Guilty! I Support the Iranian Protestors

As protests continue to wreak havoc in Iran with a breadth and intensity not seen since the 1978 revolution against the Shah, Tehran’s clerical rulers and their Revolutionary Guards enforcers have become increasingly desperate.

That could be seen in videos that recently surfaced of the horrific massacre of hundreds of unarmed protestors in Bandar-e Mahshahr, an oil town on the Persian Gulf near Iraq. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and his top Iran advisor, Brian Hook, both condemned the regime for sheer evil of this deed, worthy of Hitler’s executioners.

So what is the regime to do? Why, blame the Americans, of course!

In every Iranian media today you will find articles and columns blaming President Trump, Secretary of State Pompeo, and yes – even me! – for fueling the protests.

Hossein Shariatmadari, the executive editor of Kayhan, a daily that is run by Iran’s intelligence ministry, is a top regime propagandist. When things go wrong for his clerical brethren, he reassures them that it’s not their fault: it’s the Americans.

Over the years, he has repeatedly identified me as the head of some secret-spooky CIA HUMINT program to assist the Iranian opposition.

I’m flattered he thinks that one person, unfunded, unsupported, with only a voice, can have such an impact. And I’m positively thrilled that he actually believes that the CIA has such a program (alas, they do not).

Nevertheless, in his latest screed, published in Kayhan on December 4, he positively fumed.

“Didn’t Trump officially support the protests as soon as they started? And didn’t he announce that America will meet the needs of the rioters? I say, Damn him! Mike Pompeo, Trump’s secretary of state, and Kenneth Timmerman, former CIA member and currently director of the American institute NED [National Endowment for Democracy], also acknowledged that the CIA has not only helped the Iranian rioters by providing software systems but also has delivered them hardware.”

For years, the State Department has funded software developers to provide Persian-language messaging apps and encrypted web-browsers for Iranians. That’s a matter of public record.

Early iterations of these apps were woefully deficient, and actually caused more harm than good, since Iranian statehackers were able to penetrate them and expose the Iranians who were using them.

I am guessing that the technology has gotten better since then. Why? Because the regime felt so threatened that immediately when the protests erupted in response to the gasoline price hikes on November 15, they cut off all access to the Internet nation-wide, starting with the popular Telegram app that reportedly is now used by forty million Iranians (half the entire population).

Iran’s so-called Cyber Army monitors traffic on these apps on a regular basis. And they monitor opposition news sites, especially those that have tentacles into the regime itself and expose the abject corruption of the regime’s leaders.

Iran’s intelligence services goes to great lengths to neutralize these opponents, not just by hacking their websites, which they do frequently, but by sending assassins out to kill them.

In early November, an Iranian regime assassin gunned down a cyber activist, Massood Molavi, in the streets of Istanbul, in a brazen attack caught on live video surveillance cameras. Molavi’s sin? Exposing secret documents from within the regime’s intelligence services on a Telegram channel known as “Black Box.”

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo referred to Molavi in a recent press conference where he blasted Iran’s clerical and military leaders for their murderous crackdown on protesters and dissident.

Just one month earlier, the regime boasted of capturing the publisher of a popular opposition news site, Ruhollah Zam, luring him from Europe to Iraq with promises of big money. After they forced him to make a televised confession, he disappeared.

But no amount of bluster, and clearly, no amount of bullets, can check the will of the Iranian people to resist the tyranny of their usurper rulers.

As I wrote in 2009, on a previous occasion when IRGC Brig. Gen. Hossein Shariatmadari and others in the state-run media in Iran tried to lay the “blame” on me and my foundation for an earlier run of nation-wide protests, I would be happy to accept such an honor, however misplaced.

However, neither I nor my board can take credit for such power or influence. As I wrote then,

“The people of Iran have shown through their courage, independence and determination that they don’t need help from anyone outside their country to get them to take to the streets. I have full confidence that they will get rid of the dictators of Tehran. Apparently, so do the regime’s leaders.”

Wonder if they’ve started fueling the Leader’s escape jet yet?

EDITORS NOTE: This FrontPage Magazine column is republished with permission. © All rights reserved.

Muslims Reject Hijabi Model Halima Aden

Making headlines as the first mainstream hijabi model who appeared on Kanye West’s runway then again in Sports Illustrated, Halima Aden is turning heads again — this time as a headline speaker at the Reviving Islamic Spirit conference.

Taking place December 20-22, 2019 in Toronto, Canada, the choice of hijabi model Halima Aden has drawn mixed reviews from Muslims. While there’s always the group that loves the fanfare of celebrity Muslims, there is also the group of Muslims who are interested in faith for the sake of faith rather than the next fashionable identity brand (which is how some see Halima and social justice Muslims).

https://twitter.com/NourMGoda/status/1204071146632699905?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1204071146632699905&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fclarionproject.org%2Fris-muslims-reject-hijabi-model-halima-aden%2F

Though I don’t wear the hijab and understand that Muslim women who do wear one tend to have their own reasons for it, I can sympathize with the frustration of seeing items of faith reduced to markers of diversity or fashion, or embraced by businesses as a marketable item. On that, conservatives, traditionalists, a reformer like myself and even Islamists disinterested in social justice causes, can all agree: Stop fetishizing what some women in Islam choose to wear as part of their faith.

While I’m sure Halima Aden is a wonderful person, leaning into bringing on board celebrity Muslims to draw an audience is against what I imagine is the spirit of Islam. We should be led by our ethics and ideas, and not by how loved we are by the material world.

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EDITORS NOTE: This Clarion Project column is republished with permission. © All rights reserved.

Those territories are not “occupied,” and there is no “West Bank” and no “Palestine”

This article makes supremely important points that are all too often overlooked. Find out how and why the “Palestinians” were invented in The Palestinian Delusion: The Catastrophic History of the Middle East Peace Process.

“Losing the Semantic War on ‘Palestine,’” by Mitchell Bard, Algemeiner, December 5, 2019:

I have written before about the importance of semantics in the discussion of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and how frustrated many people are about losing various battles over nomenclature, such as references to the disputed territories as “occupied,” and “Judea and Samaria” as the West Bank. An arguably more important semantic battle regarding this area has gone largely unnoticed — and been lost without a fight.

