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Posted on September 7, 2019September 6, 2019 by Msgr. Charles Pope Four Depictions of Discipleship – A Homily for the 23rd Sunday of the Year In Sunday’s Gospel, Jesus defines four demands of discipleship. Let’s look at them one by one.I. The CONTEXT of discipleship – The text says that large crowds were following Jesus and so He turned to address them. Just about any time you find mention of a big crowd in the Bible, fasten your seat belt and prepare for a hard teaching. Jesus didn’t trust large crowds, who were often merely after what they could...

A young Houston woman shot and wounded at least one would-be-robber outside of her home early Tuesday morning, according to the police. Lachelle Hudgins had just parked her car when it was approached by two men, KTRK-TV reported. They tried to reach through her driver’s window and grab her purse, while the three others stood nearby, according to KTRK reporter Miya Shay. “I couldn’t do anything except scream,” Hudgins said. “At one point, they told me to stop screaming, and he reached his hand inside my car.” Before the thugs could swipe her purse, though, Hudgins acted quickly and snatched...

Florida Sens. Marco Rubio and Rick Scott on Wednesday asked President Trump to waive visa requirements for Bahamians affected by the shattering blow of Hurricane Dorian. The Republican lawmakers sent Trump a letter outlining their reasoning, citing their state's proximity to and relationship with the Bahamas. They asked Trump to make it easier for citizens of the Bahamas to come to the United States to reside with relatives while they rebuild their lives.

Bahamas Paradise Cruise Line ship Grand Celebration transported more than 1,100 Bahamians to the United States, the line said in a statement. Evacuees were taken to Port of Palm Beach in Riviera Beach, Florida, early Saturday, according to the cruise line. The ship was in the Bahamas on Thursday and Friday with nearly 300 first responders, 850 boxed lunches and a total of 225,000 pounds of supplies, including food and water, the line stated.

NORTHERN IRELAND & LONDON — "I'm starting to hear things that I haven't heard in a long time," Eileen Weir told Business Insider. "There was a republican funeral here yesterday and they shot over the coffin. I know that's a matter of honour for that fallen comrade, but at the same time, the IRA said all of there guns were out of use, so where did they get that gun?" Weir runs a cross-community women's centre in Shankill, west Belfast. Shankill was a focus of violence during The Troubles. Irish republican and unionist paramilitaries carried out lethal bomb attacks and...

Our gospel tune today is 16 Hands by Wylie & The Wild West (2007). THE WESTERNER https://thewesterner.blogspot.com/

Guns are in the news again. Democrats shamelessly use every mass shooting tragedy as an opportunity to take away the God-given and Constitution-given rights of gun owning Americans. Never forget what Obama’s Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel once said, “Never let a crisis go to waste.” Also, never forget that 41 people were shot over the Labor Day weekend in Chicago. Isn’t that a “mass shooting?” Doesn’t 100% Democrat-controlled Chicago already have the strictest gun control in the country? But nonetheless, I’m willing to compromise. I’m willing to give Democrats a crown jewel of what they’ve crusaded for, for decades....

My neighbor, E.Z. Ryder, fancies himself a farsighted entrepreneur and is always full of imaginative ideas. He was sitting on his front porch shuffling through a stack of blueprints as I pulled into my driveway. He waved and motioned me to join him, so I walked over. “See these plans? This is my best idea ever -- an assisted suicide center for political consultants.” “What? Why?” “I got this idea during the last presidential campaign.” Ryder said. “Political consultants burn through billions of dollars and have no idea what they’re doing except to enrich themselves. “They do a number of...

Pray For the Peace of Jerusalem (Old Testament) Daniel 3 The Image of Gold and the Blazing Furnace 3 King Nebuchadnezzar made an image of gold, sixty cubits high and six cubits wide,[a] and set it up on the plain of Dura in the province of Babylon. 2 He then summoned the satraps, prefects, governors, advisers, treasurers, judges, magistrates and all the other provincial officials to come to the dedication of the image he had set up. 3 So the satraps, prefects, governors, advisers, treasurers, judges, magistrates and all the other provincial officials assembled for the dedication of the image that King...

Today’s Campaign Update (Because The Campaign Never Ends) Pay attention to Brexit. – While our fake U.S. news media establishment has spent the week obsessing over President Donald Trump making a mark on a map with a Sharpie, some major, real events have been taking place across the Great Pond, in jolly old England. Ok, well, things aren’t exactly jolly in London right now, as a political war between the EU-captive elites and Brexit-favoring Prime Minister Boris Johnson has broken out into full public view. As we have seen in America with the “Never Trump” fake conservative subversives joining ranks...

