#judeo-christian reconciliation

[straynoahide]

towards a post supersessionist theology and judeo-christian reconciliation

I'm writing this post as a way to set in order my own theological and spiritual beliefs, fully knowing that 1) the topic is controversial, 2) there isn't and has never been a single doctrinal interpretation within Christianity, 3) the consensus or lack of consensus Christians reach regarding the Old Covenant determines how we relate to Judaism and living Jews as a people and community.

I want to offer more than anything my own interpretations, but heavily influenced by the Hebrew Catholic perspective and tradition, in so far as "Hebrew Catholicism" is not a denomination but a set of liturgies and cultural traditions that are observed with varying degrees of personal or familial commitment, varying interpretation in themselves; it is not an unified theology.

What it is, however, is a metaphorical and literal place of both Jewish and gentile coreligionaries that, I think, makes us within the church have a singular perspective and relation to Am Yisrael, which can be used for the positive, where in the beginning of the Church, the Jewish Christians of the I Century and first Gentile Christians, these relations became volatile and led to a lot of grief. In the XXI century, however, the challenges are different- we have different factions within the Catholic Church, some still politically antisemitic, some still spiritually antisemitic, and that is worth standing against with both historical insight and conceptual-moral clarity, in the light of the Gospel and its Message of universal love.

Index of topics I want to cover.

PHILOSEMITISM

SUPERSESSIONISM

INTERFAITH AND CHURCH WORK

ON PHILOSEMITISM

Last clarification- I am not a philosemitic Christian. I am a philosemitic person, who is a Christian of a Hebrew-speaking tradition. I am only a philosemite in the etymological sense, like I can be regarded as a Philhellene because I admire Greek culture, speak Greek and participate in Greek cultural institutions. I can't be swayed by reticence or suspicion into throwing away this characterization just because other Christians have been assholes to Jews while stating their doctrine regards Jews as especial souls, or want to trigger a doomsday prophecy instead of fighting for justice.

What I see is a world where the "normal to Jews" has been disproportionate antisemitism, with a singular form of tyranny from Europeans, Islamics, etc, making specifically targeted crimes against humanity. Being "neutral" to Jews is not enough politically, that's why I am proudly philosemitic. You can't make justice by being colorblind, you can't jump to a postracial society without seeing racialized reality. You can't make justice towards Israel and Jews by being neutral about antisemitism, while not rejecting political antizionism as a proxy for current jihadism and holocaust continuism.

This is lost to many here because their entire activism is performative and not materially significant, but you need to actually love the people you are defending, in this as in any endeavor in life. You are a shitty activist if you say you defend a group but don't actually have personal relationships and positive affects towards those people.

Hebrew Catholics by definition cannot be "philosemitic Christians". Hebrew Catholics who are Jewish have a relationship of identity with Jewishness. Therefore, some Hebrew Catholics are literally, "Jewish Christians", and many identify as Christian Jews too, although obviously that is a point of controversy from people observant to Judaism that includes cultural beliefs about an ethnoreligious identity (and less controversial to more secular Diaspora Jews who don't share these cultural beliefs about Jewishness so strongly, and dissociate Judaism and Jewishness in themselves more easily).

Hebrew Catholics who are gentiles, like me, have a relationship of kinship with Jews, although not identity. A philo-whatever is a foreign admirer. I am not a foreigner to my own people- my own here meaning the Hebrew Catholics. We also, having our own worldview, make no ethnic or national distinctions. A gentile, Peruvian, Spanish, Israeli, Jewish or non-Jewish Hebrew Catholic is equally a Hebrew Catholic so long as they share the tradition and spirituality.

The Hebrew tradition is not a "foreign tradition" in the Church either, it is intrinsic, because Jewish Christians have existed since the religious doctrine was established, and could not have been established without ancient Israelite religion from which it sprang just like Rabbinic Judaism from the Pharisaic doctrines. Jewish heritage is both its basis and the substrate from which many of the polemics of Christ against what came before make sense, and cannot ever be dissociated from any doctrinal analysis.

ON SUPERSESSIONISM

To anyone less familiar with the formal definition, Supersessionism is the idea that the Mosaic Covenant, giving the moral laws of Judaism, was "replaced" by the New Covenant during the time of Christ, the Mitzvah Hadashah or New Commandment; that the Chosen People were replaced by all of humanity in God's eyes. Everything in Christianity is "New" and it can be perceived as pejorative to the "Old", but in terms of communities, the Old and the New have become contemporaneously different and cohabitate.

A lot of evil has come from the fallout and appropriation of Supersessionist beliefs by non-Jewish Christians since the times of the Roman Empire. It reduced Jews to a charicature, either to become an exemplary minority or a stained minority, but in both cases reduced to a role imposed by an external entity and ignoring the self-development of their own ancestral worldview into Judaism in the Diaspora.

The response to that fall-out has also rarely been good. One polemic against Supersessionism is that of the Messianics, which is nihilistic of Judaism, and appropriative: "Everyone is a Jew" - obviously false, even Christ made conceptual distinctions between Jews and Gentiles, he just did not make distinctions of dignity and spiritual kinship. Another response, from the resonation of captivity and exilic narratives with people who have been under the yoke of slavery, is the Black Hebrew Israelite response, which is also appropriative: "we were the Jews". Again, obviously false.

I think supersessionism has three components you can analyze separately but flow together: the spiritual component, the identitary component, and the political component.

Political supersessionism is when a usually theocratic Christian society makes supersessionist doctrine a point of argument into what Jews, in that society, are supposed to be or to be allowed to do. From forced conversions, to ghettos, to Nuremberg laws emanate from this relationship of, fundamentally, racial supremacy. Political supersessionism has no place in liberal democracy or the modern Church, that has embraced Christian Democracy over theocracy when dealing with modern society.

The identitary and spiritual components are harder to dissociate but I think this is precisely where we should imagine and build a post supersessionist theology and not fall into the previously mentioned pitfalls. I think the message of the Gospel is universal and this is not a bad thing. But the God of History in the biblical narrative, is a national God, because so far History is a History of national narratives, and Jesus Christ was a Jewish man in Judea. Jews still exist, living Jews. It is their nation. And the nation needs true allies, not condescension.

These are two spiritual truths that exist in complement and not in opposition to one another. God's Israel is Israel, the Israelites, the Jewish People, Israeli Jews and Diaspora, in biblical times as today. But he is also the King of the Universe (Adonai Elohim, Melech HaOlam), HaShem governs us all, and thus is also our Father.

This is compatible in Judaism and it is compatible in Christianity, which does share a lot with Jewish thought still. Spiritual universalism, universal values, and the national identity are not incompatible beliefs. Justice must acknowledge both. We must acknowledge Jewish indigeneity, Jewish self-determined security, and Jewish right to a national existence; not from religious beliefs, not because of supersession, but because it is the right thing to do, because this is what our world is like right now, and also, because Jewish humanity should be, WAS, the main acknowledgement of the Gospel, nothing more, and nothing less; it was a Jewish story, setin a Jewish society, with real Jewish people, and as every humanity, contains all the good and all the bad.

ON INTERFAITH AND CHURCH WORK

Dual-Covenant theology itself is another attempt to escape the supersessionist fallout which has its problems. It states that the Mosaic Covenant is still binding to Jews but that the New Covenant only applies to Gentiles. Hebrew Catholicism perhaps exposes the problems with this the best: it creates a tiered distinction of Christians, with different obligations and relationship to God depending on your ethnic origin. That is deeply unchristlike.

Hebrew Catholic congregations allow the celebration of Mosaic traditions voluntarily, depending on each personal or family's tradition, but as cultural practices and not as practices of religious observance. Some families sit Seders, others don't. It is unrelated to ethnic or national background. Instead of trying to fit Judaism into the Christian worldview, it allows Jewishness to exist, unerased, at ease and without tension, inside a Christian spiritual life. All liturgy, all rites are Catholic. It is not schismatic nor heretical.

