End Times and Current Events

Does Rick Warren want you to “come home” to the Catholic Church?

You’ve heard about the Purpose Driven Life for Catholics, but did you ever think it would lead to a major evangelization project by the Church of Rome that targets Protestant Christians?

Catholics Come Home: God’s Extraordinary Plan for Your Life is the name of a new book that is taking Rome and the world by storm, with this incredible endorsement by Rick Warren, which signals a troubling shift toward embracing this new project:

(http://standupforthetruth.com/files/2013/06/Warren-quote.jpg)

Make no mistake; this Catholics Come Home movement is not just to bring “lapsed Catholics” into the system of Rome. ( see The Eucharest: the New Evangelization targets you, Christian!) It’s target is everyone, including Bible-believing Christians. The project’s founder, Tom Peterson, has opened the doors to entice Protestants and people of other faiths to Catholicism:


The movement officially kicked off in 2011 with a 3.5 million prime-time television campaign aimed at drawing more people to the church of Rome. The marketing reach of these ads in the first three weeks was 250 million television viewers in over 10,000 U.S. cities and every diocese throughout the United States. With the release of the Catholics Come Home book this spring, there is a renewed push to get the word out of Rick Warren’s involvement, as this video promotion reveals:


Rick Warren’s partnership with Roma Downey in the minisieries, The Bible was troubling enough, but the millions of viewers who tuned in also were targeted in the Catholics Come Home commercial campaign when it aired earlier this year on The History Channel:


Other endorsements for the book:

(http://standupforthetruth.com/files/2013/06/Kreeft.jpg)

Let me pause there and add that this last testimonial from Dr. Peter Kreeft is interesting, as he has been quoted in a 2010 book titled Natural Law by Robert Morey:

“…explicit knowledge of the incarnate Jesus is not necessary for salvation.” ~ Peter Kreeft  (page 355, Natural Law, published 2010 Xulon Press)

“We are in the midst of a New Evangelization; and I believe this book is a signal moment in its success. It is also a sign that will lead many folks back home to the family of God, which is Catholic Church,” —Dr. Scott W. Hahn, author of The Lamb’s Supper and Signs of Life (former Protestant turned Catholic “evangelist”)

“Catholics Come Home inspires each of us to share God’s love with others, in order to help change the world for the better, for eternity!” – Roma Downey, actress and co-producer of the History Channel series The Bible.

Recently Roma Downey acquired a Master of Spiritual Psychology (New Age) degree at University of Santa Monica. New Age leaders at the school include Deepak Chopra, Barry Siegel (promoted in Purpose Driven Life)], Neil Donald Walsh, and Michael Beckwith. (Source)

looks tha way  :o lots of Catholics are coming out of the closet

U.S. Roman Catholic Church And Protestant Denominations Agree To Recognize Each Other's Baptisms

In a monumental occasion for ecumenical relations, the U.S. Roman Catholic church and a group of Protestant denominations plan to sign a document on Tuesday evening to formally agree to recognize each other's baptisms.

Catholic leaders will join representatives from the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), Christian Reformed Church in North America, Reformed Church in America and United Church of Christ at the ceremony in Austin, Texas, to sign the agreement, which is called the "Common Agreement on Mutual Recognition of Baptism." The event coincides with the national meeting of Christian Churches Together in the U.S.A.

Currently, the Protestant churches recognize Roman Catholic baptisms, but the Catholic church does not always recognize theirs. The mutual agreement on baptisms, a key sacrament in the churches, has been discussed between denominational leadership for seven years and hinges in part on invoking trinity of the "Father, Son and Holy Spirit" during the baptism.

In a report in the Austin American-Statesman, Bishop Joe Vasquez of the Diocese Austin told the newspaper that the effort "is part of our response to Jesus' prayer that 'we all be one.'"

rest: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/01/29/catholic-protestant-baptism-recognize_n_2575915.html

That is not entirely true. Maybe some do, but for most the belief is that the person be immersed bodily, not sprinkled with water.

Whatever, this is a huge change, at least in pr. We know there are much closer ties behind the scenes, but to openly start getting all buddy buddy and officially recognizing each other, that's something different.

Seems the open consolidation to a central theology is starting.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=duJxlbDnLXI

(http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-nxEfTSsLFF4/UoUD4u9PoaI/AAAAAAAAJy8/imdMhBfJ3fk/s1600/POST11142013B.jpg)

Speaking of "Catholics coming home", there was an ad in my local paper two weeks in a row so far about this same topic. Keep in mind, I live in Amish country, and can't even think of a Catholic church within 10 miles of my city. Lots of Amish, Mennonite, Protestant and Baptist churches (even a Mormon church about 15 miles away) but no Catholic churches. You have to go out a little further to find those. Despite that, it has this ad in the paper: (linking to the image because it is from a camera and hasn't been resized. It's a massive image)

http://img441.imageshack.us/img441/1188/pfl8.jpg (http://img441.imageshack.us/img441/1188/pfl8.jpg)

I just find it odd, is all...

Yeah, we will all find out pretty soon(potentially) which so-called "Christian" ministries will either continue to take a stand, or their sand-all-along foundations will start crumbling down. It is pretty odd, yeah, that they would advertise that when there are no RCCs in your area - but then again, these leavened churches will fall for anything nowdays, it seems.

Warren was on Piers Morgan tonight - first off in this video, when he was asked about his views on homosexuality, he pretty much gave a "I'm against it, but, but, BUT..." kind of answer, and then shifted the direction to "tolerance".

With that being said - throughout this 3.5 minute video, look how they keep flashing images of POPE FRANKIE in the background - pretty much they're trying to give their viewers a deceptive impression that the RCC is *true Christianity*.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6CxFcneiSxo

http://news.yahoo.com/pope-reaches-39-indifferent-39-catholics-145203142.html
1/6/14
Pope reaches out to 'indifferent' Catholics

VATICAN CITY (AP) — Pope Francis offered another gesture to Catholics who are estranged from the church, saying Monday he respects them but that God is waiting for them.

Francis made the comments after he celebrated Epiphany, a major Catholic feast day that recalls the visit to the infant Jesus Christ by three kings.

"I would like to tell all those who feel far from God and the church — and I say this respectfully to those who are afraid or indifferent: The Lord calls you and wants you to be part of his people and does so with great respect and love!" Francis said. "The Lord doesn't proselytize, he gives love and this love looks for you, waits for you — for you who don't believe or have drifted away. This is the love of God."

Francis has made a priority of reaching out to atheists and Catholics marginalized by their church, particularly gays. He has tasked priests, bishops and cardinals with going out to preach on the margins of society and not wait for the faithful to come back to the church.

Francis himself is leaving the Vatican on Monday to go visit a Rome church where parishioners are acting out Jesus' nativity scene.

Pope tells Christians to put aside their divisions

 Pope Francis has led a prayer service in a Rome basilica attended by representatives of Orthodox, Anglican and other Christian communities in hopes of healing centuries-old divisions.

The service Saturday evening in St. Paul Outside the Walls Basilica capped a week of efforts in Rome and worldwide to foster unity among Christians.

The pope told participants that divisions among Christians impair the work of spreading the Gospel in the world. He urged Christians to humbly continue “on the way to the restoration of full visible unity.” Francis also prayed for God’s help in overcoming “our conflicts, our divisions and our self-seeking,” which he described as obstacles to unity.

http://www.srnnews.com/pope-tells-christians-to-put-aside-their-divisions/

Which is why the RCC has put out CCM/"Christian" Rock, pagan prayer practices like contemplative prayer, etc in these Protestant/Baptist churches, so they can do just that - break down the walls and push ecumenicism.(things Rick Warren and the Emergent Church have been putting in their programs)

Sorry Francis, scripture says otherwise...

51  Suppose ye that I am come to give peace on earth? I tell you, Nay; but rather division:
52  For from henceforth there shall be five in one house divided, three against two, and two against three.
53  The father shall be divided against the son, and the son against the father; the mother against the daughter, and the daughter against the mother; the mother in law against her daughter in law, and the daughter in law against her mother in law.
Luke 12:51-53 (KJB)

EXPOSED – The Vatican “unites” with “separated brethren” through Bible versions. Stated goal since 1965.

http://ephesians511blog.net/2014/02/16/exposed-the-vatican-unites-with-separated-brethren-through-bible-versions-stated-goal-since-1965/

(http://ephesians511blogdotnet1.files.wordpress.com/2014/02/post2162014a.jpg?w=779&h=347)

Yeah, and the Vatican used very crafty language in it.

With that being said - well, that explains why the modern-day, organized "church" system has no problems yoking and being friends with even the most liberally doctrinally minded people. Countless times when I've warned others about the RCC, they would makes responses like, "Why do you hate them?", "You don't like those who have different opinions than you", etc, etc.

Again, that pretty much explains why they give these responses.

"They are of the world, therefore speak they of the world..."

We already know the RCC is the head of churchianity in the world. "The Mother of Harlots".

Pope to Copeland: Catholics and Charismatics must spiritually unite

We are galloping toward a one-world melding of religions, and the ramifications are staggering. Pope Francis has now sent a video message to Word of Faith father Kenneth Copeland, urging a reconciliation between Catholics and Charismatics.

“The Catholic and Charismatic Renewal is the hope of the Church,” exclaims Anglican Episcopal Bishop Tony Palmer, before a group of cheering followers at the Kenneth Copeland Ministries.   Palmer said those words are from the Vatican. Before playing the video message from Pope Francis to Kenneth Copeland, Palmer told the crowd,  “When my wife saw that she could be Catholic, and Charismatic, and Evangelical, and Pentecostal, and it was absolutely accepted in the Catholic Church, she said that she would like to reconnect her roots with the Catholic culture. So she did.”

The crowd cheered, as he continued, “Brothers and sisters, Luther’s protest is over. Is yours?”

Even Kenneth Copeland finds this development incredible: Said Copeland, “Heaven is thrilled over this…You know what is so thrilling to me? When we went into the ministry 47 years ago, this was impossible.”

How can this impossibility be? Could the ears of those once aware of the evils of ecumenicism suddenly be sealing shut? What is even more gobsmackingly painful is the reaction from evangelicals, who seem quite thrilled with this unholy alliance.

Here is the longer version of what Copeland and Palmer said. Note that at about 40 minutes in, Copeland and the congregants join in prayer for the “Holy Father,” then watch as Anthony Palmer videotapes a return message to Pope Francis from Kenneth Copeland himself.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=b5TwrG8B3ME

Here is just the Pope’s message, at about 30 minutes in:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=NZ9Ssvs5cgY

    Here is the transcript:

    “Two rules: Love God above all, and love the other (neighbor), because he is your brother and sister. With these two rules we can go ahead. I am here with my brother, my bishop brother, Tony Palmer. We’ve been friends for years.

    He told me about your conference, about your meeting. And it’s my pleasure to greet you. A greeting both joyful and nostalgic (yearning). Joyful because it gives me joy that you have come together to worship Jesus Christ the only Lord. And to pray to the Father and to receive the Holy Spirit. This brings me joy because we can see that God is working all over the world. Nostalgic (yearning) because but…it happens, as within our suburbs. In the suburbs there are families that love each other and families that don’t love each other. Families that come together and families who separate themselves. We are kind of…permit me to say, separated.

    Separated because, it’s sin that has separated us, all our sins. The misunderstandings throughout history. It has been a long road of sins that we all shared in. Who is to blame? We all share the blame. We have all sinned. There is only one blameless, the Lord. I am nostalgic (yearning), that this separation comes to an end and gives us communion. I am nostalgic (yearning), of that embrace that the Holy Scripture speaks of when Joseph’s brothers began to starve from hunger, they went to Egypt, to buy, so that they could eat.

    They went to buy. They had money. But they couldn’t eat the money. But there they found something more than food, they found their brother. All of us have currency. The currency of our culture. The currency of our history. We have lot of cultural riches, and religious riches. And we have diverse traditions. But we have to encounter one another as brothers. We must cry together like Joseph did. These tears will unite us. The tears of love.

    I am speaking to you as a brother. I speak to you in a simple way. With joy and nostalgia (yearning). Let us allow our nostalgia (yearning) to grow, because this will propel us to find each other, to embrace one another. And together to worship Jesus Christ as the only Lord of History.

    I thank you profoundly for listening to me. I thank you profoundly for allowing me to speak the language of the heart. And I also ask you a favor. Please pray for me, because I need your prayers. And I will pray for you, I will do it, but I need your prayers. And let us pray to the Lord that He unites us all. Come on, we are brothers. Let’s give each other a spiritual hug and let God complete the work that he has begun. And this is a miracle; the miracle of unity has begun.

    A famous Italian author named Manzoni, once wrote in his novel, of a simle man amongst the people, who once said this, “I’ve never seen God begin a miracle without Him finishing it well.” He will complete this miracle of unity. I ask you to bless me, and I bless you. From brother to brother, I embrace you. Thank you.”

http://standupforthetruth.com/2014/02/pope-to-copeland-catholics-and-charismatics-must-spiritually-unite/

WOW! No wonder churchianity is in such chaos with heretics like that!

Pretty much throughout my lifetime going to these Babel Baptist/Protestant church buildings - if you just merely warn about the heresies of the RCC, even THEY will frown on you like you're hateful.

Even a previous pastor I had had nothing but praise for Bobby Jindal(Louisiana's Catholic governor), calling him a "man of faith".

Being Ecumenical with Spiritual Darkness

Being Ecumenical with Spiritual Darkness

READ THE WORD OF GOD, IT’S FINAL

Exodus 20:3-5 – “Thou shalt have no other gods before Me.

4 Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth.

5 Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the Lord thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate Me”

(http://ephesians511blogdotnet1.files.wordpress.com/2014/02/popes-mary-worship.jpg?w=812)

Isaiah 44:17-18 – “And the residue thereof he maketh a god, even his graven image: he falleth down unto it, and worshippeth it, and prayeth unto it, and saith, Deliver me; for thou art my god.

18 They have not known nor understood: for He hath shut their eyes, that they cannot see; and their hearts, that they cannot understand.”

Who or what church is being drawn towards an entity that can’t see or understand?

(http://ephesians511blogdotnet1.files.wordpress.com/2014/02/global-impact.jpg?w=802&h=351)

https://ambrose.edu/global-impact-week

Any person or entity that is in any way, shape or form ecumenical with Roman Catholicism is automatically thrown in to a place of not seeing or understanding if they see what’s happening. They share the same plight of spiritual darkness as the Pope and all the r

(http://ephesians511blogdotnet1.files.wordpress.com/2014/02/cp-post-632012.jpg?w=812)
http://www.christianpost.com/news/evangelicals-and-catholics-together-getting-born-again-75971/

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=geXkqM8Rkto

Evangelicals are falling in to the same spiritual abyss by the choices they make. To have the Pope address TBN huckster, Kenneth Copeland, is giving a bizarre “dark credibility” to Kenneth Copeland who is already spiritually dark to begin with.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=OuQC2EeLu00

http://ephesians511blog.net/2014/02/24/being-ecumenical-with-spiritual-darkness/

It's also going on at the local levels too - when I lived in New Orleans, there was a Baptist seminary there that hosted events every now and then where Catholic priests were invited to "dialogue".

And even some of the so-called "end times watchmen" like Hal Lindsey and Tim LaHaye have praised the Pope.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2LNJ6Jb3DOc

POPE JOINS CHARISMATICS IN CALL FOR ONE-WORLD CHURCH (Friday Church News Notes, February 28, 2014, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - In an informal seven-minute video that has been posted to YouTube, Pope Francis calls for the unity of all Christians. The context is even more instructive. The video was recorded on a smartphone owned by Anglican Episcopal charismatic bishop Anthony Palmer when he visited the Vatican recently. Palmer has known the pope since the latter was an archbishop in Argentina. The pope’s video clip was recorded to be played at a Pentecostal pastors conference hosted by Kenneth Copeland, a man laden down with heresies who falls on the floor and laughs hysterically while “drunk in the spirit.” The pope said that all Christians are to blame for disunity, and that God has begun the miracle of Christian unity and will finish it.


In his remarks at the Copeland crusade before the pope’s video was played, Palmer showed that he is a passionate and effective one-world church builder. He has a personal testimony of conversion experience, says he believes in salvation by God’s grace alone, and is well spoken and personable. But he could not be more deceived. Consider the following statements carefully that Palmer made as a prelude to the pope’s remarks: “I come tonight in the spirit of Elijah, which is the spirit of reconciliation. ... I’ve come to understand that diversity is divine; it’s division that is diabolic. ... It’s the glory that glues us together, not the doctrine. If you accept that the presence of God is in me and the presence of God is in you, that’s all we need. God will sort out all our doctrines when we get upstairs. ... Division destroys our credibility. ... I believe we will see more people go out into the churches in the spirit of Elijah. We need to throw as much resources and energy into the ministry of reconciliation as we do to the ministry of evangelization. I challenge you to find a bridge builder and back him.”


Nothing could be more dangerous and unscriptural than to replace Bible doctrine with experience as the basis of unity. This is the heart and soul of the charismatic delusion, and now we see it being proposed by the pope of Rome as the foundation for a one-world church. In his own call for unity, Palmer said nothing about the heresies of the papacy, the priesthood, sacramentalism, infant baptism, baptismal regeneration, the mass, mariolatry, purgatory, the saints, prayers to the dead, nunnery, monasticism, and a host of other heresies. He said nothing about Copeland’s Word-Faith heresies. With his philosophy of “Elijah reconciliation,” none of that matters as long as an individual loves “Jesus,” believes the “gospel,” and has the “spirit.” We aren’t allowed to examine WHAT Jesus, WHAT gospel, or WHAT spirit. That type of examination would spoil the unity and bring us right back to division, which, we are led to believe, is diabolic.


What spiritual deception! How late the hour is! No wonder Jesus warned that false teachers will become so subtle that “if it were possible, they shall deceive the very elect” (Mat. 24:24). Be not deceived, the following verse singlehandedly destroys the call for end-time unity: “Beloved, when I gave all diligence to write unto you of the common salvation, it was needful for me to write unto you, and exhort you that ye should earnestly contend for the faith which was once delivered unto the saints” (Jude 3).


KENNETH COPELAND’S ENTHUSIASM OVER THE POPE’S CALL FOR UNITY (Friday Church News Notes, February 28, 2014, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - After the pope’s video call for unity was finished, Kenneth Copeland said, “Glory, glory, glory. ... Heaven is thrilled over this.” He said, “You know what is so thrilling to me? When we went into the ministry 47 years ago, this was impossible.” Copeland prayed for the pope in his nonsensical, fake, gibberish “tongues.” He recorded a video message for the pope in which he said, “All of these leaders [at the conference] represent literally tens of thousands of people that love you. ... Thank you, sir. We do bless you, and we receive your blessing. We thank God for you.” Then he led the crowd in shouting together to the pope by video, “We Bless You!!!!!” Copeland said that he is available to visit the Vatican.


ALL ECUMENICAL ROADS LEAD TO ROME (Friday Church News Notes, February 28, 2014, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - Anglican Episcopal bishop Tony Palmer, who video recorded Pope Frances’ call for Christian unity, made the following statement at the Kenneth Copeland meeting: “When my wife saw that she could be Catholic, and Charismatic, and Evangelical, and Pentecostal, and it was absolutely accepted in the Catholic Church, she said that she would like to reconnect her roots with the Catholic culture. So she did.” The Pentecostal crowd cheered, as Palmer continued, “Brothers and sisters, Luther's protest is over. Is yours?”


GLUE FOR THE ONE-WORLD “CHURCH” (Friday Church News Notes, February 28, 2014, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The Kenneth Copeland conferene in which the pope’s video call for unity was shown is a petri dish for the examination of the end-time one-world “church.” All of the elements were there. There was the contemporary worship music. There was the charismatic focus on feeling and experience. There was the “unity in diversity.” There was the rejection of biblical separatism and the labeling of it as “diabolical.” And there was Rome, showing the most humble, innocent, spiritually-passionate, and harmless of her many faces.


HAS THE ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH CHANGED ITS DOCTRINE OF JUSTIFICATION? (Friday Church News Notes, February 28, 2014, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - Anglican Episcopal Bishop Anthony Palmer, who has joined the pope in calling for Christian unity and condemning “division,” claims that the issue of justification has been settled and that Rome has agreed that justification is by grace alone. Therefore, there is no reason for further disunity. The protest is over, he says; there should be no more “protestants”; all Christians should be “catholics”; there should be one “church.” If the issue were not so serious with such terrible eternal ramifications, this position would be laughable. Palmer is referring to the 1999 Joint Declaration of Justification that was signed by the Vatican and some Lutheran denominations and has since been accepted by some Methodists. The declaration states, “Together we confess: by grace alone, in faith in Christ’s saving work and not because of any merit on our part, we are accepted by God and receive the Holy Spirit, who renews our hearts while equipping us and calling us to good works.”


FIRST, PALMER IS WRONG ABOUT ROME’S DOCTRINE OF SALVATION. The Joint Declaration on Justification doesn’t mean that the Roman Catholic Church no longer preaches salvation through sacraments! Rome has a genius for giving theological words new meanings. She is a chameleon who has changed colors countless times. In the current debate, she has redefined “grace” and “alone” and “justification.” She is an ecclesiastical example of a naughty little boy telling a lie with his fingers’ crossed behind his back, and the apostate Protestants sitting at her table don’t know or care. In the Council of Trent and the Second Vatican Council and the New Catholic Catechism, Rome stated her doctrine of salvation in the clearest of terms: salvation is by faith in Christ PLUS sacraments. Salvation was purchased by Christ and given to the “church” to be distributed through the sacraments, and it begins with baptismal regeneration. Rome has expressed ZERO repentance for this false gospel. (For documentation see the report “How Rome Denies Salvation by Grace Alone” at the Way of Life web site.)


SECOND, PALMER IS WRONG ABOUT THE ESSENCE OF THE REFORMATION. Insofar as it went (and it fell terribly short of being Scriptural), the essence of the Reformation was about the authority of Scripture -- sola scriptura. And the Roman Catholic Church is not even pretending that Scripture is the sole authority for its faith and practice. For this essential fact to be ignored shows the duplicity of the unity movement.


THIRD, PALMER IS WRONG ABOUT THE BASIS FOR UNITY. Even if two professing Christians or churches agree on the doctrine of salvation, that is far from being a sufficient basis for unity in fellowship and ministry. We are commanded to earnestly contend for the faith once delivered to the saints (Jude 3). What part of the faith? All of it! We are to mark and avoid those whose teaching is contrary to the doctrine which we have learned from Scripture (Rom. 16:17). Even if one accepts the philosophy of “essential” vs. “non-essential” doctrine, there are still dozens of “essential” doctrines that would form the basis for separation. We are to prove ALL things, not just some things (1 Thess. 5:21). Paul taught Timothy to allow “no other doctrine” into the churches (1 Tim. 1:3). This is not a complicated matter. The bottom line is that it is impossible to join any unity movement today while being faithful to God’s Word.


