Pro-life advocates redirected their efforts after the Supreme Court refused to reopen Roe v. Wade
Christian activists are refocusing their efforts to overturn abortion after the Supreme Court’s recent refusal to revisit Roe v. Wade, which legalized the practice in all 50 states.

Attorneys for Norma McCorvey, “Jane Doe” in the 1973 lawsuit, have now set their sights on reversing the case of Sandra Cano, “Mary Doe” in the companion Doe v. Bolton lawsuit. Roe is better known because it legalized abortion, though only through the second trimester. Doe extended abortion access up to birth. Lawyers expect it to take two years to get Doe before the Supreme Court.

Both pro-life advocates today, McCorvey and Cano hope the decisions in their cases will be reversed based on more than 5,300 pages of evidence citing that abortion harms women. The appeals also include sworn testimony from more than 1,000 women who say they were hurt by abortion.

“That’s the heart of it,” said Allan Parker, lead attorney on both cases and president of the Justice Foundation, a nonprofit San Antonio-based law firm. “You cannot take the life of your own child without it producing severe psychological and emotional trauma.”

The foundation filed a petition for writ of certiorari on Jan. 14, asking the Supreme Court to hear the Roe v. Wade case based on a federal rule that allows an original party to request a ruling be vacated when factual and legal changes deem the decision no longer just. The Court refused without explanation on Feb. 22. “We’re saddened greatly that they didn’t listen to the women that they purport to protect,” Parker said, “but we will not give up.”

Previous attempts to reopen both cases have been unsuccessful. However, observers say that with four of the nine Supreme Court justices believed to oppose abortion, the appointment of a pro-life justice during President Bush’s second term could tip the scales in favor of reversing the 1973 decision. “Reversing Roe v. Wade would mean that women would no longer suffer the trauma of abortion,” said McCorvey, who now regrets her role in legalizing abortion.

McCorvey was 21 years old and pregnant for the third time when she signed on for the case. After the ruling, McCorvey strongly advocated abortion even working at an abortion clinicÑuntil an unlikely friendship changed her mind, and her heart. “I came to the Lord through the wisdom of a 7-year-old child,” she said.

Through that childss persistence, a hardened McCorvey finally attended church. It was a day that changed her life forever. In 1995, McCorvey was baptized; today, she calls herself “100 percent pro-life, no exceptions.”

Before the ruling was handed down, McCorvey gave birth to a girl, who was adopted. “I never had an abortion, so I can honestly say when [Roe v. Wade] is overturned, then my job is done.”

Similarly, Cano never had an abortion and claims she never sought one. “I was nothing but a symbol in Doe v. Bolton with my experience and circumstances discounted and misrepresented,” she said in a sworn affidavit.

Cano claims she simply wanted a divorce and help regaining custody of her two children when she met the attorney working on Doe v. Bolton. Pregnant at the time with her fourth child, she said she thought she was signing divorce papers when she was actually signing a lawsuit against the state of Georgia for refusing her an abortion. “I never sought an abortion there or anywhere else,” Cano claims.

Though she gave her baby up for adoption, Cano said she knows what it’s like to feel responsible for an abortion. “I have been forced to live with the consequences of this false compassion for too long for me not to bring to the attention of the Court the fact that abortion is not in a woman’s interest, and the fact that legalization of abortion began with manipulations and misrepresentations,” she said.

“Abortion trauma and grief is real,” said Joyce Zounis, director of women’s outreach for Operation Outcry: Silent No More, a movement encouraging women to speak out about how abortion affected them. “Just like driving through McDonald’s for a hamburger, I thought this was my quick fix,” said Zounis, who had her first of seven abortions at age 15. “No one told me that there are possible physical or psychological complications.”

Arlene Campbell testified that her uterus was perforated during her only abortion, resulting in an emergency hysterectomy at the age of 22. “Having to be told that I had a complete hysterectomy caused self-hatred, shame, years of rejection. It just tore my life apart,” she said.

Today, at the age of 53, Campbell has no children, yet she wants women “to know that there is forgiveness and healing in the Lord Jesus Christ.”

“If this is supposed to be protecting women, it’s not working,” said Theresa Burke, Ph.D, founder of Rachel’s Vineyard Ministries, a program whose goal is to help bring healing to post-abortive women and their families. “It forces [them] to live with the reality and the psychological impact of taking a human life.”

Burke submitted a 250-page expert witness affidavit to the court. “We should be able to find nonviolent alternatives that don’t invade a woman’s physical and psychological integrity,” she added.