Many of Israel’s detractors, professors, the media, and others now routinely refer to the conflict as “Israel-Palestine.” Here are a few examples:

  • Jewish Voice for Peace has a web page for Israel Palestine Conflict 101.
  • Human Rights Watch’s website has the header “Israel/Palestine” as does the respected journal Foreign Policy.
  • The Global Policy Forum goes one better with its page on “Israel, Palestine and the Occupied Territories.”
  • Brown University’s newspaper headlined its coverage of a discussion by two Middle East analysts, “Policy experts talk Israel-Palestine conflict.”
  • Tablet ran the story, “How To Talk About Israel And Palestine.”
  • Haaretz, Newsweek, NPR, and The Independent are just a sample of media outlets listing articles under “Israel-Palestine.”
  • The Middle East Studies Association routinely has panels and papers such as “Regional Politics and the Palestine/Israel Conflict” and “Memory and History in the Palestine/Israel Conflict.”
  • The University of Colorado has an endowed professor of Israel/Palestine Studies in the Program in Jewish Studies.

Why is this a problem?

Any scholar who is not pushing a political agenda knows Palestine ceased to exist in 1948 when Israel won its war of independence, and Jordan (which is also part of historic Palestine) seized the West Bank and Egypt captured the Gaza Strip.

The use of the word “Palestine” is sometimes unclear. Is it referencing the Palestinian Authority, the West Bank, East Jerusalem, Israel, Gaza, or some combination of these areas? Depending on the interpretation, this could delegitimize the existence of Israel and the right of the Jewish people to self-determination in their homeland.

It is also problematic because it can imply that the conflict is over an area where the Palestinians were once sovereign. This feeds the narrative of Israel as an occupier. The Palestinians have never had a state, and had no interest in one during the Jordanian occupation.

Referring to the Israel-Palestine conflict also reinforces the idea that the dispute is over land. Often misleadingly described as a fight by two peoples over one land, the reality is more complex, as it involves politics, psychology, history, and religion. In recent years, the Islamization of the conflict has eclipsed other factors, as many Palestinians reject the historical Jewish connection to the land and will not contemplate Jews living on Islamic territory or ruling over Muslims.

The most pernicious aspect of the reference to “Palestine” is to create a false equivalency with the sovereign nation of Israel. Israel is a democracy that shares the values and interests of the West. Palestine does not exist; it may one day in the future, but for now, there is only the Palestinian Authority, which is autocratic, denies its people their basic rights, and does not share the values or interests of the West…

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EDITORS NOTE: This Jihad Watch column is republished with permission. © All rights reserved.

Trump Secures Freedom for American Jailed in Iran

President Trump secured the freedom for an American jailed in Iran.

Xiyue Wang was a 37-year old graduate student at Princeton doing research in Iran in 2016 when he was jailed for spying. The U.S. denied those charges.

By May 2017, he was convicted and sentenced to 10 years in prison and sent to Tehran’s notorious Evin Prison used for political prisoners.

Just days ago, Wang was flown in a Swiss government airplane from Tehran to Zurich. He was  met by Brian H. Hook, the State Department’s special representative for Iran.

Wang was traded in a prisoner exchange for Masoud Soleimani, an Iranian scientist who was arrested at a Chicago airport last year and was convicted on charges of violating American trade sanctions against Iran.

The charges against Soleimani were dropped by the Justice Department.

The New York Times reports, “American officials said that Mr. Soleimani’s release was a low price to pay for Mr. Wang’s freedom because Mr. Soleimani was expected to be released from prison as early as next month under a plea agreement.”

https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1203366688638541826?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1203366688638541826&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fclarionproject.org%2Ftrump-secures-freedom-for-american-jailed-in-iran%2F

For his part, Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said Tehran was “fully ready” for a full prisoner exchange with the U.S., prompting political analysts to wonder if the move signified a thawing in relations between Iran and the U.S.

Iran is still holding a number of American citizens, also falsely arrested as spies. These citizens include Baquer Namazi, 81, and his son Siamak, 45, who were sentenced in 2016 to 10 years in prison each for “collaborating with an enemy state [the U.S.],” charges that were never detailed.

Siamak was arrested just a short time after the nuclear deal between Iran and world powers was concluded. His father, a retired official with the United Nations, was arrested in February while visiting his son in jail.

Ironically, Siamak, a businessman, was connected to the National Iranian American Council, a pro-Iranian lobby group in Washington, D.C. He spoke out against U.S. sanctions on Iran and advocated for closer business ties between the countries. He was arrested in October of 2015 while visiting relatives in Iran.

As pointed by The Wall Street Journal, the payment by the Obama administration to Iran of $1.7 billion in cash received on the day a number of U.S. hostages were released “has created an incentive for them to imprison more Americans to trade for some future concession.”

Even considering the fact that Siamak was promoting the Iranian regime, the Journal continued, “the mullahs put their need for U.S. hostages above gratitude for such political assistance. Revolutions tend to devour their foreign sympathizers.”

The Namazis are held separately in Tehran’s notorious Evin Prison, where their health is said to be significantly deteriorating.

Other Americans being held by Iran include:

  • Karan Vafadari, an American-Iranian dual national who owns an art gallery in Iran.
  • Robert Levinson, a former FBI agent and CIA contractor, who went missing while on a trip to Iran’s Kish Island in the Persian Gulf in 2007. Pictures of Levinson taken in 2011 were broadcast on Fox News in 2013. They showed a haggard Levinson with unkempt graying hair and beard in chains and wearing an orange jumpsuit.
  • Nizar Zakka, a Lebanese citizen and a permanent resident of the United States who is an information technology expert was arrested while atending a professional conference in Iran. Zakka, whose appeal was denied, was sentenced to 10 years in prison on charges of spying.

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EDITORS NOTE: This Clarion Project column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

Bronx: Muslim migrant plotted to behead people with chainsaw, amassed large stash of weapons

“Defense attorney Susan Kellman said Alimehmeti had struggled to fit in after moving to the US aged six from Albania.”

Yeah, that explains it. Doesn’t everyone who struggles to fit in as a child stockpile weapons and try to join a terrorist group?

“ISIS fanatic dubbed ‘The Dentist’ who hoped to behead people and stockpiled knives and a pocket chainsaw in his Bronx apartment is jailed for 22 years as judge brands him a ‘ticking time bomb,’” by Isabella Nikolic, Mailonline, December 9, 2019 (thanks to The Religion of Peace):

An ISIS fanatic who was dubbed ‘The Dentist’ and hoped to behead people with a pocket chainsaw has been jailed for 22 years after a judge branded him a ‘ticking time bomb’.

Sajmir Alimehmeti, 26, who lived in an apartment in the Bronx, was sentenced by US district judge Paul Englemayer, who listed the terrifying stash of weapons he amassed.

