Free Republic

Anyone familiar with the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) shouldn't be surprised at their recent segment attacking the network of health care sharing ministries (HCSMs). The taxpayer-supported PBS network pushes left-wing themes relentlessly.In this case, they manipulated data and facts to paint a false picture of Health Care Sharing Ministries that fits their ideology.Let's set the record straight.PBS's segment asserts that Health Care Sharing Ministries don't share in the full amount of a patient's medical bill, neglecting to mention that this is also a standard practice with health insurance. Nobody — not insurers, not members of health care sharing ministries, and...

Below is a list of the largest media ministries in the country. These days, almost all ministries have some media component, Pastors write books. Journalists have podcasts. However, the list below is a list of those ministries whose work is primarily media driven. They include media organizations — such as television and radio networks — as well as “teaching and preaching ministries” whose presence is primarily on radio and television. For those of you who are fluent in the MinistryWatch 1000 database, this list includes the “Educational Media” and the “Radio/TV Stations” categories. It is important to note that this...

Perhaps no other topic tends to be more polarizing or politicized in America than healthcare. Here at Medi-Share, one of the nation’s leading nonprofit Health Care Sharing Ministries, we often find ourselves in the middle of conversations or news articles regarding our unique approach to meeting the healthcare needs of Christians. One such article was recently published in The New York Times under the headline, “It Looks Like Health Insurance, but It’s Not. ‘Just Trust God,’ Buyers Are Told.” We appreciate the interest in the unique and growing alternative of health care sharing, but we believe the article left readers...

Pope Francis recently reaffirmed that religious freedom is "a fundamental human right" and warned against the impulse to "relegate [religions] to the enclosed precincts of churches, synagogues or mosques." The freedom of religion cannot be reduced to the freedom of worship. This resonates with the rich tradition of religious liberty in our country, which has long allowed Catholics and other people of faith to live out their beliefs beyond the sanctuary, whether by healing the sick, educating the young or feeding and clothing the poor. But a mandate of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) now jeopardizes...

February 10, 2009 Part Two: Islam in American Prisons By Kathy Shaidle RightSideNews Copyright © 2009 "One in 10 inmates behind bars turns to Islam." It was small story in a local newspaper called the Daily Herald out of Everett, Washington, but it spread quickly around the internet, thanks to that startling claim. The paper's February 2009 investigation declared that so-called "prison Islam" was the fastest-growing religious group in U.S. correctional facilities. Some of those worshippers claim affiliation with the Nation of Islam (NOR), a black separatist movement that was launched and promoted by two convicts, Elijah Mohammed and his...

Israel’s Ministry of Interior has decided to reinstate an old regulation that is threatening to cripple, if not shut down, several Christian ministries by limiting the time volunteers can spend serving in Israel to 27 months. The ruling was as sudden as it was drastic. The effects began to be felt earlier this month when three volunteers from Christian Friends of Israel, assuming their visas would be renewed at the Interior Ministry under the previous five-year agreement, were instead told they had two weeks to pack up and leave the country.

Only two of six Christian ministries under scrutiny for allegations of opulent spending turned over documents to a Senate panel by a Thursday deadline, with others either fighting the request or asking for more time. A month ago, Iowa Sen. Chuck Grassley sent pointed questions to a half-dozen high-profile ministries asking about salaries, perks and private jets in a quest to determine whether rules governing tax-exempt groups had been broken. Grassley, the ranking Republican on the Senate Finance Committee, said in an interview he remains confident he will get the ministries' "full cooperation," despite opposition from some. Grassley's office said...

WASHINGTON — The top Republican on the Senate Finance Committee has launched a wide-ranging investigation into the financial dealings of six TV evangelists, including Joyce Meyer, the popular preacher who has built a $124-million-a-year empire headquartered in Fenton. On Monday, Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, asked Meyer to provide his staff with documents detailing the finances of the Joyce Meyer Ministries, including the religious group's compensation to Meyer, her husband and other family members, as well as an accounting of their housing allowances, gifts and credit card statements for the last several years.

Early this summer, Paul Crouch of the Trinity Broadcasting Network (TBN) wrote to supporters, telling them that the network's spring "Praise-a-Thon" was a success. For five days, Crouch and a slate of other televangelists had raised money on-air for TBN, the largest Christian television network in the world. "TBN is debt free," Crouch wrote. "Free to invest every penny into expansion to the rest of the world!" For TBN, that means investing in broadcasting its Christian-themed programs on thousands of cable systems and more than 5,000 television stations. But it also means investing in something else: Southern California real estate....

In the FightA Youth Exodus From Church -- What Are We Doing Wrong?By Matt FriedemanAugust 14, 2006(AgapePress) - AgapePress has reported that Dr. Frank Page, the new president of the Southern Baptist Convention, is disturbed that many students are leaving the church once they graduate. Indeed, the Convention's Council on Family Life reports that some 88 percent of children from evangelical homes are leaving the church shortly after they graduate from high school. But why? I wonder if it is not for these three reasons: First, we give students what they want, instead of what they need. Some say...

WASHINGTON, March 29, 2006 – Though training Iraq's warfighters and front-line security forces will remain the top priority, training the cooks, clerks and medics who allow the forces to operate against the enemy is an important part of the equation, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff said this week. During a trip to Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and Turkey, Marine Gen. Peter Pace spoke about establishing the institutions to run Iraq's military. "Priority No. 1 is always going to be training the trigger pullers," Pace said to reporters traveling with him March 26. "Priority No. 2 is training those...

I'll admit to liking the Harry Potter books, but I can't suspend disbelief any longer. The kid lives in the realm of big government, and it's interfering with my enjoyment of the Half-Blood Prince. Consider these facts about life in the wizarding world: Huge government bureaucracies: Every time another department within the Ministry of Magic is mentioned, I wonder if the real threat to Harry's liberty is Voldemort or the Leviathan government, which has a branch overseeing all aspects of wizard daily life. There's the Improper Use of Magic Office, the Department of Magical Accidents and Catastrophes, even the Department...

I accidentally came across an interesting thing at www.goodnews.org, the website for a ministry know as the Good News Defenders. The following video "feed" documents Brian Wilson's (and the Beach Boys) troubled past, and alledged ties to Satanism: "THEY SOLD THEIR SOULS FOR ROCK AND ROLL" I found it fascinating, but presumptuous to assume that Brian's well known auditory hallucinations are actual demons (or the like). Good News Defenders goes overboard in drawing false inferences from certain facts. Still, there are some interesting things mentioned that Are, in fact, true: )1) Brian Wilson DOES here voices (auditory hallucinations) that scream...

<p>Flash: This just in from Harvard. The Committee on College Life has renewed its official recognition of the Harvard Radcliffe Christian Fellowship. Big deal? You bet. It turns out that while anyone may join this small campus Christian group, it continues to draw its leadership from among candidates who actually believe in the Holy Spirit and the resurrection of Jesus Christ.</p>

Attorney pledges to make divorce more civil A new divorce mediation company — the only one of its kind in Spartanburg County — promises a Christian approach to a legal procedure often fueled by decidedly un-Christian sentiments. By Tom Langhorne A new divorce mediation company — the only one of its kind in Spartanburg County — promises a Christian approach to a legal procedure often fueled by decidedly un-Christian sentiments. Divorce Mediation Ministries, a private company owned and operated by Spartanburg attorney Barry Bland, proposes to help couples craft divorce agreements without the finger-pointing lawyers and ugly court battles that...