I really think this is the best and the only way, perhaps. Everyone, every community is entitled to our own worldviews and beliefs, which include beliefs about our culture, beliefs about other people- but what we are not allowed to is imposing that on others, or dictating to others what their culture and religion and rites' significance are.

Hebrew Catholicism bridges the distance between Jews and Christians better than any other ideology, even secular ones I think, because Judaism is centric to Jewishness even to most secular Jews (Diaspora or Israeli hilonim). The way to make that bridge, is by aiming for a post-supersessionist theology and lifestyle.

What Church work could accomplish this? First, the very existence of Hebrew-speaking congregations in Israel where you show instead of telling. Just like the Druze are full members of Israeli society, we have to show that so are Christians, who to many are still associated only with antizionist Palestinians. Second, the doctrinal things I am mentioning. It is in this kind of manner that you get things like Nostra Aetate, which rebuked Jewish Deicide. Perhaps not in a decade, perhaps not under this Pope- perhaps not even in my lifetime, but I see it clearly and it is my hope that post-supersessionist interfaith relations between Jews and Christians are possible.

The descendants of Bnei Anusim, more than anyone, deserve a world in which their national, communitarian and religious identities are not at tension because of the more parochial or narrower perspectives of others. PD: whether you are a monolingual Jew or a gentile Christian, speaking to HaShem in Hebrew is beautiful. I'm not just speaking of prayer. Learn a random sentence, try it at least once! Maybe you will feel the רוח הקודש renewed.

[straynoahide]

wow🤍I do understand the reticence and the pain, which is why moments like this matter so much and these words have all the more weight.

we need to move to a world of judeo-christian reconciliation and i'll also do everything for it, hopefully with both the support of jews and christians, but even if i have to swim against the tide.

i just don't see another option. we can't undo the past but we can learn to be together.

with all respect to dati and haredi folks i relate a lot to clerical and family pressure, communities of coertion, etc. - in a different way of course. but i also come from religious trauma. i have always known when the way someone treats another person, religious or non-religious, is or is not an echo of the divine, across all sorts of boundaries. ethnic, national, gender, class, etc. traditionalism and religion are also not necessarily the same values, and sometimes it is traditional mores that get religious justification.

meanwhile, goodness is goodness. it is eternal and universal. for me, hashem is the god of am yisrael but the king of the universe - no tension, no contradiction, nothing to replace nor diminish.

i'm still on my own spiritual journey. my blood family is from spain and i'm ethnically iberian; i'm gentile, but i have ties and people in israel, some jewish and some not, and maybe i will die there, and before that we'll be compatriots, who knows.

it's heartwarming to see confirmed -bc i really know it's there, whether it's what we face or not in particular moments- the open, plural jewish democracy as the soul of israel.

as the early jewish christians said, shalom shalom :)

Man, making and commenting on Jumblr posts as someone who is racially and ethnically but not religiously Jewish is rough sometimes. I'm so tired of people going "your username says you're a Christian so you have no place in this discussion. Shut up!" First off, just because I'm a Christian doesn't mean I'm not also a Jew. Not all Jews are by way of their religion! Like, I shouldn't have to give a detailed account of my lineage every single time I say something in a community that I'm a part of??? Like, maybe don't assume someone's an outsider just because their username and profile picture doesn't explicitly mention their status as part of the community??? I'm sorry(/sarc), I didn't realize my faith in Jesus invalidates my heritage as a Jew, descended from a long line of Rabbis, and (as far as my parents have told me) from the tribe of Levi!

[readingsquotes]

"As deployed by the United States in conjunction with the continuing War on Terror (invoked wherever Islamist forces might threaten American foreign interests), human rights even come to appear more akin to a religion than to uniformly enforceable law. Indeed, Meister argues that Human Rights Discourse bears the marks of a secularized Judeo-Christian world religion claiming to supersede on a global scale the evil, pagan, and cyclical past of revolution and counterrevolution. (In mainstream usage, “Judeo-Christian” is synonymous with “Western civilization.��) Provocatively, Meister suggests that the Judeo-Christian unconscious of Human Rights Discourse is manifest in its universalization of Jewish suffering in the Holocaust as the sacrificial usher of a new era, in a manner analogous to the early Christian Saint Paul’s description of Christianity’s birth through the universalization of the suffering of Christ, the Jewish Messiah. The most grotesque pitfall of Human Rights Discourse is that it accompanies a global order which allows Israel to be the most glaring Western exception to 21st century humanitarianism—giving fuel to old and new varieties of antisemitism, which take Jewish peoplehood to be exceptional or intrinsically malign. In Meister’s description, the cardinal principles of Human Rights Discourse state that the victims of past atrocity are passive and innocent, the perpetrators are the handful of leaders who were tried at Nuremberg or The Hague, and most beneficiaries of injustice are allowed to keep their benefits if they acknowledge that the atrocity belongs to a time which must be placed in the past. Nowhere is this as clear as in present-day Germany. There, post-reunification Holocaust remembrance culture (Erinnerungskultur) has papered over a denazification process that was grossly incomplete at best, and actively undermined at worst, especially in the former West. This instance of justice-as-reconciliation is now supplemented by the nebulous notion that Israel’s security is Germany’s “Staatsräson,” or reason of state, as articulated by Chancellor Angela Merkel and reiterated by Olaf Scholz. The Staatsräson has become a pillar of German national debate in the wake of October 7th. While declaring steadfast support for Israel as it wages war on a besieged civilian population, liberal humanitarian Germans empathize and identify with the exterminated European Jews as abstracted and idealized innocent victims. Germany has been ostensibly relieved of its “Jewish question” so totally that German commentators will go so far as to proclaim that due to its unwavering support of Israel, Germany is now in itself a victim of antisemitism."

-

January 27, 2024

Critique & Essays

Palestine’s Martyrdom Upends the World of Law

Bassem Saad

[mysterealist]

Mystery#1: Why are most Democrat held districts mostly run-down urban areas, & still continue to vote in democrats?

Mystery#2: Has the decline of The Public's Faith in Biden, opened the eye's of a nation to the False Promises & Mass Manipulation of Cultural Marxism & The Entire Democratic Party's stranglehold around Our Nation's Cities?

In the vast tapestry of American politics, the fabric of liberal democrat values has experienced a perceptible unraveling in recent years. As the Biden administration took the reins, cities across America found themselves embroiled in a storm of controversy, their foundations shaken by the weight of corrupt leadership and divisive policies. From coast to coast, the once vibrant landscapes now bear the scars of ideological discord and governmental ineptitude.

In the wake of this tumult, it becomes increasingly evident that the public's faith in liberal democrat values is waning. Cities, once beacons of progress and prosperity, have become battlegrounds of rhetoric and finger-pointing. The blame game, a hallmark of contemporary politics, takes precedence over meaningful action and genuine dialogue.

From the onset, it was clear that certain figures within the administration had a target in their sights. The divisive rhetoric and incessant accusations served only to deepen the chasm of mistrust between citizens and their elected leaders. Instead of fostering unity and progress, these leaders chose the path of division, sowing seeds of discontent at every turn.

One cannot ignore the stark reality that our nation's traditional values are under siege. The bedrock principles upon which America was built—freedom, democracy, and justice—are threatened by a tide of political correctness and cultural Marxism. Our history, once celebrated as a testament to the resilience of the human spirit, is now vilified and dismissed as irrelevant.

At the heart of this cultural upheaval lies a fundamental disregard for our Judeo-Christian heritage. The values that once bound us together as a nation are now cast aside in favor of a narrative that seeks to undermine our collective identity. Rather than embracing our shared history, some seek to rewrite it, erasing the contributions of those who came before us.

