Texas Churches May Establish and Maintain Their Own Security Teams

by Eric Inman

Ten years ago, a private security company in Texas posed a question to the TX dept. of public safety – whether churches were subject to the regulations of occupational code section 1702, which regulate and license  private security companies.  The resulting opinion was that, yes, they were.

From that time forward, Texas churches were honor-bound to not operate armed security teams – unless team members held private security certifications, and were under the authority of a private security certificate holder’s license. 

The same company that posed the question immediately launched their solution: They would train church volunteers for armed security teams,  the church would pay for all the training, plus – churches would pay the company an hourly rate for any hours worked by the volunteers – who, essentially became unpaid employees of the company. The obvious implication was that the company planned this sweetheart deal all along.

Churches all over Texas were compelled to tell their retired law enforcement professionals, and others, who made up their volunteer teams, that they could no longer serve. Now, only active duty LEO’s, and/or level 4 (armed, 40 hours training) security officers could participate. Not surprisingly, many or most law enforcement retirees, with thousands of hours of training and experience, refused to become a private security guard for that purpose. Several of those honorably retired law enforcement professionals testified at various hearings during the past two legislative sessions. Additionally, not many of the approximately 24,000 evangelical Christian churches in Texas could afford to pay for this scheme… and the results were:  a) Churches ignored the opinion and continued to operate their teams, b) They complied, or, c) They disbanded their armed teams or never formed one.

Fortunately, in September 2017 that all changed. Due to the efforts of Rep. Matt Rinaldi, Rep. Matt Schaefer, and many others, HB421 was passed (under another bill as an add-on), which removed “places of worship” from the 1702 security regulations.

Happily, churches may now – without governmental interference – establish and maintain their own security teams, armed or otherwise.

E. Inman

Sr. Special Agent, USNPS, (Ret.)

Featured photo: Screen shot of Eric Inman testifying before the Texas House of Representatives Homeland Security & Public Safety Committee, March 7, 2017.  Homeland Security & Public Safety – Mar 7th, 2017

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MSNBC’s Joy Reid Is Now SHILLING For MS-13 After Attacking President Trump For Using Words Such As Church And Family

Another day, another example of the extreme anti-American sentiment running through parts of the Democratic Party as MSNBC’s Joy Reid not only attacked the president for using seemingly normal words such as church and family but also spent time directly shilling for the murderous illegal immigrant gang known as MS-13.

That’s right, not content with attacking the very idea of America, Reid used her on air time during the networks coverage of the State of the Union address to laughably claim that no one has ever heard of MS-13 unless they watch Fox News. Or, in other words, MS-13 isn’t actually a danger to Americans and should be left alone.

Fox News reports:

During MSNBC’s coverage of the State of the Union, Reid mocked the president’s remarks while analyzing the speech with “Hardball” host Chris Matthews.

“He gives a speech tonight, in which he makes it sound like the biggest issue in the United States, the biggest threat is MS-13, a gang nobody that doesn’t watch Fox News has ever heard of. So he makes it sound like they’re the biggest threat.”

Reid said Trump simply mentioned the deadly gang to accommodate the “audience he wants applause from.”

First off. In no way shape or form did President Trump say MS-13 was the “biggest” issue in America, that claim is all in the head of Reid and Reid alone. Secondly, MS-13 is incredibly dangerous and has killed an untold number of American citizens and people across the world. How someone could appear on television and seemingly defend them while attacking the American people is beyond me.

Amazingly, this shilling for MS-13 came around the same time that Reid was actually triggered by the president using words such as church and family.

While this seems insane to a normal person, it actually makes sense when you consider the anti-family agenda of the globalist world order.

Church … family … police … military … the national anthem … Trump trying to call on all the tropes of 1950s-era nationalism. The goal of this speech appears to be to force the normalization of Trump on the terms of the bygone era his supporters are nostalgic for. #SOTU

— Joy Reid (@JoyAnnReid) January 31, 2018

“This is not satire. I repeat this is not a satirical piece. Joy Reid was actually triggered and angered by the use of the words family, church, police, and military. If this is not direct proof of hardcore anti-American, pro-globalist sentiment I don’t know what is,” I reported at the time.

Paul Joseph Watson also noted the insanity:

Yes, you read that right. Reid is literally upset that Trump used the words church, family, police, military and the national anthem during his address to lawmakers.

It was perhaps the most bizarre reaction of the night, and there was no shortage of competition.

Twitter users took Reid to task for her apparent unease with every day words and ‘American as apple pie’ concepts.

“No, Joy, the Left is so out of touch you don’t even recognize normal when you see it,” responded one.

It has become strikingly clear that hard-left deep state puppets such as Reid are becoming more and more bold in their anti-American proclamations at a time when the mainstream media has been willing to cheer on literally anyone that “stands against” Donald Trump.

One has to wonder how long it will take some Democrats, and, more importantly, independents, to realize that the Democratic Party of yesterday no longer exists and has been replaced by one that openly puts the needs of illegal immigrants in front of the American people?

Florida church warns at every door ‘we are heavily armed’

By Travis Fedschun | Fox News  11/19/2017

A Florida church has a stark warning to all who enter who may wish to do harm–“we are heavily armed.”

The River at Tampa Bay Church regularly broadcasts its services live on social media, and in the wake of the Texas church massacre where 26 people were killed, a leader of the congregation made a splash on social media when he posted a photo of the sign.

“Welcome to The River at Tampa Bay Church — right of admission reserved — this is private property,” it reads. “Please know this is not a gun free zone — we are heavily armed — any attempt will be dealt with deadly force — yes we are a church and will protect our people.” The message is signed “The Pastors.”

 

 

Associate Pastor Allen Hawes told FOX 13 Tampa the sign has been up for over a year at the non-denominational church, but garnered attention after Senior Pastor Rodney Howard-Browne posted it on his Instagram account.

Hawes has his own concealed-carry weapons permit, and said those armed during services that draw over 1,000 could include parishioners with concealed-carry permits, private plainclothes guards, or uniformed deputies hired for security.

“If you think you are going to come here and do that, this is a deterrent for you because it is everywhere, it’s not like we hide these signs,” Hawes said. “They’re big signs, and it’s going to tell these people, we will protect our people.”

