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Preamble to Secular and Sacred Origins
Languages
which are ‘living’, that is used by large populations, such as English and French,
have words whose meaning can change.
For
example, the word democracy for the Athenians meant a system of social
governance more closely related to the Catholic social-teaching principle of
subsidiarity where the greatest amount of power/decision making starts at the
lowest possible level in society, for example at the neighbourhood rather than
the municipal governance level.
Today
when most people hear the word democracy it conjures up notions of governments
with power yet increasingly isolated from, and deaf, to the cries of the
people: the poor and vulnerable, those who are Christian and for life.
In his
work on how China is messing around with Canadian democracy, a clear and
present danger ignored by the Trudeau government, Jonathan Manthorpe notes: A
feeling of powerlessness has become pervasive among Western Democracies, and in
many cases there are good reasons for people to think that their civic systems
are not functioning as intended……There is clearly a need to refashion Western Democracy
and for a new compact between governments and citizenry. [1]
Throughout
modern democracies, policies language, political speeches tend to deliberately
muddy the waters so that sometimes what is labeled as the liberal left party is
actually more conservative than the party which tends to be labeled as the
conservative right, and vice-versa, depending on how parties figure they can
manipulate the electorate to gain or retain power.
Granted
it is simplifying things, but here any reference to liberal means governments
and thinking of the left and any reference to conservative means governments
and thinking of the right. Ideally, like the preferred porridge of Goldilocks,
no government, indeed no individual, should be locked into either extreme but
rather seek to balance, for example, social justice with the God given right to
life. Denial of the sacred origins of democracy opens the door to the chaos of
the culture of death.
In:
MESSAGE OF JOHN PAUL II TO THE EUROPEAN STUDY CONGRESS ON THE THEME: "TOWARDS
A EUROPEAN CONSTITUTION?" , of June 2002, the Holy Father tried to teach
this, as he appealed to the EU nations not to ignore their Christian heritage:
ultimately ….if a new European order of this kind is to be adequate for the
promotion of the authentic common good, it must recognize and safeguard the
values that constitute the most precious heritage of European humanism, which
has assured and continues to assure Europe a unique influence in the history of
civilization. These values constitute the characteristic intellectual and
spiritual contribution that has formed the European identity through the
centuries and is part of the valuable cultural treasure of the continent. As I
have recalled on other occasions, they concern the dignity of the person; the
sacred character of human life; the central role of the family founded on
marriage; the importance of education; freedom of thought, of speech and of the
profession of personal convictions and religion; the legal protection of
individuals and groups; the collaboration of all for the common good; work,
seen as a personal and a social good; political power understood as a service,
subject to law and reason, and "limited" by the rights of the person
and of peoples…..in the process leading to a new institutional order, Europe
cannot deny its Christian heritage, since a great part of its achievements in
the fields of law, art, literature and philosophy have been influenced by the
evangelical message…… being open to the new challenges emerging, Europe will
need to draw inspiration with creative fidelity from the Christian roots that
have defined European history. [2]
In the
end the EU expunged any reference to its Christian roots and heritage from the
constitution.
As St.
Cyprian, a courageous bishop and martyr of the early Church admonishes us, and
these words apply today: The world hates Christians, so why give your love
to it instead of following Christ, who loves you and has redeemed you?
Currently
the United States is going through the divisiveness of an impeachment process
against President Trump, it is worth noting how leftist media is obsessed in
its hostility towards non-liberal-leftist politicians and policies to such an
extent that, for example CNN, which used to be a news channel, is now almost
ninety percent of the time trolling, blah-blahing all anti-Trump all the time.
What
is, euphemistically these days, referred to as the ‘news media’, has became
similarly obsessed with defeating the conservative parties around the world,
and simultaneously degrading Christianity, Catholicism in particular. As far
back as the early the sixties in Canada, when there was a chance the
Conservatives might continue in government, something which at anytime drives
the Liberal/Leftist parties nuts, in his
MEMOIRS, former Prime Minister [conservative] Brian Mulroney notes: The most
famous illustration of this hostility was a statement by Val Sears….who
exhorted the traveling press on to another day of objective journalistic duty
with the memorable cry, “To work, gentlemen, we have a government to
overthrow.” [3]
Before
looking into the secular and sacred origins of democracy it is vital to
remember democracy is about human beings living in common, about the human
person.
All
human beings, that is each person, is created innately, intrinsically, free.
Constitutive
of this freedom is our wills are free, that is we are free to choose life or
death, love or hate, beauty or ugliness, to dwell in the light of Christ or the
darkness of hell.
There
is a degree of freedom within all creation, according to natural law, hence the
stars shine, shimmer, some move, as do some planets, the air, the seas, birds,
trees, animals, all have a type of freedom, but only human beings, that is we
as persons in the image and likeness of God, share in the Holy Trinity’s
freedom of being, of life as freedom, freedom to choose.
Choice
has consequences as we all experience.
Once
the Holy Trinity creates the human person, male and female, that is man and
woman, in His image and likeness, endowing us with free will, we are
simultaneously created as free persons.
Any
government, democratic or not, which deliberately curtails freedom is acting as
an agent of satan. Granted certain personal curtailments are reasonable and for
the greater good and have their moral legitimacy rooted in Sacred Revelation,
hence ‘thou shalt not kill’, makes arresting and putting murderers in prison
reasonable.
Passing
laws, that allow the murder of pre-born children, are satanic laws, which seek
to usurp what is God’s alone: the gift of life.
Nothing
in Sacred Scripture is asked of us, no more than the original directive to Adam
and Eve, to curtail our freedom. Rather every commandment from God is
opportunity, opportunity for us to freely love God and one another.
Constitutive
of every commandment is this choice: to be free or unfree.
Freedom
while not something we self-create, anymore than we create our selves, is
something we can throw away, by imprisoning ourselves in the darkness of sin,
like hate which imprisons us in ourselves, also our freedom can be taken away
from us, which is what governments can, and do, do.
Thus,
both sacred and secular history are replete with the struggle of human beings
to live in community as free members thereof, and likewise of the unrelenting
attempts of some human beings to dominate others.
The
inspiration for the evil of dominance comes from the perpetually unfree
creature whose arrogant ‘non serviam’ [I will not serve] instantly made him and
his minions prisoners in the cold and dark of hell: the place of chosen
unfreedom for all eternity.
It
would be millennia before our ancestors would develop linguistic processes,
both verbal and written, that would formulate rules, laws, ideas about how the
clan, tribe, city, eventually kingdoms, alliances, emerging nation states and
their alliances, should be governed.
Throughout
secular history in particular when enough people found the system of government
oppressive, a curtailing of objective freedom, resistance would begin and
spread and either through civil war, or revolt against an occupying power, cast
off the chains that bound them. Given the length of human history, only in
recent times have people been able to cast off the chains of unfreedom, through
the ballot box.
Songs
of the people, paralleled in Sacred Scripture in the Psalms, over time in
pamphlets, plays, operas, latterly novels, film, and paralleled by works of
philosophy, law, politics etc., gave voice to the cries of the oppressed and
those seeking to set them free.
