Aelfric on a New Heaven and a New Earth

As my circle of churchly friends has broadened in recent years, I’ve become more aware of the view that at the end of the world as we know it, the Earth will not be destroyed but renewed.  And, yes, I’ve heard this view from robustly orthodox and learned gentlemen.

When I came across this view, I did not necessarily disagree with it.  But it did seem a bit modern to me – and you know how ill disposed I can be toward modern things.  The fire and brimstone and destruction of the world from my pre-Anglican dispensationalist days seemed more traditional and (at least literally) biblical to me.

But I have just discovered that is not such a modern view at all.  The other night, I was reading a sermon for the Second Sunday in Advent from The Sermones Catholici, commonly known as the Homilies of Aelfric and was surprised by this passage:

Jesus concluded this gospel with these words: "Heaven and earth shall pass away, but my words shall never pass away." Heaven and earth will not turn to naught, but they will be changed from the form in which they now exist to a better form, as John the Evangelist said, "Then there shall be a new heaven and a new earth." There will not indeed be others created, but these will be renewed. Heaven and earth will pass away, but will, nevertheless, continue, for they will be cleansed by fire from the form which they now have, and will yet stand ever in their own nature. Then will the sun be sevenfold brighter than it now is, and the moon will have the light of the sun.

Now this was written in England about a thousand years ago.  So that long ago and likely well beforehand, the expectation that the earth would not be utterly and completely destroyed but instead be wonderfully renewed was accepted and well within orthodoxy.

Again, this surprised me and not just because of my fire and brimstone background.  I am somewhat familiar with medieval depictions of the end times in illuminated manuscripts, stained glass and other church art.  And they are scary and surely intended to be so.  They, at least as a whole, do not emphasize “I am making all things new.” (Rev. 21:5)  One would not expect a renewal eschatology to be much accepted in those times.  Or at least I wouldn’t.

Yet another area for further study . . .

A Helpful Suggestion (not to be confused with a shameless plug)

Good day! I hope you all had a good weekend. And I especially wish a Happy Hanukkah to those who are observing that worthy celebration.

But I’ve got some good news and some bad news for you.

The good news: Christmas is just over two weeks away.

The bad news: Christmas is just over two weeks away.

Well, if you have ALL your Christmas preparation and shopping done already, maybe it's not bad news at all. But if you're normal, you probably still feel you've got too much work to do.

So let me help. My experience is that Amazon is very good about delivery. So if you order a fine book like my Texas Anglican novel Pilot Point (Hint. Hint.) about now, it will almost certainly get delivered to yourself or to your lucky gift recipient well before Christmas. And, yes, Amazon will even gift wrap it for you if you want. It doesn't get much easier than that.

And, of course, the Kindle version of Pilot Point gets delivered electronically almost immediately.

You're welcome.  Always glad to help.  Now enjoy the rest of Advent.

Farewell for now, First Things

Long time readers may remember that I have been very well disposed toward First Things for years and have often recommended its articles.

But back in September, the sudden ousting of Maureen Mullarkey alarmed me, and I mentioned I would be watching First Things more closely.

And so I have and have come to a personal conclusion.  I will not be renewing my subscription to First Things, nor renew gifts subscriptions for friends.

Pretty much the last straw was the issue after Pope Francis’ U. S. visit.  It was weak sauce, to be frank.  Editor R. R. Reno was clearly well disposed towards his visit.  And any criticism of Francis was hard to find and weakly said.

This is a far cry from the courageous and critical First Things I used to know.

And R. R. Reno seems to be the problem.  He became editor in 2011.  Not only have I found the journal less interesting since then, I have referred to it favorably only once since he became editor.  That quite in contrast to the years before.

To be honest, I had not noticed that very much.  The Mullarkey episode alerted me that I should take notice, and now I have.

Should First Things be done with Reno and right itself, I will gladly return.  But for now, there are more worthy journals and blogs to read and support.

Farewell, First Things . . . for now.

Obama is Covering Up Immigration Histories of Known Jihadis

Obama is not only willfully averting his eyes from the danger of his de facto open borders policy.  He doesn’t want the rest of us to see it either.

The Obama Administration is covering up the immigration history of 72 known jihadis.

Back in August, Senators Cruz and Session asked for the immigration history of these 72.  The Obama Regime is sitting on the information, and the two Senators have spoke out about it.

Further, they are demanding the immigration history of San Bernardino mass murderer Syed Farook.

I’m sure “the most transparent administration in history” will disclose that as soon as possible.

Leftists Yesterday After the San Bernardino Shooting

I’ve watched the San Bernardino Shooting and its aftermath closely.  I would rather not be proven right again and again about the past and present madness of importing massive Muslim populations to the West, but, sadly, I am once again proven too correct on that.

What did shock me was the behavior of the American Left.  They really should not be able to shock me anymore after the several decades I’ve been watching them.  But somehow they keep on managing so to do. 

The blood was hardly dry and the identity or origin of the shooters was almost completely unknown when the Left tried to pin this on their political enemies.  The loathsome Markos Moulitsas took the lead on this.

Yo GOP, kinda hard to talk about "keeping people safe" when your peeps are shooting up America.

— Markos Moulitsas (@markos) December 2, 2015

Who knew that a Muslim gunman and his Saudi bride were at the heart of the Republican base! 

Of course, he had no idea about the eventual identity of the perps, but he could not resist immediately using the awful event to smear conservatives.  Polite words utterly fail.

And MSNBC, CNN, and Bloomberg News were oh-so-eager to inform us that there was a Planned Parenthood clinic only about a mile away!

And, again well before we knew anything about the perps, Obama (and Hillary) jumped to advocate making it harder for law-abiding citizens to arm themselves against the jihadis he’s importing.

Then Leftists, as if they hadn’t besmirched themselves enough, mocked and ridiculed those offering prayers for the victims.

We have found out the hard way about the nature of Islam and its adherents.  We would do well to open our eyes to the nature of Leftist ideologies and their adherents as well.

Your University Might Be Run By New Totalitarians If . . .

. . . If students find it necessary to take reasoned discussion underground.  That is the case at Brown.

Yes, I do think Brown is the sort of university that should be told to defend free speech or have its Fed funds cut off.

Again, Numerous Muslim Refugees to U. S. Have Already Gone Terrorist

I apologize if this post is in part repeating myself.  But I note that otherwise reasonable, intelligent and well-meaning people are all for bringing thousands of Muslim “refugees” to the U. S.  So I find repetition needful.

The question of whether bringing Muslim refugees to the U. S. brings Jihadis to the U. S. has already been answered definitively.  It has already happened on numerous occasions.

And note that the linked examples come from earlier batches of refugees that were much smaller than the number Obama is bringing to our shores.  We are going to vet these any better?

If you would like to focus on a particular past batch of refugees, Scott Johnson has studied the Somali refugees residing in Minnesota.

Excuse me for pounding the virtual table.  But, again, the nature of Islam overseas is such that importing mass numbers of Muslims is importing massive trouble.  The U. K. and France have already found this out the hard way. 

And now so are we.