What Modernity Hath Wrought

by Thomas A. Droleskey

Men steeped in the ravages of Original Sin continue to bombard each other in the Middle East. The Hezbollah militants based in southern Lebanon continue to lob rockets into civilian population centers in northern Israel. The Israelis continue to destroy the infrastructure of a good deal of Lebanon, killing countless numbers of civilians and destroying the homes of countless others. The craven cowards who populate the administration of President George W. Bush have indemnified the Israeli destruction of Lebanon at every turn, going so far as to delay the evacuation of American citizens from Lebanon in order not to embarrass Israeli leaders by making it appear as though the devastation in this once proud country is not great as has been imposed upon by the elected killers in the Israeli government who used the kidnapping of two Israeli soldiers as the pretext for the launching of a long-planned campaign of death and destruction throughout Lebanon.

Israel has used Lebanon as a punching bag before, delivering their American-subsidized bombs and tanks to wreak death and destruction there in 1982. As the world's attention was focused on the final weeks of the war between the United Kingdom and Argentina over the Malvinas (Falklands) in the South Atlantic Ocean, the government of then Prime Minister Menachem Begin and Defense Minister Ariel Sharon invaded southern Lebanon in an effort to get rid of the Palestine Liberation Organization and its then head, Yasser Arafat, once and for all. The campaign then pushed up into Beirut, which was subjected to merciless bombing. West Beirut was under siege, especially on August 12, 1982, for some time before the administration of President Ronald Wilson Reagan sent American Marines as part of a "peacekeeping" force there. We know all too tragically of the murder of 241 Marines by Hezbollah suicide terrorists on October 23, 1983.

Undeterred by the wanton destruction of Lebanon in 1982 and the price that its American subsidizer paid for getting its forces out of that country, Israel is at again, knowing that the George W. Bush administration is even more supportive of its military policies than has any previous administration since President Lyndon Baines Johnson decided to support Israel unreservedly in the Six Day War (June 5-10, 1967). Johnson's support for Israel was unflagging even when the Israeli's "accidentally" bombed the U.S.S. Liberty in the Mediterranean, killing 34 American sailors. Indeed, Johnson and his Secretary of Defense, Robert S. McNamara (who helped to mastermind the "Edsel" when he was the head of the Ford Motor Company, relying upon the same sort of quantitative analysis--Planning, Programming, Budgetary Systems--that he would use with disastrous results in "planning" American involvement in Southeast Asia in the John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson administrations) covered-up the deliberate attack on the U.S.S. Liberty by the Israelis.

Consider this report, written by Eric Margolis, that appeared on the Lew Rockwell website on May 2, 2001:

On the fourth day of the 1967 Arab Israeli War, the intelligence ship 'USS Liberty' was steaming slowly in international waters, 14 miles off the Sinai Peninsula. Israeli armored forces were racing deep into Sinai in hot pursuit of the retreating Egyptian army.

'Liberty,' a World War II freighter, had been converted into an intelligence vessel by the top-secret US National Security Agency, and packed with the latest signals and electronic interception equipment. The ship bristled with antennas and electronic 'ears' including TRSSCOMM, a system that delivered real-time intercepts to Washington by bouncing a stream of microwaves off the moon.

'Liberty' had been rushed to Sinai to monitor communications of the belligerents in the Third Arab Israeli War: Israel and her foes, Egypt, Syria, and Jordan.

At 0800 hrs, 8 June, 1967, eight Israeli recon flights flew over 'Liberty,' which was flying a large American flag. At 1400 hrs, waves of low-flying Israeli Mystere and Mirage-III fighter-bombers repeatedly attacked the American vessel with rockets, napalm, and cannon. The air attacks lasted 20 minutes, concentrating on the ship's electronic antennas and dishes. The 'Liberty' was left afire, listing sharply. Eight of her crew lay dead, a hundred seriously wounded, including the captain, Commander William McGonagle.

At 1424 hrs, three Israeli torpedo boats attacked, raking the burning 'Liberty' with 20mm and 40mm shells. At 1431hrs an Israeli torpedo hit the 'Liberty' midship, precisely where the signals intelligence systems were located. Twenty-five more Americans died.

