As noted here, "Pope Francis on Sunday awarded medals to American actors Richard Gere and George Clooney and actress Salma Hayek at an event held at the Vatican to promote the work of a foundation inspired by the pontiff, Scholas Occurrentes.
Clooney attended the event with his wife Amal, a lawyer."
It was George Clooney who said that, "At some point in our lifetime, gay marriage won't be an issue, and everyone who stood against this civil right will look as outdated as George Wallace standing on the school steps keeping James Hood from entering the University of Alabama because he was black."
This would, of course, include the Catholic Church and all those of good will who accept the Natural Law.
Francis has asserted that, "The Catholic Church should not dismiss out of hand civil unions, but should study them" and that, "the issue of gay marriage should be studied and not dismissed out-of-hand.." Small wonder that he sees no problem with awarding Clooney at the Vatican.
The sin of homosexuality, [and here we are speaking of homosexual acts] is condemned in both the Old and New Testaments. Saint Peter, our first Pope, in his Second Epistle, says:
"And reducing the cities of the Sodomites, and of the Gomorrhites, into ashes, God condemned them to be overthrown, making them an example to those that should afterwards act wickedly. And he delivered just Lot, oppressed by the injustice and lewd conversation of the wicked." (2 Peter 2: 6-7).
The sin of homosexuality has been condemned by Fathers and Doctors of the Church, and by the Popes, for 2,000 years. And with good reason, Saint Peter Damian [himself a Doctor of the Church] explains that the sin "should not be considered an ordinary vice, for it surpasses all of them in enormity." (The Book of Gomorrah).
The Catechism of the Catholic Church tells us that: "Basing itself on Sacred Scripture, which presents homosexual acts as acts of grave depravity, tradition has always declared that 'homosexual acts are intrinsically disordered.'" (2357). Which is why, in his 1994 Angelus Address, protesting against a special resolution crafted by the European Parliament encouraging the nations of Europe to approve homosexual "marriage," Pope John Paul II said that, "What is not morally acceptable, however, is the legalization of homosexual acts. To show understanding towards the person who sins, towards the person who is not in the process of freeing himself from this tendency, does not at all mean to diminish the demands of the moral norm (cf. Veritatis Splendor, No. 95)...
But we must say that what was intended with the European Parliament's resolution was the legitimization of a moral disorder. Parliament improperly conferred an institutional value to a conduct that is deviant and not in accordance with God's plan...Forgetting the words of Christ 'The truth shall set you free' (John 8:32), an attempt was made to show the people of our continent a moral evil, a deviance, a certain slavery, as a form of liberation, falsifying the very essence of the family."
But Pope Francis has implied that respect for homosexual persons, which should consist of an authentic charity which shows them the unnatural lie they have embraced and that they should view with horror the sin in which they find themselves, might mean changing the Church's teaching.
But the Church teaches otherwise. The CDF has taught authoritatively that, "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." (Considerations Regarding Proposals to Give Legal Recognition to Unions Between Homosexual Persons, 4).
Pray for the Church, infiltrated by Masonry.

Tuesday, May 31, 2016
Saturday, May 28, 2016
Father Dwight Longenecker and The Open Conspiracy
“And they adored the beast, saying, who is like to the beast? And who shall be able to fight with him?” (Revelation 13:4).
As Rev. P. Huchede explains in his book History of Antichrist, “All vile parasites of fortune, astonished at the rapidity with which Antichrist achieves his conquests and also at the unlimited sway of his power, deceived by his prodigies, will prostrate themselves before him and adore him as their god. As soon as he believes himself master of the bodies and souls of all peoples, he will decree and proclaim his divinity and establish a new religion. According to the Apostle, he will lift himself up above all that is called God or that is worshipped, so that he sitteth in the temple of God showing himself as if he were God (2 Thessalonians 2:4). He will command all peoples to place his statue in the public places to be worshipped, the image of the beast whose wound was healed (Revelation 13: 13-15)…..Then he shall think himself able to change times and laws – religious, political, and sacred – by which the world had been governed up to his advent (Daniel 7: 25)…None but adorers of this new god can enjoy the possession of riches or honors. This god shall increase their glory and shall give them power over many and shall divide the land for nothing (Revelation 13: 7)….Those who will refuse to obey his impious orders shall be the object of a terrible and universal persecution….No language can give an adequate idea of the atrocity and effects of this frightful persecution. “I beheld and lo that horn made war against the saints, and prevailed over them” (Daniel 7: 21). The beast shall make war against the saints and shall overcome them and kill them (Revelation 11: 7). And he “shall crush the saints of the Most High” (Daniel 7: 25). And he will put to death all those who will not adore the image of the beast (Revelation 13: 15). Then the truth shall be oppressed. The Church shall see her children apostatize in vast numbers, and in the agony of her heart-rending grief, she will cry out in the words of her divine spouse, ‘My God, My God, why hast thou forsaken me?’ (Mark 15: 34). Then by order of the tyrant the continual sacrifice shall be abolished (Daniel 9: 27). The holy sacrifice of the Mass shall no longer be offered up publicly on the altars. The Church shall be devastated; the sacred vessels desecrated; the priests shall be scattered and separated from their flocks and put to death….The Church has taken up her abode in the catacombs.” (History of Antichrist, pp. 23-26, Tan Books).
In order for the new religion of humanitarianism to succeed, all dissenting voices will have to be either converted, silenced or removed. The Reign of Antichrist, which will be presented as an age of “love and harmony” will have to be brutally violent in order to achieve world unity. There are already many voices which have called or are calling for such a “global purge” or “cleansing action.” Harvard historian Arthur Schlesinger, Jr, in the July-August 1995 edition of Foreign Affairs, said that, “We are not going to achieve a new world order without paying for it in blood as well as in words and money.” Likewise, David Spangler, Director of Planetary Initiative at the United Nations, has said, “Lucifer comes to give us the final Luciferic initiation…that many people now and in the days ahead, will be facing – for it is an initiation into the New Age…No one will enter the New World Order unless he or she will make a pledge to worship Lucifer. No one will enter the New Age unless he will take a Luciferian initiation.” Benjamin Crème, another prominent New Age “prophet,” on page 128 of “Maitreya’s mission,” insists that those who refuse to join in this World Initiation will find themselves in the minority and will have to “withdraw from this life.” Creme exhorts his followers to, “Be not afraid, therefore, when the ‘men of cloth’ raise their voices against the Great Lord, naming Him anti-Christ and arch-deceiver, for they know little of the laws which underlie their faiths and act and speak from ignorance and fear.” (April, 1997).
In the New Order, a Police State will employ the use of various technologies to keep the citizenry in line. In the words of Zbigniew Brzezinski, “The Technocratic Age is slowly designing an every day more controlled society. The society will be dominated by an elite of persons free from traditional values who will have no doubt in fulfilling their objectives by means of purged techniques with which they will influence the behavior of people and will control and watch society in all details…it will become possible to exert a practically permanent watch on each citizen of the world.” Mr. Brzezinski is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations who has attended meetings of the Bilderberg Group.
This from LifeSite News. And already many are preparing to welcome the Man of Sin. See here
Within the Church herself, clerics who serve the Devil seek to discredit Catholics who hold to the Church's Tradition, to her authentic teaching. See here.
And while Father Longenecker is trashing those who refuse to prostitute their faith and genuflect before the Prince of this world, proponents of the Satanic Earth Charter are ecstatic. This because Pope Francis has endorsed the demonic movement in paragraph 207 of his encyclical.
"As can be seen from many recent documents from UN agencies like UNFPA, there is a trend for the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights to be supplanted by documents such as the Earth Charter. Man is considered to be the result of the evolution of matter, and he must agree to submit himself to the Great Whole. This, we are told, is the price to pay for "sustainable development". This view of Mother Earth denies man the central place in the world that was assigned to him in the 1948 Declaration. We must return to this anthropocentrism and this universalism, which was inspired by the Roman, Jewish, and Christian traditions and was brilliantly reaffirmed by the Renaissance, if we wish to save and protect human capital. The quintessential value is man and not the environment. Without men properly prepared to become responsible managers of Nature, Nature itself cannot but deteriorate and man cannot but vanish. This view of man and his relationship with nature necessitates a fully humanistic conception of development. This conception prompts us to revisit current educational, health, and food policies. It also prompts us to reconsider policies relating to women and families."
- Monsignor Michel Schooyans
Speaking about the Earth Charter and related globalism, Msgr. Michel Schooyans said, "In order to consolidate this holistic vision of globalism, certain obstacles have to be smoothed out and instruments put to work. Religions in general, and in the first place the Catholic religion, figure among the obstacles that have to be neutralized."
According to its founders, the Earth Charter is "a declaration of fundamental principles for building a just, sustainable, and peaceful global society in the 21st century." The Earth Charter Commission hopes that the Charter will become the common standard "by which the conduct of all individuals, organizations, businesses, governments, and transnational institutions [such as the Roman Catholic Church, my note] is to be guided and assessed."
The globalists who are behind the Earth Charter seek to promote a New Age religion which will neutralize the supernatural faith of Roman Catholicism. In the words of Archbishop Javier Lozano Barragan, "Clearly, we are faced with the total denial of Christianity."
Pope Francis in Laudato Si, No. 207: "The Earth Charter asked us to leave behind a period of self-destruction and make a new start." See here
H.G. Wells, himself a Socialist, had argued, traditional Christianity has been rendered "old-fashioned and unserviceable" [read obsolete] and religion must now "adapt itself" to our modern "forward looking turn of mind."
Enter the Earth Charter. According to its founders, the Earth Charter is "a declaration of fundamental principles for building a just, sustainable, and peaceful global society in the 21st century." The Earth Charter Commission hopes that the Charter will become the common standard "by which the conduct of all individuals, organizations, businesses, governments, and transnational institutions [such as the Roman Catholic Church, my note] is to be guided and assessed."
The globalists who are behind the Earth Charter seek to promote a New Age religion which will neutralize the supernatural faith of Roman Catholicism. In the words of Archbishop Javier Lozano Barragan, "Clearly, we are faced with the total denial of Christianity." Which is why Mikhael Gorbachev, at the three separate press conferences at the RIO + 5 Conference, said that, "The Ten Commandments are out of date. They will be replaced by the [then] fifteen principles of the Earth Charter.
The Termite Nations have dispensed with God and His Commandments in their quest for unbridled hedonism. We are being prepared for the Reign of Antichrist. The Rev. P. Huchede, in his work entitled "History of Antichrist," explains the religious preparation, both intellectual and moral, for the Reign of Antichrist which will arrive after economic collapse: "But how shall he deprive the world of Christianity and have himself adored as God? Alas, it is only too true that the minds and hearts of men are admirably disposed for revolution and consequently ready to accept and bear the cruel yoke of such a tyrant. Revolution as the word itself implies means a subversion, but a subversion of all that is true, good, beautiful, and grand in the universe. It is the subversion of religion, representing its dogmas as myths and its moral teachings as tyranical. It is the subversion of authority...
