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November 23, 2010

Let The Olympic Games of Absurdity Begin!

by Thomas A. Droleskey

Furious efforts to defend the false "pontiff," Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI, for suggesting that men engaged in the selling of themselves to engage in perverse sins against nature could use a certain type of prophylactic in order to prevent the spread of a certain disease that is contracted principally by means of sins against the Sixth and Ninth Commandments have begun. In other words, let the Olympic Games of Absurdity begin!

The mere fact that we have to be discussing any of this in public is a sign of the madness with which we are faced. Modesty of speech has always characterized the language of true and legitimate Successors of Saint Peter, yes, even when dealing with the sin of Sodom, one of the four sins that cry out to Heaven for vengeance. No true pope has ever descended to the level of physicality when discussing matters pertaining to the Virtue of Chastity and the maintenance of holy purity. 

Consider, for example, how Pope Saint Pius X dealt with clerics who had been caught in the perverse sin against nature that the false "pontiff" believes can be made at least a little "safer" from its bodily consequences by the use of a prophylactic:

That horrible crime, on account of which corrupt and obscene cities were destroyed by fire through divine condemnation, causes us most bitter sorrow and shocks our mind, impelling us to repress such a crime with the greatest possible zeal.

Quite opportunely the Fifth Lateran Council [1512-1517] issued this decree: "Let any member of the clergy caught in that vice against nature . . . be removed from the clerical order or forced to do penance in a monastery" (chap. 4, X, V, 31). So that the contagion of such a grave offense may not advance with greater audacity by taking advantage of impunity, which is the greatest incitement to sin, and so as to more severely punish the clerics who are guilty of this nefarious crime and who are not frightened by the death of their souls, we determine that they should be handed over to the severity of the secular authority, which enforces civil law.

Therefore, wishing to pursue with the greatest rigor that which we have decreed since the beginning of our pontificate, we establish that any priest or member of the clergy, either secular or regular, who commits such an execrable crime, by force of the present law be deprived of every clerical privilege, of every post, dignity and ecclesiastical benefit, and having been degraded by an ecclesiastical judge, let him be immediately delivered to the secular authority to be put to death, as mandated by law as the fitting punishment for laymen who have sunk into this abyss. (Pope Saint Pius V, Horrendum illud scelus, August 30, 1568)

 

Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI and his conciliar "bishops" do not display this type of legitimate and thoroughly warranted moral outrage against the sin that God saw fit to punish by destroying the cities of Sodom and Gomorrha. And some of his defenders, including Dr. Janet Smith, who is the "Father Michael J. McGivney Chair of Life Ethics at Sacred Heart Major Seminary" in Detroit, Michigan, believe that those who are engaged in the selling of their bodies to engage in perverse sins against nature are actually taking the "first steps" in the direction of morality, a completely preposterous notion that demonstrates we were living in a land of such absurdity that mind-reading and projection are now considered to be constituent elements of attempting "parse" "papal" statements:

We must note that the example that Pope Benedict gives for the use of a condom is a male prostitute; thus, it is reasonable to assume that he is referring to a male prostitute engaged in homosexual acts. The Holy Father is simply observing that for some homosexual prostitutes the use of a condom may indicate an awakening of a moral sense; an awakening that sexual pleasure is not the highest value, but that we must take care that we harm no one with our choices.  He is not speaking to the morality of the use of a condom, but to something that may be true about the psychological state of those who use them.  If such individuals are using condoms to avoid harming another, they may eventually realize that sexual acts between members of the same sex are inherently harmful since they are not in accord with human nature.  The Holy Father does not in any way think the use of condoms is a part of the solution to reducing the risk of AIDs.  As he explicitly states, the true solution involves “humanizing sexuality.” (What did Benedict really say?)

 

"An awakening of a moral sense"? What insanity. How hard is it for supposedly educated people to understand that it is NEVER necessary to parse the words of a true pope because they are clear, reflecting the Scholasticism that is the official philosophy of the Catholic Church, not the hideous "new theology" of Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI that was condemned in its entirety by Pope Pius XII in Humanum Genus, August 12, 1950. Catholics in the past may have disagreed with how to apply a papal teaching in a particular circumstance or disagreed about how best to explicate it. True popes, however, chose their words with care, and they never spoke "off the cuff" to a reporter, not that they gave reporters access to themselves, that is, so that they could give an unclear message that would confuse the faithful and offend God in the process.

To assert that the use of the prophylactic in question can lead to an "awakening" of the "moral sense" is just absurd.

Those who persist in perverse sins against nature believe that they are very moral people. They "love" each other. They care for the environment. They are involved in their communities. Many of those who persist in such perverse sins believe that they are good "parents" to the children they have adopted or are their own progeny by means of in vitro fertilization. Sure, they have a "moral sense." Unfortunately, it has nothing to do with loving God as He has revealed Himself through His true Church. And this perverted sense of "morality" has nothing to do with loving themselves as others since it is impossible to "love" oneself or others if one does things that are injurious to one's own immortal soul and is an occasion for others to offend God and wound themselves by means of disgusting, vile sins against nature.

"Humanizing sexuality"? When has a true pope ever spoken in such graphic terms? There is no such thing as "humanizing sexuality." We are called to preserve Chastity as befits the obligations of our state-in-life. Those who sin against Chastity, those who are, quite literally, "Magdalene souls," can start anew in the Sacrament Tribunal of Penance as they seek to reform their lives in cooperation with the graces won for us by Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ on the wood of the Holy Cross by the shedding of every single drop of His Most Precious Blood and that flows into our hearts and souls through the loving hands of Our Lady, she who is the Mediatrix of All Graces. Period. We need to avoid sin and the near occasions of sin as we seek to grow in the practice of virtue. That's all we need to do. It's not complicated, apart, that is, from our own disordered natures that seek to rationalize sins against holy purity, including sins of immodest speech about this delicate topic.

