Spirit Digest stands with U.S. District Judge David Bunning

The doctrine on the necessary conformity of civil law with the moral law is in continuity with the whole tradition of the Church. This is clear from John XXIII's Encyclical: "Authority is a postulate of the moral order and derives from God. Consequently, laws and decrees enacted in contravention of the moral order, and hence of the divine will, can have no binding force in conscience...; indeed, the passing of such laws undermines the very nature of authority and results in shameful abuse". This is the clear teaching of Saint Thomas Aquinas, who writes that "human law is law inasmuch as it is in conformity with right reason and thus derives from the eternal law. But when a law is contrary to reason, it is called an unjust law; but in this case it ceases to be a law and becomes instead an act of violence". And again: "Every law made by man can be called a law insofar as it derives from the natural law. But if it is somehow opposed to the natural law, then it is not really a law but rather a corruption of the law".

This is not understood by many today.  Including many Catholics.  See here.

The owner of Spirit Digest asserts that the Judge is correct in this situation. 

Why no similar statement from the Vatican after Pope Francis' meeting with a sodomite?

Writing for The New York Times, Jim Yardley notes that the Vatican issued a statement indicating that Pope Francis’ Meeting with Kim Davis wasn’t an endorsement of her views.

One has to wonder why no such statement was issued by the Vatican after Francis met with radical homosexual activist Simon Cazal who agitated for the Church to change her teaching relative to the sin that cries to Heaven for vengeance.

Homosexual activists want to rape Kim Davis and burn her but homosexual activist John Hosty says I need to learn how to love

Theodore Shoebat writes, "Homosexual activists are sending sadistic threats to Kim Davis, saying that they will capture her husband, tie him up and force him to watch them rape her. They also said that they will burn her house as they sleep and burn them to death."

Today there is a demand for sex without love, for a licentiousness in sex which has wrought a heartless society in which individuals do not care for anyone but themselves. The fruit of this demonic theology is the slaughter through abortion and euthanasia of human beings created in the Imago Dei. It is a theology of violence which is rooted in hatred of truth. For at the heart of immorality is falsity, the hatred of truth. Fr. Vincent P. Miceli, in an essay entitled "The Taproot of Violence," explains: "...violence entered creation from the rebellion of Lucifer. This rebellion arose from the heart of pride. But the sin of pride is the offspring of the vice known as hatred of truth. Hatred of truth is the result of the creature's attempt to rearrange God's hierarchy of beings and values into an order which the creature prefers to the plan of God. This attempt immediately produces the violence of disorder, the chaos of falsity and immorality. For hatred of truth is really hatred of God who creates all things wisely and governs them lovingly. Lucifer, the Morning Star, was instantly deformed into the Prince of Darkness because he attempted to live a lie. He wanted to dethrone God and become God himself..."

We live in an environment where there is a "violence of disorder" because we have abandoned truth.  And hatred of truth leads to violence.  It is the very root of violence.  Jesus said to the Pharisees, "If God were your Father, you would love me, for I proceeded and came forth from God; I came not of my own account, but he sent me.  Why do you not understand what I say?  It is because you cannot bear to hear my word.  You are of your father the devil, and your will is to do your father's desires.  He was a murderer from the beginning, and has nothing to do with the truth, because there is no truth in him.  When he lies, he speaks according to his own nature, for he is a liar and the father of lies.  But, because I tell the truth, you do not believe me." (John 8: 42-45).

It is rejection of truth which leads to violence.  And so we read in verse 59 of the same Chapter, "So they took up stones to throw at him; but Jesus hid himself, and went out of the temple."  If there is exaggerated rhetoric and violence across our society, it is because many have rejected God's created order.  But there is a consequence to this rejection of truth.  As Dorothy Sayers reminded us, if we will not have Christ, we will have chaos.

Liberals like Joy Behar want to demonize Christians as the Nazis demonized Jews

Scott Whitlock, writing for Newsbusters, notes that:


"It didn't take long for The View's new co-hosts to start slamming Christians and conservatives. On the season premiere, Tuesday, Michelle Collins mocked the appearance of Kim Davis, the Kentucky clerk jailed for refusing to issue gay marriage licenses. The recently-added host sneered that Davis is "my top candidate for 'this bitch got a man?'"

