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“But when the husbandmen saw the son, they said among themselves, This is the heir; come, let us kill him, and let us seize on his inheritance.  And they caught him, and cast him out of the vineyard, and slew him.” 

Matthew 21: 38-39.

One event only has made the Holy Land holy.  It is an event that was in many ways odd.  It was certainly quite unlike conventional notions of a holy and sanctifying event.   Harps were absent; the air was most likely heavy and foul; diaphanous light was nowhere to be seen.  It was, to be frank, a shabby event, on a grubby day, in a squalid place.  And I am sorry to say that the conduct of every man who took part was disgraceful.

There may be other holy lands on other planets, reverenced by beings quite different than ourselves; but this is the Holy Land of men.  They say everyone gets the face he deserves.  I say all planets and beings get the holy land they deserve.

Ours, the holy land of mankind, is a shabby, squalid, grubby place of disgrace.

In Scripture, the word grace means favor, so when we read that Noah “found grace in the eyes of the Lord,” we are being told that Noah found favor.  He became, not without reason, God’s favorite.  In a proverb it is said of God, “Surely he scorneth the scorners but he giveth grace to the lowly,” and we are thereby supplied with the antonym of the word grace.  That antonym is scorn.

We have another proverb from the playwright poet William Congreve, commonly rendered as “hell hath no fury like a woman scorned.”  Few men pass through life without seeing this confirmed, either intimately or at some short distance.  The actual lines from Congreve are,

“Heaven has no Rage, like Love to Hatred turn’d
Nor Hell a Fury, like a Woman scorn’d.”

The woman in question is raging and furious because she is no longer her former lover’s favorite.  She has been scorned, has fallen out of favor, has been disgraced.  In scripture disgrace likewise means withdrawal of God’s favor (see Jeremiah 14:21).

What Congreve tells us, and all experience confirms, is that the withdrawal of favor very often makes the former favorite insane.  It sometimes causes the former favorite to seek the reasons he or she fell from favor, and to try to reform.  But since men and women are, for the most part, narcissistic and vainglorious beings, this does not happen very often.

It certainly did not happen when God’s favor was withdrawn in our Holy Land.

Many Christians are in the habit of chanting that the Lamb of God takes away the sins of the world, but I daresay very few consider that he first took away what had been the world’s grace.  God’s former favorites fell out of favor, and much of their conduct ever since, like that of Congreve’s jilted woman, has been predictably disgraceful. 

Rage, hate and fury; fury, hate and rage.  At God, and more especially at God’s new favorite.  There is, it appears, no jealousy so deathless as the jealousy of men who no longer find grace in the eyes of God.

All of this was, of course, foretold in a  parable that is hot, strangely enough, a homiletic favorite.  This is sometimes called, “The Parable of the Householder Demanding Fruit from His Vineyard.”  In the parable said householder plants and trims an excellent vineyard, and then graciously lets it to some favored husbandmen (i.e. caretakers).  The householder thereupon travels to a far country.  After a time, the householder sends servants to receive the fruits of his vineyard, and these servants the favored husbandmen stone and kill.  At last, the householder sends his son, thinking that even the most obstreperous husbandmen will respect his flesh and blood.  But he is mistaken, as the line in my epigraph relate.

The householder therefore withdraws his favor from the obstreperous and homicidal husbandmen.  In modern terms, the former favorites are fired, sacked, given the boot.  Because the householder’s former favorites rendered no fruit and murdered his son, they no longer find grace in his eyes.  They are now and forever disgraced.

Thus, when Jesus asked his disciples what the householder would do to his former favorites, they correctly answer.

“He will miserably destroy those wicked men, and will let out his vineyard unto other husbandmen, which shall render him the fruits in their seasons.”

This parable of course foretells the disgrace of the Jews, the termination of their days of employment as God’s favorites.  As Jews (not as individual human beings), they are scorned from that day hence (their former status having been been “miserably destroyed”), and this withdrawal of God’s favor has, predictably, made made many of these former favorites insane.

I have said that our Holy Land is a place of disgrace.  No doubt many of you are itching to remind me that it is a place of grace also.  This is true, but that is not something of which Christians needs to be reminded.  Christians remembers without bidding that Christ rose from the dead.  Christians must be reminded that, before that glorious advent of grace, “the veil of the temple was rent in twain.”

“From the top to the bottom,” in case there is any doubt.

