Free Republic

More has been done to further progress by America than anywhere else because we are a people who believe we can do things better. Since Columbus touched these shores, the Pilgrims knelt down and kissed the ground, and our Founding Patriots risked everything for independence, the commitment to pursuing human betterment for all has been understood as our God-given responsibility. This is because Americans believe in the value and potential of every individual, which also is the engine that powers capitalism. Distilled to the bare essence, markets operate based on the principle that the decisions made every day by millions...

California’s sex-education law prohibits school districts from indoctrinating students on the need to remain celibate before marriage or teaching them that abstinence is the only safe way to prevent pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases, a judge has ruled. The decision by Fresno County Superior Court Judge Donald Black applies only to the Clovis School District. But as the first ruling to interpret California’s 11-year-old law on sex education and disease prevention, it should put schools on notice that “young people need complete, accurate health information required by law,” said Phyllida Burlingame, director of Reproductive Justice Policy for the ACLU, which...

Fear Not by R.C. Sproul We are fragile mortals, given to fears of every sort. We have a built-in insecurity that no amount of whistling in the dark can mollify. We seek assurance concerning the things that frighten us the most. The prohibition uttered more frequently than any other by our Lord is the command, “Fear not …” He said this so often to His disciples and others He encountered that it almost came to sound like a greeting. Where most people greet others by saying “Hi” or “Hello,” the first words of Jesus very often were “Fear not.” Why?...

In the Darkness We See Farther – Pondering the Paradox of the “Dark Knowing” of Faith By: Msgr. Charles PopeAs human beings we are very visual and there is a certain demand of our flesh to see on its own terms. But of course God, who is pure spirit, will not be seen in this way.How can the human eye perceive what is spiritual? It is not designed to do so. We cannot see God, as God, any more than we should expect to be able to see justice sitting down to lunch with humility. These are not physical concepts;...

Last week The New Republic’s Elizabeth Stoker Bruenig wrote an extended pre-mortem not just for Mike Huckabee’s presidential campaign but for the culture wars in general. Tracing the rise of Huckabee’s political career to the rise of the religious Right, she tries to use Huckabee’s career as a stand-in for the fortunes of religious conservatism writ large. To Bruenig, a Huckabee defeat will represent “one more [conservative] loss in a greater, longer defeat in America’s culture wars.” I agree with Bruenig that Mike Huckabee will probably lose, but I come to the exact opposite conclusion about the culture wars. A...

Christianity is in sharp decline in America, according to new research from the Pew Research Center, making for a significantly less Christian country than that of just seven years ago. The number of Christians dropped by almost 8 percentage points in seven years to 71 percent, and the trend holds across race, gender, education, and geographic dimensions, though Christianity still dominates American religious identity at 70 percent, USA Today said. "It's remarkably widespread," Alan Cooperman, director of religion research for the Pew Research Center, said, according to The Washington Post. "The country is becoming less religious as a whole, and...

History of Mother's Day -- A Mother's Day Gift to You The following transcript is from the 1955 movie A Man Called Peter (1955 Henry Koster Film). The movie was adapted from a book by Catherine Marshall by the same name. Catherine was the wife of the late great preacher, Dr. Peter Marshall. The transcript below is directly from the movie. Catherine (prior to her marriage to Peter Marshall) was a college student. She and several other college students (one man and three women) were asked to accompany Dr. Peter Marshall to speak at a college event about their Christian...

Gov. Scott Walker told a heavily — if not exclusively — Christian crowd gathered at the Italian Community Center in Milwaukee Thursday to go out and share their faith with the world, and to pray for their leaders in government and business regardless of party or position. "Always pray for our leaders so that God's will will be followed rather than their own," he said. Walker spoke at the annual Governor's Prayer Breakfast, organized by the West Allis-based Christian publishing nonprofit ProBuColls Association. An evangelical Christian, Walker has been increasingly open about his faith on the campaign trail, as he...

The next time they appear in court for homeschooling, Dirk and Petra Wunderlich could face four years in prison—each. “I am sad today,” said Dirk Wunderlich, recounting how on April 28 he lost his most recent case in the German state of Hesse, and also heard dire warnings from the presiding judge. “We had hoped the judge, who seemed open-minded and friendly, might give us a chance,” Wunderlich added. “But no, he said he could not: The law is the law.” In their most recent court appearance, Dirk and Petra Wunderlich were fined 450 euros each (about $1,000) for not...

(RNS) When Republican presidential hopeful Scott Walker spoke last Saturday (April 25) to an influential gathering of Christian conservatives in an Iowa church, he brought along a little reading material. Standing before more than 1,000 people at the Iowa Faith & Freedom Coalition, the Wisconsin governor used part of his time to read from “Jesus Calling: Enjoying Peace in His Presence,” a Christian devotional written in the first-person voice of Jesus by missionary-turned-author Sarah Young. “‘The way to walk through demanding times is to grip my hand tightly,’” Walker read to the crowd. “‘Regardless of the day’s problems, I can...

