Just Another Blog in the Wheel

Yesterday my Roman Catholic friends celebrated the supposed Crowning of Mary as Queen of Heaven. Having just heard the entire service, I’m made once again to wonder just why it is that Romanists deny that they pray to Mary, why they deny that they hold Mary to be the functional equivalent of a Fourth member of the Godhead. We might well ask, if the world rumor about Rome being ready to officially rank Mary as a member of the Quadrinity—if they were to do that, what changes would be necessary to Romish faith and practice? I answer that question: none.

However, the denial continues as does the worship and adoration rendered to that blessed (but abused by her friends) woman. In what seemed a perfunctory effort to bring some earthly balance to the way Mary is thought of by the faithful, the priest, a man dear to me, quoted assorted Scripture texts which he apparently hoped might support various Marian dogmas. They didn’t.

His emphasis, however, encouraged more diligent imitation of Mary’s virtues, a safer application than a call to yet more exalted devotion. In all the priest’s Bible-summoning, however, the Scriptures he didn’t cite left bigger holes unfilled than Munchkins do.

The priest said that Mary’s assumption to heaven is known to be fact by the symbolic teaching of the Book of Revelation, particularly in its 12^th chapter where “the woman” is spoken of. He said we must remember that the symbolism in that chapter applies both to Mary and to the entire church, for both are “clothed with the sun.” But while we read of a loud voice from heaven declaring, “Now have come the salvation and the power and the kingdom of our God, and the authority of His Christ”, we find no mention of any woman let alone “the” woman, being assumed up to heaven, and not a word that could be construed as reporting a coronation. Revelation 12 is where they find Mary being crowned Queen of Heaven and Earth? How anyone could conclude that such occurred in this chapter is indeed a mystery. The woman flees into the desert under God’s watchful care for 3.5 years. She is given eagle’s wings to help her escape from the dragon, but she flies out to the wilderness, not up to heaven. She is the object of special divine care, rescued from drowning when the torrent spewed by the dragon threatened to engulf her. At that time the earth “opened its mouth” and swallowed the pursuing river. The earth again, not the heavens. There simply is no mention or allusion to her—or anyone else—being lifted to heaven. If anything may be safely concluded it is that the woman, whoever she is, remained altogether on earth, because the dragon—who had explicitly been cast down to earth—went off to make war against her, even “the rest of her offspring” who obey God’s commands—obey on earth.

The priest spoke of Jesus as “Mary’s only begotten Son.” I had never heard that before and was rather startled by it. Could it be that their interest in perpetuating her maidenhood into eternity may have been bolstered by a desire to attribute to her a relational descriptive everywhere else reserved for God the Father, thus making her seem ever more divine? I don’t know. But I do know that we heard nothing of Mary’s assumption in any passage cited. We heard, rather, Romanists’ presumptions, and wept. The pretense of offering Scriptural support was dropped finally when it was admitted that the May crowning of Mary as Queen of Heaven is a tradition of long standing in the church and therefore ought to be continued. As if every sin attaining to the boast of great age ought for that reason be perpetuated.

Other Scripture was “dragged in,” such as the prophecy of the sword piercing her soul, which, we were correctly assured, was fulfilled as she witnessed the crucifixion. But an earthly piercing is not a heavenly crowning. At homily’s end, the proposition about Mary’s crowning remained as unsupported as when the homily had begun.

But the end didn’t come before we were exhorted to see Mary as a model worthy of imitation in her virtues, special mention being made of her devotion to prayer. While we see no harm in encouraging imitation of anyone’s virtues we do not see how the specific instance cited—Mary’s being among the 120 who were filled with the Spirit at the Jerusalem Pentecost—sets her apart from the pack in any way. There is absolutely nothing attributed to Mary in that passage that did not pertain equally or more to the other 119.

