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The cult of Mary and revering relics:
Whoever does not believe in this is eternally damned by the Catholic
Church.
Is a dictatorship trying to rule over a democracy?
During our last program we showed how early Christianity emerged and
changed over the course of centuries - from the peaceful teaching of
Jesus of Nazareth to an aggressive pagan cult religion called Catholic.
It became clear how ever more Roman concepts and other pagan ideas were
put into practice against the Christian teaching - sometimes even
violently. Today, we will portray in detail how the Holy See almost
exclusively bases itself on this pagan foundation. We will shine a light
on Catholic tradition, its customs, rites, cults, dogmas, insignia,
holidays, etc.
As we go through the details, it will become increasingly difficult to
conceive as possible the extent of such a conglomeration of pagan cult
concepts.
The Catholic cult of Mary as the
"mother of God" is deeply rooted
in pre-Christian paganism
The teaching and structure of the Catholic Church in almost all aspects
is derived directly from pagan idolatry.
Given this statement, its connection to the cult of Mary becomes clear
as an essential component of the Catholic faith. It is the cult of the
"mother of God" who, according to a dogma proclaimed by Pius XII,
presumably was taken physically up to heaven. Jesus of Nazareth did not
speak of His mother as the "mother of God." She was Mary, a simple,
modest and devout woman, a woman of the people. So it would be quite
interesting to look into how such an odd development took place and
above all, what antecedents did this cult have? Looking back, we realize
that the cult of a mother of God is deeply rooted in pre-Christian
paganism.
For example, it is known that the Egyptian goddess Isis and the Greek
goddess Artemis were revered in a similar way as Mary is venerated until
today in the Catholic Church. In part, they were even referred to using
the same terms as "Queen of the Heavens" or "Star of the Sea" - perhaps
some of us know that song "Star of the Sea, I Greet You" that is still
sung today in places of pilgrimage honoring Mary. Did Jesus of Nazareth
ever refer to Mary, His mother, as "Star of the Sea?" This was the title
of the great mother-goddesses in Greece and Egypt. And what is also
significant is that the dogma that claims Mary as the mother of God -
that is, not only the mother of Jesus, but the mother of God - was
decided at the Council of Ephesus in 431, when it declared that the
second letter of Cyril to Nestorius was in agreement with the Council of
Nicaea.61 Interestingly enough, Ephesus was the center of the Diana
cult, that is, a city where the mother-goddess Diana was particularly
revered. Clearly, this is a pagan thought that found its way into the
Church.
Perhaps it is interesting to note that Diana was the goddess of the
hunt, and at the same time, the "mother of God."
And so, the mother of Jesus became a cult object, a pagan cult object.
This went so far that in Altötting, for instance - a place of pilgrimage
in Bavaria - so-called "Black Madonnas" were sold right into the 20th
century. From a work of reference compiled on Dr. Edmund Müller's
collection of relics called "Mittel zum Heil," we can read the
following:
A very striking possibility to consume a remedy when in need was to
take shavings from the clay figure of a "Black Madonna." Still
well-known into the 20th century, the Black Madonnas came from Altötting
in Bavaria and were known among the folk as "bodily" copies of grace
from Einsiedlen in Switzerland. The latter were held to be miraculous
and healing because the clay supposedly had soil and mortar from the
Lady Chapel mixed into it as well as relic particles. This held true
only for those Madonnas that were sold by the convent itself ...62
So relic particles, perhaps even corpse pieces, were added to these
Madonnas. Whoever acquired these "religious remedies" scraped some from
the clay figure and added it to their food. The monastery itself sold
these right into the 20th century. This is just one example to show how
far a cult, a pagan cult, will go. But most Catholics don't even know
this. Surely this doesn't have the least bit in common with religion,
much less with a Christian religion or the teachings of the Nazarene.
Many a church leader may perhaps excuse this as having to do with
folklore, or even superstition, but the fact remains that the basic
celebrations of this Mary cult are part of church dogma, even to
portraying Mary as the "mother of God." She is revered in the Catholic
Church as the Madonna with a corona of stars on a crescent moon. This
portrait is similar to the Egyptian goddess Isis, who was depicted in
exactly the same way.