Calling out the woman for her multiple marriages, Collins snarled, "Have you seen the lady?... I'm serious. She's a monster. " This prompted gasps from the audience. Bitch? Monster? Seems more than a little anti-woman to attack Davis for her looks."

In Man Against Mass Society, Gabriel Marcel writes, "In spite of everything that can be said to the contrary, is not the real and deep purpose of propaganda after all that of reducing men to a condition in which they lose all capacity for individual reaction? In other words, whether the men in control of propaganda intend this or not, is it not of the very nature of propaganda to degrade those whose attitudes it seeks to shape? And is it possible to be unaware of the fact that propaganda presupposes, in these men in control, a fundamental contempt for the rest of the human race? If we really attach any value at all to what a man is in himself, to his authentic nature, how can we assume the responsibility of passing him through the flattening-out machinery of propaganda?

What we ought to enquire into, however, is the nature of this contempt. There are, of course, fine shades of distinction that analysis ought to bring out: but is there any essential difference between the attitude of someone like Goebbels, for instance, and that of a chief of Communist propaganda? In both cases we are faced with a radical and cynical refusal to recognize the competence of individual judgment, an impatience with what appears, from this point of view, the intolerable presumptuousness of the individual. It is also broadly noteworthy that even the sense of truth cannot fail gradually and unconsciously to be destroyed in those who assume the task of manipulating opinion. It would require a very uncommon degree of simple-mindedness in a professional propagandist for him to remain very long convinced that his truth was the whole truth. Such simple-mindedness is only conceivable in a fanatic." (pp. 50-51).

We witness such a fanaticism in Rudolf Hess, who became deputy leader of the Third Reich, and who said: "It was granted to me for many years of my life to live and work under the greatest son whom my nation has produced in the thousand years of its history. Even if I could I would not expunge this period from my existence. I regret nothing. If I were standing once more at the beginning I should act once again as I did then, even if I knew that at the end I should be burnt at the stake. No matter what men do, I shall one day stand before the judgment seat of the Almighty. I shall answer to him, and I know that he will acquit me."

For such a fanatic, the State is beyond criticism. Its realm is utterly sacred. And even if one should have convictions which run counter to those of the State, these must be subordinated to the State. Hermann Goring expressed this belief when he said, "I have no conscience! Adolf Hitler is my conscience!" and "It is not I who live, but the Fuhrer who lives in me."

As Dusty Sklar notes, "In the suggestible state, the proselyte may attribute divine powers to his leader and accept dogmas which he might have rejected in a more normal state [see here for example]. Some of the men closest to Hitler, for example, acknowledged that they believed in his divinity. Himmler's masseur, Felix Kersten, relates that he once answered the phone and heard Hitler's voice before passing the phone on to Himmler, who exclaimed" 'You have been listening to the voice of the Fuhrer, you're a very lucky man.' Himmler told Kersten that Hitler's commands came 'from a world transcending this one.' and that they should be 'saved' by 'a figure of the greatest brilliance' which had 'become incarnate' in Hitler's person." (The Nazis and the Occult, p. 157).

