boy of Sudan The jubilation was short-lived. and waved goodbye to her chatting sons. PHOTO COURTESY OF LUCY SCHALY/THE BEAVER COUNTY TIMES COUNTY BEAVER SCHALY/THE LUCY OF COURTESY PHOTO

32 WORLD Magazine • March 4, 2017 A moment later, an explosion shook the earth. Bombs rained from the sky and soldiers appeared, spraying bullets through the stunned village. Daau watched a well-known village leader fall dead from a gunshot wound to the head. Like other children, Daau fled into the forest to escape the carnage. He was separated from his family, but running for survival. Soldiers pursued. The growing group of children—mostly boys—ran deeper into the forest. A leopard­ snatched a small child from the group, as starvation and thirst killed others. He didn’t know it, but Daau was part of a vast group that came to be known as the Lost Boys of Sudan—a hunted host of up to 30,000 children who trekked a thousand miles across treacherous terrain seeking refuge in other African nations. Thousands of children died on their journeys. The war had erupted in the 1980s, in part as the Khartoum-based government in northern Sudan tried to impose Islamic law on Christians and others in the south. Southerners resisted, and rebels in the Sudan People’s Liberation Army bolstered resis- tance. Northern forces launched a brutal campaign­ in a war that killed an estimated 2 million people and drove 4 million from their homes. For those living in the refugee camps, months turned to years, and conditions were often severe. As a teenager, Daau cared for smaller boys in his camp in Ethiopia, and buried the ones who didn’t survive. He remembers leading other children in a funeral procession for an orphaned 6-year-old boy so heartbroken he’d stopped eating. The older boys carried his tiny body to a shady spot nearby and dug a shallow grave. Daau offered a prayer, but said the moment was “too much for our young souls.” Still, Daau found purpose in Christian ministry in the camp, leading services of prayer and singing Christian Young Sudanese Lost When George W. Bush won the songs. He scanned message boards for news of his remaining Boys near Palotaka, presidency in 2000, he moved Sudan, in 1992 walk family. He longed to find his mother. off to scavenge for quickly: On his second day in office, Meanwhile, Christians in the United States began stirring food in the jungle by he ordered high-level staff to find a over the suffering in Sudan. U.S. Rep. Frank Wolf, R-Va., an abandoned way to help bring an end to the war began making trips to the war-torn region to learn more Catholic mission. in Sudan. about conditions and persecuted Christians in the south. Daau knew little about the The Christian aid agency Samaritan’s Purse resurrected a developments in the United States at the time. He was still hospital that had been surrounded by land mines. When the surviving. When Ethiopian forces drove refugees from the aid workers arrived, one nurse was providing medical care camps, Daau and others fled. They walked to Kenya. The for the entire community. development stunned them, but he says he remembers pray- In a controversial move, the European group Christian ing to Jesus: “I know You are here. … I know You are good.” Solidarity International launched a slave redemption pro- Still, Daau hadn’t given up on finding his family alive. He gram to pay slave traders for southerners and others soon learned his father had died, but he heard that his ­kidnapped during government raids. The stories galvanized mother was still living. Daau continued searching among Christians in many U.S. congregations. thousands of refugees. His discovery came suddenly. Susan Rice (who later became the U.S. ambassador to the One day, a woman in a camp recognized his mother’s name United Nations and a national security adviser for President and pointed the way. After more than a decade of separation, Barack Obama) helped persuade President Bill Clinton’s Daau and his mother were reunited. He recalls her saying: “I administration to impose sanctions on Sudan in the 1990s. thought I would never get to be your mother again, but I

DEREK HUDSON/GETTY IMAGES The U.S. government also offered aid to southern Sudan. knew that God could be a mother for you. … I am praising God.”

March 4, 2017 • WORLD Magazine 33 Part III: A nation is born `1 As Daau and his mother rejoiced, military forces in southern Sudan were still holding their defenses against government assault. And they had an impressive leader. John Garang had earned a doctorate from Iowa State University in 1981 and returned to Sudan to teach. The charismatic personality with American friends became leader of the rebel movement in the south. Southerners revered the 6-foot-tall powerhouse. Meanwhile, the Bush administration worked to per- suade the government in northern Sudan to sign a peace agreement with the south. The United States had imposed sanctions on Sudan in the 1990s and declared the nation a state sponsor of terrorism for harboring international ­terrorists—including Osama bin Laden, who lived in Khartoum in the early 1990s. The 9/11 attacks brought terrible clarity: With America on a massive offense against terrorism, leaders in Sudan likely worried the relationship would worsen if they didn’t offer some cooperation. By early 2002, leaders were laying the foundation for a Comprehensive Peace Agreement, eventually signed in January 2005. Less than seven months later, Garang, the charismatic leader of the southern movement, died in a helicopter crash. At his funeral, an archbishop compared Garang to Moses delivering his brothers from captivity. Now the people hoped for a Joshua in Garang’s military colleague and successor, Salva Kiir. With the war officially ended, southern Sudanese started returning home in droves. Thousands came back to a wilderness:­ villages overgrown by years of neglect, churches burned, and homes razed. Still, beauty began ­rising from ashes. During a visit in 2008, I (1) Celebrating independence in 2011. ­witnessed villagers returning to (2) Phillip Madol, a Lost their homeland just north of the Boy who returned to Ugandan border. William Levi, a South Sudan after the South Sudanese Christian who independence, flees the violence in 2014. had fled the region decades (3) President Salva Kiir. before, was leading a project to

`2

34 WORLD Magazine • March 4, 2017 MADOL: BEN CURTIS/AP • INDEPENDENCE: ROBERTO SCHMIDT/AFP/GETTY IMAGES rebuild the area through his Christian orga- Part IV: Things fall apart nization Operation Nehemiah Missions. Though most roads were still unpaved, By 2013, cries rang out again in Juba, but these were cries medical services were scarce, and clean of terror instead of joy. Fighting had erupted between soldiers water was difficult to find, villagers packed loyal to President Salva Kiir and those loyal to Vice President Sunday services at open-air church Riek Machar. gatherings. The conflict swelled after Kiir fired Machar, saying the vice One villager, Michael Wani Vuni, had president was planning a coup. Machar denied the allegation. returned to the area after 25 years in refu- The political fighting stoked ethnic strife: Kiir is a member of gee camps. He brought a few possessions, the Dinka tribe; Machar belongs to the Nuer ethnic­ group. his wife, his six children, and his father-in- When the two men collided, so did some members­ of their law. The family slept in a tent with a tarp, tribes. Reports emerged Dinkas had killed Nuers in Juba and and they cooked over an open fire. Nuer tribesmen had slaughtered Dinkas in other regions. Still, Vuni said conditions in the camps Relentless fighting has followed. Soldiers and militia mem- were worse, and he was determined to stay bers on both sides of the conflict have attacked civilians. A U.S. in southern Sudan: “To tell you the truth, if State Department report said human rights violations include another war comes, I will not leave. I will ethnic-based killings, mass displacement of civilians, rape and live here and die here.” sexual slavery, kidnappings, and recruitment of child soldiers. A return to war didn’t seem imminent Kiir has condemned attacks on civilians—and has pledged when southern Sudanese voted for inde- severe punishment for soldiers caught on rampages—but pendence from northern Sudan in January ­violence continues, and many citizens have fled rather than 2011. By July, scores of South Sudanese risk an attack. An estimated 340,000 have left the country in filled the streets, rejoicing and openly the last six months. weeping over their official freedom. Meanwhile, Machar fled South Sudan after fresh fighting They raised their new flag and sang a broke out last summer. Kiir has appointed a new vice presi- national anthem that included a tribute to dent, but it’s unclear if peace will take hold or Machar will “our martyrs whose blood cemented our attempt a return. national foundation / We vow to protect Though violence has peaked recently, trouble began years our nation / O God, bless South Sudan!” before. While Southern leaders from different tribes and ­factions had managed to fight a common enemy from the Islamic north, they hadn’t learned how to govern together—a monumental task for a deeply needy nation emerging from decades of brutal civil war. Even after independence, the remaining leadership was full of factions and unhealed rifts often decades old. The country’s leaders are responsible for their actions, but some Americans say the U.S. government didn’t do enough to `3 prepare the nation they were encouraging to break out on its own. Former congressman Frank Wolf, who was at the Independence Day celebration in Juba in 2011, says the Obama administration “took its eye off the ball.” Indeed, Obama condemned genocide in Sudan’s western region of Darfur during his presidential campaign in 2008. But after he won office, Sudan strategy stalled. Scott Gration, President Obama’s special envoy to Sudan, favored working more with the northern government in Khartoum. Susan Rice, then the U.S. ambassador to the UN, favored maintaining a harder line: Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir was accused of massive war crimes, and his regime continued bombing Christian populations in disputed oil regions along the north-south border. The infighting produced a stalemate, and engagement waned during the critical period leading up to the vote on independence in 2011. Gration eventually resigned, and in the period leading up to the outbreak of fighting in 2013, two key U.S. posts were vacant: the special envoy to Sudan and the chief of Africa policy for the State Department.

