An Illusion of a "Victory"

by Thomas A. Droleskey

The devil is a master of deceit and illusion. He wants us to believe illusions about ourselves and how "wonderful" we are, how much in need we are of avoiding anything that excessively taxes our physical or mental strength, how little in need we are of authentic penance to make reparation for our sins to the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus through the Immaculate Heart of Mary as her consecrated slaves. Most of us live our lives laboring under some kind of delusion about ourselves and our abilities, minimizing our sins and cutting as many corners as we can in the belief that God will not hold us responsible for the "little" things we do when observing the binding precepts of the Divine positive law and the natural law as He has entrusted them exclusively to the Catholic Church for their safekeeping and infallible explication is just too "inconvenient" or "impractical" for us.

The devil also creates illusions in the realm of popular culture and civil governance. He has convinced even believing Catholics, including those who make no concessions to conciliarism or to the legitimacy of the conciliar ecclesiastical officials, that "progress" can be made in the retarding of various social evils without insisting upon an absolute adherence to the binding precepts of the Divine positive law and the natural law in every aspect of social life, without even trying to plant the seeds for the conversion of men and nations to the Social Reign of Christ the King and Mary our Immaculate Queen. Loving to create a perverse game of false opposites, the adversary raises up some people in public life who are so very bad and obviously supportive of evil that anyone else appears to be better by comparison. Knowing that the human being is always looking for shortcuts in his personal and social lives, the devil wants people to get excited about apparent "victories" that are simply illusions that permit evil to be promoted under cover of law and in every aspect of popular culture while those who are opposed to various evils such as the surgical dismemberment of babies in their mothers' wombs under cover of law congratulate themselves on these illusory "victories."

Such is the case with the decision of the Supreme Court of the United States in the case of Gonzales v. Carhart that upheld the constitutionality of the 2003 Partial Birth Abortion ban that was signed into law by President George W. Bush and then challenged in various United States Distinct Courts immediately thereafter. Reiterating what I have been writing on these subject for the past twelve years without any equivocation, the partial birth abortion ban did not represent a "victory" for the restoration of legal protection for the innocent preborn when it was first raised by Republicans in the United States House of Representatives and the United States Senate in 1995. The upholding of the constitutionality of the bill, which was twice vetoed by President William Jefferson Blyth Clinton, by the Supreme Court of the United States yesterday, Wednesday, April 18, 2007, is not a "victory" for the restoration of legal protection for the innocent preborn in their mothers' wombs. It is an illusion that changes nothing of the reality of the fact that not one child will be saved by the law, now fully effective, and the Supreme Court decision that upheld its constitutionality.

A careful reading of the Text of the Court's Opinion, written by Associate Justice Anthony Kennedy, reveals that the statements made above are absolutely accurate. Indeed, the Court's opinion includes a very accurate description of each of the methods of baby-killing, each of which remains fully "legal" in this country after the decision in Gonzales v. Carhart. Here is a summary of the sobering facts that I have enumerated any number of times over the past twelve years:

1. The direct, intentional killing of an innocent human being is equally morally heinous no matter the age at which the human being is killed. That is, the killing of six week old child in his mother's womb is the same crime morally as the direct, intentional killing of a ninety year old man.

2. The particular method by which a human being is killed does not make the act of killing any more immoral than the use of another method, admitting that it is permissible in the administration of civil justice for legislators and jurists to take into consideration such methods when legislating and meting out punishments for those adjudged guilty after due process of law of having committed acts that of their nature are in opposition to the binding precepts of the Fifth Commandment.

3. Thus it is that the use of the baby-killing method invented by a Dr. Martin Haskell, known "medically" as "intact dilation and extraction," to provide a means of killing a baby that was less "invasive" and thus allegedly less is no more morally heinous than the killing of an innocent preborn baby by means a suction vacuum machine that is twenty-nine times more powerful than the home vacuum cleaner.

4. The use of "intact dilation and extraction" is no more morally heinous than the killing of an innocent preborn baby by means of the use of various injections, including that of potassium chloride, into the baby so as to kill it in the womb before it is passed out stillborn or taken out by means of a Caesarian section.

5. The use of "intact dilation and extraction" is no more morally heinous the the killing of an innocent preborn baby by means of the use of what is known as the "hysterotomy," a procedure by which a preborn baby is killed by the use of a procedure similar to a Caesarian section, except that the child's neck is twisted in the womb before it is removed. (The hysterotomy was made famous in the case of Dr. Kenneth Edelin.)

6. The use of "intact dilation and extraction" is no more morally heinous than the "dilation and evacuation" method of killing a baby by means of carving up a baby in the uterus and then extracting his remains with forceps.

7. Those, including some conciliar bishops, have said that partial birth abortion is infanticide have missed the point entirely: each and every abortion kills a living baby deader than dead. Each abortion, whether chemically induced or surgically performed, is infanticide. (See Every Abortion Kills a Baby Dead).

8.The Partial Birth Abortion bill that is now the law of the land contains an immoral"life of the mother" exception, meaning that this procedure of killing a baby will still be used. And it will be used not only in cases where it is alleged that a mother's life is "endangered." Do we really think that those who kill for a living are going to be scrupulously honest about observing the exact conditions of the "life of the mother" exception?