So Mary was adopted by the Roman Catholic Church, elevated to the mother
of God and is portrayed as the direct successor of Egyptian goddesses,
such as Isis and other figures of pagan mystery cults. She is the
successor of Diana or Artemis, or even Astarte, who was the Phoenician
divinity of fertility. And this dogma of enthroning Mary as a mysterious
cult goddess developed in Ephesus, a city where the cult of the mother
of God had been a custom for centuries. What is also significant is the
fact that while the council of Ephesus was trying to eliminate devotion
to Diana, the bishops were besieged by crowds demanding: "Give us our
Diana of the Ephesians!" 63
From this, we can deduce that Mary, the woman and mother, is above all
women and mothers. If we now think of the fact that particularly
Catholic priests are not allowed to marry, could this have something to
do with the fact that they might, for instance, marry a simple woman?
Instead, they have to "marry," so to speak, the woman of all women and
the mother of all mothers.
In fact, this is an explanation for the deepest psychological root of
celibacy in the Church. The "great mother" was a figure that prevailed
in the subconscious of mankind millennia before the emergence of
Christianity. Back then, priests of the "great mother" were not allowed
to marry; they wore feminine robes and saw themselves as the sons of
this great mother. In view of this, the priests, who may not marry a
woman, are basically in service to this "great mother," an archetypal
figure of pagan origin.
But an important question would be: Why did the Church need to take over
this pagan cult of the mother goddess? Could it have something to do
with the fact that the Church had portrayed God as a cruel, arbitrary,
punishing God, who allegedly can send His children into eternal
damnation? So to balance things out, it took the "mother of God," who is
a more comforting figure, so that the people would not be left in fear
of a "punishing" God.
Mary, the virgin and undefiled woman who
bore God - Whoever doesn't believe this is eternally damned.
Many who pay their church taxes or tithes are not aware of this
Now, some may ask, what about the person who doesn't believe in this
Mary cult or revere the so-called "mother of God," but simply respects
and cherishes her as the mother of Jesus, the physical mother of Jesus?
According to church doctrine is this person eternally damned?
The answer is, yes. In the book "The Teaching of the Catholic Church as
Contained in Her Documents" by Neuner-Roos, it says:
If anyone does not truly and rightly confess with the Fathers that
the holy, ever virginal and immaculate Mary is Mother of God, since in
recent days she really and truly conceived, without seed, by the Holy
Ghost, the same divine Word who was born before all time and gave birth
to him in chastity, her virginity remaining unimpaired after the birth -
condemnatus sit. (No. 269)
This would mean that all those who call themselves Protestant are
eternally damned, or condemned. So, why do they curry favor with the
Holy See?
This is a question that always comes up when there is talk about
ecumenism, or when the Protestants make a pilgrimage to the Holy See or
gather with it in other ways, and then, as recently happened, a
high-ranking cardinal like the cardinal of Cologne, Cardinal Meisner,
expresses himself with great reticence on the subject. In the Protestant
Press Service release from June 5, 2005, it is reported:
An ecumenical progress is expected by the archbishop of Cologne only
between the Roman-Catholic and Orthodox Churches, but not between
Catholics and Protestants. With the Reformed Church it is a long and
laborious way, said Meisner. We should not fool ourselves with things
that cannot be kept.
Sometimes, one could wonder at the spiritual perspicacity of those
Protestants who are drawn to the Catholic Church.
Whoever does not pay deep respect and honor
to the relics of the saints is damned by the Catholic Church.
A cult of the dead: Belief and practice in this church is based on bones
Being eternally damned by the Catholic Church can happen very quickly.
As children, many are compelled to go to church, and in many churches
there is a skeleton dressed in beautiful clothing in a glass casket near
the altar. What a ghoulish sight for children! And yet, when a Catholic
doesn't believe salvation comes from these skeletons, he is damned.