REX FEATURES VIA AP March 4, 2017 • WORLD Magazine 35 Andrew Natsios, special envoy for Sudan under Bush, told Part V: A precarious future Reuters: “When all of this was deteriorating, there was no one in charge.” Obama did give Sudan a final moment of attention before The United States continued to give hundreds of millions leaving office in January: He eased sanctions against the of dollars in aid, but corruption and embezzlement spread Khartoum-based government and lifted a trade embargo. within the young government. In 2012, President Kiir Sudan remains on a list of state sponsors of terrorism, but announced $4 billion had gone missing. Obama said the country had made progress in cooperating on Even without embezzlement, money alone wasn’t enough some counterterrorism efforts. Human rights groups decried to bring stability. Wolf says the leaders needed more help the decision, noting the Sudanese government still foments learning how to function as a democracy: “I don’t think we fighting in the south and has heavily bombed Christians and prepared them. … I don’t think there was a walking others along the north-south border. alongside.” It’s unclear how President Trump will handle the situa- Jok Madut Jok, a former South Sudanese official, told The tion. Sudan is one of the seven countries the president listed Wall Street Journal financial assistance without reconciliation on a temporary travel ban into the United States. If Trump between tribes and factions was doomed to fail: “What they sees Khartoum as a continuing threat—not only to South missed is that people’s souls have to be fat in the same way.” Sudan—he may draw a harder line again. Rep. Chris Smith, R-N.J., says he’s hopeful the Trump adminis- tration will re-engage on South Sudan. One of Smith’s recommen- dations: appoint a special envoy to South Sudan with an already- established relationship with President Kiir. Smith’s suggestion: George W. Bush. The pair formed a significant relationship during Bush’s tenure (and Kiir still wears the cowboy hat Bush gave to him). Smith—who traveled to South Sudan last year—has another ­suggestion: work with faith-based organizations. The congressman says the Obama administration often sidelined Christian groups from receiving grants and other assistance in conflict zones. But Christian groups and churches often have the most influence in local communities and the most direct ways of delivering aid to people who need it most. Many pastors in South Sudan already have been meeting with government officials to promote peace and are teaching their ­congregants to treasure unity in Christ above tribal identities. ALBERT GONZALEZ FARRAN/AFP/GETTY IMAGES

South Sudanese displaced by violence wait to be registered for migration and food services in Wau, South Sudan, last May (top); Akki Adduok, a displaced woman residing in a settlement in Malakal, South Sudan, sits where her shelter used to be. An attack last year by soldiers loyal to President Kiir destroyed most of the settlement (bottom).

36 WORLD Magazine • March 4, 2017 South Sudanese In the meantime, while some flee, Levi continues to take his wife and six children when he worship at a ­former refugees like Levi and Daau returns to his village each year. He’s determined to continue church in Yirol. ­continue to return. Daau completed a the work of building up families and preaching the gospel in university education in Nairobi and has the land where he was born: “Our ministry does not depend launched a Christian school for children in Juba. With hun- on tribes. We are Christians. If we have to die there, we will dreds of schools closing in South Sudan, he says 160 children die there.” showed up for the first day of classes at Good Shepherd Academy in Juba. Many have lost their fathers to the war and live with their mothers in nearby camps. Epilogue For Daau, schools are critical: He believes many of the country’s problems stem from a lack of good leadership, and After Daau and I finished our conversation in late January, educating children from a young age provides a path to I drove past a monument to African slaves on Sullivan’s Island, training and mentoring future leaders. S.C. Tens of thousands of West African slaves arrived at this He also trains pastors in refugee camps to continue serving port in the late 1700s. A plaque laments their suffering, but their churches, even while they are in exile. Travel can be also celebrates the contributions they and their descendants treacherous, since many roadways have grown dangerous, made to a new nation. and targeted killings based on ethnicity continue. I thought of Daau: He laments the suffering he and others Though the work is dangerous, Levi also says it’s worth it. have endured in South Sudan, but he remains hopeful the Operation Nehemiah continues to provide farming, clean redemption of Christ can work peace in tragedy. He writes water, churches, and gospel-based teaching through a radio about how suffering drew him to Christ in his memoirGod’s program in his home region. He says most fled the area after Refugee: “My whole life I had not simply been running through fighting erupted again last year, but a small staff remains thorns, from one tragedy to the next, but to someone, the

FABIO BUCCIARELLI/AFP/GETTY IMAGES BUCCIARELLI/AFP/GETTY FABIO ­on-site to tend to the group’s projects. Redeemer of all. I had been chasing after the cross of Christ.” A

 [email protected]  @deanworldmag March 4, 2017 • WORLD Magazine 37 DEGREE CATEGORIES

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Biblical and Theological Studies College students • A.A. in Biblical and Theological Studies who are serious • B.A. in Biblical and Theological Studies: Seminary Track about the gospel. • B.A. in Biblical and Theological Studies

In the heart of Louisville’s Southern Seminary campus, the Church Ministry faculty of Boyce College trains students who will serve the • B.A. in Church Ministry: Expository Preaching and church and engage the culture with a biblical worldview amidst Pastoral Leadership a rapidly changing world. Apply online at boycecollege.com. • B.S. in Church Ministry: Youth and Family Track • B.S. in Church Ministry: Christian Leadership Track • B.S. in Biblical Studies: Biblical Counseling • B.S. in Biblical Studies: Worship and Pastoral Studies • B.S. in Biblical Studies: Worship and Music Studies

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Boyce College is the undergraduate school of The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary FEATURES Pledges of protection After fulfilling major campaign promises regarding abortion and the Supreme Court, will President Trump stand up for religious liberty? by J.C. DERRICK in Washington

ES MODDER became a lieuten- Chicago’s Stone Church. “The government is not ant commander and a decorated invited into my conscience.” military chaplain during his Then-candidate Donald Trump heard 21-year career with the U.S. Modder’s story on the first Monday in October, Marines and U.S. Navy. He deployed when Modder, Joe Kennedy—a high-school foot- multiple times to support the Navy ball coach suspended for engaging in midfield SEALs on high-profile missions, and he earned rave prayers—and others met privately with Trump in reviews from superiors who praised him for his Washington, D.C. Modder told me Trump’s “charismatic leadership” and “sound judgment.” pledges to nominate a pro-life Supreme Court That is, until 2014, when the Navy abruptly justice and protect religious liberty were key removed Modder from its promotion list, ­reasons he voted for Trump in November. detached him from his unit, and brought him A few short months later, Trump is promptly before a board of inquiry—imperiling his pension fulfilling campaign promises as the nation’s 45th and benefits. The reason? Modder had offered president. He has restored the pro-life Mexico Biblical views on sexuality during private coun- City policy and nominated Judge Neil Gorsuch to seling sessions, including with his male assistant, the U.S. Supreme Court—drawing effusive praise whom Modder did not know was married to from social conservatives. But Trump has sent another man. After a legal battle, Modder avoided mixed signals on religious liberty: Early indicators DEPARTMENT DEFENSE being fired and was able to retire from the service and reports of pushback within the administration last year with an honorable discharge. suggest Trump is taking a less assertive approach “I’ll do everything the military requires of to the issue. Among more than a dozen conserva- me, but the one thing you can’t touch is my tive Christian leaders interviewed, most Modder ­ordination,” said Modder, now senior pastor of expressed confidence that the president will

40 WORLD Magazine • March 4, 2017 ­fulfill his religious liberty promises in due time, Trump speaks before with Christian leaders. Last September—one yet some acknowledged creeping skepticism. signing an executive week before he met Modder—Trump convened order in the Oval Office. “I’m still optimistic, but all the way through more than 30 evangelical and Catholic influencers the election, this was the one issue that was his for what organizers described as a religious liberty weak point from a Christian conservative per- listening session on the 25th floor of Trump spective,” said Mat Staver, chairman of Liberty Tower. From seats overlooking Central Park, Counsel, a Christian legal group. “I think he needs ­participants sipped Trump brand water bottles in more information and more advisers to give him front of nameplates that read like a who’s who list the lay of the land on this issue.” of Trump skeptics: Ryan T. Anderson, Stanley Carlson-Thies, Maggie Gallagher, Jay Richards, ELIGIOUS LIBERTY controversies in John Stonestreet, Mark Tooley, and others. recent years apparently helped bring out During a Q&A period with Trump, participants conservative Christians—and even some repeatedly tried to secure religious liberty com- Rworking-class Democrats—to the polls in mitments beyond his public statements. Each November to cast votes against Hillary Clinton. time, Dallas Pastor Robert Jeffress, one of Two oft-cited examples: the Obama administra- Trump’s top evangelical surrogates, would inter- tion’s attempts to force the Little Sisters of the ject to say the Supreme Court was the most Poor to provide abortifacient drugs in insurance important issue and Trump was right not to plans and a $135,000 penalty Oregon authorities ­distract his attention from it. levied against Christian bakers who declined to Such persistent evasiveness worried many, and participate in a same-sex wedding. those concerns became a reality on Jan. 31. Trump Trump was well-aware of these concerns and announced he would keep in place a 2014 Obama

MANDEL NGAN/AFP/GETTY IMAGES NGAN/AFP/GETTY MANDEL repeatedly discussed them in closed-door meetings executive order prohibiting federal contractors

March 4, 2017 • WORLD Magazine 41 stop an effort to overturn Obama’s 2014 executive order for federal contractors. Observers believe Ivanka and Kushner are also trying to strip the religious liberty order down to language that would only eliminate the Johnson Amendment—a 1950s-era ban on political speech for churches and other 501(c)(3) nonprofits. “No question there are some competing interests in his adminis- tration,” said Tony Perkins, presi- dent of the Family Research Council. Perkins, who has a two- decadelong friendly relationship with Vice President Mike Pence, expressed faith in White House chief of staff Reince Priebus to help balance those competing interests— as he did when he was chairman of the Republican National Committee.

