Free Republic

Surveys show that 70 percent of Americans still haven’t even heard of the Planned Parenthood scandal – after six revealing undercover videos – stunning evidence, if such were still needed, of the mainstream media’s dereliction of public duty when it comes to the truth about abortion. But where are our Catholic media, not only the big outlets like Catholic News Agency, National Catholic Register, and so forth, but those old vehicles of Catholic truth: the diocese and the parish? Some states have started investigations or pulled funding from Planned Parenthood. More videos will surface, which should happen more swiftly now,...

AUSTIN -- Gov. Greg Abbott often posts Bible passages and prayerful remarks on social media, but a Facebook posting about a holy day in his Catholic faith drew vitriolic comments suggesting he worships idols.Abbott posted a commemoration of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary, marking Roman Catholic belief that Mary was brought into heaven body and soul.“The Virgin Mary is exalted above the choirs of angels. Blessed is the Lord who has raised her up,” Abbott wrote to accompany a sketch of Mary above the clouds. The sketch contains a notation saying it’s a political ad by Texans for...

Ezekiel 34:26 I will make My People and their Homes Around My Hill a Blessing. And there shall be Showers, Showers of Blessing, For I will not Shut Off the Rains, but Send them in their Seasons.

In Obergefell v. Hodges, America was once again confronted with the pseudo-philosophical and theological ruminations of Justice Anthony Kennedy. Though one’s initial, reasonable tendency would be to assess any court decision on legal grounds, Justice Kennedy’s opinion is founded on a constitutional jurisprudence that went awry long ago. Instead, perhaps the more appropriate hermeneutic for reading Justice Kennedy’s opinion is the theological lens—a lens that prominently reveals and displays the arrogant and fanciful creation of a liberty out of nothing.In his refreshing dissent, Justice Alito harbors the claim against Justice Kennedy that his majority opinion has imported “a distinctively postmodern...

President Obama President Obama isn’t the Antichrist – but he sure is “paving the way” for him, said some Christian evangelists who’ve been watching the White House in biblically prophetic light with alarm. “Although President Obama is certainly not the Antichrist, his policies are paving the way for the Antichrist,” said pastor Robert James Jeffress, Jr., of the First Baptist Church of Dallas, Texas, Christian Today reported. “While I am not suggesting that President Obama is the Antichrist, the fact that he was able to propose such a sweeping change in God’s law and still win re-election by a...

Rare blood-moon events already have happened three times in the last year or so, and on Sept. 28, there will be a fourth – the final appearance in what is an even more rare tetrad sequence. Because of how close it will be to earth, this final blood moon will appear both larger and brighter than usual, giving it a special significance. Such a series of events would be noteworthy at any time, but reports of looming economic turmoil and geopolitical instability are leading some observers to speculate this “super blood moon” heralds a dramatic change in world events. Maybe...

Religous conservatives aren't going quietly into the night, Americans United's Barry Lynn tells Salon.Because non-politicians like Donald Trump, Carly Fiorina and Ben Carson have garnered the most attention during the GOP presidential primary thus far, another distinctive feature of this cycle’s batch of candidates has gone relatively unnoticed. For all the talk and hype about the GOP modernizing and learning the lessons of the George W. Bush era — and for all the breathless speculation about the millennial generation and how it demands of politicians a different approach — the religious right’s presence within the party remains formidable. The aforementioned...

Prison officials in the state of Kentucky have told chaplains that they are not allowed to speak of homosexual activity as sinful. The Department of Juvenile Justice revoked the credentials of a Baptist chaplain, citing his refusal to comply with a policy that forbids reference to homosexuality as sinful. Chaplains who do not agree to abide by that policy will not be allowed to work in prisons, officials said. The Kentucky policy stipulates that "staff, volunteers, interns and contractors shall not imply or tell LGBTQI juveniles that they are abnormal, deviant, sinful or that they can or should change their...

In the politically charged language of the present, Bishop Vitus Huonder is a “conservative” if not an “extremist.” In fact, he is simply a faithful Catholic Christian. And for that he’s being threatened with three years in jail. It’s happening in Switzerland, but the conflict epitomizes a wider phenomenon of anti-Christian secularists on both sides of the Atlantic using the courts to target Christians for simply standing up for biblical truth.In 2011, Huonder, the Catholic Bishop of the Diocese of Chur in Switzerland, supported parents being able to opt out of having children as young as four subjected to...

Cordova has said that Belen means Bethlehem in Spanish, but the Freedom From Religion Foundation is arguing that the nativity scene is religious in nature and should be moved to private property.

