Free Republic

... We must remember that it is not we who anathematized Rome, but Rome that anathematized the gospel and thereby anathematized itself. The issue is not even really the condemnation of Protestants (those wounds are easy to heal) but the anathema against the gospel. The evangelicals who remain authentic witnesses to the gospel of grace alone through faith alone, therefore, are carrying on the Catholic faith. Just prior to the Council of Trent, there were many—including cardinals—who accepted the material principle (that is, the gospel) as the Reformation restated it. In fact, there was still much hope on both sides...

A husband-and-wife team of anthropologists at Washington State University named Barry and Bonnie Hewlett believe that they’ve found a society without gay sex—and that there other societies, too, in which some presumably universal behaviors, such as homosexuality and masturbation, are nonexistent at all levels of analysis. The Hewletts work amid a group of peaceful net-hunting foragers in central Africa known as the Aka, who live in migratory camps of about 25 to 35 individuals.

California Schools Scrambling To Add Lessons On LGBT Americans Many are flummoxed about how to carry out a new law requiring California public schools to teach all students, from kindergartners to 12th-graders, about lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender Americans. David Columbus, a senior and president of Downtown Magnets High School's Gay-Straight Alliance club, said he was pushed around and called names since he was 3 because he liked Barbie dolls. But, he said, he has thrived in the school's supportive environment. Teresa Watanabe October 16, 2011 At Wonderland Avenue Elementary School in Laurel Canyon, there are lesson plans on diverse...

Bill Clinton thinks he deserves more credit for reforming welfare and balancing the budget. “I go crazy every time I read the conventional wisdom,” he said Friday night at his presidential library in Little Rock, Ark. “So part of the Republican narrative is that I was ‘saved’ from myself by the election of the Republican Congress [in 1994] that ‘forced me’ to do welfare reform and ‘made the balanced budget possible.’” Clinton said reporters and commentators “keep saying this, overlooking all relevant facts.”

People should stop calling the site of the September 11 attacks "Ground Zero," New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg said on Tuesday, urging Americans to move past a term long linked with the World Trade Center's twin towers destruction. "We will never forget the devastation of the area that came to be known as ground zero. Never. But the time has come to call those 16 acres what they are: The World Trade Center and the National September 11 Memorial and Museum," Bloomberg said in a speech on the rebuilding of lower Manhattan. Ground Zero originated as a term to describe...

I've never been more convinced that Israel is the axis on which Islamic jihad turns than after reading four, clarifying pages of Bat Ye'or's new book, "Europe, Globalization, and the Coming Universal Caliphate" (Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 212 pp.). Ye'or asks. "Given the immense territories conquered and Islamized over thirteen centuries of expansion and war," she writes, "why would Muslim countries keep plotting to destroy Israel? ... Why is Israel considered so alarming?" ...........hide the age-old reason. "What Israel possesses," Ye'or explains, "is the Bible." To appreciate this explanation, it's essential to realize that Jewish and Christian Bible characters, from...

On the tenth anniversary of 9/11, we mourn our losses. We mourn the loss of fellow Americans who died at the hands of a sworn enemy and we mourn the loss of those in the ranks of our military who have since fought a righteous fight to protect us from that enemy. In a weekly radio address, President Barack Obama called for unity as the 10th anniversary of September 11, 2001 draws near: "We were united," said the President, "and the outpouring of generosity and compassion reminded us that in times of challenge, we Americans move forward together, as one...

At 3:22 p.m., I posted this photo of Vice President Joe Biden and Shimon Peres, with an accompanying caption that indicated it had been taken last year in Jerusalem, Israel: The point of posting the photo was to show that, although the State Department refuses to say that Jerusalem is in Israel, even the White House website acknowledges this elementary truth (at least for Western Jerusalem, west of the 1949 armistic lines). But not any more. Within two hours of posting, the White House has apparently gone through its website, cleansing any reference to

Family seeks recognition for soldier slain in Ark.By: JEANNIE NUSS | Associated Press 07/26/11 4:36 PM Andy Long lies in a military cemetery in Arkansas, between a Persian Gulf veteran and a man who served in Korea. While the tombstones around him say where the soldiers served, the granite slab marking the 23-year-old's grave doesn't list a military campaign — at least, not one the Army recognizes. In the two years since Long was killed and another soldier was wounded outside a military recruiting station in Little Rock by a self-professed jihadist, their families have struggled to convince the military...

A Sacramento-based advocacy group has filed referendum papers seeking to let voters decide the fate of a new California law requiring public schools to teach about societal contributions made by gay and lesbian people. Capitol Resource Institute, which describes itself as a "watchdog for family values," filed its documents this month with the state Attorney General's Office, which is a prelude to launching a signature-gathering campaign. The group hopes to kill Senate Bill 48, legislation that Gov. Jerry Brown said "represents an important step forward for our state"

TRENTON — Students in New Jersey, a state that lost about 700 residents in the Sept. 11 attacks, can soon get classroom lessons on the attacks, from the history of terrorism to the heroics of regular people.Acting state Education Commissioner Christopher Cerf is scheduled to join with a volunteer task force Thursday to unveil a curriculum revolving around Sept. 11.Implementing the curriculum, which features lessons for students from kindergarten through high school, will be voluntary and open to schools public and private, in New Jersey or elsewhere. Schools in France and Missouri have expressed interest, organizers say.Donna Gaffney, a co-founder...

