Free Republic

A British neo-Nazi couple who named their son after Adolf Hitler was sentenced Tuesday to several years in prison for being part of a terrorist group. Adam Thomas, 22, was sentenced to six years and six months in prison, while Claudia Patatas, 38, was jailed for five years, Sky News reported. Thomas and Patatas were found guilty for being members of National Action, a far-right neo-Nazi organization in the United Kingdom that was banned in 2016. Judge Melbourne Inman QC, who handed down the sentence, said the group had “horrific aims.” "Its aims and objectives are the overthrow of democracy...

“It’s like we’ve got a voice now. People are listening,” says 53-year-old Billy Inman, whose teenage son was murdered by an illegal alien nearly sixteen years ago. “Donald Trump gives us a little bit of hope. … For years, I’d talk to our ‘elected ones,’ and it was like talking to a wall … [but] Donald Trump is bringing us onto his stage.” In June 2000, the Inman family—Billy, Kathy, their 16-year-old son Dustin, and their dog Lucky–were on their way to enjoy an early Father’s Day family fishing trip. They were stopped at a traffic light when an illegal...

Some BYU students are defying national odds by showing their support over Ted Cruz and they’re encouraging others to do the same. The Ted Cruz College Republicans coordinated an ‘bubbly’ event to spark conversation for the upcoming election and show support for Cruz on Saturday, Feb. 6. The event was held at Sodalicious at the Village at South Campus in Provo. Many students gathered together to watch the Republican Debate and enjoy refreshments. Fliers and posters were hung up to show support, and many attendees wore stickers with Ted Cruz’s name on them. According to Pew Research the rate of...

Excerpted KANAB — Most of the people who came to the funeral of LaVoy Finicum didn't know the Arizona rancher personally. They came anyway, in trucks and campers and caravans, drawn either by kinship with the Finicum family or by sympathy for the cause that took him to rural Oregon. The Arizona rancher was one of the most recognizable faces of the armed standoff in Oregon, where a group of protesters seized the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in early January to protest what they said was federal overreach into Western rangelands. Finicum was shot dead by police on Jan. 26...

The CW this week is that McCarthy’s Benghazi gaffe was a gift to Hillary Clinton but it’s also a gift to House conservatives who are looking for a foothold in electing Boehner’s successor. You won’t convince the centrists in the caucus that McCarthy’s too squishy to rule but you might convince them that he’s a political liability whom the GOP can’t risk having as a major spokesman during next year’s death match with the Clintons. All tea partiers need to mount a challenge is a candidate. Hensarling won’t do it, Jordan won’t do it, Ryan won’t do it. Jason Chaffetz?...

A Secret Service official’s allegedly deliberate decision to embarrass Rep. Jason Chaffetz could “give pause” to other lawmakers who have applied for federal jobs, cautioned former House Judiciary Chairman Jim Sensenbrenner, R-Wis.

Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Jason Chaffetz will run for speaker. The Utah Republican announced his decision on Fox News Sunday, citing support from colleagues who “recruited” him to challenge the establishment favorite, Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif. “We don’t want to fight internally,” Chaffetz told Fox News anchor Chris Wallace, “but realistically we can’t vote to promote the existing leadership. “Kevin McCarthy’s a good man,” Chaffetz said, “and he’s a reason we have such a solid majority. But things have changed, and there’s really a math problem.” Chaffetz granted that McCarthy may have the majority of votes to...

Boehner was the lesser of two evils. But not by much. You had Obama on the one side and Mr. Spray Tan on the other, and the hatred of one did not mean the love of the other. And for five years he failed. Handed the speakership by a pissed-off public, he did nothing with it. He didn't figure out how to handle Obama, he didn't figure out how to handle Reid, he was clueless with Pilosi and rudderless with the Republicans. He could neither command nor cooperate. Nor could he speak. As half the population was left without a...

In 2001, 1 in 7 Americans accepted polygamy as a "family" form (7%); by 2015, it's jumped to 1 in 6 Americans (16%). Source: Shocker: Morality Goes Out the Window, Americans Embrace Social LiberalismAs of last week, three of the dozen "apostles" of the Mormon Church – 1 in 4 -- were well ahead of that cultural curve and indeed, per Mormon doctrine, were headed for eternal polygamy.Allow me to explain: Seven years ago this Spring, the Salt Lake Tribune published an article that mentioned how "Three of the church's current apostles, for example, were widowed and remarried. Each will...

BANGKOK, Thailand -- Nearly 50 years after Mormons opened small churches here converting Buddhists, animists and other Thais, they have now announced plans to construct their first big temple in Thailand, enabling their families to be "sealed" together for eternity, posthumous weddings for dead ancestors and other "highest sacraments."