"Humanizing sexuality"? No! A thousand times no to this garbage of personalism. We must obey the Ten Commandments. That's it.

Here is how Pope Leo XIII and Pope Pius XI discussed the beauty of marriage and the modern deviations from that beauty:

9. But what was decreed and constituted in respect to marriage by the authority of God has been more fully and more clearly handed down to us, by tradition and the written Word, through the Apostles, those heralds of the laws of God. To the Apostles, indeed, as our masters, are to be referred the doctrines which "our holy Fathers, the Councils, and the Tradition of the Universal Church have always taught,"[9] namely, that Christ our Lord raised marriage to the dignity of a sacrament; that to husband and wife, guarded and strengthened by the heavenly grace which His merits Rained for them, He gave power to attain holiness in the married state; and that, in a wondrous way, making marriage an example of the mystical union between Himself and His Church, He not only perfected that love which is according to nature,[10] but also made the naturally indivisible union of one man with one woman far more perfect through the bond of heavenly love. Paul says to the Ephesians: "Husbands, love your wives, as Christ also loved the Church, and delivered Himself up for it, that He might sanctify it. . . So also ought men to love their wives as their own bodies. . . For no man ever hated his own flesh, but nourisheth and cherisheth it, as also Christ doth the Church; because we are members of His body, of His flesh, and of His bones. For this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife, and they shall be two in one flesh. This is a great sacrament; but I speak in Christ and in the Church."[11] In like manner from the teaching of the Apostles we learn that the unity of marriage and its perpetual indissolubility, the indispensable conditions of its very origin, must, according to the command of Christ, be holy and inviolable without exception. Paul says again: "To them that are married, not I, but the Lord commandeth that the wife depart not from her husband; and if she depart, that she remain unmarried or be reconciled to her husband."[12] And again: "A woman is bound by the law as long as her husband liveth; but if her husband die, she is at liberty."[13] It is for these reasons that marriage is "a great sacrament";[14] "honorable in all,"[15] holy, pure, and to be reverenced as a type and symbol of most high mysteries.

10. Furthermore, the Christian perfection and completeness of marriage are not comprised in those points only which have been mentioned. For, first, there has been vouchsafed to the marriage union a higher and nobler purpose than was ever previously given to it. By the command of Christ, it not only looks to the propagation of the human race, but to the bringing forth of children for the Church, "fellow citizens with the saints, and the domestics of God";[16] so that "a people might be born and brought up for the worship and religion of the true God and our Savior Jesus Christ."[17]

11. Secondly, the mutual duties of husband and wife have been defined, and their several rights accurately established. They are bound, namely, to have such feelings for one another as to cherish always very great mutual love, to be ever faithful to their marriage vow, and to give one another an unfailing and unselfish help. The husband is the chief of the family and the head of the wife. The woman, because she is flesh of his flesh, and bone of his bone, must be subject to her husband and obey him; not, indeed, as a servant, but as a companion, so that her obedience shall be wanting in neither honor nor dignity. Since the husband represents Christ, and since the wife represents the Church, let there always be, both in him who commands and in her who obeys, a heaven-born love guiding both in their respective duties. For "the husband is the head of the wife; as Christ is the head of the Church. . . Therefore, as the Church is subject to Christ, so also let wives be to their husbands in all things."[18]

12. As regards children, they ought to submit to the parents and obey them, and give them honor for conscience' sake; while, on the other hand, parents are bound to give all care and watchful thought to the education of their offspring and their virtuous bringing up: "Fathers, . . . bring them up" (that is, your children) "in the discipline and correction of the Lord."[19] From this we see clearly that the duties of husbands and wives are neither few nor light; although to married people who are good these burdens become not only bearable but agreeable, owing to the strength which they gain through the sacrament.

13. Christ, therefore, having renewed marriage to such and so great excellence, commended and entrusted all the discipline bearing upon these matters to His Church. The Church, always and everywhere, has so used her power with reference to the marriages of Christians that men have seen clearly how it belongs to her as of native right; not being made hers by any human grant, but given divinely to her by the will of her Founder. Her constant and watchful care in guarding marriage, by the preservation of its sanctity, is so well understood as to not need proof. That the judgment of the Council of Jerusalem reprobated licentious and free love,[20] we all know; as also that the incestuous Corinthian was condemned by the authority of blessed Paul.[21] Again, in the very beginning of the Christian Church were repulsed and defeated, with the like unremitting determination, the efforts of many who aimed at the destruction of Christian marriage, such as the Gnostics, Manicheans, and Montanists; and in our own time Mormons, St. Simonians, phalansterians, and communists.[22] (Pope Leo XIII, Arcanum, February 10, 1880. So much for you Mitt Romney and Glenn Beck fans out there, both of whom belong to the American ethnocentric Mormon sect that "reformed" its marriage practices only as a result of the Edmunds-Tucker Act of 1887 that was upheld as constitutional by the Supreme Court of the United States of America in the case of The Late Corporation of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints v. United States, May 19, 1890. Mormons are not going to "restore" the United States of America. Our Lady of Fatima will, and anyone who thinks to the contrary is not thinking as a Catholic. Catholicism is the one and only foundation of personal and social order. Nothing else.)

To begin at the very source of these evils, their basic principle lies in this, that matrimony is repeatedly declared to be not instituted by the Author of nature nor raised by Christ the Lord to the dignity of a true sacrament, but invented by man. Some confidently assert that they have found no evidence of the existence of matrimony in nature or in her laws, but regard it merely as the means of producing life and of gratifying in one way or another a vehement impulse; on the other hand, others recognize that certain beginnings or, as it were, seeds of true wedlock are found in the nature of man since, unless men were bound together by some form of permanent tie, the dignity of husband and wife or the natural end of propagating and rearing the offspring would not receive satisfactory provision. At the same time they maintain that in all beyond this germinal idea matrimony, through various concurrent causes, is invented solely by the mind of man, established solely by his will.

