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If John Edward’s new book turns out to be as popular as his previous endeavors, we could soon see rosaries for sale at Wal-Mart.With Practical Praying: Using the Rosary to Enhance Your Life, the best-selling author and TV psychic medium is putting himself on the line in an entirely new way. “I had major, major blocks on a personal level,” he said in a telephone interview. “I’ve been very private about my rosary praying.”A book about the rosary wouldn’t be commercial coming from most writers, but Mr. Edward, 35, has such a built-in following of far-reaching fans that his book...

Intelligent design proponent William Dembski stood on an empty stage Monday at the Lied Center. Organizers of the event had tried in advance to get a science professor to spar with him, but all who were asked declined. Dembski, a professor at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Ky., expounded on the theory and criticized evolution before a nearly packed auditorium. “I hope that tonight shows that there is substance to this science,” said Mark Brown, director of Campus Crusade, which invited Dembski to campus. “Real science should pursue the truth. Truth is the friend of science and religion equally.”...

A rural school district agreed to stop teaching a religion-based alternative to evolution as part of a court settlement filed Tuesday, a legal group said. Frazier Mountain High School will stop teaching a philosophy class discussing the theory of "intelligent design" this week and won't teach it in the future, said Ayesha N. Khan, legal director for Americans United for Separation of Church and State. Officials at the El Tejon Unified School District were not immediately available for comment. A federal judge in Fresno had been scheduled to hold a hearing Tuesday afternoon on whether to halt the class midway...

Dennis Rader’s pastor sought permission to perform a jailhouse exorcism on the BTK killer but authorities wouldn’t allow it, the Rev. Michael Clark told an Overland Park audience Sunday. Clark believes demonic forces drove Rader to murder 10 victims in the Wichita area, he said at Holy Cross Lutheran Church. In response to an audience member’s question, the Lutheran pastor said he spoke at length with the Sedgwick County sheriff about performing the exorcism. The sheriff politely refused to allow it, Clark said. “Dennis was influenced, I believe, by some kind of demonic force and that played a role in...

Scientist compares Moses to Hitler, calls New Testament 'sado-masochistic doctrine'Controversial scientist and evolutionist Richard Dawkins, dubbed "Darwin's Rottweiler," calls religion a "virus" and faith-based education "child abuse" in a two-part series he wrote and appears in that begins airing on the UK's Channel 4, beginning tomorrow evening. Entitled "Root of All Evil?," the series features the atheist Dawkins visiting Lourdes, France, Colorado Springs, Colo., the al-Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem and a British religious school, using each of the venues to argue religion subverts reason. In "The God Delusion," the first film in the series, Dawkins targets Catholicism at the pilgrimage...

    For the freedom you enjoyed yesterday... Thank the Veterans who served in The United States Armed Forces.     Looking forward to tomorrow's freedom? Support The United States Armed Forces Today!       ...walk under ladders?....throw salt over your shoulder?.....black cat cross your path?.....lucky horse shoes?......Ladybird, ladybird, fly away home......Skin Of Your Teeth?.........3 lights on a match?......did you drop the scissors?....were you singing before seven?.... did you bite you tongue?...Are you superstitious?It's Friday the 13th with so much to dread. Some people ignore it and just stay in bed. Silly Superstitions It's bad luck to walk...

President urged to slaughter sheep From correspondents in Jakarta 13-04-2005 From: Agence France-Presse INDONESIA'S president said he has been urged to slaughter 1000 sheep to prevent a repeat of the disastrous quakes that have hit his country, but he rejected the advice as superstitious nonsense. Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono said he had been bombarded with telephone text messages, or SMS, saying sacrificial lambs could calm the seismic forces that have claimed thousands of lives. "I have received many SMSs which say: 'Mr. President, please slaughter 1000 sheep'," Yudhoyono was quoted as saying by the state news agency Antara. Yudhoyono urged the...

A wave of brutal attacks has left three young boys traumatised after their private parts were mutilated in a bizarre ritual that has shocked Western Province. The unexplained injuries inflicted on the boys is being attributed to witchcraft by villagers in Bungoma District. Many are still unsure of what to make of the horrific attack on the three boys, aged between four and 14 years old. None of the boys’ attackers have been identified and the police are attributing the bizarre acts to sorcery. Residents of two villages where the boys come from, are living in a state of shock...