There was, on the other hand, a great deal attributed to the Apostles, and especially Peter, that is not predicated of Mary. Of this nothing was said. We do not count silence as a case-clincher, but we do wonder at Luke’s omission, his failure to report anything about her after the crucifixion which would be remotely suggestive of eminence, let alone preeminence. If anything, we are made to believe that her unspeakably honorable role in God’s unfolding plan had pretty much been played, and she was on her way, escorted rather swiftly by Luke’s narrative, to the relative obscurity she doubtless coveted. We ought to be careful not to stain Mary with the ugly lust for ostentation which her self-appointed devotees attribute her. If any crown were offered to Mary in heaven, doubtless she would have refused it and cast it at her Savior’s feet.

No Mary-loving service would be complete, of course, without reference to her alleged intercessory superpowers as revealed in the incident at the wedding in Cana (John 2) wherein Mary made Jesus aware of the shortage of vino at the marriage celebration. “They have no more wine.” (There is something almost comically disproportionate about this simple sentence resulting in trillions of “Hail Mary, pray for us sinners” utterances. The priest mentioned her instruction to the servants present, “Do whatever He tells you,” deliberately, it seemed, trying to convey the impression that she was Jesus’ manager and/or agent. But curiously absent from the priest’s citations were the words our Lord used in response to her initial observation: “Woman, why do you involve Me? My time has not yet come.” That this was a rebuke of sorts cannot be disputed. It reveals Mary (again) to be precisely that sort of run-of-the-mill, bumbling, endearing disciple that we find Peter and the other apostles to have been throughout the pre-Pentecost narratives. These are just NORMAL people. There is no Queen of Heaven here, no Manager of Intercessions, no “Bring your worries to me” woman. We see instead a woman trying to figure out just who Jesus is and wondering intensely when He was going to make it known.

Interestingly—not surprisingly—absent from the priest’s list of passages were texts like this from Mark 3: In this scene, a crowd gathered deep around Jesus had assumed that a special privilege would belong to Jesus’ mother, in tow with Jesus’ siblings from Mary, all waiting outside to see Him. If any favor is ever accorded to anyone by a dignitary, it is AT LEAST helping them avoid those long lines where commoners must wait and wait for audience with the celebrity. If there is a Level One Favor for favored souls, it would certainly be a back-stage pass. But Mary couldn’t/didn’t merit even that! No moving her to the head of the line. From whence does the notion of His eagerness to crown her Queen of Heaven arise? Not from any divine text in our possession! When told that Jesus’ blood family was waiting outside to see Him, our Lord said, “Make way for the Queen of Heaven!” Oh. Sorry. No. He didn’t say that. He said, “Who are my mother and my brothers? Whoever does God’s will is my brother and sister and mother.”

That would mean, minimally, that there is lots of competition for the Queen’s crown. But more plainly, it means that the “tradition” invented and perpetuated by Rome is not merely one added to Scripture (which is the breathings of God). It is a tradition added AGAINST Scripture, and therefore ought to be tossed out, not continued.

The last element of the service was the singing of a Latin hymn to their reigning monarch: “Save us, Mary,” they chanted over and again. “Save us.” Amen, but not to Mary. Rather, “Lord Jesus, save them from laying any more bricks in their well-intentioned road to perdition. Grant them eyes able to distinguish between a mother chosen by You to guarantee His humanity, and a goddess manufactured by themselves to partake of your divinity. Grant them a desire to see You honored, above all. Amen.”

An enthusiastic friend of mine sent out a letter with the following in it:

The Chosen
Most are invited, but only some are picked out of the crowd. Is it our free will or God’s election? God calls everyone and gives them the power to respond—but to be chosen, we must respond to the call, using the power God gave us to take on the character of Christ.

Read it again— “to be chosen we must respond.” What then does it mean to be chosen? Oh goodness, me! Here is an example of that which induces in us spontaneous praise to God, not only for His sovereign salvation, but also for the Canons of Dordt and wonderful Westminster. The Confessions are very helpful on this topic. My friend, unfortunately, is not. Pray we can help our peers see some of the beauty which remains hidden from them. A great deal of the attractiveness of God’s Gospel is inevitably out of sight when schemes dictate that becoming chosen is up to you! As the great rabbis said: Oy Vey!

pastor steve

God punishes improper responses to His Word by binding His enemies to false beliefs and false explanations of things.

