Reflections on the Commemorated Feast of Saint Vincent de Paul, C.M.

Today, Sunday, July 19, 2026, is the Eighth Sunday after Pentecost and the Commemoration of the founder of the Congregationn of the Miss, Saint Vincent de Paul, one of Holy Mother Church's foremost apostles of charity.

Father Francis X. Weninger's reflection on Saint Vincent de Paul discusses not only his legendary charity for the poor, which was driven solely by supernatural motives, but also his intense hatred of sin:

Vincent de Paul, a Frenchman, was born at Pouy, not far from Dax, in Gascony, and from his boyhood was remarkable for his exceeding charity towards the poor. From the care of his father's flocks he was sent to study letters. He learned the humanities at Dax, and theology first at Toulouse, then at Saragossa. Having been ordained priest, and having taken a degree in theology, he fell into the hands of the Turks, and was led captive by them into Africa. But being sold into slavery, he won his owner (an apostate) back to Christ. By the help of the Mother of God, therefore, Vincent and his owner hurried away from the shores of the barbarians. Then Vincent undertook a journey to Rome, to visit the thresholds of the Apostles. Having returned to France he governed, in a most saintly manner, first, the parish of Clichy, and then that of Chatillon. He was appointed by the king as principal chaplain of the French galleys, and showed marvelous zeal in striving for the salvation of both the drivers and the rowers. The holy Francis de Sales appointed him superior of the nuns of the Visitation, whom he ruled for nearly forty years with so great prudence, that he amply justified the opinion of their most holy founder, who confessed that he knew no worthier priest than Vincent.

To the preaching of the Gospel unto the poor, especially to the country people, he devoted himself unweariedly, until he was disabled by old age. To this apostolic work he obligated both himself and the members of the congregation, which he specially founded under the name of secular Priests of the Mission, by a perpetual vow confirmed by the Holy See. And how greatly he labored for bettering the discipline of the clergy, is attested by the seminaries erected for senior clerics, by the frequency of sacred conferences among the priests, and by the religious exercises preparatory to the sacrament of Holy Orders; for which purposes, as well as that of giving pious retreats for laymen, he desired that the houses of his institute should be freely opened. Moreover, for the extension of faith and piety, he sent evangelical laborers, not only into the provinces of France, but also into Italy, Poland, Scotland, Ireland, and even to Barbary and to the Indies. And at the death of Louis XIII, whom he had attended and exhorted on his deathbed, Vincent himself was summoned by the queen, Anne of Austria, mother of Louis XIV, and made a member of the young King's Council of Conscience. In this position he most zealously urged that only the more worthy men should be placed in authority over the churches and monasteries; that civil discords, single combats, slowly-spreading false doctrines, which he both perceived and dreaded, should be ended; and that due obedience should be rendered by all to the apostolic decisions.

There was no kind of misfortune which he did not, with fatherly tenderness, endeavor to relieve. The faithful groaning beneath the Turkish yoke, infants which had been abandoned, wayward youths, maidens exposed to danger, nuns driven from their convents, fallen women, convicts condemned to the galleys, infirm strangers, disabled workmen and even lunatics, and beggars without number, all these he received and devoutly assisted with resources and in hospices which have lasted to this day. When Lorraine, Champagne, Picardy, and other provinces were devastated by plague, famine, and war, he relieved their necessities with an open hand. He founded many societies for seeking out and alleviating the lot of the wretched, among them a celebrated association of matrons, widely spread under the name of Sisters of Charity. He likewise promoted the foundation of the Daughters of the Cross, of Providence, and of St. Genevieve, for the education of the weaker sex.

Amid these and other most important affairs he was ever intent upon God, affable to everyone, and always true to himself, simple, upright, lowly, and ever shrank from honors, riches, and luxuries. He was heard to say that in nothing was there any pleasure for him except in Christ Jesus, Whom he desired to imitate in all things. At length, worn out with bodily pains, labors, and old age, on September 27th, in the year of salvation 1660, and in the eighty-fifth year of age, at Paris, in the house of St. Lazare, which is the mother-house of the Congregation the Mission, he calmly fell asleep. Since he became illustrious for virtues, merits, and miracles, Clement XII placed him among the Saints, assigning July 19th as his annual feast. And Leo XIII, at the earnest request of many bishops, claimed and appointed this notable hero of divine charity, who has deserved so exceedingly well of every class of men the special patron before God of all the charitable societies existing in the entire Catholic world, and in any way soever emanating from his foundation.

Practical Considerations

I. The continual labors and cares of St. Vincent had only one aim: the spiritual welfare of others and the prevention of all offences to God. He declaimed against those who incited others to sin and vice, and thus led them to eternal destruction. He fully comprehended the truth of the words of St. Dionysius the Areopagite: "Among all divine works none is more divine than laboring with God for the salvation of souls." Have you no opportunity to perform a work which is so agreeable in the sight of the Lord? Think well, and do not neglect it. St. Vincent was also convinced that among all evil works, there is none more evil and displeasing to God than when we incite others to sin and thus assist the devil in gaining souls. Those who do this are called by the Holy Fathers of the Church messengers, representatives, vicars of the devil, because they are sent and incited by him to execute his plans for the destruction of men. They are his vicars, because they do that which is really the devil's work. Still more severely speaks St. James of Nisibis: "All those," says he, "deserve the name of devils, who prevent others from keeping those commandments, which appear hard to keep, and who advise them to follow the devices of the flesh." He means to say that such people may be regarded as real devils; but I add that they are worse, more hurtful and more to be feared than the devils themselves, as many a person whom Satan cannot tempt, is incited to sin by their flatteries, promises, and still more by their bad example, and, hence is led to destruction. If you, therefore, desire to be a representative of the devil, or his vicar, you ought to be informed that his abiding place belongs also to you. According to the words of Christ, hell is prepared for the devil and his angels: "Depart from me, you cursed, into everlasting fire, which was prepared for the devil and his angels " (Matth. xxv.). Angel means a messenger, a representative. For you and your equals, as angels and messengers of the devil; for you, deceiver, as a representative of the devil, for you is hell, and in hell the eternal fire, if you do not leave your wicked ways. Endeavor to repair the evil you have occasioned, and do penance. What will you do?

II. The countenance of the dying St. Vincent expressed the comfort and happiness that filled his soul. This was probably because he thought of his innocent life, his zeal in the service of God, his constant endeavor to do good. You may well believe me when I say that you will not be thus consoled in your last hour, when you remember your sinful, unchaste life, your negligence in the service of the Almighty, your idleness in performing good works. The recollection of them will cause you inexpressible fear and horror. Before all, will the thought of those sins torment you which you committed so wantonly, and which you have not even confessed rightly, much less expiated. "They shall come with fear at the thought of their sins," says the Holy Ghost, "and their iniquities shall stand against them to convict them." (Wisdom, iv). The wicked Antiochus did not heed his sins during the time that his health was unimpaired; he gave them not even a thought: but when his last hour approached, he said: "But now I remember the evils that I did in Jerusalem." (I. Macc, vi.) Now, not before: now that I am called into eternity, to appear before the judgment-seat of the Most High, now I remember them against my will. But what resulted from this remembrance? "Into what tribulation am I come, and into what floods of sorrow." (I. Mace, vi.) If you would not experience equal woes, but die comforted and happy, lead a Christian life after the example of St. Vincent. Avoid evil, and practice good works. Should your conscience be stained with sin, expiate it by sincere penance, without losing another day. (St. Vincent de Paul.)

Yes, Saint Vincent de Paul was not one of today's sappy statists who use other people's money to impoverish them while keeping the poor in their poverty so as to empower themselves to control the legitimate liberties of others, starting by doing everything possible to eliminate the Natural Law right to private property if not directly then by excessive taxation and regulation

Saint Vincent Paul serve others for the love God as he saw in all others the Divine impress whose sanctification and salvation it was his mission to advance upon peril of the loss of his own immortal soul, and it was to advance the eternal and temporal good of souls that he urged his followers to avoid even the appearance of sin.

How sad it is, therefore, the largest Catholic university in the United States of America, Saint John's University, Jamaica, Borough of Queens, City of New York, New York, which is own own baccalaureate alma mater (January 31, 1973) at which I taugth as an adjunct professor off and on from 1982 to 1992, has celebrating sins of the most perverse kind in the name of "inclusion" for the past five years.

Here is a reminder of the facts:

This covering up of the Catholic Faith at formerly Catholic institutions now under conciliar control has involved the hiring of non-Catholic professors and the recruiting of non-Catholic students so as to prevent professors who are of a mind to teach the Faith from doing so, especially by starting their class sessions with the Sign of the Cross and a confessionally Catholic prayer that would "offend" non-Catholic students. This sort of insidious attack on the honor and majesty and glory of God is a daily occurrence at these formerly Catholic institutions under conciliar control. It permeates the courses taught by most of their professors. It permeates the horrific "liturgies" offered on their campuses (and in the Newman Centers on the campuses of non-Catholic colleges and universities). It permeates the "advice" given in the "reconciliation room." It permeates the atmosphere of faculty meetings and the hiring decisions made by departmental personnel and budget committees.

Believe me, this is not merely "academic" knowledge acquired from reading articles. This is first-hand knowledge that I have experienced in my own teaching career and second-hand knowledge that has been transmitted to me by various colleagues over the years.