The Council of Trent decreed the veneration of the corpses of martyrs
and damned those who do not believe in relics. We read:
Also, that the holy bodies of holy martyrs ... are to be venerated by
the faithful; through which (bodies) many benefits are bestowed by God
on men; so that they who affirm that veneration and honour are not due
to the relics of saints ... are wholly to be condemned as the Church has
already long since condemned, and now also condemns them.64
This explanation may not be directly classified as a dogma, but it
nevertheless remains an obligation for Catholics to believe this,
although it really is deepest paganism.
In ancient Egypt there were many cult sites where the remains of
so-called "gods" were venerated, and from which a magical effect was
said to emanate. When we read about the relics and the "Black Madonnas,"
we can see the direct path that leads to the "magic" that still prevails
today in the Roman Catholic Church and that has nothing to do with
Christianity.
Furthermore, it cannot be excused as mere folklore. This matter of
relics was taken in hand by the popes right from the very beginning. We
read, for example, the following:
In about 750, long lines of wagons constantly came to Rome bringing
immense quantities of skulls and skeletons which were sorted, labeled
and sold by the popes. Graves were plundered by night and tombs in
churches were watched by armed men.65
Gregorovius wrote: "Rome was like a moldering cemetery...." 66 In
the church of St. Prassede there is a marble tablet still today, on
which is written that in the year 817 Pope Pascal had the bodies of 2300
martyrs brought from cemeteries into this church. And when Pope
Bonifatius VI transformed the Pantheon into a Christian church in the
year 609, "twenty-eight cartloads of sacred bones were said to have
been removed from the catacombs and placed in a porphyry basin beneath
the high altar." 67 The foundation of this church consists of
hundreds upon hundreds of skeletons, and the high altar was built upon
this.
It could be said that the beliefs and practices of the Catholic Church
are really founded on bones, that it is a cult of the dead. This
statement is justified by the fact that this veneration of relics is an
intensification of a pagan cult. Generally we can conclude that much
found in the Catholic Churches, almost all their customs, stems from
paganism. We not only find its roots in paganism, but beyond this, the
Catholic Church greatly increased the use of paganism. These relic
customs were not known to such extent in paganism.
Perhaps we should question of whether any such customs and rites or
cults come up in the teachings of Jesus of Nazareth at all. We would not
find a single point in common! And a repeated comparison would be
worthwhile: What did Jesus, the Christ, teach, and what does the
Catholic Church teach?
Jesus said: "Let the dead bury their dead. But you, follow Me"
(Mt.8:22).
And there is also a passage that reads:
And one of them, a lawyer, asked him a question to test him. Teacher,
which is the great commandment in the law? And he said to him, You shall
love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and
with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a
second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these
two commandments depend all the law and the prophets. (Mt.22:35-40)
So, where did all the rest come from and what should it serve?
Some things are already known about this. Even the prophets of the Old
Covenant, for instance, Jeremiah, knew that all this comes from
paganism. For example, he said:
For the customs of the peoples are vanity. A tree from the forest is
cut down and worked with an axe by the hands of a craftsman. They
decorate it with silver and gold; they fasten it with hammer and nails
so that it cannot move. Their idols are like scarecrows in a cucumber
field, and they cannot speak; they have to be carried, for they cannot
walk. Do not be afraid of them, for they cannot do evil, neither is it
in them to do good. (Jer.10:3-5)
So, even the prophets said that such customs were all hullabaloo, and
that the people of God should not surround themselves with such statues
or put together such objects made of wood, silver and gold for their
belief, because all that is done by the pagans. Clearly, the Catholic
Church closed rank with pagan cults, and not with the true prophets of
God.
Dark superstition - still today:
A relic in the pectoral cross of bishops, a relic in every altar...
Dogma:
"Anyone who does not accept all the whole of church tradition..."
- is for all practical purposes, in hell
Many a guileless person would like to say that these relics of dark
superstition belong to a distant past. But it is particularly shocking
to see that actually, it is all much closer to us than we would like to
think. Recently a visit was made to the museum holding the cathedral
treasures of Würzburg, Germany. There, the insignia of the current
bishops, in use right up until today, was on display.
