The Faithful Watchman

Everyone worships something… that is just how God made us. But in a world that is corrupted by sin and in constant rebellion to its Creator, that worship gets distorted and twisted in ways that dishonor God. We can understand how that would happen in a jungle tribe where there is no direct access to what God has revealed about the right way to offer worship, but what about in America today? There is access to the Bible on everyone’s phone or laptop, and the instructions are clear.

But That’s the Problem

Many people claim that the problem is just that—the God of the Bible is much too demanding. He expects people to only worship him, follow a list of rules, act a certain way, hang out with certain people, and avoid certain people. So many expectations and such harsh judgment! They would prefer a loving god who accepts them for who they are and validates their choices. If they could find that god, they would probably worship him . . . or her.

The Apostle Paul outlines this type of thinking in Romans 1, describing a recognition of a powerful and divine being who is rejected and replaced with idols preferred by the individual. These idols put up with and even seem to condone and celebrate the immoral acts that the Creator rejected, so the people’s slide into sinful, shameful acts continues until their hearts are so darkened and hardened that God gives them over to their passions.

A Shocking Twist

So I was surprised when I saw a recent commercial from Apple. The immediate tone is that someone very important is coming to HQ, and everyone is anxious to perform at their best. Evidence of “sins” is being hidden, and bargains are being struck around the table. Thunder rolls as the earth shudders and the breeze flutters, carrying this powerful being who suddenly appears at the head of the table. Mother Nature and her assistant have arrived with her royal announcement, “I hope we didn’t keep you waiting,” as a young lady gasps in awe.

The CEO asks how the weather was (how cliché) and she responds, thunder rolling and sun blocked by clouds, “The weather was however I wanted it to be.” She immediately begins chiding them about their promise to get to a “zero carbon footprint” and wants to know how they are doing. They report on their progress and how they will be eliminating plastics in packaging by the end of next year. And using all recycled aluminum. And getting rid of leather. But Momma steps in to give the poor guy at the table wearing a leather jacket the bad news that he should be phased out. So, would it be better for him to be dead than the cow he is wearing? Her face says it all: humans are worth less than cows.

Next, they move to how all of the clean electricity their stores and offices run on. And where, she asks, does all of this clean electricity come from? “Thanks to you and your powerful wind and sun.” Then she gets both upset and smug when he starts to explain their “carbon neutral protocol,” scolding him for assuming she doesn’t already know. (But why is she there if she already knows?)

Another lady talks of their penance in planting entire forests and grasslands with the goal of permanently removing carbon from the atmosphere. (But wouldn’t that kill all the plants and algae? Mother Nature seems to miss that part.) Then the water offering of 63 billion gallons is presented, and the goddess finally seems to be pleased.

She is then presented with another token: the first carbon-neutral product line. But she still wants them to do more. So the CEO continues to promise more “good works” to appease his goddess: all products will have zero climate impact by 2030. Her response, “They’d better!” After setting the appointment for next year, she leaves the room and we hear, “Don’t disappoint your mother!” Everyone relaxes because she thought they did OK.

So the sacrifices must continue—that is, the “blood” must continue to be spilled. But that is not how the God of the Bible treats his creatures. Although we rebelled against him, he was willing to take on flesh and bear the penalty for our sins in his own body so that the temporary payment of goats and calves would be ultimately satisfied in the sacrificial death of the perfect Lamb of God (Romans 5:6–8; Hebrews 9:11–15).

The Gaia Cult

While people claim they don’t want to worship a god with so many demands, that is exactly what they are doing, and this video reveals the heart of the matter. The ancient goddess Gaia is the embodiment of the earth (Terra being the Roman equivalent) who brought forth Uranus and then the Titans and others through various means. While there was not a strong and devoted form of this throughout history, the veneration of a mother goddess connected to the earth is present in many cultures. And that idea persists today, especially in the neo-pagan ideas of Western culture seeking to save the planet from the scourge of man-made climate change. Placards at Earth Day marches and various environmental causes make a plea to “Love Your Mother,” and those who have sought to revive forms of goddess worship from European paganism continue that type of worship. The modern green movement has adopted Mother Earth as their goddess, and her sacraments and offerings are clear in their worship.

Read more at: harbingersdaily.com

A woman who describes herself as “ecosexual” believes she is in the midst of a love affair with an oak tree.