They included a military-grade survival knife with a five-inch blade, three tactical knives with four-inch blades, two credit-card-sized folding knives, a commando wire pocket saw, a 24-inch pocket chainsaw, a rucksack designed for tactical combat, a tactical ski mask and handcuffs.

Judge Englemayer said it was impossible to conceive of a ‘benign reason’ for Alimehmeti to ‘stockpile weapons that would be used to restrain, gut, or decapitate a human body’, according to the New York Post.

Alimehmeti reportedly used coded language when referring to places he wanted to travel to ‘brush his teeth’.

Prosecutors also said that he claimed he watched ISIS beheading videos to keep himself motivated while exercising.

He allegedly initially tried to travel to the Middle East to join ISIS twice in 2014 but was stopped by British authorities both times.

He is accused of being stopped at Manchester Airport in October 2014 when security found nunchucks and camouflage clothing in his luggage.

And he is accused of trying to get to the Middle East again in December that year but was stopped by security at Heathrow Airport in London when they found images of ISIS fighters and improvised explosive devices on his cellphone….

Defense attorney Susan Kellman said Alimehmeti had struggled to fit in after moving to the US aged six from Albania.

She claimed he was radicalized as a teenager during a stint for robbery in the Fishkill Correctional Facility by Mohamed Mamdouh, one of the masterminds behind a foiled plot to blow up a Manhattan synagogue in 2011.

In addition to 22 years in prison, Alimehmeti also was sentenced to five years supervised release.

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EDITORS NOTE: This Jihad Watch column is republished with permission. © All rights reserved.

Terror Attack At Naval Air Station Highlights Immigration Catastrophe

Limitations in the vetting process endanger national security.

The nearly all-consuming fixation on the lack of border security along the U.S./Mexican border ignore the many other elements of what should be a cohesive and coordinated immigration system.

Contrary to the claims made by the open borders, immigration anarchists, the purpose of the border wall is not to prevent the entry of aliens and/or cargo into the United States, but to make certain that all who enter the United States are properly vetted and records of their entry are created.

However, not enough attention is paid to the vetting process itself upon which the integrity of the immigration system depends.

The issue of border security must include the process by which visas are issued and by which aliens are screened at ports of entry.

The great majority of foreign terrorists who have attacked our nation have actually entered the United States through ports of entry either with visas that were obtained by concealing the backgrounds and true identities of the aliens in question, or by making bogus claims to political asylum, getting released and then disappearing.

The issue of the vetting of aliens has made it to the front page of newspapers and the “A block” of television news program because of the deadly shooting at the Pensacola Air Naval Station by a 21 year old member of the Saudi military, Mohammed Saeed Alshamrani, a second lieutenant in the Saudi Air Force as reported in the New York Times on December 6, 2019, Trainee on Military Base Mounts Deadly Attack.

It has been reported that Alshamrani had posted virulently anti-American remarks in social media.  The immediate obvious question is whether or not the vetting process including appropriate searches of social media accounts that might have disclosed his hatred of America before he was granted his visa.

The ability to effectively vet applicants is limited.  Searches delve into possible criminal histories, but when applicants have no criminal histories and no known ties to criminal or terrorist organizations, such vetting process may fail.

Apparently there are two purposes behind the training of foreign pilots by the U.S. military: to protect U.S. national security interests and encourage the sale of military aircraft and other equipment by U.S. military suppliers.

Justifiably, a number of political leaders, and other have called for the suspension of this program so that the vetting process can be evaluated.  To this point, on December 8, 2019 the New York Post reported, Lindsey Graham wants training program suspended after Pensacola shooting.

That report included this excerpt:

US Rep. Matt Gaetz, a Florida Republican who represents the base, said on ABC’s “This Week” that the incident “has to inform our ongoing relationship with Saudi Arabia.”

“We should not be taking new incoming Saudi students until we’re absolutely confident in our vetting process,” Gaetz said.

There are currently more than 850 Saudis in the US for various training activities — among about 5,000 foreigners from 153 countries in the country undergoing some form of military training.

There has been a string of incidents that include foreign military students going missing in the United States in the past. There have also been worrying reports about foreign students enrolled in other U.S. schools going missing, including some who are citizens of countries that have a nexus to terrorism.  Yet with only about 6,000 ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) agents for the entire United States and with more than half of them engaged in the investigation of non-immigration issues, there are precious few agents available to enforce the immigration laws.  “Sanctuary” policies of a growing number of cities and states exacerbate the crisis.

One of the most astonishing incidents involving a failure of the vetting process occurred six months after the terror attacks of September 11, 2001 when it was discovered that two of the dead terrorists had been granted authorization to attend a civilian flight school in March 2002, six months after they participated in the terror attacks of 9/11.

On March 19, 2001 the House Subcommittee on Immigration and Claims conducted a hearing into that fiasco on the topic, INS’s March 2002 Notification Of Approval Of Change Of Status For Pilot Training For Terrorist Hijackers Mohammed Atta And Marwan Al-Shehhi.  The video of that hearing is worth watching.

I was called as an expert witness at that hearing.

For all of the beast-beating and complaints of the members of that subcommittee and other members of congress, measures to prevent such failures have been outweighed by the demands of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and a veritable laundry list of corporations and special interest groups that our immigration laws not be enforced and our borders be allowed to remain wide open by those who know the price of everything and the value of nothing- even when lives and national security are on the line!

Today we are focused on aliens being given the best possible military flight training in America’s latest fighter planes.  The possibilities of what such a highly-trained pilot could do in the seat of such as aircraft is mind-numbing.

In the wake of the shooting at the Pensacola Air Naval Station information had been circulated that the alleged shooter had visited New York City days before the attack, possibly in the company of other classmates.  This immediately gave rise the concern that he, and possibly others, might have been scoping out potential targets for terror attacks.

The mainstream media, in a moment of rare candor raised that possibility.  Yet no one had thought to a Department of Justice press release published just days earlier.

On December 3, 2019 the DOJ reported, Hizballah Operative Sentenced to 40 Years in Prison for Covert Terrorist Activities on Behalf of Hizballah’s Islamic Jihad Organization; Ali Kourani Was Trained by Hizballah’s External Terrorist Operations Component and Gathered Intelligence in New York City in Support of Attack-Planning Efforts.

