http://www.theorthodoxromancatholic.com/index.htmlThe Orthodox Roman Catholicenjhdunphy@theorthodoxromancatholic.comCopyright 2007 J. H Dunphy2008-07-31T18:24:59-07:00 hourly 1 2000-01-01T12:00+00:00 Thu, 31 Jul 2008 18:59:35 -0700jhdunphy@theorthodoxromancatholic.comHOME2008-07-31T18:24:59-07:00http://www.theorthodoxromancatholic.com/index_files/9dd49d709a015819653f81003a34fb33-34.html#unique-entry-id-34http://www.theorthodoxromancatholic.com/index_files/9dd49d709a015819653f81003a34fb33-34.html#unique-entry-id-34I apologize I inadvertently let the hosting account expire. God bless you all for your patience and loyalty. ]]>jhdunphy@theorthodoxromancatholic.comFalse Charity2008-04-18T18:52:19-07:00http://www.theorthodoxromancatholic.com/index_files/2d36e15d06a920b0410f4ff5519c753f-33.html#unique-entry-id-33http://www.theorthodoxromancatholic.com/index_files/2d36e15d06a920b0410f4ff5519c753f-33.html#unique-entry-id-33"Pharisaical Priests of False Charity" and the "Novus Ordo Missae"

Nothing so incensed Our Divine Savior like the pharisaical brand of religion which was obsessed with external realities only and had nothing to do with the inward conversion of hearts to holiness. Over and over again, Our Lord had to rebuke the pharisees who wanted only the satanical bread of this world as opposed to the Bread of Eternal Life which Christ alone offered to mankind. By the same token, Satan offers only the false charity of the bread of this world to souls today; Christ Our Divine Savior has the everlasting spiritual Bread of eternal life, His Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity.

The necessary ingredient for souls to be led astray by satanical false charity is to be willing to make a sinister "exchange"-- like many Jews of Christ’s own day. What exchange? The exchange is the salvation of our souls. This is all that Satan ever craves if only we are willing to give up our souls--then we can have the enticing bread of this world when we make the easy exchange of false charity. To accomplish this exchange one must only imitate or cooperate with the pharisaical teachers of false charity who are the apostles of ‘lovism’ that have long ago abandoned the ‘truth’ of Christ’s Word for the prosperity modernist gospel of feel-good religion.

Like Judas, the pharisees’ lovism sought the exterior approval of the world so they looked good, felt good, and were praised by their synagogue followers in Jesus’ day. They were the popular teachers in Jesus’ day. They were the popular teachers of the faith: they did everything to be seen, and sat down front at synagogues with their flamboyant robes of widened phylacteries and long fringes– to gain attention– and they loved the places of honor at feasts. Most important of all to these teachers of false charity and lovism was the secular world of the market place, for they loved to be called ‘rabbi’.

"Holy Detachment"

A good test to see if one is personally following this false charity of pharisaical lovism and loving inordinately the things of this world is to examine how attached one is to the ‘bread’ of this world. A great prophet of Catholic truth who fought steadfastly and bravely with every bit of his energy against the notion of worldly priests and who gave many a retreat to priests and religious throughout his entire life was the Jesuit priest Father John A. Hardon. Father John Hardon taught ‘detachment’ as the number one virtue of sanctity for priests and religious. Moreover, Fr. John Hardon was the spiritual director of Mother Theresa of Calcutta’s Sisters of Charity. Father Hardon adamantly taught about the virtue of charity, true charity, over and over to these holy sisters of Mother Theresa’s religious order who have practiced this holiest of virtues in their religious order since its very inception.

How can one tell if one is too attached to the false loves of this world or not: simply ask yourself if you are thoroughly detached from the things of this world. And if one is too attached to the things of this world then he is full of false charity and exactly like the Rich Man in the New Testament who walked away from Christ when Our Lord asked him to give up everything he possessed and come follow Him if he wished to be perfect. When Father John Hardon was asked whether this Rich Young Man in the gospels was saved in his opinion, Father Hardon said he believed the Rich Young Man was lost because of his excessive attachments to the things of this world– his money and all his possessions, for he went away sad when Christ told him to give up everything.

Father Hardon once pointed out in one of his lessons on detachment that what causes Catholic bishops and priests to apostasize on their Catholic faith is excessive attachment to the things of this world: sexual gratification, pride of self worth, clerical envy for power in the Church and notoriety, and money. Furthermore, Fr. John Hardon, made it known that bishops in the United States are literally worth millions and millions of dollars. Why? Because they are the sole owners of whole dioceses, legally. And nobody else!

When Father John Hardon was asked what he meant by detachment, he taught the following truth which he repeated again and again in the multitude of books he wrote on Catholic theology: "By detachment I mean, you must be detached from everything in this world. And when I say from everything, I mean from everything, from everything, from everything."

Finally, Fr. Hardon taught that Our Lord wants us all to be rich, but only with the things that are spiritual, celestial, and eternal. And especially is this true of those in the clerical life of the priesthood and the religious life. Everything else is simply useless according to Fr. Hardon. St. Paul reiterates this very same truth rather strongly in Corinthians: "For Jesus Christ my Lord; I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but as rubbish." To Father Hardon all the things that one possesses have no value whatsoever unless they bring us safely to heaven.


From Our Lord’s own words about the Rich Young Man, He teaches that wealth and riches are eternally deleterious to our souls and our heavenly salvation if they are not used for our eternal happiness and reaching heaven. His prophetically powerful words bear this out: "How difficult it is for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven."


Our Lord emphasizes that we ought to build up treasures for the Kingdom of Heaven: "Fear not, little flock, for it hath pleased your Father to give you a kingdom. Sell what you possess and give alms. Make to yourselves bags which grow not old, but a treasure in heaven which faileth not: where no thief approacheth, nor moth corrupteth." In other words we need to be totally detached from all the pleasures and possessions and honors that the world holds dear if we truly wish to reach heaven. Then we can be internally detached.


What exactly was Our Divine Teacher calling the Rich Young Man to become if he were to leave all his money and possessions and come after Jesus and follow Him? Why he was begging him to become a priest, for isn’t that the life of the holy priest to become totally detached from the wealth and riches of this world? And Our Lord wanted this Rich Young Man to come and follow Him. To follow Christ totally and completely is to become saintly. And to become saintly oneself as well as one who helps others become saintly, is this not truly the vocation of a holy priest?

"Thirty Pieces of Silver"

How important is becoming holy to modern day Catholics or even to today’s priests? How interested are priests and people in the false charity of pharisaical ‘lovism’ which would much rather trade one’s soul for the bread of this world and the thirty pieces of silver of Judas Priest?

So many Americans today, and so many Catholic priests and bishops, seek the false bread of false charity offered by Satan to the world and not the heavenly bread which Our Lord offered mankind. Truly the social gospel dominates most of parish life today with expensive activity buildings being constructed to lure all the parishoners into expanding the church’s "bread of this world" by fund raisers, finance committees, and beauracries layered as high as the church steeple to plan and man all these financial enterprises. Much more time and effort is spent on renovating churches, building activity buildings, going on trips, participating in interfaith ecumenical prayer socials, building church image and community than on actual worship, devotions, and a serious saintly prayer life together that is cemented upon the solid pillars of Roman Catholic orthodoxy and catechetics. And who is the social engineer of all this socializing and making money and who sits like a mini-monarch before his cabinet of the parish council but the parish pastor.

How many priests today are not listening to this heavenly truth of detachment as Our Lord preached it so many centuries ago, but still as relevant today as ever? Very, very few according to Father John Hardon who said often about the numbers of those saved in his lectures--virtually all of the Fathers of the Church agreed that ‘most of those living in any age will be lost’ (which includes priests). These are, indeed, grim statistics about those who will lose their souls for the serious sin of false charity and all of its false loves of this world. And Father Hardon reiterated this truth by pleading in his conferences: "Pray for priests, pray for priests, so many have lost their faith!"


To be serious about one’s soul and one’s personal holiness, according to Father John Hardon, one must tenaciously follow Christ and become holy by following Him in poverty of spirit as well as living like Jesus--who was literally born into poverty. This is especially true of priests who must vigorously follow Our Lord in true poverty of spirit through the holy counsels of poverty, chastity, and obedience to reach heaven. This cannot be done, according to Father Hardon, unless the priest be detached "from everything, from everything that this world holds dear." A key test to judge priestly holiness or that of the people is Fr. Hardon’s following yardstick: "To the degree that one is detached from the things of this world, to that degree is one holy."

So the pharisees, or the Jewish priestly cast like Judas Priest, entertain the pretense of a loving affection publicly for Christ and His Truth, but they hide within their human hearts a diabolical attachment to the things of this world for the thirty pieces of silver, therefore, they live the diabolical exchange for the bread of this world as opposed to the bread of heaven as is evidenced by their lives of false charity. There is absolutely no difference between the judas priests of the Jewish priestly cast and those in today’s modern Catholic Church. All judas priests preach the popular gospel of false charity, the prosperity gospel of today’s modern Catholic Church since Vatican II: a religion whose priests too often crave the world’s eye and approval, lack humility, are ostentatious, are prideful and arrogant about the existence of sin–especially sexual sin, dissemble about doctrine constantly, and finally have desacralized the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass to a Protestant praise banquet for everyone attending, be it priest presider or people.

What, above all, proves the false charity of all pharisaical priests whether ancient or modern? Truly Jesus’ own words: "Practice and observe whatever they tell you but not what they do." (Matt. 23:3) Thus these reprobate priests of today are obvious for their hypocrisy and their unwillingness to repent and love God: and so, they do not practice what they preach or even preach what one would hope they should practice; for a prideful and not prayerful priest with no contrite heart is as easy to detect today as a pharisaical priest in Christ’s Own Day. Christ, the Divine Teacher, so often rebuked the pharisees for their false teachings on love throughout His entire Public Life; and, no doubt, would have done the same today if He were here present. These false teachers of pharisaical lovism are, therefore, the paradigm of Judas Priest. Our Lord’s Own Words condemn this lifestyle of preaching and not practicing, the essence of Judas Priest: "They bind heavy burdens, hard to bear, and lay them on men’s shoulders; but they themselves will not move them with their finger." (Matt. 23:4) Certainly Our Lord deemed priests of false charity as most meager in their striving for holiness, if at all.