Even intelligent people are not immune from the desire to conform. As Sklar notes, "We 'catch' ideas, too, because we want to be like others, particularly when we want not to be our despised selves. If we're satisfied, we don't need to conform, but if we're not, we imitate people whom we admire for having greater judgment, taste, or good fortune than we do. Obedience itself is a kind of imitation. Through conformity, the person who feels inferior is in no danger of being exposed. He's indistinguishable from the others. No one can single him out and examine his unique being. Conformity, in turn, sets him up to be further canceled out as an individual, to have no life apart from his collective purpose. This gives a movement tremendous power over the individual...Hoffer [Eric Hoffer] observes: 'Above all, he [the true believer] must never feel alone. Though stranded on a desert island, he must still feel that he is under the eyes of the group. To be cast out from the group should be equivalent to being cut off from life. This is undoubtedly a primitive state of being, and its most perfect examples are found among primitive tribes. Mass movements strive to approximate this primitive perfection, and we are not imagining things when the anti-individual bias of contemporary mass movements strikes us as a throwback to the primitive.'" (Dusty Sklar, The Nazis and the Occult, citing Eric Hoffer, p. 158).
What is a Christian to do when faced with a mass movement which seeks to subjugate the individual to the collective? A movement which "refuses to recognize the competence of individual judgment" and to enslave all in a prison of absolute conformity to the State? The Christian must prepare himself or herself by relinquishing the fear of public opinion and to pray for the Holy Spirit's gift of Fortitude.
It was the Cure of Ars [St. Jean Vianney, patron saint of parish priests] who said: "Do not try to please everybody. Try to please God, the angels, and the saints - they are your public." To which he added: "If you are afraid of other people's opinion, you should not have become a Christian."
There is always a price to be paid for following Jesus. Those committed to their Christian faith must expect a certain amount of unpopularity. God knows I live with this unpopularity every day. So be it. What difference does this make? It was St. Gerard Majella who asked, "Who except God can give you peace? Has the world ever been able to satisfy the heart?" To which I would add: look closely at the photograph at the top of this post. Think of the masses who succumbed to Hitler's propaganda of a "thousand year Reich" which would transform the world. Were these throngs of people any happier at the end of the war? Did the world satisfy their hearts? Were these people not left with the bitter and empty taste of defeat?
What is the absolute worse the world can do to us? Why do we fear the world so much? We must recall the words of Blessed Miguel Pro, S.J., as he faced his firing squad: Viva Christo Rey! Long live Christ the King! For, as St. Paul of the Cross has told us, "The aversions that you experience, the ridicule, the scorn, the jokes, etc., should be received with great gratitude toward God. These serve as the pyre of love on which the victim of love is burned..."

The soul that gives itself completely to God can expect to be persecuted. Even killed. But what of it? We should remember the words of Jesus: "I tell you, my friends, do not be afraid of those who kill the body but after that can do no more. I shall show you whom to fear. Be afraid of the one who after killing has the power to cast into Gehenna; yes, I tell you, be afraid of that one. Are not five sparrows sold for two small coins? Yet not one of them has escaped the notice of God. Even the hairs of your head have all been counted. Do not be afraid. You are worth more than many sparrows." (Luke 12: 4-7).

Before the Nazis began their genocide against the Jewish People, they first demonized them, comparing them (among other things) to rats emerging from a sewer.  The Jews were painted as disease-ridden vermin.

Today, Christians who oppose same-sex "marriage" are portrayed as "backward," as mentally ill or "homophobic," as "hypocrites," and even as "monsters."

It is necessary to place us in a ghetto before relegating us to the death camps and the firing squads.

Judge David Bunning: We will not bow down before your false gods

In his Encyclical Letter Annum Sacrum, No. 10, Pope Leo XIII warned that, "In these latter times especially, a policy has been followed which has resulted in a sort of wall being raised between the Church and civil society. In the constitution and administration of States the authority of sacred and divine law is utterly disregarded, with a view to the exclusion of religion from having any constant part in public life. This policy almost tends to the removal of the Christian faith from our midst, and, if that were possible, of the banishment of God Himself from the earth. When men's minds are raised to such a height of insolent pride, what wonder is it that the greater part of the human race should have fallen into such disquiet of mind and be buffeted by waves so rough that no one is suffered to be free from anxiety and peril? When religion is once discarded it follows of necessity that the surest foundations of the public welfare must give way, whilst God, to inflict on His enemies the punishment they so richly deserve, has left them the prey of their own evil desires, so that they give themselves up to their passions and finally wear themselves out by excess of liberty."

This punishment, this chastisement, is in evidence everywhere in the latter times. A judge in Kentucky, drunk with what he perceives as "power," and enamored with himself, holds a Christian woman in "contempt" for not being obedient to an unjust law and for refusing to bow before his ego.

This is, of course, an exercise in complete nonsense and madness. As human beings, we possess only contingent rights, those which have been given to us by God. There can never be a "right" to choose that which is evil. And homosexual acts are evil.

When moral liberty is detached from Natural and Divine Law, it degenerates into license. Pope Leo XIII reminds us in his Encyclical Letter Libertas Humana that, "Liberty, the highest of natural endowments, being the portion only of intellectual or rational natures, confers on man this dignity - that he is 'in the hand of his counsel' and has power over his actions. But the manner in which such dignity is exercised is of the greatest moment, inasmuch as on the use that is made of liberty the highest good and the greatest evil alike depend. Man, indeed, is free to obey his reason, to seek moral good, and to strive unswervingly after his last end. Yet he is free also to turn aside to all other things; and, in pursuing the empty semblance of good, to disturb rightful order and to fall headlong into the destruction which he has voluntarily chosen...

