Such a failure of discernment from So Many of those who might - until 2020 - have been regarded as The Best Christians seems to demand explanation.
How could the devout, church-involved nice-good Christians not notice the totalitarian coup, the evil motivation behind the birdemic and its peck, the actual intent of antiracism/ multiculti/ mass migration, the reality of the climate change agenda?
Such colossal failures invalidate any amount of 'good' stuff; in the same way and for the same reason that a single un-repented sin self-excludes from resurrection and Heaven.
The failure to know sin leads to no repentance. And enthusiastic embrace and zealous promotion of any of the above evil-motivated ideologies and projects is even worse.
I think we need to engage in an act of imagination to see what happened, from the perspective of a church-involved, nice-good Christian. And, after all, most Christians have tried to be this at some point, and have admired those who achieved it so much better than we ourselves could manage.
My understanding is that this failure indicates that their church-discernment was overwhelmingly external and social - and boiled-down to mere obedience to some kind of institution that self-identified as a Christian church.
This would include those who claimed to 'follow scripture' in their lives; but reveals that they were in truth just following scripture-as-interpreted-by-some-institution.
Church Christians have sometimes noticed (especially in relation to sex and sexuality) that value/ moral-inversion was now official, and increasingly mandatory (legally and via employers and service providers - evil is the new Good, and vice-versa.
And some of these that devout church-goers have noticed this is sustained (in part or in whole) by all political parties, bureaucracies and the mass media.
Yet these same self-identified Christians have enthusiastically and zealously embraced one or all of the agendas of birdemic-peck agenda, climate change, and antiracism/ mass migration - which emanate from exactly the same Establishment source; 'evidence' for which has exactly the same origin; and which form elements of the same ideology of leftism.
I think this is probably due to the way that Christians have come to regard Christian morality as a legalistic, quasi-bureaucratic checklist; imposed-upon naturally evil and self-deceptive individuals from without, and sustained by social mechanisms.
The individual is regarded as the root of evil; kept in check only by the group. God's inspiration and guidance is seen as coming to the group, and reaching the individual only via the group - at least, when it concerns major and serious matters.
Individual revelation (from the Holy Ghost) is allowed in some personal matters that aren't covered by explicit rules and regulations; but not for matters of the group: whether that group be global, national, institutional or church group.
In serious matters, individual revelation and personal discernment is regarded as merely/ always/ necessarily a cloak for self-interest and self-justification of sin.
The idea that each Man's primary guidance could (let alone should) derive from the divine within each of us (by virtue of our status as Sons of God) and from the direct knowledge of the Holy Ghost - is seen as a snare.
Ultimately, Man's duty is to subordinate himself willingly to A Group - and the only legitimate question is Which Group? (for which specific matter)?
For devout, church-involved nice-good Christians; individual discernment is a sign of stupidity, mental illness or evil when it conflicts with the group.
It is literally nonsensical and incomprehensible to such folk that The World including all the major institutions, and the leadership of all major churches - could be wrong; and that some very small proportion of individuals would nonetheless be right.
For these church Christians, there is no debate, no issue to be addressed; they have decided as a fundamental assumption Not To Trust Themselves; but to surrender their judgment to some or many institutions.
And because they regard obedience to groups as the only true virtue; the possibility that all groups are evil cannot be allowed even as a possibility; therefore no amount of evidence of evil could ever convince them it was the case.
Very good. The point about Christians not trusting themselves in favor of obedient submission to a group/institution is extremely insightful. As far as I can tell, this is intricately connected to conventional concept of the long-suffering, humble, meek Christian for whom self trust and non-obedience equals the sin of spiritual pride.
ReplyDeleteRecent and current events reveal that this kind of consciousness - though perhaps useful and necessary in a previous Christian time - cannot be the way forward now.
I believe God desires that we learn to think for ourselves and learn to trust ourselves with Jesus as our guide. The utter failure of groups/institution underscores this.
@Frank "perhaps useful and necessary in a previous Christian time "
ReplyDeleteYes, that may well have been the case. But as men are now, from a lifetime of observation, it seems incredible (in the literal sense) that so many people will implicitly and habitually trust institutions/ committees/ votes over the judgment of any specific person.
I don't believe in the idea of original sin, but even if I did - I can't see why it would apply only to individuals and somehow exempt groups.
But, as so often, we are up-against unconscious assumptions - which is why observations and evidence is all-but irrelevant.