In
recent history the works of Hugo, Dickens, Dostoyevsky, and others, sought to
give voice to the voiceless, in the dirty thirties the novel and film version
of THE GRAPES OF WRATH, and in this age of the internet, digital media, the
Wachowskis brothers Matrix Trilogy, articulate the deep need of human beings,
irrespective of who is seeking to dominate us, to be free.
Towards
the end of the third film in the series, in the midst of the final battle
between the protagonists, the character who embodies darkness, death,
destruction, hatred, named in the film ‘Smith’, cannot comprehend why the
character ‘Anderson/Neo’, who embodies the human hunger for freedom, peace,
love, speak with each other: Smith: “Why, why, why, why do you do it? Why,
why get up, why keep fighting? Do you believe you are fighting for something?
For more than your survival. Can you tell me what it is. Do you even
know?....Is it freedom or truth? Perhaps peace? Could it be for love? Illusions
Mr. Anderson, vagaries of perception, temporary constructs of a feeble human
intellect trying desperately to justify an existence that is without meaning or
purpose……You must know it by now you can’t win. It’s pointless to keep
fighting….Why Mr. Anderson, why, why do you persist? [4a]
The
hiss of satan himself is in those words, it is his challenge to Christ in the
desert, in the garden, on the cross, his taunt of every soul, every human
being, every faithful disciple of Christ and it is the uncomprehending
arrogance of those who oppressively rule in China, Russia, Iran, and increasingly
as ersatz democratic governments in Canada, Venezuela, etc., seeking to
overrule their own people.
Mr.
Anderson’s/Neo’s reply is as incomprehensible to them as Jesus’ word to the
Father in the Garden: “Not as I will, but as You will”.
Smith:
Why Mr. Anderson, why, why do you persist?
Mr.
Anderson/Neo: Because I choose to. [4b]
That
answer is echoed by the defenders of life in the culture of death, by word and
deed, by fidelity to Christ, by demanding authentic democracy, and is also to
echo Christ’s own words and life, for Christ choose to lay down His life for
us, as we must for one another, for that is love and there is no greater act of
resistance to the tyranny of the democracies of death than to love and choose
life. It is the freedom of the children of God.
Living
as an urban hermit in this city on the 53rd parallel, this time of
year the Scriptural words about people living in darkness and seeking light,
[Mt. 4:16ff], adds to the stark reality of living in a modern democracy oozing
into our lives the culture of death and darkness.
T
hese
dark days are brightened by Christmas lights shining from the homes of
believers and unbelievers alike, while St. John reassures us Light Himself has
created us to be filled with light, not darkness: What came to be through
Him was life, and this life was the light of the human race; the light shines
in the darkness, and the darkness cannot overcome it. [Jn.
1:3-5]
In his
recent Apostolic Letter On The Meaning and Importance of the Nativity Scene,
Pope Francis also consoles us: Why does the Christmas crèche arouse such
wonder and move us so deeply? First, because it shows God’s tender love: the
Creator of the universe lowered himself to take up our littleness. The gift of
life, in all its mystery, becomes all the more wondrous as we realize that the
Son of Mary is the source and sustenance of all life. In Jesus, the Father has
given us a brother who comes to seek us out whenever we are confused or lost, a
loyal friend ever at our side. He gave us his Son who forgives us and
frees us from our sins. [5]
In the
next essay we will go deeper into the origins, strengths, dangers, weaknesses
of modern democracies, keeping in mind always this admonition from St. Paul:…..
it is the hour now for you to awake from sleep. For our salvation is nearer
now than when we first believed; the night is advanced, the day is at hand. Let
us then throw off the works of darkness and put on the armour of light…….[Rms.
13:11,12]
[1]
CLAWS OF THE PANDA, Beijing’s Campaign of Influence and Intimidation in Canada;
p. 270; Jonathan Manthorpe; Cormorant Books Inc. 2019
[2] https://w2.vatican.va/content/john-paul-ii/en/speeches/2002/june/documents/hf_jp-ii_spe_20020622_costituzione-europea.html [see paras. 3 &4]
[3]
BRIAN MULRONY MEMOIRS, p.74; A Douglas Gibson Book, McClelland & Stewart
Ltd. 2007
[4a
& b] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Matrix_Revolutions
[5] http://w2.vatican.va/content/francesco/en/apost_letters/documents/papa-francesco-lettera-ap_20191201_admirabile-signum.html para. 3
© 2019
Fr. Arthur Joseph
In the
title: modern democracies: lovers’ of death, ‘lovers’ is deliberately in the
possessive, for they own the culture of death which they have, primarily by
legislation, frequently by their supreme, or equivalent courts, forged into law,
in the cold, black, fires of hell, the culture of death.
When we
pray, as we must, for those in government at all levels, we would to well to
beseech the Holy Trinity that this word penetrate the hearts of all in
government: Hear, therefore, kings, and understand; learn, you magistrates
of the earth’s expanse! Give ear, you who have power over multitudes and lord
it over throngs of peoples! Because authority was given you by the Lord and
sovereignty by the Most High, who shall probe your works and scrutinize your
counsels! Because, though you were ministers of His kingdom, you did not judge
rightly, and did not keep the law, nor walk according to the will of God,
Terribly and swiftly He shall come against you, because severe judgment awaits
the exalted—For the lowly may be pardoned out of mercy but the mighty shall be
mightily put to the test. [Wis. 6: 1-11]
It is
true that many of our Christian brothers and sisters live in countries where
there is persecution by blood, and not just by terrorists, while all Christians
who live in ersatz democracies live under the immense weight of the culture of
darkness and death where the only politically correct discrimination is to be
anti-Christian and primarily anti-Catholic.
In this
21st century we are called to be one with Christ in His sufferings
as we live out the Beatitudes: Blessed are they who are persecuted for the
sake of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are you
when they insult you and persecute you and utter every kind of evil against you
falsely because of Me. Rejoice and be glad, for your reward will be great in
heaven. Thus, they persecuted the prophets who were before you. [Mt.
5:10-12]
Even
just a cursory check of actual and semi-democratic countries around the world
today reveals virtually everyone in either a state of flux, i.e. a weakening of
true democracy, or a state of chaos, the former would include Canada, Great
Britain, the United States, the latter Bolivia, Chile, Hungary.
Even
states where democracy is more of a fledging peoples’ aspiration than fact,
unrest is intense, such as in Hong Kong and Iran.
