Thursday, February 16, 2023

St. Paul Observed: "The Wisdom Of The World Is Folly Before God." Who, Exactly, Is Going To Hell For "Satanic Rebellion Against God?"

 

"You can safely assume you’ve created God in your own image 
when it turns out God hates all the same people you do." 
Tom Weston S.J.

"The terrible thing about our time is precisely the ease with which theories can be put into practice.  The more perfect, the more idealistic the theories, the more dreadful is their realization.  We are at last beginning to rediscover what perhaps men knew better in very ancient times, in primitive times before utopias were thought of: that liberty is bound up with imperfection, and that limitations, imperfections, errors are not only unavoidable but also salutary. The best is not the ideal.  Where what is theoretically best is imposed on everyone as the norm, then there is no longer any room even to be good.  The best, imposed as a norm, becomes evil.”  
"Conjectures of a Guilty Bystander,” by Trappist monk, Father Thomas Merton

The Twin Roots Of Christian Cruelty


Paul Krugman: "Dollars, Cents And Republican Sadism." (Pain IS The Point)
http://paxonbothhouses.blogspot.com/2018/01/paul-krugman-dollars-cents-and.html

Often, Stinginess And Cruelty Are Christianity's Paradoxical Effects
http://paxonbothhouses.blogspot.com/2016/02/often-christianitys-paradoxical-effects.html

Alan: Yesterday, at the Novus Ordo site, I was struck by the clear "call" for "submission," the same word that translates the Arabic root of "Islam." Although submission can be virtuous, it lends itself to vice-viciousness when informed by psychological Absolutism. 

The trade-off of Absolutism is this: "we" will absolutely surrender to Authority (typically a male authority) with the understanding that Absolute Authority will take providential care of Everything, even ensuring that there is "good reason" for the worst tragedies - forgotten children dying in overheated car seats, plagues, The Iraq War, multiple amputations from vaccine-preventable meningococcal infection.

And, as pièce de résistance, my surrender secures an ironclad guarantee of "my" personal salvation. 

On the other hand, Liberalism is so saturatedly satanic that there is no possibility of salvation, only Eternal Damnation. 

Liberalism: "Satanic Rebellion Against God?" (The Thinking Housewife)


The ironic downside of total (totalitarian) submission to Absolute Authority is that Christian traditionalists, political Zionists and jihadists all adopt the same self-certain pose: "Not only is "my" Absolutism better than "your" Absolutism, "my" Absolutism happens to be The One, True, Holy Absolutism which - in demonstration of God's Great Goodness - authorizes ME to act as The Smiting Hand of Deity, working tirelessly for your total destruction while "I" anticipate self-satisfied glee over your eternal charring and re-charring -- all the way down to the bone -- in The Lake of Unquenchable Fire.


"Chesterton On Charity, Hope And Universal Salvation"

"Charity is the power of defending that which we know to be indefensible. Hope is the power of being cheerful in circumstances which we know to be desperate. It is true that there is a state of hope which belongs to bright prospects and the morning; but that is not the virtue of hope. The virtue of hope exists only in earthquake and eclipse. It is true that there is a thing crudely called charity, which means charity to the deserving poor; but charity to the deserving is not charity at all, but justice. It is the undeserving who require it, and the ideal either does not exist at all, or exists wholly for them."
Heretics, ch. 12 (1905)
Gilbert Keith Chesterton (1874-1936) English journalist and writer
Preliminary and follow-up discussion with Fred Owens, author of "Frog Hospital."

On Mon, Sep 1, 2014 at 11:26 AM, Fred Owens wrote:

As far as I can tell, this group seems to be different than Laura's group...... I have not seen her write against the Jews, nor for them either.

The 'Radical Traditionalist Catholic' Movement

By Heidi Beirich
Though tiny in comparison with the approximately 70 million Americans who are mainstream Catholics, "radical traditionalist Catholics" may form the single largest group of hard-core anti-Semites in America.
Fred Owens

My gardening blog is  Fred Owens
My writing blog is Frog Hospital

send mail to:
Fred Owens
35 West Main St Suite B #391
Ventura CA 93001

Dear Fred,

Thanks for your email.

