Chaitanya Jyothi Museum Opening, 2000
RAMANAM
In nomine Patris, et Filii, et Spiritus Sancti. Amen.
Countrymen,
ORBIS NON SUFFICIT
SOLUS DEUS SUFFICIT
Globalization by Socialists and Moslems of murder, rape, and taunting of Christians, and arson, vandalism, and mayhem committed upon their handiworks, indicate, among other things, that the churches’ lines of battle are overextended. Their defenses are too thin to hold against attack. Appeasement whets perpetrators’ appetite for yet more blood-letting and destruction. Front must be shortened and concentration of force at defensible and attack-launch positions must be achieved. Then, successful attack to terminate the murder, rape, etc., must be launched. The churches’ weakness today is their diffusion of strength across indefensible geographical and therefore spiritual areas of operation. The following list details remedies.
The right thing to do is this:
1- Consolidate congregations and judicatories who use versions of The Latin Rite.
This would include all so-called mainline denominations/churches. This done, even congregants living in sparsely-settled areas would experience reasonable travel times and distances for participation in church functions.
Consolidation would rest on agreement to the centrality of The Latin Rite itself rather than to differential calculus regarding clerical orders. The Liturgy is The Kerygma. Therein rests the ecumenical peace: The Liturgy, not the clergy, is core of The Church and of the churches. The corporeality of Grace is the conduct of The Liturgy, not apostolic succession: reference the so-called consecration of queers and women as bishops. (Q.E.D.)
In cities, consolidation could go by way of government-sponsored Religion Parks. In suburbs and towns, consolidation could go by way of these four considerations: consolidate, liquidate, educate, celebrate.
A judicatory who refuses consolidation may be informed by their congregations that they, the judicatory, may henceforth pay all expenses incurred by said congregations, who herewith also cease paying assessments (taxes) laid on them by their judicatory.
The military term for consolidation of congregations and judicatories as described here is: shorten front. It has two purposes, one defensive, one offensive. They are: (1) to shorten a line of battle, a front, too long for the force at hand to defend, and (2) to prepare for an assault at some point or points along an enemy’s line of battle, his front and/or flanks.
The Church is a military formation of power not of this world but effective in it. Thus, military terminology and the concepts upholding them are as appropriate for use by The Church as they are for The Army.
2- Liquidate the value of their properties.
Identify areas, and one or two or a few points inside them, to which congregants using some version of The Latin Rite have reasonable travel times and distances for participation in church functions.
Sell off properties not at these one or two or a few points and use the proceeds to build at these points as well as to fortify clergy retirement funds.
The military terms for liquidation of properties as described here are: abandon weak positions and concentrate force.
Again, The Church is a military formation of power not of this world but effective in it. Thus, military terminology and the concepts upholding them are as appropriate for use by The Church as they are for The Army.
3- Train clergy — all men — to self-support as worker priests engaged in secular labor of their choice and to officiate in the clerical order gratis.
This gives the clergy and laity, both, the great power of freedom.
Offer clergy graduated retirement income based on age, starting at sixty five, and years in standing publicly celebrating The Mass and/or reciting The Daily Office at a sanctuary for a congregation.
The military term for training clergy as described here is: sustain the troops.
Again, The Church is a military formation of power not of this world but effective in it. Thus, military terminology and the concepts upholding them are as appropriate for use by The Church as they are for The Army.
4- With fewer congregations and more clergy, celebrate versions of The Latin Rite and/or recite its adjuncts daily at the few sanctuaries remaining.
Daily conduct of The Liturgy — The Mass and/or elements of The Daily Office, such as Morning Prayer, The Angelus, Evening Prayer, Compline — are God’s concentrated attacks to expose worldly wiles to powers of the light of truth. Some combination of The Mass and/or The Daily Office should occur daily in every sanctuary, for every congregation, in every judicatory comprising churches using a version of The Latin Rite.
The Liturgy is The Kerygma. The Mass and The Daily Office are God’s light bestowed upon the world to reverse its lapses into darkness and to elevate it from confusion to clarity. Celebrating The Mass and reciting The Daily Office are evangelical actions. They corporealize light.
With fewer congregations and judicatories and many clerical and lay volunteers concentrated in succinct geographies, daily celebration of some version of The Latin Rite is possible and desirable. Such celebration is, in fact, Christians’ duty and balm.
Judicatories should never allow the number of congregations to exceed the number of clergy and lay volunteers willing to maintain The Mass and/or The Daily Office in daily occurrence in each its congregations. The thinking of judicatories must be ecclesial and historical, not financial. Judicatories’ thirst for properties must not exceed their enthusiasm for and guarantee of daily public worship and prayer in each congregation who relies upon their stewardship.
If daily public worship and prayer cannot be provided in each congregation of a judicatory, reduce the number of congregations and/or judicatories until they can be provided. Better one bright light than a dozen dim ones. Better concentrated attack in force at one point than force-dissipating attacks against many points.
The military term for maintaining The Mass and/or The Daily Office as described here is: close with the enemy in overwhelming force at the point of attack.
