Quote:Young US men are joining Russian churches promising 'absurd levels of manliness'

"A lot of people ask me: 'Father Moses, how can I increase my manliness to absurd levels?'"

In a YouTube video, a priest is championing a form of virile, unapologetic masculinity.

Skinny jeans, crossing your legs, using an iron, shaping your eyebrows, and even eating soup are among the things he derides as too feminine.

There are other videos of Father Moses McPherson - a powerfully-built father of five - weightlifting to the sound of heavy metal.

He was raised a Protestant and once worked as a roofer, but now serves as a priest in the Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia (ROCOR) in Georgetown, Texas, an offshoot of the mother church in Moscow.

ROCOR, a global network with headquarters in New York, has recently been expanding across parts of the US - mainly as a result of people converting from other faiths.

Father John Whiteford, an archpriest in the ROCOR from Spring, north of Houston, says home-schooling ensures a religious education and is "a way of protecting your children", while avoiding any talk about "transgenderism, or the 57 genders of the month or whatever".

"Show me one saint in the history of the Church who ever blessed any kind of birth control," Father Moses says. As for masturbation - or what the church calls self-abuse - the priest condemns it as "pathetic and unmanly".

Father Moses says Orthodoxy is "not masculine, it is just normal", while "in the West everything has become very feminised". Some Protestant churches, he believes, mainly cater for women.

Buck Johnson has worked as a firefighter for 25 years and hosts the Counterflow podcast.

"Negative American views on Russia are what worry me," Buck says. He tells me the mainstream, "legacy" media presents a distorted picture of the invasion of Ukraine.

"I think there's a holdover from the boomer generation here in America that lived through the Cold War," Buck says, "and I don't quite grasp why - but they say Russia's bad."

The head of the Russian Church in Moscow, Patriarch Kirill, has doggedly backed the invasion of Ukraine, calling it a Holy War, and expressing little compassion for its victims. When I ask Archpriest Father John Whiteford about Russia's top cleric, who many see as a warmonger, he assures me the Patriarch's words have been distorted.

Footage and photographs of Putin quoting Bible verses, holding candles during services in Moscow's Cathedral of Christ the Saviour and stripping down to his swim trunks to plunge into icy water at Epiphany, seem to have struck a chord. Some - in America and other countries - see Russia as the last bastion of true Christianity.

"Russia does not have homosexual marriage, it does not have civil unions, it is a place where you can home-school your kids and - of course - I love the thousand-year history of Orthodox Christianity here," he told a Russian video host.

This wispy-bearded Texan is in the vanguard of a movement urging conservatives to relocate to Russia. Last August, Putin introduced fast-track shared values visa for those fleeing Western liberalism.

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c30q5l8d4lro

(May 25, 2025 at 1:54 am)Fake Messiah Wrote: Men, do you feel emasculated? Are you bored with life? Well, suffer no more. The Russian Church is offering you an opportunity to go to Russia and die on the Ukrainian front like a manly man. Living is gay.

Quote:Young US men are joining Russian churches promising 'absurd levels of manliness'

"A lot of people ask me: 'Father Moses, how can I increase my manliness to absurd levels?'"

In a YouTube video, a priest is championing a form of virile, unapologetic masculinity.

Skinny jeans, crossing your legs, using an iron, shaping your eyebrows, and even eating soup are among the things he derides as too feminine.

There are other videos of Father Moses McPherson - a powerfully-built father of five - weightlifting to the sound of heavy metal.

He was raised a Protestant and once worked as a roofer, but now serves as a priest in the Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia (ROCOR) in Georgetown, Texas, an offshoot of the mother church in Moscow.

ROCOR, a global network with headquarters in New York, has recently been expanding across parts of the US - mainly as a result of people converting from other faiths.

Father John Whiteford, an archpriest in the ROCOR from Spring, north of Houston, says home-schooling ensures a religious education and is "a way of protecting your children", while avoiding any talk about "transgenderism, or the 57 genders of the month or whatever".

"Show me one saint in the history of the Church who ever blessed any kind of birth control," Father Moses says. As for masturbation - or what the church calls self-abuse - the priest condemns it as "pathetic and unmanly".

Father Moses says Orthodoxy is "not masculine, it is just normal", while "in the West everything has become very feminised". Some Protestant churches, he believes, mainly cater for women.

Buck Johnson has worked as a firefighter for 25 years and hosts the Counterflow podcast.

"Negative American views on Russia are what worry me," Buck says. He tells me the mainstream, "legacy" media presents a distorted picture of the invasion of Ukraine.

"I think there's a holdover from the boomer generation here in America that lived through the Cold War," Buck says, "and I don't quite grasp why - but they say Russia's bad."

The head of the Russian Church in Moscow, Patriarch Kirill, has doggedly backed the invasion of Ukraine, calling it a Holy War, and expressing little compassion for its victims. When I ask Archpriest Father John Whiteford about Russia's top cleric, who many see as a warmonger, he assures me the Patriarch's words have been distorted.

Footage and photographs of Putin quoting Bible verses, holding candles during services in Moscow's Cathedral of Christ the Saviour and stripping down to his swim trunks to plunge into icy water at Epiphany, seem to have struck a chord. Some - in America and other countries - see Russia as the last bastion of true Christianity.

