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                  May 2, 2007

The Fruit of "Reconciling" with the Principles of 1787

by Thomas A. Droleskey

One of the regular themes of articles of mine that were published in The Wanderer between October of 1992 and January of 2001 was the failure of the conciliar bishops, whose "legitimacy" as bishops I am ashamed to admit that I accepted until just last year, to impose canonical sanctions upon Catholics in public life who support the taking of innocent preborn life under the cover of civil law.

How was it possible, I argued over and over again, for John Paul II to keep men in episcopal power who fail to govern their dioceses and to mete out the discipline that public sinners deserve? How was it possible, I argued over and over again, for men who I considered to be the Successors of the Apostles to look the other way as the very thing, sin, that caused Our Lord to suffer unspeakably in His Sacred Humanity during His Passion Death is promoted by "Catholics" in public life? A March, 1993, article of mine in The Wanderer, which was later incorporated into Christ in the Voting Booth nine years ago, even made the case that the then named National Conference of Catholic Bishops/United States Catholic Conference could challenge the constitutionality of being "muzzled" by the regulations imposed by legislation passed in the 1950s at the behest of Senator Lyndon Baines Johnson to restrict the ability to speak out on matters pertaining to electoral politics when the good of souls demanded such intervention. Time after time, article after article, year after year, I hammered away at the coalition between the leftist apparatchiks in the "bishops'" bureaucracy in Washington, D.C., and their like-minded brethern in the fifty state "Catholic" conferences and allied organizations and pro-abortion politicians in both major political parties, especially the Democrat Party.

The cowardice of the current crop of conciliar bishops to discipline Catholics in public life who support abortion and perversity is just the rotten fruit of the long, sorry record of Catholic bishops in this country, dating back to Archbishop John Carroll himself, "reconciling" with the "principles" of 1787, that is, the principles of the United States Constitution, which is founded in the belief that it is not necessary or desirable for the civil state to recognize any religion and that it is possible for individual men to maintain the common good as long as they pursue "civic virtue" individually and arrange the institutions of government at the federal level in such a way so as to prevent the establishment of permanent majorities on any one issue that might seek to run roughshod over the rights of those in the minority on any one issue. Pluralism was the "wave of the future" and adherents of different denominations would have to make their "peace" with each other in order to advance the common good.

Although the facts that follow have been reviewed in my writing a great deal in the past twenty years and in countless articles on this site (and in its printed predecessor, Christ or Chaos, from 1996-2003), it is important once again to provide a primer to understand that Joseph Ratzinger's own embrace of a "healthy secularity," which is of the essence of the conciliar view of Church-State relations,. flows directly from the Potomac River, thus illustrating the simple fact that what men such as Theodore Cardinal McCarrick, the former conciliar archbishop of Washington, D.C., who gave an defense of the Americanism in Canada seven months ago, are simply aping the counterfeit church of conciliarism's party line while remaining completely faithful to the Americanist currents that helped in very large measure to lead up to conciliarism.

Catholic Teaching is Not Americanism or Conciliarism

The Catholic Church has taught from time immemorial that she can adapt herself to any particular form of civil governance. Pope Leo XIII made this point very clear in Immortale Dei, November 1, 1885:

The right to rule is not necessarily, however, bound up with any special mode of government. It may take this or that form, provided only that it be of a nature of the government, rulers must ever bear in mind that God is the paramount ruler of the world, and must set Him before themselves as their exemplar and law in the administration of the State. For, in things visible God has fashioned secondary causes, in which His divine action can in some wise be discerned, leading up to the end to which the course of the world is ever tending. In like manner, in civil society, God has always willed that there should be a ruling authority, and that they who are invested with it should reflect the divine power and providence in some measure over the human race.

 

The Church has taught, however, that the civil state has an obligation to recognize the true religion, no matter the particular constitutional/institutional arrangements that men in any one nation believe at one point in time correspond to the pursuit of the common temporal good in light of man's Last End, that is, to save his immortal soul as a member of the Catholic Church. Pope Leo XIII stated this matter very clearly in Immortale Dei:

As a consequence, the State, constituted as it is, is clearly bound to act up to the manifold and weighty duties linking it to God, by the public profession of religion. Nature and reason, which command every individual devoutly to worship God in holiness, because we belong to Him and must return to Him, since from Him we came, bind also the civil community by a like law. For, men living together in society are under the power of God no less than individuals are, and society, no less than individuals, owes gratitude to God who gave it being and maintains it and whose everbounteous goodness enriches it with countless blessings. Since, then, no one is allowed to be remiss in the service due to God, and since the chief duty of all men is to cling to religion in both its teaching and practice-not such religion as they may have a preference for, but the religion which God enjoins, and which certain and most clear marks show to be the only one true religion -- it is a public crime to act as though there were no God. So, too, is it a sin for the State not to have care for religion as a something beyond its scope, or as of no practical benefit; or out of many forms of religion to adopt that one which chimes in with the fancy; for we are bound absolutely to worship God in that way which He has shown to be His will. All who rule, therefore, would hold in honor the holy name of God, and one of their chief duties must be to favor religion, to protect it, to shield it under the credit and sanction of the laws, and neither to organize nor enact any measure that may compromise its safety. This is the bounden duty of rulers to the people over whom they rule. For one and all are we destined by our birth and adoption to enjoy, when this frail and fleeting life is ended, a supreme and final good in heaven, and to the attainment of this every endeavor should be directed. Since, then, upon this depends the full and perfect happiness of mankind, the securing of this end should be of all imaginable interests the most urgent. Hence, civil society, established for the common welfare, should not only safeguard the wellbeing of the community, but have also at heart the interests of its individual members, in such mode as not in any way to hinder, but in every manner to render as easy as may be, the possession of that highest and unchangeable good for which all should seek. Wherefore, for this purpose, care must especially be taken to preserve unharmed and unimpeded the religion whereof the practice is the link connecting man with God.

Now, it cannot be difficult to find out which is the true religion, if only it be sought with an earnest and unbiased mind; for proofs are abundant and striking. We have, for example, the fulfillment of prophecies, miracles in great numbers, the rapid spread of the faith in the midst of enemies and in face of overwhelming obstacles, the witness of the martyrs, and the like. From all these it is evident that the only true religion is the one established by Jesus Christ Himself, and which He committed to His Church to protect and to propagate.

 

Pope Leo XIII outlined in Immortale Dei the distinctions that exist between the ecclesiastical and temporal realms, each distinct and competent in its own sphere of competency, yet stressed the fact that the civil state must make sure to pursue its policies in light of the eternal good of souls:

In very truth, Jesus Christ gave to His Apostles unrestrained authority in regard to things sacred, together with the genuine and most true power of making laws, as also with the twofold right of judging and of punishing, which flow from that power. "All power is given to Me in heaven and on earth: going therefore teach all nations . . . teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you." And in another place: "If he will not hear them, tell the Church." And again: "In readiness to revenge all disobedience." And once more: "That . . . I may not deal more severely according to the power which the Lord hath given me, unto edification and not unto destruction." Hence, it is the Church, and not the State, that is to be man's guide to heaven. It is to the Church that God has assigned the charge of seeing to, and legislating for, all that concerns religion; of teaching all nations; of spreading the Christian faith as widely as possible; in short, of administering freely and without hindrance, in accordance with her own judgment, all matters that fall within its competence.

Now, this authority, perfect in itself, and plainly meant to be unfettered, so long assailed by a philosophy that truckles to the State, the Church, has never ceased to claim for herself and openly to exercise. The Apostles themselves were the first to uphold it, when, being forbidden by the rulers of the synagogue to preach the Gospel, they courageously answered: "We must obey God rather than men." This same authority the holy Fathers of the Church were always careful to maintain by weighty arguments, according as occasion arose, and the Roman Pontiffs have never shrunk from defending it with unbending constancy. Nay, more, princes and all invested with power to rule have themselves approved it, in theory alike and in practice. It cannot be called in question that in the making of treaties, in the transaction of business matters, in the sending and receiving ambassadors, and in the interchange of other kinds of official dealings they have been wont to treat with the Church as with a supreme and legitimate power. And, assuredly, all ought to hold that it was not without a singular disposition of God's providence that this power of the Church was provided with a civil sovereignty as the surest safeguard of her independence.

The Almighty, therefore, has given the charge of the human race to two powers, the ecclesiastical and the civil, the one being set over divine, and the other over human, things. Each in its kind is supreme, each has fixed limits within which it is contained, limits which are defined by the nature and special object of the province of each, so that there is, we may say, an orbit traced out within which the action of each is brought into play by its own native right. But, inasmuch as each of these two powers has authority over the same subjects, and as it might come to pass that one and the same thing -- related differently, but still remaining one and the same thing -- might belong to the jurisdiction and determination of both, therefore God, who foresees all things, and who is the author of these two powers, has marked out the course of each in right correlation to the other. "For the powers that are, are ordained of God."Were this not so, deplorable contentions and conflicts would often arise, and, not infrequently, men, like travelers at the meeting of two roads, would hesitate in anxiety and doubt, not knowing what course to follow. Two powers would be commanding contrary things, and it would be a dereliction of duty to disobey either of the two.

But it would be most repugnant to them to think thus of the wisdom and goodness of God. Even in physical things, albeit of a lower order, the Almighty has so combined the forces and springs of nature with tempered action and wondrous harmony that no one of them clashes with any other, and all of them most fitly and aptly work together for the great purpose of the universe. There must, accordingly, exist between these two powers a certain orderly connection, which may be compared to the union of the soul and body in man. The nature and scope of that connection can be determined only, as We have laid down, by having regard to the nature of each power, and by taking account of the relative excellence and nobleness of their purpose. One of the two has for its proximate and chief object the well-being of this mortal life; the other, the everlasting joys of heaven. Whatever, therefore in things human is of a sacred character, whatever belongs either of its own nature or by reason of the end to which it is referred, to the salvation of souls, or to the worship of God, is subject to the power and judgment of the Church. Whatever is to be ranged under the civil and political order is rightly subject to the civil authority. Jesus Christ has Himself given command that what is Caesar's is to be rendered to Caesar, and that what belongs to God is to be rendered to God.

