INC™ Ministers, Deceivers!

PATUNAY NA SINUNGALING ANG MINISTRO NG INC™!

STONING TO DEATH IN ISLAM!

A Woman Caught in Adultery (John 8:1-11)
(Muslims must learn from Jesus in the Bible, not in the Quran)

Then each went to his own house, while Jesus went to the Mount of Olives.

But early in the morning he arrived again in the temple area, and all the people started coming to him, and he sat down and taught them. Then the scribes and the Pharisees brought a woman who had been caught in adultery and made her stand in the middle.

They said to him, “Teacher, this woman was caught in the very act of committing adultery. Now in the law, Moses commanded us to stone such women. So what do you say?”

They said this to test him, so that they could have some charge to bring against him. Jesus bent down and began to write on the ground with his finger.

But when they continued asking him, he straightened up and said to them, “Let the one among you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.” Again he bent down and wrote on the ground. And in response, they went away one by one, beginning with the elders.

So he was left alone with the woman before him. Then Jesus straightened up and said to her, “Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?” She replied, “No one, sir.” Then Jesus said, “Neither do I condemn you.  Go, [and] from now on do not sin any more.”

Philippine President-elect mocks Saints and the Catholic Church... again!

Photo source: Monk's Hobbit

President-elect Rodrigo R. Duterte, who was hailed from Mindanao, once again mocks the Catholic Church. And at this time, he mocks saints and Catholic practice of venerating them. According to this news, he mocks the saints by joking on having difficulty choosing between more than 5,000 declared saints to pray for. And blurted out that there is only ONE GOD and his "name" is ALLAH.

'Allah' is NOT a name but it's an Arabic word الله‎ which is the English equivalent for 'god' or 'God'. Therefore to say that God's name is 'allah' is erroneously incorrect.  His name, according to Judeo-Christian tradition is 'Yahweh' or 'Jehovah' or mostly substituted with 'Elohim' or 'Adonai'.

The 'SAINTS' aren't gods. They're like us. They live like us but died a heroic death for God and His Church. In other words, they are Christianity's heroes worthy of emulation. And in particular, we Catholics venerated them because we firmly believe the saints OFFER our prayers before the throne of God (Rev. 5:8).  

And as his followers liked his revolting commentaries, he even went beyond INSULTING THE HOLY SCRIPTURES “Those were written 3,000 years ago. Ano ba pakialam natin sa kanilang sinulat?”

Let's pray for his leadership and be vigilant for we cannot be complacent with his detestable, very distasteful and very destructive strong worded comments on the Catholic Church and our bishops and priests. -CD2000

Duterte makes fun of Catholic Church’s practices
By Alexis Romero (philstar.com) | Updated June 27, 2016

MANILA, Philippines - President-elect Rodrigo Duterte Monday made fun of the practices of the Roman Catholic Church, which has been critical of his stance on family planning and death penalty.

Duterte, in particular, joked about the Catholic practice of venerating saints, people officially recognized by the Church as models of the faith.

“I believe in one God Allah. Period,” he said during his last flag ceremony as Davao City mayor. Allah is the name of the God worshipped by Muslims.

Duterte’s discomfort with Catholicism, it seems, stemmed from his unpleasant experiences when he was still a child. He recalled that when he was a child, his mother Soledad would punish him by asking him to kneel before an altar.

"I told Jesus, help me. He said I can’t help a naughty boy,” he said in jest.

Duterte said in the Catholic faith, there are about 5,000 saints to choose from.

“You choose your saint: San Tiago, Santo Isabelo, Santo Roman, Santilmo, Santo Rodrigo,” the next Philippine president said, drawing laughs from the audience.

“St. Peter himself loves cockfighting,” he said in jest, referring to the apostle whose symbol in art is the rooster.

According to the Christian Bible, a rooster crowed after St. Peter disowned Jesus Christ.

Roman Catholicism is a monotheistic religion, which means that it worships only one God, Jesus Christ. Catholics do not worship saints but only venerate or respect them.

Duterte said he has been at odds with the Catholic Church because of its opposition to artificial family planning methods. He noted that in Davao City, pills, ligation and other birth control methods are accessible to couples.

“I go against the Church because its position is not realistic,” the tough-talking leader said.

Duterte has called the Catholic Church “the most hypocritical institution” for its supposed failure to practice what it teaches. He claimed that bishops continue to teach morality but has failed to address clergy sexual abuses.

Last December, Duterte revealed that a Jesuit priest molested him when he was in high school but was too afraid to file a complaint.

Duterte, however, went beyond Catholic doctrines and questioned the relevance of the scriptures themselves.

“Those were written 3,000 years ago. Ano ba pakialam natin sa kanilang sinulat?” he said.

LGBT Agenda Is a Demonic Attack on the Family, Cardinal Sarah Warns U.S.

Source: ChurchPop

François-Régis Salefran, Wikimedia Commons

Same-sex marriage, transgenderism, and divorce are demonic attacks on the family, Cardinal Robert Sarah warned in his keynote speech for the National Catholic Prayer Breakfast in Washington D.C. early on Tuesday, May 17th, 2016.

“This is about defending ourselves, children, and future generations” he said, according to LifeSiteNews, “from a demonic ideology that says children do not need mothers and fathers. It denies human nature and wants to cut off entire generations from God.”

He listed examples of this evil ideology: “Do we not see signs of this insidious war in this great nation of the United States? […] The legalization of same-sex marriage, the obligation to accept contraception within health care programs, and even ‘bathroom bills’ that allow men to use the women’s restrooms and locker rooms.”

“Should not a biological man use the men’s restroom? How simpler can that concept be?”

He also pointed to divorce and cohabitation as destructive, especially for children.

