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Researchers report that they've found the missing link between an ancient aquatic predator and its ancestors on land. Ichthyosaurs, the dolphin-like reptiles that lived in the sea during the time of the dinosaurs, evolved from terrestrial creatures that made their way back into the water over time. But the fossil record for the lineage has been spotty, without a clear link between land-based reptiles and the aquatic ichthyosaurs scientists know came after. Now, researchers report in Nature that they've found that link — an amphibious ancestor of the swimming ichthyosaurs named Cartorhynchus lenticarpus. "Many creationists have tried to portray ichthyosaurs...

A website opposing the candidacy of Mark Miloscia, a pro-life Catholic, may just be the most vehemently anti-Catholic political attack you've seen this election season. Thus far, it's uncertain who created the site, but it's certainly from those opposing the Republican state senate candidate Interestingly, Miloscia switched from Democrat to Republican precisely because he felt that religious people were no longer welcome in the Democrat party. It appears to be growing increasingly difficult to argue with that. We're getting to the point where this can hardly be called surprising. Radical Muslims are slaughtering Christians in many parts of the globe...

[This is part of Catholic Analysis' special series on Pope Alexander VI. This part, the sixth, grapples with Alexander's interesting relations with the French. Read the fifth part.] With a devout personality, encouraged by his friend, St. Francis of Paola, King Charles VIII was just the man to bring about needed reforms. He was quirky, but responsible, and he was a little naive, but full of ideas. There was only one snag to him: Charles had been taught to covet Naples, and he saw it as a gateway to further expansion. He wanted Alexander to give it to him, but...

Father John Hunwicke writes, "The Holy Father has criticised the fault of 'wanting to close oneself within the written word, and not allowing oneself to be surprised by God, by the God of surprises; within the law, within the certitude of what we know and not of what we still need to learn and to achieve'. (He went on to make balancing criticisms of other and contrary attitudes.) When the first wave of Ordinariate clergy were being 'formed' at Allen Hall, our teaching was solidly, insistently, based upon the Conciliar and post-Conciliar Magisterium. This meant the written words of Vatican...

Which Bible verses did the NIV delete? WHOLE Bible verses deleted in the NIV The following WHOLE verses have been removed in the NIV--whether in the text or footnotes.. here is but an example but there is over 40 IN ALL!!! The NIV also is a collaberator with the JWB or Jehovah's Witness "Bible". Matthew 12:47 -- removed in the footnotes Matthew 17:21 -- COMPLETELY removed [also deleted from the Jehovah's Witness "Bible"]. What are you NIV readers missing? KJV: "Howbeit this kind goeth not out but by prayer and fasting." Matthew 18:11 -- COMPLETELY removed [also deleted from the...

Question: If one thing is clear, it's that there is one, single, visible Church that Jesus founded. This multitude of competing, conflicting denominations is no sign of God's work; therefore, it must be the work of the Evil One. Somewhere in the midst of these 30,000 denominations, there is one true church, and the rest are in sin and rebellion. Answer: The "thousands-of-denominations" argument is very often employed to prove all sorts of things. Here are some citations from letters received from other Catholics: How can all these denominations claim to follow the Bible yet all come to different conclusions?...

Wittenburg, Germany - In a shocking story that is now making headlines on only the most reputable of news sources, a recent exhumation of the body of Martin Luther showed that the Reformer has indeed "rolled over in is grave." Luther was buried beneath the pulpit of the Castle Church in Wittenburg after his death in 1546. As noted in the records of the burial ceremony, Luther was placed within the tomb laying on his back. When the work crew opened the tomb over the weekend to perform maintenance on it, they found the remains of Luther lying face down,...

I make no apology for this title. The Jews have much to answer for, especially the Jews of Israel – and there’s no letting up. I write from England, this precious stone set in the silver sea, where our forefathers were nourished on the blessed freedoms of a robust paganism. We relished our ever-inventive superstitions and gloried in unbridled passion. We made our choice between 14 gods, worshipped devils, and were in lifelong bondage to an inexorable fate known sinisterly as Wyrd. Standards there were, agreeably low. Sure, hopeless ruffians were we, shackled to a changeless decree of the gods,...

I am coming up on my first year as an ordained minister in a continuing Anglican church, and I have noticed that participating on political forums (even when the topic is religious) I find that my opinions and postings more often than not generate more hatred than anything else. Among the things I often hear are that the laity are the real priests and that I am a Pharisee, that my vocation disqualifies me from offering an opinion on anything Christian because I am too narrow minded, and (my personal favorite) because I look too Catholic I must be a...

When I'm in a, shall we say, mellow mood with friends, I can occasionally launch into accounts of politics in seventeenth-century England. This usually results in incredulous stares, followed by, "Oh, so sorry. Fascinating story, I'm sure. But it's really just hours past my bedtime." It's a shame anybody should feel that way, though. Because even in the hands of a dreary lecturer and deadly bore (um, not saying I am one), the story of seventeenth-century England is one of riotously awful chaos -- and the birth of modern freedom. Sit down. Have another drink. Let's talk about it.