 

Even in the things of Caesar, however, the things of God must be kept in mind. Everything a man does in this passing, mortal vale of tears must be undertaken in light of eternity. Even our mundane activities must be done for the honor and glory of God as the consecrated slaves of Our Lady's Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart. This is why there so much sloth and incompetence in the Pluralist States of America, examples of which we encountered when dealing with the replacement of our motor home's engine just a few days ago. A world in which men are taught that they are "gods" and/or that everyone goes to Heaven, which is what is taught in the Lutheran strain of Protestantism and its offshoots and in much of the conciliar structures, is one in which daily activity is done as a means to the achievement of material ends, not the means by which to get home to Heaven as members of the Catholic Church who are trying to remain in states of Sanctifying Grace at all times in order to be ready for the moment for their Particular Judgments, which can occur any time. Such a world produces civil rulers, Catholics and non-Catholics alike, who do not believe that they have any responsibility, either in their own individual lives or in their public conduct, to choose well in this life in preparation for the next.

This point is amply made by Pope Saint Pius X in Vehementer Nos, February 11, 1906:

That the State must be separated from the Church is a thesis absolutely false, a most pernicious error. Based, as it is, on the principle that the State must not recognize any religious cult, it is in the first place guilty of a great injustice to God; for the Creator of man is also the Founder of human societies, and preserves their existence as He preserves our own. We owe Him, therefore, not only a private cult, but a public and social worship to honor Him. Besides, this thesis is an obvious negation of the supernatural order. It limits the action of the State to the pursuit of public prosperity during this life only, which is but the proximate object of political societies; and it occupies itself in no fashion (on the plea that this is foreign to it) with their ultimate object which is man's eternal happiness after this short life shall have run its course. But as the present order of things is temporary and subordinated to the conquest of man's supreme and absolute welfare, it follows that the civil power must not only place no obstacle in the way of this conquest, but must aid us in effecting it. The same thesis also upsets the order providentially established by God in the world, which demands a harmonious agreement between the two societies. Both of them, the civil and the religious society, although each exercises in its own sphere its authority over them. It follows necessarily that there are many things belonging to them in common in which both societies must have relations with one another. Remove the agreement between Church and State, and the result will be that from these common matters will spring the seeds of disputes which will become acute on both sides; it will become more difficult to see where the truth lies, and great confusion is certain to arise. Finally, this thesis inflicts great injury on society itself, for it cannot either prosper or last long when due place is not left for religion, which is the supreme rule and the sovereign mistress in all questions touching the rights and the duties of men. Hence the Roman Pontiffs have never ceased, as circumstances required, to refute and condemn the doctrine of the separation of Church and State. Our illustrious predecessor, Leo XIII, especially, has frequently and magnificently expounded Catholic teaching on the relations which should subsist between the two societies. "Between them," he says, "there must necessarily be a suitable union, which may not improperly be compared with that existing between body and soul.-"Quaedam intercedat necesse est ordinata colligatio (inter illas) quae quidem conjunctioni non immerito comparatur, per quam anima et corpus in homine copulantur." He proceeds: "Human societies cannot, without becoming criminal, act as if God did not exist or refuse to concern themselves with religion, as though it were something foreign to them, or of no purpose to them.... As for the Church, which has God Himself for its author, to exclude her from the active life of the nation, from the laws, the education of the young, the family, is to commit a great and pernicious error. -- "Civitates non possunt, citra scellus, gerere se tamquam si Deus omnino non esset, aut curam religionis velut alienam nihilque profuturam abjicere.... Ecclesiam vero, quam Deus ipse constituit, ab actione vitae excludere, a legibus, ab institutione adolescentium, a societate domestica, magnus et perniciousus est error."

 

Although, yes, there is great freedom for men to choose particular forms of civil governance at different epochs in history (the nature of the monarchy, for example, varied from time to time even in Catholic England), there is an absolute necessity for the civil state to recognize the true Church and to subordinate itself to the binding precepts of the Divine positive law and the natural law, making sure to do nothing to interfere with the eternal good of souls and seeking to root out those things that breed sin, which disorders the souls of men and thus disorders civil states, and to never seek to promote anything contrary to God's laws and thus to the good of souls. Pope Leo XIII noted this in Immortale Dei:

So, too, the liberty of thinking, and of publishing, whatsoever each one likes, without any hindrance, is not in itself an advantage over which society can wisely rejoice. On the contrary, it is the fountain-head and origin of many evils. Liberty is a power perfecting man, and hence should have truth and goodness for its object. But the character of goodness and truth cannot be changed at option. These remain ever one and the same, and are no less unchangeable than nature itself. If the mind assents to false opinions, and the will chooses and follows after what is wrong, neither can attain its native fullness, but both must fall from their native dignity into an abyss of corruption. Whatever, therefore, is opposed to virtue and truth may not rightly be brought temptingly before the eye of man, much less sanctioned by the favor and protection of the law. A well-spent life is the only way to heaven, whither all are bound, and on this account the State is acting against the laws and dictates of nature whenever it permits the license of opinion and of action to lead minds astray from truth and souls away from the practice of virtue. To exclude the Church, founded by God Himself, from the business of life, from the power of making laws, from the education of youth, from domestic society is a grave and fatal error. A State from which religion is banished can never be well regulated; and already perhaps more than is desirable is known of the nature and tendency of the so-called civil philosophy of life and morals. The Church of Christ is the true and sole teacher of virtue and guardian of morals. She it is who preserves in their purity the principles from which duties flow, and, by setting forth most urgent reasons for virtuous life, bids us not only to turn away from wicked deeds, but even to curb all movements of the mind that are opposed to reason, even though they be not carried out in action.

 

As is noted on this site frequently, it is one thing to sin and to seek out the ineffable Mercy of the Divine Redeemer in the Sacred Tribunal of Penance. It is quite another to persist in sin unrepentantly, worse yet to seek to protect it under cover of law and promote it in every aspect of popular culture. There may be times when a Catholic state may have to tolerate various evils. There may be times when Catholics in a non-Catholic state may have to do so. That does not obviate our responsibility to seek to eliminate evil, first from our own lives by means of our daily cooperation with Sanctifying Grace and then from society by seeking to convert all men and all nations to the one true Church, outside of which there is no salvation. Pope Leo Leo XIII noted this in Libertas, June 20, 1888:

The Church most earnestly desires that the Christian teaching, of which We have given an outline, should penetrate every rank of society in reality and in practice; for it would be of the greatest efficacy in healing the evils of our day, which are neither few nor slight, and are the offspring in great part of the false liberty which is so much extolled, and in which the germs of safety and glory were supposed to be contained. The hope has been disappointed by the result. The fruit, instead of being sweet and wholesome, has proved cankered and bitter. If, then, a remedy is desired, let it be sought for in a restoration of sound doctrine, from which alone the preservation of order and, as a consequence, the defense of true liberty can be confidently expected.

Yet, with the discernment of a true mother, the Church weighs the great burden of human weakness, and well knows the course down which the minds and actions of men are in this our age being borne. For this reason, while not conceding any right to anything save what is true and honest, she does not forbid public authority to tolerate what is at variance with truth and justice, for the sake of avoiding some greater evil, or of obtaining or preserving some greater good. God Himself in His providence, though infinitely good and powerful, permits evil to exist in the world, partly that greater good may not be impeded, and partly that greater evil may not ensue. In the government of States it is not forbidden to imitate the Ruler of the world; and, as the authority of man is powerless to prevent every evil, it has (as St. Augustine says) to overlook and leave unpunished many things which are punished, and rightly, by Divine Providence.But if, in such circumstances, for the sake of the common good (and this is the only legitimate reason), human law may or even should tolerate evil, it may not and should not approve or desire evil for its own sake; for evil of itself, being a privation of good, is opposed to the common welfare which every legislator is bound to desire and defend to the best of his ability. In this, human law must endeavor to imitate God, who, as St. Thomas teaches, in allowing evil to exist in the world, "neither wills evil to be done, nor wills it not to be done, but wills only to permit it to be done; and this is good.'' This saying of the Angelic Doctor contains briefly the whole doctrine of the permission of evil.

But, to judge aright, we must acknowledge that, the more a State is driven to tolerate evil, the further is it from perfection; and that the tolerance of evil which is dictated by political prudence should be strictly confined to the limits which its justifying cause, the public welfare, requires. Wherefore, if such tolerance would be injurious to the public welfare, and entail greater evils on the State, it would not be lawful; for in such case the motive of good is wanting. And although in the extraordinary condition of these times the Church usually acquiesces in certain modern liberties, not because she prefers them in themselves, but because she judges it expedient to permit them, she would in happier times exercise her own liberty; and, by persuasion, exhortation, and entreaty would endeavor, as she is bound, to fulfill the duty assigned to her by God of providing for the eternal salvation of mankind. One thing, however, remains always true -- that the liberty which is claimed for all to do all things is not, as We have often said, of itself desirable, inasmuch as it is contrary to reason that error and truth should have equal rights.

And as to tolerance, it is surprising how far removed from the equity and prudence of the Church are those who profess what is called liberalism. For, in allowing that boundless license of which We have spoken, they exceed all limits, and end at last by making no apparent distinction between truth and error, honesty and dishonesty. And because the Church, the pillar and ground of truth, and the unerring teacher of morals, is forced utterly to reprobate and condemn tolerance of such an abandoned and criminal character, they calumniate her as being wanting in patience and gentleness, and thus fail to see that, in so doing, they impute to her as a fault what is in reality a matter for commendation. But, in spite of all this show of tolerance, it very often happens that, while they profess themselves ready to lavish liberty on all in the greatest profusion, they are utterly intolerant toward the Catholic Church, by refusing to allow her the liberty of being herself free.

 

Perfection was never realized in the Catholic Middle Ages. Conflicts abounded between self-seeking potentates and Roman Pontiffs. Local bishops were sometimes coopted by kings and blinded by nationalistic pride. All true enough. The summary of the glories of Christendom as summarized by Pope Leo XIII in Immortale Dei are nevertheless entirely true:

There was once a time when States were governed by the philosophy of the Gospel. Then it was that the power and divine virtue of Christian wisdom had diffused itself throughout the laws, institutions, and morals of the people, permeating all ranks and relations of civil society. Then, too, the religion instituted by Jesus Christ, established firmly in befitting dignity, flourished everywhere, by the favor of princes and the legitimate protection of magistrates; and Church and State were happily united in concord and friendly interchange of good offices. The State, constituted in this wise, bore fruits important beyond all expectation, whose remembrance is still, and always will be, in renown, witnessed to as they are by countless proofs which can never be blotted out or ever obscured by any craft of any enemies. Christian Europe has subdued barbarous nations, and changed them from a savage to a civilized condition, from superstition to true worship. It victoriously rolled back the tide of Mohammedan conquest; retained the headship of civilization; stood forth in the front rank as the leader and teacher of all, in every branch of national culture; bestowed on the world the gift of true and many-sided liberty; and most wisely founded very numerous institutions for the solace of human suffering. And if we inquire how it was able to bring about so altered a condition of things, the answer is -- beyond all question, in large measure, through religion, under whose auspices so many great undertakings were set on foot, through whose aid they were brought to completion.

