Free Republic

Via Greg Hengler, this testimony to the Subcommittee on the Constitution and Civil Justice may be even more chilling than some of the testimony at Kermit Gosnell’s trial. In part, that&http://media.hotair.com/wp/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/abortion-levantino.jpg#8217;s because former abortionist Dr. Anthony Levantino describes the “normal� process of later-term abortions, and not just the supposedly outlier practices of Gosnell and his co-defendants. Levantino, speaking in support of a bill to ban all abortions after 20 weeks offered by Rep. Trent Franks in response to the exposure of the Gosnell case and others like it, dispassionately describes how abortionists tear fetuses apart limb from limb in such...

EDITOR'S NOTE: For the last half of the twentieth century, Antony Flew (1923-2010) was the world's most famous atheist. Long before Richard Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens, and Sam Harris began taking swipes at religion, Flew was the preeminent spokesman for unbelief.However in 2004, he shocked the world by announcing he had come to believe in God. While never embracing Christianity—Flew only believed in the deistic, Aristotelian conception of God—he became one of the most high-profile and surprising atheist converts. In 2007, he recounted his conversion in a book titled There is a God: How the World's Most Notorious Atheist Changed His...

Much has been written about the emotional trauma that women go through after their abortions. But what most people don’t realize is that abortion is so inherently evil and destructive that it devastates everyone involved – the mother, the father – and the abortion provider. The doctors, nurses, and other clinic workers are human – and repeatedly seeing the bodies of aborted babies and participating in their deaths leaves emotional scars. After giving a graphic description of how to check body parts to make sure everything is out after an abortion, Dr. Don Sloan, abortionist, says the following: “Want to...

Hi Folks, This is a quick blog from the road. I am on the west coast promoting our first national TV ad confronting Obama's tyranny. Since the election, Obama's fundamental transformation of America has accelerated to warp speed. Every day we are hit with a new crisis, equaling a new excuse to attack and eliminate another one of our God given freedoms. Low-info voters swallow Obama and the Democrat's lies hook, line and sinker. So, I got this text from my brother David who lives on the east coast early this morning at 6am. Early morning and late night calls...

“His Word Possessed Authority” (Luke 4:31-44)In today’s Gospel, we catch a glimpse of what the public ministry of Jesus was like. We follow Jesus on what might have been a fairly typical day for him, a very busy day at that. We see Jesus engaged in various ministry activities: teaching, exorcising, healing, and preaching. And the common denominator that runs through these activities? I think we can see it in a little verse from our text: “His word possessed authority.” “His Word Possessed Authority”: in his teaching, in his casting out demons, in his healing the sick, and in his...

“Today This Scripture Is Fulfilled in Your Hearing” (Luke 4:16-30)The Holy Gospel for today is the account of Jesus at the Nazareth synagogue, right as he was starting his public ministry. Jesus gets up to read one of the lessons. He unrolls the scroll of the prophet Isaiah, and he reads this passage from Isaiah 61: “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim liberty to the captives and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are...

Millions of Americans have their own stories about how they arrived at the pro-life position on abortion, but Archbishop Samuel J. Aquila of Denver has a unique one. He experienced the reality of abortion in a way most people never have.In a new interview with the National Catholic Register, he talked about the experience of seeing the body of a baby who had been victimized by abortion in a sink. It left such an indelible impression on him that he said he will forever be pro-life.From the interview: “Today is a day to repent,” Archbishop Aquila said in his Jan....

“Marriage and the Family: The Cultural Slide and the Christian Response” (Isaiah 62:1-5; Psalm 128:1-6; John 2:1-11)The readings for today--the Old Testament Reading, the Psalm, and the Holy Gospel--these readings are filled with references to marriage and the family. They use the language and imagery of marriage and the family--and in the Gospel’s case, even the occasion of a wedding--to describe God’s love for humanity. The blessings of marriage and children are gifts that God gives to all people, and they are also pictures of the relationship that God has with his own people, the church. Look at how that...

