CHAPTER 1 –
EARLY CHRISTIANITY
How do the early Christians solve social problems?
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From the analysis of the social system carried out by the early Christians according to Jesus’ teaching, we discover the surprising relationship, and shoking for power, that exists between direct democracy and early Christianity.
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CONTENTS OF CHAPTER 1
Introduction – Authority or Power?
Social life of Jesus’ early followers.
Basic points of the ideal.
The social system.
Rise! It is time to assert yourself.
Persecutions against Christians.
Christianity and religion.
Christianity and structures.
“Our Father”.
The essence of the social message.
Synthetic table of the new message.
Annex – Documents of the 1st and 2nd century AD.
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TECHNICAL NOTES:
– In this document we use the term “presbyter” to indicate the authority of the early Christian community. The presbyter is an “elderly” lay person who lives Christianity and is elected by the whole community itself, in order to make the members grow in love. Decisions on the needs of the community rest with all members gathered together.
– We also use the term “people’s sovereignty” to follow the common language, the most appropriate expression is “people’s authority”.
– The original document is written in Italian and is here translated into English by “Google Translate”, so we apologize for any errors and formal imperfections in this text.
– In this document, as in the Italian one, the tense of verbs is the historical present.
– The text in Italian is extracted from the essay: “La sovranità del popolo oppure le strutture logoranti del potere” © (“The sovereignty of the people or the wearing out structures of power”) by Ugo Della Collina. The reproduction and use of non-commercial texts and data are permitted with the indication of the source.
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INTRODUCTION
AUTHORITY OR POWER?
Authority and power originally have a meaning opposite to each other.
Authority etymologically derives from the author, the one who makes others grow, who is the base, that is the foundation, on which others grow.
In other words, the author is someone who puts his knowledge, his abilities at the service of others to make them progress in an attitude, in a field of human activity.
This presupposes a society of ‘equals’, that is, of people with equal rights among them in every manifestation of society.
Power is, on the other hand, power over others and presupposes the submission of others and their obedience.
The result is a society made up of “superiors”, quantitatively a small minority in power, and “inferiors”, the great majority.
In practice, a society of ‘unequal’ rights, therefore with many discriminated against, where only a few have the opportunity to be authors or to grow.
A social system is characterized by two specific aspects, the possibility of:
1 – deciding,
2 – disposing of wealth and goods (today we can say of finance, capital and advanced technology).
These two aspects are interdependent, like the sides of a coin: whoever has the power to decide for others also has the possibility of accumulating wealth, whoever has the availability of wealth can increase his decision-making power.
In a society based on authority, the possibility of deciding for others, for the community, is up to all members of the community itself, as they all consider themselves socially equal, on equal terms, and therefore legally have the same rights. This constitutes a formidable social instrument of union, justice, peace, tolerance, freedom, civil growth, optimization, economic progress. Everyone has the opportunity to be author and to grow. All members decide on the distribution of wealth according to the needs of the community and possibly according to the needs of other communities.
In a society based on power, the common decision rests with a few individuals, who, to confirm their power, develop a top-down or hierarchical structure, very onerous, with people and groups considered superior or inferior and therefore with various kinds of discrimination. The ability to decide belongs to the upper classes, a right that the vast majority of individuals are denied. The economic aspect shows a more or less marked concentration of wealth with a consequent state of poverty, respectively, of large sections of the population or pockets of this.
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SOCIAL LIFE OF JESUS’ EARLY FOLLOWERS
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A community, which from a social point of view constitutes the roots of the system based on “authority”, is that of the early Christians, in the period from the 1st to the 3rd century AD. Jesus’ message marks a turning point in a large part of the world, so much so that the vulgar era begins from the year of his birth. Let’s see the salient points.
BASIC POINTS OF THE IDEAL
a) The individual in relation to the ideal.
The ideal, in Jesus, is God understood as the authority of Love. God is our true and only Dad, who loves man to the point of giving his beloved son, who translates His word into life, so that humanity can realize a new reality on earth, the fullness of times and therefore his salvation. The relationship between God and man is Love, their relationship is Freedom.
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NOTE: Jesus calls God “Dad” (in Aramaic it is pronounced “Abba”) to indicate that in the social field we are all his children and therefore brothers, and he does not call him father, as it is wrongly translated, which instead gives a sense of detachment and deference.
Even the name “Christians” is improper: it is assigned in mockery by the Jews of Antioch to the followers of Jesus, since these want to establish the kingdom of God (the kingdom of Love), and to deride them they call them Christians, in the sense of followers of a bogus messiah (Christ), a failure who proclaims himself king of the Jews (according to the reason for the sentence written on the cross by order of Pontius Pilate), therefore it is more correct to call the followers of Jesus, who live the original message, by the name of “Jesuans”, as some scholars suggest. In this study we use the term “Christians” always in the meaning of “Jesuans”.
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Man is called to live Love in every moment of life, putting aside his particular problems and himself, to be only Love, which is to give without asking for anything in return (thus the solution of his problems and one’s own personality – ed.). Paul affirms: “I am not the one who lives anymore, He is the one who lives in me”.
To be a follower of the Nazarene it is necessary to change mentality: not to feel superior to others, not to seek the power to decide on others, not to work only for one’s own interests or personal riches (that is to say no to the three temptations in the desert described by the gospel). It is necessary to live for oneself and for others, as equals, to be the other, without imposing anything, to be a service of living love.
Pain itself becomes an instrument of love: the moment in which Jesus suffers most for the realization of his message, during the crucifixion, is also the moment in which he loves man most. If we see Jesus in pain (as we see Jesus in the last), we recognize love in pain, we can transform pain into love. Loving even in pain characterizes the Christian: “Whoever wants to be my follower, take up his cross and follow me and its weight becomes soft”. And the cross, that is the death sentence, can only be given by power, always contrary to the affirmation of the original message of Jesus.
The soft weight even in persecution, for example, causes the early Christians to face death in circuses singing together (this can also be considered a form of nonviolent resistance – ed.): at that moment they are Love towards their persecutors, who remain amazed and some change their way of life.
Christians live in the tranquility of the spirit, applying the words of Jesus: “Do not worry about tomorrow”, which obviously does not mean not getting busy today for the things of tomorrow. Doing well in the present moment is the best way to prepare for tomorrow, loving in the present moment is the best way to live the scriptures.
b) The relationship among people.
As a consequence of God Love, man loves his neighbor as himself and in the other he sees the very person of Jesus, who affirms: “Whatever you do to the person least taken into consideration, you do it to me“. Those who are least considered (by others or by me), the poor, the inferior, the marginalized, the children, the apathetic, the sick, the exploited, etc., are He.
It should be noted that it is not a question of giving alms, but of helping Jesus alive in that sick person, of giving help to him in that stranger without food or blankets, of seeing Jesus in that woman rejected by everyone: it is a new relationship of enormous importance. If, on the other hand, the person “less considered” is judged for his past or for what he is now, Jesus himself is rejected.
This is particularly true with our neighbor and means seeing the positive in the other, loving him beyond everything, as he is, not judging him negatively, even in the presence of preconceptions towards him or a different behavior of his, looking for him, not wanting to “convert” him, considering him as equals, caressing him with a smile, putting aside all your problems or programs or ideas, etc. in that moment, creating a “void” inside yourself in order to just be love for the other, making yourself “one” with the other. The value of man as such comes first.
“Love your enemies”, “Do good to those who harm you” Jesus states. This requires that we are also the first to love the “enemy”, who is not only the military or political adversary, but also the one who does us wrong, who does not greet us, who does not have our faith, who does not esteem us.
Anyone who meets the other loves him as he is, with the heavy burden of him: and the shared weight becomes light.
“In fact, if you only love those who love you, what merit do you have? Don’t Roman tax collectors do the same? And if you only greet the members of your group, what do you do new? Don’t the pagans do the same?”.
And again: “There is more joy in giving than in receiving”.
It is of great importance to fully understand the affirmation of Jesus: “Whoever is not against us is with us”.
In interpersonal relationships it is good to always forgive. How many times? Seventy times seven, Jesus answers.
His request is well known: “If you remember that your brother has something against you, leave your gift that you are offering at the altar and go first to reconcile with him, then come back to offer your gift”. Note “If your brother has something against you”, therefore also “If you don’t have something against him”.
“Whoever does not love his brother whom he sees – adds John – cannot love God whom he does not see”.
“Judge not, for as you judge others, so are you judged”.
“The scriptures say not to kill, but, Jesus reiterates, even those who say “crazy” or “stupid” to his brother deserve to be thrown into gehenna”.
“I call you friends, not servants”, you must not be submissive to men, the relationship is only one of love, it is being love.
“The kingdom of God is in the heart of man”, he affirms and wants nothing more than this fire to light.
“To those who love me, I manifest myself”: to those who love the Master according to his teaching, he discovers a new reality.
The Nazarene makes a proposal of life, which he calls his proposal, his new commandment, the essence of Christianity: “Love one another reciprocally as I love you, by this you are recognized as my followers”.
And He loves his followers to the point of giving his life for them.
This type of Love is the badge of recognition of true followers and is valid in large and small things.
By way of example, living his word, without fiction, it is no longer difficult to greet the other first, to ask how he is, to get to know each other overcoming reluctance, because this is less than giving life, the measure of Jesus’ love; or for a young person – even for a non-young person – to offer a sweater when it is very cold, first choose the most uncomfortable place to favor the other, make sure to procure a useful object for the other who has felt the need, accept the idea of the other by losing one’s own in making a program, recognize the positive in the other without judging it. Another example is given by two engaged couples or spouses who love each other completely, or by two or more people who explicitly experience mutual love.
Everything can be a way to be ready “to give one’s life” for each other: “There is no greater love than someone who gives his life for his friends”.
Every moment of the day acquires value because it can be filled with love, which is living his message.
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NOTE: Speaking of mutual love, there is a Korean legend that in a certain sense helps to understand it: it tells of a man who dies deserving of heaven.
An angel is instructed to lead him to the place, but the man asks him to be able to see first how hell is made. The angel pleases him and brings him to that place. Here he sees large halls with sparkling lights, beautiful mirrors and crystals, long tables laden with all kinds of goods: the damned sitting on both sides of the tables each have a plate of exquisite rice in front of them and they must eat it with chopsticks (they are the cutlery used in the Far East) that are two meters long, so they cannot get food into their mouths.
In spite of all the strivings and the angry attempts they do not succeed in eating and suffer terrible hunger.
At this point our man is curious to know what heaven is like. The angel accompanies him and here too he sees large halls with sparkling lights, beautiful mirrors and crystals, long tables laden with all kinds of goods: the blessed sitting on both sides of the tables each have a plate of exquisite rice in front of them and they have to eat with two meters long chopsticks, so they cannot get food into their mouths! But here each person with his long chopsticks feeds the one sitting in front and the other does the same and everyone can satiate and be happy: it is mutual love.
Note that if only some of the best help others, but not reciprocally, it would not be full, real, complete paradise.
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Therefore if I am ready to give my life for you, that is also losing my attachment, my habit, my preconception, my way of seeing, etc. to make me one with you, and you do the same with me, we become one in mutual love: it is the unity between people, revealed by the Nazarene, which generates a new reality among us, which makes us feel free: it is ardor, it is supreme generosity, and everyone can best express their talents in collaboration.
Mutual love spontaneously brings joy to all members as a consequence.
“When two or more are united in mutual Love I am in their midst” says Jesus. When two or more really love one another, there is the effective presence of love among them, therefore there is Jesus, and this is perceived: where He is, that is, there is love, there is a living reality so strong that it fascinates people and operates directly, in homes, in meeting places, in workplaces, at the market, in the shacks, in the political classrooms, in the slums, on the street. It is a climate of value. Mutual love is a new presence that conquers.
To generate this presence among people therefore it is necessary to be at least two or more, an individual spirituality is not enough. The secret of joy is also being at least two or three in the mutual love relationship, without attachments (alone it is not possible).
The secret of unity is to love even those who do not become one with us and to love any pain.
In this way we can transform pain into love.
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NOTE: You experience: if you have personal worries or a pain, but at that moment you make the void inside you to make yourself with one another, forgetting your problem for loving only the other – without judging him, without the purpose of converting him or of making him change his mind – you realize that even your problem may be solved, at least in part, or that your pain is also relieved – ed.
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Today it can be said that the ideal model to generate Jesus is to live Mary: union in love and equality is valuable, division in hatred or discrimination is worth nothing.
Jesus asserts to be Light, Way, Truth, Life. Mutual love enables members of the community to acquire a new light in understanding things, to find a different way through collaboration and sharing, to discover a practical truth that has universal value for people, to generate a wonderful life in the mutual relationship.
This harmony between them facilitates the manifestation of charismas: that of inspiration, understanding, healings, languages, talents of each one.
Being united in love among themselves and towards others, this community reality, makes new life known, makes you enjoy being a family. What is striking is the Love among people: individually they are what they are with their own merits and weaknesses, but what is worth is their relationship of brotherly love. And this relationship of mutual love is achieved by the early Christians in this earth.
It is Love that brings about conversions. A writer of the first centuries attests: “The pagans, seeing Christians as they are united in mutual love, understand and believe in them”.
In this way, the word of Jesus is realized: “As you, Dad, are in me and I in you, may they too be one in Love, so that the world may believe”.
c) The community relationship.
In life each of the others is a part of us. Since we are all children of the same Dad, we are all brothers, in equal measure, including the last socially, the outcasts. The ensemble of the individuals forms a single organism in Jesus, similarly to the branches with the vine. In other words, the members of the whole community, united in love and equality, constitute the cells of a real, albeit mystical, body which is Jesus himself.
The Nazarene is opposed to the accumulation of wealth from a few, as evidenced by the episodes of the rich young man, of Dives and Lazarus, of the owner of so much grain, of the camel and the eye of a needle, and so on. He firmly wants wealth to be distributed equally among the needy so that there are no needy people in the community.
Jesus continually defines himself as “son of man”, so that we do not fall into abstract myths or formal devotions – as do the pagans who deify the personalities, reducing them to myths – but there is concrete love and true justice.
Everyone can be identified with Him from what is said above: “Whatever you do at the last one, you are doing it to me”. This constitutes the measure of the final judgment: “I am hungry and you feed me, I am ill and you assist me, I am a stranger and you give me hospitality, I am persecuted and you protect me, …”. Owing to this Paul calls all the members of the community holy, that is, sacred, inviolable.
The communion of saints is the consequence: their experiences of living love are shared, their goods are freely shared or sold, to directly give work tools to those in poverty or a decent pay to workers. The whole community gathered together takes decisions concerning the community itself and the various needs, the whole community elects the people fittest to carry out certain services (the presbyterate, deacons, etc.).
The result is that the multitude of believers is of one heart and one soul and among them there are no poor.
Already from these hints it is possible to understand the structural relationship of the communities initiated by Jesus and the apostles: these have the task, in union with God, to arouse and make grow (they are the authority) the new life in the places where they reside or they visit, and have no power of decision over individuals and communities.
“We must not obey individuals” declares Peter “but only God”, that is, Love. And Paul: “We do not master over your faith, but we are collaborators of your joy“.
We repeat the words of Jesus: “I call you friends, not servants”, there must be no subjection.
The decisions are made by all the Christians of the place, together; many passages of the “new testament” testify to the final decision that belongs to the whole community (see for example the passages: Mt 18,17-18; Acts: 1,15-25; 6,2-6; 15,22; 11, 22; 11.29-30; 15.4 and the appendix of this chapter).
In fact, Jesus clearly rejects the schemes on which power and chiefs are based, and reveals: “Truly I tell you, EVERYTHING that the community all together approves on earth is also approved in heaven and EVERYTHING that it abolishes on earth is also abolished in the sky”.
This means that what the whole community decides is what God wants: it is a new social reality of immense importance.
Only by establishing this structure, which Jesus expressly requires of his followers, can we generate a system of peace, sharing, generalized well-being, freedom, tolerance, universal brotherhood, social justice, collaboration, unity.
Only in this way is the multitude one heart and one soul and there are no needy among them.
Since we are all children of the one God, we are all brothers, with equal dignity, therefore each one also has the “royal dignity” to decide, together, on everything concerning the community itself.
Therefore, there is not a narrow group of a hierarchical type, of first or superiors, even “paternal”, who decide for the others: “Whoever wants to be first must be the last, be the servant of all”. There is no place for those who feel superior.
There is no ruling group that manages wealth at its own will. A caste of “chiefs” and “supreme chiefs” is not required (caste that over time automatically becomes a center of power, as in the civil field, attraction for careerists, “sharks” and corrupt – editor’s note), a class of power that Jesus calls “whitewashed sepulcher”, “vipers’ nest”, “actors who feign” (hypocrites), “corrupt generation”, even if the members declare themselves, and for this reason all the more, representatives of God.
Interesting is the name of “generation” that Jesus gives to the caste of power. For example, the Gospel of Matthew reports: “Some Pharisees and scribes question him: Master, we would like you to show us a sign. And he replies: a perverse and corrupt generation demands a sign! But no sign is given to it”.
He even goes so far as to affirm that the fullness of times – the end of the old world, a legacy of submission, hatred, division, injustice, wars, exploitation, destitution, and the formation of “new heavens and lands”, which in the current sense is the paradise – does not happen until the generation of leaders and superiors disappears: “Truly I tell you, that generation does not pass before all these things (the warning signs of change) have taken place. Heaven and earth have an end, but my words have no end. As for that day or hour, no one knows them”.
It should be emphasized that Jesus always condemns not the single persons belonging to the power group, but the caste of the “superiors” in itself, that is to say the hierarchical structure itself. Take care! Jesus says that this caste is a den of vipers and acting actors: we must never confuse the work of the wearing out structures of power as the work of the people.
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Christians do not need buildings either for religion (Acts 7:48) or to house managerial hierarchical bodies, which among other things would absorb a lot of staff and almost all the income destined for the poor (nowadays the amount absorbed by the structures of the Institutions thus organized, even in the civil field, are around 80-85% of their total income – ed.).
The apostles indeed proclaim: “By being united with the Lord, living stone, we too (that is, Jesus’ followers) are kept busy as living stones for the construction of a spiritual edifice” and “We are the temple of the God of Life”.
The early Christians build a new, living structure: the structure of the community authority, a cathedral of living stones, which makes the whole community suitable for approving or rejecting everything that concerns the community itself.
In fact, to indicate each Christian community, Paul always uses the term “ekklêsia”, which in ancient Greek means the meeting of the people gathered (dêmos) to decide on the needs of the city. It has no other meanings.
The theologian José Comblin confirms: “Ekklêsia must be translated precisely as democracy, where everyone is equal, everyone can speak, everyone can take part in the decisions taken by the community, without leaders who command. It is the advent of freedom, the nucleus of a new people, of a new humanity. Communities do not come together to celebrate a cult, to practice a religion, but to live mutual love in the brotherhood of a people of equals. Being together is the reason for these meetings”.
For these reasons, Christians do not need expensive stone or brick cathedrals (which take away a lot of money from the communion of goods), on the other hand they can meet anywhere.
They are not venerated marble statues or effigies of wood or other material, Christians live in love for each other, not for the effigies.
In the “New Testament” the oath is severely condemned (also the “vow” is a solemn oath): “Even if it regards heaven or earth, it comes from evil”, Jesus repeats several times. According to him, social evil is the power that subdues.
It is considered foolish to dedicate some periods of the calendar to the feast and others to penance: God is the God of Life, that which is lived in mutual love and love for others, in the small and great things of each day.
Christians love the nation of others as their own and do not feel they belong to a particular nation, but to the “kingdom of love”, where mutual love and equality in decisions are in force (it is royal dignity).
The rules, the laws, the institutions are to favor man and not in order that man is subject to the rules or laws established by power: “Saturday is made for man, not man for Saturday”. Respect for man, whoever he is, is of primary value, it is more important than precepts and traditions. Love of neighbor overcomes the rules.
The institution of repudiation, inhumane against women, is also contested.
God is the fullness of Love. Christians need neither sacrifices nor priests. It is foolish to offer the best things to God, as if he needs them: He himself supplies them to those who believe they are offering them to Him!
God does not need men representing him (that is to say, the clergy, so much so that the high priests of Jerusalem, sensing a serious danger to their power in the Nazarene, seek every slanderous foothold to have him condemned to death), but he lives in all hearts.
Jesus summarizes every priestly role with self-sacrifice and therefore invests all his followers with the priesthood, that is, with the dignity of doing right things in mutual love, a dignity that Paul now calls “regal”.
Christians find themselves together as much as possible in both public and private places, they live in houses like those of others, they marry like anyone, they have only one spouse – that is, bigamy is excluded, even if understood as concubinage – they generate children and they do not beat them or abandon babies (“Whatever you do to a child, this is done to me”). All break bread in their homes during dinner, the normal meal of each of us, in memory of Jesus, united in mutual love, which generates a new atmosphere: Love present in the midst of people and joy in the heart.
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NOTE: The bread, once eaten and digested, becomes the body that nourishes, that is, it identifies itself with the person who eats it. We, during the dinner together with the others (as in the “last supper” with Jesus), when we break the bread to nourish ourselves, remember that we too have to identify with Jesus, so that we love one another as he loves us: this fraternal atmosphere generates the presence of Love and brings joy.
