Peanut Gallery: Here’s a video of “La Manif Pour Tous” march/protest in Paris. The crowds were huge. Special thanks to Rebecca Hamilton – public catholic – for bringing this to our attention.
Our Mission: to reach one more for Jesus. “Come and see! Go and tell!”
In October 2012 there was a report from the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life that reveals people in the United States are losing their religion.
Here is the main graph from the report:
From the poll, 20% of the people in the US say they are unaffiliated with a religion and this includes agnostics and atheists. That means 1 out of every 5 people in the US has no connection to any religion.
A deeper dive into the poll data shows that this increase in people being unaffiliated with religion can be attributed to younger people.
The rise in people who characterize themselves as unaffiliated with religion comes almost exclusively from Millennials (people born between 1981 and 1994).
There was one other piece of this report that I feel is noteworthy:
88% of those who are unaffiliated with a religion ARE NOT LOOKING! Gone are the days when…
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Reading: Luke 6. 17-19 NLT
When they came down from the mountain, the disciples stood with Jesus on a large, level area, surrounded by many of his followers and by the crowds. There were people from all over Judea and from Jerusalem and from as far north as the seacoasts of Tyre and Sidon. They had come to hear him and to be healed of their diseases; and those troubled by evil spirits were healed. Everyone tried to touch him, because healing power went out from him, and he healed everyone.
Prayer: Lord Jesus – Everywhere we look we see people who are sick – in body, in soul, in mind, and in spirit… people who are bound and broken… people who are caught up in the downward spiral of sin and death.
Send your healing power… come Holy Spirit… fall on us. Make us instruments of your mercy, grace and healing power – that all may know Jesus as the Lord of their lives and Lover of their souls. Amen.
Hymn: “Pass Me Not, O Gentle Savior” – Fanny Crosby (1868)
Pass me not, O gentle Saviour, hear my humble cry; while on others thou art calling, do not pass me by. Saviour, Saviour, hear my humble cry; while on others thou art calling, do not pass me by.
Please click on audio player – “Pass Me Not, O Gentle Savior” – Bart Millard
Let me at thy throne of mercy find a sweet relief, kneeling there in deep contrition; help my unbelief. Saviour, Saviour, hear my humble cry; while on others thou art calling, do not pass me by.
Trusting only in thy merit, would I seek thy face; heal my wounded, broken spirit, save me by thy grace. Saviour, Saviour, hear my humble cry; while on others thou art calling, do not pass me by.
Thou the spring of all my comfort, more than life to me, whom have I on earth beside thee? Whom in heaven but thee. Saviour, Saviour, hear my humble cry; while on others thou art calling, do not pass me by.
Psalm 139.13-17 NLT – Made by God
You made all the delicate, inner parts of my body and knit me together in my mother’s womb. Thank you for making me so wonderfully complex! Your workmanship is marvelous—how well I know it. You watched me as I was being formed in utter seclusion, as I was woven together in the dark of the womb. You saw me before I was born. Every day of my life was recorded in your book. Every moment was laid out before a single day had passed.
How precious are your thoughts about me, O God. They cannot be numbered!
Genesis 1:26-28 NLT – Made like God
Then God said, “Let us make human beings in our image, to be like us. They will reign over the fish in the sea, the birds in the sky, the livestock, all the wild animals on the earth, and the small animals that scurry along the ground.” So God created human beings in his own image. In the image of God he created them; male and female he created them.
Then God blessed them and said, “Be fruitful and multiply. Fill the earth and govern it. Reign over the fish in the sea, the birds in the sky, and all the animals that scurry along the ground.”
Deuteronomy 30:15-20 NLT – Made for God
“Now listen! Today I am giving you a choice between life and death, between prosperity and disaster. For I command you this day to love the LORD your God and to keep his commands, decrees, and regulations by walking in his ways. If you do this, you will live and multiply, and the LORD your God will bless you and the land you are about to enter and occupy.
“But if your heart turns away and you refuse to listen, and if you are drawn away to serve and worship other gods, then I warn you now that you will certainly be destroyed. You will not live a long, good life in the land you are crossing the Jordan to occupy.
“Today I have given you the choice between life and death, between blessings and curses. Now I call on heaven and earth to witness the choice you make. Oh, that you would choose life, so that you and your descendants might live!
You can make this choice by loving the LORD your God, obeying him, and committing yourself firmly to him. This is the key to your life. And if you love and obey the LORD, you will live long in the land the LORD swore to give your ancestors Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.”
John 10:10 NLT – Made for Life
“My purpose is to give them a rich and satisfying life.”
Matthew 25:40 NLT – “Precious to God”
“And the King will say, ‘I tell you the truth, when you did it to one of the least of these my brothers and sisters, you were doing it to me!’”
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Prayer for Changing the Culture by Fr. Frank Pavone, M.E.V.
God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, we come into your presence in His name. We have heard the voice of your Son, and therefore we can make our voices heard. We have been justified in the blood of your Son, and therefore we can oppose every form of injustice.
We have repented of our sins, and therefore we can lead the sinner to repentance. We have done battle with the power of evil, and therefore we can have compassion on those still within its grip. We have been freed from the kingdom of darkness, and therefore we can bear witness to your Kingdom of Light.
Lord, as we come before you today, we repent, we resolve, and we rejoice.
We repent of every instance in which fear has made us silent when we should have spoken. We repent of the ongoing bloodshed in our land, and for ever daring to think that we can deprive the unborn of protection but keep it for ourselves.
We resolve that we will work more generously to advance your Kingdom. We resolve that we will advance the cause of righteous candidates for public office, and that we will be more afraid of offending you by our silence than of offending the IRS by our speech. We resolve that we will declare boldly to our people that no public official who fails to respect the life of a little baby can be trusted to respect our lives.
Father, today we rejoice, because we are not simply working for victory – we are working from victory. The victory of life, truth, and grace has been won by your Son’s death and Resurrection. Today we hear his voice again. “I am the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End. I hold the keys of death and of hell. Behold, I make all things new.”
Father, we rejoice that we have been made new, and as we work to renew our culture we look forward to the great day of his coming, When every eye will see him, even of those who pierced him, and every knee shall bend, and every tongue confess, to the glory of God the Father, JESUS CHRIST IS LORD!
In his Blessed Name we pray. Amen!
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Spiritual Song: “He Knows My Name” (YouTube)
Personhood – intrinsic to our creation in the “image of God.”
The Peanut Gallery 