Posted on 02/06/2013 4:11:39 AM PST by NYer
You thought there couldn’t be a law and religion angle to today’s news—fascinating for us history nerds—that archaeologists have discovered the mortal remains of Richard III beneath a parking lot in Leicester? Think again. Plans are underway to re-inter the bones in the city’s Anglican Cathedral. Not so fast, say some: the hunchback king wasn’t a Protestant, but a Catholic, and he requires a Catholic burial. In fact, as Shakespeare fans know, Richard died at Bosworth Field (“A horse! A horse! My kingdom for a horse!”), defending his throne from Henry Tudor. Henry went on to reign as Henry VII; his son, Henry VIII, broke with Rome. As The Tablet’s blog argued this morning, “Had Richard prevailed at the Battle of Bosworth Field, there would have been no Henry VII, therefore no Henry VIII and no Reformation. England today might still be a Catholic country.” Think of it: no Reformation, no Established Church, no Archbishop Laud, no Puritans, no Great Migration — no Massachusetts! — and no Establishment Clause. Surely there’s a law review article in there somewhere.
Leicester Cathedral seems to know it’s facing a sensitive situation. A Catholic priest is keeping watch over Richard’s remains (as is an Anglican, I believe), and the cathedral is planning a “multifaith” burial ceremony. Personally, I’m not sure why English Catholics are so keen to claim Richard, anyway. They must be forgetting the nephews in the Tower.
Then not true.
Yes, the same old thing, just like Arab tribes today ...
I’ve got that the Henrys are Lancastrian, John of Gaunt’s descendants, and the Richards and Edwards are Yorkist, and the Nevilles play both sides.
Richard III, modern pragmatist that he was, probably doesn’t care, but I think it’s neat that they’ve identified his remains with both scientific and historical evidence.
Catechism of the Catholic Church (no. 1032): prayer for the dead is one of the spiritual works of mercy.
1032 This teaching is also based on the practice of prayer for the dead, already mentioned in Sacred Scripture: “Therefore [Judas Maccabeus] made atonement for the dead, that they might be delivered from their sin.” From the beginning the Church has honored the memory of the dead and offered prayers in suffrage for them, above all the Eucharistic sacrifice, so that, thus purified, they may attain the beatific vision of God. The Church also commends almsgiving, indulgences, and works of penance undertaken on behalf of the dead:
He was a Catholic! Of course he should receive a Catholic burial! Anything else would be blasphemy!
Wrong, horribly wrong. A human person is a body-soul duality, not a ghost temporarily inhabiting a sack of meat. This is exactly what I mean when I say your anthropology is not Christian.
Well, I guess we disagree on that one, then. My perspective gets a lot of rankles up at my Baptist church here in Kentucky, but I’ll sum it up here:
I believe that we are both natural and spiritual. One example of scripture that discusses this is Jesus being called both “Son of God” and “Son of man.”
But to get to my core belief, it starts with Ecclesiastes. In fact, when I encounter a person who is not a Christian but is not an enemy of the faith and knows something of it (usually someone raised as a catholic in childhood but fell away as an adult) I ask them to read Ecclesiastes in its entirety in one sitting. I preface it with the comment that it is about the richest man that ever lived, he had the chicks, the cars, the villa in the Alps, but he discovered something about the “natural man” and repeats it over and over. And then there is a zinger at the end that changes everything - kinda like the movie, The Sixth Sense.
I see non-Christians as animals, that have potential. That is the “natural” man. Without Christ, as Ecclesiastes says, you eat and drink and enjoy the fruits of your labor and then you die, just like any other animal. The only difference is that you will stand before the white throne judgement. If you are in the book of life, you go on to eternity with your Creator. If not, you die the second death. You are then done. For all eternity.
And the “you” is the soul that really is separate from your body. It’s why Paul calls this body a tent. And he was VERY clear about it:
2 Corinthians 5:1
For we know that if the earthly tent we live in is destroyed, we have a building from God, an eternal house in heaven, not built by human hands.
2 Corinthians 5:4
For while we are in this tent, we groan and are burdened, because we do not wish to be unclothed but to be clothed instead with our heavenly dwelling, so that what is mortal may be swallowed up by life.
2 Peter 1:13
I think it is right to refresh your memory as long as I live in the tent of this body...
I’ve used this analogy for many years:
An animal’s body is like a drone aircraft while a human’s is like a manned aircraft. Both do similar things and are designed to function and reproduce within the environment for which they were created. But the animal is instinct and a sort of AI while the human is occupied by a self aware and sentient living soul. Just as an airplane is treated as more valuable has more safety features and precautions to preserve it’s functionality and the life of the occupant compared to a drone, a human is more valuable than an animal for the same reason. What makes it valuable is its contents.
This is a point of contention many animal rights activists have with me. I separate creation into two groups: Man, who is created in Gods image, and natural resource, which is the category into which everything else falls.
Your body will die. Your spirit will be resurrected for the great white throne judgement. If you are written in the book of life, you go to an eternity in the presence of God. If not, you die for the last time. The “second death”.
The living Christians are simply the little “s” saints. The Christian believers ONLY get the “S” after their passing.
AMEN.
You must have done a lot of family history research.
Catechism of the Catholic Church (no. 1032): prayer for the dead is one of the spiritual works of mercy.
I disagree with that particular teaching. I’m not Catholic. I do not believe Mary died a virgin. I do not believe Mary was perfect. I am not a Catholic. I agree with much of what that particular organization teaches, but I also agree with much of what Jehovas Witnesses, Mormons and pentacostals teach. But I disagree with all of them on some things.
For me, Christianity is about two things: My relationship with my Creator and my relationship with my fellow man. The latter is actually a subset of the former.
I have no relationship with dead people. I consider ALL of them merely flawed sinners such as myself. Now, I believe that after the resurrection we will have a relationship in eternity in our Lord’s presence, but everything in its time.
“Someone” may have said that, but it’s not in the Bible. Nor is it even correctly attributed to C.S. Lewis. I’d say “someone” got it wrong.
For example, as soon as I saw “War of the Roses” I recalled all about the rose bulb bubble and that it was called a war because the big Byzantine banking houses were using unscrupulous Austrian accountants to try to gain control of the rose bulb market in Hungary.
If John Henry hadn't stopped the panic by impaling Turks who tried to board trains in Italy, we'd all be speaking Byzantine today.
I did forget the name of the memory course I took, though, but when I think of it I'll let you know.
The living Christians are simply the little “s” saints. The Christian believers ONLY get the “S” after their passing.
The good news is that Revelation 7 strongly suggests that there will be a LOT of people in group 2, especially when justaposed against the scripture just before it. There is only one guy in group 3 so it’s not really a “group”.
Yes I have. Thousands of pages.
Yes, the War of the Roses was pretty tribal but the characters involved, including Richard, are just so fascinating! They were a brilliant people although hard and greedy. Those Arab tribes...just hard and greedy, lol!
Shakespearean bump....
My crazy son Patrick speaks Byzantine.
I'm sure I read that the accountants were Australian ... you must have had a different edition of the book.
Inbreeding has been a problem for the Arabs, just as it was for the Yorkists and Lancastrians ;-).
The citizens of Byzantium spoke Greek.
So they claim, but do you have any actual recordings of them speaking it? It could have been closer to Anatolian.
I claim to speak English, but if you asked an English person ... say, my sister-in-law ... you'd get an earful!
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