The 3 - July 20, 2025

Court allows therapy to help overcome same-sex attraction

While there are some, even in the Church, who seem to advocate that people who experience gender dysphoria or same-sex attraction should remain in that state, the Bible teaches that victory is possible over temptation and all areas of sin. Interestingly enough, you have those that have been critical of therapy that can help people deal with their attractions, demonizing something that is intended to help a person live in victory.

Now, a Virginia court has ruled in favor of two Christian counselors who challenged a state law that bans this therapeutical practice. At its website, Liberty Counsel noted:

The Virginia state legislature passed HB 386 in 2020 which banned talk therapy defining it as “any practice or treatment that seeks to change an individual’s sexual orientation or gender identity.” Under the law, helping children align their identities and desires to their biological sex was regarded as unprofessional conduct whereby licensed professionals could be disciplined.

The article goes on to say that, "state officials agreed to a consent decree where the court ordered the Virginia Department of Health Professions not to enforce the law against Christian therapists helping children deal with unwanted same-sex attractions, behaviors, or gender confusion." Liberty Counsel also stated:

In the decree, Chief Judge Randall D. Johnson, Jr. cited the Virginia Supreme Court in that the “constitutional guarantees of religious freedom have no deeper roots than in Virginia, where they originated[.]”

Chief Judge Johnson noted that speech “uttered by professionals” is protected and that viewpoint discrimination based on content is an “egregious” form of discrimination.

Gunman opens fire at KY church, 3 people dead

It's always very concerning when violence enters into the church doors, and when we hear about a church shooting, it can produce an emotional response. Near Lexington, Kentucky recently, a man opened fire at a church, shooting four people, leaving two dead at the church. The gunman is also reportedly dead. Todd Starnes, at his website, reported:

Police say the gunman opened fire on parishioners outside Richmond Road Baptist Church. Two women were killed. Two men survived with one in critical condition. Police say the gunman may have had a connection to the church. A state trooper was shot earlier near the Bluegrass Airport. The trooper is in stable condition. The gunman, who has not been identified, was killed by law enforcement at the church.

WLWT Television reported just days ago that the shooter was identified as Guy House, and offered this account of events:

...House is alleged to have shot a Kentucky state trooper near the Blue Grass Airport in Lexington during a traffic stop. This led House to subsequently drive 16 miles to the church, where police say he intended to harm his ex-girlfriend.

However, when House discovered she was not present at the church, he is then said to have shot the pastor of the church, Jerry Gumm, as well as his wife, Beverly Gumm, and their daughter, Christina Combs.

All three are related to House's ex-girlfriend.

Beverly Gumm and Combs both died as a result of their injuries. Meanwhile, Jerry Gumm remains in critical condition from the shooting. Combs' husband, Randy Combs, was also injured.

West Virginia abortion ban upheld by court

A manufacturer of the abortion pill, mifepristone, had filed a lawsuit against West Virginia's pro-life law. A Federal appeals court has refused to strike down the law. The Hill reported:

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit dismissed mifepristone manufacturer GenBioPro’s effort to strike down West Virginia’s near-total abortion ban in a 2-1 decision. The court ruled FDA’s approval of mifepristone did not preempt West Virginia’s law.

The article noted that the manufacturer, GenBioPro, "argued that FDA’s authority to impose regulations on the prescription and distribution of mifepristone superseded state efforts to restrict access to medications. A lower court ruled against the company, which then appealed the decision." The Hill goes on to say:

Circuit Judge J. Harvie Wilkinson wrote that a 2007 federal law “leaves the states free to adopt or diverge from West Virginia’s path” and it “falls well short of expressing a clear intention to displace the states’ historic and sovereign right to protect the health and safety of their citizens.”

The 3 - July 13, 2025

Baylor reverses course, rejects hundreds of thousands of dollars to study LGBT "inclusion"

On Thursday's edition of The Meeting House on Faith Radio, I referenced a news story from The Daily Citizen about a substantial grant that Baylor University had received dealing with LGBT inclusion.  Glenn Stanton of Focus on the Family had written that article, which stated, as an updated version on the website noted:

We explained,

On June 30, Baylor University announced its Center for Church and Community Impact (C3I) in its School of Social Work was awarded a substantial $643,401 grant from the Eula Mae and John Baugh Foundation to help “better understand the disenfranchisement and exclusion of LGBTQIA+ individuals and women within congregations to nurture institutional courage and foster change.”

But, there are new developments, according to Stanton: "Baylor’s Media and Public Relations office also sent Daily Citizen a link to Baylor President Linda A. Livingstone’s 'message to the Baylor family' on the decision to return 'all associated funds to the granting foundation.'" He went on to say:

President Livingstone helpfully notes the funded research project was “for perspectives on human sexuality that are inconsistent with Baylor’s institutional policies, including our Statement on Human Sexuality.”

