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Hong Kong's pro-democracy camp has made huge gains in the early stages of the city's fiercely contested district council elections on Sunday, taking all but 19 of the first 150 seats to declare.

Pope Signals Closeness to (Red) China and Distance from Taiwan and Hong Kong ROME — Pope Francis sent subtle but clear signals of closeness to Beijing while distancing himself from Taiwan and Hong Kong during his flight to Japan from Thailand Saturday. In a series of telegrams to officials of the three territories, the pope disclosed the current diplomatic position of the Vatican regarding key Asian conflicts. Especially revealing was the wording of the pontiff’s telegrams to China and Taiwan and the different manner in which he described each nation.

There;s a lot of America's heartland that's been gutted out by the forces of Big Government and Big Business but some Americans still have that good vision for the farmlands and ranch lands of our country under federal government control. The Republicans moving the Bureau of Land Management office to Grand Junction, Colorado doesn't change the principle of federal control that strangles the use of the land and put people like Dwight and Steven Hammond in jail. When Ammon Bundy brought his peaceful protest..... In our world today much rage obviously in the spirit of anarchy and Marxism-Leninism manifesting itself...

The indefatigable apologist for Islam Pope Francis on Monday issued yet another mea culpa to Muslims, saying: “A scene from The Song of Roland comes to me as a symbol, when the Christians defeat the Muslims and line them up in front of the baptismal font, with one holding a sword. And the Muslims had to choose between baptism or the sword. That is what we Christians did.” Was it really? The Song of Roland is actually a work of fiction, a French epic poem loosely based on the Battle of Roncevaux Pass between Muslim invaders and Christian defenders in...

Abp Vigano: Pope is subjecting Church to ‘powerful forces’ that want world government November 21, 2019 (LifeSiteNews) – For twenty centuries, the Catholic Church has professed faith in Jesus Christ, the only Savior, which has come down to us intact, as she received it from the Apostles and Fathers of the Church at the price of the blood of the Martyrs, and by the witness of the Confessors of the faith and of innumerable Saints of every people and language. This faith has been handed down by parents to their children, by priests and religious; it has been spread...

Critical blow to Holy See's financial credibilityVATICAN CITY (ChurchMilitant.com) - A leading international financial watchdog has suspended collaboration with the Vatican, dealing the Holy See's financial credibility a critical blow. On Tuesday, The Wall Street Journal revealed that the Egmont Group, an elite global collective of more than 160 financial intelligence agencies, has severed the Vatican's access to its web system, which members use to target money laundering, terrorism financing and tax fraud. The Vatican's own watchdog group, the Financial Information Authority (AIF), remains a member of the Egmont Group, but it is blocked from Egmont's information-sharing network until it...

ROME - A scandal over alleged sexual molestation and abuse at the Vatican’s youth seminary is growing, with more former papal altar boys alleging inappropriate behavior by priests inside the Vatican walls. Le Iene, an Italian investigative television program, plans to air the new allegations Sunday; the show provided the broadcast to The Associated Press ahead of time. The Vatican announced in September that its criminal prosecutor was seeking to indict a former senior seminarian and the then-rector of the St. Pius X seminary on sexual abuse charges. The announcement came two years after Le Iene first featured former seminarians...

[Catholic Caucus] International Arrest Warrant For Francis Protégé Zanchetta Requested The Argentinean prosecutor María Soledad Filtrín Cuezzo has requested international help to arrest Bishop Gustavo Zanchetta, who is accused of “homosexually abusing two seminarians”. According to AciPrensa.com, the request was made because Zanchetta has not responded to repeated telephone calls or emails. It is assumed that he is hiding in the Vatican. Earlier this month, police raided offices in his former diocese Orán. Zanchetta is a Francis' protégé and the first Argentinean bishop named by Francis. The first accusations against him were made in 2015 and involved nude selfies on...

Abp. Viganò: ‘The World Neo-Religion Will Have Its Temple — With the Pope’s Approval’ Latest essay warns against compromising Christ's truth Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò's latest essay concerns the Abrahamic Family House project, a structure that will host a synagogue, a mosque and a church in Abu Dhabi. The former papal nuncio warns against the dangers of syncretism and highlights the contradiction between this ecumenical project and traditional teaching of the Church. Dr. Aldo Maria Valli has granted us permission to republish Viganò's essay in full. To the Venerable Brothers ... who have peace and communion with the Apostolic See in the...

Vatican City, Nov 18, 2019 / 05:01 am (CNA).- In a video message to the country of Japan Nov. 18, Pope Francis said he prays that the power of nuclear weapons will never again be used in the world. Japan “is very aware of the suffering caused by war,” the pope said in his native Spanish. “Together with you, I pray that the destructive power of nuclear weapons will never be unleashed again in human history. Using nuclear weapons is immoral.” Pope Francis will be in Japan Nov. 23-26, part of a six-day trip which will begin in Bangkok, Thailand....

