Category Archives: Atheism

by Peng Huiling

Notwithstanding almost uniformly negative and often humorous reactions on social media, Professor Li Shen and his book The Principles of Scientific Atheism continue to be heavily promoted in China through a major campaign to divulge Marxist atheistic principles. As Bitter Winter mentioned in a previous article, this campaign will continue because it does not come from the private initiative of some propagandists of atheism but follows instructions coming directly from Xi Jinping and the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party.

In this article, I look at how Professor Li proves that God does not exist. Li argues that God did not create living creatures, but living creatures created God. He mentions living creatures rather than humans because he believes animals may also believe in God. For instance, he argues that domestic dogs identify God with their owners. How Li can know canine psychology and even canine theology is not explained, but he uses an argument of authority. Friedrich Engels, Marxs closest associate and co-founder of Marxist theory, said so, and who are we to argue that Engels was wrong?

Actually, Li explains, Engels went even more deeply into the theology dogs supposedly believe in. He said that, at least if they feed them, dogs do not care whether their owners are good citizens or not. The greatest criminals may still be regarded as gods by their well-fed dogs.

It may seem that this observation, even coming from such a great luminary as Engels, does not prove much about whether God exists or not, but this is not Lis opinion. In fact, he argues, the most primitive humans function very much as Engels dogs. He offers as a proof the followers of Falun Gong.

We all know, Professor Li explains, that Li Hongzhi, the founder and leader of Falun Gong, is a small-scale ruffian, a little bastard () yet his followers regard him as God. Falun Gong practitioners may object that their view of Li Hongzhi is a little bit more complicated, but this is not important for Professor Li. His point is that divinity is in the eye of the beholder.

In fact, Li claims that while dogs regard human as gods, ancient humans sank even lower because they regarded dogs and other animals as gods. Li is aware that most scholars would object that when certain cultures made animal-like images of the gods, they were not worshipping the animals, nor the statues, but the gods or forces of which the animals were the symbols. These scholars, he says, are wrong. Li believes that it is an unequivocal historical fact that primitive populations really worshiped animals.

The human evolution interpreted through the laws of Marxist historical materialism, Li continues, shows that humans evolved from the first stage, worshiping animals, to four other subsequent stages. First, they worshiped demons, entities they created by combining animal and human features. Second, they worshiped humans, sometimes deceased heroes or kings and sometimes fictional human-like characters such as the Greek goddesses and gods. Third, they tried to imagine entities that were purely spiritual, and called them gods.

The most advanced state of religious belief, and one that manifested itself firstly in Eastern Asia, or so Li believes, is one in which a supposed invisible and non-representable mystical ground of all that exists is worshiped as god.

However, no matter how far the evolutionary path went, the model for producing gods remained the same. Humans endowed some real or fictional being with divine features, be it a dog or the unreachable Tao.

The continuous invention of new religions may lead us astray, but if we go back to the dogs calling their masters gods or the primitive humans calling their animals gods, we will stay on the right path, Li tells us.

Of course, the question will arise why did the humans invent the gods or God or the Tao or whatever other reality they regarded as divine. Nobody satisfactorily answered this question, Li states, before Marx and Engels. They clarified that looking at the question about religion through religious or philosophical lenses will never answer the question. The answer lies in politics and economy. Elites invented religions as a tool to control the masses.

The pre-Marxist German philosopher Ludwig Feuerbach, Li says, stopped at this answer, which explains the founders of religions, but still does not explain why the masses believe them. Happily, Marx and Engels answered the latter question, too. They claimed that the suffering and exploited masses have needs that are not satisfied by the rich, who do not care, nor by the bourgeois liberal or humanitarian reformers, who do not understand the core of the problem. Only Marxism explains the roots of these needs, and offers the proletarians the revolutionary answer that solves their problems. When this answer is delivered, the need for God will go away.

Only, it doesnt, as the Chinese experience itself proves. Millions of believers prefer to go to jail rather than surrender their beliefs. This is why China itself is, Professor Lis arguments notwithstanding, the best evidence that Marx and Engels were wrong.

Continued here:
Atheism in China: How the Communist Party Proves that God Does Not Exist - Bitterwinter.org

While during the general audience on February 2, Pope Francis spoke of the Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games in Beijing, hoping that they would contribute to the establishment of a more fraternal world. Sport , with its universal language, can build bridges of friendship and solidarity between individuals and peoples of all cultures and religions.

And he made the stirring statement: Together, so that the Olympic Games be carriers of a more fraternal world.

At the same time, Christians in Beijing confide that clergymen are warned to be on the sidelines, to be silent, and to remain invisible in the public domain. Indeed, the Chinese government views Christianity as a real threat of foreign infiltration.

The official churches were ordered to hoist the Chinese flag next to the cross and adapt their teachings to Chinese socialist principles. On February 2, the Catholic agency UcaNews announced the promotion of a new manual on atheism in colleges and among the cadres of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), in order to target organized religions and strictly apply Marxist policy.

The manual, The Principles of Scientific Atheism, is at the center of a CCP campaign, UcaNews says, to implement fully and faithfully the decisions made at the National Conference on Religious Affairs last December. President Xi Jinping had then asked for the strengthening of the control of religions to ensure national security, and that the thought of Karl Marx be studied in depth.

The book promotes President Xi Jinping's theory that Chinese culture has always been non-religious, and it presents scientific explanations for the non-existence of God, and the harmful effects of religion.

