Planned Parenthood regularly tries to gender shame men into silence when it comes to abortion, unless those men support abortion violence. If you’re “bro-choice”, be proud! Be an “ally” to women! Or so goes the propaganda.

Of course, it doesn’t involve men stepping up to responsibility or helping to provide financial or emotional support or protecting vulnerable women from a business that profits from exploitation. Nope. Planned Parenthood’s idea of “allyship” is simply men cheering on abortion and doing nothing to stop the destruction of the life that they or other fathers have helped to procreate.

With an annual revenue of over $2 billion, Planned Parenthood relies on spineless men to beef up its predatory power. And its affiliate in my state, the Virginia League for Planned Parenthood (VLPP) is trying to con Virginians into voting for a constitutional amendment to enshrine the right to kill our unborn children for any reason throughout the entire pregnancy.

Introducing the abortion giant’s latest desperate marketing gimmick — Bros for Repro. First, everyone already has the right to reproduce. Second, abortion is not an act of reproduction; it violently destroys reproduction. Third, I thought it was “No Uterus! No Say!” Guess that mantra needs to be shelved since, apparently, men can now get pregnant. The ACLU said so. Nothing says “bros” like a bunch of dudes defending a corrupt abortion biz that depends on good men’s absence.

Continued below.

Elon Musk’s announcement about a “kid-friendly” Baby Grok AI chatbot has been met with skepticism by the National Center on Sexual Exploitation after X released a childlike female AI companion who strips when used in “spicy mode.”

In a July 19 X post, the tech billionaire unveiled his plans to release Baby Grok, stating that the application would be “dedicated to kid-friendly content.” Unlike the Grok AI chatbot Musk developed through his xAI company, the Baby Grok version is specifically intended for children’s use.

Fox Business reported that the interactions in the simplified version of the Grok AI chatbot have been tailored to be “safe and educational.”

Continued below.

The EU also committed to buy $750 billion of liquefied natural gas, oil and nuclear fuels from the United States – split equally over three years – to replace Russian energy sources.

And it will pour $600 billion more in additional investments in the United States.

Trump said EU countries – which recently pledged to ramp up their defence spending within NATO – would be purchasing “hundreds of billions of dollars’ worth of military equipment”.




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Hello.

By nationality, I am Romanian, speaking the same language. Born and baptized with it, denomination Christian-Orthodox. I usually read and pray the bible using the English language. Very rarely, if ever do I read/pray the Romanian versions. Last night, however I prayed Psalm 91 in Romanian, and had a lot of nightmares during my sleep. Things that I am afraid of came into my dreams. I'm wondering if there isn't a connection. Praying psalm 91 in English doesn't have the same effect.

Is there a difference between the language you pray/sing/read in? If you are baptized with a specific language, is it possible, that one to be more "powerful" than any other?

For context, I dream, a lot, and most of them come true. But they are not always of the Lord. So one must be extremely careful.

Thank you.

Upcoming conference (with online option) which might be of interest

To Listen and Respond: Dialogue as Feminist Method

Our Annual ACFT Conference (including the Janette Gray RSM Lecture 2025) will take place 7-8 November 2025. All are welcome.

events.humanitix.com

Paul had once lived under the Old Covenant God had with his people Israel, and he was dedicated to following all the Old Covenant liturgical, ceremonial, sacrificial, purification, circumcision, dietary, and Sabbath laws. But when he believed in Jesus Christ to be Lord and Savior of his life, all those things he once prided himself in, he now counted loss for the sake of Christ. He no longer put confidence in his own flesh and in the things that were external only, and which he prided himself in because of his religious zeal.

Now his life was surrendered to Jesus Christ to doing his will and purpose for his life. He was no longer just following a set of rules, which he took pride in for his own accomplishments, but now he had a heart realignment of the Spirit of God so that his life was now dedicated to following the Lord in submission, in death to sin, and in walks of obedience to the Lord and to his commands. For this is what it means to have faith in Jesus. Faith in Jesus Christ is not lawless. We still must obey our Lord’s commandments.

And now let me give you a modern day example of this. There are “religious” people in this world who follow their religions and their religious practices with precision and dedication, but their hearts are not surrendered to Jesus Christ (to God). They attend weekly gatherings of the church (or the false church) religiously, and they sing the songs, and pray the prayers, and they listen to the sermons, and they may do good deeds, or they may serve in some area of ministry, but self is still on the throne of their lives, not God.