To be sure, of course, I did my share of investigations as to the theological and liturgical corruption on Catholic educational institutions in conciliar captivity during my eight years of writing for The Wanderer. One of those investigations involved the scandal caused by the hiring in 1995 of a pro-abortion, law professor, Tanya Hernandez, who had worked for the Center for Reproductive Law and Public Policy, by the dean of the Saint John's University School of Law in Jamaica, Queen, New York, Rudolph Hasl, who had also removed a large Crucifix from the lobby of the then-named Fromkes Hall and replaced it with a mobile containing symbols of Judaism (a Star of David), Mohammedanism (the Islamic crescent) and Christianity (a cross without a cross), each of an equal size.

There was no room for Our Crucified Saviour in the lobby of the Saint John's University School of Law. The series of articles prompted Father Donald Harrington, C.M., to rush into the office of a departmental chairman with a copy of The Wanderer in his hands, shouting "What are we going to about this? He's killing us", a shout that was loud enough to be heard by a professor, who related the story to a student who told it to me.

Nothing happened, of course, as a result of that series of stories. We can and must chronicle the attacks on the Faith that constitute a veritable pandemic within the structures of the counterfeit church of conciliarism. As those who foment these scandals always remain in perfectly good "canonical standing" in the structures of the counterfeit church of conciliarism, however, anyone who thinks that they are "fighting for the Faith" by seeking to "reform" these institutions from within is quite mistaken. These institutions are in the hands of apostates who are protected by apostate "bishops," who are appointed by apostate "popes,” and the current “pope” is very encouraging of the promotion of what is now called the “LGBTQ+” agenda, an agenda that the new president of the university from which I received my Bachelor of Arts, cum laude, on January 31, 1973, “Father” Brian Shanely, O.P., is doing with particular abandon, thus spitting on the graves of so many dedicated Vincentian Fathers and faithful laity who sought to defend the true Faith at Saint John’s University on its original Brooklyn campus from 1870 to 1970 and even at the current main campus on the site of the former Hillcrest Country Club in Jamaica, Queens, from 1955 until most of them either died or retired”

NEW YORK, April 30, 2021 (LifeSiteNews) — The Dominican priest and president of the Catholic St. John’s University in New York City has committed the school to furthering and promoting LGBT ideology, stating that more must be done to include LGBT individuals, and saying the university policies must reflect this goal.

Fr. Brian J. Shanley, O.P., issued an internal memo — obtained by LifeSiteNews — in which he decried the recent findings of a report by “The Transgender Training Institute” (TTTI), which stated that “it is not currently possible to say that SJU is a community that is open and welcoming for LGBTQ+ students, staff and faculty.”

The report called on the university to take a “stronger, more vocal stance in support of LGBTQ+ people through both words and aligned actions.”

Writing internally to the university in response to the report, Fr. Shanley wrote that he was “disheartened to learn about the many negative experiences of our LGBTQ+ students, employees, and alumni: a lack of support, neglect, ignorance, bias, and prejudice.”

“It is clear, both from the climate survey and my own observations, that much work needs to be done to transform St. John’s into a place that is equitable and inclusive for LGBTQ+ people.”

“As the new president of St. John’s, I want everyone to know that I embrace the LGBTQ+ members of our community and that I am committed to leadership that will help to create a climate that realizes our mission to love and respect every individual as made in the image and likeness of God.”

Shanley added that LGBT individuals had “enriched our community in many ways,” mentioning that they had made “contributions” to the university for “generations,” doing so “nearly always without proper recognition and at great personal risk. We must all work together to create a campus that is more inclusive, respectful, affirming, and loving.”

The radical transformation of the campus which Fr. Shanley looks to implement would be expressed in new “practices, policies, and norms.”

Shanley proudly referenced how St. John’s was the first university to commit to a statement from a pro-homosexual advocacy group, which affirmed LGBT youth by telling them that “God is on your side.” Yet despite this, Shanley stated that the university needed to improve in its commitment to LGBT ideology, referencing a “culture of silence” when it came to “affirmation of LGBTQ+ community members.”

The TTTI also mentioned such a culture of silence: “[S]ilence translates into a campus where LGBTQ+ people are welcomed as members of the SJU community, but not necessarily embraced as LGBTQ+ people.” Shanley wrote that “it is a culture I am actively working to disrupt.”

The Catholic Church teaches that homosexual acts are one of the four sins that cry to heaven for justice. The Catechism of the Catholic Church states that “basing itself on Sacred Scripture, which presents homosexual acts as acts of grave depravity, tradition has always declared that ‘homosexual acts are intrinsically disordered’. They are contrary to the natural law. They close the sexual act to the gift of life. They do not proceed from a genuine affective and sexual complementarity. Under no circumstances can they be approved.” (CCC 2357)

The Catholic Church further teaches that the homosexual inclination is also “objectively disordered,” since God created sexual attraction for the purpose of drawing a man and a woman together to become husband and wife in marriage. In other words, the Catholic Churches teaches that God does not make anyone a homosexual.

Fr. Shanley, appointed president of the university in late 2020, revealed himself to be aware of the Catholic teaching regarding homosexuality, commenting that “some of the tenets of Catholic moral teaching create challenges for making LGBTQ+ people feel fully included and embraced.”

He described this Catholic doctrine as “a difficult and painful reality,” which was a detriment to “greater understanding and connection in our community.”

Potential pro-LGBT changes

The TTTI made a number of recommendations for the university, in order to become more in line with LGBT ideology. Among them were proposals for LGBT-specific Masses; pro-LGBT events, such as pride days; prioritizing “inviting LGBTQ+ speakers to campus”; increasing the number of “all gender bathrooms.”

The TTTI also recommended to use pronouns which align with the sex of which a student claims to be a member; provide “HR benefits” for “married” same-sex couples, including medical transitioning; begin a mandatory first-year seminar which would provide “LGBTQ+101 content, as well as content that is anti-racist, anti-ableist.”

Not only this, but the TTTI asked the university to perform actions which would seem to set the university in direct conflict with Catholic teaching on some matters.

Some such instances were the recommendations to “voice condemnation or solidarity when public news events of LGBTQ+ people intersect with the Catholic Church,” and “send messages to the university keeping the community abreast of the issue and offer support in affirming identities, highlight the mission of the university in affirming human dignity of LGBTQ+ peoples, and stress the message of inclusion embodied on campus.”

This latter suggestion was made in specific reference to the recent declaration by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, reiterating the Church’s teaching which bans blessings for same-sex couples.

In the internal memo, Fr. Shanley wrote that he would be asking the “senior management team, other campus leaders, and the Strategic Planning Committee to give careful attention to the Transgender Training Institute’s Climate Assessment.”

The various recommendations, as well as additional ones stemming from “ongoing community feedback,” would be “taken seriously,” he stated. “I am confident that our strategic plan will be responsive to the concerns highlighted in the climate survey.”

LifeSiteNews contacted the university about the matter, inquiring whether Fr. Shanley was concerned that his promotion of LGBT ideology placed him in opposition to the Church’s teaching on the matter, and if his actions could encourage students in a lifestyle condemned by the Church.

A spokesman for the university replied: “At St. John’s University, we embrace all members of the University community without exception in all that we do, and Fr. Shanley’s statements on the matters that you raise speak for themselves and the University.”

A constant tone for his presidency

The news comes just hours after LifeSiteNews reported on how Fr. Shanley was mandating COVID-19 injections for all on-campus students this fall. Citing the “expanded availability” of the injections, Shanley ordered that students must not only be injected, but provide proof of the event, in order to attend the university.

Some exceptions would be provided for those who could provide “proof of a documented medical condition,” or who did not have the injection “due to religious beliefs.”

St. John’s, which proclaims its Vincentian “compassion and zeal for service,” could face backlash based on violation of human rights under the new policy. Since the COVID injections have so far only received emergency use authorization, they are as yet only experimental, and forcing individuals to partake of experimental medicine is a violation of the Nuremberg Code, which came to be as a result of the atrocities seen in World War II.

However, the latest two developments at St. John’s are no surprise, as Fr. Shanley 2255

In 2016, as president of Providence College, he verbally attacked then-Professor Anthony Esolen, who had criticized what he described as the college’s surrender to the “the Totalitarian Diversity Cult.” Shanley rebuffed Esolen by saying that both he and the college “understand and value diversity in a very different sense from him.”

That same year, Shanley invited “Rhode Island’s most notorious abortionist” to take part in a political panel discussion at the college.

Indeed, two years later, Fr. Shanley made headlines for initially refusing to condemn a gay-rape cartoon in Providence College, which threatened a pro-family, pro-marriage student. Michael Smalanskas had put up a poster on the college notice board, defending the Catholic teaching about marriage, but was subsequently placed under the protection of campus police, after being threatened by fellow students, and a cartoon depicting his forcible homosexual rape was placed in his dormitory bathroom.

After nearly a month, following the intervention of the local bishop and a petition by the laity, Fr. Shanley intervened to condemn the threats made against Smalanskas. (New President of Saint John’s University Commits to Promoting Sodomite Ideology on Campus.)

Gee, I wonder if "Bishop" Nicholas DeMazio of Broolyn will take the same kind of forceful action against Brian Shanley that his immediate predecessor, "Bishop" Thomas Vose Daily, took against Rudolph Hasl when he hired Tanya Hernandez twenty-six years ago?