"Fr. Malachi Martin and Judas Priests"

Father Malachi Martin, a well known Catholic author and faithful priest to the end of his life and good friend of Father John Hardon, S.J. said he was able to sit down in the back of a Church and observe any Catholic priest at Mass and tell inside of a few minutes whether or not he was a faithful priest on the road to holiness.

How did he have such a perspicacious eye for judas priests--those who pretend and appear to be one of Christ’s chosen disciples but in reality seek only to betray him? In short, Father Malachi Martin sensed a faithful priest or a priest striving to be holy by his gestures and general demeanor at the altar of God. And what did he especially look for? He could tell if a priest was holy by whether or not he genuflected at all during Mass and secondly, the general reverence and devotion in the way a priest says Mass tells the rest of the story. These were telling signs to Father Malachi Martin, a very holy and faithful orthodox Roman Catholic priest himself.

"Mary Magdalen’s Perfect Act of Reverence"

We have seen how Satan tempted Christ to make this exchange of heavenly bread for earthly bread in his temptations of Christ, but Our Lord would not. We have also noticed how this same curse of exchanging the Bread of Heaven for the bread of this world fell upon Judas too--one of Christ’s own beloved twelve, in a very dramatic example recorded by the evangelist John.

Just before the passion of Our Divine Savior began, Jesus had assembled at the home of Lazarus and Mary where He celebrated one of His last meals with these intimate friends and His beloved twelve. Here the false charity in Judas the Priest’s heart came dramatically forward when Mary Magdalen used precious nard to anoint Jesus’ feet and dried them with her own hair, a deed of the purest, selfless charity towards Christ, giving off a most precious pungent odor that literally emanated through the entire house (John 12:3). This was, indeed, a very, very expensive commodity in the ancient world which was the cause celebre that Judas presumed was an extravagance of worship on Mary’s part; for the precious nard could have been sold for a good profit and the money then given to the poor, so said Judas Iscariot. This was a rich act of worship, the highest form of charity a human heart could offer to her God, scrimping not the least on what one possesses for a perfect act of self-surrender of everything to her God. This was an absolute act of supreme humility at the feet of Our Lord Jesus Christ, so evident in her supplicating person at her Lord’s feet, using her beautiful hair– the crowning beauty of any woman’s pride–as a towel of personal reverence to wipe Jesus’ feet. Mary slighted nothing in her most profound ritual of worship of her Lord and her God, utilizing the finest things of this world and the finest she had as a person.


Yet Judas pridefully and vehemently protested in typical pharisaical fashion against this ritualistic extravagance of worship on Mary’s part: "Why was this ointment not sold for three hundred denarii and given to the poor?" (John 12:5) This was a consummate lie on Judas’ part, related the most beloved apostle John who often leaned upon Our Divine Lord’s breast, for Judas cared not for the poor but kept the money box and often stole from it, so clarified John also. What an antithesis of good and evil in this scriptural passage between the prideful arrogance of one who sinfully preaches the false charity gospel of "less is more’ and another who cannot give enough to her Lord and God. Just like his betraying kiss of Christ Our Lord, we see here a glaring example of false charity against Mary’s humble offering of a totally unadulterated charitable assumption-presumption from her pure heart. What can be more beautiful than to observe this totally Catholic sense of adoration in Mary’s heart: by her loving presumption of God’s totality of love for her and us all, she seeks nothing for herself by this gesture but only how she can please her Lord and God in a veritable act of sacrificial and worshipful love. This is such an unparalleled example of true charity and false charity in contrast in Sacred Scripture.


This passage of Sacred Scripture casts another darksome shadow upon the heart of Christ’s betrayer, truly a follower of the pharisees and not of Christ, the epitomy of eternal charity and good will toward men; for Judas talked the ephemeral, plausible talk of the bread of this world, and not the Bread of Eternal Life. Why is this so?

Judas belittled openly Mary’s supreme act of charitable love of Christ, stating it would have been much better to sell the nard for profit and distribute this money to the poor. Does this not sound familiar today to the external undertakings of modernist Church types for many programs of social justice i.e. the peace movements against war, political movements against war, political movements of liberation theology, food pantries and soup kitchens, environmental and animal preservation rights, and global warming?

What Judas Iscariot, the traitor, advocates is to ignore the Bread of Eternal Life, Jesus Christ, and the reverence due Him for an inferior and external charity that only the world would acclaim great: great because it appears religious, just and good; but it is not really religious, just or good, without Christ. To lack the charitable assumption presumption of Mary’s pure love for Christ, as Judas clearly does here, by arguing that the charity of this world without Christ is sufficient is a classic example of false charity. But for Mary, charity without Christ is nothing less than a satanical exchange of the Bread of Heaven for the bread here below. How many souls are there today who starve for Christ’s Bread of Eternal Life, yet are surfeited on the satanical bread of this world?

Charity that does not begin at the feet of Christ and return there in humble worship and adoration is the totally meaningless politics of this world, striving for the diabolical wordly bread of Satan’s dominion. We cannot love our neighbor as ourselves if we do not love God with our whole mind and all our hearts’s strength as the beautiful sweet and tender love of Mary for Christ demonstrated at His feet, where we see the exhaltation of the sacred loving worship of God in the magnificent splendor of Mary. This can only mean the simultaneous burgeoning of charity in the real world for our fellow man, if one does not pursue pharisaical false charity of Judas the priest. Let us recall Christ’s words here: "You can do nothing without Me." (Mt. 15:5) And again: "The poor you will always have with you, but you do not always have Me." (John 12:3) So often doing something that is ostensibly good for others can fail because it is done without Christ and becomes, therefore, its own reward or the reward of self and not performed for the Glory of God. A soul bereft of the love of Christ and the high ritual of this love is a soul caught up in a heady altruism of this world that seeks its own glory in the bread of Satan: cognition, acceptance, approval and political correctness!


"False Charity and Novus Ordo Mass"

How dangerous the diminution of worship from the sacred, profound Presence of Almighty God to a pedestrian, egalitarian view of God as just another social worker who leads us all on a social worker mission to improve the world, whether for peace, liberation, or feeding the hungry of the world. This has been the popular scenario since Vatican II, social justice programs of all kinds. However, when they do not preach conversion to Christ in so many of these pie-in-the-sky church programs; they can quickly become exercises in political skulduggery with the winner getting the most money from the government for your organization’s pet social project.

We have watched the regal and stately worship in the Catholic Church of the 50's and 60's before Vatican II descend from the charitable assumption presumption of Christ’s sacrificial love to a worldly secularized lovism for neighbor as our goal of worship with endless declensions that falsify and profane our charity and love of God more and more: stripping the churches, dressing casually for Sunday Mass, discontinuing personal prayer books, turning the altars around to face the people, removing religious symbols, having the Mass in the vernacular and– most uncharitable of all–removing the tabernacle from the summit and center of all Catholic Churches, truly the false kiss of the false love of a Judas priest. If one doubts the perils of the Protestant social gospel in America and its deleterious affect on the Roman Catholic Church, consider only the diminution of all the Catholic moral issues of late in this land (fornication, divorce, abortion, and homosexuality and sterilization) and the adoption of these popular protestant causes so embracingly by the Church.

"False Charity & Catholic Education"

Finally, the Church is to educate the young; however, one no longer has to study the faith or become Catholic to attend a Catholic School these days. Catholic universities, Catholic high schools, and Catholic elementary schools in urban areas follow this doctrine of false charity. They appear to be doing good for their fellow man by educating them, but they believe love is charity without worshiping at Christ’s feet or teaching others to do this or even encouraging possible converts to do this anymore--because the satanical bread of worldly approval and recognition is much more desirable! The true charity of Mary and her love of Christ has so quickly become the secularized false charity of Judas Priest’s exterior false religion. Why?

False charity appears to be loving and caring for our neighbor and our God; however, false charity occurs so often apart from the ritual beauty and truth of the Catholic faith as Mary Magdalen’s sublime reverence at Christ’s Feet! We have, therefore, descended from the lofty supernatural high church ritual of Mary’s love before Vatican II to the pedestrian false love of humanism and the things of this world–the false charity of Judas Priest’s kiss.


–to be continued–
j hughes dunphy ]]>jhdunphy@theorthodoxromancatholic.comCommunion in The hand2008-03-06T19:36:09-08:00http://www.theorthodoxromancatholic.com/index_files/3b84f6653574c0865f226a61761c1c08-32.html#unique-entry-id-32http://www.theorthodoxromancatholic.com/index_files/3b84f6653574c0865f226a61761c1c08-32.html#unique-entry-id-32As we enter the third millennium,  the words of Jesus Christ Our Lord and Savior to Judas Iscariot have greater forcefulness and power in history than ever before: “Judas dost thou betray the son of Man with a kiss?”  

 
Why these condemning words of Jesus to Judas Iscariot are so portentous,  regarding our own times,  is because these are the days of betrayal, of false charity, of a pretended love of Christ provoked by Satan himself, the great imitator of Christ-like charity and the flatterer par excellence.  These times, indeed, are particularly times of betrayal for the Church:   dissenting theologians, cafeteria-select-your-own-brand-of-Catholicism, and apostates from the top of the hierarchical ladder in Rome to the bottom, the very pews in one’s local parish.   All of this is packaged under the guise of ‘a more charitable Catholicism’  for those who preach a more loving gospel, a more loving liturgy, and a more loving theology and who, in truth, are Satan’s henchmen. 
 

False charity is the false love of God epitomized by Judas’s false kiss, full of duplicitous deceit and suggesting virtue,  but, in truth, being consummate vice. To simulate the love of Christ with a diabolical boldness and to deny Him at one and the same time, just as Judas did, who was one of the most sinister and malevolent characters in all of human history  is nothing less than a total betrayal of Jesus Christ’s goodness and love which leads, therefore, so many, many souls today down the wide road that leads to a hell of destruction in this world and death in the hereafter.   
 