For example, the "pectoral cross." Since the 12th century, every bishop
has to wear a certain pectoral cross. Already in the 4th century, it was
an amulet, a vessel that held a relic. And to this day, it is stipulated
that a relic must be contained in this pectoral cross. In this and
similar ways, these rituals and insignia are carried into the present
and passed on.
A relic is also worked into every altar. A Catholic altar is fully
consecrated only when it contains a relic. What would a Catholic
believer say, who did not know that such bones or other sacrosanct
corpse pieces continue to rot away in the altar of the church which he
may be visiting Sunday after Sunday?
Here, a thoughtful contemporary would ask: Do the people really have to
believe in this cult of relics? And if it is not accepted by the
so-called faithful, that is, if the people do not believe in it, what
then?
We have already referred to the fact that it was particularly the power
of relics that had to be believed. There is a dogma that all-embracingly
declares the following: "Any one does not accept the whole of the
Church's tradition, both written and unwritten - anathema sit." (Neuner-Roos,
No. 78) So this means that the person who doesn't even know about this
tradition, or who doesn't accept even a single component of this
tradition, not believing it to be true, is already damned, without even
knowing it. According to the Catholic Church, he already has one foot in
hell, even without being aware of it.
But doesn't this concern almost all Catholics? It is hard to believe
that every Catholic even knows all the dogmas and traditions of their
church. Consequently, they are supporting a church that has long since
damned them.
Perhaps we should clarify what it actually means to be eternally damned.
Mostly we simply repeat the words, and are rather scandalized. But we
become aware of the extent of it only when we realize what it really
means: To eternally, forever more, suffer in the fire of unspeakable
torment, and never be released from it. The Church teaches that there is
no end to this torment, simply because one doesn't believe the one or
other dogma. Recently, by the way, this is also the consequence when a
couple lives together without a marriage certificate. Just a while ago,
Benedict XVI proclaimed that marriage without a certificate is not
compatible with the teachings of this Church, that is, it is a grave
sin. And according to the dogma of eternal damnation, the one who dies
in this condition of sin falls victim to the eternal fires of hell.
However, let it also be said that the Church is not shy to industriously
collect money from the many who don't believe in all their dogmas, even
though it explains to them that they are damned forever, because they do
not believe everything that it proclaims.
Who is sitting on the Chair of Peter?
Tolstoy knew very well who had founded the Church...
This is what the Church proclaims. Who believes that God commanded them
to do this? Who would believe such a thing? No normal person would
believe that Jesus, the Christ, or God, our Father, would have conveyed
such a thought, such a mandate, to the Church. If God is the love, then
He is love. Love forgives, love pardons, love carries, but the Church
damns! Who is sitting on the Chair of Peter here?
Leo Tolstoy, a great Russian author, said it very clearly in his story:
"The Resurrection of Hell." This story was first published by his son
after his death. It tells that after the event on Calvary, when Jesus
died on the cross, the devil was banned into the deepest depths of hell.
Thus, he was fettered, because after this time people strove to put the
teachings of Jesus of Nazareth into practice. There was less fighting;
the people reconciled with each other, and the devil had nothing more to
do. Hell was empty. And then, after a long time, there was suddenly a
lot of noise in hell and several devils came in joyfully with torches
and Beelzebub demanded, pointing upward: "What's going on there?" 68
And they replied: "Just what was and now always will be." They
had put hell back into business again. When the devil asked how they did
this, the second highest devil said "... I invented 'The Church.'"
Leo Tolstoy then described how this happened, that by inventing the
Church, fighting started again among the people, that an elite class had
been formed again that exploited others, and that the state exploited
others as well, and in this way, the beginnings of early Christianity
were destroyed, resulting in even more crime than before.
When the devil heard: "I invented 'The Church,''' he said:
"What is 'The Church'"? He didn't know. And the second highest devil
answered with the following:
One can imagine the church in this way: When these hypocrites utter
untruths and suspect that they will not be believed, they always call
upon God to be their witness. This, in essence, is "The Church" but I
built in another wrinkle. Those who call themselves "The Church"
convince themselves that they cannot go wrong, so they convince
themselves that they cannot and must not repudiate their lies. This
greatest of lies is what they call "infallibility." I taught these
pathetic men that God, to ensure that he should not be misunderstood,
gave power to certain men, and to those to whom they chose to transfer
this power, that they alone could infallibly interpret his teachings. So
these men, who collectively call themselves 'The Church' regard
themselves as possessing the truth, not because what they have passed on
is good or reasonable, but simply because they see themselves as the
only true heirs of the disciples, their hated master, and finally of God
himself.