Livingstone is quoted as saying: “We affirm the biblical understanding of human sexuality as a gift from God, expressed through purity in singleness and fidelity in marriage between a man and a woman.”

But, as Stanton notes, earlier in that letter, Livingstone had said:

We remain committed to providing a loving and caring community for all – including our LGBTQIA+ students – because it is part and parcel of our University’s mission that calls us to educate our students within a caring Christian community.

At The Daily Citizen, Stanton says: "Loving and caring for all students who come to a university to study and grow is critical. No one should ever be mistreated while an institution seeks to hold fast to the biblical norm of human sexuality. Nor should a Christian institution casually adopt the specific language of an ideology that is directly opposed to what a university says it stands for on sexuality and marriage."

Megan Basham of The Daily Wire, in a post on X, said:

It’s a win that @Baylor is returning the LGBTQ grant, but this statement from President
@LindaLlivings is appalling. Nowhere does address LGBTQ behaviors and identities as sin. Instead, it is all an appeal to the accommodation of LGBTQ ideology. 

And nowhere does she address faculty that are openly promoting LGBTQ affirmation in opposition to a Christian worldview. Baylor staff is openly flaunting their rebellion to God‘s Word and she has allowed this. 

Further, in her role as board member of the NCAA, she refused to speak up on behalf of young female athletes who appealed to her to use her position to help keep men out of women’s sports. 

The rot is extensive at Baylor and it begins with Livingstone.

Agreement reached that would change the way that churches engage in political speech

For years, there have been restrictions placed on churches regarding comments on cultural issues and on the positions on candidates on those issues.  These were part of the so-called Johnson Amendment, affecting policies of the Internal Revenue Service.

Liberty Counsel relates: "In a recent court filing, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) has agreed that churches and other houses of worship are not prohibited from engaging in political speech."

The analysis by the Christian legal organization stated:

This was prompted as a result by a lawsuit filed in a U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas by the National Religious Broadcasters, Intercessors for America, along with two Baptist churches in Texas, against Billy Long, in his official capacity as Commissioner of the Internal Revenue Service...

Liberty Counsel also said:

In a joint motion with the plaintiffs to settle the lawsuit, the IRS agreed to view endorsements of political candidates from the pulpit as private matters, not as a form of campaigning. The motion asked the court to bar any presidential administration from hindering the plaintiffs from backing candidates in front of their congregations. The IRS said that if a house of worship endorsed a candidate to its congregants, the agency would view that not as campaigning but as a private matter, like “a family discussion concerning candidates.”

NRB General Counsel Michael Farris stated in a recent e-mail: "The joint filing made with the Justice Department for a consent decree in our constitutional challenge to the Johnson Amendment is not final until reviewed by the judge...," noting, "We cannot make public comment until the judge has made his ruling..." But, NRB was able to include comments from a variety of Christian leaders in that e-mail.

Florida teacher fails in court in attempt to force students and other staff to use "gender" pronouns

As The Christian Post reported: "Public school teachers can no longer demand that staff and students refer to them as the opposite sex, an appeals court has ruled."

In 2023, the state of Florida had passed a law, which stated: "[a]n employee or contractor of a public K-12 educational institution may not provide to a student his or her preferred personal title or pronouns if such preferred personal title or pronouns do not correspond to his or her sex.”  That law was upheld in a 2-1 ruling by the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals; the article noted:

The three-judge panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit ruled 2-1 that Katie Wood, a high school math teacher who is a man but identifies as a woman, could not require the use of feminine pronouns or the honorific “Ms.”

A lower court decision, according to the article, determined "that Wood’s self-declared pronouns were speech from a 'private citizen' rather than a 'government employee.'” The article said that Judge Kevin Newsom, in the majority opinion...

...wrote that “a teacher’s right to speak is not without limits” and that Wood “cannot show, with respect to the expression at issue here, that she was speaking as a private citizen rather than a government employee.”

The 3 - July 6, 2025

One Big, Beautiful Bill contains beautiful protection of life

Last Thursday, for a second time, the U.S. House passed what President Trump had affectionately named the "One Big, Beautiful Bill," after the original version passed by the House had been amended by the Senate.

In addition to the extension of the 2017 tax cuts by the first Trump Administration, Medicaid reform, border enforcement, and defense spending were some of the headline-grabbing aspects of the bill.

But, there was an element that was gratifying to some in the pro-life community - for the first time in history, Congress had removed Planned Parenthood from receiving taxpayer funds. As The Daily Citizen put it:

The bill defunds Planned Parenthood, our nation’s largest abortion seller, of roughly $500 million in taxpayer dollars.

Despite demands from pro-life supporters for years, Congress has continually permitted Planned Parenthood to receive hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars annually in the form of government grants, contracts and Medicaid reimbursements. But no longer.

