21st Century Progressivism

Author: Sheila Marler

  • A Message From the Iron Age

    Reading Time: 2 minutes

    This is completely off the subject of what we’ve been talking about here but I’m in a hurry to tell you about it. What I’m going to say is more pleasant to think about than the madness going on all around us. This is a message from the Iron Age.

    The Ancient Egyptians and Picts Had Something in Common

    I would like to share with you something the Picts and the ancient Egyptians had in common. I believe I’m the first person to figure it out. Either that or the scholars are keeping it secret. They claim no one can decipher the symbols carved by the Picts on their stone slabs in Scotland. However, I’m going to argue that the Picts were doing the same thing the Egyptians were doing in their temples, tombs and coffins. They were making maps and writing instructions to aid the dead in their journey to the next life.

    It is known that the ancient peoples had contact with each other. For that reason I think it’s safe to assume that the Pictish and Egyptian religions were similar. They both focused on the hazardous journey everyone must take when they die. The Egyptians made maps and wrote instructions on their temples and tombs. The Picts made standing stone slabs to mark their graves and carved them with plants, animals, hybrid creatures, and miscellaneous symbols. The clue that the Picts had the same intention as the Egyptians is the Pictish cross slabs.

    After the the Picts were converted to Christianity, they carved crosses on the back side of the standing slabs. This tells me they were carving instructions for the dead, like the Egyptians. Why? Because that was the purpose of the symbols on the front of the slab. The Picts obviously took Jesus’s promise literally, and the cross served the same purpose as the other symbols.

    In my Father’s house there are many dwelling places. If there were not, would I have told you that I am going to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back again and take you to myself, so that where I am you also may be. Where I am going you know the way.

    Thomas said to him, “Master, we do not know where you are going; how can we know the way?”

    Jesus said to him, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.

    John 14:2-6

    The Picts took this to mean that Jesus will return for them when they die and take them to his Father’s house.

  • Something I Said

    Reading Time: < 1 minute

    What if we are giving the Zionists too much credit? What if they believe war with Iran is their last stand, and what if it was something I said?

    Giving the Zionists Too Much Credit
    Was it something I said?

    I have a new theory. It’s possible that at least some of the craziness is a reaction to, well…me, and what I’ve been saying in my blog. I know this sounds self-important, but if I really thought I was important I would have come to this conclusion much sooner.

    I don’t know if I will continue to blog. Things have gotten far too serious in the world, and nothing I can say will change that. It can only add to the furor. It’s in their hands now, as it always has been.

  • Who Are These Americans?

    Reading Time: 7 minutes

    America is supposed to be a melting pot. However, a certain cultural-religious group of people claimed ownership from the beginning. Not just ownership of industry and government, but ownership of Americanism. This should be obvious when people outside of the United States refer to Americans as Anglo-Saxons. However it doesn’t seem to register with ordinary Americans. Does anyone wonder about the nature of these people? Who are these Americans?

    Angles, Saxons and Jutes Meet in Britain

    The Angles, Saxons and Jutes originated in modern-day Denmark and Germany. They migrated to England after the withdrawal of Rome from 410 to 450 AD, and eventually merged to became the Anglo-Saxons. The Anglo-Saxons ruled England until the Norman Conquest in 1066. However, in their day they adopted Christianity and established kingdoms that spoke Old English. The Anglo-Saxons shaped English culture, language, and law.

    For Britons on the other hand, the Anglo-Saxon takeover was an unwanted incursion. Often it was deadly. Perhaps that explains why the US government makes immigration so difficult; they haven’t forgotten that they were once immigrants to Britain.

    The English Civil War

    In the seventeenth century, Anglo-Saxonism was a major ideological construct used to justify the English Civil War (1642-1651). The so-called Norman Yoke was another ideological construct and was used in a similar way. Adherents to these constructs could pose as people who were reclaiming ancient liberties that the Norman conquerors stole from them. These liberties included free parliaments and common law. In this way, English parliamentarians and radicals were able to invoke a romanticized, pre-1066 Anglo-Saxon past as marching orders for the politics of their time. Specifically, the Norman Yoke construct provided the rationale for challenging the divine right of Kings.

    Many of these concepts sound universal. But it’s important to note that these constructs belonged to a unique culture and religion at a specific time. The doctrine of the absolute authority of kings was no more universal than the doctrines of Anlo-Saxonism and the Norman Yoke. It arose after the religious wars spread chaos, instability and destruction all over Europe.

    In addition, it can be argued that the position of the parliamentarians and radicals in the seventeenth century was politically convenient. Divine kingship may have been a problem in itself, but the problem only became pressing when the radicals disagreed with Charles I. And subsequent historical events demonstrate that some of them wanted to take upon themselves the powers of kingship. Anglo-Saxonism and the Norman Yoke constructs were useful tools.

    The English Civil War ended with the execution of Charles I and the takeover by Oliver Cromwell, who proceeded to act like a dictator from 1653 to 1658.

    Factions in the Church of England

    It is also true that Charles acted recklessly. It was as though he was unaware of the fragility of the political and religious consensus that he enjoyed. The Church of England had been dealing with competing factions under Queen Elizabeth and James I, but everyone remained united by a Calvinist theology of grace. This consensus broke under Charles I.

    The king’s policies tended toward Anti-Puritanism in matters of liturgy and organization. The theological equivalent was Anti-Calvinism. Charles’s authoritarianism would prove his undoing at the hands of the Puritan faction. However, neither his behavior nor the parliament’s displeasure dictated his execution. Many of the agitators merely hoped to force his cooperation.

    The Puritans

    People in the United Kingdom and the United States often hear about how King Charles I overreached his powers as a king. But his execution was not a foregone conclusion. Many of those who opposed him were shocked when he was killed by the radicals and parliamentarians. But as argued above, this faction was acting according to its own peculiar beliefs.

    The Puritans were ethnically English, predominantly of Anglo-Saxon descent, and identified with this ancestry. As 16th and 17th-century English Protestants, they viewed themselves as a “remnant” continuing a divine, Anglo-Saxon tradition of piety and liberty. They were not genetically distinct from other English people, but were primarily a cultural/religious group from East Anglia. 

     Antonia Malchik

    Traditional Freemasonry

    Anglo-American style Freemasonry has played a part in the cultures of the United States and Great Britain. (This branch of Freemasonry is distinguished from Liberal Freemasonry.) It is the traditional, conservative branch of Freemasonry requiring belief in a Supreme Being and avoiding political/religious debate within the lodge. Anglo-American Freemasonry may not have played a part in the English Civil War because it only appeared in England as a formal organized fraternity in 1717. However, the first recorded initiation of an English gentleman, was of Elias Ashmole in 1646.

