Carlita, I have been faced with this all my life, being half NA. People cannot understand the draw of the NA spirituality but honestly, I can't believe how natural it is. Every single Christian holiday is built off the shoulders of Pagan ones. Christmas= yule. Easter is Beltane. Etc. And NA spirituality, very Pagan in nature, is lovely.
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Satan and the Sanctity of Marriage
- Thread starter Forever_Catholic
- Start date
Forever_Catholic
Active Member
We pray to Saints for intercessions because their prayers have greater merit than ours. We’re not asking them to act as God or on God’s behalf. One exception would be the prayer to Saint Michael the Archangel, in which we ask for his protection directly, but we specify that it is “by the Divine Power of God.”
It is true that as paganism declined and Christianity spread in the Roman Empire, Christians – including, the former pagans -- began to Christianize pagan festivals. Nothing wrong with that. It was natural in the process of displacing paganism with Christianity. It is also natural for all people to retain customs. Some customs associated with paganism still exist among Christians, but these things are not part of the Christian Faith. A Yule log, for example, goes way back in winter-solstice paganism, but it has only a secular association with Christmas. It is not scriptural and has no part in the liturgy.
In late Roman paganism, 25 December was established as the birthday of Mithras, the god of light, who had come to be known as “the Unconquered Sun.” The date was set according a proclamation by Emperor Aurelian in 274.
But the Catholic Church had already fixed 25 December as the birthday of Christ 100 years or more prior to that.
Was Jesus really born on December 25? - Catholic Straight Answers
Easter coincides with Passover of course, and Passover coincided with pagan celebrations of the spring equinox. But there was never a relation between Passover and spring celebrations because their focus is on entirely different things.
The word “Easter” comes from old Anglo-Saxon Orthodoxy and has an obscure origin. Maybe it derives from the name of the pagan Saxon goddess Eosrte or maybe the ancient word for spring or maybe from some other old Anglo-Saxon word. That’s something that has been debated by people who are into linguistics. In any case “Easter” is only used in English and in its German form “Ostern,“ as it was picked up from the Anglo-Saxon missionaries during the 600s. In other languages, the name for these holy days derives from the Hebrew “Pesach.”
And as with the Yule log, Easter eggs have only a secular significance.
First of all, I don't have anything against any elements of paganism that are not incorporated as elements of Christian Faith. Pagan customs, Christmas trees, Easter bunnies, and stuff like that is all fine with me as long it's seen as secular just-for-fun stuff. It only bothers me when people associate it as part of the Faith or attack the Faith because those things exist or accuse Christianity of being a spin-off or outgrowth of paganism, which it is not.
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Pagans were not bad people just for being pagans, and would not have been condemned for not knowing the true God, because he had not revealed himself to them. God only revealed himself to the Jews until Christ came to earth. Then Jesus revealed God more fully and commanded his disciples to “teach all nations” so that everyone could receive eternal salvation. He said "I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father but through Me." Pagan articles of faith don't fit into that.
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Unveiled Artist
Veteran Member
Thank you and I agree.
I wouldnt call it not Christian that some Roman customs not in Judaism are present in Christianity and more specific Catholicism (both and its offshoots). Im sure Mass has some aspects that are not directly from Jewish tradition but from Roman tradition.
As for Holidays etc I dont look at dates and stuff like yules and trees. I go to Easter Vigil every year to congradulate new christians into the Church. I know a lot of "things" used in Mass are pagan oriented. (Roman pagan). I also know the meaning and context is christian and jewish.
After awhile of observation too, I do see why people call Catholicism paganism. The faith is more mystic than other branches of christianity were spirituality is not related to any'thing' on earth. While Catholicism relates bread/wine to Jesus. I see the reasons plan as day and they are not negative. It is what it is.
Im just find it odd most Catholics dont recognize the differences between how they view things and how say a baptist would.
They both make sense. I just see more fullness in faith in the Church even though its influences are pagan.
If the pagan influences were not about Christ that would be different.
I wouldnt call it not Christian that some Roman customs not in Judaism are present in Christianity and more specific Catholicism (both and its offshoots). Im sure Mass has some aspects that are not directly from Jewish tradition but from Roman tradition.
As for Holidays etc I dont look at dates and stuff like yules and trees. I go to Easter Vigil every year to congradulate new christians into the Church. I know a lot of "things" used in Mass are pagan oriented. (Roman pagan). I also know the meaning and context is christian and jewish.
