The sordid occasion of Tony Blair being received into the Roman Catholic Church is good time to reveal another reason I won’t become a Roman Catholic.
To be received, Blair made the following profession:
I believe and profess all that the holy Catholic Church believes, teaches, and proclaims to be revealed by God.
I can’t say that about any church. I look askance at any church that would demand such a profession. And, unlike Tony Blair, I fear God enough that I think it exceedingly unwise that my first act in a church be one of dissembling.
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While we’re talking about Tony Blair, I think less of the Romans for receiving him. As Prime Minister, he willfully committed grave public sins. His forcing the Roman Catholic Church either to adopt to gays or shut down its adoption agencies is only one of his outrages. Of course, we are all sinners in need of repentance and forgiveness. But with his sins being so grave and public, I think he should be required to repent of them in public by name before being received into a church. The Romans are making no such requirement.
If my parish gave a notorious sinner such a free pass, I would have trouble going to the communion rail.
But I agree with Cranmer that the Romans can have him:
It is ironic that 'the most devoutly Christian prime minister since Gladstone' has done more to undermine Christian liberties than any challenge to the faith on these islands in more than three centuries. He is a spiritual fraud . . . he can go, and good riddance . . . .
Good riddance indeed.
4 comments:
Bless you.
"If my parish gave a notorious sinner such a free pass, I would have trouble going to the communion rail."
Yes, indeed! The bare-faced audacity! Just like that person who was guilty of heinous enough crimes to be crucified for them, and then he expected to simply stroll into Paradise merely by saying (after a life of depravity, and with no chance that he'd actually have to back up his so-called 'repentence' with deeds, oh no) a quite obviously insincere cant phrase: "And he said unto Jesus, Lord, remember me when thou comest into thy kingdom."
He actually had the gall to expect favourable treatment for this glib little sentence!
Of course, Our Lord wasn't fooled. Not at all. He knew better, didn't He? Now, what was it again that He said to this notorious public sinner who thought he could backtrack at the eleventh hour on what he'd done in public all the days of his life?
"And Jesus said unto him, Verily I say unto thee, To day shalt thou be with me in paradise."
The Roman Catholic Church: We save 'em so you don't have to :-)
Okay, so you're saying he's a liar, a hypocrite, and a bit of a Pharisee?
He'll fit right in with the rest of us, so.
I'm not particularly thrilled to have him as a newly-minted co-religionist, I remain to be convinced of his sincerity, and I do wonder about how he's reconciling the actions he took in his public life with what he now must profess, but let's give him a chance first, all right?
Wait until after he's sacrificed the first black goat at midnight on Hallowe'en in a Druid circle before we toss him out on his ear, okay?
Deisearch, the thief on the cross repented for stealing and confessed his guilt. I've yet to hear any confession or repentance from Tony Blair concerning his very public misdeeds against the church, against the UK, against religious freedom, and against children, born and unborn.
wannabe
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