    But regardless of its past influences, I would argue that the most problematic influence of Freemasonry in our time stems from its adoption of Tubal Cain as its founding ancestor. This goes at least as far back as Albert Mackey.

    Freemasons believe there are two strains of people in the world. One comes from the line of Cain, and the other comes from Seth. The term, Sons of Cain, is derived from the Freemasonic tradition of referring to Tubal Cain as their ‘Masonic ancestor’.

    The Temple Legend

    Albert Mackey wrote about Tubal Cain in the Legend of the Craft. Mackey also wrote about him in the Lexicon of Freemasonry : Tubal Cain…

    …introduced many arts into society which tended towards its improvement and civilization. Tubal Cain is the Vulcan of the Pagans, and is thought to have been closely connected with ancient Freemasonry. Faber says that “all the most remarkable ancient buildings of Greece, Egypt, and Asia Minor, were ascribed to Cabirean or Cyclopean Masons,” the descendants of Vulcan, Dhu Balcan, the god Balcan, or Tubal Cain. Oliver says, “In after times Tubal Cain, under the name of Vulcan and his Cyclops, figured as workers in metals and inventors of the mysteries; and hence it is probable that he was the hierophant of a similar institution in his day, copied from the previous system of Seth, and applied to the improvement of schemes more adapted to the physical pursuits of the race to which he belonged.”

    (As cited by Freemason.com)

    The mention of ‘the previous system of Seth’, is interesting, to say the least. The Book of Genesis, says the entire human race is descended from Seth. It doesn’t say anything about a system that follows it. In verse 4:25 Eve says that God granted her Seth in place of Abel. Then, Genesis chapter 5 presents Seth as the ancestor of Noah. The descendants of Seth survived the flood through Noah. The descendants of Cain did not. More to the point, if Seth was the ancestor of Noah he was also the ancestor of Christ. This claim is never made for Cain.

    The claim that there are two strains of people in the world is especially troubling when one considers Rudolf Steiner’s embellishments on the Temple Legend1. Steiner interpreted the Temple Legend symbolically, and argued that it represents humanity’s evolution.

    The New Temple Legend

    In The New Cain, we are told the Temple Legend was originally introduced into Europe by Christin Rosenkreutz. Later it became the core of diverse types of masonic rituals. However, Steiner did not adopt the Temple Legend from masonic sources. He reconstructed it from his independent spiritual research.2 He also incorporated his version into masonic rituals. The New Temple Legend is an occult-imaginative means to school and develop the soul’s spiritual capacities.

    From the very outset, the Temple legend points to humanity’s dual origins in the children of Cain and of Abel. The former emerged from asexual procreation, the latter from dual-gender procreation. The origin of the sons of Cain reaches back to the pre-Lemurian period, that of the sons of Abel – or of Seth, who was given to his parents as a substitute after Abel was killed – to Lemurian times. The first became tillers of the soil, scientists and technologists, who had to elaborate everything for themselves, while the latter became shepherds, priests and artists who were given inspiration from above. In a soul-spiritual sense, we can also speak here of a masculine and feminine spirit.

    We have before us here, therefore, a primal opposition in humanity’s evolution. To reconcile this was the aim of the theosophical, and now and in future of the anthroposophic world impulse, as well as of a freemasonry renewed through anthroposophy.

    (p. 10)

    One could argue that Steiner’s interpretation is more extreme than the original Temple Legend, implying that the original Legend is more benign. But the original version had already traced Freemasonry’s ‘masonic ancestor’ to Tubal Cain, in spite of the fact that his descendants did not survive the flood. Steiner merely expands on the occult implications of this mythology. In Steiner’s version, Freemasonry is the worship of Cain in the condition he had been in before his sin.

    It’s important to add that we are not presented here with the story of an ongoing rivalry. Cain’s vision is presented as the final victor over the vision of the sons of Abel-Seth. (p. 11)

    Paradise Lost

    It has been said that Milton’s Paradise Lost is the Protestant epic equivalent to Dante’s Inferno and its Catholic view of sin. The two poems clearly demonstrate corresponding differences in theology and focus. Although neither one of them is scriptural, they both exert some influence in the thought of religious believers.

    For the purposes of this article, it’s important to mention that Milton was influenced by Anglo-Saxon culture and history. In addition, he was very much a part of the English Civil War. There is a YouTube Video on the Chris Hedges channel that elaborates on the important points in Milton’s work. The interview covers important points and issues that resonate with American culture. Once you start to look for similarities you will find them everywhere.

    Misjudging Milton?

    In the Hedges interview, Orlando Reade argues that the finest moments of Paradise Lost are true to the New Testament. I am aware that I haven’t studied this poem as much as it probably deserves, but I still think it’s fitting to discuss Paradise Lost in an article that also deals with the rehabilitation of Cain. I worry about the modern ability to deal with such material on a poetic or literary level because the religious concepts these poems deal with are not fictions.

    In this work by Milton, the devil is a somewhat sympathetic character who was treated unfairly by God. Milton seems to identify his own plight with the devil, and he’s not the only one to do so. But of course, the devil was a sympathetic character because Milton created him that way. Other oppressed peoples have identified with Milton’s characterization of the devil in the same way. But if you take biblical concepts seriously, there is a difference between oppressed people and the devil.

    For one thing, Milton rebelled against the king while the devil rebelled against God. At best, you could argue that this is a powerful object lesson against divine kingship. For Milton, rebelling against the king was almost the same thing as rebelling against God. But, killing a king is another matter. Surely the comparison breaks down there?

    Donald Trump and the Idolatry of Kingship

    Today, history seems to be reorganizing itself with Donald Trump acting as an absolutist king who presides over a willing Anglo-Saxon government. In a rational world this would end Anglo-Saxonism as a meaningful construct.

    Who are these Americans? They are all of these things.

    1. Rudolf Steiner, The New Cain: The Temple Legend as a spiritual and moral impulse for evolution and its completion. ed. T. H. Meyer. Temple Lodge Publishing, 2017 ↩︎
    2. Ibid. p. 9 ↩︎

  • Strangers and Pilgrims in Anglo-Saxon Country

    Reading Time: 3 minutes

    For several decades our government has behaved as if this country doesn’t belong to us. This can be explained in two ways. Either the country is ours and the government is cheating us, or it never belonged to us at all. Foreign political analysts like to call us Anglo-Saxons. Maybe they know something about our government that we don’t know. Christians say they are strangers and pilgrims on the earth. Maybe it’s fitting for Americans to acknowledge they are strangers and pilgrims in Anglo-Saxon country.

