by
Damien F. Mackey
Part One:
Communists consider Book of Daniel “dangerous”
“The Lord heard [Susanna’s]
prayer. As she was being led to execution,
God
stirred up the holy spirit of a young boy named Daniel, and he cried aloud:
‘I am innocent of this woman’s
blood’.”
Daniel
13:44-46
The prophet Daniel’s bold defiance of King Nebuchadnezzar and his
corrupt régime finds its modern parallel in the courage and resoluteness of
Christians today in communist China.
The communists
consider the Book of Daniel to be most dangerous:
“In Liushi
church a closed circuit television camera hangs from the ceiling, directly in
front of the lectern.
"They want
the pastor to preach in a Communist way. They want to train people to practice
in a Communist way," said the house-church preacher, who said state
churches often shunned potentially subversive sections of the Bible. The Old
Testament book in which the exiled Daniel refuses to obey orders to worship the
king rather than his own god is seen as "very dangerous", the
preacher added”.
According to
this same article:
China on course to become 'world's most Christian nation' within 15 years
The number of Christians in Communist China is growing so steadily that it by 2030 it could have more churchgoers than America
....
2:00PM BST 19 Apr 2014
It is
said to be China's biggest church and on Easter Sunday thousands of worshippers
will flock to this Asian mega-temple to pledge their allegiance – not to the
Communist Party, but to the Cross.
The
5,000-capacity Liushi church, which boasts more than twice as many seats as
Westminster Abbey and a 206ft crucifix that can be seen for miles around,
opened last year with one theologian declaring it a "miracle that such a
small town was able to build such a grand church".
The £8
million building is also one of the most visible symbols of Communist China's
breakneck conversion as it evolves into one of the largest Christian
congregations on earth.
"It
is a wonderful thing to be a follower of Jesus Christ. It gives us great
confidence," beamed Jin Hongxin, a 40-year-old visitor who was admiring
the golden cross above Liushi's altar in the lead up to Holy Week.
"If
everyone in China believed in Jesus then we would have no more need for police
stations. There would be no more bad people and therefore no more crime,"
she added.
....
Officially,
the People's Republic of China is an atheist country but that is changing fast
as many of its 1.3 billion citizens seek meaning and spiritual comfort that
neither communism nor capitalism seem to have supplied.
Christian
congregations in particular have skyrocketed since churches began reopening
when Chairman Mao's death in 1976 signalled the end of the Cultural Revolution.
Less
than four decades later, some believe China is now poised to become not just
the world's number one economy but also its most numerous Christian nation.
"By
my calculations China is destined to become the largest Christian country in
the world very soon," said Fenggang Yang, a professor of sociology at
Purdue University and author of Religion in China: Survival and Revival under
Communist Rule.
"It
is going to be less than a generation. Not many people are prepared for this
dramatic change."
China's
Protestant community, which had just one million members in 1949, has already
overtaken those of countries more commonly associated with an evangelical boom.
In 2010 there were more than 58 million Protestants in China compared to 40
million in Brazil and 36 million in South Africa, according to the Pew Research
Centre's Forum on Religion and Public Life.
Prof
Yang, a leading expert on religion in China, believes that number will swell to
around 160 million by 2025.
That
would likely put China ahead even of the United States, which had around 159
million Protestants in 2010 but whose congregations are in decline.
By
2030, China's total Christian population, including Catholics, would exceed 247
million, placing it above Mexico, Brazil and the United States as the largest
Christian congregation in the world, he predicted.
"Mao
thought he could eliminate religion. He thought he had accomplished this,"
Prof Yang said. "It's ironic – they didn't. They actually failed
completely."
Like
many Chinese churches, the church in the town of Liushi, 200 miles south of
Shanghai in Zhejiang province, has had a turbulent history.
It was
founded in 1886 after William Edward Soothill, a Yorkshire-born missionary and
future Oxford University professor, began evangelising local communities.
