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By Robert Marquand Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor 12/24/2003     (XIAMEN, CHINA) China’s first Protestant church is still located on a winding back alley of fish markets and fruit stalls in this old port city. A crest atop the brick colonial structure reads 1848.     Yet the Xinjie Church here is hardly a museum piece. Every Sunday it literally overflows with more than 2,000 attendees during its two regular services, with more people coming during the Christmas season.   This church - with an alter flanked by blinking conifers - and the four other government-sanctioned churches nearby, are home to rising numbers of worshipers. Christianity - in both the official and unofficial churches - is again   gaining momentum in China, and is a source of some consternation for the party leadership. Being Christian; is fashionable, with young people sporting crosses as a mild form of dissent, and others feeling the faith has a certain international cachet. But something more is at work. In many interviews, congregants say the deity they worship  communicates, and has power in their lives, especially now when China is going through immense, jarring economic changes that upset older social contracts.   People in China have a spiritual hunger, very much so, says an official church pastor in Xiamen, and there is a need for that to be filled. I think this is the main reason why we continue to have larger services.;   Congregations in China comprise all ages, with younger people popping up during the service to take cellphone calls outside - this being Asia.  Last Sunday, several Xiamen churches held a Christmas party, notable because preaching took place. The gathering at an ocean-side exhibition center was so large that 300 people were turned away. In Quanzhou, north of Xiamen, church members tore down an 800-seat edifice, and have nearly finished a 2,500-seat $1.6 million new church which is 90 percent financed by the 3,000 congregants there.     Along the easy-going southeast coast, Protestant worshipers pay little attention to China Shanghai-based official church hierarchy. They hold Bible study groups, have choir rehearsals, and gather in volunteer groups. We have to join the [official] church, but then we do and say what we want, says a local pastor. We preach the living God. Still, what is happening around Xiamen is a far cry from the way Ji Lu worships in Beijing, the center of political power. Mr. Ji helps lead prayers in an unofficial church - where 20 people gather in a room so small that when they share tea and cakes afterward, all must stand.     Ji is one of an estimated 30 to 60 million unregistered; Christian believers. His sect is made up of nearly a hundred other small groups around Beijing - part of a range of illegal evangelical sects in China, some extremely devout, who say the church fills a \spiritual void in their lives.     The rising evangelical movement in China is creating a complex and dynamic set of tensions, as individual longings challenge a state operating for a half century on principles of collective social order.   Not only are there renewed government efforts to curb Christian churches, policies to stop Sunday schools, restrictions on the movement of pastors from one city to another, attempts to dilute theological content, and efforts to stymie new church applications with red tape, but tensions and suspicions have also been growing between official and unofficial home church; Christians as well.     One expert says the home church-official church split is more serious in the long term than Beijing scattered, stop-and-start efforts to rein in religion. A lot of Chinese are becoming Christians, argues the US-trained theologian. But the biggest problem is between unregistered and registered churches. There is a lot of antipathy between the two, a lot of water under the bridge.     Christianity in China began to flourish after the Opium Wars, as European and American missionaries set out for the Orient. ;In 1842, the Gospel of God was disseminated in Xiamen, according to the Xinjie Church council here. Xiamen is one of the original five treaty ports negotiated with China imperial court. Churches grew rapidly throughout China, and have been regarded by officialdom and locals as a mixed blessing ever since.   When the communists consolidated power in 1949 under Chairman Mao Zedong, religion was reorganized. Missionaries were largely driven out.   Catholics, Buddhists, Muslims, Protestants, and Taoists were brought under government control, and they remain the five officially sanctioned religions in China today. Protestants found themselves gathered under one roof called the Three Self Patriotic Movement; - whose purpose was to bring the Gospels into the service of the state.   According to the official Xinjie church records, In 1966, owing to the Great Cultural Revolution, church services came to a halt. This situation lasted 13 years. Since the 1980s, as China liberalized, churches were again allowed to open. But a burst of religious expression brought a series of tighter controls whose actual enforcement has varied from province to province - with urban areas such as Beijing and Shanghai drawing more oversight and intervention than rural China and the south.   Churches in the city of Wenzhou last year conducted a campaign of civil disobedience in response to official efforts to stop the teaching of Sunday School. Evangelicals in Henan Province have been targeted, as have home-church prayer leaders in Shanghai, who have been sent to labor camps in recent months. Church building is constricted. A government official in Fujian says one reason for so many home churches is that official services are overflowing. It is very difficult to register any new churches right now, says the official. There has always been a policy not to allow more churches, but now it is being enforced. The government wants to stop the evangelical growth.   Estimates of Chinese Christians vary widely. The official figure is 15-20 million unregistered, 1.8 million registered. Some Christians with access to unpublished figures in Beijing say the number is 85 million unregistered, 5 million registered. A recent graduate of Nanjing Theological Academy, considered the center of official Protestantism, gives a figure of 60 million. Jason Kindopp, a visiting scholar at George Washington University says the figure is at least; 30 million, and possibly 60 million.   In some ways, the efforts of the government in recent years has been to offer greater support to official churches - while making efforts to undermine the evangelical fervor found in home churches.   For the majority of Christians in home churches, the basic question is how or whether to worship in an official church, which they see as woefully compromised by state rules. Ji, the home-church believer in Beijing, for example, jokes about one leading theological institute as a place where first-year students believe in God. By the second year, they are merely good men.; By the third year you become a ghost who no longer believes in grace or being saved. But you are a ghost with a car, a salary, and a job.   END

by Michael J. McManus     Pollster George Barna reported recently that three-fifths of Americans believe cohabitation is an acceptable behavior.  In fact, two-thirds of Catholics see no problem with unmarried couples living together, nor half of all Protestants and even 49 percent of born-again Americans. Whatmore, Barna says “The moral perspectives of Americans are likely to continue to deteriorate. Compared to surveys we conducted just two years ago, significantly more adults are depicting such behaviors as morally acceptable.”   Certainly, the number of couples living together has soared from only 520,000 in 1970 to 5 million today, a ten-fold increase in a generation. That double the number who marry in a year. Cohabitation, not marriage, is the primary way male-female unions are formed.   However, Scripture is clear; Flee fornication, St. Paul wrote (I. Cor 718). I cited that quote in England, and a very dignified dowager interrupted me to exclaim, Jesus never said anything about it. Yes he did.  Remember the woman at the well, who Jesus said had five husbands and the man you now have is not your husband; (John 418).    The problem, as I see is two-fold ignorance of cohabitation’s consequences by the general public, and a willful avoidance of the issue by America’s clergy.   Sociology backs up Scripture on the evil of cohabitation. Since men and women living together begin with minimal commitment, there’s greater unhappiness - more infidelity, more conflict and even violence, more illness and depression.   Sociologist Pamela Smock estimates that 45 percent of such couples undergo premarital divorce, which can be painful and complicated.  A woman at a Christian publishing company told me she lived with a man for six years, and desperately wanted to leave, but felt trapped We bought a house together and he doesn’t want to sell it. Many live together to test their potential for marriage. Big mistake. Marriages that are preceded by living together have 50 percent higher disruption rates than marriages without premarital cohabitation, according to the National Survey of Families and Households.   St. Paul sagely wrote, Test everything. Hold onto the good. Avoid every kind of Evil. Cohabitation may be perceived as a test, but it is an embracing of evil. A stunning 43 percent of unmarried couples have children, vs 46 percent of married couples.   Yet have you ever heard a sermon on cohabitation?  I bet not. In scores of cities, I’ve asked pastors if they have preached on it. One hand in 50 goes up. This moral abdication is perhaps the major reason why Barna found Christians have a higher divorce rate than atheists.   There is an alternative.  A third of America’s churches now provide a more appropriate way for couples to test their relationships - with a test called a premarital inventory.  The man and woman are asked if they agree or disagree separately to 150+ one sentence statements   At times I am concerned about the silent treatment I get from my future spouse. I am concerned that my future spouse sometimes spends money foolishly. I am hoping that after marriage my future souse will change of his/her behaviors.;   A computerized report is prepared comparing what the man and woman said on each issue. Result a tenth of couples decide not to marry.   Studies show that their scores are equal to those who marry and later divorce.  So they are avoiding a bad marriage before it has begun!   In 1992, my wife and I added another component, having couples in solid marriages administer the inventory. Clergy will normally provide only an hour of feedback. They do not have time to talk through scores of issues that a couple aged 50 can provide. With both genders present, mentor couples; can actually do a better job than clergy or counselors.   From 1992-2000, 302 couples were mentored at our home church.  Of that number, 21 dropped out part way through, mostly to break up.   Another 34 couples met with their mentors six evenings, but decided not to marry. Thus, more than 50 couples avoided a likely divorce.  But of those who did marry, there have been only seven divorces or separations in a decade.  That is a 3 percent failure rate, or a 97 percent success rate.   That’s not just marriage preparation - but marriage insurance. What’s more, we created an organization called Marriage Savers that has trained 3,000 mentor couples across the country, whose churches often have even lower divorce rates. To learn more, see marriagesavers.org .   Why doesn’t your church, synagogue or mosque set a goal in 2004 to radically reduce your congregation divorce rate?     END

