The Taliban has claimed responsibility for the assassination of the long-time minorities activist.

Bhatti, 42, was leaving his home in the morning when an unknown gunman bombarded his vehicle with bullets in broad daylight. He was dead when he arrived at Shifa Hospital in Islamabad. Bhatti is usually accompanied by security guards, but he had told them Wednesday not to travel with him.

“Assassination of Bhatti is a message to all of those who are against Pakistan’s blasphemy laws,” said Ihsanullah Ihsan, a Taliban spokesman, according to CNN.

Bhatti angered extremists by demanding a review of the controversial blasphemy law in light of the case of Asia Bibi – the first woman to be sentenced to death under the blasphemy law.

Just last month, The Christian Post met up with Bhatti in Washington, D.C., for an interview during which he shared that he was receiving death threats for speaking against Pakistan’s blasphemy law. Bhatti had said that he was the No. 1 target of the Taliban after former Punjab Governor Salman Taseer, an opponent of the blasphemy law, was murdered. Taseer, who is a liberal-minded Muslim, had been the Taliban’s No. 1 target until he was assassinated by his own bodyguard on Jan. 4.

“I want to make it clear that I am mindful that in the struggle to protect the religious freedom, the rights of minorities, and to raise the voice against the blasphemy law, I can be assassinated. I can be killed,” Bhatti had told CP in the February interview.

“But I will continue to follow the principles that I believe. I will continue to raise the voice of the voiceless. And I will not feel fear because of these threats because I follow Jesus Christ who has given his own life for us. So as a follower of Christ, my destiny is to speak up for those who cannot speak up for themselves.”

Pakistan’s blasphemy law has come under intense criticism for the ease of which Muslims can abuse it to persecute Christians and other minorities. Accusation is nearly all that is needed for someone to be charged with blasphemy, which is punished by fines, imprisonment, or even death. Even without proper evidence, as in the case of Bibi, someone can be accused of blasphemy and end up on death row.

Bhatti’s death comes just two months after the murder of his friend and colleague Salman Taseer, who was one of the most vocal advocates for the release of Bibi, a Christian mother of five who was accused of blasphemy against the Muslim Prophet Muhammad. Although she has denied speaking ill of the Muslim prophet, she was beaten and has been imprisoned since June 2009. Bibi is still in prison and waiting for a court hearing date for her appeal.

Christians make up only about 1.5 percent of Pakistan’s 185 million population.

In response to Bhatti’s murder, President Asif Ali Zardari’s aide, Farahnaz Ispahani, said, “This is a concerted campaign to slaughter every liberal, progressive and humanist voice in Pakistan,” according to The Associated Press.

“The time has come for the federal government and provincial governments to speak out and to take a strong stand against these murderers to save the very essence of Pakistan.”

Bhatti was the first Christian to be a member of the Pakistani President’s Cabinet

Since a majority of our BCN readers are quite far removed from what is currently happening in Egypt, it may be somewhat difficult to understand why these protests are happening.

It’s a situation that should be covered in prayer, but it’s always better to “pray informed,” so we have linked to a very helpful article in the BBC News that explains what is happening in Egypt; why they are protesting, and what are some of the repercussions for those in other parts of the world. (Photo: Getty/BBC)

Something this article does not address, but is still important for Christians to be praying about, is the plight of the Coptic Christians in Egypt, and how they will be affected by this revolution.

An excerpt is included below; the entire article can be read at the source link provided.

Egyptians in their thousands have taken to the streets to protest against the authoritarian regime of President Hosni Mubarak, in the most serious challenge to his 30-year rule. Here is a look at what is happening in Egypt and why it matters for the rest of the world.