“The rupture of the foundational relationships of someone’s life – through separation, divorce, or distorted impositions of the family, such as cohabitation or same sex unions – is a deep wound that closes the heart to self-giving love [unto] death, and even leads to cynicism and despair.”

“These situations cause damage to the little children through inflicting upon them a deep existential doubt about love. They are a scandal – a stumbling block – that prevent the most vulnerable from believing in such love, and a crushing burden that can prevent them from opening to the healing power of the Gospel.”

He lamented that new problems are compounding the old ones. “Sadly, the advent of artificial reproductive technologies, surrogacy, so-called homosexual ‘marriage,’ and other evils of gender ideology, will inflict even more wounds in the midst of generations we live with.”

“This is why,” he concluded, “it is so important to fight to protect the family, the first cell of the life of the Church and every society.”

His speech is reported to have been received with thunderous applause from the audience. The program also included Speaker Paul Ryan, Fr. Paul Scalia (son of the late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia), and Sr. Constance Veit from the Little Sisters of the Poor.

Pope Francis in Armenia!

This is how our Church began! And the rest were hearsays!

CATHOLIC MYTH #4: THE CRUSADES WERE UNPROVOKED ATTACKS AGAINST PEACEFUL MUSLIMS

Posted on March 9, 2015 by Bryan Mercier

Just because something is repeated over and over again does not make it true. The same is true here with the Crusades. In reality, the Crusades were wars of self-defense against the Muslims. Here are the real facts:

Every historian knows that Muhammad was kicked out of Mecca for preaching his new religion. After raising an army in Medina, he returned and sacked Mecca razing it to the ground. Thereafter, his new army garnered much military strength and went on to conquer the entire surrounding area. By the time Muhammad died, his armies had conquered the whole area of land we know today as the “Fertile Crescent.”

After Muhammad’s death, Islam spread even more rapidly. In just 100 years (657 A.D. – 757 A.D.), the conquering armies of Islam decimated everything in their path from Afghanistan to North Africa. They then invaded Europe and seized many islands. They were going for full world conquest. In a short span of time, Islam conquered the Persian Empire, the Roman Empire, and two-thirds of the Byzantine Empire, the last major empire on earth. Over a thousand years of war without batting an eye. One can begin to see why the Crusades were called.

During all of this time, while some Catholic kings may have defended their countries, the Catholic Church herself never retaliated at all but just prayed for peace and hoped the Muslim aggression would stop. However, around the year 1094 A.D, due to the devastation of the Byzantine Empire, Commodore Alexius the 1st called on the pope and the Catholic Church for help in complete desperation. The pope prayed about it for a long time and eventually decided to “come to the aid of our brothers in the East.” THAT was the reason the Crusades were started. An answer to the Emperor’s plea.

Occasionally, thousands of innocent and unarmed Christians were massacred by Muslims while processing on pilgrimage to Jerusalem. In addition, more than half of all Christian lands had been seized by Islamic armies. So, the Church also sought to take back the Holy Land in order to create a safe passage for innocent pilgrims processing there. They also wanted to protect Christians around the world. For all of these reasons, the Crusades were called.

Unlike Islam, the Catholic Church had been a mostly peaceful religion and had done more good for the world than anyone else. I’m not saying that Christians were perfect or that abuses didn’t happen during the Crusades because they did, but they were started as wars of self-defense and as a response to the request of Emperor Alexius I. The Crusades had nothing to do with an “aggressive, power hungry church” who killed peaceful people of other religions or anyone who disagreed with the Catholic religion. That is huge myth which in not historical, not tenable, and not true.

Iglesia Ni Cristo®'s Hypocrisy on Biblical Images!

Members of Manalo's INC™ Church who are very critical against Catholic images of Jesus, Mary and the saints are quick to say THAT those images AREN'T JESUS, MARY or the SAINTS.

But SHAMELESSLY PUBLISHING IMAGE(S) of MOSES in their PASUGO magazine that no Manalista can GUARANTEE if that's how MOSES LOOKED LIKE.

Images of Moses and his wife and Aaron. Source: PASUGO June 2011 p. 32.

HYPOCRITES!

God vs. Atheism: Which is More Rational?

Pope Francis Surprises Rome's Retired Priests

KNOW THAT WE ARE ALL CATHOLIC FAITHFUL TO ROME!

Q: How can I answer this Protestant objection about “our crosses”?

Full Question

One Protestant objection I hear quite often has to do with “our cross.” The objection usually goes something like this: “Jesus died once and for all, for everyone. Any problems or difficulties we may encounter stem from our human nature or condition. To say that God gives us a cross that we must bear is not only unbiblical but minimizes Jesus’ ultimate sacrifice at Calvary.” In other words, we’re carrying a cross Jesus already died on!

Answer

Unbiblical? What about the words of Christ himself: “”If any man would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me”” (Luke 9:23)?

While it is true that problems and difficulties stem from our human condition, they are permitted by God because they have the ability to conform us more perfectly to him. Taking up our cross is not in opposition to his cross, but our feeble attempt to be one with him in the love he has shown us in carrying his. We express love most sublimely through sacrifice, as Scripture abundantly shows us.

Source: CatholicSay

Altar Rails and Reverence

I hope and pray that this 'altar railings' may be revived in our churches, to separated the profane from being desecrated. -CD2000

Article from The Liturgy Guy
Posted in June 22, 2014

(Photograph of the sanctuary and altar rail at Sacred Heart Catholic Church in Salisbury, NC)

Altar rails are making a comeback and with their return so is reverence. It is becoming more common these days to see the installation of rails as an integral component of liturgical reform and church architecture. From dioceses as diverse as Charlotte, North Carolina to Madison, Wisconsin the rail has returned.