Therefore, the nature of human liberty, however it be considered, whether in individuals or in society, whether in those who command or in those who obey, supposes the necessity of obedience to some supreme and eternal law, which is no other than the authority of God, commanding good and forbidding evil. And, so far from this most just authority of God over men diminishing, or even destroying their liberty, it protects and perfects it, for the real perfection of all creatures is found in the prosecution and attainment of their respective ends, but the supreme end to which human liberty must aspire is God."

Although a great physical chastisement is coming because of man's rebellion and his rejection of God's Law of Love (John 14: 15), we are already experiencing a moral chastisement. Witness how quickly sodomy, which was a crime in many states, has been legitimized by judicial fabrication into a constitutionally protected form of "liberty."

Such moral blindness is a punishment from God as Saint Paul explains, "The wrath of God is indeed being revealed from heaven against every impiety and wickedness of those who suppress the truth by their wickedness...they became vain in their reasoning, and their senseless minds were darkened. While proclaiming to be wise, they became fools and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for the likeness of an image of mortal man...Therefore, God handed them over to impurity through the lusts of their hearts for the mutual degradation of their bodies. They exchanged the truth of God for a lie and revered and worshiped the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen." (Romans 1: 18, 21-25).

Human laws are incapable of sanctioning anything which is not contained in the eternal law. This is crystal clear Catholic teaching. There is no room for doubt. All other "laws" are unjust and are, therefore, not laws at all. And Catholics are not bound to obey them. In fact, Catholics have a duty to resist them. As I mentioned in a previous post, "Any law supportive of same-sex 'marriage' is no law at all. This because any law which is promulgated must correspond to the divine law. No human authority can declare what is morally evil to be morally good. Laws permitting slavery, abortion, euthanasia, divorce and "marriages" between persons of the same gender are immoral, and therefore unjust (St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, I-II, q. 96, a.5)."

In Kentucky a theater of madness is playing out.  And this sick production is, or will be soon, being reenacted all across this nation.  This because there is no shortage of fools who are willing to expose their stupidity for all the world to see.

These fools of darkness are enraged because a Christian remnant, accompanied by other people of good will, simply refuses to worship at the altar of what Pope Benedict XVI rightly referred to as the Dictatorship of Relativism.

We will not adore their false gods.  And this makes them burn with rage.

Vatican II and Judge David Bunning's decision to jail Kim Davis

DECLARATION ON RELIGIOUS FREEDOM
DIGNITATIS HUMANAE
ON THE RIGHT OF THE PERSON AND OF COMMUNITIES
TO SOCIAL AND CIVIL FREEDOM IN MATTERS RELIGIOUS
PROMULGATED BY HIS HOLINESS
POPE PAUL VI
ON DECEMBER 7, 1965


"A sense of the dignity of the human person has been impressing itself more and more deeply on the consciousness of contemporary man, and the demand is increasingly made that men should act on their own judgment, enjoying and making use of a responsible freedom, not driven by coercion but motivated by a sense of duty. The demand is likewise made that constitutional limits should be set to the powers of government, in order that there may be no encroachment on the rightful freedom of the person and of associations. This demand for freedom in human society chiefly regards the quest for the values proper to the human spirit. It regards, in the first place, the free exercise of religion in society. This Vatican Council takes careful note of these desires in the minds of men. It proposes to declare them to be greatly in accord with truth and justice. To this end, it searches into the sacred tradition and doctrine of the Church-the treasury out of which the Church continually brings forth new things that are in harmony with the things that are old.

First, the council professes its belief that God Himself has made known to mankind the way in which men are to serve Him, and thus be saved in Christ and come to blessedness. We believe that this one true religion subsists in the Catholic and Apostolic Church, to which the Lord Jesus committed the duty of spreading it abroad among all men. Thus He spoke to the Apostles: "Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have enjoined upon you" (Matt. 28: 19-20). On their part, all men are bound to seek the truth, especially in what concerns God and His Church, and to embrace the truth they come to know, and to hold fast to it.

