When I find myself in trouble, mother Mary does not come to me – so let it be!

One acknowledges that Mr. Rees-Mogg (R-M) always has something interesting to say. Today’s podcast [Merry Christmas, one and all!], which majors on Mariology (8x ‘our Lady’), with a non-Jewish looking Madonna in the background, is no exception. But my spiritual alarm bells are ringing in my head even now, as I write.

Whilst not wishing to entirely dismiss R-M’s contribution as floccinaucinihilipilification, I have been seriously left discombobulated, and a few things need to be said to put restore my equilibrium. R-M needs to be put right! (I am not referring to his political position, of course!) Before I proceed, I wish that R-M would have read from an English translation rather than some kind of Brevier!

But let’s move on. For starters, spoiler-alert, there is no historical evidence of the annunciation having taken place on March 25^th. We also know for a fact that Jesus was most definitely not born on Dec. 25^th. The emperor Constantine can explain that better than I can.

We take note that Mary is told, not asked (contra R-M), what is about to take place (Luke 1:26ff.). Grace precedes and obedience follows. God’s plan of salvation does not hinge on Mary’s willing response! After all, she was not a Semi-Pelagian!

And there is more! R-M maintains that Mary “is no different from the rest of us” (sic). Well, recent Roman dogma insists that “she far surpasses all creatures, both in heaven and on earth!" (Vatican II, Lumen Gentium, in loc.). Not a mere human then, but less than divine, of course, somewhat reminiscent of Arius’s Christology! Which brings me on to Mary’s supposed intercession, unheard of in the early apostolic church! Never commanded, and never practised! Yet, R-M remarks that “our Lady is the great, the best intercessor for us all" (sic). This presupposes, if my logic is right, that the mediatrix is both omnipresent and omniscient, to say the least. How else could she hear our prayers?! Somewhat divine, after all! R-M fails to notice that the New Testament exclusively ascribes the ministry of intercession to both the Son (Romans 8:34, Hebrews 7:25) and the Holy Spirit (Romans 8:27), the Son being the sole Mediator between God and man (John 14:6, 1 Timothy 2:5)! On a side, I do not read in my Bible that Mary “who persuaded Christ to turn water into wine” (sic). It is clear from Jesus’s abrupt response that his mother’s attempt to mediate, or shall we say, to meddle, meets with a gentle rebuke (John 2:4). A careful study of Jesus’ relationship with his mother, as recorded in the four gospel narratives, shows that Jesus, not Mary, is at the forefront of everything!

I have no idea what R-M means when he says that “the perfect son will always do what his mother asks him” (sic). But then I would not understand, as I never was a perfect son and neither was my late mother (Mary would have understood that as she was a sinner saved by grace, though according to papal teaching, Christ need not have died for her). May be it’s different in R-M’s household, though I doubt it!

R-M finishes, in his penultimate sentence, by denying that the Christ-child is our only Saviour. Instead it is, Jesus plus Mary! Being a good papist, his hope, of course, forbids any assurance (presumably the sin of presumption!), and at the end of his life it will be purgatory, or worse, but that is not for me to say! R-M’s video, sadly, is off-message altogether, “pariet autem filium et vocabis nomen eius Iesum IPSE ENIM SALVUM faciet populum suum a peccatis eorum” (Matthew 1:21). And let us not bury the cross under the cradle: Incarnation and atonement belong together!

R-M needs to repent, no, no, not another ‘hail Mary!’. Not penance, but faith alone in Christ alone, who is the one and only Saviour of the world!

Christus Victor!

 

A friend of mine has drawn my attention to the above and thus provoked a response. 

The statement, as it stands, makes little sense, as does the incoherent / sound-bite counter attack of atheism, which is 'full of sound and fury, signifying nothing'. Or, to quote Richard Dawkins' fav. book from the Bible, 'all is vanity' - which is true when viewing life as 'under the sun'. I'd imagine that John Lennon was not all that original after all! But pious claptrap does not help the cause, either! But who cares about truth these days, which was put to death over 2.000 years ago. Ultimately Christianity sprung to life from an empty tomb connected to the most hated man in the world. If that is not true then it would be the greatest lie that needs to be debunked. As yet, no one has succeeded. At any rate, Nietzsche certainly did not have the last word. Atheism offers no hope, and neither does a watered down religion.

 

 

 

Jesus Creating A Scene (A School Assembly Talk by Yours Truly - many years ago!)