“Christ the Baptized and Baptizer” (Luke 3:15-22)Today in the church year is the Baptism of Our Lord, which we always celebrate on this, the First Sunday after the Epiphany. The Baptism of Our Lord is that auspicious occasion when our Lord Jesus Christ, as he was about to start his public ministry, was baptized by John in the Jordan, and the Spirit descended on him like a dove, and a voice came from heaven, attesting to Jesus as God’s beloved Son, with whom he is well pleased. And so every year on this day the Holy Gospel is the account...

Continuing a JPII tradition he was initially loath to pick up, this morning again saw the Pope mark Epiphany by ordaining a new crop of bishops, the crop of four headlined by the elevation of his longtime personal secretary, now Archbishop Georg Gänswein, who Benedict XVI has made his ultimate gatekeeper by naming the 56 year-old German as prefect of the Papal Household. Two of the other new archbishops – the Nigerian Fortunatus Nwachukwu, 52, and the Genovese Nicolas Thevenin, 54 – will respectively serve as papal nuncio in Nicaragua and Guatemala, while the Italian Angelo Vincenzo Zani, 62, will...

“The Gentile Christmas” (Matthew 2:1-12; Isaiah 60:1-6)It is often called “the Gentile Christmas.” I’m talking about Epiphany, of course, the festival we are celebrating today. The Epiphany of Our Lord is one of the major festivals in the church year, one of the biggies. It’s a fixed-date festival, meaning it always falls on a certain date, regardless of the day of the week--like Christmas is always on December 25. Epiphany is always January 6, right after the twelve days of Christmas. So if January 6 happened to be on a Friday or a Tuesday, for example, we’d be having service....

Did you know that Christmas celebrations were banned in Scotland until 1958? I certainly didn’t, not until my son started working on his sixth grade “Christmas around the World” report. I haven’t looked up what the English did in this regard (Scotland always has had a good deal of autonomy within Britain, and never stopped following its own legal code). But it seems the good Presbyterians of the established Church of Scotland (“the Kirk,” ironically enough for traditional conservatives) thought Christmas was a Catholic holiday, best stamped out with criminal penalties for unwholesome celebrations (pretty much anything outside of church),...

The solemnity of the Epiphany typically gets short shrift in Latin-rite Catholicism, for while Eastern Christianity lifts up the Epiphany as the apex of the Christmas season, Epiphany in the Western Church tends to get overwhelmed by the tsunami of Christmas, both liturgically and (especially) culturally. When the Epiphany fell in the middle of the week and was a holy day of obligation, its importance as the commemoration of the “manifestation” of the Messiah was underscored; transferred to a Sunday, it tends to become one Sunday among others. The pre-1970 liturgical calendar recognized the significance of the Epiphany by designating...

Buford, Ga. – There was no mistaking the man who walked through the glass doors of the hotel complex on the shores of Lake Lanier. The trademark shock of white hair remains neatly groomed. The hawk-like nose still juts out over a tight jaw. The eyes are clear and bright. But the stride is gone. Zell Miller walks gingerly now, always with a cane. The former governor and U.S. senator describes himself as an 80-year-old man with 100-year-old legs. “I very, very seldom go anywhere,” Miller said in an interview. Miller’s appearance on Friday was a rare return to a...

“The White Clothes of Jesus” (Mark 9:2-9)Today on this last Sunday in the Epiphany season the church celebrates a great, pivotal event in the life and ministry of Jesus, namely, the Transfiguration of Our Lord. Jesus goes up on a high mountain, taking along with him his inner circle of disciples, Peter, James, and John. There he is transfigured before them, that is, his appearance changes, and his clothes become dazzling white. Two great figures from the Old Testament, Moses and Elijah, appear with Jesus and talk with him. The disciples don’t know what to make of all of this....

“The Cleansing of Naaman: How Can Water Do Such Great Things?” (2 Kings 5:1-14)Our text is the Old Testament Reading for today, the story of the cleansing of Naaman. Short version: Naaman was a man who had leprosy. He was told, “Wash, and be clean.” And, after some objections, Naaman did wash, and he did become clean. But there’s more here than meets the eye, as we will see. For one thing, this story raises the question: How could simply washing in a river--and a pretty unimpressive river, at that--how could that cleanse a man of leprosy? And what does...

