Here’s a little ditty I learned back in the days of Vacation Bible School:

The Lord is good to me,
And so I thank the Lord,
For giving me
the things I need,
The sun and rain and an apple seed.
The Lord is good to me.

I suspect that many of you are baffled, particularly those of you from outside the US. This is supposedly the prayer of Johnny Appleseed, an early American missionary who traveled the frontier, planting small patches of apple trees along the way.

The song was featured in a short Disney film that was inflicted on boys of my generation. It depicted Johnny as a simple man, his only possessions a bible, a pouch of apple seeds and a tin pot which he carried on his head. Since it’s a Disney cartoon, Johnny pauses to cavort with the woodland creatures at every opportunity.

The Swedenborg Collective

Pullquote: I have often talked with angels on this subject, and they have invariably declared that in heaven they are unable to divide the Divine into three, because they know and perceive that the Divine is One and this One is in the Lord.
Emanuel Swedenborg

This is one of those cases where the reality is more complicated than Disney could handle. The man who inspired the legend was named John Chapman, a curator of apple nurseries in Ohio in the early 19th century. He was indeed a traveling evangelist, but not the sort that Disney imagines. Chapman was a actually a traveling Swedenborgian.

The Swedenborgian Church is an offshoot of Christianity, based on the writings of an 18th century Swedish visionary named Emanuel Swedenborg. Like many religious visionaries, Swedenborg believed that Christianity had been obscured by centuries of misunderstanding, and that he was receiving revelations of the pure religion directly from God. His new religion was mystical and difficult to grasp, but he clearly rejected the doctrine of the Trinity. He also rejected the simplistic interpretation of Sola Fide (faith alone), and insisted that faith is only a guide to the true path to salvation, which included works of charity.

The Swedenborgian “New Church” became moderately popular in England, then spread to the US in the early 19th century. In America, which they called the “New Jerusalem,” Swedenborg’s writings were influential if not exactly popular. It’s hard to say how many members the church had, but it did directly influence the Transcendentalists. Swedenborg’s concept of a three-tiered heaven may have influenced Joseph Smith’s emerging Church of Latter Days Saints.

Johnny Appleseed’s Religion

Pullquote: “This man for years past has been in the employment of bringing into cultivation, in numberless places in the wilderness, small patches (two or three acres) of ground, and then sowing apple seeds and rearing nurseries.”

John Chapman was a star player, from the early days of the American church until his death in 1845. Consider this extract from a meeting of the English branch of the New Church, shortly after the American branch was founded:

There is in the western country a very extraordinary missionary of the New Jerusalem. A man has appeared who seems to be almost independent of corporeal wants and sufferings. He goes barefooted, can sleep anywhere, in a house or out of a house, and live upon the coarsest and most scanty of fare. He has actually thawed ice with his bare feet. He procures what books he can of the New Church Swedenborg, travels into the remote settlements, and lends them wherever he can find readers [...] This man for years past has been in the employment of bringing into cultivation, in numberless places in the wilderness, small patches (two or three acres) of ground, and then sowing apple seeds and rearing nurseries. (quoted in Occult America, 39-41)

No word on whether or not he danced with raccoons.

Some years back, the historian Mike Wallace coined the term “Mickey Mouse History” to describe the sanitized, streamlined history that frequently gets produced in America. This is the sort of commemorative history that is informed more by nostalgia or ideology than historical principles. The Disney image of Johnny Appleseed is a perfect example of this, but the problem goes deeper.

The period where Chapman was active is known as the Second Great Awakening. It’s usually depicted as the triumph of Evangelical Christianity as it spread through the land, driven by tent revivals and itinerant preachers. Stories like Chapman’s remind us that the reality was far more complex than that. Religion in America has always been heterodox and complicated, from the founding to today.

Originally, NASA astronauts, like the Soviet cosmonauts, used pencils, according to NASA historians. In fact, NASA ordered 34 mechanical pencils from Houston’s Tycam Engineering Manufacturing, Inc., in 1965. They paid $4,382.50 or $128.89 per pencil. When these prices became public, there was an outcry and NASA scrambled to find something cheaper for the astronauts to use….

Paul C. Fisher and his company, the Fisher Pen Company, reportedly invested $1 million to create what is now commonly known as the space pen. None of this investment money came from NASA’s coffers–the agency only became involved after the pen was dreamed into existence. In 1965 Fisher patented a pen that could write upside-down, in frigid or roasting conditions (down to minus 50 degrees Fahrenheit or up to 400 degrees F), and even underwater or in other liquids. If too hot, though, the ink turned green instead of its normal blue….

