Tag: Jesus Christ

New Pope, Leo XIV, in Early Days a Papacy, Appears to Be Winning over Church’s Wary Traditionalists

Just the News
Vatican

When the new pope appeared last week for the first time on the balcony of St. Peter’s Basilica, the historic moment looked like a worst-case scenario for Catholic traditionalists.

A close adviser to predecessor Pope Francis, Cardinal Robert Prevost, now Pope Leo XIV, was seen as the “least American of the American cardinals – a figure deeply rooted in the Francis era. He was a critic of Vice-President JDVance and to the extent he was known, he was seen as a progressive, raising fears his papacy would continue the previous papacy’s trajectory.

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Catholic Church Begins Delicate Process of Assessing Francis Legacy, Where Next Pope Will Take It

Just the News
Pope Francis

With the official funeral for Pope Francis having concluded, Catholic Church leaders now begin the process of addressing the Pope’s unfinished business and deciding who will be the next Pope to carry out that process. 

Over his 12-year papacy, Francis – who in some corners was referred to as “The Woke Pope” – was a transformative but polarizing figure. He worked tirelessly in service of sometimes divisive issues including LGBTQ+ rights, the role of women in the church, a welcoming policy toward migrants and refugees, casting the fight against climate change as a moral issue and prioritizing the normalization of relations with China.

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Pope’s Death Brings Sorrow and Uncertainty over Whether Church Returns to More Traditional Doctrine

Just the News
Pope Francis

As Catholic Church officials prepare for Pope Francis’s funeral Saturday, Vatican watchers are already looking ahead to the Conclave that will determine whether the church will continue in the progressive direction Francis charted or return to a more traditional path.

Francis, who died early Monday at the age of 88 after suffering a stroke and heart failure, had been among the most influential figures on the global left during his 12-year papacy.

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Commentary: Easter Is the Greatest Holiday of All Time

Star News Contributor
Jesus Christ

Among world religions, only Christianity has a founder who professed to be the Messiah—the Son of God—who gave his life to save mankind.

The Easter weekend starts with Good Friday, the day God’s son Jesus was crucified to fulfill His plan to provide salvation from sin for those who believe in Christ. Easter Sunday is the celebration of Christ’s resurrection, the third day from his crucifixion death, and the completion of God’s plan for all to know who Jesus was.

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Ex-Employee Sues City University of New York for Allegedly Firing Her After She Converted to Christianity

Daily Caller News Foundation
Teona pagan

A former City University of New York (CUNY) staff member is suing the university for wrongfully terminating her employment after she converted to Christianity, according to a religious discrimination lawsuit filed last week.

Teona Pagan, who worked at CUNY’s Research Foundation as the Fellowships and Public Service Program Coordinator, alleges she was denied a religious accommodation for an aspect of her job that required her to recruit students for a fellowship focused on the promotion of LGBT “rights and causes,” according to the complaint filed Aug. 28. When Pagan converted to Christianity in April 2022 — months after beginning her job in November 2021 — she suddenly found her duties related to the fellowship in conflict with her sincerely held religious beliefs.

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Virginia Democrat Reportedly Compared President Joe Biden to Jesus Christ in Fundraising Pitch

Tom Pappert
Don Beyer

U.S. Representative Don Beyer (D-VA-08) reportedly compared President Joe Biden to Jesus Christ during a Tuesday fundraising event in McLean, Virginia, drawing similarities between the suffering Jesus experienced when crucified to the various political and personal tragedies of the president’s life.

Beyer apparently “invoked the crucifixion of Jesus” during the fundraising event, according to The Washington Free Beacon.

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Commentary: More Catholics Believe in the Eucharist than Previously Thought

Admin
Catholic Eucharist

A new study by Catholic market research company Vinea Research found that belief in the true presence of Christ in the Eucharist is greater than a 2019 Pew Research study previously estimated.

Pew Research had found that 69 percent of U.S. Catholics personally believe that “the bread and wine used in Communion ‘are symbols of the body and blood of Jesus Christ.’” By contrast, only 31 percent of Catholics said that they believe that “the bread and wine actually become the body and blood of Jesus.”