This propaganda work includes an appendix on the Principal theological knowledge and criticism of religion and four chapters entitled What is God?, Proof of the non-existence of God, The gods and their effects, and The religious and political theory of the Communist Party.

Finally the book argues that Marx and the CCP in China have definitively demonstrated the principles of atheism: religion is the opiate of the people. This teaching manual is a real instrument of indoctrination and participates in active propaganda to promote atheism by force.

Officially, Communist China recognizes five religions: Buddhism, Taoism, Catholicism, Protestantism, and Islam. The state requires that all religions and religious activities be strictly controlled by official religious bodies, and respect Chinese laws, that is, they are subject to the sinicization of religions introduced by Xi Jinping.

One of the main skiing venues during these Winter Olympics is in the Chongli-Zhangjiak district of Hebei province in northern China. Chongli resorts, located 180km northwest of Beijing, are a popular ski destination in the country, with nearly 3 million tourists a year. The Olympic Village of Chongli receives the Olympic delegations.

Most visitors are unaware that the beauty of the sites hides a tragic history, that of the persecution and massacre of Catholics, reports Eglises d'Asie (EDA) [Churches of Asia]. Chongli and the neighboring region of Chahar were the scene of the worst atrocities during the imperial era, during the Boxer Rebellion (1899-1901), during the Chinese Civil War (1927-1949), and during the Cultural Revolution (1966-1976) conducted under Mao Zedong.

In the second quarter of the 20th century, the establishment of communism in China opened a new period of persecution. The worst violence took place in 1946, when the Communists attacked the locality of Xiwanzi. Nearly a thousand civilians, mostly Catholics, were tortured and killed. Two years later, the Communists also ravaged Chongli.

After the Communists seized power, Catholics in the region continued to suffer abuse and persecution. In 1957, the Communists created the Chinese Catholic Patriotic Association, to control the Catholic Church in China.

Bishops, clergy, and faithful Catholics who refused to join the association [thus forming the so-called underground Church -- ed.]were mistreated and tortured. During the Cultural Revolution of 1966-76, all religions, including Catholicism, suffered severe persecution, with most churches being demolished or damaged.

Catholics in Chahar were not spared even after the brutal campaign ended, reports Bitter Winter. From 1990 to 2011, a dozen clergy including bishops, and hundreds of local Catholics were arrested, tortured, and imprisoned in Chahar. Bishop Augustin Cui Tai of Xuanhua was arrested in 2013, his whereabouts are still unknown.

Recently, several social networks have evoked the forgotten Chongli massacre. A message recalls the atrocious genocide committed by the Chinese Communists against the inhabitants of Chahar in 1946 where several thousand of our Christian civilians were massacred.

Since this appalling crime, they continue to persecute our Catholic Church and imprison our priests. They even want to use the region where this genocide took place, in Chongli, as one of the sites for their 2022 Winter Olympics, as if nothing had happened.

Excerpt from:
China: The 2022 Olympics and Scientific Atheism - FSSPX.Actualits - FSSPX.News

Will Herrmann

But when the time came, I was struggling with my faith. In particular, while I believed the Bible was the infallible word of God, I struggled with how to know if my interpretation of the Bible was correct. If we all read the same text and came to mutually-exclusive interpretations, what then?

I was also troubled by seeing so many Protestants disregarding two millennia of teachings regarding sin and morality in favor of novel interpretations. An especially poignant example was when I had asked a Lutheran pastor about something the Apostle Paul had written and was told: Were Christians, not Paulites. If Christ didnt say it, then we are not bound to follow it.

There came a point where I felt like I couldnt be Lutheran, or any form of Protestant, because I had no way of knowing if it were true. Faith just felt like a matter of consensus. I started wondering if God was a matter of consensus, too, and for a time, I wrestled with atheism. But the inevitable nihilism of life having no purpose and nothing beyond absolutely terrified me. As Dostoevsky wrote: I cant understand how an atheist could know that there is no God and not kill himself on the spot.

Unable to accept atheism, I began reading Christian writings throughout the ages, in particular Justin Martyr, Augustine and Thomas Aquinas. What I found looked rather Catholic. I was drawn to the consistent liturgy, consistent theology and morality, and consistent leadership through the popes succeeding from the Apostle Peter, commissioned by Christ.

C.S. Lewis wrote, A theology which denies the historicity of nearly everything in the Gospels to which Christian life and affections and thought have been fastened for nearly two millennia can produce only one or other of two effects. It will make him a Roman Catholic or an atheist. While he meant it as a warning, he was ultimately right. After a year and a half of attending Mass at St. Bonaventure in Bloomington, I formally entered the Catholic Church in Easter 2019.

Only nine months later, I accompanied Archbishop Hebda and Bishop Cozzens on their January 2020 ad limina pilgrimage to Rome. The most moving moment for me was when our bishops led Mass directly in front of the tomb of St. Peter. The Gospel reading was: You are Peter and on this rock I will build my Church.

And I realized that not only is this Christs Church, but its my Church, too!

Hermann, 32, is a member of St. Bonaventure in Bloomington, where he coordinates the eucharistic adoration program. His hobbies include board games, bicycling and creative writing.