For Alveda King, niece of slain civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr., the battle to overturn Roe is a personal one. She had two abortions and says today, “If there had been no Roe v. Wade, I would have never on my own had an abortion, ever.”

King said she will carry on her uncle’s legacy by speaking for all children. “How can the dream survive if we murder the children?” she asked. “None of us are winning as long as we are killing.”

Overturning either abortion decision will be a monumental challenge. A November Associated Press poll found that 61 percent of Americans say President Bush should nominate Supreme Court justices who would uphold Roe v. Wade, though 34 percent said he should nominate a justice who would overturn it. Parker said there is only one reason those figures do not intimidate. “It will be God that breaks through the stronghold of abortion,” he said.

Some of Parker’s strongest opposition comes from Christians, such as the Rev. Carlton W. Veazey, president of the Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice, who says there is no basis for the appeal. “If they say it causes serious psychological damage, what does that mean?” Veazey asked. “We’ve learned now that having a bypass operation causes depression. But people don’t stop having bypasses because of that.”

What Veazey calls a choice, Parker calls sin. “How can the God that gives us life, who says that every child is a blessing, want to allow us to kill them? It is contrary to God’s nature,” Parker said. “I’m not a theologian, I just know God.”

Suzy Richardson

Hinn said he is careful with ministry funds.
Televangelist Benny Hinn says a Dateline NBC report about his use of ministry contributions was distorted and filled with half-truths.

In a nine-page statement posted on TheTruth , a Web site Benny Hinn Ministries (BHM) launched in response to the March 6 broadcast, Hinn said he was falsely characterized by a secular news outlet that is “hostile to the gospel” and motivated by ratings.

While Dateline reported that Hinn paid as much as $10,000 each night for a hotel suite in Milan, Hinn said his ministry spent an average of $129 per night on hotel rooms last year.

He said international stopovers in London, Italy and Mexico allowed him to rest and refresh. “I only have one body to use for [God], and I will not let the work of the Lord be sacrificed by lack of rest or taking unnecessary risks,” he said.

Dateline reported that it could not document miracles or that BHM helped feed and care for 20,000 orphans overseas as the ministry claimed. Hinn described the latter report as “a tragic disrespect to the precious little ones receiving generous love and care, made possible by this ministry,” adding that BHM does in fact support 20,000 children worldwide.

Though some consider Hinn’s lifestyle lavish, he said he is cautious with ministry funds and that his organization submits to an external audit each year. “I love my precious Lord too much to ever trifle with the money entrusted to me by His dear people,” Hinn wrote in a letter to partners.

Before the Dateline report aired, Hinn sued NBC and the show’s producer seeking an injunction to prohibit the use of allegedly stolen documents. BHM spokesman Ronn Torossian said the ministry is examining the segment and will consider taking action against “anybody who has done harm to Benny Hinn Ministries.”

Both charismatic and non-charismatic critics of Hinn have cautioned Christians to use discernment when choosing ministries to support. BHM is not a member of the Evangelical Council for Financial Accountability and has frequently received low grades by Wall Watchers, a watchdog group that monitors how open various Christian ministries are with their financial statements.

Hinn, however, remains optimistic about upcoming crusades expected to draw historic crowds. Torossian said Hinn is “committed to demonstrating religious good” and “will continue to fight for the work of the Lord.”
Adrienne S. Gaines

A founding member of the band Korn, Brian “Head” Welch says faith in Jesus helped him beat depression and addiction
One of the founding members of the multi-platinum alternative metal band Korn has left the group after rededicating his life to Christ and is hoping to lead others to faith in Jesus.

More than 10,000 people attended three Sunday morning services at Valley Bible Fellowship (VBF), a nondenominational church in Bakersfield, Calif., to hear guitarist Brian “Head” Welch share his testimony Feb. 27.

“I used to be like this,” Welch said as he lowered his head to the ground and scowled. “Now, I am like this.” The congregation laughed as Welch sat straight up in his chair, threw his hair away from his face and smiled from ear to ear.

Though he told a California radio station he had been distancing himself from Korn for more than a year, Welch officially parted ways with the band Feb. 22, giving a litany of reasons for his departure, MTV News reported. Among them was his concern about having his face superimposed on a dog patrolling a strip club in a video for the group’s cover of Cameo’s “Word Up.”

Welch, who resides in Bakersfield, started attending VBF in January after a long struggle with suicidal feelings.

“[Pastor Ron Vietti] invited me to church,” Welch said during the service. “I hit the bottom of my life. I didn’t know if I wanted to go. But I couldn’t kill myself so I decided to go see if God could turn me around. I looked to God when I was 12, then I got into Korn.

