District of Columbia

An evangelical group is celebrating a victory for religious freedom after Capitol Police allowed ministers to read from the Bible on Thursday in front of the Capitol Christmas tree despite previous threats of arrests and fines.

The Washington, D.C. police force allowed Christian Defense Coalition Director the Rev. Patrick Mahoney and Hillside Missions Director Kris Keating to read Bible passages and display a miniature Nativity scene on Capitol Hill uninterrupted.

Mahoney, who initially warned his supporters that he would be arrested Thursday, and the Christian Defense Coalition praised the Capitol Police for showing restraint. more >>

First Lady Michelle Obama announced on Monday that she, alongside more than 400 other participants, succeeded in an attempt to break the Guinness world record for the most people doing jumping jacks in a 24-hour period.

Mrs. Obama led 464 Washington elementary and middle school students in jumping jacks on the White House’s South Lawn in October.

According to a White House video of Mrs. Obama, over 300,000 people participated in the record-breaking attempt, defeating the previous world record of some 20,000 people. more >>

It took losing his earthly father for award-winning singer-songwriter Matt Brouwer to understand his heavenly father.

The Nova Scotia, Canada, native says it's a hard truth that's haunted him ever since he lost his dad in a car accident at age three. Since growing up in a single parent household on a dairy farm with two older brothers, Brouwer has turned his heartbreak into a way of wrestling with God's will through song.

Such raw honesty has bolstered Brouwer's fan base, and the singer now counts Billboard Top 20 singles and Canadian Juno Awards among his achievements. Stopping by the Christian Post's Washington D.C. office en route to New York, the singer shares how with great loss comes even greater love. more >>

WASHINGTON – Congressman Trent Franks (R-Ariz.) attempted to lead House members in a fight against gender and race-motivated abortion, but met resistance among sex selection opponents seeking to protect abortion rights.

Franks chaired a house hearing Tuesday to raise support of his bill, the Susan B. Anthony and Fredrick Douglas Prenatal Nondiscrimination Act (PreNDA). The bill seeks to make abortions motivated by the sex or race of the baby illegal.

"Sex-selection and race-selection abortions trivialize the value of the unborn on the basis of sex or race, reinforcing sex and race discrimination, and coarsening society to the humanity of all vulnerable and innocent human life, making it increasingly difficult to protect such life," the measure states. more >>

WASHINGTON – Attend an As I Lay Dying concert and one will likely find two things: heavy metal and prayer.

It's a combination most metalheads or Christians wouldn't count on, but it's easy invoking divine intervention when confronted with the "Wall of Death." Hundreds of participants line up on opposing sides of a mosh pit as the band plays, the tension mounts until it snaps and both sides charge at each other in a deluge of whirling bodies. As concert-goers slam in violent communion, it's easy to see why As I Lay Dying defies categorization; it has taken them ten years, but they've conquered the secular heavy metal world while remaining openly Christian.

The group is currently celebrating its 10th anniversary with its "Decade of Destruction" tour crisscrossing America. Josh Gilbert, the band's bassist, said the trek's goal is to thank As I Lay Dying's fans for years of devotion. Such support has gained the San Diego metal act Grammy award nominations and a Billboard Top 10 placement for their last album, 2010's The Powerless Rise. more >>

President Barack Obama referenced his Christian faith and the biblical nativity story in an address to the public during the ceremonial lighting of the National Christmas Tree in Washington, D.C., which is an 89-year-old American tradition.

The speech came after the president came under scrutiny from the Christian community for not having referenced God or religion in his Thanksgiving speech this year.

"Merry Christmas! Merry Christmas!" Obama said Thursday as he began his address. "Tonight, once again, we gather here not simply to light some decorations, but to honor a story that lights the world." more >>