At least 447 Christian missionaries have “died violently” in the first 17 years of the third millennium, the Fides news agency announced in a special report Saturday.

Five bishops, 313 priests, three deacons, 61 religious men and women, 16  seminarians, three members of institutes of consecrated life, 42 lay people, and four volunteers were killed while carrying out missionary work, Fides said.

“This figure is undoubtedly low since it refers only to the cases of which we have received confirmation,” noted Fides, the information service of the Pontifical Mission Societies.

The Vatican synod for bishops which is currently taking place in Rome focuses on young people, and the Fides report paid special attention to young missionaries who have died for their faith.

“Accepting the mission implies the willingness to risk one’s life and to travel the way of the cross, in the footsteps of Jesus, who firmly set out on his journey to Jerusalem to offer his life for humanity,” stated the synod’s preparatory document.

The report profiles twelve young Christian missionaries, from a diversity of backgrounds, who were violently killed in the first 17 years of the millennium.

One religious sister profiled in the report, the 22-year-old Dominican Sr. Lita Castillo, was stabbed by two attackers in Chile as she slept in the dormitory with her fellow the nuns, along with another 19 religious sisters who were beaten and wounded. The assailants poured flammable liquid over the nuns and set fire to the college. Sister Lita suffered burns over 70 percent of her body. Known for her joy, enthusiasm and dedication, she died on October 29, 2001.

Another missionary, the 32-year-old Rwandan Sister M. Reginette, was murdered in Yemen by Islamist terrorists on March 4, 2016. Sister M. Reginette was the youngest of four Missionaries of Charity murdered and disfigured by a commando of armed militants of the Islamic State who stormed the building where they helped the elderly and disabled in the city of Aden. During the terrorist attack, 12 other people were killed, including a driver, two community helpers and elderly and disabled patients, while the Superior of the convent escaped death.

A manuscript detailing the attack reported that the terrorists “smashed and destroyed” all the religious articles they could find: the tabernacle, altar, crucifix, statues, Bibles and prayer books.

The Missionaries of Charity were “the only Christian presence” in Aden, the letter states, “and ISIS wants to get rid of all Christianity.” Pope Francis defined the massacre in Aden as  an act of “diabolical violence.”

Missionary Lazarus Nwafor, a 26-year-old seminarian from the Imo state of Nigeria, was beheaded by Muslim Fulani herdsmen on August 25, 2016, during an attack in the community of Ndiagu Attakwu.

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BY: Andrew Kugle Follow
@AndrewJKugle

October 6, 2018 5:01 pm

Sen. Tom Cotton (R., Ark.) released a statement Saturday after the Senate confirmed Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh, saying the Democrats’ “crazed, hysterical” attempt at mob rule failed.

“Judge Kavanaugh was a distinguished jurist who respects our Constitution and the judiciary’s vital but limited role in our system of government. I expect Justice Kavanaugh will continue to interpret the Constitution and the laws as written, rather than asserting his own preferences as law,” Cotton said in his statement. “Sadly, because Democrats have long depended on activist judges to impose their unpopular ideas on an unwilling people, the Democrats waged a scorched-earth campaign of character assassination against him. But the Democrats’ crazed, hysterical attempt at left-wing mob rule has failed, and rightfully so. Today is a victory not only for Justice Kavanaugh and his family, but also for the rule of law, due process, fair play, and basic decency.”

Senate Democrats attempted to block Kavanaugh’s confirmation by using allegations of sexual misconduct lodged against him in recent weeks. The allegations went back to when he was in high school and college. Democrats focused their efforts on the allegations in an attempt to galvanize opposition and put pressure on Republican senators such as Susan Collins (Maine) and Jeff Flake (Ariz.). Both ended up voting for Kavanaugh.

Kavanaugh’s first accuser Christine Blasey Ford told the Washington Post that Kavanaugh, then a junior in high school, attacked her when they were at a party in Maryland in the early 1980s. A second allegation came from a woman named Deborah Ramirez who accused Kavanaugh of exposing himself at a dorm party during his freshman year at Yale. Another allegation was brought forth from a woman named Julie Swetnick, who is represented by anti-Trump lawyer Michael Avenatti. Swetnick claimed Kavanaugh was involved in a series of “gang rapes” when he was in high school, but she offered no additional evidence or witnesses to support her allegations.