“And He Healed Many” (Mark 1:29-39)Yesterday, on a pastors’ e-mail list that I’m a part of, one of the men, Pastor Jay Webber of Arizona, brought a prayer request to our group on behalf of his son Paul and daughter-in-law Ruth. He’s given me permission to share this with you, by the way. His daughter-in-law, Ruth Webber, is 23 years old, and she is six months into her first pregnancy. However, she has been diagnosed with advanced gastric cancer, stomach cancer. Her chances for survival, Pastor Webber reports, are not good. Right now she’s up at the Mayo Clinic in...

Note: Kelly Clinger, a performer and former backup singer for the pop star Britney Spears, had two abortions when she was in her early twenties. She blogs about her pro-life activities here. January 26, 2012 (KellyClinger.com) - This morning I returned to the clinic where I had my abortions 12 years ago to pray for and plead with moms not to make the decision I made so many years ago. As I pulled into a parking spot, I sat in the car for a minute and closed my eyes. I wanted to pray that I wouldn’t fall apart; but before...

“Can Anything Good Come out of Nazareth?” (John 1:43-51)Can anything good come out of Bonne Terre? Can anything good come out of Potosi? Or let’s be more specific: Can anything good come out of St. Matthew’s? Can anything good come out of Redeemer? Those may be the kinds of questions in the minds of the people we meet and talk to. And the attitude behind the questions would be a rather dubious one. Believe it or not, some people may not think very much of those little podunk towns, Bonne Terre and Potosi, or of those little Lutheran churches, St....

On Christmas and Epiphany "Christmas Is Joy Because We See -- and at Last We Are Sure -- That God Is Man's Good" VATICAN CITY, JAN. 6, 2012 (Zenit.org).- Here is a translation of the Italian-language catechesis Benedict XVI gave last Wednesday during the general audience held in Paul VI Audience Hall. The Pope reflected on the feasts of Christmas and the Epiphany. * * * Dear brothers and sisters, I am pleased to welcome you in this first general audience of the new year, and with all my heart I offer you and your families my affectionate good wishes:...

“Friday Night Lights” (Matthew 2:1-12; Isaiah 60:1-6; Ephesians 3:1-12)“Pastor, have you lost your mind? What are you doing, dragging us out here to church on a Friday night, for goodness’ sakes! And in January, no less!” And my answer to that would be: The reason I’ve asked you all here tonight has to do with the “Friday Night Lights.” Friday night lights. Let me explain. Today is the Epiphany of Our Lord, a major festival of the church year. Epiphany is always January 6--it’s what we call a “fixed-date festival,” determined by the date on the calendar, regardless of the...

Today is January 6. Which means that it has been twelve days since Christmas. Simple math, really. Why does that matter. Well, today is the “Twelfth Day of Christmas” (you know the song – partridge in a pear tree and all). But beyond an 18th century Christmas carol, there are important historical links between today (January 6) and Christmas. Epiphany and Christmas – what’s the connection? Let’s go back to square one. First of all, nobody (that we know of) thought to write down Jesus’ birthday. Believe it or not, things like exact birthdays just weren’t that important in the...

This feast was kept in the East from the third century and its observance spread to the West towards the end of the fourth. The word Epiphany means manifestation, and just as at Christmas, it is the mystery of God appearing in visible form; only no longer does He show Himself to the Jews alone but “on this day" it is “to the Gentiles that God reveals His Son" (Collect). In a magnificent vision, Isaias beheld the Church as typified by Jerusalem, whither should flock kings and nations, the “multitude of the sea" and the “strength of the Gentiles,�...

The Visit of the Wise Men 1 Now after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea in the days of Herod the king, behold, wise men[a] from the east came to Jerusalem, 2 saying, “Where is he who has been born king of the Jews? For we saw his star when it rose[b] and have come to worship him.” 3 When Herod the king heard this, he was troubled, and all Jerusalem with him; 4 and assembling all the chief priests and scribes of the people, he enquired of them where the Christ was to be born. 5 They told...

