POPE FRANCIS: 'PAGAN' CHRISTIANS 'IN NAME ONLY' ARE 'ENEMIES OF THE CROSS'

by THOMAS D. WILLIAMS, PH.D. 7 Nov 2014, 8:00 AM PDT 410POST A COMMENT

Not all those who claim to be Christians really are, said Pope Francis Friday morning. Some are Christians “in name only,” he said. “They bear the name of Christians but live a life of pagans.”

In his homily at Mass, the Pope that there have always been two types of Christian, those who truly followed Christ and those who only pretended to. At the time of Saint Paul, there were “worldly Christians, Christians in name only, with two or three Christian features, but nothing more.” The Pope called this sort of people “Pagan Christians,” whom St. Paul called “enemies of the cross of Christ.”

In Paul’s time, the Pope said, the two groups of Christians “were in church together, went to Mass on Sunday, praised the Lord, and were called Christians.” So what was the difference? He asked. The second were “enemies of the cross of Christ.”

The Pope went on to say that “even today there are many! We must be careful not to slip into the way of pagan Christians.” These are the ones, he said, who are “pagans painted over with two brush strokes of Christianity, so they look like Christians, but are really pagans.”

According to Francis, we all run the risk of becoming “Christians in appearance.” We are tempted, he said, to mediocrity, and when Christians become mediocre, “it is their ruin, because the heart cools and they become lukewarm.” Francis reminded his hearers that Jesus used strong language to describe this sort of Christians: “Because you are lukewarm, I will vomit you out of my mouth.” These, the Pope said, “are enemies of the cross of Christ. They take the name of Christian, but do not follow the requirements of the Christian life.”

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150 million Christians persecuted by Islam

Christian suffering at the hands of the Moslems is of biblical proportions, according to the Open Doors NGO.

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Published: Friday, November 07, 2014 11:16 AM

Giulio Meotti

The writer, an Italian journalist with Il Foglio, writes a twice-weekly...

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"The number of persecuted Christians in the world is 150 million." There are many other figures, terrifying and dramatic, in the pages of the "Black book of the plight of Christians in the world", a unique initiative of French scholars and coordinated by journalist Samuel Lieven. Snapshots of a global and amorphous war.

In particular, there is a disconcerting statistic: "80 percent of the acts of religious persecution in the world are directed against Christians." How many victims? The Center for the Study of Global Christianity brings the average of one hundred thousand Christians killed each year for their faith throughout the last decade. An average of five Christians every minute.

Yesterday, in Pakistan, two Christians, including a pregnant woman, were burnt alive in the brick kiln where they worked. It was a pogrom with the participation of four hundred Muslims.

Haim Korsia, Chief Rabbi of France, cries out his reaction in the face of the spread of hatred against Christians, and establishes a comparison with the destruction of Eastern Sephardic Jewry:

"Where are the Jewish communities once so rich of Aleppo, Beirut, Alexandria, Cairo or Tripoli? Where are the schools of Nehardea and Pumbedita in Iraq? And where is the flourishing of Judaism in Esfahan and Tehran? In our memory. Driven out, killed, decimated, persecuted and exiled, the Christians of the East are personally experiencing the same plight as the Jews with whom they have lived for so long and have seen leaving those places". 

The NGO Open Doors declared that the persecution in Iraq has reached "biblical proportions". Tuesday, in Rome, the annual report of Aid to the Church in Needwas also presented. It told that of the 20 countries in the world where religious freedom is virtually absent, 14 are Muslim, and the others military or communist dictatorships, such as North Korea.

We are facing what Habib Malik of Stanford University calls "the final phase of the regional decline of Christians."

"I've got a family of Christians who do not want to convert, what do we do?".
Today Mosul appears to have been swallowed up, like Jonah in the belly of the whale. 

