{"id":81126,"date":"2023-06-01T00:01:00","date_gmt":"2023-06-01T08:01:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.cogwriter.com\/news\/?p=81126"},"modified":"2023-06-01T08:52:44","modified_gmt":"2023-06-01T16:52:44","slug":"the-return-of-paganism","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cogwriter.com\/news\/doctrine\/the-return-of-paganism\/","title":{"rendered":"‘The Return of Paganism’"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\nPress Release photo<\/em><\/p>\n

COGWriter<\/a><\/p>\n

A reader tipped me off to the following which is from the May 2023 edition of Commentary<\/em>:<\/p>\n

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The Return of Paganism<\/h2>\n

When a 28-year-old person identifying as transgender shot up a Tennessee school in March, killing three children and three adults, the usual grim afterlife of tragedy was underlined by an odd note: One by one, media outlets rushed to apologize for \u201cmisgendering\u201d the shooter, who, they explained, had been born female but had recently begun identifying as male.<\/p>\n

How to make sense of such a statement? And what to do when a newspaper headline tells you about a \u201ctrans woman left sobbing in JFK Airport after TSA agent hit her testicles\u201d? Appealing to reason hardly helps, as J.K. Rowling and others learned the hard way when trying to ask simple questions such as how one might define sex if not according to the chromosomes rooted in literally every cell of our bodies. Instead, anyone wishing to find his way through the thicket of American public discourse these days should start by embracing one simple and terrifying idea: The barbarians are at the gates. …<\/p>\n

Just what do pagans believe? …<\/p>\n

To the pagans, change is the only real constant. Just consider the heathens of old: Believing, as they did, in the radical duality of body and spirit, they enjoyed watching their gods breathe the latter into a wide array of incarnations. …<\/p>\n

Still, change alone does not a belief system make, and pagans, despite differences galore, unite by providing similar answers to three seminal questions: what to do about strangers, how to think about nature, and how to please the gods. …\u00a0our newest pagans: For them, tribal warfare isn\u2019t just a way of life\u2014it\u2019s a system of divination, with power and privilege waxing and waning to reveal who is pure and worthy and who evil and benighted.<\/p>\n

Consider, for example, intersectionality, the academic doctrine that is as close as contemporary paganism gets to a formalized gospel. Its ideas, like most of academia\u2019s excretions these days, aren\u2019t worth studying in any real depth, but the key concept is simple. We each have several components to our identity\u2014sometimes referred to, in the flowery language of assistant professors, as \u201cvectors of oppression and privilege\u201d\u2014and their interplay determines the discrimination we suffer or the violence we may be tempted to wield against others. This means that each introspection is nothing more than an invitation to a fight with those who have more power, real or imagined, than you. …<\/p>\n

Study pagan mythologies and you\u2019ll emerge none the wiser, in part because the gods, like their human worshippers, seem to consist of little more than appetites and caprices. …<\/p>\n

At once the embodiment of innocence and the object of our deepest and most sincere emotions, children, the most vulnerable of mortals, were the ultimate offering to the gods\u2014proof that the pagan believer was so certain in his belief that he would offer up his own offspring to show the gods the strength of his faith, appeasing them and avoiding potential punishment. So prevalent among the heathens of antiquity was the practice of child sacrifice that the Torah issued a strongly worded prohibition against it, in Leviticus 18:21: \u201cDo not give any of your children to be sacrificed to Molek.\u201d<\/p>\n

Child sacrifice, alas, is alive and well in America these days, too. We may not, like the Vikings, toss our young into wells as offerings to the heavens, but turn over every rock in our craggy contemporary political landscape and you\u2019ll find some pagan policy offering up the well-being of children to the gods …<\/p>\n

No sooner had the wrath of Covid subsided, though, than our pagan witch doctors jumped in with another way to sacrifice the well-being of the young on the altar of ideological convictions. According to a recent Reuters report, for example, 15,172 Americans ages six to 17 were diagnosed with gender dysphoria in 2017; by 2021, that number nearly tripled. How to explain this stratospheric rise? Have doctors gotten better at detecting this particular medical condition? Has the science simply improved?<\/p>\n