Kavanaugh has vehemently denied all accusations and there have been no corroborating witnesses to the alleged assaults.

Senate Democrats have called the allegations credible with several stating that Kavanaugh doesn’t get the presumption of innocence.

In a close vote, the Senate confirmed Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court 50-48. Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R., Alaska) voted “present” to offset her no vote with the absence of her colleague Sen. Steve Daines (R., Mont.). Daines was at his daughter’s wedding but was willing to come back to D.C. if his vote was needed. The vote was largely on party lines with Murkowski being the only Republican who didn’t vote for Kavanaugh’s confirmation, while Sen. Joe Manchin (D., W.Va.) was the lone Democrat voting in favor.

It’s a good bet that when you turn on your television to get the latest coverage on world events, you’re not flipping the channel to CNN. And if you’re like some who sample multiple sources to gather your news, you probably still aren’t flipping to CNN.

The third quarter 2018 ratings are out and CNN failed to have any of their programming make it into the top twenty listings.

President Donald Trump has done a great job of casting the fake news label all over the CNN brand and it looks like folks are listening.

Adweek reported the latest results for viewer favorites in Q3 and for the 67 straight quarter Fox News is the leader of the pack.

“FNC, which will celebrate its 22nd anniversary this weekend, marked 67 consecutive quarters as the No. 1 cable news network in total viewers across total day and prime time in Q3 2018, according to Nielsen live-plus-same-day data.”

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“Compared with its Q3 2017 ratings, Fox News was +14 percent in total viewers, +3 percent in the prime time demo, +3 percent in total day viewer,” they added.

Additionally, Sean Hannity reigned in the No. 1 position in “total views and demo for the quarter, only behind sports and special coverage of the Kavanaugh hearings, for regularly scheduled basic cable programming,” according to Adweek.

Since his return to the 9:00 p.m. slot, this quarter marked Hannity’s second highest ranking in total viewers.

The closest CNN came to the top twenty to any of its competitors was “Cuomo Prime Time” in the 23rd place.

“CNN’s first entry on the list comes from Cuomo Prime Time, which claimed the 23rd slot, followed by Anderson Cooper 360 at number 24,” as reported by Breitbart.

He must have seen the ratings slump coming because in September Donald Trump Jr. sent out this tweet taunting the failing cable news network.

It’s a shame that CNN’s ratings are down 41%. What’s worse is there’s a simple solution that they refuse to accept. Stop Lying to try to make @realDonaldTrump look bad. https://t.co/O3XyWchsJh pic.twitter.com/BCUCxKnOvO

— Donald Trump Jr. (@DonaldJTrumpJr) September 16, 2018

We at Conservative Tribune also reported in September that CNN wasn’t setting the world on fire with its ability to attract viewers.

“The numbers don’t lie. CNN’s ratings last week plummeted 41 percent in daytime and 36 percent in prime time compared with the same week last year, according to Adweek.”

You would think they would have learned by now that bashing President Donald Trump isn’t a strategy that is working for them as far as providing content that viewers want to watch.

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The Hill reported on Friday that CNN was attacked by New Yorker’s media critic Ken Auletta for its hyper focus on President Trump, calling it: “from four o’clock to eleven o’clock at night – it’s the all Trump network.”

Auletta made his comments at the Advertising Week New York conference in Manhattan and he reiterated that other outlets like Fox News did a better job of covering world events.

We are committed to truth and accuracy in all of our journalism. Read our editorial standards.

Brett Kavanaugh was sworn in as a Supreme Court justice Saturday night after the Senate confirmed the judge 50-48. The Senate vote delivered an election season triumph to President Donald Trump that could swing the court rightward for a generation.

Kavanaugh was quickly sworn in at the court building, across the street from the Capitol, while protesters chanted outside.