Licentiousness under the name of liberty becomes the order of the day; each one is invested with the right to govern himself. It is the subversion of reason: and do we not find leading minds in some of the most enlightened nations denying the principle of contradiction and maintaining the absolute identity of all beings? Revolution is therefore essentially destructive, and it becomes cosmopolitan by the action of secret societies scattered throughout the world. Is it not true to say that the 'mystery of iniquity' is prepared in secret revolutionary dens? But it does not suffice to destroy; it is absolutely necessary to build up again. The world cannot subsist long in a vacuum. It must have a religion; it must have a philosophy; it must have an authority. Revolution will furnish all these. Instead of the reasonable and supernatural religion of Jesus Christ, Revolution will preach Pantheism. The God-humanity will impart the theurgic spirit and thus lead men to adore the demon as the author of universal emancipation...What frightful immorality must follow in the train of this shameless prostitution of religion! Never has the threefold concupiscence made greater ravage among mankind. And this is the religion sought and hoped for as the cherished boon of the aspirations of our modern free thinkers. To our Christian philosophy, the honor of humanity's revolution will substitute a babel of extravagant and absurd ideas. Instead of a mild and efficient authority consecrated alike by Church and state, despotism and anarchy will rise up and contend for the shreds of religious liberty and human policy...if the state of perversion continue for a while longer, he [Antichrist] will find the world prepared to receive and serve him." (Rev. P. Huchede, History of Antichrist, pp. 13-14, Tan Books).
Father Huchede addresses the fact of the open conspiracy: "Is it not true to say that the "mystery of iniquity" is prepared in secret revolutionary dens?" This is the revolution called for by atheists, socialists, freemasons and all those who hate the Lord Jesus and His Mystical Body which is the Catholic Church. H.G. Wells described the goal of the Open Conspiracy as, "an adequately implemented Liberal Socialism, which will ultimately supply teaching, coercive and directive public services to the whole world" and added that this, "is the immediate task before all rational people...There must be a common faith and law for mankind" and this will be achieved through a "World-State."
Wednesday, May 25, 2016
Clerical abuse in the United States alone has cost more than three billion dollars
CatholicCulture.org reports:
"The clerical abuse scandal cost American dioceses and religious orders $141,283,794 between mid-2014 and mid-2015, according to a report released by the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB).

67% those funds were allotted to settlements ($87.1 million) and therapy for abuse victims ($8.8 million). The remaining funds were spent on attorneys’ fees ($30.1 million), support for offenders ($11.5 million), and other costs ($3.8 million), according to the 2015 “Report on the Implementation of the Charter for Protection of Children and Young People.”
These expenses brought the total cost of the clerical abuse scandal to American dioceses and religious institutes between 2004 and mid-2015 to $3,036,913,024, according to the data in the current report and previous reports. That figure does not include expenses incurred in lawsuits that were settled prior to 2004..."
More than three billion dollars spent on sexual abuse lawsuits and settlements in the United States alone. Tragic. Imagine the good that could have been done with all that money. Instead of closing Churches and Catholic schools, we could have been building them. Money that could have been spent on evangelization and building up God's Kingdom here on earth spent instead on the damage inflicted by [for the Most part] homosexual clerics who never should have been ordained in the first place.
This culture of sodomy has made extensive inroads into the Church. For nearly 25 years I've been calling on the Church to address the homosexual problem amongst the clergy.
When Bishop Fabian Bruskewitz proposed "Amendment 27" to his brothers in the Episcopate - stipulating that the "current homosexual culture" was the root cause of the sex abuse crisis - his proposal was rejected on a voice vote.
Father Charles Fiore, a Catholic priest who has fought the homosexual subculture in the Church for years, once said, "the grand taboo in U.S. culture is to focus on homosexuality."
Can we afford not to address this taboo any longer? Especially since the greater cost comes in the form of shattered lives and damaged souls created in the Imago Dei?
Year of mercy? Give me a break!
Three billion dollars! Dear Jesus, mercy.
Graph depicting the homosexual nature of most abuse cases courtesy of Renew America.
"The clerical abuse scandal cost American dioceses and religious orders $141,283,794 between mid-2014 and mid-2015, according to a report released by the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB).

67% those funds were allotted to settlements ($87.1 million) and therapy for abuse victims ($8.8 million). The remaining funds were spent on attorneys’ fees ($30.1 million), support for offenders ($11.5 million), and other costs ($3.8 million), according to the 2015 “Report on the Implementation of the Charter for Protection of Children and Young People.”
These expenses brought the total cost of the clerical abuse scandal to American dioceses and religious institutes between 2004 and mid-2015 to $3,036,913,024, according to the data in the current report and previous reports. That figure does not include expenses incurred in lawsuits that were settled prior to 2004..."
More than three billion dollars spent on sexual abuse lawsuits and settlements in the United States alone. Tragic. Imagine the good that could have been done with all that money. Instead of closing Churches and Catholic schools, we could have been building them. Money that could have been spent on evangelization and building up God's Kingdom here on earth spent instead on the damage inflicted by [for the Most part] homosexual clerics who never should have been ordained in the first place.
This culture of sodomy has made extensive inroads into the Church. For nearly 25 years I've been calling on the Church to address the homosexual problem amongst the clergy.
When Bishop Fabian Bruskewitz proposed "Amendment 27" to his brothers in the Episcopate - stipulating that the "current homosexual culture" was the root cause of the sex abuse crisis - his proposal was rejected on a voice vote.
Father Charles Fiore, a Catholic priest who has fought the homosexual subculture in the Church for years, once said, "the grand taboo in U.S. culture is to focus on homosexuality."
Can we afford not to address this taboo any longer? Especially since the greater cost comes in the form of shattered lives and damaged souls created in the Imago Dei?
Year of mercy? Give me a break!
Three billion dollars! Dear Jesus, mercy.
Graph depicting the homosexual nature of most abuse cases courtesy of Renew America.
Monday, May 23, 2016
Men are leaving the Catholic Church because it has become feminized...
Some years ago Wintery Knight observed: "On the Biola University site, I found a book review of a new book by David Murrow called “Why Men Hate Going to Church”.
Here’s the problem:
Here’s more:
The article goes on to quote one of my favorite Christian writers, Nancy Pearcey, an expert in apologetics and theology.
Christianity is evangelical, and evangelism takes study and preparation, which culminates in confrontations and discussions. The object of these discussions is not to win the argument. It is to win the person over to your side. So facts and arguments play a huge role in evangelism, but there has to be gentleness too, if you actually want to win. And this is what Christian men are supposed to do. But does the church support it?
Many women also don’t want to be confronted about their beliefs by informed men, because their beliefs are based more on intuition and emotion. They would rather be accepted and affirmed – and so they favor men who don’t know much about the details of Christianity. So manly Christian skills; theology, apologetics, ethics, philosophy, history, science, etc. are not valued in the feminized church.
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The Latin Vulgate (see the Douay-Rheims Bible) indicates that the effeminate will not inherit the Kingdom of God (1 Corinthians 6:10). But the New American Bible, which is used by the USCCB, omits the word effeminate:
1 Corinthians 6:9-10 (Latin Vulgate):
Verse 9: "Know you not that the unjust shall not possess the kingdom of God? Do not err: Neither fornicators nor idolaters nor adulterers:
an nescitis quia iniqui regnum Dei non possidebunt nolite errare neque fornicarii neque idolis servientes neque adulteri
Verse 10: Nor the effeminate nor liers with mankind nor thieves nor covetous nor drunkards nor railers nor extortioners shall possess the kingdom of God.
neque molles neque masculorum concubitores neque fures neque avari neque ebriosi neque maledici neque rapaces regnum Dei possidebunt."
1Corinthians 6: 9-10 (New American Bible) posted online by the USCCB:
Verse 9: "Do you not know that the unjust will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived; neither fornicators nor idolaters nor adulterers nor boy prostitutes nor sodomites
Verse 10: nor thieves nor the greedy nor drunkards nor slanderers nor robbers will inherit the kingdom of God."
Why do you think this is so? The Latin Vulgate, which we have obtained from the great St. Jerome, is the most precise translation of the Sacred Scriptures available. There are many other problems with recent translations of the Scriptures. But my focus here is on this passage. Why has the word "effeminate" been dropped from 1 Corinthians 6?
Dr. Leon Podles writes, "Walter Ong, having been formed in a masculine, Jesuit, clerical milieu does not seem to be aware of how feminized Christianity had become even before the 1960s, but he saw a rapid shift in the Catholic Church in the 1960s toward even greater feminization...The contrasts of Christianity, grace and sin, life and death, have been toned down with a considerable loss of emotional power. Without this power, the popular appeal of the liturgy has declined (even with a more accessible language) and church attendance has plummeted...Even the change from Latin to the vernacular was also a symptom of feminization, according to Ong. Latin had been a means of maintaining a Latin culture in the Roman Catholic clergy. A language restricted to men is common; it is a sign of masculine separation from the feminine world. After it became a learned language, Latin was learned almost exclusively by men. The system of education that used Latin and centered around Latin literature was centered around contest and disputation and was confined almost entirely to men. The disappearance of Latin was part of the demasculinization of the clergy.." (The Church Impotent: The Feminization of Christianity, pp. 133-135).
The Cult of Softness has made such inroads that it has crippled the inner life of the Church. Liturgy has been feminized And now, the Sacred Scriptures (the very Word of God) must be rewritten so as not to offend more "civilized" and "refined" tastes; so as not to offend "modern man." The Christian faith must be replaced by a self-worship which cloaks itself in language which purports to be Christian but which nevertheless remains a language which has been watered down to make it more acceptable to modernity.
Dr. Podles cites a study by Lewis M. Terman and Catherine Cox Miles, which included a Masculinity-Femininity test, writing, "Terman and Miles gathered data from three groups: Catholic seminarians, Protestant seminarians, and Protestant ministers. As one might expect, men attracted to the religious life differed strikingly in their masculinity from the general male population: 'The Catholic student priests score at a point far less masculine than any other male group of their age; in their early twenties they are more feminine than the general male population at middle life. The Protestant theological students in their middle twenties are, however, more feminine than they and exceed in femininity the sixty-year-old man of equal education. The adult ministerial group is barely more masculine than the Protestant theological students and less so than the student priests. They exceed in femininity the college men of the seventh decade.' Terman and Miles concluded that 'some dominant factors must be present in all three groups to make them, without regard to age, conspicuously and almost equally lacking in mental masculinity.' Interestingly enough, the similarities between the Protestant and Catholic groups and the Catholic group's slightly higher scores ruled out celibacy as a major factor in a lack of masculinity..." (P. 9).
Effeminacy (and here we are not necessarily speaking of homosexuality), has become the forgotten vice in seminary formation. This as many masculine men continue to be excluded from pursuing priestly vocations and masculinity itself is banished to the margins of the Church.
As a military veteran, I continue to witness firsthand the effects of the feminized Church. I have volunteered but am unwelcome because of my masculinity. Like so many other men, I have been marginalized. I am unwelcome. The "pastor" cannot even look at me because he has such disdain for me. He has nothing but contempt for everything I stand for. Because I engage in apologetics and fight to promote traditional Catholic teaching, I am viewed with suspicion.
Several parishioners have actually approached me to say that they enjoy my voice (and particularly my rendition of the Salve Regina in Latin) and to tell me that I should be in the choir. They seem puzzled that I am not already in the choir. But it's no mystery. See here.
Here’s the problem:
There are generally more women than men in every type of church, in every part of the world, according to church growth experts like Patrick Johnstone, author of Operation World. A traditional explanation is that women are more spiritual than men. But the leaders of this new movement suggest that the church’s music, messages and ministries cater to women.
…In America, among evangelical churches, 57 percent of members are women and, among mainline Protestant churches, 66 percent are women, according to a 1998 book American Evangelicalism (University of Chicago Press).The problem is that the church has become feminized, and men don’t like that, and so, they leave.
