Free Republic

Iran-backed militias have seized homes, businesses and cultural sites, including churches belonging to Baghdad’s Christian communities, forcing individuals to resettle and forfeit all their belongings, according to members of the Christian members of the Iraqi Parliament. The militias have targeted properties belonging to Christians, forcing individuals to leave the area, according to Christian community leaders, including representatives from the Assyrian, Chaldean and Syriac minorities, as well as the Chaldean Patriarch of Iraq who have condemned the attacks, calling them a form of ethnic cleansing aimed to rid Baghdad of its Christians. “Their claim is that the property of a non-Christian...

Although Barack Obama spent 20 years in a radical, racialist church with a pastor who asks God to damn America; although Obama is a supporter of the infanticide known as partial-birth abortion, bashes Christianity, and uses ObamaCare as a means to persecute Christians through the power of the state, Obama’s longtime supporters at the Washington Post still write gushing articles about Obama’s Christianity and lash out harshly at those who don’t vouch for the president’s questionable faith.

The conventional wisdom in American politics has long been that someone who is not religious cannot be elected president of the United States. Most Americans have consistently said that it is important to them that the president have strong religious beliefs. And a new Pew Research Center survey finds that being an atheist remains one of the biggest liabilities that a presidential candidate can have; fully half of American adults say they would be less likely to vote for a hypothetical presidential candidate who does not believe in God, while just 6% say they would be more likely to vote...

Losing a pet is heart-wrenching. Anyone who denies this either never had a pet or never had a heart to wrench. We had plenty of time to prepare for our girl's passing, and I mistakenly believed that this would make it easier or somehow a relief when she died. It was not easy and it definitely was not a relief. Zoey was a salty old broad to the end, and the departure of her larger-than-life presence has left us with a huge hole in our world; I can't believe how much I miss her. Of course in thinking about her...

After my dad became a Christian, we all moved together to Houston. And seeing the amazing transformation in her husband, my mom became a Christian within a year as well. Thus, by age 4, I was blessed to be being raised in a Christian home with two strong (but new) believers as parents.I was raised in the church. Each night, my dad would read with me from our children's Bible. We'd memorize Bible verses, and compete to see who could do the best. We'd act out scenes from the Old Testament. We attended Clay Road Baptist Church, pastored by the...

Over 500 Catholic school students from the Midwest, left the annual March for Life in DC early on Friday.  The reason for leaving was to get away from the impending blizzard, Winter Storm Jonas.  They didn't make it out in time, and got stranded on the Pennsylvania Turnpike West, in the mountains of Pennsylvania, for over 24 hours.  During that time they bore witness to their faith in amazing ways. Reports are that the students shared their food, their shelter (busses), and more with stranded travelers.  While their fellow travelers were inside warming up and finding nourishment, the students decided to...

Beck officially endorsed presidential candidate Ted Cruz on Saturday while at a rally at Faith Bible College in Iowa. "We need a new George Washington," Beck said at the rally. "Today's Washington will not be found in the garish light of gold, but rather, in the bold service of a man who stands tirelessly for what he deeply believes — that government should be of the people, by the people, and for the people." "I have prayed for the next George Washington," Beck said of Cruz. "I believe I have found him."

It all happened pretty suddenly. I went to the Walk In Clinic for a cough. I asked the Nurse Practitioner if the numb spot near my underarm was my lymph gland fighting the cough. He quickly sent me to the Vanderbilt Breast Clinic, (God bless him), an awesome place full of great people. Suddenly, I was in surgery (double mastectomy) and soon I'll be beginning chemo I'm told. They say my hair will probably fall out. I'm Stage 3A. The funny thing is I've never felt healthier. There are no symptoms. I held a handstand two weeks ago for a...

Republican presidential candidate Marco Rubio told an atheist in the audience that he won't be "forced" to stop talking about his faith on the campaign trail and argued that atheists should want his faith to influence his decisions. During Rubio's Monday town hall meeting in Waverly, Iowa, an atheist attendee named Justin Scott, a member of the Freedom From Religion Foundation who also runs his own YouTube channel, commented during a question and answer session on Rubio's recent campaign ad that simply features Rubio talking about how he follows his faith and that his goal is to live alongside God...

The Constitution provides that "no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States." But, as Gary Scott Smith of Grove City College writes in his new book, Religion in the Oval Office, "Throughout American history many citizens have viewed strong faith as an asset, if not a requirement, for politicians, especially presidents." The biography of faith, such as it is, of the Republican presidential candidate who has led the polls for six months starts with First Presbyterian Church in Jamaica, Queens. That is the church Donald Trump's parents attended...