Yet by faith in Jesus Christ we do not become lawless. By faith in Jesus Christ we are crucified with Christ in death to sin, and raised with Christ to walk in newness of life in him, no longer to live as slaves to sin but as slaves to God and to his righteousness. But we don’t serve our Lord only in some ritualistic religious fashion as a matter of self-pride and accomplishment. We serve and obey our Lord out of love for God and a heart’s desire to serve the Lord Jesus with our lives in doing his will, with or without accolades.

We want to serve Jesus Christ with our lives in doing his will even if it means being hated and berated, and thought to be the scum of the earth because we don’t preach the feel-good diluted gospel which appeals to human flesh and which does not require death to sin and obedience to our Lord and to his New Covenant commands. What other people think or say about us, though, although it may be hurtful, will not deter us from doing the will of God for our lives, for serving our Lord is not about getting the approval of humans.

Serving Jesus Christ with our lives is what faith is all about, and it is about living righteously in the power of God, and not in our own flesh. For to know Christ/God and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of his sufferings requires that we die with Christ to sin and that we now walk with him in obedience to his commands in holy living, and no longer according to the desires of our sinful flesh. And it means we will be persecuted for our walks of faith in obedience to our Lord, for we take God’s word seriously.

[Matthew 7:13-14,21-23; Luke 9:23-26; John 10:27-30; Acts 26:18; Romans 2:5-10; Romans 6:1-23; Romans 8:1-14; 1 Corinthians 10:1-22; Galatians 5:16-24; Ephesians 4:17-32; Ephesians 5:3-6; Titus 2:11-14; Hebrews 12:1-2; 1 Peter 2:24; 1 John 1:1-10; 1 John 2:3-6; 1 John 3:4-10]

Your Servant Witness

An Original Work / March 13, 2012
Christ’s Free Servant, Sue J Love

Humbly I bow, Lord, before You,
Bringing my requests to You.
May I listen; hear You speaking.
May I follow You in truth.
Gently lead me in Your service.
Guide my steps and strengthen me.
Fill me with Your love and mercy.
May I live for Thee!

Let me be Your servant witness,
Telling others of Your grace.
May I always share the gospel
With those I meet face to face.
May I show the love of Jesus,
Caring for the needs of men;
Be Your servant witness always
For my Lord, Amen!

My desire to be like Jesus,
Living for Him ev’ry day.
May I obey all His teachings
Given me, so I’ll not stray.
Love You, Jesus, Lord, my master.
You are the King of my heart;
Follow You where’er You lead me;
Not from You depart!

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Being Conformed to His Death
An Original Work / July 28, 2025
Christ’s Free Servant, Sue J Love

“The dogs” is in reference to false prophets and teachers who teach lies, and not the truth. In context they were in reference to the Judaizers who were trying to convince Gentile Christians that they had to be circumcised, as was required of God’s people under the Old Covenant. But when Jesus Christ died on that cross, he did away with all the Old Covenant liturgical, ceremonial, sacrificial, purification, circumcision, dietary, and Sabbath laws. What remained were God’s moral laws. We must still die to sin and obey God.

So, what is circumcision? It is a literal cutting away of human flesh. And what is the true circumcision? It is a spiritual cutting away of the sinful flesh via the believer in Jesus Christ dying with Christ to sin and being raised with Christ to walk in newness of life in him, no longer to live as slaves to sin, but now as slaves to God and to his righteousness. By faith in Jesus Christ we are crucified with Christ in death to sin so that we might now live for God in obedience to his commands in holy living, and for his purposes and glory.

“The dogs” may still be the modern day Judaizers who are trying to convince Christians that they need to be more like Jews, and that they need to follow some of the Old Covenant Jewish customs to enhance their faith. But they are all who teach lies in the name of God, in the name of Christ, and in the name of the gospel of our salvation, and who willfully lead God’s people, or those professing to be God’s people, to follow the lies and not the truth. For they teach a doctrine of salvation which is of human flesh, and not of God.

And some of them have been and still are people of renown who are regarded as servants of the Lord and teachers of truth by many people. What they taught, or what they are presently teaching sounds good, and it seems biblical, because they quote Scriptures, but they often take Scriptures out of context, and they twist them to say what they do not say if taught in the appropriate context. For many of them are teaching the teachings of man and not the teachings of Christ, because it tickles itching ears.

