Obama’s Love for Jihadis and Hate for Christians

by Raymond Ibrahim on November 19, 2015

Obama recently lashed out against the idea of giving preference to Christian refugees, describing it as “shameful”: “That’s not American. That’s not who we are. We don’t have religious tests to our compassion,” loftily added the American president.

Accordingly, the administration is still determined to accept 10,000 more Syrian refugees, almost all of whom will be Muslim, despite the fact that some are ISIS operatives, while many share the ISIS worldview (as explained below).

Yet right as Obama was grandstanding about “who we are,” statistics were released indicating that “the current [refugee] system overwhelmingly favors Muslim refugees. Of the 2,184 Syrian refugees admitted to the United States so far, only 53 are Christians while 2,098 are Muslim.”

Aside from the obvious—or to use Obama’s own word, “shameful”—pro-Muslim, anti-Christian bias evident in these statistics, there are a number of other troubling factors as well.

For starters, the overwhelming majority of “refugees” being brought into the United States are not just Muslim, but Sunnis—the one Muslim sect that the Islamic State is not persecuting and displacing. 

After all, ISIS—and most Islamic terrorist groups (Boko Haram, Al Qaeda, Al Shabaab, Hamas, et al)—are all Sunnis.   Even Obama was arguably raised a Sunni.

In this context, how are Sunnis “refugees”?  Who are they fleeing?  Considering that the Obama administration defines refugees as people “persecuted by their government,” most of those coming into the U.S. either aided or at least sympathized with the jihad against Assad (even if they only revealed their true colors when the time was right).

Simply put, some 98% of all refugees belong to the same Islamic sect that ISIS does.  And many of them, unsurprisingly, share the same vision—such as the “refugees” who recently murdered some 120 people in France, or the “refugees” who persecute Christian minorities in European camps and settlements.  (None of this should be surprising considering that Al Azhar—the Sunni world’s most prestigious university of Islamic law, which co-hosted Obama’s 2009 “A New Beginning” speech—was recently exposed as teaching and legitimizing all the atrocities that ISIS commits.)

As for those who are being raped, slaughtered, and enslaved based on their non-Sunni religious identity—not by Assad, but by so-called “rebel” forces (AKA jihadis)—many of them are being denied refuge in America.

Thus, although Christians were approximately 10 percent of Syria’s population in 2011, only one percent has been granted refuge in America. This despite the fact that, from a strictly humanitarian point of view—and humanitarianism is the chief reason being cited in accepting refugees, Obama’s “compassion”—Christians should receive priority simply because they are the most persecuted group in the Middle East.

At the hands of the Islamic State, which supposedly precipitated the migrant crisis, Christians have been repeatedly forced to renounce Christ or die; they have been enslaved and raped; and they have had more than 400 of their churches desecrated and destroyed.[i]

ISIS has committed no such atrocities against fellow Sunnis, they who are being accepted into the U.S. in droves.  Nor does Assad enslave, behead, or crucify people based on their religious identity (despite Jeb Bush’s recent, and absurd, assertions).

Obama should further prioritize Christian refugees simply because his own policies in the Middle East have directly exacerbated their plight.  Christians and other religions minorities did not flee from Bashar Assad’s Syria, Saddam Hussein’s Iraq, or Muamar Gaddafi’s Libya.  Their systematic persecution began only after the U.S. interfered in those nations in the name of “democracy” but succeeding in only uncorking the jihadi terrorists that the dictators had long kept suppressed.

Incidentally, prioritizing Christian refugees would not merely be an altruistic gesture or the U.S. government’s way of righting its wrongs: rather it brings many benefits to America’s security. (Unlike Muslims or even Yazidis, Christians are easily assimilated into Western nations due to the shared Christian heritage, and they bring trustworthy language and cultural skills that are beneficial to the “war on terror.”)

Finally, no one should be shocked by these recent revelations of the Obama administration’s pro-Muslim and anti-Christian policies.   They fit a clear and established pattern of religious bias within his administration.  For example:

1) When inviting scores of Muslim representatives, the State Department is in the habit of denying visas to solitary Christian representatives.

2) When a few persecuted Iraqi Christians crossed the border into the U.S., they were thrown in prison for several months and then sent back to the lion’s den to be enslaved, raped, or murdered.

3) When the Nigerian government waged a strong offensive against Boko Haram, killing some of its terrorists, Secretary of State John Kerry fumed and called for the “human rights” of the jihadis (who regularly slaughter and rape Christians and burn their churches).  More recently, Kerry “urged Tajikistan not to go overboard in its crackdown on Islam.”

4) When persecuted Coptic Christians planned on joining Egypt’s anti-Muslim Brotherhood revolution of 2013, the U.S. said no.
       
5) When persecuted Iraqi and Syrian Christians asked for arms to join the opposition fighting ISIS, D.C. refused.
       
6) When the UN Security Council held a meeting to discuss the genocide against Christians and other minorities, although “many high level delegations from UN member states addressed the Security Council meeting, some at the Foreign Minister level, the United States failed to send … a high ranking member of the State Department.”

Most recently, as the White House works on releasing a statement accusing ISIS of committing genocide against  religious minorities such as Yazidis — who are named and recognized in the statement — Obama officials are arguing that Christians “do not appear to meet the high bar set out in the genocide treaty” and thus likely not be mentioned.

In short, and to use the president’s own words, it is the Obama administration’s own foreign and domestic policies that are “shameful,” that are “not American,” and that do not represent “who we are.”

Yet the question remains: Will Americans take notice and do anything about their leader’s policies—which welcome Islamic jihadis while ignoring their victims—or will their indifference continue until they too become victims of the jihad, in a repeat of Paris or worse?


Obama Accused of ‘Crimes Against Humanity’

by Raymond Ibrahim on November 7, 2013
CBN News

According to Egyptian newspaper El Watan, a group of Egyptian lawyers has submitted a complaint charging U.S. president Barrack Hussein Obama with crimes against humanity at the International Criminal Court.

The complaint charges Obama of being an accessory to the Muslim Brotherhood, which incited widespread violence in Egypt both before and after the June 30 Revolution.

Along with Obama, the complaint reproduced by El Watan mentions several Brotherhood members by name, beginning with the leader of the organization Muhammad Badie, and other top ranking leaders such as Mohamed al-Beltagy, Essam al-Erian, and Safwat Hegazi, adding that “Obama cooperated, incited, and assisted the armed elements of the Muslim Brotherhood in the commission of crimes against humanity in the period from 3/7/2013-8/18/2013, in the Arab Republic of Egypt.”

According to the published text, the complaint begins by quoting Article 7/1 of the Statute of the International Criminal Court, titled “Crimes against humanity,” which is reproduced below:

Article 7
Crimes against humanity

1. For the purpose of this Statute, “crime against humanity” means any of the following
acts when committed as part of a widespread or systematic attack directed against
any civilian population, with knowledge of the attack:
(a) Murder;
(b) Extermination;
(c) Enslavement;
(d) Deportation or forcible transfer of population;
(e) Imprisonment or other severe deprivation of physical liberty in violation of fundamental rules of international law;
(f) Torture;
(g) Rape, sexual slavery, enforced prostitution, forced pregnancy, enforced
sterilization, or any other form of sexual violence of comparable gravity;
(h) Persecution against any identifiable group or collectivity on political, racial,
national, ethnic, cultural, religious, gender as defined in paragraph 3, or other
grounds that are universally recognized as impermissible under international
law, in connection with any act referred to in this paragraph or any crime
within the jurisdiction of the Court;
(i) Enforced disappearance of persons;
(j) The crime of apartheid;
(k) Other inhumane acts of a similar character intentionally causing great
suffering, or serious injury to body or to mental or physical health.

Next, the complaint shows how Muslim Brotherhood leadership violated some of the above definitions, for example, by torturing, mutilating, raping, and killing Egyptians in their “sit in” camps (first reported here), with a highlight on the role the Brotherhood played in inciting violence and the killing of peaceful protesters around Itthadiya Palace back in December.

Above and beyond the accusations of crimes against humanity that the lawyer-drafted complaint cited by El Watan levels against the Brotherhood, one need only look to the fate of Egypt’s Christian minority, who were especially targeted by the Muslim Brotherhood—and thus, by extension, their supporter, Obama—to see numerous examples of nearly every aforementioned definition of crimes against humanity, as follows:

Religious Persecution and Apartheid (see h and j)

Right after Morsi was ousted, the Muslim Brotherhood, including its supreme leader, Muhammad Badie, and its spiritual leader, Sheikh Yusuf Qaradawi, as well as several of the other Brotherhood members mentioned in the complaint, publicly scapegoated the Christian minority for daring to support the popular June 30 Revolution (that is, for acting like equal citizens as opposed to cowed dhimmis as required by Islamic law).  The aftermath of the atrocities committed against the Copts are well known (to those who do not exclusively rely on the so-called mainstream media), and include the torching, destroying, and plundering of at some 85 churches, some of which were ancient.  Islam’s back flag was raised above some churches; anti-Christian graffiti littered the sides of other churches and Coptic homes.

Murder and Extermination (see a and b)

Among many others to be murdered in response to Brotherhood-incitement against the Copts, a ten-year-old girl was shot and killed while walking back from Bible class.  In the Sinai, a young Coptic priest was shot dead in front of his church, while the body of another Copt was found mutilated and beheaded.  Four other Christians were slaughtered by Muslims in Luxor province.  Most recently, a church wedding was attacked, leaving, among others, two girls, aged eight and twelve, dead and riddled with bullets.

As for “extermination,” the Muslim Brotherhood and its supporters have long been threatening the Copts with annihilation if they ever opposed them.  Back in December 2012, Safwat Hegazi (a leading Brotherhood member named in the complaint, publicly declared during a Brotherhood rally:

A message to the church of Egypt, from an Egyptian Muslim: I tell the church—by Allah, and again, by Allah—if you conspire and unite with the remnants [opposition] to bring Morsi down, that will be another matter [screams of "Allah Akbar!" followed by chants of "With our soul, with our blood, we give to you, O Islam!"]… [T]here are red lines—and our red line is the legitimacy of Dr. Muhammad Morsi. Whoever splashes water on it, we will splash blood on him” [followed by more wild shouts of "Allah Akbar!"]

Around the same time, and more to the point, Dr. Wagdi Ghoneim—another vocal Brotherhood agitator who earlier praised Allah for the death of the late Coptic Pope Shenouda, cursing him to hell and damnation in a video he posted on YouTube—made another video telling Egypt’s Christians:

You are playing with fire in Egypt, I swear, the first people to be burned by the fire are you [Copts].” … The day Egyptians—and I don’t even mean the Muslim Brotherhood or Salafis, regular Egyptians—feel that you are against them, you will be wiped off the face of the earth. I’m warning you now: do not play with fire!… What do you think—that America will protect you? Let’s be very clear, America will not protect you. If so, it would have protected the Christians of Iraq when they were being butchered!

Ghoneim’s words have proven prophetic—an indicator that this Egyptian hatemongering sheikh, who was expelled under Hosni Mubarak, knows the conduct of America’s leadership better than most Americans.  Along with Iraq’s and Egypt’s Christians, he could have mentioned the Christians of Syria as well, who are being decimated thanks to Obama’s support for al-Qaeda and other Islamic terrorists, AKA, “freedom fighters.”

Deportation, Extortion, Kidnapping, and General Abuse of Copts (see c, d, e, f, g, and i)

Since the Muslim Brotherhood publicly denounced the Copts, entire towns and villages have been emptied of Christians—for example, more than 100 Christian families from El Arish. After mentioning the mass destruction of churches during a recent conference, and speaking of a different incident, Dr. Sherif Doss, an Egyptian activist, said, “But worst of all, about 140 families were evicted from their own homes; and worse still is that, not only were they thrown out of their houses, but their shops and properties were robbed and destroyed… General Sisi has promised to rebuild the churches and this takes time to be done. But we can’t wait all that time for those people destitute and in the streets, with no place to live and nowhere to work…. These people are in a very bad condition. If you go and see these villages, you will be amazed—it is as if a nuclear bomb exploded there.

People burned and plundered their homes without mercy.”

