The original issue can be found at: http://www.baptistpress.com/issue-09/21/2015 DISCLAIMER: Baptist Press should be credited for any reprinted stories that originate with BP. Suggested credit line: Reprinted from Baptist Press (www.baptistpress.com), news service of the Southern Baptist Convention. Please note that Baptist Press periodically carries stories from other sources by permission. Individuals interested in reprinting non-BP stories should contact the entity where the story originated to seek reprint permission. -------------------------------------------------------------------- FIRST-PERSON: It's time to increase our Cooperative Program giving by Ronnie Floyd Date: September 21, 2015 - Monday EDITOR'S NOTE: Ronnie Floyd is president of the Southern Baptist Convention and senior pastor of Cross Church in northwest Arkansas. SPRINGDALE, Ark. (BP) -- Increasing your church's financial giving through the Cooperative Program is like your church giving more money through its ministry budget. Just as the ministry budget moves up the financial base of support in your church, it moves up the overall financial base of our Great Commission ministries of our Southern Baptist Convention. The answer is through the Cooperative Program Over 90 years ago, the churches of the Southern Baptist Convention became weary of continual pleas for support from various ministries of our convention. This is why the Cooperative Program was born. It became the unified strategy for financial support of the ministries of the Southern Baptist Convention. The easiest way for churches to consistently support the ministries of the Southern Baptist Convention through the Cooperative Program is by inserting a regular line item in their budget. This provides the church consistency in their financial support and gives the ministries of our convention consistency in receiving funds. This is a much better option than our SBC ministry leaders spending time making multiple appeals to our churches to support the work of our convention. It just makes sense for pastors, associational employees, state executives and their employees and all Southern Baptist entity presidents and employees to talk about one thing: the Cooperative Program. A humble appeal for increasing your church's financial support through the Cooperative Program If I were an employee of our Southern Baptist Convention or a missionary, I would rather the churches increase their giving through the Cooperative Program than having to continually raise my own financial support from multiple churches. The Cooperative Program is something every church can support financially regardless of the size of their membership. This is our agreed upon, unified, strategic financial plan; therefore, we do not need to minimize nor undermine it in any way. Through the Cooperative Program, each cause shares financial resources proportionately. While some may want to designate monies or support only some of the ministries of the convention, this does not provide a healthy way to support the entire work of the Southern Baptist Convention. Blessing just one ministry at the exclusion of others eventually hurts other ministries of the Great Commission. There is not one pastor I know that appreciates a church member who only designates their contributions around the ministry budget of the church. This creates an unhealthy culture. Conversely, we believe in the autonomy of the local church and will honor and appreciate what you believe God wants your church to do. Therefore, the financial priority of each of our churches should be to support the Cooperative Program. I want to appeal to each of our churches to increase your financial support through the Cooperative Program. As well, for the sake of the Gospel, please do so sacrificially and do so as soon as possible. Increasing your church's support through the Cooperative Program is the greatest way you can forward the work of reaching the world for Christ. Not one of us can adequately support any one cause, but all of us together can pray, plan, give, cooperate and support every cause. If you are concerned about missionaries coming home If you are concerned about some of our missionaries having to come home and the decrease of our missionary forces, the greatest thing your church can do to help turn it around is increase your giving through the Cooperative Program. It helps build our base of support financially, which in turn will increase our ability to reach the world. Pastor and church leaders, please go to your finance committee, deacon body, church board, elders or whoever is key to leading in the decisions of your church financially and appeal to them to increase your church's financial support through the Cooperative Program as soon as possible. This helps us reach our states, our nation and our world for Christ. This financial