The illustration demeans and desecrates the pivotal point in human history: the Incarnation, Passion, death, and resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ.

(LifeSiteNews) — They say a picture is worth a thousand words. What about a profane illustration that demeans and desecrates the pivotal point in human history: the Incarnation, Passion, death, and resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ?

The illustration accompanies an online promotion of a play by Jesuit-run America Magazine’s LGBT-targeting publication, Outreach. But the play which it advertises is unimportant. However, the illustration and what it signifies is of grave concern.

To Satan, this is a priceless work of art. It is a symbol of victory, of his vain pride pretending to triumph over the cross of Christ. It is the ultimate mockery of Christ. And it has been thrust upon us just as “Pride Month” begins.

In the illustration, LGBTQ, “Lesbian-Gay-Bisexual-Transgender-Questioning,” has dislodged the greatest title known to man: “Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews.” It is an attempt to simultaneously erase every other superlative by which Our Lord and savior is known: The Lion of the tribe of Judah, the King of Kings and Lord of Lords, the Alpha and the Omega, who has triumphed by His blood.

Continued below.

Not sure what his angle is on this one (apart from being an obvious, petty, and superficial attack on who he sees as his main rival)

But he's been taking a number of stances recently that could be seen as somewhat counterproductive given the base he's chosen to endear himself to over the past 6 years.

He appeared to side with Disney over DeSantis

Appears to be chastising others in the GOP for being "too strict" on abortion (not two months after bragging and taking credit for "killing Roe v. wade").

He also has been taking a "not so conservative stance" on certain entitlement programs.



Had he built his base off of the Chris Sununu/Larry Hogan centrist type of republicans, this strategy may make some sense.

However, he's spent a good part of the last decade trying to ally with and energize the most right wing part of the base, only to then run to the left of his main primary opponent?? Seems like a gamble.

Only thing I can figure is that maybe he has campaign advisors in his ear giving him the impression that he'll easily cruise through the primaries, and these more "softened" stances are part of a strategy to gain more moderate/independent votes that he was lacking (and caused him to lose to Biden) in 2020.

Or, perhaps I'm giving it too much thought and it really is just as simple as the short-sighted "ready, fire, aim" mentality he's become known for.

Attend a Corpus Christi procession​

To this day, the Fronleichnamprozession is still seen as a symbolic embodiment of contemporary Bavarian Christianity.

Although some of the most famous Feast of Corpus Christi processions take place in more rural communities outside Germany's major cities, processions can also be seen in cities such as Munich and Frankfurt. The Feast of Corpus Christi processions usually begin early in the morning, so plan your visit accordingly if you don’t want to miss out on witnessing these magnificent processions.

Click to expand...

Well said!

There's just a lot of evidence that pops up constantly the points towards a longer human time line than what the Creationist talk about. I find them an interesting read.

153,000-year-old footprints from South Africa are the oldest Homo sapiens tracks on record

Apocatastasis - OrthodoxWiki

I am a lapsed Eastern Orthodox Christian considering returning to the faith. If I were to do so, I would embrace the teaching of universal reconciliation. I refuse to believe that an all-loving God would send beings created in His image to eternal conscious torment for finite sins, with no chance of ultimate reconciliation. This doesn't mean that, in the afterlife, people will be converted against their will. But His love will ultimately penetrate and transform anyone willing to be open to it.

2 Corinthians 1:8-11 ESV


Jesus told us that if we follow him with our lives, in truth, and in action, and not in lip service only, that we will be hated and persecuted as he was hated and persecuted. For if we follow the Lord with our lives, the people of the world should not embrace us as their own, but they should be against us and what we stand for. And we should be experiencing that opposition from the ungodly and from those who are still being led by the flesh and not by the Spirit, which may include some pastors and elders of “churches.”

I have felt what Paul described here. I know what it is like to be physically, emotionally, mentally, and/or spiritually abused and mistreated. I know what it is like to be in despair and to feel utterly hopeless as though there is no way out of what I was going through. The Lord allowed me to go through many such experiences in my life so that I could feel what others feel who are being persecuted for their walks of faith in Jesus Christ. Yes, it is true that I have not had all such experiences as others, but I have had many.