The woman, Sonja Semyonova, 45, claims she connected with the tree during her lonely, solo walks in the summer of 2021. Those walks began in 2020, during the coronavirus pandemic. It was the same year that she moved to Vancouver Island in British Columbia, Canada.

“I was walking a path near the tree five days a week for the whole winter. I noticed a connection with the tree,” she said, explaining that she had been “craving that rush of erotic energy that comes when you meet a new partner, and that is not sustainable.”

“The presence I feel with the tree is what I’m looking for, but that’s a fantasy with a person,” she said, further describing her experience with the tree.

“The feeling of being tiny and supported by something so solid. The feeling of not being able to fall,” she said, further describing her “erotic” experiences with this tree, although she said she does not have physical relations with the oak.

“I would lie against it. There was an eroticism with something so big and so old holding my back,” she continued, asserting that there are major misconceptions about ecosexuality, which the environmental group the Sierra Club describes as “unabashedly queer.”

The website Here Come the Ecosexuals! defines ecosexuality, in part, as “a person that finds nature romantic, sensual, and sexy.”

Semyonova believes that ecosexuality is simply a “different way to explore the erotic.” For example, she said watching the seasons change is an “erotic act” to her.

“You go from death in winter, and then everything comes alive in spring and mates,” she said, adding, “There are similarities between sex with people and the eroticism ecosexuals feel with nature, but they’re not the same.”

Further, Semyonova suggested that many people are simply repressed ecosexuals, but if they had the realization, many so-called climate issues would be easier to solve. She used outdoor picnics and hikes as evidence that some people are ecosexual. It remains unclear how simply enjoying God’s creation — whether having a family picnic near a stream or gardening in one’s yard — equates to having romantic or erotic feelings towards trees.

Read more at: breitbart.com

He has been charged with 4th-degree criminal mischief.

The man who destroyed a Satanic holiday display in the Iowa State Capitol on Thursday has been arrested and charged, police said.

Michael Cassidy, 35, was arrested after allegedly beheading a Baphomet statue put up last week by the Satanic Temple of Iowa, the Iowa State Police confirmed to Fox News.

He has been charged with 4th-degree criminal mischief.

Cassidy, a former Navy pilot who now works as a flight instructor and was previously a Mississippi congressional candidate, explained to The Republic Sentinel why he decided to destroy the Satanic display.

“I saw this blasphemous statue and was outraged,” Cassidy told the outlet. “My conscience is held captive to the word of God, not to bureaucratic decree. And so I acted.”

“The world may tell Christians to submissively accept the legitimization of Satan, but none of the founders would have considered government sanction of Satanic altars inside Capitol buildings as protected by the First Amendment,” Cassidy added. “Anti-Christian values have steadily been mainstreamed more and more in recent decades, and Christians have largely acted like the proverbial frog in the boiling pot of water.”

After being charged, Cassidy posted a Bible verse to social media on Thursday evening.

“1 Peter 5:8 KJV Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour,” Cassidy posted on X.

An activist history teacher failed a Seattle student on a quiz for saying only women can get pregnant and that only men have penises.

A 10th grade Ethnic Studies World History teacher at Chief Sealth International High School in Seattle gave students a quiz titled, “Understanding Gender vs. Sex.” The quiz provided a series of statements to label true or false, or questions with multiple choices.

Many of the questions focused on personal pronoun use (When someone uses ‘they/them’ pronouns, what does that mean about their gender identity?”) or assumptions one may make around gender identity (“True/false: Transgender people are gay”). Two questions, however, are objectively false, but students are taught the opposite.

Question 4 was a true or false question with the statement, “All men have penises.” The student labeled the statement “true” since it is, in fact, true. But the teacher penalized the answer, marking it incorrect. The teacher claims women can have a penis.

Similarly, Question 7 was a true or false question with the statement, “Only women can get pregnant.” Again, the student marked the statement “true” because only women can get pregnant. Again, the teacher penalized the student, insisting the answer is false. The teacher believes men can get pregnant.

Student’s mom is concerned

The student’s mother wrote to the Jason Rantz Show on KTTH expressing “frustration and anger.” She says she expressed concerns to the school, but was “met with silence.”

