Free Republic

“The statistics purport to show that most people who identify themselves as Christian turn out, when questioned on what they actually think, to be ‘overwhelmingly secular in their attitudes on issues ranging from gay rights to religion in public life’. Dawkins’s conclusion is that these self-identified Christians are ‘not really Christian at all’.”

When American troops removed Saddam Hussein from power, Muslim extremists took over Iraq. They launched a campaign of genocide against Iraqi Christians, and most Christians fled from Iraq, with many of them living in Syria as refugees. Syrian Christians make up 10 percent of the population of Syria, and belong to one of the oldest traditions of Christianity in the world. Remember that Saul of Tarsus converted to Christianity when he was on his way to Damascus, Syria, to persecute Christians. He changed his name to Paul, after Jesus knocked him off his horse. Paul wrote half of the New...

NASHVILLE, TENNESSEE, February 8, 2012, (LifeSiteNews.com) — One of the most influential evangelical leaders in the United States says Christians should go to jail rather than comply with the Obama administration’s mandate to provide all contraception, including abortion-inducing drugs, in their health care plans. Dr. Richard Land, president of the Southern Baptist Convention’s Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission (ERLC), told LifeSiteNews.com "we will not comply" with the Dept. of Health and Human Services’ mandate requiring religious institutions to cover abortifacient products such as Plan B, Ella, and the IUD. "We want the law changed, or else we’re going to write...

When Obama proposed the regulation that claims government has the authority to fine religious groups which don’t offer their employees health insurance with free contraception service, the fire storm he ignited began to spread among those expected to support him in the 2012 election, including some who backed Obamacare.

HANCEVILLE, Alabama, February 9, 2012 (LifeSiteNews.com) - Lawyers for the Eternal Word Television Network (EWTN) say that the broadcasting network has taken the Obama administration to court over a mandate forcing Catholic employers to pay for birth control, sterilization, and abortifacient drugs. The Becket Fund for Religious Liberty announced that it had filed suit Thursday morning on behalf of EWTN, considered the largest religious media network in the world. “The federal government cannot force people to violate their religion like this,” said Mark Rienzi, Senior Counsel at the Becket Fund and a constitutional law professor at the Catholic University of...

Obama's abortion rules for the Catholic religion are no different than requiring Muslims to eat pork.

Reporting from Golden, Colo. — On the eve of Republican presidential nomination contests in Minnesota, Missouri and Colorado, Rick Santorum tore into the Obama administration Monday over new rules that will force many religious employers to provide contraception to their workers. "That's just a bunch of poppycock," Santorum told reporters when asked about White House Press Secretary Jay Carney's statement that the administration was willing to work with religious groups to address their concerns. "I mean that's just ridiculous. Mr. President, we're not that stupid."

A couple from Texas who moved to a violence-plagued area of northern Mexico to run a Baptist church were found murdered on Tuesday in their ransacked home, relatives said. John and Wanda Casias, originally from Amarillo, Texas, moved to an area outside of Monterrey, Mexico, in the late 1970s or early 1980s to make it their home. Valerie Alirez, the eldest child of John Casias, said one of her brothers found her father and stepmother dead on Tuesday in their home in Santiago, Nuevo Leon. John Casias, 76, was a Baptist preacher and the couple ran the First Fundamentalist Independent...

OH MY WORD!!!! Fellow Freepers you MUST listen to this!!!! God was NOT mocked yesterday!!!! He was alive and well and used His servant, Eric Metaxas, yesterday to speak straight to the President. It starts at about 35min, BUT the GREAT moment takes place at the 45min mark. BEFORE the Preisdent speaks, God through Metaxas, says that people, even Satan use the scripture to do the OPPOSITE of what God does. I was BLOWN away!!!! Eric did not know that Obama would misuse the scripture in just a few short minutes but GOD DID!!!! THEN the most amazing thing happens...

... And nowhere is religious intolerance more present than in Iran. Baha'i's and Christians are consistently threatened with death and torture simply for believing. Simply for their beliefs. In September of this past year, a Christian Pastor was threatened with death if he refused to renounce his beliefs. And he is not alone in this. In Egypt, we have been witness to gruesome attacks against Coptic Christians. Attacks in the very places they hold to be sacred... Egyptians recognize that they will not have any freedoms, if they cannot be free to simply believe. Taken from the famous words of...