Who are the protesters and what do they want?
The protests began on Tuesday, 25 January, when thousands of Egyptians gathered in Cairo’s central Tahrir Square after an internet campaign—inspired by the uprising in Tunisia—called for a “day of revolt”. The police responded with tear gas and water cannons, but the protesters stood their ground. Since then, they have staged mass street protests on a daily basis in many major cities—including Cairo, Alexandria, Suez and Ismailiya—in defiance of government-imposed curfews. The protests have been largely peaceful, but more than 100 people are reported to have been killed in clashes with police.

Protesters want President Hosni Mubarak, 82, to step down after 30 years in power. They say they are fed up after decades of poverty, repression, rigged elections, corruption, high unemployment and rampant abuse by police. They also want guarantees that—contrary to widespread speculation—President Mubarak’s son, Gamal, will not succeed him.

Source: BBC Staff – BBC News

Yasmine El-Rashidi, writing online ahram.org.eg says that amidst clashes and threats, Copts feel marginalized in the Egyptian elections. El-Rashidi says that from the well-known to the unknown, Muslims had offered their bodies as “human shields” for last Thursday night’s mass, making a pledge to collectively fight the threat of Islamic militants and towards an Egypt free from sectarian strife.

She states that: “We either live together, or we die together,” was the sloganeering genius of Mohamed El-Sawy, a Muslim arts tycoon whose cultural center distributed flyers at churches in Cairo Thursday night, and who has been credited with first floating the “human shield” idea.

The online article says that among those shields were movie stars Adel Imam and Yousra, popular Muslim televangelist and preacher Amr Khaled, the two sons of President Hosni Mubarak, and thousands of citizens who have said they consider the attack one on Egypt as a whole.

“This is not about us and them,” said Dalia Mustafa, a student who attended mass at Virgin Mary Church on Maraashly Street. “We are one. This was an attack on Egypt as a whole, and I am standing with the Copts because the only way things will change in this country is if we come together.”

The story goes on to say that in the days following the brutal attack on Saints Church in Alexandria, which left 21 dead on New Year’ Eve, solidarity between Muslims and Copts has seen an unprecedented peak. (Photo: a Coptic Christian funeral/AP)

It states that millions of Egyptians changed their Facebook profile pictures to the image of a cross within a crescent—the symbol of an “Egypt for All.”

Around the city, banners went up calling for unity, and depicting mosques and churches, crosses and crescents, together as one.

According to the article, the attack has rocked a nation that is no stranger to acts of terror, against all of Muslims, Copts and Jews.

In January of last year, on the eve of Coptic Christmas, a drive-by shooting in the southern town of Nag Hammadi killed eight Copts as they were leaving Church following mass. In 2004 and 2005, bombings in the Red Sea resorts of Taba and Sharm El-Sheikh claimed over 100 lives, and in the late 90′s, Islamic militants executed a series of bombings and massacres that left dozens dead.

El-Rashidi writes: “This attack though comes after a series of more recent incidents that have left Egyptians feeling left out in the cold by a government meant to protect them.”

She reports that last summer, 28-year-old businessman Khaled Said was beaten to death by police, also in Alexandria, causing a local and international uproar. Around his death, there have been numerous other reports of police brutality, random arrests and torture.

El-Rashidi goes on to write: “Last year was also witness to a ruthless parliamentary election process in which the government’s security apparatus and thugs seemed to spiral out of control. The result, aside from injuries and deaths, was a sweeping win by the ruling party thanks to its own carefully-orchestrated campaign that included vote-rigging, corruption and widespread violence.

“The opposition was essentially annihilated. And just days before the elections, Copts—who make up 10 percent of the population—were once again the subject of persecution, when a government moratorium on construction of a Christian community center resulted in clashes between police and protestors. Two people were left dead and over 100 were detained, facing sentences of up to life in jail.”

She states: “The economic woes of a country that favors the rich have only exacerbated the frustration of a population of 80 million whose majority struggle each day to survive. Accounts of thefts, drugs, and violence have surged in recent years, and the chorus of voices of discontent has continued to grow.”

