Yessy543

Nomination of Types of Christianity for deletion

A discussion is taking place as to whether the article Types of Christianity is suitable for inclusion in Wikipedia according to Wikipedia's policies and guidelines or whether it should be deleted.

The article will be discussed at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Types of Christianity until a consensus is reached, and anyone is welcome to contribute to the discussion. The nomination will explain the policies and guidelines which are of concern. The discussion focuses on good quality evidence, and our policies and guidelines.

Users may edit the article during the discussion, including to improve the article to address concerns raised in the discussion. However, do not remove the article-for-deletion template from the top of the article. Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 ^{> haneʼ} 10:20, 19 March 2011 (UTC)

Your recent edits

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about protection

By the way, I saw your comment ("the article is protected") at Articles for deletion. The reason why you could not edit protected articles is because you were new; after 10 edits and 4 days, you should be able to edit any semi-protected (grey lock) article. Only the few completely protected articles (red lock) need administrator intervention. Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 ^{> haneʼ} 18:21, 22 March 2011 (UTC)

The important things we share

Yessy,

I let my humor express my frustration. Allow me to back off from that frustration a bit and try to speak to the issues.

You have written much of the fear for others regarding spiritual matters. You seem almost desperate to warn and protect. God love you for that.

The faithful are not alone. Your words to shield are no less effective than your prayers to shield. You are a shepherd and you smell the wolves. That is a precious gift.

I read this, this morning:

Read it all as a whole before passing judgment. Do not tear it apart word for word. Do not let the word “illumination” trigger you into assuming this is about the illuminati— . it isn’t—The Illuminati stole and usurped that word. I ask this, because the author says exactly what I think you are saying. He fears for the soul feeling so very much alone as it seeks to live life more fully toward God. The author is no Jesuit, no Freemason, was a catholic and remained so even though his superiors imprisoned him for his seeking to reform their abuses. Read all the way through, please, until you have read how he has led up to the necessity of Holy Scripture. His mention of “the dark night” has to do with a poem that comes right before this.

In order to expound and describe this dark night, through which the soul passes in order to attain to the Divine light of the perfect union of the love of God, as far as is possible in this life, it would be necessary to have illumination of knowledge and experience other and far greater than mine: for this darkness and these trials, both spiritual and temporal, through which happy souls are wont to pass in order to be able to attain to this high estate of perfection, are so numerous and so profound that neither does human knowledge suffice for the understanding of them, nor experience for the description of them: for only he that passes this way can understand it, and even he cannot describe it.

Therefore, in order to say a little about this dark night. I shall trust neither to experience nor to knowledge, since both may fail and deceive: but, while not omitting to make such use as I can of these two things, I shall avail myself, in all that with the Divine favor, I have to say, or at least, in that which is most important and dark to understanding, of Divine Scripture: for if we guide ourselves by this, we shall be unable to stray.

In humility, I confess to you that I am a Christian mystic. In boldness, I am Christian, but in humility, I am a Christian mystic. I did not seek to be a mystic, do not dabble in the occult, and my mystical ability is as if a language—much like an ability to read words printed on a page—it seems a natural gift provided to me and to many as a loving gift from the Father. It is prayer. For reasons I do not know, but which center upon the truth that we are loved by God. He, the One true God, Lord God of Hosts, has led me gently and encouraged me patiently to find love and peace in Him when denied such by the world.

If He has shown me something of the future, it is not as a “seer,” it is as preparation. I am no master, but I am a shepherd. What beautiful truth I have been given such profound and personal means yet hidden from the sight in that intimacy of prayer, has kept me alive when I should have died! It has kept me faithful when I should have erred, it has restored me to the journey of the Way, which is Jesus Christ, when I otherwise would have continued to stray. I am not special, except perhaps weaker, and so God uses more direct means with me than he does most others.

I claim no special powers, or secret knowledge, for to claim that would be a lie. The more I read and prayed for understanding of Holy Scripture, the more profound the mystical and spiritual understanding became—glimpsing, “as through a glass darkly” the sublime Reality to which God has called us even as we must endure the evils and tyranny of this world which threaten to overwhelm us in this life. Unlike Saint Paul, I have not seen a level of Heaven, but I have been allowed to see glimpses of the spiritual work which the faithful do only because they cooperate out of love for our God in Christ Jesus. I try very hard to cooperate with what God asks of me. I have a strong and enduring faith—have had since before I can remember.