THE BREADTH OF THE POPE’S ECUMENISM (Friday Church News Notes, February 28, 2014, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - Pope Francis is fulfilling Bible prophecy with his broad ecumenical vision. According to Revelation 17, Roman Catholicism is at the heart of the one-world religion that will yoke together with the Antichrist. Only Rome could fit the bill as the city on seven hills, and only Catholicism is clothed in purple and scarlet, has a golden cup in her hand, and is drunken with the blood of the martyrs. But the vision of Revelation 17 extends beyond Rome. The Harlot is a mother who has daughters and her reach is global (Rev. 17:15). Ecumenism has been “in the air” since the great world missionary conferences of the turn of the 20th century and the Second Vatican Council of the 1960s. Francis is standing on the shoulders of popes such as John XXIII (who headed up Vatican II) and John Paul II (the personable jet-setting pope who was beloved of a long line of evangelicals led by Billy Graham). Francis is calling for unity among all Christians. And he is calling for unity with Jews. This month, when he received a delegation of the American Jewish Committee, he said that Catholics and Jews must work together “for a more just and fraternal world” (“Pope: Jews and Catholics,” AsiaNews.it, Feb. 13, 2014). Francis is even calling for unity with atheists. Last year he said, “The Lord has redeemed all of us, all of us, with the Blood of Christ: all of us, not just Catholics. ... Even the atheists. Everyone! ... And this commandment for everyone to do good, I think, is a beautiful path towards peace” (“Pope at Mass,” Vatican Radio, May 22, 2013). For his part, John Paul II included all of the world religions in the ecumenical vision, yoking multiple times with Hindus, Buddhists, Muslims, Sikhs, Bahai’s, Animists, etc. in prayer for world peace in Assisi, Italy.


CONCLUSION: The Friday Church News Notes is designed for use in churches and is published by Way of Life Literature’s Fundamental Baptist Information Service. Unless otherwise stated, the Notes are written by David Cloud. Of necessity we quote from a wide variety of sources, but this obviously does not imply an endorsement. We trust that our readers will not be discouraged. It is God’s will that we know the times (1 Ch. 12:32; Mat. 16:3) and that we be as wise as serpents and harmless as doves. The News Notes remind us that the hour is very late, and we need to be ready for the Lord’s coming. Are you sure that you are born again? Are you living for Christ? “And that, knowing the time, that now it is high time to awake out of sleep: for now is our salvation nearer than when we believed. The night is far spent, the day is at hand: let us therefore cast off the works of darkness, and let us put on the armour of light. Let us walk honestly, as in the day; not in rioting and drunkenness, not in chambering and wantonness, not in strife and envying. But put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make not provision for the flesh, to fulfil the lusts thereof” (Rom. 13:11-14).

“Mental Illness” – Rome’s New Ecumenical Tool and Possibly New Weapon Against True Believers

http://ephesians511blog.net/2014/03/05/mental-illness-romes-new-ecumenical-tool-and-possibly-new-weapon-against-true-believers/

Pic says it all

(http://ephesians511blogdotnet1.files.wordpress.com/2014/03/post352014b.jpg?w=812)

http://mentalhealthandthechurch.com/

John 10:20 – “And many of them said, He hath a devil, and is mad; why hear ye Him?”

Acts 26:24-25 – “And as he thus spake for himself, Festus said with a loud voice, Paul, thou art beside thyself; much learning doth make thee mad.

25 But he said, I am not mad, most noble Festus; but speak forth the words of truth and soberness.”

Conclusion

We all kind of saw this day coming didn’t we?

And let's not forget how these mental(and physical) illnesses are caused by vaccines, Big Pharma drugs, and these processed (junk)foods. And not to mention too a lot of these "mental illness" diseases like depression have been completely made up so that Big Pharma can get big profit$. Shouldn't the RCC and the Warrens at least know this?

Oh wait a minute - both the RCC and Rick Warren are Council on Foreign Relations - so yeah, they know very well about these vaccines and other poisons that have infiltrated our food/water/drug supplies. >:(

Non-Denominational Megapastor Stuns Congregation With Personal Revelation

A non-denominational megachurch pastor reportedly stunned his congregation this weekend when he announced that he and his wife are converting to Catholicism.

Ulf Ekman, pastor and founder of Word of Life Church in Uppsala, Sweden, told parishioners Sunday during his sermon that he and his wife, Birgitta, have experienced a theological change-of-heart, Charisma News reported.

On Ekman’s ministry website a statement titled, “Pastor Ulf Ekman to Be Accepted Into the Catholic Church” provides details on the preacher’s conversion, stating that “a process of many years of prayer and reflection” preceded the decision to embrace the Catholic faith.

“For Birgitta and me, this has been a slow process were we have gone from discovering new things, to appreciating what we have discovered, to approach and even learn from our fellow Christians,” Ekman is quoted in the release. “We have seen a great love for Jesus and a sound theology, founded on the Bible and classic dogma.”

The statement went on to explain that the couple found solace and intrigue in the Catholic Church’s “sacramental life,” while also revering what Ekman called “a solid structure for priesthood.”

While his Protestant views had previously led to critiques of the Catholic Church, the pastor said that, after studying the faith, he realized that many of those criticisms simply weren’t valid. The release emphasized that the conversion was the result of “a personal journey.”

“This led us to the realize that it was actually Jesus Christ who led us to unite with the Catholic Church,” the pastor continued.

From anger to sadness and confusion, people are responding to Ekman’s theological switch in a variety of ways, according to the Alethia blog and think tank. That said, it may not be entirely surprising to some, as Alethia’s Andreas Glandberger, who runs Alethia, noted that the pastor has taken “steps toward Roman Catholicism since 2007,” Charisma News reported.

Watch Ekman tell his congregation about the conversion here (go to the 25:00 mark to hear his specific comments about Catholicism).

The announcement comes after Ekman, who founded Word of Life about 30 years ago, announced his retirement in March 2013 as senior pastor at the church. Word of Life has around 3,300 members.

http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2014/03/10/non-denominational-megapastor-stuns-congregation-with-personal-theological-revelation/

When I lived in New Orleans, pretty much all of the so-called Baptist pastors there were in lockstep with the Catholic archdiocese. They were also good buddies with Louisiana's Catholic governor Bobby Jindal(who also served as the state's Health secretary and US Congressman prior to being governor in 2007), whom they would invite to SBC meetings. The Baptist seminary also had these "dialogue" events with Catholic priests.

Pretty much these false perversions have played a big role too - they speak the same language as Catholicism and other Babylonian religions.

It's only a matter of time now before all Baptist/Protestant ministers come out and say "We're Catholics too".

Talk about the pot calling the kettle black! Hey Rick, you DO know that corporations have NO first amendment rights, right? Oh wait, your little megachurch IS a 501c3, so yes you DO know. ::)

And if you're so against Obamacare, then explain this...

(http://hiscrivener.files.wordpress.com/2009/12/obama-and-rick-warren.jpg)

If the contraceptive mandate passes, it will ruin a core U.S. ideology
http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/religious-liberty-is-americas-first-freedom/2014/03/21/498c0048-b128-11e3-a49e-76adc9210f19_story.html

By Rick Warren,   Published: March 21
 
Rick Warren is pastor of the Saddleback Church, in Lake Forest, Calif., and the author of “The Purpose Driven Life.”

Does our Constitution guarantee the freedom of religion, or does it merely allow a more limited freedom to worship? The difference is profound. Worship is an event. Religion is a way of life.

Specifically, does the First Amendment guarantee believers of all faiths the freedom to practice their ethics, educate their children and operate family businesses based on their religious beliefs, moral convictions and freedom of conscience? Do Americans have the freedom to place our beliefs and ethics at the center of our business practices — or must we ignore them when we form a company?

These questions will be brought before the Supreme Court on Tuesday. The outcome of Sebelius v. Hobby Lobby will affect every American because any religion allowed to be practiced only inside a house of worship, and not in the day-to-day business of life, is a worthless faith.

Since I wrote “The Purpose Driven Life” 12 years ago, I have received more than 500,000 letters and e-mails from people trying to live in ways they believe honor God. For millions of Americans, faith is something you live by. It colors every decision and action, both at home and at work. It is personal, but it is not private.

**This right here shows he has a big ego - it was HIS *book* that "evangelized" 1000s of people? Whatever happened to the word of God, the bible?

David and Barbara Green are one example of a purpose-driven family leading a purpose-driven business. From the time the Greens started Hobby Lobby in their garage, building picture frames with their sons, they committed themselves and their company to one simple purpose: “Honoring the Lord in all we do by operating our company in a manner consistent with biblical principles.”

**Did you catch his buzz-phrase he's used for the umpteenth time? "purpose driven"? FYI, this is the SAME buzzphrase other "religions" AND New Agers use like Mitt Romney and Oprah! And how is building earthly riches(like this company does) honoring the Lord in a manner consistent with biblical principles?

Hobby Lobby has grown into a multibillion-dollar business with more than 550 stores and nearly 16,000 full-time employees. David Green has written, “We had faith that we would succeed if we lived and worked according to God’s Word.”

The Greens live their religious values and ethics in every aspect of their business: by providing salaries and benefits far above average industry levels and by their commitment to helping employees maintain a healthy work-life balance, which includes closing on Sundays so workers have more time with their families.

**Uhm, we're NOT under the OT law anymore. But as a "Christian" pastor, you SHOULD know this. ::)

Every year, Hobby Lobby gives a portion of its profits to charities, educational institutions, community ministries and churches around the world. My own congregation was a surprise beneficiary of the Greens’ generosity a few years ago, and that is how I first met this amazing family.

**charities? As in these man-centered, money-grabbing charities like Habitat for Humanity? educational institutions? As in these government, socialist-runned public schools? community ministries and churches? As in these 501c3 government-runned "churches"?

There is massive evidence that everything Hobby Lobby does is predicated on the Greens’ deep belief that they must honor God and obey his commands in their business. Every Christmas and Easter, Hobby Lobby takes out full-page ads to share the Greens’ faith in the communities where they have stores. Hobby Lobby is not a secular, publicly traded company. Rather, it is the personal, purpose-driven mission of one of the most devout families I’ve ever met.

**Uhm...Xmas and Ishtar are PAGAN holidays! And what is your obsession with "purpose driven"? ::)

Two years ago, the Greens’ commitment to practicing their religious convictions in their family business required that they object to just a few of the contraceptives the government requires providing to employees under the Affordable Care Act. They believe that a few specific drugs and devices have the potential to terminate life that has been conceived, and they view this as morally wrong based on Psalm 139:13-16, which says that God planned the purpose of every life before we were born. Represented by the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, they went to court, and now the case has made it to the Supreme Court.

**God PLANNED a PURPOSE of every life? Uhm, that's not what it says...

Psalms 139:13  For thou hast possessed my reins: thou hast covered me in my mother's womb.
Psa 139:14  I will praise thee; for I am fearfully and wonderfully made: marvellous are thy works; and that my soul knoweth right well.
Psa 139:15  My substance was not hid from thee, when I was made in secret, and curiously wrought in the lowest parts of the earth.
Psa 139:16  Thine eyes did see my substance, yet being unperfect; and in thy book all my members were written, which in continuance were fashioned, when as yet there was none of them.

The administration argues that because Hobby Lobby is a for-profit corporation, the company has no religious rights under the First Amendment. In fact, the government says that exempting Hobby Lobby from paying for drugs and devices to which the Greens object would amount to an imposition of the Greens’ faith on their employees.

**Again, corporations(whether for profit or not), are treated as artificial persons b/c they registered with the state, therefore they are under state charter and have to abide by such. So therefore they have no 1st amendment rights.

The first people who came to America from Europe were devout pilgrims seeking the freedom to practice their faith. That’s why the first phrase of the first sentence of the First Amendment is about freedom of religion — preceding freedom of speech, freedom of the press and freedom of assembly. Why? Because if you don’t have the freedom to live and practice what you believe, the other freedoms are irrelevant. Religious liberty is America’s First Freedom.

In this case, the administration is insisting that those who form and operate a family business based on religious beliefs must disobey what they believe is God’s standard in order to obey the government’s program. The administration wants everyone to render unto Caesar not only what is Caesar’s but also what is God’s. If it wins, the first purpose on which the United States was founded would be severely damaged.

**And that's exactly the opposite both Hobby Lobby AND yourself did when you formed your entities - giving UP what is God's TO Caesar.

I used to own the letter that President Thomas Jefferson penned in February 1809 to the Methodist Episcopal Church of New London, Conn. (The Greens now own it because I wanted them to have it.) In that letter, Jefferson thundered, “No provision in our constitution ought to be dearer to man than that which protects the rights of conscience against the enterprises of civil authority.” My prayer is that the Supreme Court will agree with Jefferson.

^^ Pretty much, this is yet another example of how the RCC has used this "defend religion freedom" agenda to lead everyone into a lot of misdirection. Other Catholic activists like Phyllis Schlafly do the same thing.

Apparently, this "battle" against "mental illness" is yet another ECUMENICAL agenda...

http://www.ocregister.com/articles/mental-606966-warren-illness.html
In a rare partnership, 2 top O.C. faith leaders lead outreach to mentally ill

Roman Catholic Bishop Kevin Vann and Saddleback Church Pastor Rick Warren crossed paths shortly after the death of Warren’s son, who struggled with mental illness. They've embarked on a rare partnership: Do battle together against mental illness.
3/26/14

Roman Catholic Bishop Kevin Vann recalls his early days as a deacon in the 1980s. New at his parish, the first funeral he presided over was a suicide. Not long after, a man came to the rectory door claiming to hear voices. Vann didn’t know what to do, so he walked with the man for hours. A beloved priest suffered depression; Vann wasn’t sure how to help.
 
Last year, Saddleback Church Pastor Rick Warren endured the same anguished helplessness in a more personal way: He and his wife, Kay, buried their son Matthew. The 27-year-old, struggling with mental illness, ended his life on April 5. Warren later wrote about the help and medical intervention his son had received – none of which was enough.
 
The two men crossed paths shortly after Matthew Warren’s death. After private discussions, Vann, the leader of 1.2 million Catholics as head of the Diocese of Orange, and Warren, pastor of the 30,000-member evangelical church, embarked on a rare partnership: Do battle together against mental illness.
 
Their friendship has blossomed since, and on Friday their working relationship comes to fruition at the nation’s first religiously backed conference to address mental health issues.
 
The Gathering on Mental Illness and the Church at Saddleback Church’s Lake Forest campus will bring together national and county experts, who will hold roundtables and workshops. Warren and Vann are hosting the gathering with the National Alliance on Mental Illness – Orange County.
 
Some national experts call the partnership groundbreaking, and say the event marks the nation’s first large-scale ecumenical outreach.
 
Warren and Vann say they not only want to help those suffering, they want to empower church leaders. The goal is to equip pastors and churches nationwide in ways that will bring professional help and relief for those tortured by mental illness.
 
National statistics show one in four people will be afflicted with mental illness. While clergy are a first line of defense, some people don’t ask for help because of the stigma associated with mental illness. Studies have found that clergy nationwide receive little training on mental health.
 
The National Institute of Mental Health reported that individuals with disorders listed in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders requested assistance from clergy more often than from psychologists and psychiatrists combined.

**The same "clergy" who use these corrupted bible versions like the NIV? The same "clergy" who think their pews can confess their sins to them? ::)
 
“For a long time, Christian churches and individual communities have been working together, looking for ways to give a unified Christian witness to the difficult questions we all face,” Vann said. “In some ways it surprises me to think, that for some, the Gathering on Mental Health and the Church Conference seems novel or groundbreaking. The truth is that the Catholic Church has a long history of working with other Christian churches and with people of other faiths on the local and the international level.”
 
Vann added that the conference “provides an opportunity for two large and important faith communities in Orange County to come together, evangelicals and Catholics, and really anyone who is interested, to meet and talk about and pray about a real issue for many families, mental health.”
 
A decade ago, Rick and Kay Warren launched the PEACE plan in a massive effort to mobilize 1 billion members of congregations to attack five “global giants” – extreme poverty, pandemic disease, deficient education, conflict injustice and spiritual emptiness.
 
As part of that, the Warrens launched the Global Summit on AIDS – their assault on the deadly disease with an approach that claimed churches worldwide as the most capable to address the disease.
 
“Every year we learn more about the brain so there is more possibility for hope,” Warren said. “When we started with HIV/AIDS, there was an enormous stigma. I thought AIDS was the last taboo. People with mental illness will hide their pain. We want to remove that stigma.”
 
While the Mental Health Services Act of California provides financial resources and new programs, traditional treatment services don’t overcome the problems of stigma and discrimination. This requires the attention and participation of the entire community, including faith-based organizations, said Myrlene Chapman, a board member of the National Alliance.

Now wait a minute - didn't good 'ole slick Rick say how his son committed suicide b/c of a lack of gun control laws? And b/c he bought a gun illegally over the internet? Which is it, Rick? ::)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fMBfmhK7MR4

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BJRmIl_s6sQ

http://losangeles.cbslocal.com/2014/03/28/megachurch-pastor-unites-faith-psychology-leaders-to-raise-mental-health-awareness/
3/28/14
Megachurch Pastor Unites Faith, Psychology Leaders To Raise Mental Health Awareness

LAKE FOREST (CBSLA.com) — A prominent Orange County pastor joined forces with other faith, health and psychology leaders to provide effective and compassionate care to those who suffer from mental illness.

Pastor Rick Warren of Saddleback Church in Lake Forest convened “The Gathering on Mental Health and the Church” as part of ongoing community outreach efforts following the death of his 27-year-old son, who committed suicide last April amid struggles with severe depression and suicidal thoughts.

The mental health forum on Friday featured 20 interactive workshops covering depression, suicide-risk reduction, bipolar disorder, eating disorders, addictions, and other topics along with speakers addressing the role of church leaders in mental health and crisis management, according to a spokesperson.

"management"? Could this also be another Clergy Response Teams agenda?

All 3,300 seats at the church were sold-out, CBS2′s Stacey Butler reported.

Huh? Sold out? I thought the purpose of this "forum" was to *reach out* in *compassion* to the "mentally ill"? So shouldn't everyone be able to come for FREE, and NOT have to pay for it?

“When families have a mental illness crisis, the first person they call is not the school district. And the first person they call is not an attorney. And the first person they call is not even a doctor. The first person they typically call before there is a crisis is they call their church,” Warren said.

**Then why in the world did you send your son to all of these psychiatrists? Why are you inviting these mental health "experts" to work with you?

In addition to Rick and Kay Warren, speakers included Bishop Kevin Vann of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Orange; Eric Johnson, Ph.D., Lawrence and Charlotte Hoover Professor of Pastoral Care at The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary; Matthew Stanford, Ph.D., professor of psychology, neuroscience and biomedical studies at Baylor University; Aaron Kheriaty, M.D., associate professor of psychiatry, UC Irvine; and others.

**Interesting(in a bad way, that is) list...the RCC, Freemasonic-infiltrated SBC and Baylor Univ, and of course "mental health" experts at universities.

“Integrating the physical, mental, and spiritual aspect is very helpful because people either miss the spiritual aspect or focus too much on the biological,” said Luke Maxwell, a suicide attempt survivor.

Warren said the event was aimed at removing the stigma surrounding mental illness following the death of their son, Matthew, who took his life on April 5, 2013, after a lifelong struggle with mental illness.

“One of the things I believe is that God never wastes a hurt and that oftentimes your greatest ministry comes out of your deepest pain,” said Warren. “When Kay and I began ministering to people with HIV & AIDS about a dozen years ago, I thought being HIV positive was the greatest taboo. But actually, I think mental illness is and we want to remove the stigma.”

**WRONG, Rick! Here's what the scriptures say...

1Thes 3:1  Wherefore when we could no longer forbear, we thought it good to be left at Athens alone;
1Th 3:2  And sent Timotheus, our brother, and minister of God, and our fellowlabourer in the gospel of Christ, to establish you, and to comfort you concerning your faith:
1Th 3:3  That no man should be moved by these afflictions: for yourselves know that we are appointed thereunto.
1Th 3:4  For verily, when we were with you, we told you before that we should suffer tribulation; even as it came to pass, and ye know.
1Th 3:5  For this cause, when I could no longer forbear, I sent to know your faith, lest by some means the tempter have tempted you, and our labour be in vain.

According to the National Institutes of Health, one in four adults — approximately 61.5 million Americans — experiences mental illness in a given year. One in 17 —  about 13.6 million — live with a serious mental illness such as schizophrenia, major depression or bipolar disorder.

Warren, who founded Saddleback Church in 1980, is also author of the bestselling “The Purpose Driven Life” and gave the invocation at President Barack Obama’s 2009 inauguration.

Butler said Pastor Warren hopes his partnership with the Roman Catholic Diocese in Orange and the National Alliance on Mental Illness-Orange County will create a lasting change throughout the country.

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Whatever happened to these verses of scriptures Warren and his RCC/SBC ilk failed to bring up?

Philippians3:13  Brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended: but this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before,
Philippians 3:14  I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.  

When I read this article last week, this is why these portions stuck out at me...

If a church is a 501c3, then it also means the IRS can look into not only their accounting books, but also their membership rolls.(ie-do NOT believe these hireling pastors that say getting an "audit" is voluntary b/c of 1st amendment/separation of church and state issues - a 501c3 has forfeited ALL of their 1st amendment rights, as we all know)

With that being said - if/when Warren and the rest of these Churchianity minions pull this off - it means, let's say, if one of their church members is reported to have some kind of mental illness, then it means the IRS(b/c they're able to look at the membership rolls) will be able to retrieve this info, and guess what happens next...with all of the gun control agendas Caesar is pushing(and recently, Obama signed EOs allowing the government to look into medical records to see if people lack competence to own a gun), they'll subsequently tell these church members with mentally ill family members that their 2nd amendment rights are stripped b/c of just that. And then Warren himself has been pushing for gun control since his son's suicide.

Either way, whatever the reason Warren says cases of mental illness should be told to the church - this is very, very wicked. If anything, it's not of these church's business. Their business is to preach the gospel and edify each other daily.

Now another SBC(and CFR) member has endorsed this agenda...

http://www.christianpost.com/news/land-interviews-land-on-mental-health-in-the-church-and-where-to-go-from-here-118011/
Land Interviews Land on Mental Health in the Church and Where to Go From Here
4/15/14

Editor's note: As a follow-up to Rick Warren's ground-breaking conference on mental health and the Church, CP asked Executive Editor Richard Land to interview Dr. Rebekah Land, his wife and a Christian psychologist with over 40 years' experience as a therapist, on the conference and to ask her what a new focus on psychological illness might mean for the Church universal. Dr. Rebekah Land has a Ph.D. in marriage and family therapy, master's degrees in social work and pastoral counseling and a bachelor's degree in sociology.

The conference is online at http://www.mentalhealthandthechurch.com/ and is well worth listening to. But if you don't have the time right now, this is what Becky Land found after listening:

Dr. Richard Land: This is Dr. Richard Land, executive editor of The Christian Post. I am interviewing my wife, Dr. Rebekah Land, who has a Ph.D. in Marriage and Family and has been a Marriage and Family therapist with for 40+years. First of all, Saddleback Church hosted a conference late last month on Mental Health and the Church. Why have a conference on mental health in the church at all?

Dr. Rebekah Land: As you know there are a lot of hurting people inside and outside of the church, and Rick Warren started out the day by answering that very question. He gave five points which I think were excellent. He pointed out that Jesus himself had a healing ministry, that a third of His ministry was healing.

