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August 26, 2015   Wednesday of the Twenty-first Week in Ordinary Time Reading 1 1 Thes 2:9-13 You recall, brothers and sisters, our toil and drudgery.Working night and day in order not to burden any of you,we proclaimed to you the Gospel of God.You are witnesses, and so is God,how devoutly and justly and blamelesslywe behaved toward you believers.As you know, we treated each one of you as a father treats his children,exhorting and encouraging you and insistingthat you walk in a manner worthy of the Godwho calls you into his Kingdom and glory. And for this reason we...

Christians in the U.S. worry that the day may be coming when they will no longer be able to freely speak their minds about their faith. But that day has already arrived in Canada, Europe, and the U.K. In 2008, a Canadian Human Rights panel imposed a $5,000 fine on the Reverend Stephen Boisson for a letter he had written in 2002 to a small newspaper describing homosexual activists as immoral (the ruling was eventually overturned by a higher court). In the same year (2002), an Ontario court ordered a Catholic school to admit a homosexual teen and his older...

A Catholic hospital in California has agreed to permit a doctor to sterilize a woman after the American Civil Liberties Union threatened to file a lawsuit, the San Francisco Chronicle reported. "Rachel Miller, due to have her second child in late September, agreed with her husband that this would be her last pregnancy and decided she would be sterilized by tubal ligation after giving birth," the newspaper reported. Miller says that her insurance will not cover both childbirth and sterilization at any other hospital in a 150-mile radius. Citing the US bishops’ healthcare directives, Mercy Medical Center in Redding initially...

We make men without chests and expect from them virtue and enterprise. We laugh at honor and are shocked to find traitors in our midst. —C. S. Lewis from "The Abolition of Man". (This article originally appeared in the May 2006 print edition of HPR.)This is an article that I wrote during my years of seminary formation, but I was advised to wait to have it published until after my priestly ordination. With the bishop’s seminary visitation on the way, it seemed like a good time to resurrect it from my files. It deals with a touchy subject, that will...

I recall when I got scorned for attacking homosexuality on my blog with a comment that said, “You are a homophobe, do you not know that God loves everyone including homosexuals,” in which I answered with, “do you not know that God loves everyone including the homophobe?” Indeed, we say “God loves everyone,” including, but not limited to; heretics, pedophiles, hemophiliacs, sodomites, lesbians, murderers, rapists, child molesters, drug pushers and every mutant from the pit of hell, except, of course, the legalist and the Pharisee, that is, the good old Catholic Church. y now, objectors who read so far what...

“Therefore you have no excuse, O man, every one of you who judges. For in passing judgment on another you condemn yourself, because you, the judge, practice the very same things. We know that the judgment of God rightly falls on those who practice such things. Do you suppose, O man—you who judge those who practice such things and yet do them yourself—that you will escape the judgment of God? Or do you presume on the riches of his kindness and forbearance and patience, not knowing that God’s kindness is meant to lead you to repentance” (Romans 2:1-4) Recently, I...

A friend recently went through statements published by the Irish Bishops’ Conference between 2012 and 2015 to examine the language the bishops used about morality, especially in response to the initiatives of the Enda Kenny government. During this period the Irish government legalised both the killing of unborn babies through abortion and the treatment of homosexuality as equivalent with heterosexuality through so called same-sex "marriage". The statements from the Bishops’ Conference show the Irish bishops failing to name the evil of abortion and homosexual sex even though the Second Vatican Council named abortion an “unspeakable crime” (Gaudium et Spes, 50)...

The World Meeting of Families, the central religious event of Pope Francis' first visit to the United States, is intended to convey a message of love and joy as it seeks to promote church teaching on marriage. Yet four weeks away from its opening in Philadelphia, friction is mounting as lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender Roman Catholics lobby for a broader role in the event and organizers move to limit them.The tensions surrounding the gathering will pose a real-world test of the pope's approach that emphasizes compassion and welcome while upholding Catholic doctrine that marriage is only between a man...

Two Western pro-gay groups are trying to hit back against the traditional morality of the African bishops heading into this year's Synod on the Family. Both groups have helped fund a subversive project promoting LGBT Catholics living in West Africa. The project is headed by the European Forum of LGBT Christian Groups, based in the Netherlands. At first, the forum planned to put together a film highly sympathetic to LGBT Catholics in Ghana, Togo, Benin, Nigeria and Cameroon, who are presumably victims of anti-gay oppression and "bigotry." Now, however, the project will gather similar testimonies and make them part of...

Pope Francis at last October's extraordinary synod (CNS) Five cardinals are among the signatories to a petition organised by Catholic student association TFP Student ActionMore than 500,000 people, including five cardinals, have signed a petition asking Pope Francis to reinforce Church teaching on marriage and the family at the synod of bishops in October.The petition, launched by Catholic student association TFP Student Action and backed by 25 pro-family groups around the world, was posted on the organisation’s site in late January. It has since been signed by five cardinals, 117 bishops and hundreds of civil leaders, in addition to...

