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Freemasonry and the Altar of Pluralism

03/10/2012 16 Comments

by Cris Putnam

My wife and I visited our nation’s capital last week.  Along with perusing Smithsonian museums, the Capital building and various monuments we did something off the beaten path and visited The Hall of the Temple which is the headquarters of Scottish Rite freemasonry. Mammoth sphinxes guard the massive building styled after classical Greek temples. This YouTube clip will give you an idea of the size of the building. Completed in 1915, it was designed by John Russell Pope, architect of other notable Washington buildings, including the National Gallery of Art and the Jefferson Memorial. Many of our nation’s leaders like George Washington, Theodore Roosevelt, Gerald Ford and 13 other presidents as well as Senators Charles Schumer and Robert Dole; Chief Justice Earl Warren and other Supreme Court justices have been and are Masons and Masonry is a major influence American policy. The Scottish Rite is for those who progress beyond the initial degrees of the blue lodge to more advanced involvement.

We happened to arrive at a time when there were no other tourists so we were able to get a private tour. Our tour guide was an American University intern who said he was not a Mason although I got the distinct impression that it was his ambition to become one.  Once inside, Egyptian hieroglyphics and numerous esoteric symbols adorn a vast atrium. As you ascend the central staircase you discover the building’s nine-foot-thick walls hold the remains of Albert Pike and John Henry Cowles.

In a second-floor inner sanctum called the Temple Room, coiling snakes of bronze flank a large wooden throne, canopied in purple velvet, referred to as the seat of the sovereign grand commander. Our tour guide generously offered that we take a seat. The room is impressive and has all of the trappings one would expect of a mystical ritual room. What I found most interesting was the central altar which featured religious texts from Christianity, Judaism and Islam. Our guide was quick to inform us that one can be a monotheist or a polytheist, as along as one believes in a creator god, one can be a mason. He also said, “…any religion other than Satanism is acceptable for obvious reasons.”

Accordingly, the details of a Mason’s religious faith are irrelevant as it pertains to membership in the Lodge. It is only necessary that he affirm a deity. So the Lodge includes Christians, Muslims, Hindus, and followers of other religions. The problem with this is obvious because most all of those religions make exclusive truth claims. It seems to me that if you are a consistent follower of any of those religions (except Hinduism) that you cannot embrace the pluralism of Masonry.  As we moved through the building, we entered another smaller meeting room and it also featured a central altar with the holy books of Islam, Judaism and Christianity (see smaller altar pictured below). Is this compatible with Christianity?

Most denominations say no but the Southern Baptist Convention offered a statement concluding that membership in the Lodge is “a matter of individual conscience.”[i] This anemic evaluation by the SBC has effectively served as an endorsement of the Lodge in the eyes of Masons. In The Scottish Rite Journal one Mason has concluded:

Because of your support, the vote of the Southern Baptist Convention is a historic and positive turning point for Freemasonry. Basically, it is a vitalization of our Fraternity by America’s largest Protestant denomination after nearly a year of thorough, scholarly study. At the same time, it is a call to renewed effort on the part of all Freemasons today to re-energize our Fraternity and move forward to fulfilling its mission as the world’s foremost proponent of the Brotherhood of Man under the Fatherhood of God.[ii]

I think the SBC has made a grave error with such a weak statement. An overwhelming majority of denominations denounce Freemasonry as incompatible with Christianity and sources have reported that 1993 convention was overrun with masons.  As a Bible believing Christian, I want to offer and argument as to why the Masonic view of the God of the Bible is inconsistent with the Bible’s claims.

The central altar contains many divergent holy books

The Masonic view is that although the Bible is an important book it is not the exclusive Word of God. It is a good guide for morality and works righteousness. In Masonry, the Bible is one of many divine revelations of the Great Architect of the Universe to mankind, it is only one among many.  The Scottish Rite’s principle text, Morals and Dogma by Albert Pike, illustrates the position that other texts (even secular philosophy) are as inspired as the Bible:

The Apocalypse is, to those who receive the nineteenth Degree, the Apotheosis of that Sublime Faith which aspires to God alone, and despises all the pomps and works of Lucifer. LUCIFER, the Light-bearer! Strange and mysterious name to give to the Spirit of Darkness! Lucifer, the Son of the Morning! Is it he who bears the Light, and with its splendors intolerable blinds feeble, sensual, or selfish Souls? Doubt it not! for traditions are full of Divine Revelations and Inspirations: and Inspiration is not of one Age nor of one Creed. Plato and Philo, also, were inspired.[iii]

In this paragraph, Pike is speaking of the book of Revelation (Apocalypse) and offers some disturbingly vague thoughts about Lucifer (from the Vulgate rendering of Isaiah 14). Many argue this is a cryptic endorsement of Luciferianism. Although it seems to be in the form of rhetorical question, the words “Doubt it not!” are not too ambiguous. Even so, what is not at all cryptic is the view that all traditions are divine revelations. Thus, we see that pluralism is inherent in and foundational to masonic philosophy.  At a minimum, Freemasonry is Universalist and deistic at its core.