In a
telling article in CRISIS MAGAZINE, Donald DeMarco notes, referring to the
recent Canadian election: What is most striking about the election for this
observer, living in Canada, is that many Canadian voters seemed indifferent to
the fact that their culture is clearly shifting in a totalitarian direction. A
profile of the candidates is a sufficient indication of this. The Trudeau
government required students applying for government-funded summer jobs to sign
an attestation professing their support of abortion, same-sex marriage, and the
LGBTQ coalition. He banned certain Christian summer camps serving
underprivileged children from participating in the Canada Summer Jobs Program
because of their religious beliefs. (This “is nothing short of anti-religious
bigotry,” commented Justice Centre staff lawyer Marty Moore.) He has committed
$7.1 billion over the next ten years to promote abortion at home and abroad. He
will not allow Liberal MPs to vote their conscience on matters of abortion and
LGBTQ matters, and he will not allow pro-life candidates to run as Liberals. He
opposes conscience rights for health care workers. [1]
Totalitarianism,
no matter how it is disguised, in Canada’s case Trudeau and those of his ilk
disguise it under various slimy garbs such as ‘social justice’ or ‘equality’,
it is what it is, the persistent destruction of democracy of which unrelenting
attacks on Christianity and the Gospel of Life, and on the family, are
foundational policies.
If we
look at the famous Five Eyes [Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the United
Kingdom and the United States] intelligence alliance, each of these countries
is a democracy with Judeo-Christian roots, each also, when it comes more so to
Christianity, has seen in the past sixty plus decades a precipitous drop in
adherence to the Faith, in practice of faith and an increase in the culture of
death, a thickening of the darkness and all but persecution by blood of
Christianity and Judaism.
True
there are countries in the world where Islamic terrorists, but not exclusively
them, slaughter Christians and Jews, sometimes this happens in the
above-mentioned countries.
What is
disheartening is the often-weak response of governments, for fear of labeling
the terrorists, Islamic ones mostly, as what they are, that is the
group/religion they belong to, because that would be discriminatory.
As
attributed to W.C. Fields: “a rose by any other name is still a rose.”
Is it
any wonder so many people of faith, even many citizens of no particular faith,
feel so anxious and discouraged living in this culture of darkness and death,
under the guise of increasingly totalitarian ‘democratic’ governments?
While
as yet in the democracies that comprise the Five Eyes governments, and most
others, are not persecuting by blood, yet as DeMarco illustrates there are
other ways of applying persecutorial pressure.
True,
while actual democracies do not have concentration camps per se, restricting
the right, for example, to protest the death camps of abortion clinics anywhere
near such places, and putting people who violate the distance restrictions in
jail, here we already see the extent to which democratic governments are
willing to push against their own people.
Thus,
is it any wonder we see in modern democracies an increasing distrust of
government, of politicians, a polarizing of populations into hardened political
allegiances, and an increase of politicians tweaking the truth into whatever
variations of facts best suit their continuing to hold power?
Benjamin
Carter Hett, in his work which while actually a work of history in the current
context is prescient, reflects on how Hilter, in his efforts to gain absolute
power, stated: “the greatness of a lie there is always a certain element of
credibility.” [2a]
Given
the polarization in most democracies either along party lines or around issues
such as climate change, Hett also notes the hardening of “political
confessionalization” in the politics of the years in Germany leading to
Hitler’s seizure of power: “……people are often conditioned to voting as they
do by the influence of the social surroundings: by their neighbours,
colleagues, churches, clubs, newspapers, and other media.” [2b]
Modern
politics, such as surrounding the Brexit issue in Great Britain, are proof
positive modern politicians know how to manipulate confessionalization. The
disingenuous expressions, of anti-life politicians, for example, that their
goal is protection of rights, are Hitleresque in their vileness, since the
subsequent laws they pass first and foremost deny pre-born, already living
human beings, the right to life outside the womb.
“There
are hours when we can do only one thing: gather up all our extreme woe and
extreme plight into one imploring shout, one simple cry for mercy and help. And
to cry it out or scream it or weep it or whimper it to God who wants to save.
To moan out all the woe within us into the sacred space where God touches our
self and loves it and is good to it. [3]
Like
Fr. Alfred Delp, who wrote the above while waiting to be executed by the Nazis
in 1945, exploring in these essays the reality of living in democracies who are
lovers’ of death, we too must hand our extreme woe and plight over to our
Beloved Abba, to our Beloved Redeemer Jesus, to our Beloved Holy Spirit who
guides us into the depths of fidelity to Christ and the Gospel of Life in these
dark days.
Jesus
comforts us when it comes to the challenge of confronting evil spirits in our
day, showing us the effectiveness of prayer and fasting. {Mk. 9:29}.
[1] https://www.crisismagazine.com/2019/welcome-to-the-peoples-democratic-republic-of-canada
[2]a:
pp.38-39; b: p.67, from: THE DEATH OF DEMOCRACY, Hitler’s Rise to Power and the
Downfall of the Weimar Republic by Benjamin Carter Hett; [Allen Lane] Penguin
Random House, 2018
[3]
quoted by Erasmo Leiva-Merikakis in: FIRE of MERCY HEART of the WORLD, Volume
II, p. 461, Ignatius Press, 2003
© 2019
Fr. Arthur Joseph
In some
respects, 1969, the last year of the Sixties, was a year like any other of that
turbulent decade.
While
the struggles which hallmarked the Sixties were still grabbing headlines, much was beginning to change just below the
surface, to the extent, by way of examples: in the 1970’s, disco,
ego-pleasure-centric, replaced the dominance of folk songs and the urging a
communal re-boot of society; the sexual variations and promiscuity of the
sixties became, in the 1980’s, HIV/AIDS. Little understood or even recognized
in the Sixties, AIDS would turn into a pandemic; the 1980’s was the decade when
Wall Street seemed to churn out an endless succession of millionaires,
highlighting what has become known as the 1%, i.e. the one percenters, a term
which originated in the 1960’s when the American Motorcycle Association
asserted 99% of motorcycle riders were law abiding citizens. Criminal biker
gangs seized upon that and declared themselves the ‘one percenters’!: no irony
here!; then the 1990’s arrived, when the reach of terrorism spread far afield
from the Middle East; the 2000’s to date witnesses the evil of Islamic and
homegrown terrorism spread, from 9/11 forwards to this day, and the culture of
death now appears unstoppable, which it will be unless there is a profound
conversion of every human heart and Christians abandoning all forms of
compromise with the surrounding culture, choosing instead to uncompromisingly living
out the Gospel of Life.
Precisely
because much was happening below the surface 1969 was a year surfeit of
mega-drama, yet persistent in unrest, unease, further casting off of any sexual
mores and of faith, particularly, but not exclusively, among Christians, and
Catholics most of all, with an increasing compromise with the surrounding
culture, leading throughout the following decades in so-called Catholic
countries, notably in Latin America, to the spreading of American
Evangelicalism, often of the ‘God wants you to be rich’ kind.