Defense Minister Ehud Barak alluded to the 2005 Disengagement from Gaza Sunday as he warned that Israel would strike back at terrorists there. "Since Friday, about 36 missiles have been fired from Gaza at Israeli communities," he said in a speech at the World Policy Conference in Vienna. "Israel will know how to defend itself and will not let this situation continue. [Prime Minister Ariel] Sharon evacuated the Gaza Strip and took out every last soldier and civilian, gave instructions to tear down all buildings, even synagogues, so as not to supply any excuse to the Palestinians. And what happened?...

The evangelist producer of an online documentary to be released this Sunday has high hopes that the film, which shows eight pro-abortion young adults change their stance to pro-life just moments after being asked a question,

With Labor Day coming up, I find myself again reflecting on the wisdom of our elected leaders, who, in years past, had the insight to offer a holy day of celebration in honor of the American Labor Movement and its Marxist underpinnings. But that’s not all I found myself doing this fine weekend. No, I was on the road for an extended drive in my fairly new, reliable as hell, non-union-built Toyota Tacoma, which came equipped with Sirius Satellite Radio reception. Our single local “conservative talk” station, in typical lame fashion, had again bumped Rush’s Weekend in Review for some...

John Lennon was a closet Republican, who felt a little embarrassed by his former radicalism, at the time of his death - according to the tragic Beatles star's last personal assistant. Fred Seaman worked alongside the music legend from 1979 to Lennon's death at the end of 1980 and he reveals the star was a Ronald Reagan fan who enjoyed arguing with left-wing radicals who reminded him of his former self. In new documentary Beatles Stories, Seaman tells filmmaker Seth Swirsky Lennon wasn't the peace-loving militant fans thought he was while he was his assistant. He says, "John, basically, made...

Conservatives have a new celebrity spokesman-writer-thinker-philosopher. David Mamet, Pulitzer prize-winning playwright, screenwriter, movie director and sometime essayist, has come out of the closet. No longer, he declares, is he a "brain-dead liberal." Now he's a wide-awake conservative. Some time after arriving in Hollywood, of all places, and at age 60, he engaged in a conversation with his Republican rabbi (where did he find one?), who gave him the books of conservative writers, such as Thomas Sowell, Shelby Steele, Milton Friedman and Paul Johnson. He had a dramatic political conversion. Mamet re-evaluated his own heroes, starting with the playwright Bertolt...

Earlier this week, humorist Ricky Gervais presented his arguments for atheism and why he thought he was a better Christian than many Christians. In this follow-up essay, writer Lee Strobel offers his defense of Easter. It was the worst news I could get as an atheist: my agnostic wife had decided to become a Christian. Two words shot through my mind. The first was an expletive; the second was “divorce.” I thought she was going to turn into a self-righteous holy roller. But over the following months, I was intrigued by the positive changes in her character and values. Finally,...

Via the Brody File, I feel obliged to post this now that he’s the tea-party frontrunner and the recipient of some surprisingly encouraging buzz from evangelical leaders. You know what the most fun part of having Trump in the race would be? The fact that he’s basically the bizarro Romney. They’re oddly alike in some ways. Each has been wildly successful in business and used it as a springboard to other prominent pursuits. Each is highly regarded for his managerial ability, to the extent that Trump had a whole television series built around it. And each is suspect for being...

Donald Trump Explains Conversion to Pro-Life Side on Abortion New York, NY -- Business mogul Donald Trump shocked attendees at the conservative CPC conference in February when he declared himself pro-life after years of supporting the pro-abortion position. http://www.lifenews.com/2011/04/08/donald-trump-explains-conversion-to-pro-life-side-on-abortion/

“Myth-Busters: Apostolic Witness and Prophetic Word” (2 Peter 1:16-21)“Cleverly devised myths.” That’s what we Christians are accused of believing. All that stuff about Jesus Christ being the Son of God and the only Savior of the world? “Just a bunch of fables, fairy tales, myths.” But then this is nothing new. Even back in the first century, Christians were ridiculed for believing the same thing, that they were falling for a bunch of poppycock, fables and fairy tales. St. Peter refers to this accusation in our epistle for today when he writes, “For we did not follow cleverly devised myths...