HE DAY AFTER the leak, Trump didn’t mention the draft order but made broad Tpromises to defend religious free- from considering sexual orientation or gender Jared Kushner and dom during his remarks at the National Prayer identity in hiring or firing decisions. The order Ivanka Trump walk Breakfast. The only details he offered described outside the West Wing. includes no religious exemption. freedom of worship: “I will totally destroy the “There’s 17,000 faith-based groups that con- Johnson Amendment and allow our representa- tract with the federal government,” said Kelly tives of faith to speak freely.” Shackelford, president of First Liberty Institute. Hours later, Republican lawmakers unveiled “Under Obama, if you didn’t have the right beliefs, House and Senate versions of the Free Speech

you were excluded from working with the Fairness Act, legislation that would repeal the CALL/AP ROLL WILLIAMS/CQ TOM • PERKINS: IMAGES SOMODEVILLA/GETTY CHIP TRUMP: AND KUSHNER government.” Johnson Amendment. The decision to keep the order unchanged Trump has pledged to sign the First Amend­ stunned many evangelical leaders, but most ment Defense Act, a bill prohibiting punitive blunted their criticism and pointed to a coming ‘No question ­government action based on marriage views, if it executive order on religious freedom. The follow- reaches his desk. But he’s made no public promise ing day, a White House source leaked a draft of there are to take executive action on the matter. the order to liberal and LGBT groups, sparking some “If you pay attention to what Trump does vehement opposition from the left and belated competing when he talks about religious liberty, it always support from the right. interests in comes down to saying Merry Christmas or the The draft order would prohibit federal agen- [Trump’s] Johnson Amendment, which is irrelevant to the cies from taking “adverse action” against persons administration.’ threats traditional believers now face in law, or organizations based on their religious beliefs. —TONY PERKINS much less culture,” said Maggie Gallagher, a Among other things, the order defines freedom of senior fellow at the American Principles Project. religion as including all religious practice, not A key transgender case headed to the Supreme only the freedom to worship; grants relief to Little Court should provide clarity in the coming weeks. Sisters of the Poor and other groups that object to The high court has scheduled March 28 oral providing abortifacient drugs; and guarantees arguments in Gloucester County School Board v. faith-based groups can’t lose their tax-exempt G.G., a challenge to the Obama-era requirement status or accreditation due to their views on that all public schools allow students to use the ­marriage or sexuality. locker room and restroom facilities matching Liberal groups decried the proposal as a their perceived gender identity. Last year Trump license to discriminate, and it became increas- told The Washington Post he would rescind the ingly clear some in the White House agree. Department of Education directive. Politico reported Trump’s daughter Ivanka “The president could reverse those guidelines Trump and her husband, Jared Kushner, helped today,” said Gallagher, who co-founded the

42 WORLD Magazine • March 4, 2017 National Organization for Marriage. “If he hasn’t done so, or his education secretary hasn’t done so, LGBT envoy? by March 28, we will have a pretty clear signal Former Secretary of State John Kerry touted LGBT he’s going to embrace and affirm the whole legal rights as an established “cornerstone” of U.S. for- regime that Obama created, which inserts LGBT eign policy in a January exit memo. On Feb. 13 into every federal law banning sex Foreign Policy reported the State Department had discrimination.” retained Randy Berry, President Obama’s special Most Christian leaders who spoke with envoy for gay rights. But since Berry is a WORLD maintain a positive outlook. They point career foreign service officer, not a out it’s still early in Trump’s presidency, he’s political appointee, it remained ­fulfilling his promises so far, and it would make unclear to what extent the Trump little political sense to break a key pledge to a core administration would continue constituency in order to placate a voter bloc that Obama-era policies. largely did not support him. ‘The president Berry, who is openly gay, has insisted his “The evangelical vote was critical to his suc- could reverse role was limited to campaigning­ against violence cess,” said Perkins, who noted Johnson Amend­ those [gender toward LGBT persons, not advocating for same- ment repeal would enable pastors to criticize identity] sex marriage. Critics dispute that description of his Trump. “He’s not going to empower them and work, saying the elevation of LGBT rights guidelines offended some U.S. allies and often came at the then turn away from them.” today.’ expense of traditional human rights. Modder hopes Trump vindicates that optimism. —MAGGIE GALLAGHER In a Jan. 31 letter, almost 300 Caribbean pastors The retired military officer said troops in combat urged President Trump to re-evaluate America’s need God-fearing chaplains who aren’t constantly LGBT advocacy. They drew a parallel with looking over their shoulders. The potential reli- Obama’s transgender directive that threatened gious liberty executive order would provide such loss of federal­ funding for U.S. public schools: protection: “Religious liberty works both ways— “Please understand this same kind of coercion is it’s not just for conservatives. … I believe being used against our countries to force us to fall President Trump is going to do the right thing.” A in line with the entire same-sex agenda.” —J.C. Pro-life aid In 1984 President Ronald Reagan first instituted the Mexico City policy, an executive action banning federal funding for international nongovernmental organizations that perform or promote abortion. The ban helped curb the liberalization of abortion laws around the world. The initial Mexico City policy affected only certain funding streams—primarily U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) money, amounting to hundreds of ­millions of dollars. In 2003 former President George W. Bush expanded the policy to include some State Department ­programs but resisted calls to apply it to all global health funding, including HIV/AIDS programs. On Jan. 23, only four days after taking office, Trump Mothers and their babies taxpayer dollars do not fund issued a sweeping presidential memorandum that reinstated line up for free medical care organizations that aid coer- at a clinic funded by the the Mexico City policy and expanded it to “global health assis- United Nations Population cive abortion or sterilization tance furnished by all departments or agencies.” Fund in Cainta, Philippines. programs, such as the United “Now it will apply to billions,” said a visibly energized Rep. Nations Population Fund. Chris Smith, R-N.J., who had long advocated for the expansion. The following week, Trump “The abortion industry is aided by the PEPFAR program, by fulfilled another key campaign promise when he nominated global health—all these other spigots of funds—and I’d rather 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals Judge Neil Gorsuch, 49, to it be going to faith-based groups and secular groups that replace late Justice Antonin Scalia on the Supreme Court. respect the sanctity of human life.” Gorsuch, aside from pristine legal credentials, co-wrote a life- Trump also directed the secretary of state to take all nec- affirming book against assisted suicide and ruled in favor of essary actions, to the extent lawfully permitted, to ensure Hobby Lobby in a key religious liberty case (see p. 44). —J.C. GALLAGHER: HANDOUT • BERRY: BRENDAN SMIALOWSKI/AFP/GETTY IMAGES • PHILIPPINES: BULLIT MARQUEZ/AP

 [email protected]  @jcderrick1 March 4, 2017 • WORLD Magazine 43

FEATURES FACING THE FURY What to expect from the Supreme Court confirmation hearings for Judge NEIL GORSUCH by Emily Belz

­campaigns and opposition research. An ad from the liberal group People For the American Way that aired in 12 states depicted Gorsuch as a judge ripping up the Constitution. In Washington, D.C., the week after Trump announced his nomination, Gorsuch went on a charm tour, meeting dozens of senators every day. (Former Sen. Kelly Ayotte, R-N.H., who announced her refusal to vote for Trump after the tape of Trump’s inflammatory comments about women came out during the presidential campaign, is the designated shepherd, taking Gorsuch from meeting to meeting. Ayotte lost her bid for a second term in November by 750 votes.) Judiciary Committee Democrats, unlike some of their colleagues, thus far haven’t taken U.S. Supreme Court nominee Neil Gorsuch, 49, as aggressive a position against Gorsuch. Sen. Dianne 3 reportedly cried when he heard the news of Justice Feinstein, D-Calif., the top Democrat on the committee, Antonin Scalia’s death last February. The conservative said after her meeting with Gorsuch that he was judge couldn’t have known then, with President Barack “impressive.” Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., a senior Obama in office, that a year later he would be smuggled Democrat on the committee, said he doubted that into the White House for a prime-time announcement Gorsuch “meets the high standard set by [failed Obama that he was the nominee to replace Scalia. nominee] Merrick Garland” but didn’t oppose a hearing. If Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Another Judiciary member, Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., Grassley, R-Iowa, can keep his schedule amid the committed immediately after Gorsuch’s nomination to Democratic uproar against Gorsuch’s nomination, hear- a hearing and a vote on him. ings should begin in mid-March. Gorsuch can expect a Feinstein, Durbin, and Leahy all previously voted to barrage of questions about his views on abortion, confirm Gorsuch to the 10th Circuit. Gorsuch support- assisted suicide, originalism, and executive power. ers will point to those votes during the confirmation “The left is going to bring its full fury to bear,” said battle, but some Senate Republicans, notably, voted to Robert George, a professor of legal philosophy at confirm Justices Elena Kagan and Sonia Sotomayor to Princeton University and a friend of Gorsuch’s. lower positions, then opposed them at the Supreme Staffers in the White House and on Capitol Hill are Court level. Democrats will put up a fight and have hard at work on his behalf, and conservative groups are vowed to pursue him on the question of abortion. spending millions on ads in red states with Democratic Those who know Gorsuch don’t expect the hearings senators. Liberal groups are launching their own ad to generate much material against his confirmation.

GORSUCH: SAMUEL CORUM/ANADOLU AGENCY/GETTY IMAGES March 4, 2017 • WORLD Magazine PROTEST: GABRIELLA DEMCZUK/THE NEW YORK TIMES/REDUX 45 “Gorsuch is really smart,” said attorney Josh Blackman of the South Texas College of Law, who has written several books on the Supreme Court. Blackman also runs a site called FantasySCOTUS, a Supreme Court fantasy league (like with football), which correctly predicted Gorsuch’s nomination. “By the third question [Senate Democrats] are going to be out of their league. … They’re not going to score a single point.” Gorsuch’s own Washington career began as a teenager, when he was a Senate page. After earning degrees from Columbia University, Harvard Law School, and Oxford University, Gorsuch settled into a legal career in Washington before moving back to Colorado (his family goes back four generations there) when he was appointed to the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. The experience of Gorsuch’s mother, Anne Gorsuch Burford, surely marked his perception of politics and his preparation for his own hearing. President Ronald Reagan appointed Burford to head the Environmental Protection Agency. Burford had a tumultuous Senate confirmation and tenure at the agency, as she sought to turn regulations over to states and cut costs aggressively—to the fury of environmentalists. Two years into her tenure the Democratic House of Representatives cited her for contempt of Congress for withholding agency documents—and with that she resigned. “One of the most controversial appointees of President Reagan,” declared a wire news report in 1984. Gorsuch will avoid that kind of drama. Since Robert Bork’s crash-and-burn nomination in 1987, Supreme Court nominees have stuck to a script, dodging questions about social issues like abortion on the grounds that they might have to rule on the issue. Kagan, back in a 1995 law review article, called the Supreme Court hearings a “vacuity and farce” because nominees could decline to disclose their views on controversial issues and cases. Kagan argued the He has supported religious individuals objecting to pay confirmation hearings for Justices Stephen Breyer and for abortifacients, writing a concurrence supporting the Ruth Bader Ginsburg were positively “cozy.” Green family in the Hobby Lobby case when it came before “Both judges knew that they were playing the game in the 10th Circuit. Later he dissented from the court’s deci- full accordance with a set of rules that others had estab- sion not to hear en banc a case from the Little Sisters of the lished before them,” she said. “Such hearings serve little Poor against the Obamacare contraceptive and abortifa- educative function, except perhaps to reinforce lessons of cient mandate. cynicism that citizens often glean from government.” Then in Kagan’s own hearings in 2010, she participated ASSISTED SUICIDE in the scripted “farce,” refusing to comment on the consti- A few Democratic senators submitted questions in writing tutionality of gay marriage—which she later voted to during Gorsuch’s Senate confirmation in 2006, and all of ­legalize. John Yoo, an official in the George W. Bush them asked about his extensive writings on assisted sui- Department of Justice, has said that the Supreme Court cide. Assisted suicide is likely to be a topic again in these has “only itself to blame” for the increasingly politicized hearings, especially because it relates to another life hearings since it has been issuing increasingly politicized issue—abortion. Gorsuch has previously defended those decisions. Below are several subject areas where writings as in line with existing court precedent. Democrats are likely to intensely question Gorsuch. Gorsuch seems to oppose the principle behind assisted CHIP SOMODEVILLA/GETTY IMAGES suicide. In 2013 Gorsuch wrote an essay in Reason, Morality, ABORTION and Law: The Philosophy of John Finnish, edited by John Gorsuch has never declared a position on the legality of Keown and Robert George, the Princeton University profes- abortion, but Democrats are sure to read between the sor. The essay is dryly titled “Intention and the Allocation lines of some of his rulings and writings—and the sup- of Risk” and discusses criminal intent, supporting current port he has received from pro-life groups. In his book on jurisprudence on when someone is guilty of intentionally assisted suicide, he wrote that all life is “intrinsically taking a life. Gorsuch takes the “intent” question into the valuable.” matter of equality of human beings, no matter how “useless.”

