Posted on 05/09/2011 11:11:10 AM PDT by bronxville
Comparing Christianity and the New Paganism
The most serious challenge for Christianity today isn't one of the other great religions of the world, such as Islam or Buddhism.
Nor is it simple atheism, which has no depth, no mass appeal, no staying power. Rather, it's a religion most of us think is dead. That religion is paganism — and it is very much alive.
Paganism is simply the natural gravity of the human spirit, the line of least resistance, religion in its fallen state.
The "old" paganism came from the country. Indeed, the very word "paganism" comes from the Latin pagani, "from the fields" or "country-dwellers." Country people were the last to be converted to Christianity during the Roman Empire, the last to abandon their ancestral roots in pre-Christian belief. Today, country people are the last to abandon Christianity for the "new" paganism, which flourishes in the cities.
The old paganism was a far greater thing than the new. In fact, Chesterton brilliantly summarized the entire spiritual history of the world in this one sentence:
"Paganism was the biggest thing in the world, and Christianity was bigger and everything since has been comparatively small."
There were at least three elements in the old paganism that made it great. And all three are missing in the new paganism
The first is the sense of piety (pietas), the natural religious instinct to respect something greater than yourself, the humility that instinctively realizes man's subordinate place in the great scheme of things. "Moderation" or "temperance" went along with this, especially in classical civilization. The motto "nothing too much" was inscribed over every temple to Apollo, along with "know thyself."
This natural modesty and respect contrast sharply with the arrogant attitude of the new pagan in the modern West. Only Oriental societies still preserve a traditional reverence. The West does not understand this, and thinks it quaint at best and hypocritical at worst.
The new paganism is the virtual divinization of man, the religion of man as the new God. One of its popular slogans, repeated often by Christians, is "the infinite value of the human person." Its aim is building a heaven on earth, a secular salvation. Another word for the new paganism is humanism, the religion that will not lift up its head to the heavens but stuffs the heavens into its head.
A second ingredient of the old paganism that's missing in the new is an objective morality, what C.S. Lewis called "the Tao" in his prophetic little classic "The Abolition of Man." To pre-modern man, pagan as well as Christian, moral rules were absolute: unyielding and unquestionable. They were also objective: discovered rather than created, given in the nature of things.
This has all changed. The new paganism is situational and pragmatic. It says we are the makers of moral values. It not only finds the moral law written in the human heart but also by the human heart. It acknowledges no divine revelation, thus no one's values can be judged to be wrong.
The new paganism's favorite Scripture is "judge not." The only judgment is the judgment against judging. The only thing wrong is the idea that there is a real wrong.
The only thing to feel guilty about is feeling guilty. And, since man rather than God is the origin of values, don't impose "your" values on me (another favorite line).
This is really polytheism — many gods, many goods, many moralities. No one believes in Zeus and Apollo and Neptune any more. (I wonder why: Has science really refuted them—or is it due to total conformity to fashion, supine submission to newspapers?) But moral relativism is the equivalent of the old polytheism. Each of us has become a god or goddess, a giver of law rather than receiver.
A third ingredient of the old paganism but not of the new is awe at something transcendent, the sense of worship and mystery. What the old pagan worshiped differed widely — almost anything from Zeus to cows—but he worshiped something. In the modern world the very sense of worship is dying, even in our own liturgy, which sounds as if it were invented by a Committee for the Abolition of Poetry.
Our religious sense has dried up. Modern religion is de-mythologized, de-miraclized, de-divinized. God is not the Lord but the All, not transcendent but immanent, not super-natural but natural.
Pantheism is comfortable, and this is the modem summum bonum. The Force of "Star Wars" fame is a pantheistic God, and it is immensely popular, because it's "like a book on the shelf," as C.S. Lewis put it: available whenever you want it, but not bothersome when you don't want it. How convenient to think we are bubbles in a divine froth rather than rebellious children of a righteous divine Father! Pantheism has no sense of sin, for sin means separation, and no one can ever be separated from the All. Thus the third feature, no transcendence, is connected with the second, no absolute morality.
