This is something I have said before, but it bears repeating: the Left HATES Christians, hates Christianity, hates Jesus and hates anyone who follows Him, believing such people to be nothing but foolish and naïve science deniers who believe in fairy tales. They loathe our worship of the Lord and view it with nothing but contempt and mockery.
 
That is the precise response some Leftists in the mainstream media had to President Trump appointing Vice President Mike Pence to lead the Coronavirus Task Force and to Vice President Pence praying alongside the CTF in a photo (above).
 
The New Yorker, after President Trump appointed VP Pence to lead the Coronavirus Task Force, shared a cartoon of the Vice President with the caption: “We remind everyone that the first defense against this outbreak is vigorous handwashing and repentance.”
 
Days later, a contributing writer for The NYT Magazine tweeted out the picture of Pence and the CTF praying, stating: “Mike Pence and his coronavirus emergency team praying for a solution. We are so screwed.”
 
Do you see how little these heathens think of Christians and those who pray to God? Funny how they would never dare say the same if they saw a picture of Muslims praying to Allah about the same thing. They would applaud their commitment to their religious beliefs, but when Christians pray to the Lord, we are mocked. Not that this comes as any surprise.
 
These godless people do not understand the power of prayer. They outright mock it whenever a mass shooting occurs (which is nowhere near as often as they would want us to believe) and people offer prayers for those affected. They are devoid of any sense of reverence to God in their unbelief, somehow believing that everything came to be out of pure chance, and have the nerve to claim that we are the illogical ones for believing in God.
 
Verses such as Philippians 4:6: “Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God,” and Mark 11:24: “Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours,” and others that highlight the power of God through prayer are utterly meaningless to these people.
 
They legitimately believe that we came from MONKEYS despite all of the massive holes in Darwin’s theory and even its origin, and yet, do not believe in the God of the Universe.
 
It’s worth pointing out that, obviously, prayer is not the only thing the vice president and the CTF are doing. Unlike what some Leftists might sarcastically suggest, they are not “praying the virus away”, or at least, that’s not all they are doing. They are praying to the Lord, who has total and absolute control over everything that happens, that He give them strength in dealing with this, wisdom in how to tackle it, and success in minimizing the influence and effect of the virus so that as many people may survive it and so that this can be put behind us.
 
The seventh question of the Westminster Confession of Faith asks “what are the decrees of God?” The answer is: “The decrees of God are, His eternal purpose, according to the counsel of His will, whereby for His own glory, He hath foreordained whatsoever comes to pass.” This means that God has, for His eternal purpose and His own glory, preordained whatever comes to pass, such as a coronavirus outbreak. It wouldn’t happen if God did not ordain for it to happen. That is not the same as saying God caused it or it’s His fault, because God is the Healer, whereas Satan is the destroyer. However, He has allowed it and the Vice President, as well as the others in that picture, understanding the power of the Lord, are praying that He give them the tools to deal with it and that He would allow for this virus to be defeated.
 
And while I know that the Westminster Confession of Faith is a Presbyterian document, I don’t think too many Christians would disagree with the notion that God is absolutely in control of everything that happens, because if even one molecule in this universe were not under the complete and utter control of God, He would cease to be God.
 
Unfortunately, this is where many on the Left and general unbelievers would retort with “if God is so good then why does He allow these things to happen” which can be difficult sometimes to explain. I couldn’t imagine trying to explain to someone who has suffered throughout their life why God, who is so good, or is regarded by Christians as being so good, would allow for such suffering to happen. The best I could imagine myself doing would be pointing out the story of Joseph, how he was betrayed by his brothers, hated by them, thrown into a pit, be rescued by them only to be then sold into slavery, be falsely accused of trying to have sexual intercourse with his master’s wife and be thrown into prison for years and how if anyone had any “right” to be angry at God, it was him, and yet, he never abandoned his faith in God. Eventually, as we all know, through the path that he took, despite how rocky it was, Joseph became the second-leading ruler of Egypt only behind Pharaoh, and saved millions of lives as a result of that appointment.
 
The point of that is to say that, even when things are at their bleakest and we wonder where God is, we have to remember that God is there, working behind the scenes, for our good. Some may look at what’s happening with the coronavirus and mock Pence and the others for praying to a God who would allow this to happen, but the VP and other fellow Christians know the goodness and the love of God, know who He is and that He wouldn’t allow for this to happen for no reason. Whether that reason be an individual one where someone with the virus or someone who has family with the virus turns to the Lord and repents of their sins, or a larger reason, such as forcing companies to understand the perils of being so dependent on a communist nation that can’t do jack to protect itself and turn away from it to keep their businesses from being hurt like that in the future. I mean, 80% of our medicine comes from China! Maybe this will force some businesses to reevaluate their desire to work with the Chinese and focus on other countries (if not the U.S.).
 
People who do not know the Lord look at us Christians in contempt and think of us as monkeys who believe in fairy tales. They think prayer, despite the power that it has, is completely worthless. But God, as previously stated, is the one in control. It is through Him that anything at all happens. And God is delighted when His children pray to Him, asking for salvation of their soul or simply to be strong in the face of trouble.
 
We pray, not because we are without hope, but because we are full of hope, knowing the goodness of God. We humble ourselves before Him, bowing our heads to Him in prayer. The simple looks at these actions and thinks little of them, while God looks at them and is delighted.
 
Do I know what will happen with this coronavirus? No. I am not God, after all. However, we know from Romans 8:28 that “God works all things together for the good of those who love Him, who are called according to His purpose.” Like Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego, we will obey the Lord and trust that He will deliver us from earthly perils, and that even if He doesn’t, we will not be shaken in our faith.
 
Those three were threatened to be thrown into a blazing fire so hot that it killed the Babylonian guards that were trying to put them in there. The only thing that burned upon being thrown into the fire was the rope that bound them together, with Nebuchadnezzar questioning why there were four people in the cauldron and not three, with the extra person looking like one who was like “the Son of God”.
 
We trust in the Lord and His ways, knowing that they are greater than ours, and thus, we pray to Him both in times of great need and of great abundance; in times of suffering and times of joy. I am so glad that Vice President Pence is a man of faith, one who knows God and His goodness, and leads his CTF team in prayer while searching for ways to mitigate the problem.
 
God is good; remember that.
 
Psalm 34:17
“When the righteous cry for help, the Lord hears and delivers them out of all their troubles.”
 
Author: Freddie Marinelli.

As a Christian, I want to always share the good news - the Gospel of Jesus Christ - so I try to speak about the goodness of God every time I get a chance. Because no matter what mistakes we made in our lives, we know that Christ paid for the sins of those who trust Him. So I tend to try to share the good news with anyone – any sinner – who’s willing to listen.

But also as a Christian I have high expectations of those who speak from a pulpit – you don’t have to be perfect, but you need to understand Scripture. And you need to be passionate about Jesus and about people – showing the same love and compassion towards sinners that Jesus showed. So what I definitely don’t want to see is a “Church” in which they allow in their pulpit anyone who clearly has no understanding of the Word of God – someone like Mayor Pete who hates babies and is in favor of killing them if their moms don’t want them.

This past Sunday, Democrat presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg spoke at the First Baptist Church in James Island, South Carolina, and decided to quote the Bible to get his political message across. The problem is, while using the Bible, he clearly misunderstood the very verse he used. I’ll explain that in just a moment, but let me share with you what he actually said:

“My point in standing before you is not to claim that I understand more than I do, but rather to promise – as the Scripture says – not to lean on my own understanding too much, but to do a lot of listening along the way”. And he added “Not to say that I get it, but to promise to always surround myself with people who will let me know when I don't.”

Now, all of this sounds reasonable, doesn’t it? Mayor Pete has this ability to sound so reasonable all the time. After all, there’s nothing wrong with surrounding yourself with people who will let you know what you don’t know. That makes perfect sense. Except he’s citing a Bible verse to appeal to Christians as if the Bible was the one directing Buttigieg to listen to other people when he doesn’t know - and this is where he's wrong. The problem is that that’s not what the Bible says. The Bible actually warns us about false prophets, for example, and to be careful about who we surround ourselves with. We obviously don’t want to listen to murderers, do we? Or sexual predators.  What good thing could we possibly learn from them?

What Mayor Pete said comes from Proverbs 3:5 “Trust in the LORD with all your heart and do not lean on your own understanding”.

If Buttigieg knew anything about the Bible he’d know that a) it’s the inerrant Word of God and b) it must be interpreted by the Bible itself. As many Theologians would point out, “you have to interpret the Bible by the Bible”. This means you don’t just read one verse and interpret it any way you want, which is what Buttigieg mostly does, but rather you need to continue the reading of Scriptures and understand that particular verse by other verses in the Bible such that you will be consistent and correct in your interpretation.

But in this particular case, the verse is so clear that it doesn’t require reading any additional Bible verse to understand its meaning.

You see, what God asks from us in that verse is that a) we trust Him and b) we do not lean on our own understanding. That even when we see bad things happening, we need to trust God's plan.

