Free Republic

FULL TITLE: Chaldean Patriarch to Christians of Mosul:"We your shepherds will stay with you to the end." "Our suffering will be salvation to us and others." I’ll start my speech by the Word of Christ, as His Word is the source of strength and salvation of us, the poor of this lost world: "There is no need to be afraid, little flock" (Luke 12:32). Our present pain is associated with our Christianity and with the mystery of our Passover (i.e., Easter). Our suffering, if joined to the suffering of our Savior Jesus, "Man of Sorrows", will turn out to be...

It is normally Yorkshire which likes to refer to itself as God's Own County. But by the look of this stunning picture, Norfolk can now lay claim to the title. Amateur photographer Jeremy Fletcher took this extraordinary photograph which appears to show a God-like bearded man in the clouds. The 56-year-old took the image during recent turbulent weather conditions and says the clouds momentarily parted at sunset to reveal the image. Mr Fletcher, of Bray, Berkshire, was in Norfolk for a three-month work attachment took the photograph on an evening stroll along the beach at Snettisham . "I realised the...

While only about 18 percent of Gen X women were married by 40, the number of their Millennial counterparts waiting till age 40 to tie the knot could now almost double, according to a recent study. Using data from the American Community Survey to estimate age-specific marriage rates, Washington, D.C.-based Urban Institute finds that the percentage of Millennials marrying by age 40 will fall lower than for any previous generation of Americans, even in a scenario where marriage rates recover considerably. In the early millennium period, from 2000 to 2004, the peak first marriage rate for single U.S.-born women at...

Craven County Democratic candidates for the North Carolina Legislature and an Onslow County Democrat running for the U.S. House must at moments have felt like Daniel in the lion’s den in front of Craven-Pamlico Christian Coalition Monday. The expressly conservative and mostly Republican group’s meeting packed about 50 people into a New Bern Golden Corral room, which usually sees a smaller crowd, to hear and question U.S. District 3 House candidate Marshall Adame; N.C. Senate District 2 candidate Carr Ipock; and N.C. House District 3 candidate Whit Whitley. The meeting opened with a prayer, the Pledge of Allegiance, and a...

DOHA (Reuters) - An influential group of Islamic scholars has denounced the forced expulsion of Christians from northern Iraq by Islamist hardliners, saying it paves the way for fighting between the country's ethnic and religious groups. The Christian community of Mosul fled to the Kurdish autonomous region last week, ending a presence stretching back nearly 2,000 years, after Islamic State militants set them a deadline to submit to their rule or leave. "The International Union of Muslim Scholars (IUMS) condemns the forced expulsion of the Christian brothers of Iraq from their homes, cities and provinces," the group said in a...

PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) -- An evangelical Christian group plans to try to convert children as young as 5 at Portland apartment pools, public parks and dozens of other gathering spots this summer -- a campaign that's got some residents upset. They've banded together in recent weeks to warn parents about the Child Evangelism Fellowship's Good News Club, buying a full-page ad in the local alternative weekly to highlight the group's tactics. "They pretend to be a mainstream Christian Bible study when in fact they're a very old school fundamentalist sect," said Kaye Schmitt, an organizer with Protect Portland Children, which...

The National Organization for Marriage is calling for a public response to an employee survey conducted internally by J.P. Morgan Chase Bank. Workers at the financial institution leaked information on the so-called confidential survey, which asked in part if they identified as LGBT and whether they were an ally of the LGBT community (see earlier story). Joe Grabowski, with the National Organization for Marriage, tells OneNewsNow that this survey was intrusive into the private beliefs of the employees. “It's a very invasive question,” he says. “And one could certainly imagine - especially in the wake of things like the forced...

Over the past five years, an underground movement has been burgeoning on evangelical Christian campuses. Although many of these colleges explicitly ban “homosexual behavior,” they are now home to dozens of LGBT-friendly student groups. The umbrella organization Safety Net, founded in December 2011, encompasses groups from approximately 75 different evangelical Christian colleges. Some of these groups are tiny, and many operate in near-secret. But over the past two weeks, an LGBT group at Gordon College has made itself impossible to ignore. When we, the authors, attended Gordon College over a decade ago, the vast majority of administrators, faculty, and students...

A new reality show called "Married at First Sight" is legally marrying two complete strangers as part of a "social experiment," all in the name of entertainment. The show debuted last week on the FYI channel and follows three couples who are thrown into a legal marriage the moment they meet. A sexologist, psychologist, sociologist and spiritual adviser use "scientific matchmaking" to pair up the couples, then watch to see what happens. According to the show's publicist, the marriages are indeed binding. But the couples can have their divorces paid for by the show within six months if they choose...

Yesterday the Messiah Most Miserable issued a dictatorial fiat executive order stating that no federal contractor can "discriminate" in its personnel practices based on employees' gender identity and/or sexual orientation.  Churches and related organizations are NOT exempted.  The USCCB pitched a fit.  My question is, "would this order of Obama's had been a blip on their radar screens if they had been exempted?"  Given prior behaviors, I must opine that had Obama exempted churches, they wouldn't have given a rat's rump regarding the matter. But since the USCCB and so many of the dioceses are officially on the federal...

