The World and Everything in It: July 2, 2025

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LINDSAY MAST, HOST: Good morning!

A Texas law shielding kids from explicit online porn survives, we’ll tell you why.

NICK EICHER, HOST: Supreme Court analysis of that coming up and two other cases, plus an update from Washington on the big beautiful Senate debate.

Also today, WORLD Tour.

Later, an Anglican priest stands up for marriage, and finds himself at odds with church and state.

RANDALL: Jesus said this thing about taking up your cross daily and following him. He didn't say, it's going to be a walk in the park, everybody.

And WORLD Opinions’ Hunter Baker tells of an ex-Soviet spy who risked all to warn the west.

MAST: It’s Wednesday, July 2nd. This is The World and Everything in It from listener-supported WORLD Radio. I’m Lindsay Mast.

EICHER: And I’m Nick Eicher. Good morning!

MAST: Up next, Kent Covington with today’s news.

KENT COVINGTON, NEWS ANCHOR: Trump: Israel has agreed to 60-day Gaza ceasefire » President Trump says Israel has agreed on terms for a 60-day ceasefire in Gaza.

And he is warning Hamas to accept the deal now, saying “it will not get better — IT WILL ONLY GET WORSE."

That came just hours after the president told reporters that he believes Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu wants to halt the fighting and bring Israeli hostages home.

TRUMP: He wants to do that. He wants to. I think we'll have, I think we'll have a deal next week, that's what I think.

Netanyahu will meet with the president at the White House next week.

Trump U.S. and Israeli officials held a “long and productive meeting” Tuesday about halting the war in Gaza.

Netanyahu made no mention of a ceasefire deal when he discussed the upcoming visit with his cabinet yesterday.

NETANYAHU: [SPEAKING HEBREW]

He told Israeli leaders that he’s heading to Washington to hash out a new trade agreement among other things.

One Big Beautiful Bill » The fate of what President Trump calls his “One Big Beautiful Bill” is now in the hands of the House.

The Senate narrowly passed it with Vice President JD Vance casting the tie-breaking vote.

VANCE:  The yays are 50, the nays are 50. The Senate being evenly divided. The vice president votes in the affirmative. The bill as amended is passed.

Three Republicans defected, including Sen. Rand Paul.

PAUL:  It's gonna add much more to the debt. And so I think without question, this is not a fiscally conservative bill. And if you're someone who thinks the debt is a problem, I don't see how you could vote for this.

Sen. Thom Tillis shared those concerns. The third Republican, Sen. Susan Collins of Maine objected to, among other things, new work requirements in the bill for Medicaid and food assistance programs.

But GOP Sen. John Thune said:

THUNE:  We're fulfilling the mandate we were entrusted with last November, and setting our country and the American people up to be safer, stronger, and more prosperous.

The bill passed after an all-night marathon of debate and amendments.

USAID overhaul » The Trump administration is officially folding most USAID foreign aid programs into the State Department.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Tuesday that the agency has burned through billions of dollars with little to show for it. And he remarked earlier this year:

RUBIO: These are taxpayer dollars, and we owe the American people the sure, the, the, the assurances that every dollar we are spending abroad is being spent on something that furthers our national interest.

He announced the government will cut about 80 percent of the agency’s programs. Most of the remaining work will now run directly through the State Department.

Critics blasted the move, including former USAID administrator Andrew Natsios:

NATSIOS: I think we've lost the humanitarian instinct. The humanitarian imperative in the US government by shutting USAID down.

Secretary Rubio says the U.S. is not halting all foreign aid but it is scrapping the heavily charity-based model. He said the administration plans to focus on bolstering trade and private investment with needy nations, rather than what he called endless humanitarian aid that breeds dependence.

Alligator Alcatraz » President Trump toured a large new immigration detention center Tuesday in the Florida Everglades which state officials have dubbed “Alligator Alcatraz.” Trump told reporters:

TRUMP:  Very soon this facility will house some of the most menacing migrants. Some of the most vicious people on the planet. We're surrounded by miles of treacherous swamp land, and the only way out is really deportation.

