Fascism at Work and In Your Face

by Thomas A. Droleskey

One of the easiest things for human beings to do is to stick a label on someone else and thus dismiss everything he or she says or does from that point on, making no effort whatsoever to review dispassionately a body of work on its merits rather than on preconceived notions. Leftists do this all the time with people considered to be "rightists." Rightists do this all of the time with leftists. Liberals do it with conservatives. Conservatives do it with liberals. Socialists do it with capitalists. Capitalists do it with socialists. Yankees' fans do it with Mets' fans. Mets' fans do it with Yankees' fans. And on and on and on and on, ad infinitum.

To wit, my own work began to be disparaged in the Catholic community in the early-1990s when I started my association with the "bishop-bashing" national Catholic newspaper, The Wanderer. That label kept me off of the Ever Wishful Television Network (EWTN) at a time in the early-1990s that some of the readers of The Wanderer were clamoring for me to appear on Mother Angelica Live. My move over to The Remnant in 2002, after about  two years of exile in cyberspace, caused me to be labeled as a "radical traditionalist," thus causing many who used to read my work at The Wanderer to consider me having left the Church. Nothing of what I wrote from that point on could have any possible value. Well, obviously, the same can be said at present now that I have come to accept the legitimacy of the sedevacantist position. That label, perhaps the worst of them in, has caused the entire corpus of my work to be dismissed as irrelevant, if not dangerously irresponsible. This, of course, is all in God's Providence and to be given to Our Lady's Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart to be used as she sees fit for the honor and glory of the Blessed Trinity and for the good of souls.

The tendency of people to dismiss the work of others on the basis of preconceived notions and labels is wrong. Understandable. Part of fallen human nature. But wrong nevertheless. As I have come to realize with the passage of time, even leftists and communists have valid things to say now and again about the state of the world, which is why it is important to assess each statement on its own merits without fascistically dismissing it on the basis of our own biases and unwillingness to give credit where credit is due. The old axiom that even a broken clock is right twice a day is, after all, true. It is, therefore, nothing less than astounding to me to find that otherwise intelligent people behave like fascistic ignoramuses when they are asked to read uncritically the work of writers with whom they have substantial disagreements on practically every single issue of importance. A person interested in justice cannot simply dismiss the work of others on the basis of "Well, it's 'so-and-so' who wrote this. It can't be any good." Words must be assessed on the basis of their conformity with truth as far as it is possible for us fallen creatures to determine by the grace of God.

Thus it is that the reaction to Senator John F. Kerry's botched "joke" during a speech in California a few days ago bespeaks of fascism. Mind you, Kerry is as dim a bulb as President George Walker Bush, his fellow member of Skull and Bones. He, like Bush, is able to contradict himself in the same sentence. "I voted for the war before I voted against it." Kerry's contradictory statements on Iraq over the years demonstrate that he has not been, shall we say, of one mind. He is as much a prisoner of the speeches written for him as is Bush, just as prone to flub his lines as Bush. This is what happened the other day when he said:

“You know, education, if you make the most of it, you study hard, you do your homework and you make an effort to be smart, you can do well. If you don’t, you get stuck in Iraq.”

Kerry was supposed to have said:

“Do you know where you end up if you don’t study, if you aren’t smart, if you’re intellectually lazy? You end up getting us stuck in a war in Iraq. Just ask President Bush.”

Remember, Kerry is the man who said in the year 2004 that:

"My oath between me and God was defined in the Catholic Church by Pius XXIII and Pope Paul VI in the Vatican II. ..."

Kerry may not play video-golf like the man who defeated him in the 2004 Presidential elections, George W. Bush. He is, however, no more a serious student of matters of the mind than the current president. It is thus not at all out of character for the pro-abortion Catholic Senator from Massachusetts to misspeak one of his lines or to misstate something when speaking extemporaneously.

Kerry's remark in Pasadena, California, on Monday, October 30, 2006, was seized by Republicans, including White House Press Secretary Tony Snow (and by Bush himself eventually), and used to claim that Kerry was insulting the intelligence of the American troops serving in Iraq. Not listening to the inanity of "talk radio" and having sworn off of television over three and one-half years ago now, I can only imagine the field day that "conservative" talk show hosts have had with Kerry's remark, calling into question Kerry's regard for this nation's military service personnel. The reports that I have seen online indicate that the Republicans have been hammering Kerry in a most fascistic way even when it became clear the Skull and Bonesman from Yale had muffed his line and was aiming humor (it's hard for a humorless person to effect humor) at Mr. Bush. One must be willing to put aside a contempt for John Kerry's support for baby-killing and other evils and assess his remarks dispassionately without seeking to capitalize on a mistake by wrapping one's deliberate misrepresentations of that mistake in the American flag and waving it for the sale of electoral gain.