So, Tolstoy's opinion was that the devil founded the Church. And that
Tolstoy wasn't just shooting in the dark is shown in the following
formulation of the Catholic Church in Neuner-Roos:
Hence also the meaning of the sacred dogmas is perpetually to be
retained which our Holy Mother Church has once declared; nor is that
meaning ever to be departed from under the pretence or pretext of a
deeper comprehension of them. ... (No. 48)
And, as already quoted: "Any one does not accept the whole of the
Church's tradition, both written and unwritten - anathema sit" (No. 78).
In No. 351, we also read: "... It is to be held as a matter of faith
that no one can be saved outside the Apostolic Roman Church. It is the
only ark of salvation and anyone who does not enter it must sink in the
flood."
Logically, this means that all other religions deserve eternal
damnation. The great world religions are, for example, Hinduism,
Buddhism, Islam, Jainism, Confucianism, Judaism, Taoism, or even all the
Protestant and other denominations that are not Catholic. It has always
been said that this statement was weakened at the Vatican Council, but
this is not borne out. We can read what was decided at the Vatican
Council, in Neuner-Roos: "Hence they could not be saved who, knowing
that the Catholic Church was founded as necessary by God through Christ,
would refuse either to enter it or to remain in it" (No. 417, German
Edition).
But who of the Protestants all over the world does not know of the
Catholic Church? Everyone knows the Catholic Church. This means that
this sentence holds true for all people except at most, some isolated
tribes in the rainforest of Papua New Guinea or the Amazon basin, who
really don't know that a Catholic Church exists. But for all others it
holds true: According to the Church, they are damned.
Getting back to the question: Who is sitting on the Chair of Peter? The
founder of the Protestant Lutheran Church, Martin Luther, wrote an
answer in the Smalcald Articles in 1537:
... all things which the Pope, from a power so false, mischievous,
blasphemous, and arrogant, has done and undertaken, have been and still
are purely diabolical affairs and transactions ... the holy Christian
Church can exist very well without such a head, and it would certainly
have remained better if such a head had not been raised up by the devil
... This teaching shows forcefully that the Pope is the very Antichrist,
who has exalted himself above, and opposed himself against Christ
because he will not permit Christians to be saved without his power ...
the Pope's teaching, where it is best ... is nothing other than the
devil himself, because above and against God he urges his falsehoods
concerning masses, purgatory, the monastic life, one's own works and
divine worship ... and condemns, murders and tortures all Christians who
do not exalt and honor these abominations above all things. Therefore,
just as little as we can worship the devil himself as Lord and God, we
can endure his apostle, the Pope, or Antichrist, in his rule as head and
lord. For in the Council we will stand ... before the Pope and devil
himself, who intends to listen to nothing, but merely to condemn, to
murder and to force us into idolatry...69
That is what the founder of the Lutheran Church has to say about the
pope. And even though this was never retracted, the Protestant churches
tend to curry favor with the Catholic Church. Why? Maybe because the
Protestant Lutheran Church also still has a lot of paganism in it. The
Protestants did not take over the cult of Mary and relics, but they did
take over a lot of other things that are pagan. For example, the altars
in the churches are a pagan concept, a pagan practice. The pulpit
existed already in the Isis cult. And the early Christians did not have
communion in such a ritualized form as has been developed in the
Catholic and Lutheran churches. They celebrated a feast of love
together, at which they ate with each other and at which the poor were
also fed. It is only later that it became ritualized and was turned into
something called the Sacrifice of the Mass, a meal of sacrifice, which
also existed in pagan cults.