I am preparing a post entitled Totalitarian Absolutism and "The Thinking Housewife." 

When done, I will copy you. 

While researching this upcoming post, I came across Heidi Beirich's article, The "Radical Traditionalist Catholic" Movement. http://paxonbothhouses.blogspot.com/2014/09/the-radical-traditionalist-catholic.html

I would guess Laura does not focus "the Jews" for one of two reasons.

1.) Consciously or unconsciously, she knows that the anti-Semitic "button" is crimson red and she would get burned by pushing it. That said, conservative Christianity's fondness for political Zionism inclines me to believe Laura feels sympathy for the modern state of Israel but perhaps not strongly enough to vocalize support for "swarthy" non-white Semites. After all... "Let one Semite in the tent and look who's parking his camel at curbside." (Christian conservatives are extraordinarily good at "Willful Ignorance." http://paxonbothhouses.blogspot.com/2014/08/the-psychology-of-willful-blindness-why.html)

2.) If Laura expressed sympathy for the Church's foundational teaching that "Jews are Christ Killers," many of her own followers would point out that this (de facto if not de jure) church teaching is manifestly false, an error set straight by "The Second Vatican Council" which Traditionalist Catholics see as the cornerstone of "The Great Apostasy." Since it takes but one hole in the dike to collapse the entire structure of Absolutism, better not poke any hole at all.

A personal vignette...

In the 1960s, a nun named Sister Inez taught my youngest brother, Bill, that "Jews are Christ Killers." 

Blessedly, I and Bill's three other siblings -- Janet, Kevin and Gerald -- escaped the Christ Killer calumny, an abomination zealously promoted by Pope Paul IV whose teaching on extra ecclesiam nulla salus -- "Outside the Church there is no salvation" -- is linchpin justification for sedevacantists and reason to condemn all other religions as idolatrous.

Check out Wikipedia's "Pope Paul IV" entry and pay special heed to the section entitled "Papacy." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pope_Paul_IV

Pax tecum

Alan

PS May I append this correspondence to Totalitarian Absolutism And "The Thinking Housewife?"

***

On Mon, Sep 1, 2014 at 1:04 PM, Fred Owens wrote:

to not repeat the church's anti-
semitism is good
I don't think it's necessary for her or any other Catholic to formally renounce old customs -- just stop doing it
the cult of apology is a modern affliction

this reminds me of my dad who admitted to racial antagonism but made no effort to recruit his children in his attitude. He only said -- quite strongly --  that's my life. 


Dear Fred, 

Thanks for your email.

My particular passion for truth urges me to set records straight. 

"Time To Expunge Catholicism Of Traditions & Texts That Represent God As A Terrorist"


However, as a practical matter, I reluctantly agree that (very often) it is better to stop acting on bad ideology/dogma/custom than to run a fool's errand trying to elicit formal recantation.

The Church's induced obsolescence of usury is a good model for "letting things wither" although, in this instance, I think the Church went overboard.

Here is a pertinent excerpt from my post, "Shallowness and The Thinking Housewife." http://paxonbothhouses.blogspot.com/2012/12/shallowness-and-thinking-housewife.html

"Not long ago, usury was considered such grievous sin that "banking" (and the moral filth on which it hinged) were left to European Jews. "Back then," righteous Christians shunned usury like a rabid pit bull loose in the house. http://paxonbothhouses.blogspot.com/2012/03/we-have-multiplied-and-filled-earth.html Nowadays, there is neither nun nor priest who does not carry multiple credit cards, all of them charging usurious rates of interest. Personally, I would like to see more focus on usury, but since Capitalism vanquished traditional theology -- simultaneously elevating every deadly sin to "Glamor Status" -- it is impossible to suggest any "banking regulation" without "the good Christians" up in arms, shouting you down. Make no mistake, conservative American Christianity knows full well which side its bread is buttered on. And it is Mammon who spreads his unction."