A similar state of things would certainly have continued had the agreement of the two powers been lasting. More important results even might have been justly looked for, had obedience waited upon the authority, teaching, and counsels of the Church, and had this submission been specially marked by greater and more unswerving loyalty. For that should be regarded in the light of an ever-changeless law which Ivo of Chartres wrote to Pope Paschal II: "When kingdom and priesthood are at one, in complete accord, the world is well ruled, and the Church flourishes, and brings forth abundant fruit. But when they are at variance, not only smaller interests prosper not, but even things of greatest moment fall into deplorable decay."

 

The men of the so-called "Enlightenment" or "Age of Reason" who wrote the Constitution of the United States of America did not understand the history of Christendom, which they distorted as an era that "enslaved" man to the "tyranny" of the priesthood. They believed that the Incarnation of Our Lord in Our Lady's Virginal and Immaculate Womb was a matter of complete indifference to individual men and their nations. They believed that individual men and their nations did not have to subordinate themselves to the Deposit of Faith that Our Lord entrusted exclusively (as in solely, only) to the Catholic Church that He founded upon the Rock of Saint Peter, the Pope. They believed that men could be virtuous on their own powers, which is more or less the lie of the heresy of semi-Pelagianism (that we "stir up graces" within ourselves), without having belief in, access to and cooperation with Sanctifying Grace. And they believed, of course, that it was necessary for the Church and State to be separated, an absolute principle of Martin Luther and John Calvin and of Judeo-Masonry.

The devil is very clever. He raised up "bad" Protestants (Martin Luther, John Calvin, Henry VIII, Elizabeth I, Oliver Cromwell), men and women who persecuted the Church viciously, killing thousands upon thousands of Catholics, in order to raise up "nice" Protestants and Freemasons in the United States of America, men and women who would be willing to "tolerate" Catholics and to let them practice their Faith openly. The devil knew that the pull of human respect and religious indifferentism and materialism and pluralism would be too strong for Catholics to resist, especially if the first bishop of the United States, John Carroll, wanted to accommodate the Faith to the religiously indifferentist Constitution rather than to seek to convert the United States of America to the Catholic Faith. The adversary uses this same strategy today in electoral politics, raising up the egregious Bill Clinton so as to make anyone, even the proud, ignorant statist and butcher of innocents named George Bush, look better by comparison.

Admitting that there are some vestigial principles of Catholicism in some parts of the Constitution of the United States of America, particularly in the Fifth Amendment, the Constitution is not a "Christian" document. Protestantism is not Christianity. Protestantism is a heresy. Judeo-Masonry is not Christianity. It is a tool of the devil to create a world where men are indifferent to the fact of the Incarnation and to the fact of Our Lord's Redemptive Act and to the fact that He has entrusted to the Catholic Church all teaching authority and sanctifying powers, thereby convincing man that he is "self-redemptive" can could do as he please in his personal and social lives. Placing the Catholic Church on a level of equality with all other religions (and with atheism, which is protected in the Constitution of the United States of America in Article VI and in the First Amendment) is the sure path to social chaos over the course of time. Indeed, Orestes Brownson saw this soon after his conversion to Catholicism in the Nineteenth Century. (See: National Greatness.) Pope Leo XIII warned quite specifically in Testem Benevolentiae Nostrae, January 22, 1899, that the Americanist leanings of some of the hierarchy of the United States of American meant the following:

For it raises the suspicion the suspicion that there are among you some who conceive and desire the Church in America to be different from what it is in the rest of the world.

 

What Pope Leo XIII warned about has become the norm in the counterfeit church of conciliarism, embraced warmly by Joseph Ratzinger and by one Americanist, both Catholic and conciliarist, after another.

Pluralism Engenders Social Degeneracy

The founders of the United States of America believed that pluralism, the existence of many different religious and philosophical "beliefs" and "ideas," was a protection against the "imposition" of any one "view" as "normative" in civil society. That, for the founders, was considered to be the essence of tyranny.

James Madison, who was more or less the architect of much of the Constitution, believed that agreement on matters of public policy had to be forged through a difficult process of "compromise, negotiation and bargaining," wrought largely in the context of a bicameral federal legislature in which a variety of factions (regional, religious, economic, social) would be forced to "clash" with one another to bring about a result that was sanctioned by a majority of legislators yet at the same time protected the rights of those who disagreed with the majority to make their views heard during the policy-making process. This would produce transient majorities, those that formed only for a moment on a particular issue. These transient or temporary majorities would be concerned about and sensitive to the views of others in the diverse, extended "commercial" republic. Even the strongest and most influential individual or group of individuals would not be able control the policy-making process at all times. Compromises would have to be made in order to advance the common good. It was not possible in such a complicated and delicate process of compromise, negotiation and bargaining in the midst of a pluralist society for there to be the recognition of any particular religion as the one and true religion, making the United States of America the first in the history of the world that did not have an official state religion.

As noted above, Americanists of the political and theological orders contend that the religious indifferentism of the Constitution of the United States of America is actually a benefit to Catholics, who were able to practice their Faith openly, although not without persecution and discrimination at the state level, as opposed to the bitter persecution that their ancestors had experienced in England and Ireland and in most of the English colonies of North America prior to July 4, 1776. This is what led James Cardinal Gibbons, the Americanist Archbishop of Baltimore from 1877 to 1921, to say of the intentions of the first bishop and archbishop of Baltimore, John Carroll:

The dominant idea in the mind of Bishop Carroll, who was a great a statesman as he was a churchman, an idea that has remained the inspiration of the Church, and has dictated all her policy of the last century . . . was absolute loyalty to the letter and the spirit of the Constitution of the United States of America.

Bishop Carroll did not wish to see the Church vegetate as a delicate exotic plant. He wished it become a sturdy tree, deep rooted in the soil, to grow with the growth of and bloom with the development of the country, inured to its climate, braving its storms, invigorated by them and yielding adamantly the fruits of sanctification. His aim was that the clergy should be thoroughly identified with the land in which their lot is cast; that they should study its laws and political constitution, and be in harmony with its spirit. (James Cardinal Gibbons, A Retrospect of Fifty Years, pp. 248. 249.)

 

This is quite a statement. The clergy of the United States of American must be in harmony with the spirit of the Constitution of the United States of America, not with the conversion of the nation to the Social Reign of Christ the King. Pluralism was good enough for John Carroll and James Gibbons. The Faith could be taught, souls sanctified and saved, all while we "got along" with those of different denominations and "made our way" materially, politically, and socially. As Pope Leo XIII pointed out in Testem Benevolentiae Nostrae, however, the dangers of pluralism, being difficult to recognize and to resist, would subtly influence Catholics into viewing the Church through the eyes of pluralism rather than viewing the world through the eyes of the Faith:

But, beloved son, in this present matter of which we are speaking, there is even a greater danger and a more manifest opposition to Catholic doctrine and discipline in that opinion of the lovers of novelty, according to which they hold such liberty should be allowed in the Church, that her supervision and watchfulness being in some sense lessened, allowance be granted the faithful, each one to follow out more freely the leading of his own mind and the trend of his own proper activity. They are of the opinion that such liberty has its counterpart in the newly given civil freedom which is now the right and the foundation of almost every secular state.

 

Far more dangerous to the Faith than the bloody revolutions against the Faith wrought by Martin Luther and John Calvin and Henry VIII and Elizabeth I and Oliver Cromwell and Ulrich Zwingli, Pope Leo XIII was saying in diplomatic language to James Cardinal Gibbons himself in Testem Benevolentiae Nostrae, is the novelty of civil and religious liberty enshrined in the pluralism of the Constitution of the United States of America. Americanists (and they are in every ecclesiastical camp--conciliarist, indult, among the faithful and and or two of the American priests in the Society of Saint Pius X, other "recognize and resist" chapels, sedevacantist communities) seem to be incapable of recognizing and admitting that the degeneration of the country is not the result of the rise of some "foreign" force of secularism but the logical, inexorable result of the false premises of the American founding.

Social degeneracy and chaos are the logical result when large numbers of citizens do not submit themselves to the Deposit of Faith and/or seek to root out sin in their lives by an earnest effort to cooperate with the graces won for them 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 and that flow into our souls through the loving hands of Our Lady, the Mediatrix of All Graces. A religiously indifferent or "neutral" civil state will be powerless to stop such degeneracy. Indeed, it is usually the case that, to one extent or another, such a state is an active agent in the promotion of such degeneracy. What was, after all, one of the first things that went into Iraq following the unjust and immoral invasion of American forces in March of 2003? Pills and devices to help prevent the conception of children. Ah, yes, the fruits of "civil liberty" and pluralism, which are promoted in this country by one administration after another, whether Democrat or Republican without any cessation whatsoever.

Yes, the state of nations depends upon the state of souls, which must be striving for sanctify or fall into various pitfalls of sin and vice and self-deception. Pope Leo XIII pointed this out in Tametsi Futura Prospicientibus:

From this it may clearly be seen what con sequences are to be expected from that false pride which, rejecting our Saviour's Kingship, places man at the summit of all things and declares that human nature must rule supreme. And yet, this supreme rule can neither be attained nor even defined. The rule of Jesus Christ derives its form and its power from Divine Love: a holy and orderly charity is both its foundation and its crown. Its necessary consequences are the strict fulfilment of duty, respect of mutual rights, the estimation of the things of heaven above those of earth, the preference of the love of God to all things. But this supremacy of man, which openly rejects Christ, or at least ignores Him, is entirely founded upon selfishness, knowing neither charity nor selfdevotion. Man may indeed be king, through Jesus Christ: but only on condition that he first of all obey God, and diligently seek his rule of life in God's law. By the law of Christ we mean not only the natural precepts of morality and the Ancient Law, all of which Jesus Christ has perfected and crowned by His declaration, explanation and sanction; but also the rest of His doctrine and His own peculiar institutions. Of these the chief is His Church. Indeed whatsoever things Christ has instituted are most fully contained in His Church. Moreover, He willed to perpetuate the office assigned to Him by His Father by means of the ministry of the Church so gloriously founded by Himself. On the one hand He confided to her all the means of men's salvation, on the other He most solemnly commanded men to be subject to her and to obey her diligently, and to follow her even as Himself: "He that heareth you, heareth Me; and he that despiseth you, despiseth Me" (Luke x, 16). Wherefore the law of Christ must be sought in the Church. Christ is man's "Way"; the Church also is his "Way"-Christ of Himself and by His very nature, the Church by His commission and the communication of His power. Hence all who would find salvation apart from the Church, are led astray and strive in vain.

