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Showing posts from December, 2012
Holy Christmas to everyone. As we celebrate the birthday of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, I am reminded of the good things that are happening in a world filled with sadness and hurt. It is the times when God's angels perform the daily miracles that many people do not seem to notice. On a day like today, when so many folks return home to visit family there are also folks who have spent the day alone. For everyone who posted their Santa booty on their Facebook page, there are just as many that have no computer and received no presents. Just as people strive to have the perfect holly, jolly Christmas others struggle to survive. So as we celebrate the birth of Jesus during the Christmas season, let us put our action behind what we learned in the scriptures. We need to be doers and not just hearers of the word. St. James epistle is quite clear on this point. Just as Moses heard, he also acted. Just as Mary said yes, she also acted. The list is endless with people like Noah, Peter, E...
There will be tribulation but there is Jesus. It is what I keep hearing as I pray for the victims in the Sandy Hook School tragedy. We are struggling to comprehend how this can happen. But just today, there is an article that says that mass killings happen once every two weeks in the United States. How can that be true? The report says that many of them go unreported. The Sandy Hook murders grabbed our collective attention because it involved innocent children. But all murdered victims are innocent. Including those killed by abortion. This is not another politicized statement about what happened in Newtown. It is statement of the fact that we as a nation have lost our moral way. When there is not right or wrong then we struggle to maintain our civility. When we prevent people from praying and instead, bully them into thinking they cannot talk about God in "public" places, we only cause confusion in a world that is already filled with chaos. So where do we go from here? I say ...
I urge everyone to pray for the victims of the Newtown, Connecticut mass murder. It is unfathomable that someone could be so evil. Not knowing his motive makes it even harder to bear. What triggered this amount of hatred? Satan is definitely meddling in the minds of some folks. We need prayer warriors to respond to this new level of evilness. There is no peace, says the Lord, for the wicked. (Isaiah 48:22)
Julea Ward was just a few credits away from her counseling degree when Eastern Michigan University expelled her. As part of her practicum, the school assigned Julea to a homosexual case study. As a Christian, Julea didn't think that she could see the student -- not because she didn't want to help, but because she didn't want to affirm his lifestyle. After consulting her supervisor, Julea referred the student to another counselor -- which is, as her attorneys pointed out, "a common, professional practice." Weeks later, the university hauled Julea before a disciplinary committee and told her she'd have to enroll in a "remediation" program. When she refused, they kicked her out of the program. For the last three years, Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF) has fought its way through the courts to vindicate Julea. Yesterday, they succeeded. After a blockbuster ruling in January, Eastern Michigan finally agreed to settle the case this week -- capping a long an...
Every time you ask a question about your TV, even if it doesn't answer back, you're doing the right thing. You are becoming more media literate. It's perfectly fine to ask questions about the pervasive influence of commercials, the content of programming, and the seductive spell cast by the glow of the flat screen (or tube, if you've got an old-enough set that still works). The task becomes a critical one for parents as they grind their teeth in anxiety over making TV their children's electronic baby sitter. Or making the computer the sitter. Or the video game. A new online guide, produced jointly by the Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood and the Alliance for Childhood in collaboration with an organization called TRUCE -- short for Teachers Resisting Unhealthy Children's Entertainment -- helps clarify the issues for parents, and grandparents, too. Called "Facing the Screen Dilemma: Young Children, Technology and Early Education," the 27-page guid...
As the Church celebrates the season of Advent, Pope Benedict said that Catholics should remember ā€œGod is presentā€ and recall his ā€œplan of loving goodness. Advent invites us, in the midst of many difficulties, to renew the assurance that God is present," he told thousands in his general audience at the Vatican recently. Pope Benedict XVI called Advent the time which prepares us for the coming of Christ, which he said is "the great plan of loving goodness," which God wants to use to draw us to him. "He came into the world, becoming a man like us, to fulfill his plan of love and God demands we become a sign of action in the world," he told the pilgrims at Paul VI Hall. "This ā€˜plan of loving goodness’ hasn't remained in God's silence, in the height of his heaven, but he has revealed it by engaging in a relationship with man, whom he has revealed himself to," he said. Pope Benedict noted that God has not delivered simply a set of truths, but has co...
The Pope's Twitter account will be @pontifex and will start on December 12, the feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe, Vatican representatives announced. The news of the 85-year-old tweeting came out weeks ago, but officials finally revealed the account's name and that it will be launched on the Marian feast day, which they said was a coincidence. But instead of informing people of his favorite band and other trivia, the Pope’s goal will be to impart spiritual messages to people around the globe. Greg Burke, who was recently appointed media advisor to the Holy See's Secretary of State, explained that the name was chosen because pontifex means both ā€œPope and bridge builder,ā€ and the Holy Father desires to reach out to everyone with the initiative. On the first day, Pope Benedict will personally tweet, but after that assistants will tweet content he approves. "They will be his words and no one will be putting words in his mouth," Burke explained. "My personal input wi...