“He’s been yanking on my shirt, steering me back to Him. I kept falling down, but He kept calling me back. Finally I came back here.

“I was a methamphetamine addict,” he said unable to finish his thought as tears welled up in his eyes. “I look at my kid,” Welch said, referring to his 6-year-old daughter. “That stuff makes you not have control. The only way to quit is through the Lord. Drugs. I’m convinced that drugs, and other very bad things, steer all of us back to the Lord. But for me, drugs are done.”

Welch told attendees that his method of coping was to seek God. “This is the Book of Life right here,” Welch said holding up a Bible. “It’s not about religion, it’s not about this church, it’s not about me. It’s about the Book of Life, and everybody needs to be taught this. It’s crazy, it’s gonna do stuff like this, like change a guy from a rock band.”

VBF executive pastor Jim Crews said Korn’s mission was to help its fans heal through the expression of their anger. Now, he said, Welch wants to take that healing to the next level and explain to his fans that there is light at the end of the anger tunnel. “He is now an extension of the Korn ministry for those fans,” Crews said. “He wants to complete the process.”

More than 300 people accepted Christ after Welch spoke to the Bakersfield congregation; others were unsure but supportive.

Stephanie Alvarez and Jody Gutierrez, both 22 and from Bakersfield, have traveled all over the state to see Korn perform.

“What makes them good is the combination of all five of them,” Gutierrez said. “It’s not going to be the same without him because they are a package deal. But they are like family. They are close with each other and close with their family, and I respect that a lot.”

Alvarez said she was disappointed about the split. “If he’s changed to better himself I can’t be mad at him about that,” she said. “I’ve never seen him so happy.”

Kyle Cavazos, 14, of Bakersfield waited in the long line outside VBF with his three friends, wanting to hear Welch’s message for himself. “Their music is not about the melody, it’s about the words,” Cavazos said. “And if he wants to do [this], it’s not going to stop me from listening to him.”

Chris and Angie Vega, both 30 and from Bakersfield, showed up at the service to lend Welch their support. Chris Vega is Korn bassist Reggie “Fieldy” Arvizu’s cousin. The couple said they will continue to love and listen to Welch as he heads into the next phase of his career.

Welch was baptized in the Jordan River in early March, tagging along with other VBF members on a trip to Israel. Welch told MTV News that he believed he would return from Israel a “different person.”

Fans likely will hear a different message in the solo music he plans to work on this year. Now sporting a “Matthew 11:28” tattoo on his neck and “Jesus” on his fist, Welch told MTV his new music will have a “Christian, spiritual edge to it,” and he plans to use the proceeds from the album sales to help build a skatepark and possibly help Vietti plant “rock’n roll churches’ across the country.
Michelle Lovato
in Bakersfield, Calif.

Rioters burned images of Hinn and threw rocks at those attending his Festival of Blessings in the city of Bangalore

More than 7 million people attended evangelist Benny Hinn’s recent Festival of Blessings in Bangalore, India, despite unprecedented rioting that led to at least 30 injuries.

Angered by allegations that Hinn was coming to convert Hindus, members of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) called for his visa to be revoked, and dissidents threw rocks at vehicles transporting nationals to the event. Others burned images of Hinn in effigy, demanding that the California-based minister “go back, go back, go back.”

Indian news media reported that 300 buses were damaged during the meeting Jan. 21-23, which was attended and supported by local officials, including Chief Minister N. Dharnam Singh. “The programme has neither any impact on Hindus nor [has] it led to conversion of people into Christianity,” Singh said, India’s Central Chronicle reported. “BJP is obsessed with making an issue out of every religious issue.”

Though no one on Hinn’s team was harmed, Jon Wilson, vice president of events for Benny Hinn Ministries, said roughly 25 attendees visited the ministry’s first aid center, with one little girl suffering a massive bump on her head after being hit by a rock.

“I never thought I would face such a thing,” Hinn told Charisma. “It was frightening. People started to throw rocks, slash tires, burn cars. I think the scariest part was seeing me burned in effigy. Beating a dummy with sticks. I thought, My God. I thought I would be killed.”

Indian media carried reports of the protests for days before the event, which was Hinn’s second crusade in the nation. The first, held last year in Mumbai, drew what was then his largest crowd–some 4.8 million attendees.

The Bangalore event is Hinn’s largest to date, and he said the news reports might have contributed to the record-setting crowd. Hinn said thousands of attendees reported miracles.

