“He will cover you with his feathers, and under his wings you will find refuge.”
(Psalm 91:4)
You Will Find Refuge

Dear Friends,

Greetings! As you are all aware there have been many signs pointing to major world changes and portents beginning this month. We believe they will be continuing on into the foreseable future, culminating with the second coming of Jesus in the clouds with great glory.

We certainly don't have long to wait to see if these “signs of the times” are indeed correct. In the event, this month, September, does begin to see momentus events taking place around the world we thought we would present the following Psalm which we have always found very encouraging and comforting.

Have a great week, month, and future ahead!

Psalm 91

1 Whoever dwells in the shelter of the Most High will rest in the shadow of the Almighty.

2 I will say of the Lord, “He is my refuge and my fortress, my God, in whom I trust.”

3 Surely he will save you from the fowler’s snare and from the deadly pestilence.

4 He will cover you with his feathers, and under his wings you will find refuge; his faithfulness will be your shield and rampart.

5 You will not fear the terror of night, nor the arrow that flies by day,

6 nor the pestilence that stalks in the darkness, nor the plague that destroys at midday.

7 A thousand may fall at your side, ten thousand at your right hand,

but it will not come near you.

8 You will only observe with your eyes and see the punishment of the wicked.

9 If you say, “The Lord is my refuge,” and you make the Most High your dwelling,

10 no harm will overtake you, no disaster will come near your tent.

11 For he will command his angels concerning you to guard you in all your ways;

12 they will lift you up in their hands, so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.

13 You will tread on the lion and the cobra; you will trample the great lion and the serpent.

14 “Because he loves me,” says the Lord, “I will rescue him; I will protect him, for he acknowledges my name.

15 He will call on me, and I will answer him; I will be with him in trouble, I will deliver him and honor him.

16 With long life I will satisfy him

and show him my salvation.”

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SPUTNIK

Russia, Iran and China Trying to Stop West From Overthrowing Assad

09.09.2015

(And the word of the LORD came unto me, saying, Son of man, set thy face against Gog, the land of Magog, the chief prince of Meshech and Tubal, and prophesy against him, And say, Thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold I [am] against thee, O Gog, the chief prince of Meshech and Tubal: And I will turn thee back, and put hooks into thy jaws, and I will bring thee forth, and all thine army, horses and horsemen, all of them clothed with all sorts [of armour, even] a great company [with] bucklers and shields, all of them handling swords: Persia, (Iran) Ethiopia, and Libya with them; all of them with shield and helmet: Gomer, and all his bands; the house of Togarmah of the north quarters, and all his bands: [and] many people with thee.

And the sixth angel sounded, and I heard a voice from the four horns of the golden altar which is before God, Saying to the sixth angel which had the trumpet, Loose the four angels which are bound in the great river Euphrates. And the four angels were loosed, which were prepared for an hour, and a day, and a month, and a year, for to slay the third part of men.

And the number of the army of the horsemen [were] two hundred thousand thousand (two hundred million): and I heard the number of them.

And it shall come to pass, [that] in all the land, saith the LORD, two parts therein shall be cut off [and] die; but the third shall be left therein.

And I will bring the third part through the fire, and will refine them as silver is refined, and will try them as gold is tried: they shall call on my name, and I will hear them: I will say, It [is] my people: and they shall say, The LORD [is] my God. Ezekiel 38:1-5, Revelation 9:13-16, Zachariah 13:8-9

For further explanation regarding these verses and their intrepatations see the “Studies” section of this website.)

Russia, Iran and China are trying to stop the West and the Gulf countries from overthrowing the regime of Bashar al-Assad in Syria.

Middle East expert Michael Lüders during his interview with German channel N24 called such attempts by the United States and its allies absurd.

According to him, without the current president, Syria will, in all likelihood fall under the control of Islamic State terrorists.

Lüders further said, “Turkey and the countries of the West and the Persian Gulf are still determined to overthrow the regime of Bashar al-Assad in Damascus. Russia, Iran and China, however, are trying to prevent this and continue to support him. This means the growth of confrontation.”

The German analyst further said that currently proxy wars are already in full swing in Syria. Before it was not in the open but now apparently there is no pretense. The main problem according to the analyst is the question of who would replace Assad if he were to leave.

“He still controls a third of the territory of Syria. If his regime by the efforts of a religious minority Alawites falls, then the power in all likelihood will pass into the hands of Islamic state militants. That is, to try to overthrow Bashar al-Assad, without having any idea how to stop the advance of Islamic State sounds a bit absurd,” Lüders concluded.