As you can see, God is not telling us to go listen to other people to understand better, but rather to trust Him. That's the mandate. How do you trust Him? By listening to Him. And we listen to Him by reading all of the Bible and trust what He says – when you get to know God you know He’s the only one you can truly trust. He told Abraham that he would have a son and He would give his offspring a land “flowing with milk and honey”. And He did. I wonder if Mayor Pete knows that. God said that if we walk in all His statutes, He would cause everything we touch to prosper. I wonder if Mayor Pete knows that. God also said that He would never leave us nor forsake us. I wonder if Mayor Pete knows that. Jesus healed everybody who asked Him to heal them – He never denied healing to anyone who came to Him. I wonder if Mayor Pete knows that.

Mayor Pete is not supposed to go listen to other people, though that’s not a bad thing to do, but rather listen to GOD. Listening to God by the reading of Scriptures is the BEST way to lead your life. If Buttigieg did read the Bible regularly, he’d be a much better politician (and definitely would not be a Democrat). He would also do his best to stop sinning, knowing he isn't perfect and he will sin by his very nature, but will try to mitigate that sin. But because we know he’s leading a life that God calls “an abomination” (Bible verses against homosexuality include Leviticus 18:22, Leviticus 20:13; Romans 1:26-27, 1 Corinthians 6:9 and many more), we can tell he doesn’t understand God at all. And how could he, when it's clear he doesn't understand this simple Bible verse?

For this reason, Mayor Pete should never be allowed to speak from a pulpit. No matter what the message is. He should attend service and try to understand who God is and who he is, as a sinner. And furthermore, he would know that there’s a way to Heaven that is inclusive but also unique and does not involve doing good deeds to try to convince God on judgement day that you weren’t all that bad while here on Earth. The Bible is clear, in Galatians 3:11 "the righteous shall live by Faith". We're saved by faith and by faith alone.

The sad part is that Mayor Pete and, likely, the leaders of the church where he “preached” do not understand the good news. You see, if it wasn’t for the bad news there wouldn’t be any good news. The bad news is that we’re all sinners. The good news is that God provided a way for us sinners to ensure eternal life. And that way is Jesus Christ exclusively. There is no other way. And when you understand the work of redemption that Jesus did 2,000 years ago – the fact that He was sinless, the fact that He was tortured by the Romans and crucified FOR OUR SINS, descended into Hell and was raised from the dead, then understanding what He did for you causes you to want to know everything about Jesus. Like when you follow an athlete or a singer, you want to know everything about them, right? Followers of Christ want to know everything about Him. And out of gratitude for what He did for us, we want to obey Him in all His commandments. But it all starts with understanding God.

Did Jesus die for everybody? No. He died only for those who trust Him, like John 3:16 says: “God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life”. "Whoever believes in Him" excludes those who don't. God tells us that Jesus died for the sins of those who trust Him. Those who don’t trust Him are going to end up in Hell. There is one condition for salvation and that’s that you trust Jesus. When you do, you get ALL the blessings God promises. ALL of them.

I pray that Mayor Pete one day sees the light and truly gives his life to Jesus.
  
1 Kings 2:3
“keep the charge of the Lord your God, walking in his ways and keeping his statutes, his commandments, his rules, and his testimonies, as it is written in the Law of Moses, that you may prosper in all that you do and wherever you turn .“

Author: Danielle Cross

This is not a sports website or a basketball website by any stretch of the imagination. What happens in the world of sports or the NBA is largely irrelevant to this website unless it has something to do with immoral business dealings by the league with authoritarian communists or when a basketball player asserts that there is vast racism in this country when there largely is none. Some topics relating to sports are relevant to this website, but many are not.
 
But it should come as no surprise to long-time readers of this website that I, personally, am a big basketball fan and have been for years. I stay in tune with many of the things happening in the NBA from trades, to free agent signings, to individual player stats to win columns, etc. Basketball, though not close to the level of politics and theology, is a big passion of mine. So hearing the news of the tragic death of Kobe Bryant, one of the greatest players to have ever set foot on the basketball court, has honestly both shocked me and left me in mourning, at least to some extent.
 
Of course, I never met the guy or knew him personally and he certainly never knew I existed, but that does not really matter. The whole basketball world, from the fans to the players to the coaches and those in the executive offices and lower on the corporate ladder, is in mourning over this extremely unexpected and horrific event.
 
The fact that it was not only him, but also his 13-year-old daughter and 7 other people apart from them (9 total, with another 13-year-old apart from Kobe’s daughter, at least according to TMZ) also perished in this incident makes it all the worse because of the potential of those lives. Kobe’s playing career ended in 2016, but he was not done with the game. Gianna, Kobe’s daughter, had dreams of continuing her father’s legacy and enter the WNBA, likely dominate in that league as her father did for so many years in the NBA.
 
All loss of life is tragic, particularly when it comes in this manner. No one in Kobe’s family could’ve possibly prepared, even a little, for last Sunday. But I hope that in this grief and time of mourning, the Bryant family, as well as the families of the people who likewise perished aboard that helicopter, come closer to God and that He would bring them closer to Him, so that they might seek His comfort and, if not quite yet saved, that they might be saved.
 
As far as Kobe and Gianna go, I would like to believe that they are playing for Heaven’s basketball team now. The reason I say this is because of the various sources saying that the guy, and his family, were/are all Catholic.
 
Now, if you are indeed a long-time reader of mine, you know my irks with the Catholic Church and the doctrines they teach. They emphasize a relationship with the Church as opposed to Christ and have many other doctrinal problems, let alone political and social problems that have plagued the Church for centuries (Dictatus Papae, anyone?). However, that does not mean that the entirety of the body of that church is cast off from God’s sight and presence. For all the problems within the Catholic Church (problems that are not exclusive to the Church), there are, indeed, some among the Church who are saved, provided they put their salvation on Christ and not the Church.
 
Kobe Bryant and his family, I believe, are among those who have been saved. Why do I say this? Well, while Kobe has been raised Catholic (which alone does not necessarily save someone), after the rape allegations were made against him, he sought the counsel of a priest who advised him to let God control that situation. Kobe said of that meeting with the priest that “that was the turning point”, supposedly in reference to him trusting his life to the Lord.
 
One could also assume that his faith had influence over his family as well, possibly giving Gianna, Kobe’s oldest daughter, the opportunity to trust the Lord with her life as well. Now, I will say that I do not know for certain whether this is the case, but for my own sake, without having substantial evidence to convince me in one way or another, I believe Gianna did also make it into Heaven alongside her father (and I hope whomever else in that crash that perished also received the Lord Jesus into their hearts and repented of their sins before this).
 
It is this faith that saves us and this faith that tells us the meaning of life. I’ve already mentioned this to some extent in a previous article relating to British youth being “the least happy generation”, but the answer to the meaning of life can be found in the shorter catechisms of the Westminster Confession of faith, particularly in the first one (though I will mention all the ones I consider to be relevant for this).
 
The first shorter catechism found in the Westminster Confession of Faith asks the question: “What is the chief end of man?” The answer to this question is: “Man’s chief end is to glorify God and to enjoy Him forever.”
 
Again, I’ve already mentioned this once, but to reiterate: this right here is the meaning of life. We are created in God’s image so that we may glorify and enjoy Him forever. This is how every Christian should try to live: doing everything for the glory of the Lord.
 
The seventh shorter catechism asks the question: “What are the decrees of God?” The answer reads: “The decrees of God are, his eternal purpose, according to the counsel of his will, whereby, for his own glory, he has foreordained whatsoever comes to pass.”
 
With this, we know that God is in control and that nothing is a surprise to Him. He already knew and foreordained everything had happens, knowing the day and the hour in which we all pass.
 
The 20th shorter catechism asks the question: “Did God leave all mankind to perish in the state of sin and misery?” The answer reads: “God having, out of his mere good pleasure, from all eternity, elected some to everlasting life, did enter into a covenant of grace, to deliver them out of the estate of sin and misery, and to bring them into an estate of salvation by a Redeemer.”
 
God, in all of His wonderful love and grace, has given to us a Savior and Redeemer so that we would not have to suffer His wrath and perish due to our sin.
 
The Lord has put purpose into our lives and that purpose is to glorify Him. This is not a purpose that is exclusive to those who believe (though belief in God is a prerequisite, otherwise one would not glorify a being that they do not believe exists) but a purpose given to each and every single one of us. We are to glorify God and enjoy Him forever.
 
God also already knows whether or not this is something we will strive for and, not only knows it, but has preordained it. He has elected some of us to believe and be saved by the works of His Son Jesus at the cross.
 
And in all of His ever-lasting love for us, who do not deserve such love and grace, God has given us a path to salvation through His Son Jesus. And while the Westminster Confession of Faith is a Protestant document, many of the doctrines it teaches are fairly universal. God loves us. He has given us a purpose to glorify Him, doing everything in His name and for His glory, and ultimately, we shall enjoy Him forever. This is not merely a Protestant thing – it is a Christian thing.
 
This, I hope, is how Kobe lived his life and I hope he is, indeed, enjoying God forever, having been saved by the Lord Jesus.
 
I also hope this is how the other passengers lived their lives, or at least tried to, and can all now enjoy the Lord in Heaven.
 
John 4:24
“God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.”
 
Author: Freddie Marinelli. 

