WASHINGTON UPDATE 12/03/2015 GOD IS IN CONTROL AND PRAYER IS POWERFUL

| December 03, 2015 | Permalink God CAN Fix This Of all the horrific shootings this country has suffered these past few years, yesterday's tragedy at San Bernardino may have been the most significant. Not because it took more lives than others, or even because of the gunmen's potential motives. No, Wednesday's tragedy was more stunning because it prompted an even fiercer attack -- on faith. Instead of turning to one another for strength in crisis, Americans turned on each other. Led by a rabid media, the headlines were no longer about the victims and their grieving families -- but about leaders who dared to do what the frightened people inside the killing ground asked: pray. Splashed with contempt across the front cover of the New York Daily News were the messages of several Republicans, whose natural reaction to tragedy was to turn where men since the first Continental Congress had. To God. "Our prayers are with the victims, their families, and the first responders in San Bernardino," Senator Ted Cruz (R-Texas) had tweeted. "Please keep the victims of #SanBernardino in your prayers," Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wisc.) urged. In bold text, the News's cover screamed back, "GOD ISN'T FIXING THIS." It was a startling response -- one that exploded through the darkest corners of Twitter "progressivism," until even a Connecticut senator, before anyone had an inkling of what had happened or why, lashed out with: "Your 'thoughts' should be about steps to take to stop this carnage. Your 'prayers' should be for forgiveness if you do nothing -- again." Later, his office tried to clarify, but it was too late. Angry liberals had already made their point: This is no longer the America of 1774. Or even 2001. It's a new era of openly demonizing anyone with deep and sincere faith. "As latest batch of innocent Americans are left lying in pools of blood," the News scoffed, "cowards who could truly end gun scourge continue to hide behind meaningless platitudes." Meaningless platitudes? Like the ones enshrined in our Constitution -- or inscribed on our coins? How far we've fallen. Hours after a Muslim couple mowed down dozens of people in a quiet county office, the story isn't that they may have been radicalized in Saudi Arabia or had enough explosives to blow up a neighborhood block, but that the American people had the audacity to get on their knees and pray. "At one time in American history," The Atlantic's Emma Green wrote wistfully, "liberals and conservatives shared a language of God, but that's clearly no longer the case; any invocation of faith is taken as implicit advocacy of right-wing political beliefs." The one constant in crisis -- from Pearl Harbor to 9/11 -- was "In God We Trust." Now, the same party that voted God out of its platform is so hostile to Christians under President Obama that it begs the question: Is this culture of enmity so strong that it's actually motivating acts like this? Despite what liberals would have you believe: hate is what drives men to slaughter innocent people -- not guns. And the government can't make us safer until it recognizes that the problem isn't the instruments of violence, but the environment of it. If the White House truly wanted to end the animosity dividing us, it would stop inflaming it through policies that punish religion and fast-track moral decline. It isn't that God can't fix this -- it's that cynics like the ones at New York Daily News won't let Him. In her column about the Left's response to the shooting, The Federalist's Mollie Hemmingway hit the nail on the head. Liberals are only diminishing the Christian faith so that they can exercise their own religion: big government. "[Progressives] explain that the god of good government would have been able to take care of us if only we'd given it sufficient power to do so. In this case, that power is gun control," she points out. "Progressives tend to believe that government -- if made to have sufficient size, scope, and proper management over the affairs of man -- will fix or at least seriously mitigate the problem of evil in the world. They tend to believe that man can be perfected, and perfected through government action. These almost cartoonish denunciations of prayer we saw yesterday, combined with the implicit praises of government action, are best understood as a sort of primitive religious reaction to the problem that growth of the state still hasn't fixed the problem of evil in the world." While these forces tug at the fraying fabric of America, our prayers are more important than ever. And we will continue offering them -- for our leaders, for the victims, and for our nation -- without apology. From Pews to Primaries... While the media was desperately trying to shame men and women of faith after yesterday's nightmare in San Bernardino, the Republican presidential field continued to embrace them. Presidential candidates from Dr. Ben Carson to Senator Ted Cruz (R-Texas) aren't buying the line that the GOP has to appeal to moderates to win. Instead, the campaigns are aggressively pursuing evangelicals -- and turning the media's narrative on its head in the process. With great intentionality, the campaigns are making a point of meeting with dozens pastors, which speaks -- not just to the increased influence of evangelicals, but to the growing engagement of pastors and their churches. Recognizing that our nation is in peril, more religious leaders are making the conscious choice to step out and engage the political process. Every other day it seems the candidates are announcing clergy endorsements, including hopefuls like Governor Jeb Bush and Donald Trump who are less vocal about their faith. Like us, they know that evangelicals represent about half of the voting population in GOP primaries -- so it's not just a positive development, but a strategic one. "We know that if even a fraction of the evangelicals who routinely don't vote were to turnout and vote, Washington could be changed almost overnight," Cruz said. Dr. Carson, Senator Rick Santorum, Senator Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), and Senator Cruz are all making a point of meeting with faith leaders. And of course, Governor Mike Huckabee has the advantage of actually being a former pastor. If you want to know who has influence in 2016, follow the candidates. And right now, those candidates are racing each other to church! Malevolence or Benevolence? Fetal Tissue Research "You don't need to kill a young human to get effective stem cells." That was the core message of Dr. David Prentice today at FRC when he lectured on, "Malevolence or Benevolence? Fetal Tissue Research, Planned Parenthood's abortions, and Embryonic Stem Cells." Dr. Prentice, one of America's most distinguished bioethicists and stem cell experts, currently serves as Vice President and Research Director for the Charlotte Lozier Institute, the research arm of the pro-life Susan B. Anthony List. He is also Adjunct Professor of Molecular Genetics at the John Paul II Institute of the Catholic University of America and an Advisory Board Member for the Midwest Stem Cell Therapy Center at the University of Kansas, which was developed under his leadership. Previously, he served more than ten years as Senior Fellow for Life Sciences at FRC and, before that, for more than two decades as a professor and researcher at several major universities. Dr. Prentice showed an interactive map, GetYourCare.org, produced by the Lozier Institute and others that displays how accessible community health centers are across the country as compared to Planned Parenthood centers. He noted that were Planned Parenthood a country, it would be the sixth largest abortion provider in the world. And he emphasized that as opposed to embryonic stem cells, adult stem cells "are where the real successes are." After cataloging a host of effective adult stem cell treatments, Dr. P made clear that embryonic stem cell research is not just a medical failure but a moral one, as well. "To get embryonic stem cells, you have to destroy a young human being. It's simply unethical to sacrifice a life like that as an experiment," he said. We're grateful for the work of this brilliant scientist who sustains his leading-edge scientific expertise on the solid rock of unchanging moral truth. Morality and science not only can co-exist but thrive. Dr. Prentice proves it. And adult stem cells, as he demonstrates so persuasively, truly do save lives. To learn more, visit Dr. P's fascinating website, "Stem Cell Research Facts," where you can view moving videos of people whose lives have been transformed by adult stem cell treatments. Tony Perkins' Washington Update is written with the aid of FRC Action senior writers.