Free Republic

Many fans of the television series Sex and the City are shocked and disappointed when they read the Candace Bushnell book that inspired it. In the print version of the tale, there is no supportive sisterhood of single friends, no light-hearted banter, no suggestion that anyone actually finds fulfillment in cocktails, casual sex, and Manolo Blahniks — only a cast of cynical, lonely, and alienated men and women jaded by the predatory New York dating scene. A recent collection of “True Stories of Breakups, Bad Relationships, and Broken Hearts” paints an equally harsh picture of the modern battle of the...

Sarah Palin has said the United States should rededicate itself to seeking God's will. The former US vice-presidential candidate argued that a humble spirit could help leaders to get more answers on issues such as health care, energy and national security. In a video released Friday by the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association, the 2008 Republican candidate for vice president, said it was important for leaders to recognise they don't have all the answers. Mrs Palin said: "No one person has all the right answers. It takes a united nation, and it does take godly counsel, and it takes prayer and...

An elderly French couple, having retired after long years of work, were enjoying a tranquil, bucolic existence in a cottage outside of Paris. While rocking on the porch one evening, they were discussing what the other would do if one of them died. After some thought, the husband said, "Well, if one of us dies, I'll move back to Paris." How human! It's always easier to think of others dying, rather than ourselves. You'll die and you'll die and you'll die, but I won't die. Something of the same mind also shows up in our attitude toward sin and sinners....

King Solomon said in the Book of Ecclesiastes there’s nothing new under the sun. Women have killed or attempted to kill their unborn babies throughout human history, way before 1973, when the Supreme Court found a long-hidden, deeply buried “right of privacy” in the U.S. Constitution to have abortions. Roe v. Wade made the act legal and culturally acceptable. This Generation X-er can’t recall a time when abortion was as high-profile as it’s been in 2009. This year, a nut murdered George Tiller, a man nationally known for performing partial-birth abortions. Several months later, another nut murdered pro-life activist Jim...

Pontius Pilate would feel very much at home in our culture. His cynical question — “What is truth?” (Jn 18:38) — captures the prevailing mindset of our day. It provides a three-word summary of relativism — the view that objective truth does not exist, that there is not objective “right” or “wrong” about human behavior. Relativism refuses to limit or define human behavior. All is relative and depends on the situation, the culture, the person, etc.Although often depicted as a courageous rebellion against forces of intolerance and persecution, relativism is really cowardice. Because truth requires something of us. Pontius Pilate...

Washington D.C., Nov 20, 2009 / 06:21 am (CNA).- An unprecedented coalition of prominent Christian clergy, ministry leaders, and scholars has crafted a 4,700-word declaration addressing the sanctity of life, traditional marriage, and religious liberty. The declaration issues “a clarion call” to Christians to adhere to their convictions and informs civil authorities that the signers will not “under any circumstance” abandon their Christian consciences. The statement,  called “the Manhattan Declaration,” has been signed by more than 125 Catholic, Evangelical Christian, and Orthodox leaders, and will be made fully public at a noon press conference in the National Press Club in...

he sudden spasm of intense debate over abortion on Capitol Hill this week threatens not only to stall the passage of health care legislation, but also to shatter the delicate cease-fire that has governed the abortion issue during the Obama era. After months of dodging high-profile confrontations over abortion, Democrats — including President Barack Obama — find themselves faced with a stark set of alternatives: Support a bill that imposes limits on access to abortion or demand one that might, however indirectly, fund the procedure with taxpayer money. It's the kind of decision point the White House and Democratic leaders...

When I see the Obama Administration trying to force their version of health care on us; trying to shove Cap and Trade down our throats; and telling us that we can have everything we want without any tax increases, it sounds like the irresponsible parent telling the children they can do what they please without any fear of consequences. Of course, the natural result of such liberalism is a bunch of spoiled brats with an entitlement mentality. Sadly, that's what too many Americans have been conditioned for during the past 30 to 40 years. The reason we're in this economic...