Christianity is booming in communist-ruled Cuba, and one indication of this is the continuing inflow of tens of thousands of Bibles which are distributed to the faithful in the country's more than 1,000 churches. Last month, some 83,000 copies of the Bible poured into the country courtesy of the International Missions Board. The copies of the Bible are distributed by the Baptist Convention in Cuba. The American Bible Society, which claims to have "strong relations with Cuban churches, both Catholic and Protestant," also started its "Million Bible Mission" last year. About 60,000 Bibles were imported and distributed to the faithful...

No one can deny the explosive impact of the Planned Parenthood videos painstakingly obtained over three years of undercover reporting by the Center for Medical Progress. A GOP that had shoved the abortion issue to the political back burner has suddenly seen it boiling over, with major Republican candidates (such as Marco Rubio) now speaking loudly about the “barbarism” of “murdering babies.” As Jason Jones and I wrote here last week, if you tune out the Trump-induced static at the last Republican debate, you will hear one message loud and clear: The Republican party has committed itself to advancing protection...

<p>DENVER (AP) — A suburban Denver baker who would not make a wedding cake for a same-sex couple cannot cite his Christian beliefs in refusing them service because it would lead to discrimination, the Colorado Court of Appeals ruled Thursday.</p>

Today the Russian Orthodox Church celebrates the memory of one of the early stars in the pleiades of new martyrs and confessors of the Communist yoke, Metropolitan Benjamin (Kazansky) of Petrograd and Gdovsk, together with Archimandrite Sergei, Yuri, and John. Hieromartyr Benjamin was born Vasily Pavlovich Kazansky in 1873, in a village near Kargopol, now of Archangelsk province, to the family of Priest Pavel and his wife Maria Kazansky. He was raised in a spirit of piety, and loved to read the Lives of the Saints, contemplating the struggles of the martyrs, and wishing that he too could make...

MURFREESBORO, Tenn. (WKRN) – It was an unscripted moment like few others on the presidential campaign trail Monday in Murfreesboro, Tennessee. Ted Cruz paused for a moment and looked into the audience at a community center for a man who changed his family’s life. “I was told Pastor Gaylon Wiley was here,” he told the crowd. “I haven’t seen Brother Wiley since I was a kid.” Then as the room with a thousand people fell silent, Cruz said “Brother Wiley led my dad to the Lord.” Out in the audience that day was Gaylon Wiley, who now lives in nearby...

As the Russian economy reels from low oil prices and Western sanctions, the country is seeing rising interest in unorthodox financial solutions, most recently one pitched by the Orthodox Church. Last week, the Russian Chamber of Commerce and Industry threw its support behind a so-called Orthodox Financial System developed under the aegis of the Moscow Patriarchate and strongly resembling the better known Islamic financial system. "The Chamber of Commerce and Industry supports the creation of the Orthodox Financial System … and is ready to provide its platform for detailed and professional discussion of these questions together with the relevant committees...

Yesterday, a news story broke where an undercover video was shown allegedly capturing a Planned Parenthood worker brokering a deal to sell the body parts of their aborted fetuses. The woman on the video goes into graphic detail about how the tiny organs are harvested while she casually sips her wine and eats her salad. The viral video has propelled outrage all over the internet and launched hashtags such as #PPSellsBodyParts. This story has put the abortion debate back into the national spotlight. As a Christian (and a pastor), I’ve never seen abortion as a “political” issue, but rather as...

The interview of Bishop Athanasius Schneider recently published on the website Adelante la Fe (the Spanish language partner of Rorate Caeli) is quickly making its rounds in traditional (aka Catholic) circles, and for good reason. In reviewing reactions, it occurs to me that we are very much a pendulum people; given to extremes and far too quick to grant hero status to better-than-average clerics at the drop of a biretta. No doubt, Bishop Schneider offered some praiseworthy commentary in the interview, but a little perspective may be in order to prevent us from getting carried away. Much of the attention...

The [Center for Medical Progress investigative] tapes [about the collection and sale of fetal organs and parts] have generated a visceral reaction independent of how they were made or whether Planned Parenthood was making a profit. Rather, the widespread revulsion over the tapes arose because they unmasked the fact that, in our public conversation about abortion, we have so muted the humanity of the unborn child that some consider it quite acceptable to speak freely of crushing a child's skull to preserve valuable body parts and to have that discussion over lunch.... This newest evidence about the disregard for the...

Lots to digest here. Enjoy the ride. http://www.metatech.org/wp/conspiracy/september-24-2015-23-cern/