1917_The_Finished_Mystery_Text

great city which spiritually is called Sodom andEgypt, where also our Lord was crucified." Ittypes professed Christianity in its lowest phase.Ezekiel 16:47.Yet hast thou not walked after their ways, nordone after their abominations: but, as if thatwere a very little thing, thou was corruptedmore than they in all thy ways.— As thoughthe ill-fame of Sodom were not enough,(apostate) Christianity has excelled her incorruption; Sodom's literal depravity was "a verylittle thing" to ecclesiasticism's ways.Ezekiel 16:48-50.As I live, saith the Lord God, Sodom thy sisterhath not done, she nor her daughters, as thouhast done, thou and thy daughters. Behold,this was the iniquity of thy sister Sodom,pride, fulness of bread, and abundance ofidleness was in her and in her daughters,neither did she strengthen the hand of thepoor and needy. And they were haughty, andcommitted abomination before Me; thereforeI took them away as I saw good.— Sodom'sgreatest depravity (A111, 112) was a result ofdepraved, sexuality in connection with thereligion of Baal. "This dreadful ‘consecration'spread over Phoenicia, Syria, Phrygia, Assyriaand Babylonia. Ashtaroth, the Greek Astarte,was its chief object." Its antitype in the churcheswas, for national, state or municipal rulers, underguise of advancing religion, to cause theirtributary governments to become"Christianized." Whole nations' were thus"Christianized" and baptized— the peoples ofsavage governments. Through a letting down ofthe bars of immorality, spiritual and fleshly, thisministered to the beastly propensities of rulersand of others. The clergy, from Pope to classleader, prostituted religion for the pleasure andprofit of association with the rich and powerful.Rulers were assured of the "Divine right ofkings," and received homage, as God'srepresentatives. The people were led