The Scriptorium

Denver is still banning Christians from their Parade of Lights Christmas parade. A local Christian church who hoped to have a float in the parade and sing Christmas songs has been told that nothing religious will be allowed in the parade. However, the city is allowing homosexual Native Americans called “holy men” to have a float in the parade.

They have backed down on banning any signs using the word Christmas due to a large number of complaints from Denver residents.

How can secularists insist that religion be removed from religious holidays, and still claim to support freedom of religion? How scary is it to have our government telling us we can’t use the word Christmas or sing Christmas carols in public anymore?

If you’d like to send the Mayor of Denver, or the company hosting the parade an e-mail voicing your displeasure with Christians being banned from the public square, follow the links below:

Denver Mayor John Hickenlooper

Denver Civic Ventures, Inc.

WorldNetDaily Article

A Christian Pastor is being sued for following the biblical mandate on church discipline. A member of the church had committed adultery and was unrepentant. As the Bible instructs, the pastor took the matter before the church, and they removed the adulterer’s membership.

This is definitely a case to watch. An appeals court has ruled that the church member has a right to sue her pastor, and the case will now move to the supreme court. If the pastor loses this case, this means pastors and churches could be sued for simply following Biblical teachings. It opens the churches up to government involvement. Homosexuals would be able to sue for discrimination, along with any other activist group that would enjoy causing problems for Christian churches.

This is actually what Jefferson was referring to when he wrote his letter to the Danburry Baptists and explained to them that there was a wall of separation between church and state. Government is not to get involved in church affairs and church governance. You won’t see any liberals supporting the separation of church and state in this case though, I’m sure.

A Texas appeals court has ruled that a pastor can be sued for following biblical mandates in administering church discipline, but a civil rights defender says the United States Constitution is on the minister’s side.

Four years ago Pastor Buddy Westbrook of Crossland Community Bible Church in Fort Worth was approached by member Peggy Penley, who needed counseling for marital problems. Eventually Penley left her husband to live with another man. Pastor Westbrook then proceeded to follow the three-step conflict resolution guidelines given in the Bible in the 18th chapter of Matthew. Eventually, the minister went before the church with the matter, sending a letter to the congregation in which he removed Penley from church membership.

Westbrook subsequently found himself having to defend his actions in court. Initially, a district court ruled in the pastor’s favor, but an appeals court said Penley had a right to sue her pastor. However, Hiram Sasser of Liberty Legal Institute, the firm that is defending Westbrook, contends that pastors are protected from such lawsuits under the United States Constitution.

Continue Reading: Agape Press Article

Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy Thompson announced his resignation today with an ominous warning of a health-related terrorist attack and a global flu outbreak.

“For the life of me, I cannot understand why the terrorists have not attacked our food supply because it is so easy to do,” Thompson said at a news conference.

He is the eighth member of President Bush’s 15-member Cabinet to leave.

Bush’s top choice to replace Thompson is Medicare chief and former commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration Mark McClellan, a longtime ally from Texas.

He is the brother of White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan.

Earlier Friday, Bush announced his nomination of former New York Police Department chief Bernard Kerik to replace Tom Ridge as secretary of Homeland Security.

Thompson said much more needs to be done to protect food imports, noting he worries “every single night” about food poisoning.

He also chastised Congress for not approving more funds for avian flu, which could kill as many as 30 million to 70 million people worldwide, according to some estimates.

“This is a really huge bomb out there that could adversely impact on the health care of the world,” Thompson said.

Is it just me or does it seem like an invitation to the terrorists to say in a press conference that it would be so easy to poison our food source. I’m probably being too anal here, but it just seems like a stupid thing to say if you know the terrorists watch our news.

WorldNetDaily

Remember when American’s United for Separation of Church and State was going into Christian churches before the election to spy on congregations who might be preaching about politics. When a church was caught endorsing Bush, American’s United would then turn them into the IRS in order to get their non-profit status revoked. You might also remember that the ACLU said not a word about this tactic of spying on churches.

The ACLU seems to have changed it’s mind, and is now chastising the FBI for spying on religious groups it suspects of being involved in criminal activity, or more specifically terrorist activities. I guess spying on the enemy, Christians, is okay, but spying on other religions for the purposes of national security can’t be tolerated.

I would much rather have the FBI keeping tabs on my church than have the ACLU spying on us and looking for anything they can sue us over, or use against us to get our non-profit status taken away.

The American Civil Liberties Union on Thursday accused the FBI and local police of spying on political and faith-based groups and formally asked the government for information about such FBI surveillance.

In Freedom of Information Act requests filed in 10 states and Washington, D.C., the ACLU sought information about the FBI’s use of Joint Terrorism Task Forces and local police for what it called political surveillance.

It pointed to some documented examples of task forces’ involvement in the investigation of environmental activists and anti-war protesters.