Perhaps most troubling of all is the systematic erosion of our rights and freedoms. Whether it's the removal of historical monuments or the infringement upon private property, the democratic party has shown a willingness to sacrifice individual liberties on the altar of political expediency. What was once considered sacrosanct is now subject to the whims of an increasingly authoritarian regime.

The cultural Marxist conspiracy, as some have labeled it, poses a clear and present danger to the fabric of American society. It seeks not only to rewrite history but to erase it entirely, replacing truth with propaganda and justice with oppression. It is a threat not just to our way of life, but to the very essence of who we are as a nation.

As we confront these challenges, it is incumbent upon us to reclaim our voice and reaffirm our commitment to the principles that have guided us for generations. We must reject the politics of division and embrace a vision of unity and reconciliation. Only then can we hope to heal the wounds of the past and build a brighter future for all Americans.

In the end, the fate of our nation rests in our hands. We must stand firm in defense of our values and resolute in our determination to preserve the legacy of freedom and democracy for future generations. The road ahead may be fraught with peril, but it is also filled with promise and possibility. Let us rise to the occasion and forge a path toward a more perfect union, one built upon the enduring principles of truth, justice, and liberty for all.

written by,

Mr. Realist

KC KP 2024

[straynoahide]

Jewish Deicide and Supersessionism are two trashy ideas responsible for so much violence against the Jewish People. Forever a stain in the history of Christianity. Hopefully not in its future. Step by step towards Judeo-Christian reconciliation.

[boratos]

confessional

The confessional room is seen as better fashioned than the outdated reconciliation rooms. The reconciliation room had penitents face to face with the priest with no barrier. The confessional design has the latticed screens to separate both parties. The screen is to make people feel there’s more anonymity between parties for them to feel more honest. Both parties face parallel instead of having to face each other.

The confessional's design hides the priest from the penitents, but allows the penitents to be seen by the public. To me, it’s interesting that the penitent cares most about what the priest hears and not anyone catching them in the act of a confessional. The latticed screen still provides visibility, and the voice is still recognizable. However, it’s this suspension of belief that is enough to satisfy.

confession, in the Judeo-Christian tradition, the acknowledgment of sinfulness in public or private, regarded as necessary to obtain divine forgiveness.

With the system that's been set up it is or feels needed to have acknowledgment of your wrongdoings to get the ultimate forgiveness and therefore bringing you closer to god.

+1 barrier (adding the latticed screen between both parties allows more honesty because it’s a less intimate setting)

-1 inhibitions (feel like you can be more honest because the priest won’t see your face and recognize you)

[terrifickid]

The idea of separation from God can be found in various religious and philosophical traditions, but it's most prominently discussed in the context of Judeo-Christian theology.

In the Judeo-Christian tradition, the concept of separation from God is often linked to the biblical narrative of the Fall of Man, as described in the Book of Genesis. According to this narrative, Adam and Eve, the first human beings, were created in a state of harmony and communion with God in the Garden of Eden. However, they disobeyed God's command not to eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, leading to their expulsion from the Garden and their subsequent estrangement from God.

This separation from God is understood to have introduced sin and brokenness into the world, creating a rift between humanity and the divine. As a result, humans are seen as spiritually separated from God and in need of reconciliation. This theme of separation and reconciliation is central to Christian theology, where Jesus Christ is often portrayed as the means of restoring the relationship between God and humanity through his sacrificial death and resurrection.

Outside of Judeo-Christian theology, the idea of separation from the divine can be found in other religious and philosophical traditions, where it may be conceptualized in different ways. For example, in Hinduism, the concept of samsara (the cycle of birth, death, and rebirth) involves a sense of spiritual separation from ultimate reality (Brahman) due to ignorance and attachment to worldly desires. Similarly, in Buddhism, the concept of dukkha (suffering or dissatisfaction) arises from the illusion of a separate self and the craving for permanence in an impermanent world.

[perestroika-hilton]

meszaros on the “judeo-christian” approach to the concept of alienation below the cut I plan on reading the whole book this summer bc I like what ive read of necessity of social control 

As is well known, Feuerbach, Hegel and English Political Economy exercised the most direct influence on the formation of Marx's theory of alienation. But we are concerned here with much more than simple intellectual influences. The concept of alienation belongs to a vast and complex problematics, with a long history of its own. Preoccupations with this problematics – in forms ranging from the Bible to literary works as well as treatises on Law, Economy and Philosophy – reflect objective trends of European development, from slavery to the age of transition from capitalism to socialism. Intellectual influences, revealing important continuities across the transformations of social structures, acquire their real significance only if they are considered in this objective framework of development. If so assessed, their importance – far from being exhausted in mere historical curiosity – cannot be stressed enough: precisely because they indicate the deep-rootedness of certain problematics as well as the relative autonomy of the forms of thought in which they are reflected.[6]

It must be made equally clear, however, that such influences are exercised in the dialectical sense of “continuity in discontinuity”. Whether the element of continuity predominates over discontinuity or the other way round, and in what precise form and correlation, is a matter for concrete historical analysis. As we shall see, in the case of Marx's thought in its relation to antecedent theories discontinuity is the “übergreifendes Moment”, but some elements of continuity are also very important.

Some of the principal themes of modern theories of alienation appeared in European thought, in one form or another, many centuries ago. To follow their development in detail would require copious volumes. In the few pages at our disposal we cannot attempt more than an outline of the general trends of this development, describing their main characteristics insofar as they link up with Marx's theory of alienation and help to throw light on it.

1. The Judeo-Christian Approach The first aspect we have to consider is the lament about being “alienated from God” (or having “fallen from Grace”) which belongs to the common heritage of Judeo-Christian mythology. The divine order, it is said, has been violated; man has alienated himself from “the ways of God”, whether simply by “the fall of man” or later by “the dark idolatries of alienated Judah”,[7] or later again by the behaviour of “Christians alienated from the life of God”.[8] The messianic mission consists in rescuing man from this state of self-alienation which he had brought upon himself.

But this is as far as the similarities go in the Judeo-Christian problematics; and far-reaching differences prevail in other respects. For the form in which the messianic transcendence of alienation is envisaged is not a matter of indifference. “Remember” – says Paul the Apostle – “that ye were without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenant of promise, having no hope, and without God in the world: But now in Christ Jesus ye who sometimes were far off are made High by the blood of Christ.... Now therefore ye are no more strangers and foreigners, but fellow-citizens with the saints, and of the household of God; And are built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner stone; In whom all the building fitly framed together groweth unto an holy temple in the Lord: In whom ye also are builded together for an habitation of God through the Spirit.”[9] Christianity thus, in its universality, announces the imaginary solution of human self-alienation in the form of “the mystery of Christ.”[10] This mystery postulates the reconciliation of the contradictions which made groups of people oppose each other as “strangers”, “foreigners”, “enemies”. This is not only a reflection of a specific form of social struggle but at the same time also its mystical “resolution” which induced Marx to write: “It was only in appearance that Christianity overcame real Judaism. It was too refined, too spiritual to eliminate the crudeness of practical need except by raising it into the ethereal realm. Christianity is the sublime thought of Judaism. Judaism is the vulgar practical application of Christianity. But this practical application could only become universal when Christianity as perfected religion had accomplished, in a theoretical fashion, the alienation of man from himself and from nature.”[11]

Judaism in its “crude” realism reflects with a much greater immediacy the actual state of affairs, advocating a virtually endless continuation of the extension of its worldly powers – i.e. settling for a “quasi-messianic” solution on earth: this is why it is in no hurry whatsoever about the arrival of its Messiah – in the form of two, complementary, postulates:

1. the softening of internal class conflicts, in the interest of the cohesion of the national community in its confrontation with the outside world of the “strangers”: “For the poor shall never cease out of the land: therefore I command thee, saying, Thou shalt open thy hand wide unto thy brother, to thy poor, and to thy needy, in thy land.”[12]

2. the promise of readmission into the grace of God is partly fulfilled in the form of granting the power of domination over the “strangers” to Judah: “And strangers shall stand and feed your flocks, and the sons of the alien shall be your ploughmen and your vinedressers.”[13]

The formidable practical vehicle of this expanding domination was the weapon of “usury” which needed, however, in order to become really effective, its suitable counterpart which offered an unlimited outlet for the power of this weapon: i.e. the metamorphosis of Judaism into Christianity. For “Judaism attains its apogee with the perfection of civil society; but civil society only reaches perfection in the Christian world. Only under the sway of Christianity, which objectifies a national, natural, moral and theoretical relationships, could civil society separate itself completely from the life of the state, sever all the species-bonds of man, establish egoism and selfish need in their place, and dissolve the human world into a world of atomistic, antagonistic individuals.”[14]

The ethos of Judaism which stimulated this development was not confined to the general assertion of the God-willed superiority of the “chosen people” in its confrontation with the world of strangers, issuing in commands like this: “Ye shall not eat any thing that dieth of itself: thou shalt give it unto the stranger that is in thy gates, that he may eat it; or thou mayest sell it unto an alien: for thou art an holy people unto the Lord thy God.”[15] Far more important was in the practical sense the absolute prohibition imposed on the exploitation of the sons of Judah through usury: “If thou lend money to any of my people that is poor by thee, thou shalt not be to him an usurer, neither shalt thou lay upon him usury.”[16] Usury was only allowed in dealings with strangers, but not with “brethren”.

Christianity, by contrast, which refused to retain this discrimination between “any of my people” and “strangers” (or “aliens”) postulating in its place the “universal brotherhood of mankind”, not only deprived itself of the powerful weapon of “usury” (i.e. of “interest” and the accumulation of capital coupled with it) as the most important vehicle of early economic expansion but at the same time also became an easy prey to the triumphant advance of the “spirit of Judaism”. The “crude and vulgar practical principle of Judaism” discussed by Marx – i.e. the effectively self-centred, internally cohesive, practical-empirical partiality could easily triumph over the abstract theoretical universality of Christianity established as a set of “purely formal rites with which the world of self-interest encircles itself”.[17] (On the importance of “usury” and the controversies related to it at the time of the rise of early capitalism)

It is very important to emphasise here that the issue at stake is not simply the empirical reality of Jewish communities in Europe but “the spirit of Judaism”; i.e. the internal principle of European social developments culminating in the emergence and stabilisation of capitalistic society. “The spirit of Judaism”, therefore, must be understood, in the last analysis, to mean “the spirit of capitalism”. For an early realisation of the latter Judaism as an empirical reality only provided a suitable vehicle. Ignoring this distinction, for one reason or another, could lead – as it did throughout the ages – to scapegoat-hunting anti-Semitism. The objective conditions of European social development, from the dissolution of pre-feudal society to the Universal triumph of capitalism over feudalism, must be assessed in their comprehensive complexity of which Judaism as a sociological phenomenon is a part only, however important a part it may have been at certain stages of this development.

Judaism and Christianity are complementary aspects of society's efforts to cope with its internal contradictions. They both represent attempts at an imaginary transcendence of these contradictions, at an illusory “reappropriation” of the “human essence” through a fictitious supersession of the state of alienation. Judaism and Christianity express the contradictions of “partiality versus universality” and “competition versus monopoly”: i.e. internal contradictions of what has become known as “the spirit of capitalism”. In this framework the success of partiality can only be conceived in contradiction to and at the expense of universality – just as this “universality” can only prevail on the basis of the suppression of partiality – and vice versa. Similarly with the relationship between competition and monopoly: the condition of success of “competition” is the negation of monopoly just as for monopoly the condition of extending its power is the suppression of competition. The partiality of Judaism, the “chimerical nationality of the Jew is the nationality of the trader, and above all of the financier”[18] – writes Marx, repeatedly emphasising that “the social emancipation of the Jew is the emancipation of society from Judaism”,[19] i.e. from the partiality of the financier's “nationality”, or, expressed in more general terms, from “the Jewish narrowness of society”.[20] “Jewish narrowness” could triumph in “civil society” because the latter required the dynamism of the “supremely practical Jewish spirit” for its full development. The metamorphosis of Judaism into Christianity carried with it a later metamorphosis of Christianity into a more evolved, less crudely partial form of – secularised – Judaism: “The Jew has emancipated himself in a Jewish manner, not only by acquiring the power of money, but also because money had become, through him and also apart from him, a world power, while the practical Jewish spirit has become the practical spirit of the Christian nations. The Jews have emancipated themselves in so far as the Christians have become Jews.”[21] Protestant modifications of earlier established Christianity, in various national settings, had accomplished a relatively early metamorphosis of “abstract-theoretical” Christianity into “practical-Christian-Judaism” as a significant step in the direction of the complete secularisation of the whole problematics of alienation. Parallel to the expanding domination of the spirit of capitalism in the practical sphere, the ideological forms have become more and more secular as well; from the various versions of “deism” through “humanistic atheism” to the famous declaration stating that “God is dead”. By the time of the latter even the illusions of “universality” with which “the world of self-interest encircles itself” – retained and at times even intensified by deism and humanistic atheism – have become acutely embarrassing for the bourgeoisie and a sudden, often cynical, transition had to be made to the open cult of partiality.

As has been mentioned, under the conditions of class society because of the inherent contradiction between the “part” and the “whole”, due to the fact that partial interest dominates the whole of society – the principle of partiality stands in an insoluble contradiction to that of Universality. Consequently it is the crude relation of forces that elevates the prevailing form of partiality into a bogus universality, whereas the ideal-oriented negation of this partiality, e.g. the abstract-theoretical universality of Christianity, before its metamorphosis into “practical-Christian-Judaism” – must remain illusory, fictitious, impotent. For “partiality” and “universality” in their reciprocal opposition to each other are two facets of the same, alienated, state of affairs. Egoistic partiality must be elevated to “universality” for its fulfilment: the underlying socioeconomic dynamism is both “self-centred” and “outer-directed”, “nationalist” and “cosmopolitan”, “protectionist-isolationist” and “imperialist” at the same time. This is why there can be no room for genuine universality, only for the bogus universalisation of the crudest partiality, coupled with an illusory, abstract-theoretical postulate of universality as the – merely ideological – negation of effective, practically prevailing partiality. Thus the “chimerical nationality of the Jew” is all the more chimerical because – insofar as it is “the nationality of the trader and of the financier” – it is in reality the only effective universality: partiality turned into operative universality, into the fundamental organising principle of the society in question. (The mystifications of anti-Semitism become obvious if one realises that it turns against the mere sociological phenomenon of Jewish partiality, and not against “the Jewish narrowness of society”; it attacks partiality in its limited immediacy, and thus not only does it not face the real problem: the partiality of capitalist self-interest turned into the ruling universal principle of society, but actively supports its own object of attack by means of this disorienting mystification.)

For Marx, in his reflections on the Judeo-Christian approach to the problems of alienation, the matter of central concern was to find a solution that could indicate a way out of the apparently perennial impasse: the renewed reproduction, in different forms, of the same contradiction between partiality and universality which characterised the entire historical development and its ideological reflections. His answer was not simply the double negation of crude partiality and abstract universality. Such a solution would have remained an abstract conceptual opposition and no more. The historical novelty of Marx's solution consisted in defining the problem in terms of the concrete dialectical concept of “partiality prevailing as universality”, in opposition to genuine universality which alone could embrace the manifold interests of society as a whole and of man as a “species-being” (Gattungswesen - i.e. man liberated from the domination of crude, individualistic self-interest). It was this specific, socially concrete concept which enabled Marx to grasp the problematics of capitalist society in its full contradictoriness and to formulate the programme of a practical transcendence of alienation by means of a genuinely universalising fusion of ideal and reality, theory and practice.