El-Rashidi concludes: “The terror attack that struck the country on New Year’s Eve is in many ways a final straw—a breaking point, not just for the Coptic community, but for Muslims as well, who too feel marginalized, oppressed, and overlooked by a government that fails to address their needs.

“On this Coptic Christmas eve, the solidarity was not just one of religion, but of a desperate and collective plea for a better life and a government with accountability.”

Source: ASSIST News

Note: The following is the first chapter of Abby Johnson’s forthcoming book. To find out more about the book, which will be released January 11, click here.

January 10, 2011 (LifeSiteNews.com) – CHERYL POKED HER HEAD INTO MY OFFICE. “Abby, they need an extra person back in the exam room. Are you free?”

I looked up from my paperwork, surprised. “Sure.”

Though I’d been with Planned Parenthood for eight years, I had never been called into the exam room to help the medical team during an abortion, and I had no idea why I was needed now. Nurse-practitioners were the ones who assisted in abortions, not the other clinic staff. As director of this clinic in Bryan, Texas, I was able to fill in for any position in a pinch, except, of course, for doctors or nurses performing medical procedures. I had, on a few occasions, agreed at a patient’s request to stay with her and even hold her hand during the procedure, but only when I’d been the counselor who’d worked with her during intake and counseling. That was not the case today. So why did they need me?

Today’s visiting abortionist had been here at the Bryan clinic only two or three times before. He had a private abortion practice about 100 miles away. When I’d talked with him about the job several weeks before, he had explained that at his own facility he did only ultrasound-guided abortions — the abortion procedure with the least risk of complications for the woman. Because this method allows the doctor to see exactly what is going on inside the uterus, there is less chance of perforating the uterine wall, one of the risks of abortion. I respected that about him. The more that could be done to keep women safe and healthy, the better, as far as I was concerned. However, I’d explained to him that this practice wasn’t the protocol at our clinic. He understood and said he’d follow our typical procedures, though we agreed he’d be free to use ultrasound if he felt a particular situation warranted it.

To my knowledge, we’d never done ultrasound-guided abortions at our facility. We did abortions only every other Saturday, and the assigned goal from our Planned Parenthood affiliate was to perform 25 to 35 procedures on those days. We liked to wrap them up by around 2 p.m. Our typical procedure took about 10 minutes, but an ultrasound added about five minutes, and when you’re trying to schedule up to 35 abortions in a day, those extra minutes add up.

I felt a moment’s reluctance outside the exam room. I never liked entering this room during an abortion procedure — never welcomed what happened behind this door. But since we all had to be ready at any time to pitch in and get the job done, I pushed the door open and stepped in.

The patient was already sedated, still conscious but groggy, the doctor’s brilliant light beaming down on her. She was in position, the instruments were laid out neatly on the tray next to the doctor, and the nurse-practitioner was positioning the ultrasound machine next to the operating table.

“I’m going to perform an ultrasound-guided abortion on this patient. I need you to hold the ultrasound probe,” the doctor explained.

As I took the ultrasound probe in hand and adjusted the settings on the machine, I argued with myself, I don’t want to be here. I don’t want to take part in an abortion. No, wrong attitude — I needed to psych myself up for this task. I took a deep breath and tried to tune in to the music from the radio playing softly in the background. It’s a good learning experience — I’ve never seen an ultrasound-guided abortion before, I told myself. Maybe this will help me when I counsel women. I’ll learn firsthand about this safer procedure. Besides, it will be over in just a few minutes.

I could not have imagined how the next 10 minutes would shake the foundation of my values and change the course of my life.

I had occasionally performed diagnostic ultrasounds for clients before. It was one of the services we offered to confirm pregnancies and estimate how far along they were. The familiarity of preparing for an ultrasound soothed my uneasiness at being in this room. I applied the lubricant to the patient’s belly, then maneuvered the ultrasound probe until her uterus was displayed on the screen and adjusted the probe’s position to capture the image of the fetus.