“I felt no struggle on the platform,” Hinn said. “A lot of deaf and mute were healed. A lot of cripples. One young man jumped over a rail and hadn’t walked in 20 years.”

However, one man in the crowd died, and Hinn was blamed for his death. Police later said the cause of the man’s death was unknown and that Hinn was not responsible, news reports said.

Anti-Christian forces in India have fiercely opposed evangelism efforts there for years, said Joseph D’Souza, president of the All India Christian Council. But he fears the crusade may have reawakened opposition that had begun to calm since the nation’s recent election and the passing of an anti-conversion law.

“For those of us who have been involved in fighting for religious freedom this was a very complicated situation,” D’Souza said.

Though he believes Hinn should have been given the freedom to hold the crusade, he attributes some of the violence to the publicity that preceded the event. He said the advertisements were perceived as targeting Hindus for conversion and drew attention to the vast scale of the event–a clear sign of foreign funding.

“We have just come out of a difficult seven years of head-on persecution by the BJP-led forces,” he said. “Due to the election results they are quiet now, but we must not give them ammunition to attack Christians. This crusade definitely gave them much ammunition. … We must not lose the credibility Christians gained through the times of persecution.

“The fact of the matter is that God is doing a wonderful work across the land through locals and nationals, and this wonderful work is not drawing attention of those who are the enemies of the gospel,” D’Souza added. “The crowds that attend these crusades are representative of what God is doing on the ground.”

Because of India’s anti-conversion law, Hinn was not permitted to give an altar call, but he led the crowd in the sinner’s prayer en masse. No one knows how many people made professions of faith, Hinn said, but he noted that after last year’s India crusade 300 churches were planted to disciple new converts.

“The Lord knows how to get those people to the church because we’re not allowed by law to do it,” Hinn said. “The great thing is, I’m allowed on television to say anything I want. So when I get back I encourage [those who attended the crusade] to find a church.”

This month, Hinn is scheduled to host a healing crusade in Nigeria, where his team is anticipating the ministry’s largest crowd ever, with 6 million to 8 million people expected each night.
Adrienne S. Gaines

In Indonesia, the world’s largest Islamic country, pastor Petrus Agung has built a church the size of a stadium
It’s not exactly common to see a church the size of a stadium in Indonesia, the world’s largest Muslim nation. But Jemaat Kristen Indonesia (JKI), translated Gospel of the Kingdom Church, isn’t afraid to take risks.

Despite a traditional law that forbids any group from building a facility larger than the city’s grand mosque, the congregation, located in Semarang, the capital city of Central Java, is building a 12,000-seat arena dubbed the “Holy Stadium,” which was to open this spring.

Though the largest mosque in Semarang seats 3,000, JKI–which has grown from 25 people to 6,000 since 1991 and now operates an FM radio station, the city’s only nonsmoking café, a medical ministry and a drug-treatment center–received a permit for construction of its stadium in record time.

Pastor Petrus Agung, who leads the ministry with his wife, Tina, chalks it all up to the favor of God. Saved at the age of 17, Agung said he was called to pastor in 1990 when God spoke to him three times. “The first time I thought it was the devil,” he told Charisma. “When the voice said, ‘Start a church in the city,’ I laughed. I said: ‘Devil, you are a liar. I am an evangelist. I have no calling to be a pastor. It will be a disaster.'”

But the voice persisted. “Before I rebuked that voice the third time, the Lord said, ‘It’s Me.’ I cried and said, ‘Forgive me, Lord.’ And He said, ‘Start a church.'”

Agung obeyed, launching JKI in February 1991 with his wife, a handful of musicians and some friends. In seven years, Agung said, the church grew to 400 members, which he said is small by Indonesian standards. “There are millions of people around us, so that’s very slow,” he told Charisma.

The church’s growth rate began to change after Agung began speaking in public- and private-school assemblies. At one school, he said, the principal brought all the students into the auditorium and told the pastor he could speak freely with the students for two hours.

At first the youth were not responsive. “I was so frustrated,” he said. “But the Lord said: ‘Don’t worry. Keep talking.’ After 15 minutes, He said stop. … So I stopped, and I thought it was my worst preaching, but I said: ‘If you want to receive Jesus … if you want to change your life, come. I will pray for you.’

“They ran, and I began to pray for them. They began to weep and cry. … It was always like that … and not only in the Christian schools.”

The church grew to 700 within two months, then Kong Hee, pastor of 16,000-member City Harvest Church in Singapore, came to preach a revival meeting and challenged Agung to believe that God would grow the ministry to 2,000 people by the end of 2000.

