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  • 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.

Satanic Temple opens 'religious' abortion clinic, promotes 'abortion ritual'

The Satanic Temple opened a second telehealth abortion facility to provide what it describes as “religious abortion services,” and sees the killing of pre-born babies as part of its “destruction ritual.”

Despite its name, TST is not affiliated with the Church of Satan, an organization founded by Anton Szandor LaVey in the 1960s. TST also has its headquarters in Salem, Massachusetts, where it holds two virtual satanic Temple services each week.

TST announced in a press release provided to The Christian Post that its new 24/7 telehealth abortion facility, “Right to Your Life Satanic Abortion Clinic,” will open in Virginia. Women will be charged a fee to obtain abortion-inducing drugs, but the group claims it will help pay for some travel-related expenses.

Continued below.
Sounds like something it would do. Mockery is its reason for existence; here it appears to even be stealing the name. Steal, kill, and destroy....now that sounds familiar. These people will tell you they don't actually believe in satan.

Nice try at a tactic to achieve their goal.
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Play It On Repeat

When was that slogan (and it is a slogan) first used?
I got February 24, 1918 from Google.

It looks like a nice little read.

The price is right.

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The Great Multitude before the Throne Rev 7:9,10

It is pretentious nonsense to think this means a rapture to heaven of the Church.
Totally refuted by Revelation 1:7 Look: He is coming with the clouds and everyone will see Him......
Keras, you continue to bring irrelevant verses. Rev 1:7 is about the 2A (2nd Advent). It occurs after the Trib (Matt 24:29-30).

Acts 1:11 pertains to the pre-Trib rapture. It completely aligns with 1 Th 4:16-17 in that Jesus will descend unseen by the unbelieving world below and into the view of believers, only.
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Why did Achish let David live in Gath?

1 Samuel 27:

1 David said in his heart, “Now I shall perish one day by the hand of Saul. There is nothing better for me than that I should escape to the land of the Philistines.”
David was an outcast. He fled to the Philistines.

2 So David arose and went over, he and the six hundred men who were with him, to Achish the son of Maoch, king of Gath. 3 And David lived with Achish at Gath, he and his men.
King Saul was the enemy of the Philistines, and David was Saul's enemy. Achish thought: The enemy of my enemy is my friend. David was Achish's friend in that sense.

David had 600 men with him. He didn't stay so close to Achish at Gath for long.

5 Then David said to Achish, “If I have found favor in your eyes, let a place be given me in one of the country towns, that I may dwell there. For why should your servant dwell in the royal city with you?”
From both Achish and David's points of view, it was better that they were not so close to each other.

6 So that day Achish gave him Ziklag.
David's reputation as a warrior was well-known, making him a valuable ally. Achish created a buffer zone between Philistine territory and Israel by allowing David to settle in Ziklag, a border town.

It appeared to be a win-win situation: David was no longer chased after by Saul, while Achish gained an ally against Saul.

In ancient Near Eastern culture, offering hospitality to a fugitive from another kingdom was sometimes practiced to gain political advantage.

Some years later, Hadad the Edomite fled from David and Joab to Egypt in !K 10:

19 There Hadad found such great favor in the sight of Pharaoh that he gave to him in marriage the sister of Queen Tahpenes, his own wife.
More years later, 1K 11

40 Solomon sought to kill Jeroboam. But Jeroboam arose and fled to Egypt, to Shishak king of Egypt, where he remained until the death of Solomon.
Why did Achish accommodate David in his territory?

To form an alliance with David against their common enemy, Saul.
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Bull Market is now two years old; appears that it will continue.

The bull market is 2 years old. Here's where Wall Street thinks stocks go next.

The bull market in the S&P 500 (^GSPC) began two years ago and is showing few signs of slowing.

Backed by the rise of artificial intelligence euphoria and a surprisingly resilient US economy, the S&P 500 has gained more than 60% in the past two years and is hovering near an all-time high.

Wall Street strategists who spoke with Yahoo Finance believe the bull can keep running wild. Barring any unexpected shocks, the path higher appears to be clear, with earnings growth expected to keep accelerating and the economy on seemingly solid footing as the Federal Reserve cuts interest rates.


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First look: Biblical epic ‘Mary’ with Anthony Hopkins, executive produced by Joel Osteen, to hit Netflix

This winter, Netflix invites audiences on a compelling journey back to ancient Judea to witness the story of the Nativity from an untold perspective: through the eyes of Mary of Nazareth, mother of Jesus Christ.

