Nicene Truth

The Importance of the Nature/Grace Distinction, Pt. 3

Considering the Eastern Orthodox View

By: Jay Dyer

Distinction isn't tension and often times this distinction I've been writing about is characterized as an opposition.  Human nature, even fallen, isn't in opposition to grace, but it the effects of the Fall do bring about a tendency towards sin and opposition to God.  In the Catholic view, synergism, which is the human will following and conforming to the divine will is always is always upheld, even if one takes the Thomistic and Augustinian view that there is operative or efficacious grace.  The human will never can and never does lose its own natural energy.  But the natural energy of the human will isn't sufficient to cause divine grace or life, and this is where we differ with both the Calvinist and the Orthodox concerns the need and power of divine grace.  I know the Orthodox would not say that the human will causes divine grace, but in the final analysis, salvation, whether the beginning of faith or the persevering therein is ultimately in the hands of man.  This is the point where we differ.

Jacques Vallee-On 'Messengers of Deception'

DailyGrail.com

As mentioned recently, Daily Grail Publishing has just released a reprint of Jacques Vallee's UFO classic, Messengers of Deception (Amazon US and Amazon UK). Last week I had a quick chat with Jacques about the book, and the controversy it created in ufology. It was intentionally short - I could talk to Jacques for a couple of days on all manner of topics, but in this case I just wanted to address the elements of his work which have made him, as he describes it, "a heretic among heretics" - namely, his concern about uncritical acceptance of the UFO phenomenon, and also the 'psychic' manifestations found in UFO reports which suggest that they may not be "nuts and bolts" craft.

PBS Interview with Lisa Randall on Multiple Dimensions

Randall's book is fascinating.  Pay no heed to the old dude and his global warming propaganda...

Quantum Issues, Free Will, Synchronicity, and Determinism

[From a discussion a while back in philosophy class. The picture is here as a joke, by the way. -Jay]

By: Jay Dyer

Oddly, immeidately after quantum issues came up in Phenomenology class (the very same day, in fact--how's that for Providence/'synchronicity"), I was confronted by an interesting chapter in a philosophical/theological/social commentary book I had been reading that examined this very issue. Since it has resurfaced in a post I decided to post the following. All I know of this subject is the discussions that took place in my Philosophy of Science class, and various tidbits/articles I have read. I thought it would be relevant to this topic and Dr.-----'s statements below. I don't know enough on this to say I totally agree with the author's analyses (he is, as a side note, a commited non-Christian, so this is not necessarily a theological debate), but it's interesting and insightful nonetheless. I agree with Dr. ----- in his response that randomness in the world does not equate with freedom for a sentient being-it's a non sequitur: but it still may have implications for consciousness, free will, and determinism. Forgive misspellings: I'm typing all of this out by hand.

Joseph P. Farrell's "Secrets of the Unified Field" (Several Parts)

[I'm reading his Unified Field Theory now, and I've read some of the SS Brotherhood of the Bell.  I suspect that the Philadelphia Experiment really did occur, but even if it didn't, I believe there are multimple dimensions, portals, and that dimensional travel is possible.  Angels do it.  The interview is fascinating.  Farrell is of particular interest to me, in that there aren't many people I know that are big fans of patristics (the Church Fathers) and speculative/conspiracy subjects, though I don't share his anti-Augustinian conclusions.  Also good in this regard is Lisa Randall's Warped Passages. -Jay]

Continue to Youtube to hear the next 11 parts.

Operation Paperclip Casefile

By: Agent Orange

Conspiracy Archive

After WWII ended in 1945, victorious Russian and American intelligence teams began a treasure hunt throughout occupied Germany for military and scientific booty. They were looking for things like new rocket and aircraft designs, medicines, and electronics. But they were also hunting down the most precious "spoils" of all: the scientists whose work had nearly won the war for Germany. The engineers and intelligence officers of the Nazi War Machine.

The U.S. Military rounded up Nazi scientists and brought them to America. It had originally intended merely to debrief them and send them back to Germany. But when it realized the extent of the scientists knowledge and expertise, the War Department decided it would be a waste to send the scientists home. Following the discovery of flying discs (foo fighters), particle/laser beam weaponry in German military bases, the War Department decided that NASA and the CIA must control this technology, and the Nazi engineers that had worked on this technology.

Leading UFO Reserchers Confirm Christian View

By: William Nugent [Not affiliated]

ArticleOnline

A general consensus has emerged among serious, science oriented UFO researchers that a certain small percentage of UFOs are real and are not figments of anyone's imagination. Furthermore, it is well known that many individuals claim to receive messages from alleged extra-terrestials aboard UFOs.

The messages received from UFOs are generally occultic and steer people away from belief in Christian doctrine. Extra-terrestials tend to undermine or attack the Christian faith.

Dr. Quigley's 'Tragedy and Hope' Reveals Call By Cecil Rhodes for 'American Union'

By: J.R.

JonesReport.com

Dr. Carroll Quigley, a highly respected professor of history at the Foreign Service School of Georgetown University for 28-years, revealed in his 1348 page magnum opus, Tragedy and Hope (1966), the nefarious goal of Cecil Rhodes’ secret society calling for an American Union, coming to fruition today as the “North American Union.” From 1884 to about 1915, according Dr. Quigley, the members of The Rhodes Secret Society exhaustively worked at extending the British Empire and forming a federal system. The Rhodes Secret Society was “constantly harping on the lessons to be learned from the failure of the American Revolution and the success of the Canadian federation of 1867, and hoped to federate the various parts of the empire as seemed feasible, then confederate the whole of it, with the United Kingdom, into a single organization...(hoping) to bring the United States into this organization to whatever degree was possible…(making) Washington the capital of the whole organization or allow parts of the empire to become states of the American Union (emphasis added. Below see scan copy of page 133 of Tragedy and Hope).”

Husserl’s Four Aguments Against Skeptical Relativism

The Famed Phenomenologist Deals the Epistemic Deathblow to Relativism (in a very presuppositional fashion!)

By: Jay Dyer    

     Unfortunately, modern academia (in particular the humanities) tends to be suffused with relativistic tendencies.  Oddly, this was also the case when Edmund Husserl wrote in 1901 of skeptical relativism, that it was “quite rare to encounter a thinker free from the taint of such erroneous doctrines.”  Although he was referring to “anthropologism,” a specific form of relativism pertaining to the human species, Husserl would proceed to offer a devastating critique of full-blown relativism in his monumental work, the Logical Investigations.  The purpose of this paper is to offer a summary and analysis of his four principal arguments against skeptical relativism, thus demonstrating their contemporary relevance for modern thinking. 
    

The Destruction of the Temple, Josephus, and Christ's Prophecy

Flavius Josephus' Account of the Destruction of Jerusalem and the Partial-Preterist Vindication of Christ's Olivet Prophecy    

By: Jay Dyer   

     One of the most fascinating first-hand battle accounts is that of the destruction of the Jewish Temple in 70 A.D. by the Roman Governor Titus Vespasian, later written based on the eyewitness experience of Jewish Pharisee/historian Flavius Josephus.  Josephus, however, is not the only prominent historical figure to give a description of the events of the Jewish war of that year.  Jesus of Nazareth also appears to give an accurate and detailed foretelling of the disastrous events to come upon Israel in Matthew, Chapters 23-24; and Luke, Chapter 21.  The thesis of this paper is that both Gospel accounts are referring to the same event that Josephus describes in The Wars of the Jews.