Searching through news articles and op-eds for me to find inspiration, I came across an opinion piece published on Scientific American with the following title: “Can Science Rule Out God?”, with the subhead reading: “We must understand the laws of nature before we can deduce their origins”.
 
Naturally, I became interested in what the author of the piece, a man by the name of Mark Alpert, had to say on this subject. The debate between science and religion has existed for centuries at this point since the Age of “Enlightenment” (I put it in quotation marks since it seems to have had just the opposite effect when it came to logic and reason).
 
From the outset, Mr. Alpert notes that he himself is not a religious man, does not outright believe in the existence of God as He is found in the Bible, but is not an atheist either, but something more akin to an agnostic (which has roots to the Greek word “agnostos” meaning “unknown” or “unknowable”, or in other words, basically means ignorant since “agnoia” means “ignorance”, so it is interesting that someone would be willing to call themselves “ignorant”). Mr. Alpert also mentions that for a decade, he had been an editor at the very scientific journal that he is currently writing for in efforts to expose “the falsehoods of ‘intelligent design’ proponents who claimed to see God’s hand in the fashioning of complex biological structures” like the human eye and bacteria.
 
Not quite sure what falsehoods he could be talking about with this. The only other argument here is that these complex things came about entirely by chance, which as I have explained time and time again, is nothing more than mathematical probability of an event occurring and it has no inherent power to act upon anything, but I digress.
 
Mr. Alpert eventually writes something that I found interesting. He notes that “as physicists investigate the most fundamental characteristics of nature, they’re tackling issues that have long been the province of philosophers and theologians: Is the universe infinite and eternal? Why does it seem to follow mathematical laws, and are those laws inevitable? And, perhaps most importantly, why does the universe exist? Why is there something instead of nothing?”
 
That last question is really what intrigues me (and the question about the universe being infinite and eternal, which I will get to). Indeed, why is there something instead of nothing? And here is where we arrive to one of three possible theories to explain the existence of the universe:
 
Theory #1: the universe was created by God, who is a self-existing, eternal being, omnipotent, omnipresent and omniscient.
 
Theory #2: the universe is eternal and self-existing.
 
Theory #3: the universe is not eternal but self-created.
 
Let us observe the objective reality that there is, indeed, something, as opposed to nothing. By sheer reason and logic, we can completely eliminate the third theory as a whole. Why? Because of two laws: the Law of Causality (or the Law of Cause and Effect, if you will) and the Law of Noncontradiction.
 
The Law of Causality is, as explained, the law of Cause and Effect. Simply put, this law means that every effect must have an antecedent cause. For a ball to move, force must be applied to it. Someone must move it themselves, be it with their hands or their feet, or simply a strong enough gust of wind or the force of gravity must act on it in order for the effect of motion to occur. Following Newton’s First Law, the Law of Inertia, an object at rest stays at rest and an object in motion stays in motion with the same speed and in the same direction unless acted upon by an outside force.
 
Every effect must have an antecedent cause and if there is no cause, there is no effect. The second of the laws I mentioned is the Law of Noncontradiction which simply states that A cannot be A and non-A at the same time and in the same relationship. Something cannot BE and NOT BE at the same time and in the same relationship.
 
For example, you can be a father and you can be a son at the same time, but you cannot be both at the same time and in the same relationship. You cannot be your own father and you cannot be your own son. It is logically impossible for such a relationship to exist. Another example would be that you cannot exist and not exist at the same time and in the same relationship. Or you cannot have a job and not have a job at the same time and in the same relationship, etc.
 
So why do I bring this law into the conversation? Because in order for the universe to create itself, it first must BE and NOT BE at the same time and the same relationship. It must exist and NOT exist, which is not physically or logically possible. In order for something to create anything, even itself, it must first BE. You cannot argue that the universe created itself because you would then be arguing illogically, as the universe must first have not existed and existed at the same time and in the same relationship.
 
NOTHING can create itself, as a result. It is logically, not to mention physically, impossible for something to create itself simply because it would have to literally defy LOGIC in order for this to happen. Not even God has the power to create Himself.
 
If there ever was a time when there was nothing, without the acting of an outside being that is self-existing and eternal, there would be nothing at this very moment. Ex nihilo, nihil fit. Out of nothing, nothing comes. So if there is SOMETHING, it absolutely could not have come from nothing, at least out of its own power. So the third theory is eliminated entirely.
 
So let’s move on to the second theory, which is something Mr. Alpert covers, even if unwittingly. Mr. Alpert writes:
 
“Cosmologists don’t know if the universe even had a beginning. Instead it might’ve had an eternal past before the big bang, stretching infinitely backward in time. Some cosmological models propose that the universe has gone through endless cycles of expansion and contraction. And some versions of the theory of inflation postulate an eternal process in which new universes are forever branching off from the speedily expanding ‘inflational background.’”
 
Such theories should be easy enough to discern why they might not hold up. If the universe is endlessly expanding and contracting in cycles, what is causing it and when did that start? To return to the Law of Causality, all effects must have an antecedent cause. If something, anything, including the universe itself, is expanding and contracting like a lung, then what is the CAUSE?
 
It is this very law that also eliminates the second theory. The very existence of the universe, the fact that there is something instead of nothing, is an effect. Again, out of nothing, nothing comes. Even those who believe in the second theory understand this principle and it is the reason why such people do not believe in the third theory. But the Law of Causality also throws a wrench at the second theory. The existence of the universe, being an effect, must have an antecedent cause.
 
Funny enough, even Mr. Alpert notes this: “But other cosmologists argue that inflation had to start somewhere, and the starting point could’ve been essentially nothing. As we’ve learned from quantum theory, even empty space has energy, and nothingness is unstable. All kinds of improbable things can happen in empty space, and one of them might’ve been a sudden drop to a lower vacuum energy, which could’ve triggered the inflationary expansion.”
 
A few things about this. First, I’m glad that he notes that cosmologists have enough logic to argue that this cycle of inflation (if true) had to start somewhere. That’s nice.
 
Second, and most importantly, suppose that the “sudden drop to a lower vacuum energy” is, indeed, what happened and caused this “inflationary expansion”. We return, once again, to the Law of Causality. What CAUSED that sudden drop? I don’t think I need to argue why a “sudden drop” is an effect. When you suddenly drop a coin, that drop had an antecedent cause. The same, therefore, must be applied here.
 
Which brings us to the first theory I talked about: the theory of a self-existing, eternal being with the power to create and manipulate energy and matter itself to create anything and everything.
 
Now, non-believing skeptics might argue “but doesn’t the Law of Causality apply to this theory too? You argued that an eternal, self-existing universe cannot be because of this Law, which says that all things must have a cause. Why is this theory, the one that points to an eternal, self-existing God, any different?”
 
The answer is simple: because the Law of Causality states that every EFFECT must have an antecedent cause. God is not an effect, but the antecedent cause. God is not a creation. He is not an effect, because if He were, literally nothing would make any sense. There’d be no universe and no intelligent being to understand anything for anything to make sense. God CANNOT be an effect and most certainly, He is not.
 
God is the antecedent cause in the Law of Causality. If you argue that the universe came about because of a “sudden drop” to a lower vacuum energy, one must still explain the cause of that sudden drop and the only feasible and logical outcome would have to be the acknowledgement of a self-existing, eternal, omnipotent, omnipresent and omniscient being and there is only one such being that can come to mind, and that is the God of the Bible.
 
It is for this very reason that science cannot rule out the existence of God and those who adamantly deny the existence of God are not scientific. It is impossible to prove that something does not exist. You cannot prove a negative. It’s for this same reason that it is up to the prosecution to find guilt beyond a reasonable doubt in order to get a conviction. It is not up to the innocent to prove their innocence (though exculpatory evidence should be looked for, but is not necessary), but for the accuser to prove guilt. One cannot prove that God does not exist, and by virtue of the things that I talked about, it would be illogical for people to say that He hasn’t been proven to exist, because He has.
 
Science can’t rule out God because God is FACT. Science can’t rule out God because without God, there’d be no science in the first place. There’d be absolute nothingness because ex nihilo, nihil fit. Out of nothing, nothing comes. If there is no God, there’d be nothing right now.
 
Romans 1:20
“For since the creation of the world, God’s invisible qualities, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood from His workmanship, so that men are without excuse.”
 
Author: Freddie Marinelli.

Looking through the news, one can’t help but be overwhelmed at the sheer number of problems that people must face on a regular basis. We read stories about shootings, terrorist acts, foreign governments intruding in elections (mainly Ukraine), a whole political party seeking the impeachment of a president on the grounds of “we don’t like him”, people claiming to be a different gender from what they are, people attempting to justify and rationalize the murder of the unborn, people demanding increased immigration, legal or illegal, as a means of “enriching” our country, etc.
 
There are a whole lot of problems in Western civilization (and the world as a whole, but we’ll focus on the West today) and one can’t help but think: how did it all come to this?
 
The answer to this question seems to lie in the past, about 80 years ago, with the findings of Oxford social anthropologist J.D. Unwin in his book called “Sex and Culture”.
 
Unfortunately, I do not currently have access to this book, but thankfully, Father John Peck does and has written a very good article about it on his own website: frjohnpeck.com. The article is titled: “Why Sexual Morality May be Far More Important than You Ever Thought.”
 
