Protest and martyrdom

Ben

"...the idea of a faithful minority persecuted by a decadent state, whose claim to liberalism must be unmasked as tyrannical...."
Very good Theo, you're learning. I was getting worried after your last post. However, I am concerned that Hadrian - who is clearly a wannabe Jesuit - will start having a go at you now.

hadrian

Hadrian is Protestant, NOT Romanist, so the term 'jesuit' is singularly misapplied, Ben!
So far as what the term 'protest' denotes, I should say it means merely stating the Truth, standing by it and being prepared to suffer affliction for it. Christ and the Apostles categorically assert that those who would live godly in Christ Jesus will suffer persecution and that it is through much tribulation we enter into the Kingdom of heaven. In other words the hostile spirit that vainly attempted to destroy Christ will not let His disciples have an easy ride! We are called to serve, sometimes but thankfully more rarely than we have a right to expect, right to the point of death.
This is hardly 'jesuitical' teaching- it is Christ's own.
For a Protestant of course our attitude towards this differes from the RC's in so far as we do not view any of this as gaining us merit with God or rendering us salvable or worthy;No, such a calling is simply the consequence, the fruit of not following, by the grace of God, the way of the fallen world.
On this specific issue, Charles Moore has decided what Ross and Brand did was so out of order and is so organically related to the culture of the BBC that he is directing his ammunition on this specific target. He has every right to do so, though whether breach of the law of the land is justified in this case is arguable. Perhaps the harder way would be organising a mass ( in the non RC sense!) protest against the BBC for its dire moral drift. Odd for self proclaimed 'liberals' however who so trumpet the right
of mass demonstrations and protest rallies, mind you, to be so uppity about others whom they perceive to be reactionary exercising these rights!!!

Ray

Moore's protest is symbolic, yet heartfelt nonetheless. He should be applauded and supported.

In fact, Moore rather reminds me of that old black farmer in "Mississippi Burning" who, waving his shotgun in righteous indignation at all those smug BBC 'bien pensants', yells "I ain't gonna' take this s**t no more!".

Ben

Dear Hadrian, I know you're a prod! You do seem to thrive on analytic "Jesuitical" casuistry though. I think you're in the wrong denomination. However, if you started agreeing with Athanasius it would be a lot less entertaining, and indeed, interesting

Athanasius

Ben - if Hadrian started agreeing with me, then poor Theo would have hardly any comments on his blog...

Clothilde Simon

I bet Charles Moore can spell "licence", even if he hasn't go one.

Craig Strachan

If you disapprove, say, of an unelected and incompetent Prime Minister, should you withold your income tax until he is out of the job?

Balaams Ass

We have no TV licence, because we don't believe the programmes are worth it. As parents we believe it is our responsibility to be very watchful of what comes into our home. The technology is fine and we use it to watch many DVDs and videos. I am not sure of the point of Charles Moore's protest. He maybe trying to redeem the unredeemable and should probably 'leave Gomorrah' rather than trying to get Gomorrah to mend its ways!

Unam Sanctam

I've just started reading Harry Potter, now his Holiness has blessed the contents. I must say I am rather glad, they are very good. Has anyone heard if Rome has blessed Captain Scarlet as I have inherited some old VHS videos and I would rather like to watch them. I have already sprinkled them with holy water to minimise risk.
Mmmm, I wonder if he was a heroic jesuit in creators Gerry Anderson's eyes, or is the Universal Church PLc limited to club members, on a quid quo pro basis.

hadrian

Ben- 'analytical casuistry' is hardly the appropriate term for the rigorous process of logical, staright-forward consistent thinking and deduction. The Christian church currently suffers from far too much flabby thinking and its happy clappyism is rightly held in contempt by the world at large. Rigorous argumentation from the coherent premises of Scripture may drive the world mad in anger but has to be taken seriously and is feared because of its persuasive power.
Jesuitical skullduggery is quite another matter of twisting truth to cheat and deceive.

Roderick Blyth

Hadrian's self flatterring reference to rigorous argumentation (I suppose he meant argument) from the coherent premises of scripture is singularly misapplied to his own case! If he had added the word 'well-informed' the self-deception would have been comprehensive.

Balaam's Ass has the thr right idea: it's not just Jonathan Ross, it's what Jonathan Ross typifies. I really don't see how anyone with the slightest intellectual or moral self-respect can have television in his home, unless to watch sport, which is a different kind of a waste of time - the mindless equivalent of doing the crossword.

hadrian

Roderick- you can split hairs if you like over the fine nuances between 'argument' and 'argumentation'- my dictionary defines the latter as 'debate; reasoning; method of reasoning', all of which are perfectly susceptible to rigorous treatment. However when you imply that my knowledge of Roman Catholicism is not 'well informed' I can only say I have cited an instance of explicit disagreement between papal pronouncements on the Scriptures and more recent official RC Bishops on the same subject and as yet I have had not a single explanation- except the very convenient one that 'you do not understand.' Frankly I think I understand only too well, as do most Protestants- the Roman Church's concept of unchanging Truth is hugely deficient, hugely self deceptive and as liable to change as the wind. Either the Popes were in error or the bishops, by simple law of contradiction. Or does Rome have some mystical way of bypassing such an iron rule of truth and logic?