Directed by D.J. Caruso, written by Timothy Michael Hayes and executive produced by Lakewood Church Pastor Joel Osteen, “Mary” follows Mary, Joseph, and their newborn son, Jesus, as they flee from King Herod’s deadly pursuit, according to Netflix.Two-time Academy Award winner Anthony Hopkins stars as Herod, while Israeli actress Noa Cohen plays Mary and Ido Tako plays Joseph.

Producer Mary Aloe, a professing Christian, described the film as a “labor of love,” adding that the story is “needed more than ever — in this very unbuttoned world we live in.”

Continued below.

All the gods of the nations are IDOLS

BSB, Ex 20:

4 You shall not make for yourself an idol in the form of anything in the heavens above, on the earth below, or in the waters beneath.
The 2nd commandment: Do not make idols.

NIV, Ps 96:

For all the gods of the nations are idols, but the LORD made the heavens.
The Israelites worshiped the one true God of creation, not represented by idol images. Other nations worshiped idols. They were false gods of demons.

Why are the gods of the nations idols?

Their gods are represented by idols.

In the context of this book, "the nations" would largely be seen as what? Babylonians? Egyptians? Phoenicians?

Yes, and plus the rest of all other nations.

Does "idol" here mean a material shaped like a god?

Right, e.g., the Egyptian sun god was depicted as a man with a falcon head and a solar disk on his head.
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King Jehoash killed the son of the man who saved him

Jehu of the Northern Kingdom killed King Ahaziah of Judah.

2 Kings 11:

1 Now when Athaliah the mother of Ahaziah saw that her son was dead, she arose and destroyed all the royal family.
She killed all her grandchildren and potential heirs—except one baby boy, Jehoash, who was hidden in the temple. She ruled Judah for 6 six years without knowing there was a surviving descendant. Then Jehoiada, the priest, killed Athaliah and installed the 7-year-old Jehoash as king.

Twenty-some years later, Jehoiada died. 2Ch 24:

15 But Jehoiada grew old and full of days, and died. He was 130 years old at his death. 16 And they buried him in the city of David among the kings, because he had done good in Israel, and toward God and his house.
Despite two decades of instruction from Jehoiada, Jehoash failed to internalize the teachings of Jehoiada.

17 Now after the death of Jehoiada the princes of Judah came and paid homage to the king. Then the king listened to them. 18 And they abandoned the house of the Lord, the God of their fathers, and served the Asherim and the idols.
Jehoash turned away from God.

20 Then the Spirit of God clothed Zechariah the son of Jehoiada the priest, and he stood above the people, and said to them, “Thus says God, ‘Why do you break the commandments of the Lord, so that you cannot prosper? Because you have forsaken the Lord, he has forsaken you.’”
Zechariah warned Jehoash.

21 But they conspired against him, and by command of the king they stoned him with stones in the court of the house of the Lord. 22 Thus Joash [i.e., Johoash] the king did not remember the kindness that Jehoiada, Zechariah’s father, had shown him, but killed his son.”
Jehoiada saved the baby Jehoash from his grandmother's political purge and installed him as King of Judah when he was seven years old. He did well until Jehoiada died. Then Zechariah, the son of Jehoiada, warned him. He killed the son of the man who saved him.

Each of us must learn to grow in faith in God directly through a personal relationship and not through some intermediary instructor.
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Biden-Harris Admin Used FEMA Disaster Funding For Illegal Immigrants

Is DHS lying? There is a billion in spending right there.
As you learned, Trump wasted over 3 billion on a "wall" that didn't work. We have already shown that he took FEMA money for immigrants and then falsely accused Biden of doing the same thing. The republicans in Congress voted to provide more money to FEMA for communities helping immigrants. That wasn't Biden; that was a republican-operated House of Representatives.

Reality can be difficult to experience. But it's real. Try to find a way to accommodate it.
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Who was responsible for killing the 70 sons of the house of Ahab?

Who was responsible for killing the 70 sons of the house of Ahab?

Elijah prophesied to Ahab in 1K 21:

21 This is what the LORD says: ‘I will bring calamity on you and consume your descendants; I will cut off from Ahab every male in Israel, both slave and free.'
14 years later, to fulfill the purge, Jehu told the guardians of Ahab's descendants to behead them. Their actions were driven by fear and self-preservation, highlighting the brutal political realities of the time. 2K 10:

9 The next morning Jehu went out. He stood before all the people and said, “You are innocent.
The public at large were innocent.

It was I who conspired against my master and killed him,
Jehu was responsible.

but who killed all these?
That's a rhetorical question pointing to the guardians. They were also responsible. Jehu was shedding some of his responsibility to them.

