[Although work proceeds on the next article, those wanting to examine root causes of today's article might want to re-read From Luther to Sanger to Ferguson.]
The great martyr of the Order of Preachers, Saint Peter of Verona, known more commonly as Saint Peter Martyr, is a reproach to each of the errors of conciliarism. Yes, I mean each of the errors of conciliarism. Every single last one of them.
Saint Peter Martyr’s holy life of patient endurance in trial and his commitment to defend the integrity of the Holy Faith to the point of shedding his own blood and writing the words “Credo In Unum Deum” in his very own blood serves as an encouragement to those Catholics who are castigated by their own families for being “outside of the Church” because they refuse to make any compromises or concessions to the apostasies, blasphemies, sacrileges and other errors of conciliarism and because they refuse any association with the men, posing falsely as Catholic “popes” and “bishops” and “priests,” who propagate them.
Indeed, many readers have written to me over the years to tell truly heart rending stories about how the state of apostasy, betrayal and confusion that has been wrought by the conciliar revolutionaries has devastated their families. So many of those who have written are estranged from their closest relatives. Some have been divorced by their spouses or live, for all intents and purposes, separate lives from them. Several have not seen their own children for years because of the hatred of their spouses of the “old religion” that would force them to change their lives and to be considered “odd” by their family members and friends.
A few readers have written to express their frustration at being unable to convince their families and friends about the true state of the Church Militant on earth during this time of apostasy and betrayal. Some believe that the “right” article or the “right” book or the “right” argument will win the day once and for all.
Life, however, is seldom neat. Each of us is flawed as a result of the vestigial after-effects of Original Sin and our own Actual Sins. Each of us has specific temperaments (choleric, sanguine, melancholic, phlegmatic). Additionally, the prevalence of emotionalism and sentimentality in the world today is such that many people are easily swayed by the last person they have spoken with or the last thing they have read, swaying this way and that way as a tree branch in the wind. Others, as noted above, are fearful of what their families and friends will think of them if they come to the conclusion that the man in the white cassock who lives in the Casa Santa Marta inside the walls of the the sovereign State of Vatican City is not a legitimate Successor of Saint Peter. Those who have some kind of prominence or financial support to lose might wait until there is a “right” time to publicly declare themselves in order to help others to recognize that the Catholic Church, the spotless and immaculate mystical spouse of her Divine Founder and Invisible Head, Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, can never give us liturgies that are incentives to impiety or doctrines and teachings filled with ambiguities and that are, in many cases, complete contradictions of her perennial teaching.
Although we can give our family members and friends some information now and again, we must understand the nature of the human condition. No one likes to be “pushed” into a conclusion that they are unwilling to reach or, for whatever reason, unready to make. While we can offer a good natured reminder now and again when someone sends us a note or speaks to us about what the “pope” has said or done, the best that we can do is to plant a few seeds and then to water it with our prayers and sacrifices for them. Constant pushing and badgering does nothing to convince anyone about anything.
Yes, we might have to suffer some period of estrangement in this life from those who think that we are crazy, schismatic, disloyal or involved in some kind of heresy. Once we do come to a knowledge of the truth, however, we must embrace it, recognizing that it is only by the graces won for us by the shedding of every single drop of Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ’s Most Precious Blood on the wood of the Holy Cross that flow into our hearts and souls through the loving hands of Our Lady, she who is the Mediatrix of All Graces, we have been able to do so and that we are not one tiny little bit better than those who denounce it for being “apostates.”
One of the worst characteristics I have found among a handful of self-described “old sedes” is a haughty arrogance that leads them into saying that one has never been a Catholic until he “converts” to “sedevacantism,” which has become a religion in and of itself in the minds of so many whose own righteousness leads them to forget the gentleness of the Divine Redeemer Himself in dealing with those who, acting in good will, were slow to respond to His preaching.
The phrase “sedevacantism” is merely a description of the fact that the Throne of Saint Peter (the sede) is vacant (vacante). It is not a religion. There are many wonderful, believing Catholics yet attached to the counterfeit church of conciliarism who maintained the Supernatural Virtue of Faith but who are confused and bewildered by events, having not the time to read and reflect on various material we might send to them as they are busy with their lives. Some of these good Catholics exhibit a far better grasp of the need to eschew worldliness and worldly fads and trends and are far, far better in adhering to authentic Catholic standards of modesty of dress and decency of deportment than is the case in some chapels where no concessions are made to the conciliar officials, especially those chapels where laxity is tolerated, if not encouraged, by the clergy as “no big deal.”
Although I argued with relatives at a Thanksgiving Day meal in New Hartford, New York, on Thursday, November 25, 1976, a day after my twenty-fifth birthday, and with friends ten years later in my “conservative” Novus Ordo days, I listened as the arguments against the legitimacy of the conciliar “pontiffs” were made. I gave as good as I got. However, I did listen, listening yet again in the late-1990s in my “indulterer” days and then in the first five years of the first decade of the Twenty-first Century during the “resist but recognize” years.