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Tass

Iran agrees to open airspace for Russian planes with humanitarian aid for Syria — embassy

September 09, 11:16

Russia's Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov earlier said Moscow would continue to supply humanitarian aid to Syria on alternative routes after Bulgaria closed its airspace for Russian aircraft

Stanislav Krasilnikov/TASS

TEHRAN, September 9. /TASS/. Iran has agreed to open its airspace for Russian planes carrying humanitarian cargo for Syria, press secretary of the Russian Embassy in Iran Maxim Suslov told TASS on Wednesday.

On Monday, the Greek Foreign Ministry announced that it had received a US request to close its air space for the flights of Russian aircraft with humanitarian cargoes for Syria. Athens said that the Russian side chose the route to the east of Greece for the delivery of humanitarian aid to Syria. On the same day, Bulgaria refused to provide an air corridor to Russia for these purposes. Russia's Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov said earlier Moscow would continue to supply humanitarian aid to Syria on alternative routes.

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OATH KEEPERS VOW TO GUARD KIM DAVIS FROM FURTHER IMPRISONMENT

"We believe Federal District Court Judge David Bunning grossly overstepped his bounds."

by GATEWAY PUNDIT | JIM HOFT | SEPTEMBER 11, 2015

Stewart Rhodes and national and local leadership of the Oath Keepers organization released video Thursday vowing to protect Christian Rowan County Court Clerk from further arrests.

Oath Keepers offer of protection for embattled Clerk Kim Davis

Stewart Rhodes released this statement.

STATEMENT BY STEWART RHODES:

We believe Federal District Court Judge David Bunning grossly overstepped his bounds and violated Mrs Davis’ due process rights, and in particular her right to a jury trial. This judge has assumed unto himself not just the powers of all three branches of government, but has also taken on the powers of judge, jury, and “executioner.” What matters to us is not whether you agree with her position on gay marriage or her decision to not issue marriage licenses. What matters is that the judge is violating the Constitution in his anger and desire to punish her for going against his will. We are already being subjected to an unconstitutional imperial presidency, that grew exponentially under both Bush and Obama, expanding the claimed war powers of the president to swallow up our Bill of Rights and circumvent jury trial. The result is an executive branch that claims the absurd power to declare any American an “unlawful combatant” on the say-so of the president alone.

Now we see the rise of an imperial judiciary that not only legislates from the bench but is attempting to expand their “contempt” power to likewise swallow up our Bill of Rights and circumvent jury trial. Both methods are used to allow the powerful office holder to merely point his finger and have his opponent thrown behind bars without a grand jury indictment and without being found guilty by a jury of their peers. No innocent until proven guilty before a jury. Just “guilty” because the leader says so. That is a dictatorship, whether done by a president or by a judge. No one man should have that kind of power in his hands alone to decide guilt and impose a sentence of indefinite detention. Under our Constitution, that dictatorial power does not exist. We must stand against this. And so we will protect her and prevent it from happening again. – Stewart Rhodes

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THE AMERICAN DREAM

FROM THIS POINT FORWARD, CHRISTIANS ARE GOING TO BE BANNED FROM HOLDING MANY JOBS IN AMERICA

Christianity is being criminalized in the United States

by MICHAEL SNYDER SEPTEMBER 7, 2015

Christianity is being criminalized in the United States. No, I am not talking about the kind of Christianity that is so prevalent in America today where “Christians” just ignore what the Bible says and do whatever they wanted to do in the first place anyway.

Rather, I am talking about the kind of faith that Kim Davis has demonstrated. Christians all over this country are being put into positions where they must choose to either submit to the “new morality” or potentially lose their jobs. For Kim Davis, deciding to take a stand meant that she was thrown into prison. The radical judge that threw her into prison has said that she will stay there until she is willing to change her mind.

The pace of which our nation is circling the toilet is absolutely breathtaking. Just eleven years ago, a state constitutional amendment that banned gay marriage in Kentucky received support from 75 percent of the voters.

Now, Kim Davis has been locked away, and more county clerks may be next. There is news that another county clerk named Casey Davis has stepped forward to say that he won’t issue any same sex marriage licenses either.

What in the world has happened to America? We live in a country where Christians are being imprisoned for what they believe, but Planned Parenthood is free to slaughter babies, chop them up, and sell off their parts to the highest bidder.

We better start paying attention. What is happening right in front of our eyes is eerily reminiscent of what happened in Nazi Germany…

Rowan County Clerk Kim Davis entered her fourth day as an inmate at the Carter County Detention Center Sunday, after refusing to license gay marriage. About 300 people gathered on the lawn outside the jail to support her Saturday, chanting “thank you, Kim” and waving signs that said “Kim Davis for President” and “God gives his hardest battles to his strongest soldiers.”

Davis was held in contempt of court and jailed on Thursday for refusing to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples, despite being ordered to do so several times by the courts.

