Free Republic

Are kids from more religious families more or less altruistic than their peers from less-religious families? That's what a high-profile new study from University of Chicago neuroscientist Jean Decety and a global crew of collaborators sought to determine... (snip) In their study, Decety and his colleagues gave the sticker test to 1,170 kids at schools in six cities--Amman, Cape Town, Chicago, Guangzhou, Istanbul, and Toronto...The researchers also gave the kids another test, in which they watched videos of people hurting other people, and then judged (a) how mean the bullies were, and (b) how much punishment the bullies deserved. (snip)...

One hesitates to give attention to Jesse A. Myerson. But it's probably worth it, if for no other reason to contend that many of his beliefs are likely shared by the mindless lemmings disguised as "journalists" who wildly cheered on Saturday when an obviously orchestrated "climate change" agreement designed ultimately to redistribute massive amounts of wealth from developed to underdeveloped countries — which would virtually guarantee that they will stay undeveloped — was announced in Paris. Almost two years ago, Myerson, whose experience includes "the Media and Labor Outreach committees at Occupy Wall Street," identified of "Five Economic Reforms Millennials...

Exclusive Interview with William J. Murray, Defender of Persecuted Christians By Julio Severo William J. Murray, who is known for his incredible work of helping persecuted Christians, is the son of one of the most famous atheists and Marxists in America, Madalyn Murray O'Hair, founder of American Atheists. When she enrolled William in the school in the early 1960s, she was enraged at prayers and mentions of God in the school setting. Her lawsuit led to a landmark Supreme Court ruling officially banning Bible reading in American public schools in 1963. Mike Huckabee and William J. Murray If there...

The international climate pact passed Saturday "represents the best chance we have to save the one planet we've got," President Obama said hours after the historic agreement was signed. "No nation, not even one as powerful as ours, can solve this challenge alone," Obama said of the deal, which the United States and nearly 200 other countries agreed to in Paris Saturday after two weeks of intensive talks. "And no country, no matter how small, can sit on the sidelines. All of us had to solve it together."

The Paris climate talks have mostly wound to an end. There are still a few details to clean up over the weekend, but we’re being told that representatives from hundreds of nations have come together and are prepared to release their final agreement on how to save the world from climate change. Or maybe not: even as of this morning nobody seemed to be able to agree as to whether or not there was an agreement. (CNN) “Obviously, nobody will get 100% of what they want,” French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius said Friday as he discussed the “balanced and as...

We only have to look at what’s going on today in Rome to catch up to Obama sidekick Pope Francis The very first thing Barack Obama did on his first full day at the White House was to jack up the heat. Out on the campaign trail, he had advised the plebes of the world to keep their thermostats—- to “72 degrees at all times”—no matter how frigid the winter and had lectured plain folk to pump air into their tires for the sake of the environment. It was said that the new administration made it warm enough in the...

PREFACE Thousands of books, documents and articles have been researched over several years in preparation for this book. You will be fascinated by this fast-paced history of the world from a perspective you have never imagined. Current events will come into focus in the back drop of 1,400 years of inconceivable yet true events and conflicts. Every effort has been made to present this information objectively. It is hoped this work is received that way. You will not be the same after you have read what every American needs to know about the Qur'an. Click the source ebook link above...

An exceptional essay, discussing the primary forces at work against society Tet, Take Two: Islam's 2016 European OffensiveMatthew Bracken is the author of Enemies Foreign and Domestic, and a well-known advocate for Second Amendment rights. The following guest-essay by Mr. Bracken is also being published at Western Rifle Shooters Association. As we roll into the New Year, we are witnessing the prelude to the culmination of a titanic struggle between three great actors. Three great social forces are now set in motion for a 2016 showdown and collision that will, in historical terms, be on par with the First and...

LE BOURGET, France — One of the smartest ways to fight global warming is putting a price on carbon dioxide pollution, some key world leaders said at Monday's international climate summit. Either a tax on carbon dioxide emissions or trading carbon pollution like pork bellies, which puts a price on carbon, will help use capitalism to get closer to a day when the world isn't adding heat-trapping gases to the atmosphere, according to leaders of France, Germany, Canada, Chile, Mexico and Ethiopia, as well as heads of the World Bank, International Monetary Fund and Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development....

Starting November 30, people from all around the world will be (or at least should be) converging towards Paris for the much-talked Climate Conference. As can be expected from such an event, the climate hysteria will be at the forefront of the talks in hopes to solve the (imaginary) climate problem. Yes, imaginary. Most of what you hear about climate in the media is either false or hidden from your sight – fueling fear is very profitable for the media. So no, the climate is not getting hotter and hotter contrary to what the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration claims....