This false philosophy of Judas’ love has embraced the hearts of modern day Christians i.e. Protestants and liberal Catholics everywhere in remarkable numbers:  the pretense of a loving affection for Christ that hides within the human heart  a diabolical attachment to the things of this world.   Was this not the very nature of Judas’ false charity, the external appearances of love without any corresponding affection within, because of a slavish love of ‘mammon’ or the bread of this world.   Judas, sadly lacked the amorous assumption-presumption in Christ’s Divine predisposition, meaning he was without the supernatural trust, childlike confidence and acceptance of Christ’s love in all things.  This, happily,  the Mother of God so perfectly paradigmed. However, how many Protestants and liberal Catholics today have also exchanged Judas’ love of money,  or the thirty pieces of silver, for Christ’s love?   “Then one of the twelve, who was called Judas Iscariot, went to the chief priests and said: ‘What will you give me if I deliver Him to you?   And they paid him thirty pieces of silver.  And from that moment he sought an opportunity to betray Him.’” (Matt 26: 15)
  

   
Nowhere do we see a better paradigm of this false charity than with the modernist clergyman, priest or preacher where the effrontery of money, wealth and the prosperity gospel of feel-good Christianity have come to replace the unadulterated and undiluted truth of the gospel taught with ethical and theological prowess, an act of true charity for souls.   Do we not have too many horrible examples to cite of priests and preachers who fleece their flocks so they can live the so-called ‘good life.’  Certainly no preacher who is indulging his lower nature of grasping for money and the things of this world is inclined to inveigh against such a serious sin as false charity.  One style of preaching always gains the plaudits of admiration from the world, while the other is despised and contemptuously discarded.   The people-pleasing preacher who tweaks the gospel so it is most happily received by one’s flock was the magic touch of the pharisees in Jesus’ own day.   Were they not so popular that even in the market places they were noted publicly, as Christ Our Lord said?  “And the pharisees love salutations in the marketplaces.” 
 

The prosperity gospel of preaching to the masses for the thirty pieces of silver and the passing bread of this world is oriented to worldly approval and adulation, the very earmarks of the satanical gospel of Judas priest.  To appear loving and charitable and boldly advance this exteriorly, yet inwardly in a state of denial is the number one characteristic of false charity: a sheer duplicity of purpose and intent manifested wherever the gospel for repentance to sin is not preached.  Christ rebuked Satan for this false charity of offering Him the bread of this world instead of the Bread of Eternal Life: “Man shall not live by bread alone but by every Word that proceeds from the Mouth of God.”  (Matt. 4: 4).   True charity clearly is concerned with the supernatural bread of repentance for sin, the whole purpose of Christ’s Mission on earth, and not for the perishable bread of false charity which Satan offered to Christ and to us all whenever we sin.  For the gospel of false charity consists in not admonishing the sinner whenever he sins or does wrong, but it consists instead in affirming the sinner in his sin in order to receive the bread of this world as payment for the gospel of false charity.  Can one truthfully deny that false charity plagues Christianity everywhere today?  We have all observed today that the sexual sins of clergy and faithful are largely untouchable: homosexuality, pedophilia, pornography, contraception, sterilization, masturbation, divorce, abortion, and fornication; in short no sexual sins are opposed. 
        
“Lovism” 

 
“Lovism,” Satan’s wicked fraud from the great imitator himself, is the gospel of false charity which leads so many souls and their teachers like the scribes and pharisees of Jesus’ day down the wide road that leads to destruction; for they have exchanged the bread of this world for the Bread of Eternal Life, and therefore they receive their just pay of thirty pieces of silver and damnation by Christ’s own words, especially because these betrayers, like Judas, come from Jesus’ own followers, the priests and preachers of false charity of the day.  Here are Jesus’ words of condemnation of Judas the priest and false charity: “He who has dipped his hand in the dish with Me will betray Me.  The son of Man goes as it is written of Him, but woe to that man by whom the Son of Man is betrayed!  It would have been better for that man if he had not been born.” (Matt. 26: 23-24) These are the vehement, condemning words of the Eternal High Priest Who will judge all priests this same way, if they teach the gospel of “lovism” and false charity.  We must not be so spiritually or theologically naive to think these words condemning Judas the Priest were to be construed only for Jesus’ times and not also for our own.  The import of Jesus’ own words here is such priests today and yesterday are doomed to hell or something worse than the human mind can imagine, unless they repent.   
 


The false kiss, the feigned love of God and the easy wide road to eternal life with the bread of this world is so utterly enticing like all temptation and sin for priests today and for us all.   Indeed thirty pieces of silver are worth it to many. The ‘many’ must keep in mind Christ’s sobering words: “Many are called, but few are chosen.”  (Matt 22:14)   Let us not sugar-coat wrongly either the tone or the severity of Jesus’ condemnation for such false priests and His expectations for them because Christ, our divine High Priest, makes it absolutely clear that He is speaking strictly of the priestly caste in His condemnations of them: “Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing but inwardly are ravenous wolves.  You will know them by their fruits.  Are grapes gathered from thorns or figs from thistles?   So every sound tree bears good fruit, but the bad tree bears evil fruit.” (Matt 7: 15-18) We know that Christ our Divine Teacher is speaking strictly of the priestly caste here who retained the role of prophet in Jewish society, since they both taught and interpreted the Law of the old covenant and their priesthood retained the traditional role of prophets for time immemorial in the Jewish religion.  Jesus told us to beware, to be watchful and discerning: therefore, for us to judge the worthiness of priest-prophets one has to test their fruits, and only then can one tell whether they are the false prophets or not, who water down or alter Christ’s gospel of repentance and then become teachers and preachers of false charity.


Truly, then, we must have Christ’s heavenly vision with proper deception-perception of such evil priests like the pharisees who were the prototype of the modern priest of false charity today.  Why false charity?  Because these false priests and teachers are the ones who widen the path that leads to destruction and hell– an easier way, founded on the false loves of Satan, this world, and one’s pride, all of which appear to be a kinder and gentler path to heaven, but, in truth, are the cruelest, most wicked, and most malevolent way to lead souls to hell.   
 

Our Divine Teacher’s words on such false purveyors of the Gospel are very pointed: “But woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites!  For you lock people out of the kingdom of heaven.  For you do not go in yourselves, and when others are going in, you stop them.  Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites!  For you cross sea and land to make a single convert, and you make the new convert twice as much as child of hell as yourselves.”  (Matt. 23: 13-15)     Most importantly such false priests bearing rotten fruits are very obviously to be avoided by Christ’s faithful sheep since these priests of false charity are to be condemned to hell with their docile flock as our divine Teacher instructed: “Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.”  (Matt. 7: 19) Neither of these two can or will bear fruit.     
 

This false kiss, the feigned love of God, and the dipping of the betrayer’s hand into the same dish as the Savior’s are, indeed, a part of today’s modern Catholic Church where false charity abounds in the liturgical chaos after Vatican Council II.   The essential direction of false charity after Vatican II was to create a more loving theology, a more loving liturgy, and a more loving people who were open to the world.  To comprehend the vast pall that false charity drapes over the Church today since Vatican Council II, one has only to observe the fruits of this great conciliar gathering to make any credible judgment; for did not Our Divine Lord say: “By their fruits you will know them”?  (Matt. 7: 16)    
 

Some of the very obvious fruits of Vatican II of late are: pedophilia and homosexuality in the priesthood and episcopate; dissenting theologians everywhere in Catholic universities and seminaries; a spiraling Catholic divorce rate equal to Protestants; contraception, sterilization, and abortion in epic numbers; the loss of the faith of literally millions of fallen away Catholics; catechetics out-of-control; and the hemorrhaging of the priesthood and sisterhood with tens of thousands leaving these holy vocations for the material world and its pleasures.  Can we not say that bishops and priests have been the leaders of this sad display of rotten fruit and moral stagnation since Vatican II, precipitated by their teaching and example of false loves,  this huge apostasy of the Catholic religion?    
 
 

To verify this, one need only remember clearly Our Lord’s Words regarding the identity of whom the main malefactor is in all of this false love and false charity:  “He who has dipped his hand in the dish with Me will betray me.”  (Matt. 26: 23)   Judas Iscariot certainly is one of His most intimate followers, one of those whom he Himself, the Son of God made Man, selected as His very Own Apostle.  In fact, those who are the nearest and dearest to Jesus Christ in spreading the Word of God to save souls became His betrayers– His apostles or His priests.   These are the special souls of Jesus’ inner circle who daily dip the Bread in the Chalice of His Blood and unfortunately betray Him.   
 
 

Twice in scripture, in two different instances, Christ Our Savior warns us of the identity of the betrayers: they will use a false kiss and they will dip their hand in the Chalice with Him.  Indeed, no two symbols bespeak of intimacy than the one whom you permit to kiss you and the one with whom you share your meals.   Yes, it is the priesthood of Jesus Christ and those who exercise it that our Lord zeroes in upon as the ultimate source of His worst betrayal.   Therefore, to understand false charity thoroughly as Christ warns us and his disciples to do, we ought to first heed the example left us of Judas, the false priest, and we must have the proper deception-perception of the characteristics, philosophy, and behavior of such woeful practitioners of false charity.   

“ False Charity and Extraordinary Ministers” 


In the modern Catholic Church, do we not see perhaps a false charity of exteriority in the big hand-shaking, kissing fest that has interrupted the sacredness of the Mass where the silent reverence for the Sacred Species has given way to a cheapened love of ostentation, both artificial and feigned, by many Catholics in the pews; so much so that people talk down openly the sacred from “the peace of Christ be with you” to just about any spontaneous salutation that meets their fancy nowadays, and most often one highly unsacred: ‘How are you or you look so good’ etc.  Or how many of those dipping their hand in the cup as extraordinary ministers at Mass have betrayed Our Divine Lord like Judas by being in His very midst and not in a state of grace?     Is not the exteriority of religious practice ever so evident in today’s kiss of peace and the down-front extraordinary ministers of the Eucharist who with the priest so often dip the host into the cup of Christ’s blood unworthily–both liturgical innovations since Vatican Council II– neither of which have been correctly followed since Rome reluctantly gave permission for them.  How many priests unnecessarily use these so-called ministers of the Eucharist when they do not have to use them, only to hasten, so often,  the most sacred ceremonies of the Mass with  an abrupt and irreverent conclusion.  So-called, because they declericalize the priesthood and clericalize the laity; notwithstanding the reluctant approbation from Rome.   How many of these so-called extraordinary ministers charge the altar during Mass?  One wonders how much of this is done to feel important or feel good about oneself– a true characteristic of false charity? 
 

So numerous, indeed, are the extraordinary ministers who have dipped their hands into the Sacred Chalice with the Lord as extraordinary ministers at Mass and have betrayed our Divine Savior by being down-front and not in a state of grace.