This is all so reminiscent of what then President William Jefferson Blythe Clinton did at the end of 1995 when involved a titanic power struggle with the Republican-controlled Congress over the Federal budget for Fiscal Year 1996. Clinton shut down the government when he could not reach an agreement with the Republicans, whom he blamed repeatedly for attempting to "cut the size" of the Federal budget and for seeking to harm children (by denying their school lunches) and despoil the environment. Even his then White House Press Secretary, Dee Dee Myers (a Catholic, mind you, one of many in the Clinton administration), admitted a few years later that Clinton's words were not inaccurate. Indeed, they were not. Clinton and his then-adviser, Dick Morris, reasoned that most Americans would not listen to the Republicans explain that they were not cutting the size of the Federal budget (something that they should have been attempting to do) but were only cutting the projected rate of increase in the Federal expenditures from those proposed by the Clinton administration. Federal spending was going, tragically, to increase no matter whose version of the budget was adopted, Clinton's or the Republicans, the only question was how high the rate of increase would be. Clinton was able to parlay this to his advantage most fascistically, intimidating the Republicans for most of the rest of his years in office. Fascism really does work in this country, especially when it is in your face.

There are many variations of fascism. A thumbnail definition of it is the political ideology that seeks to identify the interests of one nation with a particular political party or movement, requiring the subordination of everything in national life to the national "interests" defined by the ruling elite. German, Italian, Japanese, Argentine and Israeli fascism had decidedly different manifestations one from the other. What they had in common, however, was a careful effort to label opponents as enemies of the state and to use assert in a positivist manner their own positions as being infallibly true and beyond criticism, relying upon slogans and invectives to do so.

The same has been true at many points in the history of the United States of America (the Civil War, the warfare waged against the American Indians, the Spanish-American War, World War I, the Depression, World War II, the Cold War, the Vietnam War, the Persian Gulf War, the invasion of Iraq). Forget about rational discussion. The way to "end a debate" is to use loaded language ("extremism," "disloyalty," "aiding and abetting the enemy," "not supporting our troops") and to repeat allegations over and over again. This is what stopped me as a teenager and as a young college student from realizing that not all of the leftist criticisms of American foreign policy were wrong. Indeed, some of them were quite correct, admitting that diagnosing a problem and prescribing a remedy are two entirely different things (leftists do not understand that the way to ameliorate all of the problems of the world is by the restoration of the Social Reign of Christ the King). I permitted myself to be buffaloed by slogans. So have must of us at one point or another.

Pope Pius XI wrote about this in Mit Brennender Sorge, March 14, 1937:

Whoever exalts race, or the people, or the State, or a particular form of State, or the depositories of power, or any other fundamental value of the human community -- however necessary and honorable be their function in worldly things -- whoever raises these notions above their standard value and divinizes them to an idolatrous level, distorts and perverts an order of the world planned and created by God; he is far from the true faith in God and from the concept of life which that faith upholds.

Beware, Venerable Brethren, of that growing abuse, in speech as in writing, of the name of God as though it were a meaningless label, to be affixed to any creation, more or less arbitrary, of human speculation. Use your influence on the Faithful, that they refuse to yield to this aberration. Our God is the Personal God, supernatural, omnipotent, infinitely perfect, one in the Trinity of Persons, tri-personal in the unity of divine essence, the Creator of all existence. Lord, King and ultimate Consummator of the history of the world, who will not, and cannot, tolerate a rival God by His side.

This God, this Sovereign Master, has issued commandments whose value is independent of time and space, country and race. As God's sun shines on every human face so His law knows neither privilege nor exception. Rulers and subjects, crowned and uncrowned, rich and poor are equally subject to His word. From the fullness of the Creators' right there naturally arises the fullness of His right to be obeyed by individuals and communities, whoever they are. This obedience permeates all branches of activity in which moral values claim harmony with the law of God, and pervades all integration of the ever-changing laws of man into the immutable laws of God.