 

Mark 11:15-19

The Bible translation before me has a heading which reads, ‘Jesus clears the Temple’. I would like to change it since it is not in the original text, ‘Jesus creating a scene’. It all seems a bit more wild to me – quite unexpected.

Not all like this kind of Jesus. Some prefer Him to be a helpless babe in a manger – cute and cuddly. Others see Him as the greatest of all teachers, a wonderful communicator, a teacher, a story teller. There are also those who claim Him to be a popular miracle worker, a nice person healing the sick and helping the poor. Most people perhaps, know Him, as the man of Galilee who died on a Roman cross as a common criminal to forgive us our sins.

But what is it that Mark is telling us about Jesus? It seems to me that the Jesus of the Bible is ‘wholly other’ – you need to find out for yourself. You can find out for yourself – if you wish. Jesus is so different from the way the majority see Him, who hate Him and use His name as a swear word.

Notice how Jesus is extremely displeased with the religion of His day. Mark points us to the time and the place. It’s Passover time when thousands upon thousands of Jewish people are flocking to Jerusalem, the temple, the most holy place on earth – to some Jews, the very centre of the universe. Mark tells us how Jesus had planned it all very carefully – we read about it in v.11 (11a-b). Done quite deliberately - on purpose – and to my mind ‘to create an unforgettable scene’. It was there (in the temple) and ‘then’ (at Passover time) that Jesus did what he did and said what he said.

The temple area – where people are supposed to worship God – was being turned into a market, where people were buying – animals for sacrifices and selling – at a huge profit. Religion, we may say, can be a dangerous thing as it so often takes advantage of the poor and the gullible. Jesus says, “I don’t want it; it must go!” And so it did – in A.D.70, when the temple was destroyed by the Romans, as Jesus had predicted.

Jesus was against the religion of his day. We see it in his action when he overturned the tables of the money changers and the benches of those selling doves. Imagine being ripped off – financially, I mean, by religious leaders for wanting to worship God. The temple itself had become a den – that is a cave where robbers meet to share their spoils. The robbers are the religious leaders – common criminals cloaked in religious garb. That’s what was happening and it is still happening today. There are many places even today where you have to pay to pray! That is not the religion of Jesus!

But Jesus doesn’t just act – He also speaks, v.17. His words explain His actions: He quotes from the Jewish Scriptures – 11:17b. May I paraphrase it for you? Church is for everybody and you cannot worship God in a place that resembles a zoo. Imagine all the animals – lots of them. Think of the noise, and worse still, the smell. Worse than a bunch of students who haven’t washed for a week!

There was no respect for God in that sort of religion! I hope then, you can see how Jesus and religion don’t always easily mix. I think Jesus is still displeased when religious people take advantage of the poor and hinder others from finding God.

But also notice not only how Jesus acts and speaks – expressing His displeasure. Did you not also notice from our reading that it happened publicly? There is nothing secret about it. It is not possible to misunderstand Jesus. He criticises the Jewish leaders for allowing it to happen. Jesus didn’t say ‘you keep your religion’ and ‘Ill keep mine’. No – he would not stand idly by - doing nothing.

He was inviting conflict, asking for trouble – and getting it. The Jewish leaders, so Mark tells us, were seeking to destroy Him (11:18). Jesus’ words and actions had consequences resulting in His death. He paid with His blood to set people free from the slavery of a religion that had turned evil! Imagine following a religion designed to keep you from God!

So what about you and what about me? What is your religion? Is religion your God or is God your religion?

When I find myself in times of trouble Mary does not come to me

In response to this shortvideo, which amounts to an undisguised and open attack after all, one needs to see the wider picture by reflecting on what the Bible actually has to say.

Extra-biblical resources (Protestant or the Roman Church) do not offer a uniform picture and are of limited help.

Apostolic Christianity knows nothing about Mary crushing the seed of the serpent (contrary to the mistranslation of the Vulgate (according to the Council of Trent, “no one is to dare, or presume to reject it under any pretext whatever”), see Genesis 3:15. It can be safely repudiated on linguistic grounds! William Tyndale had to be murdered for translating the Bible into English in 1536, long before the Council was convened! 

The immaculate conception, Mary’s hymen not being broken when giving birth to her first-born son, her perpetual virginity, let alone her sinlessness (did Jesus not die for Mary’s sins?) are nowhere found on the pages of Scripture! We read nothing in the Bible about Mary being the queen of heaven, or her bodily assumption, or the use of the rosary, which implies that Mary hears our prayers and is more approachable than her Son! It also makes Mary omniscient and omnipresent, i. e. divine, which is blasphemous! Marian statutes, her breast milk, apparitions and such like have, of course, no place even in the early post-apostolic church, but enough about all that.

