Disparaging remarks against the Christian Faith, specifically:
"Those who view Christianity, in any substantial form, as anything other than an Imperial Cult are simply living in a fantasy land."
WOW...warned for failure to support official propaganda. This is a degree of censorship taken to a whole new level on OC.net. I attacked no one personally (though somebody obviously took it personally), I didn't use any forbidden words, and I replied with a post entirely relevant to one I was responding to. Furthermore, I responded in line with an objective analysis of history, and am by no means the first to suggest that Christianity's growth and expansion was dependent on Imperial support, or even the first to suggest that without such support it is quite likely that Christianity would have suffered the fate of, say, the worship of Deus Sol Invictus. Furthermore, how can one say that the Church is NOT an imperial cult? We have Icons of Saints, who were only Saints because of their service to the Empire, in our Churches, our vestments were the dress of the Late Roman Aristocracy, we pray daily in our services for the victory of the Empire against the Barbarians, though the Barbarians have won long ago and the Empire is no more, our theology has been developed by Emperors who have summoned councils that have been expected to do their bidding...in one example where they did not, at the early sessions of Nicea II when the iconoclasts were strong, Empress Irene simply disbanded the council and resummoned it inviting only the bishops who intended to vote in her favour. Consider Chalcedon, it represented a change in Imperial policy from Ephesus II, they only reason we're not Eutychians today is because of a change in Emperors and a change in Imperial Policy. Bishoprics were long given to influential members of Roman Aristocracy, consider Balsamon, perhaps regarded as the greatest of all canonists in the history of the Church, he was Patriarch of Antioch, a political appointment, though he never actually visited the city throughout his whole life. The use of incense in the Church has been argued to be modeled after it's use in the veneration of the Emperor, they very doors to the altar are today called 'royal doors', not because of some divine royalty, but because by them the Emperor entered into the altar, being the only layman allowed to enter and commune there. There are countless examples of bishops being installed and deposed on account of the Imperial Authority, many heresies are heresies because they were opposed by the Empire, Church unity was a political goal and Church doctrine was a political means...this should hardly be controversial, I don't believe I had a single professor in seminary who would have argued otherwise. Up until Constantine we were a growing but relatively weak and splintered group, with St. Constantine came the Oecumenical Synods, came unity in the Church, and came the development of Christian dogma in ernest. What we believe, how we worship, who we are was defined from the time of the Emperor St. Constantine to the time of the Empress St. Theodora...we were defined during the golden age of the Empire, and were defined in relationship to the Empire. How is the Christian Faith not the greatest and most holy of cults the Empire has known? How is our cult not defined by the Empire?
And the funniest thing is that I was warned for making 'disparaging remarks' when I was actually making POSITIVE remarks
