Remember, remember! The fifth of November, The Gunpowder treason and plot; I know of no reason Why the Gunpowder treason Should ever be forgot! Guy Fawkes and his companions Did the scheme contrive, To blow the King and Parliament All up alive. Threescore barrels, laid below, To prove old England's overthrow. But, by God's providence, him they catch, With a dark lantern, lighting a match!
Guy Fawkes Day is fun, essentially the English equivalent of Halloween. I introduced my children to it when they were young, and they look forward to singing the poem each year. But at the time it was deadly serious. Differences between Catholics and Protestants in the 17th century led to horrific persecutions as well as the deadliest European war prior to the modern era.
The Roman Catholic Church had dominated religious life in western Europe since the end of the Roman Empire. The eternal souls of all men and women were in the hands of the Church. When King John of England refused to accept Pope Innocent III’s appointee as Archbishop of Canterbury, the pope placed John and his whole kingdom under interdict. English priests were forbidden from administering the sacraments, which meant, according to Catholic beliefs, every Englishman from the lowest peasant to the king himself was in mortal danger.
What we tend to forget today is that these beliefs were very important to our ancestors. Modern Hollywood storytelling often makes medieval men out to be cynical opportunists, with as little actual faith as Hollywood screenwriters themselves. When priests today deny the Eucharist to professing Catholics such as Joe Biden or Nancy Pelosi because of their support for abortion and other abominations, nobody really cares, because we all understand that neither Biden nor Pelosi truly believe in Christian doctrines. They really are the cynical opportunists that Hollywood thinks our ancestors were.
But medieval Europeans took their faith seriously enough to kill for it, and to die for it. After Henry VIII broke from Rome and his son Edward VI made England a Protestant nation, the Catholic Queen Mary responded by brutally persecuting Protestants. Mary’s death opened the door to the reign of Elizabeth, who restored Protestant rule and persecuted Catholics in return. Prospects of a Catholic restoration grew dim when the Protestant King James VI of Scotland succeeded Elizabeth, so Guy Fawkes and Robert Catesby plotted to blow up the king and his parliament on November 5, 1605.
There is a deep human need for a belief in something greater than ourselves, a God-shaped hole in our hearts. John Lennon envisioned a time when men had nothing to kill or die for, but what kind of sterile life would that be? It might sound savage, but we need something worth dying for to make life worth living.
Today we’ve been taught that our religious beliefs should be a private matter, even as novel religions bearing the rainbow flag and black power fist ascend in western culture. Yes, these are religions too. They have their gods and devils, their doctrines and anathemas, and they seek to supplant Christianity as the dominant force in our culture. These Marxists have made common cause with barbarians who would tear down the civilization our fathers built.
The same animating spirit that inspired Guy Fawkes to attempt an act of mass murder four centuries ago inspires young men and women today. Yesterday saw the horrific desecration of national monuments in both Washington DC and London by pro-Palestinian protestors. Our own sacred memorials were painted with anti-Israeli slogans and foreign flags. Remember assabiyah — just because we’ve decided that militant religion is obsolete doesn’t mean everyone else has too. We are in a clash of civilizations, and we need to rediscover the will to care if ours continues past this generation.
While I’m glad that Catholics and Protestants are no longer trying to kill each other, I think we’ve lost some vitality when it comes to defending our faiths. Obviously I’m not suggesting we launch a holy war on our ideological enemies, but we need to fight back in the arenas we have available to us. Christians should be more involved in politics, not less. Run for city council, run for school board, run for state legislature, and make sure the principles we believe in remain the framework of our culture.
This does not mean it must be bloody war. We’ve had enough of that in our time. It means living out our faith in the public square and in promoting policies that protect our nation from those who would see it destroyed, whether Marxists, barbarians, or foreign governments. It means not being ashamed of the Gospel of Christ.
Our ancestors believed in the reality of Jesus Christ as surely as they believed the sun would rise each morning, and that affected the way they lived. We must regain that kind of faith, and allow it to inform the way we interact with the world. May we have the clarity of our fathers who died rather than renounce their belief. May we have the boldness of the early Christians who were not ashamed of the Gospel even under persecution by the mighty Roman Empire.
Then Peter, filled with the Holy Spirit, said to them, “Rulers of the people and elders, if we are being examined today concerning a good deed done to a crippled man, by what means this man has been healed, let it be known to all of you and to all the people of Israel that by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom you crucified, whom God raised from the dead—by him this man is standing before you well. This Jesus is the stone that was rejected by you, the builders, which has become the cornerstone. And there is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved.”
Acts 4:8-12 ESV
VERY WELL DONE! Thank you.
Peter also left this Hope assuring nugget: 1 Peter 1:3-5 KJV
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, which according to his abundant mercy hath begotten us again unto a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance incorruptible, and undefiled, and that fadeth not away, reserved in heaven for you, who are kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.
The author has a great understanding of history and its progress. The need to teach history properly leads to public failure and participation in our republican form of government.