Tags: Will Herrmann

Category: Featured, Why I am Catholic

More here:
Why I Am Catholic Will Herrmann - TheCatholicSpirit.com - The Catholic Spirit

As I stood under the intricately painted ceiling of the San Ignacio cathedral in Rome, I had to fight to prevent my breath from being taken away by the grandeur. The ceilings were high enough that the temperature on the ground floor was cold enough to bring goosebumps. Beyond the mild physical discomfort required to view such magnificence, though, the work seemed to defy words. Painted by Andrea Pozzo in 1685, the humans staring down from the painting featured anatomically correct veins and tendons which could be viewed from the ground, likely one hundred feet away. The plants and animals were so intricate that you could make out a single blade of grass or hair. And, if you positioned yourself in the very center of the room, the painting suddenly burst to life. The two-dimensional work popped right off of the ceiling; it felt as though you could reach out and grasp the hands of the figures depicted there. In an instant, I was lifted off of that floor and transported into a heavenly canvas full of clouds and warm, golden light.

I was privileged enough to feel such a visceral reaction to this Baroque work while I studied abroad in Italy this past Winter Break. While the trip was full of wonderful food, community and natural beauty, the purpose of our time was to study medieval art. We traveled across the country, starting in Orvieto, then to Sienna, Florence and finally Rome. My first observation, as is many peoples when going to Europe for the first time, was the emphasis on walkable cities and aesthetic beauty. Superhighways and skyscrapers are replaced with wide cobblestone streets bustling with people and brilliantly colored buildings with intricately carved facades. Despite hardly speaking the language of those around me, I could tell that their lives revolved around building and sustaining fulfilling relationships with one another, unlike the business-oriented, fast-paced lifestyles that we in the U.S. abide by.

Now seems like the appropriate time to inform you that I am a pretty run-of-the-mill person. I am an able-bodied, middle-class white man from a small town in the midwest, so cross-cultural engagement wasn't readily available to me until I came to Valparaiso University. While I have worked hard in my classes and extracurriculars to empathize with and understand different cultures, religions and backgrounds beyond my own, my time in Italy provided me with a new and unexpected means of cross-cultural communication: that between religious and non-religious people.

I was raised Catholic, received the sacraments from Baptism to Confirmation, but grew away from the faith shortly before coming to college, where I would finally come to terms with my atheism. I am not an anomaly in this instance; the number of people who identify as Christian has been steadily dropping in the U.S. A Pew Research Poll, from 2019, found that less than 50% of Americans age 18-29 call themselves Christians, and are choosing instead to identify as agnostic, atheist or spiritually undecided. To be as frank as possible, I am not saying that this is an inherently positive or negative matter; rather it further highlights the importance of not only interreligious dialogue, but also that between the religious and the secular.

In Italy, I got a brief taste of this. I was the only openly atheist individual in my class of about nineteen students. However, unlike the polarized discourse we see in the modern political sphere, our conversations were patient and pleasant. Many nights, a group of students and I would go out to the local cafes or wine bars, split a bottle of the regional white wine of Orvieto (which is far better than Winking Owl) and talk about life. We shared our stories and laid out the details and events that we think made us who we are today. We were all shocked by what we found: unity. Many of us had experienced indescribable loss, crippling uncertainty and immeasurable happiness. For myself, I explained how I thought my life led me to become an atheist, and my friends respected and understood. Then, upon learning more about their lives, I gleaned a similar insight into their relationship to faith. We had all lived, or at least attempted to live, a fulfilling human experience in the short 18-22 years that we had had thus far. We only differed (and not substantially at that) in our motivations for waking up and doing it again.

I do not feel the divine presence in cathedrals like San Ignacio like others may. That is not to say, however, that I feel nothing at all. The peace, humility and joy that others receive through prayer and presence in such a space was present in me as well. When I walk into those cathedrals, I think of the stories and the lives of those who built them. Each of these long passed people, from the painters, to the priest, to the bricklayers, had full and nuanced lives like us. Yet, they were united by the common goal of glorifying God to construct a marvel that often transcends the capabilities of our language. Thus, the question becomes how can we achieve beauty, or at the very least some unity, without a clear, common goal? I will not claim to have the answer to this question, but I can say that I am learning to see unity. While those in the Medieval age who built the cathedrals, as well as billions of their descendants today, see religion as a source and motivation to pursue meaningful connections with others, I derive those feelings from the nuance of others' lives and from complicated beauty of the human condition: the one thing in this one life that we all share.

The views expressed are those of the writer and do not necessarily reflect those of The Torch.

More:
Studying Abroad: 'Encountering God as an Atheist' | Features | valpotorch.com - The Torch

As we all know, the BBCs adaptation ofSally RooneysNormal Peoplewon lockdown. It secureda place in the hearts ofmillions worldwide for youngcouple Marianne and Connell (and Connells chain) and putCounty Sligo on the world map. To follow it up,Hulu and BBC Three have turned to Rooneys debut novel, Conversations with Friends, and another pair of Irish students, Frances and Bobbi, for a coming-of-age story of love, friendship andironicchatsabout atheism.

Expectations, fuelled by the heart-wrenchingturmoil and loved-up euphoriaof Normal People,are high. The audience comes pre-prepared this time, with Hulu hoping Americanviewerswill respond toanotherburst of millennial love and heartache. The cast hasa more American flavour, perhapswith that precise audience in mind,and the presence of Taylor Swifts other half, Joe Alwyn, in a key role that will draw inthe curious. Will it match Normal Peoples 62 million streams? Here are some clues.