The physical abuse was at the hands of my father when I was growing up as a child, and that is the extent of my physical abuse. But that was horrific enough. But there are other ways in which we can be mistreated and abused and persecuted which are not of a physical nature, but which can be extremely painful, nonetheless. We can have people falsely accuse us of things we did not do and turn others against us, who will also reject us and cast us aside because of the seriousness of our walks of faith in the Lord.

We can have people yell and scream at us because we are following the Lord and not the flesh, and because we are not with the majority, but because we are with the minority, and because we are actually testing what we read and hear against the Scriptures in context, and because we don’t just believe everything we hear coming from the mouths of those who claim to be of God and who claim to be telling people the truth. For if we are truly living lives separate from the world and unto God, we are going to be persecuted.

And we can be greatly misunderstood by other Christians (or by those giving lip service only to the Lord) who are living more worldly lives, and because of the seriousness of our walks of faith, and because we take the Scriptures to heart, and so we obey them in practice, though not in absolute perfection. And they may cast judgments on us based on themselves and on their own prejudices and culture and traditions and worldly thinking. And they may be people who actually side with our persecutors and against us.

And we can have others who profess faith in Jesus Christ betray us and do evil against us and set traps for us like Jesus’ persecutors did to him. And they may be mean and hateful and spiteful towards us because we are walking in obedience to the Lord when they are not, and so we are an offense to them. And this is especially true at this time when so many “Christians” are following a diluted and altered gospel. And many of them are being trained to oppose us strongly and/or even deceitfully.

And when this piles up, and when we have no other humans to rescue us from this evil, but we often have to stand alone, but not alone because God is with us, it can be very disheartening, for sure. And when this increases, the closer we walk with the Lord, and the more that we truly are separate (unlike, different) from the world, it can be extremely emotionally painful when it appears as though all have deserted us. And Paul felt this, and so did some of the prophets of old. Jeremiah definitely comes to mind here.

But what did Paul say here? He said that this was to make us rely not on ourselves but on God who raises the dead. Amen! Persecution can be very humbling. And in our sorrow and despair it can lead us right into the arms of Jesus and into much deeper walks of faith which we may not have otherwise had. Especially when we have nowhere to turn but to God for our comfort, and for our encouragement, it can actually work to increase our faith and our walks of obedience to our Lord. So that can be good for us.

And then what did Paul do? He didn’t keep his persecutions and his difficult experiences to himself, and neither did Jesus. They talked about them. Why? For our comfort and encouragement, if not for now, for a future time when we will go through similar experiences, and so we will know that grace of God which can carry us through such difficulties. And so we will trust the Lord even in these difficult times, and so we will not lose heart, and so we will not give up the fight, but so we will persevere in running the race.

So, the Lord has had me share some of my experiences so that you know that you are not alone in your suffering, if you are suffering as I have suffered, and so you hopefully will find encouragement and hope and healing in knowing, by the grace of God, that we can endure, and we can come out of these times of suffering whole and healed and on fire for the Lord, and not discouraged and not be in despair and not ready to give up all hope. And that is why Jesus and Paul and others shared their experiences, too.

And so the Lord has had me write two books, not professionally published, but just posted on the internet, where I share some of those experiences, and even my own failures, but how God has used those experiences in my life to make me who I am so that I would answer his call on my life, and so that I will do what he has called me to do in sharing what he teaches me each day through his word and to put it on the internet.

The first one was written in 2018, and it has 17 chapters. The second one was written maybe a week ago, and it has 7 chapters. So, out of obedience to my Lord I am going to share with you the links to these two books so that you can read them, as the Lord leads you, if you have at all identified with anything I have shared with you today. And, again, this is for your encouragement, to give you hope in your difficult circumstances so that you know that there is a “rainbow at the end of the storm”.