According to an Associated Press report from February 1968, NASA ordered 400 of Fisher’s antigravity ballpoint pens for the Apollo program. A year later, the Soviet Union ordered 100 pens and 1,000 ink cartridges to use on their Soyuz space missions, said the United Press International. The AP later noted that both NASA and the Soviet space agency received the same 40 percent discount for buying their pens in bulk. They both paid $2.39 per pen instead of $3.98.

Way to go, private enterprise!

The Roman Catholic Church’s College of Cardinals, after intense prayer and guided by the Holy Spirit, has selected popes for nearly a millennium. Some Holy Fathers have turned out to be saints; others became murderers (Pope John XII), torturers (Pope Urban VI) and adulterers (too many to name).

Less reliance on faith and more, for example, on a democratized search for a pope might have kept the more notorious ones from office. And certainly a more practical belief that God had not ordained every pope to lead the church would have led to the quick firing of the most corrupt ones.

—William Lobdell, Losing My Religion: How I Lost My Faith Reporting on Religion in America—and Found Unexpected Peace (2009), p. 161-2

An Italian scientist says he has reproduced the Shroud of Turin, a feat that he says proves definitively that the linen some Christians revere as Jesus Christ’s burial cloth is a medieval fake.

The shroud, measuring 14 feet, 4 inches by 3 feet, 7 inches (4.4 by 1.2 metres) bears the image, eerily reversed like a photographic negative, of a crucified man some believers say is Christ.

“We have shown that is possible to reproduce something which has the same characteristics as the Shroud,” Luigi Garlaschelli, who is due to illustrate the results at a conference on the para-normal this weekend in northern Italy, said on Monday….

Carbon dating tests by laboratories in Oxford, Zurich and Tucson, Arizona in 1988 caused a sensation by dating it from between 1260 and 1390. Sceptics said it was a hoax, possibly made to attract the profitable medieval pilgrimage business.

But scientists have thus far been at a loss to explain how the image was left on the cloth. Garlaschelli reproduced the full-sized shroud using materials and techniques that were available in the middle ages.

They placed a linen sheet flat over a volunteer and then rubbed it with a pigment containing traces of acid. A mask was used for the face.

The pigment was then artificially aged by heating the cloth in an oven and washing it, a process which removed it from the surface but left a fuzzy, half-tone image similar to that on the Shroud. He believes the pigment on the original Shroud faded naturally over the centuries.

There’s more information about it here. The only thing I’m surprised about is that someone didn’t do it earlier.

Oh wait… they did.

One of the standard arguments we hear for the historicity of the resurrection is the martyrdom of the apostles. Would the followers of Jesus really have sacrificed themselves for a lie?

The argument has a number of weaknesses. One of the greatest is the fact that all the details of this martyrdom comes down to us through tradition, and we have no way of knowing when the traditions originated. They may be early or late, literary or historical.

Acts gives a few stories, like the stoning of Stephen (Act 8:54-60) or the death of James, brother of John (Acts 12:1-2), but nothing of the deaths of the major apostles. The first mention we get of the deaths of Paul and Peter come from First Clement, one of the first popular works of the community, dated between 90-140 CE. But the story is extremely vague, told to fit the theme of jealousy:

There was Peter who by reason of unrighteous jealousy endured not one not one but many labors, and thus having borne his testimony went to his appointed place of glory. By reason of jealousy and strife Paul by his example pointed out the prize of patient endurance.

After that he had been seven times in bonds, had been driven into exile, had been stoned, had preached in the East and in the West, he won the noble renown which was the reward of his faith, having taught righteousness unto the whole world and having reached the farthest bounds of the West; and when he had borne his testimony before the rulers, so he departed from the world and went unto the holy place, having been found notable pattern of patient endurance. (1 Clem 5:4-6, Lightfoot)

Pullquote: There may also be a kernel of history about the execution of the apostles — or there may not. We just don’t know.

Notice there are no details. As far as we can tell from this text the two chief apostles may have died of old age. And what sort of jealousy are we talking about here? The jealousy of the Jews is one traditional answer. The jealousy between their rival factions is another guess. But maybe it was a more prosaic kind of jealousy.

Consider the apocryphal Acts of Peter, dated to the last half of the second century. Look at what is has to say about the persecution of Peter:

And a certain woman which was exceeding beautiful, the wife of Albinus, Caesar’s friend, by name Xanthippe, came, she also, unto Peter, with the rest of the matrons, and withdrew herself, she also, from Albinus. He therefore being mad, and loving Xanthippe, and marvelling that she would not sleep even upon the same bed with him, raged like a wild beast and would have dispatched Peter; for he knew that he was the cause of her separating from his bed. [...]