The abortion giant has warned H.R. 1 could lead to the closure of nearly half of abortion-providing Planned Parenthood centers. Such a result would be a truly monumental win for life.

But there was some disappointment in the pro-life community.  Live Action News spells it out:

The reconciliation bill, which originally defunded Planned Parenthood of Medicaid payments for 10 years when the House first passed it in May, will now defund the abortion giant for just one year due to changes made in the Senate before its passage on July 1.

The piece included comments from Live Action Founder and President Lila Rose, who said in a statement: “For years, Americans have been forced to subsidize the killing of innocent children and the exploitation of vulnerable women. Planned Parenthood is the nation’s largest abortion chain, ending over 400,000 lives annually while masking their business as healthcare. This defunding victory is a crucial step toward ending that injustice,” adding, “But this is only the beginning. Every dollar stripped from the abortion giant is a win for life, but the goal is total and permanent defunding and the closing of every abortion facility’s doors. No taxpayer should ever be complicit in violence. Every mother deserves real support, and every child deserves the chance to live.”

Developments regarding the issue of males participating in female sports: UPenn reverses course, high court announces it will hear case

One of the symbolic individuals regarding the unfairness of males competing in women's sports is a former University of Pennsylvania swimmer named Will Thomas, who identified as a female named, Lia.  The victories that Thomas "won" in his cosplay scheme will now be coming off the board. According to Newsweek: "The University of Pennsylvania has agreed to ban transgender women from its women's sports teams, resolving a federal civil rights investigation centered on former swimmer Lia Thomas."  Just to be clear, when you hear the term, "transgender woman," it actually means a biological male presenting as a woman.  The article continues:

The U.S. Department of Education announced the voluntary agreement Tuesday, stating that Penn violated Title IX by allowing Thomas to compete in women's events during the 2021–2022 season.

As part of the resolution, Penn will reinstate Division I swimming records and titles to athletes displaced by Thomas's victories and issue personalized apology letters to each of them, per the Department of Education. The university must adopt "biology-based" definitions of male and female in athletics and publicly commit to barring "males from competing in female athletic programs." 

Riley Gaines, who has become a leading spokesperson for the integrity of female sports, who actually tied Thomas in a swim meet, but who did not receive the trophy to recognize it, is quoted in the Newsweek article as saying, "This Administration isn't just talking about women's equality, but instead actively defending it. I hope this sends a clear message to educational institutions: you can no longer disregard women's civil rights. And to every female athlete, know this: your dignity, safety, and fairness matter, and our nation's leaders will not stop fighting for them."

Meanwhile, the issue, at last, will be heard by the U.S. Supreme Court.  Alliance Defending Freedom reported: "The U.S. Supreme Court agreed...to hear two cases concerning state laws that protect women’s sports. The states of West Virginia and Idaho, together with attorneys from Alliance Defending Freedom, asked the high court to take the cases." The ADF website stated:

In State of West Virginia v. B.P.J., West Virginia Attorney General JB McCuskey, supported by ADF attorneys who serve as co-counsel and also as counsel to former college soccer player Lainey Armistead, asked the Supreme Court to hear their case after the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit ruled against West Virginia’s law protecting fairness in women’s sports. In Little v. Hecox, Idaho Attorney General Raúl Labrador, also supported by ADF attorneys as co-counsel, is asking the high court to uphold his state’s Fairness in Women’s Sports Act after the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit stopped the law from going into effect.

Eight evangelical Church leaders in Colombia slain

From time to time, we learn about unfortunate occurrences somewhere around the world where Christians experience death and other forms of punishment for the practice of their faith. The Christian Post reported last week:

In an event that has shaken the country, Colombian authorities located on Tuesday a mass grave in a rural area of the municipality of Calamar, department of Guaviare, which contained the bodies of eight Christian religious leaders.

The victims, natives of Arauca, were carrying out humanitarian and spiritual work in that region when they were disappeared.

The article related: "The discovery was made possible by the capture of a guerrilla in May, whose mobile phone contained photographs of the detained leaders and, subsequently, of the crime, which made it possible to locate the grave and proceed with its exhumation."

A statement by the Evangelical Confederation of Colombia said:

"We ask for prayer for peace and consolation to these families; We raise a firm voice of clamor and demand to the authorities so that these crimes do not go unpunished, that progress is made quickly in the investigations and that real guarantees are provided for the protection of the life and integrity of those who exercise spiritual leadership in the most vulnerable regions of the country...

While President Gustavo Petro decried the mass murder, the article said that his government's involvement is insufficient, according to the daughter of one of those losing their lives in this incident. She told the newspaper, SEMANA, that they are calling on the Petro government "to be present and to avoid this type of situation, because two armed groups are disputing the territory and the one that is in the middle is the peasantry and there is no response from the State. There is no protection from the State. In other words, here we are really alone in a war between two armed groups..."