And Haman said unto king Ahasuerus, There is a certain people scattered abroad and dispersed among the people in all the provinces of thy kingdom; and their laws are diverse from all people; neither keep they the king’s laws: therefore it is not for the king’s profit to suffer them.Esther:3:8
‘ENORMOUS MISTAKE’
Published Nov. 29, 2022 12:05PM ET
Remo Casilli/Reuters
Listen to article7 minutes
ROME—Russia is calling Pope Francis a race-baiting liar over comments he made during an interview with the leading Jesuit magazine America. Francis—who drew scorn early on in the Russian invasion of Ukraine for not naming Russia as the invader—has lately amped up his criticism over the war.
Francis told the magazine, “Generally, the cruelest are perhaps those who are of Russia but are not of the Russian tradition, such as the Chechens, the Buryati and so on.”
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Konstantin Kosachev, the deputy speaker of Russia’s Federation Council said the pope calling certain ethnic groups within Russia’s fighting core “cruel,” were “completely false.”
Kosachev shot back that the pope was speaking out of turn. “From my point of view, the statement is completely unacceptable both in form and content,” he said, according to TASS. “As for its form, it’s not for the leader of the Roman Catholic Church to comment on a situation that neither the state (the Vatican) nor the Roman Catholic Church has anything to do with, I would like to make it clear.” He added, “It’s surprising that they came from one of the leaders of Christianity.”
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He was found in a private home in Summer Hollow, just east of the tiny Texas city of Cut and Shoot, officials said. Local media reported that the residence belonged to Oropesa’s aunt.
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Kosachev also said the pope had drawn a line between people and religion and hinted he may even be making things worse on the battlefield. “It is totally unacceptable in today’s world and I can only regret that Pope Francis made an enormous mistake in this case, which can only have a negative impact on the conflict and will in no way help the parties find common ground and a way out of the crisis through reconciliation,” he said in a statement.
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Russian foreign ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova chimed in against the pontiff. “This is no longer Russophobia, it’s a perversion on a level I can’t even name,” she wrote on her Telegram channel. “We are one family with Buryats, Chechens and other representatives of our multinational and multi-confessional country.”
But be not ye called Rabbi: for one is your Master, even Christ; and all ye are brethren.
Matthew:23:8
The spat will certainly dampen hopes Francis has expressed about wanting to play a role in peace negotiations between Ukraine and Russia. He recently offered to travel to both Moscow and Kyiv and to offer Vatican property as a neutral place to meet.
The magazine also asked Francis why he has never uttered Vladimir Putin’s name in the nearly year long conflict. “Why do I not name Putin? Because it is not necessary,” he said. “It is already known. However, sometimes people latch onto a detail. Everyone knows my stance, with Putin or without Putin, without naming him.”
Francis has used his weekly audiences on Wednesdays and Sundays to point out the atrocities suffered by the Ukrainian population. “When I speak about Ukraine, I speak of a people who are martyred,” he told the magazine, echoing comments he made last week to the public. “If you have a martyred people, you have someone who martyrs them.”
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The pope went on to again defend his reluctance to point directly to Russia. “ Certainly, the one who invades is the Russian state. This is very clear,” he said. “Sometimes I try not to specify so as not to offend and rather condemn in general, although it is well known whom I am condemning. It is not necessary that I put a name and surname.”
Francis has also previously offended Ukraine by calling Darya Dugina, a Russian propagandist and daughter of top ally to Vladimir Putin, an “innocent victim of war.”
The Vatican did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the matter.
Texas Massacre Suspect Found Hiding Under Pile of Laundry: Cops
The prince that wanteth understanding is also a great oppressor: but he that hateth covetousness shall prolong his days. Proverbs:28:16, While they promise them liberty, they themselves are the servants of corruption: for of whom a man is overcome, of the same is he brought in bondage. 2 Peter:2:19
‘THIS COWARD’
AJ McDougallBreaking News Reporter
Updated May. 02, 2023 11:05PM ET Published May. 02, 2023 9:00PM ET
Listen to article3 minutes
Less than an hour after an anonymous tipster came forward on Tuesday, law enforcement officials apprehended Francisco Oropesa, the fugitive believed to have gunned down five people in a cold-blooded massacre last week, according to authorities.
Oropesa, 38, was “caught hiding in a closet underneath some laundry,” according to San Jacinto County Sheriff Greg Capers, who labeled him a “coward” in an evening news conference.