46 WORLD Magazine • March 4, 2017 Gorsuch has a limited view of exec- utive power—and that is why some lib- erals have argued for his confirmation. In an immigration opinion last year, Gorsuch argued courts should do away with the Chevron doctrine, where courts defer to the executive branch’s interpretation of regulations. Courts established the Chevron doctrine under Reagan to limit inter- vention of the judiciary in executive branch regulations. The idea was that an agency like the Department of Agriculture would have more expertise to interpret agriculture regulations than federal judges would have. But over the years, Chevron has become a more powerful tool for the executive branch. Conservatives argued that Obama abused Chevron, using executive agen- cies as policymakers. Now liberals might be ready for courts to do away with it. Chevron “permit[s] executive bureaucracies to swallow huge amounts of core judicial and legislative power and concentrate federal power in a way that seems more than a little difficult to square with the Constitution of the framers’ design,” Gorsuch wrote in his ruling, Gutierrez- Brizuela v. Lynch. “In times like these, we need judges who are neither toadies nor resisters,” wrote former Judge Michael Ayotte (center) “Judge [Richard] Posner con- McConnell, who served on the 10th Circuit with Gorsuch, in introduces Gorsuch tends that assisted suicide should a piece for the Hoover Institution. McConnell highlighted to Feinstein in the hallway of the be legalized because (in his view) Gorsuch’s limited view of executive power. “We need judges U.S. Capitol. the balance of social utility who take their bearings from the Constitution, and not from appears to justify it,” Gorsuch party loyalties. In Neil Gorsuch, we have such a judge.” wrote. “But his utilitarian argu- ment for legalization leaves him forced to concede that ORIGINALISM some human lives are worth greater legal protection than Like Scalia, Gorsuch bases his judicial philosophy in origi- others because of their comparative instrumental value. … nalism and textualism. That means he follows the text and If we throw over existing law and permit some persons’ original intent of the Constitution. He does not see it as a lives to be taken intentionally, how are we supposed to go “living” document. Originalists believe that changes about the business of sorting out which lives may be so should come from the people—through legislatures or taken? Whose life may be taken and who decides? Does it through constitutional amendments—not through the even matter whether we have the consent of those to be courts. Gorsuch has said that judges should focus “back- killed, at least if we can confidently conclude their lives ward, not forward.” really lack (what someone deems to be) sufficient instru- “An assiduous focus on text, structure, and history is mental value? Peter Singer’s work advocating infanticide essential to the proper exercise of the judicial function,” he reveals just how far the logical progression ignited by this wrote last year in a law review article. “That, yes, judges line of inquiry may take us.” should be in the business of declaring what the law is using the traditional tools of interpretation, rather than EXECUTIVE POWER pronouncing the law as they might wish it to be in light of Given the ferocity of lawsuits against Trump’s immigration their own political views. … Though the critics are loud executive order, the Supreme Court will likely hear a and the temptations to join them may be many, mark me ­number of cases on Trump’s use of executive power over down too as a believer that the traditional account of the the next few years. judicial role Justice Scalia defended will endure.” A

 [email protected]  @emlybelz March 4, 2017 • WORLD Magazine 47 FEATURES NORTHER N MIGRATION Somali refugee resettlement stirs passions in a small town, with many watching Europe’s cautionary tale

BY JILL NELSON in Rapid City, S.D., and Stockholm, Sweden

Somali men in Aberdeen at a Nov. 12 event in which the immigrants hosted a thank-you meal for all who had helped and welcomed them.

McQUILLEN CREATIVE GROUP

48 WORLD Magazine • March 4, 2017 NORTHER N MIGRATION

n Jan. 27, the evening Americans who, according to polls, tional director of the Hatune of President Donald approve of Trump’s order, and the Foundation, told the crowd about his Trump’s announce- topic of discussion was Muslim organization’s efforts to rescue ment of an execu- immigration. Christian and Yazidi women and girls tive order banning The emcee for the evening was from sex slavery in Iraq. His stories entry to the United state Rep. Scott Craig (who is also were moving, but the crowd seemed States from seven ­pastor of Bighorn Canyon Community most alarmed by tales of Sweden’s ­terrorist hot spots, around 175 people Church), co-sponsor of a bill, now transformation: People gasped when gathered in a hotel conference room in withdrawn, that would have given the Jensen, who lives in Sweden, pre- Rapid City, S.D. Most in the crowd governor power to close the state to dicted his homeland would be the first were part of the 40 to 50 percent of refugees. Hans Erling Jensen, interna- country in Europe to become Islamic. Columbus, Ohio, that injured 11 people was even more troubling, as was a case last year in Minnesota in which three Somali-Americans were found guilty of plotting to join ISIS. Levsen points out that overall crime rates have not increased since Aberdeen became a hub for secondary migration, listing fear of deportation and good screening methods as deter- rents. He says the tone of hateful calls he’s received this past year has reached new levels and cites social media as one factor that “injects ­ignorance like a poison,” noting that “fearful people are prone to irrational actions.” But a Somali man was found guilty last summer of sexually assaulting a handicapped woman in Aberdeen (At the event, I also briefly gave an Andrew Curly from the office of Rep. after he had only been in the country overview of Islamic history.) Kristi Noem, R-S.D., speaks with people for a week. (Lutheran Social Services, in Sioux Falls who are protesting Why do people in a “fly-over” state President Trump’s executive order which overseas refugee resettlement with only three mosques, endless open suspending the U.S. refugee program. in the state, refused to comment on the space, and more cattle than people case.) A case involving a missing Karen care about Muslim immigration? woman who worked at the meatpacking “Look into what’s going on in porter of immigration, citing an aging plant has also increased suspicion. Aberdeen,” several locals told me. population and low unemployment. “This is changing the landscape of our That’s where hundreds of Somalis— But some locals are concerned small town,” Fuhrmann said, noting migrants from one of the terrorist about these new trends, and tempers that many women in town now have havens falling under Trump’s execu- flared at both a town hall meeting and concealed pistol permits. “They’re all tive order—have arrived during the an event hosted by Americans First of packing heat because they don’t trust past few years to work in the meat- Aberdeen last year. them. We never had to do that before.” packing industry, and assimilation has “It isn’t that we’re a racist town,” Fuhrmann’s greater concern been a struggle. argued Sharon Fuhrmann, a 68-year- involves the long-term implications of About 250 miles east of Rapid City old Aberdeen resident who enjoys immigration from Muslim countries. and 125 miles north is the small town of hosting Asian students from the local For instance, Ilhan Omar won election Aberdeen, population 27,000. Sioux college. She pointed to the general to the Minnesota House of Representa­ Falls is currently the only direct refugee acceptance of the Karen community tives in November and became the resettlement site in the state, but the that arrived from Myanmar to fill local first female Muslim and Somali- controversial reopening of Aberdeen’s jobs. The Karens are primarily American lawmaker in the nation’s meatpacking plant, DemKota Ranch Christian and have a reputation for history, but allegations of overlapping Beef, has created a wave of secondary hard work, and they aren’t from a “faith tradition” marriages to multiple migration to the town. country the Obama administration last men marred her achievement. According to the Pew Research year designated as a terrorist haven. Like others in town, Fuhrmann Center, South Dakota ranked No. 7 in The Somalis are from such a coun- began researching Islam—a topic she

the nation for refugees resettled per try, and their reputation for problems dove into after watching troubling JOE AHLQUIST/THE ARGUS LEADER VIA AP capita during the fiscal year 2016, and in other parts of the Midwest precedes news reports from Germany and neighboring Nebraska and North them. In 2012, Rich Stanek, sheriff of Sweden. Dakota ranked first and second respec- Hennepin County, Minn., testified tively. Somalis have topped the list of before a House subcommittee about ore than 4,000 miles north- incoming refugees to small towns Somali immigrants and crime in his east of Aberdeen, a similar across the Great Plains looking to fill state. He said most Somalis were Mbut much wider conversation jobs in the meatpacking industry. ­law-abiding citizens but authorities is taking place in Sweden, a country Between 700 and 1,000 Somalis were also seeing Somali-related gang that has taken in more refugees per now live in Aberdeen, where Mayor violence across Minnesota. A terrorist capita than any other European Mike Levsen has been a vocal sup- attack by a Somali refugee last year in nation.

