By Walt Garlington for the Saker Blog
Mr Paul Gottfried gives us a standard line about the need to return to the Golden Age of the American republic at the end of a short book review he penned:
Since Janowski leaves his heuristic queries open, this reviewer feels free to note that the egalitarian democracy he so graphically describes represents a falling away from something much better. It is a denaturing of the constitutional republic upholding federalism and ordered liberty that marked America’s earlier phase. The United States was not always the quasi-tyranny it is now becoming. It started with a well-conceived political order, one that some Americans wish to return to.
But is this still really a tenable ideal and goal? What did the former English colonies gain from independence in 1776? Is it not the truth that the colonies lost nearly everything a traditional people would consider worth living for and exchanged it for never-ending political feuds and money-grabbing after that fateful year?
There is hardly anything of cultural value to speak of in the United States today. What lover of beauty 500 years from now will have any desire to watch Saturday Night Live or play Grand Theft Auto or own a Ford F-150 pickup truck? But the usual farming village or small city of artisans in Christian Europe was filled with cultural treasures, however externally poor those people may appear to modern eyes. Their life revolved firstly around the parish church: the Divine Liturgy – the union of Heaven with earth, morning and evening prayers, the feasts and fasts of the Church calendar, the holy days dedicated to our Lord and His Most Pure Mother, the patron saint of the parish church, the patron saint of each person in the parish, baptisms, etc.
Then there was the life of each family, whose members included those who lived long ago by virtue of their graves in the parish churchyard and by virtue of remembering those same members and others often in prayers for the departed. The family home was also a major part of the family itself, more often than not being the same place in which their forebears had lived for many generations, with the furniture, tools, etc., also being handed down from many years before. Entertainment too was handed down from many old hands: ballads and folk songs, communal dances and games, and so on.
Related to family life was the vocation of each person, for the children usually followed in the profession of one of their close kinsmen. And the members of these professions themselves often formed communities of their own, each with its own traditions.
For this peaceful and stable way of life, the English colonies in North America substituted something truly atrocious. They called it ‘liberty’, but it is nothing of the sort. It was an unleashing of the passions, which is slavery of the lowest and most degraded form, and manifests itself in the constant re-creation of the methods of production and the grasping after money and material goods. This kind of life undermines the well-being of society, breaks all the traditional bonds between people – within families and outside them, dissipates the societal virtues accumulated by the previous generations, and causes anxiety to abound. What occupation should I pursue? What college should I go to? Where should I live afterwards? Where can I go to make the most money? Such questions were largely unknown to our ancestors.
Compounding these problems, we now have a never-ending political drama that further erodes the influence of the Church, families, and other healthy traditions. In order to protect the ‘liberty’ we won through independence from Great Britain, we placed ourselves within an unending cycle of political elections and battles. There is hardly ever any rest from it. ‘The price of liberty is eternal vigilance’, we are taught here in the exceptional nation. Vicious, lengthy campaigns are waged to gain elected offices, and no sooner are these watchmen of our freedoms chosen than we turn our jealous Argus-eyes upon them to make sure they don’t encroach upon anything that is ours.
Politics in the old countries, and in the colonies before 1776, was much less volatile and imposed itself much less in daily life. Most officials held their positions by heredity, meaning little jostling and wrangling to obtain them. Likewise, many modern government functions were handled by kin-groups or churches: education of children, care for the poor, sick, and elderly, etc. When there was interaction with the government, it was usually not with a nameless bureaucrat but with the count or lord who lived in the village manor and whom they knew well – a man with whom the villagers received Holy Communion, who supplied their festivals with foodstuffs, in whose fields they worked at harvest-time.
The federalism and order liberty of the American constitutional republic hailed by Mr Gottfried above were merely the vestiges of a healthy pre-Modern Christian society. As the States began to fulfil the telos of their new republican creation, however, those forms faded away. Now we have no true communities, whether villages or cities, only atomized urban apartments and rural suburbs. Here we have no Christian life to speak of, but we may squeeze in a church service at the mega-church beside the interstate on Christmas Eve to keep Grandmother from nagging us. Here we have few family connections, save those that are mediated by social media, and which are further cheapened by our desire for views and likes of our posts related to family life.
This view can be confirmed by looking at the South, where old European attitudes lasted the longest in the US. In Dixie there were hereditary government offices (de facto rather than de jure); political elections were not all-consuming affairs (turnout was often very low at elections); ancestors were remembered; the Church calendar still played some role in determining the rhythm of life; families remained rooted in a particular place and home for generations. Some of this still holds true today, in a very weakened form.
New England has shown the opposite tendency. She has from the beginning been in a constant state of ferment, developing new religions, new industries, new political theories.
Some Southerners (this author included) are sometimes tempted to throw all the fault for the decay of old settled ways in the States entirely on New England, but that is dishonest, for the South also found ways to undermine them on her own: by repealing primogeniture laws, by disestablishing Christianity as the official religion of the Southern States, by extending the franchise to more and more people, by outlawing nobility.
