The World and Everything in It - June 16, 2021

MARY REICHARD, HOST: Good morning!

American troops are leaving Afghanistan, leaving religious minorities in fear.

NICK EICHER, HOST: That’s ahead on Washington Wednesday.

Also World Tour.

Plus the first in our summer Destinations series. Today, a visit to a mid-west parade and you’ll meet two women keeping Dutch traditions alive.

And commentary on a new high school curriculum in California.

REICHARD: It’s Wednesday, June 16th. This is The World and Everything in It from listener-supported WORLD Radio. I’m Mary Reichard.

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

REICHARD: Time now for the news. Here’s Kent Covington.

KENT COVINGTON, NEWS ANCHOR: Biden set to meet with Putin Geneva today » Reporters fired questions at President Biden in Geneva shortly after his arrival ahead of today’s face-to-face meeting with Vladimir Putin.

Biden has called the Russian president a “worthy adversary” and has said he hopes to find areas of cooperation with Putin. But he's also warned that if Russia continues its cyberattacks and other aggressive acts towards the United States—quote—“we will respond in kind.”

Back in Washington, the president has backing from both sides of the aisle to stand up to Moscow. Republican Congressman Michael McCaul...

MCCAUL: I think he should say no more. We’re not going to take this anymore. We are going to respond. There will be consequences, and we are going to hit you back.

This will be Biden’s first meeting with Putin as commander in chief.

U.S., E.U. agree to end trade dispute on aircraft subsidies » President Biden this week has held long days of meetings with heads of state at the G-7, NATO and U.S.-E.U. summits.

And on Tuesday, Biden and European officials announced a breakthrough in a long and bitter trade dispute. The two sides will end a 17-year rift over the aircraft subsidies for U.S.-based Boeing and France-based Airbus.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen told reporters…

LEYEN: The agreement we have filed now really opens a new chapter in our relationship, because we move from litigation to cooperation on aircraft, and that after almost 20 years of dispute.

The deal is expected to lift billions of dollars in punitive tariffs.

The U.S. imposed $7.5 billion in tariffs on European exports in 2019 after the World Trade Organization ruled that the EU had not complied with its rulings on subsidies for Airbus.

The EU retaliated last November with $4 billion in punitive duties after the WTO ruled that the U.S. had provided illegal subsidies to Boeing.

The Airbus-Boeing ordeal was the longest-running dispute in the history of the World Trade Organization.

Biden administration pushes plan to combat domestic terror » The Biden administration says it plans to step up efforts to prevent domestic terrorism in the United States.

The National Security Council on Tuesday unveiled a new strategy to counter domestic threats. It includes the sharing of intelligence within law enforcement agencies and working with tech companies to eliminate certain content online.

Attorney General Merrick Garland told reporters Tuesday that “domestic violent extremists pose an elevated threat to the homeland in 2021.”

GARLAND: Our experience on the ground confirms this. The number of open FBI domestic terrorism investigations this year has increased significantly.

A report from the Office of the Director of National Intelligence stated that white supremacist groups and anti-government militias pose the highest risk.

Garland said the president’s budget request for the next fiscal year will seek $100 million in funding for the Justice Department to counter domestic extremist threats.

COVID deaths hit 600k as new cases continue to fall » The United States passed a grim milestone on Tuesday. Officially, the U.S. death toll from COVID-19 has surpassed 600,000. However, two other numbers are cause for encouragement.

The United States just saw its first day with new infections below 10,000 since March of 2020. And daily pandemic-related deaths have dropped to around 340. That too is a figure not seen since March of last year, just days after COVID-19 was first declared a pandemic.

The daily death toll is now just one-tenth of the level seen at its January peak of more than 3,000.

Calgary police arrest pastor for violating COVID-19 rules » While most coronavirus restrictions have been lifted in the United States, many remain in place in Canada. And police in Calgary this week arrested the pastor of a Baptist church for allegedly violating COVID-19 rules. WORLD’s Kristen Flavin has more.