Similarly, Muslim Brotherhood supporters are extorting Copts, rationalized in the context of making them pay jizya—the money, or tribute, that conquered non-Muslims historically had to pay to their Islamic overlords “with willing submission and while feeling themselves subdued” to safeguard their existence, as indicated in Koran 9:29.  For instance, the roughly 15,000 Christian Copts of Dalga village in south Minya province were recently forced to pay jizya.  In some cases, those not able to pay were attacked, their wives and children beaten and/or kidnapped.  As a result, some 40 Christian families had fled Dalga, joining the ever growing list of displaced Christians in the Middle East.

Days before the June 30 Revolution, letters addressed to the Copts threatened them not to join the protests against Morsi, otherwise their “businesses, cars, homes, schools, and churches” might “catch fire”—which of course they all did. The message concluded by saying “If you are not worried about any of these, then worry about your children and your homes.”

Such threats, as mentioned, were hardly limited to anonymous letters.  During a TV interview, Sheikh Essam Abdulamek, a then member of parliament’s Shura Council, warned Egypt’s Christians against participating in the June 30 Revolution against Morsi, threatening them by saying “Do not sacrifice your children” since “general Muslim opinion will not be silent about the ousting of the president [Morsi].”

And the children of Copts have certainly been targeted—both during and after Morsi’s tenure.  Some, especially young girls, are regularly abducted, raped, and shamed into converting to Islam and “marrying” their rapists. Coptic boys have increasingly been abducted from the doorsteps of their churches and held for ransom. Recently, a 6-year-old Christian boy was murdered by his kidnapper—after the boy’s family paid the ransom.  (Read more about the jihad on Egypt’s Christian children.)

——

In short, by simply focusing on the plight of Egypt’s Christians, almost every criterion found under the category of “crimes against humanity”—including murder, extermination, deportation, torture, rape, disappearance, apartheid and religious persecution—are met.

Only one is necessary for the charge to stick.

As for the Obama administration’s support for the Brotherhood, if most Americans are clueless or indifferent about it, average Egyptians have long known and resented it—hence the many large placards and signs held during the June 30 Revolution calling on Obama to stop supporting terrorism and calling on Americans to wake up.

One need only follow the words and deeds of Anne Patterson, John McCain, Lindsay Graham, Hillary Clinton, et. al. to know that the U.S president is a firm supporter of the crimes-against-humanity-committing Muslim Brotherhood.

Of course, whatever the merits of El Watan’s report—here is another English-language article talking about apparently a different complaint of crimes against humanity leveled against Obama by Coptic activists—all these complaints seem futile, as the U.S. is not a signatory to the International Criminal Court.

However, all technicalities aside, the facts are clear: by any definition, the Muslim Brotherhood and its supporters have committed numerous crimes against humanity in Egypt, especially in the context of the Christian Copts; and by its ongoing support for the Brotherhood, the Obama administration is complicit.   Remember this next time the Obama administration cites concerns about “human rights” violations as reason to involve the U.S. in war—as it recently tried to do in Syria, again, to support more Islamic terrorists who are committing even worse crimes against humanity.


Atheists provide answer to big Obama election mystery

By Catholic Online (NEWS CONSORTIUM)
12/10/2012

Religiously unaffiliated form coalition with secular agenda.

A baffling mystery that has troubled Americans since early November may finally have an answer; how did Obama, with so much opposition arrayed against him, manage to eke out the votes to win the election? Demographic data suggests Obama had the support of a previously ignored coalition.

LOS ANGELES, CA (Catholic Online) - That secret coalition served as Obama's fifth column in the election, propelling him to victory, even in those states where Catholics and Protestants soundly rejected him. That coalition was made of atheists, agnostics, and those who consider themselves "religiously unaffiliated" and "spiritual but not religious."

It is no secret that the number of Americans who do not identify with an organized church is growing. According to surveys, they might comprise as much as 20 percent of the population. In the 2012 election, exit polls suggest they were also 12 percent of the voters who participated that day and that small margin was just enough to return Obama to the White House.

According to Gregory Smith of the Pew Forum on religion and public life, "This is a striking development in American politics. There's no question that the religiously unaffiliated are a very important and politically consequential group," Smith told NPR in an interview.

Even in swing states where Romney won Protestant and Catholic voters by small margins, the support of "unaffiliated" voters was enough to steal state after state for Obama. While the unaffiliated can do nothing in the face of the Christian majority, when Christians are divided, as they were in the most recent election, the unaffiliated vote can become decisive.

What's most surprising is that even after the election, this group was largely ignored. Analysts looked at women, at Catholics, and at Hispanics. Each group was credited with handing Obama victory for one reason or another. However, exit polling data suggests the religiously unaffiliated proved to be the key bloc in a number of places.

What this means is that future candidates will have to address this previously unrecognized block in some fashion, if they want to win hotly contested races.

What is most interesting about the bloc is that they identify with the left and democratic issues much more than the right. This does not bode well for conservatives. Why this is remains a mystery, but surveys say they tend to support anti-life policies, redefining marriage, and other socially liberal causes.

And their number is only growing.

The antidote is twofold. First, conservatives, Christians especially, cannot afford to divide on what issues and candidates they support. They must unite to build a wall against the creeping secular threat to traditional values. Second, greater efforts must be made to recover the youth and insulate them from attacks by atheists, and those who say they are "spiritual but not religious." To make such a claim is tantamount to a sheep saying the shepherd is unnecessary.

For now, political demographics are changing and will continue to change the nature of the political discourse in this nation. If we desire to keep a Christian nation then we should redouble our efforts now before Obama's fifth column dictates the outcome of our political future.



Obama Rebuilds Mosques While Churches Burn

Posted by Frank Crimi
Front Page Magazine
September 26, 2012

While Christian churches are being destroyed on a near daily basis in Muslim countries throughout the world, the Obama administration is investing millions of dollars to rebuild overseas Islamic mosques and minarets.

According to the State Department, the mosque restoration program, first reported on back in 2010, is a “cultural preservation” project designed to “fight Islamic extremism by building relationships with Islamic leaders.”

To that end, the State Department, through the US Agency for International Development, is spending millions to preserve mosques and minarets in 27 different Islamic countries.
 
While the State Department would not reveal the entire cost of its Muslim outreach program, it did acknowledge one restoration project, the refurbishing of Egypt’s 1,300-year-old Amr Ibn El-Aas Mosque, was part of a $770 million program to rebuild Cairo’s sewer system.

Perhaps the State Department’s reticence in sharing the full fiscal details of its taxpayer-funded Islamic goodwill project centered on the fact that federal regulations prohibit USAID funds from being used for saving structures which are used for “inherently religious activities.”

Of course, it should be noted, that the “inherently religious activities” of those overseas Islamic mosques includes preaching hatred of Jews, Christians and Americans, incitement to terrorist activity, and global imposition of Islamic rule.

In recent days, Muslim clerics in at least 20 Islamic countries have used these “houses of worship” to urge their congregations to take to the streets in violent protests to defend Islam over the release of the video “Innocence of Muslims.”

So, given that, it’s not surprising that the Obama administration’s diligent efforts to help preserve the religious heritage of Islam has failed to engender in its Muslim beneficiaries a similar respect toward preserving the religious heritage of Christianity in the Islamic world.

For example, while the State Department was busy repairing Egyptian mosques, scores of Egypt’s Coptic Christian churches were being burned down by Muslim mobs, one which included St. George’s Church in the Egyptian village of Merinab.

The 100-year-old St. George’s was in the midst of its own renovation when local Muslim sensibilities were offended by the presence of a cross, bell, and dome on the church’s roof. So, in the interest of “community peace,” church leaders agreed to take down the spire and cross, leaving the dome intact.

Unfortunately, that compromise proved insufficient to soothe Muslim outrage, leading a Muslim throng numbering in the thousands to descend on the church, burn it to the ground, while shouting, “Kill all the Christians.”

In 2010, the State Department provided monetary support for saving three mosques on Zanzibar Island off the coast of Tanzania, mosques which included the 900-year-old Kizimkazi mosque, considered one of the oldest Islamic buildings on the coast of East Africa.

That generous American donation was repaid in July 2012 when Muslim mobs, shouting, “Away with the church — we do not want infidels to spoil our community, especially our children,” burned down three Christian churches on Zanzibar Island.

In 2011 the State Department provided funds to restore the 15th century Gobarau Minaret in Katsina State in Nigeria’s predominantly Muslim north, an area which has become a virtual killing field for Christians at the hands of Muslim militants, led by the al-Qaeda-linked terror group Boko Haram.

Since 2009 over 288 Christian churches in Nigeria have been burned, thousands of Christian-owned homes destroyed, and over 2,000 Christians killed, including in July 2012 when fifty members of a northern Nigerian church were burned to death in their pastor’s house.

Finally, the State Department provided taxpayer funds to restore the 18th century Golden Mosque in Lahore, in Pakistan’s Punjab province, an area which happened to be the scene of an assault on a Christian colony in July 2009 by thousands of Muslims who set fire to over 50 houses and two churches, burning to death eight people, including a seven-year-old child.

Unfortunately, the ongoing eradication of Christian churches in the Islamic world shows no signs of abating any time soon, especially given comments like those of Sheik Abdul Aziz bin Abdullah, the grand mufti of Saudi Arabia, who recently declared that it is “necessary to destroy all the churches of the region.”

While Aziz bin Abdullah’s clarion call was directed toward Christian churches on the Arabian Peninsula, it has nevertheless been earnestly followed by Muslims in Islamic countries throughout Africa, the Mideast, and Asia.
 
For example, in the past two months Muslims in Kenya have attacked 11 churches, assaults which include grenade attacks on a crowd of 150 Christians attending an outdoor church meeting, killing two and wounding more than 30; and one attack during a church service that killed one and injured 16.

In June the Sudanese government bulldozed three church buildings to the ground and confiscated three Catholic schools in the capital of Khartoum, saying that such buildings are now unwelcome in the Islamic-ruled country.

In Afghanistan, where more than 2,000 American troops have died protecting that country, the last public Christian church was demolished in October 2011, forcing Afghan Christians to practice their faith in underground “House Churches.”

In Indonesia, a ministerial decree has led to the closure of more than 400 Christian churches. While Christian worshippers must make due in storefront churches or, lacking that, parking lots and the side of streets, it hasn’t stopped Muslim mobs from trying to prevent those services.

Specifically, in May a horde of 600 Muslims, led by Indonesia’s Islamic Defenders Front, hurled bags of urine, rotten eggs, ditchwater and stones at over 100 Christians attempting to attend church service in an empty parking lot in the city of Bekasi, located outside the capital of Jakarta.

Unfortunately, news of that type of anti-Christian behavior was not included in the recent public service announcement the State Department aired on Pakistani television in which it condemned religious intolerance in the video “Innocence of Muslims.”

Instead, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, while lamenting the hurt feelings the video engendered among Muslims, said the Islamic faith “respects the fundamental dignity of human beings,” and that it is “a violation of that fundamental dignity to wage attacks on innocents.”

Ironically, as Clinton’s public apology was being aired, St. Paul’s Lutheran Church, an 82-year-old church in northwest Pakistan, was being burned by a mob of hundreds of Muslims protesting the offending video.

Since that attack was, in the words of Mrs. Clinton, “a violation of that fundamental dignity to wage attacks on innocents,” perhaps she will inquire if there are any funds still available in her mosque restoration program to help cover the costs of rebuilding St. Paul’s Lutheran Church.


HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius Violated Federal Law in Promoting Obama

By Stoyan Zaimov , Christian Post Reporter
September 13, 2012

Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, whose contraceptives bill earlier this year sparked major protests by the Roman Catholic Church, has been accused by federal agents of violating federal law by campaigning for President Barack Obama.

"That the secretary violated federal law in this manner is disturbing, but hardly a surprise," said a spokeswoman for Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah). "Since almost day one, this administration has had a singular focus on politicking – not governing – that's borne out by the secretary ignoring a strict prohibition on electioneering while working for federal taxpayers."

The Office of Special Counsel (OSC) revealed on Wednesday that Sebelius gave a speech in February at a Human Rights Campaign event in Charlotte, N.C., that noted how "imperative" it was to re-elect President Obama.