“The FBI is wasting its time and our tax dollars spying on groups that criticize the government, like the Quakers in Colorado or Catholic Peace Ministries in Iowa,” said ACLU associate legal director Ann Beeson.

“Do Americans really want to return to the days when peaceful critics become the subject of government investigations?” she said. The ACLU is America’s most prominent independent advocacy group for civil liberties.

The FOIA requests seek FBI files on groups and individuals targeted for speaking out or practicing their faith.

The FBI denied using the task forces — a key element of the government’s efforts to prevent another terror attack like those on Sept. 11, 2001 — to spy on innocent individuals.

Asked about the ACLU action, an FBI spokesman said, “The FBI does not investigate individuals or groups that are engaged in exercising their constitutional rights of freedom of expression.

He added, “Only if they are engaged in criminal activity in support of a cause would we be interested in them.”

In its FOIA request, the ACLU asked for information on procedures used by the task forces for monitoring people based on their race, religious affiliation, organizational membership or participation in protest activities.

Realizing that their continued corruption and lack of effectiveness in solving problems has finally caught up with them, the U.N. is proposing big changes that they hope will save them from irrelevancy.

For those of us who despise the U.N., there’s a bit of good news here. Increasing the size of the Security Council, as they propose, will only lead to more endless debates and an inability to ever actually take action and solve a problem. Increasing the number of countries participating will do nothing to help their image. Can you imagine Egypt ever agreeing to do something about the Christians being slaughtered by Muslims in Sudan?

The report also suggests requiring all member states to seek U.N. approval before any pre-emptive action is taken. In other words if you are in imminent danger and you need to act militarily to protect your country, you’ll need to submit your request to the U.N. and wait through weeks of debate for an answer. By the time they define what a threat is and whine about all the thousands who will die if action is taken, your country will probably be blown off the face of the earth and the problem will be solved.

The answer to the U.N.’s corruption and irrelevance is not to give them more power and full control of every countries right to self defense. Didn’t Kerry suggest something similar? A global test, was it? His idea didn’t go over so well in the U.S. I don’t imagine the U.N. will have any better luck.

The New York Times

Europe is taking the next natural step after desensitizing the population to abortion, especially brutal late term abortions. Now that the public has been trained to view an unborn baby as a non-feeling piece of tissue that only becomes human in the moment it first sees the light of day, it’s time to convince people that human life really isn’t that sacred after birth either.

Corningen University Hospital in the Netherlands has instituted a policy that would allow doctors to Euthanize babies and children up to 12 years old if they are deemed to be suffering from a terminal illness. What kind of animal does it take to kill a child because you feel their life is no longer worth living? Making this policy even more disgusting, the parents would have no say in this decision.

Now watch as the secular humanists hold themselves up as an example of love and compassion for putting children out of their misery.

Four times in recent months, Dutch doctors have pumped lethal doses of drugs into newborns they believe are terminally ill, setting off a new phase in a growing European debate over when, if ever, it’s acceptable to hasten death for the critically ill.

Few details of the four newborns’ deaths have been made public. Official investigations have found that the doctors made appropriate and professional decisions under an experimental policy allowing child euthanasia that’s known as the Groningen University Hospital protocol.

But the children’s deaths, and the possibility that the protocol will become standard practice throughout the Netherlands, have sparked heated discussion about whether the idea of assisting adults who seek to die should ever be applied to children and others who are incapable of making, or understanding, such a request.

“Applying euthanasia to children is another step down the slope in this debate,” said Henk Jochemsen, the director of Holland’s Lindeboom Institute, which studies medical ethics. “Not everybody agrees, obviously, but when we broaden the application from those who actively and repeatedly seek to end their lives to those for whom someone else determines death is a better option, we are treading in dangerous territory.”

The Dutch debate is being closely watched throughout the continent. Belgium has laws similar to those in the Netherlands, and a bill permitting child euthanasia is before its Parliament. No date has been set for debate.

Great Britain is considering legalizing assisted suicide for the terminally ill, amid reports that doctors already may be helping thousands of patients to die each year.

“Assisted dying is a fact,” said Hazel Biggs, the director of medical law at the University of Kent, who’s about to publish a report estimating the number of assisted deaths in Britain at 18,000 annually. “We have to regulate it, to ensure that vulnerable people are being protected.”

Under the Groningen protocol, if doctors at the hospital think a child is suffering unbearably from a terminal condition, they have the authority to end the child’s life. The protocol is likely to be used primarily for newborns, but it covers any child up to age 12.

The hospital, beyond confirming the protocol in general terms, refused to discuss its details.

“It is for very sad cases,” said a hospital spokesman, who declined to be identified. “After years of discussions, we made our own protocol to cover the small number of infants born with such severe disabilities that doctors can see they have extreme pain and no hope for life. Our estimate is that it will not be used but 10 to 15 times a year.”

