eChurch Blog

Some people feel guilty about their anxieties and regard them as a defect of faith [but] they are afflictions, not sins. Like all afflictions, they are, if we can so take them, our share in the passion of Christ.

C. S. Lewis

Don’t normally do these open threads but felt I would today. If anyone wants to raise any issues of interest, request prayer, generally offload, have a moan, or simply say Hi, then do so.

Feel free and keep it classy….

I’ll kick off with a new blog I’ve discovered over on PsychCentral entitled: The Emotionally Sensitive Person, written by Karyn Hall, PhD. Haven’t been following long and started with the post Emptiness. I like the subjects covered so far and if this sort of thing is of interest to you then it’s well worth a gander; or if you can’t be bothered, I’ll keep an eye on it for us anyhow.

A few links I found interesting for one reason or another:

Who Will Stand Up to the Hetero-Phobes? – Max Wind-Cowie – Huffington Post

Hatred of those on benefits is dangerously out of control – Owen Jones – Independent

Early Modern England – England’s Poor Law similar to modern day welfare system, scholar finds

Geekosystem – Dante’s Circles of Hell, Redesigned in LEGO Form

The Biblical world – Jesus Versus Diablo or What Would Jesus Play?

Turtle Bay and Beyond – European Court of Human Rights: a significant victory for the freedom of the Church

National Catholic Register – Mark Shea – A reader asks about “Lost Christianities”

Persecution.org – The Future of Middle East Christians

Catholic Herald – Peter D Williams – Five ways to lose the argument with atheists

Swiss Cardinal Kurt Koch – President of the Pontifical Commission for Religious Relations with the Jews – has made some very positive comments relating to the Catholic Church’s relationship with the Jewish people.

His comments were made against the backdrop of the Society of St. Pius X (SSPX) ongoing reconciliation talks with the Vatican, and more specifically, the controversial Bishop Richard Nelson Williamson within the society, noted for his Holocaust denial.

I have previously posted on Bishop Richard Nelson Williamson if you’re interested.

The Nostra Aetate revolutionised the Catholic Church’s relationship with those of other faiths; most notably the Jews. Here is the core text relating to the Jews:

As Holy Scripture testifies, Jerusalem did not recognize the time of her visitation,(9) nor did the Jews in large number, accept the Gospel; indeed not a few opposed its spreading.(10) Nevertheless, God holds the Jews most dear for the sake of their Fathers; He does not repent of the gifts He makes or of the calls He issues-such is the witness of the Apostle.(11) In company with the Prophets and the same Apostle, the Church awaits that day, known to God alone, on which all peoples will address the Lord in a single voice and “serve him shoulder to shoulder” (Soph. 3:9).(12)

Since the spiritual patrimony common to Christians and Jews is thus so great, this sacred synod wants to foster and recommend that mutual understanding and respect which is the fruit, above all, of biblical and theological studies as well as of fraternal dialogues.

True, the Jewish authorities and those who followed their lead pressed for the death of Christ;(13) still, what happened in His passion cannot be charged against all the Jews, without distinction, then alive, nor against the Jews of today. Although the Church is the new people of God, the Jews should not be presented as rejected or accursed by God, as if this followed from the Holy Scriptures. All should see to it, then, that in catechetical work or in the preaching of the word of God they do not teach anything that does not conform to the truth of the Gospel and the spirit of Christ.

Furthermore, in her rejection of every persecution against any man, the Church, mindful of the patrimony she shares with the Jews and moved not by political reasons but by the Gospel’s spiritual love, decries hatred, persecutions, displays of anti-Semitism, directed against Jews at any time and by anyone.

And here’s some of the article from the Catholic News Service detailing Cardinal Kurt Koch’s comments:

“All the doctrinal decisions of the church are binding on a Catholic, including the Second Vatican Council and all its texts,” Cardinal Koch said when asked if the SSPX would be expected to accept all the teachings of Vatican II. “The ‘Nostra Aetate’ declaration of the Second Vatican Council is a clear decree and is important for every Catholic,” he added.

At the same time, Cardinal Koch said, “it is very necessary to make clear the difference between the position of the Society of St. Pius X and the negation of the Shoah (the Holocaust), which is a position that has no place in the Catholic Church. It is very clear.”

Following the revelation of Bishop Williamson’s comments about the Holocaust, SSPX leaders issued a statement saying his position in no way reflected the views of the society. “I’m very happy about this,” Cardinal Koch said. “The Holy Father has spoken clearly about this position of Williamson, that it’s not possible, there is no place for deniers in the Catholic Church.”

In his speech at Rome’s Pontifical University of St. Thomas Aquinas, Cardinal Koch said “Nostra Aetate” is “the ‘foundation document’ and the ‘Magna Carta’ of the dialogue of the Roman Catholic Church with Judaism.”

The declaration highlighted the Jewish roots of Christianity and took “an unambiguous position against every form of anti-Semitism,” he said.

The church’s theological reflection on its Jewish roots, as well as on the relationship between God’s covenant with the Jewish people and the new covenant instituted by Christ have been developed further and authoritatively by Blessed John Paul II and Pope Benedict XVI, he said.

God’s plan of salvation for humanity began with his covenant with the Jewish people and if Christianity ignores that, he said, “it is in danger of losing its location within salvation history.”