9. Baby-killers will simply resort to the dilation and evacuation means of killing children if they cannot justify the use of partial birth abortion, meaning, as I have been contended since 1995, that zero babies will be saved by the law and by yesterday''s decision in Gonzales v. Carhart. Indeed, Associate Justice Anthony Kennedy went to great lengths to remind those who challenged the law that the other procedures, which he described in great detail, would remain perfectly legal. Justice Kennedy also explained that baby-killers who "accidentally" turned a dilation and evacuation killing of a child into an intact dilation and extraction (partial birth abortion) killing of a child would face no legal liability:

This reasoning, however, does not take account of the Act's intent requirements, which preclude liability from attaching to an accidental intact D&E. If a doctor's intent at the outset is to perform a D&E in which the fetus would not be delivered to either of the Act's anatomical landmarks, but the fetus nonetheless is delivered past one of those points, the requisite and prohibited scienter is not present. 18 U. S. C. §1531(b)(1)(A) (2000 ed., Supp. IV). When a doctor in that situation completes an abortion by performing an intact D&E, the doctor does not violate the Act. It is true that intent to cause a result may sometimes be inferred if a person "knows that that result is practically certain to follow from his conduct." 1 LaFave §5.2(a), at 341. Yet abortion doctors intending at the outset to perform a standard D&E procedure will not know that a prohibited abortion "is practically certain to follow from" their conduct. Ibid. A fetus is only delivered largely intact in a small fraction of the overall number of D&E abortions. Planned Parenthood, 320 F. Supp. 2d, at 965.

 

10. In other words, ladies and gentlemen, baby-killers will still be able to kill babies in the later stages of pregnancy by the use of the saline solution abortion and the hysterotomy and the dilation and evacuation (and even an actual hysterectomy performed for reasons of killing a preborn child and to honor a woman's elective wishes to render herself sterile from that point forward). The belief that a "victory" was won yesterday is an illusion of the worst sort.

Some "true believers" in the American constitutional processes will contend that there is "just one victory" in a long battle to restore full legal protection to the preborn. How can this be any kind of victory when the decision of the Supreme Court of the United States in Gonzales v. Carhart reaffirms the "right" of women to "choose" to kill their children, albeit with some regulations here and there (parental notification or consent with a "judicial bypass, a twenty-four or forty-eight hour waiting period, information on what an abortion is and surgical complications arising therefrom, the places and conditions under which babies may be killed in the second and third trimester), under cover of law is beyond me. Justice Kennedy went to great lengths to explain exactly how available baby-killing has become in this country, which is one of the reasons he joined Chief Justice John Roberts and fellow Associate Justices Antonin Scalia, Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito in upholding the constitutionality of the partial birth abortion ban legislation. According to Kennedy, you see, access to abortion will not be impeded by the partial birth abortion ban, which, as he sees it, is a way for the American public to express its outrage over a particular type of child-killing and to place some limits on the use of that form of child-killing:

It was reasonable for Congress to think that partial-birth abortion, more than standard D&E, undermines the public's perception of the doctor's appropriate role during delivery, and perverts the birth process.(Associate Justice Anthony Kennedy, Gonzales v. Carhart.)

 

Undermines the public's perception of the doctor's appropriate role during delivery, and perverts the birth process? Sentimentality and emotionalism have replaced the rule of law according to the binding precepts of the Divine positive law and the natural law, which binds all men in all nations in all circumstances at all times without any exception whatsoever. To justify a morally flawed bill that does not even fully outlaw the child-killing procedure described as "undermining the public's perception of the doctor's appropriate role during delivery" is itself perverse and absurd. The only logical conclusion one can draw from this is that forms of child-killing that are publicly acceptable, largely because it is out of view and done on tiny human beings who cannot speak for themselves,will remain perfectly legal as they do not undermine "the public's perception of the doctor's appropriate role" before delivery of a child. Such is the monstrous way in which jurists reason in a world where men and their nations are not subordinate to the Catholic Church in her exercise of the Social Reign of Christ King in all that pertains to the good of souls.

Do not be deceived by the those who are creating and sustaining the illusion that a "victory" has been won. Do not be deceived by those who recite the old canard that we cannot "let the perfect be the enemy of the good." The partial birth abortion ban has never been anything "good." It has always been and it remains on this very day a cheap political trick by which phony pro-life politicians, most of whom support baby-killing in the "hard" cases and fund the chemical assassination of children by means of domestic and international "family planning" programs, have burnished their credentials while they do nothing to reverse the Food and Drug Administration's September, 2000, decision to market the human pesticide, RU-486, the French abortion pill, while they do nothing to reverse the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act (FACE), while they campaign most actively for fully pro-abortion candidates who belong to their own political party.

