In choosing the breaking news links for sydneyanglicans.net, I use mainstream media outlets. The links are supposed to be what the world is saying about christians, so I generally shy away from the advocacy style, conservative web sites. But sometimes, mainstream media will not report stories you should know about. This week there's a glaring example of that.

Iranian Pastor Yousef Nadarkhani is on trial for apostasy, for leaving Islam and converting to Christianity. He has refused to recant and could be executed any day now. The story has kept popping up on Christian websites, but nothing from mainstream media. I'm not the only one to notice this. The media-watch site, getreligion.org, has a good analysis of the coverage. Time is growing short, so pray. You can also contact the Iranian authorities to register a protest. Here's how. (Late update: The mainstream media is starting to catch on, but only after politicians got involved)

Speaking of things ignored by the mainstream media, there was another of the Scanlon reports on social cohesion released this week. The Herald reported it like this. There was only a passing mention of the findings on religion "And while hardly a soul (or 3.6 per cent) admits to negative feelings towards Christianity, and even fewer have negative feelings to Buddhism, 25 per cent of us admit somewhat or very negative attitudes towards Islam. " I went in search of more information and found the entire report to download here. The religion findings are on page 37. It may come as a surprise to many christians that so few people turn out to be negative about christianity. But it is absolutely in line with the public opinion findings we got during the Connect09 campaign. It should be a spur to our evangelism.

The BC/AD/BCE debate which flared up recently in connection with Australia's national curriculum, has spread to the BBC. Executives have tried to introduce the terms into programmes, but there is a backlash - see here and here. Edwin Judge commented on the Australian move here.

Other stories to note this week, the pokies debate flares(see also Sandy Grant's blog), ominous signs of more persecution and violence for churches in Indonesia, and surprising support for Farmer Graham in the week's most unusual story.

Banner photo:  ElvertBarnes