The Nazarene Fund: Frequently Asked Questions

WHAT IS THE NAZARENE FUND?

The Nazarene Fund is an initiative of Mercury One dedicated to the evacuation of particularly vulnerable Christians from countries like Iraq and Syria into new countries where they might rebuild their lives.

Between now and December 2015 our goal is to raise $10 million to save more than 400 families from regions taken over by ISIS. ISIS has used the Nazarene sign to symbolize death – we will use it to symbolize life.

More details here.

WHAT WILL THE MONEY BE USED FOR?

Donations to The Nazarene Fund will be used to resettle Christian families who have been displaced by conflict in the Middle East, primarily at the hands of ISIS. Should it become impossible or impractical to resettle families, the contributions will be used to provide additional humanitarian support where they are forced to stay.

WHY DO YOU SAY “PRIMARILY AT THE HANDS OF ISIS?”

While ISIS is the most influential – and perhaps most dangerous – group terrorizing Christians in the Middle East, it is not the only one. Other terrorist groups like Al-Qaeda, Al-Nusra, and less organized terrorist sympathizers have also caused enormous persecution against the ancient Christian communities in the Middle East. In fact the pro-longed genocide against Christians in Iraq dates back at least till 2004, and began at the hands of the ISIS’ predecessor, Al-Qaeda in Iraq.

YOU CALLED THIS “GENOCIDE” – DOES THE INTERNATIONAL COMMUNITY RECOGNIZE IT AS SUCH?

While the United States and the United Nations have refused to formally designate the ISIS threat against Christians as a “genocide,” a growing number of human rights activists and organizations are finding ISIS to be guilty of crimes against humanity, war crimes and genocide.

The legal definition of “genocide” according to Article II of the United Nations’ 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide legally defines the term as any of the following acts committed with the intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethical, racial or religious group, as such: (1) killing members of the group (2) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group (3) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part (4) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group (5) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.

THIS OBVIOUSLY SEEMS LIKE A GENOCIDE; SO WHY HAS THE U.S. AND UNITED NATIONS NOT RECOGNIZED IT AS SUCH?

If genocide were formally declared, then it would trigger certain international mechanisms that are meant to protect the group under threat. Some human rights activists believe the United States fails to declare the ISIS threat against Christians as “genocide” because it would force the United States government to be more involved in providing direct assistance to them. Presently, the United States government’s response has been dismal, and especially so with regard to the ancient Christian communities of the Middle East.

Here, you can read additional information on what would automatically happen if the United Nations were to declare this a genocide, as well as specific evidence of genocidal acts by ISIS against Christians.

BUT, HOW IS IT FAIR THAT YOU ARE PRIMARILY FOCUSED ON CHRISTIANS?

It’s not a matter of fairness – we wish we could help everyone – but it is a matter of practicality, resources and urgency. The United States is a Christian majority country that can more quickly and more easily rally support for displaced Christians.

We also have a grave concern for all of those being effected by ISIS in the region, not excluding the majority Muslim population, which has been the victim of more terrorist related causalities than any other religion or culture. However, the Christian community faces a particular threat of extermination.

Lord George Weidenfeld is a British peer who has personally rescued 25 families from ISIS, resettling them in Poland, and he did so because he was himself rescued by Christians in 1938 as a young Jewish boy. Now he says, “he is repaying the favor.”

When Weidenfeld was asked by a reporter why he was only helping Christians, he responded, “I cannot save the world, but there is a very specific possibility on the Christian side.”

He went on to say,

I want to focus on something I can — with great difficulty and effort — achieve. I have tremendous sympathy for Muslim victims, but . . . there is an enormous amount of Muslim money in the Muslim world [for them to help their own], and the other thing is the logistical problem: Muslims could be shifted a few hundred kilometers away from the conflict but the Christians will have to find safe havens on the other end of the earth.

Columnist Charles Krauthammer, who is distant cousin of Weidenfeld, defended him in The Washington Post by saying, “this comes under the heading of no good deed goes unpunished. It’s a rather odd view that because he cannot do everything, he should be admonished for trying to do something.”

We agree.

If we had limitless resources, we would help everyone, but we don’t. So, we’ll start with those we can most easily help, the Christians.

WILL YOU BE “VETTING” THOSE WE HELP EVACUATE? HOW DOES THAT WORK? AREN’T YOU CONCERNED ABOUT BRINGING IN PEOPLE WITH ILL INTENTIONS?

Yes, those we help evacuated will undergo a thorough “vetting” process to ensure they aren’t actually closeted terrorists.