“I said in my heart, ‘I don’t know,'” Agung said. “But I tried to be polite with him, so … I said, ‘2,000 is fine.'”

Then at the revival meeting that night, Kong Hee surprised his friend even more. “He said something powerful: ‘Let’s say 2,000 before 2000. So by the end of 1999 you are going to reach 2,000,'”Agung recalled. “I was so afraid when he declared that.”

But before Christmas 1999, JKI had more than 2,000 members, with hundreds getting saved that year. Agung says since then the church has held a baptism service almost every month.

Though the congregation, whose average age is 21, earns less than $300 a month, they have sacrificially given jewelry, bikes, homes and land to build the new facility. Agung and his wife gave their car, money and all her heirloom jewelry, including her wedding rings, to the project. But the couple is convinced they can’t out-give God.

Today, the ministry is debt-free, and the Holy Stadium is more than 80 percent paid for even though construction is not complete. In the wake of the tsunami that devastated parts of South Asia, the church has become a center for distributing relief and supplies.

Agung said obedience to God is at the heart of the church’s growth. “We have to hear what He says and just obey it,” he said. “Do it, whatever He says.”
Larry Keefauver in Semarang, Indonesia

A variety of ministries hosted pre-inauguration events aimed at praying for the president and the nation’s future

Thousands of Christians from across the nation came to Washington, D.C., in January to celebrate the re-election of George W. Bush and to participate in several inaugural events sponsored by area Christian organizations.

The Fourth Inaugural Prayer Breakfast, held Jan. 20 at the Omni Shoreham Hotel, drew more than 1,000 participants, who came to pray for the president and the nation before the swearing-in ceremony at noon.

The event’s organizers, Stephen and Carol Poulos of Ask for America, called on guests to renew their commitment to pray for the United States and its leaders, not just on Inauguration Day, but every day. “God has given us a mandate to pray,” Carol Poulos said. “We want our voices to be heard not only in this room, but across this nation.”

Government and military officials joined prominent Christian leaders in prayer during the four-hour, bipartisan and nondenominational gathering. Participants interceded for the president, the three branches of government, the nation’s capital, the armed forces, the media and a national revival. Prayer leaders included Col. Ralph Benson, chaplain of the Pentagon; Ohio Secretary of State Kenneth Blackwell; Ohio pastor Rod Parsley of World Harvest Church in Columbus; Matt Crouch, president of Gener8Xion Entertainment; Lou Engle, founder of The Cause and former leader of The Call prayer events; and Stephen Strang, publisher of Charisma magazine.

Strang was featured in the Feb. 7 issue of Time magazine as one of the nation’s 25 most influential evangelical leaders alongside author Rick Warren, evangelist Joyce Meyer, Dallas pastor T.D. Jakes and National Association of Evangelicals President Ted Haggard.

Vicki Yohe and Lindell Cooley, former worship leader at Brownsville Assembly of God in Pensacola, Fla., and now senior pastor of Grace Church in Nashville, Tenn., led worship during the event.

Attendee Martha Fisher of Oneness in Christ Ministries said the prayer breakfast gave her an expectation that “God is establishing His presence globally in a way not seen before.”

“God wants to bless America so that we in turn can bless others,” Stephen Poulos told participants. “At this very moment, the [United States] is coming alongside the many nations surrounding the Indian Ocean that were ravaged by the tsunami. Without the blessing of God, the kind of compassion that our Lord and Savior Jesus wants to bestow would be impossible.”

A second inaugural day prayer initiative, sponsored by Faith and Action Ministries, was held at the Honorable William J. Ostrowski House in Washington. Approximately 100 people, many of whom were pastors representing more than 30 denominations, gathered to pray for President Bush and the future of the United States.

“The focus of our prayers [was] to thank God for Bush’s re-election and for the principles he espouses,” said the Rev. Rob Schenck, who heads up the Capitol Hill ministry.

Schenck said he believes Bush’s moral legacy will have a lasting impact on the United States through his appointments to the federal bench. “We must pray that he will make the right choices,” Schenck said. “The inauguration is about the next four years; Bush’s federal court appointments are about the next 40.”

The Christian Inaugural Eve Gala, a black-tie reception and dinner held at The Ritz-Carlton Hotel in downtown Washington, drew 850 guests, including such leaders as outgoing Attorney General John Ashcroft, senior Bush adviser Karl Rove, Republican Sen. Dan Thume of South Dakota, and newly elected Republican National Committee Chairman Ken Mehlman.