In addition to illegal immigrants deemed dangerous, officials say it will also house those considered to be higher flight risks, and some with prior deportation orders.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis:

DESANTIS:  What we have here can hold 3000 now. We have 2000 facility up at Camp Blanding that we're gonna be open, which is our National Guard site.

The complex sits on an old airstrip and features hundreds of security cameras, miles of fencing, and heavy patrols.

Protesters gathered outside, raising questions about environmental impacts on the Everglades and the conditions of the facility for the migrants held there.

Jimmy Swaggart obit » Pentecostal televangelist and gospel singer Jimmy Swaggart has died at the age of 90. WORLD’s Benjamin Eicher has more.

BENJAMIN EICHER: Swaggart’s family wrote on Facebook, “Today was the day he has sung about for decades” adding today, he met Jesus.

His family described him as “a worshiper, a warrior, and a witness to the grace and mercy of God.”

In 1988, Jimmy Swaggart was embroiled in a very high-profile scandal involving a prostitute, after which he gave a tearful public confession.

SWAGGART: I have sinned against you, my Lord.

The Assemblies of God ruled that he should take one year away from ministry, but he returned after just three months.

Three years after that, Swaggart was involved in another very similar scandal. This time, he resigned, as the denomination was moving to revoke his credentials.

But he continued a ministry as an independent Pentecostal pastor and later founded the Sonlife Broadcasting Network.

Swaggart authored dozens of books and study guides and sold millions of recordings over six decades.

For WORLD, I’m Benjamin Eicher.

I'm Kent Covington.

Straight ahead: more on the Senate’s version of the Big Beautiful Bill. Plus, protecting minors from harmful material online.

This is The World and Everything in It.

NICK EICHER, HOST: It’s Wednesday, the 2nd of July.

Glad to have you along for today’s edition of The World and Everything in It. Good morning, I’m Nick Eicher.

LINDSAY MAST, HOST: And I’m Lindsay Mast.

Time now for a special edition of Washington Wednesday. Today we continue our coverage of Supreme Court decisions with a case on protecting kids from online pornography.

But first, more on the Senate’s marathon session to pass the One Big Beautiful Bill.

From WORLD’s Washington bureau, here is reporter Leo Briceno.

LEO BRICENO: Getting President Trump’s legislative agenda over the Senate’s finish line after a 26 hour marathon vote session required some creativity. Majority Leader John Thune:

THUNE: Mr. President, it's been a long road to get to today.

Lawmakers ironed out changes that would win over holdouts. One sticking point was a 10-year moratorium on state regulations for artificial intelligence. Tennessee Senator Marsha Blackburn worked with Texas Senator Ted Cruz to change that to a 5 year block on state AI laws. But in the early hours of Tuesday, Blackburn changed course.

BLACKBURN: This body has proven that they cannot legislate on emerging technology… There are all of these pieces of legislation dealing with AI that we haven't passed, but you know who has passed it? It is our states.

Blackburn then introduced an amendment to strip out the AI provision altogether and it passed 99-1. Only Senator Thom Tillis of North Carolina voted against it.

Another change pushed back the deadline for phasing out clean energy subsidies passed under President Biden, a key concession made to win over the support of Alaska Senator Lisa Murkowski. Renewable energy construction projects would still be eligible to receive government help if their construction begins before the end of 2027.

But the farthest reaching change affects Medicaid policy by limiting how much states can tax their own healthcare providers to raise funds. Under current law, the federal government matches at least one dollar for every dollar states raise on their own. By taxing their own hospitals and clinics, states can raise money, get their federal match, and send resources back to their providers. Right now, states can tax individual providers up to 6% of their individual revenues to finance Medicaid. The bill would lower that to 3.5% by 2027.