To be clear, there was never a requirement to remove altar rails (also called communion rails) in the years following the Second Vatican Council. However, there were many in the Church who aggressively sought to remove that which was considered traditional and sacred. Gone were the high altars, beautiful Catholic statuary, and of course, altar rails.

A liturgically misguided attempt at egalitarianism ruled the post-conciliar landscape, one which challenged the very distinction between sanctuary and nave. Overtones of anticlericalism were pervasive, as was a new type of Catholic worship, one intentionally structured for ecumenical purposes.

By their very presence altar rails hindered the march toward the profane desired by many. With such liturgical innovations as Extraordinary Ministers of Holy Communion and most particularly the practice of Communion in the hand, altar rails were an affront to the moderns. In the new, democratic, liturgy kneeling had simply become outdated and uncouth.

In his seminal work “The Spirit of the Liturgy” Cardinal Ratzinger noted that, “The man who learns to believe learns also to kneel, and a faith or a liturgy no longer familiar with kneeling would be sick at the core.” In recent years, however, there has been a slow yet steady healing occurring within the liturgy.

Church designers, architects and historians such as Duncan Stroik and Denis McNamara have done their part in this effort. McNamara, who is a professor at the Liturgical Institute of the University of Saint Mary of the Lake in Mundelein, addressed the theological significance of rails in a July 2011 interview with the National Catholic Register:

“(The altar rail) is still a marker of the place where heaven and earth meet, indicating that they are not yet completely united…But, at the same time, the rail is low, very permeable, and has a gate, so it does not prevent us from participating in heaven. So we could say there is a theology of the rail, one which sees it as more than a fence, but as a marker where heaven and earth meet, where the priest, acting in persona Christi, reaches across from heaven to earth to give the Eucharist as the gift of divine life.”

Altar rails are contributing to the restoration of the sacred and the recovery of reverence within the Holy Mass. At my home parish of St. Ann’s in Charlotte, North Carolina the rail returned with the 2009 renovation of the church. The altar rail was installed to accommodate the Traditional Latin Mass which was offered weekly. Over time the use of the rail was expanded to include all masses, whether offered in the Ordinary form or Extraordinary form.

The altar rail has also returned to Sacred Heart Catholic Church in Salisbury, North Carolina (also in the Diocese of Charlotte). While the new church was completed back in 2009, the rail was not installed until just last year in support of the weekly Sunday Traditional Latin Mass.

More recently there is also the story of St. Mary’s of Pine Bluff, Wisconsin. Father Richard Heilman, pastor, had the altar rail installed earlier this year following a $20,000 gift from an anonymous donor. Overall the return of the rail has been well received by his parishioners. Since Fr. Heilman was already offering the mass ad orientem, and using kneelers for the faithful at Holy Communion, the reintroduction of the altar rail made perfect sense. More importantly, Father has seen reverence for the Eucharist continue to grow. Much like St. Ann’s in Charlotte, the majority of parishioners at St. Mary’s of Pine Bluff choose to receive Communion on the tongue.

It is fitting to conclude with the words of our pope emeritus, Benedict XVI, when he was still Cardinal Ratzinger, Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. Ratzinger noted that, “the practice of kneeling for Holy Communion has in its favor a centuries-old tradition, and it is a particularly expressive sign of adoration, completely appropriate in light of the true, real and substantial presence of Our Lord Jesus Christ under the consecrated species.”

Pray that more Catholics are blessed to experience the return of the altar rail to their parish and to receive Holy Communion while kneeling.

Muslims HATE us! Period!

If we Catholics are encouraged to greet Muslims a 'Ramadan Kareem' or 'Eid Mubarak' then why these Muslim hate preachers say Muslims aren't allowed to reciprocate the same gesture during Christian festivities? For this Muslim extremist preacher, greeting a KUFAR (that is those who are non-Muslims), that greeting is WORST than killing?!!! Really?!

What a SHAME! Muslims must start HATING THEIR PREACHERS for preaching hate. But as we know, they will not, because what this Muslim preacher is saying is exactly what all Muslims believe should be.

IGNACIO DE LAYOLA MOVIE, SHOWING ON JULY 27, 2016!

Cast of Ignacio de Loyola:
Andreas Muñoz - Iñigo de Loyola
Javier Godino - Xanti
Julio Perillán - Father Sanchez
Gonzalo Trujillo - Inquisitor Frias
Isabel García Lorca - Doña Ines Pascual
Lucas Fuica - Don Beltran de Loyola
Mario de la Rosa - Calixto
Jonathan D. Mellor - Inquisitor Figueroa

Ignacio de Loyola is distributed by Jesuit Communications Foundation Philippines thru Solar Pictures.

Read more: http://www.showinginphilippines.com/2016/06/ignacio-de-loyola-showing-starts-july.html#ixzz4Bv0IIkkH

LACK OF REVERENCE FOR THE EUCHARIST PUTS PEOPLE OFF CATHOLICISM -Patrick Madrid

The 'lack of reverence' for the Holy Eucharist is not just happening in the US. I am afraid this wrong practice of abuse is also happening in the Philippines. I can enumerate them one by one but Brother Patrick Madrid's reflection below maybe an EYE-OPENER for every Catholic reading this article. During this year of Extraordinary Year of Mercy, please do one of the 7 Spiritual Works of Mercy by INSTRUCTING those Catholics and non-Catholics still are IGNORANT of our faith! -CD2000

By Francis Phillips for Catholic Herald
Posted Thursday, 16 Jun 2016

How lack of reverence for the Eucharist puts people off Catholicism

A woman receives Communion during a Mass for young adults at St Patrick's Cathedral in New York City (CNS photo/Gregory A. Shemitz)

Patrick Madrid recalls the Mormon who told him: 'I've never seen Catholics show awe. So I guess they don't believe it'

Having referred to Patrick Madrid’s Life Lessons: Fifty Things I Learnt in My First Fifty Years (US, UK) in my last blog, I have found it both so readable and so full of wise reflections based on his own experiences (which could easily be the reader’s experiences too), that I will highlight another chapter here.

