Free Republic

In the fourth century, St. Ambrose of Milan spoke truth to power. U.S. bishops could learn something from him.On Saturday, New Mexico state Sen. Joe Cervantes, a Democrat from Las Cruces, tweeted that because he voted to repeal a state law that criminalized abortion, he was denied communion by Bishop Peter Baldacchino, apparently after several warnings (something the senator conveniently neglected to mention).I was denied communion last night by the Catholic bishop here in Las Cruces and based on my political office. My new parish priest has indicated he will do the same after the last was run off. Please...

What is Church Discipline? There is hardly a practice in the local church that is misused more than “church discipline.” Don’t get me wrong, I don’t have many answers and its misuse is understandable. I think there are three primary ways we can find it misused: 1) It is never used at all, 2) it is used in an unbiblical way, and 3) people are brought in for discipline for “sins” that don’t require its use. Matthew 18:15-17 is the primary passage that speaks to the practice of church discipline (even if we are still left with a lot...

FARGO, North Dakota, August 11, 2011 (LifeSiteNews.com) - The Church should seek the conversion of pro-abortion politicians, but if they remain obstinate they should be expelled from the Church, says Bishop Samuel Aquila of Fargo. The Bishop proposed in an interview with Catholic World Report this week that Bishops should take their cue from the Gospel of Matthew in handling pro-abortion politicians. “Our Lord tells us to speak to the person, and then take two or three others with us if he does not change,” he said. “If he still does not change, the Church can speak to him,...

Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary has asked an association of churches to leave its Fort Worth, Texas, campus because the seminary says the group has a member church or churches that tolerate homosexuality. A 1997 affiliation agreement between Tarrant Baptist Association and the seminary for use of an office building on the campus requires that the two organizations remain in "theological harmony." The seminary, which is associated with the Southern Baptist Convention, contends that the association has violated the agreement for retaining fellowship with a church or churches that don't adhere to the denomination's position that homosexuality is a sin. "The...

Allegations made by Cheryl Maher that she had hot-tubbed nude with Kevin Garn when she was 15 were taken seriously by the LDS Church, and were referred to Garn's local ecclesiastical leaders to be dealt with, a church spokesman said. In August 2008, Maher wrote a seven-page letter to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints President Thomas Monson describing the hot tub incident, its impact on her life and making other allegations against Garn. Five days later, she received a letter from Brook Hales, secretary to the First Presidency, that said, "Please be assured this matter will be...

Disgraced pastor Ted Haggard won't be fundraising for a Monument nonprofit run by a sex offender, won't be ministering to anyone and needs to get a job, his overseers said in a statement released Wednesday. "Mr. Haggard's solicitation for personal support was inappropriate," his church supervisors said. The statement came one day after the four-member team of ministers responsible for overseeing the spiritual restoration of Haggard met with him in Phoenix.

(Matthew 18:1-35)When someone becomes a follower of Jesus Christ, he also becomes part of a spiritual family. He belongs, as Jesus said, to “these little ones who believe in me” (Matthew 18:6). “In Christ, we who are many form one body, and each member belongs to all the others.” (Romans 12:5: cf. I Corinthians 12:24-27). Among the followers of Christ, there is a powerful spiritual unity that overcomes social and ethnic distinctions that separate people in the larger culture.Believers form a spiritual family of brothers and sisters in Christ. Our loyalty to Christ and to those who belong to Him is so significant that...

“One of the most glaring omissions in modern Baptist church life is the absence of the regular practice of biblical church discipline,” wrote New Orleans Seminary professor Stan Norman in a paper presented at the second conference in Southwestern Seminary’s Baptist Distinctives Series, held this fall. Titled “The Reestablishment of Proper Church Discipline,” Norman wrote that the concept of a spiritual accountability to God and one another is absent. Early Baptist congregations would gather to heal breaches of fellowship, admonish wayward members, rebuke the obstinate, and if required, remove the unrepentant. By engaging in these activities, Baptists believe they were...

How Discipline Died - The church should stop taking its cues from the state. by Marlin Jeschke - Christianity Today Magazine, August 2005 The Protestant reformers named three "marks by which the true church is known": the preaching of the pure doctrine of the gospel, the pure administration of the sacraments, and the exercise of church discipline to correct faults. Today, church discipline is feared as the mark of a false church, bringing to mind images of witch trials, scarlet letters, public humiliations, and damning excommunications. Does discipline itself need correction and redemption in order to be readmitted into the...

Author faces LDS discipline hearing The Salt Lake Tribune (USA), Dec. 8, 2004 http://www.sltrib.com By Peggy Fletcher Stack Mormon history: His text substantially differs from official versions of the church's origins Mormon author Grant H. Palmer has been summoned to an LDS Church disciplinary hearing on Sunday, facing possible excommunication for apostasy. The charge stems from Palmer's 2002 book, An Insider's View of Mormon Origins, which challenges the traditional explanations of the faith's founding events - Joseph Smith's First Vision, the visit of the Angel Moroni, Smith's translation of ancient writings on gold plates and the restoration of the priesthood....