By TREVOR KAVANAGH Political Editor THE SUN February 1998   TWO top bishops last night warned Tony Blair must answer to God for toppling Saddam Hussein.   The Bishop of Durham and the Archbishop of York blasted the war in newspaper interviews.   In an astonishing grab for the moral high ground, they admitted Saddam was wicked but claimed the allies were not the right people to oust him.   Tom Wright, Bishop of Durham, accused the PM and President George Bush - both devout Christians - of a strange distortion of Christianity; to justify action.   He compared them to white vigilantes going into Brixton to stop drug dealing. Dr David Hope, Archbishop of York, reminded the Prime Minister of the higher authority; he will have to face one day and urged churchgoers to pray for his soul.   Referring to Saddam, he said Undoubtedly a very wicked leader has been removed but there are other wicked leaders.   His words echoed Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams; warning that Mr. Blair would be called to account.   Some years ago, the main-line Christian denominations were taken over by leftists; the process is even more far gone in Europe than in America.   Hence this utterly bizarre news story Two Top Bishops Last Night Warned Tony Blair Must Answer to God for Toppling Saddam Hussein. Yes, that’s right. God was in Saddam’s corner all the way The Bishop of Durham and the Archbishop of York blasted the war in newspaper interviews. In an astonishing grab for the moral high ground, they admitted Saddam was wicked but claimed the allies were not the right people to oust him.     Tom Wright, Bishop of Durham, accused the PM and President George Bush - both devout Christians - of a strange distortion of Christianity; to justify action. He compared them to white vigilantes going into Brixton to stop drug dealing.   If anyone understands that reference, send us an email; I’m completely in the dark. And if England and America weren’t the right people; to oust Saddam, who were? All those other nations who have been lining up to do the dirty work all these years, I guess.   Dr David Hope, Archbishop of York, reminded the Prime Minister of the higher authority; he will have to face one day and urged churchgoers to pray for his soul. Referring to Saddam, he said. Undoubtedly a very wicked leader has been removed but there are other wicked leaders.     Meaning, I guess, that God will fault Tony Blair for not removing the Mullahs, Kim Il Jong, and a few others. Well, Reverend, give him time.   Meanwhile, when it comes to removing very wicked leaders, the score is Tony Blair and George Bush--(remember the Taliban), Church of England clerics--.   ***

Tanzania Archbishop Denied Access to Zanzibar Cathedral over Easter   Christ is risen! So what is next? If Jesus is risen then put your faith where your fear is. If Jesus is risen, then your business is the kingdom and the kingdom calls us to busyness. – Michael Bird   Every single one of our most pressing moral issues today – abortion, euthanasia, same-sex “marriage,” transgenderism, the proliferation of IVF, contraception, the collapse of the family, declining fertility, anti-natalism and environmental extremism, pornography, sex trafficking – in some way violates, devalues and deforms the image of God in mankind. --- Zachary Mettler   The conclave will be a contest between two competing visions of Catholicism. On one side are the aging liberal boomers, who came up in the aftermath of the Second Vatican Council and whose vision for the church is decidedly modern. On the other side is a cohort of more traditional, theologically orthodox and culturally conservative prelates who reject the liberalism of “the spirit of Vatican II.” They understand that Catholicism is attracting new, increasingly young converts worldwide precisely because it stands against the chaos and confusion of modernity. --- The Federalist   Evangelicals—for the most part—no longer think of the pope as the “antichrist” or of the Roman church as the “whore of Babylon” from the Book of Revelation. --- Russell Moore   We are not called to be Church watchers. We are not called to fuss at the rectory, the chancery, or the Vatican. Our proper “stance” is to face the world with the Church at our back. (We should add the gospel on our lips) – Austin Ruse   Our love grows soft if it is not strengthened by truth, and our truth grows hard if it is not softened by love. Every Christian should be both conservative and radical; conservative in preserving the faith and radical in applying it. – John Stott   Dear Brothers and Sisters, www.virtueonline.org April 25, 2025   THE POPE IS DEAD . Beloved by the masses, Pope Francis’s tenure was marked by controversy and scandal. His public persona as a pope of the people, was evident by his concern and defense of the poor and marginalized with optics of foot washing, baby kissing and daily phone calls to Christians in Gaza, told only one side of the story.   There was another side that revealed his hatred of orthodox Catholics, the Rupnik scandal, his cozying up to Fr. James Martin and the LGBTQ crowd, his rejection of the Latin Mass for those who still wanted it; his abandonment of Chinese Catholics, and much more. His refusal, during his entire papacy, ever to return to Argentina raised more questions than answers, with hints of sexual abuse coverups and suggestions that the pope himself might be homosexual. Francis was not an intellectual like his two predecessors, he had a pastoral heart which appealed to the masses. He will not go down in history as a saint like Mother Teresa.   Judge Andrew P. Napolitano wrote that Catholics believe that he is the Vicar of Christ on earth. But Francis may have been the worst pope in history. He watered down Church teachings on marriage, sexuality and confession. He declined to judge right from wrong. He forbade the Mass that every canonized saint in Heaven attended and participated in since 1564. He has even claimed that all religions are equal and welcomed in the eyes of God — contrary to 2,000 years of express Church teaching. “This is heresy.”   He attacked long-standing theology, universal liturgy and Thomistic Natural Law; when his principal job was to preserve them. He even questioned the concept of sin, said the judge. One sign-post was the abortion issue and Nancy Pelosi. San Francisco Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone barred her Holy Communion, she went to Rome where the Pope gave her the Eucharist.   Biblical theologian Carl Trueman writing in First Things , said the era of Francis is now over, and it is time to start the post mortems on his tenure. Throughout his time as pope, Roman Catholic critics of Francis typically prefaced their remarks with an acknowledgment of his strengths: his care for the poor, his stand on abortion, his clarity on transgenderism. He was certainly solid on these matters, as one would expect any Christian with a basic catechetical knowledge of the faith to be. Yes, one might say, the pope was Catholic. But in other areas, he was more problematic.   No matter, the Episcopal Church and the official Anglican Communion put out the usual bromides about how wonderful he was on a whole range of social issues, including his warmly embracing former Archbishop Justin Welby and more. Pope Francis, the Archbishop of Canterbury, and the Moderator of the Church of Scotland jointly visited South Sudan, making it the first trip of its kind in Christian history. The visit aimed to raise awareness about the conflict that has left over 400,000 people dead. Their visit changed nothing. South Sudan today is still a hell hole of violence, starvation and death.   “Francis was thus my own worst Protestant nightmare: an authoritarian Roman pope driving a liberal Protestant agenda, a leader who embodied the worst of all possible Christian worlds,” concluded Trueman.   The Most Rev. Steve Wood , Archbishop of the Anglican Church in North America, issued the following statement upon the death of Pope Francis: It is with profound sadness that I have received the news of the passing of His Holiness Pope Francis. On behalf of the Anglican Church in North America, I extend our deepest condolences to our Roman Catholic brothers and sisters throughout the world during this time of mourning and transition.   “Pope Francis’s leadership was marked by his heart for the poor, his commitment to interreligious dialogue, and his unwavering call for us all to be better stewards of God’s creation. Through his humble service, he reminded Christians of all traditions of our common call to bring Christ’s compassion to a broken world.”   Not a single mention of Francis’s heresies, In the name of being pastoral, and his all-paths lead to God, many believed he abdicated his right to be the pope sending mixed messages to the faithful. The faithful just cringed and moved on.   Will the next pope follow the agenda of powerful elites or challenge it? Pope Francis failed to bring clarity to those issues almost certainly because of his overwhelming orientation toward a left-leaning view of social justice. Can that be reversed?   The papal conclave will be a battle not just for the Catholic Church but for Western Civilization, wrote John Daniel Davidson for the Federalist. He might be right. (See the movie.)   I have posted a number of reflections on his life as the pope, including Carl Trueman in First Things, Pope Francis, My Worst Protestant Nightmare - First Things Dr. Jules Gomes in The Stream, https://www.virtueonline.org/post/pope-francis-sharp-left-turn-toward-heresy Mary Ann Mueller, a hermit and Catholic did not have good things to say about Francis, which you can read here: https://www.virtueonline.org/post/is-pope-francis-a-lamppost-to-perdition The Death of a Pope by David Duggan offers insights into Pope Francis’s papacy. https://www.virtueonline.org/post/the-death-of-a-pope My own ramblings about Rome and Canterbury can be read here: https://www.virtueonline.org/post/roman-catholic-liberals-and-anglican-revisionists-have-much-in-common You can read one positive take on Pope Francis by former Anglican bishop Michael Nazir-Ali here: https://anglicanmainstream.org/michael-nazir-ali-on-a-pope-for-the-poor/   Time will tell whether the next pope will follow in Francis’s footstep and permit the continuation of liberal Protestant policies. It’s up to the men who will be gathering in the Sistine Chapel in the coming weeks. As a Catholic friend once said to me about the last papal election, the Holy Spirit never errs. But, he added, the same cannot be said for the College of Cardinals.   As of this digest the odds-on favorite to be the next pope by bookmakers and artificial intelligence is Pietro Parolin , suggesting a 27.6% probability of him winning. As reported by the Italian newspaper La Repubblica, the Italian cardinal, currently serves as Secretary of State of the Holy See.   *****   King of England, Charles III , put his foot in it in his mouth over his Easter message that would have had his mother the late Queen rolling in her grave. Here is what he said; “On Maundy (Holy) Thursday, Jesus knelt and washed the feet of many of those who would abandon Him. His humble action was a token of His love that knew no bound or boundaries and is central to Christian belief.… The love He showed when He walked the Earth reflected the Jewish ethic of caring for the stranger and those in need, a deep human instinct echoed in Islam and other religious traditions, and in the hearts of all who seek the good of others.” The King’s anti-Christian statement and mass arrests for those voicing unfashionable opinions are ugly signs of Britain’s rapid decline, noted The Spectator. Former Chaplain to the Queen (Charles’ late great mother Elizabeth II) Dr. Gavin Ashenden ripped the statement. “It’s very offensive both for Jews and Christians to have this put together. It’s as if there’s no distinction between Jesus the Savior and Mohammed the warlord.”   The king, before he became king, had made it clear that he would not be a proponent of the faith once for all delivered to the saints, but of all faiths. He clearly followed through in this Easter message.   As one British woman screamed; "We have no proper leadership for Christianity in this country. Is someone going to stand up and do something about the Church of England in this country?" She has a point.   *****   One wonders for how much longer the issue of homosexuality will continue to consume the Anglican Communion both in money and headlines. It’s a fair question and the short answer is, I don’t know. The long answer is, not forever and probably not for much longer.   The lines have been drawn; Western Anglicanism has largely capitulated on the issue and the Global South has tightened its theological and moral reins. Both GAFCON and the GSFA have repeatedly reiterated that there is not a snowball’s chance in hell that they will capitulate to Western demands to approve sodomy and homosexual marriage. From Lambeth Resolution 1:10 to the latest iteration in the Jerusalem Declaration, that marriage will only be recognized between a man and a woman is the irreversible standard. But money is being used by Anglican pansexualists to twist Global South prelates into changing their thinking. It’s a difficult choice when people are starving. You can read my latest, Dancing Around Christ here: https://www.virtueonline.org/post/dancing-around-christ   It is fascinating to watch intellectual gadfly’s like entrepreneur Elon Musk, philosopher Richard Dawkins and Canadian psychologist Jordan Peterson flirt with Christianity but are not prepared to make a commitment to Christ.  The label “cultural Christian” has become a new way to position oneself between theism and a rejection of the value of Western culture and civilization that has its foundation in Christianity.   