What was that "forceful action," you ask?

Well, I am being facetious as "Bishop" Thomas Vose Daily said and did nothing when Hasl hired Hernandez, and "Bishop" DeMarzio will be hamstrung to do or say anything this time because he knows that his "pope," Jorge Mario Bergoglio, is sitting back and enjoying every minute of the German "bishops'" open defiance of the conciliar Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith's document prohibiting the "blessing" of sodomite "civil unions" that he approved but almost immediately undermined (seeAntipope Appoveth, Antipope Undermineth What He Approveth).

This open support for the agenda of perversity within the counterfeit church of conciliarism has been the very basis of this false religious sect’s liturgical revolution.

We have the seen the conciliar sect’s false “pope” go from saying “Who am I to judge” to his standing idly by with his motor mouth firmly sealed with super glue as men like Brian Shanley and most of the conciliar “hierarchy” of Germany, Belgium, and Switzerland embrace everything about the agenda of perversity as being perfectly consonant with the Catholic Faith and thus being no impediment to personal sanctification and salvation, no less a threat to the very integrity of social order and thus of the very existence of nations.

Men such as Brian Shanley must, therefore, deny the following plain words inspired by God Himself in the Book of Genesis as meaning what they say or that they refer to the pestilential sin of Sodom that they seek to protect and promote with the zeal of those inspired by the forces of darkness to promote all that is rotten, ugly, impure, indecent, impious, and odious in the sight of the true God of Divine Revelation, the Most Holy Trinity, Who visited fire and brimstone upon the cities of Sodom and Gomorrha:

And when the men rose up from thence, they turned their eyes towards Sodom: and Abraham walked with them, bringing them on the way. And the Lord said: Can I hide from Abraham what I am about to do: Seeing he shall become a great and mighty nation, and in him all the nations of the earth shall be blessed? For I know that he will command his children, and his household after him to keep the way of the Lord, and do judgment and justice: that for Abraham's sake the Lord may bring to effect all the things he hath spoken unto him. And the Lord said: The cry of Sodom and Gomorrha is multiplied, and their sin is become exceedingly grievous.

I will go down and see whether they have done according to the cry that is come to me: or whether it be not so, that I may know. And they turned themselves from thence, and went their way to Sodom: but Abraham as yet stood before the Lord. And drawing nigh he said: Wilt thou destroy the just with the wicked? If there be fifty just men in the city, shall they perish withal? and wilt thou not spare that place for the sake of the fifty just, if they be therein? Far be it from thee to do this thing, and to slay the just with the wicked, and for the just to be in like case as the wicked, this is not beseeming thee: thou who judgest all the earth, wilt not make this judgment.

And the Lord said to him: If I find in Sodom fifty just within the city, I will spare the whole place for their sake. And Abraham answered, and said: Seeing I have once begun, I will speak to my Lord, whereas I am dust and ashes. What if there be five less than fifty just persons? wilt thou for five and forty destroy the whole city? And he said: I will not destroy it, if I find five and forty. And again he said to him: But if forty be found there, what wilt thou do? He said: I will not destroy it for the sake of forty. Lord, saith he, be not angry, I beseech thee, if I speak: What if thirty shall be found there? He answered: I will not do it, if I find thirty there.

Seeing, saith he, I have once begun, I will speak to my Lord. What if twenty be found there? He said: I will not destroy it for the sake of twenty. I beseech thee, saith he, be not angry, Lord, if I speak yet once more: What if ten should be found there? And he said: I will not destroy it for the sake of ten. And the Lord departed, after he had left speaking to Abraham: and Abraham returned to his place. (Genesis 16: 16-33)

And he said to him: Behold also in this, I have heard thy prayers, not to destroy the city for which thou hast spoken. Make haste and be saved there, because I cannot do any thing till thou go in thither. Therefore the name of that city was called Segor. The sun was risen upon the earth, and Lot entered into Segor. And the Lord rained upon Sodom and Gomorrha brimstone and fire from the Lord out of heaven. And he destroyed these cities, and all the country about, all the inhabitants of the cities, and all things that spring from the earth.

And his wife looking behind her, was turned into a statue of salt. And Abraham got up early in the morning and in the place where he had stood before with the Lord, He looked towards Sodom and Gomorrha, and the whole land of that country: and he saw the ashes rise up from the earth as the smoke of a furnace. (Genesis 19: 21-28.)

Although apologists for all things lavender would have us believe that the sin of Sodom was that of a “lack of hospitality,” we know this is yet another Modernist myth designed to reaffirm those steeped in perverse sins against nature in their freely chosen behavior until the time that they meet Christ the King at the fearful moment of their Particular Judgment.

Perhaps, however, Brian Shaley would have Catholics ignore Holy Mother Church's condemnations of against homosexual behavior that are contained in the very pages of Holy Scripture that were written the Divine Inspiration the Third Person of the Most Blessed Trinity, God the Holy Ghost:

[13] If any one lie with a man as with a woman, both have committed an abomination, let them be put to death: their blood be upon them. [14] If any man after marrying the daughter, marry her mother, he hath done a heinous crime: he shall be burnt alive with them: neither shall so great an abomination remain in the midst of you. [15] He that shall copulate with any beast or cattle, dying let him die, the beast also ye shall kill. (Leviticus 20: 13-15.)

And into whatsoever city or town you shall enter, inquire who in it is worthy, and there abide till you go thence. And when you come into the house, salute it, saying: Peace be to this house. And if that house be worthy, your peace shall come upon it; but if it be not worthy, your peace shall return to you. And whosoever shall not receive you, nor hear your words: going forth out of that house or city shake off the dust from your feet. Amen I say to you, it shall be more tolerable for the land of Sodom and Gomorrha in the day of judgment, than for that city. (Matthew 10: 11-15.)

For this cause God delivered them up to shameful affections. For their women have changed the natural use into that use which is against nature. And, in like manner, the men also, leaving the natural use of the women, have burned in their lusts one towards another, men with men working that which is filthy, and receiving in themselves the recompense which was due to their error. And as they liked not to have God in their knowledge, God delivered them up to a reprobate sense, to do those things which are not convenient; Being filled with all iniquity, malice, fornication, avarice, wickedness, full of envy, murder, contention, deceit, malignity, whisperers, Detractors, hateful to God, contumelious, proud, haughty, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents, foolish, dissolute, without affection, without fidelity, without mercy. Who, having known the justice of God, did not understand that they who do such things, are worthy of death; and not only they that do them, but they also that consent to them that do them. (Romans 1: 18-32.)

[9] Know you not that the unjust shall not possess the kingdom of God? Do not err: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, [10] Nor the effeminate, nor liers with mankind, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor railers, nor extortioners, shall possess the kingdom of God. (1 Cor. 6: 9)

[6] And the angels who kept not their principality, but forsook their own habitation, he hath reserved under darkness in everlasting chains, unto the judgment of the great day. [7] As Sodom and Gomorrha, and the neighbouring cities, in like manner, having given themselves to fornication, and going after other flesh, were made an example, suffering the punishment of eternal fire. [8] In like manner these men also defile the flesh, and despise dominion, and blaspheme majesty. [9] When Michael the archangel, disputing with the devil, contended about the body of Moses, he durst not bring against him the judgment of railing speech, but said: The Lord command thee. [10] But these men blaspheme whatever things they know not: and what things soever they naturally know, like dumb beasts, in these they are corrupted. (Jude 1 6-10.)

Does the Catholic Church have to apologize for the Book of Leviticus, for the words of Our Lord Himself, for the writings of Saint Paul the Apostle and for that of Saint Jude Thaddeus, our dear Patron of Hopeless Cases, who was blessed to carry the Holy Shroud adorned with the Holy Face of Our Lord Jesus Christ upon it?

The conciliar revolutionaries have adopted the language of the homosexual collective, whose members are filled with bitter anger and hatred at anyone who dares to criticize their "lifestyles" as they are, whether or not they realize it, in rebellion against the very nature that God has implanted within them and have thus done what all revolutionaries do to justify themselves before men: to do violence to language in order to cloud supernatural and natural truth with a fog of irrationality and sentimentality.

It is shameful that one conciliar official after another has adopted this language, thereby conceding that one can identify himself on the basis of the inclination to and/or the commission of perverse sins against nature and the Sixth and Ninth Commandments and that civil society and must treat such self-identification as a legitimate basis for social interaction and legal protection under various "civil rights" statutes and ordinances.

Then again, obviously, many conciliar officials, not a few of them afflicted with perversity themselves, have gone of their way created, fostered, and promoted a culture that has sustained and propagated the entire agenda of homosexual collective, including "marriage" and, quite importantly, persecuting anyone who criticizes sodomy for what it is. There has been the systematic recruitment, retention, and promotion of homosexuals through the nooks and crannies of the conciliar structures, including its hierarchy, such as it is, and within parishes, schools, universities, colleges, seminaries, professional schools, religious houses, and houses of so-called "spiritual formation." I suggest that those who have any doubt about this fact should consider the massive amount of documented evidence that Mrs. Randy Engel amassed in The Rite of Sodomy, which has an entire chapter devoted to the horrors of "New Ways Ministry," welcomed as it is at this time by the conciliar revolutionaries in the Vatican itself.

