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New rules about gay clergy have boosted interest in Lutheran CORE group's national meeting: They'll discuss leaving the ELCA. If the largest Lutheran church body in North America splits over a recent controversial vote on gay clergy, the foundation likely will be laid this weekend.Opponents of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America's recent vote to permit gay ministers are meeting in Indianapolis, where the No. 1 item on the agenda is: "A possible reconfiguration of North American Lutheranism."Organizers of the annual Lutheran CORE meeting were unprepared for the huge response, finally capping attendance after 1,200 people signed up -- far...

Speaking about the need for health care on Fox Business, he quoted Jesus. He reminded us that Jesus said, ... "when I was hungry, did you feed me? When I was sick, did you care for me?"

Meeting barely a month after the Episcopal Church voted to end its ban on the consecration of openly homosexual bishops and the blessing of same-sex unions, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America [ELCA] has taken similar steps. Meeting last week in Minneapolis, the Lutherans voted first to adopt a comprehensive statement on human sexuality that at least allows for the recognition and blessing of same-sex relationships in the church. Beyond this, it establishes a platform for the eventual acceptance and affirmation of same-sex marriage ceremonies. Then, acting just as the week came to an end, the denomination voted to eliminate...

First-ever polls comparing conservative and progressive activists are revealing to what degree these groups diverge when it comes to issue priorities, issue positions, and beliefs about scripture. While the majority of both groups say religion is important in their lives, for example, they have strikingly different beliefs about scripture. Nearly half of conservatives (48 percent) believe scripture to be the literal word of God, while only three percent of progressives shared the same view, according to the 2009 Religious Activist Surveys conducted by the Bliss Institute of Applied Politics at the University of Akron in partnership with Public Religion Research.

Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) -- In a new interview that is certain to upset pro-life Catholics, dissident Catholic professor Douglas Kmiec continues to claim that pro-abortion President Barack Obama takes a pro-life view. He says he was so excited talking about abortion with Obama during the campaign that he said Obama's views made him think his candidacy was "my catechism come to life."Kmiec, a former Pepperdine University law professor whose covering up Obama's pro-abortion views during the election drew a rebuke from Denver Archbishop Charles Chaput, receive a reward from Obama by being named as the ambassador to Malta.In an interview...

Los Angeles religious leaders have launched a phone campaign to urge lawmakers to include undocumented immigrants in any healthcare reform plan. At a religious service Friday, faith leaders called access to healthcare a moral and spiritual imperative. More than 150 worshippers attended a Mass at Our Lady Queen of Angels Catholic Church and prayed for an all-inclusive reform plan.

I am very thankful that the voices of Christians against Islam are on the rise. Unfortunately there are also Christians who are disrespecting Christianity, by fasting for Ramadan. "Christians" like this who live in fantasy land and ignore the plight of Christians in Islamic countries are part of the problem.

CHICAGO (ELCA) -- Two independent Lutheran congregations in San Francisco watched the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) Churchwide Assembly in Minneapolis with special interest. St. Francis Lutheran Church and First United Lutheran Church were expelled from the ELCA in 1995 for violating church standards the assembly voted to change. The 2009 Churchwide Assembly approved a series of proposals to change the denomination's ministry policies, including a policy to allow Lutherans in publicly accountable, lifelong, monogamous, same-gender relationships to serve as ELCA associates in ministry, clergy, deaconesses and diaconal ministers. "What does this mean?" was a question asked at council...

If you've ever stood in a pet shop and watched Siamese fighting fish attack their reflection in a glass tank, then you know what it's like to read a fascinating new survey of more than 3,000 religious activists on the left and the right. The survey was published this week just as leaders and foot soldiers of the religious right -- the group most closely identified with religious activism in politics -- gathers for the fourth annual Values Voter Summit in Washington, a weekend of red-meat speechifying and unabashed angling among Republican candidates looking to challenge a suddenly vulnerable Barack...

