The man accused of a massacre at a youth camp in Norway and a bombing in the capital, Oslo, has admitted responsibility, his lawyer says.

Anders Behring Breivik

According to the BBC, Anders Behring Breivik, 32, described his actions as “gruesome but necessary,” and said he would explain himself at a court hearing on Monday.

Mr. Breivik’s lawyer, Geir Lippestad, said the attack had been planned “for some while.”

“He thought it was gruesome having to commit these acts, but in his head they were necessary,” Mr. Lippestad told Norwegian media.

Mr. Breivik has been charged with committing acts of terrorism, and is due to appear in court on Monday when judges will decide whether he should be detained as the investigation continues.

“Still pictures of him, wearing a wetsuit and carrying an automatic weapon, appeared in a 12-minute anti-Muslim video called Knights Templar 2083, which appeared briefly on YouTube,” said the BBC.

“A 1,500-page document written in English and said to be by Mr. Breivik – posted under the pseudonym of Andrew Berwick – was also put online hours before the attacks, suggesting they had been years in the planning.”

At least 85 people died when the gunman ran amok on Utoeya island on Friday, hours after an Oslo bomb killed seven. As Norway mourned the victims, police continued to search for the missing.

Four people from the island camp shooting are yet to be found; it is thought some may have drowned after swimming out into the lake to escape the hail of bullets.

“In Oslo police said the death toll could rise further as bodies or body parts were in buildings damaged by the bomb but still too unstable to search,” said the BBC.

“Police have also said another person may have been involved in Friday’s attacks, which happened within hours of each other.”

According a Facebook page attributed to him, the killer describes himself as a Christian and conservative.

However, Christians are rejecting his claim to be a believer, saying a Christian would never do such terrible things.

In a profile of the Norwegian bombing and shooting suspect by Jeff Schapiro, a Christian Post Contributor, the writer said that Larry Keffer of the Biblical Research Center and Norwegian evangelist Petar Keseljevic had spoken to The Christian Post (www.christianpost.com) on Saturday about the attacks and about Breivik.

Schapiro said that “fortunately, none of Keseljevic’s family or friends were harmed in the disaster,” but Keseljevic says that attacks on a “peace-loving country” like Norway can have a “maximum impact.”

“It’ll have an impact all over Europe,” he said.

Keffer then warned that people should not think that just because Breivik says he is a Christian that he actually is one.

“When I was out in Norway,” he said, “the people there thought they were Christian because they were Norwegian.” Many people in the so-called “Christian nation,” he says, claim the faith but haven’t necessarily been genuinely converted.

“A true Christian would not go and … shoot people in a camp or blow up buildings,” he said. “That’s not what a Christian does. So just because a man claims to be a Christian, or even believes that he is a Christian, does not necessarily make him so.”

“The Bible says that ‘you know them by their fruit.’”

Schapiro went on to say, “Keffer and Keseljevic have an interesting perspective on the attacks. WorldNet Daily reported that they were both arrested and convicted for proclaiming the Gospel in Oslo during a parade back in 2008.

“They were arrested for trying to share life with the people of Norway, Breivik was arrested for taking it.”

He then quoted Keffer as saying, “Christians’ ministry is to reconcile people to God and give life, not to blow them up and send them to hell.”

So far, 92 deaths have been reported, 85 of which were from the youth camp rampage, but the total number may increase as the day wears on.

At Media reports says Breivik’s Facebook page was taken down on Friday, but not before the media could glean some insight from it. The Atlantic reports that his favorite books are Franz Kafka’s The Trial and George Orwell’s Nineteen-Eighty-Four. His favorite television show is “Dexter,” which features a serial-killer as its main character.

Spiegel Online reported that on Friday at around 11 p.m., a police unit raided Breivik’s apartment, which is located in a four-story brick building in west Oslo where he also lived with his mother. He reportedly played the World of Warcraft computer game and previously served in the Norwegian army. He is described by the publication as a “right-wing extremist who had repeatedly made anti-Islamic statements on Internet forums.” He also had permits for both an automatic rifle and a Glock pistol.