Our Holy Land must a place of disgrace because we are narcissistic and vainglorious beings who must be reminded that God has no fixed favorites.  He does not love us for what we are, but for what we do.  He could snap the Cross in two, just as he rent the veil of the temple in twain.  Disgrace may come to any man, any tribe, any church.

Jesus loves me, but I know,
It may not always be thus so,
Serve him well, he has your back,
Otherwise you get the sack.

Yes, Jesus loves me,
Yes, Jesus loves me,
Yes, Jesus loves me,
But he can let me go!

South Dakota could be the next state to vote on an amendment that would make killing babies in abortions a supposed state constitutional “right” up to birth.

Yesterday, the sponsoring group filed a petition with 55,000 signatures to place the radical pro-abortion amendment on the November ballot. Abortion activist Rick Weiland presented the petition at a press conference at the Downtown Library in Sioux Falls on Wednesday.

The Life Defense Fund, a pro-life group, announced it will challenge the legitimacy of the abortion amendment and say there is a lack of transparency in the petition signatures. The pro-life group confirms it gathered evidence that circulators failed to distribute the required circulator handout information to petition signers and encouraged signing the petition twice.

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Jon Hansen, Co-Chair of the Life Defense Fund says one of the things they’ve observed is people asking to sign the petition to repeal the sales tax on food, who were given the abortion petition instead.

The post South Dakota Amendment Would Make Killing Babies in Abortions a “Right” Up to Birth appeared first on LifeNews.com.

The Biden administration is under fire for selectively prosecuting pro-life advocates who protested abortion inside abortion centers while ignoring hundreds of pro-abortion attacks on churches, pro-life groups and pregnancy centers.

Heather Idoni is one of the dozen pro-life advocates who have been charged or convicted of violating the bogus FACE law that denies free speech rights to pro-life Americans. As LifeNews reported, the pro-life advocates have been found guilty of violating a federal law protecting abortion centers and now face the possibility of 11 years in prison.

That political persecution is bad enough, but recent reports indicated Idoni was placed in solitary confinement for 22 days for sharing food with fellow prisoners. https://www.lifenews.com/2024/04/29/pro-life-advocate-placed-in-solitary-confinement-for-22-days-for-sharing-food/

Now, a new report indicates Idoni has suffered a stroke as a result of the cruel and unusual punishment.

Idoni was reportedly “rushed to the hospital this week after suffering a stroke while being held at Northern Neck Regional Jail in Virginia. She is reportedly stabilized and will be taken back into custody to await sentencing on May 17.”

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“In an exclusive interview, she said that she received this punishment for sharing food with fellow prisoners. Idoni alleged that she was allowed to walk outside her cell only for two hours in the middle of the night each day and that the lights of her cell were continually kept on. Idoni has been in prison since she was convicted last autumn,” the report says.

Idoni’s attorney says the federal prison should be following international human rights standards for the humane treatment of prisoners and there is concern tat those standards are being abrogated in her case.

Idoni has been treated shoddily while in prison and was shackled like a death row inmate during a court appearance – and was subjected to 22 days of solitary confinement for sharing food with other prisoners.

In an exclusive interview, she said that she received this punishment for sharing food with fellow prisoners. Idoni alleged that she was allowed to walk outside her cell only for two hours in the middle of the night for two hours each day and that the lights of her cell were continually kept on. Idoni has been in prison since she was convicted last autumn.  

Fellow pro-life advocate Cal Zastro, who joined Idoni in another traditional pro-life rescue in Tennessee and has also been convicted of violation of the FACE Act, told LifeSiteNews that when Idoni was brought into the courtroom for a trial in Nashville, the U.S. marshal had the middle-aged woman shackled at the wrists, waist, and feet, as if she were a dangerous criminal. 

Zastro said that, upon entering the courtroom, the shocked judge ordered the shackles removed. Initially the marshal agreed to remove the shackles from only one wrist to allow Idoni freedom to write, a concession necessary for her to take notes, as she was then representing herself in court. Only at the insistence of the indignant judge were the shackles of both wrists finally removed, although the marshal left the bars around her waist and feet. 

According to the report, Idoni is relying on her faith in God saying that, despite the prison hardship “God is going to be glorified” and she has “never not felt His presence.” 

Idoni and the other pro-life advocates are appealing the bogus convictions.

The post Pro-Life Advocate Suffers Stroke After She’s Placed in Solitary Confinement for 22 Days appeared first on LifeNews.com.

