Free Republic

This country talks a lot about terrorist attacks—and rightly so. Almost anybody in America can give you some kind of a listing of the most destructive acts of terror that have happened in our country. But let me suggest to you this: The two greatest attacks of terror on America were perpetrated by the Supreme Court. Not by any Muslim, but by the Supreme Court of the United States. The first one was the legalizing of abortion. Subsequent to that, there have been millions of babies slaughtered in the wombs of their mothers. It’s incalculable to even comprehend that. The...

This past Tuesday the Vatican hosted about 150 mayors of cities throughout the world with the ostensible goal of "combating climate change". Ten of those were US mayors, most being pro-abortion. They included Bill De Blasio of New York. Joining them was CA Governor Jerry "Moonbeam" Brown. They met in a workshop entitled "Modern Slavery and Climate Change: The Commitment of the Cities". Hosted by the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences, the meeting was hosted by rabid population-control advocate Jeffrey Sachs. I've written about both these before in recent months. As Breitbart points out, Tuesday's seminar was immediately followed by...

The secular war against San Francisco Archbishop Cordileone continued Thursday with the city holding a California State Assembly judiciary hearing that argued over the legality of Cordileone's making teachers working at four diocesan high schools sign "morality clauses" classifying them as ministers who must uphold Catholic teaching regarding same-sex "marriage," homosexuality, contraception and artificial insemination in the classroom as well as in their private lives. Kathleen Purcell, a constitutional lawyer representing sides opposed to the morality clauses, argued that since the San Francisco archdiocese follows a curriculum approved by the state, actively recruits non-Catholic students, has promised not to proselytize...

July 25, 2015   Feast of Saint James, Apostle Reading 1 2 Cor 4:7-15 Brothers and sisters:We hold this treasure in earthen vessels,that the surpassing power may be of God and not from us.We are afflicted in every way, but not constrained;perplexed, but not driven to despair;persecuted, but not abandoned;struck down, but not destroyed;always carrying about in the body the dying of Jesus,so that the life of Jesus may also be manifested in our body.For we who live are constantly being given up to deathfor the sake of Jesus,so that the life of Jesus may be manifested in our...

Introducing the Church Fathers By Thomas Van ( | Jul 27, 2014 Several years ago, CatholicCulture.org processed and made available online a set of the writings of the Fathers of the Church. In order to make our readers aware of this under-used resource, and because the Fathers are still too little known despite their importance as a font of authentic Christian renewal, I will be posting a series of articles introducing the Fathers in chronological order. Who are the Fathers? Despite how the Qu’ran describes us, Christians are not “people of the book,” but people of the Word. While the New...

WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Pope Francis' favorability rating in the U.S. has returned to where it was when he was elected pope. It is now at 59%, down from 76% in early 2014. The pontiff's rating is similar to the 58% he received from Americans in April 2013, soon after he was elected pope.After Pope Francis was elected the leader of the 1.2 billion-member Roman Catholic Church in March 2013, he attempted to focus the church on a renewed sense of protecting the poor, on interfaith relations and on respecting gay and lesbian members of the church. He was lauded in...

The question of whether animals will join us in the afterlife finally has a definitive response from Rome. It’s a topic that’s been long debated, with Popes weighing in unofficially on both sides. Last December, a story broke nationwide claiming that Pope Francis had declared that animals are going to heaven, but it turns out that the media had conflated two stories, and that it was actually Pope Paul VI who had, many years earlier, told a young boy that “one day we will see our animals in the eternity of Christ.” Paul was later contradicted by Pope Benedict XVI,...

Veil in Reverse – A Reflection on the Veiling of Moses’ Face Msgr. Charles Pope • July 23, 2015 • In most traditional Catholic settings, we think of the veil as something a woman wears, a sign of traditional modesty and prayer. In this sense we consider it something good and positive, though perhaps some among us are less enthusiastic.But in the readings from Exodus that we are hearing in daily Mass, the veil is presented in far more ambivalent terms:As Moses came down from Mount Sinai with the two tablets of the commandments in his hands, he did not...

Catholics in Iraq are 'challenging' the Islamic State not with weapons or violence but through education and teaching, thanks to the contribution and support of Australian Catholic University. This October courses will begin at the Catholic University of Erbil, which was desired by the Chaldean Church in Iraq as a concrete way to aid the Christian youth in the Middle East. In recent days, Archbishop Bashar Matti Warda of Erbil for Chaldeans met with representatives of Australian Catholic University (ACU) and the President of the Australian Catholic Bishops Conference and Archbishop Denis James Hart of Melbourne in order to better...

Baghdad prelate calls for serious action against Islamic terrorists, seeks to ease suffering of familiesVATICAN CITY — The Chaldean Patriarch of Baghdad, Louis Raphael Sako, says he is personally “very worried” about his nation’s future and warns that the so-called Islamic State, ISIS, “is growing” in strength and influence each day and nowadays the militant group is “like a real state.” In a recent gesture of solidarity, the Iraqi Patriarch donated food and medical supplies to displaced Muslims living in a refugee camp near the city of Ramadi. Accompanied by other members of the Church and representatives of Caritas Iraq,...