Read more here: foxnews.com

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Please Help Support Our Church Security Team in Sutherland Springs, TX

Oath Keepers Security Volunteers on Duty Outside First Baptist Church of Sutherland Springs, Texas

We still have Oath Keepers volunteers on the ground in Sutherland Springs, TX, helping provide security for the First Baptist Church of Sutherland Springs as they recover and rebuild after the horrendous mass shooting on November 5. A secondary mission for our team is to offer free security assessments to South Texas churches, and to offer free training for their security teams (helping them form a team if they have none, or helping them train the team they have).

Our men have been on the ground for the past week, at the invitation of the church pastors, and have done a superb job in helping to preserve the privacy and security of the church and its members as they go through the heart wrenching grieving, memorial, and healing process. And we will be part of the long term solution to help prevent this from happening again, which will also help to defend our gun rights by denying the enemies of the Second Amendment the victims they need to push their agenda.

We still need volunteers, per our CALL TO ACTION.

If you can’t volunteer, please help support those who can. You can DONATE to help us continue this vital mission.  

Not everyone can attend these events, but we could use your help with the ongoing expenses. Our unpaid volunteers need to be reimbursed for gas money spent on travel and food, and we have also spent money on airfare and a rental car to bring in one of our key team leaders, retired Washington D.C. Metro police officer and Army Ranger veteran, Brian Krogmann, who flew in from Arizona.

We appreciate all who have supported our recent disaster relief efforts in Texas, Florida, and Puerto Rico, and we will do our best to not stretch our donors too thin. But the anti-gunners are doing all they can to use this tragedy, as well as the recent Las Vegas mass shooting, to further erode and destroy your right to bear arms. When the pastors of the First Baptist Church of Sutherland Springs reached out to us and asked us for help, we didn’t hesitate because it was the right thing to do. And by stepping up when called, we will also be part of the long term solution of increased security for churches, not just in Texas, but all across the nation. 

Because of this operation, we can now speak with direct knowledge of what happened there in Sutherland Springs since we have seen the aftermath with our own eyes, and we have spoken directly with the church members and their pastors. We have also had the honor to meet and speak at length with the man who put a stop to the killing, Stephen Willeford. And all of that will make a real difference as we counsel and advise churches across the nation on what they must do to prevent the same thing from happening to them – they must have robust armed security that is prepared for active shooter attacks like this.  

We all know that until churches go from being soft targets to being hard targets, terrorists and madmen will take advantage of that softness to work their evil. Oath Keepers is playing a direct, key part in making that necessary change, across this nation. Please donate to support this effort. 

DONATE

If you prefer to send a check, the mailing address is:

Oath Keepers
5130 S. Fort Apache Road, Ste. 215
Las Vegas, NV  89148

A donation of any amount will be greatly appreciated by our Oath Keepers on the ground in Sutherland Springs, TX and will help us in our mission to defend the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, including the Second Amendment, going forward.  

Thank you,

Oath Keepers

 

 

 

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Pastor of First Baptist Church: ‘Do not let lives that were lost lie in vain’

Pastor Pomeroy delivers emotional message of resilience.

By Katrina Webber, Max Massey, Mariah Medina

SUTHERLAND SPRINGS, Texas – Hundreds of people attended Sunday service at the First Baptist Church – one week after the Sutherland Springs community was forever changed by a tragedy that claimed the lives of 26 members of the church.

A church that had a few dozen members a week ago hosted worshipers from across the country in a tent donated by a San Antonio business.

Approximately 200 chairs were set up for church goers, but volunteers quickly found themselves adding more chairs for the large crowd.

Pastor Frank Pomeroy began the service thanking god for the strength and power the community has exhibited in light of the tragedy.

“We have the freedom to choose, and rather than choose darkness like the young man did that day we choose the light,” Pomeroy said.

Pomeroy, who lost his daughter in the attack, said the shooting shouldn’t deter the congregation from worshiping and that thee congregation should “not allow the lives that were lost or the families hurt lie in vain.”

“We can’t let that act be an excuse to miss church,” Pomeroy said. “We can’t let that act be an excuse for us to act heinous.”

Pomeroy, joined by Senator John Cornyn, delivered an emotional message of resilience on Sunday that brought many of those in attendance to tears.

“I want to assure you that across this great nation people are praying for you and doing what they can to hold you up,” Cornyn said. “God bless you all and the community of Sutherland Springs.”

After the sermon, Pomeroy was met with a standing ovation.

The Sutherland Springs community of about 600 people has received support and company from hundreds of foreigners who traveled to be with the community in their time of mourning.

The First Baptist Church itself will be put to other use.

On Saturday, church officials announced it would be turned into a memorial that will open to the public at 5 p.m. on Sunday and maintain hours during the week.

Up until the creation of the memorial, people have been paying tribute to those who lost their lives along a road near the church. The road is adorned with crosses, balloons and flowers, commemorating those who were killed.

Now there will be an indoor memorial where people can reflect on the 26 people who lost their lives.

Read more at: KSAT

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Here’s the Story about the Texas Church Shooting Gun Control Advocates Don’t Want You to Hear

By now, everyone has heard about the horrific shooting in Sutherland Springs, Texas, in which a man dressed in tactical gear entered the First Baptist Church and opened fire. 26 people were killed and 20 others were injured.

Of course, the tears were still wet on people’s cheeks when the anti-gun folks began screaming for gun control. Chelsea Handler, struggling to be relevant, made this ignorant Tweet:

If the pro-gun control people want to blame someone besides the man in there pulling the trigger, the man who illegally got a weapon, maybe they should look in the mirror. Maybe they should consider their own complicity in making guns more difficult for law-abiding citizens to carry. Maybe they should look at their part in this war on guns and gun owners. Perhaps their derision played a part in seeing to it that no one in that church had the means to stop that killer.

If these folks had their way, none of us would be allowed to be armed…except, of course, the criminals who wouldn’t follow the laws anyway. The New York Times published an op-ed solemnly titled, “It’s Not Too Soon to Debate Gun Control” immediately on the heels of the shooting. Okay. If that’s what you want, then here’s my side of the debate. And it’s based on facts, not on emotional rhetoric.

