Below are this week's Articles of Interest as compiled by Mr. Van Baker. This collection of articles is cultivated by Mr. Baker with the goal of highlighting some of the trends, upheavals, and things to watch for in our society. These articles are not necessarily the express views of the United Church of God, Mr. Baker, or me as the pastor, but they are informative of what is occurring in our nation and culture. In accordance with Christ's warning to correctly discern the times (Matthew 16:1-4), it is wise to be aware of what is going on around us. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------

As Christians Are Slaughtered, the World Looks Away – Islamists massacred over 200 people in Yelwata, Nigeria— many of them women and children. The media barely mentioned it. And the Christian West, or largely post-Christian West, remains silent and deeply uninterested.
https://www.thefp.com/p/christians-slaughtered-in-nigeria

This Is The Worst Year For The U.S. Dollar Since The Oil Crisis Of 1973 – The U.S. dollar just keeps getting weaker and weaker, and that is a major problem because our current standard of living depends on having a strong dollar. When the U.S. dollar is strong relative to other national currencies, our paychecks stretch farther and we can buy more stuff. Conversely, when the U.S. dollar is weak relative to other national currencies we can’t buy as much stuff and our standard of living goes down. So the fact that the U.S. dollar is “having its worst start to the year since 1973” should deeply alarm all of us.
https://charismanews.com/culture/this-is-the-worst-year-for-the-u-s-dollar-since-the-oil-crisis-of-1973/

World fertility rates in 'unprecedented decline', UN says – "The world has begun an unprecedented decline in fertility rates," says Dr Natalia Kanem, head of United Nations Population Fund, the UN agency for reproductive rights. Dr. Kanem points out that 40 years ago China, Korea, Japan, Thailand and Turkey were all worried their populations were too high. By 2015 they wanted to boost fertility. "Calling this a 'crisis,' saying it's 'real.' That's a shift I think," says demographer Anna Rotkirch, who has researched fertility intentions in Europe and advises the Finnish government on population policy.
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/clynq459wxgo

Same-sex households on the rise in the US – A decade after the Supreme Court’s landmark decision in Obergefell versus Hodges legalising same-sex marriage across the US, new data shows steady growth in the number of American households led by same-sex couples, both married and cohabiting. According to recent figures released by the US Census Bureau, the number of households headed by married same-sex couples increased from 425,357 in 2015, to 774,553 in 2023. Similarly, households led by same-sex partners who are not married rose from 433,539 to 536,894 over the same period. Despite these gains, same-sex couples still make up a relatively small portion of all households. Married same-sex couples represent just 1.3% of all married households, while same-sex cohabiting make up 5.6% of the total cohabiting population.
https://christiantoday.com/news/same-sex-households-on-the-rise-in-the-us

Pride Month 2025 was a big "flop": Have we reached the end of the rainbow? Signs that the rainbow Pride movement is fading fast abound, and this is perhaps nowhere more evident than in the sparse attendance of “World Pride DC 2025” (WPDC25) which ended in June. Giddy WPDC25 planners had anticipated up to 3 million mostly LGBT individuals from around the world would descend upon and overwhelm the nation’s capital, but the large crowds failed to materialize. WPDC25 was a bust, and so was the just-ended LGBT “Pride Month” across much of the nation.
https://www.lifesitenews.com/analysis/pride-month-2025-was-a-big-flop-have-we-reached-the-end-of-the-rainbow/

White House Condemns Assisted Suicide – The Telegraph reported on June 26, 2025 that the US State Department stated that the British Parliament passing of the Leadbeater assisted suicide bill is “supporting state-subsidised suicide.” The British assisted suicide bill passed on June 20, 2025 by a vote of 314 to 291 and will soon be debated in the British House of Lords. The Telegraph reported that the US State Department sent this message to the British Parliament: “As the UK Parliament considers support for state-subsidised suicide, euphemistically called a Bill for ‘terminally ill adults’ the United States reaffirms the sanctity of life,” the US bureau of democracy, human rights and labour said.
https://www.lifenews.com/2025/06/27/white-house-condemns-assisted-suicide-its-state-subsidized-sucicide/

New Technology Gives Earlier Dates for Dead Sea Scrolls – While scholars have held the Dead Sea Scrolls to date somewhere between the fourth and second century BC, there has been considerable difficulty dating individual manuscripts with any degree of accuracy. Now using AI technology and new radiocarbon dating carried out in cooperation with the Israel Antiquities Authority, there have been some surprises as the documents have been found to be older than assumed, according to a new study published in PLOS One June 25. The results also indicate literacy was more widespread than was previously assumed.
https://charismanews.com/culture/new-technology-gives-earlier-dates-for-dead-sea-scrolls-challenging-doubts-about-book-of-daniel/

Jimmy Swaggart, TV Evangelist, Dies at 90 – Jimmy Swaggart, a scandal-plagued Pentecostal televangelist who was known for his fire-and-brimstone sermonizing, and who waged a fiery campaign against rock ‘n’ roll even though he was the cousin of rock pioneer Jerry Lee Lewis and country star Mickey Gilley, died Tuesday [7/1] at age 90. For better or worse, Swaggart became the figure many Americans first thought of when they considered the idea of “TV preachers,” as his flair for emotional fire-and-brimstone sermons came to overshadow even Billy Graham, whose own warnings of an eternity without God sounded comparatively kinder and gentler in comparison to Swaggart’s penchant for melodrama.
https://variety.com/2025/music/obituaries-people-news/jimmy-swaggart-dead-tv-evangelist-cousin-jerry-lee-lewis-1236432640/

AI Is Quietly Rebuilding Manufacturing From the Inside Out – Artificial intelligence isn’t coming for manufacturing. It’s already there, installed, integrated, and making corrections before anyone upstairs has time to schedule a meeting. The shift hasn’t been loud or flashy. That’s part of the reason so many people still don’t believe it’s real. But those working closest to the machines know the difference. The line runs cleaner. Errors happen less often. Waste is down. And in most cases, no one on the floor was told why. It just started working better.
https://pjmedia.com/david-manney/2025/06/26/ai-is-quietly-rebuilding-manufacturing-from-the-inside-out-n4941196