None but superficial minds could stumble into concepts of a national God, of a national religion; or attempt to lock within the frontiers of a single people, within the narrow limits of a single race, God, the Creator of the universe, King and Legislator of all nations before whose immensity they are "as a drop of a bucket" (Isaiah xI, 15). . . .

 

Thousands of voices ring into your ears a Gospel which has not been revealed by the Father of Heaven. Thousands of pens are wielded in the service of a Christianity, which is not of Christ. Press and wireless daily force on you productions hostile to the Faith and to the Church, impudently aggressive against whatever you should hold venerable and sacred. Many of you, clinging to your Faith and to your Church, as a result of your affiliation with religious associations guaranteed by the concordat, have often to face the tragic trial of seeing your loyalty to your country misunderstood, suspected, or even denied, and of being hurt in your professional and social life. We are well aware that there is many a humble soldier of Christ in your ranks, who with torn feelings, but a determined heart, accepts his fate, finding his one consolation in the thought of suffering insults for the name of Jesus (Acts v. 41). Today, as We see you threatened with new dangers and new molestations, We say to you: If any one should preach to you a Gospel other than the one you received on the knees of a pious mother, from the lips of a believing father, or through teaching faithful to God and His Church, "let him be anathema" (Gal. i. 9). If the State organizes a national youth, and makes this organization obligatory to all, then, without prejudice to rights of religious associations, it is the absolute right of youths as well as of parents to see to it that this organization is purged of all manifestations hostile to the Church and Christianity. These manifestations are even today placing Christian parents in a painful alternative, as they cannot give to the State what they owe to God alone.

No one would think of preventing young Germans establishing a true ethnical community in a noble love of freedom and loyalty to their country. What We object to is the voluntary and systematic antagonism raised between national education and religious duty. That is why we tell the young: Sing your hymns to freedom, but do not forget the freedom of the children of God. Do not drag the nobility of that freedom in the mud of sin and sensuality. He who sings hymns of loyalty to this terrestrial country should not, for that reason, become unfaithful to God and His Church, or a deserter and traitor to His heavenly country. You are often told about heroic greatness, in lying opposition to evangelical humility and patience. Why conceal the fact that there are heroisms in moral life? That the preservation of baptismal innocence is an act of heroism which deserves credit? You are often told about the human deficiencies which mar the history of the Church: why ignore the exploits which fill her history, the saints she begot, the blessing that came upon Western civilization from the union between that Church and your people? You are told about sports. Indulged in with moderation and within limits, physical education is a boon for youth. But so much time is now devoted to sporting activities, that the harmonious development of body and mind is disregarded, that duties to one's family, and the observation of the Lord's Day are neglected. With an indifference bordering on contempt the day of the Lord is divested of its sacred character, against the best of German traditions. But We expect the Catholic youth, in the more favorable organizations of the State, to uphold its right to a Christian sanctification of the Sunday, not tp exercise the body at the expense of the immortal soul, not to be overcome by evil, but to aim at the triumph of good over evil (Rom. xii. 21) as its highest achievement will be the gaining of the crown in the stadium of eternal life (1 Cor. ix. 24).

Even Catholics in this country have come to accept fascistic sloganeering as a substitute for rational thought. Some Catholics, including traditionally-minded Catholics (yes both sedevacantist and non-sedevacantist), incant the jingoistic slogans of American nationalism, which is far, far different from authentic patriotism (a concept that wills the good of one's nation, which is the Catholicization of herself and every aspect of her popular culture), to support our unjust invasion of Iraq and to accept uncritically all of the government's "explanations" as to what happened in the City of New York and in western Pennsylvania and at the Pentagon in Alexandria, Virginia, on September 11, 2001. Truth is equated with and to be expressed by sloganeering. Such, however, is but the logical consequence of a world where Christ is not King and where Our Lady is not honored as its Queen.

The truth of the Divine Plan that Our Lord instituted for man's return to Him through the Catholic Church was the first casualty of the Protestant Revolt, which served as the apologist for and forerunner of the modern state. All truth must inevitably fall by the wayside when men do not submit themselves to the Deposit of Faith that Our Lord has entrusted exclusively to the Catholic Church and when they not believe that is necessary for their souls to be in states of Sanctifying Grace in order to act in conformity with the binding precepts of the Divine positive law and the natural law.

