Free Republic

July 13, 2014Fifteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time    Reading 1 Is 55:10-11 Thus says the LORD:Just as from the heavensthe rain and snow come downand do not return theretill they have watered the earth,making it fertile and fruitful,giving seed to the one who sowsand bread to the one who eats,so shall my word bethat goes forth from my mouth;my word shall not return to me void,but shall do my will,achieving the end for which I sent it. Responsorial Psalm Ps 65:10, 11, 12-13, 14 R/ (Lk 8:8) The seed that falls on good ground will yield a fruitful harvest.You...

Dozens of Rialto eighth-graders questioned whether the Holocaust occurred in essays written for an in-class assignment this spring. Rialto Unified School District administrators, besieged by criticism after the assignment became public in May, claimed at the time that none of the students who completed the assignment questioned or denied the Holocaust, but a survey of the students’ work by this news organization found numerous examples of students expressing doubt or flatly denying that the Holocaust occurred. :snip: “Students got high praise and grades for writing that the Holocaust was a hoax. I’m sick about that, I’m sick about that,” said...

The Spiritually Self-Seeking Church " . . . till we all come . . . to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ . . . —Ephesians 4:13 " Reconciliation means the restoring of the relationship between the entire human race and God, putting it back to what God designed it to be. This is what Jesus Christ did in redemption. The church ceases to be spiritual when it becomes self-seeking, only interested in the development of its own organization. The reconciliation of the human race according to His plan means realizing Him not only in...

Some Papal Quotes that somehow and in some way beyond my meager intellect are in continuity with each other, or something. First Quote Pope Eugene IV, the Bull Cantate Domino, 1441. ex cathedra (infallibly defined): “The most Holy Roman Church firmly believes, professes and preaches that none of those existing outside the Catholic Church, not only pagans, but also Jews and heretics and schismatics, can have a share in life eternal; but that they will go into the eternal fire which was prepared for the devil and his angels, unless before death they are joined with Her; and that so...

July 12, 2014Saturday of the Fourteenth Week in Ordinary Time    Reading 1 Is 6:1-8 In the year King Uzziah died,I saw the Lord seated on a high and lofty throne,with the train of his garment filling the temple.Seraphim were stationed above; each of them had six wings:with two they veiled their faces,with two they veiled their feet,and with two they hovered aloft. They cried one to the other,“Holy, holy, holy is the LORD of hosts!All the earth is filled with his glory!”At the sound of that cry, the frame of the door shookand the house was filled with...

Speak to Your Mountains Today's Scripture “And Jesus answered them, Truly I say to you, if you have faith (a firm relying trust) and do not doubt, you will not only do what has been done to the fig tree, but even if you say to this mountain, Be taken up and cast into the sea, it will be done.” (Matthew 21:21, AMP) Today's Word from Joel and Victoria We’ve all had seasons when the challenges of life feel overwhelming. During those times, it’s tempting to talk about how bad things are. Maybe you received a bad medical report,...

The Spiritually Vigorous Saint " . . . that I may know Him . . . —Philippians 3:10 " A saint is not to take the initiative toward self-realization, but toward knowing Jesus Christ. A spiritually vigorous saint never believes that his circumstances simply happen at random, nor does he ever think of his life as being divided into the secular and the sacred. He sees every situation in which he finds himself as the means of obtaining a greater knowledge of Jesus Christ, and he has an attitude of unrestrained abandon and total surrender about him. The Holy...

“Meanwhile, I am left with the Atheist on my hands,” Dorothy Sayers once penned to C.S. Lewis in a letter in which she sought some practical advice from the popular Oxford apologist. She went on to write, “I do not want him. I have no use for him. I have no missionary zeal at all.” While many Christians likely attempt to project a little more enthusiasm for evangelism, I’m not sure they do not, deep down, resonate with Sayers’ sentiment. With the relentless barrage of new atheist bravado over the last decade, believers are liable to grow weary in well-doing....

(Original title: "Well Done Phil" “It seems odd, that certain men who talk so much of what the Holy Spirit reveals to themselves, should think so little of what he has revealed to others.” – C. H. Spurgeon, Commenting and Commentaries (London: Passmore & Alabaster, 1876), 1. “Tradition is the fruit of the Spirit’s teaching activity from the ages as God’s people have sought understanding of Scripture. It is not infallible, but neither is it negligible, and we impoverish ourselves if we disregard it.” – J.I. Packer, “Upholding the Unity of Scripture Today,” JETS 25 (1982): 414 “Although tradition does...

July 11, 2014Memorial of Saint Benedict, Abbot    Reading 1 Hos 14:2-10 Thus says the LORD:Return, O Israel, to the LORD, your God;you have collapsed through your guilt.Take with you words,and return to the LORD;Say to him, “Forgive all iniquity,and receive what is good, that we may renderas offerings the bullocks from our stalls.Assyria will not save us,nor shall we have horses to mount;We shall say no more, ‘Our god,’to the work of our hands;for in you the orphan finds compassion.”I will heal their defection, says the LORD,I will love them freely;for my wrath is turned away from them.I...