And whereas there was great trouble in Rome, Albinus made known his state unto Agrippa, saying to him: Either do thou avenge me of Peter that hath withdrawn my wife, or I will avenge myself. And Agrippa said: I have suffered the same at his hand, for he hath withdrawn my concubines. And Albinus said unto him: Why then tarriest thou, Agrippa? let us find him and put him to death for a dealer in curious arts, that we may have our wives again, and avenge them also which are not able to put him to death, whose wives also he hath parted from them. (Acts of Peter, XXXIV, MR James)

Peter is executed for convincing women not to marry or have sex. The same theme is found in the apocryphal Acts of Andrew, with Andrew being executed for coming between a woman and her fiancee. The Acts of Paul has a similar story, with Paul being imprisoned for preaching that maidens shouldn’t marry. Paul isn’t executed until much later, when he mouths off to Emperor Nero.

Is this the sort of jealousy to which First Clement refers? The jealousy of a man spurned by his betrothed? I’d guess not. These three noncannocical works all date last half of the second century, and probably represent the arguments that were going on at the time. These stories may only tell us that there was a faction of the community that considered celibacy extremely important, and so they wove that theme into their traditions about the apostles.

There may also be a kernel of history about the execution of the apostles — or there may not. We just don’t know.

Related Post: Martyrdom Does Not Establish Truth

I once joked that the real difference between Jesus Christ and Joseph Smith was 1800 years. Poor Smith was born into a time with court records, journalists and scandal-mongers. He couldn’t get away with anything. In contrast, we only know about Jesus from the religious writings of his followers. What would Jesus look like if 1st Century Jerusalem had tabloids? What would we think of Jesus if we could interview his mother? (”He’s not the messiah, he’s a very naughty boy!”)

I thought about this joke again while I was reading Paul Johnson’s The Kingdom of Matthias. This is the history of the Prophet Matthias (aka Robert Matthews), a contemporary of Joesph Smith. Like Smith, Matthias lived and preached in the Burned Over District of New York during the Second Great Awakening. Like Smith, Matthias received messages from God and preached an apocalyptic message.

Pullquote: What would Jesus look like if 1st Century Jerusalem had tabloids?

Unlike Smith, who mostly stayed in the hinterlands, Matthias tried to take his gospel to New York City. It didn’t go over so well. If the choices are Liar, Lunatic or Lord, then Matthias was clearly the middle option. Unfortunately for Lewis’ Trilemmia, Matthias was nevertheless able to step in and take over a collapsing religious community. The community was founded by Elijah Pierson, a perfectionist and reformer who emphasized lengthy prayer and fasting.

It’s an odd combination, since Pierson was Matthias’ polar opposite. Pierson was a feminist and a liberal who believed in healing the fallen world. Matthias was extremely patriarchal and sought his own kingdom apart from the world. But shortly before Matthias had arrived, Pierson’s wife had died from too much stress and fasting. Pierson lost his ministry and his mind, and the scenes of him trying to resurrect his wife are some of the most painful I’ve ever read.

For a while, Pierson provided the property, money and community, while Matthias provided the crazy. Others from Pierson’s old group fell into their orbit, including his servant Isabella Van Wagener. She was an ex-slave who would later become the itinerant preacher Sojurner Truth. The group continued to dance to Matthias’ tune until Pierson died. The death was considered suspicious, and the whole thing fell apart in a scandalous murder trial that became a five-day sensation in the NYC papers.

Pullquote: It’s frightening how the extremes of religion blend imperceptibly into madness.

I want to make fun of these people, but I don’t have the heart. Both Matthias and Pierson were two mindsick, broken individuals. I can’t blame them for retreating from a world they couldn’t understand. They’d be laughable if Matthias hadn’t been a dangerous and abusive man. I’ll only say that it’s frightening how the extremes of religion blend imperceptibly into madness. When Matthias strutted around in pseudo-military garb, he was a madman. When Smith did the same, it was accepted by his community. When Matthias whipped a woman with his belt, it eventually destroyed his community and sent him to prison. When Jesus used his belt on the moneychangers …

In the end, Matthias’ legacy was not made by his message or his ministry (thankfully), but by the juicy scandal he created by breaking up the marriage of two of his followers and taking the wife for himself. He left the region after being convicted of abusing one of his female followers. Later on, Joseph Smith and Matthias (under a different name) met in one of the Mormon camps, where Matthias tried to preach his way into the movement. Smith had Matthias cast out of the camp, and the local papers would have us believe that both men proclaimed the other to be a tool of the devil.

