It is fair to say that this is the worst time for Christians and Christianity in the West since the Roman empire. In order to promote equality, liberal democracy has created protected classes of people who cannot be criticized. The other side of this are people who must me mocked and ridiculed. Christians were the first group placed in this category and remain the popular object of ridicule in the West. There is no prohibition against overt hatred of Christians in most Western countries.
We are not feeding Christian to lions in gladiatorial pits, but you can be sure some elements of the ruling class have thought about it. Back in the Obama years, much of the health care bill was designed to torment Christians. For example, forcing Catholic groups to pay for abortions and prophylactics. There was no public health reason for these provisions. They simply satisfied the demented and sadistic impulses of the people who put together the program.
In some Western countries, practicing your faith is close to illegal. Päivi Räsänen is a Finnish politician. She was charged with crimes against democracy for tweeting out a picture of a Bible and quoting it in public. She was eventually acquitted by the courts, but that was not the point. Persecution is about the process. This was true under communism and is even more true under liberal democracy. Hell is being in the control of ideological fanatics staffing a bureaucracy.
The fact is the managerial elites of the West are not irreligious. Ideology is just religion that replaces God with man. Our elites are fanatics for liberal democracy and they will murder anyone who questions it. Christianity has always been their primary target because the Christian’s first loyalty can never be to man or the institutions and ideologies he creates. Liberal democracy, of course, demands absolute obedience to the state and the people who run the state.
It is not just the secular elites that make war on the Christian. The big churches have been taken over by the ideologues. Anywhere you see a rainbow flag it is either a gay bathhouse, a public school or a Protestant church. The Pope cares more about climate change than the Catholic faith. Even the Baptists have seen their organizations taken over by far-left radicals. The great challenge for most Christians is in finding a church that is not run by a far-left lunatic.
Culture is to a great degree a trickle down affair. The hostility toward Christianity among the Cloud People has infected the Dirt People. Church attendance has been in decline for a few generations. Close to 30% of Americans have no religious identity. This means they have no experience with religion. About 40% of people who still identify as Christian no longer attend church. Overall, about 40% of Americans still belong to a church and attend services on a regular basis.
In Europe, Christianity is just about dead. Only 1.4 percent of the population of England attends Anglican services every Sunday. Fewer than one-in-ten Germans say they believe in God. For most Europeans, Christianity is as alien as Islam. They know nothing about it, other than what is taught in history class. Given the entrenched self-loathing that has been imposed by America, Christianity is part of the hated past where evil Europeans tried to enslave black bodies.
It is not all bad news for Christianity. The faithful are slowly realizing that for their faith to survive this age, it must live outside this age. Christians are reverting to what all persecuted minorities must do. They are learning to live in the shadows and think of themselves as the outsider. Traditional Catholics seek one another out and form up shadow communities. Bible study in America is becoming a private affair organized by small local communities of believers.
These defensive measures are what will form the basis of a revival. Anything that is open to everyone is valuable to no one. Christianity was at its most powerful when it was exclusive and required sacrifice from the believers. One of the main reasons for the decline of the Western churches is their success. Once it was easy to be a Christian, it stopped being a powerful force in society. Its return to a persecuted, underground movement is the only path to renewal.
This presents a challenge and an opportunity in dissident politics. Many people waving the dissident banner have yet to shed their liberal disdain for Christianity. Some have manufactured bizarre conspiracy theories about the Church. On the other hand, many sober minded dissidents have soured on their faith, due to the take over of the churches by liberal democratic fanatics. One reason many dissidents have soured on the world is they have seen what happened to their churches.
In America, this is compounded by the problem of evangelical politics. In the 1970’s, in reaction to the cultural revolution, evangelicals decided to engage directly with politics in order to get their guys in office. This was a disaster. Many of the evangelical activist groups became profitable grifts for the leaders. The pols who took advantage of the evangelical vote sold out those voters. They convinced believers that their faith required them to accept liberal degeneracy.
The debacle of Christian political activism cannot be overstated. The neocons were able to take over largely with the support of evangelicals. Even now, after the disaster of the Bush years, many of these groups still care more about Israel than the condition of their own people. When the typical dissident sees stuff like this, he wants to hoist the back flag and start slitting throats. It is a reminder of just how easily these people were turned into weapons against the West.
That said, there is a slow rapprochement between the secular dissidents and the growing number of dissident Christians. The former is coming to understand the defining role not just of belief but of structured rational belief. The latter is coming to terms with the reality of their situation. For the West to survive and resurrect itself after the horrors of liberal democracy, it will need a new set of core beliefs, based in the old ways shaped by the experience of the crisis.
This is where dissident Christians can contribute the most to the cause. The sin of despair is one of the worst, because it is deliberate. One deliberately decides that salvation is impossible. It is the state immediately before suicide. The only reason to be a dissident it to maintain hope that through the struggle, reason and decency can be restored in the West. Without hope, the dissident has no reason to exist, which is why despair must become a mortal sin for dissidents.
You see more and more dissidents and dissident Christians willing to circulate in the same platforms. Gab has become the social media exchange for both dissidents and dissident Christians. Nick Fuentes and his groypers blend dissident political critiques with overt Christian beliefs. For the first time in a long time church attendance has ticked up in America. These are grim times for the defenders of civilization, but we still have hope because that is what must carry us through.
Happy Easter.
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Pingback: Strange Daze: Resurrection Aftermath
Powerful article.
Though many religious people try to make light of the differences between a scientific approach to life and a religious one— imagining that they can be a “person of faith”, while also affirming the findings of science— I don’t believe that’s the case.
Looked at closely, the two perspectives are diametrically opposed: theology is antithetical to science:
The scientist reaches his conclusions by a process of logical deduction, based on known facts and the most reasonable interpretation of them. For any given belief, he can show you the evidence for why he believes it to be true; why he believes his interpretation of the facts to be the most reasonable one.
He’s familiar with other proposed interpretations, and he can tell you why he prefers his. And at every step along the way, he’s careful not to go any farther than the facts allow.
And when he does venture beyond the facts, and propose a theory purporting to explain them, he’s careful to maintain the distinction: to point out when he leaves the realm of demonstrable fact— ‘what can be shown to be true’— into the realm of speculation: ‘this is my tentative interpretation of those facts.’
“This is how far the facts take us; from here on out, I’m merely offering a theory, a tentative interpretation of those facts; which may or may not turn out to be true”.
That’s the voice of science.
And the true scientist is constantly on the lookout for disconfirmatory facts, and doesn’t take it personally when they appear. He knows that his peers will be doing this— looking for facts which don’t accord with his theory— and that his theory will stand or fall on that basis. He knows that the only way his theory will survive is if no disconfirmatory facts can be found; so he eagerly looks for them.
He’s not looking to defend his theory at all costs; he doesn’t have any personal investment in his beliefs being right.
(I realize that scientists being human, not all scientists will live up to these ideals: some will be ego-invested in being right. But that’s seen by the scientific community as abberant behavior, as an undesirable abrogation of scientific standards. All scientists would agree that to the extent he becomes emotionally-invested in his theory being true, he’s failing to live up to the standards of science).
But how different is the world of the “faithful”!
Have you ever met a believer who’s eagerly seeking evidence that he may be wrong?
No! In fact, continuing to believe in the face of apparent contrary evidence is seen as the essence of faith.
Don’t agree?
Compare the trajectory of science over the past 500 years, with that of religion:
Science in the last 500 years demonstrates a continuing evolution, an ongoing willingness to abandon old beliefs and embrace better ones; a continuous ongoing progression towards greater and greater, ever-more-refined understanding. One would be hard-pressed to find any belief held in 1622 that’s still held today in the same form it was then.
By comparison, religious doctrines have remained virtually unchanged. The essential doctrines which Christians professed in 1622 are the same ones you’ll hear being professed in church today.
While the essence of science is embracing new knowledge, the essence of religious faith is resisting it.
All the difference in the world! Two diametrically-opposed ways of engaging with reality.
A scientist, faced with the claim that Jesus rose from the dead, would respond by asking for the evidence that it had happened; while pointing out that if it did, it would represent an extraordinary violation of the laws of the Universe as we know them. And while acknowledging the possibility that an all-powerful God could have raised Jesus from the dead; he’ll still ask why he should believe that it happened: Where’s the evidence for it?
And when informed that the “evidence” consists solely of stories recounted in a “holy book”, written decades after the purported event occurred, would politely point out the obvious: “That hardly amounts to proof!”
Compare that to the believer’s testimony:
“I know it’s true! I don’t need proof: I take it on faith!”
And when asked how— in the absence of definitive evidence— he can be sure his faith is justified, his testimony inevitably comes down to this: “I had a profound spiritual experience which makes me certain it’s true.”
Imagine a scientist using the same argument to justify one of his theories: “God assured me it was true”
He’d be hooted off the podium!
Whereas the believer offering the same “proof” is applauded as a mighty man of faith!
S: “How do you know it’s true?”
B: “It says so in this holy book, a book inspired by God.”
S: “How do you know it was inspired by God?”
B: “It says so, in this holy book.”
S: “But how can you be sure that’s true?”
B: “I had a profoundly-emotional experience, in which the God of the holy book assurred me. Since then, I just know it; no “facts” could convince me otherwise. I stand on my faith!”
The literal minded will never enter the Kingdom of Heaven, which consists of metaphor and parables.
Are you suggesting then that Biblical accounts are nothing more than metaphor and parable?
That is, that while they convey truths about reality, they shouldn’t be taken literally: as recounting events that actually happened and people who actually existed?
Virtually all the Christians I’ve known have understood the Bible literally: as recording actual history and real people. And would tell you that their faith depends on those things actually having happened.
Taking the resurrection accounts as myths symbolizing the eternal recurrence of life is NOT what their faith is about.
They would say, along with Paul, that it makes all the difference in the world whether Jesus actually rose from the dead.
The last three paras in the piece try to paper over the chasm between religious belief and objective truth, seeing as the latter is supposed to be non-negotiable around here. The conclusion that religion at least offers hope to the cause seems forlorn.
I’m not an atheist proselytiser. I advocate religion for everyone in the world, except me. I can suggest another way though for the dissident to square the intellectual inconsistency: by acknowledging, engaging with, and appreciating the *cultural value* of religion without actually believing in all the twaddle. Try it.
“I advocate religion for everyone in the world, except me.”
Dude, I get it. Religion is ridiculous but the alternative is so much worse. It’s hard to imagine something more ridiuclous than the historic Jesus but that is what we must hope for.
I admire a number of Christians yet I can’t ignore the vapidity of Jesus. Seriously, can you name one saying from Jesus that demonstrates wisdom?
The only aphorisms that I can can think of from Him are bone-headed stupid, like “turn the other cheek” or “love your enemies.” The Semon on the Mount is silly.
I admire His followers but I don’t admire Him. Uncomfortable for me.
Freud agrees with you and “love your enemies,” absolutely bewilders him. He simply cannot understand it. He asks: “Why should we do it? What good will it do us? But, above all, how shall we achieve it? How can it be possible? My love is something valuable to me which I ought not to throw away without reflection . . . If I love someone, he must deserve it in some way . . . He deserves it if he is so like me in important ways that I can love myself in him; and he deserves it if he is so much more perfect than myself that I can love my ideal of my own self in him . . . But if he is a stranger to me and if he cannot attract me by any worth of his own or any significance that he may already have acquired for my emotional life, it will be hard for me to love him. Indeed, I should be wrong to do so, for my love is valued by all my own people as a sign of my preferring them, and it is an injustice to them if I put a stranger on a par with them.”
Mr. Fake, if you’re telling me that I am wrong can you please correct me down a bit more explicity?
I get the sense that you feel that you are really putting me down by identifying me with Freud, but all your words are amorphous.
I suspect that the weakness of your response supports the strength of my criticism.
“get the sense that you feel that you are really putting me down by identifying me with Freud.”
Yes and no.
My subtle point was that Freud WAS a genius and he agrees with you. But whether Freud was good for the human race or right about all or most things. . .well, that’s another story.
What’s true, what’s beneficial, whats propogates power. . .all messy, confusing, issues to put it mildly
“Turn the other cheek” was meant to apply to a situation where “your brother strikes you.” Looking at the difference between violent neighborhoods and safe ones, we can see the value of giving our brothers a second chance.
“Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you” to me implies that being hated and persecuted is a blessing, a sign that youre doing the right thing, and that they “know not what they do” because they are instruments of satan.
Sounds pretty stupid to me buddy. Seriously, Jesus never uttered a phrase that can withstand scrutiny.
He’s pretty lame. I’m sorry.
Maybe so but his followers won.
Which is the ultimate wisdom.
Perhaps you should ponder why that happened and what lessons can be learned and applied from it.
Dino, excellent response!
I won’t kid you, I think that I demolished all the Christian arguments, but I appreciate your follow-up. I could be wrong. Thanks brother!
The literal minded will never enter the Kingdom of Heaven, which consists of metaphor and parables.
Jesus is a dry well when it comes to wisdom. That’s not my fault.
Not that anybody is reading these comments anymore, but some final thoughts on whatever:
-God’s existence cannot be proven or disproven in any sort of objective way
-The nature of God cannot be proven or disproven in any sort of objective way
-Christianity can “work” if it’s amongst a homogenous population of generally high quality, intelligence, and moral fiber. . .ie: what they used to call White people. A people must have a religion.
-The strength and sexual energy of the young must be channeled EARLY into productive work and family. The longer the libidious energies are thwarted in holding patterns of school and other crap, the more perverted and bent the individual will become.
-Separation is the most commonsense and humane way to deal with different peoples. Those who oppose separation are the tyrants/parasites/criminals who want access to the victims.
-General contentment on earth is not attainable in industrial/information mass societies. Tolkein’s ideal community was the shire. People want a village of their own kind where like isn’t complicated of cars, computers, etc. Where people wake and live under the sun and air. There must be blood and religion to unite the people; and their must be an “other” enemy who threatens what is cherished.
– I could be wrong! In the pre-industrial ages where the above conditions were met, people’s couldn’t stop killing each other. Might be no answer for humanity on earth.
Mr. Fake, I can’t tell you of the depth of my desire to live in the Shire. Maybe I’m oversensitive to crowds but I don’t think I’m all that unusual.
We evolved to live in villages. Mass society overwhelms us, generally speaking. I guess is that the extent to which one is comfortable in a city is the extent to which one is a sociopath.
Very good post Z Man.
Have a Happy Easter.
Leftists, to use a general term, have a strange perception of what love is, that they then monopolize. When Leftists see on our side Tough love, ballbusting teasing/rough housing, a strong protective/disgust stance against a maladaptive Other, they really do fail to comprehend and believe it is contrary and evil
It goes beyond to their comprehension of stuff like kindness, or standing your own ground with a gun vs hiding/whimpering/appeasing, the role of judgment and punishment vs absolute peacenik inclusivity. An inability to comprehend that God has overabundant mercy but He really doesn’t suffer fools. And Leftists may or may not have awareness that they act on seething grudges toward legitimate rebukes of their character and behavior rather than the pacifist view they enterain of themselves.
And yet present day Christianity is to be appropriately determined by these strange perceptions? Like a warped autoimmune system to eliminate the traditional or muscular attributes. A warped Weltanschauung that won’t abide anything outside/challenging to itself
One thing that’s clear about us human beings: how prone we are to self-deception, to fooling ourselves. It’s very easy for us— you might even say it comes naturally— to talk ourselves into believing things that simply aren’t true. You can see examples of this everywhere you look.
For example: progressives hold to an egalitarian view of humanity— the belief that all people-groups are equally endowed, that group racial differences are an artifact of environmental inequities, and will disappear under conditions of equal opportunity— despite the fact that science has shown this not to be the case.
Despite the fact that evolutionary theory has shown beyond any reasonable doubt that radical inequalities are inevitable in a world where racial groups evolved separately in response to radically-different environments, progressives resist that truth.
Why is that? Why are they unable to accept what science clearly shows us to be the case?
Have they made some prior commitment to equality that they simply can’t give up?
Are they expressing a deeply-felt ideology— ‘What I wish were true’ or ‘What I’d like to be true’ or ‘What I just know must be true’— rather than lessons derived from actual experience: ‘What I’ve found to be true’ or ‘What the facts lead me to believe is true’
That’s the beauty of science, and logical analysis: it allows us to distinguish between beliefs that are supported by facts, and those that aren’t.
Experience-based conclusions vs. wishful thinking.
My goal is to believe only what’s demonstrably true; and stay openminded about the rest.
Not what I was taught as a child; not what everyone around me believes; not what makes me feel good to believe— but rather, what the demonstrable facts show to be true.
All the rest, I’m content to remain agnostic about: “I don’t have enough facts to know the answer.”
I’ve come to hold my dissident-right beliefs because the facts support them. When called on to defend my beliefs, I can point to the facts which corroborate them. I can explain why it’s reasonable to hold the beliefs I do.
Religion is different. It always involves a “leap of faith”, beyond where the facts take you. That’s why in conversations with religious people, their testimony always finally comes down to, “I had a powerful spiritual experience which confirmed my beliefs.”
That’s not fact, it’s emotion. Nothing wrong with emotion— with feeling a profound sense of the rightness of your beliefs— but such a subjective experience has no necessary connection with demonstrable truth.
Heres my testimony:
If it werent for christianity, we’d all be speaking turkish, living in some inbred muslim society, castrated, working as slaves with 12th century technology.
Agreed.
And from that we can conclude that it was a good thing that Christian armies resisted the encroachmemt of Muslim armies centuries ago.
But it would not seem to have any bearing on the question of:
Is Christianity true?
I.e., is the Christian narrative an accurate account of reality?
I’m sort of mixed on what to think about the christian issue. On one hand, I’ve gone through my own phase of DR3 where I’ve become disaffected with the left and felt that “christians are the real tolerant ones”. But every now and then, I run into people like richard greenhorn on theamericansun who reminds me why I was attracted to the left in the first place.
It’s a tough needle to thread. Jesus broke bread with tax collectors and sinners because healthy people don’t need a doctor, but then he said if you love your children more than Him you aren’t worthy of Him. Doesn’t get less tolerant than that if you ask me.
OTOH it’s fair to say we see today what tolerance gets you.
It’s a difficult situation. The secular and Christians dissidents have no hope of winning without each other.
There are many Christians whom I respect and admire yet I fear they will fall sway to the racial universalism inherent in their faith. They are obligated to believe that Jesus can transform a black thug into a middle class Republican. Sorry, but that is a miracle on par with walking on water.
Understandably, they distrust me because I haven’t accepted Christ as my savior.
Again, a difficult situation.
I disagree that racial universalism is inherent in Christianity. This is a very recent addition as post-Marx culturalism took hold among Western elites. Christian anti-racism was an attempt by mainstream Protestants then Catholics to strike a bargain with the the new religion of the ruling class.
I want to believe you but if that black thug is going to the same Heaven as your daughter it is a difficult argument to make that he should not be in your community and marry her.
I know that Christians site the Babel story as a sigh that God wants separate peoples but I have yet to see that argument persuade any anti-racist Christian. I am not as optimistic on this point as the Z man.
I think it’s telling that the Christian congregations that are most passionately “anti-racist” are those who have also rejected much of what the Bible clearly teaches:
You can’t embrace feminism without ignoring the passages mandating male headship.
You can’t embrace homosexuality without ignoring the passages which condemn it.
You can’t lobby for “abortion rights” without ignoring the commandment not to murder, as well as the commandments to come to the aid of the weak and helpless.
Anybody who says they believe the Bible is “God’s word”— yet feels free to decide which of God’s words they’ll heed and which they’ll ignore— clearly isn’t taking the Bible all that seriously.
I don’t think any Christians believe any this of any color is going to heaven on the merits of his thugness, which is quite a straw man you’ve made there. However, most Christians I know at least believe that all people, even black thugs, need to submit to Christ, and that all people should be treated charitably and respectfully. The main question I have for race realists is: what exact policy are you angling for, regarding blacks/POC? Do you want a government law commanding all white people to refer to non-whites to by the most denigrating slur associated with their skin color? Or do you just want the end of affirmative action and the restoration of freedom of association? It seems to me most race realists talk like they want the latter but act like they want the former.
Drew,
Good questions!
Policies I would like to see enacted:
• end “anti-discrimination” laws and restore freedom of association.
• end “affirmative action” and restore meritocratic standards.
• end the war on free speech and remove “hate speech” laws.
• end the de facto ban on research regarding group racial differences.
• even-handed standards on social media platforms regarding who’s allowed to say what.
FWIW, some of the finest people I know have been African and African-American.
But that has nothing to do with my acceptance of the reality of group racial differences.
There are “many mansions” in heaven. You will be in the Wipipo house.
JR,
Haven’t you heard?
The Wipipo House has been converted to Celestial Section 8 Housing.
Much of the Old Testament tells the story of God taking great effort to mold a separate people: giving the Hebrews a separate set of rules and customs, urging them to see themselves as distinct, and to hold themselves apart from the peoples around them. Inplicit in this vision of “a chosen people” is the assumption of vast differences between groups, which would be lost through miscegination.
