"My Adversary will one day think that he is celebrating a complete victory..."

Everywhere we look today, signs of persecution against the Church are emerging.  Our Lady told Father Gobbi of the Marian Movement of Priests that, "My Adversary will one day think that he is celebrating a complete victory: over the world, over the Church, over souls.  It will be only then that I will intervene - terrible and victorious - that his defeat may be all the greater when he is certain in his conviction that he has conquered once for all...You, my sons, have been called to live through these events.  It is now the time for you to know this, that you may be consciously prepared for the battle.  This is now the time for me to begin disclosing part of my plan.  First of all, it is necessary that my Enemy have the impression of having conquered everything, of having everything now in his hands.  This is why he will be permitted to penetrate even into the interior of my Church, and he will succeed in plunging the sanctuary of God into darkness.  He will reap the greatest number of victims from among the ministers of the sanctuary.  This will in fact be a time of great falls on the part of my beloved sons, my priests.  Satan will seduce some of them by pride, others by love of the flesh, others by doubts, others by unbelief, and still others by discouragement and loneliness.." (October 18, 1975).

Our Lady, speaking to Barbara Reuss on April 25, 1946 at Marienfried, said that, "There are dark incomprehensible events.  In the place where the greatest confidence is found and where the people are taught I can do everything, I will make preparations for peace.  I am the sign of the living God.  I place my sign on the foreheads of my children.  The star (Lucifer) will persecute the sign.  But my sign will conquer the star."

While Our Lady is placing her sign on the foreheads of her children [those who are consecrated to her and who live out a true devotion to her], the Devil is also placing his mark on the foreheads of his children.  Our Lady explained to Father Gobbi that, "These are the times when the followers of him who opposes himself to Christ are being signed with his mark on the forehead and on the hand.  The mark on the forehead and on the hand is an expression of  a total dependency on the part of those who are designated by this sign.  The sign indicates him who is an enemy of Christ, that is to say, the sign of the Antichrist.  And this mark, which is stamped, signifies the complete belonging of the person thus marked to the army of him who is opposed to Christ and who fights against his divine and royal dominion.  The mark is imprinted on the forehead and on the hand.  The forehead indicates the intellect, because the mind is the seat of the human reason.  The hand expresses human activity, because it is with his hands that man acts and works.  Nevertheless, it is the person who is marked by the mark of the Antichrist in his intellect and in his will.  He who allows himself to be signed with the mark on his forehead is led to accept the doctrine of the denial of God, of the rejection of his Law, and of atheism which, in these times, is more and more diffused and advertised.  And thus he is driven to follow the ideologies in mode today and to make of himself a propagator of all the errors..."

I have been witnessing many signs of demonic activity, both within the Church as well as without.  We can expect to see more and more cases of demonic possession.  Last Saturday, while I was praying the Rosary just prior to Confession, the silence in the Church was punctuated by the piercing sound of a woman wailing and howling like a wild animal.  Our Lady doesn't want the ever thickening darkness and apostasy to frighten or discourage us.  But neither does she want us to be blind to it.  More than ever today, we are called to be prayer warriors, marching under the banner of the Mother of God.

We can expect, if we are consecrated to the Immaculata, to be hated even within the Church by those who pass themselves off as Catholic but who are only in the Church in a bodily manner while remaining external to her pale (see Lumen Gentium, No. 14).  Indeed St. Louis de Montfort tells us that, "Finally, sinners continually hate and persecute the elect, openly and secretly. The elect are a burden to them. They despise them, criticise them, ridicule them, insult them, rob them, deceive them, impoverish them, hunt them down and trample them into the dust; while they themselves are making fortunes, enjoying themselves, getting good positions for themselves, enriching themselves, rising to power and living in comfort."

I continue to experience this hatred personally.  It is very real and palpable.  But just as real - and far more powerful than this satanic hatred - is the love of Jesus and Mary.

Remain under the mantle of the Immaculata.  This is our sure refuge.  Now is the time of darkness and confusion.  A time of diabolical disorientation.  A time when devils are being loosed upon the world.  Pray without ceasing.  Pray and trust.

"The alarming signs of the times testify to a fierce spirit of evil advancing everywhere.."