You will notice in this excerpt from the earlier DOJ press release that announced Kourani’s  conviction that immigration law violations were among the crimes that he committed:

Yesterday, a jury returned a guilty verdict against Ali Kourani, a.k.a. “Ali Mohamad Kourani,” a.k.a. “Jacob Lewis,” a.k.a. “Daniel,” on all eight counts in the Indictment, which charged him with terrorism, sanctions and immigration offenses for his illicit work as an operative for Hizballah’s external attack-planning component.  Kourani is scheduled to be sentenced on Sept. 27, 2019…

My recent article, Alleged Hezbollah “Sleeper” Arrested In NYC By Joint Terrorism Task Force included this paragraph:

On September 19, 2019 the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York issued a press release that announced, Manhattan U.S. Attorney Announces Indictment Of New Jersey Man For Terrorist Activities On Behalf Of Hizballah’s Islamic Jihad Organization. The subtitle of that press release provides more disturbing information, Alexei Saab Allegedly Was Trained by Hizballah’s External Terrorist Operations Component in Bomb-Making and Conducted Intelligence-Gathering in New York City and Washington, D.C., and Elsewhere in Support of Hizballah’s Attack-Planning Efforts.

On August 2, 2019 the Justice Department posted thus extremely this worrying news release, Afghanistan National and Former U.S. Military Interpreter Charged for Role in Human Smuggling Conspiracy.

On August 20, 2018 the Department of Justice issued a press releaseTwo Individuals Charged for Acting as Illegal Agents of the Government of Iran. 

My piece written in February 2018, Saudi Graduate Of Al Qaeda Terror Training Camp Arrested In Oklahoma –  Alleged classmate of 9/11 hijackers attended US flight school in 2016 included a link to the DOJ press release, Saudi Citizen Charged in Oklahoma With Concealing Attendance at Al Qaeda Training Camp.

There is a clear nexus between immigration and national security yet, for decades, the immigration system has abjectly lacked the resources it needs to imbue this important mission with the resources essential to enhancing the integrity of this vital system.  Furthermore, the radical Left have demanded the dismantling of immigration law enforcement altogether, in essence ordering “Shields down” in a truly perilous era.

How many more innocent victims must be slaughtered before our nation comes to its senses?

RELATED ARTICLE: ‘Catch and Release Is Over’: Border Apprehensions Drop for Sixth Month in a Row

EDITORS NOTE: This FrontPage Magazine column is republished with permission. © All rights reserved.

Not All Findings of Religious Freedom Index Are Encouraging

The Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, a leading nonprofit law firm defending religious freedom, is taking an innovative approach to evaluate the current state of religious freedom in America.

Most assessments in this area focus on government actions such as laws, regulations, or court decisions that affect religious freedom. Becket’s first-ever Religious Freedom Index instead focuses on public opinion, using a national poll to examine six dimensions of religious freedom. The results are generally positive, with a few caveats.

At least formally, religious freedom in America long has been defined broadly. The First Amendment, for example, refers to the “free exercise of religion,” which obviously extends beyond speech or religious worship. In fact, colonial laws protected the exercise of religion for more than a century before the United States was born.

In the mid-20th century, following World War II, the U.S. was an original supporter of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Article 18 of that document says that religious freedom includes both belief and behavior, in private and in public, individually and collectively.


The demand for socialism is on the rise from young Americans today. But is socialism even morally sound? Find out more now >>


But rights, even such fundamental and comprehensive ones, are more than statements or ideas. To be real, they must be experienced and that, in turn, depends a great deal on people’s understanding, perception, support, or opposition to religious freedom. This is why, for example, the Pew Research Center’s evaluation of religious freedom around the world looks at social, as well as government, hostilities involving religion.

Becket’s Religious Freedom Index asked about the degree of acceptance/support or challenge/opposition to six dimensions of religious freedom.

The index, for example, asked five questions about religious pluralism, such as practicing religion in daily life without fear of discrimination or harm. Overall, it shows an average of 80% support for religious pluralism.

Although there was little difference between Democrats and Republicans regarding religious pluralism, the largest gap was about the freedom to practice one’s religious beliefs “even if they are contrary to accepted majority practices.”

Significantly, however, Democrats led Republicans by 10 points (85% to 75%). Future indexes will show whether this continues as the category of “accepted majority practices” changes over time.

The Religious Freedom Index also explored “how Americans value religion and its role in society.” The results were not as encouraging.

“When it comes to issues and what happens today in our country,” for example, 56% said that religion is “part of the solution” while 44% said it is “part of the problem.” The division about “people of faith” was 59% to 41%.

Problems, of course, need solutions. This perception by many (thankfully, not a majority) that not only religion in general, but people of faith in particular, are part of the problem may weaken support for the freedom to practice one’s religious beliefs even when those beliefs are contrary to majority practices.

The index also examined the familiar area of church and state. Here, even though the U.S. Constitution explicitly prohibits any “religious test for public office,” one-quarter of Americans say that candidates “should be disqualified or blocked from holding public offices” based on their religious beliefs.

They also say that “[s]ociety should not tolerate public officials who might allow their religious beliefs to influence their decisions.” It will surprise many that the percent of religious people who say they believe this is exactly the same as the percent of agnostics and atheists.

The Religious Freedom Index is based on an online poll surveying a representative sample of 1,000 Americans age 18 and older. The margin of error was plus or minus 3.1%, and Heart and Mind Strategies constructed  the index.

Becket’s conclusion from this first Religious Freedom Index is that “there is evidence for broad support of robust religious freedom protections, discomfort with government interfering in religious practice, and positive attitudes toward a culture of accommodation of religious practice.”

The caveat, however, is this: “Within each dimension the composition of support and opposition varies depending on political parties, age, ethnicity and many other factors.”

This means that the consensus supporting religious freedom in America might be broad, but it also may not be very deep.

COMMENTARY BY

Thomas Jipping is deputy director of the Edwin Meese III Center for Legal and Judicial Studies and senior legal fellow at The Heritage Foundation. Twitter: .

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A Note for our Readers:

With the demand for socialism at an all-time high among our young people—our future leaders and decisionmakers—the experts at Heritage stopped and asked a question that not many have asked:

Is socialism really morally sound?

The researchers at The Heritage Foundation have put together a guide to help you and our fellow Americans better understand the 9 Ways That Socialism Will Morally Bankrupt America.

They’re making this guide available to all readers of The Daily Signal for free today!

GET YOUR FREE COPY NOW! >>


EDITORS NOTE: This Daily Signal column is republished with permission. © All rights reserved.

Trump: “The King said that the Saudi people are greatly angered by the barbaric actions of the shooter”

https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1203030938663428103?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1203030941108711424&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.jihadwatch.org%2F2019%2F12%2Ftrump-the-king-said-that-the-saudi-people-are-greatly-angered-by-the-barbaric-actions-of-the-shooter

Does Trump himself believe this? Does he actually think that “the Saudi people…love the American people”? Or is he calculating that he needs to take this line because he wants to keep the Saudis on his side against Iran?

