It’s Friday, October 24th, A.D. 2025. This is The Worldview in 5 Minutes heard on 140 radio stations and at www.TheWorldview.com. I’m Adam McManus. (Adam@TheWorldview.com)
By Adam McManus
Spanish priest acquitted on hate crime charges for criticizing radical Islam
A Spanish Catholic priest who was facing three years in prison for making critical remarks about radical Islam nearly a decade ago has been acquitted, reports The Christian Post.
The advocacy organization Abogados Cristianos announced in an X post last Friday that “The Malaga Court [acquitted] Pastor Custodio [Ballester], prosecuted for criticizing Islam: there is no hate crime.”
In 2016, Ballester was charged with saying, “Islam does not allow for dialogue. You either believe or you are an infidel who must be subdued one way or another.”
The Rev. Franklin Graham praised Ballester’s acquittal as “good news” in an X post on Monday.
A report published last month by the Spanish Observatory for Religious Freedom and Conscience found that 69% of the attacks were directed at Christians, while instances of antisemitism grew by 38% compared to 2023 and had increased by 867% since 2022.
Senator Schumer’s shutdown flip flop, afraid of an AOC challenge
Democratic Senator Chuck Schumer of New York, the Minority Leader of the U.S. Senate, has historically opposed government shutdowns.
He opposed a shutdown on October 16, 2013.
SCHUMER: “What if I persuaded my caucus to say I’m going to shut the government down. I’m going to not pay our bills unless I get my way. It’s a politics of idiocy, of confrontation, of paralysis.”
Then, Senator Schumer opposed a government shutdown on January 25, 2019.
SCHUMER: “Shutting down government over a policy difference is self-defeating. We can never hold American workers hostage again.”
And, as recently as March 13th of this year, Senator Schumer opposed a government shutdown then.
SCHUMER: “While the [Continuing Resolution] bill is very bad, the potential for a shutdown has consequences for America that are much, much worse. Therefore, I will vote to keep the government open and not shut it down.”
But now, Democratic Senator Schumer is leading the fight for the government shutdown, driven by the AOC/Sanders wing of his party.
Listen to CNN’s John Berman’s introduction of his recent appearance.
BERMAN: “Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, who joins us now from Capitol Hill. Senator, I was saying that every Republican who’s gone on TV the last, what nine hours or so, has called this the ‘Schumer Shutdown.”
Later, Berman said this.
BERMAN: “Everyone in Congress right now, on the Republican side, is really pointing the finger squarely at you personally. And one of the things they’re saying is, this is about politics in New York, that you might face a primary from Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.”
In fact, Republican Senator John Kennedy of Louisiana said as much.
KENNEDY: “Senator Schumer, his relationship with the truth is very casual. The truth is that this is a political shutdown. Senator Schumer is nervous as a pregnant nun about losing his re-election to the socialist wing of his party led by Congresswoman Ocasio-Cortez, which is in control.
“Now, we will eventually come out of this shutdown. Here’s how I think it will happen. Senator Schumer is a smart man. He’s been around a long time. His first car was a chariot. Washington is all he’s ever known his entire life. He knows he’s on shaky ground here in terms of policy.
“So, here’s how I think it’ll end. Schumer will go to six or eight of his colleagues, Democrats of course, and say, ‘I want you to vote to lift the shutdown.’ He’ll say, ‘I can’t vote with you. I’ve got to appear to be tough. I may even have to criticize you, but’ — wink wink, nod nod – ‘I’m trying to make the loon wing of the party love me, but you bail me out here.’ But he’s got to be careful with that, because he doesn’t want it to look like a mutiny, because then he looks even weaker.”
CA teacher to ICE: “They are not the only ones with guns in this city.”
The Department of Homeland Security will refer a California teacher for a possible criminal probe after he made threatening comments toward immigration officials, reports WorldNetDaily.com.
Listen to Los Angeles Unified School District history teacher Ron Gochez.
GOCHEZ: “Don’t forget where you’re standing. This is South Central Los Angeles. They are not the only ones with guns in this city. They’re not the only ones that don’t forget that. And I don’t say that because we’re calling it for violence. I’m saying that because the people have every right to defend themselves against masked, unidentified gunmen with AR-15s and other military rifles.”
Gochez founded the Los Angeles chapter of Union del Barrio—a revolutionary socialist movement that demands an end to capitalism and open borders from Alaska to Chile. The group sees communist dictators like Fidel Castro, Hugo Chavez, and Che Guevara as heroes.
DHS spokeswoman Tricia McLaughlin said that the teacher’s comments endanger ICE agents’ lives.
New Bible story book injects sexual perversion, gender confusion, and woke ideology
And finally, a new children’s book of Bible stories claims that the Bible has “made-up” stories and events in its pages, drawing criticism from Focus on the Family, reports The Christian Post.
The Just Love Story Bible, authored by Rev. Dr. Jacqui Lewis and Rev. Dr. Shannon Harris, reimagines 52 stories from the Old and New Testaments, weaving in sexual perversion, gender confusion, and woke ideology. For them, the Bible is not authoritative; they are.
In the book’s introduction to Genesis, the woke authors, who are part of the leftist Presbyterian Church (USA), write, “Some of the stories had made-up characters and events. Others were about real people and things that really happened.”
Harris, an associate dean at Auburn Theological Seminary in New York City, explained her motivation behind the project at a Q&A event for the book in September.
HARRIS: “I wanted to do this project with Jackie, because when my kids were little, it was really hard to find a children’s Bible that I didn’t feel like I had to change some of the words. Like there might be stories that talked about God, like God was a boy (laughing) and only used kind of male language for God. Or they might tell a story, but they wouldn’t tell enough about the story to understand whether it was about a made-up character or a real person.”
Later, to the audience of parents and young children, she read an excerpt from her woke Just Love Story Bible in which she reinterpreted the plagues and other punishments that God had sent to get Pharoah’s attention or the attention of His chosen people, the Jews.
HARRIS: “Four natural disasters, one after the other. Well, the prophet and the people thought they were to blame. They thought that the disasters were God’s way of punishing them. They didn’t know that when bad things happen, like swarms of bugs, floods, earthquakes or tornadoes, it’s not God’s punishment, but it’s easy to worry when bad things happen, to feel like God’s angry at you, even when that’s not true.”
Inspired by the Joel 2:28 passage, Harris also imagined what a young person might envision.
HARRIS: “So what did the young people prophesy back then? Perhaps one of them bravely announced to the prophets, priests and people: ‘I don’t believe that our loving God sends terrible things to teach us a lesson.’”
In an op-ed published by Focus on the Family’s news arm, Daily Citizen, Paul Batura warned families about The Just Love Story Bible. He said, “[T]he motives of the authors appear broader and far more dangerous than merely trumpeting diversity. They also want to sow seeds of doubt in children’s minds that the events depicted in the Bible are literally true, including the Resurrection.”
He added, “Questioning the accuracy and authority of the Bible is hardly a new exercise, but so blatantly and openly selling such a heretical interpretation of God’s Word to children undermines God’s sacred Word in a particularly dangerous and destructive way.”
Indeed, 2 Timothy 4:3-4 says, “For a time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions, and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths.”
Close
And that’s The Worldview on this Friday, October 24th, in the year of our Lord 2025. Follow us on X or subscribe for free by Spotify, Amazon Music, or by iTunes or email to our unique Christian newscast at www.TheWorldview.com. I’m Adam McManus (Adam@TheWorldview.com). Seize the day for Jesus Christ.