California lawmakers have passed a bill requiring schools to teach sodomite history.  See here.  Expect such legislation to advance everywhere.  It was Fr. Vincent Miceli who warned that:

"The West has divinized Security and Technocracy; the East, Science and Revolution.  But in both camps atheistic humanism has become the State religion.  And both of these systems of secular humanism eclipse the person, eliminate his freedom, deny his human-divine value and subject him to the tyranny of technological impersonalism.  The alarming signs of the times testify to a fierce spirit of evil advancing everywhere.  It is the spirit of rebellion against God and man.  Hitherto the powers of government in each country, as yet relying on God and reason, were firm and vigorous eough to restrain this rebellion.  But today many agnostic countries can barely contain that lawless spirit, while many others have actually legalized the principle of lawlessness itself, the principle of license masquerading as liberty.

We are reminded of St. Paul's warning to the Thessalonians.  In the last days there will be an aweful, unparalleled outbreak of evil everywhere.  This will be called the Great Apostasy.  In the midst of this general falling away a certain Man of Sin, having the image of Satan and breathing hatred toward God and man, will appear.  He will exercise frightening preternatural powers of destruction against the just.  This Child of Perdition will be so special and singular an enemy of Christ that he will be called Antichrist.  For just as types of Christ went before Jesus, heralding his coming, so shadows of Antichrist have already preceded him....

But compared to the final Antichrist all forerunners of him were so many mini-Antichrists.  This Arch-Antichrist will orchestrate revolutions so expertly that the very framework of society will shatter into pieces under his wicked hand.  In a stunningly evil way, he will knit together his totalitarian rule of heresy, sedition, revolution, schism, war - indeed of every evil movement - and hurl them effectively against the Church.  Preceded by apostasy, conceived in apostasy, gestated in apostasy, born in apostasy, the Man of Sin will come to power through a General Apostasy.  In other words, Antichrist could never have existed except for the decision of the majority of persons in East and West to apostatize from God and to join the forces of atheism.." (Essay entitled "Detente All Around: Prelude to Antichrist?").

Evil is indeed spreading everywhere.  Men have grown weary of being men and are beginning to deny Christ more and more.  Which is why even in the Church, many have come to accept homosexuality and abortion as good.  Such persons, such enemies of Christ, may still use Christian jargon as they go through the motions of Christian worship, but at base they have opted for evil and radiate the spirit of Antichrist.  More than a century ago, Cardinal John Henry Newman predicted the Desolate City which we find ourselves in today:

"Surely there is at this day a confederacy of evil, marshalling its hosts from all parts of the world, organizing itself, taking its measures, enclosing the Church of Christ in a net, and preparing the way for a general apostasy from it..."

As everything grows more and more dark, continue to pray to the Immaculata.  Pray the Rosary.  Every day.  Consecrate yourselves to Our Lady every day.

Such is our only hope.  There is refuge in the Turis Davidica.

As the chastisement approaches...

Our Lady once told Saint Dominic that the Rosary and the scapular would one day save the world.  And that day is fast-approaching.  On October 7, 1983, Our Lady said, "Beloved sons, in the battle in which you are daily engaged against Satan and his crafty and dangerous seductions, and against the might armies of evil, apart from the special help given you by the angels of the Lord, it is necessary for you to employ a weapon which is both secure and invincible.  This weapon is your prayer....Prayer possesses a potent force and starts a chain reaction in good that is far more powerful than any atomic reaction....The prayer of my predilection is the holy rosary.  For this reason, in my apparitions I always ask that it be recited.." (To Father Stephano Gobbi, Our Lady Speaks to Her Beloved Priests, message 275).

We are now on the verge of a calamity few can imagine.  A chastisement approaches.  One which will devastate much of humanity.  It has been foretold.  Our Lady has warned us repeatedly but most refuse to listen.  Or their hearts have been hardened by sin and they are incapable of listening.  One such confused soul left a comment at this Blog calling me "insane."  The same was said to Noah in his time.  He too was called "crazy."  But the warnings from Our Lady must not be ignored.  Too much is at stake. 