In this article, Fr. Peck notes that Unwin examined data from “86 societies and civilizations to see if there is a relationship between sexual freedom and the flourishing of cultures.” In his book, Unwin described four “great patterns of human culture” and levels of flourishing of those cultures based on architecture, art, engineering, literature, agriculture and other sciences. Fr. Peck says that the “primary criterion for classification was how they related to the natural world and the forces it contains.”
 
These four great patterns are as follows:

• Zoistic, which is completely focused on day-to-day affairs, needs and desires with no inherent interest in the understanding of nature. Unwin describes this as a “dead culture” and is the lowest form of civilization, if one can call it that.

 

• Monistic, where a culture adopts superstitious beliefs and/or “special treatment of the dead to cope with the natural world,” as Fr. Peck describes it.

•  Deistic, where cultures attribute powers of nature to a god or gods.  

• And finally, Rationalistic, where cultures use rational thinking to understand nature and make decisions based on this logic and findings.

 
 
Unwin also noted varying degrees of sexual restraint that tend to appear in any given culture. These degrees are divided into two categories of their own: prenuptial (before marriage) and postnuptial (during marriage).
 
First, there is the prenuptial category of Complete Sexual Freedom. As the name suggests, this is where there are zero restrictions on sexuality before marriage.
 
Second, there is Irregular or Occasional Restraint, where “cultural regulations require an occasional period of abstinence.”
 
The final prenuptial category is Strict Chastity, where the culture demands that people remain virgins until marriage.
 
Then, there are four postnuptial categories:

• Modified Monogamy, where people are married to one spouse at any given time, but this relationship can be terminated by either person for any given reason.

 

• Modified Polygamy, where men can have more than one wife (sometimes, it’s the inverse, where a woman has more than one boyfriend or husband, but that is very rare and a product of our time, not something that would really be found during Unwin’s era), but the wife has the right to leave her husband at any point for any reason.

 

• Absolute Monogamy, where people are married to one spouse at a time and the relationship lasts for life (a more Catholic view, and not something I totally agree with, but ideally, the relationship should and would last a lifetime, provided both parties understand the trinity that exists in their relationship, with God being at the head of the husband and wife).  

• Absolute Polygamy, where men can have more than one wife, but wives cannot leave their husbands and must “confine their sexual qualities (activity) to their husband for the whole of their lives.”

 
So, understanding all of these concepts and the way they work in the real world, what are the effects that Unwin ultimately found with these 86 societies and cultures? The short answer: nothing good for the cultures in the long-term if they allow for sexual freedom.
 
According to Fr. Peck, Unwin found that “increased sexual constraints, either pre or post-nuptial, always led to increased flourishing of a culture. Conversely, increased sexual freedom always led to the collapse of a culture three generations later.”
 
This is very significant because we can easily picture our own culture here. During the 1960s, 70s and 80s, Western civilization went through what is known as a “sexual revolution”, where old norms of chastity and virginity were replaced in favor of allowing people to do what they want with whom they want any time they want, provided no laws or human rights were violated. While it used to be that virginity was something to be kept until marriage, the very concept of it is mocked and ridiculed in our time. If someone doesn’t have sex by their late teens or early 20s, that person is considered an outcast if it is known that they are a virgin.
 
Unwin also found the most influential factor in a society’s flourishing to be whether or not prenuptial chastity was a requirement. If it was, that culture would typically flourish, while if it was not, that culture would descend into collapse and eventual replacement by another culture that has more social energy and for this to happen, the replacing culture has to have more sexual restraint.
 
This would explain, at least in part, why Islam is growing at the pace that it is. Of course, factors such as threatening people with “submit or lose your head” are taken into consideration here, but one of the very few pros of Islam is their sexual restrictions (apart from polygamy and killing of homosexuals, that is).
 
In today’s Western culture, if a girl gets pregnant at an early age, that is not usually seen as that big of a deal, even if it is a hindrance on the family, for a number of reasons. For one, abortion is seen as a viable, often preferable, option. Two, pregnancy is what often follows sexual freedom, so it is not seen as completely unexpected, even if not an ideal outcome.
 
But in cultures where there are high levels of sexual restraint, if a girl gets pregnant at an early age, the girl is subject to scorn and the family becomes extremely upset. This type of behavior, though seemingly harsh, tends to be a tool of discouragement for others to do the same.
 
Another of Unwin’s findings is that, when strict prenuptial chastity ceased to be the norm, categories of absolute monogamy, deism and rational thinking would disappear within three generations.
 
This is also rather easy to see in our own culture. With the sexual revolution happening a generation or so ago, we find less people in Western civilization who accept that marriage should be for life (50% divorce rate is the result of this), less people believe in God and less people accept objective truth and opt for subjective lies that comfort them, such as the belief that a man can be a woman and vice versa.
 
Basically, what we see today is the effect of the sexual revolution of the late 20th century. What Unwin noticed in the societies that allowed for sexual freedom are what is happening today: less acceptance in absolute monogamy and more acceptance of ending a marriage on the basis of “I just don’t feel the spark anymore”; less acceptance of God and His Sovereignty and more acceptance of abstract superstitions like cosmology, giving power to the mathematical concept of chance, and believing in “karma” or “chakras” or other nonsense; and less acceptance of objective, provable truths and more acceptance of subjective, improvable lies that serve to comfort the individual and provide them with zero conflict, or at least, that is the advertised objective.
 
These things, Unwin notes, tend to lead to the collapse and replacement of a culture. As previously mentioned, when a culture allows for total sexual freedom, said culture collapses within three generations to a level of essentially being a “dead culture” where people have little interest in anything apart from fulfilling their most carnal desires day in and day out and not seeking, maybe even rejecting, any attempt at actually understanding nature and creation. It is at this level where a culture is often subject to replacement by another culture.
 
I’ve seen semi-joking tweets from Ann Coulter about supporting Islam when there would be stories about Muslim parents protesting schools imposing LGBTQ curricula on students. As I’ve said time and time again in the past, the LGBT agenda and Islam are very antithetical with one another and, under Hegelian Dialectics, are bound to clash at one point or another. That is one of the examples of these two cultures colliding, and given Unwin’s findings, Islam will come out on top here.
 
If Christians were to do the same (and I don’t see many, if any, stories about Christian parents protesting LGBT curricula in schools, likely out of fear of persecution by Leftwing mobs), Christianity would also come out on top, provided it remains resilient on this issue and doesn’t try to give ground away, like the Catholic Church has done in allowing for gay priests, or like some protestant churches have done in allowing “Same-Sex Attracted” pastors to lead congregations.
 
But the very reason any of that has even happened is because of the sexual revolution being so popular in the Western culture in the first place. Churches, fearing people would abandon them, chose to follow the crowd, even if that meant abandoning God and flocking to what is inarguably considered in the Bible to be sinful. As a result, people have still abandoned churches, seeing no real reason to attend, and the churches have abandoned God, so they provide no actual reason for anyone to attend, given that the Gospel is no longer being preached (again, in some churches, not all of them).
 
The reason pastors like Joel Osteen are so popular is because they actually preach the Gospel and provide the basic message of “God loves you despite what you have done if you trust in Him”. This provides a rest from the secular, shallow world and helps people to find meaning in their lives.
 
The secular world, particularly as it allows for sexual freedom, has led to the destruction of the family. Mary Eberstadt researched mass killings, the rise of mental health issues and the surge and dominance of identity politics and found that these are a “primal scream” as a result of “the loss of identity that was once provided by growing up in a long-term, immediate family with siblings and a sizable group of cousins, aunts and uncles, all of which provided identity – essential for well-being,” as Fr. Peck also notes in his article.
 
In other words, the destruction of the nuclear family has given rise to many of the problems we see today, like mass shootings, general mental health issues like depression and anxiety, and the dominance of identity politics and the perceived importance of valuing oneself and identifying oneself based on their physical attributes, sexual desires, or made up victimhoods.
 
And the destruction of the nuclear family can also be traced back to the sexual revolution and to overall sexual freedom. When kids don’t know who one of their parents is, that’s a problem. When kids grow up thinking that having two dads or two moms or more than two parents is normal, that’s a problem. When teenagers are mocked for restricting their own sexual desires, that’s a problem. When people believe marriage to be a “union of love” without any concept of God being a part of that union, that’s a problem. When people conflate love with lust, that’s a problem.
 
These things are all a result of sexual freedom and the sexual revolution of the early 20th century. Western civilization, much as I would hate to admit, will fall if this is not remedied. There is nothing inherently special about Western civilization that would have it be spared of this fate by God, particularly when said civilization is less and less likely to believe in God as time goes on.
 
On this site, we’ve already explained that Israel would often be punished for disobeying God and would be redeemed for returning to God and obeying Him again. Western civilization, having been founded on Christian principles, cannot live apart from such principles, as doing so would divorce it from God.
 
My desire is for Western civilization to return to what it once was: fearful, obedient and loving towards God, who would reciprocate such fear, obedience and love with love and blessings. Note that this does not mean returning to the way everything was in the past. The Left often tries to argue that “Make America Great Again” envisions an America where black people are either segregated from white people or are slaves of white people. That is not what MAGA means whatsoever. It only indicates a desire to return America to the greatness and power it once knew, economically, militarily, and culturally.
 
