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D r a g n e t
AS ANCIENT MYTHS GO, THIS ONE’S YOUNG
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This Rock
Volume 10, Number 3
 March 1999 
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"IT IS A DOGMA of feminist mythology that before there was God, there was Goddess." So writes Charlotte Allen in the February 1999 First Things, reviewing the book Goddess Unmasked: The Rise of Neopagan Feminist Spirituality by Philip G. Spence. Davis, a professor of religious studies at the University of Prince Edward Island, traces the current preoccupation with the Goddess-which includes in Catholic feminist circles the worship of Sophia, the feminine personification of divine wisdom in the book of Proverbs-back to its roots.
"Those roots," Allen writes, "Davis argues persuasively, turn out to be planted not in the misty terrain of prehistory but in the well-mapped soil of the early nineteenth century, when neopaganism was born, along with other manifestations of Romanticism, in reaction to the rationality-obsessed Enlightenment."
In fact, Davis dates the birth of Wicca, the primordial, Goddess-centered religion that supposedly survived many centuries of Christian persecution, to the 1950s. It was largely the brain-child, he argues, of a man: Gerald Brousseau Gardner, an Englishman who dabbled in nudism and seances before joining a group of Rosicrucians that styled itself a witches' coven. In 1954 Gardner published Witchcraft Today, the Wiccan Baedecker.
Gardner coined the named "Wicca," which he mistakenly thought was a cognate of the Anglo-Saxon word wis for "wise." Wicca actually means "male wizard"; wicce is the female equivalent. Gardner claimed he was passing on the secret lore of a witch named Old Dorothy; but Old Dorothy was Old Conveniently Dead Dorothy when the book came out. "The consensus," writes Allen, "even among his [Gardner's] disciples, is that he more than likely made it all up or appropriated it from literary sources."
Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger's words continue to fall on Western ears deafened by the shibboleth of "academic freedom," but shortly before leaving for a February meeting in San Francisco with bishops of the U. S., Canada, and Oceania, the head of the Vatican Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith said that theologians who teach at Catholic universities "need a dose of humility."
The Zenit news agency reported the cardinal reminded his listeners that if these institutions are to call themselves Catholic then they must teach what the Catholic Church teaches.
An upshot of the three-day meeting, which addressed controversial theological problems, was a reaffirmation of the Church's position on the intrinsic immorality of homosexual acts. Archbishop Eric D'Arcy of Hobart, Australia, reported that the moral status of homosexuality figures prominently among the issues that bishops must confront in their dioceses.
ThePontifical Council for Social Communication at the Vatican requested that a Spanish organization calledInternet Observation Services (SOI) recommend an appropriate patron saint of computer operators and the Internet. Ecumenical News International reports that SOI's researchers decided on a Church Doctor: Isidore, bishop of Seville, Spain.
Isidore (556-636) has been viewed for many centuries as a man ahead of his time. He wrote a dictionary, Etymologies, with a structure similar to what is now called a database. Like the World Wide Web, Etymologies put at the disposal of its readers massive amounts of information on medicine, agriculture, architecture, the books and offices of the Church, and other Church subjects. It was an extremely popular reference work.
According to the Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church, Isidore "had a profound impact upon the culture and educational practice of Western medieval Europe . . . His works became a storehouse of knowledge freely utilized by innumerable medieval authors." SOI pointed out that, like the Internet, the work of Isidore was a bridge between one era and the next, in his case the ancient world and the Middle Ages.
Isidore took part in the Church's fourth council of Toledo (633). Interested in the training of the clergy and known for his kindness to the poor, Isidore died in 636.
The Protestant newsmagazine World called Pope John Paul II's papal bull, Incarnationis Mysterium, issued late last year, "a Y2K crisis of immense theological significance." The problem? The Pope's inclusion of indulgences as part of the Jubilee 2000 celebration.
The article, by R. Albert Mohler Jr., says: "As recently as 1967 Pope Paul VI released an encyclical [actually, it was an apostolic constitution, Indulgentiarum Doctrina] defining an indulgence as 'the remission in the sight of God of the temporal punishment due to sins which have been already blotted out as far as guilt is concerned; the Christian believer who is properly disposed gains it on certain conditions with the help of the Church which, as the minister of redemption, authoritatively dispenses and applies the treasury of the satisfactions of Christ and the saints.' He also extended this to the dead, whose punishments in purgatory can be relieved through the intercession of the living."