The second purpose he mentioned is that it would help us remove the stigma that is associated with mental illness. For a long time there has been a lot of shame associated with the term "mental illness." People are often embarrassed to come forward and acknowledge that they are struggling because they believe it is not okay.

A third purpose is to have church leaders model authenticity themselves. Rick shared a story from his own early ministry, which I had not heard before. In the very early years of his ministry he was practically working around the clock, and he burned himself out to the extent that he actually fainted in the pulpit. He began to struggle with depression, which was in large part caused by being physically worn out. This has given him more sensitivity to emotional and physical issues.

**Huh? Didn't Warren say this conference last month was over his SON(who committed suicide last year)? Guess this isn't a surprise, as these wolves focus largely on THEMSELVES.

The fourth reason he said was to make churches and individuals more aware of community resources. I thought that was really valuable advice, that all churches should be more aware of the mental health resources available in their own communities in the event their services are needed.

He said the fifth purpose is that we need to stand publicly with those who are suffering. That has been a problem for a long time-people are embarrassed to acknowledge that they struggle. We give the impression that if you just pray, you should be okay. If you are struggling with mental health issues, it is not okay to say so.

Dr. Richard Land: Well, you and I have talked about this many times. There seems to be a segment of the Christian faith that wants to segregate or separate mental illness from other illnesses while there is increasing evidence illustrating that mental health issues are often no different than physical challenges. Taking medication is no different from taking insulin to medicate diabetes. After Rick Warren's tragic experience of his son's suicide when he lost a life-long battle with depression, Rick succinctly said, "Your brain chemistry is not your character."

Dr. Rebekah Land: Yes, and that is absolutely true. The problem is that we cannot look at somebody's face and see what's going on inside their skull. We cannot tell if there is actually a physical problem in there. So it is not as simple as saying the right things or thinking the right things because you may do everything you know to do and you still struggle. Rick also said, "Your illness is not your identity. Jesus defines you, not your illness."

Dr. Richard Land: Now, Rick Warren, at Saddleback Church, organized the conference in conjunction with. . . .

Dr. Rebekah Land: Actually, the Roman Catholic Diocese of Orange County and the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI). The day began with Bishop Vann sharing that when Rick's son committed suicide, he reached out to Rick, and that was the beginning of a close friendship that has developed over the last few months. They began to share a vision for their congregations to work together. I really appreciated that. I think it models how we need to work together because mental illness is something that affects all of us regardless of our church affiliation. Many of us struggle with it ourselves or know others who struggle with it, and it is an opportunity for ministry to those who are hurting.

**Uhm...how about struggling with SIN, as Paul said even he did in Romans 7? ::)

Dr. Richard Land: Now who were some of the speakers at this conference?

Dr. Rebekah Land: One of the things that impressed me was the range and quality of the speakers. There were pastors, priests, psychologists, psychiatrists, an author, an editor, and there were lay people. There were two really powerful testimonies of people who had gone through extreme difficulties personally and another person who had dealt with mental illness in her family. The first man was told that he should never marry and he would never hold down a job due to his mental illness. He is now successful, he is married, and he has children. He said, "I am still on medication. You know, I am not over it."

Another lady gave a testimony about her history of cutting and how she still struggles. Another woman gave her testimony about what it was like to cope with mental illness in her family. In her case it was her mom, and her mom was a pastor's wife. She shared that her mother sunk to the depths of depression, ended up on the street, and how that impacted them as a family. I don't see how you could listen to that testimony and not have compassion and concern and realize there are people who are dealing with serious mental issues sitting in the pew next to you and you don't even know it.

Dr. Richard Land: Now, did you actually go to this conference or did you avail yourself of the miracle of the internet?

Dr. Rebekah Land: Well, when we first heard about it, I thought going to it seemed like a really good idea, and then I discovered it would be available online. I was amazed because, as you know, I have gone to a fair number of conferences over my lifetime, especially professional conferences, and you do not usually get to hear these kinds of speakers without paying a great deal of money. So I expected that even online there would be a hefty fee involved, and actually there was no fee. I also encouraged my counseling students to attend. I was really appreciative of that opportunity.

Another feature is the workbook itself for the conference was 104 pages long. One impressive feature is that the whole last section is devoted to several pages of resources. It listed the resources that they have there at Saddleback, the kinds of groups and ministries that they have for various kinds of issues, as well as community resources. I think that is a good model for churches to use because they need that kind of information on hand when somebody calls or comes in to see one of the ministerial staff. The pastoral staff needs to know who to call. They need to know who the community resources are, and they should have interacted personally with them to find out who they are and who can they feel comfortable referring people to.

**Huh? What about opening up the pages of SCRIPTURE and EDIFYING these people?

Dr. Richard Land: So, were you able to choose which workshop you wanted to watch during the breakout sessions?

Dr. Rebekah Land: Well, actually they chose a couple for us. Fortunately for me, the one that I would have chosen they aired, and that was Dr. Daniel Amen, a psychiatrist, who as you know is a personal favorite of mine. He is involved in brain research. They also told us that after a couple of weeks the conference would be available for viewing on the conference website, which is mentalhealthandthechurch.com. I am really looking forward to watching some of the sessions again as well as the breakout sessions that I could not attend.

Dr. Richard Land: So it sounds like it was a good experience.

Dr. Rebekah Land: It was an excellent conference. I really appreciate Rick Warren taking the lead and allowing God to use his own personal tragedy to be a blessing to others.

Dr. Richard Land: So you really thought it met a lot of needs.

Dr. Rebekah Land: Absolutely. I think it really did, and I think including the personal testimonies of people who have dealt with serious mental issues helped put a face on the problem. They are just like us and our families.

Dr. Richard Land: Amazingly enough, this issue and Rick Warren having this conference, is controversial in some circles of the Christian faith.

Dr. Rebekah Land: Right. Hopefully having this conference with such a wide range of participants has helped people to realize that this is not something to hide behind closed doors or of which to be ashamed. Rick has modeled mental health and authenticity by sharing his own personal and family hardships in this area. I hope this will encourage others to acknowledge that they need help or some to realize that these issues may be closer to them then they thought

Dr. Richard Land: To me, what the Christian faith says is that we can understand all of these things and they impact us. But they don't define us.

Dr. Rebekah Land: We do not have to let them define us.

Dr. Richard Land: Using secular psychological theories, you may understand all of this, but you are limited in what you can do about it. You can understand it, but you are the victim of your background and your experience.

Dr. Rebekah Land: Yes. That is exactly right. The idea that you can just learn about your past or the reason you struggle will not necessarily make it go away. You have to have more than just awareness. In fact, as a Christian, you may still struggle, but you need to know that we will walk by your side through it. Hopefully this conference encouraged those who are struggling themselves as well as those who need to be supportive of those who are struggling. Rick Warren put it well when he said your brain chemistry is not your character. This is a good take away from the conference.

**Then why are you PUSHING these pharmaceutical meds, Rick? >:(

Dr. Richard Land: Thank you. I appreciate your taking time to share with us.

Dr. Rebekah Land: Thank you. I enjoyed it.

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Do you see how MAN-centered this is, and NOT ONE IOTA over Jesus' finished works on the cross, his burial, resurrection, salvation, and the hope of eternal life?

1/3 of his ministry was "healing"? Where does it say that?

Luke 4:17  And there was delivered unto him the book of the prophet Esaias. And when he had opened the book, he found the place where it was written,
Luk 4:18  The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor; he hath sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised,
Luk 4:19  To preach the acceptable year of the Lord.

FYI, the word brokenhearted is DELETED from these other perversions - with that being said, brokenhearted does NOT mean "mental illness".


Now THIS ia Agenda 21 talk! Communities? Yeah, that sums it up RIGHT there!


Sorry, Rick, but scripture says WE as believers ARE appointed to affliction!

James 5:10  Take, my brethren, the prophets, who have spoken in the name of the Lord, for an example of suffering affliction, and of patience.
Jas 5:11  Behold, we count them happy which endure. Ye have heard of the patience of Job, and have seen the end of the Lord; that the Lord is very pitiful, and of tender mercy.

Speaking of Job - it was in Warren's PDL that he said how Job gave up on God(which is pure Gnosticism talk on his part).

Look up, brethren, we are drawing nigh so close now!

Vatican Delegation to Saddleback at Rick Warren's Church

http://galatiansfour.blogspot.com/2014/04/vatican-delegation-to-saddleback-at.html

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dVCY8pW-ACs

Rick Warren appeared on the Catholic news show "World Over" on EWTN and spoke of a Vatican delegation to Saddleback. Rick Warren as we know, is ecumenical to the core and a worker for Rome's building of the one world religion.

Early on Warren praises Pope Francis, saying "he is doing everything right.", "this is what the world expects a Christian to do", "if you love Pope Francis, you'll love jesus". Then he talks about his parents and that his father taught him how to get along with a pauper or a king. Next up, they discuss his P.E.A.C.E plan where Warren says he sent over 23,000 of his church members overseas to help carry it's agenda. One interesting statement is when Arroyo says to him, of people overseas, that he is truly "non-denominational", well of course he would be to advance the false ecumenism. Warren responds with the statement, "You love jesus, you're all in the same camp." At the 14:00, he speaks of the essentials and liberty in the non-essentials, of course applying this to Catholicism and more of the ecumenical message. The apostate church, sure is bigger then China or India.

They cover the phony "religious freedom" subject related to Hobby Lobby. Warren states that he believes "religious liberty may be the civil rights issue of the next decade". Which is rather ominous considering what is planned regarding persecution of real Christians in this world. The focus on this false "religious liberty" is an advanced Trojan horse, to continue what the false culture wars did uniting the churches into the one world religion.  At 19:41, Arroyo, talks about the Vatican sending a delegation to Saddleback. Warren speaks of agreeing with the Vatican delegates on re-evangelizing "Christians in name only".  Can any of my readers figure out the bishop's name they are stating? Warren then talks about his "health" pursuits for the rest of the video, and states, "It's not about me!"

Warren's latest Mental health project with Catholic clergy

FYI, Warren wants to include psychiatry and drugs as part of his "mental health" initiative program...

http://humansarefree.com/2014/04/20-signs-that-big-pharma-is-scamming-us.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+HumansAreFree+%28Humans+Are+Free%29
20 Signs That Big Pharma is Scamming Us

If you could get 70 percent of Americans addicted to your drugs and rake in $280 billion a year in the process, would you do it? If you could come up with a “pill for every problem” and charge Americans twice as much for those pills as people in other countries pay, would you do it?

 If you could make more money than you ever dreamed possible by turning the American people into the most doped up people in the history of the planet, would you do it?

 In America today, the number of people hooked on legal drugs absolutely dwarfs the number of people hooked on illegal drugs. And sadly, the number of people killed by legal drugs absolutely dwarfs the number of people killed by illegal drugs.  But most Americans assume that if a drug is “legal” that it must be safe.

After all, the big pharmaceutical companies and the federal government would never allow us to take anything that would hurt us, right?  Sadly, the truth is that they don’t really care about us. They don’t really care that prescription painkillers are some of the most addictive drugs on the entire planet and that they kill more Americans each year than heroin and **** combined.

 They don’t care that antidepressants are turning tens of millions of Americans into zombies and can significantly increase the chance of suicide (just look at the warning label). All the big pharmaceutical companies really care about is making as much money as they possibly can.

The following are 20 signs that the pharmaceutical companies are running a $280 billion money making scam:

 #1 According to a study conducted by the Mayo Clinic, 70 percent of Americans are on at least one prescription drug.  An astounding 20 percent of all Americans are on at least five prescription drugs.

 #2 According to the CDC, approximately 9 out of every 10 Americans that are at least 60 years of age say that they have taken at least one prescription drug within the last month.

 #3 The 11 largest pharmaceutical companies combined to rake in approximately $85,000,000,000 in profits in 2012.

 #4 During 2013, Americans will spend more than 280 billion dollars on prescription drugs.

 #5 According to Alternet, last year “11 of the 12 new-to-market drugs approved by the Food and Drug Administration were priced above $100,000 per-patient per-year”.

 #6 The CDC says that spending on prescription drugs more than doubled between 1999 and 2008.

 #7 Many prescription drugs cost about twice as much in the United States as they do in other countries.

 #8 One study found that more than 20 percent of all American adults are taking at least one drug for “psychiatric” or “behavioral” disorders.

 #9 The percentage of women taking antidepressants in America is higher than in any other country in the world.

 #10 Children in the United States are three times more likely to be prescribed antidepressants than children in Europe are.

  #11 A shocking Government Accountability Office report discovered that approximately one-third of all foster children in the United States are on at least one psychiatric drug.  In fact, the report found that many states seem to be doping up foster children as a matter of course.  Just check out these stunning statistics:

"In Texas, foster children were 53 times more likely to be prescribed five or more psychiatric medications at the same time than non-foster children. In Massachusetts, they were 19 times more likely. In Michigan, the number was 15 times. It was 13 times in Oregon. And in Florida, foster children were nearly four times as likely to be given five or more psychotropic medications at the same time compared to non-foster children."
#12 In 2010, the average teen in the U.S. was taking 1.2 central nervous system drugs.  Those are the kinds of drugs which treat conditions such as ADHD and depression.

 #13 The total number of Americans taking antidepressants doubled between 1996 and 2005.

 #14 All of those antidepressants don’t seem to be working too well. The suicide rate for Americans between the ages of 35 and 64 rose by close to 30 percent between 1999 and 2010. The number of Americans that are killed by suicide now exceeds the number of Americans that die as a result of car accidents.

 #15 According to the National Household Survey on Drug Abuse, 36 million Americans have abused prescription drugs at some point in their lives.

 #16 A survey conducted for the National Institute on Drug Abuse found that more than 15 percent of all U.S. high school seniors abuse prescription drugs.

 #17 According to the CDC, approximately three quarters of a million people a year are rushed to emergency rooms in the United States because of adverse reactions to pharmaceutical drugs.

 #18 According to the Los Angeles Times, drug deaths (mostly caused by prescription drugs) are climbing at an astounding rate:

"Drug fatalities more than doubled among teens and young adults between 2000 and 2008, years for which more detailed data are available. Deaths more than tripled among people aged 50 to 69, the Times analysis found. In terms of sheer numbers, the death toll is highest among people in their 40s."

#19 In the United States today, prescription painkillers kill more Americans than heroin and **** combined.

 #20 Each year, tens of billions of dollars is spent on pharmaceutical marketing in the United States alone.

 The American people deserve better than that. Every year, the United States spends more on health care than Japan, Germany, France, China, the U.K., Italy, Canada, Brazil, Spain and Australia combined. In fact, if the U.S. health care system was a separate nation it would be the 6th largest economy on the entire planet.

 For all the money that we spend, we should be the healthiest people in the world by a wide margin. Instead, life expectancy is higher in dozens of other countries and we have very high rates of cancer, heart disease and diabetes.

Are you SURE about that, Rick? ::)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jTyCiGPWA0I

RICK WARREN CALLING FOR UNITY WITH ROME (Friday Church News Notes, April 25, 2014, Way of Life Literature fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143)

(Friday Church News Notes, April 25, 2014, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - This month, Rick Warren of Saddleback Church gave an exclusive interview with Catholic television channel EWTN, complete with effusive praise for the Catholic Church and the popes and a call for unity with Rome. He praised the works of Catholic contemplative “saints” such as St. John of the Cross and Teresa of Avila, calling their books “great classic devotional works,” ignoring the fact that they held to a false sacramental gospel and venerated Mary as the Mother of God and the Queen of Heaven. Warren said that Saddleback uses Roman Catholic contemplative prayer methods such as the very dangerous “centering prayer,” and Saddleback’s “spiritual director” was trained by a Roman Catholic named Jean Vanier. (See “Silence vs. The Silence” at www.wayofife.org.) In fact, he said that when he was writing The Purpose Drive Church he would get up in the morning, light candles, and start writing. He called Pope Francis “our pope” and said, “For authenticity, humility, Pope Francis is the perfect example. He is doing everything right.” Warren said that Saddleback recently received a delegation from the Vatican consisting of about 30 Catholic bishops to study the church’s “style of evangelization.” Warren said, “I fully support the Catholic Church’s New Evangelization,” which is a program to regain lapsed Catholics to the false Catholic faith and which is centered around veneration of Mary. When asked by EWTN’s Raymond Arroyo, “What is keeping Christians apart from the unity that John Paul II and all the recent popes have called for?” Warren replied: “I think we need to go back to the words of St. Augustine. ‘In the essentials we have unity; in the non-essentials we have liberty; in all things we show charity.’ I think this is really true. I think as the world, particularly the western culture, becomes more secular, more anti-Christian ... it is really incumbent on all Christians of every brand and stripe that we join together on the things that we share in common” (Rick Warren, EWTN, “World Today,” Apr. 10-11, 2014). Rick Warren is one of the most influential Christians on earth and also one of the most dangerous. He is enthusiastically building the end-time, one-world church.

http://www.shtfplan.com/headline-news/psychiatrists-are-the-new-federal-gun-control-agents-and-political-thought-police_04272014
Psychiatrists Are the New Federal Gun Control Agents and Political Thought Police
4/27/14

The Obama administration has a new partner in crime and it is the American Psychiatric Association (APA).  The APA created the new Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (5th Edition) which was recently adopted. DSM 5 is highly controversial and has sparked outrage from the mental health practitioners. As many of these practitioners point out, the new DSM-V makes a pathology out simple and normal behaviors such as grieving for the loss of a loved one.

This constitutes a new subjective approach in diagnosing of mental illness that promises to end free speech and any form of political dissent. The federal government has already declared anyone who oppose its unconstitutional policies as having “political paranoia,”  which is now diagnosed as a type of mental illness.

Psychiatry Targets Internet Conspiracy Theorists

Particularly disturbing is that the new manual targets internet users and conspiracy theorists. If someone is judged, by some vague set of criteria, to spend too much time on the internet, they could be judged to be mentally ill and ineligible to own a gun. How are you receiving this information? The chances are that you are, at least according to Obama and Biden, giving in to your internet addiction and reading this article. Under the new Obama guidelines this would be grounds for gun confiscation. The alternative media is predicated on internet readership and listenership. These groups would be among the first groups to oppose a martial law crackdown, and now they are the first to be targeted.

Subsequently, this is just another backdoor method to disarm citizens who would oppose the abject tyranny being imposed upon America. And these facts sum up what is truly behind the Obama administration’s latest attack upon gun ownership because they want to prey upon a defenseless nation by disarming as many of us as possible before the purges can begin in earnest.

Under Obama’s new proposed gun regulations, anyone who has a diagnosable, or is potentially diagnosable (i.e. pre-crime) for being mentally ill, can have their gun confiscated. Vice President Biden even feels that they can violate HIPPA privacy regulations in requiring the states to report who has been treated for a mental illness. Therefore, in the name of confiscating your gun, this administration thinks it is acceptable to violate federal privacy laws.

What is interesting to me is that the Obama administration is not even trying to distinguish between mental illnesses in terms of who should, or should not own a gun. In the eyes of the Obama administration, all mental illnesses are created equal. A person with a phobia is just as dangerous as a sociopath. One in six Americans have a “diagnosable anxiety disorder”. This is completely understandable given the economic and political times that we live in. However, under the new proposed guidelines, all of these people would be ineligible to have a gun in their possession even though there is not a shred of research which indicates this population would be inclined towards gun violence any more than any other population.

I once predicted that any form of political protest would be demonized and used as the basis for the administration of assignment a mentally ill label upon anyone who disagrees with the government.

Political Schizophrenia

This is the new  Soviet style political schizophrenia. We will see confinements among the alternative media and the veterans for things like ADHD, grieving, normal anxiety, bad eating habits, etc. All of these behaviors and more have been categorized as pathologies under the Obama administration and a supportive American Psychiatric Association.

Oppositional Defiant Disorder Is the Newest Weapon Against Political Dissent

When I went through my clinical training, the Bible of mental illness, The Statistical and Diagnostic Manual (DSM-4r) defined Oppositional Defiant Disorder (ODD) as a highly controversial mentally illness used to describe children and teens as mentally ill they exhibited disobedience and defiance. When I was first nationally credentialed, most practitioners did not take this diagnosis seriously and we mistakenly believed that it would fade away. We uniformly believed this to be true because defiance and oppositional behaviors are hallmark traits of healthy rebellion exhibited by children and teens as they seek independence. Rather than ODD fading away, the diagnosis has become the tool of the ruling elite.

The new DSM (5) has expanded the definition of ODD to include adults who exemplify “paranoid ideation” about the government and frequently express these delusional ideations on the internet.

In its analysis of the political abuse of psychiatry in both the Soviet Union and China, The Journal of the American Academy of Psychiatry and the Law stated that “Psychiatric incarceration of mentally healthy people is uniformly understood to be a particularly pernicious form of repression, because it uses the powerful modalities of medicine as tools of punishment, and it compounds a deep affront to human rights with deception and fraud…”

Conclusion

The Obama people are trying to take this country down a very slippery slope. They are seeking to disarm as many Americans as possible with all available means such what has been described in this article.

The historical precedent, and subsequent danger of seizing guns under such a false pretense, has been well-established. Therefore, I will not belabor a well-established point, that all 19 genocides in the 20th century were preceded by gun confiscation. Why should we consider Obama’s recent actions to be any less threatening of deadly?

What is even more frightening, is the new ODD diagnosis will not just seize guns. It will commandeer a person’s mind through incarceration, for their own good of course, and forced drugging which will chemically castrate the brains of all arrested political dissidents.

We already know that Obamacare forces doctors to ask the gun ownership status of their patients. It is not a leap of logic that anyone owning a gun will soon be diagnosed with yet another manufactured mental illness tied to gun ownership.

I would like to hear from psychiatrists. Are you going to support this tyranny? Or, are you going to be an Oathkeeper to your profession and “do no harm” to your patients? Or, will you capitulate and goose-step your way through the new political prisons in America and do your part to suppress liberty?

^^ Just to clarify - the RCC is pushing this "mental health" agenda(which Rick Warren and the SBC are helping to carry out). The RCC is pushing gun control(which Rick Warren, Franklin Graham, and other "evangelical leaders" are helping to push too). The Pharmaceutical industry is runned by Jesuits. The RCC has also been pushing universal health care(and we have Obamacare now, albeit with Newt Gingrich's fingerprints on it).

Ultimately - it seems like a lot of the Vatican's agendas are tied in with each other very closely.

Don't buy into all of the hoopla over how it's ONLY Obama pushing gun control, how he's the most anti-gun President, etc, etc. Besides - California largely became a "blue" state b/c of what one of the Vatican's puppets(Reagan) did.

^^

Graham: ‘God has already done a universal background check on us’
4/26/14
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2014/apr/26/franklin-graham-god-has-already-done-universal-bac/?utm_source=RSS_Feed&utm_medium=RSS

INDIANAPOLIS — Rev. Franklin Graham, the keynote speaker at Sunday’s prayer breakfast at the NRA’s annual meeting, responded to calls for him to express his previously stated support for universal background checks on gun purchases by deferring to a higher power.

“I’ve been asked to pray at the opening session of the NRA Annual Meeting and for their prayer breakfast,” Mr. Graham, president of Samaritan’s Purse and son of legendary evangelist Billy Graham, said on his Facebook page.

