• Starting today August 7th, 2024, in order to post in the Married Couples, Courting Couples, or Singles forums, you will not be allowed to post if you have your Marital status designated as private. Announcements will be made in the respective forums as well but please note that if yours is currently listed as Private, you will need to submit a ticket in the Support Area to have yours changed.

  • CF has always been a site that welcomes people from different backgrounds and beliefs to participate in discussion and even debate. That is the nature of its ministry. In view of recent events emotions are running very high. We need to remind people of some basic principles in debating on this site. We need to be civil when we express differences in opinion. No personal attacks. Avoid you, your statements. Don't characterize an entire political party with comparisons to Fascism or Communism or other extreme movements that committed atrocities. CF is not the place for broad brush or blanket statements about groups and political parties. Put the broad brushes and blankets away when you come to CF, better yet, put them in the incinerator. Debate had no place for them. We need to remember that people that commit acts of violence represent themselves or a small extreme faction.

'Sup brothers (and sisters) - Some questions about MJ

Hello folks. How is it going? I am a Christian (recently converted to Catholicism from nondenominational in 2022), and am wondering what your favorite Bible translations are, and what your thoughts are on traditional services and attire (tefillin, tassels) in MJ compared to reform Messianic Judaism. Also, what are your thoughts on Catholicism or Protestantism? From what I know, MJs are Christians who have Jewish traditions, or Jews who believe in Jesus as the Messiah.

Documentary about the Shakers

A few weeks ago I watched a Ken Burns documentary about the Shakers. I came across them in my readings on spiritualists like the Dukhobors, the historical Jesus, early Christianity and the religious imaginary's role in mysticism. I had heard of the Shakers when much younger (I remember the Shaker furniture fad occured in my early teenage years), but not in a sympathetic light (they were seen as wierd or heretical by Evangelicals), and I could not understand the Spiritualist or mystical religion they practiced.


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The Shakers came out of a religious milieu of mystical or ecstatic religion: the Quakers in England, and the Camisards in France. The Camisards were the descendants of persecuted French Protestants that fled to Manchester, in the UK. They had a charismatic or ecstatic type religion. This is the kind of religious environment that the founder of the shakers, Anne Lee, would have been exposed to. The Camisard worship involved spirited singing, prophecy, speaking in tongues, and their religion was shaped by an apocalyptic imagination.

This is a reproduction of what an early Shaker worship meeting might have been like. The building used is an actual Shaker meeting hall that has been preserved in Kentucky.


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Demon spirits or Gods angels?

I know someone named 'Lacey' who says she occasionally and ubrubtly hears a woman audibly speak to her things like, I best describe it as "words of knowledge". and Lacey says these things turn out true. Lacey also mentioned that one time while she was praying, a voice that sounded like her deseased aunt told her "get your things in order, youll be coming with us soon". I'm careful describing this as "words of knowledge" because I don't know if this is of God.

Missouri attorney general to sue New York over Trump prosecutions

Missouri attorney general to sue New York over Trump prosecutions

Andrew Bailey’s lawsuit targets New York attorney general and Manhattan DA, who both secured Trump convictions

Bailey, a Republican politician appointed by Missouri’s governor, Mike Parson, last year, said in a post on X (formerly Twitter) that he would be filing a lawsuit “against the State of New York for their direct attack on our democratic process through unconstitutional lawfare against President Trump”.

“We have to fight back against a rogue prosecutor who is trying to take a presidential candidate off the campaign trail. It sabotages Missourians’ right to a free and fair election,” he added in a subsequent message.


Well, when this gets tossed out, that should eliminate this 'lawfare' nonsense. (Who am I kidding?)

Donald Trump’s ground game strategy: Rely on help from outside organizations like Turning Point

“(The) ability to work with outside groups on field work alleviates the need to have the same size staff footprint as in previous cycles, allowing us to retain a greater share of resources for advertising and paid voter contact programs than in past cycles,” a senior Trump adviser told CNN.