Israeli gunboats circled the wounded 'Liberty,' firing at crewmen trying to fight the fires. At 1515, the crew were ordered to abandon ship. The Israeli warships closed and poured machine gun fire into the crowded life rafts, sinking two. As American sailors were being massacred in cold blood, a rescue mission by US Sixth Fleet carrier aircraft was mysteriously aborted on orders from the White House.

An hour after the attack, Israeli warships and planes returned. Commander McGonagle gave the order. 'prepare to repel borders.' But the Israelis, probably fearful of intervention by the US Sixth Fleet, departed. 'Liberty' was left shattered but still defiant, her flag flying.

The Israeli attacks killed 34 US seamen and wounded 171 out of a crew of 297, the worst loss of American naval personnel from hostile action since World War II.

Less than an hour after the attack, Israel told Washington its forces had committed a 'tragic error.' Later, Israel claimed it had mistaken 'Liberty' for an ancient Egyptian horse transport. US Secretary of State, Dean Rusk, and Joint Chiefs of Staff head, Admiral Thomas Moorer, insisted the Israeli attack was deliberate and designed to sink 'Liberty.' So did three CIA reports; one asserted Israel's Defense Minister, Gen. Moshe Dayan, had personally ordered the attack.

In contrast to American outrage over North Korea's assault on the intelligence ship 'Pueblo,' Iraq's mistaken missile strike on the USS 'Stark,' last fall's bombing of the USS 'Cole' in Aden, and the recent US-China air incident, the savaging of 'Liberty' was quickly hushed up by President Lyndon Johnson and Defense Secretary Robert McNamara.

The White House and Congress immediately accepted Israel's explanation and let the matter drop. Israel later paid a token reparation of US $6 million. There were reports two Israeli pilots who had refused to attack 'Liberty' were jailed for 18 years.

Surviving 'Liberty' crew members would not be silenced. They kept demanding an open inquiry and tried to tell their story of deliberate attack to the media. Israel's government worked behind the scenes to thwart these efforts, going so far as having American pro-Israel groups accuse 'Liberty's' survivors of being 'anti-Semites' and 'Israel-haters.' Major TV networks cancelled interviews with the crew. A book about the 'Liberty' by crewman James Ennes' was dropped from distribution. The Israel lobby branded him 'an Arab propagandist.'

The attack on 'Liberty' was fading into obscurity until last week, when intelligence expert James Bamford came out with Body of Secrets, his latest book about the National Security Agency. In a stunning revelation, Bamford writes that unknown to Israel, a US Navy EC-121 intelligence aircraft was flying high overhead the 'Liberty,' electronically recorded the attack. The US aircraft crew provides evidence that the Israeli pilots knew full well that they were attacking a US Navy ship flying the American flag.

Why did Israel try to sink a naval vessel of its benefactor and ally? Most likely because 'Liberty's' intercepts flatly contradicted Israel's claim, made at the war's beginning on 5 June, that Egypt had attacked Israel, and that Israel's massive air assault on three Arab nations was in retaliation. In fact, Israel began the war by a devastating, Pearl-Harbor style surprise attack that caught the Arabs in bed and destroyed their entire air forces.

Israel was also preparing to attack Syria to seize its strategic Golan Heights. Washington warned Israel not to invade Syria, which had remained inactive while Israel fought Egypt. Bamford says Israel's offensive against Syria was abruptly postponed when 'Liberty' appeared off Sinai, then launched once it was knocked out of action. Israel's claim that Syria had attacked it could have been disproved by 'Liberty.'

Most significant, 'Liberty's' intercepts may have shown that Israel seized upon sharply rising Arab-Israeli tensions in May-June 1967 to launch a long-planned war to invade and annex the West Bank, Jerusalem, Golan and Sinai.

Far more shocking was Washington's response. Writes Bamford: 'Despite the overwhelming evidence that Israel attacked the ship and killed American servicemen deliberately, the Johnson Administration and Congress covered up the entire incident.' Why?

Domestic politics. Johnson, a man never noted for high moral values, preferred to cover up the attack rather than anger a key constituency and major financial backer of the Democratic Party. Congress was even less eager to touch this 'third rail' issue.

