The World and Everything in It - May 26, 2020

MARY REICHARD, HOST: Good morning! People who’ve found themselves with extra time on their hands recently have taken up some interesting new hobbies.

NICK EICHER, HOST: Also faith-based foster and adoption agencies face a new challenge to religious liberty in Michigan.

Plus, the next installment of our story of community grief and recovery following a deadly attack.

One of the most beautiful things to me about this was watching how this community came together around these families. And it did not matter who was black or who was white . . .

And WORLD commentator Ryan Bomberger on National Foster Care Month.

REICHARD: It’s Tuesday, May 26th. 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: Now the news. Here’s Kent Covington.

U.S. bans travel from Brazil amid COVID-19 outbreak » The White House has announced that it’s banning travel to the United States from Brazil. 

The move came just hours after National Security Adviser Robert O’Brien noted a worsening COVID-19 crisis there.

OBRIEN: They’re having a tough time with this crisis and we’re going to help them get through it. But in the meantime, it’s likely that we’re going to have to restrict travel from Brazil. 

About 370, 000 Brazilians have tested positive. That is now the second-highest total in the world. The United States has five times as many confirmed cases. But … U.S. health officials have conducted 20 times as many tests. That suggests Brazil may currently have the worst outbreak in the world. 

Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro has largely resisted coronavirus lockdowns … insisting that closing businesses will ultimately cause more hardship by wrecking the economy. 

The travel ban won’t affect U.S. citizens returning home. And it’s not expected to impact trade. 

President Trump had already temporarily banned certain travelers from other nations, including China and many European countries. 

Japan to lift state of emergency in Tokyo and surrounding areas » But things are moving in the right direction in Japan. Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is removing a coronavirus state of emergency from Tokyo and surrounding areas. WORLD’s Leigh Jones has more. 

LEIGH JONES, REPORTER: Experts on a government-commissioned panel approved the plan to end a state of emergency … that has lasted for more than a month and a half.

That cleared the way for Prime Minister Abe to allow more businesses to gradually return to normal.

Abe declared the state of emergency on April 7th, first in parts of Japan including Tokyo. He later expanded it to the entire nation and extended it through the end of May. 

Japan’s state of emergency is a soft lockdown. It’s largely a request for people to stay at home … and for non-essential businesses to close or operate shorter hours. 

The government will lift the emergency declaration in Tokyo and its three neighboring prefectures in the coming weeks. That will reopen schools and public facilities.

Japan has a population of nearly 130 million people … but only about 17,000 confirmed cases. And despite a large eldery population, it’s recorded fewer than one-thousand coronavirus-related deaths.  

Reporting for WORLD, I’m Leigh Jones. 

U.K. set to reopen retail stores » And in the U.K., Prime Minister Boris Johnson said his government is gearing up to reopen thousands of stores. 

Speaking to reporters at 10 Downing Street in London, he said it’s another of Britain’s—quote—“careful but deliberate steps on the road to rebuilding our country.”

JOHNSON: We intend to allow all other non-essential retail, ranging from department stores to small independent shops to reopen. Again, this change will be contingent upon progress against the five tests and will only be permitted for those retail premises which are COVID secure.

Outdoor markets can reopen on Monday … and all other stores can reopen June 15th, provided they follow new guidelines. 

Johnson said he also wants to start reopening schools next month … part of a push to get more parents back to work and jumpstart the British economy. 

Trump threatens to move GOP convention from North Carolina » President Trump on Monday threatened to pull the Republican National Convention out of North Carolina. That is if the state’s governor can’t assure the GOP that he’ll allow large gatherings roughly three months from now, when the convention is scheduled to start.

In a tweet, Trump said Democratic Governor Roy Cooper was still in “shutdown mood” and couldn’t guarantee full attendance in the arena where the convention is scheduled to take place. He added that Republicans need an answer “immediately.” 

Vice President Mike Pence explained that the party needs a quick answer because party conventions take “immense preparation” and months of planning. 

PENCE: We look forward to working with Governor Cooper, getting a swift response, and if need be, moving the national convention to a state that is further along in reopening and can say with confidence that we can gather there.

Before the pandemic, the GOP had estimated 50,000 people would come to Charlotte for the convention centered around its NBA arena.

On Friday, Governor Cooper moved the state into Phase 2 of its reopening … loosening restrictions on hair salons, barbers and restaurants. But indoor gatherings are still limited to 10 people. 

