An Attack Against Religious Freedom by the Courts of Our Land?

An appellate court recently ruled against religious liberty against a Colorado baker who refused to make a wedding cake for a gay couple. He was willing to make anything for him but a wedding cake. He was relying on his constitutionally protected religious right to follow his Judeo-Christian values without interference from the government. Instead of protecting his constitutionally protected religious right protected under the first amendment, the Colorado Court of Appeals violated his religious rights by ruling against him in using a Colorado Anti-Discrimination Act; the courts claiming that he violated the discrimination act in refusing to bake the gay couple’s wedding cake. Such an act can lead to further discrimination against other gay couples seeking services to their same-sex marriage ceremonies.

The Colorado baker insisted that he did not discriminate by offering other items he had to sell. Because of religious conviction, he refused to participate in an unholy union between couples by selling a wedding cake for their ceremony. The baker argued that his opposition to same-sex marriage as something against his faith was not an act against their individual sexual orientation, but an act against same-sex marriage on grounds of religious conviction.

Colorado law prohibits places of public accommodation from refusing to serve people based on sexual orientation. By refusing to bake a wedding cake for the same-sex marriage ceremony, Colorado found the Colorado baker in violation of the law. The appellate court finds that same-sex marriage is closely related to sexual orientation and thus by violating one, is violating the other. By offering anything to sell but the wedding cake, the Colorado baker argued he is innocent from any discrimination based on sexual orientation. Furthermore, he believed that he was protected under the first amendment to follow his religious conviction defined by Judeo-Christian values.  

The Civil Rights Act of 1964 passed and enacted into law to protect people from discrimination regarding race, color, religion, sex, or national origin. In addition to that, the state of Colorado in 2014 passed a marriage equality act which ensures by state law the right for gay marriage. To ensure protection for gay couples from discrimination, the first amendment protection that people of faith enjoyed for many years are now threatened and their Constitutional rights threatened. The recent finding in Colorado’s court of appeal seems to protect same-sex marriage rights from being discriminated, but failing to protect “people’s of faith” Constitutional rights in allowing them to follow their religious convictions. By ruling against the Colorado baker, the courts are discriminating against fundamental freedoms protected under the first amendment and forcing individuals to adopt the government’s view; thus, the state forcing itself against protection of religious rights which in turn, is against Separation of Church and State.

The recent ruling of the Colorado appellate court is a statement that they recognize “man’s law trumps God’s law” which is in direct violation of the first amendment of the Constitution of the United States and established laws of certain churches such as The Code of Canon Law of the Catholic Church; which is recognized in the United States legal system as a legal document of authority for the peoples of the Catholic faith.  In the Code of Canon Law: Can. 22 “Civil laws to which the law of the Church yields are to be observed in canon law with the same effects, insofar as they are not contrary to divine law and unless canon law provides otherwise.” According to Colorado appellate court, man’s law (natural law) trumps Divine law; religious convictions dictated by ones’ religious faith, as it trumps Constitutional law set forth by the Congress of the United States.

We hope and pray that this unlawful discriminatory case against religious freedom is taken up by a higher court and overturned. But whether this case is taken up or not by a higher court, this issue will have to be taken up and defined by the Supreme Court under the banner of religious freedom. Not only the Colorado baker’s Constitutional freedom were discriminated against, but others, as they are targeted by gay couples using same-sex ceremonies to silence and legally nullify the opposition. Other parts of the country, people who refused to photograph, bake cakes, arrange and sell flowers, and provide other services towards servicing same-sex marriage ceremonies, are being discriminated against. The higher courts will have to face this discrimination against religious freedoms that are currently protected under the first amendment.  The courts will have to face ruling to uphold the first amendment guaranteed by the Constitution, or rule against Constitutional freedom by ruling in favor of natural law “trumping” divine law; man’s law (civil law) legally superior to God’s law.

If the Supreme Court rule in favor of man’s law being superior to divine law, the Constitutionally protected first amendment will be nullified and almost anything goes in regulating action or speech regarding the protection of same-sex relationships, same-sex marriages, and other avenues relating to homosexuality while anything defined as divine law would not be legally recognized.

God have mercy on this country; pray for America. Pray for conversions.

DID THE CATHOLIC CHURCH GIVE US THE BIBLE? Who wrote and canonized it? (The early Christians knew!)