Do not be deceived into thinking that a reversal of Roe v. Wade is on the horizon. It is not. Associate Justice Anthony Kennedy joined the four members (Roberts, Scalia, Thomas, Alito) who would probably vote to reverse Roe v. Wade at some point solely because the principles of Roe, which he supports, were not threatened in Gonzales v. Carhart. Even if, say, the oldest member of the Supreme Court of the United States, Associate Justice John Paul Stevens, who was appointed by the thirty-third degree Mason named Gerald Rudolph Ford, Jr., resigns or retires and is replaced by President George W. Bush by a "recess appointment" who is pro-life, creating, at least until the end of the time of the 110th Congress, a majority to reverse Roe, no cases are working their way through the United States District Courts and United States Circuit Courts of Appeal that challenge the constitutionality of Roe v. Wade itself, thus making it next-to-impossible for such a case to be heard and decided by the end of Bush's term on January 20, 2009. (A "recess appointment" is one made by a president when Congress is in recess and a vacancy has occurred in an office requiring confirmation by a majority vote of the United States Senate. Such an appointee serves until the end of the two-year term of that Congress unless he is confirmed by the Senate and, in the case of a Federal judge, is thus appointed to serve during what is called "good behavior," which means for life or until resignation or impeachment and removal from office after conviction by a two-thirds vote of the United States Senate.)

Even a reversal of Roe v. Wade would not end baby-killing nationwide, although it would limit it in some states. For example, Associate Justice Antonin Scalia has stated quite publicly, including at a Communion Breakfast in the City of New York ten years ago next month, that is, in May of 1997, that the Constitution of the United States of America is "silent" about abortion, a belief that is itself most arguable (arguments can be made on purely constitutional grounds that the U.S. Constitution's Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments prohibit abortion), meaning that state legislatures are "free" to permit, restrict or prohibit child-killing. Scalia said that he would be duty bound to uphold the constitutionality of state legislation permitting abortion as he contends that it is not prohibited by the words of the United States Constitution and that he is prohibited from using anything extraneous to the actual words of the Constitution, including the binding precepts of the Divine positive law and the natural law, to strike down legislation he might not like personally but is not, as he sees it, prohibited by the words of the Constitution, making him a rank legal positivist (that law has no higher foundation that the actual words of various constitutions and statutes and codes and ordinances). Those states that chose to keep baby-killing "safe and legal" if Roe v. Wade would thus find a friend in the person of Antonin Scalia (and possibly John Roberts and Samuel Alito), as well as "states' rights" members of The Federalist Society, ever desirous of defending the "rights" of states rather than recognizing the primacy of the Deposit of Faith as Our Lord had entrusted it exclusively to the Catholic Church. No human legislature at any level of government (national, state, local, provincial) has any "right" to contravene by means of positive legislation and/or by judicial decisions the binding precepts of any of God's laws, including the Fifth Commandment.

An analysis by the Life Legal Defense Fund (see PDF - Executive Summary, Table, and Map for a most comprehensive and cogent summary of the actual truth of the situation that we face at the present time; please take the time to review this factual information as it will help you to "sober up" in the face of illusory "victories") concludes that baby-killing would be limited or prohibited in only seven states if Roe v. Wade was overturned. Thus, even the overturning of Roe v. Wade would not be a "victory" for the restoration of legal protection for the innocent preborn in their mothers' wombs. Much like yesterday's decision of the Supreme Court of the United States in Gonzales v. Carhart, a reversal of Roe v. Wade would make pro-life Americans "feel" better without changing the reality of the daily slaughter of the preborn under cover of law.

The professional, career politicians and their political consultants know all of this. So do the leaders of the various advocacy groups. The illusion created by the whole partial birth abortion ban debate, which did, to be sure, explain the horror of one particular form of child-killing, is tailor-made for those who run for office ("Vote for for the Democrats to protect Roe v. Wade;" "Vote for Republicans to protect life")and those who make quite a substantial living from the direct mail appeals that are made whenever these illusions are created during times of "crisis" and "controversy" ("Give to us now in order to keep abortion 'safe and legal';" "Give to us now in order to continue making the progress we are making under our pro-life leader, President George W. Bush"). Both sides will sound the clarion calls, knowing full well that nothing has changed and that nothing will change in this country as long as we assassinate millions of babies this year by means of chemical abortifacients and as long as anyone in public life maintains that there is a single instance in which an innocent human being in his mother's womb under cover of law. This is one of the absolute, iron laws of naturalism, which cannot admit that the one and only way to retard evils in the hearts and souls of men and thus in their nations is Catholicism and Catholicism alone.

Given the fact that both those who support baby-killing in all instances and those who believe in baby-killing in some instances (Bush, for example, and most other so-called "pro-life" public officials and leaders of the National Right to Life Committee and its related organizations and sycophantic supporters) know that nothing substantive has changed as a result of the decision of the Supreme Court of the United States in the case of Gonzales v. Carhart, it is truly laughable to see the likes of Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton and other completely pro-abortion advocates adverting to the "forty years" of "legal precedent" that support baby-killing under cover of law. The devil knows that the only way to combat that sort of fractured history is for someone to point out that full protection to innocent human life in the womb has been afforded only as a result of the influence of the Catholic Church in history, a point that no "conservative" Catholic commentator is going to make lest he lose his "access" to the "talking head" shows and support from pro-life Protestants and Jews and Mohammedans.

There is quite a parallel here, if you think about it.