Unfortunately, while Trump can greatly succeed (and is succeeding as much as he can) in the first two endeavors, the last one is totally out of his hands and things don’t exactly appear to be moving in the right direction in that aspect.
 
If the U.S., and indeed, all of Western culture does not turn this ship around culturally, then it doesn’t matter if the economy is the best we’ve ever seen or if we can win any of the wars we currently are engaged in or possibly could be engaged in, for Western civilization will ultimately be lost as a culture and replaced by another.
 
And given the horrible options of Islam or Chinese supremacy, I would hope that Western civilization will return to God sooner rather than later.
 
Exodus 19:5
“Now therefore, if you will indeed obey my voice and keep my covenant, you shall be my treasured possession among all peoples, for all the earth is mine.”
 
Author: Freddie Marinelli.

Of course, that question in the title is very rhetorical. The answer is that he does not know God. He knows of Him, of course, but does not actually know Him on a personal basis, otherwise, he wouldn’t say the crazy, wrong, and even at times, idolatrous, things that he says.
 
Saint Peter’s Square was holding the inauguration of the Vatican Christmas tree and Nativity scene last Thursday, and the Pope thanked the people of Veneto and Trentino-Alto Adige, who donated the tree and the Nativity scene.
 
But in doing so, Il Papa went on a tangent regarding his favorite topic: not the Gospel, but climate change and the “emergency” that we face.
 
“Today’s meeting offers me the opportunity to renew my encouragement to your people, who last year suffered a devastating natural disaster, with the demolition of entire wooded areas. These are events that frighten us; they are alarm signals that creation sends us, which summon us to immediately take effective decisions to safeguard our common home.”
 
Don’t know about you, but it sure sounds like he believes God is not actually sovereign and that the climate depends entirely on us to survive.
 
Of course, this is far from the first time Pope Francis has said ridiculous and seemingly idolatrous things. He’s often lambasted politicians for being “weak” regarding cutting emissions, has encouraged people to “adopt more simple and respectful lifestyles”, though does not show himself to be leading by example, and encourages people to seek the “old-age” wisdom of indigenous peoples and how they treated and lived with nature. Indigenous peoples were people who worshipped nature, not God, so I can see why Pope Francis feels at home with such ideologies.
 
But to return to his quote at Saint Peter’s Square, funny enough, I have already written an article discussing what he is talking about. In an article titled: “There Is No Link Between Climate Change And Extreme Weather Events”, I talk about… well… how there’s no link between climate change and extreme weather events like what northern Italy recently had.
 
If you remember, the ultimate conclusion reached in that article is that scientists researching this very topic found that “any trend of rising ‘climate damages’ were primarily due to increased population densities and economic activity in the path of storms and that it was, at this time, not possible to determine what portion of those damages can be attributed to greenhouse gases, which is something they don’t expect to change in the near future at least.”
 
What’s more, a 2012 IPCC report called “Special Report on Extreme Weather” ultimately agreed with these scientists on their findings that there was no actual statistical connection between climate change and extreme weather events.
 
The only reason any environmentalist whacko says that hurricanes are due to climate change is to frighten people into believing the cult’s ideologies. Because hurricanes exist and because they can cause damage, even death, then there must be a scientific explanation for them (there is). The Left has hijacked science to be a political tool (look at what they are claiming about gender) and insists that these hurricanes, which are real, is a result of man-made climate change, which is not real, and they provide no actual evidence to this.
 
Pope Francis is among the false teachers that the Bible warns us about. 2 Timothy 4:3-4 says the following: “For the time will come when people will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear. They will turn their ears away from the truth and turn aside to myths.”
 
The Pope, much like other Leftists, hates the fact that he is not God Almighty. What the climate cult hopes to achieve is to turn mere mortals into gods, like Greta Thunberg. They seek to have the power of God, able to create and destroy, to be sovereign over all the universe. Convincing people that they have more power than they actually do, and that such power can be harmful to the environment and that this power must be controlled by the government and by the leaders (like Francis) aims to achieve what that letter to Timothy says. In order to suit their own desires, they get teachers (scientists) to say what they want to hear, instead of the truth.
 
It’s extremely obvious that Pope Francis is a false teacher, a false shepherd, a false prophet. He speaks of things he has no clue about, as evident by the fact that he insisted that extreme weather events are a result of climate change. But what is worse, perhaps, is the fact that he has the Truth available to him anytime he wishes to read it and still adamantly rejects it and perverts it.
 
Of course, he doesn’t explicitly say that he rejects the Truth of the Gospel. Doing so would get him removed from the power he has. But he rejects it every time he speaks such falsehoods. He does not trust that the Lord is in control; that He is sovereign over everything, including the weather and the climate of the world. He has no actual faith in God, so he turns to Man. He believes Man has the power to wrestle away control from God with regard to the climate – that we can turn up the temperature or cause it to severely drop if we so chose to.
 
He does not trust that, even if the climate does warm up or cool down, it is because God has created the Earth this way and because He has ordained it to be so. If God wanted to, He could make the climate completely static, utterly unchanging. He and He alone has the power to warm or cool the planet. To believe we are capable of wrestling away such control is heresy.
 
The Pope often says that we are “harming” the planet that God has given us because of the sin in our hearts. Of course, Man is capable of harming nature, there’s no disputing that. We can pollute lakes and other bodies of water. We can pollute the ground. We can pollute the air (by the way, it’s funny but not unexpected that whenever he talks about climate change, Pope Francis always attacks capitalism and does not say anything about China and their egregious polluting practices). However, being able to do that does not mean we are capable of forcing a warming or a cooling of the climate.
 
As stated in previous articles, the climate engages in a cycle of warming periods. There was the Roman Warming Period, which lasted around the same time as the Roman Empire did; there was the Medieval Warming Period and we are currently in the Modern Warming Period. Each of these Warming Periods denote a time when the Earth was abnormally warm, but even then, one can hardly call that “abnormal”. This is a cycle that appears to happen every thousand years, with one Warming Period and with no Warming Period in a millennium, so if it alternates like this, I’d say that the warming and the cooling is not abnormal at all. What would be abnormal would be any break in the cycle, either making the cycle last longer (the Warming Periods usually last 300-600 years) or making them way shorter.
 
This is the way that God has ordained the world to exist for now. One cannot realistically argue that any of these Warming Periods, particularly the Medieval and Roman ones, are a result of man-made climate change or are a result of our lifestyles.
 
The third chapter of the Westminster Confession of faith (which I recognize is a Protestant document, not a Catholic one, but I believe it to be accurate doctrine applicable to anyone who is a follower of Christ) begins with the following words: “God, from all eternity, did by the most wise and holy counsel of His own will, freely and immutably ordain whatsoever comes to pass.”
 
You don’t have to be a Protestant to believe these words to be true. You don't even have to be a Christian. If you believe in an all-powerful, sovereign God, you have no choice but to believe these words to be true. Whether you are a Christian, Jew or Muslim, this is something all theists believe and what all atheists do not believe. God, for all of time, by his own wisdom and holy counsel of His very own will, entirely freely and unchangingly ordains whatever happens. That means that nothing happens without His ordaining so. He isn’t caught off-guard by anything; nothing is a surprise to Him. He doesn’t look at anything and say “Didn’t see that one coming”.
 
So to assert that mere men, creation made from dirt by the Holy power of God and made in His own image, are capable of acting in a way that overpowers the will of God is an assertion made by someone whose life and heart and being do not totally belong to Christ. To believe that we are capable of wrestling away control from God in this manner is antithetical to the very belief system present in Christianity.
 
If one does not believe God to be omnipotent, omniscient and omnipresent and one does not believe that God ordains whatsoever comes to pass, one cannot be considered a believer in God, because whatever god such a person believes in is not the One True God of Scripture and is nothing more than a fictitious, man-made deity, whose characteristics are created by Man, and not the other way around.
 
It is shameful that the man who is considered the head of the Church would be so lacking in faith. And even though he is far from the first Pope to not be a Christian, it is still shameful that such secular people could be put into what is considered the highest honor of Christendom in the mortal realm.
 
Ezekiel 13:9
“My hand will be against the prophets who see false visions and utter lying divinations. They will not belong to the council of my people or be listed in the records of Israel, nor will they enter the land of Israel. Then you will know that I am the Sovereign Lord.”
 
Author: Freddie Marinelli.

Despite the fact that we recently had the Democrats hosting the first day of the Impeachment Circus, little news came out of it (just like with the Mueller hearings) other than things that are to the detriment of the Democrats (regardless of what people deep in denial might say about this). So, I turn my attention to another piece of recent news: The Salvation Army being defamed by hateful Leftists who pressured a spineless celebrity to threaten to pull out of their halftime show during the Cowboys-Bills Thanksgiving Day game.
 