So, what does it look like to worship in the Spirit of God and to glory in Christ Jesus and to put no confidence in the flesh? It means that we are following the teachings of Christ and of his New Testament apostles in what they taught as the gospel of our salvation, and what they taught is required of us now by God for us to have salvation from sin and eternal life with God. And they all taught that we must deny self, die to sin, and follow Jesus in walks of obedience to his commands, for this is what it means to believe.

Basically, to believe in Christ Jesus as Lord of our lives it means surrender of our lives to God, submission to him as Lord (Owner-Master of our lives), and death to our old ways of living so that we can now walk in holiness and in righteousness in obedience to our Lord and to his commands. It means we no longer are the masters of our own lives, choosing our own course, but we are now following the course that God has for our lives in doing his will, going wherever he sends us, and saying whatever he gives us to say.

But if you are still listening to “The dogs,” who are telling you that God requires nothing of you other than a profession of faith in Jesus Christ, and that God is going to welcome you into his heaven when you die, based on lip service only, stop believing the lies and believe the truth. For by faith in Christ we must now die to sin and obey God with our lives. For if sin is still what we practice, and not obedience to God, we will not inherit eternal life with God when we leave this earth, but hell will be our eternal destiny.

[Matthew 7:13-14,21-23; Luke 9:23-26; John 10:27-30; Acts 26:18; Romans 2:5-10; Romans 6:1-23; Romans 8:1-14; 1 Corinthians 10:1-22; Galatians 5:16-24; Ephesians 4:17-32; Ephesians 5:3-6; Titus 2:11-14; Hebrews 12:1-2; 1 Peter 2:24; 1 John 1:1-10; 1 John 2:3-6; 1 John 3:4-10]

My Sheep

Based off John 10:1-30 NIV
An Original Work / June 24, 2012
Christ’s Free Servant, Sue J Love

My sheep hear me. They know me.
They listen to my voice and obey.
I call them and lead them.
They know my voice, so they follow me.
They will never follow strangers.
They will run away from them.
The voice of a stranger they know not;
They do not follow him.

So, I tell you the truth that
I am the gate, so you enter in.
Whoever does enter
Will find forgiveness and will be saved.
Nonetheless whoever enters
Not by the gate; other way,
He is the thief and a robber.
Listen not, the sheep to him.

Oh, I am the Good Shepherd,
Who laid his own life down for the sheep.
I know them. They know me.
They will live with me eternally.
The thief only comes to steal and
Kill and to destroy the church.
I have come to give you life that
You may have it to the full…

They know my voice, so they follow me.

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Beware of Evil Workers
An Original Work / July 28, 2025
Christ’s Free Servant, Sue J Love

Jason Christopher Yates, 56, pleaded guilty to two of eight felony counts of possession of child pornography on Tuesday, July 22, in a district court in McLeod County, Minnesota, according to a plea petition obtained by USA TODAY.

Yates became the CEO of My Faith Votes in 2015 during the nonprofit's inception, according to his Truth & Liberty Coalition bio.

“In early August 2024, the My Faith Votes board of directors separated Jason Yates from My Faith Votes and board member Chris Sadler assumed the position of Acting CEO," the statement reads. "Over the last three months Chris has been working with the dedicated My Faith Votes team to encourage millions of Christians to vote, pray and think biblically about this election in America.”

When agents met with Yates on Sept. 13, 2024, he confirmed that the child sex abuse images on the hard drive did not belong to the relative who found them, the affidavit states. He also told the agents that he had a prior conviction for possessing child sex abuse images, but it had been expunged, the document continued.

The nonprofit was founded in 2015 by Sealy Yates, an attorney who previously served on President Donald Trump's evangelical advisory board, according to Politico. He is also Jason Yates’ uncle, according to Christian news site The Roys Report. Both are also literary agentsrepresenting Christian authors.

Is it just my imagination but does the 2001 near death experience of Rabbi Alon Anava correspond strangely with Matthew chapter four and does his teachings since then remind you of Matthew chapter five, six and seven, [The Sermon on the Mount].

I would guess that Rabbi Alon Anava might be a possible fulfillment of Zechariah chapter three for many reasons but his second near death experience certainly adds interesting clues.