Generally speaking, the Christian community in the Middle East has represented the economic and social backbone of these societies. Highly educated and successful, they have been university professors, engineers, bankers and administrators. Many are multi-lingual and well traveled. They are non-violent, non-sectarian and have been trusted for many years, employed in some of the most important positions in secular and Islamic regimes. Whatever country takes them in will be blessed by their contributions to society.

Yet, the emphasis of our approach is “verification.” We have an internationally respected and experienced security contractor handling this process on our behalf with the mandate to do their work according to standards that are even more stringent than those employed by others in the international community, including the United Nations.

The vetting program begins with the families being recommended by the local Christian leaders. In most cases, these are people whom the Christian leaders have known for their entire lives. So, we are evacuating people from within an enclosed cultural system. We then meet with each of the recommended IDPs/Refugees personally to begin the process of ensuring they are who they say they are. During this time we record their stories, collect documentation of their identity and then we diligently and carefully verify and cross-check both their stories and their documents. Along the way, we confirm their desire to be relocated and also make sure they fully understand this will be a challenging process to assimilate into a new country and culture. We employ of a number of other “best practices” used by the intelligence community to analyze the behavior of the interviewees throughout the entire process. While we can’t fully disclose all that’s involved in vetting these people, we can tell you that international standards are employed.

During the vetting process, we also work with government officials from the “receiving” countries to ensure all appropriate immigration paperwork is completed and verified.

ONCE THE FAMILIES ARE VETTED, WHAT HAPPENS NEXT?

Families are legally transported from their home or host country to their new country where they are received by individual sponsors or a sponsoring organization (depending upon the country). They are helped to assimilate from finding accommodations to education for their children to finding employment to language acquisition, etc.

Through sponsoring organizations, the families are also provided with some financial assistance with the intent of easing their transition into life and work in their new home and country.

WHERE ARE THE RESCUED REFUGEES GOING TO END UP?

We hope to be able to bring many of them to the United States. However, the United States remains closed to Christian refugees. Meanwhile, a number of European and South American countries have agreed to provide a limited number of VISAS to those we help evacuate.

HOW DO WE PRESSURE THE U.S. TO BECOME A RECEIVING COUNTRY?

Presently, the United States is not a receiving country. If you would like to help us put pressure on the U.S. Government to take in Middle Eastern Christians, then please fill how the form entitled “Are you ready to house a family from the Middle East?” here.

What are some other ways? Write your Congressperson; Raise your voice as an advocate through social media; Get your pastor, rabbi or priest on board; Provide financial support.

AND THIS ALL COSTS APPROXIMATELY $25,000 PER FAMILY?

Yes, we have budgeted approximately $25,000 to evacuate a family of five. This also includes providing some financial assistance to that family for a year.

Normally, families have to be evacuated in a group via charter aircraft after they are already securely transferred from wherever it is they are presently finding accommodation. The families are vetted by international security professionals, and sometimes are required to stay in a temporary location for a number of days. Additionally, there are expenses involved in laying down the infrastructure in the receiving countries, and in general logistical and administrative support in the evacuating countries. The evacuation process is – by its nature – variable, and some evacuations cost more than others. Every situation is unique.

Our goal is to make each evacuation as inexpensive as possible so we can provide as much of the $25,000 as possible to the family as a gift to help them get on their feet.

Those gifts are provided in installments through the first year of their resettlement.

ISN'T THE WORLD ALREADY DEALING WITH THE REFUGEE PROBLEM?

The situation in Iraq and Syria has created the worst refugee crisis since World War II, and the entire world is struggling to deal with it. It’s an “all hands on deck” moment. It is anything but resolved, and unless we work to provide safe and legal ways for the most vulnerable to escape, we will continue to witness the death of those who have been trying to flee without any assistance or those who’ve been forced to stay.

HOW ARE WE EVEN MAKING A DENT IN THE REFUGEE CRISIS?

We cannot save the world, but we can save many lives. Every time you save a single life – to them – you are saving their entire world. We know we can’t solve the whole problem, but we sure can make the difference in the lives of many. Rather than being focused on the enormity of the problem we are focused on the individual lives we can save.

IS THIS RESCUE OPERATION LEGAL?

Absolutely, everything is being done with legal counsel and in cooperation with governments according to established international standards and regulations.

ARE WE BUYING OR BRIBING BAD GUYS? DOES ANY OF THE MONEY GO TO TERRORISTS?

No and no.

HOW CAN I GIVE?