I am not sure what you mean by that… (view full text of question in comments section - Interlude II - Credo)

Speaking of knowing: Do I know your name? If not, level the field for me a bit, won’t you?

You had asked me about the relation of ethics and epistemology. I think it is fine if we limit our discussion to this—it is wide enough to have fun in, without ranging off into Natural Law’s existence.

I’m sorry I failed to cite the verses supporting my statements. I had assumed you would connect those circuits yourself, but I see that I should not have assumed. I’m sorry. This should help:

In 2 Thessalonians, you will find the passage I paraphrased. Speaking of certain people who “received not the love of the truth, that they might be saved,” the Holy Spirit says,

Because they refused to love the truth, “God shall send them strong delusion so that they will believe a lie: that they all might be damned who believed not the truth.” (2:10-11) This really is the Gold Passage on the subject, don’t you think? I suspect you formulated your response to my post as if I was just theologically rambling rather than relying on Scripture. So what we should do from here, after I get your name, is to get your take on the Thessalonians passage. How does this impact your view on the question under discussion? And please do note, emphasizing again the original concern of setting ethics and epistemology in right relation in our thinking, note verse 12. There we learn why it is that these folks were given over to believe a lie, that is, why they refused to love the truth. It was because they “had pleasure in unrighteousness.” The truth didn’t thrill them. Wickedness did. So God said to them, as He did to Israel in the quail episode, “O, is that what you want? Okay. I’ll give it to you. Here! Now choke on it.”

Here we come face to face with a God unimpressed with protestations about “free will.” On another occasion I would like to try to show you why the very notion of “free will” is riotously funny, but I don’t see that it needs to touch our discussion at this stage. My assertions treat of ethics and epistemology, not volition. And on any reading of “free will,” the passage in Thessalonians can be reconciled. For Free Willers, these folk abused their free will, using it to pursue wickedness. This gave God the right to cause them to be arrested by their own sin and to be cast into the House of Lies, their house of detention. You’d need to argue for a sort of freedom that is able to break God’s imposed judgments. By that standard, everyone should be able to will themselves not to suffer or die. No one goes THERE. I am assuming again, but I fear I’d insult you to think any other way. You do recognize that if something comes as a sentence of God, He might indeed lift it, especially if there should be repentance. But we cannot say He is under obligation to give the condemned power to escape their condemnation! We don’t see judges handing AK-47s to those found guilty in their courts, telling them they now have even odds of either going to or escaping from the slammer. There is such a thing as JUST punishment. It is to that that I direct your attention. What can you learn about the relation of ethics and epistemology from the fact that God has told us of His sovereign sending of delusions which render people incapacitated (through their own fault) in so far as their being able to recognize or embrace the truth. This is a really serious question, and one that would help us all to get to know the God Who Is more accurately. He’s that frightening. He is.

Yours and His,

pastor steve

“And to the immoral and wicked, each day brings into clearer relief the relationship between ethics and epistemology.”

Interesting remark. Can you expound on how epistemology and ethics are related? I have followed your stuff before and I don’t remember this emphasis. What do you mean by epistemology? Are you speaking in the Van Til vein? Or epistemology generally?

Thank you for your good question(s). I am tempted to spend the rest of this day answering you; I’m not sure if that would be immoral (wink). Let us briefly, then, dance a cha-cha in the Field of Knowledge. 1, 2, 3.

1. The Enlightenment project sought to trump God in the Knowledge Wars from the outset of the enterprise by relieving Him of any responsibility or relationship to or with our knowing of a thing or things. It actually wasn’t a great leap from our declaration of independence to our barring God from the discussions altogether. Since He had been excluded as a matter of METHOD, the method obviously presupposed autonomy and adequacy. God’s Lordship moves from Sovereign to Trusted Adviser to Hired Consultant to Who-Asked-for-Your-Opinion? The religion of Humanism has brilliantly engineered the seating arrangements for those in their theater, making it appear as if their thinking alone is uncontaminated by religious prejudice. Along with this fantasy comes its concomitant:

“Since we got here without His help (har har hardy har har), we do not need His help now, although, if He wants to agree with us and wish us well, we’ll let Him have a seat—somewhere; perhaps even a seat of honor—so long as He behaves. What we most certainly will not do is share our glory with another. No. This is OUR story, not His. All the evil that ever happened came about because people pretended to speak for this “God” who, by definition, cannot be wrong. To this fairytale belief must be attributed every past and present evil, including mass murder, sexual dysfunction, and insufficient parking spaces in Brooklyn. We’re not going to surrender all our gains by pretending we need Him now. That would be a step backward and worse.”

The Word once confessed to be the light in which we see light has become equated with darkness and ignorance. The light in Enlightenment was distinguished from the darkness which was from the beginning identified with the Word of God and traditions derived therefrom.

Witness the small “e” definition of enlightened: rational, tolerant and well-informed. What a set-up! That’s like an accused thief telling the court that every item found in his possession after the robbery-every item with the victim’s name etched on it-bears in itself the obvious evidence of rightfully belonging to the thief. “Of course it’s mine, your honor. The very fact that it says “from the library of Steve Schlissel” suggests that this egomaniac was jealous of my growing collection and sought to have it regarded as his by a mere engraving of his name. Not only does this prove all these etched items were mine all along, but it also makes the plaintiff guilty of vandalism for defacing my property.” Everything that can be considered as true “evidence” must pass a prior test of being regarded as vindicating the defendant. In order to be regarded as true knowledge, one needs to have begun the acquisition autonomously .

The Enlightenment project is the human-racial continuation of taking from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, and by that method, bypassing (we imagine) reliance upon God. (I’m wondering if we haven’t answered your essential question, by the way, simply by recalling here the NAME of the forbidden tree—KNOWING right and wrong, good and evil; in other words, the epistemology of ethics.) The underlying assumption is either a) God is not there so there’s no use waiting for instruction from Him; b) God is there but He has a serious ego problem and regards us as competitors, thus making communications from Him suspect—something like the Patriots coach telling the Giants what their next play ought to be; c) He is there and He means well, but He’s a bumbling communicator and simply unable to help us sort things out—His Word, variously interpreted from Day One (Six?), proves its inadequacy by that very variety. If it were REALLY God’s Word, it would pass all the tests that I’ve conjured beforehand, for, before looking or listening, I’ve firmly decided what qualities God’s Word OUGHT to have if it is indeed to be received as God’s Word. One of those qualities is convincing. If it is to be reckoned as coming from God it must have such power, pertinence and clarity as would make “misunderstanding” impossible.

All of that is merely an updated version of “The woman Thou gavest me…” It is humanity’s ace-long-out-of-the-hole. If there is a problem here, the matter of to whom responsibility can be traced, is obvious. No matter what: it’s God’s fault. The disparities which exist between His Word and our being, thoughts, and activities are only explicable on the basis of His imperfections (or His ignorance or His immorality, etc.).

Since we ARE created by the one true God, we insist that the very notion of our knowing anything independently of our Creator is manifest rubbish. Yet the devil aimed just here when seeking to remove our first parents from their created estate (i.e., in unbroken covenant with God). “Upon what basis shall you assign any particular to the category of ‘Good’ or the category of ‘Evil’?” (Perhaps we should note that, when ontology is added to this discussion—as it must be at some point—we have completed the headings of the principal areas of philosophical concern: Being, Knowing, Right Living.)

As you can see, the question from the beginning has been, “Whose knowledge is true, adequate and comprehensive enough to make Law?” If we speculate about knowledge as if it were distinct from, or unrelated to, Law, we would be engaging in the definitive act of futility: abstracting. God’s knowledge, for us, is no merely theoretical thing, but as intimately related to the what and ought of all, as the Holy Spirit is to the Father and the Son. These may be distinguished. They may NOT be separated.