KRISTEN FLAVIN, REPORTER: Pastor Tim Stephens of Calgary’s Fairview Baptist Church is behind bars, awaiting a June 28th hearing. Police arrested him on Monday and charged him with violating a court order.

Authorities say Stephen’s church was not following pandemic-related safety rules, including limits on crowd size, social distancing, and face coverings.

Alberta Health Services says authorities served Pastor Stephens with a court order prior to Sunday services. Officials say he acknowledged the order but went forward anyway with an outdoor service in violation of COVID-19 regulations.

Jay Cameron, a lawyer with the Justice Centre for Constitutional Freedom, told CBC News—quote—"We will challenge his arrest and defend against the new 'health' charge.”

Reporting for WORLD, I’m Kristen Flavin.

I’m Kent Covington.

Straight ahead: Christians in Afghanistan prepare for a Taliban take over.

Plus, the push to create soldiers for social change in California public schools.

This is The World and Everything in It.

NICK EICHER, HOST: It’s Wednesday, the 16th of June, 2021. Glad to have you along for today’s edition of The World and Everything in It. Good morning, I’m Nick Eicher.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: And I’m Mary Reichard. First up today: the trials ahead for Afghanistan.

Speaking in Brussels on Monday, President Biden said that while the U.S. military is pulling out of Afghanistan, the United States is not abandoning the Afghan people.

BIDEN: Our troops are coming home. But we agreed that our diplomatic, economic, and humanitarian commitment to the Afghan people and our support for the Afghan national defense and security forces will endure.

EICHER: But what that U.S. support in Afghanistan will look like in the months and years ahead is not entirely clear.

Many in Afghanistan believe chaos will soon fill the void left by the departure of U.S. and allied forces. And for Christians and other religious minorities, the gathering storm clouds appear particularly dark.

REICHARD: WORLD senior editor Mindy Belz has written on the topic and joins us now to talk about what the troop pullout means for the people of Afghanistan.

Mindy, good morning!

MINDY BELZ, SENIOR EDITOR: Good morning, Mary.

REICHARD: Well, first of all, Mindy, what’s happening right now? The U.S. troop pullout is already well underway, correct?

BELZ: That's correct. We have a report this week from the U.S. Central Command, which interestingly said that they are 50 percent through the entire process. That means they have turned six bases over to the Afghan Ministry of Defense. They have carried 611 loads of C17s out of Afghanistan with materials and troops on board and that's halfway through. If you remember, President Biden said that we might be done with this by July 4th and clearly that's not going to happen, but I think that the withdrawal is on track for the September 11 deadline that he set when he came into office.

REICHARD: Have we seen any early clues that might give us a sense of how this will unfold as the last of the U.S. and allied troops depart?

BELZ: Well, sadly, we have. Even before the departures were underway, the Taliban began offensives and interestingly enough, because I think the U.S. media, most of us have been focused on the cities, and there are really three main cities in Afghanistan. But the Taliban is smarter than us and understands the territory better. And they immediately went into rural areas. And really, it's striking, in just the last six weeks—since May 1—they have gained control of 30 districts across Afghanistan, that means half of the country's 34 provinces have Taliban strongholds in them right now. And so clearly, the Taliban aims to get control. What we have to understand about Afghanistan is that gaining control of these rural areas of the village is essentially how you control the cities. The cities are made up of people who once lived in the villages and the society is still very clearly geared that way. And so the Taliban is going about this in a really smart way. And it looks like for right now, they are largely unimpeded. There have been firefights. There have been areas where the Afghan National Army has beat them back and continue to hold territory. But the Taliban is clearly gaining ground.

REICHARD: What about NGOs? Are non-governmental organizations and aid groups planning to stay put after the troop pullout? Or are many of them deeming it too dangerous without that U.S. presence?