That is, an illusion of monstrous proportions is about to be created by Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI when (if) he issues the motu proprio "liberating" the modernized version of the Immemorial Mass of Tradition for "private" celebrations by priests in the conciliar structures (many of whom are not validly ordained priests, obviously) without a conciliar bishop's permission (and which might, some press reports indicate, authorize a group of thirty people in a parish to request the offering of the Mass according to the Missal of John XXIII). Ratzinger knows full well that there are conciliar bishops (Roger Mahony, Tod Brown, George Niederauer, Joseph Adamec, et al.) who will protest the motu proprio with all of their might, causing them to protest personally to Roman officials themselves and/or to drag their feet in acting on the implementation of the motu proprio. These conciliar bishops will point to the "forty years" of "tradition" represented by the Novus Ordo Missae, much as those who support abortion fully are pointing currently to the "thirty years" of "legal precedent" of Roe v. Wade. The "liberation" of the Mass would be as "divisive" to a conciliar church that has "prospered" under the "inclusion" of the "people" in the "liturgy," the "bad" conciliar bishops will argue, just as the no-exceptions pro-abortion crowd is saying that Gonzales v. Carhart is "harmful" to the women who have grown up with the "rights" established in Roe v. Wade.Oh, yes, there is quite a parallel here.

Such false opposition within the counterfeit church of conciliarism upon the issuance of any motu proprio "liberating" the modernized version of the Traditional Mass will serve Ratzinger's purposes so very well, causing traditionally-minded Catholics to be swept away by the emotion of the moment and to leap to the defense of the "pope" who "liberated the Mass," choosing to go easy on him on such things as the ecclesiological and Eucharistic heresies, choosing to go easy on him about ecumenism and religious liberty and the abomination that is the Novus Ordo Missae. Some, although not all, Catholics in the "resist and recognize" camp will join their brethern in the "indult" community and learn how to keep their peace in order to oppose those nasty conciliar bishops who are opposing the "pope" who is a Modernist to the very core of his being. This is exactly what is happening now in the political realm as even some sensible people have taken leave of their senses and are hailing George W. Bush as a "pro-life hero" for signing the partial birth abortion ban into law, ignoring the truth about the law itself and ignoring the fact that Bush is a pro-abort and supports and funds the chemical killing of children in their mothers' wombs in this country and around the world, ignoring also the death and carnage he has visited upon Iraq. Ah, who is going to preside over a memorial service for the 170 people killed in Baghdad, Iraq, yesterday? Oh, well, more invisible people that are killed every day, joining the four thousand invisible babies who are killed by means other than "intact dilation and extraction." Who wants the facts to get in the way of a good time?

The human propensity to believe in illusions is easier than using one's reason to face simple facts. All I could do last year was to shake my head in disbelief when some completely no-exceptions pro-life leaders kept insisting that the bill passed by the South Dakota State Legislature a year ago did not permit the direct, intentional killing of any child in any circumstances when the bill's own sponsor, State Representative Roger Hunt, kept insisting to me that the bill did indeed contain a "life of the mother" exception that would leave the "choice" of a "direct action" to a physician. Hunt and other of the bill's supporters touted this "exception" during the campaign to defeat a referendum designed to overturn the bill, which had been signed into law in March of last year by South Dakota Governor Mike Rounds. It was beyond the capacity, evidently, of some otherwise completely no-exceptions pro-life leaders to admit this fact, preferring to believe that their own interpretation of the bill as one containing no exceptions was correct and that the bill's own sponsor had it wrong.(See: Good Intentions Do Not Redeem Moral Flaws, No Exceptions to Catholicism, Not One, Ever, The Folly of Playing by the Adversary's Rules.)

What I wrote in The Folly of Playing by the Adversary's Rules is relevant once again:

The illogic of playing by the devil's rules was also on display in the case argued before the Supreme Court of the United States yesterday, November 8, 2006, concerning the constitutionality of the conditional, partial ban on partial birth abortions that was passed by the United States Congress in 2003. The Solicitor General of the United States, Paul Clement, actually argued that the conditional ban on partial birth abortions, which permits babies to be killed by this particular method of child-killing in the later stages of pregnancy if a "mother's life is endangered," is not meant to impede another method of baby-killing in the later stages of pregnancy (dilation and evacuation, a procedure in which a child is carved up in the birth canal and then extracted piece by piece). In other words, certain forms of baby-killing are acceptable to the "pro-life" administration, including partial-birth abortion in some cases, and one is not, well, at least in most cases. Does anyone see any problem with something called logic here?

Here is an excerpt from the story about the case in The New York Times:

Among the justices most interested in the medical details was the one whom both sides consider most likely to be in a position to control the outcome, Anthony M. Kennedy.

Justice Kennedy’s questioning suggested that he had not made up his mind, despite his strongly worded dissenting opinion when the court struck down Nebraska’s version of the federal law six years ago, and despite his obvious distaste for the procedure at issue. Instead, his questions suggested that he remained open to persuasion that the law placed doctors in legal jeopardy and imposed an unconstitutional burden on their patients’ right to terminate their pregnancies.

One example was his response to the assertion by Solicitor General Paul D. Clement that it was never necessary for doctors to use the banned procedure because a more common procedure, one not covered by the statute, “has been well tested and works every single time as a way to terminate the pregnancy.”