Yes, as Pope Pius XI noted in Divini Illius Magistri, December 31, 1929, men can come to know moral truth outside of the Catholic Church. The Church, however, is nevertheless the infallible explicator of the natural law. She must be listened to in order to see the totality of truth and how it is we are supposed to understand those truths that are knowable by reason alone but have been entrusted to the care of Holy Mother Church for their safekeeping and explication until the end of time:

Hence it is that in this proper object of her mission, that is, "in faith and morals, God Himself has made the Church sharer in the divine magisterium and, by a special privilege, granted her immunity from error; hence she is the mistress of men, supreme and absolutely sure, and she has inherent in herself an inviolable right to freedom in teaching.' By necessary consequence the Church is independent of any sort of earthly power as well in the origin as in the exercise of her mission as educator, not merely in regard to her proper end and object, but also in regard to the means necessary and suitable to attain that end. Hence with regard to every other kind of human learning and instruction, which is the common patrimony of individuals and society, the Church has an independent right to make use of it, and above all to decide what may help or harm Christian education. And this must be so, because the Church as a perfect society has an independent right to the means conducive to its end, and because every form of instruction, no less than every human action, has a necessary connection with man's last end, and therefore cannot be withdrawn from the dictates of the divine law, of which the Church is guardian, interpreter and infallible mistress.

This truth is clearly set forth by Pius X of saintly memory:

"Whatever a Christian does even in the order of things of earth, he may not overlook the supernatural; indeed he must, according to the teaching of Christian wisdom, direct all things towards the supreme good as to his last end; all his actions, besides, in so far as good or evil in the order of morality, that is, in keeping or not with natural and divine law, fall under the judgment and jurisdiction of the Church."

It is worthy of note how a layman, an excellent writer and at the same time a profound and conscientious thinker, has been able to understand well and express exactly this fundamental Catholic doctrine:

"The Church does not say that morality belongs purely, in the sense of exclusively, to her; but that it belongs wholly to her. She has never maintained that outside her fold and apart from her teaching, man cannot arrive at any moral truth; she has on the contrary more than once condemned this opinion because it has appeared under more forms than one. She does however say, has said, and will ever say, that because of her institution by Jesus Christ, because of the Holy Ghost sent her in His name by the Father, she alone possesses what she has had immediately from God and can never lose, the whole of moral truth, omnem veritatem, in which all individual moral truths are included, as well those which man may learn by the help of reason, as those which form part of revelation or which may be deduced from it."

Therefore with full right the Church promotes letters, science, art in so far as necessary or helpful to Christian education, in addition to her work for the salvation of souls: founding and maintaining schools and institutions adapted to every branch of learning and degree of culture. Nor may even physical culture, as it is called, be considered outside the range of her maternal supervision, for the reason that it also is a means which may help or harm Christian education.

It is with this in mind that those who are beginning to pierce through the fascistic slogans that have been repeated mindlessly since September 11, 2001, must come to understand that peeling away the "onion skin" of what happened on that day is only part of the larger problem facing us at the present moment. While there have been some very good statements made about the inconsistencies of the government's storyline (see: Patriots Question 9/11 - Responsible Criticism of the 9/11 Commission Report) and analyses of the impossibility of steel columnized structures such as the World Trade Center towers from pancaking down upon their very footprints (see: Paul Craig Roberts, What we know and don’t know about 9/11), the true facts of September 11, 2001, are only part of the larger picture of what happens when men and their nations are bereft of the teaching authority and sanctifying helps offered them by the Church that the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity made Man in Our Lady's virginal and immaculate womb, Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, founded upon the Rock of Peter, the Pope. There is no room for Edward the Confessors of Henrys of Bavaria or Louis IXs of France in a world where the prevailing ethos is Judeo-Masonic and makes war upon the necessity of belief in the Incarnation and the Catholic Church as definitional in the life of every man and in the life of every nation.