Muslims in Iraq entered a Catholic church in Iraq, and when they saw a statue of the Virgin Mary they destroyed it because they deemed it an idol. As we read from one report: The militants also removed the cross from St. Ephrem’s Cathedral, the seat of the Syriac Orthodox archdiocese in Mosul, and put up the black ISIS flag in its place. They also destroyed a statue of the Virgin Mary, according to Ghazwan Ilyas, the head of the Chaldean Culture Society in Mosul, who spoke by telephone on Thursday from Mosul but seemed to have left on Friday....

Well, my friends, how does it feel to watch our Republic bleed out?

As sparring partners go, a Hollywood actress and an evolutionary biologist would not appear to be a natural fit. However, Oscar-winner Angelina Jolie, 39, and controversial scientist Professor Richard Dawkins, 73, have found themselves inadvertently at loggerheads over whether children should be allowed to read fairytales. Miss Jolie, who plays an evil fairy godmother in her latest film Maleficent – a spin on the classic story of Sleeping Beauty – said fairytales play an important role in how she raises her six children, using ‘a little magic’ to impart important moral lessons. The other day, one of the kids lost...

Will the United Methodist Church soon have to drop the “United” part of its name? A group of 80 pastors, including at least two from North Carolina, says the nation’s second-largest Protestant denomination faces a split because of an inability to resolve long-standing theological disputes about homosexuality and church doctrine. But more than lamenting the divisions, the pastors indicated there is little reason to think reconciliation – or even coexistence – could be found. Like a couple heading to divorce court, the pastors cited irreconcilable differences that can’t be mended.

In one of his blander pronouncements during the papal visit, Netanyahu mentioned on Monday that Jesus spoke Hebrew. There was nothing incorrect about Netanyahu’s statement. Jesus was after all, an Israeli Jew. But Francis couldn’t take the truth. So he indelicately interrupted his host, interjecting, “Aramaic.” Netanyahu was probably flustered. True, at the time, educated Jews spoke and wrote in Aramaic. And Jesus was educated. But the language of the people was Hebrew. And Jesus preached to the people, in Hebrew. Netanyahu responded, “He spoke Aramaic, but he knew Hebrew.” Reuters’ write-up of the incident tried to explain away the...

Pope Francis and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu traded words on Monday over the language spoken by Jesus two millennia ago. "Jesus was here, in this land. He spoke Hebrew," Netanyahu told Francis, at a public meeting in Jerusalem in which the Israeli leader cited a strong connection between Judaism and Christianity. "Aramaic," the pope interjected. "He spoke Aramaic, but he knew Hebrew," Netanyahu shot back. Like many things in the Middle East, where the pope is on the last leg of a three-day visit, modern-day discourse about Jesus is complicated and often political. A Jew, Jesus was born in...

Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu and Foreign Minister Avigdor Liberman were right when they blamed the noxious anti-Israel incitement rampant in Europe for Saturday's murderous shooting attack at the Jewish Museum in Brussels >>SNIP<< Pope Benedict XVI was perceived as a friend of Israel, despite his childhood membership in the Hitler Youth. His opposition to Islam's rejection of reason, eloquently expressed at his speech at the University of Regensburg in 2006, positioned him as a religious champion of reason, individual responsibility and law — Judaism's primary contributions to humanity. His predecessor Pope John Paul II was less willing to confront Islamic...

Israel Welcomes Pope FrancisBy Joel Leyden Israel News AgencyJerusalem --- May 24 ... Within 24 hours, the fourth Pope to visit Israel will arrive in the Holy Land. Pope Francis is under no obligation to visit Jordan, Israel and the Palestinians. He is not running for office. He is not closing a business deal. Nor is he seeking to find a cheaper source of gas for the Vatican from the newly discovered gas and oil fields off the shores of Israel. The Catholic church was not always welcoming of Jews and of Israel. For centuries, Jews were portrayed as the...

The Trouble With Calvin – Pt. 1 Over my next five blog posts, I am going to critique the famous “five points” of Calvinist theology: 1. Total Depravity 2. Unconditional Election 3. Limited Atonement 4. Irresistibility of Grace 5. Perseverance of the Saints (“Once Saved, Always Saved”).Pt. 1 – Total DepravityIn John Calvin’s magnum opus, The Institutes of the Christian Religion, Calvin presents a view of man that is very much like Luther’s, but contrary to what we find in the pages of Sacred Scripture. Calvin used texts like Gen.6:5,The Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great...

Four words on a previously unknown papyrus fragment provide the first evidence that some early Christians believed Jesus had been married, Harvard Professor Karen King told the 10th International Congress of Coptic Studies today. King, the Hollis Professor of Divinity at Harvard Divinity School, announced the existence of the ancient text at the congress’ meeting, held every four years and hosted this year by the Vatican’s Institutum Patristicum Augustinianum in Rome. The four words that appear on the fragment translate to “Jesus said to them, my wife.” The words, written in Coptic, a language of Egyptian Christians, are on a...