Historians Rebuke Justin Welby’s “Dangerous and Irresponsible” Smear of George Bell

Six very reputable historians have taken Archbishop Justin Welby to task for his smearing of George Bell.  Please read their entire open letter to Welby, but skipping to their conclusions...:

We state our position bluntly. There is no credible evidence at all that Bishop Bell was a paedophile….  We state this after reviewing all that is known about his character and behaviour over many years….  We note, and emphasize, that there was never so much as a whisper of such an allegation in his lifetime. It is the testing of accusations which shows the integrity of a society, not the making of them. 

Does that need saying today!  But moving along...

There is today no cloud at all over Bishop Bell. Nobody employing credible critical method could think otherwise. Two of us are biographers of former Archbishops of Canterbury and we all acknowledge the many difficulties and pressures which any archbishop must face, not least in a position which Archbishop Lang once called ‘incredible, indefensible and inevitable’. None of us may be considered natural critics of an Archbishop of Canterbury. But we must also draw a firm line. The statement of 15 December 2017 seems to us both irresponsible and dangerous. We therefore urge you, in all sincerity, to repudiate what you have said before more damage is done and thus to restore the esteem in which the high, historic office to which you have been called has been held.

Kudos to these scholars for this excellent statement.

As for Justin Welby, he has become rather isolated in this matter.  His smears reflect more on him than on George Bell.  And that is as it should be.

DACA and Illegal Immigration – Democrats are Using Labour’s Playbook

With DACA, the so-called Dreamers, and illegal immigration again a matter of dispute between President Trump and the Democrats and Establishment Republicans in Congress, I wish to point out the big picture.

To go deeply into the history of said big picture would take a book, a big roach-killing book, not a blog.  But my humble, very condensed effort anyway….

Tony Blair’s Labour was not happy with the cultural make up of the British electorate.  So Labour imported an electorate more to their liking through massive immigration.  The U. K. is suffering the fruit of that, including frequent Islamic terror attacks.

Democrats are trying to do the same thing to America.  They’ve already done it to California and to a lesser extent Colorado among other states.  They are trying to do it to all of us. One even admitted it recently. They want to overwhelm American voters retaining traditional American Constitutional values by importing Democrats.  To a large extent, they have already succeeded, thanks in part to establishment Republican enablers.  Massive crime from illegals is only part of the fruit of that.  The overwhelming of social services in many communities is another.  Oh yes.  I didn’t mention Democrats make a point to buy illegals’ future votes with welfare and other social services us citizens pay for.

The future of America depends on stopping the Democrats and their RINO enablers before it’s too late.

When Did the Magi visit Jesus?

Until recent years, I took it for granted that, as we see in manger scenes, there was a traffic jam at the manger with animals, angels, shepherds, that annoying drummer boy . . . and the Magi, the “Three Kings” if you will, complete with camels, of course.

But then I noticed that Herod targeted two year olds in his slaughter of the Holy Innocents in Bethlehem. And the Magi visited Jesus in a house, not at the manger.  So I joined those who deduce that Jesus was closer to two when the Magi visited him.

But, just after Christmas last week, in reading an Anglo-Saxon homily for Holy Innocents Day, I noticed an interesting alternative chronology from Aelfric.  He has the three Magi announcing Christ’s birth to Herod twelve days after his birth - how much this is history influencing the church calendar or the calendar influencing Aelfric’s history, I will let the reader decide. The three then visit Jesus no more than a few weeks after his birth.

Then Herod is called to Rome to clear himself of accusations before the Emperor, successfully it turned out.  When he returns, having found out the Magi withheld information after the birth of Christ from him, he then gives the infamous order to kill all the male babies of Bethlehem, two and younger.  Thus Aelfric attributes the two year delay in the order to commit mass infanticide to Herod’s trip to Rome, not to any lateness in the Three Kings’ visit.  Again, he has the Magi visit Jesus mere weeks after his birth.

I do not have any opinion on this question of which chronology is correct.  I think it plausible that the Magi first saw the star when Christ was born, and then discerning what it meant and then preparing and making the trip  resulted in a delay of many months.  Further, it may have been months after their visitation until Herod figured out he was tricked.  But Aelfric’s chronology sounds plausible as well.  But I confess this is not a question I have studied closely.

In any case, I present this puzzle of history to you on this Eve of the Epiphany.  If any have insight on this matter, feel free to comment.

The Fraud of Kwanzaa

Christmas and Hannukah both have a wealth of wonderful history behind them.  Kwanzaa?  Not so much.  With the warning that the history behind Kwanzaa is unpleasant, read for yourself.

When I first heard of Kwanzaa, I almost immediately suspected it was a racist, Leftist attempt to distract from Christmas.  I’ve since seen nothing to show me that my first suspicion was not right on target.

New Bishop of London: “Safeguarding is at the heart of the Gospel.”

No, it’s not. 

In fact, the most cursory knowledge of history and of current events informs that believing and preaching the Gospel of Christ is a good way to get killed or at least blackballed.  Anyone who preaches the Gospel and insists on the orthodox preaching of the Gospel by church clergy has a snowballs chance of becoming a bishop in today’s Church of England, token flying bishops excepted.