Pope Pius XI noted in Mit Brennender Sorge, written in his own hand in the German language to condemn Nazism, that we can never abandon the cause of Christ the King so as to permit national leaders to proceed with policies contrary to justice and thus to God's very laws and His rights. Men must indeed seek the sanctification of their souls and to defend the rights of Christ the King at all times:

And today we again repeat with all the insistency We can command: it is not enough to be a member of the Church of Christ, one needs to be a living member, in spirit and in truth, i.e., living in the state of grace and in the presence of God, either in innocence or in sincere repentance. If the Apostle of the nations, the vase of election, chastised his body and brought it into subjection: lest perhaps, when he had preached to others, he himself should become a castaway (1 Cor. ix. 27), could anybody responsible for the extension of the Kingdom of God claim any other method but personal sanctification? Only thus can we show to the present generation, and to the critics of the Church that "the salt of the earth," the leaven of Christianity has not decayed, but is ready to give the men of today -- prisoners of doubt and error, victims of indifference, tired of their Faith and straying from God -- the spiritual renewal they so much need. A Christianity which keeps a grip on itself, refuses every compromise with the world, takes the commands of God and the Church seriously, preserves its love of God and of men in all its freshness, such a Christianity can be, and will be, a model and a guide to a world which is sick to death and clamors for directions, unless it be condemned to a catastrophe that would baffle the imagination.

Every true and lasting reform has ultimately sprung from the sanctity of men who were driven by the love of God and of men. Generous, ready to stand to attention to any call from God, yet confident in themselves because confident in their vocation, they grew to the size of beacons and reformers. On the other hand, any reformatory zeal, which instead of springing from personal purity, flashes out of passion, has produced unrest instead of light, destruction instead of construction, and more than once set up evils worse than those it was out to remedy. No doubt "the Spirit breatheth where he will" (John iii. 8): "of stones He is able to raise men to prepare the way to his designs" (Matt. iii. 9). He chooses the instruments of His will according to His own plans, not those of men. But the Founder of the Church, who breathed her into existence at Pentecost, cannot disown the foundations as He laid them. Whoever is moved by the spirit of God, spontaneously adopts both outwardly and inwardly, the true attitude toward the Church, this sacred fruit from the tree of the cross, this gift from the Spirit of God, bestowed on Pentecost day to an erratic world.

In your country, Venerable Brethren, voices are swelling into a chorus urging people to leave the Church, and among the leaders there is more than one whose official position is intended to create the impression that this infidelity to Christ the King constitutes a signal and meritorious act of loyalty to the modern State. Secret and open measures of intimidation, the threat of economic and civic disabilities, bear on the loyalty of certain classes of Catholic functionaries, a pressure which violates every human right and dignity. Our wholehearted paternal sympathy goes out to those who must pay so dearly for their loyalty to Christ and the Church; but directly the highest interests are at stake, with the alternative of spiritual loss, there is but one alternative left, that of heroism. If the oppressor offers one the Judas bargain of apostasy he can only, at the cost of every worldly sacrifice, answer with Our Lord: "Begone, Satan! For it is written: The Lord thy God shalt thou adore, and Him only shalt thou serve" (Matt. iv. 10). And turning to the Church, he shall say: "Thou, my mother since my infancy, the solace of my life and advocate at my death, may my tongue cleave to my palate if, yielding to worldly promises or threats, I betray the vows of my baptism." As to those who imagine that they can reconcile exterior infidelity to one and the same Church, let them hear Our Lord's warning: -- "He that shall deny me before men shall be denied before the angels of God" (Luke xii. 9).

These words, written nearly seventy years ago now, are as application to the United States of America at present as they were to Nazi Germany. Indeed, they are as applicable to the entire ethos of conciliarism, especially as exemplified by Benedict XVI, who is singularly loyal to the modern State as he disdains with utter contempt the immutable doctrine of the Social Reign of Christ the King, as he endorses the heresy condemned repeatedly by pope after pope, the separation of Church and State. Fascism is just one of many secular " 'sims" that will arise when the Catholic Church is not recognized as the true Church and its authority to exercise the Social Reign of Christ the King is not honored in a nation's very organic legal documents.

Pope Pius XI noted in Mit Brennender Sorge the necessity of subordinating moral truth to the truths of the true Church:

It is on faith in God, preserved pure and stainless, that man's morality is based. All efforts to remove from under morality and the moral order the granite foundation of faith and to substitute for it the shifting sands of human regulations, sooner or later lead these individuals or societies to moral degradation. The fool who has said in his heart "there is no God" goes straight to moral corruption (Psalms xiii. 1), and the number of these fools who today are out to sever morality from religion, is legion. They either do not see or refuse to see that the banishment of confessional Christianity, i.e., the clear and precise notion of Christianity, from teaching and education, from the organization of social and political life, spells spiritual spoliation and degradation. No coercive power of the State, no purely human ideal, however noble and lofty it be, will ever be able to make shift of the supreme and decisive impulses generated by faith in God and Christ. If the man, who is called to the hard sacrifice of his own ego to the common good, loses the support of the eternal and the divine, that comforting and consoling faith in a God who rewards all good and punishes all evil, then the result of the majority will be, not the acceptance, but the refusal of their duty. The conscientious observation of the ten commandments of God and the precepts of the Church (which are nothing but practical specifications of rules of the Gospels) is for every one an unrivaled school of personal discipline, moral education and formation of character, a school that is exacting, but not to excess. A merciful God, who as Legislator, says -- Thou must! -- also gives by His grace the power to will and to do. To let forces of moral formation of such efficacy lie fallow, or to exclude them positively from public education, would spell religious under-feeding of a nation. To hand over the moral law to man's subjective opinion, which changes with the times, instead of anchoring it in the holy will of the eternal God and His commandments, is to open wide every door to the forces of destruction. The resulting dereliction of the eternal principles of an objective morality, which educates conscience and ennobles every department and organization of life, is a sin against the destiny of a nation, a sin whose bitter fruit will poison future generations.

Such is the rush of present-day life that it severs from the divine foundation of Revelation, not only morality, but also the theoretical and practical rights. We are especially referring to what is called the natural law, written by the Creator's hand on the tablet of the heart (Rom. ii. 14) and which reason, not blinded by sin or passion, can easily read. It is in the light of the commands of this natural law, that all positive law, whoever be the lawgiver, can be gauged in its moral content, and hence, in the authority it wields over conscience. Human laws in flagrant contradiction with the natural law are vitiated with a taint which no force, no power can mend. In the light of this principle one must judge the axiom, that "right is common utility," a proposition which may be given a correct significance, it means that what is morally indefensible, can never contribute to the good of the people. But ancient paganism acknowledged that the axiom, to be entirely true, must be reversed and be made to say: "Nothing can be useful, if it is not at the same time morally good" (Cicero, De Off. ii. 30). Emancipated from this oral rule, the principle would in international law carry a perpetual state of war between nations; for it ignores in national life, by confusion of right and utility, the basic fact that man as a person possesses rights he holds from God, and which any collectivity must protect against denial, suppression or neglect. To overlook this truth is to forget that the real common good ultimately takes its measure from man's nature, which balances personal rights and social obligations, and from the purpose of society, established for the benefit of human nature. Society, was intended by the Creator for the full development of individual possibilities, and for the social benefits, which by a give and take process, every one can claim for his own sake and that of others. Higher and more general values, which collectivity alone can provide, also derive from the Creator for the good of man, and for the full development, natural and supernatural, and the realization of his perfection. To neglect this order is to shake the pillars on which society rests, and to compromise social tranquillity, security and existence.

Thus, you see, the fascism that passes for popular discourse in this country and around the world is but one of the many logical consequences of a world where even Catholics have been convinced that we must not think and act and speak as Catholics at all times. The words of Pope Leo XIII, contained in Sapientiae Christianae, January 10, 1890, must stir up in our hearts and souls a desire to see the world through the eyes of the true Faith and to reject the fascistic sloganeering of the present day:

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

The chief elements of this duty consist in professing openly and unflinchingly the Catholic doctrine, and in propagating it to the utmost of our power. For, as is often said, with the greatest truth, there is nothing so hurtful to Christian wisdom as that it should not be known, since it possesses, when loyally received, inherent power to drive away error. So soon as Catholic truth is apprehended by a simple and unprejudiced soul, reason yields assent. Now, faith, as a virtue, is a great boon of divine grace and goodness; nevertheless, the objects themselves to which faith is to be applied are scarcely known in any other way than through the hearing. "How shall they believe Him of whom they have not heard? and how shall they hear without a preacher? Faith then cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of Christ." Since, then, faith is necessary for salvation, it follows that the word of Christ must be preached. The office, indeed, of preaching, that is, of teaching, lies by divine right in the province of the pastors, namely, of the bishops whom "the Holy Spirit has placed to rule the Church of God.'' It belongs, above all, to the Roman Pontiff, vicar of Jesus Christ, established as head of the universal Church, teacher of all that pertains to morals and faith.