Let’s be honest. The person to blame for this tragedy was the shooter.

Devin Patrick Kelley got his gun illegally.

It’s essential to note that the shooter was dishonorably discharged from the Air Force for assaulting his wife and child, and due to this, it is illegal for him to have a gun.

Huh. What a shock. A criminal who broke the law (by lying on his background check) and got a gun.

Let me just emphasize that the shooter circumvented our existing gun laws and got a gun anyway.

Because people who are going to commit a crime like shooting 46 people do not worry about silly things like lying on a background check.

A good guy with a gun stopped a bad guy with a gun.

What the gun-control people are missing is that it was a neighbor with a gun who ended this cowardly attack on unarmed churchgoers. This is the part of the story that gun control advocates don’t want you to hear. It’s the part that they conveniently ignore while screaming that guns are the problem.

If it hadn’t been for two brave men and judicious marksmanship, Kelley’s killing spree could have continued. There could be more dead bodies in Sutherland Springs, Texas this morning.

Because the police didn’t show up until this situation was long over.

Here’s the part of the story we SHOULD be talking about.

According to the Texas Department of Public Safety, church neighbor Stephen Willeford “grabbed his rifle and engaged the suspect.” Willeford was alerted by his daughter, who called him and said that a man in body armor was shooting people in the church.

He grabbed his gun and bravely headed down to confront the killer.

The local said that while Willeford has no military experience, he is an excellent shot, and when he came face to face with Kelley, he didn’t hesitate; he shot in between Kelley’s body armor, hitting him in his side.

The 26-year-old had dropped his Ruger assault rifle and climbed in an SUV to flee the scene.

He said that Kelley had taken a hostage in the passenger seat as he fled. (source)

What would have happened if Willeford hadn’t taken action?

Authorities said the armed neighbor may have saved countless lives by opening fire on Kelley and forcing him to flee the First Baptist Church in Sutherland Springs during his 11:30 a.m. massacre. (source)

Another report said that Kelley had “several guns” in his SUV. What was Kelley planning to do once he left the church? We’ll never know because of two brave men.

The story didn’t end there in the church parking lot, though.

Another local resident, Johnnie Langendorff, happened to drive through the intersection when Willeford and Kelley were exchanging gunfire. He picked Willeford up, and the two men pursued the shooter.

“The shooter of the church had taken off, fled in his vehicle, the other gentleman came and said we need to pursue him. And that’s what I did…

He got a little bit of a jump on us. We were doing about 95 (mph) down (Route) 539 going around traffic and everything. Eventually he came to a kind of a slowdown and after that we got within just a few feet of him and then he got off the road.

He just lost control. That is when I put the vehicle in park and I was still on the phone to dispatch (police). The other gentleman jumped out and has his rifle drawn on him. He didn’t move after that.”

Police arrived within five to seven minutes to the location where the shooter stopped. (source)

Let me repeat, it took police FIVE TO SEVEN MINUTES to get to the location where the shooter stopped. This was after the two men had chased him for a distance and after a man engaged the shooter and after he had opened fire on a church.  So we have to be talking about at least 10 minutes. At least.

photo credit

Kelley must have realized there was no escape and shot himself after he ran off the road.

The man who killed at least 26 people in a Baptist church in a rural Texas town on Sunday died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound, Wilson County Sheriff Joe Tackitt told CBS News in an interview on Monday morning….

“There was some gunfire exchanged, I believe, on the roadway also, and then (the shooter’s vehicle) wrecked out,” said Tackitt. “At this time we believe that he had a self-inflicted gunshot wound, after he wrecked out.” (source)

So tell me again about how civilized people should call the police and wait for help. Tell me about how dangerous it is for Americans to have guns and take the responsibility for their own safety.

What if someone in that church had been carrying concealed?

Maybe today, I wouldn’t be writing about dead children. A two-year-old. A six-year-old. An 8-year-old. A fourteen-year-old.

Maybe I wouldn’t be writing about 26 people who were mowed down by a criminal who had a gun illegally. Maybe when Kelley stopped to reload, someone could have stopped him.

Instead, the people in that church were powerless victims.

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BREAKING: At Least 27 Dead in Mass Shooting in Texas Church

Several people have been shot after a gunman opened fire inside a church in Sutherland Springs, Texas, authorities told media. The shooter has been killed by police.

Welcome to the Offended States of America

If you know something is going to upset you, why would you deliberately put yourself in a situation in which you will be angered, saddened, or hurt? There’s no other answer except that you actually want to be offended.

Why would you go to George Washington’s church if you’re offended by George Washington? Why would you attend the university founded by Thomas Jefferson if you are offended by Thomas Jefferson?

Why do we live in a world in which the offended people get to make the rules when they deliberately propel themselves into places that are certain to offend them? It’s so blatant of late that I am positive they’re doing it on purpose. We no longer live in the United States of America. We live in the Offended States of America.

Take George Washington. Wait – I didn’t mean that literally!

I’ve never seen anything so ridiculous in my life as the historic church founded by George Washington taking down the memorial of George Washington. I was gobsmacked.

“The plaques in our sanctuary make some in our presence feel unsafe or unwelcome,” the church leaders said, according to The Washington Times. “Some visitors and guests who worship with us choose not to return because they receive an unintended message from the prominent presence of the plaques.” (source)

Even the Google listing promotes the history of the church.

And it isn’t like people have no option but to attend Christ Church. This is a map of the other Episcopal churches in the area.

By my count, there are 21 different churches of that denomination right there in the Alexandria, Virgina area, so, honestly, I don’t think I’m being outrageous when I suggest that there are multiple options to attend an Episcopalian service in a church that George Washington did not found if one is outraged by the existence of George Washington.

This is even worse than tearing down every last vestige of Southerners who fought in the Civil War. (Here’s why I think that removing Civil War memorials is baloney.) While I don’t think any of those monuments should be removed, at least it makes a smidgeon of sense if they’re in a public place. But these people went to a church famous for its attendance by George Washington and Robert E. Lee and then got mad about it.