The New Testament is more complex: while the faith is indeed universalized to include all peoples and not just the Jews— “Here there is no Gentile or Jew, circumcised or uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave or free, but Christ is all, and is in all.” (Col. 3:11)
it’s certainly the case that only recently has this been interpreted as promoting racial universalism. The fact that the good news of the gospel applies to all people, doesn’t imply anything further in terms of how the races should relate.
Lincoln certainly didn’t think so:
“I am not nor ever have been in favor of making voters or jurors of negroes, nor of qualifying them to hold office, nor to intermarry with white people; and I will say in addition to this that there is a physical difference between the white and black races which I believe will for ever forbid the two races living together on terms of social and political equality. And inasmuch as they cannot so live, while they do remain together there must be a position of superior and inferior, and I as much as any other man am in favor of having the superior position assigned to the white race.”
18 September, 1858, in his debate with Stephan Douglas.
But all that is beside the point: every day science is presenting us with more evidence of the vast differences among the various races, and how that came to be. While there are certainly universal commonalities shared by all, there are also great inherent differences.
There also great differences between healthy and handicapped people. Should it therefore be socially morally acceptable for those who are healthy to mistreat those who are disabled? That there are immutable racial differences should only imply, at most, that different accomodations and expectations are needed for different races. It shouldn’t be justification for mistreatment.
Is exclusion mistreatment?
If a smart and law-abiding black is forbidden to live somewhere, due to his race, is he being mistreated?
Drew,
While I don’t disagree with anything you say, I think you may be missing the point. No one is advocating for the mistreatment of Blacks.
What we SHOULDN’T be doing, (IMO):
• denying the existence of inherent group racial differences, and the part they play in determining outcomes.
• assuming that all inequalities in performance— e.g., the Black-White performance gap in schools, or the disproportionate representation of Whites in high-IQ fields— are due to racism and discrimination.
• removing or lowering standards under the guise of affirmative action.
• enacting racial quotas.
• pretending that group racial differences don’t exist, and penalizing anyone who points them out, or scientists who choose to study them.
• removing freedom of association, with “anti-discrimination laws” which prevent private citizens from hiring who they want, renting to who they want, etc.
• attempting to hide the extent of disproportionate Black crime.
All of these are policies which are currently being promoted, and which amount to mistreatment of White people.
To continue your analogy: it’s as if— due to the fact that some people are disabled— no one is allowed to out-perform a disabled person; and pointing out the fact of someone’s disability is punished as “hate speech”.
Had Paul strolled through Nigeria there would have been a very long letter to the Corinthians on this topic.
It’s an inherent vulnerability in any universalist ideology or religion. As soon as the Christian agrees that the outgroup have souls then the left can grind him down by appealing to his own morality. Same problem with secular liberals, if other ethnic groups are sapient then your own ideology compels you to accept them as fellow humans.
Obviously regarding other races as zombies or automatons isn’t going to win the optics game, so you’re really just left with the same moral particularism that works so well for our triple parenthetical friends.
Nothing funnier than watching people argue about their respective Middle-Eastern fairy tales, the mutual demonisation and one-upmanship. What is needed is an overarching metaphysical view of the so-called Abrahamic religions. A Hindu has a firmer grasp of Jesus as avatara than any Christian apologist could ever have – and a Buddhist would tell you to stop trying to arrive at truth through dialectics/argument.
And both of them built civilizations where the average man shits in the street due to an IQ of 87
The one and only parallel I have found between Christianity and Buddhism is that the Resurrection may have more in common with the “rainbow light body” than anyone previously imagined…
(Conversations with grandchildren, part one)
You can’t have a talk with children because there’s the mother, and nowadays the main role of the mother is not to raise children but to confront the father.
(Who’s to blame? We, men, not only allowed but have encouraged women to stray that way. We decay; that’s the Law. So, don’t blame Putin, don’t blame Biden: blame yourself, blame your father. And after coming to grips with it, make peace with yourself – make peace with your Maker.)
(Conversations with grandchildren, part two)
Hard times make you strong;
gentle things make you glad.
Be grateful for both,
fall in love with neither.
(against hope)
Hope is the belief that, someday,
‘the self’ and ‘the other’ become a diluted,
somehow palatable mess.
Yes, hope is a mess, a psychotropic easily available, free as a D.I.Y. kit or on sale ready to use. (Indeed, as far-fetched as it may seem, some willingly pay to “hope makers”.)
Now, I’m not sure if there aren’t any not dying of hope deprivation, but I’m quite certain some are dying with – and even of – hope OD.
Just as the apostles thought jesus was dead, we simply must be in a situation like that. There has not been a pope since 1958, and it seems like there are no bishops or priests either, since no new ones can be made if there is no pope. It seems like His mystical body is gone too, as would be the promise that the Roman Catholic Church would last until the end of time.
But there are still a few Catholics left. Remember, when Adam fell, 100% of the human race apostatized. Noah, only two led out of Egypt made it to Jerusalem, the Babylon captivity, the english reformation.
God has been preparing us for this with these types of apostasies. We still have baptism and marriage and we can still be faithful and save our souls and that’s all that matters. Certainly not the Masonic USA…
Z, I rarely criticize you bluntly, but you really told a whopper out the gate with today’s essay: “It is fair to say that this is the worst time for Christians and Christianity in the West since the Roman empire.”
This is just about the worst hyperbole I recall in the two years or so I’ve been reading you. Perhaps you meant it for emphasis, as an introduction to the rest of the article? In any event, please allow me to enlighten you on just a few of the abuses Christians have suffered in later times. I won’t even go into the details of history, which are abundantly clear. The Inquisition lasted centuries. How many victims did it claim? Once Protestantism became a movement, it led to how many wars and other persecutions? Even in more recent times, Irish are killing each other nominally for religious differences, although the absolute numbers are rather small.
Now I will be the first to agree with your other points. The problem, what you inveigh against, is not that Christians are persecuted so much as that Christianity has become so marginalized. This is a long process going back at least a few centuries. Yes, the Church’s influence waned, a lot. But on the other hand, in most cases it was replaced by freedom to pursue any religion one chose — including no religion at all. These days, being a practicing Christian rather IS a dissident thing — you will find yourself in a minority. You may even be smirked at or openly ridiculed by the “worldly” or the “unsaved.” But persecution? Really? With very tiny exceptions, perhaps the infrequent parent incensed that his children must be vaccinated to attend a public school, there is virtually no persecution of anyone for belief in the modern world, at least in the Western nations.
If you believe that you are welcome to carry out an experiment to test it: try standing in the public square and forcefully advocating for standard Christian doctrine on judaism, sodomy, and baby killing. Even the thought experiment falsifies your argument.
Ben watches too much MSNBC and believes it all
Excellent post and observations, Zman.
What is most noteworthy about liberals who hate Christianity is that they hate democracy too, when it might put a Christian into office. It’s very hard to figure out exactly what they believe, actually. They tend to get elected because their flat affects and memorized technocratic jargon come off as mature and intellectual, rather than being the consequence of being a burned out hedonist who can no longer think creatively and spontaneously. They hope their voters won’t notice when they become senile in old age, when Christians become sages. The middle aged liberal is what Trump famously called “low energy” and this perfectly describes their entire remaining life.
It’s easier than ever to be a Christian, which has always been simultaneously and mysteriously a light yoke and a narrow road. It doesn’t even require genital mutilation. And everything else is at its lowest point of credibility, so to speak in secular terms compared to something of infinite credibility.
But what is absolutely mysterious is that the internet hasn’t killed the protestant heresy the way it should have. Every serious theological debate between true believers seems to take place between Catholics and Orthodox and everything else is nothing but sensationalism and scandal. Evangelicals are gradually becoming more pagan, and even demonic.
the Protestant Revolution was the starting point for the West’s descent to the hellhole we call the West today.
Well, the trad-Cathy’s have come out in force. I hate this intra-tribal bickering. I’ve noticed that the dissident movement has started to attract libertarian’s, pagans, gays, Protestants, Catholics and even some elites. We are all in the same boat and it’s taking on water fast. We can fight about all this after we win. Because our enemies hate all of us. And the enemy does have a say. South Africa is a good example. The boers hate the English (for good reason). Yet their situation is so dire they now increasingly make common cause with them. We must strenuously strive to maintain solidarity. Never thought I would ever speak that way, lolz. Incidentally, I just read a Desmond doss biography. The seven-day Adventist are a fascinating sect.
Just some branches of it. Look at Baptists or the Dutch Reformed and say they didn’t produce a great ethos.
Catholicism and Paganism both sprouted some destructive offshoots in their heydays.
Sounds like a secular dissident looking to form an intersectional alliance with… what’s a “dissident” Christian? A Christian who’s forsaken their faith. For many Christians, Christianity is merely the hope that Jesus might validate their politics. A Christian has no more investment in a liberal democracy than in totalitarian dictatorship. Jesus said His kingdom is not of this world. Most American and posibly European Christians want to make the Kingdom very much of this world.
Rod Dreher’s Ben Op is wise advice to today’s Christians but Rod lacks the courage of his convictions. He, too, is a politico who wants Christianity to be a reforming force in Western Civ and is angry when it proves not to be.
Whatever. There are plenty of Saints that fought for their people and there’s nothing wrong with recognizing that the Church is necessary for a functioning society. Your post is a piety spiral and I see it everywhere. Go be a monk somewhere.
“Go be a monk somewhere.”
Preferably one that takes a vow of silence.
Yeah but did they? They fought for the Catholics. As likely as not against other whites. Maybe that is the good that will come out of this current crisis. Fewer brother wars. On a more practical note. I wouldn’t care to have Catholic neighbors, or Amish or even Mormon. I don’t want Congolese neighbors.
A quick review of those “conspiracy theories” give me the greatest of joy. They confirm my bias, that what I’d intuited was correct–
That the Christ is Ours, is Ours, is Ours.
Contra dancing, English country dancing, various traditional folk dancing feature music dancing dress cultural customs reaching far back into the history of our people, Europeans.
Men and women of a variety of ages gather together keeping our culture alive. Men and women meet in traditional ways, reminiscent of traditional culture, as gathering in the square of ancient villages.
People study and learn to play live music. People learn traditional dance; keeping themselves physically fit, developing important skills such as balance, and preserving and developing mental alertness. People learn that which is congruent to who we are and vivify our culture and history.
Men and Women meet, marry, have children; propagating the past through the present into the future.
Never thought to encounter a fellow contra/English/Scottish Country dancer here. New England, yes?
Calif. (gaze at floor in shame)
Check out the RSCDS website. You’ll find Scottish Country Dancing near you in California.
I hope that I have bumped into you at the Jane Austen ball in Pasadena at some point Good Sir. Carry on!
I’ll be damned, we’ve found some true Scotsman.
RSCDS member since 1993 here. Greetings! This is a pleasant surprise!
The RSCDS is obviously a radicalizing influence.
I grew up contra dancing. Well, my parents did it and I just ran around with the other kids. It’s ironic that those NPR tote toting libtards do more to preserve European tradition than about anyone else.
Wherever you are in the world, there is probably a branch of the Royal Scottish Country Dance Society. Not for the out-of-shape.
Who can sing like the Russians?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SjcN7Mw8-zg&list=PLMOgArQx8GfpUSusL3kthG0M2k-_BQnIl&index=12
The only church I sympathise with is the Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia, the branch that left shortly after the Revolution, and it’s sister churches in Eastern Europe. There have always been vicious internal politics, but the core is as hard-core as it has always been, except perhaps for the pre-Nikon Old Believers. It’s worth learning some Russian and Church Slavonic, just to be able to enjoy the stunning liturgical music of the Slavs. I recommend reading anything from St. Theophan The Recluse, much beloved saint of Russia.
Jesus founded the, ahem, Russian church outside Russia? And when was that?
I’ve always understood a “lapsed” believer (Catholic, Presbyterian, whatever) to refer to someone who still believes that particular doctrine to be true, but who has stopped “practicing” the faith (going to church, going to mass, receiving the sacraments, etc.).
By that usage, if you’ve stopped believing altogether, you’re not lapsed, you’re something else.
So whether it’s accurate to describe Z-man as a lapsed Catholic depends on what his beliefs are regarding the truth of Catholic doctrine.
I identify as a lapsed catholic for my general religious beliefs as well. It’s a much nicer label than cultural catholic, which implies I’m some liberal dissenter, though it may be technically more accurate in my case.
I don’t identify as a ‘lapsed’ Catholic. I always say that I’m as Catholic as a Borgia. And I mean that sincerely, including the desire to Deus Vult my enemies and let God sort them out.
I didn’t leave the Catholic Church. The Catholic Church left me. Pax Vobiscum.
For lapsed/ indifferent Catholics, find a church that celebrates the traditional Latin mass and offers communion on the tongue. By definition, it is not POZ’ed.
For those of us 55 and younger, it is like nothing you have ever seen.
The Latin is weird (at first) and the communion on the tongue…challenging (I always sit in the front pew). More importantly, you will find the parishioners are, to a man, rejects from the modern…everything.
I am not optimistic about my chances for salvation, but when I go to the great beyond, I can’t say I was never given the chance or didn’t know any better.
“I am not optimistic about my chances for salvation, … .”
If you were not baptized, you would not be receiving the Blessed Sacrament. Ditto Holy Absolution.
Therefore, your sins are forgiven, and where there is forgiveness of sins, there is eternal life. This is not in question.
Stop worrying. Use the Sacraments. That’s what they are for.
kinda true. a mortal sin will send you straight to hell, so must go to confession regularly.
Well, yes, except that a mortal sin–by definition–is one that you refuse to confess and repent yourself of.
So…. let me try and get this straight:
As mortal humans, born into a fallen world, in which everyone around us is a sinner, we have zero chance of not sinning ourselves; being born into this world guarantees that we’ll be sinners, and there’s nothing we can possibly do to avoid it;
Yet God— who is perfectly loving, perfectly just, and perfectly merciful— is going to condemn us to eternal suffering for the sins which we couldn’t possibly avoid committing?
Really? Is that what Perfect Love and Perfect Mercy and Perfect Justice would do?
And since sin has occurred, someone has to pay for it, someone has to die, blood has to be shed. God can’t forgive us without a sacrifice.
Really? Why is that? Since God created everything— including the rules by which sinners are forgiven— why can’t God just say, “To heck with the sacrifice, if you’re sincerely sorry, I’ll just go ahead and forgive you”?
And only a perfect person, sinless himself, can serve as that sacrifice. So God sacrificed the only blameless person— the only person who didn’t deserve punishment, his son Jesus— and If I accept Jesus’ atoning death, all our sins are washed away…. I’m clothed in Christ’s righteousness, and when God looks at me, he sees Jesus. As long as I’m on this Earth, I’ll keep on sinning; but since I belong to Jesus, my sins— for which, before I was saved, God was ready to cast me into eternal torment— no longer offend him.
Sorry, but that just doesn’t make sense.
There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy.
Couldn’t agree more, the TLM renued my faith that was destroyed by modern Protestantism. They are “our” people and I find it a refuge from an insane world.
God knows English too. It’s the default language of the world and has more words than any other language, Russian being a close second (once again the Russians are a sleeper civilization that has more depth to it than we give them credit for). I don’t even let my housekeeper speak Spanish in my house, and I’m not going down the street to be given The Word in a foreign tongue. Or, some clown who thinks he knows spiritual tongues.
Latin was good for Italians circa 300AD. We’ve moved on Thank You.
I appreciate that it is unchanging and used only on special occasions, it makes for less confusion and interpretation. For example who ever says ” my that’s a rather gay new hat you have my dear”. Latins difficult and takes work and preparation for mass, I don’t see that as a bad thing. Its also comforting that I can go into any tlm church on the planet and feel at home.
Mr. Wirth,
That is a fair critique, but the Latin mass isn’t so much in a foreign language (which I despise hearing in my own country) than it is a universal language from our European patrimony.
…and for your school age kids, the Latin will help with their vocabulary…
Mow Noname: Well said. I agree.
The study of Latin (or any highly inflected language) disciplines the mind. A MAJOR benefit at any time or in any place. Today’s world could use some disciplined thinking.
both my a=sons took Latin in high school , and it helped discipline their thinking ans to understand written concepts.
find an ordinariate parish near you. beautiful ad orientem Mass in English and our kind of Christian dissendents abound
If you can’t find a Latin Mass or an Ordinarate, its a good rule of thumb that regular Novus Ordo parishes that have perpetual adoration also conduct the liturgy in a very reverent manner..
Your housekeeper? Clean up your own shit, lazy fatass.
One of the things that impresses me with respect to Christianity, at least in the here and now, are massive, intricate and beautiful cathedrals erected throughout Europe in the name of God and faith. Most of those I’ve walked through are in Spain, but I have visit at least one anytime we’re there. Even the Alhambra doesn’t hold a candle to the cathedral in Granada, IMO. They are a true testament to western man’s faith, ingenuity and industriousness.
usNthem: The churches and minsters in England are magnificent.. So is St. Stephen’s Cathedral in Budapest. I’ve visited lovely churches in Austria. And, of course, the Hagia Sophia in Istambul. How anyone can look at the beauty and technical ingenuity employed to the glory of God – or for that matter listen to brilliant classical music written to celebrate God’s glory (Handel, Bach, etc.) – and claim it is all delusional rubbish is now beyond my understanding. But . . . there but for the grace of God.
This is where the biblical christianity/divine divergence sits for many I would think. It does for me.
On the one hand the biblical stories in and of themselves appear to me to be tied into mechanisms intentionally used to inject certain groups into authority structures in early Europe (in the same way modern media is used), to ensure Europeans were used to keep alive a foreign set of foundation myths to replace their own and to exploit the native tribes solely for their own benefit as they spread up through Europe and not much more.
On the other the influence of Christianity in reaching towards the divine as evidenced by European flowering in all areas and the beauty and rigor it produced in everything from art, architecture, music to the huge influence on most modern science foundations cannot be dismissed. Although this may have happened if it had remained Greco-Roman as similar remains abound from those cultures. Who knows.
Irrespective the lack of a foundational religion is being displaced by an evil that cannot be ignored.
So it is something of a quandry that I wish I had a better answer for.
Right on target. I will never be a ‘true believer’ because I see some of the underpinnings you described and how hard it is to reconcile.
But I also agree that Christianity in spite of some of the traps embedded in its doctrine ‘outgrew’ those and flourished on its own. It is so intertwined with the history of Europe and being the forefront of the world as we know it they simply cannot be unraveled from one another.
I would have zero problem with a return to the muscular Christianity of the crusades or even better, the Inquisition. 😎
We were clear eyed & sober about who our blood enemies were during those periods. What we have now is so grossly weak and hollow by comparison in most places they are scarcely even the same thing by any yardstick one could measure by.
Unfortunately the muscular Christianity was almost entirely driven by the muscular approach of the knight elite feudal system in Europe.
Given the globohomo erosion of any male elite mind set and the effeminate state/managerial only outlook of the current candidates I doubt any of this can be manifested even if Christianity could be resurrected.
“Right on target. I will never be a ‘true believer’ because I see some of the underpinnings you described and how hard it is to reconcile.”
[…]
“I would have zero problem with a return to the muscular Christianity of the crusades or even better, the Inquisition. 😎”
Okay, both of those things cannot be true.
If muscular Christianity is good in the final paragraph, why is it not good in the first paragraph?
If patriarchal authority is good in the final paragraph, why is it no good in the first?
I can understand that something is good for society as a whole even if it is not the best fit for me personally. In every permutation of every situation I’d prefer a strong Christian doctrine to what we have now. All aspects of Christianity I cannot reconcile personally, but these are minor quibbles I have with something that on the whole is valuable as a societal compass.
Amen on cathedrals.
I tend to agree with the argument that the architectural, artistic, sculptural, and musical elements were deliberately developed and refined over centuries to create an incredibly sophisticated, cinematic worship experience.
Two lesser known cathedrals I’ve been lucky enough to visit are Nidaros in Trondheim and the Cathedral of Santa Maria of Palma de Mallorca. Both are equally impressive, quite different, and distinctively tied to their people and place.
Antoni Gaudi’s Sagrada Família is impressive in terms of its sheer scale and complexity, yet when I examine its details I feel as though I am witnessing the very leading edge of Catholicism’s pozzing.
That is ironic, because by all accounts Gaudi was a committed Catholic and Catalan nationalist who lived a circumspect personal life.
I attended a mass in Maui, and the crucifix over the alter had a Jesus that looked like Don Ho. Got a good chuckle out of that.
If white Christians could see what the historic Jesus really looked like, I guess that many would find their enthusiasm for the faith waning.
It’s hard to identify emotionally with the Divine when it has the face of a racial other.
The Alhambra is a Moorish palace, not a place of worship, so the comparison is not faithful to the purposes for which it was built.
