Empty playgrounds. Schools without enough students to stay open. Small towns, deserted and abandoned. This is not some dystopian vision of the future. Demographers say this is our future. 

Global population growth is leveling off, and as early as the second half of this century could begin to shrink for the first time since the Black Death struck the world almost 700 years ago.

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“Everything that we understand that functions in our societies today, that depends on people, which is almost everything, is going to change,” says Stephen J. Shaw, a data scientist, demographer and producer of the film “Birthgap.”

Shaw spoke to us from his home in Japan, a nation at the forefront of this global demographic collapse. Shaw told us he made the documentary mostly out of fear. “…Fear of the future that we’re, as a planet, completely unprepared for and mostly unaware of,” Shaw says.

The population crisis could be the most important story of our time, mainly due to all the changes and serious economic, social, and political problems it could bring to our world. 

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Taxes could soar as economies shrink; the many elderly could cause retirement and medical systems to collapse; businesses will struggle to find employees, and there won’t be enough young to care for the old. 

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Shaw says, “Sporadically you’re going to have housing that’s left desolated. You’re going to have stores that are empty. You’re going to have places with fewer and fewer employees, fewer customers. You’re talking of decimation of communities, you’re talking of closed schools, you’re talking of closed hospitals.”

A nation needs an average fertility rate of 2.1 children per woman to keep its population from shrinking. But 70% of the global population and almost every developed nation falls below that replacement rate.

The U.S. fertility rate hit a new record low last year, dropping to births per woman, a number temporarily offset by record numbers of illegal immigrants.

In his film, Shaw explains how fewer children from fewer and fewer mothers creates a cascading effect, leading to what he predicts as a downward spiral from which no known civilization has ever recovered. 

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Amid talk of a broader war in the Middle East, there is also news that a Jesus revolution may be underway.

An unprecedented number of Muslims are choosing to follow Christ, especially in Iran as people search for a better life.

Iranians are growing tired of the ayatollahs and a nation led by the empty promises of their Islamic theocracy. An anonymous internal poll found that 80% now prefer a democratic government, and many are leaving Islam.

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“You have a country with one of the highest drug addiction rates in the world. You have a country where corruption runs rampant. You have a country where more than half the people live below the poverty line,” explained Todd Nettleton of The Voice of the Martyrs (VOM).

“And the people of Iran are looking at this and they are saying, ‘Wait a minute. If this is what Islam has brought us in the last 45 years, we’re not interested. We want to know what the other options are.'”

According to Nettleton, Vice President of Messaging at VOM, the faith option many are choosing is Jesus with at least a million Muslims reportedly leaving Islam for Christianity.

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So, how is the regime reacting to this with a reported 50,000 of 75,000 mosques now closed?

“This is not something that is making the regime happy. And, really, in many ways, they are seeking to solidify their power and to crush any kind of dissent,” Nettleton said. “We have heard multiple stories this year of Bible study, a home church being raided. Everyone there is photographed, everyone there is questioned. But then the leader of the meeting is held on to. They are arrested. They are detained, they’re put in prison.”

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Evangelist and motivational speaker Nick Vujicic has announced that his new faith-friendly online banking service will finally be opening in November after years of planning.

Vujicic got the idea to launch a financial service that’s friendly to conservatives after he was suddenly debanked about five years ago because he was supporting the pro-life cause.

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“I got kicked out of a bank with no warning. They froze my credit cards, froze my debit cards,” he said. “They gave me a letter to say that they did a review of me as a client and they don’t want anything to do with me.”

The new project, ProLifeFintech, is an institution that will “honor God first, serve the people who use our fintech platform, and always choose to support life…All life,” according to its website. (Fintech is another term for online banking.) 

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The new financial organization’s plan is to give 50 percent of its net profits to Judeo-Christian-aligned nonprofit organizations.

As CBN News has reported over the last couple of years, multiple conservatives have been targeted by financial institutions at home and abroad. 

Last year, Barclays Bank in the UK ended up paying nearly $17,000 for closing a Christian charity’s account after a three-year legal battle in which it was alleged the bank caved to LGBT activist demands.   

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A persecution watchdog who has spent years exposing anti-Christian atrocities across the globe contends that Christians in the West can learn a great deal from fellow believers in duress.

“When you see the joy of the persecuted church, this is, to me, the valuable lesson that we need in the West,” David Curry, CEO of Global Christian Relief, told CBN News. “They’re under pressure, they’re under constraints … but, yet, they’re bold, and they’re happy, and they’re present.”

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Curry described taking a recent trip to Nigeria, where Christian persecution has reached a fever pitch in recent years. He encountered people there who have had personal injuries or who have lost loved ones due to attacks by Islamic extremists.

