Free Republic

Thank you for introducing me to Dr. John Bergsma. A really good author

Utter nonsense. Greece, Romania, Bulgaria are strongly Eastern Orthodox and they are part of the EU

The Russians aren’t quite as Christian as you say. Furthermore their armies in Ukraine have large Muslim (20% of the Russian population) and Buddhist Tubman, not to mention rampant atheism.

When he was campaigning against the previous, socially conservative, government, Tusk said building a wall was against human rights.

Wait. Isn't Israel allegedly an "apartheid state" discriminating against Arabs?

How come they appoint an Arab Christian to the head if a university on her own merits?

How come they have an Arab Muslim supreme court justice?

How come they have Arabs in parliament and in the military??

It was the assassination of the hier to an important throne, nit the attempted assassination of the head of government of a minor state

Saudi arabia is rich only for a few - the Al Saud family. They literally have slaves as in foreigners who are indentured workers.

Eritreans are a mix of Christians and Mohammedans - the Christians like this Nura wouldn’t head to Saudia.

though she would have been culturally closer to Ethiopia or Kenya, both of whom are doing well economically.

Slovakia's second main problem is that it is languishing economically and has no base for people to stay. Young people leave for Prague (big IT and other industries) or Vienna or Germany). And, on a population base of 5 million, they can't afford this.

It's capital Bratislava has the bulk of the economy and eastern slovakia languishes and is really poor

Even beautiful cities like Kosice are left aside

the bigger problem - to MY mind - and I just saw this last year when I went on a 2 week travel around Slovakia and touched Budapest -- Slovakia has no real history of high culture

Yes, the Putinistas on FR will jump and say "what about Ukraine" - but the Ukraine builds its national mythology around Kyivan Rus (and used to around Bandera) and now around its resistance to Putin's invasion

Slovakia on the other hand doesn't have this - it was part of the 9th century Great Moravia, but that entity didn't leave any physical or cultural remnants. After that it was dominated by Magyar (Hungarians).

In fact most "Hungarians" are heavily genetically slavic - take a look at their features, few have dominant Ugric genetics. Here are what the original Magyars looked like (photo of their Khanty relatives)

vs the Magyar people

Slovakia was a critical part of Hungary - all its art, history, castles etc. date from the Hungarian domination.

And it hasn't had the opportunity to build its own national mythos

Technically Fico and his party are "left wing populists" - they are in favor of big government, government control of media and economy.

His party is SMER - "Direction - Social Democracy"

And I’m going to bet there will be no apology

The Church is Israel, Israel is the Church...This Guy is wondering, What is the issue here? How hard is it for people to grasp the concept of continuity?

Correct

Trumpisourlastchance This is a repudiation of Christ, yet fake Christians support this land idolatry cult. How about that?

you are very correct, Trumpisourlastchance --> I can understand Rabbinical Jews talking about this, but anyone who holds the Jesus is Lord and God, would not be going around crowing about potentially new animal sacrifices in the temple

Replacement Theology essentially claims that the Jewish people were the chosen people of God and that due to their rejection of the Christ they have been replaced as God’s chosen people by the Church. This replacement is then taken to mean that the Jewish people have been rejected or “accursed” by God for their rejection of the Gospel.

In Nostra Aetate the Church explicitly rejects replacement theology:

Nevertheless, God holds the Jews most dear for the sake of their Fathers; He does not repent of the gifts He makes or of the calls He issues. . . (4)

The Church rejects the idea that the covenant with Israel has been nullified or revoked.

The Old Testament is an indispensable part of Sacred Scripture. Its books are divinely inspired and retain a permanent value, for the Old Covenant has never been revoked. (Catechism, 121)

While the role of preparing the world for the arrival of the messiah has been fulfilled by the Jewish people, they still are God’s chosen people whose fidelity to God remains a light to the nations. The Jewish people were called to a unique and special relationship to God that included preparing for the messiah but was not limited to that one role.

The Church is the expanded Israel - grafted into the family of God.

There is no separate gospel for Jews and for gentiles as the false dispensationalists believe.

As to supersessionism — in Catholic theology the Church was never understood as depriving Israel of any place in God’s plan.

The New Testament makes it clear that Christ’s sacrifice on the cross has made the temple sacrifices obsolete, and the Eucharist has taken their place as an ongoing rite.

ealgeone - perhaps you need to read the Gospel of St. John?

25 Now there stood by the cross of Jesus his mother, and his mother's sister, Mary the wife of Cleophas, and Mary Magdalene.

26 When Jesus therefore saw his mother, and the disciple standing by, whom he loved, he saith unto his mother, Woman, behold thy son!

27 Then saith he to the disciple, Behold thy mother! And from that hour that disciple took her unto his own home.

Jesus was an obedient Jew - and as per Jewish law, it was the duty of the other siblings to take care of the mother. But why does HE tell a disciple (John) to take care of Mary?

If the Blessed Mother actually gave birth to other children, as many non-orthodox mistakenly believe, it would be unthinkable to put her in the care of St. John, a non-blood relative, because the ancient Jews greatly valued family and related responsibilities.

