The End Time Church: From the Cathedrals to the Catacombs

By Dan L. White

Copyright ©2019 by Dan L. White, all rights reserved.

Scripture quotations are from the World English Bible (WEB) which is in the public domain.

Chapter 63
A Light, not a Mirror

Two groups of Christians?

That sounds illogical, but after Hadrian, there were two groups of Christians, both periodically persecuted, but headed in different directions.

When Marcus and the Gentile Christians in Hadrian’s new Jerusalem, Aelia Capitolina, forsook the weekly Sabbath and the annual Bible festivals, that created two distinct Christian groups. One group followed what the apostles and original assembly had done on Sabbath and Feasts. The other group — in those matters, at least — chose to follow Rome.

The Sabbath and Feasts are spiritual connecting times with the Creator. The Sabbath is God’s memorial of His creation. The Feasts are God’s plan for His creation.

Throughout Israel’s history, giving up the Sabbaths and festivals was catastrophic. When Jeroboam dropped the Feasts, the ten tribes never recovered from that sin. When Hezekiah’s father Ahaz shut up the Temple and forsook the Sabbath and Festivals, Judah was cursed. When Josiah’s father Amon did the same, that brought on more curses.

On the other hand, when Yahweh personally spoke and wrote the Ten Commandments, including the Sabbath commandment, at Pentecost time, a festival time, Mt. Sinai shook and smoked with the very presence of God. Solomon’s dedication of the Temple at the Feast of Tabernacles was one of the most spiritual times in the Bible. When Hezekiah reopened the Temple that his father had closed and then observed Passover, God heard their prayer in heaven. When Josiah found the book of the law and set his heart to obey, one of his first actions was to observe the Passover-Unleavened Bread festival. In the New Testament, Yeshua was born at the time of the Feast of Tabernacles, He was executed at Passover, He was accepted as the wave sheaf offering during Unleavened Bread, and He began His flock at the Feast of Pentecost. The fall festivals in God’s plan for man have yet to occur, at the second coming of the Messiah.

The highest points in the Bible were at festivals. The Sabbath and Feasts are spiritual connecting times with the Creator of the universe. Yet some Gentile Christians were willing to forsake that, because they were “Jewish.”

As pagans, Gentiles had been cut off from God, with no prior knowledge of Sabbaths and Bible Feasts. So naturally they had other traditions.

What traditions?

Sun worship.

Sun worship was common around the world. In the Roman Empire, the form Mithraism was prevalent during the early Christian era. Gentile Christians had a history of pagan traditions, such as the pagan annual festivals of the winter solstice and the spring mating season, and dies Solis, the weekly great Day of the Sun.

When the Roman led Christians stopped observing the fourth commandment Sabbath and the Yahweh festivals, where would they naturally turn?

They gradually turned back to what they were used to — their pagan heritage. As Israel did when they made the golden calf, the Roman Christians simply turned back to Egypt.

After the Bar Kochba rebellion, Rome hated everything about the Jews. Government and social pressure opposed the “Jewish” Bible Sabbath and Feasts.

Most people will always yield to social pressure. Everybody likes to be part of the in-crowd. An old rock and roll song said, “I’m in with the in-crowd. I go where the in-crowd goes. I’m in with the in-crowd and I know what the in-crowd knows.” People try very hard not to be frowned upon by family, friends and their in-crowd.

An old television show, Candid Camera, had a gag where an unsuspecting victim got on an elevator with several of the show’s actors. The victim faced the front door of the elevator, as is common, but when he noticed everyone else in the elevator facing the rear, he then turned and faced the rear. This happened with person after person, facing the rear where there was no door, just because everyone else was.

The “in-crowd” is one of the strongest tools that Satan has. And the Roman in-crowd hated Sabbath and Feasts.

Christians were mocked and persecuted for doing anything “Jewish,” and they were surrounded by friends, family and the whole society keeping days and festivals that Rome approved. There was heavy “in-crowd” pressure on Christians to abandon the Bible Sabbath and Feasts and to keep pagan days and festivals that the Gentile Christians had always kept, anyway.