Either way, the Saudi problem is not going to go away, and is going to have to be dealt with sooner or later. This is a regime that has spent billions, if not trillions, to spread Wahhabi Islam — a form of the religion that is even more virulent and violent than the others — around the world. Its schools are routinely found to teach hatred of Jews and Christians, despite repeated promises of textbook reform. Even if Trump thinks the Saudi regime is reforming, a claim that has been made but for which there is scant evidence, he should realize that “the Saudi people” are mostly doctrinaire Muslims (as they have been taught to be and threatened into remaining) who therefore have no love for the kuffar of America.

For years I have called for an end to our sham alliance with Saudi Arabia. The Pensacola shooting only shows yet again why this is needed.

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EDITORS NOTE: This Jihad Watch column is republished with permission. © All rights reserved.

VIDEO: The Vortex — Taking Down Bad Bishops

TRANSCRIPT

As you more than likely know, the lying, cheating former bishop of Buffalo, Richard Malone, is now off the scene.

Malone, you might recall, is who Church Militant tried questioning in the Detroit airport a year ago, just as his corruption and cover-up were coming into the full light of day and the media spotlight. What we were specifically querying him about, and that he lied to us about, was the case of Anthony Ravarini, whom Church Militant had interviewed a few months before.

Anthony was forced to perform oral sex on a Buffalo priest when he was six years old. There were two witnesses to the event.

But when we asked about justice for Anthony — specifically why Malone had left the offending priest, Fr. Denis Riter, not only in active ministry, but actually a pastor at a Buffalo diocesan parish — Malone lied to us and said the case had been fully examined by his sex abuse review board. Then, the lying, cheating bishop turned around and accused us of lying — because that’s what liars do.

He lied when he said his review board had thoroughly investigated the case. No, they did not, and still haven’t. Anthony was never questioned. Neither of the witnesses was ever questioned. That obviously leaves open the question of just who was questioned.

The abusive priest was (and he denied it), even claiming that the young Anthony had caused the genetic material to be on his face, hair and clothing by his own effort. That ludicrous claim was apparently enough for Malone and his “review board.”

Cases like that are why Bp. Malone is now former Bp. Malone.

But note: The arrogance this man displayed and still continues to display is breathtaking. He had the gall to issue a statement the day the Pope fired him, saying he was planning on sticking around the diocese to help with the healing — his word — and said that his leaving was his choice. Liar! Just incredible!

But don’t think Malone is alone in his arrogance among the bishops. He just got caught — something they had better get used to in the coming months. Hundreds of lawsuits have flooded the courts, and the truth of this decades-long evil of sex abuse (most of it homosexual, power, ambition, financial malfeasance and so forth) is going to all be revealed.

In the case of Buffalo, the Pope appointed nearby Albany Bp. Edward Scharfenberger to step in and administer the diocese until a new bishop is appointed. He said, rather straightforward, that we have to look these affairs straight in the face, as they are. But perhaps most importantly, he made this comment to the assembled media: “We are here; thank you for your work.”

That is a very important point. Without the intense media coverage — non-stop pounding on this rotten, cover-up bishop — he would still be running the show. That coverage first came when his former secretary, Siobhhan O’Connor, went to the local media with documents proving his lies and corruption. She and her story were even on 60 Minutes.

Meanwhile, Church Militant had already been working on the other angle of victims like Anthony being denied justice, as Malone just lied to and ignored them.

A week back, secular media did a story on how untrustworthy these diocesan review boards actually are. Their goal is to protect and insulate the institution from financial or legal damages, not to get at the truth. That scenario is playing out here in the archdiocese of Detroit, where the corrupt Abp. Allen Vigneron keeps losing court hearing after court hearing in his attempt to railroad innocent priest Fr. Eduard Perrone.

Likewise, over in the diocese of Crookston, Minnesota, Bp. Michael Hoeppner — who ordered his priests and cautioned his laity to stay away from a Church Militant talk sponsored by a local group — was caught on videotape deposition lying and evading and twisting himself in knots trying to prevent the truth from coming out.

The truth was his track record in dealing with abuse allegations and threatening victims with reprisals if they went public. Hoeppner eventually settled — because they had to — for millions of dollars to multiple victims. But his case was so bad, it became the very first instance in the world of a bishop running afoul of the Pope’s new guidelines for dealing with cover-up bishops.

The archbishop of St. Paul-Minneapolis, Bernard Hebda, was charged by the Vatican to investigate Hoeppner and send his report back to Rome. And for the record, it was once again intense media scrutiny that brought all this out.

When Church Militant spoke with Hebda’s communication guy and asked what the status of the report was, he responded, “After having submitted the preliminary investigation to the Vatican, we have not been instructed to do anything further at this point.”

Hoeppner deserves the Malone treatment, and he’s not the only one. These rotten men live in darkness and operate in darkness, terrified of being dragged into the light. Until the spotlight swings around to them, too many of them are arrogant, power-hungry dictators who feel their office gives them permission to skip over the Ten Commandments and the Gospel.

Being dragged into the light is precisely how you take down a bad bishop. Church Militant intends to keep up the dragging.

EDITORS NOTE: This Church Militant video is republished with permission. © All rights reserved.

MIDDLE EAST INTEL REPORT: Iraq/ISIS, Turkey/Libya and Analysis

IRAQ/ISIS

An entity calling itself “The Iraqi Media Security Cell” has announced on twitter that it has just arrested a major lieutenant of the late ISIS leader al-Baghdadi.  This fellow called himself Abu Khaldun, though his real name is Hamid Shakir Saba’ al-Badri.  According to a report on al-arabiyya he was caught by Iraqi police in an apartment in Kirkuk, in the northern part of Iraq.  He was a paternal nephew of al-Baghdadi’s and headed the Islamic State’s intelligence unit.

Meanwhile, elsewhere in Iraq, the anti-government and anti-Iranian demonstration are continuing without let-up, particularly in the southern, Shi’a-dominated parts of the country.  This is in spite of the Iranian-backed Shi’a heshd sh’abi (popular militias), and some elements of the regular Iraqi security forces, using live rounds against demonstrators.

In another matter, Iraqi authorities have also reported that 5 rockets have landed inside an American base in Iraq’s western, Sunni-dominated, province of Anbar.  There were no casualties from this attack.  The missiles allegedly came “from a desert area east of the American base.”  A group calling itself “the al-Jazeera and desert operations” claimed responsibility.