How can such a moral impropriety be countenanced in this seemingly groundless accusation?  Consider only the paucity of response to the Rite of Reconciliation or Confession on Saturdays in most Catholic Churches around the country these days where precious few, indeed, attend this holiest of sacraments of Christ’s infinite mercy with any sense of sin, and where one may literally cleanse away through the priest’s holy words of absolution the mountains of serious or venial sins which so impede one’s worthy reception of Christ’s Body and Blood in the Eucharist.    


Is this such a wild and uncharitable accusation in light of the vast number of so-called Catholic couples who practice artificial birth control, or are even sterilized, and march audaciously down the aisles to communion every week?  Similarly, a more wretched parallel can be drawn of priestly betrayal of Christ’s Sacred Presence in the literal abominations of Christ’s prophetic words coming true with pedophile-homosexual priests offering Mass in such sacrilegious serious sin  and being oblivious to any kind of self-scrutiny or guilt: numbers that defy one’s sense of horror and shame i.e Boston or Los Angeles dioceses with over two  hundred under indictment at one time in the former and over three hundred or more in the latter.  How many of these priests were not reluctant to dip into the Lord’s Chalice with sacrilegious hands and how many bishops– too many to count–allowed this profane behavior of homosexual-pedophile priests to go on and on in the false charity of Satan which exchanges the bread of this world–public attention and adulation– for the Bread of Eternal Life: Christ’s Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity? 
 

Wherein lies the false charity of this accusation, one may ask?  It is everywhere these days.  It’s a gift of satanical malevolence, disguised as charity, when millions and millions of liberal Catholic voters push down the switch again and again in voting booths, nationally, and pro-abortion politicians  are re-elected over and over in a veritable blood bath of baby murdering in the tens of millions: Catholics who see no guilt in this at all, in fact, they believe it is an act of charity to womankind– a woman’s right to choose.   
 

Let us note again the kiss of peace in days gone by for the liturgy of the Tridentine Mass and the early “Novus Ordo” Mass of Pope Paul VI where the kiss clearly was totally interior and had nothing at all to do with the feel– good religion of exteriority of today, for to the accustomed acclamation “Pax Domini sit semper vobiscum” (Latin: “May the Peace of Christ be always with you.”) was the liturgically and theologically correct responsorial of “Et cum Spiritu tuo.” (Latin: “And with your spirit.”)    

The current compromised Latin translation becomes desacralized in the exchange of the Bread of Eternal Life for the more politically correct bread of this world with the mistranslation of “Spiritu” as the English “you”.   Thus the exteriority of the pharisees, the professional teachers of false charity in Jesus’ Day and members of the priestly caste,  had the main goal and purpose of being seen or recognized so as to receive public approbation for their deeds, which we have just seen as likewise true of modern day so-called Eucharist ministers as well as the ‘modernized’  kiss of peace.   This was the very same temptation Satan offered Christ to exchange the bread of this exterior world for the spiritual bread of Christ’s world of interiority in the three temptations of Christ– something Christ Our divine Savior would neither agree to do in whole or even in part.   

How long faithful orthodox Roman Catholics have patiently and prayerfully awaited for the holy hands of the Good Shepherd of all Souls to act upon these sacrilegious abominations against His Infinite Divine Presence in the Most Holy Eucharist through the firm hands of an orthodox Roman Catholic pontiff.   Nor must we forget that it was by a most abrupt excommunication  and the gravest of anathemas that the Divine Shepherd Himself expelled into darkness  the very first priest of false charity from His Presence and so such egregious manifestations of this satanical malaise must be severed today with equal dispatch from the Mystical Body.    
 
–to be continued–  
j hughes dunphy]]>jhdunphy@theorthodoxromancatholic.comThe Sacred and Holy2008-03-06T18:52:39-08:00http://www.theorthodoxromancatholic.com/index_files/33eb0bab4bd536eef5acbc85a8bfc4f9-31.html#unique-entry-id-31http://www.theorthodoxromancatholic.com/index_files/33eb0bab4bd536eef5acbc85a8bfc4f9-31.html#unique-entry-id-31The season of Lent begins with Ash Wednesday, and the beginning of Lent is probably the holiest season of the liturgical year. Lost Lents are bad things for one’s soul. The secular spirit of the day or the infidel spirit mocks everything that is holy, without expressing outward infidelities, which has become a kind of unprofessed belief of sinners. This secular spirit, so sacred to many, gives no consideration of sacred seasons and sacred ceremonies, consequently, we should cherish these times of the liturgical year all the more.

It is an essential part of the Catholic faith, this season of Lent and all of its ceremonies, especially that of receiving ashes which becomes an outward sign to the world of one’s Catholic character. This Catholic character can be seen in those who have worldly or secular positions in society but yet are not afraid to exhibit their Catholic character i.e.
Thomas More while he was Chancellor of the English realm. Thomas More was loyal to his sovereign the King, nevertheless openly put God first on all occasions his sterling character was challenged: for example, his conscientious fulfillment of all the duties of his state of life, no matter how large or how small and insignificant.

The Christian character consists in: 1. Fidelity to one’s duty– giving all one’s due, be it to God, our fellow man, or ourselves. 2,. Freedom from human respect– readiness to practice one’s religion openly (wearing ashes on Ash Wednesday etc.) 3. Love of poor or self-denying almsgiving and 4. Good Habits. Clearly, these are the marks of a solid Christian character. It is amazing how much Christian character is dependent upon good habits. This means good habits vigorously adhered to: such as morning and evening prayers, the liturgy of the Hours, the regular attendance at the Sacraments; attendance at Mass and the Most Holy Eucharist. .....and even ashes, one of
the devout usages of which, give grace just as all the sacramentals do. Here, especially, we can refer to a more devout usage of holy water during Lent, which removes all venial sin.

A person without holy habits is like a ship without sails and without a rudder: one moves along some how, but there is a huge concern if it can reach its intended destination. There is something in a habit that is so sanctifying because it is also strengthening. A very small thing persevered in during Lent, such as daily Mass and Communion during this holiest of seasons, has more valuable results than a much greater thing done intermittently. For example, suppose during Lent we propose to read everyday a chapter of the Imitation of Christ, or practice some trifling mortification at meals, or to perform some little devotion , most especially in honor of the Sacred Passion: it will do us more good to persevere in these small resolutions than if we were once or twice to fast on bread and water when the notion fancied to come upon us. This practice of doing the same things, however slight in our faith, builds virtue and Catholic character.

Good habits build virtue, and require effort to form; bad habits are very easily formed, because they go with the secular main stream. All bad habits are indulgences of some part of our unrestrained nature, idle habits, for
instance, spring from the sloth of our nature, which hates trouble and cannot bring itself to face difficulties with a strong will. For the most part good habits require resistance. St. Ignatius calls them "inordinatio" and he says want of restraint is one of the roots of all sin.

Let us therefore carry our crosses faithfully during this Lenten season, so we can reap the fruit of a productive faith. The priest reminding us of this at every Mass, makes the sign of the cross over the altar and gifts some fifty times or more. We live in a world that wants a Christ without a Cross, a Mass without sacrifice, and a religion without a savior.]]>jhdunphy@theorthodoxromancatholic.comCommunion in The hand2008-01-16T20:40:41-08:00http://www.theorthodoxromancatholic.com/index_files/695a8e24d8d5b6a79a7181ed2925ec00-30.html#unique-entry-id-30http://www.theorthodoxromancatholic.com/index_files/695a8e24d8d5b6a79a7181ed2925ec00-30.html#unique-entry-id-30The final betrayal of Christ is seen when Judas dipped his unworthy hand into the chalice of Christ’s blood with a piece of the Bread of Life. This most audacious and outward betrayal of Judas Priest precipitated Christ’s most vehement condemnation in all of Sacred Scriptures: "Woe to the man by whom the Son of Man has been betrayed: it were better that he were not born." Then He said to Judas Iscariot: "Go and do what thou art about, quickly."

This was, above all, the very first excommunication condemnation. In short, Christ excommunicated Judas Iscariot from His very Presence. Secondly, Our Divine Lord uttered by His grave words what was then the very first anathema ever, with His ‘woe’ to Judas Priest: "Woe to the man by whom the Son of Man has been betrayed: it were better that he were not born." The naked turpitude of what Judas Priest was doing publicly, before the very eyes of His Divine Savior and the other eleven apostles, committing the sin of sacrilege by an unworthy communion, was forthright condemned by Our Lord for its wicked malevolence, the unworthy reception of Divine Innocence Itself while in the state of mortal sin.

This most morally corrupt of all of Judas Iscariot’s actions was a sacrilege of egregious proportions, for it contradicted virtually everything that Our Divine Lord and Savior had taught for His entire public life on earth and something so heavenly He had done also in the very presence of Judas. This was, at least, the very essence of false charity for it constituted a false love of Jesus Christ by a feigned affection in His Presence while at the same time being an act of raw betrayal for a mere thirty pieces of silver. This was only possible for Judas from his defiled heart, conscience and unprepared soul, the characteristics always of a sacrilege of the Most Holy Eucharist.

This is also the heart, soul and conscience of all unworthy communicants that take up the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ so unworthily and so often in the "Novus Ordo" liturgy of communion in the hand. This betrayal of Judas Priest is, unmistakably, common today in "Novus Ordo" Churches with unworthy communicants everywhere: for example, those living in serious sins of fornication, adultery, sodomy, inebriation, theft, avarice, anger, gluttony, contraception, sterilization, divorce and remarriage. If one doubts the veracity of unworthy communicants in such accusations, consider only the dearth of Catholics today who attend the Sacrament of Confession weekly in one’s local parish, especially Saturday afternoons. Nor are these wild accusations regarding the frequency of such Eucharistic sacrileges when one considers our Divine Teacher’s Own Words: "In the end the charity of many shall grow cold." This must especially be the case of the charity one owes to Almighty God. Moreover, one cannot overlook St. Paul’s sternest of warnings here, regarding such unworthy communicants: "He who eats and drinks the body of Our Lord unworthily, eats and drinks his damnation to himself"

The new rite of communion in the hand allows all kinds of other abominable sacrileges of God’s Divine Presence, too, with sacrilegious, unauthorized inter-communion services; laity performing para-liturgical communion services, hospital visits by laity who refer to themselves as "lay-priests" or "eucharistic ministers" and who hand out communion to whomever happens to be present in the hospital room visiting the sick. This abuse is especially notorious at Masses celebrating Catholic baptisms, marriages, funerals, ordinations or investitures of Religious, for everyone feels in these situations: "I am worthy to enter under Your roof, O Lord; therefore no word is necessary from You, for I am already healed."