"One of the imperatives is to make sure that we not only come together here in Charlotte to present the nomination to the president, but we make sure that in November, he continues to be president for another four years," Sebelius said at the event.

The Obama administration has backed Sebelius's contraceptives mandate bill, which requires religious employers to provide health insurance that covers contraception, sterilization and some abortifacient drugs. The mandate has been strongly opposed by conservative Christians, in particular the Roman Catholic Church, who have even threatened to suspend their charity programs over what they see as a violation of their religious freedom.

On her part, Sebelius has admitted that she made a mistake in her speech, but said that she does not believe she should have been found guilty of violating the Hatch Act, which is a 1939 federal law that prohibits executive level employees from promoting specific politicians or parties.

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"The report correctly states that I have acknowledged that the statements that you have identified were a mistake," Sebelius said in a Sept. 7 letter to the Office of Special Counsel, Reuters reported.

The White House also acknowledged that the HHS Secretary had made a mistake, and the Department of Health and Human Services reimbursed the U.S. Treasury for the cost of the trip to Charlotte.

"This error was immediately acknowledged by the secretary, promptly corrected, and no taxpayer dollars were misused," White House spokesman Eric Schultz said in a statement. "This administration holds itself to the highest ethical standards, which is why President Obama has installed the toughest ethics rules of any administration in history – beginning on his first day in office, when he signed an executive order instituting unprecedented reforms," he added.

In the same investigation, Sebelius was also accused of choosing party lines by urging the audience to "elect a Democratic governor here in North Carolina," calling for the defeat of a ballot seeking to preserve the traditional definition of marriage as a union between one man and one woman.

"If there was a violation of the Hatch Act based on the use of my title, I believe the violation was technical and minor," Sebelius said, noting that she does not believe she will receive any punishment. "These are not the types of violations that the Hatch Act is intended to address."



Christian conservatives decry Obama 'war on religion'

By Katie Sanders, Times Staff Writer
August 27, 2012
Tampa Bay Times

TAMPA — Christian conservatives have said it before, but this time they say they mean it more than ever: President Barack Obama's "war on religion" makes this year's election the most important in American history.

"The church has allowed this to happen," said Ralph Reed, founder of the Faith and Freedom Coalition, noting 17 million evangelical Christians didn't vote in 2008. "I vowed that after the 2008 elections that as long as I have breath in my body that was never going to happen in America again."

Newt Gingrich, Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi and U.S. Senate candidate Ted Cruz of Texas were among party heavyweights lined up by the Faith and Freedom Coalition on Sunday to berate Obama's social and economic policies.

Addressing 1,000 people at the Tampa Theatre, the speakers lauded Mitt Romney but steered clear of talking up his religious views. Only Gingrich, the former U.S. House speaker who fell short of the party's nomination this year, somewhat addressed Romney's Mormon faith.

"I'm delighted that he has a faith, and I'm delighted that it matters to him," Gingrich said. "That's a big improvement amongst our left-wing secular elites."

Most of the focus was on Obama.

Incoming Florida House Speaker Will Weatherford said Obama does not believe in "the very pillars that this country was founded upon." Conservative activist Phyllis Schlafly skewered Obama for thanking everyone but God at a White House Thanksgiving celebration. Gingrich mocked Obama for bowing "to a Saudi king."

The White House has said the president is a committed Christian who prays daily. His autobiographies describe a winding road to his Christian faith.

Their fury went beyond Obama's support of gay marriage and abortion rights. Several targeted the administration's controversial rule requiring religious institutions to, as Reed put it, "violate their own religious conscience" by covering contraception in employees' health care plans.

"My friends, this is an injustice that we are not going to let stand, and either in the courts or on Election Day, we're going to end it once and for all," Reed said.

Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, who in June survived a recall election, was welcomed like royalty, save for a handful of Occupy Tampa and Occupy Chicago protesters. They waited quietly through the two-hour program but stood up and yelled "Walker hates workers!" as he began his address. Others in the balcony tried unfurling banners that said, "Walker hates working families." Police issued warnings to six protesters.

Safety Harbor resident Lora Platt teared up throughout the speeches and got emotional again when asked by a reporter what she thought of the event.

"Four more years of Obama," she said while wiping her eyes, "we won't have a country left."

Talk of the weather was inevitable. Cruz joked that the crowd should be thankful for the storm.

"If nothing else, it kept Joe Biden away," referring to the vice president's canceled Florida swing.

Mike Huckabee, the Fox News host and former Arkansas governor, used the hurricane as an anti-Obama metaphor.

"We will take a hurricane getting near us in August, but we will make sure that the hurricane of this administration is way, way, way away from us come January of next year," he said.


Obama's Incredible Attacks on God and Country - Shocking Documentation

by Austin Miles
July 16, 2012
The Christian Post

This world has become a strange place for a religious person to live. As Helen Trautman, CEO of Results Unlimited in Pittsburgh lamented: "Muslims do not recognize Jews as God's Chosen People...Jews do not recognize Jesus as the Messiah...Protestants do not recognize the Pope as the leader of the Christian world, and Mormans do not recognize each other at the liquor store. There may be some Pentecostals in that mix as well.

Making it even more confusing, Obama seems to have declared war on God Himself. In a story published by Worth Reading (7/10/12) by Phyllis Schlafly, founder of Eagle Forum. titled: "One nation Under Government--Not Under God," it details "Obama's record of hostility to religion that we have never before seen in any American president."

Orlean Koehle, President of California Eagle Forum, gathered even more details of Obama's war on God and America and forwarded them to us.
Prepare to be shocked as you see all of Obama's maneuvers to make America Godless and to see what he has accomplished for Marxism in a very short time:

Listed below in chronological order are (1) numerous records of his attacks on Biblical persons or organizations; (2) examples of the hostility toward Biblical faith that have become evident in the past three years in the Obama-led military; (3) a listing of his open attacks on Biblical values; and finally (4) a listing of numerous incidents of his preferential deference for Islam’s activities and positions, including letting his Islamic advisors guide and influence his hostility toward people of Biblical faith.

1. Acts of Hostility Toward People of Biblical Faith:

April 2008—Obama speaks disrespectfully of Christians, saying they “cling to guns or religion” and have an “antipathy to people who aren't like them.” [1]

February 2009—Obama announces plans to revoke conscience protection for health workers who refuse to participate in medical activities that go against their beliefs, and fully implements the plan in February 2011. [2]

April 2009—When speaking at Georgetown University, Obama orders that a monogram symbolizing Jesus' name be covered when he is making his speech. [3]

May 2009—Obama declines to host services for the National Prayer Day (a day established by federal law) at the White House. [4]

April 2009—In a deliberate act of disrespect, Obama nominated three pro-abortion ambassadors to the Vatican; of course, the pro-life Vatican rejected all three. [5]

October 19, 2010—Obama begins deliberately omitting the phrase about “the Creator” when quoting the Declaration of Independence—an omission he has made on no less than seven occasions. [6]

November 2010—Obama misquotes the National Motto, saying it is “E pluribus unum” rather than “In God We Trust” as established by federal law. [7]

January 2011—After a federal law was passed to transfer a WWI Memorial in the Mojave Desert to private ownership, the U. S. Supreme Court ruled that the cross in the memorial could continue to stand, but the Obama administration refused to allow the land to be transferred as required by law, and refused to allow the cross to be re-erected as ordered by the Court. [8]

February 2011—Although he filled posts in the State Department, for more than two years Obama did not fill the post of religious freedom ambassador, an official that works against religious persecution across the world; he filled it only after heavy pressure from the public and from Congress. [9]

April 2011—For the first time in American history, Obama urges passage of a non-discrimination law that does not contain hiring protections for religious groups, forcing religious organizations to hire according to federal mandates without regard to the dictates of their own faith, thus eliminating conscience protection in hiring. [10]

August 2011—The Obama administration releases its new health care rules that override religious conscience protections for medical workers in the areas of abortion and contraception. [11]

November 2011—Obama opposes inclusion of President Franklin Roosevelt’s famous D-Day Prayer in the WWII Memorial. [12]

November 2011—Unlike previous presidents, Obama studiously avoids any religious references in his Thanksgiving speech. [13]

December 2011—The Obama administration denigrates other countries' religious beliefs as an obstacle to radical homosexual rights. [14]

January 2012—The Obama administration argues that the First Amendment provides no protection for churches and synagogues in hiring their pastors and rabbis. [15]

February 2012—The Obama administration forgives student loans in exchange for public service, but announces it will no longer forgive student loans if the public service is related to religion. [16]

2. Acts of Hostility from the Obama-led Military Toward People of Biblical Faith:

June 2011—The Department of Veterans Affairs forbids references to God and Jesus during burial ceremonies at Houston National Cemetery. [17]

August 2011—The Air Force stops teaching the Just War theory to officers in California because the course is taught by chaplains and is based on a philosophy introduced by St. Augustine in the third century AD—a theory long taught by civilized nations across the world (except America). [18]

September 2011—Air Force Chief of Staff prohibits commanders from notifying airmen of programs and services available to them from chaplains. [19]

September 2011—The Army issues guidelines for Walter Reed Medical Center stipulating that “No religious items (i.e. Bibles, reading materials and/or artifacts) are allowed to be given away or used during a visit.” [20]

November 2011—The Air Force Academy rescinds support for Operation Christmas Child, a program to send holiday gifts to impoverished children across the world, because the program is run by a Christian charity. [21]

November 2011—The Air Force Academy pays $80,000 to add a Stonehenge-like worship center for pagans, druids, witches and Wiccans. [22]

February 2012—The U.S. Military Academy at West Point disinvites three star Army general and decorated war hero Lieutenant General William G. (“Jerry”) Boykin (retired) from speaking at an event because he is an outspoken Christian. [23]

February 2012—The Air Force removes “God” from the patch of Rapid Capabilities Office (the word on the patch was in Latin: Dei). [24]

February 2012—The Army orders Catholic chaplains not to read a letter to parishioners that their archbishop asked them to read. [25]

3. Acts of Hostility Toward Biblical Values:

January 2009—Obama lifts restrictions on U.S. government funding for groups that provide abortion services or counseling abroad, forcing taxpayers to fund pro-abortion groups that either promote or perform abortions in other nations. [26]

January 2009—President Obama’s nominee for deputy secretary of state asserts that American taxpayers are required to pay for abortions and that limits on abortion funding are unconstitutional. [27]

March 2009—The Obama administration shut out pro-life groups from attending a White House-sponsored health care summit. [28]

March 2009—Obama orders taxpayer funding of embryonic stem cell research. [29]

March 2009—Obama gave $50 million for the UNFPA, the UN population agency that promotes abortion and works closely with Chinese population control officials who use forced abortions and involuntary sterilizations. [30]

May 2009—The White House budget eliminates all funding for abstinence-only education and replaces it with “comprehensive” sexual education, repeatedly proven to increase teen pregnancies and abortions. [31] He continues the deletion in subsequent budgets. [32]

May 2009—Obama officials assemble a terrorism dictionary calling pro-life advocates violent and charging that they use racism in their “criminal” activities. [33]

July 2009—The Obama administration illegally extends federal benefits to same-sex partners of Foreign Service and Executive Branch employees, in direction violation of the federal Defense of Marriage Act. [34]

September 16, 2009—The Obama administration appoints as EEOC Commissioner Chai Feldblum, who asserts that society should “not tolerate” any “private beliefs,” including religious beliefs, if they may negatively affect homosexual “equality.” [35]

July 2010—The Obama administration uses federal funds in violation of federal law to get Kenya to change its constitution to include abortion. [36]

August 2010—The Obama administration Cuts funding for 176 abstinence education programs. [37]

September 2010—The Obama administration tells researchers to ignore a judge’s decision striking down federal funding for embryonic stem cell research. [38]

February 2011—Obama directs the Justice Department to stop defending the federal Defense of Marriage Act. [39]

March 2011—The Obama administration refuses to investigate videos showing Planned Parenthood helping alleged sex traffickers get abortions for victimized underage girls. [40]

July 2011—Obama allows homosexuals to serve openly in the military, reversing a policy originally instituted by George Washington in March 1778. [41]

September 2011—The Pentagon directs that military chaplains may perform same-sex marriages at military facilities in violation of the federal Defense of Marriage Act. [42]

October 2011—The Obama administration eliminates federal grants to the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops for their extensive programs that aid victims of human trafficking because the Catholic Church is anti-abortion. [43]

4. Acts of Preferentialism for Islam:

May 2009—While Obama does not host any National Day of Prayer event at the White House, he does host White House Iftar dinners in honor of Ramadan. [44]

April 2010—Christian leader Franklin Graham is disinvited from the Pentagon’s National Day of Prayer Event because of complaints from the Muslim community. [45]

April 2010—The Obama administration requires rewriting of government documents and a change in administration vocabulary to remove terms that are deemed offensive to Muslims, including jihad, jihadists, terrorists, radical Islamic, etc. [46]

August 2010—Obama speaks with great praise of Islam and condescendingly of Christianity. [47]

August 2010—Obama went to great lengths to speak out on multiple occasions on behalf of building an Islamic mosque at Ground Zero, while at the same time he was silent about a Christian church being denied permission to rebuild at that location. [48]

2010—While every White House traditionally issues hundreds of official proclamations and statements on numerous occasions, this White House avoids traditional Biblical holidays and events but regularly recognizes major Muslim holidays, as evidenced by its 2010 statements on Ramadan, Eid-ul-Fitr, Hajj, and Eid-ul-Adha. [49]

October 2011—Obama’s Muslim advisers block Middle Eastern Christians’ access to the White House. [50]

February 2012—The Obama administration makes effulgent apologies for Korans being burned by the U.S. military, [51] but when Bibles were burned by the military, numerous reasons were offered why it was the right thing to do. [52]

Many of these actions are literally unprecedented—this is the first time they have happened in four centuries of American history. The hostility of President Obama toward Biblical faith and values is without equal from any previous American president.