“There’s been an ad circulating asking me to call on the NRA to support universal background checks. I want you to know that God has already done a universal background check on every one of us. He created you and knows everything about you. Nothing is hidden from His eyes.”

Pastor Michael McBride, director of the PICO National Network’s Lifelines to Healing Campaign, said in a statement that he prays Mr. Graham will “speak truth to power” Sunday morning “and remind the NRA leadership that support for Second Amendment rights goes hand in hand with keeping guns away from young people, criminals and other dangerous people who shouldn’t have them.”

Mr. Graham told Time Magazine last year that he and Dr. Richard Land of the Southern Baptist Convention’s Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission supported President Obama’s efforts to increase background checks in the wake of the Newtown, Conn. school shootings in December 2012. Legislation to increase the checks fell victim to a filibuster in the U.S. Senate last year.

“As ministers, we agreed together that we could stand on a united front for universal background checks,” Mr. Graham said. “We think that’s reasonable and responsible.”

Evangelicals and Catholics Together Marks 20 Years

 When evangelicals and Catholics set aside centuries of mutual suspicion 20 years ago, the idea was fairly simple: Even if we can’t always work together, at least let’s not work against each other.

Now, two decades after the launch of the group Evangelicals and Catholics Together, relations between the two groups appear stronger than ever, forged by shared battles over abortion, same-sex marriage, religious freedom and immigration.A new pope is finding crossover appeal among evangelicals who share Pope Francis’ emphasis on evangelism and his distaste for the fancier trappings and authoritarianism of the papacy.

“The first affirmation of Evangelicals and Catholics Together is that Jesus Christ is Lord, and there’s the source of our hope,” Catholic theologian Matthew Levering of Mundelein Seminary outside Chicago told the recent Q conference of evangelical movers and shakers in Nashville, Tenn.

“This was an anchor for when they began to discover that we share the same gospel.”

The movement was spearheaded by former Nixon aide Charles Colson and the Rev. Richard John Neuhaus, founder of the ecumenical magazine First Things. Together, the two men — who have since died — held out the promise that there was more that united the two groups than divided them.
Evangelicals and Catholics teamed up in fights against abortion and gay marriage. While the U.S. Catholic bishops led the public opposition to a contraception mandate included in President Obama’s health care law, the evangelical owners of the Hobby Lobby chain took the case to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Earlier this year, Catholic bishops and evangelical leaders combined efforts to pressure the House to pass immigration reform measures this year. ECT officials are hoping to finalize a new statement on marriage by June, said First Things editor R.R. Reno.

Even as both sides have had strained relationships with the Obama White House, they came together under George W. Bush, a United Methodist with a strong evangelical following. Bush looked to Catholic theologians to undergird his invasion of Iraq and opposition to embryonic stem cell research. His knelt at the casket of Pope John Paul II in 2005 and welcomed Pope Benedict XVI into the Oval Office in 2008.

To be sure, there are still sectors within evangelicalism that see Catholics as people who need to be “saved,” and within Catholicism where evangelicals and other Protestants are seen as something akin to heretics. Yet 50 years after the Second Vatican Council revolutionized the Catholic approach to other churches, relations couldn’t be much better.

In a 2009 Pew Research Center survey, 49 percent of white evangelicals said they view Catholicism as “very” or “somewhat” similar to their own religion. Among Catholics, 60 percent said they view Protestantism as similar to their religion.

Timothy George, an early evangelical leader within ECT and dean of Beeson Divinity School at Samford University, said ECT allows evangelicals and Catholics to remain distinctive while finding common ground.

“ECT represents an ecumenism of conviction, not accommodation, which I think is the way forward,” he said.

Even as many evangelicals reject or remain suspicious of the papacy, they’ve found a pope in Francis that they can deal with. In a February survey, Pew found that 56 percent of white evangelicals had a favorable view of Pope Francis (compared with 14 percent who had an unfavorable view and 30 percent who expressed no opinion). In contrast, 85 percent of Catholics expressed a favorable view.

“The mere fact that more Protestants are talking about the pope, and more favorably, means a change in relations between Catholics and Protestants,” said the Rev. James Martin, a Jesuit priest and editor at large at America magazine. “His actions cut across divides because he focuses on words and deeds, just like Jesus did.”

Francis has urged the faithful to recover their enthusiasm for preaching the gospel and has said that evangelism should be “first and foremost.” And he called on Christians to care for the poor, saying, “There is an inseparable bond between our faith and the poor.”

Protestants don’t expect Francis to change church doctrine on key theological differences between Protestants and Catholics, such as papal infallibility, the veneration of the Virgin Mary, the nature of the sacraments, the doctrine of the church or theological views of salvation. But they’ve come a long way in mutual admiration and cooperation, observers say.

“At the time, there was a huge hue and cry,” George said about ECT’s release. “By and large, I think evangelicals now see Catholics as allies, not as enemies, in the deep pressing moral issues of our time.”

As both churches prepare to mark the 500th anniversary of the Protestant Reformation in 2017, the pope’s tenure has also highlighted the historic tensions between Protestants and Catholics. The role of the papacy is an elevated position Protestants would reject, and the Catholic Church just made previous Popes John Paul II and John XXIII saints.

“[Pope Francis] seems to be wanting to democratize things and make the papacy more transparent,” said Carl Trueman, a church history professor at Westminster Theological Seminary. “On the other hand, he’s putting things into place that seem to raise the papacy higher through the sainthood of previous popes.”

 http://www.christianheadlines.com/news/evangelicals-and-catholics-together-marks-20-years.html

That's not quite what the scripture says...

1John_3:18  My little children, let us not love in word, neither in tongue; but in deed and in truth.

And yes, it seems like the typical Babel church building pastor of today will work with their respective archdiocese's interfaith groups(where they work with other religious leaders like Islamic clerics, Mormons, Jewish rabbis, Episcopalian priests, etc).

Why Did Copeland, Robison Meet With Pope Francis?

(http://cdn.charismanews.com/images/stories/2014/featured-news/pope-francis-with-evangelicals.jpg)

Two prominent Fort Worth-based Christian ministers led a delegation of Evangelical Christian leaders to Rome to meet privately with Pope Francis.

James and Betty Robison, co-hosts of the Life Today television program, and Kenneth Copeland, co-host of Believer's Voice of Victory, met the Roman Pontiff at the Vatican on Tuesday.  The meeting lasted almost three hours and included a private luncheon with Pope Francis.

Mr. Robison told the Fort Worth Star Telegram, "This meeting was a miracle.... This is something God has done. God wants his arms around the world. And he wants Christians to put his arms around the world by working together."

Mr. Robison said he was impressed by Pope Francis' humility and courtesy to the visiting delegation of Evangelical Protestant Christian leaders.

In a written statement, Mr. Robison said he believes "the prayers of earnest Christians helped lead to the choice of Pope Francis."  He described Jorge Mario Bergoglio, the Argentine Archbishop chosen as Pope, as "a humble man...filled with such love for the poor, downtrodden..."

In addition to Mrs. Betty Robison, the high-profile Protestant delegation included Kenneth Copeland, co-founder of Kenneth Copeland Ministries in Newark, TX; Reverend Geoff Tunnicliff, CEO of the World Evangelical Alliance; Rev. Brian Stiller and Rev. Thomas Schirrmacher, also from the World Evangelical Alliance; and Rev. John Arnott and his wife, Carol, co-founders of Partners for Harvest ministries in Toronto, Canada.  Gloria Copeland did not travel to Rome because of a previously scheduled commitment.

The ecumenical meeting in Rome was organized by Episcopal Bishop Tony Palmer.  Rev. Palmer is an ordained bishop in the Communion of Evangelical Episcopal Churches, a break-away alliance of charismatic Anglican-Episcopal churches.  Bishop Palmer is also the Director of The Ark Community, an international interdenominational Convergent Church online community, and is a member of the Roman Catholic Ecumenical Delegation for Christian Unity and Reconciliation.

Bishop Palmer developed a friendship with Pope Francis when the future Roman Pontiff was a Catholic official in Argentina.  Prior to becoming a CEEC bishop, Rev. Palmer was the director of the Kenneth Copeland Ministries' office in South Africa.  He is married to an Italian Roman Catholic woman.  He later moved to Italy and began working to reconcile Roman Catholics and Protestants.  Kenneth Copeland Ministries was one of Mr. Palmer's first financial contributors over 10 years ago in support of his ecumenical work in Italy.

Earlier this year, Pope Francis called Bishop Palmer to invite him to his residence in Vatican City.  During the meeting, Bishop Palmer suggested that the Pope record a personal greeting on Mr. Palmer's iPhone to be delivered to Kenneth Copeland.  Mr. Copeland showed the Papal video greeting to a conference of Protestant ministers who were meeting at Mr. Copeland's Eagle Mountain International Church near Fort Worth, Texas.  In the video, Pope Francis expressed his desire for Christian unity with Protestants.

Later, James Robison telecasted the video on his daily TV program, Life Today.  "The pope, in the video, expressed a desire for Protestants and Catholics to become what Jesus prayed for — that Christians would become family and not be divided," Mr. Robison said the response to the video was very positive, and that Pope Francis asked Bishop Palmer whether a meeting could be arranged with Evangelical Protestants seeking Christian unity in the world.

In his written statement released after the Papal meeting, Mr. Robison said he was "blessed to be part of perhaps an unprecedented moment between evangelicals and the Catholic Pope."  He described the Protestant delegation's private meeting with the leader of the Roman Catholic Church as "an intimate circle of prayerful discussion and lunch to discuss not only seeing Jesus' prayer answered, but that every believer would become a bold, joy-filled witnesses for Christ.

In describing the ecumenical gathering as a miracle, Mr. Robison said, "This is something God has done. God wants his arms around the world. And he wants Christians to put his arms around the world by working together."

During the luncheon on Tuesday, Mr. Robison got a high-five from Pope Francis after the Pope and Protestant guests talked about the need for all people to have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ.  According to the Life Today host, the Roman Pontiff did not know what a high-five was until Bishop Palmer explained it to him in Italian.  Mr. Robison said, "The Pope made it very clear that he wanted every believer to become Spirit-filled, joy-filled witnesses."

Mr. Robison said Pope Francis had written recently, "Too many Catholics look like they've been to Lent with no Easter. It's a mistake for them to look like they've been to a funeral" as he challenged Catholics to witness and never try to control the Holy Spirit, but yield to Him.

Mr. Robison said he received a divine call from God to seek Christian unity while he was hospitalized several years ago with a serious staph infection following hip surgery.  Robison recalled, "[I ] was so weak I could not lift a cup of water to my lips...God got my full attention...He spoke to me through Isaiah 58:6-12 and I saw the importance of living in freedom, touching the suffering, the hungry, poor, and downtrodden. I recognized the promise that our prayers would be answered quickly and we would become a free-flowing stream and a well-watered garden, restoring the foundations upon which we must build. During that time God instructed me to focus my attention on Jesus' prayer and encouraging others to begin fulfilling it through us in our day."

During that time, he said, he was impressed by a prayer of Jesus in John 17:21, pleading that all Christian believers be one.  "We've tried to focus on being an answer to Jesus' prayer," Robison said. "We want to see Jesus' prayer for unity answered in our day."

Aware that the meeting with the Pope will be troublesome among staunch Protestants, Mr. Robison said he and the other visiting Evangelical Christian leaders talked about diversity and their belief that Roman Catholics and Protestants could work together without compromising their beliefs.

"The world is suffering," said Robison. "We as Christians have too much love to share without fighting one another."

Mr. Robison said he and other "respected Evangelical leaders and Spirit-filled Catholics began meeting together to pray for God's will to be done and to bring true believers together in supernatural unity....We have been commanded to love God with all of our heart and our neighbors as ourselves. The enemy has kept many Christians from loving one another as Christ loves us and have failed to recognize the importance of supernatural unity even with all of the unique diversity."

Mr. Robison, whose ministry digs water wells and supplies food for impoverished people in third-world nations, recounted that he was christened as a fatherless boy in an Episcopal Church.  As an adult, he joined the Southern Baptist Church.  In the 1980s, he became one of the first prominent Southern Baptist ministers to openly proclaim he had received the baptism of the Holy Spirit.

http://www.charismanews.com/opinion/44555-why-did-copeland-robison-meet-with-pope-francis

Pope Francis Meets US Televangelists, and the First-Ever ‘Papal High-Five’ Follows

(http://media.salemwebnetwork.com/cms/RT/10916-pope%20high%20five%20edited.800w.tn.jpg)

 What does it take to produce the first-ever papal high-five? A meeting with American televangelists, apparently.
 
The gesture came during a three-hour meeting of Pope Francis and Texas televangelists Kenneth Copeland and James Robison, just weeks after the pontiff met with televangelist Joel Osteen and other religious leaders. At the June 24 meeting, Robison said he was so moved by Pope Francis’ message of the gospel that he asked the translator to ask Francis for a high-five. The pope obliged, raised his arm and the two men smacked hands.
 
The televangelists are among some wealthier U.S. evangelicals who have recently met with Francis, who has called for a focus on the poor and a simple lifestyle for clergy. In March, the pope met with members of the Green family, the Oklahoma billionaires whose company, Hobby Lobby, won their challenge to President Obama’s contraception coverage mandate at the Supreme Court last week.
 
Copeland and Osteen have been criticized by some as teaching “health and wealth” prosperity theology, the belief that faith can increase one’s wealth. But from his humble shoes to his simple Fiat, Francis has set a decidedly un-extravagant example.
 
“The prosperity gospel seems to be fundamentally opposed to the message that Francis has been spreading. But he has shown that he’s willing to meet with just about anyone,” said Michael Peppard, a professor of theology at Fordham University.
 
“Joel Osteen seems to have a charismatic authority among a large amount of people. Maybe Francis is channeling Jesus: If you disagree with someone, meet with them.”
 
Last year, Francis fired the German “Bishop of Bling,” Franz-Peter Tebartz-van Elst, for spending $43 million on a fancy residential complex. Copeland, meanwhile, was one of several televangelists targeted by Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, in 2007 for their lavish lifestyles.
 
Copeland declined to provide full information about his finances, and the investigation wrapped up in 2011 with no penalties for the pastors who did not cooperate and no definitive instances of wrongdoing found.
 
Copeland was unavailable for comment about his meeting with the pope, but in an address to his congregation, he played a recording from earlier this year where Francis spoke on a smartphone camera and called on Christians to set aside their differences. Copeland led his congregation in prayer where many spoke in tongues, a common Pentecostal practice.
 
Robison, a Texas televangelist with Baptist roots who is not an advocate of prosperity theology, defended his friend Copeland.
 
“All the things I’ve seen him criticized for, I have not seen validity,” Robison said. “I don’t appreciate Christians standing back and criticizing each other.”
 
Robison said he was born into the Episcopal Church but didn’t have a “born-again” conversion until later in life, the kind of story he sees among many Protestants and Catholics. “There are a lot of evangelicals and Catholics who don’t know Christ,” he said.
 
In fact, Francis’ meeting may reflect a shift in emphasis within the papacy. His predecessor, Benedict XVI, regularly bemoaned the decline of Christianity in his native Germany and across Europe. In contrast, the Argentine Francis comes from a region where competition from Pentecostalism is one of the biggest challenges facing the Catholic Church, Peppard said.
 
As unusual as it might seem for a pope meet with celebrity Protestant preachers, the potential awkwardness goes both ways. While some praised Robison for going to Rome, others said Protestants and Catholics have too many differences, on issues that include the role of the Bible, saints, the status of the Virgin Mary and the nature of salvation. “Very disappointed in you James and Betty. Never forget the Inquisition — Never forget!” one commenter wrote on Robison’s website.
 
But Robison said he and Francis found common ground in caring for the poor.
 
“I don’t see him as presenting himself as infallible,” Robison said of Pope Francis. “He’s been to confession. He asks for prayer. He’s anxious to apologize on (behalf) of Catholic leadership.”
 
Osteen’s meeting with Francis on June 4 was part of a larger gathering coordinated by the International Foundation, also known as “the Fellowship.” Osteen was joined by Utah Sen. Mike Lee, a Mormon; California pastor Tim Timmons; and Gayle D. Beebe, president of evangelical Westmont College.
 
The June 24 meeting leaned particularly toward charismatic Christianity. Other guests were Anthony Palmer, a bishop and international ecumenical officer with the independent Communion of Evangelical Episcopal Churches; Geoff Tunnicliffe, the outgoing head of the Worldwide Evangelical Alliance; and John and Carol Arnott of Catch the Fire Toronto, which grew out of a Pentecostal revival 20 years ago.
 
The pope met with more than 50,000 Catholic charismatics in Rome last month, admitting he was not always comfortable with the way they prayed. Still, he knelt on stage as they prayed for him and spoke in tongues. “Where does division come from? The devil!” Francis told them. “Division comes from the devil. Flee from internal struggles, please!”
 
Pentecostal and charismatic Christians  – charismatics are often Pentecostals in other churches, including the Catholic Church — share much in common, such as speaking in tongues and healing. Together, they make up at least 584 million people in the world, about 9 percent of the global population and one in four Christians worldwide, according to the Pew Research Center.
 
And that’s probably partly why Francis extended the invitation to the U.S. pastors. The Rev. Wesley Granberg-Michaelson, a veteran of Catholic-Protestant ecumenical groups and the author of “From Times Square to Timbuktu: The Post-Christian West Meets the Non-Western Church,” said Pentecostalism is growing in the Global South at three times the rate of Catholic growth, especially among the poor.
 
“My guess is that Francis knows this community can’t be ignored,” Granberg-Michaelson said. “Certainly, Francis would want to encourage Catholic charismatics to feel at home, as well as build ecumenical relationships with the Pentecostal community — and those reinforce one another. That’s also why what he is doing is both ecumenically creative, and makes sense.”

http://www.christianheadlines.com/blog/pope-francis-meets-us-televangelists-and-the-first-ever-papal-high-five-follows.html

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qHQDXkWBt_M

Russell Moore, Rick Warren to Join Vatican Conference on Marriage and Family Life

 The Vatican will host religious leaders from across the religious spectrum later this month for a conference where they are expected to defend traditional marriage as between a man and a woman.
 
While hosted by Vatican officials and scheduled to open with an address by Pope Francis, the conference will include Muslim and Jewish representatives, as well as American leading evangelicals like megachurch pastor Rick Warren and Southern Baptist ethicist Russell Moore.
 
The gathering comes just weeks after Pope Francis and senior Catholic leaders wrapped up a two-week Vatican Synod on the Family, which highlighted tensions within the Catholic hierarchy over gays and lesbians and cohabiting couples.
 
Despite initial overtures toward gay and lesbian Catholics and the “gifts and qualities” they had to offer the church, the final synod report scaled back that language. Conservative and traditionalist Catholics said any attempts to soften the church’s teaching on homosexuality was a “betrayal” and akin to heresy.
 
Organizers say the new conference will show that while the Catholic hierarchy is split on how to address contemporary challenges to marriage and family life, the church can nonetheless seek common ground with religious leaders outside the Vatican.
 
“I am willing to go anywhere, when asked, to bear witness to what we as evangelical Protestants believe about marriage and the gospel, especially in times in which marriage is culturally imperiled,” said Moore, who heads the Southern Baptist Convention’s Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission.
 
The Nov. 17-19 conference, “An International Interreligious Colloquium on The Complementarity of Man and Woman,” will feature about 30 speakers from 23 countries and 14 religions.
 
The conference has been in the works for at least a year, said Helen Alvare, a law professor at George Mason University who is handling communications for the gathering. But the Vatican’s blockbuster family summit laid a good foundation for a larger discussion, she said.
 
“The drive we have for new language is a huge part of this,” Alvare said. “People fear complementarity means women are second, and their fears are somewhat justified. There’s a need to educate, to inspire, to show and tell about the beauty of the relationship between men and women.”
 
Cohabitation, nonmarital parenting and same-sex marriage are dominating the global conversation on the family, Alvare said.
 
“Same-sex marriage takes up a great deal of oxygen,” she said. “It’s a controversial question that’s going to be out there. Positive stories are difficult. But I’m hopeful because I’ve seen that with the work with Pope Francis.”
 
The conference will include Wael Farouq, a Muslim and president of the Tawasul Cultural Center in Cairo; Henry B. Eyring, a top-ranking apostle in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints; and Manmohan Singh of the World Sikh Council.
 
“Marriage is your personal project, but it effects the world,” Alvare said. “The message is aimed at those who are there, that those in their own religious traditions and societies can have more language to work with and also that they have more hope.”
 
The gathering will be sponsored by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith and co-sponsored by the Pontifical Council for the Family, the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue, and the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity.

http://www.christianheadlines.com/blog/russell-moore-rick-warren-to-join-vatican-conference-on-marriage-and-family-life.html

http://www.ocregister.com/articles/vatican-642454-warren-world.html
Pastor Rick Warren speaks at Vatican conference on family, marriage
11/17/14

(http://images.onset.freedom.com/ocregister/gallery/nf95i1-warrenpope.jpeg)

Rick Warren spoke on the "Biblical Meaning of Marriage" Tuesday at the Vatican, where he is among 30 global religious leaders examining the changing roles of marriage and family in the world.

Warren joined leaders from 23 countries and 14 religions invited by Pope Francis on at the kickoff Monday to The Complementarity of Man and Woman: An International Colloquium.

“It’s great to be with leaders from different streams of Christianity from all over the world,” Warren said from the Vatican on Monday. “Although we have some differences, we all love Jesus Christ and we all want marriages and families to be healthy and strong.”

Upon meeting Pope Francis, Warren said: “Up close, you can feel the humility and compassion that others see from afar.”

Participants, who included Southern Baptist evangelist Russell Moore as well as Muslim, Jewish and Latter-day Saints representatives, will consider topics such as traditional marriage, cohabitation and same-sex marriage.

“Clearly this is a conversation that Pope Francis and the Vatican want to get ahead of,” said Juan Martinez, vice provost of Fuller Theological Seminary. “People of faith want to give a faith response, and that’s important.”

Vatican officials selected participants based on their interest in this topic and their reputations as leading religious voices worldwide, said Helen Alvare, a law professor at George Mason University and spokeswoman for the event.
The conference has been planned for a year and was coordinated by four Vatican offices: the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith; the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue; the Pontifical Council for the Promotion of Christian Unity; and the Pontifical Council for the Family. The conference is expected to create a deeper conversation on the relationship between men and women.

“Many believe that people talk about the relationship between men and women all of the time,” Alvare said. “That conversation is not very deep; it is usually about the troubles they are having, or about sex, but it doesn’t go deeper, to consider the meaning and purpose in the world and in the divine plan, of there being two sexes, drawn to one another, capable of a ‘one-flesh’ union, responsible for the creation of all new life.”

Religious scholars will examine how this relationship is lived in cultures and societies of Christians, Buddhists, Sikhs, Taoists, Muslims and Jews.

The focus is on the meaning of marriage around the globe, and God’s plan, as understood by religions around the globe.

Organizers expect the conference will address contemporary changes in traditional marriage and will seek a common ground among religious leaders outside the Vatican.