As the chastisement approaches, let us not succumb to fear but rather let us have recourse to the power of the Rosary.  The Rosary is powerful not only because prayerfully meditating upon the mysteries of Our Lord's life can change us in ways we cannot even begin to imagine, but most especially because the Virgin Mother of God makes the Rosary her prayer and prays with us.

Every time we pray, "Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners.." the Mother of God accedes to our request and joins her prayers to ours thereby making the Rosary so very powerful.  Again, it was to Fr. Gobbi that Our Lady explained, "You ask me to pray for you fifty times.  I hear your prayer and pray with you.  And so your prayer becomes all powerful, for my Son will deny me nothing."

Forget the scoffers. For such are "...like irrational animals, creatures of instinct, born to be caught and killed, reviling in matters of which they are ignorant [and] will be destroyed in the same destruction....These are waterless springs and mists driven by a storm; for them the nether gloom of darkness has been reserved.  For, uttering loud boasts of folly, they entice with licentious passions of the flesh men who have barely escaped from those who live in error.  They promise them freedom, but they themselves are slaves of corruption; for whatever overcomes a man, to that he is enslaved." (2 Peter 2: 12; 17-19).

 Our first Pope warned of these scoffers who would come (2 Peter 3: 3-10) and warned of a fire to come by which "the elements will be dissolved with fire, and the earth and the works that are upon it will be burned up."

In Noah's time, the place of refuge was the Ark.  Today, Our Lady is the New Ark.  And by the prayerful recitation of the Holy Rosary, we enter that Ark and find refuge.

The time is short.  So too is the time for scoffing.  Soon those who mock God will find themselves in a sea of fire.  And without anywhere to turn.  For they have rejected Our Lord and His Law of Love. And they have refused to approach their Heavenly Mother who calls to them day and night to return home.

"There are evils of a physical order..."

On June 7, 1986, Our Lady told Father Gobbi of the Marian Movement of Priests, "In these times, you all need to hasten to take shelter in the refuge of my Immaculate Heart, because grave threats of evil are hanging over you. There are first of all evils of a spiritual order, which can harm the supernatural life of your souls. Sin is spreading as the worst and most pernicious of epidemics, which is bringing sickness and death everywhere to many souls. If you live habitually in mortal sin, you are spiritually dead, and if you come to the end of life in this state, eternal death in hell awaits you. Hell exists; it is eternal, and today many are running the danger of going there, because they are being contaminated by this mortal disease. There are evils of a physical order, such as infirmity, disasters, accidents, droughts, earthquakes, and incurable diseases which are spreading about. Even in that which happens to you in the natural order, see a warning sign for yourselves. You should see a sign of divine justice, which cannot allow the innumerable crimes which are committed every day to go unpunished. There are evils of a social order, such as divisions and hatred, famine and poverty, exploitation and slavery, violence, terrorism and war. To be protected from all these evils, I invite you to place yourselves under shelter in the safe refuge of my Immaculate Heart...

But, in these times, you have need above all of being defended from the terrible snares of my Adversary, who has succeeded in establishing his reign in the world. It is the reign which is opposed to Christ; it is the reign of Antichrist....The hour is in preparation when the man of iniquity, who wants to put himself in the place of God to have himself adored as God, is about to manifest himself in all his power. Under the bloody scourge of this terrible trial, how are you to avoid being scattered and discouraged and to remain strong in the faith and faithful only to Jesus and to his Gospel? My Immaculate Heart will become your strongest defense, the shield of protection which will safeguard you from every attack of my Adversary."

And this is precisely what St. Louis de Montfort prophesied in True Devotion to Mary, "..Mary must become as terrible as an army in battle array to the devil and his followers, especially in these latter times. For Satan, knowing that he has little time - even less now than ever - to destroy souls, intensifies his efforts and his onslaughts every day. He will not hesitate to stir up savage persecutions and set treacherous snares for Mary's faithful servants and children whom he finds more difficult to overcome than others. It is chiefly in reference to these last wicked persecutions of the devil, daily increasing until the advent of the reign of anti-Christ, that we should understand that first and well-known prophesy and curse of God uttered against the serpent in the garden of paradise..." (True Devotion to Mary, 50, 51).