I was expecting to see what I had seen in past ultrasounds. Usually, depending on how far along the pregnancy was and how the fetus was turned, I’d first see a leg, or the head, or some partial image of the torso, and would need to maneuver a bit to get the best possible image. But this time, the image was complete. I could see the entire, perfect profile of a baby.

It looks just like Grace at 12 weeks, I thought, surprised, remembering my very first peek at my daughter, three years before, snuggled securely inside my womb. The image now before me looked the same, only clearer, sharper. The detail startled me. I could clearly see the profile of the head, both arms, legs, and even tiny fingers and toes. Perfect.

And just that quickly, the flutter of the warm memory of Grace was replaced with a surge of anxiety. What am I about to see? My stomach tightened. I don’t want to watch what is about to happen.

I suppose that sounds odd coming from a professional who’d been running a Planned Parenthood clinic for two years, counseling women in crisis, scheduling abortions, reviewing the clinic’s monthly budget reports, hiring and training staff. But odd or not, the simple fact is, I had never been interested in promoting abortion. I’d come to Planned Parenthood eight years before, believing that its purpose was primarily to prevent unwanted pregnancies, thereby reducing the number of abortions. That had certainly been my goal. And I believed that Planned Parenthood saved lives — the lives of women who, without the services provided by this organization, might resort to some back-alley butcher. All of this sped through my mind as I carefully held the probe in place.

“Thirteen weeks,” I heard the nurse say after taking measurements to determine the fetus’s age.

“Okay,” the doctor said, looking at me, “just hold the probe in place during the procedure so I can see what I’m doing.”

The cool air of the exam room left me feeling chilled. My eyes still glued to the image of this perfectly formed baby, I watched as a new image entered the video screen. The cannula — a strawshaped instrument attached to the end of the suction tube — had been inserted into the uterus and was nearing the baby’s side. It looked like an invader on the screen, out of place. Wrong. It just looked wrong.

My heart sped up. Time slowed. I didn’t want to look, but I didn’t want to stop looking either. I couldn’t not watch. I was horrified, but fascinated at the same time, like a gawker slowing as he drives past some horrific automobile wreck — not wanting to see a mangled body, but looking all the same.

My eyes flew to the patient’s face; tears flowed from the corners of her eyes. I could see she was in pain. The nurse dabbed the woman’s face with a tissue.

“Just breathe,” the nurse gently coached her. “Breathe.”

“It’s almost over,” I whispered. I wanted to stay focused on her, but my eyes shot back to the image on the screen.

At first, the baby didn’t seem aware of the cannula. It gently probed the baby’s side, and for a quick second I felt relief. Of course, I thought. The fetus doesn’t feel pain. I had reassured countless women of this as I’d been taught by Planned Parenthood. The fetal tissue feels nothing as it is removed. Get a grip, Abby. This is a simple, quick medical procedure. My head was working hard to control my responses, but I couldn’t shake an inner disquiet that was quickly mounting to horror as I watched the screen.

The next movement was the sudden jerk of a tiny foot as the baby started kicking, as if it were trying to move away from the probing invader. As the cannula pressed its side, the baby began struggling to turn and twist away. It seemed clear to me that it could feel the cannula, and it did not like what it was feeling. And then the doctor’s voice broke through, startling me.

“Beam me up, Scotty,” he said lightheartedly to the nurse. He was telling her to turn on the suction — in an abortion the suction isn’t turned on until the doctor feels he has the cannula in exactly the right place.

I had a sudden urge to yell, “Stop!” To shake the woman and say, “Look at what is happening to your baby! Wake up! Hurry! Stop them!”

But even as I thought those words, I looked at my own hand holding the probe. I was one of “them” performing this act. My eyes shot back to the screen again. The cannula was already being rotated by the doctor, and now I could see the tiny body violently twisting with it. For the briefest moment the baby looked as if it were being wrung like a dishcloth, twirled and squeezed. And then it crumpled and began disappearing into the cannula before my eyes. The last thing I saw was the tiny, perfectly formed backbone sucked into the tube, and then it was gone. And the uterus was empty. Totally empty.

