Pat and I love the Roman Catholic people. It is their rotten, false church that we despise- a church that sends millions of people to hell every year and a major component of the fast-forming Great Whore Church of Revelation (Rev 17). This is the age of the Laodicean Church, the lukewarm church, and compromise is everywhere. Now it has spread to Northern Ireland, where previously enough people knew their scriptures to be able to mount an effective defence of the faith. That’s why Satan hates Northern Ireland and causes so many problems there: it is a beacon of truth, where the full Gospel is still proclaimed. But there is compromise afoot there…..
There follows an article from The Belfast Telegraph. It shows how N. Ireland politician Peter Robinson, leader of the once staunchly Protestant DUP, is compromising by saying he will attend funerals, including the mass, at Catholic churches. This is no small matter: it gives credence to a foul practice: the “sacrificing” of our Lord Jesus Christ every week at the mass where, under the doctrine of transubstantiation, our Lord’s body – in Catholic belief – is literally transformed into the wafer and his blood into the wine (see our Table of Truth, top left of this page, and download it.)This is something all Bible-believing Christians should make a stand on. It matters a great deal.
A Catholic close relative once said to us: “Do you mean none of you (Bible-believers) will attend my funeral?” We said that, with sorrow, this was the case. This hopefully brought it home to her that she belonged to a FALSE church, not a Christian body. Had we gone along with the funeral in an RC building it would have confirmed to her that her faith was just another Christian denomination. It is not. In fact this dear lady had a funeral service taken by a fine young Christian pastor who preached the word of God.
When I speak I upset people when I denounce things like the Alpha Course. It’s all part of the End Times compromise. Nicky Gumbel, Alpha’s main promoter, says Catholics are just another Christian denomination. This is manifestly untrue as anyone who studies church history or reads Fox’s Book of Martyrs should quickly understand. Described as “A history of the lives, sufferings and deaths of the early Christian and Protestant Martyrs,” you can get it from Penfold Book and Bible House, PO Box 26, Bicester, Oxfordshire, OX6 8PB.
When I tour America I often come across churches founded by people who fled from the Catholic death squads across Europe. The Mennonites and many others had to flee for their lives as anyone who didn’t bow the knee to Rome was, for hundreds of years, horribly tortured and then murdered. Europe was ethnically cleansed of non Catholics and even today you can see their torture chambers in the basements of many an old Catholic building.The Roman Catholic Church killed tens of millions – one estimate is 60 million- of those who stood for the truth and God’s word. It is not just a false church, it is an abomination in the eyes of God.
As such we should have no compromise with it. We should not join with them in “Churches Together.” We should not walk with them. Yes, we should talk with them – but ONLY to tell them that they should leave this vilest of organizations.In the light of this, read this sad story from Northern Ireland. Note also that where there is error in one area there is often other error. I spotted that Robinson’s sister is allegedly some kind of “minister” in the Free Methodist Church. No woman can ever be a minister in this sense. It is an abomination and another mark of how today’s church doesn’t know scripture or bother with doctrine.
Women’s role in the church is set out in, among other passages, Ist Corinthians 14:34 which makes clear that women should keep silent in churches, for it is not permitted for them to speak and goes on (14:35) “And if they will learn anything, let them ask their husbands at home: for it is a shame for women to speak in church” and: “Let the woman learn in silence with all subjection. I suffer not a woman to teach, nor to usurp authority over the man, but to be in silence.” (I Timothy 2: 11,12.)Women have many roles in the body of Christ and I could not operate without Pat’s backup. However, she does not teach in public, although it would be fine for her to teach women.
Women have many jobs but church leadership and “ministry” is not one of them. Women should also have their heads covered in church and our daughter has a good teaching on this subject if you key it into our search engine, top right.Now to the story:
The article (below) appeared in the Belfast Telegraph this week, and highlights a sad indicator of just where the DUP (Democratic Unionist Party) are in 2011, with Peter and others, selling their roots for a mess of pottage ?