A lot of my ideas, like this one, are random thoughts that pop into my mind and then I just go with it and see how it ends up...

Archdiocese of Washington Becoming Witnesses of the Resurrection and the Truth of the Gospel. A homily for the third Sunday of Easter. By: Msgr. Charles PopeThe Gospel for this Sunday speaks to the necessity of becoming witnesses of the Resurrection of Jesus. It begins with the necessary foundation of the proclamation of the Church: “The Lord is risen indeed, he has appeared to Simon!” This solemn declaration of the Church forms the doctrinal certitude of the resurrection. But on this foundation of the truth the personal witness of every Catholic must be built. In this gospel we see how the...

Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal, appearing at the Iowa Faith and Freedom Coalition’s Spring Kickoff on Saturday, made it clear that he will not allow religious liberty bullies to run rampant in his state. Referring to the recent events surrounding Indiana’s Religious Liberty Restoration Act, Jindal said corporate America teamed up with the radical left “to come after our religious liberty rights.” Jindal warned, “Corporate America needs to be careful because the same radical left that doesn’t want us to have religious liberty rights does not want us to have economic liberty rights. The same radical left that doesn’t want us...

Today’s gospel teaches us to pray always and not lose heart. This is a gospel about having tenacity in prayer and, even when the results seem discouraging, continuing to beseech the Lord. It is also a gospel about the Lord’s will to extend the gospel to all the nations and to make the Church truly catholic.Let’s look at this gospel in five stages.STAGE I. TRAVELS - The text says, At that time, Jesus withdrew to the region of Tyre and Sidon. Thus Jesus goes north of Israel into the territory we know today as Lebanon. Now Matthew is not just...

This past Easter Sunday, some acquaintances invited my husband and I to join them for lunch and proselytized us as an added bonus activity. They run a house church (where they meet in a home versus traditional church) and through getting to know Matt and I set their sights on recruiting us. We had little in common with this family but a few odd circumstances brought us together for a time. We were unaware that this was the agenda for the day until we went to leave. In an obvious, sudden turn of conversation, discussing spiritual topics became an urgent...

I'm going to transcribe an article that Jerry Walls wrote when he was a grad student at Notre Dame: ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- I am nearing the end of three very happy (with a brief interlude) years as a graduate student in the philosophy department at Notre Dame. The philosophy department is quite lively and stimulating and I have learned a great deal about my discipline. Along the way, I have also acquired an education of another sort–namely in the ways of the Roman Catholic Church. My education in this regard has been informal and piecemeal, to be sure. My insights have been...

"...Meadowbrook did not escape the political convulsions touched off during Mr. Walker’s first term as governor. In a speech to the congregation during its annual meeting in 2013, Mr. Mackett pleaded for an end to the “turmoil” caused by “slander” and “name calling” among members divided by politics.He declined to elaborate in an interview. But Lee Heyward, who succeeded Mr. Mackett as head pastor, said,“John and Meadowbrook were going through a really tumultuous time during that whole season of Act 10,” referring to the law Mr. Walker signed in 2011 that stripped Wisconsin’s public employees of most bargaining rights.The church...

DES MOINES, IOWA — Nine Republican presidential hopefuls will share a stage Saturday here in the hopes of winning the backing of the state's socially conservative GOP activists, whose support can be crucial to winning the state's presidential caucus, the first major event in the presidential primary..... Notably absent are New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie and Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, both of whom were invited. "The event will have a definite religious cast to it," said Don Racheter, chief operating officer of the Public Interest Institute, an Iowa nonprofit free-market group. The coalition evolved from the state branch of the...

It's really so very simple.  Jesus died for your sins, was buried, and rose again. Do you accept that message? I often over complicate the message to my own shame, but it is just that simple.  It amazes me how there are entire denominations (thinking RCC) that constantly refer to "the Gospel", yet when pressed they cannot even define what "the Gospel" is anymore... or if they do define it, it is some sort of faith + works complicated mess, far beyond what Paul described in 1 Corinthians 15:1-4: "Now I would remind you, brothers, of the gospel I preached...

This Season of Unreason will end with the elections of November 2016, but its consequences – validation of the idea that belief without evidence is a virtue, that religion, and especially Christianity, deserves a place in our politics, our Constitutionally enshrined secularism notwithstanding – will live on and damage the progressive cause. But it does not have to be this way. There will almost certainly be no (declared) atheist or even agnostic among the candidates. This is scandalous, given the electorate’s gradual, relentless ditching of religion. A survey just out shows that 7.5 million Americans have abandoned their faith since...