All 12 half-hour episodes land in May on BBC Three in the UK, Hulu in the US and RT in Ireland. Expect to be able to stream it on Amazon Prime in Canada, Australia, Africa and New Zealand, and the newly launched HBO Max in other European countries.

A BBC trailer broke in February with the tagline: Prepare to get intimate. Theres a Huluonefor the US, too, and its alot racier than the more demureBeeb version, if youre into that kind of thing.

As any Rooney stan will tell you, the series is adapted from the Irish novelists 2017 debut novel. The voice of a generation label can be an painful one youre forced to speak on behalf of all millennials and will, at some point, be compared with Lena Dunham but Rooneys smart, empathetic, economical prose definitely captures the uncertainty and rootlessness of a generation coming of age in the 2010s. A less comforting book in a lot of way than Normal People, Conversations with Friends should make for emotionally flooring telly.

Like Normal Peoples Marianne and Connell, it follows two Trinity College Dublin students: Frances (Alison Oliver), the narrator, and her American ex-girlfriend-turned-BFF Bobbi (Sasha Lane). The duo perform as a spoken word poetry double-act and fall into the orbit of thirty-something married couple, actor Nick and photographer-writer Melissa (Joe Alwyn and Jemima Kirke), when Melissa agrees to a profile piece. Slowly, and without the knowledge of either of the others, Frances and Nick begin an affair. Its the exact nature of their relationship, and its impact on Francess bond with Bobbi, that Conversations with Friends grapples with over seven months of surreptitious shags, summer holidays and deep soul-searching.

The shows breakout star is Alison Oliver who plays Frances, a student from County Mayo with a judgy mum, an alcoholic dad, and that thirtysomething actor lover. The actress is a graduate of the same Dublin acting school as Normal Peoples Paul Mescal, The Lir Academy. The Daisy Edgar-Jones comparisons will no doubt follow, but unlike the Londoner, Oliver is a first-timer on screen who has mostly stage work to her name until now. Its a heck of a showcase role, alongside more experienced actors like American Honeys Sasha Lane, Girls Jemima Kirke and the shows biggest name, The Favourite actor Joe Alwyn. Co-directing with Leanne Welham (His Dark Materials) is Normal Peoples Lenny Abrahamson. Lennys deep affinity for Sallys writing and talent for finding actors to bring her fictional creations to life played a huge part in bringing Normal People so successfully to screen, says BBC director of drama Piers Wenger. In casting Alison, Sasha, Joe and Jemima, that same flair and instinct is in evidence and we cant wait to see how they will bring Frances, Bobbi, Nick and Melissa to life.

Like Normal Peoples Marianne and Connell (and author Sally Rooney herself), Frances and Bobbi study at Trinity College Dublin and the uni features in early episodes. Much of the shoot took place in Belfast, while the series swaps the books summer holiday destination of Brittany for the sunnier climes of Stari Grad on the Croatian island of Hvar.

Conversations with Friendsis streamingin May.

Where was Normal People filmed? The seriess Irish, Italian and Swedish locations uncovered.Anatomy of a Scandal: everything you need to know about Netflixs must-see thriller.

See original here:
Conversations with Friends: plot, cast and everything you need to know - Time Out

The recent report of the Commission on the Defence Forces has recommended change in the chaplaincy service to reflect the religious and non-religious beliefs of modern Ireland. It also wants an end to exclusionary religious practices such as convening Masses during induction.

If implemented, these changes would show respect for personnel of minority faiths or with non-religious philosophical convictions.

There is similar religious discrimination in our equality laws, which the Department of Justice is now reviewing, and in the religious oaths in our Constitution for the president, judges, and the Council of State, which includes the taoiseach and tnaiste.

Ireland is no longer a Catholic country. We are now a pluralist country with outdated privileges for Catholics.

Atheist Ireland, the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community of Ireland, and the Evangelical Alliance Ireland, made a joint submission to the commission seeking change in its Catholic culture that discriminates against all of us.

While the three groups have very different world views and policy emphases, we campaign together for secularism and human rights. Every person should be treated with respect, as should our right to hold our beliefs, and the State should treat us all equally before the law by remaining neutral between religions and beliefs.

The Defence Forces is a microcosm of society and should have a clear neutral policy on religion and belief. It should not promote any particular religious or atheistic belief, or oblige personnel to participate in religious rites as part of military events.

The Irish Constitution guarantees freedom of conscience and religion. The State is forbidden to discriminate between religions, or between religions and those with no religion. Despite this, Catholicism has always been part of the culture of our Defence Forces.

About 9 per cent of Defence Forces personnel are non-Christian or have no religion, yet 15 of its 16 chaplains are Roman Catholic and full-time, and the other is Church of Ireland and part-time.

Catholic chaplains are responsible to Catholic bishops of their dioceses and provincials of their orders for religious ministrations and promoting the spiritual and moral welfare of all members of the Defence Forces under their spiritual care.

They must also co-operate with the head chaplain and the commanding officer in promoting the social and recreational welfare of such personnel. The duties are therefore seen as both sacramental and pastoral.

This means all full-time Defence Forces chaplains are responsible to a Roman Catholic bishop for promoting the spiritual and moral welfare of all members of the Defence Forces under their spiritual care, while merely co-operating with the commanding officer.

