Showing posts with label Judaism. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Judaism. Show all posts

Sunday, April 20, 2014

Happy Easter 2014

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AP Photo

Over 2 billion people are celebrating Easter today, April 20, as the calendars of Western and Eastern churches coincide this year, and these billions of faithful people are celebrating HOPE

But not only have the calendars of the Eastern and Western Christian Churches coincided but this week has also been a celebration of hope and freedom, with Passover starting last Monday night and continuing through the weekend until next Tuesday. Which of course also coincides with Holy Week, which culminates this weekend with Easter Sunday. This linkage is entirely appropriate, since Jesus had come to Jerusalem for the Passover ceremonies and the famous Last Supper was a Passover Seder… the ritual meal where Jews all over the world retell the story of the Exodus, celebrate their God-given freedom and eat the unleavened bread, matzoh, to commemorate their ancestor’s journey and deliverance from bondage and slavery.

The story of the Resurrection is a story of freedom too… freedom of the soul and a promise of eternal life to believing Christians who understand what the rolling away of the stones means for them.

Both holidays change their dates on our calendar from year to year, Passover or Pessah in Hebrew, because it is based on the centuries old Hebrew calendar and Easter because the early Church fathers determined that Easter is always celebrated on the Sunday immediately following the Paschal Full Moon date of the year, which always occurs after Passover.

However, it’s rare that the two holidays occur this close together and in this momentous year, when Judeo-Christian values seem to be under siege, I likewise see in that a sign of hope for the future.

I and my friends here at the Daily Thought Pad and on the Watcher’s Council wish you and yours Chag Pessach Sameach and a Blessed Easter.

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Video: Calvary – Hillsong Live – Lyrics – Easter Single 2014

 

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The meaning of Easter is HOPE, and we, all of us, need and deserve hope.

Wednesday, December 4, 2013

God Rest Ye Merry Merchants – Christmas: An American Holiday and Tradition to Love and Preserve – WoC 2013

Christmas: An American Holiday to Love and Preserve…

The War on Christmas verses the Spirit of Christmas Series by Marion Algier - AskMarion – 4

Once upon a time not all that long ago – in fact, anyone over 50 will easily remember it – the word “Christmas” was everywhere during the month of December. Everywhere you looked – in stores, in town squares, in cities, in offices, and, of course, in private homes — there were Christmas trees, Christmas decorations, Christmas cards, Christmas gifts, Christmas parties, and Christmas vacations. Even Jews got into the act… Hanukkah Bushes, Christmas lights in blue and white and an embracement of all the festivities. Just ask Ben Stein.

Christmas was arguably the most beloved of American holidays. Independence Day, Memorial Day, and Thanksgiving were important too; but Christmas was something more. It gave rise to a whole “Christmas season” during which people got into the “Christmas spirit.” The first words of a popular song, recorded by Johnny Mathis as a platinum hit, summed it up perfectly: “It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas / Everywhere you go…”

Then something strange began to happen. The very thing that made the “season” special started to disappear from the public arena. Stores no longer held “Christmas sales.” Businesses, and soon after, individuals, ceased to hold “Christmas parties.” And on and on. “Christmas” became a dirty word, and was replaced by “holiday.” The War on Christmas had begun.

We’ve grown so accustomed to the change that we’ve lost sight of just how significant it is. “Christmas” is loaded with meaning and rich in spirit. It imparts rich feelings unlike anything else. “Holiday,” by contrast, is a bland word that can signify anything from Independence Day to Labor Day to “Sweetest Day.” At most, it means a day that you might get off from work if you’re lucky. And nothing else. Saying “holiday” and meaning Christmas is like saying “a long dead politician” (Kindle) and meaning Abraham Lincoln (Kindle). Technically, it’s not wrong. But the whole significance is lost.

Of course, this didn’t happen by accident. Ask most people how it happened, and they’ll just shrug and say, “political correctness.” And in fact, “PC” is a cruel master, uncaring about what it destroys, and swift to punish those who violate it. So most choose to bow and submit.

But not here. We are part of the The Battle for Christmas. We hope to reclaim the richness and beauty of Christmas. But it’s more. Christmas is a treasure and and part of our heritage that we all should be actively working to preserve our traditional American culture in any and all forms. Because that culture is worth keeping. It’s part of what holds us together and makes us American… including those of us who are not Christians.

So let’s fight back in the war on Christmas. And to all who feel the same we do… happy holidays and Merry Christmas!: Celebrating America’s Greatest Holiday (Kindle).

God Rest Ye Merry Merchants

“The Celebration of Christmas in America is not Just a Christian Holiday, but a Celebration of our National Past and Our Collective Wishes and Psyche as a Nation!”

In his mawkish 1942 hit "White Christmas," Bing Crosby yearned for a holiday "just like the one I used to know." The extraordinary popularity of Crosby’s nostalgic longing (the all-time top-selling single until it was eclipsed by "Candle in the Wind 1997," Elton John’s mawkish tribute to Princess Diana) suggests the holiday’s tremendous power to revive memories–perhaps only imaginary, idealized memories–of childhood and Christmases past. According to Karal Ann Marling, "Christmas is the universal memory" for contemporary Americans (whether they’re Christian or not), an event in which "virtually everybody has played a part." By telling the story of Americans’ celebration of Christmas, she promises to uncover a surprisingly neglected piece of not only our national past, but our collective wishes and psyche.