...In those early music classes you learned songs that became part of your American songbook, songs as familiar as your grandmother's hands or the stretch of street where you grew up... Today's kids still learn traditional American folk tunes, but educators are casting a wider net. "There is certainly a world music trend now," says Brian Shepard, of the Music Teachers National Association, based in Ohio. "Schools are teaching folk tunes from other cultures." At Hicks Elementary... students learned Nigerian boat song Eh Soom Boo Kawaya, Canadian folk song J'entends le Moulin and Norwegian emigrant song Oleanna, and other far-flung...

ABC's 'This Week': Founding Fathers Were 'Guys Who Didn't Give Women the Vote and Let Slavery Stand' By Noel Sheppard Created 07/03/2011 - 12:16pm ABC's "This Week" began its Independence Day weekend program with a segment that echoed Time magazine's cover story questioning whether the Constitution matters anymore. After historian Douglas Brinkley said, "We shouldn't act like [the Founding Fathers] were somehow omnipotent," ABC's John Donvan responded, "They were not gods, they were guys - guys who didn't give women the vote and let slavery stand" (video follows with transcript and commentary): DOUGLAS BRINKLEY, HISTORIAN: It's a very slippery slope...

ABC's "This Week" began its Independence Day weekend program with a segment that echoed Time magazine's cover story questioning whether the Constitution matters anymore. After historian Douglas Brinkley said, "We shouldn't act like [the Founding Fathers] were somehow omnipotent," ABC's John Donvan responded, "They were not gods, they were guys - guys who didn't give women the vote and let slavery stand" (video follows with transcript and commentary): DOUGLAS BRINKLEY, HISTORIAN: It's a very slippery slope to start cherry-picking your favorite golden oldie from the Founding Fathers and slapping it on to political speeches today. Democrats and Republicans quote from...

After all, the Good Book was once used to justify slavery. I stopped even peeking at "comments" sections a long time ago, like many writers. However, in the wake of a piece I did on the controversy over homophobia among black comedians, rappers and others, I have been pointed to some comments sections by other people writing on the subject, and have made an exception and taken a look. What I have been struck by is how often perfectly sensible commenters approach this rich and delicate subject by simply stating that the Bible forbids homosexuality. It's clear that a lot...

Regular readers of Time magazine this week found in their mailbox yet another pile of leftist tripe in the vein of "the Constitution is a living document." This week's cover article by managing editor Richard Stengel is a freak show of anti-Constitutional babble including an assertion that the Constitution was not intended to limit government: "If the Constitution was intended to limit the federal government, it sure doesn’t say so...The truth is, the Constitution massively strengthened the central government of the U.S. for the simple reason that it established one where none had existed before."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k5T1Aq2tFVA&feature=player_embedded

WASHINGTON, D.C. -- U.S. adults, on average, estimate that 25% of Americans are gay or lesbian. More specifically, over half of Americans (52%) estimate that at least one in five Americans are gay or lesbian, including 35% who estimate that more than one in four are. Thirty percent put the figure at less than 15%. Just your best guess, what percent of Americans today would you say are gay or lesbian? 2002 and 2011 Trend The findings, from a Gallup poll conducted May 5-8, 2011, mark the second time Gallup has asked Americans to estimate the gay population. In 2002,...

Malcontent Caller #1: Walter Explains His Support for ObamaMay 24, 2011 BEGIN TRANSCRIPT RUSH: Okay, we have some "malcontents" on the phone, Snerdley tells me. You described them as "malcontents." All right, well, we're gonna start with one. Walter in Edgewater, New Jersey. Great to have you, sir. You're malcontent number one on the EIB Network. CALLER: Good afternoon, Rush. Yeah, just a quick question: If President Obama if doin' such a bad job, then why are a lot of Republican candidates droppin' out or don't want to run against him? Don't they care about the country? RUSH: Uh, the...

Here are just a few of the contradictions which have come out in the last week or so regarding Osama bin LadenÂ’s death. misidentifying which of bin LadenÂ’s sons was killedclaiming bin LadenÂ’s wife killed by gunfire / shot in the legclaiming bin LadenÂ’s wife was used by bin Laden as a human shieldclaiming bin LadenÂ’s wife jumped in front of him in an attempt to save himclaiming bin Laden was unarmed vs. holding a gun vs. reaching for a gun vs. resistingclaiming that Obama and advisors were watching the raid liveclaiming that they had about 25 minutes where they...