The abnormality of post-1776 America is also reflected in the fact that Christian monasteries, one of the foundation stones for spreading and strengthening the Christian faith in the old countries of Asia, Africa, and Europe, are few in number in all regions. The vocation of total dedication to God has found shallow soil in the US, as Metropolitan Kallistos Ware says in his little book The Orthodox Church, because we are all of us – New England, South, Great Plains, and the rest – so preoccupied with improving our material condition that vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience are anathema to most. Only in a handful of the Spanish and French Roman Catholic communities that were later absorbed by the expanding American union were some scattered monasteries to be found, and the number of monasteries has been bolstered in recent years largely by the influx of immigrants from Orthodox and Roman Catholic countries.
From today’s vantage point, the days of the young American republic do look pleasant. But it is a deception, like a mirage in the desert. As soon as we look more closely at them, we see that the hollowness of present-day American life began with the separation from Great Britain in 1776, which was a separation from the whole stream of traditional Christian life and its replacement with the new idols of an all-engrossing political life (which is everywhere present and fills all things, to use the words the Orthodox Church uses in a prayer to the Holy Ghost) and economic upheaval and progress without end.
Thus, to good men like Mr Gottfried who pine for the by-gone days of the early American republic, we say, They are right to look to the past for a model of how to live, but they must go back further, before the federal constitution of 1787, and before the separation from Europe in 1776, and before even the Renaissance, when the Orthodox Church and family and neighbor were the sources of life, the only sources of a life that is worth living. Unless the peoples of the States rediscover those springs, life will continue to be parched and barren, and no paper constitution will be able to make it verdant and fruitful again.
One idyllic dream from long ago can certainly be substituted for another, but the predominantly unChristian future remains before us.
Even so, may peace and good will prevail. Against all odds, right now.
Talk about Freemasonry and its liberal bases of expansion of capitalism. Divide and rule… in the European monarchies (Portugal) there was an intense liberal influence that later, as in other countries, destroyed the essentials of social and religious life. Continuous destruction… where will we end up?
New forms of doctrine arise in the world, following the example of the Christian year 00. These are necessary transformations… they are far above the merely material human objectives. The spiritual life commands the destinies of the world. Small transformations consolidate its destinies. Following the example of Christianity 2000 years ago, today there are deep processes of transformation of the Christian doctrine. As before, few see it, many less live it.
New initiation cycle. 2000 thousand in 2000 thousand years.
Bertolt Brecht once observed, is required ‘’because things are the way they are, things will not stay the way they are.
There are no going back
There is a going back, there are just no advantages 2 it right now.
One supposes that the next article veering in the direction of this series shall be to praise and recommend
the writings and thoughts of the Italian aristocrat Julius Evola,—and also not forget the French aristocrat Joseph Arthur de Gobineau, that spiritual idiot-retard who initiated several catastrophic developments:
1) helped initiate that insane and mutually annihilatory historical conflict between the Germanic-Scandinavian peoples and the Slavonic peoples; 2) helped initiate racism of all forms with white Europeans claiming rights to attack and enslave non-whites and/or non-Europeans based on superiority in the military technology and not much else; 3) helped initiate genderization of races deeming white Europeans a “masculine race” and all other races “feminine races”; 4) created the anti-Asian concept of the “yellow peril”.
One also supposes that a society where everyone is compelled on penalty of “cruel and unusual death”
to live simple anti-consumer and anti-sexual micromanaged-microregulated lives like monks and nuns “in imitation of Jesus suffering crucified on the cross” would constitute the ultimate desirable “spiritual society”.
The universal even global compulsion would of course be indispensable and absolutely necessary so as
to resist the “natural carnal temptations” of a more “natural carnal lifestyle”.
This commentary has an absurd idolisation of an autocratic and unfair way of life. Those village communities ruled by the Lord of the manor also has to give “first night”rights of brides to the Lord). Mozart wrote an opera on this theme. They burnt women as witches, the servants in the manor house had one day off a year. Girls without marriage prospects were forced into a nunnery, like it or not.
So a bright kid with the potential to be Newton or Motzart had to be a cobbler because his great grandfather was.
What this article does is to hanker for a romantic idyll that never existed. Sure we all regret the decline of community, but I think that is much more to do with size of cities than the particular form of government. It is much more to do with social cohesion than government forms. It is obvious from the gun rampage in USA that the society is broken. However it is not to do with the fact they have elections.
My guess is that this author like the many who watch Dowtown Abbey, somehow are delusional enough to think that they would be living in the big house and never doing duty as the scullery maid, working 17 hours per day 7 days per week.
I generally agree with the thrust and sentiments of your comment, although your narrative conflates serfdom with peasantry, which are miles apart. In the usual Hollywood type narrative, if you weren’t titled, then you lived a life of abject squalor and destitution, devoid of rights. It’s great for movies, but it’s so very far from the truth and speaks more to the utter ignorance of producers and directors (and their fellow travelers – journalists – yuck) as well as their audiences, than medieval society as it was. For example, many peasants were far richer than their titular betters, and there was even social mobility enough for the ambitiously minded. And at least in medieval society, obligations went both directions.
