Free Republic

After 20 years of research, Jyoti Thottam shares the immersive and unlikely story of a group of nuns from Kentucky who opened a hospital in India in 1947. ...When her mother was 15, she left her home at the southern tip of India and traveled more than 1,000 miles to Mokama, a small town in an area considered to be the poorest and most violent in the country. There, she spent seven years studying nursing at a hospital run by a handful of Catholic nuns from Kentucky

“I don’t need a ride. I need more ammunition.” The recent words of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy may echo through history alongside phrases from notable freedom fighters such as Patrick Henry ("give me liberty or give me death!") and Winston Churchill ("never give in"). But these political figures are not alone in standing for their beliefs when under attack by those trying to destroy them and end their way of life. Christians in more than 70 nations face regular attacks and persecution because of their Christian faith and testimony, and many choose to remain in their country to serve God...

Join with fellow FREEPERS to pray for AMERICA: For those in Authority in Government, Family, Military, Business, Healthcare, Education, Churches, and the Media. I urge, then, first of all, that requests, prayers, intercession and thanksgiving be made for everyone: for kings and all those in authority that we may live peaceful and quiet lives in all godliness and holiness. 1 Timothy 2:1-2 Religion Forum threads labeled “Prayer” are closed to debate of any kind.

How long shall we as a church continue to live this way? We have been reluctant and stayed in our comfort zones for so long. We have pursued our selfish desires without concern for the last instructions that Jesus gave to His disciples. We have complained so much that the government wants to Islamize Nigeria. We have prayed severally for God to kill Boko Haram members and Fulani Herdsmen, but we have failed to realize that our inaction is responsible for the tragedy in Nigeria. It is high time we woke up and become responsible Christians and pursue the agenda...

It was the kind of calling that Petr Jasek simply could not turn away from. For more than 28 years, the Czech Republic native and global ambassador for international nonprofit The Voice of the Martyrs (VOM) had traveled the world in support of persecuted Christians. And then...While preparing to board a flight home from the country’s capital Khartoum, the Christian leader was detained on charges of espionage and purporting to “wage war against the country of Sudan.” He was informed he was facing the death penalty and thrown into a filthy cell.Although it was seemingly designed for just one person,...

Famed eighth century missionary Saint Boniface appeared at the Vatican yesterday for the kickoff of the Amazonian Synod. Reading from the working document, the moderator was saying, For the indigenous peoples of the Amazon Basin, the good life comes from living in communion with other people, with the world, with the creatures of their environment, and with the Creator. Indigenous peoples, in fact, live within the home that God created and gave them as a gift: the Earth. Their diverse spiritualities and beliefs motivate them to live in communion with the soil, water, trees, animals, and with day and...

(This post was first published on March 17, 2015 and is being reprinted again today because I believe that it is the most important thing that we can say about St. Patrick, and for which to honor him on his Feast Day!) Has anyone created a comic book or graphic novel, St. Patrick: Demon Slayer? If not, someone should. Patrick, born in Britain — probably Scotland — around 385 A.D., went from being the teenage son of Roman British parents (some like to say “Italian”), to being kidnapped by wild Irish ruffians and brought to (Northern) Ireland as a slave....

Since last month’s killing of 26-year-old missionary, John Allen Chau, a lot of ink has been spilled.On November 17, 2018, Chau of Washington state died at the hands of an isolated tribe in an island that is under India’s jurisdiction, although it is about 1000 miles southeast of India.North Sentinel Island is closed to any outside influence. Chau wanted them to learn about Jesus, the only hope for salvation, who died in the place of sinners---receiving in His own body the due penalty of our sins.The Boston Globe’s Renee Graham wrote that what killed him was hubris. She opined, “Chau...

It's impossible to look at a photograph of John Allen Chau, the young American killed by tribespeople on North Sentinel Island, without sadness. He is in the full glow of youth, with decades of life ahead of him. His friends and family have paid tribute to his gifts and his character: 'He was a beloved son, brother, uncle and best friend to us. To others he was a Christian missionary, a wilderness EMT [Emergency Medical Technician], an international soccer coach, and a mountaineer', they wrote on Instagram. John Allen Chau was killed on North Sentinel Island.In a moving post, they ask...

A bronze statue of the Roman Catholic priest Junipero Serra at the Old Santa Barbara Mission was decapitated and doused with red paint on Sunday night or early Monday morning. The statue, on the western side of the Central Coast property near the mission's office, has since been covered with a tarp. The Santa Barbara mission has been called the "Queen of the Missions." The statue was vandalized in a similar fashion as another Father Serra statue in Monterey last year. That figure, which was beheaded but not painted, has since been repaired. Another, in Santa Cruz, was vandalized with...

The fourth-grade tradition of building a California mission out of Popsicle sticks and sugar cubes is being pushed aside by the state as history lessons change to reflect all cultures and more accurately depict the past. A new framework for the curriculum at K-12 public schools means less research into the floor plans of the mission at say San Juan Capistrano, and more time looking at what life was like for both the missionaries and the native people of California.