The Christian faith requires its adherents to give exclusive deference to the Bible. It follows necessarily that to deny the Bible’s exclusive authority is to deny its purpose to declare that Jesus Christ alone has provided the means of salvation through his sacrificial substitutionary atonement for the sins of the world.  Christians regard the Bible as the exclusive and authoritative Word of God and Jesus affirmed:

Then he said to them, “These are my words that I spoke to you while I was still with you, that everything written about me in the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms must be fulfilled.”(Lk 24:44)

The Bible claims inspiration of the Old Testament (2 Tim 3:16; 2 Pet 1:19-21) and the New Testament (1 Thes 2:13; 1 Cor 2:13; 2 Pet 3:16) and it claims that salvation is exclusively through Christ (Jn 14:6; Acts 4:12). The Bible claims that this is for all people everywhere (Jn 3:16) and pertains to the whole world (Gen 17:5-9; Acts 2:39. 3:25). Because the Bible’s message is universal in scope and exclusive in efficacy, it cannot possibly be just one inspired book among many and no other religion can be correct if it is true. It’s either exclusively true or its false, the law of excluded middle applies. Thus, Freemasonry’s view of the Bible is contradictory and the altar of pluralism is an affront to its claims.


More of our personal photos available here: http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.1963307737733.57066.1694068579&type=3&l=d4fec5bee1

[i] A Report on Freemasonry (Atlanta: Home Mission Board of the Southern Baptist Convention, 1993), 6.

[ii] The Scottish Rite Journal (August 1993), cited by John Weldon, “The Masonic Lodge and the Christian Conscience,” Christian Research Journal 16/3 (Winter 1994):21.

[iii] Albert Pike, Morals and Dogma, http://www.sacred-texts.com/mas/md/md20.htm page 321.

Filed Under Apologetics Tagged With Freemasonry

Petrus Romanus The Jerusalem Connection Part 1

03/08/2012 129 Comments


By Cris D. Putnam

In Vatican City, on October 10, 2010, Pope Benedict XVI opened the Synod of Bishops’ Special Assembly for the Middle East at St. Peter’s Basilica. The synod took place at the Vatican from Oct. 10–24 under the theme: “The Catholic Church in the Middle East: Communion and Witness.” Speaking as the alleged Vicar of Christ, the pontifex maximus said the Promised Land is “not of this world” and that Israel is not an earthly kingdom. His words are not surprising as the Roman Catholic Church has historically led the way in promoting supercessionism (replacement theology) by denying ethnic Israel’s place in God’s plan. According to the pope’s biblical eisegesis, “He reveals Himself as the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob (cf. Ex 3:6), who wants to lead his people to the ‘land’ of freedom and peace. This ‘land’ is not of this world; the whole of the divine plan goes beyond history, but the Lord wants to build it with men, for men and in men, beginning with the coordinates of space and time in which they live and which He Himself gave them.”[1]

While it is true that God’s plan ultimately transcends time and space, it simply cannot be denied that the Lord meant a literal land in His promises to the patriarchs. However, the pope is not so naïve; rather, he is promoting an agenda by painting the Promised Land as a metaphysical abstraction. His political and theological overtones reflect the Vatican’s consistent position that “Jerusalem cannot belong to one state.”[2] Rome ostensibly pleads the case of Palestinians and Catholics who want to make pilgrimage but in truth, there is a wealth of evidence that the Vatican wants to possess Jerusalem as its own

Furthermore, the pope’s homily is harbinger of the coming tribulation or “time of Jacob’s trouble” (Jer. 30:7). Like Paul in Romans 11:25, Jesus also said that Jerusalem would be occupied by gentiles until the times of the gentiles are fulfilled, just prior to His Second Coming.

“And they shall fall by the edge of the sword, and shall be led away captive into all nations: and Jerusalem shall be trodden down of the Gentiles, until the times of the Gentiles be fulfilled” (Lk 21:24).