Still, these individuals exuded joy and hope, which, in turn, left him encouraged.

“It just gives me joy, because the Lord is sufficient,” Curry said. “God is sufficient—a relationship with Jesus. I don’t want to go through those things, but I’ve seen it take them deeper in their faith, and it’s encouraging.”

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Despite observing such strong persistence among the persecuted, Curry said it’s important to note not everyone takes this posture; some people are understandably broken mentally and spiritually due to the intense trauma they face.

Still, the perseverance he’s seen has left him deeply encouraged and inspired on his own journey.

In fact, Curry has felt boldness in his own life as a result of seeing the powerful responses from Christians around the globe encountering attacks due to their faith.

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Ashlee Bond has been on a truly captivating journey. The show-jumping rider is the first Christian athlete to represent Israel at the Olympics. Bond participated in the Tokyo Games in 2021 and was in Paris this summer to once again compete in the Olympic games.

Dealing with Terror Threats

There were some significant considerations for Bond when competing in the 2024 Olympic Games, though, especially after Hamas’ Oct. 7, terror attack and the ongoing tensions in the Middle East—events that led to increased security concerns for Israeli Olympians.

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“It was definitely nerve-racking, to say the least,” she said. “I pride myself on being a pretty tough person, someone who isn’t shaken too easily.”

But Bond said she and others received a threatening email before the 2024 Olympics that left her stunned.

“[It] singled me out personally, along with … I believe 16 other Israeli athletes from a terrorist organization threatening our lives and saying … ‘If you fly over, you drive over, we run the airports, we run the streets, we will have blood run in the streets like Munich in ’72,’” she said, referencing the 1972 terror attack that claimed the lives of 11 Israeli Olympians. “That was a little concerning.”

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Bond said she coped with associated fears by leaning into Jesus, focusing on her calling and not any of the worries that the email sparked in her heart. The threats were especially concerning because the emails were delivered and addressed to each individual’s personal email—and that’s not all.

“There were a couple Israeli athletes that got their obituaries sent to them,” she said.

Biggest 2024 Controversy

The Olympian also addressed the biggest controversy surrounding the 2024 Olympic Games: the drag-queen-dominated opening ceremony widely seen as mocking the Last Supper.

“For me, it’s really simple … this world is … sinful, and it’s a fallen world, and you don’t have control over the media,” Bond said. “And the media is, for the most part, very demonic, and they want to push their agenda, and the devil is trying to get as many souls as he can.”

She continued, “I don’t support the opening ceremony and what they did by any means, but I can still be a participant as an Olympic athlete and just … spread the Word of the Lord and be that light.”

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U.S. track and field star Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone won the gold medal in the 400-meter hurdles at the Paris Olympics on Thursday, once again breaking her own world record, finishing the race in just seconds.

This was the sixth time the 25-year-old American lowered the world record while winning a race.

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In the Paris final, she led the race heading into the corner before escalating even further down the home stretch to win by a wide margin, winning the race by seconds. American teammate Anna Cockrell won the silver.

After her victory, Sydney said “Thank you, God” and then talked more about her faith in the press conference.

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“I credit all that I do to God. He’s given me a gift, He’s given me a drive; I just want to improve upon myself, and I have a platform and I want to use it to glorify Him,” she said. “And so whenever I step on the track, it’s always the prayer of ‘God, let me be the vessel in which You’re glorified,’ whatever the result is. How I conduct myself, how I carry myself, not just how I perform, and so, it’s just freedom in knowing that regardless of what happens, He’s going to get the praise through me, and yeah, that’s why I do what I do.”

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Law enforcement officials averted two separate terror plots that would have resulted in a devastating loss of life. One involved a plot to “kill as many people as possible” at one or more Taylor Swift concerts in Austria. The other involved the plan to assassinate former President Trump and other public officials.

Swift abruptly canceled three concerts in Vienna this week, citing concerns for safety after authorities arrested two suspects in an alleged terror plot against the site. They are both male teenagers who are Austrian citizens. Police say one had recently pledged allegiance to the terror group ISIS, after becoming radicalized on the internet.

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FBI Special Agent Richard Frankel told ABC News, “ISIS is still out there. They are still online. They are still recruiting.”

A raid on one of the suspect’s homes uncovered what appeared to be bomb-making materials. One of the two confessed to planning to “kill as many people as possible outside the concert venue.”

“The situation surrounding the planned terrorist attack in Vienna was very serious,” Austria’s Chancellor Karl Nehammer said in a statement. “The threat was recognized early, combated, and tragedy prevented.”