God demonstrates His right to be the sole Lawmaker by creating the universe. This gives Him a distinct advantage over all competitors’ claims to equal adequacy. You will no doubt recall how this was the focus of God’s rebuke to Job and Co. “Did you make the world? Why then do you talk as if you did?” Until we create ex nihilo, we are doing nothing except playing catch-up (even though, ironically, playing catch-up puts us further and further away from God). The only proper response to the Word of God is to shut the mouth, bow the knee, open the ear. Even kids in the Bible know that. Little Sammy said it all: “Speak, Lord. Your servant is listening.”

Okay, quickly. Number 2 in our discussion about the unbreakable bond between knowledge and ethics would concern the skepticism and cynicism that has engulfed us. The greater our claims to infallible, autonomous knowledge, the deeper the skepticism that characterizes the daily lives of ordinary people. At the beginning of the 20th century, Western Civilization did not believe (as Hebrews 11 describes it). At the beginning of the 21st century, we disbelieve. An interesting byproduct of our disbelief has been the tyranny of the experts. This glorious human race that knows so much by itself that it doesn’t have need of a god, this same race daily becomes more insecure about anything and everything it thinks it knows. Just as God is boxed out of the legal, educational, and entertainment spheres, so also is knowledge gained by generational experience considered worthless.

There are few areas untouched by this pathetic slavery to experts, but one standout area that has provided the most compelling proof that moderns don’t know their tuchases from their elbows is child-rearing, particularly pedagogy. It’s enough to know that it worked for a thousand years to disqualify it for continued use. The tried and true is, for that reason, regarded as false. If a method successfully prepared literate and thoughtful citizens since 1776, it is sure to be scrapped in favor of the novel, the inane, or the insane. When it comes to modern school policies, from the rejection of phonics to the subjective “rightness” of wrong answers in mathematics, parents who follow the “experts” can count on just one thing: that their children will be ignorant and morally degenerate when they complete the requisite 12 years of preparing for four more years of drunken parties and STD’s.

(How should we rank our collective response to AIDS when evaluating the quality of particular evidences which illustrate and prove the inextricable bond between ethics and epistemology? It must be near the top, no? We KNOW, beyond a doubt, we KNOW the answer available to EVERYONE, which, if accepted and adopted, would provide a virtual guarantee that you would NOT get AIDS. [We are aware of the statistically miniscule likelihood of accidental contagion, but even that small group would be made smaller by the large-scale doing of deeds in keeping with repentance.] Yet, because the solution involves self-control and moral living, it is rejected out-of-hand. We have made the decision that we must NEVER instruct our youth that there are inescapable consequences attached to certain behaviors and choices. We have nationally accepted the fact that the truth is of no value in combating the so-called “plague of the 21st century.” Sufferers in the Great Plague that decimated Europe would have regarded it as nothing less than a complete miracle-by marrying as virgins and then remaining faithful to your respective spouse, you will successfully escape “the plague.” Yet moderns regard that price as insufferably high. It is rejected before it is proposed.)

Any alien peeking into the homes of today’s Yuppy parents would think that no preceding generation had ever had children, so entire is their reliance on new methods of child-rearing. Spanking? Abuse. Forbidden socially, soon by law. Yelling? Out. Displeasure? Debatable. That this radical fear of punishing is cause-effect connected to the guilty consciences of this generation of parents is not discussed. It is simply assumed that effective discipline is equivalent to barbaric discipline. These moms and pops are enlightened! What’s enlightening is to hear the names the three and four-year-olds call their parents in public spaces whenever the little wretches hear that most hated of all words (”No”).

3) A third area you might want to consider in assessing the relationship of knowledge and morality is that which is suggested by God’s bringing of judgment upon willful sinners to “believe the lie.” As an exercise, why don’t you write a brief essay drawing out some implications? God punishes improper responses to His Word by binding His enemies to false beliefs and false explanations of things. What does that imply about what we “know”—if anything? Please do write a piece, short or long, then send it along to me as an encouragement by which I can know that my reply justified the time put into it. Or else I’ll feel guilty. Let’s figure stuff out together. Waddayasay?

Thanks again,

pastor steve

There are limits to everything.