Mathew Staver, Davis’s chief legal counsel, compared her persecution to that of Jews faced in Nazi Germany. Staver told the radio show “Crosstalk” Wednesday, “[Davis is] there to do a duty, a job and the job duty was changed. Does that mean that if you’re Christian, don’t apply here? … What happened in Nazi Germany, what happened there first, they removed the Jews from government public employment, then they stopped patronizing them in their private businesses, then they continued to stigmatize them, then they were the ‘problems,’ then they killed them.”

In the future, Bible-believing Christians are going to be completely disqualified from being county clerks or holding any other government position that deals with marriage.

But it won’t stop there. Ultimately, any Christians that will not go along with the new morality will be labeled a “bigot” and a “hater” and will essentially become unemployable.

If you don’t believe me, just consider what happened to the CEO of Mozilla. He was extremely good at his job, but he was forced out when it was revealed that he had once donated $1,000 to a group that supported Proposition 8. It didn’t matter that 52 percent of Californians actually voted in favor of Proposition 8. He broke “the code”, and so he was not fit to run a major tech corporation.

By extension, that means that no Bible-believing Christian is fit to run a major tech corporation.

And if you are a Christian, don’t think about a career as a high ranking military official either. According to a startling Buzzfeed report, Barack Obama actually told the top military officers in this nation that they could either support the end of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell or they could resign…

In a meeting with the heads of the five service branches in 2010, President Obama offered the leaders a choice: Support my efforts to end the military’s Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell policy, or resign, the Commandant of the Coast Guard said.

In a video obtained by BuzzFeed via a Freedom of Information Act request, Coast Guard Commandant Adm. Robert Papp revealed that Obama was unwilling to compromise with service leaders over DADT during a meeting in 2010. “We were called into the Oval Office and President Obama looked all five service chiefs in the eye and said, ‘This is what I want to do.’ I cannot divulge everything he said to us, that’s private communications within the Oval Office, but if we didn’t agree with it — if any of us didn’t agree with it — we all had the opportunity to resign our commissions and go do other things,” he said.

Are you starting to get the picture?

It is becoming unacceptable to be a Bible-believing Christian in America, and it is only going to get worse in the years ahead. The following is what Carl Gallups, the author of “Be Thou Prepared“, had to say about this in a recent piece for WND…

The imprisonment of Kim Davis won’t be the end of the insanity infecting America. We have been given over to a depraved mind, and the travesty inflicted upon this brave believer is unprecedented in American history as far as I know. I do not believe that anyone, public official or private citizen, has ever been jailed simply because of his or her firmly held faith-belief that marriage is between a man and a woman and not between two men or two women.

This is how it starts. In television shows and movies, Bible-believing Christians are being relentlessly mocked. Laws are being passed that are slowly marginalizing believers and that are trying to force us to accept things that we simply cannot accept. And even now, many employers will not even think of hiring you if they discover that you are a committed follower of Jesus Christ.

And just like in Nazi Germany, eventually the persecution becomes more overt and more violent. On Saturday, a non-denominational church in New York was firebombed…

Police in New York are investigating after a firebomb was thrown inside of a door at a non-denominational church on Saturday.

The incident occurred early Saturday morning at approximately 5:30 a.m. as a yet unidentified suspect threw a Molotov cocktail threw a glass door at the Chapel at Crosspoint in Getzville. The explosive then started a fire in the vestibule, which set off the sprinkler system and flooded the entryway.

The Getzville Fire Department and the Amherst Police Department responded to the four-alarm incident, according to assistant Police Chief Charles Cohen.

The culture is turning radically against us, and what we have seen so far is just the beginning.

So are you willing to give up your job, your future and potentially even your freedom for your faith?

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WND

ISIS DEMANDS SYRIAN CHRISTIANS PAY ISLAM TAX

CHERYL CHUMLEY

Published: September 7, 2015

The flag of ISIS, as shown on a cake.

ISIS terrorists gathered together dozens of Christian men in Syria and told them to either pay a Shariah-inspired tax and sign onto a list of faith-based restrictions, or pay a penalty that could include loss of life.

The tax, called a jizya, as well as the contract, are aimed at ensuring Christians know and abide by their forced second-class citizenship, or “dhimmi” status, in the ISIS dominated areas.

Among the restrictions: Christians cannot own guns, build places of worship, show their crosses in public or even ring church bells, the Blaze reported.

The terrorists put forth their demands to Christian men gathered in the town of Qaryatain, a community that used to be home to thousands of the faith but is now dominated by radical Muslims.

The Middle East Media Research Institute reported the contract also forced Christians to “respect Muslims and not criticize their religion,” the Blaze reported.