If you do not know who he is you would want to take a listen to his testimony at:

www.AlonAnava.com/

There demons during Christ time and 1 Tim. 4:1 says there Are wandering Spirits. and teachings of Demons ?

What sat you. ?

dan p

Rome in 1855​

In the early months of 1855, Sarah Peter, a 54-year-old widow of means from Cincinnati, Ohio, was touring France and Italy. A philanthropist keenly interested in the arts, she had recently established the Philadelphia Design School for Women, which survives today as the Moore College of Art and Design. In Europe, she was gathering up information about artwork and already successful institutions that taught art and design.



“Sarah Peter, 1854.” Jean Aubrey, public domain.

While abroad, Mrs. Peter also found herself drawn to Catholicism—something that ran counter to prejudices she had carried with her since childhood as an elite Episcopalian with many socially prominent Unitarians in her circles, too.

Continued below.

Christ answered hatred not with vengeance, but by sending the Spirit of Truth—so that the Apostles could bear witness to His divine mission.​

Christ answered hatred not with vengeance, but by sending the Spirit of Truth—so that the Apostles could bear witness to His divine mission.

Continued below.

Why does Christ say the Holy Ghost 'shall bear testimony of Me'?

Christ answered hatred not with vengeance, but by sending the Spirit of Truth—so that the Apostles could bear witness to His divine mission.

www.fathercoleridge.org

Recently, Pope Leo XIV delivered a personal message to Silicon Valley executives, academics, and Vatican officials gathered in Rome for a conference on artificial intelligence. He encouraged them to follow a human-centric “ethical criterion” in AI development that would account for “the well-being of the human person not only materially, but also intellectually and spiritually.” Addressing the representatives of companies like OpenAI, Anthropic, Google, and Palantir, he warned of AI’s danger to the “intellectual and neurological development” of children, and “the possibility of its misuse for selfish gain at the expense of others, or worse, to foment conflict and aggression.”

Despite what any Silicon Valley sage may tell you, no one person or company really knows exactly how humanity will adapt—or not—to this world-changing technology. Every technology needs guardrails. But there is no central conversation about managing AI development—it’s millions and millions of conversations happening at warp speed around the world. Governments and businesses will have to work together to protect people from potential economic or even societal collapse, especially as artificial general intelligence (AGI) looms closer. Pope Leo’s bold entry into these discussions is an opportunity to cut through the noise. His advice helps distill the most important elements of a sensible response to AI’s exponential development—and point the way to practical, ethical guardrails.

Pope Leo has taken an urgent interest in the global challenge of AI from the very beginning of his papacy, explaining to an audience of cardinals in May that he chose his papal name to honor Pope Leo XIII, who used his position to speak up for workers during the Industrial Revolution of the nineteenth century. Leo XIV wants to guide the Catholic Church as it “offers its trove of social teaching to respond to another industrial revolution and to innovations in the field of artificial intelligence that pose challenges to human dignity, justice and labor.”

Continued below.

Being Catholic is a beautiful gift but can be misunderstood. If you want to be prepared to answer tough questions, check out these books.

Being Catholic is a beautiful, powerful, life-changing gift.

We are the Church founded by Jesus Christ 2,000 years ago, continuing the apostolic succession in an unbroken line through the centuries.

We consume his Body and Blood so that he is really present with us and makes us more like himself every time we receive him.

The fullness of the truth is in Sacred Scripture and Sacred Tradition, in both reason and faith. We enjoy undaunted intellectual explorationwhile respecting the holy mysteries that give our lives meaning and purpose.

We have the examples of the saints to support and guide us, and we can find a Catholic Mass anywhere we go on this planet.

It’s an incredible thing. But sometimes — actually quite often — the world doesn’t understand who we are, what we believe, and what we stand for.

When these situations arise and someone challenges our beliefs, we can always find the answer with a little research. But it also helps to be prepared ahead of time with an understanding of how our faith responds to tricky scenarios.

If you want to be prepared to answer tough questions about Catholic beliefs, check out these helpful books.

3 Books to help Catholics answer tough questions​

1100 TOUGH QUESTIONS FOR CATHOLICS​

Continued below.

[1991 Sign in Manhattan, New York that reads: "Don't give up! Pray. It works! The family that prays together stays together."]