Contemporary Puritans are synonymous with Christian conservatives and the Religious Right, and are not direct descendants of the original Puritans of New England. They can be of any faith so long as they adhere to certain precepts that contemporary Puritans believe their ideological ancestors would accept. These beliefs include endorsing Judeo-Christian ethics in legal matters and worship as part of public ceremonies. Contemporary Puritans see the United States as enmeshed in a period of moral decline. They point to abortion, gay rights, divorce, violent crime, drugs and other social ills as proof of their beliefs. Although they are active in...

In Luke 18:9-14, Jesus told of two men who went down to worship. One was a publican and the other was a Pharisee. The Pharisee was so proud of his religious heritage and his legalistic achievement that he looked up to Heaven and said to God (I am paraphrasing here): “I thank you, Lord, that I am not like that sinner, for I have done this and I have done that and I have done the other thing and I really am a good guy.” The publican came in, bowed his head in conviction over his sin, pounded his chest...

The great British preacher John Newton had a friend, a poet by the name of William Cowper, who along with Newton wrote hymns which eventually were compiled in the Olney Hymnal. Cowper’s more noted contributions to this hymnal were “Oh, for a closer walk with God” and “There is a fountain filled with blood.”......Sadly, we find documented in Forbes Winslow’s Anatomy of Suicide (written in 1840) that Cowper has tried more than once to take his own life. As psychiatrist and Christian author John White puts it, “Here then we are presented with a gifted and Godly man, a man...

(MEMRI) — Yassir Al-Burhami: Appointing infidels to positions of authority over Muslims is prohibited. Allah said: “Never will Allah grant the infidels a way [to triumph] over the Believers.” We are not afraid of losing the elections or of not getting votes. We are not trying to ingratiate ourselves before the people. Can the Christians of Egypt be compared to the Jews of Al-Medina? The case of the Jews of Al-Medina is one example of the relations between the Muslims and the infidels. The Muslims can implement any form of conduct used by the Prophet Muhammad. When the Prophet Muhammad...

Dear FReepers, Since the first week in January, a worldwide sensation has swept the internet. Thousands of people have reported hearing trumpets, horns, clicking and thumping noises coming from out of the ground, or the mountains or in the forests. Basically, wherever the din of society can't drowned out the sounds.

Many GOP voters -- including some well-meaning Freepers -- keep attempting to lecture voters that Mitt Romney's Mormonism "doesn't matter." Well, tell that to three of every five South Carolina primary voters who, according to CNN exit polls, said a candidate's religion mattered either "a great deal" or "somewhat." Click EXIT POLLS: South Carolina for polling data. Only 40 percent of South Carolina GOP voters said that the "Religious Beliefs of Candidates Matter... Not Much/Not at All" Two-fifths of the "Not Much/Not at All" Crowd voted pro-Romney -- compared to... ...less than one-third of them voting for Gingrich... ...less than...

An author who grew up in the Mormon Church says she isn't surprised that a recent survey of Latter-day Saints (LDS) shows that they overwhelmingly consider themselves to be Christians. The survey, "Mormons in America: Certain in Their Beliefs, Uncertain of Their Place in Society," was conducted by The Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life. It shows that 97 percent of Mormons consider themselves Christians. But an earlier Pew survey of the general public found that only 51 percent of Americans agree. Tricia Erickson is the author of Can Mitt Romney Serve Two Masters? The Mormon Church Versus the...

How Will The Shocking Decline Of Christianity In America Affect The Future Of This Nation?January 19,2012 Is Christianity in decline in America? When you examine the cold, hard numbers it is simply not possible to come to any other conclusion. Over the past few decades, the percentage of Christians in America has been steadily declining. This has especially been true among young people. As you will see later in this article, there has been a mass exodus of teens and young adults out of U.S. churches. In addition, what "Christianity" means to American Christians today is often far different from...