I was frozen in disbelief. Without realizing it, I let go of the probe. It slipped off the patient’s tummy and slid onto her leg. I could feel my heart pounding — pounding so hard my neck throbbed. I tried to get a deep breath but couldn’t seem to breathe in or out. I still stared at the screen, even though it was black now because I’d lost the image. But nothing was registering to me. I felt too stunned and shaken to move. I was aware of the doctor and nurse casually chatting as they worked, but it sounded distant, like vague background noise, hard to hear over the pounding of my own blood in my ears.

The image of the tiny body, mangled and sucked away, was replaying in my mind, and with it the image of Grace’s first ultrasound — how she’d been about the same size. And I could hear in my memory one of the many arguments I’d had with my husband, Doug, about abortion.

“When you were pregnant with Grace, it wasn’t a fetus; it was a baby,” Doug had said. And now it hit me like a lightning bolt: He was right! What was in this woman’s womb just a moment ago was alive. It wasn’t just tissue, just cells. It was a human baby. And it was fighting for its life! A battle it lost in the blink of an eye. What I have told people for years, what I’ve believed and taught and defended, is a lie.

Suddenly I felt the eyes of the doctor and nurse on me. It shook me out of my thoughts. I noticed the probe lying on the woman’s leg and fumbled to get it back into place. But my hands were shaking now.

“Abby, are you OK?” the doctor asked. The nurse’s eyes searched my face with concern.

“Yeah, I’m OK.” I still didn’t have the probe correctly positioned, and now I was worried because the doctor couldn’t see inside the uterus. My right hand held the probe, and my left hand rested gingerly on the woman’s warm belly. I glanced at her face — more tears and a grimace of pain. I moved the probe until I’d recaptured the image of her now-empty uterus. My eyes traveled back to my hands. I looked at them as if they weren’t even my own.

How much damage have these hands done over the past eight years? How many lives have been taken because of them? Not just because of my hands, but because of my words. What if I’d known the truth, and what if I’d told all those women?

What if?

I had believed a lie! I had blindly promoted the “company line” for so long. Why? Why hadn’t I searched out the truth for myself? Why had I closed my ears to the arguments I’d heard? Oh, dear God, what had I done?

My hand was still on the patient’s belly, and I had the sense that I had just taken something away from her with that hand. I’d robbed her. And my hand started to hurt — I felt an actual physical pain. And right there, standing beside the table, my hand on the weeping woman’s belly, this thought came from deep within me:

Never again! Never again.

I went into autopilot. As the nurse cleaned up the woman, I put away the ultrasound machine, then gently roused the patient, who was limp and groggy. I helped her sit up, coaxed her into a wheelchair, and took her to the recovery room. I tucked a light blanket around her. Like so many patients I’d seen before, she continued to cry, in obvious emotional and physical pain. I did my best to make her more comfortable.

Ten minutes, maybe 15 at most, had passed since Cheryl had asked me to go help in the exam room. And in those few minutes, everything had changed. Drastically. The image of that tiny baby twisting and struggling kept replaying in my mind. And the patient. I felt so guilty. I’d taken something precious from her, and she didn’t even know it.

How had it come to this? How had I let this happen? I had invested myself, my heart, my career in Planned Parenthood because I cared about women in crisis. And now I faced a crisis of my own.

Looking back now on that late September day of 2009, I realize how wise God is for not revealing our future to us. Had I known then the firestorm I was about to endure, I might not have had the courage to move forward. As it was, since I didn’t know, I wasn’t yet looking for courage. I was, however, looking to understand how I found myself in this place — living a lie, spreading a lie, and hurting the very women I so wanted to help.

And I desperately needed to know what to do next.

This is my story.

