There are those who might be tempted to think that my use of the word sodomy in several articles is evidence of a hostility toward the homosexual person. Nothing could be further from the truth. As a Catholic loyal to the Magisterial teaching of the Church, I follow the great Saint Augustine while hating the sin and loving the sinner (interficere errorem dilligere errantem - kill the error, love the one who errs). Having said that, is it illicit or somehow objectionable to use the word sodomy?
Here's what Dr. Germain Grisez has to say about the matter. "The word sodomy is used, not as a term of reproach, but in its descriptive sense, precisely to distinguish between the act of homosexual intercourse and the disposition toward it. One should not allow sentiment to cloud the truth about this act. John Paul II, Address to the Bishops of the United States (Chicago), 6, AAS 71 (1979) 1224-1225, OR, 29 Oct. 1979, 9, makes the point clearly: 'As men with the message of truth and the power of God (2 Cor 6:7), as authentic teachers of God's law and as compassionate pastors you also rightly stated: "Homosexual activity...as distinguished from homosexual orientation, is morally wrong." In the clarity of this truth, you exemplified the real charity of Christ; you did not betray those people who, because of homosexuality, are confronted with difficult moral problems, as would have happened if, in the name of understanding and compassion, or for any other reason, you had held out false hope to any brother or sister. Rather, by your witness to the truth of humanity in God's plan, you effectively manifested fraternal love, upholding the true dignity, the true human dignity, of those who look to Christ's Church for the guidance which comes from the light of God's word."
Paul
Saturday, July 30, 2005
Prayer of exorcism
A Simple Exorcism for Priests or Laity Prayer Against Satan and the Rebellious Angels
Published by Order of His Holiness Pope Leo XIII
The following is a simple exorcism prayer that can be said by priests or laity. The term "exorcism" does NOT always denote a solemn exorcism involving a person possessed by the devil. In general, the term denotes prayers to "curb the power of the devil and prevent him from doing harm." As St. Peter had written in Holy Scripture, "your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goeth about seeking whom he may devour." (1 St.Peter 5,8) The Holy Father exhorts priests to say this prayer as often as possible, as a simple exorcism to curb the power of the devil and prevent him from doing harm. The faithful also may say it in their own name, for the same purpose, as any approved prayer. Its use is recommended whenever action of the devil is suspected, causing malice in men, violent temptations and even storms and various calamities. It could be used as a solemn exorcism (an official and public ceremony, in Latin), to expel the devil. It would then be said by a priest, in the name of the Church and only with a Bishop's permission. Say Prayer to St. Michael the Archangel In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, Amen Most glorious Prince of the Heavenly Armies, Saint Michael the Archangel, defend us in "our battle against principalities and powers, against the rulers of this world of darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places" (Eph., 6,12). Come to the assistance of men whom God has created to His likeness and whom He has redeemed at a great price from the tyranny of the devil. Holy Church venerates thee as her guardian and protector; to thee, the Lord has entrusted the souls of the redeemed to be led into heaven. Pray therefore the God of Peace to crush Satan beneath our feet, that he may no longer retain men captive and do injury to the Church. Offer our prayers to the Most High, that without delay they may draw His mercy down upon us; take hold of "the dragon, the old serpent, which is the devil and Satan," bind him and cast him into the bottomless pit ... "that he may no longer seduce the nations" (Apoc. 20, 2-3).
Exorcism
In the Name of Jesus Christ, our God and Lord, strengthened by the intercession of the Immaculate Virgin Mary, Mother of God, of Blessed Michael the Archangel, of the Blessed Apostles Peter and Paul and all the Saints. (and powerful in the holy authority of our ministry)*, we confidently undertake to repulse the attacks and deceits of the devil. * Lay people omit the parenthesis above. Psalm 67 God arises; His enemies are scattered and those who hate Him flee before Him. As smoke is driven away, so are they driven; as wax melts before the fire, so the wicked perish at the presence of God. V. Behold the Cross of the Lord, flee bands of enemies. R. The Lion of the tribe of Juda, the offspring of David, hath conquered. V. May Thy mercy, Lord, descend upon us. R. As great as our hope in Thee. (The crosses (+) below indicate a blessing to be given if a priest recites the Exorcism; if a lay person recites it, they indicate the Sign of the Cross to be made silently by that person.) We drive you from us, whoever you may be, unclean spirits, all satanic powers, all infernal invaders, all wicked legions, assemblies and sects. In the Name and by the power of Our Lord Jesus Christ, + may you be snatched away and driven from the Church of God and from the souls made to the image and likeness of God and redeemed by the Precious Blood of the Divine Lamb. (+ = Make the sign of the cross each time) Most cunning serpent, you shall no more dare to deceive the human race, persecute the Church, torment God's elect and sift them as wheat. + The Most High God commands you, + He with whom, in your great insolence, you still claim to be equal. "God who wants all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth" (I Tim. 2,4). God the Father commands you. + God the Son commands you. + God the Holy Ghost commands you. + Christ, God's Word made flesh, commands you; + He who to save our race outdone through your envy, "humbled Himself, becoming obedient even unto death" (Phil.2,8); He who has built His Church on the firm rock and declared that the gates of hell shall not prevail against Her, because He will dwell with Her "all days even to the end of the world" (Matt. 28,20). The sacred Sign of the Cross commands you, + as does also the power of the mysteries of the Christian Faith. + The glorious Mother of God, the Virgin Mary, commands you; + she who by her humility and from the first moment of her Immaculate Conception crushed your proud head. The faith of the holy Apostles Peter and Paul, and of the other Apostles commands you. + The blood of the Martyrs and the pious intercession of all the Saints command you. + Thus, cursed dragon, and you, diabolical legions, we adjure you by the living God, + by the true God, + by the holy God, + by the God "who so loved the world that He gave up His only Son, that every soul believing in Him might not perish but have life everlasting" (St.John 3, 16); stop deceiving human creatures and pouring out to them the poison of eternal damnation; stop harming the Church and hindering her liberty. Be gone, Satan, inventor and master of all deceit, enemy of man's salvation. Give place to Christ in Whom you have found none of your works; give place to the One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church acquired by Christ at the price of His Blood. Stoop beneath the all-powerful Hand of God; tremble and flee when we invoke the Holy and terrible Name of Jesus, this Name which causes hell to tremble, this Name to which the Virtues, Powers and Dominations of heaven are humbly submissive, this Name which the Cherubim and Seraphim praise unceasingly repeating: Holy, Holy, Holy is the Lord, the God of Hosts. V. O Lord, hear my prayer. R. And let my cry come unto Thee. V. May the Lord be with thee. R. And with thy spirit. Let us pray. God of heaven, God of earth, God of Angels, God of Archangels, God of Patriarchs, God of Prophets, God of Apostles, God of Martyrs, God of Confessors, God of Virgins, God who has power to give life after death and rest after work: because there is no other God than Thee and there can be no other, for Thou art the Creator of all things, visible and invisible, of Whose reign there shall be no end, we humbly prostrate ourselves before Thy glorious Majesty and we beseech Thee to deliver us by Thy power from all the tyranny of the infernal spirits, from their snares, their lies and their furious wickedness. Deign, O Lord, to grant us Thy powerful protection and to keep us safe and sound. We beseech Thee through Jesus Christ Our Lord. Amen. From the snares of the devil, deliver us, O Lord. That Thy Church may serve Thee in peace and liberty: We beseech Thee to hear us. That Thou may crush down all enemies of Thy Church: We beseech Thee to hear us. (Holy water is sprinkled in the place where we may be.)
Published by Order of His Holiness Pope Leo XIII
The following is a simple exorcism prayer that can be said by priests or laity. The term "exorcism" does NOT always denote a solemn exorcism involving a person possessed by the devil. In general, the term denotes prayers to "curb the power of the devil and prevent him from doing harm." As St. Peter had written in Holy Scripture, "your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goeth about seeking whom he may devour." (1 St.Peter 5,8) The Holy Father exhorts priests to say this prayer as often as possible, as a simple exorcism to curb the power of the devil and prevent him from doing harm. The faithful also may say it in their own name, for the same purpose, as any approved prayer. Its use is recommended whenever action of the devil is suspected, causing malice in men, violent temptations and even storms and various calamities. It could be used as a solemn exorcism (an official and public ceremony, in Latin), to expel the devil. It would then be said by a priest, in the name of the Church and only with a Bishop's permission. Say Prayer to St. Michael the Archangel In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, Amen Most glorious Prince of the Heavenly Armies, Saint Michael the Archangel, defend us in "our battle against principalities and powers, against the rulers of this world of darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places" (Eph., 6,12). Come to the assistance of men whom God has created to His likeness and whom He has redeemed at a great price from the tyranny of the devil. Holy Church venerates thee as her guardian and protector; to thee, the Lord has entrusted the souls of the redeemed to be led into heaven. Pray therefore the God of Peace to crush Satan beneath our feet, that he may no longer retain men captive and do injury to the Church. Offer our prayers to the Most High, that without delay they may draw His mercy down upon us; take hold of "the dragon, the old serpent, which is the devil and Satan," bind him and cast him into the bottomless pit ... "that he may no longer seduce the nations" (Apoc. 20, 2-3).
Exorcism
In the Name of Jesus Christ, our God and Lord, strengthened by the intercession of the Immaculate Virgin Mary, Mother of God, of Blessed Michael the Archangel, of the Blessed Apostles Peter and Paul and all the Saints. (and powerful in the holy authority of our ministry)*, we confidently undertake to repulse the attacks and deceits of the devil. * Lay people omit the parenthesis above. Psalm 67 God arises; His enemies are scattered and those who hate Him flee before Him. As smoke is driven away, so are they driven; as wax melts before the fire, so the wicked perish at the presence of God. V. Behold the Cross of the Lord, flee bands of enemies. R. The Lion of the tribe of Juda, the offspring of David, hath conquered. V. May Thy mercy, Lord, descend upon us. R. As great as our hope in Thee. (The crosses (+) below indicate a blessing to be given if a priest recites the Exorcism; if a lay person recites it, they indicate the Sign of the Cross to be made silently by that person.) We drive you from us, whoever you may be, unclean spirits, all satanic powers, all infernal invaders, all wicked legions, assemblies and sects. In the Name and by the power of Our Lord Jesus Christ, + may you be snatched away and driven from the Church of God and from the souls made to the image and likeness of God and redeemed by the Precious Blood of the Divine Lamb. (+ = Make the sign of the cross each time) Most cunning serpent, you shall no more dare to deceive the human race, persecute the Church, torment God's elect and sift them as wheat. + The Most High God commands you, + He with whom, in your great insolence, you still claim to be equal. "God who wants all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth" (I Tim. 2,4). God the Father commands you. + God the Son commands you. + God the Holy Ghost commands you. + Christ, God's Word made flesh, commands you; + He who to save our race outdone through your envy, "humbled Himself, becoming obedient even unto death" (Phil.2,8); He who has built His Church on the firm rock and declared that the gates of hell shall not prevail against Her, because He will dwell with Her "all days even to the end of the world" (Matt. 28,20). The sacred Sign of the Cross commands you, + as does also the power of the mysteries of the Christian Faith. + The glorious Mother of God, the Virgin Mary, commands you; + she who by her humility and from the first moment of her Immaculate Conception crushed your proud head. The faith of the holy Apostles Peter and Paul, and of the other Apostles commands you. + The blood of the Martyrs and the pious intercession of all the Saints command you. + Thus, cursed dragon, and you, diabolical legions, we adjure you by the living God, + by the true God, + by the holy God, + by the God "who so loved the world that He gave up His only Son, that every soul believing in Him might not perish but have life everlasting" (St.John 3, 16); stop deceiving human creatures and pouring out to them the poison of eternal damnation; stop harming the Church and hindering her liberty. Be gone, Satan, inventor and master of all deceit, enemy of man's salvation. Give place to Christ in Whom you have found none of your works; give place to the One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church acquired by Christ at the price of His Blood. Stoop beneath the all-powerful Hand of God; tremble and flee when we invoke the Holy and terrible Name of Jesus, this Name which causes hell to tremble, this Name to which the Virtues, Powers and Dominations of heaven are humbly submissive, this Name which the Cherubim and Seraphim praise unceasingly repeating: Holy, Holy, Holy is the Lord, the God of Hosts. V. O Lord, hear my prayer. R. And let my cry come unto Thee. V. May the Lord be with thee. R. And with thy spirit. Let us pray. God of heaven, God of earth, God of Angels, God of Archangels, God of Patriarchs, God of Prophets, God of Apostles, God of Martyrs, God of Confessors, God of Virgins, God who has power to give life after death and rest after work: because there is no other God than Thee and there can be no other, for Thou art the Creator of all things, visible and invisible, of Whose reign there shall be no end, we humbly prostrate ourselves before Thy glorious Majesty and we beseech Thee to deliver us by Thy power from all the tyranny of the infernal spirits, from their snares, their lies and their furious wickedness. Deign, O Lord, to grant us Thy powerful protection and to keep us safe and sound. We beseech Thee through Jesus Christ Our Lord. Amen. From the snares of the devil, deliver us, O Lord. That Thy Church may serve Thee in peace and liberty: We beseech Thee to hear us. That Thou may crush down all enemies of Thy Church: We beseech Thee to hear us. (Holy water is sprinkled in the place where we may be.)
Friday, July 29, 2005
Pope Benedict XVI on coming persecution
Pope Benedict XVI recently warned that Catholics and other Christians may not be able to speak out against homosexuality any longer, referring to it as an "objective disorder." Read this important article from LifeSiteNews.com:
Ratzinger Warned in April 1st Lecture - "Very Soon It Will Not Be Possible to State That Homosexuality...is an Objective Disorder"
ROME, Italy, July 28, 2005 (LifeSiteNews.com) – In the conclusion of Cardinal Ratzinger’s lecture, now Pope Benedict XVI, delivered on April 1st, the eve of John Paul II’s death, the then Cardinal strongly denounced the European Enlightenment culture and its increasing dogmatism against religion, Christianity and freedom.
The Cardinal expressed his belief that the reasons given by the architects of the EU Constitution for excluding God from the document—that the mention of God or recognition of the Christian roots of the continent might offend those of other religions—doesn’t hold up under scrutiny.
“The affirmation that the mention of the Christian roots of Europe injures the sentiments of many non-Christians who are in Europe, is not very convincing, given that it relates, first of all, to an historical fact that no one can seriously deny…It is not the mention of God that offends those who belong to other religions, but rather the attempt to build the human community absolutely without God,” said the Cardinal.
Instead, Ratzinger continued, it is obvious that the exclusion of religion from the public sphere is rather the result of the imposition of Enlightenment dogma, which dogma falsely professes the ideals of freedom and tolerance. Indeed, one of the inevitable consequences of what Ratzinger called the ‘Culture of Rights’, as divorced from its Judeo-Christian roots, is that “the concept of discrimination is ever more extended, and so the prohibition of discrimination can be increasingly transformed into a limitation of the freedom of opinion.”