Madrid relates that, as a full-time Catholic apologist, he was once giving a lecture on the Catholic faith when a Mormon in the audience asked if he could speak to him later on. During their conversation, which happened to be on the Eucharist and the Blessed Sacrament in the tabernacle, the Mormon remarked, “I really don’t get the impression that most Catholics believe what you have just said about ‘the Eucharist’.”

Madrid was taken aback, commenting: “As a Catholic I figured that I’d know a whole heck of a lot better than what he, a Mormon, could possibly know about what Catholics believe, especially on something as central … as the Eucharist.” Then the Mormon explained that he had been to several Catholic weddings and to other Catholic Masses “And the Catholics I’ve seen there sure didn’t seem as though they believed in what you just said about Jesus being in the Eucharist.”

IGLESIA NI CRISTO® MUST WATCH!

Pan-Orthodox Council in Crete is in Crisis?

Afraid of being too friendly with Rome, Pan-Orthodox Council may not push through... Let's keep praying for our separated Orthodox brethren that they may soon recognize the Bishop of Rome as our 'Apostle Peter' in our present generation. -CD2000


Article Source: Catholic Herald
By Fr Alexander Lucie-Smith
Posted Thursday, 16 Jun 2016

Deep fears about modernity lie behind the unravelling of the Pan-Orthodox Council

Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I, left, and Russian Orthodox Patriarch Kirill (AP Photo)

For some even the slightest change in relations with Rome will end up with tradition being swept away

The fate of the Pan-Orthodox Council, which is due to start its deliberations in Crete this Sunday, hangs in the balance. At present it seems that the Bulgarians will definitely not be there, neither will the Antiochenes, and it looks as if the Serbs, Georgians and the Russians are pulling out as well. There is a useful summary of what is going on in this article at the Guardian website.

The trouble, for us outsiders, is that it is very difficult to understand why this is happening. The Council has been over five decades in preparation, so the idea that it needs more time to prepare really seems unreasonable. Again, the Bulgarian objections to the seating plan look like a pretext. Again, the objection to the way the documents of the Council were drawn up, being made now, when the way they were drawn up was supposedly approved by all parties, seems suspect at this late stage. But one thing is clear: five out of the 14 Orthodox churches do not want to meet. And one of those five, Russia, is the biggest of the Churches, which means that a meeting, if it does take place, will hardly be able to speak for all Orthodox.

But why don’t they want to meet? Trawling round the many Orthodox websites, what emerges, it seems to me, is a fear that the Council, if it meets, will open some sort of floodgate to modernity, which will result in the sweeping away of tradition. In fact, as observers have noted, the tone and content of the documents is extremely conservative, clearly designed to calm any such fears; but the slightest hint of change – and in particular rapprochement with Rome, and ecumenism in general – is clearly enough to make many parties cry halt even before the Council begins.

Certain Orthodox Churches are happy to be ecumenical, such as that of Constantinople, but this is clearly not shared by Bulgaria or Georgia, or the monks of Mount Athos. Of course, ecumenism is an “iceberg issue”, only one 10th of which is above the surface, and which masks much deeper matters at stake.

Incidentally, at the Second Vatican Council, Archbishop Lefebvre’s supporters made a great play of defending the traditional liturgy, as their headline stance, but the real problem for them was the declaration on religious freedom, Dignitatis Humanae. Similarly, the radical Orthodox traditionalists are known as Old Calendarists, but the Julian calendar issue is the rallying cry for a deeper concern with ecumenism, which they regard as the great “pan-heresy”.

For the Orthodox Churches ecumenism is the great divider: for some a good and necessary thing, for others, the thin end of the wedge, leading to a collapse of tradition.

At this point it may be useful to remember why the Catholic Church and others embarked on our current ecumenical endeavours. The first reason was theological, because Christ founded only one Church, and wanted that Church to be one. So, to work for unity is to do the work of the Lord. The second reason was because divided churches do not give a coherent witness to the Lord. And thirdly, when faced with so many external threats, such as atheism and secularisation, the various Christian churches needed to unite against the common threat rather than squabble amongst themselves.

These reasons have not gone away in the last few decades, indeed they have become more pressing, and to their number has been added Islamic terrorism in the Middle East. The ancient but numerically tiny Orthodox Churches in the Middle East now face extinction, thanks to the threat of ISIS.

That the 14 autocephalous Churches cannot even meet does not bode well for their co-operation with each other, let alone with Catholics, in the face of all these threats, and hardly gives a good example to the world of Christian harmony and charity. Now is clearly not the time to be quarrelling over seating plans, rather it is the time for getting ready for mission to the world.

Of course we have been here before. There were many reasons for the fall of the Byzantine Empire, but one contributing factor was the way the Empire fatally weakened itself through internal religious strife, rather than facing the external threats of the time. History, sadly, seems to be repeating itself.

The Catholic Church was Right All The Way!

The Catholic Church was right all the way!

Time To Admit It: The Church Has Always Been Right On Birth Control

Michael Brendan Dougherty and Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry
Business Insider Feb. 8, 2012, 4:39 PM

Painting the Catholic Church as "out of touch" is like shooting fish in a barrel, what with the funny hats and gilded churches. And nothing makes it easier than the Church's stance against contraception.