Spokeswoman for the governor, Dory MacMillan, responded to the White House Monday, saying state officials are currently working with the RNC. But she made no assurances, adding—quote—“North Carolina is relying on data and science to protect our state’s public health and safety.”

Astronauts set to once again blast off from American soil » For the first time in nearly a decade, U.S. astronauts are about to blast into orbit from American soil. 

A Falcon 9 rocket and Dragon capsule is slated to lift off tomorrow afternoon … with two NASA astronauts on board, Doug Hurley and Bob Behnken.

NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine said a successful launch will mean Americans no longer have to hitch a ride on Russian rockets. 

BRIDENSTINE: We’ve been buying Russian seats now for nine years. And, you know, they started off at $20 million dollars a seat. Now we’re up to $90 million dollars a seat. So this brings back an American capability to launch astronauts to space. 

And for the first time in history, a private company is running the show. Elon Musk’s SpaceX is the conductor and NASA the customer.

The astronauts will depart for the International Space Station … from the exact spot where men once flew to the moon. 

President Trump and Vice President Pence both plan to attend the launch.

NICK EICHER, HOST: It’s Tuesday, the 26th of May, 2020.

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. Well, today marks the end of Season 2 of The Olasky Interview. We’ve brought you 12 of the best interviews by Marvin Olasky, past and present. So be sure to check those out.

EICHER: Yes, and especially today’s final episode. We’re finishing on a high note with Albert Mohler, president of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. This interview took place just this past October in Asheville, at our most recent WORLD retreat. 

You may recall Mohler is a member of WORLD’s board. And he was so kind to come and address our staff—and answer their questions, too. 

So you get not only Marvin Olasky’s questions, but several WORLD staffers doing the same. Including some voices you know well, Megan Basham and J.C. Derrick.

REICHARD: It was a fun time—back in the day when people met in groups! 

But it’s different now … and a lot has changed.

Americans have spent a lot more time at home than usual over the past few months. Aside from work, child care, and household chores, some people are using their extra time to start a new hobby.

Here’s WORLD Radio’s Sarah Schweinsberg.

SARAH SCHWEINSBERG, REPORTER: When governors began issuing mandatory lockdowns, most allowed garden nurseries to stay open. 

AMBI OF GREENHOUSE

J and J Garden Center in Layton, Utah was one of them. Debbie Allred has worked there for a decade. She says the last two months have been unprecedented.

ALLRED: We’ve had actually about two months, two-and-a-half months of kind of Black Friday shopping everyday. We’ve actually emptied out all of our back greenhouses. 

Across the country, gardening is growing during lockdown. University garden extension offices report a surge in calls. Garden bloggers I spoke with said they’ve had record numbers of website visits and book sales. One called Home Gardening with Pete saw a 200 percent increase in web traffic since March. 

J and J’s Allred says many of the customers she helped had never gardened before. Some didn’t even have yards. 

ALLRED: I’ve helped a lot of people living in apartments. And they just basically have pots to plant their tomatoes… as well as planter boxes. 

Novice gardeners like Kellie and Chad Den Hartog in Iowa say gardening has been a fun way to fill extra time during lockdown. 

Den Hartog: Chad and I like to go out and do things on our weekends a lot. We don’t have kids or anything yet… and kind of thought that gardening would be a good way to fill it up and then you get to see the fruits of your labor hopefully in a couple months. 

Now they’re just waiting on their fresh ingredients for homemade salsa. 

Den Hartog: So I have tomatoes and peppers and jalapenos and onions. 

Breadmaking is also proving popular during lockdowns. The evidence? Unprecedented demand for flour and yeast at grocery stores and traffic to bread-making websites. 

Esmee Williams is the head of predictive analytics for popular cooking website, All Recipes. The site gets 3 billion visits a year. 

WILLIAM: So it’s like having this really cool lens into American kitchens. We can really get a sense of what’s happening.

Williams says over the past three months what’s been happening in the kitchen is bread.  

WILLIAMS:  So in April, views of bread recipes are up 385 percent year over year. Views of recipes that use bread machines, up 232 percent in March. In April that number was 404 percent year over year. 

One bread that has risen above the rest during quarantine is sourdough, which doesn’t use yeast. Jim Challenger runs a smaller Instagram account dedicated to the fermented bread. But it’s quickly growing.

Challenger: So I think I got 1,500 followers between last Friday and this Friday.