This underlines my belief that there are some people who want nothing more than to find something by which they can be offended. They must actually search out a setting and put themselves into it deliberately so that they can share their outrage with the world. This virtue-signaling, politically correct melodrama is a symbol of everything that is wrong with the world. People get attention from their outrage. They become famous amongst the other virtue-signallers who then jump on the Outrage Express about something that had never even crossed their minds before.

Our college campuses are rife with it as students are brainwashed by professors promoting violent sedition into resisting perceived “fascism” with the goal of changing our country into a Communist one. You’re worried about fascism, boys and girls? If you somehow succeeded in your overthrow of the Trump/Pence administration, you’d have it in spades in your ridiculously idealized Commie utopia.

And what about your privilege?

Everyone is cast in either the role of victim or victimizer. They are either the privileged or the downtrodden. In this tunnel-visioned world, men are privileged as long as they aren’t black, and then they’re probably going to prison through no fault of their own. Caucasian people need to check their white privilege, smart people need to check their cognitive privilege, and holy guacamole, according to this article, there are a metric ton of privileges we need to look out for. In case you aren’t sure if you are part of the privileged class or the victim class, here’s a handy list from the article. This way you can identify your privilege and check it.

• Ability: Being able-bodied and without mental disability


• Class: Class can be understood both in terms of economic status and social class, both of which provide privilege. Social class can determine access to opportunities, to participation in politics, and opens up particular educational and vocational doors more easily.


• Education: Access to higher education confers with it a number of privileges as well. Educational privilege opens a number of doors to higher paying careers (which links it to social class privilege).


• Gender: Male-identified, masculine individuals still hold a level of privilege over people of other genders. Another word for the systemic operation of male privilege is “patriarchy”.


• Gender Identity: While often linked to sexual orientation and gender privilege, this is the privilege that comes with having a gender identity (how one identifies and express oneself in gendered terms) that conforms to the gender identity that was assigned at birth and to societal and cultural expectations of such a gender identity.


• Passing: Passing is the ability to appear to belong to another group. The ability to pass is itself a privilege because it allows an individual to claim the advantages of a more privileged group.


• Racial: In the West, racial privilege is usually equated with white privilege since power, money, and influence tends to be concentrated among Caucasians in Western Europe and North America.


• Religious: Religious privilege comes with being a member of the dominant religion in a culture – to have one’s own religious practices and observances recognized as the norm.


• Sexuality: Heterosexual privilege includes the assumption that everyone is heterosexual which forces Queer people to be constantly undergoing a coming out process in their daily lives…Sexuality privilege also includes sexual practices and sexual history – the media often associates a woman’s worth with her sexual history through the hypersexualization of women, but also by relating a girl’s self-worth to her chastity and the public disparagement of women who are sexually active. This links sexuality privilege to gender privilege as well. (source)

Welcome to the Offended States of America

Literally, no one can win because if you win, someone will be offended. We have become a nation where no one is anyone if someone hasn’t offended them.

Personally, I’m offended by the constant barrage of offenses, and this isn’t the first time I’ve written about the outrageous level of outrages.

Words to express our affront are being made up left and right by the mere addition of “ism” to the ends of what were formerly perfectly neutral words. It seems like pundits can take basically any word and add “ism” to the end of it and that means they’re being slighted. The list of isms could go on and on, but instead of promoting more equality, all they’re doing is promoting more division. Isn’t that divisionism?

Personally, I’m affronted by the constant barrage of affronts. When did we, as a nation, become such weenies? How is it that such a collection of whiners has become the vocal majority? Certain people are constantly offended and demand the attention of others so they can express the epic level of their personal offendedness.

So vast is the recent level of Great American Butthurt that no mainstream news outlet is complete without breathlessly exposing a secret “ism” each day. These secret “isms” are called “microaggressions,” defined as “the everyday verbal, nonverbal, and environmental slights, snubs, or insults, whether intentional or unintentional, which communicate hostile, derogatory, or negative messages to target persons based solely upon their marginalized group membership.” (source)

Why stop with the Founding Fathers?

Now that we’re taking down all the statues of previous figures in history that offend us, let’s really get on a roll and fix this country. I think we should throw into the wormhole any movie produced by Harvey Weinstein since he was a sexual predator. And anything touched by any of those other people recently accused of being harassers? All of that needs to go, too. Don’t think Hollywood isn’t scrambling before someone demands it. Will that whole industry go down in flames because of the pervs who couldn’t stop raping and fondling women without consent?

I’m not making light of their crimes. Like most women, I’ve been on the receiving end of sexual harassment when I was in the workforce, and it’s horrible. But what I’m saying is, where does it end?

Who has not committed some act that made others feel bad? Should all of their contributions to society, entertainment, or enlightenment be ignored because they did something bad or were even wholly awful people? If something is accepted as common during a specific era, who are we to demonize them centuries later?  Where is the line drawn between people who must be erased from history and people who are foul individuals that still get to have their accomplishments present?

Find me more than a handful of our current politicians who don’t have repugnant secrets, who haven’t abused their power, who haven’t sold out to industries that are willfully poisoning us all to make a buck, or, by golly, erase every vote they have ever cast. Undo the laws that they sponsored. Tar and feather them and remove any mention of them forever. Think about it, we have the freaking William J. Clinton Library and Museum, and he was a serial harasser, womanizer, and cheater. I demand that library be renamed for someone who was perfect…or just be called The Library unless that offends illiterate people. Does this make me a readerist? Please don’t take my books away.

If our nation could be powered by offendedness, we would no longer have a need for fossil fuels. If we could earn money from outrage, we could finally correct that pesky national debt.

But until then, could we please put a lid on it before all we have left is a country completely bereft of history and culture?

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WHAT? Now Hillary Clinton Wants To Be A Pastor?

How would you feel if you went to church next Sunday and “Pastor Hillary Clinton” got up to deliver the message? According to Clinton’s longtime pastor, Hillary says that she wants wants to start preaching. Considering the fact that she stands in direct opposition to just about everything that the Bible says, it is hard to imagine her doing this with a straight face. Bill and Hillary Clinton have been fueling anger and hatred toward conservative Christians for decades, but now she is suddenly going to turn over a new leaf? If Clinton announced that she had decided to denounce abortion then she would definitely get my attention, but at this point this just seems like another Clinton political stunt. 

