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God chose us “that we should be holy and blameless before Him” (Eph. 1:4). The challenge of Christian living is to increasingly match your practice to your position. God chose you in Christ to make you holy and blameless in His sight. To be “holy” is to be separated from sin and devoted to righteousness. To be “blameless” is to be pure without spot or blemish—like Jesus, the Lamb of God (1 Pet. 1:19). Ephesians 1:4 is a positional statement. That is, Paul describes how God views us “in Christ.” He sees us as holy and blameless because Christ our...

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8 January 2026 Thursday after Epiphany Sunday Collegial Church of St Michael and St Gudula, Brussels Readings at MassThe readings shown here are for places where the Epiphany is celebrated on Sunday 4 January.If you are celebrating the Epiphany on Tuesday 6 January this year then these are not the right readings. To see the right readings, you need to set this web site to use your own local calendar. On this web page, find the list of dates. After the last date there is a heading which says “Calendar Used”. Click on the calendar name below this heading,...

🇺🇸Pray For The Peace of Jerusalem 🇮🇱(1/8/26)[Prayer]A New Study For A New Year: PersonalitiesGenesis 3:8-248 And they heard the voice of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day: and Adam and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God amongst the trees of the garden. 9 And the Lord God called unto Adam, and said unto him, Where art thou? 10 And he said, I heard thy voice in the garden, and I was afraid, because I was naked; and I hid myself. 11 And he said, Who told thee that...

Today, the House Judiciary Committee released an interim staff report titled "FireAid Apparently Misused Charitable Donations by Funding Illegal Aliens, Podcasters, and Non-Profits' Administrative Costs." Based on internal documents obtained by the Committee, the report details how FireAid—a fundraising initiative created to provide direct relief to wildfire victims in Southern California—diverted donations intended for fire victims to left-leaning pet projects, illegal aliens, and administrative costs for various non-profit organizations. FireAid advertised that all donations raised during its benefit concert would go directly to victims of the California wildfires. Unfortunately, this was not the case. To date, FireAid has granted $75...

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Rep. Steny Hoyer (D-Md.), the longest serving House Democrat, will not seek re-election in 2026 and retire after serving more than 44 years in Congress. “I did not want to be one of those members who clearly stayed, outstayed his or her ability to do the job,” Hoyer said in an interview Wednesday with the Washington Post. Hoyer, 86, plans to formally announce his retirement plans Thursday on the House floor. The Maryland Democrat is one of more than 40 House members who have opted to depart the lower chamber by the start of 2027. Hoyer’s district, southeastern Maryland’s 5th...

In an August City Journal piece, my former colleague John Sailer wonderfully quoted an anonymous professor: “Every day, the universities wake up and break the law.” Just about every faculty-hiring process in America’s colleges and universities discriminates—sometimes barely legally, when it’s just political discrimination to ensure that only radical professors get hired. The education-establishment discriminators do that by drafting job advertisements with specializations that ensure only radicals need apply: a preference for environmental history, human rights, and/or social movements when they’re subtle, a specialization in genderqueer Palestinian sociology with a concentration on community engagement in Dubuque when they’re not. Political...

... Mr. Romney’s lead idea is to eliminate the income limit on the Social Security payroll tax. He imagines that a huge 12.4% hike to the marginal rate on an essential cohort of the striving will have a “relatively small impact on economic growth.” Moreover, this whopping increase in social-insurance premiums wouldn’t come with better coverage. Mr. Romney would largely sever the link between Social Security contributions and benefits. We think these changes are poor policy—and we also note that they aren’t taxes on the rich but on salarymen. Mr. Romney dismisses the doomed-from-the-get-go DOGE effort to end the deficit...

The Trump administration said Wednesday it will control Venezuela’s oil sales “indefinitely” in the wake of deposed strongman ruler Nicolás Maduro’s capture. Energy Secretary Chris Wright asserted the US will market and sell Venezuelan crude, with proceeds held in US-controlled accounts that he said “can flow back” to Venezuela, a day after President Trump said Venezuela would turn tens of millions of barrels of oil over to the US. “Instead of the oil being blockaded, as it is right now, we’re gonna let the oil flow … to United States refineries and around the world to bring better oil supplies,...

