Posted on 07/21/2018 7:42:56 PM PDT by Libloather
Last week’s arrest of Marina Butina, the 29-year-old operative who allegedly wielded sex as a weapon to spy for Russia, revealed not one but two channels into American power pursued by Russian intelligence. We’ve known for a while now that the Russians have attempted to use the NRA, and America’s love affair with guns, to shape the nation’s politics. But Butina’s other “backdoor” was more surprising: the faith community, which she infiltrated through the National Prayer Breakfast.
The annual National Prayer Breakfast dates back to 1953, and every US president since Eisenhower has regularly attended, along with much of Congress, foreign heads of state and high officials. Invitations to the seemingly bland event come on congressional letterhead.
And yet the breakfast is entirely organized by and funded through a private and deeply secretive Christian organization called the Fellowship, known by its innermost members as “The Family.”
(Excerpt) Read more at nypost.com ...
Can you imagine the level of outrage if Trump had made an open mic comment like that to Vlad?
He would be up for immediate impeachment proceedings.
Russia is a proud defender of Western Christendom? May I have some of what you’re smoking? Must be good stuff.
Actually it’s not Mexico stealthily invading the US. It’s Central America. Mexico is just the highway to us.
We were told here for years that W was a God chosen and Godly acting president. People got banned who said otherwise.
So as long as truth comes out, you’re ok with personal property being confiscated by illegal means? That’s what we’ve stooped to.
They need us. Russia doesn’t. They want to be at least an equal world power to us if not remove us from that position. Germany, the UK and France, simply by their geography can’t and don’t.
The Russia government supports the Russian Orthodox church and actively suppresses protestants.
They are returning to the time when Russian Orthodox was the state religion.
So? Doesn't make it right. Half this forum got banned in April '07 for supporting Giuliani in the primaries. Jim showed the door to some of the best and brightest FReepers we had here and for what?
There was great love for George W. Bush on Free Republic in the beginning that was further strengthened after 9/11. This blinded us to the now indisputable fact that George W. Bush did not have America's best interests at heart in his governance, much less acted "Godly."
The Cold War was a long time ago. Reagan is dead. Thatcher is dead. Western Europe is far Left liberal and being overrun with radical Muslims. President Trump is wisely choosing this time to re-evaluate who are our true friends and enemies.
They are returning to the time when Russian Orthodox was the state religion.
The Russian people overwhelmingly support this. They view Americanized protestant religions as cultish and don't want them proselytizing. There is no cherished tradition of "freedom of religion" in Mother Russia. There is one true church, one true God, and this is represented by the Orthodox Church. All others are heretical.
[I just find it odd that conservatives don’t have trouble with Trump seemingly cozying up to Putin.]
The article is severely lacking in facts about what the lady did with the prayer breakfast and what the prayer breakfast did with her. Not a peep.
That is a patently false presentation of religion in Russia.
I didn't say that, you did. But your statement suggests you think it is more OK for top FBI and CIA agents, and the Secretary of State to sign off on illegal spying against the other party's presidential campaign in the United States than for some Russian hacker to fool John Podesta into giving up his email password.
One is typical of what every foreign government, and our own does to gather intelligence in foreign countries. The other should never happen in our country. Can you tell which is which?
And one more thing. The forensic evidence points to a local transfer using a thumb drive at the DNC. The theft you are referring to may have been done by a young American working at the DNC. His name could be Seth Rich, and he may well have died for it.
As to confiscating personal property illegally, have you read about the the various seizures by the Mueller team? Are you OK with them?
Russia's Newest Law: No Evangelizing Outside of Church | News ...
Christians are Severely Persecuted in Putin's Russia – But That Could ...
Christian Persecution Increasing in Russia - Christian News Headlines
Report: Non-Orthodox Christians Face 'Strong Discrimination' in Russia
Russia, other former Soviet republics persecuting Christians, new ...
Moscow church destroyed in sign of new Russian repression Posted on Sep 26, 2012 | by Jill Nelson
MOSCOW (BP) -- It was in the early hours of the morning on Sept. 6 when Pastor Vasili Romanyuk's phone rang. A group of men backed by local police were demolishing his Holy Trinity Pentecostal Church, housed in a three-story building nestled in a Moscow suburb. As word spread, congregants arrived at the scene hoping to save the building, but their efforts were futile. By dawn the church was in ruins and some of its most valuable contents were missing.
An isolated incident? A misunderstanding? Analysts watching the current climate in the former Cold War country don't think so: "This destruction of the church is about as concrete of evidence as you can get that something very bad and very troubling is taking place," said Katrina Lantos Swett, chair of the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom. "This could not have happened without the backing, support, and implicit blessing of the police."
The incident is just one sign of deteriorating freedoms in Russia, and behind the scenes a cozy relationship between the Kremlin and the Russian Orthodox Church has raised more than a few eyebrows. As President Vladimir Putin digs into his third term, a number of Kremlin crackdowns involving vague interpretations of the country's extremism law and other human-rights abuses are troubling signs that the country has slipped into a familiar, repressive era.
"When you have unknown people backed by the police coming out at midnight to begin tearing down a church, you know something doesn't smell right," Lantos Swett said.
Officials evicted Holy Trinity Church from its original building in 1995 and relocated the church to the eastern Moscow suburb. The congregation used its own funds to construct a new building and repeatedly battled officials over permits. The church demolition and its history reflect an emerging pattern: Authorities confiscate land from non-favored religious communities and force the congregation to relocate to a remote suburb, the religious leaders apply for permits that are subsequently denied, and officials confiscate (once again) or demolish the relocated congregation, citing lack of proper documentation.
