Free Republic

Students at Kings College London (KCL) have successfully campaigned for the removal of a window featuring former Archbishop of Canterbury Lord Carey, an alumnus of the college, on the grounds that his stance on gay marriage makes him “homophobic”. The move comes despite Carey’s reputation as a liberal while he was Archbishop, ushering in the ordination of women priests for the first time in the Church’s history. The front windows of KCL’s Strand campus, which line the famous London thoroughfare for 90 metres feature head and shoulders images of 50 well known alumni of the College, including former Prime Minister...

1.“Catholics worship statues.” This stereotype is painful to hear. Not only is this completely false, but it is ludicrous. Despite the fact that there are 801 millions Protestants world-wide, according to the Pew Research Center, my rant will be geared towards our brothers and sisters in the United States. In this country, approximately 51.5% of people are Protestant Christians. Realistically, most of these families have pictures in their home, which is completely normal, right? Right. They have pictures of their loved ones, both living and deceased. Is it not hypocritical then to say that Catholics are idol worshipers, when these...

Pope Francis’ homily for the latest consistory of cardinals meeting in Rome this week is being called a re-statement of his programme for his pontificate. Fr. Thomas Rosica, his English language spokesman, wrote on Twitter: “More than anything I’ve heard from (the pope) today’s homily is his mission statement.” Let us assume for a moment that the pope knows the implications of what he is saying, and that the people closest to him are telling the truth when they say, repeatedly, that the things that are happening are happening at his behest, and examine what this “mission statement” has to...

The American progressive coop has already taken place here in America and won the day, and I challenge anyone anywhere to prove what I am saying is wrong. However the poetic justice in all of this is that Obama and the Left's delusional lawless and godless Utopian agenda and visions are heading the world straight into the Day of the Lord (Rev. 6-19) with the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse to greet them (Rev. 6). O Fools!! There can NEVER be a Utopia established by fallen men apart from the saving grace of the Lord Jesus Christ (Dan. 2:43-44, 7:13-14,...

SAN FRANCISCO (KPIX 5) – Students and parents from schools controlled by the Catholic Archdiocese of San Francisco protested at Saint Mary’s Cathedral on Ash Wednesday, saying the church should stay out of teachers’ bedrooms and drop proposed morality clauses in teacher contracts. On Ash Wednesday, one of the holiest days on the Catholic calendar, the students and parents are hoping Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone will change his mind on the clauses, as the church heads into 40 days of Lenten reflection. "We’re here because if Jesus were alive today, he’d be standing right next to us,” Mairead Ahlbach, a student...

Visitors line up outside U.S. Supreme Court in Washington Oct. 6, 2014, to get a seat inside to watch oral arguments on the first day of the new term. (CNS/Jonathan Ernst, Reuters) The likelihood that the Supreme Court next June will announce its discovery of a constitutional right to same-sex marriage raises an obvious question for the Catholic Church: What do we do now? Two steps come to mind. First, press for strong legal protections for individuals and institutions conscientiously unable to cooperate with a legal regime that requires sweeping concessions to the LGBT agenda. Second, give serious thought...

After years of decline from media darlings to relative obscurity, why has Call to Action USA (CTA) reemerged in San Francisco? Because Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone’s recent efforts to strengthen the Catholic identity of his schools tackles the central claim of Call to Action—that the Church discriminates unjustly against Catholics who are unwilling to accept or abide by Catholic moral teaching.If San Francisco follows the lead of several other dioceses and unapologetically requires Catholic schools to employ only those who are faithful to the Church, it may be a harbinger of things to come. And the fringe dissidents don’t like...

Here is how Russell Moore, the Southern Baptist pastor who heads the church’s Washington office, responded to the murder of the 21 Coptic Christians by ISIS: These are my brothers, faithful to Christ even unto death. King Jesus puts heads back on, and puts… http://t.co/0Dps0Lvtxy— Russell Moore (@drmoore) February 15, 2015 A number of Southern Baptists had similar responses. The Southern Baptist bloggers at Pulpit & Pen will have you know that this is a betrayal: Do Southern Baptist leaders and other evangelicals really not know what a Christian is or how you become one? Is it being born into an ethnic group...

Rob Bell believes the Bible is irrelevant. The Bible says Rob Bell is irrelevant. Transcript: At some level, I’m happy when this happens, it’s not that unusual. We have someone who makes a splash in our little world, the evangelical world. And he typically makes that splash because he’s quite effective at gathering large numbers. But after a while we begin to doubt his loyalty to the core convictions of evangelicals. Well, it’s not unusual when this happens that about this same time, our hero with the wide reach determines to turn on we evangelicals and embrace the broader world....

