A cursory glance at statistics on feasts in Malta shows that 48 per cent are dedicated to Mary, mother of Jesus, 45 per cent to Catholic saints and just seven per cent dedicated to Jesus and the Apostle Paul. (This statistic has been compiled from data provided in Malta’s Timeline: A Handbook of Maltese Chronology, by Chev. Joseph Galea, edited by Raymond M. Cassar).
One of the issues dividing Christians is idol worship, feasts and their celebration. While there is nothing wrong in celebrating feasts per se since they help us to learn from the life of saints, certain aspects of Catholic feasts are abhorrent and diametrically opposed to the Word of God (the Bible). Feasts not only create a potential for idol worship but also provide a source for keeping Christians back in their progress towards maturity as pilgrims on this earth.
The Bible does not mince its words on this subject and bans outright the worship of statues and other man-man objects in the Ten Commandments, as well as in many other parts of the Bible, both in the Old and New Testaments. In Exodus 20, for instance, we read: “2. I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery. 3. You shall have no other gods before [a] me. 4. You shall not make for yourself an image in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below. 5. You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, punishing the children for the sin of the parents to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me, 6 but showing love to a thousand generations of those who love me and keep my commandments.”
The Roman Church took the liberty of deleting Verse 4 because of the idolatry within it, even in the papal system, and thus the second Commandment has been deleted or sometimes absorbed into the first. All remaining Commandments are therefore shifted along this one count.
The Roman Church has no other option but to create excuses and compromise to justify idolatry along many lines since it is deeply embedded in its make-up.
One of the poor excuses to justify idolatry is that in Old Testament times, the Hebrews worshipped God in the Tabernacle when His presence was manifested in the Holy of Holies (the Ark of the Covenant). The whole reasoning behind the Tabernacle was that God in His infinite mercy, wisdom and love gave His chosen people (the Hebrews) a place to seek His presence, forgiveness of sins and a means of establishing a relationship with Him.
The Tabernacle also foreshadowed Jesus Christ (Hebrews 8:5. They serve at a sanctuary that is a copy and shadow of what is in heaven.
This is why Moses was warned when he was about to build the tabernacle: “See to it that you make everything according to the pattern shown you on the mountain.”
In the desert wilderness, atop Mount Sinai, God gave Moses two things for us: The tabernacle in Exodus 25 (its pattern, size and furniture), and the Ten Commandments (including judgments and ordinances: the law).
Knowing our frail human nature in seeking God through our material senses, God helped humanity in a progressive manner in its initial struggles to come to the knowledge of Him. This, He lovingly did by manifesting Himself in the Tabernacle. But this was done according to His Divine order and not in the human way, which was deviant to that of God.
Along the course of history, paganism and religion took over the place of this relationship. Man forgot His first love and relationship along God’s ways and sought Him through idols and paganism instead of seeking Him in spirit and the word (John 4:24, God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in spirit and in truth.). Man’s perception of the Divine became different from God’s original way of revealing Himself to man.
One of the greatest steps backward in this sense was when Constantine (who in 303 AD became the Roman Emperor and gave Christianity to the world) replaced statues of Roman gods and goddesses with Christian saints and Mary, mother of Jesus. The Roman Church did nothing to control this over the centuries and idol worship continued to develop strongly up to the present day, ultimately leading to the entrenched position of the Roman Church not to change matters, afraid that it might lose its popularity.
Feasts also spin the economic wheels! In the process, the costs of this compromise have been costly because biblical truth was not preached and all sorts of justifications and compromises were concocted to maintain the status quo. To complicate matters, when the first great split in the Christian Church took place (East-West Schism) in 1054 AD, the Orthodox Church on its part, also continued worshipping images through iconology and even revering the bodies of dead saints.
Now, that summer is fast approaching, we will see the yearly encore of religious folklore, traditions and customs (call them what you will) that not only bring about excesses of all sorts (including even deaths through fireworks accidents), they also draw God’s people away from the Risen Christ and leave them infantile in their relationship with God through His Son Jesus Christ.
The leadership of the Roman Church is afraid of change even though it knows deep down that it carries this huge burden of responsibility and accountability in front of God and the well being of living souls.
But the truth needs to be exposed whatever the cost or sacrifices may be.
How can one expect renewal, a born-again experience and a fresh outpouring of the Holy Spirit on the Roman Church when these things are allowed to carry on and on? The wish of the Maltese bishops in their pastoral letter of a few months ago expressed their wish for the Maltese church to be born-again because Maltese churches have been reduced to mere museums. But there is a huge divide between words and actions. We should be faithful to God’s Word always and not use it only when it suits one’s interests, or to satisfy one’s whims. It should be used solely as it is written for the glory of the Kingdom of God to bring souls to salvation to Christ Jesus. Perhaps the warnings of Revelation 22:19 need reminding: “And if anyone takes words away from this book of prophecy, God will take away from him his share in the tree of life and in the holy city, which are described in this book.”
Anthony Zarb Dimech