(1728) Dark again and yet enlightened perhaps. (1814)
Dogma
When you see that word, what are the connotations in your mind? Negative? Ian Paisley? Fire and brimstone? Burning Savanorola at the stake, Joan of Arc? Thomas More? Inquisition? Torquemada? Fanatical and maniacal priesthood, almost Druidic? Ranting at the people?
Or the Great Schism over the filioque clause among other things? Consubstantiation versus transsubstantiation? The Franks pretending to be Christian? The pogroms?
It’s one reason I’ve shied away from ecclesiastical dogmas … for a start, I’m not well enough read on it all. And even if I were … from what point of view? How far does the awe and wonder of cathedral architectture come into it? That’s something I can relate to. Pageantry? Pomp and circumstance? Nah, you can keep it … give me a stable or a room in an inn.
I saw this Hearts of Oak episode of Father Harris at NOWP, also on X, thought he looked a bit scruffy, the guy … oops … just found out he has serious illness, is on morphine. Oops. Ok, thought I’d best watch it on X, do my duty by Steve, yet not wanting to get into the issues I see coming this Saturday at TR’s Putting the Christ Back into Christmas thing in London I think it is.
Watched it, coz I like Peter, the presenter. Whaaa? It was only 2 mins 40 seconds or thereabouts and yet it was pretty vital stuff. Checked out NOWP and the Rumble version:
HERE
It was really something … yikes, 52 mins? Er, maybe too busy now, plus cream-crackered after today, lay on the bed, ipad on chest, hands behind head on pillow, and just listened. The guy knows his history, even reads from Hebrew text, translates for Peter. Er right … Jewish history for the 400 years before the Logos, going Greek … the second temple, the strife of the next 400 years … Assyria etc..
I’m well aware that Dearieme and others do not accept Abraham or even Moses … I’m open to it … who cares which actual names they were, whether bullrushes came into it. It’s pretty massively accepted by so many scholars studying those times, going back at least a millennium. But I’m also aware of the interpretations leading to the KJV … this Father Harris uses a different version … and can we call any human Father, scripturally?
Two things stayed with me. “Before Abraham was, I am.” And therefore, He decided to step into humankind for a period of time. Fair enough in my book, can’t see why not. But it also comes back to this faithful Christian and cultural Christian and my political, rather than religious interest was piqued by this Father Harris … he’s the one I think involved in this Saturday thing … or maybe it was another pastor.
What’s he going to teach? Confession, priests, rosary beads, indulgences, fragments of the True Cross? Let me just check with Chaucer. Or is it going to be all happy-clapping? Or is it going to be like Charlie Kirk? Plus Hebrew text does come into it … can we have Christianity totally devoid of those 400 years? What of Isaiah? Daniel? What of Enoch? Elijah?
Fthr Harris outlines the theology of it, also the purpose of John the Baptist pointing the way. The thing which hits me is how on earth could there be wars over it? Pogroms? Sounds stupid to me.
I mentioned the cultural Christian and that is a great fightback for a start if it can come off on Saturday and not be just a damp squib. But there’s always that possibility that someone, maybe many, are going to see the light because everyone who has done knows it’s very powerful … and those are souls lost to the enemy who’s expended so much money, effort, misery to ensure it never happens. Viciously.
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