While we are comparing, what Western religious architecture would you compare to the mouth-dropping mosques of Isfahan, Iran?
I suppose my point is that while the Alhambra is the big tourist attraction in Granada, the Cathedral is much more impressive in my opinion, not only as a monument to the Christian faith, but also sheer impressive architecture.
There are too many to name.
A lot fewer now, with some 1400 burned in Europe and Canada.
Berkan: While I have not been to Iran, I’ve visited Turkey a number of times and seen some beautiful mosques, particularly the Selimiye in Edirne built by Suleiman’s architect Sinan. It was lovely, but I would readily hold up half a dozen Christian Cathedrals as its superior.
Yes. And I’m afraid the cathedrals are imperiled. The anti-whites, if they obtain enough power, will convert them into multiculti shrines. The Muzz, if they gain enough power, will turn them into mosques. And the Hutus, if given enough power, will house rappers there.
The French are desecrating their own cathedrals. Check iut the woke display planned for renovated Notre Dame.
I don’t even want to know.
The Church owns no property in France, It all belongs to the French Republic.
Thus far has fallen the Eldest Daughter of the Church.
I have never been one for organized religion but I do consider myself to be a “spiritual” person but even a heathen such as myself was struck dumb in awe at the Sagrada Familia in Barcelona.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sagrada_Fam%C3%ADlia
If I ever convert to Catholicism it will be in no small part due to Gaudi’s cathedral.
do it. ever since I started taking the Catholic Faith seriously, I have found much joy and happiness.
do it. ever since I started taking the Catholic Faith seriously, I have found much joy and happiness.
I’m glad. But the litmus test will be when you are persecuted and have to take big risks.
If the world does not hate you, you ain’t doin’ it right.
Pingback: DYSPEPSIA GENERATION » Blog Archive » The Dissident and the Christian
Here’s a talk by Richard Carrier, professor of ancient literature at Columbia University, presenting evidence for the possibility that Jesus may not have existed at all:
https://youtu.be/WUYRoYl7i6U
He also wrote a lengthy book on the subject:
https://www.amazon.com/Historicity-Jesus-Might-Reason-Doubt/dp/1909697494/ref=nodl_
And then there’s the inimitable Christopher Hitchens:
https://youtu.be/9V85OykSDT8
Richard Carrier…. wasn’t he the guy that Roissy et al mocked so mercilessly, for asking his blog readers for a date? And not just any date, a date who would be into polyamory?
Something tells me homeboy as what you might call a vested interest in undermining the foundations of Western morality.
Carrier can be a total flake, but what he says about the Bible can still be true; one has no necessary connection with the other.
I listen to the evidence he presents, and weigh that, and judge his arguments accordingly.
I could care less about internet rumors about his social life.
“I listen to the evidence he presents, and weigh that, and judge his arguments accordingly.”
It must be truly wonderful to be smarter than the greatest minds the Western tradition like Thomas Aquinas and Isaac Newton and many others.
Saying you could care less means that you do care. Just an FYI, Mr. Copernicus.
“Mr. Copernicus.”
Oh, yeah, and him, too. He was include in “many others.” So, oddly enough, were many others.
I seem to recall Joe Smith was also interested in polyamory. According to Fawn Brodie’s well researched bio “No Man Knows My History” he was jailed for destroying a newspaper office whose owner accused him of infidelity with his wife and was publishing critical articles.
“Here’s a talk by Richard Carrier, professor of ancient literature at Columbia University, … .”
Columbia University, is it? Drive on. The readers of this blog are singularly unimpressed.
Anyway, Christ dealt with such foolish and self-absorbed people quite directly in Luke 16: 29 – 31:
“Abraham said to him, ‘They have Moses and the prophets; let them hear them.’ And he said, ‘No, father Abraham; but if one goes to them from the dead, they will repent.’ But he said to him, ‘If they do not hear Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded though one rise from the dead.’ ”
Matthew 22: 14: “Many are called but few are chosen.”
Christianity makes exclusive claims. Most people will be damned. Most modern people–ignorant by definition–find that “unfair.” There is no human answer to this question. Such things are not our concern.
But theirs are juvenile minds. And always will be.
Let God be God. Those people and their foolish ideas are not your concern; they are God’s.
Get on with your life.
“There is no human answer to this question.”
Zowee, do I EVER disagree with that one.
We are meant to know, to discover all these things. Made for it, in fact.
“Zowee, do I EVER disagree with that one.”
Duly noted.
Carrier is a joke in academic circles. Mythicists, the people that think Jesus never existed, are a very fringe movement. But they have a lot of followers on Internet
The historicity of Jesus is very well established
The historical sources about the existence of Jesus are numerous and varied. Jesus is one of the most attested characters in ancient history.
Graeco-roman references to Jesus: pagan historian Thallos (around AD 55, twenty years after Jesus death), stoic writer Mara bar Serapion (sometime after AD 70), Roman historian Tacitus (AD 56-120), Roman administrator Pliny the Younger (AS 61-113), Roman historian Suetonius (around AD 120).
(Compare this to references to Alexander the Great, who died in 323 BC. “We have ancient narratives of Alexander’s life, written between 30 BCE and the third century CE—hundreds of years after his death. The earliest known account is by the Greek historian Diodorus, but we also have histories written by other historians, including Roman historians”. But nobody doubts the existence of Alexander the Great)
Jewish references to Jesus: Josephus (two independent mentions in 94AD), Talmud (several hostile mentions that mention ancient traditions).
Of course the earliest accounts are Christian, the set of texts and traditions that ended up becoming the New Testament: the earliest account is the ancient creed included in 1 Corinthians 15, 3-5 (dated from 2 to 10 years after Jesus death), the pre-Markan passian account (7 years after Jesus death?), other ancient creeds included in Paul’s letters, the Paul letters by themselves as well as the Luke-Acts, John and Matthew specific sources. All this before 70AD or so.
See this in reference to Richard Carrier
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=akd6qzFYzX8
“… the earliest account is the ancient creed included in 1 Corinthians 15, 3-5 … .”
There are 22 (or 23?) hymns and creedal statements in Revelation/Apocalypse. Possibly as early as A.D. 70.
Also the Didache (“The Teaching of the Twelve Apostles”). Possibly as early as some of the NT books.
imnobody00,
“Graeco-roman references to Jesus: pagan historian Thallos (around AD 55, twenty years after Jesus death), stoic writer Mara bar Serapion (sometime after AD 70), Roman historian Tacitus (AD 56-120), Roman administrator Pliny the Younger (AS 61-113)”
Do you have links to those? I’m not doubting you, I’m just not familiar with them.
As far as the Josephus quote: except for extreme fundamentalists, I’m not aware of any Biblical scholar who sees that as genuine. Examining the language of that quote, and comparing it to the language in the rest of Josephus, unbiased scholars have pretty much all come to the conclusion that it was a later interpolation, put there by someone wanting to bolster the Christian story.
> And it’s also well-attested that of all ancient texts, the Christian ones have been fiddled-with in that fashion far more than any others.
“Of course the earliest accounts are Christian”
Why “of course”? I’d think that the events described in the NT would have been of interest to any contemporary observer, not just Christians.
I’m not invested in the notion that Jesus didn’t exist. I agree it’s likely that he did.
The question is: how much of the NT accounts about him
are genuine, and how many were added later? How many of the sayings attributed to Jesus did he actually say?
“Luke-Acts, John and Matthew specific sources. All this before 70AD or so.”
I don’t think so, unless the scholarship has changed drastically in the past decade.
I know one of those texts refers to the destruction of the Temple by the Romans, which didn’t happen until 70 AD; so that one had to have been written after that.
Last I heard, scholars date Paul’s letters (the genuine ones) around 50-60, the other NT texts from 70-90.
Bless your heart.
Msgr. Ronald Knox wrote a satirical article where he applies the “critical history method” to Boswell’s Life of Johnson, and concludes that the the book had several separate sources, Johnson didn’t actually exist, and the book was written decades later than traditionally claimed.
IMO there’s no good reason not to believe the entire NT was composed before 70 AD.
KL,
You say “there’s no good reason not to believe the entire NT was composed before 70 AD.”
What are your reasons for believing they were written before then?
Top comment! As we’ve seen during the last 2 years, most Christians are no different from agnostics and atheists in their hankering for the material things of life.
It still chokes me up.
I was raised in a shitlib family. When I was just a little guy, I went with a bunch of the local brats to an informal summer kids’ club that the catholic ladies put on in their back yards. It was tame stuff, they told us kids bible stories, played memorization games and even regular games. It was a great place for little kids to go and it was free. When my mom found out about it, she gave me a spanking and told me never to go there again. When I tried to tell her that they weren’t bad people, and all we did was play games, I got spanked again. I would understand when I was older, she told me.
I was raised to hate Christians and think of them as hypocrites, cultists and grifters. That.. or as ignorant uneducated rubes. It wasn’t until I was 56 that I truly understood, now that I was older. My wife dragged me to church, kicking and screaming… and I was just shocked by the people I met. These folks were not grifters. They walked the walk… the same walk we all need to in order to have working, prosperous communities. These were GOOD people. Maybe there’s a few assholes… but there are in any community.
I look at the decline and fall of the church in a different way, Z. The church didn’t fall to liberal democracy. It fell to sin. Greed, lust, perversion, corruption… it’s all there. Liberal democracy isn’t evil; all it really is, is a road to hell paved with good intentions. It’s just another attempt by man to supplant God’s law with his own. It will destroy itself and many of its adherents shortly.
And all the other institutions are falling and failing the same way. Look at the Biden’s and their sin… people are flat out rejecting the legitimacy of the courts, the schools, the media, and govt because of this stuff. If I recall, our esteemed blog host can’t even be bothered voting anymore… and I have no ammo to contradict him with on that. That is just one of the things that will need to change.
We all have to be better people again. Yes, we have to do something about the jews and the blacks… but it has to be fair. They’ll need to be kept on a short leash, and we will have to earn the moral authority to do that.
This WILL end well…eventually. If we have the stones to earn it.
“Jews and the blacks … need to be kept on a short leash…”
We have no moral obligation before judgement by God to expend such effort. The solution is deportation and separation. Let them predate upon their own in their own lands. It’s time for White hands to again reach for the stars, but this time without the rootless and the savage dragging us back down.
We will have to do that to protect ourselves, Horace. If you give jews and blacks places of authority in your govt and your communities… this is what they will look like. They have to be on our leash, or they will have us on theirs and that won’t be good for anyone.
“The church didn’t fall to liberal democracy. It fell to sin. Greed, lust, perversion, corruption… it’s all there.”
Same things. Democracy is based on the unthinking rejection of authority. You recognize that when you write this:
“Greed, lust, perversion, corruption… it’s all there.”
So you are in complete agreement with Z’s essay of today.
Essentially. We come to the same conclusions but arrive there by different means. He certainly isn’t wrong; he just views the world through a secular lens, whereas I view it through a spiritual one.
Essentially. We come to the same conclusions but arrive there by different means. He certainly isn’t wrong; he just views the world through a secular lens, whereas I view it through a spiritual one.
Duly noted.
Thanks for that interesting share.
Ahhh the CQ! It’s been a little quiet around here lately. This should be a fun thread!
I’d argue that the CQ is more important than the JQ. And I say that as a secular dissident.
Semi-OT:
Here are some Good Friday afternoon whitepills courtesy of the lovely young Russian women that make up the folk-signing group, “Beloe Zlato,” which translates to, “White Gold.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YoE6KinOLCU
https://www.youtube.com/c/BeloeZlato
These look like my people.
Wonderful diversion, doubly emphasized by the first thing to appear on my YouTube screen—a “commercial” with all Blacks using their new bank card! Sigh….
Wild Geese: Thank you for that. Brought back many memories and much nostalgia. The architecture of the store they’re in front of, the chai metal glass holders on the train where they sing California Dreamin’, and two of the women are wearing the exact soft knit-cream colored traditional headscarf I bought while living there, which I still use.
Been enjoying Beloe Zlato for a couple of years now; really talented gals.
Thanks much- I watch Russian and Turkish TV to get my fill of “normal people” vitamins. Haven’t seen ONE dindu on Haber Türk for weeks and weeks, no femtards, no fagtards, no anti-religion bagelytes or leftist Kurds either. Music shows from the Caucaus Republics are a special treat—good-looking, conservative Whyte People, mostly Muslim. Zero Divershitty.
Ha! Try looking up Aryan anything on youtube- they’ve gone full BJP Hinduvata “history”.
It’s so strange to watch Eastern European women on the internet with their clothes on.
Reading this post I had to wonder whether Z has listened to the most recent Tom Woods episode with Paul Gottfried. (Ep. 2102 Is This the Government We Deserve? with Paul Gottfried) It’s on Youtube and it’s quite interesting.
That bit about raising the black flag and slitting throats is, of course, from Mencken. So why not quote some more of his wisdom?
“Religion is fundamentally opposed to everything I hold in veneration – courage, clear thinking, honesty, fairness, and, above all, love of the truth.”
“Evangelical Christianity, as everyone knows, is founded upon hate, as the Christianity of Christ was founded upon love.”
“Puritanism. The haunting fear that someone, somewhere, may be happy.
(A Mencken Chrestomathy ch. 30 (1949)
“We must respect the other fellow’s religion, but only in the sense and to the extent that we respect his theory that his wife is beautiful and his children smart.
(Minority Report: H. L. Mencken’s Notebooks (1956)
“Morality is doing what is right, no matter what you are told. Religion is doing what you are told, no matter what is right.”
Dissidents these days also quote a lot of Fred Nietzsche’s witticisms, consciously or not, despite the latter’s proud lack of hope, faith, charity, etc. my issue with the religious Rod Dreher type of folks is they think they deserve applause for still being devout after all this dreck that happens daily. Sorry, the world doesn’t care… Christians as well as Muslims, Wiccans, etc. might improve by not expecting brownie points and to be let off the hook for being “people of faith” and behaving as just another identity pressure coalition. Being religious doesn’t seem to immunize a person against the universal virus of denying reality.
“ Cynic, n. A blackguard whose faulty vision sees things as they are not as they ought to be.” -Ambrose Bierce
“Being religious doesn’t seem to immunize a person against the universal virus of denying reality.”
In fact, I suspect that over-ruling your reason in order to believe one unbelievable thing, may make a person more susceptible to the next unbelievable thing coming along.
And a little logic shows you that at best, only one of the religions could possibly be true. When they all disagree about fundamental questions of reality, there’s only two possibilities:
One is true, and all the rest are false
or
They’re all wrong.
But they can’t all be right. So whoever does turn out to be right, we can know for a fact that most religious believers are wrong about the ultimate nature of reality.
When you see sincerely religious people embracing mutually-contradictory beliefs— if Islam provides an accurate picture of reality, then by definition Christianity and Buddhism and Hinduism are wrong—
And you hear each defending his beliefs with the personal testimony that “my life experience confirms my faith”
— “the closer I adhere to my (Christian, Muslim, Hindu, Buddhist) beliefs, the better my life gets”—
Or the ultimate: “God told me that Mormonism is true”—
What can you say to THAT?
And when you see multiple people, affirming mutually-contradictory belief systems, each believing themselves to have found the one true faith; each defending his particular beliefs with the testimony that his life-experience has confirmed them—-
>>>> It becomes clear that the very nature of religious experience is to be felt as being self-confirming.
“In fact, I suspect that over-ruling your reason in order to believe one unbelievable thing, may make a person more susceptible to the next unbelievable thing coming along.”
Credo quia absurdum.
And no, you are not smarter than Augustine of Hippo.
“>>>> It becomes clear that the very nature of religious experience is to be felt as being self-confirming.”
No, your basic error is that you are unable to observe things accurately but you don’t know that, and then you conflate what you think you are seeing with objective truth–gross subjectivity. Precisely what you are blaming the people you are talking about of.
Your personal experience is seen by you as observation of objective reality, but it is not.
All you have done is to lump yourself in–unwittingly–with the very people you have convinced yourself you are observing.
As “logic,” it’s an epic fail.
Augustus of Hippo?
Really?
I’m not talking about my personal experience. I’m talking about what observation and applied logic tell us about religion.
What I observe is that people of mutually-contradictory religious traditions— only one of which can be true— all testify to having the same sorts of experiences, which they point to in order to validate their particular set of beliefs.
When my Mormon sister tells me that God has confirmed to her through prayer that Mormonism is true; while my Baptist friend testifies that God has confirmed to him that the Baptist picture of God is the true one; and my Catholic friend insists that God has confirmed to him the truth of his Catholic faith—
And when I observe that their beliefs are different enough in key ways that only one of them can be true—-
In other words, when I see religious people of different faiths believing different things about God— each insisting that God has given them spiritual confirmation that their particular set of beliefs is true—
Then logic tells me that there are only a few possibilities:
1) Each of them is having a valid religious experience: God is a trickster who enjoys telling everyone that their belief system is the right one;
2) One of them is having a genuine encounter with God, while the others are deluding themselves: believing that they’re hearing from God, when in fact they’re not;
3) None of them are hearing from God.
It’s even more apparent when you look at religion around the world: if the Christian picture of a personal God is correct, then the Hindu belief that God is impersonal must necessarily be false.
If Christians are correct that God is a spirit, then the Mormon belief in a embodied God can’t also be true.
If Hindus are right about God, then Christians and Muslims and Buddhists are wrong. God can’t be both personal (Christianity) and impersonal (Hinduism). Jesus can’t be both divine (Christianity) and not divine (Islam).
So we don’t even need to know whose version of God is the correct one.
> When faced with mutually-contradictory notions of God, what we can know with absolute certainty, is that at most *only one of them can be true*; and logic tells us that if one of them is true, then the rest must necessarily be false.
Or maybe they’re all false. What CAN’T be the case, is that they’re all true.
So whichever version of God is the correct one, logic forces us to conclude that most religious believers are believing in a God that doesn’t exist.
I may not be as smart as Augustus of Hippo. But apparently I’m smarter than you.
Mencken is always fun to read, no doubt about that.
Doesn’t make him right by any stretch of the imagination.
Pastors of all stripes love to talk about the great awakening periods of our history. How the pews were empty in 1790 and then suddenly… Same with the second one, the third one, etc. The last one was the Jesus Movement of the late 60’s and 70’s, which was particularly huge on the west coast. What I’ve told these pastors is look at their fruit. Don’t look at the movements in their day. Look at their end results, which I’ve lived through my entire life.
At the end of each of these movements the church (no particular denomination) is left weaker and more estranged than ever. The pews empty once again. Society, far from moving towards the Gospels, is moved even further away. And that’s because all of these movements weren’t about God. They were about human interaction with God. Or supposed human interaction. Tell this to pastors and they’ll naturally recoil and suspect that you don’t have a healthy “relationship with Jesus.” Jesus is reduced to a peer that you go to the beach with or something.
What if….and this is just a thought….attending church isn’t about us? If you tell your average pastor that “I attend church because I’m obligated to do so as I want to pay respect to the creator of the universe and all space and time in-between, and it would be selfish of me to not spend at least an hour or two tipping my hat to God when I spend hours a week in a health club focusing on myself” he would say “but do you really have a relationship with him?”
The pews empty once again.
“Many are called. but few are chosen.” Matthew 22: 14.
Empty pews are to be expected.
If the world doesn’t hate you, you are doing something wrong.
“Jesus is reduced to a peer that you go to the beach with or something.”
Delicious observation!
“What if….and this is just a thought….”
It’s about us *and* Him. Both things. We owe the sacrifice of thanksgiving. And He calls us together to give us certain gifts, which *is* about us.
It’s both; not “either or.”
Excellent post.
they are not empty at my trad cath church. cannot get a seat unless you arrive early, and we have 3 Sunday morning Masses.
Great to hear. There are churches like that in Belgium and France, believe it or not.
That Hagee video trying to raise money for Js was cringeworthy. I see similar ads on Fox asking for donations for poor Js in Israel. I get that evangelicals love Js, but the feelings are not mutual. It takes a special kind of stupid to send money to the richest demographic on the planet, that openly despises you. They may as well send checks to Pelosi and Biden for their ice cream budgets.
Those commercials are interesting. The dirt poor Jewish people begging in some Eastern Europe dump, maybe Ukraine or who knows. In this country , 6 of the 10 richest people are Jewish and yet they demand simple minded Christians donate to overseas jews.
Donating money to people that hate us is not a good idea. I was watching the local news a few minutes ago. It dedicated 5 minutes, out of 22 minutes available, to a story on anti Asian hate crimes. The usual type of story with no mention that black are committing most of these crimes. It had the usual “hate whitey” vibe. The reporter’s name was Pearl so I am sure he was in the usual suspect ethnic group.
“I see similar ads on Fox asking for donations for poor Js in Israel.”
It tells you who the viewers are. The demographic that they will pay through the nose to pitch to. For example, Lou Dobbs’s viewers were clearly suckers for those “Holocaust survivors
in Russia.” Camera showed a bunch of babushkas in wretched conditions–usually weeping–but they were always getting stuff delivered right to their wretched doorsteps by strapping young men. It was a jarring “tell.” But the buyers of the airtime didn’t care. And the marks in front of their TV sets didn’t see it.
