Down Home Persecution; Dealing With Trump; The 6 Million Dollar Protest; Hope in Bitcoin; Ad Denied for Pricking Consciences; Home, Far Far Away; and Stronger Than Steel and Superman

Christianity

U.S. on List of Christian-Persecuting Nations wnd

The United States, Mexico and Russia were listed as “new and noteworthy” nations in the 2016 “Hall of Shame Report” published by the Washington, D.C., based human rights group International Christian Concern persecution.org, or ICC.

While ICC notes “there is no comparison between the life of a Christian in the U.S. with persecuted believers overseas,” the group noted a number of “worrying trends as an alarming indication of a decline in religious liberty in the United States.”

Here's the ICC report: Hall of Shame pdf

Israel

[OPINION] Will Trump demand a huge quid pro quo from Israel? jpost

Donald Trump is looking more and more like a godsend to the Jewish right and a disaster for those on the left. But this may be a case of "be careful what you wish for, lest it come true."

Interesting, if not a little long-winded, slightly rambly piece. Warning: There's 1 curse word included as part of a quote about 2/3rds through.

Israel to cut 6 million dollars in UN funding after anti-settlement resolution jpost

The cut ... is described as “an act of protest” and symbolically represents the portion of the UN budget allocated to anti-Israel bodies including: The Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People; The Division for Palestinian Rights; The Work of the Special Committee to Investigate Israeli Practices; and Special Information Programme on the Question of Palestine of the UN Department of Public Information.

"It is unreasonable for Israel to fund bodies that operate against us at the UN,” Israel’s Ambassador to the UN Danny Danon said in a statement. “The UN must end the absurd reality in which it supports bodies whose sole intent is to spread incitement and anti-Israel propaganda."

Cashless

Bitcoin might just be a plausible response to the “war on cash” declared by governments around the world qz

Disparate collections of people around the world may find an unlikely common cause in 2017. They include Indians struggling with the effects of demonetization; Chinese currency speculators; Swedish pensioners; and desperate Venezuelans.

Abortion

Pro-life group’s bus ads banned by Canadian judge because they aren’t ‘welcoming’ washingtontimes

Calgary-based Canadian Center for Bioethical Reform (CCBR) endthekilling.ca, was on the losing end of a Dec. 22 ruling by Justice C.S. Anderson of the Court of Queen’s Bench in Alberta. The judge found that ads CCBR wanted to run in Grande Prairie might cause “psychological harm to women who have had an abortion.”

This sounds very similar to the reasoning a pro-life tv ad was banned in France that was listed on this site back in November.

Space

Your Home Planet, as Seen From Mars jpl.nasa.gov

The image combines two separate exposures taken on Nov. 20, 2016, by the High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE) arizona.edu camera on NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. The images were taken to calibrate HiRISE data, since the reflectance of the moon's Earth-facing side is well known. For presentation, the exposures were processed separately to optimize detail visible on both Earth and the moon. The moon is much darker than Earth and would barely be visible if shown at the same brightness scale as Earth.

Research

Researchers design one of the strongest, lightest materials known news.mit.edu v

The new material, a sponge-like configuration with a density of just 5 percent, can have a strength 10 times that of steel.