No one, however, must entertain the notion that private individuals are prevented from taking some active part in this duty of teaching, especially those on whom God has bestowed gifts of mind with the strong wish of rendering themselves useful. These, so often as circumstances demand, may take upon themselves, not, indeed, the office of the pastor, but the task of communicating to others what they have themselves received, becoming, as it were, living echoes of their masters in the faith. Such co-operation on the part of the laity has seemed to the Fathers of the Vatican Council so opportune and fruitful of good that they thought well to invite it. "All faithful Christians, but those chiefly who are in a prominent position, or engaged in teaching, we entreat, by the compassion of Jesus Christ, and enjoin by the authority of the same God and Savior, that they bring aid to ward off and eliminate these errors from holy Church, and contribute their zealous help in spreading abroad the light of undefiled faith.'' Let each one, therefore, bear in mind that he both can and should, so far as may be, preach the Catholic faith by the authority of his example, and by open and constant profession of the obligations it imposes. In respect, consequently, to the duties that bind us to God and the Church, it should be borne earnestly in mind that in propagating Christian truth and warding off errors the zeal of the laity should, as far as possible, be brought actively into play.

The faithful would not, however, so completely and advantageously satisfy these duties as is fitting they should were they to enter the field as isolated champions of the faith. Jesus Christ, indeed, has clearly intimated that the hostility and hatred of men, which He first and foremost experienced, would be shown in like degree toward the work founded by Him, so that many would be barred from profiting by the salvation for which all are indebted to His loving kindness. Wherefore, He willed not only to train disciples in His doctrine, but to unite them into one society, and closely conjoin them in one body, "which is the Church,'' whereof He would be the head. The life of Jesus Christ pervades, therefore, the entire framework of this body, cherishes and nourishes its every member, uniting each with each, and making all work together to the same end, albeit the action of each be not the same. Hence it follows that not only is the Church a perfect society far excelling every other, but it is enjoined by her Founder that for the salvation of mankind she is to contend "as an army drawn up in battle array.'' The organization and constitution of Christian society can in no wise be changed, neither can any one of its members live as he may choose, nor elect that mode of fighting which best pleases him. For, in effect, he scatters and gathers not who gathers not with the Church and with Jesus Christ, and all who fight not jointly with him and with the Church are in very truth contending against God.

Invoking Our Lady's maternal intercession on this day, November 2, and during this month of November, dedicated as it is to the Poor Souls in the Church Suffering in Purgatory, may we seek to do penance for our own sins and for the sins of everyone in the whole world so as to be better able to see the world clearly through the eyes of the true Faith and to act in conformity with the Faith in every aspect of our lives without any exception whatsoever. Clarity comes with assisting only at the Immemorial Mass of Tradition, which communicates most clearly the Kingship of the Chief Priest and Victim of every Mass, Our Lord Jesus Christ, and it comes with spending time with our King in His Real Presence in the Most Blessed Sacrament. Our Lady will accept the offerings we give to her Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart for the needs of all souls, including those in Purgatory, so that the day may be expedited when her Fatima Message will be fulfilled and Tradition restored in Holy Mother Church as Christendom is restored in the world.

I will go to my grave reminding people that we cannot fight secularism and all of its attendant evils, such as fascistic sloganeering, with secularism. We can only fight secularism and all of its attendant evils with Catholicism. May Our Lady, the Queen of All Saints, help us to be warriors of Christ the King and of her Our Immaculate Queen.

Vivat Christus Rex!

Our Lady, Queen of All Saints. 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 John the Evangelist, pray for us.

Saint Vincent de Paul, pray for us.

Saint Augustine, pray for us.

Saint Thomas Aquinas, pray for us.

Saint Vincent Ferrer, pray for us.

Saint Sebastian, pray for us.

Saint Jude, pray for us.

Saint Tarcisius, pray for us.

Saint Lucy, pray for us.

Saint Agnes, pray for us.

Saint Agatha, pray for us.

Saint Bridget of Sweden, pray for us.

Saint Philomena, pray for us.

Saint Margaret Mary Alacoque, pray for us.

Saint John of the Cross, pray for us.

Saint John Bosco, pray for us.

Saint John Mary Vianney, pray for us.

Pope Saint Pius X, pray for us.

Pope Saint Pius V, pray for us.

Saint Charles Borromeo, pray for us.

Saint Robert Bellarmine, pray for us.

Saint Teresa of Avila, pray for us.

Saint Therese Lisieux, pray for us.

Saint Bernadette Soubirous, pray for us.

Venerable Anne Catherine Emmerich, pray for us.

Venerable Pauline Jaricot, pray for us.

Francisco Marto, pray for us.

Jacinta Marto, 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.