They ran that annoying drivel on his *every* broadcast.
Why don’t the Bagelyte Oligarchs contribute more to the welfare of these allegedly dirt-poor co-religionists? The chutzpah of that woman (founder’s daughter) is impressive.
If you believe in God — particularly if you are a Christian — then why do you even care about any of this? Christianity always made it clear that we are not for this world, but for the next. If I believed in God then no matter what happened in this world it would all be temporary, and after it was over nothing would be lost, it would all still be there in the mind of God. That would be so reassuring! God has been willing to allow many disasters in the world, and if He is willing to allow his world to be overrun by Africans and go to hell, well I’m still not going to be thrilled about it, but I would care much, much less. He does have a Plan after all.
I’m genuinely puzzled by this. This world is precious to me precisely because I believe it’s all that there is, and if it goes to hell then hell is all there is. But if I believed in a next world I wouldn’t think that way. I particularly wouldn’t care about race! Minor sects aside, all religions are emphatic that All Men Are Brothers. Even the Southern slave owners believed that a slave might go to Heaven and sit before the throne of God, while his master might suffer for eternity in Hell. If I believed that then my priorities would be drastically different!
I would be interested in hearing peoples thoughts on this.
“Christianity always made it clear that we are not for this world, but for the next. ”
Yes, my issue with God and religion has always been the “pie in the sky” aspect. So easy for the rulers to trick people into slavery with promises of heaven WHEN YOU’RE DEAD.
There may very well be God and a timeless heaven, but all I can directly know is this earth, here and now.
Much of what both of you mention as problens with Christianity largely come from the Protestants. Scofield and his fellow travelers did much to damage the acknowledgement that “faith without works is dead” and that Christians are called to take care of their fellow man. The elites want Christians as rootless as the cosmopolitans. Shit there was no apocalyptic Rapture doctrine until the mid1800s. The shift was pushed to prepare for the next life and stop making the world a better place. The Catholics held out a bit longer but Vatican II ensured that Globohomo gained control there.
“Shit there was no apocalyptic Rapture doctrine until the mid1800s. The shift was pushed to prepare for the next life and stop making the world a better place. The Catholics held out a bit longer but Vatican II ensured that Globohomo gained control there.”
You are right on some of this and wrong on some.
“The shift was pushed to prepare for the next life and stop making the world a better place.”
Christianity has never taught that it was incumbent upon its adherents to “make the world a better place.” However, when the Church has been left alone to do Her *proper* work, it has without exception made the world better. But as Christ told Pontius Pilate, “My kingdom is not of this world.” Not the same thing at all.
” … Vatican II ensured that Globohomo gained control there.”
That is false. Vatican 2 was a bad blow, but the elect cannot be deceived:
“For there shall arise false christs and false prophets and shall show great signs and wonders, insomuch that, if it were possible, they shall deceive the very elect.”
Vatican 2 has deceived many people, but those people are not among the elect.
Christ Himself has told us that the gates of hell will never be able to prevail against His Church.
“Shit there was no apocalyptic Rapture doctrine until the mid1800s.”
Shit there *was* a Rapture doctrine. It was devised by a Spanish Jesuit in the 17th century in an ultimately successful attempt to drive a wedge into the Protestant reforms.
You are right, though, about Schofield. He did the devil’s work. But the elect are not deceived; have never been deceived; never will be deceived.
You focus on peripheral things. You ought not to do that:
“Finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report; […] think on these things.”
Focus on the right things, and get on with your life.
If I may respond to myself, I shall quote CONAN THE BARBARIAN:
“I have known many gods. He who denies them is as blind as he who trusts them too deeply. I seek not beyond death. Let me live deep while I live; let me know the rich juices of red meat and stinging wine on my palate, the hot embrace of white arms, the mad exultation of battle when the blue blades flame and crimson, and I am content.”
” Let teachers and priests and philosophers brood over questions of reality and illusion. I know this: if life is illusion, then I am no less an illusion, and being thus, the illusion is real to me. I live, I burn with life, I love, I slay, and am content.”
And my other issue is say I get all religious and believe in God and all that. . .then what?
Still gotta pay the bills, still horrible people in the world ( that He created),etc.
He doesn’t DO anything, from a prosaic point of view. He does not smite the wicked ( who often win), he doesn’t stop bad things from happening to good people, and on and on. it’s like looking for a hero father all the time and saying, “where is he?”
In this world, belief in God and a quarter will get ya a twinkie.
God doesn’t cause the bad things, it’s a result of the “free will” He gave everyone, the freedom to make poor, or no, choices. God is just the steel in your spine that allows you to stand up to the bad things when they happen, in the sure and certain knowledge that all will be made clear after death. Here endeth the first lesson. (and yes you can be “good without God), as the billions who lived and died before Jesus appeared..)
“And my other issue is say I get all religious and believe in God and all that. . .then what?”
And then you participate in “the life of the world to come.” Here and now.
Still gotta pay the bills, still horrible people in the world ( that He created),etc.
“He doesn’t DO anything, from a prosaic point of view. He does not smite the wicked ( who often win), he doesn’t stop bad things from happening to good people, and on and on. it’s like looking for a hero father all the time and saying, “where is he?”
So this simply tells us who and what YOU are. It says nothing whatsoever about God.
What you want is a cosmic vending machine. You want your carnal wishes to be fulfilled. That’s all.
Good luck with that. It’s the mentality of a 12-year-old schoolboy.
There’s this weird thing people do these days where they discover, like, some extremely basic fact of life that the Church talked about and solved 1,800 years ago but they act like it’s some amazing new insight.
Like Fakeemail here: golly, man, I still have to work and, like, bad things still happen even though people believe. Has anyone even thought about that!!!
Jesus wept
“Yes, my issue with God and religion has always been the “pie in the sky” aspect.”
Oh, really? Cite the Scripture text(s) where “pie in the sky” is taught as a Christian doctrine.
I’ll wait.
When you get tired of trying–and you will–cite for me where the Fathers said anything like that.
When you get tired of that–and you will–cite me any Christian liturgy from any period of history where pie in the sky is taught.
Or cite for me some authoritative evidence of Christian TEACHING (not popular piety, which is an entirely different thing, and has clearly confused you) that tells what happens to people after physical death.
And don’t try to force a text into your argument.
That fear of the next world consequences for evil done in the human body in this world is a good thing.
The Bolsheviks kept God out of their thinking and conscious so they were free to murder millions.
The Bible tells slaveholders to treat slaves as fellow human beings. Contrary to the modern wokist’s rhetoric slavery is not a sin in the New Testament.
Slaves have always been abused at times in all societies, including the American South, but for pure evil and murder on a large scale no one has exceeded the atheistic communists.
We have much to fear from any ideology that is Atheistic at its core.
“The Bible tells slaveholders to treat slaves as fellow human beings.”
Okay, I’m drawing a blank here. Help me remember the reference(s) to which you refer.
“Contrary to the modern wokist’s rhetoric slavery is not a sin in the New Testament.”
True. In fact, in the Apostolic Constitutions of St Hippolytus, it is specified that slaves must get their master’s permission to become a Christian. That is how the early Church was administered. The churches were forbidden to accept any slave as a convert without the master’s permission.
I know that the NT says that slaves must do their very best for their masters b/c thereby they could avoid brining the Gospel into disrepute. But I am drawing a blank on where masters are told what to do towards their slaves.
We care about this world because it is the one in which we must dwell for approximately 80 years. Just because you believe in the afterlife, doesn’t mean you must accept hell on earth.
Ostei: While the fact that “We live here” makes the current world important, I would argue its ultimate value comes from it being a creation of God. He didn’t create mankind and place him to live in suffering and hell – he put him in the Garden of Eden. While human nature fell prey to sin, this world remains an incredible example of the diversity, complexity, and beauty of God’s creation. It is valuable in and of itself, in my opinion, not merely as a corrupted echo of the divine.
I may not go out and worship a tree, but I see God’s hand in the natural world around me far more than I do in my supposed ‘fellow’ men. Well, with the exception of a newborn infant.
“ Christianity always made it clear that we are not for this world, but for the next. If I believed in God then no matter what happened in this world it would all be temporary, and after it was over nothing would be lost, it would all still be there in the mind of God. ”
This is perhaps the biggest reason why I am so opposed to Christianity.
Christianity tries to convert and hold our civilization in its grasp. Then when it screws up, it attempts to defend itself from any criticism on the position “they aren’t for this world”.
Some seem to almost want to loose so that they can be persecuted and may get ma rtyred just like Jesus. Being righteous and loosing is seen as preferable to cracking skulls and beating back the invaders.
If the orcs conquer all the white countries and the cannibals eat us all alive, the Christians will die with a dung-eating grin on their face thinking that they have achieved some victory by going to heaven.
“Christianity tries to convert and hold our civilization in its grasp.”
Well, we don’t have one of those, but let’s skip over that part for now.
“Then when it screws up, it attempts to defend itself from any criticism on the position “they aren’t for this world”.”
This ain’t hard, bro. The people to whom you refer are *not* Christians, period.
And it doesn’t matter what you think or what they might say.
I think we have to separate “religion” from individual faith. After all, the Pharisees and rule followers were called out as hypocrites.
Faith and belief is individual. “Who ever believes,” yes white people
as well as non-white people.
Works or fruits are a result of faith. Not vice versa, as this should manifest itself voluntarily. The parable of the talents for example.
Over the years, I have come to view faith, Ephesians 2, as a guarantee of getting on the team/ heaven. But I don’t want to be the last person on the roster that contributes little, but a good starting player / this life here on earth, by producing on an individual level – whatever you do to the least of these –
patience, kindness, generosity, etc ( Galatians)
“Christianity always made it clear that we are not for this world, but for the next.”
I have hard time believing anyone agreeing with this statement has been raised in the Church, but as I’m not a scholar on all derivations of Christianity, I’ll give you a pass. Nonetheless, the implication of your statement is a misleading one
Let me say simply that when I was younger and in Catholic Parochial schools, nothing could be further from the truth. We were in effect taught that such belief was itself—sin! We were put in the world for a purpose and to ignore it and bide our time until “salvation” was a failure on our part to live the true meaning of “the life”. There was much to do as a believer on this planet, beside pray.
Yes, Catholics do believe in salvation through works, rather than faith alone. But the Church still teaches that the ultimate goal is Heaven, and that this takes precedence over anything in this world, so it works out pretty much the same. I didn’t say that if I were a believer I wouldn’t oppose Wokeism and CRT and the coming tsunami out of Africa — I think I would. But I would care about all of it far less, since in the end it would matter far less.
“ I didn’t say that if I were a believer I wouldn’t oppose Wokeism and CRT and the coming tsunami out of Africa — I think I would. But I would care about all of it far less, since in the end it would matter far less.”
Yes while the Byzantine empire was collapsing and being overrun by Muslims, a tremendous amount of energy that could have been spent on defense, was instead wasted on various religious factions fighting each other.
JEB the goal of heaven does not preclude an active and meaningful existence while alive, but I’m not sure it is based in good works=salvation belief. But rather that a believer wishes to follow in Jesus’ footsteps and in doing so naturally performs good works and other Christian acts of kindness.
Catholic and Protestant—believe in salvation through *Jesus*, not specifically through accumulation of good works. This is stated specifically in scripture—not that I’m a big believer in that specifically, but talk to an evangelical and he’ll bite your ear off if you say good works accumulation will get you into heaven.
Even Catholicism in the early years taught a bit against this. The morality play “Everyman”—a road show for the peasants—taught that even “good works” would not follow you to the grave.
Now if you are of that bent, good works=salvation, then you have more of a position in line with Jewish tradition. They seem to have a concept of plus’s and minus’s in the actions of people throughout their lives. And in the end, Hashem will judge you based on your “ledger”.
At this point we are getting into the weeds of theology. So many people believe so many things, and I am in no position to judge whose interpretation is correct, even if I cared enough to try.
“But the Church still teaches that the ultimate goal is Heaven, … .”
Defining “Heaven” how, specifically?
That is crucial.
“I didn’t say that if I were a believer I wouldn’t oppose Wokeism and CRT and the coming tsunami out of Africa … .”
Any *real* Christian opposes *all* of those things.
The New Testament makes it very clear that God appointed the boundaries for ALL nations.
It also teaches “Give not that which it holy to the dogs.”
And I Timothy 5: 8 says this:
“But if anyone does not provide for his own, and especially for those of his household, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever.”
“Denied the Faith; Worse than an unbeliever” is almost the harshest criticism in the whole of the Bible–reserved for those of the Household of Faith who look outside of the Household *first.*
It is clear that Christians are to be a holy nation; a body made up of different members; branches on the same vine; members of he Household of Faith. They are to look to themselves *first* and then, *where practicable,* to minister to the needs of unbelievers.
And the Parable of the Good Samaritan is often twisted to suit the “Woke.” But it teaches that your neighbor is precisely that–someone *quite close* to you in space, including those whose paths you might cross, as the Samaritan encountered the “certain man who went down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and he fell among thieves.”
The teaching is quite clear that your neighbor is precisely that, *not* total strangers on the other side of the world–or anywhere else for that matter.
There is no excuse for this kind of ignorance that allows our enemies to twist and invert Christian teaching. Those who are ignorant have but themselves to blame, and are not serving our cause
Well put. Nothing good comes from ignorance in the long run.
There’s how you think your priorities would be and there’s how they’d actually be.
The history of the Christians from the beginning down to your local church is a massive history of impact upon the world. Your local church probably does more for people every week than the largest national atheist organisation.
Christianity is not a religion of “now you’re good to go, now quietly wait for death”, it always involves intense mental and physical action.
Because on the other hand, why would this world be precious to you even if it was all there is? You know you’re going to die, you know you’re going to lose it all anyway. The most glittering future you can imagine will be one you don’t see that will end in the heat death of the universe.
Christianity actually frees you up to be courageous and even to fail, since temporal victories are uncertain regardless. The whole “give em pie in the sky to take advantage now” has always been mostly hokum, small grain of truth for your fraudulent healer types and so on. The rulers of this world have always had an uneasy coexistence with the church since the church gave men priorities higher than contingent loyalty to the ruler.
This whole thing goes way deeper than anyone realises. They spent a youth in some at best well meaning local church with half remembered Sunday school lessons, and think that’s all there is, like they know how it works [I don’t necessarily mean you particularly]. Christianity is deeper, and stranger than can be imagined. I’m not talking secret mysteries either, it’s in the open, it’s just neglected, or forgotten.
The problem is, I don’t think Christianity — or any religion — is actually true. (I could give you a long argument to that effect, but this isn’t the place for it). I’m willing to grant that belief might have many good consequences, but I’m just not the sort of person who can believe that something is true because it would be good if it were true.
” … but I’m just not the sort of person who can believe that something is true because it would be good if it were true. but you Christians ARE” is obviously the unwritten end of your sentence.
But that just tells us who and what YOU are, but tells us nothing about God or religion or faith or anything that you took a stab at.
You know I didn’t actually say that, nor did I intend it. I’m sure there are atheists out there who reject God because they think it would be better if He didn’t exist. But excuse me, I feel the need to descend to your level for just a moment:
Your a idiot!!!
Ah, nice to get that out of my system… 🙂
“I’m not talking secret mysteries either, it’s in the open, it’s just neglected, or forgotten.”
Neglected.
Of forgotten because neglected.
And there are those–myriads or them–who allow our worst enemies to tell them what Christianity is or does or what it teaches.
“This whole thing goes way deeper than anyone realises.”
Well, that is overstated, for it is put to us point-blank in the NT:
“Oh, the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments, and his ways past finding out! (Romans 11: 33)
So we know that it is so far beyond human intellect and imagination and that we have to use language in special ways even to talk about it, but we do know that things are “way deeper than anybody realises.”
First-rate post!
“If you believe in God — particularly if you are a Christian — then why do you even care about any of this?”
B/c we are the stewards of this world. It has been given to us to care for, and it is for our use and benefit, and it takes a special kind of stupidity to destroy the planet we have been given–the only planet we have.
And b/c we have been called to be “the salt of the earth.”
And for many other, similar reasons. And b/c this is the only world we have.
“I particularly wouldn’t care about race! Minor sects aside, all religions are emphatic that All Men Are Brothers.”
That is patently false. Christianity teaches no such thing.
Christianity focuses on “the Body” and “the Household of Faith.” All Christian believers are brothers, but not all men. The Christian scriptures teach no such thing. You believe that b/c you have heard it so often said. That demonstrates only that propaganda is surpassingly effective, but it does *not* show that *all* religions teach universal brotherhood, even with unbelievers.
“While we have time, let us do good unto all men, especially to them that are of the Household of Faith.” Galatians 6:10
Do good to *all* men, but the division there between “us” and “them” is unmistakable.
“Many are called, but few are chosen.”
“You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you so that you might go and bear fruit—fruit that will last—and so that whatever you ask in my name the Father will give you.”
The Church is exclusive. And she makes exclusive claims.
“But cowards, unbelievers, the corrupt, murderers, the immoral, those who practice witchcraft, idol worshipers, and all liars—their fate is in the fiery lake of burning sulfur. This is the second death.” (Rev. 21:8)
That’s a list of those who will be excluded from the Holy City.
“From one man he made all the nations, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and he marked out their appointed times in history and the boundaries of their lands.” Acts 17: 26.
Where is the universal brotherhood of man there?
No, all men are not brothers, nor do the Scriptures teach any such thing. The Enlightenment, on the other hand, did teach that. “Alle Menschen werden Brüder” (“All people will become brothers”) springs to mind, from Beethoven’s glorious and moving 9th symphony. But Beethoven did not write the Scriptures. Nor are his Enlightenment political sentiments authoritative for Christians. Indeed, when Napoleon turned out to be not a liberator but a conqueror, Beethoven changed the dedication of his 3rd symphony, preferring his Enlightenment sentiments instead of the unfortunate (to Beethoven) facts.
Christianity consists only of “the elect.” All others are damned. Modern man finds that “unfair,” but there it is, and there is no getting around it. There is no human explanation for that. It is an unanswerable question–why some but not others? But that is not our concern because we are not God, which is a pretty fortunate arrangement, all things considered.
The Household of Faith or The Body/Bride of Christ consists *only* of the elect. That is *not* the brotherhood of all men, nor can it be twisted to deceive the elect, although–observably–it deceives a great many people, but they are either not elect, or they are not going to be elect, or they are just out and out lazy. Too lazy to be bothered with studying until they apprehend the truth.
If you can cite some texts in the NT that proclaim the brotherhood of “all” men, please do so.
This is a tendentious argument. Even if I grant that Christianity does not see non-Christians as brothers (I’m not convinced), Christians spent most of the last 2000 years trying to Christianize the world, which means at minimum that they saw all men as potential brothers. And the Bible certainly does not have anything to say about race (unless you believe that Cain thing, which is just stupid). Despite the diversity of interpretations of Christ’s words, no Christian church, aside from fringe sects, has ever hesitated to open its doors to non-whites. So what exactly is your point?
I believe the ball is in your court. Unless, of course, you don’t know what the Scriptures say and are not prepared to say so, preferring instead to call me
“tendentious,” and then tossing out your question rather than answering mine.
That you ae unconvinced is of no concern to me.
JEB, you freely admit you are a “non-believer”, which I and others have said “is fine” with us. Many in the DR movement are non-believers. We agree to overlook that and work together to obtain what we *both* believe to be the “greater good”.
But then you begin to argue wrt what “Christianity teaches and believes”—that is to say, doctrine. You don’t discern a contradiction in that? Or at least an admission that you don’t possess the level of understanding with which to argue about Christian beliefs with anyone? Then, when IP points this out (really rather politely), you attack him by calling him an “idiot”.
JEB, as with so many things, you just don’t seem to know when to “quit while ahead”. You’ve made some interesting observations which tell us much about how both non-Christians and “weak” Christians view Christianity and act within such “understanding”, but as IP points out, what you conclude is arguably heresy. Heck, the Catholic Church has entire departments to detect and correct such misunderstandings. IP has only scraped the surface.
I was raised a Catholic, and there are Catholic clergy within my extended family. While I don’t claim to be an expert I probably have a better understanding of Christian teaching than the great majority of the general population. And I stand by what I said. It is undeniable that all major Christian sects have been willing and eager to open their doors to nonwhites, and from that I conclude that, whatever the technical standing of nonbelievers (which probably varies from sect to sect anyway), no one of any race is excluded from Christian brotherhood should they choose to claim it. It’s hard for me to see how this could be heretical, or even controversial.
But in any case, why would you suggest that my atheism might be a problem? That seems very odd! I would never suggest that a Christian could not be an expert on atheism. Or Judaism! Or Hinduism! So I see no contradiction at all in the idea that an atheist might know something about Christianity. In fact your objection seems rather close to the Wokeist idea that those who do not share the “lived experience” of the Marginalized can have nothing legitimate to say about them.