BELZ: The ones that I spoke to in preparing the story, remarkably, want to stay put. Even some of the larger groups, like Doctors Without Borders, are hoping to continue to work as they have. Many of these groups are the ones that had been there even before the war began in 2001. And I do highlight the work of two Christian or Christian-based organizations that are there, too. And they've been there a long time. And they don't plan to leave just because U.S. troops are leaving, but they recognize—they all say their meeting, they're just talking security. Keep in mind, it's not just only troops on the ground that the Americans were providing, but it is air cover, air defenses, and also a hefty diplomatic presence and intelligence, you know, so that we actually knew what was going on in all of these 34 provinces and now we're not sure that we do. And so that is going to call into question the security of U.S.-based aid groups.

REICHARD: Let’s talk about the church. You wrote that the Christian church has grown in Afghanistan over the past two decades, but largely underground?

BELZ: That's correct. The people who work with the church in Afghanistan say that there are basically three types of Afghan believers: those who've been forced to leave, those who survived by exercising their faith underground, and those who are dead. And it is entirely an underground church. But it is a church that is highly active, that is being discipled. I talked to a number of Afghans both inside the country and outside the country who participate actively in discipling new believers. And that is entirely made up of Muslim converts. So on the one hand, it's always been an exciting church to follow, but also a very precarious and fragile church.

REICHARD: Afghanistan has a constitution and it ostensibly allows freedom of religion in the country. So have Christians been able to gather publicly at least in Afghan government strongholds?

BELZ: They really cannot. I mean, we've seen international fellowships in Kabul, the Capitol. There's one legal church building, and it is Catholic Church. It's on the grounds of the Italian embassy in Kabul. And that's pretty much it. And I think as things—what's happened as we've moved toward, you know, this withdrawal, even when the Trump administration began negotiations with the Taliban—and those were negotiations that the Afghan government was not allowed to be part of and that was a significant rub and it became clear that the Taliban was going to have a large role in what came after U.S. presence. As that became gradually clearer to Afghans, they have all had to react and sort of move into survivor mode. And so they're very reluctant to talk. They're very reluctant to do anything that will sort of stir the waters until they see which way things are going to go. And that is, you know, even though they have constitutional protections, people are just very afraid of what comes next.

REICHARD: Mindy, what’s life like for Christians in Afghanistan? How are they meeting together and worshiping despite all of these challenges you mention?

BELZ: Yeah, and we haven't even talked about COVID-19, which has, you know, just been another layer as it has been everywhere we see conflict situations. But they're very creative, I would say. A lot of their fellowships take place in homes, in private residences, in office buildings. Actually, you know, a decade ago, when I was traveling to Afghanistan, I would show up at an office and it would turn out to be a small fellowship meeting for believers. They're very careful. They're very careful in terms of discipling new believers, but it is, I think, a picture of the power of the gospel that it has not been hindered in one sense, despite, I think, some of the greatest hindrances in the world. And so it's a church that is vibrant and yet also very much under threat at this time. It's a precarious time as they face perhaps a destabilizing situation and the exit of American forces.

REICHARD: WORLD senior editor Mindy Belz. I’m placing a link to a really in-depth feature she wrote for WORLD Magazine. You can find it in today’s program transcript.

Mindy, thanks so much!

BELZ: Thanks for having me, Mary.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: Coming up next on The World and Everything in It: World Tour with our reporter in Africa, Onize Ohikere.

ONIZE OHIKERE, REPORTER: UN warns of famine in Ethiopia—We start today here in Africa.

AUDIO: [Unloading aid trucks]

Tens of thousands of malnourished children are at risk of dying in Ethiopia’s Tigray region. That according to the United Nations and humanitarian groups working in the area.

Tommy Thompson is emergency coordinator for the World Food Programme.