Pastor Romanyuk and a small group of the church's 550 congregants arrived on site around 3:30 a.m. as about 45 men claiming to be civil volunteers blocked them from the building and threw stones. "When I arrived, I just burst into tears," 25-year-old Natalya Cherevichinik told The Moscow Times as she surveyed the destruction. "I couldn't believe that something that had been built over several years could be destroyed in a few hours."
Russian Evangelicals Leery of Orthodox Church, Friday, December 30, 2011:
class="adjusted">MOSCOW, Russia -- For decades, the Russian Orthodox Church was persecuted under the Soviet Union's Communist Party.
Since the early 1990s, the church has grown in size and influence as its relationship with the Russian government has improved significantly.
However, that cozy relationship worries the country's evangelicals.
Threats Against Evangelicals
For eight years, Yuri Sipko ran one of the largest Baptist organizations in Russia. Now, 20 years after the fall of Communism, he worries about the growing threats against the country's evangelical movement.
"The collapse of Communism was supposed to usher in an era of greater religious freedom, but I'm concerned we are moving in the wrong direction," Sipko said.
What makes the Russian evangelicals very concerned is an emerging relationship between the Russian government and the Russian Orthodox Church.
"For example, the government recently introduced religious classes based on the principals of the Orthodox Church in public schools," Sipko said.
"Then late last year, the Russian president announced an initiative to appoint Orthodox chaplains to all army units," he said. "Our constitution clearly states no religion can be the state religion."
Russia Church-State Relations
Russia watchers credit two men, Prime Minister Vladimir Putin and President Dmitry Medvedev, for elevating the church's prominence. The state media has also played a key role, often showing the leaders attending church services.
Sergey Ryakhovski knows both men well. As head of Russia's Pentecostal Union, he meets regularly with top government and Orthodox Church leaders.
Ryakhovski worries that the Orthodox Church's influence is coming at the expense of religious freedom, especially for minority groups such as Christians, Jews, Muslims, and Buddhists.
"There are so many laws and by-laws that regulate religious life in Russia," Ryakhovski said. "For example, evangelical Christians just can't go out and buy a church building or buy a piece of land to build a church."
"Plus, criticizing or challenging the Orthodox Church is not a task for all," he added.
Orthodox Church Revival
The Russian Orthodox Church on the other hand has had it easy in recent times after decades of state persecution.
Church buildings that were destroyed during the Soviet era have been rebuilt with Russian taxpayer money. In the past 20 years, the government has spent hundreds of millions of dollars restoring some 23,000 churches.
Most Russians say they belong to the Orthodox Church. Yet CBN News found mixed reactions on the streets of Moscow to the growing bond between church and state
At Expense of All Others, Putin Picks a Church
By CLIFFORD J. LEVY Published: April 24, 2008
STARY OSKOL, Russia —
It was not long after a Methodist church put down roots here that the troubles began.
First came visits from agents of the F.S.B., a successor to the K.G.B., who evidently saw a threat in a few dozen searching souls who liked to huddle in cramped apartments to read the Bible and, perhaps, drink a little tea. Local officials then labeled the church a “sect.” Finally, last month, they shut it down.
There was a time after the fall of Communism when small Protestant congregations blossomed here in southwestern Russia, when a church was almost as easy to set up as a general store. Today, this industrial region has become emblematic of the suppression of religious freedom under President Vladimir V. Putin.
Just as the government has tightened control over political life, so, too, has it intruded in matters of faith. The Kremlin’s surrogates in many areas have turned the Russian Orthodox Church into a de facto official religion, warding off other Christian denominations that seem to offer the most significant competition for worshipers. They have all but banned proselytizing by Protestants and discouraged Protestant worship through a variety of harassing measures, according to dozens of interviews with government officials and religious leaders across Russia.
Russia's De-Facto State Religion : Persecution : http://www ... www.persecution.org/?p=9350&upm... International Christian Co... Putin frequently appears with the Orthodox head, Patriarch Aleksei II, ... Baptists, evangelicals, Pentecostals and many others who cut Christ's robes like bandits, ...
Government Returning Land to Religious Organizations to Favor Orthodox Tuesday, March 3rd, 2009: An ambitious draft law on the transfer of property of religious significance to religious organisations may reignite a process begun in 1993.
The idea that “The Christian Right” is necessarily represented by the National Prayer Breakfast is absurd. The headline should read, “Why the NY Post wants you to believe the Christian Right has embraced Putin.” And “sanctions everything Trump did/does” could be added.
First mistake is believing that Marina Butina is what she is portrayed to be or charged with being. This is the same Democrats running around finding closet Russians, that once ran around finding Communists, then denounced the communist hunters
WAIT, could that be why they hate the Russians so much? Russians themselves kicked communism to the curb?
That "conservatives don’t have trouble with Trump seemingly cozying up to Putin" is a false presumption as a broad brush.
That conservatives are not vocally critical of his lack of censure of Putin is likely due to the Left railing against him, while Trump is the more pro-conservative Pres. since Reagan, albeit with far more character faults (none of which he seems able to see or acknowledge, which is one of them). .
I agree completely.
The Mueller seizures have been backed by search warrants.
What Russian hacking was backed by a search warrant?
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