Martinez was not surprised that Warren was selected to attend and speak at the conference. Warren is a graduate of the Pasadena seminary and one of its most famous students.

“Rick Warren is a good positive spokesperson in the evangelical world,” he said. “He has influence in certain segments of the Christian world. He has a strong place in Orange County, but his books have been translated globally. His concepts have had a strong influence around the world. As he speaks, people will listen. As his perspectives are made public, they tend to become representative of a significant number of evangelicals.”

http://christiannews.net/2014/12/02/rick-warrens-call-for-christians-to-unite-with-catholics-holy-father-raising-concerns/
12/2/14
Rick Warren’s Call for Christians to Unite With Catholics, ‘Holy Father’ Raising Concerns

In a new video, megachurch leader and author Rick Warren is calling for Christians to unite with Roman Catholics and “Pope Francis,” who Warren recently referred to as the “Holy Father”—a move that is raising concerns among Christians nationwide and is resulting in calls for Warren to repent.

Warren made the comments following his visit to the Vatican last month, where he spoke at an interfaith conference on the “Complementarity of Man and Woman.”

“We have far more in common than what divides us,” he said in the two-minute video released by the Catholic News Service on Wednesday, described as being an outline for “an ecumenical vision for Catholics and Protestants to work together to defend the sanctity of life, sex and marriage.”

“They would all say, ‘We believe in the Trinity; we believe in the Bible; we believe in the resurrection; we believe in salvation through Jesus Christ,” Warren asserted, speaking of the various denominations within Christianity, of which he included Roman Catholicism. “These are the big issues.”

The author of the bestselling book “The Purpose Driven Life” then sought to defend Catholics from those who take issue with the practice of seeking the intercession of Mary and the various deceased persons that have been sainted by the Vatican.

“Sometimes protestants think that Catholics worship Mary like she’s another god, but that’s not exactly Catholic doctrine,” Warren contended. “People say, ‘What are the saints all about? Why are you praying to the saints?’ And when you understand what they mean by what they’re saying, there’s a whole lot more commonality [that we have with Roman Catholics].”

“There’s still real differences—no doubt about that,” Warren stated. “But the most important thing is, if you love Jesus, we’re on the same team.”

He closed by speaking of his belief that Christians and Catholics serve as co-laborers for the cause of defending life and family.

“When it comes to the family, we are co-workers in the field in this for the protection of the sanctity of life, the sanctity of sex and the sanctity of marriage,” Warren said. “So, there’s a great commonality and there’s no division on any of those three.”

But Warren’s comments have raised concern from Christian leaders nationwide, who are now calling the Saddleback leader to repentance. Matt Slick of the Christian Apologetics and Research Ministry (CARM) repudiated each of Warren’s points.

“Sure, there are Catholics who love the real Christ, the one who died on the cross for our sins. That is not the problem,” he said. “The problem is the Roman Catholic Church’s false teachings concerning Mary and salvation.”

“Rick Warren says both the Catholics and the Protestants believe in the Bible. But, there is a significant difference between the Bible of the Protestants and the Roman Catholic Church, which has added seven books,” Slick wrote. “[T]here are numerous problems in the apocryphal books, such as the teaching of salvation by works [and] the offering of money for the sins of the dead.”

“Warren implies that both Protestants and Catholics have the same view of salvation,” he continued. “Though it’s technically correct to say that Catholics believe in salvation through Jesus Christ, they reject justification by faith alone in Christ alone. Instead, it teaches that good works of various kinds are necessary for salvation.”

The Christian apologist then pointed to several Roman Catholic teachings on Mary, mainly from the Catechism of the Catholic Church (CCC), such as that Mary “by her manifold intercession continues to bring us the gifts of eternal salvation” and that “y asking Mary to pray for us, we acknowledge ourselves to be poor sinners and we address ourselves to the ‘Mother of Mercy,’ the All-Holy One.”

“Rick Warren has not only failed to recognize the problems in these serious areas, but he has lent his credibility as a Protestant pastor in support of the Roman Catholic Church,” Slick wrote. “This should never be done by any Protestant pastor who takes the Bible seriously. I must conclude that Mr. Warren does not take the word of God seriously and/or he does not understand the damnable teachings of Roman Catholicism regarding salvation.”

“Rick Warren needs to repent,” he said.

http://www.nowtheendbegins.com/blog/?p=33010

APOSTATE PASTOR RICK WARREN AND ELTON JOHN HOLD HANDS IN CONGRESS, JOKE ABOUT KISSING EACH OTHER

WARREN SAID THAT THEIRS WOULD BE “THE KISS HEARD ROUND THE WORLD”

“Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind, Nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners, shall inherit the kingdom of God.” 1 Corinthians 6:9,10 (KJV)

Laodicean church pastor Rick Warren appeared in Congress with pop icon and outspoken homosexual Elton John on Wednesday to ask for more MONEY for AIDS research. They were clearly having such a good time that they started holding hands as you see in the photo below.

Did Rick ever bother to tell Elton John that he was lost and headed for Hell?

After taking their seats at the witness table, the giddy pair laughed and smiled as they held hands, with Warren saying “Amen” and cautioning Elton John that if they kissed it would be “the kiss heard ‘round the world.” Is Rick Warren trying to tell us something here, is there a “coming out” moment in his future? Hard to say at this point, but sure looks like it.

Such is the state of the professing Christian Church in 2015, weak, powerless, and effeminate. Elton John, the man who has worn more wigs and dresses than Marilyn Monroe, we expect this from. But Rick Warren claims to be a minister of the gospel of Jesus Christ. Here was his perfect OPPORTUNITY to lovingly and graciously tell not only Elton John, but all of Congress that without being born again they will die and go to a Devil’s Hell. But instead, he holds hands with a gay man, and jokes about kissing him. It was a joke, right?

“And unto the angel of the church of the Laodiceans write; These things saith the Amen, the faithful and true witness, the BEGINNING of the creation of God; I know thy works, that thou art neither cold nor hot: I would thou wert cold or hot. So then because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will spue thee out of my mouth.” Revelation 3:14-16 (KJV)

RICK WARREN IS THE PERFECT REPRESENTATIVE OF THE CHURCH OF LAODICEA IN THE LAST DAYS.

So to Elton John, if you are reading this, I lovingly invite you to get saved and believe the gospel that Jesus Christ was crucified, died, buried and rose again on the 3rd day to PURCHASE forgiveness for YOUR sins on the cross at Calvary.

And Rick Warren, if  you are reading this, I extend the very same invitation to you as well.

Last days indeed…

Evangelizing evangelicals – why Pope Francis loves to meet with charismatic movements

Pope Francis’ attendance for the second consecutive year at the Catholic charismatic movement’s Renewal with the Spirit convocation shows his attention to charismatic movements as means to foster ecumenical path.

Not by chance, Renewal with the Spirit styled the convocation to be heavily ecumenical.

During the meeting with Pope Francis’ in St. Peter’s Square, prayers were raised by Cardinals Kurt Koch and Leonardo Sandri, president of the Pontifical Council for the Promotion of Christian Unity and Prefect of the Congregation for the Eastern Churches; the Anglican Archbishop David Moxon, who represents the Archbishop of Canterbury toward the Holy See; and Msgr. Barnaba El Soryani, Coptic-Orthodox Bishop, as a delegate of Theodore II, Patriarch of Alexandria.

Also present were Msgr. Athanasisu Matti Shaba Matoka, Syriac-Catholic archbishop emeritus of Baghdad; His Eminence Polycarpus Eugenio Aydin, vicar of the Syriac-Orthodox diocese of the Netherlands; Rev. Louie Giglio, from the Passion City Church of Atlanta; Jonas Jonsoon, from the Lutheran Church of Sweden; and Giovanni Traettino, president of the Evangelical Church for Reconciliation in Italy.

This varied presence aligns with Pope Francis’ commitment to ecumenism. Beyond the recently opened dialogue with Orthodox and Anglican Churches, the Evangelical world is a big challenge for ecumenism, and perhaps one of the most important ones.

Dialogue with evangelical groups, especially Pentecostals, has been called “the fourth ecumenism” by several authors, including the Catholic sociologist Massimo Introvigne, an international authority on religious sects.

According to Introvigne, the fourth ecumenism – that of the new Protestant sects born at the beginning of the 20th century – is perhaps the most fruitful ground for ecumenical dialogue.

Attempts at such dialogue have limits: for example, a search for parties to represent the Pentecostals. Although they make up three-quarters of Protestants in some parts of the world and as much as one-third of all Christians, Pentecostals are very fragmented. The diversity within the group presents difficulties for dialogue.

This might be why Pope Francis has chosen to foster dialogue specifically with individuals and small groups.

On July 28, 2014, the Pope paid a private visit to the evangelical pastor Giovanni Traettino’s Church in Caserta. The two had met in 2006 and have maintained good relations ever since.
 
That meeting came at the end of a series of meetings Pope Francis had with evangelical leaders in 2014.

Televangelist Joel Osteel, pastor Tim Timmons and president of the Evangelical Westmont College Gayle D. Beebe visited Pope Francis June 4, 2014.

Pope Francis then met June 24 of that year with the televangelists James Robins and Kenneth Copeland, with the bishop Anthony Palmer of the Communion Evangelical Episcopal Churches, with the spouses John and Carol Arnott from Toronto and – among others – with Geoff Tunnicliffe and Brian C. Stiller, respectively general secretary and ambassador of the World Evangelical Alliance.

According to the prominent Italian vaticanista Sandro Magister, through these meetings Pope Francis is putting into action a broad effort to “win the favor of the worldwide leaders of those ‘evangelical’ and Pentecostal movements which especially in Latin America are the most fearsome competitor of the Catholic Church, from which they are snatching enormous masses of the faithful.”

Attending the Renewal with the Spirit convocation is part of this effort. Pope Francis himself acknowledged – during his trip back from World Youth Day in Rio de Janeiro – that he used to look at charismatic movements with suspicion, and that he later changed his mind, and now he believes that “this movement does much good for the Church overall.”

Renewal with the Spirit president Salvatore Martinez, an academic of music and musician, who has been committed to the movement since his youth, had the occasion to meet with Pope Francis at the very beginning of the pontificate, after the Mass the Pope celebrated in the Vatican parish Sant’Anna March 17, 2013, four days after his election.

After that, Martinez had a private meeting with Pope Francis in September 2013, and there the invitation to the 2014 annual convocation was forwarded directly to the Pope, who accepted, probably considering it as a part of his ecumenical commitment.

Speaking in front of the convocation June 1, 2014, the Pope voiced hope that both evangelical and Catholic charismatic groups, gathered in the International Catholic Charismatic Renewal Services, would share the same office as a sign of ecumenism. They did it.

Meeting with them Oct. 31, 2014, the Pope praised the decision, and stressed that “unity is not uniformity… it does not mean doing everything together, nor thinking the same way, nor losing identity.”

Pope Francis went further. Last May 23, he sent a video message to the participants of the Day of Dialogue and Prayer organized by the Diocese of Phoenix, which gathered Catholics and evangelical Pentecostal pastors. In the message, the Pope asked them to pray “together for the grace of unity,” that unity that “is flourishing among us, and begins with the only Baptism all of us received.”

All of these signals suggest that Pope Francis has indeed changed his mind and, starting from an initial skepticism, he later found in charismatic movements a privileged path to seek ecumenism.

There could be another pressing factor in the Pope’s enthusiasm for such meetings – a wave of conversions, particularly in Latin America, where it is estimated that100 million Catholics have converted to evangelical Christianity. Now, it appears that Pope Francis would like to evangelize the evangelicals.

His spiritual ecumenism, putting prayer at the center, and even making it a diplomatic tool, represents the most logical meeting point with the Protestant world.

Attending a large Catholic charismatic event could be the bridge the Pope needs to reach his final goal, to turn the evangelicals from rival to allies and push ecumenical efforts forward.

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/catholicnews/2015/07/evangelizing-evangelicals-why-pope-francis-loves-to-meet-with-charismatic-movements/

Former Hillsong Worship ‘Pastor’ Darlene Zschech Now Leading Followers To Rome

Darlene Zschech is a prominent voice in the contemporary praise movement

“Wherefore come out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing; and I will receive you,” 2 Corinthians 6:17 (KJV)

Darlene Zschech started out as a  “worship pastor” at Hills Christian Life Centre, Sydney, Australia, and has published many popular worship albums under the Hillsong Music label. She is also associated with Integrity Music and the Hosanna label. She and her husband, Mark, are now senior “pastors” of Hope Unlimited Church in New South Wales.

Last week, she performed on stage as a headliner at the Vatican’s Renewal of the Holy Spirit rally. On her Facebook page, Zschech breathlessly gushed “The prep has begun in Rome. I can feel the prayers. Honoured to be singing this week, with Andrea Bocelli, Don Moen (Praise & Worship Leader), Noa (Achinoam Nini) with Pope Francis and thousands of worshippers gathering in St. Peter’s Square at the Vatican. This is a celebration of unity and peace in the Renewal of the Holy Spirit. Amazing days for the Body of Christ.”

https://youtu.be/q50H2DMV8dM

As a former Catholic for 28 years, I can assure you that the Catholic Church is not part of the Body of Christ. When I went through 12 years of private Catholic school indoctrination, we never called ourselves “Christians”, we always referred to ourselves as Catholics. Now obviously I believe that Catholics can be saved, but I do not think it is possible for that to happen within the Catholic system. Bible doctrine and Catholic doctrine are indeed at odds with each other, I never met a priest or a nun who could tell me for sure that they were going to Heaven when they died. Because unlike the Bible, Catholic doctrine teaches that you cannot know for sure. That’s why they teach the false doctrines of Sacraments, Purgatory, Saint Worship, and pray to Mary, because they are trying to build up as many “good works” as they can to outweigh their bad on Judgment Day. And that is why the vast majority of Catholics will wind up in Hell because they were never saved in the first place.

“For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: Not of works, lest any man should boast.” Ephesians 2:8,9 (KJV)

In all the endless hours of sermonizing and talking put in by Pope Francis, can you show me a 5 minute presentation of Gospel on how to be saved? No, you can’t because he doesn’t talk about those things. So what, I wonder, did Darlene Zschech and the other Laodicean “evangelicals” have to discuss with the Catholics when they arrived starry-eyed in the City of Babylon to pay homage to the Pope? I think that’s a pretty good question. From the looks of things, they just performed Christian rock music, got everyone all hyped up on emotion, and had you fall down and pray to their “generic Jesus” who judges nothing, loves all, and supports same-sex marriage.

Darlene Zschech has a lot in common with another famous Laodicean imposter:

https://youtu.be/igNCUw1adIw

Christian, in these last days as we watch denomination after denomination falling under the spell of Mother Rome, you would do well to guard your walk with the Lord and have nothing to do with these Laodicean, prosperity preaching imposters. If you ever get the chance to have an audience with Pope Francis, why don’t you tell him how to get saved? Because Darlene Zschech certainly didn’t tell him that when she had her chance.

http://www.nowtheendbegins.com/blog/?p=33942

Pope Francis Taps Rick Warren To Sell Vatican Socialist Agenda To American Christians

Rick Warren, senior pastor of Saddleback Church, has announced he will be speaking in Philadelphia later this month at the World Meeting of Families event to commence Pope Francis’ highly anticipated visit to the United States.
“Beware of false prophets, which come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ravening wolves.” Matthew 7:15 (KJV)

    EDITOR’S NOTE: False Prophet and soon to be global king Pope Francis knows how to build a team, I’ll give him that. He chose Laodicean pastor and Chrislam founder Rick Warren to close his little traveling road show later this month at the World Meeting of Families. In that speech, look for Warren to speak to “all the common ground we have with Catholics“, and how “Pope Francis is our pope“, and all that other nonsense that paid shills get paid to say. Hate to break it to you, Rick, but the Vatican does not believe or teach the Bible. They worship Mary, they pray to idols, they think priests can forgive sins, and they falsely teach that a wafer of bread becomes the body of Jesus. But don’t let that stop you from soaking up the spotlight and fleecing the flock.

Rick Warren announced his plans to attend the event during the Sunday morning worship service at the Lake Forest, CA church. “Next month, Pope Francis is coming to America for a world gathering on families,” he told the congregation. “I’m not a Catholic, and we have many differences with Catholics. But they love the Lord and we have much in common with that – we believe in the Bible, and the Trinity, and in Jesus and the resurrection.”

“There are probably going to be a million people in Philadelphia at this final event with Pope Francis, and he’s asked me to be the final speaker,” the Purpose Driven Life author continued amid cheering and applause.

According to its website, the World Meeting of Families is a “week-long international event of prayer, catechesis, and celebration that draws participants from around the globe.” The 8th annual event, which organizers say will be attended by up to two million people, seeks to “strengthen the bonds between families and to witness the crucial importance of marriage and the family to all society.”
Rick Warren calls apostate Roman Catholic Pope Francis “our pope”

    GRAPHIC WARNING: If you are a Bible believer, listening to Rick Warren extolling the praises of Roman Catholic King Francis will make you nauseous. But if you ever wondered what a paid liar looks and sounds like, then please watch this video.

https://youtu.be/igNCUw1adIw

While acknowledging there are differences between the two groups, Pastor Rick Warren has in the past called on non-Catholic Christians to join with Pope Francis and the Catholic Church in pursuit of common goals, such as the sanctity of life and the sanctity of marriage. In November, the pastor joined the leader of the Roman Catholic Church and 30 other global religious leaders for an interfaith Vatican conference on marriage and family, where he spoke on the “Biblical Meaning of Marriage.” “It’s great to be with leaders from different streams of Christianity from all over the world,” Warren said at the time. “Although we have some differences, we all love Jesus Christ and we all want marriage and families to be healthy and strong.”

“Wherefore come out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing; and I will receive you,” 2 Corinthians 6:17 (KJV)

http://www.nowtheendbegins.com/blog/?p=35402

Rick Warren, T.D. Jakes, Joel Osteen Express Excitement Over ‘Pope Francis’ Visit

As the Roman Catholic head Jorge Bergoglio, who is known as “Pope Francis,” traveled to the United States this past week for a six-day visit, megachurch leaders Rick Warren, T.D. Jakes and Joel Osteen expressed their excitement and support for the papal pomp and circumstance.

On Wednesday, T.D. Jakes of The Potter’s House posted a photo on social media of himself and his wife at the White House, outlining that he had been invited by Barack Obama to be among the VIP’s welcoming Francis to the nation’s capital.

“A special thanks to President Obama for his VIP invitation to attend such a historical event,” he wrote. “As the world watches this international figure move through our country, let’s pray that the pope’s journey is safe!”

Jakes acknowledged that he has theological differences with the pontiff, but said that he saw the matter as one of loving his neighbor.

“At a time when so little is said positive about faith in our country, let’s pray for his safe passage regardless of our differences of views about faith. It is our love that’s on trial here and our understanding of the question, ‘Who is my neighbor?'” he wrote. “By the way, my wife First Lady Serita Jakes and I, tried to represent our faith, church and country with dignity and respect!”

EEW Magazine notes that Jakes’ comments are not his first expressing ecumenism with the Roman Catholic religion.

“There are many outreaches that we have common ground about,” he told News One in 2013. “I think one of the great mistakes in how we rationalize things in this country currently is that we have a tendency to perpetuate the ideology that we should focus on our differences, rather than to focus on our commonalities.”

“When I think of the Roman Catholic Church and their belief in Jesus’ death, burial and resurrection, the fact that they serve the poor, the fact that they’re interested in education, there are many things that we can gather around and agree upon,” Jakes added.

On Wednesday, the Texas-based author and speaker also uploaded a photo of himself with Saddleback Church leader and “Purpose Driven Life” author Rick Warren as they waited together at the White House for the pontiff’s arrival.

“Sharing a fascinating moment in history with my brother @pastorrickwarren! So good to see you,” he wrote. “A very diverse crowd of VIP’s produced a very provocative conversation about our times! Left me with so many deep thoughts on which I can reflect!”

As previously reported, Warren spoke at the Vatican last November during an interfaith conference on the “Complementarity of Man and Woman.” During his visit, he was recorded by the Catholic News Service as he urged Christians and Catholics to work together.

“Sometimes protestants think that Catholics worship Mary like she’s another god, but that’s not exactly Catholic doctrine,” Warren contended. “People say, ‘What are the saints all about? Why are you praying to the saints?’ And when you understand what they mean by what they’re saying, there’s a whole lot more commonality [that we have with Roman Catholics].”

“There’s still real differences—no doubt about that,” he stated. “But the most important thing is, if you love Jesus, we’re on the same team.”

Joel Osteen, leader of Lakewood Church in Houston, Texas, likewise expressed support for the Roman Catholic pontiff this past week in speaking with reporters.

“I like the pope. I like that he’s making the Catholic Church more open to bring people in and not exclude them,” Osteen told the Christian Post. “He’s a man of the people. I like what he stands for: humility, reaching out to others and he’s not so formal that people can’t relate to him.”

But some have expressed concern over the affirmation that evangelicals are giving to the Roman Catholic religion. Jordan Standridge, pastoral associate at Immanuel Bible Church in Springfield, Virginia, released an article this week entitled “Why Evangelicals and Catholics Cannot Be Together.” He pointed to problems stemming from the 1995 “Evangelicals and Catholics Together” document.

“Well-known evangelical pastors .. joined themselves with Catholic priests and philosophers in an ecumenical fashion in order to promote the agreements over the disagreements that have plagued Protestants and Catholics for centuries,” Standridge wrote.

Now, he said, “The vast majority of Christians in America do not evangelize Catholics. Someone like me who has shed many tears over the deception of the Roman Catholic Church is seen as hateful.”

“I totally understand the desire to believe people are saved,” Standridge continued. “I also desperately want Roman Catholics to go to heaven, but we can’t let our desire for people to be saved or our desire to please men lead us to cheer them on as they run towards Hell. We must love them.”

http://christiannews.net/2015/09/27/rick-warren-t-d-jakes-joel-osteen-express-excitement-over-pope-francis-visit/

Charismatic ‘Azusa Now’ Revival Featured Christian Psychics And Catholic Church Sponsorship
MajorChange is engaged in mobilizing Catholics who recognize the importance of the Charismatic outpouring in the 20th century and want to participate in an ecumenical 15 hour prayer and fasting Azusa Now event in the Los Angeles area.

Yes, the Vatican under Pope Francis is working diligently these days to ‘reconcile’ backslidden Christians (all non-Catholics) to Mother Rome.