The Puritan, John Bradford in his treatise 'The Hurt of Hearing Mass' has written as follows: Unto these our popish protestants I cannot but say, as Elias said 'How long will you halt on both knees ? If God be God, follow him' : if the mass be God and God's ordinance, follow it [1 Kings 18 v 21]. Paul the apostle willethus to 'separate ourselves from such as teach other doctrine, and will not consentto the sound doctrine of the Lord Jesus Christ [Romans 16:17, 1 Tim 6: 3-5 and2 Tim 3:1-5]. Wherefore , in that the masses teach another doctrine than Christor His apostles ever taught, and by their massing depart from sound doctrine, byGod's command we must separate ourselves from them, as they are no part ofChrist's true Catholic church'
Need we say any more to those who hold the faith once delivered and indeed to an ungodly world, surely those who profess Christ's name surely have great responsibility ? Let us stand fast for the truth of the Gospel and let our light shine in 2011. Romans 1 v 16
DUP's Peter Robinson: I’ll go to Catholic Mass[Leader signals change of direction]from The Belfast Telegraph of Monday, 21 February 2011
Peter Robinson has said he is prepared to attend funeral Masses “as a mark of respect” for dead Catholic friends and dignitaries. It will be seen as evidence of Mr Robinson’s aim to reposition the DUP as a secular, centre-right party. “We have to be a party that has respect and understanding for all sectors of the community,” he said.
Attending Mass will be a first for any DUP leader and will provide a clear lead to ministers who have in the past felt unable to attend Catholic funerals. For instance, when Cardinal Cahal Daly was laid to rest last year, DUP ministers Arlene Foster and Sammy Wilson visited Armagh to offer sympathies to the church hierarchy, but did not enter the city's Catholic cathedral or walk in the Cardinal’s cortege.
Even this caused some awkwardness in party circles at the time. Mr Robinson sidestepped theological issues, and said: “I would have no objection to attending the funeral of a friend who was a Roman Catholic.
“I wouldn’t be going as an act of worship, I would be going as an act of respect for the individual.” He regards this issue as a matter of individual conscience rather than party discipline, and added: “These are personal matters and some of my other colleagues might have a different view on them.”
A precedent was set in 2009 when Jimmy Spratt, the DUP policing spokesman and a former police officer himself, represented the party at the funeral of Constable Stephen Carroll, a Catholic who was murdered by republican dissidents. Mr Robinson said: “I have been in a Roman Catholic chapel on a number of occasions but not for a service.”
He added: “I have a very large number, perhaps a surprisingly large number, of Roman Catholic friends. “There are issues of showing respect to individuals so that (religious objections) would not keep me out of going to the communion service.”
Mr Robinson was recently filmed welcoming Prince Charles to St Malachy’s Church in Alfred Street. The two men were clapped as they left the historic building where Fr Martin Graham, a curate, showed them the results of a £3.5m restoration project.
Mr Robinson said the event showed that Northern Ireland had entered a “new era”. He said: “It is a good start. It should send an indication that respect, understanding and tolerance is growing in Northern Ireland.”
The DUP’s traditional difficulty with Catholic services dates back to its origins in the Free Presbyterian Church which, like the party itself, was founded by the Rev Ian Paisley.
Mr Paisley set the tone by refusing to attend any function at which Mass was celebrated, describing the Catholic communion service as an “abomination” and “idolatry”. He objects to the Catholic doctrine of transubstantiation, which holds that the bread and wine used in the service actually become the body and blood of Christ.
Many fundamentalist Protestants shared his objections — for instance, members of the Orange Order are also expressly forbidden to attend and can be disciplined for doing so. Mr Robinson is not a member of the loyal orders, or of any church.
However, he is a bible-believing Protestant and frequently attends Pastor James McConnell’s Metropolitan Tabernacle, an evangelical mega-church in north Belfast. His sister Pat Herron is a minister in the Free Methodist Church.
DUP sources say that Mr Robinson’s willingness to attend Catholic functions, including Mass, as part of his duties as First Minister, raises the question of whether Martin McGuinness, the Deputy First Minister, will now attend functions at which members of the Royal family are present, or funerals of local soldiers killed in Afghanistan. So far, he has declined to do so.