Of those groups, perhaps one of the most important is Turning Point Action, which is hosting Trump in Michigan on Saturday. It will be his second engagement with the organization in as many weeks. Turning Point was one of several groups that sat down with campaign advisers Chris LaCivita and James Blair during a donor retreat earlier in the year that focused on how outside groups could best assist Trump’s reelection effort.

TPA — an affiliate of Turning Point USA, the youth organization started by Trump ally Charlie Kirk — is aiming to ultimately spend $108 million on a get-out-the-vote effort in key battleground states [AZ MI WI], according to two sources familiar with the plans.

Kirk and Tyler Bowyer, TPA’s chief operating officer, created the program after Republicans faced major losses in the 2022 election.

Republican operatives described the effort as valiant but risky.

“You are placing a lot of a trust in these (outside groups), who might be hard to manage,” said one operative, who spoke on condition of anonymity to offer a candid assessment.

A former RNC official who also requested anonymity to speak candidly said, “There’s not a presence being built up, they don’t have a footprint. They have a handful of staffers in the states. … It seems that they are miscalculating how this election is going to be won.”

--

Does Charlie Kirk/TPA have much experience at getting out the vote? Not really. He has a track record of one election and zero wins.

Donald Trump’s Get-Out-The-Vote Plan is Bonkers

In 2022, the Turning Point network entered the ground game business, mainly in Arizona, where it is headquartered. As the Arizona Republic reported, “Turning Point PAC, the political action committee started by Turning Point USA, spent $494,105 during the 2022 election cycle, including the primary elections. The bulk of that, $377,201, went towards the general election races for U.S. Senate, governor, and Secretary of State in Arizona.” Turning Point’s candidates lost all of those races.

[Well, if you only spend half a million of course you're going to lose. Now Kirk will get $100 million dollars to run through his fingers. And what a plan!]

Then-Chair of the Republican National Committee, Ronna McDaniel, gave [Kirk's get out the vote] plan the cold shoulder. Kirk launched blistering attacks on McDaniel, claiming she was a Democratic plant and urging Trump to dump her. According to Real Clear Politics, McDaniel told Trump that Kirk’s penchant for insulting African Americans, such as saying Martin Luther King, Jr. did not deserve a holiday, would hurt efforts with Black voters.

Kirk won the fight. McDaniel quit under pressure. Then Trump took Kirk’s suggestion to install his daughter-in-law, Lara Trump, as RNC co-chair.

“This is why he was trying to get rid of Ronna,” [a] Trump ally said. “He shouldn’t make it sound like, ‘Oh, we’re tired of losing. We don’t have an early vote program.’ He should have just said, ‘Listen, he who controls the RNC controls millions of dollars and I want to get my hands on them.’ I mean, that would have been a more honest grift.”
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Revelation 12

There has been some interesting discussion on here about Revelation 12. I would like to present a different interpretation, with some Bible verses to support it. I welcome your thoughts and criticism! Bible verses in italics from NIV.

Firstly, most of the interpretations of Revelation 12 I have seen here relate to past events from the perspective of John. However the beginning of Revelation points to it being of future events:

The revelation from Jesus Christ, which God gave him to show his servants what must soon take place...
Revelation 1:1a

I believe instead that Revelation 12 relates to the events of the 1940s: the Second World War, the Holocaust, the formation of Israel and the 1948 Arab-Israeli war. Here is why:

She gave birth to a son, a male child, who "will rule all the nations with an iron scepter."
Revelation 12:5

This son who will rule all the nations with an iron scepter appears to be Jesus (e.g. Rev 19:15). However an underlying principle to understand the symbolism of the people and beasts in Revelation - and elsewhere in the Bible, such as Daniel, is that they represent large groups of people - empires, nations or organizations. Sometimes they can reference an individual who represents the group as its' leader. A good example to show this is Daniel's explanation to Nebuchadnezzar of his dream:

"This was the dream, and now we will interpret it to the king. Your Majesty, you are the king of kings. The God of heaven has given you dominion and power and might and glory; in your hands he has placed all mankind and the beasts of the field and the birds in the sky. Wherever they live, he has made you ruler over them all. You are that head of gold.
"After you, another kingdom will arise, inferior to yours. Next, a third kingdom, one of bronze, will rule over the whole earth.

