Question on Revelationgreenspun.com : LUSENET : Catholic : One Thread |
I looked through the Revelations thread but I don't think that was the one so, I thought I'd start another.John, you and someone else...can't remember now his name, Joseph, I believe...said that Revelations has already happened. I questioned that and I still do. I'm curious. Do you think the world we live in now is Christ's Kingdom on Earth? Because that is what comes at the end of Revelations. Or do you think that is still yet to come?
And also, this may be a little hard to translate from my thoughts to black and white but I'll try. If what was to happen was prophecied in Scripture, wouldn't Satan have known what was going to happen? And if he knows, why do it? If he knows he will not win, why would he even try? Hmmm hope that makes sense.
Thanks and God bless~
-- Jackiea (sorry@dontlikespam.com), June 02, 2002
to the top, please
-- ... (...@.......), June 02, 2002.
Jackiea,I am also in the belief that revelations has actually happened to the Jews and Early Christians back at the time of Nero and his slughter of them during his reign. Could it happen again? I don't think so as far as what is said in the Book for it is the past. Today's revelations has not really happened yet and if it does we probably will never really be aware of it.
Think of it this way. If Christ weree to be among us again today, would we really know him? This is what I am always asking myself. We DO know that he is actually with us in the presence of the Holy Spirit. That is obvious by the constant changes of the things and people whom we see each and every day. GOD is visible in his continuing creative powers. ALLELUIA.
-- Fred Bishop (FCB@heartland.com), June 03, 2002.
Hi Jackiea!The only problem with the "Revelations has already happened" theory is the ending . . . it hasn't happened yet. Jesus has not returned to the Earth in the glorious Return with the Hosts of Heaven, the dead in Christ have not risen from their graves, Jesus is not presently here ruling and reigning in the New Jerusalem and the devil and his hordes have not been burned up in the lake of fire. There's actually much more that has never occurred either, but these are a few of the most objective and obvious criteria for knowing that in fact Revelations, at least a good portion of it, has yet to unfold.
David
-- Non-Catholic Christian (dlbowerman@yahoo.com), June 03, 2002.
Well, that's what I figured, too, David. Think I'll go read my Commentary and see what that has to say about it.PS~Thanks. Glad to see I wasn't "losing" it. :)
God bless and nice to see you around here again.
-- Jackiea (sorry@dontlikespam.com), June 03, 2002.
With a sense of lightness I recall asking about this when in school. My prof laughed and said two things drive thinking men nutso. Einstein's Theory of Relatevity and The last book of the bible. Welcome aboard.
-- Jean Bouchard (jeanb@cwk.imag.net), June 03, 2002.
Hi, Jackiea.
Too bad you don't have a link or URL to that other thread. I would like to reread what we said there.I apologize if I left you with the impression that I believe that all of what is described in Revelation is only in the past. I recognize that some passages seem to refer to current events [a sort of reliving of the past] and other passages almost surely refer to things that have yet to happen.
However, I am convinced that very much of what is written there (perhaps a lot more than you and David B have thought) pertains to events that had already transpired (or were transpiring) when St. John wrote down the words. The book was written for the benefit, first of all, of the persecuted Christians of his own time. It stands to reason, then, that they would recognize past and current events recorded in those words -- as well as the promise of future deliverance (some of which was in their future but our past).
You asked: "Do you think the world we live in now is Christ's Kingdom on Earth? Because that is what comes at the end of Revelations. Or do you think that is still yet to come?"
I would answer, "Both!"
Although we are not required, as Catholics, to agree to a single interpretation of Revelation, my understanding is that the most common belief among ancient commentators (Fathers of the Church, etc.) is that we indeed are living within Christ's kingdom on earth -- and his kingdom is the Catholic Church. Under this interpretation, we are living through the "millennium" [thousand years] -- the reign of Jesus, "one thousand" being just a symbolic number to refer to a very long period (i.e., the entire span of the Christian Era until the end of the world). And yet, in another manner of speaking, His Kingdom will be made manifest in its fulness at his Second Coming at the end of time. (That is why I referred to a kingdom "both" of the present and the future.)
[I will be surprised if you don't come across things similar to this in your J.B. Commentary. I suggest that you look for a small, recently published paperback book on Revelation by Fr. Alfred McBride (a Norbertine priest). I'll bet that you could get hooked on his books. What a wonderful man!]God bless you.
John
-- J. F. Gecik (jfgecik@hotmail.com), June 04, 2002.
It's a panoramic view from the beginning to the end. If the past, present and future were painted on the sky like the Sistene (sp?) Chapel, you would have Revelations!
-- Gail (Rothfarms@socket.net), June 04, 2002.
This may or may not be helpful, but I have read a couple of books by a really good Catholic writer, Kevin Orlin Johnson. One of them is about apparitions and another is about the Rosary. In both of them, when discussing prophecies, he says that one way to recognize a valid prophecy is that it isn't limited to "predicting" just one specific, limited event.There's a writer named Michael O'Brien who's written a series of Catholic novels ("Father Elijah" was the first one) and he uses this interpretation - that even though Hitler wasn't THE Antichrist, he was *one* of the antichrists, and therefore, many of the prophecies which will later be applicable to the *final* antichrist could also be applied to him.
-- Christine Lehman (christinelehman@hotmail.com), June 13, 2002.