Finally, the last of these betrayals, while not seemingly as notorious as receiving with a defiled heart or conscience, is an unprepared soul or the wedding guest ignorant of what he is about as Christ related in Holy Writ, ever so careless of the grace-filled event of receiving the Body and Blood of his Lord and God.

Such are the multitudes as the Last Gospel of the Tridentine Mass teaches us from the beloved teacher of Eucharistic love himself, the apostle John, who tells us of those "to whom the Lord came and they knew Him not." And as we read on here: "but to those who knew Him, they became the sons not of the world, the flesh (or the devil) but of God."
St. Paul further warns: "He that eateth and drinketh unworthily eateth and drinketh judgment to himself, not discerning the Lord’s body." As the Church has taught our thanksgiving ought to be at least a quarter of an hour as is underscored by all faithful priests who recite the Benedicite after Mass and other such prayers. To leave the church after communion without thanksgiving would be a very rude act; how ill-mannered would he be thought to be who, when invited to the table of one far above him in rank, did not so much as thank his host! To act in this cold, indifferent manner is to behave like Judas who, after receiving communion, immediately went out. St. Philip Neri, it is said, once sent two altar boys with burning tapers to accompany a person whom he observed thus hurrying from the church ignorantly.

So many, very many "Novus Ordo Catholics" give no thanksgiving after Mass whatsoever but depart in haste almost immediately, in some cases, even before the last communicant receives. There is the Last Blessing of the priest and within minutes, one hears: "Go the Mass is ended", thus leaving no time for thanksgiving. Why is this true of the "Novus Ordo Missae?"

It is true simply because there is virtually nothing left of the Sacred Silence after a "Novus Ordo" Mass with an almost ‘riotous’ outbreak of idle conversations and the rush of hectic motion that totally ignores the Great Eucharistic Miracle that has just occurred. Who lingers after, but the Lord alone in a cold, empty, dark church!

Finally, St. Paul tells us that infirmities and death are not unusual chastisements of unworthy communicants (1Cor: 11, 30). We must remember the awful fate of Judas Priest was terror, despair, hatred of God, the torments the lost suffer in hell as well as the punishments that begin on earth for the unworthy communicant. Also he who comes to the marriage feast (holy communion) without a wedding garment (proper preparation of sanctifying grace and thanksgiving) can be cast into exterior darkness (Matt. 22).

If to this Banquet of His, so immense and inconceivable as it is in the love for us which it implies, Our Lord has attached so many and so great graces, rewards, and eternal happiness, can we expect that He will give these special graces to those who only spurn them? If here He offers the gifts of life– the true life of His Body and Blood, Soul and Divinity– and men seek life in the passing things of earth, can we blame Him, if seeking perversely this world’s manna they die?

He Himself has uttered the very crushing sentence on them: "Except you eat the Flesh of the Son of Man, and drink His Blood, you shall not have life in you." This is a sentence to give us pause, indeed; a sentence that challenges our serious reflection. As in all God’s other punishments, here too it is rather we ourselves who create the punishment. We make it more and more difficult for ourselves to appreciate the blessings of the Most Holy Eucharist and therefore to share in them.

Attitudes have a tendency to deepen themselves– to harden and become set. Self-sufficiency, absorption in the cares and goals of earth, the self-centered quest for pleasures, all these settle into our outlooks on life, a jaded attitude of values that makes us insensible to higher things and the real needs of our souls. Many today feel so very, very self-sufficient. Self-sufficiency is becoming more and more the characteristic of our times. Inflated by the vast progress of science, everyone’s critical judgments are so aroused to such prideful levels and many, therefore, look to powerful government agencies and politicians for the remedy to all their ills. And elated by ownership of this world’s goods, people of today seem almost to despise the silent Savior and Dweller in the tabernacle, Who so wants to be the food of their souls and give them "life and that more abundantly." This invitation comes to all today as it did to the ancient Jews of the Old Law in Our Lord’s day who said: "It is a hard saying." Like the Pharisees, they feel no need of the Bread of Life Eternal; they enjoy, instead, the loaves that this great, noisy busy world offers to them daily. Politely they beg Jesus Christ out of their lives, except perhaps for the occasional formality of Easter, Christmas or social-event Communions.

Many others, indeed, are too much absorbed with their work. Like the Pharisees who cared more about saving an ox that had fallen into a pit than about curing a sick man on the Sabbath, they are more intent upon working for this life, that must end sooner or later, than for the life that is eternal. They feel their needs perhaps, they are assuredly aware of their wants, and the weight of sin troubles them; nevertheless they know their souls are ill. Basically, they realize the greatness of the gift Christ offers us on the altar– but there is simply no time for that now.

Later on perhaps they will attend to the Most Holy Eucharist. Therefore, now and then they come to the altar for communion, but it is with minds still full of earthly concerns, which a perfunctory preparation did not succeed in banishing. In their minds they are still tying up their oxen. For a few brief moments they are a ciborium containing the Living Presence of Jesus Christ; but there is no lasting consecration. Christ cannot even begin to work those marvelous miracles of grace in them that He is so eager to work in their souls.

Then there are those who are so taken up with the pleasures of life. The world offers such pleasures to them in apparent abundance– tinseled, glamorous, and golden pleasures of technological media everywhere. On every side pleasure calls out to them, invites them; a hundred signs flaunt their attractive sensual delights before their eyes by day, and later on they flash them with lights that even obscure the stars at night. The ease and comforts of it all that modern life bestows, far from quenching the appetites for pleasures, only deepen them. Hungry souls, they no longer understand that their hunger can be satisfied by one, and by one only– Christ in the Tabernacle, Christ in the Mass, Christ in the Eucharist in their hearts. To spend an hour with Him, to have Almighty God as the companion of their souls, this seems dark to their eyes that are blinded by the pedestrian lights of the avenues of fashion and scintillation. Perception is not, is not the reality of this life or of the world in which they live. Jesus waits, invites, calls us all daily and nightly: "I am the Bread of Life."

Moreover, to respond to this holy invitation we must prepare ourselves for so great and so supernatural a moment St. Paul urges us to examine our conscience: "Whoever, therefore, eats the bread or drinks the chalice of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty of profaning the Body and Blood of the Lord. Let a man examine himself, and so eat of the bread and drink of the chalice. For anyone who eats and drinks without discerning the Body eats and drinks judgment upon himself."

Our Lord in His Divine Providence has left us this egregious example of an unworthy communicant through the bad example of Judas Iscariot who sinned in all three ways that we have discussed in approaching this Most Holy Sacrament: approaching the Lord without the adoration due; approaching Him devoid of sacrificial prayer; and, finally, approaching Him with a defiled and unprepared heart. Each of these oversights are blameworthy and characteristic of Judas Priest, the very first unworthy communicant, who was everlastingly condemned for this debauchery by the Lord Himself. Must we not expect the same condemnation for those today who so casually receive communion in the hand and who lack the internal disposition of homage before the Lord, and who lack the internal piety of prayer, and who recklessly come to the Most Holy of Holies with defiled, unprepared hearts awash in serious sin and indifference.

Such sacrilegious improprieties in receiving communion in the hand with the "Novus Ordo" Mass must not be taken so lightly for they are as unorthodox and unroman Catholic as believing Judas Iscariot would be a worthy apostle and priest. This plague of sacrilegious betrayals in the "Novus Ordo" Mass must end, and end terminally soon; for this can only be done by the very firm hand of a wise shepherd in Rome such as our current pontiff, Pope Benedict XVI who has already done more to return Holy Mother Church to its orthodox Roman Catholic ways than any pope in a hundred years with his glorious "motu proprio" that liberated the Tridentine Latin Mass. Communion in the hand with its liberation theology of the liturgy only deserves a vigorous condemnation of anathemas and subsequent excommunication of all of its advocates for its offenses against God’s Infinite Presence in the Most Holy Eucharist, the pinnacle of all orthodox Roman Catholic beliefs. We pray to the Blessed Virgin Mary, the "singular vessel of devotion," for a great Eucharistic miracle through the hands of Pope Benedict XVI who alone knows how to faithfully render such a charitable anathema and excommunication.

The Lord’s condemnation to the Jews will be the same to us moderns who, in any way, unfaithfully reject the Most Holy Eucharist: "You knew not the time of your visitation."

What happened to ancient Palestine for this oversight: the totality of destruction at the hands of the Roman legions. The graces of Our Lord’s Divine Presence, once lost, can never be regained again. "I am the Bread of life and He that eateth Me, the same also shall live by Me." Many, many today, sadly heed Him not. Too many have their pleasures, such as they are– but, indeed, "blessed are they that hunger and thirst for justice, for they shall have their fill."

– to be continued–
J Hughes Dunphy]]>jhdunphy@theorthodoxromancatholic.comCommunion in The hand2007-12-12T13:45:13-08:00http://www.theorthodoxromancatholic.com/index_files/579977b8acc6cb0c467c909222b620fa-29.html#unique-entry-id-29http://www.theorthodoxromancatholic.com/index_files/579977b8acc6cb0c467c909222b620fa-29.html#unique-entry-id-29Nothing goes together so clearly as the philosophy of liberal Protestantism and the "Novus Ordo Missae" liturgy with communion in the hand. This is so very basic to any notion of false charity and how these two heretical views of Christianity share in their so-called worship of God.

The betrayal of Christ by Judas Priest is threefold and the second tier of this disgraceful sacrilege, which we will consider now, is the missing presence of Judas Iscariot when all the rest of the apostles and Christ were deep in prayer in the Garden of Olives. This was the second biblically noted event in Judas Iscariot’s life: his absence from Christ’s side with the other apostles when Our Lord was so deep in the contemplation and prayers of His Passion, just before His Way of the Cross and Crucifixion. This again, was a remarkable event in the life of Judas Iscariot, this willful and voluntary absence from the side of Christ, His Savior, when Our Lord and Savior was deep in the prayers of His Passion.

This cold calculating indifference towards Our Divine Lord and His Holy Presence by simply ignoring Him at prayer, especially His prayers acknowledging His imminent Passion and Death, lives in our own times, most notoriously, in liberal Protestantism and liberal Catholicism of today.

As a matter of fact, there are virtually no differences between these two extreme realities of modern day Christianity, save the former does not claim to be part of the Orthodox Roman Catholic Church while the latter, mistakenly, does. Both betray Christ: one overtly, the other covertly.