Does this mean Roman Catholic chaplains are responsible for the spiritual and moral welfare of Evangelicals, Ahmadiyya Muslims and members of other religious minorities, as well as atheists, humanists, and secularists in the Defence Forces?

Or does it mean that only Roman Catholic personnel have this privilege? Neither of these options is satisfactory. Over the years Defence Forces personnel have had to attend mandatory Masses, participate in ceremonial duties in churches and be generally deferential to Catholicism.

There are no rules or guidelines to ensure that personnel need not participate on the grounds of conscience in religious rituals.

While there have been some reforms, the commission has identified the chaplaincy and Masses during induction as outdated practices that must change or end. It also wants an end to other discriminatory practices, including the treatment of pregnancy and childbirth as an irregular absence from duty, and not permitting certain facial hair including beards.

The rights of minorities to freedom of conscience and religion cannot be reconciled with fully State-funded employees of the Defence Forces being appointed by Catholic bishops, or by forcing personnel to participate in religious practices.

It is time for the Defence Forces to embrace pluralism and equality in relation to religion or belief. The phrase religion or belief is important here. While it is obvious to most that the conscience of Evangelicals and Ahmadi Muslims should be protected, the Venice Commission has stressed that the belief aspect of this phrase includes deeply held conscientious beliefs that are fundamental about the human condition and the world, including atheism.

The Department of Justice is now reviewing our equality laws. The Irish Human Rights and Equality Commission has recommended that the religion ground in the Acts should be amended to religion and belief, to bring it in line with EU law.

This would help us move to a more inclusive culture based on human rights.

Atheist Ireland, the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community and Evangelical Alliance Ireland welcome the report of the Commission on the Defence Forces, and we look forward to a time when all State bodies recognise and include all minorities.

Jane Donnelly is human rights officer with Atheist Ireland

See original here:
Ireland is a pluralist country with outdated privileges for Catholics - The Irish Times

In recent years, American Catholics have found our country violently at odds with many of our firmly-held beliefsfrom traditional marriage to defense of the family to defense of the unborn. In response, many of us have looked to the outside world for a Christian country that would emit a glimmer of hope.

Some conservative Catholics have found Russia as a potential ally. However, given the Russian invasion of Ukraine, perhaps we need to look a bit more closely.

It is true that President Putins Russia defends the family and traditional marriage, but so does President Zelenskys Ukraine. Both countries are about the sameon gay rights, and both vehemently oppose same-sex marriage. On this issue, both countries are quite conservative.

When it comes to abortion, President Putin and President Zelensky oversee countries very open to legalized abortion. Russia has the worlds highest per-capita abortion rate, while President Zelensky wishes to makeabortion more accessible in Ukraine. President Zelensky also wants prostitution and other immoral practices legalized. While prostitution is also illegal in Russia, it isonly punishable by a minimal fine. Thus, prostitution is very popular and even lauded by President Putin himself.

Russia and Ukraine, while both Christian on some issues, are pretty much like any other nation when it comes to their lawscafeteria Christian and non-Christian on the preeminent issues.

Yet, even with all of these facts, you will hear that Russia is a Christian country, as if Ukraine is less of one. You will hear justification of Russias aggression as a type of a Christian crusade against Western atheism. But such an outlook fails to line up with the facts.

When looking at the demographics, Russiais actually less Christian thanUkraine. Furthermore, and more importantly, Russia is also less Catholic than Ukraine. Ukraine not only has a higher percentage of Catholics (~7.8% to ~0.5%) but also has more total Catholics (~3,354,000 to ~717,101).

In addition, Ukraine is home to the largest Eastern Catholic Church, the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church. Its former mother church is in Lviv, where the United States and many Western allies have beenplacing their embassies. Lviv is amajorityUkrainian Greek Catholic city and oblast. Two other oblasts (provinces) in Western Ukraine are mostly Catholic as well. Lviv has been and still is home to the Roman Catholic Church (Latin Rite) and Armenian Catholic Church (another Eastern Catholic Church) in this region of Ukraine.

The Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church is not only the largest Eastern Catholic Church, but it also provides a direct connection back to the Christianization of Kievan Rus as one of the successor churches to the conversion of St. Grand Prince Vladimir I of Kiev to Christianity in 988. Therefore, the Catholic roots for Ukrainians run deep.

In addition to the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church, Ukraine also has the Ruthenian Greek Catholic Church, with its mother church in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA. This church is for Ruthenians/Rusyns, another East Slavic groupwho make up a sizable minority in Ukraine, in addition to other areas of the Carpathian Mountains where they live. This area is calledCarpatho-Ruthenia and includes Ukraine, Slovakia, Poland, Hungary, and Romania, and is actually in the same region where the White Croats originate from, one of the tribes that founded the strong Catholic nation of Croatia.

In Ukraine, the Ruthenians inhabit the Zakarpatska Oblast in Western Ukraine where the Ruthenian Greek Catholic Church is the main Catholic jurisdiction there. The Ruthenian Greek Catholic Church can trace its origins to Saint Cyril and Methodius converting the Slavs of Great Moravia to Christianity in 863.

It is true that a Russian Greek Catholic Church exists too, but it has never garnered as much membership or sense of national identity as the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church has garnered.

Due to the changing borders of Ukraine, Ukrainians at one time lived under Habsburg Rule in places like Lviv and thus have more deeply Catholic roots. Many of the Ukrainian diaspora, especially in the United States, are part of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church. The same cannot be said for Russia, where there are not any significant cities, regions, or history where the Russian Greek Catholic Church plays a major role.