Earlier today when I came across an article published by the Atlantic entitled “Hillary Wants To Preach”, I was tempted to dismiss it as some of that “fake news” that we have been hearing so much about lately. But it turns out that this story is actually true…

Hillary Clinton wants to preach. That’s what she told Bill Shillady, her longtime pastor, at a recent photo shoot for his new book about the daily devotionals he sent her during the 2016 campaign. Scattered bits of reporting suggest that ministry has always been a secret dream of the two-time presidential candidate: Last fall, the former Newsweek editor Kenneth Woodward revealed that Clinton told him in 1994 that she thought “all the time” about becoming an ordained Methodist minister. She asked him not to write about it, though: “It will make me seem much too pious.” The incident perfectly captures Clinton’s long campaign to modulate—and sometimes obscure—expressions of her faith.

For Clinton, this would be yet another very unusual chapter in a very strange religious journey. She has always claimed to be a “Christian”, but it is also important to remember that in college she did her senior thesis on a radical leftist that dedicated his book to Lucifer…

In 1993, the president of Wellesley College approved a new rule that all senior theses written by a president or first lady of the United States would be kept under lock and key, a move aimed at preventing the public from learning about their new First Lady. After the Clintons left the White House, however, Hillary’s senior thesis was released to the public – a 92 page homage to radical leftist Saul Alinsky, who dedicated his book to Lucifer.

And back in 2015, Clinton delivered a speech in which she insisted that “religious beliefs” that do not conform to her progressive agenda “have to be changed”…

“All the laws we’ve passed don’t count for much if they’re not enforced. Rights have to exist in practice, not just on paper. Laws have to be backed up with resources and political will. And deep seated cultural codes, religious beliefs and structural biases have to be changed.”

Hillary Clinton is not interested in the God of the Bible or in living the way that the Bible actually intends for us to live.

Clinton and her husband have been promoting just about every form of evil imaginable for decades, but that won’t matter to many people. If Hillary wants to preach, many on the left will be absolutely thrilled…

“Given her depth of knowledge of the Bible and her experience of caring for people and loving people, she’d make a great pastor,” Shillady told me. No, she probably won’t go to seminary, he said. No, she probably won’t pursue an official lay position in the Methodist church, like deaconess. (I reached out to Clinton’s spokespeople for comment, but didn’t hear back.) “I think it would be more of … her guest preaching at some point,” he said. “We have a long history of lay preachers in the United Methodist Church.”

Since the election, “I think her faith is stronger,” Shillady added. “I haven’t noticed anything different, except that I think she is more relaxed than I’ve ever seen her.” Maybe after all these years of hard-scrabble politics, Clinton is finally becoming a more straightforward version of herself: a woman whose fondest ambition is teaching scripture in church.

I am just glad that she isn’t in the White House. If she had won the 2016 election, things would have gone very badly for extremely outspoken conservatives like me.

As I keep saying, our nation is in the midst of a cultural war. If the left ultimately wins, they plan to do whatever they can to criminalize our way of thinking. And I am not the only one that is warning about this. For example, just consider what Newt Gingrich had to say about this recently…

“Remember: There are a lot of people on the other side, including in the elite news media, who deeply, deeply want President Trump to fail,” he warned, “who deeply want our values to be wiped out by making them, frankly, illegal, and who are deeply committed to changing America in ways that would turn it into a country you and I would have no real knowledge of and no understanding of.”

In an America where the political and cultural divisions seem to be widening, Gingrich pointed out Trump can make a real difference.

“He’s clearly committed to breaking up political correctness,” the former Georgia representative said. “He’s clearly committed to advocating the kind of future that we want for our children and our grandchildren.”

I wrote quite a bit about this cultural war in my brand new book entitled “Living A Life That Really Matters”. It is my most important book yet, and just today I had someone tell me how it had deeply affected them. The truth matters, and many on the left are trying very hard to convince us that right is wrong and that wrong is right.

If Hillary Clinton wants to “preach”, she certainly has the right to do so.

But in the end, her side is not going to win. No matter how hard the left tries to twist and distort the Bible, the plain meaning of the Scriptures is there for everyone to see. The Bible has been changing hearts and minds all over the planet for centuries, and nothing is going to change that.

And Hillary Clinton better be careful, because if she starts reading the Bible too much it might end up changing her heart too…

Papal States become Vatican City

When a church becomes a secular state with a government or even an army, one needs to ask if the organized religion is more devoted to a political entity, than a spiritual belief. A contemporary example could be the Iranian Mullahs, but for the definitive historic paradigm has been the Catholic Church. Catholic translates into universal. Notwithstanding, the crucial question that is traditionally avoided seeks to ask if the quid essential Christendom Church has operated more as an ingrained assemblage than a shepherd for saving souls.

In comparison to other religions, the Italian Stati Pontifici transacted in direct land acquisitions of visible temporal governmental administration. According to the Encyclopædia Britannica, The Papal States provides a concise account of the development of Church political power.

“The Republic of St. Peter, or the Papal States, emerged in the mid-8th century as part of a broader political reconfiguration. Popes Gregory II (715–731) and Gregory III (731–741) turned away from the Byzantine Empire because of increased imperial taxation, the emperor’s policy of iconoclasm (prohibition of the veneration of religious images), and Constantinople’s failure to protect Rome adequately. When the Lombards threatened to take over the whole peninsula in the 750s, Pope Stephen II (or III; 752–757) appealed for aid to the Frankish ruler Pippin III (the Short), who “restored” the lands of central Italy to the Roman see, ignoring the claim of the Byzantine Empire to sovereignty there. This Donation of Pippin (756) provided the basis for the papal claim to temporal power. In the same year, by the Treaty of Pavia, the Lombard king Aistulf ceded territory in northern and central Italy. It was probably also about this time that the Donation of Constantine was forged by an unknown cleric in Rome. A legitimate donation by Charlemagne and decrees by Louis the Pious and his son Lothar I confirmed and expanded early Carolingian grants of territory to the papacy. The pope consequently became ruler of the area around Ravenna, the Pentapolis (along the Adriatic Sea from Rimini to Ancona), and the Roman region.”