All evolutionary attempts to explain morality ultimately miss the point. They seek to explain morality, but even at their best what they explain is not morality at all. Imagine a shopkeeper who routinely increases his profits by cheating his customers. So smoothly does he do this that he is never exposed and his reputation remains unimpeached. Even though the man is successful in the game of survival, if he has a conscience it will be nagging at him from the inside. It may not be strong enough to make him change his ways, but it will at least make him...

Morality is both a universal and a surprising fact about human nature. When I say that morality is universal I am not referring to this or that moral code. In fact, I am not referring to an external moral code at all. Rather, I am referring to morality as the voice within, the interior source that Adam Smith called the “impartial spectator.” Morality in this sense is an uncoercive but authoritative judge. It has no power to compel us, but it speaks with unquestioned authority. Of course we can and frequently do reject what morality commands, but when we do...

(CNN) -- If you were to judge the success rate of monogamy by the sex lives of public figures, perhaps couples should change their marriage vows to say, "Till a tempting new partner do us part." Talk-show host David Letterman recently joined former presidential candidate John Edwards, South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford and former New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer on a long list of politicians and entertainers (think Jude Law) who have admitted having sex outside their marriage or committed relationship. But do they just illustrate the realities of modern life? In the age of hookups, friends with benefits and...

A simple spritz of a fresh-smelling window cleaner made people more fair and generous in a new study. The researchers figure cleanliness fosters morality. They conducted fairness tests, with subjects completing tasks in a room that was either unscented or one that was sprayed with a common citrus-scented window cleaner. One test involved a game. Study participants were given $12 of real money, which they were told came from an anonymous partner in another room. They had to decide how much of it to either keep or return to their partners who, they were told, had trusted them to divide...

Today's enlightened liberals are not so much into deconstructing rival iconic figures as they use to be. It may be because they are too busy fashioning alternative narratives, and sometimes even deliberately forgetting the lugubrious past history of some of their own cultural icons. Of course, there are grave errors inherent to this obscurantist approach, chief among which are the squandering of vitally important lessons for posterity, and a scoffing at wisdom that may otherwise be retained as a legacy they can proudly call their own. The indignant bickering from the Hollywood glitterati at the belated arrest of acclaimed Film...

Controversy Erupts as Catholic Bishop Asks Pro-Gay Bishop Not to Enter His Diocese By Peter J. Smith MARQUETTE, Michigan, October 13, 2009 (LifeSiteNews.com) - A public controversy has erupted between two bishops of the Catholic Church in the United States, with one of the youngest bishops in the country publicly taking on one of his own colleagues in an effort to defend the Church's teachings on homosexuality and other issues. Marquette Bishop Alexander K. Sample, 49-years-old and one of the youngest US Catholic bishops, recently banned Bishop Thomas Gumbleton, 79, a retired auxiliary bishop of the Archdiocese of Detroit and...

Inevitably, the crisis on Wall Street has revived the never-ending notion that markets undermine morality. Oliver Stone, ever restless to recapture the days of former glory, has begun production on a sequel to the 1987 movie Wall Street, which immortalized Gordon Gekko as the symbol of markets and greed. But the debate on how markets affect morality has not always been a slam dunk for capitalism's naysayers. Matthew Arnold, especially in his influential 1868 book, Culture and Anarchy, might have been spectacularly critical, but Voltaire's passionate defense of markets, most eloquently stated in his 1734 Philosophical Letters, made him the...

Compass? We Don’t Need No Stinking Compass! by Big X Before Big X achieved fame, glory and untold wealth as a writer-producer, he spent a decade or so  as an executive in the financial industry. So when I read Mr. Weinstein’s comment that “Hollywood has the best moral compass, because it has compassion,” I couldn’t help but choke and spray a fine mist of Starbucks all over my laptop screen. In comparison to “real” businesses, I think I can say from personal experience inside and outside the bubble that Hollywood is the most systemically ruthless, amoral, deceitful, cruel and thuggish...

She who laughs last, laughs best. vs: Don't throw stones if you live in a glass house. You should have paid the money and saved your family from the humilliation you caused them. I guess the Palin joke(s) won't compare with what you'll be getting on Leno.