An apparently homeless thief was electrocuted to death while trying to steal copper wiring from a California construction site — as power was knocked out to 2,500 homes, reports said. The unidentified man was killed Sunday in a vacant strip mall that’s in the process of being demolished, with witnesses saying they heard a loud explosion at around 2 p.m. before electricity went out for several hours, police told CBS News. The explosion is believed to be a transformer that blew up, knocking out power for several hours, Pomona police said. One neighbor rushed to the scene where a woman...

Tensions have been high in Minnesota, particularly after the Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) recent announcement that they’d be sending 2,000 ICE officers to the state. After the January 7 shooting that killed a 37-year-old woman in Minneapolis, Governor Tim Walz responded in a press conference, calling for protestors to remain calm, and rejecting any further federal law enforcement be sent to the Twin Cities. “I have a very simple message, Walz said, “We do not need any further help from the federal government. To Donald Trump and Kristi Noem, you’ve done enough.” DHS Secretary Noem herself held two separate...

Working out, we can see the all the local media "news" reports at the gym. Some network affiliated stations, some 'independent' ones. Amazing that Minnesota has been the epicenter of fraud and took center stage on that and Florida media is silent. Then the governor of the state, the handpicked running mate of the 'black' woman sidekick to Sleepy Joe, is forced to quit his attempt for re-election. Florida media again is silent. But a moron driver tries to run over an ICE agent and the Miami media...goes all in on "eeeevil Trump!"

Join with fellow FREEPERS to pray for AMERICA: For those in Authority in Government, Family, Military, Business, Healthcare, Education, Churches, and the Media. I urge, then, first of all, that requests, prayers, intercession and thanksgiving be made for everyone: for kings and all those in authority that we may live peaceful and quiet lives in all godliness and holiness. ~ 1 Timothy 2:1-2 Religion Forum Threads labeled [Prayer] are closed to debate of any kind. Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and petition with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace...

More than 100 people were killed during the U.S. military operation in Venezuela that captured Nicolás Maduro and his wife, the country's Interior Minister Diosdado Cabello said Wednesday...Cuba revealed on Monday that 32 of its citizens were killed during the operation...Seven U.S. service members were injured

Intestinal parasites are my companion in Costa Rica. Every six months or so I make a trip to the pharmacy and ask for pastillas antiparasiticos. The most common over-the-counter pill is the anti-protozoal agent Nitazoxanide: two pills a day for three days to treat an array of intestinal parasites. The pills scour your digestive system, wiping out nematodes, cestodes, and helminths, as well as various protozoa with exotic names such as Cryptosporidium parvum, Giardia lamblia, and Entamoeba histolytica. My body always lets me know when it is time for a treatment. The first sign is a growling stomach within a...

SALT LAKE CITY — Two people were killed and six were injured in a shooting in Salt Lake City's Rose Park neighborhood on Wednesday evening when a fight broke out in a church parking lot outside a funeral. The shooter or shooters remained at large as of the latest update from police at 11 p.m. "The situation still is very fluid. At this point, we know that there are at least eight victims, I can confirm that two of them have died; three of them are critical condition, and three others (are) in unknown condition," said Salt Lake police spokesman...

Jellyfish and sea anemones, despite lacking brains, show sleep behavior similar to that seen in humans, according to a new study published in Nature Communications. Researchers found that these simple marine animals, like jellyfish, experience periods of rest that align closely with human-like sleep, offering new insight into how sleep functions in creatures with nervous systems but no centralized brain. The study revealed that the upside-down jellyfish (Cassiopea andromeda) sleeps for about eight hours daily, primarily at night, with a short rest during the day. The starlet sea anemone (Nematostella vectensis), which was studied in a lab setting, also showed...

On my phone if I hold it straight up and down I cannot see free republic. The font size is too small. But if I flip it over and the phone is now east and west the font is big enough that I can scroll comfortably. Was this done on purpose?

A dangerous combination of bromazolam and fentanyl is fueling a sharp rise in overdose deaths across Oahu.The drug, often called fake Xanax or designer Xanax, is being mixed with other substances, mostly fentanyl, to make counterfeit prescription pills. Experts feel people experimenting, especially teens, will fall victim to the lethal combination. Bromazolam-related deaths have hit seven fatalities on Oahu so far this year. By comparison, in all of 2024, there were zero on the island with one in Hawaii County. “A lot of abusers and people in general take it for depression and anxiety,” said Gary Yabuta, director of the...