10 Know, then, that not a word the Lord has spoken against the house of Ahab will fail. The Lord has done what he announced through his servant Elijah.” 11 So Jehu killed everyone in Jezreel who remained of the house of Ahab, as well as all his chief men, his close friends and his priests, leaving him no survivor.
Who was responsible for killing the 70 sons of the house of Ahab?

  1. In the immediate sense, the guardians were responsible. They physically carried out the execution order.
  2. In the strategic sense, Jehu was responsible. He conspired against his king and planned the execution.
  3. Ultimately, God was responsible. He divinely commissioned Jehu (2K 9:7).
  4. Causally, Ahab was responsible for his sin against Naboth (1K 21:19).
Different actors played roles at various levels. This layered structure of responsibility is crucial to have a more complete understanding of the narrative.

Confusion about Prayer language (tongues)

In prayer,, we can asks for truth to be shown to others concerning prosperity or whatever but for ourselves just focus on God and His Word. We're followers of Jesus and we"ve asked to receive the baptism of the Holy Spirit. #8 states what the results will include.

If things are revealed that need to be removed when speaking in tongues, we can pray for deliverance.
Is this common, that things come up to surface while praying in tongues, many people tend not talk about it, it can be uncomfortable sometimes
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On Housing


The article asserts...

It is not wise to spend more than 30% of your monthly income, to pay
for a mortgage (or rent). Paying more than this, results in an inability to
spend any money to improve your situation in life.

Median income in America has gone UP 50%, in the last 11 years.
(This is pretty amazing.)
But, the cost of buying a house, has gone up even more.
---------- ----------

Note that the federal government does not control private home
construction companies. And, it is more profitable for private home construction
companies to build LARGE and EXPENSIVE homes, rather than a lot of cheaper
and more affordable homes. If you want free enterprise, this is what you are
going to get -- construction companies building as many expensive homes as
they can sell, and very few people building affordable family homes.

The affordable housing shortage is NOT NEW. It has been developping for
(probably) over a decade.

The tendency of the younger American generations, to EXPECT to be able to
work an unskilled job, and earn enough for comfortable living, AND save for
buying a house, is an incredibly naive and ignorant expectation.

With the millenials, the trend of being a "slacker" and living with your parents,
although you were an adult, became a normal style of living in America.
Now, the electronic screen generations tend to think that being a slacker, and
living comfortably, and having enough money to raise a family AND enjoy
expensive hobbies, is somehow guaranteed under the U.S. Constitution (I am
speaking a caricature, and generalization).

I speak bluntly about these expectations, because it is politically incorrect
to speak about these topics, BUT they affect the finances of the younger
American generations.

American Christians need to enter into the financial discipline of getting as
much technical education as possible, working technically challenging jobs
(even if they are not fulfilling), living simply, and buying small one-family
houses, instead of the walled neighborhood large homes that realtors want
to sell them. Or the big, jacked up pickup trucks that all Texans want to drive.

Ironically, it is new immigrants to America, who are willing to go through this sacrifice.
But increasingly, it is Americans whose families have been in this country for multiple
generations, who are NOT willing to live sacrificially.

Although wages have gone up to match the rate of inflation, since the Pandemic,
younger Americans are not showing the discipline to work for the future, and
live frugally. More and more younger Americans are signing into mortgages
that they cannot afford, and then finding out that they cannot afford basic
groceries and utilities, for the big house mortgage.

Younger generations who do not live sacrificially, will not improve their
financial future, and are terrifically susceptible to Donald Trump's conspiracy
theories about new and criminal migrant groups, who are stealing their jobs,
and their futures.

Christian congregations ought to be teaching church members about
basic finances.
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The Third Crisis of the Church: What It Means and 5 Things You Can Do...

The Cambridge historian Richard Rex has noted that the first great crisis in Christianity was over the nature of the Trinity, especially over the nature of Christ, hence the early Christological heresies. The second great crisis, associated with the Reformation, was over the nature of the Church. This entailed the Protestant attack on sacramentality and the sacred hierarchy. The third great crisis, Rex observes, the one we are enduring today, is over the nature of the human person. Here the concrete issues revolve around the fact of sexual difference. Does the difference between masculinity and femininity have any theological significance?