Many people, (including our editor) are wondering why the Catholic Church doesn't just ditch this requirement. They note that most Catholics ignore it, and that most everyone else finds it divisive, or "out-dated." C'mon! It's the 21st century, they say! Don't they SEE that it's STUPID, they scream.

Here's the thing, though: the Catholic Church is the world's biggest and oldest organization. It has buried all of the greatest empires known to man, from the Romans to the Soviets. It has establishments literally all over the world, touching every area of human endeavor. It's given us some of the world's greatest thinkers, from Saint Augustine on down to René Girard. When it does things, it usually has a good reason. Everyone has a right to disagree, but it's not that they're a bunch of crazy old white dudes who are stuck in the Middle Ages.

So, what's going on?

The Church teaches that love, marriage, sex, and procreation are all things that belong together. That's it. But it's pretty important. And though the Church has been teaching this for 2,000 years, it's probably never been as salient as today.

Today's injunctions against birth control were re-affirmed in a 1968 document by Pope Paul VI called Humanae Vitae. He warned of four results if the widespread use of contraceptives was accepted:

1. General lowering of moral standards
2. A rise in infidelity, and illegitimacy
3. The reduction of women to objects used to satisfy men.
4. Government coercion in reproductive matters.

Does that sound familiar?

Because it sure sounds like what's been happening for the past 40 years.

As George Akerloff wrote in Slate over a decade ago,

By making the birth of the child the physical choice of the mother, the sexual revolution has made marriage and child support a social choice of the father.

Instead of two parents being responsible for the children they conceive, an expectation that was held up by social norms and by the law, we now take it for granted that neither parent is necessarily responsible for their children. Men are now considered to be fulfilling their duties merely by paying court-ordered child-support. That's a pretty dramatic lowering of standards for "fatherhood."

Today's moral lodestar People.com

How else are we doing since this great sexual revolution? Kim Kardashian's marriage lasted 72 days. Illegitimacy: way up. In 1960, 5.3% of all births in America were to unmarried women. By 2010, it was 40.8% [PDF]. In 1960 married families made up almost three-quarters of all households; but by the census of 2010 they accounted for just 48 percent of them. Cohabitation has increased tenfold since 1960.

And if you don't think women are being reduced to objects to satisfy men, welcome to the internet, how long have you been here? Government coercion: just look to China (or America, where a government rule on contraception coverage is the reason why we're talking about this right now).

Aleteia: Last Priest from Dachau Concentration Camp Dies at 102

Father Hermann Scheipers survived Nazis and communists in long career

Aleteia by John Burger
June 14, 2016

ERIC SCHWAB/Getty Images

The last Catholic priest to have been imprisoned in the Dachau concentration camp has died at age 102.

Father Hermann Scheipers was a young priest in 1940 when he was arrested by the Nazis and taken to the camp, near Munich. Dachau had a large population of priests: some 95% of the 2,720 clergymen imprisoned there were Catholic.

Father Scheipers died June 2 in Ochtrup in Münsterland, the same town where he was born on July 24, 1913.

His work among young people, soon after his ordination, drew the attention of the Nazis. An obituary at KNA, a German Catholic news agency, translated by Mark de Vries, noted:

Because he was sympathetic with Polish forced laborers, celebrated Mass with them and heard their confessions, he was arrested [in] October of 1940 and brought to Dachau five months later. His file, which he came across by chance, states the true reason for his arrest: “Scheipers is a fanatical proponent of the Catholic Church and thus likely to cause unrest among the population.”

He wore the number 24255 on his prison uniform.

Father Scheipers recalled the way the camp commander welcomed him and his fellow inmates: “You are without honor, without help and without rights. Here, you can either work or perish.”

The sign over the entrance to the prisoner camp famously read, “Arbeit macht frei,” or “Work will make you free.”

CBC Investigates: Filipino man claims death threats from members of powerful Christian church

By Eric Rankin, Gavin Fisher, CBC News Posted: Jun 14, 2016

Lowell Menorca says he fears persecution from the Iglesia Ni Cristo. They say his claims are 'fabrications''

Lowell Menorca holds the image he claims a family member found on his car in the Philippines. He says the note prompted him to leave the country, and he is now seeking refugee status in Canada. (Gavin Fisher/CBC)

A Filipino man has applied for refugee status in Canada claiming the lives of his young family have been threatened by members of what he calls a "cult-like" Christian church in the Philippines — and he alleges to CBC News he's still being stalked in Metro Vancouver.

Lowell Menorca, 39, a former un-ordained minister in the Iglesia Ni Cristo (INC), or Church of Christ, brought his allegations to the CBC in his first major English language interview.

His case has generated headline news coverage in the Philippines.

Iglesia Ni Cristo is the third largest faith in the Philippines after Catholicism and Islam, and it has hundreds of churches around the world, including many in Canada.

The INC preaches these are "the last days," and only its members will be saved. According to the church's doctrines, to be expelled means losing your salvation.

Menorca says the INC expelled him after a split developed among descendants of the man who founded the church. He says he was suspected of being an anonymous blogger who had accused INC leaders of overspending and corruption.

Menorca believes the leadership has wasted vast amounts of money on things such as a private Airbus jetliner (since sold) and the construction of the Philippine Arena, the biggest covered stadium in the world, built to celebrate the INC's centennial in 2014.

He alleges he was illegally detained by Church officials, arrested by police and then hit with more than 40 lawsuits for libel for speaking out about his alleged treatment from the church.

"This is an orchestrated effort by the church to intimidate me," says Menorca, "to put me behind bars, ultimately to silence me."

Menorca says a family member found this note on his car in the Philippines on March 6, the night before he was to appear at a court hearing against the INC. (Lowell Menorca)

But officials with the Iglesia Ni Cristo call Menorca's claims "fabricated" and "devious."