As kids, we loved the devil. Satan was the topic in youth ministry that didn’t make us nod off. The apocalypse might keep us awake, too — white horses and dragons made good fantasy reading that was otherwise forbidden. But devil stories were better. A pastor’s son had been “dabbling” in horoscopes, putting the family at risk of demon possession! One morning, he was shaving when the neighbor’s cat began talking to him from the window.

I was oblivious to the horror trends of the era, films where talking cats were a dime a dozen. Later, I heard the story again… and again. It was a standard and legal justification for execution in the witch burning trials, proof that the devil was pussyfooting around.

When Mike Warnke shared his lurid past as an army brat, drug addict and high priest of Satan, we were mesmerized. Mike’s book, The Satan Seller was in high demand. Kidnapped into the church of Satan after being shot, Warnke was saved by Jesus Christ. He came clean about baby sacrifices, summoning evil spirits, orgiastic perversions, rapes, Illuminati conspiracies, very long fingernails, ritual slayings, and magic spells. Mike, who billed himself a “Christian comedian,” put out spoken word albums about his conversion and about the dangers of Halloween, among other things, selling millions of books and records. Warnke was by far the coolest testament to Christ’s awesome powers. Defying the powers of darkness, he told his story to Oprah, Larry King, and more.

More than mere witness for Jesus, Warnke was internationally renown as the foremost authority on Satanism and the occult. He was a trusted advisor in law enforcement on Satanic crime and ritual abuse.

Celebrations of Dope

Pullquote: Journalists Jon Trott and Mike Hertenstein ran some background checks and Warnke’s story tumbled like a house of cards.

Today he continues to save souls with his ministry Celebrations of Hope. He looks more like a bishop in his white clerical robes than the freewheeling Jesus biker of his youth — and that’s because he IS a bishop. Sort of. Ordained by an independent priest into the Byzantine Catholic tradition, Warnke is not your average evangelist.

But then, no one knows just who or what Warnke is. Testimonials on his website refer to his honesty, integrity, humility, and humor. Yet the man can’t seem to “keep the story straight” from one book to another. Does he have two BAs or a PhD? How many times was he injured in Vietnam? When did he become a Christian? And how many wives has he had?

In 1992, Cornerstone, a Christian publication, said The Satan Seller was the source most responsible for the “Satan scare” that was in vogue those past few decades. Journalists Jon Trott and Mike Hertenstein ran some background checks and Warnke’s story tumbled like a house of cards.

Black Mass with Manson

Pullquote: All his friends and colleagues said he was lying.

Speaking to over 100 friends and colleagues, not one of them could verify strange behavior, track marks or wounds, or any other clues to Mike’s past. Everyone said he was lying. The calendar of full moon rituals didn’t even match up, and neither did other dates. A ritual with Charles Manson was quite the black magic: for Manson was at that time in jail. Claims of missing bodies thrown in dumpsters did not match any records.

Mike had asked friends to sign an authenticity affidavit for his book, but they refused, saying it was all bull. Pictures from the peak of Warnke’s Satan worship days showed a conservative nerd, not a strung out longhair with six inch fingernails. Mike’s involvement as a high priest of Beelzebub was limited to one or two Ouija sessions as a kid and possibly some rock n’ roll air guitar.

Far worse than tall tales, former wife Carolyn spoke freely about Mike beating the living hell out of her.

Backmasking for Jesus

Pullquote: I think we’re safer listening to Led Zeppelin backwards that Mike Warnke straight up.

In response to the dismantling of this ministry, Warnke said Satan was at work again. He stated that maybe he had “embellished” certain scenes to get the message across. One example was that the coven of 1,500 had only 13 members, a difference hardly worth mentioning. Mike stood by his story, saying it had happened exactly as described.

He was already in trouble with the IRS for tax evasion and misuse of ministry funds. Word Records dropped him as his lies caught up to him. There was no way out, so finally Mike confessed he had acted ungodly towards his wives and been a failure to others. But he would not turn his back on Satan — the story stands to this day, despite the complete lack of evidence and the multitude of holes.

I think we’re safer listening to Led Zeppelin backwards that Mike Warnke straight up.

But perhaps Mike really was in the hands of the devil. Jesus himself said, “You belong to your father the devil… because he is a liar and the father of lies.”

Lorette C. Luzajic writes about all kinds of interesting people at Fascinating People.