“Very soon,” said the Cardinal in a chilling prophesy that is already coming to fulfillment in many Western nations, including Canada, “it will not be possible to state that homosexuality, as the Catholic Church teaches, is an objective disorder in the structuring of human existence.”
According to Ratzinger it is “obvious that the ill-defined or undefined concept of freedom, which is at the base of this culture, inevitably entails contradictions…A confused ideology of freedom leads to dogmatism, which is showing itself increasingly hostile to freedom.”
Ratzinger concluded by expressing his strong doubt that the Enlightenment culture will ever provide a common cause for men. “We have to ask ourselves,” says the Cardinal, “if it is really complete in itself, to the degree that it has no need of a root outside itself.” The implied answer, of course, is no, the Enlightenment culture without the firm foundation of Europe’s roots in Christianity can only devolve into a pseudo and dogmatic religion, ultimately restrictive of freedom.
As the radical homosexual agenda continues to have its perverted way of life "normalized," Catholics and other Christians will continue to be marginalized.
Paul
Thursday, July 28, 2005
Apostasy
There can be little doubt that we are in the Great Apostasy described in Sacred Scripture, foretold by the Prophets. Read this article, which may also be found at: www.spiritdaily.com
IT'S CREEPING INby Alan Yusko
There is a new movement of apostasy attacking the church in these last days. It is the acceptance of the occult. It is a slow process but the occult is being presented and is slowly being accepted by professing Christians. The best example is the demonic Harry Potter books and movie. Many in the professing Christian church have enjoyed the material and actively encourage others to do so. It is not limited to just laymen. There are well-known pastors and teachers who have accepted the demonic Harry Potter.
People seem to believe the lie that the occult is nothing more than make-believe and harmless fun. The fact that acceptance or involvement with the occult is an abomination to God is not considered. Here is what the Bible says concerning the occult:
Deut 18 10 There shall not be found among you any one that maketh his son or his daughter to pass through the fire, or that useth divination, or an observer of times, or an enchanter, or a witch, 11 Or a charmer, or a consulter with familiar spirits, or a wizard, or a necromancer. 12 For all that do these things are an abomination unto the LORD: and because of these abominations the LORD thy God doth drive them out from before thee.
As you can see there is no room for debate. The occult with its spellcasting, witchcraft, divination etc is all an abomination to God. The Satanic and occultic garbage is not harmless fun. It is deadly dangerous and will be avoided and rejected by all those who belong to and love the Lord Jesus.
The apostates, on the other hand, call themselves Christians, yet they love and partake in the occult. I have heard from such people. These people try to justify their occult and dare to call those against their "occultic fun" nasty names such as legalist, Pharisee etc.
I believe a person who gets involved with the occult and then attempts to justify his sin, is not saved. I do not believe a saved person will commit and enjoy something that is an abomination to God. The occult is an abomination and involvement in it cannot be justified. It is not harmless fun or entertainment. People who attempt to justify the occult are not saved. It is as simple as that.
1 John 2 3 And hereby we do know that we know him, if we keep his commandments. 4 He that saith, I know him, and keepeth not his commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him. 5 But whoso keepeth his word, in him verily is the love of God perfected: hereby know we that we are in him. 6 He that saith he abideth in him ought himself also so to walk, even as he walked.
HOW THE DEVIL SUCCEEDED WITH ROCK MUSIC
Lets look at rock music. There was a time when the church knew this music was from the devil and was not an acceptable form of worship. However, today in 2002, Satan has completely succeeded in getting his demonic music accepted in "church" circles. In fact professing Christian young people now are so apostate that they freely listen to secular rock with no care or concern. How did this travesty happen? Did the devil do it over night? Or was it a slow process?
Rock music was accepted into the church in a very slow way. It started slowly in the late 1970's through to the 1990's. Here is how the devil did it:
In the world of biology, we are given the example of a frog that when placed into boiling water, will immediately jump out. However, if that same frog is put into a bowl of cool water which is slowly heated by a Bunsen burner, the frog will eventually boil to death.
Rock and roll is like the frog and the water. The term "rock and roll" means fornication. It is a street name for sexual immorality. It has wrecked the lives of many teenagers through suicide, drug abuse, immorality, perversion, Satanism, etc. Sadly, we live in a day where many Christians and church leaders have allowed this demonic music into their churches claiming that the music is holy and sanctified because the lyrics are changed to include some 'religious' words.
Rock first came into the church and it was immediately rejected by many who love the Lord. Back then it was a complete imitation of the secular, just as it is today. Yet the tare-rebels argued that it was different from secular music because it used assorted "God" words mixed into the lyrics. In the early days, everyone agreed that secular rock was evil. In those early days the rebels considered religious rock as an acceptable alternative to secular rock. From that position all kinds of foolish arguments were given to justify this evil music. It was said that the only way to reach young people was to get them into the church by playing their rock music. The Bible was not considered sufficient for this "modern" generation. In order to win the youth and bring young people into church, the rebels argued, that religious rock music was required.
Unfortunately, many believed this lie from the devil. Liberal pastors believed this lie and allowed this evil music into the church.
Today people have gone so apostate that there is no difference between secular and religious rock music. The rebellious young people listen to both. Listening to secular rock music is very acceptable today with the rebellious and the apostate.
THE PLAN FOR THE OCCULT
The same thing is happening today with the occult as it did with rock music. Satan is working through his tares to bring in occultism and make it acceptable in 'religious' circles. Harry Potter has great blessings from the devil. Both children and adults have enjoyed reading the books and going to the movie. Even so-called Christians have 'enjoyed' Harry Potter. For example, we are aware of a professing Christian lady who read the Harry Potter books. She also encouraged her 9 year old girl to do the same. This lady attends a liberal church and considers herself to be a Christian. There are many professing Christians in churches like that lady. They think nothing of partaking in occult evil and it is all considered harmless fun. To God, however, it is an abomination.
John 14 15 If ye love me, keep my commandments.
John 14 23 Jesus answered and said unto him, If a man love me, he will keep my words: and my Father will love him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode with him. 24 He that loveth me not keepeth not my sayings: and the word which ye hear is not mine, but the Father's which sent me.
CONCLUSION
Where is the discernment in the church? Are Christians losing their ability to discern the difference between good and evil? Demonic rock music made it into the liberal churches with the full blessings of professing Christians. Now the occult is packaged to be harmless fun and entertainment and is slowly gaining acceptance in the liberal churches. The very fact that demonic rock music even made it into the church, is proof of the moral and spiritual decline affecting the church. Will the same slow process occur with the occult? I would say yes, but it will not be as slow. Rock and roll has prepared the hearts of the rebellious and acceptance of the occult will be a simple matter.
Christians who love the Lord should be aware and warned of this situation. The days we live in are days of apostasy and falling away. Many people are choosing to fall away from the Lord rather than to draw near unto Him. While professing Christians accept the occult and rock music, they also attack those who do not conform to their perverted false faith that allows such actions.
2 Thess 2 3 Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition;
We are being invaded by hard rock, acid rock, punk rock, new wave, rap, and heavy metal music under the guise of religious rock and roll. In fact, todays "modern" and "liberated" young person freely listens to all the secular rock and roll without concern or conviction for his sin. What is next on the apostasy scene? Here is the answer: Acceptance of the occult. The devil has made major inroads with the occult with the Harry Potter fad. Expect more occultism to be popularized and justified by so-called Christians in the days to come. I use the term "so-called" because all who accept this hellish garbage are not really saved Christians. There are Satanic false Christian tares who are being mightily used by the devil to wreck havoc from within the professing Christian church.
2 Tim 4 3 For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears; 4 And they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned unto fables.
It is interesting to note in the above verses that people who seek after rock music and the occult are satisfying their own lusts. They have willingly turned away their ears from the truth and are seeking the lies from the devil. Men must make a choice between God or the devil. It is sad but many (the majority) are choosing the devil over God!
Matt 7 13 Enter ye in at the strait gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way, that leadeth to destruction, and many there be which go in thereat: 14 Because strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it. 15 Beware of false prophets, which come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ravening wolves.
Whose side are you on reader?
IT'S CREEPING INby Alan Yusko
There is a new movement of apostasy attacking the church in these last days. It is the acceptance of the occult. It is a slow process but the occult is being presented and is slowly being accepted by professing Christians. The best example is the demonic Harry Potter books and movie. Many in the professing Christian church have enjoyed the material and actively encourage others to do so. It is not limited to just laymen. There are well-known pastors and teachers who have accepted the demonic Harry Potter.
People seem to believe the lie that the occult is nothing more than make-believe and harmless fun. The fact that acceptance or involvement with the occult is an abomination to God is not considered. Here is what the Bible says concerning the occult:
Deut 18 10 There shall not be found among you any one that maketh his son or his daughter to pass through the fire, or that useth divination, or an observer of times, or an enchanter, or a witch, 11 Or a charmer, or a consulter with familiar spirits, or a wizard, or a necromancer. 12 For all that do these things are an abomination unto the LORD: and because of these abominations the LORD thy God doth drive them out from before thee.
As you can see there is no room for debate. The occult with its spellcasting, witchcraft, divination etc is all an abomination to God. The Satanic and occultic garbage is not harmless fun. It is deadly dangerous and will be avoided and rejected by all those who belong to and love the Lord Jesus.
The apostates, on the other hand, call themselves Christians, yet they love and partake in the occult. I have heard from such people. These people try to justify their occult and dare to call those against their "occultic fun" nasty names such as legalist, Pharisee etc.
I believe a person who gets involved with the occult and then attempts to justify his sin, is not saved. I do not believe a saved person will commit and enjoy something that is an abomination to God. The occult is an abomination and involvement in it cannot be justified. It is not harmless fun or entertainment. People who attempt to justify the occult are not saved. It is as simple as that.
1 John 2 3 And hereby we do know that we know him, if we keep his commandments. 4 He that saith, I know him, and keepeth not his commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him. 5 But whoso keepeth his word, in him verily is the love of God perfected: hereby know we that we are in him. 6 He that saith he abideth in him ought himself also so to walk, even as he walked.
HOW THE DEVIL SUCCEEDED WITH ROCK MUSIC
Lets look at rock music. There was a time when the church knew this music was from the devil and was not an acceptable form of worship. However, today in 2002, Satan has completely succeeded in getting his demonic music accepted in "church" circles. In fact professing Christian young people now are so apostate that they freely listen to secular rock with no care or concern. How did this travesty happen? Did the devil do it over night? Or was it a slow process?
Rock music was accepted into the church in a very slow way. It started slowly in the late 1970's through to the 1990's. Here is how the devil did it:
In the world of biology, we are given the example of a frog that when placed into boiling water, will immediately jump out. However, if that same frog is put into a bowl of cool water which is slowly heated by a Bunsen burner, the frog will eventually boil to death.
Rock and roll is like the frog and the water. The term "rock and roll" means fornication. It is a street name for sexual immorality. It has wrecked the lives of many teenagers through suicide, drug abuse, immorality, perversion, Satanism, etc. Sadly, we live in a day where many Christians and church leaders have allowed this demonic music into their churches claiming that the music is holy and sanctified because the lyrics are changed to include some 'religious' words.
Rock first came into the church and it was immediately rejected by many who love the Lord. Back then it was a complete imitation of the secular, just as it is today. Yet the tare-rebels argued that it was different from secular music because it used assorted "God" words mixed into the lyrics. In the early days, everyone agreed that secular rock was evil. In those early days the rebels considered religious rock as an acceptable alternative to secular rock. From that position all kinds of foolish arguments were given to justify this evil music. It was said that the only way to reach young people was to get them into the church by playing their rock music. The Bible was not considered sufficient for this "modern" generation. In order to win the youth and bring young people into church, the rebels argued, that religious rock music was required.
Unfortunately, many believed this lie from the devil. Liberal pastors believed this lie and allowed this evil music into the church.
Today people have gone so apostate that there is no difference between secular and religious rock music. The rebellious young people listen to both. Listening to secular rock music is very acceptable today with the rebellious and the apostate.
THE PLAN FOR THE OCCULT
The same thing is happening today with the occult as it did with rock music. Satan is working through his tares to bring in occultism and make it acceptable in 'religious' circles. Harry Potter has great blessings from the devil. Both children and adults have enjoyed reading the books and going to the movie. Even so-called Christians have 'enjoyed' Harry Potter. For example, we are aware of a professing Christian lady who read the Harry Potter books. She also encouraged her 9 year old girl to do the same. This lady attends a liberal church and considers herself to be a Christian. There are many professing Christians in churches like that lady. They think nothing of partaking in occult evil and it is all considered harmless fun. To God, however, it is an abomination.
John 14 15 If ye love me, keep my commandments.
John 14 23 Jesus answered and said unto him, If a man love me, he will keep my words: and my Father will love him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode with him. 24 He that loveth me not keepeth not my sayings: and the word which ye hear is not mine, but the Father's which sent me.
CONCLUSION
Where is the discernment in the church? Are Christians losing their ability to discern the difference between good and evil? Demonic rock music made it into the liberal churches with the full blessings of professing Christians. Now the occult is packaged to be harmless fun and entertainment and is slowly gaining acceptance in the liberal churches. The very fact that demonic rock music even made it into the church, is proof of the moral and spiritual decline affecting the church. Will the same slow process occur with the occult? I would say yes, but it will not be as slow. Rock and roll has prepared the hearts of the rebellious and acceptance of the occult will be a simple matter.
Christians who love the Lord should be aware and warned of this situation. The days we live in are days of apostasy and falling away. Many people are choosing to fall away from the Lord rather than to draw near unto Him. While professing Christians accept the occult and rock music, they also attack those who do not conform to their perverted false faith that allows such actions.
2 Thess 2 3 Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition;
We are being invaded by hard rock, acid rock, punk rock, new wave, rap, and heavy metal music under the guise of religious rock and roll. In fact, todays "modern" and "liberated" young person freely listens to all the secular rock and roll without concern or conviction for his sin. What is next on the apostasy scene? Here is the answer: Acceptance of the occult. The devil has made major inroads with the occult with the Harry Potter fad. Expect more occultism to be popularized and justified by so-called Christians in the days to come. I use the term "so-called" because all who accept this hellish garbage are not really saved Christians. There are Satanic false Christian tares who are being mightily used by the devil to wreck havoc from within the professing Christian church.
2 Tim 4 3 For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears; 4 And they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned unto fables.
It is interesting to note in the above verses that people who seek after rock music and the occult are satisfying their own lusts. They have willingly turned away their ears from the truth and are seeking the lies from the devil. Men must make a choice between God or the devil. It is sad but many (the majority) are choosing the devil over God!