The annual national collection for the Catholic Campaign for Human Development (CCHD) is this weekend. What many Catholics do not realize is that at the very core of the CCHD is a philosophy of revolutionary leftist ideologies. Over the years, the CCHD has been rightly criticized for funding organizations that are themselves promoting contraception, homosexuality, abortion, prostitution, and socialism. But these issues are only symptoms of an overall thrust that is aimed directly at convincing Catholics to fund Marxist revolution in the United States. The intent of this article, while certainly not exhaustive, is to help Catholics understand how the...

Abu Dharr al-Ghifari, a Companion of Prophet Muhammad, is credited by many as a principal antecedent of Islamic socialism.[1][2][3][4][5] He protested against the accumulation of wealth by the ruling class during 'Uthman's caliphate and urged the equitable redistribution of wealth. The first Muslim Caliph Abu Bakr introduced a guaranteed minimum standard of income, granting each man, woman, and child ten dirhams annually; this was later increased to twenty dirhams.[6] The first experimental Islamic commune was established during the Russian Revolution of 1917 as part of the Waisi movement, an early supporter of the Soviet government. The Muslim Socialist Committee of...

On Oct. 31, 2010, a dozen Islamist gunmen stormed the Catholic cathedral of Our Lady of Salvation, in Baghdad. Striking during a service, they butchered some 60 priests and worshipers, notionally in revenge for insults to Islam. Ghastly as that crime might be in its own right, atrocities of this kind are quite commonplace around the world. Mobs sack churches in Egypt, Nigerian suicide bombers target worshiping congregations, and Eritrea has its hellish concentration camps for Christians. "Christians today," writes John L. Allen Jr., "indisputably are the most persecuted religious body on the planet." So widespread and systematic are the...

In a comment elsewhere, someone wondered about differences between Catholics and Lutherans.  HEREI cannot go into deep detail about these differences.  Books can be written about each point, and have been.Here are my lunch break reflections while the US Bishops are having lunch during their annual meeting.Keep in mind that I am a former Lutheran convert to the Catholic Church.  I was validly baptized as a Lutheran.  I rejected the Lutheran catechism and instruction when I was 7 years old because I couldn’t square their message about corruption with the beauty of the music of Mozart.  After a vaguely Christian time and a...

You May Be A Communard If ... Definition of "communard" 1.1 (Communard) historical. A supporter of the Paris Commune. Origin Late 19th century: from French, from commune. #YouMayBeACommunardIf ... * You feel that you have the "right" to not be offended. * You think that you have the "right" to "feel safe" * You feel that you have the "right" to free healthcare * You feel that you have a "right" to a free college education. * You feel that you have the "right" to free housing * You feel that you have the "right" to enslave others * You...

Those of us who oppose the expansion of governmental controls often get the retort, "You’re just using a slippery slope argument; the bad consequences you foresee are extremely unlikely to happen." Ah, but predicted bad consequences often do happen. As evidence, I offer the following instance. In 2013, a student in Palatine Township High School (Illinois) complained about sexual discrimination to the federal Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights (OCR). The allegedly illegal "discrimination" suffered was because the school refused to allow the student, a male who “identifies” as a female, to use the girls' locker room. The applicable...

The nightmare of our lives living in the 21st century is that the devil exists and so does rampant Marxism The devil must be Marxist. Though the devil and Marxists try in vain to hide them under their overblown wigs, they both sport the same horns. You don’t necessarily have to be downwind to pick up the scent of sulphur, the devil and Marxist’s Chanel No. 5. The devil and his demons have been out there “Satan and all evil spirits who wander throughout the world seeking the ruin of souls” just as it states in St. Michael’s prayer since...

Mike Adams, a professor at the University of North Carolina-Wilmington is not your stereotypical left-wing teacher. On the heels of a report that showed that liberal arts professors overwhelmingly support Democrats, Adams’ semester-opening statement to his students has gone viral. First printed in Townhall in late August, over the last few days it has been reprinted multiple times. [Trigger warning: The following is extraordinarily insensitive and its candor may cause some students to be highly offended. Symptoms of being confronted with viewpoints other than one’s own may cause one to get “the vapors” and students have even been known to...

".......It is here where the modern Left made its transition away from communism into a postmodern existentialism. Dr. Hicks strongly argues that postmodernism is rooted in the Counter Enlightenment movement featuring German superstars such as Kant, Hegel, Nietzsche, and Heidegger. According to Hicks, postmodernism favors subjectivity over objectivity, the inadequacy of language to communicate over reason and truth, various collective multicultural groupings over individual identity and autonomy, willpower over realistic experience rooted in rational analysis, communalism and solidarity over individualism in values, markets and politics, and finally, suspicion, if not hostility, toward science and technology. As such, the postmodern critique...

Hello all you other gainfully employed chumps paying for your own health care insurance. I just wanted you to know something I've found out. If you have a BRONZE plan like I do, because you are paying for it yourself and can't afford anything else, you are paying a $6,000 deductible per person before you can file a single claim to perhaps get any benefit. Meanwhile, people who have subsidized plans because they aren't working or not working or not earning very much get the vaunted SILVER plan! And you are paying for it. You are paying for a plan...