As with individuals, so with nations. These, too, must necessarily tend to ruin if they go astray from "The Way." The Son of God, the Creator and Redeemer of mankind, is King and Lord of the earth, and holds supreme dominion over men, both individually and collectively. "And He gave Him power, and glory, and a kingdom: and all peoples, tribes, and tongues shall serve Him" (Daniel vii., 14). "I am appointed King by Him . . . I will give Thee the Gentiles for Thy inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth for Thy possession" (Psalm ii., 6, 8). Therefore the law of Christ ought to prevail in human society and be the guide and teacher of public as well as of private life. Since this is so by divine decree, and no man may with impunity contravene it, it is an evil thing for the common weal wherever Christianity does not hold the place that belongs to it. When Jesus Christ is absent, human reason fails, being bereft of its chief protection and light, and the very end is lost sight of, for which, under God's providence, human society has been built up. This end is the obtaining by the members of society of natural good through the aid of civil unity, though always in harmony with the perfect and eternal good which is above nature. But when men's minds are clouded, both rulers and ruled go astray, for they have no safe line to follow nor end to aim at.

Just Another In a Long Line of Americanists

Pope Leo XIII's words of Catholic truth quoted just above are lost (as in "space cadet" lost) on Theodore Cardinal McCarrick, who once invoked the name of "Allah" in a blessing, given in a Mohammedan style raise of his hand, in the presence of King Abdullah of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan on September 13, 2005 (his "blessing" sort of disappeared form the website of the Archdiocese of Washington, D.C. soon thereafter; see: Thou Shalt Not Have Strange Gods Before Me, which contains McCarrick's remarks, and Denying Christ by Omission and Commission, both written when I was privately considering but not yet commenting favorably on sedevacantism). McCarrick is blinder than most Americanists. Perhaps this is attributable to his belief that men who have perverse inclinations should not be excluded from the conciliar priesthood. Perhaps it is as simple as being a successor to the Americanist spirit of John Carroll and John Ireland and John Purcell and Peter Richard Kenrick and John Lancaster Spalding and, perhaps more directly (in more ways than one), Francis Spellman. McCarrick's October, 2006, address to the conciliar bishops in the P.R.C. (People's Republic of Canada), contains absolutely nothing new, although it is useful to note to demonstrate how thoroughly the conciliarist view concerning the nature of the relationship between the Church and State is opposed to Catholicism.

McCarrick's address, which first came to my attention on Monday, April 30, 2007, in an e-mail sent from a reader who had received an alert from Mr. John Vennari, the editor of Catholic Family News, who had learned of it from an article written by Mr. Charles Wilson of the Saint Joseph Foundation, is the antithesis of what has been presented thus far in this commentary (see: www.cccb.ca/site/content/view/2364/1214/lang,eng). Two passages illustrate just how far the Americanist and conciliarist mind is from the Faith:

The history of the relationships between Church and State in the United States is something which could take not just an address, but a whole course of studies to present fairly and adequately.  I will not pretend to do this in a short presentation, but it is obvious to me, and I think to scholars who write on this subject, that the initial intent of the writers of the American Constitution was not to negate religion, but to make sure that no particular religion would be enshrined as the state religion of our country.  The Founding Fathers had had experience of this in England.  A great many were members of the Anglican Church, which was the established Church in England.  They realized that other Protestant denominations were present among them and, indeed, among the early leadership of the nation.  There were also other schools of thought present in the early American intelligentsia, some of whom – like Jefferson’s – were not totally convinced of the value of any particular organized Church, although it seems clear that they did have a belief in God and a willingness to see others exercise that belief according to their own consciences.

 

Here you have a clear statement that the intentions of the founders of the Constitution of the United States of America matter more than the doctrine of the Catholic Church, which is not mentioned once in McCarrick's address. At no time did McCarrick inform his Canadian conciliarist hosts that Pope Leo XIII, while praising what he could of the natural virtues of George Washington and the fact that the Faith was unopposed by the Constitution of the United States of America, said in Longiqua Oceani, January 6, 1894, that the Church-State relationship in the United States of America is not the model for the rest of the world that it has become under the aegis of conciliarsm and the apologetics of Karol Wojtyla and Joseph Ratzinger:

For the Church amongst you, unopposed by the Constitution and government of your nation, fettered by no hostile legislation, protected against violence by the common laws and the impartiality of the tribunals, is free to live and act without hindrance. Yet, though all this is true, it would be very erroneous to draw the conclusion that in America is to be sought the type of the most desirable status of the Church, or that it would be universally lawful or expedient for State and Church to be, as in America, dissevered and divorced. The fact that Catholicity with you is in good condition, nay, is even enjoying a prosperous growth, is by all means to be attributed to the fecundity with which God has endowed His Church, in virtue of which unless men or circumstances interfere, she spontaneously expands and propagates herself; but she would bring forth more abundant fruits if, in addition to liberty, she enjoyed the favor of the laws and the patronage of the public authority.

 

In other words, credit God the Holy Ghost for the growth of the Church in the United States of America, not the dissevering of Church and State. Pope Leo XIII was saying that the Church would bring forth more fruits"if, in addition to liberty, she enjoyed the favor of the laws and the patronage of the public authority." McCarrick does not see this, nor can he see the fact that the religiously indifferentist state he extols is itself the reason for the secularism he bemoans. The latter is the result of the former. He is as blind in seeing this as Ratzinger himself. He is blind as seeing this as Martin Luther was of seeing that it was his own Revolt against the Divine Plan that God Himself instituted to effect man's return to Him through His Catholic Church helped to bring us to our current state of affairs in the Church and the world that spawned the antinomianism (the belief that one can do and believe whatever he wants and still get to Heaven) he opposed so vigorously. Luther, blinded by his own sins and his complete embrace of the separation of Church and State, could not see that he was responsible for the rise and spread of antinomianism. Similarly, Americanists, not all of whom are conciliarists even though they are of one mind with Ratzinger on the rejection of the Catholic teaching on the necessity of at least praying and working for the establishment of the confessionally Catholic state, are incapable of seeing that the very thing they extol, the American Constitution, has produced the secularism they think is so anomalous to the "intention" of the American founders.

The blindness of men like McCarrick and Ratzinger is willful. It flies in the face of this simple statement of logic and Faith that was penned by Pope Leo XIII in Immortale Dei:

To hold, therefore, that there is no difference in matters of religion between forms that are unlike each other, and even contrary to each other, most clearly leads in the end to the rejection of all religion in both theory and practice. And this is the same thing as atheism, however it may differ from it in name. Men who really believe in the existence of God must, in order to be consistent with themselves and to avoid absurd conclusions, understand that differing modes of divine worship involving dissimilarity and conflict even on most important points cannot all be equally probable, equally good, and equally acceptable to God.

 

Pope Leo XIII saw very clearly that the essential holding of the modern state concerning its duties to the true Faith would lead us to world in which we find ourselves today. It does not take a great deal of intelligence to recognize that Pope Leo was simply reasserting basic Catholic truth, which applies just as much to the disunity within the ranks of conciliarism and its variety of "inculturated liturgies" as it does to the fate of civil states that promote "civil" and "religious" liberty as "ends" that negate any necessity of recognizing and adhering to the Social Reign of Christ the King as it must be exercised by the Catholic Church.

The first Vice President and the second President of the United States, John Adams, wrote of the "benefits" that would accrue to a society where the "superstitions" of the past, meaning Catholicism, did not hold sway over the minds of men:

The United States of America have exhibited, perhaps, the first example of governments erected on the simple principles of nature; and if men are now sufficiently enlightened to disabuse themselves of artifice, imposture, hypocrisy, and superstition, they will consider this event as an era in their history. Although the detail of the formation of the American governments is at present little known or regarded either in Europe or in America, it may hereafter become an object of curiosity. It will never be pretended that any persons employed in that service had interviews with the gods, or were in any degree under the influence of Heaven, more than those at work upon ships or houses, or laboring in merchandise or agriculture; it will forever be acknowledged that these governments were contrived merely by the use of reason and the senses.

Unembarrassed by attachments to noble families, hereditary lines and successions, or any considerations of royal blood, even the pious mystery of holy oil had no more influence than that other of holy water: the people universally were too enlightened to be imposed on by artifice; and their leaders, or more properly followers, were men of too much honour to attempt it. Thirteen governments thus founded on the natural authority of the people alone, without a pretence of miracle or mystery, which are destined to spread over the northern part of that whole quarter of the globe, are a great point gained in favour of the rights of mankind. (President John Adams: "A Defense of the Constitutions of Government of the United States of America," 1787-1788)

 

Thomas Jefferson, whose "good will" was praised by McCarrick in his Canadian address last year, had this to say in a letter he wrote in 1813:

History, I believe, furnishes no example of a priest-ridden people maintaining a free civil government. This marks the lowest grade of ignorance of which their civil as well as religious leaders will always avail themselves for their own purposes. (Letter to Alexander von Humboldt.)

 

A people who consider themselves to be "priest-ridden" winds up in slavery to the devil.  A nation whose king is not Christ the King has only the devil for its king. No nation is "under God" unless it is under the true God has He has revealed Himself exclusively through His true Church. McCarrick and other Americanists would rather die than admit this.

Moreover the myth of the ability of inter-denominationalism or non-denominationalism to pursue the common good that is at the foundation of the Americanist and conciliarist approach to opposing secularism was exploded by Pope Saint Pius X in Notre Charge Apostolique, 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. The new Sillonists cannot pretend that they are merely working on “the ground of practical realities” where differences of belief do not matter. Their leader is so conscious of the influence which the convictions of the mind have upon the result of the action, that he invites them, whatever religion they may belong to, “to provide on the ground of practical realities, the proof of the excellence of their personal convictions.” And with good reason: indeed, all practical results reflect the nature of one’s religious convictions, just as the limbs of a man down to his finger-tips, owe their very shape to the principle of life that dwells in his body.