VANCE: The question occurs on passage of the bill as amended.

In the end, Vice President JD Vance cast a tie-breaking vote. Three Republicans voted against the bill’s passage: Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky, Susan Collins of Maine, and Thom Tillis of North Carolina.

The bill now heads to the House of Representatives where its fate is uncertain. Texas Congressman Chip Roy is one of a handful of House Republicans dissatisfied with the Senate’s version of the bill. On Friday, I asked Roy about the July 4th deadline.

BRICENO: Do you think Republicans should consider pushing back their self -imposed deadline to take some of the pressure off and getting these notifications right?

ROY: Talk to somebody who's established the deadline, I have not. I mean, to me, the deadline is getting the policy right.

Speaker Johnson has said he wants to bring the bill to a vote on Wednesday afternoon. With all Democrats planning to vote against the bill, Johnson can only afford to lose three Republican votes.

Reporting for WORLD, I’m Leo Briceno in Washington.

LINDSAY MAST, HOST: Coming up next on The World and Everything in It: WORLD legal correspondent Jenny Rough continues our coverage of the U.S. Supreme Court’s final week of the term. Today, three major rulings, all of them decided 6 to 3, they highlight some of the biggest tensions in American law and culture.

NICK EICHER, HOST: The court rejected a constitutional challenge to the task force behind a controversial health mandate. It upheld a Texas law requiring age verification for online porn, siding with a state effort to protect children. And it ruled that South Carolina can exclude Planned Parenthood from the state Medicaid program, finding no individual, private right to sue under federal law.

CLARE MORELL: Children don’t have to go looking for it. It finds them. , And so children quickly get sucked down very dangerous rabbit holes.

JENNY ROUGH: Protecting kids from pornography, I’ll get to that pivotal case in just a moment.

But I’ll start with Kennedy versus Braidwood, this one involved Christian business owners and they pursued a creative but ultimately unsuccessful strategy.

Back in 20-19, a task force within the Department of Health and Human Services mandated that health insurers cover so-called PrEP drugs, these are pills or shots individuals take to help prevent HIV.

Christian businesses in Texas filed a lawsuit. They said the structure of the task force violates the Appointments Clause of the Constitution, and its mandates should be scrapped.

But before unpacking the legal issue, I wanted more context from a medical perspective, so I called up a doctor. Barry Perkins went to medical school in Houston from 1992 to 1996 when the AIDS crisis was still at its peak.

PERKINS: I saw a lot of HIV patients, a lot of patients with AIDS, with AIDS-defining illnesses.,

These days, Perkins says he can’t remember the last time he saw a patient with AIDS, and rarely sees one with HIV.

PERKINS: The reason it’s at that stage right now is because of medical research and advancements with pharmaceuticals that suppress the virus.

Even though the drugs encourage promiscuity, he says the advancements are good. They save lives and reduce spread.

PERKINS: As Christians, we should want people to flourish. What if you have someone who is living a sinful life, and they take this medication to keep themselves from getting sick. But then let’s say they turn their life around and they come to know Jesus and they become a Christian, and they want to get married and have children. Well because of this medication they can go on and live their lives in a healthy way.

Still, he says individuals should be responsible for covering PrEP drugs.

PERKINS: I mean, people have to be responsible for their own actions, don’t they?I’m not a big fan of the government forcing someone to purchase something for someone else because of their behavior.

That’s the position Braidwood took in this case.

ANDY SCHLAFLY: We’re talking about medication that costs more than $20,000 a year per person.

Andy Schlafly is general counsel for the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons. He filed a friend-of-the-court brief in support of Braidwood.

SCHLAFLY: So if there are five people in a company who decide they want to try this lifestyle medication, that’s $100,000 the company has to shell out.

He says there’s no such thing as free care.