decision is a Gospel decision. In order for us to push back on the lostness of our world by advancing the Gospel, we must increase our giving through the Cooperative Program. If we are going to reach the nations, as well as help every Gospel endeavor we do together within our own respective states and across America, we need to increase our financial support through the Cooperative Program. I pray your church will join my church and other churches that are stepping up during this time and increasing our financial giving through the Cooperative Program. -------------------------------------------------------------------- Prayer woven in NAMB's strategy to plant churches by Tobin Perry Date: September 21, 2015 - Monday NEW YORK CITY (BP) -- A total of 1.6 million people call the New York City borough of Manhattan home. It's undoubtedly one of the most densely populated -- and most influential -- areas in the world. Just 25 years ago less than 1 percent of Manhattan's midtown population considered themselves evangelicals. In the late 1980s that led the borough's pastors to their knees in prayer. "They didn't just pray, 'Lord, bless our city,'" said Steve Canter, the North American Mission Board's Send North America: New York City missionary. "They literally walked the streets, rallying together, thinking and praying in their neighborhoods. They rallied their churches to pray." According to a 2009 study, nearly 4 percent of borough residents now consider themselves evangelical. The number of evangelical churches has also nearly doubled since Sept. 11, 2001, according to Canter, who credits the consistent prayer of those pastors as the only variable to which that growth can be traced. That's a key reason prayer has become a critical component of the NAMB's Send North America: New York City strategy. "We want to see that kind of focused prayer on every neighborhood of New York City," Canter said. To help mobilize that focused prayer for New York City's approximately 380 neighborhoods, Canter and other New York City Southern Baptists have developed the 4•5•1 Initiative in an effort to mobilize Christians to pray four days a week for five minutes about one neighborhood. So far 200 people have made the commitment. New York City isn't alone among NAMB's 32 Send North America cities in prioritizing prayer. Each Send North America city has included prayer as part of its strategy. In addition, NAMB's TenTwo prayer strategy -- which will be emphasized Oct. 2 -- enlists Southern Baptists to pray daily at either 10:02 a.m. or 10:02 p.m. for God to call more church planters to the mission fields of North America, particularly the continent's cities. The TenTwo strategy is based on Jesus' words in Luke 10:2, where Jesus commands His followers to pray for God to call more workers to the harvest. "Unless the Spirit of God moves through the prayers of the saints, we will not experience the supernatural power of God bringing life to lost people," said Gary Frost, NAMB's Midwest Region vice president who also directs prayer strategies. "We must pray fervently 'for' our cities and 'in' our cities if we expect to dispel the darkness." Through Send North America: Denver, Colorado Baptists are urging Southern Baptists to become prayer partners, called "15ers," for the Mile High City. The term 15er comes from mountain climbing, a popular Colorado activity. Dave Howeth, NAMB's city missionary for Denver, says the state has 57 mountains in the state, called "14ers" that are more than 14,000 feet high. The state has no 15er mountain (one that is more than 15,000 feet high). Howeth and other Colorado Baptist leaders hope to grow an email list of 15,000 people who are committed to praying for church planting efforts in metro Denver and the Front Range. "You don't plant churches until you plant the Gospel," Howeth said. "You don't plant the Gospel, of course, unless you have people who are praying. We need to have a prayer saturation before we can have a Gospel saturation or any kind of movement." The Tennessee Baptist Convention is mobilizing volunteers from its churches to pray on site in metro Denver for God to call church planters to specific places in the area. Built to coincide with the North American Mission Board's Pray TenTwo initiative, the effort will take place the weekend of Oct. 2-4. Matt Marrs, NAMB's Send North America: Kansas City missionary, says local leaders in metro Kansas City are working together to establish a day of prayer for the city on Oct. 2, from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. at First Baptist Church in Raytown, Mo. Kansas City-area Southern Baptist leaders are focusing their efforts on mobilizing local churches who will commit to pray for the city one day per month. Local church leaders attending the day of prayer will pray for four specific areas of Send North America: Kansas