The anti-Church has come. Why faithful Catholics should not be afraid
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The Church and anti-Church
Pope Paul VI (37) spoke of the “smoke of Satan” having entered the Church, and Sister Lucia, that the apostasy in the Church would begin at the top. For the past half-century, there has been a growing crisis in the Church, arising as much from a lack of clear and unambiguous teaching, as from the climate of dissent among priests, Religious and laity. Within the contemporary Church, the crisis has been brought to fever pitch, if not breaking point, by the rejection of Our Lord’s yes/no paradigm and the undermining of established doctrinal positions by protean pastoral practises.
Duración 13:42 minutos
One recent example is Bishop Fernando Ocariz’s pixilated declaration in defence of Amoris Laetitia’s proposed Holy Communion for adulterers - quote – “a new pastoral impulse which requires concrete answers in continuity with the doctrine of the Magisterum” (39). The blood-dimmed tide is loosed as there emerges from the darkness and confusion a real and open conflict between those who remain faithful and loyal to Our Lord’s Gospel and the increasing numbers of the uncatechised, who, by adhering to the praxis of ‘political correctness’ formulated by LGBT ideologues, reject the Christian Gospel. The open and unilateral imposition of this politically correct ideology in many parishes and dioceses is validating an anti-Church that is in opposition to the Catholic Church, the true Church of Christ.
The anti-Gospel of the anti-Church is, in many cases, indistinguishable from secular ideology, which has overturned both the natural law and the Ten Commandments, the sources that, from time immemorial, have informed and protected man’s moral, spiritual and physical well-being.
This anti-Gospel, which seeks to elevate the individual’s will to consume, to pleasure and to power over the will of God, was rejected by Christ when tempted in the wilderness (40). Disguised as “human rights”, it has reappeared, in all its luciferian hubris, to promulgate a narcissistic, hedonistic attitude that rejects any constraint except that imposed by man-made laws.
Thus approaching its fulfilment is St. Pius X’s prophesy that “the great movement of apostasy being organized in every country for the establishment of a One-World Church which shall have neither dogmas, nor hierarchy, neither discipline for the mind, nor curb for the passions, and which, under the pretext of freedom and human dignity, would bring back to the world (if such a Church could overcome) the reign of legalized cunning and force, and the oppression of the weak, and of all those who toil and suffer.” (41)
Cardinal Carlo Caffarra, the founding president of the Pontifical John Paul II Institute for Studies on Marriage and the Family, wrote to Sister Lucia asking for prayers for this new undertaking. She declared in a signed response (42) to him that “the final battle between the Lord and the kingdom of Satan will be about marriage and the family. Do not be afraid, (she added), because anyone who works for the sanctity of marriage and the family will always be fought and opposed in every way, because this is the decisive issue.” And then she concluded: “however, Our Lady has already crushed his head.”
The Cardinal noted that for John Paul II this was the crux, as it touches the very pillar of creation, the truth of the relationship between man and woman, and among generations. It is well known that any tampering with a keystone risks the collapse of the entire building. The keystone, the basic cell of society is marriage and family. With the tacit acceptance of contraception and divorce, the recent ‘merciful’ embracing of remarried civil divorcees and the benign nod to same-sex ‘marriage’, the keystone has been tampered with and the omega point has been reached. With this background, the question as to whether Amoris Laetitia should be treated as a gauntlet thrown down or a Trojan horse naturally raises its head.
For nearly three centuries, the popes have confronted the dark trinity of masonry, liberalism and modernism, which in our time, having transmuted into atheistic secularism, has a baneful grip on all the major institutions of global influence but particularly on education, communications, politics and the law. Atheistic secularism has been working for the demise of the family, its driving spirit being the LGBT ideology; its public face, “political correctness”; its Sunday dress, “inclusivity and non-judgmentalism”.
St. Pius X was the first to clearly identify Modernism, that subversive rebellion against fixed moral norms and religious belief, as the synthesis of all heresies and as the hidden enemy within the Church. Though he unmasked Modernism, with his Encyclical Pascendi, he failed to uproot it and, like the cockle (43) in the field, it continued growing and developing ideals, doctrines and goals that were quite alien, if not diametrically opposed to the Catholic Church. Thus, Modernism, remaining within the Catholic Church, has metastasised into the anti-Church.