SCHLAFLY: It just gets fed back into the cost of the system. And by forcing employers to cover this and insurance companies to cover this with no cost to the patients the costs go up for everybody. Businesses should not be subjected to these costly mandates which, in the position of Braidwood Management, are unconstitutional.

Unconstitutional because Braidwood claims the task force members were improperly appointed under the Appointments Clause.

But the Supreme Court disagreed. It held that the task force members are inferior officers consistent with the Appointments Clause.

Justice Brett Kavanaugh wrote the opinion. Justice Clarence Thomas wrote the dissent, joined by Justices Samuel Alito and Neil Gorsuch.

The pharmaceutical business is a powerful lobbying industry in Washington. Even though Braidwood lost, Schlafly says perhaps we’ll see some changes.

SCHLAFLY: It’s sort of RFK Junior’s issue in a sense in that he stood up against Big Pharma. And he could put people on this task force who are not going to be influenced by Big Pharma.

Next, protecting kids from pornography , Free Speech Coalition versus Paxton. In 20-23, Texas passed a law requiring porn websites to verify the ages of their users. Adults must enter identifying information to show they’re 18 or older.

CLARE MORELL: It actually does change the brain,

Clare Morell of the Ethics and Public Policy Center works on helping states pass these age-verification laws. She says pornography websites harm kids in several ways.

MORELL: There’s brain science that shows it is extremely addictive, actually changes a child’s brain and desensitizes them to pleasures in the real world. A study I was just recently looking over said children exposed to pornography between the ages of 6 to 12 then were more likely to struggle with sexual dysfunction as an adult. The rates on child-on-child sexual abuse have increased. Nurses and doctors in the ER say they are seeing 11- to 12-year old boys who have sexually assaulted 4- to 8-year old girls.

So psychologically, emotionally, spiritually dangerous. Representatives of the porn industry filed a lawsuit. They claim the law violates their First Amendment right to free speech.

But why is a porn debate about free speech? Well, the court has long held that almost every form of meaningful expression counts.

BARRY MCDONALD: That includes porn, it includes video games, it includes things like parades—

Barry McDonald teaches First Amendment law at Pepperdine University.

MCDONALD: —art, of course. Movies. And the court has said the government has no business in terms of policing people’s taste. So the fact that it’s a porn movie rather than an Academy Award winner doesn’t really matter to the constitutional analysis.

The court has also long said that free speech has two sides, the right to speak it, and the right to hear it.

MCDONALD: That’s why adults who want to consume porn without entering their age information are able to claim that this unduly impedes their ability to receive the speech they want to consume.

Now the court typically applies strict scrutiny in cases touching on fundamental rights. A law that restricts speech is unconstitutional unless it overcomes three high hurdles.

The Free Speech Coalition argues the law doesn’t clear one of them because it’s too broad. There are alternative ways to keep kids away.

MCDONALD: Namely, by encouraging the use of content filters to protect minors. But that just hasn’t worked...

It’s impractical, parents don’t know how to use them. Or can’t. Claire Morell again:

MORELL: Apps like Snapchat, TikTok, they will not grant access to third party parental controls or filters. And so when a child can click through to PornHub inside of the Snapchat app without ever leaving the app, a parent would never know. In just five clicks they can get to PornHub and they never leave the app.

Justice Amy Coney Barrett is the mother of seven kids. She mentioned this at oral argument.

JUSTICE AMY CONEY BARRETT: Let me just say that content filtering for all those different devices, I can say from personal experience, is difficult to keep up with.

Texas argued the court should apply an easier test for the state to satisfy: rational basis.

Here, the court took a middle ground: the intermediate scrutiny test. It said the law’s okay because its main objective is to protect kids, and it doesn’t burden more speech than necessary. It only incidentally burdens it. Justice Clarence Thomas wrote the majority opinion.

Justice Elena Kagan wrote the dissent, joined by Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Ketanji Brown Jackson. They said the court should stick with strict scrutiny and suggested this might be an instance where the law could still survive.