In 11 contract clauses, signers also agreed to “not make Muslims hear the reciting of their books or the sounds of church bells,” “not carry out any act of aggression against ISIS, such as giving refuge to spies and wanted men,” “no engage in commercial activity involving pigs or alcohol with Muslims,” and “must abide by ISIS dress code and commerce guidelines,” MEMRI found.

In return, ISIS pledged to protect the men and their properties.

The tax ranged between one and four gold dinars, depending on level of wealth.

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WND

GET PREPARED FOR PERSECUTION: IT'S HERE!

Exclusive: Carl Gallups declares, 'Today it's a county clerk. Tomorrow it will be pastors'

Published September 6, 2015

The subtitle to my new book new book, “Be Thou Prepared,” is “equipping the church for persecution and times of trouble” for exactly the reason we see Kim Davis imprisoned today.

The imprisonment of Kim Davis won’t be the end of the insanity infecting America. We have been given over to a depraved mind, and the travesty inflicted upon this brave believer is unprecedented in American history as far as I know. I do not believe that anyone, public official or private citizen, has ever been jailed simply because of his or her firmly held faith-belief that marriage is between a man and a woman and not between two men or two women.

Not only is this legal sham unparalleled in American history, it flies in the face of the Word of God and almost 6,000 years of human history. Christians are often mocked for uttering the phrase, “What would Jesus do?” Well, here’s a different phrase for our legal system: What would our Founding Fathers say about this monstrosity that is being called a “legal ruling”?

What would the founders of our nation and the framers of the First Amendment say about an American court that has actually jailed a public official because that official believes in the traditional definition of marriage? Do we know of any Founding Father or Supreme Court justice present at our country’s foundation who believed otherwise? Is there a single word penned by the authors of our Constitution indicating homosexual marriage was right, natural, or legal and that anyone who stood in the way of homosexual marriage ought to be jailed?

Today it’s a county clerk. Tomorrow it will be pastors. After that, it could be anyone who has a faith rooted in the Scriptures. And make no mistake, this has been the radical gay agenda from the very beginning.

What we have in this case is a blatant example of what many of us have been saying for years – homosexual marriage has never been about “equality” for gays; it is about forcing a radical and unnatural agenda upon the rest of the nation and especially upon the Christians of America.

Ms. Davis was targeted, plain and simple. There were scores of other offices to which the “offended” parties could have gone. But instead, they chose and targeted a clerk they knew to be opposed to gay marriage. This is not about parity or fairness; it is about heterophobia and Christophobia and horrific hate-speech on the part of the radical homosexuals involved in this sordid and shameful affair.

If mainstream America thinks the radical gay agenda won’t come for their children, they better think again. A California high school has already instituted a gay history course in its curriculum. Such a course will surely become part of public “education” nationwide.

Next will be homosexual technique instructions under the guise of “sex education.” This homosexual sex education will find its way into the curriculum through Common Core. Does heartland America really want their young children taught gay sex when they go to school? Mark my words – it’s on the way.

What the SCOTUS did when they imposed homosexual marriage on the nation was illegal and unconstitutional by the justices’ own words and admission. The effect was to disembowel the First Amendment and allow the government to create a new religion.

Christianity, Islam and Judaism all hold to the written beliefs that marriage is only between a man and woman. Yet the high court’s decision now illegally imposes upon all 50 states a new religious doctrine that marriage can be something it has NEVER been before in the history of the United States or of the world’s three largest monotheistic faith groups – two of which (Christianity and Islam) are the two largest faith groups on the planet. In effect, the Supreme Court has done a backdoor rewriting and trashing of America’s First Amendment protection. We now have a new religion in America. Those who refuse to bow at its altar will go to jail. What Houston Mayor Annise Parker could not effect by her power, Ms. Davis’ judge has done without shame.

What has transpired this week is why a huge part of my message to America is “you better get prepared for some tough times.” Direct persecution of Christians at the hands of government officials and government institutions is on the way. In fact, it’s already begun. The SCOTUS opened the door for it, and a judge has now obliged the radicals.

On the one hand, we must continue to stand against this unholy travesty. I applaud Ms. Davis. It could very well be that what has happened to her will begin to break the back of this ludicrous and hyper-radical agenda that is now right under our collective noses.

On the other hand, is this not a sign of the prophetic times in which we are living? Did Jesus Himself not warn us that just before His return it would be “just like the days of Lot”? (Luke 17). As I have been proclaiming to our nation in every venue the Lord provides, these are indeed prophetic times. They are trying times. But they are also the times wherein the Bible declares to the people of God, “You have been raised up for such a time as this.”