"Between 2003 and 2009, nearly 800 Christians were executed [there] in cold blood, not counting the fifty martyrs of the Syrian Catholic cathedral in Baghdad, including two priests, killed on October 31, 2010. To date, we have exceeded one thousand Christians killed, including a bishop and five priests. More than sixty churches were destroyed.

http://goo.gl/WIK9KV

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Christian Rapper Renounces Sick Gay Life

By David Daniels - The Washington Times - Monday, October 27, 2014

Jackie Hill-Perry considers herself not merely an agent of change, but its embodiment as well.

A Christian spoken-word poet from Chicago, Ms. Hill-Perry professes to be a former lesbian — a change she ascribes to God.

God, she says, “not only changes your affections and your heart, but He gives you new affections that you didn’t have.” Now married to a Christian man, the 25-year-old poet is pregnant with the newlyweds’ first child, which is due Dec. 13.

Her debut spoken-word album “The Art of Joy” will be released for free on Nov. 4 by Humble Beast record label.

Ms. Hill-Perry’s experience runs counter to pronouncements by gay rights groups that exclaim sexuality as an inherent, immutable characteristic. What’s more, her assertions come amid wide-ranging reports about the psychological dangers of so-called “reparative therapy,” which aims to change the orientation of homosexuals.

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Woman Who Faced Muslim Death Sentence Honored

By Terence P. Jeffrey

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Meriam Ibrahim with her newborn daughter, Maya, in the Omdurman Federal Women's Prison in Sudan earlier this year. (AP Photo/Al Fajer)

(CNSNews.com) - Meriam Ibrahim--the Sudanese woman married to a naturalized U.S. citizen who refused to renounce her Christian faith even while facing a death sentence for it--will be honored later this month in Washington, D.C., at the Family Research Council’s Values Voter Summit.

“Meriam's bold stand for Jesus Christ as she faced death has touched the hearts of people in every nation,” said FRC President Tony Perkins. “Her incredible example of courage should inspire Christians in America to be bold and courageous in their faith as we witness growing religious hostility here in our country.”

Meriam's fagter had been a Muslim but she professed Christianity. The court also convicted her of “adultery” because it refused to recognize her marriage to a Christian as legitimate. The court sentenced her to die for her alleged “apostasy” and to be whipped for her purported “adultery.”

http://goo.gl/akTYrY

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Muslim Persecution of Christians - why is Obama so silent?

According to recent studies, Christians in all three nations are experiencing the worst form of persecution around the globe:

• Libya: Ever since U.S.-backed, al-Qaeda-linked terrorists overthrew Gaddafi, Christians—including Americans—have been tortured and killed (including for refusing to convert) and churches bombed. It’s “open season” on Copts, as jihadis issue a reward to Muslims who find and kill Christians. This was not the case under Gaddafi.
• Syria: Christians have been attacked in indescribable ways—wholesale massacres, bombed and desecrated churches, beheadings, crucifixions, and rampant kidnappings—since the U.S.-sponsored “Arab Spring” reached the Levant.
• Iraq: After the U.S. toppled Saddam Hussein, Christian minorities were savagely attacked and slaughtered, and dozens of their churches were bombed (see here forgraphic images). In the last decade, Christians have beenterrorized into near-extinction, with well over half of them fleeing Iraq.

http://www.frontpagemag.com/2014/raymond-ibrahim/presbyterian-church-slams-israel-ignores-christian-persecution/

HARVARD HOSTING SATANIC 'BLACK MASS'

 JEROME R. CORSI About | Email | Archive

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NEW YORK – With secularism on the rise in the United States, Satanists increasingly appear willing to challenge Christians for equal time and space in the public square, under the rubric of asserting First Amendment rights of religious freedom.

Now, under the auspices of a student group, Harvard University is going to allow a Satanist group from New York to perform on Monday a Black Mass on campus.

It will take place in the basement of Memorial Hall, despite strong objections voiced by the Roman Catholic Church

Read more at http://www.wnd.com/2014/05/harvard-hosting-satanic-black-mass/#lQ4CrT9Ot1VV53dY.99