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THE SOCIAL SYSTEM
From the analysis of the social system carried out by the early Christians in accordance with the teaching of Jesus, we discover the amazing relationship, and shocking for power, that exists between democracy and Christianity.
Mary, and here we see the greatness of the social message launched by this woman, a true revolutionary, she declares (from the “Magnificat” of the Luke’s Gospel):
“God, the full Authority of Love, …
disperses those who consider themselves superior,
overthrows the mighty from their seats,
raises those considered last,
fills the needy with goods,
sends the rich away empty-handed”.
Her son achieves all this through the (non-hierarchical) communities initiated by him or by the apostles or his followers: in what way?
How does he disperse those who consider themselves superior?
Since we are all brothers, all equal, and the new way of life – which summarizes the laws and the prophets – is mutual love, there is automatically no place for those who consider themselves superior to others, for those who want to discriminate against people or groups.
In equality and in mutual love there is neither Jew nor foreigner, neither free nor slave, neither male nor female, neither adult nor child, neither white nor black, neither educated nor illiterate, neither healthy nor sick, neither married nor eunuch, neither rich nor poor, neither beautiful nor ugly, neither practicing nor not observant.
We all participate in the same Life brought by Jesus, in diversity, which becomes a gift for one another: “Do not be superiors (either as individuals or as an institution), since only one is your superior, God, full Authority of Love, and you are all brothers”, reveals Jesus.
How does he overthrow the mighty and raise the last up?
A social system is created where all members of the community make decisions concerning the community itself (it is the institutionalized structure of the authority of the community) and directly elect the most suitable people for the various tasks. The presbyters have the function of making such a life grow, they do not decide for others, it is pure service, so Peter is the “stone” on which the community is built and grows, that is, he is the authority (in the etymological sense of the term).
In this way he has no possibility of taking root the individual or the group that wants to decide for the community and at the same time even the “last” can decide on a equal footing on what concerns everyone, including them.
It is the CRUCIAL POINT! In fact, Jesus is opposed to any form of hierarchical power and proclaims: “The leaders of the nations, you know, decide on them and the great exercise power over them, these must NOT be among you”.
But then we could ask ourselves: if there should be no leaders or superiors, who is the one that decides?
“In truth I tell you, Jesus replies, EVERYTHING that the community gathered together approves on earth is also approved in heaven and EVERYTHING that it rejects on earth is also rejected in heaven” (in modern terms it is direct “political” democracy, with decisions taken by everyone in real time).
It is the realization of the words of Jesus: “The last are first”.
Confirms the “Letter to Diognetus”, a document of the 1st-2nd century AD extremely interesting: “Christians testify to an admirable system of social life”.
How does he fill the needy with goods and send the rich away empty-handed?
The members of the community continue to carry out their work and their activities and make a part of the proceeds or assets available directly (through specially elected representatives by the whole community together, which also controls their effectiveness), giving to those who find in poverty the possibility of starting a job, even on their own: almost everyone can return the money with their resulting earnings; interest rates are not demanded. Those who already work, but have insufficient or no wages, are given a decent wage. Everyone is given the possibility of having a common table.
Those who do not want to work are not benefited from the canteen and the communion of goods. There is no collectivization of property or work: money and assets DO NOT pass through a hierarchical body that manages them at its own discretion.
With this solution, the multitude is one heart and one soul and there are no needy ones among them (in modern terms it is direct “economic” democracy). In the event of serious economic difficulties for the community of a territory, the others share their surplus with it.
It is the solution of social problems: “Christians testify – we repeat – to an admirable system of social life”.
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NOTE: Why CRUCIAL POINT? The social system brought by the Nazarene and Mary is the one that most frightens those who hold the levers of power in their hands: where it is implemented, it automatically crumbles the aberrant structures created by the powerful, that is, overthrows their “seats” or “thrones” or “armchairs”, not with weapons and bloody actions, but with the validity and goodness of its own realizations and with the nonviolent rejection of the oligarchic centralizing institution of power (which is a “den of vipers”, seat of “acting actors” and “whitewashed sepulchers”, “corrupt generation”, according to what Jesus claims).
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RISE! IT IS TIME TO ASSERT YOURSELVES
From this testimony of social life spring the well-known “Beatitudes”, which are indeed a vibrant exhortation of the Master to develop, with firmness, the values that people have in order to reach the fullness of time, to concretize the authority of the Love and Equality.
In fact, power prevents socially valid values from spreading; if it fails, it tries to harness them in its hierarchical structure, making them practically ineffective or null.
Hence the need for the Sermon on the Mount, addressed by Jesus to his followers in front of a crowd of thousands of people who go there to listen to him: let’s realize his message and NOW (on this Earth) social problems are solved.
Rise! It’s time to assert yourselves, You, who are poor, because you have the way to realize the community of Love and solidarity.
Rise! It’s time to assert yourselves, You, who suffer from hunger, because you have a way to achieve social justice.
Rise! It’s time to assert yourselves, You, who are exploited and submissive, because you have the way to realize freedom.
Rise! It’s time to assert yourselves, You, who build peace among men, because you have the way to be recognized as an expression of Love.
Rise! It’s time to assert yourselves, You, who have understanding towards others, because you have the way to realize a new world, the realm of tolerance.
Rise! It’s time to assert yourselves, You, who have a heart without attachments or conditioning or double ends, because you have the way of life being Love.
Rise! It’s time to assert yourselves, You, who are the last, because you have the way to create the structure of equality.
Rise! It’s time to assert yourselves, You, who are persecuted, insulted, chased away, derided, hated due to the fulfilments of my message, because you have the way to create a new society.
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The Master invites us to speak of the realizations that spring from his message at every crossroads, to the crowds, everywhere. The Life that Christianity brings is communion, since it includes in itself a FORMIDABLE INSTRUMENT: decisions are taken together by the whole community and this obviously does not want either oppression or indigence within it.
For the Nazarene and the early Christians, evil in the social field is power of every kind, economic, political, religious, etc., with the ensuing submission and injustices: “Come to me, you who are humiliated by fatigue and oppressed (because of the wearing out structures of power), I bring you liberation from it, I bring you salvation”.
Jesus affirms to come for the afflicted with the evil of subjugation, not for the self-satisfied rich, and he offers them a new medicine, the authority of the community, which allows them to be healed.
He thus transforms pain into love, so we too can transform pain into love: “Have confidence, I win the power of the world!”.
In those times, and subsequently, to implement the democracy brought by Jesus means for Christians to be crucified.
And for this reason of life, for this social and individual freedom, for the realization of Justice, Peace and Democracy, the early Christians suffer like him persecution and death penalty on the part of hierarchical superiors and the powerful, who consider all this to be serious and very worrying to themselves.
But by this we are recognized as his disciples, it is the badge of recognition of his followers: if, risking to take the cross with which the power wants to penalize us, we carry out the system of social life brought by the Master.
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PERSECUTIONS AGAINST CHRISTIANS
Jesus is the main victim, the most illustrious trophy of the death penalty imposed by power.
The leaders of religion consider him a serious case, therefore they accuse him of impiety and hand him over, invoking the torture of the cross, to the secular power.
This in turn, having no valid reasons on the basis of Roman law, tries and condemns him for… aspiration to power, accusing him of wanting to crown himself king: he who always fights against the caste of superiors and their order!
His followers, the Christians, are persecuted first by the Jewish religious leaders and later by the Roman political leaders.
It should be noted that we do not write “by the people”, but “by the leaders”, since only these and their collaborators consider them a danger to the hierarchical institutions.
If the followers of Jesus do not make an act of veneration to the supreme heads, they must be eliminated, defining them for the occasion as “impious”, “atheists” or, later, “heretics”; in other words, individuals in any case dangerous, as they do not conform to the doctrines of dominion, indeed they overcome them by carrying out the message.
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Jesus’ murder.
The prefect of Palestine, Pontius Pilate, representative of the Roman emperor, would not want to condemn the Nazarene because, on the basis of the information received from his informers (and his wife), he considers him a righteous one, delivered to him only for local religious quarrels and above all by the rancor of the high priests. These in fact want to take revenge on Jesus who defines them as a den of vipers, reciting hypocrites, a corrupt generation and because it creates a society without superiors, where decisions belong to the whole community together, since men are brothers, equal, with the same rights, children of the one God. He therefore has a great following among the people, many believe him to be the Messiah, and there is the danger that the people will proclaim him king of the Jews, so that he will be freed from the domination of Rome: in this case the very powerful war-machine of the empire would intervene, carrying out a frightful massacre both of the Jews and of their leaders, so it is better that only one man dies than many.
“He does not want leaders who exercise their power and decide for everyone. What does he mean by this? It means that he wants to be the head, he wants to proclaim himself the king of the Jews, and many of the mob already acclaim him as such! But we already have our king, he is Emperor Tiberius, and if you, Pontius Pilate, do not condemn him to death, we accuse you in Rome before Caesar of freeing a subversive who wants to usurp his throne here in Palestine”.
Pilate must now condemn the Master “for reasons of state”, or more precisely for not having big trouble. Nevertheless, he plays one last card to save him: he restores the custom of freeing a prisoner, chosen by the crowd, on the occasion of the Easter feast.
The high leaders of the clergy immediately make the temple guards and all their hired employees unleash to the open space in front of the courthouse, thus completely occupying the courtyard of the palace – containing about 200 people – to stir up and yell at the top of their voices, incessantly, that Barabbas, a Jewish partisan, is free and Jesus crucified.
The prefect at this point washes his hands [but does not end it there with the high priests] and immediately has the Nazarene lead to the scaffold for having proclaimed himself … king of the Jews (Rome establishes the penalty of crucifixion for subversives against the empire and for slaves seeking to free themselves). Luke the Evangelist confirms in this regard: “The high priests and our leaders hand him over to be sentenced to death, and then crucify him”.
Along the way and on Calvary, Jesus is mocked by all the leaders of the clergy and by some of the soldiers present, never by the people!
The above on Pilate, according to the canonical gospels, but is not confirmed by historians. In fact, the Jewish philosopher Philo of Alexandria (20 BC-50 AD) describes Pontius Pilate to Emperor Caligula as follows: “A corrupt tyrant, greedy and insensitive to the reasons of justice. Pride, arrogancy and insolence is his rule… under him people are killed without respect for any law”.
Even the historian Josephus Flavius (37-103 AD) speaks of him in a negative way, as a brutal leader and devoid of any understanding regarding the Jewish religion.
Indeed Jesus, after being handed over to the Roman prefect under the false accusation of declaring himself king of the Jews, is immediately condemned to death, tortured and, to mock him, a crown of thorns driven into his head. In order to mock him even more, Pilate has the following written motivation place on the wood: “THIS IS JESUS, THE KING OF THE JEWS” (according to Jewish tradition the Christ, that is the Messiah, would become king, so Jesus, being condemned to death, is a failed Messiah, a fake Christ). At nine in the morning Jesus is already nailed to the cross amidst terrible pains and dies 6 hours later.
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Can the reason for so much fury be explained by the fact that they worship their God? No, not at all! Their God is the same as that of the Jews, whereas the Romans worship over four hundred, and one more or one less has no relevance for them.
In Rome neither Jews nor Christians sacrifice to the emperor, but only the latter from Nero onwards are frequently persecuted. The Jews, even before Nero, were allowed to worship their only God throughout the empire and were granted exemption from attending the games held in honor of the divine emperor; at times they suffer some repression or are temporarily expelled from Rome following riots, whereas Christians are condemned to mass genocide by various monarchs.
The god (of the powerful) is only the juridical reason, the moral excuse, to accuse those who follow Jesus of being dangerous atheists or perverters. The principles (or princes) of death are opposed to the God of life; the god of power and of superiors is opposed to the God of mutual love and of the last.
The early Christians accept diversity of function in their communities, an expression of equality, NEVER accept hierarchical diversity, an expression of submission.
Emperor Diocletian unleashes one of the most violent and systematic persecutions against them (to be sure of annihilating them all he also kills non-Christian Jews), being rightly convinced that the Nazarene’s message undermines the empire structure itself.
In fact, Jesus evaluates the hierarchical institution as completely negative, which is based on a superior/inferior organization, whereas he arouses communities with structures of authority, based on equality, suitable for the growth of people, where the ultimate decision is for everyone, even for the last: “The heads of nations, you know, decide over them and the “superiors” exercise power over them; among you it must NOT be like this, but THE SERVANT IS THE SUPERIOR FOR YOU, THE LAST SLAVE IS THE CHIEF FOR YOU”, he explicitly declares.
This concretized Truth, this Freedom, cannot be accepted by the powerful of the “world”, they are Romans or Jews or self-styled Christians or whatever.
On the other hand, the population is fascinated by the beauty of being one in Love and discovers that a social structure freed from the “powerful”, where everyone is really equal, and for this reason everyone makes decisions together, generates a system of peace, of sharing, of authentic justice, of freedom, of unity, of understanding, of great collaboration, of the manifestation of talents and charisms, of responsible maturity, of progress.
It is all being one big family, it is realizing universal brotherhood, which, without the communion of decisions in the climate of mutual love, it is not possible to achieve.
And the multitude of believers increases more and more.
The “Magnificat” is the social message of Christianity (with a modern term we could speak of “direct authority of the people” – editor’s note): when Luke reports in the Gospel the announcement spread by Mary, various communities of Christians are already established both in Palestine and in many other nations, showing that the “Beatitudes” correspond to the truth and are practicable.
Hence the persecutions: first carried out by the high priests of Jerusalem, then by the high heads of the empire of Rome and then by subsequent ones.
In reality, the nonviolent revolution initiated by Mary frightens the “superiors” of all times, who try in every way to crush it or put it on the back burner: it is not for nothing that the King of France Philip the Fair forbids the reading of the “Magnificat” in his kingdom.
This revolution, however, does not end, it continues even today to improve every population, mainly the secular one, in the most unexpected ways.
In the socio-political field, one effect of this ferment is the democratic achievements of the last few centuries, unimaginable in countries or organizations that still do not receive the social message transmitted by Jesus.
CHRISTIANITY AND RELIGION
Christianity is not a religion, understood in the classical sense – generally characterized by rules or precepts, ceremonies and symbols, formal rites, sacrifices and constraints, observance of calendar periods, individual sublimations, long prayers, pious practices on schedule, veneration of institutionalized people or images – but it is normal, concrete, everyday life, realized people in a relationship of Love being Love, a community experience between brothers, as equals, in spiritual and social freedom, without individual or social discrimination.
We can say that original Christianity is the religion of Love, which everyone can live: Jews or pagans, white or black, citizens of our country or of other countries.
Not those who accomplish external fulfillments or recite long formulas, that is, not those who say “Lord, Lord!”, but who is love, who realizes the original message of Jesus, does the will of God.
Life according to the Spirit is replaced by power with religion made up of rules, ritual acts and traditions, but that life is real, natural, free, it cannot be transplanted into old hierarchical structures, as it would be denatured, and the original spirit of Jesus would be suffocated by them: “You cannot put new wine in old wineskins, otherwise these won’t hold up and the wine is lost; the new wine must be put in new wineskins and thus both are maintained”.
Jesus vehemently lashes out against the groups of power, calling them hypocrites, acting actors, when they want to make others believe, even by imposing it, that their rules, structures, unjust or infamous acts are good and come from God. He condemns sin against the Spirit, without any possibility of forgiveness, that is, when they make the inspirations, actions, relationships or structures that come from the Truth of God Love believe perverse, even prohibiting or preventing these things from having a sequel.
CHRISTIANITY AND STRUCTURES
On the basis of what is illustrated so far, we can affirm that the realization of Christian socio-political structures in a state or in an area is not creating a state religion, it is not imposing mandatory baptism, it is not founding hierarchical organisms or building material temples, it is not exposition of effigies, but it is, and is an essential condition, to make it possible in a complete way that socio-political decisions, of any kind, are taken by all citizens, as a community, in a binding manner, without discrimination against anyone, whatever their class, race, marital status, sex, religion, political party, income, level of education, etc. It is making possible an equitable distribution of the wealth produced, it is creating the structures for a complete democracy by direct decision.
It should be emphasized that Jesus is historically the first to advocate a new democracy, both political and economic, by community decision, where all are equal (all being children of the one Father) and protagonists in variety, and to reveal moreover that the essence of the new life is mutual love, which generates unity among people (the main religions of the earth, to this day, arrive at the maximum to conceive love for others, none mutual love).
The two realities are one effect of the other and are the sign of identification of Christians: in fact, Jesus recognizes as his followers those who live mutual love and who are ready to give their lives for this reality, in order not to deny it, in order not to build structures of power or not to have collusion with it. The domination of the “superiors” and the hatred indeed, generated by the intolerance of the powerful, could persecute them, considering them serious cases, to the point of inflicting on them capital punishment.
On the other hand, Jesus and the apostles continually condemn oaths, vows, obedience to people, since in a system of direct democracy, such as that created by the early Christians, obeying a group or a leader makes no sense, only the decisions taken by the whole community are valid (in which there must be no hierarchical structures) and which for this reason are the decisions of heaven itself.
This means that the will of the community as a whole is identified with the will of God: the rest is a restriction or a danger for people and for the democracy revealed by Jesus.
It should be emphasized that the Nazarene, with his “Give to Caesar what belongs to Caesar, give to God what belongs to God”, is also historically the first to support the separation between the State and the religious sphere. At the time of Jesus this constitutes a serious heresy.
“If someone gives you a slap on the right cheek, offer him the other too …”. This sentence of Jesus could make it seem that he wants submissive and “good” people, almost resigned, instead it is a real social revolution to face the violence, brutality, and consequently the privileges, exploitation and excessive power, which the domination of certain leaders and powerful people of all sorts exercise against populations or minorities or individuals.
Incidentally, we remember that Gandhi understands this well: the Indians respond to the beatings of the colonizers with non-violence, that is, with the refusal to use violence as a political struggle, even when brutal means are used against them; in this way the oppressive incivility of power is highlighted.
Non-violence, says the Mahatma, must not be passive but active, provocative, against the unjust rules and norms, we carry out civil disobedience, so that the often violent reaction of those who say (or believe) that they belong to a superior civilization, it shows their bestiality and anti-democratic nature instead. Eventually, after years of non-violent struggle, Gandhi negotiates and gains independence for India.
Jesus too applies active non-violence. Out of respect for the Truth, he denounces the malfeasance of power, in particular of the religious one, calling this nest of vipers, corrupt generation, hypocrites, whitewashed tombs (the two high priests of Jerusalem are both dressed in white). Power responds with the brutality and infamy of the death sentence and with the handing over to the executioners of the Just One.
Subsequently the Christians, who follow him, are persecuted and sentenced to capital punishment in the circuses of the empire, where they face death singing united in mutual love and forgiving their killers.
Jesus has many women in his following, something unheard of for Palestine at that time: it is the first time that a Master has had female disciples. They have functional positions in all Christian communities.
The Master brings a new vision of children, until then socially considered nothing. He hugs them and caresses them when they want to drive them away: “Whatever you do to a child, you do it to me” and “The kingdom of God belongs to those who are like them”.
In fact, the early Christians do not beat their children, whether they are male or female, but educate them since childhood in Love. This is of the utmost importance. Whoever does not love or respect the little ones does not realize the fullness of time.
In those days, decisions in Palestine were made by the great priests. With the “royal priesthood” extended by Jesus to every member, all are priests, all have the royal dignity, all are sovereigns, therefore decisions are made by all, even by the last, by the inferior, by the slaves, as equals: and this constitutes a serious heresy.
Even those who perform functions are elected by the whole community, never from the top: Jesus in fact identifies himself with the community as a whole or with each person considered inferior, never with hierarchical superiors or with an institution or a religious doctrine.
We conclude with a reflection on Paul. The apostle understands that Jesus’ message is for all human beings, not just for Jews. In the interpersonal relationship, the essence is mutual love, which can also be experienced with a pagan, with a Samaritan, with a foreigner, with an atheist, etc., if these correspond. If I love, if you love, if you, Samaritan, love a Jew, if you, Jew, love a pagan, if you, Roman, love a barbarian, and so on, and the other does the same towards you, unity is generated.
It can be experienced by all peoples of the world. We could express it with a slogan: “all for all”.
Likewise, in the social field, decisions concerning the community must be taken, on everything, by all interested parties, be they Jews or non-Jews, Greeks or Egyptians, etc., since we are all equal in diversity, all children of the one God: it is equality, it is the original democratic message, an irreplaceable premise for universal brotherhood.
It can be achieved by all peoples of the world. We could express it with a slogan: “everybody for everything”.
In modern terms, the community structures generated by the message of Jesus and the “Magnificat” of Mary are called “universal suffrage” and “direct sovereignty of the people”.
Because of the fact that it prevents the realization of the above, the “evil” in the social field, Jesus reiterates, is power with its supreme leaders: “The leaders of nations, you know, decide on them and the powerful exercise their dominion on them; there must be no such structures among you”.
Authority comes from God, power with its top-down structure is the symptom of the antichrist, even worse if it operates in the name of a god. The apostle Paul proclaims: “When all structures of power and forms of domination are annihilated and, last, even physical death is defeated, we have the fullness of time”.
Various passages of the bible speak of God who gives every human being the freedom to decide, a characteristic of laicality. The oligarchic and centralizing power, political, economic or religious, always opposes the freedom of individuals to decide. The freedom to decide allows for a great development of society, but it can also lead to individualism and the dominance of the strongest.