50 WORLD Magazine • March 4, 2017 SHOPPERS: JOACHIM LADEFOGED/VII/REDUX • EKEROTH: JANERIK HENRIKSSON/AFP/GETTY IMAGES prompt medicalcare thesedays dueto many stories ofsexual assaults. out alonepast dark:She’s heard too lation 124,000, butnolongerventures her coastal cityofHelsingborg, popu feel safewalking thestreets atnightin old Swedish native, says sheusedto from ideal:Stephanie Heino, a28-year- landscape. ­political correctness pervades the mindset ofmulticulturalism and pack refugee shelter, andageneral design oftheyear award foritsflat- ­company IKEAwon the2016 Beazley tarian superpower.” TheSwedish their self-proclaimed titleof“humani ­transforming into refugee housing. apartments insmallvillagesare country, where vacation resorts and cities have created anoverflow tothe nomic burdens. Housing shortagesin cover-ups ofMuslim crime, andeco crime andsexual assaults, media some familiarconcerns:increased about theimmigration influx,citing towns are makingthebiggest noise Heino says it’s difficultto get But the reality ontheground isfar The Swedes take great pridein Here too, rural areas andsmall - - - entering Sweden rose from 20,000 in prefurnished apartment. ­secondhand: ayear-to-year leaseina ­contract andeventually settledfor years togetafirsthand housing She was onawaiting list forthree the housingsituationisanightmare: needs amongSweden’s migrants, and the prioritizationofmore urgent Stockholm, Sweden. Immigrants shopinamall As thenumberofasylumseekers to beSweden it’s notgoing ‘eoe long ‘Before anymore.’ —Kent Ekeroth the United States: DoesMuslim immi versy thathasignited protests across parties across Europe, andthecontro tive order, theriseofanti-immigration the heartofPresident Trump’s execu tance ofpersecutedminorities. immigration platform fortheaccep Democrats donot leave room intheir bodyguards nearby. TheSwedish September afteratalkinStockholm, to seeviolence,” Ekeroth toldmein be Sweden anymore, andwe’re going This leads to a question that is at This leadstoaquestion thatisat to wealthy MiddleEastern and move someasylumseekers Sweden tohaltallimmigration Committee, says it’s timefor member ofParliament’s Justice Democrat representative and we needtohelptherefugees.” party’s platforms:“Ireally think said shedoesnotsupportthe approval rating. Now thepartyhasa20percent Swedes supportedtheparty. In 2010, only6percent of on ananti-immigration platform. reformed itselfandcampaigns party thatclaimsithas Democrats, aformerneo-Nazi the popularityofSweden 2012 to163,000 in2015, sohas can bedeported. lum oftendisappearbefore they and thosewhoare deniedasy rate isthehighest inEurope, countries. Sweden’s acceptance Kent Ekeroth, aSweden Despite herconcerns, Heino “Before longit’s notgoingto March 4, 2017 4, March Washington Institute for adjunct scholaratThe said Magnus Norell, an a fewhundred years ago,” politics. We gotridofthat have religion mixed with transformation over time? to asubtleandlong-term Europe openeditsdoors identify asIslamist, has 20 percent ofMuslims aside, ifanestimated 15to grant groups? Jihadists ciated withotherimmi and greater risknotasso gration present aunique “With Islamism, you • WORLD Magazine WORLD ------51 Near East Studies and a native of Sweden. “Now it’s coming in through the back door and we’re still trying to get our heads wrapped around it.” Voices on Islam Pierre Durrani, a former Islamist While the left labels any conversation about Islam bigotry and xenophobia, the youth leader in Sweden who is now an right digests news filled with hysteria, sometimes misinformation, and stories that agnostic, said Muslim Brotherhood paint all Muslims with the same brush. The left worries about the right’s overreac- adherents pose a greater threat to the tion while the right is furious about the left’s silence. The rapid rise of candidates West than jihadists due to their ability­ and parties in the United States and Europe campaigning on anti-immigration to blend in and play the long game. platforms proves they have struck a chord with more than the fringe. Islamists may be a minority in Sweden, More than ever, the West needs people with deep knowledge of Islamism but they are politically active, proclaim who can communicate concerns without hysteria. The following profiles include the right to speak for all Muslims, and people from a variety of perspectives who all agree on one thing: Islam is differ- are funded by Swedish taxpayers. ent socially from other religions. They draw varied conclusions from that prem- Islamists who have made their way ise (note their perspectives on Trump’s executive order), but most find common into the nation’s Green Party, part of a cause in the battle against Islamism and the importance of getting to know your coalition government, made headlines Muslim neighbors and inviting moderates to help figure out what this means for last year when one member refused to the future of the Western world. While by no means an exhaustive list, these are shake hands with a woman and people who have been engaged in the conversation for more than a decade and another was seen making the four-­ have generally found ways to get along despite disagreements. finger Muslim Brotherhood sign Many readers will take issue with Sam Harris’ attack on all religions, Raheel ­during a live television broadcast. Raza’s pluralistic definition of her religion, and Shadi Hamid’s conclusion that we Sweden may be the most politically must accept some form of Islamism in the political landscape of the Middle East. correct country on the planet, but These differences are precisely why they are on this list: to show how even more Swedes are beginning to ask ­liberals and moderate Muslims are waking up to the real intent behind accusations of Islamophobia—a term Harris claims was “consciously engineered to prevent questions and cast their lot with the us from talking honestly about Islam, Islamism, jihadism, etc.” Most of the people Sweden Democrats. on this list face continual death threats. —J.N. he United States is far from reaching the demographic tilt that is altering the landscape RAHEEL RAZA SAM HARRIS T (Muslims Facing Tomorrow) (Project Reason) of Europe: The 1 percent Muslim ­population in America is expected to Worldview and profile Worldview and profile reach only 2 percent by 2050. Muslim reformer; Pakistani- Atheist; American; But in a small state like South Canadian; author and activist ­neuroscientist and author Dakota, with a statewide population of Perspective on religion Perspective on religion only 850,000, small trends can have An observant Sunni Muslim who follows Faith is leading humanity into ruin, and vast consequences, especially in farm the Five Pillars of Islam but believes the world would be better off with- towns with limited resources and there are many paths to God. out the three major monotheistic religions. fledgling economies. Europe has Perspective on Islam underestimated the number of She has fought hard to keep Sharia law Perspective on Islam Muslim refugees coming in and over- out of Canada and warns moderate A YouTube clip of Harris made waves estimated the ability to assimilate Muslims about Islamist Muslim student for his pointed response to Ben them—lessons Jensen of the Hatune groups on campuses. Her message to fel- Affleck’s charges of bigotry: “We have Foundation says Americans would be low Muslims: Follow the laws of the land to be able to criticize bad ideas, and wise to note. or move to a Muslim-majority country. Islam is the mother lode of bad ideas.” The challenge for South Dakota, Can Islam reform? Can Islam reform? Sweden, and the rest of the Western Yes, because any religion that has tilted Skeptical of Islam’s ability to reform world will be this: promoting a much- toward an extremist perspective can but wrote Islam and the Future of needed and reasonable conversation also be turned back to a tolerant one Tolerance: A Dialogue with Maajid about Muslim immigration while also that is compatible with the 21st century. Nawaz (see profile). reaching out with compassion to

Stance on Trump’s executive order Stance on Trump’s executive order PHOTOS HANDOUT Muslim neighbors. This twofold “Muslims should embrace [the EO] as Believes the EO is unethical, ineffec- approach may be the best defense citizens of the USA and help sift the tive, and inconsistent, but shames against the deep-rooted ideology of sand from the grain. It’s about region, ­liberals for refusing to speak honestly Islamism and the Western denial of its not religion, and every leader has the about Islam and marching with true face. A right to secure the borders.” Islamists.

52 WORLD Magazine • March 4, 2017 SHADI HAMID MAAJID NAWAZ AYAAN HIRSI ALI (Brookings Institution) (Quilliam Foundation) (The AHA Foundation) Worldview and profile Worldview and profile Worldview and profile Secular Muslim; American; Muslim reformer; British; Somali-born Dutch- scholar and author author, radio host, and American; atheist; author, politician activist, and former Dutch politician Perspective on religion Jesus told His followers to give unto Perspective on religion Perspective on religion Caesar what is Caesar’s and to God A former Islamic extremist, he is now a All religions are inherently violent, but what is God’s. Islam has no such separa- vocal critic of Islamism in the U.K. the sacred texts of Islam have been used tion between mosque and state. to justify violence throughout history. Perspective on Islam Perspective on Islam Saying ISIS has nothing to do with Islam Perspective on Islam Islam plays an outsized role in politics in hurts Muslim reformers. Islam is not a religion of peace. The lion’s share of terrorist acts are committed by the Muslim world. “It always has and it Can Islam reform? Muslims. probably always will” because “There needs to be a reform of the Muhammad was also a state-builder. way Muslims look at their scripture.” Can Islam reform? This does not hold true for American Muslims need to be more open to this Islam is at a crossroads. Muslims need Muslims who have assimilated well. conversation. to debate and reject the violent core of their faith, and they need the support of Can Islam reform? Stance on Trump’s executive order the West. No. “Islam has already had a reformation The EO fails to grasp the scope of of sorts” in the late 19th century: Islamic global jihad. Stance on Trump’s executive order modernism. Taking politics out of Islam is It’s a bad approach that does not get to like Christians saying Jesus was just a man. the root of this long-term ideological war. “Maybe Islam shouldn’t be this way … but I have to look at the world the way it is.” TAWFIK HAMID (Potomac Institute for Stance on Trump’s executive order Policy Studies) NABEEL QURESHI Trump’s executive order attacks both (formerly part of Ravi Worldview and profile vulnerable refugees and Islam in general. Zacharias International Islamic radical turned Ministries) ­moderate Muslim; American; physician, author, and speaker Worldview and profile DOUGLAS MURRAY Former Ahmadi Muslim turned Perspective on religion (The Spectator and Henry Christian; Pakistani-born American; Acknowledges the positive influence Jackson Society) author and speaker Christians and Jews have had on Muslim Worldview and profile neighbors as well as their persecution Perspective on religion Agnostic; British; writer, in some Muslim lands. “I left Islam because I studied commentator, and journalist Muhammad’s life. I accepted the gospel Perspective on Islam because I studied Jesus’ life.” Perspective on religion We are at a “historic crossroads” Claims his study of Islam made him an where we “must choose between Perspective on Islam atheist but continues to speak out free socie­ties and Islamism.” He The foundations of Islam are violent, but against Christian persecution. claims the two cannot exist together most Muslims want to peacefully honor Perspective on Islam in peace. God. Islam has not been a religion of peace. Can Islam reform? Can Islam reform? Murray and Ayaan Hirsi Ali won an Yes. De-emphasizing non-Quranic Radical Islam is the reformation, so Intelligence Squared debate on this ­writings and re-examining the hadiths instead, Islam must be reimagined, and premise against Maajid Nawaz (see is a good start. that is not likely to happen anytime soon. ­profile) in 2010. The three have since found common cause in the battle Stance on Trump’s executive order Stance on Trump’s executive order against Islamism. The EO was clearly based on security The Christian teaching of loving one’s concerns and would have targeted all enemy, even in the face of death, may Can Islam reform? predominantly Islamic countries were be the most effective way to battle He is “slightly pessimistic”: There’s little it truly a “Muslim ban.” Islamic extremism. willingness to admit what the problem is and reformers face untold obstacles. Stance on Trump’s executive order ‘We have to be able to criticize bad Trump’s EO reflects some lack of thought but “nothing compared to the ideas, and Islam is the mother lode lack of thought among the policy’s critics.” of bad ideas.’ —Sam Harris

 [email protected]  @WorldNels March 4, 2017 • WORLD Magazine 53 TRUTH IN PUBLIC: A CAMP FOR CHRISTIAN POLITICAL ENGAGEMENT. LEARN CHRISTIAN WORLDVIEW. ENGAGE THE CULTURE. GET TRAINED BY EVANGELICAL LEADERS.