Justice Kennedy responded: “Well, but there is a risk if the uterine wall is compromised by cancer or some forms of pre-eclampsia and it’s very thin. There’s a risk of being punctured.”

His comment reflected arguments that the doctors challenging the law have made. They say that “partial-birth abortion” — known medically as both “intact dilation and evacuation” and “D and X,” for dilation and extraction — is often safer because the removal of an intact fetus avoids injury to the uterus. The more common method of second-trimester abortion, in which the fetus is dismembered, can leave behind bone fragments.

 

Like Harry Blackman before her thirty-three years ago, Associate Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, no friend of innocent preborn life whatsoever, asked why intact dilation and extraction, partial-birth abortion, is more gruesome to the bill's sponsors than dilation and evacuation. Her point is well taken. She believes in all abortion, obviously. However, Justice Ginsburg was pointing out the absolute absurdity of opposing one form of child killing without opposing them all. It is very sad that one who supports evil under cover of law can see the logical fallacies of those who claim to be "pro-life." What Catholics have forgotten on this issue is the simple fact that all forms of child killing are gruesome and each is equally morally heinous in the eyes of God, being one of the four sins that cry out to Heaven for vengeance. And even if the law is sustained by the Supreme Court of the United States, you see, baby-killers will simply resort to the other forms of killing defended by Solicitor General Paul Clement.

 

As noted above, conciliarism has played a very significant role in helping to reinforce the underlying suppositions of Americanism concerning the alleged "necessity" of opposing various moral evils in a generic, non-denominational way, opening up the path to scores of logical inconsistencies. . . . . We must not deceive ourselves into thinking that we are one or two elections away from this or that goal, that the closely divided results of various elections and referenda augers well for us. They do not. They are a sign of the fact that the forces of evil are inculcating more and more young minds in an acceptance of moral depravity as their "right" and that the sentimentalities of naturalism are the foundation of individual moral judgments and thus of public policy itself. And just consider how most of the conciliar shepherds are deaf, dumb, and blind as their flocks vote for the likes of Edward Moore Kennedy and Hillary Rodham Clinton and and Debbie Stebenow and Maria Cantwell and Arnold Schwarzenegger by the droves. No, it is not the route of electoral politics that is going to change the country or the world.

Consider this passage from The Devotion to the Sacred heart of Jesus: How to Practice the Sacred Heart Devotion, written by Father John Croiset, S.J., about this betrayal of Catholics to the cause of Christ the King:

Consider that it was no less afflicting and sad for Jesus Christ to see the ingratitude of the majority of the faithful, who would have only coldness and indifference for Him in the Sacrament of His love. He aw the little esteem, nay, even the contempt with which they would treat this greatest proof of His love. He saw that no matter what He might do to be loved by the faithful, even dwelling always amongst them in the Blessed Eucharist, neither this excess of His love, nor His benefits, nor His very presence would be capable of making the greater part of them love Him or would prevent them from forgetting Him. he saw that those churches in which He was to be sacramentally present would be left for most of the time without adorers. He saw what little reverence, nay, what disrespect would be shown in His presence. He saw clearly how the greater part of His followers, who spend long hours in vain amusement and useless visits and complete idleness, would rarely find a quarter of an hour to spend before Him in the Blessed Sacrament. He knew how many others would visit Him only under compulsion and without either devotion or reverence. And finally, He saw the very small number who would eagerly visit Him and devoutly adore Him. He saw clearly that the greater number take no more notice of Him than if He were not really present in the Blessed Sacrament or than if He were a person of no consequence.

The harsh treatment which He received from the Jews, Gentiles and heretics was indeed very painful to Him, but they were His open enemies. But could we ever thought it possible that those who recognize His benefits, that those who make profession of being faithful to Him, that His own children should not only be insensible to His benefits and in no way touched with compassion at the sight of the grief caused by such contempt, but that they should treat Him with contempt by their irreverences and sacrileges? Our Saviour might well say: "If pagans and Turks and infidels had treated Me so, I might have endured it." "for if my enemy had reviled me, I would verily have borne it". (Ps. 54:13), but that Christians, Catholics whom I have not only redeemed, but have fed and nourished with my Body and Blood, should have nothing but contempt for Me, that they should treat Me with ingratitude, is too much. "But thou a man of one mind, my guide and my familiar: who didst take sweetmeats together with me! (Ps. 54: 14-15)

What must be the sentiments of this most generous and tender Heart of Jesus which has so loved men, and which finds in the hearts of those men only coldness and contempt? "I am become a reproach among my enemies." (Ps. 30: 12). If after exposing Myself to the contempt and hatred of My enemies in the midst of the outrages which I suffer, I could at least find a large number of faithful friends who would console Me! But it is quite the contrary: "They that saw me without fled from me." (Ps. 30:12) The greater number, seeing that I have disguised Myself under the feeble appearance of bread in order to have the pleasure of dwelling among men, abandon Me and forget Me as a person who has no place in their hearts, "I am forgotten as one dead from the heart." (Ps. 30:13)

To think and to act as a Catholic means that we must not look for results as we seek to plant the seeds for the restoration of Tradition in the Church and of Christendom in the world as the fruit of the Triumph of Our Lady's Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart. The Apostles did not see the glory of the first Christendom with their own eyes. They did not engage in inter-religious dialogue as they proclaimed the truths of the true Faith without compromise, being willing to suffer everything for the sake of the Holy Name of Our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. The path to the first Christendom, therefore, was laid by the patient bearing of sufferings in the midst of persecution by the Jews and by the Romans, the statists of their own day, as the Gospel of the Divine Redeemer was proclaimed with great for the souls for whom Our Lord had shed every single drop of His Most Precious Blood. This is exactly what we must do today as the consecrated slaves of Our Lady's Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart as we plant the seeds for her glorious triumph as she had promised at Fatima.

