OUTRAGE ensues after Christian Chick-fil-A CEO invites LGBTQ+ activists to try CFA's delicious chicken sandwiches



The corporate media are lining up once more to harangue the fans of Chick-fil-A, implying that they are homophobic for eating chicken sandwiches.

The occasion for this latest effort is the first broadcast interview with the company's CEO, in which he talks about how his Christian faith guides the mission of the chicken sandwich company.

'They’re welcome to come eat with us. We’d love to give them a great-tasting sandwich and give them great hospitality.'

"It is our anchor, in the sense of what our corporate purpose states: that we’re in business to glorify God by being a faithful steward of all that’s entrusted to us and have a positive influence on all who come in contact with Chick-fil-A,” Andrew Cathy said.

The interview with Craig Melvin of "Today" was very cordial, but it has inspired headlines claiming newly outraged critics of the company.

Melvin asked Cathy to respond to LGBTQ-identifying people who have boycotted the Christian company's chicken sandwiches over gender, sexuality, and marriage issues.

"Well, for anybody that hasn’t tried us, we’d love for you to come try and have our great-tasting food and the hospitality that we’re known for," Cathy responded. "I think that everybody that will be willing to walk in the door, they’ll see that they’re welcome to come eat with us. We’d love to give them a great-tasting sandwich and give them great hospitality."

Melvin pressed him about conservative statements made by the previous CEO, Cathy's father, in support of conservative Christian causes.

"We’re focused on serving everybody that comes in and eat with us," Cathy responded.

Critics in the comment section of an Instagram clip of the interview included Katie Couric, Valerie Bertinelli, and Chelsea Handler.

"Chick-fil-A CEO faces backlash after LGBTQ interview question," read the headline at WAGA-TV.

"Chick-fil-A CEO slammed over evasive answer about LGBTQ rights during Today interview," was the headline at Entertainment Weekly. That report included comments from two participants in a drag queen television show.

"Chick-fil-A boss grilled over LGBTQ rights as CEO dodges question about chain's controversial past — sparking a furious debate among customers," was the headline at the U.S. Daily Mail.

"Today show host leaves Chick-fil-A CEO spinning over company’s LGBTQ+ stance," claimed the headline at the Independent.

"Don't eat at Chick-fil-A. And don't sleep with anyone who does," was the headline of an opinion piece at Out magazine.

RELATED: Chick-fil-A gets support from surprising ally against religious discrimination from Buffalo

A Blaze News request for comment from Chick-fil-A was not returned in time for publication.

Melvin and his "Today" show co-hosts did not appear to join the boycott, as they hungrily munched on the sandwiches at the end of the segment.

Despite criticism from Valerie Bertinelli and two drag queens, the company manages to earn about $24 billion sales across the board last year, according to Melvin's report.

The Chick-fil-A CEO also proudly reported that the company provided more than 200 million meals for the hungry through charity efforts in the past six years.

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Billy Crystal no longer trusts God. Christians should listen.



Billy Crystal recently said he has stopped talking to God. “No, ’cause I don’t trust Him,” he told CBS correspondent Tracy Smith. His home burned in the Pacific Palisades fire, and his longtime friend Rob Reiner and Reiner’s wife, Michele, were murdered.

Suppose you were sitting across the table when he said it. What would you say?

We arrive at someone’s sorrow with conclusions before we’ve heard their story. We deliver our answers and leave. They’re still grieving, and now they may also feel guilty for struggling.

I asked that question on my radio program because someone we know may eventually trust us enough to say the same thing. A neighbor who buried a child. Someone who prayed beside a hospital bed and went home alone. Would we hear their anguish or immediately start preparing our answer?

I’ve spent 40 years caring for my wife, Gracie. Her suffering began before I met her. Over her lifetime, she has endured 98 operations and the loss of both legs. Along the way, people have told us what we should believe, how we should feel, and what God was evidently trying to accomplish. Some never acknowledged the weight of what we carried.

Rush Limbaugh used the phrase “drive-by media” to describe reporters who rushed into a story, stirred things up, and moved along, leaving others to deal with the damage. Are we in danger of engaging in drive-by ministry?

We arrive at someone’s sorrow with conclusions before we’ve heard their story. We deliver our answers and leave. They’re still grieving, and now they may also feel guilty for struggling. It costs considerably more to pull up a chair.

Job’s friends managed that at first. They sat silently beside him for seven days because they saw how greatly he suffered. Most of us struggle to give someone seven uninterrupted minutes.

Scripture makes room for anguish. David asks in Psalm 13, “How long, O LORD? Will you forget me forever?” Those words are in our Bibles. We ought to be able to hear them from someone sitting in our living rooms. David ultimately recalls God’s steadfast love, but the psalm lets us hear his sorrow along the way.

I learned something about the cost of coming near in a dusty prosthetic clinic in Ghana. Through Standing With Hope, the ministry Gracie envisioned after losing her legs, we’ve provided prosthetic limbs in Ghana for more than 20 years.