A 2018 study by Lisa Littman, assistant professor of behavioral sciences at Brown, addressed this very question. Teens, Dr. Littman concluded after studying 256 subjects, were highly susceptible to what she called \u201crapid-onset gender dysphoria.\u201d When spending time, particularly online, with groups of people who favorably discussed the idea of being transgender, teens were much more likely to become gender dysphoric, a phenomenon Dr. Littman described as \u201cpeer contagion.\u201d<\/p>\n

The paper was accepted by\u00a0PLOS One<\/i>, a peer-reviewed scientific journal, but after transgender activists protested, the article was removed, and a Brown dean explained that censorship had been necessary because Dr. Littman\u2019s findings \u201cinvalidate the perspectives\u201d of the transgender community. …<\/p>\n

A study published in 2022 and led by Columbia epidemiologist Dr. Catherine Gimbrone examined the longitudinal data collected by the Monitoring the Future project, which asks high-school students a wide array of questions about attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors. Dr. Gimbrone\u2019s findings were alarming: Before 2012, there had been no differences between boys and girls, and none between self-identified conservatives and liberals, when it came to mental health. Then, depression scores began to soar for liberal girls and rise considerably for liberal boys. Conservative children registered a far less significant spike. Put crudely, the obsessive and relentless pagan emphasis on gender, ideology, and other divisions was literally driving kids crazy. …<\/p>\n

When pagans waving the banner of diversity, equity, and inclusion insist that we judge others by the color of their skin, not the content of their character, tell your children that the Hebrew prophets offered a much more transformational vision of racial justice … https:\/\/www.commentary.org\/articles\/liel-leibovitz\/paganism-afflicts-america\/<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

In other words, paganism is growing in the USA, it is not based on truth, but lusts (called “appetites and caprices” in the above article). And \u201cperspectives\u201d of the transgender community invalidate facts according to many of the these type of pagans. Those who do not embrace the new paganism are better off mentally than those who resist it. Yes, believing the Bible (which contains the inspired writings of the Hebrew prophets) is what people should be doing.<\/p>\n

As far as paganism and children goes, last September,\u00a0LifeSite News<\/em> posted the following:<\/p>\n

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New Disney TV series \u2018Little Demon\u2019 glorifies Satan, Antichrist and \u2018normalizing paganism\u2019<\/h2>\n

September 7, 2022 10:29 pm<\/p>\n

Disney launched a new adult TV series on August 25 titled \u201cLittle Demon\u201d<\/a> that chronicles the story of Satan\u2019s daughter, normalizing explicit sexual references and the presence of the devil in society.<\/p>\n

\u201cThirteen years after being impregnated by Satan, a reluctant mother, Laura, and her Antichrist daughter, Chrissy, attempt to live an ordinary life in Delaware but are constantly thwarted by monstrous forces, including Satan, who yearns for custody of his daughter\u2019s soul,\u201d the show\u2019s synopsis reads. …<\/p>\n

The trailer also portrays the teenager receiving affirmation for insulting her mother, a character who draws a mocking parallel between the Bible and the media, and a woman dressed in a \u201ctrans binder.\u201d …<\/p>\n

U.S. Rep. Mike Johnson<\/a>, a Republican representing Louisiana, has attracted a great deal of attention over his lengthy criticism of the show, which he posted on Facebook<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cI couldn\u2019t get to the remote fast enough to shield my 11-year-old from the preview,\u201d he wrote. \u201cI wonder how many other children were exposed to it.\u201d<\/p>\n

The congressman also quoted Aubrey Plaza, who voices the character Laura, when she said, \u201cI love that we are normalizing paganism\u201d in an interview<\/a> with the show\u2019s cast and creators.<\/p>\n

Disney executives … publicly criticized conservative moves to protect children from unjust LGBT initiatives, including the Florida Parental Rights in Education bill<\/a> signed by Gov. Ron DeSantis earlier this year.<\/p>\n

Most recently, a drag queen<\/a> is set to appear in a new Disney+ Marvel series that will be released later this year about a teen superhero. https:\/\/www.lifesitenews.com\/news\/new-disney-tv-series-little-demon-glorifies-satan-antichrist-and-normalizing-paganism\/<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Disney’s animation reportedly also promotes other aspects of the LGBTQ+ agenda such as lesbianism.<\/p>\n

Of course, we have warned about about aspects of Disney’s abominable promotions here. The following denouncements were posted this year:<\/p>\n