And last week’s idiot award goes to that loveable old buffoon, Joey Biden, for giving a full guarantee that he would personally eliminate fossil fuels by 2050. He’s just going to wave them away, like with a cloth or something.And don’t write him and his crazy plan off; Joey may have started out as the Scarecrow,but thanks to the Democrats’ seniority system, he has been promoted to full Wizard.If Barack Hussein Obama taught us anything it is that we should believe them when they tell us what they intend to do. So if Joey says he’s going to eliminate fossil...

Ditching credit cards for facial recognition will remove the last physical barrier between our bodies and Corporate America Aram Sinnreich recently went grocery shopping at a Whole Foods Market in his hometown of Washington, D.C., and realized he had left his wallet at home. He had no cards and no cash, but he had no reason to worry — at least, not about paying for his food. “I used my iPhone to pay, and I unlocked it with my face,” he said. That’s when it struck him: We are just one small step away from paying with our bodily features...

<p>I knew a woman who was married to a professional man. He worked hard, long hours, was always inventive, creative. He was a dedicated father; she demanded it, for sure, but even beyond that, he was all in and was an extremely active dad. She didn’t like to cook, didn’t think it was her job, so he learned how. She didn’t like to tidy up, and he was no Mr. Clean, but he gave it a go. She wanted him to be compliant, yet resilient, and he tried to be all of the things she wanted. He even pretty well achieved it. He’d come so far that he sent us all a poem about how to appease the women in his house, who wanted him to leave the toilet seat down, he learned to pee sitting down. What a mensch! Only, in the end, she tired of his acquiescence and left him for a belligerent roofer 10 years her junior.</p>

...helping New York firefighters hunt for survivors. WHEN actors want to support a cause they might appear on a charity ad or visit the suffering with an army of cameras in tow. But seventeen years ago today, as the world reeled from the 9/11 terror attacks, Hollywood actor Steve Buscemi instead donned a uniform he hadn't worn in nearly two decades to help hunt for survivors. *snip* The Reservoir Dogs and Boardwalk Empire star pulled 12-hour shifts for several days alongside other emergency service personnel. He wasn't there for publicity and refused all interview requests during the days he spent...

Ten takeaways from a dramatic and occasionally mystifying Saturday in college football: 1. We welcome LSU into the 21st Century of offensive football. The most consistently underwhelming offense in the elite echelon of the sport has roared to life in 2019, just a decade or two behind most of the aerial revolution. It has been the biggest thing preventing the program from competing for a national title since 2011, when it made the BCS Championship Game. But after beating Texas 45-38, the Tigers have announced their arrival as a modern football power.

“Unto you, O men [or the collective sense of mankind], I call; and my voice is to the sons of man [son of Adam]. O ye simple, understand wisdom: and, ye fools, be ye of an understanding heart. Hear; for I will speak of excellent things; and the opening of my lips shall be right things” (Proverbs 8:4-6 KJV).

(Video at Source) Hong Kong (CNN) - Protests calling on US President Donald Trump to intervene in the ongoing Hong Kong political standoff escalated rapidly Sunday, with marchers setting fire to a barricade outside a subway station entrance in the city's business district. Earlier in the day, tens of thousands of protesters waving US flags marched on Hong Kong's US Consulate to call for help from the Trump administration in ending a three-month confrontation with the government. The march began in the Chater Garden public park in Central before heading to the consulate as part of the 14th straight weekend...

This is a great website that can be used as a resource by FReepers to debate wind energy. They lay out the damage to our environment and how gov't ignores the very people who supported "green" power.

Vegan activists stormed a Spanish rabbit farm this weekend, and were surprised when the farmers fought back when they attempted to steal their property. A video posted to Twitter shows a British vegan activist with her face covered in blood, who goes on to detail why they are in such a state.On the description of the original Instagram post, Mythical.Mia details what happened when they attempted to “rescue” 16 rabbits from the farm: The farmer was extremely aggressive and attacked us, strangling activists and smashing their heads with metal poles. The police came and told us to leave peacefully, which...

The latest Marquette Law School poll should serve as a warning to President Donald Trump and encourage more Republicans to support reasonable limits on guns. Trump is trailing his top Democratic challenger, former Vice President Joe Biden, by 9 percentage points — 42 percent to 51 percent — among registered voters in Wisconsin, a crucial swing state in the 2020 election. And based on several questions about gun control in the statewide survey, the Republican president’s inaction on mass shootings isn’t helping his reelection chances. According to the Marquette poll released last week: 81 percent of respondents in Wisconsin favor...