McDonald says this case is long overdue, that prior cases did not strike the right balance, because they tipped the scales in favor of protecting adults over kids. Here, that changed.

MCDONALD: I’m glad they did this. They at least sided on behalf of kids rather than porn seeking adults, you know?

Even so, he says the court’s First Amendment precedents applying a different test in similar cases might cause confusion in the lower courts.

Morell notes up to 24 states have adopted similar laws:

MORELL: Texas’ law passed in 2023 but really it felt like it just spread like wildfire in a good way after that because it's very feasible now for states, not just Texas, but any other states that want to pass these laws and even Congress to pass a nationwide age verification law. And I hope that that is the next step. That is personally what I'm advocating for, because we want all of America's children to be protected, not just these 24 states.

Finally, one last case, the court ruled that an individual has no right to sue a state for prohibiting Planned Parenthood from participating in the state’s Medicaid program , in this case, South Carolina. Planned Parenthood can’t sue, either. If Congress wants to allow lawsuits like this, it has to say so clearly. And in this case, it didn’t.

Reporting for WORLD, I’m Jenny Rough.

LINDSAY MAST, HOST: Next up, World Tour. We begin with some WORLD news of our own from Nigeria. Onize Oduah is going to be out for the next three months as she is on maternity leave. She and her husband have welcomed a baby girl into their family, so here’s WORLD’s Mary Muncy with today’s international run-down.

MARY MUNCY: We begin today in Poland, where citizens elected a new president, and the prime minister survived a no-confidence vote.

Presidential candidate Karol Nawrocki won by just a little more than a percentage point.

NAWROCKI: We must do everything we can to ensure that Poland remains Poland, rich in its cultural heritage, in our attachment to what is enshrined in our national community, to the symbol of the cross and to Christian values.

Nawrocki promised to preserve the nation’s heritage and remain true to its Christian values.

The president-elect is part of the more conservative Law and Justice party while Prime Minister Donald Tusk is part of the liberal Civic Platform. After Nawrocki’s win, Tusk called for a no-confidence vote to see if he could hold a coalition together, and he survived.

Nawrocki is expected to be friendly to the United States and possibly put conditions on helping Ukraine. Tusk will likely focus on promoting cooperation with the European Union and reforming the nation’s judicial system.

Next, to Hungary.

Tens of thousands gathered for a Budapest Pride parade last Saturday in open defiance of the Hungarian government.

In April, officials passed a Constitutional Amendment to secure children’s “right to physical, spiritual and moral development.” The law included shutting down all public LGBTQ events.

COUNTER PROTESTER: Do you people want the city of Budapest to be destroyed? Then stop doing this!

As part of a counter protest at Pride, one Christian preacher walked through the crowds holding a cross and speaking out against the celebration.

COUNTER PROTESTER cont. : You need to repent, people. This is what the real Christian looks like! Repent from your sin …

Prime Minister Viktor Orbán and his government already effectively recognize marriage as only between one man and one woman. And the country protects children from adoption by two adults of the same sex. The country’s Constitution recognizes only two sexes: a man and a woman.

Aniko Soltesz is Hungarian and attended the parade.

SOLTESZ: [HUNGARIAN] I viscerally object to any restriction of rights. I agree that everyone should be free to choose a partner, and I deeply condemn any restrictions that tends to crush the right of assembly, to crush freedoms, and that is why I am here.

She says here that she objects to Orbán’s government because she believes it is restricting her right to peaceably assemble.

Authorities are expected to use security camera footage and facial recognition technology to identify those who attended. Under Hungarian law, authorities could impose fines up to $586 U.S. dollars for participating in a public LGBTQ event.

In East Asia:

AUDIO: [CANTONESE]

Members of the League of Social Democrats held a rally Sunday in Hong Kong. The purpose? The pro-democracy party announced that it is disbanding.

Party chairwoman Chan Po-ying said political pressure forced the party leadership’s hand.