THOMPSON: This is a crisis of certainly food security, but it's really a crisis of access, protection issues, that's preventing us from doing the work that's required. It's an incredibly dangerous environment for us all to be working in. There have been nine humanitarians who have been killed thus far. Every day we have our teams - and this is WFP, NGOs, partners, everybody who's trying to operate in the north - find themselves challenged at checkpoints. They're increasingly hostile in some of these checkpoints. We have our beneficiaries having the things that are given to them looted from them.

Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed sent government forces into Tigray in November to disarm leaders of the Tigray People's Liberation Front. He blamed the group for attacks on army camps.

But international watchdog groups accuse government forces of widespread atrocities against civilians. And now, humanitarian agencies say Ethiopian forces and troops from neighbouring Eritrea are keeping relief shipments out of the region.

The UN estimates more than a quarter million people in Tigray now face famine conditions.

Suu Kyi goes on trial in Myanmar—Next we go to Southeast Asia.

AUDIO: [Protesters chanting as they march]

Protesters in Myanmar marched briefly in Yangon Monday to mark the start of former president Aung San Suu Kyi’s corruption trial.

The military leaders who removed her from office in February accuse the democratically elected leader of a wide range of offenses. They include violating pandemic restrictions with a political rally and importing allegedly illegal walkie talkies.

Suu Kyi’s supporters say they are trumped up crimes used to justify the military coup.

AUDIO: [Woman speaking Burmese]

Reporters are not allowed in the courtroom for the trial. But Suu Kyi’s lawyer said she appeared to be in good health.

Despite daily protests, the military junta shows no signs of stepping aside. More than 850 civilians have died in the brutal crackdown on dissent.

Ortega arrests opposition party leaders—Next to Central America.

Nicaraguan police have arrested six opposition politicians in a bid to silence anyone who might challenge President Daniel Ortega’s rule. Several of them released defiant video messages before their arrests.

AUDIO: [Woman speaking Spanish]

Ana Margarita Vijil is a member of the Unamos opposition party. She vowed Ortega’s opponents would eventually force him out of office.

Ortega first came to power in 1979 and led the country for 11 years. He returned to the presidency in 2007 and has side-stepped term limits ever since. His Sandinista party now controls the courts and the legislature.

Under a law passed in December, Ortega’s government has the power to declare citizens “terrorists” or classify them as “traitors to the homeland.” Anyone branded with that label cannot participate in this year’s presidential elections.

French composer plays with AI piano—And finally, we end today in Europe.

AUDIO: [Sounds of piano playing]

A French composer has created a playing partner who doesn’t really exist. Using Artificial Intelligence and a player piano, Alexandros Markeas has developed a unique musical experience.

The digital musician doesn’t just play its own tune. It responds to the notes Markeas plays. The composer says he enjoys creating music that’s a surprise, something he didn’t expect.

That’s this week’s World Tour. Reporting for WORLD, I’m Onize Ohikere in Abuja, Nigeria.

NICK EICHER, HOST: A small town in Florida recently lost something valuable.

OK, not exactly lost. Turns out the town accidentally sold something valuable.

And what’s more, the buyer, well, that was an accident, too.

Businessman Bobby Read thought he was buying a small municipal building with the goal of turning it into a gym.

He had no idea he was buying the town’s water supply.

The building he purchased sits at the foot of the water tower for the town of Brooksville.

He told television station WFLA that he was shocked at what the town’s property appraiser told him.

READ: We can’t split the lot because you own the whole thing.

“You own the whole thing.” Great!

So as new landlord, Read was more than happy to give the water tower back.

The city manager said the person whose job it is to write legal descriptions of city properties—he didn’t do a very good job.

It’s The World and Everything in It.

NICK EICHER, HOST: Today is Wednesday, June 16th. Thank you for turning to WORLD Radio to help start your day.

Good morning. I’m Nick Eicher.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: And I’m Mary Reichard. Coming next on The World and Everything in It: the first in a summer series we’re calling Destinations. 

Today, a story from Orange City, Iowa. Every May, the city hosts a tulip festival. The flower is the main attraction, but there’s also folk music, dancing in the streets, and everywhere you look: traditional Dutch costumes.