“And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? for ye are the temple of the living God; as God hath said, I will dwell in them, and walk in them; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. Wherefore come out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing; and I will receive you, And will be a Father unto you, and ye shall be my sons and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty.” 2 Corinthians 6:16-18 (KJV)

This past weekend, Charismatics and Catholics filled a sports stadium in Los Angeles in order to ‘have unity’ with each other. This is what the Catholic website majorchange.org had to say about the event:

    MajorChange is engaged in mobilizing Catholics who recognize the importance of the Charismatic outpouring in the 20th century and want to participate in an ecumenical 15 hour prayer and fasting Azusa Now event in the Los Angeles area. We are coordinating efforts between TheCall, the Archdiocese of Los Angeles and various Catholic apostolates to inform, invite and include Catholic participants in this epic prayer meeting. Prayers of mutual blessings and reconciliation will resound throughout the day. source

Yes, the Vatican under Pope Francis is working diligently these days to ‘reconcile’ backslidden Christians (all non-Catholics) to Mother Rome. Sensing that the Charismatics are the weakest link in within Christianity, and rightly so, they have spent years wooing leaders like Kenneth Copeland, Jesse Duplantis and others with their massive megachurch followings. Remember this gem from a few years ago?

https://vimeo.com/88182479

The Catholic Church system has no interest in joining forces with anyone, they are buying not selling. While I believe that many Christians who attended the Azusa Now event sincerely want peace among the brethren, but guess what? The Roman Catholic Church is not Christian, they never were. The Vatican has been the greatest persecutors of Christians in world history. Rome killed Christians in the catacombs for 3 centuries before instituting a hostile takeover in 325 AD with the creation of the Roman Catholic Church. Then, in what used to be taught in schools as the Dark Ages, the Roman Catholic Church killed Christians for a thousand years. If that was not enough, the Roman Catholic Church slaughtered millions of Christians during the three centuries of the Spanish Inquisition.
Watch as ‘words of knowledge’ are ‘imparted’ by Christian psychics in mass deception at Azusa Now:

Charismatics with their ‘words of knowledge’ are really more like psychics in trying to foretell the future. Are we to believe that the event organizers received names of people and places including street names from the Holy Spirit? Where do you find that in the Bible? This is nothing more than the same type of con game people like Benny Hinn use at their revivals to deceive millions. This is what passes as ‘revival’ these days, and is a perfect fulfillment of the Laodicean church in the last days. If you have the stomach to watch this all the way through you will see it is much more like a game show than what the Bible would call a revival.

https://youtu.be/kzdjsWjFRU0

"Preach the word; be instant in season, out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort with all longsuffering and doctrine. For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears; And they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned unto fables.” 2 Timothy 4:2-4 (KJV)

None of what happened at Azusa Now has anything to do with Bible doctrine or Bible teachings. It is nothing more than ‘Christian’ smoke and mirrors designed to get people hyped up on feelings instead of sound Bible teaching. Azua Now is a great illustration of end times false revival and false unity. Real revival, like what we had under great preachers like DL Moody and Billy Sunday, does not happen today because Christians really don’t want Bible teachings.

Walk away.

http://www.nowtheendbegins.com/charismatic-azusa-now-revival-featured-christian-psychics-and-roman-catholic-church-sponsorship/

Lou Engle of The Call Prostrates Himself, Kisses Foot of Catholic Leader as Act of ‘Reconciliation’

Lou Engle of The Call is again raising concerns after a Roman Catholic leader prostrated at his feet on Saturday in declaring that he wanted to “kiss his feet” in an act of reconciliation between Christians and Catholics, and Engle returned the act by likewise kissing the man’s shoe.

The gesture took place during “Azusa Now,” an event hosted by The Call, which was attended by over 100,000 people at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum.

“Believing that decades of globe-spanning prayer have saturated the heavens, we will boldly ask God for the rain of revival,” a description of the event states. “We will consecrate an entire day—15 hours—for the purpose of unity, miracles, healing, and the proclamation of the gospel.”

Engle had specifically invited Roman Catholics to attend the event.

“We just want to welcome our Catholic brothers and sisters from the Archdiocese of Los Angeles to gather together to pray,” he said in a promotional video. “Come join your brothers and sisters at the Memorial Coliseum believing for a move of unity and an outpouring of the Holy Spirit.”

One segment of the event featured Matteo Calisi, a Roman Catholic leader who had been appointed by “Pope Benedict” to serve on the Pontifical Council for the Laity, and had also served as president of the Catholic Fraternity of Charismatic Covenant Communities and Fellowships. Calisi founded United in Christ, an organization that strives for ecumenism between Christians and Catholics.

During the segment at Azusa Now, Calisi told the audience that division between Christians and Catholics is a “diabolical sin,” and that Jesus “doesn’t care” that Christians and Catholics disagree on biblical doctrine. I think he cares
Mal 3:6 For I am the LORD, I change not; therefore ye sons of Jacob are not consumed.

“He doesn’t care about our differences,” he said through a translator. “We’re not going to be known by our differences … but for the love we have for one another.”

“We Catholics … we want to ask you Protestants for your forgiveness for not respecting the love of Jesus,” Calisi said. “Please give us your forgiveness and your mercy.”

He stated that he wanted to wash Engle’s feet on stage as a gesture of reconciliation, but since it was not possible, he desired to instead kiss his feet.

“We wanted to, Lou, kiss your feet as Catholics,” Calisi said, to which Engle nodded. “And just honor you with this gesture right now.”

Calisi then laid prostrate Engle’s feet, clutching one foot with his hands. Engle placed both hands upon Calisi’s back as he did so.

When Calisi stood, Engle moments later fell to the ground prostrate at Calisi’s feet and kissed one shoe, as others gathered around to lay hands on them. Calisi then spoke against what he called a “spirit of division” between Christians and Catholics.

While some characterized the gesture as a “tender moment,” others expressed deep concern.

“What’s up with Lou Engle letting the representative of the Catholic Church kiss his feet because it would logistically be impossible to wash his feet?” wrote one man from Brazil. “I seem to remember John falling at the feet of an angel … and the angel freaked out! He yanked John up onto his feet and admonished him for doing so. Worship God!!! was the charge set forth by this angelic being who understands the Kingdom of Heaven!”

“This kind of stuff must stop!!! I don’t care where it happens, the ‘holy environment’ it happens in, to whom the ‘honor’ is bestowed or the intentions behind it I call malarky!” he said.
“Besides all of the bad teaching etc., shame on Lou for letting anyone bow prostrate to him and kiss his feet,” another said. “What a big difference from true, biblical apostles like Paul who tore his garments and corrected such an error. The rampant, false teachings and practices in pockets of the American ‘church,’ makes me feel literally sick to my gut.”

The incident begins at approximately 6 hours 55 minutes into the video.

https://youtu.be/AqBazUpVNDs

http://christiannews.net/2016/04/10/lou-engle-of-the-call-prostrates-himself-kisses-foot-of-catholic-leader-as-act-of-reconciliation/

Azusa Street and the Birth of Pentecostalism

The following is excerpted from THE PENTECOSTAL-CHARISMATIC MOVEMENTS: THE HISTORY AND THE ERROR. ISBN 1-58318-099-0. The 5th edition of this book, November 2014, is significantly enlarged and revised throughout. The Pentecostal movement, with its offshoot the Charismatic movement, is one of the major building blocks of the end-time, one-world “church.” The author was led to Christ by a Pentecostal in 1973 and has researched the movement ever since. He has built a large library on the subject, interviewed influential Pentecostals and charismatics, attended conferences with media credentials, and visited prominent churches in many parts of the world. The book deals with the history of Pentecostalism beginning at the turn of the 20th century, the Latter Rain Covenant, major Pentecostal healing evangelists, the Sharon Schools and the New Order of the Latter Rain, Manifest Sons of God, the Charismatic movement, the Word-Faith movement, the Roman Catholic Charismatic Renewal, the Pentecostal prophets, the Third Wave, recent Pentecostal “revivals” such as Pensacola and Lakeland, and prominent Pentecostal and charismatic scandals. The book deals extensively with the theological errors of the Pentecostal-charismatic movements (exalting experience over Scripture, emphasis on the miraculous, the continuation of Messianic and apostolic miracles and sign gifts, the baptism of the Holy Spirit, the baptism of fire, tongues speaking, physical healing guaranteed in the atonement, spirit slaying, spirit drunkenness, visions of Jesus, journeys to heaven, women preachers, and ecumenism. The final section of the book answers the question: “Why are people deluded by Pentecostal-Charismatic error?” David and Tami Lee, former Pentecostals, said: “Very well done! We pray God will use it to open the eyes of many and to help keep many of His children out of such deception.” A former charismatic said, “The book is excellent and I have no doubt whatever that the Lord is going to use it in a mighty way. Amen!!” 487 pages. Available in print and eBook editions from www.wayoflife.org,
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By the late nineteenth century, the stage was set for Pentecostalism to be birthed.

The holiness movement had produced a frenzy of spiritual excitement and a lusting after “second blessings” and “second baptisms.” Men such as John Dowie and Frank Sandford had set the stage with their emphasis on divine healing, the expectation of an end-time miracle revival and the re-establishment of apostolic sign gifts, including tongues speaking, and a restoration of the offices of apostle and prophet.

Charles Parham

By any reckoning, Charles Parham (1873-1929) is a key figure in the birth of Pentecostalism. He was ordained as a Methodist, but “left the organization after a falling out with his ecclesiastical superiors” (Larry Martin, The Topeka Outpouring of 1901, p. 14).

In a restless search for religious instruction he visited the ministries of a number of strange holiness, faith-healing, and Latter Rain teachers, picking up various heresies along the way, which he eventually merged together into his Pentecostal theology.

Prior to the turn of the century, Parham observed the meetings of Benjamin Irwin, founder of the Fire-Baptized Holiness Church, and was deeply influenced by Irwin’s “third blessing” doctrine (the blessing of salvation, the blessing of power, and the blessing of sinless perfection). As we have seen, Irwin taught that it was necessary for the Christian to seek the “baptism of fire” for power and perfection. Pentecostal historian Vinson Synan describes this connection:

“THE FIRE-BAPTIZED HOLINESS CHURCH SERVED AS AN IMPORTANT LINK IN THE CHAIN THAT LATER PRODUCED THE MODERN PENTECOSTAL MOVEMENT. By teaching that the baptism of the Holy Ghost was an experience separate from and subsequent to sanctification, it laid the basic doctrinal premise of the later movement. It is probable that Charles F. Parham, the man who initiated the Pentecostal revival in Topeka, Kansas, in 1901, received from Irwin the basic idea of a separate baptism of the Holy Ghost following sanctification. Indeed, for a time in 1899, Parham promoted the ‘baptism of fire’ in his Apostolic Faith magazine” (Synan, The Holiness-Pentecostal Tradition, p. 59).

Parham adopted the heresy of annihilation from his Quaker grandfather-in-law, David Baker, denying the eternal punishment of the wicked and believing, rather, that the unsaved would be annihilated in hell.

In 1898, Parham came under the influence of the aforementioned Frank Sandford, and in 1900 Parham traveled to Chicago to study the ministry of John Dowie and to examine Zion City.

Like Sandford and Dowie, Charles Parham taught that physical healing is the Christian’s birthright and railed against the use of medicine and doctors. He claimed that it was always God’s will to heal sicknesses. In the September 13, 1899, issue of his Apostolic Faith magazine, Parham replied to the question of whether the Bible forbids the use of medicine by exclaiming, “We say yes, most emphatically YES” (emphasis his).

An issue of Christian History magazine (Issue 58, Vol. XVII, No. 2, 1998) contains a photo of Parham and seven of his followers standing on the steps of the Carthage, Missouri, courthouse. The year was 1906, and Parham is holding a flagpole with banners reading “Apostolic Unity.” The others are holding banners proclaiming “Truth, Faith, Life, Victory, HEALTH.” They were making a statement of their doctrinal faith that health is a guaranteed part of the Christian life.

Parham was the first Pentecostal preacher to pray over handkerchiefs and mail them to those who desired his ministrations (James Goff Jr., Fields White Unto Harvest, p. 104).

In spite of his teaching that it was always God’s will to heal and that medicine and doctors must be shunned, one of Parham’s sons died at age one of a sickness that was not healed. He died, in fact, two months after the outbreak of “tongues” at Parham’s Bethel Bible School in Topeka. Another son died at age 37. Most of those who attended Parham’s meetings were not healed. In October 1904, a nine-year-old girl named Nettie Smith died. Her father was an avid follower of Parham and refused medical treatment for his daughter. The little girl’s death turned local public opinion against Parham because her sickness was treatable and the community considered her death unnecessary.

Parham himself suffered various sicknesses throughout his life and at times was too sick to preach or travel. For example, he spent the entire winter of 1904-05 sick and bedridden (James Goff Jr., Fields White Unto Harvest, p. 94), in spite of his own doctrine that healing is guaranteed in Christ’s atonement.

In the March 22, 1899, issue of Apostolic Faith magazine Parham listed his beliefs as follows: “salvation by faith; healing by faith, laying on of hands, and prayer; sanctification by faith; coming (pre-millennium) of Christ; the baptism of Holy Ghost and Fire, which seals the Bride and bestows the gifts.”

Thus we see the combination of the various heresies he had collected in his travels.

Parham also believed in the annihilation of the unsaved. He taught that there were two separate creations, and that Adam and Eve were of a different race than people who allegedly lived outside of the Garden of Eden. The first race of men did not have souls, he claimed, and this race of people without souls was destroyed in the flood. Parham believed that only those who received the latter day Spirit baptism and spoke in tongues would make up the bride of Christ and would be “sealed for the Marriage Supper of the Lamb” and that these would have a special place of authority at Christ’s return. He believed in a partial rapture composed of tongues speakers.

From John Dowie, Parham adopted the heresy that Anglo-Saxons are Israelites.

He associated often with the Ku Klux Klan and believed that interracial marriages caused the flood of Noah (Martin, The Topeka Outpouring of 1901, p. 19). Parham did not believe that black people could be sealed as part of the bride of Christ.

After his visits with Dowie and Sandford, Parham established the BETHEL BIBLE SCHOOL IN TOPEKA, KANSAS. It was patterned after Sandford’s ministry and was opened in October 1900 in a thirty-room building called “Stone’s Folly.” It was so named because the owner, whose name was Stone, was unable to complete the building before going bankrupt.

Parham was convinced that Christ’s return would be preceded by a Latter Rain outpouring of signs and wonders, and he believed that tongues is the evidence of the baptism of the Holy Spirit. He further believed that the tongues are real earthly languages that would enable missionaries to preach the gospel to the ends of the earth without having to learn foreign languages. According to Parham’s teaching, those who received the Latter Rain baptism would form the bride of Christ and would rule with Him at His coming.

Parham urged his students to seek this experience, and in this context he laid hands on one of his Bible school students, AGNES OZMAN, on January 1, 1901, and she allegedly began to speak in Chinese and later in Bohemian. She spoke while in a trance (Topeka State Journal, Jan. 9, 1901).

Subsequently, Parham and others at the small Bible school also allegedly began to speak in tongues. They even claimed that cloven tongues of fire appeared over the heads of the tongues speakers.

Parham said that language professors and other linguistically educated people confirmed that the tongues the students were speaking were languages, but this has never been confirmed. Newspaper reporters of the day described the phenomenon merely as “gibberish.”

The only actual record we have of one of the “tongues” spoken by Parham’s students was written by a reporter of the Topeka State Journal. I found a copy of this during a visit to the Kansas State Historical Society.

“Mr. Parham called Miss Lilian Thistlethrate [Thistlethwaite] into the room and asked her if she could talk some. She at first answered that the Lord had not inspired her to say anything but soon began to utter strange words which sounded like this: ‘Euossa, Euossa, use rela sema calah mala kanah leulla ssage nalan. Ligle logle lazie logle. Ene mine mo, sah rah el me sah rah me.’ These sentences were translated as meaning, ‘Jesus is mighty to save,’ ‘Jesus is ready to hear,’ ‘and ‘God is love’” (“Hindoo and Zulu Both Are Represented at Bethel School,” Topeka State Journal, Jan. 9, 1901).

Ligle logle lazie logle!!!!! Ene mine mo!!!!! This is exactly the type of “tongues” I have heard dozens of times at Pentecostal and charismatic meetings in various parts of the world, but it is childish nonsense.

In 1914, Charles Shumway diligently sought evidence to prove that early Pentecostal tongues were real languages, but he failed to find even one person to corroborate the claims that had been made (James Goff, Jr., Fields White Unto Harvest, Fayetteville: University of Arkansas Press, 1988, p. 76).

“In his 1919 Ph.D. dissertation, Shumway censured the local Houston Chronicle for credulous reporting and stated that ‘letters are on hand from several men who were government interpreters in or near Houston at the time [when Parham conducted a Bible school there], and they are unanimous in denying all knowledge of the alleged facts’” (Goff, p. 98).

After examining the “tongues” spoken at the Azusa Street mission led by William Seymour, Holiness leader W.B. Godbey concluded that they were not languages (G.F. Taylor, The Spirit and the Bride, Falcon, NC: by the author, 1907, p. 52).

The Rocky Mountain Pillar of Fire (a holiness publication) for September 12 and November 14, 1906 contained the following accounts:

“This Hindu can talk in six different languages and says he has never heard any of them at the ‘Tongue meeting.’ One of the languages he can talk is Arabian and some of the people at those meetings claim to talk that language, but he said it sounded like a lot of turkey gobblers” (Sept. 12, 1906).

“A gentleman, who has for years been at the head of a missionary work in India, has just been to Los Angeles with the view of securing some missionaries for his field who profess to have the gift of tongues. He came back stating he could find no one who could really speak in any of the languages of India with which he is acquainted” (Nov. 14, 1906).

Many linguists who have studied the “tongues” of Pentecostals and Charismatics have come to the same conclusion. William J. Samarin, professor of linguistics at the University of Toronto, summarized his research as follows:

“Over a period of five years I have taken part in meetings in Italy, Holland, Jamaica, Canada, and the United States. I have observed old-fashioned Pentecostals and neo-Pentecostals; I have been in small meetings at private homes as well as in mammoth public meetings; I have seen such different cultural settings as are found among the Puerto Ricans of the Bronx, the snake handlers of the Appalachians ... Russian Molakans in Los Angeles. ... It is extremely doubtful that the alleged cases of xenoglossia [languages] among charismatics are real. Any time one attempts to verify them he finds that the stories have been greatly distorted or that the ‘witnesses’ turn out to be incompetent or unreliable from a linguistic point of view. ... GLOSSOLALIA IS INDEED LIKE LANGUAGE IN SOME WAYS, BUT THIS IS ONLY BECAUSE THE SPEAKER (UNCONSCIOUSLY) WANTS IT TO BE LIKE LANGUAGE. YET IN SPITE OF SUPERFICIAL SIMILARITIES, GLOSSOLALIA IS FUNDAMENTALLY NOT LANGUAGE” (Samarin, Tongues of Men and Angels, 1972, pp. xii, 112, 113, 227).

The Gospel Message, published in Kansas City, in October 1906, contained the following testimony:

“We were acquainted with Mr. Chas. Parham many years ago, and when he visited Kansas City with his workers after he had made his statements regarding the wonderful blessing that had come to his school in Topeka, we invited him to visit us with his followers and tell us about this experience. They accordingly came, and before the meeting we told him that there were those present that could speak Spanish, German, Arabic, and Swedish, and that if any of his people could speak in other tongues, we would be glad to hear them in one or more of these: they had, however, no liberty that night but told something of their past experience, and their strange writings which had been reported as the work of the Holy Spirit. When, however, we asked Mr. Parham pointedly and publicly if he knew certainly whether these writings were of the Holy Spirit, or just scribblings, he candidly said he did not know, but that he was having them, or would have them, investigated, but a report of such investigation has never reached us” (reprinted from Larry Martin, Skeptics and Scoffers, pp. 47-48).

This reminds us that every time someone attempts to test Pentecostal tongues or healings or other “signs and wonders” objectively, the phenomena prove to be either completely bogus or strangely illusive. The most amazing signs and wonders always occur some place far away or long ago and are otherwise not verifiable.

I visited the Kansas State Research Library in Topeka in 2002 and got a photo of the building where Parham had his Bible School. (It was destroyed by a fire in December 1901). I also found some old newspaper articles and other documents about Parham’s school, which I cite in the following part of this report.

Two articles give the testimony of S.J. Riggins, a student who left the school, claiming that the other students were merely speaking “gibberish.”

“‘I believe the whole of them are crazy,’ said Mr. Riggins to a Capital reporter. ‘I never saw anything like it. They were racing about the room talking and gesticulating and using this strange and senseless language which they claim is the word from the Most High. ... I do not believe their senseless jargon means anything. I am trying to be an earnest Christian. ... When I left the congregation today, I told why I did so, with all the earnestness at my command.’ ... Mr. Riggins said that some of Miss Auswin’s [Ozman’s] writing, which she claimed to be inspired, was submitted to a Chinaman here in Topeka with the honest intention of seeing if he could translate it. The Celestial threw up his hand and said: ‘Me no understand. Takee to Jap.’ Mr. Riggins told this story without a suspicion of levity and if he put any humor in it at the last it was done unconsciously, for he seemed terribly in earnest” (Topeka Daily Capital, Jan. 6, 1901).

“‘They began to claim the gift of tongues and the gift of discernment, and each talked a different kind of gibberish, claiming to be inspired by God, and that they talked one of the foreign languages. ... I was not under the influence, and could see that the students of the school had been led to this extreme through their fanaticism, and finally decided to leave the school. Accordingly last Saturday morning I went away, but before going, I called the inmates of the building together and explained to them my reasons for leaving. I told them they were under the influence of the evil one, and that the best thing they could do would be to leave the school, as I was doing. They all laughed at me, and I left the school, and do not intend to return.’...

“About fifteen members of the colony have now been given the gift of tongues and when a State Journal reporter called at the school this morning each of the favored ones were called up and spoke a few sentences in strange and unnatural way outlandish words which they neither know the meaning of nor the language to which they belonged. ... It is a peculiar sight to see a whole room full of the men and women of the school sitting around, occasionally breaking out with brief outbursts of talk in one of the many languages which they claim to speak, and writing the quaint and indistinguishable hieroglyphics which they believe to be the characters for words in the Syrian, Chinese, Japanese, Arabic and other languages” (Topeka State Journal, Jan. 7, 1901).

We are convinced that Riggins was correct in his assessment that Parham and his students were speaking gibberish and practicing fanaticism under the influence of the evil one.

Consider this description by Parham of what his students were doing the day after Ozman began her tongues speaking career:

“The next day I went down town and upon my return found ALL THE STUDENTS SITTING ON THE FLOOR TALKING IN UNKNOWN TONGUES, NO TWO TALKING THE SAME LANGUAGE, AND NO ONE UNDERSTANDING HIS OR HER NEIGHBOR'S SPEECH” (Topeka Mail and Breeze, Feb. 22, 1901).

This is strictly contrary to the Bible’s instruction about the use of tongues. The Bethel Bible School “tongues” in January 1901 was confusion, which the Bible says is not of God (1 Cor. 14:33). The Bible says that tongues are not to be used unless they are interpreted and even then, the gift is to be exercised by only one speaker at a time (1 Cor. 14:23-28). Further, women are not to speak (1 Cor. 14:34).

Parham claimed that Ozman was unable to speak in English for three days after her initial tongues experience. Her own testimony was that “many times we could only talk in other tongues” (Martin, The Topeka Outpouring of 1901, p. 88).

To the contrary, the Bible says a genuine prophet or tongues speaker is in control of himself. “And the spirits of the prophets are subject to the prophets” (1 Cor. 14:32).

Ozman’s uncontrollable “tongues” were not of God.

The lack of control over the “tongues” was also described by Lillian Thistlethwaite, another student at Parham’s Bible school.