They are of those that rebel against the light; they know not the ways thereof, nor abide in the paths thereof. The murderer rising with the light killeth the poor and needy, and in the night is as a thief. The eye also of the adulterer waiteth for the twilight, saying, No eye shall see me: and disguiseth his face.
Job:24:13-15
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Authorities are weighing criminal charges for those who helped Oropesa evade police for nearly four days, though no other arrests were immediately announced.
A tip to the FBI allowed officers from the U.S. Marshals Service, the Texas Department of Public Safety, and the Border Patrol Tactical Unit to close in on Oropesa. The tipster is expected to receive at least $80,000 in reward money “through the proper channels,” according to Capers.
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“Thank you to the person who had the courage to call in this tip,” said Jimmy Paul, an assistant special agent in charge of the FBI in the Houston area. “We always said it wasn’t a matter of ‘if’ but ‘when’ he would be captured, and we’re glad this evening was that ‘when’ we’ve all been waiting for.”
And he laid hold on the dragon, that old serpent, which is the Devil, and Satan, and bound him a thousand years, And cast him into the bottomless pit, and shut him up, and set a seal upon him, that he should deceive the nations no more, till the thousand years should be fulfilled: and after that he must be loosed a little season. Revelation:20:2-3
The papal church will never relinquish her claim to infallibility. All that she has done in her persecution of those who reject her dogmas she holds to be right; and would she not repeat the same acts, should the opportunity be presented? Let the restraints now imposed by secular governments be removed and Rome be reinstated in her former power, and there would speedily be a revival of her tyranny and persecution. GC 564.2
The Great Controversy Between Christ and Satan by Ellen G White
“To the victims and the families, you are at the forefront of our minds. We are delighted that he’s finally in custody.”
They that see thee shall narrowly look upon thee, and consider thee, saying, Is this the man that made the earth to tremble, that did shake kingdoms;
Isaiah:14:16
More details on the situation were not immediately available.
Oropesa is believed to have killed five people with an AR-15 rifle after a neighbor in Cleveland, Texas approached him and asked him to stop firing a weapon in his front yard, saying the noise might disturb their sleeping baby.
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The victims were identified as Sonia Guzman, 25; Diana Velazquez Alvarado, 21; Juliza Molina Rivera, 31; Jose Jonathan Casarez, 18; and Daniel Enrique Laso, 9.
More than 250 officers with over a dozen agencies were searching for Oropesa by the start of the week, with authorities divulging precious few details as to the progress of the investigation.
Oropesa’s arrest comes just two days after the FBI admitted that investigators had “zero leads” in the case.
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On Tuesday night, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott (R) tweeted in response to the arrest, “Great job by law enforcement.”
His brief statement comes on the heels of a swell of backlash he received for labeling both Oropesa and his victims “illegal immigrants” in a statement announcing an additional $50,000 reward for information in the case. All the victims were originally from Honduras, while Oropesa is reportedly a Mexican national.
Texas Democratic Party Chair Gilberto Hinojosa was one of many who denounced Abbott for his rheotoric, accusing him of wielding the shooting as a means ““to fear-monger and lie about migrants and the victims’ immigration status.”
After it emerged that at least one of the victims was a permanent resident of the United States, Abbott’s office rapidly backpedaled, blaming the inaccurate information on “federal officials.”
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Oropesa, however, is believed to have been in the country illegally, having been deported by immigration officials four times previously.
Century after century the blood of the saints had been shed. While the Waldenses laid down their lives upon the mountains of Piedmont “for the word of God, and for the testimony of Jesus Christ,” similar witness to the truth had been borne by their brethren, the Albigenses of France. In the days of the Reformation its disciples had been put to death with horrible tortures. King and nobles, highborn women and delicate maidens, the pride and chivalry of the nation, had feasted their eyes upon the agonies of the martyrs of Jesus. The brave Huguenots, battling for those rights which the human heart holds most sacred, had poured out their blood on many a hard-fought field. The Protestants were counted as outlaws, a price was set upon their heads, and they were hunted down like wild beasts.
