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ABOARD THE PAPAL PLANE, July 30 (Reuters) - Pope Francis said on Saturday that his advancing age and his difficulty walking have ushered in a new, slower phase of his papacy and repeated that he would be ready to resign one day if serious health problems prohibited him from running the Church. "I don't think I can continue doing trips with the same rhythm as before," he said in answers to reporters' questions aboard the plane returning to Rome from a week-long trip in Canada. read more For the past few months Francis, 85, has been using a wheelchair, a...

Is the world edging towards an ‘accidental’ nuclear war? UK National Security Adviser warns of warfare due to communication breakdown between the West, Russia and China. The West could accidentally stumble into a nuclear war with Russia or China, according to the United Kingdom’s national security adviser Stephen Lovegrove. He says communication channels between the West and its rivals have collapsed, citing Russia’s invasion of Ukraine as the clearest example of this breakdown.

The Left's fundamental problem is that its haughtiness, fervor, and zeal for gaslighting sane Americans is belied by its unpopularity. Community organizer and left-wing social activist Saul Alinsky wrote in his 1971 book Rules for Radicals, “he who controls the language controls the masses.” Alinsky, whose work profoundly influenced at least one notable fellow Chicagoan, Barack Obama, was in that quip channeling George Orwell’s famous dystopian novel, Nineteen Eighty-Four. “Newspeak,” the language of Orwell’s fictional single-political party superstate, was a tool devised for monitoring the people’s communications, prosecuting “thoughtcrimes,” and ultimately controlling and dictating the people’s very beliefs. Conservatives have...

Firefighters finally had a blaze at Jim’s Steaks in South Philadelphia under control Friday afternoon, several hours after it broke out and weaved through the popular cheesesteak joint's heating and cooling system. More than 100 firefighters responded to the blaze and they had a hard time putting it out because of difficult to access flames snaking through the building's HVAC system, Philadelphia Fire Department Commissioner Adam Thiel said at a press conference shortly before 2 p.m. Eventually, the fire was placed under control, officials at the scene said. “We’re very concerned about the structural stability of this building. There really...

The Air Force is grounding the majority of its F-35 Joint Strike Fighter fleet today, due to a faulty component inside its ejection seat that could prevent the pilot from being able to safely egress from the aircraft during an emergency, Breaking Defense has learned. In response to an inquiry, Air Combat Command spokeswoman Alexi Worley confirmed the temporary standdown of ACC-controlled F-35s. “ACC’s F-35s do have Martin-Baker ejection seats, and on July 19, began a Time Compliance Technical Directive to inspect all of the cartridges on the ejection seat within 90 days,” she stated. “Out of an abundance of...

Russian soldiers appeared to castrate a Ukrainian war prisoner in a video circulating online, drawing international shock and condemnation. In the graphic video, a soldier wearing blue surgical gloves and a distinctive wide-brimmed black hat stomps on the head of a prisoner lying facedown on the ground. Another soldiers stands on the prisoner’s legs. The prisoner is wearing camouflage, with part of the pants cut away, and his hands are bound behind his back. A blue and yellow patch on his shoulder identifies him as Ukrainian. The assailant then mutilates the prisoner using a box cutter-type knife with a green...

A key measure of inflation showed prices soaring by more than expected in June. The personal consumption expenditure price index rose by 6.8 percent compared with 12 months earlier, an acceleration of inflation from the 6.3 percent annual gain in May, according to data released Friday by the Bureau of Economic Analysis. Economists had expected a slightly lower reading of 6.6 percent. This is the biggest year-0ver-year gain since January of 1982. Compared with the prior month, the personal consumption expenditure price index was up one percent, a big increase from the monthly gain of 0.6 percent in May and...

BEIJING – Is Russia’s invasion of Ukraine merely the first in a series of conflicts that will make Europe seem more like the Middle East in the coming years? A Chinese academic who requested anonymity put that question to me last week, and his reasoning showed just how differently non-Westerners view a war that is reshaping the European geopolitical order. In speaking with Chinese academics to understand how they view the world, I have found that they start from a fundamentally different position than many in the West do. It’s not just that they are more likely to blame the...

Russian gas producer Gazprom said on Saturday it had stopped supplying gas to EU member state Latvia, accusing it of violating conditions for gas withdrawal. "Today, Gazprom suspended its gas supplies to Latvia... due to violations of the conditions" of purchase, the company said on Telegram. It was not specified which withdrawal condition had been violated. The move comes a day after Latvian energy firm Latvijas Gaze said it was buying gas from Russia and paying in euros rather than in rubles. In March Russian President Vladimir Putin said countries deemed unfriendly to Moscow would have to pay for gas...