As the world economy continues to spiral out of control, as disasters multiply in the natural order, and as the darkness continues to advance, we - the faithful remnant - must take refuge in the Immaculate Heart of Mary.

There are all too many people today - including Catholics - who have become puffed up with pride and who seek to justify their sins. Such people scoff at the notion of the natural order manifesting as a "sign of divine justice." But such people are really arguing with God Himself. For we read in Leviticus 18: 26-28: "You, however, whether natives or resident aliens, must keep my statutes and decrees forbidding all such abominations by which the previous inhabitants defiled the land; otherwise the land will vomit you out also for having defiled it, just as it vomited out the nations before you."

Related reading here.

"man, so prone to evil, so weak and changeable, trusts himself too much..."

In his classic work True Devotion to Mary, Nos 173-182, St. Louis de Montfort explains why so many fail to persevere in the faith:

"Why is it that most conversions of sinners are not lasting? Why do they relapse so easily into sin? Why is it that most of the faithful, instead of making progress in one virtue after another and so acquiring new graces, often lose the little grace and virtue they have? This misfortune arises, as I have already shown, from the fact that man, so prone to evil, so weak and changeable, trusts himself too much, relies on his own strength, and wrongly presumes he is able to safeguard his precious graces, virtues and merits.

By this devotion we entrust all we possess to Mary, the faithful Virgin. We choose her as the guardian of all our possessions in the natural and supernatural sphere. We trust her because she is faithful, we rely on her strength, we count on her mercy and charity to preserve and increase our virtues and merits in spite of the efforts of the devil, the world, and the flesh to rob us of them. We say to her as a good child would say to its mother or a faithful servant to the mistress of the house, "My dear Mother and Mistress, I realise that up to now I have received from God through your intercession more graces than I deserve. But bitter experience has taught me that I carry these riches in a very fragile vessel and that I am too weak and sinful to guard them by myself. Please accept in trust everything I possess, and in your faithfulness and power keep it for me. If you watch over me, I shall lose nothing. If you support me, I shall not fail. If you protect me, I shall be safe from my enemies."

This is exactly what St. Bernard clearly pointed out to encourage us to take up this devotion, "When Mary supports you, you will not fail. With her as your protector, you will have nothing to fear. With her as your guide, you will not grow weary. When you win her favour, you will reach the port of heaven." St. Bonaventure seems to say the same thing in even more explicit terms, "The Blessed Virgin," he says, "not only preserves the fullness enjoyed by the saints, but she maintains the saints in their fullness so that it does not diminish. She prevents their virtues from fading away, their merits from being wasted and their graces from being lost. She prevents the devils from doing them harm and she so influences them that her divine Son has no need to punish them when they sin."

Mary is the Virgin most faithful who by her fidelity to God makes good the losses caused by Eve's unfaithfulness. She obtains fidelity to God and final perseverance for those who commit themselves to her. For this reason St. John Damascene compared her to a firm anchor which holds them fast and saves them from shipwreck in the raging seas of the world where so many people perish through lack of such a firm anchor. "We fasten souls," he said, "to Mary, our hope, as to a firm anchor." It was to Mary that the saints who attained salvation most firmly anchored themselves as did others who wanted to ensure their perseverance in holiness.

Blessed, indeed, are those Christians who bind themselves faithfully and completely to her as to a secure anchor! The violent storms of the world will not make them founder or carry away their heavenly riches. Blessed are those who enter into her as into another Noah's ark! The flood waters of sin which engulf so many will not harm them because, as the Church makes Mary say in the words of divine Wisdom, 'Those who work with my help - for their salvation - shall not sin.' Blessed are the unfaithful children of unhappy Eve who commit themselves to Mary, the ever-faithful Virgin and Mother who never wavers in her fidelity and never goes back on her trust. She always loves those who love her, not only with deep affection, but with a love that is active and generous. By an abundant outpouring of grace she keeps them from relaxing their effort in the practice of virtue or falling by the wayside through loss of divine grace.