Daniel 2:36-39

Nebuchadnezzar's dream was of a great statue with a head of gold, shoulders of silver and a torso of bronze. Daniel says the head of gold is Nebuchadnezzar, as king he represents his empire: Babylon. However, when he talks about the next two parts of the statue he talks about kingdoms, not their kings. The first three parts of the statue are generally understood to represent the empires of Babylon, Medo-Persia and Greece.

Using this principle, the son referred to in Revelation 12 is not Jesus Christ himself, just as the head of gold was not Nebuchadnezzar, but who they represent: Nebuchadnezzar was king of Babylon, so represented Babylon. Jesus Christ is king of Israel, so the son being born in Revelation 12 represents the country of Israel - born in 1948.

A great sign appeared in heaven: a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet and a crown of twelve stars on her head.
Revelation 12:1

This is a reference to Joseph's dream:

Then he had another dream, and he told it to his brothers. "Listen," he said, "I had another dream, and this time the sun and moon and eleven stars were bowing down to me."
Genesis 37:9

In Joseph's dream the sun and moon were his father, Jacob, and mother, Rachel, and the eleven stars were his eleven brothers. So the twelve stars in the crown of the woman represent the twelve sons of Jacob - the twelve tribes of Israel. The woman, therefore, represents the Jews who gave birth to their country, Israel.

The enormous red dragon (later called Satan) swept a third of the stars out of the sky with its' tail. We have already seen that the stars are the Jews. So this is a reference to the Holocaust, and therefore the dragon, Satan, represents Nazi Germany at this time, with the Holocaust happening at the tail end of the Nazi reign.
Later on, in verse 15, Satan makes one further attempt to fight the woman, with a river of water from his mouth. This represents the 1948 Arab-Israeli war immediately after Israel's Declaration of Independence, with the river of water being the surrounding nations unsuccessfully invading Israel.

I think it fits together and makes sense, but please let me know what you think.

Dems want a ‘democracy’ where the majority lords it over everyone else.

There is, “of course,” zero “legitimate debate discussion” to be had over whether we are a “direct democracy.”

Not today, nor ever.

“Democracy” isn’t even mentioned anywhere in any founding document, much less a direct one.

None of the framers entertained any notions about majoritarianism or federal power that would even loosely comport the ones now embraced by the Left.

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Was Jesus "Woke"?

Was Jesus "woke"

  • Yes

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • No

    Votes: 11 84.6%
  • Sometimes

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • Perhaps there is a spectrum

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • Other

    Votes: 2 15.4%

Wasn't that part of why he why he was Crucified?

Hanging our with sinners, tax collectors, women, even non Jewish women.

Approaching the ritually unclean, lepers, pardoning the woman caught in adultery.

Treating them all with respect, even in Samaria.
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Flat or round earth -The final experiment.

This should be interesting guys , this fella is taking a group to Antarctica to prove one way or the other that the earth is either round or flat , and you can go with him if you want. Have to pay your own way though.

His conversation with Carl is here and you only need to watch the first 15 or 20 mins.
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I personally am not into this stuff but I will be looking forward to seeing their results in a few months time.
The flat earth conversations and debates are everywhere these days , so this final experiment should prove very interesting.