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The Washington Post

Conservative dissent is brewing inside the Vatican

U.S. Cardinal Raymond Leo Burke, left, stands by Pope Francis saluting bishops, at the end of weekly general audience in St. Peter's Square at the Vatican, Sept. 2, 2015. (Alessandra Tarantino/AP)

By Anthony Faiola September 7 at 7:33 PM
VATICAN CITY — On a sunny morning earlier this year, a camera crew entered a well-appointed apartment just outside the 9th-century gates of Vatican City. Pristinely dressed in the black robes and scarlet sash of the princes of the Roman Catholic Church, the Wisconsin-born Cardinal Raymond Burke sat in his elaborately upholstered armchair and appeared to issue a warning to Pope Francis.

A staunch conservative and Vatican bureaucrat, Burke had been demoted by the pope a few months earlier, but it did not take the fight out of him. Francis had been backing a more inclusive era, giving space to progressive voices on divorced Catholics as well as gays and lesbians. In front of the camera, Burke said he would “resist” liberal changes — and seemed to caution Francis about the limits of his authority. “One must be very attentive regarding the power of the pope,” Burke told the French news crew.

Papal power, Burke warned, “is not absolute.” He added, “The pope does not have the power to change teaching [or] doctrine.”

Burke’s words belied a growing sense of alarm among strict conservatives, exposing what is fast emerging as a culture war over Francis’s papacy and the powerful hierarchy that governs the Roman Catholic Church.

This month, Francis makes his first trip to the United States at a time when his progressive allies are heralding him as a revolutionary, a man who only last week broadened the power of priests to forgive women who commit what Catholic teachings call the “mortal sin” of abortion during his newly declared “year of mercy” starting in December. On Sunday, he called for “every” Catholic parish in Europe to offer shelter to one refugee family from the thousands of asylum-seekers risking all to escape war-torn Syria and other pockets of conflict and poverty.

Yet as he upends church convention, Francis also is grappling with a conservative backlash to the liberal momentum building inside the church. In more than a dozen interviews, including with seven senior church officials, insiders say the change has left the hierarchy more polarized over the direction of the church than at any point since the great papal reformers of the 1960s.

The conservative rebellion is taking on many guises, in public comments, yes, but also in the rising popularity of conservative Catholic Web sites promoting Francis dissenters; books and promotional materials backed by conservative clerics seeking to counter the liberal trend; and leaks to the news media, aimed at Vatican reformers.

In his recent comments, Burke was also merely stating fact. Despite the vast powers of the pope, church doctrine serves as a kind of constitution. And for liberal reformers, the bruising theological pushback by conservatives is complicating efforts to translate the pope’s transformative style into tangible changes.

“At least we aren’t poisoning each other’s chalices anymore,” said the Rev. Timothy Radcliffe, a liberal British priest and Francis ally appointed to an influential Vatican post in May. Radcliffe said he welcomed open debate, even critical dissent within the church. But he professed himself as being “afraid” of “some of what we’re seeing”

Testing newfound freedom

Rather than stake out clear stances, the pope is more subtly, often implicitly, backing liberal church leaders who are pressing for radical change, while dramatically opening the parameters of the debate over how far reforms can go. For instance, during the opening of a major synod, or meeting, of senior bishops on the family last year, Francis told those gathered, “Let no one say, ‘This you cannot say.’ ”

Since then, liberals have tested the boundaries of their new freedom, with one Belgian bishop going as far as openly calling for the Catholic Church to formally recognize same-sex couples.

Conservatives counter that in the current climate of rising liberal thought, they have been thrust unfairly into a position in which “defending the real teachings of the church makes you look like an enemy of the pope,” a conservative and senior Vatican official said on the condition of anonymity in order to speak freely.

“We have a serious issue right now, a very alarming situation where Catholic priests and bishops are saying and doing things that are against what the church teaches, talking about same-sex unions, about Communion for those who are living in adultery,” the official said. “And yet the pope does nothing to silence them. So the inference is that this is what the pope wants.”

The contention within

A measure of the church’s long history of intrigue has spilled into the Francis papacy, particularly as the pope has ordered radical overhauls of murky Vatican finances. Under Francis, the top leadership of the Vatican Bank was ousted, as was the all-Italian board of its financial watchdog agency.

One method of pushback has been to give damaging leaks to the Italian news media. Vatican officials are now convinced that the biggest leak to date — of the papal encyclical on the environment in June — was driven by greed (it was sold to the media) rather than vengeance. But other disclosures have targeted key figures in the papal cleanup — including the conservative chosen to lead the pope’s financial reforms, the Australian Cardinal George Pell, who in March was the subject of a leak about his allegedly lavish personal tastes.

More often, dissent unfolds on ideological grounds. Criticism of a sitting pope is hardly unusual — liberal bishops on occasion challenged Benedict. But in an institution cloaked in traditional fealty to the pope, what shocks many is just how public the criticism of Francis has become.

