The Culture War – opening salvo – the calendar
A king Is born! Long Live the King! And with those words a new calendar was started. It did not matter what the kingdom was called. In Rome the calender dates from Julius, then from Augustus and so on. Each subsequent ruler had started his own era. It was like saying in the 7th year of Augustus Caesar. To get the full calendar you had to know the list of succession and how many years long each of the eras were. Other calender systems started with the foundation of their nation. The Hebrew calendar started from year one of mankind’s reign on the earth. Adam started the count and it has been progressing ever since. What do these types of these systems have in common? They represented a turning point in the affairs of men. A singular moment from which all else would progress… for those people under their system for measuring the passing time.
AD and BC
Hundreds of years after the birth of Jesus the Christ a monk decided to change the way he was measuring the passing of the years. Instead of using the years of the current Roman Emperor (era), he decided to begin his calendar from the birth of Jesus (his era). Thus began Anno Domini, The Year of Our Lord, and a simplified way of keeping track of the passage of time was created. Most of the world adopted this method to make it easier for historians and also commerce to work in their respective fields. BC then came about to measure world events that occurred prior to the birth of Jesus. Not everyone who adopted this form of measurement liked the idea that it all started with the birth of a Jew, the founder of Christianity, as the ending of one major era and the beginning of the other.
CE and BCE
Good old Henry the 8th. Wasn’t satisfied with the religion coming from Rome. He couldn’t divorce and marry whom he pleased. So he began his own flavour of religion. The church of England was born. The calendar did not change, after all they still worshipped the same God. Yet shortly after his death a slight change began to appear as to how the calendar dates were referred. It was started by those who did not like the pope and the “papists” who followed his lead. Such a slight change but a reflection of the times (for their politically correct version of time). The change? They dropped the Latin AD and adopted CE (Christian Era) and BCE (Before the Christian Era).
CE and BCE (the second coming)
Second Coming (of unbelief)? A little joke. Yet a new definition came from the Jewish community, in the 18th century of our Lord (but not theirs). They referred to the same calendar not as the start of the Christian Era but as the Common Era and BCE as Before the Common Era. Yet there is no defining moment for why the calendar should be split at that time. The only significant event is still the birth of Jesus. It reflects the heart of the rebellious, it is the age old cry of the wicked “we will not have this man rule over us.” Wicked? Simply those who will not honour or obey the words of a king.
Adoption
As we entered the Era of the Scientist a quiet rebellion against faith began. If it can’t be measured does it really exist? My senses will be the judge of reality and later my sensors would add to that reality. All else, they say, is an example of hocus-pocus. It is a magic incantation, a trick to fool the gullible. It is like the priestly words spoken at communion to change the bread and wine into the body and blood of Christ. It is a marriage of fake and faith. Fortunately some, if not many, scientists still have faith. Yet the rebellious among them, those who also say “we will not have this man rule over us,” continue the religion of their cohorts (humanism) by using the CE, Common Era designation.
Political
Scientists are supposed to be the epitome of reasoned thought. Other intellectuals are also, supposedly, of the same mould. Yet these wise and enlightened people have chosen to continue to divide the stream of time into two parts. Our time of two thousand years called the Common Era and the earlier part of history called Before the Common Era. Yet there is nothing that signifies why that division is necessary. There is no sociological event, no scientific breakthrough, no cataclysmic event that shouts down to us through time that “this, whatever it is,” has changed the world. Without the birth of Jesus, there is nothing to point at. It is simply an easy arbitrary choice. It is simply a political point for the politically correct, for they have no point of value from which to measure.
Reasoned thought? Not at all. Just an unbelieving, disrespectful act towards Jesus, his values and those who follow him. That is the basis on which the politically correct take their stance. They want to change the times and the seasons… or at least the names of them… so that they have the freedom to do whatever they desire. It isn’t even Anarchy. It is too well controlled and defined. AD/BC or CE/BCE? It was just the opening salvo in the Culture War.