    America and the Anglo-Saxon Outlook

    I criticized Professor Wen Yang recently when he said Anglo-Saxons are the worst people ever. There may be some truth in this, but it’s too extreme. I think it would be better to explain Anglo-Saxon behavior as the result of a flawed social organization.

    Wealth Inequality and the Plight of the Male Sex

    Anglo-Saxon wealth inequality stems from a long-standing flaw in social organization. It is fostered and perpetuated by the institution of boarding school. According to Alan Macfarlane, this institution may have even created our economic system. He has argued that boarding school was the beginning of capitalism.

    Before boarding school, economic activity took place in the household. However, sons who were sent off to boarding school ceased being part of that household. This severed the link between economic activity and the household.

    Boarding school breaks the social bond between a boy and his family and makes him vulnerable to generic male influences and organized male cabals. In addition, his former household looses the connection and benefit derived from his economic activity. He loses benefits as well when his household ceases to participate in his efforts. This explains how capitalism became the stomping ground of independent (i.e. lonely) men.

    Great Personal Wealth leads to Radical (i.e. antisocial and inhuman) Independence

    There are additional dangers for men who become radically independent. I would put it like this: A man’s mental and spiritual health depend entirely on his family ties. Unaccountable wealth destroys family ties. I would argue that seizing wealth from these men would be more rescue than punishment.

    There have always been proposals for small improvements in ruling class behavior. Policy-makers, politicians, and religious leaders in the mold of Pope Francis hold out hope that the existing system can be preserved. However, that hope has proven to be futile.

    Conservatives Should Have Appreciated Pope Francis When They Had Him

    Pope Francis was economically pragmatic. He fought for justice within the economic system and preached against ‘unfettered capitalism’, but he defended everyone’s part in the system. If the wealthy had listened to him perhaps they could have prolonged their privilege. However, in the last ten years they have demonstrated that capitalism itself is a run-away train. Furthermore, they enjoy riding on that train. The more unequal things get the better they like it. This position never was acceptable, but now the spell has been broken.

    Wealth Inequality is a Curse

    There is no justification for wealth inequality. It is a curse that can no longer be tolerated. The world’s wealth must be returned to families. That’s where it began and that’s where it should be used. Wealth does no good to anyone in the bank accounts or tax havens of a handful of sociopathic men.

    However, in order for a seizure to work, the system must be overhauled. Otherwise these people will return to their old ways. The system must protect the wealth of families first. this can only be done by something like bridewealth, which I have argued for previously. This system served to safeguard a family’s wealth and protect mothers at the same time. Husbands benefitted from the system as well, but there were limits in place. By contrast, economic limits do not exist today. Instead, additional burdens are imposed on women.

  • The Shocking Fate of Superman

    Reading Time: 2 minutes

    The ruffians have us on the run. All the signs are here. Whether the signs signal the ‘fall of the empire’, a worldwide annihilation, or the end of days remains to be seen. But if we take a philosophical stance for a moment, we will understand that something fundamental stands revealed: We see before us the shocking fate of Superman.

    I’m not talking about the trustworthy fictional Superman of the movies. Nor am I suggesting that the Superman I refer to is going to get his clock cleaned while we watch. Our Superman has been waiting in the wings since the end of World War II and he has already met his fate. He just doesn’t know it yet.

    The Conservatives have had their way at least since the assassination of JFK. Since then they have been busily corrupting the key structures of a free society. They may have thought they could slowly ease on to the throne without being noticed, but in 2015 the progressives called their bluff. Their response was to call out their heavy artillery. I admit it is intimidating, but there is something vaguely ridiculous about it. Superman is a cartoon.

    Superman is a Cartoon

    Our superman, or supermen, have been stewing in their juices since World War II, and dreaming of a final victory. But that isn’t what caused the present ridiculousness. They have always been ridiculous. It’s just that we see them now against the background of climate change and mass migration so their solutions appear as absurd as they are. The situation calls for a farsighted, compassionate manager but instead we are offered solutions from a superhero cartoon. The bright ideas of these characters float in space surrounded by microchips, high finance, gears, and jet fuel. And they themselves have long since ceased belonging to the earth. In fact, they despise the earth.

    So now that it’s finally time for their big reveal, they are completely unsuited to lead. But how is it possible that their cartoonish plans continue to be so honored in this day and age? We have all been blind together.

    They Never Accepted Their Defeat in World War II

    They were defeated in World War II because their ideas were just as stupid then as they are now. That should have been the end of it. However, they were allowed to keep their stolen loot and their societies rebuilt themselves exactly as they had been before the War. The thinking that led to the carnage stayed exactly the same, wrapped in a thick veil of denial. The lessons that they should have taken from their defeat have been biding their time–until now.

    Maybe This Is Justice

    It’s possible that what we see now is justice. If it makes you feel better, you could say it’s the fault of the World-War leaders and their societies, not to mention those who have supported cruel actions of their governments since that time. In any case, the outcome is no longer in our hands. Behold the shocking fate of Superman.

  • The Divinity of Jesus Christ

    Reading Time: 6 minutes

    Arianism is the issue that led to the Council of Nicaea. It is one example of a doctrine that questions the divinity of Jesus Christ.

    Arius (c. 250 – 336) believed that Jesus was just a man. His doctrine is now called Arianism. “Arianism affirmed a created, finite nature of Christ rather than equal divinity with God the Father.”

    Arius’s views were eventually denounced as heresy, but not before they divided the Church’s bishops. They caused so much turmoil in the early Church that the Emperor Constantine called a council to reconcile the factions. The final decision about this doctrine was composed at the council of Nicaea.

    I’m Against Re-litigating Arianism

    It is surprising to find that the divinity of Jesus is currently being litigated on YouTube as if the Council never happened. For reasons I will explain here, I am against re-litigating Arianism.

    But it is important to state at the beginning that this debate is connected to another important topic: the Virgin Birth of Jesus. In this article I will use Thomas Boslooper’s book, The Virgin Birth, to add the information that I wasn’t allowed to add on Wikipedia. Boslooper’s account indicates that Christian scholarship has a long history of skirting the topic of the virgin birth.

    There is Power in Christianity

    There is power in the Christian religion. Many people have testified of this. Based on my own experience, people of faith are not bothered by a critical approach to the virgin birth. However, a certain editor on Wikipedia was bothered so much that he became a thief. Then he bullied me and told lies about me for daring to write about it.

    Sincere objections can usually be overcome. However, on Wikipedia the insincere party has the ability to block anyone it disagrees with. This makes reconciliation, not to mention real understanding, impossible. I think it implies either a lack of faith or the desire for a public spectacle.