WHERE: Training, lodging, and meals will be at Asbury JULY 10-14, 2017 University. The mock legislative sessions will be hosted in the Senate Chambers in Frankfort, KY in the Capitol Building. WHO: Older high school students. WHY SHOULD YOU COME? Truth in Public is about equipping young adults to act. • Learn to articulate a biblically-based Christian worldview so that they may rightly assess the complex culture and society around them. • Gain an understanding in the inner workings of the state legislature and how to lead in the public square. • Grow as responsible Christian citizens who speak and act with integrity, clarity, and conviction as they bring the truths of Christianity to bear on society.

LEARN MORE ABOUT OUR CAMP AT WWW.GOCROSSINGS.ORG OR CALL US AT 502-491-7000 CAMPS | CONFERENCE CENTERS | MISSIONS HANDOUT Visit WORLD Digital: wng.org R hanging from chains9feetup. A room thatleadsto, well, catwalks wrapped tree inthecenterof One climbsupanddown arope- a hollowed-out computermonitor. corners, insideanolddrumset,andin the diningarea. Somesleepinquiet ous breeds andcolorsroam around us tostroke hisfur. Othercatsofvari up andloungesbetween us, allowing & Jenny Lind Schmitt Matt Rick by PART AGROWING OF TREND AUSTIN’S BLUE CAT CAFÉ IS twista feline Dining with Lifestyle NOTEBOOK ­circles ourtable. Soonhejumps Balthazar, alarge gray tabby, Lifestyle Lifestyle - separate from thecats’ litterboxes, ing mixoftables, booths, andsofas—is regulations. Thediningarea—an invit orful foodtruckto­ owner prepares meals outsideinacol Tex-Mex, andespresso drinks. The features avariety ofburgers, salads, from theBlueCat’s vegan menuthat resident cats. Theymay alsoorder charge toenjoy timewiththecafé’s such cafésaround thecountry. Patrons pay a$3“kittycover” / Technology growing numberof Austin, Texas, oneofa Blue CatCaféin cal afternoonatthe videos. Thisisatypi ­television plays cat comply with health comply withhealth

/ Science Science / - Religion - - the catsadopted.” Thecafé works with place forpeopleandcats—and to get she “wanted toprovide apositive experience. OwnerRebecca Gray said pose beyond providing auniquedining cat caféopenedin1998. Taipei, Taiwan, where theworld’s first eating itup. Theconceptoriginatedin Seattle, Vancouver, andothercitiesare Montreal, St. Louis, San Francisco, Naples, New York, LosAngeles, residents ofBoston, Cleveland, Denver, food inthesameroom aturnoff. But morning andevening. both floor wipe downthe tablesand accessible through acat door. Employees Austin’s BlueCatCaféhasapur Some mightfindtheideaofcatsand March 4, 2017 4, March • WORLD Magazine WORLD - 55 NOTEBOOK Lifestyle

Cats find favor at the Blue Cat Café.

the local Humane Society to link cat cat café is like. On this particular day bond with the cats this way in a shel- lovers with cats that could potentially at the Blue Cat, a steady flow of people ter. I’m not looking to adopt, but I’ll become feline family members. More kept the staff (and the kitties) hopping. support them.” than 220 cats have found homes Kiesha MacLean and her friend Patty Not everyone in Austin has wel- through the Blue Cat since it opened Kendall came from 30 and 45 minutes comed the cat café. Housed in a small in 2015. away because they and their children building covered inside and out with For many cat lovers, cat cafés have wanted to check the place out. Sandra brightly colored cat murals, the Blue become destination dining experi- Fly, visiting with her daughter Kelly Cat sits in a section of East Austin that ences. Some will travel long distances Easley, was curious about the idea: has changed rapidly in recent years. to hang out with feline friends. Others “This is awesome! The concept blew Empty buildings and run-down come because they want to see what a my mind. You don’t get the chance to houses sit side by side with shiny new apartment complexes and restaurants. Used car lot signs announce, “No Credit, No Problem!” An abandoned REMEMBERING THE LITTLE PEOPLE car wash sits on the same block as the After seven times as finalists, the Fisher-Price Little People finally earned a place upscale Peacock Salon and a tavern in the National Toy Hall of Fame, located on the second floor of the National offering craft brews. Museum of Play in Rochester, N.Y. Some neighbors in the area see the Fisher-Price has sold more than 2 billion Little People since their introduction café as a sign of new vitality. Others in 1959. They’ve evolved from tubular wooden figures to plastic ones with arms, see it as a symbol of increasing gentri- legs, and dimensional faces. Why has it taken so long for the Little People to gain entry into the Hall of Fame? fication in a neighborhood once domi- “They’ve been easier to overlook,” says Chris Bensch, the museum’s vice president for nated by Hispanic, family-run collections. Their limited audience of under-5-year-olds has been an additional hurdle. businesses. Gray has received threat- Anyone can nominate a toy for the Hall of Fame, but to win a toy must have ening messages from protesters. On profoundly changed play or toy design, lasted for generations, be widely respected the café’s first anniversary in October and remembered, and lead to creativity­ in play. Other 2016 inductees: the swing 2016, vandals defaced the property and Dungeons & Dragons. —by CHELSEA BOES with obscene graffiti and glued the door locks shut. Despite resistance, the Blue Cat fulfills a dream for Gray. Running a cat café is challenging: “It’s a struggle to pay the bills. This is not a money- making thing.” A HANDOUIT —Rick Matt and Jenny Lind Schmitt are graduates of World Journalism Institute’s mid-career course

56 WORLD Magazine • March 4, 2017 Give the gift of clarity: wng.org/clarity NOTEBOOK Technology

international team), must receive at least 90 percent of their funding from Race to ­private sources. The win- ning team—with a grand prize of $20 million—­ the moon must successfully­ land its 2017 BEGINS THE ERA OF spacecraft on the moon, and its lander must travel SAY AGAIN? PRIVATELY FUNDED at least 500 meters (1,640 If you didn’t get an Amazon MOONSHOTS by Michael Cochrane feet) and transmit high- Echo for Christmas, you may definition video of its sur- know someone who did. The roundings back to Earth. popular device with its voice- operated assistant, Alexa, was The Israeli team and a top seller over the holidays, one from the United and Amazon has sold more States plan to use “hop- than 5 million since its launch per” landers that will fly, two years ago. rather than drive, the The massive amount of required 500 meters. voice data Alexa is collecting Israel’s SpaceIL team was from those millions of users is the first to secure a helping Amazon solve a long- launch contract (aboard a standing speech recognition SpaceX rocket). American problem known as the cocktail contestant Moon Express party challenge: picking out a Ever since the the surface of the moon— was the first private com- single voice in a roomful of R Soviet Union crash- until now. In January, the pany in history to receive many people talking. landed a probe on the Google Lunar X Prize governmental permission Developers at Amazon lunar surface in 1959, competition selected five to travel to the moon. ­created a version of Alexa that notes distinguishing charac- only the national space finalist teams from pri- “Our goal,” said Moon teristics of a voice calling its programs of the United vate companies that will Express CEO Bob name and then homes in on States, the Soviet Union, attempt to go to the moon Richards in a statement, the words of that person, and China have had the before this year is out. “is to expand Earth’s according to MIT Technology financial and technologi- The teams, represent- social and economic Review. They hope eventually cal resources to safely ing Israel, India, Japan, sphere to the moon, our to develop a version that can land manned or the United States, and largely unexplored eighth follow two people speaking unmanned spacecraft on other countries (plus one continent.” simultaneously. —M.C.

SOUNDING five-year study using Review. Additional voice samples ­artificial intelligence collected since then are helping STRESSED ­algorithms to analyze identify speech patterns that could Disorders affecting thousands of voice possibly distinguish between PTSD ­mental health, such ­samples from veterans. and TBI. as post-traumatic His goal is to learn the Researchers have also discov- stress disorder (PTSD) relationship between the ered links between vocal markers and traumatic brain conditions of PTSD, TBI, and the risk of coronary heart injury (TBI), are difficult to and depression and vocal ­disease. They envision a vocal test diagnose. But researchers believe markers such as tone, pitch, on a smartphone app that could certain vocal cues extracted from rhythm, rate, and volume. function as an inexpensive predictive voice samples could be used to In a 2015 study of 39 male volun- screening tool for multiple diseases. detect the presence of these and teers, Marmar and his team devel- Responding to concerns about other diseases. oped a voice test that distinguished ­privacy, researchers point out that Charles Marmar, chairman of the between PTSD patients and healthy the algorithms simply capture vocal department of psychiatry at NYU volunteers with 77 percent accu- patterns, without­ logging what is School of Medicine, is conducting a racy, according to MIT Technology said. —M.C. SPACEIL: HANDOUT • ECHO: FRANK DUENZL/PICTURE-ALLIANCE/DPA/AP • MARMAR: CRAIG BARRITT/GETTY IMAGES FOR THE ROBIN HOOD FOUNDATION

March 4, 2017 • WORLD Magazine 57 NOTEBOOK Science Rallied for research? SCIENTISTS PLAN AN APRIL MARCH ON WASHINGTON by Julie Borg