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Photo by Peter Rosenberger

On an early trip, a young Nigerian man arrived wearing a prosthesis. Our team was occupied, so I sat down with him. We didn’t share a language, and I couldn’t find an interpreter. With gestures, I asked him to remove his prosthesis and the liner covering his residual limb.

The smell hit me like it had reached out and slapped me. My eyes watered, and a friend sitting several feet away backed up. I feared an infection, but I found no visible wound. He hadn’t properly washed his limb and liner, and my attempts to explain what he needed to do weren’t getting us anywhere.

I understood that he was Muslim. This was not terribly long after September 11. For all I knew, he could have been an enemy of my faith or my country. I didn’t know. What I knew was that he was missing a leg, needed help with his prosthesis, and had come to our clinic.

So I found clean water, soap, and a towel and demonstrated how to wash his limb and liner. At first, my eyes watered from the smell. As I washed his limb, I began to weep over what Christ had done for me.

My own stench was far worse. And mine wasn’t coming off with soap and water. It required His blood.

I could barely keep myself together. I had come to help put legs on people, and there I sat, overwhelmed by the mercy Christ had shown me.

Sitting with someone in anguish can leave us feeling helpless. Physical or emotional trauma makes us uncomfortable. We want to explain something, fix something, or give them something to do. Their grief may outlast everything we know to say.

RELATED: Gavin Newsom invoked Nietzsche. I thought of ‘Blazing Saddles.’

Eric Thayer/Los Angeles Times via Getty Images

Jesus stood at Lazarus’ grave and wept. He knew He was about to raise him, yet He wept. That ought to shape how we approach someone whose sorrow has spilled into words that trouble us.

I want grieving people to know Christ. I want them to know the Savior who bore our sin and rose from the dead. And when I speak of Him, I want to remember how patiently He has dealt with me.

I cannot make sense of why Billy Crystal’s home burned or why his friends were killed. But hearing his words makes me want to pull up a chair and ask, “Tell me about your friends.” Then listen long enough to hear the answer.

That takes time. It may cost us more than we expected. Forty years beside Gracie have taught me that some suffering will still be there when the conversation ends. But Christ has given us ample reason to keep showing up.

He didn’t drive by. He entered.

Talarico gets DEMOLISHED  after he cites Bible in defense of abortion



James Talarico, the Democrat nominee hoping to succeed John Cornyn of Texas in the U.S. Senate, demonstrated at the CNN Jubliee Town Hall on Wednesday that he doesn't require the presence of his Republican opponent to badly lose a debate.

Among the attendees afforded an opportunity during the town hall to raise and discuss sensitive matters with the Senate candidate was Jodi Hunt, an eighth-generation Texas woman and orthodox Catholic who has taught in the University of Dallas' theology department since 2018 and serves as the executive director of the university's Neuhoff Institute for Ministry and Evangelization.

'That's OK. We're both Christians.'

Hunt noted at the outset that like many other Catholics, she is a "one-issue voter. Abortion is a large part of that, and dignity of the human person and natural law."

Fully 67% of Texans identify as Christians, 22% as Catholic, according to 2024 data from the Pew Research Center.

"We believe that at the moment of conception, there is a human life to protect," continued the Texas Christian. "So we struggle with the idea that it's the woman's right to choose."

Hunt added that Democrats' unwillingness to protect "the most innocent among us" not only makes it hard to vote for them but saps prospective voters' trust in their ability to "provide policies to protect the rest of Texans and to promote dignity and human life."

RELATED: Vance: Talarico wears Christianity as a 'skin suit' — and it reveals more than just contempt

Talarico — a part-time Presbyterian seminarian who has attempted to use Scripture to justify abortion and previously preached at a leftist church that regards abortion as a "blessing" — said that "we may come to different moral and ethical conclusions when it comes to the question of 'should abortion be legal or not?' It sounds like you and I do come to a different conclusion. That's OK. We're both Christians."

Dusting off a claim he previously used without much pushback, Talarico asserted that "the Bible is silent on the issue of abortion."

The Catholic theologian proved immune to Talarico's gaslighting.

"The Bible is not silent on abortion," said Hunt. "There is the Ten Commandments. 'Thou shalt not kill.'"

Hunt's statement prompted thunderous applause from the audience.

"If I believed that abortion was murder, that it violated the Ten Commandments, then I wouldn't support it," said Talarico, who has protested the public display of the Ten Commandments.

After stating that he does not regard killing unborn human beings as murder, in a state where killing a pregnant woman counts as a double homicide, Talarico condemned Texas' Human Life Protection Act, claiming that "if we are authentically pro-life, I think we should be disturbed by the outcomes of this extreme abortion ban."

Hunt was joined in refuting Talarico's claim that "the Bible is silent on abortion" by others online, including Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America, which wrote, "Nope," and Students for Life of America president Kristan Hawkins, who wrote, "No, the Bible is not silent on killing children made in His image."

