http://www.mfs-theothernews.com/2012/05/christians-are-under-pressure-in-syria.html
I gotta tell you; this Arab Spring is the best thing since sliced bread.
Copts in Egypt murdered and raped, Iraqi Christians (From a US-created precursor to the actual Spring) being almost entirely bombed out of the country, Syrian Christians being attacked, and the West sits on its hands. Even Christan bodies such as the Vatican do little but plead for peace in the region. That is like asking both the Sheep and the Wolves to play nicely with each other.
The plight of the Christians in the Middle and Near East is far beyond that which can be comprehended by Christians in the West. While we think nothing of going to Church, getting breakfast or lunch before or after services, and going about unarmed and without fear, the people who are directly descended from some of the earliest Christian communities are being treated without mercy. Islamic tolerance is a wonderful thing.
An interesting note is that, when reading the rare report on these events from the mainstream media, the Copts, Melkites, Assyrian Orthodox, etc., will invariably be described as "claiming" that they are descended from the original 1st or 2nd Century Christians of that region. The continual denial and fabrication of history, especially that of the West and its religions, has become so routine that we barely notice it. Think about it - the spread of Christianity in the Near and Middle East, along with the rest of the Mediterranean, is one of the most well-documented events in ancient history. We don't even need the New Testament, record of an early Christian council, or a writing from one of the Church Fathers to consult. We know it from non-religious historical accounts, archaeology, you name it. We also have no record of any of these communities being wiped out (except in North Africa following the Arab/Berber Islamic conquest), either by war, disease, or natural disasters. The historical account in this case is clearer than that of many European regions from the same period.
Being aware of the manner in which Christianity spread and the time periods involved, we can ask the simple question - If there were Christians communities in the region in the first two centuries Anno Domini, and we also know that they never were depopulated and therefore needed to be, I don't know - recolonized?, what argument can one make to submit that these communities are not descended from the original Christians?
The Left has long been on a campaign to suppress any knowledge of the history and shared legacy of Western peoples and those who adhere to the Christian faith. They jump through hoops in their continual efforts to paint a picture that is purposely made vague. They would prefer that we conclude that our history is simply made up. Having a full understanding that knowledge of one's historical inheritance is a major factor in the ability of a people or group to maintain its identity, they relentlessly seek to undermine the understanding of that existence.
-From a previous post on the wholesale and purposeful ignorance of a archaeological find that may very well be that of Joshua's altar and thus provide solid arguments that the Hebrews, contrary to what Leftist professors in Israeli Academia claim, did in fact enter Israel via the route from Egypt:
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http://thehotgates480bc.blogspot.com/search?q=altar
http://thehotgates480bc.blogspot.com/search?q=altar
........The preceding quote and outlook is no outlier, it is what the party line is in Israeli Academia. The Left knows that their agenda(s) cannot take root as long as a people knows who they are. They need to do all that they can to excise every shred of knowledge of a nation's or people's history, memories, and identities. Leftist thought does not allow for the existence of sovereign nation-states. Those have to go. A nation that maintains a sense of identity cannot be treated as a blank slate, therefore, it cannot be brought back to "Year Zero"**. I have noted that Western Nations have seen their historical records, disparaged, excised, mocked, and simply ignored for many years. The result is exactly what a Leftist would want, an ignorant adult who knows nothing about the five base sources from which Western Society developed. I submit that these are Greek, Roman, Northern European, Christian and Jewish (I separate the two since much Jewish thought reached us directly, especially in the US, and was not filtered through Christianity).
Contributions of these cultures, such as the sciences, philosophy, theater, the arts, religion, law, societal roles, work ethic, senses of courage, sacrifice, and duty to one's nation without submerging the big nemesis of the Left, The Individual, have all been removed from our textbooks and collective memory. In their place is taught the Leftist version of history; all successful peoples were and are bad by association, they prospered at the expense of others, and they falsified in a wholesale manner their histories to justify the wrong their ancestors wrought.
