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Our semi-Liberal Catholic parish recently changed hymnals. Today was the first Sunday since the change that A Mighty Fortress is Our God was on the hymn list. Now, I come from 500 years of German Lutherans. I know the words to Ein Feste Burg, and I know the English version by heart (a bulwark never failing, Lord Sabaoth His name, etc, etc). So, anyway, the words in the new hymnal are different. My first thought, of course, was "Damn Liberal Catholics, can't leave any of our good old hymns alone", BUT, when I looked down, I saw the copyright was...

"This is just the beginning. This is a declaration of war by five judges who have spat in the face of their Creator, of marriage, of biology, and freedom. Now a major proper response for Christians and others is massive civil disobedience and defiance of this homo-fascist decision."

France’s Main Protestant Church Gives Blessing To Gay Marriages May 18, 2015 France's largest Protestant Church, the fourth-largest religious group in the country, has voted for its pastors to give their blessing to homosexual couples. The move comes two years after Paris legalized same-sex marriages. "The synod has decided to take a step forward in accompanying people and these couples by opening the possibility of celebrating liturgical blessings if they want," said Laurent Schlumberger, president of the Church. The United Protestant Church of France, claims it has about 110,000 active members and 400,000 believers. It was created back in 2012-2013...

This was so quirky, that I had to post it. I asked a priest friend to write a response.From a reader…QUAERITUR: Our Episcopal [?] priest recently became a nun. She insists on wearing her habit when serving mass. Is this proper or even allowed under canon 284?. She is causing a split in our parish. We hired a priest, not a nun. Most of us are happy that she has found another calling, but we feel that when she is working (ministering) as a priest and serving God as a priest she should look like a priest, not a nun....

Church has always been an important part of my life, and it will continue to be the central expression of my faith in God, and the core of my spiritual life. Attending Liturgy was always the pinnacle of my week, and I have virtually every word of the Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom committed to memory as a result of years as a church musician. My experience of church is beginning to take a different shape, however, after several years of difficult and painful discernment. I am now leaving the Greek Orthodox Church, and continuing to live out my Christianity...

From pro-choice Methodist Minister John M Swomley: “There is also covert violence in the idea that women should not have sexual intercourse if they don’t want children. An act of sexual intercourse is not an implied contract to have children. While this may be the belief of those who accept the doctrine that every sexual act must be open to procreation, it would be violent for any government to decide that such a sectarian doctrine should be enforced against anyone, Catholic or non-Catholic, who does not accept that teaching.” John M Swomley Compulsory Pregnancy: The War against American Women (Amherst,...

Canon Jeremy Pemberton argues at Nottingham employment tribunal that Church of England unlawfully revoked his permission to officiateThe first priest to marry his same-sex partner has begun a discrimination case against the Church of England over its withdrawal of his right to officiate as a priest following the union. Canon Jeremy Pemberton, who married Laurence Cunnington in April 2014, had been informed that Sherwood Forest Hospitals NHS trust was withdrawing an offer of a job after Bishop Richard Inwood refused him the official licence in the diocese of Southwell and Nottingham. The clergyman, who argues that Inwood unlawfully discriminated against...

The attempt to change God the Father to God the Mother is full bore idolatry—a syncretism of the spirit of the age. I remember some of the most emotionally powerful moments of worship that I have experienced occurred in a context where there was the least amount of belief. There was a time in my life when I regularly went to worship at Grace Cathedral in San Francisco, a beautiful church building that had this glorious liturgy. And it would be my habit to go there on Sunday morning and to sit in the pew and listen to the music...

This week (June 8-12, 2015), the highest courts of the Reformed Presbyterian Church of North America (RPCNA) and the Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church (ARP) met concurrently in Flat Rock, North Carolina at the Bonclarken Conference Center. The RP and ARP courts are both called “synod” – distinct from the term “general assembly” used by most other Presbyterian denominations. A general assembly is historically seen as the highest court, with a synod being lesser. In seminary, I was taught that our denominations have chosen to keep synods, in part, as a reminder that the visible church is yet fractured due to...

Not satisfied with what Women and the Church (WATCH) has done to reduce the Anglican Church in Great Britain to a pale reflection of her former glory, its former Chair and "prominent Church of England campaigner", Christina Rees, will be among the speakers at a conference in Philadelphia later this year of the Catholic movement for women's ordination, Women's Ordination Worldwide. (H/T Ruth Gledhill). The BBC's Religious affairs correspondent, Caroline Wyatt, recently posed the question: Is the UK still a Christian country? The answer was 'Yes'. But based on analyses by the US Pew Research Center, the conclusions suggest that...