As for IP, he just strikes me as unusually obtuse. (Even for a forum like this one). I base that not just on his responses to my comments (Define Heaven? Seriously?!?), but also on his responses to the comments of others. He’s just stuck in his own little world.
St. Louis IX, King of France, cared about his people and took care of them and the country he was charged to rule. Christians are definitely obligated to do what they can to make their communities better for all.
“Christians are definitely obligated to do what they can to make their communities better for all.”
Yes, but that’ is not what we are talking about. And “everything in its own order”–the Household of Faith FIRST. “All men” afterwards.
The story of Christ is compelling and disturbing, to put it lightly. It reflects what human societies REALLY are. The corruption, the sin, that has completely wrapped around human beings.
The crux of the faith of course is belief in the resurrection. As a child, it was always suspect to me that the dead Christ rose in front of a few followers and then “flew away” or something. Faith requires a leap of faith to just believe as a child and a belief that the biblical wisdom is true and will steer your people to prosperity.
But that resurrection. . .you know what they say about things that seem too good to be true?
Carl Sagan pointed out that the more radical the claim, the stronger the evidence needs to be in order to corroborate it.
To posit someone who was truly dead, coming back to life— something never seen before or since, and which according to all we know of the laws of nature, is physically impossible— would reeuire strong evidence. Which the Bible simply doesn’t provide.
“It’s true because this ancient text, written decades after the supposed event, says it’s true” just doesn’t get you there.
People believe because believing brings certain benefits; it feels good to believe.
But they believe *in spite of* the facts, not because of them.
No. Many of us believe because we have experienced the miracle of Jesus’ intercession in our life. And if that’s not good enough for you, so be it.
Can u elaborate?
The events of which I speak are intensely personal and are not the sort of thing one divulges on the Internet. Were we to get together personally, I would be more than willing to share.
There are great intercessions as Oesti alludes to, and there are “smaller” intercessions (my experience I believe).
I won’t elaborate with examples as this is not the place, but will say that as I get older and reflect upon “crossroads” I’ve come across in life—paths taken or not taken—and where those paths would have led, I can only point to “something” above my meager abilities which guided my journey here.
This is known as Devine Grace in Christianity. In atheism, “dumb luck”. Grace is not “earned” and therefore never “deserved”, but to the introspective, thinking person, it is considered a sign of a higher power than oneself at play in one’s life.
Ostei,
Over my years of trying to be a Christian, I had many religious experiences, which I concluded later were self-generated.
And when you have Muslims and Christians both saying the same thing— “My supernatural experiences have shown me this is true”—
And logic tells you that only one of them can be right— if the Christian’s experience is real, then the Muslim’s experience must be false— you see that personal experience alone simply isn’t enough to validate one’s beliefs.
You really think I haven’t minutely examined my experiences for any possibility that they were self generated? I have, of course, from every angle, and can only conclude that the experiences were instances of divine intercession. To do otherwise, to give the benefit of the doubt to “natural causes” when the balance of the evidence lies on the other side of the scale, would be to kick God in the teeth for having blessed me. Frankly, I am neither that stupid nor that arrogant.
As for the supernatural experiences of others, I can know nothing for certain about them, and therefore cannot weigh them as evidence for God’s existence or the validity of other religions. What I said is that my individual experience is enough to convince me, not you or anybody else. I’m sorry you haven’t had a similar experience. Then again, you will not receive what you do not beseech.
Why a different experience of Devine intercession for Muslims and Christians. God only has one “people”. Now as to whether that “experience” and the interpretation of that experience was true or false is another story to be examined in detail, but I can’t believe God interacts only with Christians.
Ostei: Very well stated. Once one has genuinely experienced the reality of the Divine, all protests and doubts are for naught. It’s a case of “who’re you going to believe, the ‘science’ and the ‘experts’ or your own senses and experience. I was the ultimate sceptic, but I cannot and will not deny what I now know to be real. I don’t pretend to be a theologian or Christian apologist, but my faith is not based on a mere ‘desire’ or ‘choice’ to believe.
3g: Well stated. And it almost defies belief–but it’s right in front of us in b&w–that anybody having lived through the last two+ years would have the gall to yammer about “science.”
There are even people out there who speak about “settled science.”
Climate-change nerds, very often.
Just so. What is Richard Dawkins compared to a miracle in one’s life?
And, not that it matters terribly much, but the notion that the scientists and “experts” are univocally atheistic is errant nonsense.
“God does not play dice with the universe!”–Albert Einstein
3g4me,
“Once one has genuinely experienced the reality of the Divine, all protests and doubts are for naught. It’s a case of “who’re you going to believe, the ‘science’ and the ‘experts’ or your own senses and experience.”
I hear what you’re saying: I’ve had experiences like that, and I’ve known many, many people who have had them.
But I’m not basing my argument on science, or the experts, or my own experience.
It’s something I’m sure you’ve observed as well: people having religious experiences which feel genuine to them, but which logic tells us *can’t all be true*
Logically: if the Muslim understanding of God is true, then the Christian understanding of God has to be false. Because they’re mutually contradictory, only one of them can be true.
But both Muslims and Christians testify to having religious experiences in which God confirms to them that their beliefs are true.
So when you see people from various mutually-contradictory belief systems, all testifying to similar Divine experiences— experiences which they see as confirming the truth of their particular belief system— it becomes clear that spiritual experiences alone aren’t enough to confirm the truth of ones’ beliefs.
That doesn’t mean your experiences weren’t real. It just means that experiences alone don’t validate the beliefs that generated them.
Carl Sagan doesn’t exist.
But…. when I pray to him, I get this feeling…. I feel the spirit confirming his words whenever I read them…. since I started following him, everything in my life has gotten better…. I just KNOW he’s real….
Sadly, I don’t think you’re being ironic.
“As a child, it was always suspect to me that the dead Christ rose in front of a few followers and then “flew away” or something.”
Even allowing for the possibility that that was meant to be funny, it betrays an adolescent mind. Besides which, that is not what the Scriptures say, although ignorant “teachers” may very well have told you silly stuff. But by now, you ought to have matured somewhat from when you were 8 years old.
“Faith requires a leap of faith to just believe … .”
Kierkegaard is not an authoritative source. There is no need for a leap of faith when we have eyewitness testimony that would be accepted in any court of law even today.
How do you explain the willingness to be burned alive for some fairy tale? And we are not talking here of one or two nut cases, but of many thousands of believers right up to today.
I am curious if anyone can think of another instance outside the French Revolution of a scenario where the religion of the dominant majority in a nation has been so attacked and undermined by the govt of the nation?
The only other that comes to mind is the Russian revolution, which was obviously an ethnic takeover from outside.
However, both these took place in an explicit revolution. It appears the west has had its own revolutions, with the same effects without anyone noticing.
“I am curious if anyone can think of another instance outside the French Revolution of a scenario where the religion of the dominant majority in a nation has been so attacked and undermined by the govt of the nation?”
The Khmer Rouge did it in Cambodia. The ChiComs did in China.
Another couple of revolutions.
Are there any non revolution examples like we see in the west?
“Another couple of revolutions.
Are there any non revolution examples like we see in the west?”
Oh, I see what you mean. Well, I’ll have to insist that revolutions take place in people’s hearts and minds and that the shooting comes *after* the revolution.
So I’d therefore say that we have certainly been through part of a revolution and are still in part of it although there is now a counter-revolution underway, to demonstrate which I adduce this blog and its readers.
So I’d have to say that what we see happening in the West *is* most certainly a revolution. It’s just that the shooting hasn’t gotten underway in earnest yet.
The key is that Christianity per se is not attacked. The libs attack particular doctrines that they feel are “bigoted”; i.e. contrary to civil rights law. They do not attack belief in God itself so much: that peaked in the 2000s and has fallen out of fashion. A majority of the country now supports gay “marriage”, so its safe to say that Christians who hold to “bigoted” teachings are actually in the minority.
They gave the game away in the 2020 dem primaries. Pete Butt-juice, the “devote Episcopalian” was put forward as some sort of spiritual guru, while Beto O’Rourke explicitly said that churches that oppose “civil rights” (i.e. churches that support traditional marriage) should lose their tax-exempt status, but churches that support “civil rights” (the liberal Mainline prot churches) can keep it. The line will be that you have the right to be a Catholic, Lutheran, or Baptist, but not the “bigoted” version of a Catholic, Lutheran, or Baptist.
So you can still be a Christian if you deny all the core teachings.
That makes you a globohomo with the word Christian redefined to mean what?
Its the same corruption and wearing as a skinsuit pattern that these demons do for everything.
Leftists want Christianity as they would “define” it. That is not what religion is, if it’s to be anything. That the majority of folks believe this or that means nothing. One believes in the moral truth of scripture as passed down, or they do not. I would suspect that is one reason for the shrinkage of formal church affiliation these days. Churches are all too willing to “bend the rules” to put butts in pews.
God created those unique people. They are called nations. Never forget that.
Avoid the false Christians.They made a mess in the 20th century.
Good essay
It’s been painful for me as a Christian to watch much of Protestantism and the Catholic pope to fall into the grasp of our current age and its heresies.
We as Christians must recognize that some of us have been the progressive puritans, some of us have been the Christian Zionists, we have been part of the problem.
But we can be part of the solution also.
Traditional families and traditional faith can be the bedrock of our solutions going forward.
We, as men, are fallen and therefore are the problem. That fallen and evil men do evil things in the name of God, is not the fault of doctrine. In the strictest interpretation of the commandments, taking the “Lord’s name in vain” is the only *unforgivable* sin. This discussion indicates why.
“In the strictest interpretation of the commandments, taking the “Lord’s name in vain” is the only *unforgivable* sin.”
Not sure exactly what you mean. You mix together the Ten Commandments and a statement from the New Testament that specifies what the only “unforgiveable sin” is.
The only unforgiveable sin is attributing the work of to Holy Spirit to Satan. The “sin against the Holy Spirit.”
Taking the Lord’s name in vain has nothing to do with cursing. I should have been clearer.
It has to do with using God as cover for your evil ways. To do evil in God’s name, to in essence make Him your “accomplice”, and therefore poison His image among men.
The commandment is taken in the oft (juvenile) translation and typical of what is taught in grade school. This is precisely the level of understanding of most folk—even those of a religious upbringing. More complex interpretations and discussion is out of line for most people not schooled to greater understanding.
That there are a least couple of areas of scripture to put this concept together is acknowledged, hence reference “to strictest interpretation”. However, to make simple points, I’m not really inclined to cite line after line of scripture (which I’d have to admit, I’d need to look up myself) as that is probably a waste of time for the group.
My reference to “this discussion proves why” is simply to point out that there is a conflation between evil men’s use of God’s Word and whether God’s Word *itself* is evil, and that comes up in group discussions like this.
We see this often. So often, I tire of addressing it. There are infinitely better apologists than I out there. Reinventing the wheel and defending the Faith I leave to others.
I doubt they meant cursing, or curses.
False authority, or false prophets, is how I see it.
“I doubt they meant cursing, or curses.”
Right you are.
“False authority, or false prophets, is how I see it.”
No, it has to do with swearing an oath by the Name of God and then breaking that oath, usually by lying when you had sworn by the holy Name to tell the truth. That’s what is meant by taking the Lord’s Name in vain.
IP, I assume that’s one interpretation, but not one I am familiar with. My interpretation is explained above and I’ve not seen it contradicted.
“It’s been painful for me as a Christian to watch much of Protestantism and the Catholic pope to fall into the grasp of our current age and its heresies.”
For there shall arise false Christs, and false prophets, and shall shew great signs and wonders; insomuch that, if it were possible, they shall deceive the very elect.
The elect are not deceived, at least not for long. The people you refer to are either not among the elect or, if they are, they will come to their senses at the proper time.
Don’t sweat it.
Confession: I’m an unbeliever: an agnostic rather than an atheist. I don’t necessarily rule out the existence of a divine being; I just don’t think the God of the Bible provides an accurate description. And I don’t believe the Bible records real history.
I was raised in a Christian household, and spent a couple decades trying to be a Christian, including years spent studying the Bible at a pentecostal seminary. All my family, including my then-wife, were Christian believers. I really wanted it to be true.
But after years of study and experience, I finally decided that the Christian narrative simply isn’t true: life just usn’t like that. I came to the conclusion that the religious experiences I’d been having were self-generated.
That being said, some of the finest people I know are Christians, and some of the happiest times of my life were those spent in Christian community. I don’t waste my time trying to convince believers that they’re wrong.
>>> When talking about Christians, I think it’s important to distinguish between ‘fundamentalist Christians’ who take the Bible seriously, and ‘liberal Christians’ who approach it like a menu: take what looks good to you, and ignore the rest.
Logically, that pick-and-choose attitude just doesn’t make sense. If you really believe that the Bible was inspired by the Creator of the Universe, and contains his self-description, the record of his interactions with humanity, and his advice and commandments for how to live a succesful and prosperous and morally-commendable life; then it’s going to be in your best interest to take ALL of it seriously, even the parts you don’t like.
But so many liberal Christian congregations don’t like the passages condemning homosexuality, or those promoting male headship, so they just ignore them. That’s NOT how you treat a text that you truly believe comes from the God who holds your fate in his hands.
It’s been a while since I looked, but last I heard these liberal congregations were shrinking. Christianity was growing fastest in the Third World, and especially in places like China where persecution was strongest. It puts one in mind of Jefferson’s comment about the Tree of Liberty needing to be watered by the blood of martyrs; oppression by the State only seems to strengthen these peoples’ Christian faith.
>>> This distinction is important to keep in mind because it’s only the Bible-believing Christians who are a danger to the State. They are the group who see their primary allegiance to God and God’s commands.
Liberal Christians, on the other hand, pose no threat to the State. Their motto is ‘Conform to modernity, whatever that might take’. If that means ignoring the New Testament passages mandating male headship and embracing feminism; or ignoring the passages condemning homosexuality and embracing gay Christians; then so be it. That’s why the epidemic of wokeness thrives in liberal Protestant congregations.
These will be the first people to rush to forsake Christian principles and rush to embrace whatever the State commands them to do.
” … years spent studying the Bible at a pentecostal seminary.”
That was a mistake but, of course, life is lived forward only. But now that you know that what you were taught there was not true or correct, it doesn’t seem the right reaction to turn away from *everything* IF it is true that you “really wanted it to be true.”
Courage demands another path.
“I don’t waste my time trying to convince believers that they’re wrong.”
VERY sensible. Total waste of time and energy. Pointing out to those who are in error exactly where and what their error is is enough. No need to beat a dead horse.
I don’t think the creator question is the most pressing one. Technically there is a creator(s?). You can debate about it’s nature, blind death dumb, or beyond human comprehension and so on.
Whether there is an afterlife is I think the existential query of human existence. Without some form of continued conscience after death, what does it matter to the individual person?
I believe there is a third option between your description of “literal” and “cafeteria” style biblical interpretation. There’s is a “rational” interpretation which I believe focuses on the moral teachings as set in the days of the people who first were inspired and wrote the chapters later set into the Book.
Not to drag on, but such would mean that a “literalist’s” estimate that the world is 6,000 yo is to be ignored—and this has rational explanation wrt the understanding of the authors at the time, but also that the sacrament of Marriage is never to be considered acceptable for two mean or two women to receive—likewise a rationale explanation can be made.
Certainly the Bible contains much moral truth, regarding the best way to treat our fellow man. That’s why, in my opinion, Christianity continues to spread. Compared to many alternative ways of approaching reality, striving to lead a Christian life brings many benefits.
But that doesn’t speak to the question of: ‘Is Christianity true?’
Or to put it another way:
‘Is the Christian narrative an accurate picture of the reality of the world we live in?’
I would submit that Christianity can contain a lot of true wisdom, while at the same time not being a true accounf of things that actually happened.
Good Lord! You have said so many things that I want to reply to that I don’t know where to start.
This is probably the most important thing you have published so far.
You have carried my own thinking past its former stopping point. It’s easy to see what’s going on, so I have for many years now been saying that the Lord is threshing the wheat to separate the wheat from the chaff, “which the wind driveth away.”
Nothing has made that clearer than the number of self-styled “Christians” who offered no resistance–not even passive resistance–the the Chinkypox shutdown of public worship. It has become painfully clear now that the number of Christians in AINO is vanishingly small.
*Very* few “churches” continued meeting, in open defiance of the divine Caesar’s commands. My own congregation ignored the whole thing. We continued shaking hands, sitting together, drinking from the same cup, etc. Everything was fine. It helped that our governor ignored the whole thing except for “two weeks to flatten the curve,” and then he told everybody to return to normal, and everybody did, with a few exceptions here and there. But the state gov’t never mentioned it again. So we were not really up against the wall at any time.
Our ancestors in the Faith faced *real* dangers. Beheadings; being burned alive to light the emperor’s gardens; being torn to pieces by wild beasts before a crowd of cheering pagans. All Americans faced was some idiotic and observably false drivel from their TV sets.
But they didn’t think at all and they didn’t bat an eyelash: Gathering together–for which we have an apostolic injunction–was cast aside immediately, as these so-called “churches” RUSHED to burn the pinch of incense “to the genius of the emperor.” A revolting spectacle but–of overriding importance now–clarifying for us, as it did, exactly what the situation truly is.
I’ve been saying that we were being prepared for something–probably for some great work or for some great persecution. But that we’d have to wait to see the reason for which the wheat is being threshed.
I had not been able to go beyond that point. Or maybe it was just that I hadn’t tried, thinking, instead, that when the time came, we’d see the purpose for which these events have been preparing us.
But you have cleared things up and you have clarified and advanced my own incomplete thinking, for which I am much in your debt.
This part of the essay, especially the last sentence, is the heart of the article:
“Christianity was at its most powerful when it was exclusive and required sacrifice from the believers. One of the main reasons for the decline of the Western churches is their success. Once it was easy to be a Christian, it stopped being a powerful force in society. Its return to a persecuted, underground movement is the only path to renewal.”
I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: You are a national treasure.
Here is a *must-read* for *all* Dissident Christians. It will arm you to the hilt. Published in 1970, it predicts with pin-point accuracy where we were heading, which was right where we are today:
https://chalcedon.edu/resources/books/politics-of-guilt-and-pity
Happy Easter to all.
I’m about a quarter through that book. Very interesting and thought-provoking read.
It’s not for the faint of heart. Glad you are reading it. It’s a “spell-it-out” and “take-no-prisoners” book.
>>Here is a *must-read* for *all* Dissident Christians. It will arm you to the hilt. Published in 1970, it predicts with pin-point accuracy where we were heading, which was right where we are today:
https://chalcedon.edu/resources/books/politics-of-guilt-and-pity<<
Great summary, Infant!
And a great book it is!
Be sure to follow it up with his 3-volume Faith and Action, and his most famous work, Institutes of Biblical Law.
Thanks, wyatt the warner, for the recommendations. I didn’t know about either of those.
Zman, this was a very thoughtful and insightful post. Thank you for respecting Christians, and trying to reconcile people of different beliefs into a dissident community. I am a practicing Catholic, and have had good exchanges with atheist and agnostic dissidents. It is also possible to find a local church that doesn’t kneel to the gay marxist agenda. The current Pope is awful, but local parishes are free to teach what they believe is right.
Before the 2020 election, the monsignor at our church gave a stirring homily, basically stating you cannot vote for Democrats because they openly violate the core teachings of the church. I also had an interesting discussion with our associate priest, who is a very smart millennial, having attained engineering and physics degrees before joining the priesthood a few years ago. I was angry with hypocrites like Biden and Pelosi, who proclaim to be practicing Catholics. He had very harsh words for them, saying they were the worst type of hypocrites for using their professed faith for political advantage while betraying it with their practices. He said he would deny them communion until they publicly confessed what they had done and recanted their false statements.
“It is also possible to find a local church that doesn’t kneel to the gay marxist agenda.”
Can confirm. It may be difficult or time-consuming, bit it *is* possible.
And this is no time to throw in the towel.
Christian multiculturalism. Let me share a slice of that grim picture from the Western U.S.:
I know a European white mother/grandmother who is a divorced practicing Catholic (remarried to a divorced Jesuit), is a member of her parish’s liturgical staff, was once the parish marriage counselor, and takes communion to this day. Her daughter is a lesbian, divorced and “remarried” and also takes communion, and is a family therapist (private practice). The daughter’s adopted children were christianed Catholic. Several in the extended family are divorced, two have had children outside marriage, and all take communion. A couple of them married outside their race and ethnicity. Nobody in that family thinks any of this is wrong or inappropriate or hypocritical. And, they all believe in the “Judeo-Christian” version of the West.