That said, I agree that the OP idealizes a political situation that was just as ruthless and disgusting as the current vicious iteration. All you need to do is look up the history of the Otto’s and their troubles with their families (taxes, claims, land reversion and betrayals) and their Faustian bargain with the Church, leading to the investiture controversy/conflict, in a never ending cycle of corruption, resistance, repression, and reform (and don’t forget warfare). And even beyond that to Hus and Martin Luther, and beyond even THAT (Hapsburgs anyone?) to realize that power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely, and humans are by nature, corrupt. There’s a reason that we ended up where we did in 1776, 1789, and 1848.
There is nothing new under the sun.
Droit du seigneur, or jus primae noctis, are greatly exaggerated customs.
Like the eating of children.
Or the whipping of slaves.
These things appeal to the imagination, but were never common practice, and were widely regarded as abuses.
They are like the stonings for adultery … no stable society has actually enforced such things generation after generation.
Where I live, they didn’t abolish laws governing what clothes you can wear until the 1990’s.
At the same time, nobody even had a clue there was a law forbidding women to wear jeans/pants.
“..helped initiate racism of all forms with white Europeans claiming rights to attack and enslave non-whites and/or non-Europeans..”
Right, because prior to the 19-20th centuries, the Europeans weren’t going around attacking and enslaving people at all.
And because the Germans were the prototypical European imperialist-colonialist people, not the Spanish and British and Dutch and French.
Do you even realize how absurdly off the mark you are?
Not as far off mark as this comment.—It remains the historical consensus that in the 15th, 16th, 17th and even the 18th centuries the key issue in the minds of Europeans was religion, not race.
Gobineau began an argument why the aristocracy of France deserved to rule, as against the French Revolution. He came up with the argument that the only importance was in the pedigree, the bloodline, and he maintained that the French aristocrats had the absolute right to rule because they descended from the Germanic Franks who conquered the Gauls and Romans who used to make up the Roman province Gaul.—The French did not like Gobineau’s exaltation of Germanic people, but the Germans who were then struggling to establish their own national identity liked what Gobineau was saying. Because Gobineau emphasized that it was strictly pedigree and lineage which counted, nothing else, he eventually transferred this concept from social-economic class to the matter of race, and the pedigree, inheritance, lineage of one’s race. He became basically one of the “fathers” of the modern permanently exclusive biological-genetic racism adopted by Europeans as against the older form of tribal racism where an outsider not genetically linked could always join the given tribe.
Hmmm…thank you: I knew nothing of Gobineau.
Now am rushing to buy All his books in French .
How kind of you !
Multiculturalism has become the new state religion of the US empire, and George Floyd santo subito.
If we’re going to go back, then let’s go all the way back to the first century when Christians were only following the teachings of the apostles. We could do that today. All we have to do is follow the Bible, and ONLY the Bible.
Okay!
*WHICH* Bible are you referring to?
:-)
I recommend you read the Bible that was written by men who were inspired by the Holy Spirit. Since no original New Testament writings have survived the nearly 2,000 years since they were written, I therefore recommend a more recently translated and printed version based on the surviving ancient manuscripts, some dating back to the 3rd century. The NASB, ESV, NIV and RSV are all reliably translated versions. On the other hand, if you don’t trust any of them and are not willing to do research, then I recommend you look into purchasing a “fire insurance” policy.
I think that you are totally missing the point.
WHO put the canon of the Bible together and WHO decided which translation (MT vs LXX) was the correct one.
So, let me ask you
You speak about “men inspired by the Holy Spirit”. That is called the Church.
Second, ALL the translations into English you mention are based on a Judaic *forgery* called the “Masoretic Text”. Yes, your Bible is based on a fake, a forgery.
The Church (aka your “inspired men”) never accepted it, but only the Septuagint).
Are YOU willing to do some research?
If so, you can start here: http://orthodoxinfo.com/inquirers/whichcamefirst.aspx
/off-topic-but-apparently-needed-judaism-and-christianity-back-to-basics/
Good luck!
As far as the Old Testament is concerned, if you want to use the Septuagint, go ahead. I’m sure it’s as reliable as the other. My salvation is not based on the contents of the Old Testament. Yes, it contains Messianic prophecy, but many have become Christians without knowing those prophecies. On the other hand, a simple reading of Luke or John, along with the book of Acts, is enough to teach one to become a Christian. Then, it’s a matter of constantly learning all through life in order to become more Christlike in our thoughts and behavior. According to the New Testament Survey by Merrill C. Tenney, there were only a few NT books that were questionable for inclusion in the original canon. However, that was among outsiders. The actual Christians in the churches of Christ in the 1st century have always known which books were Scriptural. The apostles would have told them. The content of the books, the change in human character that they produce, and how they fit together perfectly with the other books is what makes them accepted as inspired by God. Additionally, many ancient scholars, such as Iraneus, Polycarp, Eusebius and others quoted the NT books extensively. They were closer to that historical period and certainly had a better grasp than we might have. If I am a Christian and use what I have available to serve God as best I can, then I’m sure His grace and mercy will take care of what I’m lacking in.
