AP

CUBA: GETTING PASTORS BACK ON THE ROAD!

A Christian charity has stepped in to repair dozens of vehicles in central Cuba, helping clergy and volunteers continue reaching isolated communities. Aid to the Church in Need (ACN) funded urgent maintenance on more than 40 cars and vans where clergy depend on vehicles to visit rural congregations. Bishop Marcelo Amador told Premier News that vehicles are indispensable for pastoral care and offering support to people in need. The cars are worn out and they require constant mechanical attention. Many of the vehicles date back to the 1990s, leaving clergy to resort to hitchhiking, buses or bicycles when repairs are not possible. Thanks to ACN’s support, vital repairs to brakes, steering and electrical systems are being carried out. Clergy in the region must travel more than 100 kilometers to parishes that serve over half a million people. [Source: Premier Christian News]

HONDURAS PASTOR KILLED MOMENTS BEFORE SERVICE BEGINS
Violence against Christian leaders continues to plague Honduras. On Saturday, 9 August, Pastor Wilmer Castellanos, 55, was brutally killed just moments before he was to take the pulpit to begin a service at the Alfa Omega Church in the Las Flores community. Just moments before the service began, a man, apparently under the influence of an unknown substance and hiding a machete, silently approached the pastor and attacked him without warning. Despite efforts by church members to rush him to a medical facility, doctors confirmed he had no signs of life upon arrival.The motive remains unknown and  the suspect, reportedly a relative of the pastor, was arrested by National Police while attempting to flee, still carrying the machete.
The killing of Pastor Wilmer Castellanos marks yet another case in a disturbing wave of violence suffered by Christian leaders in Honduras. In June this year alone, three pastors were killed in separate incidents. On 14 June, Elías Guardado, pastor of a church in Lempira, was found dead in a wooded area of the municipality. On 10 June, armed men shot and killed Yonis Zepeda at his home in Choluteca. Just four days earlier, on 6 June, religious leader Hipólito Montes was slain in his residence. President of the Tegucigalpa Pastors’ Association (APT), has received death threats over his involvement in the upcoming “Prayer Walk” (Marcha de Oración), a Christian march in the Honduran capital to pray for the nation’s crisis.
Authorities attribute much of the bloodshed to the expansion and entrenched presence of criminal gangs, known locally as maras, who are involved in drug trafficking, kidnapping, and extortion. Churches and Christian leaders are often caught in the crossfire, facing harassment, threats, and persecution for refusing to collaborate with criminal groups or for promoting values that challenge the gangs’ control and economic interests.
PRAY for – *the family of Pastor Wilmer Castellanos, that God will comfort them in their grief and fill them with His peace; *Pastors and all Christian leaders facing threats for their ministry, *the strength of the Church, that it will remain steadfast and united in faith despite fierce persecution. [Source: Open Doors]

CHRISTIANS IN YEMEN
In Yemen, a Muslim-majority country on the Arabian Peninsula that borders the Red Sea, Christians are a very small and marginalised minority. Some are illiterate and many are without employment. The small number of Yemeni converts are isolated from other believers and must keep their faith secret to survive. Living in fear of government surveillance and Islamic brutality, Christians are largely without support or resources. The civil war, which began in 2014, has devastated the nation, brought the collapse of social and economic structures, and worsened the persecution of religious minorities. Because of acute food shortage, about 80% of Yemen’s 24 million people require humanitarian aid to survive. Christian aid agencies are among the international organisations trying to bring aid and raise awareness of the plight of the desperate Christian minority. [Source: Suffering Church]

