“Secularism is no friend of Christ.”
Melody Phillips, journalist for the London Times
(Salvator Mundi / Leonardo da Vinci cica 1500)
Salvator Mundi, or Savior of the world….
A haunting image is it not?
Soft, other worldly and ethereal yet also equally powerful.
Look into those eyes…
At first glance the sockets appear gauzy, almost empty or perhaps out of focus.
Yet upon further inspection, the eyes seem to be like a window, opening into a
different realm or dimension..as in, they invite the viewer to look further
and venture deeper to someplace else.
This particular painting by Leonardo just set a record sale at Christie’s Auction
House, fetching the highest amount ever paid for a single painting…
approximately 450 million dollars.
The buyer is so far undisclosed.
And there is an entire post alone waiting to be written about this particular painting,
of this particular version….but that is for another day—
for today we have more important issues to discuss.
Savior of the World—-
that is indeed, for the Christian believer, Jesus Christ.
He was not simply a moral teacher, a philosopher or Jewish rabbi…
He was, just as He said and just He remains today—
The Savior of the World.
He is of one point to the three pointed triangle of the Trinity.
It is through Him and Him alone that anyone is to be saved.
It is not through good works, it is not through thoughtful actions….
it is only through the blood of Jesus Christ.
Therefore to repent.
To die unto self.
To believe in His Resurrection and His saving Grace.
Grace.
As in nothing done by one’s self…for Grace is beyond self.
Saved from self, from sin, from death…..
That is the summation of the Gospel.
The Bible, particularly the New Testament is the Holy inspired, written retelling
regarding that summation—the Good News.
It is the lynchpin of Christianity.
There is no Heaven, no Salvation, no Grace, no Hope without Jesus Christ.
He is the only way.
And yet today we have mainline churches who are pushing, have pushed,
that one key integral component to Christianity to the side.
It has become secondary to their now all consuming main focus of secularism.
For those who adhere to the progressive Christian narrative,
they are the ones who have decided to make an alliance with those who
push for all things secular…
Progressive, uptick, Christians who now believe and embrace the stance that
the world would have them embrace….and that is to see Christianity in a 21st century,
more modern image.
Yet what they fail to understand is that such a “friendship” will be the death of the Christian Church as we know it.
In the latest interview of Gavin Ashenden on Anglican Unscripted, he makes this
point perfectly clear.
Bishop Ashenden notes that the “anti Christian Secular Narrative is being
swallowed whole as if it is Christianity—
and it is most certainly not”
That narrative being the open acceptance of same sex marriage, openly gay clergy,
the embracing of transgenderism, newly defined family units…
all the while making it clearly known that, anyone opposed to such, shall be
labeled as a hate mongerer…anti love, anti accepting, anti whatever…..
never mind that the lies offered up as a new progressive gospel run counter to
the actual word of God.
In steps a woman named Lorna Asworth.
Lorna is Saskatchewan by birth and was raised as a Mennonite.
But as Life has its way, she married a Brit who was Anglican and so
the UK and the Church of England have now been her home ever since.
That is until most recently.
Lorna has been an active member of the laity who works very closely with the clergy
as she has risen in the lay ranks within the working body of the Church of England.
Yet when someone like Lorna tenders her resignation from said working body of the
Church of England, such a resignation, one would dare assume,
would not, should not, be cause for some sort of henny penny
the sky is falling sort of reaction…yet that is exactly what has happened.
This mild mannered wife, mother and church lay worker who considers herself
a conservative Evangelical Anglican has been active on the Archbishop’s
Council as well as serving in the General Synod for the past 12 years,
has found herself at the center of a growing maelstrom and as somewhat of
a poster child if you will, for the Orthodox voice of the Church.
Lorna recently granted an interview with Anglican Unscripted where she explains her decision to ‘abdicate’ her position from the Church’s working body as
she explains what is currently happening to the Church.
She explains that the Church has lost its way.
It has left behind those who continue to claim the Gospel as the true teaching of the Church. “The Glory of the Lord has departed as the Church of England
is moving outside the presence of God.”
“There are now two different Religious communities.
One is rooted in Christ and its right to ask for the Holy Spirit.
The Second is not—and is where Glory has disappeared.”
Lorna verbalizes so clearly what so many others now feel.
“What am I to do?”
I didn’t leave them, they left me”
She spoke of meetings where those more conservative members would actually
cite scripture to reinforce a point only to be met by rolling eyes and even jeers
from the more progressive attendees.
She cites that the Church is no longer talking about Jesus and the saving message
of Christ as she actually uses the word heresy when describing what is taking place
within the Church.
And in order for the Church to save herself from the inevitable implosion,
Lorna warns that there must be repentance, from the top down.
“We have lost what it is to fear (respect in some translations) the Lord.
If you fear the Lord, you will fear nothing else…and we have lost that.”
And so we leave it to a Jewish woman, one who leans a bit right in her
journalistic style, to write an article for the London Times noting that the departure
of Lorna Asworth from the Church is putting the Church of England on a trajectory
involved in self destruction.