I Pray for Them

An Original Work / June 4, 2013
Based off John 17

“Glorify Your Son, that Your Son
May glorify our God in heav’n.
Father, You granted Him all power
And all authority over men,
That He might give eternal life
To all those whom now
You have given Him.”

“This now then is eternal life:
That they may know You,
Father, and Your Son;
That they may know the only true God,
And Jesus Christ whom the Father sent.
I have brought You the glory by
Finishing the work that You’ve given Me.”

“I have shown You to those whom
You gave to Me out of the world;
They were Yours. You gave them to Me
And they have obeyed Your words
And they accepted them. They knew
That I came from You, and they believed
With certainty, I was sent.”

“Holy Father, I pray for them by the
Power of Your name: Protect them,
So that they may be one as we are,
For they are still living in this world.
I have given them Your word;
Because of Your word, the world
Has hated them.”

“I pray they may have the full measure of
My joy now living within them.
Father, I pray You sanctify them
By Your word; truly Your word is truth.
As You sent Me into the world,
I send them to tell the world to repent.”

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The Guardian
2 JUNE 2023

Australia’s lowest-paid workers to get 5.75% increase in minimum wage


Almost 2.75 million Australians will receive a pay rise of 5.75% from July 1 after the Fair Work Commission announced its decision for those on minimum and award wages.

The annual wage review decision, released on Friday, indicates the minimum wage will increase to (Aus)$882.80 per week or (Aus)$23.23 per hour.

For some workers, the rise will be 8.6%.

Workers’ salaries have been falling in real terms in recent years as salary increases have failed to keep up with inflation. For the March quarter of this year, wages rose at an annual rate of 3.7%, well shy of the 7% annual rise in consumer prices.

The increase is about midway between the 3.8% some businesses called for, and the 7% sought by the ACTU (Australian Council of Trade Unions - OB)


SOURCE
Australia’s lowest-paid workers to get 5.75% increase in minimum wage | Industrial relations | The Guardian

(The Australian Fair Work Commission (FWC) reviews the national minimum wage yearly. FWC minimum wage decisions set the mandatory minimum wage for all workers across the country.

Australia does not have a separate minimum wage rate for service employees in restaurants etc. (we don’t normally tip))
- OB

anyone know about gematria?
here's a link Gematria - Wikipedia
it's interesting that jesus and messiah = 444 and mark of beast = 666
so what do you guys think?

I am a lapsed Eastern Orthodox Christian considering returning to the Orthodox faith, wondering if it has room for open theists. As far as I've read, Sergei Bulgakov may have been an open theist.

Daniel 4:34 (NASB95)
“But at the end of that period, I, Nebuchadnezzar, raised my eyes toward heaven and my reason returned to me, and I blessed the Most High and praised and honored Him who lives forever; For His dominion is an everlasting dominion, And His kingdom endures from generation to generation.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Such is the analogy of the fall into the life of this world…. For as Nebuchadnezzar lost the sense of the life of a man, so was the fall of man into the life of this world….. For as man’s life is a greater degree of life than that of an animals, so was man’s first created life greater than that of the life that man fell into…. For as plant life has no understanding of animal life and animal life no understanding of man’s life…. Man’s life has no understanding of the Divine life, though all are life, the lesser life has no understanding of the greater life…. The evidence that the above is true, is, the carnal mind of man can not receive the things of God…. It is the new birth that is that life which restores to man the ability to once again receive the things of God… For it follows; to the degree the new birth has grown, to that degree will one be able to see, understand, and experience the things of God…

For just as Nebuchadnezzar’s reason had to be returned to him to understand once again the life of a man, the new birth is the necessary life so man might once again have the ability to understand and experience and know the things of God….

It is this new life grown in an individual that is the salvation purchased by Christ…. All but the growing of this life in one is but man’s attempt to grab onto a salvation of one’s own imaginings…. For the Divine life was lost at the fall, the growing, understanding and experiencing of said life is one’s salvation…. For salvation is a real new life come to life in the soul, which new life can only be experienced by the new life itself…. All other life is but blind and can not see or understand this new life just the same as plant, animal, can not understand the greater life…. Such is the reason for faith, for faith alone can access into the greater life…. For this lesser life must be given up if one would experience the growing of the greater life, for to the degree of the giving up of the lesser will be one’s experiencing of the greater….