Ya gotta hand it to the Left. After 40 years of all-sex-is-rape, all-men-suck feminism, we now know when drugging a 13-year-old girl and sodomizing her in a hot tub against her will is A-OK: When the rapist is a Hollywood bigwig. Which leads John at Verum Serum to ask a provacative question: What if Roman Polanski had drugged and sodomized Khalid Sheikh Mohammed?The far left seems to have a lot more sympathy for the convicted rapist than it does for the actual victim. This is the same crowd that believed Bush should be prosecuted for war crimes and members of...

The Powerfully Stunning, Shocking, yet Redemptive Human Trafficking Conference San Diego, Ca. September 29th, 2009 Tony Nassif, founder and President of the Cedars Cultural and Education Foundation hosted the recent 7th Annual Preventing Abuse Conference in Irvine California. We are deeply in debt to him for his vision and desire to expose, educate and activate a truly godly response to one of the worst crimes against humanity. It is estimated that there are currently over 27 million who are trapped in the bondage of modern day slavery. An estimated 800,000 annually are trafficked across borders, who are mostly women and...

"As an explanation of the world, materialism has a sort of insane simplicity. It has just the quality of the madman’s arguments; we have at once the sense of it covering everything and the sense of it leaving everything out." G.K. Chesterton       In the struggle to survive, the fit win, and so it is also the fit who breed. The winners pass on their winning characteristics to the next generation, and on marches Darwinian evolution.   Nothing could be simpler. Yet Darwin thought this process could account not only for the most stunningly complex biological organs,...

Let us approach the question from another perspective. Much as injustice against black slaves is used to discredit the men who wrote and signed the Declaration and Constitution, hypocrisy is also used to discredit advocates of social conservatism. Whether due to divorce, infidelity, homosexuality, or some other moral violation, guilty politicians, preachers, and commentators are called out for violating the family values they otherwise advocate. Often, the argument against such offenders extends to the principles they support. We are led to believe, because a man gets a divorce or has an affair, he may not credibly argue in defense of...

The Gates of Hell Seem to be Prevailing, but Why? By Pastor Phil Magnan San Diego, Ca. Sept. 9th, 2009, I have been advocating against the immoral practice of abortion, homosexuality and many other issues of morality for 20 years. I certainly had hoped through our efforts that the world would have turned out better, than where we are going now. Sadly, we as a nation are turning away from the living God and giving ourselves over to greater wickedness, apostasy and depravity. Now to be clear, our main focus was to alert and educate churches as to what is...

In my ongoing series on the book of Revelation, I now move on down the postal route to the next church in Christ's message to the seven churches of Asia, Sardis. The fifth church mentioned in John’s message was probably the oldest settlement in Asia Minor. Archeological evidence shows that Sardis was probably first inhabited shortly after the confusion of languages and the subsequent dispersion of the people (Gen 11:5-7). As the capital of the ancient kingdom of Lydia, Sardis was one of the greatest cities of the ancient world. In the 6th century BC it was ruled by...

Not since the 1930's and FDR have the politics of class envy, class warfare, resentment, and covetousness been used with such effectiveness than during the current health care debate. Barack Obama, the czar of many czars, is the self-appointed Class Envy Czar. It's the same Democrat party which preaches that, "you can't legislate morality," that is now describing passing health care reform as even being a "moral obligation." The same party that sermonizes the principle of "separation of church and state," now desperately invokes the Bible to try to hustle their socialized medicine message.

An interesting reason for the "natural born" provision of the U.S. Constitution is that the founders thought it might be important for the sitting president to understand and defend the basic principles of American freedom. The universal health care push illustrates the far left's ignorance of our constitutional system better than anything imaginable. The President and every one of the ultra lefties in Congress may as well have been born in the former Soviet Union and dandled on the knee of Joseph Stalin. Their poison Ivy League educations have so indoctrinated their minds that, not only do they sing from...