It is very rare for there to be a “on the road to Damascus” “conversion.” For many of us, ourselves included, the journey was moved along by the steady drumbeat of the forces of concilairism. As I have noted before in other articles, I responded as follows when a questioner at Sacred Heart Church in Akron, Ohio, asked me on Sunday, September 24, 2006, who was responsible for my coming to recognize the true state of the Church: “Benedict XVI.” It was the recently retired Petrine Minister who pushed me into realizing that the conciliar church was counterfeit.
Although I had read articles on the websites of the Society of Saint Pius V and the Traditional Mass website associated with Saint Gertrude the Great Church before late-2005, coming to accept as early as late-2003 the possibility that the sedevacantist position might be the correct one, I realized by the end of 2005 that truth demanded an answer from me, which is when I began to read and study all the more. The rest, as they say, is “history.” And though the times have been quite rocky in the past nine years, to say the very, very least, truth must take us where it will and the difficulties experienced along those rocky roads are but small prices to pay in reparation for my many sins, which is why they are accepted with joy and gratitude.
God frequently has to to grind us down to utter dust in order to get us to be grateful for being calumniated, mocked and reviled as we keep uppermost in mind the simple truth that the intentions of all hearts and the exact circumstances of all lives are made manifest to one and all only on the Last Day at the General Judgment of the living and dead.
Those who keep that in mind, my friends, will withstand that whatever “pummeling” they might take from relatives and friends and, in the case of those who write or speak on these subjects, from critics in the public sphere will rejoice in the midst of their being ground to dust and thought ill of in the eyes of their fellow men as they pray fervently for those who have been chosen by God for all eternity to be the very loving instruments of their chastisement and purification and humiliation. Those who die in a state of Sanctifying Grace as members of the Catholic Church will be reconciled on the Last Day to spend all eternity in the glory of the Beatific Vision of God, the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Ghost for all eternity. That’s the only kind of “victory” that matters, not our own “vindication” about what we have said or written or done that has estranged us from relatives and friends and/or made us objects of public scorn and ridicule. Enduring with love and gratitude such scorn and ridicule may very well help us to win the victory over disordered self-love.
Consider this brief summary of the life and martyrdom of Saint Peter Martyr as found in Sister Jean Dorcy’s Saint Dominic’s Family:
St. Peter Martyr of Verona was not the first Dominican to die in the cause of truth, but so great was he revered for his sanctity that he was canonized the year after his death; hence he became the type of fearless apostle of the Order.
More remarkable than his death is the record of his life. Born of heretical parents, and surrounded during his whole childhood with the most harmful theories and practices, Peter preserved a purity of faith and morals which was nothing short of miraculous. Continually ridiculed and harangued by his relatives, he remained untarnished in both body and soul. Sent to Bologna to the university of the age of fifteen, he met Saint Dominic, and instantly, with no backward glances at the wealth and power he was foregoing, threw himself at the saint’s feet and begged admission to the Order. He was present at the death of St. Dominic, and shared in the legacy of primitive zeal and courage passed to the sons of a saint.
While still a student, Peter underwent a severe trial. He was publicly reprimanded and placed on punishment because a brother, passing Peter’s cell late at night, thought he had heard women’s voices in the room. The voices were those of angels, who frequently visited the saint: but in his humility he thought it better to accept the punishment and say nothing about it. He was sent to another convent to do penance, and his ordination was delayed. Peter prayed and found great strength in prayer: but, being human, he felt the disgrace keenly, and he one day complained to our Lord: “Lord, Thou knowest that I am innocent of this: why dost Thou permit them to believe it of me?” A sorrowful voice replied from the crucifix: “And I, Peter, what have I done that they should do this to Me?” Peter complained no more. The truth was eventually discovered, and Peter, reinstated in the community, resumed his studies. He prayed daily for the happiness of dying a martyr’s death.
Peter soon became a celebrated preacher and engaged in disputes with the heretics all over northern Italy. Many miracles were worked through his prayers, to the rage of the heretics. In one city, a prominent man had been won to heresy, because the devil, taking the appearance of the Blessed Mother, appeared at the heretics’ meetings and encouraged him to join them. Peter, determined to win the man back to the truth, went to the meeting of the heretics, and, when the devil appeared in his disguise, held up a small pyx in which he had placed a consecrated Host. “If you are the Mother of God,” cried Peter, “adore your Son!” The devil fled in dismay, and many heretics were converted. Enraged by Peter’s success, his enemies made plans to destroy him.
Sold like his Master for thirty pieces of silver, Peter was ambushed and killed on the road to Milan. He went to his death singing, which is the traditional Dominican way to enter heaven. Undaunted by the threats of the heretics, he walked along singing the Easter Sequence, and fell unprotesting beneath the blows of the assassins. One of his murderers, touched by grace at the sight of a saint, was converted, eventually took the Dominican habit, and was popularly known as “Blessed” Carino. To him, as to us, Peter has pointed out the way to heaven when he traced on the dusty of the road, in his own blood, the creed that had highlighted his path: “Credo in unum Deum.” (Sister Jean Mary Dorcy, O.P., Saint Dominic’s Family: Lives and Legends. Dubuque, Iowa: The Priory Press, 1964, pp. 45-46.)