As far as the Old Testament is concerned, if you want to use the Septuagint, go ahead. I’m sure it’s as reliable as the other
Well, when they contradict each other they cannot, by definition, be “as reliable” and if one of them, as I claim, is based on a deliberately anti-Christian fraud, even more so.
Which raises one key question: does the truth even matter nowadays?
If a fraud is “as reliable” as the real thing, then nothing is really true, as opposed to false, then the truth itself, and even the Truth, are situational, relative, and fundamentally meaningless.
simple reading of Luke or John
Here we can agree, but we give the word “simple” very different meanings :-)
If I am a Christian and use what I have available to serve God as best I can, then I’m sure His grace and mercy will take care of what I’m lacking in.
Can you please find some Patristic support for that point of view?
Saint Paul sure spent a lot of time trying to convince his contemporaries of the opposite.
And, finally and inevitably,
How do you know that you are a “Christian” in the first place?
How can you be sure?
What does that even mean to “be a Christian”?
Can you clarify?
Thank you,
Andrei
“If I am a Christian and use what I have available to serve God as best I can, then I’m sure His grace and mercy will take care of what I’m lacking in.”
Well, now. This sounds quite a bit like the argument that grace can be obtained by acts and deeds. Also a dash of “I always had the best intentions”, so how can I be judged? Which is nonsense, much like what I heard from a door to door proselytizer a few days back. He asked me “Do I believe I will go to Heaven?” I replied, that’s not really up to me. He flourished his bible and assured me all I have to do is accept and believe that Christ is my savior and I’m off the Heaven when I die, 100% guaranteed! Now of course I believe in the resurrection, but even a saint is not “guaranteed a spot” until they actually pass on and all is ‘said and done’. How could it be otherwise when even the most pious, gifted, and diligent of men can fall back into darkness under duress? Patristic lore is rife with such incidents. Nothing is written in stone until the last breath, for good or bad. It is one of the mighty paradoxes of the faith, why should the thief be saved for a single moment of repentance? Why is the publican redeemed when he spent his life bleeding the wealth of the common folk? And why should the Pharisee who, of which it is made clear, never missed a fast, or neglected to say his devotions, a man who served the church, gave to charity, and never intentionally hurt or allowed to be hurt his fellow men, be condemned? And why would a man’s whole legacy be voided over a bowl of lentils hungrily consumed after a day of toil?
All men are sinners; the wise beseech Christ’s infinite mercy, which will be granted according to one’s measure. Grace on the other hand, is gifted, never earned, and the whys and wherefores are far above our reckoning. Taking St. Paul as an example, can there be made any case that his encounter on the road to Damascus was a reward for his life and deeds as a Rabbi persecuting the faithful? Did Paul *deserve* a heavenly revelation, given his previous track record? What would God see in Saul/Paul then? Why was he was singled out for this role? I would think it likely to be as straightforward as this: Paul had a skillset that the apostles lacked, and God needed a tool suited to performing tasks requiring a man of erudition, master of many languages, with an encyclopedic knowledge of the traditional Hebrew faith. And crucially, in the end a here was a man who, once committed to his new cause, did so with great fervor, devotion, and a total surrender of personal will. Paul received his harsh lesson, repented and embraced the Trinity, and afterwards none was truer. The apostles quickly recognized, to their amazement, this bitterest of their foes was suddenly richly endowed with the Holy Spirit.
I do not believe that salvation can be earned. That is, we will never be able to say that “God owes us” because of a lifetime of work. We are sinners, and only one sin that has not been forgiven is enough to condemn us for eternity. We are saved when we have the kind of faith that Abraham had. That is demonstrated when we become Christians through the process that I described in my note to Andrei. If we don’t have enough faith to be baptized, then we do not have enough to be saved. We are saved by faith, but faith alone will not save us. (James 2:14-26)
Paul said this about being chosen by Christ: “The saying is trustworthy and deserving of full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am the foremost. But I received mercy for this reason, that in me, as the foremost, Jesus Christ might display his perfect patience as an example to those who were to believe in him for eternal life.” (1 Tim. 1:15-16)
I usually buy the Bible with both the OT and NT. included. I have been reading the Bible since 1974. I am aware of “hard to understand” passages, but I haven’t found any contradictions yet.