The event was sponsored by the Traditional Values Coalition (TVC) in cooperation with Strang Communications and other Christian ministries. TVC founder Lou Sheldon said the “thrust of the evening was to celebrate the providential hand of God upon America.”

In his keynote address, Ashcroft encouraged attendees to keep interceding for the president, noting that Bush’s faith and the nation’s prayers had helped him make strong decisions.
Sandra K. Chambers in Washington, D.C.

Nigerian Students Face Death Threats

Muslim militants pronounced a death sentence on five Christian students expelled from colleges in November for conducting an evangelistic outreach. The families of two of the students, Hanatu Haruna Alkali and Abraham Adamu Misal, were attacked on Jan. 26, when militants went to their homes in the northern state of Gombe, Compass Direct reported. Alkali and Misal escaped harm but are now in hiding. The location of the other three students is unknown. Alkali’s sister said the militants attacked their house, and family members fear for their lives.

Pakistani Christian Acquitted of Blasphemy

Judicial Magistrate Dr. Mohammed Anwar Gondal ruled Dec. 17 that blasphemy charges against Anwer Masih were based only on hearsay, and he nullified the police report filed against him because it violated the criminal procedure code, Compass Direct reported. The ruling made Masih the first Pakistani Christian ever to be acquitted of blasphemy charges in lower court. Masih, now 32, was arrested in November 2003 after a neighbor who had converted from Christianity to Islam claimed Masih mocked his new beard and derided Islamic beliefs. Masih remains in hiding and has been unable to reunite with his wife and children because of death threats against him. Compass said Masih likely will have to apply for asylum abroad and assume a new identity.

Colombian Seminary Student Released

Luis Alberto Vera was released in January from jail in Medellín, Colombia, but the seminary student still faces an uphill battle to clear his name, Compass Direct reported. A member of a Foursquare church in Bucaramanga, Vera was arrested Nov. 26 for allegedly mugging a man in 2002. Vera’s arrest came after a routine police check matched his I.D. number with an arrest warrant. Vera has amassed $2,110 in legal bills fighting what Compass said was the result of sloppy police work and an overloaded justice system. “I’m not sure I will be able to continue my studies,” said Vera, who left his hometown last year with his wife and son to attend the Biblical Seminary of Colombia.

‘Pastor Freak’ of Come As You Are Church says his Bible-themed body art has helped him share the gospel
A Michigan minister is using his 150 hours’ worth of body art to make a statement of faith.

Known as “Pastor Freak,” Steve Bensinger, 44-year-old senior pastor of Come As You Are Church (CAYAC) in Kalamazoo, Mich., says the tattoos–which all have biblical themes–have helped him reach more than 2,000 people with the gospel since 1997 when he founded CAYAC. He also believes they have helped make Christianity more accessible to nonbelievers.

“We accept people for who they are and get to know them,” said Bensinger, who pastors the church with his wife of 22 years, Betty. “Telling and showing them a positive side of who God is based on the Word of God. Then when we say we love them, we really mean it.”

At 6 feet, 1 inch and 290 pounds, Bensinger is formidable even without his Mohawk, facial piercings and tattoos, which he sports on his arms, back, neck, feet and legs. “By my mere appearance people look at me and want to call me a freak,” he told Charisma. “I took their power away and began calling myself freak.”

But Pastor Freak also calls himself an evangelist. On his forearm is an image of Jesus on the cross along with John 3:16, and on his leg is a graveyard scene with Bible verses on the tombstones. Each of the tattoos could have cost Bensinger $100 to $200 an hour, but the pastor gets deep discounts.

“Every day people ask me about or comment on my tattoos in admiration or wonder,” he said. “That gives me the opportunity to talk about my tattoos, which are all biblical and talk about Jesus, His love, grace and power.

“Most people have an entirely wrong concept of who God is. They look at Him as a big ogre, waiting to judge them and send them to hell. We are trying to go around and show a positive image of Jesus, His love, grace and transforming power.”

Tony Bender, large enough to be a bodyguard, is an insurance adjuster who joined CAYAC a few years ago. He says he felt called to pastor, but his former church believed having tattoos was sinful, and Bender has several.

At CAYAC, Bender says he is learning how to use his comic-style tattoos to draw young people into conversations about Jesus. And he says Bensinger is teaching him how to walk in his calling. “I’ve never walked into a place where I was more loved and welcomed, and I have been a lot of places,” Bender said of CAYAC.

Bender says being a Christian is about more than spending an hour and a half in a pew, but about going where the people are. Members of CAYAC reach out to seniors in their community, provide toys for children, assist a local motorcycle ministry and share the gospel at the local mall. “[Store employees] look for us to come and talk to them, listen and take prayer requests,” said church member Laura “Wheezy” Owens.