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Most Believe in Jesus Christ’s Resurrection, New Poll Finds

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Jesus Christ

Nearly 70% of registered voters believe that Jesus Christ physically rose from the dead, and more than 70% plan to celebrate Easter this year, a new poll finds.

A Scott Rasmussen National Survey poll, conducted March 20 and 21 among 1,000 registered voters, found that 73% of respondents will celebrate Easter this year. When asked whether they would celebrate the holiday primarily as a religious holiday or as a secular holiday, 56% of participants responded with religious, 16% said secular, and 27% said both secular and religious equally.

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Commentary: Easter Is the Greatest Holiday of All Time

Admin
Jesus Christ

Among world religions, only Christianity has a founder who professed to be the Messiah—the Son of God—who gave his life to save mankind.

The Easter weekend starts with Good Friday, the day God’s son Jesus was crucified to fulfill His plan to provide salvation from sin for those who believe in Christ. Easter Sunday is the celebration of Christ’s resurrection, the third day from his crucifixion death, and the completion of God’s plan for all to know who Jesus was.

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Commentary: The Myth of the Pagan Origins of Easter

Admin
Jesus Christ

You may not get any chocolate bunnies this Easter, but you’re bound to stumble across an article or meme suggesting that the story of Jesus Christ’s resurrection from the dead is just a reincarnation of some pagan myth. Whether it’s Ishtar, Osiris, or Attis, these claims are tantalizing but devoid of scholarly content–much like the sugar rush of the chocolate bunny, with its deficit of actual nourishment.

Claims like these are at least as old as James Frazer’s The Golden Bough, published in 1890. However, they circulate routinely in new packaging. Unfortunately, the public tends to remain ignorant of the results of alternative scholarship. Sensationalism (like sex) sells. So does controversy. And when the sensation or the controversy revolves around beliefs that millions believe in whole-heartedly, sorting fact from fiction becomes increasingly difficult.

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Commentary: The Meaning of Ash Wednesday

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Ash Wednesday

Ash Wednesday is—oddly perhaps—a day I have long associated with bushfires, better known in the American hemisphere as wildfires.

I come from the Adelaide Hills in South Australia, where on Ash Wednesday in 1983, catastrophic bushfires, driven by 70-mph winds and fueled by years of drought-ravaged eucalyptus forest, tragically claimed 28 lives. In the neighboring state of Victoria, even more lives were lost under similar conditions. In total, 75 Australians perished and 3,000 homes were destroyed in what were the nation’s deadliest bushfires up to that point.

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Commentary: Americans Embrace Religion, Reject Religious Bigotry

RealClearWire
People Praying

More than half a century ago, Time magazine famously asked, “Is God Dead?” The black and red cover, the magazine’s first to include only text, sparked countless angry sermons and thousands of letters from readers accusing Time of engaging in tasteless nihilism, Marxist pandering, and outright blasphemy.

The question, which typified the counter-culture movement and the intellectual radicalism of the 1960s, was far off the mark both then and now. The United States has always been and remains a very religious nation despite steep declines in attendance at churches, synagogues, and mosques – trends that have captured far more headlines in recent years than the nation’s enduring faith. America is also a majority Christian nation, though other religious groups and affiliations and those identifying as non-believers are growing.

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Commentary: The Gift of Christmas Is Hope Through Sacrifice

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Jesus Christ Birth

For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. John 3:16 (KJV)

We thought about and were well on the way to drafting a much different column for this Christmas – Biden Outdoes The Grinch seemed apropos to this season of economic distress and discontent. But in looking through past Christmas columns we ran across one of our columns from 2019, entitled “The Gift of Christmas is Fulfilled at Easter” and we were brought back to the recognition that no Christian should be bitter on Christmas, because if there is one day of the year that is to be dedicated to hope it is Christmas and the anniversary of the birth of Our Savior.