(Chile)—CBN News reports that the majority of the miners rescued from a Chilean mine have given evidence of deep spirituality and faith in God. They have all agreed, the report notes, that it was their faith that kept them safe and sound during those 69 days in the depths of the earth.

According to the report each miner emerged from the rescue capsule wearing a shirt that said “Thank you Lord” on the front. On the back of their shirts were the words, “To Him be the glory and honor,” from Psalm 95:4, and on one sleeve was the name “Jesus.” (Photo: BBC News)

Mario Sepúlveda, the second worker who came out of the capsule, said: “God and the devil were fighting over me and God won. I always knew they would get me out. I always had faith in the professionals here in Chile and in the Great Creator.”

The fourth miner to surface, Carlos Mamani, knelt down as soon as he came out of the capsule and pointed to Heaven, giving thanks to God, as did Omar Reygadas, who also held a Bible in his hands and wore a helmet with the phrase “God Lives” written on it.

Another report notes that while still trapped in the mine, 19-year-old Jimmy Sanchez had written a letter that was sent up to the surface saying, “There are actually 34 of us, because God has never left us down here.”

Source: Staff – CBN

A report from proceedings at the UN’s Human Rights Council (HRC) in Geneva reveals that 11 countries called for Nicarague to legalize abortion. Delegate Carlos Robelo, however, flatly refused to bow under pressure.

Instead, reports Pat Buckley, the UN consultant for the UK-based Society for the Protection of Unborn Children (SPUC), Robelo told the HRC that Nicaragua would not reverse its pro-life legislation to allow “therapeutic abortions” and maintained that the law as it stands expresses the will of the country’s people.

The proceedings were part of the HRC’s Universal Periodic Review. Under that review each of the 192 UN member states is assessed every 4 years on how they live up to their commitments under international treaties and conventions.

Nicaragua’s review was finalized on June 9th. The report, issued in March, records that the following countries called for Nicarague to legalize abortion: the Netherlands, Norway, Czech Republic, Mexico, UK, Belgium, France, Finland, Sweden, Germany, and Slovenia.

Previous news reports have indicated that other countries, including the United States and Canada, have also pressured Nicaragua on the issue. Additionally, the HRC report indicates that India suggested exceptions for “therapeutic abortion” but did not make specific recommendations.

The recommendations in the report vary, but tend to call for Nicaragua to open its laws to “therapeutic abortion” or to abortion in cases involving rape or incest. Finland’s recommendation urges Nicaragua to “Revise legislation regarding the sexual and reproductive rights of women, including the abolition of the total ban on abortion, and ensure their access to services necessary for their enjoyment of the highest attainable standard of health.”

Buckley called the pressure “appalling,” and denounced the countries for interfering with Nicaragua’s sovereignty. These countries “give the impression that there is an international right to abortion, which of course there isn’t,” he said. “There is no internationally-agreed right to abortion. It has never been accepted here at the UN and the fact that countries place pressure on a country with a pro-life constitution is appalling.”

Since Nicaragua tightened its abortion law in 2006, it has faced intense pressure from international pro-abortion groups and foreign governments. The Swedish government has cut off development aid to the country over the law, and numerous countries – including Canada, Finland, and the Netherlands – have threatened similar actions.

Nicaragua’s previous law had allowed unborn children to be killed if 3 doctors deemed the mother’s life or health to be at risk, or if the child was conceived in rape. The new law was instituted in response to demands from the strongly Catholic populace. The month before the law passed, an estimated 200,000 citizens marched on the country’s capital demanding better protections for the unborn.

In 2007, the president of the Nicaraguan Medical Association rebuked claims that the law endangers women, noting that maternal deaths had declined in the year since the new law was passed.

Amnesty International, in particular, has led a campaign against the law, claiming that the law even prevents procedures that would save the mother’s life. But government leaders have insisted that the law does not preclude giving a pregnant mother life-saving treatment that would also result in the death of her child.