Talk about overkill! The ultra-liberal UMC Next caucus has released its “Next Generation UMC” proposal for the 2020 General Conference, consisting of 23 petitions across 33 pages. UMC Next’s Convening Team includes celebrity pastor Adam Hamilton, Tom Berlin (lead submitter of the misleadingly named “One Church Plan” to the 2019 General Conference), Jasmine Smothers (another Commission on a Way Forward member and “One Church Plan” sponsor), Jan Lawrence (CEO of the LGBTQ liberationist Reconciling Ministries Network), Randall Miller (former head of RMN), Bishop Sue Haupert-Johnson of North Georgia, Bishop Mike McKee of North Texas, Junius Dotson (CEO of our denomination’s...

ROME - Interreligious dialogue is an important way to counter fundamentalist groups as well as the unjust accusation that religions sow division, Pope Francis said. Meeting with members of the Argentine Institute for Interreligious Dialogue Nov. 18, the pope said that in “today’s precarious world, dialogue among religions is not a weakness. It finds its reason for being in the dialogue of God with humanity.” Recalling a scene from the 11th-century poem, “The Song of Roland,” in which Christians threatened Muslims “to choose between baptism or death,” the pope denounced the fundamentalist mentality which “we cannot accept nor understand and...

Pope Eliminates Pork from Banquet out of Respect for Muslims ROME — Pope Francis invited 1,500 mostly poor people to lunch this weekend to celebrate the World Day for the Poor and requested that all pork be removed from the menu so as not to give offense to Muslim guests. This Sunday marked the third annual celebration of the World Day of the Poor, a Catholic commemoration established by Pope Francis in November 2016 to celebrate the end of the Jubilee Year of Mercy.

There's a growing number of parents who believe the transgender movement is destroying their children, both physically and emotionally. These parents come from a variety of backgrounds, regions and political affiliations – but they're unified in a belief that they're on their own when it comes to questioning and evaluating the reasons behind their children's gender confusion. Many of these parents have reached out to Parents of Rapid-Onset Gender Dysphoria (ROGD) Kids, an organization that began in late 2017 and has since connected with more than 600 parents, some of who meet in 50 support groups across North America. CBN...

Less than a year after having gender surgery, Nathaniel now says, “This whole thing was a bad idea. I am 19 years old, and I feel as though I have ruined my life.” It’s heartbreaking each time I get a letter from someone who underwent gender-change surgery and regrets it, especially someone as young as Nathaniel. With his permission, I’m telling a bit of his story to raise awareness of the young lives being ruined by the rush to surgery, and hoping that hearing the testimony of this young man will influence others on this path to slow down and...

I compare Muhammed's view of prayer and oaths with that of scripture, and point out how the self-contradictions of the Koran make it impossible to follow consistently.

For five days he has been under the supervision of public security personnel, under pressure. The Party wants to force him to attend a meeting of the "independent" clergy of Fujian. A member of Mindong: Pray for him, because he is very tired.Rome (AsiaNews) - Msgr. Vincenzo Guo Xijin, underground bishop, auxiliary of Mindong (Fujian), is being hounded by public security agents to force him to sign up to an "independent Church" in exchange for government recognition. President Xi Jinping has established that an "independent Church" subject to the Chinese Communist Party is the condition for Catholics to live in...

Dublin, Ireland, Nov 13, 2019 / 02:51 pm (CNA).- A group broke into an Irish Carmelite monastery during the daytime, vandalized its chapel and shouted slurs at the elderly nuns who lived there on Monday. “The poor sisters who live there play such an integral part of life in the area and it’s outrageous that a small group of thugs would target them like this,” a local parishioner who regularly goes to the chapel told the news site Dublin Live. The incident happened after 1 p.m. Nov. 11 at Star of the Sea Monastery in Malahide, about 10 miles north...

Wave of church closings announced amid plunging participation DUBLIN (ChurchMilitant.com) - Mass attendance in Ireland is down significantly but there is no consensus why. On Friday, the Irish Independent reported that Mass attendance across Ireland has decreased by a third. Bishop Dermot Farrell of the diocese of Ossory announced that Sunday Masses in the diocese will go from 140 to 92 beginning Dec. 1 since the diocese has more churches than needed. "They were built in a different era, when there were very poor roads and no transport, so people had to walk to church. And you had far more...

Pope Francis is considering adding ‘ecological sin’ to the official teachings of the Catholic Church. He said there are plans to update the Catechism of the Catholic Church to include environmental damages that risk “the common home” of humanity. The spiritual leader called on the global community to recognise ecocide as a “fifth category of crime against peace” and stressed corporations must not go unpunished if they cause harm to the planet. He said the term ‘ecocide’ covers “the massive contamination of air, land and water resources, the large-scale destruction of flora and fauna and any action capable of producing...