Bible and Mission

  Orthodox Christians are deeply concerned with laws passed in post-Christian, Western societies that are against nature.  This raises the question of what constitutes good law and bad law.  The law in America that recognised same-sex ‘marriage’ (Obergefell v. Hodges), is a good example of bad law.  Christians are calling for the repeal of this law and Chief Justice John Roberts dissented from it. [1] Laelius begins his speech on law in Cicero,  On the Republic , saying: 'True law is correct reason congruent with nature, spread among all persons, constant, everlasting’ (3.27). [2] Here we have five criteria for true law: it is reasonable, accords with nature, is universal, is constant, and is everlasting .  True law is distinguished from the more simplistic laws of society that get passed and repealed for expediency at a particular time, like traffic laws.  Only laws established in accordance with nature, as decreed by the god...

  Introduction: The 1998 Vatican document presented by Cardinal Edward Cassidy, ‘We Remember: A Reflection on the Shoah,’ observes that ‘the fact that the Shoah [Holocaust] took place in Europe, that is, in countries of long-standing Christian civilization, raises the question of any relation between the Nazi persecution and the attitudes down the centuries of Christians towards the Jews’ (n. II). [1] The document acknowledges that some Christians have, in the history of the Church in Europe, mistreated and persecuted the Jews, and have not done all that they could to oppose Antisemitism. [2]   The ‘We Remember’ document is intended as an expression of repentance by the Catholic Church and a resolve ‘ to build a new future in which there will be no more anti-Judaism among Christians or anti-Christian sentiment among Jews, but rather a shared mutual respect, as befits those who adore the one Creator and Lord and have a common father in faith, Abraham.’ Pope John-Paul II st...