Emilie Raffa also runs a sourdough blog. Her page views shot from half a million a month to three and half million. 

RAFFA: I think in times of uncertainty.. as humans we tend to go back to basics and baking bread whether you know how to do it or not, has been such a huge part of our society all over the world.

Certain crafts have also taken hold. One perhaps unexpected winner? Candle-making. 

Calla Hoover is a hair dresser in Salt Lake City. While she couldn’t work, she took up the craft. 

Hoover: I was trying to think of something else that would be relatively quick to make, that I could potentially use as gifts to give people throughout the year.

Candle making fit the bill. 

Hoover: I’ve been making really small candles.. I’ve made maybe 300?

Knitting and crocheting have become other quarantine craft favorites. 

Jordan and Lindsay English own yarn manufacturer, The Fiber Seed in Ohio. They’ve seen their online sales double since March.

JORDAN: The majority of the people who are buying yarn are not elderly. They are actually probably… I would say in a range of 60 down to 20, and it’s a very vast and wide community.

Karen Hostetler runs Mountain Meadow Wool in Wyoming. Her online sales of knitting starter kits have also taken off. 

HOSTETLER: I would say five months ago we would sell maybe three kits a month. We are selling 2 to 300 kits a month now. 

So why have these activities in particular become so popular? 

Tom Meyvis is a marketing and consumer behavior professor at NYU. He points out all of these hobbies are hands-on in a time when we are forced to rely on technology for work, school, and social contact. Meyvis says as people are forced to use technology, they long for physical objects even more.  

Meyvis: So live experiences, tactile experiences where you can hold something, hold someone. That’s being taken away. And so I think there’s a greater need for these tactile, real experiences.

Christian von Uffel is a marketing and consumer behavior consultant. He says working with our hands also helps people relax and unwind. 

And, while normal life is disrupted, hobbies give people something to discuss.

Von Uffel: We don’t have those normal things that we get to talk about so we need to find social anchors to have conversations around. 

So when life does resume its normal rhythms will people keep up their newfound hobbies? Calla Hoover says her candle making days are drawing to an end. 

Hoover: I’ve not fallen in love with it. I’ve enjoyed it. 

But Kellie Den Hartog says her gardening days will go on. 

Den Hartog: I’ve really, really enjoyed it. Going out and checking on them and seeing them grow or die… It’s been fun. 

Either way, everyone I spoke to said their new hobbies helped them through an unprecedented time.

Reporting for WORLD, I’m Sarah Schweinsberg in Layton, Utah.

NICK EICHER, HOST: Next up on The World and Everything in It: the religious liberty fight over foster care.

In 2017, same-sex couple Kristy and Dana Dumont sued the state of Michigan over its partnership with Christian foster and adoption agencies. 

The couple claimed the agencies discriminated against them … because the agencies work exclusively with couples who can provide a home that includes a mother and a father. 

The legal battle that ensued over that continues today.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: The eventual decision in this case and others like it could force a choice for faith-based agencies. Do they choose between their religious beliefs or helping to find safe homes for vulnerable children?

Joining us with an update on where the case stands is Steve West. He writes the weekly Liberties roundup for WORLD Digital and he’s a fellow lawyer. Good morning, Steve!

STEVE WEST, GUEST: Good morning, Mary.

REICHARD: This case has had a lot of back and forth since 2017. Why don’t you tell us a couple of highlights just for some context?

WEST: Sure. Back in 2017, when the Dumonts brought their lawsuit, the state worked with religious foster care agencies like St. Vincent Catholic Charities, which is the one involved here. It allowed them to refer same-sex couples who wanted to foster to other agencies. But two years later, the state’s position changed when Democratic Governor Gretchen Witmer and Attorney General Dana Nessel took office.

REICHARD: And then that happened next? 

WEST: Well, Attorney General Nessel settled the lawsuit. What that meant is the state agreed to stop working with religious foster care agencies who placed only with mothers and fathers. St. Vincent wasn’t a part of the lawsuit, so it faced a decision: challenge the state’s policy or close their doors. It just couldn’t place children with same-sex couples given its belief in biblical marriage. So, St. Vincent sued the state. It claimed that the Michigan nondiscrimination law violated its First Amendment rights because it targets religion.  Eventually, a federal judge agreed. That judge blocked enforcement of the law until the matter could be tried.

REICHARD: Okay, so that takes us up through last year. But then a federal appeals court issued a decision this month. What did that ruling say?