How can these two seemingly irreconcilable faith realities be so much akin? Their shared bias stems from the "Novus Ordo Missae" liturgy and its general proclivity to avoid at all costs the salvific themes of suffering, repentance, and one’s own sinfulness– whether of priest or people in the Mass– thus causing all its adherents to ignore, like Judas, Christ at prayer in the Garden as He contemplated His Passion and Death. And this is the very essence of liberal Protestantism which also avoids entirely, like Judas Iscariot, any connection whatsoever with a prayerful acknowledgment of these salient themes of Christ’s Passion and Death: one’s own sinfulness, the sufferings of Christ, or a need for any kind of repentance whatsoever.

The betrayal of Christ by modern day liberal Protestantism is much more overt than the "Novus Ordo Missae," for it avoids altogether any official liturgical prayer like the Mass which renews totally and completely Christ’s sufferings and death for our sins– something the Reformers threw out centuries ago– the most holy sacrifice of the Mass.

But while the betrayal of Christ in His prayers in the Garden of Olives is more overt for Protestantism in its resemblance to Judas Iscariot, "The Novus Ordo Missae’s" similarity to Judas is more covert because of its noteworthy avoidance of the penitential in what is supposed to be a Mass renewing Christ’s Sacrifice for our sins in His Passion and Death. How clear and well known this reality is to all orthodox Roman Catholics today, especially in the last forty years of Vatican II theology and ritual where the Mass has become a veritable celebration of Christ and one’s worthiness to eat and drink at the table of the Lord. References to personal sinfulness of priest and people are so downplayed in the "Novus Ordo Missae," if not entirely unrecognizable whatsoever, that it is a kind of afterthought. Betrayal whether covert or overt is nevertheless betrayal, a sin that Christ did not deal delicately with in His strong condemnation of Judas Iscariot’s treachery.

This egregious betrayal by Judas Iscariot of Our Divine Savior by being absent when Our Savior was deep in prayer during His Passion in the Garden of Olives for the sins of the world is just what we see in the "Novus Ordo Missae" and Protestant worship services, a tragic flaw that glaringly inhibits the flow of salvific graces into one’s soul for the forgiveness of sin and salvation of one’s immortal soul. For if the Mass avoids the immolation of Christ’s Sacrifice for sin on the Cross, as the liturgy of the "Novus Ordo Missae" clearly does, as well as a strong vocal need for one’s own personal immolation or repentance for sin with it, then the Eucharist becomes nothing more than a praise banquet of feel good religion devoid of sacramental legitimacy and grace. The wanton removal in the "Novus Ordo Missae" after Vatican II of repeated supplications to the saints in various litanies that for were present for centuries in the traditional "Missa Latina Tridentina" for the forgiveness of our own sins as well as the priest offering, is exemplary of the rotten fruits of the New Mass and its desacralized liturgy. The upshot of this liberal liturgical innovation was the cataclysmic loss of graces to the Catholic Church and the world. Nothing more provokes the wrath of Almighty God than an unrepentant heart if we witness the stringent language of the fifty-first psalm:

"Make me hear rejoicing and gladness, that the bones you have crushed may revive. From my sins turn away Your Face and blot out all my guilt. For in sacrifice You take no delight, burnt offering from me you would refuse, my sacrifice, a contrite spirit, a humbled, contrite heart you will not spurn."

And this truth of the missing repentant heart theme in the "Novus Ordo Missae" again becomes shockingly evident in the removal of this critical Catholic language of repentance for sin from the prayers at the beginning of the New Mass, that have always been present in the "Missa Latina Tridentina":

"May the almighty and merciful Lord grant us pardon, absolution, and remission of our sins. Amen."

Over and over again the prayers of the repentant heart theme come forth with alacrity in the "Missa Latina Tridentina" in the very same way that Our Divine Master and Teacher explained how a contrite heart should be the way to pray always in His great comparison of the publican and the pharisee who were praying in the Temple: the publican was heard by Almighty God because he begged for mercy for his sins, while the pharisee was ignored because he boasted of his personal righteousness and no need for repentance before God. Everywhere, the language of the repentant heart theme is so evident in the "Missa Latina Tridentina": the priest’s humble supplication in his own personal "Confiteor" for sin at the beginning of Mass, his intense sorrow for sins innumerable at the Offertory, his begging the Blessed Trinity for forgiveness of sin by means of the saints meritorious intercession at the end of the Offertory, the huge litany of the saints in the Canon to remove his sins and ours through the saints’ merits and prayers, and his resolve at the end of the Mass to avoid all sins with a pure heart after eating and drinking Christ’s Body and Blood in what is clearly a firm resolution or firm purpose of amendment to not sin again. Thus the repentant heart theme is intact throughout the "Missa Latina Tridentina" while it is virtually nonexistent in the "Novus Ordo Missae". This is why the "Novus Ordo Missae" for the past forty years, since its inception, is not– clearly not– an efficacious prayer that merits the effusion of graces from Almighty God’s benevolent hands to humanity. And this is why Satan has had free reign on souls in a reign of terror of sexual sin, contraception, divorce, pornography, and homosexuality, the likes of which the Church and the world have not witnessed before, with the creation of the New Mass.

The inevitable result of all this betrayal of Christ in His Passion and Death is communion in the hand, and the notion that "I am worthy, O Lord to enter under Thy roof. You need say no word for my soul to be healed." These are unmistakably the words of Judas Iscariot, the betrayer who saw no sin in himself for exchanging Christ’s life for thirty pieces of silver by being absent at Our Lord’s prayerful Passion as do many millions of apostate Catholics who rationalize no need for repentance in their souls or see any reason why they ought to attend the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. Moreover, they see no need, either, to imbibe the everlasting fruit of the Most Holy Eucharist or heed Christ’s powerful words: "Unless you eat My Flesh and drink My Blood, you have no life in you."

No one can doubt the graces Judas Iscariot lost by failing to be present in the Garden of Olives to pray in Our Lord’s Infinite Presence, an opportunity given to only twelve very special beloved souls in all of human history, to pray with Christ Our Lord Himself, of which Judas Iscariot was one of the cherished. Likewise who can doubt the harsh reality of millions of souls of former Catholics, baptized and confirmed in the one true faith and who have eaten the precious Body of Our Lord but have turned on Him just as Judas did for the thirty pieces of silver that the world has to offer. Indeed, they are the very same crowd, therefore, who said to our divine Savior two thousand years ago: "This is too much to take, eating His Flesh and drinking His Blood" and who, forthwith, departed forever.

This egregious betrayal of Our Lord’s food of the Eucharist is the very essence of liberal Protestantism as well as liberal Catholicism with a multitude of souls that are dead; dead because they are too attached to the things of this world, their own sins, and their own pride to truly participate in the sacrifice of the Mass and repent and are, therefore, starving for lack of nourishment of Christ’s Precious Body and Blood.

This second betrayal of Judas Iscariot includes also the lost graces of those Catholics who could attend Mass more often and choose not to, for an assortment of worldly reasons that more often than not represent the attractions of the thirty pieces of silver.

The graces lost for those souls who could be daily communicants, and choose not to for ephemeral reasons, are no different than the graces Judas could have had for his own overflowing happiness in the hereafter; graces Our Divine Good Shepherd of all souls offered him again and again, even up to the very last minute of Judas’ betrayal: "Do what you are going to do, friend." These words were uttered by Jesus Christ just before Judas Iscariot gave his infamous kiss to his Savior. Our Lord left the door wide open to His Everlasting Love without any condemnation, by calling Judas ‘friend’, but at the very same time allowing for the free choice of Judas and every individual. But Judas, like all liberal Protestants and liberal Catholics wanted nothing whatsoever to do with the word ‘repentance’. Just as the pharisee praying in the temple asked not for ‘forgiveness’ for his sins, so is the fate of all liberal Catholics and liberal Protestants who have no need to repent or pray for such repentance. Our Lord’s own words will condemn them: "Only one went away from the temple that day justified." Graces lost are graces lost forever, for we "did not know the time of His Visitation."

–to be continued–
j hughes dunphy

]]>jhdunphy@theorthodoxromancatholic.comCommunion in The hand2007-11-07T09:20:59-08:00http://www.theorthodoxromancatholic.com/index_files/b6a39007bc1ce3323e2745c87a05d8c0-28.html#unique-entry-id-28http://www.theorthodoxromancatholic.com/index_files/b6a39007bc1ce3323e2745c87a05d8c0-28.html#unique-entry-id-28

Liberal Catholicism like liberal Protestantism makes light of the Presence of Christ in its worship as did Judas Priest, the master of false charity and the devil’s coconspirator, most especially is this obvious in the liturgical innovation of communion in the hand and with it all the ignorance of disrespect, sacrilege, and irreverence that goes on virtually everywhere it is celebrated.

It was just this same cold ignorance in the Presence of Our Divine Lord Himself that characterized Judas’ every action, for example his boldness of challenging the way Mary Magdalen had used up the precious nard, which cost so much money, to anoint Jesus before His Passion and Death. This aggravated Judas’ false charity for he complained that this precious nard, worth over 300 denarii, could have been better spent on the poor. However, Our Divine Lord so strongly countered: "the poor you will always have with you but you will not have Me always."

Certainly, this same downgrading of liturgical matters in the "Novus Ordo Missae" is extraordinarily evident in the same lack
of respect that Judas’ false charity wanted to show Christ by saving the precious nard for profit, or more selfishly for his own personal worldly wealth. It should be noted that St. John the Evangelist in Holy Scriptures also clarified this same point regarding Judas’ false charity in that he was treasurer for the apostles but he often stole from their money for the poor for himself.

Thus the same theft goes on today, glaringly so, in the "Novus Ordo Missae" when all the examples of exterior piety, like Mary’s use of the precious nard on Our Lord’s feet, have been ignorantly eliminated from the "Novus Ordo Missae" i.e. patens used for serving communion, communion rails and communion cloths to protect the Sacred Species, genuflecting at communion time, un-ordained clergy distributing communion or extraordinary ministers of the Eucharist everywhere, removal of kneelers, tabernacles, and golden vesseled ciboria.

