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Baltimore, Md., Aug 9, 2018 / 05:00 pm (CNA).- Four years of fighting in eastern Ukraine have led to “the biggest humanitarian crisis on the European continent since the end of the Second World War,” according to the head of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church. Archbishop Sviatoslav Shevchuk of Kyiv called on the international community and the Catholic Church not to neglect the crisis in Ukraine. He made the plea during his keynote address at the Knights of Columbus convention in Baltimore on August 7.Since Russia annexed Crimea in 2014, the Ukrainian conflict has taken the lives of more than...

Pope Francis has a problem: Italian Catholics. In the home of the Vatican, believers are increasingly attracted by the hard-line stance of Interior Minister Matteo Salvini. Francis and Salvini espouse radically different approaches to migration. Where the pope has called on countries to take care of the less fortunate, Salvini has turned his close-the-borders approach to immigration into an electoral warhorse. The trouble for Francis is that Salvini seems to be winning — even among Catholic voters.

Groups reputedly founded for a “Catholic Spring” revolt within the Church have a history of criticizing Catholic bishops on LGBT issues and other topics, while taking money from wealthy, strategically minded LGBT activists who have helped reshape American religion, politics and the definition of marriage. Catholics United and Catholics in Alliance for the Common Good came to prominence in mid-October when WikiLeaks published a 2012 email exchange apparently involving John Podesta, President Bill Clinton’s former chief-of-staff and Hillary Clinton’s 2016 campaign manager. Podesta appeared to suggest he and his allies had founded the groups to sow religious revolution. Today,...

Italian Interior Minister: “Enough now with this ‘parent 1 and 2. I have restored mother and father” Claudio Cartaldo "Il Giornale" August 10, 2018 Salvini’s blitz on forms for identity cards - it’s back to the past and “No to the horror of “surrogate motherhood”.  Gone ‘parent n.1’ and ‘parent n.2’.  Back to what is natural: mother and father. Matteo Salvini launches the revolution also in the area of the family and gives the go ahead to re-examine the forms for identity cards.  [Excerpts] In an interview to La Bussola Quotidiano, the Interior Minister takes the side in defense of...

The IRS has reportedly recognized the Pussy Church of Modern Witchcraft as a legitimate church. The Maryland-based group is dedicated exclusively to lesbian feminists. Peter Reilly, a CPA for over 30 years focusing on taxation, first reported the new designation in a blog post for Forbes. "The IRS recognized it as a 501(c)(3) organization and went the extra step of recognizing PCMW as a church, the most enviable of all tax statuses exempt not only from income tax but also from the transparency that filing Form 990 creates," Reilly wrote. "A church does not have to apply for exempt status,...

In Catholic News Service, Global ChurchCatholic News ServiceAug 9, 2018 CONTRIBUTORChinese Catholics pray in late January in the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception in Beijing. (Credit: Roman Pilipey/EPA via CNS.) Two underground parish priests in China's Gansu province have been removed after being accused of holding a summer camp for a youth group at their church. GANSU, China - Two underground parish priests in China’s Gansu province have been removed after being accused of holding a summer camp for a youth group at their church.Father Wang Yiqin of Hui county and Father Li Shidong of Leling in Shandong province...

Catholics question whether Sinicization move is mixing politics with religionChina's nine major religious organizations want all religious sites across the country to raise the national flag on special days to reflect patriotism and Sinicization. But some Catholics claim the initiative aims to force religious people to be patriotic. "Is it necessary to train believers to hold the ritual of raising the national flag and to play the national anthem before they can hold religious activities?" one priest asked. The official Catholic Church in China website quoted a report from the website of the Central United Front Work Department saying that...

The Catholic Church's teaching on homosexuality has been described as "evil" by a former Irish president. Mary McAleese said she was hopeful the Pope would change the church's position on the issue. Pope Francis is due to visit the Republic of Ireland this month for the World Meeting of Families, a major event for the Church. Mrs McAleese, who was president from 1997 to 2011, said she hoped it would be free of "homophobic messages". The Pope's two-day tour will be the first papal visit to Ireland for almost 40 years. 'Exploded that myth'Mrs McAleese made her comments about the...

Join Freepers throughout the world to pray for PRESIDENT TRUMP and VICE-PRESIDENT PENCE and for AMERICA: All Levels of Government, Family, Military, Business, Education, Churches, Health Care Systems and the Media. This is the confidence we have in approaching God: that if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us. —1 John 5:14 Forum threads labeled [Prayer] are closed to debate of any kind. Please join us as we pray today for Unity in our nation!

The Russian Orthodox Church is prepared to begin a dialogue with Russian authorities and society on the return of the institution of the monarchy, one hierarch recently stated. That the Church could enter into a dialogue on the return of the only true form of government, according to Biblical teaching, was stated by His Eminence Archbishop Pitirim of Syktyvkar and Komi-Ziryansky on the television program “Fireside Chats” on the eve of the 100th anniversary of the martyrdom of Tsar Nicholas II and his family, reports Nevsky News. Abp. Pitirim explained: The Bible specifies two systems: theocracy and monarchy, which is...