Who are these people?! Where do they come from?! Ordinary Americans might wonder why anyone would stoop so low as to follow Glenn Beck, Fox News and Dick Armey (and their corporate sponsors masquerading as "FreedomWorks") as they organize their "9/12 March On Washington" to cynically exploit the 9/11 attack. Patriotic Americans might question the organizer's aim to provide a media forum for dimwitted right wingers to scream "Liar!" "Socialist!" "Antichrist!" "Muslim!" "Death Panels!" "He's not an American!" and so on and on and on about the commander in chief charged with defending us from further attacks. And some people...

2:32 PM 9/8/2009 — It’s been a week since the Dead Kennedy Show aired on TV; and, since Father Venditti has already dealt with the canonical and spiritual aspects of the whole thing, your PP would like to reflect a little on what it might mean in the whole spectrum of the development of Catholicism in the United States. As distastefull and scandalous as we all know the Dead Kennedy Show was, it has, inadvertently, betrayed some rather encouraging signs. As little as thirty years ago, the outrage that exploded among ordinary Catholics in the wake of the Show would...

"What if church wasn't just a building, but thousands of doors?" asks a new website launched by the United Methodist Church. "Each of them opening up to a different concept or experience of church. . . . Would you come?" After watching its membership drop nearly 25 percent in recent decades, the United Methodist Church, which is still the nation's largest mainline Protestant denomination, thinks it knows the answer. So it's pouring $20 million into a new marketing campaign, including the website, television advertisements, even street teams in some cities, to rebrand the church from stale destination to "24-7 experience."...

CHICAGO (ELCA) -- The Rev. Bradley E. Schmeling has been receiving letters and stories of Lutherans returning to church after many years away, given actions taken at the 2009 Churchwide Assembly of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) in August. "Even my own partner's sister's family intends to return to an ELCA congregation after many years of worship in other denominations," Schmeling said. "People write to me about their experiences with church issues. (They) know my name because of the trial a couple of years ago." In 2007 Schmeling was removed from the ELCA clergy roster for being in...

I found this while stumbling. Forgive me if it is a repost. The link below is a letter written from a Christian minister named Bruce Lowe. He graduated from the University of Arkadelphia, Arkansas in 1936. He is now a staunch defender of LGBT rights and has delineated a biblical justification for homosexual acceptance. He encourages equality before the law as well as equality within the church. Here is the introduction to his letter. Every LGBTQQ Christian should take the time to read his words. I think it will make a lot of you feel a little bit better. (The...

The Washington Post’s religion writer Anthony Stevens-Arroyo had a lot of praise for Teddy Kennedy’s funeral Mass but not because of its religious content. Stevens-Arroyo thought that the thing that made the Kennedy funeral “the most Catholic” was the constant allusions to things political. Stevens-Arroyo began his piece asking, “So, did Kennedy's liberal politics interrupt a ritual meant to unite and not divide?” His answer seems to reveal his own liberal politics instead of any understanding of American Catholicism and he certainly comes down on the side of those that saw no reason not to impose political matters on a...

If you tuned in to the soap "One Life to Live" this week, you may have noticed there's been a change of character. One character in particular. Actress Patricia Mauceri says she was fired and abruptly replaced for objecting to a gay storyline because of her religious beliefs. Mauceri played the recurring role of Carlotta Vega on "OLTL" for the last 14 years. But when she objected to how the writers wanted her deeply religious character, a Latina mother, to handle a storyline involving homosexuality, she objected. And for that she claims she was fired. Mauceri, 59, a devout Christian,...

Ten religious sisters and a priest who were formerly part of an Episcopal religious community were received into full communion with the Catholic Church at a Mass in Maryland on Thursday. One sister said God will use them to bring unity to the Church. The women were members of the Society of All Saints’ Sisters of the Poor. The former Episcopal priest, Fr. Warren Tanghe, was their chaplain. “We know our beliefs and where we are,” the sisters’ superior, Mother Christina Christie, told the Baltimore Sun. “We were drifting farther apart from the more liberal road the Episcopal Church is...