Mohler goes on to say that "Evangelicals must insist that the church has no power to forgive sin, that the work of Christ is complete, and that the entire complex of purgatory, indulgences, penance, and the treasury of merit is utterly without biblical foundation."
It's true that the doctrine of indulgences is not mentioned in the Bible. But then, that's the problem with sola scriptura: with that thinking it would do away with doctrines - such as the Incarnation and the Trinity - that even Protestants accept.
Contrary to being unbiblical, the idea of indulgences follows naturally from what the Bible does teach explicitly. Paul reminds us that sins are punished not only in the hereafter but in this life as well (1 Cor. 11:31-32). The sin of one affects the whole Mystical Body of Christ (Rom. 12:5; 1 Cor. 12:12-21,26). "I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake," Paul wrote in another place, "and in my flesh I complete what is lacking in Christ's afflictions for the sake of his body, that is, the Church" (Col1:24). So we can help one another now and help those no longer on earth (but who are still members of the Church), and the saints can help us, too (Rev. 5:8). If Christ's assertion that he is the vine and we are the branches is true, this solidarity of his Mystical Body must also be true.
Conversely, restoration to health in one branch must affect the others. Good works that reduce our own punishment must be able to be applied to other people. Look at the saints, who more than compensated for their own faults and whose "extra" good works - along with the infinite merits of Christ - not being wasted are available for application to others.
As Paul VI noted in Indulgentiarum Doctrina, "The conviction . . . that the pastors of the flock of the Lord could set the individuals free from the vestiges of sin by applying the merits of Christ and the saints . . .represented a progression in the doctrine and discipline of the Church rather than a change." In fact, the origin of the Church's power to grant indulgences may be traced to Jesus granting to Peter the keys of the kingdom and the power to bind and loose (Matt. 16: 19). Protestants argue that Peter and the other apostles were given only the power to declare sins already forgiven, but Matthew 16:19,18:18, and John 20:21-23 refer to a grant of a power to decide, such as a judge wields.
It is the British Constitution's "grubby little secret," according to Sir Michael Forsyth: the 1701 Act of Settlement, which bars Catholics from the British throne and prohibits the monarch or any heirs to the monarchy from marrying a Catholic. In a January 26 speech in London, Forsyth, a Conservative party member and former secretary of state for Scotland, called the act "deeply discriminatory" and "the only serious flaw to disfigure the monarchy." In recent decades two remote heirs to the throne-Prince Michael of Kent in 1978 and the Earl of St. Andrews in 1988-were excluded from the succession when they married Catholics.
Religious News Service reported Forsyth said he found it "astonishing" that a Labor government that has concerned itself with promulgating an "inclusive" society had not moved to amend a law couched in offensive eighteenth-century language enshrining "the formal doctrine that some ten percent of the Queen's subjects are to be treated as second-class citizens." The act excludes from the throne "all and every person and persons who. . . is, are, or shall be reconciled to, or shall hold communion with, the See or church of Rome or shall profess the popish religion or shall marry a papist."
"It is perfectly legal for the monarch to marry a Buddhist, a Hindu, or even a Moonie-but not a Roman Catholic," said Forsyth.
Here's a headline hard to resist: "2,000 Receive Baptism with the Help of Fire Hoses." It happened in Charlotte, North Carolina, the final stop last fall in a twelve-city tour of mass baptisms led by S. C. "Precious Daddy" Madison, bishop of the United House of Prayer for All People. "It was a release from a hot October sun that baked the asphalt," the Raleigh, North Carolina, News & Observer reported. "And it was a release from a year's worth of sinning."
Baptism is an annual event for members of the United House of Prayer. Founded in 1919 by C. M. Grace, who became known as "Sweet Daddy," the denomination was built around the ritual of mass baptism, the building of churches shaped like Noah's ark, and the music of brass "shout bands." "We believe in water baptism for the repentance of sin," said Apostle T. B. Dillard, minister of the United House of Prayer in Raleigh. One eighth-grade girl was quoted as saying, "I just feel that all my sins have been washed away. I feel like a whole new person."