In an open letter to his diocese, Bishop Thomas Tobin of Providence, R.I., wrote: “In trying to accommodate the needs of the age, as Pope Francis suggests, the Church risks the danger of losing its courageous, countercultural, prophetic voice, one that the world needs to hear.” For his part, Burke, the cardinal from Wisconsin, has called the church under Francis “a ship without a rudder.”

Even Pell appeared to undermine him on theological grounds. Commenting on the pope’s call for dramatic action on climate change, Pell told the Financial Times in July, “The church has got no mandate from the Lord to pronounce on scientific matters.”

In conservative circles, the word “confusion” also has become a euphemism for censuring the papacy without mentioning the pope. In one instance, 500 Catholic priests in Britain drafted an open letter this year that cited “much confusion” in “Catholic moral teaching” following the bishops’ conference on the family last year in which Francis threw open the floodgates of debate, resulting in proposed language offering an embraceable, new stance for divorced or gay Catholics.

That language ultimately was watered down in a vote that showed the still-ample power of conservatives. It set up another showdown for next month, when senior church leaders will meet in a follow-up conference that observers predict will turn into another theological slugfest. The pope himself will have the final word on any changes next year.

Conservatives have launched a campaign against a possible policy change that would grant divorced and remarried Catholics the right to take Communion at Mass. Last year, five senior leaders including Burke and the conservative Cardinal Carlo Caffarra of Bologna, Italy, drafted what has become known as “the manifesto” against such a change. In July, a DVD distributed to hundreds of dioceses in Europe and Australia, and backed by conservative Catholic clergy members, made the same point. In it, Burke, who has made similar arguments at a string of Catholic conferences, issued dire warnings of a world in which traditional teachings are ignored.

But this is still the Catholic Church, where hierarchical respect is as much tradition as anything else. Rather than targeting the pope, conservative bishops and cardinals more often take aim at their liberal peers. They include the German Cardinal Walter Kasper, who has suggested that he has become a proxy for clergy members who are not brave enough to criticize the pope directly.

Yet conservatives counter that liberals are overstepping their bounds, putting their own spin on the pronouncements of a pope who has been more ambiguous than Kasper and his allies are willing to admit.

“I was born a papist, I have lived as a papist, and I will die a papist,” Caffarra said. “The pope has never said that divorced and remarried Catholics should be able to take Holy Communion, and yet, his words are being twisted to give them false meaning.”

Some of the pope’s allies insist that debate is precisely what Francis wants.

“I think that people are speaking their mind because they feel very strongly and passionately in their position, and I don’t think the Holy Father sees it as a personal attack on him,” said Chicago Archbishop Blase J. Cupich, considered a close ally of the pope. “The Holy Father has opened the possibility for these matters to be discussed openly; he has not predetermined where this is going.”

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Syrian refugee camp in Jordan

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The Washington Post

‘People in Europe are full of fear’ over refugee influx

The refugee crisis in Hungary took another disturbing turn Sept. 3, 2015, when authorities stopped a migrant train bound for Austria and tried to remove the passengers. A husband and wife broke free and placed themselves with their toddler on the train tracks in protest. (Reuters)

By Michael Birnbaum and Griff Witte

September 3

BRUSSELS — The European Union’s sharpening divisions over a spiraling refugee crisis broke into the open Thursday with two leaders strongly disagreeing in public over whether the asylum-seekers were threatening “Europe’s Christian roots.”

That was the language used by Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban as he warned Europe against allowing in mostly Muslim families. A day after a drowned Syrian toddler washed up on the Turkish coast, another European leader retorted that Christian values demanded helping the less fortunate.

The furious exchange — a rare breach of the E.U.’s buttoned-down decorum — came as Hungarian authorities apparently laid a trap for thousands of asylum-seekers who had packed Budapest’s central train station after days of worsening conditions outside the station. Police had blocked them from entering the station for days but allowed them in early Thursday.

But a refugee-packed train apparently bound for the Austrian border came to a halt just west of Budapest, in a small town where dozens of police officers were waiting on the platform. They tried to force people off the train to take them to a migrant-processing center, threatening their chances to make it onward to Western Europe.

By day’s end, there was a standoff, with the packed train surrounded by police and the migrants refusing to budge. Some of the passengers received medical treatment on the platform.

Orban, Hungary’s nationalist leader who has spearheaded attempts to turn back the migrants, said Thursday that he had little choice but to seal his nation’s border with razor wire, soldiers and a high fence.

“We Hungarians are full of fear, people in Europe are full of fear, because we see that the European leaders, among them the prime ministers, are not able to control the situation,” he said in Brussels in a raw joint appearance with European Parliament President Martin Schulz. Orban and Schulz, a veteran politician from Germany, made no attempt to paper over their differences or their distaste for each other.