EICHER: Recent World Journalism Institute graduate Rachel McClamroch attended the festival with 25 other WJI students. She brought her audio recorder and came back with this story about the parade, and two local women who keep the town awash in Dutch fashion.

AUDIO: [MARCHING BAND AND PARADE SOUND]

RACHEL MCCLAMROCH, CORRESPONDENT: A high school band marches in bright red uniforms. A craftsman carves wooden shoes. A vendor sells stroopwafel and Dutch style sausages. And tulips are everywhere. All carefully planted to bloom at the same time in neon shades of yellow, orange, red, purple.

For the festival, the city crowns a tulip queen in her court to represent the town. Every year they are dressed in the traditional costume of a different town or region in the Netherlands. But it's not just the queen and her court. If you look around the sidewalks, tents and parade floats, many of the festival goers are wearing historical Dutch costumes. Behind all those full skirts, embroidery scarves, shoulder pads, wooden clogs and a dizzying variety of hats, there are people like Marlys Hop.

MARLYS HOP: These are kind of little hooks to hang our purse on.

Hop is an Orange City native. So the festival has always been a part of her life.

HOP: Yeah, I grew up with it. And I was on the court. But my costume wasn't very pretty (LAUGHS). But I didn't know that at the time. You know...

When she was a wife and mother in the 60s, Hop and a friend next door decided to change that by making historically accurate costumes for the festival.

HOP: Well, it isn't Dutch if it isn't authentic (LAUGHS).

This was the age long before the internet. So Hopp and her friend wrote a museum in the Netherlands, asking for patterns, photos and samples.

HOP: Here’s a packet that they sent with them. A lot of information.

They also collected books on Dutch clothing. Some were in English, but many others were in Dutch and had to be translated. Accuracy was especially difficult because each town or region had its own traditional dress

HOP: South Holland, and then there's the Zealand area: that's all islands. North Brabant, that's where my dad was from. Utrecht, Gelderland, Overijssel, Granta, Groningen, Friesland. And each one of these dress differently...

Hop and some other seamstresses eventually formed a committee dedicated to making authentic Dutch costumes.

HOP: And here’s some sketches of a pattern. I'd have to blow that up. The scale was 1/4. I'd have to blow that up on a wall. And then draw it.

Since the 1970s, they've been making outfits for the tulip Queen and teaching their craft to following generations.

MARY VANWYK OLESON: I have a love of art, textiles and anything that I can create with my hands.

Mary VanWyk Oleson and her niece run a business renting out Dutch costumes for the tulip festival.

VANWYK OLESON: Look at this. These are all hand done. And if you could maybe appreciate the work it takes...

They use the patterns that Hop and the Dutch Costume Committee put together.

VANWYK OLESON: The fact that these gals traced, cut, and then provided all the intricate details to sew each costume. To me, that 's just daunting and a labor of love.

And with every stitch they’re connecting the past and the present.

VANWYK OLESON: What it really means is a true love for where we've come from, what path was carved. Those pioneers that dug dirt, dug ground here, laid a homestead, planted, and made this their home. And people do tend to stay for generations.

HOP: It's just fun working together and you get to meet a lot of people. And that's worth it. It is.

Reporting for WORLD, I’m Rachel McClamroch in Orange City, Iowa.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: Today is Wednesday, June 16th. Good morning! This is The World and Everything in It from listener-supported WORLD Radio. I’m Mary Reichard.

NICK EICHER, HOST: And I’m Nick Eicher. WORLD commentator Janie B. Cheaney on religion in the classroom—not the kind you might think.

JANIE B. CHEANEY, COMMENTATOR: The California Board of Education recently approved the Ethnic Studies Model Curriculum for public high schools. It argues that students of all backgrounds need to find solidarity with their cultural heritage.

