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First, what are your favorite Christmas songs? I would name Silver Bells, Do You Hear What I Hear, and White Christmas by Bing Crosby, Holly Jolly Christmas by Burl Ives, O Come, O Come, Emmanuel by Enya, Frosty the Snowman, and Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer. Second, what are some hymns, and other pieces of Christian music, that resonate at Christmas?

Emma Akpan is a faith leader at her North Carolina African Methodist Episcopal Church. She also volunteers for Planned Parenthood. Akpan wrote a column for Bustle this week trying to justify her abortion advocacy with her Christian faith by claiming that she wants to end violence against women. Akpan described herself a minister at her church. “I am a clinic greeter because of my faith, which teaches me how important it is to provide care for my community,” the Raleigh, North Carolina, woman wrote. “For me, that means ensuring that women have safe access to their health care facilities.” Akpan,...

Choice. It’s a word that Planned Parenthood loves to use when promoting the killing of unborn babies in abortions. But now, the abortion chain is abandoning its favorite word in an underhanded attempt to force Christians to pay for birth control, including methods that may cause abortions, in their employee health plans. Crystal Strait, president of Planned Parenthood Affiliates of California, recently wrote an opinion piece for The Sacramento Bee to argue their case. Strait blasted President Donald Trump’s administration for rolling back President Barack Obama’s birth control mandate. The onerous requirement forced groups like the nuns of Little Sisters...

A young woman sits in the waiting room of American Women’s Medical Center on Chicago’s northwest side, waiting to be called back to the operating room for her procedure. Even now, she’s unsure about the choice she’s made. She knows that abortion is against her religion, but she feels cornered. This is the only way out. Then she hears something that breaks through her anguished thoughts. A group of voices is singing outside the building. She recognizes the familiar words of a Christmas carol: “’round yon virgin, mother and child, holy infant, so tender and mild.” Outside, a group of...

Alliance Defending Freedom attorneys representing the March for Life Education and Defense Fund have filed motions in two federal courts asking to be allowed to help defend Department of Health and Human Services rules issued in October that protect pro-life nonprofit organizations from the Obama-era abortion-pill mandate. ADF attorneys also represent Dordt College in Iowa in one of the motions. Both March for Life and Dordt College have been involved in separate lawsuits challenging the mandate, which forces employers, regardless of their moral convictions, to provide insurance coverage for abortion-inducing drugs under threat of heavy financial penalties. The new HHS...

When it comes to advertising on the D.C. metro, free speech is in for a bumpy ride. In a classic case of viewpoint discrimination, a federal judge is siding with the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority (WMATA) for turning down ad space to the Catholic Church. WMATA defended the move by saying it bans “religious, political, or advocacy” messages (depending on who’s defining them, apparently, since the Human Rights Campaign still enjoys a prominent space in the subway’s line-up). Even so, the Archdiocese of Washington complains, nothing about their message was overtly spiritual. The scene is three wise men, two...

FULL TITLE: Planned Parenthood Uses Baptist, Catholic, Methodist, Lutheran and Episcopal Labels to Push Fundraising Campaign Trying to claim the moral high ground, the abortion chain Planned Parenthood created a new social media campaign this week to make it look like it receives a lot of religious support. In essence, the abortion group is saying: “Look! We’re a great cause. Religious people support us, and you should, too!” Just ignore the fact that Planned Parenthood is responsible for destroying the lives of about 320,000 unborn babies each year – something most religious people find morally repugnant.That it has been caught...

FULL TITLE: Principal Who Screamed at Pro-Life Teen: “I Don’t Give a S— What Jesus Says” Says His Life’s Been a Wreck Ever Since Earlier this year and assistant principal at a Pennsylvania high school was caught on video yelling profanities at pro-life teenagers who are holding signs demonstrating against abortion. The teenager, Conner Haines, was part of a Christian group called Project Frontlines that was hosting a “holocaust of abortion” display on the public sidewalks outside the school. The pro-lifers showed photos of aborted babies and other information to help educate the public about abortion. Haines and his sister...

No man can serve two masters, the Bible teaches, but Mike Pence is giving it his all....that he recognizes the absurdity of his situation; that he knows just what sort of man he’s working for; that while things may look bad now, there is a grand purpose at work here, a plan that will manifest itself in due time. Let not your hearts be troubled, he seems to be saying. I’ve got this... Richard Land, the president of the Southern Evangelical Seminary and one of Trump’s faith advisers, told me. “I don’t know anyone who’s more consistent in bringing his...

The Star A-I (PG) John Mulderig Thursday, November 23, 2017 4:50 AM NEW YORK (CNS) — A holiday treat suitable for all but the tiniest, "The Star" (Sony) is a delightful animated version of the Christmas story told from the perspective of some of the animals present in the manger. Director Timothy Reckart and screenwriter Carlos Kotkin skillfully balance religious themes such as the importance of prayer and the value of forgiveness with a more secular message about pursuing your dreams. They also throw in a healthy dose of straightforward entertainment. They work their way into the biblical narrative of...