Matt 7 13 Enter ye in at the strait gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way, that leadeth to destruction, and many there be which go in thereat: 14 Because strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it. 15 Beware of false prophets, which come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ravening wolves.
Whose side are you on reader?
Wednesday, July 27, 2005
Fasting and our occult times
Michael Brown's website: www.spiritdaily.com is running this important article:
SOMETHING IS IN WIND AS FASTING IS URGED AND THE OCCULT RISES DARKLY AROUND US
Something is in the wind. For weeks now, there has been a special push for fasting, a push that seems to have been spawned almost urgently by the Holy Spirit. After years in which this practice has been urged, suddenly it seems to be taking hold, or at least finding potential new adherents. We have been getting constant feedback and just this week received the proposal for a fasting novena.
We are informed that the French renewed the consecration of their country by a "Novena of Fasting and Prayer" several years ago. So too did the Belgians and Mali (Africa). Germans held their novena before Pentecost. At last report, and probably now done, Italians and Canadians were working out plans for theirs.
Very interesting, especially in that a Medjugorje newsletter recently carried such a novena!
Just Monday, we carried a story about fasting and deliverance.
The Novena in France and the other countries consisted [see here] of uninterrupted prayer for nine days, 24 hours a day, with people being signed up to offer one hour of prayer each and also to fast either from one meal or for up to one day. Medjugorje prayer groups are playing a major role in organizing the novena in some countries.
In the final ceremony, a prayer of consecration, inspired by the 1984 prayer of consecration of the world by Pope John Paul, is offered.
Now comes the latest alleged message from Medjugorje.
"Make good use of this time of grace and devote it to God more than ever up to now," was part of the July 25 message. "Do novenas of fasting and renunciation so that Satan be far from you and grace be around you."
"That grace be around us":
This means protection. This means that for some reason we need special protection. There was no denying the urgent tone. Fasting is potent against the evil one and when we look around us we can see why it is so necessary!
Evil has been institutionalized. As if by magic (a wizard's wand), the occult is now part of the mainstream.
Public libraries have sponsored events to promote Harry Potter this month as kids and librarians and public officials dressed up as witches in some misguided cities. There were parties around the world. Libraries. Bookstores. On the front pages of newspapers was the celebration of wicca.
The problem is that witchcraft is an evil religion. The Bible and Catechism are both clear on the topic. Pope Benedict has seen Potter as having the potential to "seduce" young minds and undermine Christianity.
Yet even Catholics promote it, or think that opposition to it belongs to extremists.
How far we have come! If librarians dressed up as saints, of course, they'd be fired.
But witchery is okay, and what would have been a scandal a few short years ago is now a part of our landscape. Music is filled with direct occult significance (we'll be tackling this shortly), and movies with occult themes are released by the droves. Bewitched!
"Mainstream" Catholics go for books and movies with clear pagan mythology -- as priests defend them.
Meanwhile, a website that was once a major religious stop on the internet, has sections for astrology, witchcraft, kabbalah, earth-based religions, and other dark religions -- all under the guise of openness -- while elsewhere you can now do santeria by e-mail.
"It used to be that young people rarely thought about the supernatural," notes one ministry. "In today’s Western world, they are swamped by it on a regular—even daily—basis."
Look around. The occult -- not just psychic phenomena, not just New Age, but deeper levels of the occult -- have sprung up around you.
No wonder the need for fasting. Even satanists are defended in our modern culture (allowed to perform their rituals in the military and in our prisons)."Teenagers and pre-adolescents watch cartoons, videotapes, and prime time TV shows which contain powerful paranormal and black magic themes," noted the Christian website. "Many listen to raucous music emphasizing occult subject matter. They play video games such as Diablo ii, a Dungeons and Dragons-like computer game, where players battle a demon to save the world and in which elements of magic and witchcraft are an integral part of the action."
Nor is occult the only way that we have seen evil institutionalized. It is okay now for major politicians to be interviewed by shock jocks and it is okay for major supermarket chains to have lust on the cover at the counter and it is not only okay but required that commercials be vulgar. TV comedians prevail with what were once taboo jokes and an x-rated star is allowed at a major Republican fund-raiser.
Then there are the tattoos. Talk about our landscape! They are everywhere, and while most who have them are simply following a trend, there can be occult implications.
Skulls? Devils?
"Ye shall not make any cuttings in your flesh for the dead, nor print any marks upon you: I am the Lord," says Leviticus 19:28 -- if the Bible is any longer relevant.
The offensive practice of body piercing (rings through the lip, through the nostrils, through the tongue) is direct mutilation, and mutilation too has its roots in the occult. To pierce the body was thought by ancients to invite in spirits.
Tongue piercing was practiced in a ritual form by the ancient Aztecs, Mayas of Central America, and the Haida, Kwakiutul, and Tlinglit tribes of the American Northwest. The tongue was pierced to draw blood to propitiate the gods and to create an altered state of consciousness so that the priest or shaman could communicate with the gods.
Writes a former Hindu about a visit to a chat room: "One of the believers there was telling them it was wrong for Christians to have tattoos. Since I was formerly a Hindu, I know tattoo is from Hinduism and also witchcraft. Also, Hindus pierce their tongue with small spears and prick the entire body with little hooks and go in trances. I have witnessed this personally."
So this too is part of the occult scene. It is no coincidence that we find tattoo and body-piercing shops in red-light districts or next to the shops where they do psychic "readings" (often in drug-drenched neighborhoods). As for psychics, they advertise on television. Whether or not the "mainstream" believes it, these are all things that can cause the proliferation and attachment of evil spirits.
So it is a time for fasting! We certainly urge it. Christ told us that some demons respond only to this manner of sacrifice. With it we can protect our families and come against the present growing darkness.
[resources: Freed and Healed Through Fasting, Spiritual Warfare Prayer, Novena of Fasting, and Special exorcism prayer]
[see also: Medjugorje message urges fasting and renunciation to ward off Satan]
[As for other forms of protection: "I'm a theoretical physicist (never went to church) until Mary got her hands on me through Medjugorje in 1996," writes viewer Armond Nirdlinger. "I like to say the rosary at night on a quiet dead end street about two blocks long near down town Sebastopol, California. We are on a well for our water. Since it is hard we use those forty-pound bags of coarse salt. I got the idea of having a bag of it blessed and I sprinkled a loop down one side of the street and up the other. Now I say my prayers enclosed in a fence of demon-repelling prayers. On dark nights it helps eliminate nervous distracting thoughts. I thought some of your readers might find it useful. The bags only cost around $4. You can put a wall around your house." In special times we need special action.]
Novena of Fasting and Prayers
Prayer of Consecration
In union with all mankind, in communion with the entire Church, and with our Holy Father, Pope Benedict XVI, we address to you O Father, this supplication especially for our country, through the heart and the hands of the Virgin Mary.
Father, send your Holy Spirit, so that each one of us might become an instrument of your peace,From hunger and war, deliver us! From nuclear war, from incalculable self destruction, from every kind of war, deliver us!From the sins against the life of man from its very beginning, deliver us! From discouragement, from hatred and from the degradation of the dignity of the children of God, deliver us! From every kind of injustice in the life of society, both national and international, deliver us! From the readiness to trample on the Commandments of God, deliver us! From the attempt to extinguish the very truth of God in human hearts, deliver us! From the loss of consciousness of good and evil, deliver us! From the sins against the Holy Spirit, deliver us!
Mother of Christ and Mother of all peoples, we ask for your protection and your intercession. Pray to your Son for us, to send the Holy Spirit in abundance, the Spirit of Truth who is the source of Life. Welcome the Spirit for us and with us as you did on the feast of Pentecost with the first disciples. Mother you know and share our sufferings and hopes.
Today we entrust the whole world to you. We pray for you to accompany us on our path. Like John the apostle, we wish to accept you into our homes, to learn from you how to resemble Jesus. We entrust all our people to you, starting with those who are the weakest and who suffer the most: the unborn children, those whose life is menaced, those born in poverty, the young people searching for a sense to their life, the refugees, the unemployed, those tried by sickness, the families who are divided, elderly persons deprived of assistance and all those who are alone and without hope.
May the infinite saving power of Redemption rise up once more in the history of the world, the power of the Merciful Love of the Father! May the Holy Spirit transform consciences! May He heal our memories and purify our hearts. May the Lord always reign among us, He who is Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
AMEN.
I couldn't agree more with what Michael Brown is saying. Fasting is absolutely critical to overcome the Evil One in this present hour. Now is also the time for Christians to work together and to refrain from bitter rivalries and jealousies and other forms of infighting.
John Ansley
frappe19751975@yahoo.com
SOMETHING IS IN WIND AS FASTING IS URGED AND THE OCCULT RISES DARKLY AROUND US
Something is in the wind. For weeks now, there has been a special push for fasting, a push that seems to have been spawned almost urgently by the Holy Spirit. After years in which this practice has been urged, suddenly it seems to be taking hold, or at least finding potential new adherents. We have been getting constant feedback and just this week received the proposal for a fasting novena.
We are informed that the French renewed the consecration of their country by a "Novena of Fasting and Prayer" several years ago. So too did the Belgians and Mali (Africa). Germans held their novena before Pentecost. At last report, and probably now done, Italians and Canadians were working out plans for theirs.
Very interesting, especially in that a Medjugorje newsletter recently carried such a novena!
Just Monday, we carried a story about fasting and deliverance.
The Novena in France and the other countries consisted [see here] of uninterrupted prayer for nine days, 24 hours a day, with people being signed up to offer one hour of prayer each and also to fast either from one meal or for up to one day. Medjugorje prayer groups are playing a major role in organizing the novena in some countries.
In the final ceremony, a prayer of consecration, inspired by the 1984 prayer of consecration of the world by Pope John Paul, is offered.
Now comes the latest alleged message from Medjugorje.
"Make good use of this time of grace and devote it to God more than ever up to now," was part of the July 25 message. "Do novenas of fasting and renunciation so that Satan be far from you and grace be around you."
"That grace be around us":
This means protection. This means that for some reason we need special protection. There was no denying the urgent tone. Fasting is potent against the evil one and when we look around us we can see why it is so necessary!
Evil has been institutionalized. As if by magic (a wizard's wand), the occult is now part of the mainstream.
Public libraries have sponsored events to promote Harry Potter this month as kids and librarians and public officials dressed up as witches in some misguided cities. There were parties around the world. Libraries. Bookstores. On the front pages of newspapers was the celebration of wicca.
The problem is that witchcraft is an evil religion. The Bible and Catechism are both clear on the topic. Pope Benedict has seen Potter as having the potential to "seduce" young minds and undermine Christianity.
Yet even Catholics promote it, or think that opposition to it belongs to extremists.
How far we have come! If librarians dressed up as saints, of course, they'd be fired.
But witchery is okay, and what would have been a scandal a few short years ago is now a part of our landscape. Music is filled with direct occult significance (we'll be tackling this shortly), and movies with occult themes are released by the droves. Bewitched!
"Mainstream" Catholics go for books and movies with clear pagan mythology -- as priests defend them.
Meanwhile, a website that was once a major religious stop on the internet, has sections for astrology, witchcraft, kabbalah, earth-based religions, and other dark religions -- all under the guise of openness -- while elsewhere you can now do santeria by e-mail.
"It used to be that young people rarely thought about the supernatural," notes one ministry. "In today’s Western world, they are swamped by it on a regular—even daily—basis."
Look around. The occult -- not just psychic phenomena, not just New Age, but deeper levels of the occult -- have sprung up around you.
No wonder the need for fasting. Even satanists are defended in our modern culture (allowed to perform their rituals in the military and in our prisons)."Teenagers and pre-adolescents watch cartoons, videotapes, and prime time TV shows which contain powerful paranormal and black magic themes," noted the Christian website. "Many listen to raucous music emphasizing occult subject matter. They play video games such as Diablo ii, a Dungeons and Dragons-like computer game, where players battle a demon to save the world and in which elements of magic and witchcraft are an integral part of the action."
Nor is occult the only way that we have seen evil institutionalized. It is okay now for major politicians to be interviewed by shock jocks and it is okay for major supermarket chains to have lust on the cover at the counter and it is not only okay but required that commercials be vulgar. TV comedians prevail with what were once taboo jokes and an x-rated star is allowed at a major Republican fund-raiser.
Then there are the tattoos. Talk about our landscape! They are everywhere, and while most who have them are simply following a trend, there can be occult implications.
Skulls? Devils?
"Ye shall not make any cuttings in your flesh for the dead, nor print any marks upon you: I am the Lord," says Leviticus 19:28 -- if the Bible is any longer relevant.
The offensive practice of body piercing (rings through the lip, through the nostrils, through the tongue) is direct mutilation, and mutilation too has its roots in the occult. To pierce the body was thought by ancients to invite in spirits.
Tongue piercing was practiced in a ritual form by the ancient Aztecs, Mayas of Central America, and the Haida, Kwakiutul, and Tlinglit tribes of the American Northwest. The tongue was pierced to draw blood to propitiate the gods and to create an altered state of consciousness so that the priest or shaman could communicate with the gods.
Writes a former Hindu about a visit to a chat room: "One of the believers there was telling them it was wrong for Christians to have tattoos. Since I was formerly a Hindu, I know tattoo is from Hinduism and also witchcraft. Also, Hindus pierce their tongue with small spears and prick the entire body with little hooks and go in trances. I have witnessed this personally."
So this too is part of the occult scene. It is no coincidence that we find tattoo and body-piercing shops in red-light districts or next to the shops where they do psychic "readings" (often in drug-drenched neighborhoods). As for psychics, they advertise on television. Whether or not the "mainstream" believes it, these are all things that can cause the proliferation and attachment of evil spirits.
So it is a time for fasting! We certainly urge it. Christ told us that some demons respond only to this manner of sacrifice. With it we can protect our families and come against the present growing darkness.
[resources: Freed and Healed Through Fasting, Spiritual Warfare Prayer, Novena of Fasting, and Special exorcism prayer]
[see also: Medjugorje message urges fasting and renunciation to ward off Satan]
[As for other forms of protection: "I'm a theoretical physicist (never went to church) until Mary got her hands on me through Medjugorje in 1996," writes viewer Armond Nirdlinger. "I like to say the rosary at night on a quiet dead end street about two blocks long near down town Sebastopol, California. We are on a well for our water. Since it is hard we use those forty-pound bags of coarse salt. I got the idea of having a bag of it blessed and I sprinkled a loop down one side of the street and up the other. Now I say my prayers enclosed in a fence of demon-repelling prayers. On dark nights it helps eliminate nervous distracting thoughts. I thought some of your readers might find it useful. The bags only cost around $4. You can put a wall around your house." In special times we need special action.]