Thus it is that the counterfeit church of conciliarism, reflecting its "openness to the world" and its falsehoods, has bought into the ideology of the homosexual collective by building it into programs that are taught to presbyters, teachers and children, doing so with an special application to "touching" and expressions of "affection" when the problem of clergy abuse that has exploded into full public view in the past sixteen years now has been caused by the creation of an entire environment that is friendly to perversity. (As excerpted from:No Black and White in "Catholic Universities," Only Different Shades of Lavender.

Our true popes condemned heresy and error. They condemned moral wrong for what it is without any "nuancing" of issues.

So have our saints, including Saint Peter Damian and Pope Leo IX, and Saint Vincent de Paul was no less a fierce of opponent of heresy and error.

Saint Vincent de Paulinveighed against Jansenism and urged one and all to obey Pope Innocent’s papal bull condemning it without making any reservation or qualification as befits the docile obedience must render and the docile submission that a Catholic must demonstrate at all times to a legitimate Successor of Saint Peter.

At issue were five points that Bishop Jacques-Benigne Lignel Bossuet had summarized from Cornelius Jansen’s Augustinus that were deemed to be heretical. Saint Vincent himself worked to gather signatures to have the five propositions be condemned by Pope Innocent X:

Denounced to the Sorbonne in July 1649, these five propositions were referred to Rome in a letter signed by nearly eighty-five bishops. Our saint worked hard to obtain these signatures. He wrote on all sides, and even got Anne of Austria to apply to the Pope to hasten the definition of faith on the point. “I have made my prayers,” he said, “for three months on the doctrine of grace, and God, by new lights every day, has confirmed me in the belief that our Lord died for all, and that He wished to save every one.” And so, too, as regards the question of grace being given to all and sufficient for all “Truly I cannot understand how a God, so infinitely good, who every day stretches forth His hands to embrace sinners, expandi manus meas quotidie, could have the heart to refuse grace to all those who ask it, and allow Himself to be excelled in goodness by David, who sought among his enemies some one to who he might be merciful.”

It is thus Saint Vincent discovers in his own heart, in the intuitions of his spiritual life, the true answer to the cruel sophisms of this heresy.

While Saint Vincent was collecting the signatures for the letter to be forwarded to the Pope denouncing the five propositions, he was uniting with M. Olier and M. Bretonvilliers, to send theologians to Rome to show the danger to which these propositions were exposing the Church of France. The Jansenists had already sent others, especially Pere des Mares, the celebrated Oratorian. It is not our business to recount the endless discussions which then took place; the meetings of the special congregations appointed by the Pope, and at ten or twelve of which, each lasting for three or four hours, Innocent X, thought it his duty to be present; or the last and solemn sitting, at which Pere des Mares spoke for four hours before the Pope; and the innumerable other conferences of a similar kind, until at last, on June 9, 1653, Innocent X., having recommended himself to God in prayer, summoned one of his secretaries and dictated the Bull Cum occasione. The same evening it was promulgated in Rome, and immediately forwarded to France.

Here are the five points contained in Pope Innocent X’s Cum Occisione, May 31, 1653:

1092. 1. Some of God’s precepts are impossible to the just, who wish and strive to keep them, according to the present powers which they have; the grace, by which they are made possible, is also wanting.

Declared and condemned as rash, impious, blasphemous, condemned by anathema and heretical.

1093. 2. In the state of fallen nature one never resists interior grace.

Declared and condemned as heretical.

1094. 3. In order to merit or demerit in the state of fallen nature, freedom from necessity is not required in man, from freedom from external compulsion in sufficient.

Declared and condemned as heretical.

1095. 4. The Semipelagians admitted the necessity of a prevenient interior grace for each act, even for the beginning of faith; and in this they were heretics, because they wished this grace to be such that the human will could either resist or obey.

Declared and condemned as false and heretical.

1096. 5. It is Semipelagian to say that Christ died or shed His blood for all men without exception.

Declared and condemned as false, rash, scandalous, and understood in this sense, Christ died for the salvation of the predestined, impious, blasphemous, contumelious, dishonoring to divine piety, and heretical. (Pope Innocent X, Cum Occisione, “The Errors of Cornelius Jansen,” May 31, 1658. As found in Denziger, Nos. 1092-1096, p. 316.) [The date listed in Denziger is erroneous. May 31, 1653, was the actual date of the bull’s issuance, noting that Bishop listed it as June 9, 1653.]

Bishop Emile Bougaud then explained the joy of Saint Vincent de Paul upon receiving the text of Cum Occisione and the necessity of everyone submitting to it:

The joy of Saint Vincent when the Bull arrived was profound. He immediately wrote to Mgr. Alain de Solminihac, Bishop of Cahors: “My lord, I am sending you most agreeable news – the condemnation of the Jansenists, their five propositions having been declared heretical on June 9. The Bull was published the same day in Rome, and reached Paris on the feast of Saint Peter. Their Majesties received it very warmly, and his Eminence is about to put it in force. All Paris is rejoicing, at least those better disposed, and the others declare their willingness to submit. M. Singlin, who, with M. Arnault, is one of the leaders, has acknowledged that the Holy See must be obeyed, and M. Hamel, cure of Saint-Merri, one of the foremost, is in like dispositions and ready to publish the Bull in his church. Many of the others, as M. and Zmmme. De Liancourt, declare they are no longer what they were. In a word, it is expected that all will acquiesce. Not, indeed, that some did not find it difficult to submit, saying that although the opinions of Jansenius are condemned, there are not. I only heard this from one person. So great a blessing, my lord, is this decision, that everybody here rejoices, and those who saw the evil that the strife was causing cannot feel sufficiently grateful.” (Letters, vol. I. p. 554.)

At the same time he went to Port-Royal, having been told that the recluses, the disciples of Saint-Cyran, had resolved to fully submit to the Bull. He spent several hours with them, tenderly congratulated them on their obedience to the Holy See, and showed them every mark of esteem, affection and confidence. Alas! That absolute submission to the Pope was destined to last but a day.

We may well conclude that a man so zealous to shield from error both the sheep and their shepherds was ever watchful over his own Congregation and each of its members. “O Jesus,” he would say, “it is not expedient for us to maintain different opinions in the little Company; we must always be of one mind, otherwise we shall be torn asunder among ourselves! And the remedy is to submit to the Superior's opinion. I say it is not to the superior that we submit, but to God, to the Popes, the councils, the saints; and should any one be unwilling to do so, it will be best for him to leave, and that is what the Company wishes. Many orders in the Church afford us this example. The Discalced Carmelites, in their chapter last year, ordained that their professors of theology should teach the long-established opinions of the Church and oppose novelties. Every one knows that the Jesuits act likewise, while the Congregation of Saint Genevieve follows the opinions of Saint Augustine, which we do too, explaining, however, Saint Augustine by the Council of Trent, and not the Council of Trent by Saint Augustine, for the first is infallible, the second is not.” One day he was asked what should be done to moderate the harshness towards the Port-Royal party. “Why drive them to extremities? Would it not be better to come to an agreement? They are disposed for it if treated with more moderation, and there is no one better suited than you to soften the irritation on both sides, and to effect a complete reconciliation.”

--Sir,” Saint Vincent merely replied, “when a decision is given, there is nothing to be done but submit to it. What union can we make with them if they have not an honest and sincere intention of submitting? How can we modify what the Church has decided? It is a matter of faith, which cannot be altered or tampered with, and consequently we cannot accommodate it to suit their sentiments. It is for them to submit their private judgment, and confidently unite with us by a true and sincere submission to the head of the Church. Without that, sir, the only thing we can do is to pray for their conversion.”

It was by such vigour of thought, such force of expression, such ardour and firmness of doctrine, that Saint Vincent preserved his Congregation from all taint of Jansenism. How admirable! Of the three Congregations seemingly raised up by God for the education of the French clergy, the first was unwillingly and in a mysterious manner led away from this employment, and alone was affected by Jansenism. The other two, that of Saint Vincent de Paul and that of M. Olier, remained absolutely exempt. Free from all error, as deeply conscious as the Abbe Saint-Cyran of the divinity of our Lord, of the grace of His priesthood, of the holiness necessary for priests, but without his exaggerations or excesses, they began to form that great clergy of France which was the wonder of the second half of the seventeenth century, which traversed the wretched and impure eighteenth with little loss, and was still fresh and vigorous enough in 1793 to yield confessors and martyrs, and after exile and persecution, to win the reputation of being the holiest, the purest and the grandest of any clergy. (Bishop Emile Bougaud, History of St. Vincent de Paul, Founder of the Congregation of the Mission and of the Sisters of Charity, Longmans, Green and Co., 19 Paternoster Row, London, 1899, pp. 204-208.)

It is important for present purposes to highlight one passage from Bishop Bougaud’s biography on Saint Vincent de Paul that is worth repeating and highlighting in order to demonstrate the absolute incompatibility between the “resist while recognize” position, which is, after all, a recrudescence of Gallicanism, itself condemned as a heresy, and the true Catholic teaching concerning the unyielding submission that Catholics must render to a true and legitimate Successor of Saint Peter and Vicar of Our Lord Jesus Christ on earth:

There must never be any compromise on matters of truth. None. There is nothing to "discuss" or, to use a term that has been popularized by the conciliar revolutionaries, "dialogue" about as truth is irreformable. Truth exists. Truth does not depend upon human acceptance for its binding force or validity. Truth is. Period. No compromises.