Several important points can be derived from this statement by Jesus. First, it is a prophecy of the diaspora, which occurred in AD 70. The Romans spread the Jews all over the known world, selling many as slaves. Jesus’ prophecy could have been easily falsified but its fulfillment is verifiable. Second, the text uses the Greek term achri, rendered “until,” that clearly implies one day Jerusalem will be back in Jewish hands.[3] Thus, it is also an inferred prophecy about the reclamation of Jerusalem which began in 1967 and is still being contested by the Vatican. Jerusalem certainly was under Gentile control until 1967, and today it is the most fiercely contested piece of real estate on the planet. This should give skeptics pause because there are existing copies of Luke’s Gospel dated to the second century.[4] The fact that Jerusalem is ostensibly in Jewish hands speaks to the lateness of the hour in God’s prophetic plan. Recognizing the end-time markers “the fullness of the gentiles” (Ro 11:25) and “times of the Gentiles” (Lk 21:24) which were qualified by “until,” we now examine the current state of affairs to if they are lining up with the predicted arrival of Petrus Romanus.

One way to examine that “until” is in reference to Romans 11:25 and the spread of the Gospel and there are many competent sites like the The Joshua Project doing that.[5] One rather astonishing indicator is the success of the Gospel in China where it is reported that there are currently sixteen thousand, five hundred new converts per day![6] Africa reports similar numbers where sixteen thousand Muslims leave Islam per day for Christianity.[7] (While these numbers are exciting, there are still many unreached people-groups and languages with no Bible translation. To that end, we strongly encourage Christians to support missions.)

Still yet, another way to quantify that “until” might be to look at Israel and see if there is any movement in that sector. There were no more than a dozen or so Messianic believers in the Jewish homeland when they declared statehood in 1948 and only around 250 when they retook Jerusalem in 1967. Writing in the year 2000, Brent Kinman reported that, “Now there are in the neighborhood of six thousand believers in more than fifty congregations.”[8] Has this trend continued? As of May 26, 2011 The Baptist Press reported:

“Now there are an estimated 150 Jewish congregations around Israel meeting in different languages. The number of believers is estimated to be around 20,000, growing exponentially from 1948 when 12 Jews who believed in Jesus could be counted, to 1987 when there were 3,000 and 1997 where there were 5,000.”[9]

If you know anything about exponential growth then this strongly implies an event horizon when the line goes vertical, meaning that the time of national repentance and recognition is close-at-hand. The Old Testament contains a vivid prophecy of that eventuality, “And I will pour upon the house of David, and upon the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the spirit of grace and of supplications: and they shall look upon me whom they have pierced, and they shall mourn for him, as one mourneth for his only son, and shall be in bitterness for him, as one that is in bitterness for his firstborn” (Zec 12:10). The Hebrew term, dāqar, which is rendered “pierced,” is derivative of madqārâ which appears ten times in various forms and always denotes a puncture wound. The Theological Wordbook of the Old Testament states, “The weapon associated with dāqar is usually the sword, though a spear is the instrument in Num 25:8.”[10] So according to the Hebrew prophet Zechariah, God was pierced and only Jesus Christ meets that characteristic. Tensions in the Middle East seem to forecast this prophesied national repentance sooner rather than later.

 

Next week: The Vatican’s Designs on Jerusalem

 

 

[1] Robert Moynihan, “The Vatican Synod on the Middle East Begins,” Spero News, October 10, 2010, http://www.speroforum.com/a/41366/The-Vatican-Synod-on-the-Middle-East-begins.

[2] Chiara Santomiero, “Prelate: Jerusalem Can’t Belong to Just One State,” Zenit: The World Seen from Rome, October 12, 2012, http://www.zenit.org/article-30628?l=english.

[3] James Swanson, Dictionary of Biblical Languages With Semantic Domains: Greek (New Testament), electronic ed. (Oak Harbor: Logos Research Systems, Inc., 1997), 948 ἄχρι.

[4] P4 is likely the earliest existing copy of Luke’s Gospel but his silence on the fall of Jerusalem in AD 70 leads most to conclude it was written prior: see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Papyrus_4.

[6] “Fastest-Growing Christian Population,” Worldmag, last accessed February 10, 2012, http://www.worldmag.com/articles/13748 .

[7] Ali Sina,“Islam in Fast Demise: In Africa Alone Everyday, 16,000 Muslims Leave Islam,” last accessed February 10, 2012, http://www.faithfreedom.org/oped/sina31103.htm.

[8] Brent Kinman, History, Design, and the End of Time: God’s Plan for the World (Nashville, TN: Broadman & Holman Pub, 2000), 71.

[9] Ava Thomas, “Among Israeli Jews, 20,000 Embrace Christ,” Baptist Press, May 26, 2011, http://www.sbcbaptistpress.org/BPnews.asp?ID=35389 .