This Vatican Council likewise professes its belief that it is upon the human conscience that these obligations fall and exert their binding force. The truth cannot impose itself except by virtue of its own truth, as it makes its entrance into the mind at once quietly and with power.

Religious freedom, in turn, which men demand as necessary to fulfill their duty to worship God, has to do with immunity from coercion in civil society. Therefore it leaves untouched traditional Catholic doctrine on the moral duty of men and societies toward the true religion and toward the one Church of Christ.

Over and above all this, the council intends to develop the doctrine of recent popes on the inviolable rights of the human person and the constitutional order of society.

This Vatican Council declares that the human person has a right to religious freedom. This freedom means that all men are to be immune from coercion on the part of individuals or of social groups and of any human power, in such wise that no one is to be forced to act in a manner contrary to his own beliefs, whether privately or publicly, whether alone or in association with others, within due limits.

The council further declares that the right to religious freedom has its foundation in the very dignity of the human person as this dignity is known through the revealed word of God and by reason itself. This right of the human person to religious freedom is to be recognized in the constitutional law whereby society is governed and thus it is to become a civil right." (Nos. 1, 2).

Take action.  Sign the petition here.

Kim Davis jailed for her religious beliefs...

The iron fist of anti-Christian persecution has struck Kim Davis. Because this child of God refused to jettison her deeply-held Christian beliefs and violate her conscience, a Christianophobic judge has decided to jail her.  No accommodations will be made for her.  Because she's a Christian. See here.

I have been warning for years (see here for example) that a persecution inspired by the Homosexual Hate Movement was coming.  I was derided by some.  But Cardinal Raymond Burke agreed with me.  And now it has arrived.

Don't say I didn't warn you.

Related reading here.

Kim Davis: We must obey God rather than men

The New York Times reports: "Defying the Supreme Court and saying she was acting 'under God’s authority,' a county clerk in Kentucky denied marriage licenses to gay couples on Tuesday, less than a day after the court rejected her request for a delay.

A raucous scene unfolded shortly after 8 a.m. at the Rowan County Courthouse here as two same-sex couples walked into the county clerk’s office, followed by a throng of journalists and chanting protesters on both sides of the issue. One couple, David Ermold and David Moore, tried to engage the county clerk, Kim Davis, in a debate before the cameras, but as she had before, she turned them away, saying repeatedly that she would not issue licenses to any couples, gay or straight.

'Under whose authority?' Mr. Ermold asked.

'Under God’s authority,' Ms. Davis replied."

Pope John Paul II, in his Encyclical Letter Evangelium Vitae, reminded us that, "The passing of unjust laws often raises difficult problems of conscience for morally upright people with regard to the issue of cooperation,  Sometimes the choices which have to be made are difficult; they may require the sacrifice of prestigious professional positions or the relinquishing of reasonable hopes of career advancement. ... In order to shed light on this difficult question, it is necessary to recall the general principles concerning cooperation in evil actions. Christians, like all people of good will, are called upon under grave obligation of conscience not to cooperate formally in practices which, even if permitted by civil legislation, are contrary to God's law.' (Evangelium Vitae, No. 74).

The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, in its document entitled Considerations Regarding Proposals to Give Legal Recognition to Unions Between Homosexual Persons, warns that even where homosexual unions have been legalized, "clear and emphatic opposition is a duty." (No. 5). This important document stresses that, "any kind of formal cooperation in the enactment or application of such gravely unjust laws" and even any "material cooperation on the level of their application" must be avoided. "In this area," states the document, "everyone can exercise the right to conscientious objection."


Considerations makes it abundantly clear that, "The Church teaches that respect for homosexual persons cannot lead in any way to approval of homosexual behavior or to considerations of homosexual unions." (No. 11). In other words, there can be no doubt that all Catholics (as well as all those who profess to be Christian) have a moral duty to oppose the homosexual agenda.

I wonder if Pope Francis will raise his voice on this issue.  I won't be holding my breath.  But Kim Davis, standing with the truth of God's Holy Word, may be heard exclaiming as the Apostles did some 2,000 years ago when the will of mere mortal men came into opposition with the command of the Living God: “We must obey God rather than human beings!" (Acts 5:29).

What a shame that so few clerics appear to have such faith and courage.