One of
the best descriptive words on what was happening then, though written about the
current era, when it comes to our relationship with the One True God, is this: Our
age seems to have specialized in God-management – the absurd endeavour both to
keep functional some respectable notion of “God” and yet at each step to
neutralize any divine reality that interferes with the way in which we have
constructed the world. The domestication of the Almighty. The relativizing of
the Absolute. The taming of the Fire of divinity into a porcelain cup of
lukewarm tea. [1]
Spain,
still ruled by the dictator Generalissimo Franco, indeed he would continue to
do so until his death in 1975, saw major student riots in Madrid, which was put
under martial law with 300 students being arrested. The great irony is Franco
made sure his succession saw to the restoration of the monarchy with today
Spain being a constitutional monarchy with a democratic government. “The
Troubles”, as they were called, intensified in Northern Ireland, with Britain
sending in the army who, in the battle, often used methods which, post 9/11,
would become known as ‘enhanced interrogation’, contributing to ‘the Troubles’
lasting for another two decades. A major oil spill in Santa Barbara harbour in
California would move an American Senator to organize the following year the
first Earth Day, which over the coming decades would spread globally, along
with a general environmental movement, itself intensifying with what was
originally called “global warming”, becoming a cause celebre, but as the
‘science’ behind that has been challenged the term now is the didactic and
disingenuous: “climate change”! Climate change is a perpetual serial event
which, on the micro level, occurs with the passage of the seasons and on the
macro, occurs over the millennia. While part of our human, indeed baptized
vocation, is both to care for and use the resources of the earth, yet there is
a dark, indeed evil irony when environmental extremists insist they will not
have children, because everything will be over in a decade or so. It is the
distorted logic of the abortion culture and the all too human arrogance which
thinks we can control completely what we have not created. True, we can do harm
to creation and we should take better care of creation, starting with human
life. A culture which is in bondage to the contraceptive, abortion, euthanasia,
anti-family mentality, has no credibility when it claims to care about creation
as it blithely usurps what is God’s: He alone is the Lord and Giver of Life.
Unless
we strive to be saints, to be holy disciples and allow the holiness of Christ
flowing from within us to touch and heal the earth, the earth will remain sick.
Just how sick it is, will be, is directly connected to our holiness or lack
thereof.
In 1969,
Yasser Arafat would be elected leader of the Palestinian Liberation
Organization {PLO}; Muammar Gaddafi would, through a coup d’état, seize power
in Libya, both events, in fact, becoming the lighting of fuses which, a half
century later, continue to explode in acts of terror and war within the Middle
East and globally; in Canada the Front de Liberation du Quebec {FLQ} continued
its bombing campaign which in 1970 would lead to a major crisis with the
kidnapping and murder of a Quebec politician, the kidnapping of a British
diplomat. The ongoing aftermath, which many see as constant tension between
Quebec and the rest of Canada, is more to be found among a Quebec populace,
once considered to be 98% practising Catholic, becoming a virtually total
secular society, to the point where, through legislation, the province is now
officially secularist, even more so than France itself!
As the
year unfolded race riots, civil rights battles, an ever increasing resistance
to the war in Vietnam continued, with wars within and between nations continuing
apace. The implication of some events, as mentioned at the outset, being below
the surface, would not emerge immediately but would have ongoing consequences,
such as the general strike in Argentina in May of 1969, the consequence only
becoming apparent during the so-called dirty war of the military junta against
its own people.
1969
was the year, in June, of the Stonewall riots, leading to within the US, and
since in virtually every country on earth, the never satisfied demands for
‘gay-rights’, in some countries resulting in the legalization of so-called
‘gay-marriage’, variations on the theme such as ‘transgender’, ‘two-spirit’, with
some human beings wanting the legal right to declare they are ‘non-gender’! It was also the year, in Canada, when
homosexual activity between consenting adults, at the time pegged at 21 years
of age, subsequently lowered to 18, was decriminalized. Now, with the
prevailing mentality pushed in schools in Canada through so-called
‘gay/straight alliances’, it really is anybody’s guess as at what age ‘consent’
is accepted.
Parallel
to the above, a fifteen year old boy died in the United States and it was noted
he had scabs on his body, later identified as caused by a form of cancer, which
in the eighties would be associated with HIV/AIDS. Indeed in 1984 lab tests on
tissue from the boy’s body confirmed he had had HIV/AIDS. The suspicion was
that he had been a male prostitute. However official recognition of the disease
would only begin in mid 1981, by then it had reached pandemic proportions. While
the first case, globally, dates back officially to the late 1950’s in Africa,
it would be well into the late 1990’s before scientists would figure out the
origin of the disease was indeed in Africa, through transmission from the
original simian hosts to humans via the mishandling of bushmeat. While the
teenager mentioned is referred to by some scientists as patient Zero, a
Canadian adult male flight attendant is also sometimes given that dubious
moniker. Other than the probability that in both cases the infection came from
an unknown male, part of the ongoing origins mystery of the disease itself is
believed to be thousands of years old. Its lack of ‘discovery’ boils down to colonial
arrogance which would not have paid much attention to deaths among Africans
until the disease emerged outside Africa and became a threat to the rest of the
world.
Such is
the tragic legacy of the Sixties that to this day, regarding sexually
transmitted diseases, abortion, euthanasia, the incessant demands for ‘my
rights’, all is rooted in the poisoned soil of abandonment of natural law,
Divine Law, and, frankly, common sense, hallmarks of the so-called ‘free-love’
generation.
Within
the Catholic Church Herself, [it being noted the ‘church in our own image and
likeness’ mentality was spreading – infecting really – the Anglican/Episcopal
communion and liberal leaning Protestant denominations], the exodus from
priesthood and religious life had grown from
a raging torrent to a tsunami, as well as laity abandoning the faith, yet
self-appointed-smarter-than-the-Church, theologians, liturgists, parish
priests, nuns, laity, persisted in mucking around with the Holy Sacrifice of
the Mass, articles of faith, morality, indeed many of those who did/do remain,
physically, within the priesthood and religious life were/are actual internal
enemies of the Body of Christ the Church and continue to wreck havoc to this
day.
Obviously,
his intention was not to compound problems, in the post Vatican II confusion,
but when Pope Paul VI issued his moto proprio, Mysterii Paschalis, on reforms
to the liturgy, the calendar of Saints, many laity and clergy reacted
negatively.
It was
just another shock to system of people still trying to adjust to the already
major changes, within the liturgy, flowing from the so-called suppression of
what was previously known as the Tridentine Rite.
Pope
Paul the VI began by reminding us that: The Paschal Mystery and its
celebration constitutes the essence of Christian worship in its daily, weekly
and yearly unfolding. [2]
However,
the nub of the problem for many came with: It cannot be denied, however,
that in the course of centuries the feasts of the saints have become more and
more numerous. The Sacred Synod has therefore decreed: "Lest the feasts of
the saints take precedence over the feasts which commemorate the very mysteries
of salvation…… the names of some saints have been removed from the universal
Calendar, and the faculty has been given of re-establishing in regions
concerned, if it is desired, the commemorations and cult of other saints. The
suppression of reference to a certain number of saints who are not universally
known has permitted the insertion, within the Roman Calendar, of names of some
martyrs of regions where the proclaiming of the Gospel arrived at a later date.
Thus, as representatives of their countries, those who have won renown by the
shedding of their blood for Christ or by their outstanding virtues enjoy the
same dignity in this same catalogue. [ibid]
These
decades later it is obvious the importance of the reform for the focus to be
primarily on the centrality of Christ and our redemption.