Marling, a prolific and inventive cultural historian at the University of Minnesota who has written books on topics ranging from George Washington (George Washington Slept Here: Colonial Revivals and American Culture, 1876-1986) and Norman Rockwell to Disneyland (Designing Disney’s Theme Parks: The Architecture of Reassurance) and Graceland (Graceland: Going Home with Elvis) and As Seen on TV: The Visual Culture of Everyday Life in the 1950s, now turns her attention to the history of America’s most lavishly celebrated holiday. Marling has a keen eye for offbeat topics, arresting detail and original interpretations, and refuses "to plug the contents of the national Christmas stocking into the socket of orthodox historical discourse" (certainly that sounds unadvisable). She insists instead that her goal is to unwrap the hidden meaning of quotidian, but telling objects and practices to reveal the holiday’s deeper significance.

Myriad "scraps of Christmas detritus"–and Christmas generates loads of detritus–supply Marling with ample material: Shortly after Halloween, America’s shopping malls and stores are festooned with red and green and stocked from floor to ceiling with Christmas gifts. In the days after Christmas, discarded trees, still dangling tinsel, lie amid trash bags stuffed with discarded wrapping paper and packaging on curbs across the nation. Somewhere in between the shopping bags and the trash bags, millions of Americans attend their annual office party, endure children’s pageants, spend billions of dollars buying presents, cook traditional feasts, and gather with family and friends to exchange gifts and celebrate the nation’s most extravagant holiday. Wrapping paper, lights, ornaments, store window displays, trees, cards, Santas and cookies fill the thematic chapters of Merry Christmas! The history of Christmas, as Marling observes promisingly, is in the details.

Americans commonly assume that Christmas endured for centuries as a solemn religious holiday, before being corrupted by consumer capitalism. As early as the 1870s, critics of Christmas were engaging in "breast-beating over soulless American materialism." In 1949, opponents of the holiday’s excess launched a crusade to "restore" its "original" character. Billboards, posters and bumper stickers urging Americans to "Put Christ Back into Christmas" were a common sight during the holiday season throughout the 1950s. Like many tales of decline, this Christmas story proves a fable. In colonial America, Christmas was either not celebrated at all (it was actually illegal to celebrate the holiday in many Puritan communities), or an occasion for boisterous, drunken revelry.

In fact nearly all of Americans’ Christmas rituals and icons are 19th-century inventions, created to venerate home and family, not the birth of Jesus. Christmas trees, artfully bedecked with ornaments, became the focal point of Americans’ Christmas celebrations in the 1850s. Santa Claus became an icon in the 1860s and 1870s, springing from the pen of cartoonist Thomas Nast. Gift-giving became commonplace in the 1870s and 1880s, as more Americans adopted the practice of purchasing inexpensive, factory-made trinkets–"gewgaws" and "gimcracks"–and wrapping the presents to produce surprise. By century’s end, Christmas had become a legal holiday in every state, and the year’s most eagerly anticipated holiday for millions. In the 1920s, advertisers transformed Santa into a jovial salesman, whose girth and cheerfulness embodied consumer abundance: According to Marling, St. Nick, not that gangly, gaunt Uncle Sam, best personifies America.

As Marling observes, Americans’ celebration of Christmas grew along with material abundance and consumer culture, and the department store window, not the Nativity scene, has always furnished the holiday’s central icon. "Christmas," she writes, "is all about stores and shopping." Conversely, stores and shopping rely heavily on Christmas. Last year, Americans spent a record $184 billion during the Christmas shopping season (officially, the weeks between Thanksgiving and Christmas), and many retailers depend on Christmas sales for one quarter of their annual revenue.

But Marling is most interesting when she discusses the holiday’s paradoxes, which mingle materialism and generosity. Retailers and advertisers deliberately have exploited holidays to encourage consumption, but they have by no means stripped these "holy days" of their deeper meaning altogether. Marling notes that our most materialistic holiday is also ironically "the primary occasion for considering the harsh realities of the world, and those who have no trees and puddings."

As a result, charitable giving to the poor has accompanied the holiday since the 19th century. Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol (Kindle), which has ranked among Americans’ most beloved Christmas stories since its publication in 1843, offers a largely secular plea on behalf of the less fortunate. Funding charity dinners for the poor at Christmas time became an annual ritual of penance for the well-to-do in American cities in the late 19th century. Wealthy benefactors congratulated themselves for bestowing feasts and presents on their less fortunate neighbors, but could not have failed to recognize the troubling gulf, let alone the connection, between their abundance and others’ privation. Christmas’ mixture of materialism and charity remains paradoxical to our own day: Each December, as it has since 1912, the New York Times juxtaposes full-page advertisements for luxury gifts with small-font reminders urging readers to "Remember the Neediest."

If Christmas provides a "universal memory" for Americans, it is in large part because advertising and celebrating the holiday are so ubiquitous; even Unabomber Ted Kaczynski, railing against the evils on modern technology in his Montana cabin, took time to write Christmas cards to his neighbors each December. Christmas is so omnipresent that many nonbelievers celebrate the holiday, and even members of other faiths cannot altogether ignore it, try as they might. Stephen Nissenbaum, for example, prefaces his own history of the holiday, The Battle for Christmas (Kindle), with a touching reminiscence of his boyhood memories of Christmas as an outsider growing up in an Orthodox Jewish household.

But surely different groups of Americans have distinct recollections of the holiday. Protestants and Catholics, rich and poor, white, Asian, black and Latino–all have celebrated on December 25, but they have not celebrated alike. Marling’s attempt to delineate the diversity of Christmas traditions, a grab-bag chapter on "Somebody Else’s Christmas," lumps together Christmas in warm climes, white Northerners’ sentimental but patronizing fascination with black Southerners’ humble Christmas celebrations in the 19th century, immigrants’ Christmas traditions, even Kwanzaa. A more systematic discussion would fulfill Marling’s ambition of recasting our understanding of the holiday. And yet, though Merry Christmas! does not completely transform our view of the Christmas we "used to know," it does detail the little gestures and objects that supply the stuff of which Christmases are made.