The final experiment web site :

The Final Experiment - Antarctica
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Hi a bit late

Hi all
I'm a Christian that came out of the new age. I have always had strong spiritual experiences, and I have seen healing and demons cast. I believe in doing what he said. That goes for it all. While I believe we are always forgiven i don't believe it's a licence to sin. As he said if you love me, you keep my commands. Of course we fall but you get the point.
I am church less as I have had negative experiences, but I do visit online atm. I'm drawn to the Catholic Church, where it's sincere and historical, or maybe messianic. Sincerity means alot. Trying the best to live it. Not making excuses.
I have seen and experience the power of God. He used me. And it went, when I fell from grace, so to speak. But is there, when I make an effort. So this is how I know, we can't excuse sin.
But strive to live holy lives. Not perfect. But try.
I don't care about fitting in or TV or anything of the like. I'm quite an introvert and I like to read alot. And pets. And remain healthy. I like to coik, healthy living, I buy too many clothes, and I always help others. I value sibcerity, authenticity, honesty, and truth, and God.
I work in health care and studying psychology.
I am a deep person, and I don't like superficial.
I am 52 years old and look between 20-28. It's not fun, because you don't fit in anywhere.
I am not married and no children. I have raised others. But it wasn't my path, unless adoption is in the horizon.

Supreme Court upholds law barring domestic abusers from owning guns in major Second Amendment ruling 8-1

Chief Justice John Roberts, in the majority opinion, responded to the idea that the high court’s previous decisions have locked judges into specific laws that were on the books at the time of the Second Amendment’s enactment, Roberts said that some lower courts have “misunderstood the methodology of our recent Second Amendment cases.”

“Our tradition of firearm regulation allows the government to disarm individuals who present a credible threat to the physical safety of others,” Roberts wrote.

“The Court and Government do not point to a single historical law revoking a citizen’s Second Amendment right based on possible interpersonal violence,” Thomas wrote. “Yet, in the interest of ensuring the Government can regulate one subset of society, today’s decision puts at risk the Second Amendment rights of many more.”

--

Thomas' historicity hobby-horse was recently called out by Amy Coney Barrett.

Though Barrett acknowledged in her opinion that “tradition has a legitimate role to play in constitutional adjudication,” the Trump nominee said that “the court’s laser-like focus on the history of this single restriction misses the forest for the trees” and sought to poke holes in the history and tradition-first route taken by Thomas and the other conservative justices who agreed with his legal rationale.

Orthodox blog

Hey guys, my friend has put out an EO blog. If you're interested:

They SEWED fig leaves together

Genesis 3:

7 Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they realized they were naked; so they sewed fig leaves together and made coverings for themselves.
Strong's Hebrew: 8609. תָּפַר (taphar) — 4 Occurrences

I don't think Adam and Eve had needles and thread at this time. They could have used the stems of the fig leaves to bind them into a makeshift covering.

r/BibleVerseCommentary - They SEWED fig leaves together
Amplified Bible:

they fastened fig leaves together and made themselves coverings.
It was an ineffective covering. Then, God provided:

21 The Lord God made garments of skin for Adam and his wife and clothed them.

Putin and Kim Bromance

Putin recently visited N. Korea....during the visit, Putin and Kim exchanged gifts in this budding bromance!

Will Trump be jealous?

"....a segment aired on he state-controlled Korean Central Television. The two bonded over animals as Kim fed carrots to a horse while Putin looked on. The two also took turns to drive each other around in a Russian-built Aurus limousine. Kim, known as a keen horseman, was famously pictured riding a white stallion in Mount Paektu during snowfall in photos released by state media in 2019, flooding the internet with online jokes and memes. The horses Kim rode are symbolic for North Korea which named its economic effort to recover from the 1950-53 Korean War after the mythical winged horse Chollima. Putin has been pictured shirtless and riding a horse in photos released by Russian state media. Pungsan dogs are a breed of hunting dogs native to a region in the northern part of North Korea. Former South Korean president Moon Jae-in also received a pair of white Pungsan dogs -- named "Gomi" and "Songgang" -- from Kim in 2018 at a time when inter-Korean relations saw a breakthrough. "


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Should I be less empathetic as a man ?

sometimes I cry when i talk to people and they tell me the trials and errors they are going through especially if the issues are relatable and have experienced them before. I feel like as a grown man I shouldn’t be like I used to be like this as a kid crying when I see disabled people or people in poverty im bout to cry thinking about it now. Im starting to think this is a bad thing but im wondering should a Godly man be like this.