Novena of Fasting and Prayers
Prayer of Consecration
In union with all mankind, in communion with the entire Church, and with our Holy Father, Pope Benedict XVI, we address to you O Father, this supplication especially for our country, through the heart and the hands of the Virgin Mary.
Father, send your Holy Spirit, so that each one of us might become an instrument of your peace,From hunger and war, deliver us! From nuclear war, from incalculable self destruction, from every kind of war, deliver us!From the sins against the life of man from its very beginning, deliver us! From discouragement, from hatred and from the degradation of the dignity of the children of God, deliver us! From every kind of injustice in the life of society, both national and international, deliver us! From the readiness to trample on the Commandments of God, deliver us! From the attempt to extinguish the very truth of God in human hearts, deliver us! From the loss of consciousness of good and evil, deliver us! From the sins against the Holy Spirit, deliver us!
Mother of Christ and Mother of all peoples, we ask for your protection and your intercession. Pray to your Son for us, to send the Holy Spirit in abundance, the Spirit of Truth who is the source of Life. Welcome the Spirit for us and with us as you did on the feast of Pentecost with the first disciples. Mother you know and share our sufferings and hopes.
Today we entrust the whole world to you. We pray for you to accompany us on our path. Like John the apostle, we wish to accept you into our homes, to learn from you how to resemble Jesus. We entrust all our people to you, starting with those who are the weakest and who suffer the most: the unborn children, those whose life is menaced, those born in poverty, the young people searching for a sense to their life, the refugees, the unemployed, those tried by sickness, the families who are divided, elderly persons deprived of assistance and all those who are alone and without hope.
May the infinite saving power of Redemption rise up once more in the history of the world, the power of the Merciful Love of the Father! May the Holy Spirit transform consciences! May He heal our memories and purify our hearts. May the Lord always reign among us, He who is Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
AMEN.
I couldn't agree more with what Michael Brown is saying. Fasting is absolutely critical to overcome the Evil One in this present hour. Now is also the time for Christians to work together and to refrain from bitter rivalries and jealousies and other forms of infighting.
John Ansley
frappe19751975@yahoo.com
Lest you dash your foot against a stone
Submitted for your edification:
Teen who fell 28 feet says angel caught him
May 22, 2004 - Reported in Omaha.com. Written by Marion Rhodes. Teen who fell 28 feet likely to live. Boy hurt in fall was a 13-year-old. As Edgar Bravo dangled over the Kennedy Freeway with his hands clinging to the pavement of Cornhusker Road, he thought, "If I fall, I'll die." A few seconds later, he did fall. But he didn't die. When the 13-year-old Bellevue student hit the concrete on the shoulder of the freeway underneath the Cornhusker Road overpass, he broke both his wrists, an elbow and his nose. He suffered a broken jaw, broken teeth and several bruises.
His family calls Edgar's survival of the 28-foot fall a miracle, the work of his guardian angel.
The World-Herald interviewed Edgar with the help of Maritza Hernandez of Bellevue, his sister-in-law, who served as a translator. Edgar said he and a friend had planned to walk to another friend's house in Bellevue last Saturday night, but they realized it was too far away and turned around. They were walking east on Cornhusker Road when they approached the bridge over the freeway, also known as U.S. Highway 75. To get to the sidewalk on the bridge, they had to cross the road. The two boys dodged traffic and ran across the westbound lane. At the edge of the road, there was a guardrail.
Edgar thought if he jumped over the rail, he'd land on the sidewalk. He didn't know that behind the rail was a 5-foot gap that separated it from the walkway. He realized his mistake as he was jumping across the rail. Edgar reacted quickly and tried to grab hold of something. He hit his chest and stomach on the edge of the road, and he managed to grip onto the concrete. He hung on for about five seconds before falling 28 feet onto the freeway. Edgar said he feared for his life and started praying: "God, please help me." He thinks his prayer was answered.
As he was falling, he felt pressure around his chest, as if someone was wrapping his arms around him. He remembers seeing long, blond hair, a very bright light and something that looked like wings to his side. Then he hit the pavement. His memory came back as he lay on the shoulder. He heard two men talking to him, asking questions, telling him help was on the way. His friend had wanted to jump the rail as well, but after he saw Edgar fall, he ran to a nearby police car and alerted the officer.
The officer was shocked to see how far Edgar had fallen, Hernandez said. "He was really surprised to see that he was conscious." Edgar was listed in good condition Friday at the intensive pediatric care unit at Creighton University Medical Center. Both his arms were in casts, but he said he felt only a little pain. He has had two surgeries already and will have two more. If everything goes well, he might get to go home next week, Hernandez said. Edgar and his parents moved from Mexico to the United States last August. He is a student at Logan Fontenelle Middle School. Edgar said the experience has strengthened his faith in God.
"He thinks the person holding him was an angel," Hernandez said. "He thinks that's what made him not die."
Monday, July 25, 2005
Forced abortions and NOW
Now - the National Organization of Women - remains silent when it comes to stories like this one:
The Epoch Times
Jul 23, 2005
A woman from Hong Kong was taken to have a forced abortion while visiting Hunan Province for her father’s birthday with her eight-year-old daughter and two-year-old son. Though she was six months pregnant, the local family planning office notified her that the pregnancy was unauthorized. With the assistance of the Hong Kong Immigration Department, she was successfully rescued within 24 hours.
A Frightening Journey Home
According to the July 10 Apple Daily News Report, a woman from Hong Kong, surnamed Hsiung, was visiting her 70-year-old father in Wan Jia Village, Tao County, Hunan Province, for his birthday along with her children. Around 7 a.m. on July 8th, she was awakened by loud noises and violent kicking at the door. The visitors claimed to be the county and town family planning officials and stated they wanted to inspect her birth allowance certificate. They suspected she was in violation of the “one child per couple” policy and should submit to a forced abortion. Ms. Hsiung replied that she was a resident of Hong Kong and thus not governed by the mainland's family planning program. She was told, "Hong Kong is part of China and is regulated by Chinese policy." During the confusion, Hsiung, sought assistance, telephoning the Hong Kong Immigration Department and the Apple Daily News.
After speaking with Ms. Hsiung, the Immigration Department contacted the Public Security Bureau of Hunan Province, who then immediately instructed the Tao County Public Security Bureau to take care of this incident properly. When the police arrived, Ms. Hsiung opened the door and unexpectedly saw eight family planning officials there also. A policeman checked her Home Entry Permit, her HK ID Card and Certificate and indicated that he had no authority in this matter. Though she was left with her documents and children, the family planning officials stayed after the police left and tried to force her to go to the hospital for an abortion. Many of her relatives were present and they were able to intervene and prevent her from being taken away. The officials then left, but took her documents.
Hsiung Aware of Her Relatives' Forced Abortions
To control population growth, mainland China's Communist government has maintained a policy called "Population and Family Planning Law," with one child per couple allowed since 1978. Prior to a pregnancy, mainland couples have to apply and obtain an "Allowed Birth Certificate" to accompany their IDs, marriage certificate, etc. The Family Planning Office can force any woman with an unauthorized pregnancy to have an abortion.
Many abuses and tragedies occur because of this policy, such as: female infants being abandoned, the taking of drugs that induce multiple fetus pregnancies and giving birth in seclusion. Punishment for an unauthorized pregnancy can be brutal and instances like the destruction of residences, the impoundment and confiscation of furniture, electronics, and farm animals as well as the refusal to register the unauthorized child have all occurred. This coercive population control policy has led human rights organizations to severely criticize China for these alleged abuses.
Ms. Hsiung revealed that the mere mention of the family planning office would fill her with horror since she had witnessed so many pregnant women who had been subjected to a forced abortion. She said, "Three of my relatives in the countryside were seized and forced to abort their unauthorized pregnancies. All were pregnant for the first time, with one being 8 months along."
The silence of NOW speaks volumes. The organization is not really concerned with furthering the commonn good of women and society in general. No, NOW exists solely to foist a radical agenda upon society. One which enshrines the murder of the unborn as a sort of demonic "sacrament" to the Moloch god while enslaving women to a purely masculine criteria.
And Lucifer smiles.
Paul
Friday, July 22, 2005
On Retreat
Dear Friends of this Blog and the Spiritual Children of Saint Rita,
I will be away on retreat and will return on Sunday. They say it's going to be a much cooler weekend. May God will it so.
God bless,
Paul
Canon 915
The following article may be found at the website of American Life League:
Canon 915
Canon 915 of the Catholic Church's Code of Canon Law states:
Those who have been excommunicated or interdicted after the imposition or the declaration of a penalty as well as others who obstinately persist in manifest grave sin are not to be admitted to communion.
Father James Buckley, FSSP, has clarified why American Life League is asking the Church's bishops to enforce Canon 915:
Prior to Vatican II priests were more conscious that the obligation of preventing public sinners from receiving communion rested on them. Today they hesitate. Further, Canon Law 915 clearly prohibits public sinners from taking the Eucharist. Priests are not disciplining pro-abortion legislators when they enforce this Canon law; they are protecting the Eucharist from sacrilege.
Supporting documentation:
Canon Law is the authentic compilation of the laws of the Catholic Church. Major compilations have been made in the Church's history.
Gratian's Decree, assembled about A.D. 1140 by the Italian Camaldolese monk Gratian.
In 1234 the Dominican canonist Saint Raymond of Penafort completed a systematic arrangement that became known as the Decretals of Gregory IX.
Pope St. Pius X commissioned Pietro Cardinal Gasparri to systematically arrange Church law, and he then promulgated the Code of Canon Law in 1917.
The current code, incorporating revisions required by the Second Vatican Council, was promulgated by Pope John Paul II in 1983.
Pope John Paul II's encyclical letter, Ecclesia de Eucharistia, issued in April 2003:
37. The two sacraments of the Eucharist and Penance are very closely connected. Because the Eucharist makes present the redeeming sacrifice of the Cross, perpetuating it sacramentally, it naturally gives rise to a continuous need for conversion, for a personal response to the appeal made by Saint Paul to the Christians of Corinth: "We beseech you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God" (2 Cor 5:20). If a Christian's conscience is burdened by serious sin, then the path of penance through the sacrament of Reconciliation becomes necessary for full participation in the Eucharistic Sacrifice.
The judgment of one's state of grace obviously belongs only to the person involved, since it is a question of examining one's conscience. However, in cases of outward conduct which is seriously, clearly and steadfastly contrary to the moral norm, the Church, in her pastoral concern for the good order of the community and out of respect for the sacrament, cannot fail to feel directly involved. The Code of Canon Law refers to this situation of a manifest lack of proper moral disposition when it states that those who "obstinately persist in manifest grave sin" are not to be admitted to Eucharistic communion.76
(76Canon 915; Code of Canons of the Eastern Churches, Canon 712.)
Letter from the Congregation for Divine Worship and Discipline of the Sacraments issued in July 2002:
In view of the law that "sacred ministers may not deny the sacraments to those who opportunely ask for them, are properly disposed and are not prohibited by law from receiving them" (Canon 843.1) there should be no such refusal to any Catholic who presents himself for Holy Communion at Mass, except in cases presenting a danger of grave scandal to other believers arising out of the person's unrepented public sin or obstinate heresy or schism, publicly professed or declared.
Declaration by the Pontifical Council for Legislative Texts
Any interpretation of can. 915 that would set itself against the canon's substantial content, as declared uninterruptedly by the Magisterium and by the discipline of the Church throughout the centuries, is clearly misleading. One cannot confuse respect for the wording of the law (cfr. Can. 17) with the improper use of the very same wording as an instrument for relativizing the precepts or emptying them of their substance.
The phrase "and others who obstinately persist in manifest grave sin" is clear and must be understood in a manner that does not distort its sense so as to render the norm inapplicable. The three required conditions are:
grave sin, understood objectively, being that the minister of Communion would not be able to judge from subjective imputability;
obstinate persistence, which means the existence of an objective situation of sin that endures in time and which the will of the individual member of the faithful does not bring to an end, no other requirements (attitude of defiance, prior warning, etc.) being necessary to establish the fundamental gravity of the situation in the Church.
The manifest character of the situation of grave habitual sin.
St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, III:q 80: article 6
I answer that, "A distinction must be made among sinners: some are secret; others are notorious, either from evidence of the fact, as public usurers, or public robbers or from being denounced as evil men by some ecclesiastical or civil tribunal. Therefore Holy Communion ought not to be given to open sinners when they ask for it."
Reply to Objection 1: "Holy things are forbidden to be given to dogs, that is, to notorious sinners…."
Father Buckley comments on the above: "It is from evidence of fact and not from the denunciation of an ecclesiastical tribunal that all men know that some Catholic politicians are obstinate in the manifest grave sin of formal cooperation in abortion. These are notorious sinners who should not be given the Eucharist."
What about the politician who, perhaps due to a failure to comprehend the gravity of abortion, argues that he or she is "personally opposed to abortion" but consistently votes for measures that support abortion? Since such a person does not consider his actions gravely wrong, he may not be in a state of mortal sin.
Father James Buckley, FSSP, responds to this question as follows:
Law deals with what is objective. To vote for abortion legislation is mortally sinful because it is formal cooperation in a grave sin. To do so repeatedly despite the clear teaching of the Catholic Church to the contrary is obstinacy. Moreover, these actions are public. Consequently, pro-abortion legislators obstinately persevere in manifest grave sin and, according to Canon 915, are not to be given Holy Communion.
It must be remembered that Canon 915 puts an obligation on those who are distributing Holy Communion that they not give Holy Communion to notorious sinners.
When someone suggests that notorious sinners are not really notorious sinners because they lack knowledge of serious sin, he or she is retreating from the objective criteria the law demands. Secondly, it is not that the pro-abortion politician lacks knowledge of the Church teaching; he rejects it. The evil is in the will and not in the intellect.
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©2003 American Life League, Inc.
Paul
Thursday, July 21, 2005
Lumen Gentium, No. 14
14. This Sacred Council wishes to turn its attention firstly to the Catholic faithful. Basing itself upon Sacred Scripture and Tradition, it teaches that the Church, now sojourning on earth as an exile, is necessary for salvation. Christ, present to us in His Body, which is the Church, is the one Mediator and the unique way of salvation. In explicit terms He Himself affirmed the necessity of faith and baptism(124) and thereby affirmed also the necessity of the Church, for through baptism as through a door men enter the Church. Whosoever, therefore, knowing that the Catholic Church was made necessary by Christ, would refuse to enter or to remain in it, could not be saved.
