Why wouldn’t Pike’s work’s assuming also be “self evident”?
The assuming you accuse me of isn’t “self evident” at all. The things that the Declaration of Independence called self evident were only so because of the light of God. Where is the light of God in your scheme? You cannot show me the light of God. The light of God raises up. Your work only pulls down. It has many words of criticism. None of encouragement, except to encourage keeping up the total blasting no matter what the worship environment and what was seen in it. That is a bad blasphemy of God, my friend.
If you expect perfection in this decaying creation you will not see it except in God piercing through. But if you complain about God piercing through in an imperfect church environment, you will complain about God piercing through to you as well, for you are imperfect as well.
Anyhow, you appear to be in a bondage of a mental loop that you can never break and keeps pulling you down, down, down.
But God can break that loop. If you allow Him in. Where is the joy that the bible speaks of? That is the sign of God. You have no joy. Only grimness.
Another post that’s full of ASSUMPTIONs.
Just because someone refuses to parrot your delusion doesn’t mean they have no joy — maybe that’s just the effect YOU render.
I find Pike’s work useful because it brings to light certain historical facts regarding recycled religious symbolism and dogma. It’s also useful because it helps to understand the context many of the American founders were operating within — as illustrated by the temple they built one mile North of the White Hut.