Rheinmetall Plans to Make 700,000 Artill... Thu Apr 25, 2024 04:03 | Anti-Empire
America’s Shell Production Is Leaping,... Wed Apr 24, 2024 05:29 | Anti-Empire
Ukraine Keeps Snapping Up Chinese Drones Tue Apr 23, 2024 03:14 | Anti-Empire
Moscow Is Prosecuting the War on a Pathe... Mon Apr 22, 2024 12:26 | Anti-Empire
US Military Aid to Kiev Passes After Tru... Sun Apr 21, 2024 05:57 | Anti-Empire Anti-Empire >>
A Blog About Human Rights
UN human rights chief calls for priority action ahead of climate summit Sat Oct 30, 2021 17:18 | Human Rights
5 Year Anniversary Of Kem Ley?s Death Sun Jul 11, 2021 12:34 | Human Rights
Poor Living Conditions for Migrants in Southern Italy Mon Jan 18, 2021 10:14 | Human Rights
Right to Water Mon Aug 03, 2020 19:13 | Human Rights
Human Rights Fri Mar 20, 2020 16:33 | Human Rights Human Rights in Ireland >>
Humza Yousaf?s SNP Coalition with Greens Collapses Thu Apr 25, 2024 11:05 | Will Jones Humza Yousaf's coalition with the Scottish Greens has collapsed after he decided to scrap their power-sharing agreement following a rebellion over the Scottish Government scrapping its Net Zero target last week.
The post Humza Yousaf’s SNP Coalition with Greens Collapses appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.
Eastern Europe is Showing Britain Up on Free Speech Thu Apr 25, 2024 09:00 | ?t?pán Hobza It is now in Prague where freedom of speech is tolerated, and it is in Britain where it is under assault, says ?t?pán Hobza. Sackings and character assassinations have proliferated in the 'cradle of liberalism'.
The post Eastern Europe is Showing Britain Up on Free Speech appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.
Transgenderism, Social Media ? and Aliens Thu Apr 25, 2024 07:00 | Steven Tucker Are smartphones turning us all into a new and strange alien species? Not literally, obviously, but Steven Tucker finds symbolic truth in some of the weirder UFO conspiracies.
The post Transgenderism, Social Media ? and Aliens appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.
News Round-Up Thu Apr 25, 2024 00:31 | Will Jones A summary of the most interesting stories in the past 24 hours that challenge the prevailing orthodoxy about the ?climate emergency?, public health ?crises? and the supposed moral defects of Western civilisation.
The post News Round-Up appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.
The Micromanagement of Speech in the Workplace is Out of Control Wed Apr 24, 2024 19:30 | Dr David McGrogan Forget hate speech laws, says Dr David McGrogan. Speech in the workplace is already micromanaged in intolerable ways by employment law ? and it's getting worse.
The post The Micromanagement of Speech in the Workplace is Out of Control appeared first on The Daily Sceptic. Lockdown Skeptics >>
Voltaire, international edition
Israel's complex relations with Iran, by Thierry Meyssan Wed Apr 24, 2024 05:25 | en
Iran's hypersonic missiles generate deterrence through terror, says Scott Ritter... Mon Apr 22, 2024 10:37 | en
When the West confuses Law and Politics Sat Apr 20, 2024 09:09 | en
The cost of war, by Manlio Dinucci Wed Apr 17, 2024 04:12 | en
Angela Merkel and François Hollande's crime against peace, by Thierry Meyssan Tue Apr 16, 2024 06:58 | en Voltaire Network >>
|
Marian apparitions, social alienation - Mary at Knock - economic stimuli
national |
history and heritage |
opinion/analysis
Saturday October 31, 2009 15:26 by ipsiphi .:. (ipsi)(phi...) / i(psi...)(phi) - ( iosaf )
As I write thousands of people, the vast ,majority of them Irish are assembling at the largest public worship building on this island in eager expectation of a Marian apparition. The Roman Catholic church runs Knock and played a vital role in the building of the basilica, local economy, airport & marian cult.
Mary is thought by Catholics to have made her first apparition within a generation of the death of Paul and the apostles on a column perhaps more apt for a sceptic philosopher in what is now the Aragonese city of Zaragossa. Since then she has been held to appear on a roughly bicentianeal basis throughout Europe with some notable gigs in Latin America, none in Africa or Asia.