COMMENT:  The term “al-jazeera” in Arabic usually means “Island,” but can also have other nuances.  In this case it refers to an area in Northern Syria just south of the Euphrates.  Also, north of the Euphrates is a vast desert region extending into Iraq’s Anbar province which, in the past, was often called “al-Jazeera.”

The above-mentioned group is probably an offshoot of ISIS just trying to prove that they are still around, and still active in the Iraq/Syria theater.

TURKEY/LIBYA

Turkey has just signed a maritime “boundaries” treaty with the Fayez Sirraaj government in Tripoli, Libya.  According to this treaty, both countries “agree” where their “mutual” maritime boundary is, and that both countries have the right to “share” in the economic exploitation (meaning drilling for oil) in each other’s claimed maritime “territory.”

Other agreements were also reportedly signing whereby Turkey promised to step up its already vigorous economic and military aid to the Sirraaj government.

This treaty has been reported on by virtually every Arab and international news entity on the planet, some favorably, others not so favorably.

For example, the headlines for a recent essay on the Saudi-owned www.alarabiyya.net

screamed:  LIBYAN ARMY OFFICIAL TO AL-ARABIYYA NET:  WE WILL NEVER LEAVE LIBYA TO THE TURKS!

Brigadier General Khalid Mahjoub, the director of “moral guidance” in the Libyan national army stressed that no matter how much military support Ankara gives to the armed militias serving the Tripoli side and the latest political leader of the Muslim Brotherhood organization (an off-handed reference to Fayez Sirraaj), the Libyan army will never leave Libya to the Turks.

Gen. Mahjoub added that these recent agreements between Ankara and Tripoli reveal Turkey’s ambitions to expand in Africa and the Mediterranean.  In this regard he warned that Turkey, once it has a foothold, will never withdraw and will try as much as possible to penetrate these areas.

The unnamed author of the al-arabiyya article added that these agreements will open the door for Turkey to send more support to the armed militias allied with it and to enflame the Libyan struggle as well as serving as the doorway for Turkey to exploit Libya’s energy sources and gain control of them.

ANALYSIS

This treaty essentially gives Turkey the right to drill for oil anywhere within Libyan territorial waters–and in the minds of the Turks, anywhere in the eastern Mediterranean.

Needless to say, virtually every Arab country not currently allied to Turkey (as well as Greece) has condemned the treaty.

While the above-mentioned Gen. Mahjoub seemed to believe that Turkey’s main interest in Libya and the rest of Africa has to do with economics and the lust for energy and other resources, any close examination of Turkey’s president Erdogan reveals much more than economic interests in these regions.  This is nothing less than the physical expansion of Turkey and one more step taken in its desire to resurrect the Ottoman Empire, a new caliphate, with Turkey as its head.  Erdogan, in his head, already believes that he is the consecrated Caliph, the successor to Muhammad.  Therefore, all the countries around the Mediterranean basin which were once a part of the old Ottoman Empire, are, by definition, nothing more than provinces of Turkey.  They just haven’t realized that fact yet.

Therefore Turkey believes that it has the right to drill for oil anywhere in the eastern Mediterranean because it believes that it is the re-incarnation of the Ottoman Empire during which time the entire eastern Mediterranean (and most of the western Med. as well) was an Ottoman lake.  Therefore, Turkey is only laying claim to what it believes is its natural right.

Egypt and its Arab allies (including the Haftar movement and its allied parliament in Tabruk) have complained that this “treaty” is illegal because the Sirraaj government of Tripoli controls only the city of Tripoli and therefore has no authority to sign away the rest of Libya’s coastal waters to a foreign power.  Egypt and other countries around the Mediterranean basin also fear that Turkey’s moves threaten their own territorial waters.

Greece has scoffed at the treaty because Turkey and Libya have no geographic justification to sign such a treaty because in between both countries is a huge geographical land mass called Crete which is part of Greece’s national territory–Meaning that the existence of Crete has to be ignored before one can imagine the territorial waters of Turkey and Libya to meet.

But what Greece is forgetting, is that according to Turkish sentiments, Crete, and in fact all of Greece, are nothing more that provinces of Turkey’s Ottoman Empire.

I do believe, also, that NATO, and the pro-West leaders of the Arab world (such as they are), better take a closer look at these Tripoli/Ankara treaties–particularly the clauses stipulating increased Turkish support for the militias fighting on behalf of the Muslim Brotherhood Sirraaj government.  These militias, as reported on this site numerous times over the past several months, are essentially left-over ISIS, al-Qaeda, Muslim Brotherhood, and Ansar ash-Shari’a personnel.

In Turkey’s current invasion and occupation of portions of Syria Erdogan has utilized militias composed of ISIS, al-Qaeda, and Muslim Brotherhood members which Turkey “captures” then recycles into new militias with different names and then inserts them into what it is now calling “The Syrian National Army.”  These units are currently in the process of conquering Syria for Erdogan’s new Ottoman empire.

Many of the thousands of left-over ISIS fighters in the Syria/Iraq region are currently being rounded up by Turkey, while others are seeking refuge in the territory of their former patron, Turkey.  My fear is that while many of these fighters will be recycled into Erdogan’s “Syrian National Army” for the continued conquest of Syria, others will be sent to Libya as part of the above-mentioned treaty promises of “increased Turkish military aid for the militias serving Tripoli.”

In this regard, I will leave readers with one final note.  Rumors are seeping out of the Turkish prisons where former ISIS fighters are being held saying that “it will start again.”

We will report more on this in future installments.  Stay tuned.

© All rights reserved.

RELATED VIDEO: Hungarian TV on renewed migrant invasion via the Balkans: The Bosnian connection

Salvation Army Gets Ringing Endorsement from Trump

America isn’t the only thing making a comeback under President Trump — so is Christmas! The candidate who vowed, “We’re gonna be saying Merry Christmas again,” delivered on that promise again in a big way Thursday night. Thirty-feet of big, to be exact. In front of the giant spruce, the president made it very clear that this event wasn’t about illuminating the tree — but shining a light on the real reason for the season.

In a speech that no one would mistake for Barack Obama’s, the president talked about the wise men coming to worship Jesus. “Christians give thanks that the Son of God came into the world to save humanity. Jesus Christ inspires us to love one another with hearts full of generosity and grace… As one grateful nation, we praise the joy of family, the blessings of freedom, and the miracle of Christmas.”