Of course the truth matters. The truth is that Jesus is the Son of God and that He was crucified, buried in a tomb, and raised from the dead. All happened in accordance with the divine purpose of God the Father. We are sinners and that requires a sacrifice (blood Heb. 9:22) in order to receive forgiveness of sins. In order to benefit from that sacrifice, we are to have the same kind of faith that Abraham had (Rom. 4:16). He believed that God was able to raise people from the dead. (Heb. 11:17-19) Just as Jesus was dead and was buried, so we too are “dead to sin” (when we repent) and are buried in baptism. And just as Jesus was raised from the dead, we too are raised out of the watery grave of baptism to walk in newness of life. It is at that moment that the blood of Jesus is spiritually applied to our souls when we do that. It is this process that demonstrates our faith that Jesus was raised from the dead. If a person does not have enough faith to be baptized, then they do not have enough to be saved. It’s not the “putting away of the filth of the flesh” as the Apostle Peter said, but the answer of a good conscience towards God (Rom. 6:1-11; 1 Pet. 3:21)
I know that I’m a Christian because I have believed exactly what the Apostles taught. And I have done exactly what they taught was to be done for forgiveness. (Acts 2:38) They were guided into all the truth by the Holy Spirit. (John 14:26; 16:13) I follow the Bible because the Scriptures were written to instruct us in righteousness (2 Tim. 3:14-17).
This is what it means to be a Christian: “For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation for all people, training us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright, and godly lives in the present age, waiting for our blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ, who gave himself for us to redeem us from all lawlessness and to purify for himself a people for his own possession who are zealous for good works (Titus 2:11-14).
By the way, I do not depend on the words of anyone outside the Bible for spiritual truth. That includes “Patristic support”. If I was Robin Hood, I would not go to Friar Tuck for spiritual truth. I also would not look for truth from the likes of the popes, bishops or the fruit vendor down the street.
If you are open to other sources than the New Testament, I wholeheartedly encourage you and anyone with a spiritual thirst to review the life and teachings of St. Seraphim. The scriptures are of inestimable worth, but they are not the only source of Talents. Personally, I find it profitable to keep in mind that many of the holiest souls to walk this planet could not read a single page of written words. St. Euphrosynus comes to mind. One of the great tragedies of modern Christianity is the widespread rejection of the Saints and their great wealth of hard earned wisdom. To rely on the Bible to the complete exclusion of the wisdom of the Saints is comparable to insisting that the only way to learn to fix a car is to read the service manual.
You might have missed the book of life, revelation 20:15, with all the bible thumping.
Another opportunity to go Bible “thumping” might be something you will beg for someday. I recommend you look at these things seriously. As a person ages, they realize that death is becoming more real day by day. I respect anyone who fears God and is looking for salvation. Some are misguided, but they are looking nevertheless.
fear is a fine spur,
but love is infinitely
more satisfying
@ Roger G. Mattingly
Do we not have an answer in Luke 24:25 and 45? I mean can you imagine even after 3.5 years with the Messiah the disciples were largely ignorant of the scriptures and had to be explicitly tutored by Christ Himself and even that wasn’t enough. It took the arrival of the Holy Spirit to actually empower the disciples and “bring to their remembrance everything Christ had spoken.”
He said to them, “How foolish you are, and how slow to believe all that the prophets have spoken! 26 Did not the Messiah have to suffer these things and then enter his glory?”
27 And beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, he explained to them what was said in all the Scriptures concerning himself. Then he opened their minds so they could understand the Scriptures. 46 He told them, “This is what is written:…
Perhaps if only they, He, had that essay found here which is excellent by the way. A refresher for me. /christian-vignette-5-christ-in-the-old-and-new-testament/
And for St. Peter it took even more when he had to be given a vision that the Gentiles were included in the gift of Pentecost! That must have been quite the argument and anger management between him and St. Paul?
Slow learners all?
The apostles were fishermen and the printed scrolls of Scripture were few and far between. They were most likely very expensive due to being hand printed. It is noteworthy that this is what happened:
In these days he went out to the mountain to pray, and all night he continued in prayer to God. And when day came, he called his disciples and chose from them twelve, whom he named apostles: Simon, whom he named Peter, and Andrew his brother, and James and John, and Philip, and Bartholomew, and Matthew, and Thomas, and James the son of Alphaeus, and Simon who was called the Zealot, and Judas the son of James, and Judas Iscariot, who became a traitor. (Luke 6:12-16)
Did you read that? Jesus spent the night in prayer before choosing the apostles. He knew exactly what He was doing. Each one was “hand-picked” by God, even the one who would betray Him so that Scripture would be fulfilled.
No essay written by Andrei or myself or anyone else can take the place of the Bible. If the essay had been needed, I’m sure God would have arranged for the writer to be born 2,000 years earlier. There were no arguments between Peter and Paul. To be sure, Peter erred on one occasion and Paul corrected him. (Gal. 2:11) That’s how it should have been. But, Peter respected and loved Paul immensely (2 Pet 2:15).
@ Roger G. Mattingly
Thank you, and yes Christ chose the twelve and yes lol their argument wasn’t so great that they hated each other for life as many Christians of differing denominations do today.