Jesus creates communities where everyone’s freedom to decide can also be expressed together with all the other members of the community, with immediate executive effect, giving life to a new reality of immense social value: direct democracy. With Jesus we pass from the democracy of the “upper classes” of ancient Greece to the democracy of the last, of all.
He confirms the aforementioned letter to Diognetus: “The Christians bear witness to a wonderful system of social life”.
As the will of God is done in heaven, so the will of the whole community may be done on earth. The two wills are identical. When we pray “Our Father” we can draw a parallel: “Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven” and “In truth I tell you, everything that the community all together approves on earth is also approved in heaven”.
For these words we are socially reborn, by the authority of the people, so that now we can make happen and live it in the world.
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Editor’s note: – All peoples have the freedom to make common decisions. Socio-political decisions that are today a privilege of a few, may one day be the right of all citizens together.
Mutual love: love and you understand it.
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“OUR FATHER”
To the apostles who ask him how to pray, Jesus replies not to act like the Pharisees who recite long prayers, consisting of a sequence of words, even repetitive.
In practice we would like to give this parade of words almost a magical power that should produce graces or miracles, but which generally produces almost nothing.
For Jesus, prayer is the conversation in unity with God-Love and it is the communication of Christians with one another and with others on what is experienced in living the word of the Lord.
Therefore “Our Father” is a synthetic exposition of the experiences that Christians have in living the message of the Master. Jesus speaks to his followers of thanksgiving to God for what they can do admirable in practical life.
“You are our Dad, and you are the fullness of Love. May all be one, Dad, like we are one.
We thank you because this makes us love and live mutual love among us, which makes us brothers and brings joy, and therefore it makes us have you present in our midst, here on Earth.
We thank you because, united in love, we can all together express and implement the will of the community on common needs, and we learn that this will coincides with yours, realizing equality and universal fraternity.
We thank you because all this allows everyone to have their own daily food, we can all work and have a decent wage. The last, the poor, the marginalized, the migrants, the sick are seen by us as Jesus himself, there are no longer those in need among us, and in this way we realize social justice.
We thank you that you forgive our shortcomings as we forgive those who commit shortcomings towards us, and we can realize the realm of tolerance.
We thank you because you do not make us fall into the temptations of wanting structures of power or wealth reserved for a few (the temptations of the desert – ed.), and thus you set us free from the social evil of submission and exploitation
These experiences that they live, Christians share in encounters with one another and with others. The multitude of believers is one heart and one soul and among them there are no longer the poor. Many pagans and members of other religions, seeing how they love one another, believe them, and Christians, for the testimony they offer of Jesus’ message and for their admirable social structure, are multiplying every day.
This is how early Christians solve social problems. It is a real revolution!
THE ESSENCE OF THE SOCIAL MESSAGE
Jesus wants to change the world and to carry out two fundamental pillars, generated by faith in God our Dad, full authority of Love:
1) Mutual love.
The first step to experiencing mutual love is to get to know one another.
Loving means to give without asking for anything in return. Jesus states: “Whatever you do to the (socially) last, you do it to me. By this you are recognized as my benefactors: I am hungry and you feed me, I am sick and you cure me, I am a migrant and you welcome me, I am marginalized and you accept me …”.
If I love the other, in particular the least considered and the neighbor, with a “pure” love, which means without attachments, without even wanting his conversion or his change, if I make the emptiness inside me to be only love for the other, then it is not I who act, but it is love; and the other perceives love.
And if the other reciprocates, a different relationship is born, a new life, A NEW REALITY: it is mutual Love, whereby one becomes one, it is unity. “This is how you are recognized as my followers”.
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NOTE: Similarly, in chemistry two elements can join together to generate a new substance: for example, hydrogen and oxygen, which are two very different gases, under certain conditions merge with each other, becoming water, a liquid with completely new characteristics.
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It is the word of Jesus that is fulfilled and attracts people.
To be Christian is to live by being love, mutual love and towards the last, it is not saying “Lord”, “Lord” – these are the words of Jesus – it is not saying prayers for hours or whipping one’s body, it is not practicing ideologies of power or giving primary importance to organizations or superiors, is not following formal devotions or an abstract doctrine, it is not believing in prefabricated material beliefs.
Recognizing God of Love is living mutual love in the relationships of people among themselves, which makes people grow.
2) The authority of the people.
Recognizing God our Dad means recognizing ourselves as brothers, equal, beyond the cultural, political, religious beliefs or habits of each one, for which every important decision is taken in common, on an equal footing, by institution. From this bond, accepted a priori, an irreplaceable social system is born, A NEW REALITY: it is the Authority of the people, which makes the community grow, which “makes the multitude be one heart and one soul“.
It is the message of Jesus that is fulfilled and attracts the multitude.
It is the universal brotherhood that makes us all one. It is an innovating and transforming force of society like no other model, which makes the community grow. Only one thing is necessary: the vital institution of the authority of the people, in which “the others” can also participate. The authority of the people is a Body, whose vivifying spirit is mutual love.
They are the Christian roots: these two basic values, fully understandable by all the peoples of the earth, are the precious pearl that, in order to possess it, it is better to lose everything that the power of the leaders gives us. Many of these persecute the implementers of the community message and “if you take up the cross for this, you are recognized as my followers”.
Nowadays various theories or groups (with beautiful purposes) try to bring to power some people who would know how to lift populations out of poverty, exploitation, the abuses of power with their own decisions.
The few who manage to impose themselves can bring, with some exceptions, partial results, sometimes not shared, sometimes temporary.
In any case, the populations always remain at the mercy of or depend on the approval of someone, albeit paternal.
Jesus goes further: he does not entrust the decision of social problems to a few, even if they are well disposed or paternal, but gives the power to decide for the community to ALL the members of the community itself, which lead to unparalleled results and a flourishing of activities.
It is a revolution: everyone is invested with sovereignty and the decisions taken together are the most suitable and the most shared, they are the ones that “Heaven wants”.
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SYNTHETIC TABLE OF THE NEW MESSAGE
Table 1 schematically shows the main basic points of the great novelty transmitted by the message of Jesus, which marks a turning point for humanity.
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TABLE 1 – Basic points of Christianity
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Basic point: the relationship of the individual with ideology.
God is our Dad, the full Authority of Love.
God comes alongside man.
Love which is life, is light.
Love now in the present moment,
to be first to love,
to love those who are against us,
to be love, to transform pain into love.
Basic point: the relationship of people to one another.
Mutual love, which creates unity between people, and brings joy to their hearts and the development of personality.
Jesus identifies himself in the relationship of mutual love that exists between several people, when they are ready to love one another (even to the point of giving their lives for one another) and therefore also to create a void within themselves to be only love, without attachment, towards the other, as he is.
This generates Love in their midst, and this Love operates and conquers people.
Love each neighbor.
The followers are all called saints because they live love.
Jesus identifies with the socially last: he values children and women, the exploited, the poor, the sick, the marginalized, the persecuted by unjust power.
Basic point: the community relationship.
We are all brothers, therefore all with equal rights;
the decisions are up to the whole community together, both to the free and the slaves, on everything: this generates union in diversity, peace, collaboration, social justice, equal distribution of wealth, solidarity, freedom, tolerance, progress, generalized well-being.
The persons in charge of the various tasks (presbyters, deacons, etc.) are also elected by the community.
Each one makes available the goods he deems to give, with the proceeds the needy can work and/or have a decent wage; those who do not want to work do not benefit from the canteen.
Jesus identifies with the whole community united in love, where all are equal in diversity.
Everything that the whole community decides together is an expression of God’s will: it has immense value, it is the greatest expression of human dignity.
He declares that he does not want either bosses or superiors, social evil is power over others, that is, the hierarchical social structure = superior/inferior beings and consequently with unequal rights, that is, privileges for a few and discrimination for many.
Authority makes others grow and progress, it does not exercise the power that subjugates others.
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ANNEX
DOCUMENTS OF THE 1st AND 2nd CENTURY AD
WE REPORT SOME OF THE MANY PASSAGES OF THE WRITINGS OF THE 1st AND 2nd CENTURY AD, WHERE THE EXPERIENCES OF THE EARLY CHRISTIAN COMMUNITIES BASED ON THE MESSAGE OF JESUS ARE DESCRIBED, WHICH OPERATE A DEMOCRATIC REVOLUTION WITH RESPECT TO THE STRUCTURES AND MODELS OF ORGANIZATIONS.
From “Acts of the Apostles” (6.2-6).
“Then the apostles convene the community and say: it is not right that we neglect to spread the word of God in order to serve the tables. Choose therefore among yourselves, brothers, seven men of good reputation, full of spirit and wisdom, to whom you will entrust this task. … All the members of the community accept this proposal and elect Stephen, Philip, Procoro, Nicanore, Timone, Parmenas and Nicola, a Christian from Antioch. They then present them to the apostles who, in union with God-Love, lay their hands on them”.
[Note: In modern terms it is the realization of universal suffrage for the election of those who must perform a specific function, in this case for the election of deacons in the community of Jerusalem; the result is then ratified by the apostles].
A further example is offered by the following letter from Ignatius (late 1st century AD) to Polycarp, a presbyter, mainstay of Smyrna, at the point where he speaks of the need for a courier to deliver a message to a Syrian community.
“It is good, Polycarp, that you gather the whole community of the faithful in Smyrna, so that they elect a person of their trust and diligence, who may well be called the courier of God, who is entrusted with the task of going to Syria …”.
A similar episode is reported in Acts (15.22) for the election of two messenger in Jerusalem, in the year 48 AD.
“Then the apostles, the presbyters and the whole community decide to elect some of them and send them to Antioch together with Paul and Barnabas: Barsabbas and Silas are elected, men held in great esteem among the brothers …”.
From the Gospel according to Matthew (18.17-18).
“If your brother commits a fault, go and warn him between you and him alone;
… If he doesn’t listen to you, take one or two people with you, … if he doesn’t listen to them either, tell the whole community together; if he does not even listen to the community, let him be like a pagan.
In truth I tell you: everything that (the members of the community all together) approve on earth is also approved in heaven and everything that they do not approve on earth is not approved even in heaven”.
[Note: in modern terms it is the realization of the authority of people, who have the final decision].
And Jesus continues: “Truly I also tell you that if two (whoever) of you agree on earth to ask for anything, my Father who is in heaven grants it to you, for where two or more are united in my name (in the mutual love), I am among them”.
The modality of substitution of the ex-apostle Judas is interesting (Acts 1.15-26).
“In those days Peter stands up in the middle of the assembly of the brothers – there are about one hundred and twenty people gathered – and says:” Brothers, … it is necessary that among those who are always close to us for the whole time of Jesus’ life, … one of them becomes a witness with us of the new life by being love”. The members of the assembly designate two, Giuseppe and Mattia. … They then draw lots between the two (second ballot) which falls on Matthias, who is associated with the eleven apostles” (the draw is also in Greek democracy – ed.).
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OTHER WRITINGS OF THAT PERIOD.
We report two passages from the “Didache”, a document of which the first five chapters are written by a Christian of the first century; the remaining chapters are probably added since the 4th century.
“(Jesus’ followers) do not raise their hand either on their sons or on their daughters, but since childhood they educate them in love”.
“(The followers of the consuming power) are lovers of vain things, greedy for malversations, exploiters of the poor, intolerant of those who are oppressed.”
Finally, here is a passage taken from the letter “to Diognetus”, a beautiful attestation of Greek literature on the concrete daily life of early Christians, whose first five chapters are written by a follower between 70 and 150 AD at the time of the first persecutions; here too the following chapters are probably added since the 4th century.
“Christians are not distinguished from other human beings either by territory, or by language, or by customs. In fact, they do not live in their own cities, they do not speak their own language different from other languages, they do not lead a particular kind of life.
Their faith is not in the observance of precepts, dictated by people, which are based on multiple formal rites, nor is it in adhering to a philosophical doctrine of certain men, as others do.
They live in Greek or barbarian cities, as happens to everyone, and adapt to local customs in clothing, food and other things, testifying to an admirable and undoubtedly unusual system of social life.
They live in their homeland, but as strangers, they participate in everything as citizens and are not attached to anything as if they are foreigners. Each other’s homeland is their homeland and every homeland is as if not their own.
They marry like everyone else and have children, but they do not abandon their babies. They share the table, but not the bed.
They are in the midst of corruption, but they do not live by corruption. They reside here on earth, but the citizenship that distinguishes them is that of Love. They obey established laws and perform better with their lives than the laws themselves require.
They love everyone and are persecuted. The others know nothing about them and they are doomed. They suffer the death penalty and go back to life.
They are poor and they make many rich. They lack everything and have everything in abundance.
They are despised and in contempt they show the value of their message. They are outraged and thereby proclaimed righteous. They are insulted and speak well of others. They are mistreated and hold others in high regard. They do good and are punished as evildoers. They are executed and rejoice as if they receive life. They are opposed by the Jews and persecuted by the pagans and those who hate them would not know the reason for that hatred.
In conclusion, just as the soul is in the body, so are Christians on earth. The soul is diffused in all parts of the body, Christians are diffused in all the cities of the earth” … “And every day they multiply more”.
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CHAPTER 2 – PAGANISM
The Roman Empire and pagan religion.
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CONTENTS OF CHAPTER 2
Basic points of paganism.
The social system.
Synthetic table of paganism.
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Every system of power is based on an ideology that must justify its validity. This is, for example, the task of state religions, generally founded – by assimilating elements from pre-existing beliefs – by a strong political or military or cultural personality, which establishes or continues a sovereignty often of a despotic type. It happens that over time the power changes or adapts the ideology several times to legitimize its needs.
Let’s look at the basic points of a centralizing and absolute regime, like the Roman one, combining them with the creed of the current religion, paganism.
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BASIC POINTS OF PAGANISM
a) The individual in relation to ideology.
The hierarchical structure of the Roman empire, due to its immense power, is the center of everything. Everyone must be subjected to it, if required everyone must sacrifice themselves for it. The top of the structure is the emperor, who is a god.
With the empire, the phenomenon is accentuated that paganism, like all confessions of state, is the religion of power; it serves to keep people submissive with the fear of the gods, with formal rules, with the control that the high priests and their employees operate.
The pagan religion, with a purely individualistic spirituality, reveals that the gods dwell in their kingdom above the clouds, they do not send social messages in favor of the people, they are also organized in hierarchical order, and men must be subject to them, make sacrifices personal and offer them scrupulously better things to get their favors (“do ut des”).
We recall that since the beginning of their conquests, the ancient Romans have a great devotion to the gods: they consecrate the weapons they manufacture to them, obtaining swords of iron much more resistant than enemy swords and shields, which in battle break under the blows of the Romans. However, if these do not consecrate their weapons to the gods, the swords do not acquire greater hardness than the opposing weapons. It is a real, established fact.
Religion inculcates a dutiful devotion to pagan divinities, making them considered authors of the power of Rome.
What is the real reason?
During the religious ceremony, the newly fashioned short swords are inserted into the bodies of kids which are then burned on the wood fire as a sacrifice to the gods.
In this way a process of carburization is initiated, that is, the diffusion of carbon in the surface layer of the iron, transforming it into steel: hence the superior hardness of Roman swords.
Paganism concedes little to morality, but spreads devotion and religious discipline.
The cult of the Roman state is aimed at people-gods and is centered on the celestial triad or trinity, the greatest divinity, composed of three distinct gods: Jupiter, Juno and the virgin Minerva.
The best known rites are celebrated in the Capitoline temple, in which the three divine figures are worshiped in adjacent cells, with that of Jupiter in the center; this veneration is already present among the Etruscans (8th century BC). In Rome, the oldest sanctuary is the “capitolium vetus” on the Quirinale, which contains the triad in a single chapel.
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NOTE: Also in the religion of ancient Egypt the major deity is a trinity, composed of the gods Osiris, supreme head, resurrected after his death, Isis, his wife and sister, goddess of motherhood and love, Horus, their son, who incarnates each time on earth in Pharaoh.
Similarly, for the pagan religion the Roman emperor is a god who incarnated on earth. Since the 7th century even in the Far East the Japanese emperor is declared of divine origin, son of the sun god.
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There are also supplications and offerings to statues and material images, adored or venerated like the gods they depict (being inert they do not cause annoyance to the powerful), and with these acts the faithful feel comforted.
Sometimes the rumor spreads that some simulacrum emits tears or drops of blood or has moved; people come and the most naive or inexperienced believe it.
Even if the fact does not exist, the power often makes it to be considered truthful, because it is considered useful to reinvigorate the devotion among the people.
It is believed that the gods sometimes, for their own purposes, come down here into our world, taking on human or animal form.
The adoration, among other things, of a god, in turn the son of a god, who was incarnated on earth to manifest the divine will to men, is of Etruscan derivation since the 8th century BC.
They often make a well-known human personality become a divinity. Occasionally Jupiter and other gods make earthly women pregnant, giving birth to human children or demigods or other gods; every now and then some virgin goddess generates a child by remaining a virgin.
Religion considers atheists and sacrileges as enemies of power, for which they suffer exemplary punishment or capital punishment.
All the aforementioned elements are taken again by Constantine I, Roman Emperor and Pontifex Maximus of paganism, and his successors when, in the 4th century AD, they carry out a monumental restructuring of the religion. But it does not end there.
Certain priests (the augurs) perform divination in the course of elaborate ceremonies, interpreting the behavior of animals or natural phenomena as a manifestation of the will of the gods.
In charge of the organization of the pagan cult is the “pontifex maximus” of Rome: this office is assumed by the emperor himself, god made man, to whom one must sacrifice as an act of adoration (the veneration of power) and to whom miracles and healing of the sick, the blind and the crippled are attributed, especially whilst he is visiting a city.
When the emperor, god made man, dies, he rises again taking the appearance of a star that shines in the celestial vault.
Whoever does not make an act of devotion and subjection to the supreme head is condemned.
The cult of the personality, that is to say of those are in command, is much propagated: the leaders, like the gods, are mythologized, they must be considered superior beings, divine, abstract models and therefore unattainable, in order to better subdue the common people. People must feel annihilated in the face of such perfection, so that they cannot aspire to better positions, rather must be happy to remain submissive or at least must resign themselves to it.
Significant in this regard is the theory set out by the Greek philosopher Epictetus, courtier of the “god” Nero: “The universe is governed by divine reason, which is perfect; it follows that no one can know or change their own destiny. Man must stop fighting to achieve goals in this world and instead accept with serenity (meaning: with resignation) his own powerlessness in the face of fate”.
Another expression deemed necessary is therefore that of personal sacrifice, in order not to achieve personal goals in this world.
There is news of groups of pagan hermits, the “therapists”, quite widespread at the beginning of the empire, especially on the coasts of the Red Sea. They have frequent fasts and reserved lives, seek to arrive at mystical visions of divinity, and believe that it is a high value for women who reach old age remaining virgin.
Some groups also are influenced by Judaic beliefs with the celebration of a Jewish holiday and the observance of the Sabbath.
In Hierapolis, a city in Anatolia, there is a famous column on top of which pagan hermits go up, on which they remain uninterruptedly for a week, in order to establish a closer relationship with the divinity.
The vestals, chosen by the pontifex maximus at the age of 6-10 to be consecrated to the goddess Vesta for thirty years (practically for the entire fertile age), must always keep the sacred fire burning, symbol of the greatness of Rome, remaining physically virgins: whoever transgresses is buried alive.
They are held in high regard – the pagan leaders consider them the “ruby” of their religion – and places of honor are reserved for them in public events.
To ingratiate themselves with the favor of the gods, the vestals have to face, in the comfort of a golden semi-prison, two serious personal sacrifices: that of having to deny life to their children and that of macerating themselves in the control of the senses, if they do not want to die as described above.
Although virginity sometimes arouses a strange or morbid sense of amazement among the people, the Roman world attaches great importance to it and women who are in this condition cannot undergo the death sentence (since the 4th century AD the theme of physical virginity is strengthened following the mentioned restructuring of the religion, which began with Emperor Constantine I).
Pagan theology, better known as mythology, establishes that there are various divinities in a state of virginity, including Diana and the aforementioned Minerva, seat of wisdom.
In particular, Emperor Domitian (51 – 96 AD) professes a special veneration for the latter, going so far as to declare that he is the son of the virgin goddess and therefore a god himself.
Proponents of virginity are both philosophical currents, such as the Stoics and followers of gnosis, and pagan intellectuals of various kinds including Pliny (23 – 79 AD), who praises the chastity of elephants for the fact that they mate … only every two years. Certain Gnostic writings even exalt wives who reject, considering it abominable, the sexual approach with their husbands (by almost all pagan or primitive religions, and especially by them, very strong emphasis is placed on physical virginity and/or the immolation of children to divinity – ed.).
b) The relationship among people.
There are no particular behaviors beyond what is contemplated by the laws that regulate relationships among people.
Public events, even bloody shows and certain religious festivals are frequented, which can lead to excesses of drunkenness, sex or violence.
Under the empire, holidays become so numerous that they surpass working days.
Of extreme importance is the obedience of those who belong to a lower class towards those who are superior. Observance of religious precepts also constitutes an act of obedience to the state.
Leaders require solemn oaths to ensure uniformity to their will, that is, subjection to individuals or to the factual situation.