The long and short of it is, we have become a nation of idolaters; we worship everything but the one true God. Millions have dropped out of the church and Gen Zs are not even giving the church a first thought.   What is truly sad to read is that nearly 70% of born-again Christians disagree with the biblical position that Jesus is the only way to God. A clear majority of Americans (72%) say they believe in the classic Christian doctrine of the Trinity, one God in three Persons: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. However, only about one third of Americans 55 and under believe in an active, creator God.   And now you know why only ONE PERCENT of churches in America are growing with effective evangelism. You should also know that Boomers (those born between 1946 and 1964) are the church’s biggest financial supporters. They represent 80 percent of all church giving. When they have gone there are no new generations to support the local church. It is why churches are dying and that part time pastors and priests along with retired priests are the future. The only healthy thing left in mainline churches are their pension plans.   Here's a snippet of what is going on in the mainline churches and how they are devolving. Jeff Walton an Anglican writer with Juicy Ecumenism wrote this: Presbyterian Church (USA) Shutters Foreign Missions ran the headline. The 1.09-million-member mainline Protestant denomination counted more than 3 million members at the merger of its predecessor bodies in 1983 and has experienced a membership decline of nearly 65 percent since that time. Gender queer is clearly not working. This week the Presbyterian Church (USA) fired missionaries around the world, ending its foreign mission agency.   The gravity of the church worldwide has shifted to the Global South. The church is at most half the size compared to when the current structures were set up. Does this sound familiar to Anglicans? It should.   The PCUSA leaders sent out a letter that didn’t lament missionary cuts resulting in less people hearing the gospel message, but instead expresses concern that “When progressive Christians, communions and mission sending organizations leave a mission field, their absences are inevitably and invariably filled with voices, personnel, and mission partners who view Jesus and his ministry differently, in less inclusive and liberating ways.”   If the newfangled doctrines of inclusion and diversity haven’t worked in the West, why does anyone think they will work in the Global South! Do you think the Anglican Church of Nigeria that faces daily persecution and is growing like crazy started down this rocky road that they would have a church in ten years? Of course not.   Just to make the point, Walton notes that The Episcopal Church’s international mission structure is (now) less centralized, but the closest equivalent to the Presbyterian Mission Agency in The Episcopal Church is Ecumenical and Interreligious Ministries. The Episcopal Church recently moved to cut staff through layoffs, early retirements, and the elimination of vacant positions in a reorganization announced in February.   Presiding Bishop Sean Rowe, a management wonk, was brought in to clean house, lower expectations and fire unproductive units. With dioceses merging and churches closing, death is inevitable. There are just so many life-support machines…and when the (spiritual) power goes out…   *****   An unofficial source told VOL that the Tanzania Archbishop the Most Reverend Maimbo Mndolwa, was denied access to the Anglican Cathedral in Zanzibar over Easter. The archbishop is caretaker of the Diocese as they are without a sitting bishop. The previous incumbent was forced to retire early. The archbishop is orthodox but not all his bishops, many of whom have been bought with TEC dollars. The Cathedral was built by Anglicans on the site of the former Slave Market, which David Livingstone fought to clos; is the island’s largest tourist attraction.   *****   REPARATIONS have become an issue de jure in both the Episcopal Church and the Church of England. The CofE is grappling with the issue, and theologian Ian Paul has come out blasting the Church Commissioner’s decision to put aside £100m ($133 million)  of their investments to be directed to working with and for communities affected by historic transatlantic slavery, with the intention that it creates a lasting legacy. The £100 million, which will be built up over the 9-year period of the three triennia through to 2031, sits alongside the £3.6 billion ($1.336 billion) indicative distributions that the Commissioners have articulated for the corresponding periods.   Paul notes the lack of evidence, the racist assumptions behind the goals of the project, and the way that this has been driven by ideology instead of Christian theology. “For my troubles, I was identified in the Fifth Report of the Racial Justice Group as an ‘Anglican blogger’ who puts out a ‘false narrative’ that must be ‘suppressed’ (p 23). Actually engaging with the issues raised might have been more productive!”   Collectively, these [papers] argue that the Church of England’s program of reparations is problematic for two reasons:   (a) Firstly, it represents a departure by the Church Commissioners from their core duties, of which international reparatory justice is not one, however worthy or not it might be in the abstract; and a diversion of funds intended for the good of parishes to a purpose for which they were not intended.   (b) Secondly, that this specific act of reparatory justice is poorly justified, historically uninformed and overall inadvisable.   Handing out millions of pounds while the CofE can’t pay decent salaries to vicars is an appalling use of funds. Paul said it lacked due consideration of the legitimate prior claims on the money entrusted to the Commissioners – especially those of parishes, where preaching the Christian gospel and performing pastoral acts of charity most effectively take place and which should be the Commissioners’ highest priority. You can read more here: https://www.virtueonline.org/post/uk-should-the-church-commissioners-pay-slavery-reparations   The Episcopal Church has been working to promote what it calls racial justice and healing through direct institutional change and advocacy for public change. The church advocates for a Congressional commission to study reparations and draft proposals for the government moving forward. Several dioceses in the Episcopal Church have launched reparations programs in the past 13 months, while others are preparing to do so. The Diocese of Georgia is committing 3% of its unrestricted endowment to help create a center for racial reconciliation. The Episcopal Church has struggled to address its complicity with racial injustice and white supremacy for more than three decades.   *****   If you want to know where the Christian faith is spreading the fastest, think Iran . Iranians are rejecting Islam and embracing Christianity. The Iranian Revolution led by Ayatollah Khomeini, the uprising against the shah was fueled by a mix of economic dissatisfaction, opposition to his authoritarian rule and a rising wave of religious fundamentalism. What followed was not just a change in leadership but a complete reordering of society. Sharia law became the foundation of the state, and the Islamic Republic swiftly moved to suppress secularism, silence dissent and impose rigid moral codes.   But of the 75,000 mosques in Iran, 50,000 have closed. Dissatisfaction with Islam and its leaders is growing. Rather incredibly, Iran now has one of the fastest-growing Christian populations in the world. Not in grand cathedrals. Not in public squares. But underground, spreading quietly and carefully. The underground church is growing by leaps and bounds. Persecution is making new Christians. Most Christian churches are outlawed. There are an estimated 1 million Christians in Iran and the figure grows daily as people declare their faith in Christ.   Apostasy — leaving Islam — is a crime punishable by death. Churches were outlawed, converts were hunted, and Farsi Bibles became contraband. Any challenge to the regime’s authority was swiftly and brutally crushed. Yet today, despite every effort, Christianity is exploding. You can read more here: https://www.virtueonline.org/post/why-iranians-are-rejecting-islam-and-embracing-christianity   *****   One hopeful sign this week in England was a UK Court ruling shutting down trans madness. The Stream reported that Great Britain’s Supreme Court has declared in a landmark ruling that the terms “woman” and “sex” in the 2010 Equality Act referred to biological sex, not acquired gender.   The judgment was hailed as a victory for common sense by gender-critical campaigners and politicians, with JK Rowling saying it would protect “the rights of women and girls across the UK”.   Kemi Badenoch, the Tory leader, said the ruling meant that the “era of Keir Starmer telling us women can have penises has come to an end”.   ***** You can read more stories at www.virtueonline.org website where we look at the Culture Wars, the Theology of the Church, reform and renewal and daily news of the Anglican Communion.     *****   I have been given an opportunity to attend the consecration of the new Bishop of North Africa in Tunisia . There will be a number of archbishops, bishops and clergy attending. I could use some financial support to make this trip possible and to assist the new bishop.   Please consider a tax-deductible donation. A PayPal donation link can be found here: here: http://www.virtueonline.org/support.html   If you are more inclined with old fashioned checks, you can send your donation to:   VIRTUEONLINE                                                                          P.O. BOX 111                                  Shohola, PA 18458   Thank you for your support,   David   My Substack on the Middle East continues to grow. It is drawing a lot of attention across the globe. You can access my Substack here: https://davidvirtue2.substack.com/

By Chuck Collins www.virtueonline.org April 25, 2025   “Church” isn’t an optional extra for Christians. Anglicans understand that church is God’s idea and his special way of reaching his people. It’s his appointed meeting-place. As the Old Testament tabernacle and temple were glimpses back to Eden before the fall, and looked forward to paradise restored in the New Jerusalem when Jesus returns, so today’s church is God’s instrument by which he delivers his grace. And he does this specifically in the reading and preaching of the Bible, and in the word eaten (the sacrament). The English reformers understood and respected the supernatural power of the Bible to turn people’s hearts and affections to God where Christians re-union with their Redeemer. And it is in this reunion by which the Lord reorients the hearts and affections of Christians. Thomas Cranmer, the chief architect of our Anglican heritage, knew this: “For as the word of God preached putteth Christ into our ears, so likewise these elements of water, bread, and wine, joined to God’s word, do after a sacramental manner put Christ into our eyes, mouths, hands, and all our senses.”   The people who gather expecting to meet God in word and sacrament is the bridge between heaven and earth. One aspect of this is what Anglicans call: the communion of the saints. Before Holy Communion, the congregation is invited to join angels and archangels, and all the company of heaven, who are in eternity forever acknowledging God’s holiness - to “lift up your hearts!” When Anglicans sing and when they pray, they are not just coming up with something on their own to offer God. No, it’s far bigger and more important than that! Worshipping Anglicans join the ongoing heavenly choir who are continually, day and night, acknowledging God’s beauty and his worthiness: “Worthy is the Lamb who was slain, to receive power and wealth and wisdom and might and honor and glory and blessing!” (Revelation 5).   Anglicans say in the creed recited each week that the church is “one, holy, catholic and apostolic,” but have you noticed that the word “holy” is missing from the Nicene Creed in the 1662 Book of Common Prayer? This is curious, but it is not accidental. This is a loud and important statement of reformational understanding. The rejection of this word by Cranmer shows how the English reformers viewed the institutional church as essentially a human institution, a larger body that includes Christians and nonChristians.   