The author of that quote I gave a few paragraphs above is John of the Cross. He speaks of the “dark night” but it is not the “Dark Night of the Soul” for which is most famous. In the poem, he writes of what he calls the “Dark Night of faith.” John of the Cross is my favorite, because in that work quoted (The poem is called The Ascent of Mount Carmel) he seeks to write instruction for lowly persons like me. The novice. I am among the ones who are not masters and not teachers, but only servants and students. He is fearful that we may go astray. He is fearful that we may lose courage and simply stop seeking nearness with the love of God.

He even, in another place, writes how the truly great souls will endure terrible temptations and terrible punishments before they can become great. I have little fear of that, because I have only barely endured this life so far, and have no reason to suspect anything great can be expected of me even by our God. I am a threat to no one, and so evil might have little interest in me. I remain watchful, I protect my soul in prayer, an in study of Holy Scripture. Paul’s Epistles are my favorites along with the Gospel of John.

I have meant to mention to you, and remind you (in your care and nurturing of souls) that it is the Apostle John who cautions us in his Epistle, to be on guard against the Gnostics (“falsely so called”). I have heeded that warning. The faith we share is to be shouted from the housetops—there are no levels of knowledge to be withheld only for a few—but the Gospel is for all to hear and we hope for many to accept.

In my denomination, we are forbidden from joining with Freemasons. Many of my peers and some of my superiors, none-the-less, were successfully recruited by that group. I declined when they sought me out. Some of those who were seeking me to join them were deeply spiritual persons with a fine and tested faith, and seemed to want me to join them so as to help tip the balance a bit in the favor of such persons. Still, I hold secret matters of faith as dangerous and probably alluring should I have submitted to them. Since then, I have watched those who accepted membership and initiation into the Freemasons with interest. They tend to make the most money without any apparent regard for ability or faithfulness to the teachings of the Apostles—even the most apostate among them are tolerated and even promoted to positions of influence while the relative few of us who rejected Freemasonry tend to remain lowly servants in remote settings—far from influence and power except for the godly and meek few over whom we may have been given spiritual oversight.

I have no proof, but appearances are that Freemasons take care of one another even at the expense of doing what is wrong and even then without regard to if that harms an innocent who is not one of them. I could not do that, nor could I knowingly associate with those who do.

This is to say, Yessy, that I agree with what you say, but in branding Christian Mysticism as being the very ones I rejected, such branding also brands me—and I am not like them. There will be Christian mystics who are Freemasons and there will be Christian mystics who are not. There will be Christian Mystics who embrace the occult or at least toy with it, and there will me Christian Mystics who shield themselves from such dangers. There will be Christian Mystics who reject large portions of the faith and edit the Bible to only that which they chose to except “with a pen knife”, and those who embrace all of what God has revealed to us through Holy Scripture. That being so, I believe what must be done is to present Christian Mysticism without connecting the evils that go along with any spiritual practice as potential threats so as to frighten away those called by God in and through the spiritual life.

There are Freemasons who are not mystics, and maybe not even Christian. There are occultists who are not mystics and certainly most of those are not Christian. I cannot see how any Gnostic could possibly be a Christian at the same time—I believe a Christian who begins to lean toward Gnosticism and secret knowledge is a soul rooted among stones or among thistle and thorns. Likewise, there are persons who attend Church, who are not occultists, who are not Freemasons, who do not hold that there is a secret knowledge but who will, one Day, be told by our Lord, “Depart from me you workers of iniquity! I never knew you!” My point is that in matters of the spiritual life, there are many things to fear, many warnings to be made, and there are few holy and trustworthy guides. Still, we must be of courage and we must trust in the Blood of Christ to atone for what we do imperfectly in our striving toward God—it is far better to rely upon that assurance bought for us by Him at such a great price, then it is to be paralyzed by fear and so not seek Him at all.

In Christ, I am your brother.

Crews Giles. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Crews Giles (talk • contribs) 21:55, 2 April 2011 (UTC)

Pauline mysticism

Sorry, I mistakenly reverted your edit on this article. I have no rolled it back to your version. ► Philg88 ◄ ^talk 01:39, 6 May 2011 (UTC)