Free Republic

When he embarked on his journey to discover a path to India Christopher Columbus’ lead ship was the Santa Maria. Built in 1460 it measured 62 ft with a crew of just 40, the Santa Maria would take Columbus to the New World and would change the course of human history. Half a century earlier there was another man who sailed ships who didn’t change the course of human history. His name was Zheng He and he commanded the Chinese navy during the early 15th century. His Treasure Ships were not only larger than the Santa Maria, they were more...

American Jews Who Worked for a Secular America Made a Fatal Error By Dennis Prager Published November 28, 2023 Since World War II, most American Jews have believed that the more secular American society is, the more secure their status.This has been, as I have argued all of my life, a colossal error. Indeed, it may turn out to be a fatal error. With the outburst of unprecedented levels of antisemitism, American Jews are living the famous warning: "Beware what you wish for; you just may get it."The primary reason American Jews have lived in the most Jew-friendly, even Jew-honoring,...

I use the phrase “Judeo-Christian.” When I use it in a published piece, at least one disgruntled reader will shoot me a grumble of protest. “Judeo-Christian” is a controversial phrase. Since it raises hackles, why do I use it?First, let’s look at the controversy. “Judeo-Christian” is so controversial that a 368-page scholarly book has been written about the history and usage of the phrase. Chicago University Press went so far as to call it “dangerous” and a “linguistic battlefield.” I guess that makes those of us who use the phrase warriors. Professor Mark Silk suggests that the phrase is “neo-fascist.”...

"abortion isn’t just about abortion. It’s part of a constellation of seemingly unrelated issues – including gay rights, “transgenderism” and the place of marriage and the family in our society. All are part of a clash of cultures – Judeo-Christian on one hand, neo-pagan on the other."

The term "Judeo-Christian values" is frequently used. I am one who uses it. I do so for the same reason the late great British prime minister Margaret Thatcher did: "The truths of the Judaic-Christian tradition," she said, "are infinitely precious, not only, as I believe, because they are true, but also because they provide the moral impulse which alone can lead to that peace, in the true meaning of the word, for which we all long... There is little hope for democracy if the hearts of men and women in democratic societies cannot be touched by a call to something...

President Joe Biden this week cut "God" out of his proclamation for a National Day of Prayer. Instead, he calls on "citizens" to follow "their own faiths and consciences."

Bari Weiss’s recent essay in Tablet, “Stop Being Shocked,” is a must-read for anyone hot on the trail of the metaphysical shift going on in American culture. She exposes the threat leftism poses to Jewish self-identity, but at a deeper level, she adds to the growing body of evidence proving the hopeless incompatibility of leftism and liberalism.Weiss begins with a useful definition of liberalism: [T]he belief that everyone is equal because everyone is created in the image of God. The belief in the sacredness of the individual over the group or the tribe. The belief that the rule of...

Americans remain the most religious people in the industrialized world: 87% believe in God, two-thirds say they’re Christians, and 45% attend religious services at least once a month (23% weekly). One political party supports their worldview, the other disdains it. One views religion as an ally, the other as an adversary. ... The modern Democrat party – the party of Biden, Bernie and Kamala – is increasingly hostile to religion, depicting it as a force for repression and a danger to democracy. ... In his seminal work, The Clash of Civilization and Remaking of World Order, Samuel Huntington predicted that...

All day coverage for Mt. Rushmore, South Dakota 4th of July Celebration.

My purpose here is not to comment on the unspeakably tragic, mind-bogglingly ugly shootings in El Paso and Dayton. As a nation, we mourn and grieve.And until we have more facts and information, I don’t believe it is wise to comment on the motivation of the shooters.But I believe it is an opportune time to renounce white nationalism.It is unAmerican, it is unChristian, and it is deadly.America’s greatness is not color-based. It is not ethnically driven. America’s greatness is derived from the vision of our Founders, a vision that was largely Christian, driven by biblical principles.Because of those principles, the...

The Continental Congress in Philadelphia approved the final text of the Declaration of Independence on the Fourth of July, but it wasn't until July 8, 1776 that the historic document had been printed and could be publicly read. From the tower at Independence Hall the great bell rang out, summoning citizens to hear the new nation's proclamation of sovereignty. What we know today as the Liberty Bell had not yet acquired its iconic crack. But its noteworthy inscription was plain to see: "Proclaim LIBERTY Throughout All the Land Unto All the Inhabitants Thereof." Those words hadn't been drafted by one...