When James Madison was a member of Congress in 1791 and charged with drafting the Bill of Rights, he made two grammatical demands. One was that the word “the” precede “freedom of speech” in the First Amendment, and the other was a command in the Ninth Amendment that the “rights retained by the people,” rights too numerous to enumerate, “shall not be disparaged” by the government.

This principle — that our rights preexisted the government — would be played out over and over in litigation in the centuries following the ratification of the Bill of Rights. The ratification itself was insisted upon by five of the new states who threatened to leave the new union unless restraints were added to the Constitution so as to protect the individual liberties that the Declaration of Independence — then only 15 years old — stated unambiguously were granted by the Creator.

Though the colonists deeply valued all the rights articulated in the Declaration, truly it was the freedom of speech that drove the revolution. Yes, the Americans had Kentucky long guns that enabled the colonial militias to shoot and kill British forces from distances that the British weaponry was unable to reach. Yes, the Americans were animated by defending their homeland.

But it was speech — sung in taverns, written in broadsides, delivered in sermons, distributed in pamphlets, adopted by the Continental Congress and colonial legislatures, and proclaimed in town squares from Boston to Charleston — that whipped the brushfires of freedom into a revolution and a new nation.

I offer this brief historical, philosophical and legal analysis of the freedom of speech as background for the discussion that follows.

Today, this most basic and utterly essential freedom — both a natural human right and a constitutionally protected right — is under assault by governments that hate or fear the content of the speech. I am addressing the demonstrations on college campuses today and the authoritarian responses to them by college presidents, governors and mayors.

Here is the dispute in a nutshell.

Students at various universities are repulsed by the gravity of the assault on Gaza by the IDF. They have chosen to address this assault and not the assault on Israeli civilians and military on Oct. 7. They are free to address whichever assault they choose.

They have also chosen to articulate their views by occupying public places on campuses; shouting, singing and haranguing college administrators. The administrators, fearing a loss of donations from those who disagree with the students or harm to other students who challenge the demonstrators, have engaged local and state police to suppress these demonstrations.

Can the government interfere with speech because of its content? In a word: NO.

How about on private property where campuses are not owned by the government? That depends on the location of the campus, as most states — but not all — have public accommodation laws that make college campuses public places available for the articulation of ideas. Even the colleges in states without these laws that accept federal funds do so in contracts with the federal government, which require that they respect free speech rights.

These public accommodation laws and these agreements with the feds are violative of the property rights of the owners of these colleges. Yet, like free speech, property rights, too, are under attack in America today. Nevertheless, today it is clear beyond dispute that college campuses are places for the free exchange of ideas, whether these ideas are approved by the owners of the campuses or not.

Is speech that preaches hate and threatens violence protected on college campuses? In a word: YES.

In Terminiello v. Chicago (1949), a Roman Catholic priest aimed hatred at President Harry Truman and the hate speech produced violence and property damage. In Brandenburg v. Ohio (1969), a Ku Klux Klan leader aimed hatred at Blacks and Jews. In Terminiello, the violence was caused by the audience members who hated the speech they came to scorn. In Brandenburg, the KKK speaker demanded violence, but it never came about.

The Supreme Court sided with both speakers. The jurisprudence from both cases is now integral to American law. It teaches that all innocuous speech is absolutely protected and all speech is innocuous when there is time for more speech to challenge it.

Moreover, the court ruled, freedom of speech is so essential to human happiness and democratic values that it tolerates violence; meaning, those who cause violence can and should be addressed by the criminal justice system, but those who preach it are immune from prosecution, unless they cause an immediate, unthinking violent act — meaning there is no time for more speech to challenge the call for violence.

In the case of college campuses, the violence has been caused by the government. Whether the property on which the demonstrators stand is owned by the government — like the University of Texas, where the governor sent in police on horseback to rough up peaceful demonstrators — or is privately owned like Columbia University, where the mayor sent in police to arrest peaceful students, is of no moment.

No moment because the students have an absolute right to think as they wish, to say what they think, to read what they want, to publish what they believe; and they can do this alone or in groups, quietly or profoundly — and they can do this with impunity. Anything short of leaving them alone involves the governmental evaluation of the content of speech, the very acts that the First Amendment was written to prevent.

Today, the government wants war, and the students want peace. In the bitter days of the 1960s, student demonstrators chased an incumbent president from reelection and chastised a newly elected one into a policy change over war. Today, the government seems determined to use force to prevent change and suppress freedom. If the British had done this successfully in the 1770s, we’d all be bowing to Charles III today.

To learn more about Judge Andrew Napolitano, visit https://JudgeNap.com.