City: partnering churches, church planters, church replanters and unreached people groups. "We're doing really impossible things," Marrs said. "We talk about reaching Somalis, Pakistanis or Gulf Arabs. You're not going to just get someone right out of seminary and bring up a mission team from the South, put them together and go reach a very difficult people group with the Gospel. That's only going to happen when the Spirit of God opens the hearts of indigenous people." For more information about NAMB's TenTwo prayer strategy, visit www.namb.net/Why-TenTwo. -------------------------------------------------------------------- WMU: More than ever, pray for IMB missionaries by Julie Walters Date: September 21, 2015 - Monday BIRMINGHAM, Ala. (BP) -- As International Mission Board personnel who are eligible for the organization's voluntary retirement incentive prayerfully consider God's leading, Woman's Missionary Union leaders are calling for more intense prayer and support for Southern Baptist missionaries. "Ongoing, focused prayer for our missionaries has always been a foundational component of missions discipleship through WMU," said Wanda S. Lee, executive director of national WMU. "It is both a privilege and responsibility to lift up our missionaries in prayer, and so vital right now as they are making potentially life-changing decisions." National WMU will host a special time of prayer for international missionaries during an observance of the Week of Prayer for International Missions at WMU's headquarters in Birmingham, Ala., Dec. 3. In addition to prayer, WMU is seeking to help missionaries who decide to return to the U.S. with housing and transportation. Missionary housing has long been a ministry provided by WMU through a password-protected database of available housing for missionaries. WMU provides counsel to those who want to learn more about starting a missionary house ministry and facilitates communication between missionaries and those who have houses available for use. Currently, approximately 530 homes are available for long-term housing and 117 for short-term housing of missionaries made available by churches, associations and individuals in 27 states. WMU is seeking to update the database prior to posting it for missionaries to use in their search for housing if they leave the field. "If you have a home available to offer to missionaries as they transition back to the U.S., please contact us so we can add your residence to our housing list," Lee said. "We also know transportation will be a need, so we are contacting those currently on our list to see if they may also have a vehicle they can offer for use." Contact housing@wmu.org or (205) 991-8100 with questions or information about housing or transportation for missionaries. -------------------------------------------------------------------- Scholars reflect on history of Christian persecution by S. Craig Sanders Date: September 21, 2015 - Monday LOUISVILLE, Ky. (BP) -- Scholars from around the world gathered at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary to discuss the history of Christian persecution at the 9th annual conference for the Andrew Fuller Center for Baptist Studies. "As the church of Jesus Christ in the 21st century, we do not operate from a position of strength, but that's a good thing," said Andrew Fuller Center research associate Jeff Robinson in a concert of prayer for the persecuted church that culminated the Sept. 15-16 conference in Louisville, Ky. "We want to remember that we're the persecuted church of Christ, and when we're persecuted, we grow," he said. "When we're at ease in Zion, we tend to decline." Prior to leading conference attendees in a time of prayer for both persecuted Christians and their oppressors, Robinson recounted the story of Romanian Baptist pastor Josef Tson. When communist authorities threatened Tson in 1977 for preaching the Gospel, the pastor famously quipped, "Don't you understand that when you kill me you send me to glory? You cannot threaten me with glory." Tson's example of courage and perseverance in the face of suffering was also a topic for Union University Dean Nathan Finn, who presented a paper on communist persecution of Baptists in the 20th century. Finn, dean of the School of Theology and Missions and professor of Christian thought and tradition at Union, said the "militantly atheist" governments "routinely suppressed the freedom of religion" between 1917 and 1989 by expelling or executing Baptists. Communist countries North Korea and China continue to make headlines regarding reports of such brutality today. "Everyone agrees that Islamic radicalism is the single biggest source of Christian persecution in the world today, but it isn't the only threat," Finn said. "As long as communism continues to eke out an existence, Christianity will be threatened," he