Jimmy Carter meets with Muslim Brotherhood in Cairo - National Law Enforcement | Examiner.com http://www.examiner.com/law-enforcement-in-national/jimmy-carter-meets-with-muslim-brotherhood-cairo

Did Brigham Young teach that Christians are ignorant people? From our series entitled, "Are Mormons Christians?":

Did Joseph Smith say all Christian churches are wrong and Mormons should join none of them? From our series entitled, "Are Mormons Christians?":

A new set of issues for Christians in Southeastern Europe has arisen, largely as a result of misdirected policies of the Clinton/Albright and successive Washington administrations.Believe it or not, Christmas Carols in the Washington Embassy of Romania which, once-upon-a-time, was the instrument of a strident Stalinist-style government that was overthrown in 1990! I say once-upon-a-time because, though not so long ago, it seemed to me like a fairy-tale. There we were, about seventy invited guests, in the upstairs reception Hall of the Embassy, where a 4-man Brass Quartette from a Romanian Baptist church in Virginia presented a concert of about...

A group of "Christ Warriors" in Texas just outside of Dallas torched over 22 pairs of Air Jordan's (a lot of them the very ones people were rioting over during Christmas) on Friday night. The video is just making the rounds today on the net but they intend on making bigger statements shortly..that this was just the start. They are saying shoes and items like these are basically what is wrong with society in general and that at the end of the day they aren't worth anything without Christ in your life and at the gates of Heaven. Arguments have...

MAIDUGURI, Nigeria — Like many other Christian outposts in the spiritual homeland of Nigeria’s “Taliban,” the Victory Baptist Church in the northern desert city of Maiduguri no longer relies solely on God for protection. A modest whitewashed spire in a skyline dominated by mosques, for the last month it has had a military guard to defend it from Boko Haram, the militant local Islamist sect blamed for a string of attacks nationwide in recent weeks. The soldiers in the sandbagged machine-gun nest outside the church, though, were unable save three members of the flock last week.

A recent letter by members of a devout Muslim group in Somalia epitomizes the Islamic war on non-Muslims. In the letter, members of Al-Shabaab warned church leaders to stop preaching the gospel to Muslims. Al-Shabaab, who has publicly announced its intention to rid Somalia of Christians and is responsible for killing many Christian converts from Islam, is now threatening to target Christians who preach the gospel among Somali Muslims living in Kenya. As you read the excerpt from the letter, please pray for protection for the targeted Christians. Here is the excerpt from the letter posted at Persecution.org: We would...

Medics carry the body of a victim after a bomb blast at St. Theresa Catholic Church inNigeria's capital, Abuja, on December 25."Lagos, Nigeria (CNN) -- Nigeria's Christians are losing faith that the government will protect them from attacks by Islamic extremists and will "respond appropriately" to future killings, the country's leading church group warned Wednesday. In a public message to President Goodluck Jonathan, the Christian Association of Nigeria called the Christmas Day targeting of churches in several cities "a declaration of war on Christians and Nigeria as an entity." The group also criticized its Muslim counterparts for failing to condemn...

Islamofascism: Scores of Christians attending Catholic mass in Nigerian churches were slaughtered in their pews by massive bomb blasts on Christmas Day. While decried as "un-Islamic," a frightening number of Muslims believe the bombings are justified. The year that began with a New Year's attack on an Egyptian Coptic Christian Church that killed 21 worshippers is ending with attacks on two Nigerian churches that killed 35 and injured at least 57. While such attacks are officially condemned, they are part of a campaign of violence and suicide bombings for which 34% of Nigerian respondents in a Pew Global Attitudes Project...

This Christmas let us spare a thought and say a prayer for countless Christian victims of Muslim brutality, over the centuries and in our own time.An explosion ripped through a Catholic church during Christmas Mass near Nigeria’s capital Abuja on Sunday morning, killing at least 25 people. A radical Muslim group, Boko Haram, claimed responsibility for the attack and another bombing in the city of Jos, as explosions also struck the nation’s predominantly Muslim northeast. The Christmas Day attacks show the growing national ambition of Boko Haram, was responsible for some 500 murders this year alone. The assaults come a...