Chris Gustafson, communications director for the Senate Leadership Fund, said in a statement obtained by Blaze News, "Talarico proved once again that he’s simply too liberal and too dangerous for Texas."

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To prepare for motherhood, I took a hammer to my smartphone



Ever since my daughter was born, my greatest ambition has been to become the best version of myself so she has every chance at a good life. I worry about how my own frailty and inadequacy might hold her back, stunting her emotionally or spiritually. But I trust that, with Jesus, all things are possible through the grace of God.

The recent trial of Lindsay Clancy has made me think about this responsibility more seriously than ever.

If I start to feel grumpy, I can look down at an object in my home and be encouraged to offer up a quick prayer.

In January 2023, Clancy killed her three young children in their Massachusetts home. Her murder trial ended in a mistrial in September, with jurors unable to agree on whether she should be held criminally responsible. Her lawyers argued that she was suffering from postpartum psychosis.

The crime was horrifying enough. But I found much of the public response almost as troubling. Hundreds of women gathered outside the courthouse to show their support for Clancy. Some spoke of identifying with her struggles as a mother.

I understand the desire to raise awareness of postpartum mental illness and the need for better care. Mothers who are suffering deserve help, and serious mental illness can be devastating. But I couldn't help wondering why a case involving the deaths of three innocent children had become, to such an extraordinary degree, a conversation about the needs and suffering of mothers.

Putting children first

In a healthy society, the murder of three children would remain, first and foremost, a tragedy for those children. We could debate the legal complexities, including whether Clancy was criminally responsible for her actions. We could discuss how to better recognize and treat postpartum psychosis. But somehow the case became a referendum on how society treats mothers, while the children seemed to recede into the background.

I worry that this response reflects a larger problem in how we think about parenting. We increasingly expect children to accommodate the lives we want to lead, rather than accepting that having children requires us to change our lives for their sake.

My own experience of motherhood has been one long exercise in making those changes. I've had to question things I valued before having my daughter, abandoning cherished habits and ambitions that might otherwise consume me or cause me to neglect her.

I've also come to realize that the first change must begin within. I can't be what my daughter needs without Jesus guiding my thoughts, words, and actions. Each day, I try to sacrifice my ego and become a little less selfish — to lose myself without losing my sanity.

Along with prayer, here are some of the practical things that have helped me do that.

Losing the smartphone

After witnessing countless mothers ignoring their children to stare at a smartphone, I decided I would get rid of mine before I ever had children. So on my wedding day, I took a hammer to my smartphone to symbolize my readiness for motherhood.

I believe this decision has positively impacted my initiation into motherhood. Because I haven't been staring at screens, my sleep has improved and I've regained my attention span. I've also had considerably more time to do things I value, such as reading and knitting.

I slept better than expected during pregnancy and since the birth of our daughter. Even with regular interruptions and frequent waking throughout the night, I've generally felt well-rested. I think my ability to fall asleep easily has a lot to do with not spending my evenings on a screen.

Just as important, I haven't been bombarded with TikTok parenting advice reels designed to scare me into buying something I don't need or believing something that might cause me to treat my child like there's something wrong with her.

I do what I feel is best, with some advice from friends and older women I trust, and this has made motherhood feel relatively stress-free.

Our daughter, too, is screen-free. However, she does have access to a radio, which she loves to turn on and dance along with. I never see that horrible dead look in her eyes — she is happy and active, with ample curiosity and passion.

I was nervous that smashing my smartphone might make it harder to keep in touch with friends, but I've never regretted it. I still have a flip phone, which allows me regular phone conversations with my good friends, and I feel I've been more present and focused around my daughter.

This, as well as getting quality sleep and having more time to read or pursue my hobbies, has helped me strike a good balance between giving myself fully to motherhood and maintaining my own interests.

Embrace household chores

A regular, daily routine for household chores also grounds me, keeping me rooted in the moment. I don't use a dishwasher, so I wash the dishes by hand after each meal. I also do a little laundry every morning.

Doing things by hand keeps me out of my head and is a meaningful way to show love to my husband and child by caring for the clothes we wear and the dishes we eat from.

These might seem like mundane chores, but I have been careful to curate clothes and dishes I love so that, as I manage the household, I am maintaining a space I feel fully committed to and in love with.

The things we wear and eat from represent choices I've willingly made. Each garment and object reminds me of my vocation. When I carefully and meticulously care for all the things in my home, I am offered constant reminders to be grateful.

If I start to feel grumpy, I can look down at an object in my home and be encouraged to offer up a quick prayer. By doing this, I take my thoughts captive, as the apostle Paul encourages, and my attitude is readjusted.

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Keturah Hickman

Foster space for secure attachment

Downgrading my phone and choosing to manage my household deliberately and slowly have helped me make our home a peaceful place where I can build a close, secure relationship with my daughter. There are fewer distractions, less rushing, and fewer occasions for angry responses.