Here is video of Bernard Whitman and Tucker Carlson talking with Martha MacCallum about health care. Bernard Whitman said "the fact that in this day health care is not considered a basic and fundamental human right in this country is an absolute disgrace," and asked "what would Jesus do?" After Whitman says this you can hear Tucker Carlson chuckling in the background. Tucker Carlson asked "if health care is a right, where does it come from?" It's definitely not in the Constitution. (Watch Video)

He who is merciful to the cruel, will become cruel to the merciful. Al Taqyyaa and political correctness are recipes for irreversible damage to the values of freedom and liberty, which are the foundation of our US constitution and other Western liberal democracies. There is nothing "progressive" about covering up misogyny, there is nothing "progressive" about defending oppression and attacking courageous voices like Dr. Wafa Sultan.

The cult of enviornmentalism is being preached at St. Mary’s Resurrection Elementary School in New Jersey. In this Fox Report below, you’ll see Catholic school children start their day by pledging “allegiance to the earth and all Her sacred hearts”, an allusion to the Sacred Heart of Mary and Jesus. You’ll also hear them sing their song, “Whose the greatest mom of all? Earth Mama!” It’s hard to believe that a Catholic teaches children to replace Mother Mary with Mother Earth as the “greatest mom of all”, because actually, Catholic educators, Mary isn’t just the greatest mom of all, she’s...

There is no authoritative biblical or theological guidance in the church. There are only many voices. During last week's biennial Church Wide Assembly of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA), the church affirmed major policy recommendations to allow for the blessing of same-sex unions (which practice will soon inflate to same-sex marriage) and the rostering of gay and lesbian pastors in partnered relationships. Earlier in the week it also passed by one vote—out of over 1,000 total votes cast—a Social Statement on Sexuality that admitted there was no consensus on the moral evaluation of homosexual conduct, and offered no...

The New International Version of the Bible is by far the most preferred translation of the Scripture, according to a new survey of U.S. evangelical leaders. More than 65 percent of the participating leaders named the NIV as their preferred Bible in a survey conducted by the National Association of Evangelicals (NAE) in light of the NIV’s 30th anniversary this year. “New Bible translations face large competition to gain a foothold in churches and homes but once established they have long staying power,” commented Leith Anderson, president of the NAE, which claims to represent 30 million evangelicals. “And, the NIV...

A former 1960s radical, Michael Lerner is the founder of Tikkun magazine, a publication that blends the scriptures of the Old Testament with the economic and social doctrines of Karl Marx. A frequent speaker on college campuses across the United States, Lerner brings this curious mix of religion and radical politics to the student audiences he addresses. In each appearance, as a way of legitimating his anti-Israel message, Lerner is introduced as a “rabbi.” In fact, his ordination ceremony took place within the context of the “Jewish Renewal” movement -- a sort of “New Age” Judaism whose origins trace back...

Al Gore was able to get most people to forget the money he took from the tobacco industry and Buddhist monks by winning both the Nobel Prize and an Oscar for his work on educating the world about the dangers of global warming and other problems that affect the environment. Gore's problem is that in this economic climate he cannot get himself arrested even for chaining himself to the entrance of a coal-fired electrical plant. Realistically, trying to improve the environment during a recession is a losing game, even if the North Pole ends up having a climate like Cuba...

What would Jesus do? Well, Ed Schultz thinks he knows - that is on health care reform at least. Schultz, on his Sept. 2 MSNBC program, "The ED Show" told viewers he believed Jesus would vote for a government public option. That, he said, was to the dismay of some on religious right, or what he used the pejorative "Bible thumpers" to describe. "Now, I have been referring to the health care reform deal as the real moral issue of our time," Schultz said. "I believe Jesus would vote yes for a public option, but some Bible thumpers don't see...

The top-selling Bible in North America will undergo its first revision in 25 years, modernizing the language in some sections and promising to reopen a contentious debate about changing gender terms in the sacred text. The New International Version, the Bible of choice for conservative evangelicals, will be revised to reflect changes in English usage and advances in Biblical scholarship, it was announced Tuesday. The revision is scheduled to be completed late next year and published in 2011.