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Commentary: Giving Before Getting

Admin
Gift Giving

When I was a little girl, my mother would take me and my five siblings to Grants, a long-gone discount store. We did this the first week in December every year, shopping for each other using money we had earned and saved. Running down the aisles, touching everything, brimming with excitement, and bursting with secrets, we pondered, prattled, and preened our way to the checkout register.

We shouldered big secrets in our little souls, guarding our arms with shouts of “Don’t look!” Arriving home, we immediately began wrapping in various places throughout our tiny house, knowing our treasures would soon be given away. The anticipation, giggles, scrambles, and copious quantities of tape make me now wonder how my mother could stand it. But stand it she did, and in so doing, she taught us necessary lessons in gift-giving.

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Commentary: Advent and Christmas at the Vatican

RealClearWire
The Vatican

When I was a child, my parents and I would attend Christmas Eve Mass at St. John’s Catholic Church in Whitehall, Wisconsin. When we got home, my father and I would watch the replay of Christmas Eve Mass at the Vatican on television. After watching the beautiful Mass at St. Peter’s Basilica, we would say to each other, “One day, we’ll go there together!”

Sadly, my father and mother were never able to make the trip to the Vatican. However, as the former U.S. Ambassador to the Holy See, I was blessed to attend Christmas Eve Mass at St. Peter’s on several occasions. And each time, I brought the memory of my parents with me.

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Commentary: An Amazing Story of Redemption Out of Pearl Harbor

RealClearWire

December 7th, 1941 is “a date which will live in infamy,” declared President Franklin D. Roosevelt. The Japanese pilot that led the infamous raid on Pearl Harbor is the subject of a new fascinating book, Wounded Tiger by T. Martin Bennett. Christian apologist Josh McDowell calls Bennett’s book, “mesmerizing.”

I spoke with Bennett on my radio show about this amazing story of violence, repentance, redemption, and forgiveness. I have been aware of Fuchida’s incredible story before, having produced a TV segment on his conversion for D. James Kennedy Ministries-TV about 30 years ago.

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Ohio GOP Congressman Apologizes After Condemning Christian for ‘Bigoted’ Post

Just the News

Ohio Republican Rep. Max Miller on Tuesday issued an apology after a heated Twitter exchange in which he appeared to condemn an activist in hist state for expressing a basic statement of her Christian faith.

“I posted something earlier that conveyed a message I did not intend. I will not try to hide my mistake or run from it. I sincerely apologize to Lizzie and to everyone who read my post,” Miller stated. He did not clarify what his intended message was.

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Minnesota Lutheran Church Recites ‘Sparkle Creed,’ Professes Belief in ‘Non-Binary God’

Admin

A Lutheran church in Edina stood for the reading of the “sparkle creed” during a church service, according to a livestream available on its YouTube page.

“I believe in a non-binary god, whose pronouns are plural,” Pastor Anna Helgen said during Sunday’s service. “I believe in Jesus Christ, their child, who wore a fabulous tunic and had two dads.”

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Commentary: Religious Conviction in Woke Sports

RealClearWire

When the University of Oklahoma softball team showed up for the College World Series last week, reporters expected to hear pride and camaraderie from a squad on the way to winning its third consecutive national championship.  

But several star Sooners players startled the press and went viral online by declaring that their joy in Christianity trumped their considerable athletic accomplishments.  

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Commentary: Nativity Sets Around the World Show Each Culture’s Take on the Christmas Story

Admin

For many Christians around the world, celebrating the Nativity, or the birth of Jesus Christ, is the most important part of the Christmas season.

Among the most common Christmas traditions are small sets of figures depicting Joseph, Mary and Jesus that are displayed in individual homes, and live reenactments of the manger scene in communities and churches. While Nativity sets focus on the holy family, they can also include an angel, the three wise men bringing gifts, shepherds or some barnyard animals.

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Students Petitioning Catholic University to Remove Painting Depicting George Floyd as Jesus

Peter D'Abrosca
George Floyd memorial

Students at Catholic University of America (CUA) are now petitioning the administration to remove paintings depicting George Floyd as Jesus Christ from the school’s campus ministry office and from CUA’s law school.

