Tuesday, October 25, 2005
ANOTHER UPDATE ON THE ORDER OF THE TRANSFIGURATION, CHARLES MERCIECA, AND ARCHBISHOP JOHN
To put it in context...
Dr. Charles Mercieca wrote two books, a portion of which are published on the Church of the Mother of God Transfigured website:
http://user.transit.ru/~maria/s2-2.htm
http://user.transit.ru/~maria/books/mamapeng.htm
He is founder and president of the International Association of Educators for World Peace
He has signed the Association of World Citizens Peace Declaration of Taipei 2001 which appears in the newsletter of the Institute for Planetary Synthesis (University for Planetary Synthesis) which is associated with the Arcane School of Lucis Trust.
Charles Mercieca is Vice President of the Association of World Citizens, an organization with branches in 30 countries, the majority third world, and "more coming online".
Mercieca is a Catholic according to an article for the Federation of World Peace and Love. Check out the Federation's website at that link. There's a picture of Pope Benedict there.
The article says in part:
Dr. Mercieca is also very spiritual. He is a devoted Catholic who embraces all religions. He loves helping his friends. He believes in the matriarchal society, which rules from the heart, and Mariologists view the Blessed Virgin Mary as the essence of the matriarchy. When I visited him on November 14, 2003, he was gracious enough to let me stay in a spacious room with a private bath. On the wall facing the bed was a niche, in which hung a tapestry of the Virgin Mary. On another wall hung photos of Mrs. Mercieca, who you can tell from her eyes was a woman of great character and wisdom. This proves, as often heard, that a great man always has a great woman behind him. Unfortunately, she died young.
I was told the room was full of positive energy and that the Patriarch of the Mother of God Church in Moscow, Archbishop John Bereslavsky, and other well-known people had used it. He was right about the positive energy of the room. It was the first time in my whole life that I slept like a baby in somebody's home. Before I checked in at the airport, he said: "Today I have prayed many times at church for your safe trip home and the angels will be with you." I felt I was as blessed as his children.
Dr. Mercieca is an honorary Committee Member of the Federation of World Peace and Love, the association that provided the above article about him.
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At the Messenger for Divine Mother website is an article by Charles Mercieca titled "Valiant Messenger of the Blessed Mother: Archbishop John Bereslavsky". The article describes Archbishop John but fails to mention that he was excommunicated from the Orthodox Church. It talks about the yearly Sobor, a meeting of members of the church which lasts two days and is essentially one long liturgy. The following is from the article:
This liturgical function focuses continuously on the Blessed Virgin Mary whose presence is felt deeply by every one present. In fact, everyone that participates in this impressive spiritual event, which is conducted by Archbishop John, enters into a trance and experiences a heavenly gift, which is priceless. This gift may be described as an out-of-time experience where the minutes pass like seconds and the hours pass like minutes. Another phenomenon that is experienced lies in the increasing energy one feels. Instead of feeling exhausted toward the end of the Sobor, after some nine to eleven hours of continuous participation, one feels refreshed and energetic. Besides, one starts looking forward with eagerness for the next Sobor. [emphasis mine - ct]
I believe he is describing an occult type of out-of-body experience. In any case "Divine Mother" is hardly a phrase the Blessed Virgin would use to describe herself. She is certainly not divine, yet it becomes rather obvious that Charles Mercieca would like her to be divine, and that this church he is promoting is Matriarchal and does not raise Jesus up for adoration, but rather substitutes a woman in His place. I doubt that the woman is the Blessed Virgin.
Whatever belief system Mercieca is promoting, it is coming out of visionary experiences. The article states that this new Russian church is Marian and uses "a fusion of liturgy of Russian Orthodoxy and Roman Catholicism." The church is described as "vibrant", and the article recounts the visionary experiences of Archbishop John:
Archbishop John has emerged as one of the greatest spiritual leaders of our time. He views the martyrs of the Solovski Islands as the patron saints of his vibrant Marian Church. In his prophetic visions, he sees Russia emerging as the New Jerusalem of the third millennium. The best way to savor the deep Marian spirituality of Archbishop John is to read his books and to hear him talking. The Solovski Islands martyrs have revealed to him the mysteries of life, death, and resurrection of souls.
Spiritual Life and Involvements
Archbishop John was born in Moscow in 1946. As a young adult, he converted to the faith and joined the Catacomb Church that escaped the communist rule of his nation. The Virgin Mary sent him a holy woman to look after him spiritually. She was known as Mother Euphrossinia.
Dr. Mercieca has some rather un-American attitudes, though I believe I've read these same attitudes expressed in Rome. Much of what he says in the article is truly Catholic in perspective, but our faith does not denigrate the material world, and that is what Dr. Mercieca is doing.
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In an old blog, Irish Elk has noted Mercieca's involvement with the Peace Abbey's "pet rock", and his enthusiasm for the politics of Cuba. When you get to the website, look for the bombed out cathedral and the heading "To Coventry the peace rock rolls..." which is down near the bottom.
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RSNews.net has a story on Archbishop John from which we can learn that he has written an unbelievable 300 books, one of which, SOLO SOPHIA, is reviewed here. According to the article he is considered a leading expert in Sophiology and Mariology Researches and a member of the International Council of World Religions and Cultures. Sophiology is one of the philosophies that John Paul II studied when he studied Soloviev and other Russian philosophers.
When someone writes an inordinate number of books, I tend to suspect channeling of some sort, and I'm often not wrong. It seems to be a sort of trademark.
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The question that nags...where are these people getting their money?
Could the following be the source? A reader sent in this interesting exercise in follow the links.
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Charles Mercieca signed the Association of World Citizens Peace Declaration of Taipei 2001 which appeared in the newsletter of the Institute (or University) for Planetary Synthesis.
Their website offers a proposed syllabus to start the university which was in the formative phase at the time the webpage was written. Scroll down to the bottom of the webpage. There you will see:
The University is for the moment only a blueprint. Similar projects, however, have already advanced into the stage of materialisation and offer courses for students. We advise those who would like to follow such a course of study to contact these institutions directly. Below we give some of their names and addresses:
ARCANA WORKSHOPS - http://www.meditationtraining.org
ARCANE SCHOOL - http://www.lucistrust.org
UNIVERSITY OF THE SEVEN RAYS - http://www.sevenray.com
TERRA - http://terra.pioneers.free.fr
That last one is of particular interest. The link will bring you here. Place your cursor over the triangle for "Grand Lodge, Ancient Universal Mysteries" and click. You will get the a Grand Orient Masonic Lodge website. While you're at it, check out the rest of the triangles on the Terra homepage. If you explore the 5eme Souffle/5th Breathe link and look at their books, you will see that Leadbeater, Blavatsky, and Bailey are all included on the list, as are books by Mesmer, a book on magic, and one on alchemy. It's certainly an interesting list!
I have no evidence that Mercieca is associated with Grand Orient Freemasonry other than the fact that The University for Planetary Synthesis must think his Association of World Citizens is in line with their thinking. It is an interesting exercise in follow the links, however.
