Monday, January 04, 2021
More of Generation Z Are Believing in God.
Belief in God rising among Gen Z amid COVID-19 pandemic, survey finds.
Gorby, Chernobyl & The Demise of The Soviet Union.
Mr Gorbachev is still a divisive figure in his homeland as many Russians still associate him personally with the collapse of the Soviet Union.
The fall of the Berlin Wall is widely seen as the symbolic moment when communism in Eastern Europe – started by Vladimir Lenin's Bolshevik revolution in 1917 – was brought to an end.
However, Mr Gorbachev revealed his real thoughts on what caused the fall of communism during a 2006 interview, during which he claimed it was nothing to do with his desire for reform.
He also stopped short of highlighting the importance of the Berlin Wall coming down, instead noting the Chernobyl disaster of 1986 as the pivotal moment in the fall of the Soviet Union.
He said: “The nuclear meltdown at Chernobyl, even more than my launch of Perestroika, was perhaps the real cause of the collapse of the Soviet Union five years later.”
Sunday, January 03, 2021
Only Half? - I Rarely Meet Anyone Who Has A Good Word - Irrespective of Age or Politics!
Half of Britons feel the BBC does not share their values
Nearly half of Britons think that the BBC no longer represents their values amid declining levels of trust in the broadcaster, particularly outside London, research for The Times suggests. In the past year a third of the public said that the values of the BBC had become less like theirs amid controversy over its coverage of Brexit and the... Times.
I Opt - Contrarian.
Thomas Becket: holy martyr, or stubborn contrarian with a death-wish?
Thomas Becket is depicted in a stained glass window at St Peter's Berkhamsted by Nathaniel WestlakeMurder in the cathedral
December 29th is the 850th anniversary of the death of Thomas Becket in 1170. To have the Archbishop of Canterbury murdered in his own cathedral would have been shocking enough. But in this case, those who committed the crime were convinced they were doing the will of their king, Henry II. In the dark of a winter's evening, as a service was underway, a group of armed men burst into the cathedral shouting "Royal Knights! King's men!" The situation exploded. They called Becket "traitor". He called one of them a "pimp"! More ... https://www.christiantoday.com/article/thomas.becket.holy.martyr.or.stubborn.contrarian.with.a.death.wish/136125.htm
Trans-Pacific Trade Agreement Soon? - Definitely No Loss of Freedoms and Having To Submit To Federalists and Bureaucrats!
Champions of free trade want the UK to join the Trans-Pacific Partnership, an agreement between 11 countries around the Pacific Rim including Australia, Canada, Chile, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, Singapore and Vietnam. The breakneck speed at which the Prime Minister nailed down a deal with the EU has raised hopes that the UK can rapidly secure deals and exploit opportunities to boost trade and grow the economy. Victoria Hewson, a trade expert at the highly influential Institute of Economic Affairs, pushed for the UK to join the Pacific nations’ trading group – technically known as the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP) – which in 2018 accounted for 13 percent of global GDP. Express.
Saturday, January 02, 2021
Wisdom.
The assumption that the west believes in nothing strongly enough to fight for it has fuelled conflict in the Middle East and elsewhere. Around the world, aggressors gain the advantage because they know that western democracies that say they’ll bring them to heel don’t actually mean it.
From Iran to North Korea, from China to the Palestinians, rogue states, terrorist regimes and other aggressors have been able to continue their murderous, expansionist activities because they think that, however much the west may threaten them, it won’t follow through.
So the Palestinians never believed the west meant it when it told them they had to accept the right of Israel to exist. Why should they have believed this, when until 2016 at least the west never stopped excusing, funding and incentivising their aggression?
The one exception to this has been US President Donald Trump, who called the Palestinians’ manipulative bluff. Told by the rest of the west that moving the US embassy to Jerusalem would provoke the Arab world to violence, he ignored this and moved it anyway.
Not only was there no such uprising, but now the Palestinians have been marginalised by an Arab world that’s increasingly making its peace with Israel in a way that was previously unthinkable.
That’s largely due in turn to Trump taking the United States out of the Iran nuclear deal and reimposing sanctions on the regime. He thus showed that, unlike former President Barack Obama or the British and the Europeans, when he said he intended to stop Iran from getting nuclear weapons he really did mean it.
Now there are fears that President-elect Joe Biden may reactivate the Iran deal and start pumping money again into the regime’s nefarious activities; or he may once again incentivise the Palestinians’ agenda of destroying Israel; or he may allow China to walk all over him in its drive to dominate the west.
This is based on the fear that Biden may behave as the left always behave. They have no red lines of principle over stopping aggressors and protecting their victims. Instead, their doctrine of moral equivalence means that they make no such value judgments between aggressor and victim.