“We are the church, doing what God told us to do,” Bensinger added.

For the last 2-1/2 years, Bensinger has been president of the Christian Tattoo Association (CTA), an international ministry for tattoo professionals and enthusiasts founded in 1990. Today, CTA lists more than 100 affiliated shops, with members and branches as far away as the United Kingdom and Australia.

Critics of tattooing often cite Leviticus 19:28, which prohibits tattoos. But Bensinger believes the ban against tattooing is no different from the prohibitions against trimming one’s beard or mixing fabrics that are also listed in that chapter.

“When Jesus said it is finished on the cross that meant we now live under grace, not the law,” Bensinger said, noting that Revelation 19:16 says, “And He has on His robe and on His thigh a name written: King of Kings and Lord of Lords.”

“It’s not about rules but relationship,” Bensinger said. “No one is made right with God under the law. We are not harming our bodies or anyone else. The body of Christ should be known for our love. Because of our love for each other we can do what Christ commanded.”

Bensinger believes he is impacting those whom the church might otherwise not reach, such as 19-year-old Jenn McGuiness. “I walked in the doors a Roman Catholic, but I walked out a saved Christian,” she said.

McGuiness worked as a nude dancer before a friend told her about Bensinger’s ministry. “Pastor Freak knew nothing about me, but preached that you don’t have to make a living dancing at DeJaVu [the local adult club where she worked] but that God would provide all my needs,” McGuiness recalled. “I gave my life to the Lord that night and have been coming ever since.”
LaVenia Jean LaVelle in Kalamazoo, Mich.

Bill Winston hopes his business school will help close the economic gap between minorities and the general population
If you ask pastor William S. Winston his age, expect to hear this: “My real birthday”–the day he became a Christian–“is Sept. 22, 1980.” If you persist, he will say he’s at least 50 years old.

There are other numbers, however, that Winston is more willing to reveal. When he moved his congregation from a downtown storefront to the Chicago suburb of Forest Park, Ill., between 12 and 15 people followed.

Now, 16 years later, Living Word Christian Center claims a membership of 14,000. The congregation paid $4 million for the three-theater cineplex behind a mall to house their church, and today Winston estimates the renovated building is worth 10 times as much.

“I am an example that real wealth is not in dollars; it’s in your own insight, your own ability to see opportunities and take advantage of them,” Winston said.

That’s the vision Winston hopes to cast into the students at his Joseph Center School of Business and Entrepreneurship, where his dream of training a workforce of Christian entrepreneurs is coming to life. More than 130 men and women have graduated from the nine-month business program based on biblical principles.

“If everybody develops their unique ability, that unique ability would make room for them in this universe of opportunities and bring them into substantial income,” Winston said.

African-Americans make up roughly 13 percent of the U.S. population but only 3.5 percent of the leadership of firms, and they generate less than 3 percent of the income firms produce, said Eric Dobyne, regional director of the Minority Business Development Agency, a division of the Department of Commerce.

“If you look at that number and think about … the amount [African-Americans] would be able to contribute to the overall economy if they were just at entrepreneurial parity–meaning the point at which the percentage of the population is equivalent to the percentage of firms–you’re talking about a significant impact on the American economy,” Dobyne said.

He said The Joseph Center could help shrink that gap. “In order for us to progress I think it’s going to be important that we have partnerships between the public sector, being the government, the private sector, being corporations, and the faith-based organizations,” he said. “So anytime I see an entrepreneurial center open, I think it’s definitely a step in the right direction.”

India native Rajan Oommen said The Joseph Center helped point him in the right direction. He grew up in an entrepreneurial family and ran his own deep sea fishing business but believed he needed more training. He considered getting an MBA, but when he saw The Joseph Center’s graduation ceremony, he took it as a sign that he should attend.

Now, almost four years after graduating from The Joseph Center, Oommen has his own mortgage business and says he earns a six-figure income. “I need to make far more money than this,” he said. “I have been told by God specifically to do things in [million-dollar] amounts, [such as helping to build Bible schools and churches]. The six-figure dollar amount will not … suffice to do those things.”

Born in Tuskegee, Ala., Winston says he grew up in a community of entrepreneurial-minded African-Americans. He joined the Air Force, then later got a job at IBM, working in sales on commission.