Here’s more:
To describe many women, Murrow lists traits like “relational,” “nurturing” and “peace-making.” He describes many men as “goal-driven,” “competitive” and “adventurous.” These differences show up in the types of movies many women and many men like: romantic vs. adventure films, Murrow said. In sum, women thrive when secure, and men thrive when challenged, he said.As Christianity became more feminized, it began to focus more on producing emotional satisfaction. But men want something different.
The article goes on to quote one of my favorite Christian writers, Nancy Pearcey, an expert in apologetics and theology.
…many people think of church only as a nurturing place that addresses personal needs, Pearcey said. Think: sitting in circles, sharing feelings, holding hands, singing softly, comforting members. An example of the feminization of the church is its music. Typical praise songs refer to Jesus as a Christian’s lover and praise his beauty and tenderness. Rarely do they praise his justice or strength, or refer to him as the head of an army leading his church into spiritual battle, like “Onward Christian Soldiers.”All of the outward facing disciplines within Christianity, such as apologetics, theology, ethics, etc. are de-emphasized, censored or resisted in feminized churches. There is no place for rationality, moral judgments and boundaries, debates and disagreement, confrontations and persuasion, or other manly Christian practices.
Christianity is evangelical, and evangelism takes study and preparation, which culminates in confrontations and discussions. The object of these discussions is not to win the argument. It is to win the person over to your side. So facts and arguments play a huge role in evangelism, but there has to be gentleness too, if you actually want to win. And this is what Christian men are supposed to do. But does the church support it?
Another turn-off for men is touchy-feely sermons. Pearcey said the modern church stresses emotions and inner spiritual experiences while neglecting the intellectual side of the faith.
“The more traditionally masculine side of Christianity enjoys crossing swords with hostile secular worldviews. So, as long as Christianity appeals to the emotional, therapeutic, interpersonal, relational areas, it’s not going to appeal to men as much as to women,” Pearcey said.Christian men love apologetics and they also love theology, philosophy, ethics, science and history. We love competition. Anything testable that can be debated! Anything where there is a clear winner and loser.
Churches should engage men’s intellects to help them see the relevance of Christianity to the “real” world of politics, industry and business, Pearcey said.
“We have to recover the notion that Christianity is true on all levels, not just for your emotional life or repairing relationships, as important as those things are,” she said.
Many churches emphasize Jesus’ softer teachings, like his love and his desire to save, and they ignore the doctrines of sin and hell, according to Podles. But men dislike liberal Christianity — “a mild religion of progress and enlightenment” as opposed to a battle between good and evil, Podles said.
Men want to expend their lives for a great cause, even if it involves risk, according to Murrow. He said that’s why the U.S. military’s “Army of One” campaign was effective. But American churches rarely teach about Christian suffering and martyrdom, Murrow said. Instead, today’s Christianity is presented as an antidote to these things, he said.And men thrive on risk, adventure and achievement:
“Men are more attracted to religion if it presented as a quest, an adventure, a heroic exploit,” Pearcey said. “They want something challenging, bracing, demanding.”Many women believe that the purpose of Christianity is to be happy and to make others happy by not discussing controversial things like religion. They do not attach the same importance as men do to the duty to be an informed ambassador for Christ, trained in apologetics, and able to persuade others about God’s existence and character. They do not believe that the Lord’s reputation needs to be defended in public in the same way that men do.
To reach men, churches should stress the cost and dangers of following Christ — including Christians’ conflict with the world, the flesh and the devil, according to Podles.
Yet, men should be reminded that the sacrifice won’t always be a “huge, glorious display like William Wallace stepping out on a battlefield,” Erre said. Many times it will be staying in a troubled marriage, raising a handicapped child, or working a hated job to provide for a family, he said.
Many women also don’t want to be confronted about their beliefs by informed men, because their beliefs are based more on intuition and emotion. They would rather be accepted and affirmed – and so they favor men who don’t know much about the details of Christianity. So manly Christian skills; theology, apologetics, ethics, philosophy, history, science, etc. are not valued in the feminized church.
Touchy-feely sermons come from touchy-feely pastors. A feminized church tends to attract more “gentle, sensitive, nurturing” leadership,” according to Pearcey.
“If religion is defined primarily in terms of emotional experience and is therapeutic, then who is it going to attract as ministers?” she said.
Pearcey said to consider a typical youth pastor.
“He’s really into relationships, very motivating, but is he teaching good apologetics? Is he teaching youth to use their minds and to understand deeper theological truths? At least the ones I’ve known haven’t,” she said. “Today, the common trajectory is for youth pastors to become senior pastors,” she added.Maybe women should be more sensitive to male needs and character, and more concerned about what the Bible teaches about the the role of apologetics in the Kingdom of God.
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The Latin Vulgate (see the Douay-Rheims Bible) indicates that the effeminate will not inherit the Kingdom of God (1 Corinthians 6:10). But the New American Bible, which is used by the USCCB, omits the word effeminate:
1 Corinthians 6:9-10 (Latin Vulgate):
Verse 9: "Know you not that the unjust shall not possess the kingdom of God? Do not err: Neither fornicators nor idolaters nor adulterers:
an nescitis quia iniqui regnum Dei non possidebunt nolite errare neque fornicarii neque idolis servientes neque adulteri
Verse 10: Nor the effeminate nor liers with mankind nor thieves nor covetous nor drunkards nor railers nor extortioners shall possess the kingdom of God.
neque molles neque masculorum concubitores neque fures neque avari neque ebriosi neque maledici neque rapaces regnum Dei possidebunt."
1Corinthians 6: 9-10 (New American Bible) posted online by the USCCB:
Verse 9: "Do you not know that the unjust will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived; neither fornicators nor idolaters nor adulterers nor boy prostitutes nor sodomites
Verse 10: nor thieves nor the greedy nor drunkards nor slanderers nor robbers will inherit the kingdom of God."
Why do you think this is so? The Latin Vulgate, which we have obtained from the great St. Jerome, is the most precise translation of the Sacred Scriptures available. There are many other problems with recent translations of the Scriptures. But my focus here is on this passage. Why has the word "effeminate" been dropped from 1 Corinthians 6?
Dr. Leon Podles writes, "Walter Ong, having been formed in a masculine, Jesuit, clerical milieu does not seem to be aware of how feminized Christianity had become even before the 1960s, but he saw a rapid shift in the Catholic Church in the 1960s toward even greater feminization...The contrasts of Christianity, grace and sin, life and death, have been toned down with a considerable loss of emotional power. Without this power, the popular appeal of the liturgy has declined (even with a more accessible language) and church attendance has plummeted...Even the change from Latin to the vernacular was also a symptom of feminization, according to Ong. Latin had been a means of maintaining a Latin culture in the Roman Catholic clergy. A language restricted to men is common; it is a sign of masculine separation from the feminine world. After it became a learned language, Latin was learned almost exclusively by men. The system of education that used Latin and centered around Latin literature was centered around contest and disputation and was confined almost entirely to men. The disappearance of Latin was part of the demasculinization of the clergy.." (The Church Impotent: The Feminization of Christianity, pp. 133-135).
The Cult of Softness has made such inroads that it has crippled the inner life of the Church. Liturgy has been feminized And now, the Sacred Scriptures (the very Word of God) must be rewritten so as not to offend more "civilized" and "refined" tastes; so as not to offend "modern man." The Christian faith must be replaced by a self-worship which cloaks itself in language which purports to be Christian but which nevertheless remains a language which has been watered down to make it more acceptable to modernity.
Dr. Podles cites a study by Lewis M. Terman and Catherine Cox Miles, which included a Masculinity-Femininity test, writing, "Terman and Miles gathered data from three groups: Catholic seminarians, Protestant seminarians, and Protestant ministers. As one might expect, men attracted to the religious life differed strikingly in their masculinity from the general male population: 'The Catholic student priests score at a point far less masculine than any other male group of their age; in their early twenties they are more feminine than the general male population at middle life. The Protestant theological students in their middle twenties are, however, more feminine than they and exceed in femininity the sixty-year-old man of equal education. The adult ministerial group is barely more masculine than the Protestant theological students and less so than the student priests. They exceed in femininity the college men of the seventh decade.' Terman and Miles concluded that 'some dominant factors must be present in all three groups to make them, without regard to age, conspicuously and almost equally lacking in mental masculinity.' Interestingly enough, the similarities between the Protestant and Catholic groups and the Catholic group's slightly higher scores ruled out celibacy as a major factor in a lack of masculinity..." (P. 9).
Effeminacy (and here we are not necessarily speaking of homosexuality), has become the forgotten vice in seminary formation. This as many masculine men continue to be excluded from pursuing priestly vocations and masculinity itself is banished to the margins of the Church.
As a military veteran, I continue to witness firsthand the effects of the feminized Church. I have volunteered but am unwelcome because of my masculinity. Like so many other men, I have been marginalized. I am unwelcome. The "pastor" cannot even look at me because he has such disdain for me. He has nothing but contempt for everything I stand for. Because I engage in apologetics and fight to promote traditional Catholic teaching, I am viewed with suspicion.
Several parishioners have actually approached me to say that they enjoy my voice (and particularly my rendition of the Salve Regina in Latin) and to tell me that I should be in the choir. They seem puzzled that I am not already in the choir. But it's no mystery. See here.
Wednesday, May 18, 2016
Facebook censorship: Targeting orthodox Christians and conservatives
Jeff Dunetz notes:
"Media Research Center President Brent Bozell will meet with Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg on Wednesday to address the social media website's censorship issues. In anticipation of that meeting, Bozell made the following statement:
Potentially a bigger scandal (because it affects more people) is the accusation that Facebook censors individual member pages, blogs, smaller media outlets, and discussion groups reflecting a conservative point of view. Sometimes, the sites are shut down, sometimes they are simply threatened into silence.
In 2013, a Facebook page for the conservative website "Chicks on The Right" was threatened with a shut-down after posting a message criticizing White House Press Secretary Jay Carney. According to the site, the "offending" message of “Jay Carney can kiss my assular area” violated the site’s standards, so it blocked the "Chicks" site. Only because Fox News' Todd Starnes learned of and publicized the incident was "Chicks on The Right" was saved from a permanent place in the Facebook penalty box.
Starnes' interest in Facebook censorship may stem from the time he was placed in the Facebook penitentiary. You may want to make sure there are no kids in the room before you go on because the Fox News host's "horrible" violation was a post mentioning four offensive subjects in the same paragraph. The proper nouns were: Paula Deen, Chick-fil-A, the NRA and Jesus Christ.
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Readers of this Blog know that I was temporarily blocked from posting by Facebook because I objected to the incivility being directed against presidential candidate Donald Trump. See here and here. This comes as no surprise. It was Adolf Hitler, in Mein Kampf (My Story) who said that, "The chief function of propaganda is to convince the masses, who slowness of understanding needs to be given time in order that they may absorb information; and only constant repetition will finally succeed in imprinting an idea on their mind.........the slogan must of course be illustrated in many ways and from several angles, but in the end one must always return to the assertion of the same formula. The one will be rewarded by the surprising and almost incredible results that such a personal policy secures."
As this website explains:
"Once they succeeded in ending democracy and turning Germany into a one-party dictatorship, the Nazis orchestrated a massive propaganda campaign to win the loyalty and cooperation of Germans. The Nazi Propaganda Ministry, directed by Dr. Joseph Goebbels, took control of all forms of communication in Germany: newspapers, magazines, books, public meetings, and rallies, art, music, movies, and radio. Viewpoints in any way threatening to Nazi beliefs or to the regime were censored or eliminated from all media.