Singer Ellie Goulding had initially partnered with the Christian organization that helps the homeless and the poor to sing during their halftime show for the Cowboys-Bills game on Thanksgiving Day. But angry Leftists bashed her for helping out The Salvation Army (Goulding had also been volunteering with them in New York) because they accused the organization of having an “anti-LGBTQ” agenda. In other words, Leftists hate that a celebrity would help out a Christian organization, so they throw out this accusation, which is the same one they use for Chick-fil-A, and just like with the chicken sandwich restaurant, it’s nothing but defamation.
 
Goulding, like many other celebrities, caved to the outrage mob and gave the following statement: “Upon researching this, I have reached out to The Salvation Army and said that I would have no choice but to pull out unless they very quickly make a solid, committed pledge or donation to the LGBTQ community. I am a committed philanthropist as you probably know, and my heart has always been in helping the homeless, but supporting an anti-LGBTQ charity is clearly not something I would ever intentionally do. Thank you for drawing my attention to this.”
 
In other words, she did NOT make any research on this and is taking the word of outright liars as the truth, threatening to pull out of the show if The Salvation Army does not quickly make a contribution to the LGBTQ community, aka extortion.
 
The reason I say she did not make any research is because she herself said that The Salvation Army was anti-LGBTQ when they are not.
 
The Salvation Army began in East London in 1865. It was a Protestant church and is now commonly known worldwide as an international charitable organization with the aim of ministering to the needy and bringing the Gospel to the streets. The Salvation Army’s website has a whole section regarding their helping LGBT homeless people. They explain how 40% of homeless youth in America identify as LGBT, nearly 33% of homeless transgender people are rejected from emergency shelters (not associated with The Salvation Army) and that LGBT Americans have a higher chance of being poor.
 
“The Salvation Army USA serves more than 23 million Americans every year. In every ZIP code of America, services are offered without discrimination… When a transgender person seeks help from us, we serve them in the same manner as any other person seeking assistance,” read their site.
 
Even the Prairie Pride Coalition, a gay rights organization in Illinois, advised locals in their community to go to The Salvation Army for help. The Salvation Army also provides people with shelter, job training, and help with substance abuse and food insecurity.
 
To say that The Salvation Army is anti-LGBTQ is a despicable lie. It’s a Christian organization and as such, they have the OBLIGATION to serve, as followers of Christ are called to serve, those around us who need help. That isn’t to say that they promote or support the LGBT agenda or anything of the sort. But doing so isn’t necessary for an organization to do good. Not that hateful bigots on the Left will see it that way. In their eyes, if an organization doesn’t kowtow to their every whim, it should be considered illegitimate in people’s eyes and should be defamed and destroyed.
 
As I have said multiple times in the past, no Christian or Christian organization (at least no true Christian) hates gay people. Why? Because hate is for evil; for Satan. We hate evil because God hates evil. We recognize that homosexuality is a sin and that it’s evil, which is why we do not endorse it or support it. But everyone is a sinner, including Christians, and if we were to discriminate against anyone who was a sinner, literally nothing would ever be done because there isn’t a single person on this earth who isn’t a sinner.
 
Jesus dined with sinners, not because He agreed with their sin or because He was accepting of their sin. Far from it; He dined with them because He did not want them to sin any longer. He forgave the adulterous woman not because He was okay with her sin but because He called on her to not sin any longer. He healed the blind and the lepers, who were considered to be that way because they sinned, not because He agreed with their sinful ways but because He loved them and called on them to not sin any longer, having them recognize Him as the Son of God and do what’s right in God’s eyes.
 
One doesn’t have to be accepting of homosexuality to be charitable to a homosexual. One doesn’t have to agree with the LGBT agenda in order to help the LGBT community where help might be needed.
 
God loves us despite our sin, not because of it. Likewise, we are to love our brothers and sisters in Christ, love our neighbors and even love our enemies, hard as that last one might prove to be. The Salvation Army, being a Christian organization, knows this extremely well and shows that in their good works. For anyone to defame them is utterly shameful, but not something I can be surprised by considering who is doing the defaming.
 
The Left hates Christians, hates God and hates anyone who would dare disagree with them. The Salvation Army, being a Christian organization, is one of their targets for defamation and destruction.
 
But The Salvation Army had a very good response to such defamation:
 
“We’d like to thank Ellie Goulding and her fans for shedding light on misconceptions and encouraging others to learn the truth about The Salvation Army’s mission to serve all, without discrimination. We applaud her for taking the time to learn about the services to the LGBTQ community. Regardless of race, ethnicity, sexual orientation or gender identity, we’re committed to serving anyone in need. Every day, we provide services such as shelter for the transgender community and resources for homeless youth…”
 
The Salvation Army knows that they are not what the hateful Leftists claim they are and are not afraid to fight back against such shameful defamation and ludicrous accusations.
 
As Christians, we are called to witness the Truth of the Gospel to everyone. I don’t know for certain if that is what they do in these shelters still, but I certainly hope they do, as that is what they are supposed to do.
 
But to reiterate, as Christians, we are called to serve and not to judge or discriminate against those who sin. We are, ourselves, sinners and we will be measured by the same rod with which we measure others. When it comes to LGBT people, we are called to rebuke them for their sins with love and try to help them to receive Christ. Same as we would adulterers or criminals or other kinds of sinners, we are to rebuke and help them receive Christ if possible.
 
2 Corinthians 5:21
“For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.”
 
Author: Freddie Marinelli.

Back in late November of last year, I wrote an article discussing the harrowing situation a family, or more specifically, a father and his young son were in because of the son’s monster of a mother, wherein she forced him to dress and act like a girl around him and in the school he would attend.
 
As a reminder, court documents said that James Younger, the young boy in question who is only 7 years of age at this point, would only dress as a girl when he is with his mother and was enrolled into school under the name of “Luna”. He would have to use the girls’ restroom and he would be addressed as “Luna” by his teachers, principal, librarian, and most other authoritative figures in his life… except his father, who is trying to save the young boy.
 
But unfortunately, evil reigns supreme in this case, as a Texas jury has decided that Jeffrey Younger, the father of James, will not be the Sole Managing Conservator over his “two twin boys” (Yes, there are two, but it appears James is the only one that is being forced to be transgender by his mother, though it’s uncertain that his twin brother will not be forced as well).
 
James’ mother, Dr. Anne Georgulas, according to LifeSiteNews, has been granted authority to “transition” James from a boy to a girl, meaning chemical castration when he turns 8, putting him on puberty blockers and eventually, put him on a hormone treatment in his mid-teens.
 
LifeSiteNews also says that “the jury’s decision likely means that Mr. Younger will be required to ‘affirm’ James as a girl, despite his religious and moral objections, and will also be forced to take a class on transgenderism.”
 
Jeffrey Younger recently was a guest on The Luke Macias Show and shared with the host:
 
“I want you to imagine having electronic communication with your son on FaceTime, and imagine that your ex-wife has dressed him as a drag queen to talk to you. He has false eyelashes and makeup. His hair has got glitter in it. He’s wearing a dress. Now imagine how you would feel seeing what I believe is actual sexual abuse – I believe this is not just emotional abuse but is the very, most fundamental form of sexual abuse, tampering with the sexual identity of a vulnerable boy… [James] wears a dress at her (Georgulas’) home; he has a new made-up name, Luna – it appears in the court filings. He goes to school; the teachers call him ‘Luna’. He uses the girl’s bathroom at school. All of his authority figures – his mother, his teacher, the librarian at school, the police officer at school, the principal at school – tell him he’s a girl. I’m the only authority figure in his life that tells him the truth; that he’s actually a boy.”
 
Furthermore, Jeffrey notes that, in his opinion, he has witnessed his then-wife “was only giving [James] love and affection when he was acting like a girl,” adding that she used to lock the young boy in his room and tell him that monsters only eat boys.
 
He continued: “Every. Single. Day. You have to see your son sexually abused, and you have to maintain your calm, because the courts are not going to be fair to you. And the only way you can survive this and get your son through this alive is to calmly allow your son to be tortured right before your eyes and outlast the opposition. That’s what it’s like. They’re asking me to affirm a delusion.”
 
It is utterly despicable what this mother is doing to her own son. I believe Jeffrey’s account regarding withholding affection unless James acts like a girl and locking him in his room and telling him monsters only eat boys, but even if they aren’t true, the situation as a whole is very much true and is horrifying.
 
The mother is a vindictive (I really want to use a bad word here, that’s how mad I am, but you can use your imagination) and is sexually and emotionally abusing her OWN SON. And now, because of course it’s this way, a jury, the people who decide the boy’s future, have sided with his mom likely because of “political correctness.”
 
If I were Jeffrey, I would go to my ex-wife’s house, barge in, take my kids and go to a non-extradition country, safe from that monster’s predatorial hands.
 
I would honestly not give one single flipping crap (I really wish I could say something stronger) about what the legal consequences of this are. I would much rather obey God’s Law over Man’s law if Man’s law contradicts with God’s.
 
What happened in that courtroom was an abortion of justice. Even by the Left’s own standards, this should be considered extremely evil because it’s FORCING A CHILD TO BE A GENDER HE DOESN’T WANT TO BE!
 
Court documents show that he very aggressively does not want to act or dress like a girl when he is with his father. He KNOWS he’s a boy, but is being FORCED to act like a girl when with his “mom” (I wouldn’t even call her that, as calling her that is an insult to all mothers) or when in school.
 
