Mangled Thoughts

Posted by D
Constantine converted the Church form a tradition of which the terms of f association were liturgy and confession of faith rooted in belief in Christ and Trinity into administrative apparatus of Imperial government. The force of this emerges thus: the Roman Empire was not simply a world government by militiary might and administrative dictat , it was religious empire the pinnacle of which was the Imperial cult. Religion in the strict definition of the word and not the hazy feel good sense with wombats use it. To illustrate, Islam, communism and other such regimes which run on superstious-mythic beliefs about reality which bolster abslotutist capricious regimes which, it is assumed , are charged with some mystical power and imperative to enusre some divinely or not so divinely (Marx and Hegel and Comte) dictated order. Government orginated as a protection racket - waging war and threating war against those the self appointed `holy men’ claimed to serve if they did not submit , something which is delineated with stark clarity of the early feudal period which laid the foundations for not only the medieval period but `modern europe’.God and some `divine necessary’ order was invoked to prop it all up, since few in the ancient past were impious and so did not wish to be considered evil-doers.

The belief Rabbinic Judaism was a legalistic religion, based on the caricature of an interpretation of the Pharisees and what they might have or might not observed from the NT, and the Talmuds and subsequent rabbinc commentaries , is utter rot. The great rabbinic collections, in any case were wrtten from the 2nd century and on, rabbinic Judaism , a lay `movement, was synogugue based. The legalism attributed to the pharisees is based on merely literary works in which so called statements of `legal rulings’ are merely rhetorical and allusive in force onyl. However, until the second Roman-Jewish war, Judaea was subject to the religious regime of Royal court and Temple .

Deuteronomy , though a literary work, reflects the religious background inclusive of economic autarchy and rule by dictat , anchored in the agrarian economic interests of aristocrastic families including high caste priestly families. Nothing novel in that, as far as great deal of the history of civilization goes. Indeed ,Rome was economically decadent, Romans were subordinated to the interests of slave worked estates, the economic linchpin of the Roman Army and power base for the poliically ambitious, as well as taxes collected from subject cities.In this, along with administrative dictat, instead of economic liberty is the explanation why so many Romans were destitute and like so many even in Australia today relied on handouts by the government.

Back to Constantie, he made the Christian cult the cult of the empire and the Church an instiution of government. Quite a contrast, the reason why Chrisitianity was decalred an illicit religion in the 2nd century rests on the definition of religion: a new religion thus coud only ean one thing , a pack of thugs out to overthrow the government and impose their regime, something which until Constantine Chrisitians repeatedly stressed was a false perception of Chrisitans and their motives and practices, stressing the preyed for the good health of Emperor ,and the continuance of the Pax Romanum.

Constantine changed all that and in doing so, the pastoral way suddenly became a great careerah move for ambitious young men, over against the army as the route for high office. There were added benefits. Relgious institues were exempt from taxation and other encumbrances imposed on estate owners, army commanders, and other types. It was aslo a safer occupation, far less likely to be assasinated.

Old hands of the Church held nothing but contempt for the new arrangemnt and the new cleric, pungently remarking what a fine life it is to be cleric these days with the added bonus, one could pass on parishes and dicoceses and all ecclestical property and revenues to son and heir.

Nothing cahned really since. This mornig a Mr. Nick francis, `Executive Director’ of Brotherhood of St. outlined his associations to religious order. Did so by claimning government must spend money on looking after people and helping businesses create oppportunities for the unemployed and the destitute.

That so many are unmeployed and some sunk in unhappy circumsstances has everything to greedy theiving all consuming governments, constriction of markets and so forth, seems to entirely escape Francis.

Equally odious, not Chrisitian is his assertion the association is committed to raisding `solutions’ but not their execution which is the responsibility of government by taxation and transferring the revenues into schemes devised by central government and types like himself. It seems a christian is a christian is one in name only.
Heaven forbid Chrisitans whether each off their own bats or in collaboration becasue something can be better done because of more resources, without hitting `taxpayer’ and imposing more central planning, and ,more measure which corrupt markets. That Chrisitians, if they are so concerned to help people who might benefit from direct muscle to change their lives, now seems to be some kind of heresy.

Might be, no , it is. After all, each denomination is guilty of heresy, the gnostic type ,in unifying the socialist beleifs of Plato, Comtes, the infantile notions of Rousseau with Marx and some others and declaring it to be the definition of the creed.. The Churches seem to be convinced, the Holy Spirit is coda for some mysterious lumpenmasse man residing in so many merely material bodies.

A rather witless position to occupy, no physics for a start. It underpins, however, why the clerics detest the individual as some foul ideology, irrespective of the christian faith first and foremost asserts the primacy and dignity and integrity of the individual, and certanly so over mob rule.Or is that item merely, for clerics a mere trivial and redundant detail. Contrast their assertion of autonomy which amounts to , the individual is at liberty only in trivial matters, free so long as they obey the group and the littlepooh bahs who run them.

Then there is a curious contradiction which suggests to one, hypocrites. The churches seem committed to salvationism through socialist economics, citing the Sermon on the Mount and Deuteronomy as the two great docotroal dissertations proving that is indeed god’s holy scheme.Take out goody and what is left, the churches are committed to a very materialistic conception, god will come to poeple once the socialisto economic order of things is perfectly realised. Moreover, the inference is clear enough, unlike `secular-atheistic’ sociliast progroms, this will work, the reason is, goddy is dictating to them from high up all the details on how to make it work , like Francis’s schemes, amounting to nothing but a divinised notion of socialism.

The churchs’ commitment to socialism has the rather unholy explanation from religion. The churches are major beneficiaries from the extortion and racketeering ways of government. Some power hungry clerics too. Why, after all, bother with more modest circumstance4s of the apostolic way when careerah and personal gaqin can be made out of administering the great schemes of government? And, by god, the notion some clerics are meek, mild selfless types is rot, marked by not only careerahism but complaints they are underpaid.

A bishop of Adelaide wailed loudly about how injust the federal govt is on the folowing occasion. Some refugees landed in Adelaide. Unused rooms of a convent were supplied as accomodation to the refugees. Laity stumped up with supplies of various things until the new arrivals had landed jobs and standing on their own two feet.

So what was the crime, chrisitians showed generosity to new arrivals, did so on a very cost effective basis. The crime was, the government should have stepped in and per usual truck loads of money do what apparently what is forbidden to chrisitans to do.

Tehn the GST debate,clerics claiming if applied to some types of church revenues would amount to persecution of the Church.Utter crap, GST or any tax has no bearing on belief nor freedom of worship and association in Australia.

The churches are not christian and because freed of the burden of extortionate racketeering governments and the greedy selfish interests who support thhe scams which is most of what government is into, they of course like other vested interests, do not have to face the consequences, of god almighty confiscating corrupting government. The churches are not chrisitan, and they are mainoly run by spivs pretending to be apostles.Sanctimonious bs. occurios as an apt epithet.