We must stop playing by the adversary's rules in his playground and start seeing the world clearly through the eyes of the true Faith as we reject Modernity in the world and the Modernism that is at the foundation of the conciliar church. Let us pray with earnest supplication before Our Lord's Real Presence in the Most Blessed Sacrament and pray as many Rosaries each day as our states-in-life permit so that soon will be heard the cry from all hearts, consecrated to the Immaculate Heart of Mary and to the Sacred Heart of Jesus:

 

Am I saying that there is no way to "make progress" against abortion in the pluralistic framework of the United States of America? Pretty much. Oh, there are instances when some local governmental body or even a state legislature might have a worthwhile proposal to support. We must remember some basic facts that I will never tire of reiterating:

1. No one who supports a single exception to the inviolability of innocent human life is pro-life. Such a person is simply less pro-abortion that those who are support baby-killing under cover of law without any restrictions or exceptions.

2. No one who supports contraception is pro-life.

3. No one who supports candidates for public office who support baby-killing under cover of law is pro-life. How can we "build a world where every child will be welcomed in life and protected by law" when people said to be "pro-life" not only believe that babies can be killed in some instances but that it is no impediment to the building up of a "culture of life" by supporting the public careers, whether elected or appointed, of men and women who believe that the civil law can and must permit mothers to pay killers to slaughter their children?

4. The institutions of civil governance must be subordinate at all times to the binding precepts of the Divine positive law and the natural law as they have been entrusted to the Catholic Church, something that citizens have a positive duty to point out, as Pope Leo XIII noted in Sapientiae Christianae, January 10, 1890:

Now, if the natural law enjoins us to love devotedly and to defend the country in which we had birth, and in which we were brought up, so that every good citizen hesitates not to face death for his native land, very much more is it the urgent duty of Christians to be ever quickened by like feelings toward the Church. For the Church is the holy City of the living God, born of God Himself, and by Him built up and established. Upon this earth, indeed, she accomplishes her pilgrimage, but by instructing and guiding men she summons them to eternal happiness. We are bound, then, to love dearly the country whence we have received the means of enjoyment this mortal life affords, but we have a much more urgent obligation to love, with ardent love, the Church to which we owe the life of the soul, a life that will endure forever. For fitting it is to prefer the good of the soul to the well-being of the body, inasmuch as duties toward God are of a far more hallowed character than those toward men.

Moreover, if we would judge aright, the supernatural love for the Church and the natural love of our own country proceed from the same eternal principle, since God Himself is their Author and originating Cause. Consequently, it follows that between the duties they respectively enjoin, neither can come into collision with the other. We can, certainly, and should love ourselves, bear ourselves kindly toward our fellow men, nourish affection for the State and the governing powers; but at the same time we can and must cherish toward the Church a feeling of filial piety, and love God with the deepest love of which we are capable. The order of precedence of these duties is, however, at times, either under stress of public calamities, or through the perverse will of men, inverted. For, instances occur where the State seems to require from men as subjects one thing, and religion, from men as Christians, quite another; and this in reality without any other ground, than that the rulers of the State either hold the sacred power of the Church of no account, or endeavor to subject it to their own will. Hence arises a conflict, and an occasion, through such conflict, of virtue being put to the proof. The two powers are confronted and urge their behests in a contrary sense; to obey both is wholly impossible. No man can serve two masters, for to please the one amounts to contemning the other.

As to which should be preferred no one ought to balance for an instant. It is a high crime indeed to withdraw allegiance from God in order to please men, an act of consummate wickedness to break the laws of Jesus Christ, in order to yield obedience to earthly rulers, or, under pretext of keeping the civil law, to ignore the rights of the Church; "we ought to obey God rather than men." This answer, which of old Peter and the other Apostles were used to give the civil authorities who enjoined unrighteous things, we must, in like circumstances, give always and without hesitation. No better citizen is there, whether in time of peace or war, than the Christian who is mindful of his duty; but such a one should be ready to suffer all things, even death itself, rather than abandon the cause of God or of the Church.

Hence, they who blame, and call by the name of sedition, this steadfastness of attitude in the choice of duty have not rightly apprehended the force and nature of true law. We are speaking of matters widely known, and which We have before now more than once fully explained. Law is of its very essence a mandate of right reason, proclaimed by a properly constituted authority, for the common good. But true and legitimate authority is void of sanction, unless it proceed from God, the supreme Ruler and Lord of all. The Almighty alone can commit power to a man over his fellow men; nor may that be accounted as right reason which is in disaccord with truth and with divine reason; nor that held to be true good which is repugnant to the supreme and unchangeable good, or that wrests aside and draws away the wills of men from the charity of God.

