The World and Everything in It — October 6, 2020

MARY REICHARD, HOST: Good morning!

The race for a vaccine against COVID-19 raises concerns about its safety and the ethics of its development.

NICK EICHER, HOST: We’ll talk about the pros and cons. 

Also how digital church is affecting physical church. 

Plus, our Classic Book of the Month. This time, a presidential biography by David McCullough.

And WORLD commentator Les Sillars on when kingly crowns roll in the dust.

REICHARD: It’s Tuesday, October 6th. 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.

KENT COVINGTON, NEWS ANCHOR: Trump returns to the White House » After spending three days at Maryland’s Walter Reed military hospital, President Trump returned to the White House on Monday. 

His chief physician Dr. Sean Conley told reporters…

CONLEY: Though he may not entirely be out of the woods yet, the team and I agree that all our evaluations, and most importantly his clinical status, support the president’s safe return home.

Doctors said the president had been without a fever for 72 hours and “met or exceeded all discharge criteria.” But Conley said he was “not at liberty” to discuss the condition of the president’s lungs and whether there are signs of scarring or other lasting damage. 

Well-wishers cheered outside the hospital Monday as the president’s Marine One helicopter departed. 

The president received criticism for briefly leaving the hospital a day earlier to drive past supporters, waiving from his armored SUV. Some said it put Secret Service agents in danger of contracting COVID-19. But the White House said the short trip  was “cleared by the medical team as safe.” And Chief of Staff Mark Meadows told Fox News …

MEADOWS: We took additional precautions with PPE and others to make sure that they were protected. 

Earlier Monday, White House Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany announced that she too has tested positive for COVID-19. That adds to a list of more than a half-dozen officials with ties to the White House to test positive within the past five days. 

NYC to close many schools and may close businesses and religious institutions » New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo has ordered schools in some New York City neighborhoods to close today in an effort to halt a coronavirus flare-up. 

That after the city’s mayor, Bill de Blasio, asked for permission to reinstate restrictions in nine ZIP codes where the virus is spreading more quickly. 

But while Cuomo ordered the closure of some schools, he did not immediately grant de Blasio’s request to shut down businesses as well. But the mayor said Monday…

DE BLASIO: Our plan is to move ahead Wednesday morning with enforcement in those nine zip codes of all nonessential businesses. We will continue working with the state in the meantime to get to a final resolution. 

Most of the neighborhoods targeted by the restrictions are home to part of the city’s large Orthodox Jewish community, where many religious schools resumed in-person instruction in early September.

And Cuomo said he may also bar religious services and other gatherings. 

CUOMO: If I do not have the agreement from the religious community directly as a starting point, then we will close down the religious institutions. 

He said he’s confident any such closures would survive legal challenges. 

Regal will once again close all U.S. theaters » The nation’s second-largest chain of movie theaters is shutting down all of its locations once again, less than two months after reopening. WORLD’s Kristen Flavin reports. 

KRISTEN FLAVIN, REPORTER: Regal will temporarily close all 536 of its U.S. locations on Thursday—along with more than a hundred theaters it owns in the U.K. The closures will affect some 45,000 employees.

The news comes after filmmakers once again pushed back several major planned fall releases, including the latest Wonder Woman and James Bond films. 

Studios grew increasingly skittish after the action-thriller Tenet failed to light up the box office. It was billed as the return of the blockbuster, but since its September 3rd release, it’s earned only $45 million domestically. 

Against the backdrop of COVID-19, Regal and it’s top competitor, AMC Theaters, have installed a host of safety measures to reassure customers.

But Regal said without major new releases to draw in moviegoers, it’s losing more money by remaining open amid the pandemic.

Reporting for WORLD, I’m Kristen Flavin. 

Azerbaijan-Armenia conflict heats up » AUDIO: [SOUND OF NAGORNO-KARABAKH]

Small mushroom clouds have billowed over neighborhood streets in Nagorno-Karabakh since Friday. That as troops from Armenia and Azerbaijan continue to fight over the disputed region.

Azerbaijan’s Defense Ministry on Monday accused Armenia of shelling several residential towns. Armenia denied that accusation and accused Azerbaijan of firing missiles into the region’s capital of Stepanakert.

 NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg told reporters on Monday…

STOLTENGERG: It is extremely important that we convey a very clear message to all parties involved that they should cease fighting immediately, that we should support all efforts to find a peaceful solution. 