In other words, silence in the midst of various allegations and suspicions (“You’re outside the Church!” “You’re a schismatic!” “You are just strange!” “You think that you’re better than the rest of us!” “You don’t want your children to have fun and enjoy themselves!”) is usually a pretty good thing as it is in imitation of the Divine Redeemer Himself, Who was, after all, put to death by means of our own sins having transcended time, and of saints such as Saint Peter Martyr, who was content of being poorly regarded by his brother Dominicans in order to be more conformed to the image Our Divine Redeemer, Christ the King. (See an excerpt from Saint Anthony Mary Claret’s The Golden Key in the appendix below on the Virtue of Holy Indifference, a virtue that was exhibited by Saint Peter Martyr perfectly.)
When it comes to the defense of the Holy Faith, however, we must be never be silent as silence in the face of attacks upon the Holy Faith is blameworthy and damnable.
Dom Prosper Gueranger, O.S.B.’s inspiring account of the life and martyrdom of Saint Peter Martyr teaches us this truth in several ways:
The hero deputed this day by the Church to greet our Risen Lord was so valiant in the good fight that martyrdom is part of his name. He is known as Peter the Martyr; to that we cannot speak of him without raising the echo of victory. He was put to death by heretics, and is the grand tribute paid to our Redeemer by the thirteenth century. Never was there a triumph hailed with greater enthusiasm than this. The martyrdom of St. Thomas of Canterbury excited the admiration of the faithful of the preceding century, for nothing was so dear to our forefathers as the liberty of the Church; the martyrdom of St. Peter was celebrated with a like intensity of praise and joy. Let us hearken to the fervid eloquence of the great Pontiff, Innocent IV, who thus begins the Bull of the martyr’s canonization: ‘The truth of the Christian faith, manifested, as it has been, by great and frequent miracles, is not beautified by the new merit of a new Saint. Lo! a combatant of these our times comes, bringing us new and great triumphant signs. The voice of his blood shed (for Christ) is heard, and the fame of his martyrdom is trumpeted, through the world. The land is not silent that sweateth with blood; the country that produced so noble a warrior resounds with his praise; yea, the very sword that did the deed of parricide proclaims his glory. . . . Mother Church has great reason to rejoice, and abundant matter for gladness; she has cause to sing a new canticle to the Lord, and a hymn of fervent praise to her God: . . . the Christian people has cause to give forth devout songs to its Creator. A sweet fruit, gathered in the garden of faith, has been set upon the table of the eternal King: a grape-bunch taken from the vineyard of the Church has filled the royal cup with new wine. . . . The flourishing of the Order of Preachers has produced a red rose, whose sweetness is most grateful to the King; and from the Church here on earth there has been taken a stone, which, after being cut and polished, has deserved a place of honour in the temple of heaven.
Such was the language wherewith the supreme Pontiff spoke of the new martyr, and the people responded by celebrating his feast with extraordinary devotion. It was kept as were the ancient festivals, that is, all servile work was forbidden upon it. The churches served by the Fathers of the Dominican Order were crowded on his feast; and the faithful took little branches with them, that they might be blessed in memory of the triumph of Peter the Martyr. The custom is still observed; and the branches blessed by the Dominicans on this day are venerated as being a protection to the houses where they are kept.
How are we to account for all this fervent devotion of the people towards St. Peter? It was because he died in defense of the faith; and nothing was so dear to the Christians of those days as faith. Peter had received the charge to seize all the heretics who at that time were causing great disturbance and scandal in the country round about Milan. They were called Cathari, but in reality were Manicheans; their teachings were detestable, and their lives most immoral. Peter fulfilled his duty with a firmness and equity which soon secured him the hatred of the heretics; and when he fell a victim to his holy courage, a cry of admiration and gratitude was heard throughout Christendom. Nothing could be more devoid of truth than the accusations brought by the enemies of the Church and their indiscreet abettors against the measures formerly decreed by the public law of Catholic nations, in order to foil the efforts made by evil-minded men to injure the true faith. In those times, no tribunal was more popular as that whose office was to protect the faith, and to put down all them that attacked it. It was to the Order of St. Dominic that this office was mainly entrusted; and well may they be proud of the honour of having so long held one so beneficial to the salvation of mankind. How many of its members have met with a glorious death in the exercise of their stern duty! St. Peter is the first of the martyrs given by the Order for this holy cause: his name, however, head a long list of others who were his brethren in religion, his successors in the defence of the faith, and his followers to martyrdom. The coercive measures that were once, and successfully, long since ceased to be used: but for us Catholics, our judgement of them must surely be that of the Church. She bids us to-day honour as a martyr one of her Saints, who was put to death whilst resisting the wolves that threatened the sheep of Christ’s fold; should we not be guilty of disrespect to our Mother if we dared to condemn what she so highly approves? Far, then, be from us that cowardly truckling to the spirit of the age, which would make us ashamed of the courageous efforts made by our forefathers for the preservation of the faith! Far from us that childish readiness to believe the calumnies of Protestants against an institution which they naturally detest! Far from us that deplorable confusion of ideas which puts truth and error on an equality, and from the fact that error can have no rights, concludes that truth can claim none! (Dom Prosper Gueranger, O.S.B., The Liturgical Year: Paschal Time, Book II, pp. 374-376.)