Cardinal Koch said that for Pope Benedict, the key to the theological understanding of the importance of a relationship with Judaism and Jews is that the Bible is one book detailing the entire history of salvation.

While Catholics profess that, in the end, all salvation will be accomplished through Jesus Christ, “it does not necessarily follow that the Jews are excluded from God’s salvation because they do not believe in Jesus Christ as the Messiah of Israel and the son of God,” the cardinal said. “That the Jews are participants in God’s salvation is theologically unquestionable, but how that can be possible without confessing Christ explicitly is and remains an unfathomable divine mystery.”

The cardinal said, “The Catholic Church neither conducts nor supports any specific institutional mission work directed toward the Jews,” but that does not exclude Christians bearing witness to their faith “in an unassuming and humble manner.”

There’s more over on Vatican Insider and Rome Reports.

Because the last time I checked, the unique identity of man is not defined by where he wants to put his penis. Identity is not gained, nor will it ever fulfill, if it is no more than a great narrowing of the human person to a single characteristic — in this case his sexual characteristic. Gay Man? Really? No one demands heterosexuals to “accept their identity” and define themselves as Straight Men. Such a thing would be a grave insult to the fantastic complexity of their being. Yet this is the modus operandi of the Activist…….

SOURCE

I have noted in the past my growing weariness with the Culture Wars and have said such thing as:

I feel that in some respects the church’s mission has been subverted into a cultural war that detracts from her true purpose; namely, the Kingdom. By this, I mean the kingdom not of this world, but of the one to come, and that indeed is already amongst us, and growing at a furious and unprecedented rate globally.

And:

I feel that getting sucked into the vortex of the cultural wars is exactly what those most opposed to the Church would wish for, and we play into their hands.

Although I know some will react negatively to Bad Catholic’s blog post entitled: Why I don’t Care, I have to commend this to your attention as for me it superbly articulates the problems at the heart of the Culture Wars.

It’s a challenging and refreshingly honest post that powerfully resonated with me; do take the time to hop over and give it a read.

1 insult + 1,000 compliments = 1 insult.

SOURCE

This is a fascinating read and one far too complex to synthesise and so here’s the intro with a link to the article:

Mcgrath v Dawkins, Amazon and others [2012] EWHC B3 (QB) -read judgment

In an interesting ruling on a strike-out action against a libel claim, a High Court judge has delineated the scope for defamation in blog posts and discussion threads where the audience is small and the libel limited.

Background

….continue reading

Section 5 of the 1986 Public Order Act says a person is guilty of an offence if he:

(a) uses threatening, abusive or insulting words or behaviour, or disorderly behaviour, or

(b) displays any writing, sign or other visible representation which is threatening, abusive or insulting, within the hearing or sight of a person likely to be caused harassment, alarm or distress thereby.

This Act has been used against Christians on quite a few occasions, most recently in the case of Jamie Murray, owner of the Salt & Light Coffee House.

This was a truly bizarre incident in which the displaying of Scripture on a video screen prompted a police visit following a complaint. The police notified Murray that he was displaying offensive or insulting words which breached Section 5 of the Public Order Act; in other words, the Biblical texts contravened the act.

The Christian Institute have been long campaigning for the removal of the word ”insulting” from the act, and it’s interesting to note today the National Secular Society announce their intention to pressure for reform of this act, alongside The Christian Institute, the Peter Tatchell Foundation, and others.

A website has been set up and a Twitter account.

The campaign will officially launch at the House of Commons today.

This act must be reformed to remove the word “insulting” which is so ridiculously subjective, ambiguous and arbitrary, over-zealous police may be deployed by folk against anyone they feel may have so much as slighted them.

Christians should support this reform if we wish to continue our freedom to express our faith in such ‘sensitive’ times.

That’s what I’m calling it: “Lisa’s Identity Clause”.

It comes about from a collection of blog posts I’ve read on Lisa Graas’ blog looking at the issue of identity, and more specifically, identity as a Christian suffering from mental health issues.

I have been meaning to blog about this before now, but am prompted to do so now following a brief exchange with Lisa on Twitter over an article on BeliefNet today.

The crux of “Lisa’s Identity Clause” is that we are not our disorder. For example, folk will say: “I am Bipolar”, but is this strictly true? Is this not to frame our entire identity on one facet. OK, this particular facet may permeate many areas of our lives, but it is not the entirety of who we are, or what makes us, us.

I understand the compulsion to embrace a psychiatric diagnosis and can certainly see how this may empower a person to more fully understand their own modes of behaviour and such. But I think it is an error to define ourselves entirely by this. There is no equivalent in the physical disease world; I mean, folk don’t go around saying “I am diabetes”.

I think that in our modern world identity issues are more prevalent than we might imagine, and in this regard it is no coincidence that Scripture urges us to take our identity from Christ. Our own identities may shift on uncertain sands, but His identity is fixed.

I think we as Christians have to be wary of too fondly embracing labels in order to define ourselves.

I’ll leave off my thoughts at this point and hand over to Lisa who articulates this far more eloquently and succinctly than I could.

I’ll finish with one of my favourite phrases which is: We suffer that we may comfort those that suffer.

By the way, it’s the Feast of St. Dymphna today, the Patron of those suffering nervous and mental afflictions!