The top-selling Bible in North America will undergo its first revision in 25 years, promising to reopen a contentious debate about changing gender terms in the sacred text. The New International Version, the Bible of choice for conservative evangelicals, will be revised to reflect changes in English usage and advances in Biblical scholarship, it was announced Tuesday. The revision is scheduled to be completed late next year and published in 2011. “We want to reach English speakers across the globe with a Bible that is accurate, accessible and that speaks to its readers in a language they can understand,” said...

ELCA Synod Bishops, Voting Members Respond to Assembly Actions 09-190-CD* CHICAGO (ELCA) -- Most of the 65 synodical bishops of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) want leaders, congregations and pastors to stay in conversation following the adoption of a social statement on human sexuality and the opening of the ELCA's ministry to people in committed same-gender relationships. Many bishops wrote to their respective synods following the 2009 ELCA Churchwide Assembly. Some letters are posted on synod Web sites. "It will be good for all our leaders and members to take a bit of a breath over this," wrote...

“For what my grandpa called the cause of his life, as he said that every American have decent quality health care as a fundamental right and not a privilege, we pray to the Lord.”

Barack Obama has apparently now been advised to shift the ground in the debate over health care reform, to get it away from discussions about specific provisions in the pending legislation (whether it will force us to unplug grandma or use our tax dollars to pay for others' abortions) and get it onto a far loftier moral high ground. This he did last weekend in a conference call to liberal clergy, urging them to endorse universal health care because of what he has decided is all part of the biblical injunction to "be our brother's keeper." Ostensibly, many moral theories...

What is Black Liberation Theology anyway? Barack Obama's former pastor, Jeremiah Wright catapulted black liberation theology onto a national stage, when America discovered Trinity United Church of Christ. Understanding the background of the movement might give better clarity into Wright's recent vitriolic preaching. A clear definition of black theology was first given formulation in 1969 by the National Committee of Black Church Men in the midst of the civil-rights movement: Black theology is a theology of black liberation. It seeks to plumb the black condition in the light of God's revelation in Jesus Christ, so that the black community can...

(WARNING: Extreme hypocrisy alert! If what you read below revolts you, don't say you weren't warned in advance).Did you know that there is a new religion out there? In addition to the Eastern Orthodox Catholics, Anglican Catholics, and Roman Catholics, there is now something called "Kennedy Catholics." At least according to the suddenly devout William Rivers Pitt in his DUmmie THREAD, "For any and all Kennedy Catholics on this page." Fasten your seatbelts because you will see the exact same folks who have no problem cursing out people who attend real (not Kennedy) Catholic churches suddenly become exceeding reverent,...

The mix of politics and religion can be an intoxicating cocktail. Just now, you can smell the incense everywhere, from Martha's Vineyard to Washington. For a left that obsesses over a wall of separation between church and state, when death comes and health care bills need rallies, there is little hesitation to break out the devotional smells and bells. But the loss of Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, one of the most prominent Catholic politicians in the United States, a leading proponent of health care reform and major supporter of the president's agenda, should not obscure a pivotal fact: Barack Obama...

There is much truth to the adage that many of our wounds are self inflicted. This has been especially true for the Catholic Church in the United States and the Archdiocese of Boston in particular. Recall that the clergy sex abuse scandal first came to light there because of their egregious nature and the laxity of the then Archbishop Bernard Cardinal Law in handling them. According to statistics the Church is still reeling from the aftershocks. On Wednesday the Church further diminished her credibility when it was announced that a Mass of Christian Burial would be celebrated for Senator Edward...

My September Foundation Watch is up on the Capital Research Center website. It's called "Left-Wing Radicalism in the Church: The Catholic Campaign for Human Development." Here's a summary: Each November around Thanksgiving every Roman Catholic parish takes up a collection for the nonprofit Catholic Campaign for Human Development (CCHD), a program run under the auspices of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB). Last November, under intense pressure from Catholic parishioners, CCHD finally stopped collecting money for the fraud-ridden radical group ACORN. But the Bishops’ Conference continues to support other radical community activist groups with similar goals, such as...