Questions are being raised over why Italy’s hierarchy and associated institutions, principally opposed to the current government’s immigration policy, are so outspoken in their disapproval of Italy’s ruling coalition.Public clashes between successive Italian governments and the Church are par for the course on the Italian political scene, but the latest dispute over immigration possibly points to something more sinister than the standard, rough and tumble politics. Matters came to a head last week when the Italian Catholic weekly Famiglia Cristiana placed on its cover a silhouetted pope, his hand extended towards the face of Italy’s deputy Prime Minister Matteo Salvini,...

In a legal first, a British High Court judge has recognised a shariah marriage when ruling on a ‘divorce’ petition of a Muslim woman, likely setting a precedent on the acceptance of Islamic marriages and divorces in the UK. Mr Justice Williams ruled that an estranged Muslim couple’s Islamic marriage does fall under the scope of the 1973 Matrimonial Causes Act and that they could, therefore, ‘divorce’ — despite the couple never having had a legal civil ceremony, reports The Guardian. Nasreen Akhter and Mohammed Shabaz Khan, both of Pakistani heritage, had ‘married’ in an Islamic nikah ceremony conducted by...

The uttermost parts of the north Ezekiel 38 Two witnesses Isaiah 11:9 They shall not hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountain: for the earth shall be full of the knowledge of YHVH, as the waters cover the seabed. Habakkuk 2:14 For the earth shall be filled with the knowledge of the glory of YHVH, as the waters cover the seabed. Descriptions of Gog and MaGog Revelation 20:7 And when the thousand years are expired, Satan shall be loosed out of his prison, 8 And shall go out to deceive the nations which are in the four quarters of...

China’s Xi Jinping turns out to be a jealous “god” indeed. The communist country’s long-known antipathy for religion has taken a more brutal form of late, the Associate Press reports, as Xi’s government has increasingly imposed a “Sinicized” form onto believers. The new policy has resulted in ethnic cleansing, forced re-education, and suppression of scriptures, including among the region’s Christians especially: Under President Xi Jinping, China’s most powerful leader since Mao Zedong, believers are seeing their freedoms shrink dramatically even as the country undergoes a religious revival. Experts and activists say that as he consolidates his power, Xi is...

The study evaluated Christian news articles to determine actual or proposed methods of social issue resolution. The articles were identified from common online sites posting Christian news (Breaking Christian News, Charisma News, Christian Broadcasting Network, Christian Post, Christian Times, Christianity Today, LifeSiteNews and Newsmax). The sites were reviewed between January-June 2018. This study found 44 articles that reported a recent effort or future call for Christians to resolve a social problem. In 25 instances the issue resolution was a faith-based call to action which included generally: an individual response (n=14), prayer (n=7) or church-based action (n=4). In contrast, in 19...

RTV's 'Sunday Sermons from South St. Paul' blows the lid off Pope Francis's attempt to change the constant teaching of the Catholic Church on capital punishment. In what surely must be one of the most courageous sermons of 2018, this diocesan priest takes the gloves off and asks: "What's it going to be? The constant teaching established by Scripture, doctors and fathers of the Church, sainted popes and God Himself? Or that which rests on the whim of Pope Francis, who seems to think the Catholic Church’s binding teaching is whatever his opinion happens to be." God help us, what...

Abortion is completely legal only in three places in Latin America: Cuba legalized the practice in 1965, followed by Mexico City in 2007 and Uruguay in 2012. Argentina, like the majority of countries in the predominantly Catholic region, bans abortion almost entirely. Since 1921, a pregnancy may be terminated only if it is the product of rape or if it endangers the woman’s life or health. Abortion under any other circumstance can result in one to four years in prison for both the woman and the doctor who performs it. That may soon change. On August 8, Argentina’s Senate will...

August 2, 2018 (C-Fam) – Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán appears to relish giving indigestion to elites of Western Europe and the European Union. He did it again on July 29 in the Romanian spa town of Băile Tuşnad at an annual event called the Bálványos Summer Open University and Student Camp. His speech was nothing short of a call to political arms for center-right Europeans to rise up and take over the European Parliament in the coming elections. Orbán is particularly pleased to have been given another term with a clear mandate for his vision of a stronger Hungary,...

July 23 (UPI) -- Delaware Gov. John Carney signed a law Monday prohibiting medical and mental health professionals in the state from practicing or referring conversion therapy for minors. The law made Delaware the 14th state, along with Washington, D.C., to ban conversion therapy, a practice which attempts to change the sexual orientation or gender identity of LGBT people. "All Delawareans, including Delaware children, deserve to be respected for who they are, and I was proud to sign Senate Bill 65 into law today," Carney wrote on Twitter. "Discredited practices like conversion therapy have no place in Delaware." Under the...

The bishop of Chioggia has criticized Catholic attacks on Interior Minister Matteo Salvini for his efforts to curb illegal immigration, noting that people’s frustration with Italy’s immigration situation “is not irrational.” Addressing a recent cover story in Famiglia Cristiana, Italy’s largest Catholic publication, which compared Mr. Salvini with the devil, Bishop Adriano Tessarollo said he thinks it is “stupid” to identify the magazine with all Catholic priests. “Let’s stop this collectivizing mentality,” the bishop said in an interview with Corriere del Veneto. “Broad categorical judgements are the most malevolent and offensive thing there is.” In an online interview with Vanity...