The interracial stuff isn’t cutting edge anymore. So Starbucks has to cap off this Christmas ad with lesbian lovebirds: ***VIDEO ON LINK**** Starbucks appears to confirm the allegation that a lesbian couple is featured on the company’s Christ-free Christmas cup: ***TWEET ON LINK*** Moonbats have finally found a use for Christmas; it can be an opportunity to thumb their noses at Christian values.

Hungary’s Viktor Orbán has launched a stunning denunciation of globalism, declaring that the “true spirit of the age” points to a resurgence of conservative values centred on country, family, and tradition. The Hungarian premier drew battle lines between a “silent majority” of ordinary people who “provide for their families, love their homelands, and insist on their Christian roots” on the one hand, and the “globalist elites, the bureaucrats who serve them, the politicians in their pay, and the agents of the Soros-type networks that embody their interests” on the other. “We should realise that the soothing melodies pouring out of...

SPINDALE, N.C. -- When Andre Oliveira answered the call to leave his Word of Faith Fellowship congregation in Brazil to move to the mother church in North Carolina at the age of 18, his passport and money were confiscated by church leaders -- for safekeeping, he said he was told. Trapped in a foreign land, he said he was forced to work 15 hours a day, usually for no pay, first cleaning warehouses for the secretive evangelical church and later toiling at businesses owned by senior ministers. Any deviation from the rules risked the wrath of church leaders, he said,...

FULL TITLE: Revealed: The evangelical North Carolina church that 'kidnapped children with the help of a social worker insider and brainwashed them through years of abuse' A secretive church congregation in North Carolina has used money, influence and lies to rip more than two dozen children from their parents and take them in as their own, an investigation has revealed. Once the children were inside the Word of Faith Fellowship in Spindale, North Carolina, the evangelical church physically and verbally abused them for years, former congregation members claim. Word of Faith Fellowship regularly used its muscle to turn children against...

There are many religious people in the pro-life movement, and they take courage and inspiration from their faith. Pro-life Christians want their pastors to speak out against abortion. But the following clergy members have come out in favor of abortion, and some of the things they say are shocking. To illustrate exactly what they are talking about when they speak of abortion, below is a picture of an 8-week-old preborn baby, a potential victim of an abortion. ***IMAGE ON LINK*** There are many religious people in the pro-life movement, and they take courage and inspiration from their faith. Pro-life Christians...

Texas religious leaders gathered Thursday to bless an abortion clinic and its staff as a judge considers whether to allow the state to ban brutal dismemberment abortions on live unborn babies. The pro-abortion clergy prayed at the Whole Woman’s Health abortion facility in Fort Worth, Texas, blessing its staff and patients, saying prayers and singing “Hallelujah,” according to the Daily Caller. The Texas abortion chain is one of the groups challenging the state dismemberment abortion ban. It also has a poor reputation for patient health and safety, racking up dozens of health and safety violations in the past decade. They...

DURHAM, North Carolina, November 3, 2017 (LifeSiteNews) – A Catholic nurse is suing Duke University Hospital, claiming that the university discriminated against her religious and pro-life beliefs by requiring her to assist in abortions. Sara T. Pedro was told during her employee orientation that Duke University Hospital provides no exceptions to employees in its Emergency Department who don’t want to participate in abortions. The lawsuit, filed by The Thomas More Law Center on Pedro's behalf, says that Duke’s Emergency Department performs “a large number of abortions.” The lawsuit claims that Pedro faced retaliation and discrimination after she made a written...

As can be seen in the region every day, it is not realistic to expect the Assyrians to be quiet and accept their "fate" under the tender mercies of Shiite or Sunni rule. The future Assyrian regional government could be an independent state or autonomous region like the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) in Iraq. Even if it is city-state like Vatican City, it would be monumental in stopping the annihilation of Assyrian people and could also serve as a safe haven for other persecuted minorities. "Thank God that Jews, a historically persecuted people just like us, now have Israel......

As expected, the response to my article “Since When Did Jesus Get Connected to Guns?” was fast and furious, especially from those who failed to read the article.Many adamantly defended their right as Christians to defend themselves, while others pointed to the Second Amendment, despite my stating explicitly that “I am not questioning our right to defend ourselves” and that my article was not “about the Second Amendment.”Others pointed to Luke 22:35-38, where Jesus apparently told His disciples to go out and buy swords, telling them they had “enough” with the two they had on hand. For these readers, this...

Speaking at a dinner in Washington, D.C., on Wednesday evening that was hosted by In Defense of Christians, Vice President Mike Pence said that he and President Trump see that crimes committed by radical Islamic terrorists in Middle East against Christians in that region as “vile acts of persecution animated by hatred for Christians and the Gospel of Christ.” “Let me assure you tonight, President Trump and I see these crimes for what they are--vile acts of persecution animated by hatred for Christians and the Gospel of Christ,” said Pence. “And so, too, does this President know who and what...