Commander McGonagle was quietly awarded the Medal of Honor for his and his men's heroism – not in the White House, as is usual, but in an obscure ceremony at the Washington Navy Yard. Crew member's graves were inscribed, 'died in the Eastern Mediterranean..' as if they had be killed by disease, rather than hostile action.

A member of President Johnson's staff believed there was a more complex reason for the cover-up: Johnson offered Jewish liberals unconditional backing of Israel, and a cover-up of the 'Liberty' attack, in exchange for the liberal toning down their strident criticism of his policies in the then raging Vietnam War.

Israel, which claims it fought a war of self defense in 1967 and had no prior territorial ambitions, will be much displeased by Bamford's revelations. Those who believe Israel illegally occupies the West Bank and Golan will be emboldened.

Much more important, the US government's long, disgraceful cover-up of the premeditated attack on 'Liberty' has now burst into the open and demands full-scale investigation. After 34 years, the voices of 'Liberty's' dead and wounded seamen must finally be heard.

The State of Israel, which sells advanced missile technology to the so-called People's Republic of China and spies on its chief banker and providers of weapons, is no friend of the United States of America. It is not "American's only ally" in the Middle East. Its leaders use the American-Israel Political Action Committee to funnel money into the campaign coffers of career politicians of both major political parties so as to buy their silence about Israeli atrocities against all manner of people. The leaders of Israel consider all non-Jews to be sub-humans who can be liquidated quite easily if deemed necessary to advance what is claimed to be Israeli national security interests, thus aping Adolf Hitler's hatred of Jews as sub-humans Remorse for the killing of the seamen aboard the Liberty? Perish the thought. Remorse over the death and destruction visited upon Lebanon in 1982 and being wreaked there at present? Not on your life. Remorse over the forcible eviction of Palestinians from their homes in 1948 and then placing them in the Israeli version of concentration camps? None whatsoever. No, the Zionists who founded and who continue to run Israel believe that they have the right to do anything at any time. The precepts of the Just War Theory do not apply to men who deny the Sacred Divinity of Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ and who spit at the mere mention of His Holy Name.

To be sure, Hezbollah and its Syrian and Iranian bankers are not blameless in the current round of violence in Lebanon. Adherents of what George W. Bush has positivistically called over and over again as the "religion of peace" hate the Talmudic Jews and Zionists just as much as they are hated in return. Once again, men steeped in Original Sin advert to hatred and killing as a first and only resort, not knowing (or caring) anything about the Mercy of the Divine Redeemer and His injunction to forgive the sins of others as they themselves are forgiven. 

The government of the United States of America, however, is not backing Hezbollah with its money and arms. It is backing the wanton policies of death and destruction of the State of Israel, doing and saying nothing to restrain the monsters who run the Israeli government from ceasing their barbaric campaign against the Lebanese people, about twenty percent of whom are Maronite Rite Catholics (another five percent, approximately, are Melkite Rite Catholics). When you think about it, though, the Bush administration could not even begin to criticize the death and destruction that Israel is visiting upon Lebanon. After all, this country has been doing the same thing to Iraq for the past three years. Countless numbers of civilians have been killed in our efforts as "liberators" to "democratize" Iraq and thus to make the region "safe" for Israel as "democracy" is spread from one Mohammedan state to another.

The Middle East has also been made "safe" for contractors close to President George W. Bush and Vice President Richard N. Cheney to receive contracts to "rebuild" Iraq following our own military efforts there. These same contractors will be employed to help rebuild Lebanon's infrastructure when Israel gets the multinational security force that it wants put into place along the Lebanon-Israeli border. It's a very neat and perverse trick: American taxpayer dollars are used to bomb the infrastructures in Iraq, enriching American contractors, who are paid with American taxpayer dollars. The bombs dropped by the Israeli's in Lebanon have been subsidized in large measure by American taxpayer dollars, which will be used to pay the American contractors who will be hired to rebuild Lebanon now. The American taxpayer pays now and well into the future for the always changing and ever-failing schemes of men who believe that they can make the world "safe" by the use of military campaigns that are waged without regard for moral truths and without regard for the rights of Christ the King and Mary our Immaculate Queen.

