2. BOMBSHELL: FIRST CHILD EUTHANIZED IN NETHERLANDS WAS DISABLED, NOT DYING
from: LiveAction
SYNOPSIS: In 2025, the Netherlands performed its first euthanasia on a child under 2024 guidelines that expanded eligibility to children between the ages of one and 12. The official review confirmed that while the child suffered from severe disabilities, including cerebral palsy and epilepsy, they were not dying.
Medical experts held conflicting views, with some doctors arguing that reasonable alternative solutions and palliative care options existed to manage the child's condition. An appointed committee of doctors ultimately ruled that the procedure was "handled well" and did not violate any laws, despite disagreement from other medical professionals. This case highlights the ongoing ethical debate regarding euthanasia, as critics argue that able-bodied individuals are making subjective, potentially dangerous determinations about the value of life for the disabled.
Pray against the normalization of this horrible act – "euthanasia" – murder of children just becaise they have a disability.
3. PATRIARCH BARTHOLOMEW PRESENTED WITH SYMBOLIC ICON FROM UKRAINE
from: RISU
SYNOPSIS: On September 5, Fr. Konstiantyn Shevchenko, a priest from Kherson, presented a symbolic icon of Christ to Patriarch Bartholomew at the opening of the "Fanarion" Orthodox Christian Dialogue Center in Budapest.
The icon is unique because it was painted on a kitchen cutting board recovered from the rubble of a destroyed home in Kherson, symbolizing the interruption of family life by the war.
The "Fanarion" center was inaugurated in the presence of various religious leaders, diplomats, and officials, serving as a new hub for dialogue between theology, culture, and science. Patriarch Bartholomew highlighted the center's significance, stating that it will act as a "window to the world" where Orthodoxy transcends national and cultural barriers. Fr. Konstiantyn Shevchenko currently serves as the rector of the Ukrainian Orthodox community in Salzburg, which operates under the Episcopal District of the Austrian Metropolis.
Intercede with God for a fair and lasting peace settlement between Ukraine and Russia, which invaded it in 2014 and attacked full-scale in 2022.
4. NINE WORDS FOR BABY TRAFFICKING
from: Them Before Us
SYNOPSIS:The language the baby trafficking industry uses has a specific goal: to obfuscate and sanitize the injustice in order to obstruct your understanding of what is actually happening. The nine words or phrases are:
1. GESTATIONAL CARRIER
2. TRADITIONAL SURROGATE
3. INTENDED PARENT(S)
4. PRE-BIRTH ORDER
5. SPERM DONOR
6. EGG DONOR
7. TERMINATION CLAUSE
8. SELECTIVE REDUCTION
9. PRE-BIRTH ORDER
10. MOTHER/FATHER
Oops! Nowhere in the contracts does it mention "mother" or "father" in the normal meaning of the words. You see, this is a business transaction, like buying and selling cars or little slaves for the convenience and pleasure of the future owners. This article emphasizes that surrogacy contracts often bypass standard child welfare protections, such as background checks and home studies, citing the example of a registered sex offender who obtained custody of an infant through a surrogacy arrangement. The child becomes a piece of merchandise!
Ask the Lord to awaken people to what is really going on within the "In Vitro Fertilizaion" baby trafficking industry.
5. AUTISM DATING SERIES WINS EMMY FOR BEST REALITY SHOW
from: Disability Scoop
SYNOPSIS: The Netflix series "Love on the Spectrum" won three Emmy Awards, including Outstanding Unstructured Reality Program, for its fourth season. The show, which follows adults with autism as they navigate dating and relationships, also received awards for casting and picture editing. Building on its success with seven previous wins, the documentary series has already been renewed for a fifth season by Netflix.
“Love on the Spectrum” features people with autism from across the U.S. who are looking for love. The show is a spinoff of an Australian version. The Emmys were for the show’s fourth season, which was released in April. They add to the seven Emmys “Love on the Spectrum” has won for previous seasons. An edited broadcast of the Creative Arts Emmy Awards will air Saturday at 8 p.m. ET on FXX and will be available to stream on Hulu the following day.
Thank God that more and more people are becoming aware that disabled people have feelings and life goals like the rest of us.
CIALIS LINKED TO HIGHER GLAUCOMA RISK IN LARGE STUDY
from: Science Daily
SYNOPSIS: A large observational study of nearly 74,000 men suggests that long-term use of tadalafil (Cialis) may be associated with an increased risk of glaucoma and other eye pressure conditions. Patients prescribed tadalafil for urinary symptoms related to an enlarged prostate showed a 22% higher likelihood of developing glaucoma and a 32% greater risk of ocular hypertension.
Researchers emphasize that while the study identifies an association, it cannot prove a direct cause-and-effect relationship between the medication and eye health issues. Experts advise that individuals using tadalafil long-term should undergo baseline eye screenings and regular follow-ups, especially those with pre-existing risk factors like a family history of glaucoma or high eye pressure. The findings do not suggest that patients should discontinue their treatment, but rather highlight the need for closer eye health monitoring for those on chronic medication therapy.
Pray for men to find out exactly what side-effects certain drugs can have on various bodily organs and systems before they start using them long-term.