How grievously all these err and how shamelessly they leave the ways of honesty is already evident from what we have set forth here regarding the origin and nature of wedlock, its purposes and the good inherent in it. The evil of this teaching is plainly seen from the consequences which its advocates deduce from it, namely, that the laws, institutions and customs by which wedlock is governed, since they take their origin solely from the will of man, are subject entirely to him, hence can and must be founded, changed and abrogated according to human caprice and the shifting circumstances of human affairs; that the generative power which is grounded in nature itself is more sacred and has wider range than matrimony -- hence it may be exercised both outside as well as within the confines of wedlock, and though the purpose of matrimony be set aside, as though to suggest that the license of a base fornicating woman should enjoy the same rights as the chaste motherhood of a lawfully wedded wife.

Armed with these principles, some men go so far as to concoct new species of unions, suited, as they say, to the present temper of men and the times, which various new forms of matrimony they presume to label "temporary," "experimental," and "companionate." These offer all the indulgence of matrimony and its rights without, however, the indissoluble bond, and without offspring, unless later the parties alter their cohabitation into a matrimony in the full sense of the law.

Indeed there are some who desire and insist that these practices be legitimatized by the law or, at least, excused by their general acceptance among the people. They do not seem even to suspect that these proposals partake of nothing of the modern "culture" in which they glory so much, but are simply hateful abominations which beyond all question reduce our truly cultured nations to the barbarous standards of savage peoples. (Pope Pius XI, Casti Connubii, December 31, 1930.)

 

True popes spoke of matters pertaining to holy purity with modesty, not graphic specificity. Indeed, the sort of graphic specificity used by the conciliar "popes" and apostles of the hideous "theology of the body" was condemned by Pope Pius XI in Divini Illius Magistri, December 31, 1929:

65. Another very grave danger is that naturalism which nowadays invades the field of education in that most delicate matter of purity of morals. Far too common is the error of those who with dangerous assurance and under an ugly term propagate a so-called sex-education, falsely imagining they can forearm youths against the dangers of sensuality by means purely natural, such as a foolhardy initiation and precautionary instruction for all indiscriminately, even in public; and, worse still, by exposing them at an early age to the occasions, in order to accustom them, so it is argued, and as it were to harden them against such dangers.

66. Such persons grievously err in refusing to recognize the inborn weakness of human nature, and the law of which the Apostle speaks, fighting against the law of the mind;[43] and also in ignoring the experience of facts, from which it is clear that, particularly in young people, evil practices are the effect not so much of ignorance of intellect as of weakness of a will exposed to dangerous occasions, and unsupported by the means of grace.

67. In this extremely delicate matter, if, all things considered, some private instruction is found necessary and opportune, from those who hold from God the commission to teach and who have the grace of state, every precaution must be taken. Such precautions are well known in traditional Christian education, and are adequately described by Antoniano cited above, when he says:

Such is our misery and inclination to sin, that often in the very things considered to be remedies against sin, we find occasions for and inducements to sin itself. Hence it is of the highest importance that a good father, while discussing with his son a matter so delicate, should be well on his guard and not descend to details, nor refer to the various ways in which this infernal hydra destroys with its poison so large a portion of the world; otherwise it may happen that instead of extinguishing this fire, he unwittingly stirs or kindles it in the simple and tender heart of the child. Speaking generally, during the period of childhood it suffices to employ those remedies which produce the double effect of opening the door to the virtue of purity and closing the door upon vice.[44]

 

Thus is condemned all classroom instruction in matters pertaining to the Sixth and Ninth Commandments is prohibited. Prohibited also, of course, is the graphically explicit speech of the conciliar "popes" and their disciples who promote the "theology of the body" that engages in the most vile, vulgar forms of speech that would never issue forth from the mouth of the Divine Redeemer, Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, or that of His Most Blessed Mother. Such vile, vulgar forms of speech have never issued forth from the lips of our saints, who maintained custody of their eyes and who shunned all immodest speech at all times.

Here is an excerpt from Saint Alphonsus de Liguori's sermon on the vice of speaking immodestly (the entire text of the sermon is appended below along with a link to the audio recording of the sermon that I made in July of 2008):

3. ”The stroke of a whip," says Ecclesiasticus, "maketh a blue mark; but the stroke of a tongue will break the bones." (Eccl. xxviii. 21.) The wounds of the lash are wounds of the flesh, but the wounds of the obscene tongue are wounds which infect the bones of those who listen to its language. St. Bernardino of Sienna relates, that a virgin who led a holy life, at hearing an obscene word from a young man, fell into a bad thought, and afterwards abandoned herself to the vice of impurity to such a degree that, the saint says, if the devil had taken human flesh, he could not have committed so many sins of that kind as she committed.

4. The misfortune is, that the mouths of hell that frequently utter immodest words, regard them, as trifles, and are careless about confessing them: and when rebuked for them they answer: ”I say these words in jest, and without malice." In jest! Unhappy man, these jests make the devil laugh, and shall make you weep for eternity in hell. In the first place, it is useless to say that you utter such words without malice; for, when you use such expressions, it is very difficult for you to abstain from acts against purity. According to St. Jerome, ”He that delights in words is not far from the act. ” Besides, immodest words spoken before persons of a different sex, are always accompanied with sinful complacency. And is not the scandal you give to others criminal? Utter a single obscene word, and you shall bring into sin all who listen to you. Such is the doctrine of St. Bernard. ”One speaks, and he utters only one word; but he kills the souls of a multitude of hearers." (Serm. xxiv., in Cant.) A greater sin than if, by one discharge of a blunderbuss, you murdered many persons; because you would then only kill their bodies: but, by speaking obscenely, you have killed their souls.