His words were a breathtaking departure from Christmases past, which were full of nothing but the pageant of political correctness. To millions of Americans, Donald Trump hasn’t just tapped into the frustration they feel about Christmas, but the mockery of the values they hold dear. And he took another moment to prove it, intentionally recognizing the Salvation Army for its important work—despite the Left’s latest attacks over its Christian roots.

“Joining us today are David and Sharron Hudson of the Salvation Army. Each year, through their Angel Tree program, the Salvation Army brings new gifts to more than 600,000 children. David and Sharron are an inspiration to us all. And, David and Sharron, thank you very much for being with us. Thank you.” After Chick-fil-A walked away from the group and the Cowboys almost lost their halftime show over the Red Kettle campaign, it matters that this president made a point of standing alongside the nonprofit. The message was subtle but clear: he isn’t caving to the cultural bullies, and Americans shouldn’t either.

For the Salvation Army, the support couldn’t come at a better time. As Rich Lowry points out, the red kettles that used to be a sign of charity and goodwill are suddenly a symbol of liberal controversy. “It takes a perverse worldview not to have fond feelings about this tradition, which is spectacularly successful on its own terms, raising almost $150 million a year.” But then, the Left has never let “sentimentality interfere with their dictates.”

“If you think that volunteering for an organization that is raising funds to provide food and housing, among many other services, for the needy is an inherently praiseworthy act, you haven’t been following the woke Left-wing activists cutting a swath through American culture. Any institution, no matter how storied or how generous, is subject to a punitive campaign of social ostracism that is often highly effective. In today’s environment, what seems preposterous one moment is inevitable the next, and after one target is ground into submission, another is quickly found.”

Fortunately, President Trump doesn’t believe in surrender. And he’ll go to the mat to guarantee that Christian organizations like this one can continue serving Americans — for the same reason he’ll keep fighting the war on Christmas: because no one should ever have to compromise their faith in a country like ours.


Tony Perkins’s Washington Update is written with the aid of FRC Action senior writers.


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Judges: Wise Men Still Seek Them

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EDITORS NOTE: This FRC column is republished with permission. All rights reserved.

Tommy Robinson previews a new documentary film on antisemitism in modern UK

Posted by Eeyore

EDITORS NOTE: This Vlad Tepes Blog column with video is republished with permission. © All rights reserved.

Three of the 9/11 jihadis gave their addresses as Naval Air Station Pensacola, site of latest jihad murders

And in eighteen years we have learned nothing. The truth has been stigmatized and prohibited.

“Mohammed Saeed Alshamrani: 5 Fast Facts You Need to Know,” by Jessica McBride, Heavy, December 6, 2019:

Mohammed Saeed Alshamrani was identified as the active shooter armed with a handgun who killed three people and wounded eight more at the Pensacola Naval Air Station in Florida. Alshamrani was first named in a tweet from NBC News reporter Ken Dilanian….

3. Three of the 9/11 Hijackers Gave Their Addresses as Being at Naval Air Station Pensacola

The Navy Times reported in February 2016 that NAS Pensacola officials had increased security measures at the base, after the base had been known was “unusually open” for years….

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EDITORS NOTE: This Jihad Watch column is republished with permission. © All rights reserved.

Rep. Rashida Tlaib gives keynote address at conference of anti-Semitic group dedicated to destroying Israel

Imagine the outcry if some Representative addressed the Ku Klux Klan. The outrage would be universal and he or she would be made to resign immediately. But although this is very much the same thing, no one will take any particular notice of this.

Find out the insidious agenda behind the hypocritical and deceptive “Palestinian” calls for “justice” in The Palestinian Delusion: The Catastrophic History of the Middle East Peace Process.

“Rep. Rashida Tlaib Keynotes ‘American Muslims for Palestine’ Conference Devoted to Destroying Israel,” by Samantha Mandeles, Legal Insurrection, December 5, 2019:

Tlaib: “I’m incredibly proud to be here. The incredible work that all of you have done have opened doors for myself, somebody like me to serve in the United States Congress.”

In a recent post, I documented how American Muslims for Palestine (AMP) ejected me from its annual conference Thanksgiving weekend because it was afraid I would provide negative coverage. For background on the harassing treatment I received, see Fearing Negative Coverage, ‘American Muslims for Palestine’ Conference Ejects Legal Insurrection Reporter.

Now we know why AMP wanted to cleanse the audience of media who could report accurately on what was going on: The AMP conference was an anti-Israel, anti-Semitic hatefest, and the keynote speaker was Democratic Representative Rashida Tlaib, who has worked with the group on many occasions.

AMP – Key Anti-Israel Connector

American Muslims for Palestine is a key connector of anti-Israel Islamist and radical leftist groups, including fringe anti-Zionist Jews who provide cover.

Though it has a long history of opaque fundingstaff overlap with now-shuttered ‘charities’ found to be connected to terrorist groups, and persistently disseminating classic anti-Semitism, AMP managed to maintain its connections with ‘intersectional’ social justice activists by hijacking the language of human rights and claiming to fight for “oppressed peoples everywhere” (in the words of AMP speaker Linda Sarsour).

 

[Screenshot from AMPs Palestine Convention Facebook page, November 2019.]

You can read more about AMP and the groups it works with in some of my earlier posts:

AMP’s Annual Anti-Israel Hatefest

As in the past, AMP’s 2019 Palestine Conference was chock full of historical falsehoods and thinly veiled anti-Semitism. This is shocking to precisely nobody; this year’s speakers’ roster featured some of the most noxious anti-Israel agitators active today, including ‘intersectional’ activists:

Despite the behavior of her fellow AMP speakers, when Rep Tlaib took the stage at the annual Palestine Conference, she gushed about her pride in being invited to keynote, saying:

I’m incredibly proud to be here. The incredible work that all of you have done have opened doors for myself, somebody like me to serve in the United States Congress.

As Rep. Tlaib continued, she demonstrated a favorite rhetorical trick of the ‘intersectional’ far-left: “movement hijacking“—the appropriation and exploitation of unrelated social justice causes (frequently by BDS supporters) in order to subsume those causes within a broader left-wing movement in which anti-Israel activists are then revered as leaders.

I would remember the history here in this country…still, the oppression of our black brothers and sisters. Every time I saw the different color license plates, the dehumanization at the checkpoints, everything. So interconnected…So when you think about the border, you gotta understand how interconnected it is with the oppression, of what’s happening in Falastine, the oppression that’s happening to our people. When I see…like, the police going after, killing innocent people, innocent, treating African American brothers and sisters like they’re disposable, I think of Filastine and what happens to our brothers and sisters in the occupation.