There are a few other things that have made this model tenable and enjoyable for me and my daughter: co-sleeping, breastfeeding, and baby-wearing.

In most ways, I am not very crunchy. I mostly do these three things because I am lazy and also have hobbies I haven't wanted to abandon just because I am a mother. Not only have these things allowed my daughter and I to bond, but they enable me to get more sleep, wash fewer dishes, and move about the house with arms unencumbered.

The key to successful co-sleeping for us has been having a floor king-size bed. I never have to worry about the baby rolling out of bed, and there's plenty of room to push her away to have quality time with my husband. Because the baby latches well, we are both able to sleep while she nurses, so I barely have to wake up when she's hungry.

Breastfeeding, in particular, has given me plenty of opportunities to read. With the help of many pillows to get comfortable while I'm awake and nursing, I've managed to read nearly 30 books (mostly nonfiction) since she was born. Imagine if I'd had a smartphone instead!

I don't know what I would have done without baby-wearing either. My baby is what might be classified as a Velcro baby. She is happy as long as she is with me, often in my arms. Wearing her was the only sane solution if I didn't want to use the cry-it-out method. It has also helped me regain my core strength!

When the baby was under 6 months old, I'd use a woven wrap to wear her on my chest while I cleaned or sewed. Now I often have her on my back in an Ergo backpack carrier.

We spend our days together doing everything. We go for long walks and have little conversations throughout the day. When we wake up, no matter how I feel, I begin the day with a smile for my daughter and an exuberant greeting. She responds equally enthusiastically.

And now that she feels safe and connected, she's begun displaying independent spurts where she plays off by herself. As long as I am in eyesight, I can do things for hours on my own without her fretting.

I love watching her discover that she can explore the world on her own while knowing I'm nearby if she needs me.

The joy of sacrifice

Since becoming a mother, I've been struck by how often our culture treats children as obstacles to adult happiness. We're encouraged to pursue our ambitions, protect our independence, and make time for ourselves. None of those things is necessarily bad. But children have needs of their own, and those needs often require us to sacrifice things we would otherwise enjoy.

That sacrifice has brought me far more happiness than I could have anticipated. My life has become smaller in some ways, but richer in others. I've given up a smartphone, slowed down my days, and learned to take pleasure in the ordinary work of caring for my family. I haven't lost myself in the process. I've discovered how much of the person I used to be I can happily do without.

I keep thinking about the three Clancy children and how easily they have been lost in the arguments surrounding their deaths. Whatever conclusions people draw about their mother's mental illness or criminal responsibility, those children deserved a safe and loving home. They deserved to grow up.

I want to give my daughter every chance to do just that. I know I will make mistakes, and I know there will be days when I fall short. But I want to spend my life becoming the mother she needs, rather than expecting her to accommodate the mother I happen to be.

You can medicate despair. You can’t manufacture meaning.



What happens when a society teaches people that they have no lasting purpose, then wonders why they feel hopeless?

I am spending time volunteering with Stranraer Reformed Presbyterian Church in Scotland. On Thursday, October 15, the church is hosting a free public talk on depression at 7 p.m. at the Millennium Centre. Depression deserves our attention because its effects reach beyond individuals into families, communities, and the life of nations.

The Christian still wrestles with sin and sorrow. Yet Christ is working in us. Our hope rests on His faithfulness, not on our ability to manufacture a cheerful mood.

I am also a professor at Arizona State University, where I see the importance of this question among students. The 2024-2025 Healthy Minds Study, based on responses from more than 84,000 students at 135 colleges and universities, found that 37% reported moderate to severe depressive symptoms, and 33% reported moderate to severe anxiety. Both measures had improved since 2022, but the burden remains enormous.

In Great Britain, the picture is troubling too. NHS England found a common mental health condition in 22.6% of adults ages 16-64 in 2023-2024, up from 18.9% in 2014. Among 16- to 24-year-olds, the figure was 25.8%. In Scotland, 2023-2024 data show that 10% of adults reported at least two symptoms of depression and 16% at least two symptoms of anxiety.

Some people seek relief through alcohol or drugs, but self-medication can become another prison. The National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism notes that alcohol may temporarily relieve anxiety even as heavy drinking and repeated withdrawal worsen it. The damage can spread outward: The United Kingdom recorded 9,809 alcohol-specific deaths in 2024, and victims in England and Wales believed offenders were under alcohol's influence in 39% of violent incidents in 2023-2024.

Clinical depression is not simply unbelief. Faithful Christians suffer it, and medical treatment can help. My concern here is spiritual hopelessness: What account of life can sustain someone when pleasure fades and suffering remains?

The secular state can fund treatment and other necessary services, but it cannot supply redemption. No program can answer the question that comes before policy: Why should I have hope? If human beings are only material organisms, here briefly and then gone, what lasting meaning does suffering possess?