COLUMBIA, SC (WIS) - Last week, South Carolina Lieutenant Governor Andre Bauer said he would sacrifice his political ambitions if Governor Mark Sanford resigns. Sanford refused, and now Bauer finds himself on defense. The issue? His private life. Lt. Gov. Andre Bauer wants to talk about where he would take the state if Gov. Mark Sanford leaves office. And unless Sanford decides to step down soon, making Bauer his successor, the lieutenant governor will likely run for the number one job. But since his remarks on the subject last week, Bauer has become a target -- first, accusations on a...

On August 19th President Obama attempted to bolster the case for his failing Health Care Bill by telling a crowd of religious leaders that we are morally obligated to support the Bill. Despite the obvious irony of proclaiming that his opponents “bear false witness” on the issues and concerns in the House Bill (see my previous posts for the truth about the Health Care Bill), the linking of favorable morality with passage of the Bill is especially disturbing. Furthermore, I wonder if leaving 17 Million Americans uninsured after the Bill’s acceptance (as per CBO estimates) is therefore immoral. If so,...

What is the moral foundation of your economic beliefs? Do economic beliefs even require a moral foundation? Do you find it natural to accept the varied religious beliefs of others even if they contradict your own? On the other hand, are you often at odds with people who espouse different economic beliefs and policies? Why, especially if the former forms the foundation for the latter? Would you ever use the ballot box to force others to practice your religion or make them pay to build you a church? Why do you find it easy to do this with your economic...

With relativistic people, there is no such thing as a true axiom, yet you'd never know it listening to our modern mantras. We hear things such as "Our strength lies in our diversity," "Religion has caused all the wars in history," and "Everything is a matter of perspective" proclaimed with theological assurance. Of course, the last supposition is contradictory, and embracing it renders moral supposition itself meaningless. Regardless, it's natural for man to make sense of the world by "profiling" elements of reality. Many of our assumptions pertain to race, and one is always uttered in the wake of stories...

Sorry, call it Vanity, but Truth needs a hearing. http://www.onenewsnow.com/vidPlayer.aspx?videoId=15368 LISTEN TO It but have a bicarbonate of soda ready. Obama praising muslims around the world, ‘reminding us’ muslims like all other religions offer peace and equality foR ALL "These rituals remind us (they are) advancing justice, tolerance and the dignity of all human beings. It's a way of advancing oportunity for the world everywhere. like my own Christian faith." To put it mildly - - Balderdash! This creepy guy occupying the White House for 4 years (God bless America by getting him out of America and into some Arab...

Barney Frank, Eugenics Death Panels, and a Dining Room Table It’s too bad the woman in the video below confronting Barney Frank over Obamacare didn’t come with facts instead of slinging the word “Nazi” around. The corporate media loves it when people compare Obama to Hitler and accuse the administration of Nazism. It makes it easier to dismiss the opposition as mental patients. Kurt Nimmo August 19, 2009 Lately the corporate media have spent a lot of time and energy roasting former VP candidate Sarah Palin for her comments on Obama’s proposed death panels. Palin didn’t provide a lot of...

WASHINGTON -- Repeatedly invoking the Bible, President Obama yesterday told religious leaders that health-care critics are "bearing false witness" against his plan. The fire-and-brimstone president declared holy war in a telephone call with thousands of religious leaders around the country as he sought to breathe life into his plan for a system overhaul. Without naming anyone specifically in the 10-minute conference call, Obama said opponents had been spreading lies. "I know that there's been a lot of misinformation in this debate and there are some folks out there who are, frankly, bearing false witness," Obama said. "I need you to...

The code words used for so-called "health care reform," single-payer, universal coverage, etc. bring images into the minds of many of "free" health care, something for nothing. When I was a boy, I was often puzzled why Dad didn't go for the special deals, discounts, etc. when we shopped for something. Now I understand that these were tricks crafted for the consumer looking for something for nothing. Dad knew that if you went after "something for nothing," you would be hooked and reeled in like a fish who took the bait. In the real world there is no "something for...