Who puts truth and error on an equality?
Well, perhaps an example or two will suffice:
I thank you for the kind words contained in your message to me at my election, and I wish in turn to offer my greetings and best wishes on the occasion of your Enthronement at Canterbury Cathedral.
The pastoral ministry is a call to walk in fidelity to the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ. Please be assured of my prayers as you take up your new responsibilities, and I ask you to pray for me as I respond to the new call that the Lord has addressed to me.
I look forward to meeting you in the near future, and to continuing the warm fraternal relations that our predecessors enjoyed. (Message of The Head Apostate in Rome to the Head Apostate in England.)
Yes, dear brothers and sisters in Christ, let us all feel intimately united to the prayer of our Savior in the Last Supper, to his invocation: ut unum sint. Let us ask the merciful Father to live in fullness that faith that we received as a gift on the day of our baptism, and to be able to bear free, courageous and joyful testimony to it. This will be our best service to the cause of unity among Christians, a service of hope to a world still marked by divisions, by contrast and rivalry. The more we are faithful to His will, in our thoughts, words and deeds, the more we will actually and substantially walk towards unity.
For my part, I wish to assure you, in the wake of my predecessors, of my determination to continue on the path of ecumenical dialogue and I would like to thank in advance the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity, for the help that it will continue to offer, in my name, for this noble cause. I ask you, dear brothers and sisters, to bring my cordial greeting and the assurance of my remembrance in the Lord Jesus to the churches and Christian communities here represented, and request of you the charity of a special prayer for my person, to be a pastor according to the heart of Christ. (Bergoglio’s Address to Representative of the Schismatic and Heretical Orthodox Churches, Protesant sects, Talmudists, Mohammedans and Other Infidels, Masons and Pantheists.)
We know how much violence has been produced in recent history by the attempt to eliminate God and the divine from the horizon of humanity, and we experience the value of witnessing in our societies to the original opening to transcendence that is inherent in the human heart. In this, we feel close even to all those men and women who, whilst not recognising themselves belonging to any religious tradition, feel themselves nevertheless to be in search of truth, goodness and beauty, this truth, goodness and beauty of God, and who are our precious allies in efforts to defend the dignity of man, in building a peaceful coexistence among peoples and in guarding Creation carefully. (Bergoglio Address to Representative of the Schismatic and Heretical Orthodox Churches, Protesant sects, Talmudists, Mohammedans and Other Infidels, Masons and Pantheists.)
We all know there are numerous models of unity and you know that the Catholic Church also has as her goal the full visible unity of the disciples of Christ, as defined by the Second Vatican Ecumenical Council in its various Documents (cf. Lumen Gentium, nn. 8, 13; Unitatis Redintegratio, nn. 2, 4, etc.). This unity, we are convinced, indeed subsists in the Catholic Church, without the possibility of ever being lost (cf. Unitatis Redintegratio, n. 4); the Church in fact has not totally disappeared from the world.
On the other hand, this unity does not mean what could be called ecumenism of the return: that is, to deny and to reject one’s own faith history. Absolutely not!
It does not mean uniformity in all expressions of theology and spirituality, in liturgical forms and in discipline. Unity in multiplicity, and multiplicity in unity: in my Homily for the Solemnity of Sts Peter and Paul on 29 June last, I insisted that full unity and true catholicity in the original sense of the word go together. As a necessary condition for the achievement of this coexistence, the commitment to unity must be constantly purified and renewed; it must constantly grow and mature. (Ratzinger/Benedict Ecumenical meeting at the Archbishopric of Cologne English)
Since 1967, our dialogue has treated major theological themes such as: revelation and faith, tradition and teaching authority in the Church. These efforts have been candid in addressing areas of difference. They have also demonstrated a considerable degree of convergence and are worthy of reflection and study. Our dialogue and the many ways in which Catholics and Methodists have become better acquainted have allowed us to recognize together some of those “Christian treasures of great value”. On occasion, this recognition has enabled us to speak with a common voice in addressing social and ethical questions in an increasingly secularized world. I have been encouraged by the initiative which would bring the member churches of the World Methodist Council into association with the Joint Declaration on the Doctrine of Justification, signed by the Catholic Church and the Lutheran World Federation in 1999. Should the World Methodist Council express its intent to associate itself with the Joint Declaration, it would assist in contributing to the healing and reconciliation we ardently desire, and would be a significant step towards the stated goal of full visible unity in faith.
Dear friends, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit and mindful of God’s great and abiding Mercy throughout the world, let us seek to foster a mutual commitment to the Word of God, to witness and to joint prayer. As we prepare our hearts and minds to welcome the Lord in this Advent season, I invoke God’s abundant blessings upon all of you and on Methodists throughout the world. (Address of Benedict XVI to Methodists.)