Certain pagan priests, called “bishops” – all employees of the pontifex maximus, that is to say of the Roman monarch – have the office of overseer (in Greek “epískopos”) of the territory of their competence, called “diocese” since the 3rd century.
Assisted by their collaborators (the clergy), they must check that people observe the religious formalities imposed: those who derogate are in serious danger and in the most serious cases risk capital punishment on charges of impiety or atheism.
c) The community relationship.
For theology the gods represent, each in a distinct way, the practical needs of daily life, some indeed very valid, of the social community. Numerous temples are dedicated to them.
Religion is based on a rigidly hierarchical structure composed, in order, of the pontifex maximus, monarchical bishops and clergy, and constitutes an excellent tool used by the Roman power for the subjugation of the people.
Over time, paganism empties a large part of its spirituality, tending more and more to identify itself with the cult of the person in power, so that, due to the maximum reliability of the system and greater personal prestige, the position of pontifex maximus is assumed by the emperor himself.
At this point at the top is the emperor, god incarnate on earth, omnipotent political, military, judicial, administrative and religious leader.
On the social scale there are then various classes with an increasingly reduced power, up to the mass of slaves who have none.
Women too are totally dependent first on their father and then on their husbands and cannot possess anything.
Respect for the hierarchy guarantees order, that is, subjection, and is defended by severe laws, which go as far as the confiscation of all assets and the death penalty.
The Roman peace that is achieved with the genocide of the rebel populations is well known: that is to say the peace of the cemeteries.
To the leaders go as much as possible of goods and riches.
The lower social classes show their malaise which at times turns into a riot, without however achieving concrete effects.
Power harshly represses any expression of equality, especially mindful of the “fearful message” launched by the gladiator Spartacus, and not only by him, who violently frees slaves, considering them human beings like everyone else.
Christianity is also fought or frowned upon, being the bearer of equality and democracy.
Manual or heavy labor is carried out exclusively by slaves, so much so that a well-known pagan scholar states that it is impossible in practice to eliminate slavery, since after that there would be no one left to use for work!
THE SOCIAL SYSTEM
Large land ownership (latifundium) is widespread, especially in favor of the senatorial aristocracy. The military class also has a very strong influence on the life of the empire. There is therefore the class of knights, made up of wealthy merchants and administrative officials. In the first two centuries, the average ones of traders and small landowners also developed; the less well-off enjoy relative well-being in this period. Without any right or almost, as already written, are the slaves, whose ranks are increased by prisoners of war, by criminals and finally by Christians.
The heavy bureaucracy of the government apparatus and the peculiar corruption of the high spheres of power still exert a weight on economic resources that over time becomes unsustainable. Towards the end of the 2nd century AD a crisis begins that worsens more and more due to the enormous increase in military spending – mainly due to the pressure of the “barbarians” – for the consequent harsh taxation, for the unbridled inflation that leads to financial collapse, for political anarchy -institutional, due to the decrease of the population following terrifying epidemics of plague, which leads to agricultural depression and the collapse of the middle social classes, due to the discontent and rebellion of the lower classes. Diocletian (243 – 313 AD) and Constantine I the Great (274 – 337 AD) try to remedy the situation with a complicated decentralization, which splits the territorial administrations, with a monetary reform and with the strengthening of the power of the emperor, who he becomes in effect an absolute monarch. For the Western Empire, the end is not far off.
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SUMMARY TABLE OF PAGANISM
In table 2, we report a summary of the basic points of paganism, the main religion of the Roman Empire.
The comparison of this table with table 1, relating to Christianity, highlights the substantial differences between the two systems.
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Table 2 – Basic points of the pagan empire of Rome.
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Basic point: the relationship of the individual with ideology.
The greatest divinity is the trinity or triad, composed of three gods, polytheism;
virginity has a high value;
man must ingratiate himself with divinity, make sacrifices and formal rituals.
The emperor is also an incarnate god, a cult of the person and his effigies, mythology (theology) of the state.
Basic point: the relationship of people to one another.
Obedience and suspicion, which generate uniformity, standardization, fear.
Basic point: the community relationship.
Hierarchical structure: the superior decides for the inferiors.
It produces discrimination, subjection, need, persecution, wars, the death penalty.
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Explanatory note: in the social field the fundamental difference between paganism and the original message of Jesus lies in the fact that whilst the former exalts the hierarchical structure of political and religious power, the latter does not want either political or religious leaders, but rather authority (in the etymological sense) and exalts a new form of democracy.
Let’s see the two concepts more specifically.
Paganism: the gods themselves are hierarchically ordered; the emperor, head of power in Rome and pontifex maximus of religion, is also a god who became incarnate on earth.
All those in charge of the offices, functions and services to be performed are chosen or imposed from the top.
The people must resign themselves, with serenity, to the will of the hierarchy, a wonderful form of heavenly and earthly dominion.
Jesus’ message: God wants us all to be equal, being brothers, therefore there must be no leaders who decide the fate of peoples or who exercise dominion over them, nor a caste of religious high priests, whom Jesus calls vipers’ nest, whitewashed graves and perverse generation.
Human beings must rise and assert themselves, not resign themselves to the injustices of the world (non-violence in the Gandhi’s sense).
All the members of the community together directly elect the persons in charge of functions or services for the community itself and also directly take the decisions that concern it: “Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven”, in this way everyone is invested with the royal dignity.
The relationship among people is that of mutual love: “Love one another as I love you”.
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CHAPTER 3 – CHATOLICISM
In the 4th century AD, the Roman emperor Constantine wants a solution to make religion an effective instrument of power.
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CONTENTS OF CHAPTER 3
The birth of a new religion.
Catholic monasticism.
Imperial theology.
The persecutions against Christians continue.
The suffocation of social values.
The derivations from Catholicism.
The seeds of the “word”.
Laity and clergy.
Reflections on theological definitions.
Synthetic table of Catholicism.
Final remarks.
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Along the course of the 4th century AD a new close interdependence is created between political power and religion, generatrix of the subjection and integralism typical of dominion.
The Roman emperors of the 4th century in fact initiate a further religious confession, which substitutes SOCIAL EQUALITY IN DIVERSITY, one of the pillars of Christianity, origin-consequence of unity and mutual love, with THE SOCIAL DISTINCTION OF DIVERSITY, origin-consequence of uniformity and submission, in practice discrimination and backwardness.
Let’s see how it develops (the facts described in this chapter result from documents of the period to which they refer and therefore are not personal opinions).
Constantine I, monarch of the West, has a motto: “One empire, one divinity, one emperor”. He therefore personally kills in 310 AD his predecessor and competitor (and father-in-law) Maximian, so he has an idea that within a system of power cane considered useful: trying to exploit some values of Christianity to shore up the shaky empire of Rome.
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NOTE: Even earlier Maxentius, acclaimed in 306 AD emperor of Rome as opposed to Constantine, grants donations to Christians to broaden the basis of consensus for his office. In April 311 AD even the Augustus of the East, Galerius, grants the Christians of his territory permission to freely profess their faith.
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Pagan religion, centered on an individualistic spirituality and formal practices, does not give fullness of life; the gods are believed more by compulsion (on pain of death) than by conviction.
Over time, paganism tends increasingly to identify itself with the cult of the institutionalized superior personality, that is, the emperor and the … statues of him, who, being an incarnate god, also holds the position of pontifex maximus of religion.
Constantine knows that the pagan religion is “harmless” against power or, rather, it is an excellent instrument of power, but, being no longer accepted with sufficient certainty by the people, he believes that it is extremely necessary to restructure paganism all over again.
Christians, on the other hand, constitute a compact body, which not even cruel persecutions are able to annihilate, they respect the ordinary laws established by the State and with their lives surpass the laws themselves for the better, they are closely united with their “Lord” (that is, the only master who they recognize as such) God-Love.
Christianity creates social structures that are “dangerous” for the centralizing and top-down power, and it carries within it a “cultural revolution” which makes the number of its followers increase more and more.
Constantine, having conquered power, finds himself with Christianity which is already freely professed in a large part of the empire both in the West and in the East (see previous note), so it is difficult to eliminate it; he therefore wants an effective solution to make it “harmless” or, better, to make it an instrument of power, since the persecutions of previous centuries do not reach the intended purpose.
To exploit the new creed, in addition to the recognition of a single God who opposes polytheism – whose greatest divinity is the pagan triad, composed of three distinct gods – it is necessary to overcome the obstacle of the basic points of Christianity, especially of the “Magnificat” by Mary, which gives rise to concrete testimonies of a community life, which adapts badly, indeed constitutes a serious threat to the systematic structures of power. From the socio-political point of view we can speak of a full democracy with direct decision, which is the opposite of absolutistic hierarchical centralism.
There is also another question of no secondary importance to be resolved: the cross.
For the early Christians it is only an instrument of torture, a scaffold on which thousands of brothers and slaves are killed: it is the power (evil), contrary to them, that loads it on them. And they hold the Roman Empire responsible for Jesus’ death sentence on the cross.
This then understood in a broad sense, as pain or affliction, even if they know how to carry it well (loving the other even in pain) Christians do not seek it, rather they do everything possible to remove it: “Dad, if you want, move away from me this chalice”.
The hierarchical bureaucratic apparatus of the empire, on the other hand, considers the cross, and in general the death penalty, a valid tool for imposing exemplary punishments.
He also believes that hard personal sacrifice is an effective means of annihilating the personality and keeping the lower classes in subjection.
All this serves to maintain order, as submission to power is euphemistically called.
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NOTE: Constantine, to keep his soldiers in subjection, in 312 AD commands that the symbol of the worst torture, that of the cross, be depicted on all military shields: with such a “warning” he obtains greater obedience and discipline from the troops (it is an excellent example of psychological violence dictated by the techniques of constriction typical of power).
Another interpretation is that the emperor has the Greek initials of Christ depicted on the shields, χ ρ superimposed, which accompanied in battle by gigantic representations of the face of the sun god, indicate the extraordinary power of the new alliance between divinities, which in the future leads to a single religion.
However, he is one of the few leaders in history who does not lose any battle in war.
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We need to open a parenthesis. In the 2nd and 3rd century AD the emperors pay great attention to the Christian movement that spreads throughout the empire. Court scholars analyze the causes of so much attraction and come to the conclusion that the success of Christians is due to two essential factors:
1) they live mutual love among themselves, and many of these belong to socially inferior or less considered classes, in which Christians see instead Jesus himself;
2) the decisions on everything concerning the community are taken by all the members of the community, since they consider themselves brothers and therefore equal, of equal dignity.
Consequently, Christians are very united, but they are not closed in on themselves, since they also love others and those who are their enemy. They are of one heart and one soul and, in their communities, there are no poor, since those who have property and/or income freely donate their surplus to a common fund, managed by the community as a whole, solely to give the possibility of work and/or a decent wage for those in need and offer a canteen for the most urgent or necessary cases.
The empire of Rome is especially frightened by point 2, which creates a model of political-economic direct democracy, exactly the opposite of the hierarchical organization of power, and therefore undermines – in the words of Diocletian – the very structures of the empire. Point 1 is also dangerous as it creates a compact, united group that values the last and the weak on the social ladder, a group that could become a force in opposition to the absolute power of the sovereign.
Hence the persecutions, often very cruel and systematic, ordered by various Roman emperors, which however fail to eradicate the phenomenon.
Constantine is interested in compacting the structures of command and has an idea that is brilliant for power: to create a single religion that takes into account both paganism, the dominant religion, whose maximum divinity is the triad or trinity, which has a hierarchical clerical organization closely dependent on the pontifex maximus (that’s the emperor) and Christianity, or more precisely some of its aspects, which however must necessarily accept “a hierarchical clerical organization”, whose members (declared representatives of Christ) in reality they would all be employees of the emperor. These would have the main task of systematically replacing the structure of direct decision democracy, the essence of the Christian social message.
Constantine believes that the reduction of the now ineffective multitude of pagan gods to a single divinity is a valid solution, especially since the God of Christians has the ability to attract and unite people very well!
To achieve this, he must separate the civil hierarchy from the religious one – as he first separates it from the military one – and renounce being God himself.
In the meticulous plan of restructuring the pagan religion, the emperor (he always takes care of his activities in every detail) foresees such variations and doubling, but ensuring that everything remains under his strict control.
He therefore declares that the sovereign is such by the will of God, replacing with this formula the belief in the sovereign-god, and that the high hierarchy of the clergy represents God, that is, in effect, both the sovereign and the hierarchy of the clergy express the will of God. With these formulas the emperor substitutes the will of heaven (of God), expression of the will of the whole united community, with the will of the power structures: “In truth I tell you” Jesus reveals in fact “everything that the whole community approves on earth is approved even in heaven and everything that it rejects on earth is also rejected in heaven”.
For the Roman power in practice almost everything remains as before.
As for the essence of the Christian message and the novelty of its structures, which can revolutionize civil society, we must not even talk about it.
Yes, there are the documents of the followers of Jesus, especially those of the first two centuries, containing ideas that are dangerous for the dominant system, but given that there are very few copies in circulation (printing was invented in Europe 1,100 years later! – ed.) and illiteracy is widespread, it is sufficient to train domesticated “preachers”, who do not overflow from the pre-established orders.
THE BIRTH OF A NEW RELIGION
According to the plan studied by the pontifex maximus Constantine I – remember that he is a pagan and remains so for his entire life, except for the last moments – once the foundations of the new religion are quickly realized, it must be completed gradually, while the previous paganism must be temporarily maintained in order not to provoke too many reactions.
Along the course of the 4th century it is quite fully defined (when it “creates” a religion, power establishes its basic points so that they are the prop of power itself), therefore in 380 AD it officially becomes the state religion and is called “catholic”, that is to say universal, since it is made compulsory in the whole world subject to Rome. The salient phases are reported below.
A leader knows well that, to subjugate the mass, the supporting and decisive structure is the hierarchical one, which is instead clearly rejected, as seen, by Jesus and the early Christians, who replace it with a living structure that gives the authority of decision to all community members together.
A leader also knows that the prop of his prestige are his valuable buildings, the myths he makes and the cult of symbols he imposes.
In October 313 AD the edict of Milan is promulgated (various scholars believe that this edict never existed), and freedom of faith is granted to Christians, but only to those … who accept the religious dictates of the pagan emperor!
Constantine the Great in fact proposes to the presbyter Miltiades, elected years earlier by the entire Christian community of Rome, a clerical hierarchical organization for the leadership of the community itself, with a high priest at the top, under direct imperial control (it is remembered here that early Christianity does not have clerical authorities, but only laical ones). Miltiades perhaps does not pronounce on the offer (there is no certain information about it, since the factotum Constantine presents the events not as they really take place, but as he wants them to appear), however he takes note of the refusal expressed by the assembly of Christians and, on the other hand, he himself does not agree on certain theological doctrines of the pagan Constantine, who wants a future fusion of the two creeds.
According to some, Miltiades does not accept the proposals at all, according to others he is in doubt: in conclusion, the sovereign brands him as unreliable and incapable.
A few days later, we are in January 314 AD, Miltiades dies in obscure circumstances – in ancient times they consider him a martyr – and immediately in his replacement Constantine has one of his courtier elected by a small circle, a very rich man of the “aristocratic” class, from the name of Sylvester, totally loyal to the wishes of the emperor, probably one of his eunuchs, and Constantine places him or rather imposes him as chief overseer of the religion (from the future name of Catholicism), also granting him the title of pontifex maximus. It should be noted that this is a position previously held only by the emperor, which is now inherited by one of his courtiers. More precisely, the sovereign splits the offices, keeping for himself that of pontifex maximus of the pagan hierarchical clerical organization, and entrusting Sylvester with that of pontifex maximus of the Catholic hierarchical clerical organization. This office is therefore only a mere cloning of the other, always strictly dependent on the Roman emperor.
The old persecutors of Christians now proclaim themselves leaders of Christianity.
Indeed, on the basis of the administrative model of the empire, even for the new religion the territory is divided into dioceses, already operating in a similar way in the civil field, headed by an overseer, called “bishop” (the same name that already has his pagan colleague), who are granted judicial posts, as well as a high fixed income and a range of privileges and tax exemption.
He employs priests – the new Catholic clergy (the word Catholic is assigned years later) – who help him carry out the functions for which he is in charge, who are appointed by him and who owe obedience to him.
A very serious fact is that the appointment of the bishop, subject to the approval of the monarch, and of the service staff – now ministries – becomes a right of the clergy or the high clergy only, for which those people are not freely elected, except in rare cases, by the whole community.
Now a caste of the clergy, created by the pagan emperor and who is close to him, has the right to decide on Christians and to appoint “clerical superiors”.
Over time, only the high hierarchy has the right to decide and appoint.
In practice, the social structure of Christianity, that is to say the community itself must make decisions on everything that concerns it (in modern terms it is the sovereignty of the people or direct democracy), is replaced by the Roman sovereign with the hierarchy that he sets up.
Constantine can thus destroy the essence of the social message transmitted by Jesus.
All lay Christians, who must be clearly distinguished from the clergy, are deprived of any possibility of exercising their “royal priesthood”, that is, their sovereignty in making decisions: this is the opposite of Christianity, since, we repeat, it is fundamental for Jesus that decisions are made directly by all members of the community, at any time in history.
By Catholicism it is forbidden even for lay people to break bread in homes, which now belongs solely to the new Catholic clergy, while mutual love and “Jesus in the midst of those who love” are sent to heaven, and lived only by divinity, in practice they are cast into oblivion.
It is also forbidden for women and slaves – the majority of the population – to either own anything or become priests.
Women are also prohibited from learning to read and write and public speaking.
The courtier Sylvester instead is the first pontifex maximus of the new religion (from the future name of Catholicism) and for the occasion the emperor offers him as a gift, being his man of straw nominee, a very luxurious residence: the complex of Lateran palaces rich in precious marble, embryo of the papal possessions.
The pontifex maximus Sylvester, an aristocrat dressed in precious clothes with gold tinsel and flanked by a crowd of armed guards, for over twenty years (he dies on December 31, 335 AD), gives the green light to the pagan monarch to make any decision in religious matters (the emperor in fact wants to make people believe in abstract definitions, formal rules, ritual ceremonies, statues, etc., all practices that strengthen power and take the place of life in mutual love – ed.).
To impose itself on the masses, buildings and monumental temples are necessary for the hierarchical organization, so the sovereign has the first building for the worship of the faithful (from the future name of Catholics): Saint Mary Maggiore in Rome.
We know that the Christians of the origins always refuse to own these expensive buildings, so as to be able to allocate the funds to the elimination of poverty (among them there are no poor) and not to turn their life, that is to be love, into a religion or power.
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NOTE: In common practice, as identification marks of objects, names are given to the objects themselves. In the same way the powerful give themselves signs of recognition, offered by monumental palaces, by clothes or uniforms that manifest the distinction, by expensive means of transport, by the diffusion of their material effigies, by a crowd of obsequious flatterers, by the exclusive use of the information, from formal rules valid for subjection, etc., signs deemed suitable for imposing one’s prestige on the outside – ed.
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Constantine is not interested in developing the life brought by Jesus with its spiritual and social consequences, but in defining theological concepts that are in accord with the philosophy of power, for which he intervenes directly in questions of religious doctrine, making it change where and every time he deems it appropriate.
Theological definitions, those that enjoin a God-formula or a God-name to believe in, instead of the God-Life that is realized, allow us to compare theories and aspirations of the faithful, groups, clergy, anyone and to judge their conformity to the official dictates: the accusation of heresy otherwise is triggered, considered a crime against the State – that is, not in line with the doctrine of the rulers – and therefore severely punished, often with death.
The “God among us” of the early Christians becomes the “god with us” of power.
THE EXTRAORDINARY MAJORITY OF CHRISTIANS REJECT OR DOES NOT APPROVE all these and other manipulations of their lives, but the monarch persists in his plan and introduces Catholic scholars and trustworthy theologians, also chosen from among the “lapsi” (= “fallen”, Christians who are become pagans to escape persecutions prior to 313 AD), who draw up religious theories and documents according to its dictates, even if their content is often in contrast with the teachings of Jesus or do not respect historical truth.
Several bishops are also chosen by Constantine from among his employees or among the “lapsi”, all of them being more malleable to his wishes.
Obviously, the most compliant ones receive hefty remuneration in return.
In this way the premises are laid for the imperial hierarchical power and the clerical hierarchical neo-power to coexist in “harmony”, which is substantially maintained for the entire duration of the empire.
An example indicative of the malaise that Christians feel as a result of the new situation is given by the so-called “donatism”. In the year 315 AD about seventy bishops succeed in having Donatus elected bishop of Carthage, a just man, in place of the existing one, Cecilian, a corrupt renegade. Some delegates go to the emperor to defend their thesis, nevertheless the pagan Constantine not only ratifies the previous election (secretly favored by him in 311, like others at various times, when he imposed the plan of the new religion), but against the Donatists, who persist in asking not to consecrate other unworthy priests, begins in 316 AD to a ferocious repression. His successor, his son Constant I, embraces the Catholic religion and established a regime of persecution against them. In 414 AD the Donatists are deprived of all civil rights and, if they do not cease their activity, they suffer the death sentence (and this is the antithesis of Christianity! – ed.).