Moreover, the United States of America is in no position to criticize any other nation in the world about the killing of innocent human beings. What do I mean? Well, it is quite simple. As cruel and as barbaric as the Israeli bombing of Lebanon has been since it began on Wednesday, July 12, 2006, far more innocent human beings have been killed under the cover of law in this nation by means of surgical abortion alone, to say nothing of chemical abortifacients. We are the last nation on earth to lecture anyone about "human rights" and protecting the "innocent." Our national leaders, including those who say they are pro-life but actually support the surgical dismemberment or burning of innocent preborn children in their mothers' wombs in certain "hard" cases, act as though the evil of child-killing under cover of law is a permanent feature of national life that simply cannot be addressed as there is too much "support" for it amongst the general populace. Meaning to take away nothing at all from the horror and revulsion that any right-thinking person should have about Israel's wanton policies in Lebanon, it is important to remember this stark fact: around 48,000 babies have been put to death under cover of law in this country since Israel began its bloody campaign on July 12, 2006.

The United States of America is going to pay a heavy price for its diffidence in the wake of the slaughter of the preborn, which makes it more and more possible for its leaders to be diffident in the wake of their own merciless military adventures and the unspeakably merciless military adventures of their alleged ally, Israel. Saddam Hussein, who was certainly a despicable thug, presided over the execution of about 1.5 million people during his thirty-four years in power. About that many innocent preborn babies die every year in this country. Every year. Ah, yes, but we are the "civilized" United States of America. We are advanced. We have "democracy" and "civil liberty" to give the world.

The duplicity of American leaders is endless. As we pound our chests and talk about how we have "liberated" Iraq from Hussein, who kept all other gangsters, including al-Qaeda, out of his country, we forget that we helped to enable his regime during the Iran-Iraq War in the early 1980s. None other than the Reagan administration special Middle East Envoy, a chap named Donald D. Rumsfeld, met with Hussein in 1983 to discuss ways that the United States, while maintaining its policy of official "neutrality" in the Iran-Iraq War, could help Iraq. In other words, the United States enabled the Hussein regime when its leaders thought it expedient to do so.

Shaking Hands: Iraqi President Saddam Hussein greets Donald Rumsfeld, then special envoy of President Ronald Reagan, in Baghdad on December 20, 1983.  (National Security Archive, http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB82/ There is an interesting, fact-based article, replete with links to national security documents is available at: Shaking Hands with Saddam Hussein.)

Sad to say, ladies and gentlemen, we are the enablers of our own leaders and their morally bankrupt policies, both domestically and internationally, that sanction the killing of the innocent here and abroad, whether by abortionists or by our own military adventures or those of others, including the State of Israel. We are the enablers of our own leaders by believing in the nationalist, idolatrous myths of the moral superiority of the United States of America, founded on the abjectly false beliefs that men could pursue the common good absent a frank recognition of the Catholic Church as the true religion of the State and thus absent a complete and total subordination to the Deposit of Faith entrusted to that Church by her Divine Bridegroom, Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. We are the enablers of our own leaders by believing in the nationalist, idolatrous myths of the moral superiority of the United States, which advances the Protestant and Judeo-Masonic lie that men can be virtuous on their own power without having belief in, access to and cooperation with Sanctifying Grace.

As the innocent are being killed under cover of law in this country and in Iraq--by our own military at times and by the various Mohammedan militants--and in Israel by the Hezbollah and in Lebanon by the Israelis, what is the Vatican's response? A call for the Talmudic Jews and Zionists and Mohammedans to convert to the true Faith? The consecration of Russia to Our Lady's Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart by a pope with all of the world's bishops? (Hello, out there in never-never land: still believe that the consecration has been done? This is the "period of peace"? This is the Reign of Mary Immaculate? Would you want to rethink that positivist contention, please? Perhaps it is time to read--and to take seriously--The Devil's Final Battle.) No, the Vatican's response is conciliarspeak, meaning naturalism that warms the cockles of hearts of Freemasons and their fellow travelers worldwide.

Consider this indefensible effort to defend the novelties of "inter-religious dialogue" by Archbishop Celestino Migliore, the Permanent Observer of the Holy See at the United Nations, in an interview with Zenit, published on July 23, 2006:

Q: Which is the "Catholic view" of dialogue, and why is it crucial for believers?