This being said, what must be thought of the promiscuity in which young Catholics will be caught up with heterodox and unbelieving folk in a work of this nature? Is it not a thousand-fold more dangerous for them than a neutral association? What are we to think of this appeal to all the heterodox, and to all the unbelievers, to prove the excellence of their convictions in the social sphere in a sort of apologetic contest? Has not this contest lasted for nineteen centuries in conditions less dangerous for the faith of Catholics? And was it not all to the credit of the Catholic Church? What are we to think of this respect for all errors, and of this strange invitation made by a Catholic to all the dissidents to strengthen their convictions through study so that they may have more and more abundant sources of fresh forces? What are we to think of an association in which all religions and even Free-Thought may express themselves openly and in complete freedom? For the Sillonists who, in public lectures and elsewhere, proudly proclaim their personal faith, certainly do not intend to silence others nor do they intend to prevent a Protestant from asserting his Protestantism, and the skeptic from affirming his skepticism. Finally, what are we to think of a Catholic who, on entering his study group, leaves his Catholicism outside the door so as not to alarm his comrades who, “dreaming of disinterested social action, are not inclined to make it serve the triumph of interests, coteries and even convictions whatever they may be”? Such is the profession of faith of the New Democratic Committee for Social Action which has taken over the main objective of the previous organization and which, they say, “breaking the double meaning which surround the Greater Sillon both in reactionary and anti-clerical circles”, is now open to all men “who respect moral and religious forces and who are convinced that no genuine social emancipation is possible without the leaven of generous idealism.”

 

Pope Saint Pius X reiterated the truth of authentic Catholic Social Teaching in Notre Charge Apostolique, distinguishing from the "impotent humanitarianism" of the Sillon and of Americanists and conciliarists, so wedded to various leftist programs, whether sponsored by governments or leftist non-government organizations or the United Masonic Nations or other "international" groups, that are designed to "create" the "better" world"

We wish to draw your attention, Venerable Brethren, to this distortion of the Gospel and to the sacred character of Our Lord Jesus Christ, God and man, prevailing within the Sillon and elsewhere. As soon as the social question is being approached, it is the fashion in some quarters to first put aside the divinity of Jesus Christ, and then to mention only His unlimited clemency, His compassion for all human miseries, and His pressing exhortations to the love of our neighbor and to the brotherhood of men. True, Jesus has loved us with an immense, infinite love, and He came on earth to suffer and die so that, gathered around Him in justice and love, motivated by the same sentiments of mutual charity, all men might live in peace and happiness. But for the realization of this temporal and eternal happiness, He has laid down with supreme authority the condition that we must belong to His Flock, that we must accept His doctrine, that we must practice virtue, and that we must accept the teaching and guidance of Peter and his successors. Further, whilst Jesus was kind to sinners and to those who went astray, He did not respect their false ideas, however sincere they might have appeared. He loved them all, but He instructed them in order to convert them and save them. Whilst He called to Himself in order to comfort them, those who toiled and suffered, it was not to preach to them the jealousy of a chimerical equality. Whilst He lifted up the lowly, it was not to instill in them the sentiment of a dignity independent from, and rebellious against, the duty of obedience. Whilst His heart overflowed with gentleness for the souls of good-will, He could also arm Himself with holy indignation against the profaners of the House of God, against the wretched men who scandalized the little ones, against the authorities who crush the people with the weight of heavy burdens without putting out a hand to lift them. He was as strong as he was gentle. He reproved, threatened, chastised, knowing, and teaching us that fear is the beginning of wisdom, and that it is sometimes proper for a man to cut off an offending limb to save his body. Finally, He did not announce for future society the reign of an ideal happiness from which suffering would be banished; but, by His lessons and by His example, He traced the path of the happiness which is possible on earth and of the perfect happiness in heaven: the royal way of the Cross. These are teachings that it would be wrong to apply only to one's personal life in order to win eternal salvation; these are eminently social teachings, and they show in Our Lord Jesus Christ something quite different from an inconsistent and impotent humanitarianism.

 

Ah, here is where most Americanists and conciliarists, with a few exceptions here and there, come to the belief that it is not permissible to speak in any way that offends those who are steeped unrepentantly in various sins, especially those of a perverse nature, and who promote sins under cover of law in in every aspect of popular culture. A false concept of "charity" for others mandates silence about the Faith, especially when it comes to seeking to correct or to discipline those in public life who are deviating from the Faith, causing grave scandal to the faithful, keeping non-Catholics from converting to the Faith, and supporting each of the four sins that cry out to Heaven for vengeance. This is exemplified in the following passage from "Uncle Teddy" (as his "nephews" called him during his days as the conciliar bishop of Metuchen, New Jersey, and then the conciliar archbishop of Newark, New Jersey) McCarrick's Canadian address:

Most of the disputes we have faced surround this issue of emphasis.  All of us accept the primacy and priority of the defence of life.  As I said earlier, it is the basis of all human rights since one must be alive to enjoy them.  Some of us take the position that while it is essential to ask a Catholic politician to be faithful to the cause of human life, his or her responsibility does not end there.  The defence of human dignity is also a priority for us.  Pope Benedict’s first encyclical gives us support, I believe, in this point of view.  Listen to his words:  “The exercise of charity became established as one of the Church’s essential activities, along with the administration of the sacraments and the proclamation of the word: love for widows and orphans, prisoners, and the sick and needy of every kind, is as essential to her as the ministry of the sacraments and preaching of the Gospel.  The Church cannot neglect the service of charity any more than she can neglect the Sacraments and the Word.”           

Cardinal Avery Dulles made this same point in a recent interview:  “The Church’s prime responsibility is to teach and to persuade.  She tries to convince citizens to engage in the political process with a well-informed conscience.”  He also cautions that the imposition of penalties comes with some serious risks: “In the first place, the Bishop may be accused, however unfairly, of trying to coerce the politician’s conscience.  Secondly, people can easily accuse the Church of trying to meddle in the political process, which in this country depends on the free consent of the governed.  And finally, the Church incurs a danger of alienating judges, legislators and public administrators whose good will is needed for other good programs, such as the support of Catholic education and the care of the poor.  For all these reasons, the Church is reluctant to discipline politicians in a public way, even when it is clear that their positions are morally indefensible.”   

 

This is a true confluence (my apologies to the estimable Hall of Famer Mr. Ralph Kiner, who popularized on New York Mets' broadcasts and telecasts the word "confluence" when speaking of how the old and never-will-be-missed cement monstrosity known as Three Rivers Stadium in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, was at the confluence of the Monongahela and Allegheny Rivers to form the Ohio River) of the Potomac River into the Tiber River. A concern for false "charity" must trump any consideration of the "imposition of penalties," lest the counterfeit church of conciliarism wind up "alienating judges, legislators and public administrators whose good will is needed for other good programs, such as the support of Catholic education and the care of the poor." Well, as we know, there is no "Catholic" education going on in conciliar schools, each of which must,with a few random exceptions here and there, teach some form of classroom instruction in matters pertaining to the Sixth and Ninth Commandments. Thus it is that those who support grave evils are allowed to remain "Catholics" in good standing in the conciliar structures in order to protect "Catholic" education and "charitable" programs that frequently play fast and loose with anti-life and pro-perversion forces.

This is what Pope Leo XIII had to say in Sapientiae Christianae, January 10, 1890, about the views of Joseph Ratzinger and Theodore McCarrick and Avery Dulles:

Hallowed, therefore, in the minds of Christians is the very idea of public authority, in which they recognize some likeness and symbol as it were of the Divine Majesty, even when it is exercised by one unworthy. A just and due reverence to the laws abides in them, not from force and threats, but from a consciousness of duty; "for God hath not given us the spirit of fear."

But, if the laws of the State are manifestly at variance with the divine law, containing enactments hurtful to the Church, or conveying injunctions adverse to the duties imposed by religion, or if they violate in the person of the supreme Pontiff the authority of Jesus Christ, then, truly, to resist becomes a positive duty, to obey, a crime; a crime, moreover, combined with misdemeanor against the State itself, inasmuch as every offense leveled against religion is also a sin against the State. Here anew it becomes evident how unjust is the reproach of sedition; for the obedience due to rulers and legislators is not refused, but there is a deviation from their will in those precepts only which they have no power to enjoin. Commands that are issued adversely to the honor due to God, and hence are beyond the scope of justice, must be looked upon as anything rather than laws. You are fully aware, venerable brothers, that this is the very contention of the Apostle St. Paul, who, in writing to Titus, after reminding Christians that they are "to be subject to princes and powers, and to obey at a word," at once adds: "And to be ready to every good work." Thereby he openly declares that, if laws of men contain injunctions contrary to the eternal law of God, it is right not to obey them. In like manner, the Prince of the Apostles gave this courageous and sublime answer to those who would have deprived him of the liberty of preaching the Gospel: "If it be just in the sight of God to hear you rather than God, judge ye, for we cannot but speak the things which we have seen and heard."

Wherefore, to love both countries, that of earth below and that of heaven above, yet in such mode that the love of our heavenly surpass the love of our earthly home, and that human laws be never set above the divine law, is the essential duty of Christians, and the fountainhead, so to say, from which all other duties spring. The Redeemer of mankind of Himself has said: "For this was I born, and for this came I into the world, that I should give testimony to the truth." In like manner: "I am come to cast fire upon earth, and what will I but that it be kindled?'' In the knowledge of this truth, which constitutes the highest perfection of the mind; in divine charity which, in like manner, completes the will, all Christian life and liberty abide. This noble patrimony of truth and charity entrusted by Jesus Christ to the Church she defends and maintains ever with untiring endeavor and watchfulness.

But with what bitterness and in how many guises war has been waged against the Church it would be ill-timed now to urge. From the fact that it has been vouchsafed to human reason to snatch from nature, through the investigations of science, many of her treasured secrets and to apply them befittingly to the divers requirements of life, men have become possessed with so arrogant a sense of their own powers as already to consider themselves able to banish from social life the authority and empire of God. Led away by this delusion, they make over to human nature the dominion of which they think God has been despoiled; from nature, they maintain, we must seek the principle and rule of all truth; from nature, they aver, alone spring, and to it should be referred, all the duties that religious feeling prompts. Hence, they deny all revelation from on high, and all fealty due to the Christian teaching of morals as well as all obedience to the Church, and they go so far as to deny her power of making laws and exercising every other kind of right, even disallowing the Church any place among the civil institutions of the commonweal. These men aspire unjustly, and with their might strive, to gain control over public affairs and lay hands on the rudder of the State, in order that the legislation may the more easily be adapted to these principles, and the morals of the people influenced in accordance with them. Whence it comes to pass that in many countries Catholicism is either openly assailed or else secretly interfered with, full impunity being granted to the most pernicious doctrines, while the public profession of Christian truth is shackled oftentimes with manifold constraints.