“A Different Kind of Righteousness” (Matthew 5:1-37)“For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.” So said Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount. Listen to that again: “Unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.” Now this saying of Jesus assumes a couple of things: 1) that entering the kingdom of heaven is something to be highly desired; and 2) that it takes righteousness to enter it. So let’s start there, with those two points. First,...

“Weak Power and Foolish Wisdom” (1 Corinthians 1:18-31)The American Religious Identification Survey conducted a huge, nationwide survey in 2008, the first one since they did a similar survey in 2001. They asked people to identify themselves by their religion, and they included every religion you could think of--Catholic, mainline Protestant, Evangelical, you name it. Perhaps the most interesting result to come out of this survey is the only group they found that increased in number in every state in the union. Guess which religious identification that was. Give up? “None.” That’s right, “none” was the religious identification that increased everywhere,...

“Repent, for the Kingdom of Heaven is at Hand” (Matthew 4:12-25)“Repent, for the Kingdom of Heaven is at Hand.” So Jesus began to preach when he entered into his public ministry, as we heard in today’s Gospel reading from Matthew 4. “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” But, hey, doesn’t that sound familiar, like we’ve heard it somewhere before? Right you are, grasshopper! At the beginning of Matthew 3, we see John the Baptist enter into his ministry, and the summary of his preaching is given as, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” Holy...

“Epiphany: Where to Find Jesus and Why” (Matthew 2:1-12)What’s the big deal about Epiphany? I mean, why do we come out for a special service on a weeknight in January? Why does this rate a place as a “major festival” in the church year? And after all, a lot of churches have dropped the historic practice of having Epiphany service on January 6--even some Lutheran churches, sad to say. I guess they figure it’s too much bother. Easier to stay home and not make the trip. Well, thank God, the wise men from the east didn’t stay home and not...

Today's Solemnity of the Epiphany celebrates the manifestation of Christ to the Magi, an event that St Matthew emphasizes greatly (cf. Mt 2: 1-12). His Gospel narrates that some "Magi" - probably Persian religious leaders - reached Jerusalem guided by a "star", a luminous, heavenly phenomenon which they interpreted as a sign of the birth of a new king of the Jews. No one in the city knew anything; rather, the king in charge, Herod, remained very disturbed by the news and conceived the tragic design of the "slaughter of the innocents" to eliminate the newborn rival. The Magi, instead,...

Straight Answers: Who Were the Magi?   By Fr. William Saunders HERALD Columnist 1/1/97  Who were the Magi? — A reader in SpringfieldThe Gospel of Matthew mentions the Magi who came from the East to worship the newborn Christ child (cf. Matthew 2:1-12). Exactly who the magi were though remains somewhat of a mystery.Oftentimes, the English translations of the Bible use the word astrologers for magi. In Greek, the original language of the Gospel' the word magos (magoi, plural) has four meanings: (1) a member of the priestly class of ancient Persia, where astrology and astronomy were prominent in...

The Gift of the Magi ONE DOLLAR AND eighty-seven cents. That was all. And sixty cents of it was in pennies. Pennies saved one and two at a time by bulldozing the grocer and the vegetable man and the butcher until one's cheeks burned with the silent imputation of parsimony that such close dealing implied. Three times Della counted it. One dollar and eighty-seven cents. And the next day would be Christmas. There was clearly nothing to do but flop down on the shabby little couch and howl. So Della did it. Which instigates the moral reflection that life is...

Gold, Frankincense, and Myrrh December 21st, 2010 by Stu WalkerIn four days we will celebrate the Birth of Our Lord, Jesus Christ. Shortly after that, we will celebrate the event when the three wise men came to see Jesus. They brought Gold, Frankincense, and Myrrh. It is pretty amazing to think, for a moment, how God plans out things in a person’s life, especially when it is His Son. God knows and knew the hearts of men. When Herod asks the three kings to come and tell him where he may find Jesus, so he, too, can worship him and...

