Thursday, March 28, AD 2024 3:03am

Weakness and The Truth

“Put you on the armour of God, that you may be able to stand against the deceits of the devil.  For our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; but against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places. Therefore, take unto you the armour of God, that you may be able to resist in the evil day and to stand in all things perfect”  Epistle of St. Paul to the Ephesian 6: 11-13

 

Mr. Voris is exactly right.  The American bishops are asking for a fight after having failed to feed, train and arm their military.  There is no way a single letter, as well intentioned and necessary as it is, read from the pulpit on a single Sunday, urging us to call our elected representatives, is going to save our freedoms and protect our right to practice the faith that Christ handed to us.  It will not help catechize the silly young woman mentioned in the Real Catholic video, nor will it educate the nation as to why the Church teaches abortion, artificial contraception and sterilization are evils.

I hate to say this but in many ways the bishops almost deserve to be ignored. Truth be told, they have lost an immense amount of respect among the devout laity (the non-devout obviously having no respect for them). This is not a loss of respect for the position,  but for the men and the way they hold it; weak and timidly.  The result is a wasteland of liberalism and heresy that is to be found in so many parishes across our nation.  Now, after having the President of the US attempt to force them into committing mortal sin, they want the help of those few who actually believe, practice and uphold the faith to come to the rescue.

Bishops, as Christ has told you, the world will never love you or what the Church teaches. There is no compromise with it (which is what has been going on for decades) because your compromise will never be enough. You will never be left alone. Those who claim to admire the Catholic “social teaching” will still call you bigots for defending marriage, and the faithful morons for actually having the audacity to believe the words of the Apostles and the Church Fathers about Christ’s resurrection.  Although a few  do, all the bishops,  and all Catholics, need to understand that WE ARE AT WAR.  I cannot say it more plainly than that.   But how can the soldier be expected to take up the sacrifice required when the leadership apologizes for defending their commander in chief against his enemies. (Unless, of course, you are Barack Obama and some perpetually angry Muslims are in a fit over some perceived insult)

I can right now call to mind several liberal/progressive/radical friends who would not bat an eye nor lift a finger if tomorrow Mr. Obama outlawed Catholicism, shut down all parishes, and muffled its priests, bishops and devoted lay people.   These are not hardcore Alinskyites. In fact, they have probably never read him (nor read most of the people whose ideas they spout) but your average everyday liberal progressive (mostly) Democrat who works at your local bank, sits next to you in your cubicle or teaches your kids They will howl for a woman’s right to kill her child but couldn’t care less if your Constitutional Rights are abridged because you are a problem.  The Church is the only impediment to their plans and the brave new world they wish to engineer. They will not stop until it is destroyed or reduced to the feeble and pathetic state in which we today find so many  once proud Protestant communities.

So wake up bishops! It’s time to build up the ramparts and start teaching solidly and uncompromisingly what the Church teaches. A good place to start, in my opinion, is with some public excommunications of scandalous “catholic” politicians s who love to embrace  “their faith tradition” to garner votes but then pass laws that run completely counter to what the faith teaches ….but maybe that’s a topic for another post.

0 0 votes
Article Rating
16 Comments
Oldest
Newest Most Voted
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments
Paul W. Primavera
Friday, March 2, AD 2012 9:54am

Very well said, Walter! Ezekiel 34:1-10 comes to mind.

Michael P
Michael P
Friday, March 2, AD 2012 10:28am

I am writing the following comment because at some point the responsibility to find the TRUTH is squarely on our shoulders and no one elses. Hopefully for her someone confronts her with love at CUA regarding these truths.

You know what?! I am a weak Catholic and at times more than I care to count or think about I am a c-o-w-a-r-d. That’s right I am a coward. Does it make it right for me to be one to retreat into my cowardice? Do I take up a political lobby and make people embrace my cowardice? No I have no recourse but to beg God and the Saints to pray for the grace for me to do better. I need to the courage to explain WITH LOVE the wrongness of homosexuality, contraception, abortion, et al to my wife. I need the courage to tell my kids that they need to go to mass and say prayers with Daddy. I need the courage to pray on my own and go to adoration because without that I cannot and will not survive this world and in some way lead them safely to the next. In some ways it would be easy to go to the other side. But how can I pervert truth to fit what I want to believe to make it easier for myself? I have already told God once I will be right back, once. Now I have people that are (whether they know it or not) depending on me to get them to heaven. I just need men (faithful priests/other men) and God & Heaven to get me there.

T. Shaw
T. Shaw
Friday, March 2, AD 2012 11:34am

Required: courage and humility.