[10] Robert Laird Harris, Gleason Leonard Archer, and Bruce K. Waltke, Theological Wordbook of the Old Testament, electronic ed. (Chicago: Moody Press, 1999, c1980), 195.

Filed Under Petrus Romanus Tagged With Israel, Petrus Romanus

Why Take the Prophecy of the Popes Seriously?

03/01/2012 14 Comments

By Cris D. Putnam

So how do we evaluate something so mystical, so weird, and so utterly unique? While we must allow for supernaturalism a priori, our evaluation must acknowledge the standards of science. Good science is a search for what is true. Science is defined by a process called the scientific method. Typically, this includes an observation about a phenomenon, a hypothesis formulated to explain it, and a test performed via a controlled experiment. The key to the testing process is falsifiability. A positive test result means a hypothesis is plausible, not proven, but a negative test result proves it false. Hence, the proper test of a hypothesis is to make a prediction and devise a test such that at least one outcome proves the theory false. Karl Popper is generally regarded as one of the greatest philosophers of science of the twentieth century. He is famous for establishing the criteria for modern scientific inquiry, two of which are suggested as:

 

  1. It is easy to obtain confirmations, or verifications, for nearly every theory—if we look for confirmations.
  2. Confirmations should count only if they are the result of risky predictions; that is to say, if, unenlightened by the theory in question, we should have expected an event which was incompatible with the theory—an event which would have refuted the theory.[1]

Now, we are not exactly trying to prove a scientific theory, but the idea is that we want to have this sort of methodology in mind as we evaluate the Prophecy of the Popes. We are not arguing that all of it will stand up to this level of rigor. Even so, we are confident that the Christian worldview explains the reality we observe much better than the naturalistic theories advocated by most scientists. Our faith is grounded in evidence of a historical nature and we are confident and encouraged by the level of intellectual scrutiny that things like the evidence for Jesus’ resurrection can endure. Accordingly, we have no agenda to meet with the Prophecy of the Popes. It either authenticates itself on its merit or it becomes a conversation piece. We mentioned above that one prophecy in particular grabbed our attention in a way that prompted willingness to invest in the research. Benedict XV was assigned the motto Religio depopulate: “religion depopulated.”

Benedict XV

September 3, 1914 to January 22, 1922

Religio depopulata “Religion depopulated”

This is the kind of prediction we like because it was easily falsifiable. For instance, his reign could have been marked by a remarkable revival in the Church. It was a risky prediction and according to Popper, “Confirmations should count only if they are the result of risky predictions.”[2] If Roman Catholicism had grown or even stayed the same this would have been necessarily falsified. Yet, in remarkable fulfillment, this was the time when Catholicism lost more adherents in one short period than at any other time in history.

World War I was devastating to the Roman Catholic Church, and then to add insult to injury, some 200 million left the Russian Orthodox fold to join the Bolshevik revolution or were killed or persecuted by the communists. A papal historian confirms, “Lenin declared war on religion and on assuming power was immediately to subject both the Orthodox and the Roman Catholic Churches in Russia to murderous persecution.”[3] According to a leading expert on democide (death by government), “the Soviet Union appears the greatest megamurderer of all, apparently killing near 61,000,000 people. Stalin himself is responsible for almost 43,000,000 of these. Most of the deaths, perhaps around 39,000,000 are due to lethal forced labor in gulag and transit thereto.”[4] Lenin and Stalin specifically targeted religious leaders as they viewed them as a threat. Religion was heavily depopulated during this period. Indeed, the prophecy demonstrates breathtaking accuracy here. Because it is beyond dispute that this was published in 1595, this fulfillment alone seems to defy coincidence and supports taking the prophecy seriously.

 

 


[1] Karl Popper, Conjectures and Refutations (London: Routledge and Keagan Paul, 1963), 33–39.

[2] Karl Popper, Conjectures and Refutations, 33.

[3] John Julius Norwich (2011-07-12T04:00:00+00:00). Absolute Monarchs: A History of the Papacy (Random House Digital, Inc.. Kindle Edition), Kindle locations 7678–7679.

[4] R. J. Rummel, “How Many Did Communist Regimes Murder?” last accessed January 31, 2012, https://www.hawaii.edu/powerkills/COM.ART.HTM?PHPSESSID=2a47ce24761a818095b37d0dd2e2112c.