 

So many sins against modesty are committed in conciliar schools and religious education programs, to say nothing of how the indoctrination children receive in America's Concentration Camps, that one cringes when considering the debt that is owed to God as these young souls have been corrupted and their innocence despoiled by being taught to be familiar" by means of programs that are designed to break down their natural psychological resistance to having their innocence despoiled.

Then again, of course, this is what the so-called "theology of the body" and of all of the programs used in the conciliar schools and religious education programs are designed to do, something that Mrs. Randy Engel documented so well many years ago now in Sex Education: The Final Plague and The McHugh Chronicles, the latter of which describes the efforts of the late Monsignor and then "Bishop" James T. McHugh to promote a program instruction in matters relating to the Sixth and Ninth Commandments that was modeled along the lines of the founder of the Sex Information Caucus of the United States (SIECUS), founded by the late Mary Caledrone, with whom "Bishop" McHugh worked very closely.

Those would say that we "must" do "something" to "teach" children about these matters as they are learning it from their friends or from television or motion pictures or from their parents or all of these sources combined are thinking completely naturalistically.

Sure, we live at a time of the most sophisticated means of mass communications in history. Granted. Fallen human nature has not changed, however. Standards of modesty do not change. Our true popes have warned of the dangers of the Masonic control of mass communications in their own days. They did not propose graphic instruction in matters of holy purity as the "vaccination" against the "greater" doses of poison found in theater plays and then in motion pictures or on television. They simply urged Catholics to have nothing to do with Masonic, naturalistic productions and to keep custody of the eyes of their children. This is not complicated, something that Pope Leo XIII pointed out in Humanum Genus, April 20, 1884, and that Pope Pius XI noted in Divini Illius Magistri, December 31, 1929, and in Vigilanti Cura, June 29, 1936 (the excerpt from this last encyclical letter will be placed in Appendix B below):

Moreover, human nature was stained by original sin, and is therefore more disposed to vice than to virtue. For a virtuous life it is absolutely necessary to restrain the disorderly movements of the soul, and to make the passions obedient to reason. In this conflict human things must very often be despised, and the greatest labors and hardships must be undergone, in order that reason may always hold its sway. But the naturalists and Freemasons, having no faith in those things which we have learned by the revelation of God, deny that our first parents sinned, and consequently think that free will is not at all weakened and inclined to evil.[13] On the contrary, exaggerating rather the power and the excellence of nature, and placing therein alone the principle and rule of justice, they cannot even imagine that there is any need at all of a constant struggle and a perfect steadfastness to overcome the violence and rule of our passions.

Wherefore we see that men are publicly tempted by the many allurements of pleasure; that there are journals and pamphlets with neither moderation nor shame; that stage-plays are remarkable for license; that designs for works of art are shamelessly sought in the laws of a so-called verism; that the contrivances of a soft and delicate life are most carefully devised; and that all the blandishments of pleasure are diligently sought out by which virtue may be lulled to sleep. Wickedly, also, but at the same time quite consistently, do those act who do away with the expectation of the joys of heaven, and bring down all happiness to the level of mortality, and, as it were, sink it in the earth. Of what We have said the following fact, astonishing not so much in itself as in its open expression, may serve as a confirmation. For, since generally no one is accustomed to obey crafty and clever men so submissively as those whose soul is weakened and broken down by the domination of the passions, there have been in the sect of the Freemasons some who have plainly determined and proposed that, artfully and of set purpose, the multitude should be satiated with a boundless license of vice, as, when this had been done, it would easily come under their power and authority for any acts of daring. (Pope Leo XIII, Humanum Genus, April 20, 1884.)

89. It is no less necessary to direct and watch the education of the adolescent, "soft as wax to be moulded into vice,"[58] in whatever other environment he may happen to be, removing occasions of evil and providing occasions for good in his recreations and social intercourse; for "evil communications corrupt good manners."[59]

90. More than ever nowadays an extended and careful vigilance is necessary, inasmuch as the dangers of moral and religious shipwreck are greater for inexperienced youth. Especially is this true of impious and immoral books, often diabolically circulated at low prices; of the cinema, which multiplies every kind of exhibition; and now also of the radio, which facilitates every kind of communications. These most powerful means of publicity, which can be of great utility for instruction and education when directed by sound principles, are only too often used as an incentive to evil passions and greed for gain. St. Augustine deplored the passion for the shows of the circus which possessed even some Christians of his time, and he dramatically narrates the infatuation for them, fortunately only temporary, of his disciple and friend Alipius.[60] How often today must parents and educators bewail the corruption of youth brought about by the modern theater and the vile book! (Pope Pius XI, Divini Illius Magistri, December 31, 1929.)

 

Yes, Saint Augustine himself, who had overcome sins of the flesh by means of the graces sent to Him by Our Lord through the loving hands of Our Lady, had to deal with evil influences in his day. Our situation is really nothing new. The remedy must be the same: exhortations to love God and to resist sin as one seeks to grow in sanctity in cooperation with the graces won for us on Calvary. We do not need--and indeed must reject and condemn--the "personalism" of the conciliar "popes" that has given rise to the so-called "theology of the body" that is nothing other than an extensive, intensive workshop of the devil himself.