COPYRIGHT 2024 ANDREW P. NAPOLITANO

DISTRIBUTED BY CREATORS.COM

MPs will be given the opportunity to vote on lowering the abortion time limit in an historic vote that will take place on Wednesday 15 May.

This morning, the Leader of the House of Commons, Penny Mordaunt MP, announced that Report Stage of the Criminal Justice Bill will take place on Wednesday 15th May.

A cross-party group of over 40 MPs have signed a landmark amendment to the Government’s flagship Criminal Justice Bill ahead of Report Stage that would lower the abortion time limit from 24 to 22 weeks in line with advances in medical science.

The group of MPs led by Caroline Ansell includes former health minister Maggie Throup, ex-shadow cabinet Labour minister MP Rachael Maskell, ex-shadow Labour minister Marie Rimmer, ex-Cabinet Minister Sir Jacob Rees-Mogg and Miriam Cates.

Parents of children who were born at 22 and 23 weeks gestation along with a large group of MPs delivered a petition, signed by 102,573 people, to the Prime Minister at 10 Downing Street calling for a reduction to the abortion time limit.

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Over 750 medical professionals have also called on MPs to back the amendment to the Government’s Criminal Justice Bill, in what would be the biggest change to abortion law for a generation.

A 24-week abortion limit is now beyond the point when many babies survive, double that of the most common time limit among European Union countries and represents a contradiction at the heart of our abortion law.

Originally set at 28 weeks, the abortion limit was lowered in 1990 to 24 weeks gestation. Improved survival rates for extremely premature babies between 24 and 28 weeks was one of the key considerations that motivated this change.

By the same logic, and informed by the improved survival rates for babies born at 22 and 23 weeks gestation, MPs are now calling for the abortion time limit to be updated.

In the decade to 2019 alone, the survival rate for extremely premature babies born at 23 weeks doubled, prompting new guidance from the British Association of Perinatal Medicine (BAPM) that enables doctors to intervene to save premature babies from 22 weeks gestation.

Research published in November 2023 by academics at the University of Leicester and Imperial College London indicates that a significant number of babies born at 22 and 23 weeks gestation can now survive outside the womb. According to this research, there were a total of 261 babies born alive at 22 and 23 weeks, before the abortion limit, who survived to discharge from hospital in 2020 and 2021.

This is compared to the Government abortion statistics, which show that in 2021 alone, 755 abortions were performed under Section 1(1)(a) of the Abortion Act when the baby was at 22 or 23 weeks gestation (the vast majority of abortions are permitted under Section 1(1)(a) of the Abortion Act, for which there is currently a 24-week time limit).

This leaves a real contradiction in British law. In one room of a hospital, doctors could be working to save a baby born alive at 23 weeks whilst, in another room of that same hospital, a doctor could perform an abortion that would end the life of a baby at the same age.

Our 24-week time limit is also out of step with the majority of European Union countries, where the most common time limit for abortion on demand or on broad social grounds is 12 weeks.

Countries with 12-week limits for abortion on demand or on broad social grounds include Germany, Italy and Belgium as well as the more “liberal” Nordic countries Denmark and Finland. Even Sweden has a time limit for abortion on demand or on broad social grounds that is much lower than the United Kingdom at 18 weeks.

Lowering the abortion time limit is supported by a large majority of the British public. Polling undertaken by Savanta ComRes shows that 60% of the general population and 70% of women support a reduction in the time limit to 20 weeks or below.

Caroline Ansell MP, who is leading the group of over 40 MPs who have tabled the amendment, said:

“The increase in survival rates for babies born at 22 and 23 weeks gestation is one of medical science’s great success stories in recent years. More and more babies born at these ages are able to survive thanks to the hard work of neonatal teams”.

“As in 1990, when our laws were last changed to reflect similar increases in survival rates, it is time our abortion time limit was updated. Our current time limit is an outlier compared with our European neighbours and my hope is this amendment will command widespread support across the House”.

Mischa from Surrey, mum to Amaya, who was born at 23 weeks and five days said:

“Our beautiful Amaya was born at 23 weeks and 5 days. She’ll be turning 3 years old in the summer and has come such a long way. She’s the most expressive baby and it is so fun to see what silly face she may pull next, always showing her emotions!” 

“She is such a waterbaby and adores her swimming lessons. I’ll never forget bringing her home for the first time and as I opened the ambulance door, the whole family was there cheering and clapping to welcome home my baby. She has brought so much light to so many lives”.