They are fully incorporated in the society of the Church who, possessing the Spirit of Christ accept her entire system and all the means of salvation given to her, and are united with her as part of her visible bodily structure and through her with Christ, who rules her through the Supreme Pontiff and the bishops. The bonds which bind men to the Church in a visible way are profession of faith, the sacraments, and ecclesiastical government and communion. He is not saved, however, who, though part of the body of the Church, does not persevere in charity. He remains indeed in the bosom of the Church, but, as it were, only in a "bodily" manner and not "in his heart."(12*) All the Church's children should remember that their exalted status is to be attributed not to their own merits but to the special grace of Christ. If they fail moreover to respond to that grace in thought, word and deed, not only shall they not be saved but they will be the more severely judged.(13*)
Catechumens who, moved by the Holy Spirit, seek with explicit intention to be incorporated into the Church are by that very intention joined with her. With love and solicitude Mother Church already embraces them as her own.
How many of those who dissent from the Magisterium of the Church have ever really pondered these words? Note where LG teaches us that, "All the Church's children should remember that their exalted status is to be attributed not to their own merits but to the special grace of Christ. If they fail moreover to respond to that grace in thought, word and deed, not only shall they not be saved but they will be the more severely judged."
When a Catholic engages in dissent from the Magisterium of the Church, he or she is failing to respond to that grace of Christ "in thought, word and deed." And LG says that, "not only shall they not be saved but they will be the more severely judged." Of course, this passage also applies to Catholics who engage in judgmentalism. As I noted in a previous post, we are not free to judge another's interior dispositions. But we are free to judge words, ideas and actions which fail to live up to the demands of the Gospel and which dissipate when held up to the Lumen Christi.
Paul.
They are fully incorporated in the society of the Church who, possessing the Spirit of Christ accept her entire system and all the means of salvation given to her, and are united with her as part of her visible bodily structure and through her with Christ, who rules her through the Supreme Pontiff and the bishops. The bonds which bind men to the Church in a visible way are profession of faith, the sacraments, and ecclesiastical government and communion. He is not saved, however, who, though part of the body of the Church, does not persevere in charity. He remains indeed in the bosom of the Church, but, as it were, only in a "bodily" manner and not "in his heart."(12*) All the Church's children should remember that their exalted status is to be attributed not to their own merits but to the special grace of Christ. If they fail moreover to respond to that grace in thought, word and deed, not only shall they not be saved but they will be the more severely judged.(13*)
Catechumens who, moved by the Holy Spirit, seek with explicit intention to be incorporated into the Church are by that very intention joined with her. With love and solicitude Mother Church already embraces them as her own.
How many of those who dissent from the Magisterium of the Church have ever really pondered these words? Note where LG teaches us that, "All the Church's children should remember that their exalted status is to be attributed not to their own merits but to the special grace of Christ. If they fail moreover to respond to that grace in thought, word and deed, not only shall they not be saved but they will be the more severely judged."
When a Catholic engages in dissent from the Magisterium of the Church, he or she is failing to respond to that grace of Christ "in thought, word and deed." And LG says that, "not only shall they not be saved but they will be the more severely judged." Of course, this passage also applies to Catholics who engage in judgmentalism. As I noted in a previous post, we are not free to judge another's interior dispositions. But we are free to judge words, ideas and actions which fail to live up to the demands of the Gospel and which dissipate when held up to the Lumen Christi.
Paul.
The CDF has spoken
The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith has already addressed - at length - the whole subject of same sex "marriage." Archbishop Sean O' Malley needs to address the dissent of Rev. Walter Cuenin. And soon. Fr. Cuenin's views are causing scandal in and around the Archdiocese of Boston.
Paul
CONGREGATION FOR THE DOCTRINE OF THE FAITH
CONSIDERATIONS REGARDING PROPOSALS TO GIVE LEGAL RECOGNITION TO UNIONS BETWEEN HOMOSEXUAL PERSONS
INTRODUCTION
1. In recent years, various questions relating to homosexuality have been addressed with some frequency by Pope John Paul II and by the relevant Dicasteries of the Holy See.(1) Homosexuality is a troubling moral and social phenomenon, even in those countries where it does not present significant legal issues. It gives rise to greater concern in those countries that have granted or intend to grant – legal recognition to homosexual unions, which may include the possibility of adopting children. The present Considerations do not contain new doctrinal elements; they seek rather to reiterate the essential points on this question and provide arguments drawn from reason which could be used by Bishops in preparing more specific interventions, appropriate to the different situations throughout the world, aimed at protecting and promoting the dignity of marriage, the foundation of the family, and the stability of society, of which this institution is a constitutive element. The present Considerations are also intended to give direction to Catholic politicians by indicating the approaches to proposed legislation in this area which would be consistent with Christian conscience.(2) Since this question relates to the natural moral law, the arguments that follow are addressed not only to those who believe in Christ, but to all persons committed to promoting and defending the common good of society.
I. THE NATURE OF MARRIAGEAND ITS INALIENABLE CHARACTERISTICS
2. The Church's teaching on marriage and on the complementarity of the sexes reiterates a truth that is evident to right reason and recognized as such by all the major cultures of the world. Marriage is not just any relationship between human beings. It was established by the Creator with its own nature, essential properties and purpose.(3) No ideology can erase from the human spirit the certainty that marriage exists solely between a man and a woman, who by mutual personal gift, proper and exclusive to themselves, tend toward the communion of their persons. In this way, they mutually perfect each other, in order to cooperate with God in the procreation and upbringing of new human lives.
3. The natural truth about marriage was confirmed by the Revelation contained in the biblical accounts of creation, an expression also of the original human wisdom, in which the voice of nature itself is heard. There are three fundamental elements of the Creator's plan for marriage, as narrated in the Book of Genesis.
In the first place, man, the image of God, was created “male and female” (Gen 1:27). Men and women are equal as persons and complementary as male and female. Sexuality is something that pertains to the physical-biological realm and has also been raised to a new level – the personal level – where nature and spirit are united.
Marriage is instituted by the Creator as a form of life in which a communion of persons is realized involving the use of the sexual faculty. “That is why a man leaves his father and mother and clings to his wife and they become one flesh” (Gen 2:24).
Third, God has willed to give the union of man and woman a special participation in his work of creation. Thus, he blessed the man and the woman with the words “Be fruitful and multiply” (Gen 1:28). Therefore, in the Creator's plan, sexual complementarity and fruitfulness belong to the very nature of marriage.
Furthermore, the marital union of man and woman has been elevated by Christ to the dignity of a sacrament. The Church teaches that Christian marriage is an efficacious sign of the covenant between Christ and the Church (cf. Eph 5:32). This Christian meaning of marriage, far from diminishing the profoundly human value of the marital union between man and woman, confirms and strengthens it (cf. Mt 19:3-12; Mk 10:6-9).
4. There are absolutely no grounds for considering homosexual unions to be in any way similar or even remotely analogous to God's plan for marriage and family. Marriage is holy, while homosexual acts go against the natural moral law. Homosexual acts “close the sexual act to the gift of life. They do not proceed from a genuine affective and sexual complementarity. Under no circumstances can they be approved”.(4)
Sacred Scripture condemns homosexual acts “as a serious depravity... (cf. Rom 1:24-27; 1 Cor 6:10; 1 Tim 1:10). This judgment of Scripture does not of course permit us to conclude that all those who suffer from this anomaly are personally responsible for it, but it does attest to the fact that homosexual acts are intrinsically disordered”.(5) This same moral judgment is found in many Christian writers of the first centuries(6) and is unanimously accepted by Catholic Tradition.
Nonetheless, according to the teaching of the Church, men and women with homosexual tendencies “must be accepted with respect, compassion and sensitivity. Every sign of unjust discrimination in their regard should be avoided”.(7) They are called, like other Christians, to live the virtue of chastity.(8) The homosexual inclination is however “objectively disordered”(9) and homosexual practices are “sins gravely contrary to chastity”.(10)
II. POSITIONS ON THE PROBLEMOF HOMOSEXUAL UNIONS
5. Faced with the fact of homosexual unions, civil authorities adopt different positions. At times they simply tolerate the phenomenon; at other times they advocate legal recognition of such unions, under the pretext of avoiding, with regard to certain rights, discrimination against persons who live with someone of the same sex. In other cases, they favour giving homosexual unions legal equivalence to marriage properly so-called, along with the legal possibility of adopting children.
Where the government's policy is de facto tolerance and there is no explicit legal recognition of homosexual unions, it is necessary to distinguish carefully the various aspects of the problem. Moral conscience requires that, in every occasion, Christians give witness to the whole moral truth, which is contradicted both by approval of homosexual acts and unjust discrimination against homosexual persons. Therefore, discreet and prudent actions can be effective; these might involve: unmasking the way in which such tolerance might be exploited or used in the service of ideology; stating clearly the immoral nature of these unions; reminding the government of the need to contain the phenomenon within certain limits so as to safeguard public morality and, above all, to avoid exposing young people to erroneous ideas about sexuality and marriage that would deprive them of their necessary defences and contribute to the spread of the phenomenon. Those who would move from tolerance to the legitimization of specific rights for cohabiting homosexual persons need to be reminded that the approval or legalization of evil is something far different from the toleration of evil.
In those situations where homosexual unions have been legally recognized or have been given the legal status and rights belonging to marriage, clear and emphatic opposition is a duty. One must refrain from any kind of formal cooperation in the enactment or application of such gravely unjust laws and, as far as possible, from material cooperation on the level of their application. In this area, everyone can exercise the right to conscientious objection.
III. ARGUMENTS FROM REASON AGAINST LEGALRECOGNITION OF HOMOSEXUAL UNIONS
6. To understand why it is necessary to oppose legal recognition of homosexual unions, ethical considerations of different orders need to be taken into consideration.
From the order of right reason
The scope of the civil law is certainly more limited than that of the moral law,(11) but civil law cannot contradict right reason without losing its binding force on conscience.(12) Every humanly-created law is legitimate insofar as it is consistent with the natural moral law, recognized by right reason, and insofar as it respects the inalienable rights of every person.(13) Laws in favour of homosexual unions are contrary to right reason because they confer legal guarantees, analogous to those granted to marriage, to unions between persons of the same sex. Given the values at stake in this question, the State could not grant legal standing to such unions without failing in its duty to promote and defend marriage as an institution essential to the common good.
It might be asked how a law can be contrary to the common good if it does not impose any particular kind of behaviour, but simply gives legal recognition to a de facto reality which does not seem to cause injustice to anyone. In this area, one needs first to reflect on the difference between homosexual behaviour as a private phenomenon and the same behaviour as a relationship in society, foreseen and approved by the law, to the point where it becomes one of the institutions in the legal structure. This second phenomenon is not only more serious, but also assumes a more wide-reaching and profound influence, and would result in changes to the entire organization of society, contrary to the common good. Civil laws are structuring principles of man's life in society, for good or for ill. They “play a very important and sometimes decisive role in influencing patterns of thought and behaviour”.(14) Lifestyles and the underlying presuppositions these express not only externally shape the life of society, but also tend to modify the younger generation's perception and evaluation of forms of behaviour. Legal recognition of homosexual unions would obscure certain basic moral values and cause a devaluation of the institution of marriage.
From the biological and anthropological order
7. Homosexual unions are totally lacking in the biological and anthropological elements of marriage and family which would be the basis, on the level of reason, for granting them legal recognition. Such unions are not able to contribute in a proper way to the procreation and survival of the human race. The possibility of using recently discovered methods of artificial reproduction, beyond involv- ing a grave lack of respect for human dignity,(15) does nothing to alter this inadequacy.
Homosexual unions are also totally lacking in the conjugal dimension, which represents the human and ordered form of sexuality. Sexual relations are human when and insofar as they express and promote the mutual assistance of the sexes in marriage and are open to the transmission of new life.
As experience has shown, the absence of sexual complementarity in these unions creates obstacles in the normal development of children who would be placed in the care of such persons. They would be deprived of the experience of either fatherhood or motherhood. Allowing children to be adopted by persons living in such unions would actually mean doing violence to these children, in the sense that their condition of dependency would be used to place them in an environment that is not conducive to their full human development. This is gravely immoral and in open contradiction to the principle, recognized also in the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, that the best interests of the child, as the weaker and more vulnerable party, are to be the paramount consideration in every case.
From the social order
8. Society owes its continued survival to the family, founded on marriage. The inevitable consequence of legal recognition of homosexual unions would be the redefinition of marriage, which would become, in its legal status, an institution devoid of essential reference to factors linked to heterosexuality; for example, procreation and raising children. If, from the legal standpoint, marriage between a man and a woman were to be considered just one possible form of marriage, the concept of marriage would undergo a radical transformation, with grave detriment to the common good. By putting homosexual unions on a legal plane analogous to that of marriage and the family, the State acts arbitrarily and in contradiction with its duties.
The principles of respect and non-discrimination cannot be invoked to support legal recognition of homosexual unions. Differentiating between persons or refusing social recognition or benefits is unacceptable only when it is contrary to justice.(16) The denial of the social and legal status of marriage to forms of cohabitation that are not and cannot be marital is not opposed to justice; on the contrary, justice requires it.
Nor can the principle of the proper autonomy of the individual be reasonably invoked. It is one thing to maintain that individual citizens may freely engage in those activities that interest them and that this falls within the common civil right to freedom; it is something quite different to hold that activities which do not represent a significant or positive contribution to the development of the human person in society can receive specific and categorical legal recognition by the State. Not even in a remote analogous sense do homosexual unions fulfil the purpose for which marriage and family deserve specific categorical recognition. On the contrary, there are good reasons for holding that such unions are harmful to the proper development of human society, especially if their impact on society were to increase.
From the legal order
9. Because married couples ensure the succession of generations and are therefore eminently within the public interest, civil law grants them institutional recognition. Homosexual unions, on the other hand, do not need specific attention from the legal standpoint since they do not exercise this function for the common good.
Nor is the argument valid according to which legal recognition of homosexual unions is necessary to avoid situations in which cohabiting homosexual persons, simply because they live together, might be deprived of real recognition of their rights as persons and citizens. In reality, they can always make use of the provisions of law – like all citizens from the standpoint of their private autonomy – to protect their rights in matters of common interest. It would be gravely unjust to sacrifice the common good and just laws on the family in order to protect personal goods that can and must be guaranteed in ways that do not harm the body of society.(17)
IV. POSITIONS OF CATHOLIC POLITICIANSWITH REGARD TO LEGISLATION IN FAVOUROF HOMOSEXUAL UNIONS
10. If it is true that all Catholics are obliged to oppose the legal recognition of homosexual unions, Catholic politicians are obliged to do so in a particular way, in keeping with their responsibility as politicians. Faced with legislative proposals in favour of homosexual unions, Catholic politicians are to take account of the following ethical indications.
When legislation in favour of the recognition of homosexual unions is proposed for the first time in a legislative assembly, the Catholic law-maker has a moral duty to express his opposition clearly and publicly and to vote against it. To vote in favour of a law so harmful to the common good is gravely immoral.