Anyone who can still claim after reading these quotes that he is not certain about the papal vacancy that has existed since the death of Pope Pius XII on October 9, 1958, has fallen prey to the Kantianism’s supposition of the impossibility of knowing anything for certain, a supposition that had been advanced by Michel de Montaigne during the Renaissance.

Dom Prosper Gueranger, O.S.B., contrasted Saint Vincent de Paul’s true charity with the false, narcissistic philanthropy of his own day one hundred sixty years ago:

Vincent was a man of faith that worketh by charity. (Galatians 5:6) At the time he came into the world, viz., at the close of the same century in which Calvin was born, the Church was mourning over many nations separated from the faith; the Turks were harassing all the coasts of the Mediterranean. France, worn out by forty years of religious strife, was shaking off the yoke of heresy from within, while by a foolish stroke of policy she gave it external liberty. The Eastern and Northern frontiers were suffering the most terrible devastations, and the West and center were the scene of civil strife and anarchy. In this state of confusion, the condition of souls was still more lamentable. In the towns alone was there any sort of quiet, any possibility of prayer. The country people, forgotten, sacrificed, subject to the utmost miseries, had none to support and direct them but a clergy too often abandoned by their bishops, unworthy of the ministry, and well-nigh as ignorant as their flocks. Vincent was raised up by the Holy Spirit to obviate all these evils. The world admires the works of the humble shepherd of Buglose, but it knows not the secret of their vitality. Philanthropy would imitate them; but its establishments of today are destroyed tomorrow, like castles built by children in the sand, while the institution it would fain supersede remains strong and unchanged, the only one capable of meeting the necessities of suffering humanity. The reason of this is not far to seek: faith alone can understand the mystery of suffering, having penetrated its secret in the Passion of our Lord; and charity that would be stable must be founded on faith. Vincent loved the poor because he loved the God whom his faith beheld in them. “O God!” he used to say, “it does us good to see the poor, if we look at them in the light of God, and think of the high esteem in which Jesus Christ holds them. Often enough they have scarcely the appearance or the intelligence of reasonable beings, so rude and so earthly are they. But look at them by the light of faith, and you will see that they represent the Son of God, who chose to be poor; he in his Passion had scarcely the appearance of a man; he seemed to the Gentiles to be a fool, and to the Jews a stumbling-block, moreover he calls himself the evangelist of the poor: evangelizare pauperibus misit me.” (Luke 4:18) This title of evangelist of the poor, is the one that Vincent ambitioned for himself; the starting point and the explanation of all that he did in the Church. His one aim was to labor for the poor and the outcast; all the rest, he said, was but secondary. And he added, speaking to his sons of St. Lazare: “We should never have labored for the candidates for priesthood, nor in the ecclesiastical seminaries, had we not deemed it necessary in order to keep the people in good condition, to preserve in them the fruits of the missions, and to procure them good priests.” That he might be able to consolidate his work in all its aspects, our Lord inspired Ann of Austria to make him a member of the Council of Conscience, and to place in his hands the office of extirpating the abuses among the higher clergy and of appointing pastors to the churches of France. We cannot here relate the history of a man in whom universal charity was, as it were, personified. But from the Bagnio of Tunis, where he was a slave, to the ruined provinces for which he found millions of money, all the labours he underwent for the relief of every physical suffering were inspired by his zeal for the apostolate: by caring for the body, he strove to reach and succor the soul. At a time when men rejected the Gospel while striving to retain its benefits, certain wise men attribute Vincent’s charity to philosophy. Nowadays they go further still, and in order to logically deny the author of the works they deny the works themselves. But if any there be who still hold the former opinion, let them listen in his own words: What is done for charity’s sake is done for God. It is not enough for us to love God ourselves; our neighbor must also love him also must love him; neither can we love our neighbour as ourselves unless we procure for him the good we are bound to desire for ourselves – viz., divine love, which unties us to our Sovereign Good. We must love our neighbour as the image of God and the object of His love, and must try to make men love their Creator in return, and love one another also with mutual charity for the love of God, who so loved them as to deliver His own Son to death for them. But let us, I beg of you, look upon this Divine Saviour as a perfect pattern of the charity we must bear to our neighbour.'

The theophilanthropy of a century ago had no more right than had an atheist or a deist philosophy to rank Vincent, as it did among the great men of its Calendar. Not nature, nor the pretended divinities of false science, but the God of Christians, the God who became Man to save us by taking our miseries upon Himself, was the sole inspirer of the greatest modern benefactor of the human race, whose favourite saying was: 'Nothing pleases me except in Jesus Christ.' He observed the right order of charity, striving for the reign of his Divine Master, first in his own soul, then in others; and, far from acting of his own accord by the dictates of reason alone, he would rather have remained hidden for ever in the face of the Lord, and have left but an unknown name behind him.

'Let us honour,' he wrote, 'the hidden state of the Son of God. There is our centre; there is what He requires of us for the present, for the future, for ever; unless His Divine Majesty makes known in His own unmistakable way that He demands something else of us. Let us especially honour this divine Master's moderation in action. He would not always do all that He could do, in order to teach us to be satisfied when it is not expedient to do all that we are able, but only as much as is seasonable to charity and conformable to the Will of God. How royally do those honour our Lord who follow His holy Providence, and do not try to be beforehand with it ! Do not, and rightly wish your servant to do nothing without your orders? And if this is reasonable between man and man, how much more so between the Creator and the creature ! ' Vincent, then was anxious according to his own expression, to 'keep alongside of Providence,' and not to outstep it Thus he waited seven years before accepting the offers of the General de Gondi's wife, and founding his establishment of the Missions. Thus, too, when his faithful coadjutrix, Mademoiselle Le Gras, felt called to devote herself to the spiritual service of the Daughters of Charity, then living without any bond or common life, as simple assistants to the ladies of quality who the man of God assembled in his Confraternities, he first tried her for a very long time. 'As to this occupation,' he wrote, in answer to her repeated petitions. 'I beg of you, once for all, not to think of it until the Lord makes known His will. You wish to become the servant of these poor girls, and God wants you to he His servant. For God's sake, Mademoiselle, let your heart imitate the tranquility of our Lord's heart, and then it will be fit to serve Him. The Kingdom of God is peace in the Holy Ghost; He will reign in you if you are in peace. Be so then, if you please, and do honour to the God of peace and love.'

What a lesson given to the feverish zeal of an age like ours by a man whose life was so full! How often, in what we can call good works, do human pretensions sterilize grace by contradicting the Holy Ghost ! Whereas Vincent de Paul, who considered himself 'a poor worm creeping on the earth, not knowing where he goes, but only seeking to be hidden in Thee, my God, who art all his desire,' – the humble Vincent saw his work prosper far more than a thousand others, and almost without his being aware of it. Towards the end of his long life he said to his daughters; 'It is Divine Providence that set your congregation on its present footing. Who else was it, I ask you? I can find no other. We never had such an intention. I was thinking of it only yesterday, and I said to myself Is it you who had the thought of founding a Congregation of Daughters of Charity? Oh ! Certainly not. Is it Mademoiselle Le Gras? Not at all. O my daughters, I never thought of it, your “saeur servant” never thought of it, neither did M. Portail (Vincent's first and most faithful companion in the Mission. Then it is God who thought of it for you' Him, therefore, we must call the Founder of your Congregation, for truly we cannot recognize any other.'

Although with delicate docility, Vincent could no more forestall the actions of God than an instrument the hand that uses it, nevertheless, once the divine impulse was given, he could not endure the least delay in following it, nor suffer any other sentiment in his soul but the most absolute confidence. He wrote again with his charming simplicity, to the helpmate given him by God; 'You are always giving way a little to human feelings, thinking that everything is going to ruin as soon as you see me ill. O woman of little faith, why have you not more confidence and more submission to the guidance and example of Jesus Christ? This Saviour of the world entrusted the well-being of the whole Church to God His Father; and you, for a handful of young women, evidently raised up and gathered together by His providence, you fear the He will fail you! Come, come, Mademoiselle, you must humble yourself before God.'

No wonder that faith, the only possible guide of such a life, the imperishable foundation of all that he was for his neighbour and in himself, was, in the eyes of Vincent de Paul, the greatest of treasures. He who had pity for every suffering, even though well deserved; who, by an heroic fraud, took the place of a galley-slave in chains, was a pitiless foe to heresy, and could not rest till he had obtained either the banishment or the chastisement of its votaries. Clement XII, in the Bull of canonization, bears witness to this, in speaking of the pernicious error of Jansenism, which our saint was one of the first to denounce and prosecute. Never, perhaps, were these words of Holy Writ better verified: The simplicity of the just shall guide them: and the deceitfulness of the wicked shall destroy them. (Prov. Xi, 3.) Though this sect expressed, later on, a supreme disdain for Monsieur Vincent, it had not always been of that mind. 'I am,' he said to a friend, 'most particularly obliged to bless and thank God, for not having suffered the first and principal professors of that doctrine, men of my acquaintance and friendship, to be able to draw me to their opinions. I cannot tell you what pains they took, and what reasons they propounded to me; I objected to them, amongst other things, the authority of the Council of Trent, which is clearly opposed to them; and seeing that they still continued, I instead of answering them, quietly recited my Credo; and that is how I have remained firm in the Catholic faith.'