The new paganism is a great triumph of wishful thinking. Without losing the thrill and patina of religion, the terror of religion is removed. The new paganism stoutly rejects "the fear of God." Nearly all religious educators today, including many supposedly Catholic ones, are agreed that the thing the Bible calls "the beginning of wisdom" is instead the thing we must above all eradicate from the minds of the young with all the softly destructive power of the weapons of modern pop psychology — namely, the fear of the Lord.
"Perfect love casts out fear," says St. John; but when God has become the Pillsbury Doughboy, there is no fear left to cast out. And when there is no fear to cast out, perfect love lacks its strong roots. It becomes instead mere compassion — something good but dull, or even weak: precisely the idea people have today of religion. The shock is gone. That the God of the Bible should love us is a thunderbolt; that the God of the new paganism should love us is a self-evident platitude.
The new paganism is winning not by opposing but by infiltrating the Church. It is cleverer than the old. It knows that any opposition from without, even by a vastly superior force, has never worked, for "the blood of the martyrs is the seed of the Church." When China welcomed Western missionaries, there were 2 million conversions in 60 years; when Mao and communism persecuted the Church, there were 20 million conversions in 20 years. The Church in East Germany is immensely stronger than the Church in West Germany for the same reason. The new paganism understands this, so it uses the soft, suggestive strategy of the serpent. It whispers, in the words of Scripture scholars, the very words of the serpent: "Has God really said...?" (Gen. 3:1).
The new paganism is a joining of forces by three of the enemies of theism: humanism, polytheism and pantheism. The only five possibilities for ultimate meaning and values are: atheism (no God); humanism (man as God); polytheism (many gods); pantheism (one immanent God); and theism (one transcendent God). The Battle of the Five Kings in the Valley of Armageddon might, in our era, be beginning. Predictions are always unwise, but the signs of the times, for some thoughtful observers, point to a fundamental turning point, the end of an age.
The so-called "New Age Movement" combines all the features described under the title of the new paganism. It's a loosely organized movement, basically a flowering of '60s hippiedom, rather than a centralized agenda. But strategies are connected in three places. There may be no conspiracy on earth to unify the enemies of the Church, but the strategy of hell is more than the strategy of earth. Only one thing is more than the strategy of hell: the strategy of heaven.
The gates of hell cannot prevail against the Church; in fact, God uses the devil to defeat the devil, just as He did on Calvary, when the forces of the Hebrew, Greek and Roman worlds united to crucify Christ, as symbolized by the three languages on the accusation sign over the cross.
The very triumph of the devil, the death of God, was the defeat of the devil, the redemption of mankind, "Good Friday" Because God, who spoke the first word, always gets the last word.
Sure you did...But that's alright...Perhaps some Catholics will dig into the subject now that it's been brought to light here and see where their 'Queen of Heaven' originates from...
Neither does the term "King of Kings" that we use for the Christian God have any relationship to that same term used for pagan gods
I don't care what you or any non-Christian says, just because pagan gods are called the god of light and we call our Christian God the God of Light, does not mean our Christian God is related to the pagan gods
Suspect you meant "of the heath," or uncultivated land.
Colloquialisms with similar meaning today would be referring to someone as being from "the sticks" or "the boonies."
Oh I’m not making any “moral relative allegations towards Christianity”. I’m simply pointing out that nothing exists in a vacumn, not even Christianity. The gospel is for everybody of every race and culture, but different cultures interpret it in different ways, and over the centuries some of all that has become “attached” to Christianity. Christianity, wherever it is practiced, is a fusion of a lot of elements - of which the “plain truth of the bible” is only one. A lot of what we think of as being a “Christian” way of doing things is in fact a “cultural” way of doing thins. That doesn’t neccesarily mean its bad or wrong or not worth defending of course. After all, it also works in reverse. Christianity alters cultures - sometimes very markedly.
Quite so. I stand corrected.
A lot of folk think that because some pagan religions use terms like "King of Kings" that Christianity has just copied the expression and therefore is just one more of many religions, no better and probably worse. Certainly it has no more validity than they do.