noted. "Let's remember to pray for two things: that communism will finally be rejected the world over and that Christians suffering in communist lands will be faithful even unto death." With disciplines ranging from New Testament studies, Baptist history and missiology, scholars delivered plenary sessions on the history of persecution from the Roman Empire to present-day sub-Saharan Africa. Benjamin Hegeman, adjunct professor of intercultural studies at Houghton College and missionary in Benin, presented the conference's final paper, "Islam and the Suffering Bride of Christ in Sub-Saharan Africa." Hegeman said sub-Saharan Africa -- which includes Uganda, Sudan and Somalia -- currently leads the globe in Christian persecution. The rise of Islamic jihadism wiping out Christianity in these nations, Hegeman said, began not as a response to Western civilization but as an "in-house cleansing" of moderate Islam. Westerners must therefore hold government officials and the media accountable for acknowledging the religious factor in Islamic violence toward Christians, he said. "Efforts to debunk, dismiss or negate the evidence of this growing persecution will not succeed as God will certainly allow a 21st-century 'Foxe's Book of Martyrs' to be written uniquely for Africa," Hegeman said. "Their blood cries out and they, of all martyrs, merit to be heard by the global church." Historians also discussed evidence of persecution of Christians in Ancient Rome, Anabaptists in Reformation-era Europe, and Baptists in colonial Virginia. Steve Weaver, senior fellow for the Andrew Fuller Center and senior pastor of Farmdale Baptist Church in Frankfort, Ky., said many Southern Baptists assume American Christians have always had religious liberty, but that was not the case in colonial Virginia. Weaver noted the Virginian colony was established with the Church of England as the official church, allowing Anglicans to "prosecute and persecute" Baptists for converting their members "by the droves." He said it was not until Thomas Jefferson brought religious liberty to Virginia in 1785 that Baptists were free from mob violence and imprisonment. Yet, through this century of suffering, Baptists thrived as imprisoned leaders demonstrated complete satisfaction in Christ. "The men of this era can serve as models for persecuted Christians in our day. Their faithfulness to Christ and conscience remains an inspiring reminder of the Christian call to discipleship," Weaver said. "Whenever persecution is experienced for the cause of Christ, as the Virginia Baptists and persecuted Christians of every generation have found, Christ is present and he is enough." While Virginia Baptists advanced and accomplished religious liberty, Anabaptists in Reformation-era Europe offer much wisdom on the subject as well, noted Jason Duesing, provost at Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary. Duesing said historians often ignore Anabaptists as "nuisances," but they serve as models of endurance and free churches. While an evangelical stream of Anabaptists identified with the Reformers like Martin Luther and Ulrich Zwingli, they differed and therefore suffered because they advocated further reform, most notably the separation of church and state. "These believers were standing under the conviction of what they perceived to be the biblical means for protecting Gospel essentials: The preservation and right articulation of the Gospel can only be accomplished through the preservation and right articulation of the church," Duesing said. The conference opened with plenary addresses on Christian persecution in the New Testament and early church. Thomas R. Schreiner, James Buchanan Harrison Professor of New Testament Interpretation at Southern Seminary, examined the persecuted churches the Apostle John addressed in Revelation. Schreiner, who is publishing a forthcoming commentary on Revelation, said persecution for these churches was not an "all-out attack" but nevertheless threatened early Christians. Other plenary speakers during the conference included Brian Vickers, professor of New Testament interpretation and biblical theology at Southern Seminary, and Bryan Litfin, professor of theology at Moody Bible Institute. Prior to the event, the Center for Ancient Christian Studies hosted a Sept. 14 preconference, "Martyrdom in the Early Church: Fact and Fiction." The free event featured presentations from Litfin; Jarvis J. Williams, associate professor of New Testament interpretation at Southern Seminary; and Southern Seminary alumnus Gregory Cochran, director of applied theology and associate professor at California Baptist University. Audio and video of the Andrew Fuller Conference plenary sessions will soon be available online at sbts.edu/resources. -------------------------------------------------------------------- Baptists 'not threatened' by