This overview of the history of ecclesial crises is very perceptive but one might add that within the Catholic Church today the crisis is not confined to matters of anthropology. Rather a perfect storm has been building across the various branches of theology. In some cases, the crisis has been created because elements of the Catholic intellectual tradition that should exist in a symbiotic relationship have been de-coupled from one another and left in a kind of free-floating state. For example, moral theology has been de-coupled from dogmatic theology. Quite simply, the field of fundamental theology that undergirds all other branches of Catholic theology has been an intellectual battle zone for the past half century. There is no common agreement within the Catholic theological academies over such “building blocks” as the relationship between nature and grace, faith and reason, history and ontology, scripture and tradition, and the principles that ought to govern scriptural exegesis. Not only are the relationships a subject of academic debate, but the individual concepts themselves are not understood in the same way across the world of Catholic scholarship. There is, for example, no common agreement about key concepts like “grace,” “sacrament,” “tradition,” and even “priesthood.” Notions like the understanding of a priest as “alter Christus” (another Christ) are accepted by some but rejected by others. Some scholars believe that priesthood entails an ontological change in the recipient of the sacrament while others believe this idea is medieval nonsense. Some scholars read the Scriptures through the lens of contemporary social theories such as Critical Theory or a wide variety of Feminist theories, while others accept the teaching in The Interpretation of the Bible in the Church (1993), a publication of the Pontifical Biblical Commission, that is expressly critical of the employment of Marxist and Feminist social theories.

Continued below.

The Struggle with Our Thoughts

struggle5.png




The Struggle with Our Thoughts

One does not arrive at virtue except through knowledge of self and knowledge of Me, which knowledge is more perfectly acquired in the time of temptation, because then man knows himself to be nothing, being unable to lift off himself the pains and vexations which he would flee; and he knows Me in his will, which is fortified by My goodness, so that it does not yield to these thoughts.

The Love Crucified Community.
The Simple Path to Union with God (p. 74). Kindle Edition.

++++++++++

The growth in self-knowledge is not an easy task. When we run from the truth about ourselves it will often lead to trouble and suffering. “Fear of facing ourselves can back us into tight corners, and there is no escape if the inner journey is not started.

Sometimes repression is something that can be needed. Our inner world is deep, perhaps bottomless, filled with billions of experiences buried so deep that they cannot be remembered or considered. This can be a good thing if we are not prepared to experience them. It allows us to live our lives without too much conscious baggage. Yet, the depths of our unconscious still have a strong hold on us and can cause havoc if they move close to the surface just below consciousness.

Our everyday struggle can let us know even if dimly what we are dealing with. Our thoughts and fantasies will show us hints about the source of our inner struggle. However, if we do not have a strong ego, it may be impossible for us to deal with these issues without causing us a great deal of shame or self-hatred. This can be a serious roadblock that can keep us from taking the inner journey.

When prayer comes into the picture, which is an opening of one’s heart and mind to God, it is then that we are called to trust in God and His leadership in our lives. It is true, that trust can be a difficult choice, but once we accept that we are loved by God, and as a Christian, Jesus fulfills that role, we can face the most painful, and yes violent, inner issues before the gaze of Our Loving God. We learn to trust from experience that flows from a deep prayer life. Prayer allows us to step back and observe thereby learning that we are not our emotions or feelings, but are important aspects of our inner life. They pass, and there is a flow. When this becomes a reality for us we can find it easier to stay focused and rooted in our faith in God’s presence in our lives.

Jesus commands us to love ourselves, for otherwise, we will run from this necessary but daunting task of true growth in God’s love. BrMD
,

Tokyo’s Cardinal-Elect Kikuchi Is a Missionary, Manager and Papabile

In the same week, Japan received a new cardinal and the Nobel Peace Prize.

In far-flung outposts of the Catholic Church, great distances from Rome, marvelous devotion and dedication are encountered, often at high levels.

Perhaps that’s one reason why Pope Francis continues to elevate Churchmen from the peripheries to the College of Cardinals.

The Holy Father’s announcement on Oct. 6 of 21 men to be awarded red hats included five from Asia. Following the Dec. 8 consistory, more than 20% of the cardinal-electors will be eligible to vote for the next pope.

Tokyo’s Archbishop Tarcisio Isao Kikuchi, who will turn 66 on Nov. 1, is one of the newly appointed princes — the second Japanese cardinal named by Francis. Six months ago, I chatted with Archbishop Kikuchi for several hours at St. Mary’s Cathedral, a gigantic modern sculpture of a church.

Continued below.

Adult film industry jumps into campaign in support of Kamala Harris

I never said they had anything to do with the development of the TCP/IP stack. Indeed, MS was so notoriously late to the party, and Windows NT drivers would not have worked with Windows 9x, so for Windows 95/98/ME, they used the BSD TCP/IP stack, which was the most mature IP stack of its time.