Atheists claim that they are happy, healthy, moral, etc. The assert that atheism is more moral than theism and that is leads to health, wealth, morality etc. Yet, consistently, finding via studies and surveys of various sorts cut through the propaganda and demonstrate that atheists are consistently the least charitable, less sociable, more depressed, more immoral than their counterparts. Even when it comes to societal and political issues and perhaps related to those more activists atheists who define atheism as anti-theism; things do not generally fare very well for atheists. These links have compiled various studies and other recourses on...

WASHINGTON – A number of black evangelical leaders are rising up as a new voice in the conservative movement traditionally dominated by white Protestants. Their centerpiece agendas are abortion and same-sex “marriage” – the same two key social issues emphasized by most conservative evangelicals. But unlike the typical white evangelical Christian that is most likely part of the conservative wing of the Republican party, these African American leaders may be card-carrying Democrats but willing to switch over to the Republican side if their conservative values are addressed. Bishop Harry R. Jackson, Jr., who heads the socially conservative black pastors group...

Britain’s Leaders Warn of the Loss of Common Values The decline of Christianity and moral values in general is reaching new lows in Britain. While the number of faithful has been decreasing for some time now, warnings about the situation are starting to come from all quarters. Britain is no longer a Christian nation, affirmed Anglican bishop, Paul Richardson, in an article published Jun. 27 in the Sunday Telegraph newspaper. The Anglican prelate was also critical of his fellow bishops for not understanding just how serious the change is in contemporary culture, and for their lack of action in dealing...

Moral Relativism; The Liberal LynchpinPosted By Michael McGruther On July 9, 2009 @ 2:51 pm In Entertainment, Politics, Religion | 2 Comments The vast majority of adults in this world know that moral perfection is absolutely impossible, so I get upset when self proclaimed Hollywood/MSM liberals ruthlessly attack any conservative that cannot do the impossible; avoid succumbing to temptation for their entire life. Hollywood/MSM liberals always use this angle to attack conservatives nationwide because by strongly believing in nothing specific they’ve set themselves up to perpetually come out on top of any moral argument, guilt, worry and public-scorn free.[1] In...

The other day I was driving behind a car with a “Friend of Tibet” Virginia license plate. That’s great and I’d like to be a “Friend” myself, but with the job and the family and cutting the lawn … Can I just become a “Facebook Friend of Tibet?” If so, am I entitled to the same preening as Tibet’s actual Friends? It got me wondering whether we’d see “Free Iran” paraphernalia anytime soon, and whether we’d see it on the same Volvos and Priuses as those “Free Tibet” bumper stickers. Somehow I doubt it, since Obama could barely fit any...

“We recognize no Sovereign but God, and no King but Jesus!” "This nation of ours was not founded on Christian principles." “[July 4th] ought to be commemorated as the day of deliverance by solemn acts of devotion to God Almighty.” "The second day of July, 1776, will be the most memorable epoch in the history of America. I am apt to believe that it will be celebrated by succeeding generations as the great anniversary Festival. It ought to be commemorated, as the Day of Deliverance, by solemn acts of devotion to God Almighty. It ought to be solemnized with pomp...

Anyone who was complaining about bonus’s being paid out at companies that received government aid better think twice. Government interference within the marketplace never accomplishes its intended results. In every instance, governments are always unable to properly anticipate the consequences of their actions when trying to legislate “problems” away. By removing performance based job targets the government has displaced the competitiveness which is required within the financial industry for success. Ironically, now more than ever, this kind of competitive nature is what will be required at the assisted financial entities if they are to compete with non-assisted companies. However, due...

It is difficult to gain attention in an era that uses superlatives to describe dishwashing liquid and mayonnaise. Perhaps speaking simply and directly might prove such an oddity that words may again have their proper power. And so, here it is: The greatest moral crisis is now upon us. I don't mean the continual, factory slaughter of thousands of babies a day; or the endless parade of carnal innovations mincing across the public square, howling for recognition; or even the redefinition of marriage to include the indefinite union of anything. These are effects, more or less, of the real moral...