Good article.
ReplyDeleteAnother way of framing this inquiry (assuming The Great Apostasy as prophesied in Revelations is true): what would such a phenomenon look like if you could reverse engineer it? Put differently, if point "Z" is the End Times (again, assuming Revelations' Antichrist revealed, etc..), how could one explain the mechanism of moving from, say, T-U-V-W-X and Y?
I liked what Seraphim Rose wrote in "Orthodoxy and the Religion of the Future." He seemed to properly connect several dots. But,
his analysis is incomplete without struggling to resolve the dilemma of obedience in an age of apostasy--especially if promoted by those at the top.
Maybe--somehow, somewhere--the church bureaucracy will unequivocally renounce the Mark of the Vexx? I doubt it.... To the point: "this failure indicates that their church-discernment was overwhelmingly external and social - and boiled-down to mere obedience to some kind of institution that self-identified as a Christian church," seems an apt summary. I've poured through various warnings and prophecies during lockdown and what I've found is this: the few that call this evil out do so *in spite of/outside of* their religious systems. I really cannot think of a stronger indictment than that.
Great post!
ReplyDeleteWhether "Christian" or atheist, the majority of people's consciousness has been materialized and they live in the fake world/political correctness program, which conflates "niceness" w goodness itself. System Christians, in my view, are mentally simulating spirituality w a materialized mind & heart, addicted to the emotional squirting and fake virtue feedback afforded on this lower clunky, calcified & fiction-driven plane of consciousness. They are often so deep in the dream that they've become the dream: a disintegrating simulation (which is partly or perhaps largely why "dementia"/alzheimer's gets them in the end, but that would be another tangent).
This "niceness" (which would include things like conformity, agreeableness, obedience, non-confrontational-ness...you know, NOT being "difficult" in any way) is materialism's/PC version of "goodness."
Niceness has thus become the costume of spiritual evil in our time. System/materialized Christians are nice, strive to be nice and take pride in being nice, thereby making each a potential (and unwitting) Trojan horse for evil. Indeed, as you say, evil is the new "good," and "niceness" is the sugar that tempts people to swallow the poison and stay with a nice church group. They're just all so nice...
If a single un-repented sin (self-)excludes from Heaven, wouldn't Heaven be virtually empty?
ReplyDeleteEven if one is willing to repent and learn as much as possible, who can achieve total knowledge of his sins, as the necessary prerequisite for repenting each and every single one of them?
Also, isn't this dangerously close to a mechanistic and merely merit-based approach to salvation ("You repent sufficiently, and then you have EARNED your ticket to Heaven")?
Mustn't there also be some sort of wholesale forgiveness for those at least earnestly devoted to repenting and learning? Or is that where purgatory comes in?
I have to think part of it is that we all are facing the collapse of a civilization. With that fact comes an even stronger than usual subconscious need to sort out people based on identifiable indicators of social loyalty, because we are losing faith in civilized society, so we get tribalistic.
ReplyDeleteI try very hard not to assign malicious intent to the maskies, but I usually fail. I don't worry about it because I know it's just an instinctive response. I do feel a little guilty for forcing them to feel the same about me, because I know it hurts their "I'm nice" feelings.
I like going to church, though. And, ironically, this blog actually helps me keep my 'church-habit' because it helps me keep my boundaries, i.e. I'm not there for affirmation.
@ Herzog - By a happy not-coincidence, WmJas provides the answer, the proper perspective on this matter, in a post this morning:
ReplyDeletehttps://narrowdesert.blogspot.com/2021/08/no-mercy-for-sin.html
@Lucinda - I go to church about once a month for Holy Communion and to hear the sermon, and I usually get something positive out of the experience.
Isn't there a significant amount of laziness or at least giving up responsibility to others or the group on the part of those who are institutional followers, or who prioritize obedience to authority?
ReplyDeleteIsn't there something just intuitively "higher" about those who go to the next level by trying to disintermediate their relationship with God?
I sense there is more than just some kind of evolutionary-psychological explanation for the hatred or vitriol caused by those who disintermediate. Something spiritual. It's almost like the ultimate prod for being ostracized or persecuted. "How dare you think for yourself!"
It's now clear that there are only individuals - invidual priests, individual parishioners, individual lay people - who resist the evil totalitarian spirit that is taking over.
I think that such people are now learning to recognize each other. It's instinctive and spiritual.