S
spauline
Guest
I’m putting this here because I don’t know where else to put it, as it deals with the biblical imagery of earth, sea and sand.
So here goes:
OK, this is just a brief meditation of mine. From what I understand, as Peter Kreeft puts it, the RCC has (more or less) the mind of the conservative but the heart of the liberal.
Well, anyway, in today’s politics we have conservatives and liberals and, like above, neither side adequately fully represents the total position of the Church. Modern conservatives, like the Pharisees, tend to uphold the letter of the Law, but hard heartedly won’t lift a finger to help one observe it. Liberals on the other hand have compassion, or at least intend too, but their hearts are so soft that it softens their head, and so in their misguided compassion, they end up endorsing things that are seriously wrong, especially abortion, euthanasia, and homosexuality.
So the liberals have more compassion at least in social justce for BORN persons, but they end up in misguided compassion embracing immoral things. Conservatives on the other hand will uphold morals, but are hard hearted in economics and military policies.
So conservatism is partly right and partly wrong, just like liberals, but neither are fully correct. So then these respective ideologies are like the SAND in the New Testament, they can provide a temproray foundation for civilization but not enough, for when the rain of total bad and lies come, they each collapse.
So we need the solid rock of Peter (Matt 16:18) and the general earth of the Magisterium (1 Tim 3:15) to have the full foundation of truth.
On the other side we have the sea, from which arise, usually, the beasts of Scripture. That is, from the utter chaos of the unbridled passions and worldly desires arise the great kingdoms of sin in human history, which the beast represents in ancient Catholic thought. Also, doesn’t St. James say we should not be “tossed to and fro by every wave of doctrine”?
Anyway, let’s go to the apoc. In Revelation 12, the dragon spews a **flood **after the woman, in order that she might be “carried away by it”. But the earth swallows it and saves the woman. How true in Catholicism. Just as the false doctrines referred to by James toss one to and fro, so the devil constantly spews the flood of lies, heresies after the Church, in order that She may be “carried away” by error. But the earth, the solid pillar and “ground” of the truth, the Magisterium, saves the woman by swallowing the lies.
So when that doesn’t work, the devil takes his position on the sands of the sea, hiding behind ideologies that are partly true and partly false, much like the sand, that, while being somewhat like the solid earth, yet is not fully stable. Kind of like today, the devil must enjoy distracting humanity with ideologies that are not totally false and not totally true: full conservatism and full liberalism.
Meanwhile, through the distraction of the “sands” rises up a society that is the worst, the beast from the sea. Which is really what we get in modern politics: instead of having the Catholic balance of the mind of the conservative and the heart of the liberal , we get the mind of the liberal and the heart of the conservative: hard-hearted economics and military and soft-headed morals of abortion, euthanasia and homosexuality, amongst other things.
And in it all we have the false prophet, who comes up from the earth, telling mankind that the worst of all possible worlds is the best, that is, that (as JPII put it, per the Navarre Bible commentary) pure materialism, independent of any religion, can provide the full “foundation” for humanity, but in reality, pure materialism is utter deprevation of foundation, it is, in real truth, the beast of the sea.
Just my thoughts!
So here goes:
OK, this is just a brief meditation of mine. From what I understand, as Peter Kreeft puts it, the RCC has (more or less) the mind of the conservative but the heart of the liberal.
Well, anyway, in today’s politics we have conservatives and liberals and, like above, neither side adequately fully represents the total position of the Church. Modern conservatives, like the Pharisees, tend to uphold the letter of the Law, but hard heartedly won’t lift a finger to help one observe it. Liberals on the other hand have compassion, or at least intend too, but their hearts are so soft that it softens their head, and so in their misguided compassion, they end up endorsing things that are seriously wrong, especially abortion, euthanasia, and homosexuality.
So the liberals have more compassion at least in social justce for BORN persons, but they end up in misguided compassion embracing immoral things. Conservatives on the other hand will uphold morals, but are hard hearted in economics and military policies.
So conservatism is partly right and partly wrong, just like liberals, but neither are fully correct. So then these respective ideologies are like the SAND in the New Testament, they can provide a temproray foundation for civilization but not enough, for when the rain of total bad and lies come, they each collapse.
So we need the solid rock of Peter (Matt 16:18) and the general earth of the Magisterium (1 Tim 3:15) to have the full foundation of truth.
On the other side we have the sea, from which arise, usually, the beasts of Scripture. That is, from the utter chaos of the unbridled passions and worldly desires arise the great kingdoms of sin in human history, which the beast represents in ancient Catholic thought. Also, doesn’t St. James say we should not be “tossed to and fro by every wave of doctrine”?
Anyway, let’s go to the apoc. In Revelation 12, the dragon spews a **flood **after the woman, in order that she might be “carried away by it”. But the earth swallows it and saves the woman. How true in Catholicism. Just as the false doctrines referred to by James toss one to and fro, so the devil constantly spews the flood of lies, heresies after the Church, in order that She may be “carried away” by error. But the earth, the solid pillar and “ground” of the truth, the Magisterium, saves the woman by swallowing the lies.
So when that doesn’t work, the devil takes his position on the sands of the sea, hiding behind ideologies that are partly true and partly false, much like the sand, that, while being somewhat like the solid earth, yet is not fully stable. Kind of like today, the devil must enjoy distracting humanity with ideologies that are not totally false and not totally true: full conservatism and full liberalism.
Meanwhile, through the distraction of the “sands” rises up a society that is the worst, the beast from the sea. Which is really what we get in modern politics: instead of having the Catholic balance of the mind of the conservative and the heart of the liberal , we get the mind of the liberal and the heart of the conservative: hard-hearted economics and military and soft-headed morals of abortion, euthanasia and homosexuality, amongst other things.
And in it all we have the false prophet, who comes up from the earth, telling mankind that the worst of all possible worlds is the best, that is, that (as JPII put it, per the Navarre Bible commentary) pure materialism, independent of any religion, can provide the full “foundation” for humanity, but in reality, pure materialism is utter deprevation of foundation, it is, in real truth, the beast of the sea.
Just my thoughts!