But consider. It could equally well be the other way round. After all, if the Christian Deity is the one true God, creator and master of all, that fact would resonate through all eternity. In other words, the pagans (who like all Humans have an instinctive link to their creator) are simply copying the term from Him!
I think the one and only CS Lewis (who was an Anglican incidentally) puts it a lot better than I do!
I don’t know if the “new pagans” have taken over a Catholic cathedral, but I know they’ve taken over a bunch of Episcopalian churches...
Oh, I’d say that the pagans have taken over some Catholic churches mostly because the Vatican has said things to that effect themselves.
That's not my contention nor any that I've read...Did you make that up???
Diana was a Roman goddess known by many names, among them, Queen of Heaven...
The bible says everyone, everywhere worshiped Diana...
bronk-Did you get anywhere with it?
Yes and no.
Some people were greatful when I showed them these dangers backed up with plenty of information and they stopped practicing NA. Others,including a few Catholic's who were holding yoga classes in the church ignored me even when I gave them information from church documents condemning it.
Fighting this is like playing "wack a mole" with a hydra .You knock one out and it changes forms and pops back up again somewhere else.
We must be vigilant though. The devil figures we will get tired and lose our zeal-this is why daily rosaries,Saint Micheal Prayer, Jesus Prayer, attending Adoration etc..must be followed if we are to have strength to fight this enemy.
Cronos (post 47): And you give us adequate proof of why your kind are wrong -- your basic facts are utterly wrong. Here's another blooper from you.
Diana was the goddess of the hunt. The Roman goddess consort of Jupiter and Jupiter's queen was Juno.
Diana never had the title of Queen of Heaven -- give me proof for your statement.
iscool: Oh c'mon...It's all over the internet...Google goddess Diana and you'll be inundated with source material...
Cronos: Are random google queries the source of your data? If you type in diana queen of heaven you get a website that praises Princess Di... now, if this is the source of your information, there's no wonder you are consistently wrong.
For the first three...The fourth is the first of many sites that claim Diana was known as the Queen of Heaven...Apparently you quit after reading the first two, eh???
Do you know where the Title "King of Kings" originated? Did you know that that was the term used of various chief gods as well as of the Persian Emperor (Shahenshah) -- do you now claim that Christianity is paganism?
you can find the God of the OT referred to the “Sun of righteousness” (Mal. 4:2) and pagan gods were compared to stars and other semitic Gods given the name El or Adonai. Even the term God of Light has similarities in Zoroastrianism — do you condemn us Christians for using this term?
. In the Khorshed Nyaish [Khwarshed Niyayesh], Mihr Yazad or the Angel Mithra, the God of Light, Justice, and Truthfulness is represented as carrying a vazra or mace to strike it over the heads of the Daevas or the evil powers
compare to Ed underwood, God of Light, http://holybreathspiritualqigong.com/FatherGod.html - Jesus is the son of the God from Heaven our creator, the God of Light, opc.org O God of Light, Your Word, a Lamp Unfailing, first baptist A God of Light "I praise you, Lord, because you are my light and my salvation,' and because you know what lies in darkness, and light dwells with you'. . . ." (Psalm 27:1, Daniel 2:22).
So, I ask you again, Even the term God of Light has similarities in Zoroastrianism — do you condemn us Christians for using this term?
Very well put. Which of Lewis' books is that?
I can’t remember and I don’t have my copies to hand. It might be “Mere Christianity” or “Basic Christianity” where he expounds on this misappreciation of causality.
>> Dr. Peter Kreeft: “Paganism is simply the natural gravity of the human spirit, the line of least resistance, religion in its fallen state.”
A statement flawed in so many ways. Whatever paganism is, it is not the gravity of one’s spirit. Arguably, the path of least resistance is one that is opened to the arms of our Lord, not one that leads to the road of paganism. Finally, religion is the procedures of man; it is Faith which binds us to our Lord. Attending to the formality of religion without the understanding of Faith in Christ is a waste of time.
Paganism is no doubt a routine for the idle minded.