Places of worship, like this splendid Al-Hussein Bin Talal mosque named after the revered late King, stand out like jewels across the earth’s surface. From the ancient to the modern, the magnificent to the humble, they all point to the divine, to the Transcendent One, to the Almighty. And through the centuries these sanctuaries have drawn men and women into their sacred space to pause, to pray, to acknowledge the presence of the Almighty, and to recognize that we are all his creatures. (Ratzinger/Benedict Speech to Muslim religious leaders, members of the Diplomatic Corps and Rectors of universities in Jordan in front of the mosque al-Hussein bin Talal in Amman.)
Get the idea?
There are, of course, so many other examples than this given in 2013 during the early days of Bergoglio's turn as the universal public face of apostasy. I, for one, no longer have the time to catalog and comment on each regularly as Bergoglio regurgitates his revolutionary shibboleths without cease. Those who do not want to see an apostate when face-to-face with one by now just do not want to be convinced. There is a price to pay for doing so, and that price is very steep in terms of human respect and possibly even financial security. There is little to gain, humanly speaking, especially in today's climate, from accepting, no less speaking out about, the fact that a series of pretenders, one worse than the other, have laid claim falsely to the Throne of Saint Peter to preside over a counterfeit ape of the Catholic Church.
Let us turn now to Dom Prosper Gueranger, O.S.B.’s prayer to Saint Peter Martyr:
The victory was thine, O Peter! and thy zeal for the defence of the holy faith was rewarded. Thou didst ardently desire to shed thy blood for the holiest of causes, and by such a sacrifice to confirm the faithful of Christ in their religion. Our Lord satisfied thy desire; he would even have thy martyrdom be in the festive season of the Resurrection of our divine Lamb, that his glory might add lustre to the beauty of thy holocaust. When the death-blow fell upon thy venerable head, and they generous blood was flowing from the wounds, thou didst write on the ground the first words of the creed, for whose holy truth thou was giving thy life.
Protector of the Christian people! what other motive hadst thou, in all thy labours, but charity? What else but a desire to defend the weak from danger induced thee not only to preach against error, but to drive its teachers from the flock? How many simple souls, who were receiving divine truth from the teaching of the Church, have been deceived by the lying sophistry of heretical doctrine, and have lost the faith? Surely the Church would do all she could to ward off such dangers from her children; she would do all she could to defend them from enemies, who were bent on destroying the glorious inheritance which had been handed down to them by millions of martyrs! She knew the strange tendency that often exists in the heart of fallen man to love error; whereas truth, though of itself unchanging, is not sure of its remaining firmly in the mind, unless it be defended by learning or by faith, as to learning, there are but few who possess it; and as to faith, error is ever conspiring against it, and, of course, with the appearance of truth. In the Christian ages it would have been deemed not only criminal, but absurd, to grant to error the liberty which is due only to truth; and they that were in authority considered it a duty to keep the weak from danger, by removing from them all occasions of a fall; just as the father of a family keeps his children from coming in contact with wicked companions who could easily impose on their inexperience, and lead them to evil under the name of good.
Obtain for us, O holy martyr, a keen appreciation of the precious gift of faith–that element which keeps us on the way to salvation. May we zealously do everything that lies in our power to preserve it, both in our ourselves and in them that are under our care. The love of this holy faith has grown cold in so many hearts; and frequent intercourse with free-thinkers has made them think and speak of matters of faith in a very loose way. Pray for them, O Peter, that they may recover that fearless love of the truths of religion which should be one of the chief traits of the Christian character. If they be living in a country where the modern system is introduced of training all religions alike–that is, of giving equal rights to error and to truth–let them be all the more courageous in professing the truth, and detesting the errors opposed to the truth. Pray for us, O holy martyr, that they may be enkindled within us an ardent love of that faith without which it is impossible to please God. Pray that we may become all earnestness in this duty, which is of vital importance to salvation; that thus our faith may daily gain strength within us, till at length we shall merit to see in heaven what we have believed unhesitatingly on earth. (Dom Prosper Gueranger, O.S.B., The Liturgical Year: Paschal Time, Book II, pp. 378-380.)
Yes, how many simple souls, many of whom today have never received the true teaching of the Church, have been deceived by the lying sophistry of the conciliar revolutionaries, and have lost the Faith as a result?
Is it not true that men today, being deprived of the superabundance of the fruits of Sanctifying and Actual Grace, are more prone to be deceived by error?
Is it not true that error, conspiring against truth, seeks to wrap itself up in the appearance of truth, which is what Jorge Mario Bergoglio/Francis has done for all but a relative handful of days in the past twenty-five months, sixteen days during his daily “homilies” during his staging of the Protestant and Judeo-Masonic Novus Ordo liturgical abomination at the Casa Santa Marta, home to the false "pope's" Ding Dong School Of Apostasy.)
Do not we have an obligation to help our families and our friends from being deceived by error?