Chris Rasmussen teaches American history at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. During this holiday season, he urges Americans of all faiths to "Put the Christ Back into Christmas."It is part of American heritage and tradition! (Originally Posted in December 2009)

By Karal Ann Marling – Author of Merry Christmas! : Celebrating America’s Greatest Holiday (Kindle)

On Glenn Beck’s 2010 Post-Thanksgiving Review Program Rabbi Daniel Lapin (who founded the American Alliance of Christians and Jews) said: Although I am Jewish and do not celebrate Christmas I respect the traditions and the holiday and like the holiday for two good reasons: It helps the economy and it makes people better… (95% of the money spent at Christmastime is for others… rather than for ourselves).

Lapin has spoken against the secularization of Christmas, saying that "We see obsequious regard for faiths like Judaism and even Islam, while Christianity is treated with contempt". He is opposed to replacing the "Merry Christmas" greeting with "Happy Holidays", saying instead "Let us all go out of our way to wish our many wonderful Christian friends a very merry Christmas… Nationwide, Christmas Nativity Scenes are banned from city halls and shopping malls but Chanukah/Hannukah menorahs are permitted.  One of the latest incidents: School Administrators Reportedly Instruct Teachers to Remove Christmas Cards From Hallways.

Merry Christmas!: Celebrating America’s Greatest Holiday (Kindle)

A great book on Losing Our Religion(Kindle) by atheist S. E. Cupp, who says she is he perfect person for this book because she has no dog in the hunt, takes on the all too often avoided question and discussion of religion in America…

The Battle for Christmas (Kindle)

Related:

Where Does the War on Christmas Come From? A Worthwhile Read – WoC 2013

The War on Christmas verses the Spirit of Christmas Series 2013 at AskMarion – WoC 2013

ANOTHER FAILED IDEA: Woman gets laughed at after bringing up Obamacare at Thanksgiving…

The Twelve Days of ObamaCare

Disney scores big with biblical values

Advent – The Season of Anticipation and Hope – WoC 2013

The Thanksgiving Illusion

Obama Thanksgiving and Christmas Disgrace

Keeping Pets Safe for the Holidays: The “Not So Safe” or No-No Pet Food List

Sarah Palin on Politics and Religion • 11/10/13 With Susan Page

The Cross – Billy Graham’s Message To America

Best Holiday Movie Classics – A Merry Christmas From Hollywood

Two great new books for the holidays: ‘Good Tidings and Great Joy: Protecting the Heart of Christmas’ (Kindle) and The Romney Family Table: Sharing Home-Cooked Recipes & Favorite Traditions (Kindle)

Monday, December 2, 2013

The War on Christmas verses the Spirit of Christmas Series 2013 at AskMarion - WoC 2013

One of the best things we can do as parents, grandparents, members of the religious community and patriots is to share the values and traditions we hold dear as individuals, families, churches and concerned citizens by teaching the histories and details of each to the next generation as well as standing up against those who would try to steal them from us and from future generations.

For several years now, we here at AskMarion have taken up the War on the War on Christmas, running a Christmas, Hannukah or related article daily from December 1st through the Epiphany on January 6th.  We began this year’s (2013) series yesterday with the start of Advent.

Once upon a time not all that long ago – in fact, anyone over 50 will easily remember it – the word “Christmas” was everywhere during the month of December. Everywhere you looked – in stores, in town squares, in cities, in offices, and of course… in private homes — there were Christmas trees, Christmas decorations, Christmas cards, Christmas gifts, Christmas parties, Christmas vacations and yes… Nativity Scenes. Even non-religious folks and Jews happily joined in with Hannukah Bushes, Christmas lights in blue and white and an embracement of all the festivities. One of the best Christmas cards I ever got was from my Jewish friend, Cheryl… On the cover:  From Naomi and Abe to Biff and Muffy with related sketches… when people were allowed to have a sense of humor instead of being politically correct. It still makes me smile 40-years later.

Just ask Ben Stein:

“The More We Enjoy Each Other’s Holidays and Traditions, the More Beautiful the World Looks!”

“I am a Jew and every single one of my ancestors was Jewish, and it does not bother me even a little bit when people call those beautifully lit-up, bejeweled trees ‘Christmas trees’.” …Ben Stein

Confessions for the Holidays by Ben Stein

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*The following was written by Ben Stein and recited by him on CBS Sunday Morning Commentary, December 18, 2005.

Here at this happy time of year, a few confessions from my beating heart:

I have no freaking clue who Nick and Jessica are.

I see them on the cover of People and Us constantly when I’m buying my dog biscuits. I still don’t know. I often ask the checkers at the grocery stores who they are. They don’t know who Nick and Jessica are, either. Who are they? Will it change my life if I know who they are and why they’ve broken up? Why are they so darned important?

I don’t know who Lindsay Lohan is either, and I don’t care at all about Tom Cruise’s baby.

Am I going to be called before a Senate committee and asked if I’m a subversive? Maybe. But I just have no clue who Nick and Jessica are. Is this what it means to be no longer young? Hm, not so bad.

Next confession: I am a Jew and every single one of my ancestors was Jewish, and it does not bother me even a little bit when people call those beautifully lit-up, bejeweled trees Christmas trees.

I don’t feel threatened. I don’t feel discriminated against. That’s what they are — Christmas trees. It doesn’t bother me a bit when people say ‘Merry Christmas’ to me. I don’t think they’re slighting me or getting ready to put me in a ghetto. In fact, I kind of like it. It shows that we’re all brothers and sisters celebrating this happy time of year.

It doesn’t bother me one bit that there’s a manger scene on display at a key intersection at my beach house in Malibu.