Time’s Amy Sullivan seems to have a special assignment to try and play up the religiosity of liberal Democrats despite their libertine policy stands, from Barack Obama to Ted Kennedy. On Thursday, Sullivan underlined "Ted Kennedy’s Quiet Catholic Faith." How does that match with his ultraliberal political record on abortion and homosexuality, his perfect 100-percent scores with NARAL or the Human Rights Campaign? Sullivan simply ignores that obvious problem. (HRC’s YouTube channel proudly shows Kennedy suggesting Jesse Helms might be in Hell at a March 2008 dinner. So much for Christian charity.) Kennedy "fully embraced" the Catholic Church, Sullivan claimed:...

Catholicism was comfort, conflict for Kennedy His stance on abortion and divorce from wife Joan defied church teachings BOSTON - Sen. Edward Kennedy was raised from birth to cherish his Catholicism, and it became both a source of comfort and conflict throughout his life. The son of the country's most famous Catholic family defied church teachings when he divorced his first wife, then was granted an annulment only after he admitted he wasn't being honest when he promised her he'd be faithful. His most significant and public break with the church came with his support for abortion rights. Yet Kennedy...

ELCA Churchwide Organization Begins Revising Its Ministry Policies 09-189-FI CHICAGO (ELCA) -- The 2009 Churchwide Assembly of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) directed that ministry policies be revised to eliminate prohibitions against partnered gay and lesbian members serving as lay and ordained leaders of the church. When the policy documents have been revised, congregations will have the option of calling a person in a publicly accountable, lifelong, monogamous same-gender relationship, but they will not be required to do so, said the Rev. Stanley N. Olson, executive director, ELCA Vocation and Education. The assembly also directed that the policies...

Let us detour for a moment from the recent death of Senator Ted Kennedy and the continuing debate over health care reform to consider a bizarre little happening in the Twin Cities that occurred last week. The Evangelical Lutheran Church of America convened for an annual meeting at the Minneapolis Convention Center. Among the items on its agenda was a vote to decide whether to allow non-celibate homosexuals to be ordained as pastors. On Wednesday, the day of the vote, a freak storm unexpectedly swept through town without warning, bringing a tornado that damaged both the convention center and the...

Lutheran ministers who are in same-sex relationships will not be allowed to serve as clergy in United Methodist congregations despite the new full communion agreement between the two denominations. Bishop Gregory Palmer, president of the United Methodist Council of Bishops, made clear on Wednesday that UMC's ban on noncelibate gay clergy still stands. "Our Book of Discipline on that subject did not become null and void when they took that vote," said Palmer, according to the United Methodist News Service. "It still applies to United Methodist clergy." Palmer was referring to the highly publicized vote last week by the chief...

My favorite Christian radio station, KLTY in North Texas, has turned to politics. It has begun to advertise a Conference on Social Justice sponsored by Soujorners and Jim Wallis. Jim Wallis stands behind a facade of christian activism to further the aims of the democrat party and particularly, Barak Obama. I have written KLTY an email: "I am concerned with the advertising that you have been playing for the social justice conference in November. I have found, in the past, that anything that Jim Wallis and Sojourners’ have sponsored have been loose disguises for the furtherance of a progressive (if...

The ELCA (Lutherans) in their convention vote in favor of placing homosexuals in the pulpits is stirring a hornets next of protest within the church community. Reports from the Upper Midwest tell of churches exploring cutting back on everything from financial support of ELCA to withdrawing from the ELCA in favor of other organizations such as the Lutheran Congregations in Mission for Christ (LCMC). Coincidentally, at the ELCA convention in Minneapolis, just prior to the vote, a tornado damaged the Central Lutheran Church and the Minneapolis Convention Center as delegates pondered the vote leaving some wondering if it wasn't a...