Christians by Numbers Around the World Report Sees Shift in Global Distribution ROME, DEC. 23, 2011 (Zenit.org).- Christians account for almost a third of the world's population. This was one of the findings in a report published Monday by the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life.The data from the 2010 survey of more than 200 countries found that worldwide, there are 2.18 billion Christians, nearly a third of the estimated global population at that time of 6.9 billion.The report looked at what has changed in the past century. Since 1910 the number of Christians nearly quadrupled, from about 600...

Another Christmas, another slaughter of Christians by members of the so-called "religion of peace." The Boko Haram, a "radical Muslim sect" as the Associated Press puts it, claimed credit for bombing a Nigerian Catholic church on Christmas, killing 35 and wounding 52. What do the Boko Haram want? A sect spokesman calling himself Abul-Qaqa offered this in an interview with The Daily Trust, the newspaper of record across Nigeria's Muslim north. "There will never be peace until our demands are met," he said. "We want all our brothers who have been incarcerated to be released, we want full implementation of...

The congregation of the embattled GKI Yasmin church in Bogor was forced to move its Christmas prayers to a member’s house after Islamic groups assembled at the disputed site and threatened to challenge the sermon on Sunday. The service was slated to start at 9 a.m. in the sealed church on Jalan Abdullah bin Nuh, but the congregants went elsewhere after members of the Indonesian Muslim Communication Forum (Forkami), the Islamic Reform Movement (Garis) and the Bogor Muslim Community (KMB) objected to that plan. The opposition protestors came to the church in the morning and shouted to guarding police officers...

Religious Freedom: As our nation celebrates Christmas, Christians in the nations we shed blood and treasure for to establish democracy face extinction. For Christians in Iraq and Afghanistan, it may be the last Christmas ever. Christianity faces the threat of actual extinction in Iraq and Afghanistan as a consequence of systematic, sustained and sometimes violent persecution, according to the chairman of the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom. According to USCIRF head Leonard Leo in an interview with CNSNews.com, the Iraqi government has not taken adequate steps to protect Christians or prosecute those who attack them. The precipitate U.S. withdrawal...

Let's keep the persecuted church in our prayers today. Watch this video to find out why.

In advance of Christmas, Gallup released the results of a year’s worth of interviews of Americans about their attitudes toward religion. The results aren’t necessarily surprising, but they do make you wonder: How exactly is it that the phrase “Merry Christmas� has been branded offensive? From the poll summary: The United States remains a predominantly Christian nation, with 78% of all adults identifying with a Christian faith, and more than 9 in 10 of those who have a religious identity identifying as Christians. [M]ore than 9 in 10 Americans say they believe in God, and … 8 in 10 say...

A Peculiar People February 3, 2009 9 But ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an holy nation, a peculiar people; that ye should shew forth the praises of him who hath called you out of darkness into his marvellous light: 10 Which in time past were not a people, but are now the people of God: which had not obtained mercy, but now have obtained mercy. 1 Peter 2:9-10 Obama ends ban on U.S. funds to aid abortions WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama has signed an executive order ending the ban on federal funds for international groups that...

A funny thing happened on my way to shop at Target yesterday: there was no Salvation Army guy with the little red kettle collecting money! What gives? Read more: http://www.americanthinker.com/2011/12/salvation_army_troop_withdrawal.html#ixzz1hEeCpSh3

This is the season of the year when Salvation Army volunteers are on the streets and outside stores ringing their bells to encourage donors to fill their red kettles with money for the poor. The longtime Christian organization provides food, shelter, elderly services, disaster relief, prisoner rehabilitation and many other forms of aid. But it also has adopted a position statement that is a step toward abortion, and pro-life leaders are expressing alarm at what they see developing. In its statement on abortion, the Salvation Army says: "A number of biblical and theological principles underpin The Salvation Army's position on...

Pray for persecuted Christians in the Middle East(warning: graphic content)!

Interview Series: International human rights lawyerJustus Reid Weiner: "They flee to almost any country that will issue them a visa." "The disputed territories of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip have been administered by the Palestinian Authority (PA) and in more recent years, in part, by Hamas. Under these regimes, the resident Christian Arabs have been victims of frequent human rights abuses including intimidation, beatings, land theft, firebombing of churches and other Christian institutions, denial of employment, economic boycott, torture, kidnapping, forced marriage, sexual harassment, and extortion. "Muslims who have converted to Christianity are the ones in the greatest...