Moreover, Dr. Janet Smith contended at the conclusion of her defense of Ratzinger/Benedict's comments that have generated so much confusion in the conciliar and secular media (see Benedict's Comments Sow Confusion) by providing the following, completely laughable analogy to support the assertion made by Ratzinger/Benedict in his book length interview with Peter Seewald:

An analogy: If someone was going to rob a bank and was determined to use a gun, it would better for that person to use a gun that had no bullets in it.  It would reduce the likelihood of fatal injuries. But it is not the task of the Church to instruct potential bank robbers how to rob banks more safely and certainly not the task of the Church to support programs of providing potential bank robbers with guns that could not use bullets.  Nonetheless, the intent of a bank robber to rob a bank in a way that is safer for the employees and customers of the bank may indicate an element of moral responsibility that could be a step towards eventual understanding of the immorality of bank robbing.

 

How many bank robbers do not understand the inherent immorality of stealing? Puhhlease!

Similarly, those who commit sins against perversity know that they are wrong, which is why they are so angry and why they will never be content until everyone concurs with their actions. Those who rebel against the very natures that God has implanted in their rational, immortal souls can have their consciences malformed in their youth or they can kill their consciences by repeated, unrepentant Mortal Sins. They still nevertheless know, at least on some level, that they are wrong, which is why, quite literally sometimes, they must shout at anyone who they know disapproves of their so-called "alternative lifestyle."

Furthermore, Dr. Smith's analogy is based on a fallacious premise. A putative bank robber who decides to use a gun without bullets because he does not want to harm anyone has forgotten that someone in the bank might drop dead of a heart attack at the mere sight of the gun, not knowing that it is not loaded with bullets. A police officer responding to the bank robbery will shoot first without asking that putative bank robber if he has bullets in his gun. Innocent bystanders might be wounded or killed as a result if the bank robber ducked for cover as he pulled his gun. Lives would still be endangered no matter the "care" that the robber took to avoid hurting someone while he broke the Seventh Commandment, "Thou shalt not steal."

Similarly, bodies and, much more importantly, souls are wounded and killed by perverse sins against nature, not one of which can be excuse or made "safe" or "safer: from its physical and spiritual consequences. The Catholic Church indeed is not in the business of enabling men to offend God by means of their sins. Rather than applaud  nonexistent "steps" to have an "awareness" of the moral sense, the Catholic Church exhorts sinners to quit their sins for love of God and out of fear of losing their immortal souls for all eternity. Period. End of argument.

It is, of course, unsurprising that Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI cannot get the Sixth and Ninth Commandments right as he cannot get the First and Second Commandments right. He has a serial offender of the honor and majesty and glory of God, going along his merry way thinking that he is pleasing God as he is enabled in his commission of what are, in the objective order of things, Mortal Sins, leaving subjective judgment entirely to God, against which millions upon millions of Catholics gave up their very lives rather than to give even the appearance of committing. (See What's The First Commandment Got To Do With Anything? and Can A True Pope Change the Fifth Commandment?)

The happy 'bishop', the newly-elected president of the falsely named United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, Timothy Dolan, the conciliar "archbishop" of New York, has tried to defend Ratzinger/Benedict by saying that the "pope" did not change anything:

You get the impression that the Holy See or the pope is like Congress and every once in a while says, ‘Oh, let’s change this law,’ ” he said. “We can’t.” (A New Leader Confronts Disaffection in American Catholics.)

 

True. Well put, "Archbishop" Dolan. There's only one little problem with this statement: it flies in the face of what the counterfeit church of conciliarism has done to give impetus to the belief that moral laws can change.

The conciliar "popes" have given the appearance of "changing" the First Commandment by esteeming the symbols of false religions and by entering into places of false worship, thereby offending God gravely as they communicate to Catholics and non-Catholics alike that one is permitted to do these things.

The current conciliar "pope" has violated the First Commandment by undermining the very immutable nature of dogmatic truth as he asserts time and time again that the language used to formulate various dogmas is conditioned by historical circumstances, which is utter blasphemy against God the Holy Ghost, Who has directed our true popes and the fathers of our twenty true councils to convey dogmas and teachings in the way that was done.

The conciliar "popes" have broken the Second Commandment by endorsing the heresy of religious liberty that was termed "insanity" by Pope Gregory XVI in Mirari Vos, August 15, 1832, and injurious babbling by Pope Pius IX in Quanta Cura, December 8, 1864, and by praising the nonexistent "ability" of false religions to contribute to the "betterment" of the world and the establishment of world peace.

The conciliar "popes" have broken the Third Commandment by changing Catholic worship in the Roman Rite to make it more in accord with Protestant practices, thereby creating an abomination of desolation that is responsible for the empty pews that "Archbishop" Dolan decried  in his interview in The New York Times and that is responsible for his own decision to close or consolidate many formerly Catholic schools and parishes in his archdiocese.

The conciliar "popes" have helped to descralize Sunday, another phenomenon that was decried by "Archbishop Dolan" in his New York Times interview, by permitting Catholics attached to their false structures to attend the Protestant and Novus Ordo service on the late-Saturday afternoon or evening before a Sunday and on the late-afternoon or evening before a Holy Day of Obligation.

The conciliar "popes" have broken the Fourth Commandment by denying that the civil state has positive obligation to recognize Catholicism as the true religion and to pursue the common temporal good in light of man's Last End, the possession of the glory of the Beatific Vision of God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost in Heaven for all eternity.

The conciliar "popes" have tampered with the Fifth Commandment by sanctioning the execution of living human beings for purposes of organ harvesting (see Triumph of the Body Snatchers) and they have denied that the civil state has a right and in some instances a duty to impose the death penalty upon malefactors found guilty after the administration of the due process of law of heinous crimes.

The conciliar "popes" have undermined the Sixth and Ninth Commandments by easy, ready "decrees of nullity" and by corrupting the innocence and purity of the young by means of the explicit classroom instruction in matters relating to holy purity that was prohibited in no uncertain terms by Pope Pius XI in Divini Illius Magistri (as noted above).  They have also inverted the ends of marriage and undermined the role of parents of the principal educators of children by insisting that children be immersed in those explicit programs that violate their innocence prior to the reception of the worthless rite of confirmation in their conciliar structures.