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ISIS has not claimed responsibility, but it has been behind attacks at other concerts. In March, gunmen killed 60 people at a theatre in Moscow.

Swift plans to continue her tour next week in England.

Meanwhile, in a separate event in the U.S., officials arrested a Pakistani man with ties to Iran for plotting to assassinate former President Donald Trump and other public officials. The 46-year-old suspect, Asif Merchant, was arrested last month and charged by the Justice Department with murder for hire.

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JERUSALEM, Israel – While the Middle East waits for a major attack by Iran and its proxies, there’s a war of words going on between Israel and its enemies. Nations far and wide are keeping their eyes on what will happen in the region.

Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant told a group of Israeli pilots on Tuesday that Israel is ready. “Every day that passes we improve our readiness – both in defense and in attack,” Gallant said.

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Meanwhile, in Beirut, Hezbollah leader Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah vowed revenge for the killing of his top commander and added that waiting to attack was part of his battle plan. “The Israelis want to end this situation. This stand-by situation is part of the battle,” he said.

In southern Lebanon, hundreds celebrated the selection of Yahya Sinwar as the next leader of Hamas. Sinwar succeeds Ismail Haniyeh, who was killed in Tehran last week. Sinwar masterminded the October 7th massacre of 1,200 Israelis and the kidnapping of 250 Israelis and foreign nationals, including American-Israelis.

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The new leader is Israel’s most wanted terrorist. He is still believed to be in hiding in the Gaza Strip, likely surrounded by some of those hostages as human shields.

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Israel Defense Forces Chief Spokesman Daniel Hagari made it clear that Sinwar is the next terrorist on their list.

He warned, “There is only one place for Yahya Sinwar. It’s (in the grave) next to Mohammed Deif, next to a Ghandour, next to Ayman Nofal [Hamas commanders Israel claimed it has killed], next to all the terrorists that were responsible for the 7th of October. This is the only place we are planning for Yahya Sinwar.”

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Hunter Armstrong, a gold medalist on the U.S. Olympic swim team, said he has “no other choice” but to make God “a priority” in his day-to-day life.

“I keep God as a priority,” the athlete told Baptist Press. “I can’t really live without Him. I can live without swimming or being an Olympian or any of that stuff.”

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Armstrong, 23, made the comments about his faith shortly after winning a gold medal during the Olympic Games in Paris, France, last week for his performance in the third leg of the men’s 4×100 free relay, earning him the fastest time among his American teammates.

He also helped the U.S. win silver over the weekend in the 4×100 medley relay. This is not the Ohio State University swimmer’s first Olympics, either. During the 2021 Summer Olympics in Tokyo, he won a gold medal in the 4×100 medley relay.

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The gold medalist has used his platform to point people toward the Lord. In fact, he said his Christian faith is “the first thing I want people to see and know about me” — even in times when trusting in God has been difficult.

Armstrong has continued to prioritize his faith since the start of the Olympic Games. He said he has been regularly attending Bible studies since being invited by fellow Team USA swimmer Carson Foster.

“I’ve overcome so much this year that I’m just happy to be here,” Armstrong reflected. “Obviously, I want to have a great performance for myself, my country, and my teammates. But if I walk away and I don’t have a single medal or a single best time, I can still walk away knowing that I represented myself well and God.”

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Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared Sunday that Israel stands ready to defend itself against any enemy attack. There is also the possibility that the Israel Defense Forces will go on the offensive.

Netanyahu sees the situation as a seven-front war where Iran and its proxies are trying to strangle the Jewish state.

“Their visible aggression is insatiable, but Israel is not helpless,” Netanyahu said. “We are determined to stand against them on every front, in every arena, far and near. Anyone who murders our citizens, anyone who harms our country, will be held accountable. He will pay a very heavy price.”

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Some anticipate Iran will launch a bigger attack than April 13, when some 350 missiles and drones rained down across Israel, resulting in only minor damage.

The Alma Research Center in northern Israel estimates a combination of “ballistic missiles, cruise missiles and UAVs from many sites in western Iran” could be launched.

U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin has dispatched a fighter squadron to the Middle East, and the head of the Central Command, General Michael Kurilla, is already in the region.

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Retired IDF General Amir Avivi tells CBN News Kurilla is expected to play a valuable role in helping coordinate a similar coalition effort that protected Israel in April.

“It enables to really assist Israel to deal with all the different threats – whether it’s ballistic missiles, a UAV, and any other capability Iran might shoot at Israel or Hezbollah – and it increases dramatically the chances of really being able to secure Israel in the best way possible,” Avivi explained.

He added, “There is no 100%, but it definitely improves a lot – the chances of really dealing very well with most of the capabilities Iran and Hezbollah have.”

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