Myth Become Fact
....Lewis himself as a young man had fallen into the trap of thinking Christianity just another myth. He had read J. G. Frazer’s celebrated twelve-volume work on myth, The Golden Bough (1890-1915), and was intrigued by the many parallels in the history of religions to the idea of the “dying god.”
In sum, all of mankind’s religious and philosophical yearnings partake in, have an inchoate share in, the truth of the Incarnation. The particularity of Christianity — namely, that it is the true religion — is no longer scandalous, but a beautiful mystery that extends universally, seeing reality whole. As someone once said to me, even if this viewpoint is not true, it certainly is beautiful. I think it beautiful and true.
This also accounts for all the vestiges of Christianity found in ancient philosophy. For example, the teachings of the neo-Platonists, as the young St. Augustine discovered on his path to conversion, had lots of hints of Christianity in them, especially the notion of the Logos (the Word). They had remarkable similarity to the writings of St. John, who would not have known those works. But as St. Augustine notes, they lacked the historical flavor of Christianity, particularly the fact of the Word becoming flesh.
Myth and Christianity are not, therefore, antagonistic to each other. Various myths exist either as anticipations of Christianity or as echoes of Christianity. It then makes perfect sense that Christianity took various pagan holidays and feast days and “borrowed” them, or rather purified them and infused them with deeper meaning, instead of rejecting them. Too often we try to “hide” the fact that Christmas is really a pagan holiday that Christians borrowed. This is something rather to be proud of.
Then, as one runs about flouting a new “enlightened” idea that Christianity is really just a myth, one neatly rationalizes any variety of immoral acts. The enlightened person’s life soon becomes sheer misery, an enslavement to sin. In a word, this “enlightened” viewpoint isn’t really very enlightened.
Christianity, without ceasing to be mythical, is solidly rooted in fact. Your faith is rooted in real events that happened in history. Did you ever notice how the first chapter of St. John’s Gospel, accused of being the epitome of myth with its claims about the Word becoming flesh, sparkles with historical detail? (”A man named John . . . “). Have you ever noticed how St. Luke goes out of his way to state that his account is based on real facts (see Luke 1:1-4)? And St. Paul comes right out with it: “And if Christ has not been raised, then empty is our teaching” (1 Cor. 15:14).
One need not accept the historicity of the Gospels on blind faith. It is eminently reasonable to believe that in Jesus Christ, born in Bethlehem, the deepest yearnings of mankind, expressed in so many various mythological modes, have been fulfilled.
http://www.victorclaveau.com/htm_html/Catholic%20Apologetics/Apologetics/myth_become_fact.htm
The book the author quoted from, The Mystery of the Incarnation by Christoph Cardinal Schoenborn (Ignatius Press, 1983), is now out of print.
The Pantheon Code - fascinating and well worth a peek...
http://www.solvinglight.com/features/athenaandeve01.htm
PS: Vanders, I’m still not sure where you’re coming from, anyway, the author of the thread-starter [Dr Peter Kreeft] actually wrote the definition of Paganism in his article. He’s a Professor of Philosphy at Boston University and actually an expert on C.S. Lewis.
Audio...
http://www.peterkreeft.com/audio.htm
“The World’s Sixteen Crucified Saviors (or Christianity before Christ)”
“FRIENDS and brethren — teachers of the Christian faith: Will you believe us when we tell you the divine claims of your religion are gone — all swept away by the “logic of history,” and nullified by the demonstrations of science?”...
http://www.infidels.org/library/historical/kersey_graves/16/
This guy “proves” that ALL of Christianity itself is pagan. I’d be interested to get your feedback on it.
Are you a Hislop apologist?
In case you missed it, here’s another funny post in post 81 from the master!
Nothing like Christian unity...2000 years and counting...
Right from the beginning, there were those who thought that they knew better. Guys like Simon Magus were in it for the fun and profit. Others were just full of self-pride(Marcion et al). Marcion was, after all a great role model for Calvin, just as Calvin was a great role model for Joseph Smith.
In this case, though, the Church of Iscool (population one) seems to be more of a solitary occupation, consisting of being seated in the Throne of Sports Worship each Sunday during football season.
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