Free Republic

Here it is, the first television ad of the 2016 presidential campaign, courtesy of the first official presidential candidate, Ted Cruz. No beating around the bush here—we get a mention of Jesus in the very first sentence:(VIDEO-AT-LINK) "Were it not for the transformative love of Jesus Christ, I would have been raised by a single mom without my father in the house. God's blessing has been on America from the very beginning of this nation. Over and over again when we faced impossible odds, the American people rose to the challenge. This is our fight, and that is why I'm...

President Obama met privately with Mormon leaders last night in Utah. One topic on the agenda for the meeting? Immigration. "President Obama is meeting with leaders of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Salt Lake City, including President Henry Eyring, President Dieter Uchtdorf, Elder Tom Perry and Elder Todd Christofferson," White House deputy press secretary Eric Schultz told the press. "The President is pleased to meet with top LDS leaders as so many presidents before him have done. Among other issues, they will discuss the church's long record of service, including its work on disaster relief and...

As we draw closer to the big U.S. Supreme Court decision this year on the legality of same-sex “marriage,” we can expect to see our Facebook timelines, Twitter feeds, email boxes, and television screens flooded with stories about the “marriage equality” movement. The misguided goal of this global movement is to mandate into law equal recognition for relationships that are, in fact, unequal in reality. The law can then be used to silence public opposition and force a cultural acceptance of this farce, as is already taking place in the U.S. and worldwide. Part of this movement is a campaign...

The likely result of recent clashes, says Robert R. Reilly, will "be fewer such religious freedom bills proposed in the future and ... Republican candidates for president will keep their mouths shut about this issue"Scholar, former assistant to President Reagan, and author Robert R. Reilly has written widely on “war of ideas" issues, Islam, foreign policy, and classical music and is the author of several books. His most recent book Making Gay Okay: How Rationalizing Homosexual Behavior Is Changing Everything, was published last year by Ignatius Press and was described by Austin Ruse (President, Catholic Family and Human Rights Institute)...

Bishkek, April 3, Interfax - Russia will continue raising the issue of the protection of Christians in the UN, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said. "No one was going to ignore this issue [of Christians' protection]. It was raised in the meeting of the [UN] Human Rights Council and a statement was adopted, which was signed by 65 countries. It was initiated by Russia, Lebanon and the Vatican with Armenia's support," he said responding to a question about the possible support by Russia of the initiative to protection Christians in the light of the situation in Kenya. "This issue was...

I’ve been thinking about how homosexualists target Christian businesses for destruction. Approach a florist or a bakery or, now, a pizzeria and tell the owner that this is for a homosexual “wedding” and then hammer them with law suits. Enough already. It’s time for everyone to calm down. We need a new approach. Think about this. When some homosexual couple comes to your Christian business for services at their immoral event, don’t panic. Go ahead and take their business! Then explain what is going to happen next. Tell them that the food and services will be just fine. And then...

Rev. Franklin Graham has spoken out in support of Indiana Gov. Mike Pence's decision to sign the Religious Freedom Restoration Act into law, but some conservatives, such as Dr. Robert Jeffress, are now concerned that Pence may be "capitulating" to the opposition.After initially signing the Religious Freedom Restoration Act into law on March 26, Pence immediately faced backlash from gay rights supporters. State leaders and businesses vowed to boycott the state of Indiana, accusing the state of anti-gay discrimination. Early Monday morning, Republican leaders in the Indiana General Assembly held a press conference to address the concerns and criticism. They...

(VIDEO-AT-LINK) In a video posted by The Dallas Morning News to YouTube on Wednesday, 2016 Republican presidential hopeful Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) spoke about the controversy involving Indiana’s “religious freedom” law. Cruz took aim at Democrats in particular for using the wedge issue of same-sex marriage for political gain, even at the expense of those with a “good faith religious belief” about marriage. “[H]ere’s what’s happened,” Cruz said. “Which is it used to be there was a bipartisan consensus. We’d defend the civil liberties of Americans, even those we disagreed with. We defended the religious liberty of people to seek...

For discussion purposes.... Pretend you own a bakery, or pizza place, et. The area in which you work is also one in which you live close by. You know your customers. You are a Christian. A young man and woman are living together in the apartment above yours. You see them a couple of times a week and even say hello. They come into your business and want to order a cake with the following inscription: TWO YEARS TOGETHER You know they're not married. Do you bake the cake? What say you Fellow Freepers

The Bible - Almighty God’s Infallible Word – exposes in greater depth the inner workings not just of fallen corrupt mankind, but of the demonic "political" machine of heaven’s lawless angelic intelligences and their fierce leader, the original radical, slanderer, blasphemer and character assassin - (aka. Lucifer). My friends, we are ALL subjected to a GREAT spiritual war raging today for the hearts, minds and souls of mankind and are at the very end of our times journey as a human race. My dear friends, ALL things are headed to that great Day and time called the “Day of the...