On March 13th Noah was diagnosed with a brain tumor found at the cerebellum against his brainstem (Classic Medulloblastoma) Please pray for Noah, his parents Samuel and Christina, and his sister Lauren. Noah's MRI yesterday shows his tumor has regrown, and he faces more difficult treatment to come. Lord have mercy.

Transhumanism, the movement which aims to use science fiction-esque methods such as brain uploading, cyborgism, and cryogenics to achieve immortality and/or a higher state of evolution, is strongly associated with atheism. Not only is there a strong emphasis on science, which is often considered to be at odds with religion to a certain extent, but this particular brand of science seems particularly opposed to the notion that God should have control over life and death. But according to transhumanist Micah Redding, there's a growing contingent of Christians in the transhumanist movement who are seeking a slightly different type of...

INHUMAN—PART 5: THE SPIRIT BEHIND TRANSHUMANISM July 5, 2015 by SkyWatch Editor Share EDITOR’S NOTE: In the countdown to the release of the highly anticipated documentary “INHUMAN: THE NEXT AND FINAL PHASE OF MAN IS HERE”(scheduled for release around August 15), SkyWatch TV is running this exclusive online series on transhumanism and the dawn of the Human Hybrid Age.CONTINUED FROM PART ONE, PART TWO, PART THREE, PART FOUR  It would be nice to be an artilect, a god, a supremely powerful omnipotent being. I could be such a creature [soon.] It’s possible. It’s not an unattainable dream. All I...

On Friday night, while the political media was transfixed watching Donald Trump's in-all-ways-secular stump ramble in Mobile, Ala., Ted Cruz was holding a deliberately religious rally in Des Moines. Evangelical voters were always meant to be a linchpin of Cruz's presidential bid, and as our Katie Zezima and Tom Hamburger write, the Des Moines event was not shy about making that pitch. Blasting Planned Parenthood and lamenting the "persecution" of business owners sued for denying services to same-sex couples, Cruz was clearly trying to do two things: Plant his flag as the Republican crusader -- and prompt religious voters to...

MEDIA ADVISORY, Aug. 25, 2015 /Christian Newswire/ -- In the Bible, Exodus 18:21 teaches Christians when picking leaders to "select from all the people able men, such as fear God, men of truth, hating covetousness." David Jeffers, author of "Understanding Evangelicals: A Guide to Jesusland" (tinyurl.com/qb63fpr), in his latest video (youtu.be/ZmKeXj91Wfo) says such a man is Ted Cruz. "Ted Cruz has already shown his willingness to defend Christian's 1st Amendment rights, that he will stand for truth by calling the leader of his Senate caucus a liar, and that he will stand against what Cruz calls 'the Washington Cartel.'" Jeffers...

Perhaps that seems like a strange question. Can we see faith? You decide. - Noah built the ark by faith (Heb. 11:7). What did the people without faith do? - Rahab hid the spies by faith (Heb. 11:31). If she hadn't had faith, wouldn't she have turned them in instead? Did the people hunting for the spies have faith? - Abraham left his home and went where God led him, not even knowing where he was going, because he had faith (Heb. 11:8-9). If he hadn't had faith, would he have gone or stayed home? It is faith that causes...

“‘Do not be anxious for your life, as to what you shall eat, or what you shall drink; nor for your body, as to what you shall put on’” (Matthew 6:25). God gives you life and sustains your life. If you were living in Palestine during the time of Jesus, you might have been concerned about having the basics of life. That’s because there were times when the snows didn’t come to the mountains, and as a result the streams didn’t run. When the streams dried up, there was no water. Crops didn’t always produce either. They were subject to...

"[Love] believes all things" (1 Cor. 13:7). Love always expects the best of others. In Luke 15 Jesus tells a parable about a father who had two sons. The younger son asked for his share of the family inheritance, then left home and squandered it on sinful pursuits. When he realized his folly, he decided to return home and ask his father's forgiveness. So "he got up and came to his father. But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him, and felt compassion for him, and ran and embraced him, and kissed him. And the...

His Wrath is Not Turned Back, His Hand is Still Outstretched! Pondering the Wrath of God as a Work of Revelation Msgr. Charles Pope • August 24, 2015 • When reading Scripture that mentions the wrath of God, most think of His wrath in human terms. But we must be clear that God does not get angry the way we do. Further, our God is not moody: pleasant and patient one moment and then angry and punishing the next. No, God does not suffer from mood swings or throw tantrums. God is love; stably, serenely, and consistently so.So then what...

Wearing religious garb publicly, whether cassock, biretta, habit, etc., was at one time a no-brainer act for all priestly and religious vocations. It was always understood to give a public witness to the Faith, and serve as a tool for evangelization. Even Hollywood has picked up on this, and invariably portrays priests and religious in traditional habits. But many in the Church have forgotten this elemental truth over the past few decades. A very handy post from Fr. Peter Carota – who you should read daily! – notes the conversion experience of one secular woman who found herself having a...