That does not mean every government intervention fails. It means government has limits. A list of recommended behaviors may help people manage a problem, but it cannot give them a reason to live or reconcile them to God. Our trouble reaches deeper than ignorance of the rules.

A culture that reduces human beings to appetite, chemistry, and consumption should not be surprised by a crisis of purpose. Physical pleasure and distraction cannot bear the weight of the human soul. An evening's escape still leaves tomorrow's question waiting.

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Owen Anderson

Christianity begins somewhere else. Human beings are made in the image of God, and Christ redeems His people by His blood. Our lives therefore have meaning now, not merely after death.

Sometimes Christianity itself gets reduced to “when you die, you go to heaven and avoid hell,” as though everything before death were unimportant. That misses our present calling. Alienation from God has consequences now. Clinical depression is no verdict on anyone's salvation, but spiritual despair can foreshadow the hopelessness of separation from God. Communion with Christ brings hope into the present.

First, our feelings do not define us. We cannot always explain why darkness settles over us, but we can bring God's Word to bear on it. The psalmist asks his own troubled soul, “Why are you cast down, O my soul?” (Psalm 42:5). Then he directs it: “Hope in God.” His sorrow is real, but it does not have the final word.

Second, Christianity offers grace rather than a ladder we climb to earn acceptance. Rules can identify wrongdoing, but they cannot free sinners from sin's power. Islam's five pillars, for example, prescribe religious duties, but Islam does not offer the Reformed Christian doctrine of justification by grace alone through faith alone. The distinction is not academic: Christian hope rests on what Christ has done, not on whether we can accumulate enough religious merit.

I find no comparable assurance in religions built around reincarnation. A cycle of death and rebirth governed by karma is not the Christian promise of reconciliation with God and resurrection. Christianity offers a destination, not an endless series of attempts to repair ourselves.

RELATED: What Chris Hansen knows about sin that modern culture forgets

Kelsey McNeal/Disney General Entertainment Content/Getty Images

The Christian still wrestles with sin and sorrow. Yet Christ is working in us. Our hope rests on His faithfulness, not on our ability to manufacture a cheerful mood.

That hope also takes practical form in the church. We visit the lonely, listen to the grieving, pray with the discouraged, and help families bear burdens they cannot carry alone. The sufferer needs patient fellowship, not an accusation that sadness proves spiritual failure. The gospel gives us both a message to proclaim and neighbors to love.

Finally, Christian hope reaches beyond the individual. The Great Commission sends the church into the world because the nations belong within the scope of Christ's saving purpose. History need not follow a straight upward line; setbacks do not cancel God's promises. I believe Scripture points toward a day when “the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord” as the waters cover the sea (Isaiah 11:9).

That gives parents, students, and churches reason to labor faithfully even when today's headlines seem to announce defeat.

Christians have hope to offer a hopeless world. We should bring it into the darkness. If you happen to be in the Stranraer area, join us October 15 at 7 p.m. And for a further resource on spiritual depression, listen to Martyn Lloyd-Jones’ series.

What Fulton Sheen understood about fame that today’s Christian influencers don’t



Humility is the necessary virtue.

Let me unpack that a little: Without humility, Saint Peter will not let you pass through the Pearly Gates.

Our culture has moved so far toward autonomy that we can barely imagine obedience as anything other than weakness.

And what is humility?

Like the old adage says, humility is not thinking less of yourself, but thinking of yourself less. If you study the lives of the saints — or, for that matter, almost any historically admirable person — you’ll recognize that humility is an immensely attractive quality.

Celebrity cleric

Blessed Fulton J. Sheen, America’s most famous Catholic bishop of the 20th century, had plenty to be proud of. Now on his way to sainthood, Sheen was a brilliant scholar, a gifted writer, and one of the most compelling communicators of his age. His radio broadcasts reached millions. His television program, “Life Is Worth Living,” drew audiences in the 1950s that rivaled the biggest entertainers in America.

Yet two episodes in Sheen’s life suggest that one of his greatest virtues was not eloquence at all. It was obedience.

The first came before almost anyone knew his name.

After his ordination in 1919, Sheen pursued advanced studies in Europe and distinguished himself at the University of Louvain in Belgium. He became the first American to win the prestigious Cardinal Mercier Prize and earned the university’s coveted agrégé degree. By the time he was 30, Oxford and Columbia reportedly wanted him to teach philosophy.

Then, in 1926, his bishop ordered him home to Peoria, Illinois — not to a university, but to St. Patrick’s, one of the city’s poorest parishes.

Sheen went.

He visited the sick, celebrated Mass, begged for parish funds, and preached. Nine months later, his bishop explained what had happened. People worried that Sheen’s European success had made him “high-hat,” too important to take orders. The parish assignment had been a test.

He passed.

Entertainer in exile

Soon Sheen was sent to teach at Catholic University in Washington, D.C., beginning the public career that would eventually make him famous.

