The Seattle-based Mars Hill church network, founded and
(until recently) led by pastor and prolific author Mark Driscoll, is to disband
into individual autonomous churches. Driscoll resigned as senior pastor of the
network last month after facing growing criticism of his leadership style and
also of the marketing of his books. A church investigation found that Driscoll
had not done anything immoral or illegal, but that he was regularly brash,
arrogant and rude in personal relationships, and that he had led the network in
a ‘domineering’ style. Driscoll resigned after accepting that the criticism was
accurate. Mars Hill will sell its offices and other properties that are not
connected with individual churches.
A father in the Ivory Coast who tried to sell his 11 year
old daughter into a forced marriage has
been fined and jailed. He was caught when the girl’s school reported her
absence from classes to a rights group, which in turn told police; the girl was
found wearing a marriage veil at a ceremony where the groom was absent. The
practice of child marriages is widespread in poor Muslim areas of the country;
the convicted man’s brother told journalists that Islam “recommends” child
marriages because it says that when a woman has her first menstrual period, she
can marry. The brother added that their own mother was married at the age of
nine.
Meanwhile, Boko Haram has denied claims from the Nigerian government
that a ceasefire has been agreed that will include the release of the captured
schoolgirls. It says no deal has been agreed and that the girls have been
married off.
A hospital in Orange County, California has designed a
special “Small Baby Unit” for babies who are “micro premature” i.e. born before
28 weeks’ gestation, or below 1kg in weight. The unit is kept dark and quiet,
in order to mimic conditions in the mother’s womb. Parents are encouraged to
play the role of therapists, touching the baby, then learning gentle baby
massage, and eventually having extended skin-to-skin contact (during which any essential painful procedures are carried out). Compared with
2009 before the unit was set up, the hospital has seen chronic lung infections among such babies drop by 40% and infections drop by 60%; the treatment also
reduces stress and anxiety for parents.
There are reports from eastern Ukraine, where pro-Russian
militants are in charge, of abductions and killings of Protestant and Catholic
Christians. Four church ministers have been murdered, and numerous church
buildings either destroyed or taken over by the militants.
In sport, a film called “United Passions” has been released
that charts the creation and development of FIFA, the governing body of world
football. One newspaper described it as “thoroughly un-objective” and “full of
scenes of people looking out of windows at scenic locations where boring meetings
are taking place,” and summarised, “we have seen it and reviewed it so that you
don’t have to.” However, it might have one redeeming feature for Scottish
viewers; the English are the bad guys since the English FA originally opposed the
creation of FIFA.
In technology news, a new gadget has been released in the USA
to help locate ‘lost’ items. The KiiTAG can be attached to items such as your
hand luggage in an airport, and it will send a Bluetooth notification to your
phone if the tag is more than 200ft from the phone, telling you its last known
location. It should be a godsend to people who regularly forget where they left
things -- as long as they have remembered their smartphone.
And finally, an IT help desk worker in New York became so
fed up with people treating him like he was a robot that he started pretending
to be an automated machine when he answered calls. However, he earned himself a
20-day suspension when he successfully convinced one caller that he really was
a machine.
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