What did I write that made you think that I said Windows was involved in the development of TCP/IP? Because that was not what I was trying to say.
I don't know that I'd call MS "late to the party" given that they were part of the PC architecture group that created the modern open source PC.

And, of course, NT drivers won't work with Window 9x, they are different operating systems. I don't really understand your point.

But you keep making it.

The Implemention of the World Wide Web occurred only after IPv4 had reached a level of maturity, and is an application level protocol. Some people like it more than others. However, the Internet predated the Web and Sir Tim Berners-Lee.
Yeah, I think I just said that.
By the way Sir Tim implemented the Web on a NeXT machine running NeXT OS, a UNIX-like operating system with a FreeBSD userland and a Mach-based Microkernel, that later was mated to the Carbon subset of the MacOS Classic API to become Mac OS X, which has since been turned into other derivative products by Apple.
Yeah, I have a picture of the server running the initial implementation of the Web at CERN.

And, why does the rest of this matter ? Tracing the history of Apple software seem like the kind of pointless word salad that makes me think this is AI generated in the first place.

The NeXT OS itself had a quite different UI called NextStep, which later was open sourced as OpenStep, and one can still find derivatives of it used on fringe communities on Linux systems to this day.
....and, again
.....what is your point ?

Before the web the transfer of porn over the Internet did happen, but even university connections were not supremely fast back then, but suffice it to say there is a very good reason why most Usenet providers dropped access to alt.binaries
Not in my experience. I got most of my information off the internet from alt.binaires up until about 2000. The alt.binaries were by far the biggest set of Usenet lists out there.
There were also criminal hackers, but the fact you appear to be using the word “hacker” to refer to them suggests you were not a part of the legitimate hacker culture that actually developed much of the Internet infrastructure, for example, the routing protocols, networking stacks, et cetera, who were associated with the ITS users on the PDP-10 minicomputers at MIT, like esr and rms, or with BSD at Berkeley or the WAITS system at Stanford, which were some of the earliest ARPANET sites to be connected.
This minute attention to meaningless details is another reason I'm convinced this is AI junk.

1) No one cares,

and more to the point

2) This sentence is over 80 words long, and has no coherent subject. Also,

3) "Hackers" didn't create routing protocols. Good lord, we're talking about seriously sophisticated communications systems that had to be implemented system-wide to work. This is the work of engineers and project managers.

Among people who worked on the Internet in a serious way back then, what the general public calls a “Hacker”, they call a “cracker” for criminal hacker, since that represents a dark subset of the broader hacker culture responsible for such things as open source software.
Here, again, you're missing the point:

Open source software was mandated as part of the DoD guidelines under DAPRA. If you used the network to develop something, it should be made available to everyone on the network. That was the whole point of APRAnet: collaboration. A lot of this work was done by Rand Corporation, IBM, Xerox and Bell Labs. Calling people like Donald Knuth and Admiral Hopper "Hackers" is an insult, no matter how you define the word.

But I'll grant you this, and I get into arguments about it all the time: To me there is no difference between hacker and cracker. If you're doing something you're not supposed to be doing, you're a criminal. Therefore, a hacker.

There are just people who are my kind of criminal. At least I admit it.

<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>><<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>><<<<<<<<<<<<<<<


AND NOW, SOMETHING JUST FOR ANYONE WHO MADE IT THIS FAR ON THIS STUPID THREAD:

Just for giggles and grins, the very first website ever put on the World Wide Web. Basically, it just says the Web is a thing and has some resource links, most of which still work.

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Indie Cover of Tom Petty - Stand My Ground by Christian & secular indie band

Hello folks. Tom Petty made some good music back in the 1970s-1980s. :) One of them was "I Won't Back Down", a classic from 1989. 30 years later, an indie band by the name of Judah & The Lion covered the original. The music was changed from 4/4 time to 3/4 or 6/8 time and slowed down into a ballad. Slow ballads make me tear up and get emotional, which is one of the reasons I like that genre.

My favorite slow ballads:
Chris Tomlin - Indescribable is one of my favorite worship ballads, while Dolly Parton - I Will Always Love You (Danish National Symphony Orchestra) is my favorite secular ballad. The Whitney Houston version and the original by Dolly Parton are good as well. The saddest ballad is Skylar Grey - Coming Home Pt. II (the original version without rap, cos most rap sucks).

Tom Petty - I Won't Back Down (Judah & The Lion Cover) [Indie, Folk, Pop Ballad] (2019):
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Over the last couple of years, indie folk songs have piqued my interest. They often have haunting bitter/sweet sound & lyrics and I frequently find myself searching for a song I've heard that has caused me to stop what I'm doing & listen. This is one of those:

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