The ManicaPost
Pastor Lee Fore Kingdom Matters
MANY of the world’s major holidays, including St. Valentine’s Day, are an annual observance with its roots entrenched firmly in pagan beliefs and customs.
What would God think about Valentine’s Day? Friendship and sending cards are wonderful things, and God is not opposed to romance at the right time in the right way.
But does the pagan religious history of Valentine’s Day taint the modern practices? What does God have to say about observing pagan traditions, renamed or not?
But really, what harm can there be in the celebration of lovers in the name of St. Valentine? After all, what does it matter that some of the day’s customs stem from pagan rites?
Valentine’s Day was established as a religious holiday, the Feast of St. Valentine honoured the Roman priest who lost his life during the reign of Roman Emperor Claudius II.
According to various historical accounts, Valentine, a priest in Rome, was persecuted for his beliefs and executed on February 14.
Approximately 270 AD Valentine became a symbol of love and compassion.
Several hundreds of years later when the Roman Catholic Church gained a stronger foothold in Europe and set about substituting pagan rituals with more “Christian” sounding names, Valentine was officially recognised.
In ancient Rome this pagan feast day was known as Lupercalia, the “feast of Lupercus.” Mid-February was traditionally the time of the festival, an ode to the God of fertility and a celebration of sensual pleasure, a time to meet and court a prospective mate.
Lupercus was the Roman god that protected them from wolves, which were a great danger in that area. So, each year in the middle of February the Romans honoured the god Lupercus, giving him thanks for protecting them.
The people feasted, danced and played games.
When the young men wanted partners for dancing and games, they drew names of girls from a bowl. Sometimes they became sweethearts, too.
This went on for hundreds of years.
As more and more people throughout the Western Roman Empire converted to an increasingly popular “Christianity,” they brought many of their favourite customs with them, including this “feast of Lupercus”.
In AD 496, Pope Gelasius outlawed the pagan festival. But he wanted to replace it with a similar celebration.
He needed a “lovers” saint to replace the pagan deity Lupercus.
The martyred bishop Valentine was chosen as the patron saint of the new festival.
Thus, “the church endeavoured to amalgamate (mix), as it were, the old and new religions, and sought, by transferring the heathen ceremonies to the solemnities (observances) of the Christian festivals, to make them subservient (subordinate) to the cause of religion and piety.
The result has been the strange medley (mingling) of Christian and pagan rites…”
God warned ancient Israel, the people He chose to represent true religion, not to mix pagan customs with worshipping Him as the one true God.
“When the Lord your God cuts off from before you the nations which you go to dispossess, and you displace them and dwell in their land, take heed to yourself that you are not ensnared to follow them, after they are destroyed from before you, and that you do not inquire after their gods, saying, ‘How did these nations serve their gods? I also will do likewise.’
You shall not worship the Lord your God in that way; for every abomination to the Lord Which He hates they have done to their gods” (Deuteronomy 12:29-31).
In the New Testament, Paul compares mixing paganism with Christianity to worshipping demons: “What am I saying then? That an idol is anything, or what is offered to idols is anything? Rather, that the things which the Gentiles sacrifice they sacrifice to demons and not to God, and I do not want you to have fellowship with demons.
You cannot drink the cup of the Lord and the cups of demons; you cannot partake of the Lord’s table and of the table of demons” (1 Corinthians 10:19-21).
Holidays like St. Valentine’s Day continually secularise into icons of Western culture, creating a caricature of religion.
Most people couldn’t care less if its origins are in the Roman Lupercalia or early church doctrines that that had nothing to do with the Bible.
It’s this very apathy about how to worship God, and the corresponding moral decay, that is the result of mixing Christianity with paganism.
It’s sad that churches have adopted this pagan culture, and this season some are planning for a valentine’s dinner or an outing to observe it as a church, this practise subscribe to syncretism in ignorance.
This can be likened to a married man putting a girlfriend’s portrait in his matrimonial home in the presence of his wife.
The syncretism by believers ignores the fact that God told the Israelites to completely eradicate all vestiges of pagan worship from their presence, not merely from their worship of Him (Deuteronomy 12:2-4).
Moreover, our whole life is to be one of worshipping and honouring God in all we do.
The things we participate in should be seen in the context of bringing glory to Him.
This does not mean we can’t have fun, for God wants us to enjoy life. But our fun is not to be independent of Him. All that we think, say and do should be to God’s honour.
Jesus said that His followers would “worship the Father in spirit and truth” (John 4:23). The observance of Valentine’s Day is just one of many traditions that must be rooted out of Christian lives if Christianity is to return to its true foundation laid by Jesus Christ.
However Zimbabwean relationships both Christians and non-Christians have sophisticated style of romance and the demonstration of love is predicated on the practical, for instance, being the provider et al so having to put a special effort to show love feels awkward and alien.
As they spell out this year’s celebration for leap year being subscribed to women giving gifts to their lovers.
Let every day be“Valentine”, getting a present or being taken out for dinner on the 14th of February it simply means idol worshipping in the name of love, since that should be done on a daily basis. Others now consider Valentine’s a day to get a small house or “slay queen or king”and do all sorts of mischief. Let church be the church! — SOURCES: Wikipedia and Bible Study Tools.
Pastor Lee Fore is a religious commentator contact+263 773 469 191 or +263 712 314 734. Email: [email protected] <mailto:[email protected]>