During the spring of 1933, Nazi student organizations, professors, and librarians made up long lists of books they thought should not be read by Germans. Then, on the night of May 10, 1933, Nazis raided libraries and bookstores across Germany. They marched by torchlight in nighttime parades, sang chants, and threw books into huge bonfires. On that night more than 25,000 books were burned. Some were works of Jewish writers, including Albert Einstein and Sigmund Freud. Most of the books were by non-Jewish writers, including such famous Americans as Jack London, Ernest Hemingway, and Sinclair Lewis, whose ideas the Nazis viewed as different from their own and therefore not to be read.
The Nazi censors also burned the books of Helen Keller, who had overcome her deafness and blindness to become a respected writer; told of the book burnings, she responded: "Tyranny cannot defeat the power of ideas." Hundreds of thousands of people in the United States protested the book burnings, a clear violation of freedom of speech, in public rallies in New York, Philadelphia, Chicago, and St. Louis.
Schools also played an important role in spreading Nazi ideas. While some books were removed from classrooms by censors, other textbooks, newly written, were brought in to teach students blind obedience to the party, love for Hitler, and anti-Semitism. After-school meetings of the Hitler Youth and the League of German Girls trained children to be faithful to the Nazi party. In school and out, young people celebrated such occasions as Adolf Hitler's birthday and the anniversary of his taking power."
Today, censorship is beginning to be used against Christians to silence moral opposition to abortion and homosexuality. Today's censors do not have to gather up thousands of books, march by torchlight in nighttme parades and throw books into huge bonfires. They have merely to strike a few keys from the comfort of their offices.
Inflated in their rebellion against the God-Man, the Sons of Satan, those committed toward the atheistic program of attacking the Church from without and undermining it from within in preparation for the Man-God, will continue to intensify their persecution of craftiness and subversion until it reaches its culmination in an explosion of hate-filled rage which will bear much blood and death. Father Livio Fanzaga, writing about the Antichrist, says that, "Catholicism alone will resist him. How then do we destroy this superstition which alone obstructs the world's self-revelation? How do we destroy this superstition which divides mankind and which prevents man from being truly brotherly and free? The true Antichrist is revealed in the replies to these questions. Here is perceived his profound being as the man of iniquity. He will not tolerate the idea of men who adore any god other than himself. His intolerance obliges him to make an exception to his pacifism and his philosophy of non-violence. He is the greatest pacifist in the history of the human race, but because peace and justice really reign on earth he will make an exception to kill and destroy the great superstition of Catholicism, once and for all time..." (Wrath of God: The Days of the Antichrist, p. 124).
On September 15, 1992, Our Lady told Father Gobbi of the Marian Movement of Priests that, "..It is the hour of my great sorrow for the Church, my dearly beloved Daughter. How grievously the Church is suffering in these times, as she carries her great cross and climbs the bloodstained Calvary of her passion and her bloody immolation! Never before, as today, has the Church been made so utterly like my Son Jesus. She is like Him in solitude and abandonment; she is like Him in denial and betrayal; she is like Him in contempt and condemnation; she is like Him in her crucifixion and in her agony. This is the hour of my great sorrow for the Church, because the hour of her redemptive passion has come. It is the gour of my great sorrow for humanity, so ill and so reduced to slavery by the spirits of evil. The diabolical powers are ruling the earth and producing everywhere the wicked fruits of their dark reign. And thus this humanity has again become pagan, after almost two thousand years of its redemption and of the first announcement of the Gospel of salvation. Faithlessness and impiety again cover it; sins wound it; evil poisons it; pride rules it; impurity seduces it; egoism and hatred enchain it; Satan reduces it more and more to slavery and reigns over you with his diabolical power...This is the hour of my great sorrow for all of you, my poor children, because the time of your great suffering has come. Take refuge in me. Hasten to the sure refuge of my Immaculate Heart, because we must live together through the hour of the greatest trial, which has now come for you, for the Church and for all humanity."
"Media Research Center President Brent Bozell will meet with Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg on Wednesday to address the social media website's censorship issues. In anticipation of that meeting, Bozell made the following statement:
“I look forward to sitting down with Mark Zuckerberg and Facebook because, as I’ll explain to them, no one knows more about liberal bias in the media than we do. We have been documenting and exposing it for almost 30 years. Facebook has a serious problem. Trust is everything and now conservatives don’t trust them. My hope is that today’s meeting will begin to put concerns to rest.”The liberal media are all over one part of the Facebook scandal story - and ignoring another. Generally, media have covered the accusations that the social media site is censoring conservative news and sources from their trending news feed. Coincidentally, this is also the part of the Facebook story affecting the media.
Potentially a bigger scandal (because it affects more people) is the accusation that Facebook censors individual member pages, blogs, smaller media outlets, and discussion groups reflecting a conservative point of view. Sometimes, the sites are shut down, sometimes they are simply threatened into silence.
In 2013, a Facebook page for the conservative website "Chicks on The Right" was threatened with a shut-down after posting a message criticizing White House Press Secretary Jay Carney. According to the site, the "offending" message of “Jay Carney can kiss my assular area” violated the site’s standards, so it blocked the "Chicks" site. Only because Fox News' Todd Starnes learned of and publicized the incident was "Chicks on The Right" was saved from a permanent place in the Facebook penalty box.
Starnes' interest in Facebook censorship may stem from the time he was placed in the Facebook penitentiary. You may want to make sure there are no kids in the room before you go on because the Fox News host's "horrible" violation was a post mentioning four offensive subjects in the same paragraph. The proper nouns were: Paula Deen, Chick-fil-A, the NRA and Jesus Christ.
"I'm about as politically incorrect as you can get. I'm wearing an NRA ball cap, eating a Chick-fil-A sandwich, reading a Paula Deen cookbook and sipping a 20-ounce sweet tea while sitting in my Cracker Barrel rocking chair with the Gaither Vocal Band singing 'Jesus Saves' on the stereo and a Gideon's Bible in my pocket. Yes sir, I'm politically incorrect and happy as a June bug."Mr. Starnes says he received a message from the Facebook police that said:
"We removed this from Facebook because it violates our Community Standards," Facebook wrote me. "So you're temporarily blocked from using this feature."
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Readers of this Blog know that I was temporarily blocked from posting by Facebook because I objected to the incivility being directed against presidential candidate Donald Trump. See here and here. This comes as no surprise. It was Adolf Hitler, in Mein Kampf (My Story) who said that, "The chief function of propaganda is to convince the masses, who slowness of understanding needs to be given time in order that they may absorb information; and only constant repetition will finally succeed in imprinting an idea on their mind.........the slogan must of course be illustrated in many ways and from several angles, but in the end one must always return to the assertion of the same formula. The one will be rewarded by the surprising and almost incredible results that such a personal policy secures."
As this website explains:
"Once they succeeded in ending democracy and turning Germany into a one-party dictatorship, the Nazis orchestrated a massive propaganda campaign to win the loyalty and cooperation of Germans. The Nazi Propaganda Ministry, directed by Dr. Joseph Goebbels, took control of all forms of communication in Germany: newspapers, magazines, books, public meetings, and rallies, art, music, movies, and radio. Viewpoints in any way threatening to Nazi beliefs or to the regime were censored or eliminated from all media.
During the spring of 1933, Nazi student organizations, professors, and librarians made up long lists of books they thought should not be read by Germans. Then, on the night of May 10, 1933, Nazis raided libraries and bookstores across Germany. They marched by torchlight in nighttime parades, sang chants, and threw books into huge bonfires. On that night more than 25,000 books were burned. Some were works of Jewish writers, including Albert Einstein and Sigmund Freud. Most of the books were by non-Jewish writers, including such famous Americans as Jack London, Ernest Hemingway, and Sinclair Lewis, whose ideas the Nazis viewed as different from their own and therefore not to be read.
The Nazi censors also burned the books of Helen Keller, who had overcome her deafness and blindness to become a respected writer; told of the book burnings, she responded: "Tyranny cannot defeat the power of ideas." Hundreds of thousands of people in the United States protested the book burnings, a clear violation of freedom of speech, in public rallies in New York, Philadelphia, Chicago, and St. Louis.
Schools also played an important role in spreading Nazi ideas. While some books were removed from classrooms by censors, other textbooks, newly written, were brought in to teach students blind obedience to the party, love for Hitler, and anti-Semitism. After-school meetings of the Hitler Youth and the League of German Girls trained children to be faithful to the Nazi party. In school and out, young people celebrated such occasions as Adolf Hitler's birthday and the anniversary of his taking power."
Today, censorship is beginning to be used against Christians to silence moral opposition to abortion and homosexuality. Today's censors do not have to gather up thousands of books, march by torchlight in nighttme parades and throw books into huge bonfires. They have merely to strike a few keys from the comfort of their offices.
Inflated in their rebellion against the God-Man, the Sons of Satan, those committed toward the atheistic program of attacking the Church from without and undermining it from within in preparation for the Man-God, will continue to intensify their persecution of craftiness and subversion until it reaches its culmination in an explosion of hate-filled rage which will bear much blood and death. Father Livio Fanzaga, writing about the Antichrist, says that, "Catholicism alone will resist him. How then do we destroy this superstition which alone obstructs the world's self-revelation? How do we destroy this superstition which divides mankind and which prevents man from being truly brotherly and free? The true Antichrist is revealed in the replies to these questions. Here is perceived his profound being as the man of iniquity. He will not tolerate the idea of men who adore any god other than himself. His intolerance obliges him to make an exception to his pacifism and his philosophy of non-violence. He is the greatest pacifist in the history of the human race, but because peace and justice really reign on earth he will make an exception to kill and destroy the great superstition of Catholicism, once and for all time..." (Wrath of God: The Days of the Antichrist, p. 124).
On September 15, 1992, Our Lady told Father Gobbi of the Marian Movement of Priests that, "..It is the hour of my great sorrow for the Church, my dearly beloved Daughter. How grievously the Church is suffering in these times, as she carries her great cross and climbs the bloodstained Calvary of her passion and her bloody immolation! Never before, as today, has the Church been made so utterly like my Son Jesus. She is like Him in solitude and abandonment; she is like Him in denial and betrayal; she is like Him in contempt and condemnation; she is like Him in her crucifixion and in her agony. This is the hour of my great sorrow for the Church, because the hour of her redemptive passion has come. It is the gour of my great sorrow for humanity, so ill and so reduced to slavery by the spirits of evil. The diabolical powers are ruling the earth and producing everywhere the wicked fruits of their dark reign. And thus this humanity has again become pagan, after almost two thousand years of its redemption and of the first announcement of the Gospel of salvation. Faithlessness and impiety again cover it; sins wound it; evil poisons it; pride rules it; impurity seduces it; egoism and hatred enchain it; Satan reduces it more and more to slavery and reigns over you with his diabolical power...This is the hour of my great sorrow for all of you, my poor children, because the time of your great suffering has come. Take refuge in me. Hasten to the sure refuge of my Immaculate Heart, because we must live together through the hour of the greatest trial, which has now come for you, for the Church and for all humanity."
Monday, May 16, 2016
Our Lady warned of "a bad Council and a bad Mass..."