I think of Veronica who had the courage to express her love for Our Lord in the midst of a hate-filled crowd. The Sixth Station of the Cross: “Veronica wipes the Face of Jesus.”

Pray for courage to step up and profess our loyalty to Christ.

I was thinking of hateful Pelosi’s garbage gab about how the bishops did not enforce Church Teachings and her rat-reasoning that they ought to continue the error.

One needs the humility to admit you were wrong.

I have experience in this. Infrequently, in my line, I need to correct a “loose interpretation” or “inconsistent application” (heh) of a principle(s) that our people had missed. The complaint is, “You didn’t ‘ding’ us for this last year.” My answer is, “To err is human. That doesn’t make the discrepancy less wrong or mean that we can allow it to persist.” And, from then on we do it right. It is embarrassing, but they get over it and you restore your authority.

Pinky
Pinky
Friday, March 2, AD 2012 11:55am

Michael – I hope that no one posts a comment that criticizes you for what you’ve just said.

The first thing you need to do is return to prayer. Get comfortable with it again. If you’ve been away from the Church, go to Confession. And don’t worry about having to bulldoze your wife and kids into the understanding and practice of the faith. As it becomes more a part of your life, you’ll find yourself communicating it more through your example (and the words will start to come natural enough too).

I don’t know if you really are a coward; it’s not cowardice that keeps me from throwing a 40-yard perfect spiral, it’s the fact that I’m out of shape. That makes it embarrasing to go out onto the practice field and work on my throwing.

I’ve known converts and reverts over the years. I’m more of a revert myself than I’d like to admit, due to a particularly lazy stretch in college. It takes determination to get back, but more often than not it just takes a start. Don’t psych yourself out. Just do it. And please be willing to hang around this site and keep us informed. There are plenty of sites that can give you the encouragement that you’re looking for.

Michael P
Michael P
Friday, March 2, AD 2012 12:18pm

Pinky — If someone does criticize me then I will take the good from it and move on. Prayer yes I am with you. I need prayer and when I miss a day or two day I can tell that I have missed it.

Bulldozing them with my faith…I don’t expose them to my faith, it seems to me, at all. I feel that I hide it from them for fear of the criticism…hence cowardice. I dont expect my wife to practice her faith and do pray for her and offer up all that I have for her to see more clearly (make sense?). As far as my kids they are 5 and 3. I have a duty as a father to take them to mass and pray with them but again the coward in me is a problem, and my wife is sometimes hostile to the faith.

I am a revert and ask for the grace of perseverance to keep going and even get more couragous especially these days of “apathy to religious freedom” which breathes down my neck just a little bit more every day.

I am determined but need other men/dads and God to give me the courage to ACT OUT/DO what is right and just. Thank you for your words of encouragement. I do like this site and have been checking it on a regular basis.

Paul W. Primavera
Friday, March 2, AD 2012 12:48pm

Michael P,

I think you are quite courageous. As for exposing your family to the faith, shine your light before men. Sometimes the only exposure you can give is your behavior. My ex-wife is an atheist and my children are in her custody. When I returned to the faith and began to pray the Rosary every night, she fell away from me till the point of divorce came. There was and is nothing I can say, and indeed to say anything to my ex-wife only arouses great ire. And since I do not have custodianship of my children, I have very limited influence outside of my daily phone calls (because of my job, we live 800 plus miles apart, so frequent visits are not possible). The only sermon we can sometimes give is how we live our lives, which I admit I often fail at. I do what I can, and I pray the Rosary for her and for my cihildren every day. Thank God for the Confessional where I can confess my faults! I can’t make this situation right, but I can do whatever little penance might help.

trackback
Friday, March 2, AD 2012 1:03pm

[…] US Bishops Asked for a Fight But Failed to Feed, Train & Arm Their Military – Walter Cole […]

Chris
Chris
Friday, March 2, AD 2012 1:05pm

This is not a loss of respect for the position, but for the men and the way they hold it; weak and timidly

You nailed it, thank you for putting into words how I was trying to reconcile this whole situation. Respecting the office while still being disappointed with how our leadership has dropped the ball.

I would also like to add all the “Catholic” governers recently approving gay marriage in various states. Very, very disappointing…… very, very sad……..

Tito Edwards
Admin
Friday, March 2, AD 2012 1:10pm

Michael Voris is filling the gaping hole that the bishops abandoned in the public square and the pulpit.

Period.

Kyle Miller
Kyle Miller
Friday, March 2, AD 2012 3:05pm

I think Voris is mostly right. The bishops and priests do have a responsibility to catechize, and they can speak with a voice of authority. But, the learned laity also have a responsibility to catechize our fellow Catholics. Sounds easy, but it can be very difficult for many Catholics are hard of heart. “What the Church teaches is my Sunday life. The rest of the week is mine.”