“I keep trying to wrap my head around how it is legal to teach inaccurate information and force students to answer against their beliefs or receive negative scores,” she said to the Jason Rantz Show on KTTH. She asked for anonymity for fear her son would face retribution.

The mom told the Jason Rantz Show on KTTH that she worries about the school routinely allowing teachers to bring political beliefs into the classroom. The gender identity issue is just one example. She also said her child, who is white, routinely faces scrutiny for his skin color and so-called privilege.

She said various teachers have called her son, “f****d and racist,” a “product of the patriarchy that teaches young boys not to care about anything,” and that “he shouldn’t use the term straight to identify as because its offensive.”

District defends politically motivated quiz

Seattle Public Schools, through a spokesperson, defended the quiz as “inclusive,” arguing it was appropriate for an Ethnic Studies course.

“Seattle Public Schools is dedicated to establishing inclusive environments that allow exploration of contemporary issues, specifically examining the impacts of power systems such as racism and patriarchy,” the spokesperson said to the Jason Rantz Show on KTTH. “This commitment extends to fostering welcoming and inclusive settings where students, staff, and families have the freedom to express their authentic selves.”

The spokesperson said the quiz was in line with state and local guidelines covering such topics. But it’s not clear how this unscientific lesson around gender identity was connected to world history.

Read more at: mynorthwest.com

Anti-Defamation League reports over 2,000 incidents across the United States since October 7

Whether it’s eating less meat or cycling instead of driving, humans can do many things to help prevent climate change.

Unfortunately, breathing less isn’t one of them.

That might be a problem, as a new study claims the gases in air exhaled from human lungs is fueling global warming.

Methane and nitrous oxide in the air we exhale makes up to 0.1 per cent of the UK’s greenhouse gas emissions, scientists say.

And that’s not even accounting for the gas we release from burps and farts, or emissions that come from our skin without us noticing.

The new study was led by Dr Nicholas Cowan, an atmospheric physicist at the UK Centre for Ecology and Hydrology in Edinburgh.

‘Exhaled human breath can contain small, elevated concentrations of methane (CH4) and nitrous oxide (N2O), both of which contribute to global warming,’ Dr Cowan and colleagues say.

‘We would urge caution in the assumption that emissions from humans are negligible.’

As most of us remember from science classes at school, humans breathe in oxygen and breathe out carbon dioxide.

When we inhale, air enters the lungs, and oxygen from that air moves to the blood, while carbon dioxide (CO2), a waste gas, moves from the blood to the lungs and is breathed out.

With plants, it is the other way round; plants use CO2 to create oxygen as a by-product (the process known as photosynthesis).

Read more at: dailymail.co.uk

Iran’s foreign minister has warned that the war in Gaza could lead to a “big explosion” of conflicts in the Middle East, with Lebanon and Yemen already “involved” and more countries poised to join.

“At least every week, we receive a message from the U.S. telling us that U.S. bases in Syria and Iraq are targeted by some groups,” Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amirabdollahian told the Doha Forum on Monday.

“At any moment, there is a possibility of a big explosion in the region, one not controllable by any party,” he explained via translator. The ominous warning follows the U.S. veto of a United Nations Security Council resolution to seek an immediate cease-fire.

U.S. Deputy Permanent Representative Robert A. Wood called the demand for an unconditional cease-fire “dangerous” and “a recipe for disaster for Israel, for Palestinians and for the entire region.”

The U.K. abstained from voting. U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres had issued a letter to the Security Council in a rare use of Article 99 of the organization’s charter over concerns of “a collapse of the humanitarian system” in Gaza as Israel continues “intense” fighting in the territory.

Read more at: endtimesheadlines.org

One hundred thousand Koreans will be able to utilize deposit tokens based on the central bank digital currency (CBDC) next year, within a pilot program jointly operated by the Bank of Korea (BOK) and financial authorities.

A CBDC is a new form of digital money issued by a central bank.

The BOK, Financial Services Commission (FSC) and Financial Supervisory Service (FSS) announced the plans, following the visit of Agustin Carstens, general manager of the Bank for International Settlements, to the BOK on Thursday. The plans are a developed version of their earlier announcement made in October, that disclosed the central bank’s intention to take real-world experiments on CBDC.

Under the pilot project, 100,000 selected individuals can purchase goods with deposit tokens issued by commercial banks in the form of CBDC, similar to using a voucher at the store. Selected commercial banks will recruit participants around September to October of the following year, and will continue the project for three months.