Responding Thursday to Nicaragua’s rejection of the HRC recommendations, Amnesty International (AI) pledged to continue its battle against the pro-life law, which they labelled as dangerous to women and an affront to women’s “rights.”

“The refusal to support these recommendations shows contempt for its [Nicaragua’s] obligations under UN treaties to protect women and girls from human rights violations,” claimed Guadalupe Marengo, Deputy Director for AI’s Americas programme. “It also demonstrates a chilling indifference to women and girls in their country.”

But Buckley called Amnesty International’s claims “absolute nonsense.” “Any effort to protect the life of the baby would also protect the life of the mother,” he insisted. “Of course a woman has a right to every possible treatment to protect her life, but that should never ever be at the expense of a direct attack on the life of the baby.”

Sagan’s religion included the belief that the human race is nothing special. Given the incomprehensible vastness of the universe and the impersonality of it all, how could humanity possibly be important? Sagan concluded that our race is not significant at all. In December 1996, less than three weeks before Sagan died, he was interviewed by Ted Koppel on “Nightline.” Sagan knew he was dying, and Koppel asked him, “Dr. Sagan, do you have any pearls of wisdom that you would like to give to the human race?”

Sagan replied,

We live on a hunk of rock and metal that circles a humdrum star that is one of 400 billion other stars that make up the Milky Way Galaxy, which is one of billions of other galaxies, which make up a universe, which may be one of a very large number—perhaps an infinite number—of other universes. That is a perspective on human life and our culture that is well worth pondering. (ABC News Nightline, December 4, 1996)

In a book published posthumously, Sagan wrote, “Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity, in all this vastness, there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves” (Pale Blue Dot, New York: Random House, 1994, p. 9).

Although Sagan resolutely tried to maintain a semblance of optimism to the bitter end, his religion led where all naturalism inevitably leads: to a sense of utter insignificance and despair. According to his world-view, humanity occupies a tiny outpost—a pale blue speck in a vast sea of galaxies. As far as we know, we are unnoticed by the rest of the universe, accountable to no one, and petty and irrelevant in a cosmos so expansive. It is fatuous to talk of outside help or redemption for the human race. No help is forthcoming. It would be nice if we somehow managed to solve some of our problems, but whether we do or not will ultimately be a forgotten bit of cosmic trivia. That, said Sagan, is a perspective well worth pondering.

All of this underscores the spiritual barrenness of naturalism. The naturalist’s religion erases all moral and ethical accountability, and it ultimately abandons all hope for humanity. If the impersonal cosmos is all there is, all there ever was, and all there ever will be, then morality is ultimately moot. If there is no personal Creator to whom humanity is accountable and the survival of the fittest is the governing law of the universe, all the moral principles that normally regulate the human conscience are ultimately groundless—and possibly even deleterious to the survival of our species.

Indeed, the rise of naturalism has meant moral catastrophe for modern society. The most damaging ideologies of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries were all rooted in Darwinism. One of Darwin’s earliest champions, Thomas Huxley, gave a lecture in 1893 in which he argued that evolution and ethics are incompatible. He wrote that “the practice of that which is ethically best—what we call goodness or virtue—involves a course of conduct which, in all respects, is opposed to that which leads to success in the cosmic struggle for existence” (“Evolution and Ethics,” The Romanes Lecture, 1893).

[Note: Huxley nonetheless went on to try to justify ethics as a positive result of humanity's higher rational functions, and he called upon his audience neither to imitate "the cosmic process" nor to run away from it, but rather to combat it—ostensibly by maintaining some semblance of morality and ethics. But what he could not do—what he and other philosophers of his era did not even bother attempting to do—was offer any justification for assuming the validity of morality and ethics per se on purely naturalistic principles. Huxley and his fellow naturalists could offer no moral compass other than their own personal preferences, and predictably, their philosophies all opened the door wide for complete moral subjectivity and ultimately amorality.]