So therefore faith is the substance that accesses the sense and understanding of the life that is greater than the life that one was born into when born into the life of this world….

‘access by faith into the grace wherein we stand’

or, for contemplation;

‘access by faith into the life wherein we stand’


Be blessed in the faith that accesses, a fellow follower, Not me

So I’m thinking about buying a diptych for my baby’s nursery. Only thing is, it says it’s a wedding diptych but its medium size (Diptych: Virgin of Kazan and Jesus Christ the Teacher in blue velvet case, medium icons - Wedding Set) and only 5.75 X 10 inches open.


Would this be okay? I mean…it’s not as big as the one in our icon corner of the main part of the house.

Hi guys! Do you guys think God would allow someone to go back in time to give themself a piece of information that would prevent them from falling away after being deceived and losing The Holy Spirit? If so, does anyone know of anyone that might be able to take them there?

Did God want us to go to church, or did He want us to live a specific way ?

I think I may have a mental illness. That may be a reason why I don’t have guilt at all. Still no excuse for the things I have done.

Hi, I have been porn-free since January after 8 years, but often when I see a woman, thoughts like "hot" come to mind, or if I accidentally look at someone's butt, I think that it looks good or other perverse thoughts..

I am in a relationship and I struggle against these thoughts in my head, and I don't want to accept them, I fight them and say to me that there are not true but what can I do to prevent them from arising in the first place?

Is it considered lustful if I have such thoughts but reject or don't want them and feel bad as a result?

I often have such thoughts about other people's appearances, even if they're not of a lustful nature. What can I do about it? Are these thoughts from Satan? Is it my own lust even if I reject them in my mind, sometimes only after a few seconds when I realize it?

Thanks!

Contrary to the myths that are haunting the internet, the word “Easter” has nothing to do with any ancient pagan goddesses, including the most popular claim that Easter is the English name for the ancient Assyrian goddess Ishtar. Notable experts in the field of Assyriology have completely refuted this myth. Addressing the pronunciation of Ishtar as Easter, Jacob Lauinger, associate professor of Assyriology at Johns Hopkins University¹ said: “The equation of Ištar and Easter is crazy … We know very little about how Akkadian (of which Assyrian is a dialect) words and names were pronounced, but it appears that at some point Ištar was pronounced issar.”

And other experts in the field of the history of theology, such as the notable Andrew McGowan, Dean of Yale University’s Berkeley Divinity School², have also refuted this myth: “The Ishtar connection is indeed a modern myth … There is consensus that... ‘Easter’ is derived from the words used in Germanic languages …

The only connection between Easter and Ishtar is that they sound similar. A simple fact check shows these claims to be false: Easter not derived from name of ancient Mesopotamian goddess

The word "Easter" did not exist until the 16th century, when it was coined (invented) by William Tyndale, the man who first translated the Bible from its original Hebrew and Greek languages into English.

Tyndale, an early “reformer” (which movement gave rise to the Protestant Reformation), was persecuted and driven out of England by the church when his request for permission to translate the Scriptures from the original Hebrew and Greek into English were rejected. He fled England and traveled to Hamburg, Germany and joined up with Martin Luther, who had previously translated the Bible from the original Hebrew and Greek into German. Tyndale undertook his translation and relied heavily on Luther's work, coining new English words drawn from many of Luther's German words and phrases (German being the "mother tongue" of English), such as Easter, the English equivalent of the German word Oster used by Germanic people even to this day for the observance of the Resurrection– the word "Oster" in turn derives from an old Teutonic root word "Aufstehen" the word for “resurrection." Tyndale used the German “Oster” and coined the new English word “Easter” for the Christian observance of the Resurrection. The resurrection of Jesus is observed worldwide, but only by English-speaking peoples is it called "Easter."