FIVE-YEAR-OLDS TAUGHT THEIR BODY PARTS MAY NOT MATCH THEIR GENDER
AUSTRALIA: Victoria’s “Respectful Relationships” curriculum has been updated to teach children as young as five that their body parts may not match their gender, and that biologically male students who identify as female are entitled to play sport on girls’ teams.  Initiated in 2016 as a response to Victoria’s family violence royal commission, “Respectful Relationships’ is supposedly a teaching resource for teachers with the aim of “preventing family violence by promoting gender equality and teaching children about respectful relationships”. They warn of a “school-to-clinic pipeline” for children struggling with adolescence, who are persuaded they were born in the wrong body, and pushed towards irreversible and often harmful medical treatment.
Concerns over the curriculum are being expressed by parents, pediatricians and psychiatrists. A spokeswoman for Parents of Adolescents with Gender Distress said she and other parents of gender-dysphoric children were concerned that the policy at Victorian schools of affirming children’s chosen genders, often without the knowledge of parents, is resulting in them being sent down a path towards irreversible medical treatment. “The school-to-clinic pipeline is a very real thing,” the spokeswoman said. “We have multiple examples of young people who have been socially transitioned at school without their parents’ knowledge or consent, and as soon as they turn 18, they’ve gone to see an affirming GP or clinician and they’ve been handed a script for hormones, often based on the fact that they’ve been socially transitioned for a couple of years.”
An independent review by UK pediatrician Hilary Cass concluded in 2024 that the evidence base for gender affirming medical interventions like puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones is ‘remarkably weak’. The gender-affirming care model has been abandoned in a number of overseas jurisdictions, including the UK. Queensland is the only Australian state to have banned new prescriptions for puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones for minors. Dr Spencer, who was stood down from her role at the Queensland Children’s Hospital in 2023 after raising clinically grounded objections to the gender affirming model, has also raised concerns: “Because of the harms of medical interventions – like infertility, lack of sexual function, physical health problems and the risk of regret – we need to do what we can to assist children to feel comfortable in their body,” she said. “I think it’s wrong to introduce the notion of being transgender early. It just introduces confusion.”
A Victorian government spokesperson said: “Our schools will always support all students, and staff are trained to create the most supportive spaces. Transgender young people are 15 times more likely to attempt suicide than the general population, and we know that when young people are supported to affirm their gender identity, we get better outcomes.” However as Psychiatrist Andrew Amos has said, multiple international reviews had revealed “without question” there was “no evidence that gender affirming care, as practised in Victoria and around Australia, reduces the risk of suicide in children and adolescents. There is reason to believe it may increase the risk, particularly by reducing the likelihood of diagnosing coexisting mental illnesses in children with gender dysphoria.” Source: Compiled from APN from media sources]

BRAZIL TOPPED THE WORLD IN BIBLE DISTRIBUTION IN 2024
Brazil topped the world in Bible distribution in 2024, delivering 4.2 million printed copies and recording more than 16 million digital downloads. According to the Wycliffe Global Alliance report, Brazil also logged 5 billion online Bible chapter views. The Bible Society of Brazil played a central role in these achievements, with its mission to translate, produce and distribute relevant Bibles. A spokesman for the Wycliffe Alliance says Brazil’s accomplishments highlight a global movement that is bringing the Bible closer to nearly every language community in the world. Wycliffe organizations are currently involved in translating the Bible in more than 3,000 languages in 146 countries. Only 544 languages—spoken by an estimated 36 million people—still lack a translation project. [Source: Christian Daily International]

FORMER TRANS KIDS WARN OTHERS – ‘DON’T DO IT!’
The scripture, “God made them male and female,” is being ignored by a culture that encourages and celebrates being transgender. For many who went far enough to take steps, including surgery to alter their gender, the regret is enormous. Now, many of them are warning others not to make the same mistake. Eighteen-year-old Chloe Cole, a self-described “former trans kid,” is leading the fight to protect children from transgender surgeries. Chloe de-transitioned following years of taking puberty blockers and an irreversible double mastectomy at the age of 15. “We need to stop telling 12-year-olds that they were born wrong, that they are right to reject their own bodies and feel uncomfortable in their own skin. We need to stop telling children that puberty is an option, that they can choose what kind of puberty they will go through. My childhood was ruined along with thousands of de-transitioners that I know through our networks. This needs to stop,” she said.
In her book, Detrans: True Stories of Escaping the Gender Ideology Cult, Mary Margaret Olohan writes that many of these young people wanted to “find themselves” and had no idea of the impact transitioning would have on them. “They were told that the reason that they didn’t feel comfortable at school, the reason they didn’t have a lot of friends, the reason that they didn’t feel special, is because they weren’t in the right body. And that if they got into this right body that all of their problems would disappear, and they would feel happy and content and fulfilled. And of course, this is a lie,” Olohan told CBN News. She contends that what proponents label “gender-affirming care” is really puberty and hormone blockers, followed in many cases by gender mutilating surgeries in which there is also no going back. “A lot of these girls got double mastectomies, which is called ‘top surgery’, before they were legal adults.
As more de-transitioners start telling their stories, Olohan sees a common denominator among the young people who are now regretting their decision to transition to a different sex.  “I would say yes. For there comes a point where they think, okay, I’ve done what I was told to do. The doctor said I would be better and be happier after this. And then there’s a moment where they realize, ‘Wait, I’m not happier. I’m not better. I still have very serious mental health issues.’ Parents are often faced with a frightening ultimatum by doctors who ask: “Would you rather have a dead daughter or a living son?” “ When transitioners speak up, they’re met with a lot of hate, a lot of vitriol, a lot of bitterness and anger, and they’re told that you were never actually transgender and that you are a traitor.”
As for Chloe, her testimony before Congress has helped change the way states look at gender-affirming care. Today, half of all U.S. states ban puberty blockers and surgeries for young people under 18, and more states are expected to follow. Chloe says she and thousands of others have been the victims of one of the biggest medical scams in American history. “I speak to you in the hope that you will have the courage to bring this scandal to an end and ensure that other vulnerable teenagers and young adults don’t go through what I went through. [Source: CBN News]