Philosophers who incorporated Darwin’s ideas were quick to see Huxley’s point, conceiving new philosophies that set the stage for the amorality and genocide that characterized so much of the twentieth century.

Karl Marx, for example, self-consciously followed Darwin in the devising of his economic and social theories. He inscribed a copy of his book Das Kapital to Darwin, “from a devoted admirer.” He referred to Darwin’s The Origin of Species as “the book which contains the basis in natural history for our view” (Stephen Jay Gould, Ever Since Darwin, New York: Norton, 1977, p. 26).

Herbert Spencer’s philosophy of “Social Darwinism” applied the doctrines of evolution and the survival of the fittest to human societies. Spencer argued that if nature itself has determined that the strong survive and the weak perish, this rule should govern society as well. Racial and class distinctions simply reflect nature’s way. There is therefore no transcendent moral reason to be sympathetic to the struggle of the disadvantaged classes. It is, after all, part of the natural evolutionary process—and society would actually be improved by recognizing the superiority of the dominant classes and encouraging their ascendancy. The racialism of writers such as Ernst Haeckel (who believed that the African races were incapable of culture or higher mental development) was also rooted in Darwinism.

Friedrich Nietzsche’s whole philosophy was based on the doctrine of evolution. Nietzsche was bitterly hostile to religion, and particularly Christianity. Christian morality embodied the essence of everything Nietzsche hated; he believed Christ’s teaching glorified human weakness and was detrimental to the development of the human race. He scoffed at Christian moral values such as humility, mercy, modesty, meekness, compassion for the powerless, and service to one another. He believed such ideals had bred weakness in society. Nietzsche saw two types of people—the master-class, an enlightened, dominant minority; and the “herd,” sheeplike followers who were easily led. And he concluded that the only hope for humanity would be when the master-class evolved into a race of Übermenschen (supermen), unencumbered by religious or social mores, who would take power and bring humanity to the next stage of its evolution.

It’s not surprising that Nietzsche’s philosophy laid the foundation for the Nazi movement in Germany. What is surprising is that at the dawn of the twenty-first century, Nietzsche’s reputation has been rehabilitated by philosophical spin-doctors and his writings are once again trendy in the academic world. Indeed, his philosophy—or something very nearly like it—is what naturalism must inevitably return to.

All of these philosophies are based on notions that are diametrically opposed to a biblical view of the nature of man, because they all start by embracing a Darwinian view of the origin of humanity. They are rooted in anti-Christian theories about human origins and the origin of the cosmos, and therefore it is no wonder that they stand in opposition to biblical principles at every level.

The simple fact of the matter is that all the philosophical fruits of Darwinism have been negative, ignoble, and destructive to the very fabric of society. Not one of the major twentieth-century revolutions led by post-Darwinian philosophies ever improved or ennobled any society. Instead, the chief social and political legacy of Darwinian thought is a full spectrum of evil tyranny with Marx-inspired communism at one extreme and Nietzsche-inspired fascism at the other. And the moral catastrophe that has disfigured modern Western society is also directly traceable to Darwinism and the rejection of the early chapters of Genesis.

At this moment in history, even though most of modern society is already fully committed to an evolutionary and naturalistic world view, our society still benefits from the collective memory of a biblical worldview. People in general still believe human life is special. They still hold remnants of biblical morality, such as the notion that love is the greatest virtue (1 Corinthians 13:13); service to one another is better than fighting for personal dominion (Matthew 20:25-27); and humility and submission are superior to arrogance and rebellion (1 Peter 5:5).

But to whatever degree secular society still holds those virtues in esteem, it does so entirely without any philosophical foundation. Having already rejected the God revealed in Scripture and embraced instead pure naturalistic materialism, the modern mind has no grounds whatsoever for holding to any ethical standard; no reason whatsoever for esteeming “virtue” over “vice”; and no justification whatsoever for regarding human life as more valuable than any other form of life. Modern society has already abandoned its moral foundation.