The Evangelical Universalist Forum

Fascinating videos, particularly the Bible's Ages one!

OK Caleb - I see (and I love the presenter :slight_smile:). I thought this video was going to be the one on which Gordon Strachan collaborated (I read his book in a library one Saturday many years ago, and I know that Martin was going to recommend one of Strachan’s works in a bibliography). Yes I see the presenter doesn’t make the same claims that Gordon Strachan does. As for what I think? I still don’t know :-/ But I agree with pilgrim that the evidence of Gildas (and other bits of evidence I’ve read about) suggest that Celtic Christianity started very early indeed; and perhaps this is what is meant by Gildas concerning the sun of the Christ shining here during the height of the reign of Tiberius :slight_smile: But I feel cautious about going beyond this.

Yeah, the presenter is great. I like the part (not sure if you’ve watched it all yet) when he takes about 5 seconds to put on his reading glasses to read from a book.

My attitude from watching it is, “wow this actually could have happened.” I might be at 54% did happen, 46% didn’t. Its a very cool idea. Not sure how much practical difference it makes in one’s Christian walk. Also, I wonder, if the effect on a Brit could enhance one’s nationalist pride (in a positive way), or just be an encouragement spiritually, and enhance a feeling of connection to Christ. It certainly has given me a sense of awe, at least from a historical perspective, imagining what it would have been like to live back then.

I also thought the possible Holy Grail fragment was pretty darn cool. My feeling was, “that could be legit”. They start talking about the grail at the 39:00 mark.

I think Blake would have gone apoplectic at his poem being used to stoke British Nationalism. With the lyric ‘Jerusalem’ he doesn’t answer his questions about whether or not Jesus came to England - they underline his contention that the Vision of Christ has been lost in his day with the Dark Satanic Mills of the Industrial Revolution and Enlightenment rationalism replacing the Vision of Christ. But the Glastonbury Legends have been used by fringe religious groups like The British Israelites (these day small in number fringe eccentrics) to try and bolster a sense of nationalistic and even ‘ethnic’ religious identity (one of the reasons I am cautious I guess)

The cup in the video, the Nanteos cup, was apparently discredited in 1977 by specialists and said to be made of wych elm, not olive wood, as in the video.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nanteos_Cup
-the cup pictured in the wikipedia article is not the actual Nanteos cup.

Quiz question:
Where, in one of his epstles, does Paul make mention of three ‘British’ converts?

No clue. Google didn’t help me either.

Interesting. Wikipedia says something different:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pope_Linus

Yes. It’s an interesting idea/possibility, but no more than that.

He has a number of great video clips out there, but this is one of my favorites:

I just felt it right that I should share an experience I had last week, after watching that film. I had a disturbed night, where I was disturbed in my spirit, and I felt that God was warning me about the man or the contents of the film. I’ve had that kind of warning before, that turned out right, so I would just ask that you ask the Holy Spirit to confirm if the man and his teachings are ‘kosher’ if you are planning to watch the film. This is meant in love from your fellow believer. :smiley:

My mom was said to be born with a veil over her eyes. She passed away October 4, 2013, at the age of 92. She was a devote Protestant Christian all her life. She had the gift of prophesy. I learned to appreciate it. Go with the hunch or intuition.

Hmm. Well, I came across it because it was shared by Alex smith on FB, and I believe it was shared originally by Bob Wilson, both from this board.
I doubt they would have shared it if they thought there was anything seriously wrong with it. I think we need to be equally careful not to just dismiss things on the basis of a feeling.

Randy- thank you. :slight_smile:

Melchizedek- I understand what you are saying. Each person is responsible for ‘making sure’ or ‘testing the spirits’ for themselves. When Alex first shared this video on another thread on here, I had some reservations due to the ‘zodiac’ stuff, but Cindy allayed my fears and I ‘gave it a chance’. I watched the whole film and found it thoroughly thought provoking and very interesting. Much of what Dr Trench says is spot on I’m sure. Right at the end of the film during the question and answers, he says he doesn’t care about the law (Mosaic Law), or words to that effect. The way he explained this was not right I felt, but I put that aside, as maybe his exuberance causing him to sound disrespectful. I went to bed looking forward to checking out his web site and the things he’d touched upon. As I settled down for the night I prayed about the film and asked God if it was true. I started to feel very uneasy and initially I tried to push it aside, as just my own doubts about him. The uneasiness got stronger, to the point I kept waking during the night and Dr Trench was in my thoughts along with this strong feeling of unease. I’ve only had this experience once before and it happened the same way. It turned out to be spot on, so I believe it was the Holy Spirit warning me not to pursue this any further. What I want to stress, is the importance of ‘testing the spirits’, with things like this. Ask the Holy Spirit to confirm if this stuff is kosher. Many times I’ve got into dodgy stuff because I haven’t prayed about it before hand. I could have been saved hours of wasted study, never mind the incorrect understanding of God and the things pertaining to God. God bless. :slight_smile:

Fixed Mel’s BBCode to embed the video.