But “cultural heritage” doesn’t mean traditions and folklore. Nor does it mean developing appreciation for other cultures. The curriculum document, available on the California BOE website, is clear about that. Quote, “By asking students to examine and reflect on the history, struggles, and contributions of diverse groups within the context of racism and bigotry, ethnic studies can foster the importance of equality and justice.” It’s also supposed to, quote, “bring students and communities together.” It does that by dividing them up into groups and focusing on oppression by another “group” that has no ethnic status.

“White” is not a color or a culture, but a malevolent power. Students who have supposedly been force-fed Anglo-European concepts like rule of law, parliamentary government, and individualism will now be free to learn how their own cultures were quashed by the same.

“Critical thinking” about European oppression has been the cutting edge of educational policy since the 1970s. California’s ethnic studies proposal just codifies and extends to public schools what began in the university system 60 years ago.

A bizarre, quasi-religious fervor pervades the document. The goal is not good citizens, but soldiers for social change. Lesson plans include class chants aiming at nothing less than spiritual solidarity. The “In Lak Ech Affirmation” is based on ancient Aztec cosmology, updated as the “four movements” of reflection, action, reconciliation, and transformation. The chant calls on Aztec deities to, quote, “allow us to become more realized human beings” in search of “healing epistemologies” and “makin’ things happen.”

To unwoke ears, it just sounds silly. Opponents point out that the gods of the ancient Aztecs, and the bloody rites associated with them, were not models of liberation. Also, that dragging pagan religion into the classroom might violate the Disestablishment Clause of the First Amendment. Not that anyone actually imagines the Aztec gods are listening. Or do they?

R. Tolteka Cuauhtin, a Los Angeles teacher, has argued that white Americans were guilty of “theocide” by replacing indigenous religions with Christianity. His book, Rethinking Ethnic Studies, proposes a, quote, “regeneration of indigenous epistemic and cultural futurity.” In other words, Western culture, and the Christian faith that built it, have got to go—to be replaced by the indigenous epistemic of sun worship and human sacrifice.

Just kidding, of course—but not by much, given the spiritual zeal of abortion zealots and radical environmentalists. More traditional educators are concerned about a proposal that pits groups against each other. Substituting leftist ideology for balanced history has already created hostility and tensions. The Model Curriculum almost literally deifies social change—and invites the wrath of the gods.

I’m Janie B. Cheaney.

JANIE B. CHEANEY: No doubt you’ve heard about WORLD’s June Giving Drive. And I’ll add an amen to my colleagues over the past several days as they’ve encouraged you to support us. If you’ve done that already, thank you so much for your continued generosity and vision for the important work of WORLD.

But I’ll add something else: I have the benefit of years of personal history here as a magazine columnist and as a commentator on The World and Everything in It and I’m grateful to have been able to see the way God has sustained WORLD through the gifts of His people.

The other benefit of years is being able to see how strategic WORLD has proved to be.

As our culture continues its long slide, I’m grateful for WORLD’s voice of truth. I’m reminded of the great conservative thinker William F. Buckley Jr., who famously said the job of the conservative is to stand athwart history, yelling “Stop!” And no doubt we need to stop. But we also need voices like WORLD’s to stand athwart history, pointing to the sovereign Christ who governs history.

If you agree with that, would you support WORLD’s June Giving Drive today?

Please visit WNG.org/donate and help strengthen the future of WORLD. Again, WNG.org/donate.

NICK EICHER, HOST: Tomorrow: a presidential summit. We’ll take you to Geneva. Our European correspondent Jenny Lind Schmidt is on hand for the meeting between President Joe Biden and Russia’s Vladimir Putin.

Also, the U.S. postal service is in deep financial trouble and Congress is considering a bailout.

That and more tomorrow.

I’m Nick Eicher.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: And I’m Mary Reichard.

The World and Everything in It comes to you from WORLD Radio.

WORLD’s mission is biblically objective journalism that informs, educates, and inspires.

For the moment all discipline seems painful rather than pleasant, but later it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it.

Go now in grace and peace.

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