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A Columbus, Miss., pastor, who is white, was allegedly given the boot by his former church for supporting protests and the idea that "black lives matter" after George Floyd's police-related death, The Christian Post reports. After three and a half years leading The Heights Church, Bishop Scott Volland and his wife, Debra, were voted out by the church's board on June 18 because of differing views on addressing racial issues. "Whether it is saying that 'black lives matter' (as a human fact), or in speaking out to remove racially offensive/insensitive monuments or politicians, I have been informed that my 'agenda...

It may be a rivalry on the field, but there’s a commonality to the Egg Bowl off of it. Especially when it comes to its state flag. In the midst of the tumult across the nation, the calls have been growing louder for the state of Mississippi to replace its stars-and-bars-emblazoned flag. The NCAA extended its ban on holding sponsored events in the state until the flag is changed. The SEC also announced that it would no longer hold conference sponsored championships or tournaments in the state. Conference USA joined the SEC Monday in taking the same stance.

The successor to prison-bound former Rep. Chris Collins and the challenger to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell will be decided Tuesday along with nominees for dozens of House seats as six states hold elections. But it may take several days for votes to be counted as states cope with an expected surge in mail-in ballots because of the coronavirus pandemic. Elections in Kentucky, Mississippi, New York, North Carolina and Virginia had already been delayed, while South Carolina’s runoffs for state-level offices were always planned for Tuesday.In New York, Kentucky and North Carolina, which is hosting a GOP runoff for White...

Kylin Hill, a star running back at Mississippi State, threatened Monday to leave the program if the state does not change its flag. Mississippi is the only state that features the Confederate battle flag as part of its state flag, and it has been under increased pressure recently to move away from that symbol of slavery and the Civil War.

GOP rallies around Trump after firing of Manhattan US attorney BY ALEXANDER BOLTON - 06/22/20 08:05 PM EDT — GOP rallies around Trump after firing of Manhattan US attorney Senate Republicans on Monday largely defended President Trump following his controversial decision this week to fire Geoffrey Berman, the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York. Senate Majority Whip John Thune (R-S.D.) said Trump was within his right to fire Berman, who was involved in a number of politically sensitive investigations that touched on Trump and his advisers. “It’s kind of like previous firings, I would say,” Thune said....

Republican Senators from Mississippi were pressed to speak about House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s (D-CA) letter to the Joint Committee on the Library on June 10 asking that 11 statues of Confederate soldiers be removed from the U.S. Capitol. WJTV in Jackson, Mississippi asked GOP Sens. Roger Wicker and Cindy Hyde-Smith about Pelosi’s effort and whether or not they also stood by the state’s flag, which has a field with the Confederate flag design: 12 News reached out to U.S. Senator Roger Wicker (R-Miss.) about whether he’s in favor of removing Mississippi’s statues in the U.S. Capitol building.

The board of trustees of the Institutions of Higher Learning, during its Thursday meeting, is expected to consider and approve a plan to relocate the Confederate monument at the University of Mississippi. Several sources close to IHL board members told Mississippi Today on Monday that the 12-member board, amid statewide and national protests about racial inequities in government and Confederate iconography, will vote to approve the university’s plan to move the monument at its Thursday morning board meeting. The meeting will be held virtually, and a meeting agenda will be released on Wednesday. Several representative bodies comprised of University of...

A Mississippi woman who was jailed after she accused her parents of being racist on Facebook leading to them receiving 'thousands' of death threats has been freed from custody after 24 hours, her attorney said. Kaileigh Schmidt, 21, of Hattiesburg, was booked into the Jones County Adult Detention Center at noon Wednesday and charged with two counts of obscene communication. Schmidt posted a series of screenshots to Facebook on June 5 allegedly showing her father and stepmother using racial slurs. She also sent the messages to Antifa’s and Black Lives Matter’s social pages, along with her parents' address, phone numbers...

Mississippi authorities are on a manhunt for a suspect who fatally shot a sheriff's deputy after grabbing the cop's gun while he was taken into custody. The Hinds County Sheriff's Office said in a tweet that Joaquin Steven Blackwell, 22, of Magee, Mississippi, is 'armed and dangerous' after having fatally shot a Simpson County Deputy Friday afternoon in Mendenhall, Mississippi. The Jones County Sheriff's Department identified the deputy as being James Blair, 77, in a Facebook post Friday, noting he was 'Shot and killed in the line duty' and his end of watch date.

Protester Zachary Borenstein was arrested on felony charges of defacing a monument on the campus of the University of Mississippi on Saturday. Borenstein reportedly teaches geometry to junior high school students in Hollandale, Mississippi. In response to the vandalism, the university has decided to relocate the monument. According to a report by Campus Reform, Zachary Borenstein, a geometry teacher at Simmons Junior-Senior High School, was arrested on Saturday after he allegedly defaced a campus monument with spray paint. Borenstein, a graduate of the University of Mississippi, allegedly painted the words “spiritual genocide” on a Confederate monument on campus. Borenstein faces a felony charge for...