If people want a creche, fine. The menorah a few hundred yards away is fine, too. I do not like getting pushed around for being a Jew, and I don’t think Christians like getting pushed around for being Christians. I think people who believe in God are sick and tired of getting pushed around, period. I have no idea where the concept came from that America is an explicitly atheist country. I can’t find it in the Constitution and I don’t like it being shoved down my throat. Or maybe I can put it another way. Where did the idea come from that we should worship Nick and Jessica and aren’t allowed to worship God as we understand him? I guess that’s a sign that I’m getting old, too. But there are a lot of us who are wondering where Nick and Jessica came from and where the America we used to know went to.

— by Ben Stein: "Confessions for the Holidays." CBS News Transcripts. 18 December 2005.

So let’s take a quick look at where many these traditions came from… that the Atheists and secularists now both fear and fight.

Video: CHRISTMAS – History Channel [ Part 1 of 5 ]

Video: CHRISTMAS – History Channel [ Part 2 of 5 ]

Video: CHRISTMAS – History Channel [ Part 3 of 5 ]

Video: CHRISTMAS – History Channel [ Part 4 of 5 ]

Video: CHRISTMAS – History Channel [ Part 5 of 5 ]

christmas-icons-posters-collage

How to Build a Christmas Photo Collage Using Wondershare Photo Collage Studio

A great read: Losing Our Religion: The Liberal Media’s Attack on Christianity written by an atheist

Related:

ANOTHER FAILED IDEA: Woman gets laughed at after bringing up Obamacare at Thanksgiving…

The Twelve Days of ObamaCare

Advent – The Season of Anticipation and Hope – WoC 2013

The Thanksgiving Illusion

Obama Thanksgiving and Christmas Disgrace

Keeping Pets Safe for Thanksgiving: The “Not So Safe” or No-No Pet Food List

Sarah Palin on Politics and Religion • 11/10/13 With Susan Page

The Cross – Billy Graham’s Message To America

Two great new books for the holidays:Good Tidings and Great Joy: Protecting the Heart of Christmas’ (Kindle) and The Romney Family Table: Sharing Home-Cooked Recipes & Favorite Traditions (Kindle).

PBS runs Rick Steve’s Christmas in Europe throughout the Season as well which is a great watch!

We welcome you to join us daily for our  War on the War on Christmas… on Religious Freedom post from now through January 6th 2014

Tuesday, November 15, 2011

Anti-Semitic Vandalism in Brooklyn Sparks Community Outrage

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In the early morning hours of Friday November 11th, vandals set fire to several parked cars and scrawled anti-Semitic graffiti on nearby benches in the predominantly Jewish neighborhood of Midwood in Brooklyn in what the police said was a hate crime.

The arson took place along Ocean Parkway between Avenue I and Avenue J in what is commonly referred to as the Flatbush section, where three cars; a BMW, a Lexus and a Jaguar, were set ablaze. In addition, the epithet “KKK” was scrawled on the side of a red van, the police said, and swastikas and anti-Semitic slurs could be found on benches.

“The violence – I’m calling it violence when you blow up three cars – adds a sickening dimension to this type of anti-Semitism,” said Assemblyman Dov Hikind, who lives two blocks away and represents the 48th assembly district. He said he regularly walked past the benches with his 90-year-old mother to Sabbath services. “We walk down Ocean Parkway every single week,” Mr. Hikind said. “All I could think about was my mother sitting on a bench with a swastika. She survived Auschwitz.” Mr. Hikind said that this area of Brooklyn, including Midwood and Borough Park, contains one of the largest concentrations of Holocaust survivors outside of Israel.

The Police Department’s Hate Crimes Task Force is involved in the investigation and Mr. Hikind said the police promised to increase their presence in the neighborhood. “The fact that this most recent attack came on the heels of the 73rd anniversary of Kristallnacht may or may not be a coincidence,” Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg said in a statement in response the episode in Brooklyn. “Either way, this kind of hateful act has no place in the freest city in the freest country in the world.”

“Somebody had to have seen something,” remarked Hikind. “Even the tiniest detail that may seem irrelevant could prove to be a vital piece of information to the investigation. It is simply impossible that three cars were set on fire in the middle of a residential neighborhood and nobody saw anything. To the cowards who did this, who are responsible for this vicious and depraved anti-Semitic act, I say, ‘we will hunt you down and prosecute you to the fullest extent of the law for this hate crime.’”

Since Friday, the reward for credible information leading to the arrest and conviction of the person or persons responsible for this heinous crime has increased by $25,000. The monies were put together by both Mr. David Ben-Horeen, publisher of The Jewish Voice, as well as other leaders of the community, and $1000 by NYC council member David Greenfield. The reward now stands at $30,000.

As of Sunday afternoon police had made no arrests. The NYPD Hate Crimes Task Force is investigating. Brooklyn District Attorney Charles Hynes said dozens of empty beer bottles were found at the scene. He said they would be tested for fingerprints and DNA samples. Police in the 66th Precinct bolstered patrols in the neighborhood; especially at the scene of the attack.

Separately, the police said Friday that they had arrested a man accused of scrawling swastikas in five incidents last week in Jackson Heights, Queens. The man, Franco Rodriguez, 40, spray painted the symbols on the doors of several local libraries and a Catholic church, the police said.

On Sunday, November 13th, about 100 Midwood residents along with elected officials staged a peaceful protest march on Ocean Parkway past the four public benches from which the 16 swastikas had been removed after the pre-dawn attack Friday. Carrying an Israeli flag, the marchers were led by Mr. Hikind, State Senator Eric Adams, Rabbi Chaim Gruber, New York City Public Advocate Bill de Blasio, civil rights lawyer Norman Siegel and other community leaders. “There was a time when vandals used magic markers to express hate; now they’re using gasoline,” Adams said.

U.S. Sen. Charles Schumer condemned the vandalism during an unrelated event on Sunday. “It’s disgraceful and they should throw the book at the people who did it,” Schumer said. “Sometimes vandals think they’re pranks, sometimes they’re more malicious than that. Either way they cause great harm.”