Interestingly,
at the time already Pope Emeritus, Benedict XVI, replied to a letter from Elio
Guerriero on questions about the reforms: ……..As for the liturgical
question, I can understand Pope Montini’s decision very well. It seems to me,
nevertheless, that greater patience in implementing the reform would have
promoted peace in the Church…….The sudden break with the old missal caused
resistance that perhaps could have been avoided. In any case, it would have
been good to make clearer the continuity between the two missals. But to do
that, the liturgists, too, had to help, and instead they proved unavailable.
The real problem resulted, not from the pope’s decision, but from the
intransigence of the liturgists. [3]
1969
did not end with anything as dramatic as the 70’s year of the three Popes, or
the 80’s with the collapse of the USSR, rather the Sixties ended with a
profound sense of exhaustion, politically, spiritually, almost as if the entire
decade was partially slinking away to hide, or running with insane abandon over
the edge of a cliff.
Remaking
God, self, the Church, the world into one’s own image had proven a dismal failure,
as governments, both democratic and non, became ever more powerful, and
continue so; the chasm between the obscenely rich and dehumanized poor
relentlessly deepened, and continues; the rock foundation of faith in the One
True God, in Jesus sent to love and save us, began to be replaced, and
continues to be, by an idolatrous obsession with ideology of one type or
another. People for whom an ideology is their raison d’etre tend to be
inflexible, refuting any counter point: racists are ideologues, so are
abortionists. Bondage to ideology leads to hatred, violence, revolutions,
divisions, the fracturing of society and, for there are ideologues, sadly,
within the Church, whose goal is to prevail and that results in one thing only:
schism.
There
are still those, for example in the USA and Canada, other leftist democracies,
seeking political power, who spout the bromides of care for the workers, the
poor, the disenfranchised, the discriminated against – but since they
consistently fail abysmally to bring about real change – other than legislating
more and more immorality and anti-life laws – the numbers of the homeless
continue to grow, tensions expand between and within nations, family life
remains under assault, terrorism continues and it may seem at times the very
Church Herself will soon be little more than a tiny remnant.
With
politics today so tainted by money, lacking a moral foundation and common
sense, and politicians of all stripes saying and doing anything that panders to
the loudest screamers, like those saying climate change means the world will
end in ten to twelve years, no wonder the electorate is so angry and cynical.
Politics
without the Gospel, without the Beatitudes, has become a mere simulacrum of
democracy and is doomed. Eventually we could all find ourselves trapped under
the jackboot of some form of totalitarianism.
All
this ignores the real emergency: the millions of human beings on a daily basis
being trafficked, enslaved, put in labour and concentration camps, being victims
of terrorism, war, domestic and sexual abuse, used as child labourers and
soldiers, the millions of our brothers and sister aborted, euthanized, living
homeless, hungry, fleeing across deserts, through jungles, across turbulent
seas, with all the attendant risks and thus with thousands dying along the way,
reminding us of the man in the ditch cared for by the Samaritan. This is the
real climate emergency, the paucity of seeing each other as, loving one another
as, brothers and sisters.
Current
ideologies are a form of collective lust, lust being all that is left to human
beings who willfully choose to abandon belief in, trust in, obedience to God
who is love, in a word who toss aside the holiness of a love relationship with
the Holy Trinity in favour of being a plaything of self and others and worst of
all, playthings of satan.
Lust is
not merely, not even primarily, a sexual vice.
Lust is
surrendering ourselves to the distorted thinking and choice making which comes
from that powerful emotion itself, an emotion that is ego-centric, whereas
authentic love is other-centric and shown by God Himself and intimately
manifested in His Beloved Son Jesus Christ who is God-with-us.
The
lust of the Sixties was for a new world order, a new sexual order, a new way of
thinking, believing – believing only in what our minds came up with as worthy
of belief – to the extent that after those ten years of experiment we, the
human family, have been left with a pandora’s box of fears, which once opened
spews forth ideologies which imprison, angers which devour, divisions which
harden, hearts which are broken, and don’t even know it, and millions of souls
wandering the face of the earth wondering “who am I, why am I, where am I
going”, stumbling past the man seated at the well awaiting for them.
Such is
the legacy of the Sixties.
However,
we need not remain in bondage to this legacy.
Christ
is the Way, the Truth, the Life and meditating upon Jesus our Eucharist Pope
Benedict XVI re-teaches the truth: By making the bread into his Body and the
wine into his Blood, he anticipates his death, he accepts it in his heart, and
he transforms it into an action of love. What on the outside is simply brutal
violence - the Crucifixion - from within becomes an act of total self-giving love.
This is the substantial transformation which was accomplished at the Last
Supper and was destined to set in motion a series of transformations leading
ultimately to the transformation of the world when God will be all in all (cf.
I Cor 15: 28).
In their
hearts, people always and everywhere have somehow expected a change, a
transformation of the world. Here now is the central act of transformation that
alone can truly renew the world:
violence is transformed into love, and death into life…..To use an image
well known to us today, this is like inducing nuclear fission in the very heart
of being - the victory of love over hatred, the victory of love over death.
Only this intimate explosion of good conquering evil can then trigger off the
series of transformations that little by little will change the world….. All
other changes remain superficial and cannot save……together with forgetfulness
of God there is a kind of new explosion of religion…..But to tell the truth,
religion often becomes almost a consumer product. People choose what they like,
and some are even able to make a profit from it. But religion sought on a
"do-it-yourself" basis cannot ultimately help us. It may be
comfortable, but at times of crisis we are left to ourselves.
Help
people to discover the true star which points out the way to us: Jesus Christ! Let us seek to know him better
and better, so as to be able to guide others to him with conviction… Let us go
forward with Christ and let us live our lives as true worshippers of God! Amen.
[4]
[1]
FIRE OF MERCY HEART OF THE WORLD, volume II, Meditations on the Gospel
According to St. Matthew, p. 315; Erasmo Leiva-Merikakis, 2003, Ignatius Press
[2] http://w2.vatican.va/content/paul-vi/en/motu_proprio/documents/hf_p-vi_motu-proprio_19690214_mysterii-paschalis.html
[3]
BENEDICIT VI His Life and Thought, Elio Guerriero, p. 513; Ignatius Press 2018
[4] http://w2.vatican.va/content/benedict-xvi/en/homilies/2005/documents/hf_ben-xvi_hom_20050821_20th-world-youth-day.html
© 2019
Fr. Arthur Joseph
One of
the most vital, on the sacredness of human life, papal teachings preceding the
great encyclical of St. John Paul: Evangelium Vitae [1], is Humane Vitae of St.
Paul VI [2]. As Pope Pius XI did more than forty years earlier with his
Encyclical MIT BRENNENDER SORGE, shining a light to expose fully the evil of
Nazism, so Pope Paul VI shined a light on the evil of the emerging
contraceptive-abortive-hedonistic culture of death.