Being raised in a Protestant home, the Scriptures were (and in many ways still are) the end-all-be-all of the faith for me. However, there is a reason I am no longer a Protestant. This reason has many branches but all points back to one thing, context. Given the necessity of context, I find the whole idea of “Scripture Alone” horrifying. What it is: Sola Scriptura is the idea that Christianity ought to be based off of “Scripture Alone” (which is the English translation of “Sola Scriptura”), that is to say, it should be without ritual, or the teaching authority of...

Blessed John Paul II: Champion of Religious Freedom Most Reverend William E. Lori, S.T.D. Address at the National Catholic Prayer Breakfast Washington, D.C. April 27, 2011Introduction“Ladies and gentlemen: On the threshold of a new millennium, we are witnessing an extraordinary global acceleration of that quest for freedom which is one of the great dynamics of human history. This phenomenon is not limited to any one part of the world; nor is it the expression of any single culture. Men and women throughout the world, even when threatened by violence, have taken the risk of freedom, asking to be given a...

Words Matter Today's Scripture “The Sovereign LORD has given me a well-instructed tongue, to know the word that sustains the weary. He wakens me morning by morning, wakens my ear to listen like one being instructed.” (Isaiah 50:4, NIV) Today's Word from Joel and Victoria Your words are important. They matter. Even more so, God’s Word matters. When your words become His Words, that’s when you’ll see an explosion of His goodness, favor and abundance in your everyday life! Not only that, there are people God has placed in your life who are waiting for you to speak God’s...

The Spiritually Lazy Saint " Let us consider one another in order to stir up love and good works, not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together . . . —Hebrews 10:24-25 " We are all capable of being spiritually lazy saints. We want to stay off the rough roads of life, and our primary objective is to secure a peaceful retreat from the world. The ideas put forth in these verses from Hebrews 10 are those of stirring up one another and of keeping ourselves together. Both of these require initiative— our willingness to take the first step toward...

The Bible doesn’t mention anything about contraception or abortion, but this hasn’t stopped 89 million American evangelicals acting as if “thou shall not consume a pregnancy pill” were one of the Ten Commandments. For the benefit of my mostly American audience, it’s not. In fact, the first four of the Hebrew God’s Decalogue amount to nothing more than “maniacal throat clearing,” to steal a phrase from the late Christopher Hitchens. The decision of the five conservative justices to rule in favor of Hobby Lobby, thus granting religious personhood to 90 percent of U.S. corporations, which means that certain for-profit companies...

A new Gallup poll revealed that a small percentage of Americans consider religion old fashioned while the majority of Americans think it can actually solve today's world problems. The recent poll asked over 1,000 adults about their views on the topic and found that 57 percent of individuals surveyed are optimistic about religion and only 30 percent find it to be out of date. "The majority of Americans continue to believe that religion can answer today's problems, another indicator that the nation, by far, remains a religious country," said Frank Newport, Gallup's editor-in-chief, in a statement. "And, with the trend...

The battle over gay marriage is being fought in nearly every corner of American society — from public schools to the highest courts, and from television sitcoms to neighborhood barbecues. Religious Americans — particularly evangelical Christians — have often been at the center of these debates, attempting to hold the line on traditional understandings of marriage. But as support for same-sex marriage grows (a clear majority of Americans now favor same-sex marriage), many Christians are starting to shift. Indeed, the majority of white mainline Protestants, white Catholics, and Latino Catholics now back same-sex marriage rights. Strong majorities of white evangelical...

In the wake of the U.S. Supreme Court’s historic ruling in favor of Hobby Lobby and religious freedom, some homosexual advocates claim the decision was also a victory for the “gay rights” movement. As previously reported, the Supreme Court decided last week that the federal government cannot force closely-held companies to obey regulations which violate the owners’ religious beliefs. The ruling was seen as a historic victory for religious rights, and many Christians praised the court’s decision. ... However, in the wake of the Hobby Lobby ruling, a few commentators have suggested that the decision might also be a victory...

ATLANTA – A furor erupted recently at an Atlanta high school after a science instructor showed an illustration from Christian apologist Ken Ham to her students. According to reports, Anquinette Jones of Henry W. Grady High School taught a freshman Biology class last spring. Using a 52-slide PowerPoint presentation, Jones introduced the theory of evolution to her students, as required by the Atlanta Public Schools science curriculum. The PowerPoint presentation is primarily pro-evolution, asserting that evolutionary theory is supported by numerous scientific fields, including anatomy, embryology, and biochemistry. “96% of the human genome is the same as the chimpanzees [sic]...

GILBERT, Ariz. – The United States Supreme Court has agreed to hear a challenge to a municipal law in Arizona that indirectly forces churches to display their signs at night, while allowing other types of signs to be displayed 24/7. As previously reported, in 2008, Good News Community Church of Gilbert filed a lawsuit in federal court seeking to obtain an injunction against the city’s sign ordinance, which prohibited entities from displaying temporary directional signs on the public ways more than 12 hours before services and more than 1 hour afterward. The church had found itself in disputes with the...