Look out, Washington, their diversity goals on R here comes another their website. march. Scientists are pre- “We are committed to paring to converge on the centralizing, highlighting, are not, as the organizers Scientists and its role nation’s capital on Earth standing in solidarity with, maintain, ‘scientific issues,’” at a rally in decision Day, April 22, for what and acting as accomplices he wrote on his blog. “They in San making.” Francisco they’re billing as a “March with black, Latinx, API, are moral issues, which Robert for Science.” The effort indigenous, Muslim, Jewish, means they reflect world- S. Young, a began as a campaign by women, people with dis- views and preferences that coastal geologist at Western ­scientists who fear the new abilities, poor, gay, lesbian, are not objective.” Carolina University, administration in the White bisexual, queer, trans, non- Some scientists say they believes that scientists House may not be as sup- binary, agender, and intersex will support the march marching in opposition to a portive of certain public scientists and science advo- only if it stays out of politics. newly elected Republican policies as they’d prefer. cates,” the organizers wrote The CEO of the American president will only rein- The organizers of the in a statement they later Society of Plant Biologists force a partisan divide. He march say it will be non- removed. told the ScienceInsider wrote in an op-ed for The partisan, but they intend Even evolutionary biol- blog his organization New York Times that the for it to impact policymak- ogist and self-proclaimed would likely support the march could “turn scien- ers and to give credibility atheist Jerry Coyne is con- participation of its mem- tists into another group to scientific consensus. cerned about such politici- bers in the march if the caught up in the culture Some scientists,­ though, zation of science. “After all, event maintained an wars and further drive the doubt the claims of non- stuff like ‘immigration pol- emphasis on “a positive wedge between scientists partisanship—particularly icy,’ ‘native rights,’ and many and apolitical message and a certain segment of after the organizers stated other issues of social justice regarding empirical science the American electorate.” SCIENTISTS: MARCIO JOSE SANCHEZ/AP • BRAIN CANCER: ERAXION/ISTOCK CANCER: • SANCHEZ/AP BRAIN JOSE MARCIO SCIENTISTS: SPECIAL DELIVERY Researchers at the University of North Carolina and the University of British Columbia have developed a promising new method for treating glioblastomas, a common and deadly form of brain cancer, using reprogrammed skin cells. Glioblastomas are difficult to eradicate because they grow rapidly and shoot tendrils into the brain that doctors can’t see and drugs don’t reach. The standard treatment is surgery, radiation, and chemotherapy, but in many patients the tumor returns within a few months. In a study published in the Feb. 1 issue of Science Translational Medicine, the researchers harvested skin cells from a patient and then reprogrammed them to become neural stem cells—cells with an innate ability to seek out brain cancer cells. Capitalizing on this ability, the scientists engineered the stem cells to carry therapeutic drugs: Once the stem cells reach cancer cells, they launch the drugs at them and kill them. Because the drugs are carried only by the neural stem cells, they don’t circulate throughout the patient’s body, so side effects are reduced. Scientists already knew stem cells could treat tumors, but obtaining them was a difficult and lengthy process. “Speed is essential,” co-author Shawn Hingtgen said in a press release. “Brain cancer patients don’t have weeks and months to wait for us to generate these therapies.” The new technique is fast and simple, he said. The researchers have used the technique only in lab dishes and on mouse models so far, but believe human clinical trials are just one or two years away. —J.B.

58 WORLD Magazine • March 4, 2017 NOTEBOOK Religion

Faiths and freedoms BLUE LAW SHOULD BAPTISTS DEFEND THE RIGHT OF MUSLIMS SQUABBLE TO BUILD MOSQUES? by James Bruce Looking for a beer on a Sunday morning in Bismarck, N.D.? You can Local officials in Ethics and Religious “The answer to Islam is quench your thirst at R Bernards Township, Liberty Commission not government power. Laughing Sun Brewing N.J., did not have a happy (ERLC) of the Southern The answer is the gospel Co., which opens at 11:30 new year. They had told Baptist Convention. of Jesus Christ and the a.m. If you need a pair of planners of a proposed The Southern Baptist new birth that comes socks, though, you’ll mosque that it would Convention? John from that.” have to wait. Target need more parking Wofford, pastor of Wofford, in a letter opens at noon. spaces than a church Armorel Baptist Church published by the Retailers have no needed, but on New of Blytheville, Ark., Arkansas Baptist News, choice: A 2015 law per- Year’s Eve a federal judge objected and asked pushed back: “Would mitting bars to open at 11 a.m. does not apply to called their decision Russell Moore, president Jesus Christ stand in a them. Some may say ­illegal discrimination on of the ERLC, at the court of law, defending shops being closed on the basis of religion denomination’s 2016 the rights of a false reli- Sunday morning gives under the Religious Land annual meeting, how gion to erect mosques, workers an opportunity Use and Institutionalized “someone within the temples or other places to go to church, but the Persons Act. Southern Baptist of worship which are rules frustrate state The Islamic Society of Convention can support clearly in violation of the Rep. Pam Anderson, a Basking Ridge and the defending of rights First and Second Democrat from Fargo: Mohammad Ali Chaudry, for Muslims to construct Commandments of God?” “I’m annoyed that I have who filed the complaint, mosques in the United Moore is not alone in to wait until Sunday his defense afternoon to shop.” So of mosque Anderson introduced A rendering of the legislation to let North proposed mosque rights. The National Dakotans shop on Association of Sunday morning, with a few restrictions, such as Evangelicals a ban on vehicle sales. also sup- The North Dakota ported House approved the bill Muslim free- on Jan. 31—but only by a dom to build: 48-46 vote—and sent the “The law bill to the North Dakota should be Senate for consideration. applied fairly Christopher T. to all faiths.” Dodson, executive direc- Nor is tor of the North Dakota Wofford Catholic Conference, alone in his appealed to state and opposition: federal rulings to say the had received support for States when these people Dean Haun, pastor of issue isn’t religion at all, their cause by, among threaten our very way of First Baptist Church in but rest. The Sunday closing law doesn’t force others, the American existence as Christians Morristown, Tenn., specific beliefs, nor does Association of Jewish and Americans?” resigned as a trustee of it impose a time of Lawyers and Jurists, the In his response, the International Mission ­worship: “The purpose Interfaith Coalition on Moore emphasized reli- Board in protest. A big of the law is to provide a Mosques, the Unitarian gious liberty and sincere question: Is it the role of common period of rest Universalist Legislative belief. If communities government today to and relaxation to the Ministry of New Jersey, can ban mosques, they apply the laws of ancient benefit of families and and the International can also ban Baptist Israel to the religious communities.” —J.B.

MOSQUE: FACEBOOK/ISLAMIC SOCIETY OF BASKING RIDGE JUSTIN • TARGET: SULLIVAN/GETTY IMAGES Mission Board and the churches. Moore added: ­cafeteria that is America?

Give the gift of clarity: wng.org/clarity March 4, 2017 • WORLD Magazine 59

VOICES Mailbag ‘Bitter pills’ JAN. 21 Thank you for this pro-life issue. It has great articles and a great cover graphic. The lead article on chemical abortions was the best I’ve read on the subject. —PAUL MATLOCK / Pagosa Springs, Colo.

Instead of a surgical procedure after judges, so when anyone referred to the ‘Unhelpful insults’ my last miscarriage I was given pills hundreds of thousands of people JAN. 21 I was struck by Joel Belz’s col- that cause chemical abortions. I nearly killed, the judges always had the visual umn on showing respect for those bled to death. It was the most horrific of one person before them. with whom we disagree politically. We experience of my life. My home looked —NOLAN NELSON / Eugene, Ore. aren’t free, even when armed with the like a crime scene, the pain was excru- truth, to be mean or rude in the appli- ciating, and I ended up at the hospital ‘Life on ice’ cation of that truth. Thank you for anyway. I cannot imagine a teenage JAN. 21 At some clinics couples can helping me raise the bar on my words. girl going through that. “adopt” someone else’s embryo and —DAVID LELAND / Raleigh, N.C. —YVETTE BEGIN FREEMAN on Facebook carry it to term. It’s a wonderful solu- tion for the problem of extra embryos. When we use the truth as a weapon We work with women who are having Our niece and her husband adopted without love, brutality is the result. babies, but I almost never hear about two from the same set of parents and The unsaved then regard Christians as male responsibility. Our society seems now have two beautiful daughters enemies to conquer rather than more focused on fixing results than who are truly sisters. friends calling them to salvation in fixing causes. —DEBRA COSTAS on Facebook Christ. God have mercy on us. —GEORGE NETTLETON / Willow Street, Pa. —JOHN LANGEBERG on wng.org ‘Quite contrary’ Thank you for this insightful story. JAN. 21 Good column on Genesis 3. In ‘Beyond ISIS’ Leslie Wolbert’s statement about the true contrast to the curse, Paul JAN. 21 I so appreciate Mindy Belz’s flushing the last of her baby down the writes in Ephesians that women are to Globe Trot newsletter for its variety of toilet particularly spoke to me. submit to their husbands, not try to news and items for prayer. She has a —LUKE MACKENZIE / Union City, Pa. control them, and that husbands are to unique perspective from all her expe- love their wives rather than lord it rience traveling in the Middle East, ‘Incapable of shame?’ over them. It’s all made possible by and I look forward to reading her JAN. 21 The 2 million Israeli abortions our Lord Jesus Christ. recent book, They Say We Are Infidels. since 1948 are just as much of a holo- —WILMA RITTINGER on Facebook —DIANE ETHERTON / Upper Marlboro, Md. caust as the 1 million Jewish children killed by Hitler. The American num- I agree with Janie B. Cheaney’s main (To sign up for Globe Trot, email Mindy bers since 1973 are far worse. Has the points but would point out that while Belz at [email protected].) promise “never again” been forgotten? God “curses” the serpent and the —MICHAEL DuMEZ / Oostburg, Wis. ground, that word is not attached to So few American Christians are deeply Adam or Eve themselves. Is there pain concerned about refugees or know At the Nuremberg trials, U.S. chief and separation from God? Yes! We’re much about the persecuted church prosecutor Robert H. Jackson of our doomed without His intervention. But that I am not surprised that little Supreme Court introduced as one of I suspect there’s a reason, rooted in American humanitarian aid is reach- his first exhibits a shrunken head of Genesis 3:15, God chose not to use that ing displaced Christians in the Middle someone killed in the camps. It was word. East. Moreover, aid groups working in prominently displayed before the —SCOTT HAYDEN / Bangkok, Thailand Muslim-dominant countries often are