Tlaib’s remarks echoed longstanding efforts by anti-Israel activists to stoke racial tension against Israel by falsely accusing it of being responsible for local police shootings of blacks in the U.S. As we documented, that campaign went into overdrive during the Ferguson riots, after the Michael Brown shooting in the summer of 2014.

You can watch Rep Tlaib’s entire AMP speech here and below.

There is much more. Read the rest here.

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Trump Secures Release of American Student Held in Iran

Pensacola jihadi hosted dinner party night before his massacre to watch videos of mass shootings

Pensacola jihadi ranted about “crimes against Muslims,” investigators trying to determine if he had religious motive

Three of the 9/11 jihadis gave their addresses as Naval Air Station Pensacola, site of latest jihad murders

EDITORS NOTE: This Jihad Watch column is republished with permission. © All rights reserved.

The Primacy of Jesus and the Church’s Liturgical Year

Fr. Thomas Weinandy, OFM Cap.: The Father established Jesus, his glorious incarnate Son, as the alpha and the omega, the beginning and the end, and so King of kings, the Lord of lords.


Today, even at the highest ecclesial levels, the importance of Catholic doctrine is disparaged. In particular, Jesus is reduced to one of many founders of divinely willed religions.  I was contemplating this sad reality on the recent Solemnity of Christ the King, the celebration of Jesus Christ as the definitive Lord and universal Savior.  In the entire cosmos, he alone holds primacy of place.  There is no name greater, and therefore, there is no one superior to Jesus, the incarnate, only begotten, Spirit-filled Son of the Father.

As I pondered this effective belittling of Jesus, the thought came to me that the Church’s liturgical year is both the safeguard and the promoter of Jesus’ primacy.  The climax of the Church’s liturgical year is the Feast of Christ the King. But then it begins again with Advent, the preparation for the Solemnity of the Nativity, the birth of Jesus, the incarnate Father’s Son.

Christmas is founded upon an event, a liturgical celebration, that took place nine months earlier on March 25, the Annunciation.  On that feast, the Church joyfully recalls the coming of the archangel Gabriel to Mary.  He is sent by the Father to announce to her that by the overshadowing of the Holy Spirit she will conceive a son, whom she is to name Jesus – YHWH-Saves.  Gabriel informs Mary that her son will inherit the everlasting kingdom of David and will be called the Son of God.

In these conjoined events, we celebrate the singular significance of Jesus.  Yes, Jesus is a man conceived and born of a woman. But conceived in Mary’s womb by the power of the Holy Spirit.  No other event in the history of the world comes close to this marvelous truth, and, therefore, no other human being, past or future, can be greater than Jesus, the eternal Son of the living God.

This is his divine identity, and it is unique to him.  No other religion lays claim to such a truth, and no founder of any other religion claims to have God as his very own divine Father.

The best Mohammed can do, for example, is to profess that he is the greatest prophet – a  far cry from the truth that Jesus is the Son, the very Word, of his heavenly Father.

Not surprisingly, then, the Church marks the dawn of the new calendar year, January 1, by celebrating the Solemnity of Mary, Mother of God, for with the birth of her son the dawn of a new and eternal life appears.  Mary, in herself, is the proclamation and the defender of the mystery of the Incarnation.  To honor Mary as the Mother of God is to honor her human son as the Father’s divine Son.

*

Who first proclaims this truth that Jesus is the Son of God?  The Father himself! At Jesus’ baptism, as the Holy Spirit descends upon him, the same Spirit by whose power he was conceived as man, the Father declares who Jesus is: “This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased.”

The Father affirms, and so confirms, that his Son, Jesus, is God as he himself is God, for Jesus possesses fully the Father’s very divine Spirit of Sonship.  This declaration of Jesus’ divine identity is what we celebrate on the Feast of the Baptism of Jesus.  Once again, we find the Church’s liturgical year professing the primacy of Jesus.

During Lent, the Church prepares to celebrate the definitive events by which Jesus becomes the universal Savior, the events in and through which he enacts his name, YHWH-Saves.  Through his passion and death, Jesus obtains the forgiveness of our sins, for he lovingly offers his holy and innocent life to his Father out of love for us.

So pleased was the Father that, by the power of the Holy Spirit, he raised his Son, Jesus, from the dead and at his ascension made him the Lord of glory.  In so doing the Father made Jesus truly Jesus, mankind’s singular, definitive Lord and universal Savior.

The Father established Jesus, his glorious incarnate Son, as the first and the last, the alpha and the omega, the beginning and the end, and so King of kings, the Lord of lords.  During Holy Week, Easter, and the Ascension, the Church celebrates this mighty work of the Father made manifest in his incarnate Spirit-filled Son, Jesus Christ.

To hold or to insinuate that Jesus is merely one of many “saviors” is not simply to denigrate Jesus but to insult the Father himself.  Ultimately, it is to sin against the Holy Spirit – the unforgivable sin!

In order to reap Jesus’ salvific benefits, one must be united to him.  This is what the Church celebrates on the Solemnity of Pentecost.  As the risen Savior and Lord of all, Jesus pours out his Father’s Holy Spirit upon the Church so that all who believe in him and are baptized become new creations in him by sharing in his risen and glorious Spirit-filled life.

This communion with the risen Jesus finds its fullest earthly expression in the Eucharist.  There the faithful share in his one saving sacrifice and partake of Jesus’ risen body and blood. The great mystery of the Eucharist is what the Church celebrates yearly on the Solemnity of Corpus Christ.  We become one body in Christ.

This feast, too, declares the singularity and primacy of Jesus.  No other religion contains such a marvelous truth, for no other religion has a founder to whom one is so united as to be in communion with God the Father through the indwelling Spirit.

So, we end where we began, with the Solemnity of Christ the King.  This feast anticipates the heavenly liturgy, a solemnity that will never end, for we await the coming of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, at the end of time, when we will share fully in his resurrection and ascend to our Father.  Then, in the Holy Spirit, every knee shall bend and every tongue shall proclaim that Jesus Christ alone is Lord to the glory of God the Father!

COLUMN BY

Fr. Thomas G. Weinandy, OFM, Cap.

Thomas G. Weinandy, OFM, a prolific writer and one of the most prominent living theologians, serves as a member of the Vatican’s International Theological Commission. His newest book is Jesus Becoming Jesus: A Theological Interpretation of the Synoptic Gospels.

EDITORS NOTE: This Catholic Thing column is republished with permission. © 2019 The Catholic Thing. All rights reserved. For reprint rights, write to: info@frinstitute.org. The Catholic Thing is a forum for intelligent Catholic commentary. Opinions expressed by writers are solely their own.

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