bonnie [Jul 27, 14:26]: While in Valence, Ellen White was intensely interested in visiting the Cathedral of Saint Apollinaire where she observed the officiating priests with their white robes and over these a surplice of black velvet trimmed with gold braid, with the form of the cross marked in the back. She heard their words of prayer and their chanted hymns. This exposure while in Europe to the grandeur and impressiveness of the Catholic worship services proved helpful to her as she described Catholic worship in the book The Great Controversy. (See pp. 566, 567.)She wrote:We looked upon the bust of Pius VI. The marble statue beneath the bust contained the heart of the Pope. This is the Pope specified in prophecy, who received the deadly wound. He was carried captive to Valence and we looked upon the tower where he was confined and where he died. From this tower he could look upon the beautiful waters of the Rhone and this gave him much delight.bonnie [Jul 27, 14:26]: It was a gratification to look upon this representation of the Pope which prophecy has so faithfully described. We looked upon a black cloth stretched across the walls of the portion of the building where the people were worshiping the second day of November. This black cloth was adorned with ghastly death-heads and bones in white, which looked frightful. But they were observing the feast for the dead [All Souls Day].These vestments of the priests, symbolically adorned with large figures of the cross and with a variety of colours, bore no resemblance to the simplicity of worship. But priestly ceremonies, burdened with pompous display, processions, and art to produce effect, are abundant. Lighted tapers and outward display are very poor substitutes for spiritual vitality, which was wanting.Manuscript 70, 1886.Ace [Jul 27, 14:26]: Gal 3:13 Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us: for it is written, Cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree:bonnie [Jul 27, 14:27]: Today we come to the climax of our series on "Paganism in the Church," and the subject today is centered in the symbol of the cross. Although the cross has become a revered relic and often even an object of worship, I would like to explore the ancient background of this cherished symbol. In our last broadcast we discovered that the Bible describes the worship of Tammuz, the Pagan God of the Sun. Satan inspired those idolatrous people to represent Tammuz by the letter "T," the first letter of his name. It came to be a world-wide symbol of sun worship and all the moral pollutions attached to that kind of worship. The heathen actually sacrified human beings to the devil on crosses. Centuries before Jesus was born crucifixion was a method of worshiping the pagan sun god. When sun-worshiping generals went to battle they offered thousands of human sacrifices to the devil.bonnie [Jul 27, 14:28]: It is said that Alexander the Great, after a victorious campaign, crucified over 10,000 human beings on the cross to celebrate his victory. Three-thousand chief Babylonians were crucified at one time as a sacrifice to the Devil. When the Catholics first went down into South America and Mexico, soon after these were discovered, they were amazed to find that the sun-worshiping heathen there had crosses. They were amazed because they did not know that these people knew anything about crosses. They did not know anything about Christianity, but they had crosses because they were the sign of Tammuz-the Sun God. But listen, friends, the time finally came for the Son of God to be born. The exact day of His birth no one knows. But He lived to be thirty-three and one-half years when He was crucified, which was in the spring of the year at the time of the Passover. Listen friends, it is almost too terrible for words. You remember Tammuz was exalted by Satan to be the false Messiah or rival of Jesus.bonnie [Jul 27, 14:28]: The symbol of the cross, the first letter of his name, "T", was the sign of sun worship. Down through the years, many times as Satan had succeeded in leading Israel into sin and Pagan sun worship, it had seemed that the sun god was victorious over the true God. Jesus, the Creator of the world, came into a world that had forgotten Him. He suffered every insult at its hands and, finally, died upon the symbol of sun worship, the cross; as Paul says, "Even the death of the cross."bonnie [Jul 27, 14:29]: In order to show that his system of worship was superior to that of God's and to show his supremacy, Satan heaped the supreme insult upon Christ by crucifying Him upon the cross, the symbol of sun worship! Think of the Son of God dying in such awful humiliation while the people looked on, in derision. What mockery! And what rejoicing then by the demons! The Son of God delivered by His own people and crucified by the sun-worshiping Romans on the symbol of sun worship! Think of the great Son of God dying in such awful humiliation while the people looked on, wagging their heads in mockery. But Satan saw that his disguise was torn away. His administration was laid open before the unfallen angels and before the Heavenly Universe. He had revealed himself as a murderer