Luther took this over as well as many other aspects. But above all, the
Protestant-Lutherans took over the main component, namely, that of the
priests, where a human being presumes to stand between an individual and
God. It is a central aspect of Catholic teaching, that you can get into
heaven only when you believe what another person tells you. And the
Protestant Church also took over this superstition: Only the priests can
mediate salvation for you. Whereby they are also contradicting their own
Bible again, because it says there: "For there is one God, and there
is one mediator between God and men" and now it comes, not the
priests, but it says in the Bible, "the man Jesus Christ."
There's no talk at all about priests in 1 Tim. 2:5.
Although they adopted a lot of things from the Catholic Church which, in
turn, took from paganism, none of this is going to do the Protestants
any good, because according to Catholic teaching, if they do not adopt
the central doctrines of Catholic faith in their entirety, then all
Protestants are damned.
We have now heard a lot about eternal damnation, about hell, and such
atrocities. On the one hand, the Catholic Church acknowledges that man
bears within an immortal soul; on the other hand, it proclaims that the
one who doesn't believe in its dogma will be destroyed. So the life
created by God will be destroyed, if the person doesn't believe in the
dogmas of this organization.
Of itself, hell is a thought, of which we must say that if just one
person lands in eternal damnation and stays there, that would be a
victory over God, because God created this life. God is a God of love
and if only one person remains eternally damned, then God would be
vanquished. So therefore, this teaching of hell and of eternal damnation
is a blasphemy against God.
But when we question this more exactingly, it is often denied or played
down by the Catholics. For example, a German Catholic newspaper (Weltbild,
20/96: "Ewig Einsam"), has a forum for the Catholics to ask questions
and receive answers and there it says: "How should one talk about
hell these days?" And the answer is: "There is a thesis that hell
means for a person that he simply ceases to exist. He is no more."
Does this means that suddenly there is a brand new interpretation?
What's behind this thought that the person shall no longer exist?
They're not saying it's a dissolution into Nirvana, where the energy
still remains, but that the person dissolves into nothing. What is
"nothing"? Is there such a thing as nothing if everything is energy? The
law of God knows no such thing as decay, or dissolution or disappearing
or ceasing to exist. Instead, it knows only transformation, evolution
and growing into higher forms of being. So behind such a statement, that
a being simply ceases to exist, there is either a profound lack of
spiritual knowledge, or perhaps the desire to destroy the creation of
God.
The Catholic Church also claims in its Catechism that the Church is
"necessary for salvation." (No. 846) This means that for the salvation
of a person it is necessary to be in this church. If he is not in this
church, then he will not attain salvation; he is damned.
This is even written up in a dogma, also found in Neuner-Roos:
The Holy Roman Church, founded through the word of our Lord and
Redeemer, firmly believes, confesses and proclaims that no one outside
of the Catholic Church, neither pagan nor Jew, nor non-believer or one
separated from the unity will take part in eternal life, but will rather
fall victim to the eternal fire, which is prepared for the devil and his
angels, if before his death he does not join it (the church). (No.
381, German edition)
Protestant-Lutheran doctrine:
God has pre-determined, that is, has foreseen, who goes to heaven and
who goes to hell
It has become clear that according to Catholic doctrine, Protestants,
for example, will fall victim to the eternal fires of eternal damnation.
Now, as a Protestant, a person could deny this by saying that he doesn't
believe in this dogma, and therefore has nothing to worry about, perhaps
even quoting the Bible: "Come out of her, my people, lest you take
part in her sins, lest you share in her plagues." (Rev.18:4)
However, what a Protestant-Lutheran person doesn't know is that he might
be jumping from the pot into the frying pan. For although it is not
openly stated today, the Protestant-Lutheran Church teaches that a
person is predestined. According to the arbitrary will of God, a part of
mankind is promised salvation and the other part falls victim to eternal
damnation, without being able to do anything about it. Such a doctrine
is actually even more perverse than that of the Roman-Catholic Church.
So, Protestant-Lutheran belief surely is not a way out of this dilemma.