In “Our Godless Constitution,” Brooke Allen lays this claim on the chopping block and brings down the ax:

Our Constitution makes no mention whatever of God. The omission was too obvious to have been anything but deliberate, in spite of Alexander Hamilton’s flippant responses when asked about it: According to one account, he said that the new nation was not in need of “foreign aid”; according to another, he simply said “we forgot.” But as Hamilton’s biographer Ron Chernow points out, Hamilton never forgot anything important….

It bears repeating — our nation’s most important document makes no mention of a deity. If God was the foundation, you wouldn’t know it from the US Constitution. Brooke continues:

In the Declaration of Independence, He gets two brief nods: a reference to “the Laws of Nature and Nature’s God,” and the famous line about men being “endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights.” More blatant official references to a deity date from long after the founding period: “In God We Trust” did not appear on our coinage until the Civil War, and “under God” was introduced into the Pledge of Allegiance during the McCarthy hysteria in 1954.

There’s also the Treaty of Tripoli which clearly says the US was not founded on the Christian religion, and it was “endorsed by Secretary of State Timothy Pickering and President John Adams” and unanimously ratified by the Senate. Here is the quote from it:

As the Government of the United States… is not in any sense founded on the Christian religion — as it has in itself no character of enmity against the laws, religion, or tranquillity of Musselmen.

What about the founding fathers? Weren’t they all bleeding evangelicals like Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson? Hell no:

If we define a Christian as a person who believes in the divinity of Jesus Christ, then it is safe to say that some of the key Founding Fathers were not Christians at all. Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson and Tom Paine were deists — that is, they believed in one Supreme Being but rejected revelation and all the supernatural elements of the Christian Church; the word of the Creator, they believed, could best be read in Nature. John Adams was a professed liberal Unitarian, but he, too, in his private correspondence seems more deist than Christian.

George Washington and James Madison also leaned toward deism, although neither took much interest in religious matters. Madison believed that “religious bondage shackles and debilitates the mind and unfits it for every noble enterprize.” He spoke of the “almost fifteen centuries” during which Christianity had been on trial: “What have been its fruits? More or less in all places, pride and indolence in the Clergy, ignorance and servility in the laity, in both, superstition, bigotry, and persecution.” If Washington mentioned the Almighty in a public address, as he occasionally did, he was careful to refer to Him not as “God” but with some nondenominational moniker like “Great Author” or “Almighty Being.” It is interesting to note that the Father of our Country spoke no words of a religious nature on his deathbed, although fully aware that he was dying, and did not ask for a man of God to be present; his last act was to take his own pulse, the consummate gesture of a creature of the age of scientific rationalism.

Brooke continues with more detail on the founding fathers, and it’s worth reading the whole thing.

Fall from Grace

My personal “fall from grace” began with John Calvin. I was participating in Buy Nothing Christmas last year, and for Dad’s free gift, I decided to write about his hero Calvin. Neither of us was expecting a lengthy piece called A Tremendous Blasphemy. This was a pivotal moment — my rabbit hole. To quote Johnny Cash, I went out walking with a Bible and gun… I examined the messengers of my family’s truth, only to see the immorality throughout our pillars of faith. Now you know how this journey for me began.

Calvin was born Catholic in France in 1509. His father encouraged his intelligence. John began college at 14, and excelled in theology, law and Greek. Calvin was critical of holes in the Catholic faith, and he began to study Scripture for answers. By 27, he wrote the Institutes of Christian Religion. This epic work of doctrine became a kingpin of the Reform movement, propelling Calvin to its forefront.

A Change is Gonna Come

Pullquote: God preordained a part of the human race, without any merit of their own, to eternal salvation, and another part, in just punishment of their sin, to eternal damnation.
John Calvin

Calvin rejected the primacy of the papacy. He declared the Eucharist was symbolic — the bread did not really transubstantiate, or become Christ’s flesh. But his central idea was that to know God, you must study the Bible. He would not reveal himself through the church or through the world, but through the word.

Images of God were idols. There was no salvation in works or the church, but only justification through faith. But even if you want faith, you can’t if God didn’t want you to. This was Calvin’s infamous “predestination” theory. As he put it, “God preordained … a part of the human race, without any merit of their own, to eternal salvation, and another part, in just punishment of their sin, to eternal damnation.”

Branded a heretic of the church, Calvin fled, ultimately to Geneva, where he became a church leader and revolutionary. His contributions to free the grip of Rome are well known. That he preached passionately even in sickness is legendary. He wrote prolifically. He also spoke against slavery and built many schools for ex-Catholic refugees.

But for all the trumpeted freedom and reason Calvin brought, unspeakable atrocities are glossed over or swept under the rug.

Those Evil Catholics

Pullquote: On occasion, the decapitated heads of those Calvin had condemned were paraded victoriously through the streets to warn others.