Protesters noted the attack occurred one day after the 73rd anniversary of Kristallnacht in Nazi Germany on Nov. 9-10, 1938, when synagogues were set on fire and the windows of Jewish-owned shops were broken. Sunday’s march also included about 25 people from the Occupy Wall Street movement in Manhattan, which put out a statement condemning the vandalism. The mix of people who showed up for the march “shows that we stand together against hatred. And it makes residents here feel better,” Hikind said.

The NYPD has established special hotlines for tips. Anyone with information concerning Friday’s incident is urged to call 718-265-7327 or718-265-7387. All calls will be kept confidential.

By: Fern Sidman at the NoisyRoom

Sunday, August 7, 2011

The False Hope of the American Tea Party - Interesting Read

As Beck and others have said before - it is a spiritual war. J~

The False Hope of the American Tea Party Interesting Read!!
http://www.theignorantfishermen.com/2011/08/false-hope-of-american-tea-party.html ^ | 8/2/11

Posted on Tuesday, August 02, 2011 5:26:23 PM by The Ignorant Fisherman

With all that is going on today with the horrific spending practices here in America by our “elected and entrenched” leaders, there is much to be greatly concerned about. In our day a minority of Americans still hold onto the conservative values of our founding fathers, who sought to establish a nation under the adherence and practice of willingly subjecting themselves to the liberating absolutes of the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God.

As we look at our history (from the civil war unto this very hour) we have seen this ideal - which is rooted in reality - removed and nearly eradicated from EVERY facet of our Judeo/Christian culture and society.

"We have witnessed first hand the wasteland that our nation has become - both (socially and fiscally) – by the Lefts lawless and secular vision they have promoted and put forth"

As the godless Left has slowly and consistently filled and saturated every facet of our government branches with their lawless ideology - which totally contradicts ALL that our founders believed - we have witnessed first hand the wasteland that our nation has become - both (socially and fiscally) – by their lawless and secular vision they have promoted and put forth.

Now here at the end, Americans are either apathetic or frantically panicking to try undo 100 years of secular social engineering, socialistic fiscal polices and the greedy mismanaging of the American tax payers money. Good intentions pave the road to ruin here in the “Land of the FREE” and “Reality has been forsaken and lawlessness and anarchy has been awakened.

Delusional Preachers of this Hour

Countless conservative talk show hosts through out these 50 states are daily trying to sustain the panic stricken masses with optimistic appraisals and fictitious ideas and remedies that can NEVER fix our current decimated fiscal state, let alone our catastrophic social crisis that has exponentially sent our fiscal national debt to the moon. My dear friends, How do you save a steel sinking ship when it is filled with 95% water? The obvious answer… You do not! You abandon ship and hope that the sinking ship does not suck you into its abyss when it goes down to Davy Jones locker. That is where we are today here in America. Either you have the courage and fortitude to face this reality or you do not. The choice is yours, but whatever you choose, NOTHING will stop this ship from sinking! Do NOT deceive yourselves about our day and hour! My friend, NO Tea Party will stop the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse from their soon up coming horrific ride (Rev. 6). (Some feel that they can be delayed if we change our ways and turn back to God and prayer!)

"Either you have the courage and fortitude to face this reality or you do not. The choice is yours, but whatever you choose, NOTHING will stop this ship from sinking!"

Through out this nation, Americans (conservative, moderate and liberal) in their subjective delusional worlds and minds are vainly hoping for the best as our nation’s fiscal house is at the precipice of default and implosion. With blinded minds of ignorance and great faith these believe that we as a nation can remove this consuming exponential behemoth one day and undo 100 years of the horrific consequences of social and fiscal lawlessness.

The Boy with His Finger in the Dike

As we come near to the end of the “Great Experiment”, the Tea Party was founded and started to awaken American to our sobering fiscal realities and sought to hold Washington accountable for their actions. Thank Almighty God for this movement, but sadly and in all reality, this movement - as the little Dutch boy with his finger in the fractured dike - has only slowed down this consuming LEVIATHAN very minutely. Alarmingly, under this cry for accountability by the Tea Party, all goes on in Washington as Washington always does but at an even faster pace. My dear friends, just look at these last 6 years, big Government has morphed into Enormous and Ginormous Government! Even with the countless voices of the Tea Party, Conservative radio, active U.S. citizens and a small group of law makers, ALL goes on as usual. Nothing can stop this U.S. beast from consuming and moving us ever forward to a socialistic state of tyranny and oppression. My Friends, Are we not already there!

"Thank God for this movement, but sadly and in all reality, this movement - as the little Dutch boy with his finger in the fractured dike - has only slowed down this consuming LEVIATHAN very minutely"

Americans and those who are active in the Tea Party (we here at the IFB being of those Americans) need to comprehend the REALITY of the hour and know with ALL our hearts that America dream is over. How many Americans today are willingly gullible, naive and delusional about this reality? These cannot see past their noses on this reality. They are imprisoned in a subjective world with NO vision of the ETERNITY that awaits every single one of us (John 3:16-17; Rev. 20:1-3, 11-15; 21:8; 22:11). This is not a fatalistic or “give up” mentality. The REALITY is that the jig is up and innumerable lawless consequences and 5th column foes of our American constitution have entered into the mightily seized Alamo and it is just a matter of precious time before we ALL fall. IT MUST BE my dear friends. To think other wise is to willingly to deceive yourselves!

What to Do?