PO-YING: We need to consider a lot of reasons including, especially our comrades, friends, the consequences for them, so we choose to disband.

The party made headlines in 2019 when it led massive anti-government demonstrations. Since then, authorities have prosecuted and jailed many activists under a national security law that Beijing imposed in 2020.

The party’s platform advocated non-violent forms of resistance, but added that members would not avoid physical confrontations if they were deemed necessary.

And finally, 14-hundred miles to the north in Beijing, the first of its kind sporting exhibition in China.

SOUND: [SOCCER MATCH]

Four teams of humanoid robots competed in fully autonomous three on three soccer matches. Robots operated by artificial intelligence without human intervention, except for the occasional need to remove a malfunctioning robot off the field.

The players featured advanced visual sensors, allowing them to identify the ball and navigate the field. While not fast moving games, the event seemed to entertain spectators.

CHENG HOA: [CHINESE] In the future, we may arrange for robots to play football with humans. That means we must ensure the robots are completely safe. For example, a robot and a human could play a match where winning doesn’t matter, but real offensive and defensive interactions take place. That would help audiences build trust and understand that robots are safe.

Cheng Hao is founder and CEO of Booster Robotics—the company that supplied the robots. He hopes to eventually have robots and human players compete, and this weekend’s event helped accelerate the robotic systems to someday make that possible.

That’s this week’s WORLD Tour. I’m Mary Muncy.

NICK EICHER, HOST: Plans in Western PA got a little quacked-up last weekend. Crowds had flocked to a little amusement park near Pittsburgh called Idlewild, in part to see a six-story, 700-pound inflatable billed as the World’s Largest Rubber Duck.

Jase Wiarda told us he’s hauled the duck coast-to-coast for four years now.

WIARDA: We bring people in from all over, and everybody's, you know, they see it, and it's … there’re instant smiles. Everybody's always really happy. [thunder rolls in]

Ah, but not everybody, not all the time. A storm rolled in and for safety reasons the duck had to… well, the duck had to duck.

WIARDA: We have to take it down before the wind gets too high—otherwise it’s unsafe to everybody around.

Not popped, just deflated—like a few disappointed fans. Because in the case of foul weather, this fowl’s not going to float.

It’s The World and Everything In It.

NICK EICHER, HOST: Today is Wednesday, July 2nd. Thank you for turning to WORLD Radio to help start your day.

Good morning. I’m Nick Eicher.

LINDSAY MAST, HOST: And I’m Lindsay Mast.

Coming next on The World and Everything in It: Holding fast to first principles.

Religious liberty. Free speech. The rule of law. Those ideas helped build the West and protect human dignity. Together, they form what we call classical liberalism.

EICHER: But over time, modern liberalism began to distort those bedrock ideas. Cracks began to appear in the foundation.

And now, even some conservatives are asking whether classical liberalism is still worth defending.

WORLD’s Jenny Lind Schmitt brings us the story of one man who says yes, and shows why those basic freedoms are more vital, and more vulnerable, than ever.

JENNY LIND SCHMITT: In 2019, Bernard Randall preached what he thought was a fairly straightforward sermon for a Church of England priest.

RANDALL: No one should be told they must accept an ideology. Love the person even when you profoundly dislike the ideas. Don’t denigrate a person simply for having opinions and beliefs that you don't share. …

At the time, Randall was serving as a chaplain at Trent College, a Church of England K-12 school near Nottingham. A few months earlier, school administrators had invited an LGBT group to implement an “inclusivity curriculum” at the school. Its lessons were more about revolution than inclusion. At a staff-day training, group leaders encouraged school staff to join in a chant to “smash heteronormativity.”

A student asked Randall if he could preach a sermon about whether students must accept pro-LGBT teaching in a Christian school.