A parent’s role is limited under the protocol. While experts and critics familiar with the policy said a parent’s wishes to let a child live or die naturally most likely would be considered, they note that the decision must be professional, so rests with doctors.

KRT Wire

INDC Journal conducted a research project on the migration and mating patterns of the many species of North American moonbat. Their latest field study: Dances with Moonbats can be viewed here. It’s rather entertaining, and you’ll learn a lot about the American moonbat.

Hat tip: LGF

Michelle Malkin’s blog posts today that Iran is rounding up and arresting internet bloggers. While censorship is nothing new in Iran, it’s interesting that the U.N.’s working group on Internet Governance includes a delegate from Iran. The U.N. recognizes that the internet will impede their efforts to silence opposition, especially that of Christians, and is eager to become the governing power that will regulate it. The same “hate speech” laws, and rights of conscience garbage applied to member nations, will be applied to the internet. With Iranians heading up the working group, censorship is guaranteed. To send a letter of protest to the U.N., send an e-mail to the U.N. Working Group on Internet Governance, care of Edoardo Bellando, send an e-mail to bellando@un.org. I sent a polite e-mail letting them know my thoughts on their Iranian delegate, and their attempt to regulate the internet. I received a personal response that was very respectful and full of all kinds of excuses, examples of how wonderful the U.N. is, and claims that Reporters Without Borders is nothing more than a hate group that has extremist views. Blah blah blah blah…anyone who doesn’t agree with the U.N. is an extremist in their opinion. The fact that they see the reporters as the terrorist in this scandal, and not the Iranian government, tells us a lot about the U.N.

“The government is now attacking blogs, the last bastion of freedom on a network that is experiencing ever tighter control,” said the worldwide press freedom organisation. “At the same time, an Iranian delegate is sitting on a UN-created working group on Internet governance. The international community should condemn this masquerade,” it added.

Three webloggers identified only by their first names were arrested on 29 October 2004. They were : Dariush (http://www.dariushkabir.com), Omid (http://www.shurideh.com) and Payvand (http://gayaneh.net).

Mojtaba Saminejad was arrested at the beginning of November for speaking out against the arrest of his three colleagues in his blog (http://man-namanam.blogspot.com).

Farid Modaressi, a member of the student organisation the Office to Consolidate Unity, was arrested on 28 November on the order of the prosecutor’s office in the city of Qom. He had posted a number of articles on his weblog (http://farid.blogset.com) exposing persistent harassment in the city by members of the conservative movement. Two of his brothers were reportedly arrested two days earlier and are apparently still being held.

Reporters Without Borders Article

What therapists in Florida call PEST (post election selection trauma), sounds an awful lot like a spoiled temper tantrum, and a bunch of hate filled extremists to me. At a therapy session for PEST victims, the participants revealed their hatred for religion and willingness to use violence to get their way. One of the therapists points out that his patients are terrified of Rush Limbaugh. My question is, why are they listening to him?!!! If they can’t figure out how to change the station, they may need more than visualization techniques.

Twenty John Kerry supporters met for their first group therapy session in
South Florida Thursday, screaming epithets at President Bush as they shared
their emotions with licensed mental health counselors.

The first of several free noontime therapy sessions at the American Health
Association in Boca Raton was designed to treat what mental health
counselors have dubbed Post Election Selection Trauma (PEST).
“If I had a cardboard cutout of President Bush, and these people wanted to throw darts at it, I would let them do it,” Robert J. Gordon, AHA executive director, told the Boca News after the session. “It’s no joke. People with PEST were traumatized by the election. If you even mention religion, their faces turn blister-red as they shout at Bush.”

Although the meeting was closed to the press, AHA therapists obtained permission from participants to provide an anonymous transcript to the Boca Raton News.

“I’m scared,” said one man. “Democracy is at stake and nobody is rising to protest this president.” “I want to be a patriot, but it’s impossible to be a patriot in an immoral war,” said another participant, a woman. “Bush is breaking up marriages and dividing families by keeping our troops in Iraq.”

Gordon said the participants also granted reluctant permission to open up next Thursday’s meeting to the general press. Reporters will be forbidden from taking photographs or using the real names of patients. “The media outlets, especially Rush Limbaugh and his ilk on talk radio, scare our patients to death,” said Gordon, facilitator for the meetings. “More than anything else, people with PEST tremble physically.”
Gordon said the Kerry supporters in therapy are predominantly Jewish and older than 50. Most are registered independents and all live in Palm Beach County.

“We mostly let them vent during the first session,” Gordon said. “By the third session, we’ll be doing some meditation exercises to aid some of their symptoms. We may use visualization and some techniques designed for bipolar disease and other mental disorders. That might help them adjust to reality.”