In these very sobering hours may the realities at hand bring you to the comprehension that bigger forces are at work here in America and in the world in general (Eph. 6:12)

The stage is being set for far greater evils and horrific policies of godless fallen man that will enslave and engulf the entire world (Rev.6-19; 13). Do these biblical observations sound like the ravings of a mad man? Well my friend, they are not! To be wise in this world, one must KNOW the Savior and Creator of this World (John 1:10-12, 3:3-7, 17:17, Rom. 1:16, 1 Cor. 18-31, Heb. 1:2-3). Without Almighty God and His precious Word - which is the ONLY source and key of revelation and light to unlock the subjective, delusional prisonhold of this vain and futile world, there is ABSOLUTELY NO hope!

"WITHOUT Almighty God’s Word and revelation ALL is a mystery! ALL is unanswerable! ALL is despair! ALL is hopeless!"

WITHOUT Almighty God’s Word and revelation ALL is a mystery! ALL is unanswerable! ALL is despair! ALL is hopeless! My friend, do not deceive yourselves with false hopes, false vain ambitions. False saviors, and false Utopian visions that can NEVER come to pass in a sin ravished world (Gal. 1:4). My friend, do the very best that you can in this hour for the critical and fatal condition of our nation, but do NOT place ALL your trust in it my friend, see the BIG picture from Heaven’s ETERNAL perspective and trust Almighty God for the Kingdom of Heaven is TRULY at hand!

(Eph. 5:16-17!)

Everything we (American patriots, fiscal conservatives, the tea party) do is worthwhile and needs to be done, but will only be successful if we pray and put God at the center.  The only people who don’t get that are the atheists and the secularists… who are the elites and those they have brainwashed.

In the end it will be God’s will, but as the saying goes… ‘God helps those that help themselves’ and  call on Him!!  Nobody but God knows whether we are in the End Times or if our actions can delay them.. or if we are just at the end tines for America or Western Civilization.  But those who do believe know that we will be judged in the end as a nation in respect to our stand on Israel and as individuals.  There will be no ‘collective salvation’ as the Progressives are preaching.  M~

Rare earthquake shakes Israel's coast

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August 7, 2011JERUSALEM - An unusual and rare earthquake struck Israel’s central coast Sunday, and tremors were felt as far south as Gaza. The earthquake registered 4.3 on the Richter scale, and no one was injured. “We have no trace of any historic important earthquakes in the past” in the area, earthquake-report.com reported. One Haifa resident wrote to the site, Haifa, “I felt a light shaking from side to side" at about 11:55  Sunday morning. The quake was 10 miles deep and was traced from 44 miles northwest of Tel Aviv to 49 miles west-southwest of Haifa. One Petach Tikva resident told Arutz Sheva, “The table began  to move for about 10 seconds.” Another earthquake, which registered 5.9 on the Richter scale on a Greek island, shook up hundreds of thousands of Israelis four months ago between Tzfat, in the Galilee, and Nahariya, on the northwestern cost. Two major earthquakes have struck Tzfat (Safed) in the past two centuries, the worst one striking in 1837, killing 4,000 people, destroying the city and nearby Arab villages. A smaller quake in 1927 caused damage as far south as Shechem in Samaria. –Israel Nation News

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Israel lies near the path of the left-lateral strike slip Levant Fault system which runs through Lebanon and Jordan. This fault system has been relatively quiet until seismic activity erupted in the Gulf of Aden in late 2010 and 2011 and the tear of the East African continent along the Rift Valley accelerated as was seen with the earthquake swarm and historic eruption of the Nabro volcano, which had its first eruption in Eritrea in recorded history. This region is now becoming kinetic.  –The Extinction Protocol

I remember reading a Bible prophet in the 1980s who said that the Dome of the Rock (now Moslem mosque, former Solomon's Temple) would fall because of an earthquake.  This would allow the Jews to rebuild Solomon's Temple.  Interesting. T~

h/t to Jean Stoner and Tolline Enger~

Saturday, December 4, 2010

Churches and Religion in America

The churches, Christianity, Judaism and religion in general (except Islam) are under attack right now in America… in the world, right now… today!

Yet, the largest church in New York City is Conservative

    Churches in America PART 1   -  CLICK FOR VIDEO

Dietrich Bonhoeffer… the left loves him!  This is a guy you should know about and a book you should read: Bonhoeffer: Pastor, Martyr, Prophet, Spy  The left is selling him as an man who fell away from his faith, but in reality his faith grew stronger.  This is an important book to read because the author was prompted… called to write it and it fell into Glenn Beck’s hands.

Early in the 20th Century in Germany there was theological liberalism being taught to theologians. (Exactly what is happening in America now).  And the churches allowed themselves to be co-opted, also like what is happening the United States today.  Jim Wallis, Obama’s mentor and Beck hater, is a perfect example of that.  This process is part of the Progressive agenda, just like the distortions about the Constitution and our laws that we are being sold through the teaching of case law instead of Constitutional law!

When you have a nation that considers itself Christian in a very vague and weak way (like the USA) they are very susceptible.

Bonhoeffer was very much in the know from a family with strong connections.  He and his family knew what Hitler was and what was coming. He have a huge anti-Hitler speech 3-days after Hitler came to power.

In the early 1930’s there were still some pastors who thought they could turn the tide.  But Hitler started infiltrating the churches and taking over almost immediately!  Bonhoeffer wrote a paper called the Church and the Jewish Question. He coined the phrase religionless Christianity, which the Progressives have spun into a lie to serve their purpuses.  (There are lessons in the tower of babel that we all must learn and remember.)

Bonhoeffer came to America before he was ordained and was inspired by a friend who was a pastor at the Abyssinian Church in NYC and it changed him.  They were preaching and experience true Christianity rather than what was being taught and preached in Germany.

Churches in America PART 2  -  CLICK FOR VIDEO

Every pastor who signed the petition against the infiltration of the churches was decimated and most were killed.

Bonhoeffer was very much like Whitfield her in the early United States.

Bonhoeffer becomes part of the underground, helping smuggle Jews out of Germany.  He leaves and comes to the United States but feels called to return to Germany and fight for his nation, his people, for Christians and Jews.  When he returns to Germany he becomes a spy.