Their red line is instead merely to keep negotiations and peace processes going. The result is that they excuse and empower aggressors just to keep them from walking out of the talks.
So when they claim to be against tyranny, racism and oppression, the world’s tyrants, racists and oppressors know they don’t mean what they say.
Britain now faces more battles with the EU The free world faces more battles with Iran, China, Russia, Islamic jihadists and other lethal foes. The Jews face their interminable battle against those who wish to destroy them.
What the Brexit deal reminds us is that hypocrites are dismissed with contempt as paper tigers; and that for freedom, justice and democracy to win against aggression, injustice and tyranny, the leaders of the free world must not pay mere lip-service to defending the former but actually mean what they say. Jewish News Syndicate, Melanie Phillips.
Where I Visit The Costa Brava Regularly (Usually) These Are a Menace. Time Too To Look at Grey Squirrels and Magpies!
Defra officials are considering shooting populations of parakeets after the number of birds grew by nearly 1,500 per cent in the space of just 20 years. Mail.
God The Holy Spirit.
The Holy Spirit has been called the forgotten God. But He’s also, according to Scripture, at the heart of the Christian life. “I believe in the Holy Spirit,” says the Nicene Creed, “The Lord and Giver of Life, Who proceeds from the Father and the Son, Who with the Father and the Son is both worshiped and glorified. Who has spoken to us through the prophets.”
Now, there’s a longstanding debate between Eastern and Western churches about whether the Spirit proceeds from the Father alone or from the Son as well. What Christians agree on, however, is that the Spirit is God. He’s a person, not a force.
He inspired the Scriptures. He raised Jesus Christ from the dead. He’s the comforter sent by Jesus, the One who gives us ears to hear the Gospel and who intercedes for us when we pray, indwelling us to this day. We are His temples, and He is the pledge of our inheritance. He guarantees that the faith we now confess in the Triune God will one day be sight.
This Point originally aired on December 29, 2018, Breakpoint.
Friday, January 01, 2021
Pope Goes For Smart Answers Rather Than Christian Ones. - The Man Is Embracing Heresy!
Comedian Stephen K Amos was prepared to challenge Pope over homosexuality.
Stephen K Amos (Isabel Infantes/PA)
Pope Francis spoke to the comedian about sexuality and humanity (Danny Lawson/PA)
Comedian Stephen K Amos was ready to confront Pope Francis over homosexuality before a “life-changing” conversation.
Gearing up to meet the pontiff in the Vatican, non-believer Amos was prepared to challenge the head of the Catholic Church over its doctrines.
Amos grew up in a believing household but has never felt the need for organised faith, which made him feel like he did not belong either in a religious community, or in a potential afterlife.
The stand-up star was given an audience with Francis and braced himself for dismissive answers from the papal leader, who he believes is a progressive exception to the religious rule.
But Amos has said his meeting with Francis was life-changing and has given him “faith in human beings”.
Francis told Amos that all humans have dignity and too much attention is paid to defining adjectives such as “gay”.
The comedian said the words of tolerance from the pontiff during his secular epiphany provide a lesson for millions, and bring about a greater religious acceptance of homosexuality.
He met the religious leader as part of the BBC series Pilgrimage: The Road To Rome, which follows a group of UK celebrities travelling an ancient route from Canterbury to the seat of the Catholic Church.
Amos told the Press Association: “If he had said, to my face, ‘you’re not going to be accepted into the promised land’ et cetera, I would not have sat there and just gone ‘thanks for that’, and walked away.
Pope Francis spoke to the comedian about sexuality and humanity (Danny Lawson/PA)“I would have asked questions, I would have gotten into it.
“I was absolutely on the back foot. I know what I think he’s going to say, and if he had said that, I would have absolutely challenged him.”
Amos was instead told that he was not being judged, and common humanity is more important than differences in sexuality.
The comedian said that moment, which left him in tears, changed his life and took away the burden of certain religious questions he had struggled with.
He said: “It was life-changing. It’s given me faith in human beings. It’s opened my eyes about not judging religious people based on my own negative experiences.
“I was carrying around a lot of grief. In a weird way it did alleviate some of that sadness.
“When I left that meeting there was joy in my heart.
“I had lost a couple of people who were very close to me who were particularly religious.
“Lots of things come into your mind, like ‘is there an afterlife? Will I see you again? In a weird way, he took that off my shoulders.
“I don’t know if I will see these people again, but he has told me the door is open.”
Blogger: just to confirm ...
Significant Increase In Bible Sales.
'People draw hope from Scripture': Bible sales increased amid COVID pandemic
Bible sales increased during the COVID-19 pandemic, according to LifeWay Christian Resources.
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