Also, we have to emphasise in this context that Marx had nothing to do with abstract “humanism” because he opposed right from the outset – as we have seen in the quotations taken from On the Jewish Question, written in 1843 – the illusions of abstract universality as a mere postulate, an impotent “ought”, a fictitious “reappropriation of non-alienated humanness”. There is no trace, therefore, of what might be termed “ideological concepts” in the thought of the young Marx who writes On the Jewish Question, let alone in the socioeconomically far more concrete reflections contained in the Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts of 1844.

[straynoahide]

I can't find my old reblog of this for some reason but, the gist in interfaith relations: Judeo-Christian reconciliation can never be built on the basis of prioritizing one worldview over the other. This message is inherently biased and tone-deaf against Christianity.

What "emphatically is or isn't" in Scripture is not really something someone outside a faith group has a vote in when it comes to a supernaturalist worldview, that's not how it works. We don't believe in things because they are literally in a text. Exegesis takes more.

Christianity will never not interpret its own worldview and doctrines in its own sacred texts, that the Hebrew Bible has come to be. The Logos and the Trinity are Eternal truth to Christians and they don't begin appearing in the NT, they begin with Creation, of course.

Judaism's canon has a similar problem with regards to Samaritanism and with regards to 'itself', to the Israelite religion at the time each part was drawn from, across centuries, amidst older oral traditions.

When your Torah is the Pentateuch, the Nevi'im of the Hebrew Bible become re-interpretations and revisions of historical events that a group (now) external to you disagrees with, and it irks you. This is what prophecy is. Any of these "bibles" are polyphonic, they are libraries of traditions, and prophecies are necessarily revisionist of past events from a 'literal' perspective, sometimes contradictory, sometimes unfulfilled not by textual design. Christian doctrine began as a schismatic form of Jewish thought and it is inextricable from the existence of Jewish tradition to begin with.

I am really not bothered by this because I know it is possible to share a corpus of literature as Scripture, while still having separate beliefs and worldviews. It isn't inherently disrespectful, "irksome" maybe, because that has a lot to do with internal life and not interfaith stuff.

One doing something right only means the other doing something wrong if you see doctrinal differences as adversarial, which should not happen in an interfaith framework that respects being different. I'm not bothered when someone says, "in my religion, this man does not meet the criteria for a Messiah", bc that's not about me.

Please do not inherently see Christian affirmation as Jewish negation, just because Christians have wanted to make antisemitic, political uses of doctrine.

I'm not Christian or Jewish so take what I say with a grain of salt.

But I think a big stumbling block in interfaith relations between Christianity and Judaism is the Christian practice of back tracing Christian doctrine into Jewish texts, cultural motifs, and practices.

Like somebody opening up the Tanakh and looking for the Trinity or Christ would probably irk me a bit. Or seeing a Christ where there emphatically is not one. It all sort of suggests that Jews are doing Judaism wrong.

[academicatheism]

Social Contractualism and Procedural Realism: Durkheim’s Reconciliation

In pursuing the origin of morality without recourse to a god, whether Judeo-Christian or otherwise, Procedural Realism emerged as arguably one of the stronger theories. Non-theistic philosophers have also defended Social Contractualism and offered it as a sound theory to explain the origin and workings of morality. It should come as no surprise then that the two theories can be reconciled with one another. Durkheim presents this reconciliation in a surprising manner.

When speaking of the authority the totem has on clan societies, Durkheim suggests that the totem, like society itself, has a moral power that, though imagined as external and distinct from the individual, becomes internalized by members of the clan. Durkheim states that “since society can exist only in the individual minds and through them, it must penetrate and become organized in us; it becomes an integral part of our being, and in so doing it elevates and enlarges that being” (Durkheim, The Elementary Forms of Religious Life, 157). Interestingly, this is in keeping with Korsgaard’s internalization of man, the notion that individuals internalize external authority when they achieve autonomy for purposes of assuming self-governance (Korsgaard, Reflections on the Evolution of Morality, 25).

This is perhaps why there has been widespread confusion that morality is simply culturally relativistic. While it is the case that morality might involve an external authority, whether religious or societal, becoming internalized, Korsgaard and social contractualists do not discount the role reason plays once moral authority becomes internalized. In other words, an autonomous individual living under a fascist regime and another autonomous individual in a similar situation can come to the same conclusion that their governments are acting immorally. A truly autonomous individual is not swayed by coercion or even threats to one’s life and as such, such an individual will make modifications to the moral tenets they internalized. For instance, if a person living in the United States in the 1950s internalized the authority of a society that segregated African Americans and Whites, it does not follow that such an individual will continue to regard segregation as moral simply because it’s legal. A self-governing individual will reason that there’s something amiss about a society that adopts racist ideology such as segregation or apartheid. Reason, as history has shown, can follow moral outrage, a feeling of anger or contempt toward a government that adopts immoral or amoral ideologies. Moral outrage can and has been justified after the fact.

In this way, the social contract is subsumed into the individual who, if she sees fit, can question the way her society is structured and governed. This is precisely how morality has evolved as there are many ideologies and practices in the annals of history that modern people find appalling; people today are at times incredulous when reading, for instance, about a culture that sacrificed children to their gods, especially since this is now considered taboo. Taboos are such because of the internalization and later modification of an external authority. This is why there are ages of consent around the world that no longer correspond to menarche. It is morally reprehensible for an adult to marry a child in most parts of the developed world though it is clear that this taboo was once acceptable.

Ultimately, the reconciliation of social contractualism and procedural realism is unremarkable given the Kantian origins of both theories. Kant proposed something of a moral contract when he suggested to treat others as ends in themselves and never as a means. Further, Kant suggested that rational beings would recognize the autonomy of others, so in a sense, one would see oneself in other people, and so a social contract is simple to uphold because of self-recognition as an end. Since people concerned with the right way to behave uphold this contract, the moral power society wields becomes internalized and modified in individuals; these individuals, in most cases, proceed to persuade others of necessary modifications. This is how progress is arrived at, via the gradual evolution of morality. It would turn out, then, that social contractualism and procedural realism are two sides of the same coin, arriving at the same conclusion though by way of different and seemingly disparate language. Hopefully, given Durkheim’s statement, it is clear now that the language of these two theories is not disparate after all.

[howwelldoyouknowyourmoon]

Moon’s theology was designed to maximize worker output

A Korean Evangelistic Movement in the West

Professor James A. Beckford      1973

... The radical novelty of this group [the Unification Church, now known as the FFWPU] lies in both its peculiar teachings and in its social organization, but perhaps most strikingly is the way in which it effects a conciliation between ostensibly incompatible teachings and principles of organization. For the teachings combine strands of Karmic Buddhism with Christian messianism, spiritualistic metaphysics with Judaic millennialism, and biblical truth with esoteric revelation, while its social organisation combines communal living with autocratic control. ...