    Here on my own blog, I am at least able to write without interruption. The question remains as to whether anything I write will get through to anyone. And yet, I keep writing.

    My Cautious Approach to the Scholarship

    Before I begin, it is important to remember that the The Virgin Birth was published in 1962. Religious leaders have had more than thirty years to consider or make changes based on Boslooper’s arguments and criticisms. So, some of the criticisms may no longer be justified.

    I have noticed while studying James B. Adamson’s commentary on the Book of James that Christian theologians must be familiar with the findings of biblical scholars. Apparently, when they agree with those findings they are willing to make changes. What else can explain the omission of this phrase from the Lord’s Prayer, ‘And lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil’?

    Boslooper Cites the Failure of Biblical Scholarship

    Boslooper was convinced that biblical scholarship had failed to present the kind of analysis of the story of Jesus’ birth that would serve as the basis of a satisfactory interpretation. He was mainly inspired by Oscar Cullmann’s1 disappointment when he could not find a single book on the virgin birth that presents a historical approach to the subject. The purpose of this book was to fill this need in biblical critical scholarship. The Virgin Birth is a history of interpretations of Jesus’ birth.

    Thomas Boslooper’s Introduction Summarized

    The subject of the virgin birth brings with it an entire history of interpretations. Christian communities have always taken different views on this part of Jesus’ story. There is also a history of responses from the non-Christian community.

    Beginning with Ignatius and continuing through Origen, the virgin birth was at the center of the Church’s controversy with the non-Christian world. The exact point of disagreement differed with every non-Christian community.

    The Debate With Jews and Gentiles

    With the Jews, Christians struggled to demonstrate the relationship of the virgin birth to the Old Testament. With the Gentiles, the discussion centered on the relationship of the virgin birth to other religious traditions.

    Meanwhile, within early Christianity itself the virgin birth had a positive effect over all with the development of Marian theology. A theology of Mary developed at the same time as a body of extra-canonical literature to support it.

    Protestant Christianity

    In Protestant Christianity, two main factions developed around the story of the virgin birth, supernaturalists versus naturalists. The supernaturalists considered the virgin birth historical. For them, it was an indispensable support to the whole structure of Christianity. The naturalists on the other hand, thought the virgin birth was unhistorical and therefore, unimportant.

    Examples of How Modern Historians Dealt With the Virgin Birth

    The story and doctrine of the virgin birth are treated as almost invisible by modern historians and contemporary theologians. They all tend to follow the naturalistic interpretation and attach it to a single historical or theological idea. Many of them treat the virgin birth in the narratives of Matthew, chs. 1 and 2 and Luke, chs. 1 and 2 as unrelated to the main story of Jesus. Boslooper gives several examples of historical treatments:

    • Harnack thought the virgin birth should be understood as the outgrowth of a mistranslation of Isaiah 7:14.
    • Lobstein proposed the view that the virgin birth is a myth created by popular devotion to explain the divine Sonship of Christ.
    • For Percy Gardner, the narratives of the virgin birth represent two separate attempts to give a date for the divine origin of Jesus.
    • Soltau saw the story of Jesus’ conception as an attempt at the end of the first century to reconcile the belief that Jesus was born in Bethlehem on the one hand, with the earlier tradition of his origin in Nazareth on the other.
    • Conybeare understood the virgin birth as a legend adopted by the Catholic Church to reconcile the Ebionite and Docetic parties.
    • Charles Guignebert argued that all the stories of the miraculous birth were a solution to a Christological problem that arose in the primitive community. This problem had to do with the conflict between the terms ‘Messiah’ and ‘Son of God’.

    Contemporary Theologians

    According to Boslooper, Emil Brunner, Nels Ferré, and Paul Tillich oversimplify the problem of interpretation. They underestimate the significance of the virgin birth by linking it to the early Christian doctrine of the sinlessness of Jesus. This association was not a positive development in their opinion. They thought it stood in the way of a true understanding of the incarnation.

    For Brunner and Ferré, the virgin birth obscures and obstructs the fact of Jesus’ true humanity.2 For Tillich, it represents one of the New Testament’s rationalizations. He thought it changed a positive religious concept into a negative form.3

    Positive and Negative Aspects in the Interpretation of the Virgin Birth

    On the negative side, the history of interpretation has been a history of error. The Old Roman Catholic Church maligned the Biblical narratives by transferring the chief emphasis from Jesus to Mary and from marriage to virginity. Following the Protestant Reformation, the rationalistic naturalists underestimated the importance of the narrative through their a priori judgments against miracle, and the theological supernaturalists by attaching the virgin birth to the deity of Christ and by insisting on the ‘literal historicity’ of the story removed Jesus’ origin from the context of history. Historical critics, by being obsessed with the compulsion to demonstrate what was the source from which the Biblical narrative was ‘derived,’ tended to deprive the church of the significance of the content of the story of Jesus’ virgin birth. (Boslooper pp. 20-21)

    But the history of interpretation has also had positive effects. Boslooper argues that it has provided insight and contributed to our understanding of the Biblical narratives.

    The Roman Catholic Church preserved the relevance of the virgin birth to personal morality. The naturalists have helped the church recognize the true moral character of the narratives and helped curb the abuses that appeared through apocryphal tradition. The supernaturalists have insisted on the importance of the story of Jesus’ origin and demanded that the church take the doctrine seriously. Historical criticism gave a proper literary classification to the virgin birth. It eventually recognized its true role in the world and provided the basis for understanding the content of its message. (Boslooper p. 21)

    The Crux of the Problem (In Boslooper’s View)

    Boslooper argued that both the Roman Catholic and Protestant positions took the virgin birth in the gospels as literal history. In this way they weakened the thrust of its morally redemptive message.

    The Catholics produced a Docetic theology of Mary, questioned the sanctity of sex, and idealized virginity. The Protestants used the virgin birth to prove the deity of Christ and to set forth a moral idealism attached solely to the person of Jesus. In these approaches the original message was lost. The original message was that moral order is to be established within the marriage bond.

    Boslooper’s Objection to the Literal Historical View

    Boslooper argued that ‘The virgin birth is ‘myth, in the highest and best sense of the word’. He thought both Roman Catholics and Protestants were wrong to insist on the ‘literal historicity of the narratives’. For him, the universal message of Jesus’ origin is the important thing. The ‘truth’ in Boslooper’s opinion, is found somewhere between the Roman Catholic tradition and the Protestant tradition.

    My Conclusion

    I will point out that Boslooper goes beyond presenting a history of interpretations of the virgin birth when he tries to explain the purpose of the story. It seems to me he exceeded his stated purpose with mere speculation.