Just visit now.mercuryone.org, and donate to The Nazarene Fund.

The double standard behind the White House outrage

Bloomberg / Contributor | Getty Images

Presidents have altered the White House for decades, yet only Donald Trump is treated as a vandal for privately funding the East Wing’s restoration.

Every time a president so much as changes the color of the White House drapes, the press clutches its pearls. Unless the name on the stationery is Barack Obama’s, even routine restoration becomes a national outrage.

President Donald Trump’s decision to privately fund upgrades to the White House — including a new state ballroom — has been met with the usual chorus of gasps and sneers. You’d think he bulldozed Monticello.

If a Republican preserves beauty, it’s vandalism. If a Democrat does the same, it’s ‘visionary.’

The irony is that presidents have altered and expanded the White House for more than a century. President Franklin D. Roosevelt added the East and West Wings in the middle of the Great Depression. Newspapers accused him of building a palace while Americans stood in breadlines. History now calls it “vision.”

First lady Nancy Reagan faced the same hysteria. Headlines accused her of spending taxpayer money on new china “while Americans starved.” In truth, she raised private funds after learning that the White House didn’t have enough matching plates for state dinners. She took the ridicule and refused to pass blame.

“I’m a big girl,” she told her staff. “This comes with the job.” That was dignity — something the press no longer recognizes.

A restoration, not a renovation

Trump’s project is different in every way that should matter. It costs taxpayers nothing. Not a cent. The president and a few friends privately fund the work. There’s no private pool or tennis court, no personal perks. The additions won’t even be completed until after he leaves office.

What’s being built is not indulgence — it’s stewardship. A restoration of aging rooms, worn fixtures, and century-old bathrooms that no longer function properly in the people’s house. Trump has paid for cast brass doorknobs engraved with the presidential seal, restored the carpets and moldings, and ensured that the architecture remains faithful to history.

The media’s response was mockery and accusations of vanity. They call it “grotesque excess,” while celebrating billion-dollar “climate art” projects and funneling hundreds of millions into activist causes like the No Kings movement. They lecture America on restraint while living off the largesse of billionaires.

The selective guardians of history

Where was this sudden reverence for history when rioters torched St. John’s Church — the same church where every president since James Madison has worshipped? The press called it an “expression of grief.”

Where was that reverence when mobs toppled statues of Washington, Jefferson, and Grant? Or when first lady Melania Trump replaced the Rose Garden’s lawn with a patio but otherwise followed Jackie Kennedy’s original 1962 plans in the garden’s restoration? They called that “desecration.”

If a Republican preserves beauty, it’s vandalism. If a Democrat does the same, it’s “visionary.”

The real desecration

The people shrieking about “historic preservation” care nothing for history. They hate the idea that something lasting and beautiful might be built by hands they despise. They mock craftsmanship because it exposes their own cultural decay.

The White House ballroom is not a scandal — it’s a mirror. And what it reflects is the media’s own pettiness. The ruling class that ridicules restoration is the same class that cheered as America’s monuments fell. Its members sneer at permanence because permanence condemns them.

Julia Beverly / Contributor | Getty Images

Trump’s improvements are an act of faith — in the nation’s symbols, its endurance, and its worth. The outrage over a privately funded renovation says less about him than it does about the journalists who mistake destruction for progress.

The real desecration isn’t happening in the East Wing. It’s happening in the newsrooms that long ago tore up their own foundation — truth — and never bothered to rebuild it.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.

Trump’s secret war in the Caribbean EXPOSED — It’s not about drugs

Bloomberg / Contributor | Getty Images

The president’s moves in Venezuela, Guyana, and Colombia aren’t about drugs. They’re about re-establishing America’s sovereignty across the Western Hemisphere.

For decades, we’ve been told America’s wars are about drugs, democracy, or “defending freedom.” But look closer at what’s unfolding off the coast of Venezuela, and you’ll see something far more strategic taking shape. Donald Trump’s so-called drug war isn’t about fentanyl or cocaine. It’s about control — and a rebirth of American sovereignty.

The aim of Trump’s ‘drug war’ is to keep the hemisphere’s oil, minerals, and manufacturing within the Western family and out of Beijing’s hands.

The president understands something the foreign policy class forgot long ago: The world doesn’t respect apologies. It respects strength.

While the global elites in Davos tout the Great Reset, Trump is building something entirely different — a new architecture of power based on regional independence, not global dependence. His quiet campaign in the Western Hemisphere may one day be remembered as the second Monroe Doctrine.