The two countries have reported some 250 deaths since clashes erupted late last month. Nagorno-Karabakh is in the majority Muslim Azerbaijan but has served primarily as home to Armenian Christians since 1994.

Nobel Committee awards prize to three men for discovering hepatitis C » The Nobel Committee is awarding the Nobel Prize for medicine to two Americans and a British-born scientist…

PERLMANN: Harvey J. Alter, Michael Houghton, and Charles M. Rice for the discovery of  hepatitis C virus.

The committee’s Secretary-General Thomas Perlmann, heard there, credited the men with saving millions of lives.

Charles Rice said he found out about the award when his landline, which never rings, woke him at 4:30 in the morning.

RICE: I figured that, you know, this was probably a crank phone call or there was some disaster in the laboratory and, you know, one of our low temperature freezers was warming up and a crisis was occurring. 

The trio’s work, dating back to the 1970s and 80s, identified a major source of blood-borne hepatitis.

Before the discovery of hepatitis C, some compared blood transfusions to Russian roulette. But the committee said their discovery helped to essentially eliminate “post-transfusion hepatitis in many parts of the world.”

Hepatitis C is a major cause of liver cancer and cirrhosis requiring liver transplants.

I’m Kent Covington.

Straight ahead: COVID-19 vaccine trials.

Plus, Les Sillars on the destructive force of liberalism.

This is The World and Everything in It.

MARY REICHARD: It’s Tuesday, the 6th of October, 2020. Glad to have you along for today’s edition of The World and Everything in It. Good morning, I’m Mary Reichard.

NICK EICHER: And I’m Nick Eicher. First up: vaccine trials.

Pharmaceutical companies are racing to create a safe, effective way to build immunity against the novel coronavirus. Health officials say viable vaccines are key to getting back to normal. But some people have questions: how are scientists developing them and are they safe?

WORLD senior correspondent Katie Gaultney reports.

KATIE GAULTNEY, SENIOR CORRESPONDENT: As a doctor of nursing practice, Tara Cavazos is very comfortable being the one giving the shots.

DOCTORS OFFICE: [knock, door opens] Good morning. How are you doing today? You’re going to get your flu shot. Is that right? Yes. Okay, perfect. So remember with the flu vaccine…

But last month, she found herself in the role of “patient,” as a participant in Pfizer’s COVID vaccine trial in Dallas. Being a member of the medical community means she’s probably savvier than the average participant about how to interpret her experience. She’s doing close analysis to try to figure out if she got the “real deal” or the placebo.

CAVAZOS: They use hypertonic saline in the placebo, and the injection when I got it, it hurt, which most of them do. But it felt different than a typical flu shot or a tetanus vaccine. I had some discomfort. So part of me thinks maybe that was the hypertonic saline that was making my muscle feel sore.

In other words, she felt like it was a placebo. But she hopes she’s wrong. Her office has been swabbing patients for COVID since the pandemic arrived in Dallas.

CAVAZOS: And so for me, it’s a way to keep my patients safe. Because if I have some sort of immunity, I can keep serving them, keep my family safe, and also to be something greater than just myself. And if I can contribute in a small way by being in a clinical trial, I feel like it’s a way to give back to medicine. 

Over the course of several appointments, Cavazos will get two injections, along with regular nasopharyngeal swabs and blood draws to detect the presence of the virus or antibodies. She says she isn’t too worried about complications, since this is phase three of the trial. The vaccine manufacturers already have a lot of research and testing under their belts at this point.

Dave Thompson is a toxicologist who works with pharmaceutical manufacturers on testing before they’re ready to try out a product on humans. He explains the vaccine trial process.

THOMPSON: For phase one, a vaccine would be given to a small number of people and this would be between, say 20 and 100 individuals. 

Then comes phase two… 

THOMPSON: …which would involve several hundred, maybe a thousand patients here. They would evaluate the proper dose that they want to use in the ultimate trial, the phase three trial.

That’s the last and biggest trial, with many tens of thousands of participants per vaccine candidate. Pfizer’s is just one. Moderna, AstraZeneca, and Johnson & Johnson’s subsidiary Janssen, are among the other companies running trials around the world. It’s a horse race to see who can develop a safe and effective COVID-19 vaccine.

Dr. Anthony Fauci told Congress last month, that’s a good thing for the rest of us.

