Member: Aequinoctium

"There is a place where the sidewalk ends
And before the street begins,
And there the grass grows soft and white,
And there the sun burns crimson bright,
And there the moon-bird rests from his flight
To cool in the peppermind wind.

Let us leave this place where the smoke blows black
And the dark street winds and bends.
Past the pits where the asphalt flowers grow
We shall walk with a walk that is measured and slow,
And watch where the chalk-white arrows go
To the place where the sidewalk ends.

Yes we'll walk with a walk that is measured and slow,
And we'll go where the chalk-white arrows go,
For the children, they mark, and the children, they know
The place where the sidewalk ends.
"
— Shel Silverstein (Where the Sidewalk Ends 30th Anniversary Edition: Poems and Drawings)

posted by theoldman at 7:39 am (EST) on Oct 25, 2009

On reflection, I realize how my remark might be misunderstood. I am not one of those who confuses Gnosticism with some sort of unmediated mysticism of a "democratic" gnosis. It's just that virtually every Christian Neognostic ecclesiastical group derives its apostolic authority from lines that spent many, many centuries in staunch opposition to Gnosticism. Hence the oxymoron.

In the creed of my church, the word Gnostic is substituted for Apostolic, since we take our spiritual authority not from the Apostolic traditions (however accessible they might be to us), but from the Gnostic transmissions received by To Mega Therion (and to a much lesser degree Jules Doinel, and arguably even Anna Kingsford). The chief mechanism by which this authority is sustained is not the episcopal catena (although we have such), but the continuing operation of the Sanctuary of the Gnosis--being the global initiate body of the IX° O.T.O., with its executive power vested in the O.H.O.

Holy Orders in E.G.C. have a different significance than those in sacerdotalist churches, let alone churches that attribute unique salvific power to Jesus the pseudo-Christ. Still, some of our clergy value the Christian Apostolic catena as providing a connection--tenuous though it may be--with the Mystery Cults of antiquity whose personnel and practices were absorbed into the early Church.

posted by paradoxosalpha at 8:56 am (EST) on May 2, 2009

Glad you liked the phylogeny piece. It was heavily dependent on research undertaken by our US Primate Sabazius. In the years since I wrote it, I've become aware of other claims to perpetuate one or another of the esoteric churches mentioned, but I haven't done the footwork to see if they check out. I don't know if you noticed the recent wiki wars regarding neo-Gnosticism; they seem to have largely passed. Those dust-ups were interesting to me, because they entirely bypassed the gnostic churches of Thelema, focusing instead on churches claiming a Christian apostolic gnosis--something I consider oxymoronic, although none of the detractors were using my criteria.

posted by paradoxosalpha at 9:16 am (EST) on May 1, 2009