They say he's fleeing prosecution, not persecution, in the Philippines, and they expect the Canadian government to deny his refugee application.

The INC flew its San Francisco-based supervising attorney to Vancouver to answer the CBC's questions about the case.

Iglesia Ni Cristo supervising attorney Rommel
V. San Pedro says that Menorca's claims about
the church are "fabricated." (CBC)

"It's so obvious to see that he's fabricated this whole story", says Rommel V. San Pedro.

"In the end, the Canadian government is going to see through all of these allegations, and see there's no threat here."

"We can tell you there is no corruption inside the Iglesia Ni Cristo."

But Menorca claims he has proof church supporters have threatened his life and the lives of his pregnant wife and two-year-old child.

Alleged Threat to Daughter

Menorca's battle with the church came to a head three months ago in the Philippines.

On March 6 — the night before he was to appear at a court hearing against the INC — he claims a family member discovered a photo on the windshield of his car, parked at a safe house.

The family portrait, possibly lifted from Menorca's social media postings, had a red "x" through the face of his two-year-old daughter Yurie — and the warning "March 7, 2016, Say Goodbye."

It was signed "Mandirigma," Tagalog for "warriors"— a term often used online by some who purport to be defenders of the church.

"When I saw it, it literally crumbled my world" says a tearful Menorca.

"I really didn't want to stand by and watch if they're really going to push through with it, so that moment we decided that we would leave the country."

That night, he flew his family to Vietnam.

But he claims the intimidation continued.

Within hours, Menorca says photographs were posted on a Facebook site that appears to target those expelled from the INC, showing his family on the plane and at the airport terminal.

Comments in Tagalog and English accompanied the pictures. Among them: "You can run but you can't hide" and "You will not be able to escape, you are an animal, you are evil!!!"

Intimidation continues in B.C.: Menorca

Menorca said his family next fled to Thailand, seeking a safe haven.

But while he had a valid Visa to the US, his daughter and his pregnant wife Jingky did not.

Menorca says he eventually made the difficult decision to board a flight to Seattle that routed through Vancouver. When he landed on Canadian soil he immediately approached immigration officials and sought refugee status in the hope he can bring his wife and child here.

The Catholic Church Strikes Back!

...but not in the way some would expect! Here comes the Catholic Church!!!

Aleteia: Franciscan Friars Open New Community in Muslim Country

First new friary in Turkey since Istanbul

Source: Aleteia
By John Burger
Posted in April 7, 2016

St. Francis of Assisi traveled to Egypt in 1219 to meet with the Sultan. In 2016, some of his spiritual sons have established a new community in another predominantly Muslim country: Turkey.

A new friary in the Turkish city of Izmir represents the hope of several friars to witness to the Gospel, promote ecumenical and interreligious dialogue and dialogue with Turkish culture, according to a report Wednesday by the Fides news agency.

It is the first new Franciscan community in Turkey since the establishment of one in Istanbul, an hour by air to the north. But its planning goes back to 1995, when then-minister general Father Hermann Schalück and Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I, who resides in Istanbul, discussed the formation of an international Franciscan presence. In the following years the first fraternity for ecumenical and interreligious dialogue in Istanbul was formed.

Among the annual activities envisioned are celebrations of the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity, exchange and visits to Muslims during Ramadan, a permanent formation course on ecumenical and interreligious dialogue, and an interfaith prayer meeting in the spirit of the Assisi meetings that were called by Pope St. John Paul II.

With a population of some 2.8 million people, Izmir is Turkey’s third most populous city, after Istanbul and Ankara, the capital. The friars may have a chance to see the flow of migrants and refugees trying to get to Europe, as the city is close to the Aegean Sea.

A SELF-EXCOMMUNICATED ROBERTSON POBLETE JOINED THE SCHISMATIC REBELLIOUS LEVEBRIANS (SSPX), CATHOLICS ARE INFORMED NOT TO JOIN HIS GROUP

Mr. Roberto Poblete [far left in Red] with the rebellious group SSPX in Metro Manila. (Source: Splendor Of The Church)

A former Catholic (self-proclaimed) "defender" had defected to SSPX, therefore, we are all requested to get rid of his group and pray for his return to the true fold.

His unbecoming behavior as reported by one of the CFD members in Manila, is unacceptable. He therefore is recommended to our prayers and sacrifices. He needs our prayers like a lost sheep among the fold, for only God can change his heart to humble himself before the Church and return home.

Come Home Mr. Robertson! Come Home in Humility and in Repentance! God bless.

HISTORY: First Catholic service for centuries to be celebrated in chapel of King Henry VIII

A bit old news but it's still relevant for both Catholics and members of the Anglican communion and various Protestant churches of all denomination to recognize what binds us together more than what divides us. And to recognize that THEY ALL CAME FROM JERUSALEM to ROME and to the WORLDWIDE CATHOLIC CHURCH! -CD2000

Ruth Gledhill for Christian Today Posted in 05 January 2016

The Queen, Supreme Governor of the Church of England, recorded her 2010
Christmas broadcast in the Chapel Royal at Hampton Court Palace

The first Roman Catholic service for more than 450 years is to be celebrated in the Chapel Royal at Hampton Court Palace.

Archbishop of Westminster Cardinal Nichols will celebrate Vespers and the Bishop of London, Dean of the Chapel Royal, will preach in Henry VIII's chapel, built by Cardinal Thomas Wolsey in the early 16th century but taken from Wolsey by the King and rebuilt.

Henry VIII broke with Rome and established the Church of England after Wolsey failed to secure his annulment [it was actually a 'DIVORCE' that's why Rome refused his request. (Britannica)] from Catherine of Aragon. Henry's third wife Jane Seymour gave birth to his only son Prince Edward at Hampton Court. His fifth wife Catherine Howard is said to haunt the palace, where she had faced accusations of adultery. The King married his sixth and last wife, Catherine Parr, at Hampton Court.