I teach 8th grade faith formation (CCD). I know I teach the evils of contraception during the morality and sexuality series. But, I can’t make them accept the words. You can fill their heads but their hearts aren’t there. They may get older and publish an article for CNN saying how wonderful contraception is. I sow the seed, but it might be falling on rocks.

So it is with the bishops and priests. They sow the seeds, but where are they falling? Reading assignment: Mark Chapter 4.

I do agree with him that we need to hear more of the “why” does the Church take the positions it does. Most homilies in my parish fall in the park of “Jesus loves us.”, “Live right for God.”, and “Love your neighbor.” So much more to discuss.

Pinky
Pinky
Friday, March 2, AD 2012 5:11pm

By “bulldozing”, I mean that the first time the subject comes up it can feel confrontational, but as time goes on it will be less so. At some point, it starts to feel weird to *not* talk about one’s faith. Any time a person in a marriage is going through a major change in emotion or mindset, it’s natural to be hesitant to talk about it with the spouse, but it’s important to do so.

While I clearly don’t know much about your situation, I can tell you that there are stories like Paul’s, but there are also stories of couples who’ve discovered or rediscovered their faith together. And plenty of stories where one spouse thinks the other one is weird, but learns to live with it. There are a lot worse sites a wife could find on her husband’s internet history than The American Catholic.

Donald R. McClarey
Admin
Friday, March 2, AD 2012 5:17pm

“I dont expect my wife to practice her faith and do pray for her and offer up all that I have for her to see more clearly (make sense?).’

Ask her to say one prayer with you each night before you turn in. Husband and wife joint prayer can work wonders.

DJ Hesselius
DJ Hesselius
Saturday, March 3, AD 2012 6:28am

I did not hear a letter at our parish about contraception, but we attend a Byz Rite and have been absent from it off and on for about a month due to colds, or Scouting activities at another Church, etc and what not. What finally prompted me to call my Senators was a plea from a homeschooling group (a national legal group), not the bishops. Alas, my senators voted as I expected. They are all for contraception for the little people as a freebie.

Nancy
Saturday, March 3, AD 2012 9:30am

there is hope: http://www.discerninghearts.com/?p=7128 Holy families inspire holy priests and holy priests inspire holy families.

trackback
Wednesday, March 7, AD 2012 10:24am

[…] as this article from The American Catholic reports, that is the position the American bishops find themselves in […]

WK Aiken
WK Aiken
Wednesday, March 7, AD 2012 12:59pm

Michael P-

With apologies to all lady participants here at TAC, understanding your wife’s mind is a challenge at best and sometimes downright impossible. Over 20 years of marriage, I have determined that I cannot understand “what” my wife thinks, or mostly even “how” she thinks.

That said, though, I can tell you this. Women of character and fortitude will respect a man who lives his faith. If you confidently and matter-of-factly say “Honey, I’m taking the kids to church. Would you like to go?” and accept her answer no matter what it is, she will see your constancy of intent in a relatively short time. Then, if you offer the traditional.,quick Catholic blessing before dinner, not expecting anybody else to participate, but just doing it like asking for the peas, this will also become less-than-weird very quickly.

It may take some quid-pro-quo, as in “And when I get back we can go to the park together.” It may take some initial mutual-benefit explanation: “And you can have the house to yourself for the next 90 minutes.”

But, simply doing it and not making anything more out of it than if you were going down to the corner store for a gallon of milk will communicate more than all the explanations and apologias in the world. As well, the heart of a wife and mother who sees her husband expressly doing good things for her children will soften considerably. Some of the women in my wife’s social circles say that seeing their husbands happily playing with, working with or taking the kids on errands actually gets them a little “romantic,” if you catch my drift.

Don’t worry about any of the rest. Once you have become a person who lives his faith, loves his kids (who, at 3 and 5 will go anyplace with Dad just because Dad says “Hey, kids! Let’s go!”) and respects his wife’s decisions will find in her a willing listener when you do eventually explain your viewpoints with love and kindness.

That is, the love and kindness that comes from doing all the previously-mentioned stuff first. Don’t worry – it may take weeks if not months, but it will happen. Trust in Jesus, pray for His words to enlighten, and for the wisdom and grace of The Holy Spirit to give you the courage to simply start. One step. The rest will follow in God’s time.

Discover more from The American Catholic

Subscribe now to keep reading and get access to the full archive.

Continue reading

Scroll to Top