Many other English words were similarly coined by Tyndale, relying on the German, such as the word "passover" (to translate the Hebrew pesach and Greek pascha and German passah), “passover” carrying over the “pas” sound from all three original languages but at the same time creating a new English word that gives a theological definition of the event itself, the angel “passed over” the homes of those who were covered by the sign of the blood. (Tyndale was actually quite a brilliant linguist and we, especially we Protestants, owe much to his work). In every instance in the Hebrew and Greek where pesach/pascha were used, Tyndale translated the words as “passover.” Only in one instance does he translate the word “passover” as “Easter,” and that was the post-resurrection passover mentioned in Acts 12:4 recounting the arrest and imprisonment of Peter during the days of Unleavened Bread. In this one instance, Tyndale translated “pascha” as “Easter” rather than “passover,” his intent being to indicate a post-resurrection observance.³

Tyndale coined many other English words to translate the Hebrew and Greek for which there were no equivalent English words, such as “atonement” (at-one-ment) “scapegoat,” “mercy seat,” “shewbread,” and others. Even the name “Jehovah” was coined by Tyndale to translate the Hebrew tetragrammaton, the four consonants YHVH, and adding the vowels from the name “Adonai” thus producing the name “YaHoWaH” rendered in English as “Jehovah.”

The story of Tyndale’s life and his translation of the Bible from the original Hebrew and Greek is quite a fascinating story, which you can read here Words “Fitly Spoken”: Tyndale’s English Translation of the Bible | Religious Studies Center. Not only was Tyndale the first to translate the entire Bible from the original languages into English, but he is credited with creating modern English and, further, with translating the Hebrew into poetical English phrases that have become proverbial in the English language.



¹ Jacob Lauinger, Associate Professor, Assyriology, Director of Graduate Studies: Curriculum Vitae Jacob Lauinger | Near Eastern Studies Jacob Lauinger | Johns Hopkins University - Academia.edu

² Andrew McGowan, Dean and President of Yale University, Berkeley Divinity School, Curriculum Vitae Andrew McGowan | Yale Divinity School

³ There is a theological difficulty with translating “passover” as “Easter” in that the Christian passover is not Easter. The Christian passover is the Lord’s Supper. Easter is the Christian observance of the resurrection on the Sunday following the Jewish Passover.

It’s going to be in the 90’s this weekend and decided to make this. It’s great on a hot day. Refrigerate leftovers.

1 (8 ounces) cream cheese softened
1/2 cup sugar
8 ounces cool whip thawed*
6 cups berries I used:
3 cups strawberries sliced
1 cup blackberries
1 cup blueberries
1 cup raspberries

Instructions

In a large bowl, beat together cream cheese and sugar until smooth and creamy. Fold in the thawed cool whip.

Add strawberries, blueberries, blackberries, blueberries, and raspberries. Fold carefully into the cream cheese mixture. Serve immediately.

I feel silly even posting about this because the answer is kind of Occams Razor, but I'm also debating whether I should respond.

Long story short: my cousin has begun a new career as a "life coach" (I know, ew) and she's gathered a big following on Instagram, almost 5,000 followers. She's older than me and has had a lot of trauma in my life, her dad was never around when she was a kid, her first husband walked out on her and their four kids, and then her second husband walked out on her because his son was becoming violent towards her.

What's really weirding my family and I out is that she's taking aim at Christianity as the repressive source of all her pain. She should be acknowledging that she's chosen men poorly and the culprit is the fact that she had an absentee father for the first 25-30 years of her life.

But now her posts on social media over the past six months to a year have taken a more inappropriate tone. She's been on the attack against Christianity's morality, especially revolving around the body, sex, and sexuality. She's made some uncomfortable posts about 'hiding' her femininity and then the straw that broke the camel's back for me was a post she made a couple days ago with a picture card that just said "Masturbation is not sin" followed by a long caption railing on Christianity for essentially being nosy about what people do in the privacy of their homes.