Anglican formularies make the distinction between the visible and invisible church. The visible church is the human institution rooted in human society that is populated with believers and unbelievers. The invisible church is the mystical body of the elect within the visible church who are chosen from eternity for eternal life. Because no one knows who really belongs to God, the church of which Christ is the head can only be invisible.   This distinction between the visible and invisible church explains how King Henry VIII could be the head of the institutional Church of England, while Christ is the only head of his mystical body, the church invisible, which will be revealed on the day Jesus comes back to bring heaven to earth.   The Thirty-nine Articles spell this out for us: “The visible Church of Christ is a congregation of faithful men, in the which the pure word of God is preached and the sacraments be duly ministered according to Christ’s ordinance in all those things that of necessity are requisite to the same.   As the Church of Jerusalem, Alexandria, and Antioch have erred: so also the Church of Rome hath erred, not only in their living and manner of ceremonies, but also in matters of faith” (Article XIX). The reformers wanted to make sure the English church distanced itself from any ideas that the church and tradition (i.e. the pope) is infallible, or in some way equal in authority with Holy Scripture.   There is an ongoing debate in the church today as to whether or not the Bible is the “product” of the apostolic and catholic church. To the extent that this is true, the church that wrote the Bible can then modify it or add teachings that do not necessarily stand the test of Holy Scripture. This makes the Bible subject to the church, and it makes some amorphous undefined “great tradition” the guiding rule of faith and worship above the Bible. Cranmer, once again, saw this coming and he declared, “The Church hath power to decree rites or ceremonies and authority in controversies of faith; and yet it is not lawful for the Church to ordain anything contrary to God’s word written, neither may it so expound one place of Scripture, that it be repugnant to another” (Article XX).   Holy Scripture is the divinely inspired authority by which all other authorities are to be judged, including creeds, councils of the church, traditions, human reason and experience. This is why the first Homily is the first: “The Reading of Holy Scripture.” In this sermon, that was appointed to be read in every church in England and Ireland sequentially along with the other homilies, Christians are reminded that, “As drink is pleasant to those who are dry, and meat to those who are hungry, so is the reading, hearing, searching, and studying of holy scripture, to those who desire to know God, or themselves, and to do his will” (Gatiss version).   So, the church is a gathering in which the word of God is preached and the sacraments are duly ministered specifically for the reunion and refreshment of God’s people. Neglecting the gathering, the fellowship, and the worship is to say, “No thank you” to the God who has made his plan and grace available to us in this way. When someone is born again, it is never in isolation to be lone-ranger Christians, but rather into the family of believers who want to be together where God said he will meet and bless his children.   Rev. Canon Chuck Collins is a reform theologian who regularly writes on Anglican issues. He resides in Texas.

By Dave Doveton,                                                                                          ANGLICAN MAINSTREAM                                                                          April 23, 2025   “We wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities and powers, against the world-rulers of this darkness, against the spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places” (Eph 6.12). In my last blog I examined the mimetic theory of René Girard, the French literary theorist and anthropologist, and how it may explain the current surge in identity crisis within our societies. Girard was also prophetic in the sense that he foresaw that western civilization faced an existential threat which aimed at its total collapse.   In the last chapter of his final book “ I see Satan fall like lightning ”, Girard [i]  outlined what he saw as the roots of the totalitarian movements of the 20th century. He believed that the underlying dynamic was a conflict, a conflict between societies and institutions based on Judeo-Christian values, and a neo-paganism which aimed at overthrowing those institutions and systems – be they cultural, political, educational, legal, or religious. A prime example of totalitarian movements is Marxism, which flowered in its political manifestations as the communist regimes of Russia, China, Ethiopia, and Cambodia’s Khmer Rouge. Presently we experience the ‘long march’ of cultural Marxism through the institutions of the civilised west which has put this conflict on full display. Michael Giere writes, “The only connecting tissue in the Marxist worldview is that Christianity and its foundational moral ethos must be destroyed, and the sovereignty of the individual and classical reason must yield to scientific socialism – and its core theory that the institutions of Western culture psychologically oppress everyone. No longer is communism only for the “workers of the world.” Now, everyone is a victim . ” [ii] Note that we are dealing with a movement, not just the political manifestation of an ideology, but a massive movement that infiltrates the institutions of a society and eventually sweeps all before it. Hannah Arendt in her writings on 20th century totalitarian systems observed this, most notably with regard to the Stalinist and Nazi movements.  “ The totalitarian form of domination depends entirely upon the fact that a movement, and not a party, has taken power … ” [iii] We are dealing with a movement based on a philosophy of victimisation and group guilt that turns out ultimately to be a paganising crusade maintaining a moral high ground. Girard called this ideology ‘victimology’ and he outlined its method, “The most powerful anti-Christian movement is the one that takes over and “radicalizes” the concern for victims in order to paganize it. The powers and principalities want to be “revolutionary” now, and they reproach Christianity for not defending victims with enough ardor. In Christian history they see nothing but persecutions, acts of oppression, inquisitions . ” [iv] We recognise in this description those contemporary ideologies such as ‘wokism’ and the social and cultural movements that aim at tearing down not only statues but the very fabric of western civilisation. By latching onto every scrap of evidence that heroes of the past may have skeletons in their closets, they cry for the delegitimising of our past cultural, literary and political leaders. They deface statues of Disraeli and Mandela and rail against Shakespeare. Girard is not the only one to characterise the attack on Western civilisation as totalitarian. The French intellectual Renaud Camus, banned from entering the United Kingdom, has characterised this trend as based on totalitarian ideology. He has been described as  “a clear-eyed analyst of a shocking, even catastrophic, cultural and social trend: the suicide of Western civilization, orchestrated by elites in many different fields—politics, business, academia, media, and the church.” [v] The danger of this movement is that it is extremely deceptive in the way it presents itself – namely as more genuine and more effective than Christianity in standing on the side of victims and the oppressed. It claims to be the authentic way to freedom and true human liberation. “This other totalitarianism presents itself as the liberator of humanity. In trying to usurp the place of Christ, the powers imitate him in the way a mimetic rival imitates his model in order to defeat him. They denounce the Christian concern for victims as hypocritical and a pale imitation of the authentic crusade against oppression and persecution for which they would carry the banner themselves. In the symbolic language of the New Testament, we would say that in our world Satan, trying to make a new start and gain new triumphs, borrows the language of victims.” [vi] Furthermore, Girard describes how this neo-pagan movement then casts Judeo-Christian morality in its strategy to delegitimise Christianity.  “ Neo-paganism would like to turn the Ten Commandments and all of Judeo-Christian morality into some alleged intolerable violence, and indeed its primary objective is their complete abolition.  Faithful observance of the moral law is perceived as complicity with the forces of persecution that are essentially religious…” [vii] Here we are given an answer to the conundrum of why the Jewish people who have borne centuries of victimisation and persecution are attacked instead of Hamas. Jews represent through Moses ultimately the Lord almighty, the great lawgiver of the legal and moral order of western civilization which is defined as the oppressor. Note how Israel and by extension the Jewish people are framed by their detractors in pejorative terms – as oppressors, as colonisers, as an ‘apartheid state’. In the words of intersectional theory, they are labelled as ‘white’ – even though most Jews in Israel are not European but Semitic (Middle Eastern) and many were refugees having been expelled from Arab states in the mid-19th century or migrated north from Africa. How, we are asked, did so many young people at institutions of higher learning in the UK and the USA cheer the rapists and killers of a death cult like Hamas [viii] , and how are so many well-meaning citizens caught up in the frenzy of antisemitic marches through the streets of capital cities? [ix]  Why is Luigi Mangione, who is facing charges of shooting a corporate executive in cold blood in New York, idolised by masses of people on social media?  Being caught up by the psychological dynamics of crowds and mass demonstrations, virtue-signalling and idealism certainly are part of this, but there are more powerful forces at play. The movement turns killers into  cause célèbre  by portraying them as victims. Even the laws of homicide can be ignored – but why? The answer is that the Movement is primary – Arendt described it as flowing like a river which permitted nothing to hinder its flow. Thus, laws can be ignored and institutions brought down [x] . We see this in both Stalin and a school of legal theorists in Nazi Germany who, Arendt says,  “tried their best to prove that the very concept of law was so directly in conflict with the political content of a movement as such that even the most revolutionary new legislation would eventually prove to be a hindrance to the movement.” [xi] Today’s movement has much of the basic philosophy used by the totalitarian movements of the 19th and 20th century. They have used similar arguments to those used to justify the most horrendous violence and mass murder ever seen – in the 20th century the deaths of over 100 million people. Paradoxically, the movement that appears to be motivated by compassion and justice turns out to be the purveyor of mayhem and suffering. This should not surprising because,  Satan disguises himself as an angel of light . Girard describes this descent into chaos as ‘mimetic, violent contagion’ the all-powerful mechanism of pagan societies. However, he offers us the way of salvation for a civilisation swept up in this movement in the cross and resurrection of Jesus. “The resurrection is not only a miracle, a prodigious transgression of natural laws, it is the spectacular sign of the entrance into the world of a power superior to violent contagion” [xii] And what is this power? It is the Holy Spirit, who infuses the disciples and takes charge in undertaking His great move of redemption and revival. What a great hope! FOOTNOTES [i]  Rene Girard,  I See Satan Fall Like Lightning , Orbis Books, Maryknoll NY, 2001. [ii]   https://thebullelephant.com/you-cant-fix-stupid-or-evil/ [iii]  Hannah Arendt,  Authority in the Twentieth Century , p407. [iv]  Girard, p180. [v]  Rod Dreher,  Camus Against the Machine ,  https://europeanconservative.com/articles/dreher/camus-against-the-machine/ [vi]  Girard, p180,181. [vii]  Girard, p181. [viii]   https://anglicanmainstream.org/article/how-did-young-people-go-so-wrong-they-cheer-killers-and-rapists-of-hamas/ [ix]  Douglas Murray in speaking of his new book,  On Democracies and Death Cults: Israel, Hamas and the Future of the West , asks this question, “When a death cult attacks a democracy, why do so many people in our midst side with the death cult? See   https://www.standard.co.uk/comment/douglas-murray-democracies-death-cults-israel-hamas-britain-supporters-b1223011.html [x]  Karl Marx’s favourite saying was “Everything that exists deserves to perish”. A quote from Goethe’s  Mephistopheles. [xi]  Arendt p 408. [xii]  Girard p 189.