Again, The Church is a military formation of power not of this world but effective in it. Thus, military terminology and the concepts upholding them are as appropriate for use by The Church as they are for The Army.
Facing the facts of human theological geography, lay and episcopal leaderships must consolidate congregations and judicatories (shorten front), liquidate inapposite properties (abandon weak positions and concentrate force), ensure that clergy — all men — have a living wage (sustain the troops), and discharge their primal duty to celebrate The Mass and/or recite The Daily Office in each congregation in public daily (close with the enemy in overwhelming force at the point of attack).
Shorten Front
Abandon Weak Positions/Concentrate Force
Sustain The Troops
Close With The Enemy In Overwhelming Force
=
Consolidate
Liquidate
Educate
Celebrate
Remarkably, my first and only assignment as clergy, ordained or non-ordained — early 1970s, without ordination or standing initially, UCC, Southwest Conference — was to consolidate two small UCC congregations in El Paso, Texas. The congregation to which I was assigned chose to continue, expand, and precipitate my being ordained with standing in the Southwest Conference, UCC.
Thus, I failed that assignment. After than failure, I requested a new assignment and was told none was available in the Conference. In 1976 I confirmed in the Episcopal Church and have remained there ever since, though inactive, in the capacity of layman.
My first and only assignment by The Church while in the clerical order was exactly what The Church intended generally and wanted me to do specifically. I did not see it. Not for not wanting to see it. I just did not see it. Now I do. Miserere mei Deus secundum misericordiam tuam iuxta multitudinem miserationum tuarum dele iniquitates meas.
Βασιλεία του Θεού
Kingdom of God
Update 1: Following WWII, the judicatories made the mistake of adding more plant in the new suburbs while keeping legacy plant in cities and large towns. They overextended their lines, so to speak. They could not pay a living wage to men to man those extended lines. So they hired ordained women, who would work for less because they had a husband to support them, and who swallowed the malarkey that they were doing good and breaking the future by leading the church.
But that made it worse. Women have as much role in clerical orders as they do in combat units. None. So normal people faded away from plant in both suburbs and cities/large towns. Then, as paying customers families left but the judicatories persisted in demanding income laying assessments on an array of plant ever more overextended relative to its taxpayer base pledging families, judicatories turned to freaks as both ordinands and customers congregants. So more normals faded away.
It started after WWII and the calculation was financial rather than ecclesial or historical. Judicatories then should have shortened front (consolidated judicatories who use versions of The Latin Rite), abandoned weak positions (sold off apposite properties) and concentrated force (at geographic points reasonably accessible to all), sustained the troops (teach/assist men-only clergy to self-sustain their families), and closed with the enemy (The Mass celebrated and/or The Daily Office recited gratis daily at each of the now-few but sustainable sanctuaries).
Just as ignorance and treason cannot long strut under color of The First Amendment, so too fear, doubt, and anger cannot long strut under color of Empathy.
Update 2: No, Christianity Doesn’t Need To Endorse Homosexuality To Grow
Update 3: Sri Lanka Expels 200 Islamic Clerics Following Deadly Easter Attacks
Update 4: Chinese officials warn Christianity is ‘enormous harm’ to society
Update 5: Colorado school shooter Devon Erickson hates Trump, hates Christians, loves Obama
Update 6: Rod Dreher: Radicalization & Degeneration
Update 7: Matt Walsh: Modern Churches Are Hideous. After Notre Dame, Let’s Start Building Beautiful Churches Again.
Update 8: From 1996: Paradigm Shift For The Churches
Update 9: UMC Bishops advance ‘full communion’ agreement with Episcopal Church
Update 10: What Those Who Seek Socialism Really Need Is A Church And Family
Update 11: “Lex orandi, lex credendi (Latin loosely translated as the law of what is to be prayed [is] the law of what is to be believed) is a motto in Christian tradition, which means that it is prayer which leads to belief, or that it is liturgy which leads to theology. It refers to the relationship between worship and belief. As an ancient Christian principle it provided a measure for developing the ancient Christian creeds, the canon of scripture, and other doctrinal matters. It is based on the prayer texts of the Church, that is, the Church’s liturgy. In the Early Church, there was liturgical tradition before there was a common creed, and before there was an officially sanctioned biblical canon. These liturgical traditions provided the theological framework for establishing the creeds and canon.”
A remarkably accurate statement to find in Wikipedia.
Update 12: Good News: Celebrating The Mass in Latin at North American Martyrs Catholic Parish, Edmonds, WA, by the The Priestly Fraternity of Saint Peter (Fraternitas Sacerdotalis Sancti Petri).
Update 13: Trump hosts Amish in historic Oval Office visit
Update 14: Bishop nixes Nicene Creed at Epiphany Mass to avoid offending unbelievers
Update 15: The Babylon Bee: Episcopalians Confused By Strange Book Trump Brought To Church
Update 16: Prominent Georgia Church Breaks with Increasingly Progressive UMC Denomination
AUM NAMAH SHIVAYA