One Peter Five notes:
"Today, on the Feast of Pentecost, I called Fr. Ingo Dollinger, a German priest and former professor of theology in Brasil, who is now quite elderly and physically weak. He has been a personal friend of Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI for many years. Father Dollinger unexpectedly confirmed over the phone the following facts:
Not long after the June 2000 publication of the Third Secret of Fatima by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger told Fr. Dollinger during an in-person conversation that there is still a part of the Third Secret that they have not published! “There is more than what we published,” Ratzinger said. He also told Dollinger that the published part of the Secret is authentic and that the unpublished part of the Secret speaks about “a bad council and a bad Mass” that was to come in the near future. Father Dollinger gave me permission to publish these facts on this High Feast of the Holy Ghost and he gave me his blessing. Father Dollinger was ordained a priest in 1954 and served as secretary of the well-respected bishop of Augsburg, Josef Stimpfle. In God’s providence, I met this bishop once when I was not yet a Catholic, and I was deeply touched by his humility, warmth and welcome. He invited me to visit him once in Augsburg. When I was in the process of conversion, I did reach out to him, but then, to my chagrin, I discovered that Bishop Stimpfle had already passed away. (He is greatly missed.) Father Dollinger was himself also involved with the German Bishops’ Conference’s discussions concerning freemasonry in the 1970s at the end of which came the statement that freemasonry is not compatible with the Catholic Faith. He later taught moral theology at the seminary of the Order of Canons Regular of the Holy Cross which belongs to the Opus Angelorum. Bishop Athanasius Schneider, auxiliary bishop of Astana, Kazakhstan, is member of that same Order of Canons Regular of the Holy Cross. Most importantly, Father Dollinger had Padre Pio (d. 1968) as his confessor for many years and became very close to him. Dollinger is also personally known to one of my beloved family members. This sensitive information pertaining to the Third Secret, which has been circulating among certain Catholic groups for a few years now, has now been personally confirmed to me by Fr. Dollinger himself, at a time in history where the Church seems to have fallen into a pit of confusion. It might help explain, at least in part, why we are where we are now. Importantly, it shows the loving mercy of the Mother of God to warn us and to prepare her children for this battle that the Church now finds herself in. In spite of the decision of those in responsible places within the Church, She has made sure the fuller truth would still be revealed and spread. This information also might explain why Pope Benedict XVI, once he had become pope, tried to undo some of the injustices that are directly related with this Dollinger revelation, namely: he freed the Traditional Mass from its suppression; he removed the excommunication of the bishops of the Society of St. Pius X (SSPX); and lastly, he publicly declared in 2010 in Fatima: “We would be mistaken to think that Fatima’s prophetic mission is complete.”
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I 've said this many times before, masonic forces seek to subvert the Church from within and to create a 'new church' created in the image and likeness of man. The new humanitarian religion will result from a quiet revolution within the Church. This new religion will be anti-supernatural. And it will embrace the Socialistic New World Order and the Reign of Antichrist. This is the false church Venerable Anne Catherine Emmerich saw in her visions.
In this false church within the True Church, the cancer within the Mystical Body of Christ, there is a loss of the sense of the sacred. Which is why Fr. Miceli wrote that, "Much of the new liturgy has been drained of the numinous and the sacred. The new forms are without splendor, flattened, undifferentiated. Why was kneeling replaced by standing? Jesus himself fell on his knees and on his face as he prayed to his heavenly Father. Satan too knows the meaning of worship and man's need for it. He tried to get Jesus to fall down and worship him. Why has the liturgical year and the Mass been so unfortunately mutilated against the wishes of the faithful? In fact, the faithful are now confused about the Mass, the feast of the saints, the holy seasons. Why was the Gloria, that prayer of total consecration on God's Majesty and Goodness, restricted practically to Sundays alone, and only to those Sundays outside of Lent? Moreover, is the faith really renewed and vivified by by obscuring our sense of community with the Christians of apostolic and ancient times? The new liturgy no longer draws us into the true experience of reliving the Life of Christ. We are deprived of this experience through the elimination of the hierarchy of feasts and the at random changing of the dates of famous feasts....
Then too, the new forms are the result of experimentation. But one experiments with things, with objects that one wants to analyze. Experimentation is the method of science. The wretched idolatry and vulgarity of tinkering with sacred realities has, unfortunately, penetrated the Church and produced a mediocrity-ridden liturgy, a show for spectators that distracts from the holy, frustrates intimate communion with God and trivializes, where it does not suppress, sacred actions, symbols, music and words.
In reality, such diminished liturgies have renewed nothing. Rather these innovations have emptied churches, dried up vocations to the priesthood and sisterhood, driven off converts and opened the doors wide to a flood of renegades. Even though valid in its essence, such a new liturgy cannot inspire for it is colorless, artificial, banal, without the odor and flavor of sanctity. A humanized and popularized, man-oriented liturgy will never produce saints. Only a divinized, God-oriented liturgy can accomplish that miracle. One suspects that many priests realize the banality of the new liturgy. That is why they often become, during the Mass and other ceremonies, actors and entertainers. They put on a show in order to gain the attention of the congregation. These comedians in chasubles preach a utopian Christianity rather than the true Christianity. Their treasure is man rather than God; their emphasis this-worldly rather than other-worldly; their goal progress rather than sanctity; their apostolate is immanent rather than transcendent; their means to their goal is the way of revolution rather than the way of the cross; they preach a secular Church instead of the Sacred Church founded by Christ; the essence of their morality is self-assertion rather than self-denial; the Christ they present to the congregation is the Humanist Christ rather than the God-Man crucified Christ...they genuflect before the world and stand before Christ...they are moved by resentment and envy instead of radiating the joy of Christ.."
These comedians in chasubles, these actors on a stage erected to celebrate the Cult of Man, prefer the tabernacle off to the side and the celebrant's chair in the center. The idea of a crucified Christ is repugnant to these propagandists for a man-centered religion. And those who maintain an authentic devotion to the Mother of God and her Holy Rosary, those who fall to their knees in prayer, are considered "out-of-date" and "immature" in faith.
Enter the Man-god. John 5:43.
Saturday, May 14, 2016
Idle hands and priests who act out sexually...
Another priest acting out sexually. This one posting photos of himself on a "gay" [read sodomite] website. See here.
Many priests today have succumbed to luxuria. Allergic to real work and having given themselves over to a life of ease and comfort, boredom has wreaked much havoc in their lives.
The axiom, "Idle hands are the devil’s workshop” is rooted in Sacred Scripture. The apostle Paul tells us that those who waste their time in idleness or in a non-productive manner are easily led into sin: “We hear that some among you are idle. They are not busy; they are busybodies” (2 Thessalonians 3:11).
Saint Paul and his fellow missionaries set an example of diligence for the church. “You yourselves know how you ought to follow our example. We were not idle when we were with you. . . . On the contrary, we worked night and day, laboring and toiling so that we would not be a burden to any of you” (2 Thessalonians 3:7-8).
But a Cult of Softness and laziness has crept into the lives of so many clergy today. So many are accustomed to a life devoid of any physical work that they have sought entertainment to alleviate their boredom. Many of these have sought solace in alcohol or have turned to various sexcapades to satisfy their lusts.
Perhaps it's time to expect our priests to DO more. Instead of cooks to prepare their meals, perhaps they could cook for themselves? Rather than employing housekeepers, perhaps they could pick up a dust cloth or push a vacuum themselves? Perhaps they could clean the Church and wash the altar linen? Clean the parish grounds etc. Most of these tasks, if not all, have been delegated to lay persons in most parishes.
Perhaps the laity have spoiled the clergy? Maybe if we expected more from our clergy, maybe if they actually did some physical work along with the spiritual, they wouldn't have so much idle time.
Idleness which is the Devil's workshop.
Many priests today have succumbed to luxuria. Allergic to real work and having given themselves over to a life of ease and comfort, boredom has wreaked much havoc in their lives.
The axiom, "Idle hands are the devil’s workshop” is rooted in Sacred Scripture. The apostle Paul tells us that those who waste their time in idleness or in a non-productive manner are easily led into sin: “We hear that some among you are idle. They are not busy; they are busybodies” (2 Thessalonians 3:11).
Saint Paul and his fellow missionaries set an example of diligence for the church. “You yourselves know how you ought to follow our example. We were not idle when we were with you. . . . On the contrary, we worked night and day, laboring and toiling so that we would not be a burden to any of you” (2 Thessalonians 3:7-8).
But a Cult of Softness and laziness has crept into the lives of so many clergy today. So many are accustomed to a life devoid of any physical work that they have sought entertainment to alleviate their boredom. Many of these have sought solace in alcohol or have turned to various sexcapades to satisfy their lusts.
Perhaps it's time to expect our priests to DO more. Instead of cooks to prepare their meals, perhaps they could cook for themselves? Rather than employing housekeepers, perhaps they could pick up a dust cloth or push a vacuum themselves? Perhaps they could clean the Church and wash the altar linen? Clean the parish grounds etc. Most of these tasks, if not all, have been delegated to lay persons in most parishes.
Perhaps the laity have spoiled the clergy? Maybe if we expected more from our clergy, maybe if they actually did some physical work along with the spiritual, they wouldn't have so much idle time.
Idleness which is the Devil's workshop.
Thursday, May 12, 2016
Francis: Open to the possibility of "Women deaconesses."
Catholic Family News is reporting:
"After crippling moral theology, opening the door to Eucharistic sacrilege and undermining Catholic doctrine on Matrimony by means of the latest Synods and Amoris Laetitia, Francis now turns his sights to the possibility "woman deaconesses."
It's almost as if he lies awake at night thinking, "What can I disrupt next?"
In this he aligns himself with the destructive program of Modernists, warned of by St. Pius X in Pascendi: "There is no part of Catholic truth which they leave untouched, none they do not strive to corrupt.”
Francis has also learned, by means of Amoris Laetitia, that he can mangle Catholic doctrine and practice with virtually no resistance from the hierarchy, except for some 'careful' responses from a tiny handful of conservatives. He has good cause to believe there will be no organized opposition from prelates."
If Francis intends to ordain women to the diaconate, he is not only engaging in heresy but will foment schism in the Church. There is absolutely no basis whatsoever for considering this. Gerhard Ludwig Muller, Professor of Dogmatic Theology in Munich, explains in his scholarly work entitled "Priesthood and Diaconate" (Ignatius Press) that the consecration of deaconesses in the early Church was not an ordination of women to the diaconate. He writes:
"The institutionalization of charitable services performed by widows in the Christian community, of the assistance rendered by women during baptismal ceremonies, and of liturgical functions in a convent of consecrated virgins is apparent from the beginning of the third century in the ecclesiastical neologism: diaconissa/diacona. For Koine Greek, unlike Latin, could not construct the female form of 'servant' by a change of ending, but could only indicate it with the feminine article (cf. Rom 16:1). Aside from that, we also encounter the title diaconissa (and, similarly, presbyterissa and episcopissa) as a designation for the wives of deacons - for example, in papal instructions or conciliar canons that admonish higher clerics to practice celibacy, in the sense of continence.
Although there are records of the liturgical installation of deaconesses dating back to the fourth century, one must not overlook the fact that the selfsame authors who testify to this practice also make clear that the consecration of deaconesses was not the ordination of women to the diaconal ministry; on the contrary, it was a question of a different ecclesiastical office.
To the early Church it was clear that, without prejudice to the various degrees of bishop, presbyter, and deacon, which assumed a definitive form in the transition to the postapostolic age, these ministries owe their existence to the historical initiative of the apostles and to the special presence of the Holy Spirit in the foundational phase of the Church; whereas the latter, so-called nonsacramental consecrations were introduced by ecclesiastical authorities and thus are not matters of divine law but only of Church law." (pp. 48-49).