Endnotes

[1] Sarah Pulliam Baily, "Obama: ‘They cling to guns or religion’," Christianity Today, April 13, 2008.

[2] Aliza Marcus, "Obama to Lift ‘Conscience’ Rule for Health Workers," Bloomberg, February 27, 2009; Sarah Pulliam Baily, "Obama Admin. Changes Bush ‘Conscience’ Rule for Health Workers," Christianity Today, February 18, 2011.

[3] Jim Lovino, "Jesus Missing From Obama’s Georgetown Speech," NBC Washington, April 17, 2009.

[4] Johanna Neuman, “Obama end Bush-era National Prayer Day Service at White House," Los Angeles Times, May 7, 2009.

[5] Chris McGreal, “Vatican vetoes Barack Obama’s nominees for U.S. Ambassador,” The Guardian, April 14, 2009.

[6] Meredith Jessup, “Obama Continues to Omit ‘Creator’ From Declaration of Independence,” The Blaze, October 19, 2010.

[7] "Remarks by the President at the University of Indonesia in Jakarta, Indonesia," The White House, November 10, 2010.

[8] LadyImpactOhio, "Feds sued by Veterans to allow stolen Mojave Desert Cross to be rebuilt," Red State, January 14, 2011.

[9] Marrianne Medlin, “Amid criticism, President Obama moves to fill vacant religious ambassador post,” Catholic News Agency, February 9, 2011; Thomas F. Farr, “Undefender of the Faith,” Foreign Policy, April 5, 2012.

[10] Chris Johnson, “ENDA passage effort renewed with Senate introduction,” Washington Blade, April 15, 2011.

[11] Chuck Donovan, “HHS’s New Health Guidelines Trample on Conscience,” Heritage Foundation, August 2, 2011.

[12] Todd Starns, “Obama Administration Opposes FDR Prayer at WWII Memorial,” Fox News, November 4, 2011.

[13] Joel Siegel, “Obama Omits God From Thanksgiving Speech, Riles Critics,” ABC News, November 25, 2011.

[14] Hillary Rodham Clinton, “Remarks in Recognition of International Human Rights Day,” U.S. Department of State, December 6, 2011.

[15] Ted Olson, “Church Wins Firing Case at Supreme Court,” Christianity Today, January 11, 2012.

[16] Audrey Hudson, “Obama administration religious service for student loan forgiveness,” Human Events, February 15, 2012.

[17] “Houston Veterans Claim Censorship of Prayers, Including Ban of ‘God’ and ‘Jesus’,” Fox News, June 29, 2011.

[18] Jason Ukman, “Air Force suspends ethics course that used Bible passages that train missile launch officers,” Washington Post, August 2, 2011.

[19] "Maintaining Government Neutrality Regarding Religion," Department of the Air Force, September 1, 2011.

[20] "Wounded, Ill, and Injured Partners in Care Guidelines," Department of the Navy (accessed on February 29, 2012).

[21] "Air Force Academy Backs Away from Christmas Charity," Fox News Radio, November 4, 2011.

[22] Jenny Dean, "Air Force Academy adapts to pagans, druids, witches and Wiccans," Los Angeles Times, November 26, 2011.

[23] Ken Blackwell, "Gen. Boykin Blocked At West Point," cnsnews.com, February 1, 2012.

[24] Geoff Herbert, "Air Force unit removes 'God' from logo; lawmakers warn of 'dangerous precedent'," syracuse.com, February 9, 2012.

[25] Todd Starnes, "Army Silences Catholic Chaplains," Fox News Radio, February 6, 2012.

[26] Jeff Mason and Deborah Charles, "Obama lifts restrictions on abortion funding," Reuters, January 23, 2009.

[27] "Obama pick: Taxpayers must fund abortions," WND, January 27, 2009.

[28] Steven Ertelt, "Pro-Life Groups Left Off Obama’s Health Care Summit List, Abortion Advocates OK," LifeNews, March 5, 2009.

[29] "Obama Signs Order Lifting Restrictions on Stem Cell Research Funding," Fox News, March 9, 2009.

[30] Steven Ertelt, "President Barack Obama’s Pro-Abortion Record: A Pro-Life Compilation," LifeNews, February 11, 2012.

[31] Steven Ertelt, "Barack Obama’s Federal Budget Eliminates Funding for Abstinence-Only Education," LifeNews, May 8, 2009.

[32] Steven Ertelt, "Obama Budget Funds Sex Ed Over Abstinence on 16-1 Margin," LifeNews, February 14, 2011.

[33] Steven Ertelt, "Obama Admin Terrorism Dictionary Calls Pro-Life Advocates Violent, Racist," LifeNews, May 5, 2009.

[34] "Memorandum for the Heads of Executive Departments and Agencies," The White House, June 17, 2009.

[35] Matt Cover, "Obama’s EEOC Nominee: Society Should ‘Not Tolerate Private Beliefs’ That ‘Adversely Affect’ Homosexuals," cnsnews.com, January 18, 2010.

[36] Tess Civantos, "White House Spent $23M of Taxpayer Money to Back Kenyan Constitution That Legalizes Abortion, GOP Reps Say," Fox News, July 22, 2010.

[37] Steven Ertelt, "Obama, Congress Cut Funding for 176 Abstinence Programs Despite New Study," LifeNews, August 26, 2010.

[38] Steven Ertelt, "President Barack Obama’s Pro-Abortion Record: A Pro-Life Compilation," LifeNews, February 11, 2012.

[39] Brian Montopoli, "Obama administration will no longer defend DOMA," CBSNews, February 23, 2011.

[40] Steven Ertelt, "Obama Admin Ignores Planned Parenthood Sex Trafficking Videos," LifeNews, March 2, 2011.

[41] Elisabeth Bumiller, "Obama Ends ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’ Policy," New York Times, July 22, 2011.

[42] Luis Martinez, "Will Same Sex Marriages Pose a Dilemma for Military Chaplains?," ABC News, October 12, 2011.

[43] Jerry Markon, "Health, abortion issues split Obama administration and Catholic groups," Washington Post, October 31, 2011.

[44] Alexander Mooney, "President Obama marks Ramadan," CNN, August 1, 2011.

[45] "Franklin Graham Regrets Army's Decision to Rescind Invite to Pentagon Prayer Service," Fox News, April 22, 2010.

[46] “Obama Bans Islam, Jihad From National Security Strategy Document,” Fox News, April 7, 2010; "Counterterror Adviser Defends Jihad as 'Legitimate Tenet of Islam'," Fox News, May 27, 2010; "'Islamic Radicalism' Nixed From Obama Document," CBSNews, April 7, 2010.

[47] Chuck Norris, "President Obama: Muslim Missionary?," Townhall.com, August 17, 2010.

[48] "Obama Comes Out in Favor of Allowing Mosque Near Ground Zero," Fox News, August 13, 2010; Pamela Geller, "Islamic Supremacism Trumps Christianity at Ground Zero," American Thinker, July 21, 2011.

[49] "WH Fails to Release Easter Proclamation," Fox Nation, April 25, 2011; "President Obama ignores most holy Christian holiday; AFA calls act intentional," American Family Association (accessed on February 29, 2012).

[50] "Report: Obama’s Muslim Advisers Block Middle Eastern Christians’ Access to the White House," Big Peace (accessed on February 29, 2012).

[51] "USA/Afghanistan-Islamophobia: Pentagon official apologizes for Quran burning," International Islamic News Agency (accessed on February 29, 2012).

[52] "Military burns unsolicited Bibles sent to Afghanistan," CNN, May 22, 2009.

Remember November--Take it seriously. Defenders of the faith, ARISE!. Print this out for reference. Thanks again to Orlean Koehle for alerting us.

Orlean Koehle, State President
Eagle Forum of California
"For God, Family, and Country"


Catholic dioceses, institutions sue over contraception rule
May 21, 2012 12:13 PM

(CBS/AP) NEW YORK  -- Dozens of Roman Catholic dioceses, schools and other institutions sued the Obama administration Monday over a government mandate requiring most employers to provide birth control coverage as part of their employee health plans.

The lawsuits filed in federal courts around the country represent the largest push against the mandate since President Barack Obama announced the policy in January. Among those suing are the University of Notre Dame, the Archdioceses of Washington, New York and Michigan, and the Catholic University of America.

"We have tried negotiation with the administration and legislation with the Congress, and we'll keep at it, but there's still no fix," said New York Cardinal Timothy Dolan, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. "Time is running out, and our valuable ministries and fundamental rights hang in the balance, so we have to resort to the courts now."

The U.S. Health and Human Services Department adopted the rule to improve health care for women. Last year, an advisory panel from the Institute of Medicine, which advises the federal government, recommended including birth control on the list of covered services, partly because it promotes maternal and child health by allowing women to space their pregnancies.

However, faith leaders from across religious traditions protested, saying the mandate violates religious freedom. The original rule includes a religious exemption that allows houses of worship to opt-out of the mandate, but keeps the requirement in place for religiously affiliated charities.

In response to the political furor, Obama offered to soften the rule so that insurers would pay for birth control instead of religious groups. However, the bishops and others have said that the accommodation doesn't go far enough.

Health and Human Services spokeswoman Erin Shields said Monday that the department does not comment on pending litigation.

In a statement, Planned Parenthood president Cecile Richards decried the lawsuit as an attempt to restrict women's access to low-cost birth control.

"Access to birth control is a critical health and economic concern for American women," Richards said. "It is unbelievable that in the year 2012 we have to fight for access to birth control. Yet this lawsuit would make it harder for millions of women to get birth control. Insurance companies should cover birth control just like any other preventive prescription, as the independent Institute of Medicine (IOM) recommended."

Notre Dame's president, the Rev. John Jenkins, said in a statement that the school decided to sue "after much deliberation, discussion and efforts to find a solution acceptable to the various parties." The university argued that the mandate violates religious freedom by requiring many religiously affiliated hospitals, schools and charities to comply.

"We do not seek to impose our religious beliefs on others," Jenkins said. "We simply ask that the government not impose its values on the university when those values conflict with our religious teachings."

Other religious colleges and institutions have already filed federal suit over the mandate, but observers had been closely watching for Notre Dame's next step.

The university, among the best-known Catholic schools in the country, has indicated past willingness to work with President Barack Obama, despite their differences with him on abortion and other issues. Notre Dame came under unprecedented criticism from U.S. bishops and others in 2009 for inviting Obama, who supports abortion rights, as commencement speaker and presenting him with an honorary law degree.