Christians appeal to the life of relationship and to the (democratic) achievements brought by Jesus, whose correspondence they do not see with the imposed system and theology.
Therefore the protagonist Constantine, inspired by the vestals and probably by the pagan hermits, decides that those who want to intensely live the message of Jesus can do so, but under very close surveillance and in special places or rather in special buildings. The monarch initiates a new religious expression for this purpose: monasticism.
CATHOLIC MONASTICISM
Constantine instructs Pachomius, one of his Egyptian militiamen, ex-serviceman against Maxentius, to find a form for what are the first monasteries. Our man, after having been baptized, makes contact with a fellow countryman named Anthony, a culture man of Alexandria, known for his periods spent in the desert, a righteous man who has the ability to attract people.
Pachomius becomes a disciple of these and, taking into account the experience of the master and the suggestions of the emperor, draws up a “rule” and founds a large monastery on an island in the Nile, the first ever in the Catholic world: we are in 322 AD. With the approval of the sovereign, thousands of people flock there eager “to live the Scriptures”.
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NOTE: Around the middle of the 3rd century AD Emperor Decius begins a systematic persecution against Christians throughout the empire.
In Egypt some of them manage to safe themselves by fleeing, forced, into the desert. Here they have to adapt to the harsh environment: they generally live in caves, eat the scarce foods they manage to scrape together, live in union with God and in love for human beings who share their lot. They do not lead an individual life as a hermit, except perhaps for someone by personal choice, until the advent of Catholicism, that is, after more than 70 years.
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Given the success of the initiative, Pachomius creates eight other male monasteries and, through his sister Mary, two female convents. Every member, monk or nun, is obliged to absolutely obey a superior, called respectively abbot or abbess. Even the aforementioned Anthony must become abbot.
In this initial phase, members can freely leave that system of life.
The cenoby (from the Greek: koinóbion “common life”) codified by Pachomius and Anthony the Abbot, is brought to Rome and the West by Athanasius of Alexandria, always at the request of the Roman monarch (not a leaf stirs but Constantine wills it).
A few decades later, in 360 AD, Catholic monasticism was introduced to the East by Basil. He believes that the goods of the world belong to everyone and therefore private property is the result of usurpations: then they make him compile his rule, which must be observed inside the monasteries by the order founded by Basil.
Let’s say that from the 4th century AD power also gives a strong impulse to the phenomenon of individual Catholic hermits, who lead a life of penance and prayer, especially in the solitude of the desert.
This type of asceticism reaches its extreme form at the beginning of the 5th century with the so-called stylites, who live seated on the top of a column for many years, often until death, where they pray for long hours, especially at night, eat a predetermined number of cereal, neither one more because it would be gluttony nor one less because it would be presumptuous.
The columns reach from 3 to 20 meters in height. The first to climb up it is Simeon the Elder, in the East, and fashion soon spreads throughout the empire; pilgrims flock from all over to see the stylites, to whom even the monarchs sometimes go for advice … from above.
However, what power interests is above all the monastery, where all those who wish to fully live the message of Jesus can be conveyed and kept under control. They are “socially dangerous”, because they can realize the social essence of Christianity, offered by the “Magnificat” of Mary, from mutual love, from the concrete communion of saints, from the emancipation of individuals less considered.
Over time, the rule is perfected and made very rigid (some scholars assume that it is also inspired by contemporary prison regulations): people who accept Catholic conditions are channeled into the monastery, where they remain for their entire existence.
So that they don’t have second thoughts, the monks (the same goes for the female part) must solemnly swear to god (take a vow) to observe in perpetuity:
– obedience, that is, everyone must lose his will to do only that of God, in practice that of his superiors (even if this is sometimes in contrast … with the Christian message);
– chastity, that is, denying life to one’s children in order to macerate themselves in penance and control of the senses. Whoever wants to reach the “perfect” life according to power is therefore … forbidden to marry;
– poverty, that is to give the convent all its assets and revenues, which are administered exclusively … by the superiors.
The members of the monastery dedicate themselves for long hours to prayer and work; they are given the opportunity to keep, copy and read the Bible for the purely spiritual purpose of building up their souls.
Later, among those who learn to read and write, the most suitable to undertake theological studies are chosen.
IMPERIAL THEOLOGY
Many Christians counter the content of the monastic vows: in the scriptures obedience to men is not accepted, and as for virginity there is no command from the Lord, indeed it is considered a sin against the Spirit of God to forbid marriage (I Tim 4,1-3). From the time of Abraham – about 1800 years BC – the faithful of the Bible understand, by making humanity take a great leap forward, that the life of one’s children must not be sacrificed to divinity. The God of Life does not need such offers! Furthermore, material goods must be given to allow the needy to work and have a decent pay, and thus remove them from poverty, and not to the bosses. Jesus announces that we are all equal, children of the same Dad, not “paternal” superiors and inferior individuals, and he harshly condemns any type of oath or vow, because these are nothing but forms of enslavement to hierarchical power, that is to say, of discrimination and “brain control”.
The pagan emperor instructs court theologians and scholars to demonstrate instead, through theological definitions and deliberately written documents, that his own theses are valid.Let’s see the conclusions to which those courtiers arrive and the subsequent developments.
Obedience – The ecclesiastical superior represents… god, so to obey the superior is to obey God and not men! This must be valid for all Catholics towards the local bishop and, in monasteries, for monks towards their abbot.
Each member of the clergy or monk must control the others, so that they respect the imposed rules (therein the mutual control and the consequent judgment supplant mutual love).
All then owe obedience to the pontifex maximus, a position already the prerogative of the Roman emperor and now passed on to his own employee, who in this respect is in effect the successor of the various pontifex maximus Constantine, Diocletian, Decius, Domitian, Nero.
It should be noted that this office is ABSOLUTELY NON-EXISTENT among the early Christians. And there is no trace of any document of the first two centuries, neither canonical nor apocryphal, showing the coming of Peter to Rome or HOWEVER that the presbyter of the capital has the aforementioned power.
Jesus and Peter never assume the office of “supreme pontiffs”, indeed it is the latter who persecute them. Peter carries out his mission as envoy to Jerusalem, Palestine and as far as Antioch and, very reliably, in parts of Anatolia and Mesopotamia.
Zones are also assigned to each of the other apostles: India to Thomas, Arabia to Bartholomew, the lands of the Gentiles, from western Anatolia and Greece to Spain, to Paul, and so on. Some formulate the hypothesis that Peter was killed in Babylon (or Jerusalem) around 58 AD.
Paul immediately, having returned to Palestine from the third missionary trip, although advised against by his followers due to the danger to which he is exposed, runs to Jerusalem, where he meets James and the other presbyters. The place of Peter in the Jerusalem community is in fact now entrusted to James, one of Jesus’ four brothers, held in great esteem by the Christians of the time.
Paul then goes into the temple and there he is recognized by the employees of the high priests, who incite him against a large group of religious fundamentalists. These seize him, drag him into the street amidst beatings and insults and are about to lynch him, when the tribune of the nearby Roman cohort promptly intervenes with the soldiers to quell the tumult, arrests the apostle and, making his way through the crowd of fanatics that are screaming “to death, to death!”, leads him inside the fortress. Paul thus saves his life.
With James, the collection of writings that form the basis of the gospels in Greek by Mark, Luke and Matthew begins; Gospels completed after the death of Jesus’ brother. Indeed in 62 AD King Agrippa II appoints Anan (son of that Anna who condemns the Master with Caiaphas) high priest, who has James stoned at the beginning of 63, taking advantage of interval between the death of the Roman procurator Festus and the arrival of his successor.
The local Christian community then elects in his place the other brother of Jesus, Simeon (according to some, not him, but his homonymous carnal cousin). Perhaps even earlier Joses is elected, but there is no certain news.
Simeon remains a presbyter of Jerusalem until late in life, when he undergoes martyrdom at the beginning of the 2nd century AD.
In his place, 13 presbyters follow one after the other, due to continuous persecutions, up to the second Jewish revolt.
In 134 AD Hadrian’s legions occupy Jerusalem with great bloodshed, the prisoners are sold as slaves and the city becomes a Roman colony forbidden to the Jews. Even the surviving Christians must all flee: a part settles in Egypt, most of them in Jordan and Syria.
The latter are given the name of Ebionites (the poor), due to the miserable socio-economic conditions in which they are forced to live (we know how many difficulties and sufferings all the populations who emigrate face even today) and a Christian Jewish named Marco is elected presbyter of the community, who carries out the service from about 135 to 155. After him others are elected over the years.
In the 4th century the Catholic power (the word Catholic is assigned years later) of Rome has the Ebionites declared guilty of heresy – that is, of a crime against the State – because they do not conform to the “theological definitions” imposed by the emperor and his theologians, so a bloody unspoken persecution begins against of them (and this is the real crime!).
In 380 AD the Catholic monarch Theodosius and the pontifex maximus Damaso send all the survivors to the stake and since then no trace of the life of the Ebionites remains: the reason for the genocide is probably that there must be none who can claim a succession of Peter.
In fact, from the very beginning, the pagan Constantine proceeds to a very careful elimination of every previous document or brief sentence concerning the martyrdom of the apostle Peter. Shortly thereafter, in 324 AD, he has his Greek courtier Eusebius, a moderate Arian, draw up an “Ecclesiastical history”, which is repeatedly modified by the emperor himself according to his own convenience. There, the emperor, in order to give a juridical and religious foundation to the office of Catholic pontifex assigned by him to his courtier Sylvester (with the protests of the Christians), finds it convenient to make the people believe, and has it written by Eusebius, who Peter comes to Rome, where he is made bishop of the city and is martyred under Nero. On the basis of this writing, the monarch declares and forces us to believe that his courtier Sylvester, he too an Arian, a rich aristocrat dressed in sumptuous gold-laminated clothes and escorted by a host of armed men, is the successor of the apostle and therefore of Jesus: in truth he is only the heir of a hierarchical office held by Constantine.
Eusebius “must devise” for his sovereign also the names of the “first successors” of Peter in the City, whom anachronistically he calls bishops in the monarchical meaning imposed by the emperor, in an unlikely, almost regular succession of twelve years each, taking as a model the chronology of the Greek Olympics.
With regard to obedience to local bishops also, Constantine the Great has his theologian write 13 letters, of which Ignatius, a Christian presbyter, is declared the author, fed to the lions in the Circus Maximus around the year 111 AD. In reality they are obtained by interpolating, reducing or expanding some authentic writings of the martyr. In almost all the aforementioned 13 letters we speak, among other things, of the duty of the territorial communities to obey and be subject to the local bishop, because in this way they are subjected to god (really, to the powerful emperor). The substantial difference is evident from what they live in the early Christian communities, where the presbyter is at the service of the community, where all the members together make decisions and where the relationship with God is Love. Even beyond the Middle Ages, the aforementioned documents are valid in Catholic circles. Centuries later, the falsity of 6 of those letters is ascertained, but in fact we can say with some certainty that only one (except for some details) is authentic by Ignatius and absolutely does not report the argument mentioned above.
Ultimately, obedience is imposed as … the will of God, in fact the will of superiors. For Christians, however, the affirmation of Peter is valid: “We must not obey individuals”, and the will of God is instead expressed by every sentence of Jesus reported in the new testament, sentences of Love that is to be lived in the practical life of all days both on an individual, interpersonal and community level.
The Gospels and other scriptures of the early Christians of Jerusalem are made difficult to access to the masses and almost immediately prohibited. Even many writings, although very valid, are not considered or recognized by the power of Rome, and many are destroyed.
Jesus says to his followers: “Whoever listens to you listens to me”, meaning “Whoever listens to you who realize and make visible my message (later reported in the Gospels), listens to my words, that is, listens to me”.
After the false historians dictated by the clever Constantine, the phrase is explained in the opposite meaning: “Whoever listens to clerical superiors, listens to me”, that is, the reverse of the revelation made by Jesus!
What is described till now would be enough to bring down the scaffolding of the pseudo-representatives or rather of the non-representatives of Christianity.
Chastity – After some time, marriage is forbidden to whoever enters the monastery and this for various reasons: virginity is considered by pagan religion and power as one of the major values and is deified by mythology, see the virgin goddesses; the sacrifice of potential children to divinity is highly regarded among the numerous pagan people, see the vestals; having heirs can give rise in the long run to a dynasty of power (for clerical “superiors”) and this is not acceptable to the civil hierarchy; from a practical point of view, it appears difficult to pass one’s entire life into penance within the closed walls of a monastery in a promiscuous manner.
It should be noted that perpetual virginity is not contemplated among the early Christians except possibly for eunuchs (Mt 19; 9-12). Paul states: “As for virgins (in biblical language we mean marriageable girls – ed.) I have no command from the Lord”.
Incidentally, we note that eunuchs are quite numerous at that time: Constantine himself prefers to surround himself – since it suits the powerful – with a crowd of castrated courtiers and the leader of these becomes an influential personage at court (even in our days the horrible sore is widespread and it is estimated that 55 million men are mutilated in the world, half of which in China – ed.). Some indication suggests perhaps that Paul is such.
In the parable Jesus recounts: “Just as in common life the girls to marry are foolish who, in order not to keep the oil lamp burning, do not find a husband, while the others are wise”, so it is also in the evangelical life, for those who keep or do not keep Love alight, they find or do not find the Lord.
Paul in the first letter to the Corinthians states: “Do we not have the right to have with us a bride who lives this reality, as already have both the other apostles and the brothers of Jesus and Peter?”.
Paul himself says to the disciple Timothy: “The mainstay (the presbyter) of the community must be blameless, husband of one wife”. And again he confides to him: “The Spirit openly declares that in the future some depart from the true faith, giving heed to lying spirits and to evil doctrines, seduced by the hypocrisy of impostors, already branded in their conscience, who forbid marriage …”.
During the first three centuries all Christians know that Jesus has four brothers, sons of Joseph, whose names are reported in the Gospels as well as other documents, and some sisters.
The brothers are: James the Younger, Joses (= Joseph), Judas and Simeon; Mary is also called the mother of James the Younger and of Joses by the canonical evangelists.
Also in the first three centuries, various Gospels are widespread among Christians that report the union, even physical, of Jesus with Mary Magdalene and this, from a certain moment on, is named before the mother of Jesus also in the canonical gospels.
Jesus at first shows his presence to Mary Magdalene, after the resuscitation wrought by God, and says to her, while she embraces his feet according to the custom of the time: “Get up, do not touch me, because I have not yet gone up to my Dad”.
In the fragment of a document of the time, in Greek, it is written: “On Sunday morning Mary Magdalene … still does not perform at the tomb of her Man those offices that wives (women) usually perform towards their loved ones who die; she therefore takes her friends with her and goes to the tomb”.
Constantine, however, is anxious to justify his religious policy: he has theologians and scholars of the court write documents in which they must assert that the brothers of Jesus are indeed children of Joseph, but had by another woman in his first marriage; left a widower, Joseph marries Mary, the mother of Jesus in old age!
And that’s not enough, he also has his courtiers write that a Christian writer of previous centuries affirms that this version of events is confirmed in the Gospel of Peter (then destroyed by the Catholic Pontiffs).
For a few decades, 4th century Catholics have to believe it.
Subsequently, since there are well-founded objections, the power gives the task of finding a new solution to a cultured man and a hermit, Jerome.
In the “Vulgate” he comments that the brothers of Jesus are not really brothers, but … cousins or relatives, because in the Aramaic language the same word is used for different meanings; however he bluffs when he does not take into account the fact that the Gospels (except those of the Ebionites and others, destroyed by Catholic power), the letters of the New Testament and many documents of the first century are all written originally in the Greek language, which uses a word for indicate “brother” (adelphós) clearly distinct from the word “cousin” (anepsiós).
The evangelists and Paul know very well what they write and they know it perfectly.
Jerome introduces other inaccuracies in the translation of the Gospels which still exist today.
In the Italian Catholic version – apart from the fact that “Our Father” should be read instead “Our Dad” – we only recall here the sentence: “Whoever does not hate (or who does not leave) his father, his mother, his wife, brothers, sisters and even one’s own life, he cannot be my disciple”, where the word “hates” or “leaves” is put to make it understood that to consecrate oneself means … to abandon everything to enter the environment of the clergy! As if in the time of Jesus Christians left the world to withdraw into a caste!
More properly, Jesus’ phrase must be understood: “If (God Love, that is, love for others) is not placed before one’s father, mother, wife, children, brothers, sisters and even one’s life, one cannot be my disciple”, that is, Love takes first place over everything. In this way he is fraternally united not only with natural relatives, but with hundreds of other people! And this can be done by anyone.
The beautiful gospel and all the writings that report the union between Jesus and Mary Magdalene are made unknown to the laity by the clerical power, which at the beginning of the 5th century AD brands them in a slanderous way, ordering their destruction together with all the original existing gospels!
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Let’s open an aside: the gospels of the 1st and 2nd centuries are about 500, written by each of the many Christian communities around the world, gospels used and lived for more than two hundred years by the followers of Jesus. The Catholic hierarchy, established in the 4th century by Constantine and self-erecting as a representative of god, IT DESTROYS THEM ALL, since they contain ideas contrary to the doctrines and traditions of power.
Not being able to “forget” them completely, the hierarchy orders to write copies of four of them, already highlighted above, with the insertion of many glosses, which mainly concern the parts on the miracles and virginity, the softening of the responsibilities of the Roman leaders for the order given to kill Jesus, obedience to the “superior” human beings, and the other Augustinian theories.
But even in this way these copies of the Gospels contain elements that are dangerous for the institutions, therefore the hierarchy PROHIBITS THE READING of them to the laity, with very harsh penalties for those who dare to read them, especially if translated into the local languages; and this for 1100 years and beyond.
The inclusion by the high clergy of interlinear glosses in copies of the surviving Gospels continues throughout the Middle Ages, with the aim of making some theological passages typical of Augustine’s Catholicism more credible.
With the prohibition of the reading of sacred texts, the laity are forbidden to know the authentic social message of Christianity (which is clearly contrary to the system of hierarchical power) and above all of mutual love and democracy lived by the early Christians, which make the multitude be one heart and one soul; every important decision on the needs of the community is taken – by institution – directly by the whole community, as equals, and surplus income and assets are made available, so that the possibility is directly given, to those in poverty (Jesus himself identifies with these), to start a job or to have a decent wage. Of these things we must absolutely no longer speak and everything is replaced by a clerical hierarchy, imposed by the pagan emperor Constantine, but believed to be established by the God of the Gospels. The hierarchy decides on everything, appropriates almost all the goods collected and to whose rules everyone must conform and be subjected. The people do not know this anyway, as they can no longer read the Gospels! And if they know it and want that life back, the hierarchy sends them to the stake.
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Perpetual physical virginity, the highest value of paganism, becomes a disciplinary rule of primary importance according to Catholic leaders. Preachers throughout the empire – famous in this sense is Ambrose in Milan, also known for the heated fervor in destroying Jewish synagogues – try to persuade women and especially young girls to enter the convent (and the hierarchy takes their possessions) , making believe that to reach the perfection required by God it is necessary to follow the rules that determine the behavior inside those cells. Just someone comes to mysticism. In reality, the sacrifice of the individual leads to submission to superiors (which frequently causes nervous depression) and … canonical abortion, that is, the immolation of the potential life of one’s children to “divinity”. In practice, the nonviolent struggle against the wearing structures of power is cunningly replaced by the struggle against … natural sexual needs, which struggle can also cause nervous depression.
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NOTE: remember that Paul considers the practice of circumcision useless, because what is worth is how much you love, regardless of whether you have a piece of skin on your penis or not. The same can be said of physical virginity: what is worth is how much you love, regardless of the condition of a piece of skin in your vagina – ed.
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Since the 6th century AD, with the disappearance of the Western emperors, celibacy is made obligatory by the political-religious power for all the clergy of the Latin rite, including bishops, also to prevent ecclesiastical income from going to the children of priests (we repeat the words of Paul: “Some turn away from the true faith … seduced by the hypocrisy of impostors … who forbid marriage”).
The emperors of the East, later Orthodox, since they have the direct submission of the clergy, do not consider it necessary to prohibit marriage except for the patriarchs (= bishops).
In the 16th century the council of Trent decides that only who is not married can be canonized “Saint”, unless he dies a martyr or … a widower!
And it is forbidden for the clergy to let the laity know – it is the height of hypocrisy and discrimination – that the Catholic hierarchy forbids the canonization to “Saint” of a married person, both male and female: it is one of the signs of the apartheid established by clericalism in concerns the married people and, in general, the laity.
This discrimination continues today.
Consequently, sex, created by God, instead becomes an expression of sin and the pedagogy is all set obsessively on purity and severity, while it is more or less indifferent, if not suspicious, of Love.
We point out that in the Gospels Jesus never speaks, not even once, about sex, nor does he give any command, as already seen, about virginity.
Still at the beginning of the 20th century AD in seminaries books of ascetical theology are read with phrases like this: “Woman is the devil!”.
A Christian writer of the 20th century tells in his “Memoirs” that as a young seminarian this raises doubts in him: “Hey! – he reasons – is the mother of Jesus the devil? Is my mother the devil?”.
The clerical leaders plagiarize seminarians from an early age with the fable that they are “superior” to the laity, that not marrying is a “superior” state, that those who come out of it must be considered worse than Judas and strongly risk eternal damnation, which the woman is only temptation and of children it is better not to even smell them.