Putting Christ back into Christmas... or else! _______________________________________________________________________ What a great idea... and beautifully produced and performed by vocalist Carrie Rinderer and the American Christian Life United (ACLU!) Choir... Video/more at Reaganite Republican_______________________________________________________________________ ~Say 'Merry Christmas'~ If you don’ see merry Christmas in the window, no you don’t go in that store If you don’t see merry Christmas in the window, yes you walk right by that door Oh it’s all about the little baby Jesus and my Savior’s birthIt’s the one and only reason that we celebrate the season wishing love to all and; peace upon the earth...

Called the "Arab Spring," repressive governments crumpled like dominoes, changing the landscape of the Middle East and North Africa forever and sending shockwaves around the world. Unfortunately for the already minority Christian population in Muslim-dominated countries like Egypt, Libya and Tunisia, the future is all but clear. Will 2012 bring more persecution and marginalization for Christians or greater liberty to worship...

Just in time for the "holiday season," Barack Hussein Obama has apparently found Jesus. More likely, he read the most recent presidential approval poll, which indicated that his weakest demographic is composed of those who attend church regularly and, conversely, that his strongest is composed of those who don't.

Watch this short video about the plight of Christians across the globe. (Warning: the video contains some graphic images.) We cannot remain silent in the face of such evil!

Bookmark and Share Text Size A | A | A December 12, 2011 Special Dispatch No.4354 Sheikh Ahmad Abu Quddum of Jordan's Tahrir Party Discusses Jihad Against Germany, Pledges to Impose 'Jizya' Poll Tax on Non-Muslims, and Vows to Annihilate Israel Following are excerpts from an interview with Sheikh Ahmad Abu Quddum of the Tahrir Party in Jordan, which aired on JoSat TV on December 8, 2011. JoSat, a private Jordanian channel, is owned by businessman Riyadh Al-Huroub. His wife, Rula Al-Huroub, is the moderator on this show. Sheikh Ahmad Abu Al-Quddum is a leader of the Tahrir party in...

Link only: http://caucuses.desmoinesregister.com/2011/12/13/conservative-christian-leaders-hit-the-road-in-iowa-for-michele-bachmann/

Maybe this is how the residents of Bethlehem felt. Coloradans — even the non-football fans — are as shocked and awed as anyone by the miracle occurring in their own backyard with the rise of Tim Tebow, the Denver Broncos quarterback and quite possibly the most famous Christian bachelor to walk the Earth in the past 2,000 years. The “Mile-High Messiah” — just one of the many nicknames he’s acquired since arriving here last year — has led the city’s flagging NFL franchise on an improbable 6-1 run this season. In the process, he’s halted the team’s slide into midsize-market...

More Americans than ever say they celebrate the upcoming holiday of Christmas as a religious one. A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that 88% of American Adults say they celebrate Christmas, and 81% of this group celebrate it as a religious holiday. Just 16% of those celebrants regard it as a secular holiday.

ESPN First take remix by DJ Porter with Skip Bayless

As'ad AbuKahlil—a political science professor at California State University, Stanislaus—spoke last month at a day-long "teach-in" at the University of California, Berkeley titled, "Building Solidarity with the Arab Spring." It consisted of a number of "workshop sessions" at the Valley Life Sciences Building, followed by a "plenary session" at the Multicultural Center, and was co-sponsored by the Arab Resource Organizing Committee, the Berkeley Muslim Students Association PAC, the International Socialist Organization, and the Syrian American Council. AbuKhalil's workshop on "The U.S. and the Arab Uprising" was held in a tiny, hot, windowless room filled with students wearing hijabs and keffiyehs....

Reports did not mention where they were imported from Published Thursday, December 08, 2011 Saudi authorities seized a large quantity of imported shirts and other clothes adorned with the cross, a newspaper reported on Thursday. The ministry of commerce and industry said it had confiscated all the stuff seized at garment shops in the southwestern town of Raniya. “We confiscated all the stuff after a Saudi customer informed us about the presence of such items at shops,” said Mohammed Dafer Al Subai, director of the government trade office in Raniya. In its report, the Arabic language daily Sabq newspaper said...