As one can see, there is a deep affinity between Ukrainians and the Catholic Church that is not present in Russia. And these Catholics are usually the most fiercely patriotic to Ukraine. There is a reason for that. Ukrainians have often looked West, as they did under the Kingdom of Galicia-Volhynia when they looked for protection from the Mongols in the 1200s. This kingdom and the Galician region were centered on Lviv as their capital.

Lviv and the other Catholic Ukrainian regions of the West were also key in the struggle for Ukrainian independence in the Rukh Movement that saw Ukraine achieve independence from the brutal Russian-led USSR in 1991with 92.5 percent of the vote, and a sizable majority in all oblasts except the Autonomous Republic of Crimea and a city with special status, Sevastopol, where there was still a majority but with extremely low turnout.

Ukrainian Catholics and their countrymen sought independence from the abuses Russian-led empires had committed on the Ukrainian people over the years. Just take Catholic clergy in the Soviet Union for example. There were many martyrs and confessors, such as 128 bishops and nuns of the Ruthenian Greek Catholic Church who were sent to gulags and 36 Ruthenian Greek Catholic priests who were murdered.

The Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church, meanwhile, was outlawed by the Soviet Union from 1946-1989. In 2014, in Crimea,many Catholic clergy were forced to leaveafter the Russian takeover. Some may think these abuses were merely because of communism. But in fact, as seen in this Crimean example, it appears to be a Russian Federation problem too.

The Russian invasion of Ukraine will come with much Catholic heartache. As loyal Catholics, we must remember that the quest of other large Slavic experiments has not boasted proudly for our Church or most others in the recent past. Russia often has revanchist goals, and while it may seem like Russia will stop at Ukraine, there are always worries its invasion could spread to other parts of the former Soviet Union and Warsaw Pact.

Catholic countries like Poland, Slovakia, and Hungary could be next in line for Russian onslaught. Beyond that, other Catholic countries like Croatia and Slovenia are just a stones throw away. Already, Catholic Lviv is in the crossfire. For Catholics, the threat of Russia is very real, not just inside Russia.

Catholics should not only hesitate to support a Putin invasion because unnecessary wars are against our Faith, but we should also be against a Putin invasion of Ukraine because our Faith is strong in Ukraine. If conservative Catholics desire a more Catholic world, then we should do all we can to support Ukraine, one of the few countries with a truly Catholic heritage.

[Photo Credit: SERGEI GUNEYEV/Sputnik/AFP via Getty Images]

Here is the original post:
The Myth of the Crusader Putin - Crisis Magazine

When I left the Church, Ill admit I didnt get far.

I spent a few years not attending services and happily proclaiming my agnosticism/atheism, but during college I was drawn back into religion quite easily. My dad was a pastor, so it was a constant conversation whenever I visited our home and I found I deeply enjoyed religion classes, reveling in learning about the Hebrew Scriptures and the Book of Revelation.

I was one of those Im an atheist! types walking around reading Meeting Jesus Again for the First Time.

For me, the departure from church wasnt a rejection of spirituality; it was a rejection of institutionalized Christianity. Although it wasnt my language, I was in line with the spiritual but not religious moniker that swept our nation for a bit there. I had a deep connection with this ancient tradition and I was just in the process of renegotiating it.

During this time, I stumbled onto John Shelby Spongs Jesus for the Non-Religious. Just based on the name, you can see why it appealed to me. I tore through the book as if on a rampage, scribbling notes all over the margins, reading and re-reading passages. Throughout it were words, phrases, and stories that perfectly articulated my experience, confirmed my doubts, and validated me: I felt seen and increasingly comfortable in this liminal space.

In many ways, Spong was my main deconstruction teacher. Reading his books and watching any video of him I could find gave me language and confirmation that it was okay to leave behind the doctrines of Christianity that no longer worked for me. While my progressive upbringing had sidelined many of these doctrines (original sin, for example), they had never fully dismantled them. For me, Spong dismantled them.

An example was the literal belief of Heaven and Hell. While my progressive upbringing never focused on these places, literal or not, they were also never fully discarded or dis-merited, or even re-envisioned much from a progressive lens.

This left me with confusion. My scientific understanding of the Universe said Heaven and Hell werent possibly realbut they were still being mentioned without full explanation in sermons, hymns, and in the regular interactions of church members.

When I came across this video from John Shelby Spong, my entire world shifted.

As I reflect now on Spongs influence in my life, I can think of three key stages I went through with him:

What John Shelby Spong started would be continued by Richard Rohr in my life. Whereas Spong helped me tear apart my experience, validating my theological questions and helping me to understand at a deeper level, Rohr would later help me to pick up the pieces that most mattered.

I was able to meet Spong briefly in the early 2010s while he was in Seattle and I remember being awe-struck by his kindness. He was frail and one of his eyes appeared cloudy, but he would look each of the people in front of him directly in their eyes: he would see their inherent dignity. And as a young person, possibly the youngest in the crowd that night, it was a true experience of feeling seen. This was a man who had helped me understand myself and make sense of my life experience; he was a shepherd for my soul at a time when I didnt know where to go.

Thank you for seeing me, John. And for helping me to see myself.