    Why do I say this? The statement that the virgin birth is myth ‘in the highest and best sense of the word’ is one thing. Defining its purpose and limiting its influence to the attestation of the humanity of Jesus and the sanctity of sex and marriage is a bit high-handed. For one thing, even assuming it is myth, the inspirations or motivations behind the story can’t be known.

    However, the main problem might be that the question of Jesus’ divinity has been forgotten entirely. In what way is he divine? How might this divinity be possible for a human born to a woman?

    The Perspective of Faith

    The faithful who experience his divinity probably don’t need an explanation for it. Maybe that’s why so many scholars have treated it as unimportant or detachable from the rest of the story. The most I can do at this point is acknowledge that the virgin birth really is a difficult subject. One might argue whether it is a myth in the best sense of the word, but the virgin birth is definitely a mystery in the best sense of the word.

    1. Nels F. S. Ferré, The Sun and the Umbrella (1953), pp. 28-29. ↩︎
    2. Paul Tillich, Systematic Theology, Vol. 2 (1957), pp. 126-127, 149. ↩︎

  • The Apocalypse of the New Thing: Robert Eisler, Imperial Egypt, and the Cosmic Rupture

    Reading Time: 6 minutes

    Isaiah 43:19: Behold, I will do a new thing; now it shall spring forth; shall ye not know it?

    I think of this verse whenever I hear someone say that Jesus was at work in the world before the Christian era. If he was always here, how can he be a new thing? This is important because of the promises Jesus has given Christians. It is also important because there is another entity who has been here at least since the world was created: the prince of this world. In this article I will relate Robert Eisler and Isaiah 43:19 to imperial Egypt to argue that Jesus represents the apocalypse of the new thing. The following quote is the entire passage from Isaiah 43:16-22.

    Thus says the Lord, 

    who opens a way in the sea, 

    a path in the mighty waters,

    Who leads out chariots and

    horsemen,

    a powerful army,

    Till they lie prostrate together,

    never to rise,

    snuffed out, quenched like a wick. Remember not the event of the 

    past, the things of long ago consider

     not; See, I am doing something new!

    Now it springs forth, do you not

    perceive it?

    In the wilderness I make a way,

    in the wasteland, rivers. Wild beasts honor me,

    jackals and ostriches,

    For I put water in the wilderness

    and rivers in the wasteland

    for my chosen people to drink,

    The people whom I formed for

    myself,

    that they might recount my praise.

    Yet you did not call upon me, Jacob,

    for you grew weary of me, Israel.

    Was Jesus a New Thing or Has He Always Existed?

    When I wrote Justice of the Rupture, I was inspired by an article on the Political Theology Website. The article seemed to agree with my understanding that the birth of Jesus was a new thing in this world.

    As I understand it, the claim that the Christ has always existed has two distinct sources. It can refer to a teaching of Hermeticism or to the decision of the First Council of Nicaea.

    The following is the decision of the First council of Nicaea:

    We believe in one God, the Father Almighty, maker of all things visible and invisible; and in one Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, the only-begotten of his Father, of the substance of the Father, God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God, begotten (γεννηθέντα), not made, being of one substance (ὁμοούσιον, consubstantialem) with the Father. By whom all things were made, both which be in heaven and in earth. Who for us men and for our salvation came down [from heaven] and was incarnate and was made man. He suffered and the third day he rose again, and ascended into heaven. And he shall come again to judge both the quick and the dead. And [we believe] in the Holy Ghost. And whosoever shall say that there was a time when the Son of God was not (ἤν ποτε ὅτε οὐκ ἦν), or that before he was begotten he was not, or that he was made of things that were not, or that he is of a different substance or essence [from the Father] or that he is a creature, or subject to change or conversion [τρεπτὸν in Greek; convertibilem in Latin] — all that so say, the Catholic and Apostolic Church anathematizes them.

    First Council of Nicæa (A.D. 325)

    My Paraphrase of the Decision and a Request for Correction if Necessary

    I understand this decision to say that Jesus was begotten of the substance of the Father. He has always existed, just as the Father has always existed. Therefore, it is not correct to say there was a time when the Son of God was not, or that before he was begotten he did not exist. Or that he is made of a different substance or essence from the Father.

    I’m not a theologian and normally I would not attempt to analyze theology. However, an understanding of the Council’s decision has bearing on who and how we worship. I could be wrong, but the decision doesn’t seem to be explicit about Jesus’s pre-Christian working in the world, independent from the person of the Father.

    The Christ of Hermeticism

    One problem I see with Hermeticism’s claim that ‘the Christ’ operated in the world from the beginning, is the effect it has on our view of pre-Christian religions. If the Christ has always existed and he has taken part in the world from its creation, pre-Christian believers in those religions were wrong or evil. On the other hand, if Jesus was truly a new thing the ancient people were not at fault. They couldn’t be expected to conform to our understanding of the Christian religion. It is likely they were pressured to conform to the demands of another deity.

    Ancient Egyptians Were Compelled to Obey Their Gods

    The burial practices of ancient Egypt suggest that the Egyptians did not love their god or gods the way we love Jesus. Their deities compelled them to perform certain rituals in order to gain eternal life. And they found ways of hedging their bets.

    For example, it is interesting that the ancient Egyptians disguised the gender of women in their burial ceremonies. It was apparently the only way women could attain eternal life. If those deities had their way, women would not have been allowed in at all.

    In the ancient Egyptian mindset, only male divine beings such as Atum, Osiris, or Re had access to the powers of creation or resurrection (Bryan 1996; Roth 2000). Goddesses were believed to be protective vessels.1

    The Egyptians clearly knew what their deities demanded and yet they defied them in behalf of their women. I propose that those deities represented the prince of this world. If I’m correct about this identification, the prince of this world does not like women.

    I would argue that the Egyptian deities represent a hostile and indifferent cosmos; the same cosmos that was hostile to Jesus.

    The Baptism of Jesus

    According to the first chapter of Mark, something remarkable happened at the baptism of Jesus.

    In those days Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee and was baptized by John in the Jordan.  And just as he was coming up out of the water, he saw the heavens torn apart and the Spirit descending like a dove on him.  And a voice came from heaven, “You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.” (Mark 1:9-11)

    In the Political Theology article cited above, J. Leavitt Pearl argued that when the heavens were torn open it was an apocalypse. The voice from heaven had to burst through the cosmic order for the Spirit to descend on Jesus like a dove.

    Wikipedia’s Struggle Over the Virgin Birth Article

    When I wrote about my work on Wikipedia’s Miraculous Births article I concluded that Wikipedia’s editors must have an unspoken agreement that the Virgin Birth article should remain empty of content. Maybe they think such an article would be offensive to believers. (Wikipedia now has a separate article entitled Virgin Birth of Jesus. But the article, Virgin Birth, is still empty.)