I just find that I'm offended by this new worldview she's adopted not just because of it's content but because she was basically raised by my grandma, one of the most pious and devout Christians I've ever known, and I can just imagine how deeply hurt my grandma would be by my cousin basically walking away from the faith and entertaining a lot of this new age, secular, feminist trash.

My first instinct was just to unfollow her, and I'm still going to do that, but I wonder whether I should respond first. I just don't know what the ripple effects might be of me wading into that swamp. For context, I've never been close to my cousins or any extended family other than my grandma. I think in part because my cousin was just old enough that she was always at a slightly different stage of life than me so we never tried to hang out, but we've get along well. I wouldn't call us friends though like a lot of people are with their extended family.

I typed up this response and I'm still debating whether I might post it to her comments, "Gotta disagree cuz. As a Catholic I affirm the Church’s teaching on the conjugal act which states that it must be both unitive and procreative. Anything that isn’t unto both of those ends runs contrary to the natural law, including masturbation. If I’ve learned anything in the last 15 years it’s that while Protestant doctrine is often (and almost always) arbitrary, Catholic teaching is always well-reasoned and developed from 2000 years of natural wisdom and divine revelation"

Kenneth Hagin Ministries founded RBTC in 1975 and has now grown and expanded to 280 campuses globally. Their student global population has passed 22,000 students.

That is amazing!

Well done Speaker McCarthy. Your leadership forced a bipartisan response.

Welp, there goes the defense of, "I Vulcan mind melded" the documents as unclassified as I walked out the door.
Moreover, it's clear indication of Trump's state of mind given retention and refusing to relinquish classified documents.

IMHE (in my humble experience), I have found that faith is not necessarily blind faith (devoid of proof, evidence, knowing facts)... but rather belief in God which grows stronger as evidence and proof accumulate growing our knowledge and understanding of God... and affirming our ongoing trust in him on the matters we may never have all knowledge / proof of.

Saving faith (IMHE) is total trust in God who once we believe in his Son makes up every shortcoming in us and our walk with him by the inputted righteousness of his Son into our account. Saving faith in Jesus is a complete lack of faith in my self or my abilities. Anything less is not saving faith.

I’m an employee at my home church and have an issue with something going on. You’re welcome to go read my last thread for all of the details, but basically another employee us harassing me and the church isn’t doing enough about it. I’ve done all I can do on my end to try and stop it, but the matter has escalated to the where I have gotten church leadership involved to get him to stop.

It has come to the point where I have told my pastor I am considering resigning. I was going to resign right then, but after a discussion with him, I’m giving the church one more shot to make it right, and if they don’t, I’m leaving. (This issue has gone on for months and this man’s sin has not properly been reprimanded. He’s been encouraged by the church: He still prays over the offering and is spoken highly of by everyone, even those who know the situation.)

I have gotten income from the church that I haven’t tithed yet. I’m also expecting more money coming in from different sources in the next few days. Should I tithe to the church I have a dispute with, or should I donate my tithes to a Christian organization until the matter is resolved/I move churches?

In Matthew 5 it says to leave your tithe and reconcile with your brother before offering your gift to God. But I’ve done all I can to reconcile: the man won’t stop harassing me and the church isn’t doing their duty to make it stop. My relationship with God is fine, if not better than it was when all of this started. So what should I do with my tithe?

A new report by Pew Research Center and the General Social Survey published Tuesday found a surge of adults leaving Christianity to become atheist, agnostic or "nothing in particular." It predicted that if the number of Christians under 30 abandoning their faith accelerates beyond the current pace, adherents of the historically dominant religion of the U.S. could become a minority by 2045.

Noting how approximately 90% of Americans identified as Christians in the early 1990s, the study observed that number, which includes children, had fallen to only 64% by 2020. The number of people in the U.S. who identify as religiously unaffiliated, meanwhile, skyrocketed from 16% in 2007 to 29% in 2020, the research showed. Other religions such as Judaism, Islam, Hinduism and Buddhism, accounted for approximately 6% in 2020.