When a Vacaville woman tried to end her relationship with a former Baptist minister in late 2013, he told her that she'd created a monster. On Wednesday, Sarah Nottingham explained to a Solano County Superior Court judge that for a week, then-Pastor Mark Lewis showed her what a monster he could be. Nottingham's words came during the sentencing hearing for Lewis, who in January pleaded no contest to charges of arson and stalking. Judge Dwight C. Ely sentenced Lewis to eight years in prison Wednesday in connection with the case that proceeded to a jury trial earlier this year, only...

youtube.com/watch?v=7jwo-p-lG5w Hear our prayer We have sinned before Thee Have compassion upon us and upon our children Help us bring an end to pestilence, war, and famine Cause all hate and oppression to vanish from the earth Inscribe us for blessing in the Book Of Life Let the new year be a good year for us Avinu malkeinu sh'ma kolenu Avinu malkeinu chatanu l'faneycha Avinu malkeinu alkenu chamol aleynu V'al olaleynu v'tapenu Avinu malkeinu Kaleh dever v'cherev v'raav mealeynu Avinu malkeinu kalehchol tsar Umastin mealeynu Avinu malkeinu Avinu malkeinu Kotvenu b'sefer chayim tovim Avinu malkeinu chadesh aleynu Chadesh a leynu...

VATICAN CITY (Reuters) - A prominent American Catholic gay rights group was given VIP treatment for the first time at an audience with Pope Francis on Wednesday, a move members saw as a sign of change in the Roman Catholic Church. "This is a sign of movement that's due to the Francis effect," said Sister Jeannine Gramick, co-founder of New Ways Ministry, which ministers to homosexual Catholics and promotes gay rights in the 1.2 billion-member Church. Gramick and executive director Francis DeBernardo led a pilgrimage of 50 homosexual Catholics to the audience in St. Peter's Square. They told Reuters in...

Want to drop a V6 engine into your Volkswagen Bug prayer life? Looking to live as one worthy to be called the Bride of Christ? Would you like to battle sin and Satan and sabotage like the mighty saints of yore? Then gird your loins, grab a red marker, and open your calendar to the first week of Lent. You’ll want to scribble this prayer on Friday, February 20th: Come, Holy Spirit, living in Mary… Only two days after Ash Wednesday, Friday, February 20th is not only a day for fasting and walking the Stations of the Cross. It’s also...

NEW YORK, February 17, 2015 (LifeSiteNews.com) -- As if it wasn’t controversial enough that a homosexual activist group will be marching under its own banner in the New York St. Patrick’s Day parade led by New York Cardinal Timothy Dolan, the parade has refused a pro-life group’s request to participate. inclined, rather than advocates for sinful behaviour. The group, however, is an overt promoter of same-sex ‘marriage.’ The controversy heightened January 22, though, when the parade officially rejected a pro-life adoption advocacy group’s application to march this year. “It’s absolutely been a double-cross,” Dr. Elizabeth Rex, president of the Children...

Tomorrow is Ash Wednesday. Catholics, what will you be giving up for Lent, or what will you be doing for Lent?

Earlier last week, in an address before French immigrants to Israel, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu proudly stated that his appearance in the rally last month in Paris and his planned address to the US Congress were in his capacity "not just as the prime minister of Israel but as a representative of the entire Jewish people." Rather than rally behind the prime minister of the Jewish State, Jews driven by a liberal agenda which is often counter to the interests of the Jewish people and the State of Israel chose to immediately go into attack mode. Social media platforms featured...

We are hated because we persist in wanting to exist as Christians. In other words, we are hated because we persist in demanding a basic human right.CHRISTIANITY in Iraq is going through one of its worst and hardest stages of its long history that dates back to the first century. Throughout all these long centuries, we have experienced many hardships and persecutions during which we offered caravans of martyrs. During the past year, more than 125,000 Christians have been forced to flee from their villages only because they chose to remain Christians and refused the conditions ISIS imposed on them....

A screen shot from a video released by Islamic State militants on Feb. 15. “They were killed simply for the fact that they were Christians. … The blood of our Christian brothers and sisters is a testimony which cries out to be heard.” Pope Francis responded today to the news that 21 Egyptian Christians have been beheaded by Islamic State militants. “Their blood confesses Christ,” the Holy Father said to a visiting delegation representing the Church of Scotland. “The martyrs belong to all Christians.” On Sunday, ISIS released a graphic video showing the beheading of 21 Coptic Christians on...

Graeme Wood writes the best analysis and description of the horror of ISIS here at The Atlantic. He goes into detail about the roots of ISIS, its relationship to mainstream Islam and the ambitions of the Caliphate. He explains how ISIS combines not only a horribly literalistic interpretation of the Koran, but also how it is interlaced with radical Muslim apocalyptic visions.He sums up the whole article pretty well with this paragraph The Islamic State, also known as the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS), follows a distinctive variety of Islam whose beliefs about the path to the Day of Judgment matter...

Along with Pope Francis and so many others, I was deeply saddened to learn of the latest violence by fanatics who see anybody who disagrees with them as their enemy.These attacks threaten civilization itself.Whether it’s a massacre in Paris, Indonesia, Nigeria, Syria, Iraq, Iran, India or now in Libya and Egypt, we keep saying, “How much worse can it get?”And then we woke up Monday morning to see that it did get worse, with this brutal massacre of these young Egyptian Christians in Libya.They were beheaded for nothing less than their religious convictions. It moves me to prayers. It moves...