But it is time to give the full account which Holy Church reads today in her liturgy. We will only remind our readers that in the year 1883, the fiftieth anniversary of the foundation of the St. Vincent de Paul Conferences at Paris, the Sovereign Pontiff Leo XIII proclaimed our saint the patron of the societies of charity in France.

Vincent de Paul was a Frenchman by nation, and was born at (Ranquines, in the parish of) Pouy, not far from Dax in Gascony, (upon the 24th day of April, in the year of salvation 1576.) From a little child he showed remarkable charity towards the poor. His father removed him from keeping his cattle, in order to give him a school education, and he learnt earthly things at Dax, and theology both at Toulouse and at Saragossa. He took Priest's orders, and a degree in Divinity. In 1605, he was taken prisoner by Mahommedan pirates, who carried him off, and sold him for a slave in Africa. In his slavery he converted his owner, who was an apostate, back to Christ. Under the protection of the Mother of God, Vincent escaped from Barbary. He first visited the thresholds of the Apostles, and afterwards returned to France. He was the saintly Rector first of the Parish of Clichi, and afterwards of that of Chatillon. He was appointed by the King, Chaplain General for the galleys of France, and worked with extraordinary zeal for the health of the souls both of those who commanded and of the convicts who rowed. He was made Superior of the Nuns of the Visitation by St Francis de Sales, and discharged this duty for about forty years, with a wisdom which so approved itself to the judgment of their holy Founder, that he was used to say he knew no worthier Priest than Vincent.

The preaching of the Gospel to the poor, especially peasants, was the work at which he toiled unweariedly, till he was disabled by age. To this special work he bound himself and the members of the Congregation which he founded under the missionary Congregation of Secular Priests, by a perpetual vow approved by the Holy See. How great were his labours for bettering the discipline of the clergy, is attested by the building of Seminaries for the final education of young clerks, the number of meetings of Priests to discuss holy things, and the religious exercises preparatory to Ordination, for which, as well as for godly retreats by laymen, he wished that the houses belonging to his Institute should be always freely open. To spread wider the growth of faith and godliness, he sent his Gospel labourers not only into the several provinces of France, but also into Italy, Poland, Scotland, and Ireland, and also to Barbary and India. He assisted Lewis XIII. on his death-bed, and the Queen Anne of Austria, mother of Lewis XIV., put him upon the young King's Council of Conscience during the Regency, in which position it was his unceasing effort that none but the most worthy should be named to churches and monasteries, that civil contests, duels, and creeping false doctrines, from which himself shrank as soon as he met them, should be put down, and that all men should yield the obedience which was due to the decisions of the Apostolic See.

There was no kind of misery which he did not strive with fatherly tenderness to relieve. Christians groaning in Mahommedan slavery, foundlings, deformed children, young maidens exposed to danger, houseless nuns, fallen women, convicts sent to the galleys, sick foreigners, disabled workmen, lunatics, and beggars without number, all these he relieved, and devoutly housed in divers charitable institutions which remain to this day. When Lorraine, Champagne, Picardy, and other districts were desolated by plague, famine, and war, he made immense efforts for their relief. He founded many charitable societies, to find out and succour the unfortunate. Among these are remarkable that of Matrons, and that of Sisters of Charity which hath been so widely spread. By those of the Cross, of Providence, and of St. Guinevere he aimed at bringing up young girls as school - mistresses. Amid all these and other most anxious business-matters, he remained always looking simply to God, kind to all, true to himself, plain, upright, and lowly. From all honours, riches, and pleasures, he ever shrank, and was heard to say, that nothing gave him any pleasure, except in Christ Jesus, Whom it was his wish in all things to follow. With a body worn out with hardships, work, and old age, he gently fell asleep in the house of St. Lazarus at Paris, the chief house of the Congregation of the Missions, upon the 27th day of September, in the year of salvation 1660, and of his own age the 85th. He was famous on account of his life, his works, and his miracles, and Clement XII. inscribed his name among those of the saints, appointing for his Feastday the 19th day of the month of July. Finally, at the earnest prayer of many prelates, Leo XIII. proclaimed and established this hero of charity, illustrious for his services to all classes of men, as the patron before God in heaven of all charitable societies throughout the whole Catholic world which derive their origin in any way from his institution. (Matins, The Divine Office, Feast of Saint Vincent de Paul.)

How full a sheaf dost thou bear, O Vincent, as thou ascendest laden with blessing from earth to thy true country ! O thou, the most simple of men, though living in an age of spendours, thy renown far surpasses the brilliant reputation which fascinated thy contemporaries. The true glory of that century, and the only one that will remain to it when time shall be no more, is to have seen, in its earlier part, saints powerful alike in faith and love, stemming the tide of Satan's conquests, and restoring to the soil of France, made barren by heresy, the fruitlessness of its brightest days. And now, two centuries and more after thy labours, the work of the harvest is still being carried on by thy sons and daughters, aided by new assistants who also acknowledge thee for their inspirer and father. Thou art now in the kingdom of heaven where grief and tears are no more yet day by day thou still receivest the grateful thanks of the suffering and the sorrowful.

Reward our confidence in thee by fresh benefits. No name so much as thine inspires respect for the Church in our days of blasphemy. And yet those who deny Christ now go so far as to endeavor to stifle the testimony which the poor have always rendered to Him on thy account. Wield, against these ministers of hell the two-edged sword, wherewith it is given to the saints to avenge God in the midst of the nations: treat them as thou didst the heretics of thy day; make them either deserve pardon or suffer punishment, be converted or be reduced by heaven to the impossibility of doing harm. Above all, take care of the unhappy beings whom these satanic men deprive of spiritual help in their last moments. Elevate thy daughters to the high level required by the present sad circumstances, when men would have their devotedness to deny its divine origin and cast of the guise of religion. If the enemies of the poor man can snatch from his death-bed the sacred sign of salvation, no rule, no law, no power of this world or the next, can cast out Jesus from the soul of the Sister of Charity, or prevent his name from passing from her heart to her lips: neither death nor hell neither fire no flood can stay him, says the Canticle of Canticles.

Thy sons, too, are carrying on thy work of evangelization; and even in our days their apostolate is crowned with their zeal; develop in them thy own spirit of unchanging devotedness to the Church and submission to the supreme Pastor, Forward all the new works of charity springing out of thy own, and placed by Rome to thy credit under thy patronage. May they gather their heat from the divine fire which thou didst kindle on the earth; may they ever s4ek first the kingdom of God and His justice, never deviating, in the choice of means, from the principle thou didst lay down for the, of 'judging, speaking, and acting, exactly as the Eternal Wisdom of God, clothed in our weak flesh, judged, spoke, and acted.' (Dom Prosper Gueranger, O.S.B., The Liturgical Year, Volume 13, Time After Pentecost, Book IV, pp. 138-146.)

As noted just above, however, the Vincentian Fathers and the Daughters of Charity long ago succumbed to the conciliar revolution.

I saw this first-hand in the immediate aftermath of the “Second” Vatican Council while an undergraduate at St. John’s University, Jamaica, Borough of Queens, City of New York, New York, from February of 1970 to January of 1973 (summer sessions were just beginning back in those days, and I availed myself of them to graduate in three years). Although I had much to learn about that insidious council, to which I paid no attention during my high school years (1965-1969) at Oyster Bay High School, Oyster Bay, New York, I knew that what was being taught by some of the theology and philosophy professors had nothing to do with the solidity of the Faith as I had learned it at St. Aloysius School, Great Neck, New York (1956-1962). Bizarre is the only word to describe some of those course, including one taught by a Passionist who believed that Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ was but a mere allegorical figure (he required us to read the indecipherable works of Joseph Ratzinger, Yves Congar, Henri de Lubac, Karl Rahner, and Edward Schillebeeckx). The situation got worse over time (see the anecdote in the appendix below), and I can’t even imagine what it has become like at my undergraduate alma mater since the ascendancy of the Argentine Apostate. Sadly, DePaul University in Chicago, Illinois, is one of the major hotbeds of conciliar revolutionary activity, including active support of the homosexualist agenda (see, for example, "Diversity Partners"), and as I explained above, there is also a like association at the St. John's University School of Law that is listed on the university's official website (Celebrating Pervesity at the Law School Alma Mater of Mario Cuomo, Hugh Leo Carey, Ronald Brown, and Charles Rangel).

More to the point of this particular commentary—but not entirely unrelated—is the fact that the hospitals run by the Daughters of Charity Health System in California were sold to Verity healthcare systems in 2016, a sign of the sterility of the conciliar religious sect. However, as one could expect, those healthcare systems still administered by the Daughters of Charity provide “palliative care.”

Here is one example:

Palliative Care is an interdisciplinary healthcare approach that focuses on improving quality of life for persons living with or affected by chronic or life-threatening conditions, through the prevention, assessment and relief of pain and other physical, psychosocial and spiritual symptoms, from the time of diagnosis throughout the process of living and dying.

Such excellent care will be provided according to need either concurrently with disease-modifying treatment or as the main focus of care, respecting the values and goals of individuals, their families and other loved ones. It will assist them to live fully in community, optimize function, facilitate goals and decision making, provide opportunities for personal growth and healing, and will support families, other survivors and communities in their bereavement. (Ascension Health.)