Under such evil circumstances therefore, each one is bound in conscience to watch over himself, taking all means possible to preserve the faith inviolate in the depths of his soul, avoiding all risks, and arming himself on all occasions, especially against the various specious sophisms rife among non-believers. In order to safeguard this virtue of faith in its integrity, We declare it to be very profitable and consistent with the requirements of the time, that each one, according to the measure of his capacity and intelligence, should make a deep study of Christian doctrine, and imbue his mind with as perfect a knowledge as may be of those matters that are interwoven with religion and lie within the range of reason. And as it is necessary that faith should not only abide untarnished in the soul, but should grow with ever painstaking increase, the suppliant and humble entreaty of the apostles ought constantly to be addressed to God: "Increase our faith.''

But in this same matter, touching Christian faith, there are other duties whose exact and religious observance, necessary at all times in the interests of eternal salvation, become more especially so in these our days. Amid such reckless and widespread folly of opinion, it is, as We have said, the office of the Church to undertake the defense of truth and uproot errors from the mind, and this charge has to be at all times sacredly observed by her, seeing that the honor of God and the salvation of men are confided to her keeping. But, when necessity compels, not those only who are invested with power of rule are bound to safeguard the integrity of faith, but, as St. Thomas maintains: "Each one is under obligation to show forth his faith, either to instruct and encourage others of the faithful, or to repel the attacks of unbelievers.'' To recoil before an enemy, or to keep silence when from all sides such clamors are raised against truth, is the part of a man either devoid of character or who entertains doubt as to the truth of what he professes to believe. In both cases such mode of behaving is base and is insulting to God, and both are incompatible with the salvation of mankind. This kind of conduct is profitable only to the enemies of the faith, for nothing emboldens the wicked so greatly as the lack of courage on the part of the good. Moreover, want of vigor on the part of Christians is so much the more blameworthy, as not seldom little would be needed on their part to bring to naught false charges and refute erroneous opinions, and by always exerting themselves more strenuously they might reckon upon being successful. After all, no one can be prevented from putting forth that strength of soul which is the characteristic of true Christians, and very frequently by such display of courage our enemies lose heart and their designs are thwarted. Christians are, moreover, born for combat, whereof the greater the vehemence, the more assured, God aiding, the triumph: "Have confidence; I have overcome the world." Nor is there any ground for alleging that Jesus Christ, the Guardian and Champion of the Church, needs not in any manner the help of men. Power certainly is not wanting to Him, but in His loving kindness He would assign to us a share in obtaining and applying the fruits of salvation procured through His grace.

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. So soon as Catholic truth is apprehended by a simple and unprejudiced soul, reason yields assent.

 

Then again, how can those who have cast themselves out of the Catholic Church cast stones at others who have done so? Quite a paradox, if one is willing to think about the depth of the issues we face.

McCarrick's and Dulles's and Ratzinger's unwillingness to "offend" civil authorities whose "blandishments" are "needed" for the "service of the poor" is really nothing new, however.

It was, after all, the American bishops, who sought the silencing of Father Charles Coughlin in the 1930s after his unremitting criticism of their beloved Franklin Delano Roosevelt's New Deal, one of those multifaceted "services" for the poor, and his happening to mention that it was members of Talmudic Jewish sects who were responsible for warring against the Catholic Church and thus against the interests of even natural justice in civil society.

It was, after all, Francis Cardinal Spellman, the Archbishop of New York from 1939 to 1967, who always chose to do the bidding of the thirty-third degree Mason Franklin Roosevelt and to defend the "principles" of the American concept of separation of Church and State. Consider, once again, this excerpt from Mrs. Randy Engel's The Rite of Sodomy (the website for the book has an interesting article, linked on its sidebar, The Sirico Brief, about a conciliar priest, much wedded to the ways of Americanism and Calvinist capitalism, who has the approval of the highest of conciliar officials) about Spellman's betrayals of the Catholic Faith:

Yet during the Second World War, when President Roosevelt issued an order that required post exchanges to stock condoms and required quarter-masters (including Catholic officers) to distribute prophylactics, Spellman was again silent. further the Roosevelt Administration consistently failed to prosecute violations of the Comstock Law that prohibited the interstate traffic and foreign importation of articles of "immoral use" to prevent conception.


With the exception of one or two well-publicized attacks on Planned Parenthood clinics in New York City, Spellman tended to ignore the increased encroachment of government sponsored Malthusian programs at home and abroad. He viewed the issue of population control through a political rather than a moral lens. This was in sharp contrast to his predecessor Cardinal Hayes who had fought the Anti-Life Establishment tooth and nail and won.


That Cardinal Spellman was more than willing and able to compromise Catholic moral teaching when it suited him politically was amply demonstrated by the Puerto Rican birth control debacle of 1960.


In the mid-1930s, Cardinal Hayes effectively squashed all attempts by the Roosevelt Administration to impose a Malthusian program of population limitation on Puerto Rico. Hayes, a master of "punishment politics," told FDR either to withdraw the birth control initiative his administration had started on the island or face the loss of Catholic vote in the upcoming election. Roosevelt took Hayes' warning to heart and ordered that the Comstock Law be enforced in the [Territory] of Puerto Rico [which became a Commonwealth after World War II]. On September 15, 1936, the "Grand Experiment" was put on hold.


After Hayes' death in 1938, the American hierarchy, including the Powerhouse in New York, began to take a more lenient position toward federal and private population control initiatives on the island, especially under the Eisenhower Administration from 1953 to 1961.


With the repeal of the Comstock Law, and the massive influx of millions of U.S. dollars from the American-based Gamble, Rockefeller, McCormick and Ford Foundations, together with the dollar-hungry pharmaceutical industry, the Church in Puerto Rico braced itself for a major anti-life assault. The Puerto Rican bishops also had to contend with the loss of the traditional legal and political support they had come to expect form the American hierarchy.


In 1960, the Puerto Rico hierarchy decided to make one last concerted effort to drive the Sangerite forces from the island. The Catholic resistance was lead by two American Bishops--James F. Davis of San Juan and James E. McManus of Ponce. The Catholic Church in Puerto Rico helped to organize a national political party--the Christian Action Party (CAP). The new political front was composed primarily of Catholic laymen and its platform included opposition to existing permissive legislation on birth control and sterilization.


When increasing numbers of CAP flags began to fly from the rooftops of Puerto Rico's Catholic homes, the leaders of the opposition parties, who favored turning Puerto Rico into an international Sangerite playground for massive U.S.-based contraceptive/abortifacient/sterilization experimental programs, became increasingly concerned for their own political futures. Then unexpected help arrived in the unlikely person of His Eminence Francis Cardinal Spellman of New York.


One month before the hotly contested national election, Spellman arrived in Puerto Rico ostensibly to preside over two formal Church functions. While on the island, Spellman agreed to meet with CAP's major political rival, Governor Luis Munoz Marin, leader of the Popular Democratic Party (PDP) and a supporter of federal population control programs for Puerto Rico.


In an interview that followed his meeting with Munoz, Spellman, known for years as FDR's errand boy with a miter, claimed that politics were outside his purview. The cardinal's statement was interpreted by the press as an indictment of the partisan politics of Bishops Davis and McManus. To underscore his message, as soon as Spellman returned to the States he made a public statement in opposition to the latest directives of the Puerto Rico bishops prohibiting Catholics from voting for Munoz and his anti-life PDP cohorts. Catholic voters in Puerto Rico should vote their conscience without the threat of Church penalties, Spellman said.


Boston's Cardinal Cushing, John F. Kennedy's "political godfather," joined Spellman in expressed "feigned horror" at the thought of ecclesiastical authority attempting to dictate political voting. "This has never been a part of our history, and I pray God that it will never be!" said Cushing. Cushing's main concern was not the Puerto Rican people. His main worry was that the flack caused by the Puerto Rican birth control affair might overflow into the upcoming presidential campaign and hurt John Kennedy's bid for the White House.


The national election turned out to be a political disaster for CAP. Munoz and the PDP won by a landslide. Bishop Davis was forced to end the tragic state of confusion among the Catholic laity by declaring just before the election that no penalties would be imposed on those who voted for PDP.


Two years later, with the knowledge and approval of the American hierarchy and the Holy See, the Puerto Rican hierarchy was pressured into singing a secret concordat of "non-interference" in government-sponsored birth control programs--a sop being that the programs would now include instruction in the "rhythm method." While insisting on their right to hold and express legitimate opposition to such programs, the Puerto Rican bishops promised they would "never impose their own moral doctrines upon individuals who do not accept the Catholic teaching."


When the Sangerite storm hit the mainland in the late 1960s, AmChurch would echo this same theme song, opening the floodgates to a multi-billion dollar federal-life-prevention (and destruction) program. (pp. 647-649)

 

Oh, by the way, it might be relevant to point out that Francis Cardinal Spellman ordained one Theodore McCarrick to the priesthood at Saint Patrick's Cathedral in the City of New York on May 31, 1958. Just continuing "Spelly"s legacy, it appears.

 

And although this list could go and on and on ad infinitum, it was, after all, the longtime Americanist archbishop of Boston, Richard Cardinal Cushing, a man who enabled the Kennedys at every turn and who boasted shortly before he died that he had made a convert in his life, who said that it was not his "job" oppose a bill in the Massachusetts General Court (the name of the commonwealth's state legislature) in 1965, sponsored by one State Senator Michael S. Dukakis, that sought to decriminalize the sale and use of contraceptives:

"Early in the summer of 1965, the Massachusetts legislature took up a proposal to repeal the state's Birth Control law, which barred the use of contraceptives. . . . In a state where Catholics constituted a voting majority, and dominated the legislature, the prospects for repeal appeared remote. Then on June 22, Cardinal Cushing appeared on a local radio program, 'An Afternoon with Haywood Vincent,' and effectively scuttled the opposition. Cardinal Cushing announced: 'My position in this matter is that birth control in accordance with artificial means is immoral, and not permissible. But this is Catholic teaching. I am also convinced that I should not impose my position upon those of other faiths'. Warming to the subject, the cardinal told his radio audience that 'I could not in conscience approve the legislation' that had been proposed. However, he quickly added, 'I will make no effort to impose my opinion upon others.' So there it was: the 'personally opposed' argument, in fully developed form, enunciated by a Prince of the Church nearly 40 years ago! Notice how the unvarying teaching of the Catholic Church, which condemned artificial contraception as an offense against natural law, is reduced here to a matter of the cardinal's personal belief. And notice how he makes no effort to persuade legislators with the force of his arguments; any such effort is condemned in advance as a bid to 'impose' his opinion. Cardinal Cushing conceded that in the past, Catholic leaders had opposed any effort to alter the Birth Control law. 'But my thinking has changed on that matter,' he reported, 'for the simple reason that I do not see where I have an obligation to impose my religious beliefs on people who just do not accept the same faith as I do'. . . . Before the end of his fateful radio broadcast, Cardinal Cushing gave his advice to the Catholic members of the Massachusetts legislature: 'If your constituents want this legislation, vote for it. You represent them. You don't represent the Catholic Church.' Dozens of Catholic legislators did vote for the bill, and the Birth Control law was abolished. Perhaps more important in the long run, the 'personally opposed' politician had his rationale." (Diogenes, Catholic World Report, 2004, quoted in my own A Champion of the Americanist Spirit.)