Humane
Vitae is the unambiguous teaching of the Church on the sacredness of human
life. Every human being is a, and has the dignity of being person, created in
the image and likeness of God, the Divine Person. All this is rooted in Sacred
Scripture and Sacred Tradition, and the transmission of this gift, the creating
by God of a new person occurs in cooperation with Him, as a sacred act in the
Sacrament of Holy Marriage, between the spouses. Yet so lavish is God, who is
Love, with His gift of life, that He does not refuse to breath an immortal
soul, that is to create a human person in His image and likeness, even if the
man and woman are by some other fashion, engaging in a natural law act outside
of the sacredness of the sacrament.
Here is
not that place for a protracted dissertation on Humane Vitae, rather it is to
point in the direction of both the irreducible treasury of wisdom and
compassion therein, and as well to consider briefly one of the major acts of
dissent, albeit coached in episcopal bureaucratic lingo.
Humane
Vitae caused an uproar not simply by defining artificial contraception as evil
but in an unwritten between-the-lines subtext exposes the reality of the
Antichrist: The Antichrist's deception already begins to take shape in the
world every time the claim is made to realize within history that messianic
hope which can only be realized beyond history through the eschatological
judgement….. the Church has rejected even modified forms of this falsification
of the kingdom to come under the name of millenarianism… especially the
"intrinsically perverse" political form of a secular messianism.
[3]
Children,
it is the last hour; and just as you heard that the antichrist was coming, so
now many antichrists have appeared. Thus we know this is the last hour. They
went out from us, but they were not really of our number; if they had been,
they would have remained with us. Their desertion shows that none of them was
of our number. [1 Jn. 2:18,19]
Remembering
the ‘last hour’ does not mean a specific sixty minute period, but rather is in
fact every moment of every day since the Ascension of Our Lord, hence its
apparent millennial slowness to arrive is perhaps excruciatingly frustrating
for some Christians who focus on the hour, rather than the merciful magnanimity
of the Holy Trinity both giving time for more brothers and sisters to be born,
to come to know Christ and be His and for us already alive to be converted anew
every day until we no longer live but Christ lives in us.
One day the Antichrist will come: a human
being who introduces an order of things in which rebellion against God will
attain its ultimate power….. Then it will be clear what the Christian essence
really is: that which stems not from the world, but from the heart of God;
victory of grace over the world; redemption of the world, for her true essence
is not to be found in herself, but in God from Whom she has received it. When
God becomes all in all, the world will burst into flower. [4]
The
distortions regarding human life, freedom, faith, etc., etc., spawned by the
dark forces of the culture of death in the Sixties, continue to poison the
souls, hearts, minds, choices of humanity today, a poison which infects even
bishops and priests. This from Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI, is particularly germane: Among the freedoms that the Revolution of
1968 sought to fight for was this all-out sexual freedom, one which no longer
conceded any norms…… At the same time, independently of this development,
Catholic moral theology suffered a collapse that rendered the Church
defenseless against these changes in society……..There are values which must
never be abandoned for a greater value and even surpass the preservation of
physical life. There is martyrdom. God is about more than mere physical
survival. A life that would be bought by the denial of God, a life that is
based on a final lie, is a non-life. Martyrdom is a basic category of Christian
existence….there is a minimum set of morals which is indissolubly linked to the
foundational principle of faith and which must be defended if faith is not to
be reduced to a theory but rather to be recognized in its claim to concrete
life…..Faith is a journey and a way of life. [5]
Humane
Vitae begins with a simple, clear, powerful statement which encapsulates the
entire truth about human life and the gifting of life by the Holy Trinity: The
transmission of human life is a most serious role in which married people
collaborate freely and responsibly with God the Creator. It has always been a
source of great joy to them, even though it sometimes entails many difficulties
and hardships. The fulfillment of this duty has always posed problems to the
conscience of married people, but the recent course of human society and the
concomitant changes have provoked new questions. The Church cannot ignore these
questions, for they concern matters intimately connected with the life and
happiness of human beings. [6]
At the
end of September, 1968, as a prime example of the reaction within the Church
itself, aided and abetted by a cacophony of dissenters in various fields from
theology to rights movements, the Canadian Conference of Bishops issued their
response to Pope Paul’s encyclical, which has evermore been known as the
‘Winnipeg Statement’: It is a fact
that a certain number of Catholics, although admittedly subject to the teaching
of the encyclical, find it either extremely difficult or even impossible to
make their own all elements of this doctrine. In particular, the argumentation
and rational foundation of the encyclical, which are only briefly indicated,
have failed in some cases to win the assent of men of science, or indeed of
some men of culture and education who share in the contemporary empirical and
scientific mode of thought. We must appreciate the difficulty experienced by contemporary
man in understanding and appropriating some of the points of this encyclical,
and we must make every effort to learn from the insights of Catholic scientists
and intellectuals, who are of undoubted loyalty to Christian truth, to the
Church and to the authority of the Holy See. Since they are not denying any
point of divine and Catholic faith nor rejecting the teaching authority of the
Church, these Catholics should not be considered or consider themselves, shut
off from the body of the faithful. But they should remember that their good
faith will be dependent on a sincere self-examination to determine the true
motives and grounds for such suspension of assent and on continued effort to
understand and deepen their knowledge of the teaching of the Church. [ 7]
The
continuing tragedy and danger in the above is twofold: 1] it opens the door to
the misuse of ‘conscience’ by people then and now to excuse actions which no
fully matured and informed conscience would allow and 2] it implies a
parallelism between science, the notions of intellectuals, indeed almost a
superiority to Catholic teaching, in clear opposition to the primacy of
revealed truth and orthodox theology.
Furthermore,
it contradicts this teaching from Humane Vitae: Therefore We base Our words
on the first principles of a human and Christian doctrine of marriage when We
are obliged once more to declare that the direct interruption of the generative
process already begun and, above all, all direct abortion, even for therapeutic
reasons, are to be absolutely excluded as lawful means of regulating the number
of children. …..Equally to be condemned, as the magisterium of the Church has
affirmed on many occasions, is direct sterilization, whether of the man or of
the woman, whether permanent or temporary…..Similarly excluded is any action
which either before, at the moment of, or after sexual intercourse, is
specifically intended to prevent procreation—whether as an end or as a means.
….Neither is it valid to argue, as a justification for sexual intercourse which
is deliberately contraceptive, that a lesser evil is to be preferred to a
greater one, or that such intercourse would merge with procreative acts of past
and future to form a single entity, and so be qualified by exactly the same
moral goodness as these. [ 2 -op.
cit. para. 14]
So
messed up are Catholics, Christians in general, about ‘conscience’, that when,
in 2002, a Catholic student sues his Catholic High School to bring his
boyfriend as his prom date, it was the Catholic teachers themselves, who as
‘friends of the court’, argued in support of the young man; currently in Canada
there is NO abortion law, unlike other countries who legalized abortion and
have time limits as to when in the pregnancy abortions cannot be done, Canada
has no such limitations; Canada has a limitless contraceptive mentality
expressed most egregiously through its legalization of so-called gay
‘marriage’, a totally sterile divergent simulacrum of the real thing, and, not
satisfied with legalizing murder at the beginning a of a human person’s life
Canada now legalizes so called ‘assisted dying’, an ambiguous way of avoiding
stating the obvious: assisted self murder.