Lets not forget sir that also after everything was said and done St. Peter came under special attention from our Lord when he was asked three times whether he loved him or not and to feed his lambs. The crucifixion was such a shocking event that my guess is St. Peter and others maybe were questioning whether to continue on or to return to his fishing nets? They were chosen for the purpose…
and repentance for the forgiveness of sins will be preached in his name to all nations, beginning at Jerusalem. You are witnesses of these things. I am going to send you what my Father has promised; but stay in the city until you have been clothed with power from on high.”
And St. Paul was truly the only scholar among them as St. Peter confessed:
Bear in mind that our Lord’s patience means salvation, just as our dear brother Paul also wrote you with the wisdom that God gave him. He writes the same way in all his letters, speaking in them of these matters. His letters contain some things that are hard to understand, which ignorant and unstable people distort, as they do the other Scriptures, to their own destruction. 2 Peter 3: 15
Thanks again. Cheers
Where are the michealangelos of today? Surely they haven’t disappeared?
Into the tattoo parlours where the new canvas is the skin.
I know a guy who tattooed his two sons faces onto his own arm and they are literally a wonder to behold, literally photograph quality. Amazing, but I was rebuked when I complained what a waste of a talent he should be adorning great buildings and such with marvels like this?
I know of another first gen Canadian from Greece and the mind he has for art is a wonder. He chose for his career electronic version and is going nowhere? Sob
And then there was my mother who said the churches here Canada are so plain. I didn’t understand her true feelings until I visited her quaint little village of a few hundred people in Slovenia and was awe struck speechless actually looking at what in Canada would have been taken for an expensive museum?
Culture dies with sin unfortunately but it needs to be said the castles of Austria / Germany was built because a king taxed the people so unmercilessly that they hardly had money for food. Let’s not forget that!
“…. it the right of our manifest destiny to over spread and to possess the whole of the continent which Providence has given us for the development of the great experiment of liberty and federative development of self government entrusted to us.“ – John L. O’Sullivan, 1845
Ah, those halcyon days of subduing the savage hordes, stealing their land, and grabbing their resources. Anyone notice how that is exactly what the European Ashkenazim are now doing in Palestine? Manifest Destiny is just a subset of Zionism, the racist notion that certain Europeans were “chosen” by God to dominate and exploit brown-skinned people all around the globe. If you don’t understand how this could be the case, just have any Native American or any Palestinian explain it to you.
The Catholic and Orthodox Churches were patrons of art why? Because they knew it was a gift from God and took advantage of it sometimes unfortunately to the extreme! Reminds of the OT where God provided the artisans for King Solomon’s Temple and such.
We have lost so much thanks Darwin and the rest of monkey town Albion /USA!?!?
The Catholic and Orthodox Churches were patrons of art why?
Sorry, but you are conflating two TOTALLY different and even OPPOSED phenomena into one.
Please compare this:
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/6/6f/Leonardo_da_Vinci_attributed_-_Madonna_Litta.jpg/800px-Leonardo_da_Vinci_attributed_-_Madonna_Litta.jpg
with this:
https://i.pinimg.com/736x/bc/91/43/bc9143f08fe9c1ac25d83d00a90b5982.jpg
Worlds, even UNIVERSES apart!
Okay Saker, I’ll never commit such a sin as putting the words C and O in the same sentence ever again. In any case my thinking was mostly the buildings and such. The Italians are were a sensual bunch weren’t they. Apologies!
What you call the C and O has a few problems:
The C is not C at all, never was.
And C is an anti-O in origin and essence
As for the Italians, I don’t blame them, we are all a sensual bunch, including plenty of “Os”, but the Latins created an entire “sensual-pietism” around such stuff, and THAT bothers me as it is in direct contradiction of the non-carnality of truly Christian imagery. 3 dimensional art and “realistic” representations of God, His Mother or His saints are, in fact, a form of idolatry.
The Church (I mean the O one, of course) never went down that path and has always been VERY careful about this (although lots of 19th century Russian “icons” are a spiritual disaster too, but that is another topics for another day).
Interesting that you should say this.
Cheers
The benefits and existence of Orthodox Iconography are, forgive me for saying, beyond the comprehension of a casual observer of Orthodox Christianity. Icons may seem quaint, perhaps dogmatic. Or perhaps you see the art and church around it as beautiful and moving in a way difficult to put into words, but nothing beyond that. Actually, Orthodox ‘art’ has a very specific role and purpose. Yes it is often beautiful and intentionally so, but there are additional mysteries unable to be understood without other prerequisites. To borrow a parable, if one finds an oasis in the desert, the trees will provide shade from the noonday heat. This is known to all. But it requires a keener eye to see that the trees bear nutritious fruit, and a good nose to know when they are ripe to pluck.
(I will say there are VERY specific reasons as to why icons must be two dimensional). Suffice it to say the functionality of the blessed icon is degraded if the composition does not conform to the dogmatic requirements. Much like wheels must be round and not square if they are to roll, the icon has to be in two-dimensions to function as it was intended to. Again, the decorative aspect of the item is merely a feature of a utilitarian object which serves as a valuable aid to furthering the Church’s goals.