DID THE CATHOLIC CHURCH GIVE US THE BIBLE? Who wrote and canonized it? (The early Christians knew!)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S1wnGFJ6Fps

The Catholic Church, the true bible Church.     Who made the bible?   Over the course of many centuries, the Holy Spirit employed faithful yet fallible men in the writing of the books and epistles that would someday become the bible. These works, along with others later to be deemed uninspired, became generally accepted as sacred scripture. But there would be no consensus. Then, four centuries after the time of Christ, other faithful yet fallible men would be used to discern which of these works would ultimately be worthy of inclusion in a closed canon of Scripture. Following a decree by Pope Damasus in A.D. 382, the final form of the Christian bible was established. This collection of 73 books was confirmed at the Council of Rome and later at two African councils. These official gatherings were convened in cooperation with and under the authority of the Bishop of Rome – Pope Damasus – with Saint Augustine presiding as Bishop of both African councils. Because of his great knowledge and piety, Augustine, a once-rebellious convert to the Catholic Church, is regarded as one of the great champions of the Christian faith. In fact, Martin Luther (Lutheranism) was an Augustine monk and John Calvin (Presbyterianism) quoted Augustine more than any other theologian. Remarkably, both were prominent figures in the sixteenth century Protestant rebellion against Augustine’s beloved Church. No institution short of the Church founded by Christ Himself could ever possess the authority to discern the final form of God’s written Word. So what did Augustine’s church look like at the time of the bible’s birth? Catholic. Christians of the pre-bible era already understood that the true Church must possess essential characteristics; as the following writings will show:

BISHOPS, DEACONS AND PRIESTS

“You must follow the bishop as Jesus Christ follows the Father, and the priests as you would the Apostles. Reverance the deacons as you would the command of God. Let no one do anything of concern to the Church without the Bishop.” (Ignatius of Antioch; Letter to the Smyrnaeans; 8:1-2; 107 A.D.)

“If Christ Jesus is himself the high priest of God the Father; and if he offered himself as a sacrifice to the Father; and if he commanded that this be done in commemoration of himself, then certainly the priest, who imitates that which Christ did, truly functions in place of Christ.” (Cyprian of Carthage; Letters 63:14; 253 A.D.)

THE REAL PRESENCE OF JESUS CHRIST   “We call this food Eucharist; and no one else is permitted to partake of it, except one who believes our teaching to be true and who has been washed in the washing which is for the remission of sins and for regeneration (baptism), and is thereby living as Christ has enjoined in a state of grace. For not as common bread nor common drink do we receive these; the food which has been made into the Eucharist by the Eucharistic prayer set down by Him, and by the change of which our blood and flesh is nurtured, is both the flesh and the blood of that incarnated Jesus.” (Justin Martyr; First Apology 66; 151 A.D.)

“Do not regard the bread and wine as simply that, to the Master’s declaration, the body and blood of Christ. Even though the senses suggest to you the other, let faith make you firm. Do not judge in this matter by taste, but be fully assured by faith, not doubting that you have been deemed worthy of the body and blood of Christ.” (Cyril of Jerusalem; Catechetical Lectures, 19:7; 350 A.D.)

“Let no one eat or drink of your Eucharist, unless they have been baptized into the name of the Lord; for concerning this the Lord has said, ‘Give not that which is holy to the dogs.” (The Didache [Ancient handbook of Christian worship]; 70 A.D.)

HOLY MASS

“And on the day called Sunday, all gather together to one place and the memoirs of the apostles or the writings of the prophets are read. Then when the reader has ceased, the president (priest) verbally instructs and exhorts to the imitation of these good things. Then we all rise together and pray and when our prayer is ended, bread and wine and water are brought and the priest offers prayers and thanksgivings and the people assent, saying Amen; and there is a distribution to each and to those who are absent, a portion is sent by the deacons. And they who are well to do, and willing, give what each thinks fit; and what is collected is deposited with the priest, who comforts the orphans and widows and those who are in want. But Sunday is the day on which we all hld our common assembly, because it is the first day on which God made the world; and Jesus Christ our Savior on the same day rose from the dead.” (Justin Martyr; First Apology 66; 151 A.D.)

REGENERATIVE BAPTISM

“The Church received from the Apostles the tradition of giving baptism even to infants. For the Apostles, to whom were committed the secrets of divine mysteries, knew that there is in everyone the innate stains of sin, which must be washed away through water and the Spirit” (Origen; Commentaries on Romans 5:9; 244 A.D.)

“Happy is our sacrament of water, in that, by washing away the sins of early blindness, we are set free and admitted into eternal life.” (Tertullian; Baptism 1; 203 A.D.)

“Additionally, Augustine’s church possessed all sacraments, practiced the baptism of infants, the ‘circumcision’ of the new covenant, (Colossians 2: 11-13) believed in the perpetual virginity of Mary, and taught that after the words of Christ are spoken by the priest, the bread and wine of the Holy Eucharist become Christ – and remain bread and wine in appearance only. (Transubstantiation) Sadly, the worship style of most modern denominations would be unrecognizable to St. Augustine. Many Christians claim obedience to Christ but have discarded the traditions that He and the Apostles passed on to us. But looking to the early Christians, we too can worship Jesus as did the Apostles did on His terms. “To be deep in history is to cease to be Protestant.” (John Henry Cardinal Newman (1801 – 1890; Catholic convert from Anglicanism)

[Our love for Truth should be as strong as our love for Jesus; our obedience to Him requires it]