St.
John Paul, in his encyclical on the Holy Spirit, reminds us that: The Second
Vatican Council mentioned the Catholic teaching on conscience when it spoke
about man's vocation and in particular about the dignity of the human person.
It is precisely the conscience in particular which determines this dignity. For
the conscience is "the most secret core and sanctuary of a man, where he
is alone with God, whose voice echoes in his depths." It "can
...speak to his heart more specifically: do this, shun that." ….The
conscience therefore is not an independent and exclusive capacity to decide
what is good and what is evil…. the conscience is the "secret
sanctuary" in which "God's voice echoes." The conscience is
"the voice of God," even when man recognizes in it nothing more than
the principle of the moral order which it is not humanly possible to doubt,
even without any direct reference to the Creator. It is precisely in reference
to this that the conscience always finds its foundation and justification. The
Gospel's "convincing concerning sin" under the influence of the
Spirit of truth can be accomplished in man in no other way except through the
conscience. If the conscience is upright, it serves "to resolve according
to truth the moral problems which arise both in the life of individuals and
from social relationships"; then "persons and groups turn aside from
blind choice and try to be guided by the objective standards of moral
conduct."…..A result of an upright conscience is, first of all, to call
good and evil by their proper name…….[8]
While
it may appear that the chaos, disorder, nihilism, relativism, hedonism of the
Sixties, is even more expansive in our own day, found primarily in the angers,
divisions, within nations and between nations – [without ignoring that some
aspects of the Sixties, such as the spread of civil and human rights, continue
to benefit the human family], the real battlefield, the real place of damage
done, and where metanoia must occur if we are to live the fullness of human
dignity and the fullness of our Baptismal vocation, is the human heart.
So
vital is Humane Vitae as a gift to the treasury of the Church’s teaching on
human dignity, St. John Paul, through a
series of General Audiences between 1979 and 1984, including reflections on
Humane Vitae, his 1988 Apostolic Letter
on The Dignity and Vocation of Women, his 1995 encyclical The Gospel of Life,
developed in depth what has become known as “the theology of the body”: The heart has become a battlefield between
love and lust. The more lust dominates the heart, the less the heart
experiences the nuptial meaning of the body. It becomes less sensitive to the
gift of the person…The truth and power of love are shown in the ability to
place oneself between the forces of good and evil which are fighting in man and
around him, because love is confident in the victory of good and is ready to do
everything so that good may conquer. [9]
The
1968 uproar and dissent around Humanae Vitae, the ever deepening and darkening
of the culture of death as more powerful than the Light of Christ and the
Gospel of Life is mere illusion, a satanic trick to confuse and discourage. Our
best protection with the help of the Most Holy Spirit, Our Blessed Mother, the
Angels and Saints, from such confusion and discouragement is, the mutual
strengthening love we have for one another, to be faithful to our vocation as
disciples of and witnesses to Christ.
We,
with Christ, are sowers of seeds of the Gospel of life through our living the
Gospel with our lives without compromise. We have no control over where the
seeds land: on rock, on sand, in good earth. We sow, we water with our tears
and prayers, and He, who loves every human being is the One who will – who does
– give life in abundance, and therein lies true hope and joy.
Because
we the Baptized are alive at this precise time in history, at this precise
period of intense spiritual warfare, while feeling the weight of the culture of
darkness and death, the pain, of seeing so many of our brothers and sisters
lead lives not simply antithetical to the very existence of Christians as the
leaven of society, of culture, of the broader human family, but who are
persecutorial in numerous ways, and not just by attitude and words, for many of
our Catholic and Christian brothers and sisters it is also martyrdom by blood,
all this is for us a way of sharing in the pain of Christ for souls, sharing in
His Cross, in His redemptive suffering for all humanity.
We
should not be discouraged, no matter the intensity of the pain and weariness
experienced and embraced as we are striving to be light in the darkness and
salt of the earth for: I consider that the sufferings of this present time
are as nothing compared with the glory to be revealed for us….We know that all
creation is groaning in labor pains even until now; and not only that, but we
ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, we also groan within
ourselves as we wait for adoption, the redemption of our bodies. For in hope we
were saved. Now hope that sees for itself is not hope. For who hopes for what
one sees? But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait with endurance. In the
same way, the Spirit too comes to the aid of our weakness; for we do not know
how to pray as we ought, but the Spirit itself intercedes with inexpressible
groanings…….Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father
of compassion and God of all encouragement, who encourages us in our every
affliction, so that we may be able to encourage those who are in any affliction
with the encouragement with which we ourselves are encouraged by God. For as
Christ’s sufferings overflow to us, so through Christ does our encouragement
also overflow. [from Romans 8:18-39 & 2 Corinthians 1:3-5]
[1] http://w2.vatican.va/content/john-paul-ii/en/encyclicals/documents/hf_jp-ii_enc_25031995_evangelium-vitae.html
[2] http://w2.vatican.va/content/paul-vi/en/encyclicals/documents/hf_p-vi_enc_25071968_humanae-vitae.html
[3] Catechism of the Catholic Church,
para.676 http://www.vatican.va/archive/ENG0015/__P1V.HTM
[4] THE
LORD; Fr. Romano Guardini; p. 513; Henry Regnery Company, 1954
[5] https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/full-text-of-benedict-xvi-the-church-and-the-scandal-of-sexual-abuse-59639
[6] http://w2.vatican.va/content/paul-vi/en/encyclicals/documents/hf_p-vi_enc_25071968_humanae-vitae.html
[7] http://www.u.arizona.edu/~aversa/modernism/winnipeg.html cf.para.17
[8] http://w2.vatican.va/content/john-paul-ii/en/encyclicals/documents/hf_jp-ii_enc_18051986_dominum-et-vivificantem.html
[9] The
Theology of the Body, Human Love in the Divine Plan; John Paul II; pp. 126
& 376; Pauline Media 1997
© 2019
Fr. Arthur Joseph
It is
said, that long before the start of WWI, St. Pius X would be seen walking about
the Vatican corridors, praying, and be heard to say under his breath: “I see so
much blood and can to nothing to stop it.” The carnage in Europe was already
under way when he died on August 20, 1914.
In
October of 1958, Edward R. Morrow gave a speech to American radio and
television executives in which he stated: ……..our history will be what we
make it. If we go on as we are, then history will take its revenge, and
retribution will not limp in catching up with us. [1]
Commissioned
by the Anglican Church of Canada to look into the issues impacting loss of
membership, Pierre Berton, by his own admission a non-believer, did his due
diligence and later published the report as a book: The Comfortable Pew, which
he ended with: “But there seem to be two ways in which a truly Christian
reformation could come about. It could come about through some terrifying
persecution of the Christian Church – a persecution that would rid the Church
of those of little faith, of the status-seekers and respectability-hunters, of
the deadwood who enjoy the club atmosphere, of the ecclesiastical hangers-on
and the comfort-searchers. Once the Church becomes the most uncomfortable
institution in the community, only those who really matter will stick with it.