Four decades later, obedience cost him far more.

By then, Sheen was a household name. His television audience reached into the tens of millions. But he had also clashed with New York’s powerful Cardinal Francis Spellman over money Sheen raised for the missions. Sheen appealed the dispute to Rome and prevailed. Spellman, according to accounts of the dispute, did not forget it.

In 1966, Sheen was sent to Rochester, New York. Many biographers have interpreted the transfer as a form of exile: One of the world’s most famous religious communicators suddenly found himself running a relatively modest diocese far from the center of American media.

His years there were difficult. Accustomed to packed auditoriums around the world, Sheen once gave a series of retreat talks in Rochester’s largest auditorium and drew a disappointing crowd.

“The whole world comes to hear Fulton Sheen, except his own diocese,” he reportedly told a fellow priest.

RELATED: Tens of thousands attend beatification of anti-communist TV star priest Fulton Sheen

Dick Lewis/New York Daily News/Getty Images

Right or wrong

It’s tempting to make the lesson here that Sheen’s superiors were right. They were not necessarily right at all. Spellman may have acted vindictively. Sheen himself made mistakes in Rochester. Authority can be petty, shortsighted, and simply wrong.

But that’s precisely why obedience — like its close friend, humility — is a virtue.

Obedience means little when the person in authority agrees with you. Its real test comes when you believe you are more talented, more informed, or more capable than the person giving the order — and perhaps you are.

Modern celebrity culture teaches almost the opposite. Discover your gift. Build your brand. Grow your platform. Maximize your reach. If an institution doesn’t recognize your genius, leave it. If a boss frustrates your calling, find another boss. If a church constrains your ministry, start your own.

That instinct is not always wrong. Institutions can become corrupt, and conscience has claims no human authority can erase. Obedience is not servility, nor does it require cooperating with evil.

But our culture has moved so far toward autonomy that we can barely imagine obedience as anything other than weakness.

Serving in silence

There is a particularly American — and, yes, Protestant — dimension to this. The Reformation elevated individual judgment against ecclesial authority, while the American experiment elevated independence and suspicion of hierarchy. Those impulses produced real goods. But untethered, they can also produce a Christianity in which everyone becomes his own pope, pastor, and doctrinal court of final appeal.

Catholicism proposes something harder: Your gifts are not entirely your own. Your vocation does not entitle you to the largest audience. You may be called to serve where no one applauds. You may even be badly deployed by legitimate authority.

Sheen, who had every reason to believe his voice belonged on the biggest stage available, accepted assignments beneath his stature and endured humiliations he did not deserve.

In 1979, near the end of Sheen's life, Pope John Paul II embraced the frail priest in St. Patrick’s Cathedral and offered what may be the perfect summary of his legacy: “You have written and spoken well of the Lord Jesus Christ. You are a loyal son of the Church.”

Not the most famous son. Not the most brilliant.

A loyal one.

In an age obsessed with building our platforms, Fulton Sheen leaves us with a harder question: Can we remain faithful when obedience costs us the audience we think we deserve?

Don’t hide from Halloween. Use it to love your neighbors.



October is here again, so what the advertisers call "spooky season" is upon us. Stores are packed with Halloween candy and costumes, along with spiders and bats and skeletons (and they have been there since school started, but that’s a complaint for another day).

Last week, we talked about how too many Christians are fixating on what they perceive as the evil of Halloween — its emphasis on ghosts, witches, and death — without acknowledging that it sprang from both Christian and pagan roots and has been largely sanitized into a cultural holiday focused on costumes, candy, and neighborhood fun for children.

DON’T hit them over the head with a Bible. But don’t hide your faith either.

This has led to some (wrongly) judgmental attitudes, much of it springing from bad theology.

I ended that article with a promise that there is a better way to reclaim and redeem Halloween, because surely we Christians can do better than being the always-dark, candy-less house on the block.

Trick or tract?

Our highest calling, of course, is to love our neighbor. And Halloween brings those neighbors to our door, literally. What if we prayerfully and thoughtfully considered how we can bless those neighbors on this one day, with an eye to building relationships?

I am not talking about handing out Christian tracts instead of candy. Don't be that person.

I am talking about eagerly seeking an opportunity to connect with at least one if not more families in your neighborhood with whom you can begin to build relationships. This, in fact, is why God has you where you live (see more on this here).

Let me tell you about what one family did for Halloween. They set up a tent in the driveway, hung lights from it, and under the tent placed their BBQ grill, on which they cooked hot dogs. A table held buns and condiments, a bowl of Halloween candy, and Jell-O shots for the adults. They publicized this on the neighborhood webpage a day or two before Halloween.

To be clear, they weren't Christians seeking to love their neighbor. They were seeking to promote the father's business. But how might we promote our Father's business similarly?