Jesus’s treatment of his mother most often is couched in the language of ‘sinless rebuke’, as we read in the Gospel narratives. The diligent reader will note that this can be verified without any fear of contradiction!

Martin Luther rightly protested that the Church cannot create new articles of faith! Extra-biblical Roman dogma surrounding Mary may be, indeed, must be, rejected with a good and robust conscience.

Karl Barth’s quotation is far more accurate when he says, “as Luther understood it in his perfectly correct exegesis of the Magnificat, the greatness of the New Testament figure of Mary consists in the fact that all the interest is directed away from herself to the Lord” (Church Dogmatics, in loc.). In other words, Christ must increase and Mary must decrease, as, indeed, she did in the apostolic Church. We hide not under her mantle, but behind the Cross.

 

Mozart was not the only Wunderkind!

A most remarkable gospel-filled composition written by a seven-year old boy! Also note the acrostic revealing the name of the author! Modern song-writers take note (pardon the pun)!

Who is really deluded?!

It is easy to be taken in by juvenilish affability, but I think it took Alex a long time to say very little, indeed, but that surely is pardonable!

Nothing on epistemology. How can an agnostic know that of which he is ignorant?! In order to prove that Alex’s imagined God [a given a priori, or one might as well disprove green elephants, or Dawkins’ flying spaghetti monster] does NOT exist [and I agree with him, though I am a Christian] one would have to be omniscient! I can comprehend the incomprehensible? Really? God in a box? Such a ‘god’ is, for sure, an idol, if I may paraphrase Ludwig Feuerbach. The existence of God does not depend on belief or unbelief! Neither do Alex’s thought immaterial thought processes! I am assuming that he agrees with me that matter does not think! Alex, I hope, won't mind if it matters!

The undeniable and regrettable abuses in terms of power have nothing to do with original (as in apostolic) Christianity, let alone its founder. The apostle Paul as well as Peter command, indeed, demand, submission to Nero!

Religion has always been used as a cloak for power as can be proved from the Tanakh, the Roman Empire, Roman Catholicism and Hitlerism, not to mention current events in the Middle East! Nothing surprising there; that's what one would expect in a fallen world, where love for one’s neighbour means nothing! But Alex fails to mention the atrocities committed by non-theistic regimes! One could provide an endless list, of course!

It's all explained in the Bible. I dare say that if the ten commandments were enshrined in our society we'd all be better off! Instead, it's now Romans 1:18ff. All downhill, with the brakes off, full steam head! Degradation, then disintegration! Then the eternal abyss!

The empirical method has some validity, of course, but it cannot explain the origin of the universe, let alone the meaning of our existence. R. Dawkins quotes Ecclesiastes as his favourite book, and ironically, when one views life from the vantage point of 'under the sun' (the key to unlocking this book) then nothing (as in nihilism) d o e s make sense, which means that the origin of life is 'fluke', the meaning of life is 'farce' and the destiny of life is 'fertiliser'. ‘F’ is the word!

For all the arguments, man is incurably religious, which, of course, points the human race beyond the realm of the material. Meanwhile, if one chooses to live, in the words of D. Bonhoeffer, 'without God before God' then an egocentric ‘Anythingism’ will be the creed of the day, with the survival of the fittest at the forefront (notwithstanding the extinction of dinosaurs and the existence of the corona virus).

I am with C.S. Lewis, of course, when it comes to the existence of God: “A man can no more diminish God’s glory [on full display for all to see in God’s creation] by refusing to worship Him than a lunatic can put out the sun by scribbling the word ‘darkness’ on the walls of his cell (brackets mine / The Problem of Pain, in loc.)

Perhaps it is time for Alex to repent - that is to say, 'to think again' and enjoy life to the full, since the world offers so little fleeting pleasures but for a season! Reading the Bible prayerfully would be a good start, as opposed to wanting to “tie up the libertine in a field of feasts” and “keep his brain fuming” (Shakespeare). So, ‘tolle lege’! It transformed Augustine. Why not a lesser intellectual than Alex?!

Who is deluded? Time will tell – and eternity is just round the corner! But it’s better to know for certain, as there are only two days, ‘this day’ and ‘that day’!