Archbishop Migliore: In speaking of "Catholic" view, there is nothing more direct than to revisit the thought of the Pope, particularly as expressed in Cologne, when in August 2005, he met with some leaders of the Islamic community.

Benedict XVI affirmed that religions are called to create, support and promote the precondition of every encounter, every dialogue, and of every understanding of pluralism and cultural difference. That precondition is the dignity of the human person.

Our common human dignity is a true precondition because it comes before every other consideration or methodological principle, even those of international law.

We see it in the "Golden Rule," found throughout the religions of the world. Another description of this concept is reciprocity.

Encouraging awareness and experience of this common heritage within and among religions will surely help in the translation of this positive vision into political and social categories which will, in their turn, inform the juridical categories underlying the national and international relations.

Contrast that mindless exercise of practical indifferentism, which treats false religions as having something "positive" to "contribute" in the advancement of world "peace," with the words of Pope Pius XI in Ubi Arcano Dei Consilio, December 23, 1922:

This peace of Christ, however, surpasses all human understanding -- "the peace of God which surpasseth all understanding" (Philippians iv, 7), and for this very reason dominates our sinful passions and renders such evils as division, strife, and discord, which result solely from the unrestrained desire for earthly possessions, impossible. If the desire for worldly possessions were kept within bounds and the place of honor in our affections given to the things of the spirit, which place undoubtedly they deserve, the peace of Christ would follow immediately, to which would be joined in a natural and happy union, as it were, a higher regard for the value and dignity of human life. Human personality, too, would be raised to a higher level, for man has been ennobled by the Blood of Christ and made kin to God Himself by means of holiness and the bond of brotherly love which unites us closely with Christ, by prayer and by the reception of the Sacraments, means infallibly certain to produce this elevation to and participation in the life of God, by the desire to attain everlasting possession of the glory and happiness of heaven which is held out to all by God as our goal and final reward.

We have already seen and come to the conclusion that the principal cause of the confusion, restlessness, and dangers which are so prominent a characteristic of false peace is the weakening of the binding force of law and lack of respect for authority, effects which logically follow upon denial of the truth that authority comes from God, the Creator and Universal Law-giver.

The only remedy for such state of affairs is the peace of Christ since the peace of Christ is the peace of God, which could not exist if it did not enjoin respect for law, order, and the rights of authority. In the Holy Scriptures We read: "My children, keep discipline in peace." (Ecclesiasticus xli, 17) "Much peace have they that love the law, O Lord." (Psalms cxviii, 165) "He that feareth the commandment, shall dwell in peace." (Proverbs xiii, 13) Jesus Christ very expressly states: "Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's." (Matt. xxii, 21) He even recognized that Pilate possessed authority from on High (John xiv, 11) as he acknowledged that the scribes and Pharisees who though unworthy sat in the chair of Moses (Matt. xxiii, 2) were not without a like authority. In Joseph and Mary, Jesus respected the natural authority of parents and was subject to them for the greater part of His life. (Luke ii, 51) He also taught, by the voice of His Apostle, the same important doctrine: "Let every soul be subject to higher powers: for there is no power but from God." (Romans xiii, 1; cf. also 1 Peter ii, 13, 18)

If we stop to reflect for a moment that these ideals and doctrines of Jesus Christ, for example, his teachings on the necessity and value of the spiritual life, on the dignity and sanctity of human life, on the duty of obedience, on the divine basis of human government, on the sacramental character of matrimony and by consequence the sanctity of family life -- if we stop to reflect, let Us repeat, that these ideals and doctrines of Christ (which are in fact but a portion of the treasury of truth which He left to mankind) were confided by Him to His Church and to her alone for safekeeping, and that He has promised that His aid will never fail her at any time for she is the infallible teacher of His doctrines in every century and before all nations, there is no one who cannot clearly see what a singularly important role the Catholic Church is able to play, and is even called upon to assume, in providing a remedy for the ills which afflict the world today and in leading mankind toward a universal peace.