Consider the words of Pope Leo XIII, contained in Sapientiae Christianae, January 10, 1890:
The chief elements of this duty consist in professing openly and unflinchingly the Catholic doctrine, and in propagating it to the utmost of our power. For, as is often said, with the greatest truth, there is nothing so hurtful to Christian wisdom as that it should not be known, since it possesses, when loyally received, inherent power to drive away error. (Pope Leo XIII, Sapientiae Christianae, January 10, 1890.)
Do not those of us who live in the United States of America, a land that celebrates “free-thinking” and the very heresy of religious liberty that is a cornerstone of the conciliar revolution, find ourselves subjected to the constant assaults upon right reason and truth (and the very foundation of the conciliar revolution is the attack upon the very nature of dogmatic truth, which is a direct attack on the very nature of God Himself), from those who believe that error has “civil rights” and that it is not necessary to be Catholic in public discourse, that being “conservative” is “good enough”?
Consider what the late Father Edward Leen, S.J., had to say about the influence of naturalism upon the minds of Catholics sixty years-one ago before the doctrinal, liturgical and moral revolutions of conciliarism had begun in earnest at the “Second” Vatican Council and thereafter to this very day:
A shudder of apprehension is traversing the world which still retains its loyalty to Jesus expressing Himself through the authority of His Church. That apprehension has not its sole cause the sight of the horrors that the world has witnessed in recent years in both hemispheres. Many Christians are beginning to feel that perhaps all may not be right with themselves. There is solid reason for this fear. The contemplation of the complete and reasoned abandonment of all hitherto accepted human values that has taken place in Russia and is taking place elsewhere, causes a good deal of anxious soul-searching. It is beginning to be dimly perceived that in social life, as it is lived, even in countries that have not as yet definitely broken with Christianity, there lie all the possibilities of what has become actual in Bolshevism. A considerable body of Christians, untrained in the Christian philosophy of life, are allowing themselves to absorb principles which undermine the constructions of Christian thought. They do not realise how much more dangerous it is for Christianity to exist in an atmosphere of Naturalism than to be exposed to positive persecution. In the old days of the Roman Empire those who enrolled themselves under the standard of Christ saw, with logical clearness, that they had perforce to cut themselves adrift from the social life of the world in which they lived–from its tastes, practices and amusements. The line of demarcation between pagan and Christian life was sharp, clearly defined and obvious. Modern Christians have not been so favorably situated. As has been stated already, the framework of the Christian social organisation has as yet survived. This organisation is, to outward appearances, so solid and imposing that it is easy to be blind to the truth that the soul had gradually gone out of it. Under the shelter and utilising the resources of the organisation of life created by Christianity, customs, ways of conduct, habits of thought, have crept in, more completely perhaps, at variance with the spirit of Christianity than even the ways and manners of pagan Rome.
This infiltration of post-Christian paganism has been steady but slow, and at each stage is imperceptible. The Christian of to-day thinks that he is living in what is to all intents and purposes a Christian civilisation. Without misgivings he follows the current of social life around him. His amusements, his pleasures, his pursuits, his games, his books, his papers, his social and political ideas are of much the same kind as are those of the people with whom he mingles, and who may not have a vestige of a Christian principle left in their minds. He differs merely from them in that he holds to certain definite religious truths and clings to certain definite religious practices. But apart from this there is not any striking contrast in the outward conduct of life between Christian and non-Christian in what is called the civilised world. Catholics are amused by, and interested in, the very same things that appeal to those who have abandoned all belief in God. The result is a growing divorce between religion and life in the soul of the individual Christian. Little by little his faith ceases to be a determining effect on the bulk of his ideas, judgments and decisions that have relation to what he regards as his purely “secular” life. His physiognomy as a social being no longer bears trace of any formative effect of the beliefs he professes. And his faith rapidly becomes a thing of tradition and routine and not something which is looked to as a source of a life that is real.
The Bolshevist Revolution has had one good effect. It has awakened the averagely good Christian to the danger runs in allowing himself to drift with the current of social life about him. It has revealed to him the precipice towards which he has was heading by shaping his worldly career after principles the context of which the revolution has mercilessly exposed and revealed to be at variance with real Christianity. The sincerely religious–and there are many such still–are beginning to realise that if they are to live as Christians they must react violently against the milieu in which they live. It is beginning to be felt that one cannot be a true Christian and live as the bulk of men in civilised society are living. It is clearly seen that “life” is not to be found along those ways by which the vast majority of men are hurrying to disillusionment and despair. Up to the time of the recent cataclysm the average unreflecting Christian dwelt in the comfortable illusion that he could fall in with the ways of the world about him here, and, by holding on to the practices of religion, arrange matters satisfactorily for the hereafter. That illusion is dispelled. It is coming home to the discerning Christian that their religion is not a mere provision for the future. There is a growing conviction that it is only through Christianity lived integrally that the evils of the present time can be remedied and disaster in the time to come averted. (Father Edward Leen, The Holy Ghost, published in 1953 by Sheed and Ward, pp. 6-9.)