When legislation in favour of the recognition of homosexual unions is already in force, the Catholic politician must oppose it in the ways that are possible for him and make his opposition known; it is his duty to witness to the truth. If it is not possible to repeal such a law completely, the Catholic politician, recalling the indications contained in the Encyclical Letter Evangelium vitae, “could licitly support proposals aimed at limiting the harm done by such a law and at lessening its negative consequences at the level of general opinion and public morality”, on condition that his “absolute personal opposition” to such laws was clear and well known and that the danger of scandal was avoided.(18) This does not mean that a more restrictive law in this area could be considered just or even acceptable; rather, it is a question of the legitimate and dutiful attempt to obtain at least the partial repeal of an unjust law when its total abrogation is not possible at the moment.
CONCLUSION
11. The Church teaches that respect for homosexual persons cannot lead in any way to approval of homosexual behaviour or to legal recognition of homosexual unions. The common good requires that laws recognize, promote and protect marriage as the basis of the family, the primary unit of society. Legal recognition of homosexual unions or placing them on the same level as marriage would mean not only the approval of deviant behaviour, with the consequence of making it a model in present-day society, but would also obscure basic values which belong to the common inheritance of humanity. The Church cannot fail to defend these values, for the good of men and women and for the good of society itself.
The Sovereign Pontiff John Paul II, in the Audience of March 28, 2003, approved the present Considerations, adopted in the Ordinary Session of this Congregation, and ordered their publication.
Rome, from the Offices of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, June 3, 2003, Memorial of Saint Charles Lwanga and his Companions, Martyrs.
Joseph Card. RatzingerPrefect
Angelo Amato, S.D.B.Titular Archbishop of SilaSecretary
NOTES
(1) Cf. John Paul II, Angelus Messages of February 20, 1994, and of June 19, 1994; Address to the Plenary Meeting of the Pontifical Council for the Family (March 24, 1999); Catechism of the Catholic Church, Nos. 2357-2359, 2396; Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Declaration Persona humana (December 29, 1975), 8; Letter on the pastoral care of homosexual persons (October 1, 1986); Some considerations concerning the response to legislative proposals on the non-discrimination of homosexual persons (July 24, 1992); Pontifical Council for the Family, Letter to the Presidents of the Bishops' Conferences of Europe on the resolution of the European Parliament regarding homosexual couples (March 25, 1994); Family, marriage and “de facto” unions (July 26, 2000), 23.
(2) Cf. Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Doctrinal Note on some questions regarding the participation of Catholics in political life (November 24, 2002), 4.
(3) Cf. Second Vatican Council, Pastoral Constitution Gaudium et spes, 48.
(4) Catechism of the Catholic Church, No. 2357.
(5) Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Declaration Persona humana (December 29, 1975), 8.
(6) Cf., for example, St. Polycarp, Letter to the Philippians, V, 3; St. Justin Martyr, First Apology, 27, 1-4; Athenagoras, Supplication for the Christians, 34.
(7) Catechism of the Catholic Church, No. 2358; cf. Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Letter on the pastoral care of homosexual persons (October 1, 1986), 10.
(8) Cf. Catechism of the Catholic Church, No. 2359; cf. Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Letter on the pastoral care of homosexual persons (October 1, 1986), 12.
(9) Catechism of the Catholic Church, No. 2358.
(10) Ibid., No. 2396.
(11) Cf. John Paul II, Encyclical Letter Evangelium vitae (March 25, 1995), 71.
(12) Cf. ibid., 72.
(13) Cf. St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, I-II, q. 95, a. 2.
(14) John Paul II, Encyclical Letter Evangelium vitae (March 25, 1995), 90.
(15) Cf. Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Instruction Donum vitae (February 22, 1987), II. A. 1-3.
(16) Cf. St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, II-II, q. 63, a.1, c.
(17) It should not be forgotten that there is always “a danger that legislation which would make homosexuality a basis for entitlements could actually encourage a person with a homosexual orientation to declare his homosexuality or even to seek a partner in order to exploit the provisions of the law” (Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Some considerations concerning the response to legislative proposals on the non-discrimination of homosexual persons [July 24, 1992], 14).
(18) John Paul II, Encyclical Letter Evangelium vitae (March 25, 1995), 73.
Paul
CONGREGATION FOR THE DOCTRINE OF THE FAITH
CONSIDERATIONS REGARDING PROPOSALS TO GIVE LEGAL RECOGNITION TO UNIONS BETWEEN HOMOSEXUAL PERSONS
INTRODUCTION
1. In recent years, various questions relating to homosexuality have been addressed with some frequency by Pope John Paul II and by the relevant Dicasteries of the Holy See.(1) Homosexuality is a troubling moral and social phenomenon, even in those countries where it does not present significant legal issues. It gives rise to greater concern in those countries that have granted or intend to grant – legal recognition to homosexual unions, which may include the possibility of adopting children. The present Considerations do not contain new doctrinal elements; they seek rather to reiterate the essential points on this question and provide arguments drawn from reason which could be used by Bishops in preparing more specific interventions, appropriate to the different situations throughout the world, aimed at protecting and promoting the dignity of marriage, the foundation of the family, and the stability of society, of which this institution is a constitutive element. The present Considerations are also intended to give direction to Catholic politicians by indicating the approaches to proposed legislation in this area which would be consistent with Christian conscience.(2) Since this question relates to the natural moral law, the arguments that follow are addressed not only to those who believe in Christ, but to all persons committed to promoting and defending the common good of society.
I. THE NATURE OF MARRIAGEAND ITS INALIENABLE CHARACTERISTICS
2. The Church's teaching on marriage and on the complementarity of the sexes reiterates a truth that is evident to right reason and recognized as such by all the major cultures of the world. Marriage is not just any relationship between human beings. It was established by the Creator with its own nature, essential properties and purpose.(3) No ideology can erase from the human spirit the certainty that marriage exists solely between a man and a woman, who by mutual personal gift, proper and exclusive to themselves, tend toward the communion of their persons. In this way, they mutually perfect each other, in order to cooperate with God in the procreation and upbringing of new human lives.
3. The natural truth about marriage was confirmed by the Revelation contained in the biblical accounts of creation, an expression also of the original human wisdom, in which the voice of nature itself is heard. There are three fundamental elements of the Creator's plan for marriage, as narrated in the Book of Genesis.
In the first place, man, the image of God, was created “male and female” (Gen 1:27). Men and women are equal as persons and complementary as male and female. Sexuality is something that pertains to the physical-biological realm and has also been raised to a new level – the personal level – where nature and spirit are united.
Marriage is instituted by the Creator as a form of life in which a communion of persons is realized involving the use of the sexual faculty. “That is why a man leaves his father and mother and clings to his wife and they become one flesh” (Gen 2:24).
Third, God has willed to give the union of man and woman a special participation in his work of creation. Thus, he blessed the man and the woman with the words “Be fruitful and multiply” (Gen 1:28). Therefore, in the Creator's plan, sexual complementarity and fruitfulness belong to the very nature of marriage.
Furthermore, the marital union of man and woman has been elevated by Christ to the dignity of a sacrament. The Church teaches that Christian marriage is an efficacious sign of the covenant between Christ and the Church (cf. Eph 5:32). This Christian meaning of marriage, far from diminishing the profoundly human value of the marital union between man and woman, confirms and strengthens it (cf. Mt 19:3-12; Mk 10:6-9).
4. There are absolutely no grounds for considering homosexual unions to be in any way similar or even remotely analogous to God's plan for marriage and family. Marriage is holy, while homosexual acts go against the natural moral law. Homosexual acts “close the sexual act to the gift of life. They do not proceed from a genuine affective and sexual complementarity. Under no circumstances can they be approved”.(4)
Sacred Scripture condemns homosexual acts “as a serious depravity... (cf. Rom 1:24-27; 1 Cor 6:10; 1 Tim 1:10). This judgment of Scripture does not of course permit us to conclude that all those who suffer from this anomaly are personally responsible for it, but it does attest to the fact that homosexual acts are intrinsically disordered”.(5) This same moral judgment is found in many Christian writers of the first centuries(6) and is unanimously accepted by Catholic Tradition.
Nonetheless, according to the teaching of the Church, men and women with homosexual tendencies “must be accepted with respect, compassion and sensitivity. Every sign of unjust discrimination in their regard should be avoided”.(7) They are called, like other Christians, to live the virtue of chastity.(8) The homosexual inclination is however “objectively disordered”(9) and homosexual practices are “sins gravely contrary to chastity”.(10)
II. POSITIONS ON THE PROBLEMOF HOMOSEXUAL UNIONS
5. Faced with the fact of homosexual unions, civil authorities adopt different positions. At times they simply tolerate the phenomenon; at other times they advocate legal recognition of such unions, under the pretext of avoiding, with regard to certain rights, discrimination against persons who live with someone of the same sex. In other cases, they favour giving homosexual unions legal equivalence to marriage properly so-called, along with the legal possibility of adopting children.
Where the government's policy is de facto tolerance and there is no explicit legal recognition of homosexual unions, it is necessary to distinguish carefully the various aspects of the problem. Moral conscience requires that, in every occasion, Christians give witness to the whole moral truth, which is contradicted both by approval of homosexual acts and unjust discrimination against homosexual persons. Therefore, discreet and prudent actions can be effective; these might involve: unmasking the way in which such tolerance might be exploited or used in the service of ideology; stating clearly the immoral nature of these unions; reminding the government of the need to contain the phenomenon within certain limits so as to safeguard public morality and, above all, to avoid exposing young people to erroneous ideas about sexuality and marriage that would deprive them of their necessary defences and contribute to the spread of the phenomenon. Those who would move from tolerance to the legitimization of specific rights for cohabiting homosexual persons need to be reminded that the approval or legalization of evil is something far different from the toleration of evil.
In those situations where homosexual unions have been legally recognized or have been given the legal status and rights belonging to marriage, clear and emphatic opposition is a duty. One must refrain from any kind of formal cooperation in the enactment or application of such gravely unjust laws and, as far as possible, from material cooperation on the level of their application. In this area, everyone can exercise the right to conscientious objection.
III. ARGUMENTS FROM REASON AGAINST LEGALRECOGNITION OF HOMOSEXUAL UNIONS
6. To understand why it is necessary to oppose legal recognition of homosexual unions, ethical considerations of different orders need to be taken into consideration.
From the order of right reason
The scope of the civil law is certainly more limited than that of the moral law,(11) but civil law cannot contradict right reason without losing its binding force on conscience.(12) Every humanly-created law is legitimate insofar as it is consistent with the natural moral law, recognized by right reason, and insofar as it respects the inalienable rights of every person.(13) Laws in favour of homosexual unions are contrary to right reason because they confer legal guarantees, analogous to those granted to marriage, to unions between persons of the same sex. Given the values at stake in this question, the State could not grant legal standing to such unions without failing in its duty to promote and defend marriage as an institution essential to the common good.
It might be asked how a law can be contrary to the common good if it does not impose any particular kind of behaviour, but simply gives legal recognition to a de facto reality which does not seem to cause injustice to anyone. In this area, one needs first to reflect on the difference between homosexual behaviour as a private phenomenon and the same behaviour as a relationship in society, foreseen and approved by the law, to the point where it becomes one of the institutions in the legal structure. This second phenomenon is not only more serious, but also assumes a more wide-reaching and profound influence, and would result in changes to the entire organization of society, contrary to the common good. Civil laws are structuring principles of man's life in society, for good or for ill. They “play a very important and sometimes decisive role in influencing patterns of thought and behaviour”.(14) Lifestyles and the underlying presuppositions these express not only externally shape the life of society, but also tend to modify the younger generation's perception and evaluation of forms of behaviour. Legal recognition of homosexual unions would obscure certain basic moral values and cause a devaluation of the institution of marriage.
From the biological and anthropological order
7. Homosexual unions are totally lacking in the biological and anthropological elements of marriage and family which would be the basis, on the level of reason, for granting them legal recognition. Such unions are not able to contribute in a proper way to the procreation and survival of the human race. The possibility of using recently discovered methods of artificial reproduction, beyond involv- ing a grave lack of respect for human dignity,(15) does nothing to alter this inadequacy.
Homosexual unions are also totally lacking in the conjugal dimension, which represents the human and ordered form of sexuality. Sexual relations are human when and insofar as they express and promote the mutual assistance of the sexes in marriage and are open to the transmission of new life.
As experience has shown, the absence of sexual complementarity in these unions creates obstacles in the normal development of children who would be placed in the care of such persons. They would be deprived of the experience of either fatherhood or motherhood. Allowing children to be adopted by persons living in such unions would actually mean doing violence to these children, in the sense that their condition of dependency would be used to place them in an environment that is not conducive to their full human development. This is gravely immoral and in open contradiction to the principle, recognized also in the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, that the best interests of the child, as the weaker and more vulnerable party, are to be the paramount consideration in every case.
From the social order
8. Society owes its continued survival to the family, founded on marriage. The inevitable consequence of legal recognition of homosexual unions would be the redefinition of marriage, which would become, in its legal status, an institution devoid of essential reference to factors linked to heterosexuality; for example, procreation and raising children. If, from the legal standpoint, marriage between a man and a woman were to be considered just one possible form of marriage, the concept of marriage would undergo a radical transformation, with grave detriment to the common good. By putting homosexual unions on a legal plane analogous to that of marriage and the family, the State acts arbitrarily and in contradiction with its duties.
The principles of respect and non-discrimination cannot be invoked to support legal recognition of homosexual unions. Differentiating between persons or refusing social recognition or benefits is unacceptable only when it is contrary to justice.(16) The denial of the social and legal status of marriage to forms of cohabitation that are not and cannot be marital is not opposed to justice; on the contrary, justice requires it.
Nor can the principle of the proper autonomy of the individual be reasonably invoked. It is one thing to maintain that individual citizens may freely engage in those activities that interest them and that this falls within the common civil right to freedom; it is something quite different to hold that activities which do not represent a significant or positive contribution to the development of the human person in society can receive specific and categorical legal recognition by the State. Not even in a remote analogous sense do homosexual unions fulfil the purpose for which marriage and family deserve specific categorical recognition. On the contrary, there are good reasons for holding that such unions are harmful to the proper development of human society, especially if their impact on society were to increase.
From the legal order
9. Because married couples ensure the succession of generations and are therefore eminently within the public interest, civil law grants them institutional recognition. Homosexual unions, on the other hand, do not need specific attention from the legal standpoint since they do not exercise this function for the common good.
