Shooting at Church of Christ in Texas Leaves Two Dead

Two people are dead after a gunman opened fire Sunday at a church near Fort Worth, Texas, officials said. One victim died at the scene and another died en route to the hospital, MedStar told CBS News.   A third person is in critical condition.

The gunfire began just before 10 a.m. at West Freeway Church of Christ in White Settlement, a city outside Fort Worth. Inside, paramedics found three men with gunshot wounds, according to Macara Trusty, spokesperson for local ambulance service MedStar.

A witness told CBS Dallas / Fort Worth the gunman shot someone with a shotgun during communion and that he was then taken down by another church member.

“It was the most scariest thing. You feel like your life is flashing before you. I was so worried about my little one,” Isabel Arreola said. 

The church called West Freeway Church of Christ is located in White Settlement, in suburban Tarrant County.

The church live-streams its services on YouTube, and Sunday’s shooting was captured. The video has since been taken offline, but it reportedly showed an armed man who appeared to be a security guard responding after the initial shots were fired.

Darick Favors, Bishop Known for Miraculous ‘Laying on of Hands’ Found Dead in Motel With ‘Drugs’

A Dallas pastor known for his miraculous “laying on of hands” ability was found dead about noon Wednesday, Dec. 13, at a Star Motel.

According to The Christian Post, bishop Darick Favors, 42,  had checked in to the motel on Monday and was expected to check out on Wednesday. He was found deceased in his room.

Favors — who had been teaching at Full Gospel Tabernacle in Dallas since he was 19 — was allegedly found in the hotel with unknown drugs, and police have yet to determine his cause of death.

His wife shared a post to Facebook asking for people to “show [the] family mercy” and to “not interfere,” but rather to remember the good things about Favors and to pray for her and her family.

 

Chron.com reached out to the church for comment and were unable to reach anyone.

Ex-priest to stand trial for 1960 murder of Texas beauty queen

AUSTIN, Texas (Reuters) – A former Roman Catholic priest is due to stand trial this week on charges he beat, raped and strangled to death a Texas beauty queen nearly 60 years ago after hearing her last confession.

 Irene Garza 

Lawyers for John Feit, 84, have denied his responsibility for the 1960 murder of Irene Garza, 25, in McAllen, Texas, and said in court filings that he was wrongly accused of “one of the most notorious and heavily publicized crimes in the history of the Rio Grande Valley.”

 Irene Garza

Jury selection is scheduled to begin on Tuesday and opening statements are expected on Thursday at a state district court in Hidalgo county in south Texas. The trial is likely to take about two weeks, county officials said on Monday.

Garza, a former Miss South Texas and second-grade school teacher, was last seen giving confession during Holy Week at Sacred Heart Catholic Church on April 16, 1960, according to the Texas Rangers cold case website.

Her body was found five days later in a nearby canal. An autopsy showed that Garza had been raped while comatose and died of suffocation. 

 Left- Irene Garza who was raped and murdered after giving her last confession to Feit-Right

Feit had initially been considered by authorities to be a suspect in the case but was not indicted. He had been implicated in the assault of another woman in the area a few weeks before Garza’s disappearance, but pleaded no contest to aggravated assault and served no jail time.

Shortly after Garza’s body was found, Feit was ordered by his church superiors to leave McAllen, the Dallas Morning News reported.

 Feit

Feit later left the priesthood and moved to Arizona, where he started a family.

Texas Rangers investigating cold cases reported in 2002 that a local priest had told them, shortly after Garza’s body was found, that he had seen scratches on the hands of Feit, who was a visiting priest at Sacred Heart Church at the time.

The local priest, Father Joseph O’Brien, also told investigators that Feit had confessed to the murder, law enforcement officials said. Feit has denied that.

Blasphemous Minister Who Supports Polyamory Claims ‘Holy Trinity Is a Polyamorous Relationship’

DALLAS, Texas — A blasphemous Baptist minister in Texas known for his book “The Queering of an American Evangelical” says that he supports polyamorous—or plural—relationships and believes that God Himself is polyamorous.

“The Holy Trinity is a polyamorous relationship,” Jeff Hood, who holds a doctorate with a focus in “queer theology” from Brite Divinity School and who was ordained at a church within the Southern Baptist Convention, asserted during a recent Patheos interview with Chuck McKnight.

“You can’t talk about the level of intimacy and ecstasy that these three beings are constantly experiencing without defining their relationship in such a way,” he claimed. “Their love has always been and will always be a shared phenomenon. In the Holy Trinity, love is never denied. We should spend our lives making sure that the love of polyamorous individuals is never denied and always protected. The Holy Trinity demands it.”

Hood has stated before on his website that he believes that “the disciples and Jesus were involved in some sort of polyamorous relationship.”

In August, he told Jennifer Martin of Splinter that he thinks polyamorous relationships reflect the Trinity.

“Not only is polyamory a positive thing, I think it’s a holy thing,” Hood opined. “I think it mimics the personhood of God. Different relationships can show us different things, and I think polyamory can show us what the Trinity looks like.”

Hood has also outlined that he believes that because “love is love,” polyamorous relationships should be supported just like same-sex relationships.

“While there could be many explanations of the polyamorous God, the one that matters the most is this: God dwells within the oppressed and marginalized (Matthew 25). Polyamorous folks are constantly oppressed and marginalized,” he told McKnight. “God is polyamorous, and if we want to get saved than we have to figure out a way to become connected to polyamory.”

Hood acknowledged during the interview that his views are rejected by many Christians, who he called “church [expletives] that have no knowledge of God.”

“Do these people sound like they know anything about love? [Expletive] no. I ain’t listening to a [expletive] word they say,” he said. “I know who I’m listening to. I hear the voice of God, ‘I am the way, the truth and the life. No one can can love Me and condemn polyamory, for I am polyamorous.’”

Hood’s views on the subject have been met with mixed reaction.

“God explicitly condones polygamy and the whole Bride of Christ is polygamous,” one commenter wrote.  

“Plural unity within the Trinity is not polyamory,” another stated. “What people want to do is their business; however, if you feel the need to justify it scripturally, at least be less sloppy when you try. Otherwise you’re just preaching to the choir, so to speak.”

“Jeff Hood is clearly biblically ignorant. His so-called knowledge of God comes from Satan,” a third wrote. 

Pastor Jeff Hood

 [written by  Heather Clark]

Abortion Clinics Offer Free Abortions to Hurricane Harvey Victims

Whole Women’s Health, one of the nation’s leading abortion providers, is offering free abortions to Hurricane Harvey victims.

“Unfortunately, we know all too well that abortion can be difficult to access in some parts of the country, especially Texas,” Whole Women’s Heath said on its blog. “During Hurricane Harvey, many of the clinics in Houston had to close temporarily, leaving women with very few options.”

“We’re offering NO-COST abortions to those affected by Hurricane Harvey,” the organization said.

According to the Dallas Morning News, nearly 80 women have already taken up the abortion provider on its offer, or are scheduled to do so soon.

But while the women may see the procedure as a free service, Texas Right to Life says “there is always a cost” to having an abortion.

“The promotion of this heinous no-cost service is riddled with fallacies because abortion is never free,” Texas Right to Life spokesperson Melissa Conway told Baptist Press. “There is always a cost to abortion. Women are not free from the emotional toll that ensues after abortion and the child is certainly not free to live another day. Abortions, just like the catastrophic effects of the hurricane, are never free and we as a community pay the price for their needless destruction.”

Conway also says now is the time for Christians to “be the hands and feet of Christ” and help pregnant women in need.