pope's U.S. visit by David Roach Date: September 21, 2015 - Monday WASHINGTON (BP) -- As Pope Francis visits the U.S., Southern Baptist leaders say they stand with his statements of biblical morality but urge Catholics to reject the Vatican's official teaching on salvation in favor of a personal relationship with Christ by faith alone. Russell Moore, president of Southern Baptists' Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission, hopes Francis will speak to key moral concerns being debated in the public square during his Sept. 22-27 U.S. visit. "I hope the pope speaks with clarity about the dignity of all human life, including that of the unborn; the stability of the family, including the necessity of mothers and fathers for children; and religious liberty for all," Moore told Baptist Press in written comments. "I also hope he speaks directly as he has before to our responsibility for the most vulnerable among us, the poor, the prisoner, the immigrant and the orphan." R. Albert Mohler Jr., president of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, agrees and wants Francis to clarify his "decidedly mixed signals" regarding multiple issues, including human sexuality. "This pope's method is to speak to the theological left and the theological right with two different sets of messages," Mohler told BP. "As he'll be speaking to a largely disillusioned Catholic population and a very skeptical secular population, I don't expect him to be any clearer on the issues" during the U.S. visit. Yet Francis' trip could provide an opportunity for American archbishops and members of the press to request clarification regarding the tension between popular perceptions of Francis' progressivism and his professed support of traditional Catholic doctrines, Mohler said. He cited unique tension between progressives' hope that Francis will change Catholic teaching on homosexuality and the pope's position that "all homosexual behavior and relationships" are "objectively disordered." Mohler called Francis' Sept. 24 address to a joint session of Congress "problematic." "No Roman Catholic pope has ever been invited to address a joint session of Congress," Mohler said. "And Baptists historically have been very opposed to the United States government recognizing any religion or religious leader in such a way." 'A light comes on' Retention and recruitment of Catholic church members is expected to be another focus of the pope's visit, with the Pew Forum reporting earlier this year that six U.S. Catholics leave the church for every one new Catholic convert. But Baptist pastors who have seen numerous Catholics come to know Christ as their personal Lord and Savior say Francis poses no threat to Protestant evangelism. Chris Goeppner, pastor of Riverbank Church in White River Junction, Vt., has seen 150-200 Catholics profess faith in Christ since 2010. Catholics "who haven't been to church for a long time come to [our] church and hear a message that has some familiar verbiage," Goeppner said. "... But now they've connected it to a relationship, and it's been really cool to see when the light bulb goes on." Goeppner told BP about one Catholic woman who committed her life to Christ at Riverbank during the past month. The woman said, "I've been going to Catholic church my whole childhood and even during my early adult years, and I never heard this message that you shared today about Jesus." Because the Gospel is so "powerful" and "irresistible" for many Catholics, Goeppner said he feels no need to "lean into" Catholic doctrines and refute them from the pulpit. Dennis Diaz, pastor of Mesilla Park Community Church in Las Cruces, N.M., agrees. "We are not really 'targeting' Catholics any more than any other group in our city," Diaz, a former Catholic, told BP in written comments. "That we have had many become part of our church family is largely due to the fact that we relate well to them and they can relate to us." Many basic Christian doctrines "can be found in the Roman Catholic Church," Diaz said. But "the waters can get a bit muddy on how a person receives salvation." "I believe a simple way of understanding the difference is this: The Catholic Church believes that salvation is mediated to each of us by the Catholic Church," he said. "As evangelicals, although we believe the church is vitally important, we believe Christ is the only mediator, and we received salvation by grace through faith in Him alone, not through the church. "Because of this, many of those raised Catholic are confused about what it means to be saved, belong to Christ and have eternal life. Often when they hear the clear Gospel message, a light comes on, and it requires little persuasion to lead them in prayer to entrust their lives to Christ," he said. 