After the fall of Col. Moammar Gadhafi in 2011, Libyan tensions fired up, and embassies were abandoned. Then, on Sept. 11, 2012, heavily armed Islamist militants launched an organized attack on the U.S. diplomatic mission in Benghazi. Four Americans were killed: U.S. Ambassador Christopher Stevens, Navy SEALs Tyrone Woods and Glen Doherty and State Department computer expert Sean Smith. Six CIA contractors defied orders to defend the compound. Thirteen hours later, only four of them were still alive, but they had saved more than two dozen fellow Americans. When the heroes returned home, then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and President...

And Moses said unto God, Behold, when I come unto the children of Israel, and shall say unto them, The God of your fathers hath sent me unto you; and they shall say to me, What is his name? what shall I say unto them? And God said unto Moses, I Am That I Am: and he said, Thus shalt thou say unto the children of Israel, I Am hath sent me unto you. And God said moreover unto Moses, Thus shalt thou say unto the children of Israel, the Lord God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the...

Over the last several months, the supportive emails and calls I have received have greatly outnumbered the hate mails, which usually come from feminists who hate males. The influx of support can be attributed largely to a viral column I wrote last semester called "Get Out of My Class and Leave America." After it ran, people called my office voicing support for over 40 straight days. I say "straight" days based on the safe assumption that none of these callers were gay activists. As much as I appreciate the support, it is based on the fiction that I am some...

Last evening one of the "elders' at our church gave the Sunday Evening Bible study, sitting in the for the pastor. He admitted that it was not the message he'd prepared, but that he felt strongly that the Lord wanted him to give. He talked about consecrating ourselves to the Lord, explaining that God had asked the Israelites on several occasions to do just that and He would fight their battles for them. He explained that God had wanted the Israelites to consecrate themselves before they went to battle in Canaan, but they were only partially obedient, and their victory...

We can wipe out the adoption crisis tomorrow. We could wipe it out this week, but we’re too busy arguing to have abortion banned, we’re too busy arguing to defund Planned Parenthood. We are too busy withholding mercy from the living, so that we might display a big spectacle of how much we want mercy to be shown to the unborn. Where is your mercy? … What is your goal in only doing activism that makes you comfortable? ~ #BlackLivesMatter activist Michelle Higgins, speaking at the InterVarsity Christian conference, as quoted by The Blaze, December 31 ————————- UPDATE: InterVarsity issued...

It bothered me to hear my favorite candidate, Donald Trump, seem to seek to question Ted Cruz evangelical bona fides by saying, not too many evangelicals come out of Cuba. I was going to tweet and advise him not to go there. Then I thought 'Donald Trump is a smart guy' maybe he knows something I don't know.. So I began looking for 'evidence' that Ted Cruz is a 'born again' Christian. You know a person can 'identify' as anything now days. Just because you go to church and mentally agree with Christianity doesn't mean you have come to know...

About 15 years ago, on Christmas Eve, our family departed from the traditional American Jewish observance of the holiday (ordering Chinese takeout) and elected to find an open restaurant. We drove to the local city center (or what passes for it in suburbia) and were stunned to find that not only were all the restaurants open, they were also packed. I had pictured my Christian friends and neighbors at home, gathered around the table Norman Rockwell–style, eating goose or ham or whatever gentiles eat bathed in the twinkling lights of decorated trees. In fact, I liked to think of them...

President Obama’s reactions to ISIS attacks have become predictable and thin. His words seem to lack an appreciation of the grave conflict underway. Obama’s language betrays his adherence to progressive dogma: that the horrific assaults against the West are a nuisance to be managed, minimized, and explained through a value-free deconstruction of history where America sometimes stokes grievances across the Middle East. Although the role and responsibilities of a young government lawyer named Ted Cruz are very different from a sitting president, the accounts of how Cruz responded to the attacks of September 11, 2001 provide some insight into who...

Should parents "discipline" their children rather than "punish" them? And is this distinction especially important for Christian parents?Yes and yes.Far from synonymous, these associated words carry vastly different meanings. As Mark Twain famously said, "The difference between the almost right word and the right word is really a large matter 'tis the difference between the lightning-bug and the lightning."In the case of discipline and punishment, 'tis the difference between light and lightning.Big DifferenceTo discipline one's children is to rebuke, correct, and train them because you love them too much to let them grow into harmful, hateful, ungrateful people. Discipline proceeds...

Atheism is cool. At least, that's the popular perception of a worldview that's enjoyed a rebrand and a renaissance in the last couple of decades. Authors like Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens have issued forceful public challenges to the claims of the major faiths and the rights they've traditionally been granted, while well-respected and high-profile public figures have lent vocal support to their ideas. When Stephen Fry outlined an atheist (or even anti-theist) position on an Irish talk show, the interview went viral in hours, while comedian Ricky Gervais frequently uses his substantial platform to attack and undermine religion in...