nourishing obscurity

The Jannie pointed out the resemblance to the thick and thin stripes of the Union Jack

Let’s do the disclaimers first. As was mentioned in part 1 and again in comments, there are images or symbols in the Vatican which are not Christian and in fact, in some cases, they’ve actually been knowingly imported.

These two posts are not getting into the faith itself but into whether or not these images and symbols are consistent with that faith, as based on scripture. In particular, are the images and symbols anathema to that faith?

The question of Mary as Co-redemptrix and Queen of Heaven is one at issue. One man wrote in comments on a youtube I saw:

I always feel bad for Mary when I see her image worshiped like that. She was a faithful follower of Christ, blessed by God to bear His son. She didn’t ask to be made into an idol and worshiped, but it was done to her anyway.

This is not quite in Holy Handgrenade of Antioch territory or worshipping the Bomb, as Mary is a major figure but scripture portrays her thus: Ecce Ancilla Domini Fiat “Behold the Handservant of the Lord”. The handservant is not a Queen of Heaven or Co-redemptrix.

The people I feel sorriest for are the faithful. Battered on one side by the other religions, the atheists, humanists etc., they’re also sold down the drain by the high-ups [Ephesians 6:12 - see P2 and the Ambrosia affair, Roberto Calvi among others].

As long as the bible is the central and in fact only text, then the faithful are the faithful. When that is the line, then anyone of any denomination can join in.

A totem pole in the Vatican – same symbolism

And holding property is not necessarily bad in itself, nor is the producing of goods – the monks made wine to sell to upkeep the buildings and lands. And there’s nothing wrong with wine – it’s what you do with it which is the issue.

There’s a blogger, Martin Kelly, who is a catholic and at one point was a co-author at Devil’s Kitchen. Now I’m not prepared to be at odds with him, he’s a good man. Ditto with John in Cheshire. Nor am I at odds with Chris Mounsey.

Politically and religiously I agree with everything I’ve seen so far from the first two. The only issue I see between them and me is if they were to push the elements like the Co-redemptrix. I’d have to politely decline.

I think all denominations could get along as long as they steered clear of the finer points of doctrine and stuck to the basic text. There’s most certainly common ground – the Great Schism was over power plays and the finer points of Doctrine, not the central text.

On the other hand, so many have used the text selectively instead of looking at the totality – there was a comment [unpublished] the other day from a woman trying to use it to justify feminism, i.e. the setting of Woman against Man and then she had the gall to say we [men] were misusing it.

Certainly the church, after the early church, got caught up in doctrinal issues and that was the great Gnostic push to pervert and kill off the direction. Obviously, some sort of doctrinal precepts needed to be laid down but I’d suggest they were all contained within the scriptures themselves.

Perhaps they needed to be reasserted in the light of all the apocrypha. Again, not going into the actual theology, the safest way was to have core texts, the gospels and everything else is either precedent or ancillary to those. And the message is basically to love thy neighbour as thyself. And theologically, there is no difficulty for those of that faith in the Trinity. That’s all that is needed.

The dome of St Peter’s

Martin said, on his blog:

One can be sure that this decision will not have been taken without great prayer and reflection, and it is disquieting to think how many column inches will be filled with futile theorising in respect of his successor’s identity in the weeks ahead, as if a conclave were some sort of demographic beauty contest.

Now look – I’m not interested in going in and trying to theologically put him down or argue. There’s a centre ground where the goodness of the man is vastly more important than the doctrinal issues and if you like, that’s a libertarian stance.

Why I don’t extend that to Islam as a theology is that is completely different – many of the precepts are directly destructive to society. Which again, does not say anything about the average Muslim housewife.

There has to be some centre ground where we can say OK, I don’t agree but I do recognize you as a good man or woman and I can do business with you.

Here’s the Catholic explanation of the East facing churches.   There is another explanation that this is facing the rising sun or morning sun or if you like, eastern star.

Now the circular wafer of the Mass.  It is placed in a monstrance:

Here is another monstrance:

With the wafer placed in that monstrance, would it look anything like this?

That is Islam.   The image came from this site – check the url.

Wiki does not touch on the etymology of “Vati-can” and as it’s inconclusive, nor will I.  And so to this one:

The theme in these two posts is not to assert what precisely the symbols and images mean but to note that they are certainly not Christian. This one above is problematic because one explanation is that it represents Peter crucified upside down. That is as the Catholic world accepts it.

To the non-Catholic or even non-Christian, it’s pretty obvious what it’s symbolizing.   Not only that, why is the symbol of St Peter there behind him?   With every political party’s platform, there is the party symbol behind and the leader is there as an apologist fro that party.   In a similar way, Peter or his descendant is the leader or chief representative of his party and in this case, that party is not Peter but Jesus.  It should be the cross of Jesus, not Peter which is behind him.   So it doesn’t wash.

And as for the twisted cross which popes since Vatican II have used – I’m not going to say a word. As for the IP as a mast of a boat facing both ways, Albert Pike explained it in Morals and Dogma.

And lastly, the Vatican crest itself:

Thanks to the fuel project for those images.

One characteristic of occultists is that there have to be “mysteries”, they’re hidden in plain sight behind symbols, there are always two explanations – the innocuous one easily sold to the layperson and then the real one which only adepts can supposedly divine.   I’d like to know that the innocuous explanation of that crest is.

Finally

Catholics will be pretty annoyed by these two posts as somehow saying their religion is bunkum, they’re something the non-Christian will immediately seize on and say there you go.    Look, I’m just as much down on Rowan Williams and the CofE hierarchy.   I’m not bad-mouthing Catholicism, I’m pointing out grave anomalies in the symbolism of the high echelons at the Vatican.

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