FAUCI: And so as these trials go on, we predict that some time by the end of the year, let’s say November or December, we will know whether or not these are safe and effective.

He says the trials are showing an immune response from the vaccine that may be better than natural immunity, and without the potential for long-term complications. Some people who have had COVID-19 struggle with ongoing negative neurological, cognitive, or vascular effects.

The ticking clock means companies are conducting research and testing at an unprecedented pace. That’s one reason it’s called “Operation Warp Speed.” Manufacturers are already producing vaccines so they’ll be ready for distribution if and when FDA approval comes through. It’s a gamble because there’s a chance those vaccines will never go to market.

Dr. Jeff Barrows is senior vice president of bioethics and public policy for the Christian Medical and Dental Associations. He says even with that huge production effort, we almost certainly won’t have enough doses for everyone who wants one, at least at first. So the National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine has come up with a way to prioritize.

BARROWS: Their model basically goes from trying to get the best good out of the vaccine itself. And so what they’re going to do is try and label those individuals or those workers that are in certain sectors of our society that are number one most exposed to the virus. And so they’re laying out the groups of individuals who should get access to the vaccine first, I think in a very equitable and ethical way.

High-risk healthcare workers likely will get first dibs, followed by first responders, people with significant health risks, the elderly, and so on.

But not everyone who can get a vaccine wants one. Some are worried about vaccine safety.

Toxicologist Dave Thompson says everyone should weigh their own risk.

THOMPSON: I respect people’s right to either take a vaccine or not. I don’t think people should be made to, to do that. But myself, I think that vaccines are very safe. There’s a risk involved, but it’s a reasonable risk.

Christians have another issue to wrestle with. All of the vaccines currently in phase-three testing have used one of two aborted fetal cell lines at some point along the way. Those cells were gathered from abortions done in 1972 and 1985.

Moderna and Pfizer used them in the research phase, while AstraZeneca and J&J’s Janssen are using them in production. If the only vaccine to make it to market comes from that group, Barrows says his organization will still encourage its members to get the vaccine.

BARROWS: The good, that will be accomplished is much, much greater than any complicity with evil. And again, again, recognizing that the evil occurred at a minimum of a 35 to 40 years ago.

But those who object to any use of fetal cell lines—no matter how long ago the abortions took place—have another option: wait. Developers can use cell lines derived from sources other than human fetal tissue.

Barrows says it can be hard to get accurate data on the exact developmental steps taken for many of these vaccine trials. But it appears a handful of pharmaceutical companies, including giants like Novavax, Sanofi Pasteur, and GlaxoSmithKline are using ethically sourced cell lines for their vaccines.

Reporting for WORLD, I’m Katie Gaultney in Dallas, Texas.

NICK EICHER: Coming up next on The World and Everything in It: the state of the church.

After the March coronavirus shutdown, almost every church in the country began to stream Sunday worship. And even as many have begun to reopen and gather in person, they’re still putting services online for people who cannot.

MARY REICHARD: How does digital church affect churches and church goers? WORLD’s Anna Johansen reports.

ANNA JOHANSEN, REPORTER: Kristi Funni used to drive to church every week. Pre-COVID, of course.

FUNNI: My husband was serving on the greeting team on Sunday mornings, and I serve in children’s ministry. My daughter was attending youth group every week. 

When the church shut down, the whole family switched to watching the online service in their living room—usually in their P.J.s. Though grateful for the virtual option, Funni says it wasn’t the same.

FUNNI: Very different. It wasn’t, it wasn’t like being at church at all, for us anyway. 

No one really felt comfortable singing in their P.J.s in the living room.

FUNNI: So at that point, the worship part of it became kind of observational. And you tried to engage as far as like listening and you know, meditating on the words, but it was not the same.

Her husband’s Bible study switched to Zoom meetings, but the group dropped by about half. Funni tried to join a Zoom prayer meeting, but the format was too unwieldy for the number of people. The family still watched the service every Sunday, but Funni had a hard time staying engaged.

Her experience highlights a continuing concern for churches. Most have resumed meeting in person in one form or another. But the majority report a massive drop in attendance, less than half of what it used to be. Many people are still attending online—either because of health concerns or space limitations at their church building. That means digital church isn’t going anywhere anytime soon.

Heidi Campbell is a professor of communications at Texas A&M University. She studies digital religion and media, and says the way you do online church matters.