A status of segregation is imposed, an artificial environment is created, with formal rules that often in practice replace the gospel, a strict formation as a hierarchical “individual” is given, so much so that at times the person is unconsciously psychologically deformed and the heart and the soul are rendered sterile, producing in 54% of cases victims with nervous frustrations or occult partners or aberrations.
As for the laity, since over 99.99% of normal people (not counting the eunuchs and the genetically malformed) fail for natural reasons to stay in continence perpetually – which in truth would go against nature – all become sinners, so all that remains for them is to submit “with serenity” to their superiors: what can they expect of sinners!
On the other hand, it is a “good thing” to obey and do penance or sacrifices for sins committed (by whom, by the superiors in power, or is it another way to subjugate Christians? – ed.).
Ultimately, married lay people, the vast majority of the faithful, are made to become a distinguished, subjected, incapable caste, second-class people, who don’t count, who don’t have to count, even today.
Poverty – From the “Acts of the Apostles” it appears that among the early Christians there are no poor, since among brothers it is shared: those who own fields or houses in excess freely sell them and the amount is distributed, following the decisions of the base, to whoever is in need, to be active in a job that gives him a profit.
With the rules supported by Constantine, everything is overturned: Catholic monks must be in poverty and their assets and revenues must be given to the hierarchical organization, which disposes of them at its discretion. It is completely the opposite of the message brought by Jesus.
In doing so, the superior structures of the clergy, and not only the monastic ones, accumulate material wealth over time.
Subsequently, vast estates, abandoned by the landowners due to the heavy taxes to which they are subject, are confiscated, as well as by the empire, by the ecclesiastical hierarchy, giving a solid basis to its power.
Reaching the highest offices, such as bishop or later cardinal, therefore becomes a goal coveted by the powerful or aspiring such.
Those riches are also coveted by the monarchs of every century who, when they deem it appropriate, find various pretexts to seize it, albeit with violence.
In addition to this, from the 6th century AD, the hierarchy imposes on everyone, under penalty of excommunication, the payment of “tithe” in favor of the clergy, that is, a tax equal to 10% of the net income of each activity.
In theory, the proceeds should be divided into three equal parts: one for Catholic structures, one for the support of priests, one for the poor. But over time this last part practically disappears, parish priests are given a reduced share, the so-called “stipend”, and the hierarchical direction of the clergy almost exclusively benefits from the tithe.
Charity, almsgiving, some circumscribed unselfish acts become alibis to avoid or snub social justice and the generalized sharing of goods. The hierarchy makes us believe: “Blessed are the poor, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven” … in the afterlife. But the Nazarene firmly maintains that equity and equality must be implemented now (“Rise, you poor, …”), they are not just a reward after death.
THE PERSECUTIONS AGAINST CHRISTIANS CONTINUE
To those who complain that the monastic condition is too harsh, the authorities respond that before the edict of Milan, Christians are punished with death, so what are they complaining about?
With the help of their God, they can accept the new situation with serenity, which among other things is an excellent form of penance for their sins!
It is like saying: in the past you are forced to death, now, for my magnanimity, you only have a life sentence, you want better!
Faithful to the saying of Rome “divide et impera”, Constantine reduces the life that springs from the Christian message to a mere theology – the new mythology of power – which does not unite, but divides.
He and his successors, the true founders of Catholicism, can thus make everyone uniform with obedience to the imposed definitions and otherwise use violence. Emperor Theodosius formalizes the new belief with an edict a few decades later.
As a good pagan Constantine tries to mythologize the religious “leaders”, generally the dead ones, in order to propose them as abstract models, therefore unattainable, which in this way can be venerated rather than imitated.
In essence, the adoration of pagan gods and their effigies is replaced by the veneration of religious personages and their images.
From the sovereign emperor, to whom we must be subjected and who must be worshiped as a god, we pass to the sovereign pontiff and clerical superiors, to whom we must be subject and who must be respected as “representatives” of god.
It should be noted that Jesus, on the contrary, identifies himself with the inferiors: “Whatever you do to an inferior, you do it to me”, while he defines the “superiors” as a den of vipers, perverse generation or caste, acting actors. Other than representatives of God!
And the fruits of the “superiors” from the 4th century onwards are also seen in Catholicism: persecutions, submission, massacres, inquisition, torture, stake, confiscation of the victims’ goods, rules against democratic progress, all passed off as … Christianity.
Ascertaining the influence on the soldiers’ psychology of the symbol of the abominable torture, shown on their shields, an influence that increases obedience to the leaders, the great Constantine enjoins that Catholics must now venerate the effigy of the cross.
He also circulates the news that the wood of the true cross of Jesus Christ is found in Palestine by his mother Elena (after 300 years, how?!) and orders that that piece of wood be adored by Catholics!
It should be noted that even the Germanic barbarians of the time adore the wood of certain trees – now no longer – but the adoration of that piece of wood for Catholics still exists today.
Typical is the insistence with which the pagan monarch wants the Master to be declared of “divine nature”, that is, a God, both because this, by analogy, is closer to the theological doctrine that the pagan majority believes and because people oppose to the imperial thesis can be more easily prosecuted for atheism and finally because Jesus can thus be mythologized. In this way, all the attention of the faithful must be directed towards the personality-myth, who more than a God becomes an idol, while his social message is consequently placed in the background.
The sovereign would like to arrive at a triad (analogous to the maximum divinity of pagan mythology composed of three gods) of which he gives the new names: Jesus, the Spirit and the eternal and omnipotent Father, however he is unable to give a plausible explanation.
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NOTE: Already in the 3rd century AD, some thinkers are looking for a compromise between the pagan triad and the God of Christians, assuming that the latter is composed of three protagonists of the Gospels, but this thesis does not have much success among believers.
In the following century, Emperor Constantine, who is also the pontifex maximus of paganism, takes up this theory and asserts it with all the strength of his power.
This also to sidetrack Christians, who must now discuss the number of members of their divinity (1, 2 or 3?): in this way mutual love, the social elevation of the “last” and direct democracy are overshadowed, all values carried by the true message of Jesus, and which cause a lot of concern to the ruling class.
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About 80% of the faithful and various bishops and theologians, even of the court, are of different opinion (Jesus in the Gospel never declares himself God, even once, while he repeatedly declares himself the son of man; even for the early Christians of the Palestine he is the Master or, according to some, at most the promised biblical messiah).
A large following have the ideas of Arius, a priest of Alexandria, who attempts a conciliation, stating that God is “unique” and therefore Jesus cannot be of “divine nature” too, at most of “divine adoption”.
Even the Ebionites, the descendants of the early Christians of Jerusalem, are against the imperial thesis. But the pagan emperor doesn’t give in.
In 324 AD Constantine I, physically eliminated Licinius, becomes the sole master of the territories of both the West and the East.
The following year he, a pagan, convenes and presides over a large assembly in Nicaea, Anatolia, of Catholic bishops closest to him: 318 out of 1800 participate in it, equal to 18% of the total. The pontiff Sylvester is absent, who is pro-Arian, however as a good courtier he only does what the emperor says.
Constantine, “as beautiful and graceful as an angel” (according to the adulatory chronicles of the court), enters the meeting room and, sitting on a throne of solid gold, immediately forces the bishops to welcome in all the dominions of Rome, as a position official, the “divine nature” of Christ and the three components of the triad. The Arians are severely condemned and Arius, invited to Nicaea only for the zealous pro-imperial prelates to throw their shoes at him, is forced to go into exile.
Later, the sovereign, as Christians are too many opposed to his theology and the objections being too many (the original Christians believe in one God, our Dad, our Father), considers it appropriate to change his opinion: he recalls the exiled and in 334 AD thepontifex maximus pontiff Sylvester, who is later canonized as a saint, solemnly approves Arianism as the official religion.
The following year Sylvester dies, again in the Arian version.
After the death of Constantine I, his son Constantius II rules the East and persecutes Arius’s opponents and the pagans. In 340 AD his brother Costante kills his other brother, Constantine II, and becomes Augustus of the West, instead ordering the persecution of Arians and Donatists. In 350 AD General Magnentius, head of the imperial guards, kills Constant. Constantius II in his turn gets rid of Magnentius and becomes the sole master of the empire, making Arianism welcome by the religious hierarchy as an official position.
With the approval of the Roman pontiffs, several missionaries leave for Europe and the East, spreading the Arian version there; in particular, the converted Germanic populations professed Arianism for over two centuries.
It is the year 366 AD: the clergy elects bishop of Rome, and as such is consecrated, Ursino, an ecclesiastic personage obviously Arian version.
A week later a hideous “coup” is carried out by the non-Arian clergy, since this version is more suited to the strategy of the god of power. In fact, protected by the officially neutral Emperor Valentinian I, the deacon Damasus, who has himself consecrated bishop of Rome by another prelate, organizes the massacre in the basilica of Saint Mary Maggiore of all 137 ecclesiastics, gathered there, electors of Ursino. This, protected by the religious faithful to him who shield him with their bodies by sacrificing themselves, manages to escape.
And so Damasus, emeritus assassin, proclaims himself the successor of the apostles of Jesus (?!) and declares that from now is Rome (and no longer Jerusalem) the “new see of the apostles“, of which he appoints himself head. Probably the bones of the apostles still turn over in the graves.
The false succession of the high priest is made to believe valid up to our days: for power its offices are sacred, the truth or the righteousness of the person is of no interest.
Emperor Theodosius, after a sort of abuse to privilege the pontiff Damasus and the high spheres of the clergy, with the edict of 380 AD declares that is State religion the new confession initiated by his colleague Constantine I, in the trinitarian (non-Arian) version – which admirably favors the distinction of social castes – to which he officially and definitively gives the name of Catholicism.
This confession is in fact nothing other than the pagan state religion, corrected and restructured, revived with a coating of SOME PARTS OF THE GOSPEL. We pass from the God, our Dad, of the Master Jesus, to a Jesus-god-of-power, a God-ideology, imagined by Constantine, whose “representative” on earth, imposed by the monarch, is none other than his rich courtier totally dependent on him.
We pass from the God of mutual love to the theoretical and abstract definitions of God, which one must absolutely believe, on pain of death. We pass from the life of the “ekklêsia” to obedience to hierarchical power (and this is, and brings, a devastating halt to the progress of humanity – ed.).
As you can see, it is the emperor who decides what the theology (or mythology) of the state religion must be.
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NOTE: Wanting to unify the religions of the empire, power must justify since the time of Constantine I, with the majority of pagan derivation, the replacement of their supreme celestial divinity, the triad, composed of three distinct gods, with a single divinity. For the definitive solution takes a few decades, until Augustine, after a long thought, defines a supreme omnipotent celestial divinity, the Trinity, consisting of three distinct divine persons, instead of three distinct gods (these theories are not actually known from the Christianity of the first two centuries).
In effect, a God is “created” by Constantine and Augustine, to whom they give the name Jesus, who has little to do with the true Jesus of Nazareth. This doctrine in fact practically allows the power to distinguish between classes, castes, and therefore their discrimination, as in fact it operates for centuries; and as the aforementioned pagan triad or the Egyptian triad of pharaohs or the Hindu Trinity allows it.
In the social field, the unity of equals free in diversity, the essence of Christians, is thus removed from the middle and replaced by the followers of Constantine with the pagan uniformity of subordinates to superiors in the distinction. All this also makes mutual love mythologized, which is diverted with rather suggestive aspects by Augustine – the theologian of imperial power and a very skilled and captivating writer – towards the “celestial” divinity, above the clouds, and therefore in concrete life completely forgotten for over 1500 years by the hierarchy official.
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The protests of Christians are huge, who seek the life of the origins and rightly DO NOT recognize it in the dictates of the emperor, so much so that the political-religious leaders “see themselves forced” to adopt violence against those who do not agree on the change from they imposed.
Emperor Theodosius, with the full approval of the pontiff Damasus and of the clerical superiors Augustine, Ambrose and Jerome, all four then solemnly canonized saints, ORDERS IN PERMANENT FORM THAT ALL CHRISTIANS (for Christians only), who do not conform to the new theology of the rulers, ARE BURNED AT THE STAKE.
It is the most nefarious of human rights denials and violations of the Christian message.
It is another proof that the original message of Jesus has little to do with Catholicism, that it is more exact to call it Constantinism, from the name of its creator and founder, or Augustinism, from the name of its theorist.
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NOTES ON AUGUSTINE OF TAGASTE (in present-day Algeria), who lives from 354 to 430 AD.
Regarding power, Augustine declares that it is necessary to obey both religious leaders and sovereigns and masters, even if these are unjust or guilty of the worst crimes, since the validity of their actions does not depend on their moral integrity, but descends from God himself, who he uses them only as tools. This doctrine is the opposite of what Jesus declares: “The leaders of the nations, you know, decide on them and the powerful exercise their dominion over them, among you there must NOT be these” and consequently “Everything that the community together it approves or rejects on earth, it is approved or rejected also in heaven”.
On the other hand, Augustine theorizes, human beings are all sinners and it is because of their sins that there are so many sufferings and injustices in this world (not for the sins of the leaders who command?!). And it is because of people’s sins that Jesus dies on the cross (not for the power misdeeds!).
It is good for human beings therefore to resign themselves, indeed it is only right that they do many penances and sacrifices to merit eternal salvation in the next life, the only thing that is really worth!
Augustine, the acclaimed by power, is the inventor and supporter of the terrible death penalty by burning at the catholic stake. He is also the new theorist of the war that becomes “holy” if unleashed by Catholic leaders. All this causes very serious consequences for several centuries on the registered involution of humanity.
We add that women, according to his theory, are inferior beings to men, to whom they must remain subject by divine will: this too in future centuries has heavy repercussions on human beings of the female sex. Augustine accepts, among other things, the ancient belief that the transmission of life to children is the sole work of the male, since the woman is nothing more than a recipient.
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And in this way Christians, if they do not make an act of veneration to power or acceptance of the recent religious confession or if they ask for the reference to the gospel for its implementation or if they want the “ekklêsia”, are persecuted and sentenced to death by the great priests (now defined Catholics): they are the new martyrs, once branded with the name of “impious” or “atheists”, now branded with the name of “heretics”.
It is also the Freedom of speech and of life that any power always tries to stifle.
This doctrine of death immediately enters into force: the first Christians to climb the woodpile to be roasted alive on the orders of the Catholic clergy caste are six Spaniards with their presbyter.
This murderous monstrosity continues uninterruptedly over the course of 1400 years (yes, you are reading well: one thousand four hundred years) of crimes against humanity and the property of Christians imprisoned or killed are immediately confiscated by the high Catholic hierarchy. Even the descendants of the early Christians of Jerusalem, the Ebionites, are all exterminated as heretics!
In this way, the successors of the pontifex maximus Nero continue to scrupulously ignite the horrendous, inhuman fires started by that one, now in permanent form, and this time it is again that the executioners proclaim themselves hypocritically representatives … of the God of Jesus!!!
The new pagan-Catholic culture of death calls the condemnations to the torture of Christians “acts of charity” (the pits are full of this “charity” of the high Catholic hierarchy over the centuries).
On the contrary, Jesus himself declares: “I do not come to condemn the world, but to save it, to make it free”.
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NOTE: While Jesus’ message enlightens normal life with love, Augustine affirms “Love and do what you want”. That is, you can also torture and burn human beings alive, as long as you do it with serenity, without hatred, loving the victim. It is the aberration that is added to the aberration.
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The “final solution” for Christians is in its last act. The lying deceit is complete. The Jerusalemite descendants are eliminated, the liveliest communities are threatened and persecuted, the objectors are condemned to the death penalty, the authority of the entire united community (the ekklêsia, the direct democracy revealed by Jesus) is annihilated and destroyed by its replacement with a clerical caste created by Constantine.
Catholic domination imposes a new religion on everyone, Christians and non-Christians, by passing off hierarchical structures as Christianity, which is precisely the opposite of those brought forth by the social announcement of Jesus, and a theology of power, which effectively replaces the gospel.
The reading of the Gospel is strictly forbidden to all lay people, as is its translation into local languages, so that the essential truth of the “good message” is not received by the masses.
Living the gospel, in practice, is replaced by rules and precepts (dictated by people of the clergy, but to be observed as an expression of God’s will), by multiple formal rites, by long prayers, by devotions to images, by serene submission to “superiors”, while the great social message is reduced for the common people to give alms to the poor, offerings to the (high) clergy and some good deeds towards others.
The clerical caste prohibits all lay Christians even from “breaking bread” in their homes at the time of dinner, where the Gospel and Paul expressly ask everyone to do so, united in mutual love that brings joy.
This ban still persists.
The Catholic high priests self-declare that they are seated on the side of the wise, that they alone are the true representatives and interpreters of the message of the Master, so that other human beings have only to sit on the side of the inept with “serenity”, under pain of being burnt at the stake.
In practice it means that the institutional strength of the very rich high clerical hierarchy, expression of the emperor, is consolidated, and consequently the submission and marginalization of the huge multitude of the lay population.
Indeed, Hilary of Poitiers (315 – 367 AD) confirms that there is a more insidious power than persecutions, and it is the power that enriches the high hierarchy, which does not strike the body with the sword, but kills the soul with money.
From Constantine onwards, in fact, anyone who offers a large sum of money to the high hierarchy can more easily become a bishop, so over time only the nobles, with some exceptions, can afford it (and maybe get richer).
From that same 380 AD onwards even the Jews have a tragic fate, they are accused by the leaders of Rome of being guilty of killing Jesus – Augustine defines them all as “perfidious deicides” – when we know that it is not the people who want it, but the he high Jewish religious hierarchy and his collaborators, in league with the Roman power.
Luke the Evangelist confirms in this regard: “The high priests and our leaders hand him over to make him sentence to death and then him crucify”.
The Jewish people are out of the question, but they must equally suffer the confiscation of property, the prohibition of reading the Torah (like Christians suffer the prohibition of reading the Gospel), the destruction of synagogues, massacres, the fires, the loss of rights and, later, the obligation to be locked up in the unlivable ghettos.
In the beginning, the persecutions against the Jews are also used as a red herring to clear the empire of the same accusation of “deicide”. In this regard, many fake documents are drawn up to clear the Roman power and the emperor.
For example, attempts are made to mitigate Pilate’s responsibility by writing biographies of him in which the prefect is greatly repents of what he has done and spends the remainder of his life in penance and doing good (so much so that he could be declared a saint). Or in other biographies Pilate, under the continuous weight of remorse, makes a life of hell and a horrible death as punishment for his guilt. For all tastes!
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OBSERVATIONS ON MISLEADING NEWS.
We recall, reporting passages already written in previous chapters, that all the original Gospels are destroyed from the 4th century. The four canonical gospels that we have are copies made to write by the theologians of the imperial court of Rome, where interlinear glosses are inserted to justify, among other things, the behavior of the Roman prefect Pilate. From this it appears that a large portion of the blame for the killing of Jesus falls on the Jewish people and not on the Roman empire, because when Pilate, due to doubts of conscience, asks the crowd which prisoner to free for Passover, Jesus or Barabbas, the people choose Barabbas. But in reality it doesn’t happen that way.
First: There is no Jewish custom, now or then, of releasing a prisoner for Passover.
Second: Even if Pilate asks the crowd of Jews whom to free, which is completely unthinkable given the absolute Roman power over the subject populations (if Pilate wants to free Jesus he can do it very well without listening to anyone), he asks the crowd in the open space in front of the tribunal, containing about 200 people, and where the high priests rush the temple guards and all their servants, thus almost completely occupying the courtyard, to stir up and shout at the top of their lungs non-stop that Barabbas be free and Jesus crucified. Therefore the Jewish people have nothing to do with it, but only a small group of subordinates of the local high clergy. And the blame cannot be attributed, as some claim, even to direct democracy, since this requires the free vote of ALL the population of the territory (in this case of Jerusalem) and not the participation of, more or less, 200 conditioned people.
Third: That Pilate has problems of conscience, as reported by copies of the canonical gospels, is not confirmed by historians, who describe him as a brutal leader who kills without any respect for the law or religious scruple (see in this regard the chapter “Jesus’ murder” as written by the philosopher Philo of Alexandria and the historian Flavius Josephus).
Incidentally, we also note that for various secular scholars even the passages of the new testament, which speak of the resurrection of Jesus, are glosses inserted to support the thesis of Emperor Constantine, Pontifex Maximus of the pagan religion, who wants Jesus to be deified, according to the custom of those times regarding personalities considered of great importance. In this way the cult of the adoration of God-Jesus and the veneration of leaders and statues develops, where the mutual love that unites and the direct community democracy, realizations of his message, are increasingly forgotten, while the elevation of the last is reduced to giving alms to the poor (those who do so earn merit for their soul) and/or, by improving, to doing good works.
Consequently, similar considerations can be made about miracles.
Analogously, glosses are introduced that assert Mary’s virginity (a highly appreciated value of the piece of skin in pagan religion) and her veneration, to completely forget the revolutionary concretizations of life arising from her “magnificat”.
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A few years later, in 392 AD, the old pagan religion is abolished and bloody repressive measures are also adopted against these nostalgic believers.
The freshly camouflaged paganism, neo-paganism, can thus blame, without fear, the previous paganism of the persecutions suffered by Christians … in past centuries.