Calvin’s theocracy in Geneva had councils banishing rosaries, card games, theater, fancy clothing, entertainment, and taverns. These things weren’t just poo-pood-punishments, for those offenses ranged from fines to torture to exile to death. Flash mobs of Calvinist vandals raged through convents and churches, ransacking “idolatrous” crucifixes and priceless artwork of saints, humiliating nuns, destroying and burning artifact, scourging clerics and priests.

Disobedient children were hung at the gallows by their feet as stern warnings. The press was censored. Muslims, Jews, and Catholics were exiled. To question Calvin’s doctrine was forbidden — just like the papacy he hated. It was Calvin himself who had a law passed that decreed anyone questioning his authority to be executed. On occasion, the decapitated heads of those he had condemned were paraded victoriously through the streets to warn others. Famously, one execution was of Calvin’s close friend, Servetus, who questioned the preacher’s trinity doctrine.

Oo, Oo, Witchy Woman

Pullquote: The Bible teaches us that there are witches and they must be slain. This law of God is a universal law.
John Calvin

And lest we forget: the witches. The Protestants and Catholics share equal guilt for The Burning Times, and witch sport was a favorite of Calvin. He expounded on woman’s romping with various demonic beasts. Some of the symptoms of witchcraft included owning pets, an easy birth, a difficult birth, a failed crop, and a suggestion of equality with men. “The Bible teaches us that there are witches and they must be slain. This law of God is a universal law,” Calvin said.

Calvin called menstruation “a foul disease,” he abhorred nuns their chastity for robbing men of their due, he advised battered women to stay with their husbands, and he claimed that women who used birth control were guilty of murdering a man’s sons.

Justification Through Faith

There are many apologists for Calvin’s nasty side, and Dad is their champion. Same old, same old: it was the times; he could have been worse; popular beliefs of the day; he didn’t have as much authority as critics say; Reform could not have happened without force; he did some good; etc.

But the scariest apologists say Calvin was right in all of these things. Apparently, the problem with Christianity is that we need to get back to the firm foundations of Calvinist doctrine and stop apologizing for the bad stuff in the good book.

Lorette C. Luzajic writes about all kinds of interesting people at Fascinating People.

Members of a panel of experts appointed by the board to revise the state’s history curriculum, who include a Christian fundamentalist preacher who says he is fighting a war for America’s moral soul, want lessons to emphasise the part played by Christianity in the founding of the US and that religion is a civic virtue….

One of the panel, David Barton, founder of a Christian heritage group called WallBuilders, argues that the curriculum should reflect the fact that the US Constitution was written with God in mind including that “there is a fixed moral law derived from God and nature”, that “there is a creator” and “government exists primarily to protect God-given rights to every individual”.

Barton says children should be taught that Christianity is the key to “American exceptionalism” because the structure of its democratic system is a recognition that human beings are fallible, and that religion is at the heart of being a virtuous citizen.

I just don’t understand these people. They idolize the American founding fathers, and yet few of them were Christians in the way they would use the term today. Most of the prominent founding fathers were deists and did not believe that Jesus was God.

Then they assert that “religion is at the heart of being a virtuous citizen” — which, I admit, can be quote-minded from people like John Adams — but that doesn’t make it true. There is no evidence that religious people are more “moral” and better citizens than non-religious people.

That kind of bullshit needs to be kept out of schools. They can teach their intolerance and revisionist history in their churches, but not in our secular public schools.

Discovered in a monastery in the Sinai desert in Egypt more than 160 years ago, the handwritten Codex Sinaiticus includes two books that are not part of the official New Testament and at least seven books that are not in the Old Testament.

The New Testament books are in a different order, and include numerous handwritten corrections — some made as much as 800 years after the texts were written, according to scholars who worked on the project of putting the Bible online. The changes range from the alteration of a single letter to the insertion of whole sentences.

And some familiar — very important — passages are missing, including verses dealing with the resurrection of Jesus, they said….

The Codex also includes much of the Old Testament that was adopted by early Greek-speaking Christians.

That portion includes books not found in the Hebrew Bible and regarded in the Protestant tradition as apocryphal, such as 2 Esdras, Tobit, Judith, 1 & 4 Maccabees, Wisdom and Sirach.

The New Testament portion includes the Epistle of Barnabas and The Shepherd of Hermas.

You can view the manuscripts at The Codex Sinaiticus Project.

Brave New World

As Columbus sailed toward the New World, a new pope was elected in the old world. The year was 1492, and Rodrigo Borgia became Pope Alexander VI. Among the most notorious of all papacies, Borgia’s family was the inspiration for Mario Puzo’s Godfather books. Puzo’s last book, simply titled The Family, delves into their juiciest lore.