It is self-evident that the Catholic Church and the anti-Church currently co-exist in the same sacramental, liturgical and juridical space. The latter, having grown stronger, is now attempting to pass itself off as the true Church, all the better to induct, or coerce, the faithful into becoming adherents, promoters and defenders of a secular ideology (44). Should the anti-Church succeed in commandeering all the space of the true Church, the rights of man will supplant the rights of God through the desecration of the sacraments, the sacrilege of the sanctuary, and the abuse of apostolic power. Thus, politicians who vote for abortion and same-sex “marriage” will be welcome at the Communion rails; husbands and wives who have abandoned their spouses and children and entered into adulterous relationships will be admitted to the sacraments; priests and theologians who publicly reject Catholic doctrines and morals will be at liberty to exercise ministry and to spread dissent, while faithful Catholics will be marginalised, maligned and discredited at every turn. Thus, the anti-Church would succeed in achieving its goal of dethroning God as Creator, Saviour and Sanctifier and replacing Him with man the self-creator, the self-saviour and the self-sanctifier.
To achieve its objectives, the anti-Church, in collaboration with the secular powers, uses the law and media to browbeat the true Church into submission. By adroit use of the media, the activists of the anti-Church have managed to intimidate bishops, clergy and most of the Catholic press into silence. Equally, the lay faithful are terrorised by fear of the hostility, ridicule and hate that would be visited upon them should they object to the imposition of LGBT ideology. For example, in 2015, the congregation of St Nicholas of Myra in the Archdiocese of Dublin gave a standing ovation to their parish priest when he declared from the pulpit that he was gay and urged them to support same-sex “marriage” in the Irish referendum. It is not difficult to imagine the kind of treatment that an objector would have received. Thus, the oppressive influence of the anti-Church is most clearly seen at work when a person is fearful to openly uphold God’s revelation about homosexuality, abortion or contraception in their parish community.
Indeed, faithful Catholics, both lay and clerical, are increasingly subjected to a legitimate fear that their livelihood and careers would be in jeopardy should they stand up against the anti-Church (45). Employers are particularly fearful when activists of secular groups level charges of ‘homophobia’ or ‘transphobia’ against their faithful Catholic employees. Dreading the potential loss of business, employers, in these situations, often feel constrained into silencing or even dismissing accused Catholics.
Whilst bad publicity from the LGBT lobby can damage business, most employers have an even greater fear of the adverse legal judgments that conflicts with such groups can bring them. Even so, one should not ignore the reality that there are still other employers who would readily acquiesce to complaints against a faithful Catholic because consciously, or unconsciously, they are in sympathy with the anti-Church. As is well known from numerous test cases, when employers are faced with pressure from LGBT activists, freedom of speech and freedom of conscience of their employees are disregarded, if not suppressed. Most faithful Catholics, especially those working in the public sector, know this, feel intimidated and so keep quiet about their opposition to secular ideology.
Priests and bishops are the immediate and more natural leaders of the laity and they, above all, are caught in the broadening spectrum of fear generated by the Anti-Church. Additionally, because of the clerical vow of obedience and respect, their fear, being reverential, is greatly aggravated, especially when they find their ranks divided; their unity split; long-standing sacramental disciplines violated; canon law ignored; their evangelising spirit dismissed as proselytism and solemn nonsense. In regard to their persons, they are labelled as little monsters throwing stones at poor sinners, or who reduce the sacrament of reconciliation to a torture chamber or, hide behind the Church’s teachings, sitting on the chair of Moses and judging at times with superiority and superficiality. As clerical sons, they see themselves as less deserving of a papal embrace than Italy’s arch-abortionist Emma Bonino and even less worthy of rehabilitation than renowned false prophet and global population and abortion advocate, Paul Ehrlich.
As priests, they are told they owe an apology to gays and that the "great majority" of Catholic marriages they would have blessed are invalid; in addition, they are called sayers of prayers and, for considering Mass attendance and frequent confession as important, are branded Pelagians.
As Catholics, knowing that the Five First Saturdays were requested in reparation for blasphemy against our most Blessed Lady, they are personally affronted by the scurrilous musings (46) that, on Calvary, where She became the Mother (47) of all those redeemed by Christ, the Holy Virgin of Fatima perhaps, desired in Her heart to say to the Lord “Lies! Lies! I was deceived.” As “trees of the forest shake before the wind” (48), so clerical hearts quake with fear at the possibility that they could actually be more Catholic than the Pope (49)!
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