Relax in The Beam of My majesty and drink deep of My Forgiveness for there is great healing here and rebuke the Harlot that drinks the blood of the Saints and the Prophets for truly there is only condemnation there for you "ARE" Forgiven, cleansed in My blood alone and I AM "Your" Salvation. Enjoy My creation for I have set it as a table of remembrance of My Glory, before you were in the womb. You will see as you rest in Me you make yourself completely available to My Voice calling to you in the wilderness(DRY PLACES), all...

Historically speaking, God's glory has often shone the brightest when the church was at its weakest. In fact, Christians should see times of cultural/political weakness as a time of the greatest opportunity to exhibit Christ. If God ordains that the Church should endure weaknesses, insults, distresses, persecutions or difficulties, for Christ’s sake, we should be well content, for when we are weak, Christ is strong. (2 Cor 12:10) Perhaps the greatest apologetic will be to respond to such hardships and difficulties with joy and love toward those who may bring them our way (1 Peter 3:13-22), along with steadfast perseverance...

Young people won’t necessarily find faith in formal church services says the NHS's former Chief Nurse Dame Sarah Mullally as she is named as Bishop of Crediton Declining numbers at services should not necessarily be a cause of despair for churches because people will still “encounter God” without ever taking their place in a pew, the Church of England’s newest bishop designate has insisted. Dame Sarah Mullally, the former NHS Chief Nurse for England who has been named as the next Bishop of Crediton, said clerics must recognise that young people are as likely to hear the Christian message through...

My questions pertain to the tribulation they are as follows: 1. If there is a rapture, does it happen before or after people start receiving the mark of the beast? 2. If before is there some event that happens prior to receiving the mark of the beast? I'm not looking to debate if there is or isn't a rapture, just where in the progression of events people are forced to receive the mark of the beast and we move to a cashless world.

A group of religious leaders and health experts yesterday called on President Obama to provide access to funding so that women who have been raped by terrorists abroad can have abortions. Christian, Jewish and Muslim leaders met at St John's Episcopal Church, just opposite the White House, to raise awareness of the need to provide post-rape care, including abortions, for the victims of groups such as ISIS in Syria and Iraq and Boko Haram in Nigeria. "Women are dying now. Families are being pushed further into poverty now because this care is not available to them," said Rev Harry Knox,...

MOSCOW, June 5, 2015 (LifeSiteNews) – Churches that have deemed homosexuality morally acceptable have rejected Christianity and are preparing their followers to accept the Anti-Christ, according to one of the leading figures in the Russian Orthodox Church. His statement came as the Russian Orthodox Church announced that it is ending “formal contacts” with the United Protestant Church of France and the Church of Scotland over those churches’ abandonment of traditional Christian sexual morality. In its statement, the church said ecumenical dialogue was pointless after France’s United Protestant Church last month voted to allow pastors to officiate at same-sex “marriages” and...

The Independent may not be posted due to legal issues but click HERE for the full article.

Jimmy Carter severed his ties with the Southern Baptist Convention, but apparently is still a Baptist (Maranatha Baptist Church). Josh Duggar and the Duggar family are Independent Baptist. Some will say that neither of them go to the right Baptist church or the correct one and thus neither of them are truly Baptist, just as some Methodists will say that other Methodists don't go to the right Methodist church and thus truly aren't Methodist. Some Jewish people may say that other Jews, (although quite orthodox in their beliefs) aren't quite Orthodox enough and thus aren't truly Jewish when it comes...

As the Church of England prepares to install its first female bishop this year, church leaders are growing bolder and louder in their call for the use of feminine language to describe God. Some of them are even going so far as to refer to Jesus, a historical figure — and a man — as “Jesa Christa.” Many priests and bishops already substitute “she” for “he” in parish services around the country. At a recent Westminster Faith Debate on women bishops, a woman rabbi sang ‘The Lord’s My Shepherd’ with female instead of male pronouns.Bishop of Buckingham Alan Wilson...

Moscow, June 3, Interfax - The Moscow Patriarchate criticizes the decisions of the Presbyterian Church of Scotland to consecrate homosexuals and of the United Protestant Church of France to bless homosexual marriages. "These decisions of the Church of Scotland and the Church of France have deeply disappointed the Russian Orthodox Church as they seem incompatible with norms of Christian morals," the Department for External Church Relations says in its statement posted Wednesday on its official website. Guided by definitions of the Bishops' Councils, which say that future relations with many Protestant communities depend on their faithfulness to norms of Gospel...