At the moment of death, he faced God   By Mary Ann Mueller VOL Special Correspondent www.virtueonline.org April 22, 2025   Pope Francis has died. Watching the secular news coverage, you would think that they were covering the death of a saint such as Pope John Paul II or Mother Teresa of Calcutta.   In fact, in September 1997 the media was shamed into covering Mother Teresa’s simple burial which followed on the heels of Princess Diana's opulent funeral. The contrast between the two was stark and sobering.   Now as the Pope’s Saturday (April 26) funeral looms the talking heads focus only on the “progressive” aspects of Francis' papal ministry – his meek and humble stature such as carrying his own briefcase, paying his hotel bill in person, and rejecting the splendor of the papal palace for a simple room at Domus Sanctae Marthae (St. Martha's House) which is basically a guest house for visiting clergy.   Then, of course, there was the continued breaking of Catholic social tradition (small t) with the open embrace of the LGBTQ agenda signaled by his “Who am I to judge?” comment; the washing of prisoners’ feet – male or female; the encouragement of the modernist aspects of the German Synodal Way of Church reform …   As the leader of 1.4 billion Catholics – there were 1.2 billion Catholics in 2013 when Cardinal Jorge Bergoglio became Pope Francis – and as a recognized worldwide spiritual leader the now dead pope went out of his way to cradle the fringe element of society – the marginalized, the oppressed, and the displaced to the expense of the welfare and deeply spiritual needs of his Catholic core.   This is the other aspect of Francis' meek and mild pontificate – his cracking down on the conservative Catholics who recoil at the thought that gays are allowed to be blessed in their sinfulness, his attempt to stamp out the traditional Latin Mass which brings solace and joy to many, and his allowing the ritual blessing of a statue of the Pachamama (the Mother Earth goddess) at a Amazon Synod event in Rome where even Franciscan friars bowed in homage to her. This riled the sensibility of traditionally-minded Catholics.   He has ignored or, even worse, put his foot on the neck of a whole swath of Catholics who have been left in the dirt as Francis lead the Catholic Church down the Primrose Path to perdition.   I was initially thrilled when Jorge Bergoglio the Cardinal Archbishop of Buenos Aires, Argentina was elected the Bishop of Rome a dozen years ago. But the bloom has fallen off that flower and decayed.   Jesus was meek and mild, too. But, by thunder, when He saw the Temple being desecrated He swung into action. He was protecting what is holy.   “It is written, ‘My house shall be called a house of prayer,’ but you have made it a den of thieves.” He thundered in Matthew 21:13.   In fact the action Christ took to protect the integrity of the Temple was so dramatic that it appears in all four Gospels: Matthew 21:12-17; Mark 11:15-19; Luke 19:45-48 and John 2:13-16.   In contrast Pope Francis failed to protect the holy. He failed to meet the spiritual needs of his conservative Catholics. He failed to defend “the Faith once for all delivered to the saints.” He failed to authentically teach what the Catholic Church believes by muddying the doctrinal waters. He failed to spiritually lead his flock into a deeper love and greater knowledge of Jesus Christ.   Pope Francis failed!   St. John Chrysostom is quoted as once saying: “The road to hell is paved with the bones of priests and monks, and the skulls of bishops are the lampposts that light the path."   Has Jorge Bergoglio been such a lamppost? Is the Catholic Church better off because he was Pope?   History is not the judge of such questions. Only God is.   Mary Ann Mueller is a journalist living in Texas. She is a regular contributor to VirtueOnline.

Bruce Atkinson, PhD www.virtueonline.org April 23, 2025     We beseech thee also so to rule the hearts of those who bear the authority of government in this and every land, that they may be led to wise decisions and right actions for the welfare and peace of the world. (From The Prayers of the People, Holy Eucharist Rite I)     This Anglican congregational prayer from the Book of Common Prayer liturgy begs the question:  how much does God actually rule the hearts and minds of our leaders?  We pray that He does so…  more and more.  However, the evidence indicates that God continues to allow human beings “a lot of rope to hang themselves,” that is, a lot of room for ignorance, foolishness and just plain evil, and this certainly includes those in positions of leadership.  Christians disagree on which leaders are more evil than others but we know that none of them are close to perfect.   In Romans 13, we are told that all leaders hold their positions through the providence of God.  While this is true, it does not mean that God approves either of their position or their functioning in it. We all exist and continue breathing by the providence of God , and even the existence of evil (and evil leaders) is by the “permissive will of God.”   However, we must emphasize that this does NOT mean that they will lead in the perfect or directive will of God.  God ‘allows’ the rise of tyrants and those like Hitler or Stalin who create horrible holocausts.  But that does not make them in any way good.  We still must oppose their evil ways.   I have yet to track down the origin of the following quote (I was told that the main points were from an article by the late Drew Griffin), but I must say that in this one case, I am in complete agreement:   “We who believe the Bible know that all authority comes from God [ Romans 13:1] and no person, from parents to presidents, teachers to tyrants rise to that position apart from God’s providence.   As Abraham Kuyper, the Dutch theologian and politician, once said, ‘There is not a square inch in the whole domain of our human existence over which Christ, who is Sovereign over all, does not cry, ‘Mine!’’   So God’s providence and control is not in doubt.  The question we’re actually seeking to answer is this:   Does God’s providence equal His approval?   So if the answer is ‘Yes,’ to if God’s providence equals His approval, then God has not only chosen our national leaders (whomever they may be), He must also approve of them and require us to support them as well, regardless of how evil they may be.  The problem with this line of reasoning is that it quickly abandons reason and actually runs counter to the character of God.  In order to navigate this kind of question, we have to understand that God’s providence is absolute, but His approval is not. Otherwise, we would have to say that all the murderous tyrants [and those like Hitler] or even all the lousy forms of government which have existed were in God’s perfect will.  They were not.”     I propose that sometimes God chooses bad leaders to get our attention toward those things we as believers have disregarded to our detriment (both Archbishop Justin Welby and Pope Francis could have been part of this plan).   God did not create us to be robots under His divine control; for good and/or evil, He gave us some degree of free choice … with which we can do the opposite of His will if we so choose.  In leadership positions, wolves do exist in sheep’s clothing and can deceive (if briefly) even those who are faithful believers ( Matthew 7:15 , 24:24).   As a bit of an iconoclast, I struggle to some extent with Paul’s clear directive here in Romans 13, and must provide some biblical balance: “Let every person be subject to the governing authorities.  For there is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by God .  Therefore, whoever resists the authorities resists what God has appointed, and those who resist will incur judgment.  For rulers are not a terror to good conduct, but to bad.  Would you have no fear of the one who is in authority? Then do what is good, and you will receive his approval, for he is God's servant for your good.  But if you do wrong, be afraid, for he does not bear the sword in vain.  For he is the servant of God, an avenger who carries out God's wrath on the wrongdoer.”  (Romans 13:1-6, ESV)   To balance out what Romans 13 directs in supporting and obeying our civil leaders, let us examine more of what the Bible reveals about leadership authority.  King David was given his role of authority by God Himself, but David made very clear that it had severe limits:   Put not your trust in rulers, nor in any child of earth, for there is no help in them.   4 Happy are they who have the God of Jacob for their help!  Whose hope is in the LORD their God.  (Psalm 146:2, 4)   It is better to take refuge in the Lord than to trust in man.It is better to take refuge in the Lord than to trust in princes. (Psalm 118:8-9)   And Jesus causes us all to ponder:  "Render therefore to Caesar the things which are Caesar's; and unto God the things that are God's" (Matthew 22:21).    I like this quote from my online friend professor Gerald McDermott:    “True faith always must distinguish between what belongs to God and what belongs to Caesar, and making that distinction always threatens Caesar.”   Surely this is a true statement… which suggests what?  It means that many of those in politics (including so-called 'evangelicals' who care more about politics than Jesus) want to conflate the two together to the point where we cannot easily tell the difference.  ‘Confuse and deceive’ is exactly the modus operandi of our enemy, the Father of Lies.  So what belongs to Caesar and what does not?    We must note that in the New Testament, there is zero emphasis and minimal commentary regarding civil government or politics.  This tells me that our “distinguishing what belongs to God and what belongs to Caesar” must result in our paying very little attention to Caesar and certainly it means that we are not to expect the government or its leaders (including Trump) to solve our country’s problems— virtually all of which are due to the human predilection to sin.   As members of Christian churches, we are to pray for our civil authorities (all their doings belong to God even though they do not acknowledge it) but we are to waste little other time and energy focusing on what they are doing or how they are doing it.  Of course , they will be untrustworthy; God has said so.   As Christians, our focus is (or should be) first upon worshiping God, then upon on the Great Commission (Matthew 28), and finally on our own church's work in feeding the poor and healing the sick.    Unless we are clearly called by God to government service, in the main, Christians should ignore ‘Caesar’ except where government interferes in our lives such that we cannot avoid it.  Politics should take up very little of our attention. It is a matter of priorities.  According to both Jesus and Paul, we are to put first things first ; that is, we are to focus on heavenly (spiritual) things, not earthly things .  Jesus told us to seek first God’s Kingdom (Matt 6:33, cf. Col 3:1-4, 2 Cor 4:18) and to seek a closer relationship with Him (John 17:3, cf. Phil 3:7-11, Jer 29:13, Micah 6:8)—and then everything else would work out just fine… that is, according to God’s will.   I am one of those who thinks that church leaders need to be essentially apolitical, as the godly evangelist Billy Graham attempted to be.  Furthermore, Christians in politics need to be absolutely moral in their dealings with other people and to adhere to the scriptures as much as possible in their partisan preferences and platforms.   Bottom line:  As Peter famously said when the proper authorities told him to quit preaching about Jesus, “ We must obey God, not men!”  (Acts 5:27-29)   Bruce Atkinson is a practicing psychologist and Christian counselor in the Atlanta area. He earned an MA in theology and a PhD in clinical psychology from Fuller Theological Seminary.  He also has an MS in research psychology from Illinois State University and a BA from Beloit College, WI.  He is a USAF Veteran (medic) who served in Vietnam.  He is also a member of the Anglican Church in North America and is Moderator and contributor to www.virtueonline.org