Filed Under Petrus Romanus Tagged With Petrus Romanus

Criticizing Pastors, Conspiracy Theorists and Serving the Body

02/28/2012 15 Comments

by Cris D. Putnam

This post comes from several responses I have made recently on facebook and in emails concerning topics like prophecy, the NWO, transhumanism and various other conspiracy theories. I have always been interested in weird stuff and trade in ideas outside the box of most folks. I have found that there is a considerable body of Christ followers that share my off beat interests and I have made it my ministry to serve them. Because I know that I lean toward “conspiracy thinking” I found this podcast The Umbrella Man and Conspiracy Thinking  by Christian philosopher Kenneth Samples very interesting and a little convicting. If you are a conspiriologist, I suggest giving it a listen and examining yourself.

Even so, I think the Bible supports a conspiratorial worldview in the sense that we are engaged in spiritual warfare with powers and principalities (Eph 6:12) and that things are seldom as they seem on the surface e.g. “And no wonder! For Satan himself is disguised as an angel of light” (2 Co 11:14). We are called on to be “shrewd as serpents and as harmless as doves.” (Mt 10:16) Yet we need to be very cautions about potentially making false accusations and doing the devil’s handy work as an “accuser of the brethren” (Rev 12:10). It is important to make a distinction between what is speculation and what is known with certainty. In conspiracy forums, too many times, I see theories become absolutes.

I also bring this up because several well meaning folks have lamented to me that pastors are avoiding a certain topic or asking why they are afraid to preach about “insert favorite conspiracy theory here.” I think we need to be more charitable with our pastors and remind ourselves of their role. Pastors have to deal with families, marriages, divorces, adultery, problems with kids, people with cancer and other diseases, deaths, horrible sins of all sorts, so remember the very painful and difficult realities of daily existence are always in front of them. Those items alone can be overwhelming for a pastor. When you spend your day consoling a parent whose baby just died, driving to a nursing home to comfort a stroke victim and then perhaps conducting  a funeral or maybe a wedding, an issue like “Prince Charles could be the antichrist” seems fanciful and unimportant. We must acknowledge that a lot of this sort of information is speculative. Topics like the NWO, the nephilim, or even the prophecy of the popes are on the fringe and frankly there is a lot of nonsense mixed in with the material which is valid. Because it is important for pastors to maintain a level of credibility in dealing with the hard issues of regular life, I cannot fault them for being hesitant to  jump on the bandwagon. However, that is where there is room for Christians with those interests to make a contribution. If this is your area of interest, then it is your ministry and you are called to do it with excellence (1 Cor 10:31). That means you should do your best to think critically and parse the information you present for accuracy. There is certainly a role for “out of the box thinking” but always remember, no matter what you do, you are serving the Lord and you are a minister, so take your ministry seriously.

For as the body is one and has many parts, and all the parts of that body, though many, are one body—so also is Christ. For we were all baptized by one Spirit into one body—whether Jews or Greeks, whether slaves or free—and we were all made to drink of one Spirit. So the body is not one part but many. If the foot should say, “Because I’m not a hand, I don’t belong to the body,” in spite of this it still belongs to the body. And if the ear should say, “Because I’m not an eye, I don’t belong to the body,” in spite of this it still belongs to the body. If the whole body were an eye, where would the hearing be? If the whole were an ear, where would be the sense of smell? But now God has placed the parts, each one of them, in the body just as He wanted. And if they were all the same part, where would the body be? Now there are many parts, yet one body. So the eye cannot say to the hand, “I don’t need you!” nor again the head to the feet, “I don’t need you!” On the contrary, all the more, those parts of the body that seem to be weaker are necessary. And those parts of the body that we think to be less honorable, we clothe these with greater honor, and our unpresentable parts have a better presentation. But our presentable parts have no need ⌊of clothing⌋. Instead, God has put the body together, giving greater honor to the less honorable, so that there would be no division in the body, but that the members would have the same concern for each other. So if one member suffers, all the members suffer with it; if one member is honored, all the members rejoice with it.(1 Co 12:12-26)

Filed Under Spiritual Warfare Tagged With Conspiracy

PID Interview on Petrus Romanus

02/27/2012 1 Comment

Tom and I recorded this interview yesterday with Derek and Sharon Gilbert. I thought it went well and I was able to discuss the origin and history of the prophecy of the popes in some detail. (click the title below to access the podcast)

P.I.D. Radio 2/26/12: Peter the Roman – The Final Pope

Cris Putnam and Tom Horn join us to discuss their forthcoming book, Petrus Romanus: The FINAL Pope is Here.  They tell us why they began to take the prophecy of St. Malachy seriously, the evidence that lends it credence, and what it means in light of reports that Pope Benedict may not live out the year.

Filed Under Petrus Romanus Tagged With Interview
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