The Catechism of the Catholic Church teaches clearly that: "Deacons share in Christ's mission and grace in a special way. The sacrament of Holy Orders marks them with an imprint ('character') which cannot be removed and which configures them to Christ, who made himself the 'deacon' or servant of all. Among other tasks, it is the task of deacons to assist the bishop and priests in the celebration of the divine mysteries, above all the Eucharist, in the distribution of Holy Communion, in assisting at and blessing marriages, in the proclamation of the Gospel and preaching, in presiding over funerals, and in dedicating themselves to the various ministries of charity." (CCC, 1570).
And again: "Since the Second Vatican Council the Latin Church has restored the diaconate 'as a proper and permanent rank of the hierarchy,' while the Churches of the East had always maintained it. This permanent diaconate, which can be conferred on married men, constitutes an important enrichment for the Church's mission. Indeed it is appropriate and useful that men who carry out a truly diaconal ministry in the Church, whether in its liturgical and pastoral life or whether in its social and charitable works, should 'be strengthened by the imposition of hands which has come down from the apostles. They would be more closely bound to the altar and their ministry would be made more fruitful through the sacramental grace of the diaconate.'" (CCC, 1571).
Women cannot receive Holy Orders. Period. End of story. The Sacrament of Holy Orders is conferred in the degrees of Bishop, Presbyter, and Deacon (See Lumen Gentium Nos. 18-29). Tradition in its entirety has always firmly held that all degrees of ordination are essentially rooted in one sacrament, as being a repraesentatio Christi capitis [a representation of Christ the Head].
Related reading here.
Wednesday, May 11, 2016
The fraudulent banner of "pluralism"...
Life Site reports:
"Freedom doesn’t need reassignment surgery. But the scalpel is out. The anesthesia has been administered.
Tragically, most are asleep.
Overnight, we are witnessing the most radical (and destructive) transformation in America’s legal and cultural landscape than we’ve ever seen before. President Obama has long declared his intentions of “fundamentally transforming the United States of America”. No one realized he meant the change would be of a sexual nature.
We’ve gone from “no one should have a say what goes on in the privacy of someone’s bedroom” to forced conformation through the loss of your job or business, the imposing of steep fines or even the threat of prison. Bow to the rainbow god of LGBTQXYZ activism or you will be assimilated. I thought the Borg were some Star Trek fiction. But it’s the Obama administration and its fascist efforts to silence opposition and demand allegiance to the flag of the united states of LGBT fascism.
The recently fired baseball hall-of-famer, Curt Schilling, should have known better than to think free speech applied to him, personally. He dared to post a meme about transgenderism (not my style at all, but the First Amendment is more important than my own personal messaging preference). Silly conservative. It only applies to the Left as they parade their absolute intolerance through mainstream media, Hollywood, academia, public education, courts of law and now—aggressively—through the Department of (In)Justice.
Attorney General Loretta Lynch invoked Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and Title IX (as added in the 1972 Educational Amendments to the civil rights bill) in a press conference on C-SPAN attacking North Carolina’s recent House Bill 2, or HB2. She declared that these federal statutes were meant to cover “gender identity” issues because they bar discrimination based on “sex” (although the laws never mention this newly conjured up “gender identity”). Well, if that’s the case, then scholarship-stealing former NAACP chapter president Rachel Dolezal is covered by “race identity”, too. Why can’t white people, who thinks they’re black, apply for any black minority-based scholarship? Who are we to prevent their delusion…I mean, equality?
Lynch, who is adamantly pro-abortion, mentioned how the DOJ is concerned about discrimination against any American. Oh, but not those in the womb. Over 1 million a year have a lack of access to Life, but let’s pretend that the real injustice is the faux LGBT lack-of-access to bathrooms. Never mind that the nation’s largest abortion chain has been caught on video and in documented evidence illegally selling aborted baby body parts for profit. Lynch wasn’t moved, as the nation’s top attorney, to act. But within weeks of #HB2 becoming law, the Civil Rights division of the DOJ moved with lightning speed to protect the “equal rights” of 0.1% of the population.
Lynch says that North Carolina’s common sense #HB2 “presents the problem that does not exist.” We haven’t yet legalized men (whether transgender or not, because those bathroom bills don’t require any proof of such “status") going into girls’ bathrooms and changing rooms on a nationwide scale. Of course, we’ve never seen any articles of men secretly videoing or photographing women in bathrooms or similar facilities. Lynch says “North Carolina’s HB2 is based on distinction without a difference.” Really? No difference? Our sexual anatomy’s the same?
Lynch, like the rest of so-called progressives, compared the “transgender” issue with the struggle for dignity and justice of American blacks. Comparing something that esteemed medical professionals like Dr. Paul McHugh (former psychiatrist-in-chief at Johns Hopkins Hospital) and others call a “mental disorder” is nothing like the irrefutable innate characteristic of skin color. Of course, the deluded NAACP’s leadership agrees that opposing men using women’s bathrooms (or vice versa) is akin to racist support of Jim Crow laws. This, from the organization that recently forgot the actual wording of the First Amendment and sued me (and The Radiance Foundation) for exercising my right to free speech. I accurately called the far-left, pro-abortion organization the “National Association for the Abortion of Colored People” in several of my articles. Thankfully, Alliance Defending Freedom defended my actual civil rights. The NAACP was crushed in court and smacked down by the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals for trying to “censor speech it didn’t like.”
Here’s the thing. If we take this twisted liberal “logic” to its illogical conclusion by eradicating gender distinctions, it’s biological women (as if the term “women” needs a qualifier) who will always be harmed the most. Since LGBT activists are hell-bent on pretending that biological binary sex is just a figment of our imagination, let’s just do away with all gender-divided sports, for instance. Men should now be able to play in all women’s sports. Well, actually, there should be no women’s sports—just sports. Gee, I wonder which “gender” will dominate those records? Science has shown repeatedly that even among the most elite of professional athletes, there is a huge gap in performance as evidenced by the 10%-25% difference in world records between men and women.
This isn’t sexism. It’s realism. My wife and I are equal, but we’re not the same. She has a womb. I don’t. And I’m perfectly ok with that. She bore three of our four amazing children. She wins the Trophy of Strength Award for that category, all the way! We’re different, and no amount of political BS (bogus stuff) will change that.
But Obama’s administration is desperately trying to force this nation into having reassignment surgery. Forget the Constitution. Fundamentally transforming America requires ignoring the very thing that makes the United States great. Law. Order. And a rich cultural heritage of Religious Freedom that “hold these truths to be self-evident”.
Apparently, common sense is not evident to this current President and those who work in our Executive Branch. Flagrantly disregarding the fact that they’re not in the legislative branch of government, they act like dictators, twisting the law to suit their gender-confused agenda.
This is no time to sleep, fellow Americans. The surgery is in progress, and it just might be irreversible. This isn’t about loving anyone you want, tolerance, or equality. Love illuminates the truth and lifts people out of their circumstances. Tolerance keeps people where they are and pretends there are no circumstances. (If you think that a perfectly healthy part of your anatomy needs to be cut off, there are definitely some circumstances.) And equality is too precious to have it distorted and defined by those who do all they can to suppress the truth."
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Back in June of 2005 I posted the following here at La Salette Journey:
Those who are promoting the homosexual agenda are using time-proven tactics which have been employed by secular humanists for some time now. In the words of Ralph Martin, 'First, a plea is issued for a dominantly Christian society to 'tolerate' what appears to be a deviant behavior. Then pressure is applied to place the deviant behavior on an equal footing with traditional Christian values. Secular humanists argue that a pluralist society cannot do otherwise. They then try to make the deviant behavior seem normal and behavior governed by Christian values seem abnormal - a threat to a pluralist society. The last step is often to use the legal system to protect immorality and to undermine what Christians have always considered righteous behavior.' (A Crisis of Truth, pp. 101-102).
Professor James Hitchcock, in his excellent work entitled 'Catholicism and Modernity' (New York:Seabury Press, 1979, p. 86), explains the role of the media in this entire process: 'The media's alleged commitment to 'pluralism' is at base a kind of hoax. The banner of pluralism is raised in order to win toleration for new ideas as yet unacceptable to the majority. Once toleration has been achieved, public opinion is systematically manipulated first to enforce a status of equality between the old and the new, then to assert the superiority of the new over the old. A final stage is often the total discrediting, even sometimes the banning, of what had previously been orthodox.'
Was I exaggerating? Cardinal Raymond Burke told the Catholic News Agency, back in 2011, that he could envision a time when the Catholic Church in the United States "even by announcing her own teaching" will be accused of "engaging in illegal activity, for instance, in its teaching on human sexuality." When asked if he could even see American Catholics being arrested for their faith he replied, "I can see it happening, yes." See here.
That time is now. The persecution will now intensify. Soon, when the Man of Sin reveals himself, that persecution will gradually sharpen until it erupts into full-scale violence and murder.
Related reading here.
"Freedom doesn’t need reassignment surgery. But the scalpel is out. The anesthesia has been administered.
Tragically, most are asleep.
Overnight, we are witnessing the most radical (and destructive) transformation in America’s legal and cultural landscape than we’ve ever seen before. President Obama has long declared his intentions of “fundamentally transforming the United States of America”. No one realized he meant the change would be of a sexual nature.
We’ve gone from “no one should have a say what goes on in the privacy of someone’s bedroom” to forced conformation through the loss of your job or business, the imposing of steep fines or even the threat of prison. Bow to the rainbow god of LGBTQXYZ activism or you will be assimilated. I thought the Borg were some Star Trek fiction. But it’s the Obama administration and its fascist efforts to silence opposition and demand allegiance to the flag of the united states of LGBT fascism.
The recently fired baseball hall-of-famer, Curt Schilling, should have known better than to think free speech applied to him, personally. He dared to post a meme about transgenderism (not my style at all, but the First Amendment is more important than my own personal messaging preference). Silly conservative. It only applies to the Left as they parade their absolute intolerance through mainstream media, Hollywood, academia, public education, courts of law and now—aggressively—through the Department of (In)Justice.
Attorney General Loretta Lynch invoked Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and Title IX (as added in the 1972 Educational Amendments to the civil rights bill) in a press conference on C-SPAN attacking North Carolina’s recent House Bill 2, or HB2. She declared that these federal statutes were meant to cover “gender identity” issues because they bar discrimination based on “sex” (although the laws never mention this newly conjured up “gender identity”). Well, if that’s the case, then scholarship-stealing former NAACP chapter president Rachel Dolezal is covered by “race identity”, too. Why can’t white people, who thinks they’re black, apply for any black minority-based scholarship? Who are we to prevent their delusion…I mean, equality?
Lynch, who is adamantly pro-abortion, mentioned how the DOJ is concerned about discrimination against any American. Oh, but not those in the womb. Over 1 million a year have a lack of access to Life, but let’s pretend that the real injustice is the faux LGBT lack-of-access to bathrooms. Never mind that the nation’s largest abortion chain has been caught on video and in documented evidence illegally selling aborted baby body parts for profit. Lynch wasn’t moved, as the nation’s top attorney, to act. But within weeks of #HB2 becoming law, the Civil Rights division of the DOJ moved with lightning speed to protect the “equal rights” of 0.1% of the population.
Lynch says that North Carolina’s common sense #HB2 “presents the problem that does not exist.” We haven’t yet legalized men (whether transgender or not, because those bathroom bills don’t require any proof of such “status") going into girls’ bathrooms and changing rooms on a nationwide scale. Of course, we’ve never seen any articles of men secretly videoing or photographing women in bathrooms or similar facilities. Lynch says “North Carolina’s HB2 is based on distinction without a difference.” Really? No difference? Our sexual anatomy’s the same?