But by
the late 1950s, as the region was engulfed by Mao's violent anti-Christian
campaigns, it was forced to close.
Liushi
remained shut throughout the decade of the Cultural Revolution that began in
1966, as places of worship were destroyed across the country.
Since
it reopened in 1978 its congregation has gone from strength to strength as part
of China's officially sanctioned Christian church – along with thousands of
others that have accepted Communist Party oversight in return for being allowed
to worship.
Today
it has 2,600 regular churchgoers and holds up to 70 baptisms each year,
according to Shi Xiaoli, its 27-year-old preacher. The parish's revival reached
a crescendo last year with the opening of its new 1,500ft mega-church,
reputedly the biggest in mainland China.
"Our
old church was small and hard to find," said Ms Shi. "There wasn't
room in the old building for all the followers, especially at Christmas and at
Easter. The new one is big and eye-catching."
The
Liushi church is not alone. From Yunnan province in China's balmy southwest to
Liaoning in its industrial northeast, congregations are booming and more
Chinese are thought to attend Sunday services each week than do Christians
across the whole of Europe.
A
recent study found that online searches for the words "Christian Congregation" and "Jesus" far outnumbered those for
"The Communist Party" and "Xi Jinping", China's president.
Among
China's Protestants are also many millions who worship at illegal underground
"house churches", which hold unsupervised services – often in
people's homes – in an attempt to evade the prying eyes of the Communist Party.
Such
churches are mostly behind China's embryonic missionary movement – a reversal
of roles after the country was for centuries the target of foreign
missionaries. Now it is starting to send its own missionaries abroad, notably
into North Korea, in search of souls.
"We
want to help and it is easier for us than for British, South Korean or American
missionaries," said one underground church leader in north China who asked
not to be named.
The
new spread of Christianity has the Communist Party scratching its head.
"The
child suddenly grew up and the parents don't know how to deal with the
adult," the preacher, who is from China's illegal house-church movement,
said.
Some
officials argue that religious groups can provide social services the
government cannot, while simultaneously helping reverse a growing moral crisis
in a land where cash, not Communism, has now become king.
They
appear to agree with David Cameron, the British prime minister, who said last week that
Christianity could help boost Britain's "spiritual, physical and
moral" state.
Ms
Shi, Liushi's preacher, who is careful to describe her church as
"patriotic", said: "We have two motivations: one is our gospel
mission and the other is serving society. Christianity can also play a role in
maintaining peace and stability in society. Without God, people can do as they
please."
Yet
others within China's leadership worry about how the religious landscape might
shape its political future, and its possible impact on the Communist Party's
grip on power, despite the clause in the country's 1982 constitution that
guarantees citizens the right to engage in "normal religious activities".
As a
result, a close watch is still kept on churchgoers, and preachers are routinely
monitored to ensure their sermons do not diverge from what the Party considers
acceptable.
....
Such
fears may not be entirely unwarranted. Christians' growing power was on show
earlier this month when thousands flocked to defend a church in Wenzhou, a city
known as the "Jerusalem of the East", after government threats to
demolish it. Faced with the congregation's very public show of resistance,
officials appear to have backed away from their plans, negotiating a compromise
with church leaders.
"They
do not trust the church, but they have to tolerate or accept it because the
growth is there," said the church leader. "The number of Christians
is growing – they cannot fight it. They do not want the 70 million Christians
to be their enemy."
The
underground leader church leader said many government officials viewed religion
as "a sickness" that needed curing, and Prof Yang agreed there was a
potential threat.
The
Communist Party was "still not sure if Christianity would become an
opposition political force" and feared it could be used by "Western
forces to overthrow the Communist political system", he said.
Churches
were likely to face an increasingly "intense" struggle over coming
decade as the Communist Party sought to stifle Christianity's rise, he predicted.
"There
are people in the government who are trying to control the church. I think they
are making the last attempt to do that." ....