Pax tecum

Alan 
PS At your suggestion, I just penned the following comment concerning Christopher Columbus and Europe's impact on The New World.  http://paxonbothhouses.blogspot.com/2014/09/reflection-on-christopher-columbus.html


An unexpected "companion piece":

Monday, February 13, 2023

Paid Leave For Menstrual Pain And The Immediate Impulse To Punish By Residents of The United States Of Barbaria


Dear F

Thanks for your email. 

Make no mistake. We live in The United States Of Barbaria, and much of our barbarism arises from America's widespread belief in a vengeful God.

Inevitably, we re-make ourselves in the image of our gods, and since America's god has chosen to create a universe in which Hell is a place of eternal torment -- without possibility of reform -- we re-make ourselves in the image of a sadistic God who often holds us hostage by a mechanism very much like Stockholm Syndrome. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stockholm_syndrome

That said, I believe, alongside John, that "God is love." And so, I believe all Christian denominations have a serious moral responsibility to re-formulate their teachings on Hell. 

Don't hold your breath.

In this regard, I applaud Unitarian Universalism, and G.K. Chesterton.

"G.K. Chesterton: On Charity, Hope And Universal Salvation"


When I was a boy at St. Thomas the Apostle school in Irondequoit, New York, "sister"(Margarita - second grade?) told us - and this is  nearly verbatim - "There is no reason why Catholics need to believe that anyone's soul is in Hell. Indeed, we should pray that Adolf Hitler is in heaven."

A Short History Of Hell

Religion, Eternal Punishment, And Hell-Gehenna (With A Special Guest Appearance By Bertrand Russell)

Is Hitler In Hell? - An Attempt To Rescue "Christian" "Conservative" Friends From Their Delusional Support For Donald Trump And The Big Lie


Why "Conservative" "Christians" Are All Going To Hell (If There Is A Hell...Which I Don't Believe)
https://newsfrombarbaria.blogspot.com/2020/07/why-conservative-christians-are-all.html

The Innate Hostility Of Absolutists: Relativists Are "Okay" With Absolutists; Absolutists Prefer That Relativists "Go To Hell" - Which Is Where They Belong!

The Thinking Housewife, A Traditionalist Catholic: "We Can Be Pretty Sure That Many Good People Are Roasting In Hell"


I correspond with "The Thinking Housewife," a smart and sometimes insightful person.
But when she's got her head ensconced in The Dark Place, she is as benighted as a black hole. Laura, her given name, is an obsequious absolutist, who will undergo any cerebral contortion to make Catholicism's "Official Story" appear not only believable, but "God's Truth."
Read about The Cadaver Synod, and then ask yourself if Rome's claims to inerrancy make any sense.

And if you don't read Spanish, you can get the same "scoop" in Wikipedia's article on The Cadaver Synod: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cadaver_Synod 

I find the following insights are utterly fascinating, and I am confident you will too.
These insights into "Salus Populi Suprema Lex" have nothing to do with the "hell" articles posted above, except insofar as my key word search led to the word "helluva" which is in the title of this long-overlooked post.

"Salus Populi Suprema Lex": A Revealing Investigation Of How A Little Historical Understanding Prevents A Helluva Lot Of Lunacy

Harking back to the early Roman church, consider this teaching of Saint Gregory Nyssa, and others: 

Apocatastasis
The Catholic Encyclopedia

Apokatastasis - briefly defined by Merriam Webster



I forget the number of Americans -- mostly common folk -- who owned (or borrowed) a copy of Paine's "Common Sense," an indispensable underpinning of the consciousness-raising that led to the American revolution. As I recall,the number was somewhere between 30 and 50%! 





The rest of Russell's quote: "Cruel men believe in a cruel God, and use their belief to excuse their cruelty. Only kindly men believe in a kindly God, and they would be kindly in any case. Men tend to have the beliefs that suit their passions."       Bertrand Russell, London Calling (1947)




Love

A

On Mon, Feb 13, 2023 at 10:13 AM FV wrote:

(Some companies are) approving 3 day paid leave for women who have painful periods due to endometriosis or fibroids.
Japan has done this for many years.

How far would it get here?  

It's a missed opportunity for impregnation. Can't award that is what I hear.





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