 

The Americanist and conciliarist view of the world is one of cowardice and apostasy. It has deceived millions, if not billions, leaving countless souls to spend their entire lives on earth aimlessly without ever knowing the purpose of human existence and how to endure suffering as a consecrated slave of Our Lady's Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart. Entire nations have been left to wander in the wilderness of naturalism, blowing this way and that way as the false opposites known as the "left and the right" convince citizens that they alone possess the keys to national prosperity and international peace. This utter madness is from no other place than hell. There is no other path to personal happiness and/or social order than Catholicism, something that Pope Pius XI pointed out in Divini Illius Magistri, December 23, 1922:

This peace of Christ, however, surpasses all human understanding -- "the peace of God which surpasseth all understanding" (Philippians iv, 7), and for this very reason dominates our sinful passions and renders such evils as division, strife, and discord, which result solely from the unrestrained desire for earthly possessions, impossible. If the desire for worldly possessions were kept within bounds and the place of honor in our affections given to the things of the spirit, which place undoubtedly they deserve, the peace of Christ would follow immediately, to which would be joined in a natural and happy union, as it were, a higher regard for the value and dignity of human life. Human personality, too, would be raised to a higher level, for man has been ennobled by the Blood of Christ and made kin to God Himself by means of holiness and the bond of brotherly love which unites us closely with Christ, by prayer and by the reception of the Sacraments, means infallibly certain to produce this elevation to and participation in the life of God, by the desire to attain everlasting possession of the glory and happiness of heaven which is held out to all by God as our goal and final reward.

We have already seen and come to the conclusion that the principal cause of the confusion, restlessness, and dangers which are so prominent a characteristic of false peace is the weakening of the binding force of law and lack of respect for authority, effects which logically follow upon denial of the truth that authority comes from God, the Creator and Universal Law-giver.

The only remedy for such state of affairs is the peace of Christ since the peace of Christ is the peace of God, which could not exist if it did not enjoin respect for law, order, and the rights of authority. In the Holy Scriptures We read: "My children, keep discipline in peace." (Ecclesiasticus xli, 17) "Much peace have they that love the law, O Lord." (Psalms cxviii, 165) "He that feareth the commandment, shall dwell in peace." (Proverbs xiii, 13) Jesus Christ very expressly states: "Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's." (Matt. xxii, 21) He even recognized that Pilate possessed authority from on High (John xiv, 11) as he acknowledged that the scribes and Pharisees who though unworthy sat in the chair of Moses (Matt. xxiii, 2) were not without a like authority. In Joseph and Mary, Jesus respected the natural authority of parents and was subject to them for the greater part of His life. (Luke ii, 51) He also taught, by the voice of His Apostle, the same important doctrine: "Let every soul be subject to higher powers: for there is no power but from God." (Romans xiii, 1; cf. also 1 Peter ii, 13, 18)

If we stop to reflect for a moment that these ideals and doctrines of Jesus Christ, for example, his teachings on the necessity and value of the spiritual life, on the dignity and sanctity of human life, on the duty of obedience, on the divine basis of human government, on the sacramental character of matrimony and by consequence the sanctity of family life -- if we stop to reflect, let Us repeat, that these ideals and doctrines of Christ (which are in fact but a portion of the treasury of truth which He left to mankind) were confided by Him to His Church and to her alone for safekeeping, and that He has promised that His aid will never fail her at any time for she is the infallible teacher of His doctrines in every century and before all nations, there is no one who cannot clearly see what a singularly important role the Catholic Church is able to play, and is even called upon to assume, in providing a remedy for the ills which afflict the world today and in leading mankind toward a universal peace.

Because the Church is by divine institution the sole depository and interpreter of the ideals and teachings of Christ, she alone possesses in any complete and true sense the power effectively to combat that materialistic philosophy which has already done and, still threatens, such tremendous harm to the home and to the state. The Church alone can introduce into society and maintain therein the prestige of a true, sound spiritualism, the spiritualism of Christianity which both from the point of view of truth and of its practical value is quite superior to any exclusively philosophical theory. The Church is the teacher and an example of world good-will, for she is able to inculcate and develop in mankind the "true spirit of brotherly love" (St. Augustine, De Moribus Ecclesiae Catholicae, i, 30) and by raising the public estimation of the value and dignity of the individual's soul help thereby to lift us even unto God.

Finally, the Church is able to set both public and private life on the road to righteousness by demanding that everything and all men become obedient to God "Who beholdeth the heart," to His commands, to His laws, to His sanctions. If the teachings of the Church could only penetrate in some such manner as We have described the inner recesses of the consciences of mankind, be they rulers or be they subjects, all eventually would be so apprised of their personal and civic duties and their mutual responsibilities that in a short time "Christ would be all, and in all." (Colossians iii, 11)

Since the Church is the safe and sure guide to conscience, for to her safe-keeping alone there has been confided the doctrines and the promise of the assistance of Christ, she is able not only to bring about at the present hour a peace that is truly the peace of Christ, but can, better than any other agency which We know of, contribute greatly to the securing of the same peace for the future, to the making impossible of war in the future. For the Church teaches (she alone has been given by God the mandate and the right to teach with authority) that not only our acts as individuals but also as groups and as nations must conform to the eternal law of God. In fact, it is much more important that the acts of a nation follow God's law, since on the nation rests a much greater responsibility for the consequences of its acts than on the individual.

45. When, therefore, governments and nations follow in all their activities, whether they be national or international, the dictates of conscience grounded in the teachings, precepts, and example of Jesus Christ, and which are binding on each and every individual, then only can we have faith in one another's word and trust in the peaceful solution of the difficulties and controversies which may grow out of differences in point of view or from clash of interests. An attempt in this direction has already and is now being made; its results, however, are almost negligible and, especially so, as far as they can be said to affect those major questions which divide seriously and serve to arouse nations one against the other. No merely human institution of today can be as successful in devising a set of international laws which will be in harmony with world conditions as the Middle Ages were in the possession of that true League of Nations, Christianity. It cannot be denied that in the Middle Ages this law was often violated; still it always existed as an ideal, according to which one might judge the acts of nations, and a beacon light calling those who had lost their way back to the safe road.

There exists an institution able to safeguard the sanctity of the law of nations. This institution is a part of every nation; at the same time it is above all nations. She enjoys, too, the highest authority, the fullness of the teaching power of the Apostles. Such an institution is the Church of Christ. She alone is adapted to do this great work, for she is not only divinely commissioned to lead mankind, but moreover, because of her very make-up and the constitution which she possesses, by reason of her age-old traditions and her great prestige, which has not been lessened but has been greatly increased since the close of the War, cannot but succeed in such a venture where others assuredly will fail.

It is apparent from these considerations that true peace, the peace of Christ, is impossible unless we are willing and ready to accept the fundamental principles of Christianity, unless we are willing to observe the teachings and obey the law of Christ, both in public and private life. If this were done, then society being placed at last on a sound foundation, the Church would be able, in the exercise of its divinely given ministry and by means of the teaching authority which results therefrom, to protect all the rights of God over men and nations.

It is possible to sum up all We have said in one word, "the Kingdom of Christ." For Jesus Christ reigns over the minds of individuals by His teachings, in their hearts by His love, in each one's life by the living according to His law and the imitating of His example. Jesus reigns over the family when it, modeled after the holy ideals of the sacrament of matrimony instituted by Christ, maintains unspotted its true character of sanctuary. In such a sanctuary of love, parental authority is fashioned after the authority of God, the Father, from Whom, as a matter of fact, it originates and after which even it is named. (Ephesians iii, 15) The obedience of the children imitates that of the Divine Child of Nazareth, and the whole family life is inspired by the sacred ideals of the Holy Family. Finally, Jesus Christ reigns over society when men recognize and reverence the sovereignty of Christ, when they accept the divine origin and control over all social forces, a recognition which is the basis of the right to command for those in authority and of the duty to obey for those who are subjects, a duty which cannot but ennoble all who live up to its demands. Christ reigns where the position in society which He Himself has assigned to His Church is recognized, for He bestowed on the Church the status and the constitution of a society which, by reason of the perfect ends which it is called upon to attain, must be held to be supreme in its own sphere; He also made her the depository and interpreter of His divine teachings, and, by consequence, the teacher and guide of every other society whatsoever, not of course in the sense that she should abstract in the least from their authority, each in its own sphere supreme, but that she should really perfect their authority, just as divine grace perfects human nature, and should give to them the assistance necessary for men to attain their true final end, eternal happiness, and by that very fact make them the more deserving and certain promoters of their happiness here below.

It is, therefore, a fact which cannot be questioned that the true peace of Christ can only exist in the Kingdom of Christ -- "the peace of Christ in the Kingdom of Christ." It is no less unquestionable that, in doing all we can to bring about the re-establishment of Christ's kingdom, we will be working most effectively toward a lasting world peace.

 

Americanists believe that the American brand of "civil liberty" and "religious liberty" can "improve" the world, which has not even worked in this country no less in others, such as Iraq, where our leaders have attempted to engage in American social engineering. Conciliarists believe in the same thing, adding a little twist here and there of syncretism in behalf of "world peace," although they protest strongly and loudly and repeatedly that this is not the case at all, as they continue to proselytize in behalf of a "greener" world where religious divisions will not get in the way of "human dignity" and "respect" for a "diversity of cultures" and "beliefs." No matter the cloud of rhetoric that is used to couch these novelties and syncretisms in language that can be used by those unwilling to call apostasy by its proper name to defend the legitimacy of the spiritual robber barons who deceive so many souls as they work, whether wittingly or unwittingly, for the devil's reign over men and their nations, these words of Pope Saint Pius X, contained in Notre Charge Apostolique, apply to the machinations of both Americanists and conciliarists:

We fear that worse is to come: the end result of this developing promiscuousness, the beneficiary of this cosmopolitan social action, can only be a Democracy which will be neither Catholic, nor Protestant, nor Jewish. It will be a religion (for Sillonism, so the leaders have said, is a religion) more universal than the Catholic Church, uniting all men become brothers and comrades at last in the "Kingdom of God". - "We do not work for the Church, we work for mankind."