The BOK explained that the digital currencies have the potential to significantly address challenges with existing voucher systems, such as special grants during COVID-19 and childcare grants offered by the government. The challenges include high transaction fees, slow settlement processes, limitations of post-transaction verification and concerns over fraudulent claims.

However, participants will be restricted to using the currency solely for its designated purpose of payment. Other uses, including personal remittance, will not be permitted at this time.

Additionally, technological experiments will be conducted to evaluate the feasibility and effectiveness of issuing and distributing these new forms of financial products.

Read more at: koreatimes.co.kr

A radical surrogacy law advancing in Michigan seeks to redefine parenthood to eliminate genetics and biology and cut off children from their mothers and fathers.

Michigan, which in 2022 ensconced a “right” to abortion-on-demand into its state constitution, may be on the verge of another adaptation to the sexual revolution: adopting commercial surrogacy.

The Great Lake State, along with Nebraska and to some degree Louisiana, are the three states that still outlaw commercial surrogacy. “Commercial” surrogacy is distinguished from “altruistic” surrogacy, where the latter is nominally a volunteer undertaking. I say “nominally” because (a) how does one really monitor financial exchanges in such quasi-private contexts and (b) when does “compensation for care” (e.g., medical “expenses”) blur into pay?

Are you surprised that the vast majority of states allow trafficking in children? If you are, you’re soooo 1987, when New Jersey’s “Baby M” case was decided. As bioethics activist Jennifer Lahl has observed, America is the “Wild West” when it comes to artificial reproduction.

Amid the controversies over abortion from the 1970s-90s, many state legislators decided to steer clear of any involvement in the emerging field of artificial reproduction, including surrogacy. And Roe fostered a perspective of treating childbearing as an “individual liberty interest” with which states should not interfere, a mindset that has perdured in the various post-Dobbs state constitutional amendments enshrining abortion-on-demand.

So, while those pushing commercial surrogacy in Michigan would like simply to suggest the state is catching up with all the others, in fact, the legislation advancing in Lansing is extreme.

Just as Obergefell redefined marriage to eliminate sexual difference, Michigan’s proposed surrogacy law redefines parenthood to eliminate genetics and the bodily. The only “parent” in law in Michigan would be the person(s) commissioning the baby.

If there are two, they wouldn’t even need to live together or have any formal relationship to be listed as “Parent One” and “Parent Two.” (Yeah, sexual differentiation in parentage goes away, too). Parenthood becomes a state of mind.

We need to make ourselves fully aware of what that means.

For a child to come into existence requires genetics, gestation, and upbringing, what Catholicism once used to call procreatio et educatio. You need a man for sperm; a woman to provide an ovum. You need a woman – who may or may not be the woman who provided the ovum – to bear that fertilized ovum for nine months. And you need somebody to raise that newborn.

That used to be understood as what mothers and fathers do.

Read more at: lifesitenews.com

The H5N1 virus was detected on a poultry farm in northwest Belgium

An outbreak of the highly contagious H5N1 avian influenza has been reported on a poultry farm in the northwestern part of Belgium, according to the World Organization for Animal Health (WOAH).

In a Monday statement quoted by Reuters, the Paris-based organization said that the outbreak was detected in the city of Diksmuide near France and that at least 95 birds died of the infection while the rest of the flock, consisting of 20,100 birds, had been culled.

Previously, German authorities also reported on Friday that 11,500 turkeys had to be slaughtered after an outbreak of the highly pathogenic virus was detected at a farm in the eastern state of Brandenburg.

In the Netherlands, outbreaks have been detected at a laying hen farm, prompting the culling of approximately 110,000 chickens, and at a petting zoo, where some 90 birds that posed a risk of spreading the virus were slaughtered.

Another outbreak was also reported by the French Ministry of Agriculture last week at a turkey farm in northwest France, prompting authorities to raise the national alert level for bird flu from ‘negligible’ to ‘moderate.’

In recent years, the H5N1 avian influenza has led to the culling of hundreds of millions of birds worldwide. In Europe, outbreaks typically occur in autumn and winter, and this season has also already seen cases detected on farms in Italy, Croatia, and Hungary, in addition to those previously mentioned.

Read more at: rt.com