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

But, if the laws of the State are manifestly at variance with the divine law, containing enactments hurtful to the Church, or conveying injunctions adverse to the duties imposed by religion, or if they violate in the person of the supreme Pontiff the authority of Jesus Christ, then, truly, to resist becomes a positive duty, to obey, a crime; a crime, moreover, combined with misdemeanor against the State itself, inasmuch as every offense leveled against religion is also a sin against the State. Here anew it becomes evident how unjust is the reproach of sedition; for the obedience due to rulers and legislators is not refused, but there is a deviation from their will in those precepts only which they have no power to enjoin. Commands that are issued adversely to the honor due to God, and hence are beyond the scope of justice, must be looked upon as anything rather than laws. You are fully aware, venerable brothers, that this is the very contention of the Apostle St. Paul, who, in writing to Titus, after reminding Christians that they are "to be subject to princes and powers, and to obey at a word," at once adds: "And to be ready to every good work."[7] Thereby he openly declares that, if laws of men contain injunctions contrary to the eternal law of God, it is right not to obey them. In like manner, the Prince of the Apostles gave this courageous and sublime answer to those who would have deprived him of the liberty of preaching the Gospel: "If it be just in the sight of God to hear you rather than God, judge ye, for we cannot but speak the things which we have seen and heard."

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

 

5. The fact that contraception and abortion and usury and perverse sins against the Sixth and Ninth Commandments and pornography and blasphemy exist at all under the aegis of the modern, religiously indifferentist state is the result of Modernity's rejection of the Incarnation as defintional in the lives of men and their nations, thereby spawning the separation of Church and State, and Modernism's embrace of Modernity's basic presuppositions, each of which flies in the face of these eternal truths stated so eloquently by Pope Saint Pius X in Vehementer Nos, February 11, 1906:

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

 

6. To protect physical life we must have a civil government that seeks to foster the eternal good of its citizens. Pope Pius XI, writing in Divini Illius Magistri, December 31, 1929, quoted Silvio Cardinal Antoniano, a disciple of Saint Philip Neri and a teacher of Saint Charles Borromeo, as follows:

"The more closely the temporal power of a nation aligns itself with the spiritual, and the more it fosters and promotes the latter, by so much the more it contributes to the conservation of the commonwealth. For it is the aim of the ecclesiastical authority by the use of spiritual means, to form good Christians in accordance with its own particular end and object; and in doing this it helps at the same time to form good citizens, and prepares them to meet their obligations as members of a civil society. This follows of necessity because in the City of God, the Holy Roman Catholic Church, a good citizen and an upright man are absolutely one and the same thing. How grave therefore is the error of those who separate things so closely united, and who think that they can produce good citizens by ways and methods other than those which make for the formation of good Christians. For, let human prudence say what it likes and reason as it pleases, it is impossible to produce true temporal peace and tranquillity by things repugnant or opposed to the peace and happiness of eternity."

 

We do not remain indifferent to the daily slaughter of the preborn, both by surgical and chemical means, even though the political processes afforded us by naturalism will stop this massacre. No, the daily, invisible massacre of thousands of children must be uppermost in our prayers. We must pray to Our Lady of Guadalupe and Saint Gerard Majella so that at least one child may be saved each day at each place where babies are killed by surgical means under cover of law. We commend the preborn and the elderly and the disabled and the unwanted to Our Lady's Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart in her Most Holy Rosary, which can be prayed before her Divine Son's Real Presence in the Most Blessed Sacrament of a true Catholic Church, one that has validly ordained priests. And we can be a prayerful presence in front of abortuaries with our fellow traditional Catholics as we seek to give a visible, tangible witness to the fact that every abortion is an indirect attack on the Incarnation itself, which is why, for example, Saint Gertrude the Great Church in West Chester, Ohio, held a Pro-Life Vigil on the Transferred Feast of the Annunciation on March 26, 2007, with the Most Blessed Sacrament solemnly exposed for adoration and acts of reparation.

We can also get good scientific facts in the hands of our relatives and friends. A new DVD being distributed by the American Life League (one can see that Mrs. Judie Brown has offered her own remarks concerning Gonzales v. Carhart, Judie Brown's blog: Partial victory or blowing smoke?) describes the first sixteen days of life. A clip can be seen by clicking here: http://www.all.org/babysteps.php.            

Providing people with such information is useful, obviously. Much more importantly, however, is to seek the conversion of those whom God has put into our paths from all eternity to a knowledge and acceptance of and submission to His Holy Truths as He has entrusted them exclusively to the Catholic Church, which is why we must lead people to those places where the Immemorial Mass of Tradition is offered only by priests who make no concessions at all to conciliarism or to the legitimacy of the "shepherds" of the counterfeit church of conciliarism that says it is opposed to various evils as it accommodates itself over and over again to the prevailing ethos of naturalism that is the result of the overthrow of the Social Reign of Christ the King it accepts as irreversible.