... The conjunction of Christian messianic millennialism and schematic meta-physics [polarity, three stages of growth, four-position foundation, parallels of history, etc.] in the set of Unification Church beliefs described above does not amount to a major novelty on the religious scene of the Western world, for a number of groups have already espoused formally similar views. Yet, the additional complication of a perspective borrowing heavily from spiritualistic traditions serves to give the UC a unique distinctiveness among contemporary religious groups. In Korea, of course, the shamanistic tradition has always been dominant, and nearly all the new religions have effected a synthesis between shamanistic elements and a wide diversity of other inspirations. Indeed, the realm of spiritual matters is of the utmost importance to UC members, and their daily activities evince a heightened awareness of a dimension transcending the ‘everyday’ world. Moon’s Divine Principle teaches that the physical and spiritual worlds are indivisible, and that it is possible for man to develop a special sensitivity to spiritual affairs. The aim of the sincere UC member is accordingly to achieve spiritual perfection during earthly existence as a preliminary to joining the ‘limited number’ of Divine Spirits who will enjoy the fruits of a paradisal existence thereafter. ‘Spiritual’ in this context refers to a person’s attitudes towards, and actions in respect of, God, and ‘spiritual perfection’ means adopting attitudes and behaviour-patterns that reflect a relationship of mutual love with God. 

The notion of ‘salvation’ seems inappropriate, therefore, in the UC context, since the opportunity to achieve spiritual perfection arises from the outworking of almost mechanical ‘principles’, and it is the individual’s personal responsibility to improve his own condition.

A further implication of UC belief in the indivisibility of the physical and spiritual realms is that both good and evil spirits are understood to influence the course of everyday events on earth. The allegedly recent upsurge in para-normal phenomena, for example, is said to be partly the result of spirits’ attempts to re-inhabit physical bodies in order to achieve perfection before the time of irrevocable judgement arrives. Thus,

More and more people are speaking in tongues, healing, prophesying, imparting spiritual fire, and performing mighty works at this time. Most, of these are the co-operative ministries of Life-Spirits.5

Since it is believed that Life-Spirits can only establish rapport with people sharing their aims, UC members count themselves an ‘elect on earth’ in a uniquely privileged generation. They therefore link their own specially privileged role with Moon’s divine mission and with the aspirations to perfection of innumerable spirit entities in what they foresee as an imminent period of division.

Illustrative of the strength of interest in spiritualistic matters in the UC is the fact that a highly publicised part of the legitimation for Moon’s claims to messiahship rests upon the evidence of an American spirit-medium. Several publications carry the message of Arthur Ford,  ‘a world-known sensitive’ , that Moon was ‘Truth Incarnate...a prophet…who has tremendous spiritual power and also psychic power...who will bridge the gap between the east and west and the past and the future’. Similarly, Moon’s own account of his divine calling describes an intense vision that he experienced at the age of sixteen in which Christ instructed him to complete the mission that He had failed to accomplish 2,000 years before. It is widely believed amongst UC members that Moon still receives revelations direct from God, although he is also thought to be subject to temptations by satanic spirits.

The UC’s explanation of evil is simple and relatively orthodox by most Christian standards: Satan usurped God’s position as the object of man’s affection, thereby-forestalling the realisation of the happiness that God had intended for Adam and his descendants. Moon’s teachings deviate sharply from Christian traditions, however, in regard to the possibility of overcoming evil, for he adopts a position more closely resembling that of Buddhism. Denying that Jesus cancelled the law of ‘an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth’, Moon teaches that man can discharge his debt of evil by acts of ‘physical indemnity or restitution’ such as fasting, taking cold baths, early rising and exceedingly hard work. He explicitly endorses belief in the operation of an inexorable Law of Karma, holding that:

Those who harm or mistreat their brothers will find themselves in the position of being themselves mistreated if they fail to make amends. If they arrive in the spirit world with unpaid debts, they will have to work to assist perhaps the very ones they hurt in order to pay what they owe.6

Conversely, Moon argues that discomfort, dissatisfaction and disappointment are penalties imposed by Satan on those who try to live by God’s Principle, and this frequently serves as a rationalization for all kinds of failure in UC enterprises. The psychological effectiveness of such a theodicy* probably depends heavily on a very real belief in the active interference of spirit beings in human affairs.

[* Theodicy, in its most common form, is an attempt to answer the question of why a good God permits the manifestation of evil, thus resolving the issue of the problem of evil.]

UC beliefs therefore resemble those of many so-called ‘Little Traditions’ in peasant cultures of South Asia through their fusion of karmic laws and demonic contingencies: Moon’s followers explain evil by reference both to ‘inexorable laws of indemnity’ and to the interference of satanic spirits. If this reconciliation between two distinct theodicies appears to rest upon a paradox, then we must agree with Obeyesekere that ‘the paradox is part of the system and integral to it’.7 In fact, receptivity to the influence of local religious traditions is a distinguishing feature of Buddhism in Asia which helps to explain its ability to embrace theoretically incompatible elements of doctrine and thereby to survive as a viable religious form.

Moon’s teachings on the subject of the denouement of God’s plan for human restitution are the most confused parts of the UC’s total body of beliefs; on the one hand, there are predictions of the imminent collapse of all social systems in the last days of God’s battle with satanic forces, but, on the other, there are statements to the effect that mid-twentieth century history is characterized by fruitful patterns of unification in religion, culture, economics and politics. Nevertheless, Moon has unequivocally identified signs that the Second Advent is in process of occurring: victory for the Allies in World War I symbolized the defeat of the satanic forces that had ensnared Adam; Allied victory in World War II symbolized the defeat of the satanic forces that had prevented Christ from accomplishing His mission; finally, the anticipated frustration of the Soviet Union’s alleged plot to bring the entire world under the communist yoke will symbolize the Lord of the Second Advent’s establishment of freedom, and good on earth. ...

... Similarly, the Western groups [of the UC] have no knowledge of the intensively shamanistic character of Tong-il rituals and beliefs in its homeland nor of the harmonious relations that it enjoys with the South Korean government.

1. ‘Tong-il’ is the native Korean title for the movement known in the West as the Holy Spirit Association for the Unification of World Christianity [or Unification Church, now the Family Federation for World Peace and Unification].

5. The Divine Principle, ed. Young Oon Kim, H.S.A.U.W.C., Washington D.C., 8th edition, 1970, p. 95.

6. Ibid., p. 60.

7. G. Obeyesekere, ‘The Great Tradition and the Little in the perspective of Sinhalese Buddhism’, Journal of Asian Studies. XXII, 2, 1963, p. 149.

Arthur Ford was a con man too

The FFWPU / Unification Church and Shamanism

Sun Myung Moon’s theology used to control members

Ashamed to be Korean

The Moons’ God is not the God of Judeo-Christianity

Sun Myung Moon – Restoration through Incest

Studying the Divine Principle is a passive ingestion of written ‘truth’

[alicechennnnn]

My theme peace and freedom is inspired by emoji dove of peace.

Emoji Meaning

A dove carrying an olive branch, a symbol of peace in Western and Judeo-Christian culture. Depicted as a white bird in full profile facing left, flying as it holds a green sprig in its beak.Commonly used to represent such sentiments as peace, love, hope, and reconciliation.

Originally designed to be a religious symbol that resonated with Christian and Jewish users as well as a symbol for peace.