Halloween hospitality

  1. If you have access to one, a tent in the driveway with lights strung on it is very welcoming on a dark night!
  2. Grilling hot dogs was a pretty good idea — another might be a big crock-pot filled with chili, with paper cups and spoons for serving.
  3. A hot drink station with cocoa, cider, tea, etc.
  4. Freshly made pumpkin bread or oatmeal cookies in little treat bags as an alternative to commercial candy.
  5. Set out lawn chairs and invite people to sit down and rest for a moment — and if they do, introduce yourselves and get to know their family.
  6. Let your kids dress up and pass out the goodies (if you also allow your kids to trick-or-treat, one of you can hold down the fort while the other takes the kids around the neighborhood).
  7. Let people know a day or two ahead that you welcome them to come by and "sit a spell," as the saying goes.

This will cost you time, effort, and money. But it is a ministry investment in the lives of precious people God has placed in your neighborhood. You can't love them if you don't make an effort to know them, and you can't know them if you never even meet them.

And they will know you after this!

You could also just set out lawn chairs toward the end of the driveway where you will be able to actually see and converse with the adults as you pass out candy. Compliment the kids' costumes. Ask the adults where they live in the neighborhood. They won't linger long without a reason to stop at your house, but at least you'll physically meet some of them. Since most parents don’t accompany their kids all the way up to the door, you at least have to get out where they are!

RELATED: Halloween isn't opening a door to demons. Christians need to stop pretending it is.

Walter Leporati/Getty Images

A few do's & don'ts

  1. DO wear a costume. Bible costumes are fun. So are a lot of others. Don't be anything that will scare children. Don't be a witch. Don't be the devil (duh).
  2. DON'T hand out Christian literature that talks about how evil Halloween is. In fact, you don't have to hand out Christian literature at all. But if you do, hand it out with full-size candy bars.
  3. DO ask their name and where they live in the neighborhood. Discreetly record a voice message to yourself or write down names and information — the idea, after all, is to use Halloween to start building a relationship. See #6 below.
  4. DON'T exclude your kids from this opportunity. Recruit them to participate as fully as possible in your family blessing the neighborhood, whatever you end up doing.
  5. DON’T be a Halloween hider. What a sad message you send to your children by turning off all the lights to avoid the neighbors. God put you in your neighborhood. Unless you live somewhere with no trick-or-treaters, get out there and redeem the opportunity.
  6. DO follow up! Sometime in November, reach out to someone you met on Halloween and invite him or her over for coffee or to watch the big game or for a casual dinner. Your goal here is to become an authentic friend. As you get to know each other, don’t be afraid to ask for help on something, either — that’s what friends do.
  7. DON’T hit them over the head with a Bible. But don’t hide your faith, either. Practice transparent honesty and pray for the opportunity to discuss deeper things. Until then, BE the deeper thing.

Halloween is an opportunity for your family to bless others and begin forging relationships to lost people in need of Jesus. I would love to hear about your family’s experience redeeming this annual event by loving your neighbor!

Editor's note: This article has been slightly expanded from Diane Schrader's 2025 article on Halloween.

What to do when your in-laws are working against you



Marriage creates a new family, and sometimes that means setting boundaries with the family you came from.

BlazeTV host Ron Simmons tackles complicated viewer questions of dealing with in-laws who might be causing more strain than the relationship is worth.

One viewer asked Simmons how to “deal with in-laws” who don’t share the viewer's faith “when a child is involved.”

“I think you have to always respect your in-laws, up to the point where you make sure that there’s obviously no abuse or anything like that,” he says. “But I would say respect with boundaries.”


Simmons explains that a job that comes with being a Christian parent is to “expose our children to the love of Christ … so that the Holy Spirit can begin working on them and bring them under his umbrella.”

“And I wouldn’t allow anything, as much as I could, that would get in the way of that,” he says.

Simmons then reads a question from a viewer who explained that her father-in-law asked her husband “to keep his estate and money from the wives.”

“He said it’s not for us to know, but me and my husband tell each other everything. So it feels wrong for him to ask that,” the viewer explained.

“First of all, that’s wrong for … the dad to do that, all right? That automatically puts a strain between his son and daughter-in-law. I mean, that sets up a marriage strain right there,” Simmons explains.

“Now, a lot of people, maybe they're first-generation money, they’re afraid that, you know, the wives are going to not respect that and, you know, go off and spend the money or something like that,” he says. “But as far as you and your husband go, it’s perfectly OK for your husband to talk to you about that, right?”

“You don’t break that bond,” he continues. “That’s why the Bible says that when we grow up and we get married, the husband leaves his mom and dad and clings to his wife, that they become one flesh, and one flesh shares with each other. I promise you, my right hand knows what my left hand is doing, right?

“Is it wrong for him to ask that? Personally, I think it is,” he adds.

Want more from Allie Beth Stuckey?

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Pastor takes a stand after Iowa city council starts official business with 'hail Satan' prayer: 'Reverse that curse'



An apparent fetishization of religious "diversity" had officials in an Iowa city permit a satanic invocation prior to conducting official business on Tuesday. While many at the meeting appeared willing to put up with the infernal appeal, one Christian man stood up and spoke out.