The Genesis Foundation and the Choral Foundation are working together to make the service possible, as the first Latin Rite of the Catholic Church to be celebrated since the 1550s at the Chapel Royal.

A spokesman described it as "an unprecedented coming together of the Catholic and Anglican churches on such an historically important site".

Catholic Herald: How Catholics can reclaim Britain

Source: Catholic Herald

Non-believers long for a spiritual truth which only the Church can provide. But to win souls we must focus on God and charity, not political arguments

A visible faith: last Sunday’s Corpus Christi procession through central London (Mazur/catholicnews.org.uk)

British Catholicism is in an odd position. In terms of regular practice, it is a faith in decline. Mass attendance fell 30.7 per cent between 1993 and 2010, according to the Latin Mass Society. The number of Catholics peaked in 1993 and the number of priests in 1965.

British Catholicism is in an odd position. In terms of regular practice, it is a faith in decline. Mass attendance fell 30.7 per cent between 1993 and 2010, according to the Latin Mass Society. The number of Catholics peaked in 1993 and the number of priests in 1965.

Britain is and remains a country whose environment, institutions and modes of thought are still drawn in the main from the Christian tradition. This positions the Catholic Church well to win converts, yet this is something it does very badly. A recent analysis of data from the British Social Attitudes Survey found that for every one convert made by the Church in England and Wales, 10 cradle Catholics have been lost, while only 1.3 per cent of current Catholics have been converted either from no religion or a non-Christian faith.

The Personal Ordinariate of Our Lady of Walsingham, established in 2011 by Benedict XVI, has not seen the flood of converts from Anglicanism which many hoped for, and while the initiative responds to the decline of the Church of England, no similar initiative exists to draw home those in the Welsh Methodist churches or the Presbyterian Church of Scotland.

AsiaNews: For Mongolian Catholics, a first native priest is a source of joy and pride

The country’s Catholic community is the world's youngest. On 28 August, it will celebrate the ordination of Deacon Joseph Enkhee-Baatar. “One of us has it made! And if he did it, others will follow his example. We are sure that there will be many after him." An indigenous Catholic minister will be able to “connect our faith with what our” traditions.

Ulaanbaatar (AsiaNews) – On 28 August of this year, Mongolia’s tiny Catholic community will welcome its first native priest, Joseph Enkhee-Baatar, at a service in Ulaanbaatar’s Saints Peter and Paul Cathedral led by Mgr Wenceslao Padilla, apostolic prefect of Mongolia.

In December 2014, the future priest was ordained deacon by Mgr Lazzaro You Heung-sik, bishop of Daejeon. Fr Giorgio Marengo, a Consolata missionary present in the country since 2003, sent AsiaNews the following piece in which he describes the reaction of his community of faithful to the news.

The small Catholic community in Arvaiheer (21 people) joyfully welcomed the news that on 28 August Enkhee-Joseph will be ordained as the first native priest of ‘Outer’ Mongolia. In Chinese-controlled Inner Mongolia, there have been priests in the past century, but none in independent Mongolia. Enkhee will be the first.

Sitting around the table, sipping some suutei-tsai (a salty tea with milk) after Sunday Mass, parishioners expressed their views about the news. Obviously, they are happy about it.

For some, "Enkhee has shown that he is very patient and disciplined if he has managed to train for so long and in a foreign country." In fact, Enkhee spent many years at seminary in Daejeon, South Korea, the guest of the local diocese.

The faithful know that becoming a priest is a demanding process, especially in terms of self-discipline. Some actually can hardly believe it. Still "One of us has it made! And if he did it, others will follow his example. We are sure that there will be many after him."

In reality, no one knows him personally. When they were baptised, he was already in Korea to study. Of course, they their love and prayer went along with him to the faraway place.

"For us it is very important that the new priest be Mongolian because he will speak our language like one of our children or one of our siblings. More importantly, he will be able to link the faith to our traditions."

Such a goal is quite legitimate. For a religion still seen as "foreign", having a native minister can mean a lot both in terms of the relationship with local secular authorities, who so far have had to deal with foreigners (us missionaries). At a deeper level, they also know that Enkhee will be able to do a lot to reconcile traditional Mongolian practices and the Catholic faith.

"We expect that a Mongolian priest knows better how to explain our faith to those who have questions; this way, he can help us on our journey of internalising the same faith."

A flicker of satisfaction and joy can be seen in their eyes: pride in being Mongolian. As one woman says, he will be able to “connect our faith with what our ancestors passed on to us and made us what we are: Mongolians.” For Catholics in Arvaiheer, “This is the greatest wish. And they will count on Enkhee for this.”

Eventually, the conversation shifted to television where a Christian woman was able to respond intelligently to a journalist’s provocations, showing that her faith did not go against the deepest values she had received.

For a moment, the faithful forgot about Enkhee and began asking me to help them understand how Catholics must participate in family or social events in which the others follow the country’s dominant Buddhist tradition. Everyone talked about their experience. I listened to them and tried to offer some suggestions.

Ultimately, our role as missionaries is to foster the encounter with Christ. After that, it will be up to them re-define their cultural identity in the light of the faith, and find their place in society. The first Mongolian priest will help in this, as long as he can remain humble and attentive after he meets a lot of people in August.

Let us also hope that his fellow Mongolian Catholics will help him keep his feet on the ground, and become a minister of mercy and holiness who accompanies them in the inculturation of their faith. With a lot of praying and through a simple life.