One of the Left’s arguments in favor of transgenderism is “letting people choose who or what they want to be.” Dumb as it is to deny biological and scientific FACT, adults can do whatever they damn well please, so if one wishes to be a different gender from what they are, then fine. They are definitely wrong to do so and if they go through the transition procedure, will permanently alter their bodies and will likely come to regret it, but it’s their decision to make.
 
But here? The only decision being made is by the “mother” and by the courts, siding with the “mother”. The young boy doesn’t have a choice in the matter. His mother wants him to be a girl, so he has to be a girl. And not one Leftist will care because “woke”, even though if the roles were reversed, and it was the boy who wanted to be a girl and the mother who didn’t want that, the Left would accuse her of bigotry and transphobia and say it’s “the kid’s choice”.
 
Apparently, the kid only has a choice when it’s a choice the Left agrees with. Why am I not even surprised at this in the least?
 
It’s pure evil what is happening and the judge preceding over the case should lose her job and her law degree. This is the very perversion of justice, the state allowing a woman to sexually, emotionally, biologically and physically abuse her child just because she’s on the “right side of history.”
 
Injustice is never on “the right side of history.” History, but most especially the Lord God, who is the creator of the universe, will utterly condemn this action by the woman and by the court.
 
The Mayo Clinic says that possible side-effects of cross-sex hormone therapy include: blood clots in a deep vein (deep vein thrombosis) or in a lung (pulmonary embolism), high triglycerides which are a type of fat in the blood, gallstones, weight gain, elevated liver function tests, decreased libido, erectile dysfunction, infertility, hyperkalemia or high potassium, hypertension, Type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular disease and hyperprolactinemia, where a noncancerous tumor in the brain causes the pituitary gland to overproduce the hormone prolactin and have it rush through the veins.
 
In other words, there are a LOT of health hazards when it comes to the hormone treatment of transgenders itself, let alone the chemical castration and things like gender transition surgery.
 
The young boy will be forced to live a life, perhaps a short one, full of chemical and biological, let alone social, misery all because his mother FORCED HIM TO BE A TRANSGENDER GIRL!
 
Now, I don’t usually do this, but I highly recommend visiting the website: savejames.com. In this site, you can find more information regarding the case, including multiple court documents detailing the situation, such as documents showing Georgulas accusing Jeffrey of domestic violence (thankfully, he was acquitted) and everything else regarding the actual case. They also allow for people to donate to the site to help Jeffrey keep his son, though it’s not likely that this story will have a happy ending. If you wish to donate, that is your decision. I will not ask that you do, as I am not certain it would help any at this point, but do as you wish.
 
As far as Jeffrey and James go, I pray to the Lord that He will watch over them and keep them safe. From what I understand, Jeffrey is religious and the site says that he has volunteered to serve on the board of a private Christian school that his step-daughters attended, so it’s likely that he already is a Christian, which is good. Regarding James, it’s unclear. With limited contact with his father, he will likely have limited contact with his father’s faith as well and more contact with his devilish “mother”.
 
The entire situation is horrible, but I pray that James will be able to go through this as safely as one possibly can when being hurled into permanent harm’s way, and I pray that things do get better for James, his father and his twin brother, who might be subjected to the same things as James in the future (if he isn’t already).
 
One can only hope that the young boy is as safe as possible, the father will be as strong as possible and will eventually be justified and given custody of the boys and that the Lord will appear strongly in everyone’s hearts, especially Georgulas’, who absolutely needs Him the most. Don’t misunderstand, they all need Him badly and need His comfort and love badly, but it’s her evil heart that needs the most purging and cleansing with the Holy Spirit.
 
I hate what this woman is doing and even slightly hate her for doing it, but if there ever was a case of demons plaguing someone, this is it (you particularly think this if you read the “James’ Story” section of the aforementioned website that says “Ms. Georgulas [believes] she is called by God to do these terrible things,” which really only makes me think Satan is behind this, using his demons on her). This woman is being utterly plagued by demons and only the power of the Lord can save her.
 
At the risk of sounding like a broken record, I will end by saying this one more time: I pray that everything will turn out well for everyone in question, with everyone finding comfort, love and security in the Lord.
 
Mark 3:11
“And whenever the unclean spirits saw him, they fell down before him and cried out, ‘You are the Son of God.’”
 
Author: Freddie Marinelli.

How would you feel if your brother or sister or any close family member whom you loved was unjustly taken from you? A slew of emotions would flood you, among which would be sadness, grief, shock, perhaps anger. These are the emotions that Botham Jean’s family likely went through after September 6th, 2018, when the young black man was shot and killed inside his own apartment by Dallas police officer Amber Guyger, who entered his apartment, mistaking it for her own and believing Botham to have been an intruder.
 
Roughly a year and a month after the tragic shooting, Amber Guyger was sentenced to 10 years in prison on the charge of manslaughter. Many believe the sentence should be considerably more, with some believing it to have been a premeditated killing simply due to the racial differences between Guyger and Botham and the fact that she was a police officer, but the sentence for manslaughter in Texas usually carries with it a term of 2 to 20 years in a state prison and a fine of no more than $10,000, so ten years is right down the middle (and Texas doesn’t use “voluntary” or “involuntary” in their legal code, so the charge is simply manslaughter).
 
However, despite the fact that Guyger did kill Mr. Botham Jean, in the court room following the sentencing, Botham’s younger brother, Brandt, got to say a few words to Guyger. And they are words that I believe she needed to hear, as do many people in this world.
 
Brandt said, full of emotion in his voice, “I wasn’t ever going to say this in front of my family or anyone, but I don’t even want you to go to jail. I want the best for you because I know that’s exactly what Botham would want you to do. And the best would be to give your life to Christ. I’m not going to say anything else. I think giving your life to Christ would be the best thing that Botham would want you to do. Again, I love you as a person and I don’t wish anything bad on you.”
 
He then proceeded to ask the judge: “I don’t even know if this is possible, but can I give her a hug, please? Please?”
 
After a bit, the equally as emotional judge granted Brandt permission to hug Guyger. This action was met with gasps and loud sobbing as well from those present in the courtroom.
 
What’s more, after Brandt hugged Guyger, Judge Tammy Kemp also proceeded to hug Guyger, with Guyger whispering something inaudible to the judge. The judge quietly replied to Guyger: “Ma’am, it’s not because I am good. It’s because I believe in Christ. None of us are worthy. Forgive yourself.”
 
This is considerably different to what happened outside the courtroom, where there were angry chants regarding the verdict of 10 years that was handed to Guyger, with chants of “no justice, no peace” being heard throughout and even the mother of another young black man who was slain by an Arlington police officer in 2017 crying and asking: “How many of us does it take to get justice? What about my son? What about Botham Jean? How many of us is it going to take before you understand that our lives matter?”
 
While those who are not most affected by the killing of Botham Jean were angry about the verdict (justice was done, regardless of the emotions behind it, as 10 years is in the middle of the range of possible prison terms in the penal code), those who were most affected by it, namely Botham’s younger brother and even parents showed nothing short of grace towards the woman who took away their loved one.
 
Not one of Botham’s family members would’ve been at fault for being angry with Guyger. Not one of them owed forgiveness to her; she certainly didn’t deserve it. But that’s what grace is all about. That’s what mercy is all about.
 
Mercy wouldn’t be mercy if forgiveness were owed. If forgiveness were owed, that’d be justice, not grace. Grace – mercy – is doing what is right to someone who does not deserve it in the least.
 
It’s giving your enemy food and water to eat and drink. It’s forgiving someone for the wrong they did to you even when they do not deserve it whatsoever.
 
Asking for forgiveness is difficult. But forgiving someone else, even more so.
 
When we do wrong and we know we do wrong, it can be hard to ask for forgiveness, knowing full-well that we do not deserve it. But when someone wrongs us, it can be even harder to forgive that someone.
 
It takes a lot to be willing to forgive. It’s one of the most amazing aspects of God and one of the rarest in Man.
 
Brandt didn’t need to forgive Guyger. No one needed to forgive Guyger. No one had to show her grace. It would’ve been easier for Brandt to have shared with Guyger the pain he felt for what she had done, blaming her in the process and reminding her of what evil she had done. It would’ve been easier for him to have lambasted her and shown anger and hatred towards the woman who had taken away his big brother, whom he loved dearly. He easily could’ve withheld forgiveness from her and not a single person in that courtroom would’ve thought he would’ve been unjustified to have done so.
 
But Brandt believes in the God who forgives sins almost no matter what they might be. He believes in His Son, who died on the cross for the sins of the people who might believe in Him. He believes in the Son who died in our place, who died because our sins put Him on that cross. He believes in the Father who forgives those who forgive others.
 
Forgiving others, difficult as it is, is the righteous and right thing to do. No, no one in that courtroom would’ve thought Brandt would’ve done the wrong thing if he had withheld forgiveness. No one apart from God.
 
But God knows Brandt’s heart and that his soul belongs to Him. Brandt understands the importance of forgiveness and showing grace to those who do not deserve any of it.
 
When Jesus taught his followers how to pray, he shared the following: “Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name. Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.”
 