This might tell us more about the kind of people who see, expect to see or have thought they have seen her than it would indicate any particular favouritism on her part. Each time she has appeared she has been reported as bringing news for the world, after all & not just the typically poor communities.
it may be time to udpate the icon & milk it for what's its worth. She has also changed her style over the centuries. Crowns, imperialistic pomp & glory have gradually been replaced with simple blue and white robes. Her solo appearances have sometimes been expanded to include guest appearances from bearded european looking sainted gospel writers holding their correct medieval symbols of hagiography. No doubt after the catholic absorbtion of the rosary and angelus from Islam, she's been promoting those prayer techiques for the last 2 centuries. Shortly after her son Jesus appeared to a catholic mystic with a bared heart of post-enlightenment anatomical detail - she also included that little detail (as illustrated).
Her visits have never gone without much controversy - Our Lady is indeed a controversial visitor.
There are some who dismiss out of hand the idea that she appears at all. This is for several reasons. The most obvious being that some do not believe in her & such fall under the category of sneering infidels and sinners. The second which ought bear serious consideration by any who do believe in her, is what might be called the protestant approach that scripturally and theologically the marian cult is not satisfactorily compatible with christian thought in that intercession of demigod or semigoddess characters is an internalisation of pagan thought and dilutes the central tenets of Christ's mystery & redemption. In to that later category would fall those boring people who still quibble over the question of where she went & the thorny concept of did she die. For some she ascended in much the same way as Jesus and Muhamad to go out there into outer space or heaven and though forever worrying about us is not really expected to offer an appearance this side of Nostradamus.
Which brings me quite logically to considering without upsetting those of catholic, christian or no faith - the common sociological factors behind marian apparitions in history. They have mostly occured during times of social change, insecurity, economic crises and shifting moral or ethical values. They also tend to occur in areas with poor infrastructure and generally low level of educational attainment.
But undeniably once the marian cult approves an appearance, generally after systematic brutalisation and cruelty to the poor chap or as is the norm - chapette who had the guts to claim s/he had seen Our Lady - the economic benefits are extraordinary.
The RC church frowns upon today's flock who on the word of a Dublin clairvoyant have trundled off to Knock bringing with them what will undoubtedly be a short term economic stimulus. A bIshop has spoken of the dangers to people's faith (one presumes the Roman Catholic faith which accomodates many paradoxes not least of which is the marian cult) on the basis that She did appear in Knock as in Fatima, Lourdes, Zaragossa, Guadalupe, Walsingham, Pontmain, Beuarraing - clocking up a majority of spiritual interventions in times of plague and a fair share of famines - but did not appear in Medjugorje in the lead up to the Yugoslavian wars, the deployment of EU and NATO troops and a contigent of Gardia.
Nor could we not in passing have any of her appearances in north America been approved. I've already made the point that nobody in Africa or oriental Asia (excluding India) has ever dared to report her appearance with the great exception of 7 children who did see her just before the Rwanda Hutsi/Tutsi genocide in Kibeho.
Her un-approved message came in the form of a black woman who called for prayer, penance, conversion, the rosary & warned of an imminent war.
The rest is history.
__________________________________________________________________________
It ought not go without general social reflection in Ireland, why and how these people not only sustain the cult at Knock but can move to discourage the phenomonal movement of people supported in true 21st century style with youtube and blogs to Mayo today.
It is a very telling sign that for many people who are, I would opine, psychologically vulnerable responding to a synchretic meme. A clairvoyant of the charlantan ilk of fortune tellers and thaumaturgs may to some be a bizarre mish-mash of new age, theosophy, traditional religion, pagan sentimentalism, publicity seeking opportunism & paranoia. To others he and his followers are no different from those who exercise their legitimate and enshrined rights of free worship, assembly and expression.
But regardless of whether or not, today Mary makes an appearance & updates her usual message for the first time in over 200 years - we can not ignore the fact that there are multitudes of post-Celtic Tiger citizens who want to see her.
Perhaps it is time for the magic lantern box to be updated & the fraud bulit on a fraud (For I do ascribe to the theory that the first apparition was a hoax) & some wise soul could ensure that Mary does appear.
- on a regular basis.
Thanks then to "our Lady" or rather her representation & place in mass psychology - not only will Ireland's economy recover from the tourism stimulus but there will be succour for the vulnerable.
I can see no possible harm in that for anyone.
+ here endeth the lesson.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mariology
|
View Full Comment Text
save preference
Comments (30 of 30)