To cite these precious examples of exterior piety, created through centuries of orthodox Roman Catholicism and the reverential worship of God, as being archaic and superfluous is the very same as Judas priest’s adamancy in not wanting to exhibit the most reverential obeisance and care of Christ before His Passion and Death that Mary Magdalen wanted. And Judas Priest’s attitude– to deny the very worship and reverence due Our Divine Lord, is the very essence of Liberal Protestantism, which is to say all Protestantism because it is to the left of Roman Catholicism, especially in all things liturgical. Nevertheless, this betrayal, whether within the Church or without, smacks of the same despicable insolence to Our Divine Lord and God that Judas Priest exhibited just before Our Lord’s Passion and Death.

This attitude of diminishing the worship of God for which all men are obligated by the First Commandment, is the very nature of Liberal Protestantism with its liturgy-free worship and its rebellious "sola scriptura" or "scripture alone" is sufficient for salvation mentality. As a matter of fact, Protestantism is literally devoid of all exterior piety that the Catholic faith for centuries has prided itself upon in reverencing Our Divine Lord until, that is, the influx of the "Novus Ordo" and its watered down version of the liturgy and Mass.

Walk into a "Novus Ordo Missae" Church and walk into a Protestant one after that and note the similarities in the absolute void of pious memorabilia: no kneelers, no altars, no crucifixes, no tabernacles, no Eucharistic Presence of Our Lord and God. No uplifting reminders of God’s Holy Presence can be found in either worship space: no stained glass windows, statues or pictures of saints–especially the Blessed Virgin Mary and St. Joseph–no pulpits, no stations of the Cross, no holy water fountains, and finally no vigil lights. Finally, one cannot forget the vanishing of the large red tabernacle vigil light, so gloriously indicative of Our Divine Lord’s dear Presence in the Eucharist, always missing in Protestant worship space but now, sadly, the fate of almost all "Novus Ordo Missae" Catholic Churches.

In light of this litany of seemingly endless disrespect and sacrilege can one any longer doubt the denial of Jesus Christ and His Divine Presence as being total and complete by the Judas Priests of the "Novus Ordo Missae" and communion in the hand along with its boon ally, Liberal Protestantism?

–to be continued–
j hughes dunphy]]>jhdunphy@theorthodoxromancatholic.comCommunion in The hand2007-10-07T22:02:53-07:00http://www.theorthodoxromancatholic.com/index_files/7722fec56c6724802401bed40a09a06a-27.html#unique-entry-id-27http://www.theorthodoxromancatholic.com/index_files/7722fec56c6724802401bed40a09a06a-27.html#unique-entry-id-27
"Betrayal and Communion in the Hand and the Novus Ordo Missae"

In the past forty years with the reformed liturgy known as the “Novus Ordo Missae” (New Order of the Mass), nothing eclipses the endless abominations in the Temple of God like communion in the hand, an innovation promulgated by Pope Paul VI’s reign and magnified exponentially throughout the Church universal under Pope John Paul II.

It is not an exaggeration to say this is the most widespread abuse of the “Novus Ordo Missae” or reformed liturgy of the Mass, for it has contributed everywhere it has been introduced to the exterior and interior collapse of personal piety and the reverence due to the Sacred Species and, nowhere is this more obvious, than in the rite of the “Novus Ordo Missae” itself. Moreover, here it is necessary to refer, particularly, to the very arrogance of human touch so presumptuously reaching out to touch what is so untouchable by human flesh, the Infinite Spirit of God. What can be more unimaginable and arrogant than to touch what is so utterly unapproachable by fallen human nature, the Infinite Perfection of the Godhead, and to reach out boldly with hands so soiled and impure from a lifetime of sinning for Infinite Purity Itself?

For the profane to defile the Most Holy, for the mundane to belittle the Celestial or the finite to be arrogant before the Infinite is the worst form of detraction of the Glory of God because this sacrilege is perpetrated by creatures visibly more audacious than the rebellious angels themselves, since it has been effected by beings created not from pure spirit as the angels, but from mere dust-- and that makes the offense more hideous.

What is being advanced in the “Novus Ordo” reformed liturgy of communion in the hand is one of the most egregious attacks upon all Sacred Tradition in Catholic teaching, the liturgy, and the faith by everything the nether regions has to offer sinful human pride since the very foundation of Christendom itself in the Upper Room; for all the Catholic faith and its worship of God comes down to its belief and practice: its teachings, preachings and doctrine of the Most Holy Eucharist.


No ploy of Satan has been more effective and had more impact than utilizing human pride to achieve his nefarious ends and purposes since the fall of the angelic hosts, for this tactic likewise brought down our first parents in what was the second most precipitous fall in the war between the celestial realm and the infernal. It is this poisonous pride of self-worth that has manifested itself in a plethora of disguises of satanical false charity, most of which are extraordinarily subtle, seemingly transparent but, nevertheless, most lethal to souls. And where does this attack by Satan and his fallen angels strive for its greatest triumph than against the Most Holy Eucharist Itself. Some aspects of this false charity of self-esteem out-of-control may be more recognizable and overt in secular society today with the endless barrage of infernal enticements to the human ego for gratification of every capital sin, justifying by endless specious arguments why the human ego ought to be gratified with every kind of human lust be it gluttony of food or drink or sexual excess of every kind, a so-called right to vent one’s anger at one’s neighbor, reasons why one ought to receive a wage for doing absolutely nothing, and envious arguments aplenty why one ought to have more than one’s neighbor by inundating oneself with material possessions. All of these offenses, while serious enough against God from the perspective of self-adulation, pale in respect to Satan’s ultimate attack of false charity on the Church, the liturgy, and the Holy Eucharist in particular-- his most subtle and pernicious assault of them all.

The Great Imitator sallies forth in disguises most appalling, alluring, and enticingly pointed to make what is profane in liturgical matters appear holy. His invasion of the sanctuary of God has become more deleterious now in salvation history than ever before, for he has opted to capture the ultimate gift of grace to mankind from God Himself, the very cult of His worship: the pinnacle of all sacramental love on earth, the Most Holy Eucharist Itself. This, undoubtedly, is the most insidious and pernicious attack of them all, one that even Pope Paul VI, after allowing this innovation of communion in the hand came to vociferously regret only a few years later: “The smoke of Satan has entered the sanctuary of the Church.”

So the love of self through the ruse of false charity, the very cult of Satan himself, has brought the battle for souls to a boil with an attack on the heart of man’s salvation, the Most Holy Eucharist. By advancing his philosophy of false charity and self love and by attacking the Holy Eucharist, God’s throne of grace for mankind in this world, Satan launches his worst battle for souls conceivable. Anyone with the least spiritual vision can verify the lethal results on souls of this vicious attack by Satan, most notably in the decline of exterior piety and reverence of those receiving Holy Communion as well as the precipitous drop in numbers of worthy communicants and, finally, the rise of unworthy ones. Clearly, this all stems from the catastrophic innovation of Communion in the hand out of the reformed rite of the “Novus Ordo Missae.”

Love of self, self adulation, and self-esteem are the wicked tools of false charity used by Satan to attack reverence due the Holy Eucharist caused by the “Novus Ordo” innovation of communion in the hand, a veritable reversal of the traditional teaching of ‘holiness of demeanor and humility and unworthiness’ advocated by the Church for centuries in approaching the Holy Eucharist.


Nothing exhibits one’s love of Christ in the Eucharist more or less than one’s exterior piety and comportment towards this sacrament, especially in the very receiving of Our Divine Lord Himself. Because of the suppressed sense of one’s unworthiness and sinfulness in the “Novus Ordo Missae” as compared to the “Missa Latina Tridentina” (Tridentine Latin Mass) which is so evident even at first glance from the single streamlined “Confiteor” in the “Novus Ordo Missae” to the much longer and more supplicatory “Confiteor” repeated three times over during the “Missa Tridentina Latina”, one sees how the door has been opened wide to all kinds of errant rationalizations of false charity in the face of sin before Almighty God.


The most egregious example of false charity is the very notion of communion in the hand itself --an outgrowth of the “Novus Ordo”-- where a false sense of priestly self-worth pervades the laity, alluring the unordained to take up Christ’s Body and Blood for oneself in Communion just like a priest at the altar. Self pride and a failed sense of sinfulness feed all kinds of other egalitarian liturgical improprieties of exterior demeanor too: casual dress, shorts, t-shirts, unfolded hands, distracted and unprayerful expressions of the face, standing posture instead of kneeling before the Lord, lack of thanksgiving after Mass for the Holy Eucharist in silent prayer, dropped particles of the Sacred Host, everywhere; all because of the very liturgical aberration of communion in the hand itself. Any of these abominations of the Most Holy Presence could, clearly, be venial or mortal sins of disrespect--reckless violations of the First Commandment. All of these sins deprive the Trinity of the adorations He so rightly deserves.


Each and every one of these liturgical aberrations derives from an inflated pride of one’s self-worth and moral equivalency with God and the fallacious notion: ‘I am really worthy for You to enter under my roof, O Lord, because you love me no matter what I do’ --truly a Protestant notion that is now enshrined in the hearts and minds of the vast majority of “Novus Ordo” Catholics; notwithstanding clergy, be it bishops, priests, or deacons.


It is this philosophy of false charity that is essential to the survival of Protestant worship and that has now become the very life of the “Novus Ordo” liturgy and Mass since Vatican II. In fact, this false charity of Protestant worship has become the very heart and soul of the “Novus Ordo Missae”, especially with communion in the hand. This false charity not only pervades liberal Protestantism (all Protestantism being liberal vis-a-vis Roman Catholicism) and the “Novus Ordo Missae”, but also consumed the very heart and soul of Judas Iscariot, Christ’s betrayer. Modern day Protestantism and the Liberal Catholicism of the “Novus Ordo Missae”, just like Judas Iscariot in Christ’s own day, have diminished, downplayed, and degraded the divine and supernatural of Christ's Infinite Presence in this world to the humanistic and mundane, a fact that has had the most deleterious consequences upon personal piety since Vatican II.

--to be continued--

j hughes dunphy ]]>jhdunphy@theorthodoxromancatholic.comCHASTITY & PURITY2007-06-29T13:01:08-07:00http://www.theorthodoxromancatholic.com/index_files/4bdd37282b1851026617e26c22245230-26.html#unique-entry-id-26http://www.theorthodoxromancatholic.com/index_files/4bdd37282b1851026617e26c22245230-26.html#unique-entry-id-26

Orthodox Roman Catholic Pledge of Purity: based on teaching of John Hardon, S.J.

"Only two kinds of people will reach heaven: the very chaste and the very humble.  Nobody else, nobody else, nobody else.”  Father John Hardon, S.J.  


