YouVersion Bible App goes viral

The YouVersion Bible app has completed exceeded all expectations as it cruised past the 20 million downloads mark earlier this month.

The free Bible app has jumped by 5 million since February alone, with around one new person downloading the app every 1.1 seconds in April alone.

The creators of YouVersion, the team at Lifechurch.tv in Edmond, Okla., have been thrilled with the results.

"People are sharing it with each other on Facebook and Twitter. It's really created a viral effect," said Bobby Gruenewald, who heads the team behind YouVersion at Lifechurch.tv.

"The pace has been increasing and picking up. We are really excited because we see more people engaging in the Bible."

In an interview with The Christian Post, Gruenewald affirmed his belief that the YouVersion Bible app is sparking a "Bible-engagement revolution."

"For the last several decades, there has been a problem with scripture engagement. People say they want to read the Bible but fewer and fewer people actually do read it once a month or never at all," he explained.

“But today, people have technology with them almost at all times. Since people have mobile devices with them from morning until evening, the YouVersion Bible app is also with them throughout the day and gives them more chances to read the Bible, said Gruenewald.

"We actually begin reading the Bible more than ever before and the main variable is that it's always with us at all times," said the Innovation Leader at LifeChurch.tv.

YouVersion is compatible with most mobile phone devices, and has 113 translation versions and 41 languages available. Bible translations include the updated NIV, Kings James Version, and English Standard Version.

Gruenewald added that 25 percent of new users come with phones set to languages other than English. Downloads for Chinese, Korean, Spanish versions are among the fastest growing languages.

"One of our biggest focuses right now is broadening the geographic reach of the Bible app. The way we are doing that is we are adding modern Bible translations," said Gruenwald.

Gruenewald also testified that the success of the Bible app had strengthened his personal faith.

"Our faith as to what's possible has really increased as we've seen what's God done so far."

"If you asked me three years ago when we were getting started if it's possible to get 20 million people to install this on their phones, we would have probably thought, possible maybe but not probable."

"What we're seeing today: God has really used it," he added. "We're asking the question and believing it's possible. We can see 100 million, 500 million people using their phones to engage in God's word each day."

A majority of Americans believe it's Biblically wrong to celebrate Bin Laden’s death

In a study undertaken by the Public Religion Research Institute/Religion News Service, it has been found that six out of ten Americans believe that based upon Scripture, people should not celebrate the death of al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden.

Furthermore, 62 percent of Americans completely or mostly agree with the statement that it is “immoral to celebrate the death of another human being, no matter how bad that person was.”

The survey was conducted in the week after a team of Navy SEALs had assassinated Bin Laden at the orders of U.S. President Barack Obama. After the announcement of Bin Laden’s death, a number of Americans took to the streets in celebration over the passing of the man who was behind the devastating 9-11 attacks on the Twin Towers in New York.

The survey revealed that that 66 percent of white evangelical Protestants – a higher proportion than Catholics (59 percent) and white mainline Protestants (53 percent) felt that the rejoicing was wrong.

The study further found that a large majority of Americans (82 percent) believe that Bin Laden distorted the teachings of Islam, while nearly two-thirds (65 percent) think that he will be eternally punished in hell for his sins.

Fifty day campaign for 50,000 Twitter users to tweet Lord's Prayer

GDOP London are attempting to recruit 50,000 followers on Twitter to tweet the Lord’s Prayer as part of their 50 day campaign leading up to the Global Day of Prayer on June 12.

"We want to get people of all ages and backgrounds praying the Lord 's Prayer wherever they are at 12 o'clock every day or anytime of the day," said GDOP London convener Jonathan Oloyede.

"We want to be praying 'Lord let your kingdom come and thy will be done over this whole nation'. So join the campaign as we countdown 50 days from Easter weekend to Pentecost weekend,” he added.

"Email, text, phone your friends the link #GDOPLondon via our twitter viral initiative and let's every one of us reach the goal if we can of 50,000 people on the Twitter campaign praying the Lord's prayer."

The project coordinator Daniel Eagle said he was eager to creatively use the power of social networking to mobilise prayer.

"As the world becomes more and more interconnected as a global village it is imperative that we use all the tools at our disposal to promote the cause for which GDOP London exists.

"The Convener Jonathan Oloyede mentioned a few years back that he saw in a sense a canopy of prayer and praise enveloping London and all the British Isles as different pockets of fire came together to pray.