As with most governments, engaging in warfare became a stable in the expansion and safeguard of wealth and power. Wars of the Papacy and the Papal Statesreference:

“From the Middle Ages to the birth of the modern Italian State in the 1870s, the men who served as the leaders of the Catholic Church held not only a spiritual and religious authority, but also a very real and temporal political and military power as the rulers and princes of a unique European state known as the Papal States. As rulers engaged in geopolitical and military disputes, coalitions, and negotiations, the Popes also waged war, signed treaties, and took part in all of the intrigue associated with European princes and kings of that time period.”

Read the long list (cited by this source) of conflicts over the centuries to appreciate the involvements stemming from a political power government.

Flash forward to the actual creation of the Vatican City model that continues to this day. The same Encyclopædia Britannica continues.

“In 1929 Vatican City’s independent sovereignty was recognized by the Fascist Italian government in the Lateran Treaty. Sovereignty is exercised by the pope upon his election as the head of the Roman Catholic Church. He has absolute executive, legislative, and judicial powers within the city. In 1984 a major reshuffle of offices in the Roman Curia resulted in the delegation of the routine administration of Vatican City to a pontifically appointed commission of five cardinals headed by the Secretariat of State. The inhabitants of Vatican City, the majority of whom are priests and nuns, also include several hundred laypersons engaged in secretarial, domestic, trade, and service occupations.

Special extraterritorial privileges are extended to more than 10 other buildings in Rome and to Castel Gandolfo, the pope’s summer residence in the Alban Hills. In addition, Vatican City maintains embassies in numerous foreign nations.”

With all this as background, the 1929 emergence of Vatican City’s independence, initiated active foreign policy involvements into world affairs that are just as rooted in intrigue and deception as those from the previous millenniums.

It is hard to avoid the endless viewpoints that the Holy See conspiracy is at the core of the New World Order. While many are worthy of an in-depth review, the obvious interventions are more than enough of reoccurring political intercessions. Dealing as an above criticism figure of State force, the Popes wheel back door influence that few ordinary governments can muster.

Why does the international community pursue a diplomatic negotiation when most other religious denominations are treated as photo ops in a love feast of ecumenical promotions? Is it that the Vatican is that much more overwhelming in global authority to ignore or does the answer lie within the prominent expanse of influential officials, who proclaim to be members of the Catholic congregations?

These are temporal questions. The spiritual side of the coin usually take a back seat when it comes to tearing down the Soviet Empire or chiming in on income disparities. As most believers understand and voiced in God and Jesus, Politics and Government,

“Jesus said that his “kingdom is not of this world” (John 18:36). That marvelous statement still leaves an important question unanswered: As long as we live in this world, what kind of civil government is right for humankind? The Bible does not contain an explicit blueprint for government. It does, however, provide abundant guidance and clear precepts for moral conduct in our thoughts and deeds that should influence our politics. Liberty, justice, charity, right, and wrong are dominant themes throughout the Bible. The political challenge is to get them in the right balance. In I Samuel, chapter 8, it is plain that the highest form of government would be for the people to follow God’s laws, and that any human ruler (and by extension, human government in general) will be prone to abusing the people under its authority.”

If this assessment is correct, what is the explanation when Vatican City ignores the Biblical inspiration of prophecy and substitutes their version of a temporal rooted political system? Kingship in a globalist world order under the mandate of human extinction weaponry does not reflect the Metaphysic of the Son of God. All of recorded history establishes an undeniable record that peace and justice has never been achieved under a government, in this world.

The more that the Vatican extends their proclaimed moral authority upon wicked governments by becoming a co-conspirator to advance the globalism political agenda, the further it betrays the gospel message of their divine savior. The essential question for Catholic defenders of their Pontiff, especially the current one; boils down to by what teaching of Christ can the Church assert that justifies the imposition of a temporal political government?

“Upon this rock I will build my Church”, cannot be expanded into rationalizing the suspect Just War Theory founded upon the thinking of St. Augustine and St. Thomas Aquinas. The crucial element when invoked freed the armed conflicts that are central to the chronicles of Europe.

“The first thing is the authority of the prince by whose command the war is to be waged. It does not belong to a private person to start a war, for he can prosecute his claim in the court of his superior. In like manner the mustering of the people, that has to be done in wars, does not belong to a private person. But since the care of the commonwealth is entrusted to princes, to them belongs the protection of the common weal of the city, kingdom, or province subject to them. And as they lawfully defend it with the material sword against inward disturbances by punishing male-factors, so it belongs to them also to protect the commonwealth from enemies without by the sword of war.”

The forbidden history of western civilization is replete with armies blessed by religious prayers that ignored the Good News within the gospels. The Papal States wars, in true tradition of blood shedding carnage, had no similarity to the sacrifice made on Calvary.

The religious wars that followed the Protestant Reformation were fundamentally about temporal authority. The universality in the Catholic convention did not shine in the brightest light during this period of conflict. When governments go to war against their perceived heretics, the slaughter is often intense. However, when a religious sect itself becomes a government, seldom will forgiveness follow the ending of hostilities.

In this Transhumanism era, the forces of satanic science confront the basic decadency of the human spirit. The Vatican City creed needs to forgo its governmental secular interactions with the international community and reestablish the preaching of Christ’s teachings. The horrors of an apocalyptic future can only be avoided by divine intervention.

The Catholic Church needs to rediscover the original meaning within the gospels of Jesus Christ. Institutional precedent must not be confused with divine doctrine. Government will never redeem the Cain killing Abel sin.

‘They Kept Us As Slaves’ – Mega Church Exposed Running Massive Slavery Ring in North Carolina

Spindale, NC — Scores of former slaves have come forward to expose the Word of Faith Fellowship congregation as a hub for modern slavery in the United States in which hundreds have been victims, according to a scathing report from the Associated Press. To date, the church leaders have yet to be held accountable.

