Wednesday, July 29, 2015

The Jesuit Teaching on Regicide, Murder, Lying, Theft, Etc

"But we should swell beyond all reasonable limit, our enumeration, were we to quote even a tithe of the “moral maxims” of the Jesuits. There is not one in the long catalogue of sins and crimes which their casuistry does not sanction. Pride, ambition, avarice, luxury, bribery, and a host of vices which we cannot specify, and some of which are too horrible to be mentioned, find in these Fathers their patrons and defenders. The alchemists of the Middle Ages boasted that their art enabled them to operate on the essence of things, and to change what was vile into what was noble. But the still darker art of the Jesuits acts in the reverse order; it changes all that is noble into all that is vile. Theirs is an accursed alchemy by which theytransmute good into evil, and virtue into vice. There is no destructive agency with which the world is liable to be visited, that penetrates so deep, or inflicts so remediless a ruin, as the morality of the Jesuits. The tornado sweeps along over the surface of the globe, leaving the earth naked and effaced and forgotten in the greater splendor and the more solid strength of the restored structures. Revolution may overturn thrones, abolish laws, and break in pieces the framework of society; but when the fury of faction has spent its rage, order emerges from the chaos, law resumes its supremacy, and the bare as before tree or shrub beautified it; but the summers of after years re-clothe it with verdure and beautify it with flowers, and make it smile as sweetly as before. The earthquake overturns the dwelling of man, and swallows up the proudest of his cities; but his skill and power survive the shock, and when the destroyer has passed, the architect sets up again the fallen palace, and rebuilds the ruined city, and the catastrophe is effaced and forgotten in the greater splendor and the more solid strength of the restored structures. Revolution may overturn thrones, abolish laws, and break in pieces the framework of society; but when the fury of faction has spent its rage, order emerges from the chaos, law resumes its supremacy, and the institutions which had been destroyed in the hour of madness, are restored in the hour of calm wisdom that succeeds. But the havoc the Jesuitinflicts is irremediable. It has nothing in it counteractive or restorative; it is only evil. It is not upon the works of man or the institutions of man merely that, it puts forth its fearfully destructive power; it is upon man himself. It is not the body of man that it strikes, like the pestilence; it is the soul.It is not a part, but the whole of man that it consigns to corruption and ruin. Conscience it destroys, knowledge it extinguishes, the very power of discerning between right and wrong it takes away, and shuts up the man in a prison whence no created agency or influence can set him free. The Fall defaced the image of God in which man was made; we say, defaced; it did not totally obliterate or extinguish it. Jesuitism, more terrible than the Fall, totally effaces from the soul of man the image of God. Of the “knowledge, righteousness, and true holiness” in which man was made it leaves not a tree. It plucks up by its very roots the moral constitution which God gave man. The full triumph of Jesuitism would leave nothing spiritual, nothing moral, nothing intellectual, nothing strictly and properly human existing upon the earth. Man it would change into the animal, impelled by nothing but appetites and passions, and these more fierce and cruel than those of the tiger. HOPV2 401.5
Society would become simply a herd of wolves, lawless, ravenous, greedy of each other’s blood, and perpetually in quest of prey. Even Jesuitism itself would perish, devoured by its own progeny. Our earth at last would be simply a vast sepulcher, moving round the sun in its annual circuit, its bosom as joyless, dreary, and waste as are those silent spaces through which it rolls."- The History of Protestantism Vol. 2, Chapter 5, The Jesuit Teaching on Regicide, Murder, Lying, Theft, Etc..., page 401

Monday, July 27, 2015

On the Brink of Bliss

I once seriously considered marriage, in much the same way a small boy craves big-people stuff. My thinking back then was that, yes, it's no walk in the park, but if you put in the work it is rewarding. I wasn't really feeling like an adult by that time despite having obtained an ID card. Embarking on the apex of adult relationships seemed like a sure way to accelerate the process. Colleagues and a wife instead of "the boys" and (a) girl pal(s) seemed like a step up into the somber big boy world of Duties and Responsibilities.  Also, hardship greys the hairs. I looked boyish, nobody was taking me seriously. It got so bad that I'd be in the company of my peers yet some ignorant lazy buggers picked on me as the "kijana" whenever an errand called for sending someone. All because I lacked a premature potbelly, stress wrinkles, a steely gaze or a "baba somebody" moniker. I was just Tony to all and sundry, or, in extreme cases, Duski Bolt. Indeed one of the portly girls gathered enough courage to tell me to my face that I had babyish eyes. Luckily for her I looked, and was, harmless back then. But I digress. Point is, I toyed with the idea of marriage for a variety of reasons. Think Marriage Challenge. As for whether my intended was going to accept my proposal, I took it for granted that given enough time, I wouldn't even really need to ask for her hand except as a formality, a ceremony, a gimmick, an exam whose answers I knew beforehand but still had to sit and write anyway. I felt  to be "in love" was a necessary prerequisite for marriage, therefore I strove to feel and act the way a person who is in love is supposed to, according to an unrehearsed mix of my convictions then and contemporary romantic conventions as depicted on TV. Probably I would do it differently today, just relax and steer the ride at my own leisure, but at the time it was an honest effort under the perceived pressure of self-imposed adult burdens and a need to impress. Those were some big shoes I was yet to grow into, but clumsily walking nevertheless, in earnest, a kid trying to become his daddy overnight. In my haste to settle down I skipped vital steps in the metamorphosis. Long story, we leave it for now. It helped that my intended spoke the truth from her heart, often smiled radiantly and redundantly and was easy to talk to. At times she could draw me out of my shell, which is no mean feat. I often retreat too far inwards to bring myself back into circulation but this one figured me out and disentangled me patiently like I was knotted up Christmas lights. In her presence my mental clutter cleared miraculously. Although there were times when she was the cause of fretful contemplations rather than their bane. Still I decided on the balance of things that marrying her might be a good idea... once I started working, if ever. Also there was the little (big) issue of sex, which marriage would not only rubber stamp but also require on the regular, so hooray, another plus. Other specifics like the wedding, and the house, and how many kids, blended vaguely into the blurry background of things that would somehow sort themselves out with time, why stress. Those days I was an atheist due to poor choice of reading material, but she was a believer. I merely assumed I would convert her to my perspective and married life could begin from there, because even in my unbelief I knew enough not to be unequally yoked with a believer, can you imagine! But she was strong, thank God, though my evangelization was not altogether very zealous because I quickly figured out that a little faith in the mother will be good for the kids if for nothing else. Besides, who wants to raise faithless brats in this cold blooded 21st Century? not me. Yeah that's how far my thinking went. Kids. Weird. Anyway, my marriage fantasies (!) were overtaken by subsequent developments (!) and now rants such as these are all that remain of that adventure that never was.