As in it appears everyone gets it but the Church herself….
cookiecrumbstoliveby 
Reblogged this on Talmidimblogging.
Sorry but this could be a longish post!
“It is not through good works, it is not through thoughtful actions….
it is only through the blood of Jesus Christ.
Therefore to repent.
To die unto self.
To believe in His Resurrection and His saving Grace.
Grace.
As in nothing is done by one’s self…for Grace is beyond self.
Saved from self, from sin, from death…..
That is the summation of the Gospel. “
This is indeed the summation and a very good one too. In fact it represents a transcendent bargain; the exchange of the worthless tiny self of ‘me’ for the incomparable value of union with God. Our precious sense of individuality is as food for Him offered by our hearts in a eucharistic mystery. He consumes ‘me’ not the other way around. And lo! we do not die nor become mindless fools but instead that intelligence once felt to be ‘mine’ is known then as it has always been………His. This is the mystery of Jesus Christ, a mystery at once unknown but yet known. And certainly beyond the secular mind. Deep within the contemplative orders of the old Christian church this was well known and practised. To paraphrase those words He gave us: If you want to save your life you must first lose it! (I will be there, do not fear).
Secularistic evil thought is always weak for it lives upon its own self-importance and therefore is dependent upon what this church of England is calling ‘good disagreement’ that is :
“We can all have what we want, we can easily deny our biologies. There are no absolutes to disagree with us any longer.”
And so we see the church of England has now become a mere Association of Religious Secularism (England). It is not necessary to provide its acronym.
However, I have to disagree with the good Bishop Ashenden laying this modern heresy at the feet of Carl Gustave Jung who devoted his entire life to trying to heal the fractured psyches of his patients. Though not an apologist for Jung it is quite clear that he was a deeply spiritual man who longed for the Church to see the power of its own transformational symbols in that they held the Absolutes which the human mind could discover in contemplation and prayer. But he knew that this required deep faith in God.
A more fitting target for the Bishops fomentations would be B.F.Skinner who utterly ignored Nature and applauded Nurture. That Nature was a simple tabula rasa, of no divinity, upon which behavioural constructions could be made. This ‘psychology’ reduced men and women to digits to be manipulated and it prepared the way for the high speed internet and plethora of social networking sites. These two things are the cause of the CoE’s demise not Jung. By removing Nature Skinner and his multifarious adherents removed the indescribable, the unknowable the very place where the Absolute resides, where our Soul resides, out of which our Faith arises. Skinner’s madness authenticated ‘secularism’ and denied the concept of the ‘prayerful Soul’. And what we see today is the result of this insanity.
What a marvelous addition to the post Chris!!!
Having grown up in the Episcopal Church, which has been long gone by the wayside—as we now witness the “mother” Church being on the same one way track to destruction, I have been so heartened hearing, reading, seeing the words offered by those who like the host of Anglican Unscripted Kevin Caulsen, those Lorna Asworths and Gavin Ashendens out there who are speaking up…I’ve often felt somewhat alone in my dismay—knowing that what’s been happening is so very wrong but what must be wrong with me if I’m the only one who seems to see the problem…
And whereas knowing the good Bishop background in psychology, law as well as theology and with my only having had one college course in psychology, I cannot speak with any real sense of knowledge of the teachings of Jung…but I totally understood the gist—being that the church is buying into the business of “self” as God….
which she and her more progressive followers are indeed doing…putting aside the Gospel as mere conjecture or fairytale and buying into the secular view of self—as I think Bishop Ashenden noted that when asked about his belief in God, Jung seems very much of the affirmative, its just that his version of God was something of his own design—and that being the human person as the center of the universe….
But like I say, I can’t really go deeply into the thought process of Jung having not studied enough of his work—but the bottom line I think we—as in you, me and the good Bishop understand is that it is Jesus Christ who is our whole Salvation!
Lotsa good theology up in the house today.
of which house is that dear?
In your house today.
Theology up in da house!
didn’t know if you meant the cookie house or that of the Lord’s—but I suppose the good of the cookie is always for the Lord 🙂
Well, God’s theology is always good! But your use of it today was too.
Many thanks Wally—this craziness in our society today has me all worked up!
Well, as I told you before….I like the direction some of your writing has taken. Keep on trucking my friend.
🚚🚛
Ba ha ha
Your writing is always so powerful, Julie! You build your case reasonably and yet, you never fail to elicit a powerful emotional response from me as well. This is another excellent and wonderful post! Truly heartbreaking events within the church, however. 🙁 Hugs!
Kudos to Lorna Ashworth for speaking the truth!
Jesus Christ, the Savior of the World. I just wanted to see it again. Doesn’t it look pretty? I thought it looked pretty in your post so I just did it again. And again – Jesus Christ, the Savior of the World. 😀 It is a shame when his church becomes so fragmented but it doesn’t change the truth of Jesus Christ, the Savior of the World.
Can’t change the Truth 😃
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