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NOTE: The drama lies not so much in the evolution of theology or in the negative ideas of free thinkers regarding Christianity or other values, as in appropriating the messages received by the few in power. With these messages they often build a state religion or ideology and transform them into an instrument of domination and impediment of the mass to self-awareness.
Power imposes and peddles such deformations as the true announcement of salvation (it is the sin “against the Spirit” of which Jesus speaks).
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All non-Catholic writings are prohibited, in particular those dealing with science and other cultures, considered pagan and therefore diabolical matters.
Temples and pagan buildings, expressions of a false religion, and the synagogues of the “perfidious” Jews are destroyed.
Catholic theology becomes the only truth, other ideas are not allowed, nor scientific research, nor the reading of the Gospels and texts of other religions, etc. Violence is exercised (even with the stake) against those who have different opinions or make non-conformist choices or carry out scientific research.
This integralist dogmatic mentality is that typical of today’s “Taliban”.
The senseless intolerance of the Catholic hierarchs towards the “different” – which causes the loss of precious human skills – and towards human knowledge, together with the greedy corruption of political-administrative power, lead in a few decades to the total decay of Rome and to a thousand years of socio-cultural obscurantism with consequent arrest of progress.
The leaders know well that to attack the “different” they must label them “scoundrels, beings of evil”. Catholic bishops and leaders among the most zealous in the persecutions of Jews, labeled “deicides, perfidious beings”, Christians, labeled “heretics, beings of the devil”, pagans and scientists, are declared saints, taken as a model of the “true” faith.
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As an example, we report here the episode of Hypatia, a very beautiful woman, a scholar of mathematics, astronomy and philosophy – the inventor of the astrolabe among other things – who teaches in Alexandria in Egypt.
There the Catholic patriarch Cyril instigates the faithful against the Jews, who are consequently oppressed in a shameful way and are eventually chased away by the fury of the integralist crowd from the city.
These facts generate the disapproval of the prefect of Egypt, supported for humanitarian reasons by Hypatia. A strong disagreement arises and Cyril, believing that Hypatia, of pagan religion, exercises a decisive influence on the state official, preaches (in the basis of Augustine’s “Taliban” theology) that women are inferior beings, who therefore must remain reserved and submissive, they cannot educate themselves or speak in public, much less teach.
He therefore entrusts to one of his collaborators, in an unofficial form, the “mission” of killing the scientist: the delegate organizes and leads a large group of fanatical fundamentalist subordinates, who assaults Hypatia on the street, drags her, between beatings and insults, inside a Catholic temple and here “for the glory of God” he massacres her, gouging out her eyes and quartering her into many pieces. All the remains of her “evil” body are then taken to a landfill and burned: we are in 415 AD.
On the contrary, Cyril is canonized as a “saint” by the Catholic pontiff – the calendars in common use recall him – as a staunch defender of the faith (in the closed and cruel fundamentalism of the leaders? – ed.). Cyril also sends to the stake many Christians who do not adapt to the new theology of the oppressors and then has all the more than 500,000 papyri of the famous library of Alexandria destroyed, constituents the sum of the culture and science of the time, which in this way are lost for always.
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The leaders now have at their disposal a more effective tool of power and cheating, since they make the mass believe that the new state religion is the true and only expression of the message of … the good Jesus.
From the 4th to the 18th century millions of Christians of any denomination throughout the world, or in any case human beings, are tried under ruthless torture and burned alive, beheaded, impaled, hanged, garrotted or, if they abjure, are sentenced to perpetual prison to rotting in unlivable dungeons, being declared non-conforming to the religious doctrine of power. However, the high clergy immediately appropriates their assets before the trial.
It should be noted that many judges of the “holy” inquisition who subject thousands and thousands of Christians to those ferocious tortures to then transform them into human torches are canonized “saints” by Catholicism, among others, and as such are venerated even today.
Whoever has ears to understand, somebody understand, warns the Nazarene.
The main purpose of such continuous violence, as shown by written orders from the high hierarchy, is to terrorize the people in order to keep them subject (to the domination of a few).
The massacres of Greek Orthodox, Jewish and Muslim populations carried out by the Crusaders are also notorious.
Notorious are the cruel punitive expeditions ordered by the hierarchy against workers who require, sometimes supported by monks, more humane living conditions: the hierarchy has the protesting workers cut off hands and feet, then sends them back home.
From 1184, by order of the sovreingn pontiff Lucius III, the “special tribunals” of the Inquisition become mandatory in every diocese in the world.
It must be remembered that the Roman emperors unleash, over the course of 300 years, 11 persecutions against those Christians who do not make an act of veneration to the supreme head.
Now, in all the territories where the Roman Catholic confession is in force, the persecution unleashed against Christians is permanent: those who do not make an act of veneration and subjection to the supreme head are condemned.
And it does not end here: in 1244 the sovreingn pontiff Innocent IV orders to burn alive all women of any age considered “witches”. To be considered a witch, one could think of who knows what crimes, NO: it is enough for the woman to feel tired in her legs or feel pain that is not localized or sweat without a plausible explanation or be sterile or have three moles on the skin, etc.
Since then and for 540 years, millions of women, tied up with heavy chains or locked in cages so that they do not fly away, are taken to the stake, sometimes hanged or quartered, and their assets are collected immediately by the high clergy before the trial.
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NOTE: At the beginning of the 13th century, women become more aware of themselves.
For example, with Waldo they go around the villages helping the poor and preaching the gospel, but this is considered by the Catholic high priests to go against the “will expressed by God”. If they are against God’s will, it means that those women belong to the devil, so it is holy to kill them with fire.
Shortly thereafter, Claire of Assisi and her companions want to follow in the footsteps of Francis: never let it be! Women who go around helping the poor and talking about the gospel are against God’s expressed will! So it is a holy thing to give them a pagan life sentence, like vestals, locked up inside a convent in strict seclusion for their whole life!
The women are now raising their heads too much, their wings must be clipped, such diabolical manifestations must be prevented! So that the high Catholic hierarchy exhumes the pagan superstition of the witch: the first one to be burned alive is in 1244 in Toulouse.
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The creators of non-existent “monsters” also rage on children: the sons of witches or in any case newborns, which the clerical hierarchy believes to be generated by the devil or replaced by him with human-like beings, are condemned to death by the thousands! The executions take place by drowning in water. “Whatever you do to one of these children, you do to me” (already previously, moreover, millions of children are denied potential life due to the ban on marriage for the clergy).
They are all refined human sacrifices of children ordained by the god of power.
But all this is not enough: in 1254 the same Innocent IV issues a bull in which he asks the civil magistrates to have all the Christians accused of heresy tortured in order to extort their confession.
The “moral” influence of the Roman papacy contributes significantly to the spread of torture throughout Europe; only Sweden does not accept the invitation.
England accepts it for political reasons, but not for religious reasons.
It is well known of the cruelties committed and refined over the centuries by the Inquisition, even through the secular arm: the faithful, however, must absolutely believe that those are holy activities and that one must be subject to the murderous doctrines imposed, which, mind you, do not defend Christianity, but they defend the god of power, who is the antichrist.
In 1452, even before the discovery of America, the sovreingn pontiff Nicholas V supports the slave trade with his request to the European powers to enslave all Africans of Muslim faith.
With a bull of 1484, the sovreingn pontiff Innocent VIII not only justifies the burning of “witches”, assimilated to heretics, homosexuals and black cats, but began a more widespread persecution: the aberrant witch hunt, in which all people must participate.
The mere suspicion of someone about a woman is enough for her to undergo both a sham trial, where she is forbidden to have a defender, and inhuman torture for many days, obviously for her own good according to the hierarchy: dislocation of the wrists, ripping of the twenty nails and of the nipples, serious burns of the feet, lifting in the air with ropes tied to the wrists behind the back, progressive and rational fracture of the bones, red-hot irons stuck in various parts of the body.
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NOTE: For example, the “wise men” of the Catholic clergy and then also the Protestant ones believe that if a person suddenly has convulsions with emission of drool (today we say epileptic attack) it means that some of the women or girls present there is actually a witch, causing those disturbances with her evil influence!
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Carrying out the orders of the sovreingn pontiffs, the torturer friars, generally Dominicans or Franciscans (the bones of Francis still turn over in the tomb!), the more they are pitiless towards the accused, as towards heretics and homosexuals, the more they acquire spiritual merits for an afterlife. The technical ability, on the other hand, lies in making the victim suffer as much as possible without letting her die.
Whether she confesses that she has relations with the devil or does not confess it, whether she repent or does not repent, the unfortunate, even if she is a child, after the torture she must suffer the death sentence.
Only for those who abjure the sentence can it be commuted to life imprisonment. Given the large number of women sentenced to death, many times now there are mass-executions.
The infamous tortures and macabre killings are ordered and willed by the hierarchical power always in the name of their god, falsely identified with the God of Jesus.
To demonstrate the abysmal difference that exists between Christianity and the pagan-imperial component of Catholicism, we report some operative phrases from the so-called “Black Book”, one of the guides of the inquisition to investigate Christians, written at the end of the 15th century and much used, supported by the sovreingn pontiffs, also in the following centuries:
“We think that physical torture proves to be the most efficient and healthy means to lead to spiritual repentance”; “If a person confesses, he is guilty by confession of him”; “If despite all the means employed the unfortunate accused continues to deny his guilt, he must be considered a victim of the devil and therefore does not deserve compassion from the servants of God, let him die among the damned”; “A child must accuse her parents (of suspected heresy – ed.), a mother must accuse her children, not doing so constitutes a sin against the holy inquisition and deserves excommunication and hell; “Anyone who disagrees with the papacy is undoubtedly a heretic”; “Anyone who takes Jesus’ words literally and limits his answers to “yes” or “no” is a heretic (i.e. a Christian – ed.) and deserves death”.
It should be noted that the texts on torture drawn up by the Inquisition are used in the 20th century as a model to be inspired by the Nazi SS for their torments.
We arrive at 1520. The sovreingn pontiff Leo X solemnly condemns, because contrary to Catholic truth, Luther’s phrase: “Burning heretics is against the will of the Spirit”. Does this mean, according to the hierarchy, that the Holy Spirit likes the roast of heretics?! Yes, yes, and he prefers it with a side of fennel. What a gourmet! What professionalism! Hitler looks like an amateur imitator by comparison.
The god of these requires human sacrifices, like the god of the Maya or the Moloch of the Carthaginians.
The brutal massacres suffered by all the Christian Indians of the American continent are also known because, if they follow their own customs, they are considered superstitious by the Catholic hierarchy, therefore heretics: between the massacres of political power and the stake inflicted by clerical inquisition, 25 million victims are calculated.
The principles, or princes, of death are opposed to the God of Life!
Jesus well prophesies: “False prophets go as far as killing in the name of God, beware of them!” … “You recognize the false prophets by their fruits”.
Today his words can be expressed as follows: “False prophets kill in the name of an idea, be it religious, social, political, party, economic, cultural”. It is therefore easy to recognize them.
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In 1555 the sovreingn pontiff Paul IV builds in Rome, like those already existing in some European cities, a foul-smelling ghetto for the Jews, cramming them within high walls and burdening them with heavy taxes and humiliating legal and working restrictions and with the prohibition of having at home toilets and running water.
They must always wear a yellow countermark sewn on their clothes (does it remind you of something? – Ed.).
In the 16th century, and even more so in the 17th century, the position of the high hierarchy, always composed, with all the associated privileges, of a caste of nobles (even today in the Vatican the sovreingn pontiffs and cardinals all have noble titles, king the first and princes the second – ed.), who wants for itself ever greater pomp and ostentation of wealth, as a sign of the blessing and favor of God towards it, whereas making believe that the fault of the indigence, in which the majority of the people find themselves, is the poor themselves, because of their sins: God “rightly” makes them stay in that condition for penance!
The laity who do not want or do not tolerate this state of affairs and those friars who discover in the gospel (its reading is forbidden to the laity, reaffirmed by the decree of 1564 on forbidden books, so that they remain ignorant of it) that the teaching of Jesus is the exact opposite of the above, they must undergo torture and the stake of the Inquisition, which in the aforementioned period accentuates its horrid activity.
Fear makes people harmless and at the same time makes their mentality stupid. It is the policy of making people harmless, keeping them in ignorance, indigence, isolation, social immobility, psychic weakening produced by the wearing out physical or spiritual fear, that the strong, political, economic, religious, military powers pursue.
The French revolution claims the rights of human beings and prohibits criminal executions promoted by the inquisition: in contrast the sovreingn pontiff Pius VI divulges one of the worst social affirmations, establishing in a bull of 1791 that by the express order of god men are neither equal or free, therefore they must be subjected to “superiors” and sovereigns.
Subsequently, with his “Syllabus”, document of 1864, the sovreingn pontiff Pius IX solemnly condemns the freedom of the press and opinion, liberalism and anyone who claims that workers have the right to a just wage!
Years earlier Pius IX himself supports more or less in a veiled way the Sonderbund war in Switzerland (1847), which the Catholic cantons wage against the Protestant ones, since the latter want a more democratic and federal constitution, with fewer privileges for the clergy caste.
For the avoidance of doubt, in 1870 the First Vatican Council concludes: “If someone says that the Roman pontiff has only a duty of supervision or direction and not a full and supreme power … he must be excommunicated”.
Jesus says: “The leaders exercise power over the nations, these personages must not there be among you”, therefore in 1870 the Nazarene is… excommunicated by the hierarchy??
The long river of tears and blood generated by the special courts – created and presided over by the hierarchy – ceases months later, under the bloody aspect, with the occupation of Rome by the Italian troops.
These also close the revolting ghetto of the “Eternal City”, the only one still existing in the world.
Lost the papal state, the hierarchy replaces it with the personality cult of the sovreingn pontiff, of Constantinian memory, in the manner of the Roman emperors (“I am the state” of the king here becomes “I am the Church” of the sovreingn pontiff).
And it all reaches its peak in 1907 when the reigning high priest Pius X solemnly condemns any acceptance of modernism and any type of democracy both in the civil field and within the ecclesiastical organization.
This is a proof of the remoteness of Catholicism from the original social message of Christianity and a confirmation that the Catholic hierarchy, established by Constantine, is born to double-cross, overwhelming it, the democracy started by Jesus and by the Christians of the first three centuries.
Consequently, in the following decades, the Vatican gives more or less direct and unanimous support to the totalitarian parties of the fascist type in Europe and America, responsible for the disastrous consequences and the ruins produced by dictatorships and wars.
But even today the current Roman catechism (1992 AD) contains a chilling page justifying the death penalty for the most serious cases. This means forgetting the meaning and value of the Gospel: Jesus in fact is handed over to the executioners because he is considered by the authorities to be an extremely serious case, so for him the death sentence is absolutely justified!
Capital punishment is included in the new catechism because the Catholic pontificate makes use of it for centuries, so it cannot be abolished all at once: these are concepts expressed on TV by the then Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger.
The catechism itself admits certain wars calling them just, as it is now obsolete to call them “holy” (even oil wars and similar are legitimized in this way by those interested, but perhaps it would be better to define them … peace missions).
On the other hand, these two instruments, the death penalty and the “just” war, are in line with the current doctrines of power of the neo-conservatives.
THE SUFFOCATION OF SOCIAL VALUES
It should be emphasized that centralizing hierarchies, in general, proclaim themselves as representatives or champions of values that first fight and then, if they fail to eradicate them, simulate transferring them into their own structures, giving these the name of those values: so values often become formal screens, decoy, in order to cover up the wearing action of power. Sometimes acculturation is part of this aspect.
For the sovreingn pontiffs, all successors of Constantine I and heirs of the state religion of Rome, the war if promoted by them is called “holy”, the massacres of defenseless populations perpetrated by them become “admirable punishments of God”, tortures and killings of Christians at the request of the inquisition are “acts of charity”, denying the right to life to one’s children by prohibition of marriage is passed off as “consecration” (or “sine qua non” condition), the oath, condemned from Jesus, it changes its name and is a “vote” or “promise”, prostitution, considered a sin, is called “sacred” if it is managed by the hierarchy itself.
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NOTE: In the Middle Ages, the Catholic hierarchy creates and manages large brothels, the largest being in Avignon, the temporary seat of the papacy. This form of prostitution is commonly called “sacred” and women who go to those places at night to “work” must stay in church during the day to pray! Once they cease their activity because they are sick or no longer young, they are abandoned in the worst poverty or locked up for life in a convent to do penance for their sins; a fate that obviously does not affect those who earn the revenues of prostitutes, that is, the high clergy, who are forbidden to work.
Subsequently, it is in fact possible for the noble cardinals of the papal court, also composed of courtesans (high-class prostitutes), to have sexual relations of any kind, but it is good that nobody around knows this. The only condition is that they do not marry, since having legitimate children, therefore heirs, jeopardizes the economic interests of the “holy” institutions. In Rome the brothels, of which a high percentage of the income goes to the titular cardinals, last until 1870.
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Conversely, the Christian who insists on respecting the New Testament or whose ideas do not coincide with the doctrines of power is now qualified as a “heretic”, a “follower of the devil”; the woman who expresses her aspirations, but does not convince one of the leaders, she is transformed into a “witch”; the Jew, being persecuted by definition, is branded “cursed by god”.
In practice, a climate of terror is rendered, given the easy possibility of being accused.
For the power, if it is wanted by this, killing others is not a crime.
The sense of GUILT and the FEAR of the punishments on this earth and in the hereafter are instead instilled in the victims and the people as a weapon to keep them subjugated – by generating cases of depressive neurosis or psychosis owing to psychological violence – and individuals must make great sacrifices and penances to repair “the sins they commit”.
After the first Catholic council (Nicaea, 325 AD) until the mid-twentieth century there is never any mention in official hierarchical documents of mutual love, of the presence of Jesus among people united in love, of the substantial social applications of the Magnificat. The essence of the gospel is not suited to power!
To this day, the Italian biblical text of the C.E.I. (Italian Bishops’ Conference) notes that the Magnificat is “a poetic passage … on the theme of the poor and small aid at the expense of the rich and powerful”.
Even Mary, the mother of Jesus, is mythologized (the new mythology) and so the hierarchy, to set aside the Magnificat, reduces her to a model of superhuman virtues to be imitated individually, as far as possible, or to an object of pious veneration through … her material images.
Between the 4h and 5th centuries, the political-clerical power makes more documents write, in which, with different nuances, it is said that the apostles, who rushed to Mary, now nearing the end, suddenly see some angels arriving who take her soul and, subsequently, carry her body to heaven. This “transport” is not mentioned in any Christian writing before Constantine.
THE DERIVATIONS FROM CATHOLICISM
The original message of Jesus contains in itself the tools to be implemented and the early Christian communities demonstrate it: the message and the life, individual and collective, are a unique thing that comes true.
The state confession that is born in the 4th century, wanted and founded by the emperor of Rome and his closest collaborators of the clergy, instead aims to make people believe in a God-formula, according to theological theoretical definitions developed by thinkers, and at the organization hierarchical which must manage the devotion to this God-formula, with a very partial practical realization (where more where less) of the original message.
As already seen, the God-abstract-definition replaces the God of life and those who do not fully agree with that definition are persecuted; obedience replaces mutual love, uniformity replaces unity, whereas hierarchy replaces “ekklêsia”.
Religion thus becomes an instrument of the power of those who stand as the representative of the God-myth (or God-mute) and his doctrine (the same is true of an ideology) and obviously leads to divisions and struggles of power both within the confession itself and among the confessions (or ideologies).
And the Constantinism also obviously produces all this.
It is in the year 1054 AD, the Eastern Emperor Constantine IX Monòmaco considers the primacy of the bishop of Rome to be invalid and detaches himself from the Catholic hierarchy, constituting a new confession, Orthodoxy. Constantinople is proclaimed the “new see of the apostles” and the emperor assumes the role of religious sovereign, believing that he is the continuer of the work of the apostles and that he is superior to the bishops in theological doctrine.
He recognizes a position of prestige to the patriarch of the Byzantine capital, to whom however he entrusts purely representative functions.
The population of the subjected territories must become Orthodox.
We recall here that as early as 754 AD the Byzantine emperors proclaimed themselves “equal to the apostles”.
This form of power is called Erastianism (Caesaropapism).
In 1517 Martin Luther begins the reform in Germany, which aims to recover the evangelical component of Catholicism and eliminate the corruption of the clerical hierarchical structure.
He is politically supported by many German princes, who try to make themselves independent from the emperor. The Protestant reform develops in various forms, especially in central-northern Europe, often becoming a confession of power as well.
In 1534, King Henry VIII of England breaks away from Rome and gives rise to a new confession: Anglicanism, of which he proclaims himself supreme head.
Those who do not accept the Anglican primacy are condemned to be burned or beheaded, at best they are deprived of civil rights.
The monasteries are suppressed and their properties confiscated by the crown, which in turn distributes a part of it to the small nobility.
The closure of the monasteries, which assist the poor or the sick since the Middle Ages, forces the English state to tackle the problem of pauperism during the 17th century, putting in place a system of social assistance.
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It is curious that monarchs, initiators of a new religious confession, are often violent not only towards their subjects, but also towards their families.
It is known of the wives made beheaded by Henry VIII, less known the episodes of Constantine I, who has his wife, his firstborn son and brother-in-law executed, as well as personally killing his father-in-law Maximian.