    In my opinion, it is not necessary for Christians to deny virgin birth stories from other cultures. Those stories might resemble the pattern of the Christian story but their heroes are not comparable to Jesus. They belong to the ideology of earthly empires and have a different character. More importantly, they are not opposed to the prince of this world.

    The West’s Dalliance With Empire

    In this light, it is ironic that the West is currently being presented with the bellowing of empire-minded officials. It is especially revealing that their ideology comes complete with the denigration of women. Fortunately, their error has been carefully defined by scholars such as Robert Eisler.

    It seems our current ideologues have mixed up the metaphors not to mention the religions involved. They apparently don’t have the empathy shown by the ancient Egyptians. They have taken the side of the prince of this world.

    Orpheus the Fisher

    In his book, Orpheus the Fisher2, Robert Eisler had this to say about the development of Christianity:

    …I have certainly been deceived in my expectations of discovering early extensive and important Pagan influences on the initial formation of Christian ritual and cult symbolism. In 1908 I was still under the illusion–which I am afraid is even today cherished by many students of comparative religion–that primitive Christianity was, to a great extent, a syncretistic religion. In particular I had been strongly impressed by the statement of Eichhorn and other scholars, that we must look out for a pagan or, more exactly, an Oriental prototype for the Eucharist, since a sacramental, not to speak of a theophagic rite is unknown to the Jewish cult-system.(Eisler, Preface p. v)

    Here Eisler is telling us that due to the scholarly influence of his time he mistakenly connected the sacramental eating of fish and bread by Jesus’s disciples with a hypothetical ritual of bread and fish-eating in pre-historic Canaan. But when he gave a lecture on this hypothesis he was criticized by a scholar named von Dobschutz-Strassburg. After further study, he came to the conclusion that the criticism was correct.

    By the time Orpheus the Fisher was published Eisler no longer believed in a connection between the Canaanite ritual and Christianity. He admits that there were later developments into a mystic theophagy and these had Pagan parallels, but pagan influences were not at work in the initial stage of Christian origin. Instead, the source of the Eucharistic rite is a purely Jewish ritual.

    Eisler went on to modify his views on similar problems. For example, he explains that although the deities of the mysteries seem to be similar to the Christian fisherman, those deities are cruel and unforgiving. Therefore, they do not resemble the character of God the Father and his Son Jesus Christ.

    Jesus was not cruel. He was Isaiah’s ‘new thing’.

     

     

    1. Kathlyn (Kara) Cooney, Gender Transformation in Death: A Case Study of Coffins from Ramesside Period Egypt ↩︎
    2. ↩︎

     

  • James 1:15

    Reading Time: 2 minutes 
    James 1:15

    Then his lust having conceived gives birth to sin: and when sin is full grown it brings forth death.

    James 1:15 reminds Adamson of Thomas à Kempis’s analysis of temptation (the phrase, à Kempis, indicates his home town of Kempen, Germany. His name is Thomas Hemerken ). Adamson believes James 1:15 and the other verses in this section inspired Hemerken’s analysis.

    At first it is a mere thought confronting the mind; then imagination paints it in stronger colours; only after that do we take pleasure in it, and the will makes a false move, and we give our assent..1 (Note 101a, p. 72)

    Adamson Demonstrates the Theology and Psychology of the Process

    • Stage One: I see something in a shop. I say to myself: “I should love to have that–but I can’t afford it.” That is the first stage. I am feeling the pull and lure of the bait, but I have suffered no more harm as yet.
    • Stage Two: “I know! I will steal it!” That is, lust, impregnated by the devil, “conceives” the notion and “gives birth’ to the act of theft. Adamson says we should not read too much into the twin image of conception and birth. The grammar behind “having conceived gives birth” is similar to the Hebrew construction rendered “she conceived and bore” (Genesis 4:1, etc.), the participle and finite verb in this instance bringing “thought and act together as a single stage between the temptations on the one hand and death on the other”(Hort)2. “Lust” produces “sin.” James expresses this single idea by the metaphorical parallel of motherhood, signified by the two chief steps–the first and the last–of that single process. “Conceives and bears” are not two separate points.
    • Stage 3: That sin , unless (however late, like the penitent thief) I properly repent before my physical death, will, “being fully grown,” cause my damnation and my spiritual “death” at the Day of Judgment. This agrees with Ropes and supplements him. The “consummation” and the death are in the “next world,” not in our earthly existence.

    The Analogy of a Human Infant Growing to Full Manhood

    James is picturing the growth of sin from birth onward in the analogy of a human infant growing to full manhood. In other words, in the context of a human conception, birth, and growth to maturity.

    “Sin, when full grown, when it becomes a fixed habit…brings forth death.”

    The immediate cause of death is sin, and sin, when full-grown, is in its very nature self-destructive, containing seeds of death in its womb and nurturing its unborn chid until the time of delivery. (Adamson,pp. 73-74)

    1. The Imitation of Christ, tr. Ronald A. Knox and Michael Oakley [1959], p. 32. ↩︎
    2. F. J. A. Hort, The Epistle of St. James, i.1-iv.7 (1909). ↩︎

  • ‘They’ Told Us Who Killed Charlie Kirk

    Reading Time: 8 minutes

    I think ‘they’ told us who killed Charlie Kirk. They may as well have signed their names to it. My suspicions in this regard only increased when the FBI announced the arrest of six defendants and charged them with wire fraud conspiracy and money laundering conspiracy. In these two incidents together, there may be clues to the powers that control the current administration.

    Gambling

    Assassinations and gambling are the specialities of organized crime. However, it’s not confined to organized crime. Or rather, organized crime is not roped off from the government. They are intertwined. The book, Double Cross,1 written by Sam and Chuck Giancana is helpful in this analysis. (Chuck Giancana is the brother of Sam Mooney Giancana. Sam is Chuck’s son and the godson of Mooney.)

    At the end of his life, Mooney Giancana’s empire was based on a numbers racket–gambling was his forte. He learned about this racket when he was sent to Leavenworth for running a still in Illinois. There he met Eddie Jones, who was incarcerated for running a policy racket, also known as ‘numbers’. Black men invented the policy racket and back then, black men owned it.

    Giancana had never heard of this racket, but after learning the ropes from Eddie Jones he determined to take it for himself. He probably had fewer scruples than usual, due to his extreme racism. After he secured Jone’s racket, he expanded it into Texas with the help of Jack Ruby.

