Free Republic

“Then Nebuchadnezzar came near to the door of the furnace of blazing fire; he responded and said, ‘Shadrach, Meshach and Abed-nego, come out, you servants of the Most High God, and come here!’ Then Shadrach, Meshach and Abed-nego came out of the midst of the fire. And the satraps, the prefects, the governors and the king’s high officials gathered around and saw in regard to these men that the fire had no effect on the bodies of these men nor was the hair of their head singed, nor were their trousers damaged, nor had the smell of fire even come...

Marching to Save Lives and a Nation Msgr. Charles Pope • June 19, 2016 •  The following is from a Homily I preached just prior to our march and prayer vigil at the Planned Parenthood “clinic” being built here in Washington, D.C.The first reading at Mass today (Saturday of the 11th week of the year) is from Second Chronicles; it details the reforms of King Joash and then his sad decline. Joash’s grandmother Athalia, a worshipper of Baal, was Queen of Judah and proved to be much like her mother Jezebel; she rose to power by having every possible...

With remarkable insouciance, NYT writers Jeremy W. Peters and Lizette Alvarez blithely make reference to “a Bible verse from Romans that calls for the execution of gays,” meaning Saint Paul’s letter to the Romans 1:18-32.As anyone who has ever read the New Testament knows, Saint Paul never permits that Christians should commit any violence whatsoever against homosexuals, but the Times editors apparently thought that fact-checking with the original text was superfluous or that readers were too ignorant to check for themselves.The Times report, titled “After Orlando, a Political Divide on Gay Rights Still Stands,” follows on the fatal shooting of...

"If a man comes into your assembly with a gold ring and dressed in fine clothes, and there also comes in a poor man in dirty clothes, and you pay special attention to the one who is wearing the fine clothes, and say, 'You sit here in a good place,' and you say to the poor man, 'You stand over there, or sit down by my footstool,' have you not made distinctions among yourselves, and become judges with evil motives?" (James 2:2-4). You must show equal respect to poor and rich alike. Partiality is an age-old problem that exists in...

“Then Nebuchadnezzar the king was astounded and stood up in haste; he responded and said to his high officials, ‘Was it not three men we cast bound into the midst of the fire?’ They answered and said to the king, ‘Certainly, O king.’ He answered and said, ‘Look! I see four men loosed and walking about in the midst of the fire without harm, and the appearance of the fourth is like a son of the gods!’” (Daniel 3:24-25). God will never leave His children alone. King Nebuchadnezzar was livid with rage when he had Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-nego bound...

And the fourth kingdom shall be strong as iron: forasmuch as iron breaketh in pieces and subdueth all things: and as iron that breaketh all these, shall it break in pieces and bruise. And whereas thou sawest the feet and toes, part of potters’ clay, and part of iron, the kingdom shall be divided; but there shall be in it of the strength of the iron, forasmuch as thou sawest the iron mixed with miry clay. And as the toes of the feet were part of iron, and part of clay, so the kingdom shall be partly strong, and partly...

Will the Real Jesus Please Stand Up? A Meditation on the Gospel for the 12th Sunday of the Year Msgr. Charles Pope • June 18, 2016 • Today’s Gospel sets forth some parameters for picturing Christ. Sadly, just as in the time of Jesus, many today worship a “designer Messiah.” It is not the real, revealed Christ whom they acknowledge and worship. Rather, it is a Christ of their own fashioning, whom they “carve” in the form of an idol and then worship.Let’s examine some of the parameters Jesus sets forth for our acknowledgement and worship of Him. As...

“Then [Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-nego] were tied up in their trousers, their coats, their caps and their other clothes, and were cast into the midst of the furnace of blazing fire. For this reason, because the king’s command was urgent and the furnace had been made extremely hot, the flame of the fire slew those men who carried up Shadrach, Meshach and Abed-nego. But these three men, Shadrach, Meshach and Abed-nego, fell into the midst of the furnace of blazing fire still tied up” (Daniel 3:21-23). When God doesn’t deliver you from a trial, He refines you through the trial....

"My brethren, do not hold your faith in our glorious Lord Jesus Christ with an attitude of personal favoritism" (James 2:1). Your true worth is based on the value of your soul, not on external considerations. Jesus is "our glorious Lord" (James 2:1)—the Sovereign One who rules over all His creation, and the One in whom the fullness of God's glory is revealed. John said, "The Word [Jesus] became flesh, and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, glory as of the only begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth" (John 1:14). Paul said, "In Him all...

Who knows our sin? While Scripture could be taken to mean saints in heaven are aware of details of our sin, it is unlikely Msgr. Charles Pope Question: Do the souls in heaven know our sins, or is that knowledge reserved to God alone?— Peter Tate, Long Beach, California Answer: We are in the realm of speculative theology when it comes to answering questions like this. However, it does not seem to pertain to God’s justice that he would reveal our sins to others (even the saints in heaven), especially our more hidden sins. We are not to reveal to...