Venezuela sits at the center of it all. It holds the world’s largest crude oil reserves — oil perfectly suited for America’s Gulf refineries. For years, China and Russia have treated Venezuela like a pawn on their chessboard, offering predatory loans in exchange for control of those resources. The result has been a corrupt, communist state sitting in our own back yard. For too long, Washington shrugged. Not any more.The naval exercises in the Caribbean, the sanctions, the patrols — they’re not about drug smugglers. They’re about evicting China from our hemisphere.

Trump is using the old “drug war” playbook to wage a new kind of war — an economic and strategic one — without firing a shot at our actual enemies. The goal is simple: Keep the hemisphere’s oil, minerals, and manufacturing within the Western family and out of Beijing’s hands.

Beyond Venezuela

Just east of Venezuela lies Guyana, a country most Americans couldn’t find on a map a year ago. Then ExxonMobil struck oil, and suddenly Guyana became the newest front in a quiet geopolitical contest. Washington is helping defend those offshore platforms, build radar systems, and secure undersea cables — not for charity, but for strategy. Control energy, data, and shipping lanes, and you control the future.

Moreover, Colombia — a country once defined by cartels — is now positioned as the hinge between two oceans and two continents. It guards the Panama Canal and sits atop rare-earth minerals every modern economy needs. Decades of American presence there weren’t just about cocaine interdiction; they were about maintaining leverage over the arteries of global trade. Trump sees that clearly.

PEDRO MATTEY / Contributor | Getty Images

All of these recent news items — from the military drills in the Caribbean to the trade negotiations — reflect a new vision of American power. Not global policing. Not endless nation-building. It’s about strategic sovereignty.

It’s the same philosophy driving Trump’s approach to NATO, the Middle East, and Asia. We’ll stand with you — but you’ll stand on your own two feet. The days of American taxpayers funding global security while our own borders collapse are over.

Trump’s Monroe Doctrine

Critics will call it “isolationism.” It isn’t. It’s realism. It’s recognizing that America’s strength comes not from fighting other people’s wars but from securing our own energy, our own supply lines, our own hemisphere. The first Monroe Doctrine warned foreign powers to stay out of the Americas. The second one — Trump’s — says we’ll defend them, but we’ll no longer be their bank or their babysitter.

Historians may one day mark this moment as the start of a new era — when America stopped apologizing for its own interests and started rebuilding its sovereignty, one barrel, one chip, and one border at a time.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.

Antifa isn’t “leaderless” — It’s an organized machine of violence

Jeff J Mitchell / Staff | Getty Images

The mob rises where men of courage fall silent. The lesson from Portland, Chicago, and other blue cities is simple: Appeasing radicals doesn’t buy peace — it only rents humiliation.

Parts of America, like Portland and Chicago, now resemble occupied territory. Progressive city governments have surrendered control to street militias, leaving citizens, journalists, and even federal officers to face violent anarchists without protection.

Take Portland, where Antifa has terrorized the city for more than 100 consecutive nights. Federal officers trying to keep order face nightly assaults while local officials do nothing. Independent journalists, such as Nick Sortor, have even been arrested for documenting the chaos. Sortor and Blaze News reporter Julio Rosas later testified at the White House about Antifa’s violence — testimony that corporate media outlets buried.

Antifa is organized, funded, and emboldened.

Chicago offers the same grim picture. Federal agents have been stalked, ambushed, and denied backup from local police while under siege from mobs. Calls for help went unanswered, putting lives in danger. This is more than disorder; it is open defiance of federal authority and a violation of the Constitution’s Supremacy Clause.

A history of violence

For years, the legacy media and left-wing think tanks have portrayed Antifa as “decentralized” and “leaderless.” The opposite is true. Antifa is organized, disciplined, and well-funded. Groups like Rose City Antifa in Oregon, the Elm Fork John Brown Gun Club in Texas, and Jane’s Revenge operate as coordinated street militias. Legal fronts such as the National Lawyers Guild provide protection, while crowdfunding networks and international supporters funnel money directly to the movement.

The claim that Antifa lacks structure is a convenient myth — one that’s cost Americans dearly.

History reminds us what happens when mobs go unchecked. The French Revolution, Weimar Germany, Mao’s Red Guards — every one began with chaos on the streets. But it wasn’t random. Today’s radicals follow the same playbook: Exploit disorder, intimidate opponents, and seize moral power while the state looks away.

Dismember the dragon

The Trump administration’s decision to designate Antifa a domestic terrorist organization was long overdue. The label finally acknowledged what citizens already knew: Antifa functions as a militant enterprise, recruiting and radicalizing youth for coordinated violence nationwide.