According to AHA officials, symptoms of PEST are similar to post-traumatic stress disorder. They include nightmares, sleeplessness, hostility,
listlessness, and emotional outbursts including threats to leave the country.

“There’s an overall sense of emotional helplessness and abandonment,” said Sheila Cooperman, a licensed AHA psychotherapist from Delray Beach. “In psychology, we call it ‘learned helplessness.’ After you zap a caged dog twice, he stops moving because he knows there is no place to go. That’s what happened with these Kerry voters. They’ve been zapped so many times that they’re on the verge of giving up on politics.”

Cooperman, also a practicing psychic, added, “One person today said he thinks the country is now run by fascists. Another felt personally threatened by the president’s love for big business. Many believe Bush is going to draft their grandchildren. The anxiety may not affect them every day, but it affects their energy level.”
An additional 30 people are signed up for two other AHA election support groups, which will meet for the remainder of the year and possibly beyond.

Gordon said his patients’ emotional problems typically started with the “hanging chad” debacle of 2000. “First, they need to realize they’re not going to overturn the 2004 election,” Gordon said. “They have to live with it. The problem is they have no faith because they think the religious right has hijacked the political system. We try to tell them there is still an election in 2008. You can’t just give up and be apathetic.”
The AHA, using a holistic approach to health that has been mocked as new age voodoo by some national talk show hosts, has stressed to patients that their post-election emotions are normal and deserve to be taken seriously.

“These people talk about the 2000 election being stolen,” Gordon said. “They talk about Theresa LePore and the Ohio recount. They feel it’s the ‘Right House,’ not the White House. They feel the world is not safe with George W. Bush as president. They spewed out a lot of anger. They are angry at the Democratic Party for being aimless and leaderless. They have a right to
these feelings.”

BocaNews.com Article

David Limbaugh mentions in his blog today another interesting blog by an undergraduate student living in Jordan. Athena is studying terrorism and Arabic, and her blog, Terrorism Unveiled has an interesting commentary on the tragedy of mercy killings in Muslim countries. Read the full commentary here.

A fifth grade public school teacher is suing his district and principal for banning the Declaration of Independence and other historical documents from the classroom because they reference God. Good for this teacher! Even the most tortured interpretation of the First Amendment doesn’t allow schools to ban teaching certain parts of American history just because they mention religion. I’m glad someone is finally taking this on. When they start banning facts and history, it’s getting just a little too close to Nazi Germany type censorship to just ignore. Can you imagine 15 years from now speaking with an adult who has never read or even heard of the Declaration of Independence? Our public schools are suposed to educate our children, not see how ignorant they can make them before they graduate.

A public school teacher is suing his district and principal for barring him from using the Declaration of Independence and other historical documents in class because they contain references to God and Christianity.

Steven Williams, who teaches fifth grade at an elementary school near San Francisco, filed the federal lawsuit last week, arguing a First Amendment right to teach U.S. history, which includes religious, and specifically Christian, references.

He said the school’s principal prevented him from using handouts from documents including the Declaration of Independence, “The Rights of the Colonists” by Samuel Adams and President Bush’s 2004 Day of Prayer proclamation.

District officials said they received the lawsuit and referred it to their attorneys, but wouldn’t comment further.

TheKCRAChannel.com

Little Green Footballs has pictures of the protests that took place in Canada during Bush’s visit. I’m not sure how they can call themselves “peace” protesters while holding some of these signs.

idfisrael.com also has pictures of the events. Is it just me, or does Canada not look like much of a friend to the U.S.?

California is not claiming that parents have no right to know when certain medical procedures are performed on their children. For example, California parents would not be told if their child left school for an abortion, or to receive AIDS testing. Not only is it absurd to think parents don’t have a right to know when their children are leaving school or having a procedure done, it’s dangerous to the child’s health.

An abortion is not a minor procedure. Infections can develop and there can be complications. If a child’s parents are completely unaware their children have had this procedure done, they may not take a fever, or increase in pain seriously. What they may thing is a flu bug, could be an infection from the procedure their child secretly had done earlier in the day. Eventually, a child is going to die because the schools took over the parenting roll. When that happens, watch how fast the schools put the responsibility back on the parents.

California schools cannot inform parents if their children leave campus to receive certain confidential medical services that include abortion, AIDS treatment and psychological analysis, according to an opinion issued by the office of state Attorney General Bill Lockyer.

The opinion was prompted by resistance from teachers unions and groups such as Planned Parenthood to a Sacramento-based lobby group’s efforts to help schools enact a “parent-friendly” policy requiring parental notification and consent in the wake of “medical emancipation” statutes that allow students to confidentially seek medical help off campus.

Previously it was understood that schools were allowed to enact confidentiality policies, but now the state’s top lawyer is saying they are required.

WorldNetDaily