Free Republic

Liberal blogger and Media Matters employee* Oliver Willis channeled his inner Ted Turner last Wednesday, while writing for his eponymous Web site.

Democrats have declared war on the Catholic Church, with new laws that threaten to bankrupt Catholic schools, hospitals, charities and parishes. Thus far, the worst attacks have come in New York. “We’ve taken a lot of hits this year,” Dennis Poust, spokesman for the New York State Catholic Conference, tells Newsmax. “Outside the government, the Catholic Church is the largest provider of health, human services and education in [New York]. But some legislators are so driven by malice that they’re willing to see our charities and schools go under.” Keep reading at NewsMax.com »

A recent poll of more than 350,000 Americans on the importance of religion revealed that the nation is separated into enclaves of widely divergent viewpoints on faith, with some states and regions clearly religious and others significantly secular. Gallup conducted a telephone poll of 355,334 U.S. adults, asking the question, "Is religion an important part of your daily life?" As one might suspect, states from the "Bible Belt" scored the highest, with 85 percent of Mississippians and 79 percent of Tennesseeans, for example, answering yes. The poll also revealed, however, that in addition to the Bible Belt, the U.S. also...

As the National Religious Broadcasters convened today in Nashville, an ominous shroud cast by political chatter about the reimposition of the so-called "Fairness Doctrine" in the nation's capital hung over the gathering. NRB President Frank Wright said he sees the move as a credible threat under a Democrat-dominated Congress and with President Obama in the White House. "And we have a personal concern," Wright told Broadcasting & Cable. "The only radio station that ever lost its license under the fairness doctrine regime was a Christian radio station in Red Lion, Pa. We are only responding now to the statements the...

---snip--- “This is a direct attack on students of faith, and I’m outraged Democrats are using an economic stimulus bill to promote discrimination,” said Senator DeMint. “Democrats should be ashamed of themselves for siding with the ACLU over millions of students of faith. These students simply want equal access to public facilities, which is their constitutional right. This hostility toward religion must end. Those who voted to for this discrimination are standing in the schoolhouse door to deny people of faith from entering any campus building renovated by this bill.

Republican Sen. Jim DeMint proposed an amendment Thursday to overturn a provision in the stimulus bill that prohibits renovation funding for schools that allow religious worship in their facilities. BY CRISTINA CORBIN Republican Sen. Jim DeMint proposed an amendment Thursday to kill a provision in the Senate stimulus bill that prohibits renovation money for schools that allow religious groups to meet on campus. DeMint proposed the amendment after the provision was passed in the Democratic-controlled House despite unanimous Republican opposition. The amendment is expected to be voted on Thursday, an aide to the senator told FOXNews.com. DeMint and others who...

(CNSNews.com) – President Obama’s economic stimulus bill would forbid colleges -- both religious and secular -- from receiving stimulus funds to improve facilities that are used for religious purposes. The provision is found in the Higher Education Modernization, Renovation and Repair section (Sec. 9302) of both the House and Senate versions of the bill, the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009. According to the provision, none of funds of the $6 billion allotted to the renovation, modernization, or repair of college buildings may be used for facilities “(i) used for sectarian instruction, religious worship, or school department of divinity;...

Democrats in Congress have declared war on prayer, say conservative groups who object to a provision in the stimulus bill that was passed by the House of Representatives last week. The provision bans money designated for school renovation from being spent on facilities that allow "religious worship." It has ignited a fury among critics who say it violates the First Amendment and is an attempt to prevent religious practice in schools. According to the bill, which the Democratic-controlled House passed despite unanimous Republican opposition, funds are prohibited from being used for the "modernization, renovation, or repair" of facilities that allow...

Washington-- Want to be almost certain you'll have religious neighbors? Move to Mississippi. Prefer to be in the least religious state? Venture to Vermont. A new Gallup Poll, based on more than 350,000 interviews, finds that the Magnolia State is the one where the most people 85% say yes when asked "Is religion an important part of your daily life?" Less than half of Vermonters, meanwhile 42% answered that same question in the affirmative. Joining Mississippi in the top "most religious" states are other notches in the Bible Belt: Alabama (82%), South Carolina (80%), Tennessee (79%), Louisiana (78%), and Arkansas...

(Jan. 23) - Not everyone was happy with President Barack Obama's nod to nonbelievers and non-Christians in his inaugural address. And some of the stiff criticism about Obama’s religious inclusiveness is coming from African-American Christians who maintain that no, all faiths were actually not created equal. "For we know that our patchwork heritage is a strength, not a weakness," the new president said. "We are shaped by every language and culture, drawn from every end of this earth," he also said. Nothing too controversial, proclaiming that America's strength lies in its diversity. But between those two statements, the new president...