Obama Forces Franciscan University to Drop Health Insurance Coverage
By Deacon Keith Fournier
5/16/2012
Catholic Online (www.catholic.org)

The Administration has mandated that all health insurance plans must cover "women's health services" including contraception, sterilization, and abortion-causing medications. Franciscan University has excluded these services and products from its student health insurance policy will not participate in a plan that requires us to violate the consistent teachings of the Catholic Church on the sacredness of human life.

STEUBENVILLE, OH (Catholic Online) - I graduated from the Franciscan University of Steubenville in May of 1977. As a "revert" to the Catholic Church, I came back to the faith after turbulent years searching for truth and meaning. I was a teenage "hippie", caught up in the sixties and early seventies.

During this period I became enamored with the little poor man of Assisi, Francis. In my faith journey I reached out to one of his brothers, a holy Franciscan priest named Fr. Michael Scanlan, T.O.R. who was the rector of a seminary in Pennsylvania. He had just agreed to assume the Presidency of a small college in Steubenville, Ohio and was dedicated to returning it to fidelity to the Catholic faith.

I had a year of philosophy while I was discerning a monastic vocation and wanted to continue my studies once I left the monastery. So, with his full support and encouragement, I joined him at that College as one of the "first responders" to his vision. I became a part of the early renewal of that great work of the Holy Spirit now called Franciscan University of Steubenville .

I led one of the first student households and helped in many other ways to form the Catholic culture on the campus, one of the distinctive marks of that now extraordinary Catholic College. I became a worker in the vineyard, a part of that miracle of the Lord. I graduated with honors in philosophy and theology.

After marrying my wife on the campus we began to have children. I went on to law school in nearby Pittsburgh.  Upon graduation I stayed to serve the work of Steubenville in any way that I could, standing with Fr. Michael Scanlan. I learned so much from that wonderful priest and champion of the Church. 

In the nineties, I started my first law firm while still helping Fr Mike in his work. I soon left the practice to go in house as a Dean. I served as the Dean of Students and the Dean of Evangelization. That chapter of my life helped to informed the chapters of my life which followed.

I love Franciscan University of Steubenville. It is one of the seeds of the spiritual renewal which has broken forth in Catholic higher education around the world. I was privileged to stand at the side of a man who understood the mission of a Catholic College and had the courage and the heroic faith to fight to both establish it and protect it against all odds.

On Wednesday, the Franciscan University, under the inspiring leadership of Fr Michael's Successor, Fr Terence Henry, TOR, once again made U.S. history. It became the first Catholic College to be forced by the Federal Government to stop offering health insurance to its students.  It had no choice. It cannot and will not violate its deeply held religious convictions. President Obama has forced a Franciscan College to choose between the poor. Let me explain.

In the words of Mother Teresa, children in the womb are the "poorest of the poor". This University has taken the only stand possible. They will not participate, directly or indirectly in taking their lives through procured abortion. Nor will they participate in other immoral acts - such as funding sterilization or dispensing contraception - in the name of "health care". So, needy students, who are also the poor, will suffer.

All this is occurring because of a United States Administration which is acting unconstitutionally. Here is the University announcement: "The Obama Administration has mandated that all health insurance plans must cover "women's health services" including contraception, sterilization, and abortion-causing medications as part of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA)."

"Up to this time, Franciscan University has specifically excluded these services and products from its student health insurance policy, and we will not participate in a plan that requires us to violate the consistent teachings of the Catholic Church on the sacredness of human life."

"Additionally, the PPACA increased the mandated maximum coverage amount for student policies to $100,000 for the 2012-13 school year, which would effectively double your premium cost for the policy in fall 2012, with the expectation of further increases in the future."

"Due to these changes in regulation by the federal government, beginning with the 2012-13 school year, the University 1) will no longer require that all full-time undergraduate students carry health insurance, 2) will no longer offer a student health insurance plan, and 3) will no longer bill those not covered under a parent/guardian plan or personal plan for student health insurance. The current student health insurance plan will expire on August 15, 2012."

"We encourage you to decide how you are going to provide for accidents or illnesses requiring visits to ... physicians, health clinics, or the hospital emergency room while you are a student here. As always, our Health Center on campus will be staffed by a certified nurse practitioner Monday - Friday during normal business hours. No insurance is necessary to receive basic health-related services at the Health Center, and the visits cost only $5 at the time of service. However, if you are referred off campus for further lab testing, physician specialists, X-rays, etc., you will be responsible to pay for those services."

As one of the "living stones" (I Peter 2:5) formed in the early days at Steubenville, I knew that this genuinely Catholic University would not bend the knee to the new Caesar. I want Fr Tery, Fr Michaels worthy successor, to know I am a loyal living stone, placed in the foundation of that great work. I will help him and that wonderful University in any way that I can.

I ask the readers of Catholic Online to pray for Franciscan University of Steubenville. I also ask you to pray for all other genuinely Catholic Colleges and Universities facing the same crossroads. The promise of Jesus still stands. The Catholic College is a part of the Church which Jesus founded upon Peter the Rock and stands under the protection of heaven. The gates of hell will not prevail. (Matt. 16:17,18)

The unconstitutional Edict issued by On January 20, 2012 by Kathleen Sebelius, the Secretary of Health and Human Services requires all employers, including Catholic and other religious employers, to cover sterilization, abortion inducing drugs, and contraception if they offer health care plans.

The alleged exemption provided for religious employers did not cover hospitals, universities, soup kitchens, outreaches to the poor and many other vital expressions of Catholic faith and mission. The purported accommodation which followed was a fraud, a shell game, which accomplished nothing. When the Mandate was recorded in the Federal Register, nothing had changed.

Catholics, like many other Christians and people of faith, believe that the Gospel of Jesus Christ demands a response which goes beyond the walls of our Church buildings. We are our brother and sister's keeper. We do not reach out to people in need because they are Catholic. We reach out to people in need because we are Catholic.  

The HHS Edict is a violation of the Free Exercise of Religion which is protected under the First Amendment to the United States Constitution.  "Congress shall make no law respecting the establishment of religion or PROHIBITING THE FREE EXERCISE THEREOF!

That Right to the Free Exercise of religion has been called the "FIRST FREEDOM" in the American tradition for good reason. It is a foundation for all of our freedoms. Religious Freedom is a fundamental human right. The Birth Certificate of our Nation, the Declaration of Independence, affirmed the existence of inalienable rights and self evident truths. Those Rights of Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of happiness are endowed by our Creator and not conferred by a Government.

They cannot - they must not- be taken away by Government. Religious Liberty is at the heart of the very understanding of Right to Liberty in the Western tradition. The Obama Administration is violating human rights. If this Mandate will require all employers, including Catholic and other religious employers, to cover sterilization, abortion inducing drugs, and contraception in their health care plans or face the boot of fines and penalties.

These fines and penalties would have the practical result of closing many of the Church's outreaches, ministries and institutions of care and compassion.  This HHS Mandate not only injures the Church and religious institutions it injures American society. It harms the common good.
It is an unjust law. The Federal Government of the United States is trying to force us to act against deeply held religious convictions and to violate conscience. The claim that such an edict is an unjust law is rooted in the western understanding of the nature of law itself.

It is the firm foundation upon which the American founders grounded their insistence that there are inalienable rights, endowed upon us all by a Creator, which cannot be taken away by any civil government. Positive law must reflect the Natural Law.

Saint Augustine said of an unjust law, "For it seems to me that an unjust law is no law at all." Saint Thomas Aquinas explained, "Human law is law only in virtue of its accordance with right reason: and thus it is manifest that it flows from the eternal law. And in so far as it deviates from right reason it is called an unjust law; in such case it is no law at all, but rather a species of violence." In doing so, they echoed Cicero, Aristotle and Plato and the entire Natural Law Tradition.

Martin Luther King, Jr., in his 1963 Letter from a Birmingham Jail, gave this explanation of how one determines whether a law is unjust, "How does one determine whether a law is just or unjust? A just law is a man-made code that squares with the moral law or the law of God. An unjust law is a code that is out of harmony with the moral law."

This Edict came one day after Pope Benedict XVI addressed a group of US Bishops during their visit. He warned them of the growth of radical secularism in the United States and the accompanying threats to the fundamental Right to Religious Freedom so integral to the American experiment.

The action of Franciscan University is only the beginning of a coming avalanche. An Administration which claims to care about the poor fails to hear the cry of the poorest of the poor, our first neighbors in the womb, and routinely violates their Right to Life. They also fail to respect the Free Exercise of Religion, violating another human right.

Now, they have forced a Catholic University to stop providing health care coverage to poor and needy students. They are compelling a University named in honor of the little poor man of Assisi to choose between the poor whom they can service. This is a terrible miscarriage of justice. Franciscan University is showing the kind of courage which should be seen as an example for many.



Churches Feel Persecuted by Obama
By MERCEDES SCHLAPP, Cofounder of Cove Strategies
May 11, 2012

President Obama's decision to support gay marriage will not help his re-election efforts. He has taken an issue that tugs at the heartstrings of many Americans and has turned it into a political ploy.

President Obama already has the support of the progressives and liberal constituents, but his announcement will further alienate religious voters including some of his core supporters who voted for him in 2008. Hispanic evangelical leaders are already calling President Obama's decision offensive. Recall what happened in California with Proposition 8, which eliminated the rights of same sex couples to marry. With their large congregations, Hispanic and African-American pastors, vocal opponents of same sex marriage, joined forces in support of Proposition 8. Could the president's changed views result in a less enthusiastic support from these minority groups?

The president's approach on this issue represents the worst of politics. Over the last 15 years he has taken opposing positions on this topic. First he favored legalization of same sex marriage in 1996 when he was a state senator and then changed his position to court Christian voters in 2008. And now in 2012, he is back where he started. This type of evolution is not Darwinian but Machiavellian. He has played both sides: one moment he is distancing himself from gay voters and the next he is misleading the Christian voters.

Although his announcement was not a shocking revelation by any means, President Obama's abrupt decision will lead to many disappointed voters who feel betrayed. He will surely re-invigorate conservative and religious voters in key states who continue to feel that President Obama is threatening their religious liberties by imposing his liberal agenda on their churches. From imposing mandates on contraception to now redefining marriage, churches are feeling minimized and frankly persecuted by the administration.

Why would the president make the announcement before the election knowing that gay marriage stirs such an emotional debate and is a divisive issue? President Obama was clearly pressured to respond after Vice President Joe Biden's comments on gay marriage. He even had to cancel his campaign trip to the swing state of North Carolina where a critical vote was scheduled this week on traditional marriage. Even the media kept digging in with Press Secretary Jay Carney who stayed vague at best. It was surely not the best timing and politically risky for the president, especially when 1.3 million voters in North Carolina overwhelming rejected same sex marriage and supported a constitutional amendment on traditional marriage, and several battleground states such as Florida and Ohio have already enacted a similar measure. This result is even more curious in light of North Carolina's embrace and support of President Obama in 2008.

The Obama team may have helped a new political marriage develop and that's the courtship of Mitt Romney with the Christian base of his party and those stubborn, church-going independents who have views so strong that they will not bend to the will of any party, including on moral issues. These unlikely partners are beginning to see the good in each other even more today than they did a few days ago. We will likely see a slew of Christian and conservative independents in North Carolina adding Mitt Romney bumper stickers on their SUVs and minivans as a result of Biden's announcement, I mean Obama's.

Mercedes Viana Schlapp is cofounder of Cove Strategies and a conservative political commentator for both English and Spanish media. She served as director of specialty media at the White House under President George W. Bush.


Catholic archbishop warns of Obama administration 'blind spot' on church-state issues

By Anthony Man
Sun Sentinel
April 23, 2012

The Roman Catholic leader for South Florida, Archbishop Thomas Wenski, said Monday that President Barack Obama's administration has a "blind spot" on church-state relations and there are "troubling signs" that could be interpreted as anti-Catholic sentiment.

Wenski made his comments during a 50-minute interview with Sun Sentinel reporters and editorial writers as he promotes a move by the nation's Catholic bishops to put renew the debate on the federal government's order that all insurers, even employer insurance provided by Catholic hospitals and universities, provide contraceptive coverage.