[straynoahide]

anon!! if you read this, reach out to me

there is a difference between messianic judaism, which is appropriative and redefines judaism, and hebrew catholicism, which happens to be my religion and tradition, and embraces christian jews (or rather, accepts their embrace) while keeping a distinct identity and seeking worldwide interfaith reconciliation.

always do cultural appreciation, not appropriation. culture is shared voluntarily and naturally and becomes your own through a tradition. from your family or coreligionaries. unless you have a spiritual practice that is solely individual, but this seems at odds with many core tenets of catholic doctrine (not judging if that's the case, i'm very open-minded).

if you are catholic, you are by definition in full communion with the Vatican, so you can practice no other religion, but you can derive spiritual signification from rituals.

for centuries, gentile christianity was de-hebraized in the effort to persecute jews. today, jews in israel and communities across the world revert this trend by preserving the hebrew heritage of christianity within the light of catholic spirituality. the st james vicariate finally gave home to this vision started by a carmelite.

messianic judaism denies that judaism and christianity diverged and that both stand with equal dignity today. for centuries, christianity taught jewish deicide, but rejecting it is not the end-point of judeo-christian mature and mutual good will. messianic judaism and many doctrinal views of christianity are supersessionist, and erase the modern and historical jewish identity as the People of Israel.

it is often done by jews that when converting seek to abandon their previous ethnoreligious identity by projecting their decision on other jews, perpetuating a historical trend of diluting their identity for the benefit of gentiles.

the way is the opposite. hebrew catholicism (comes from hebrew-speaking catholicism) is a form of spirituality that incorporates the religious faith of christ, with the cultural traditions of judaism, and observes them in the sense you can observe a national tradition with a religious significance. for example, hebrew catholics celebrate yom kippur or passover in community, and may or may not keep dietary laws and shabbat, but they aren't religious traditions. just like st patricks is an irish national holiday, but it is still culturally irish and a french catholic does not need to celebrate st patricks.

this is similar, but for what is culturally jewish. the community incorporates people of jewish and non-jewish origin (often with jewish blood family ties, but not necessarily), and is salient in hispanic countries because of the Inquisition's effects in creating 'new christian' crypto-jews/marranos (bnei anusim), but today we reject supersessionism and embrace both communities trying to help the Vatican come into a good and constructive relation with israeli society and the jewish people in general.

our goals are not always well understood because of the actions of other christian communities and centuries of historical trauma in judaism, and certain elements of israeli society that espouse hostility to christians, but we will succeed hashem willing.

I practice a melange of catholicism and judaism (i do not appropriate any closed rituals, most of my beliefs are just informed by judaism/the tanakh, I don’t use the three-letter name for example), but due to this I feel a distance from the church and recently, from being able to be fully religious. Do you have any advice for inhabiting a hebrew bible-space within a church that is mine and not-mine?

keep the ritual. and then, negotiate room near that ritual for yourself. not against the ritual, not removed from it. near it. the language held here, in this ask, in my posts, has fit-ness only as something kept near the sacraments, not in them. academia, literary mags/poetry submissions, art praxes, etc, find the nearnesses

[go-redgirl]

Trump’s Walk Across Lafayette, Holding Bible Aloft by St. John’s Church Were Crucial

President Donald Trump walked across Lafayette Park on Monday evening after it had been cleared of demonstrators, and held aloft a Bible in front of the burned-out edifice of St. John’s Episcopal Church.

Democrats and the media were aghast, claiming the president had ordered “peaceful” protested tear-gassed merely so that he could hold a “photo-op.” In fact, Trump’s gestures held immense positive significance for the country and will likely be remembered that way.

First, the walk across Lafayette demonstrated to the nation that its democratically-elected government, not the crowd, was in control.

While some may have been peaceful at that particular moment, the Lafayette Park protest had been violent several nights running. There is also a difference between “peaceful” and “lawful,” a difference obscured in much of the media coverage of protests around the nation. Free speech and assembly cannot and do not come at the cost of public safety.

The president, seeking to restore order in cities across the country, could not very well have done so while allowing thugs from Antifa to lob bricks at Secret Service officers,  or chase reporters away from the public square outside his own office.

In response to the familiar cry — “Whose streets? Our streets!” — the president showed America exactly whose streets and parks these were: they belong to the country as a whole, not an unruly occupying left-wing force.

Second, the president showed that he would not tolerate the desecration of a house of worship, especially if it was done, ostensibly, alongside a protest for the freedom of others.

The president swears to “preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.” Religious freedom, enshrined in the First Amendment, is fundamental. The torching of the church Sunday — like the defacing of synagogues in L.A. Saturday — was an attack on liberty itself.

Third, and most important, was the president’s embrace of the Bible. The president was reminding the nation who we are: people of the Book, or many books, a nation bound by the words of a covenant, and grounded in moral precepts.

Against a mob, and a media, unable to distinguish between right and wrong, or between assembly and anarchy, the president reaffirmed the idea that there is a higher authority above us all, and a common, if unspoken, set of principles.

Every successful protest movement in American history has spoken directly to those same ideas. The way that Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. led the civil rights movement to victory, for example, was by appealing to the fundamental Judeo-Christian precepts upon which the nation was based. He shamed his opponents by pointing to the principles from which they had deviated, but which they, too, embraced. That caused conflict, but it also enabled reconciliation.

The media, and the crowd, did not realize it, but Trump had seized the moral high ground in that moment. He reached into the mainframe of the American machine and rebooted it with the source code that is the common basis for all we do.

A liberal rabbi complained on Twitter that Trump was “using a CHURCH as the symbol of his declaration of war on the people of this country.” Wrong: the Book was his symbol, not of a war on the people, but a common defense.

The president has long since accepted, and embraced, the idea of justice for George Floyd. The protests are no longer about justice, but about the power of the far left, and the media, to bring the country to its knees.

The moment looting began in Minneapolis, two days after Floyd’s murder, this became a different kind of struggle. And President Trump’s walk across Lafayette Park, and his raising of the Bible, marked a turning point, back in the direction of democracy.

READ MORE STORIES ABOUT:

Crime Faith Politics Bible Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. First Amendment George Floyd justice Lafayette Park liberty Riots St. John's Episcopal Church

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INDIVIDUALS/COMMENTS/POSTS:

My 200 Cents • 11 hours ago 

The communist left hates God and everything He stands for. Because President Trump has committed his path to the LORD and seeks His will daily, they hate him too.

Leftists are the ones who use churches and Bibles as props all the while murdering unborn babies.

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Wesley Alexander My 200 Cents • 11 hours ago

And like Cuomo and others allowed the elderly in nursing homes to die due to Cuomo's policies.

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Enoch Returned My 200 Cents • 10 hours ago

welcome to the second American Civil War

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random thoughts 4u Enoch Returned 

Obama started the Civil War. Trump will finish it.

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Marv Sauer Reel American • 3 hours ago

Have you ever heard of Redemption?

God does not use perfect people as instruments... He uses available ones. Trump is available to God. God doesn't need Trump to be perfect... He needs Trump to be yielded and available. He surely is. 1. Embassy moved to Jerusalem 2. First President to speak at March for Life 3. De-escalating foreign wars, bringing troops home. 4. Building a border wall (The Bible advocates border walls) 5. EO decrying anti-semitism on college campuses. All of these actions comply with the Bible. See what I mean?

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Chesapeake Snappyjo • 6 hours ago

Pelosi, Schumer, Biden, Waters have been scamming the taxpayers for a generation but somehow all the problems are Trump's fault. Nope he's uncovering the crimes of the scammers and they're in full panic.

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Marv Sauer pablo_st_cruz • 2 hours ago

Resistance rage. Pure emotion, no substance. Conservatives take into account that there is a God who is Holy, and that He left us a Guide - His Word, the Bible, to guide our relationships with Himself, and one another. Progressives don't allow God's will into their thinking, that's why they don't see clearly - nor understand Conservatives, nor God Himself. Praying for you.

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[pivot2thrive]

Dead to Christianity, Alive through Christ

The western church in Europe and America is dying, just look at the numbers.

And for that, I am truly grateful. Good riddance...at least to that brand of faith.

You see, the church that I got older in (I don’t say grew up because I don’t believe that there was much related to growing up in that faith tradition) influenced me (and my family and friends) to believe that while I didn’t deserve it, God loved me anyway (what kind of a parent would tell a child that they do not deserve the parent's love?). All I had to do was accept Jesus Christ as my Lord and Savior, then I’d be saved and I’d get to go to heaven. Of course, I’d have to read my Bible so I could better understand what I’m supposed to do now that I’m a servant. The Bible was the only thing reliable about understanding God since people were imperfect (that is until you actually read it and realize just how horrible it can be and that the criticisms of Christianity’s critics can be quite valid). Further, with Christ as Lord, I learned that I needed to save other people and that I was to live in a community with other fellow believers. Essentially, I learned that others were more important than me. I needed to carry my cross so others could be saved. On top of this I learned that emotions were fleeting and dangerous and not to be trusted so I was to use my left brain to consider God’s word and make emotion abated choices, so I learned to kill those pesky little buggers.