Urging Presbyterian Church USA to "repent and be restored to fellowship," the National Black Church Initiative, which represents 34,000 churches from 15 denominations, has declared it has severed ties with PCUSA after it amended its constitution changing their definition of marriage to include same-sex couples."NBCI and its membership base are simply standing on the Word of God within the mind of Christ. We urge our brother and sisters of the PCUSA to repent and be restored to fellowship," NBCI President Rev. Anthony Evans said, according to Charisma News."PCUSA's manipulation represents a universal sin against the entire church and its members....

The world is going nuts. I have often felt a bit like Cassandra, but … Cassandra was right.Here is another take.From the pen of John Zmirak at The Stream with my emphases and comments: The expected Supreme Court decision imposing on 50 states an entirely newunderstanding of marriage, and the frenzy of hatred that gay activists have stoked against Indiana for trying to shelter religious believers from crippling lawsuits should wake us to a cold and stark reality: The age of tolerance in America is vanishing before your eyes. The question is how Christians and other people of faith and good will...

To recap: Tim Cook (please, please click this link) and the left are happy to do business in countries that stone to death or otherwise jail gay people, but will not do business with Indiana, which merely passed a law insisting that the “free exercise” clause of the first amendment be on the same legal footing in courts as the “free speech” clause of the first amendment. The Supreme Court, in Perry Educ. Ass’n v. Perry Local Educators’ Ass’n, 460 U.S. 37 (1983), ruled that for a state to restrict content based speech, it must have a compelling governmental interest....

Mainstream Muslim website makes official announcement It’s not only evangelical Christians who are sensing that something has changed in the world, and that we may be entering the very last days. Muslims are also eagerly awaiting their messiah. In the latest evidence of this messianic fervor, a mainstream Sunni Muslim website has decreed that the Islamic messiah, called the Mahdi, will appear this year or in 2016 and that the Muslim Jesus will return in 2022 to conquer the world for Islam. DiscoveringIslam.org and the End Times Research Center have calculated that the “first phase” of the end of time...

Isaiah 6:3 Holy, Holy, Holy is the Lord of Hosts; The Whole Earth is Filled with His Glory.

This weekend Kirsten Powers and Jonathan Merritt stirred up controversy by writing in the Daily Beast that Christians have no biblical basis for claiming that religious belief should allow them to refuse to serve a same-sex wedding:Before considering legal rights, Christians wrestling with this issue must first resolve the primary issue of whether the Bible calls Christians to deny services to people who are engaging in behavior they believe violates the teachings of Christianity regarding marriage. The answer is, it does not. Nor does the Bible teach that providing such a service should be construed as participation or affirmation. Yet...

Here is the summation for the previous threads and the last of this for some time: Jesus Christ alone possessed the intrinsic quality of infallibility, was unlike any man that has ever lived, and was in a class all by Himself. There were some (like the Ebionites) who believed that Jesus was the messiah but also believed that he lacked divinity. Some, like those who ascribed to Arianism or semi-Arianism, who were somewhere in between the Ebionites and those who believed/believe that Jesus was fully God and Fully Man. Each of these nonetheless believed that Jesus was unlike any man...

William A. Donohue, president of the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights. (Photo courtesy of CL: www.catholicleague.org) William A. Donohue is a New York-based author, sociologist, and political activist who has been president of the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights since 1993. He holds a PhD in sociology from New York University and is an adjunct scholar at the Heritage Foundation. He is the author of several books, including the 2012 best-seller Why Catholicism Matters: How Catholic Virtues Can Reshape Society in the 21st Century and the just published The Catholic Advantage: Why Health, Happiness, and Heaven Await...

A Christian street preacher has been convicted of a Public Order offence for using the wrong Bible verse in a public conversation with a man who identifies as homosexual, reports Christian Concern for our Nation. But the preacher was acquitted of two other Public Order charges. Unusual judgmentIn a highly unusual judgment, Michael Overd, who regularly preaches on the streets of Taunton, was told by the Judge that he should not have referred to Leviticus chapter 20 to make his point but clearly indicated that he could have used chapter 18 of the book. District Judge Shamim Ahmed Qureshi found...

WASHINGTON (CNS) — Wyoming Catholic College, a Catholic university founded in 2005 in Lander, announced in late February that it “shall not participate in federal student loan programs.”The decision came after months of analysis and deliberations by the college and its board of directors.“While the financial benefits are undeniable,” said a news release, “the increasingly burdensome regulatory requirements are clearly troubling for faith-based institutions.” The decision to forego federal student loan and grant programs was reached in a unanimous vote by the college’s board of directors.“While respecting that some of our peer institutions have reached a different conclusion on this...