How it started

Ottumwa, a city in Southeast Iowa, adopted a policy on Jan. 20 allowing for invocations to be given at the start of official city council meetings.

'That's not welcome here.'

"This policy is intended to acknowledge and express the City Council's respect for the diversity of both organized and unorganized religious denominations, as well as other faiths, belief systems, or the lack thereof, represented and practiced among the citizens of the City of Ottumwa," the policy states.

Per the policy, invocational speakers are to be "selected without preference to any specific religion, belief, faith, or ideology, from amongst a diverse pool of Ottumwa citizens" and are asked not to proselytize, disparage other beliefs, and to keep their invocation under two minutes in length.

Summoning the devil

Matthew Dalbey, a former Ottumwa city council member, seized upon the opportunity not only to offer a prayer down to the devil but to violate the city's policy by taking a general dig at the beliefs of others.

"Let us pray," started Dalbey. "Dear dark father, let us stand now unbowed and unfettered by arcane doctrines born of fearful minds in darkened times. Let us embrace the Luciferian impulse to eat of the tree of knowledge and dissipate our blissful and comforting delusions of old."

RELATED: Inside the mind of a Catholic exorcist: Fr. Chad Ripperger talks shop with Shawn Ryan

Dalbey is a member of the Iowa chapter of the Satanic Temple. While Dalbey told KTVO-TV that he and other members of the Satanic Temple don't actually believe in Satan or worship him, the anti-Christian group and its members certainly behave as though they do.

After all, in recent years, the Satanic Temple has erected statues of Baphomet on government property around Christmastime; offered expectant mothers telehealth abortion services and promoted an "abortion ritual"; challenged pro-life legislation; distributed satanic literature to children; publicly performed "unbaptisms"; held a demonization ceremony in protest of the canonization of the Catholic Spanish priest Junípero Serra; and promoted euthanasia and pornography.

After imploring the devil to help the Iowans present to turn against ancient beliefs and deriding "arbitrary social norms," Dalbey championed "agnosticism in all things" and called for opposition against any "arbitrary authority that threatens the personal sovereignty of one or all."

The radical concluded his prayer with "hail Satan."

Righteous indignation

New Life Center Pastor Rick Bick refused to let the satanic prayer go unchecked.

Bick — who made an invocation prior to a council meeting earlier this year and is set to do so again in December — declared, "Let's just reverse that curse that was just put on our city."

"That ending with, 'hail Satan' and 'hail dark god'?" continued the pastor. "That's not welcome here."

'I am a Christian man with Christian values so I chose not to participate.'

Bick reiterated that the satanic prayer was a curse on this city and noted, "Most of you know that, and we just need to stop and reverse it."

Ottumwa Mayor Benjamin Foote attempted to defuse the situation by calling for a "moment of silence to reflect on whatever it is we need to reflect on at this time."

Cara Galloway, the council member who cast the lone vote against the invocation policy in January and reportedly warned about the inevitability of a satanic prayer, noted at the end of the meeting on Tuesday that selectively objecting to invocations now may expose taxpayers to legal liability.

The City of Ottumwa issued a statement on Tuesday, noting, "It is very clear that many of you have watched at least the first two minutes of the October 6 City Council meeting."

The city underscored that it "cannot discriminate against a denomination and everyone that is invited to perform the invocation has followed the correct protocol."

Councilman Bill Hoffman told Blaze News, "We as elected officials are not aware of the content before hand. In my opinion, I do not believe this one invocation expresses the beliefs of most of Ottumwa."

"Personally as a councilman, I only speak for myself, I did not stay in the room during the invocation as I do not agree with the content," continued Hoffman. "I am a Christian man with Christian values so I chose not to participate, and I stepped into the hallway and did a personal prayer to God for strength and wisdom for myself and to watch over our city."

Other members of the council and Mayor Foote did not immediately respond to Blaze News' requests for comment.

The satanic invocation has prompted widespread outrage.

"WTF," tweeted BlazeTV host Sara Gonzales.

Former NCAA swimmer Riley Gaines wrote, "Jesus, come back now."

BlazeTV host Steve Deace suggested, however, that it is par for the course in the Hawkeye State: "To be fair, Democrat candidate for congress @SarahforIowa does preside over Satanic weddings."

Sarah Trone Garriott, a leftist Lutheran minister who is presently running against Republican Rep. Zach Nunn, has helped oversee at least one "wedding" for satanists. In 2023, she discussed her efforts to accommodate disciples of the fallen on their big day, going so far as to consider readings about the devil "to make them feel more comfortable."

As of Thursday morning, Blaze News' Poll Watch has Nunn with a 6-point lead.

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Strong Men Will Save The American Church

A small Tennessee conference exposed how comfortable we have become with a Church that will not fight.