Part Two:
Andrew Bolt’s defence of Cardinal Pell is Daniel-like
“Not one witness, nothing.” Bolt said the judge listed “an
astonishing number of reasons to doubt Pell’s accuser” including assault dates
changing from 1997 to 1996 and the two boys drinking stolen bottles of “a sweet
red” wine when Pell actually “used white wine for
health reasons” that had been locked away.
Last night (21st August 2019) I watched on Sky News TV Andrew Bolt’s seismic reaction
to the Melbourne Supreme Court’s rejection of George Cardinal Pell’s appeal of
his guilty sentence to child sex offences, and then read about it again this
morning (22nd August) in Bolt’s article, “‘Absurdly high hurdle’
was set for Pell”, in Sydney’s The Daily Telegraph.
Bolt’s recounting of certain discrepancies in the details of the
case, most notably those concerning year dates and the colour of the wine that
the choir boys drank, reminded me of young Daniel’s pointing to glaring contradictions
in the case of the convicted Susanna.
Daniel, prefacing his defence with: ‘I
am innocent of this woman’s blood’ (13:46) - compare Bolt’s being “shocked, just shocked” that someone could be sent to jail if it was
remotely possible they had abused someone on “unsupported word” - then proceeded
to re-open the case (v. 49): ‘Return to court,
for they have testified falsely against her’.
Daniel’s methodology was to have the pair of accusing
elders separated in order to show up the contradictions (vv. 51-62):
.... ‘Separate
these two far from one another, and I will examine them’.
After they
were separated from each other, he called one of them and said: ‘How you have
grown evil with age! Now have your past sins come to term: passing unjust sentences, condemning the
innocent, and freeing the guilty, although the Lord says, ‘The innocent
and the just you shall not put to death.’ Now, then, if you were a witness, tell me
under what tree you saw them together’. ‘Under a mastic tree’, he
answered. ‘Your fine lie has cost you your head’, said Daniel; ‘for the angel
of God has already received the sentence from God and shall split you in two’. Putting him to one side,
he ordered the other one to be brought. ‘Offspring of Canaan, not of Judah’,
Daniel said to him, ‘beauty has seduced you, lust has perverted your heart. This is
how you acted with the daughters of Israel, and in their fear they yielded to
you; but a daughter of Judah did not tolerate your lawlessness. Now, then, tell me under what tree you surprised them together’. ‘Under
an oak’, he said. ‘Your fine lie has cost you also your head’, said Daniel; ‘for
the angel of God waits with a sword to cut you in two so as to destroy you both’.
The
whole assembly cried aloud, blessing God who saves those who hope in him. They rose up against the two
old men, for by their own words Daniel had convicted them of bearing false
witness. They condemned them to the fate they had planned for
their neighbor: in
accordance with the law of Moses they put them to death. Thus was innocent
blood spared that day. ....
Here is more from Andrew Bolt: https://www.news.com.au/entertainment/tv/he-looks-grim-andrew-bolt-says-the-outvoted-judge-in-george-pells-appeal-focused-on-evidence/news-story/05622a6ae8056a816af7a93f072764cb
‘He looks grim’: Andrew Bolt says the ‘outvoted’ judge in George Pell’s
appeal ‘focused on evidence’
Columnist Andrew Bolt has again aired his shock that
George Pell has returned to jail based on child abuse claims with “not one
witness”.
Sarah McPhee
'Absurdly high hurdle' was set for
Pell: Andrew Bolt
Sky News host Andrew Bolt notes
'there were no tears for Pell' after he lost his appeal against his conviction
for abusing two 13-year-old choir boys two decades ago. On Wednesday the
Victorian Court of Appeal upheld George Pell's conviction of child sex
offences. ....
Andrew Bolt is ‘shocked, just
shocked’ that George Pell will remain behind bars after his convictions were
upheld by a 2-1 majority judgment in Victoria’s Court of Appeal.....
Controversial columnist Andrew Bolt
said he was shocked and astonished that George Pell will remain behind bars “on
someone’s unsupported word”.
