It was Constantine, the false Christian and Emperor of Rome, who founded the Catholic Church. According to Catholic tradition, he supposedly saw a message in the heavens, a blazing cross in the sky, which was said to be a promise from god to give him victory in his battle for political power in the Roman Senate. "In this sign conquer" it said, and so he went off to quickly 'convert' his thousands of soldiers with a flick of his wrist and a quick sprinkle of water - and conquered his own country by violence in what was essentially a coup.
It's funny how sometimes we miss the blatantly obvious, but it finally occurred to me today that "conquest" is not a Christ-like value. Neither is "evangelism" since the word literally means "waging war".
Christ worked for peace, not war. He preached love and forgiveness, not picking up a sword and marching off to sow death and destruction. Yes, as "Commissionists" like to point out, he is quoted as saying "I bring not peace, but a sword" - but never once is Christ reported to have killed, incited hatred, persecuted, indulged in hate-speech, oppressed, promoted war - or brought death and destruction - or done any of the things these people claim "God" or "Christ" told them to do or say. And yes, earlier Hebrew scriptures tell of the God that led Israel into war and battle after battle - even destroying whole cities and nations and even infants with fire and steel. Hey, isn't God supposed to have flooded the earth and wiped out every living thing. Things that make you go "Hmm"... But the arrival of Christ marked a complete change - and I see this as another reason why Christ is called the "New Covenant".
The Romans were not bumbling oafs, they were smart. Not many civilizations left waterways, roads and buildings built before the time of Christ that survive and are in use even to this day. Their language is the language of history, modern law, biology, science and medicine, and the root and foundation of many European languages today. Their system of laws and government can be seen in modern governments and court rooms, and their culture is the foundation of Western society.
Rome built an empire that spanned the known world, and they ruled it for 1200 years - and they did so with amazing efficiency - a notable feat in a time without satellites, internet and modern technologies we today view as essential for administration purposes. They were cunning politicians, and military strategists, who knew a threat when they saw one - and the new religion coming from Judea was exactly that. It was not keeping to the rules, it was not keeping to itself, in fact it was spreading - and it threatened the stability of Roman society, which threatened the existence of Rome itself. And attempts, even brutal attempts to stamp it out, only made it grow faster. What were they to do? So they hijacked it and made it their own - and the beauty of it is, that despite the availability of this information today, people still just don't care about how false their religion really is. They refuse to believe it, they don't want to know. No - they just keep on blindly following the lead of this man Constantine and his successors, who know all about this and sit watching the world like predators - like hunters watching their prey from the anonymity of their duck-blind in the wild.
Since that day, when Constantine painted crosses on the shields of his legions of battle-hardened soldiers, and mockingly baptised them all as "Christians", and marched them into battle for his own personal glory and power, the cross has been used by many nations as a symbol of war, which has too often been claimed by both sides in any conflict. That's right, God only chooses one side in a war, didn't you know? It doesn't matter how many good people are on each side, or how many bad - God only chooses one, and that is the one that toes the line as far as his Church is concerned - and God sits in Rome, of course. And drives an Alfa Omega.
The fish, the symbol of "true", de facto, original Christianity - the gnostic Christianity left behind by Christ when he supposedly ascended to Heaven, was also usurped by the cross when the Catholic Church tried so hard to destroy the original church in the early years. The Christianity whose gospels and scriptures the Catholic Church tried to destroy for all time, and which wound up on the cutting room floor with the birth of the Latin Vulgate and were hidden away in caves and other ingenious hiding places. It would seem that since it's very beginning, Christianity has been at war with not only the world - but also with itself. In fact, is war not all the Christian faith has been about for the past two millennia? Oh, whether is it is spiritual war, or physical, war is still war. It may not kill your body right away, but it will start with your soul.
How very like humans to pervert a message of love and peace to make it into an ideology of war to serve their own ends.
Not many people are aware of the fact that Christ - Jesus of Nazareth, a Nazarene - was from a part of Israel where gnosticism was widespread - and that this formed a pretty strong basis for original Christian teachings and doctrine - which was undeniably gnostic in nature. It isn't a far stretch to realize that people who rely on the ignorance, compliance and obedience of the masses, don't view people who think for themselves and challenge the status quo in a friendly light.
The Roman Emperor Constantine was, as the founder of the Catholic (meaning Universal) Church, the first Pope - not Peter, as tradition holds. Peter was long dead at the time of the founding of the Catholic Church. Constantine, who documentary evidence suggests, remained a secret sun-worshipper throughout his life, and fathered the bastardized pagan-pseudo Christian monstrosity that today clings to the remnants of social influence and political power it once held in Medieval times - and which claims it pompous, former Hitler Youth, human-rights-abusing head is "God on Earth".
The Roman Catholic Church still adheres to its position that gay people are perverts, sinners and deviants, who somehow pose a "threat to God", the so-called "natural order", whatever that is - and of course, the rain forest. (That one really boggled my mind.) And let's not forget the RCC's official position that transsexuals are "dangerous", "disturbed" and "should be locked away for their own protection". Yes, indeedy.
But let's not be too hard on the Catholic Church - after all, Catholicism gave us many things, including the Dark Ages, heterosexual-only marriage, witch hunts, the Inquisition, the Crusades - and a legacy of Christian-Muslim friction which has brought the world to the brink of another global war on several occasions recently. Its arcane doctrines and warped Latin Vulgate version of religious scriptures gave rise to the Protestant Reformation, and gave all of us a legacy of perpetuated scriptural misunderstandings, a liturgy of persecution politics and empty rituals, as well as a plethora of fake holy days still celebrated as "Christian" to this very day, among them Christmas, Easter, Lent and others.
In more recent years, Catholicism has bestowed upon the world the gift of pedophile priests - or at least, finally - the knowledge of this "gift", and also over this past month, tried to blame their part in the conspiracy of covering up the crimes of their clergy against children under their care - on homosexuality and sex education. That's right folks, God says that opening your kids minds up to facts and knowledge will cause them to tempt priests and nuns into pedophilia - which is naturally to blame on those darn homosexuals and their pesky agenda. Uhuh, yeah - and if stupidity was meant to fly, God would have made assholes with wings. I seriously doubt they will convince even the most stupid of their supporters in this deception - almost as much as I doubt they will survive this century intact as an institution.
In fact, I live in hope.
Conquest may not be a Christ-like value - though it appears to be a Christian one.
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