At least after confession you don't have to change clothes.
"The U. N. is not your friend." We've seen this bumper sticker around town recently, and it could well be addressed to Catholics.
In January the Catholic Family & Human Rights Institute (CAFHRI), a United Nations watchdog group, reported that several "fact sheets" posted on the website of the United Nations Population Fund were "trying to divide Catholics from their Church on sexual matters." One fact sheet headlined "Mainstream Religious Thought Supports the Cairo Consensus" claims that most practicing Catholics, Protestants, Jews, and Muslims support the use of contraception.
Another fact sheet, "Vatican Positions Are Not Those of All Catholics," cites a poll claiming that only a minority of American priests and nuns agrees with Church teaching that contraception is always immoral. The next section of the same fact sheet reports, "At the 1995 Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing. . . thousands signed a petition asking the UN. to reconsider the Holy See's official delegate status." The source for this claim is a 1995 article published by Catholics for Free Choice, a U. S. based pro-abortion group that claims to represent the grassroots views of Catholics in this country.
Within days of CAFHRI's report, the anti-Catholic fact sheets were removed from the United Nations Population Fund website.
Need more evidence of the anti-Catholic bias of the U. N. powers-that-be? In February Frances Kissling, head of Catholics for Free Choice, hosted a seminar called "Ending Male Dominance" during a UN. population conference at the Hague. "The central problem in religion, population, and reproductive health is male dominance," she said. "Catholicism is not special, just different-we have a pope." The Holy Father, she continued, is a "great thinker and writer-not for the twentieth century but for the fifth century." According to CAFHRI's report on the conference, this comment elicited laughter and applause.
Thousands of people in Florida have been getting messages from God lately, in big black letters on billboards and on the sides of buses:
"We Need to Talk-God"
"What Part of 'Thou Shalt Not. . .' Didn't You Understand?-God"
"Keep Using My Name in Vain and I'll Make Rush Hour Longer-God"
"Loved the Wedding, Invite Me to the Marriage" -God
"Come on Over and Bring the Kids"-God
"Will the Road You're on Get to My Place?"-God
"Big Bang Theory, You've Got to Be Kidding" -God
"Need Directions?"-God
"You Think It's Hot Here?"-God
"Tell the Kids I Love Them" -God
"Need a Marriage Counselor? I'm Available"-God
"Have You Read My #1 Bestseller? There Will Be a Test" -God
The ad campaign was developed by the Smith Agency, a Ft. Lauderdale company, and funded by an anonymous donor. The non-denominational campaign ran from September through January; Catholic News Service reported that the ad agency is looking for a sponsor to take the messages nationwide.
Writing in his archdiocesan newspaper, The Florida Catholic, Miami's archbishop, John Favalora, called the billboards "prophetic reminders of God's existence."
From the February 14 Sunday Telegraph, London - another exhibit entered into evidence by Brits seeking to prove that Americans are bonkers:
"Feminists in America want to replace St. Valentine with a Portuguese princess who grew a beard to make herself repellent to men. Claiming that St. Valentine is too 'patriarchal,' leading feminists, such as Angela [sic; the writer means Andrea] Dworkin, have picked on Uncumber's Day instead.
"Legend has it that Uncumber-whose real name was Wilgefortis-was the most beautiful daughter of a fifteenth-century Portuguese pagan king who prayed to become ugly after her father arranged to marry her to the king of Sicily. Overnight she sprouted a beard, and her father was so horrified that he had her crucified. From the cross she said all women who invoked her would be freed from male encumbrances, leading to modem-day suggestions that her July 20 feast day should be celebrated.
"A cult grew up around her in fifteenth- and sixteenth-century Europe. It was believed that anyone who invoked St. Wilgefortis would die 'uncumbered' or without anxiety. Feminists now see her as a symbol for the new millennium. She appears in the latest Official Politically Correct Dictionary and Handbook as an alternative to St. Valentine.
"One advocate is Dworkin, who decries sending Valentine's flowers as 'of the grave, delivered to the victim before the kill.' But feminists this side of the Atlantic are not so sure. Beatrix Campbell, the feminist writer, said: 'I'm afraid I can't be sensible about it. I adore getting chocolates and roses.'"
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