"Archbishop" Dolan, the average Catholic has been well-catechized by conciliarism to accept change as a natural and normal part of their parish lives. Why shouldn't they see Ratzinger/Benedict's comments that have generated so much confusion as a change?

Enough. It's past my curfew once again. There is breakfast and lunch to make and pack for our daughter at 6:15 a.m. Those who want to accept the reality of our situation will do so. Others will not.

Let us remember to pray many Rosaries of reparation as we live through these chastisements at the present time.

Our Lady's Immaculate Heart will triumph. May it continue to be our privilege to plant a few seeds for this Triumph as we seek to make reparation for our own many, many sins, including those, if any, against holy purity, as the consecrated slaves of Christ the King through the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of Mary our Immaculate Queen.

Viva Cristo Rey! 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 John the Evangelist, pray for us.

Saint Michael the Archangel, pray for us.

Saint Gabriel the Archangel, pray for us.

Saint Raphael the Archangel, pray for us.

Saints Joachim and Anne, pray for us.

Saints Caspar, Melchior and Balthasar, pray for us.

Pope Saint Clement I, pray for us.

See also: A Litany of Saints

Appendix A

Saint Alphonsus de Liguori's Full Sermon on the Vice of Speaking Immodestly

SERMON XL. ELEVENTH SUNDAY AFTER PENTECOST. - ON THE VICE OF SPEAKING IMMODESTLY.


"He touched his tongue, .... and the string of his tongue was loosed." MARK vii. 33, 35.

IN this day’s gospel St. Mark relates the miracle which our Saviour wrought in healing the man that was dumb by barely touching his tongue. "He touched his tongue and the string of his tongue was loosed." From. the last words we may infer that the man was not entirely dumb, but that his tongue was not free, or that his articulation was not distinct. Hence St. Mark tells us, that after the miracle he spoke right. Let us make the application to ourselves. The dumb man stood in need of a miracle to loose his tongue, and to take away the impediment under which he laboured. But how many are there on whom God would confer a great grace, if he bound their tongues, that they might cease to speak immodestly! This vice does great injury to others. Secondly, it does great injury to themselves. These shall be the two points of this sermon.

First Point. The man who speaks immodestly does great injury to others who listen to him.

1. In explaining the 140th Psalm, St. Augustine calls those who speak obscenely “the mediators of Satan," the ministers of Lucifer; because, by their obscene language, the demon of impurity gets access to souls, which by his own suggestions he could not enter. Of their accursed tongues St. James says: "And the tongue is a fire,... being set on fire by hell." (James iii. 6.) He says that the tongue is a fire kindled by hell, with which they who speak obscenely burn themselves and others. The obscene tongue may be said to be the tongue of the third person, of which Ecclesiasticus says: ”The tongue of a third person hath disquieted many, and scattered them from nation to nation." (Eccl. xxviii. 16.) The spiritual tongue speaks of God, the worldly tongue talks of worldly affairs; but the tongue of a third person is a tongue of hell, which speaks of the impurities of the flesh; and this is the tongue that perverts many, and brings them to perdition.


2. Speaking of the life of men on this earth, the Royal Prophet says: "Let their way become dark and slippery." (Ps. xxxiv. 0.) In this life men walk in the midst of darkness and in a slippery way. Hence they are in danger of falling at every step, unless they cautiously examine the road on which they walk, and carefully avoid dangerous steps that is, the occasions of sin. Now, if in treading this slippery way, frequent efforts were made to throw them down, would it not be a miracle if they did not fall? "The Mediators of Satan," who speak obscenely, impel others to sin, who, as long as they live on this earth, walk in the midst of darkness, and as long as they remain in the flesh, are in danger of falling into the vice of impurity. Now, of those who indulge in obscene language, it has been well said: ”Their throat is an open sepulchre." (Ps. v. 11.) The mouths of those who can utter nothing but filthy obscenities are, according to St. Chrysostom, so many open sepulchres of putrified carcasses. ”Talia sunt ora hominum qui turpia proferunt." (Hom, ii., de Proph. Obs.) The exhalation which arises from the rottenness of a multitude of dead bodies thrown together into a pit, communicates infection and disease to all who feel the stench.

3. ”The stroke of a whip," says Ecclesiasticus, "maketh a blue mark; but the stroke of a tongue will break the bones." (Eccl. xxviii. 21.) The wounds of the lash are wounds of the flesh, but the wounds of the obscene tongue are wounds which infect the bones of those who listen to its language. St. Bernardino of Sienna relates, that a virgin who led a holy life, at hearing an obscene word from a young man, fell into a bad thought, and afterwards abandoned herself to the vice of impurity to such a degree that, the saint says, if the devil had taken human flesh, he could not have committed so many sins of that kind as she committed.

4. The misfortune is, that the mouths of hell that frequently utter immodest words, regard them, as trifles, and are careless about confessing them: and when rebuked for them they answer: ”I say these words in jest, and without malice." In jest! Unhappy man, these jests make the devil laugh, and shall make you weep for eternity in hell. In the first place, it is useless to say that you utter such words without malice; for, when you use such expressions, it is very difficult for you to abstain from acts against purity. According to St. Jerome, ”He that delights in words is not far from the act. ” Besides, immodest words spoken before persons of a different sex, are always accompanied with sinful complacency. And is not the scandal you give to others criminal? Utter a single obscene word, and you shall bring into sin all who listen to you. Such is the doctrine of St. Bernard. ”One speaks, and he utters only one word; but he kills the souls of a multitude of hearers." (Serm. xxiv., in Cant.) A greater sin than if, by one discharge of a blunderbuss, you murdered many persons; because you would then only kill their bodies: but, by speaking obscenely, you have killed their souls.