The Hungarian leader blamed Germany for the crisis, saying that its open-door policy toward Syrian asylum-seekers was propelling a wave of migrants to undertake dangerous journeys toward Europe’s heart. Germany expects 800,000 asylum-seekers this year, and it has said that it does not plan to turn away Syrians.

“The moral, human thing is to make clear: ‘Please don’t come. Why do you have to go from Turkey to Europe? Turkey is a safe country. Stay there. It’s risky to come,’ ” Orban said.

Hundreds of thousands of people fleeing war in Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan have overwhelmed Europe’s capacity to respond in recent months, opening stark divisions. Some leaders believe that the world’s largest economic bloc — a vast territory of 503 million residents — is more than capable of accommodating refugees. Others, including Hungary’s Orban, believe the continent’s population is in a far more delicate state.

The divisions could threaten some of the most basic tenets of the E.U., an alliance built on the ashes of World War II in a bid never again to allow such destruction. German Chancellor Angela Merkel said this week that a Europe with no internal borders — a key achievement of European unification — could be in question if no solution to the refugee crisis is found.

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FOOD BABE

15 Ways To Add Anti-Inflammatory Turmeric Root To Your Life

By Food Babe

When I was growing up, I was scared of my Mom’s Indian cooking. I thought it looked weird, smelled funny and was nothing like what I saw available at school or what other kids were eating. This was a HUGE mistake and one that I regret tremendously. Not only is my Mom’s cooking my favorite food in the world now, but I love all the healthy ingredients she uses!

Indian food, as most of you know is full of medicinal spices that have cancer fighting compounds, antixiodants, and other nutrient dense properties that nourish the body.

Back then, I knew nothing about those spices, but now I do. Turmeric is one of those spices that I am most thankful for discovering! Not only have I used it in place of Advil to heal injuries, but I eat it almost everyday.

This powerful spice has been used for centuries in Ayurvedic and Traditional Chinese Medicine to treat a number of conditions, and scientists believe that one of the reasons why turmeric is so effective is that it contains curcumin. There are dozens of studies into the health benefits of curcumin, and it’s been shown to protect against liver damage, cancer, cerebrovascular dysfunction, and Alzheimer’s disease.

To experience Turmeric this fresh, was AMAZING to say the least. Here’s 15 easy ways to add this powerful spice to your diet!

15 Ways To Add Turmeric To Your Life:

1. Brew Turmeric tea: Dr. Andrew Weil recommends this simple way to use turmeric – Just bring 1 cup of water to a boil and then stir in ¼ teaspoon of ground turmeric or fresh grated turmeric. Allow it to simmer for 10 minutes and strain before drinking. You can stir in honey or fresh lemon juice for added flavor.

2. Stir up a curry powder: When you’re cooking with turmeric, it’s a good idea to mix it with some black pepper or oil (or both!) as this has been shown to increase the bioavailability of curcumin so that your body can use it. That’s why one of the best ways to eat turmeric is in dishes with some fat, plenty of black pepper and curry powder. A basic curry powder can be made with 8 parts ground coriander, 4 parts ground cumin and 1 part each of turmeric and cayenne or paprika. You can decrease the cayenne and use paprika instead if you don’t want it spicy, and store this in a glass container in your pantry for up to 6 months. Try using this curry powder to make these Chickpea Curry Wraps, or in this Coconut Split Pea Soup! Those are both very simple recipes taken from the Food Babe Membership Program. If you want to make a more elaborate curry, you’ve got to try this Balinese Curry Sauce that I learned to make in Bali a few years ago – it’s amazing.

3. Blend it into a smoothie or juice it: You can add a pinch or two of ground turmeric or one to two inches of raw fresh turmeric to a flavorful smoothie, like this Sunrise Green Smoothie, and you won’t even taste it! Granted… it may change the color of your smoothie, since it’s got such a strong pigment. To increase the bioavailability, dissolve the turmeric in a bit of warm coconut oil before blending it in, or blend in ½ an avocado for some fat. You can also juice Turmeric, check out this recipe.

4. Season roasted veggies: Toss some fresh vegetables (like diced potatoes, cauliflower, or brussel sprouts) with a dash of olive oil and turmeric, along with any other seasonings you like. Roast at 400 degrees, tossing once until done, usually about 30-40 minutes.

5. Brush your teeth with it: When I first heard this I thought it was ridiculous… because who wants yellow teeth! That’s until I read that for some reason it doesn’t stain teeth yellow, and instead whitens them up naturally. But be warned that your toothbrush will get stained yellow! Simply dip your wet toothbrush in a pinch of turmeric, brush your teeth with it, and allow it to sit on your teeth for about 3-5 minutes. Make sure to rinse your mouth (and sink!) thoroughly and then brush with your regular toothpaste afterwards. This isn’t a daily ritual, just do this occasionally to brighten up your smile.