For a small moment on this morning’s “Morning Joe,” Huffington Post founder Arianna Huffington echoed a common conservative prediction over the last two years: President Obama says, or promises, one thing and does another. That prediction was especially true when, after the 2008 election, many conservatives predicted all the “change” promised by Obama would be hard to deliver. It seems liberals are now understanding that’s the case. Huffington aired her grievances today, saying that Obama has fallen into a “pattern” of saying one thing and doing another. “He proposed and accepted something he’s been opposing for years,” she said:

With the classroom lights down low, our teacher Julie asked, "Feel that?" I looked at my empty hands and, echoing the class, I responded, "Oh...yeah." Julie whispered, "Move your hands closer together. Feels like you're squishing a ball." Yep, an invisible purple ball. Assuming the I-know-this-to-be-true look common to enlightened teachers in enlightened schools, Julie informed us that we were sensing the "body's natural energy." We partnered with other students to feel their energy. A very pleasant female student took an enthusiastic approach, and I felt energized. A guy sporting ear, nose, and lip rings headed my way, and my...

Tuesday, April 13, 2010 Antony Flew, Unatheist, Dies at 87 Antony Flew, world's most famous ex-atheist, has passed away at age 87. Not everyone may remember Flew or his significance. I do, because Flew was the "Richard Dawkins" of my childhood. Actually, Flew was never "Richard Dawkins," because he was never as crass and philosophically illiterate as Dawkins; but when I was younger, Flew was the key voice for atheism in the English-speaking world, as Dawkins appears to be now. When I was in fourth grade I read a book entitled "Did Jesus Rise from the Dead?", a debate between...

This is my 16th Easter.For the first 38 years of my life I did not celebrate Easter because I was one of JehovahÂ’s Witnesses, a pseudo- Christian group with a very strange economy of salvation. It is not easy to describe life in a cult like JehovahÂ’s Witnesses. It is very dark. Even their light is darkness.JehovahÂ’s Witnesses do not believe in the Trinity, so they do not believe in the deity of Christ. They believe that Jesus was Michael the Archangel before he came to earth, and that after he was resurrected, he went back to being Michael the...

Mysticism is dying, and taking true religion with it. Monasteries have dwindled. Contemplative orders have declined. Our religious leaders no longer preach the renunciation of the world; our culture scoffs at the idea. The closest most Americans come to real asceticism is giving up chocolate, cappuccinos, or (in my own not-quite-Francis-of-Assisi case) meat for lunch for Lent.

I am going to disappoint Leon Wieseltier. The famous liberal wrote this week, "A day does not go by when I do not do my humble part to prevent such a transformation [of American Jewry from liberals to conservatives] from coming to pass." Well, Leon, you let one get by. My transformation has occurred. It began with 9/11 and progressed along bumpily until the Obama, Pelosi, Reid express train came roaring down the track . . . For years I had been looking around and asking, "What the heck has happened to the Democratic Party that I grew up in?"...

LITTLE ROCK -- Have you noticed? The closer Election Day comes, the more conservative some blue-dog senators sound. Till they turn almost Republican red. Consider the case of Blanche Lincoln here in Arkansas. By the time the primary is held in May, this state's senior senator could be speaking at Tea Party rallies. A headline on the front page of the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette said it all: "Pressure on the rise for Arkansas' Lincoln/ Amid criticism, she chides party, Obama." To quote the story's lede: "U.S. Sen. Blanche Lincoln distanced herself from Democrats over and over last week. On Tuesday, the...

..former Beatles drummer, Ringo Starr has found God at nearly 70 years of age. This was revealed in a story written by Ben Todd who said, “John Lennon caused a worldwide storm by claiming that the Beatles were more popular than Jesus. “Now, more than four decades on, it seems his former bandmate Ringo Starr has acknowledged a humbler place in the grand scheme of things.

January 28, 2010 (InsideCatholic.com) - Of all the things I remember about the Texas March for Life in Austin last January, the memory that stands out the most is the look on the faces of the counter-protesters who followed us along Congress Avenue and down to the capitol that frosty morning. When I glanced over to see the source of the epithets that were being screamed at us, I met the eyes of one young woman wearing a black bandana over the bottom half of her face. She happened to look over and meet my gaze, and in her...