RANDALL: So I thought that was a really good question. So I gave a sermon in the chapel basically saying you don't have to, you make up your own mind on ideologies, on belief systems. … Loving your neighbours as yourself doesn't mean you agree, but it does mean you respect their sincerity and so on. And there's no excuse for personal attacks or anything like that.

Randall explained that while not everyone agrees, the Church of England teaches that marriage is between one man and one woman. In other words, he was a Church of England chaplain in a Church of England school explaining the teaching of the Church of England.

RANDALL: You should be no more told you have to accept LGBT ideology than you should be told you must be in favor of Brexit or you must be Muslim. To both of which I’m sure you’d quite rightly object….

It was a moderate sermon. But Trent College didn’t think so. The school put him on indefinite leave. And without informing him, school administrators reported Randall to the U.K. government’s terrorist watchdog agency for “religious extremism.” The school also reported him to the U.K. equivalent of Child Protective Services as a safety risk.

Both agencies investigated and determined there was no case against Randall.

But the school would not apologize. And the hearings related to the case revealed part of the reason why.

RANDALL: And at the tribunal, interestingly, amongst various staff, the head teacher said it had never occurred to him until all this happened to think what it means to be head of a Christian school. He just had no concept of it being a Christian school in any meaningful way.

School administrators finally agreed to let Randall return under certain conditions … including the review and possible censor of his sermons.

But the church’s reaction was much worse.

RANDALL: My bishop apologised to the school for my behaviour before she even knew what I'd said…Pretty disappointing, I mean absolutely no support from the church at all.

The Church of England got its own local safeguarding office involved. They interrogated Randall and eventually concluded his Biblical teaching on marriage and his expression of his own beliefs was a safety risk. When he refused to back down, Bishop Libby Lane stripped Randall of the power to officiate church services. When Randall filed an official complaint about the bishop’s decision, then-Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby blocked it.

Randall decided enough was enough.

RANDALL: It's mind-blowing. Not only am I suing the Christian school for anti-Christian discrimination, I'm actually suing my bishop for anti-Christian discrimination, which shouldn't be possible, but that's where it's come to.

Randall’s case has now dragged on for over six years. Church officials have never explained their “safeguarding” concern, despite repeated requests.

Until the Church reinstates him, Randall cannot work as a chaplain. While he waits, he’s had to find other work. And the legal process has taken a toll.

RANDALL: Jesus said this thing about taking up your cross daily and following him. He didn't say, it's going to be a walk in the park, everybody.

At first as he told his story at events around England, Randall encountered disbelief. But people in the U.K. are slowly realizing their freedoms are eroding before their eyes.

RANDALL: So in response to a sermon saying respect people you disagree with,,...the message they all got was, well, if the chaplain whose job it is to talk about these things isn't allowed to talk about it, you'd better not.

Randall fears his case is an example of what could happen to others down the road. And that points to an even bigger question of whether a society can remain free without freedom of religion and freedom of speech.

RANDALL: And it's the religious people who tend to get cancelled first, because religion will tend to have people say...This is how I view the world. .. I'm not going to bow to the secular authority. … And religious people will do that as a matter of eternal consequence.. So you're more likely to find religious people saying, I cannot cross this line.

Reporting for WORLD, I’m Jenny Lind Schmitt in London.

LINDSAY MAST, HOST: Today is Wednesday, July 2nd. Good morning! This is The World and Everything in It from listener-supported WORLD Radio. I’m Lindsay Mast.

NICK EICHER, HOST: And I’m Nick Eicher. Up next, WORLD Opinions contributor Hunter Baker returns to the mid-20th century, to the cold war, political intrigue, and a change of heart.

HUNTER BAKER: Once upon a time in America there were two young men born near the turn of the 20th century. Both men had troubled family backgrounds. But both young men were brilliant. One attended Columbia. The other Johns Hopkins and Harvard Law. One went on to become a senior editor of Time magazine making the modern equivalent of $300,000 a year because of his unusual talent as a writer. The other rose rapidly through the ranks of the federal government and was at FDR’s side at the Yalta conference.