Even when I was an agnostic, I still liked to attend mass occasionally, especially around the holidays. But I stopped going because the service always catered to the Hispanics or Phillipinos (depending upon church location). I felt uncomfortable, like a foreigner. Often, at the conclusion of the service, congregants would turn around (backs momentarily to the Crucifix, which is a no-no) and enthusiatically applaud the organist or choir like they were applauding a group of pop superstars. Cheesy music, too. Horrible guitarists and singers. And no one in the church dressed for the occasion like they cared. Tattoos, tits, torn sneakers, babies in diapers and little else. Everything about it was undignified. And these weren’t churches in bad/poor neighborhoods that I went to. The priests didn’t care.
Also, most of the churches are ugly. Uninspiring architecture.
To hell with it all.
I sincerely believe that the greatest (gravest) error the Roman Catholic ever made was abandoning European whites in the 20th century.
I sometimes watch those Bishop Sheen videos on YouTube. He was so theatrical, but adorable, and he had no problem calling out evil like Communism and street criminals (imagine hearing that on TV now). His intended audience was European white. No apologies there. He was a highly intelligent and clear sightest priest. I don’t think they make them like that anymore. I’ve never met one.
I hope there is some kind of ressurection of the traditional, high church (Roman Catholic and Anglican). It’s a Traditional Latin Mass for me now, or nothing. European whites only, thanks. I have no desire to break bread with invaders.
I just want to add that I became a race realist through an uncomfortable, eye opening process long before Barack Obama or George Floyd. Los Angeles has that effect on some of us.
I now prefer to be with my own kin and kind. European white, culturally Christian. I miss my country.
“I don’t think they make them like that anymore. I’ve never met one.”
Oh, yes they do. Even in France and Belgium, believe it or not.
That’s reassuring to know. I just hope the Muslim invaders don’t continue to slice the throats of French priests.
I don’t think there are any priests here in the U.S. of that caliber (Bishop Sheen). Most are like that Father Mike Schmidtz fellow or Bishop Robert Barron. Not promising, not inspiring.
They will continue until force is applied in the other direction.
“They will continue until force is applied in the other direction.”
Well, or they’ll just die out. They are mostly Boomers.
This is one of those places where the accusation of “Boomer!” is both accurate and well-deserved.
They will soon be gone.
@infant.
i don;t think many of the muslims slitting throats are boomers.
“Most are like that Father Mike Schmidtz fellow or Bishop Robert Barron. Not promising, not inspiring.”
They are on the way out, though, and the generations after them have much sounder instincts and are much better instructed.
There is no Easter Day without Good Friday. Don’t forget that.
I agree with much of your post, but a young priest at our parish made some good points when I expressed similar thoughts to him. First, don’t let anything men have done, either in the ministry or congregation, come between you and God. Second, be careful about judging those who take communion. Someone you know who might be gay, divorced, an adulterer, or a sinner in some other way, may have recently confessed and repented. Gays might also be celibate, in which case they are still in communion. He said this did not apply to hypocrite politicians like Pelosi and Biden, because confessing and repenting in private is not enough. They sinned in full view and they must repent in full view, before they are in communion.
A superb article. Z addresses every key point on the topic of Christianity’s fate in degenerate liberal democracy, and does so with polish and style.
As for my experience as a Christian, it gibes with Z’s depiction. I was a regular attendee of a large and well-established Methodist church until the Covid lunacy effectively scuttled all church attendance. During this period, the church’s minister, whom I liked and respected very much, retired. He was replaced by a younger man who periodically brings in a Hutu activist whose job it is to dragoon the white parishioners into supporting Burn, Loot, Murder. Suffice it to say, I no longer support this church, and I strongly suspect many other members have abandoned the perverted organization, as well.
Anytime I see some protestant church telling everybody how they completely support Israel, I know they’ve been infiltrated and are all fake. Those people have no problems with Jews killing whoever they want to, for no reason, in Israel. I have a bitter disdain for any of them, and always tell them what I think about it. Needless to say, I don’t get invited to churches much anymore.
The biggest stumbling block I see as a Christian dealing with secular dissidents are with the ones who are most racially aware. Jesus did command us to love our enemies after all. That and the antisemitic ones can’t seem to get past the fact that Jesus was ethnically Jewish.
My personal peeve is when supposedly religious dissidents try to shoehorn their ideology into Christian doctrine. It don’t work that way. I usually just cite some scripture that they are contradicting and leave it at that.
I agree that this is the big stumbling block. Most secular dissidents (such as myself, I suppose) are not anti-Christian. In fact, most of us are very sympathetic to the Church and see its role in society.
Where we have an issue is the universalism that so many Christians espouse. The vast majority of Christians on Gab are the most ardent colorblind CivNats alive. “We’re all God’s children” is their favorite line.
If there’s no place in Christianity for the preservation of a unique people, then I suspect that the secular dissidents and the Christians will never be able to come together. You might want to check out my post for my thoughts on the subject.
I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again–if you are not a race realist, you are not a dissident. And that goes for Christians, too.
I agree with you. Unfortunately, having zero background in Christianity, I don’t know if it’s possible to bring the two together.
Personally (and ignorantly), I don’t understand why it’s impossible to be a Christian who submits to God and who believes that God made our people and that we honor and acknowledge our people as a way to honor and acknowledge God.
Yet, all I hear from Christians on Gab – and what seems to be the case with Christians that I know IRL – is that “We’re all God’s children” so we shouldn’t differentiate between the races of the earth.
I don’t know if we can reconcile this.
There’s a lot of false Christianity and a whole lot of crap on Gab.
I ignore all that. There is a lot of good there, too.
Was Hernan Cortez a Christian? I say he was and that all he accomplished for the faith was the ending of industrial-scale human sacrifice and converting an entire continent to the faith. Find me a man who did more in the last 1,000 years.
Was he a race realist? Of course.
Problem solved.
They are called retarded fuckwits and should be ignored.
It’s easily possible to be race-realist and Christian. Everybody gets their own people and their own culture. It’s that simple. The passage most used to support multi-cult, Galatians 3:28, was never meant as a command to miscegenate. It was simply an acknowledgement that our souls are of equal value to God.
If you can like your neighbor while also banning him from living in your house, then you can be a Christian and a race-realist. “We’re all God’s children” but if blacks living in North America causes problems… as it has since their arrival… then they can become God’s children in Africa.
Race-equality is just one of many false doctrines introduced by false priests. As a rule of thumb, if it’s a church doctrine that the Socialists approve of then it’s probably a lie told by Socialists.
Not sure what we/you mean by bringing dissidents—believers/nonbelievers—together. Why? We can work together, until we’ve rid ourselves of this agreed upon secular pestilence. At which point, we go our separate ways.
There were non-believers among our Founders. We can argue whether they were more aptly classified as agnostics, deists, or atheists—yet they put together a pretty good idea for an alternative governing system.
They had one thing in common, a dislike for their current system of governance. And so DR’s do as well.
“Christians on Gab – and what seems to be the case with Christians that I know IRL – is that “We’re all God’s children” so we shouldn’t differentiate between the races of the earth.”
Ask them to cite the specific Scripture(s) that support their view. And don’t take any prisoners. This is FAR too important for that.
And yes, it certainly *is* possible to “reconcile” these two positions, but *only* from the Scriptures and the Patristic writings. But there is an *appalling” ignorance of all of that, and an even more appalling lack of interest and of serious minds.
I have been astonished at the abysmal ignorance on the part of DS folks. And at their laziness.
I hadn’t expected to find that stuff here.
What I see with universalism is a weird inversion where believers show great concern for complete strangers and outsiders, yet disregard their own people. I interpret 1 Timothy 5:8 as specifically stating that those who do not provide for their own kin are worse than unbelievers.
Or there is the weird doctrine that somehow Whites are collectively guilty for things done in the past, like having their own unique form of original sin for slavery and racism. Even worse, it seems they must keep apologizing for it, as if Jesus’ crucifixion and resurrection doesn’t cover the “sin” of white privilege. Go figure.
There also seems to be this aversion to recognizing patterns that don’t put other races in a good light. Like the FBI crime statistics. Doesn’t mean you necessarily hate them, just means you need to take precautions if you find yourself driving down MLK Blvd. If anything it’s the people who supposedly “love” the blacks that contribute the most towards enabling their bad behavior.
“I interpret 1 Timothy 5:8 as specifically stating that those who do not provide for their own kin are worse than unbelievers.”
There *is* no other possible interpretation. In fact, the word “interpretation” is out of place here. It is perfectly straightforward.
The people you are talking about have *no* idea what Christianity is nor any idea what is in the Bible. They are not Christians. They worship themselves and their own false “virtue,” and they have a great time doing it.
Avoid them. They are outside the Household of Faith.
Citizen,
“If there’s no place in Christianity for the preservation of a unique people, then I suspect that the secular dissidents and the Christians will never be able to come together.”
Especially ironic, seeing as how one of the main themes of the Old Testament involves God’s efforts to forge the Israelites into a unique people; including his repeated advice/commands to them to avoid inter-mingling with the pagan peoples surrounding them.
The OT God was NOT a fan of inter-racial marriage!
Exactly. And in A.D. 70, God cast them off forever.
Even their so-called “Wailing Wall” is a fake. The old city was utterly destroyed in the standard Roman fashion. Their “wailing Wall” is a medieval Crusader structure.
We know this from the records of the Empress Helena’s pilgrimage to Jerusalem. She was Constantine’s mother.
The New Testament also makes clear that Jerusalem was utterly destroyed.
I remember Z man wrote once upon a time that he was a lapsed Catholic, but still preferred to live in a Christian society. I think that bond we all feel for western civilization is intertwined with Christianity and it should be acknowledged as one of its foundations.
Citizen: We may all be God’s children, but He created the distinct and separate races . . . to be distinct and separate. There will remain numerous ‘nations’ in Heaven. Loving one’s neighbor depends both on the Christian meanings of ‘love’ and ‘neighbor.’ Love is not mere sentiment; it’s an action verb, involving acting in what is in someone’s best interest as a Christian. That does not equate to inviting them to share one’s home or join one’s biological family or historic nation. They can be Christians amongst their own people, not interlopers among ours.
I find no conflict between my sincerely held Christian faith and my equally strong belief in White European identity. I recognize this seems to be uncommon today.
“I recognize this seems to be uncommon today.”
Yes, you’re right, and it is to this that I refer when I speak about appalling ignorance of Christianity’s primary source document, the New Testament.
“Christian” is now often used as a non-religious euphemism by the left and its allies for “White Caucasian Normie.” They can’t (yet) come out and say they hate you because you’re White, so they deflect with another, more acceptable, term. They’ve been doing this for decades in movies, books and television. Back in the 90s, they were mocking “religion” but I always had the suspicion there was more to it because 99% of their mockery was devoted to conservatives, republicans, rural & small town people. They were mocking the people and not just the beliefs while being very careful never to mock a certain other religion or two. That’s why Family Guy had two episodes devoted to mocking those groups censored. Now, “Christian” has morphed into basically all White non-allies everywhere.
It’s not just about religious belief, but about the types of people our superiors are intending to demean (you).
That’s why you occasionally hear the bizarre claim in outlets like the WaPo that “Christian Nationalism” is somehow a secret danger. In truth, there is really no such thing. There can’t be considering the rapid decline in religious faith in this country. But when you stop to think what they’re really doing is offering a euphemism for “White” it all makes sense. They need another term for the sake of plausible deniability.
With the continued decline of religion in this country, I expect “Christian” to be increasingly adopted in the way “Jew” is for others: a badge of ethnic and cultural identity and not simply literal religious belief.* You already see some of this in the popular culture. I follow two YouTubers who are big into the comic book scene. Both admit on social media they are “Christian” but they also like sexy women and lots of violence & action in their comic books and movies; and they don’t proselytize. That’s wholly different from what I remember the censorious religious right pushing in this country back when it was heavily religious. Times are definitely changing.
I predict some kind of detente in the future between the two camps as their interests increasingly overlap.
*I see the same thing on the far left. Guys like Cenk Uygar (sp?) of TYT fame claim to be atheists but repeatedly mock Christians and defend Muslims. He’s of Turkish Muslim extraction (second generation immigrant), btw. In his case, being Muslim isn’t just about about religious belief. It’s a marker of his ethnic& cultural identity which he clearly cares about.
“. That’s wholly different from what I remember the censorious religious right pushing in this country back when it was heavily religious. ”
This is largely a fake meme. There has not been an effective “Christian right” in my lifetime and I’m in my early 50s. The evangelicals backing the neocons is hardly what I would call political power. The alleged “censorship” (god, do we need MORE censorship) of the alleged “religious right” (what they really mean is Christian) is another fake meme.
Frankly, we would now be MUCH better off had an effective and censorious Christian Right ever existed. (We live in a world where trannies read LGBT propaganda to small children in public libraries.) All the cries of censorship were in response to the minor pushback, not even particularly religious based, against all of the degeneracy being pushed by the usual suspects.
The very same people who whined and cried about the alleged censorship of the alleged Christian Right immediately imposed MASSIVE censorship the second they took power.
“They can’t (yet) come out and say they hate you because you’re White, so they deflect with another, more acceptable, term. ”
I haven’t noticed any hesitation to do so.
To the extent that happens, it’s a recent phenomenon. Leftists always had excuses and code words back in the day. That’s what “Christian” was really about. Modern example: Jon Stewart’s racist tirade against “white farmers.” He’s simply a bigoted Jew looking for acceptable stand-ins for white gentiles. That’s really what he means by “white farmer.”
Loving one’s enemy doesn’t mean offering up one’s own people to genocide.
Can we agree that loving your enemy is terrible advice?
“Jesus did command us to love our enemies after all.”
You have not seriously studied the Scriptures, so your confusion and disappointment are partly your own fault, and you can do something about that. Get to it. And be careful in your choice of a teacher.
The New Testament was not written in English, but in Koiné Greek. That’s the first thing.
The second is that Greek and Latin have different words for
“enemy.”
This is a comment thread, so I’m not going into αγων (agon) and “inimicus.”
I’ll say only that Christians are commanded to “love” (another language problem) the PRIVATE or PERSONAL enemy. Christians have never been commanded to “love” the inimicus: the public enemy; the enemy of your people. Anyone who says different is most likely ignorant *and* lazy, or else deliberately deceptive concerning these things and therefore evil. Avoid them.
“That and the antisemitic ones can’t seem to get past the fact that Jesus was ethnically Jewish.”
The Scriptures make clear that Jesus was *religiously* a Jew. They do *not* make clear that he was ethnically a Jew. They *do* make clear that He and his inner circle–the Twelve–were Galilean: John 1: 45-46.
Galatia; Gaul; Galilee; Galicia. It is not clear *at all* what Jesus’ ethnicity was and, in fact, there are clues in the Scriptures that He was *not* ethnically a Jew. See citation above.
Think of the widespread but false belief that Jesus was a carpenter. That’s a tradition handed down from who knows where, but the Scriptures never once assert that Jesus was a carpenter. Never once.
“Love your enemy” is exactly like that. A misunderstanding based upon the notion (I won’t call it an idea) that the Scriptures say something that they do not say, and upon the notion that the New Testament was written in English. But it was not.
These “antisemitic” Christians are lazy and are not serious people, or they would know these things. Avoid them. They are poisoning your mind and confusing your spirit. And they are not serious people. They are also not your responsibility; they are God’s, and you ain’t God. Look to yourself and to your own house.
The truth is available, and you have this promise: ” … seek and ye shall find … .” (Matt. 7: 7-8.
Get to it.
Similar misinterpretation of murder/kill in the “thou shall not kill” commandment. Hell, even the Gospels don’t always quite agree on what occurred and what happened. Not a big deal, but it’s difficult to explain to one with no training/upbringing in any Christian faith or historical understanding of the times.
“Similar misinterpretation of murder/kill in the “thou shall not kill” commandment.”
Exactly. Good point. Good post!
The mistakes you pointed to are the reason I never read scripture. It is foolish to read scripture in your own language and without training necessary to figure out what it means. It is also highly tempting to read scripture in a way that agrees with all your biases. You end up with abominations like prosperity gospel or those WWJD wristbands.
It’s sad we cannot look to the national level denominations or 90% of who they trained, for help in study of the scripture. But there are still some knowledgeable and faithful men to look for spiritual guidance.
“You end up with abominations like prosperity gospel or those WWJD wristbands.”
Made me laff!
Great post. Good points all!
Be careful in choosing a teacher. The population has been deliberately dumbed down. When you start talking to them about the Aorist tense of Greek verbs, they zone out. It’s not on TV, you see, so they can’t be bothered with it. It’s too hard. They would have to DO something.
“My personal peeve is when supposedly religious dissidents try to shoehorn their ideology into Christian doctrine. It don’t work that way. I usually just cite some scripture that they are contradicting and leave it at that.”
Lay it on me, my son. I’m all ears. Quote me the Scriptures that you think puts these “supposedly religious dissidents” in their place.
Yep. That’s the elephant in the room as far as Christianity is concerned: Jesus (or rather, Yashua) was completely Jewish and an orthodox one too. He never came to start a new religion; he wanted to reinvigorate the old one. It was Paul, who never knew Jesus or his teachings, who dragged it off into a whole new sphere of bizarre Hellenism.
I have to disagree with you there. Jesus said he is the truth, the life and the way, and no one gets to the father except through him, and his body and blood are the new and everlasting covenant. Js have never believed any of that. Pretty hard to say that he didn’t mean to start a new religion.
On second thought, Jesus is the Messiah prophesied in Isaiah, so along your line of thought, it could be argued it is not a new religion, and if true, it is the Js who abandoned their faith.
“Yep. That’s the elephant in the room as far as Christianity is concerned: Yep. That’s the elephant in the room as far as Christianity is concerned: Jesus (or rather, Yashua) was completely Jewish and an orthodox one too. He never came to start a new religion; he wanted to reinvigorate the old one. It was Paul, who never knew Jesus or his teachings, who dragged it off into a whole new sphere of bizarre Hellenism.”
Good Lord. Are there still people ignorant enough or stupid enough to fall for that old nonsense?
And insisting on “Yasuha” is a particularly grotesque giveaway.
You’re John Hagee, ain’tcha!
Steve: That’s not what scripture says. Jesus specified that He personifies the law and His sacrifice supersedes Mosaic Law. His teaching was in direct conflict with the Jewish ‘experts’ of their day, the Pharisees (who hated Jesus and orchestrated his arrest). He called them Children of Satan.
Jesus may have been raised in the historic Jewish nation, but he was, by no modern definition, a Jew. In addition to which, modern Judaism is essentially Babylonian and teaches what the Pharisees did – in direct contradiction of Jesus’ teachings.
That may not be a ‘new religion’ in your terms, but it can never be considered Judaic nor Hellenistic.
Did YOU KNow HiS nAMe wASN’t evEN JEsUs, iT wAS YEshUA!?!?
Absolute derp.
What I never really got being half-Jewish and following DR politics is how these people latch on to the most hard core version of Nazi antisemitism as a default. Historically there are degrees to antisemitism: Chesterton and Belloc were a bit anti-Jewish and had complicated and non-PC views on the issue, as did many Catholics at the time, WASPs in America wouldn’t want Jews attending their Country Clubs or working in certain businesses, the French right-wing before Vichy wanted to deprive Jews of civil rights but had an entirely non-racial viewpoint, and accepted assimilated secular or Catholic ethnic Jews as Frenchmen.
The Nazis, on the contrary, had an especially extreme, racially deterministic version of anti-Semitism, where the Jews *must* be expelled from Europe, the social problems they arguably cause are seen as 100% genetic in origin, and there’s thought to be a complex international conspiracy of Jews shaping world historical events. These views were extreme even at the time, and even when compared to the other Axis powers (Vichy, Italy, Hungary), which had their own, less extreme, anti-Jewish laws.
For what reason, when Americans in the 2000s develop un-PC views about this particular ethnoreligious group, they go straight for the 200 proof everclear version. The idea that thinking the Jews are not all that great should be a stumbling block for Christianity is very odd when put in historical context. If anything, a positive view of Jews would tend to disincline one from accepting Christianity.
The Orthodox church in Russia is far more aligned with Russian culture than most anywhere left in the west. It seems to be in resurgence as part of a pushback on the anti-society death cult in the west.
Its also still heavily tied into the military and has recently finished a massive Military cathedral in Moscow and the Bishop is ex army.
Perhaps its partly a religious war disguised as a political one?
If the war is not religious, it is certainly cultural, at least in part. Much of Russia’s loathing of the West, with Ukraine an exponent, is motivated by revulsion toward Western degeneracy and a desire to prevent it from taking root in Russia. The puissance of Russian Orthodoxy may be the strongest bulwark against Western putrescence.
Ostei, and it works the other way too. Much of the sheer hysterical hatred towards Russia we see from the West today comes from Russia’s adherence to Christianity and its refusal to bow to sexual perversion.
Yep, and that’s why I tend to back Putin in this current situation. He may be an evil bastard, but it appears he does the right things to support the Orthodox Christian institution in Russia. I’ve given up on any American politician to do such here.
Indeed. The cultural conflict between Russia and AINO is more stark than the ideological one between the USSR and the USA.