"This is such a dark place."The irony stopped me in my tracks. The speaker was Jonas Kouassi-Zessia, an African émigré to Europe who had planted a church there.In the 19th and 20th centuries Europe – and America – was sending missionaries to Africa. Europeans and Americans referred to Africa as the "Dark Continent." Now, in the eyes of an African Christian leader, it was Europe shrouded in darkness.I recently spent two weeks with Pastor Kouassi-Zessia in Copenhagen, and with his counterparts in Paris. I was there to conduct "Globequake" conferences, focusing on helping churches stay steady and minister effectively in...

Introduction : It is great to know that Catholicism is increasing by leaps and bounds in Arunachal Pradesh, a Frontier State in North - East India. Catholics in Arunachal Pradesh now number 200,000 out of a population of 1 Million. They are all Tribals of various Tribes that live in Arunachal Pradesh. This I believe is primarily because of the pioneering missionary efforts of a Benedictine Brother from the State of Maharashtra popularly known as "PREMBHAI" or Loving Brother. He passed away in 2008. His real name was Brother Henry Gaikwad. A Little about him now : Br. Henry Gaikwad...

Pope Francis weighed in on a thorny topic in California history Saturday when he spoke at length at a Rome Mass about Father Junipero Serra, the controversial California mission founder set to become America's first Latino saint later this year. Addressing an audience that included many American priests, including Los Angeles Archbishop Jose H. Gomez, the pope referred to the 18th century Franciscan priest as “one of the founding fathers of the United States” and praised his willingness to abandon the comforts and privileges of his native Spain to spread the Christian message in the New World. I wonder if...

... Statues of ... historical figures stand in the U.S. Capitol's National Statuary Hall, where each state has two representatives cast in bronze or marble ... [Father Junipero] Serra could be the first and only actual saint in Statuary Hall -- Pope Francis recently announced plans to canonize him -- yet he's also a polarizing figure. Is it time to send Serra to the sidelines (or more accurately, move his statue to the California Capitol grounds)? ... Take our pointedly unreliable poll, leave a comment or do both! ...

Left: Monument of Junípero Serra on plaza de San Francisco de Asis in Havana; right: Mission church of Jalpan de Serra, Querétaro, Mexico, built by Junípero Serra between 1751 and 1758 (Images: Wikipedia) Los Angeles, Calif.- California missionary Father Junipero Serra’s canonization is “long overdue,” says a university professor concerned that the priest’s history has been politicized and misrepresented. “When he died, many native peoples came to the mission for his burial. They openly wept. Others of his colleagues and even colonists, believed that he would be made a saint, because of the way he had lived his life,...

It wasn’t as if God's voice boomed through sun-parted clouds, telling Kent Brantly to move his family to Liberia. Still, the young doctor said, the call was clear. It echoed through the congregation where he was raised, Southeastern Church of Christ in Indianapolis. Standing before the church community in July 2013, months before he left for Africa, Brantly said he heard the call in the teachers who urged him to memorize Scripture and the neighbors who funded his first mission trip years ago. He saw it in the aunts and uncles who spent their vacations running Bible camps, organizing youth...

One of the essential lessons of clear thinking is to avoid specious “either/or” dichotomies. Ann Coulter violated this basic standard in her intentionally sensational article, “Ebola Doc’s Condition Downgraded to ‘Idiotic.’" She wondered why missionary doctor Kent Brantly didn’t stay in the U.S. to “serve Christ” instead of going to Liberia, where he “risked making his wife a widow and his children fatherless.” In other words, in Ann’s opinion, Christian service is limited to one of two options: serve in the U.S., or abandon wife and children to “slink off” to do “heroic” “good works” in “Third World countries” that...

Image courtesy of Samaritan's Purse[/caption] Ann Coulter makes her position clear in the title of her article: “EBOLA DOC'S CONDITION DOWNGRADED TO 'IDIOTIC’”.  She ponders how Dr. Kent Brantly, whom she gives the moniker “the Ebola doctor” feels now that his trip to Liberia and subsequent care since contracting Ebola cost so much. I don’t know if Coulter was simply trying to make a point by overshooting the mark, or if she really believes, as a Christian, that Dr. Brantly’s efforts in Liberia were wasted.  It doesn’t matter though.  What Coulter wrote is irrelevant. Her point is, in her...

Last summer, long before he traveled to Liberia, worked to combat the largest outbreak of the deadly Ebola virus in history, or fell ill with the incurable virus and became the first infected person to come into the U.S., Dr. Kent Brantly returned to his hometown church and delivered a sermon.Dr. Kent Brantly is shown in this 2013 photo provided by JPS Health Network. (AP Photo/JPS Health Network) “In October, [my wife] Amber and the kids and I are moving to Monrovia, Liberia, to work as medical missionaries at ELWA Hospital,” Brantly told the congregation at Southeastern Church of Christ...