A cornerstone of Protestant salvation teaching is based on the visions of St. John in the Book of Revelations. While this is a great source for horror writers, it is more potent fodder still for Protestant apologetics who use its vague and surrealistic symbolism to justify just about any point of view they care to opine.
During my journey to becoming a Catholic, this topic was merely touched upon and only to the point that 666 was the number for Nero. Interesting enough – but what about everything else? The seven seals, the pit, the battle between Satan and God? All steeped and surrounded by mysticism and obfuscating language that doesn’t quite rise to prose or poetry. One would think that a Revelation from God in such an inspired writing and on such an important topic would be more direct and clear.
In this, I’m seeking the answers to two specific questions:
Does the Rapture exist in Catholic teaching
Is the soul consumed in the fires of Hell
The first question is whether all the Protestant talk of the Rapture can be ignored. So far as I know, the Rapture does not happen in the Catholic understanding of Revelation, and so it would be just another tool that Protestants use to discredit the Church and frighten non-believers to come-on-down and accept Jesus as your “personal” Lord and Savior, and not be “Left Behind.”
The second question is a search for truth in the nature of God. That is, if the wicked really are burned forever in the fires of Hell, then what would be the point? The purpose of Hell is punishment, and the purpose of punishment is improvement. What is gained by God or the Damned if there is no hope for either eventual salvation or non-existence? Specifically, if the wages of Sin is Death, wouldn’t Death be the opposite of Eternal Life, or non-existence? While it might serve our Schadenfreude to believe that the wicked are eternally tortured and therefore eternally regretful for their sins, it doesn’t philosophically jibe with the idea of a purely Benevolent God that manifests Infinite Mercy. While it is not for men to judge God or stoop to the hubris to believe they can know the Mind of God, what would be gained to listen to the cries of the Damned for all eternity? Justice would be served by only one of two outcomes:
The Damned are eventually reconciled with God after the Apocalypse, or
The Damned are eventually consumed by the Hellfire and cease to exist
It is a function of the Church to answer such questions. So I obtained a copy of Apocalypse : A Catholic Perspective on the Book of Revelation on the subject that has the imprimatur of Church, which should provide some insight. I’ll posts updates here on what I learn.
Today marks the first time I was able to ride the 40 miles from my apartment in Sugar Land to my parking garage at HP without having to put my foot down. There were a couple of “creeping” moments, but I never actually stopped. Go me.
My attempt to auto-update wordpress just prior to my departure from Bloomberg FUBAR’d my website – and I’ve only just had the time to bring it back up. Also, I’m back at Compaq (now HP) in Houston, working pretty much in my old group. More to come.
So I’ve decided to start up my web-based information system project up again. It’s called Kirok and I started doing some pretty heavy work on it a few years ago as an exercise to learn LAMPhp, and got pretty far as getting a good security framework in place and the rudementary blogging logic. I got stuck in analysis paralysis on how to redline documents, and then I got all busy with the college thing so Kirok went the way of the Dodo.
Since I’m looking for a new job, it makes sense to showcase some analytical and programming skills on the web so companies can try-before-they buy. So Kirok lives! Only, this time, I’m going to do it using LAMPerl, so I’m starting over. I’m keeping my MySQL data tables thus far – but after examing them I’ve got the what was I thinking?! blues – so I’m taking it real slow.
I’ll be creating a new page here for the Kirok project until I get Kirok itself bootstraped, and then it will move over there. You can check it out at http://kirok.org.
While researching my previous post regarding how I can’t afford to live in New York, I came across this related article concerning how billionaire Tom Golisano was leaving New York to avoid paying the insane income taxes on the rich – the so-called “Millionaire’s Tax” which increased personal income taxes on those making $500K or more from 6.85% to 8.97% – a tax hike of 30%. While this exodus of the rich is no real surprise – the article has this tantilizing tidbit:
Working Families Party Executive Director Dan Cantor, who championed the tax hike, called Golisano’s move “selfish.”
Which is exactly what Obama said when he was criticized about his open policy for taxing the rich. In other words, if you work hard and innovate and make a lot of money then you are punished with higher taxes, and if you don’t like it, you are vilified as being “selfish.” However, if you don’t work, don’t create jobs (or even have a job,) and/or leach off the public teet, then you’re “underprivileged” and “deserving.” This is just the kind of person Obama speaks to in order to buy votes. Make no mistake, while Obama’s policies seem progressive (the more you have the more you pay) they are really regressive (the less you have the more you end up paying) because all those extra costs being heaped on the top will trickle down to the lowest.
Obama promised not to increase taxes on those making less than $250K a year. He can probably do that by increasing the costs of most everything else. When the punchline is that the government has more of your money, it makes no difference whether it was taken from you through higher taxes or higher fees, cost of living, energy costs, indirect costs from more regulation, corruption, and the list goes on and on.
And now, Al Franken the most liberal idiot to ever defile the airwaves has been sworn in today.
It seems fitting to quote the late great Jim Croce at this moment, as his ballad clearly states the New York is a fine place to visit but ‘he’s gotta get outta here.” And so must I.
The deal is, quite frankly, that I can’t afford to live here. The New York area is firmly a two-income market. Houses that are 100 years old and upwards of 1000 square feet regularly sell for $400K or more. There are local taxes, state taxes – that are sometimes layered if you work in New York but live in the “tri-state area.” Can you say AMT? I knew you could. Also there are just tons of job openings here – saying loud and clear that no one wants to come here. Predictably the meltdown on Wall Street caused a multi-BILLION dollar short-fall in tax revenue. And even when the financial district recovers, they can carry all the money they lost ahead for the next five years so that tax revenue isn’t coming back any time soon. Also predictably, all governments between the MTA and Albany are figuring out new thing to tax or levy fees to make it up. Everything from taxing health benefits, to reinstate the commuters’ tax, to charging a $.06 fee on those plastic bags from the grocery store. Certainly income and sales taxes will go up. The affluent are already saying ‘New York’s a great place to visit, but I’m tired of paying to live here.” And so it goes.
I do have to say that I love my job – the company is great. It’s great work, with great people, and great benefits. I know definitely that I’m a better programmer and engineer from the experience. The problem is a stark contrast to the quality of the job – I just can’t make enough money to live. Moving my family here would put me solidly on a treadmill, one that I would never recover from.
This part of the country is solidly subject to Elizabeth Warren’s theories detailed in The Two-Income Trap. That is, so many households here have both spouses working that the price of everything has increased to meet that household income, to the point where no one can afford any kind of lifestyle unless both spouses work. So if you want to have a traditional household where the father works and the mother stays home and actually raises the kids (as opposed to the school system) then you’re just plain SOL.
So I’m going back on the job market. I need to find a job in Texas – a place where I have family and things cost something sane.
So, If you’re looking for a top-notch C++ systems level programmer and you’re not in New York – give me a call. I’ve updated my resume and it’s available at the link to the right.