The “Church in the Desert,” the few descendants of the ancient Christians that still lingered in France in the eighteenth century, hiding away in the mountains of the south, still cherished the faith of their fathers. As they ventured to meet by night on mountainside or lonely moor, they were chased by dragoons and dragged away to lifelong slavery in the galleys. The purest, the most refined, and the most intelligent of the French were chained, in horrible torture, amidst robbers and assassins. (See Wylie, b. 22, ch. 6.) Others, more mercifully dealt with, were shot down in cold blood, as, unarmed and helpless, they fell upon their knees in prayer. Hundreds of aged men, defenseless women, and innocent children were left dead upon the earth at their place of meeting. In traversing the mountainside or the forest, where they had been accustomed to assemble, it was not unusual to find “at every four paces, dead bodies dotting the sward, and corpses hanging suspended from the trees.” Their country, laid waste with the sword, the ax, the fagot, “was converted into one vast, gloomy wilderness.” “These atrocities were enacted … in no dark age, but in the brilliant era of Louis XIV. Science was then cultivated, letters flourished, the divines of the court and of the capital were learned and eloquent men, and greatly affected the graces of meekness and charity.”— Ibid., b. 22, ch. 7.
But blackest in the black catalogue of crime, most horrible among the fiendish deeds of all the dreadful centuries, was the St. Bartholomew Massacre. The world still recalls with shuddering horror the scenes of that most cowardly and cruel onslaught. The king of France, urged on by Romish priests and prelates, lent his sanction to the dreadful work. A bell, tolling at dead of night, was a signal for the slaughter. Protestants by thousands, sleeping quietly in their homes, trusting to the plighted honor of their king, were dragged forth without a warning and murdered in cold blood.
As Christ was the invisible leader of His people from Egyptian bondage, so was Satan the unseen leader of his subjects in this horrible work of multiplying martyrs. For seven days the massacre was continued in Paris, the first three with inconceivable fury. And it was not confined to the city itself, but by special order of the king was extended to all the provinces and towns where Protestants were found. Neither age nor sex was respected. Neither the innocent babe nor the man of gray hairs was spared. Noble and peasant, old and young, mother and child, were cut down together. Throughout France the butchery continued for two months. Seventy thousand of the very flower of the nation perished.
“When the news of the massacre reached Rome, the exultation among the clergy knew no bounds. The cardinal of Lorraine rewarded the messenger with a thousand crowns; the cannon of St. Angelo thundered forth a joyous salute; and bells rang out from every steeple; bonfires turned night into day; and Gregory XIII, attended by the cardinals and other ecclesiastical dignitaries, went in long procession to the church of St. Louis, where the cardinal of Lorraine chanted a Te Deum …. A medal was struck to commemorate the massacre, and in the Vatican may still be seen three frescoes of Vasari, describing the attack upon the admiral, the king in council plotting the massacre, and the massacre itself. Gregory sent Charles the Golden Rose; and four months after the massacre, … he listened complacently to the sermon of a French priest, … who spoke of ‘that day so full of happiness and joy, when the most holy father received the news, and went in solemn state to render thanks to God and St. Louis.'”—Henry White, The Massacre of St. Bartholomew, ch. 14, par. 34.
The same master spirit that urged on the St. Bartholomew Massacre led also in the scenes of the Revolution. Jesus Christ was declared to be an impostor, and the rallying cry of the French infidels was, “Crush the Wretch,” meaning Christ. Heaven-daring blasphemy and abominable wickedness went hand in hand, and the basest of men, the most abandoned monsters of cruelty and vice, were most highly exalted. In all this, supreme homage was paid to Satan; while Christ, in His characteristics of truth, purity, and unselfish love, was crucified.
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“The beast that ascendeth out of the bottomless pit shall make war against them, and shall overcome them, and kill them.” The atheistical power that ruled in France during the Revolution and the Reign of Terror, did wage such a war against God and His holy word as the world had never witnessed. The worship of the Deity was abolished by the National Assembly. Bibles were collected and publicly burned with every possible manifestation of scorn. The law of God was trampled underfoot. The institutions of the Bible were abolished. The weekly rest day was set aside, and in its stead every tenth day was devoted to reveling and blasphemy. Baptism and the Communion were prohibited. And announcements posted conspicuously over the burial places declared death to be an eternal sleep.
The fear of God was said to be so far from the beginning of wisdom that it was the beginning of folly. All religious worship was prohibited, except that of liberty and the country. The “constitutional bishop of Paris was brought forward to play the principal part in the most impudent and scandalous farce ever acted in the face of a national representation…. He was brought forward in full procession, to declare to the Convention that the religion which he had taught so many years was, in every respect, a piece of priestcraft, which had no foundation either in history or sacred truth. He disowned, in solemn and explicit terms, the existence of the Deity to whose worship he had been consecrated, and devoted himself in future to the homage of liberty, equality, virtue, and morality. He then laid on the table his episcopal decorations, and received a fraternal embrace from the president of the Convention. Several apostate priests followed the example of this prelate.”—Scott, vol. 1, ch. 17 GC 271.2 – GC 274.1
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