Because the Church is by divine institution the sole depository and interpreter of the ideals and teachings of Christ, she alone possesses in any complete and true sense the power effectively to combat that materialistic philosophy which has already done and, still threatens, such tremendous harm to the home and to the state. The Church alone can introduce into society and maintain therein the prestige of a true, sound spiritualism, the spiritualism of Christianity which both from the point of view of truth and of its practical value is quite superior to any exclusively philosophical theory. The Church is the teacher and an example of world good-will, for she is able to inculcate and develop in mankind the "true spirit of brotherly love" (St. Augustine, De Moribus Ecclesiae Catholicae, i, 30) and by raising the public estimation of the value and dignity of the individual's soul help thereby to lift us even unto God.

Does Archbishop Migliore believe a single, solitary word of this? Has he even read a single, solitary word of this? Which is Catholic? Archbishop Migliore's defense of the "role" of false religions or Pope Pius XI's defense of the Catholic Church as the sole basis of peace in souls and thus of peace in and among nations? As I queried a few days ago, does Pope Benedict XVI believe in a single, solitary word of this? He does not. He believes that the Second Vatican Council has "moved beyond" the "outdated" approach of a denominationally "exclusive" view of how to view the world and its problems, which have their remote causes in Original Sin and their proximate causes in Actual Sins and in the overthrow of the Social Reign of Christ the King by the Protestant Revolt and the rise of Freemasonry.

Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger wrote the following in his The Principles of Catholic Theology (1982, published in English in 1987):

It is desirable to offer a diagnosis of the text (Gaudium et Spes) as a whole, we might say that (in conjunction with the texts on religious liberty, and world religions) it is a revision of the Syllabus of Pius IX, a kind of countersyllabus  ... Let us be content to say here that the text serves as a countersyllabus and, as such, represents on the part of the Church, an attempt at an official reconciliation with the new era inaugurated in 1789. . . . the one-sidedness of the position adopted by the Church under Pius IX and Pius X in response to the situation created by the new phase of history inaugurated by the French Revolution was, to a large extent, corrected via facti, especially in Central Europe, but there was still no basic statement of the relationship that should exist between the Church and the world that had come into existence after 1789. In fact, an attitude that was largely pre-revolutionary continued to exist in countries with strong Catholic majorities. Hardly anyone will deny today that the Spanish and Italian Concordat strove to preserve too much of a view of the world that no longer corresponded to the facts. Hardly anyone will deny today that, in the field of education and with respect to the historico-critical method in modern science, anachronisms existed that corresponded closely to this adherence to an obsolete Church-state relationship.

Pope Leo XIII condemned Joseph Ratzinger's "reconciliation" with the "new era inaugurated in 1789," calling it an alliance with the devil himself. Writing in Custodi Di Quella Fede, December 8, 1892, Pope Leo stated in no uncertain terms:

Everyone should avoid familiarity or friendship with anyone suspected of belonging to masonry or to affiliated groups. Know them by their fruits and avoid them. Every familiarity should be avoided, not only with those impious libertines who openly promote the character of the sect, but also with those who hide under the mask of universal tolerance, respect for all religions, and the craving to reconcile the maxims of the Gospel with those of the revolution. These men seek to reconcile Christ and Belial, the Church of God and the state without God.

The contrast is clear. Which statement is eternally Catholic? Which statement helps to feed the madness that Modernity hath wrought, that it is possible for man to know order in his own life and peace in the world absent membership in the Catholic Church and adherence to the perennial teachings entrusted to her by the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity made Man in Our Lady's virginal and immaculate womb by the power of the Holy Ghost at the Annunciation?

Pope Saint Pius X, writing in Pascendi Dominici Gregis, September 8, 1907, would have to be wrong about his critique of Modernism for Joseph Ratzinger's defense of the ethos of conciliarism that he helped to create to be correct:

But it is not only within her own household that the Church must come to terms. Besides her relations with those within, she has others with those who are outside. The Church does not occupy the world all by herself; there are other societies in the world., with which she must necessarily have dealings and contact. The rights and duties of the Church towards civil societies must, therefore, be determined, and determined, of course, by her own nature, that, to wit, which the Modernists have already described to us. The rules to be applied in this matter are clearly those which have been laid down for science and faith, though in the latter case the question turned upon the object, while in the present case we have one of ends. In the same way, then, as faith and science are alien to each other by reason of the diversity of their objects, Church and State are strangers by reason of the diversity of their ends, that of the Church being spiritual while that of the State is temporal. Formerly it was possible to subordinate the temporal to the spiritual and to speak of some questions as mixed, conceding to the Church the position of queen and mistress in all such, because the Church was then regarded as having been instituted immediately by God as the author of the supernatural order. But this doctrine is today repudiated alike by philosophers and historians. The state must, therefore, be separated from the Church, and the Catholic from the citizen. Every Catholic, from the fact that he is also a citizen, has the right and the duty to work for the common good in the way he thinks best, without troubling himself about the authority of the Church, without paying any heed to its wishes, its counsels, its orders -- nay, even in spite of its rebukes. For the Church to trace out and prescribe for the citizen any line of action, on any pretext whatsoever, is to be guilty of an abuse of authority, against which one is bound to protest with all one's might. Venerable Brethren, the principles from which these doctrines spring have been solemnly condemned by Our predecessor, Pius VI, in his Apostolic Constitution Auctorem fidei.

Separation of Church and State? A "healthy secularity?" Catholicism? "Legitimate developments of doctrine?" Nonsense. There are diabolical concepts promoted by a number of the devil's minions, both witting and unwitting, including the scions of conciliarism, to separate themselves from the entire ethos of Christendom, which is dismissed and condemned as "triumphalistic," as a new modus vivendi is to be found with the "real world" as it exists today.

The "real world," ladies and gentlemen, is the world of the Catholic Faith. There is no other world than the world of the Catholic Faith. And it is because the manufacturers of a counterfeit religion have gained control of the ecclesiastical structures at present that those who are steeped in captivity to the devil by means of Original Sin are left to fend for themselves when tempted to kill their enemies, real and imagined, rather than to treat them as their brothers in Christ and to attempt to resolve differences with a view to the eternal justice that will be meted out to all souls at the General Judgment of the Living and the Dead on the Last Day.

There will be wars and atrocities and other sins committed by fallen men until that Last Day. True. Holy Mother Church has never in her history prior to the elevation of that admirer of the Sillon (a movement condemned by Pope Saint Pius X in Notre Charge Apostolique, August 15, 1910), Angelo Cardinal Roncalli, in October of 1958 failed to call men to convert to the true Church in order to have a chance, at the very least, of saving their own souls and thus of being instruments of temporal justice, undertaken with a view to man's eternal destiny. Modernity hath wrought the barbarism of modern wars. It hath wrought also Modernism in its sorry, anti-Incarnational wake.

Mindful of our own need to reform our own lives on a daily basis in cooperation with the graces we receive in the sacraments, mindful of the role that our sins have played in worsening the state of the Church Militant on earth and of the world-at-large as a result, mindful of our need to make reparation for our sins, especially by offering up all of our sufferings and humiliations to Our Lady's Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart as her consecrated slaves, we must redouble our efforts to flee from the conciliarist mindset in order to think with the mind of the Faith as it has been taught perennially. There is no secular, inter-denominational or non-denominational solution to any problem in the world, whether personal or social. Catholicism is the only means given us by God to know, to love and to serve Him in this life so as to be happy with Him for all eternity in Heaven.

Once again, as always, entrusting ourselves to Our Lady and to her Most Chaste Spouse, Saint Joseph, we pray that some pope will indeed fulfill Our Lady's Fatima Message. This may not happen until a major chastisement takes place. We may not be alive when it happens. May we, however, endeavor to plant a few seeds for that wonderful moment, which will usher in the peace of the Divine Redeemer in the Reign of Mary, a time when Tradition will be restored in the Church and Christendom in the world.

Vivat Christus Rex!

Our Lady of Good Success, 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 Mary Magdalene, pray for us.

Saint James the Greater, son of Zebedee, pray for us.

Saint John the Evangelist, son of Zebedee, 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 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 Catherine of Sweden, pray for us.

Saint Philomena, pray for us.

Saint John of the Cross, pray for us.

Saint John Bosco, pray for us.

Saint John Mary Vianney, pray for us.

Saint Teresa of Avila, pray for us.

Saint Therese Lisieux, pray for us.

Saint Bernadette Soubirous, pray for us.

Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich, pray for us.

Blessed Pauline Jaricot, pray for us.

Blessed Francisco, pray for us.

Blessed Jacinta, pray for us.

Sister Lucia, 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.