Traditional Catholics and Orthodox Anglicans quietly bond but theological differences remain   COMMENTARY   By David W. Virtue, DD www.virtueonline.org April 23, 2025   The death of Pope Francis has put the Roman Catholic Church in limbo.  The church is in transition. Which way will the church go now that its hero to many has gone?  The last two popes before Francis were traditionalists; Francis sought to take the church in a new direction, with many believing it was a disastrous move.   His views on homosexuality, salvation, other religions, women etc. provoked outrage from traditionalists, and rejoicing from the great unwashed. For some, the rock of Peter now looks stained with the blood of the faithful. Add his collusion with China, his betrayal of Chinese Catholics and his veneration of the baby Jesus lying on a swaddling keffiyeh — the symbol of Palestinian resistance and Jew-hatred, and the full picture reveals a different Pope.   Publicly his persona was one of kindness and empathy showing concern for women, the poor, the immigrant, the marginalized and downtrodden, washing the feet of prisoners, even befriending, Argentine Anglican Archbishop Gregory Venables on the train together when he was simply Archbishop Bergoglio. He befriended the sexually abused when efforts were made to conceal and cover up abuse in Chile. But he never once went back to Argentina during his papacy. Did he know and cover up priestly sexual abuse and did not want to face his accusers? When his friendship with the artist Fr. Ivan Rupnik came to light with the Jesuit priest’s sexual assault on multiple nuns, it devastated the pope. Rupnik was expelled from his order. Francis was forced to defrock former Cardinal McCarrick, finding him guilty of sex abuse; both serious stains on the pope’s hands.   But the way forward has been marked and there is no going back. Pope Francis loaded his incoming College of Cardinals with men who thought progressively like himself; while cardinals and archbishops like Vigano, Strickland, Burke, Chaput, Sarah et al were sidelined or excommunicated. Crossing the Big Man in White was met with retribution, none of it divine. One could argue that this was about power and politics and you might be right.   Francis understood his church to be a big tent which, to his mind, did not mean a theologically fractured church. His liberal Catholic theologians argued that the church is big enough to accommodate millions of Catholics from different countries, cultures, colors, with different points of view. As a result, no one position can speak for all Catholics.   So remarried Catholics, homosexuals (“who am I to judge”), the divorced, while unacceptable in one cultural context is acceptable in another. Doctrinal certitude was up for grades, regardless of what the Magisterium might adhere too. “Thus saith the Lord” was no longer on the table. As Western culture changed and evolved, the pope sought to evolve with it. Compassion replaced certitude; uncertainty and doubt replaced a fixed doctrinal mindset. The Tridentine Mass or Latin Mass had to go of course, replaced by the Vernacular Mass following the Second Vatican Council. Francis restricted the use of the ancient Latin Mass to promote unity among the Catholic Church. Did it? Today there is a resurgence of the Latin Mass led by young people. Go figure.   With this perspective, it is easy to write off a small group of traditionalist cardinals and theologians who speak only for a handful of disgruntled orthodox Catholics who represent a minority of faithful followers. The die has been cast.   ROME AND CANTERBURY   Herein lies a tale. Pope Francis and Archbishop Justin Welby of Canterbury had a relationship characterized by mutual respect, dialogue, and a shared commitment to ecumenism and social justice. They met on multiple occasions, exchanged messages, and collaborated on issues of global importance.   Both leaders shared a commitment to social justice, peace, and promoting Christian values, particularly in areas like marriage. They issued joint declarations, such as the one on the environment, highlighting areas where their two churches can work together.   They collaborated on issues like poverty, climate change, and the plight of Christians in the world. On the thorny area of homosexuality, the churches both agreed and disagreed.   The Catholic Church’s official line from the Catechism is that "homosexual acts" (i.e., sexual acts between persons of the same sex) are "acts of grave depravity" that are "intrinsically disordered,” and “they are contrary to the natural law.”  But Francis met regularly with a Fr. James Martin, a Roman Catholic priest, author, and advocate for LGBTQ inclusion in the Church and they worked together for the full inclusion of homosexuals in the life of the church. “Who am I to judge” became a turning point for the church.  One headline ran that Pope Francis created a 'seismic shift' toward LGBTQ acceptance. LGBTQ Catholics and theologians said the late pontiff’s legacy teaches that change can happen when leaders are willing to listen.   Listening became the mantra of Western Anglicanism; its lead exponent was the late Presiding Bishop Frank Griswold who presided over the consecration of the first openly outed homosexual in the person of Gene Robinson. The Episcopal Church changed forever. Gay and lesbian priests gave way to pansexual bishops and ultimately to homosexual marriage enshrined in resolution B012; that in turn saw the expulsion of a godly bishop who refused to go along with the unbiblical definition of marriage.   The rest of Western Anglicanism including and especially the Church of England has all but embraced the behavior, parsing the language with blessing same-sex unions but not fully embracing homosexual marriage. Observers with half a brain know this is but a glitch on the road to full on gay marriage. Who is fooling whom.   In the area of homosexuality, Western Anglicans have triumphed; but pansexualists are not content in winning the culture wars here, they want to force Global South provinces into conformity with their sexual proclivities.   To date they are not winning. Both GAFCON and the GSFA are united in their rejection of homosexuality much to the annoyance of western archbishops, bishops, clergy and a vociferous laity who refuse to allow an alternative vision of sex within marriage or celibacy. God forbid.   They have held fast to Scripture, Lambeth Resolution 1:10; and The Jerusalem Declaration which acknowledges God’s creation of humankind as male and female and the unchangeable standard of Christian marriage between one man and one woman as the proper place for sexual intimacy and the basis of the family. There you have it.   We will only know where the church is going when a new pope is elected. Will a preponderance of cardinals, many of whom have homosexual proclivities, with some actively engaged in such behaviors, swing the church formally in a new direction? If so, will the church split?   The Catholic Church has always prided itself on not splitting; pointing the finger at the Heinz 57 varieties of protestant churches as a testament to their staying power.   But homosexuality could be a game changer. It has split every mainline church in America, and it is wreaking havoc in Rome with its Lavendar mafia, a hierarchy of sex, money, and exploitation conspiracies. Some have labeled it demonic. Recent popes have failed to root it out, and there is no evidence that a new pope would or could cast out the demon of sodomy.   As Biblical theologian and Christian historian Carl Trueman observed, time will tell whether the next pope will follow in Francis’s footstep and permit the continuation of liberal Protestant policies. It’s up to the (135) men who will be gathering in the Sistine Chapel in the coming weeks. As a Catholic friend once said about the last papal election, the Holy Spirit never errs. But the same cannot be said for the College of Cardinals.   Western Christianity is underwater with millions of Americans having fled their churches never more to return. All the mainline churches will be gone in a generation. Millions of Gen Zer’s have little interest in historic Christianity. The die has been cast.   Pope Benedict XVI predicted that the Catholic Church would become a smaller but more faithful institution in the future. “The future church will be more spiritual, poorer and less political, and will find energy for what is essential. It will be a church of the little ones.”   And those “little ones” will include both faithful Anglicans and independent evangelical churches with pastors and their small faithful congregations who have kept the faith in a broken and torn world.   END

Pontiff’s unprecedented declaration permitting priests to offer same-sex blessings shocked the world   By Jules Gomes THE STREAM April 22, 2025   Jorge Mario Bergoglio became the 266th successor of St. Peter and the head of 1.4 billion Catholics on March 13, 2013. His pontifical persona as Pope Francis, taken in honor of St. Francis of Assisi — the patron saint of ecology and animals — warmed the hearts of both Catholics and Protestant,s and even non-Christians.   But Francis’s honeymoon with faithful Catholics lasted just four months. While flying back from an apostolic visit to Brazil on July 29, 2013, a reporter asked him if there was a “gay lobby” in the Vatican.   Francis’s reply was shocking: “If a person is gay and seeks God and has good will, who am I to judge?”   The newly crowned pope may have been referring to sexual orientation rather than sexual practice, but the five words followed by a question mark — “Who am I to judge?” — became the ominous trademark that would stamp his papacy.   No More Trust—Just Verification From that point on, conservative Catholics began suspiciously scrutinizing every word that came from the pope’s mouth. Francis had shattered forever the hermeneutic of trust and obedience that had accompanied papal pronouncements over the centuries.   Conservatives accused Francis of subverting theological concepts and freighting them with leftist ideology and heterodox theology.   Jesuit priest and journalist Thomas Reese inadvertently confirmed this when he praised Francis’s first major declaration, titled The Joy of the Gospel: “Look at the title of his latest apostolic exhortation (Evangelii Gaudium, 2013),” he wrote. “It’s ‘the joy of the Gospel,’ not the ‘the truth of the Gospel.’”   Reese’s words were prophetic. Conservative Catholics and non-Catholic Christians pulled up the drawbridge — one couldn’t trust this pope as a custodian of “truth.”   Meanwhile, progressives cheered. The revolution had arrived. Francis was serenading them with the song, “All You Need Is Love.”   In the words of Guido Vignelli, Francis would usher in the revolution with “six talismanic words” — pastoral, mercy, listening, discernment, accompaniment, and integration. Vignelli warned that the words were a lexicon of smoke and mirrors designed to subvert Catholicism.   Francis’s regular public overtures to homosexuals and transgendered individuals confirmed this. It culminated in handwritten endorsements of his fellow Jesuit, Fr. James Martin, and his pro-LGBTQ+ crusading.   