During February, Ill be exploring my own story with Progressive Christianity, with religion, and with my constantly evolving spirituality. It is a story from the gymnasium to the sanctuary, beyond the walls of institutionalized religion (and sometimes back again), always falling deeper into my own experience and relationship with the Divine. If youd like to read it in order,youll find them on the blogs home page.

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John Shelby Spong Helped Me to Lose Myself in the Unknown - Patheos

Many years ago, my Christian beliefs were challenged intellectually by a progressive Christian pastor. It threw me into deconstruction that took several years to fully come out of. I found out later that he himself had already deconstructed and had hoped to propel his congregation into deconstruction so he could convert them to progressive Christianity. He was very good at it. In fact, he was almost totally successful. A few of us came back around to a historically Christian understanding of the gospel, but most did not.

Because of this, when deconstruction stories started popping up in my social media newsfeed, along with hashtags like #exvangelical and #deconstruction, I paid attention. Ive been following along, seeking to understand what people mean by those words.

I witnessed a hashtag turn into a movement.

As of today, there are 293,026 posts on Instagram utilizing the hashtag #deconstruction. The vast majority are from people whove deconverted from Christianity, become progressive Christians, embraced same-sex marriage and relationships, rejected core historic doctrines of the faith, or are on a mission to crush the white Christian patriarchy. There are a few photos of deconstructed clothing (apparently this is a thing?) and a scant few sneaky posts from evangelicals attempting (mostly unsuccessfully) to convince the deconstructors that Jesus is the way. A plethora of insults, mockery, and anger are hurled at the church, along with memes stating, I regret saving myself for marriage, and Good morning! Its a great day to leave your nonaffirming church.

Online, there are countless deconstruction therapy and counseling sites which will facilitate your deconstruction and reconstruct you with mindfulness or the contemplative practices of progressive Christian favorites like Richard Rohr. There are conferences you can attend, one for which I personally paid good money (for research purposes) to be taught how to break free from toxic religion, reject Christian dogma, and learn to embrace what basically added up to warmed-over Buddhism. Phil Drysdale, a deconstructed Christian and deconstruction researcher asked people on Instagram to name the accounts that have helped them through their deconstructions. A quick scroll reveals that the leaders and guides the vast majority are looking to are accounts and people like Lisa Gungor, Audrey Assad, God is Grey, Jesus Unfollower, Your Favorite Heretics, Jo Luehmann, The Naked Pastor, and a plethora of others dedicated to providing a space for Christians to examine, reinterpret, and even abandon their beliefs. None of these accounts encourage Christians to look to Scripture as the authority for truth.

In my book, which chronicles my own deconstruction journey, I define deconstruction this way:

In the context of faith, deconstruction is the process of systematically dissecting and often rejecting the beliefs you grew up with. Sometimes the Christian will deconstruct all the way into atheism. Some remain there, but others experience a reconstruction. But the type of faith they end up embracing almost never resembles the Christianity they formerly knew. (24)

I would add that it rarely retains any vestiges of actual Christianity.

Over the past year or so, it has become common for Christian leaders to refer to deconstruction as something potentially positive. I get it. When I first heard that take, I thought, Hmmm. That could work. Just deconstruct the false beliefs and line up what you believe with Scripture. I was operating from the foundational belief that objective truth exists and can be known. But as I continued to study the movement, this understanding of deconstruction became untenable.

[Deconstruction] has little to do with objective truth, and everything to do with tearing down whatever doctrine someone believes is morally wrong.

Thats because the way the word is most often used in the deconstruction movement has little to do with objective truth, and everything to do with tearing down whatever doctrine someone believes is morally wrong. Take, for example, Melissa Stewart, a former Christian now agnostic/atheist with a TikTok following of more than 200,000. She describes how lonely and isolated she felt during her own deconstruction, and how discovering the #exvangelical hashtag opened up a whole new world of voices who related to what she was going through. Her TikTok platform now gives her the opportunity to create that type of space for others. In an interview on the Exvangelical podcast, she commented on the deconstruction/exvangelical online space:

My biggest experiences with it were people talking about what they went throughtheir storiesand it was very personal and it focused on the human beings who have come out of this, rather than on whether a certain kind of theology is right or wrong.

From my experience studying this movement, I think she hits the nail on the head. Deconstruction is not about getting your theology right. The word itself is built upon postmodernism and carries the baggage of moral relativism. For example, if your church says a woman cant be a pastor, the virtuous thing to do would be to leave that church and deconstruct out of that toxic and oppressive doctrine. Deconstructionists may even say they are simply rejecting cultural beliefs that have become entangled with Christianity. But these cultural beliefs often include doctrines like penal substitutionary atonement and biblical marriage. But deconstructionists do not regard Scripture as being the final authority for morality and theologythey appeal primarily to science, culture, psychology, sociology, and history.

Now, the narrative is evolving. Im seeing more and more posts, including an article on this site, that portray Martin Luther and even Jesus himself as deconstructionists. This, in my view, is irresponsible. If deconstruction means nothing more than changing your mind or correcting bad ideas, then I can say I deconstructed by switching from AT&T to Verizon. No one (until about five minutes ago) would have referred to Luther or Jesus as people who deconstructed. Martin Luther was trying to reform the church to get back to Scripture. Jesus is the Word made flesh. This is most certainly not what the deconstructionists are doing. In most cases, the Bible is the first thing to go.