Satan is the Master of Disunity. True unity comes from love which is an integral part of the Kingdom of God. But everywhere Satan goes, he promotes a lack of unity, misunderstanding, and conflict. In fact, one of the first signs he is particularly active in a place is an emerging strong discord whose intensity is difficult to explain.

At SMC (St. Michael Center for Spiritual Renewal), we work diligently to overcome the wiles of Satan's disunity in our ministry. During exorcism sessions, out of the mouths of the demons regularly comes comments promoting distrust and conflict among members. In between sessions, the demons sow seeds of distortion and distrust in our minds. Attacks from Satan's minions are also aimed at breaking down team coherence and its ministry.

Thus, regular communication is critical. Patience, love and prayer are fundamental. We begin the day celebrating the Mass together. We enjoy a meal around the table together. We meet before and after each session, and we have regular meetings to promote good communication.

Satan also promotes disunity on a global scale. He incites wars and international conflict. He is especially active on the local level in the family. The family is the bedrock of civilization and Satan is out to destroy it. He knows how critical the family is.

Continued below.

The Register analyzed data on ordinations collected by Georgetown’s Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate.

In a 2008 address in Washington, D.C., Pope Benedict told the U.S. bishops that “the ability to cultivate vocations to the priesthood and the religious life is a sure sign of the health of a local Church.”

By Benedict’s metric, some American dioceses are thriving today, producing lots of priestly vocations from holy families, schools and parishes. Others are struggling.

To get a concrete measure of this, the Register analyzed data on ordinations collected by Georgetown’s Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate (CARA). CARA compiled numbers from the Official Catholic Directory, an annual report that collects official data from each diocese on total Catholic population, ordinations and other statistics. CARA compared each diocese’s current Catholic population to its number of ordinations during the most recent five years in the Official Catholic Directory’s data, 2019 to 2023. In other words, the total Catholics per recent diocesan ordination in every diocese.

This statistic provides a snapshot in each diocese of the amount of ordinations relative to the Catholic population. Measuring ordinations relative to total Catholic population is important because while 20 ordinations would be very impressive in a diocese with a small Catholic population like Jackson in Mississippi, it would not be in a diocese with large numbers of Catholics like Los Angeles.

Continued below.

Hi, I would like to request prayer for strength and emotional healing. Lately, I’ve been enduring constant pelvic pain while working, and I’ve stopped taking painkillers because they were too strong for my stomach to handle. This pain has made it hard for me to work as quickly or as sharply as I used to.

On top of that, I’ve been struggling emotionally at work. I’ve noticed that my boss has been speaking to me harshly, especially when I don’t immediately understand what he’s trying to say. It feels like there’s a lack of patience and understanding, and it’s been very discouraging for me. I’ve been trying my best to push through the pain and stay focused, but there are times when it becomes too much, and I feel like I’m being treated unfairly despite my efforts.

Please pray for:

Relief from the physical pain I’m carrying each day.

Emotional strength to withstand the harsh treatment.

God’s protection over my heart and mind so I won’t feel broken or discouraged.

More compassion and understanding from my boss and colleagues.

Wisdom to respond with grace, and courage to keep going.


Thank you for lifting me up in prayer. Your support means
a lot to me.

Without going into all the history behind this, this is a warning from God to all of us, especially to us who profess faith in Jesus Christ. We are to see to it that we do not refuse God who is speaking to us through his word, and through the Holy Spirit, and through his servants and witnesses who are obeying him in teaching the truth of the gospel of our salvation and not the lies which are spreading so rapidly, which are teaching a false and diluted and altered gospel message absent of repentance and obedience to God.

And we can read more on this subject in 1 Corinthians 10:1-22. There we read that God was not pleased with most of the Israelites who were with Moses in the wilderness, and so he had them put to death, and they did not get to enter into his eternal rest because of their disobedience, which God regarded as unbelief (see Hebrews 3:1-19; Hebrews 4:1-13). For many of them were involved in idolatry, adultery, sexual immorality, drunkenness, and revelry, in putting Christ to the test and in grumbling against God.

And these things happened, and they were written down for us as examples to us so that we will not crave evil things as they did with the same result. For just as they were put to death for their disobedience and for their sinful rebellion against God, and for their refusal to obey him, and they did not get to enter into God’s eternal rest, the same will happen to us if we do what they did. For the New Testament Scriptures teach that if we walk in sin, and not in obedience to God, that we will not have eternal life with God.