Opening Wednesday night’s episode of
The Bolt Report, the Sky News broadcaster delivered an impassioned
response to the earlier day’s events.
Victoria’s Court of Appeal upheld
Pell’s convictions for child sexual abuse by a 2-1 majority.
Bolt asked viewers to turn their
eyes to Justice Mark Weinberg, who was captured on a live stream from the
courtroom as the disgraced cardinal’s appeal was dismissed.
“Take a look at the judge on the
right, sitting there looking grim,” Bolt said.
“If you think he looks grim, maybe
that’s because he was outvoted.
“He does think Pell was jailed
unfairly.”
Pell was convicted in December and
later jailed for five charges relating to the rape of a 13-year-old choirboy
and sexual assault of another boy at St Patrick’s Cathedral in Melbourne in
1996.
One of Pell’s victims died in 2014
but the other gave evidence at trial.
“Having reviewed the whole
of the evidence, two of the judges of the Court of Appeal — Justice (Chris)
Maxwell, President of the Court of Appeal and I — have decided that it was open
to the jury to be satisfied beyond reasonable doubt that Cardinal Pell was
guilty of the offences charged,” Chief Justice Ann Ferguson said, reading from
a summary of the judgment.
“Justice Maxwell and I
accepted the prosecution submission that the complainant was a very compelling
witness, was clearly not a liar, was not a fantasist and was a witness of
truth.”
Justice Weinberg’s
dissenting judgment, however, comprised more than 200 of the 325 pages.
Bolt said the judge
“instead focused on the evidence” and listed “improbabilities” within the
victim’s testimony at length.
“One thing that struck
Justice Weinberg very strongly is, he said, that this is a case that depends
entirely on the claim of Pell’s accuser being accepted beyond reasonable
doubt,” Bolt said.
“Even though this is
without there being any independent support for it. Not one witness, nothing.”
Bolt said the judge listed
“an astonishing number of reasons to doubt Pell’s accuser” including assault
dates changing from 1997 to 1996 and the two boys drinking stolen bottles of “a
sweet red” wine when Pell actually “used white wine for health reasons” that
had been locked away.
“(Justice) Weinberg
repeated there was no independent support for the complainant’s account,” Bolt
said. “So, how could you convict a man of that? How?” ....
Whilst George Cardinal Pell is who he is, Susanna and her husband,
Joakim, may have biblical alter egos.
See e.g. my series:
“And Mordecai the Jew
was next in rank to King Ahasuerus. He was a man held in respect among the
Jews, esteemed by thousands of his brothers, a man who sought the good of his
people and cared for the welfare of his entire race”. Esther... more
-
Now there was a man that dwelt in Babylon, and his name was Joakim: And he took a wife whose name was Susanna, the daughter of Hilkiah, a very beautiful woman, and one that feared God. For her parents being just, had instructed their... more
-
According to Rabbinic traditions, the two lustful elders who accused Susanna were the same persons as two wicked judges referred to and named by the prophet Jeremiah (29:21-23).
-
The German orientalist, Georg Heinrich August Ewald (d. 1875), had thought that the account of the two lustful elders who were infatuated with Susanna must have been inspired by a Babylonian tale involving the goddess of love and two old... more
Commentators have
picked up some striking likenesses between the story of Susanna (in the Book of
Daniel) and the drama surrounding Queen Esther.
-
Having previously (Part Four) touched briefly upon the similarities between the story of Susanna (in the Book of Daniel) and the drama narrated in the Book of Esther, I take matters a step further here, testing a possible identification... more
Susanna, living as she
did during the Babylonian captivity of the Jews, would seem to have been far
too early for her - according to conventional estimations - to be identifiable
as Queen Esther, supposedly living deeply into Persian... more
My conclusion in this
series has been that the Susanna in Daniel became Queen Esther. But this
conclusion now presents us with three names: Susanna, Hadassah and Esther,
since, as we are informed (Esther 2:7): “… Hadassah … was also... more
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