CAMPBELL: Just because we’re using social media doesn’t mean we’re building relationships, just because there’s connectivity doesn’t mean you have community.

Early in the pandemic, many churches were just trying to get something online. But now, they’ve been doing it long enough to start experimenting with different techniques. Campbell says the best tactic is to encourage active engagement, rather than just passive viewing. That’s especially important for building community.

CAMPBELL: Church in America has really become event and experience oriented. And it’s about the Sunday. And when that’s stripped away, you know, what is church and what is Christian community And how do we facilitate community especially when maybe the community that we thought we have, we don’t really have as strongly as we thought.

Many pastors are grateful for the ability to stream services. But digital church does have its drawbacks.

RAINER: It is extraordinarily hard to engage online.

Sam Rainer heads the research group Church Answers. He’s also a pastor at West Bradenton Baptist Church in Florida. The church has both online and in person service options. Rainer wants to have a strong digital presence and take safety seriously.

RAINER: But we are an in person first church, digital second church. And I firmly believe in the incarnational side of ministry that it’s meant to be done in the flesh as Christ came in the flesh.

Rainer calls online services a short term band aid, and says that, like many things, convenience can be both good and bad.

RAINER: If you treat church like Netflix, and it’s always on demand, well, you remove the discipline, and you remove the accountability. And when you remove discipline and accountability, people are going to fade away, or they’re going to multitask, or they’re going to do other things. 

Rainer believes churches will shrink by an average of 20 percent over the next year and a half. That’s mainly the people who were just starting to come to church, or who came occasionally, or who were already drifting away.

RAINER: I think we lost a lot of those people during the pandemic.

But not all churches are struggling.

Pastor Zach Lambert has had a very different experience at his Texas church, Restore Austin. The church has yet to return to in person services. It’s still completely online…and things are going really well.

LAMBERT: We still have pretty vibrant, small groups that meet on zoom throughout the week. And our participation in those has been really extremely high over the last six months, with even a ton of new folks joining those groups.

On Sunday, Lambert streams the service live on Facebook and YouTube. It’s hard to track attendees on those platforms, but he says he knows of several new families who have started attending Restore Austin in the last few months. He thinks it will be a while before people even want to come back to church in person.

LAMBERT: People are, I think, wondering if the one of the long lasting effects of this is that nobody wants to sit in a room with 2,500 people anymore, ever again.

Pastors like Zach Lambert and Sam Rainer want to be sensitive to people with health concerns who can’t come back to an indoor, in person service. But Rainer says it’s still good to miss the physical gathering of believers.

RAINER: Our goal is for you to long to be in person.

At the end of the day, Rainer says the people that are really invested in church are invested both on and offline. And whether you watch the sermon in your PJs in the living room, or dressed up in a pew, the most important thing is to be fully present and engaged.

For Kristi Funni, going back to an in-person service at her church was unexpectedly emotional.

FUNNI: We pulled into that parking lot. And I could feel the tears coming. Like even if I think about it right now, I can just, I can still remember that feeling. 

She says, at home, she didn’t fully realize how much she missed worshipping with fellow believers.

FUNNI: And I was just like, yeah, this is different. This is where I want to be on Sunday morning.

Reporting for WORLD, I’m Anna Johansen.

NICK EICHER: Suppose you heard the federal government spent $23 million on a toilet, what would you say?

What if you heard—furthermore—the government had no intention of making it available for use anywhere on earth?

Well, that’s exactly what’s happening, but it’s not quite as outrageous as I’m making it sound.

AUDIO: 5-4-3-2-1‚ and liftoff. Sights set on the International Space Station.

Right, NASA launched a care package complete with some Thanksgiving goodies for the astronauts to enjoy, some pressurized air tanks to repair a leak, a virtual-reality camera to shoot some great video, and that titanium toilet more suitable for the use of women astronauts.

It’s NASA’s first new space toilet in decades—boldly going where few such fixtures have gone before!

It’s The World and Everything in It.

NICK EICHER: Today is Tuesday, October 6th. You’re listening to WORLD Radio and we are so glad you are! Good morning. I’m Nick Eicher.

MARY REICHARD: And I’m Mary Reichard. Well, it’s the first Tuesday of the month and that means it’s time for our Classic Book of the Month. And for that we welcome back Emily Whitten. Good morning, Emily.