Both men were secret communists and active agents of the Soviet Union.

The writer was Whittaker Chambers. His collaborator in Soviet espionage was Alger Hiss, a leading light of FDR's New Deal. The collision of their lives in midcentury America made the reputation of a man who would become one of the most consequential and tragic politicians of the 20th century…Richard Nixon.

After making a splash as a literary communist writing plays and working for the New Masses and the Daily Worker, Chambers was recruited to enter the communist underground. He interacted with American communists who had infiltrated the federal government. He mastered the techniques necessary to remain undetected and was able to obtain information for his spymasters regularly. Alger Hiss was one of his major sources within the U.S. government.

Chambers became increasingly aware of the terrifying and murderous nature of Stalin’s totalitarian leadership in the Soviet Union. Reflecting on the disheartening revelations, Chambers wrote of his state of mind, “I heard screams.”

Chambers escaped the communist underground and fed his family through freelance literary work—including being the English translator of Bambi. His circumstances improved considerably when he was hired by Time and became one of the major contributors to the magazine. Ironically, capitalism saved the fugitive communist. During World War II, he tried to make American leaders aware of the extent of communist infiltration, but the Soviets were officially allies and New Deal officials looked askance at such warnings. He was ignored.

AUDIO: Do you swear that the testimony you’re about to give is the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help you God? I do. Sit down right there and talk into the microphone…

Toward the end of the 1940s, Chambers willingly appeared before the much-criticized House Committee on Un-American Activities to corroborate charges regarding communist infiltrators. Chambers did so at great personal cost. He would end up losing his job at Time and would earn the lasting enmity of American elites for exposing a New Deal star.

AUDIO: I certainly urge this committee not to follow any hit and run tactics…

When Hiss denied Chambers’ charges it was a one-day media rout. Hiss and the liberal establishment was triumphantly indignant. The portly, rumpled Chambers appeared to be a disgrace. But the junior Congressman Richard Nixon heard things in Hiss’s answers that raised his suspicions. In the end, Nixon’s dogged pursuit of the truth helped turn the tide in the case.

Hiss’s friends pushed him to go after Chambers for slander. Chambers played his trump card…the so-called “Pumpkin Papers”..documents he’d gathered before leaving the underground. The evidence led to perjury charges against Hiss and a conviction 75 years ago.

AUDIO: Alger Hiss, one-time high government official, will lose all civil rights after one year in prison…

Alger Hiss went to federal prison and became a persecuted celebrity for the American left. Richard Nixon ascended to the U.S. Senate, becoming Eisenhower’s running mate in 1952 and 1956, and later had both a triumphant and tragic presidency.

Whittaker Chambers went on to write one of the finest memoirs ever produced. It was titled “Witness.” It explained the legal case but went much further by delving into his testimony of faith. Chambers described how one day he looked at his baby daughter’s ears and was shaken by the unmistakable fact of design. It made him not only question his materialism, but his communism as well. So Chambers the atheist converted to Christianity, was baptized, and became a witness…a witness for man’s need for God and for faith in God as the foundation for freedom. He deserves to be remembered.

I’m Hunter Baker.

NICK EICHER, HOST: Tomorrow: The last of the big decisions from the Supreme Court term just finished. And to Colorado, where grandparenting is getting much more difficult. Also, a trip to one of America’s great western monuments. That and more tomorrow.

I’m Nick Eicher.

LINDSAY MAST, HOST: And I’m Lindsay Mast.

The World and Everything in It comes to you from WORLD Radio. WORLD’s mission is biblically objective journalism that informs, educates, and inspires.

The Psalmist writes: “Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the wicked, nor stands in the way of sinners, nor sits in the seat of scoffers; but his delight is in the law of the Lord, and on his law he meditates day and night.” —Psalm 1: 1-2

Go now in grace and peace.

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