One Christian group, centered in Rome, gradually adopted the organization and religious customs of the Roman Empire — a visible Church with a pyramidal government, socially acceptable Roman days, and many other Roman religious vestiges. The other group, mainly located east of Rome including many Gentile assemblies, had only local shepherds under Christ the King, no expansive visible government, and aimed to go only by the Bible and not by traditions of men or religious rabbis.

The contentious issues of government and holy days appeared very early among Christians. When Hadrian banned anything Jewish in his new Jerusalem in 135 CE causing Gentile Christians there to forsake the Sabbath and Feasts, that was only about one generation after the apostle John had passed on. An article on the Passover controversy by David Rudolph gives insight on this battle.

Second century Gentile churches followed two calendar traditions concerning Passover. Almost all of the churches in Asia (where Paul devoted much of his ministry [1 Cor 16:8, 19; Acts 19:10, 26), as well as churches in Asia Minor, Cilicia, Syria, Judea (until c. 135) and Mesopotamia, observed Passover in accordance with the Jewish calendar, on the fourteenth day of the first month, the month of Nissan … Far from being a minor schismatic group, Gentile Christians who celebrated Passover on Nissan 14 stretched across a vast geographic region that represented the heartland of apostolic Christianity.

By contrast, the churches in the West—in Italy, Greece (including Corinth), Spain, Britain, Gaul (which included the present-day area of France, Belgium, the south Netherlands, south-west Germany)—observed Passover on the Sunday following Nissan 14. These churches retained the name [pascha] (Passover) but they moved away from celebrating Passover on the same day as Jews, with Jews and in the manner of Jews.
Passover Controversy in the East and West, David Rudolph, Cambridge University, 2004,(unpublished).

As shown there, assemblies that Paul founded and taught were sticklers about keeping Passover, although not by the current Jewish calendar as the calculated Jewish calendar was not used until later. The assemblies that Paul taught were doing what he taught — to observe the Feasts, and correspondingly the Sabbath.

So when did this great controversy over Passover begin?

When did the split between East and West over the dating of Passover occur? According to Epiphanius (Pan. 70.9.2), who sought to answer this question, most of the churches in the East and West until c. 135 followed a common tradition of observing Passover when the Jerusalem church did, on Nissan 14. The Jewish overseers… of the Jerusalem church were instrumental in determining the proper date of Passover for the Gentile wing of the church…

Epiphanius comments that the unifying influence of the circumcised overseers ceased during the reign of Hadrian when all Jews, including Christian Jews, were expelled from Jerusalem (c.135).4 The subsequent two centuries, from the Hadrianic exile until the Council of Nicaea (c. 325), was marked by controversy in the church over the dating of Passover.

The controversy over Passover — really the attack on Passover — began when Marcus and the Gentiles in Aelia Capitolina capitulated to Hadrian.

Only about 20 years after that, Polycarp, who had been a personal associate of John, and Anicetus, bishop of Rome, disputed the date of Passover.

The 1911 edition of Encyclopedia Britannica, article Easter, says:
Generally speaking, the Western churches kept Easter on the first day of the week, while the Eastern churches followed the Jewish rule, and kept Easter on the fourteenth day. St Polycarp, the disciple of St John the Evangelist and bishop of Smyrna, visited Rome in 159 to confer with Anicetus, the bishop of that see, on the subject; and urged the tradition, which he had received from the apostle, of observing the fourteenth day. Anicetus, however, declined to admit the Jewish custom in the churches under his jurisdiction, but readily communicated with Polycarp and those who followed it.

That article also says that:
There is no indication of the observance of the Easter festival in the New Testament, or in the writings of the apostolic Fathers…The ecclesiastical historian Socrates (Hist. Eccl. v. 22) states, with perfect truth, that neither the Lord nor his apostles enjoined the keeping of this or any other festival. There is no indication of the observance of the Easter festival in the New Testament, or in the writings of the apostolic Fathers…[Socrates] attributes the observance of Easter by the church to the perpetuation of an old usage, “just as many other customs have been established.”