EMILY WHITTEN, BOOK REVIEWER: Morning, Mary!

REICHARD: What should we talk about today?

WHITTEN: One of my favorite books. John Adams by David McCullough. 

MR: Ah, yes.

WHITTEN: HBO made the book into an award-winning TV series back in 2008. I’d like to play a short clip of actor Paul Giamatti as John Adams before he became president. Here, Adams is a young, ambitious lawyer. He lives in Boston with his growing family, and a conflict we call the Boston Massacre leads to the death of several Americans by British soldiers. Despite threats to his safety, Adams takes the case. 

GIAMATTI: Disregard these uniforms. Consider them men. Consider yourselves in such a situation, whether a reasonable man would not fear for his life. Facts are stubborn things. See whatever may be our wishes, our inclinations, or the dictums of our passions, they cannot alter the state of facts and evidence. 

Mary, during a 2014 Q & A at the Library of Congress, the interviewer asked author David McCullough how he would sum up John Adams. McCullough answered by pointing to that courtroom scene in the book and the movie. 

MCCULLOUGH: Adams said, if we really believe everybody deserves legal defense in a trial, we better live up to what we say we believe. I’ll defend them. He did so certain it was going to ruin him. To the credit of the people of that time, it made him. Because they realized he was right. And he got them off because of a very clear and fair and convincing argument.

REICHARD: McCullough speaks in an understated way, but I’ve got goosebumps over here!

WHITTEN: Me too, Mary. And Adams doesn’t just yell and stomp off, he knows what’s right and he states in a way that persuades the other side. Despite a lot of pressure, Adams sticks to his principles, and he carries the day. And you see those same traits again when he helps found our country.  

REICHARD: Such an inspiring story. Emily, tell us more about David McCullough and how he came to write this book?

WHITTEN: Sure. Born in 1933, McCullough grew up in Pittsburgh. He later went to Yale to become a writer, not a historian. After graduation, he worked at several magazines, including Time and American Heritage. One day he visited the Library of Congress and saw some striking photographs of the Johnstown Flood. And that inspired him to want to know the story of those affected. So, he wrote his first book about them. 

MCCULLOUGH: History is about people. History is human. ‘When in the course of human events,’ Jefferson wrote. The operative word is human. You have to get to know the people. And remember, none of them knew how it was going to come out anymore than we know how it’s gonna come out in our time.

We live in a time when history seems to be the handmaiden of ideology. 

REICHARD: I want to stop you there. That’s a great line: “We live in a time when history seems to be the handmaiden of ideology.” Quite a statement.

WHITTEN: I think of the biased treatment of the New York Times 1619 project. In contrast, McCullough provides a well-researched look at John Adams and his fellow patriots.

McCullough quotes from public speeches, letters, and diaries. He helps readers see Adams as a fallible human being who really walked this earth. Whenever possible, McCullough stood where Adams stood and tried to see what he would have seen. That kind of humble scholarship, along with the clear writing, helps us see John Adams the man.

REICHARD:  McCullough won a Pulitzer Prize for this book, didn’t he?

WHITTEN: That’s right. In fact, it was his second Pulitzer. And of course, McCullough won many other awards, including two National Book Awards. He won the Presidential Medal of Freedom. So, I’m not the only one who enjoys his work!

REICHARD: Prolific writer. What else should we know about the book John Adams?

WHITTEN: McCullough emphasizes relationships. For instance, Adams’ relationship with his wife takes center stage for most of the book. She raises children and serves as a gracious hostess. But she also matches Adams intellectually and serves as his closest political adviser. Here’s McCullough again:

MCCULLOUGH: And he had a terrific wife. He’s the only founding father—most people don’t know this, but I think it’s so important—he’s the only founding father who never owned a slave as a matter of principle. And his wife felt the same way. She thought slavery was a sin, evil, unjust, unAmerican. And they never changed that view whatsoever.

Here we see a Christian wife and husband who really worked as a team. In many ways, they helped each other live out their Christian principles. Which as you know, Mary, isn’t always easy to do.

REICHARD: Right? So, would you call this a Christian book?

WHITTEN: No. I don’t think McCullough necessarily means to promote Christian beliefs. He does report honestly what Adams says and thinks. Occasionally Adams’ faith shines through.

REICHARD: That sounds like a book we could all benefit from right now! 