'Extra-biblical innovations' Though pastors like Goeppner and Diaz have found little need to critique Roman Catholic doctrine in sermons, Malcolm Yarnell, professor of systematic theology at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, said Catholic teaching and the Baptist Faith and Message "significantly diverge from one another at the very foundation of our respective theological statements." Among its errors, the Catholic Church teaches that tradition and Scripture are "inseparable means of revelation," communicating God's will with equal authority, Yarnell told BP in written comments. The Catholic Church also teaches that faith and good works each play some role in sinners' gaining right standing before God, he said. "Following the early Reformers, Southern Baptists have correctly opposed both of these foundational moves," Yarnell said. "...This is not to say the Gospel is absent within Roman Catholicism -- Martin Luther perceived that the Roman church had historically transmitted to us the Bible as well as the orthodox creeds. But this is to say that Roman Catholicism introduces extra-biblical innovations that confuse the presentation of the Gospel. "This is why leaders from all the major Reformation traditions -- including Luther, Zwingli, Cranmer and Hubmaier -- were critical of the Roman church. To get to the Gospel in the Roman church, one must first strip away the accretions of human tradition and human works," Yarnell said. As Mohler explained, "the official teaching of the Roman Catholic Church explicitly denies justification by faith alone, and thus I believe it teaches another gospel." However, "there are undoubtedly Christians in the Roman Catholic Church who, inconsistently with official Catholic doctrine, nonetheless simply trust Jesus as Lord and Savior." 'I pray for Pope Francis' Doug Dieterly, an Indiana pastor and former Baptist Collegiate Ministries director at the University of Notre Dame, told BP many Catholic students lack in-depth knowledge of the Bible and find the Gospel refreshing. Catholics tend to rely on church authority as the source of their theology rather than Scripture, he noted. When nominally Catholic students "come to BCM Bible study and get introduced to in-depth Bible study, they tend to see very quickly how much gold there is to be mined from the Word of God, and as a result become very, very interested and very, very involved," said Dieterly, associate pastor of Plymouth Baptist Church in Plymouth, Ind. "And if they have never made a personal decision to receive Jesus Christ as their Lord, they will typically do so." The greatest impediment to evangelism at Notre Dame, is "a mindset among some Catholics that the Catholic Church is the one true church and you don't look outside of that," said Dieterly, a former trustee chair for the North American Mission Board. Diaz, of New Mexico, seemed to speak for all the ministers interviewed by BP when he called Francis' U.S. visit "a non-issue" in terms of its impact on Protestant evangelism. "We are not threatened by the pope and his agenda," Diaz said. "He is not our adversary or competition. I pray for Pope Francis. I hope he can lead a revival within the Roman Catholic Church. I hope and pray he will embrace the Word of God as the sole authority of the church and encourage his denomination to do the same. I hope and pray He will point people to Christ alone as the way of salvation. "Until then, we will continue to seek to reach everyone in our city that does not know Christ, no matter what their background." -------------------------------------------------------------------- House OKs PPFA defunding, abortion survivors bills by Tom Strode Date: September 21, 2015 - Monday WASHINGTON (BP) -- The U.S. House of Representatives voted Sept. 18 to defund Planned Parenthood in the wake of the release of undercover videos providing evidence the organization trades in baby body parts. On the same date, the House also approved legislation to protect babies who survive abortions. House members passed the bills in the face of President Obama’s promise to veto both measures. Representatives voted 241-187 for the Defund Planned Parenthood Act, H.R. 3134. The bill would place a one-year moratorium on federal money for the Planned Parenthood Federation of America (PPFA) and its affiliates while Congress investigates the organization. The vote came after the release since mid-July of 10 secretly recorded videos that show Planned Parenthood officials discussing the sale of organs from aborted children and acknowledging their willingness to manipulate the abortion procedure to preserve body parts for sale and use. The videos also provided evidence of cutting into live babies to remove organs. The House passed the Born-alive Abortion Survivors Protection Act, H.R. 3504, by 248-177. The proposal -- which builds on the 2002 Born-alive Infants Protection Act -- would require appropriate care and hospital