According to the investigation, the Word of Faith Fellowship set up two churches in Brazil and used it as a means of siphoning young laborers to the United States to used them for forced labor.

Andre Oliveira was one of those slaves who tells the AP he was forced to work 15 hours a day, usually for no pay, first cleaning warehouses for the secretive evangelical church and later toiling at businesses owned by senior ministers. Any deviation from the rules risked the wrath of church leaders, he said, ranging from beatings to shaming from the pulpit.

“They trafficked us up here. They knew what they were doing. They needed labor and we were cheap labor — hell, free labor,” Oliveira said.

The church’s 35-acre compound in Spindale, NC provided the perfect core for this horrific human trade.

Former slaves who’d escaped the church were able to make it to authorities and describe the nature of what was happening to them.

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“And do they beat up the Brazilians?” Jill Rose, a U.S. attorney in Charlotte who heard these allegations, asked, according to the AP.

“Most definitely,” one of the former congregants responded. Ministers “mostly bring them up here for free work,” another said.

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Despite promising the victims that they would have someone look into the allegations, the victims claim that never happened. The AP reached out to Rose to verify these claims and she refused to comment.

As authorities continue to look the other way, the abuse continues.

“They kept us as slaves,” Oliveira said.

“We were expendable. We meant nothing to them. Nothing. How can you do that to people — claim you love them and then beat them in the name of God?”

One of the dozens of victims interviewed by the AP told reporters that she was put to work for no pay when she was only 12-years-old. The males were used as construction workers while the girls were often used as babysitters in the church’s K-12 school and forced to sew during the night.

While babysitting may not sound that bad, consider the following findings by the AP.

The revelations of forced labor are the latest in an ongoing AP investigation exposing years of abuse at Word of Faith Fellowship. Based on exclusive interviews with 43 former members, documents and secretly made recordings, the AP reported in February that congregants were regularly punched, smacked and choked in an effort to “purify” sinners by beating out devils.

Under the leadership of Jane Whaley, the Word of Faith Fellowship grew to nearly three thousand members in several countries throughout the world.

Members visit the Spindale compound from around the world, but Brazil is the biggest source of foreign labor and Whaley and her top lieutenants visit the Brazilian outposts several times a year, the AP found.

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Whaley would travel to Brazil and tell the members of the church there that salvation awaited them in the United States.

Thiago Silva was one of those followers who got duped into coming to the US to be a slave. He told the AP that he was excited to travel to the US, but quickly learned there was “no happiness” at the church.

“Brazilians came here for labor. I’m telling you, that’s it,” Silva said. He called the treatment “a violation of human rights.”

Silva explained that he could only call his parents if someone monitored the call to make sure he would not tell them about his treatment.

“There’s no free will,” he said. “There’s Jane’s will.”

Ana Albuquerque was another victim who came to the church when she was only five. Over time, she witnessed so much verbal and physical abuse that she began to see this behavior as normal.

“They come to you and say, ‘You will get to know the United States of America. You will get to go to the malls,’” she said. “But when you get there, everything is controlled.”

Other victims of the church describe horrifying scenarios in which they were crammed into the basements of other church leaders’ homes to be used a slave labor.

“There was never time to sit down. We were worked like slaves,” Luiz Pires said.

Slavery, in the United States, as well as the rest of the world, is a horrific and unfortunate reality. When the government looks the other way instead of stopping it, things only get worse.

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While people may not be sold at auction in town squares anymore, humans still force other humans to do their bidding — which can often come in the form of forced sexual labor. Government actors, the elite, and churches are often the main culprits in this hideous practice which makes it that much more difficult to stop.

Church of England Votes to Hold Special Transgender Services

IDENTITY POLITICS: The official Transgender Flag [image: LGBT Nation]

(21st Century Wire) This week, the Church of England officially recognised transgender people as members of their flock. 

The Anglican Church will offer special religious services for transgender people.

Many delegates at the Church’s General Synod meeting in York opposed the move, but Church leaders claims more debate on the issue “will help to inform that church, and many other churches, of the challenges children with gender dysphoria face.”

Due to continual lobbying from political and activist organisations over the last decade, UK schools have been made to incorporate ‘transgender awareness’ even at the primary school level, and as a result, the country is seeing a sharp rise in gender switching by children. The Guardian conforms this trend:

“Citing data from the Tavistock and Portman NHS Foundation Trust, he said that in 2010, 97 children in the UK were referred to gender identity clinics, but by 2016 the number had risen to 1,400.”

Proposing the motion, Chris Newlands, from Blackburn, Lancashire, told the synod a story about a ‘gender reassignment’:

… where the son of two members of an evangelical church, who he called Nathan. At the age of five, after medical advice, Nathan became Natalie, and returned to school “much happier … and with very little fuss from staff, pupils and parents.”

He added that: “Across the world, trans people have been subjected to appalling violence against them. In the UK, transphobic hate crime has risen by 170% in the last year.”

In 2012 in the US, the Episcopal Church (the U.S.-based wing of the Anglican Communion) voted to allow the ordination of transgender people.

READ FULL ARTICLE AT 21STCENTURYWIRE.COM. 

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Supreme Court Rules “Constitution Requires Govt to Directly Fund Churches”

In a landmark and highly controversial ruling by the Supreme Court on Monday, the First Amendment has now taken a back seat to extracting wealth from the citizens — to fund the church.

The Supreme Court has just ruled that churches have a right to seek state money to fund their projects. Thomas Jefferson’s famous phrase noting the separation of church and state is no more.

By a 7-2 vote, the justices sided with Trinity Lutheran Church of Columbia, Missouri, who took their case to the Supreme Court after being denied funding to put a soft surface on their preschool playground.

Demanding a right to taxpayer money, the church fought the state law which actually followed the first amendment of the Constitution and denied funding to churches.

The Missouri Department of Natural Resources rejected funding for the church project, citing their state constitution, which says, “no money shall ever be taken from the public treasury, directly or indirectly, in aid of any church, sect or denomination of religion.”

Ironically, the church claimed that the padding for their playground, which would be used for the church goers and their children, was “not religious” and “wholly secular.”