Bonhoeffer began speaking out against Hitler in 1933. He becomes a spy in 1940 and becomes dicey for him.  He was arrested for sneaking 7-Jews out to Switzerland.  After Valkerie, a close assassination attempt on Hitler’s life, Bonhoeffer was moved to a concentration camp where he ultimately died. This man was a hero, and we need heroes in life… especially because of what is ahead of us.  It really is a must read book.  The author feels he was chosen/forces by God to write it, because we need heroes like Bonhoeffer now…

Churches in America PART 3  -  CLICK FOR VIDEO

Beck is working on another book… (working title) God’s Blessing and Curse.  He also says it is a book he didn’t want to write but feels called to.

Beck and most patriots feel that God is actively involved in preserving man’s freedom, and in the end he never loses.  But in order to hear him we need to get ride of the stuff… the noise… the distractions.

Why do we always fail in our New Year’s resolutions???  To understand that we need look at the holidays as a trilogy:  Thanksgiving  * Christmas/Hanukkah  *  New Years.

Beck had the pastor of the largest church (a conservative church) in New York City on and one of the original members or new Black Robe Regiment. 

If you church is preaching social justice and collective salvation… time to change churches and get involved in changing the direction of your church!!

Court case in 1972:  The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that all beliefs fall into two categories: preference and convictions, and convictions are protected by the Constitution, they are part of who you are.

If you think it isn’t happening in America… that our church and religion(s) aren’t being attacked and infiltrated just look at the consistent war on Christmas and Christianity in the U.S. and on religion all over the world:

BILLBOARD BATTLE: CATHOLICS PUT UP PRO-CHRISTMAS BILLBOARD NEAR ATHEISTS‘ ’REASON’ MESSAGE

Recently, a group called American Atheists purchased a large, anti-Christmas billboard outside the heavily-traveled Lincoln Tunnel between New York and New Jersey. Now, a Catholic group has started a billboard war of sorts by purchasing a pro-Christmas message of its own on the other side of the tunnel.

“You Know It’s Real: This Season Celebrate Jesus,” a billboard for the Catholic League says on the New York side of the tunnel. That’s in response to the American Atheist billboard on the New Jersey side, which says “You Know It’s a Myth: This Season Celebrate Reason.”

“We decided to counterpunch after a donor came forward seeking to challenge the anti-Christmas statement by American Atheists,” Catholic League President Bill Donahue said in a statement on the group’s website. “Our approach is positive, and services the common good. Theirs is negative, and is designed to sow division. It’s what they do.”

“So after Christian motorists have had their sensibilities assaulted as they exit New Jersey, they will experience a sense of joy, and satisfaction, as they enter New York City,” he added. “It’s what we do.”

GOP SENATOR BOYCOTTS HOMETOWN ‘HOLIDAY’ PARADE

When Sen. Jim Inhofe’s (R-OK) hometown parade of lights took the word “Christmas” out of the title, Inhofe had had enough. Now he’s taking something else out of the parade: himself.

Inhofe annually appears in Tulsa, Oklahoma’s parade of lights by riding atop his horse, but said he will not do so again until the name is changed back to the “Christmas Parade of Lights.”

“Last year, the forces of political correctness removed the word ‘Christmas’ and replaced it with ‘Holiday’ instead,”  Inhofe told Tulsa World. “I am deeply saddened and disappointed by this change.”

Mirroring a decision he made last year, the senator said “I‘m not going to ride in a Christmas parade that doesn’t recognize Christmas.” He added, “I am hopeful that the good people of Tulsa and the city’s leadership will demand a correction to this shameful attempt to take Christ, the true reason for our celebration, out of the parade’s title. Until the parade is again named the Christmas Parade of Lights, I will not participate.”

Inhofe served as Tulsa’s mayor from 1978 to 1984. His decision to pull out last year went unannounced so as not to detract from the health care debate.

Inhofe‘s position is in contrast to Tulsa’s current mayor, Dewey Bartlett, who admitted he is in essence being held hostage by political correctness.

“If it was up to me, I’d call it a Christmas parade, but I also understand that we have a diverse community, and I’m sensitive to the importance of the many cultures and traditions that make up our city,” Bartlett said.  Go Here to See Video.

Chase Bank Orders Tree Removed

 

Chase Bank told a businessman to remove the Christmas tree he donated to a local branch because it could offend people.

Antonio Morales, owner of Bellagio Day Spa in Southlake, had assembled and decorated a 9-foot-tall tree in the lobby of the Chase Bank branch at 1700 E. Southlake Boulevard as a favor to the branch manager, who is one of his clients.

The tree remained in the lobby from the Monday before Thanksgiving until Tuesday. Morales said his friend called him Wednesday to tell him the tree had to go. She later showed him an e-mail from JPMorgan Chase saying that the tree had to be removed because some people were offended by it.

READ THE REST OF THE STORY AT STAR-TELEGRAM.COM  - God Help Us!!

PHILLY‘S CHRISTMAS VILLAGE GETS ’HOLIDAY’ MAKEOVER

For the past three years, Philadelphia’s German Christmas Village has hosted festive booths and Christmas tree vendors in Dilworth Plaza located near city hall. But this year, the village’s arched entrance labeled “Christmas Village” will be replaced with “Holiday Village.”

According to local news reports, the request for the change came from Managing Director Richard Negrin. City spokesman Mark McDonald said Negrin made the request after the city received complaints from nearby workers and residents. “As a city of great diversity, one shouldn't‘t be surprised that there’s a difference of views when it comes to symbols and words,” McDonald told the Philadelphia Daily News.

In addition, McDonald said the city is working on an official policy to address such events set up on city property in the future.