5. In a word, obscene tongues are the ruin of the world. One of them does more mischief than a hundred devils; because it is the cause of the perdition of many souls. This is not my language; it is the language of the Holy Ghost. ”A slippery mouth worketh ruin." (Prov. xxvi. 28.) And when is it that this havoc of souls is effected, and that such grievous insults are offered to God? It is in the summer, at the time when God bestows upon you the greatest temporal blessings. It is then that he supplies you for the entire year with corn, wine, oil, and other fruits of the earth. It is then that there are as many sins committed by obscene words, as there are grains of corn or bunches of grapes. O ingratitude! How does God bear with us? And who is the cause of these sins? They who speak immodestly are the cause of them. Hence they must render an account to God, and shall be punished for all the sins committed by those who hear them. "But I will require his blood at thy hand." (Ezec. iii. 11.) But let us pass to the second point.

Second Point. He who speaks immodestly does great injury to himself.


6. Some young men say: ”I speak without malice." In answer to this excuse, I have already said, in the first point, that it is very difficult to use immodest language without taking delight in it; and that speaking obscenely before young females, married or unmarried, is always accompanied with a secret complacency in what is said. Besides, by using immodest language, you expose yourself to the proximate danger of falling into unchaste actions: for, according to St. Jerome, as we have already said, ”he who delights in words is not far from the act." All men are inclined to evil. "The imagination and thought of man's heart are prone to evil." (Gen. viii. 21.) But, above all, men are prone to the sin of impurity, to which nature itself inclines them. Hence St. Augustine has said, that in struggling against that vice”the victory is rare," at least for those who do not use great caution. ”Communis pugna et rara victoria." Now, the impure objects of which they speak are always presented to the mind of those who freely utter obscene words. These objects excite pleasure, and bring them into sinful desires and morose delectations, and afterwards into criminal acts. Behold the consequence of the immodest words which young men say they speak without malice.

7. "Be not taken in thy tongue," says the Holy Ghost. (Eccl. v. 16.) Beware lest by your tongue you forge a chain which will drag you to hell. ”The tongue," says St. James, ”defileth the whole body, and inflameth the wheel of our nativity." (St. James iii. 6.) The tongue is one of the members of the body, but when it utters bad words it infects the whole body, and "inflames the wheels of our nativity ;" it inflames and corrupts our entire life from our birth to old age. Hence we see that men who indulge in obscenity, cannot, even in old age, abstain from immodest language. In the life of St. Valerius, Surius relates that the saint, in travelling, went one day into a house to warm himself. He heard the master of the house and a judge of the district, though both were advanced in years, speaking on obscene subjects. The saint reproved them severely; but they paid no attention to his rebuke. However, God punished both of them: one became blind, and a sore broke out on the other, which produced deadly spasms. Henry Gragerman relates (in Magn. Spec., dist. 9, ex. 58), that one of those obscene talkers died suddenly and without repentance, and that he was afterwards seen in hell tearing his tongue in pieces; and when it was restored he began again to lacerate it.


8. But how can God have mercy on him who has no pity on the souls of his neighbours?”Judgment without mercy to him that hath not done mercy." (St. James ii. 13.) Oh! what a pity to see one of those obscene wretches pouring out his filthy expressions before girls and young married females! The greater the number of such persons present, the more abominable is his language. It often happens that little boys and girls are present, and he has no horror of scandalizing these innocent souls! Cantipratano relates that the son of a certain nobleman in Burgundy was sent to be educated by the monks of Cluni. He was an angel of purity; but the unhappy boy having one day entered into a carpenter’s shop, heard some obscene words spoken by the carpenter’s wile, fell into sin, and lost the divine grace. Father Sabitano, in his work entitled”Evangelical Light," relates that another boy, fifteen years old, having heard an immodest word, began to think of it the following night, consented to a bad thought, and died suddenly the same night. His confessor having heard of his death, intended to say Mass for him. But the soul of the unfortunate boy appeared to him, and told the confessor not to celebrate Mass for him that, by means of the word he had heard, he was damned and that the celebration of Mass would add to his pains. O God! how great, were it in their power to weep, would be the wailing of the angel-guardians of these poor children that are scandalized and brought to hell by the language of obscene tongues! With what earnestness shall the angels demand vengeance from God against the author of such scandals! That the angels shall cry for vengeance against them, appears from the words of Jesus Christ: ”See that you despise not one of these little ones; for I say to you, that their angels in heaven always see the face of my Father." (Matt, xviii. 10.)

9. Be attentive, then, my brethren, and guard your selves against speaking immodestly, more than you would against death. Listen to the advice of the Holy Ghost: ”Make a balance for thy words, and a just bridle for thy mouth; and take heed lest thou slip with thy tongue and thy fall be incurable unto death." (Eccl. xxvhi. 29, 30.)”Make a balance" you must weigh your words before you utter them and”a bridle for thy mouth" when immodest words come to the tongue, you must suppress them; otherwise, by uttering them, you shall inflict on your own soul, and on the souls of others, a mortal and incurable wound. God has given you the tongue, not to offend him, but to praise and bless him. ”But, ” says St. Paul, “fornication and all uncleanness, let it not so much as be named among you, as becometh saints." (Ephes. v. 3.) Mark the words”all uncleanness. ” We must not only abstain from obscene language and from every word of double meaning spoken in jest, but also from every improper word unbecoming a saint that is, a Christian. It is necessary to remark, that words of double meaning sometimes do greater evil than open obscenity, because the art with which they are spoken makes a deeper impression on, the mind.