So, if we think that we are in right standing with God, just because we made a profession of faith in Jesus Christ, then we need to think again. For the Scriptures do not support that. They teach that, by faith in Jesus, we must die to sin and walk (in conduct) in obedience to our Lord, in practice, and no longer in sin, or we don’t have salvation from sin. For we don’t know God, we are not in fellowship with God, and we do not have eternal life with God if sin is what we practice and not obedience to our Lord and to his commands.

So, please take this to heart, and please study the Scriptures in their fulness in their correct biblical context, and not out of context. For many liars are spreading lies by teaching the Scriptures out of context and twisting them to say what they do not say, in truth. And they are leading the masses astray and to hell, on the promise of heaven with God, while they pacify them in their sins and they refuse to confront them with the gospel which teaches we must die to sin and obey God if we want to have eternal life with God.

[Matthew 7:13-14,21-23; Luke 9:23-26; John 10:27-30; Acts 26:18; Romans 2:5-10; Romans 6:1-23; Romans 8:1-14; 1 Corinthians 10:1-22; Galatians 5:16-24; Ephesians 4:17-32; Ephesians 5:3-6; Titus 2:11-14; Hebrews 12:1-2; 1 Peter 2:24; 1 John 1:1-10; 1 John 2:3-6; 1 John 3:4-10]

For Our Nation

Professionally recorded in Nashville, TN
Via Gerry Peters, music producer and arranger
An Original Work / September 11, 2012
Christ’s Free Servant, Sue J Love

Bombs are bursting. Night is falling.
Jesus Christ is gently calling
You to follow Him in all ways.
Trust Him with your life today.
Make Him your Lord and your Savior.
Turn from your sin. Follow Jesus.
He will forgive you of your sin;
Cleanse your heart, made new within.

Men betraying: Our trust fraying.
On our knees to God we’re praying,
Seeking God to give us answers
That are only found in Him.
God is sovereign over all things.
Nothing from His mind escaping.
He has all things under His command,
And will work all for good.

Jesus Christ is gently calling
You to follow Him in all ways.

Men deceiving: We’re believing
In our Lord, and interceding
For our nation and its people
To obey their God today.
He is our hope for our future.
For our wounds He offers suture.
He is all we need for this life.
Trust Him with your life today.

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Do Not Refuse God
An Original Work / July 27, 2025
Christ’s Free Servant, Sue J Love

California's dramatic fast food wage hike may have backfired, according to a new economic study – wiping out an estimated 18,000 jobs across the state in just one year.

The research, published this month by the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER), analyzed the impact of Assembly Bill 1228, which mandated a $20 hourly minimum wage for fast food workers at large chains starting April 1, 2024.

According to the economists behind the study, fast food employment in California dropped by 3.2 percent, while jobs in the same sector grew slightly across the rest of the U.S.


Not surprised.

The next time a Fundamentalist condemns repetition, just show him this psalm​

It is not from Fundamentalist TV preachers that we should receive direction on how to pray. We should learn how to pray from heaven itself and the divine instructions provided in Scripture and Sacred Tradition.

Both heaven and divine revelation teach us how to pray—and the practice of repetition is part of that instruction.

Prayer is more than just asking God to give us things or do things for us. It’s an attitude of heart, by which we “pray without ceasing” (1 Thess. 5:17). The Catechism defines prayer as “the elevation of the mind and heart to God in praise of his glory; a petition made to God for some desired good, or in thanksgiving for a good received, or in intercession for others before God.”

We can assume that in the heavenly realm—inhabited by God, his angels, and his saints—prayer and worship are conducted correctly and serve as a model for us. After all, in the Our Father, Jesus taught us to request that “thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” So let’s start by looking at some of the prayer patterns in heaven from which we can take instruction.

In Revelation 4, a door to heaven stands open. The author steps in to behold the throne of God surrounded with indescribable glory, filling the celestial realm with prayers and praise. “And the four living creatures . . . day and night they never cease to say, ‘Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord God Almighty, who was and is and is to come!’” (v. 8).

This prayerful praise is repeated around God’s throne twenty-four hours a day, without ceasing. God receives this perpetual praise; in fact, everything in heaven is done according to his will. God desires that his will be done not only in heaven, but also on earth. Heaven endorses repetitive prayer.

Continued below.