How far the Congregation of the Mission and the Daughters of Charity has fallen in the past sixty years, how very far.

Only a relatively few Catholics even know that the Daughters of Charity once enjoyed the favor of Our Lady so much that she appeared to two Daughters of Charity in the Rue de Bac ten years apart to give them sacramentals to help the children of the Church Militant on earth in perilous times.

It was in 1830 that Our Lady appeared to Saint Catherine Laboure in the image that she wanted stuck on the Miraculous Medal of Grace (In Ways That Baffle the Minds of Modern Men), and it was a mere ten years late, in 1830, that she gave the Green Scapular to Sister Justine Bisqueyburo. Poor Father Jean-Marie Aladel, C.M., was the spiritual director of both sisters. Both of these sacramentals are related to the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary, and it is no accident that it is under that title that Our Lady is the Patroness of the United States of America.

We must pray to the Immaculate Conception that she will help to convert those in the contemporary deathcare industry from their being instruments of murder to instruments of the true charity exhibited by Saint Vincent DePaul and that took deep root in the institutions established to carry on his mission. Additionally, of course, we must be fervently devoted to Our Lady’s Most Holy Rosary, which was given to Saint Dominic de Guzman in 1208, as we protect ourselves with both the Miraculous Medal of Grace and her own very shield, the Brown Scapular that she gave to Saint Simon Stock in 1215.

May this prayer to Our Lady, Health of the Sick, plant a few seeds in the souls of those who are so wrapped up in the carrying out of wickedness in the name of “compassionate healthcare” and “death with dignity” that they have forgotten that there is nothing charitable about causing the deaths of innocent human beings:

Virgin, most holy, Mother of the Word Incarnate, Treasurer of graces, and Refuge of sinners, I fly to thy motherly affection with lively faith, and I beg of thee the grace ever to do the will of God.

Into thy most holy hands I commit the keeping of my heart, asking thee for health of soul and body, in the certain hope that thou, my most loving Mother, will hear my prayer.

Into the bosom of thy tender mercy, this day, every day of my life, and at the hour of my death, I commend my soul and body.

To thee I entrust all my hopes and consolations, all my trials and miseries, my life and the end of my life, that all my actions may be ordered and disposed according to thy will and that of thy Divine Son. Amen.

Vivat Christus Rex! Viva Cristo Rey!

Our Lady of the Rosary, pray for us.

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 Camillus de Lellis, pray for us.

Saint Symphorosa and her Seven Sons, pray for us.

Saint Vincent de Paul, pray for us.

Appendix

Saint Alphonsus de Liguori Sermon for the Eighth Sunday after Pentecost

On the Particular Judgment

Give an account of thy stewardship.” LUKE xvi. 2.

BELOVED Christians, of all the goods of nature, of fortune, and of grace, which we have received from God, we are not the masters, neither can we dispose of them as we please; we are but the administrators of them; and therefore we should employ them according to the will of God, who is our Lord. Hence, at the hour of death, we must render a strict account of them to Jesus Christ, our Judge. ”For we must all be manifested before the judgment seat of Christ, that every one may receive the proper things of the body as he hath done, whether it be good or evil.” (2 Cor. v. 10.) This is the precise meaning of that “give an account of thy stewardship,” in the gospel of this day. “You are not,” says St. Bonaventure, in his comment on these words, “a master, but a steward over the things committed to you; and therefore you are to render an account of them.” I will place before your eyes Today the rigour of this judgment, which shall be passed on each of us on the last day of our life. Let us consider the terror of the soul, first, when we shall be presented to the Judge; secondly, when she shall be examined; and thirdly, when she shall be condemned.

First Point – Terror of the soul when she shall be presented to the Judge.

1. “It is appointed unto men once to die, and after this the judgment.” (Heb. ix. 27.) It is of faith that we shall die, and that after death a judgment shall be passed on all the actions of our life. Now, what shall be the terror of each of us when we shall be at the point of death, and shall have before our eyes the judgment which must take place the very moment the soul departs from the body? Then shall be decided our doom to eternal life, or to eternal death. At the time of the passage of their souls from this life to eternity, the sight of their past sins, the rigour of God’s judgment, and the uncertainty of their eternal salvation, have made the saints tremble. St. Mary Magdalene de Pazzi trembled in her sickness, through the fear of judgment; and to her confessor, when he endeavoured to give her courage, she said: “Ah! father, it is a terrible thing to appear before Christ in judgment.”

After spending so many years in penance in the desert, St. Agatho trembled at the hour of death, and said: “What shall become of me when I shall be judged?” The venerable Father Louis da Ponte was seized with such a fit of trembling at the thought of the account which he should render to God, that he shook the room in which he lay. The thought of judgment inspired the venerable Juvenal Ancina, Priest of the Oratory, and afterwards Bishop of Saluzzo, with the determination to leave the world. Hearing the Dies Iræ sung, and considering the terror of the soul when presented before Jesus Christ, the Judge, he took, and afterwards executed, the resolution of giving himself entirely to God.

2. It is the common opinion of theologians, that at the very moment and in the very place in which the soul departs from the body, the divine tribunal is erected, the accusation is read, and the sentence is passed by Jesus Christ, the Judge. At this terrible tribunal each of us shall be presented to give an account of all our thoughts, of all our words, and of all our actions. “For we must all be manifested before the judgment seat of Christ, that every one may receive the proper things of the body, according as he hath done, whether it be good or evil.” (2 Cor. v. 10.)

When presented before an earthly judge criminals have been seen to fall into a cold sweat through fear. It is related of Piso, that so great and insufferable was the confusion, which he felt at the thought of appearing as a criminal before the senate that he killed himself. How great is the pain of a vassal, or of a son, in appearing before an angry prince or an enraged father, to account for some crime which he has committed!

Oh! how much greater shall be the pain and confusion of the soul in standing, before Jesus Christ enraged against her for having despised him during her life! Speaking of judgment, St. Luke says: “Then you shall see the Son of Man.” (Luke xxi. 27.) They shall see Jesus Christ as man, with the same wounds with which he ascended into heaven. “Great joy of the beholders!” says Robert the Abbot, “a great terror of those who are in expectation!” These wounds shall console the just, and shall terrify the wicked. In them sinners shall see the Redeemer’s love for themselves, and their ingratitude to him.

3. “Who,” says the Prophet Nahum, “can stand before the face of his indignation?” (i. 6.) How great, then, shall be the terror of a soul that finds herself in sin before this Judge, the first time she shall see him, and see him full of wrath! St. Basil says that she shall be tortured more by her shame and confusion than by the very fire of hell. “Horridior quam ignis, erit pudor.” Philip the Second rebuked one of his domestics for having told him a lie. ”Is it thus,” said the king to him, ”you deceive me?” The domestic, after having returned home, died of grief. The Scripture tells us, that when Joseph reproved his brethren, saying: ”I am Joseph, whom you sold,” they were unable to answer through fear, and remained silent. “His brethren could not answer him, being struck with exceeding great fear.” (Gen. xlv. 3.)

Now what answer shall sinners make to Jesus Christ when he shall say to them: I am your Redeemer and your Judge, whom you have so much despised. Where shall the miserable beings fly, says St. Augustine, when they shall see an angry Judge above, hell open below, on one side their own sins accusing them, and on the other the devils dragging them to punishment, and their conscience burning them within? “Above shall be an enraged Judge below, a horrid chaos on the right, sins accusing him on the left, demons dragging him to punishment within, a burning conscience! Whither shall a sinner, beset in this manner, fly? “Perhaps he will cry for mercy? But how, asks Eusebius Emissenus, can he dare to implore mercy, when he must first render an account of his contempt for the mercy which Jesus Christ has shown to him?” With what face will you, who are to be first judged for contempt of mercy, ask for mercy?” But let us come to the rendering of the accounts.

Second Point. Terror of the soul when she shall be examined.

4. As soon as the soul shall be presented before the tribunal of Jesus Christ, he will say to her: “Give an account of thy stewardship:” render instantly an account of thy entire life. The Apostle tells us, that to be worthy of eternal glory our lives must be found conformable to the life of Jesus Christ. “For whom he foreknew, he also predestinated to be made conformable to the image of his son ;…them he also glorified.” (Rom. viii. 29, 30.)

Hence St. Peter has said, that in the judgment of Jesus Christ, the just man who has observed the divine law, has pardoned enemies, has respected the saints, has practised chastity, meekness, and other virtues, shall scarcely be saved. “The just man shall scarcely be saved.” The Apostle adds: “Where shall the ungodly and the sinner appear?” (1 Pet. iv. 18.) What shall become of the vindictive and the unchaste, of blasphemers and slanderers? What shall become of those whose entire life is opposed to the life of Jesus Christ?

5. In the first place, the Judge shall demand of sinners an account of all the blessings and graces which he bestowed on them in order to bring them to salvation, and which they have rendered fruitless. He will demand an account of the years granted to them that they might serve God, and which they have spent in offending him. “He hath called against me the time.” (Lam. i. 15.) He will then demand an account of their sins. Sinners commit sins, and afterwards forget them; but Jesus Christ does not forget them: he keeps, as Job says, all our iniquities numbered, as it were in a bag. “Thou hast sealed up my iniquities, as it were in a.” (Job xiv. 17.) And he tells us that, on the day of accounts, he will take a lamp to scrutinize all the actions of our life.” And it shall come to pass at that time, that I will search Jerusalem with lamps.” (Soph. i. 12.)