Nor is the argument valid according to which legal recognition of homosexual unions is necessary to avoid situations in which cohabiting homosexual persons, simply because they live together, might be deprived of real recognition of their rights as persons and citizens. In reality, they can always make use of the provisions of law – like all citizens from the standpoint of their private autonomy – to protect their rights in matters of common interest. It would be gravely unjust to sacrifice the common good and just laws on the family in order to protect personal goods that can and must be guaranteed in ways that do not harm the body of society.(17)
IV. POSITIONS OF CATHOLIC POLITICIANSWITH REGARD TO LEGISLATION IN FAVOUROF HOMOSEXUAL UNIONS
10. If it is true that all Catholics are obliged to oppose the legal recognition of homosexual unions, Catholic politicians are obliged to do so in a particular way, in keeping with their responsibility as politicians. Faced with legislative proposals in favour of homosexual unions, Catholic politicians are to take account of the following ethical indications.
When legislation in favour of the recognition of homosexual unions is proposed for the first time in a legislative assembly, the Catholic law-maker has a moral duty to express his opposition clearly and publicly and to vote against it. To vote in favour of a law so harmful to the common good is gravely immoral.
When legislation in favour of the recognition of homosexual unions is already in force, the Catholic politician must oppose it in the ways that are possible for him and make his opposition known; it is his duty to witness to the truth. If it is not possible to repeal such a law completely, the Catholic politician, recalling the indications contained in the Encyclical Letter Evangelium vitae, “could licitly support proposals aimed at limiting the harm done by such a law and at lessening its negative consequences at the level of general opinion and public morality”, on condition that his “absolute personal opposition” to such laws was clear and well known and that the danger of scandal was avoided.(18) This does not mean that a more restrictive law in this area could be considered just or even acceptable; rather, it is a question of the legitimate and dutiful attempt to obtain at least the partial repeal of an unjust law when its total abrogation is not possible at the moment.
CONCLUSION
11. The Church teaches that respect for homosexual persons cannot lead in any way to approval of homosexual behaviour or to legal recognition of homosexual unions. The common good requires that laws recognize, promote and protect marriage as the basis of the family, the primary unit of society. Legal recognition of homosexual unions or placing them on the same level as marriage would mean not only the approval of deviant behaviour, with the consequence of making it a model in present-day society, but would also obscure basic values which belong to the common inheritance of humanity. The Church cannot fail to defend these values, for the good of men and women and for the good of society itself.
The Sovereign Pontiff John Paul II, in the Audience of March 28, 2003, approved the present Considerations, adopted in the Ordinary Session of this Congregation, and ordered their publication.
Rome, from the Offices of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, June 3, 2003, Memorial of Saint Charles Lwanga and his Companions, Martyrs.
Joseph Card. RatzingerPrefect
Angelo Amato, S.D.B.Titular Archbishop of SilaSecretary
NOTES
(1) Cf. John Paul II, Angelus Messages of February 20, 1994, and of June 19, 1994; Address to the Plenary Meeting of the Pontifical Council for the Family (March 24, 1999); Catechism of the Catholic Church, Nos. 2357-2359, 2396; Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Declaration Persona humana (December 29, 1975), 8; Letter on the pastoral care of homosexual persons (October 1, 1986); Some considerations concerning the response to legislative proposals on the non-discrimination of homosexual persons (July 24, 1992); Pontifical Council for the Family, Letter to the Presidents of the Bishops' Conferences of Europe on the resolution of the European Parliament regarding homosexual couples (March 25, 1994); Family, marriage and “de facto” unions (July 26, 2000), 23.
(2) Cf. Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Doctrinal Note on some questions regarding the participation of Catholics in political life (November 24, 2002), 4.
(3) Cf. Second Vatican Council, Pastoral Constitution Gaudium et spes, 48.
(4) Catechism of the Catholic Church, No. 2357.
(5) Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Declaration Persona humana (December 29, 1975), 8.
(6) Cf., for example, St. Polycarp, Letter to the Philippians, V, 3; St. Justin Martyr, First Apology, 27, 1-4; Athenagoras, Supplication for the Christians, 34.
(7) Catechism of the Catholic Church, No. 2358; cf. Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Letter on the pastoral care of homosexual persons (October 1, 1986), 10.
(8) Cf. Catechism of the Catholic Church, No. 2359; cf. Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Letter on the pastoral care of homosexual persons (October 1, 1986), 12.
(9) Catechism of the Catholic Church, No. 2358.
(10) Ibid., No. 2396.
(11) Cf. John Paul II, Encyclical Letter Evangelium vitae (March 25, 1995), 71.
(12) Cf. ibid., 72.
(13) Cf. St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, I-II, q. 95, a. 2.
(14) John Paul II, Encyclical Letter Evangelium vitae (March 25, 1995), 90.
(15) Cf. Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Instruction Donum vitae (February 22, 1987), II. A. 1-3.
(16) Cf. St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, II-II, q. 63, a.1, c.
(17) It should not be forgotten that there is always “a danger that legislation which would make homosexuality a basis for entitlements could actually encourage a person with a homosexual orientation to declare his homosexuality or even to seek a partner in order to exploit the provisions of the law” (Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Some considerations concerning the response to legislative proposals on the non-discrimination of homosexual persons [July 24, 1992], 14).
(18) John Paul II, Encyclical Letter Evangelium vitae (March 25, 1995), 73.
Wednesday, July 20, 2005
Fr. Walter Cuenin and "gay rights."
Carol M. McKinley over at Magisterial fidelity: http://carolmckinley.blogspot.com/ just posted this:
"Fr. Walter Cuenin is pastor of Our Lady Help of Christians in the Archdiocese of Boston and one of the most visible priests in the archdiocese. At a public hearing for the Defense of Marriage Amendment, he testified that the amendment seemed to violate the Catechism of the Catholic Church.Why? Because homosexual marriage was a human rights issue, Fr. Cuenin argued. Fr. Cuenin quoted the Vatican II document Gaudium et Spes, testifying that all forms of social or cultural discrimination of personal rights must be curbed and eradicated as incompatible with God's design. "
But would the Defense of Marriage Amendment really "violate" the teaching of the Catechism of the Catholic Church? In a word, no. The Catechism of the Catholic Church teaches us that: "The number of men and women who have deep-seated homosexual tendencies is not negligible. This inclination, which is objectively disordered, constitutes for most of them a trial. They must be accepted with respect, compassion, and sensitivity. Every sign of unjust discrimination in their regard should be avoided..." (2358).
The qualifier in this passage from the Catechism is the word "unjust." Not every from of discrimination with regard to homosexual persons is "unjust." It must be remembered that, strictly speaking, human beings only possess contingent rights. That is to say, rights which have been accorded to us by God. As a consequence, we only have a right to do that which is pleasing to God. God has given us the free will to choose that which is good or evil. If we choose to do a certain evil, we cannot say that we have a "right" to do that thing. Only God has rights which belong to Him of His very nature. Only He possesses intrinsic rights.
The teaching of the Catechism is clear regarding marriage: "The intimate community of life and love which constitutes the married state has been established by the Creator and endowed with its own proper laws. God himself is the author of marriage. The vocation to marriage is written in the very nature of man and woman as they came from the hand of the Creator. Marriage is not a purely human institution.." (CCC, 1603). And again, "Holy Scripture affirms that man and woman were created for one another: 'It is not good that the man should be alone.' The woman, 'flesh of his flesh,' his equal, his nearest in all things, is given to him by God as a 'helpmate'; she thus represents God from whom comes our help. 'Therefore a man leaves his father and his mother and cleaves to his wife, and they become one flesh.' The Lord himself shows that this signifies an unbreakable union of their two lives by recalling what the plan of the Creator had been 'in the beginning': 'So they are no longer two, but one flesh.'" (CCC, 1605).
Since marriage is an institution which has God as its Author, we are not free to "forget its common and permanent characteristics" (CCC, 1603). Marriage is between a man and a woman. Period. Such is God's Will. Such is God's plan.
And what of Fr. Cuenin's attempt to use Gaudium et Spes, No. 29 to promote the idea of sodomite marriage? Let's read what this passage says:
"True, all men are not alike from the point of view of varying physical power and the diversity of intellectual and moral resources. Nevertheless, with respect to the fundamental rights of the person, every type of discrimination, whether social or cultural, whether based on sex, race, color, social condition, language or religion, is to be overcome and eradicated as contrary to God's intent. For in truth it must still be regretted that fundamental personal rights are still not being universally honored. Such is the case of a woman who is denied the right to choose a husband freely, to embrace a state of life or to acquire an education or cultural benefits equal to those recognized for men."
This passage is actually quite clear. Unless you're a liberal cleric with the cognotive functioning of a snail. This passage is dealing with "fundamental rights." But no one has a "right" to engage in homosexual acts any more than they possess a right to rob banks or commit adultery. And marriage implies sexual activity. Dr. Germain Grisez explains that:
"Different people have different weaknesses and experience different temptations. Whether caused by natural factors or by culture, morally burdensome characteristics for which individuals are not responsible should not be used as an excuse for discriminating against them, and doing so would be similar to discriminating on the basis of race, religion, and so on. In this sense, sexual orientation should be included in the list of bases of unjust discrimination. However, in speaking of sexual orientation, many people actually mean readiness to engage in homosexual activity, and in this sense sexual orientation should not be listed among the bases of unjust discrimination. For homosexual activity is gravely wrong and so, like any other kind of grave wrong, provides a reasonable basis for DEALING DIFFERENTLY with those who voluntarily engage in it, both for their own good, the protection of other individuals, and the well-being of society as a whole."
Bottom line: Father Walter Cuenin doesn't understand the Church's teaching on marriage, her teaching as to what constitutes a right and, consequently, her interpretation of Gaudium et Spes, No. 29.
One has to hope (and pray) that Archbishop Sean O' Malley will address these issues with him...and soon.
Paul Anthony Melanson
"Fr. Walter Cuenin is pastor of Our Lady Help of Christians in the Archdiocese of Boston and one of the most visible priests in the archdiocese. At a public hearing for the Defense of Marriage Amendment, he testified that the amendment seemed to violate the Catechism of the Catholic Church.Why? Because homosexual marriage was a human rights issue, Fr. Cuenin argued. Fr. Cuenin quoted the Vatican II document Gaudium et Spes, testifying that all forms of social or cultural discrimination of personal rights must be curbed and eradicated as incompatible with God's design. "
But would the Defense of Marriage Amendment really "violate" the teaching of the Catechism of the Catholic Church? In a word, no. The Catechism of the Catholic Church teaches us that: "The number of men and women who have deep-seated homosexual tendencies is not negligible. This inclination, which is objectively disordered, constitutes for most of them a trial. They must be accepted with respect, compassion, and sensitivity. Every sign of unjust discrimination in their regard should be avoided..." (2358).
The qualifier in this passage from the Catechism is the word "unjust." Not every from of discrimination with regard to homosexual persons is "unjust." It must be remembered that, strictly speaking, human beings only possess contingent rights. That is to say, rights which have been accorded to us by God. As a consequence, we only have a right to do that which is pleasing to God. God has given us the free will to choose that which is good or evil. If we choose to do a certain evil, we cannot say that we have a "right" to do that thing. Only God has rights which belong to Him of His very nature. Only He possesses intrinsic rights.
The teaching of the Catechism is clear regarding marriage: "The intimate community of life and love which constitutes the married state has been established by the Creator and endowed with its own proper laws. God himself is the author of marriage. The vocation to marriage is written in the very nature of man and woman as they came from the hand of the Creator. Marriage is not a purely human institution.." (CCC, 1603). And again, "Holy Scripture affirms that man and woman were created for one another: 'It is not good that the man should be alone.' The woman, 'flesh of his flesh,' his equal, his nearest in all things, is given to him by God as a 'helpmate'; she thus represents God from whom comes our help. 'Therefore a man leaves his father and his mother and cleaves to his wife, and they become one flesh.' The Lord himself shows that this signifies an unbreakable union of their two lives by recalling what the plan of the Creator had been 'in the beginning': 'So they are no longer two, but one flesh.'" (CCC, 1605).
Since marriage is an institution which has God as its Author, we are not free to "forget its common and permanent characteristics" (CCC, 1603). Marriage is between a man and a woman. Period. Such is God's Will. Such is God's plan.
And what of Fr. Cuenin's attempt to use Gaudium et Spes, No. 29 to promote the idea of sodomite marriage? Let's read what this passage says:
"True, all men are not alike from the point of view of varying physical power and the diversity of intellectual and moral resources. Nevertheless, with respect to the fundamental rights of the person, every type of discrimination, whether social or cultural, whether based on sex, race, color, social condition, language or religion, is to be overcome and eradicated as contrary to God's intent. For in truth it must still be regretted that fundamental personal rights are still not being universally honored. Such is the case of a woman who is denied the right to choose a husband freely, to embrace a state of life or to acquire an education or cultural benefits equal to those recognized for men."
This passage is actually quite clear. Unless you're a liberal cleric with the cognotive functioning of a snail. This passage is dealing with "fundamental rights." But no one has a "right" to engage in homosexual acts any more than they possess a right to rob banks or commit adultery. And marriage implies sexual activity. Dr. Germain Grisez explains that:
"Different people have different weaknesses and experience different temptations. Whether caused by natural factors or by culture, morally burdensome characteristics for which individuals are not responsible should not be used as an excuse for discriminating against them, and doing so would be similar to discriminating on the basis of race, religion, and so on. In this sense, sexual orientation should be included in the list of bases of unjust discrimination. However, in speaking of sexual orientation, many people actually mean readiness to engage in homosexual activity, and in this sense sexual orientation should not be listed among the bases of unjust discrimination. For homosexual activity is gravely wrong and so, like any other kind of grave wrong, provides a reasonable basis for DEALING DIFFERENTLY with those who voluntarily engage in it, both for their own good, the protection of other individuals, and the well-being of society as a whole."
Bottom line: Father Walter Cuenin doesn't understand the Church's teaching on marriage, her teaching as to what constitutes a right and, consequently, her interpretation of Gaudium et Spes, No. 29.
One has to hope (and pray) that Archbishop Sean O' Malley will address these issues with him...and soon.
Paul Anthony Melanson
Tuesday, July 19, 2005
Our Lady: Coredemptrix
Please read this excellent article from: www.marymediatrix.com
Behold Your Mother: The Fifth Marian Dogma by Fr. Peter Damian M. Fehlner, FI, STD
When our Lord just before dying and consummating His redemptive sacrifice on the Cross addressed these words (cf. Jn 19, 25-27) to the beloved disciple John (and through him to all of us) and told John (and through him also every one of us) to take her into our homes-hearts, He was also telling us to behold, contemplate her as His compassionate Mother and ours, viz., as the WOMAN, the IMMACULATE COREDEMPTRIX.
A great deal has been said and written in recent years concerning the possibility and need to define dogmatically the Marian titles of Coredemptrix, Mediatrix of all graces and Advocate, a “fifth” Marian dogma: divine Maternity, perpetual Virginity, Immaculate Conception, Assumption being the first four, with that of the Coredemption, etc., said by some to be the “final” Marian dogma in the sense that such a definition would, with the preceding four Marian dogmas, round out and render definitive the Marian synthesis in part sketched in chapter 8 of the dogmatic constitution Lumen Gentium of Vatican II.