Instead, Jesus puts his mother in the care of his apostle John. And even though John is not a son of Mary, Jesus refers to John as her son and Mary as John’s mother. Mary is thus seen as the spiritual mother of all disciples.

remember Luke 11:27-28 27 And it came to pass, as he spake these things, a certain woman of the company lifted up her voice, and said unto him, Blessed is the womb that bare thee, and the paps which thou hast sucked.

28 But he said, Yea rather, blessed are they that hear the word of God, and keep it. -- Think about Luke 18:18-19, in which a ruler refers to Jesus as “Good Teacher,” and he replies, “Why do you call me good? No one is good but God alone.” On the surface, Jesus seems to be denying his own divinity and goodness. But on closer inspection, he’s actually doing the opposite. Something similar is happening here: although Jesus at first seems to be knocking Mary down, his actual teaching shows Mary’s importance.

Jesus’ point in both Matthew 11 and Luke 12 isn’t to knock Mary down a peg. It’s to hammer home that, although Jesus is the fulfillment of God’s promise to the House of David, the kingdom of God isn’t going to go the way that Israel and Judah’s royal house went. Membership in this new dynasty is based not upon blood or marriage, but upon faith, so that “to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God” (John 1:12). That’s the point Jesus is making in Matthew 12: we are all invited into Jesus’ family, through faith. Slowly, Jesus’ followers will realize that this “all” includes even Samaritans and Gentiles, and that this new house “shall be called a house of prayer for all peoples” (Isa. 56:7).

In short yes.

Here are the reasons:
1. Revelation 1:9 “
I John, who also am your brother, and companion in tribulation, and in the kingdom and patience of Jesus Christ, was in the isle that is called Patmos, for the word of God, and for the testimony of Jesus Christ.”

2. Rev talks about famine, war, etc. - all seen in the period of the end of Nero’s reign and the year of the 5 emperors - in Jerusalem there was actually a civil war DURING the Roman siege. They burnt each other’s granaries, leading to horrific starvation and cannibalism.

3. The siege lasted for 2.5 years / 42 months / 1260 days.

4. The early Christians all believed that this was the great tribulation.

Paul in Romans 9:6 says that “not all who are of Israel are Israel.”

In his letter to the Ephesians Paul is even more explicit about the Gentiles’ spiritual inclusion when he states that “you Gentiles in the flesh . . . were [once] separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel . . . But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near . . . So then you are no longer strangers and sojourners, but you are fellow citizens with the saints” (2:11–13, 19).

“Thus says the Lord of hosts: Peoples shall yet come, even the inhabitants of many cities; the inhabitants of one city shall go to another, saying, ‘Let us go at once to entreat the favor of the Lord, and to seek the Lord of hosts; I am going.’ Many peoples and strong nations shall come to seek the Lord of hosts in Jerusalem, and to entreat the favor of the Lord. Thus says the Lord of hosts: In those days ten men from the nations of every tongue shall take hold of the robe of a Jew, saying, ‘Let us go with you, for we have heard that God is with you.’” (Zechariah 8:20-23)

As St. Paul explains, Israel is like a tree. The Jews of Jesus’ day, as ethnic Israelites, were all natural branches in this tree, and any Gentiles (non-Jews) who join the Church are like branches that are cut off from other trees and grafted into Israel. On the flipside, the Jews who rejected Jesus were cut off from their own family tree (Romans 11:17-24). As a result, we can see that the Church doesn’t simply replace Israel; rather, in a very real sense, the Church is Israel. It is the multi-ethnic and multi-national family made up of both Jews and Gentiles that the Old Testament prophets always said Israel would one day become.

metmom And please show us where the term *Holy Mother Church* is found in the Bible.

Metmom - please show us where the word "Bible" is found in the Bible?

The things we Christians 2000 years later forget are

1. Many Jews DID become Jesus followers — for the first century, indeed until 136 AD, “Christianity” was a sect of 2nd temple Judaism.

2. The other sects of 2nd temple Judaism were the Sadducees (only holding to the written Torah and the prophets), the Samaritans (well, Israelites - who only held to the Torah), the Essenes who rejected the temple worship, the Pharisees who had an Oral Torah as well as the Written.

3. The Jesus movement was a real threat to the Sadduccees and Pharisees, which is why they persecuted this “heresy”.

4. But the Jesus-movement was vindicated when the prophecy Jesus made about the destruction of the temple and His return (refer Josephus) came true in 70 AD. AND all the Jesus followers fled to hills (Pellas village) and none died in the destruction of Jerusalem.

5. The book of Revelation of the Apocalypse of St. John of Patmos was written BEFORE 67 AD - as indicated in chapters 1 and 2 talking about the listeners facing a tribulation. It was written BEFORE the Gospel of John (which dates to circa 80 AD)

6. The Jesus-movement faced its great tribulation for 1260 days / 3.5 years / 42 months from 64 AD to 67 AD when not only did the temple authorities AND the Pharisees persecute them, but Nero’s blaming of them for the burning of Rome led to the secular authorities also targeting them.

7. They survived and pointed to the destruction of the temple as the proof of their God’s truth. THAT is why they got tons and tons of new adherents — think of it, otherwise they were fools worshiping a God who was executed like a criminal and didn’t come back.