Oh yeah, and I was kicked out of the youth group for having sex with my girlfriend at 16 noting no one came to my side throughout to ask me how I was doing. Being ostracized is no pleasant experience.

For anyone with a background in human development, one can see the underpinnings of trauma, codependency, attachment issues, over emphasized left brain development, and issues with perceptions of less-than and greater-than in relational dynamics. Candidly, the framework outlined in my family template and in my faith template set the course for issues with maladaptive coping mechanisms, the first of which I believe was a process addiction to this religious way of looking at life and was later manifest in forms of relationship addiction.

Over the years I’ve come to find just how highly unrelational this brand of faith is and was. I was inculcated into an environment of sin management and performance-based acceptance. Only if I carried my cross and didn’t act outside of the boundaries would I fit in…a tough task for any adolescent or teenager. In fact, any reference to having a relationship with God was only partially understood because my upbringing did not provide me with the tools to engage the relationship outside a pharisaical, left brain, performance modality. Sounds like work not a relationship.

Psychology, neuroscience, sociology and their converging viewpoints have made me aware of various unintended (sometimes intended) consequences of me interacting within the circles I did growing up. And with these I’ve been able to piece through the traumas of my past, develop a coherent narrative of the goods and bads, and have been able begin to integrate the various parts of my self to transform the way I think and feel, in ways that are more beneficial to me and others.

Now, as I look back at the faith environment of my youth, I am saddened by just how damaging it was. As I now have children, it will be a cold day in hell before I allow them to be damaged by these kinds of belief systems (and the people committed to carrying them out).

It looks nothing like the relational core of the message of Christ nor of the great commandment of the Judeo-Christian tradition to love God and to love one’s neighbor as oneself. The message I got growing up was that others were better than me and I had to perform in order to get favor (from God, parents, etc.). And because my neurological templates were formed in the way that they were, even if I heard a more relational message, I could not internalize it. There simply was no experiential context for that.

As I look through the overarching narrative of the Christ story, I’ve come to see Jesus as the great catalyst that started a movement toward fully integrated well being (a precursor to the revolution of our efforts in science). The arc of the story is one of disconnect, grace, forgiveness and reconciliation (with God, self and others). It does not go unnoticed that God is represented in multiple persons connoting the relational nature of God. In Christ’s death and resurrection we see the elements to help each of us re-narrate our ways of thinking and feeling that lead us to toxic levels of shame, guilt and fear. God covers all three in the death and resurrection of Christ.

But, more importantly, I’ve come to see a view of a loving God that cares about the growth and development of his kids. It is in good and healthy relationships that we humans thrive. It is in isolation and unhealthy relationships that we learn the habits that tear us apart. We are not “totally depraved” sinners that are abhorrent but rather we are children learning through our trials and errors on how to grow up into joyful, peaceful, loving humans. For all of us, our “sins” are evidenced in haywire neural programming but for some of us, these haywire circuits result in much more pronounced problems. Like a good and loving parent, God provides the grace, encouragement and challenge to help us breakthrough our neural programming gone awry. In Christ, God gives me the message that I’m worth it, that my past mistakes do not define me and that I do not need to fear my future as all will be made well. If Christ’s followers embody these principles, the ongoing reprogramming efforts take a monumental leap forward, after all, our minds are programmed to connect with people in relationships much more effectively than with some book, no matter how much wisdom it imparts.

What is grace?

It is the invitation to have a meal with someone who has been able to navigate their life with similar pains and sufferings, has come out the other side, wants to show you how you can do it too and is patient with you as you stumble through trying to get there. It is the gift of intent and freedom to learn a new way to live.

To the chagrin of many institutional churches, grace abounds…just not in their doors. Some of these churches do the feed the poor part really well but miss the relational component (many Christians do the same thing). Others simply haven’t broken through to the other side and so they focus on what they can…and this usually manifests itself in the rules, dogmas and beliefs to enhance sin management.

What is grace? It’s messy. If churches truly got grace, they’d be a lot messier, a lot more authentic, and would use the tools of Christ to invite others to clean up the inside of their cups. What does messy look like? Try attending an addiction support group.

[glitter-stained]

@timstolejasonscorpseagain *deep sigh*

I have a lot of thoughts about Jason, philosophy and his development, unfortunately those thoughts are very convoluted and I have yet to reach a conclusion, mostly because I'm not that cultured and have yet to find the time to do all the philosophy reading to solidify my positions or question my doubts, which I why I tend to avoid talking about it until I'm confident I won't say something so baffling in its stupidity it will change someone's stance on a completely unrelated subject of out sheer disdain. With that being said, and thanks to the lovely vulgarisation function of our friend wikipedia, I am now fascinated with the idea of Jason reading Kierkegaard and his stance on the "leap of faith".

Now my starting point position on Jason's character in relation to love and as christic symbolism is detailed in this post down there, but the gist of it is that heroes/antiheroes don't have to be motivated by a moral code but can be motivated by love, and that's what makes Jason my favourite comics character, that his development and motivation are based on love, and that we have a nice parallel between Bruce as The Father, the Law, the Lord with a moral code that cannot yield, VS Jason as The Son, Jesus, an approach to christianity based on love (though of course Jason's lost days/utrh arc is a dark retelling, a "dark jesus" if you will).

Note that the interesting thing about philosophy is that not everybody agrees you should base your behaviour on an unyielding code of conduct, things you mustn't do because they are inherently bad: we have deontology, virtue ethics, utilitarism and other types of consequentialism, but also ethics (as understood by Levinas), agape (as per Amélie Nothomb), a lot of shit I'm not smart enough to understand and probably a lot of other stuff I've never heard about because, again, I haven't done my reading. And I wanna see more superheroes living through these stances, and not just deontology or utilitarianism, and I think Jason's stance on love could lead to a fascinating development in that direction.

Now, taking a deep breath,a chill pill and thinking about Jason as a he is right now, as a character, and whether he would have this or that book on his bookshelf. About Kierkegaard's "leap of faith*, Wikipedia tells us:

People who have actually opened a book written by Kierkegaard know more than on the matter so feel free to correct me on the matter but I would say yes, @timstolejasonscorpseagain , to answer your question I think he would love reading Kierkegaard. I'll also highlight that no, despite the theology and judeo-christian culture in which those theories are soaked, I don't hc Jason as christian, and I think the most important part of the leap of faith in regards to Jason is how it relates to love rather than God. However, we can't ignore that context, and that's one of the biggest limits of my analysis of Jason's philosophy, the fact that I was so deeply soaked in it myself growing up that I'm still widely ignorant of the other options and outlooks. One day I'll make a better, more developed post about the potential of Jason's ethics switching from utilitarism to platonic love aka agape (from Compte-Sponsville but mostly Amélie Nothomb), how fascinating it is that one of Kierkegaard's biggest critic is Levinas because of Levinas' ethics vs "christian love" in relation to Cass vs Jason and the potential of reconciliation between the two that Amelie Nothomb suggests, but for now all you get is this very narrow outline. Hope that at least answers the question, and if anyone has suggestions of authors I can read and look up to narrow that view, feel free to share them if you want!

Literature nerd Jason this and that, but no one says that he would become obsessed with the book where the narrator is dead and is reminiscing about his life and whose epigraph is a dedication (of the book) to the worm who first gnawed on the cold flesh of his corpse 💀