Baha’is in Colorado Springs will host a public meeting at 7 p.m. on July 10 at the Baha’i Center, 1622 Rainier Drive. The event marks the one-year anniversary of the imprisonment of seven Baha’i leaders in Iran, who have reportedly spent a year in jail without formal charges or access to a lawyer.   

For more information, call a Baha’i  spokesperson at 209-1054.

The Baha’i Faith is the youngest of the world’s independent monotheistic religions. Baha’is view the world’s major religions as part of a progressive process through which God reveals his will to humanity. Major Baha’i tenets include the oneness of humanity, equality of men and women, eradication of prejudice, harmony of science and religion, universal education and world peace.

Updates and background on the situation of the Baha’is in Iran are posted at http://iran.bahai.us.  To learn more about the Baha’i Faith in America, check www.bahai.usand the Religion Newswriters Association Source Guide on the Baha’i Faith at http://www.religionlink.com/tip_090211.php.

As most faith-based family groups, including Focus on the Family, remain mum on the adulterous affair between the South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford and an Argentine

Oran P. Smith

 woman, one conservative Christian group has stood up for Sanford’s wife, Jenny.

The Palmetto Family Council of South Carolina, which has a close relationship with Focus on the Family but no affiliation, has placed on its Web site, www.palmettofamily.org, a petition called “Stand with Jenny.”

Oran P. Smith, president and CEO of the Palmetto Family Council, said at first the group called for forgiveness toward Gov. Sanford but got pushback from its female constituents. “Women said we should not let this go without  people understanding the gravity of what he’s done,” Smith said.

The council’s second stand was to support Jenny through a petition drive, and  ”people started adding personal messages and comments,” Smith said.

On comment was this: “Excuse me, I do not feel that South Carolina should be viewed as a personal growth schoolroom for Sanford’s development as a ‘Christian.’”

Some took the governor to task for comparing himself to the Bible’s King David. “Go and read your Bible again and see the consequences that King David, King Solomon and Moses had to endure because they, like you, made foolish choices and God forgave them but they still had to suffer the consequences.”

Click here to read all the reasons why the Palmetto Family Council’s is supporting Jenny Sanford.

As for Palmetto Family Council’s decision to support Jenny Sanford rather than publicly bash the governor or lambast the “liberal” media for attacking a conservative Republican, Smith said: “So much of the activities on the Christian right can tend to be angry. Maybe there is a time for anger, but we are not about that.”

On a personal note, Smith thinks Gov. Sanford’s goose is cooked after his admission in an Associated Press interview Monday that the Argentine woman was his “soulmate” and that he has had multiple affairs.

Why hasn’t conservative Christian family values groups spoken out against Sanford? Should Sanford resign?

Ken Pagano, the pastor of the New Bethel Church in Louisville, Ky.,  is passionate about gun rights — so much so that he told his congregants in a recent sermon to bring their firearms to church, the New York Times reports.

In a sermon titled “God, Guns, Gospel and Geometry,” Pagan said his congregation should wear or carry their firearms into the sanctuary to “celebrate our rights as Americans!”

“I don’t see any contradiction in this,” Pagano said. “Not every Christian denomination is pacifist.”

According to the Book of Matthew, Jesus “came not to bring peace, but a sword,” which some have quoted to advocate violence in the name of the faith. But that passage is at odds with many more New Testament passages in which Jesus sounds like a pacifist (turn the other cheek if someone strikes you, for instance).

So which is it? Share your thoughts with us.

Don’t get all weepy, but South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford is no longer on the list of politicians, celebrities and talk show hosts invited to take part in the Value Voters Summit in a few months, according to The Associated Press.

Organizers of the summit, co-sponsored by Focus on the Family Action, make no mention on their Web site of Sanford’s disappearance from the lineup. But several Web sites have posted before-and-after photos of the summit’s roster of notables invited to speak.

Reports have come out saying that Sanford’s photo was removed before news of his affair broke, but it’s not clear why. Maybe it really did have nothing to do with his affair — and his lying to his constituents over his whereabouts. Maybe it did. In any case, he’s now likely to be  persona non grata with values voters.

Summit organizers still hope to have a stellar lineup of pols and celebs dedicated to the cause, and have invited, among others, actor-celebrities Stephen Baldwin, Gary Sinese, Ben Stein, Kirk Cameron and the much-hyped former Miss California USA Carrie Prejean; politicians Sarah Palin, Mitt Romney and Mike Huckabee; and talk-show torchbearers Laura Ingraham, Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck, Sean Hannity and Mark Levin.  Not everyone has accepted their invite yet, but the event doesn’t take place till Sept. 18, so there’s still time.

One person who has accepted a speaking invitation: Focus president Jim Daly.

Want more info on the event, including registration details? Check it out here.

Earlier this year, President Barack Obama’s gave a speech in Turkey and said  that “we do not consider ourselves a Christian nation, or a Jewish nation …”

Rep. J. Randy Forbes (R-Va.) would argue otherwise — and, in fact, he did just that, saying on the floor of the U.S. House of Representatives  that America is,  indeed, a Judeo-Christian nation. You Tube has captured the speech, and we’ve included it above.

Books have been writen on this complex and often-divisive topic, so we’re not about to take it on here. But we’d love to know what you think, so leave us your comments and join the debate.