Aren’t there? Well, there used to be. Or so it seemed. But I can’t tell if there are any still in place. And, I wonder, if there are limits, what they might be?

Every sunrise brings new reasons to believe Leonard Cohen was in an inspired, prophetic estate when he wrote his magnus opus, The Future. Looking at the prospects of Western and world civilization, the Canadian Jewish poet/alt-cocker-rocker wrote:

Things are going to slide, slide in all directions;

Won’t be nothing

Nothing you can measure anymore

The blizzard, the blizzard of the world

Has crossed the threshold and it has overturned

The order of the soul

One could say Cohen’s is an expansion and application of Dostoyevsky’s great truism: “If God does not exist, then everything is permitted.” Whence limits in an unregulated world of total possibility?—where phantasmal global warming and ill-coursed meteors are the only potential spoilers permitted consideration. Speak not of judgment to come! But Mankind’s real worry ought to be about “moral warming,” the state of affairs that replaces the bishop’s chair when the pleasure of our corporate “Amen-ing” of each of God’s Words has gone missing with Him.

And His absence was very much by man’s design. For the LORD God was given an eviction notice 150, even 200 years ago. He was informed that any reality He seeks to invade must be limited to men’s closets. The Public Spaces—by which was meant every sphere of life except the realm where personal opinions or private delusions grow, so long as these are judged to have no affect on one’s neighbors—all activity in the Public Spaces would henceforth and forever be regulated by man’s own sense of fairness and the common good. The Public Square would be under the strict regulatory powers of man qua Man. Any legislation perceived to have its origin in the mind of God, is, for that very reason, deemed unfit to become public policy. All discussions must begin and end with statistics gleaned from instruments subject entirely to man’s control. “Thus saith the Lord,” is thereby made equivalent to, “Thus saith the exiled monarch,” the one we tried to do away with entirely when He appeared to be within our reach two thousand years ago. We remember it well. We number the years of the Common Era from that noble effort to make Barabbas king. Well, it might be so that we couldn’t keep that Jesus dead, but at least we can keep Him off His throne (we think).

Moral warming becomes inevitable when God is declared not to exist. Because such a declaration is too provocative as long as cathedrals stand, a more polite way of saying the same thing was sought. The winner was, “God may or may not exist, but the wheels of government, time, life and Microsoft cannot be expected to sit idly by while that existence is debated.” Thus God was granted provisional existence, so long as He did not interfere with progress. He was permitted to mind His business as long as that posed no restraints on us in the conduct of ours. And everything we thought, said or did was our business, not His.

When such a state of affairs is believed to actually be, moral absolutes are gutted. The sharp gives way to the round, the sure to the perhaps, condemnation to approbation. Anything goes. Cole Porter didn’t tell the half of it. We have come to the place where the solid, deep and stable truths, which provide both framework and shape, support and hope, for life—the kind of life lived by Creatures—these truths are liquidated. In the meantime, the fluorocarbons of evolutionism and egalitarianism deplete the ozone of our consciences. People in the proverb business will be offering many revocalizations of Dostoyevsky’s truth in the coming days, as that proposition born of a seer’s contemplation is incarnated. When it is beheld by all, then it will be described as a result of observation, not speculation. Then it will be assessed in the light of the “is” as opposed to the likely, or the could-be. Poets and artists will wrap the phenomenon with descriptions as mothers wrap their babies with clothes before venturing out on a chilly day.

Nevertheless, to the gleg, each day brings vast amounts of instruction. That’s why I periodically cancel my subscription to the New York Times. Information overload. File cabinets stuffed. Take your data elsewhere.

You know, of course, that the data I refer to is not the pleasant 17% of The Times’ text which delights, informs, broadens, engages, enhances and/or enlightens. The overload occurs with the 83% which appears as self-conscious political propaganda, the so-called “news” that is, in fact and effect, a guidebook directing disparate anti-American and anti-Christian troops where they should apply the next wave of pressure if they are to effectively destroy yet another limit.

And to the immoral and wicked, each day brings into clearer relief the relationship between ethics and epistemology. Wanna talk some more about this? Prove it.