Peter Espeut
MY COLLEAGUE Ian Boyne, I guess, is as persistent as I am in defending his religious beliefs. As local head of the Church of God International, founded in the last century by Herbert W. Armstrong, Ian never misses an opportunity to use his substantial access to the media to proselytise for his new religion. If I had as much media access as he does, I suppose I might do exactly the same thing.
His Christmas column, 'An alternative to Christmas', and his Christmas edition of Religious Hard Talk both carried the same message: "Christmas is a pagan celebration from start to finish, and Christians betray Jesus by observing it; rather they should be observing the Feast of Tabernacles mentioned in the Old Testament." Every year for over a decade, Ian has pushed this line in the media, and every year I expose his false logic. He must get an 'A' for persistence. Not to challenge his obviously false position might give it a credibility it does not deserve; so let's do it again!
The debate has advanced over the years. He does not challenge the fact of Christmas: that Jesus the Christ was born, that God became man; neither is he against celebrating that blessed event; we've got past that. He just doesn't like the word 'Christmas' because it is not to be found in the Bible. It wouldn't be: it is a word from the early Christian church, meaning the Mass of (the birth of) Christ; (the Mass is the highest form of Christian worship around since biblical times; Michaelmas is the Mass of St. Michael the Archangel, celebrated every year on September 29).
PROFOUNDLY FUNDAMENTALIST
The Armstrongites are profoundly fundamentalist: if the word is not in the Bible, it means (they believe) that God could not have ordained it! This extreme kind of Fundamentalism is called in Latin 'Sola Scriptura' (Scripture alone) and Ian and the Armstrongites openly accept this view. It means that the sum total of God's revelation to humanity is to be found in the Christian Bible; since the last word of the Bible was written, there has been no new revelation. The Holy Spirit has nothing more to say!
This position is not consistent with Scripture itself, which suggests that there is much, much more; at the end of John's account of the gospel he says that everything about Jesus could not be written down, for if it were, "The world itself could not contain the books that would be written" (Jn 21:25). Earlier in his account, Jesus states: "These things I have spoken to you, while I am still with you; but the Counsellor, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you all things" (Jn 14:26).
The Holy Spirit has much more to say to his world, and has said much already; in the Roman Catholic Church we call this 'tradition', truths tried and tested as to their authentic divine inspiration, handed down to us from earlier believers. Tradition cannot conflict with Sacred Scripture but can add to our stock of truth; in fact, tradition guides how to interpret scripture. Revisionists like the founders of the Armstrong Church and the Adventist Church and the Jehovah's Witnesses want to discard centuries of tradition and create their own, under the guise of going "back to the Bible". Indeed, it is going backwards.
SCHIZOPHRENIC
The Armstrongists are quite a bit schizophrenic; they want to call themselves Christian, which would make them children of the New Covenant, but they really are more comfortable with the Old Covenant, hence their preference for the Old Testament and the Feast of Tabernacles. And so Armstrong has created a new religion, neither Judaism nor Christian. In fact, Armstrongism is Anti-Christian.
The Jews developed a calendar of celebrations to remember what their God had done for them (under the old Covenant). Christianity has developed a calendar of celebrations to remember what our God has done for us under the New Covenant: Christmas, Epiphany, Easter, Ascension, Pentecost, etc.
Anti-Christian Armstrongism rejects all these as pagan in favour of the Old Testament Feast of Tabernacles, and Passover, and Yom Kippur. St. Paul writing to the Galatians warned about Judaizers preaching "another gospel". Every few centuries Judaizers like Armstrong (and Boyne) appear. Beware!
May the blessings of Christmas stay with you all!
Peter Espeut is a sociologist and a Roman Catholic Deacon.
