What Could Be Worse Than a Theocracy?

How about this? A theocracy in which the "god" is an idol - a deified autonomous self - a parody of the Christian God worshiped by heretics.

Kevin Staley-Joyce has a post entitled: "Nancy Pelosi, Theocrat" at First Thoughts.

"Imagine this: A conservative congresswoman, her voice edgy with religious fervor, stands before a press corps announcing her intention to end abortion rights in her state, and alongside her appallingly theocratic claims that human life at all stages of development is of equal value, she quotes the Bible, and even pushes Catholic piety, praying for the intercession of the Lady of Guadalupe.

Can we begin to imagine the media’s reaction? She would surely be Palinized, and, if all other efforts failed, would be called a pedestrian poser, having breached the cardinal rule of public life—that is, not to mention the transcendent. Well, such a shocking thing did indeed happen today, though its origin was on the persnickety religious left, not the religious right. Nancy Pelosi, chair of the theology department at Pelosi State, today invoked St. Joseph’s intercession as she pushed for health care reform. At a news conference she claimed, incorrectly, that today is the feast of St. Joseph the Worker:

Today is the feast of St. Joseph the Worker, particularly important to Italian-Americans. It’s a day where we remember and pray to St. Joseph to benefit the workers of America, and that’s exactly what our health-care bill will do.

Aside from the fact that today’s feast is, in fact, the Solemnity of St. Joseph, a colleague pointed out to me that the feast of St. Joseph the Worker—actually on the first of May—was placed there to foil May Day, a fete wrought with Communist labor philosophies. In any case, Nancy came just inches short of dubbing the United States a “worker’s paradise.” For good measure, she highlighted her recent photo shoots with babies and young people, and gave an admiring footnote to the Leadership Conference of Women Religious, and their missive promoting the health care as “life-affirming.” Theocracy, theocracy, theocracy!—right?"

We have a religious government in Washington, DC. The problem is that it is a liberal Protestant government riddled with liberal Catholic fellow travelers. If we must have separation of church and state, how about a little separation of (Liberal) church and state?

Why Rome Was Never a True Republic

In Chapter 21 of Book XIX of The City of God, St. Augustine writes:

". . . if we are to accept the definition laid down by Scipio in Cicero's De Republica, there never was a Roman republic; for he briefly defines a republic as the weal of the people. And if this definition be true, there never was a Roman republic for the people's weal was never attained among the Romans. For the people, according to his definition, is an assemblage associated by a common acknowledgment of right and by a community of interests. And what he means by a common acknowledgment of right he explains at large, showing that a republic cannot be administered without justice. Where, therefore, there is no true justice there can be no right. . . justice is tha tvirtue which gives every one his due. Where, then, is the justice of man, when he deserts the true God and yields himself to impure demons?"

A few paragraphs later, he writes:

"He must be an uncommonly stupid, or a shamelessly contentious person, who has read through the foregoing books to this point, and cna yet question whether the Romans served widked and impure demons. But, not to speak of their character, it is written in the law of the true God, 'He that sacrificeth unto any god save unto the Lord only, he shall be utterly destroyed.' [Ex. 22:20] He, therefore, who uttered so menacing a commandment decreed that no worship should be given either to good or bad gods."

Rome was not a true republic because it was not a political authority ordered to the welfare of its people. It was not ordered to the welfare of its people because it had no common acknowledgment of the right. And without a common acknowledgement of the right it lacked justice. It lacked justice because of idolatry - it worshipped ursurping demons instead of the True God. Therefore, it was under the judgment of God. And it fell. The point is: Why should anyone be surprised?