To shed more light on this, we quote from an article published in "Quodlibet
Online Journal of Christian Theology and Philosophy" written by Ken
Ristau and titled: "Concerning the Will: An historical and analytical
essay examining Martin Luther's treatise 'The Bondage of Will.'" 70
God is all-powerful and therefore, God's will is alone immutable. Any
person, therefore, that appeals to the freedom of human will attempts to
usurp for themselves an attribute that belongs only to God ... God
freely chooses to create our present reality and likewise, He freely
sustains this reality. In fact, reality does not exist except by the
will of God ... In this respect, one realizes why Luther cannot ascribe
free will to any created being. For Luther, the concept of free will
requires total autonomy that can only exist as an attribute of the
Divine, whose will is not subject to any other will. God, in effect,
creates the ability to will. God alone has free will. As Luther states,
it follows, therefore, that 'free-will' is obviously a term applicable
only to the Divine Majesty; for only He can do, and does (as the
Psalmist sings) 'whatever he wills in heaven and earth' (Ps.135:6).71
In Luther's theology, the will of God is not contingent and so likewise,
the foreknowledge of God is also not contingent. For whatever God wills,
he foreknows and so, whatever He foreknows must, by necessity, happen
... Luther ... asserts, though not at any length, that the grace of God
is a gift given only to the elect, to those whom God by his
foreknowledge has predestined to become his children ... "So utterly
does grace refuse to allow any particle or power of 'free-will' to stand
beside it" 72 and at the conclusion of his work where he declares: "So,
if we believe that Satan is the prince of this world, ever ensnaring and
opposing the kingdom of Christ with all his strength, and that he does
not let his prisoners go unless driven out by the power of the Divine
Spirit, it is again apparent that there can be no 'free-will.' " 73
So, clearly a person doesn't need a church. Because whether it is
foreseen or predestined, if it happens anyway, then I must have really
taken leave of my senses, if I still pay into and support this
institution.
A church that denies the free will of the
people denies the foundation of the legal order. A paradox in effect
The absurdity of this doctrine becomes particularly clear when we apply
these statements to specific incidents. Imagine a court case, where
someone has committed a crime, and the perpetrator of the crime says:
"Well, even before I was born, God decided that I would be a bad person
or would commit a bad crime. So you can't condemn me for this." What
would the judge have to say about this?
Most likely, it would be for him as it is for most Protestants: He
wouldn't know a thing about it. For the Protestants "believe," but for
the most part, they do not really know what they believe in. So the
judge would most likely simply ignore this objection
However, this remains an interesting paradox that is pre-programmed into
the teachings of the Protestant-Lutheran Church and which undermines
every legal system. A church that denies a person's freedom of will in
ethical matters, and that says, as did Luther that: "we are captives,
bond slaves to Satan and by nature 'children of wrath.'" 74 is
basically denying the foundation of our legal system, including our
constitution, which assumes that every person has the freedom to develop
according to his personal decisions, to shape his life according to his
ethical standards. All this is ruled out when we take Luther's teaching
seriously.
Our whole legal system could not function. No one could be sentenced for
a crime, since right from the beginning the perpetrator of the crime
lacks any guilt in the matter.
Basically, we have a senseless condition of un-free "marionettes of
God." Although God is freedom, a God of love, an image of man is being
instilled that turns the creations of God into marionettes, something
that God never created.
So do we need a legal system at all if we are all marionettes? The one
is condemned to evil and the other to good, the one for heaven, the
other for hell. According to Luther, we cannot do otherwise. So then, do
we need a legal system?
The state couldn't even function according to the Lutheran principle, so
it is simply ignored. And there is one thing we shouldn't forget: If the
jury or judge were to deny the free will of the accused just as Luther
did, they would have to deny their own and then declare themselves
incapable of sound judgment, and with this, the whole system would fall
apart.
From a logical point of view, the next question we could ask would be if
we even need a legal system at all, since according to Protestant
teaching, a person is pre-destined, and Catholic doctrine states: "If
you don't believe, you are eternally damned." If I am eternally damned,
why do I need a court decision?
Catholic theologians would counter by saying that the legal order in the
world should see to it that a certain order is maintained. Order for
whom? For those who have already been damned?
The caste of priests determines what takes
place in the state - as long as the people allow this.