WEST: That decision by the 6th Circuit was a procedural one, yet it shows how much is at stake here and how fierce the battle. The court allowed the lesbian couple that started all this, the Dumonts, to be a party to this action, in other words, to intervene. So, not just the state would be involved but them also. 

REICHARD: Well you know that sounds an awful lot like political machinations as much as strictly legal consideration. Steve, is this a contingency plan of some kind?

WEST: Well, it could be. The Dumonts and those backing them may be concerned that, politics being what it is, the state could change its position once again after the November election. Neither the attorney general or the governor are up for reelection this year, but Governor Witmer has been floated as a possible running mate for Democrat Joe Biden. 

REICHARD: Mmm. And that is a big question, isn’t it?

WEST: Huge. He has to pick her and he has to win for her to be replaced. It’s more likely the legislature, which is in control of Republicans, could seek to take some action to constrain the attorney general’s position. The other possibility is that the Dumonts—who have already adopted through another agency—don’t believe the state will be as aggressive in defending their position as they will. But again, it just shows how the battlelines have been drawn—not just for adoption agencies but for religious people and religious organizations anywhere who are concerned about the breadth of these nondiscrimination laws.

REICHARD: This one is headed for the Supreme Court. Which means I’ll get to cover it next term on Legal Docket! Tell us about the similar case the court has already agreed to hear next term.

WEST: Well, what happened in that case is the City of Philadelphia barred Catholic Social Services from placing foster kids because of their Biblical beliefs about marriage. This, even though the city has a foster care crisis, with 6,000 kids in care at any given time. The difference in this case is that the courts have not required Philadelphia to keep working with the agency while the decision is appealed. That means kids are getting left behind.

But let’s take heart. A friend of mine who heads an adoption agency told me recently, “Christian families still want to adopt, donors still faithfully give, and birthmothers still want to make adoption plans.” Lawsuits and rumors of lawsuits won’t stop that.

REICHARD: Steve West writes the Liberties roundup for WORLD Digital. We’ll link to his work in the transcript of today’s program. Thanks so much for joining us today!

WEST: Thanks for having me back, Mary.

NICK EICHER, HOST: Eight years ago, a woman in Johns Island, South Carolina, just down from Charleston, became a robbery victim.

Someone broke into her home, ripped out a lockbox, and made off with it.

Police never solved the crime … that is, until a six-year-old boy decided to go fishing.

Specifically, young Knox Brewer took up a coronavirus lockdown hobby of his own … the hobby of magnet fishing … which involves literally dropping a magnet into a lake and hunting for metal objects that hit bottom.

The boy figured he’d latched on to a big one that wouldn’t budge, so he got help. Eventually, he was able to surface that stolen lockbox. His dad called police who in turn got in touch with the lady who reported the robbery two years before Knox was born.

Most of the expensive stuff was gone, but inside were valuable charms from an old bracelet that she was pleased to have back.

It’s The World and Everything in It.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: Today is Tuesday, May 26th. We’re so glad you’ve joined us today! Good morning. I’m Mary Reichard.

NICK EICHER, HOST: And I’m Nick Eicher.

Coming next on The World and Everything in It:  Moving forward after unimaginable loss. Yesterday we began a four-part serial about a small Mississippi town with a dubious distinction: it was the scene of the largest mass killing in the history of the state.

Eight people died at the hand of 35-year old Cory Godbolt. But they weren’t the only victims. The killings shattered dozens of families. WORLD correspondent Kim Henderson continues with their story.

AMBI: LOW SOUND OF APEL TALKING

Lincoln County law enforcement officers were familiar with Cory Godbolt. They also knew journalist Therese Apel. She cut her teeth there as a young reporter, and she was a friend of the slain deputy. So when she arrived at the crime scenes, officers let her move in close. But even she wasn’t expecting what happened at her last stop. 

APEL: I’m pulling up to 312 East Lincoln, um, I see him on his knees and getting onto the ground. This is Godbolt, four deputies around him. One of them has just tossed his gun to the side,  and he’s not handcuffed yet . . . 

Apel was the only media on the scene, and all she had was her cellphone. So she walked the perimeter holding it down low, trying to get the lighting right.  

APEL: I see Corey kind of turn his head. And as soon as he sees me . . .  

Audio here is courtesy of Apel and The Clarion-Ledger.

GODBOLT AT SCENE
GOLDBOLT: I love my wife. I love my kids. They would not let me live and let live. I just wanted to live. I just wanted to love my family. I just wanted to love my wife . . . 