What strange oddities!
In general, since the 16th century the powerful, including the heads of state religions, use different beliefs as a pretext: Catholic, Protestant, Anglican, Orthodox, to unleash mutual hatred, wars, rogue actions, persecutions.
Over the course of the 19th and 20th centuries, religious or interfaith tolerance, promotes by the French and American revolutions, is accepted by the majority of countries that recognize, even if in a more or less partial way, the message of Jesus.
THE SEEDS OF THE “WORD”
Various Roman emperors of the first three centuries AD, we know it, fight Christianity like the plague, trying to eradicate it because of its socio-political implications against power and given the large number of followers it attracts. However, their efforts are unsatisfactory.
Constantine I (a “devout” non-believer – ed.) with cunning move does not actually give freedom to Christianity, but only changes the name of the pagan gods, leaving almost unchanged paganism for the rest. He and his successors want to make believe, even with violence, that the hierarchical order, theology, rules and organization of the pagan state religion (changed what there is to change for the replacement of the gods with others names and personages to be venerated) are an integral part of the announcement of Christ.
In other words, the Roman power restructures paganism and formally welcomes Christianity, imposing major limitations on it, altering it and distorting its essence.
After a few decades, neo-paganism, freshly painted and illustrated by a doctrine suggestive for this purpose, becomes universally mandatory under the name of Catholicism and proves to be an excellent instrument of domination.
As for the true “word” of Jesus (i.e. the bacillus that causes the aforementioned plague) the great Constantine pursues a different strategy: he tries to enclose it within solid walls, so that it remains calcified and plastered there under strict surveillance and not has the possibility of spreading, if not in the form of theology – the new restructured mythology – detached from everyday reality and therefore not harmful to power, indeed, it favors it!
In order not to make the original message of Jesus accessible to the laity, the reading of the Gospel is forbidden to these, imposing very serious penalties on those who try to do so.
With these tools and structures, political and religious power manages, if not to eliminate, to keep the development of the essential part of the Christian message blocked for a few centuries.
However, missionaries are sent by the hierarchy to many parts of the known world, who carry with them those seeds that remain in people’s hearts and grow, even if they cannot generate suitable structures, as these are continually suffocated from the very beginning by the hierarchy itself.
LAITY AND CLERGY
As mentioned above, Constantine doubles the structure of the pagan state religion by creating the Catholic clergy (to the detriment of the mass of the faithful) and the offices of monarchical bishop and sovreingn pontiff.
The sovereign invests this caste of hierarchical superiors, all closely dependent on him, with the power of decision over the Catholics themselves, a power perfected with the fall of the empire.
Among the early Christians, on the other hand, decisions are up to the whole community, without the interference of leaders or priests, by the explicit will of Jesus, each being on equal terms, both men and women and free ones and slaves.
Thus, while among the first followers everybody is called saint, that is, “sacred”, since Jesus identifies with them, they live mutual love, love each neighbor, are ready to risk the cross, they all decide together on the needs of the community and on the distribution of surplus goods, so that there are no needy, for Catholicism instead they become holy some objects or institutions (holy water, the holy door, the holy war, the holy inquisition, the holy rule, the sacred ritual, sacred building, the sacred image, etc. and various of these pagan superstitions are still disclosed by the hierarchy) or a few individuals … provided they are already dead, belonging almost exclusively to the clergy and subjected to the rules, norms and traditions of the powerful superiors.
The lay faithful, on the other hand, are all plagiarized as sinners, therefore inept! In fact, from the 5th century AD, human beings are considered in mortal sin from birth, following Augustine’s “discovery” regarding Adam’s transgression: according to him this fault is also of the descendants, because that sin is transmitted … with the virile seed during the sexual act (is it a virus?! – ed.).
The sovreingn pontiffs of the time solemnly declare that original sin, being mortal in itself, causes children who die without baptism to go to hell, so it is necessary to baptize them as soon as they are born.
The clerical power does not realize that not even the cruelest of human laws condemns infants to atrocious punishment for eternity just because an ancestor of theirs, many thousands of years ago, makes a mistake!
To remedy this, he, but long ago the hierarchy declared that it does not exist.
How do we put it? Do we put it … in God’s mercy and resign ourselves to the evil of power?
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NOTE: Unfortunately, these doctrines cost the lives of innumerable women over the centuries, in particular midwives: if a child is born dead or in any case dies before being baptized, it means that the midwife, or mother, is a witch, lover of the devil; she kills the child, so that this (having in himself the original sin which is mortal) cannot go to paradise.
A striking case is offered by the city of Cologne which for a long period remains without midwives, because the religious superstition of the leaders – and their phobia towards women – for the above reasons causes them to be killed all on the pyre, the horrendous fire (it is hallucinating, but true!).
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It is not enough. If a faithful, in general, thinks that there are contradictions between the conformity or indoctrination desired by the superiors and the message of Jesus, the faithful is in mortal sin, he, and not the clerical superiors, who are elected, let’s face it, for belonging to the best caste.
But God has no need for a caste to represent him; power yes it needs it!
In place of the God of Christians who wants, in the social field, to free humanity from the domination of hierarchical power, from the shackles of hatred, indigence, exploitation, submission, intolerance, superstitions, division and discrimination, the high priests of Rome “create” a god who comes to save the soul of human beings in the hereafter, as these are all sinners here on earth (according to them), so the Master died because of our sins and not because of the leaders in power.
It is the classic sidetracking, which blames the people for the mistakes or crimes committed by the leaders.
Repetita iuvant: Luke writes that the high priests and our leaders hand him over to have him sentenced to death and crucified.
In this way, the concretization of the socio-economic structures and democratic freedom brought by Jesus is hindered or neglected, except for small achievements that obviously cannot solve the problems of the whole community.
Among the few of the clergy, someone emerges – overcoming restrictive laws and norms with their lives – either for their strong personality or for actions inspired by Christ and often times turns to particular social problems: just think of many worthy operators and in recent times, under this aspect, of Teresa of Calcutta.
The fact of having to make the “vows” reduces to a small circle the people in charge of a specific activity.
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Only the “Reformation” and subsequent popular revolutions, with the elimination of religious ties of imperial origin, make it possible for the laity to achieve more widespread social development over time.
Ultimately the leaven of life brought by Jesus slowly permeates structures and people of all kinds over the centuries, believers or non-believers, but above all, it should be emphasized, of the lay and civil field.
In the 20th century – let us return to the Catholic sphere – various “lay” movements arise which rediscover and concretely live some parts of the Gospel and have a relatively notable following, even if bound by disciplinary rules proper to power such as: obedience to superiors who, at the long, increasingly degrades or kills the original spirit, replacing it with uniformity (something very different from unity in love), the destination of goods which, if at the beginning it is for the economically poor, over time is more and more in favor of constructions for the leadership and for the formation of this (with such a system it becomes deformation) and the dependence on a distinct clerical caste whose Constantinian structures are not adaptable to the Truth of the new message (new wineskins are needed for the new wine).
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NOTE: It is known that very often the ownership of the aforesaid buildings, paid for with the contribution of the members and with offerings from the faithful, is immediately acquired by the Vatican.
According to recent data reported by the media, about 10 percent of the building stock in Italy is owned by the Vatican or by religious groups; in particular in the historic center of Rome this percentage doubles.
Do the people want Italy to become a feud of the high clergy?
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Within the collectivities officially recognized by the Vatican, young people who believe in the proposed consecration, carried by enthusiasm or unawareness, are somewhat exploited and their income and savings are tactfully taken away from them, of which it is almost exclusively beneficial the hierarchical management. The fourth commandment and the members of the other sex are indirectly played down, as happens in the formation of the clergy (compare for example Mt 15: 3-6).
The girls not brought to the leadership are subjected both physically, with unnerving executive work, and psychologically: they must strictly observe formal rules, recite orations or repetitive formulas, they must not think, but calmly obey only their “managers”, whereas the natural instinct and maternal affection are suffocated with various arguments (this blocking of thinking physically reduces the connections of the brain neurons, sometimes bringing individuals to a level of intelligence of thirteen year old supinely submissive to superiors or to a state of nervous depression swinging).
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NOTE: The same happens in every field where power demands absolute obedience: for example, among the US Marines, half of the survivors of the sufferings of the war, marked by disappointment at the deception suffered believing they are working for good, suffer from serious nervous disorders, of pathological maladjustment to family or work life.
The same happens to 33% of the soldiers fighting in Afghanistan.
The hierarchical structure must keep others subdued and in poverty, otherwise it cannot exercise its power – ed.
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The movements need a greater unity between them, that is, they can consider, some already do it, their differences as pearls of the same necklace, both by sharing the surplus goods for the truly needy and by working for the liberation of these from oppression of the powerful, both by communicating one group to the other, at a basic level, the experiences of love, the true one, welcoming them as different expressions of the same body.
The clergy is in crisis. From 1950 to today it has decreased by 60%, sterilized by the repulsion of an outdated system, by institutions that block original life, by brainwashing, by the obligation of celibacy aka canonical abortion, by the psychological stress caused by hierarchical rules [Paolo observes with insight: “These rules kill the spirit”, that is, love of neighbor overcomes the rules and orders given] and then by the well-being of Western countries.
In fact, many are attracted to join the clergy, as well as for religious reasons, also for the fact that they no longer have to struggle in order to feed themselves, such as the majority of the world population is forced instead.
From the point of view of the prestige of the pontificate outside the Catholic sphere, reduced to a minimum in the 19th century, a partial recovery can be noted after the Second Vatican Council, due to the accent placed on the evangelical or spiritual component of Catholicism.
But in recent decades, fairly consistent infiltrations in the key posts of the Roman curia and various episcopal seats of neoconservative sympathizers, highlight the pagan and undemocratic component of Catholicism, through a further centralization of decisions and an approaching to strong powers, that are fundamentalist as regards religion (including Protestant) and to “just” warmongers.
In this way the pontificate defends its Constantinian-Theodosian power, and by no means Christianity, which does not need those means, but totally shuns them.
On the other hand, see previous note, the Vatican is the owner of many palaces, centers commercial, luxury hotels, sacred places, health complexes, universities, etc. in Italy and abroad, which give it considerable power, with the typical consequences.
Sincere wishes can be given to Catholicism that it knows how to free itself from the now parched component wizened from the Roman Empire, the true “donation” of Constantine, and that it can instead fully realize the essence of the Life and social message brought by Jesus: a conversion that currently has significant obstacles to overcome.
The aforementioned component is however destined to fall, when there is the awareness of the faithful.
The pagan monarch and Theodosius reveal and teach the high clergy how an empire is governed with astute diplomacy and organizational capacity, that is a classic hierarchical structure of “superior” beings, who must show their expensive prestige, expression of power, and of inferior beings, kept with serenity unequal and submissive and possibly poor, albeit with violence.
Christianity is not this, it is the Life of all Christians united in Love, it is the community of love of the Magnificat, where all are brothers, human beings alongside human beings at the same level, where the ultimate decision is a right to all, is taken together, and the distribution of surplus goods, apart from investments, goes for work to the less well-off and for the needs that are considered such by the community itself.
In original Christianity, life-love, mutual love and love for the last and marginalized are valid, and those who perform functions are elected by the whole community on the basis of who lives this reality most.
Christianity is sharing, it is concrete life, it is not a monarchical succession, nor is it the execution of formal ceremonies, nor is it an expression of pre-established or institutionalized power.
What belongs to God must not be confused with what belongs to Caesar – that is, to the leaders and the powerful – we must not pass off as manifestations of God those that are manifestations of Caesar.
On the other hand, the power that enriches the high hierarchy kills the soul, says Hilary of Poitiers (315-367 AD), whilst Jesus affirms that “two masters cannot be served”: either we serve the God of Love and equality or we enslave ourselves to power – whether civil, political or religious – given by wealth (mammon, that is to say the plutocracy).
REFLECTIONS ON THEOLOGICAL DEFINITIONS
Imposing theological definitions of God is a bit like pretending that God can be enclosed in a literal formula.
For those who believe, he goes beyond the definition itself and also the opposite one, so that he understands both.
For example, God is infinitely beyond both the Trinitarian and the unitary formula.
Several times religious, political or cultural opposing factions, they want to achieve similar purposes that they call with different words, so much so that for a long time they struggle with each other until they realize that the basic concepts are similar.
Even Christians and atheists, if they live Love, they are in the will of God, which is concrete Life, not who says: “Lord, Lord”.
Such paradoxes occur even in the scientific field: the Galileo case is known to all. The hierarchy declares that the sun and celestial bodies all revolve around the Earth and whoever affirms the contrary denies a truth revealed by God. Galileo observes with his telescope that the earth revolves around the sun and that there are satellites, now then, which rotate around the planet Jupiter!
The scientist is tortured and forced to abjure in order not to be roasted alive and so the sentence is exchanged for life imprisonment at home. But Galileo, now blinded, cannot scan the sky with his sinful eyes.
WHO IS THE REAL HERETIC?
Yet with regard to the earth and the sun, both Galileo and the theologians say the same thing in different words: in fact, in the universe every celestial body is in motion, so nothing can be considered stationary.
To observe the motion of the stars, we can conventionally consider a reference point as fixed, such as any celestial body outside or inside our galaxy or the sun or the earth or other.
So Galileo and the theologians describe the same phenomenon, but unconsciously taking different points of reference.
Heresy and evil lie in intolerance and in the persecution of power towards those who manifest different opinions.
With Shakespeare, this is how we can express ourselves in this regard: “Heretics are not those who burn in the fire, but those who order the flame to be lit”.
On these things one can digress and twist the argument: in Galileo’s time the hierarchy maintains that the sun revolves around the earth, because God so disposes, and it is a heretic who affirms the opposite. But if in reality it is the earth that revolves around the sun, it means that God thus disposes and it is a heretic who affirms the opposite: it is the hierarchy therefore, which, theologically speaking, becomes the true heretic. And it is shown by the rivers of blood that over the centuries, and not only it, flow around the earth.
The largest number of Christians killed in the world, in over a millennium, is obtained by order of the highest exponents of the Catholic hierarchy! Other than representatives of Jesus. But they are defined like this … since the pagan emperor Constantine peremptorily orders to say like this to his courtier, created the first pontiff in the 4th century AD by the emperor himself.
SYNTHETIC TABLE OF CATHOLICISM
From what is illustrated, Catholicism results from the mixture of two components, of two “souls”: one of pagan-imperial origin and one of evangelical origin, confused together to keep people to themselves, attracting them with some values of the Christian message and making them believe that the alienations of power are an integral part of the same message.
The basic points therefore are some of the “table 1″ plus those of “table 2”, as it is reported in the following “table 3”, with the prevalence – even more in past centuries – of the imperial-pagan component.
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Table 3 – Basic points of Catholicism.
…………………………………………………………………………………………………………
Basic point: the relationship of the individual with ideology.
– Evangelical component:
Love that is life.
– Imperial or pagan component:
Sacrifice, virginity,
formal acts and rites,
cult of images,
all sinners from birth,
dogmatic mythology (or theology).
Basic point: the relationship of people to one another.
– Evangelical component:
Respect for the other,
mutual love (in some cases).
– Imperial or pagan component:
Obedience and inquisition,
that generate uniformity, fear,
submission, guilt.
Basic point: the community relationship.
– Evangelical component:
Aspects of social justice,
assistance work,
intermediations for peace.
– Imperial or pagan component:
Hierarchical structure
that produces discrimination,
conflicts, need, clericalism,
neurosis, persecutions,
death in the name of god.
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FINAL REMARKS
Mutual love generates union; obedience produces uniformity.
Unity expresses freedom; uniformity means submission.
Equality generates justice, peace, well-being; superiors-inferiors structure produces many situations of injustice, wars, poverty.
In other words, in the social field, authority is an expression of democracy; all power is the manifestation of a more or less alienating despotism.
All this, expressed in religious terms, sounds like this: authority comes from God; power is often a manifestation of evil (of the Evil One).
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In the previous pages we see that Jesus identifies himself with the inferiors, with the hungry, with the poor, with the abandoned sick, with the persecuted, with children (then considered nothing), with the marginalized of all kinds, for which Jesus is represented by the last in the social field.
But what are the causes of such social injustices? He recognizes them in oppressive power, and therefore harshly condemns it.
But the power, in turn, on which framework does it stand?
In other words, what is the DNA that identifies it and makes it work in this way? What is his DNA, responsible for transmitting and expressing his wearing out character?
Today we know that the DNA of living organisms is an organic structure called “double helix”.
Power also has its own “DNA”: the DNA of power is the hierarchical structure. It is the institutionalized hierarchical structure.
And what is the DNA of Jesus’ message? It is the authority of the community. It is the sovereignty of the people institutionalized.
From what is said, in the social field there are three aspects or levels:
“a” = the existence of the needy and discriminated against;
“b” = the cause of such injustices;
“c” = the deep DNA that allows this state of things.
The Christian message deals with the point “a” both by recognizing “Jesus” in every neighbor (and therefore loving him concretely), especially in the poor, the discarded, the defenseless and by distributing the common wealth in excess so that there are no needy workers.
Point “b” addresses it in the Truth, denouncing the damage produced by the oppressive structures of power.
Point “c” solves it with the founding institution of the ultimate decision that is up to the whole community together.
The Roman Empire and the pagan religion do not care much about the “a” point.
They face point “b” by imposing suggestions that have little to do with the Truth.
The point “c” is given by the DNA of absolute power.
Genetic engineering experiments begin in 1970 AD. Among other things, it is possible to remove its congenital DNA from an organic cell and replace it with the DNA of a cell from a different organism. If the manipulation is successful, it gives life to a new organism that possesses the characteristics of the being that donated its DNA, with some variants similar to the organism of the being that gives the empty cell.
Constantine does this, anticipating the times, in the 4th century AD: he empties the Christian social message of its natural DNA (the authority of the people) and inserts the DNA of the political-religious hierarchical power of the empire (for which Jesus is represented by the “superiors”), generating a “new” social organism, Catholicism, which inherits the structural characteristics of imperialist power (point “c”), imposes suggestions that often have little to do with the Truth (point “b”) , while it has some similarities in the point “a” with the Christian message, through love, individual, for neighbor and with good works.
In these conditions, the point “a” is unfortunately sometimes used as a decoy to make us believe that the whole new organism is the message of Jesus. With this alchemy, the empire initiates a most “powerful” religion for the control of Western world.
The task of those who want to realize the essence of the Christian message today, whether believers or non-believers, is to restore that original DNA in the social fabric: the institution of the people’s authority.
It is the most important and necessary operation.
Direct democracy revealed by Jesus is the social ideal that is valid for everything and everyone, not just for a privileged few!
Constantine I lost the great opportunity: that of adopting a new form of direct political and economic democracy in its territories – brought by Christianity – which can trigger an admirable evolution in the socio-political system. Rome would thus become a new beacon of civilization for the known world.
Instead, he prefers to bury the democracy wanted by the Nazarene. But democracy is a living organism made up of citizens and like all living organisms, if it does not evolve, it becomes extinct, and so it happens.
The empire decays more and more to the point of ruining and disappearing, while several, too many, centuries of obscurantism take over, which makes humanity lose the possibility of a precious cultural, social, human, scientific, political and, of course, democratic progress.
ATTENTION: What is analyzed so far on the power of the hierarchical institution, on the means used to exercise it and on the serious damage that derives from it to citizens, changing what there is to change, applies to any form of hierarchical power, it either secular or religious, political or economic, monarchical or republican, representative or despotic, civilian or military, Nazi or Communist, capitalist or populist.
In fact, without going into the past centuries, in the systems of power from the 20th century to today, such as the Nazi-fascist dictatorships, the communist ones, those of the South American, Asian or African third world and, sometimes, as in countries with representative democracy, submission is registered, massacres, persecutions, techniques of psychological coercion, hunting for suspects, torture, fear, death sentences, killings of thousands and thousands of human beings, oppressive limitations of freedom and information, injustices.
Every power makes great efforts to appear as an authority and various people, often in good faith, believe in it. We must make a change for the better, we must reach emancipation. Anyone can play his part however possible, so that the natural social evolution takes its course undergone.
In biblical-inspired creeds and in other religions there are “seeds” of Jesus’ word and we can focus on these too to find collaboration with their members, to live together a more advanced community.
With most of the civil organizations and with all the populations we can collaborate and reach an awareness of the potential we have.
We must know what abilities we possess being united, with the message of “royal dignity” among us, that is, in laical terms, of the direct sovereignty of the people (the DNA mentioned above).
It is necessary to achieve everywhere with the contribution of us all the new structure, the new legal institution: the authority of the people; in this way we make great progress and conquer other goals in the democratic evolution of human society.
It is good to form people to the values of advanced democracy, freedom, immediate-direct-participation wealth, collaboration and cooperation, healthy economy of solidarity, efficient development management, beauty of diversity. We feel us be participating in everything, until in every part of the world we develop and conquer the communion of the equality of Magnificat, we generate only one love in the diversity of all people: each one becomes a gift for the other, everyone feels at one’s ease in freedom.
It started. With this study and with our action we want to make a contribution to the work of many in the world for the implementation of this idea.
The announcement of Jesus and the life of the early Christian communities bring decisive contribution to the ideas and social conquests both of the last centuries and of the near future.
The developments of democracy that follow are illustrated in the various categories of this website.
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