July 24, 2015   Friday of the Sixteenth Week in Ordinary Time Reading 1 Ex 20:1-17 In those days:God delivered all these commandments: “I, the LORD, am your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, that place of slavery.You shall not have other gods besides me.You shall not carve idols for yourselves in the shape of anything in the sky above or on the earth below or in the waters beneath the earth; you shall not bow down before them or worship them.For I, the LORD, your God, am a jealous God, inflicting punishment for their...

Planned Parenthood President Cecile Richards has had her hands full since the Center for Medical Progress began releasing its undercover videos.Cliff Owen / Associated Press  COLUMBUS, Ohio — It may not be time to write about this, because there may be more damning video to come from the Center for Medical Progress' masterful ambushes of Planned Parenthood officials.But it's also the perfect time to write about this. I'm sitting in a hospital waiting room, waiting for my daughter to deliver my second grandchild, and babies are just kind of where my calvarium is at right now.Calvarium? That's abortion clinic...

Have you seen the Gallup Poll on Pope Francis’ popularity? HEREHis favorability has, essentially, crashed.Laudato NO!Back in February 2015, Pew Research showed that 70% of all Americans and 90% of Catholics viewed Francis favorably.Today, according Gallup, his favorability is at 71%.So, in about 6 months – half a year – Francis’ popularity in these U.S.A., has, among Catholics, fallen nearly 20% (19% to be exact). That’s in only 6 months.Let us ask:What happened between February and now?Laudato si’.There’s more.Francis lost 14% among liberal Americans.Let us also ask:How do these numbers compare with polls from the beginning of Francis’ pontificate in...

THERE is a crisis coming—and it is already here—for our Protestant brothers and sisters in Christ. It was foretold by Jesus when He said, …everyone who listens to these words of mine but does not act on them will be like a fool who built his house on sand. The rain fell, the floods came, and the winds blew and buffeted the house. And it collapsed and was completely ruined. (Matt 7:26-27) That is, whatever is built on sand : those interpretations of Scripture that depart from the Apostolic faith, those heresies and subjective errors that have divided Christ’s Church...

>There’s been a lot of attention this week to work that’s been undertaken at New York City’s celebrated Church of Our Saviour parish on Park Avenue—for many years, pastored by Fr. George Rutler. Icons that have decorated the church walls for years were mysteriously removed and some feared a “wreckovation” was about to take place.My blog neighbor Katrina Fernandez has written about this at some length and has been following the story closely.Here’s a photo of the sanctuary from a few years back:Late today, a post appeared on the parish’s Facebook page, offering the pastor’s explanation.  Note the image below, followed...

Writing for The Daily Beast Monday, a former Roman Catholic Priest, who left in November 2014 after "coming out" as homosexual, went on yet another dime-a-dozen rant against Catholic teaching on homosexuality, employing the all-too-common trope that bishops need to stop calling homosexual "love" wrong or sinful while still finding ways to maintain Church teaching, which essentially means "move the goal posts further back until you have nothing left to defend." Every point Bill Dickinson makes as to why the Catholic Church should change up their approach towards the LGBT community serve as basically a trojan horse to lower the...

The Venerable Anne Catherine Emmerich (1774-1824) was a German Augustinian nun of great sanctity. She endured a life of sufferings, bore the stigmata of our Lord and was a seer, who witnessed scenes from the life of Christ with the vividness of one who was there. Those revelations were one of the sources used in making the film The Passion of the Christ. She also foretold future occurrences in the Church. The following are from her visions pertaining to the emergence of a subversive Church of Darkness that would deceive many of the faithful into "complete decadence." May 13, 1820:...

I am alabaster in beauty ; the pearl in your crown , The voice of wisdom ; my words never fall to the ground , My majesty surrounds you for my heart you obey , My kingdom goes before you each and every day , There is no other that you serve , Your feet remain steady ; they never swerve , My heart is the path you joyfully anticipate , I AM your inheritance you pant for yet never need to wait , I AM your Shepherd ; your gateway , the pool of mercy you know , My...

For the past few weeks, the Satanic Temple has been in the spotlight concerning the controversial unveiling of a satanic statue in downtown Detroit. The Temple, by its nature, is a reclusive and shadowy organization, so it shouldn't come as a surprise that even when given center stage it masks and skirts around the true intentions of its agenda: the destruction of the Catholic Church. In an interview that aired earlier this month on WJBK-TV, president of the Detroit chapter of the Satanic Temple Jex Blackmore, in defending her beliefs, played the role of victim, claiming that there is a...

The Fire Next Time: A Meditation on the Glance of God from the Fiery Cloud Msgr. Charles Pope • July 22, 2015 • As we read through the Book of Exodus in daily Mass at this time of year (16th Week of the year) there comes the passage about the crossing of the Red Sea. As God parted the waters, He went on ahead of the people in the fiery column of His presence. And describing the Egyptians pursuit of the Israelites is this passage:In the night watch just before dawn the LORD, through the column of the fiery cloud,...