Free Republic

BILLINGS, Mont. – A gay couple has been told they can no longer receive Communion or participate in church ministry after the new priest at a Roman Catholic church in central Montana learned they had been married in a civil ceremony more than a year ago. The decision set off a split that has cut attendance at St. Leo the Great Catholic Church in Lewistown, population 5,900. It has prompted an upcoming visit from the bishop of the Diocese of Great Falls-Billings.

Archdiocese of Boston Ever since he first learned of a local satanic group's plans to use a public theater to perform a "black mass," Archbishop Paul S. Coakley of Oklahoma City has been urging public officials to cancel the event and asking Catholics to pray for that intention. He has been unsuccessful, and this Sunday, the Dakhma of Angra Mainyu will take to the stage in an 88-seat theater within the Oklahoma City Civic Center Music Hall to reenact a ritual that is an inversion of the Catholic Mass. Though they were forced to hand over what they claimed was...

On Sunday, Sept. 21, a local satanic sect apparently will be allowed to conduct a public act of blasphemy in the form of a so-called black mass at the Civic Center in Oklahoma City. In spite of an overwhelming outcry of alarm from around the world, our city leaders will allow this outrage to take place in a publicly supported facility. They will not accede to the reasonable requests of local citizens to stop this outright mockery of the Catholic Mass nor the reasonable concerns of so many that this satanic ritual invokes powers of evil and invites them into...

Oak Cliff Bible Fellowship Pastor Tony Evans Speaks Out Amid Video Revelation of Former NFL Player Ray Rice Slugging His Wife. "Submission never means abuse," Pastor Tony Evans told his Dallas, Texas, congregation on Sunday, making it clear what he believes the Christian position is on domestic violence. "We've been hearing about one kind of struggle here lately — domestic abuse," said Evans, referring to recent news headlines concerning Ray Rice, who was suspended indefinitely by the NFL after being caught on tape punching his wife. "Ladies, you do not have to submit yourself to any man abusing you. You...

Jesus reached out to harlots. He did not reach out to their harlotry. Jesus reached out to hypocrites, often with a rhetorical fist to capture their attention. He did not reach out to their hypocrisy. He reached out to tax collectors, those half-traitors to their nation. He did not reach out to their treachery.I am imagining a parade down Main Street of Anyville.It’s the typical American parade. Some people are tootling on flutes, braying out almost-G on the trumpet, or banging the big bass drum. A group of high school girls in short skirts dance and twirl their batons....

My first patient ever stares at me blankly when I say the doctor will see her soon. Her two small children treat the waiting room chairs like monkey bars; they’ve been sitting around for hours. Dee (some names have been changed throughout) is here to get laminaria inserted, the small seaweed sticks positioned in the cervix that expand upon contact with moisture, producing enough dilation to enable a second trimester abortion, which will happen tomorrow. I know I’m not succeeding at giving her the warm, confident assurance I’ve practiced in the mirror. -snip- Women have historically supported other women through...

In a lengthy interview in an Italian Catholic paper, a former Vatican ambassador to the UN has said that any change to the Catholic doctrines surrounding marriage and sexuality is impossible. Cardinal Renato Martino has joined an impressive list of high-ranking prelates to say that the Synod cannot alter Catholic doctrine. The cardinal told La Nuova Bussola Quotidiana there will “certainly” be presentations from bishops at the Synod “that do not correspond with the doctrine of the Church, but in the end, it will not be able but to reaffirm what the Church has always said about the family.”...

As most readers know by now, Pope Francis witnessed the marriage of some twenty couples in St. Peter’s Basilica on Sunday, September 14th. As Cardinal Dolan might say, Good for them! Bravo! (No, wait… these were heterosexual couples. Never mind.) In any case, like so many other things involving His Humbleness, there’s more to the story. According to a statement issued by the Diocese of Rome in the days leading up to the event, among those getting married that day were couples “who are already cohabitating; who already have children…” (NOTE: These people didn’t just happen to fall into a...

The Tswana people of South Africa practice polygamy. (Photo/Wikipedia) Say “family issues” to most Americans or Europeans, and they’re likely to flash on divorce, or the challenges of single-parent households, or perhaps same-sex relationships and the push for gay marriage.What probably wouldn’t come naturally to mind is polygamy. Yet in many parts of the non-Western world, polygamy is a major feature of family life, and thus a major pastoral challenge for the Catholic Church.Discussion of polygamy is likely to surface at the Oct. 5-19 Synod of Bishops on the family in the Vatican, and could be a factor in the...

With the Vatican’s Synod on the Family fast approaching and Pope Francis’ call to the Catholic Church to be a “field hospital for sinners” more focused on mercy than rules, lots of people are looking for hints at what the gathering of bishops will urge at the extraordinary synod next month. A wedding of 20 couples in St. Peter’s Square, some of whom cohabited prior to marriage, has CBS News hailing the “progressive Pope,” who’s progressively progressive. Or something: Many had been living together prior to getting married, which is forbidden in Catholicism. Some even have children.But none of...