This is the Lord’s prayer and notice the importance of forgiveness here. It’s not simply the Father who forgives us of our debts, or our trespasses, whichever version you might often use. We are equally as tasked with the challenging task of forgiving others who have trespassed against us or done us wrong.
 
Jesus, in Matthew 6:14-15, then explained to His followers: “For if you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you, but if you do not forgive others their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.”
 
We are tasked with showing grace and mercy just as our Father shows us grace and mercy in His forgiveness of our sins. If we do not forgive others’ sins against us, why would our Father forgive us when we do not show the same mercy?
 
Now, don’t get it twisted. Forgiveness has to be actually meant. If you do not forgive others in your heart, then it doesn’t matter what you say to them. Before Brandt could show this kind of grace and mercy to Guyger, he first had to forgive her in his heart, otherwise it would’ve meant nothing.
 
Simply saying “I forgive you” but holding within your heart unforgiveness isn’t going to fool God. For anyone who might try and argue “oh, Brandt had to forgive her otherwise God wouldn’t have forgiven him. How fair is that?” keep in mind that, again, forgiveness isn’t about being fair or about being just. No one is ever owed forgiveness. No one is owed mercy. No one is owed grace.
 
Because if anyone was owed those things, that would be justice, not forgiveness, mercy or grace.
 
What Guyger deserves is unforgiveness and the lengthy prison sentence she received. She was shown grace that she did not deserve when Brandt forgave her.
 
It’s in this same manner that God forgives our own sins. Now, don’t misunderstand, it still takes faith in Jesus Christ as one’s Lord and Savior to be forgiven, but in order for us to be forgiven, we must also be willing and able to forgive others too.
 
It’s part of being a Christian and Brandt understands this. Seemingly, so does the Judge, which was also rather unexpected.
 
Brandt wants Guyger to turn her life over to Christ that she might be saved. This is grace.
 
For those who are Christians, they know exactly why Brandt forgave her. It was the right thing to do, not the just thing to do.
 
If more people showed this kind of grace, the world would be considerably better. Not perfect by any means, of course, but better.
 
God bless Brandt, his family, the Judge and Amber Guyger. I hope that she takes Brandt’s words to heart and the Holy Spirit reaches her.
 
Matthew 18:21-22
“Then Peter came up and said to him, ‘Lord, how often will my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? As many as seven times?’ Jesus said to him, ‘I do not say to you seven times, but seventy times seven.’”
 
And please make sure to check out our free weekly newsletter. As the name suggests, it is a newsletter that comes completely free of charge. What you get is a compilation of the week’s articles sent right into your inbox. So make sure to check it out today!
 
Author: Freddie Marinelli.

I have long made the argument that climate alarmism is nothing short of a religious cult following and deeply devoting its members to a “truth” they cannot prove and call those who do not believe “deniers”. However, you would hope and expect Christians to be able to understand what a sham this is and how dangerous it would be to fall for this fake gospel. And yet, people like the Pope and the Church of Sweden have fallen away from Christ and succumbed to the cult of climate change.
 
But while the Pope might be idiotic regarding this, at least he hasn’t been as heinous as to be heretical about it (from what I can tell, at least). No, the Church of Sweden has gone as far as to do that.
 
Back in December of last year (so admittedly, it has been some time, but it’s still necessary to point this out), the Church of Limhamn tweeted the following (which has obviously been translated): “Announcement! Jesus of Nazareth has now appointed one of his successors, Greta Thunberg.”
 
Before I rebuke these guys for saying this, the reason this is being talked about right now is because it resurfaced after its most recent support for the teenage climate puppet, and following an announcement by the Church of Sweden Malmo that they would be ringing their church bells in conjunction with last week’s Global Climate Strike:
 
“In conjunction with the Global Climate Strike, church bells ring and we gather in prayer for the future of the earth. We pray that we believe that man is responsible for nurturing and managing Creation so that children are given the opportunity for a future. We pray that we know that climate change affects the most vulnerable – poor, children and women. We pray that we believe in man’s ability to change and change.”
 
The church’s site also reads: “When the Amazon burns, we gather to fight for Mother Earth together. WELCOME!”
 
So, it’s pretty obvious that these people have abandoned the teachings of Jesus Christ in favor of New Age heresy that preaches man’s role in affecting the climate of the entire planet.
 
The fact that these people say they “fight for Mother Earth” ought to be a sign as to the kind of heresy these people practice. Earth isn’t our “mother”. We live on it and it is part of God’s Creation. To elevate it to the status of “mother” would be to equate it to God and His importance as Father.
 
But as inappropriate as this might be, I have a bit of a bigger issue with the Church of Limhamn’s December 2018 tweet.
 
How in the world could any self-professed Christian even allude to there being any “successor” to Christ? And take note that they aren’t just elevating the teenage climate puppet to Christ’s level. They said “one of [Jesus’] successors.” This indicates a plurality and I only have to wonder who else these people may have elevated to Christ’s level.
 
This goes even beyond idolatry. This is committing one of the most heinous acts one can commit: heresy. One could even make the case that this is blasphemy, the unforgivable sin, but no one can argue against this being heresy, at least not honestly.
 
These people are putting words into Jesus’ mouth by saying He is appointing someone, let alone the teenage climate puppet, as His successor.
 
These people are making the same mistake as the churches of Galatia did in the early life of the church.
 
If you’ve read the book of Galatians, you know that Paul primarily addresses the fact that the churches had turned away from the gospel of Christ, which he had shared with them, in favor of different “gospels”.
 
Galatians 1:1-10 says the following:
 
“Paul, an apostle – not from men nor through man, but through Jesus Christ and God the Father, who raised him from the dead – and all the brothers who are with me. To the churches of Galatia: Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ, who gave himself for our sins to deliver us from the present evil age, according to the will of our God and Father, to whom be the glory forever and ever. Amen. I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting him who called you in the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel – not that there is another one, but there are some who trouble you and want to distort the gospel of Christ. But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach to you a gospel contrary to the one we preached to you, let him be accursed. As we have said before, so now I say again: If anyone is preaching to you a gospel contrary to the one you received, let him be accursed. For am I now seeking the approval of man, or of God? Or am I trying to please man? If I were still trying to please man, I would not be a servant of Christ.”
 
The churches of Galatia, after Paul had preached to them and shared with them the gospel of Jesus Christ, quickly turned to other “gospels” that were contrary to the gospel of Christ. In a similar manner, the Church of Sweden is doing the same thing. The gospel of Jesus Christ has been shared with them and they have the Scripture readily-available and yet, they turn away from it and turn to other “gospels”, namely the “gospel” of man-made climate change.
 
Man-made climate change is what Man believes nowadays. But regardless of whether it’s that or it’s believing in Baal or the gods of Babylon or any other, let not one Christian turn away from Christ’s gospel in favor of another because no other saves, regardless of its promises.
 
Man-made climate change stands in contradiction to both science and Christianity. For you see, to believe that Man has such a great power as to influence the climate is to believe that he can wrestle away control of it from God.
 
Apart from the fact that there is no scientific evidence to support the idea (no, man-made climate models don’t count, specifically when shared by the highly-corrupt IPCC), it is very disingenuous, maybe even blasphemous, to suggest Man could have any power that even closely matches or even outdoes God’s.
 
It stands in direct conflict with the basic Judeo-Christian principle that God is Lord of all. For if Man could wrestle away power from God in any aspect, God would not be sovereign and would not be God.
 
As far as people like the teenage climate puppet go, we have known for a very long time to watch out for false prophets. She is one of the many, many people prophesying that the world will end in a decade or so and that there is currently no future for children as a result, so to call her a false prophet, particularly when supposed Christians are elevating her to the level of “successor to Christ”, whatever that’s supposed to mean, is not exactly inaccurate in my mind.
 
Why would anyone be willing to listen and take seriously such false prophets? Because we seem like ignorant bullies if we don’t? Paul himself raised the question: “for am I seeking the approval of man, or of God?” To bend the knee to this Satanic line of thinking, to accept what these people are saying simply because of the kid’s age is to try and appease Man, not God.
 
And if we were to do so, we would not be servants of Christ.
 
I hope that there are people within the Church of Sweden that are seeing all of this and are spiritually disturbed by it. And I certainly hope the Church of Sweden turns back to the gospel of Christ and not continue down this heretical path, lest they find themselves in the same place as the vast majority of mankind will.
 
I pray that these people will return to Christ and not commit this heresy any longer, submit to another “gospel” or further attempt to please Man as opposed to God.
 
And while the Church of Limhamn did ultimately apologize days later for the tweet, that apology also came with a defense of it, saying: “Our sense has been to talk about Jesus Christ in our own way.” A poor defense on its own, considering the tweet focused more on Greta than it did about Jesus, but any defense of the tweet is an indication that they are still not under the understanding of what they did wrong, so I pray that wisdom and revelation comes their way.
 
1 John 4:1
“Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, for many false prophets have gone out into the world.”
 
And please make sure to check out our free weekly newsletter. As the name suggests, it is a newsletter that comes completely free of charge. What you get is a compilation of the week’s articles sent right into your inbox. So make sure to check it out today!
 
Author: Freddie Marinelli.