admission for a child who lives through an abortion or attempted abortion. Russell Moore, head of the Southern Baptist Convention’s Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission (ERLC), hailed the bills’ passage as the “absolutely right” action by lawmakers. “These are not difficult or complicated moral dilemmas but clear cases of acting in defense of our most vulnerable and most defenseless citizens,” Moore told Baptist Press in written comments. “As long as the human rights of babies are subjected to the autonomous ‘choices’ of others or the profiteering of corporations, our national conscience will continue to cry out.” Moore said his prayer “is that the hearts of many in the Senate, and in the White House, will be turned toward the plight of born and unborn children and their mothers.” The White House, however, made it clear two days before the votes the president would veto the bills if they reach his desk. The administration “strongly opposes” approval of the measures because they “would have the same consequence of limiting women’s health care choices,” according to a statement issued Sept. 16. Obama’s veto promise and the House votes provided further evidence of the Democratic Party’s commitment to abortion rights, even when it comes to the killing of unborn children outside the womb. Only five Democrats voted for the legislation to protect babies who survive abortions, and only two voted to defund PPFA. The House votes “are evidence of just how wedded to the idea of abortion on-demand, at any time, for any reason, that the Democratic Party has become,” said Marjorie Dannenfelser, president of the pro-life Susan B. Anthony List, in a written statement. “Where is the compassion and concern for ‘the little guy,’ the abortion survivor, whose heart is beating and alive?” The sponsor of the abortion survivors measure expressed dismay at the president’s veto promise. “President Obama will be remembered as the abortion President and nothing will mark his administration with more shame and dishonor than his lack of compassion and protection toward millions of innocent and voiceless little babies," said Rep. Trent Franks, R.-Ariz., in written comments. The battle for the proposals moves to the Senate, where Democrats appear to have enough votes to prevent their passage as stand-alone measures. Rep. Diane Black, R.-Tenn., sponsor of the PPFA defunding bill, urged Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell to give her proposal a chance. “At least give it a vote,” she told McConnell in a radio interview on The Catholic Channel. “Don’t throw up the white flag before you’ve fought the fight.” She will call every senator she knows to seek passage in that chamber, said Black, whose legislation would divert funds to other federally qualified health centers. The ERLC’s Moore sent letters to Speaker of the House John Boehner on the two days prior to the votes urging adoption of both bills. He also had endorsed legislation to defund Planned Parenthood in a July letter. House committees are conducting investigations of Planned Parenthood in light of the undercover videos. The House Judiciary Committee held the first of two hearings on the subject Sept. 9. In early August, the Senate fell short in an attempt to defund Planned Parenthood. Senators voted 53-46 to bring such a bill to the floor. While a majority of senators favored consideration of the proposal, the attempt to invoke cloture, as it is known, fell short of the 60 votes needed to begin debate on the legislation and establish a path to its passage. While the federal government has failed so far to defund Planned Parenthood, five states have acted to do so. Alabama, Arkansas, Louisiana, New Hampshire and Utah have eliminated funds for the organization since the video releases by the Center for Medical Progress began. The ERLC and other opponents of government funding for Planned Parenthood have tried in previous congressional sessions to cut off money for the organization and other abortion providers but have always fallen short. In 2011, an effort to bring a PPFA defunding bill to the Senate floor received only 42 votes. In its latest financial report (2013-14), PPFA said it received more than $528 million in government grants, contracts and reimbursements. It performed 327,653 abortions during 2013. The only Democrats to vote for the Planned Parenthood defunding bill were Reps. Daniel Lipinski of Illinois and Collin Peterson of Minnesota. They also voted for the abortion survivors proposal, along with Reps. Matthew Cartwright of Pennsylvania, Henry Cuellar of Texas and Jim Langevin of Rhode Island. The only Republicans to oppose the Planned Parenthood defunding measure were Reps. Charles Dent of Pennsylvania, Bob Dold of Illinois and Richard Hanna of New York. No GOP members voted against the abortion survivors bill.