"Social media is the next wave for global communication and interaction. GDOP London is using social media to generate prayer at the centre of this evolving communication trend. We are setting an example rather than letting those with destructive agendas set the tone for the UK community through social media."

Eagle mentioned he was hugely encouraged by the response the campaign has so far received.

"The Twitter following is very diversified and still increasing. We have quite a few individuals who have commended our efforts and we also have two individuals who have taken offense at our prayer tweeting. We try to wake London up with a prayer and good word. We also share encouraging prayer tweets when the people go to sleep at night."

Oloyede backed this up by saying he was also a firm proponent of the effectiveness of using social media.

"It works, as we know from the Obama campaign, using social media with lots of people at grassroots level mobilized. It is a very easy, cost effective way of connecting communication.

"Send a YouTube, Twitter or Facebook link to all your friends and this is one of the easier ways of getting people aware of what's going on. If you are able to text everyone on your contact list or send all your friends on your Facebook page, what is happening, we will have hundreds of thousands of people aware of this campaign. You are a vital link, please do not be the weakest link."

Oloyede added that he hoped the campaign, which concludes on Pentecost Sunday June 12, will provide impetus for the GDOP prayer event taking place at Wembley stadium later this year.

"This is building towards a cascading of prayer rising up from the whole of the British Isles, when we gather at Wembley stadium on Saturday September 17.

"It's building towards the kingdom of God breaking out in every one of our villages, towns and cities in this nation.

"Many people don't know about Jesus or how to pray and are lost and we need to reach them if we believe in the message of the Gospel."

Study finds that over 1,100 rapes occur daily in DRC

According to a study published in the American Journal of Public Health on Tuesday, over 1,100 women are raped every day in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), making sexual violence against women 26 times more common than previously estimated.

Over 400,000 women and girls between the ages of 15 to 49 were raped in the vast, war-ravaged country in central Africa during a 12-month period in 2006 and 2007.

"Our results confirm that previous estimates of rape and sexual violence are severe underestimates of the true prevalence of sexual violence occurring in the DRC," stated Amber Peterman, lead author of the study.

"Even these new, much higher figures still represent a conservative estimate of the true prevalence of sexual violence because of chronic underreporting due to stigma, shame, perceived impunity, and exclusion of younger and older age groups as well as men," she added.

The study, which worked from data gathered in 2007, did not record sexual violence among girls younger than 15 or women older than 49 years, and also did not include at all sexual violence among boys and men.

"Although the burden of sexual violence among these groups is uncertain, a review of the records of 4,133 women attending Panzi Hospital in Sud Kivu showed that six percent were younger than 16 years and 10 percent were older than 65 years," confirmed the study.

"In addition, Human Rights Watch reported that sexual violence in 2009 doubled in comparison with 2008. If this assessment is accurate, then the current prevalence of sexual violence is likely to be even higher than our estimates suggest."

In response to the horrific findings of this study, Michael VanRooyen, the director of the Harvard Humanitarian Initiative said that "rape in the DRC has metastasized amid a climate of impunity, and has emerged as one of the great human crises of our time."

Further clashes in Egypt between Muslims and Christians

Tensions that have been simmering between Christians and Muslims for weeks in Egypt, came to a boiling point over the weekend in a series of deadly clashes.

Well over 180 people were left injured, 2 church buildings were set alight and 12 people were killed after violence broke out over rumours that a church was holding a Christian woman against her will because she wanted to convert to Islam and marry a Muslim man.

The woman in question has since appeared on TV to dismiss the rumours as unfounded.

However, this did not stop Christians and Muslims hurling firebombs and stones at one another in the streets after hundreds of Salafist Muslims set fire to the Coptic Saint Mena Church while people were still inside.

The nearby Virgin Mary Church was also set on fire before riot police brought the situation under control. Church leaders declared three days of mourning for their dead.

There were further clashes later on Sunday after Christians protested outside of the state television building in central Cairo, urging the resignation of Egypt’s top military leader, Field Marshal Mohamed Hussein Tantawi, and accusing the army of failing to protect them.

The police arrested 190 people during the course of the violence to stand trial in the Supreme Military Court as a “deterrent to all those who think of toying with the potential of this nation.”

How 'There Be Dragons' reconnected one actor to his faith

Actor Wes Bentley is best known for a minor role in “American Beauty” where as a would-be director he spent time filming a bag blowing in the wind. Now it seems he has finally landed a role that will surely bring further fame as he plays one of the leads in the newly released “There Be Dragons,” which is based on the life of Spanish St. Josemaria Escriva, who founded the controversial Catholic order Opus Dei during the Spanish Civil War.