Once again, you see, no, not just crazy old Droleskey who writes these things. This much hated and reviled writer is only attempting to give voice, however poorly, to the simple Catholic truth summarized so clearly by Pope Saint Pius X in Notre Charge Apostolique on August 15, 1910:
Here we have, founded by Catholics, an inter-denominational association that is to work for the reform of civilization, an undertaking which is above all religious in character; for there is no true civilization without a moral civilization, and no true moral civilization without the true religion: it is a proven truth, a historical fact. (Pope Saint Pius X, Notre Charge Apostolique, August 15, 1910.)
Father Edward Leen was simply giving expression in 1953 to simple, timeless and immutable truths that true pope after true pope had reiterated time and time again in the last three centuries now. No Catholicism, no social order. It’s that simple. It is incomprehensible that Catholics who claim to be opposed to conciliarism, which is founded in no small measure in a blithe acceptance of the tenets of Modernity, remain as undiscerning now as Catholics were in the 1950s at the time of Father Leen, believing in “conservatism” as the means to roll back the tide of errors that have flooded into the world as a result of the Protestant Revolution and the rise and institutionalization of Judeo-Masonry.
Saint Peter Martyr was willing to lay down his life in defense of the Holy Faith.
So what if our family members and friends revile us and castigate us?
So what if complete strangers start to denounce us for our rejection of conciliarism?
So what if we are humiliated and brought low, brought to nothingness, in the sight of men?
So what?
Is not Heaven worth dying to self and to disordered self-love?
Saint Peter Martyr thought so.
What is wrong with us?
Yes, we must make efforts to plant seeds in the souls of those whom God’s Holy Providence puts in pur paths. To make such efforts bear fruit, however, we cannot pummel others with “I told you sos” or say “How’d you like the new religion, buddy?” We have to proceed with patience. People are free to accept or reject whatever it is we will tell them.
Coming to the conclusion that the man over there in the Vatican is not the pope is not an insubstantial step. We can provide a bit of information or a few links to pertinent articles from various sources, letting prayer and the graces sent to them through the loving hands of Our Lady work as they will. God works in His own good time, not ours.
We do not look for “results” in this passing, mortal vale of tears. All we can do is to try, despite our own sins and failings, to be faithful to what we know is true and that even if disagreements, perhaps major, arise that inflame old passions we must remain calm in the midst of whatever storms beset us and to simply trust fervently in prayer, especially before the Most Blessed Sacrament and to the Mother of God.
Saint Paul reminds us that we must feed babies with milk, which is why “pummeling” or “badgering” others is likely to drive people away from the truth and why we must not look for results and without taking credit for any “conversion” as we are but instruments of God, mere mortals who might be given the consolation now and again of harvesting what others had sown. In the meantime, though, we must be willing to bear trials of fire, recognizing that all is indeed revealed on the Last Day:
[1] And I, brethren, could not speak to you as unto spiritual, but as unto carnal. As unto little ones in Christ. [2] I gave you milk to drink, not meat; for you were not able as yet. But neither indeed are you now able; for you are yet carnal. [3] For, whereas there is among you envying and contention, are you not carnal, and walk according to man? [4] For while one saith, I indeed am of Paul; and another, I am of Apollo; are you not men? What then is Apollo, and what is Paul? [5] The ministers of him whom you have believed; and to every one as the Lord hath given.
[6] I have planted, Apollo watered, but God gave the increase. [7] Therefore, neither he that planteth is any thing, nor he that watereth; but God that giveth the increase. [8] Now he that planteth, and he that watereth, are one. And every man shall receive his own reward, according to his own labour. [9] For we are God’s coadjutors: you are God’s husbandry; you are God’s building. [10] According to the grace of God that is given to me, as a wise architect, I have laid the foundation; and another buildeth thereon. But let every man take heed how he buildeth thereupon.
[11] For other foundation no man can lay, but that which is laid; which is Christ Jesus. [12] Now if any man build upon this foundation, gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, stubble: [13] Every man’s work shall be manifest; for the day of the Lord shall declare it, because it shall be revealed in fire; and the fire shall try every man’s work, of what sort it is. [14] If any man’s work abide, which he hath built thereupon, he shall receive a reward. [15] If any man’s work burn, he shall suffer loss; but he himself shall be saved, yet so as by fire. (1 Cor. 3: 1-15.)
In other words, we can plant seeds and then be at peace, recognizing that it might just very well be within the Providence of God that someone else other than ourselves might be the human instruments of bringing around a certain person about the true state of the Church Militant on earth at this time or about this or that difficult situation. A “fresh face,” if you will, one that does have the “baggage” that we carry, especially with our family members who remember us when we were “different” or more worldly or, God forbid, profane or, in other words, more like themselves or when we have had to change positions when we have been convinced of being wrong, something that makes us appear “unreliable” or “unstable” in their yes. All that matters is the the salvation of the souls of others. Nothing else. Nothing else at all.
Pray hard. Sacrifice much. Suffer well. Pray for those from whom you are estranged and those who might be instruments of persecution and humiliation. Do all for the greater honor and glory of God as the consecrated slaves of Christ the King through the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of Mary.