In early 2021, Francis publicly affirmed a civilly married homosexual couple who had three children through a lesbian surrogate — both acts forbidden by the Church. But within months, the Vatican’s doctrinal watchdog ruled out blessings for same-sex couples, stating: “God does not and cannot bless sin.”   Priests backed by prelates defied the ban and conducted seasons of mass same-sex blessings in Germany. But Francis said and did nothing, reserving his regular tongue-lashings for “rigid” traditionalists.   And then, in December 2023, Francis’s handpicked new doctrinal watchdog, Cardinal Victor Manuel Fernández, issued Fiducia supplicans — a declaration that permitted priests to informally offer blessings to same-sex couples. African bishops waxed apoplectic. Even the Church of England gasped: Francis had permitted gay blessings while they were still debating the issue.   Highly Ambiguous   At the Synod on the Family in 2014 and 2015, Francis pressed the accelerator on his “pastoral” tinkering with sexual ethics by seeking to admit “adulterers” (divorced and remarried Catholics) to Holy Communion – defying the teachings of Jesus and the Church.   The “rigged” synod resulted in an inconclusive final document, followed by Francis’s even more controversial apostolic exhortation Amoris Laetitia (The Joy of Love), which subverted the Church’s policy on withholding Holy Communion from “adulterous” couples.   The furor following Amoris Laetitia alerted conservatives to Francis’s choice of weapon: ambiguity. The “reformer” pope would use clarity only when expressing his distaste for traditional Catholicism and Donald Trump.   An infamous footnote, number 351, which permitted those living in “irregular situations” to receive the “sacraments,” became “the most contentious footnote in the recent history of the Church,” wrote Phil Lawler in Lost Shepherd: How Pope Francis Is Misleading His Flock.   Francis refused to clarify what he meant by “irregular” (cohabitation? second marriage?) or “sacraments” (confession? Holy Communion?), telling journalists during an in-flight press conference that he could not recall it.   The pope, formerly known for his prolixity, never responded to four cardinals who wrote to him in September 2016 pleading for clarification. As a result, diocesan bishops announced radically different policies based on contradictory interpretations of Francis’s words.   The Doctrine of Climate Change   Meanwhile, Francis published his tree-hugging encyclical Laudato Si’ in 2015, calling for an “ecological conversion” and recruiting Jesus, Mary, and Francis of Assisi as eco-allies of Greta Thunberg. The encyclical was largely ghostwritten by atheist climate scientist Prof. Hans Joachim Schellnhuber.   Environmentalism — a topic on which the pope spoke with exceptional clarity — would become a leitmotif of his pontificate and the only area of eschatology into which he would venture boldly: The world was on the precipice of destruction because of man-made climate change.   Schellnhuber was invited to address the Amazon Synod in October 2019. That tumultuous event would slap an unforgettable icon on Francis’s face — the figurine of the Andean mother earth deity Pachamama. Eco-liberals venerated Pachamama’s wooden images in the presence of Pope Francis until a firebrand Austrian Catholic drove to Rome and dumped them in the River Tiber.   The pope’s paean to Pachamama intensified as the Wuhan virus catastrophe was unleashed on the world. In pleas bordering on pantheism, Francis warned the pandemic was caused by grumpy Gaia having a hissy fit.   “Nature is throwing a tantrum so that we will take care of her,” he pontificated. “God always forgives. We sometimes forgive. Nature never forgives.”   Francis even imitated Marcion and cancelled the words of the “vengeful” Old Testament God: “Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed, for God made man in his own image” (Genesis 9:6), going so far as tochange Canon 2267 of the Catechism of the Catholic Church in 2018, declaring the death penalty “inadmissible.”   He would seal this innovation with his magisterium authority by squirreling it into his 2024 declaration Dignitas Infinita. Three months before his death, he would beseech his friend and ideological ally, President Joe Biden, to commute the sentences of 40 criminals on federal death row — including criminals convicted of savagely massacring Jews, children, and women.   Editing Jesus   Even Jesus’s words in the New Testament needed an update. In 2020, Francis, a former chemistry teacher from Buenos Aires, took his scalpel to the Lord’s Prayer, rewriting the sixth petition — “lead us not into temptation” — as “do not abandon us to temptation.”   Francis clearly wasn’t going to “preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and folly to Gentiles,” as the Apostle Paul admonished all believers. With unimaginable hubris, the “custodian of tradition,” Francis, jettisoned Jesus and signed a covenant with Islam for the sake of “human fraternity.”   Hijacking St. Francis yet again, Pope Francis penned the longest papal encyclical ever — a “veritable bacchanalia of verbosity” — devoting 43,000 words to migration, markets, media, interfaith dialogue, populism, nationalism, the redistribution of wealth, and the death penalty.   Fratelli tutti even quoted the Koran in seeking to inspire “the vision of a fraternal society,” but never once mentioned “salvation” or the uniqueness of Jesus and His salvific work on the Cross in its eight chapters.   In preaching a Christless fraternity, critics complained that Francis was reviving the hippie deity of Woodstock, who was, in the words of H. Richard Niebuhr, “a God without wrath who brought men without sin into a Kingdom without judgment through the ministrations of a Christ without a Cross.”   Jettisoning Jesus was essential to Francis signing his Abu Dhabi covenant with Al-Azhar’s Grand Imam Ahmed al-Tayyeb. Muslim converts to Christianity facing the death penalty for apostasy — a penalty al-Tayyeb endorses — denounced the dissimulations in the document.   Muslim persecution of Christians skyrocketed under Francis. When Turkey’s radical Muslim president occupied the world’s greatest Byzantine cathedral, turning it again into a mosque, the dhimmified Francis whispered a feeble, “I think of Hagia Sophia, and I am very saddened.”   Chinese Friends in High Places   Francis’s megaphone had already been deadened by his concordat with China, renewed in 2020 and 2024 despite an ever-swelling surge in the persecution of Christians and Uyghur Muslims by the CCP. On this, the pontiff lost even his liberal fans for acquiescing to communist oppression.   Nevertheless, the world was treated to a high-decibel lecture on taking the experimental mRNA vaccine as the pope set an example by taking the abortion-tainted jab and sided with draconian lockdowns.   As monarch of Vatican City, Francis became one of the first world leaders to force a vaccine passport on citizens, enforcing institutionalized coercion and discrimination, by which he managed to violate the Nuremberg Code, the Italian constitution, and a Council of Europe resolution simultaneously. Sycophant swiftly turned the Catholic Church into a COVID cult.   Francis, forever the arch-nemesis of proselytism, then became God’s salesman-in-chief for the COVID-19 vaccine, even producing a video for the Ad Council — an agency that promotes contraception, LGBTQ+ causes, and the Marxist-led Black Lives Matter movement.   “Being vaccinated with vaccines authorized by the competent authorities is an act of love,” he cooed in the promotional video. The medical tyranny triggered a revolt of conscientious objectors in the Swiss Guard, which was swiftly quashed by the Vatican.   Soon, the Pontifical Academy for Life would invite Rabbi Avraham Steinberg to preach his brand of vaccine extremism at the Vatican, even labeling intentionally unvaccinated people as “murderers.” The Vatican mint would issue a 20-euro silver coin celebrating the contested jab.   Bad Habits Long Established Meanwhile, philosopher José Quarracino (the nephew of Cardinal Antonio Quarracino, who appointed Fr. Bergoglio as auxiliary bishop of Buenos Aires) emerged like a bad dream from Francis’s past.   Quarracino described Bergoglio as “the buffoon of plutocrats” for creating the Council for Inclusive Capitalism with the Vatican. “Bergoglio’s leadership style is that of a despot who allows neither contradiction nor independent judgment. He has always surrounded himself with mediocre, submissive, and servile personalities,” the philosopher quipped. He added that Francis had always had a bent toward “flirt[ing]with the liberal and progressive world, always insofar as it was to his advantage.”   But the most dizzying papal adventure was round the corner. In October 2021, Francis launched a Synod on Synodality geared at “listening” to the whole church. The expensive experiment involved laypeople at the grassroots — and even Protestants, lapsed Catholics, and atheists.   Altogether, the synod lasted until 2024 and opened a Pandora’s box of ideological agendas, with dissident Catholics demanding women’s ordination and a revision of Catholic teaching on LGBT issues.   But, despite his increasingly failing health, Francis remained in an “Around the World in 80 Days” mode, visiting over 60 countries from Brazil to Bulgaria and from Slovenia to South Sudan while preaching “human fraternity” in lieu of the Christian gospel.   Papal Antisemitism He became the first pope to visit the Arabian Peninsula, promoting dialogue with Islam. He would travel to Sweden to mark the 500th anniversary of the Protestant Reformation, praising the “courageous” Martin Luther and affirming that Luther “got it right” on justification.   On a visit to Kazakhstan, Francis did not mention Jesus even once in his seven-minute address to an interfaith assembly, even though the event he was there to commemorate was the Feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross.   While the U.S. Supreme Court turned Roe v. Wade on its head in 2022, igniting the dream of an abortion-free world, Francis welcomed pro-abortion Catholics like President Joe Biden and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi with a wink and a nudge while publicly bashing bishops who dared to bar them from Holy Communion.   Toward the end of his life, the pope who claimed to have the Argentinian Jewish Rabbi Abraham Skorka as his bosom pal and even cowrote the book On Heaven and Earth with him made a series of anti-Israel statements, leading to a catastrophic breakdown in Jewish-Catholic relations.   The final straw was Francis venerating the baby Jesus lying on a swaddling keffiyeh — the symbol of Palestinian resistance and Jew-hatred. In January 2025, Rome’s chief rabbi, Dr. Riccardo Di Segni, accused Pope Francis of neglecting persecuted Christians in Islamic countries while directing his “selective indignation” against Israel.   Di Segni warned that the pope’s “omissions, distractions, [and] low-profile, generic citations” against Muslims who persecute Christians “clashes with the systematic and almost daily attention and words of disapproval and condemnation towards Israel.”   A month earlier, Amichai Chikli, Israel’s minister of Diaspora Affairs and Combating Antisemitism, was forced to rebuke Francis for committing a “genocide blood libel against the Jewish state” and reminded the pontiff of the Vatican’s silence during the Nazi Holocaust.   Dr. Jules Gomes, (BA, BD, MTh, PhD), has a doctorate in biblical studies from the University of Cambridge. Currently a Vatican-accredited journalist based in Rome, he is the author of five books and several academic articles. Gomes lectured at Catholic and Protestant seminaries and universities and was canon theologian and artistic director at Liverpool Cathedral.