7. EPISTEMOLOGY AND DISABILITY: HOW WE KNOW WHAT WE KNOW
from: Disabled World
SYNOPSIS: Epistemology is the branch of philosophy that asks the one question underneath every other question: what entitles anyone to believe what they believe. It sounds like a seminar exercise until you notice how much of it is decided in ordinary rooms - a clinic, a classroom, a benefits office - where somebody quietly decides whose account goes into the record and whose does not. This paper traces the field from its classical definition of knowledge through the modern turn toward social epistemology.
It also uses disability as the lens throughout, because disabled people have been both the subject of some of philosophy's most famous thought experiments and, far too often, the last people consulted about the answers. What emerges is a practical argument with a philosophical spine: a knowledge system that excludes its best informed sources does not merely treat people unfairly, it produces worse knowledge. Researchers passed a story along chains of eight people to test how well detail survives retelling. All autistic chains retained as much as all non autistic chains did. Interviews with 153 disabled people found that 54.3 percent rated their quality of life as excellent or good. Outside observers routinely predict the opposite, which makes it a paradox about observers.
Ask the Lord to shake average, "normal" people so they will understand that disabled and elderly people often think and feel the same as "normals."
A SIX-LANE HIGHWAY, OR A NARROW ROAD WITH TIGHT GATE?
(Click the pic!) We in the West love to think that we have freedom of religion – the right to choose what to believe, as if life is like a six-lane highway where you can get on and off whenever and wherever you want. But is it really like that? Even a six-lane highway has limited access and exit points; just so, freedom isn't unlimited.
Jesus Christ, our Lord and Master, said: "Enter in by the narrow gate; for wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many are those who enter in by it. How narrow is the gate, and restricted is the way that leads to life! Few are those who find it." Freedom of choice implies the responsibility to make the right choice and live (or die) with the consequences of our choices. Missing an entrance to or exit from a limited-access highway means turning around and going back to that point of wrong decision... if you can! Some can't find their way back, and others can, for example the Old Testament kings Saul and David.
King Saul seemed to have a good start in life: he was tall, handsome, and humble. But after he became king, he grew proud and power-hungry, and finally fell into disobedience to God and His prophet Samuel, then fell into witchcraft. He regretted his sin, but didn't repent and turn his life around. True repentance isn't just regret or feeling sorry. The Greek word for repentance, metanoia, means to turn around 180 degrees and go in a different direction.
On the other hand, after King David committed the terrible sins of adultery and ordering a murder, he deeply repented – read all of Psalm 51 – and turned his life around. Nevertheless, he paid a price for his sins. Forgiveness does not mean there are no consequences. Sexual sin, even if God forgives it, can result in infertility, divorce, or sexually transmitted disease. A victim's spouse or God may forgive a murderer who repents, but the sentence can still be carried out.
Judas felt regret for betraying Christ, but committed suicide. On the other hand, Peter denied Christ three times but repented of his sin, and the Lord restored him. In 1 Corinthians ch. 6, we read about a man who had committed incest by having sex with his father's wife. St. Paul wrote to the church that he should be excommunicated "for the destruction of his flesh" ...but in 2 Corinthians, Paul instructed the church to restore him to fellowship after he had repented.
Back to our starting thoughts: Jesus said – "But truly I tell you, there were many widows in Israel in the days of Elijah, when the sky was shut up three years and six months, when a great famine came over all the land. Elijah was sent to none of them, except to Zarephath, in the land of Sidon, to a woman who was a widow. There were many lepers in Israel in the time of Elisha the prophet, yet not one of them was cleansed, except Naaman, the Syrian" (Luke 4: 25-27). There are some who make the Narrow Road too narrow or the Gate too tight, such as the Jewish leaders who got really angry with Jesus when he said this, and wanted to get rid of Him. There will be olive-skinned Gentiles, black Africans, Chinese, Australian Aborigines... believers from all the Nations in the Kingdom of God.
On the other hand, we shouldn't make the Road too wide or the Gate to loose. To believe that all religions lead to God, or that Allah is the same deity as Yahweh, or that all or most of the "Christian" confessions are more or less the same, they all get you into heaven, and that whatever you believe about Jesus is just fine – all such talk is nonsense, a big mistake. It's called "Universalism" which the Church has defined as a heresy. "How narrow is the gate, and restricted is the way that leads to life! Few are those who find it." How narrow is it? We aren't authorized to make up our own 'private interpretation' of Scripture. Holy men of God moved by the Holy Spirit, the Church, the Body of Christ throughout history, gives us the correct interpretaion of this Scripture (1 Peter 1:20-21).
At the end of each Orthodox Liturgy we sing – "We have seen the true Light, we have received the heavenly Spirit! We have found the True Faith, worshiping the Holy Trinity, Who has saved us!" This doesn't mean, of course, that each one of us Orthodox Christians have 100% of the fullness of the Faith. The fullness does exist in the Church, however, and it's available for all who take the time and effort to strive toward it.
Yes, there are sinners in the Church, that's who the Church is for, it's a hospital for sinners to be made whole. "PBPGOINFWMY" doesn't stand for "Peanut Butter Pie, Grapes In Nougat Fudge, With Marshmallow Yoghurt" or any such nonsense – no, it stands for "Please Be Patient, God Is Not Finished With Me Yet!" Come and See!
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A major goal of Agape Restoration Society is to help residents and others get needed assistance so they can live at home, either in our wheelchair-accessible Agape Restoration Communities or other housing. Our state, Pennsylvania, offers various social services for citizens age 60 and up, as shown in the photo.