Lynch, like the rest of so-called progressives, compared the “transgender” issue with the struggle for dignity and justice of American blacks. Comparing something that esteemed medical professionals like Dr. Paul McHugh (former psychiatrist-in-chief at Johns Hopkins Hospital) and others call a “mental disorder” is nothing like the irrefutable innate characteristic of skin color. Of course, the deluded NAACP’s leadership agrees that opposing men using women’s bathrooms (or vice versa) is akin to racist support of Jim Crow laws. This, from the organization that recently forgot the actual wording of the First Amendment and sued me (and The Radiance Foundation) for exercising my right to free speech. I accurately called the far-left, pro-abortion organization the “National Association for the Abortion of Colored People” in several of my articles. Thankfully, Alliance Defending Freedom defended my actual civil rights. The NAACP was crushed in court and smacked down by the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals for trying to “censor speech it didn’t like.”
Here’s the thing. If we take this twisted liberal “logic” to its illogical conclusion by eradicating gender distinctions, it’s biological women (as if the term “women” needs a qualifier) who will always be harmed the most. Since LGBT activists are hell-bent on pretending that biological binary sex is just a figment of our imagination, let’s just do away with all gender-divided sports, for instance. Men should now be able to play in all women’s sports. Well, actually, there should be no women’s sports—just sports. Gee, I wonder which “gender” will dominate those records? Science has shown repeatedly that even among the most elite of professional athletes, there is a huge gap in performance as evidenced by the 10%-25% difference in world records between men and women.
This isn’t sexism. It’s realism. My wife and I are equal, but we’re not the same. She has a womb. I don’t. And I’m perfectly ok with that. She bore three of our four amazing children. She wins the Trophy of Strength Award for that category, all the way! We’re different, and no amount of political BS (bogus stuff) will change that.
But Obama’s administration is desperately trying to force this nation into having reassignment surgery. Forget the Constitution. Fundamentally transforming America requires ignoring the very thing that makes the United States great. Law. Order. And a rich cultural heritage of Religious Freedom that “hold these truths to be self-evident”.
Apparently, common sense is not evident to this current President and those who work in our Executive Branch. Flagrantly disregarding the fact that they’re not in the legislative branch of government, they act like dictators, twisting the law to suit their gender-confused agenda.
This is no time to sleep, fellow Americans. The surgery is in progress, and it just might be irreversible. This isn’t about loving anyone you want, tolerance, or equality. Love illuminates the truth and lifts people out of their circumstances. Tolerance keeps people where they are and pretends there are no circumstances. (If you think that a perfectly healthy part of your anatomy needs to be cut off, there are definitely some circumstances.) And equality is too precious to have it distorted and defined by those who do all they can to suppress the truth."
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Back in June of 2005 I posted the following here at La Salette Journey:
Those who are promoting the homosexual agenda are using time-proven tactics which have been employed by secular humanists for some time now. In the words of Ralph Martin, 'First, a plea is issued for a dominantly Christian society to 'tolerate' what appears to be a deviant behavior. Then pressure is applied to place the deviant behavior on an equal footing with traditional Christian values. Secular humanists argue that a pluralist society cannot do otherwise. They then try to make the deviant behavior seem normal and behavior governed by Christian values seem abnormal - a threat to a pluralist society. The last step is often to use the legal system to protect immorality and to undermine what Christians have always considered righteous behavior.' (A Crisis of Truth, pp. 101-102).
Professor James Hitchcock, in his excellent work entitled 'Catholicism and Modernity' (New York:Seabury Press, 1979, p. 86), explains the role of the media in this entire process: 'The media's alleged commitment to 'pluralism' is at base a kind of hoax. The banner of pluralism is raised in order to win toleration for new ideas as yet unacceptable to the majority. Once toleration has been achieved, public opinion is systematically manipulated first to enforce a status of equality between the old and the new, then to assert the superiority of the new over the old. A final stage is often the total discrediting, even sometimes the banning, of what had previously been orthodox.'
Was I exaggerating? Cardinal Raymond Burke told the Catholic News Agency, back in 2011, that he could envision a time when the Catholic Church in the United States "even by announcing her own teaching" will be accused of "engaging in illegal activity, for instance, in its teaching on human sexuality." When asked if he could even see American Catholics being arrested for their faith he replied, "I can see it happening, yes." See here.
That time is now. The persecution will now intensify. Soon, when the Man of Sin reveals himself, that persecution will gradually sharpen until it erupts into full-scale violence and murder.
Related reading here.
Monday, May 09, 2016
Mercy never overrides justice...
Father Robert McTeigue, SJ writes: "Very often, I hear folks speak of mercy as
if it were a cancellation of justice. On this view, “justice” means, “you have
to pay off your debt—or else.” “Mercy”, then, says, “About that debt—never
mind!” And who wouldn’t breathe a sigh of relief when told that one’s debt has
been dismissed, made irrelevant? That’s an appealing, even tempting image of
justice and mercy, especially if you’ve ever been deeply in debt.
Unfortunately, such a view tragically distorts justice and mercy. If left
uncorrected, such a view runs the risk of making us unable to see or feel what
is, to borrow a phrase from C.S. Lewis, “the weight of glory.” In other words,
the roots of human dignity and the very character of God may be obscured by such
a facile, beguiling, and impoverished view of mercy and
justice."
Sadly many Catholics have succumbed to such a false notion of mercy.
Pope John Paul II, speaking to workers at the Solvay factory back in the 1980s, reminded his listeners that mercy does not cancel out the objective requirements of justice. He said:
"You know, in fact, that Christian love animates justice,
inspires it, discovers it, perfects it, makes it feasible, respects
it, elevates it, surpasses it; but it does not exclude it, does not
absorb it, does not replace it, but rather presupposes it and demands
it, because true love, true charity, does not exist without justice.
Is not justice perhaps the minimum measure of charity?"
Forgiveness is not a matter of overlooking sin. While forgiveness can anticipate contrition, reconciliation always requires contrition. And such contrition is only genuine if it involves the will and a real effort at making amends, insofar as this is possible. Therefore, authentic mercy (unlike its counterfeit which is preached at so many parishes) does not condone or ignore the evil which it forgives.
Again, Pope John Paul II: "Christ emphasizes so insistently the need to forgive others that when Peter asked Him how many times he should forgive his neighbor He answered with the symbolic number of 'seventy times seven,' meaning that he must be able to forgive everyone every time. It is obvious that such a generous requirement of forgiveness does not cancel out the objective requirements of justice. Properly understood, justice constitutes, so to speak, the goal of forgiveness. In no passage of the Gospel message does forgiveness, or mercy as its source, mean indulgence towards evil, towards scandals, towards injury or insult. In any case, reparation for evil and scandal, compensation for injury, and satisfaction for insult are conditions for forgiveness. (Dives in misericordiae, No. 14).
This counterfeit mercy is attractive to those who want nothing less than a license to perpetrate wrongs on others while demanding forgiveness from those they have offended without first repenting of their wrongdoing.
But where there are bonds of friendship or love, as D. Dietrich von Hildebrand explains, "..it is strictly required by the logos of the relationship that our partner shall recognize and regret the wrong he has done to us....Most certainly we must forgive him...but here we must desire that he recognize and repent of his wrong, not merely for his own good but for the sake of our relationship itself - of the restoration of that intimate union of hearts which essentially demands the clearing up of all misunderstandings and the healing of all disharmonies.."
We can never achieve true peace by ignoring objective evils. Dr. von Hildebrand explains that, "the attitude of rancorous enmity is not the only antithesis to the Christian spirit of forgiveness. Another attitude opposed to it is that of simply ignoring the wrong inflicted upon us, as though nothing had happened. This aberration may result from laziness, from faintness of heart, or from a sickly, mawkish clinging to outward peace. We hold our comfort too dear to fight it out with our aggressor; or again, we feel terrified at the thought of any tension or hostility, and fear lest a sharp reaction on our part should exasperate the adversary; or perhaps we yield just out of respect for the abstract idol of peace. This is akind of behavior far remote from the genuine love of peace or from a genuine spirit of forgiveness. It can never achieve the true harmony of peace, but at best a superficial cloaking of enmity, a mood of false joviality which drags our souls towards the peripheral...Also, people who behave thus fail to consider the moral damage that their supineness is likely to inflict on others. It is very often necessary to draw a person's attention to the wrong he has done to us - in fact, necessary for his own good. To pass over it in silence may easily encourage him in his bad dispositions."
This used to be understood by nearly all Christians. But today, ignorance of the Scriptures has infected even many of our clergy. In the Gospel of Luke, Our Lord says, ",,if your brother sins, rebuke him, and if he repents, forgive him; and if he sins against you seven times in the day, and turns to you seven times, and says, 'I repent,' you must forgive him." (Lk 17: 3, 4).
If he repents. The word "if" in this sentence makes this a conditional statement. Those of you who have studied philosophy or mathematics know that a conditional statement is often used to assert a connection of some sort between the antecedent and consequent. For example, an equation which states "if X = 5 and Y = 3, then X times Y = 15 represents a conditional statement. When Jesus says, "If your brother sins [against you] and if he repents, forgive him," He is saying that authentic reconciliation involves, first of all, repentance for wrongs committed.
Reconciliation is not possible otherwise. Only what Dr. von Hildebrand so eloquently refers to as a "superficial cloaking of enmity." As Christians, we are called to an authentic Christian spirit of forgiveness. We are not called to live a lie. While we must always forgive those who have wronged us, glossing over wrongs committed or pretending they never happened is not the road toward authentic reconciliation.
Sadly many Catholics have succumbed to such a false notion of mercy.
Pope John Paul II, speaking to workers at the Solvay factory back in the 1980s, reminded his listeners that mercy does not cancel out the objective requirements of justice. He said:
"You know, in fact, that Christian love animates justice,
inspires it, discovers it, perfects it, makes it feasible, respects
it, elevates it, surpasses it; but it does not exclude it, does not
absorb it, does not replace it, but rather presupposes it and demands
it, because true love, true charity, does not exist without justice.
Is not justice perhaps the minimum measure of charity?"
Forgiveness is not a matter of overlooking sin. While forgiveness can anticipate contrition, reconciliation always requires contrition. And such contrition is only genuine if it involves the will and a real effort at making amends, insofar as this is possible. Therefore, authentic mercy (unlike its counterfeit which is preached at so many parishes) does not condone or ignore the evil which it forgives.
Again, Pope John Paul II: "Christ emphasizes so insistently the need to forgive others that when Peter asked Him how many times he should forgive his neighbor He answered with the symbolic number of 'seventy times seven,' meaning that he must be able to forgive everyone every time. It is obvious that such a generous requirement of forgiveness does not cancel out the objective requirements of justice. Properly understood, justice constitutes, so to speak, the goal of forgiveness. In no passage of the Gospel message does forgiveness, or mercy as its source, mean indulgence towards evil, towards scandals, towards injury or insult. In any case, reparation for evil and scandal, compensation for injury, and satisfaction for insult are conditions for forgiveness. (Dives in misericordiae, No. 14).
This counterfeit mercy is attractive to those who want nothing less than a license to perpetrate wrongs on others while demanding forgiveness from those they have offended without first repenting of their wrongdoing.
But where there are bonds of friendship or love, as D. Dietrich von Hildebrand explains, "..it is strictly required by the logos of the relationship that our partner shall recognize and regret the wrong he has done to us....Most certainly we must forgive him...but here we must desire that he recognize and repent of his wrong, not merely for his own good but for the sake of our relationship itself - of the restoration of that intimate union of hearts which essentially demands the clearing up of all misunderstandings and the healing of all disharmonies.."