6. Add color to boring dishes: Stir a dash of turmeric into plain basmati rice, quinoa, mashed potatoes, or eggs for added color. It doesn’t add much flavor, and changes things up a bit.

7. Drink Golden Milk: This is an ancient Ayurvedic recipe that can be made a number of ways. It is essentially just a turmeric paste mixed with warm milk and oil or ghee. You can use any kind of milk for this recipe (dairy, goat, nut, oat). To make the paste, simply bring ½ cup filtered water to a low simmer and then mix in ¼ cup of ground turmeric, stirring constantly until it makes a thick paste (this can take 5-10 minutes) adding more water as needed. To make the golden milk, mix 1/2 teaspoon of paste with 1 cup of milk in a saucepan and cook over medium-low heat for about 5 minutes. Stir in about 1/2 teaspoon of coconut oil or ghee before drinking (you can also add other spices like cinnamon, ginger, or black pepper, and honey or maple syrup for some sweetness). Store the remaining turmeric paste in your fridge for 2 weeks. This is fabulous before bedtime! …zzzzzzz!

8. Make homemade mustard: You can mix up a basic mustard with ½ cup ground mustard, 2 tablespoons white wine vinegar, 1 tablespoon water, 1 teaspoon each of turmeric and salt. Store in a glass jar in the fridge.

9. Fortify your soup: A few dashes of turmeric can be added to most soups without changing the flavor, it adds a nice color to brothy soups and may help you fight a cold.

10. Mix up a cold remedy: Since turmeric has been shown to boost immunity and fight viruses like the common cold, it can be used to make a variety of home remedies. One way to do it is by mixing 1 tablespoon of powdered turmeric with 7 tablespoons of raw honey (this is known as Golden Honey). Whenever you want to boost your immunity or are fighting a cold, dissolve a 1/2 teaspoon of this mixture in your mouth every couple hours. You can also make some turmeric gummy bears (like these from The Cook’s Pajamas). Just make sure you choose the right kind of gelatin to make these (grass-fed, organic). Since gelatin is an animal product, it’s crucial that you carefully choose your gelatin and that it doesn’t come from factory-farmed animals that were subjected to antibiotics, artificial hormones and GMO feed.

11. Saute a healthy side dish: For a quick side dish, saute some fresh greens (kale, spinach, etc) in some olive oil and turmeric. I like to add fresh garlic and a dash of sea salt too.

12. Sprinkle on an avocado: This is an awesome snack, full of fiber and just enough fat to keep you from indulging in unhealthy processed snacks from the vending machine. Another variation is to mash the avocado, mix in some ground turmeric, a dash of sea salt, a dash of black pepper, and spread it on sprouted bread or brown rice crackers or cakes.

13. Make natural food coloring: There’s no reason to ever bake with artificial dyes like Yellow #5 and Yellow #6, when it’s so easy to make with turmeric. Just boil some water, whisk in enough turmeric to create the yellow shade you want, and boil for 3 to 5 minutes. Allow it to cool and store it in a glass jar in the fridge – and that’s it! If you want to use it to dye Easter eggs, simply add some vinegar to the dye.

14. Top your salad with it: You can sprinkle a pinch of turmeric directly on your salad or blend it into about any salad dressing, and the flavor will go largely unnoticed. Make a quick turmeric salad dressing by whisking together 1/2 teaspoon ground turmeric, 2 teaspoons miso paste, 2 teaspoons apple cider vinegar, 1 tablespoon olive oil, 1 tablespoon raw honey and the juice from 1/2 a lemon (this is another recipe from the Food Babe Membership Program) – or try stirring some into this tahini dressing!

15. Spread it on your skin: Turmeric has been known to reduce the inflammation and itching caused by eczema when applied directly to the skin. Just mix some ground turmeric with a little water (you can also use coconut oil, almond oil, or sesame oil), apply it on the affected areas, and wash off after about 15 minutes. Turmeric is also used to relieve the pain and swelling of sprained joints. One popular sprain remedy is a mixture of 2 tablespoons turmeric, 1 tablespoon lime juice, and a few drops of water until it makes a thick paste. Carefully rub it on the sprain and wrap it in a cheesecloth or a cloth bandage. Leave it on for at least 20 minutes. Beware, that turmeric will temporarily stain your skin, so this works best on body parts that you can cover easily or don’t mind being orange for a little while!

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Until next week...keep on believing.
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“For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, Nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”
(Romans 8:38-39)