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In scenes akin to those traditionally associated with authoritarian regimes, police in Britain were filmed arresting a military veteran for posting a meme critical of woke gender ideology on Facebook. “Is this the Gestapo? What has gone wrong in our country?” the veteran questioned as he was being placed in handcuffs by three officers in broad daylight outside of his suburban home.

The UK government on Tuesday sanctioned British YouTuber Graham Philips, one of the most prominent pro-Kremlin online conspiracy theorists who has over 320,000 subscribers to his channel. Phillips, who describes himself as a "British documentary maker" and "independent," has been accused of spreading pro-Russian propaganda during the country's invasion of Ukraine. His assets in the UK will be frozen, the BBC reported. Phillips currently lives in the eastern Donbas region of Ukraine, where Russia currently occupies a large percentage of territory. He was previously banned from the country in 2014, but made his way back following Russia's large-scale invasion in...

Western sanctions against Russia are the most ill-conceived and counterproductive policy in recent international history. World energy prices are rocketing, inflation is soaring, supply chains are chaotic and millions are being starved of gas, grain and fertiliser. Defence analysts are dumb on the subject. Strategy thinktanks are silent. Yet, hint at scepticism on the subject and you will be excoriated as “pro-Putin” and anti-Ukraine. The reality of sanctions on Russia is that they invite retaliation. Putin is free to freeze Europe this winter. He has slashed supply from major pipelines such as Nord Stream 1 by up to 80%. World...

The New York bishop who was robbed at gunpoint during a livestreamed service was once accused of conning a congregant out of her life savings, according to court documents - all while running his unsuccessful campaign for Brooklyn Borough president in 2021. Bishop Lamor Whitehead, known for his designer clothes and luxury cars, raised eyebrows when police valued the worth of the jewelry stolen from him and his family on Sunday to be close to $1 million. Whitehead has over 1.6 million followers on Instagram, where he regularly goes live. The parishioner, Pauline Anderson, sued Whitehead in September 2021, alleging...

BORODYANKA, Ukraine -- Ihor is lucky, relatively speaking: He's alive. He survived the Russian bombardment of Borodyanka, a town northwest of Kyiv that was among the those hit hardest in the first weeks following the large-scale invasion on February 24, and one of the places where evidence of war crimes by the occupying forces has mounted since their retreat at the end of March. Ihor survived by chance, mainly. He and his mother, Tamara, had been moving around within the nine-story apartment building on the main street where they lived, first holing up on the ground floor and then, on...

TOWN OF DOVER — A Racine County man has admitted to surreptitiously ordering the absentee ballots of two prominent elected officials and requesting them to be mailed to his house in to prove that he could, even though that appears to be a felony. “What I did was illegal. Not only illegal, it was criminal. But I’m guided by a moral compass. Because something is illegal, does that mean we shouldn’t do it?” the man, Harry Wait, said in a phone interview Thursday evening. “I want to prove this can happen. Do we want to invite banks to leave their...

Conservative Kentucky Senator Rand Paul has long opposed Nato enlargement and suggested that the Russian invasion of Ukraine was justified.An outspoken Republican senator is set to delay American approval of Finland's Nato application, which must be approved by all 30 Nato member countries. Sen. Rand Paul from Kentucky has called for the United States to ignore Nato's Article 5, which automatically guarantees US aid to another member country that is under attack. He argues that any such action must require congressional approval. Paul is pushing for the Senate to vote on an amendment to that effect – which has little...

President Joe Biden continues to see his dismal polling numbers get even worse, with his average through the first six quarters of his presidency the lowest in history. Biden, 79, had a poll approval of just 40 per cent at the end of his sixth quarter in office earlier this month. That is the lowest ever for a US leader at that stage of his presidency. Donald Trump scored 42 per cent approval at the same stage of his presidency, which was the lowest score in US history - until Biden came along.

“Who hath ascended up into heaven, or descended? who hath gathered the wind in his fists? who hath bound the waters in a garment? who hath established all the ends of the earth? what is his name, and what is his son's name, if thou canst tell” (Proverbs 30:4).

Join with fellow FREEPERS across the world to pray for AMERICA: For those in Authority in Government, Family, Military, Business, Agri-Business, Healthcare, Education, Churches, Technology, 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. CHRIST ABOVE ALL!