    This could be a coincidence or it could be a red flag, but five of the six suspects in the FBI’s recent gambling case are black.

    Mooney Branches Out

    Mooney spent the years from 1966-74 in Mexico setting up the most lucrative gambling enterprise in history. Chuck believed his murder was largely the consequence of his actions there, in combination with rogue elements of the CIA. It all came to an end for Mooney Giancana when the FBI pressured the Mexican government to deport him. He had received a subpoena to testify before a Grand Jury and he knew way too much. He was shot to death in his basement kitchen.

    But before Giancana was deported, he had been operating from Mexico to the Caribbean and Central and South America, setting up operations on cruise ships and ports of call. He bought protection from dictators and presidents, including Noriega. And to top it off, he and his associates ingratiated themselves with Columbia’s Medellin Cartel. Naturally, they sent the Chicago Outfit a cut of everything. The relevant question today is what happened to this network after Mooney died?

    In this light, the FBI’s apparent glee at taking down this gambling racket brings up more questions than it answers. The numbers rackets never ended. They would know that better than anyone. Illegal gambling continues today. Maybe this case was particularly egregious. But even so, it seems to me there would be an additional red flag: the crime families involved.

    The Three Crime Families

    The crime families involved in the FBI’s current case are the Gambinos, Bonnanos, and Genoveses. They all operate in New York. New York was sometimes allied with Chicago, but the two organizations were separate and had different bosses.

    At Meyer Lansky’s suggestion all of the different branches had given their organization a name. The new names were:

    • The National Alliance became the Combination or Commission
    • The New York organization became the Mob
    • Chicago became the Outfit
    • New Orleans became the Combine or the Mafia

    Before His Death, Mooney Giancana’s Organization Controlled Everything But New York

    At the time the McClellan Hearings were being held in 1958, Mooney Giancana controlled everything but New York. His partners were Marcello for gambling in Texas, Alabama and Georgia and Trafficante Jr. in Florida. Trafficante was feeding casino money to Chicago from Cuba and drugs from Central America, the Caribbean and Asia. The term Chuck used for Mooney’s relationship with Carlo Gambino in New York is ‘aligned’. Mooney worked with him to deal with European rackets and drug trade. 

    The Most Important Question: Who Ended Up With Sam Mooney Giancana’s Empire?

    It’s fair to assume that the empire that Mooney Giancana left behind was taken over by his associates. His brother, Chuck Giancana was concerned about this. He was concerned that its nefarious influence is still operating under the radar. And he would know better than anyone that this was a strong possibility. He states several times in his book that there are few lines of demarcation between the Outfit and the CIA. “There are no Black Hats and White Hats.” So he considered the following questions to be important. Have U.S. organized crime, the CIA and internal criminals shaped our world since his brother’s death? How many wars have been funded by this wealth? Which governments were compromised? How many world leaders were corrupted, imprisoned, and assassinated? Which U.S. presidents have benefitted from covert CIA operations and drug money?

    These questions should be in the back of our minds when we read about the arrests of black athletes and New York crime families for gambling.

    The Assassinations: JFK

    I’ve argued previously that the signature on Kirk’s assassination was similar to the signature on the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. The first similarity is that they both crossed the wrong people.

    JFK’s death warrant was sealed by his father’s behavior, his own behavior, and by the expectations of aggrieved parties, including organized crime, the CIA and officials in the U.S. government. He was aware of these factors, but he was probably in deeper trouble than he knew. Joe Kennedy had received favors from the Chicago Syndicate before JFK was in the public eye. When he asked Mooney Giancana for his assistance in getting JFK elected president his indebtedness reached a new level. This favor had far-reaching consequences for his family and the USA.

    Joe Kennedy made certain promises to Mooney Giancana, which he had no intention of fulfilling. Instead, all three Kennedys, Joe, JFK and Bobby, betrayed Giancana by turning against the mafia that had helped them. This was a double cross. All things considered, the false sense of security was breathtaking. Joe in particular had to have known what Giancana was capable of.

    Anton Cermak and Huey Long

    As Chuck Giancana tells it, two previous assassination cases had similarities to the Kennedy assassination: the public murders of Anton Cermak and Huey Long. All the signs were there for anyone knowledgeable about mafia tactics. The first sign, according to Chuck, is making a hit look like a looney did it. It’s an old Sicilian tactic.

    In the case of Huey Long, the looney was a sharpshooter and in debt. Huey Long was a Louisiana senator on the take. He had worked for years with the Syndicate on everything from slot machines to casinos. His partners included Carlos Marcello in New Orleans; Frank Costello, Lucky Luciano, and Meyer Lansky in New York; Santo Trafficante in Florida; and Paul Ricca in Chicago. Unfortunately for him, he got greedy. By 1935 he demanded over $3 million a year in payoffs. Long’s friends in New York had him hit with the help of the New Orleans boss.

    Anton Cermak was the Mayor of Chicago who went to war against Al Capone on behalf of a rival, Teddy Newberry. When Cermak fled to Florida in December of 1932, Paul Ricca enlisted Joe Zangara to kill him. Zangara had been a sharpshooter in the Italian Army. Diamond Joe Esposito had sponsored him five years earlier to come to the U.S. from Sicily. Since then he had been working sugar runs from Cuba. However, he got into debt and was in trouble with the Chicago bosses.

    Zangara shot Cermak while he was riding in an open car with president-elect Roosevelt in Miami. When he was arrested he spouted anti-capitalist nonsense. The main problem with that tactic was that he was really a Republican. Or it would have been a problem if anyone had cared. He also claimed he had been trying to kill FDR and got Cermak by mistake. The press did not mention the fact that Zangara was connected to the Chicago Syndicate, and cops were paid off. 

    The Fall Guy

    And then there are the cases where the accused shooter, although seeming to fit the description of a looney, appears to be a patsy. This is suspected in the assassinations of JFK and Charlie Kirk. Related factors include the claim that an ancient bolt-action rifle fired the fatal shot. Basically, the general details given to the public don’t match what people actually saw or what they know about the particular weapon. And there is the question in both cases as to the direction of the fatal shot. Finally, there is the nonchalant way the authorities address the inconsistencies–or refuse to address them.

    Lee Harvey Oswald and His Connections

    We are familiar with the FBI’s case against Tyler Robinson, but maybe not so much with Lee Harvey Oswald. We know Jack Ruby, Chicago’s man in Dallas and Oswald’s assassin, had ties to both the CIA and the Outfit. So did Oswald.Oswald was also connected to the New Orleans mob from birth. His uncle was Carlos Marcello’s lieutenant and he had a big influence on the boy.