Meanwhile, we Consolata missionaries shall remain, unless a wave of extreme nationalism does not force us to leave. Perennial outsiders, we are pilgrims and visitors, the seed that falls to the ground and disappears, so that the Church may be born.

How to Respond to the "New Atheism" By Trent Horn, A Catholic Convert, Apologist and Speaker

Photo source: Huffingtonpost

Ridicule of religion is the ethos of many modern unbelievers

By: Trent Horn

Source: Catholic Answers

In C. S. Lewis’s novel That Hideous Strength there is a scene where the non-religious protagonist, Mark, is instructed as “part of an exercise” to trample an image of a large crucifix. Because Mark is not a Christian, he is puzzled as to why he should bother with this exercise and not just leave this silly superstition alone. The professor who is leading the exercise tells Mark, “Of course it is a superstition: but it is that particular superstition which has pressed upon our society for many centuries. . . . An explicit action in the reverse direction is therefore a necessary step towards complete objectivity” (ch. 15). In other words, if religion is to be purged from society it cannot simply be ignored; it has to be ridiculed.

Lewis’s novel, published in 1945, was set in the future. Nearly seventy years later, that future is our present, and the author’s descriptions of religious ridicule pale in comparison to the current mockeries of Christianity found on the Internet. Yet while the vileness of the ridicule has increased, the attitude embodied by the professor remains the same. The best way to see how Lewis’s fiction has become prophecy is to contrast the “Old Atheism” with what some have called the “New Atheism.”

The “Old Atheism”

Throughout most of the twentieth century, public profession of atheism was synonymous with communism or the endorsement of totalitarianism. In a 1961 episode of The Twilight Zone titled “The Obsolete Man,” a librarian in a police state is executed for the crime of believing in God. Ultimately the librarian (portrayed wonderfully by the late Burgess Meredith) turns the tables on his executioner, but the image of a believer being crushed under the jackboot of totalitarian atheism was, at the time, not mere fiction. In his 1967 memoir, Tortured for Christ, Richard Wurmbrand describes how Soviet guards would tell prisoners, “I thank God in whom I don’t believe. Now I may indulge the evil in my heart” (p. 34).

These horror stories may have something to do with atheism’s low approval ratings. Gallup compared two polls conducted in 1958 and 2012 about people’s unwillingness to elect certain minorities to the U.S. presidency. In 1958, 38 percent were willing to elect an African-American and 18 percent were willing to elect an atheist. In 2012, while 96 percent were willing to elect an African-American, only 54 percent were willing to elect an atheist (Jeffrey Jones, “Atheists, Muslims See Most Bias as Presidential Candidates,” Gallup Polling, June 21, 2012).

Faced with such dismal levels of public approval, atheists felt the need to show believers that they were good people and not amoral communists. Beginning in the 1970s, the philosopher Paul Kurtz promoted what he called “secular humanism,” which focused on promoting human well-being without religion rather than converting people to atheism. Secular humanists even praised religion for its beneficial effects on society.

The Second Humanist Manifesto affirmed, “In the best sense, religion may inspire dedication to the highest ethical ideals.” The Manifesto went on to point out that while religion can hinder society, so can many nonreligious ideologies that are not based on humanism (Paul Kurtz and Edwin H. Wilson, “Humanist Manifesto II,” 1973). But this attitude of congenial disagreement changed for many people on September 11, 2001.

The “New Atheism”

I remember getting ready for school on that fateful day when my dad ran into my bedroom and turned on the television. Because I went to high school in Arizona, the attacks were in progress by the time I woke up. I stared in disbelief as the news replayed over and over again the surreal sight of the World Trade Center collapsing into a pile of dust. How could 19 human beings (the 9/11 hijackers) do something so terrible? The answer from the New Atheists was simple: Religion alone has the power to cause people to do such terrible things.

In 2004 American atheist Sam Harris, after reflecting on the September 11 terrorist attacks, published The End of Faith. In the book, Harris argued that religion is a form of mental illness and not part of a rational worldview. He writes, “[I]t is difficult to imagine a set of beliefs more suggestive of mental illness than those that lie at the heart of many of our religious traditions.” (p. 70). In 2006 British biologist Richard Dawkins went so far as to claim that religious education for children is child abuse: “Even without physical abduction, isn’t it always a form of child abuse to label a child a possessor of beliefs that they are too young to have thought about?” (The God Delusion, p. 354). These books were followed by others, such as Christopher Hitchens’ God Is Not Great and philosopher Daniel Dennett’s Breaking the Spell: Religion as Natural Phenomenon. Before Hitchens died in 2011, these authors were known as the “four horsemen” of the “New Atheism.”

What made these atheists “new” weren’t their arguments against religion but their attitude that religion should be reviled. At the 2012 “Reason Rally,” about 10,000 atheists gathered on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., where Dawkins instructed them regarding Christians: “Mock them, ridicule them in public. . . . Don't fall for the convention that we’re all too polite to talk about religion” (Lillian Kwon, “Atheists Rally for Reason; Urged to Mock the Religious,” The Christian Post, March 24, 2012).

Ridiculing religion

To be fair, there are atheists who do not see religion as a bad thing and don’t support ridicule as a way to combat it. Atheistic philosopher Walter Sinnott-Armstrong writes, “Like law, science, art, and guns, religion is a powerful tool that can be used for great good as well as for great evil. I have no desire to obstruct the benefits of religion” (William Lane Craig and Walter Sinnott-Armstrong, God? A Debate Between a Christian and an Atheist, 82).But other atheists think this “accommodation” is dangerous. Harris writes, “I hope to show that the very ideal of religious tolerance—born of the notion that every human being should be free to believe whatever he wants about God—is one of the principal forces driving us toward the abyss” (The End of Faith, 15).