Jan. 23) - Not everyone was happy with President Barack Obama's nod to nonbelievers and non-Christians in his inaugural address. And some of the stiff criticism about Obama’s religious inclusiveness is coming from African-American Christians who maintain that no, all faiths were actually not created equal. "For we know that our patchwork heritage is a strength, not a weakness," the new president said. "We are shaped by every language and culture, drawn from every end of this earth," he also said. Nothing too controversial, proclaiming that America's strength lies in its diversity. But between those two statements, the new president...

A well-known California atheist says he and 17 others, plus atheist and humanist organizations, will file suit Tuesday in D.C.'s District Court to strip all references to God and religion from President-elect Barack Obama's January inauguration ceremony. Michael Newdow, of Sacramento, Calif., says he wants to remove the phrase "so help me God" from the oath of office, plus axe the invocation prayer from Pastor Rick Warren, already under fire from the left for his opposition to gay marriage. According to Newdow, any reference to God or religion violates the Constitution. "Equality is important to me," Newdow told The Examiner....

On his November 10 Huffington Post, Nicholas Graham and nearly every commenter thereafter, purposefully distorted what Governor Palin said about prayer and the 2012 presidential race. The universal misconstruction of Palin's comments was that she was "praying to become president" in 2012 and that somehow God was speaking directly to her. But reality is she did not say that at all. Graham offhandedly claimed that Palin said that she was waiting "for a sign from God" as to whether she would run in 2012. Further distorting her comments, he claimed she was "confident God would show the way to the...

Ads proclaiming, "Why believe in a god? Just be good for goodness' sake," will appear on Washington, D.C., buses starting next week and running through December. The American Humanist Association unveiled the provocative $40,000 holiday ad campaign Tuesday. In lifting lyrics from "Santa Claus is Coming to Town," the Washington-based group is wading into what has become a perennial debate over commercialism, religion in the public square and the meaning of Christmas. "We are trying to reach our audience, and sometimes in order to reach an audience, everybody has to hear you," said Fred Edwords, spokesman for the humanist group...

Denver, Sep 25, 2008 / 05:33 pm (CNA).- The Democratic Party has been hijacked by elites hostile to religion, said Mark Stricherz, author of the book "Why Democrats are Blue" and a Democrat himself, during the Casey Lecture delivered on Tuesday at the Archdiocese of Denver. The Casey Series of Lectures was started by the Archdiocese of Denver in 2006 to promote Catholic thinking in political life, inspired by the life and political activism of the late Pennsylvania Governor Robert Casey, a devout Catholic and a Democrat. Stricherz, who has focused his investigation on the historical transition that turned the...

We are constantly reminded about the destructive consequences of religion -- intolerance, hatred, division, inquisitions, persecutions of "heretics," holy wars. Though far from the whole story, they are, nevertheless, true. There have been many awful consequences of religion. What one almost never hears described are the deleterious consequences of secularism -- the terrible developments that have accompanied the breakdown of traditional religion and belief in God. For every thousand students who learn about the Spanish Inquisition and the Salem Witch Trials, maybe two learn to associate Gulag, Auschwitz, The Cultural Revolution, and the Cambodian genocide with secular regimes and ideologies....

The Democratic National Convention's Aug. 24 interfaith service in Denver is supposed to be about unity. But to a Washington, D.C., coalition that supports nontheistic views, it's about division. The Secular Coalition Group, a lobbying organization for church-and-state separation, is pushing to get an atheist on the speaker list, and contends the service is divisive because it alienates nonreligious Democrats at a time when the party needs to unite to support the presumptive nominee, Sen. Barack Obama. "We can all hold different beliefs," said the group's executive director, Lori Lipman Brown, "but we can still come together as patriotic Americans."...

Amazing … that there are that many of us voting Republican, that is. Didn’t we see some numbers in this vein not long ago pointing towards a more lopsided outcome? The atheist vote’s just a sexy detail in an omnibus poll of religious voters. The good news: Obama’s lost seven points among Christians since June and has seen his support soften considerably in several subgroups. The bad news: Pretty much everything else, especially the fact that McCain’s only gained one point in the same period and trails among every “faith segment” except one. If Obama has a “Catholic problem,” what...

Watching the Oregon returns on CNN last Tuesday night, I was intrigued by an odd statistic: among those who described themselves as professing “no religion,” 61% cast their ballot for Senator Obama. I proceeded to scour Democratic exit polls to see if this was some sort of fluke. It was no fluke: of the 30 states where I could find comparable data, Obama won the “no religion” crowd an astonishing 26 times! ... Obama’s popularity among this cohort is at once baffling and understandable. It is understandable because its members tend to be younger, better educated, predominantly male, gainfully employed...

One presidential hopeful is a preacher, another proudly Mormon, and most openly tout their Christianity. In an arena where faith can make or break a politician, the one in 10 Americans who profess no religion feel left in the cold. "They're very disconcerted," said Darren Sherkat, an atheist sociology professor specializing in religion at Southern Illinois University. "They're horrified by both the Democratic and Republican rhetoric surrounding religion -- that people who are not religious ... are immoral, that they're not qualified to serve in public office," he said.