Apel’s phone was low on storage, so she was deleting pictures and apps as she went…she ended up with a string of videos and a full confession. 

APEL: Right after someone has committed a murder, there is energy, there’s an evil energy that rolls off them . . . I wasn’t afraid to face him, but there was this feeling of like, like it’s in your chest, you just feel so little and so helpless and so unable to make sense of what’s going on. . .

That weekend, as news of the shooting made headlines across the nation, I sent an email to my editor, Marvin Olasky. I let him know I lived near where it happened. He wrote me back with a question that’s rumbled around in my head ever since: How does such a small community deal with so much grief?

COMMUNITY PROMO
AMBI: SOUND OF A COMMERCIAL PLAYING 

Lincoln County, Mississippi, is rustic and rambling, with cattle auctions every Tuesday and a steady stream of 18-wheelers pulling out from the Walmart Distribution Center. Public schools get lots of support, there’s a community newspaper. The county seat, Brookhaven, has a thriving downtown area.  

APEL: It’s just a place that no matter which side of the tracks you live on  . . . there’s a real sense of community (KH: And it’s not the place you expected to have a mass murder.) No, and I think that’s been, that was one of the things that really rocked me at the beginning . . .

In the aftermath of the tragedy, expressions of grief in the community ran the spectrum. 

PRAYER VIDEO [Keep low and bring up]
AMBI: SOUND OF PRAYING 

Residents covered the slain deputy’s patrol car with flowers. Funeral goers filled and spilled out of the school gymnasium. A pastor led prayer in a driveway near one of the crime scenes. 

[Bring previous clip up to 03:39 “In Jesus’ great name we pray. Amen.”]

The youngest of the victims was Austin Edwards—11 years old. Just days before the shootings, he’d gone running with Cory Godbolt, a family friend and relative by marriage. Austin was excited. Cory had taught him how to manage his breathing while they jogged through the neighborhood down the street from the boy’s church.

A prosecutor would later point out the irony in court: Cory was the one who took Austin’s breath away forever.

AMBI: SOUND OF INTERVIEW ARRIVAL

Austin’s mother, Shayla Edwards, remembers what it was like to shop for a suit to bury him in. 

EDWARDS: It hit me at that moment that this was the last time I’d be able to shop for my son . . . his favorite color is blue, so I wanted him to have a, uh, something blue. . . . I just started crying, and I couldn’t stop crying . . .

A woman in the store walked up to Shayla. She’d seen the story on the news. 

EDWARDS: She stopped in the middle of what she was doing, and she prayed for me . . .

Some in the community seemed set on revenge. Within weeks, Godbolt’s home burned to the ground.

But one potential source of conflict did not take root: racial division. Godbolt is black, and seven of his victims were black. The slain deputy was white. And this is 20-17. The wounds of Ferguson, and police deaths in Dallas and Baton Rouge, were still raw.

Apel says officers later told her they were glad she witnessed Godbolt’s capture. 

APEL: They didn’t do anything untoward during the whole time. I didn’t see one of them lay a hand on him wrong. I didn’t see one of them even speak to him harshly. 

Through her reporting, Apel told the world about a community grief.  

APEL: One of the most beautiful things to me about this was watching how this community came together around these families. And it did not matter who was black or who was white . . . It was all one family. Lincoln County was a family. . .  there was a lot that was changed by the trauma and the sadness. But I think that love that was shown, um, amongst the people that, that lost the most really inspired the rest of the community to love one another better.

Meanwhile, the tragedy took a toll on the families of the eight victims—children were afraid to be alone, parents were unable to work, students dropped out of college, a mother moved away to escape the memories.  

JORDAN VIDEO (start, then play beneath)
AMBI: SOUND OF SPORTS ANNOUNCER

Shayla Edwards’ sister, Tiffany Blackwell, also lost a son in the shootings—18-year-old Jordan, a football standout who died shielding his cousin from bullets.  

BLACKWELL: Sometimes I get up, and I can get dressed and I’m fine. And then the next moment, uh, on my way to work I’ll hear a song or see something that reminds me of Jordan and Austin and I just cry the rest of, you know, the way to work . . .  

The murders happened in May. By that August, preacher’s kids Shayla and Tiffany were ready to do something positive with their grief. With the help of a friend, they decided on a prayer group—they named it: “United in Christ Against Violence.”