Also, it is useful to differentiate the Orthodox ‘church’ with all its hierarchs, worshippers, buildings and accoutrements, and all its words and deeds, and the eternal Church: the Body of Christ. The former is all too prone to human error; it could hardly be otherwise being it consists of humans. The Body of Christ has neither beginning nor end, and its Truth is eternal and cannot be altered or corrupted in any fashion.
Interesting article.
But I remain unconvinced.
Too many historical trends and divergencies are being subsumed by this narrative.
Although I agree with the underlying sentiment and the cultural critique, the story as penned is too binary and too simple, differences are exaggerated, contrasts far too pure and unrealistic.
. . . the story as penned is too binary and too simple.
Yes, maybe so, but maybe not. I say wait until the narrative concludes, and then decide. Sometimes life is surprising, mysterious, and who can tell what will come of it. I am reminded here of the last chapter of the tome on Bioethics of the late Tristram H. Englehardt, prophesizing a fourth Rome of Austin, TX. Who can conclude that any such thing is likely? But nonetheless the past is a key to the future, and Rome the First, the great persecutor of Christianity, itself became the chief corner of the Church, for a time.
I agree with much you say about today’s US. But millions of Europeans came over to the US in the 19th and early 20th Centuries because they weren’t happy where they were,32 million in fact. They didn’t agree with your description of life in their countries. And I’d like you to name the countries in Europe where the peasants had such an idyllic life as you describe for them during the middle ages.My reading of history shows a very different story of peasant life in that period.
“The reason they call it the American Dream is because you have to be asleep to believe it.” George Carlin
IMHO, the angst today is from the waking up and realizing the dream was just that. There has always been the ugliness of broken bodies and stolen land beneath the golden haze.
I am an American convert to Orthodoxy from Roman Catholicism and all I can say is. Baby steps, baby steps. Not even Russia has completely (not even close to it) returned to it’s Orthodox roots let alone Orthodox Monarchy.
I love the writings of Blessed Father Seraphim Rose (a student of St. John Maximovich). For awhile I was so influenced by his writings that I too thought I was becoming an Orthodox Monarchist, but there’s only one problem. I don’t live in 19th Century Imperial Russia. I am not Russian at all, I’m an American through and through. I could be nothing else.
I love my American Motherland and I cherish the Freedom and Liberty that this nation is “supposed to” embody (whether it lives up to those ideals or ever has is a discussion for another day) but the strong (almost religious) belief in those ideals of 1776 (and 1787) is something most Americans (especially in generations past) hold near and dear to our hearts. As Russian Orthodox people know very well national myths and legends are very important and should not be completely dismissed as silly fairy tales.
Do I pray for the conversion of America to Orthodox Christianity? I pray for the conversion of the whole world to Orthodox Christianity. Especially the West which has largely been estranged from it’s Orthodox Catholic roots since the Great Schism of 1054 AD. I wish to see the whole of Western Christendom return to Orthodoxy and be once again united with Eastern Orthodoxy.
This is a slow process though. We have over a 1000 years of Western Theological innovation to roll back. The monasteries are key to any Orthodox revival in the West. I know there are Western Rite Orthodox Monasteries.
Getting back to America. I think the Orthodox immigrants who embraced America and American ideals and values (as their Roman Catholic counterparts had done before them) understood that Orthodoxy could coexist with the American form of Government and the Constitutional Rule of Law so long as there was equality under the law and Orthodox peoples had the freedom to be “Orthodox”. It was that freedom that made America Great. It was that freedom combined with economic opportunity that drew people from all over the world to America.
Say what you will about the backgrounds and intentions of the early English colonists or even the original American Revolutionaries and Founding Fathers. We know they were not perfect, but I have to say that for my Grandparents and Great Grandparents this American nation of mine truly was the land of Freedom, Liberty and opportunity and I know that rings true for most of the Americans I know. Our Grandparents were largely decent, hardworking, God fearing people who loved this nation and it’s freedoms dearly.
When I think of America I think of 1776 but I also think of my Grandparents and Great Grandparents and what this nation and it’s freedoms meant to them. That’s why I’m not ready to give up on this nation or the truly American ideals and values I was raised to believe in.
I like what author Garlington’s approach
1)(detangle a problem “us”
2) by studying our past to see how we have changed (for the worse))
3)where there is a direct conflict with new age (satanic hidden but derived ) new living norms to follow based out on guided principles (from from “think tank” somewhere who knows where)
4) a hidden adgenda but very apparent (window blinds open in morning) by the authors approach (nice technique)
5) I could not help by gain a respect for the implied but hidden message- we are all being misled and brainwashed (to get somewhere) on purpose (infers evil actually is- is/ is- -the core driving mechanism at play (no denying this anymore- this is the only conclusion possible one can legit draw- the devil and a small group -in comparison to the rest- are in fact running the show- to our detriment. )
6) This also implies a God (source of good) must also exist (corollary) (or else everything is just random- meaning no needed for implied system of evil to be taking over in a very obvious systemic fashion (author explains nicely) it (evil) would just be proceeding at a random pace- not going parabolic stage (author illustrated well) “crazy” taking over in a well planed out manor in front of eyes (implied structure- goes directly counter to randomness by definition, hence suggests evil is alive , it exists, hidden or not , and it is multiplying fast (author carefully charts it)
7) I could not understand significant of said understood premise until I related to a line in Quran I ran across
8) Spoke of evil being “forced”
to drink boiling water. (Evil element and people) afterlife
9) I kept focusing on the forced word
10) Kept asking “why forced?”