As orthodox Roman Catholics what should be our preparation for the Second Coming of Christ, which, judging from the times in which we live, may be soon– if not very soon– but a zealous joy of preparation in prayer and living: "Drop down dew, ye heavens, from above, and let the clouds rain the just; let the earth be opened and bud forth a Savior." (Is., 14: 8) And what should be our very immediate preparation for the coming of Christ? Our Catholic Church teaches us through the words of St. Paul: "Not in rioting and drunkenness, not in chambering and impurities, not in contention and envy: but put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ." Therefore, all the excesses of our passions are here forbidden by St. Paul: eating or drinking to excess; lusts of the flesh, and uncharitable behavior towards our neighbors are here rejected strongly, all of which keep us slaves to our sensual appetites, dull the workings of the mind, and destroy a tranquil spirit. This makes us all inattentive to the care of our souls, destroying any desire for spiritual things.

Our Lord’s words on this same matter is one the severest admonitions He ever uttered: "And take heed to yourselves, lest perhaps your hearts be overcharged with surfeiting and drunkenness, and the cares of this life, and that day come upon you suddenly." (Luke: 21: 34). And Jesus warned strongly again: "And, as it came to pass in the days of Noe, so shall it be also in the days of the Son of man. They did eat and drink, they married wives and were given in marriage, until the day that Noe entered into the ark; and the flood came and destroyed them all." (Luke: 27: 27-28) Jesus condemns all sinful use of the passions, for, obviously, they did them in Noe’s Day and they were punished severely for them, days in which , as Christ suggests here, people were mesmerized by passions of the flesh more than almost any other sin.
 
And of all the passions in Noe’s day or even today, no passion of the flesh is worse than impurity; for impurity is the very worst obstacle of all to the spiritual life of union with Jesus Christ, Our Savior. Impurity is, indeed, the very worst threat to our spiritual life and union with Jesus Christ, Our Divine Savior, because it drags us down from the joy of Christ’s Second Coming for which we should be ardently longing. For this vice reduces man to the level of the brutes. It blinds him to the truth and hardens his heart against the call to spiritual things above. It enthrones self-gratification in his very soul. A man who continues a lifestyle of impurity and unchaste living will inevitably become enslaved by it, and will most likely carry it to the grave. Only a very exceptional grace of God will save him. When he is converted, it is usually the self-sacrifice of some innocent soul in years of prayer and penance that obtains for him his own repentance from this life of lust. Often such souls would be converted, if they would only beseech our Blessed Virgin Mary to intercede for him, but usually a person of such ilk has virtually no devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary.
 
Morever, purity is also a natural law, controlling and directing the sex drive towards societal repopulation and growth of nations of the world, as well as individual health and morality. This desire is almost as strong as the craving for food and drink and the instinct of self-preservation. If this passion in people is not controlled we see the societal ills foisted upon us as today: incest, pedophilia, rape, pornography, adultery, fornication, child-pregnancies, stem-cell murders, contraception and abortion. Lose control of our passions over impurity and all virtue disappears with the loss of chastity and continence. We even see again today a new world-wide corruption of people eating and drinking to excess and giving and taking in adulterous marriage relationships as well as marriages of every perverted type and kind that warrant, perhaps, another Great Flood from Almighty God’s just Hand; and we see the same sexual perversions unleashed of a modern day Sodom and Gemorrah, growing like a cancer, in countries throughout the modern world; and one cannot help but notice, for the past forty years, an equivalent flouting of God’s laws against worshiping the golden calf of materialism, just like the two million Jews wandering for forty years in the desert. Virtually everything an human does depends upon a virtuous life of purity, chastity and moderation; and, in fact, these virtues are so intertwined into what we do that in times of opulence, when the golden calf of idolatry is worshiped, there breeds from this excess much more immorality and decadence than in poverty, destroying bodily health, mental vigor, societal decency and all moral rectitude. Consider only the times in which we live that prove conclusively that opulence breeds the worst decadence!

Forty years ago in this country, when there was more want than today, a child could be raised as a virgin till the day of his or her marriage, today it is virtually impossible. In those halcyon days in America and the West, the village raised the child; now it corrupts the child.
 

Modern Media And Sexual Sin

The grosser forms of impurity, by their very ugliness and shamefulness, used to deter many people from committing them, but not in epic times of evil like those of the Great Flood and the ones in which we now live. But there are other forms of impurity too, seemingly less outrageous but nevertheless still serious sins, that are most common and not regarded with the horror they ought to inspire. Reading bad books, looking at bad movies and plays, and, among women, an indecent manner of dress are widespread evils, and do untold harm. Every bookstall is filled with cheap novels which are inducements to sin or its ugly glorification. These novels and, especially the movies today have as their main theme lust. The heroes and heroines are those who violate the sanctity of marriage and give free rein to their impure lusts and passions. Sin is described in detail, the pleasures of sexual sin are paraded, all idea of sin being an offense against God, or even everyday decency, is either ridiculed or totally excluded, and the gratification of impure desires is looked upon as merely a matter of choice or taste. To read such books or to go to such movies are serious sin because the participants are taking part in the sin. These vicious movies against holy purity and virginity and marriage are a direct incitement to our own passions; they fill our minds with impure ideas and our imaginations with obscene images. And, long after the viewing of these movies or reading these books is over, the harmful effects will continue.

The same can be said of the filth on the internet today where it has been estimated only recently that some 50 million viewers voluntarily click on the pornographic websites everyday, which try to outdo each other in their own filthy prurience. The late Fr. John Hardon, S.J. has defined today’s media in all of its forms as the "sexually stimulating media." It does not matter whether it be newspapers, magazines, television, picture shows, or the internet. To participate in these sexually explicit attacks on Christian purity is a mortal sin, and can never be justified under such glib cover-ups as "it doesn’t bother me." This attitude is the sign of a hardened heart or obtuse spirit, one on the road to hell such as the citizens of Sodom and Gemorrah and Noe’s compatriots. The natural law that is written in the hearts of all men forbids good Catholics to participate in any of this wicked fare. But how many chaste Catholics are there today in these times of epic evil which resemble so much the decadent times of Noe and Sodom and Gemorrah? Are These not the very same kind of days that Jesus warned about before His Second Coming? Should they not be frightening and terrifying words to all souls everywhere but especially to those souls who are sensitive to the wisdom of Christ’s words in everything?
 
And it must also be stressed that all sexual violations of the sixth and ninth commandments are the fastest road to hell according to Our Blessed Mother who appeared to the three children of Fatima in 1917 and showed them a shocking vision of hell: three innocent young children to whom she said the following: "More souls go to hell for sins of the flesh than any other sin." To look at immodest actions in movies is always sinful, and to read about people involved in immodest actions is also sinful. Likewise enjoying and listening to such immodest or obscene language on the radio or television is no different. It doesn’t matter what media because all sexual sin and violations of the sixth and ninth commandments never involve "parvity of matter" according to the Church’s teachings and, therefore, are always serious sins when done voluntarily. When anyone turns on the TV, pays for a movie, punches on the internet, or opens a book, newspaper or magazine for the purpose of enjoying a story involving illicit sexual pleasure, he is always acting willfully and therefore involved in a mortal sin. Our Lord warned us all so seriously about condemnation of our souls for sins of impurity when He said: "And if thy eye scandalize thee, pluck it out. It is better for thee with one eye to enter into the kingdom of God, than having two eyes to be cast into the hell of fire: where there worm dieth not, and the fire is not extinguished." Also Father John Hardon, S.J. often said of his own life, so he could always practice the virtues of holy purity and chastity: " I’ve read only two newspapers in my entire life, never watched television, listened to the radio or went to the movies." This is the spiritual wisdom of a holy celibate priest whose cause has currently been taken under consideration for canonization.

Impure Thoughts

Many dangers are likewise forthcoming from our prurient thoughts, especially when we dwell too long on certain ideas that might excite concupiscence or do not suppress certain others immediately. Resist beginnings as all spiritual writers encourage for too slow of a response to impure thoughts can be venial sin and dwelling and taking delight can be serious sin, which Our Divine Teacher so strongly advised against: "You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’ But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lust has already committed adultery with her in his heart." Therefore, the very same precautions for roving eyes apply to a wandering mind.


Impure Speech

"The tongue is a fire, a world of iniquity. The tongue is placed among our members, which defileth the whole body, and inflameth the wheel of our nativity, being set on fire by hell. The tongue no man can tame, an unquiet evil, full of deadly poison. By it we bless God and the Father: and by it we curse men, who are made after the likeness of God. Out of the same mouth proceedeth blessing and cursing. My brethren, these things ought not so be." (James 3: 5-12)

No act of impurity is more common than an unchaste tongue. It is a world of iniquity, as the apostle James testifies, set on fire by hell. And it sins often seriously through profanity, obscenity or vulgarities. In today’s world where most social conventions of decency have lost the social graces of yesteryear i.e. acting as a Christian lady or gentleman, many adults perpetrate the basest crudities of sinful speech upon youth and commit, quite often mortal sins because of their unbridled tongues and the accompanying scandals.

Our Lord Himself indicated the reasons why all should avoid giving scandal to His little ones. "See that you despise not one of these little ones." And why? "For I say to you, that their angels in heaven always see the face of My Father Who is in heaven," and, furthermore, "of such is the kingdom of God."

Terrible punishment necessarily awaits those who disregard the warning of Our Lord: "He that shall scandalize one of these little ones that believe in Me, it were better for him that a millstone should be hanged about his neck, and that he should be drowned in the depth of the sea." These words of Jesus are to be understood in a literal sense, for they do not refer to spiritual children but to those little beings on the threshold of life, for whom scandal is far more dangerous than it is for others. Several pagan Roman authors have commented upon this very innocence of children. According to Horace, a child at this age is like unto soft wax and easily lends itself to vice; once deformed it cannot be easily restored to the form of virtue. We also remember in the great novels of yesteryear, Charles Dickens relating in "Oliver Twist" about Fagan who taught young boys and orphans off the streets of London how to steal for him, via all kinds of unseemly tactics and behavior that Fagan taught them.

The Roman poet Juvenal, wishing to prevent the scandalizing of young impressionable children, taught that the greatest respect is due to them and that nothing sinful should be done in their presence. We all recognize today that the brunt of the scandal that children are subjected to by adults is the unbridled tongues of the older generation who casually use profanity, obscenity, and vulgarities to accent their speech. Often this is done in anger, frustration, or even to be comedic in order to