01/09/2007

  • The Re-establishment of Stormont in Northern Ireland: Repugnant to Christ's Crown (2nd ed.)

    New Title: "Stormont, Irish Republicanism, and the Bible"

     

    Having European ancestry, I tend to take a keen interest in the culture and affairs of my ancestral homelands especially Ireland, UK, the Commonwealth of Nations, and Spain.  

     

    Relatively recently, the Stormont legislature was re-established a few years after Sir Dave Trimble crashed it the first time (by God’s Providence).  (He should not have been made a Life Peer in the House of Lords by Her Majesty, but that is another matter.)     

     

    Succinctly, the re-establishment of Stormont is very contrary to Scripture and the subordinate Westminster Standards (including the Covenants to which the UK and her current and former colonies are bound) secondarily.   First of all, a Government is ordained of God and commissioned by God to uphold true Christianity, to encourage and protect those that do good, to threaten and punish those that do evil, and to suppress any heresy against Christ and His Church (from Rom. 13 and other passages).    Romans 13 calls public officers as a minister of God (not be confused with the office of minister in the Church).   Also elsewhere in Scripture, it mentions not to be unequally yoked together, and that has been further reinforced in the past when God in the OT warned Israel to not mix with unclean and evil nations or causes external or internal to Israel and also when God warned the Church (and nations I think) not to take part in adultery lest we would become one with the harlot.  

     

    Stormont has an administration that reflects varied spiritual and political interests.   The public officers are a mixture of Catholics and Protestants as well as Unionists and Irish Republicans.    Any Presbyterian or Dutch Reformed, who holds to the original Westminster Standards or Three Forms of Unity respectively, would know that Catholicism is a false religion, represents a false Gospel, and is led by AntiChrist.     (Even my non-Presbyterian Elders at CLC know that!)   I don’t know what to think of Unionism yet; it has its Scriptural and non-Scriptural points.    Being a former supporter of the Irish Republican cause until 2006, I have a good handle on what goals Irish Republicanism has.   Yes, the UK has done egregious things toward Ireland and should make restitution to the Irish Republic.    Whether UK should give the northern 6 counties back to the Irish, the answer depends on what government the new united Ireland wants to establish.  (This principle also applies to the USA’s Independence in 1776.)  Enter the 2 goals of Irish Republicanism:   a 32-county united Irish Republic (vs. the current 26-county Irish Republic) and a heavily socialist form (read Communist) of government.    Communism is undoubtedly evil and is a self-contradicting form of government.   It still creates classes of people (the Communist have’s and the non-Communist have-not’s) with special bonuses for the faithful Communists.    It promotes the worldly ideal of feminism, and by Government bureaucratic nonsense, Communism stifles technology.    Then, as we have seen in the Khruschev era, they sacrifice safety to play technology catch-up.   It praises man and forgets and abandons God for any success the Communist nation may experience.   Communism is God-less and at best, spiritually pluralistic.  (These and other things are the reasons why I rejected and renounced Irish Republicanism in 2006.)    Simply, Communism is contrary to God’s Word.

     

    On restitution by the UK, I believe the UK should NOT give the 6 counties of Northern Ireland to the Republic until the Republic forms a Government that upholds Christ’s Crown and Covenant lest Christ’s Crown would lose ground to a communist civil government if the Irish Republican goals were attained.   (Irish Republicanism with its Communist goals should be thwarted and killed.)

     

    Stormont (in addition to the US Government), in addition to having Christians in public office, has adherents of religions and political causes that are clearly contrary to God’s Word.   Those adherents are people who are Catholic or Irish Republican.   Though Stormont may aid in relieving longstanding tensions between the North and the South, it is a spiritual catastrophe since it is an unequally yoked and spiritually pluralistic Government due to the adherents of the false religion Catholicism and the evil Irish Republican cause.  In short, Stormont is uniting itself politically and spiritually with a harlot.    If a Government has adherents of false religions or evil causes (Catholicism, Mormonism, Arminianism, Atheism, or whatever false religion) to govern a people, how can that Government be true to God’s commission as civil ministers of God per Romans 13?    

     

    The UK, Eire, and the USA have failed to be faithful to God’s commission on Government.   The Republics of Eire and the USA introduced spiritual pluralism, pantheism, and atheism since their beginning (USA – 1776 and Eire – 1920’s) through the US’s Declaration of Independence and their respective Constitutions.  (Given the Government that the United States wanted to establish and has established, the USA was wrong to declare independence from His Majesty George III despite the unfair taxation of the colonies.)  The US also has adherents of false religions in Government (a Catholic Justice on the Supreme Court, a Mormon Senator of Utah, etc.).    I am grateful for the UK’s establishment of the Protestant Reformed Christianity (per the Westminster Standards) by their Britannic Majesties and Parliament since 1649 and the Glorious Revolution and again in 1953 when Her Majesty swore a coronation oath (before God, lords, and commons) to uphold Protestant Reformed Christianity.  

     

    With the poor spiritual health and great national sins of all 3 nations, the only solution is to return the nations back to God, and that can only happen through the Gospel and secondarily the Covenants (the National Covenant of Scotland and the Solemn League & Covenant).    Yet even now, our God is merciful to us in that He does not treat us as our sins (national and individual) deserve.   He continues to pour Grace on the nations and begs them with open arms to come to Him.