I should read the vicar's blog more often. Mea culpa. Over at Transforming Grace, he has posted on the bowdlerisation of Scripture with particular reference to a psalm/canticle in Ezekiel.
"The canticle has five verses, but the
bible reference shows that verses 27 and 28a are missing. When I notice
this sort of omission I turn to my bible to see what the naughty
liturgical committee has cut out and here it is (omissions in bold)":
I will take you from the nations
and gather you from all the countries
and bring you into your own land.
25 I will sprinkle clean water on you,
and you shall be clean from all your uncleanness-es,
and from all your idols I will cleanse you.
26 And I will give you a new heart,
and a new spirit I will put within you.
And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh
and give you a heart of flesh.
27 And I will put my Spirit within you,
and cause you to walk in my statutes
and be careful to obey my rules.
28 You shall dwell in the land that I gave to your fathers,
and you shall be my people,
and I will be your God.
Ezekiel 36:24-28
This is Rev. Neil's comment on what he saw:
Do you notice what different effects
reading the two readings, or singing the canticles, have on you as the
reader? The first reading from Common Worship omits the purpose of God’s
work in his people. The reader is left with the effect of a warm glow
of God’s ability to change the hard human heart. Sure, it’s nice to have
a new heart of flesh, but what is this new heart for? The full reading
of scripture discloses God’s purposes; to turn the hearts of his people
from idols and to give them the desire to obey him.
The cumulative effect of this sort of
distortion of scripture might explain why our denomination is as it is.
People aren’t stupid but we are all shaped by what we read in devotion.
If our liturgy shapes us to talk about worshipping the God of love who
changes hearts whilst those who read the whole of scripture have a much
fuller and rounded view of God (which includes having a heart for God
which turns away from the worship of created things and is willing to
obey God’s statutes, amongst other aspects of God’s character revealed
in scripture but are judicially removed from our liturgy and our diet of
bible readings) then of course we’ll be at odds with one another.
I do not dispute any of this. I added a comment, which I trust will be published, as follows:
They’ve removed the destination so that there is no future Hope for the
Christian or the Jew. They’ve removed the removal of idols and so made
it multi-faith which removes the Heart of our faith which is Jesus.
They’ve removed the Holy Spirit and so removed the Help of the believer as well as putting their own souls in peril.
Finally, it’s anti-Semitic as well.
No future, no faith and no fruit. No hope. No faith . No love. It’s a
pretty comprehensive attack, but it forms the basis of a good sermon!
It's anti-Semitic and it's anti-Messiah/Christ, which is no coincidence. No wonder we're in trouble.