And now, overwhelmed with the deepest sadness, We ask Ourselves, Venerable Brethren, what has become of the Catholicism of the Sillon? Alas! this organization which formerly afforded such promising expectations, this limpid and impetuous stream, has been harnessed in its course by the modern enemies of the Church, and is now no more than a miserable affluent of the great movement of apostasy being organized in every country for the establishment of a One-World Church which shall have neither dogmas, nor hierarchy, neither discipline for the mind, nor curb for the passions, and which, under the pretext of freedom and human dignity, would bring back to the world (if such a Church could overcome) the reign of legalized cunning and force, and the oppression of the weak, and of all those who toil and suffer.

 

The words of Saint Athanasius's letter to his flock should give us confidence as we cleave to the chapels in the Catholic catacombs that are served by true bishops and true bishops who make no concessions to conciliarism or to the legitimacy of the conciliar officials or priests:

"May God console you! ... What saddens you ... is the fact that others have occupied the churches by violence, while during this time you are on the outside. It is a fact that they have the premises – but you have the Apostolic Faith. They can occupy our churches, but they are outside the true Faith. You remain outside the places of worship, but the Faith dwells within you. Let us consider: what is more important, the place or the Faith? The true Faith, obviously. Who has lost and who has won in the struggle – the one who keeps the premises or the one who keeps the Faith? True, the premises are good when the Apostolic Faith is preached there; they are holy if everything takes place there in a holy way ...

"You are the ones who are happy; you who remain within the Church by your Faith, who hold firmly to the foundations of the Faith which has come down to you from Apostolic Tradition. And if an execrable jealousy has tried to shake it on a number of occasions, it has not succeeded. They are the ones who have broken away from it in the present crisis. No one, ever, will prevail against your Faith, beloved Brothers. And we believe that God will give us our churches back some day.

"Thus, the more violently they try to occupy the places of worship, the more they separate themselves from the Church. They claim that they represent the Church; but in reality, they are the ones who are expelling themselves from it and going astray. Even if Catholics faithful to Tradition are reduced to a handful, they are the ones who are the true Church of Jesus Christ."

 

Saint Athanasius quoted Saint Antony of the Desert in the biography that he, Saint Athanasius, wrote of the great Egyptian desert monk:

"Do not lose heart, children, for as the Lord has been angry, so later will He bring healing. And the Church shall quickly regain her own beauty and shine as before. And you shall see the persecuted restored and impiety retiring to its own hiding places and the True Faith in all places speaking openly with all freedom. Only, defile not yourselves with the Arians.For this teaching is not of the Apostles, but of the demons and their father the devil, and indeed from no source, from no sense, from a mind not right it comes, like the senselessness of mules." (Saint Athanasius quoting Saint Antony of the Desert, reprinted by TAN Books and Publishers, p. 95.)

 

We should take heart with these words from two great Fathers of the Church, one of whom, Saint Athanasius, we commemorate today, May 2. And we should never fail in the confidence we trust in the Blessed Virgin Mary, especially in this month of May which is devoted to her. To her Immaculate Heart has been entrusted the Triumph that will bring about the restoration of the Catholic City and thus usher in the Reign of Mary. May we never tire of praying as many Rosaries as our states-in-life permit. She will use everything will give her as the consecrated slaves of her Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart. Let us give her Rosary after Rosary after Rosary so that more and more people will see that a true pope, Pope Saint Pius X, was entirely correct in Notre Charge Apostolique when he implored us to build up the only city that pleases God, that is, the Catholic City, something that is rejected by Theodore McCarrick and Joseph Ratzinger and Avery Dulles:

No, Venerable Brethren, We must repeat with the utmost energy in these times of social and intellectual anarchy when everyone takes it upon himself to teach as a teacher and lawmaker - the City cannot be built otherwise than as God has built it; society cannot be setup unless the Church lays the foundations and supervises the work; no, civilization is not something yet to be found, nor is the New City to be built on hazy notions; it has been in existence and still is: it is Christian civilization, it is the Catholic City. It has only to be set up and restored continually against the unremitting attacks of insane dreamers, rebels and miscreants. omnia instaurare in Christo.

 

Vivat Christus Rex!

Viva Cristo Rey!

 

Our Lady of Fatima, pray for us.,

 

Saint Joseph, pray for us.

Saints Peter and Paul, pray for us.

Saint John the Baptist, pray for us.

Saint Michael the Archangel, pray for us.

Saint Gabriel the Archangel, pray for us.

Saint Raphael the Archangel, pray for us.

Saint Mark the Evangelist, pray for us.

Saint Athanasius, pray for us.

Saints Philip and James, pray for us.

Saint Helena, pray for us.

Saint Fidelis of Sigmaringen, pray for us.

Saint Peter Canisius, pray for us.

Saint Jude, pray for us.

Saint John the Beloved, pray for us.

Saint Francis Solano, pray for us.

Saint John Bosco, pray for us.

Saint Dominic Savio, pray for us.

Pope Saint Anicetus, pray for us.

Saint Benedict Joseph Labre, pray for us.

Saint Justin the Martyr, pray for us.

Saint  Scholastica, pray for us.

Saint Benedict, pray for us.

Saint Anthony of Padua, pray for us.

Saint Antony of the Desert, pray for us.

Saint Francis of Assisi, pray for us.

Saint Thomas Aquinas, pray for us.

Saint Bonaventure, pray for us.

Saint Augustine, pray for us.

Saint Bernard of Clairvaux, pray for us.

Saint Francis Xavier, pray for us.

Saint Peter Damian, pray for us.

Saint Frances Xavier Cabrini, pray for us.

Saint Lucy, pray for us.

Saint Monica, pray for us.

Saint Agatha, pray for us.

Saint Philomena, pray for us.

Saint Cecilia, pray for us.

Saint John Mary Vianney, pray for us.

Saint Vincent de Paul, pray for us.

Saint Vincent Ferrer, pray for us.

Saint Athanasius, pray for us.

Saint Margaret Mary Alacoque, pray for us.

Saint Isaac Jogues, pray for us.

Saint Rene Goupil, pray for us.

Saint John Lalonde, pray for us.

Saint Gabriel Lalemont, pray for us.

Saint Noel Chabanel, pray for us.

Saint Charles Garnier, pray for us.

Saint Anthony Daniel, pray for us.

Saint John DeBrebeuf, pray for us.

Saint Alphonsus de Liguori, pray for us.

Saint Dominic, pray for us.

Saint Hyacinth, pray for us.

Saint Basil, pray for us.

Saint Vincent Ferrer, pray for us.

Saint Sebastian, pray for us.

Saint Tarcisius, pray for us.

Saint Bridget of Sweden, pray for us.

Saint Gerard Majella, pray for us.

Saint John of the Cross, pray for us.

Saint Teresa of Avila, pray for us.

Saint Bernadette Soubirous, pray for us.

Saint Genevieve, pray for us.

Saint Vincent de Paul, pray for us.

Pope Saint Pius X, pray for us

Pope Saint Pius V, pray for us.

Saint Rita of Cascia, pray for us.

Saint Louis de Montfort, pray for us.

Venerable Anne Catherine Emmerich, pray for us.

Venerable Pauline Jaricot, pray for us.

Father Miguel Augustin Pro, pray for us.

Francisco Marto, pray for us.

Jacinta Marto, pray for us.

Juan Diego, pray for us.

 

The Longer Version of the Saint Michael the Archangel Prayer, composed by Pope Leo XIII, 1888

O glorious Archangel Saint Michael, Prince of the heavenly host, be our defense in the terrible warfare which we carry on against principalities and powers, against the rulers of this world of darkness, spirits of evil.  Come to the aid of man, whom God created immortal, made in His own image and likeness, and redeemed at a great price from the tyranny of the devil.  Fight this day the battle of our Lord, together with  the holy angels, as already thou hast fought the leader of the proud angels, Lucifer, and his apostate host, who were powerless to resist thee, nor was there place for them any longer in heaven.  That cruel, that ancient serpent, who is called the devil or Satan who seduces the whole world, was cast into the abyss with his angels.  Behold this primeval enemy and slayer of men has taken courage.  Transformed into an angel of light, he wanders about with all the multitude of wicked spirits, invading the earth in order to blot out the Name of God and of His Christ, to seize upon, slay, and cast into eternal perdition, souls destined for the crown of eternal glory.  That wicked dragon pours out. as a most impure flood, the venom of his malice on men of depraved mind and corrupt heart, the spirit of lying, of impiety, of blasphemy, and the pestilent breath of impurity, and of every vice and iniquity.  These most crafty enemies have filled and inebriated with gall and bitterness the Church, the spouse of the Immaculate Lamb, and have laid impious hands on Her most sacred possessions. In the Holy Place itself, where has been set up the See of the most holy Peter and the Chair of Truth for the light of the world, they have raised the throne of their abominable impiety with the iniquitous design that when the Pastor has been struck the sheep may be scattered.  Arise then, O invincible Prince, bring help against the attacks of the lost spirits to the people of God, and give them the victory.  They venerate thee as their protector and patron; in thee holy Church glories as her defense against the malicious powers of hell; to thee has God entrusted the souls of men to be established in heavenly beatitude.  Oh, pray to the God of peace that He may put Satan under our feet, so far conquered that he may no longer be able to hold men in captivity and harm the Church.  Offer our prayers in the sight of the Most High, so that they may quickly conciliate the mercies of the Lord; and beating down the dragon, the ancient serpent, who is the devil and Satan, do thou again make him captive in the abyss, that he may no longer seduce the nations.  Amen.

Verse: Behold the Cross of the Lord; be scattered ye hostile powers.

Response: The Lion of the Tribe of Juda has conquered the root of David.

Verse: Let Thy mercies be upon us, O Lord.

Response: As we have hoped in Thee.

Verse: O Lord hear my prayer.

Response: And let my cry come unto Thee.

Verse: Let us pray.  O God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, we call upon Thy holy Name, and as suppliants, we implore Thy clemency, that by the intercession of Mary, ever Virgin, immaculate and our Mother, and of the glorious Archangel Saint Michael, Thou wouldst deign to help us against Satan and all other unclean spirits, who wander about the world for the injury of the human race and the ruin of our souls. 

Response:  Amen.  

 





© Copyright 2007, Thomas A. Droleskey. All rights reserved.