Now it probably won’t get you killed in England.  But try preaching the Gospel openly in the streets in Muslim countries and see what happens.  I don’t advise it actually.  I wouldn't try it in Muslim neighborhoods in England now that I think about it.

To be fair, Sarah Mullally was referring to churches safeguarding the young and vulnerable from abuse.  Certainly, churches have important roles to play in that regard.  But is safeguarding “at the heart of the Gospel”?

No.

The Rapid and Open Development of Christology – Ignatius

A myth pushed by popular and once prestigious media is that orthodox church teaching on Christ is practically an invention of Constantine and some shadowy Magisterium.  Such revision of history transforms the Council of Nicaea into an incense-filled room more intent on suppressing the truth or inventing truth than in guarding it and propagating it.

Yet the truth of the matter is that church teaching on Christology developed rapidly long before Nicaea and the rest of the ecumenical councils.  Really this development began with the risen Christ teaching the Apostles about himself from the scriptures before the Ascension.  And the Christological teaching of the Apostles and their successors wasn’t done in the shadows but in the churches and even at times in the streets.  That is clear not only from the New Testament but also from writings of the Apostolic and later Fathers.  In letters and sermons read and preached to congregations, we can see that catholic Christology developed rapidly and openly.

Thus began the Patristics paper I completed this autumn.  With Christmas nearing, we will be sure to see more rubbish that God becoming man – that baby in the manger being God Incarnate – was not a marvelous loving act of God but an invention of the later church.  So now is a good time to note that the church got it right very early: that baby was both God and man, the Christ.

Perhaps the best source on that in the generation after the apostles and the writing of what became the New Testament is St. Ignatius.  As he was being led on his long trip to the lions and martyrdom early in the 2^nd Century, he wrote a number of letters to churches, of which we have six.  Impending death can aid candor, and that seemed to be the case with Ignatius.  Among the subjects about which he was very frank was the deity and manhood of Christ.  Note that the six letters addressed whole congregations, not just church leaders.

From my paper:

John’s Gospel was the most clear and developed of the four in proclaiming the deity of Christ.  His pupil Ignatius is even more straightforward.  To the Ephesians, he repeatedly calls Jesus “our God” and even writes that it is “God’s blood” that saves them and stirs them to sanctification.  He also calls Jesus “our God” when writing the church at Rome, and in begging the Romans not to intervene to prevent his martyrdom he asks, “Let me imitate the Passion of my God.”  To the Smyrnaeans, he praises “Jesus Christ, the God who has granted you such wisdom” and later calls him “the Christ God.”

         At the same time, he assertively teaches the other side of the Incarnation – the humanity of Christ.  He did not give room to those who diminish either the deity or humanity of Christ and was especially eloquent in teaching both sides of the Incarnation to the Ephesian church:

There is only one physician – of flesh yet spiritual, born yet unbegotten, God incarnate, genuine life in the midst of death, sprung from Mary as well as God, first subject to suffering then beyond it – Jesus Christ our Lord. [7]

The heresy of Docetism, that taught that Jesus only seemed to be a man, goaded Ignatius to be every bit as adamant about the manhood of Christ as he was about the deity of Christ. To the Trallians, he wrote that Jesus “was really born, ate, and drank; was really persecuted under Pontius Pilate; was really crucified and died, . . . was really raised from the dead . . . apart from whom we have no genuine life.”

Thus just a decade or two after the death of the last Apostle, St. John, Ignatius got it that Jesus Christ was completely God from eternity and completely man from his conception and birth.

And that is the theme of Christmas, is it not?  That babe in the manger was Very God of Very God and “the Word made flesh” for us and for our salvation.  If one was blessed enough to attend a Christ-mass celebrated by a church father, one likely to hear this, the Incarnation, preached.

----

It just so happens that Augustine’s preaching of the Incarnation on Christmas Day will be the subject of a talk I will give on St. John’s Day, December 27^th in Texas.  Get ahold of me if you want more details.

History Someone Wants You to Forget: Franken Stole His 2008 Election

I’ve noticed lately that the Left and the news media (But I repeat myself.) do not want us to remember the most basic history about certain matters.  I may wax vehement on that someday.  Instead, I will simply note that in media coverage of Al Franken’s expected resignation today from the Senate, I cannot recall seeing one reference to his controversial first election to that august body back in 2008.

And “controversial” is putting it nicely.  Franken and friends stole that election as my mutant twin covered back then and notes again today.

That Franken stole his first Senate election is surely an important part of his background, is it not?  But I guess the Democrats behind that theft want us to forget that theft. No stolen DemocRAT election to see here!  And you’re a kook if you think otherwise! Instead blame the voters of Minnesota . . . . when the legitimate non-felon voters of Minnesota narrowly elected Franken’s opponent, incumbent Senator Coleman.

Elections have consequences.  Stolen elections have worse consequences. We should not forget that even if some would rather we would forget.