Previewing Empty Bowls

Leaders of College Park Baptist Church in Greensboro, North Carolina, thought it was odd when the Southern Baptist Convention recently sent queries about the congregation's LGBTQ-affirming ministry. The church itself had voted to leave the conservative denomination 23 years ago. But it was still on the SBC rolls until last week. That's when the convention's Executive Committee voted to cut ties because of the congregation's “affirmation ... of homosexual behavior.” The Rev. Michael Usey of College Park said the congregation was ousted for the right reason. Said Usey, “It’s good when people reject you because they understand clearly who you are."

Experts say the U.S. Supreme Court’s June ruling overturning Roe v. Wade appears to be sending more teens to their doctors in search of birth control, including long-acting reversible forms like intrauterine devices and implants. Waits for appointments are growing in some areas, Planned Parenthood is getting a flood of questions and doctors report demand even among teens who aren’t sexually active. Some patients are especially fearful because some of the new abortion laws don’t include exceptions for sexual assault. Dr. Peggy Stager said dedicated spots for insertion of the Nexplanon implant are consistently filled at her Ohio practice and requests for contraceptive refills have increased 30% to 40% since the Court's June ruling.

Four people have pleaded guilty to misdemeanors for their roles in absentee ballot fraud in rural North Carolina during the 2016 and 2018 elections. These convictions Monday stemmed from an investigation that in part resulted in a do-over congressional election. The defendants were associated with Leslie McCrae Dowless, a political operative in Bladen County whom authorities called the ringleader of the ballot scheme. Dowless died this year before his case went to trial. The State Board of Elections has ordered a new election for the 2018 9th Congressional District because of all the fraud allegations. Cases against six other defendants are pending.

Forty years after a predominantly Black community in Warren County, North Carolina, rallied against hosting a hazardous waste landfill, President Joe Biden’s top environment official has returned to what is widely considered the birthplace of the environmental justice movement to unveil a national office that will distribute $3 billion in block grants to underserved communities burdened by pollution. Joined by civil rights leaders and participants from the 1982 protests, Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Michael Regan announced Saturday that he is dedicating a new senior level of leadership to the environmental justice movement they ignited. The new Office of Environmental Justice and External Civil Rights will merge three existing EPA programs.

A hurricane warning has been issued for the entire coast of South Carolina as Hurricane Ian’s center drifted off the coast of Florida and back to sea. The National Weather Service’s latest forecast Thursday showed that Ian’s winds were at 70 mph, just shy of hurricane force. In Charleston, South Carolina, officials opened up parking garages so residents could get their cars above the imminent flooding. Forecasters predicted the seventh highest water level in more than 120 years of records at nearly nine feet above the average low tide. Schools in South Carolina planned to go to online learning to keep buses off the road.

Hundreds of hospital patients were being evacuated from facilities across the Fort Myer’s region Thursday after damage from Hurricane Ian cut off water supplies. One area hospital began assessing the full damage from ferocious winds that tore away parts of its roof and swamped its emergency room. Other health care systems in Ian’s path, from the state’s Gulf coast to the Atlantic, were also moving patients because of flood waters. Even as the problem was too much water in much of the state, at least nine hospitals in southwest Florida had the opposite problem.

Stocks are back to tumbling on Wall Street as rising bond yields and worries about a possible recession put the squeeze back on markets. The S&P 500 was 2.1% lower in midday trading on Thursday. It's back to its lowest level since late 2020. The washout has the index on track to more than erase its big rally from a day before. For markets to really turn higher, analysts say investors will need to see a break from the high inflation that’s sweeping the world. That hasn’t arrived yet, and even more data arrived Thursday showing the opposite.

Hurricane Ian destroyed a cross-section of Florida, trapping people in flooded homes, forcing patients from nursing homes and hospitals, cutting off a popular barrier island and destroying a historic waterfront pier. Nearly 2.7 million people lost power as the rain kept falling. Floodwaters rose waist-high hundreds of miles from the coasts. Just one death has been confirmed so far but thousands remain to be rescued after Ian became one of the strongest hurricanes to ever hit the U.S. The storm is moving over the Atlantic coast and is expected to regain strength before hitting South Carolina on Friday.