"There is a blind spot in the administration and a kind of unique understanding of constitutional issues of church and state that is not shared by the mainstream of this country," Wenski said.

Later, he noted a troubling history of anti-Catholicism in the U.S. such as burning of churches in the 18th Century and signs denying employment to Irish-Catholic immigrants, that he said has largely been overcome.

Asked if the Obama-administration is anti-Catholic or prejudiced against Catholics, Wenski said "there certainly are troubling signs."

He cited a decision to end funding for a Catholic program that helped settle political refugees, a move he said he believes comes from the church's refusal to have the program participate in abortion services.

"Is this the result of anti-Catholocism? I don't know. But you've got to look at the facts and you draw your own conclusions," she said.

Wenski called the contraceptive mandate that's part of Obamacare "ridiculous", likening the impact on Catholic institutions to requiring Kosher delis to serve ham sandwiches, but saying it's nothing like requiring Catholic institutions to abide by wage and hour laws. He said the supposed compromise on the Obama announced in February was a sham.

His comments, and an overall push by the nation's bishops come as Catholic voters – make up about a quarter of the vote in Florida – are coveted by both sides in what's shaping up as a tight presidential contest between President Barack Obama and Republican candidate Mitt Romney.

The contraceptive mandate, Wenski said, is an infringement on Catholics' First Amendment rights.

"The infringement is that the government purports to force Catholic agencies to provide these products which we find to be against our religious beliefs and religious conviction," he said.

"This is really not an issue about access to contraceptives. Contraceptives are readily available in our society today…. This is not about restricting someone's access to contraceptives. It's a religious freedom issue because the government is forcing us to provide a product that is against our consciences….

"The president announced a compromise that was no compromise. First of all you don't have a compromise unilaterally. And that's what he did," he said.

Even though the White House announced a compromise, Wenski said it's not really working with the bishops. "The White House has stonewalled them and nothing is going to happen. They told a couple of bishops that they should listen to some of the nuns," he siad. "Talk about the blind spot of the administration. It continues in their lack of responsiveness to our concerns. And when they do sit down and meet with us they seem to be without a clue often."

After the compromise announcement, the political discussion evolved into a supposed Republican war on women, swamping discussion of the contraceptive mandate.

"What has hurt the cause was Obama very adroitly on Feb. 10 tried to spin the issue as an issue concerning contraceptives. And as I said for us this issue is not about access to contraception. What we're asking is not that contraceptives be made illegal. We're not asking that the government stop funding contraceptives. We're asking that the government not force us to not only provide contraceptives but also to provide abortion-inducing drugs," he ssaid.

He stopped short of telling Catholics not to vote for Obama. "We don't endorse candidates as a church.

"We lay forth the principles and we tell the people to form their consciences. And hopefully every vote, every voter when he goes into the ballot box he votes his conscience," he said.

On the contraception issue, he said: "We're trying to ramp it up again. Because we appreciate that we need to get our message across. We have to define this issue as a religious liberty issue. We have to keep the focus on that despite the fact that tin February the administration was able to divert the issue from what we believe is the core issue which is religious liberty and make it about contraception.

"We're not interested in using this as a wedge issue between Democrats and Republicans. This is much more serious that that. This is about our basic religious freedoms, what we have as Catholic people and have been able to exercise in this country since its founding," he said.

Plans include a fortnight for religious freedom for two weeks leading up to the 4th of July. The initiative was announced earlier this month by a national bishop's committee; Wenski said he's not sure how it will be marked in South Florida.

He said he didn't fear any backlash from the stepped up political activity.

"That sort of sounds like during the civil rights era telling the black people to keep quiet rather than to press their rights.

"There should be no reason why we should accept a second class citizenship status because we're afraid of some backlash. Catholics are American citizens. We have every right to make our proposals in the public square and as a priest or a bishop I don't surrender my rights as citizenship. In the United States we've always welcomed religious voices to advocate in the public square.

Wenski said all Catholics should register and vote.

"As Catholics we say that participating in our democratic experiment here is not only a right but it's a duty. It's a duty we have as Catholics to participate. So just as Catholics should pay their taxes they should also register to vote and they should actually vote," he said.


Obama has set the Catholic Church on fire
By Catholic Online (NEWS CONSORTIUM)
4/18/2012

President Obama has set the Catholic Church on fire and now Catholics are firing back. Catholics Called to Witness, a Florida-based non-profit has brought the issue to a point with their viral video, 'Test of Fire'.

LOS ANGELES, CA (Catholic Online) - President Obama declared war on Catholics long before his blatantly unconstitutional Health and Human Services mandate was issued by Kathleen Sebelius, a woman who shockingly professes to be Catholic herself.

President Obama came to office as the most pro-choice, anti-life president in history. And right from the start, his agents went to work breaking down the one institution that would stand fast and fight to the end, his vision of a brave new world for America - a vision that respects neither life nor freedom.

Not all Catholic institutions have withstood the assault. Late last year, Catholic Healthcare West, one of the largest Catholic hospitals systems in the nation, secularized. Now known as "Dignity Health" the healthcare consortium claims that it will adhere to the values of the Church as it grows and develops, but realistically, there is nothing left that can prevent the spreading moral decay from eroding those standards in the future.

Dignity Health is not a ministry of the Catholic church and is no longer compelled to answer its teaching. 

To be fair, Dignity Health was pushed there (in part) by the onerous changes coming as part of "Obamacare."

Meanwhile, Catholic Charities in Illinois lost a fight for the soul of their orphanage system when a liberal court ruled they must facilitate adoptions for homosexual couples.

And more recently, the full frontal assault on the Church was initiated with the cruel mandate that the Church must pay for insurance plans that violate the very conscience of the faithful. The unconstitutional mandate would make entire churches participants in moral turpitude by the mere act of writing a monthly check.

Faced with these attacks, the forced erosion of morality, and the trampling of individual rights, Catholics have rallied. Led by courageous bishops, such as Archbishop Dolan of New York, and inspired by the near-success of Rick Santorum, a conservative candidate for president, Catholics are preparing to vote their conscience in November.

Capturing this spirit, Test of Fire, a video produced by Catholics Called to Witness, has gone viral. Capturing hundreds of thousand views on YouTube and across social networks, the video is a stirring call to action for all Christians.

The video calls upon individuals to vote their conscience saying, "Your vote will affect the future and be recorded in eternity. Will you vote the values that will stand the test of fire?"

Opening with a powerful, almost epic musical score, the three-minute video features powerful imagery including a blacksmith forging words from iron that resonate with voters, such as "Jobs," and "Marriage" and "Freedom." Interspersed with the work of the forge, is a woman marking and casting a ballot.

While the video is a work of art, it captures perfectly the essence of the struggle that confronts Catholics in the current election cycle. Catholics are fighting for their religious freedom, identity, and the conscience of a nation.

Regardless of your personal political persuasion, it is impossible for a person of conscience to watch this video and not feel called to action.

Ultimately, Catholics will cast the ballots that will choose the next president. The coming election will be close enough that Obama cannot win without the support of a Catholic fifth column. If Catholics pause and recognize the overt assault that is being made against themselves and their faith, they can change history for the better.

Their test is scheduled for November 6th.


Obama intends to follow similar path that Hitler and Stalin followed
By Caroline May - The Daily Caller
April 17, 2012

An Illinois Catholic bishop had fiery words for President Barack Obama’s “pro abortion and extreme secularist agenda” during a homily over the weekend where he encouraged good Catholics to stand up for their beliefs at the voting booth.

“This fall, every practicing Catholic must vote, and must vote their Catholic consciences,” Bishop Daniel R. Jenky said at St. Mary’s Cathedral in Peoria, Ill. during Mass at an event titled “A Call to Catholic Men of Faith” and posted in full at The Catholic Post.

According to Jenky, the new Health and Human Services (HHS) contraception mandate has put the country on a dangerous path for religious freedom.

“[N]o Catholic institution, under any circumstance, can ever cooperate with the intrinsic evil of killing innocent human life in the womb,” he explained.

“No Catholic ministry — and yes, Mr. President, for Catholics our schools and hospitals are ministries — can remain faithful to the Lordship of the Risen Christ and to his glorious Gospel of Life if they are forced to pay for abortions,” Jenky went on to say.

Jenkey said that the church has survived thousands of years of persecution and will survive Obama and the recent HHS mandate, but it will require Catholics to stand for their beliefs — “heroic Catholicism, not casual Catholicism.”

“The church survived barbarian invasions. The church survived wave after wave of Jihads. The church survived the age of revolution,” Jenkey said. “The church survived Nazism and communism. And in the power of the resurrection, the church will survive the hatred of Hollywood, the malice of the media and the mendacious wickedness of the abortion industry.”


Bishops say Obama compromise is ‘unconstitutional’
By David Gibson
Religion News Service, Published: April 4

The nation’s Catholic bishops say the Obama administration’s proposed revisions to a mandate that requires insurers to provide birth control coverage are still unacceptable and even “radically flawed” — signaling a long drawn-out election-year fight between the White House and the Catholic hierarchy.

The bishops also say that they will continue to try to overturn the contraception regulations in Congress and the courts even as the bishops carry on negotiations with the White House.

The critical judgments on the government proposals, which were published by the U.S. Department for Health and Human Services on March 16, are contained in an internal, two-page March 29 memo from the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. The memo’s contents were first reported Tuesday (April 3) by Catholic News Service.

The HHS proposals, which invited feedback during a 90-day review period, are an effort to expand the number of faith-based groups that can be exempt from the controversial contraception mandate. Hoping to reach a compromise with the bishops, HHS is proposing that third-party companies administer coverage for self-insured faith-based groups.

The proposals would also allow religious groups — dioceses, denominations and others — to decide which affiliated institutions are “religious” and therefore exempt from the new requirement that employers offer free contraception coverage as part of employee insurance plans.

The March 29 memo from the bishops conference says the mandate’s definition of what constitutes an exempt religious organization is still too narrow and remains “radically flawed” and “unconstitutional.”

The memo also asserts that even though the Obama plan would have insurers or third-parties pay for the birth control coverage - thereby avoiding any involvement by the faith-based employer - the mandate “still forces us to act against our conscience and our teaching.”

But the memo also notes that the 32-page HHS proposal is “both tentative and complex,” and will require further study by the bishops and their staff.

“While USCCB representatives will continue to meet with representatives of the Administration to discuss these new proposals,” the memo concludes, “it must also be very clear that the church, together with other religious groups and faith-based entities, will simultaneously continue to seek relief from the legislature and redress in the courts.”

It appears that legislative action by the bishops’ Republican allies in Congress have stalled. The bishops have some hope that if the U.S. Supreme Court overturns Obama’s health care reform law — which provides the legal underpinning for the birth control mandate — then the entire issue will be moot.


Christian Blood on Obama's Hands

MONDAY, 02 APRIL 2012 05:31
DANIEL GREENFIELD

On Christmas Day of last year, Muslim terrorists set off bombs in churches across Nigeria. It was one of the worst attacks by Boko Haram which is determined to continue its reign of terror until the country is ruled by Muslim law. Christian pastors have been beheaded by Boko Haram and a spokesman for the group has openly stated that their interim goal is "to eradicate Christians from certain parts of the country."

The Boko Haram death toll has surpassed a thousand in only a few years. It has killed 250 people this year alone. It draws inspiration from the Taliban, has links to Al-Qaeda and has carried out numerous sophisticated attacks, including multiple car bombings.

That leaves one question. Why hasn't Boko Haram been designated a terrorist organization? it has killed more people than some of the organizations on the list and it is dedicated to ethnic cleansing, something that we decided was unacceptable when it came to Muslims. Shouldn't it then be equally unacceptable when it is being done by Muslims to Christians?

Apparently not. Johnnie Carson, Obama's Chicago born man in Africa, and the Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs at subcommittee hearings chaired by Senator Coons, dismissed the idea of designating Boko Haram a terrorist organization and claimed falsely, that despite Boko Haram's repeated statements about its goals and its very name, that this conflict was not driven by religion, but by social inequities.

Questions about Boko Haram's terrorism against Christians were rerouted into what Carson described as a "comprehensive" approach to the problem, sidelining security assistance in favor of providing social aid to the Muslim north and urging the Nigerian government to stop aggressively fighting terrorism.