Last time a ranking prelate (Cdl. Kasper) opined that half of all marriages were null his attribution of such a reckless assertion to Pope Francis himself could be dismissed as hearsay, deflected as referring to marriage in general and not Christian marriage in particular, or at least minimized as describing merely ‘many’ or even ‘half’ of all marriages. But none of those qualifications can be applied to blunt the impact of the pope’s startling claim “the great majority of our sacramental marriages are null”.If last time was bad, this time is very bad. Consider: Marriage is that natural human relationship...

A Parable to Ponder - Why Does God Permit Disability? Msgr. Charles Pope • June 16, 2016 • Photo Credit: Jaclyn Lipplemann, Catholic StandardAllow me to begin with a simple parable. Every now and then I take a perfectly good paper clip and untwist it, reconfiguring it for some other purpose. Once, I used them to hang Christmas ornaments on my tree. Another time I fashioned a paperclip into a hook to keep my broken file drawer from rolling open. Now if paperclips could see or think, they might be horrified and saddened to see a fellow paperclip so...

"My brethren, do not hold your faith in our glorious Lord Jesus Christ with an attitude of personal favoritism" (James 2:1). Because God is impartial, we as Christians must be impartial too. People are prone to treat others differently based upon external criteria such as looks, possessions, or social status, but God is utterly impartial. He never shows favoritism and always judges righteously. Favoritism can be defined as a preferential attitude and treatment of a person or group over another having equal claims and rights. It is unjustified partiality. James 2:1-13 confronts it as sin and admonishes us to avoid...

“Then Nebuchadnezzar was filled with wrath, and his facial expression was altered toward Shadrach, Meshach and Abed-nego. He answered by giving orders to heat the furnace seven times more than it was usually heated. And he commanded certain valiant warriors who were in his army to tie up Shadrach, Meshach and Abed-nego, in order to cast them into the furnace of blazing fire” (Daniel 3:19-20). Persecution is the world’s futile attempt to silence the voice of godly integrity. King Nebuchadnezzar was a brilliant and powerful man who had built an enormous empire by bringing entire nations under his control. Yet...

Accepting the Disabled in a World Obsessed with Physical Perfection Msgr. Charles Pope • June 15, 2016 • Photo Credit: Jaclyn Lipplemann, Catholic StandardAs mentioned in yesterday’s post, Pope Francis recently lamented the obsession of modern society with perfect bodies. Although our first thought on contemplating this might be cosmetics and plastic surgery, he was actually speaking about our increasing rejection of the disabled and the sick. This rejection is perhaps most sadly evidenced by the fact that more than 90% of unborn children with a “poor prenatal diagnosis” are aborted. Perhaps the parents are informed that their child...

"This is pure and undefiled religion in the sight of our God and Father . . . to keep oneself unstained by the world" (James 1:27). God doesn’t tolerate compromise with the world. Keeping yourself unstained by the world is an important test of your spiritual condition. The apostle John said, "Do not love the world, nor the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him" (1 John 2:15). At first glance that might sound contradictory since God Himself so loved the world that He gave His Son to die...

“Shadrach, Meshach and Abed-nego answered and said to the king, ‘O Nebuchadnezzar, we do not need to give you an answer concerning this. If it be so, our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the furnace of blazing fire; and He will deliver us out of your hand, O king. But even if He does not, let it be known to you, O king, that we are not going to serve your gods or worship the golden image that you have set up’” (Daniel 3:16-18). Unconditional obedience is the trademark of mature faith. In Matthew 13...

Pope Francis commissioned a study into the role of women deaconsThe head of the Vatican’s doctrine office is suggesting little new will come from a study commissioned by Pope Francis into the role of women deacons, according to Associated Press. Cardinal Gerhard Muller says the Vatican is putting together a list of experts for the study. But he says the focus will be historic in nature, studying the role of women deacons in the early church, and that regardless a comprehensive study was completed in 2002. That study found that female deacons of the early Church cannot be compared to...

Letting Go of Our Obsession with Having the Perfect Body Msgr. Charles Pope • June 14, 2016 • The Pope’s recent remarks about the obsession with having the perfect body were intended as a commentary on the rejection by some of the dignity and quality of life of the disabled. I will be writing more on that topic tomorrow. Today, however, permit me some musings on the obsession that many of us have with achieving the perfect body ourselves.Let me start by saying (with all the good humor I can summon) that I do not have a perfect body....

"This is pure and undefiled religion in the sight of our God and Father, to visit orphans and widows in their distress" (James 1:27). Sacrificial love is the hallmark of true Christianity. Recently a local newspaper reported the story of a young woman who had been brutally beaten, sexually assaulted, repeatedly stabbed, then dumped down a hillside and left for dead. Miraculously she survived the attack and crawled up the hill to a spot along the road where several people were parked enjoying the panoramic view of the city. Covered with blood from head to foot, she went from car...