After awhile of observation too, I do see why people call Catholicism paganism. The faith is more mystic than other branches of christianity were spirituality is not related to any'thing' on earth. While Catholicism relates bread/wine to Jesus. I see the reasons plan as day and they are not negative. It is what it is.
Im just find it odd most Catholics dont recognize the differences between how they view things and how say a baptist would.
They both make sense. I just see more fullness in faith in the Church even though its influences are pagan.
If the pagan influences were not about Christ that would be different.
goodhunter819
Member
I want to say that paganism or at least the term paganism given to non believers by Christian church, that I am sure many know that non Christian faiths like the First Nations religions of the indigenous American Indians belief dose not reflect Satanism per say and that the Spirit World' I am sure you all know is not a hell nor is Valhalla a hell for the Vikings, I would also like to say that marriage precedes the Christian church and the unified monotheist teachings by some 20,000 years and further still, it is worth knowing which I am sure many do know that Satanism unlike the native beliefs I just mentioned are not like Satanist of end product, which teaches only a eternal damnation to the flames, live now pay later sort of thing, also part of what I said about Satanism is reworded from Anton Sadozar Levy's Satanic bible which of his works I read as a method of retaining knowledge ,so I am also alternatively quoting:
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Robert Landbeck
Member
I cannot but agree. But the issue is not gay marriage, but whether traditional 'straight' marriage ever really 'strait' in the eyes of God?
In the many heated and ongoing debates over same sex unions and the very nature of marriage since the SCOTUS decision, especially those comments coming from conservative representatives of political and religious traditions taking a stand against same sex unions, is a presumption that needs examining, that is within their respective religious teachings is a 'traditional straight' marriage and union which originates with God.
If by origins those religious are referring to the union so poorly described in Genesis from which man fell from grace, than there is painfully little which allows one to comprehend the basis or nature of that union or the religious claim. But while there is considerable reference within the scriptural record to a spiritual union of one man and one woman, and one can hardly doubt that God, if there is a God, would have a particular interest in getting that right, there is an acute shortage of important detail. While the very nature of a spiritual union is rather taken for granted.
One of the unspoken missing links within institutional Christian tradition is the absence of any insight into that union, which once brought a man and woman into direct covenant with the living God, without the necessity of any institutional forms or middleman-priesthood we know today. Even after two thousand years of scholastic theological exegesis, tradition is unable to describe with clarity or precision, not only the nature of the union from Genesis from which a man and woman Fell, but exactly what the single transgression was that left man in his fallen state. A state or fall that many would agree remains the fact of human nature today; even corrupting our understanding of both Love and God.
Among the curiosities of religious teaching on marriage and one wearing so thin as to be categorised along with the Emperors new cloths is the concept of 'natural law'; the idea that human sexual union within 'straight' marriage represents a spiritual component or even a 'gift' of God. But the question is how can an unruly instinct of biology, a leftover from our evolutionary past, one outside human volition and for the most part irrational in response and itself a material reality be either moral or spiritual? The idea that a potential of biology, called euphemistically 'procreation', accrues some moral or spiritual advantage from God to the relationship is a dubious concept indeed as the basis for any moral standard. Especially since biological carnality and it's union existed long before any of the monotheisms ever appeared on earth. And the basics of concupiscence and biology haven't and isn't changed by some contrivance of language, ceremony, blessing or the most sincere aspirations of a man and woman.
It is also presumed that human nature and natural law as understood today is the same as within the union referenced in Genesis. Yet for an omnipotent, omniscient God that may not be the case, as the carnal bond has not shown itself to be a particularly solid foundation for either a spiritual or moral union between a man and woman, even less between gay men, if the writing on public toilet walls or the proliferation of 'hookup' apps has anything to say about fidelity. The idea that human sexual response has any fidelity is one of the great male lies. And it is within human sexuality that a dangerous and dark side of human nature is exposed all too clearly not to take pause and reflect.
The religious preoccupation with human sexuality, while never concerned with either Love or the nature or quality of human spiritual union, was more interested in contractual obligations, control and perpetuating their respective traditions; historically at the expense of woman. But there are valid reasons for concern! It is self evident that our species own control of this unruly force of nature within us is something much less than it should be to be honestly described as moral! A force of nature too often able to overrule any authority of conscience or common sense. And the price for this limitation has been high.