The same happened in Afghanistan. The average person there had little truck with the full Taliban program, but it was seen as much more preferable to them than the evil poison the United States attempted to dump into its wells.
The current war is just a continuation of what started in Serbia, and is in fact seen as some pay back for Kosovo, which had enormous significance for Orthodoxy. While I think the proper approach for the DR is complete indifference, the struggle against the Empire is still glorious to watch.
“Perhaps its partly a religious war disguised as a political one?”
Of course it is. It was never anything else.
“For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.”
Ephesians 6: 12
Irrespective as to its origin I completely agree with this.
The spiritual aspect greatly outweighs the material one.
We’ve still got a week left for the Orthodox, but Holy Week is a time for big reflections and this is a big one to be thinking on. The lessons of Good Friday are many, but the one that’s stuck out to me lately is that God has not asked anything of us that He, as Christ, did not already endure for us. We must be ready to bear the Cross, and bear it gladly, whether that last a minute or a hundred years, and that endurance is how we shall know ourselves, our brothers, and our God.
May God bless and keep ya Z, and all the other readers
A year or two ago, I came to the conclusion that our side can’t win without religion. (And I say this as someone who has lived his entire life with basically zero direct interaction with Christianity.) We face two foes who are deeply religious in their own way.
First, there’s the Woke/Liberal Democracy crowd that deeply believes in its religion and is willing to punish those who oppose it and to reward those who adhere. Then there’s the ethnicity that shall not be named whose religion is their people and who have evolved over the centuries to undermine any perceived threat, which at this moment is yours truly.
That’s a very powerful, very committed alliance aimed squarely at the European races. There’s simply no way that we can defeat them (at least for now) without the commitment that comes from a deep belief.
But there is hope. Both the secular DR and Christians believe in something greater than themselves and their current pleasures. Ironically, secular dissidents are very similar to the ethnicity that shall not be named: We believe in our people. Our people, our past, our traditions, our culture is something far greater than our individual lives and yet we are a part of it.
Christians, of course, believe in God, something that even many secular dissidents concede is possible, hopefully, likely.
If we are to have a future, we need these two groups to come together. We need each other. But for that to happen, we need each side to concede something vitally important. The secular dissidents need to accept the role of God and the church in society and our movement. The Christians need to accept the preservation of the European peoples and their culture as a tenet of their Christian faith.
We need a Christianity that puts God on the side of the preservative of the European peoples. The universalism of Christianity – at least as it exists today – is incompatible with that goal. “We’re all God’s children,” which I see constantly on Gab will NOT be a part of this church. Yes, we are all God’s children, but these are my people and God wants them and their culture to survive and thrive. – and to be free.
I don’t know if this synthesis is possible, but I believe that it’s the best hope for both sides. I agree with Z that Christians are slowly breaking away from the Woke churches. But what’s the point of saving your faith if it will only be practiced in future generations by other peoples.
Our best hope is the European Church of Christ.
“For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Saviour; who will have all men to be saved, and to come to the knowledge of the truth.” 1 Tim 2 3,4
This doesn’t mean we abandon our duties to our people in order to save others. It simply means that we want all people, regardless of who they are, to be saved. Happy Easter to you. Christ is risen.
Well, the Christians that I interact with view this as they have no people except other Christians. They are the ultimate colorblind CivNats or except that they replace civic nationalism with Christianity.
Maybe that’s just the way that it is. I don’t know.
I only know that I can’t submit to a God that asks me to not acknowledge that I have a people and that those unique people should be preserved.
God created those unique people. They are called nations. Never forget that.
Avoid the false Christians.They made a mess in the 20th century.
This would seem very natural. Yet, again, the Christians that I know fervently believe in being colorblind, even more than non-Christians.
To them, it’s a sin to not accept any Christian without reservation into their society.
Obviously, I’m biased, but I don’t know who you separate God and tribe. God make the European peoples. He made all the peoples of the Earth.
Did he do this just to see them blend into one race? Why didn’t he just start with one race?
Either God made a mistake or God is, Z once said, a trickster. Neither one of those can be true.
“I only know that I can’t submit to a God that asks me to not acknowledge that I have a people and that those unique people should be preserved.”
Nor should you. Nor does God demand such a thing. And He never has. And never will, since we know that He is “the same yesterday, today, and forever.”
Don’t be deceived. Find a *reliable* teacher, and get to work.
When the student is *ready*, the teacher will appear,
Keep your eyes and ears open. OPEN. When your teacher appears, you will almost certainly not recognize him b/c he might not come in any form that you expect.
Nathan Cleburne: Christ is risen indeed
Citizen of a Silly Country you wrote a very good analysis of the situation.
“The universalism of Christianity – at least as it exists today – is incompatible with that goal. “We’re all God’s children, … .”
This is a false teaching. But an appalling ignorance is part of the cause. The other part is downright laziness.
READ THIS BOOK:
https://chalcedon.edu/resources/books/politics-of-guilt-and-pity
Then get off your backside and LEARN!
How can you expect to argue something of which you are deliberately and abysmally ignorant?
Are you in the fight or not?
OK, but it’s a “false teaching” shared with Islam. Remember the “umma?” We heard about that a lot back during George W.’s Christiany wars to redeem the white-liberal souls of descendants of Arab goatherds. They plucked all kinds of fruity progressive imams at the time to explain to us how the Koran was compatible with Disney+ (weirdly, the Mecca scene from Spike Lee’s Malcolm X was cited as solid evidence for this).
Buddhism has an odd, oft-criticized universalist/nihilist flavor but they have no problem being ethno-supremacist when it’s needed; ask some Tamil Tigers about that, you’ll get an earful. Hindus are the Culture of Critique 2.0
“OK, but it’s a “false teaching” shared with Islam.”
No, it is not.
Must I say it again? Neither Scripture nor Sacred Tradition teach this nonsense and never have.
“Remember the “umma?” We heard about that a lot back during George W.’s Christiany wars to redeem the white-liberal souls of descendants of Arab goatherds.”
Okay, from this point, I’ll assume you are saying that Dubya and anybody who voted for him or any other member of his family (and I never did that) were boobs. Which is true.
But Dubya is not very bright, okay? You can safely ignore anything he might have said about Christianity.
Or anything else, come to that.
“But Dubya is not very bright, okay? You can safely ignore anything he might have said about Christianity.”
W was stupid and violent, the most dangerous combination known. It probably is not a good idea to ignore what monsters like him say about anything because it reveals their evil intentions. Listen and oppose.
CDNW:
“They plucked all kinds of fruity progressive imams at the time to explain to us how the Koran was compatible with Disney+ (weirdly, the Mecca scene from Spike Lee’s Malcolm X was cited as solid evidence for this).”
Those imams are considered apostate and would be killed immediately upon release in the Muslim wild. W was dumber than a stump but, unfortunately, had a good grasp on the idiocy of his constituency. Hands down he was the worst Western leader in recent history.
“The fact is the managerial elites of the West are not irreligious. Ideology is just religion that replaces God with man.”
I know this will annoy the academicians and the “intellectuals” here, but this statement misses the point. It is possible that some of the lower level managerial elite believe in man, but the majority of the top tier elite serve Satan. This is a war of Good vs. evil. Always was, always will be.
The signs of evil are everywhere. Is it really possible that those in the highest places who are responsible for this evil truly do nor recognize the evil that they do? They will never admit that they are evil or that they do evil, of course, but in their heart of hearts I cannot help but think that they know exactly what they do.
While not particularly religious myself, I don’t look down on those who are, as Marko mentioned. I distinctly remember back in the 70’s and 80’s, those loathsome demoncrap politicians, usually of the catholic faith, attempting to square their “faith” with their unwavering support of abortion. It was disgusting then, but at least they made a pathetic attempt – now they don’t even care. Maybe we could use a real Rapture…
The Latin Mass is the way to go for Catholics as the Vatican has been making it harder and harder to have one-especially this so-called Pope from Argentina.
The next Pope could completely rescind the Latin Mass and excommunicate the SSPX and it would only temporarily hurt attendance. The Latin Mass community is far too large, organized, and fanatical now and is only going to grow.
Last year’s edict only showed how toothless Vatican threats are. They wrecked the social trust in the hierarchy with Vatican II and 50 years of relentless cope to explain why al the new initiatives fell flat on their face. New trad seminarians are learning to keep their mouths shut in Seminary and infiltrate a Church hostile to them, and lay people are getting just as smart. It’s normalizing low-scale dissident tactics that we need to employ at the government level also.
I get the desire to return to the TLM as it links believers with a past that was marked by greater belief and orthodoxy. However, the problem is that if you want to attract new believers, the TLM is a non-starter. It’s a dead language which has no meaning today for anyone but a tiny minority.
I don’t believe many parishioners spoke or even understood much Latin before 1963 when Vatican II came along, but that was fine. There were books in English to follow along with the Latin Mass, just like there are now. The music is certainly more beautiful and interesting than some Christian Folk Mass.
Books to follow along are nice. When I went to Parochial school, we learned the Latin Mass in class. Every word, never had a book, nor did I even think of the Latin, instead automatically translating in my mind. It took a while to take the new, “English” as normal. And actually, it never was normal, it just did not “flow”.
” … if you want to attract new believers, the TLM is a non-starter. It’s a dead language which has no meaning today for anyone but a tiny minority.”
I’m going to disagree with you here.
You might be surprised at the number of people “out there’ who are starved for something beautiful and true.
Who want holiness, and contact with holiness.
Who seek a serious religion, and who already know that hootnanny “worship” is not serious religion.
Thee are far more such people than you imagine.
Keep the vernacular Novus Ordo but make the most traditional options in the missal obligatory and remove the option to use the others. So ad oreintum, no altar girls, communion at the altar rail in one specie distributed by the priest, confiterior at the start of mass, use eucharistic prayer 1, etc. That would really be the best of both worlds. Trads would still complain about some things but they would be really nitpicking at that point.
You would still leave the Devil a foot in the door.
The NO is not Catholic in any way. IT is meant to destroy the faith.
“I cannot help but think that they know exactly what they do.”
Agreed. The rank and file may be true believers, but the leaders know exactly what they are doing.
” … the Vatican has been making it harder and harder to have one … .”
Yes, like the Great Wall of China, that’s probably visible from space.
Typo alert.
“The other side of this are people who much me mocked and ridiculed. ”
sb
The other side of this are people who must be mocked and ridiculed.”
surely
We are lucky to have found a great church, Calvary Chapel. The Pastor is someone you can admire and look up to, and the congregants hopeful, unwoke, supportive.
I would encourage you all to find such a church. Good for the soul, good for your sanity. And! Follows of the Woke religion will hate you for it. 😁
Happy Reserrection Day!
Sorry. Make that Resurrection.
Hopefully the congregants can move him to anti-woke. He may be your guide in spirituality, but you can be his guide in politics. Unwoke is not good enough. Nothing short of anti-woke is good enough. Evil cannot be ignored, it must be actively opposed.
A couple years ago, our Governor posted a candle with a picture of Stacey Abrams, done in a style of religious iconography. The blasphemy of our ruling classes is brazen and they don’t care.
Some petty bureaucrats, health inspectors of all things, also harassed our home-school co-op recently, located in a small rural church outside a leftist wasteland. There was nothing illegal about what we did, but some leftist got wind of our organization and wanted to find a way to antagonize us. The co-op ended up having a “field day” at one of the parent’s houses until it blew over.
Our Pope hates us, our Bishop is just trying to keep the crazies working for the diocese from doing too much damage (the Church has a deep state also, and you’ll be surprised how little power a Bishop actually has), and we’re surrounded by fanatics who got a taste of cruel power with Corona and persecuting people not on board with gay degeneracy.
Trump is not saving us, nor is Elon Musk or Putin. It will take a couple of generations before the right can create parallel institutions capable of raising /our guy/. We can survive until then by punching holes in the ship of the current regime. They may have fancy tech, but at the end of the day it requires some ruling class competence to enforce their edicts.
Excellent post! Thanks for acknowledging the home-churching movement, which is large and growing, quietly and below the radar. This is one of the most constructive forms of resistance a person can engage in, because it strengthens the family and preserves traditional culture/beliefs while it saves your soul. Z-man, you usually sound like some kind of lapsed Christian. it’s wonderful to see you speak up for the value of traditional, non-converged Christian practice.
A blessed Good Friday to all.
My wife and I just moved down south and it has been an eye-opener. Before moving we were very disappointed with our Presbyterian (PCUSA) church. That church has gone woke and now broke.
Down here we have attended several Presbyterian Church in America (PCA) churches – which are very conservative and bible-based. The pews are full and often have young families in them.
Every mainline church is now going through a similar schism. Lutheran Missouri Synod churches are traditional bible-based and growing. Lutheran Chicago Synod churches (ELCA) fly rainbow flags out front and are hemorrhaging members at least around here.
Methodist, Baptist… they are all going to end splitting up if they haven’t already.
There is even an Anglican Province of America church near here – a conservative spin-off from the Episcopalian lesbian book-clubs.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FwJ3hPGtsng&t=176s
Welcome South, brother!
The Methodist Church is in the process of pulling apart, and it is interesting in what it says about Left Regime ideology and actions in general. While the vast majority of that faith’s dissidents will take communion and worship in the traditional remnant, the Regime Leftists demanded they retain the name so they can wear the skinsuit and declare a Pyrrhic victory. That church’s schism, predictably, was over homosexual marriage and transgenderism.
While the church denuded of its traditionalists will die in short order, the Regime Left will be able to hoist the banner of what it conquered in the meantime while the schismatics thrive due to their absence. This is a metaphor for all things in the West. Those traditional Methodists will need to be on their toes constantly because what the Regime Left lacks in preference it compensates for in viciousness.
Along these lines, the various Protestant and Catholic churches in China have been under constant attack. The hypocritically pious West bemoans the fate of Uighurs and Tibetan Buddhists but never mentions the larger persecuted group.
The Left skinsuit West both secular and quasi-religious will die in short order, I have come to believe, but it will try to take out as many heretics as possible with it. The actual West only has to survive the persecution and resurrect itself after what likely will be a bloodbath that will put the Ottomans at the gates of Sophia Hagia to shame.
Happy Easter from a respectful agnostic dissident.
The LCMS is racing towards wokeness. They will go under within 10 years.
But there is now eldona.org
To add, these sorts of religious schisms are leading indicators of a nation and culture splitting apart. We do not even have to go as far back as Germany several centuries ago, either. Look at the United States on the eve of the Civil War: the major Protestant denominations broke into regional affiliations, and even the Catholic Church had a major internal schism when the Holy See refused to recognize the Confederacy’s proposed delegate (although the inversion was well underway, prior to the CW, the South was where most Catholics lived before the Irish and Italian immigration to the Northeast, especially so in Maryland and Louisiana).
Forced integration had a similar effect as slavery did on religious affiliations.
But even those earlier divisions paled in comparison to the current struggle between secular and traditional Christianity. The Left’s current campaign to both de-Christianize the United States and infiltrate and subvert churches is helping to fuel a national dissolution that quite often is intrastate. Given how the Empire treats nations that do not follow its state religion–Russia, anyone? it is hard to believe a de jure separation would be allowed but a de facto one is well underway. Watching that is one of the few current reasons not to suffer total despair.
Again, keep an eye on what is happening with the uber Woke United Methodist Church. That is significant and symbolic enough that the State may intervene in some way to punish its dissidents, likely via taxation, and is a great example of the Empire falling apart even as it still maintains an iron grip. To paraphrase, what the State cannot control it will destroy.
It’s hard to see how any Dissident movement can succeed without roots in faith. Yet at the same time, dissidents would waste vital energy arguing about which faiths/doctrines were okay in the movement and which ones weren’t. So how can faith be a unifying force for a Dissident movement?
This is the central question and I honestly have no answer. I would love to hear Zman and others ITT opine on it. Some kind of Ecumenical Dissident Manifesto on faith and societal norms would appear to be necessary as a rallying point.
Happy Easter to All!
I think that you might find my comment above addresses your question. Don’t know if it answers the question, but I give it my best shot.
“This is the central question and I honestly have no answer. I would love to hear Zman and others ITT opine on it.”
Well-instructed Christians in the DR know perfectly well that “many are called but few are chosen.” There are unbelievers in the world; there always will be; we have always known that.
So working in harmonious partnership with unbelievers should present no problem for well-instructed Christians.
On the other hand, the unbelievers have to avoid bad behaviour. Well, *everybody* on all sides has to avoid that. But snide remarks are out, etc., etc. I think you get the point.
This ought not to present a problem. We have pressing common interests. It would be both foolish and childish to antagonize natural allies.
This is for adults only. Let’s put it that way.
Taking everything personally is a non-starter.
I think anyone who grew up in the 1980s or 90s, or early 2000s even, saw political Christianity in full bloom. It was enough to turn me off of Christianity. The 80s bore the grifter evangelical TV host; the 90s bore Bill Clinton and Billy Graham in an unholy partnership, and every politician had to be seen going to church; the early 2000s the Bush-Neocon Judeo-Christian war machine. It led me into the arms of Christopher Hitchens et. al.
It took a while for me to accept Christianity as a force for good, and the Groyper Christian dissidents are the kind of judgmental Christians we need. I am not religious but I am not disdainful of religion either. Good luck to the Christian dissidents and I am looking forward to their inquisition…
The high note at the end of your comment made me laugh out loud: “I am looking forward to their inquisition…”
Thank You
Happy Easter
I, too, L’d O L at that!
I go so far as to say that ideology isn’t the replacement of God with man, it’s the replacement of God with self. I’ve always wondered how the very obvious radical Leftists who infest all the main denominations could even stand to step through the door. Religion is by its nature patriarchal etc. — all the stuff the Left hates– and while they’re obviously trying to subvert organized religion, they’re not doing it consciously. They’re not KGB moles, taking orders from HQ. They really do think of themselves as “spiritual” people; they want their churches to grow.
The only way this works is by flipping it on its head. Instead of “What can I do to be closer to God?”, their religiosity is purely transactional: “What can God do for ME?” That’s the first step, anyway, which soon morphs into “Come celebrate how great you are!” You could attend a year’s worth of services at a mainline Protestant church and never hear the name of Jesus spoken. Why would you? You’re super and perfect just the way you are! If His name is ever heard, it’s only the preacher assuring you that He agrees with your lifestyle 100%.
It’s a giant monument to SELF. And now, no doubt, it has come full circle — a bunch of people who use religion as an IRL Twitter, sitting in church tweeting about being in church to everyone else in the pews. Uptwinkles!!
Severian: Brilliant. Perfectly explains today’s standard of MY God would never do or allow ‘x.’
I wrote this blog posting a while back that relates to this posting from the Zman. The following is an excerpt.
https://www.minds.com/carymaker/blog/christian-identitarian-and-community-1126992518921752576
Many advocates for white people are found primarily online and speak of a desire to see real life community interactions between our people. In community we can build, encourage and grow together. There are five reasons why Christianity and the church in particular, can be the starting place to build those communities.
1. Segregation: Churches are already segregated: One measure of ethnic diversity in the congregational setting is that more than 80 percent of the church comes from the same ethnic group. Using this measure, about 86.3% percent of Christian congregations in America are mono-ethnic. Of course most church leaders desire their churches to be multicultural yet that is not what people choose. People feel more comfortable in a mono-ethic setting where cultural communication is easy and trust is higher.
2. Community: People long for community but this is already present with churches. There are of course closed Christian communities such as the Amish and Mennonites. But less observed is the conservative Protestant church communities which although not closed like the Amish but are nevertheless a communities embedded within the modern culture.
3. Homeschool: The biggest participants of homeschooling are conservative Christians as well as orthodox Jews. This is important to build healthy white communities as the currently woke public educational system is destructive of our people.
4. Traditions: Some non-Christian white advocates try to revive old folk tales and traditions that can help bind our communities together. However for the last 2000 years, Christian traditions have been woven into the warp and woof of our culture and are recognizable by nearly all people.
5. Nationalistic Voting: The political left often derides the evangelical Christian nationalistic voting preferences. The dissident right also is quick to look down upon Christian conservatives for being too shallow and not recognizing the important trends of society. This criticism may be valid but what other group is voting consistently for nationalism? What other major voting bloc wants to protect the traditions and culture of America?
6. Conservative Christians generally have large families thus a better position to conserve our white values and culture.
You’re right. I once attended a Protestant church where the pastor regularly bewailed the fact that (quoting the plagiarist and rapist Martin Looter Kangz) Sunday morning was “de most segregated hour” in America. To remedy this, the church set up a “partnership” with a black church. One Sunday a bunch of earnest white congregants attended the black church, and were treated to a full-on “hate whitey” sermon by the brother who was preaching.
This Protestant church was pretty awful; the guy in charge of “community formation” was a real self-hating Southerner and would go on about how he was “so ashamed” of being white, and so on. Totally worshipped the Black Jesus. Anyway, a lot of people quit that church; this pastor was eventually forced out and is now an executive coach somewhere. Too bad there aren’t more cases like this.