​

s in the late ’40s. It starts with the nuclear bomb blowing up the world, and obviously, you need a one-world government to stop it — one world or none. And the Christian framing, which in some ways is the same question, is: Antichrist or Armageddon? You have the one-world state of the Antichrist, or we’re sleepwalking toward Armageddon. “One world or none,” “Antichrist or Armageddon,” on one level, are the same question.

Now, I have a lot of thoughts on this topic, but one question is — and this was a plot hole in all these Antichrist books people wrote — how does the Antichrist take over the world? He gives these demonic, hypnotic speeches and people just fall for it. It’s this demonium, Ex-Machina —
I want to suggest a middle ground between those two options. It used to be that the reasonable fear of the Antichrist was a kind of wizard of technology. And now the reasonable fear is someone who promises to control technology, make it safe and usher in what, from your point of view, would be a universal stagnation, right?

Thiel: Well, that’s more my description of how it would happen.

Douthat: Yes, but you’re saying the real Antichrist would play on that fear and say: You must come with me to avoid Skynet, to avoid the Terminator, to avoid nuclear Armageddon.

Continued below.

Isn't that just appealing to religious belief?​

Why is always a good question. I’ll start with a question from my daughter.

My daughter aspires to be a veterinarian, and she is well on her way. She has a summer job at a vet clinic, interned at a vet clinic last summer, and visited my cousin and her husband, who are both veterinarians with their own state-of-the-art clinic, the summer before that. One of the first questions a budding veterinarian must ask herself is whether she can handle sick and dying pets. It’s one thing, my cousin told her, to love animals but quite another to see them suffering or to euthanize someone’s pet. We talk a lot about this, and the other day we had a conversation about the difference in humans and animals. She’s heard me talk about the rational soul enough to know the philosophical answer, but she was rather surprised when other people challenged her, “If we can do it to animals, then we can do it to people?” Just saying “rational soul” didn’t cut it.

I’ve had this discussion often in Catholic circles, and I always come to the conclusion that you cannot argue about ethics or morality without getting into what it means to “be human,” and you cannot do that without talking about the rational soul, and you cannot do that without invoking the Holy Trinity. I say this as a convert who was once beholden to the materialist mindset.

But, Aristotle…?​

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About ten years ago I found myself in China teaching a weeklong philosophy seminar on the thought of Thomas Aquinas. Present were forty or so young philosophers from premier Chinese universities. Also present, acting as observers in the back of the room, were members of the Chinese Communist Party. I taught in jacket and tie, but everyone knew that I and one other Dominican professor were priests. The students talked to us more openly at the meals, at crowded tables, where it was not easy to be overheard. Most were non-Christian, but almost all were studying Western philosophy. I will never forget asking one of them why he was present at the seminar, given that the philosopher we were studying was a medieval Western Christian thinker. He said, “Father, the Cultural Revolution in the 1960s severed contemporary Chinese culture from its historical past, its traditional ethical resources. Today we know that communism is a failed system, but what we don’t know is the meaning of life. We wonder whether it might have something to do with Christianity.” I found these words prophetic.

We, too, have been severed from our historical past. It’s all too common to think that nothing can exist beyond the secular order, which represents a kind of stasis, the endpoint of Western history. And this mentality is increasingly attended by discontent, a sense that things aren’t working. This Chinese student, however, emerging from the most intensive attempt in history to stamp out religious belief, was aware of a profound and genuine possibility, a condition of naivete, that of a person seeking meaning, open to a religious proposal. He was envisaging the possibility of a post-secular order and a new religiosity.

He was correct, not only about the spiritual conditions in China, but also about those in our own societies. We live amid global religious conflict, the threat of nuclear extermination, amazing scientific progress, and Western existential malaise. The meaning of life is indeed a twenty-first-century question.

Philosophy and the natural sciences can give us answers, but only to a point. A very good philosopher might provide sound arguments for the existence of God, but he cannot introduce us to God personally. Moreover, there is a nucleus of personality in us, characterized by intelligence and freedom, which demarcates the existence of a soul. But no one knows what happens to the soul after death. And neither philosophy, nor politics, nor technology can deliver us ultimately from the problem of evil, whether moral or physical. Religion and claims about revelation remain always relevant and unavoidable. Thus our challenge—and our opportunity. In our historical moment, Catholic theology should seek to explain the meaning of life in its ultimate registers: with reference to God and the Incarnation.

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