In many academic circles, including the theological, such proposals have not met with favor, indeed often enough with rather decided and occasionally violent opposition. Such proposals are seen in those circles, not as an integration of the doctrine of Vatican II, but as a reversion to an outmoded way of theologizing about the Mother of God with unmistakable signs of a devotionalism or Marian maximalism incompatible with and embarrassing to the ecumenism sponsored by Vatican II and promoted by the present Holy Father.
Were the issue only one of devotional practice (a type of orthopraxis), the critics of the movement might have a case. Devotion qua actus humanus admits of too much and of too little. As even the critics implicitly admit, however, rather than moderation in the exercise of Marian devotion, the primary issue is the nature of orthopraxis itself as guided by dogmatic faith, indeed as encapsulating that faith at its heart. To the person who does not believe in the divine, virginal maternity any form of hyperdulia is too much by definition. Whereas for someone who does accept and believe in the dogma of Ephesus any devotion of his in practice seems too little in contrast with the devotion God’s own Son in fact has given and continues to give to His Mother in observing the fourth commandment.
The point might be put in the form of a question thus: what is the measure of too much (maximalism) or of too little (minimalism) devotion to Our Lady? De Maria numquam satis! From a purely pragmatic standpoint the old axiom guiding the Marian piety so many Saints east and west is simply indefensible. From a dogmatic standpoint it may well be the only acceptable guideline. St. Bonaventure says (Sermo I de purificatione) that he had never heard of a Saint without devotion to Mary or a great Saint without great, viz., maximal, devotion to the Virgin Mother.
What in principle defines maximal Marian devotion? Obviously the title Theotokos – Dei Genitrix. But like the NAME Jesus – Jahweh or He Who Is -, the actual honor due those NAMES is proximately defined in virtue of their roles in the great sacrificial work on Calvary, continued in the mystery of the Eucharist in the Church. St. Paul writes to the Philippians, ch. 2, v. 9: “For which reason – namely Jesus’ sacrificial obedience – God (viz., the Father) has given Him a NAME above every other name, before which every knee in heaven, on earth and under the earth (the trina mundi machina) must bend and every tongue proclaim Jesus is in the glory of God the Father.” Rendering such honor has always been recognized in the liturgy to include in some way the Mother of the Savior before and above all others. The Communicantes et memoriam venerantes in primis beatae et semper gloriosae Virginis Mariae Matris Dei et Domini nostri Jesu Christi… of the Roman Canon puts it concisely. The ancient Marian hymn Quem terra, pontus, aetera alludes to this in referring to Mary as the one who bore the trinam regentem machinam.
Granted, a rejoinder might be: how important is such a doctrinal consideration? After all do not questions of mariology occupy a rather decidedly subordinate and lower rung of the veritatum hierarchia, on the margin rather than at the core of theological discussion, particularly today?
To this the supporters of a definition reply in the negative. Questions of mariology, particularly that of the coredemption and its corollaries: the universal maternal mediation and advocacy of Mary in the Church unique to her, directly touch upon the central question of our theology and spirituality, the wisdom of the Cross and the meaning of the Pauline phrase: one God (the Father) and one Mediator of all the man-God Jesus, sole Redeemer (cf. I Tim. 2, 5-6). Is the famous dictum Christus solus Redemptor based on this passage of St. Paul exclusive or inclusive of Mary?
This is in the final analysis what the debate over the title Coredemptress is about and why it is the central debate of contemporary theology – as indeed it was clearly that on the eve of Vatican II. Those tending to accent the importance of Marian devotion in the life of the Church and of its members, indeed of all men, were known as “christotypologists”, viz., those who stressed the uniqueness of Mary in pertaining to “the order of the hypostatic union” and so her unique place in the Church as “preeminent” member of the Church; whereas those who tended to downplay such devotion and not differentiate it specifically from the veneration or dulia paid the other saints and from their intercessory role were known as “ecclesiotypologists”.
The first group insisted on the active, though subordinate role of the Virgin in the great sacrificial act whereby the Redeemer effected our ransom. The second group would not concede to Mary on Calvary more than a mere “passive” exemplarity vis-Ã -vis the Church. As in every other great christological controversy of the past two millennia the resolution of the Marian issue determines how in theory and practice the christological issue is resolved.
And in the past, without exception, affirming the Marian not only as close to but as inseparable from the core of Christian theology: no Christ without Mary, no Christian theology without also being Marian theology, has been the condition for a maximal recognition of the NAME; denying that has been the prelude to banalizing the NAME. A priori we may logically expect in virtue of this principle Card. Newman formulated so concisely (cf. the sermon entitled “The Glories of Mary for the Sake of Her Son” in Discourse to Mixed Congregations (London 1899) pp. 342-359) that the “christotypical” approach to the question of the Coredemption rather than the ecclesiotypical is the one calculated to give the maximal glory to the NAME of Redeemer, and that such glory will be given by every tongue by merging with Mary’s: Et exsultavit spiritus meus in Deo Salvatori meo (or salutari meo). This is what the NAME Jesus means as translated by St. Jerome – God is my Savior (or my Salvation). Only by venerating Mary under the title COREDEMPTRESS can we harmonize our praise of the Savior for the redemption which He has wrought for us.
Dogmatic definitions do indeed impact on theology and theologians, but they do so because first of all they are doxological acts of the entire Church, acts which have always involved the Mother of the Church, Mater et Magistra Apostolorum (St. Bonaventure).
Now it is true that Vatican II did not choose to employ the title Coredemptress, and only sparingly used that of Mediatrix. But neither did the Council forbid their use as critics of the proposed definition never cease to repeat. The Council for pastoral reasons abstained from deciding the doctrinal question then debated and still debated. But the Council did not forbid the study of this question, indeed the Church encourages such study. And any fair reading of chapter 8 of Lumen Gentium indicates that promotion of those titles matches exactly the thrust both of tradition and of Vatican II.
Another way of formulating the central issue of modern theology is this: joint predestination of Jesus and Mary as the centerpiece of the economy of salvation, or Christ alone. The genius of Luther, apart from whether one likes or dislikes him, agrees or disagrees with him, was to have formulated the question in that way: a spirituality whose primary mode is either Marian or not, a theology of the cross whose primary mode is defined with or without the Coredemptress. Luther unfortunately chose the “without Coredemptress” option, despite himself thereby underscoring the Marian dimension of “our theology” (Bl. John Duns Scotus) and every major theological question to be the key to its resolution.
The Catholic reply has always been: by the eternal counsels of God the “Christ alone” includes Mary without confusion of persons, indeed as a means to identifying and worshiping her Son as God and Savior. For her inclusion thus is the divinely appointed instrument of His Incarnation, of His redemptive work and of its application. Whence Marian devotion, as St. Bonaventure insists in commenting the purification-presentation of Jesus and Mary, is the primary, fundamental, distinctive feature of all Christian life, thought, sanctity, joy. It is not possible in virtue of the only divine salvific dispensation to be Christ-like without being Mary-like (Paul VI, at the sanctuary of Bonaria in Sardinia, 1970), for the simple reason that God became like us in becoming like Mary, viz., her Son.
Extensive research, in the past and currently, has amply demonstrated that the doctrine now known in theology as the coredemption is no mere theological opinion, whose content at least has been explicitly asserted by the Magisterium, on occasion with the use of this title as with Pope Pius XI and Pope John Paul II. Hence there can be no question of its truth, only of the opportuneness of a definition, either because of insufficiently precise articulation, and/or because the best moment for such a definition to be maximally beneficial for the Church and the salvation of souls has not arrived.
In the light of this the major objections to the doctrine: whether these be taken to refer to its truth or to the opportuneness of its dogmatic definition, take on quite a different color. Rather than demonstrate the promotors of the definition to be “maximalists”, they serve quite effectively to rivet attention on the central place of the mystery of Mary at the foot of the cross and aside the altar in the life and thought of the Church.
The objections are many, but in great part reducible to three types or categories. The first might be dubbed the generic, in the sense that support of a definition of the coredemption rests on a concept of theology rendered obsolete by Vatican II. But how could such an assumption tirelessly repeated by the critics be true? It would invalidate Vatican II. And the complementary proposition, that Vatican II in lauching a “new style” in theology “more biblically, ecumenically, pastorally sensitive” forbade the use of terminology and methods characteristic of the preconciliar mariology and indispensable to a defense of the coredemptive thesis, appears nowhere in the documents of Vatican II. The “preconciliar” mariology was not “unbiblical, anti-ecumenical, pastorally insensitive”. Dogmatic mariology as traditionally practiced in the Church, nowhere more so than when focusing on the coredemption, is the only kind of theology which can aspire to being profoundly biblical, ecumenical and pastorally sensitive.
The second type of objection might be dubbed the ecumenical because the objectors claim coredemption poses an insurmountable obstacle to ecumenism to which the Church is now committed. Objections of this type from non-Catholics are made to demonstrate the impossibility of the doctrine; by Catholics to prove why a definition is inopportune. One version of the objection will claim that affirming the coredemption detracts from the unique, distinctive role of Jesus as Redeemer. The simplest, most telling exposure of what is wrong with the argument is to retort it: if this is so, then the title Mother of God is even more a detraction. The fact is the affirmation of the divine, virginal Maternity affirms and reveals the distinct divine person of the Child of Mary. The affirmation of the maternal Coredemption affirms and reveals the distinct character of her Child’s redemptive work.
The other version touches on the pneumatological. To proclaim Mary as Coredemptress is to put her in the place of the Holy Spirit. In reply: not to proclaim Mary as Coredemptress is to revive the old Joachimism, to divorce in practice the mission of the Holy Spirit from that of the Son, the canonical or institutional aspects of the Church from the charismatic, and in the end to permit the evil spirit to occupy the place of the Holy Spirit in the economy of salvation. Both theoretically and practically resolution of key issues touching the bases of a Christian spirituality revolves about the relation of the Virgin to the Holy Spirit: is she in the words of St. Francis Spouse of the Holy Spirit and therefore Mother of God? Is she in the words of St. Maximilian the created Immaculate Conception because the Holy Spirit is the uncreated Immaculate Conception, therefore Coredemptress and Mediatrix of all graces?
The traditional Catholic affirmative in response to such questions helps us to deal with the third type of objection: cultural irrelevance of the traditional approach in mariology which converges on the mystery of the Coredemption today. It is just this affirmative which enables us to grasp the mythical character of the generation gap and cultural gulf. No such gap-gulf exists requiring a radical departure from the traditional dogmatic mariology, precisely and above all because of the IMMACULATE WOMAN of Genesis 3: 15, who is the Virgin Mother and victorious Coredemptress.
The third International Symposium on Marian Coredemption was held at Downside Abbey, August 20-26, 2002. The conferences presented at the first two symposia, both held in England, in 2000 and 2001, have been published in two volumes: Mary at the Foot of the Cross (New Bedford, MA, Academy of the Immaculate). For those who participated in the past symposia, these volumes will provide ample illustration of how the doctrine can be studied in depth and presented in a way at once traditional and contemporary, while taking account of the various cultural dimensions of this mystery touching the very center of a theology and spirituality of the cross. You can order these volumes from our online bookstore Immaculate Heart Bookstore
Paul
Monday, July 18, 2005
Antichrist ready to reveal himself?
Christina Gallagher, a stigmatist from Ireland, claims to have been given this message recently. The text may also be found at:http://www.spiritdaily.com
Paul
FOR YOUR DISCERNMENT: MESSAGE FROM ALLEGED IRISH SEER
[Below is a message alleged to come from the Virgin Mary to a widely-known Irish seer, Christina Gallagher. We submit it in the spirit of the Bible, which tells us to weigh such claims and take from them what may be good, while realizing that controversies swirl around this particular situation and that fasting is necessary to discern]
"My Children, today I speak to your hearts. I plead with you to open your hearts to Me. I am the Mother of your Saviour. I desire to help you and save you in soul. So many of you live your lives as if tomorrow will last forever."You cannot recognize the signs of the times you live in. You cannot see how the evil one is stealing the youth of your country and the world, in seduction through suicide, drugs, alcohol, lust, lack of faith and confusion."My dear children, I desire you to wake up before it is too late. Many changes will have taken place one year from now. There will be many of you caught in the web of the evil one, more deeply than you realize. Others among you will be called unprepared from your earthly life. I call you, my children, into the Light and Life of My Son, Jesus."I plead with you to hear and live My call, and to open your hearts in love, to receive the message I give you. I beg you to respond to My call as never before. Your worldly existence as you know it to be, will soon come into a great crisis."The purification is upon you, and few of you are prepared. I weep for your safety. You will see many upheavals in the world. You will experience the climate changes more and more. There will be many abnormal calamities, throughout the world. The changes in the season’s behaviour have already begun, but will increase and intensify, floods in many parts of the world beyond normal capacity, mud slides, typhoons, earthquakes and many many other abnormal and strange happenings. You have been given the gift of Pope Benedict to fulfil the work needed to be completed, but pray, pray for him."The Church of My Son, Jesus, is experiencing the labour pains of its purification. Many will run. Others will hide, like scattered sheep and My poor lambs whom they have permitted to stray. But, Jesus will shepherd His poor little lambs that are lost. "My daughter, you have endured so deeply for souls. I weep for your pain and lack of protection. I love and thank My dear children who receive the call of My Son, Jesus, in surrender, to fulfil some of My urgent works which I have asked for. Be at peace, My daughter the light has been put between you and your adversary. Soon you will be led into the battle between Light and Darkness, more intensely. Be not afraid of him who is in the world, and is antichrist, leading many souls to destruction. You have nothing to fear from him. Neither have those who follow My call, through you in Truth, to safety of soul. "Those of My dear children who have responded to the call of My Son, I tell you, be joyous, you will have life eternal. Those who have stood in mockery and gossip and were unhelpful to fulfil My message will truly find their just reward, and will experience justice in the hour of their Lord. My children who find it difficult to uproot themselves from their worldly possessions will find it impossible to permit the inrootment of the life of God in their souls."They will fall like weeds that need to be plucked from your garden. There are many who are luke warm, running to and fro causing confusion in their own hearts and the hearts of others. "My daughter, I love and bless all my children, but especially those who have helped you in your pain and endurance, thus enabling you to continue your mission for souls. They will truly receive Life in My Son and will be saved from the adversity of the evil one."One day they will be with Me in their Father’s House."My daughter, I love you in My Motherly Heart. The worlds inhabitants will endure much. Control of the beast is at hand. Oh how your lives will change through being controlled. Be not afraid I beg you, open your hearts and respond with your lives to My call. There you will find Life."I bless you, Father, Son and Holy Spirit."
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