Free Republic

One of the reasons our political structure has become dysfunctional no matter which party is in power is that too many of us are living in the moment. The closest we get to history is the instant replay. It is as if there is nothing the past can teach us; no wisdom that might be culled from those who have gone before. We buy guidebooks, or go online for information about countries or cities we plan to visit, trusting those who have been there to tell us the best places to stay, see and eat. When it comes to more...

This video has family pets enjoying daily life in the back yard. Voices are wife, grandchild and myself.

Peace be unto you; as my Father hath sent me, even so sent I you. John 20:21

This video has family pets and some voices enjoying daily life. The sound effects of the running brook was recorded from the Chepachet R.I. river. Voices are my grandchild and myself. The children song, sang by the eaglet is, (Is Anything To Hard For God).

This video has family pets eating, drinking and enjoying daily life in the back yard. The sound effects of the running brook was recorded from the Chepachet R.I. river. Voices are my grandchild and myself. The children song, sang by the eaglet is, (Is Anything To Hard For God).

In past years on the blog, I have generally published the schedule of the Lord’s final week according to the Scriptures (on the Monday of Holy Week). Since I have done this in years past, I presume most of you have seen it by now. If you haven’t, you can read it here: A Chronology of Jesus’ Holy WeekFor this year, I thought I might look at some of the moments in the Passion Narrative (this year from St. Matthew) and highlight them.The first moment occurs in the Garden of Gethsemane and presents a very good stance for Holy Week,...

The texts that Christians typically read on Palm Sunday have become so familiar that we probably don't sense their revolutionary power. But no first-century Jew would have missed the excitement and danger implicit in the coded language of the accounts describing Jesus' entry into Jerusalem just a few days before his death. In Mark's Gospel we hear that Jesus and his disciples "drew near to Jerusalem, to Bethphage and Bethany on the Mount of Olives." A bit of trivial geographical detail, we might be tempted to conclude. But about five hundred years before Jesus' time, the prophet Ezekiel had relayed...

--snip-- This was Thursday night and the two were part of a community meeting on the recent highly publicized violent incidents at the school, including a couple of lunchtime brawls and an assault on a conflict-resolution specialist by a 17-year-old student. Yes, a man charged to keep the peace got his skull fractured. At the start of the meeting, God got a shout-out by one of the speakers. It probably wasn't a bad idea. Given the disagreements over what caused the problems at Bartram, and what it's going to take to fix them, divine intervention may be the only solution....

Actor Mickey Rooney (1920-2014) was a man of great patriotism and faith. These were his greatest roles. The number one box office star in America during the greatest years of the Hollywood Golden Age, 1939-1941, was not Cary Grant, Gary Cooper, Judy Garland, or even Jimmy Stewart. It was Mickey Rooney. Rooney died Sunday at age 93. His acting career, begun on Vaudeville and matured in Hollywood, spanned over 90 years and ten decades. Mickey Rooney starred in over 300 films and was one of the last surviving stars of the silent film era. Rooney was awarded an Honorary Oscar...

In today’s society, whenever someone dares to criticize ANY type of action or behavior, it isn’t uncommon for a person to say that “you shouldn’t cast stones.” It has long been my experience that people generally don’t like being told that something they are doing is wrong. It starts as children. But many of them eventually grow out of it and start to behave like moral and responsible adults.

Be not afraid, only believe. Mark 5: 36

"Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn of Me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls. For My yoke is easy, and My burden is light." – Matthew 11: 28-30

Supreme Court Justices Ginsburg, Kagan, and Sotomayor are concerned. They should be. The religion of liberalism is under attack. The Hobby Lobby fight in the high court? The tussle with the Catholic League’s Bill Donohue over gays pushing their agenda in the New York St. Patrick’s Day Parade? The latest skirmish over global warming, aka climate change? The controversy about government funding of Planned Parenthood and the group’s abortion stances? Common Core? The business of turning NASA from a space agency to an outreach group to Muslims? All of these and more are different parts of a wholly formed universe...

Bill Gates, the richest man in the world, revealed in a recent interview that his family goes to a Catholic church and that religious morality inspires a lot of his charity work. He also shared his personal thoughts on God and the biggest issues facing the world today. "The moral systems of religion, I think, are super important. We've raised our kids in a religious way; they've gone to the Catholic church that Melinda goes to and I participate in. I've been very lucky, and therefore I owe it to try and reduce the inequity in the world. And that's...

The director of the upcoming Bible epic "Noah" shot down rumors that the movie had caused a hullabaloo for himself and Paramount Pictures. "There isn't really a controversy," Darren Aronofsky told Variety on Thursday, at "Foundations of the Deep: Noah and the Flood," an art exhibition with work inspired by the story. The director of "Black Swan" and "The Wrestler" added that he made the film for both "believers and non-believers" and was especially interested in challenging any preconceptions that the latter group might have about attending a religious film. "I'm more concerned about getting non-believers into the theater or...

"But the purpose of prayer," wrote Bill Buckley, "surely, is to stress the great divisions between the material and the supernatural condition, not to gloss over them." Indeed, though it seemed in recent days that the chasm between the material and supernatural has grown so great that not even a multi-million dollar congressionally funded bridge to nowhere and back could connect the distant shores. I'm not Catholic, (though I am doing some reading on the faith), so I'm unfamiliar with the specialties of the various saints. I know there is a patron saint for traveling, another for the military, and...

If you’d like the government to change something about Obamacare, give the White House a ring. They’re in a flexible mood. President Obama this week approved yet another delay to provisions in the Affordable Care Act, giving insurers until 2016 to sell a type of insurance policy that’s supposed to be banned under the health-reform law. The ban, which was supposed to begin this year, would prevent insurers from selling bare-bones plans that might be affordable but don’t abide by 10 “essential service rules” required under the new law. When insurers began canceling such coverage last year, however, several million...

JACKSON, MI – The human race is divided between people who see amazing coincidences, and people who see no coincidences. Both types should hear about the last days of Jackson attorney Bruce Clark. Clark, 79, who lived at Clark Lake, was an Eagle Scout as a boy and a respected member of his profession as an adult. But this is not the story of Clark’s life. It’s the story of what happened before he died two weeks ago. Struck by cancer, pneumonia and a heart attack, Clark said something unusual one day from his bed at Allegiance hospital. “He told...

Are atheism and promoting atheism consistent with American -- let alone conservative -- values and principles? The operational policy of the American Conservative Union now appears to contradict Ronald Reagan's view on this. Reagan believed atheism was not merely wrong, but the enemy of freedom. The ACU has functionally adopted the position that groups promoting atheism can be featured at its annual Conservative Political Action Conference -- so long as they promote godlessness with civility. In the same 1983 speech in which he declared the Soviet Union an "evil empire," Reagan unapologetically spelt out the "ideals and principles" that...