I haven’t watched the video so I have no opinion; but I see him talking about Jesus’ “lost years” and Joseph of Arimathea in Britain.

Which throws some preliminary flags for me in itself. :unamused: :wink: (Though admittedly I’m prejudicially suspicious about that, not having seen it either.)

Just to be fair, here’s that hour-plus lecture, too.

I did a Google, Bing and Yaoo search on Dr. Martin Trench. What I can’t find is where he obtained his degrees (i.e. his PhD). Perhaps someone here can help me out? Then I can check if these degrees are accredited by a valid agency. For example, in the US, it’s usually a regional accreditation agency, recognized by the US Department of Education. In other countries - like South Africa - it could be the South African government itself, that recognizes UNISA (i.e. University of South Africa). But for me, if the person doesn’t have valid academic credentials and he/she calls themselves a doctor, I wouldn’t take much stock in what they say.

I found this but it does not say where the degrees were taken:

Thanks, Pilgrim. If I go to most church sites, it usually lists where the minister, priest or bishop got his/her degrees (i.e. if it mentions they have degrees or titles). Usually they are from an accredited school, recognized from a recognized accreditation agency (i.e. by the US Department of Education, government of South Africa, etc). If he doesn’t name the school and claims to have a doctorate, then how do we know he actually received a doctorate or a doctorate from a non-diploma mill? And how can we trust anything he tells us? Perhaps someone should ask the church he is associated with?

sigh why does everyone put so much stock in accredited ‘education’? Do you have any idea how many doctors have no idea how to critically think? The system is designed to mold you into what they want. It is a mere brainwashing. No different with Theology or any other field. When we talk about modern medicine you have to think a little bit - Do we really know much more now than we did before? In some ways, but why do we suffer from every ailment known to man? Because modern medicine doesn’t take the root seriously. The root is exercise and eating. Not fake exercise such as walking a mile or so, or merely taking the stairs instead of the elevator. Exercise is working on a farm, running to get your heart rate up, lifting heavy objects, anything that makes you want to quit, because it is hard and difficult. That is exercise and that is why most people are unhealthy, because they think their 8 glasses of water and low intensity exercise is what it takes to be fit and healthy. Meanwhile, they drink the caffeine laced expresso which stains their teeth and gets them on a caffeine addiction. Modern medicine, for the most part, is a joke when it comes to preventative medicine. If health care costs are ever going to decline, people need to be screen on their life-style choices. Want to sit on the couch and eat chips all day? Fine, pay 5x the premium so we can cover your heart disease problem.

Now, this may go off topic a bit, but the reason I bring this up is because it is clearly demonstrable in any field how having an accredited degree is bogus way to find out the worth of someone’s ideas. “Experience” is what should be viewed, not education. Now, I am sure someone is going to come up with some sort of wise-crack rebuttal and in prep for that, I’ll say this: There are exceptions to this rule. But let us remember that Jesus himself had no credentials… So, I’d rather not use that argument against people. Some of the most knowledgeable and experienced people in this world are ‘researchers’ who 'love to research! Meanwhile, most people picked a field to make money, not because they enjoy it. So, I am betting the vast majority of people with PhD’s just don’t enjoy what they do, so I am sure many of them just drift away, collecting a paycheck, teaching old methods rather than challenge them. I also don’t want to take anything away from someone with a PhD, because there are some outstanding people with those credentials. But the credentials themselves don’t prove the person. The person proves the credentials. We have it backwards.

Hmm. Not sure what to make of the degree thing, but I’m not terribly enamoured of official degrees (or where they are from) anyway.
This is definitely not the first time that I have heard of the zodiac’s connection to Christianity.

I think his point about not caring about the mosaic law has to do with the fact that we are no longer under law, and I guess I didn’t have a problem with it because I had a good sense of where he was coming from.

Edit: On his Facebook page, He only lists himself as Martin Trench, and does not use the title Dr.
Perhaps whoever posted the videos on YouTube just made an assumption since he is the pastor of a church.