They have an engine called the Press
Ransom, the Director at St Anne’s, explains to Merlin the Magician why it is that modern people cannot overthrow their evil rulers: “They have an engine called the Press by which the people are deceived.”
That goes double when the Press is discussing Catholic matters; triple when it is an English paper; and quadruple when the paper is aligned with that faction calling itself Liberal, Leftist, Progressive, Socialist, Social Justice Warriors, Gnostics, or Morlocks or the Nameless Slaves of the Dark Lord. They change their name once a generation. It is not hard to see why.
I am told that the Telegraph is what the English call a conservative paper, so only assume a triple layer of deception.
Compare this (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/3295124/Vatican-bans-rogue-angels.html):
THE Vatican has banned the veneration of angels who do not appear in the Bible in an attempt to ward off the influence of New Age religious movements and other angel-based cults.
Prayers to disputed celestial beings such as Uriel and Jophiel – viewed by some as the angels of peace and enlightened understanding – were proscribed in a 300-page Directory of Public Piety, published last week by the Vatican Congregation for Divine Worship.
The document makes it clear that all veneration and prayer should be directed solely towards Michael, Gabriel and Raphael. The aim of the directory, say its authors, is to distinguish between acts of piety which belong to “true faith” and those which are merely “pseudo-spiritual experiences”.
Chapter six deals with angels, delivering a stinging rebuff to followers of Uriel, Jophiel, Chamuel and Zadkiel, who enjoy a burgeoning reputation in New Age religions but make no appearance in the New or Old Testament.
[…]
The Vatican directory states, in unequivocal language, that “the practice of giving particular names to angels, with the exception of Michael, Gabriel and Raphael, is to be disapproved of. Popular piety towards the angels, which is legitimate and healthy, can nevertheless sometimes lead to deviations”.
[…]The directory reflects unease in Rome about the role of angels in rival and often obscure Christian denominations.
[…]The Vatican also has bad news for those who believe that a guardian angel follows their every move, helping out where possible. Protestants have traditionally rejected the idea of angelic intervention in human lives, but popular Catholic piety has long maintained that guardian angels are available to provide supernatural assistance when needed.
“Deviation [in the veneration of angels] also takes place if the everyday events of life come to be seen in a schematic and simplistic mode,” states the directory, “whereby the smallest setbacks are attributed to malign forces and successes and achievements which have nothing to do with man’s path towards the maturity of Christ are attributed to one’s guardian angel.”
[…]
Compare it with this (http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/congregations/ccdds/documents/rc_con_ccdds_doc_20020513_vers-direttorio_en.html):
Holy Angels
213. With the clear and sober language of catechesis, the Church teaches that “the existence of the spiritual, non-corporeal beings that Sacred Scripture usually calls ‘angels’ is a truth of faith. The witness of Scripture is as clear as the unanimity of Tradition”(280).
Tradition regards the angels as messengers of God, “potent executives of his commands, and ready at the sound of his words” (Ps 103, 20. They serve his salvific plan, and are “sent to serve those who will inherit salvation” (Hb 1, 14).
[…]
215. The Church, which at its outset was saved and protected by the ministry of Angels, and which constantly experiences their “mysterious and powerful assistance”(281), venerates these heavenly spirits and has recourse to their prompt intercession.
[…]
216. Down through the centuries, the faithful have translated into various devotional exercises the teaching of the faith in relation to the ministry of Angels […]
Popular piety encompasses many forms of devotion to the Guardian Angels. St. Basil Great taught that “each and every member of the faithful has a Guardian Angel to protect, guard and guide them through life”. This ancient teaching was consolidated by biblical and patristic sources and lies behind many forms of piety. St. Bernard of Clarivaux was a great master and a notable promoter of devotion to the Guardian Angels. For him, they were a proof “that heaven denies us nothing that assists us”, and hence, “these celestial spirits have been placed at our sides to protect us, instruct us and to guide us”.
Devotion to the Holy Angels gives rise to a certain form of the Christian life which is characterized by:
devout gratitude to God for having placed these heavenly spirits of great sanctity and dignity at the service of man;
an attitude of devotion deriving from the knowledge of living constantly in the presence of the Holy Angels of God;- serenity and confidence in facing difficult situations, since the Lord guides and protects the faithful in the way of justice through the ministry of His Holy Angels.Among the prayers to the Guardian Angels the Angele Dei(294) is especially popular, and is often recited by families at morning and evening prayers, or at the recitation of the Angelus.
217. Popular devotion to the Holy Angels, which is legitimate and good, can, however, also give rise to possible deviations:
when, as sometimes can happen, the faithful are taken by the idea that the world is subject to demiurgical struggles, or an incessant battle between good and evil spirits, or Angels and daemons, in which man is left at the mercy of superior forces and over which he is helpless; such cosmologies bear little relation to the true Gospel vision of the struggle to overcome the Devil, which requires moral commitment, a fundamental option for the Gospel, humility and prayer;
when the daily events of life, which have nothing or little to do with our progressive maturing on the journey towards Christ are read schematically or simplistically, indeed childishly, so as to ascribe all setbacks to the Devil and all success to the Guardian Angels. The practice of assigning names to the Holy Angels should be discouraged, except in the cases of Gabriel, Raphael and Michael whose names are contained in Holy Scripture.
So, trying to count the distortions and outright lies in the Telegraph piece is difficult, but, in round numbers, every line contains a falsehood. What the directory is talking about is Manichean heresies, or popular superstition that says every trivial loss or trouble, such as a flat tire, is caused by a devil, but every benefit caused by an angel, who are evenly matched.
The Vatican has not banned the veneration of angels; the Directory on Popular Piety and the Liturgy enunciated guidelines telling faithful Catholics the practices of inventing up new names for spiritual beings, add “-iel” to the end and calling them angels should be discouraged.
Where the idea comes from that this is an intent to ‘ward off influence of New Age religious movements and other angel-based cults’ is not identified. Perhaps this is a speculation by the writer.
Prayers to disputed celestial beings such as Uriel and Jophiel were not proscribed, and who it is who defines these as “the angels of peace and enlightened understanding” is not named. In common Christian lore, Uriel is the archangel of the sun, which perhaps has a symbolic meaning as enlightened understanding and perhaps not. But it would serve no rhetorical purpose to announce that the Catholic Church discouraged adoration of the archangel in the sun. The sentence serves no purpose except to create the impression that the Catholic Church is opposed to enlightened understanding, or, at least, to innocent New Age hippies worshipping the angel of peace.
Jophiel, in Christian tradition, is the archangel who drove Adam and Eve from Eden, and guards the tree of life with a flaming sword. In religious art, the sword is shown with the tip broken off, to symbolize that the whole of the way back to the tree of life is not guarded, but a narrow passage exists for the faithful Christian. This is not the angel of peace. But, as before, no purpose would be served by saying the Catholic Church discourages prayer to the archangel guarding the Tree of Life. The sentence is to create the impression in the unwary reader that the Catholic Church is opposed to peace, or the innocent New Agers worshipping peace.
Time does not permit that I should wade through this horse manure line by line. If you are adroit at spotting the normal, run-of-the-mill propaganda techniques used to sell commercial products or political indoctrination disguised as news, you need no assistance from me. It should be enough to point out that the paragraph put into quotes consists of two sentence taken from two different parts of the document.
About John C Wright
John C. Wright is a practicing philosopher, a retired attorney, newspaperman, and newspaper editor, and a published author of science fiction. Once a Houyhnhnm, he was expelled from the august ranks of purely rational beings when he fell in love; but retains an honorary title.