    U.S. Intelligence Community

    Oswald was allied with the U.S. Intelligence community. He was in the Civil Air Patrol as a young man, where he worked with a homosexual CIA operative and Outfit smuggling pilot, David Ferrie. Mooney and Marcello used Ferrie to fly drugs and guns out of Central America.

    Last but not least, Oswald was not a Castro supporter. He was a CIA agent and a right-wing supporter of the “Kill Castro’ Bay of pigs camp. When he was in the Marines in the late 50s he attended intelligence training sessions run out of the office of Naval Intelligence in a top secret Japanese Spy base.

    Nor was he a communist. He went to the USSR as a spy for the U.S. government.

    The Setup

    After Oswald returned to the US he worked for a company that was doing top security projects for the US government. The CIA directed him to former Chicago FBI agent Guy Banister as soon as he and his Russian wife were back in New Orleans. Banister’s Camp Street detective offices were a front for CIA covert domestic operations, similar to the Miami-based detective agency of Richard Cain. Bob Maheu’s Washington-Vegas agency was similar. They were all fronts to cloak illegal CIA-Outfit activities and draw agents for the CIA. During this time, Oswald trained Cuban exiles. 

    Oswald’s intel superiors sent him to Dallas. There he met with Jack Ruby at the Carousel Club and re-established his relationship with David Farrie. He also established a relationship with another Mooney associate, Russian exile and CIA operative geologist George De Mohrenschildt. De Mohrenschildt had contacts with Texas oilmen. Texas oilmen contributed cash to the assassination project.

    Oswald’s Patriotism and Malleability Were His Downfall

    They decided on Oswald as the fall guy in early spring. They had already laid the groundwork to make him look like a commie by sending him to Russia and associating him with the pro-Castro stuff. He had been a bright kid according to Chuck Giancana. His downfall was his patriotism and his malleability.

    The Professional Killers

    Later, Chuck learned through the grapevine that Mooney had solicited professional killers from several quarters. They included two of Marcello’s men and two of Trafficante’s Cuban exile friends. One of them was a former Havana vice cop who became a mobster. The other was a radical-turned-corrupt US customs official. 

    From Chicago Mooney brought in Richard Cain, Chuckie Nicoletti and Milwaukee Phil. They had all worked previously on the Bay of Pigs. Cain and Nicoletti were the actual gunmen for the hit. They were at opposite ends of Dallas Book Depository. It was Cain who fired from the 6th story window. 

    The CIA added several of their own “soldiers” using one of the anti-Castro men and Roscoe White as actual gunmen, along with J. D. Tippet and Oswald. The CIA planned for White and Tippet to eliminate Oswald, but Tippet wavered and allowed him to escape. So, White had to kill Tippet.

    It Was a Coup, Obviously

    J. Edgar Hoover was fine with this plan. And if somebody knew too much the CIA took care of it. Mooney specifically told Chuck it was a coup. He said they had done the same in other countries.


    “On November 22, 1963 the US had a coup; it’s that simple. The government of this country was overthrown by a handful of guys who did their job so damned well…not one American even knew what happened. But I know. I know I’ve guaranteed the Outfit’s future…once and for all. We’re set here in the United States. So, it’s time to move on to greener pastures. Spreadn’ the Outfit’s power and makn’ a fortune in deals overseas are two of the best reasons I can think of to leave the country.” (Sam ‘Mooney’ Giancana, as quoted by Chuck Giancana)

    1. Little Brown Paperbacks (a&C), Jan. 1, 1998. ↩︎

  • Smoke and Mirrors

    Reading Time: 3 minutes

    Our political situation looks bad, but there is literally nothing of substance behind it. It’s all smoke and mirrors. Whenever the establishment gets in a bind it creates distractions. Well, currently its behavior is the official version of stomping its feet, roaring, and waving its arms around. It’s really quite astonishing to see grown men and women behaving this way. You should all be ashamed of yourselves.

    NAFTA: The Establishment’s Folly

    I have been increasingly astonished at your behavior since 2015. I’m speaking to both parties here. I was amazed, when Hillary called progressives ‘children’ during the 2016 Democratic primary. She and Bill had slit the throat of our Democracy when they were in the White House by signing NAFTA into law among other things. But Hillary blithely expected working class people to vote for her from the depths of a poverty that she helped create. And yet we are children?

    I assume you think we are children because we don’t kowtow to the bosses in the CFR like you do; because we don’t blindly follow the rules of wealthy know-it-alls, like you do. The gall of prancing around on stage like some kind of savior when the voters were cheering for another candidate!

    Ignoring the Signs

    Of course he Republicans were right behind you. They thought they were being all covert, but they were uncovered just the same. There were a few miraculous signs during the 2020 campaign. I didn’t foresee them and I certainly didn’t cause them to happen, but I did appreciate what they revealed. For example, I didn’t know the Mormons were behind the craziness until the earthquake in Utah knocked the trumpet out of the Angel Maroni’s mouth.

    You do love to make mischief in secret and then present a sympathetic face to the voters, don’t you. The earthquake didn’t hurt anyone but how annoyed you were just to be outed. That’s not how you people operate is it? You believe if you can cause fear and pain and death it demonstrates your power.

    Your Crowning Achievement: The Earth’s Destruction

    But the height of my amazement is caused by your plan for our common home, Mother Earth. What great senseless oafs you must be! What resounding bozos! You can’t be serious!

    You have acted as if our suggestions were nothing more than political challenges from your inferiors and therefore meant to be defeated by you, yourselves, with all your clever plans and tricks and money, none of which you created on your own. Our suggestions were not frivolous. They were based on something you know nothing about, common sense. And you call yourselves ‘good’! You give goodness a bad name.

    Your Lack of Belief

    You have taken all your resources from people who believe in you, and from a planet that is defenseless against you. The most glaring flaw in your plan is your failure to recognize real power; a power that heals and comforts and watches over us. This power doesn’t belong to you. It wasn’t invented by your ideologies, and it doesn’t point to your being supreme. You would do well to recognize this important flaw because it demonstrates the lie of your leadership. You are not convincing anyone. We see you.

    Your Tech Lords are Some Kind of Joke

    And then there’s the comical performance of your tech-lords who honestly believe their ideas are the answer to any questions worth asking. Their ideas are cosmic pratfalls. They are not proposals for life. They are proposals for metal and plastic and shiny reflective surfaces–things that can’t speak or breath or talk or think. And yet they use the resources needed for life. These are the fantasies of children who persistently block out the warnings and pleadings of anyone who ever cared for them.

    Come Down From That High Place Where You Don’t Belong

    You are all hot air. There is nothing real or substantial to you. Come down from that high place before you hurt yourselves.