NYC 'Bling Bishop' Lamor Whitehead sentenced to 9 years in prison for financial crimes

A New York City pastor known as the “Bling Bishop” will spend nearly a decade behind bars for financial crimes that he has vehemently denied committing.

The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York announced Monday that Bishop Lamor Whitehead was sentenced to nine years in prison for wire fraud, attempted extortion and making false statements to federal law enforcement agents.

Whitehead, pastor of Leaders of Tomorrow International Ministries in Brooklyn, was also sentenced to three years of supervised release and ordered to pay $85,000 in restitution and a fine of $95,000.

“Lamor Whitehead is a con man who stole millions of dollars in a string of financial frauds and even stole from one of his own parishioners,” said U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York Damian Williams. “He lied to federal agents, and again to the Court at this trial. Today’s sentence puts an end to Whitehead’s various schemes and reflects this Office’s commitment to bring accountability to those who abuse their positions of trust.”

Continued below.

Hillary Clinton's plan for Automatic Green Cards for foreign college graduates is revived for 2024 -- “You’d turn colleges into visa mills”

Trump pledges green cards for college grads, reviving a Hillary Clinton idea

“You’d turn colleges into visa mills,” one advocate of restricting immigration said.

“What I wanted to do, and what I will do is, you graduate from a college, I think you should get automatically as part of your diploma a green card to be able to stay in this country,” Trump said in an interview on a podcast titled “All-In” released today. A green card is the colloquial term for legal permanent residency.

Trump went on to specify that he would apply the policy to anyone attending a two- or four-year college.

Trump previously expressed support in 2015 for green cards for college graduates. But the idea was more widely associated with Hillary Clinton, his Democratic opponent, whose campaign website said she would “staple” a green card to master’s and doctoral diplomas in science, technology, engineering and math. The proposal was attacked by immigration hard-liners in Trump’s camp, including the far-right website Breitbart and then-Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.), who became Trump’s attorney general.

Trump campaign spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt clarified ... “This would only apply to the most thoroughly vetted college graduates who would never undercut American wages or workers.” [How does that work exactly? These are not the farm laborers and construction workers doing jobs Americans generally don't. These are people with college degrees.]
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Catholic University hosts transgender and drag queen book display for children

Viterbo University is a Catholic School in La Crosse, Wisconsin, and my alma mater. In the children's section of their library, they have a pride display of children's books.

One book is called "It Feels Good to Be Yourself: A Book About Gender Identity." It's designed to teach children as young 4 about concepts of transgenderism, non-binary, cisgender, etc.

Another book is called Desert Queen. It encourages boys as young as 7 to cross dressing as drag queens.

I've often seen children on campus because they have a Boys & Girls club on campus.

It's depressing to see innocent children targeted with this. I've contacted the Archbishop (I cant find the Bishop's contact) and didn't hear back. I contacted the school and just got a generic response.

Please consider joining me in contacting the Bishop and library:



A local blog wrote about the display: Viterbo Promotes Gender Confusion in Young Children | CouleeConservatives

Illegal migrant charged with murdering Jocelyn Nungaray, 12, was released into the US just weeks ago--cutoff ankle monitor

Ramos was released into the country after telling officials he he feared for his life if he was sent back to his home country, sources told The Post.
His discarded ankle monitor was found on Wednesday NewsNation reported.
More than 7.4 million migrants have been released on a non-detained docket after encounters with border patrol officers.
They are offered court appearance dates to decide their asylum requests sometimes years in the future.
The basis on which Martinez was released has not yet been revealed.
But Ramos was one of more than 184,000 enrolled into the Alternatives to Detention program for closer monitoring after raising suspicions at border encounters.

Most of the criminals released into our country by the Biden administration can wait out the 21 days.

Federal agents raid home of Oakland Mayor Democrat Sheng Thao

FBI agents conducted search warrants early Thursday at the home of Oakland Mayor Sheng Thao and the home of an employee of a city waste contractor.