Ben

Dear Hadrian, catholics are all, basically, the same denomination. Given your clear-eyed view of things, which is the correct protestant denomination? There are, after all, a lot of them, with a huge range of practices. A positive reason would be needed, as opposed to preferring something just because they're not RC. I can't imagine that you equate Baptists with Anglicans, for example, but your vitriol has, so far, been reserved for us poor catholics.

Athanasius

hadrian,

The texts you mentioned, as I pointed out before, were not necessarily contradictory unless you read them intending to find that result - Scripture can be both free from error and contain things that are 'factually' not accurate yet still communicate truth. But if that still doesn't satisfy you, then allow me to reassure you that Bishops do not have the authority to make pronouncements on doctrinal issues that vary from authentic Church (papal) teaching. If you feel that this is what has happened, then it is entirely appropriate to ignore the Bishops and take resort only to the Magisterium of the Church.

As I say, I don't believe that even applies in the case you mentioned anyway.

Of course, the problem with reasoned argument/argumentation/debate, call it what you will, is that it never works. After all, you had no convincing argument against the belief in transubstantiation, but you will cling to what you believe anyway until God calls you to the reality. This is to be expected: "it was not flesh and blood that revealed this to you, but My Father in heaven".

Roderick Blyth

No doubt Hadrian's dictionary does include the word 'argumentation'. It probably includes 'documentation' as well. That doesn't meant that any properly educated person should condescend to use coinages that are ugly, redundant, and smack of half baked attempts at grandiloquence. Once again, Hadrian, it is not just your knowledge which is at issue but your judgment. Ut in parvis, sic in magnis - your insistence on the absolute privelege of you insights, and your ill-mannered dismissal of every body else's is quite simply unattractive when contrasted with the reasonable tone adopted by Athanasius in your long-running, and unwelcome debating match. If this blog is to have a chance, you should give other people a chance to discuss some of the issues which Theo is trying, in his own half-baked way, to raise, rather than flattering yourself fit to assume the mantle of some latter day Knox.

Athanasius

Apologies, Roderick, I've only just seen your comment at the end of the Newman debate - quite right too. Sorry for hijacking Theo's blog for such a debate!

Of course it would help if Theo's original points were more debatable - but to be entirely honest, having re-read this one a few times I still can't make head nor tail of it.

It would be refreshing if Theo himself joined in the comments to explain and defend himself a little more.

TBF

"Dear Hadrian, catholics are all, basically, the same denomination"

Really?

SSPX? International Fatima Rosary Crusade?

Regnum Christi, Legion of Mary, Focolare, Cursillo, the Neocatechumenal Way, Communion and Liberation, Opus Dei?

In your own words, 'there are a lot of them with a huge range of practices'.

All of these are very divergent expressions of Roman Catholicism, and they don't all accept the authority of the Pope.

The only 'correct' Protestant denomination is the Christian one.

Still on barely one post a week, Theo?

Ben

Dear TBF, you need to get your facts right. Your list of catholics is just that. Stop reading the da Vinci Code, it's not a textbook. My question stands. And catholics are Christians, honestly.

Roderick Blyth

My dear Athanasius - saints preserve us from any more Hobson than is absolutely necessary as a theoretical basis for more interesting discussion.

It may have been a bit mean of me to write in the way I did about the debate between you and Hadrian, but there is something extraordinary about reading the Reformation being rehearsed all over again, when most reasonable christians see the force of putting those kind of doctrinal squabbles behind them.

It seems to me that the real damage done by Protestantism no longer resides in any explicit spiritual beliefs(for these have been utterly consumed by the relative individualism hich characterised protestant thought from the moment of its inception) but the way that it conditions so much contemporary secular thinking in a way that most people don't begin to realise. Thus we find the priveleging of emotion over reason, the individual over tradition, and relativism over authority - in short, everything that characterises Theo's blog.

However, I did mean it when I said that the chief function of the debate between you and Hadrian would not be that either you or your benighted opponent would have a damascene moment, but rather that the open-minded reader who was prepared to take the trouble to read the long columns of your argument was more likely to be impressed by tone than content.

I find Hadrian's brand of covenanting triumphalism an historical, social and intellectual anachronism. It is so ridiculous, that I find myself wondering whether Hadrain seriously believes a word of what he says.

It's William McGonagall theology, really.

I also find that, as usual, intolerance finds a willing bedfellow in ignorance.

It is pleasingly rich in irony that Hadrain chooses as his blogging handle a name which commemorates (i) a Roman Emperor; and (ii) an English Pope.

Nothing much Scots about Hadrian but the genius that led the Emperor to build a wall to keep the Scots out of the productive part of the British Isles.

By the way, did you know that Aeneas Sylvius Piccolomini (later to be Pope Pius II) visited Scotland as a papal legate in the early XV century and later noted 'nihil tam gratae Scotiis quam vituperationes Angliorum'.

Now there's a good example of papal infallibility!

Athanasius

Dear Mr Blyth

You are quite correct, of course. I'm sorry I allowed myself to be sucked into prolonging the debate. It did feel a little like a leap back of several centuries...

I didn't know that about Pius II - rather amusing!