EDWARDS: So we meet, um, across the railroad track, across from, um, what’s the name of that? (Blackwell: The Chamber of Commerce) The Chamber of Commerce, and we just sit out there and we pray. 

BLACKWELL: We pray for the children in the community, the teachers, the churches, the pastors . . . 

By the time the group got going, the T-V cameras that had converged on Lincoln County after the murders were long gone. They missed those meetings. They missed the push to name a stretch of highway in memory of William Durr, the deputy who died. They missed Shon Blackwell’s Facebook Live video . . . the one of him in the parking lot, praying before going into Godbolt’s preliminary hearing. 

No, they didn’t get to watch what was coming to the surface, but Apel did. God was bringing beauty from ashes. 

APEL: You couldn’t have picked a more beautiful family for this to have happened to you . . . You see that smile on Tiffany and Shayla’s faces, and you would never know the pain that they carry.

That’s good, because Tiffany, Shayla, and their families would soon need all the support they could get . . . to seek justice. 

EICHER: WORLD Correspondent Kim Henderson returns tomorrow with part three in our serial: “A Community Grief.” If you missed the first part, you can find in at worldandeverything dot org. 

Next time, a front row seat at the trial.

NICK EICHER, HOST: Today is Tuesday, May 26th. Good morning! This is The World and Everything in It from listener-supported WORLD Radio. I’m Nick Eicher.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: And I’m Mary Reichard. May is coming to a close and with it National Foster Care Month. Commentator Ryan Bomberger says the plight of vulnerable children is worth highlighting all year long.

RYAN BOMBERGER, COMMENTATOR: Children need a mom and a dad. That’s the ideal, even if it doesn’t always play out in real life. 

I was once a child without a mom and a dad. The first six weeks in my life, I was in foster care. Nine of my other adopted siblings were also in the foster care system—some as babies, some as toddlers, some as teenagers. And like all children in this flawed but vital system, each one is precious and deserving of love. 

I’m a firm believer that there is no such thing as an unwanted child. We’re all wanted by someone. I was conceived in rape, yet adopted in love. The circumstances of our conception don’t change the condition of our worth. And the circumstances that lead hundreds of thousands of children into foster care each year don’t change the condition of their equal and irrevocable worth.

In the latest report from the Department of Health and Human Services, there were more than 400,000 precious children in foster care in 2018. Each year, more than half exit foster care through reunification with biological families, adoption, and several other reasons. That includes a small percentage who, tragically, age out of the system. There were some 125,000 children waiting to be adopted as of September 2018.

As a nation, we should be doing so much better. Out of an estimated 200,000 evangelical and conservative congregations in America, it would take about one family in one-third of these congregations to adopt to completely wipe out foster care rolls of children waiting for forever families. 

As an adoptee and adoptive father, I must sound the alarm, not only because of apathy within the church but a direct attack on it as well. As you heard earlier on the program, the LGBT movement has been trying to shut down faith-based child welfare agencies who believe in the Biblical understanding of family—with a married mother and father.  

In Philadelphia, Bethany Christian Services caved to rejoin the city’s program and agreed to mandatory LGBTQ re-education training. That was June 2018. 

In April 2019, Michigan-based Bethany capitulated in its home state, agreeing to change its 75-year-old Biblical policy and place children in same-sex homes. 

And as a side note, I used to be a board member of several state chapters of Bethany Christian Services. I know there are affiliates who have not bowed to LGBT activism or changed their placement policies.

Meanwhile, Catholic Social Services never gave up the fight and its Philadelphia case has made it to the Supreme Court. Plaintiff Sharonell Fulton is a beautifully compassionate woman who has fostered 40 children through faith-based adoption agencies. The court will hear her case in the fall.  

We need to pray—for this case and for families to stand in the gap. Vulnerable children who’ve suffered neglect and abuse need love and healing in the best environment possible. They need permanence, not politics.  

I’m Ryan Bomberger.

NICK EICHER, HOST: Tomorrow: President Trump’s judicial nominees are helping to reshape the American courts. And not just the Supreme Court. We’ll talk about that on Washington Wednesday.

And, we’ll have the third in Kim Henderson’s series on mass murder in small town Mississippi.

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.

The gospel of John tells us the thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. Jesus came that they may have life and have it abundantly.

Thanks for listening today, and please join us again tomorrow for The World and Everything in It.

WORLD Radio transcripts are created on a rush deadline. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of WORLD Radio programming is the audio record.