But Winston sensed a call to ministry. He attended Oral Roberts University for a year before moving to Chicago in 1988 and founding Living Word. He said one verse has driven him through the years: Isaiah 48:17, “‘I am the Lord your God, who teaches you to profit, who leads you in the way you should go'” (NKJV).

“I was born for this part of His vision to be manifested on the earth,” Winston said. “There’s a reason Moses was born. There’s a reason Abraham was born.”

Shevelle L. Freeman, a 41-year-old psychologist, is currently enrolled at The Joseph Center. For five years, she has clung to a vision of opening Revelations Counseling Center in Detroit, Atlanta and her hometown of Chicago.

She was confident in her ability as a counselor but didn’t believe she had the skills to run her own business. When she heard about The Joseph Center, she said she knew she needed to “run for it.”

But becoming an entrepreneur isn’t about making a lot of money, she said. “It’s about kingdom business. All that I do is to the glory of God. For me, this is using my gifts, helping this world and lifting up God in the process.”
Abigail Reese in Chicago

Susie Jennings spearheads Operation Care, which has helped rally her community to reach out to an often forgotten group
Susie Jennings, a pint-size nurse, born and river-baptized as a child in the Philippines, is uniting faith-based, social and health-care services with corporate giants to open arms, hearts and pocketbooks for one of America’s often forgotten groups: the homeless.

What began as Jennings’ blanket drive for the homeless a decade ago has blossomed into Operation Care , a nonprofit organization in Dallas that is backed by a board of directors composed of major players from such groups as Verizon, the IBM Corporation and SBC Communications.

Several times a year now, Jennings said, Operation Care brings the city’s homeless from the concrete shadows to celebrate holidays, and be fed, clothed and when possible reunited with families through a visit or a phone call near Easter and Valentine’s Day, in summer and fall, and at Thanksgiving and Christmas.

At least once a month, she said, her Operation Care volunteers hit the streets to witness to the homeless, take them comfort items, food and bottled water labeled with emergency and shelter numbers and the words, “Jesus Is the Living Water.”

Always friendly, smiling and nodding, Jennings has a vision that looms much larger than her 5-foot frame. Her energy seldom wanes, and those around her instinctively know they must move with her or respectfully move out of the way.

Operation Care is not unlike other homeless ministries, which often begin with one person’s calling and become established operations that enrich communities and lives in limitless ways, according to Steve Burger, executive director of the Association of Gospel Rescue Missions based in Kansas City. “There’s always the apparent need and that committed person that becomes totally enmeshed in the issue,” he said. “Personalities and past experiences can play in–and the Holy Spirit.”

Jennings said the Operation Care outreach stems from the loss of her husband in April 1993. “He had been suffering long-term emotional illness aggravated by a chemical imbalance in his brain,” she said. “He had a bad reaction to some medication; during that time he lost a close friend, lost his job, and his psychiatrist moved away. … Then he disappeared and became a missing person.

“We found his body in Oklahoma. He had committed suicide–homeless and alone. We buried him the day before Easter. … Reuniting families is an important aspect of this ministry.”

That spring, as full-time nurse supervisor for Baylor University Medical Center, the young widow was already teaching a preschool Sunday school class at her church in downtown Dallas.

“Then the Lord grabbed hold of me,” Jennings said. “I remember driving home from the church one day and turning my head to look away when I passed the Canton Street Bridge downtown. Under the bridge, more than 100 homeless men and women peered out from the cardboard boxes that served as their homes.

“But God called me not just to look at them, but to go under the bridge in person and help them. … At first, I said, ‘Oh, no, God, not me! … Why me?’ I had always despised homeless people. I couldn’t stand the way they smelled. … They don’t smell bad to me anymore.”

According to Ray Bailey, executive director and 25-year veteran of homeless outreach with the 50-year-old Dallas Life Foundation, Operation Care’s Christmas Gift gathering at the Dallas Convention Center was the largest homeless outreach event in the city’s history.

Several thousand volunteers pitched in from the mega Prestonwood Baptist Church, The Potter’s House and more than 121 area churches. An estimated 8,000 homeless and needy individuals filed in for food, personal care items, tents, blankets, medical exams, vision care, foot washing and podiatry care, makeovers, haircuts, manicures, individual and family portraits, legal advice, prayer, and spiritual and emotional counseling.

Jennings admits that she seems to meet herself coming and going these days with the demands of her job, ministry and caring for her 88-year-old mother, but she’s not discouraged. Instead, she said, she’s listening to hear if God is calling her to give up her lifetime nursing vocation.

“If God called me, I’d leave it tomorrow to help the homeless in Dallas and across the country for Him.”
Marcia J. Davis in Dallas