A Mississippi church at the center of a legal battle over the shutdown exploded and burned to the ground yesterday — and it doesn’t look like a coincidence. The pastor of First Pentecostal in Holly Springs has led protests to allow his congregation to gather once again in defiance of local COVID-19 shutdown orders, including one inside a Walmart to accuse officials of double standards. A local judge had rebuked the church for acting in “an excessively reckless and cavalier manner,” a ruling the church had planned to fight.That fight has been indefinitely postponed, and apparently intentionally, as investigators...

A Mississippi church that is suing to stay open during the coronavirus shutdowns was destroyed by arson Wednesday, according to local officials. Fox News reports someone also spray-painted graffiti on the First Pentecostal Church of Holly Springs, including a message that read, “I Bet you stay home now you hypokrits [sic].” Local authorities said there was an explosion in the front of the church, and the building caught fire sometime between 2 a.m. and 4 a.m. Wednesday. Marshall County Sheriff’s Department Major Kelly McMillian told the local news that the fire is being investigated as a criminal act of arson....

"An as-yet identified suspect reportedly burned the church down Wednesday mmorning. The First Pentecostal Church of Holly Springs was vandalized, which caused an explosion to the rear of the facility. Authorities are investigating the vandalism as a criminal act of arson. One message spray painted on the church property read, "I bet you stay home now you hypokrits [sic]." Stephen Crampton, an attorney for the church, told WHBQ-TV on Thursday that the unknown vandal or vandals spray-painted the church and set it on fire.

As governors crack down on religious services during the coronavirus pandemic, pastors across the United States weigh in on whether Attorney General William Barr and the Department of Justice are doing enough to protect their civil liberties. The attorney general has issued multiple statements on the importance of respecting religious liberty “even in times of emergency” and intervened in cases of government crackdowns on churches and pastors. The DOJ referred the Daily Caller News Foundation to several more instances of Justice Department intervention, including an April 27 memorandum from the attorney general on balancing public safety with the preservation of...

QUESTION: Where is the law requiring customer to wear a mask in Mississippi in grocery stores ? Can someone link to that law? I've searched Gov Reeves' site and I cannot find it. Executive Order 1463 - Social Distancing, Essential Businesses covers supermarkets and grocery stores.Supplement to Executive Order 1463 is the extension of that order. Other Coronavirus (COVID-19) Executive Orders, Updates & Resources from the Office of Gov. Tate Reeves are available.

JACKSON, Miss. — Mississippi Gov. Tate Reeves says he’s going to slow the state’s reopening process after a recent surge in coronavirus cases and deaths. Mississippi is currently reporting 7,212 cases, including 281 deaths. The state health department says 397 cases and 20 deaths were reported Friday. According to the governor, it’s the largest single-day increase of both cases and deaths the state has seen. Reeves said the case and death increases have caused him to reconsider his reopening policies for the state. “This was a large enough change to make me take a step back, and look at the...

Tennessee, Mississippi, and Montana allowed some businesses to reopen Monday under new health guidelines as several states begin to relax coronavirus lockdown restrictions in a bid to get America’s workers safely back to work. The moves to reopen follow in the steps of Georgia, Oklahoma, and Alaska, which on Friday began loosening lockdown restrictions on businesses despite health officials warning the gradual return to daily life might be happening too soon. Tennessee has seen the average daily infection rate remain stable for two weeks following a ramp-up in testing, and let restaurants reopen Monday at 50 percent capacity in 89...

A federal judge has affirmed the right of a Pentecostal church in Mississippi to worship without fear of being shut down again or threatened by local police, allowing the congregation to hold drive-in services beginning Sunday. In a federal lawsuit filed by the conservative legal group, Thomas More Society, on behalf of the First Pentecostal Church of Holly Springs, U.S. District Judge Michael P. Mills issued the order against the city of Holly Springs, whose officers disrupted and shut down a midweek Bible study, 10 days after disrupting the congregation’s Easter worship service and issuing its pastor, Jerry Waldrop, a...

Dozens of Mississippi motorists drove around downtown Jackson on Saturday, honking horns and encircling the Governor’s Mansion in an effort to get Gov. Tate Reeves to fully reopen the state. The drive-thru rally, which lasted about an hour, was established by a group called Reopen Mississippi. A spokeswoman for the group told The Clarion Ledger that many in the state are hurting. “So many of our beloved small businesses are closing,” Napp said. The group said Reeves’ shelter-in-place orders violate Mississippi citizens’ rights and freedoms protected by both the U.S. Constitution and Mississippi Constitution.

Well welcome to Stalag Covid 19 for this weekend's adventure..... Hey the one and only "Rnaround Sue" Dion with a song he recorded in the days when he was part of the Contemporary Christian Music scene in the early 1980's. I was around and saw him beret and all in person. Idols and idolatry right out of the Good Book but what about today..... Resistance In Idaho: The Latest This week a woman arrested for asking too many questions, Sara Brady, as a group of mothers and children entered a closed down park in Meridian, Idaho engaging in civil disobedience....