“It’s not easy to raise our premature baby. Every day was a fight; she has been fighting so hard. But we wouldn’t change it for the world. My little one was born at 23 weeks – why does she get to live while a 24-week baby in the womb could still be aborted?”

“The UK abortion law is out of date with medical science – my daughter is living proof of that. She’s a baby, just like others in the womb at 22 or 23 weeks. We hope to see this law changed to bring it in line with modern science so babies in the womb, the same age as my little fighter when she was born, are treated the same”.

Right To Life UK spokesperson, Catherine Robinson, said:

“The UK abortion time limit is double the average among EU countries, which is 12 weeks gestation, a point in pregnancy when the NHS website describes the unborn baby as ‘fully formed’”. 

“At the moment, a baby at 22 or 23 weeks gestation could be born prematurely and have a dedicated medical team provide expert care to try to save his or her life, while another baby at the same age could have their life deliberately ended by abortion in the same hospital at the same time. This is a contradiction in UK law”. 

“Polling demonstrates widespread public support for a time limit reduction, with support for this reduction strongest among women”.

The post British Parliament Will Vote on Measure to Save Babies From Abortions appeared first on LifeNews.com.

Justice in a Shithole Country

Paul Craig Roberts

Russiagate, documentsgate, insurrectiongate, pornstargate and the phony civil and criminal trials being orchestrated against President Trump demonstrate that Democrat attorney generals, prosecutors, and judges have no integrity, no respect for law, and regard law as a weapon to be used against those who stand in the way of their agendas.

Consider, for example, the 34-count indictment brought by black Trump-hater New York city district attorney Alvin Bragg solely on the basis of Bragg’s assertion that Trump falsified business records by reporting extortion payments to an aging pornstar, who apparently threatened to make accusations to disrupt Trump’s presidential campaign unless Trump paid her off, as a legal expense instead of a campaign contribution to his campaign.

It is an absolute fact that business owners and business executives do not make decisions about how expenses are reported. Such decisions are the responsibility of accountants and attorneys. All Trump did was to sign papers prepared by accountants and attorneys, but of course Bragg, a quota-hire, is too stupid to understand how business functions.

Bragg claims, further demonstrating his stupidity and incompetence, that Trump interfered in the 2016 presidential election and got himself elected President by hiding his payment to the pornstar as a legal expense. Bragg’s contention is that otherwise the presstitutes would have used the unsubstantiated pornstar’s allegations to defeat Trump’s 2016 election as president.

How did something this absurd get to be a court case. Clearly, this is NOT THE WAY A FIRST WORLD COUNTRY WITH A RULE OF LAW BEHAVES!
It is the way a shithole country behaves. A shithole country is what Democrats have turned America into.

Bragg’s stupid case based on nothing but Bragg’s assertion of how an expense should be reported so that it can be used as a weapon against Trump–and Bragg is not an accountant–has as its only support Trump-hater Michael Cohen, who wrote a book that claims “Donald Trump is the mirror into the depth of the soul of government corruption. He is the standard bearer for corrupt dictator wannabes. He is the poster boy for fascism.”

Cohen has pleaded guilty to tax evasion, to lying to Congress, and a judge has said that it is likely that Cohen also committed perjury. Yet, Cohen is Bragg’s witness against Trump.

Moreover, the fake charges against Trump are misdemeanor charges, NOT FELONIES. Yet Bragg is falsely presenting them as felonies, claiming that the alleged misreporting of the expense constituted “election fraud.”

Bragg does not have to worry about not having a case. He knows that in NYC the jury will convict Trump even if the entirety of the evidence proves Trump innocent. All Bragg has to do is to bring an indictment. The jury will convict. Nowhere in America, not in the media, trials, medical science, or scholarship do facts any longer matter. All that matters are agendas upheld by official narratives.

There you have it. This is justice in a shithole country.

Be a proud American. “USA, USA, USA!”

Rino Republicans Help Democrats Legitimize the Murder of the Unborn in Arizona

When Republicans accepted the stolen Arizona election, they accepted murder.

https://www.theepochtimes.com/us/arizona-senate-approves-repeal-of-near-total-abortion-ban-5641218?utm_source=RTNews&src_src=RTNews&utm_campaign=rtbreaking-2024-05-01-5&src_cmp=rtbreaking-2024-05-01-5&utm_medium=email&est=AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAceE5JjMFys3H%2BbdAvWpUcQzPZ0WlGLZbDFlFfmdQNQ%3D%3D