York County Lutherans struggle with national vote on gays EYANA ADAH MCMILLAN The York Dispatch Updated: 08/26/2009 10:48:54 AM EDT For the Rev. J. Thomas Shelley, watching the Evangelical Lutheran General Assembly vote process was like helplessly witnessing a car crash. "You're absolutely powerless to prevent it," said Shelley, pastor of Zion (Schaffer's) United Lutheran Church in Codorus Township. "I feared that the results would be what they are." During the assembly, held Aug. 17-23 in Minneapolis, the 1,000-plus delegates agreed to disagree on homosexuality, endorsing -- in a 676-338 vote Aug. 19 -- an official statement on human sexuality...

The fight over health care took the most interesting turn last week. President Obama briefly switched from wonkish frippery about bending cost curves to speaking of faith. Reaching out to progressive faith leaders in two massive conference calls, Obama insisted that God was on his side. Expanding health care fulfills a "core moral and ethical obligation that we look out for one another ... that I am my brother's keeper, my sister's keeper." This would be an easy opportunity to call attention, once again, to the double standards applied to Obama. When President George W. Bush invoked God as his...

Last Friday, as members of the nation's largest Lutheran denomination were casting four historic votes recasting the role of homosexuals in the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, a mop-up operation had begun a few blocks away. In a hospitality suite on the 12th floor of the Doubletree Hotel, Bill Sullivan's cell phone was ringing and ringing. Mr. Sullivan, a former ELCA pastor, is national coordinator for the Lutheran Congregations in Mission for Christ (LCMC), a collection of 226 congregations founded in March 2001 with 25 charter member churches dissatisfied with the denomination's liberal drift. Now the trickle has turned into...

On Friday, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) voted in favor of allowing practicing homosexuals, in committed relationships, to hold positions of authority within the sect. By a vote of 559 to 451 at last week's national convention, representatives of the largest Lutheran denomination in the United States decided "to open the ministry of the church to gay and lesbian pastors and other professional workers living in committed relationships." "The actions here change the church's policy, which previously allowed gays and lesbians into the ordained ministry only if they remained celibate," ELCA information director John Brook told AFP.

For the Religious Left, socialized medicine has long been almost the moral equivalent of the Second Coming. So increasing political turbulence for Obamacare is creating panic and fear among the true believers. Must we wait still longer, they now imploring wonder, with sadness and rage. (For a report about that call, click here). Emphasize the rage. Sojourners activist Jim Wallis has issued a virtual public imprecatory pray for Sarah Palin’s political destruction after her comments on Obamacare’s “death panels.” And a United Methodist lobbyist is denouncing Obamacare’s opponents as racists. Meanwhile, the President himself appeared on an August 19 Religious...

President Obama likes to trot out wolves and declare that they are sheep.  For instance, his recent nominee for Surgeon General, Regina Benjamin, is touted as a devout Catholic whose religious values affect her every day decisions.  However, one needs only to look at how she reconciles her Catholic beliefs with her pro-abortion agenda to see that this sheep looks suspiciously like a sharp-toothed wolf.  White House spokesman Reid Cherlin claimed that Benjamin “supports the president’s position on health care issues.”1  Unfortunately, Obama’s position on reproductive issues includes a pro-abortion agenda at the top of his list.  His pro-abortion views...

Hoping to find saving grace with the religious left, President Barack Obama began a public relations blitz Thursday in which he hope to wrap universal health care in the shroud of morality. “We are God's partners in matters of life and death,” Mr. Obama reportedly said in a conference call with Rabbi Jack Moline and other clerics. The conference was part of an effort to enlist left leaning clergy in the failing battle for Obamacare. While many aspects of Obamacare have unnerved an anxious public, recently conservatives have criticized the health care plan for permitting tax-payer funded abortions. It is...

As one whose profession it has been for many years to observe the plight of Christianity, I am always grateful for signs that our God is truly a Jewish God - one with a hilarious sense of irony. This happened again during the ELCA's national assembly, which will go down in history as a singularly boneheaded display of unfaithfulness. Just as delegates worked themselves up to their decision to allow homosexuals in committed relationships to serve as pastors, a highly selective tornado knocked the cross off the roof of Central Lutheran Church in Minneapolis, where some of their shameful meetings...