WHITTEN: Right. And I know some of us may be disheartened by the state of politics today. If that’s you, I hope this book will encourage you. John and Abigail Adams lived during a time of tremendous violence and political chaos. McCullough shows that their sacrifices mattered to many people. It mattered to the British soldiers we talked about at the beginning, and it matters to us today. We have a say in our government because of what they did. That’s worth remembering.

REICHARD: I love a good biography. Thank you for the recommendation today, Emily. 

WHITTEN: You’re very welcome, Mary. Happy reading!

REICHARD: For October, Emily recommended John Adams by David McCullough. For more classic book ideas, just search for Classic Book of the Month at worldandeverything.org.

MARY REICHARD: Today is Tuesday, October 6th. Good morning to you!  This is The World and Everything in It from WORLD Radio, supported by listeners like you. I’m Mary Reichard.

NICK EICHER: And I’m Nick Eicher. Megan Basham recently reviewed the film titled Mr. Jones. It’s about a freelance reporter who broke the story on the terrible famine Stalin caused in the Ukraine in the 1930s. But Jones wasn’t the only reporter in that era telling an unpopular truth about Soviet Communism. 

Here’s WORLD commentator Les Sillars.

MUGGERIDGE: I regard liberalism as the great disease of our society…

LES SILLARS, COMMENTATOR: That’s British journalist Malcolm Muggeridge. He introduced Mother Teresa to the world in a 1967 BBC interview. Sadly, he’s largely forgotten today. But he had a biting wit and was a fierce critic of modern culture. In 1969 he went on William F. Buckley’s show, The Firing Line, and said Eleanor Roosevelt did more damage than Stalin or Hitler.

Muggeridge: Hitler and Stalin got a lot of people killed and precipitated a great war but they are now discredited. But liberalism continues to thrive despite the fact that every time it’s been applied the consequences have been disastrous…

Muggeridge abandoned Communism in the 1930s after traveling to Moscow in 1932 to write for the Manchester Guardian. Like Gareth Jones of the movie, he too sneaked into Ukraine to report on the famine there. And, like Jones, he was excoriated for it.

But it started his journey toward Christianity. In 1978 he delivered a pair of lectures at the University of Waterloo in Ontario. The first was titled, “The End of Christendom.”

Christendom, he says, is the institutional edifice on which Western civilization rests. It’s dying, but it’s not Christianity. I tried but couldn’t find a recording, so try to imagine Muggeridge saying this:

Quote: “Previous civilizations have been overthrown from without by the incursion of barbarian hordes. Christendom has dreamed up its own dissolution in the minds of its own intellectual elite. Our barbarians are home products, indoctrinated at public expense, urged on by the media systematically … dismantling Christendom, depreciating and deprecating all its values. The whole social structure is now tumbling down, dethroning its God, undermining all its certainties.” Unquote.

It sounds familiar, doesn’t it? Muggeridge wasn’t done.

“The End of Christendom” was followed by a second lecture, “But Not of Christ.” We should expect Christendom to decompose and disappear, he said. The world’s response to decay is to engage in, quote, “idiot hopes and idiot despair.”

All such hopes and fears are beside the point, Muggeridge said. Quote: “As Christians we know that here we have no continuing city, that crowns roll in the dust and every earthly kingdom must sometime founder, whereas we acknowledge a king men did not crown and cannot dethrone, as we are citizens of a City of God they did not build and cannot destroy.” Unquote.

We should rejoice when empires fall to pieces, when all is confusion and conflict, he said. Quote: “For it is precisely when every earthly hope has been explored and found wanting, when every possibility of help from earthly sources has been sought and is not forthcoming, … when in the shivering cold the last stick has been thrown on the fire and … every glimmer of light has finally flickered out, it’s then that Christ’s hand reaches out sure, and firm. Then Christ’s words bring their inexpressible comfort, then His light shines brightest, abolishing the darkness forever.” Unquote.

I’m Les Sillars, and that was Malcolm Muggeridge.

NICK EICHER: Tomorrow: President Trump and COVID-19. His diagnosis puts more fuel onto the campaign fire. We’ll talk about that on Washington Wednesday.

And, we’ll meet a biologist who spends his days tracking wolves.

That and more tomorrow. 

I’m Nick Eicher.

MARY REICHARD: 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.

Seek the Lord and his strength; seek his presence continually! 

Thanks for listening. Go now in grace and peace.

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