BRAVE MISSIONARIES SEE MANY COMING TO JESUS IN LARGE NUMBERS IN DEADLY CORNER OF AFRICA
In one of the most perilous regions of the world, an American missionary is quietly building an army – not with weapons, but with prayer. Carole Ward has made it her life’s mission to follow God’s call and train fearless believers in Africa’s Sahel region. “It’s very dry. It’s very sandy. It’s dusty. It’s desert. It can be 100, even 115 degrees all year round,” Ward tells CBN News.  This vast stretch of land cuts across ten African nations, from Senegal to Eritrea. It’s a land of extremes – scorching heat, shifting sand, and deadly danger. More than half of the world’s terror-related deaths happen here. It’s the front line in a spiritual and physical battle.
Ward has been witnessing for Christ in this area for decades, starting in northern Uganda during the height of the brutal Lord’s Resistance Army. Then came South Sudan – civil war, destroyed villages, broken hearts.  While others fled, Carole stayed, bringing healing, hope, and the relentless love of Jesus. “You can’t live here until you’ve already died,” insists Ward. “You’ve died to yourself, and the devil can’t kill a dead man because your life isn’t your own.” Her parents spent 62 years preaching the gospel in regions terrorized by Abu Sayyaf – a leader of a Muslim terrorist group, whose objective is to establish an Islamic state in the southern Philippines. Her grandparents served as missionaries in China for 30 years. Following Jesus wasn’t just a decision. It was their legacy.
Today, Carole’s mission continues in Chad – a country shadowed by the presence of Boko Haram, ISIS, and Al Qaeda, who have murdered thousands of Christians in this region.. “My heart is to move farther and farther north into more Islamic darkness with the gospel. Because if we’re not advancing as rapidly as they are, we’ve lost,” she says. She’s launched a nationwide prayer movement, raising up local believers – Chadians who know the land, language, and cost of following and sharing Christ. “We’ve had some Boko Haram come to Jesus in our missionary training school -five of which  we’ve done in Chad now – and are launching missionaries,” Ward tells CBN News during a recent visit to the country. “We have launched over 150 missionaries in Chad.” People like Digba Katsala, a street evangelist who doesn’t just preach – he rides straight into the chaos. “Sometimes people are not very receptive; at times it gets a little confrontational, but afterwards, when people see that you persist with the Word of God, then they get used to you. And when you preach, at the end there are people that start giving their lives to Christ and that’s extraordinary,” Katsala shared with a CBN News team who joined him on the back of his motorcycle.
Chad is more than 50 percent Muslim, but that doesn’t stop Digba from openly talking about Jesus. His voice echoes through market squares and busy roads. People stop. They listen. And many respond. Then there’s Abdoulaye Mayangar, once a fervent Muslim, now another travelling missionary. His father trained with Islamic extremists in the Sahel to target Christians. Now Abdoulaye walks into the same regions, not with hate, but with hope. While the world sees terror here, he sees something else. “There is hope because many Muslims in these countries are open today to listening to the gospel,” Mayangar tells CBN News. “God is really working in the Sahel. They are coming to Jesus in large numbers, and their lives are being transformed.”
Through prayer, sacrifice, and the the power of the Holy Spirit, they are reshaping the spiritual map of one of the most dangerous places on the African continent. “Prayer transforms us to be willing to lay our lives down and fulfill the Great Commission, no matter the cost. Prayer gives us the burden,” Ward says. “We actually get maps out and we map where the unreached people groups are, where is terrorism, where are wars and bloodshed, and then say ‘let’s go’.” [Source: CBNNews]

– compiled by Guido Kettniss