In a refreshing contrast, at the height of the Floyd riots, the Russian Orthodox archbishop over mid-america issued a pastoral letter telling the Orthodox to NOT support the radical movements, and citing Bolshevism as a precedent.
” … the guy in charge of “community formation” was a real self-hating Southerner and would go on about how he was “so ashamed” of being white, and so on. ”
Paraphrasing Christ: “The mentally ill you always have with you.”
That’s nothing to wonder at. Neurotics often gravitate to “churches.”
But only “churches” tolerate them. Real churches send them packing.
Theodore Miner,
Good thoughtful synopsis!
But to me, the primary question concerning Christianity, the first question to ask before going any farther, is:
‘Is it true?’ Does the Christian narrative provide an accurate description of reality?
‘Is it true?’ Does the Christian narrative provide an accurate description of reality?”
Have you investigated it seriously?
And before you answer, let me say that by “seriously” I mean have you studied at least to some serious degree the Scriptures in the original Greek?
Have you been under sound instruction from sound teachers for at least ten years?
If so, you can answer the question you have posed for yourself, assuming, as I do, that you have a sound definition of “reality.”
If not, nobody else can answer that question for you.
It appears to me that you want a quick, simple, but nevertheless definitive answer.
But there isn’t one.
You’ll have to do the hard slog for yourself.
First, all religions exist and persist because they “work” in the sense that they enhance the ability of the community to survive and thrive in the local environment in which they evolved. As such, they are as vital as eyesight, and casting them aside will ultimately have the same impact as universal blindness. In addition, religion is a tried & true mechanism for conveying ancient wisdom between generations, and thereby frees the youth from having to make every mistake in the book during their formative years. And this allows them to become productive faster rather than a burden on society.
Second, religion builds social trust and frees everyone from constantly having to look over their shoulder for fear of being stabbed in the back all the time. Again, it’s hard to be productive when you must be constantly on-guard for blindside attacks.
And yet, that is the new world we are entering with the demise of religion. Anxiety is growing because no one can trust the news, or politicians, or social norms that cast aside reality as if it was an shibboleth. The latter is a societal cancer that is killing us in slow motion. And it’s not enough to just go underground and try to wait it out.
The disease cells must go, one way or the other.
Polls show the current generation of youth has levels of despair probably unseen in centuries. You’re going to see a large percentage of Americans not seeing any point in living but only wanting to wallow in porn and social media or destroy everything without discrimination.
Europe is even worse, as in most western countries the majority believe life is not worth living. People like this are replaced, and it will either be by dissidents or Africans.
The return of real hardship will reawaken our ancient “will to live” imperative and peoples of European heritage will reactivate their innate work ethic and innovative skill set in service to that reawakening. Yes, a lot of dead weight will fall by the wayside on the road to redemption, but that is a necessity and not really a tragedy. And it all begins with a purge of the toxins and disease cells that afflict us.
Those polls illustrate a major problem, but also a major opportunity.
They are illustrating that there is indeed a void out there under the current paradigm that is waiting to be filled with positive programming.
The challenge lies in how to reach those people, and how to define and develop the positive programming in a manner that helps them begin leaving the depths of despair.
“Europe is even worse”-on most social metrics America is much worse than Europe. It’s odd because you people claim to be more Christian but if you look at the stats you are outstandingly degenerate.
“It’s odd because you people claim to be more Christian”
Exactly. The important word there is “claim.”
First, all religions exist and persist because they “work” in the sense that they enhance the ability of the community to survive and thrive in the local environment in which they evolved.
That statement indicates the existence of a religion suited to each environment, which doesn’t seem to be the case. The reality is that all religions begin in the regulation of sex and move on to life after death and the regulation of as many other facets of life as possible, including the establishment of hereditary classes that are able to exploit the weak. In fact, the dominant religions were the first examples of globalism as the 17th century European navigation and colonization used its missionary efforts to justify and enforce the subjugation of the rest of the world. Islam became both a winner and loser in this program. As belief in the supernatural has waned before science the worship of democracy has become the standard in the West and heretics to its theology are put to the sword just as other infidels were in the past. None of the victims have returned to earth to describe their post-death experiences.
Tom A,
There’s no doubt that religious belief provides benefits; not just for the believer, but for the entire community he lives in.
Anytime a person really sets out to love his neighbor as himself— to treat others with charity and compassion and forbearance, to put the needs of others ahead of his own, to do his best to embody ‘the fruit of the Spirit’ in his daily life— that person’s life will very likely go well. People will like him, and want to be around him. He’ll be perceived as a valued member of the community, even by those who don’t share his beliefs.
And anyone who believes that the loving Creator of the Universe is aware of his situation and has his best interests at heart, is going to experience a psychological security: to the extent that he feels himself in the hands of a loving God, he won’t be plauged by anxiety, depression, despair, etc.
So it’s not hard to see why religions came to be, for all the reasons you mention: they convey ‘true truth’— observations and advice which accord with reality— they provide a structure for passing-on tried-and-true wisdom, they allow for a greater degree of social trust. And they satisfy our human urge to understand, to find patterns of meaning in the Universe, to construct a narrative which allows us to make sense of our experience.
I just think that science can now do that— tell us who we are as human beings, how we got here, how we came to be the way we are.
No matter what benefits religious belief brings, we no longer need them. We no longer need iron-age myths to understand ourselves and our place in the Universe.
“No matter what benefits religious belief brings, we no longer need them. We no longer need iron-age myths to understand ourselves and our place in the Universe.‘
And this is why we are so much happier, safer, more content with religion vanquished from the public sphere. Let me know where I can read the current scientific understanding/explanation of the inevitable and natural development of the “Godly” traits/virtues of compassion, sacrifice, love, empathy, and the like—those behaviors that separate man from animal.
Not anti science, but religion and science are complementary in man’s search for meaning. Joseph Campbell in his book, “The Power of Myth” had an insight that has stuck with me. He said that the empirical truth of a society’s myths are *not* important, but rather it was what the myth represented of a society’s values and what that society’s culture strived for.
So that George Washington, as a boy, cut down his father’s cherry tree is certainly a lot of poppycock, but that our Founding father said “I can not tell a lie” (also poppycock) *is* important. Science will tell you ignore the story as it is untrue. Religion will reinforce it as it demonstrates a virtue (honesty) we should all strive to obtain.
Well said, Compsci.
Compsci,
I agree with much of what you say. I’m just approaching the truths you point out from a different set of assumptions:
I agree when you point out how myth— while not being true in a strict sense of ‘it actually happened’— CAN be true in a broader sense of ‘this is how life is’.
And can (and often does) serve as a repository of a society’s values, irregardless of whether the mythical events enshrining those values actually happened.
> However— and here’s the rub— virtually all the Christian believers I’ve known don’t see the Bible that way: as a collection of helpful myths.
Rather, they see the Bible as a recounting of actual history, of events which actually occurred; which, as I’ve tried to point out, simply couldn’t be the case regarding the OT. And is questionable at best regarding the NT stories.
When you say:
“Let me know where I can read the current scientific understanding/explanation of the inevitable and natural development of the “Godly” traits/virtues of compassion, sacrifice, love, empathy, and the like—those behaviors that separate man from animal.”
you’re asking the same questions evolutionary psychologists ask about religion, though from a different angle:
‘Why did religion evolve? What benefits does religion confer? In what sense is a religious society more likely to be successful than a non-religious one?’
and
‘Why did altruism— and the related traits you mention, of compassion, sacrifice, love, empathy, and the like—- emerge?
How are societies characterized by altruistic behavior more conducive to survival than societies without it?’
And it’s not hard to see how an altruistic society— in which empathy, sacrifice, and compassion are valued— would be more likely to flourish.
> And the answer would be the same, whether or not the stories embodying those values actually happened.
“Anytime a person really sets out to love his neighbor as himself— to treat others with charity and compassion and forbearance, to put the needs of others ahead of his own, to do his best to embody ‘the fruit of the Spirit’ in his daily life— that person’s life will very likely go well. People will like him, and want to be around him. He’ll be perceived as a valued member of the community, even by those who don’t share his beliefs.”
Every.single.word. of that is the diametrical opposite of what the New Testament teaches.
It is important to know what you are talking about before you make such easily observable false assumptions.
“I just think that science can now do that— tell us who we are as human beings, how we got here, how we came to be the way we are.”
And that is downright laughable, given the events and statements of the past two years.
“Science”?? Really?
What planet have you been on for the past two and a half years?
As a believer in God but not a Christian, I agree with all your points, Tom. However, the problem I have is exactly the question Real Bill raised. Sure, Christianity has great moral and social benefits but…is it TRUE?! Without, I hope, wishing to anger anyone here, I don’t see it as being completely true. Certainly, there seems to have been a wonderful preacher and healer called Jesus (or the Jewish equivalent) who tried to bring a deeply errant generation in a time of turmoil back to God and goodness. A certainly, he is someone we can all hold up as an exemplar of how a human should live and behave. But after that it seems to devolve into mythologising, with a steady accredition of myth being added by every gospel after the first one (Mark), until you get monstrosities like Catholic tradition and predestination.
The evidence is overwhelming that none of the Old Testament stories actually happened:
The Hebrews were slaves in Egypt for 400 years— but no contemporary historian thought fit to mention it?
Joseph rose to second-in-command of all of Egypt, and saved the country from 7 years of famine— in a country where the achievements of great men were commemorated in pyramids and temples and stone inscriptions— yet no trace of Joseph remains?
The entire Egyptian army is immersed in the Red Sea—- tens of thousands of armor-clad men with steel swords, chariots with iron-rimmed wheels— and no trace of it remains?
Millions of Hebrews— the OT puts it at 600,000 men, plus women and children— wander around a relatively small patch of desert for 40 years—- yet no trace of their presence remains?
The Hebrews at God’s command destroyed whole cities in their conquest of the ‘promised land’, killing every living creature before burning them down— yet no trace remains?
Solomon, who according to the Bible was the wisest man who ever lived, word of whose wisdom spread throughout the ancient world, prompting the Queen of Egypt to pay him a visit— yet no one in the ancient world noticed?
> The first generation of near-east archaeologists were called Biblical archaeologists, because they believed the OT narratives to be true history. They arrived with Bibles in hand fully expecting to find traces of Pharaoh’s army in the Red Sea, traces of the Hebrews’ 40 years wandering in the desert, traces of the cities the Bible tells us they destroyed.
But they found….. nothing.
> It’s simply not possible that these events occurred, yet left no trace on the historical and archaeological record. So the only reasonable conclusion is that these stories were made up.
The New Testament presents similar difficulties:
The first extra-Biblical mention of Christianity doesn’t appear until around 150 AD. (The mention by Josephus of “one Chrestus and his followers” is agreed by hostorians to be a later addition, not genuine).
How could it be that Jesus was turning the world upside down— performing miracles, drawing huge crowds— yet none of the 40 historians writing at the time thought to mention it?
King Herod decreed that all Hebrew babies under two years old be killed— yet no historian thought that worth mentioning?
Realizing that the Bible consists of made up stories— not actual history— was the beginning of my journey away from believing.
Your New Testament theory is circular. Your view is we should discard the eyewitnesses mentioned in the Bible. But the Bible was written specifically to record those histories, yet you give greater weight to other historians who have no knowledge one way or the other. Their ignorance is not surprising, given that he preached for three years, while being dismissed by the Roman and Hebrew hierarchies that perceived him as a threat, and who btw those other historians were subject to.
DLS,
So yes, that’s one of the questions: were the authors of the NT books indeed eyewitnesses?
I realize the texts make that claim— present themselves as eyewitness accounts of events which actually happened— but is that the case?
As I’ve pointed out elsewhere in this comment thread, the evidence is overwhelming that the Old Testament accounts never happened; that there’s no way they could have happened, yet left no trace on the historical and archaeological record. Yet they too present themselves as if they were accurate historical accounts: they contain details that only an eyewitness would know. Yet the evidence is overwhelming that they couldn’t have happened. If the entire Egyptian army was drowned in the Red Sea, the evidence would still be there.
So the question arises: what about the New Testament accounts? Does the evidence point to their having happened? Or does it cast doubt on their historicity?
There were approximately 40 historians and other observers writing at the time of Jesus, whose accounts have come down to us.
How likely is it that none of them would have commented on the tumultuous events the NT describes?
How likely is it that Herod commanded that all Hebrew babies under the age of two be killed, yet no contemporary observer found that worth recording?
Likewise the miracles of Jesus, which the NT texts tell us drew huge crowds, and upset the rulers to the extent they had him put to death: how could it be that no contemporary observer found that worth mentioning?
It’s been a while since I was immersed in this stuff, but IIRC scholars believe that the NT texts were written between 50-60 AD (Paul) and 70-90 AD (Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Revelation).
So if they were eyewitness accounts, they must have been passed on orally for a generation or two before being written down. So not exactly eyewitness….
And the first extra-Biblical mention of Christianity (aside from the spurious Josephus quote) didn’t occur until around 150 AD. That too seems kind of odd, given the NT description of all the hullabaloo surrounding Jesus.
@The real Bill:
That’s right. Everything you have said is true.
It is also totally immaterial.
That you cannot grasp this tells us about YOU, although it tells us exactly *nothing* about the Scriptures or about religion in general or about Christianity in particular.
Maybe one day you will grasp it. If you can ever get past your own self, maybe you will understand.
@ The real Bill:
“These things did Thomas count as real:
The warmth of blood, the chill of steel,
The grain of wood, the heft of stone,
The last frail twitch of flesh and bone.
The vision of his skeptic mind
Was keen enough to make him blind
To any unexpected act
Too large for his small world of fact.
[…]
Both you and the Real Bill bring up excellent ideas worthy of erudite analysis and discussion, but unfortunately, we do not have the luxury of such leisure pursuits at this time. The house is on fire and the societal cancer has metastasized extensively such that disease remedy must come first and foremost. And this is why I argue that we cannot talk our way out of the mess we’re in, nor via intellectual analysis, nor via mass persuasion, nor via voting, nor even via civil rebellion. There just isn’t time for these distractions.
Hopefully the collapse will begin soon (and sooner is better) such that a proactive remedy may commence. As in the human body, when the fever is high, the antibodies must disperse into the bloodstream and remove the disease cells definitively. Until basic health is restored, brain musing are of no importance.
Good post, Tom A, but the collapse is well underway already. We are watching it in real time.
You’ll know the collapse has begun when serious rioting is occurring all over the country, not just in Detroit, Baltimore, and LA., but also cities like Minneapolis, Kansas City, St. Louis, and Memphis.
Serious rioting=“shoot to kill” orders. Civil war=“population shooting back”
Not attempting to be clever here, but we do need an idea of where we are when this strife returns. What we saw in 2020 was basic LARPing. Annoying, yes. Dangerous (if in the middle), yes. You ain’t seen nothing yet, yep.
Happy Easter to all and God bless
Huge numbers of converts at my Orthodox parish in a Southern state. Orthodoxy is demanding and it’s completely unapologetic. It doesn’t bend to the prevailing winds and has never sought to accommodate with modernity. That’s a benefit of belonging to a church that measures itself against Tradition.
And thank you for not mentioned Rod Dreher. He has a few good ideas, but alas, accepts all or most of the gnostic premises of the American establishment, starting with “equality.” Can’t be trusted.
Catholic, but did an Orthodox fast one year for Advent. Absolutely brutal. Paradoxically, if the Church enforced fasting norms of only a hundred years ago, especially in Advent of Lent, membership would go up dramatically.
The biggest thing to go against the grain in the current year is to actually demand something of people.
During the fast, I am very happy for my Cajun grandma — there’s a lot of gumbo and crawfish on the stove!
The biggest thing to go against the grain in the current year is to actually demand something of people.
In current year BRAINO one of the simplest acts of rebellion is to have a basic standard of performance or attention to detail.
I have argued for a long time that the best thing for genuine Christianity is severe persecution. While no longer a Christian, when I was in the faith and very active it was depressing to see how many lifelong church goers had only a superficial understanding of their own faith. Few read the Bible and virtually none did any evangelism. For the institutional Christian religion this is the worst of times and a lot of professional clerics better learn to code but for the religious faith itself this is the best of times.
” … many lifelong church goers had only a superficial understanding of their own faith. Few read the Bible … .”
^^^THIS^^^
@Z man
I agree with no reservations, and am delighted to see you write this!
Happy Easter.
in times of great fear and despair people will instinctively seek out houses of worship, I am reminded of the ending scene in the original movie war of the worlds where the female character sylvia waited in the church “for the one who loved her best to come and find her”. all is not lost and will never be, as long as one person still believes..
And we are in those times of great fear and despair right now. Having some kind of faith or belief in the transcendent is the only way to stay sane as the globalist maniacs tear the world apart for a brief modicum of Earthly power.
“all is not lost and will never be, as long as one person still believes..”
Fortunately, it doesn’t depend on anyone who believes. It doesn’t depend on any of us. It doesn’t depend on any creature.
Wondering why that scene wasn’t in the Spielberg remake.
Happy Easter, Zman. I must confess that the reason I stopped attending my local church is the unhinged behavior of our pastor. He just will not give up the covid theater. And he is not unlike the idiotic hierarchy of this church, which has a long, honorable history from the very beginnings of our nation. How low it has sunk. But, as you say, there is hope. It seems a strong, masculine fellow is about to step into the leadership of our church. It can’t come too quickly. As soon as this alpha male takes over, I predict a surge in attendance once more. We need leadership badly at all levels in our society. Churches are a good place to start.
It’s easy to filter out churches these days.
Engaging in covid theater? That’s a hard “no”.
Flying Satan’s (rainbow) flag out front? Another quick indicator that that people inside are not Christians.
It has been hard for church attending Christians the last few years with the capitulation of church leaders. As a tradition al Catholic it was too much to bear and only now am I resuming attendance on a semi regular basis.
That said my faith never waivered and recently made headway with wayward members of my family. My brother seems to finally realize where his lack of representing Christianity has had a deleterious effect on his children.
Our host here seems to be coming back to his roots if I read him correctly. I cherish this three day period (Triduum) like no other.
We live in an area with roughly 100 Protestant churches. Our church went woke after I new pastor took over around the time Covid started. Finding a decent church where we could raise our children in the Christian has been a struggle. The mainline denominations are all chasing after the latest progressive fads, I am surprised there hasn’t been reports of a United Church of Christ congregation having a split over whether or not to hang the Ukrainian flag instead of the alphabet soup one. Many of the others are chasing whatever the popular entertainment trends are and doing a terrible job of transmitting the faith. The pastor of the church we left did a sermon series on Marvel movies. We think we have found a good church now. I appreciate this column on Good Friday. Thank you.
The UCC destroyed the 375 year-old-church I grew up in. If Satan himself was running that organization he couldn’t have done a better job of running off believers are convincing the remnant to practice heresies.
“Many of the others are chasing whatever the popular entertainment trends are and doing a terrible job of transmitting the faith.”
It’s not possible for them to transmit that which they do not possess.
Hang in there. Be faithful. All will be well. You can’t get to Easter Day without going through Good Friday.
without disagreeing with your thesis, is being christian just a way to endure hard times, a wait-it-out approach? or does being christian somehow directly lead to real world problems being solved? honestly, your post sounds like “real christianity hasn’t been tried yet”, given that there are, and have been, plenty of christians in AINO. i think that your argument is only half presented here, if only to say why another religion like Islam wouldn’t in fact be more likely to take over.
“is being christian just a way to endure hard times, a wait-it-out approach? or does being christian somehow directly lead to real world problems being solved?”
“These things I have spoken to you, that you should not be made to stumble. They will put you out of the synagogues; yes, the time is coming that whoever kills you will think that he offers God service. And these things they will do to you because they have not known the Father nor Me. But these things I have told you, that when the time comes, you may remember that I told you of them.
[…]
“I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will suffer persecution. But of good cheer! I have overcome the world.”
“… these things I have told you, that when the time comes, you may remember that I told you of them…”
Interesting time for this quote. There were many in my life, impoverished nuns for example, who day by day, year by year, put up with my antics and disrespect—but never gave up teaching me. Planting a seed that they hoped would grow with time.
They were to die, never knowing their imprint upon me. If that’s not faith…well, then there is no acceptable definition or example I can give. To them a belated thank you.
Bishop Richard Williamson groks the situation in fullness and has thus incurred the wrath of both the Lavender Mafia and the Red Sea Pedestrians.
Archbishop Vigano is not taking his foot off the traditionalist accelerator…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hM_wqGUNRGA
We’ve still got a week left for the Orthodox, but Holy Week is a time for big reflections and this is a big one to be thinking on. The lessons of Good Friday are many, but the one that’s stuck out to me lately is that God has not asked anything of us that He, as Christ, did not already endure for us. We must be ready to bear the Cross, and bear it gladly, whether that last a minute or a hundred years, and that endurance is how we shall know ourselves, our brothers, and our God.
May God bless and keep ya Z, and all the other readers