We can never achieve true peace by ignoring objective evils. Dr. von Hildebrand explains that, "the attitude of rancorous enmity is not the only antithesis to the Christian spirit of forgiveness. Another attitude opposed to it is that of simply ignoring the wrong inflicted upon us, as though nothing had happened. This aberration may result from laziness, from faintness of heart, or from a sickly, mawkish clinging to outward peace. We hold our comfort too dear to fight it out with our aggressor; or again, we feel terrified at the thought of any tension or hostility, and fear lest a sharp reaction on our part should exasperate the adversary; or perhaps we yield just out of respect for the abstract idol of peace. This is akind of behavior far remote from the genuine love of peace or from a genuine spirit of forgiveness. It can never achieve the true harmony of peace, but at best a superficial cloaking of enmity, a mood of false joviality which drags our souls towards the peripheral...Also, people who behave thus fail to consider the moral damage that their supineness is likely to inflict on others. It is very often necessary to draw a person's attention to the wrong he has done to us - in fact, necessary for his own good. To pass over it in silence may easily encourage him in his bad dispositions."
This used to be understood by nearly all Christians. But today, ignorance of the Scriptures has infected even many of our clergy. In the Gospel of Luke, Our Lord says, ",,if your brother sins, rebuke him, and if he repents, forgive him; and if he sins against you seven times in the day, and turns to you seven times, and says, 'I repent,' you must forgive him." (Lk 17: 3, 4).
If he repents. The word "if" in this sentence makes this a conditional statement. Those of you who have studied philosophy or mathematics know that a conditional statement is often used to assert a connection of some sort between the antecedent and consequent. For example, an equation which states "if X = 5 and Y = 3, then X times Y = 15 represents a conditional statement. When Jesus says, "If your brother sins [against you] and if he repents, forgive him," He is saying that authentic reconciliation involves, first of all, repentance for wrongs committed.
Reconciliation is not possible otherwise. Only what Dr. von Hildebrand so eloquently refers to as a "superficial cloaking of enmity." As Christians, we are called to an authentic Christian spirit of forgiveness. We are not called to live a lie. While we must always forgive those who have wronged us, glossing over wrongs committed or pretending they never happened is not the road toward authentic reconciliation.
Friday, May 06, 2016
Hillary Clinton: High Priestess for a Moloch State
LifeSite News has reported that: "Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton promised this weekend to 'defend Planned Parenthood' from Indiana’s new law banning abortion on the basis of a baby’s race, sex, or disability diagnosis.
'I will defend a woman's right to make her own health-care decisions,' said Clinton at a campaign stop Sunday. 'I’ll tell ya, I’ll defend Planned Parenthood against these attacks. And I commend the women of this state, young and old, for standing up against this governor and this legislature.'
The law, which is scheduled to take effect on July 1, makes it illegal for doctors to knowingly abort babies because they have a disability, such as Down syndrome, or because of their race, sex, national origin, or ancestry.
Around 90% of babies diagnosed with Down syndrome in the United States are killed in the womb."
But Hillary has no problem with murdering disabled children in the womb or killing them because of their sex or race or for any reason whatsoever.
In the same way that the Nazis waged a war against the Jewish People while denying the personhood of every Jewish person they sent to the gas chamber or placed before a firing squad, pro-death politicians like Hillary Clinton attempt to justify the killing of innocent children in the womb by asserting that these victims of genocide cannot be considered human beings until they have reached "viability," which was defined by the United States Supreme Court as that stage of fetal development when the baby is "potentially able to live outside the mother's womb [that is, can survive], albeit with artificial help." (Roe vs. Wade, U.S. Supreme Court, 1973, p. 45).
Pope John Paul II addressed this fallacious argument in his Encyclical Letter Evangelium Vitae (The Gospel of Life):
"Some people try to justify abortion by claiming that the result of conception, at least up to a certain number of days, cannot yet be considered a personal human life. But in fact, 'from the time the ovum is fertilized, a life is begun which is neither that of the father nor the mother; it is rather the life of a new human being with his own growth. It would never be made human if it were not human already. This has always been clear, and...modern genetic science offers clear confirmation. It has demonstrated that from the first instant there is established the program of what this living being will be: a person, this individual person with his characteristic aspects already well determined. Right from fertilization the adventure of a human life begins, and each of its capabilities requires time - a rather lengthy time - to find its place and to be in a position to act." (EV, No. 60).
In a feeble attempt to justify the killing of unborn children in the womb, dishonest politicians like Hillary Clinton continue to use the concept of viability as a measure of when the unborn baby is human and therefore in possession of a right to life. However, as Pope John Paul II noted in his Encyclical Letter, modern genetic science has confirmed that "from the first instant" of fertilization, "there is established the aspects the program of what this living being will be: a person.."
In fact, it is completely illogical to use viability as a measure of when the unborn baby is human because 50 years ago viability was at 30 weeks; 25 years ago it dropped to 25 weeks; and today, it is under 20 weeks. Babies are surviving earlier because of tremendous increases in the sophistication of external life support systems as well as neonatal ICU.
As a people of life, we must hold pro-death politicians like Hillary Clinton accountable for their cooperation in the genocide of abortion which has angered Our Lord Jesus and which cries out to Heaven for vengeance. We must offer reparation to the Sacred Heart of Jesus. If we do not, then a culture of death will continue to prevail in this nation and we will face the consequences of the Hell which we have silently condoned.
We must recall the words of Gabriel Marcel: "When man becomes God, then society becomes a termite colony and collapses from within."
As a High Priestess for the Moloch State, Hillary Clinton believes that women have the right to sacrifice their children to Moloch, killing them because they are the wrong sex, or race or disabled. Imagine if this little girl had been murdered because of her disability. There is no point in sugar-coating this: Ms. Clinton serves the Devil and her worldview is rooted in the fires of Hell.
The Psalmist tells us that, "Unless the Lord builds the house, they labor in vain who build it" (Psalm 126). This scriptural truth holds for the building of families, societies, nations, international communities and, most of all, Churches. Ignoring this immutable truth, the culture-of-death advocates are determined to create a Moloch state where the God of love is replaced by "the god of technocracy who experiments and flouts the law of love in the laboratory" (Fr. Miceli).
Having abandoned the God of love, the Supreme Creator, 21st-century man (led by servants of the Devil like Ms. Clinton) is now ready to worship himself and to usurp the divine powers of creation and destruction. In the words of Dr. Edmund Leach of King's College at Cambridge: "The scientist can now play God in his role as wonder-worker, but can he - and should he - also play God as moral arbiter?...There can be no source for these moral judgments except the scientist himself. In traditional religion, morality was held to derive from God, but God was only credited with the authority to establish and enforce moral laws because He was also credited with supernatural powers of creation and destruction. Those powers have now been usurped by man, and he must take on the moral responsibility that goes with them" (Edmund Leach, "We Scientists Have the Right to Play God," The Saturday Evening Post, November 16, 1968, p. 16).
'I will defend a woman's right to make her own health-care decisions,' said Clinton at a campaign stop Sunday. 'I’ll tell ya, I’ll defend Planned Parenthood against these attacks. And I commend the women of this state, young and old, for standing up against this governor and this legislature.'
The law, which is scheduled to take effect on July 1, makes it illegal for doctors to knowingly abort babies because they have a disability, such as Down syndrome, or because of their race, sex, national origin, or ancestry.
Around 90% of babies diagnosed with Down syndrome in the United States are killed in the womb."
But Hillary has no problem with murdering disabled children in the womb or killing them because of their sex or race or for any reason whatsoever.
In the same way that the Nazis waged a war against the Jewish People while denying the personhood of every Jewish person they sent to the gas chamber or placed before a firing squad, pro-death politicians like Hillary Clinton attempt to justify the killing of innocent children in the womb by asserting that these victims of genocide cannot be considered human beings until they have reached "viability," which was defined by the United States Supreme Court as that stage of fetal development when the baby is "potentially able to live outside the mother's womb [that is, can survive], albeit with artificial help." (Roe vs. Wade, U.S. Supreme Court, 1973, p. 45).
Pope John Paul II addressed this fallacious argument in his Encyclical Letter Evangelium Vitae (The Gospel of Life):
"Some people try to justify abortion by claiming that the result of conception, at least up to a certain number of days, cannot yet be considered a personal human life. But in fact, 'from the time the ovum is fertilized, a life is begun which is neither that of the father nor the mother; it is rather the life of a new human being with his own growth. It would never be made human if it were not human already. This has always been clear, and...modern genetic science offers clear confirmation. It has demonstrated that from the first instant there is established the program of what this living being will be: a person, this individual person with his characteristic aspects already well determined. Right from fertilization the adventure of a human life begins, and each of its capabilities requires time - a rather lengthy time - to find its place and to be in a position to act." (EV, No. 60).
In a feeble attempt to justify the killing of unborn children in the womb, dishonest politicians like Hillary Clinton continue to use the concept of viability as a measure of when the unborn baby is human and therefore in possession of a right to life. However, as Pope John Paul II noted in his Encyclical Letter, modern genetic science has confirmed that "from the first instant" of fertilization, "there is established the aspects the program of what this living being will be: a person.."
In fact, it is completely illogical to use viability as a measure of when the unborn baby is human because 50 years ago viability was at 30 weeks; 25 years ago it dropped to 25 weeks; and today, it is under 20 weeks. Babies are surviving earlier because of tremendous increases in the sophistication of external life support systems as well as neonatal ICU.
As a people of life, we must hold pro-death politicians like Hillary Clinton accountable for their cooperation in the genocide of abortion which has angered Our Lord Jesus and which cries out to Heaven for vengeance. We must offer reparation to the Sacred Heart of Jesus. If we do not, then a culture of death will continue to prevail in this nation and we will face the consequences of the Hell which we have silently condoned.
We must recall the words of Gabriel Marcel: "When man becomes God, then society becomes a termite colony and collapses from within."
As a High Priestess for the Moloch State, Hillary Clinton believes that women have the right to sacrifice their children to Moloch, killing them because they are the wrong sex, or race or disabled. Imagine if this little girl had been murdered because of her disability. There is no point in sugar-coating this: Ms. Clinton serves the Devil and her worldview is rooted in the fires of Hell.
The Psalmist tells us that, "Unless the Lord builds the house, they labor in vain who build it" (Psalm 126). This scriptural truth holds for the building of families, societies, nations, international communities and, most of all, Churches. Ignoring this immutable truth, the culture-of-death advocates are determined to create a Moloch state where the God of love is replaced by "the god of technocracy who experiments and flouts the law of love in the laboratory" (Fr. Miceli).
Having abandoned the God of love, the Supreme Creator, 21st-century man (led by servants of the Devil like Ms. Clinton) is now ready to worship himself and to usurp the divine powers of creation and destruction. In the words of Dr. Edmund Leach of King's College at Cambridge: "The scientist can now play God in his role as wonder-worker, but can he - and should he - also play God as moral arbiter?...There can be no source for these moral judgments except the scientist himself. In traditional religion, morality was held to derive from God, but God was only credited with the authority to establish and enforce moral laws because He was also credited with supernatural powers of creation and destruction. Those powers have now been usurped by man, and he must take on the moral responsibility that goes with them" (Edmund Leach, "We Scientists Have the Right to Play God," The Saturday Evening Post, November 16, 1968, p. 16).