Op-ed: "Was a demon enthroned at the Amazon Synod?"

Rorate Caeli ^ | October 18, 2019 | Rev. Deacon Nick Donnelly

[ebb tide]

It’s the Paul VI Audience Hall.

I’ll call a lie when I see them (I’m referring to google, not you).

[Mrs. Don-o]

PACHAMAMA

[metmom]

It’s the Paul VI Audience Hall.

OK, thank you.

What goes on there?

[ebb tide]

What goes on there?

Nothing good. Circus acts, performances by gymnansts, etc.

It's another Vatican Council II monstrosity.

[metmom]

Monstrosity is the word for it.

I googled up the Audience Hall and got one very short uninformative Wikipedia article and several, what I’d call conspiracy theory articles about it pointing out that the architecture of the whole building resembles a snake, which would be harder to write off if it didn’t look so much like one.

[ebb tide]

I agree. It’s hideous.

[AnonymousConservative]

Check out the auditorium where that stage is:

https://newagora.ca/inside-popes-reptilian-audience-hall-vatican-city/

[ELS]

It’s hard for me to comprehend that the Church that built St. Peter’s Basilica, Notre Dame Cathedral, Sagrada Familia Basilica, etc. is the same Church that approved the design and construction of that ugly audience hall.

[Salman]

That picture.

The Pope looking like a science fiction villain.

[GraceG]

Looks like a damned Chaos Demon from the Warp....

[The Mayor]

WOW!

[jocon307]

She’s really such a little crank, isn’t she? She’ll make a great Gladys Kravitz when she grows up.

[ealgeone]

"The Church has always recognised that there is a good side to these pagan religions but that there is also an idolatrous demonic side (I Cor 10:14-22; 2 Cor 6:14-18) — for they are simply the kind of religion that fallen man naturally makes for himself, but they make claims to teach the way to God."(Fr. Jeremy Davies, Exorcism: Understanding exorcism in scripture and practise.)

Emphasis mine in the above quote.

Maybe Roman Catholicism thinks there is a "good side to these pagan religions", but Christianity has always condemned idolatry.

14Therefore, my beloved, flee from idolatry. 1 Corinthians 10:14 NASB

But Rome does have its own problems with its sanctioned idolatry via the worship of Mary.

[Mrs. Don-o]

I take it --- on the basis of Biblical testimony --- that there are different sorts of pagan religion.

Some of it is straight-out diabolical: their gods and idols are devils.

Some of it is foolishly vacuous: their gods are "nothings," empty, void: they are nullities.

Some of it is truth but strangely incomplete: as when Paul, in his famous speech at the Areogapus in Athens, quoted with approval the pagan poets (Acts 17:28 "In him we live and move and have our being" -- Epimenides of Knossos; and "For we too are his offspring" --- Eratus of Soli.)

Paul quoted these pagan works, not to say that the pagan gods are true, but to say that the Athenians had legitimate spiritual yearnings toward the (unknown) True God, who would be made known to them by Paul as Jesus Christ our Lord.

[metmom]

I take it --- on the basis of Biblical testimony --- that there are different sorts of pagan religion.

ON what Biblical testimony?

I think it's very dangerous to consider that some idol worship or pagan worship is worship of nothing. There's always something behind the object being idolized or worshiped.

[ealgeone]

I take it --- on the basis of Biblical testimony --- that there are different sorts of pagan religion.

IF it is not of God then the "different sorts" are really of one sort...that is from the father of lies.

Some of it is truth but strangely incomplete: as when Paul, in his famous speech at the Areogapus in Athens, quoted with approval the pagan poets (Acts 17:28 "In him we live and move and have our being" -- Epimenides of Knossos; and "For we too are his offspring" --- Eratus of Soli.)

I don't know if I'd say Paul "quoted with approval the pagan poets".

I think he was using this as a point of common reference to further advance the Gospel.

[Mrs. Don-o]

"I think he was using this [pagan poetry] as a point of common reference to further advance the Gospel. "

Yes, he did so: by quoting the pagan poets with approval, inasmuch as there was some truth they had "in common."

In that same talk at the Areopagus in Athens --- in the verse immediately preceding the one I cited --- Paul says, with reference to the gentile nations, that these pagans "might seek God, even perhaps grope for Him and find Him, though He is not indeed far from any one of us."

All of this is no substitute for the Gospel, but it may sometimes be, as Paul found, preparatory for it.

[ealgeone]

I seriously don’t think Paul approved of the pagan gods/goddesses of Rome (the Empire).

[Mrs. Don-o]

Pagan gods are demons: "The sacrifices of pagans are offered to demons, not to God." (1 Cor 10:20)

Pagan gods are non-existent: "We know that an idol is nothing at all in the world, and that there is no God but one." (1 Cor 8:4)

Psalm 96:5 Young's Literal Translation
"For all the gods of the peoples are nought, And Jehovah made the heavens."

Deuteronomy 32:21 "They provoked me to jealousy over their non-gods, and to be angry over their empty vanity. Now I’ll provoke them to jealousy over a non-people; and over a foolish nation I’ll provoke them to anger."

1 Chron. 16:26 "All the gods of the peoples are things of nought; But the LORD made the heavens."

Hebrew words elil, elul, eliyl --- one of several words translated "idol," --- mean literally "a no-thing," "a thing of nought" vanity, a nothing

Pagan gods express the incomplete knowledge of those desiring the (unknown) True God as they "grope for Him and perhaps even find Him":--- from Acts 17:27.

BTW, what happened at the Vatican Gardens with the Pachamama idol was disgraceful: there's not one thing in it to mitigate the abomination of it. I think it's just one more example of an attempt to de-center Christ and make out that He is just one way of many to the truth about God. When in fact, He is the One, only, unique Way --- and certain faithless false "Christians" at the Vatican Amazonian Synod and elsewhere are trying to obscure that fact.

[Mrs. Don-o]

I didn’t say Paul approved of pagan gods and goddesses. I said he quoted pagan poets as expressing certain truths: that “In him we live and move and have our being” — Epimenides of Knossos; and “For we too are his offspring” -— Eratus of Soli.