The lamp, says Mendoza on this passage, penetrates all the corners of the house that is, God will discover all the defects of our conscience, great and small. According to St. Anselm, an account shall be demanded of every glance of the eyes. ”Exigitur usque ad ictum oculi.” And, according to St. Matthew, of every idle word. ”Every idle word that men shall speak, they shall render an account for it on the day of judgment.” (Matt. xii. 36.)

6. The Prophet Malachy says, that as gold is refined by taking away the dross, so on the day of judgment all our actions shall be examined, and every defect which may be discovered shall be punished. “He shall purify the sons of Levi, and shall refine them as gold.” (Mal. iii. 3.) Even our justices that is, our good works, confessions, communions, and prayers shall be examined. “When I shall take a time, I will judge justices.” (Ps. Ixxiv. 3.) But if every glance, every idle word, and even good works, shall be judged, with what rigour shall immodest expressions, blasphemies, grievous detractions, thefts, and sacrileges be judged? Alas! on that day every soul shall, as St. Jerome says, see, to her own confusion, all the evils which she has done. ”Videbit unusquisque quod fecit.”

7. “Weight and balance are judgments of the Lord.” (Prov. xvi. 11.) In the balance of the Lord a holy life and good works make the scale descend; but nobility, wealth, and science have no weight. Hence, if found innocent, the peasant, the poor, and the ignorant shall be rewarded. But the man of rank, of wealth, or of learning, if found guilty, shall be condemned. “Thou art weighed in the balance,” said Daniel to Belthassar, ”and art found wanting.” (Dan. v. 27.) “Neither his gold nor his wealth,” says Father Alvares, “but the king alone was weighed.”

8. At the divine tribunal the poor sinner shall see himself accused by the devil, who, according to St. Augustine, “will recite the words of our profession, and will charge us before our face with all that we have done, will state the day and hour in which we sinned.” (Con. Jud., tom. 6.) “He will recite the words of our profession” that is, he will enumerate the promises which we have made to God, and which we afterwards violated.
He will charge us before our face;” he will upbraid us with all our wicked deeds, pointing to the day and hour in which they were committed. And he will, as the same saint says, conclude his accusation by saying: “I have suffered neither stripes nor scourges for this man.”

Lord, I have suffered nothing for this ungrateful sinner, and to make himself my slave he has turned his back on thee who has endured so much for his salvation. He, therefore, justly belongs to me. Even his angel-guardian will, according to Origen, come forward to accuse him, and will say: “I have laboured so many years for his salvation; but he has despised all my admonitions.” “Unusquisque angelorum perhibet testimonium, quot annis circa eum laboraverit, sed ille monita sprevit.” (Hom. lxvi.) Thus, even friends shall treat with contempt the guilty soul. “All her friends have despised her.” (Lamen. i. 2.) Her very sins shall, says St. Bernard, accuse her. “And they shall say: You have made us; we are your work; we shall not desert you.” (Lib. Medit, cap. ii.) We are your offspring; we shall not leave you: we shall be your companions in hell for all eternity.

9. Let us now examine the excuses which the sinner will be able to advance. He will say, that the evil inclinations of nature had drawn him into sin. But he shall be told that, if concupiscence impelled him to sins, it did not oblige him to commit them; and that, if he had recourse to God, he should have received from him grace to resist every temptation. For this purpose Jesus Christ has left us the sacraments: but when we do not make use of them, we can complain only of ourselves. “But,” says the Redeemer, “now they have no excuse for their sin.” (John xv. 22.) To excuse himself, the sinner shall also say that the devil tempted him to sin. But, as St. Augustine says, “The enemy is bound like a dog in chains, and can bite only him who has united himself to him with a deadly security.”

The devil can bark, but cannot bite unless you adhere and listen to him. Hence the saint adds: ”See how foolish is the man whom a dog, loaded with chains, bites.” Perhaps he will advance his bad habits as an excuse; but this shall not stand; for the same St. Augustine says, that though it is difficult to resist the force of an evil habit, “if any one does not desert himself, he will conquer it with the divine assistance.” If a man does not abandon himself to sin, and invokes God’s aid, he will overcome evil habits. The Apostle tells us, that the Lord does not permit us to be tempted above our strength. “God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that which you are able.” ( I Cor. x. 13.)

10. “For what shall I do,” said Job, “when God shall rise to judge me? and when he shall examine, what shall I answer him” (Job xxxi. 14.) What answer shall the sinner give to Jesus Christ? How can he, who sees himself so clearly convicted, give an answer? He shall be covered with confusion, and shall remain silent, like the man found without the nuptial garment. “But he was silent.” (Matt. xxii. 12.) His very sins shall shut the sinner’s mouth. “And all iniquity shall stop her mouth.” (Ps. cvi. 42.)

There, says St. Thomas of Villanova, there shall be no intercessor to whom the sinner can have recourse. “There, there is no opportunity of sinning; there, no intercessor, no friend, no father shall assist.” Who shall then save you? Is it God? But how, asks St. Basil, can you expect salvation from him whom you have despised?” Who shall deliver you? Is it God, whom you have insulted?” (S. Bas., Or. 4, de Fen.) Alas! the guilty soul that leaves this world in sin, is condemned by herself before the Judge pronounces sentence. Let us come to the sentence of the Judge.

Third Point. Terror of the soul when she shall be condemned.

11. How great shall be the joy of a soul when, at death, she hears from Jesus Christ these sweet words: “Well done, good and faithful servant; because thou hast been faithful over a few things, I will place thee over many things. Enter thou into the joy of thy Lord.” (Matt. xxv. 21.) Equally great shall be the anguish and despair of a guilty soul, that shall see herself driven away by the Judge with the following words: “Depart from me, you cursed, into everlasting fire” (verse 41). Oh! what a terrible thunderclap shall that sentence be to her! “Oh! how frightfully,” says the Carthusian, “shall that thunder resound!” Eusebius writes, that the terror of sinners at hearing their condemnation shall be so great that, if they could, they would die again.

“The wicked shall be seized with such terror at the sight of the Judge pronouncing sentence that, if they were not immortal, they should die a second time.” But, brethren, let us, before the termination of this sermon, make some reflections which will be profitable to us. St. Thomas of Villanova says, that some listen to discourses on the judgment and condemnation of the wicked with as little concern as if they they themselves were secure against these things, or as if the day of judgment were never to arrive for them. “Heu quam securi hæc dicimus et audimus, quasi nos non tangeret hæc sententia, aut quasi dies hæc nunquam esset venturus!” (Conc, i., de Jud.) The saint then asks: Is it not great folly to entertain security in so perilous an affair? “Quæ est ista stulta securitas in discrimine tanto?”

There are some, says St. Augustine, who, though they live in sin, cannot imagine that God will send them to hell. “Will God,” they say, ”really condemn us ?” Brethren, adds the saint, do not speak thus. So, many of the damned did not believe that they should be sent to hell; but the end came, and, according to the threat of Ezechiel, they have been cast into that place of darkness. “The end is come, the end is come… and I will send my wrath upon thee, and I will judge thee.” (Ezec. vii. 2, 3.)

Sinners, perhaps vengeance is at hand for you, and still you laugh and sleep in sin. Who will not tremble at the words of the Baptist: “For now the axe is laid to the root of the trees. Every tree, therefore, that doth not yield good fruit shall be cut down and cast into the fire.” (Matt, iii. 10.) He says, that every tree that does not bring forth good fruit shall be cut down and cast into the fire; and he promises that, with regard to the trees, which represent sinners, the axe is already laid to the roots that is, chastisement is at hand. Dearly beloved brethren, let us follow the counsel of the Holy Ghost “Before judgment, prepare thee justice.” (Eccl. xviii. 19.)

Let us adjust our accounts before the day of accounts. Let us seek God, now that we can find him; for the time shall come when we will wish, but shall not be able to find him. “You shall seek me, and shall not find me.” (John vii. 36.) “Before judgment,” says St. Augustine, “the Judge can be appeased, but not in judgment.” By a change of life we can now appease the anger of Jesus Christ, and recover his grace; but when he shall judge, and find us in sin, he must execute justice, and we shall be lost. (Saint Alphonsus de Liguori, “On the Particular Judgment,” Sermon for the Eighth Sunday after Pentecost. For an audio presentation of this sermon, please go to: On The Particular Judgment by St. Alphonsus Liguori.)

I remember saying to myself, “I am doomed. There is no hope me. I am lost. I know I am damned without Our Lady’s intercession on my behalf” when I recorded this sermon fourteen years ago in an empty schoolroom. This is why I pray every day to be ready to accept the sort of death that God has fashioned for me for all eternity to undergo with all of its pains, which I offer up prospectively in reparation for my sins in the event that I am not conscious at the moment of death as I pray also to have perfect contrition for my sins now and at that terrible hour. Most importantly, though, I pray that Our Lady will send me the graces to beg for mercy and to be ever reliant upon and confident in her maternal intercession and protection without being presumptuous of either.

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