The quick swearing in enables Kavanaugh to begin work immediately in advance of arguments at the court Tuesday in two cases involving prison sentences for repeat offenders.

Kavanaugh’s wife and two daughters were next to him as he was sworn in. Four other Supreme Court justices were also in attendance: Clarence Thomas, Ruth Bader Ginsberg, Elena Kagan and Samuel Alito pic.twitter.com/DgyEiA1qdL

— NBC News (@NBCNews) October 6, 2018

The court says Kavanaugh took the oath required by the Constitution and another for judges that is part of federal law in the same room where the justices meet for their private conferences.

The 53-year-old justice’s wife, children, and parents were in attendance.

The near party-line Senate vote, capped a fight that seized the national conversation after claims emerged that Kavanaugh had sexually assaulted women three decades ago — which he emphatically denied. Those allegations magnified the clash from a routine Supreme Court struggle over judicial ideology into an angrier, more complex jumble of questions about victims’ rights, the presumption of innocence, and personal attacks on nominees.

Acrimonious to the end, the battle featured a climactic roll call that was interrupted several times by protesters in the Senate galleries before Capitol Police removed them. Vice President Mike Pence presided over the roll call, but his potential tie-breaking vote unnecessary.

The Associated Press contributed to this report. 

With Justice Brett Kavanaugh now on the Supreme Court, President Donald Trump continues making good on his pledge to use Supreme Court nominations to save the Second Amendment from “people like Hillary Clinton.”

During an October 9, 2016, presidential debate, Trump said, “I am looking to appoint judges very much in the mold of Justice Scalia. … People that will respect the Constitution of the United States. And I think that this is so important–also, the Second Amendment, which is totally under siege by people like Hillary Clinton.”

Trump made clear that his Supreme Court picks will “respect the Second Amendment and what it stands for, and what it represents.”

Trump has fulfilled these promises by giving us Justice Neil Gorsuch, confirmed April 7, 2017, and Brett Kavanaugh, confirmed October 6, 2018.

Both Gorsuch and Kavanaugh are guided by the seminal decision in District of Columbia v Heller (2008).

During confirmation hearings, Gorsuch referenced Heller in describing the approach to ruling on the constitutional protections of specific types of guns, saying:

Heller makes clear that we judges are to apply. The question is whether it’s a gun in common use, for self-defense–and that may be subject to reasonable regulation. That’s the test as I understand it. There’s lots of ongoing litigation about which weapons qualify under those standards. And I can’t pre-judge that litigation sitting here.

Kavanaugh also referenced Heller’s “common use” phraseology during this confirmation, explaining that AR-15s and similar semiautomatic rifles are in “common use” because widely possessed. Kavanaugh differentiated between “dangerous and unusual weapons” versus weapons widely possessed for hunting and self-defense, saying, “Semiautomatic rifles are widely possessed in the United States. There are millions and millions and millions of semiautomatic rifles that are possessed, so that seemed to fit common use and not be a dangerous and unusual weapon.”

The NRA responded to Kavanaugh’s conformation by tweeting: “The NRA congratulates Brett Kavanaugh on his confirmation to SCOTUS. Kavanaugh is an eminently qualified jurist who will interpret the Constitution as the framers intended. He respects our Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms for self-defense.”

AWR Hawkins is an award-winning Second Amendment columnist for Breitbart News, the host of the Breitbart podcast Bullets with AWR Hawkins, and the writer/curator of Down Range with AWR Hawkins, a weekly newsletter focused on all things Second Amendment, also for Breitbart News. He is the political analyst for Armed American Radio. Follow him on Twitter: @AWRHawkins. Reach him directly at awrhawkins@breitbart.com. Sign up to get Down Range at breitbart.com/downrange.

And the loons:

A large crowd of protesters has surged onto the front steps of the US Supreme Court, chanting, “Kavanaugh has got to go.” Brett Kavanaugh is inside, where he will be sworn in. https://t.co/POLG1Y9RPr pic.twitter.com/Y9JfBzjkZj

— CNN (@CNN) October 6, 2018