10. Reflect, says St. Augustine, that your mouths are the mouths of Christians, which Jesus Christ has so often entered in the holy communion. Hence, you ought to have a horror of uttering all unchaste words, which are a diabolical poison. ”See, brethren, if it be just that, from the mouths of Christians, which the body of Christ enters, an immodest song, like diabolical poison, should proceed." (Serm. xv., de Temp.) St. Paul says, that the language of a Christian should be always seasoned with salt. ”Let your speech be always in grace, seasoned with salt. ”(Col. iv. 6.) Our conversation should be seasoned with words calculated to excite others not to offend, but to love God. ”Happy the tongue," says St. Bernard, ”that knows only how to speak of holy things!" Happy the tongue that knows only how to speak of God! brethren, be careful not only to abstain from all obscene language, but to avoid, as you would a plague, those who speak immodestly. When you hear any one begin to utter obscene words, follow the advice of the Holy Ghost: ”Hedge in thy ears with thorns: hear not a wicked tongue." (Eccl. xxviii. 28.) "Hedge in thy ears with thorns" that is, reprove with zeal the man who speaks obscenely; at least turn away your face, and show that you hate such language. Let us not be ashamed to appear to be followers of Jesus Christ, unless we wish Jesus Christ to be ashamed to bring us with him into Paradise. (Saint Alphonsus de Liguori, Sermons for Sunday, pp. 169-172; the audio recording of this sermon can be accessed at: Eleventh Sunday After Pentecost: On The Vice Of Speaking Immodestly, 17 Minutes.)

Appendix B

Pope Pius XI, Vigilanti Cura, June 29, 1936

Recreation, in its manifold varieties, has become a necessity for people who work under the fatiguing conditions of modern industry, but it must be worthy of the rational nature of man and therefore must be morally healthy. It must be elevated to the rank of a positive factor for good and must seek to arouse noble sentiments. A people who, in time of repose, give themselves to diversions which violate decency, honour, or morality, to recreations which, especially to the young, constitute occasions of sin, are in grave danger of losing their greatness and even their national power.

It admits of no discussion that the motion picture has achieved these last years a position of universal importance among modern means of diversion. . . .

There is no need to point out the fact that millions of people go to the motion pictures every day; that motion picture theatres are being opened in ever increasing number in civilized and semi-civilized countries; that the motion picture has become the most popular form of diversion which is offered for the leisure hours not only of the rich but of all classes of society.

At the same time, there does not exist today a means of influencing the masses more potent than the cinema. The reason for this is to be sought for in the very nature of the pictures projected upon the screen, in the popularity of motion picture plays, and in the circumstances which accompany them.

The power of the motion picture consists in this, that it speaks by means of vivid and concrete imagery which the mind takes in with enjoyment and without fatigue. Even the crudest and most primitive minds which have neither the capacity nor the desire to make the efforts necessary for abstraction or deductive reasoning are captivated by the cinema. In place of the effort which reading or listening demands, there is the continued pleasure of a succession of concrete and, so to speak, living pictures.

This power is still greater in the talking picture for the reason that interpretation becomes even easier and the charm of music is added to the action of the drama. Dances and variety acts which are sometimes introduced between the films serve to increase the stimulation of the passions.

It must be Elevated

Since then the cinema is in reality a sort of object lesson which, for good or for evil, teaches the majority of men more effectively than abstract reasoning, it must be elevated to conformity with the aims of a Christian conscience and saved from depraving and demoralizing effects.

Everyone knows what damage is done to the soul by bad motion pictures. They are occasions of sin; they seduce young people along the ways of evil by glorifying the passions; they show life under a false light; they cloud ideals; they destroy pure love, respect for marriage, affection for the family. They are capable also of creating prejudices among individuals and misunderstandings among nations, among social classes, among entire races.

On the other hand, good motion pictures are capable of exercising a profoundly moral influence upon those who see them. In addition to affording recreation, they are able to arouse noble ideals of life, to communicate valuable conceptions, to impart a better knowledge of the history and the beauties of the Fatherland and of other countries, to present truth and virtue under attractive forms, to create, or at least to favour understanding among nations, social classes, and races, to champion the cause of justice, to give new life to the claims of virtue, and to contribute positively to the genesis of a just social order in the world.

It Speaks not to Individuals but to Multitudes

These considerations take on greater seriousness from the fact that the cinema speaks not to individuals but to multitudes, and that it does so in circumstances of time and place and surroundings which are most apt to arouse unusual enthusiasm for the good as well as for the bad and to conduce to that collective exaltation which, as experience teaches us, may assume the most morbid forms.

The motion picture is viewed by people who are seated in a dark theatre and whose faculties, mental, physical, and often spiritual, are relaxed. One does not need to go far in search of these theatres: they are close to the home, to the church, and to the school and they thus bring the cinema into the very centre of popular life.

Moreover, stories and actions are presented, through the cinema, by men and women whose natural gifts are increased by training and embellished by every known art, in a manner which may possibly become an additional source of corruption, especially to the young. Further, the motion picture has enlisted in its service luxurious appointments, pleasing music, the vigour of realism, every form of whim and fancy. For this very reason, it attracts and fascinates particularly the young, the adolescent, and even the child. Thus at the very age when the moral sense is being formed and when the notions and sentiments of justice and rectitude, of duty and obligation and of ideals of life are being developed, the motion picture with its direct propaganda assumes a position of commanding influence.

It is unfortunate that, in the present state of affairs, this influence is frequently exerted for evil. So much so that when one thinks of the havoc wrought in the souls of youth and of childhood, of the loss of innocence so often suffered in the motion picture theatres, there comes to mind the terrible condemnation pronounced by Our Lord upon the corrupters of little ones: "whosoever shall scandalize one of these little ones who believe in Me, it were better for him that a millstone be hanged about his neck and that he be drowned in the depths of the sea".

 

 





© Copyright 2010, Thomas A. Droleskey. All rights reserved.