Weve certainly seen many abuse scandals hit our newsfeeds, and there are very real people who carry the wounds, doubts, and trauma caused by those experiences. Many survivors are left with an injured faith and may wander online only to be met by a massive community of exvangelicals who triumph deconstruction and publicly shame anyone who speaks against it. This can feel like a safe place to process those hurts, but theres a specific end goal: to dismantle beliefs one subjectively thinks are oppressive or morally dubious, rather than conform our beliefs to Scripture, even if those beliefs are counterintuitive.

Rejecting any unbiblical beliefs with the goal of living more authentically as Christians should be a daily reality. But this isnt deconstruction.

As Christians, the process of evaluating our beliefs, traditions, and church culture in light of Scripture, and rejecting any unbiblical beliefs with the goal of living more authentically as Christians should be a daily reality. But this isnt deconstruction. It might be rightly called reformation or restoration or even healing.

Deconstruction has taken on a life of its own, and now is the time to accurately define our words. After all, if the word means everything, then it means nothing, yet it carries the potential to suck unsuspecting Christians into a dangerous vortex of influences from which they might not return.

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Why We Should Not Redeem 'Deconstruction' - The Gospel Coalition

In my last column, I made another reference to secularism, and it occurs to me this term and concept deserves further consideration. As it happens, a much-needed book has just been published by Routledge titled Secularism: The Basics by Jacques Berlinerblau. The author was also interviewed in the Jan. 25 edition of the Religion News Service online. My remarks here have been suggested by his book and that interview.

I have made use of the phrase steadfast secularism, intending to mean something that could also be called hard secularism or atheistic secularism. Secularism in its original form referred to the principle of striving to conduct human governmental affairs based on secular, naturalistic considerations, maintaining something of a separation between church and state.

However, there is a form of secularism, which took shape through the 20th century, that goes much further and aggressively maintains the reason for such a separation is because religion of any sort is a pernicious relic of the past and needs to be stamped out of all societies for the welfare of humanity. In the late-20th century, the so-called New Atheists (Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, Christopher Hitchens, et al) were of this ilk. Of course, earlier in the 20th century, Marxism took the same position.

Contrary to the above, the origin of the idea and term secularism in the English language can be traced to the British writer George Holyoake (1817-1906). He wanted a term and idea that was not as harsh as atheism, but would indicate an approach in government and philosophy whereby there could be cooperation with religions and believers of all types this is soft secularism. He did not intend that a government which accepted secularism as a principle, would seek to shut down religions or their influence on cultures. That further step, hard secularism, took place later in 20th-century fascist movements in Europe and in the communist revolutions in Russia and China. Today, some are noticing aspects of hard secularism filtering into many First World societies.

As Berlinerblau is careful to explain in his new book, there is a world of difference between hard and soft secularism in fact, they are pretty much opposites. Hard secularism seeks to destroy religion, whereas soft secularism seeks to accommodate and cooperate with religion, recognizing its value.

Making matters worse here in the United States, many if not most voters dont understand the difference between hard and soft secularism. This leads to the accusation, coming from the religious right, that the left-leaning Democratic Party wants to ram through atheistic secularism and to persecute religions and religious people. This would be absolutely true if the Democratic Party were aiming to align itself with hard secularism, but it isnt. It is only aiming for soft secularism that is to say, aiming for a government that defends religious freedom and does not align itself with any one religion to the exclusion of the others.

But the Democratic Party and politicians are fumbling this message over and over and they do this at their extreme peril. Americans are a very religious people even the ones who have stopped going to church. Voters in the U.S. are way more religious than western Europeans. So the Democratic Party cannot let itself be overly influenced by what flies in Europe with the public. It wont fly here.

We need to remember those famous words of the rabbi Jesus, Render unto Caesar the things that are Caesars, and unto God the things that are Gods. In a divinely inspired aphorism, that is exactly the type of secularism needed in order for religion and government to understand each other. These are two separate realms which, in 2,000 years of Christian social teaching, have been called the two swords and the two realms: the material and the spiritual. We live in both.

I am very much in favor of secularism, the right kind of secularism: the kind of secularism that reflects the meaning which is right there inside the words etymology. Secular comes from the Latin word saecularis (of an age/era) from the root saeculum (age/era). Secular values are values of an era, of an age, of politics). There are plenty of times when those sorts of values need some guidance from values that have stood the test of multiple eras and multiple political fights values that we sense come from a higher plain, a higher level.

I hasten to add that this does not mean they come from a literalist reading of Christian, Jewish or Islamic scripture. It means that there are core life-affirming and life-preserving values held in common by the worlds great monotheisms and their best teachers and we cannot let governments and corporations trample these values. We did not get the ideas of human rights, human flourishing and human charity from corporate bylaws or political party platforms.

The best sort of secularism recognizes its limitations. It must recognize that it cannot take the place of religious and spiritual value systems. Rather, it realizes that our societies must make a place and places for religion and spiritual development in our private and our public lives. There must be a constant dialog between the secular and the spiritual.

As humans, we live in the secular and the spiritual worlds simultaneously. When we forget that, its not pretty. When political parties forget that they either die, if were lucky; or they become tyrannical and that is very unlucky for us, indeed.

John Nassivera is a former professor who retains affiliation with Columbia Universitys Society of Fellows in the Humanities. He lives in Vermont and part-time in Mexico.

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On Faith: Secularism vs. atheism | Perspective | rutlandherald.com - Rutland Herald