In Vino Veritas: I'll Drink to That Roger Scruton June 2009 Concerns over binge drinking — the habit of drinking large quantities of alcohol with the intention of getting drunk, usually in company but without the benefit of conversation of any kind — have brought into focus the great difference that exists between virtuous and vicious drinking. Our puritan legacy, which sees pleasure as the doorway to vice, makes it difficult for many people to understand this difference. If alcohol causes drunkenness, they think, then the sole moral question concerns whether you should drink it at all, and if so...

Whoever murdered George Tiller has done a gravely wicked thing. The evil of this action is in no way diminished by the blood George Tiller had on his own hands. No private individual had the right to execute judgment against him. We are a nation of laws. Lawless violence breeds only more lawless violence. Rightly or wrongly, George Tilller was acquitted by a jury of his peers. "Vengeance is mine, says the Lord." For the sake of justice and right, the perpetrator of this evil deed must be prosecuted, convicted, and punished. By word and deed, let us teach that...

Oftentimes when I get into discussions about moral issues with folks who know of my zeal for the LORD, I get branded like I need scripture as a crutch - kinda’ like everything I believe has to come from the scriptures. While the scriptures are indeed the foundation of Christianity - Jesus building His church on the Rock and that Rock being Christ and Christ being the WORD based on John 1, we Christians also have to be able to make judgments based on our reasoning. There are some things that aren’t covered in the scriptures and then there are...

When the Los Angeles-based Josephson Institute of Ethics recently released its 2008 Report Card on the Ethics of American Youth, the results were not pretty. The survey of nearly 30,000 high school students nationwide found that 64 percent had cheated on a test in the past year (up from 60 percent two years earlier) and 38 percent had cheated more than once. More than a third had used the Internet to plagiarize. And lest they get credit for coming clean on the anonymous survey, which also tracked rising rates of teen lying and stealing, more than a quarter confessed to...

Americans across the country opposed to giving marital status to homosexual couples, one would think that the same sex-marriage debate would have faded away. Unfortunately, that has not been the case. Every week we hear of another state either passing laws that allow gay marriages, or judges of those states ruling by fiat to force it upon society. As a logical Christian, I look at the many prophecies God has given us throughout the Scriptures, and I can see the writing on the wall. In the near future we will be living in a society that not only allows same-sex...

I've been wanting to get around to the subject of beauty pageant contestant Carrie Prejean, Miss California, and the hysterical condemnation she's received from leftists for having the audacity to pose for a couple of moderately racy pictures (example below the fold). An example of the leftists bile appeared at TheDirty.com, which I excerpt here so that you need not add to this nimrod's page view totals: Exclusive: Self-proclaimed bible thumper Miss California... should start pointing the finger at herself for her own indiscretions. TheDirty.com has received exclusive images of the homophobic debutante that would clearly strip her of her...

Behavioral norms, mostly transmitted by example, word of mouth and religious teachings, represent a body of wisdom distilled over the ages through experience and trial and error. They include important thou-shalt-nots such as shalt not murder, shalt not steal, shalt not lie and cheat, but they also include all those courtesies one might call ladylike and gentlemanly conduct.

Forget courage, thrift, fidelity or industry. Generosity? Humility? Fortitude? Honesty? Those are so 19th Century. According to Master Card, today’s virtue resides in being eco-conscious. The latest in MasterCard’s successful “priceless” series of ads features a young boy shadowing his father, saving the lout from committing a series of environmental atrocities – a smug little moralist saving the sinner from himself. When Dad leaves the water running as he brushes his teeth, Junior is on hand. “Water glass,” says the (child’s) voice over, “five dollars.” Cut to a hardware store where Dopey Dad is looking for light bulbs. Luckily, his...

Beauty contests have turned ugly. Pageants used to celebrate good, old-fashioned values, but today a young lady cannot be crowned Miss USA unless she supports same-sex marriage. Talk about tripping up on the runway. On Sunday, Miss California Carrie Prejean was rejected for the Miss USA crown because she defended traditional marriage. One of the pageant's five judges, celebrity blogger Perez Hilton, bluntly asked Miss California if she supported same-sex marriage. Her response was: "I believe that a marriage should be between a man and a woman. No offense to anybody out there, but that's how I was raised, and...