In other words, Rome was following an old custom that came from somewhere other than the Bible. They claimed they were following traditions handed down to them from the apostles Peter and Paul. They had no record of that, and again the assemblies that Paul taught kept the Feasts.

In this Passover dispute, also commonly called the Easter dispute, both sides called the day Pascha, or Passover. At that time, Rome did not say they were trying to substitute Easter for Passover. The difference was over what day to keep Pascha.

As the Britannica pointed out, Christians from the east, less under the influence of Rome, kept Pascha on the 14^th of the month, as instructed in the Bible and the same as the apostles and early assembly had done. Christians tending toward Rome kept Pascha on the Sunday following the 14^th.

When Anicetus differed with Polycarp about the date of Passover, the Roman bishop did not dispute that Polycarp was doing what he was taught by the apostle John. Yet Anicetus and his cohorts still insisted that Pascha must be kept differently than John and the apostles did.

What does that mean?

It means that the Romish Christians were saying that the apostle John — and all the other apostles — were wrong. John leaned on Christ at the Passover and wrote 4 books of the New Testament, yet the Roman Christians thought that John was spiritually stupid to observe Passover as Christ had taught Him.

Why were those Christians in Rome so illogical?

Surely it was because they were surrounded by old customs they were comfortable with. “The first day of the week was the Mithraic Sunday before it was the Christian, and December 25 was Mithra’s birthday,” E. Royston Pike, Encyclopedia of Religion, article Mithraism.

The New World Encyclopedia, article Pope Anicetus, says, Although the Roman church did not yet celebrate a special Easter festival, it held that Jesus had been resurrected on a Sunday, and that this day should therefore be considered Easter rather than 14 Nisan.

The Bible never said to do that. There are no Bible examples of anyone doing that. So why honor Sunday?

That’s what they had known and that’s what they were surrounded with.

Polycarp did not agree with Anicetus about changing the date of Passover. If you keep Passover on a different date, even though you still call it Passover, you’re not keeping Passover. To change the date of a holy day is to cancel the holy day, just as Jeroboam did when he moved Tabernacles from the seventh month to the eighth month.

When Polycarp visited Anicetus in the middle of the second century, the bishop of Rome was not considered to be preeminent over all other bishops. Anicetus thought Polycarp was wrong, but he did not assume power over Polycarp or the Christians to the east of Rome.

That soon changed, though.

The Britannica article further explains:
About forty years later (197) the question was discussed in a very different spirit between Victor, bishop of Rome, and Polycrates, metropolitan of proconsular Asia. That province was the only portion of Christendom which still adhered to the Jewish usage, and Victor demanded that all should adopt the usage prevailing at Rome. This Polycrates firmly refused to agree to, and urged many weighty reasons to the contrary, whereupon Victor proceeded to excommunicate Polycrates and the Christians who continued the Eastern usage.

Upon urging from others, Victor was persuaded to withdraw his excommunication. Although those others disagreed with his casting out Polycrates, apparently they did accept that the bishop of Rome had the power to cast out Christians far from Rome. To accept such a power was a huge change in the Church, when the bishop of Rome became like the spiritual emperor of Rome.

A pope.

In a letter to Victor, citing the apostles John and Philip in Ephesus earlier as support, Polycrates rejected Victor’s Passover. He also rejected Victor’s excommunication.

All these observed the fourteenth day of the passover according to the Gospel, deviating in no respect, but following the rule of faith. And I also, Polycrates, the least of you all, do according to the tradition of my relatives, some of whom I have closely followed. For seven of my relatives were bishops; and I am the eighth. And my relatives always observed the day when the people put away the leaven. I, therefore, brethren, who have lived sixty-five years in the Lord, and have met with the brethren throughout the world, and have gone through every Holy Scripture, am not affrighted by terrifying words. For those greater than I have said ‘We ought to obey God rather than man,’ Eusebius, Church History, Book V, Chapter 24.