The papacies will forever be infamous for excess, to which the Reformers were rightfully opposed. But seldom had excess rivaled that of Alex 6. Rodrigo took his name from the pagan conqueror, and he shunned modesty and discretion, reveling in gold, women, and murder. He did not even attempt to hide his appetites for riches and sugar and sex. Today, the Catholic Church claims much of Alex’s legend is grossly exaggerated, and that to be fair, he really loved his children.

And so he did: he loved his daughter enough to sleep with her.

A Family Affair

Pullquote: The wild orgies in the papal palace were populated with the empire’s finest whores, and these parties were indeed a family affair.

Born in Spain in 1431, Rodrigo’s maternal uncle was Pope Calixtus III. Nepotism meant Rodrigo was Bishop and Cardinal before Pope. He also had four children and scores of mistresses, including the 15 year old Giulia who later bore him more children. His daughter Lucrezia was reportedly also his lover, and rumoured to be sleeping with both of her own brothers, too. Her marriage to her first husband, who didn’t touch her, was annulled because he was “impotent.” But he claimed he could not touch her because he was sickened by her familial involvements.

Later, Lucrezia’s brother Juan was found stabbed to death, and Pope Alex went all out hunting for his killer. When people began saying that his brother Cesare was the murderer, the manhunt was mysteriously and abruptly abandoned. Another Juan, born in 1498, of unknown parental heritage, was cared for by and claimed by Lucrezia as her “half-brother.” The possibility that this child belonged to her father is real.

If Cesare really killed his brother in a jealous fit over his sister, we can’t know for sure. But the wild orgies in the papal palace were populated with the empire’s finest whores, and these parties were indeed a family affair. Yet the gluttony for sex paled in comparison to the Borgia’s notorious bloodlust. Rodrigo allegedly committed his first murder at age 12. As pope, he was vicious, but even he was terrified of the depraved violence of his son Cesare.

Grail of Gore

Together, they sentenced countless to death as casually as they called for tea. All three of them liked to get their own hands dirty, thrilling in swords and poisons. Further legend has it they had a special chalice with a secret compartment for poison.

This cup, symbolic or actual, became fodder for countless writers, including Agatha Christie. Many of the historic events have been embellished in the medieval legend, but plenty of records attest to the violence. These accounts of merciless murder propelled Puzo’s Godfather books — the writer said he’d never met a Mafioso: he just researched the Borgia family and their heirs in criminality.

Johann Burchard, the pope’s MC, eyewitness to Borgia extravaganzas, wrote of a day’s amusement: “(Cesare) had them bound, hand and foot…. Some he shot, and others he cut down with his sword, trampling them under his horse’s feet… he wheeled around alone in a puddle of blood, among the dead bodies of his victims, while his Holiness and Madam Lucrezia, from a balcony, enjoyed the sight…”

Just Desserts

Most modern Catholics acknowledge that Pope Alexander VI was among the darkest blots in church history. Yet amazingly, there are apologists who maintain infallibility. The Catholic Encyclopedia at newadvent.org referred to him as “one who for thirty-five years had conducted the affairs of the Roman chancery with rare ability and industry.” They also praised him, as “splendid and energetic” and cheerfully quote a diarist on the good pope’s amazing sense of justice. In between all those orgies, after all, Pope Alex wrote terrific canonical philosophy and defenses of the Christian faith.

Rodrigo died in 1503. Having dinner with a Cardinal, he took ill. His intestines bled and there was hideous purpling and peeling of the skin. The death may have been from malaria — but the legend may be true and fits perfectly — it was poetic justice when the Pope accidentally drank from the poisoned grail he’d intended for the Cardinal Adriano.

Lorette C. Luzajic writes about all kinds of interesting people at Fascinating People.

Of course we were a Judeo-Christian nation. We persecuted Jews, Catholics, and unbelievers during Our Great Beginning, right? We slaughtered the Indians and took their land. We enslaved Africans to work our newfoundland. We kept women in the home and did everything we could to keep them from having equal rights. We murdered homosexuals, witches, and adulterers. Sounds like a Judeo-Christian heritage to me!

Thankfully, however, most of us have moved beyond all that.

(via)

Christianity was born into a greco-roman world, and the first Christians accepted the structure of Roman marriage. Marriage was monogamous and heterosexual, but divorce was possible and the husband might have a concubine before marriage. Marriage and procreation were considered civic requirements, and Augustus found it necessary to legislate marriage for Roman citizens.