This is the third and final post on B. Carmon Hardy’s Doing the Works of Abraham: Mormon Polygamy: Its Origin, Practice and Demise (Arthur H. Clark Co., 2007). The simple story of the end of LDS polygamy is that it ended in 1890 with the Manifesto. The not-so-simple story involves a Second Manifesto in 1904, which raises the obvious question, “If the First Manifesto ended polygamy, why the need for a Second Manifesto?” The First Manifesto did not end the officially sanctioned LDS practice of polygamy. In fact, it took twenty years to fully execute that momentous institutional change of...

As Mormonism enters its third century, it faces a Goldilocks dilemma: Too much tension with the surrounding culture invites scorn; too little threatens its uniqueness. But finding just the right balance to ensure a thriving — and distinctive — faith won't be easy. {SNIP} So, what are the Baby Bear options in Mormonism's future? Too much conflict with the wider society, say on gay rights or women's roles, premier Mormon sociologist Armand Mauss argues, would bring "not only popular disdain but even repression and persecution." {SNIP} Female elders? • Third, the LDS Church runs into much debate and even clashes...

Is the Book of Mormon too violent for children? Graphic Murder and TortureMoroni 9:8 8 And the husbands and fathers of those women and children they have slain; and they feed the women upon the flesh of their husbands, and the children upon the flesh of their fathers; and no water, save a little, do they give unto them. Bodily Mutilation and Killing by Jesus's Hero, AmmonAlma 17: 38 Now six of them had fallen by the sling, but he slew none save it were their leader with his sword; and he smote off as many of their arms as...

A devout Mormon and an evangelical street preacher exchange words near Temple Square. Next thing you know, they're dining together on roadkill In 2007, Bryan Hall was almost finished filming his documentary, Us and Them: Religious Rivalry in America. He still didn't know how to end the film. A devout member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, the now-42-year-old from Orem, thought about the protesters on Temple Square. He finally said, "Let's go talk to those crazy street preachers." There he met the outspoken leader of the street preachers, Ruben Israel, a 53-year-old Whittier, Calif., native who...

Question for a Mormon How does the Mormon community react when one Mormon tells lies about another Mormon and brags of the lie's success.

BOUNTIFUL — A judge ruled Monday that a former Davis High School teacher will face separate trials on charges of sexually abusing three students. Brianne Altice, 35, faces a total of 14 felony charges — including rape, forcible sodomy, forcible sexual abuse, unlawful sexual activity with a minor and dealing in materials harmful to a minor — stemming from alleged sexual relationships with three former Davis High students who were 16 or 17 years old at the time. Second District Judge Thomas Kay ruled Monday that it was "appropriate and necessary" to split the 10 original charges into three trials,...

No one in American life is more committed to religious liberty for all than the Latter-day Saints. We disagree strongly on crucial matters of faith—including the question of what the gospel is and what the church is, even over the question of who and what God is. But we work together for religious liberty, because we can have those debates while simultaneously agreeing that we ought to have the freedom to have them without government interference. We don’t have to agree on whether Joseph Smith was right about golden plates to agree that Thomas Jefferson was right about inalienable rights....

David Conley Nelson has spent years researching the LDS Church during the Third Reich, resulting in the new book Moroni and the Swastika: Mormons in Nazi Germany.Though it’s not officially out until February 26, the book will be launched Sam Weller’s in Trolley Square, Salt Lake City, tomorrow evening.It’s not right to say I “enjoyed” this book, because it was disturbing to discover how deeply some Mormons bought into Nazi ideology. But it’s required reading for anyone interested in Mormon history and the larger question of a religion’s responsibility to procure justice for the oppressed – even when it means...

This article caught my eye--Six Ways Mormons Can Enjoy the Spirit of Lent.  Why would Mormons want anything to do with Lent?--something Mormons have historically associated with paganism creeping into the church shortly after the age of the apostles.  Well, if American evangelicals are now attracted to such things, Mormons will do the same. Notice the way in which the author of this essay (Kelsey Berteaux) explains how easily the Lenten season can be made to fit right in with Mormon notions of works-righteousness ("grace coupled with obedience to the laws and ordinances of the gospel") . . . Though...

About Me I am originally from Los Angeles, California and currently reside in Orem, Utah. I am an entrepreneur for Eklect Enterprises and a student at Utah Valley University majoring in Software Engineering. I have been a member of the church since 1991, and my parents were converts to the church in 1984. I served a full-time mission in the Colorado Denver North Mission from 2003-2005 where I earned multiple awards, including the Gold Award in the Gospel Scholarship Program. After my mission service, I have held different auxiliary positions and callings in the church, from Nursery to Bishopric; I...