Moved by pure love, this good Mother always accepts whatever is given her in trust, and, once she accepts something, she binds herself in justice by a contract of trusteeship to keep it safe. Is not someone to whom I entrust the sum of a thousand francs obliged to keep it safe for me so that if it were lost through his negligence he would be responsible for it in strict justice? But nothing we entrust to the faithful Virgin will ever be lost through her negligence. Heaven and earth would pass away sooner than Mary would neglect or betray those who trusted in her.

Poor children of Mary, you are extremely weak and changeable. Your human nature is deeply impaired. It is sadly true that you have been fashioned from the same corrupted nature as the other children of Adam and Eve. But do not let that discourage you. Rejoice and be glad! Here is a secret which I am revealing to you, a secret unknown to most Christians, even the most devout.

Do not leave your gold and silver in your own safes which have already been broken into and rifled many times by the evil one. They are too small, too flimsy and too old to contain such great and priceless possessions. Do not put pure and clear water from the spring into vessels fouled and infected by sin. Even if sin is no longer there, its odour persists and the water would be contaminated. You do not put choice wine into old casks that have contained sour wine. You would spoil the good wine and run the risk of losing it.

Chosen souls, although you may already understand me, I shall express myself still more clearly. Do not commit the gold of your charity, the silver of your purity to a threadbare sack or a battered old chest, or the waters of heavenly grace or the wines of your merits and virtues to a tainted and fetid cask, such as you are. Otherwise you will be robbed by thieving devils who are on the look-out day and night waiting for a favourable opportunity to plunder. If you do so all those pure gifts from God will be spoiled by the unwholesome presence of self- love, inordinate self-reliance, and self-will.

Pour into the bosom and heart of Mary all your precious possessions, all your graces and virtues. She is a spiritual vessel, a vessel of honour, a singular vessel of devotion. Ever since God personally hid himself with all his perfections in this vessel, it has become completely spiritual, and the spiritual abode of all spiritual souls. It has become honourable and has been the throne of honour for the greatest saints in heaven. It has become outstanding in devotion and the home of those renowned for gentleness, grace and virtue. Moreover, it has become as rich as a house of gold, as strong as a tower of David and as pure as a tower of ivory.

Blessed is the man who has given everything to Mary, who at all times and in all things trusts in her, and loses himself in her. He belongs to Mary and Mary belongs to him. With David he can boldly say, 'She was created for me", or with the beloved disciple, "I have taken her for my own", or with our Lord himself, "All that is mine is yours and all that is yours is mine.'

If any critic reading this should imagine that I am exaggerating or speaking from an excess of devotion, he has not, alas, understood what I have said. Either he is a carnal man who has no taste for the spiritual; or he is a worldly man who has cut himself off from the Holy Spirit; or he is a proud and critical man who ridicules and condemns anything he does not understand. But those who are born not of blood, nor of flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God and Mary, understand and appreciate what I have to say. It is for them that I am writing.

Nevertheless, after this digression, I say to both the critics and the devout that the Blessed Virgin, the most reliable and generous of all God's creatures, never lets herself be surpassed by anyone in love and generosity. For the little that is given to her, she gives generously of what she has received from God. Consequently, if a person gives himself to her without reserve, she gives herself also without reserve to that person provided his confidence in her is not presumptuous and he does his best to practise virtue and curb his passions.

So the faithful servants of the Blessed Virgin may confidently say with St. John Damascene, 'If I confide in you, Mother of God, I shall be saved. Under your protection I shall fear nothing. With your help I shall rout all my enemies. For devotion to you is a weapon of salvation which God gives to those he wishes to save.'"

Why hasn't the Church been able to defeat the Culture of Death and the various evils which plague our society? Because pride has crippled us. The Devil is not conquered by pride but by humility. It was Saint Vincent de Paul who said that, "The most powerful weapon to conquer the Devil is humility. For, as he does not know at all how to employ it, neither does he know how to defend himself from it."

This is why the Devil hates and fears Our Lady and the Holy Rosary. Our Lady is the Model of Humility. And the Holy Rosary is her school of humility.

Let us all strive to imitate Our Lady's humility. Let us all enter her school of humility by consecrating ourselves to her each and every day and by prayerfully meditating upon her mysteries. We've tried things our way. How far has that taken us?

Related reading: Pope Benedict XVI on smugness and pretension here.