By the time of Imperial Rome, marriage was relatively fair to women, who were able to control their property and most aspects of their life. In light of this, it’s probably not surprising that rich wives and widows were able to contribute financially to the early church, and that some women could preach and lead rituals.

After the fall of Rome, the Church spread Roman marriage customs to the Goths, Franks and other European tribes. The tribal practices usually allowed polygamy and treated women as property who could be purchased. By the 6th or 7th century, the Christian Church was able to exert enough cultural pressure to bring the tribes into line.

Competing Traditions

Pullquote: I praise wedlock, I praise marriage, but it is because they give me virgins.
St. Jerome

As Christianity grew in influence it made numerous changes to the institution of marriage. However, Christianity had developed two different traditions on marriage. One regarded marriage as an important institution with theological significance, whereas Roman marriage had been entirely a private and civil affair. Divorce was all but abolished, and the church began to assert influence to prevent marriages that were “illegitimate” (between relatives, etc.) The church began to place “banns” (notices), inviting anyone with reasons why the marriage should not be permitted to step forward. Despite all this, it wasn’t until the 12th century that the wedding became a church ritual.

The other tradition emphasized virginity and sexual abstinence. In conflict with the first tradition, marriage was a second-rate institution for those who could not handle celibacy. The seeds of this tradition can be seen in St. Paul’s 1st Letter to the Corinthians, “To the unmarried and the widows I say that it is well for them to remain single as I do. But if they cannot exercise self-control, they should marry. For it is better to marry than to be aflame with passion.” (1 Cor. 7:8-9, RSV) Celibacy was the ideal, but marriage was a compromise for those who couldn’t live up to it.

Others went farther that Paul. Many of the Church fathers made it clear that marriage was only acceptable because it created a legitimate way of producing offspring. St. Jerome, author of the first Latin bible, summed it up:

“I praise wedlock, I praise marriage, but it is because they give me virgins. I gather the rose from the thorns, the gold from the earth, the pearl from the shell.” (Letter to Eustochium, 20)

The Fall of Woman

Pullquote: The sentence of God on this sex of yours lives in this age: the guilt must of necessity live too. You are the devil’s gateway: you are the unsealer of that (forbidden) tree.
Tertullian

All too often this emphasis on celibacy changed into extreme misogyny. Many church fathers blamed women for the feelings they brought about in men, and so women became the enemy. The ranks of these misogynists include the best and brightest, like Origen, St. Clement of Alexandria, St. Ambrose, St. John Chrysostom, and of course St. Augustine. Tertullian, never subtle, let women have it with both barrels:

“And do you not know that you are (each) an Eve? The sentence of God on this sex of yours lives in this age: the guilt must of necessity live too. You are the devil’s gateway: you are the unsealer of that (forbidden) tree: you are the first deserter of the divine law: you are she who persuaded him whom the devil was not valiant enough to attack. You destroyed so easily God’s image, man. On account of your desert — that is, death — even the Son of God had to die.” (On The Apparel of Women, Book 1, Chpt 1)

These two traditions go back and forth throughout western history. It produced profoundly mixed feelings about marriage, sex and women in general. Sadly, many of the gains of Roman marriage were lost as the misogyny took hold. While women were not to be considered property, they would lose the right to hold property and were barred from inheriting. Their lives came under the control of their fathers and husbands.

The medieval church praised marriage, but placed many restrictions on conjugal sex, as depicted in the famous Medieval Sex Flow-Chart. The celibate life of the monk was exalted, while the life of the married couple was looked at with suspicion. The religious historian Karen Armstrong believes the line of this can be traced through St. Augstine all the way to Mother Ann Lee, founder of the celibate Shakers.

To modern eyes, the influence of Christianity on the institution of marriage has been mixed. The early church adopted and promoted the model of marriage from Imperial Rome, which was certainly preferable to earlier Roman, Greek or Gothic marriage. It slowly and erratically moved marriage from a civil institution to a sacred one. However, at the same time it denigrated women, marriage and sex while elevating celibacy. The misogyny this created lives on.

Sources

Armstrong, Karen. The Gospel According to Women: Christianity’s Creation of the Sex War in the West. 1991.

Coontz, Stephanie. Marriage, A History: How Love Conquered Marriage. 2006.

Vorjack is a librarian/archivist and a public historian, living with his wife in history-soaked Albany, New York.

1. Buddha
2. Krishna
3. Odysseus
4. Romulus
5. Dionysus
6. Heracles
7. Glycon
8. Zoroaster
9. Attis of Phrygia
10. Horus

(But they left out Ishtar!)