According to the AP, Chief Justice John Roberts said for the court that the state violated the First Amendment by denying a public benefit to an otherwise eligible recipient solely on account of its religious status. He called it “odious to our Constitution” to exclude the church from the grant program, even though the consequences are only “a few extra scraped knees.”

However, the church should be denied access to public funds based “solely on account of its religious status.” When taxpayers are forced to fund an establishment of religion — in any manner (including playground padding) — this is a direct violation of the first Amendment.

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Justices Sonya Sotomayor and Ruth Bader Ginsburg were in dissent and strongly noted how this ruling weakens the nation’s longstanding commitment to separation of church and state.

“This case is about nothing less than the relationship between religious institutions and the civil government — that is, between church and state,” she said, joined by Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, as reported by the AP. “The Court today profoundly changes that relationship by holding, for the first time, that the Constitution requires the government to provide public funds directly to a church.”

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

When Jefferson coined the term separation of church and state, he explicitly noted the Establishment Clause and Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment to the Constitution which reads: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof…”

“I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should ‘make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,’ thus building a wall of separation between Church & State,” wrote Jefferson as he addressed the Danbury Baptist Association in Connecticut, and later published in a Massachusetts newspaper.

To be clear, it was the church who asked for this ‘wall’ between them and the state as religious freedom was tantamount to any relationship or perks with the state.

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What this ruling illustrates is the clear shift in society from self-reliance to government dependency. Americans have already turned to the state for health care, education, income, retirement, and security — and now, we can add religion to the list.

What Is The Church?

Image source: Pixabay.com

When you hear the word “church,” do you first think of a building or a people?

Famous revivalist Leonard Ravenhill said: “In the church in Acts, the Scripture says they were all amazed, but today, everyone just wants to be amused.”

As we look out over the landscape of the church as we know it today in modern-day America, this statement could not be truer. Many are drawn to the church because their flesh is fed in a religious fashion, but their souls remain dead to God and the love of Christ. To attract the world in an age of folly and sensuality, pastors have dressed the church in the garb of a clown or the gown of a vagabond.

But what is the church? Ephesians 2:19-22 states:

So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone, in whom the whole structure, being joined together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord. In him you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit.

The analogy the Apostle Paul uses is that of a building project—the household of God. Every true Christian—that is, the person who has turned from his sin (repented) and believed that Jesus Christ is the risen Lord—is part of the church universal (sometimes called the invisible church).

The true church is made up of those who are regenerate, repenting, believing and being conformed to Christ. We are weak sheep of a mighty Shepherd! The true church is marked by devotion, obedience and perseverance (even under trial) to the Word of God rightly preached, the ordinances faithfully administered, and church discipline employed (when necessary), not because of its own goodness, but because of its Shepherd, Jesus Christ.

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Because the whole theological scope is deeper and wider than this short column, here are 10 biblical and practical faith lessons to consider about the church:

1. The church is a divine project—God’s undertaking to eternally display His glorious grace

Christianity is a church experiencing the glory of Jesus, with the senses of the heart, through the Gospel, by God’s power (2 Cor. 3:18). That’s why a church that is weak in missions is weak in worship. If your focus is on God’s glory, your life will be about His mission.

2. We need to be constantly reminded that the church He leads is not our church; it’s Christ’s church (1 Tim. 3:15-16).

For the most part, evangelicals have not done a good job of articulating a theology of the church. At the cross, Jesus bought His chosen bride, the church, at the cost of His own life. Not a drop of His blood was shed in vain. So, God’s church isn’t a venue for us to perform at, but, rather, a garden for us to grow in. What His Word says is sufficient for all of our needs in the church.

3. The church is not a property, but a people. We can only go to church when God’s people are there.

Some people are members of the church. Others are members of the building where the church meets (3 John). The church of Jesus Christ is an organism, not an organization. That should radically shape our practice.

4. The problem in the church isn’t too much theology; it’s not enough of the right theology.

I’ve noticed that church division is rarely theological in nature. Instead it’s generally related to people being jerks and blaming theology. Yet, there’s no peace in the church without doctrinal purity in the church. True peace comes not through compromise but biblical truth (Jude 3).

Image source: Pixabay.com

5. When we try to perform the ministry of the church in the world’s way, we not only make God laugh but the world, as well.

We’re not called to ruminate about reinventing the church. We’re called to faithfully minister ordinary means of grace (2 Tim. 4:1-6). There is change in the church — but what kind, to what end, and through what means? For that, Scripture, not culture, must provide the answer.

6. The church should not be a community of self-righteous people, but a community of broken people who know they need grace.

The church isn’t an organization of spiritual giants. It’s broken men and women who can lead others to the cross. Maybe the biggest sin in the church is this: staunchly holding to biblical doctrine, while easily accepting broken relationships (Rom. 12; Eph. 5). We should be able to say, “We’re the perfect church for imperfect people, and we do it imperfectly.”

7. The church should strive to be at peace with all men but we ought to be concerned if we’re not upsetting anybody.

A church must stand for the truth or it will fall for anything. Leading in the church is not about casting or selling our vision. Rather, it’s about knowing, following and preaching God’s vision from His Word (2 Tim. 3:16).

8. Be among those in your congregation keeping the Gospel central, guarding the church’s unity, loving as Jesus loves you & welcoming outsiders.

Unity in the church is not something we can ever take for granted (Eph. 4:1-6). Ask the Lord to show us how to guard the peace and unity of your church today, by our attitudes, words and actions.

9. Satan’s first appearance in the book of Acts is not out in the world but in the church, spreading hypocrisy (Acts 5:3).

Imagine if we all acted right, did good deeds, recycled, helped each other, went to church … but didn’t treasure Jesus. Satan would love it!

If your church is not facing spiritual opposition, it could be that you need to rethink your ministry. Satan opposes that which glorifies God.

10. Make prayer your first instinct when you see weakness in the church (John 17).

After all my years, I am still amazed at how weak I am apart from prayer. Our weakness, like all other inconveniences, leads us to Christ. Let us be more upset by our own gossip about others than we are by others’ gossip about us—and pray for all involved.

What is the church? The purpose of the church is not to attract. It is to “go.” But a missional church is attractive. Are you on mission?