To move a holy day is to miss a holy day. This cannot be overstated. Polycrates went to the wall with the Roman bishop rather than keep a fake Passover a few days later.

About a century after that episode, Rome set out on its most horrible persecution of Christians, under Diocletian. Diocletian became emperor in 284. After three centuries of the totalitarian empire, the Roman dictators were having trouble holding conquered peoples under control so Diocletian reorganized the government. He appointed three other co-rulers besides himself, and each of the four men was responsible for holding four different areas of the empire in check.

One of those four, Galerius, convinced Diocletian to try to eliminate the Christians because they did not accept the authority of Rome in religion.

Oddly enough, that was the same approach that Victor had taken with Polycrates, punishing him because he did not accept the authority of ecclesiastical Rome.

At least one pope, Marcellinus, purportedly caved in to the Diocletian persecution. And when the persecution eased, that pope’s successor, Marcellus, did what Diocletian had done with the Roman government. Marcellus reorganized the Roman Church government.

New World Encyclopedia, article Pope Marcellus I
Marcellus showed himself a capable leader in reorganizing the external administration of the church. According to the Liber Pontificalis, Marcellus divided the territorial administration of the Church into 25 districts (tituli), appointing over each a presbyter, who saw to the preparation of the catechumens (prospective new members) for baptism and directed the performance of public penances.

Notice there is no example for any of that government in the New Testament. That type of government came from Rome, not from the original flock.

The Romans did martyr a number of Christians during that last persecution. Many Christians also caved in to Rome’s demands, and later insisted they had only told a little white lie.

New World Encyclopedia article Pope Eusebius, 8/28/19
Marcellus I had become pope during a period of great turmoil which left the Roman church badly shaken, with rumors that his own predecessor had committed apostasy during the persecution. After Maxentius ended the persecutions, apostate Christians began to return the the church in large numbers… Marcellus thus required strict public penance from the apostates, whom the Catholics referred to as merely lapsi (lapsed). The prescribed penance, however, provoked a severe reaction from many of the lapsi, who believed that they had never truly turned apostate but had only told a white lie to preserve their lives. Conflicts soon arose among the Catholics, some of which ended in bloodshed. Riots broke out throughout the city, and Marcellus’ inability to control the situation resulted in his banishment.

The same article points out that one group —
held that apostates could not receive absolution from mere bishops, and that only God could forgive “sins unto death” like apostasy, murder, and adultery. The Catholic Church took its name (catholic meaning “universal”) from its position that the church must accommodate sinners as well as saints, and that the bishops, as Christ’s representatives, were authorized to absolve even the most grievous sins.

That was quite a debate! The Roman Church said that Christians should not have given in to persecution and denied Christ, obviously right. But those who had so compromised themselves said that only God could forgive their sins and not Roman bishops, also very correct.

What an enormous increase in power the Roman Church claimed — that their bishops were authorized to absolve sins. Merriam-Webster says absolve is “to pardon or forgive (a sin.)” Christ forgave sins. He is God. No one else in the Bible forgave sins. But nearly three centuries after Christ, Roman bishops could!

The Roman Church also had internal riots, causing bloodshed. The just cited New World Encyclopedia article said that contemporary writers described the conflict inside the Roman Church “in very strong terms, using such terms as sedition, discord, and even warfare.”

Sedition, discord, and warfare, right inside the Roman Church!

Look at that Church at that time, almost three centuries after Christ. It had a Roman type emperor, its bishops could forgive sin, large numbers of its people had apostatized during the persecution, and afterwards they went to war with one another.

Quite a contrast between that Church and the original assemblies.

Now here is the stunning, incredible point about that Christian transformation.

Those Christians became like Rome, even while Rome was persecuting them.

This is almost unbelievable.