The Russian Orthodox Church has cancelled an official doctrinal dialogue with the Finnish Lutheran Church over the Lutheran stance on homosexuality. The Orthodox side wanted to pre-approve a communique before the meeting, but talks broke down over the Finns’ refusal to condemn homosexuality.Finnish and Russian attitudes to gay rights are poles apart, and that’s helping to derail doctrinal dialogues between the two countries’ largest religions. Archbishop Kari Mäkinen says that he was forced to cancel planned ecumenical dialogues when he met the Russia Patriarch Kiril in Moscow. The Russian Orthodox Church wanted to agree a statement in advance, as the...

Marco Purcaro and Laura Capurso speak to CNA in St. Peter's Square on Sept. 11, 2014. The couple will be married by Pope Francis. Credit: Bohumil Petrik/CNA. Rome, Italy, Sep 12, 2014 / 04:46 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- An Italian couple to be married over the weekend by Pope Francis say they could not wish for anything more than to receive the Sacrament of Matrimony from the pontiff who has influenced their lives so greatly. “Getting married by Pope Francis and marrying the man of my life is the apex of everything I could want,” said Laura Carpuso, a Catholic woman...

Reader TM sent me a link to the following letter sent by Virginia House of Delegates member Bob Marshall to Archbishop Carlo Vignano, Apostolic Nuncio of the United States. Who knows how that letter will be received, what with the new focus on “mercy” cum indifference, but the author has requested that this letter be shared as widely as possible, and I agree with the concerns expressed therein. Some excerpts: New York’s Cardinal Dolan, appointed as Grand Marshal of the 2015 St. Patrick’s Day Parade, praised the decision to allow an openly gay group to march in the St. Patrick’s...

Displaced Iraqi Christians pray at a refugee camp in Irbil (Photo: CNS) Sister Marie Claude Naddaf, provincial leader of the Sisters of the Good Shepherd for Lebanon and Syria, is still shaken by what she witnessed visiting Irbil, Iraq.Sister Marie Claude accompanied Catholic Near East Welfare Association on its mission to the capital of the Kurdish region in Iraq last week.More than 100,000 Christians and other minorities sought refuge in the region following attacks by Islamic State militants. Many were given less than half an hour to flee their houses.“I was not at all expecting to see that much misery,...

Brendan Gleeson stars in a scene from the movie "Calvary." (CNS photo/Patrick Redmond, Twentieth Century Fox) St. Pope John Paul II said that a priest should have the heart of Christ the Good Shepherd. Far too many saccharine paintings of effeminate Jesuses in the midst of delicate lambs are conducive to a misconstrual of the image as something sentimental and harmless. But shepherds not only had the smell of their sheep (to use Pope Francis’ language), but they also wielded a stick, meant to bring back strays and to fend off threats. Real shepherding was, and is, a dirty...

Reaction to the launch earlier this week of a group calling itself "Evangelicals for Marriage Equality" heralded by an op-ed in TIME by its spokesman, was met with harsh criticism from some Christians, including the assertion that no "real arguments" were made to support same-sex marriages. "I eagerly await the young evangelical that finally convinces me that the Bible and human history are wrong on marriage and that justice requires that both Christianity and society bestow marriage on same-sex relationships," wrote Andrew T. Walker, director of Policy Studies for the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention....

FULL TITLE: Satanists Sell Out Controversial Oklahoma 'Black Mass' Event, Will Stage Exorcism Despite Christian Protests (Photo: Facebook/The Satanic Temple) Satanic rights activists outside Harvard Square, after the "black mass" was cancelled by Harvard.The Satanist group that will stage a controversial "black mass" at an Oklahoma City civic center has said that all 88 tickets for its Sept. 21 event are sold out. The co-founder of the group revealed that the ritual will go ahead despite strong Christian protests and will feature a satanic exorcism, but will be "toned down" to comply with state health laws."One of the dictates of...

The Catholic historian, A. Dufourcq, called the papacy of 1447 to 1527, la papauté princière, “the papacy of princes.”[1] This trenchant appellation conveys Fr. Maurice Sheehan’s meaning when he says “these popes were more men of culture or rulers than popes.”[2] Regardless of the scandalous particulars of their military extravagances, personal profligacy, or political intrigues, what is common to these popes is that “they had other interests, other things on their minds besides being pope.”[3] Therein lies the problem. In explaining how the Renaissance Papacy was a cause of the Reformation, we should not fall into a monism, as if...

Cardinal Francis George, head of the Catholic archdiocese of Chicago, said the levers of power in government, education, entertainment, and media are enforcing a “public creed,” a “fake church” that requires all citizens to approve of gay marriage and related sexual anomalies or be punished by the State, just “as Christians and Jews are fined for their religion in countries governed by Sharia law.” Cardinal George, who was president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) in 2007-10, made his remarks in his Sept. 7 column for the archdiocesean newspaper. In his commentary, the cardinal explains that America, despite...

Cardinal George: US is adopting ‘official religion’ on homosexuality that is reminiscent of sharia Catholic World News - September 10, 2014 In an archdiocesan newspaper column, Cardinal Francis George of Chicago said that American law has “taken upon itself the mantle of a religion and officially told its citizens what they must personally think or what ‘values’ they must personalize in order to deserve to be part of the country.” He writes: Since the biblical vision of what it means to be human tells us that not every friendship or love can be expressed in sexual relations, the Church’s teaching...