While Bentley will have been hoping the role would bring him further recognition as an actor, little did he realise that it would also reconnect him to his childhood faith and help him in facing his personal “dragons."

Bentley was raised as a pastor’s child, but said this brought him more questions than answers.

“Yes, both my parents were preachers (Methodist), including my brother. I think when you are raised in a church and literally raised in a church building you are surrounded by spirituality and also religion, leaving a kid with a lot of challenges and questions,” he said in an interview with The Christian Post.

The actor said that the danger of growing up in an intensely spiritual environment led him to incorrectly assume he had his own faith, when he actually had not worked deeply enough through some of life’s tougher issues.

“I always assumed I had a relationship with God, I always assumed I had that wrapped up so I didn’t have to consider that that might not be the case and might also be what made my life more difficult.”

Bentley believes these assumptions left him unable to cope with the struggles of Hollywood and his rise to fame.

“In the assumption I just pushed it away and I had to really consider where I was spiritually. I feel like I inherited the faith. And I think a lot of PKs go through that.”

This resulted in long years of drug and alcohol addiction that took a huge toll on him personally, but in his role as Manolo in “There Be Dragons” the actor found his life turned around once more.

“I was getting dressed up and getting make-up for older Manolo. When I was preparing for the scene where I am telling my son all the terrible things I had done and asking him to pray for me and forgive me and I looked at the mirror and I had a really powerful moment and realized, I don’t want to be in my deathbed doing this and I needed to make amends to people in my life that loved me and loved them,” he admitted.

“I had things to tell them, things that were embarrassing that made me feel like not like a human being, and in that moment I realized, I want to do this, I want to do this now while I’m young. “

After going through this process, Bentley found that he had somehow reconnected with God, “I was so excited to realize what was wrong, to admit to that because it just solved all these problems for me immediately.”

Bentley also hopes that in sharing his own dark truths, he might remind other strugglers that there is a way of out from “living in such a dark place.”

“I don’t feel ashamed to tell others. I thought that by talking about it, it would help others who might’ve been where I was a little while before me. It also helped remind [me] of that and also keep away from it.”

“There Be Dragons,” tells the true story of two friends - Manolo and Josemaría (Charlie Cox) - whose relationship was deeply affected by the Spanish Civil War. While Manolo became a fascist spy, Josemaría chose a different path and decided to become a priest. The war brought out the worst in people (and the friends) and bred anger, death, betrayal and jealousy, yet even in the midst of this darkness it also developed faith, love, compassion and forgiveness.

Bishop urges West to protect Christian minorities more

In an article he wrote for Standpoint magazine, Bishop Michael Nazir-Ali said that while the United Nations had taken the necessary steps to protect people in Libya from attacks by their own government, he wondered why the United Nations or the West was “unable to tackle the widespread and growing persecution of Christians?”

The Bishop was particularly worried about countries like Iraq, Pakistan and Afghanistan, where Christian communities are regularly harassed by religious extremists.

“In the case of Iraq, why is there so much resistance to a declaration that Christians, Mandaeans, Yazidis and other minorities need to be protected and that, where necessary, their safety in certain zones will be guaranteed by the international community?” he asked.

Bishop Nazir-Ali was ordained in Pakistan but is now based in England, and he insisted in his article that international involvement would give Christians in countries like Iraq a sense of greater security concerning their future and would prevent them from fleeing.

“If the continued presence of these ancient communities is to be safeguarded, the international community needs to act now.”

The Bishop also said Pakistan present a peculiar problem in this regard because with their controversial blasphemy law they have legally enshrined discrimination. Nazir-Ali believes this law is an example of the “blatant intolerance” of religious minorities, and as a result the West should really rethink their relationship with Pakistan to properly address extremism.

“Pakistan is the recipient of massive aid from Western countries. This is to assist with basic services and to prevent the spread of extremism. But why should it not be targeted, first and foremost, at those areas which are most susceptible to extremist influence?”

The Bishop made suggestions such as removing hate speech in textbooks, reforming the education system, strengthening civil society and the role of women and non-Muslims, and fostering interfaith dialogue.

“Is there any reason why such aid cannot be linked with Pakistan’s performance, not only in how it deals with its minorities, but how it proposes to review and revise discriminatory legislation itself?” he wrote.