Visit WORLD Digital: wng.org March 4, 2017 • WORLD Magazine 61 VOICES Mailbag

under government pressure to hire ‘New light in winter’ I will continue to look for opportuni- Muslim employees, who show JAN. 21 Thanks for a great article. ties to tell people about WORLD. ­preferential treatment to Muslims in Regardless of the causes, materialism —AMY STANTON / Fort Wayne, Ind. need. is near the root of cultural suicide. The —ELIZABETH KERR / Ontario, Calif. Japanese version and its rationaliza- Correction tions may look unusual, but other The Turkish city of Izmir is home to a ‘Journey of grace?’ cultures have the same problem. strategic U.S. air base in the war JAN. 21 It’s difficult to judge harshly —DICK FRIEDRICH on wng.org against ISIS, though not one of the those in Shūsaku Endō’s novel Silence largest such bases. (“Caught in a who stepped on the fumi-e, the images ‘Reporting worth ­dragnet,” Feb. 4, 2017). of Christ, when so many in this day supporting’ will symbolically do the same thing for DEC. 10 I’ve decided to become a a much smaller threat. monthly supporter of your ministry. Read more Mailbag letters at wng.org —RICH ASPER on wng.org I’m a pastor and believe you are pro- viding fearless Christian journalism ‘Logic, not logorrhea’ for me, my church, our nation, and the LETTERS and COMMENTS JAN. 21 Thomas Sowell’s very existence world exactly when we need it. Email: [email protected] as a black conservative economist who —KEITH SISNEY / Meadville, Mo. Mail: WORLD Mailbag, PO Box 20002, writes with lucidity confounds both Asheville, NC 28802-9998 Website: wng.org the liberal establishment and far-right I couldn’t decide if I agreed or dis- Facebook: facebook.com/WORLD.magazine racists. Who will replace him? We will agreed with your call for Trump to Twitter: @WORLD_mag miss him indeed. back out of the election, but I never Please include full name and address. Letters —BOB BARNES on wng.org considered canceling my subscription. may be edited to yield brevity and clarity. VOICES Andrée Seu Peterson

will not get their food. Once the bird has experienced flight for the first time, it does not make the second or third time very smooth. The bird will flail its wings clumsily and only sustain itself for a few seconds, if that. Only with practice do they learn the ropes and develop the muscles necessary to flap their wings to their fullest potential” Learning curves (“Nature vs Nurture: How do baby birds learn how to fly?,” BU). OBEDIENCE TO GOD TAKES PRACTICE, AND Practice makes perfect is true in the spiri- PRACTICE, AND MORE PRACTICE tual life as well as the physical life. How can it not be? Christ Himself says, “You therefore must be perfect” (Matthew 5:48), and what He means by that is made plain in the context, where He says that greeting your friends is no big deal to God, but greeting your enemies is a perfect thing (verses 46 and 47). We can do perfect things, not in a way of absolute and ontological perfection that never has a stumble, but in the doable daily ways that we are able, when confronted with a carnal choice and a godly choice, to choose the godly Duolingo tells me I’m only at 51 percent Remember one. It just takes practice, meaning a conscious R fluency in French. That stinks since I’m and deliberate effort to confront weakness and French on both sides and grew up with it that God said improve (see 2 Peter 1:5 on “making every ­spoken around me, although my sister-in-law to seek Him effort”). Remember that God said to seek Him from France informs me that they don’t with all our with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength. So ­consider Québécois French to be really French. for example, if conversation with your husband I appreciate an online course that tells it like heart, soul, broke out into rancor­ yesterday, retrace your it is, that doesn’t flatter me. This way when I do mind, and steps and see where you went wrong. Why well in the drills and get bumped up a level, I strength. would you ever assume that you can’t do all can trust I got there honestly. things by Christ who strengthens you? The other thing I like about Duolingo is that Even in movies and theater, scenes have it knows (somehow) my weaknesses and multiple takes until they are right. “Take 18!” doesn’t let me get away with them. If I stumble the director shouts, camera operators moving on numeral writing, it throws numbers at me in to position. The movie dad for the eighteenth the next lesson. If noun genders are my problem time walks through the door, tosses his raincoat (in French, cheese and candle are masculine, on the chair, and says to the movie wife, “So you while snow and tavern are feminine), guess couldn’t be bothered to meet me at the station.” what comes up in the practice sessions. If the director isn’t happy, he will call for Take 19. I’ll admit there are times when I argue with Are you willing to do more takes till our my computer. I say to the chubby green owl heavenly Director is happy? He commends mascot in the sweatband that it is unfair to mark those who are “trained by constant practice to me so harshly on vowel accenting, and that there distinguish good from evil” (Hebrews 5:14) and are more important things in life than whether who “go on to maturity” (6:1). I have an accent circonflexe on hôpital. I have found in my life that, like Duolingo, The concept of “practice makes perfect” is God doesn’t let us get away with stuff. We will axiomatic in all areas of human accomplish- keep seeing the same wall thrown up on our ment worth mastering. We all knew that once, path over and over again until we learn to mas- when we were 2½ feet tall and fell all day long ter that particular wall and stop skirting around until we could finally let go of the coffee table. it. I have been married twice now, and it is Or take baby birds as an example: interesting to me that God is revisiting me with “The parent will forcibly teach them that the issues I didn’t master in the first marriage. unless they learn how to flap their wings, I look at it as a second chance to straighten

KRIEG BARRIE KRIEG they are going to keep hitting the ground and up and fly right.A

 [email protected] March 4, 2017 • WORLD Magazine 63 VOICES Marvin Olasky

the story of a Down syndrome baby in Indiana who died of starvation over six days when his parents refused surgery for his deformed esoph- agus. When Hentoff talked with liberal friends about this horror, they responded, “Why the big fuss? Consider it a late abortion.” Ouch! No major publication I saw told that story. Nor did publications describe how Hentoff One rogue liberal faced shunning in the offices ofThe Village Voice, a publication he had helped build in the 1950s. THE SHUNNING OF NAT HENTOFF During my visit there in 1990, I waited in an open area with dozens of desks where a 55-year- My thanks to the tens of thousands of old editor in Dockers grimly harangued R WORLD members who stuck with us seven or eight 25-year-olds in tight jeans even though they disagreed with our criticism about the “blow-dried fascism of the of Donald Trump last year. Although secular Reaganitemare.” Then, from a dim hallway liberals often say Christians are intolerant, the on the other side of the open area, a bent- left more often seems to have a “one strike, over 65-year-old in baggy gray slacks shuf- you’re out” philosophy, combined with an fled into the light. The Red Sea of young avoidance of inconvenient news. people silently parted before him, and the The excommunication of a great liberal middle-aged man offered a sullen look, but ­journalist, Nat Hentoff, and the whitewashed The Red Sea no one said hello to gray-bearded Nat Hentoff. obituaries that followed his death on Jan. 7 at The excommunication should not have age 91, showed both those tendencies. I read of young peo- ­surprised me, because the lead article in the dozens of Hentoff obits to see how mediacrats ple silently Voice that week complained of those who had would handle what seemed to them a great con- parted before “found common cause with the Jerry Falwells tradiction: one of their own becoming fiercely and Pat Robertsons of the world. On the pack- pro-life during­ the 1980s and staying that way. him … but no age of issues surrounding abortion, they have Reporters learn about the attractiveness of one said hello allied themselves with the society’s most “man bites dog” stories, strange and unexpected to gray- repressive and misogynistic forces.” happenings. The conservative New York Sun (I later found a statement from Hentoff, ­followed that journalistic tradition, noting: “One bearded Nat speaking at an Americans United for Life forum of the most courageous and dramatic develop- Hentoff. in 1986, on what happened when he became ments in Hentoff’s career was his emergence as pro-life: It led to “certain social problems … a defender of the pro-life movement. The turn there are people at my paper who do not speak seemed at times to be all the more newsworthy to me anymore. In most cases, that’s no loss.” because of his self-declared atheism and his Hentoff also toldThe Philadelphia Inquirer in long-established progressive bona fides.” 1988 that his colleagues thought, “No one who Many other publications, though, ignored opposes abortion … could be a true supporter of the oddity of an atheistic left-wing pro-feminist women’s rights or, for that matter, a decent libertarian becoming pro-life. Obits I read from human being. To this day two of the Voice’s NPR, Rolling Stone, Jewish News, The Atlantic, women editors no longer speak to me.”) the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, The Oregonian, and None of the obits I read captured the loneli- many other publications didn’t mention ness of Hentoff’s professional life once he Hentoff’s stand. Some publications that did, did ­professed pro-life heresy. In 1990 he sat in his so oddly: The Washington Post noted Hentoff’s windowless office (about 7 by 8 feet) at a desk “determined opposition to abortion, leading facing the door, with books, folders, and jazz VANDENNIS TINE/MEDIAPUNCH/IPX/AP him to call himself a member of the antiabortion albums piled on his desk like a barricade against left.” But I interviewed and profiled Hentoff in the noncollegial colleagues surrounding him. Nor 1990: He did not call himself that. He called did he feel theologically at home with his theistic himself consistently pro-life. pro-life allies: Hentoff told me, “I’ve always CNN, The New York Times, The Huffington wished I could make the leap of faith and believe, Post, The Associated Press, and others men- but I can’t.” When I pushed harder, he snapped, tioned in one sentence Hentoff’s “opposition to “I’m an atheist. I’m really not interested.” abortion,” but did not mention why. Hentoff told Many of the obituaries, though, noted that he me and others that he changed after digging into died listening to great jazz singer Billie Holiday. A

64 WORLD Magazine • March 4, 2017  [email protected]  @MarvinOlasky Big Bang or creation... who cares? I consider myself a Christian and all. But seriously. I just want a good grade in Bio 109

and taking a stand for a Creator won’t help. What difference will it really make if I just go along with the crowd?

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