11) forced – “against our free will, but why?”
12) then it hit me like a brick
13) we all have free will AND God’s blessings surrounding us constantly
14) but (key) taken for granted because….
15) goto line -we only realize this when we are confronted by (hence the “forced” part of the verse suddenly becomes visible) meaning we are not accustomed to drinking boiling water on earh (hence the oblivious part of our existence to our Creator- (perpetuated soc-Econ-political- sci envirmt)
16) when we are forced to drink boiling water what happens (hypothetically)…?
17) One experiences an immediate breakdown of tissues (bone /blood vessels/ nerves/- soul- is also connected – hence self- outrage of what is occurring in real time “like hay- what are you doing stop it!”
18) There is an implied outrage “how dear you- that is part of me you just destroyed /dissolved
19) So this brings us back in time to where we are in the present time…today… right now …. this event (assume it actually would occur) would be in the future… it did not occur yet (good for us) ,but….
20) this implies we should not take for granted our current situation of exixtance (the jaw- all the related tissues- bone- blood- cells-nerves- muscles- a coordinating soul- all directly connected to a Creator in our daily life) because….
21) if we/ one – does …. our life (views/ perceptions/- being prerecorded- assumption- but provable) can be played back (Judgement part)
22) implied we were oblivious to a creator in “real world” (hence article – or implied evil structure foisted on us- becomes transparent when reading article)
23) great job author
24) no time to double check- plea excuse grammar issues/auto correct issues/ spelling check malfunctioning
Oh forgot to mention- along with the missing “jaw” part was the implied but not stated “pain” part
1) I think the real “pain” is the realization (in real time in the future event- if it occurred) that one took for granted a Creator exists- now (today- right now as one is reading this) via anti social evil programming
2) hence article
3) great author (and fantastic choice of picture!!!)
Post Script
Best part of the article was the picture because it was “super smart choice” (article flows perfectly after like maple ultra smooth viscosity… flows kind of on the unconscious realm)
Picture choice:
1) hidden
2) values
3) progression
4) implied de-gression
Really great choice of picture
I really think the picture is the most under- rated part of writing- but I believe the most important (because at the end of the day- we remember the picture not the words)
Great job author!!!
Hey new article on saker web- page entitled “Role religion and philosophy in Western society”
1) They just beat me to the punch so to speak- because that was exactly whyI am here – trying to post that exact same premise about this article (which now I know they already did- so I may be redundency – (I did not read that one yet- but did see title while scrolling down to get to this one)
2) so I wanted to post the parallel connection to culture and religion…and its perceived decline…(which I am doing as you read this) but…
3) now have to check out that one- my radio in my car alone with all connection “broke” yesterday- can read it while getting it repaired, at dealer , sometime I hope.
Very well written and thought provoking…if tongue in cheek…article. Thank you.
Actually it did not break yesterday but in fact the day before yesterday (Saturday) not being able to find a spot in Costco- getting ticked – suddenly -somehow radio offs itself- can’t turn it back on.
That event in no way was related to anything that happened next day
(Although now I am starting to rethink …only now…not so sure anymore)
Then there was the life of each family, whose members included those who lived long ago by virtue of their graves in the parish churchyard and by virtue of remembering those same members and others often in prayers for the departed.
This is important very important!! Our world has become so hypersexualized that virginity is something not be cherished but despised and thrown away. Young people want to be fully educated and experienced before finding a partner for life. Isn’t that a sad thing throwing away something that actually doesn’t belong to you but to your mate and for life really? And doesn’t this play such an important role in a countries culture and life and why we are told:
He will turn the hearts of the parents to their children, and the hearts of the children to their parents; or else I will come and strike the land with total destruction.” Malachi 4:6
Time for a song I’d say sob, sob and a prayer God please visit your Church and help us and purify us once again with a time of refreshing from the presence of the Lord.
https://youtu.be/Q3aP5iuJITg
development occurs according to vision, will, integrity and knowing the difference between reality and illusion.
The core problem for a nation is Subversion/Misdirection of Vision, and alienation from Reality by Perception Management.
Christianity on its own is incomplete. Christianity has a Hierarchy, and asserts Faith over Reality (ie. Faith is more profoud than physical-reality evidence), so it is a prime tool to manipulate vision and mis-direct consequent action.
For Christianity to avoid being a tool, it needs an environment that has integrity and is physical-reality aware.