At least from the time of Marcus and the Jerusalem Gentiles in 135 to the end of the Diocletian persecution in 311, Romish Christians absorbed the religion of the ones who attacked them. They copied their worship day, began to pick up their festivals, and imitated their humanly centralized government, where even priests could forgive sin.

Some of these Christians were martyred for their faith, including some of those who were later called popes, yet as a group they absorbed the ways of the anti-Christ society that surrounded them.

Remember how Yahweh told Israel not to have anything at all to do with the Canaanites? Yet every tribe of Israel left Canaanites among them.

Ps 106:34-39
34) They didn’t destroy the peoples, as Yahweh commanded them,
35) but mixed themselves with the nations, and learned their works.
36) They served their idols, which became a snare to them.
37) Yes, they sacrificed their sons and their daughters to demons.
38) They shed innocent blood, even the blood of their sons and of their daughters, whom
hey sacrificed to the idols of Canaan. The land was polluted with blood.
39) Thus were they defiled with their works, and prostituted themselves in their deeds.

Israel was sent into Canaan to replace those perverse people, who sacrificed their own children to demons. Then what did Israel do? The same thing.

Why?

Because Moses’ people underestimated the power of osmosis. They picked up the beliefs of those people. Slowly but surely they became like Canaanites.

Second and third century Christians also underestimated the effect of the Canaanites, or in this case, the Roman society. It was easier to allow some conformity with Rome, particularly with a constant threat of persecution. People who spend their whole lives as outcasts sometimes want to join the in-crowd.

So how about today?

Modern Christians have also underestimated the effect of spiritual osmosis, absorbing what you’re surrounded with. Most Christians are still under the weight of Roman customs, yet they are now going far beyond that. They are absorbing the ways of the world that aims to destroy them.

The whole world is in the process of becoming Sodom and Gaymorrah. The wealthy cities of the Jordan plain were the prototype of the wealthy end time world, with its ease, luxury, and debasement. Surrounded by this world, Christians are doing the same as Israel in Canaan and the early Romish Christians. Instead of being a light to the world, they are mixing, mingling and melding with it.

They allow Satan’s worldly governments to control the education of their children, sending them to be raised in anti-Christ seminaries called schools. From that base comes predictable results in the whole society. Child rearing has totally forsaken Bible principles, and any who try to follow the Bible will be prosecuted — persecuted — by Satan’s world. Marriage has been largely destroyed, first with rampant divorce, then with open adultery, where we now commonly see people listed not with husband or wife but with “partner.” “Gay marriage” is already an accepted custom, even by most Christians. Women preachers and pastors now lead many churches, humbly proclaiming that they are justified in contradicting God and the Bible because of their enormous “gifts.” Homosexual preachers now follow that same course, being absorbed into Christian circles because their “gifts” are too great to be denied. All this is socially acceptable and becoming more so and creates enormous social pressure to get all Christians to conform and be part of the in-crowd.

Romish Christians justified their Bible disobedience by claiming other traditions. Modern Christians say that the archaic Bible was written for different cultures and does not apply in the same way today. Romish Christians did not follow Christ the King directly and individually, but followed human religious rulers between them and their King — those bishops who could forgive sin. Modern Christians follow spiritually decadent denominations, which are almost never willing to speak out against evil. Modern Christians believe that the greatest sin is to point out the sin of a sinner. That is Christianity today.

Christians are to be a light to the world. Instead they usually wind up being a mirror.

Modern Christians think they have found amazing new truths, when all they have done is copy the world around them and call if Christian. This end time society will get much, much worse as the whole world becomes like the five cities of the Jordan plain. Surrounded by all this, don’t underestimate the power of osmosis, copying the world and calling it Christian. Most people will always yield to social pressure. Everybody likes to be part of the in-crowd. Remember that Romish Christians absorbed the ways of Rome, even while Rome persecuted them.

So where did this Roman Christianity, which copied Rome while being persecuted by Rome, ultimately lead?

And where will today’s worldly version of churchianity lead to, in the very end time?