History curriculum in Texas remembers the Alamo, but could soon forget Hillary Clinton and Helen Keller. As part of an effort to "streamline" the social studies curriculum in Texas, the State Board of Education voted on Friday to change what students in every grade are required to learn in the classroom. They voted to remove several historical figures, including Hillary Clinton and Helen Keller. The board also voted to add back into the curriculum a reference to the "heroism" of the defenders of the Alamo, which had been recommended for elimination, as well as Moses' influence on the writing of...

Trump’s philosophy goes deeper and further back than our self-destructive dalliances with globalism, “free trade,” open borders, what’s good for Wall Street, and an imperialistic, “neoconservative” foreign policy. Trump’s “conservative” critics will insist he’s not even a Republican—and if by “Republican” they mean Jeff Flake, Mitt Romney, or Jeb Bush, then right they are.

'Tis the season to be merry, and we need a little merriment this season. This year, the passage of time between two holidays of the spirit, Hanukkah and Christmas, is short, focusing attention once more on the Judeo-Christian moorings of America. Every year we honor the ways Christians and Jews appeal to what they hold in common in exhortations. But like so much else in our high-tech, 24/7 media world, differences are magnified and politicized. Political overtones have always influenced how we celebrate our holidays, but not until now has so much attention been paid. President Donald Trump is...

President Donald Trump told a gathering of pumped-up Christian conservatives on Friday that he’s keeping his promise to stop government intrusion into people’s faiths and return the country to more traditional values. “In America, we don’t worship government, we worship God,” Trump declared to a cheering crowd at the Values Voters Summit in Washington. "How times have changed," he added, " but you know what? Now they are changing back again, just remember that." Trump, the first sitting president to address the Values Voter Summit, cited the promises he's fulfilled, including the revocation of the Johnson Amendment, which prohibited religious...

President Trump said this morning that his administration is “stopping cold the attacks on Judeo-Christian values” in a rousing speech at the Values Voter Summit. In his first major speech to a socially conservative conference since his election, Trump addressed parental rights, religious liberty, the right to life, and the importance of God over government. “This morning, I am honored and thrilled to return” as the first sitting president, he said. Trump joked that he didn’t even need to ask attendees to vote for him, but he was still there. “Religious liberty is enshrined in the very First Amendment in...

I find it amusing Donald Trump is routinely derided as “divisive” and hateful when his predecessor set race relations back by 50 years and weakened/disparaged America at nearly every opportune moment. For those rabid critics who “misremember”, it was Barack Obama who mocked middle-America voters as bitter, small town xenophobes needlessly clinging to their guns and bibles. If I may, when did supporting the Second Amendment, LEGAL immigration and honoring our nation’s founding Judeo-Christian values become a radical concept? And yet it was under his explicit direction the IRS admitted to singling out businesses and community organizations that identified as...

A dairy farmer, Jean-Pierre Le Guelvout, once kept 66 cows at a thriving estate in southern Brittany. But falling milk prices, accumulating debts, depression and worries about his heath in middle age became too much to bear. Just 46, Mr. Le Guelvout shot himself in the heart in a grove behind his house one cold December day last year. “It was a place that he loved, near the fields that he loved,” explained his sister Marie, who said she was “very close” to him but did not see his suicide coming. The death of Ms. Le Guelvout’s brother was part...

French Revolution Attacking the American Revolution The Google firing confirms a working hypothesis I have been pondering recently. The French Revolution is attacking the American Revolution. The American Revolution was sparked by the Enlightenment, Judeo/Christian moral beliefs, mixed with Greek and Roman philosophy and political theories. At its best, the American Revolution promotes universal human equality–a work still in progress–individual freedom, freedom of thought and speech, the rule of law, etc.. The French Revolution, in contrast, is Utopian, collectivist, authoritarian, intolerant, and punitive. It is anti-religion generally and anti-Christianity specifically. It accepts the belief that the ends justify the means....

Why do the heathen rage, and the people imagine a vain thing? The kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers take counsel together, against the Lord, and against his anointed, saying, Let us break their bands asunder, and cast away their cords from us.(Psalm 2:1-3)Psalm 2 is as apt a description as any I have seen in scripture, of what has happened to the Western World over the pas 100 years. The Psalmist asks two very pertinent questions; “Why are the nations of the world in an uproar?”“Why do the peoples imagine a vain thing?” or “Why are...