This series is about two “Ladies” who, according to the Almighty, have had intimate relations with the leaders of many nations for hundreds, and in some cases, even thousands of years.  As the people have tended to follow the lead of their leaders, masses of people have spiritually adulterated with these two “women,” whom God calls whores.  One whore is prophesied to form a mighty church system which is destined to rule the world by controlling a world-ruling “beast” in the final days of the world which will be a short period of time which the Prophet Daniel refers to as “the end of the end times.”  That powerful, physical lady, whom Jesus calls MYSTERY, BABYLON THE GREAT, THE MOTHER OF HARLOTS AND ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH, will, during the days, be joined by her harlot daughters to form a mighty, world-encompassing church which will influence a mighty, multi-national, political/military “beast” which, Jesus tells us, will plunge the world into a global war.  Only His return will prevent this beast and its rider (Rev. 17:1-5) from destroying all of mankind.  As stated in the previous posting, the great whore is the Catholic Church.  Her harlot daughters are the Protestant denominations that came out of her.  Though now at odds with each other and their mother, all are prophesied to come together during the final days of this age and form a global “whore” church which will influence a global “beast” government.  This church-state consortium is prophesied to destroy most of mankind.  Only Christ’s return will stop that from happening.

In this posting we will learn about the second whorish “Lady” mentioned in the title of this series.  The church system mentioned above has worshiped and glorified her since shortly after her (the church’s) founding.  This lady is spiritual and, due to Satan’s influence, extremely important to “the church.”

According to historians, this spiritual whore, known by a variety of names throughout the heathen world, was being celebrated at least 1500 years before Christ’s time on earth.  She came out of Babylon of the Chaldees and was universally called “the Queen of heaven.”  Anciently, each pagan society had its personal name for her.  She was known by such names as Beltis, Astarte, Aphrodite, Diana, Ishtar, etc.  In the Western world where she remains ultimately popular she is known as EASTER.  Ninevites worshiped her in connection with another god called Molech to whom they sacrificed their children in order to gain favor with him.  The blood of those children was used to dye eggs which they connected to Beltis, their Queen of heaven, whom they honored on her “Day” each spring.  The Israelites, led by King Solomon, worshiped her and sacrificed their children to her.  This, among other sins, caused God to condemn the king.  That God later came to earth as Jesus of Nazareth, the Savior of the world.  Read Jesus of Nazareth–God, Man or God-man?  Key world–God-man.

In his book titled The Two Babylons, Alexander Hislop states under the heading of Easter: “The festival, of which we read in church history under the name of Easter, in the third and fourth centuries was quite a different festival from what is now observed in the Romish (Catholic and Protestant) church, and WAS NOT KNOWN AS EASTER.  The festival was then called PASSOVER.”  Hislop goes on to say that the early church observed what is Biblically called the “Jewish Passover.”  This title is a deliberate mistranslation by the King James translators.  It was and continues to be the Lord’s Passover as shown in Exodus 12:11 and was observed at such by the early church.  That Passover was totally different from what the false church today calls Easter.  For one thing, it did not involve the observance of LENT.

So from whence came the observance of Lent.  A fifth century church writer named Cassianus wrote that the observance of the forty days of Lent was not practiced in the early church.  Neither Jesus nor the apostles observed anything resembling the “Lenten season.”  Nowhere in God’s Holy Bible can be found even a hint of such an observance.  Church history tells us that the forty days of abstinence called Lent was borrowed directly from the worshipers of the Babylonian goddess of lust and fertility known as Astarte.  History records that Lenten observance was held by the devil-worshipers of Koordistan known as Yezidis.  Lent was also held by the pagan Mexicans in honor of their sun god and was practiced in Egypt in honor of the goddess known as Adonis (Osiris).  This information is found in Hislop’s book as well as Landseer’s book titled Sabean Researches.

Two other heathen practices embraced in honor of the heavenly queen involved the making and eating of “hot cross buns.”  In a book titled MYTHOLOGY we find these words: “One species of the sacred bread which was offered to the gods was called “Boun.”  One of the reasons God sent the tribes of Judah and Benjamin (the Jews) into Babylonian captivity was the worship of the “Queen of heaven” which included the eating of HOT CROSS BUNS that were dedicated to her.  The entire seventh chapter of Jeremiah describes God’s judgment on the House of Judah (Jews) because of their idolatrous worship of that queen.

The question now becomes, how did the worship of this old spiritual whore enter the church?  After all, both Jesus and the Apostle Paul warned about a falling away from the Truth by the great majority of church people as she grew in size.  Only 30 years after her founding Paul warned the church that “the MYSTERY OF INIQUITY is already at work” among her membership (2 Thes. 2:7).

As prophesied, the church established by God soon fell into Satan’s orbit as the Catholic church took over the reins of religious rulership.  With the Roman Empire serving as the muscle by which she enforced her ambitions, all people in the empire were forced to convert to Catholicism at the point of a sword.  Christians had to either convert, flee or be slaughtered.  Of those who fled, a minutely few remained true to the Word of God.  This was His “remnant,” whose spiritual descendants continue to believe and obey Him today.

Within the Roman Empire were found many different religions, each with its own gods, doctrines, customs, etc.  The Catholic Church embraced many of their beliefs, practices, etc. and incorporated them into her catechisms.   Over the following generations the sources of the church’s heathenistic beliefs and practices were forgotten.  Not being allowed to read or hear the Bible being read, the people assumed that what they were being told was Bible truth.  Read Simon of Samaria: The Legacy.  Key word–Legacy.

When the so-called “protestants” left the mother church they took her paganistic beliefs and customs with them because they were, after all, “truths.”  These “truths” became the foundation of the religion created by her “harlot daughters.”  The slide of both mother and daughters into Satan’s spiritual abyss has continued on its downward trajectory ever since.  The celebration of Easter is proof of the Institutional Church’s fall from grace.  L.J.