The German American Marketing Inc., the company which runs the Christmas Village every year, is reportedly happy to accommodate the city’s request, but noted that brochures and posters would keep the “Christmas” title. “People have to go to public buildings. They shouldn’t feel offended,” the company’s spokesman said. “It’s been very successful the last two years. People like the name. We built it like a German Christmas market. We did not think a lot about it.”

Philly Christmas Village

Video:  Christmas Village in Philadelphia

Though the Village is clearly focused on Christmas, the Daily News adds that ornaments and decorations sold at the event are “largely of the secular variety, like elves, Santa’s and colored balls,” interspersed by an occasional nativity scene.

GOD TO RELEASE MEMOIR IN 2011

God is preparing to speak to you in another, hopefully, best-seller. According to publisher Simon and Schuster, the Almighty is looking to follow up his all-time number one book The Bible with a memoir.

But you‘ll never guess who will be God’s (Holy) ghost writer. According to Entertainment Weekly, Jon Stewart’s former* “The Daily Show” head writer and executive producer David Javerbaum will be serving in that capacity.

“God is represented by a burning bush, the Greek letters a and ‡, and, in this case, the Levine Greenberg Literary Agency, the same agency that represents David Javerbaum,” the publisher said in a meant-to-be funny press release.

“We feel like we are the Chosen Publisher,” Simon & Schuster’s Executive Vice President and Publisher Jonathan Karp told Entertainment Weekly. “A lot of writers are creative, but this writer is really creative. And we think He can produce the manuscript quickly: More than seven days, but less than a year.”

The yet-to-be-titled tell-all memoir is due out in 2011.

Apple pulls Manhattan Declaration app following petition

Petition Asking Apple to Reinstate Christian App Gains Steam

Perhaps it is time for Christians to be offended and to pull their accounts!!  Stand-up!!

God Rest Ye Merry Merchants

Great book on Losing Our Religion written by an atheist, S.E. Cupp. (In many ways we are allowing our religion to be stolen from us.) She said she felt she was the perfect person to write this book because she didn’t have a dog in the hunt.

Storm Warning

Broke

America by Heart

Knowledge and a belief in God: Understanding our own religion(s), the roots of political correctness, America’s true history, and the religion and history of our enemies and then standing up with the power of that knowledge is what will save America… freedom!

Related: 

Saving America - American Revival (Formula)

Video:  Does God Exist? Albert Einstein

Restoring Honor

The Worldwide Offensive to Spread Islam Could be America’s (along with the rest of the world) Greatest Battle of all… ignoring that fact or not understanding the fight could be our downfall.

How much time before "western progressives" embrace Islam and Sharia law?  Or better question, to what extent have they already embraced them?  Have you checked you children’s textbooks lately?  NASA’s Muslim Outreach

Stop Sharia Law in America!  by Brigitte Gabriel, author of They Must Be Stopped

Offensive War to Spread Islam

Non-Violent Imam Beats His Wife Bloody While Quoting the Koran

“Killing unbelievers is a small matter for us”  Egypt police murders unarmed Christians”

Yodeling Offends Praying Muslims, Say Judges (In Austria)

Video:  Christmas Village in Philadelphia

Though the Village is clearly focused on Christmas, the Daily News adds that ornaments and decorations sold at the event are “largely of the secular variety, like elves, Santa’s and colored balls,” interspersed by an occasional nativity scene.

GOD TO RELEASE MEMOIR IN 2011

God is preparing to speak to you in another, hopefully, best-seller. According to publisher Simon and Schuster, the Almighty is looking to follow up his all-time number one book The Bible with a memoir.

But you‘ll never guess who will be God’s (Holy) ghost writer. According to Entertainment Weekly, Jon Stewart’s former* “The Daily Show” head writer and executive producer David Javerbaum will be serving in that capacity.

“God is represented by a burning bush, the Greek letters a and ‡, and, in this case, the Levine Greenberg Literary Agency, the same agency that represents David Javerbaum,” the publisher said in a meant-to-be funny press release.

“We feel like we are the Chosen Publisher,” Simon & Schuster’s Executive Vice President and Publisher Jonathan Karp told Entertainment Weekly. “A lot of writers are creative, but this writer is really creative. And we think He can produce the manuscript quickly: More than seven days, but less than a year.”

The yet-to-be-titled tell-all memoir is due out in 2011.

Apple pulls Manhattan Declaration app following petition

Petition Asking Apple to Reinstate Christian App Gains Steam

Perhaps it is time for Christians to be offended and to pull their accounts!!  Stand-up!!

God Rest Ye Merry Merchants

Great book on Losing Our Religion written by an atheist, S.E. Cupp. (In many ways we are allowing our religion to be stolen from us.) She said she felt she was the perfect person to write this book because she didn’t have a dog in the hunt.

Storm Warning

Broke

America by Heart

Knowledge and a belief in God: Understanding our own religion(s), the roots of political correctness, America’s true history, and the religion and history of our enemies and then standing up with the power of that knowledge is what will save America… freedom!

Related: 

Saving America - American Revival (Formula)

Video:  Does God Exist? Albert Einstein

Restoring Honor

The Worldwide Offensive to Spread Islam Could be America’s (along with the rest of the world) Greatest Battle of all… ignoring that fact or not understanding the fight could be our downfall.

How much time before "western progressives" embrace Islam and Sharia law?  Or better question, to what extent have they already embraced them?  Have you checked you children’s textbooks lately?  NASA’s Muslim Outreach

Stop Sharia Law in America!  by Brigitte Gabriel, author of They Must Be Stopped

Offensive War to Spread Islam

Non-Violent Imam Beats His Wife Bloody While Quoting the Koran

“Killing unbelievers is a small matter for us”  Egypt police murders unarmed Christians”

Yodeling Offends Praying Muslims, Say Judges (In Austria)