Boko Haram had been inspired by the Taliban and American diplomats are forcefully pushing the Nigerian government into adopting the same disastrous failed "Hearts and Minds" policies of Afghanistan. Instead of combating Boko Haram, we will be increasing funding to the Muslim north and even opening a consulate there. And of course urging Nigeria to appoint more Muslims to high ranking positions.

While the subcommittee on Homeland Security has urged that Boko Haram be designated a terrorist group, diplomats in the State Department are doing everything possible to sabotage the effort. The lies are coming fast and thick. In the New York Times, Jean Herskovitz wrote an op-ed insisting that there was no Boko Haram, suggesting instead that random criminal gangs were really responsible for the mass murder of Christians.

Herskovitz used the exact same line put out by appeasers in the early days of the War on Terror when they claimed that there was no actual Al-Qaeda. Since then that spin has been used for countless Muslim terrorist groups, who cannot be fought because they don't truly exist. Carson echoed her in his testimony, insisting that Boko Haram was vague, loosely defined and not at all monolithic.

According to Herskovitz, the genocidal Boko Haram terrorist group was actually a "peaceful" group which only turned to violence in response to government oppression, and urged us not to act in a way that "would make us appear biased toward a Christian president" or the Nigerian Muslims would turn on us too.

As a government employee, Johnnie Carson was somewhat more discreet, but took the same position that the real fault lies with the Christian South and the Nigerian government for keeping Muslims oppressed and in poverty, and that the only solution is to pour money, jobs and power into the north. The unstated endgame of this is to create a stalemate that will force the Nigerian political system to make further concessions to Islam and the Sharia law that Boko Haram is fighting for.

The appeasers make no mention of Boko Haram's mass murder of Christians or its fundamental intolerance. All they offer is the drumbeat of statistics on poverty in the Muslim north, completely ignoring the fact that the north is undeveloped because the Muslim leaders who resist vaccines and education for their followers want it that way.

This isn't just about a Muslim terrorist group trying to impose Sharia on 82 million Christians, a system that would reduce them to permanent inferiority. Boko Haram's increasingly sophisticated attacks aren't the work of a local group with no outside support. They bear the stamps of training by practiced terrorists as part of a concerted effort to take over Nigeria.

As the country with the tenth highest petroleum reserves in the world and the second highest in Africa-- it's no secret why our oil producing allies in the Gulf, who fund half the terrorism in the world, would want to seize Nigeria and bring it under the banner of Islam. Taking Nigeria wouldn't just add to their total wealth, it would put a bigger collar around our necks as Nigerian oil accounts for about ten percent of our oil imports. If the Saudis can corral Libya and Nigeria, then Muslim countries will account for nearly 40 percent of our oil imports.

But between these cold hard statistics is a human reality. Boko Haram continues the genocidal Islamic march across the world. Its goal is the same as the Third Reich, to seize power through terror, subjugate entire nations, enslave or exterminate minorities and rob them of their resources. And once again American diplomats are aiding and abetting the carnage.

The Christians of Africa are to Islam what the Jews of Europe were to the Nazis. And Johnnie Carson and his ilk are eager to play Ambassador Joseph P. Kennedy whose Nazi sympathies overshadowed his duty to his country and his conscience. Their goal is to bring down the Goodluck administration or tie its hands enough so that it is forced to make compromises with the terrorists.

The Nigerian government thinks that there is a lobby at work aiding Boko Haram. What it does not understand is that it is only half-right. There is indeed a lobby, more than one, beginning with the Saudi lobby. But most of the appeasers do not need to be paid to do their work. Washington D.C. is full of grand buildings, but there is a rot deep in the heart of all that marble and stone. The edifices stand, but the soul is tainted.

It is that tainted soul which closes its eyes to the atrocities of Boko Haram and protects it from being designated a terrorist group. It is that rot which closes its conscience to the bodies of dead Christians, to those murdered at hands of Islamic genocidal terrorists, and instead mouths more platitudes about transparency and a comprehensive social services approach that will help tip Nigeria into the Islamic camp.

Every act of Islamic terror from Boko Haram is another stain of Christian blood on Obama's hands and the hands of his minions like Johnnie Carson. During the Holocaust, it was the diplomats who did their best to prevent the rescue of the Jews. Today the ghosts of Breckinridge Long and Joe Kennedy still walk the halls of the Harry S. Truman Building where the cover-ups continue and meaningless reassurances are doled out.

What Boko Haram intends for Nigeria is nothing short of genocide. The "cleansing" of Nigeria's Christian population until it is as "pure" as the land of Boko Haram's backers in Saudi Arabia. The lives of millions of Christians in Africa are on the line. Boko Haram has killed thousands of people and it will kill millions if the State Department gets its way and muscles the Goodluck government into an appeasement posture.

The question is how many more have to die. How much Christian blood has to be spilled until the right thing is done? Boko Haram has killed more people in one year than the Ulster Defence Force, which sits on the State Department terrorist list, has killed in decades of activity. Many of the groups on the list have no connection to the United States and no intention of ever attacking the United States. That hasn't stopped the State Department from designating them as terrorist groups. And Boko Haram, which has Al-Qaeda links, has an open and shut case for being on that list.

There is no rational reason why Boko Haram should not be on that list. Being on that list will not force us to take any action in Nigeria, just as we aren't bombing Ireland just because some Irish organizations are on that list. What it will do is make it more difficult for terrorist charities to operate in the United States. It will also make it more difficult for diplomats to pressure Nigeria into making concessions to Boko Haram and make it easier to share intelligence and provide other forms of support to the Nigerian government in its war on Islamic terror.

In her Op-Ed, Herskovitz insisted that "Boko Haram is not the problem". It is up to us to make it the problem, to prevent the Carsons and Herskovitzes from pushing the mass murder of Christians under the rug as if it were no more than a minor inconvenience in their dreams of Muslim power-sharing arrangements.

The shadows are falling over Africa. Cote D'ivorie has been lost to a Western backed Muslim coup. Kenya has been forced into making concessions to Sharia law. But Nigeria is the big prize, its oil and its sizable population makes it the grand prize in the battle for Africa. And if it is won, it will be over the dead bodies of millions of Christians.

Among all the other issues that occupy our time and attention, we must not forget Boko Haram, we must not forget the murdered Christians of Africa or the murdered Jews of Tolouse or the murdered Hindus of Karachi. Not only because that would be wrong, but because we are next. These are not isolated atrocities; they are drops in a tidal wave of death that is sweeping toward us. If we do not stand up for them, who will be left to stand up for us?


The Religious Mosaic of Barack Obama

10 MARCH 2012 12:34
MARSHALL FRANK

Is Obama truly a Christian? Could he be a Muslim? Is there more to be gleaned from his actions, and less from his words? What are his true beliefs and how do they affect decisions that affect all Americans?  

Bear in mind, I am not a religious person, but I vehemently respect and defend all religions that are peace-loving, generous and genuine, particularly Jews and Christians upon whose faith forms the bedrock of this nation’s origins and it’s values.  

Last month I posted an article presenting a Mosaic of the many undefined aspects of Barack Obama that, when joined together like a jigsaw puzzle, clearly shows the full picture that our president is someone else other than what he has portrayed himself.

Among other questions is claim to be a “Christian.” In truth, his life’s history before the alleged “conversion” in 1988 — in the church of Rev. Jeremiah Wright — had been with close alliances to Marxists, atheists and Muslims, almost to the exclusion of any Christians. Thus, one might conclude that declaring himself a “Christian” was purely for political expediency. With politics looming, he certainly would not be electable as an atheist or a Muslim.

Patterns rarely lie. Police investigators often rely on patterns when connecting dots in the field of organized crime and corruption. In my “Mosiac” article, I point out how Mr. Obama leans far more toward the Islamic faith than to Christianity. I am not alone. David Barton, of Wallbuilders.com has posted an article in which he presents a very clear pattern of Barack Obama’s attitude and policies toward Christianity, and further, his leanings toward Islam.

As you read this, remember that upwards of 77 percent of the people of this nation identify as Christian. One ABC poll put the number at 83 percent. While some folks might not like to hear it, that makes us a predominantly Christian nation.

The following text is taken from David Barton’s article. For annotations and sources, check out the full text which is linked below. Very tell-tale.

1. Acts of hostility toward people of Biblical faith:

April 2008 – Obama speaks disrespectfully of Christians, saying they “cling to guns or religion” and have an “antipathy to people who aren’t like them.”

February 2009 – Obama announces plans to revoke conscience protection for health workers who refuse to participate in medical activities that go against their beliefs, and fully implements the plan in February 2011.

April 2009 – When speaking at Georgetown University, Obama orders that a monogram symbolizing Jesus’ name be covered when he is making his speech.

May 2009 – Obama declines to host services for the National Prayer Day (a day established by federal law) at the White House.

April 2009 – In a deliberate act of disrespect, Obama nominated three pro-abortion ambassadors to the Vatican; of course, the pro-life Vatican rejected all three.

October 19, 2010 – Obama begins deliberately omitting the phrase about “the Creator” when quoting the Declaration of Independence – an omission he has made on no less than seven occasions.

November 2010 – Obama misquotes the National Motto, saying it is “E pluribus unum” rather than “In God We Trust” as established by federal law.

January 2011 – After a federal law was passed to transfer a WWI Memorial in the Mojave Desert to private ownership, the U. S. Supreme Court ruled that the cross in the memorial could continue to stand, but the Obama administration refused to allow the land to be transferred as required by law, and refused to allow the cross to be re-erected as ordered by the Court.

February 2011 – Although he filled posts in the State Department, for more than two years Obama did not fill the post of religious freedom ambassador, an official that works against religious persecution across the world; he filled it only after heavy pressure from the public and from Congress.

April 2011 – For the first time in American history, Obama urges passage of a non-discrimination law that does not contain hiring protections for religious groups, forcing religious organizations to hire according to federal mandates without regard to the dictates of their own faith, thus eliminating conscience protection in hiring.

August 2011 – The Obama administration releases its new health care rules that override religious conscience protections for medical workers in the areas of abortion and contraception.

November 2011 – Obama opposes inclusion of President Franklin Roosevelt’s famous D-Day Prayer in the WWII Memorial.

November 2011 – Unlike previous presidents, Obama studiously avoids any religious references in his Thanksgiving speech.

December 2011 – The Obama administration denigrates other countries’ religious beliefs as an obstacle to homosexual rights.

January 2012 – The Obama administration argues that the First Amendment provides no protection for churches and synagogues in hiring their pastors and rabbis.

February 2012 – The Obama administration forgives student loans in exchange for public service, but announces it will no longer forgive student loans if the public service is related to religion.

2. Acts of hostility from the Obama-led military toward people of Biblical faith:

June 2011 – The Department of Veterans Affairs forbids references to God and Jesus during burial ceremonies at Houston National Cemetery.

August 2011 – The Air Force stops teaching the Just War theory to officers in California because the course is taught by chaplains and is based on a philosophy introduced by St. Augustine in the third century AD – a theory long taught by civilized nations across the world (except America).

September 2011 – Air Force Chief of Staff prohibits commanders from notifying airmen of programs and services available to them from chaplains.

September 2011 – The Army issues guidelines for Walter Reed Medical Center stipulating that “No religious items (i.e. Bibles, reading materials and/or facts) are allowed to be given away or used during a visit.”

November 2011 – The Air Force Academy rescinds support for Operation Christmas Child, a program to send holiday gifts to impoverished children across the world, because the program is run by a Christian charity.

November 2011 – The Air Force Academy pays $80,000 to add a Stonehenge-like worship center for pagans, druids, witches and Wiccans.

February 2012 – The U. S. Military Academy at West Point disinvites three star Army general and decorated war hero Lieutenant General William G. (“Jerry”) Boykin (retired) from speaking at an event because he is an outspoken Christian.

February 2012 – The Air Force removes “God” from the patch of Rapid Capabilities Office (the word on the patch was in Latin: Dei).

February 2012 – The Army orders Catholic chaplains not to read a letter to parishioners that their archbishop asked them to read.