A dictatorship tries to rule over a democracy
If we look very closely at the Catholic doctrine, above all, the
statements in the books of Moses, which according to Catholic doctrine
are the "true word of God" and which the New Testament is said to "shed
light" on, then we actually don't need a legal system because in the
end, the priests always have the last word. And so, we could say that
this legal system is merely a cloak that is draped about oneself when
necessary, while in actuality, the Catholic Church says what should be
done, and the world order should do what the Church wants. This is how
the national or state legitimized order of law appears in church
doctrine. One could also say that democracy, where power starts with the
people, should be maintained for the sake of appearances. In reality, it
is the caste of priests of the prevailing religion that wants to
determine what is done.
We are reminded of what was done with Jesus of Nazareth. Who was it that
killed Him? It wasn't the Roman occupational authority, the world power
at that time; instead, it was the caste of priests. The question may
have sounded rather strange: Do we need worldly judges? The answer could
be: According to the Bible and church doctrines, we need them so that
the caste of priests have a cover for their operations of violence.
Whether we call it the Lutheran Church or the Catholic Church, the
government, in any case, should be their long arm, the one that carries
out their policies as long as the people allow this.
This is also rather ingeniously stated in the book by Neuner-Roos (No.
349): "We decree that the Holy Apostolic See and the Roman Pontiff
have primacy in the whole world."
Wouldn't one have to say: The people are led to believe in democracy,
but in reality, isn't it a dictatorship of the Church behind democracy?
Consider the fact that the Church demands of its faithful in every
situation - be it private or professional - that Christian doctrine
prevail as determined by church doctrine. With this, the ideology of an
organization is being placed above the state legal system. Since it is a
totalitarian ideology, which has nothing in common with democracy, one
could justifiably say that here a dictatorship is attempting to rule
over a democracy.
The imperative sentence of the Catholic
Church is applied in public life:
"We determine what is Christian!"
Of course, one must always differentiate between imperative sentences
and the question whether these imperative sentences can realistically be
exercised. Totalitarian imperative sentences from the Catholic pagan
church are rather dangerous simply as imperative sentences.
Of course, many may say, "But in reality, they aren't put into
practice!" It is interesting to note that Cardinal Meissner of Cologne
recently demanded that the German political party, the Christian
Democratic Union cross the C out of its name. Not because the CDU, as
well as the Catholic Church, have nothing to do with Christ, but
because, as he said: "We determine what is Christian!" Meissner let it
be known that the party does not conform to his strict reactionary
concepts. (Protestant Press Service: June 5, 2005) So apparently, this
imperative sentence of the Church is not only on paper, but is also put
into practice.
If anyone has any doubt about this, we recommend the book by Gabriele
titled, "For Experienced Analysts: Discover the Truth. The Church and
State Authority and the Justice of God."75 With impressive conciseness
and clarity, this book explains how these mechanisms function. According
to it, the strings of a democratic state are being pulled by the caste
of priests.
After all the absurdities that have been discussed here on pagan faith
in the churches, we would like to quote a brief excerpt from this book.
On page 75 it says:
More and more people are critical toward church belief. Originally
they equated God with the Church. But because they are no longer in
agreement with the Church, they are now also doubting the existence of
God. But which God? The God whom the churches taught about and still do?
God is not the "God" of the churches! Christ is not the "Christ" of
church doctrine! If the Spirit of eternal truth had not come at this
time in His word, many would actually not know who God or who Christ is
and what we should think of Him. They would not know that they can grow
closer to Him and understand Him by turning to Him, who dwells in their
inner being. Jesus taught that the Kingdom of God is in us. He taught us
to go to a quiet chamber: "But when you pray, go into your room and shut
the door and pray to your Father who is in secret; and your Father who
sees in secret will reward you." (Mt.6:6)
Dear readers, if you are among those people who can no longer believe in
the God of the churches and the Christ of the churches, then try out
what Jesus taught us. Original Christians create a quiet room where they
can withdraw to pray - it can simply be a small, nicely arranged corner
in a room. But this can also be done by going into nature, by listening
to the sounds of nature, by becoming quiet in the process, and praying
to God, our Father, in this way. Soon, you can experience that this is
the quickest way to draw closer to God in you.
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