“My tongue began to get thick and great floods of laughter came into my heart. I could no longer think words of praise, for my mind was sealed, but my mouth was filled with a rush of words I didn’t understand. I tried not to laugh for I feared to grieve the Spirit. I tried to praise Him in English but could not, so I just let the praise come as it would in the new language...” (Martin, The Topeka Outpouring, p. 61).

This is contrary to what we see in the book of Acts and the Epistles.

As we have seen in the previously quoted newspaper accounts, Parham’s students not only claimed to speak in tongues but also to write in them. They claimed these writings were foreign languages, such as Chinese, but when they were examined by knowledgeable people, they were found to be mere indecipherable scratchings (Goff, p. 76).

The Topeka Daily Capital printed an example of Ozman’s “inspired writings,” and it can still be seen in the Kansas State Research Library. It was nothing more than childish scratchings. The people were deluded, plain and simple. The press called the writings “quaint and indistinguishable hieroglyphics” (Goff, p. 80).

A reporter for the Topeka State Journal observed Agnes Ozman when she was allegedly writing by inspiration:

“Miss Ozman sat at a desk writing some letters which were to be posted that morning. Shortly after finishing the letters she sat down to write again and immediately announced that her hands utterly refused to write the characters of the English language. And with her hands unconsciously formed the characters of some language, but she was not able to state which. She did not interpret the marks. IN WRITING THE CHARACTERS, THE MUSCLES OF MISS OZMAN’S HANDS SEEM TO CONTRACT AND SHE MADE THE MARKS IN A SPASMODIC FASHION, HER HAND RATHER JERKING BACK AND FORTH to make the scrawls” (“Hindoo and Zulu Both Are Represented at Bethel School,” Topeka State Journal, Jan. 9, 1901).

This is the same phenomenon that occurs with New Age automatic writing, which is clearly demonic. There is not a hint of such a thing in the New Testament Scriptures.

The early Pentecostals thought they would be able to preach in foreign languages through the gift of tongues. Parham is quoted as follows in a newspaper article from that day:

“It is a wonderful work, coming as it does on the eve of the twentieth century. We have for long believed that the power of the Lord would be manifested in our midst, and that power would be given us to speak other languages, and that the time will come when we will be sent to go into all the nations and preach the gospel, and that THE LORD WILL GIVE US THE POWER OF SPEECH TO TALK TO THE PEOPLE OF THE VARIOUS NATIONS WITHOUT HAVING TO STUDY THEM IN SCHOOLS” (Topeka State Journal, Jan. 7, 1901).

“We have received several messages to go into all the world and preach the gospel, and we must obey the command. A PART OF OUR LABOR WILL BE TO TEACH THE CHURCHES THE USELESSNESS OF SPENDING YEARS OF TIME PREPARING MISSIONARIES FOR WORK IN FOREIGN LANDS WHEN ALL THEY HAVE TO DO IS TO ASK GOD for power and then have faith that the power will come” (Parham, quoted in Kansas City Times, Jan. 27, 1901).

As it turned out, they were deceived in this as they were in everything else.

Alfred Garr and his wife went to India expecting to speak in supernatural languages, but they quickly learned that it was a delusion. May Law and Rosa Pittman went to Japan expecting to preach in Japanese but when they found that no one could understand their “tongues” they moved on to Hong Kong, thinking that they must have the gift of Chinese instead, but they were no more successful there. T.J. McIntosh was the first Pentecostal missionary to Macau, and though he fully expected to speak fluent Chinese his hopes were soon dashed.

“Numerous other Pentecostal missionaries went abroad believing they had the miraculous ability to speak in the languages of those to whom they were sent. These Pentecostal claims were well known at the time. S.C. Todd of the Bible Missionary Society investigated eighteen Pentecostals who went to Japan, China, and India ‘expecting to preach to the natives in those countries in their own tongue,’ and found that by their own admission ‘in no single instance have [they] been able to do so.’ AS THESE AND OTHER MISSIONARIES RETURNED IN DISAPPOINTMENT AND FAILURE, PENTECOSTALS WERE COMPELLED TO RETHINK THEIR ORIGINAL VIEW OF SPEAKING IN TONGUES” (Robert Mapes Anderson, Vision of the Disinherited: The Making of American Pentecostalism).

Parham’s Bible school in Kansas closed down within months, and he moved to Texas to establish churches. He also started a new Bible school in Houston.

The new movement was called THE APOSTOLIC FAITH, and it grew quickly and split into many factions. The Dictionary of Pentecostal and Charismatic Movements notes that “Parham’s contributions to Pentecostalism included the particularly acute level of ‘latter rain’ millenarianism.” Parham’s first book was titled Kol Kare Bomidbar, which is Hebrew for “A Voice Crying in the Wilderness.”

He considered himself a latter days John the Baptist, announcing a new dispensation of the Spirit. He gave himself the title “Projector of the Apostolic Faith.”

When one of Parham’s co-evangelists, Lilian Thistlethwaite, wrote an account of the Topeka, Kansas, “revival,” she entitled it “The Wonderful History of the Latter Rain.”

In the summer of 1907, Parham was arrested in San Antonio, Texas, on a charge of sodomy. The charge was dropped by the authorities without comment and Parham refused to explain.

“Marred by scandal, he spent the final two decades of his life alienated from the bulk of the movement he had begun. ... At the time of Parham’s death in 1929, he was almost unknown among the developing second generation of the Pentecostal denominations. Yet to no one individual did the movement owe a greater debt” (The Pentecostal and Charismatic Movements).

Because of the charge of sodomy, W.F. Carothers and Howard Goss disfellowshipped Parham from the Apostolic Faith organization he had founded (Larry Martin, The Life and Ministry of William J. Seymour, p. 271).

When Parham visited Zion City after this and tried to raise a following there, Wilbur Glenn Voliva put up a billboard warning the inhabitants of the city as follows:

“You know that this city is the private headquarters of the Christian Catholic Apostolic Church, and a place of residence for its officers and members. Those who break in here and attempt to hold meetings of any kind, especially to run a disgraceful monkey-house, are nothing but thieves and thugs. Old Parham from Sodom made fools and monkeys out of you. Either repent of your idiotic performances, and line up for God and Zion, or pack up your stuff and get out of here, and establish a zoo somewhere else. W.G. Voliva.”

In 1908, Parham raised funds to travel to the Holy Land on an archaeological expedition to search for the lost Ark of the Covenant. He told the press that he had information about its location and that finding the Ark would fit into the end-time program. By December, he announced that he had sufficient funds and traveled to New York, allegedly to begin his journey to Jerusalem. He never purchased a ticket to the Middle East and returned home dejectedly in January 1909, claiming he was robbed after arriving in New York.

The Azusa Street Mission

One of the students at Parham’s Houston Bible school was William J. Seymour (1870-1922), a black evangelist who accepted Parham’s doctrine and carried it to Los Angeles, California.

The mission established by Seymour on Azusa Street in Los Angeles in 1906 has become famous as the birthplace of the Pentecostal movement. Meetings were held seven days a week for three years. Visitors attended from around the world, seeking their own “personal Pentecost,” and their testimonies and the preaching of missionaries sent out from the Azusa Street mission created a whirlwind of growth for the burgeoning Pentecostal movement.

Pentecostal historian Vinson Synan observes:

“The Azusa Street revival is commonly regarded as the beginning of the modern Pentecostal movement. In addition to the ministers who received their Pentecostal experience directly at Azusa Street, thousands of others were influenced indirectly” (Synan, The Holiness-Pentecostal Tradition, pp. 105, 130).

During 1901 and 1902, Seymour had attended Martin Knapp’s “God’s Bible School” and joined the “Evening Light Saints” in Cincinnati. He adopted the heresy of entire sanctification, believing that two “works of grace” were required to save and cleanse a man. One first had to be born again through faith in Christ then subsequently sanctified through a second work of grace.

Seymour believed that the “true church” was being restored in an end-time miracle revival. In 1903, he attended Parham’s Bible school in Houston. There he became committed to another heresy, that the Christian must subsequently be “baptized in the Holy Spirit with the initial evidence of tongues.”

In early 1906, Seymour was invited to Los Angeles to lead a small holiness group which, at the time of the invitation, was pastored by a woman, Julie Hutchins. The group was formed of people that had been disciplined out of the Second Baptist Church for the “second blessing” sinless perfection heresy.

Upon his arrival in Los Angeles, Seymour preached only a few times before being locked out of the church that had invited him. His doctrine that tongues speaking was the initial evidence of the baptism of the Holy Spirit was not well received.

Seymour moved his meetings to a private home and then to a former African Methodist Episcopal church building at 312 Azusa Street, and strange things began to happen. The meetings began in April 1906 and lasted more than three years. Large numbers of people visited Azusa Street to seek their own Pentecost, subsequently taking the Pentecostal theology and experience back to their homes.

Services began in the morning and continued for ten hours and more. There was no order of service, and usually no one was leading. “Whoever was anointed with the message would stand and deliver it. It might be a man, woman, or child” (Larry Martin, The Life and Ministry of William J. Seymour, p. 186).

Seymour rarely preached. Instead, much of the time he put his head down in an empty packing crate that served as the pulpit and prayed. Pastoral oversight was minimum, to say the least.

People sang out at the same time but “with completely different syllables, rhythms, and melodies” (Ted Olsen, “American Pentecost,” Christian History, Issue 58, 1998). They called this the “Heavenly Choir.”

Seymour’s wife, Jennie, claimed that she could sing “under the power of the Spirit in many languages” and even play the piano by divine inspiration (Larry Martin, The True Believers, p. 58).

The services were characterized by much confusion: dancing, jumping up and down, falling, trances, slaying in the spirit, gibberish “tongues,” jerking, hysteria, strange animal noises, “holy laughter,” “spiritual muteness” or people trying to speak and unable to do so, etc. The seekers would be “seized with a strange spell and commence a gibberish of sounds.” Seymour said, “Often when God sends a blessed wave upon us, we all may speak in tongues for awhile...” (Martin, p. 188).

A Los Angeles Times reporter observed that the participants “work themselves into a state of mad excitement in their peculiar zeal.”

A very sympathetic biographer of William Seymour admits that “at times the meetings would become so boisterous that the police were called” (Martin, The Life and Ministry of Seymour, p. 188).

Seymour taught the people to cry out to God and demand sanctification, the baptism with the Holy Ghost, and divine healing (Synan, The Holiness-Pentecostal Tradition, p. 99).

Shaking was a large part of the Azusa experience. The first case of tongues speaking under Seymour’s ministry was by Edward Lee, who after he saw an alleged vision of Peter and John shaking while speaking in tongues was convinced that people shake and speak in tongues when God’s power comes upon them (Larry Martin, The Life and Ministry of William J. Seymour, p. 142).

One man shook so violently under Seymour’s ministry that an ambulance was called. When the man who was shaking told the doctor, “Don’t touch me, this is the power of God,” the doctor wisely replied, “If that is the power of God it is giving you a devil of a shaking” (Martin, p. 306).

Spirit slaying was also a large part of the Azusa Street meetings. When Seymour laid hands on Edward Lee, he “fell to the floor like a dead man” (Martin, p. 143).

The first woman to speak in tongues at Azusa, Jennie Moore, first fell to the floor (Martin, p. 146).

Seymour also fell down “like he was dead” when he first spoke in tongues (Martin, p. 148).

“At times men would fall all over the house, like an army slain on the battle field...” (Martin, p. 179).

The same lack of control over the “tongues” and other phenomena that we have seen at Parham’s Bible School in Topeka was evident at Azusa Street. Jennie Moore, who later married William Seymour and eventually became the pastor of the Azusa Street Mission herself, was employed by a wealthy couple as a cook. When she burst out in “tongues” before her surprised employers, they feared she was going insane, and rightfully so (Larry Martin, The True Believers, p. 112). Later she “came under the power” and burst out in “tongues” during a Methodist church service.

William Seymour and Charles Parham have been called “the co-founders of world Pentecostalism” (Antonio Arnold, We Are Living in the Finished Work of Christ, p. 143), but Parham never accepted the Azusa Street experience as genuine.

When Parham visited the Azusa meetings in October 1906, he was shocked by the confusion of the services. He was dismayed by the “awful fits and spasms” of the “holy rollers and hypnotists.” He described the Azusa “tongues” as “chattering, jabbering and sputtering, speaking no language at all” (Vinson Synan, The Holiness-Pentecostal Tradition, p. 102).

The Azusa Street meetings were so wild that Parham condemned them with the term “sensational Holy Rollers.” He said that the Azusa Street meetings were largely characterized by manifestations of the flesh, spiritualistic controls, and the practice of hypnotism (Sarah Parham, The Life of Charles F. Parham, Joplin, MO: Tri-state Printing, 1930, p. 163).

When Parham arrived in Azusa Street in 1906, he began his first sermon by telling the people that “God is sick at his stomach” because of the things which were occurring at Azusa (Charles Shumway, A Study of the “Gift of Tongues,” A.B. thesis, University of California, 1914, pp. 178, 179; cited by Goff, Fields White Unto Harvest, p. 131).

According to Parham, two-thirds of the people that professed Pentecostalism in his day were “either hypnotized or spook driven” (Sarah Parham, Life of Charles Parham, p. 164).

Parham never changed his opinion. To the end of his life, he denounced Azusa Street as a case of “spiritual power prostituted.” Thus a “father of Pentecostalism” roundly rejected the Azusa Street meetings as phony, manipulated, and demonic!

Though there were many reports about healing and financial miracles at Azusa, the bank eventually foreclosed on the church’s property, which was a poor testimony, and Seymour died young at fifty-two years old, having been in poor health for a long before that. A few months before his death Seymour was described as “worn, tired, and decrepit” (John Matthews, Speaking in Tongues, 1925, p. 14).

Many people die at age fifty-two, but Seymour claimed that healing was guaranteed in Christ’s atonement, yet he was a sickly man who died young.

http://www.wayoflife.org/index_files/azusa_street_and_the_birth_of_pentecostalism.html

This was a very good read - I see where the end times delusion has really kicked in now. Thank you for posting this.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nIMMRfiFY-0

Christian and Muslim Faith Leaders Unite to Help the Poor

 Christian and Muslim leaders have met in Rome to discuss how they can work together to care for the poor.
 
According to ChristianToday.com., Christian and Muslim leaders attending the fourth Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue and the Royal Institute for Interfaith Studies sought to move past their differences and focus on helping the needy.
 
Both groups met with Pope Francis who stated, "Dialogue is going out of ourselves, with a word to hear the word of the other. The two words meet, two thoughts meet. It is the first step of a journey. Following this meeting of the word, hearts meet and begin a dialogue of friendship which ends with holding hands. Word, hearts, hands. It's simple. A little child knows how to do it."
 
At the end of the dialogue, the leaders acknowledged that the two religions “share beliefs and moral values,” and that “Our commonalities are much more than our particularities.”
 
They focused on the “humanising and civilizing” role both religions can play, particularly in standing in “solidarity” with the poor.
 
Help to the poor should be extended out of compassion and for the sake of obeying God, said the faith leaders. "It should never be used to proselytise.”

http://www.christianheadlines.com/blog/christian-and-muslim-leaders-unite-to-help-the-poor.html

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Goa-78Wk2PY

http://www.sermonaudio.com/sermoninfo.asp?SID=61016049403
Together 2016 Unites The Pope, CCM, & SBC for Million Man Apostasy
Series:  STBC Radio  · 67 of 67
6/10/2016 (FRI)
Audio: http://www.sermonaudio.com/playpopup.asp?SID=61016049403

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9yqcfgepXdw

Mike Bickle Meets With Pope Francis to Discuss Jesus

Some of the most recognizable names in the charismatic movement had a private meeting with Pope Francis on Friday. Mike Bickle, Che Ahn, Kris Vallotton, Stacey Campbell and dozens of other Protestant leaders from North America and Europe gathered at the Vatican.

According to Bickle, director of IHOP in Kansas City, the purpose of the meeting was to engage in an ongoing dialogue about the pontiff's views on Jesus and Christianity.

"The meeting lasted a couple of hours. They gave us the opportunity to ask questions. The meeting was very warm and personal," Bickle told Charisma News. "I asked him about his views on the serious error and deception of universalism that claims that 'all paths lead to God' and other religions being saved without receiving the grace of God that only comes through Jesus. He assured me that he believes that Jesus is the only way of salvation."

Bickle asked him again pointedly, "Is Jesus the only way of salvation?" He described Francis as "very strong" in his agreement on Christ as the Savior of the world and emphasized his love for Jesus and the Scriptures.


What about the pontiff's controversial statement about Muslims and members of other world religions claiming "children of God" status? Bickle was told Francis was referring to all humans being children of the creator and children of Adam not "children of redemption."

"The verse that was given to me was Matthew 5:44 describing the Father giving sun and rain to the just and unjust," says Bickle. "He is unhappy with the views of some of the Catholic leadership who do not honor or value the faith of Protestant believers. He believes that a close relationship with Jesus is the only hope for the nations."   

http://www.charismanews.com/world/57751-mike-bickle-meets-with-pope-francis-to-discuss-jesus

The faith of young believers: World Youth Day unites the pope with the deeply inspired
http://www.foxnews.com/us/2016/07/25/faith-young-believers-world-youth-day-unites-pope-with-deeply-inspired.html
7/25/16

Millions of young people around the world are preparing to venture to Krakow, Poland, for one of the most important, faith-filled days of the year -- July 25, 2016.

"A special greeting to youth: You are the future of the world, you are the hope of the Church, you are my hope," said Pope John Paul II during the inauguration ceremonies of World Youth Day back on October 22, 1978.

All these years later, the event -- celebrated every three years and lasting a week -- continues to celebrate the lives of young people and how they bring hope to the world.

World Youth Day has been celebrated in Rome in past years; the most recent one, in 2013, was held in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. On Monday, July 25, 2016, Pope Francis joins young people in Krakow, Poland, for the week-long pilgrimage, which is focused on the fifth Beatitude.

"Let us allow ourselves to be inspired by the words: 'Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy,'" said Pope Francis from the Vatican, quoting Matthew 5:7.

The World Youth Day website describes the event as "an opportunity to experience in first person the universality of the Church; to share with the whole world the hope of many young people who want to commit themselves to Christ and others. World Youth Day is a unique way to deepen your faith," it also says, "and grow closer to Christ, by means of prayer and the sacraments, together with thousands of other young people who share your interests and ambitions."

As the event kicks off, Hannah Glick, a new attendee this year, and Fr. Thomas Esposito, a veteran of World Youth Day, provided some thought and insight.

Glick, a 2016 graduate of the University of Dallas, in Texas, was not familiar with the aims of World Youth Day until college, where she learned through her friends' own "amazing" experiences. Today she lives in Dublin and received the opportunity to join a group of young Irish girls from Opus Dei.

"I started growing more in my faith in ways I didn't even know I could," said Glick. "I started to realize just how important ministering to the youth truly is, for the church and for them as individuals."

She added, "I started to question if maybe more spiritual time in preparation would be better then actual physical preparation. That was when I realized that every day of my life that I have spent growing in a relationship with Christ has been preparation. It's as if the Lord has already spent years preparing my heart."

Fr. Thomas Esposito is a monk of the Cistercian Abbey of Our Lady of Dallas. He said he experienced a "jolt of grace" with his group members when attending the 2002 event in Toronto, Canada.

"Being immersed in the seemingly endless sea of flags and faces was a powerful reminder of the Catholic Church's universal nature," Fr. Thomas told LifeZette. "I may not have the same mother tongue as the people crowding around me, but I do share their faith. To join the guardian of that faith, the Bishop of Rome, is an amazing privilege."

In light of the recent terror attacks worldwide, Fr. Thomas sees the events of Krakow as a tremendous opportunity to spread the good news and encourage the discussion of faith.

"This year's WYD will not only energize Catholics in the practice of their faith -- it will motivate them to share their experience of Christ's love with their neighbors who think that religion of any form leads only to hatred and death," he said. "I hope the events in Poland can contribute to a new springtime of dialogue and evangelization."

Although Fr. Thomas cannot attend this year, he encouraged both travelers and followers of the event to pray.

"Those eager to arrive in Poland can pray for all those traveling to join them, especially the pope, and to ask the Lord to bless the hearts of all participants with a willingness to hear the Lord speaking to them personally," said Fr. Thomas. "Those who will follow the events from afar can pray that the participants be transformed by the Holy Spirit through their experience in Poland, and return to their homes enkindled with the love of Christ."

http://www.wayoflife.org/reports/burlington-revival-ends.html

Burlington Tent Revival Ends

August 3, 2016 (David Cloud, Fundamental Baptist Information Service, P.O. Box 610368, Port Huron, MI 48061, 866-295-4143, fbns@wayoflife.org;)

The “Burlington Tent Revival” ended on July 29 after 11 weeks of services in Burlington, North Carolina. It began in May with a scheduled revival service led by evangelist C.T. Townsend at New Hope Baptist Church, pastored by Randy Hobbs. The meetings were extended and eventually moved into a large tent where there were two services a day, Monday through Friday. Many thousands attended.

A reported 1,250 people “accepted Jesus Christ as their Lord and Saviour.”

According to reports, New Hope Baptist has been praying for revival on Mondays for ten years. Prayer meetings were held each morning of the revival, and a prayer team prayed under the speaker’s platform during the services.

This is commendable, and I have no doubt that some lives were changed to the glory of God in answer to prayer.

At the same time, due to the unscriptural evangelism methodology of the host preachers, the unity emphasis which results in a narrowing of the message, and the hyped-up “camp meeting” atmosphere, it would be wise to have some doubt about the large salvation statistics. These are not people who are careful about dealing with souls and examining professions to look for evidence of biblical conversion.

Further, according to the Burlington Revival Facebook page and other reports, large numbers of the salvation professions were made by children, and while children can get saved, what typically happens in these cases is that when they return to shallow, worldly Christian homes and churches they do not make long-term spiritual progress, because the homes and churches are too weak to produce true disciples of Christ.

A church that sees most of its young people fall away to the world, walk in lukewarmness, or capitulate to a contemporary philosophy will only produce more of the same bitter fruit if provided with converts from a revival meeting.

Evangelist C.T. Townsend is out of Trinity Baptist Church of Asheville, North Carolina, pastored by Ralph Sexton, Jr.

Townsend described the meetings as an “aftershock that has literally shook across this nation,” but we have seen no evidence of that in the many reports of the revival that we have read.

Townsend is exactly right that spiritual revival is the only hope for America, but the revival must be a true Bible revival in solid, convicting, far-reaching, deep-digging truth that transforms shallow, worldly, pragmatic-centered pastors and their shallow, worldly, entertainment-oriented churches, rather than raucous Southern Gospel-driven emotionalism spread with a veneer of Scripture.

It would be wonderful if Ralph Sexton and his compatriots would get on fire for the truth and repent of such things as quick-prayerism evangelism, worldly, entertainment-focused youth ministries (led by cool young men who take youth groups to places like Dollywood) that produce few if any serious disciples of Christ, worldly music, and ecumenism (big-tent Independent Baptist unity that includes Southern Baptists and beyond).

It would have been wonderful if the reports of the Burlington Revival had told of hundreds of pastors repenting of such things in tears and seeking wisdom about how to undo the effect of their shallow ministries.