But naming the threat isn’t enough. The movement’s financiers, organizers, and enablers must also face justice. Every dollar that funds Antifa’s destruction should be traced, seized, and exposed.

AFP Contributor / Contributor | Getty Images

This fight transcends party lines. It’s not about left versus right; it’s about civilization versus anarchy. When politicians and judges excuse or ignore mob violence, they imperil the republic itself. Americans must reject silence and cowardice while street militias operate with impunity.

Antifa is organized, funded, and emboldened. The violence in Portland and Chicago is deliberate, not spontaneous. If America fails to confront it decisively, the price won’t just be broken cities — it will be the erosion of the republic itself.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.

URGENT: Supreme Court case could redefine religious liberty

Drew Angerer / Staff | Getty Images

The state is effectively silencing professionals who dare speak truths about gender and sexuality, redefining faith-guided speech as illegal.

This week, free speech is once again on the line before the U.S. Supreme Court. At stake is whether Americans still have the right to talk about faith, morality, and truth in their private practice without the government’s permission.

The case comes out of Colorado, where lawmakers in 2019 passed a ban on what they call “conversion therapy.” The law prohibits licensed counselors from trying to change a minor’s gender identity or sexual orientation, including their behaviors or gender expression. The law specifically targets Christian counselors who serve clients attempting to overcome gender dysphoria and not fall prey to the transgender ideology.

The root of this case isn’t about therapy. It’s about erasing a worldview.

The law does include one convenient exception. Counselors are free to “assist” a person who wants to transition genders but not someone who wants to affirm their biological sex. In other words, you can help a child move in one direction — one that is in line with the state’s progressive ideology — but not the other.

Think about that for a moment. The state is saying that a counselor can’t even discuss changing behavior with a client. Isn’t that the whole point of counseling?

One‑sided freedom

Kaley Chiles, a licensed professional counselor in Colorado Springs, has been one of the victims of this blatant attack on the First Amendment. Chiles has dedicated her practice to helping clients dealing with addiction, trauma, sexuality struggles, and gender dysphoria. She’s also a Christian who serves patients seeking guidance rooted in biblical teaching.

Before 2019, she could counsel minors according to her faith. She could talk about biblical morality, identity, and the path to wholeness. When the state outlawed that speech, she stopped. She followed the law — and then she sued.

Her case, Chiles v. Salazar, is now before the Supreme Court. Justices heard oral arguments on Tuesday. The question: Is counseling a form of speech or merely a government‑regulated service?

If the court rules the wrong way, it won’t just silence therapists. It could muzzle pastors, teachers, parents — anyone who believes in truth grounded in something higher than the state.

Censored belief

I believe marriage between a man and a woman is ordained by God. I believe that family — mother, father, child — is central to His design for humanity.

I believe that men and women are created in God’s image, with divine purpose and eternal worth. Gender isn’t an accessory; it’s part of who we are.

I believe the command to “be fruitful and multiply” still stands, that the power to create life is sacred, and that it belongs within marriage between a man and a woman.

And I believe that when we abandon these principles — when we treat sex as recreation, when we dissolve families, when we forget our vows — society fractures.

Are those statements controversial now? Maybe. But if this case goes against Chiles, those statements and others could soon be illegal to say aloud in public.

Faith on trial

In Colorado today, a counselor cannot sit down with a 15‑year‑old who’s struggling with gender identity and say, “You were made in God’s image, and He does not make mistakes.” That is now considered hate speech.

That’s the “freedom” the modern left is offering — freedom to affirm, but never to question. Freedom to comply, but never to dissent. The same movement that claims to champion tolerance now demands silence from anyone who disagrees. The root of this case isn’t about therapy. It’s about erasing a worldview.

The real test

No matter what happens at the Supreme Court, we cannot stop speaking the truth. These beliefs aren’t political slogans. For me, they are the product of years of wrestling, searching, and learning through pain and grace what actually leads to peace. For us, they are the fundamental principles that lead to a flourishing life. We cannot balk at standing for truth.

Maybe that’s why God allows these moments — moments when believers are pushed to the wall. They force us to ask hard questions: What is true? What is worth standing for? What is worth dying for — and living for?

If we answer those questions honestly, we’ll find not just truth, but freedom.

The state doesn’t grant real freedom — and it certainly isn’t defined by Colorado legislators. Real freedom comes from God. And the day we forget that, the First Amendment will mean nothing at all.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.