A report from The Atlantic says that he also owned his own business, Breivik Geofarm, and started to run an organic farm in eastern Norway just a month ago, where he created and stored fertilizers that could be used in explosives.

www.OnlineSocialMedia.net reports that on Breivik’s Facebook page he listed his interests as body building, hunting, freemasonry, stock analysis and the Modern Warfare 2 video game. Breivik said he had completed “3,000 hours of study in micro and macro finance, [and] religion.”

Meanwhile, the Christian Post says, “Norwegians turned to their churches and God on Saturday to try to find comfort in the aftermath of the attacks that took the lives of more than 100 people [latest update], many of them teenagers, and left citizens of this typically calm Scandinavian country in disbelief.”

Other News from Oslo

Is there something new under the Midnight Sun? “Where sin abounds, grace abounds even more.”

The horrific events in Oslo this week are different from similar atrocities, perhaps in severity and maybe in scope, than others in the news. These bizarre acts of violence occur with more frequency, but are inevitable in a decaying world culture where Jesus is less welcome all the time.

No doubt the news media and the “world system” will cite the gunman’s claims to Christianity as proof of this or that -– not his own imbalance, but (watch, here it comes) something inherently wrong with Christianity. If he indeed includes “Christian” as one of his secret identities, it reminds me of Abe Lincoln’s characterization of an opponent’s tortured use of phrasing, that a “chestnut horse” bears no resemblance to a “horse chestnut.”

Norway, like other Scandinavian countries, indeed much or Europe and now North America, recently makes the news for episodes of anti-Christian persecution. This year alone, a Norwegian evangelist was arrested for evangelizing Norwegians during Independence Day and Pride parades. The prominent preacher Petar Keseljevic was careful not to block traffic or obstruct pedestrians, but sharing the gospel, louder than a whisper, on street corners, is an offense.

Earlier this year, a refugee from North Ossetia was deported from Norway. The region will be remembered as the site where a school in Beslan was stormed by Islamic militants, and ultimately hundreds died in the systematic hostage shootings and the storming of the school. The young lady, known as Maria Amelie, is Eastern Orthodox and was in Norway without papers. Unlike many illegal Muslims, she was deported, despite having learned the language, pursued an education, and written a book. Illegally Norwegian was a best-seller, and last year a major news magazine named her Norwegian Woman of the Year.

So illegal immigration, citizens’ rights, and social tensions have been rising throughout Europe. Norway is a small country. Back when I was writing comics, I was told that some of the comic books where they appeared sold 250,000 copies in the Norwegian market, which did not overly impress me until I realized that the country’s population was about 4-million. A good percentage.

A bad percentage, however, is “religious adherence.” About 20 per cent of Norwegians claim that religious faith plays an important role in their lives -– a lower ratio (with its neighbors Sweden, Denmark, and Estonia) than any countries in the world. Only about two percent of the population attends church regularly.

Yet a remarkable group of Norwegians has been countering those trends. They gather as the Oslo Gospel Choir. They sing their own songs and gospel songs of the American church. They look like a blonde Brooklyn Tabernacle Choir. The leader Tore Aas assembled the singers from house churches and local fellowships about 20 years ago. The group performs locally, across Europe, and has been to America. They have released many albums and videos. Andrae Crouch and Albertina Walker have performed with the choir, and Princess Märtha Louise of Norway has sung solo with them on two Christmas albums.

Recent appearances in Switzerland and the Netherlands were before huge conclaves of Pentecostals, and were televised widely. Gospel? Huge? Tours? Sales? Audiences? Europe? Is there something new under the sun? –- something stirring?

Rejoice and be exceedingly glad, for great is your reward in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you. You are the salt of the earth; but if the salt loses its flavor, how shall it be seasoned? It is then good for nothing but to be thrown out and trampled underfoot by men. You are the light of the world. A city that is set on a hill cannot be hidden.

So Matthew 5:12-14 reminds us. And we should be reminded that Oslo, the city called Christiana a century ago, where the Nobel Peace Prize is awarded, and identified with things like the Oslo Accords, is more than that bundle of associations; and cannot now be defined by the violent acts of a lone madman. It might be coming into the light; something new under the Midnight Sun. To a growing number of people around the world who are mightily blessed, Norway is becoming known as the home of that great Oslo Gospel Choir. Seeds can take root anywhere, even the rocky coasts of Norway.

Here is a video of the Choir singing the classic God Will Make a Way in Oslo.
Click: God Will Make a Way