To repent of such things would be the fruit of true biblical revival in holiness and truth, as described in James:

“Draw nigh to God, and he will draw nigh to you. Cleanse your hands, ye sinners; and purify your hearts, ye double minded. Be afflicted, and mourn, and weep: let your laughter be turned to mourning, and your joy to heaviness. Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and he shall lift you up” (James 4:8-10).

But we have seen no evidence that James was at the Burlington Tent Revival.

Biblical unity is true oneness of mind and judgment.

“Now I beseech you, brethren, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that ye all speak the same thing, and that there be no divisions among you; but that ye be perfectly joined together in the same mind and in the same judgment” (1 Corinthians 1:10).

What Paul called for in this passage under divine inspiration is not a broad-tent Baptist unity in diversity. It is not a “unity” based on “essentials.”

Yet one of the very themes of the Burlington Revival was the latter type of unity.

“Pastors are coming together in unity. On Friday, June 17, the revival team posted on Facebook: ‘311 preachers under the tent tonight’” (“Thousands Stretch NC Revival into 8th Week,” CBN News, June 27, 2016).

Townsend said, “I have never seen such unity.”

Sixty churches were directly involved in the meetings and “many other churches from many denominations and backgrounds are being drawn to the meeting” (“Has the Next Great Spiritual Revival Awakening Begun?” OpenHeaven.com, July 13, 2015).

To promote unity among North Carolina Baptist pastors in this day and age is to promote unity of truth with error, unity of holiness with worldliness, unity of faithfulness to the Word of God with compromise of the Word of God, unity of Christ-centered Biblicists with man-centered pragmatists.

And the unity went beyond Baptist. An Assemblies of God pastor opened in prayer one night.

The last night of the Burlington Revival was attended by the vice president and other members of the Billy Graham Association, and a more radical ecumenical outfit does not exist. Of course, their attendance in itself is not evidence of compromise on the part of the Burlington Revival, but BGEA VP Tom Phillips gave the opening prayer from the platform that evening, and a photo of these men with a smiling C.T Townsend holding a bag emblazoned with a Billy Graham logo was published on the Burlington Revival Facebook page with this caption: “What an honor to have the Vice President and other members of the Billy Graham Association under the tent with us last night as they came to see & be a part of the #BurlingtonRevival.” 

Honor, indeed! This act is clear evidence that Townsend is grossly lacking in a proper education about modern compromise and in the spiritual discernment that is needed in a Christian leader today.

(See Billy Graham’s Sad Disobedience and New Evangelicalism: History, Fruit, and Error, which are available in print or as free eBooks from Way of Life Literature, www.wayoflife.org.)

The Burlington Revival raised over $340,000 to purchase a tent for Townsend’s evangelistic ministry so that he can conduct tent meetings in other places.

But no one associated with the Burlington Revival is currently capable of bringing the level of change to Independent Baptist churches that would keep them from continuing on the path to the emerging church.

See Why Most Independent Baptists Will Be Emerging within Twenty Years, a free eBook at www.wayoflife.org.

Pastor Steve Rogers observes: “Not ‘revival,’ not our movement, not our church, not our college, not our mission board, not our association, not the cause of Christ, nothing is above scriptural testing. Our loyalty must always rest in His Word. May God make us once again people of The Book!”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WM9J53uO5c0

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DjvmKGzZ-kc

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hwsKSqvrtXU

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DX7uEZkZKm0

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZJ1ht5aaRFc

(http://media.sermonaudio.com/gallery/photos/CooleyJason-01.jpg)

http://www.sermonaudio.com/sermoninfo.asp?SID=81116111200
Watchman What of The Night? Watchmen That Dont Warn
8/11/2016 (THU) 
Audio: http://www.sermonaudio.com/playpopup.asp?SID=81116111200

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c42GhDSyjlw

https://www.yahoo.com/news/m/210f0881-d93d-3610-9fbb-91357d1e1062/u.s.-lutherans-approve.html
U.S. Lutherans Approve Historic Agreement With Catholic Church

August 17, 2016

Nearly 500 years after Martin Luther nailed his 95 theses to the Castle Church door, the largest Lutheran denomination in the U.S. has approved a declaration recognizing “there are no longer church-dividing issues” on many points with the Roman Catholic Church.

Evangelical Lutherans Overwhelmingly Vote to Approve Declaration of Unity With Roman Catholics

The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) voted overwhelmingly last week to approve a declaration of unity with the Roman Catholic Church in an endeavor to “enumerate the many points of agreement between Lutherans and Catholics”—a move that some state is contrary to biblical Christianity.

The “Declaration on the Way” was approved 931-9 during the denominational assembly at the Ernest N. Morial Convention Center in New Orleans. According to an official press release by the ELCA, members stood and applauded following the vote.

The declaration “seeks to make more visible the unity we share by gathering together agreements reached on issues of church, Eucharist and ministry,” the document outlines. However, it is called “on the way” because “dialogue has not yet resolved all the church-dividing differences on these topics.”

The publication outlines 32 “Statements of Agreement” between the ELCA and Roman Catholics, such as “esteeming highly the spiritual benefits of union with the risen Christ given to them as they receive his body and blood in Holy Communion” and believing that “that all the baptized who believe in Christ share in the priesthood of Christ.”

ELCA Presiding Bishop Elizabeth Eaton noted to the assembly following the vote that the declaration comes 500 years after Protestants separated from Roman Catholicism.

“Dear sisters and brothers, let us pause to honor this historic moment,” Eaton said. “Though we have not yet arrived, we have claimed that we are, in fact, on the way to unity. After 500 years of division and 50 years of dialogue, this action must be understood in the context of other significant agreements we have reached, most notably the ‘Joint Declaration on the Doctrine of Justification’ in 1999.”

As previously reported, the Protestant Reformation, which resulted in the counter-Reformation by the Jesuits, was sparked by a monk and scholar named Martin Luther, who served the Roman Catholic Church in Wittenburg, Germany.

As Luther began studying the Scriptures after he was appointed to a Chair of Biblical Theology, he became consumed with a passion to discover what it meant to be a Christian. In the Catholic Church, he had seen men trying to earn their way to Heaven, but as he read the Bible, he realized that salvation was through faith in Christ alone.

“I think I’ve found the truth at last,” the classic film “Martin Luther” depicts Luther as stating to a Church official. “By faith man lives and is righteous, not by what he does for himself, be it adoration of relics, singing of masses, pilgrimages to Rome, purchase of pardon for his sins, but by faith in what God has done for him already through His Son.”

Following the revelation, Luther began to challenge the doctrines of the Roman Catholic Church, compiling a list of 95 thesis where he asserted that Catholic doctrine contradicted the Scriptures. He was later summoned to appear before a meeting of the Church, and was declared a heretic and excommunicated.

While this month’s ELCA declaration notes points of agreement between evangelical Lutherans and Roman Catholics, it also outlines several areas where differences remain between the two entities. The document explains that Roman Catholics believe in transubstantiation, while Lutherans do not believe that communion is transformed “into the [actual] substance of the body and blood of Christ.”

It also notes that Lutherans question the global papacy, which Roman Catholics assert is of the succession of Peter.

“Issues of papal ministry, especially in regard to authority and jurisdiction, raise questions that have no promise of imminent resolution,” the document outlines.

Mike Gendron, a former Roman Catholic who now leads Proclaiming the Gospel Ministries, a organization dedicated to evangelizing Catholics, said that the ECLA is in error in seeking to find common ground with Roman Catholicism despite these doctrinal disparities.

“By seeking unity with the Catholic religion they are departing from the biblical faith of the Reformers,” he told Christian News Network. “They need to know that there can never be biblical unity between Roman Catholics and denominations which uphold the gospel of God.”

He noted several other integral and fundamental differences between evangelicals and Roman Catholics.

“The Bible teaches justification by faith; Catholicism condemns with anathema those who believe justification is by faith alone (Romans 4),” Gendron explained. “The Bible teaches we are born again by the sovereign work of the Holy Spirit; Catholicism teaches regeneration is by water baptism (John 3).”

“The Bible teaches we are purified of sin by the blood of Jesus; Catholicism teaches purification is by the fires of purgatory (1 John 1:7),” he continued. “The Bible teaches that Jesus is the one mediator between God and man; Catholicism offers many mediators including Mary and its priests (1 Tim. 2:5).”

Gendron said that unity simply for the sake of unity is contrary to the Scriptures.

“Biblical unity is a sovereign work of the Holy Spirit, not man, that demonstrates a common faith in the Gospel (1 Cor. 12:13). Religious unity is a work of Satan who uses man’s prideful ambitions and biblical ignorance and to unite the world,” he stated. “Those who engage in spiritual enterprises with apostate Roman Catholicism, without confronting their error, give credibility to their heresies.”

“In doing so,” Gendron said, “they leave their own convictions and beliefs open to question.”

http://christiannews.net/2016/08/20/evangelical-lutherans-overwhelmingly-vote-to-approve-declaration-of-unity-with-roman-catholics/

https://pjmedia.com/faith/2016/08/25/is-american-christianity-witnessing-a-revival/
8/25/16
Is American Christianity Witnessing a Revival?

If there's one thing pastors constantly pray for, it's a revival. Well, according to a new study by the Pew Research Center, published Tuesday, their prayers are being answered — right now.

More than a quarter of Americans (27 percent) say they currently attend services at least once or twice a month, but did not do so earlier in their adult lives. More Christians are among this group than non-Christians. Even better, about half of these people say the main reason they attend church more frequently is due to changes in their religious beliefs — they are growing closer to God.

Different denominations are growing at different rates, but 65 percent of Christians overall attend services at least once or twice a month. Evangelicals enjoy the highest church attendance rate, at 75 percent, while historically black Protestants also have a high rate (68 percent). Even over half of mainline Protestants attend regularly (53 percent), as do 60 percent of Catholics.

A full 44 percent of evangelical Protestants in the survey said they attend more frequently than in the past, as do 33 percent of members of historically black churches, 31 percent of mainline Protestants, and 28 percent of Catholics. Among non-Christians, only 36 percent attend services regularly, and only 18 percent said they attend more frequently now than in the past.

But the reasons why these Americans are attending church more frequently are even more heartening.

Of the 27 percent who say they attend services more frequently than in the past, 49 percent cited changes in their beliefs as the reason for increased attendance. A full 20 percent said they became more religious, and 15 percent reported needing God, religion, or church in their life! Forteen percent reported that they were merely more mature or older, which means that their religious faith has deepened with age.

Social factors also explain the spike in church attendance. Thirteen percent said family changes, such as marriage or the birth of a child, drove them to church. Six percent pointed to their entering a different phase of life, and 4 percent said they attend church more regularly due to a desire for church fellowship.

One fifth of the increase in church attendance can be traced to practical issues. Ten percent said they have more time than they did in the past, and that church finally fit into their schedules, while 6 percent listed convenience or habit, and 3 percent said they found a congregation they like more.

The Pew report also found that not everyone is attending services more regularly, however. More than one fifth of Americans (22 percent) say they do not attend church frequently — no more than a few times a year — but they did attend more frequently in the past. Fewer Christians (19 percent) fit into this category than non-Christians (30 percent), but Mainline Protestants have a higher dropout rate (27 percent).


Among those who attend services less frequently, half said practical issues were the reason. Twenty percent explained that they were "too busy," and 10 percent listed personal priorities above church as the reason for their drop-off. Eight percent listed practical difficulties, while 6 percent pointed to health reasons, and 5 percent said they were looking for a congregation.

Only 17 percent said they attend services less frequently due to a change in their beliefs, while 6 percent said they disagreed with the teachings at their old church. Only 2 percent said the church itself had changed. Another 17 percent listed social factors, like family changes, friends no longer expecting them to attend, or a lifestyle change.

The numbers suggest a greater increase than a decrease, especially among Christians and especially among evangelical Protestants. This does not mean Christians should rest on their laurels, but the reports of the American church's death have been greatly exaggerated.

This does not mean Christians should grasp for political power — that is a huge temptation for the church which usually results in negative consequences for both church and state — but it gives us reason to hope that God is answering some prayers for revival. Let us watch and pray, never shying away from preaching the Gospel and confident that whether the church grows or shrinks, Jesus Christ will indeed return.

**No, it's a relationship with Jesus Christ and his written word!

James 1:18  Of his own will begat he us with the word of truth, that we should be a kind of firstfruits of his creatures.

FRANKLIN GRAHAM FOLLOWS IN HIS DADDY’S FOOTSTEPS AS APOLOGIST FOR THE ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH

Franklin Graham, son of the great Catholic compromiser, Billy Graham, said this week that he wants the Roman Catholic Church to “remain unmovable” on biblical teachings. Huh? What on earth does that mean? The Roman Catholic Church has never had biblical teaching.

THE BIBLE HAS A VERY UNIQUE NAME IT USES WHEN REFERRING TO THE ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH – THE **** OF BABYLON.
“So he carried me away in the spirit into the wilderness: and I saw a woman sit upon a scarlet coloured beast, full of names of blasphemy, having seven heads and ten horns. And the woman was arrayed in purple and scarlet colour, and decked with gold and precious stones and pearls, having a golden cup in her hand full of abominations and filthiness of her fornication: And upon her forehead was a name written, MYSTERY, BABYLON THE GREAT, THE MOTHER OF HARLOTS AND ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH.” Revelation 17:3-5 (KJV)

Franklin Graham, son of the great Catholic compromiser, Billy Graham, said this week that he wants the Roman Catholic Church to “remain unmovable” on biblical teachings. Huh? What on earth does that mean? The Roman Catholic Church has never had biblical teaching. Here is his exact quote in context:

“TIM KAINE IS HOPING THAT THE CATHOLIC CHURCH WILL TURN ITS BACK ON GOD’S WORD AND ACCEPT THE SINFUL POLITICAL WHIMS OF OUR CULTURE. HE SAYS HE HAS “EVOLVED” IN HIS BELIEFS ABOUT SAME-SEX MARRIAGE AND HOMOSEXUALITY. WELL, HIS THINKING, NOR SOCIETY’S DETERIORATING MORAL ATTITUDES, CHANGE THE TRUTH OF GOD’S HOLY WORD—IT NEVER CHANGES OR EVOLVES. ROMANS 1:18-32 IS A PICTURE OF WHERE WE ARE TODAY—TAKE A COUPLE OF MINUTES TO READ THESE VERSES. I APPRECIATE THE CATHOLIC CHURCH REMAINING VERY STRONG ON MORAL ISSUES THROUGH THE YEARS, AND I PRAY THEY WILL BE IMMOVABLE ON THE TEACHINGS OF THE BIBLE.” HE POSTED ON FACEBOOK RECENTLY.

My, my, very slick Frankie, very slick. Reminds me of when Laodicean apostate Rick Warren casually referred to Pope Francis as “our new pope“. Easy now, he is not the pope of any born again Christian, that’s for sure.

So, does the Roman Catholic system, like Franklin Graham just asserted, teach the teachings of the Bible? No, a thousand times no they do not. They teach Roman Catholicism, not biblical Christianity.

The Bible has a very unique name it uses when referring to the Roman Catholic Church – the **** of Babylon. To see how that name is used on context, please read all of Revelation 17 and 18 in your King James Bible. Pope Francis says “the Church is a mother and must have that loving and tender maternal feeling and human warmth as otherwise all that remains is rigidity and discipline.” Furthermore, the official colors of the Vatican are purple and scarlet, and they love to use their gaudy golden chalice at every possible opportunity.

https://youtu.be/ZfaHzhmmUN0

BILLY GRAHAM SINCE THE EARLY 1960’S HAS BEEN A STAUNCH ADVOCATE AND EVANGELIST FOR THE ROMAN SYSTEM

Billy Graham, though he started with a fiery conviction of the Bible as ultimate truth, made an alliance with the Roman Catholic harlot as he grew in popularity and wealth. His his pro-Catholic statements and proclamations have led untold millions of people into a false salvation.

https://youtu.be/OwNDa32MZl4

Billy’s son Franklin Graham has decided to follow in his father’s footsteps and form his own alliance with the Roman Catholic Church, as seen here at his 2014 Three Rivers Festival of Hope in Pittsburgh:

LIKE FATHER, LIKE SON

https://youtu.be/6UuY9DgXFgU

The Roman Catholic **** has never preached the truth and never will preach the truth. It will be destroyed at the end of the time of Jacob’s trouble, and the host of Heaven will rejoice at it’s demise.

Shame on you, false teacher Franklin Graham, for working to promote your false unity between Christianity and the Roman Catholic Church.

And Franklin, if you’re reading this, I was in the Roman Catholic system for 30 longs years. I was an altar boy for 3 years and spent 12 years in private Catholic indoctrination from first grade to my Senior year in high school. You may be able to fool lazy, Laodicean Christians but you’re not fooling me one bit. When I got saved back in 1990, I got saved OUT of the Catholic system. Why don’t YOU tell people that? Catholics are not Christians.

“And I heard another voice from heaven, saying, Come out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues.” Revelation 18:4 (KJV)

http://www.nowtheendbegins.com/franklin-graham-follows-daddys-footsteps-official-apologist-roman-catholic-church/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7cG1oObf2Sw

Pope Francis Signs Joint Statement With Lutheran World Federation Church For 'Full Unity'

Pope Francis and Bishop Mounib Younan, President of the Lutheran World Federation signed a Joint Statement on Monday in which Catholics and Lutherans pledged to pursue their dialogue in order to remove the remaining obstacles that hinder them from reaching full unity.

“And I heard another voice from heaven, saying, Come out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues.” Revelation 18:4 (KJV)

EDITOR’S NOTE: On October 31, 1517, Martin Luther nailed his 95 Theses to the castle church door in Wittenberg, Germany, thus sparking the release of the captive Christian church from the Roman **** of Babylon, the Catholic Vatican Church system. Exactly 499 years later – today – Pope Francis undid Martin Luther’s work and ensnares an all too willing Lutheran Church with the concordat you can read below. This is exactly what the book of Revelation warns us about, and it is both sad and sickening to see so many Christian denominations so eager and willing to bow before the Roman pope.

They also stressed their commitment to common witness on behalf of the poor, the needy and the victims of injustice. The Declaration was signed during the ecumenical prayer service held in Lund’s Lutheran Cathedral on the first day of the Pope’s visit to Sweden.

Please find below the full text of the Statement:
JOINT STATEMENT

on the occasion of the Joint Catholic-Lutheran Commemoration of the Reformation

Lund, 31 October 2016

«Abide in me as I abide in you.  Just as the branch cannot bear fruit by itself unless it abides in the vine, neither can you unless you abide in me» (John 15:4).
With thankful hearts

With this Joint Statement, we express joyful gratitude to God for this moment of common prayer in the Cathedral of Lund, as we begin the year commemorating the five hundredth anniversary of the Reformation.  Fifty years of sustained and fruitful ecumenical dialogue between Catholics and Lutherans have helped us to overcome many differences, and have deepened our mutual understanding and trust.  At the same time, we have drawn closer to one another through joint service to our neighbours – often in circumstances of suffering and persecution.  Through dialogue and shared witness we are no longer strangers.  Rather, we have learned that what unites us is greater than what divides us.
Moving from conflict to communion

While we are profoundly thankful for the spiritual and theological gifts received through the Reformation, we also confess and lament before Christ that Lutherans and Catholics have wounded the visible unity of the Church.  Theological differences were accompanied by prejudice and conflicts, and religion was instrumentalized for political ends.  Our common faith in Jesus Christ and our baptism demand of us a daily conversion, by which we cast off the historical disagreements and conflicts that impede the ministry of reconciliation.  While the past cannot be changed, what is remembered and how it is remembered can be transformed.  We pray for the healing of our wounds and of the memories that cloud our view of one another.  We emphatically reject all hatred and violence, past and present, especially that expressed in the name of religion.  Today, we hear God’s command to set aside all conflict.  We recognize that we are freed by grace to move towards the communion to which God continually calls us.
 Our commitment to common witness

As we move beyond those episodes in history that burden us, we pledge to witness together to God’s merciful grace, made visible in the crucified and risen Christ.  Aware that the way we relate to one another shapes our witness to the Gospel, we commit ourselves to further growth in communion rooted in Baptism, as we seek to remove the remaining obstacles that hinder us from attaining full unity.  Christ desires that we be one, so that the world may believe (cf. John 17:21).
Pope Francis has been working on this partnership for a long time:

Many members of our communities yearn to receive the Eucharist at one table, as the concrete expression of full unity.  We experience the pain of those who share their whole lives, but cannot share God’s redeeming presence at the Eucharistic table.  We acknowledge our joint pastoral responsibility to respond to the spiritual thirst and hunger of our people to be one in Christ.  We long for this wound in the Body of Christ to be healed.  This is the goal of our ecumenical endeavours, which we wish to advance, also by renewing our commitment to theological dialogue.

“And the woman was arrayed in purple and scarlet colour, and decked with gold and precious stones and pearls, having a golden cup in her hand full of abominations and filthiness of her fornication: And upon her forehead was a name written, MYSTERY, BABYLON THE GREAT, THE MOTHER OF HARLOTS AND ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH.” Revelation 17:4,5 (KJV)

We pray to God that Catholics and Lutherans will be able to witness together to the Gospel of Jesus Christ, inviting humanity to hear and receive the good news of God’s redeeming action.  We pray to God for inspiration, encouragement and strength so that we may stand together in service, upholding human dignity and rights, especially for the poor, working for justice, and rejecting all forms of violence.  God summons us to be close to all those who yearn for dignity, justice, peace and reconciliation.  Today in particular, we raise our voices for an end to the violence and extremism which affect so many countries and communities, and countless sisters and brothers in Christ.  We urge Lutherans and Catholics to work together to welcome the stranger, to come to the aid of those forced to flee because of war and persecution, and to defend the rights of refugees and those who seek asylum.
Pope Francis wants to absorb all of the Christianity, not just the Lutherans:

More than ever before, we realize that our joint service in this world must extend to God’s creation, which suffers exploitation and the effects of insatiable greed.  We recognize the right of future generations to enjoy God’s world in all its potential and beauty.  We pray for a change of hearts and minds that leads to a loving and responsible way to care for creation.
One in Christ

On this auspicious occasion, we express our gratitude to our brothers and sisters representing the various Christian World Communions and Fellowships who are present and join us in prayer.  As we recommit ourselves to move from conflict to communion, we do so as part of the one Body of Christ, into which we are incorporated through Baptism.  We invite our ecumenical partners to remind us of our commitments and to encourage us.  We ask them to continue to pray for us, to walk with us, to support us in living out the prayerful commitments we express today.
Calling upon Catholics and Lutherans worldwide

We call upon all Lutheran and Catholic parishes and communities to be bold and creative, joyful and hopeful in their commitment to continue the great journey ahead of us.  Rather than conflicts of the past, God’s gift of unity among us shall guide cooperation and deepen our solidarity.  By drawing close in faith to Christ, by praying together, by listening to one another, by living Christ’s love in our relationships, we, Catholics and Lutherans, open ourselves to the power of the Triune God.  Rooted in Christ and witnessing to him, we renew our determination to be faithful heralds of God’s boundless love for all humanity. source

http://www.nowtheendbegins.com/pope-francis-signs-joint-statement-lutheran-world-federation-church-full-unity/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wllJx75ysGs