“As students at the Catholic University of America, we believe that it is extremely grave that our university, the official university of the Catholic Church in North America, would cast another in the image of our Lord in this way, particularly for political purposes,” the Change.org petition says. “No political or social cause ever justifies depicting another in the place of Jesus Christ.”

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Lipscomb University’s Christian Scholars Conference to Host Ibram Kendi, ‘How to Be Antiracist’ Author, as Featured Speaker, Scrubs Website After Tennessee Star Inquiries

Corinne Murdock

Lipscomb University, a self-proclaimed Christian institution, chose “How to Be Antiracist” author Ibram Kendi as a featured speaker for its 2021 Christian Scholars Conference (CSC). The Tennessee Star reached out for more details to CSC Chair David Fleer, Lipscomb University spokespersons, Lipscomb University President Randy Lowry, and Lipscomb University Board of Trustees Chair David Solomon. None of them responded by press time.

After The Star reached out to each of those individuals, Lipscomb University completely scrubbed the original contents of its CSC page. An archived version of the website from Tuesday shows that the original CSC page was largely dedicated to Kendi’s appearance as a featured guest speaker. It also included positive remarks from Fleer about Kendi.

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Commentary: This Easter Let Us Celebrate Hope

Admin

On Easter, billions of people around the world will celebrate the resurrection of Jesus Christ – the most important day of the year for the Christian community.

Christians believe Jesus Christ was crucified, died, was buried, and rose from the dead. This act of selfless, sacrificial love for humanity is at the heart of Christianity. John 3:16 says, “For God so loved the world that He gave His only Son, so that everyone who believes in Him might not perish but might have eternal life.” It is through Jesus Christ’s suffering, death, and resurrection that we are saved from sin and have hope for eternal life with God in Heaven.

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‘Tear Them Down’: Black Lives Matter Activist Shaun King Demands ‘White European’ Jesus Statues Be Removed

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Black Lives Matter activist Shaun King called Monday for the removal of statues, murals and stained glass windows that depict Jesus as a “white European,” which he claimed “are a form of white supremacy.”

“Yes, I think the statues of the white European they claim is Jesus should also come down,” King, a former surrogate on Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders’s 2020 presidential campaign, wrote on Twitter. “They are a form of white supremacy. Always have been.”

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JC Bowman Commentary: What I Didn’t Say About the Departure of TN Dept. of Education Commissioner Candice McQueen

JC Bowman

Tupac Shakur said, “Behind every sweet smile, there is a bitter sadness that no one can ever see and feel.” I spent time with Commissioner McQueen as more than a casual observer. Her heart and passion were always for the children and teachers in Tennessee.  She fought battles which nobody knew about and which, despite the lofty title in front of her name, she had little control. 

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Christianity: The First Major Religion That Stripped the State of Its Theocratic Powers

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Jesus Christ

by Cuatro Jones   When discussing the history of the West and exploring the ideas and philosophies that led up to the creation of the Magna Carta and the U.S constitution, eventually the religion of Christianity must be brought forward in the discussion. Why? Well, despite the many sins of Christians (and there are many), Christianity is the first major religion that, at its founding, stripped the state of its theocratic powers over the spiritual lives of the people. In the Biblical narrative, we see Jesus of Nazareth establish this foundational philosophy when answering a challenge from the Pharisees of Judea regarding to whom they should pay their monetary offerings: God (Yahweh) or Caesar? This question was designed to serve as a trap for Jesus, as the Jews were monotheistic and theocratic, and Roman law essentially made the Emperor a god. It is at this pivotal, though often overlooked moment, that Jesus sets the standard for the modern West regarding the role of government and religion in public life, “Render unto Caesar what is Caesar’s, and render unto God what is God’s.” This is critical because for the first time, we see a clear and categorical line of division between the palace and the temple, set by a central religious figure. This fundamentally…

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