(VIDEO-AT-LINK)Tuesday on MSNBC "Morning Joe," House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) discussed the humanitarian crisis of tens of thousands of unaccompanied minors illegally flooding across the U.S.-Mexico border. The congressional leader dismissed the strain on our nations financial resources to care for all the children of the world in troubled areas, saying she believes the U.S. government should look at the children like "baby Jesus," who she added "was a refugee from violence." Pelosi said, "In Washington, I see an embrace of the idea that this is a humanitarian crisis by people who are not politicizing the issue. What we...

Full title: The Philosophers and the Jews: Black Eggs and White Cheese The Secret of Jewish Resilience. The Inner Story of The Three Weeks Note: only 40 min long and the rabbi translates everything, very little 'yeshivish' (annoying mix of English, Hebrew, and Yiddish) A beautiful explanation on polar opposite sides of the Jewish calendar-- the 3 weeks between the 17th of the Jewsish month of Tammuz (the day the walls of Jerusalem fell to Nebuchadnezzar) and the 9th of Av (the day of the destruction of both Holy Temples) AND the 3 weeks between Rosh Hashana and [the day...

GAZA (Reuters) - About 1,000 Palestinian Muslims fleeing Israeli shells devastating their Gaza neighborhood have found shelter in a building they otherwise would rarely if ever enter, the city's 12th-century Greek Orthodox Church. Despite its thick walls dating back to the Crusades, the Church of Saint Porphyrius was still not a very safe haven. Shortly after they arrived, Israeli aircraft bombed a nearby field, spraying shrapnel on the church and damaging graves. But children from the Shejaia district, where some 72 Palestinians - many of them women and children - were killed during fighting between Israeli forces and Hamas militants...

Conflict over excommunicated bishop may result in suspensions of seminary students and a loss of vocations China’s Catholic community reeled recently as news spread that Beijing’s seminarians had boycotted their graduation ceremony, scheduled for late June. The decision was made after the seminarians discovered that the illegitimate – and excommunicated – rector of the seminary, Bishop Ma Yinglin, was scheduled to offer the graduation Mass. When the students voiced their objection to assisting at a Mass celebrated by a bishop who is not in communion with the Pope, the seminary officials suggested replacing Bishop Ma with Bishop John Fang Xingyao,...

Essentially what this new Executive Order does is amend the preexisting Equal Employment Opportunity Executive Orders No. 11478 (for federal gov’t) and No. 11246 (for federal Contractors and Subcontractors and federally-assisted Construction Contractors and Subcontractors). Where those previously Executive Orders once prohibited employment discrimination on the basis of “race, color, religion, sex, or national origin,” will now include “sexual orientation and gender identity.” While there is a just issue to be made as to why ‘voluntary’ behaviors would be added to federal non-discrimination law, or the addition of a new race/class/species of people of people (called LGBTQ) that scientists have...

ORLANDO – A federal judge has given a secular organization the green light to distribute more atheistic and anti-Christian materials to Florida public school students, in spite of the materials’ graphic content and offensive language. As previously reported, the Freedom From Religion Foundation (FFRF) learned last year that a Christian ministry had made Bibles available to Orlando high school students on “Religious Freedom Day.” To counter the Bible distribution, FFRF sought permission from the school district to give students a variety of atheistic and anti-Christian materials. According to reports, the Orange County School Board permitted FFRF to distribute several books...

Chaldean website ankawa.com says a university professor was killed after speaking out against anti-Christian persecution. Meanwhile, the Islamic State has set the jizyah at 450 dollars Christians leave Mosul He refused to keep silent about the violence agaist Mosul’s Christians  who are forced to choose between converting to the Muslim faith, paying the jizyah (the Islamic tax for non-Muslims) or fleeing. Professor Mahmoud Al ‘Asali, a law professor who lectures on pedagogy at the University of Mosul, had the courage to make a stand against this brutal duress which he believes go against the Muslim commandments. But he paid for...

WASHINGTON – The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) has reached a settlement with a prominent atheist organization, agreeing to crack down churches and religious groups for infringements of its prohibition against ‘electioneering.’ As previously reported, the Freedom from Religion Foundation (FFRF), headquartered in Madison, Wisconsin, sued the IRS in 2012, asserting that many non-profit religious organizations have been “blatantly and deliberately flaunting … electioneering restrictions,” but the government has not enforced its rules pertaining to the matter. According to the IRS website, “Under the Internal Revenue Code, all section 501(c)(3) organizations are absolutely prohibited from directly or indirectly participating in, or...

In the Hobby Lobby decision handed down last month, the Supreme Court was asked to strike a balance between women’s rights and religious freedom. But the major conflict that has erupted in the wake of that decision has been between religious freedom and gay rights. The resulting controversy has split gay-rights and faith groups on the left, with wide-ranging political fallout that some now fear could hurt both causes. One chapter of the controversy is set to close on Monday, when President Obama plans to sign a long-awaited executive order banning federal contractors from discriminating against gays and lesbians, according...

Islamic militants have seized a monastery in northern Iraq, kicking out its Christian monks as well as Christian residents of Mosul. Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL/ISIS) insurgents stormed the ancient Mar Benham monastery in the Christian town of Qaraqosh Sunday, near the northern Iraqi city of Mosul, which was overrun by ISIS on 10 June. Mar Benham is a 4th century monastery run by the Syriac Catholic church. A member of the Syriac clergy said the monks pleaded to be allowed to save some of the monasteryÂ’s relics but the ISIS fighters refused and ordered them...