The FBI confirmed the two search warrants but declined to say who the targets of the search warrants were and whether they were connected.

The first search was conducted at the mayor’s home on Maiden Lane in the Lincoln Highlands neighborhood, and it also included officers from the Internal Revenue Service as well as the U.S. Postal Service.

Video from local news agencies showed agents carrying boxes and bags out of the house.

Property records show that the [2nd] home is connected to Andy Duong, one of the Duong family members who own and manage Cal Waste Solutions, which has been investigated over campaign contributions to Thao and other elected city officials, the Oaklandside reported in 2020.

Biden’s donor enrichment plan

Who would pay more and who wouldn’t? It would depend on how much money a corporation donated to the Democratic Party and whether it had been gifted lucrative tax credits by Biden and the Democratic-controlled Congress.
Much of the new spending Biden secured from Congress through the Inflation Reduction Act and the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act doesn’t come through direct spending by federal government agencies. Instead, most is actually done through the tax code in the form of credits for politically favored corporations. F

Between the intelligence agencies putting out propaganda to get Joe elected and the corporations mentioned in the article, it is going to be hard to fight the corrupt government establishment.

Homosexuality: Calvinist vs Arminian perspective

The debate as to whether homosexuality is a sin often revolves around the question whether or not its a choice. But this assumes that something has to be a choice in order for it to be a sin -- which is implicitly an Arminian assumption. So its interesting that Calvinists, too, argue that homosexuality is a choice. Why can't Calvinists say that homosexuality isn't a choice since everyone was predestined to either go to heaven or hell from birth, so including homosexuality as a part of this predestination-package won't be any more unfair? Thus, it would make logical sense if Arminians were to say homosexuality is a choice while Calvinists were to say that it isn't.

However, despite the fact that Arminians would logically be more likely to agree with the statement "homosexuality is a choice", Calvinists would logically be more likely to agree with the statement "homosexuality is a sin". Here is why. The reason for arguing that homosexuality is not a sin (despite Bible clearly teaching that it is), is the fact that, based on secular evidence, homosexuality doesn't seem to be a choice, while sin is a choice. So, again, the underlying assumption here is Arminian: namely, that sin is a choice. So, logically speaking, Calvinist can argue their way out of it by saying "fine, people are born gay, but homosexuality is still a sin, because according to Calvinism every sin is predestined from birth". An Arminian won't be able to argue that way so thats why the Arminian, if faced with a failure of refuting evidence against homosexuality being a choice, would be forced to try to argue that its not a sin.

Combining the two paragraphs above, here is what would happen. An Arminian would, logically, first take "conservative" position and try to argue that homosexuality is a choice. Then, after he fails to make his case, he would, logically, switch to "liberal" side and argue that homosexuality is not a sin. On the other hand, Calvinist would logically be fine simply maintaining a fixed point of view that partly agrees with liberals and partly with conservatives, namely "homosexuality is not a choice but its still a sin, since those people were predestined to sin".

Now, you might notice that in the above I didn't say they "believe" something; I only said "one would logically expect them to believe it" (with the word logically being key word). Because I don't think the actual opinion survey would confirm what I would logically expect in the above discussion. Why not? One logical explanation is maybe because Calvinists used to be Arminians prior to converting to Calvinism. So, back in their Arminian past, they had to say homosexuality is a choice. And then, after they became Calvinist, they never came back to re-evaluate their perspective. Either that, or a different explanation is that Calvinists want to give people milk before giving them hard meat. Openly admitting to predestination would be hard meat that many people can't bear. So, in order to give them milk (since the discussion in question is the one with either non-believers or not true believers) they have to pretend to be Arminian and then argue from Arminian viewpoint.
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The Polish People Have Spoken

The Polish people are rejecting the Globalist and MSM narrative. Grzegorz Braun was elected with 0% MSM coverage, after he extinguished a menorah with a fire extinguisher. He stands on a platform of peace, and putting the interests of the Polish people over the Globalists' agendas.

Other European nations are moving in the same direction.




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