3. Acts of hostility toward Biblical values:

January 2009 – Obama lifts restrictions on U.S. government funding for groups that provide abortion services or counseling abroad, forcing taxpayers to fund pro-abortion groups that either promote or perform abortions in other nations.

January 2009 – President Obama’s nominee for deputy secretary of state asserts that American taxpayers are required to pay for abortions and that limits on abortion funding are unconstitutional.

March 2009 – The Obama administration shut out pro-life groups from attending a White House-sponsored health care summit.

March 2009 – Obama gave $50 million for the UNFPA, the UN population agency that promotes abortion and works closely with Chinese population control officials who use forced abortions and involuntary sterilizations.

May 2009 – The White House budget eliminates all funding for abstinence-only education and replaces it with “comprehensive” sexual education, repeatedly proven to increase teen pregnancies and abortions.

He continues the deletion in subsequent budgets.

May 2009 – Obama officials assemble a terrorism dictionary calling pro-life advocates violent and charging that they use racism in their “criminal” activities.

July 2009 – The Obama administration illegally extends federal benefits to same-sex partners of Foreign Service and Executive Branch employees, in direction violation of the federal Defense of Marriage Act.

September 16, 2009 – The Obama administration appoints as EEOC Commissioner Chai Feldblum, who asserts that society should “not tolerate” any “private beliefs,” including religious beliefs, if they may negatively affect homosexual “equality.”

July 2010 – The Obama administration uses federal funds in violation of federal law to get Kenya to change its constitution to include abortion.

August 2010 – The Obama administration Cuts funding for 176 abstinence education programs.

February 2011 – Obama directs the Justice Department to stop defending the federal Defense of Marriage Act.

March 2011 – The Obama administration refuses to investigate videos showing Planned Parenthood helping alleged sex traffickers get abortions for victimized underage girls.

October 2011 – The Obama administration eliminates federal grants to the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops for their extensive programs that aid victims of human trafficking because the Catholic Church is anti-abortion.

4. Acts of preferentialism for Islam:

May 2009 – While Obama does not host any National Day of Prayer event at the White House, he does host White House Iftar dinners in honor of Ramadan.

April 2010 – Christian leader Franklin Graham is disinvited from the Pentagon’s National Day of Prayer Event because of complaints from the Muslim community.

April 2010 – The Obama administration requires rewriting of government documents and a change in administration vocabulary to remove terms that are deemed offensive to Muslims, including jihad, jihadists, terrorists, radical Islamic, etc.

August 2010 – Obama speaks with great praise of Islam and condescendingly of Christianity. ( He tells a Muslim audience during Ramadan that “Islam has always been a part of America and Muslims have made extraordinary contributions to this country.”)

August 2010 – Obama went to great lengths to speak out on multiple occasions on behalf of building an Islamic mosque at Ground Zero, while at the same time he was silent about a Christian church being denied permission to rebuild at that location.

2010 – While every White House traditionally issues hundreds of official proclamations and statements on numerous occasions, this White House avoids traditional Biblical holidays and events but regularly recognizes major Muslim holidays, as evidenced by its 2010 statements on Ramadan, Eid-ul-Fitr, Hajj, and Eid-ul-Adha.

October 2011 – Obama’s Muslim advisers block Middle Eastern Christians’ access to the White House.

February 2012 – The Obama administration makes effulgent apologies for Korans being burned by the U. S. military, but when bibles were burned by the military, numerous reasons were offered why it was the right thing to do.

The reader can easily put the pieces of the mosaic together. While some people may not disagree with all of these actions, one cannot lose sight of the bigger picture, in total, and what it tells us all.

These actions are unprecedented. The hostility of President Obama toward Biblical faith and values is without equal from any previous American president.


Vatican seeks to explain U.S. money laundering tag
By Nicole Winfield, Associated Press
March 9, 2012

VATICAN CITY – The Vatican on Friday sought to explain its presence for the first time on a U.S. list of countries that are a potential hub for money laundering, saying it was only natural to be included given its recent efforts to conform to international standards.

The U.S. State Department this week released its International Narcotics Control Strategy Report, which identified the Holy See as one of 68 countries or jurisdictions "of concern" for money laundering or other financial crimes.

Vatican spokesman the Rev. Federico Lombardi noted Friday that all the world's major economies — the U.S., Japan and even Italy — are identified as countries of "primary concern" for money laundering. That more serious designation is because of the sheer size of their economies.

Lombardi said it wasn't surprising that the Vatican was placed on the list of jurisdictions "of concern" since it joined a European evaluation process in 2011 to try to conform to international anti-money laundering standards.

In early July, the Vatican is expected to learn whether it has complied with a host of recommendations to fight terror financing and money laundering.

The State Department report didn't explain why the Holy See was included, noting only that it was on the list for the first time. South Sudan, which declared its independence in 2011, was also included for the first time in another category of countries being monitored.

The Vatican passed legislation in 2010 making money laundering a crime and fine-tuned the law earlier this year. It also ratified three major U.N. conventions.

The moves are all part of the Holy See's efforts to get on the "white list" of countries that share financial information and shed its long-held reputation as a secretive offshore tax haven whose bank has been embroiled in scandals over the years.


Obama wages war against Catholic Church
February 18, 2012
By Dr. R. Claire Friend
The Daily Pilot

Having fought to free ourselves from the tyranny of King George, we Americans find ourselves with the boot of yet another monarch planted firmly on our throat.

Mark Steyn compared President Obama to Henry VIII, the absolutist monarch who fought the Vatican. He ended Catholicism as the state religion of England and replaced it with the Anglican Church. He did as he wished so he could do as he wished. It is a stunning metaphor!

The Catholic Church is one of the world's oldest, most magnificent institutions. It provided the inspiration and the support for much of the greatest works of art, music and literature. The great masterpieces of Leonardo da Vinci, Michelangelo and El Greco would not exist absent Papal commissions.

Charles Murray observed in his book "Human Accomplishment" that the greatness of Western European civilization itself is derived from its belief in church and God. Catholicism itself was the defender of civilization during the Crusades against the Muslims, who attempted to conquer Europe. The French Roman Catholic King Charlemagne was the great hero who saved Europe and conquered them instead.

America has fought many kinds of battles against internal and external foes. We have always been on the right side of the angels. Our most powerful and determinative battle, however, has not been a military conflict. It has been the secular and cultural war against the faith and morality of this country, and it now threatens to determine our very survival.

Obama's war against the Catholic Church is far greater than a simple demand that employers provide contraception and abortion in the guise of women's health services. His decree thwarts the legally guaranteed constitutional separation of church and state and attacks the respect for the sanctity of life, the most inviolate covenant of Catholicism.

The president has thrown down the gauntlet. This is a battle that threatens to undermine both America's Constitution and America herself. Our first president was a hero in the war fought to gain our independence. It was George Washington who helped give birth to his country. We now have a president who threatens to ring its death knell.

Who among us will lead the crusade against this new tyrant? Will there be another Washington or Charlemagne? Let us pray one arrives before November.

R. CLAIRE FRIEND is medical doctor from Newport Beach.


Obama’s contraception mandate outrages churches, religious groups
Religious groups say it forces people of faith to make unfair choices
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
FEBRUARY 3, 2012

The Obama administration's decision requiring church-affiliated employers to cover birth control was bound to cause an uproar among Roman Catholics and members of other faiths, no matter their beliefs on contraception.

The regulation, finalized a week ago, raises a complex and sensitive legal question: Which institutions qualify as religious and can be exempt from the mandate?

For a church, mosque or synagogue, the answer is mostly straightforward. But for the massive network of religious-run social service agencies there is no simple solution. Federal law lays out several criteria for the government to determine which are religious. But in the case of the contraception mandate, critics say Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius chose the narrowest ones. Religious groups that oppose the regulation say it forces people of faith to choose between upholding church doctrine and serving the broader society.

"It's not about preventing women from buying anything themselves, but telling the church what it has to buy, and the potential for that to go further," said Sister Carol Keehan, president of the Catholic Health Association, representing some 600 hospitals.

Keehan's support for the passage of the Obama health care overhaul was critical in the face of intense opposition by the U.S. bishops. She now says the narrowness of the religious exemption in the birth control mandate "has jolted us." She pledged to use a one-year grace period the administration has provided to "pursue a correction."

The U.S. Health and Human Services Department adopted the rule to improve health care for women. Last year, an advisory panel from the Institute of Medicine, which advises the federal government, recommended including birth control on the list of covered services, partly because it promotes maternal and child health by allowing women to space their pregnancies. The regulation includes a religious exemption if an organization qualifies. Under that provision, an employer generally will be considered religious if its main purpose is spreading religious beliefs, and if it largely employs and serves people of the same faith. That means a Catholic parish likely would qualify for a religious exemption; a large church-run soup kitchen probably would not.

Employers that fail to provide health insurance coverage under the federal law could be fined $2,000 per employee per year. The bishops' domestic anti-poverty agency, Catholic Charities, says it employs 70,000 people nationwide. The fine for the University of Notre Dame, the most prominent Catholic school in the country, could be in the millions of dollars.

HHS says employers can appeal a decision on whether they qualify for an exemption. But Hannah Smith, senior counsel for the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, said, "The mandate vests too much unbridled discretion in the hands of government bureaucrats."

Mandates for birth-control coverage are not entirely new for religious groups. Twenty-eight states already require contraceptive coverage in prescription drug plans. Of those states, 17 offer a range of religious exemptions, while two others provide opt-outs of other kinds. However, opponents of the HHS regulation say there is no state mandate as broad as the new federal rule combined with a religious exemption that is so narrow.

Even in states where the requirement already exists, the issue is far from settled.

Wisconsin's 2009 contraception mandate did not include a religious exemption, but allowed an exception for employers who self-insure. While some dioceses in the state were able to self-insure, others couldn't afford to do so. The Diocese of Madison, Wis., ended up offering a policy with birth-control coverage, but asked employees to follow church teaching and not use the benefit. Local bishops continued to lobby state lawmakers for an exemption. But leaders knew a national health care overhaul was in development and hoped the federal law would be an improvement, said John Huebscher, executive director of the Wisconsin Catholic Conference, the public policy arm of the state's bishops.

In California, whose religious exemption served as the model for the Obama administration, dioceses and some church-run agencies were able to self-insure, said Carol Hogan of the California Catholic Conference, but that option is for the most part unavailable under the federal health care law. Church-run groups could have stopped offering insurance to their employees, but considered that option unfair to workers.
The bishops have responded sharply to the regulation, launching a nationwide campaign against the mandate.

Bishops in more than 140 dioceses issued statements that were read at Mass last weekend. Bishop William Murphy of Rockville Centre, N.Y., called the requirement "a radical incursion on the part of our government into freedom of conscience." Bishop David Zubik of Pittsburgh wrote that "the Obama administration was essentially saying `to hell with you,' particularly to the Catholic community by dismissing our beliefs, our religious freedom and our freedom of conscience."

The Becket Fund had previously filed two federal lawsuits over the regulations on behalf of Belmont Abbey College, a Catholic liberal arts school near Charlotte, N.C., and Colorado Christian University, an evangelical school near Denver. Both challenge the mandate as a violation of several freedoms, including the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, which says the government cannot impose a substantial burden on the free exercise of religion. The fine for Belmont Abbey would be more than $300,000 for the first year, and more than $500,000 for Colorado Christian, Smith, the Becket Fund counsel, said.

Many conservatives are also supporting legislation by Rep. Jeff Fortenberry, R-Neb., that would codify a series of exceptions to the new health care law on religious and conscience grounds

For religious-affiliated employers, the requirement will take effect Aug. 1, 2013, and their workers in most cases will have access to coverage starting Jan. 1, 2014. Women working for secular enterprises, from profit-making companies to government, will have access to the new coverage starting Jan. 1, 2013, in most cases.

Workplace health plans will have to cover all forms of contraception approved by the Food and Drug Administration, ranging from the pill to implantable devices to sterilization. Also covered is the morning-after pill, which can prevent pregnancy after unprotected sex and is considered tantamount to an abortion drug by some religious conservatives.

There is no mandate to cover abortions. But that is little comfort to Catholic leaders, since the regulation violates other church teachings.

White House spokesman Jay Carney said Thursday that the administration will not reconsider the decision.





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