Pope Saint Pius X knew that there was only one way to assure a true "victory" in the temporal realm. He outlined this way in Notre Charge Apostolique, August 15, 1910:

We know well that they flatter themselves with the idea of raising human dignity and the discredited condition of the working class. We know that they wish to render just and perfect the labor laws and the relations between employers and employees, thus causing a more complete justice and a greater measure of charity to prevail upon earth, and causing also a profound and fruitful transformation in society by which mankind would make an undreamed-of progress. Certainly, We do not blame these efforts; they would be excellent in every respect if the Sillonist did not forget that a person’s progress consists in developing his natural abilities by fresh motivations; that it consists also in permitting these motivations to operate within the frame of, and in conformity with, the laws of human nature. But, on the contrary, by ignoring the laws governing human nature and by breaking the bounds within which they operate, the human person is lead, not toward progress, but towards death. This, nevertheless, is what they want to do with human society; they dream of changing its natural and traditional foundations; they dream of a Future City built on different principles, and they dare to proclaim these more fruitful and more beneficial than the principles upon which the present Christian City rests.

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

 

As the consecrated slaves of Our Lady's Sorrowful and Imaculate Heart, let us offer our acts of reparation through her Heart to the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus so that all men and all nations will know the victory of the Catholic City, the one that will honor Christ the King and herself as our Immaculate Queen. It is only then that men and their institutions of civil governance will escape the illusions of the devil and live in the brilliant light provided by the standard of the Holy Cross, upon which was wrought our salvation and beneath which stood--and stands every day as the Sacrifice of the Cross is re-presented in an unbloody manner by an alter Christus acting in persona Christi in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass--the Mother of God and the Mother of us all, the Mother who wants us to define each aspect of our personal and social lives around this truth:

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by him: and without him was made nothing that was made. In him was life, and the life was the light of men. And the light shineth in darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it.

There was a man sent from God, whose name was John. This man came for a witness, to give testimony of the light, that all men might believe through him. He was not the light, but was to give testimony of the light. That was the true light, which enlighteneth every man that cometh into this world. He was in the world, and the world was made by him, and the world knew him not.

He came unto his own, and his own received him not. But as many as received him, he gave them power to be made the sons of God, to them that believe in his name. Who are born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God. And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we saw his glory, the glory as it were of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth. (Jn. 1: 1-14)

 

Vivat Christus Rex!

Our Lady of Fatima, pray for us.

 

Saint Joseph, pray for us.

Saints Peter and Paul, pray for us.

Saint John the Baptist, pray for us.

Saint Michael the Archangel, pray for us.

Saint Gabriel the Archangel, pray for us.

Saint Raphael the Archangel, pray for us.

Saint Jude, pray for us.

Saint John the Beloved, pray for us.

Saint Francis Solano, pray for us.

Saint John Bosco, pray for us.

Saint Dominic Savio, pray for us.

Pope Saint Anicetus, pray for us.

Saint Benedict Joseph Labre, pray for us.

Saint Justin the Martyr, pray for us.

Saint  Scholastica, pray for us.

Saint Benedict, pray for us.

Saint Anthony of Padua, pray for us.

Saint Francis of Assisi, pray for us.

Saint Thomas Aquinas, pray for us.

Saint Bonaventure, pray for us.

Saint Augustine, pray for us.

Saint Bernard of Clairvaux, pray for us.

Saint Francis Xavier, pray for us.

Saint Peter Damian, pray for us.

Saint Frances Xavier Cabrini, pray for us.

Saint Lucy, pray for us.

Saint Monica, pray for us.

Saint Agatha, pray for us.

Saint Philomena, pray for us.

Saint Cecilia, pray for us.

Saint John Mary Vianney, pray for us.

Saint Vincent de Paul, pray for us.

Saint Vincent Ferrer, pray for us.

Saint Athanasius, pray for us.

Saint Margaret Mary Alacoque, pray for us.

Saint Isaac Jogues, pray for us.

Saint Rene Goupil, pray for us.

Saint John Lalonde, pray for us.

Saint Gabriel Lalemont, pray for us.

Saint Noel Chabanel, pray for us.

Saint Charles Garnier, pray for us.

Saint Anthony Daniel, pray for us.

Saint John DeBrebeuf, pray for us.

Saint Alphonsus de Liguori, pray for us.

Saint Dominic, pray for us.

Saint Hyacinth, pray for us.

Saint Basil, pray for us.

Saint Vincent Ferrer, pray for us.

Saint Sebastian, pray for us.

Saint Tarcisius, pray for us.

Saint Bridget of Sweden, pray for us.

Saint Gerard Majella, pray for us.

Saint John of the Cross, pray for us.

Saint Teresa of Avila, pray for us.

Saint Bernadette Soubirous, pray for us.

Saint Genevieve, pray for us.

Saint Vincent de Paul, pray for us.

Pope Saint Pius X, pray for us

Pope Saint Pius V, pray for us.

Saint Rita of Cascia, pray for us.

Venerable Anne Catherine Emmerich, pray for us.

Venerable Pauline Jaricot, pray for us.

Father Miguel Augustin Pro, pray for us.

Francisco Marto, pray for us.

Jacinta Marto, pray for us.

Juan Diego, pray for us.

 

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

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

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

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

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

Response: As we have hoped in Thee.

Verse: O Lord hear my prayer.

Response: And let my cry come unto Thee.

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

Response:  Amen.