TACHILEIK, Myanmar (AP) - Furry bear paws lie next to neatly arranged skins of jungle cats, skulls of monkeys and horns of mountain goats. The parts of vanishing species from Southeast Asia's forests are laid out for Chinese buyers seeking sex boosters, cures for cancer and exotic food. "Very strong. It can fight with a tiger, so it's good for sex," the vendor says, pointing to a pair of wild buffalo horns priced at $125 and explaining that in powder form they'll surely enhance virility given the animal's power. A sizable quantity of wildlife is felled to supply dealers in...

"It's been estimated that [U.S] $800 or $900 million is lost in business on this day because people will not fly or do business they would normally do," said Donald Dossey, founder of the Stress Management Center and Phobia Institute in Asheville, North Carolina. Among other services, Dossey's organization counsels clients on how to overcome fear of Friday the 13th, a phobia that he estimates afflicts 17 to 21 million people in the United States. Symptoms range from mild anxiety to full-blown panic attacks. The latter may cause people to reshuffle schedules or miss an entire day's work. When it...

Take triskaidekaphobia, or fear of 13s, and combine it with a Friday, a generally well-regarded day of the week, and you get Paraskevidekatriaphobics, a deep fear of Friday the 13th. (Fear of splatter films of the same name is Jasonvoorhephobia.)Connecticut University Psychology professor Stuart Vyse, the author of "Believing in Magic: The Psychology of Superstition," agreed to set aside his fear of reporters and answer a few questions to debunk the day. At least that's the way the conversation started ...What is the origin of Friday the 13th as a day of bad luck or ill omen?It has several possible...

        For the freedom you enjoyed yesterday... Thank the Veterans who served in The United States Armed Forces.     Looking forward to tomorrow's freedom? Support The United States Armed Forces Today!       ...walk under ladders?....throw salt over your shoulder?.....black cat cross your path?..... lucky horse shoes?...... Ladybird, ladybird, fly away home ...... Skin Of Your Teeth? .........3 lights on a match?......did you drop the scissors?....were you singing before seven?.... did you bite you tongue?...STEP ON A CRACK---BREAK YOUR MOTHER'S BACK...IF YOU BREAK A MIRROR YOU WILL HAVE 7 YEARS OF BAD LUCK......It's Friday the...

A few years ago I appeared on a TV talk show where the celebrity host was involved with the Kabbala Centre. As a result, the show had Kabbala mineral water for the guests, accompanied by literature claiming that the water had been blessed in some way as to alter its atomic composition. I remember thinking how sad it was that the influential people who appeared on the show had their first introduction to Judaism through this kind of garbage. The Kabbala Centre deserves applause for having taken one of the most significant, yet ignored, disciplines of Judaism and bringing it...

A chilling reminder of our superstitious past has been unearthed from a rural farmhouse. The "witch bottle" was discovered buried in old foundations in the Lincolnshire village of Navenby. Containing bent pins, human hair and perhaps urine, the bottles were supposed to protect a household against evil spells. Dated to about 1830, it is evidence the fear of dark forces persisted far longer than previously thought. Discovered by accident during building work, the artefact initially sat unrecognised in a cupboard. Jo Butler, the house's owner, described what they found. She said: "The builder was breaking up foundations with a pick...

A Malian man, who had his five-year-old son's throat slit to conjure up some good luck, has been sentenced to death. Fousseyni Thera, 27, from the West African nation, decided to sacrifice his son, Daniel, after meeting an elderly witchdoctor and asking him to create a good luck charm, court documents said. The witchdoctor demanded human blood to make the charm. The men brought the boy to a tree-filled ravine in the capital, Bamako, in January this year. His father held him down while the witchdoctor cut his throat, gathering the blood in a bowl into which he dipped the...

GANGRE, Kenya -- He's always the first one in line for the village feast, tucking into a buffet carefully prepared by the women of the village like he's diving into the ocean, no restraint. He's too skinny and has, as the women point out, terrible taste in clothes. His latest hat is a visor styled from shabby paper stolen off a local cigarette billboard. But for all of his undesirable traits, Francise Akacha has a surprisingly desirable job: He's paid to have sexual relations with the widows and unmarried women of this village. He's known as "the cleanser," one of...

A Few of FR's Finest....Every Day Free Republic made its debut in September, 1996, and the forum was added in early 1997. Over 100,000 people have registered for posting privileges on Free Republic, and the forum is read daily by tens of thousands of concerned citizens and patriots from all around the country and the world. A Few of FR's Finest....Every Day was introduced on June 24, 2002. It's only a small room in JimRob's house where we can get to know one another a little better; salute and support our military and our leaders; pray for those in...