All gets revealed on the Last Day. However, it might just within the Providence of God for there to be foretastes of the Last Day in this life as we are reconciled unto others if we use various opportunities with wisdom and prudence to plant a few seeds that might be harvested by others.
We cannot live our lives in anxiety.
The path to Heaven can be trod only by those who are willing to bear the Cross and to lift it high in their daily lives seeking only to live in such a way that we will be ready at all times to die in a state of Sanctifying Grace as a member of the Catholic Church, outside of which there is no salvation and without which there can be no true social order, as we pray as many Rosaries each day as our state in life permits.
It’s the Faith that matters, the entire Faith without any compromises, now and for all eternity.
Aren’t we willing to suffer some more for the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus through the Immaculate Heart of Mary?
Saint Peter Martyr was willing to do eight hundred years ago.
What’s wrong with us?
Immaculate Heart of Mary, triumph soon!
Our Lady of the Rosary, pray for us.
Viva Cristo Rey! Vivat Christus Rex!
Saint Joseph, pray for us.
Saints Peter and Paul, pray for us.
Saint John the Baptist, pray for us.
Saint John the Evangelist, pray for us.
Saint Michael the Archangel, pray for us.
Saint Gabriel the Archangel, pray for us.
Saint Raphael the Archangel, pray for us.
Saints Joachim and Anne, pray for us.
Saints Caspar, Melchior, and Balthasar, pray for us.
Saint Peter Martyr, pray for us.
Isn’t it time to pray a Rosary now?
Appendix
From Saint Anthony Mary Claret’s The Golden Key to Heaven
God’s Providence demands that I have a heart of holy indifference–As it is arduous and difficult to gain one’s last End without complete and holy indifference, it is likewise so much the easier to gain this End with it. To thoroughly convince yourself of this, weigh this truth:
(1) God is Infinite Wisdom and Knowledge. He knows and understands the means that lead with all security to the attainment of your last End. There are all kinds of means serviceable for the gaining of your last End–health and sickness, honor and dishonor, an honored calling to a lowly occupation–provided they are put to good use.
Now if you know the answer, tell me: What will lead you most securely to your last End? Is it the enjoyment of robust health, or is it a sickly condition? Is it a state of being honored and loved, or one of being insulted and hated? Is it holding a high post, or having a humble employment? This something that you do not know, nor do I, nor does anybody else in the world. All those things are mysteries that no perception can penetrate except only the perception of Him Who is Almighty.
(2) God is Infinite Love, Who always arranged for souls the surest means for reaching their last End–surest, provided they always keep themselves in holy indifference and proper balance. God deals with souls as a mother who fondly loves her tender child.
As a true mother is incapable of giving poison to her beloved child, even more so is God incapable of providing anything harmful for a soul that surrenders itself to Him with complete indifference. O my soul, become for once fully convinced that if God visits you with illness, that this is the surest way for leading you to reach your last End; when He allows you to be despised and belittled, when He placed you in darkness, in desolation, in trials, that is the surest way for you to advance to your last End.
3) God is Infinite Power, and He helps infallibly to its last End the soul constant in holy indifference and proper balance. And who will be so bold and so daring that he can put an obstacle before God? And what will be the result? A heap of misfortune for which you cannot weep enough. Reflect well on this and what follows.
It is quite certain that such a soul must of necessity suffer in this world more than another soul. You greatly deceive yourself, my soul, if you imagine that you can escape the troubles which God’s Love holds in store for you as means to your last End. You will never be able to do so. You will suffer, and you will necessarily have to suffer the pains and ailments, the contempt and mistreatments which from eternity God has assigned for you to suffer.
“You will either fulfill what God wants, or you will suffer what you do not want.” Saint Augustine.
If you maintain an indifferent heart and bear everything with patience, you will give God pleasure and He will fortify you with an inflow of His graces. He will give you a continual peace and calm and will make the way of the cross something easy and sweet for you. If you neglect this holy indifference and bear troubles impatiently, you will displease God and He will deny you all His strengthening, supporting help and every kind of peace and consolation, letting you fall under the weight of your cross.
If it is very certain that for all eternity you will lose that high degree of glory unless you adopt the means God has appointed. If your heart is not indifferent and you do not use such means, adopting them willingly, you will weary yourself in vain and will lost your last End. It is certain that you are in danger of not gaining your eternal salvation, not even a lower grade of glory.
A soul that has not this holy indifference, falls out of (moral) necessity into many grave temptations. In such circumstances, who is not drawn downward by anger, by resentment, by faintheartedness and melancholy, by pride and fear of contempt? And who is not moved by impulsiveness and self-will, by interior upsets and disorder, and by the rebellion of uncontrolled passions?
Ah, to overcome these problems requires a particular help of God. Now will He give it to a soul unwilling to submit to His plans, to a soul who, full of anger, rejects the means which God has provided, a soul unwilling to serve except in its own way, unwilling to acknowledge Him as Master and Lord, and who insolently resists God’s designs? Let a man place his hopes in the One Whom he can trust, for the struggle is quite dangerous. (Saint Anthony Mary Claret, The Golden Key to Heaven, Immaculate Heart Publications, pp. 36-39.)