"Russia does not have homosexual marriage, it does not have civil unions, it is a place where you can home-school your kids and - of course - I love the thousand-year history of Orthodox Christianity here," he told a Russian video host.

This wispy-bearded Texan is in the vanguard of a movement urging conservatives to relocate to Russia. Last August, Putin introduced fast-track shared values visa for those fleeing Western liberalism.

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c30q5l8d4lro

Quote:Actor Who Lost It All After Christian Stance Rejoices: 'Give Glory to God'

Actor Neal McDonough is on a mission to live out his values in Hollywood.

Despite achieving widespread success in Hollywood, McDonough said it hasn’t always been easy, with the actor getting “beat up” for some of his stances.

One of the biggest reasons he made a media splash was for his longstanding policy of declining to kiss castmates, something that caught attention during his time on the TV show “Desperate Housewives.”

“I wouldn’t kiss a woman on that show years ago,” McDonough said. “And then I got blackballed.”

He continued, “I lost my house, and I lost everything — cars, you name it. I went bankrupt.”

McDonough said he ended up with a “massive drinking problem,” spending two years consuming alcohol to cope with not being able to land a job.

Despite those challenges, McDonough said he’s glad he stuck by his convictions. Ultimately, he had to decide what he’d do next – and he has since filtered those energies into making films that matter like “The Last Rodeo.” Eventually, his career came roaring back.

“It has come back tenfold,” McDonough said. “Now, I’m in the position where God has given me the gift of — Ruve and I are about to produce our eleventh production in four years. How does that happen? That wouldn’t have happened 10, 15 years ago. I had to be called really to my faith.”

A lot of this success hinged on some important questions about faith and belief, particularly in God’s goodness, love, and sovereignty. With the Lord, the actor believes anything is possible.

https://cbn.com/news/entertainment/actor...-glory-god

Quote:Why Jesus Could Only Be Catholic

Jesus founds the church, right? Matthew 16, he says, I will build my church. So if we want to be in the one flock, we should find out what church did Jesus found.

But whether you want to call it the Catholic Church or not, it is a visible society led by the apostles here on earth. It is. He compares it to a city on a hill. Why a city? Because it’s organized. Why on a hill? Because it’s visible.

Like the church in the biblical sense doesn’t just mean vaguely all Christians everywhere, it means something more concrete. It means like a visible society with leaders, leaders chosen by God. Leaders who, I don’t know if you heard the conversation about apostolic succession last hour, but leaders who then instruct their followers to choose leaders and they pass on this authority to lead.

And so we can trace through history this leadership all the way down the line, down to Pope Leo and the bishops in union with him. So we can see from history where Jesus’ Church is. We can also see from history where it isn’t. Like, we can trace the various Protestant denominations back to the Reformation. Halloween 1517. Luther has the 95 Theses. There’s no Protestants before that.

You’ve got a few groups that are kind of split off that are sort of like Protestants, but we can trace where they come from as well. So my point is, like, if you want to find the one church so you can be part of the flock, so there can be one flock and one shepherd, well, go look and see, well, where did the church that Jesus founded end up in history? And it’s very easy.

If you want to find the church that can claim to be 2000 years old, it’s right there. And it’s not going to be the pop-up shop evangelical church. It’s not going to be the Lutherans, it’s not going to be, you know, the Anglicans or anybody like this.

We can trace these histories. We know where they came from and we know where the Catholic Church came from.

https://www.catholic.com/video/why-jesus...e-catholic

(May 27, 2025 at 10:58 am)Fake Messiah Wrote: "My Christian denomination is the right one because it goes all the way to Jesus himself."

Quote:Why Jesus Could Only Be Catholic

Jesus founds the church, right? Matthew 16, he says, I will build my church. So if we want to be in the one flock, we should find out what church did Jesus found.

But whether you want to call it the Catholic Church or not, it is a visible society led by the apostles here on earth. It is. He compares it to a city on a hill. Why a city? Because it’s organized. Why on a hill? Because it’s visible.

Like the church in the biblical sense doesn’t just mean vaguely all Christians everywhere, it means something more concrete. It means like a visible society with leaders, leaders chosen by God. Leaders who, I don’t know if you heard the conversation about apostolic succession last hour, but leaders who then instruct their followers to choose leaders and they pass on this authority to lead.

And so we can trace through history this leadership all the way down the line, down to Pope Leo and the bishops in union with him. So we can see from history where Jesus’ Church is. We can also see from history where it isn’t. Like, we can trace the various Protestant denominations back to the Reformation. Halloween 1517. Luther has the 95 Theses. There’s no Protestants before that.

You’ve got a few groups that are kind of split off that are sort of like Protestants, but we can trace where they come from as well. So my point is, like, if you want to find the one church so you can be part of the flock, so there can be one flock and one shepherd, well, go look and see, well, where did the church that Jesus founded end up in history? And it’s very easy.

If you want to find the church that can claim to be 2000 years old, it’s right there. And it’s not going to be the pop-up shop evangelical church. It’s not going to be the Lutherans, it’s not going to be, you know, the Anglicans or anybody like this.

We can trace these histories. We know where they came from and we know where the Catholic Church came from.

https://www.catholic.com/video/why-jesus...e-catholic