When someone comes across a casket/reliquary that bears the name of "Yeshua, son of Joseph", Academia and the Media join in procession proclaiming that they found the burial vessel of Jesus of Nazareth, thus proving that, aside from the Sermon on the Mount, the Christian Gospels are a bunch of malarkey. It matters not that Yeshua and Joseph were extremely common names among Jews of that period. When evidence of the destruction (Or even the very existence) of Troy is found, we find those of the Left climbing over each other to be the first to deny what it is. No one even steps up to attempt to obtain different conclusions; they simply tell you what the find is and go back to working on erasing the past. Jesus of Nazareth never existed. If he did, he was just an itinerant preacher whose teachings were wrecked by those followed after him. The successful revolt of the early Romans against Etruscan rule? That never happened. The preservation of Greek liberty of the individual following the Greco-Persian Wars? That did not have any effect, things would have been no different had the Persians conquered Greece. The preservation of literacy and learning by the Church after the Fall of Rome? The Church was as barbaric as was the rest of Western European society of that time.
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Contributions of these cultures, such as the sciences, philosophy, theater, the arts, religion, law, societal roles, work ethic, senses of courage, sacrifice, and duty to one's nation without submerging the big nemesis of the Left, The Individual, have all been removed from our textbooks and collective memory. In their place is taught the Leftist version of history; all successful peoples were and are bad by association, they prospered at the expense of others, and they falsified in a wholesale manner their histories to justify the wrong their ancestors wrought.
When someone comes across a casket/reliquary that bears the name of "Yeshua, son of Joseph", Academia and the Media join in procession proclaiming that they found the burial vessel of Jesus of Nazareth, thus proving that, aside from the Sermon on the Mount, the Christian Gospels are a bunch of malarkey. It matters not that Yeshua and Joseph were extremely common names among Jews of that period. When evidence of the destruction (Or even the very existence) of Troy is found, we find those of the Left climbing over each other to be the first to deny what it is. No one even steps up to attempt to obtain different conclusions; they simply tell you what the find is and go back to working on erasing the past. Jesus of Nazareth never existed. If he did, he was just an itinerant preacher whose teachings were wrecked by those followed after him. The successful revolt of the early Romans against Etruscan rule? That never happened. The preservation of Greek liberty of the individual following the Greco-Persian Wars? That did not have any effect, things would have been no different had the Persians conquered Greece. The preservation of literacy and learning by the Church after the Fall of Rome? The Church was as barbaric as was the rest of Western European society of that time.
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We can of course assume that Muslim supremacists just love it when the historical foundations of these Christians bodies are called into question. So too do anti-Catholic Christian Evangelicals/Fundamentalists.
They, being generally quite uncomfortable with the fact that all of the Christian Churches derived from the ancient world follow doctrines quite unlike the modern ones unique to their brand of Christianity, have also had to wrestle with this fact and have made up some interesting explanations in response. The most common one is that the real early Christians employed "accepting Jesus Christ and one's personal Lord and Savior, "altar calls" for the public acceptance of this formula, belief in the forgiveness of all sins, past, present, and future and consequent "assurance of salvation", the doctrinal separation or being "born again" from Baptism, the rapture of Christians before the Tribulation, and the accompanying doctrine of "dispensationalism", which divides the actions of God with his people into epochs that cannot be confirmed by Scripture (Some practice "Ultra- Dispensationalism" which places the "Church" -just the believers, no organisation included, in a period starting in the time of St. Paul's Letters and ending with the Rapture).
These real or "true" Christians were killed off and otherwise forced underground by the bad Catholics, (And presumably Orthodox Churches, who ironically never get mentioned in this case). The truth was brought back in fits and starts by the Reformation, but that was not enough as Reformation-based Churches still would not adhere to to the doctrines and practices in the above paragraph. The solution began with the Anabaptists, who eventually got it all fixed. These later married up with the suppressed remnants of real Christians who had survived the Catholic onslaught.
This subject of course deserves a post of its own. Hopefully I can write one in the near future.
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