If there was a plausible candidate for the effects of the FAll or for the 'Stain of Original Sin' , human existence chained to the corruptions of 'natural law' would be it! One needs only consider pornography, prostitution, divorce, the broken homes and marriages that infidelity causes, unwanted children, questions of overpopulation, all sexual abuse, violence and trafficking, pedophile priests, rape, an Aids pandemic, Syphilis, Gonorrhea and at least another dozen sexually transmitted diseases or infections. Than there is contraception, abortion and suggestive links to testicular and prostate cancers, degenerating DNA in sperm, implications for the immune system and even female vaginal conditions. With such huge risks and costs to human well being, both individually and culturally, one might think such overwhelming evidences would give reason a start to seriously begin questioning this often predatory act which looks more at home on the farm than approved of by Heaven. This act, bought and sold the world over, from this perspective looks more a tyranny and a curse than any 'gift' of God, making us slaves to concupiscence and Madison avenue. And while there may be some satisfaction of the senses from carnal gratification, does it satisfy or feed the soul, the heart or bring us closer to God? Probably not!
Unfortunately finding an answer to this conundrum if an answer exists, requires questioning human nature itself. And such critical self scrutiny is no easy task when there are no obvious remedies on the table and rights and responsibilities are too confused. And so here human pride kicks in and any claim to honesty or rationality more often than not goes out the window. But is confusing a biological imperative for a spiritual expression little more than an intellectual prostitution and the sleep of reason? I suspect that is the case. So before anyone condemns others sexual conduct, those who think of themselves as straights, should take a hard look at the character of their own sexual conduct and union, founded upon the same impulse of nature. And however straight we may wish to believe our union may be, I have to doubt that there is any gay or strait before God, just the corruption of an ideal of Love lost at the Fall and yet to be understood by religion or recovered by any product of natural reason.
So then is this confusion just more wishful thinking, the futile attempt by the religious to hold fast to an idea that 'we' are 'created' in the 'image and likeness' of God without being able to convincingly define that likeness, moral or spiritual? The whole of existing religious identity rests on that assumption. An assumption, however appealing, the growing environmental crisis is quickly tearing to pieces. Our tragic stewardship of the planet could not possibly reflect the wisdom of God or a spiritual dominance within human nature, especially while we remain so self evidently an unsustainable and destructive species.
So with regard to marriage, another anomaly of the Judeo/Christian' tradition is this: If our Fall from grace came from within a spiritual union of a man and woman created and joined by God, by a single disobedience, one might imagine, even expect that our return to the grace and favour of God would be by the obverse path, by a yet unknown, single command to a single Law and obedience which re-establishes the divine union, which was once the foundation of a Covenant, Command, Law and direct knowledge of God.
Of course the existence, 'as in the beginning' of such a single Law and command would be heretical to the established religious orders, for in practical terms, it would make them all instantly redundant, changing the very nature of religion itself from the top heavy, institutional temple/church traditions we observe in the world today, to an individual spiritual-virtue ethic conception, founded within the marriage of one man and one woman and without the need of a self ordained, theological priesthood or any other mumbo jumbo at all! Just integrity and fidelity to new moral purpose. Sounds like revolutionary stuff. Maybe that's what sent Jesus to be crucified on the Cross?
Marriage between a man and woman, as an ideal of relationship that it should be . . . isn't! The high aspirations and expectations that two bring to this relationship are easily worn down by the weight of contradictory realities that too often prevent human flourishing for both men and women. And the failure/divorce rate for this union speaks loud and clear. There is a problem? And existing religion doesn't have an answer!
This ancient and flawed institution desperately needs new foundations, now more than ever before, which religion has failed to provide. Assuming there is a God, should He wish to make a spiritual union between a man and woman pre-eminent over all others, He'll need to offer something stronger than a carnal bond of lust. A relationship founded upon a divine wisdom clear of the many corruptions natural law is heir too would be a start; one that 'lifts' the spirit to new insight and confirmation of the very nature of Love, even a 'Resurrection' that corrects the dualism within the human condition.
Religion, as we understand that idea from history and tradition, intellectually bound to a failed moral paradigm and conception of natural law, self evidently offers no means to correct the crooked timber that is human nature. True religion may only begin when the way to straighten the human heart is revealed and the true spiritual marriage defined! Not by men but by God.