By David G. Duggan © Special to Virtueonline www.virtueonline.org April 22, 2025   I hold no brief for the Roman Catholic Church. For my money (much diminished after writing 4 checks to the taxing authorities last week), it is wrong on the three planes of intersection of the human with the divine: 1) theological (insofar as it advocates a “works-based salvation”–that you can earn your way into heaven); 2) historical (e.g., its continued benefit from the slave trade by its client states Spain and Portugal well into the 19th century); and 3) spiritual (its claim to “exclusive inerrancy” in doctrine and control of the “gates of heaven” excludes such latter-day saints as Dietrich Bonhoeffer and Martin Luther King, Jr. from the Kingdom of heaven). And its vice-grip over Chicago politics for at least the last 70 years makes its cozy relationship with the kleptocrats who have ruined this city a national disgrace.   Still, its role in saving Western civilization (sparing Rome from destruction by Attila; preserving libraries and learning in medieval monasteries) deserves some commendation, even from a confirmed Protestant. So, with the recent death of Jorge Mario Bergoglio, known to some as the Bishop of Rome, to others as Francis I, it is appropriate to examine his 12-year backside occupancy of the “chair of St. Peter.”   I’ll let the historians examine whether Bergoglio was a closeted homosexual and Jesuit conflicted over the role of the church in Argentina’s “dirty war” of the 1970s. Credible accusations have him violating young seminarians as the order’s “novice master,” and of being complicit in the abduction of two radical Jesuits in that decade. Those events are too far removed from the present to have any value in determining Bergoglio’s ultimate role in God’s Kingdom. Suffice it that much of his rule over the Catholic faithful can be viewed through the lens of a man trying to atone for his indiscretions. Using the Italian homophobic slur “frocciagine” (loosely “f@%%0+” or “fairy”) to say why he didn’t want to open up seminaries to those of that inclination because there were already enough of them perhaps masked his true sentiments expressed in unilaterally allowing the “blessing” of same-sex relationships. But hey, Italian was not Bergoglio’s native language so he may not have understood how that term was understood by most of those who heard it during a “private meeting” with his cardinals. And his outreach to the politically marginalized (refugees, LGBTs, the Muslims who have invaded Europe) carries the freight of one who realizes that he did not do enough when his own skin was on the line.   But what cannot be overlooked is that Bergoglio overlooked the ascending trendline of homosexual domination of the clergy. From fellow Jesuit Fr. James Martin (sometimes referred to as “Brokeback Martin”), a made-for-tv-soundbite apologist for the “gay agenda” in the church, through Cardinal Wilton Gregory of Washington, DC and former head of the US Conference of Catholic Bishops, to the defrocked and now deceased former DC Cardinal Theodore McCarrick who supposedly waited 18 years after baptizing an infant to engage with him when he entered the seminary (sort of like Jerry Lee Lewis who checked into the hospital to await the birth of his next wife), the RCC has lost any moral authority over the conduct of its faithful, let alone its priests. And Bergoglio did absolutely nothing to rectify the curia, that swamp of clerics and lay who have led the RCC into fiscal insolvency.   The Conclave will have a choice: continue down the reformist path begun by Bergoglio, or return to the orthodoxy which Ratzinger tried and failed to impose. Or maybe there’s a third path: return the church to its teaching role and avoid the political involvement, the culture wars, the feminist movement which have wrought so much destruction in the church. An unnamed disciple asked Jesus to teach them to pray. No vicar of Christ can ascribe to a higher calling than teaching the faithful to pray.   Jorge Mario Bergoglio, RIP. You will be judged by a standard higher than your own exalted station in life.   David Duggan is a retired attorney living in Chicago. He is an occasional contributor to VOL.

By David W. Virtue, DD www.virtueonline.org April 22, 2025   Sometimes people on my side of the fence get it wrong, fearfully wrong, and there is no excuse for it. None. In times past one might have excused it based on political considerations or just plain ignorance; but not anymore.   There is no basis or room whatsoever for holocaust deniers. In many places in Poland and Germany the camps remain open, a somber reminder of man’s inhumanity to man. The stench of death is still there.   I visited Auschwitz in the late 60s as a young man in my 20s. I was with a small band of young Polish believers who had not seen the horror of the camp. Most of them never made it through the whole presentation. I was (and remain) deeply fascinated by evil; some might say I have a morbid interest in the subject, but I am reminded that there is a great battle going on in the universe between good and evil; God and Satan, and we must all choose sides.   For Christians, St. Paul reminds us that “we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.” Who would deny that we are experiencing such today!   Holocaust denying you might think belongs to the Hillbilly folk from rural Georgia – Deliverance territory – but that is not true.   A former Queen’s chaplain recently endorsed a holocaust denier Catholic priest as a “great scripture scholar whose books are well worth reading.” Pick me off the floor.   Dr. Gavin Ashenden, is a scholar of some repute himself. He holds a law degree, undergraduate and graduate degrees in theology and a Ph.D. with a dissertation on the life of Charles Williams. No small achievement.   But in a Catholic podcast, the ex-Chaplain to Queen Elizabeth II, triggered fresh controversy after the celebrity convert to Catholicism signed a joint statement endorsing a notorious holocaust denier Catholic priest – Fr. James Mawdsley – who has loudly proclaimed the holocaust is “The biggest lie in history.” Mawdsley also claimed that the word “antisemitism” is “completely meaningless,” and denied that the Catholic Church “ever taught a hatred of people” before once again claiming that the Holocaust is a “lie.”  It didn’t happen, he says.   The statement, issued by the three co-hosts of the Catholic Unscripted podcast—Gavin Ashenden, Katherine Bennett, and Mark Lambert—praised the infamous pro-Nazi priest Fr. James Mawdsley as “a great scriptural scholar” whose “books are well worth reading.”   Catholics and Jews excoriated the podcast after Bennett platformed Mawdsley, a priest who was suspended by the traditional Latin Mass society, the Priestly Fraternity of St. Peter, in order to discuss the post-Vatican II changes in the Good Friday liturgy.   Catholic Unscripted released the prerecorded podcast on YouTube just before the Jewish Passover and Christian Holy Week. On the Wednesday of Holy Week, Campaign Against Antisemitism (CAA) flagged up the podcast’s Jew-hatred on X and Facebook.   The antisemitism campaign group reported that “several people from the Catholic community” had written to them “in disgust” regarding the priest’s well-publicized views on “the Jews” and the Holocaust. His views were not challenged on the podcast.   Thousands of Catholics and Jews from across the world slammed Mawdsley and Bennett for the podcast. The CAA messages were reposted on social media by prominent personalities, including Damien Thompson, associate editor of The Spectator and host of the Holy Smoke podcast. “This is an outrage and a gift to the enemies of traditional Catholicism,” Thompson wrote.   After almost a week of being called out for their Jew-hatred, Ashenden, Bennett, and Lambert issued a statement falsely claiming that Mawdsley was a “great scriptural scholar and his books are well worth reading.”   In their statement, the Catholic Unscripted team went on to exonerate Bennett for not challenging Mawdsley on his antisemitic claims, “knowing him to be fiercely well researched and more knowledgeable (sic) than her.”   However, an investigation into Mawdsley’s profile and writings reveals that the priest has neither the training nor the credentials of a biblical scholar. After his A-levels at school, he went to Bristol University to study mathematics and physics, but dropped out after three terms.   He was ordained in 2016 after completing his priestly formation at the St. Peter’s Seminary in Wigratzbad, Germany. The seminary does not offer licentiate degrees in biblical scholarship — a canonical requirement in the Roman Catholic Church for a priest or layperson to be recognized as a scripture scholar. He was also briefly married, divorced and got an annulment.   The priest has never published a single article in a peer-reviewed journal or published through an academic press. All his seven books are self-published by his own company New Old. The company does not seem to have published books by any other author.   Mawdsley is also not part of any academic guild of Catholic biblical scholars, such as the Catholic Biblical Federation (international) or the Catholic Biblical Association of Great Britain.   Further, Mawdsley’s misreading of the biblical texts to promote antisemitism is in direct violation of the exegetical and hermeneutical principles laid down in the Vatican’s "The Jewish People" and their "Sacred Scriptures in the Christian Bible."   That this “priest” should be given a pass by Ashenden is a tragedy of the highest order. Ashenden knows better. That Ashenden flipped to Rome is understandable bearing in mind the sorry state of the Church of England. But there are millions of global Anglicans who have not bowed the knee to Rome nor do they view people like Mawdsley as acceptable. Recently a populist Anglican priest, one Calvin Robinson, got tossed out of his Anglican jurisdiction, accused by his archbishop of antisemitism.   In short, antisemitism has no place in Christian life or teaching. Antisemitism must be exposed for what it is. Hateful words lead to escalation, to discrimination and dehumanization, culminating in genocide. Today the state of Israel faces charges of genocide.   We as Christians should repudiate this new antisemitism with every bone in our bodies. It is repeating the shameful errors of the German Christians who looked the other way in the 1930s when the Nazis made clear they intended to exterminate the Jews--just as Hamas and Iran intend.  For Christians to deny the Holocaust or not defend Jews and Israel when this pattern is being repeated, is unconscionable.    If we do not speak up, then who will speak for us when our time comes?   END