At this point, one would expect the Church to come back to those basic
principles of love, faith, and hope that have made martyrs out of men.” (142-3)
[2]
In
1951, Hannah Arendt published her book: The Origins of Totalitarianism, from
which these words are applicable not only to the 1960’s but perhaps even more
so in 2019: “Never has our future
been more unpredictable, never have we depended so much on political forces
that cannot be trusted to follow the rules of common sense and
self-interest—forces that look like sheer insanity, if judged by the standards
of other centuries. It is as though mankind had divided itself between those
who believe in human omnipotence (who think that everything is possible if one
knows how to organize masses for it) and those for whom powerlessness has
become the major experience of their lives.” [3]
By 1968
the post Vatican II experimentation with liturgy, outside the clear norms laid
down by the Church, was creating chaos, driving people still in shock just from
the authentic liturgical changes away from these experimental ersatz events,
for that was all they were, while at the same time priests, religious brothers
and sisters, monks and nuns, seeking to define commitment in their own image
and likeness continued to leave in droves.
At the
beginning of the Sixties President Kennedy had famously challenged people not
to demand everything from country, aka government, but to ask of themselves
what they could do for their country. By 1968, as all the various protest and
rights movements became engrained not just in the American, but in Western
culture, that was turned on its head and remains so today: citizens of
democratic countries have become insatiable as they demand more and more from government
and politicians of all stripes, since then and in 2019, know if you want to be
elected to the power you salivate over then pander NOT to ordinary people but
to the screamers demanding more, more, more.
The
quotations cited above are because, as Morrow indicated, we are the makers of
our history, wittingly or not, and it is critical to be informed and to note
when some speaker, writer, preacher even, utters words which are prescient
awareness of where things are headed.
It is
to choose to be educated and act on what is learned, as opposed to being a
self-mesmerizing, go with the flow person. Not all information educates, indeed
in these days of the internet much of it dumbs down God given intelligence. Urgently
we need daily to ask the Holy Spirit for His gifts of wisdom and discernment so
we, the electorate, return to voting based upon actual issues and not emotional
or ‘what’s-in-it-for-me’ self-centredness.
So, it
is no surprise that much of Western society and even the most addleheaded
stoners, the pie-in-the-sky leftists, by the end of 1968 [in 2019?] could not
accept that, no matter how the masses are organized, there is no such thing as
human omnipotence.
Granted
that illusion of such a possibility lingers among extremists of the left and
right to our day for, flowing from the Sixties, what little faith in anything
is left in the lives of millions is in science, technology, relativism,
nihilism, unbridled consumption and obsession with self – though tragically
there are not enough lithium batteries now, nor will there ever be, to power
cell phone cameras long enough to take enough pictures of the self for anyone
thereby to actually come to know the person whose image they have taken.
At
first blush, in early January 1968, it did appear, with the advent of the
‘Prague Spring’, that just maybe before the decade was over some vital changes
were going to happen in the lives of oppressed peoples, at least in one
country: Czechoslovakia.
A
certain measure of reform and freedom did last until August but fearing such a
contagion might spread the Soviets, and some Warsaw Pact countries, invaded and
crushed the ‘spring’. Shades of the Warsaw uprising and aftermath of WWII.
Thousands managed to flee the country for Western Europe and Canada. Those left
behind would be under the Soviet boot until the Velvet Revolution of 1989. By
1993 what had been one country became two, the Czech Republic and Slovakia.
In
Vietnam the battle of Khe Shan began and would drag on until late April. The
infamous Tet offensive started as well. This would also be the year of the My
Lai massacre of innocent Vietnamese by American troops, showing how the
prolonged, brutal conflict was totally out of control. Indeed, those two
battles, the My Lai and other massacres by the US troops, were harbingers of
what was to come, the eventual take over of the south by the Viet Cong.
The
emotional and moral toll, on both American troops and anti-war protestors, was
bringing, combined with the ongoing violence in the civil rights struggle, an
entire nation to the breaking point, so much so President Johnson announced he
would not seek re-election, opening the door to a year of pollical violence and
uncertainty, ending with Nixon, of Watergate infamy, eventually becoming
president.
Countries
as diverse as Mexico, Brazil, Poland, Yugoslavia, were in turmoil with civil
unrest, revolutions, while in France, where student unrest was so widespread
and violent it led to De Gaulle fleeing the country as his government feared
outright civil war. The so-called ‘May 68’ turmoil continues to impact France
to this day, and other Western countries share the French secularist obsession,
which explains much about continued unrest by the Muslim community in France,
and other countries, and has much to do with Islamic terrorism for the
secularist, science, technology, sexual-identity, etc. moral turpitude of so
many post-Christian countries infecting Islamic youth terrifies the Mullahs and
angers the extremists, justifying in their warped minds, terrorism. Another
haunting outcome of the Sixties relentless pursuit of rejection of all
Christian truth and morals.
The
United States, the wounds of the Civil War clearly still gaping, was slipping
into greater internal confusion and chaos, exemplified dramatically by first
the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King, then of Robert Kennedy, and all
the ensuing riots, including during the Democratic Convention in Chicago.
Meanwhile
Mao Zedong, another example of if only the masses can be controlled, was
forcing millions of urban youth away from universities and the cities out into
the countryside to be re-educated.
In
October police overreaction in Derry to a civil rights march began the
inexorable trek of the Northern Ireland events known as “The Troubles”. This
violent struggle would eventually subside with the Good Friday Agreement in
1998 but with the Brexit chaos currently unfolding in Great Britain, could
unravel if the now non-border between the North and the Republic becomes an
actually hard border again when, and if, Britain leaves the EU, cutting of the
Republic which itself is an EU member country.
There
is an illusion, particularly among hard core so-called ‘populists’ in many
countries, among human beings in general, that, there was some period in human
history when everything was in right order regarding faith, morals, family,
male and female identity, etc., etc.
Reality
is that since original sin, while there have been brief periods when a
coalescing of ‘faith, family, country’ gave a modicum of peace within and among
disparate kingdoms, latterly nation states, they are rare. Mostly human beings
are in a greater or lessor degree of conflict with the self and among each
other.
The
Sixties shows us that attempts to reimage self, other, nation, God into what
agrees with, frankly, our impulsive need or want of the moment, triggers waves
of disorientation within self and the larger community, waves which like a
tsunami sweep through cultures, religions, nations, people’s lives, leaving
nothing but destruction in their wake and stunned survivors having to pick
themselves up out of the rubble and strive to begin anew.
Unless
this beginning, for Christians who are called to be salt of the earth and light
of the world, {cf. Mt. 5:13-16}, is Christocentric then, as we see in our own
day, with the secularization of virtually every aspect of society in the
Western world in particular, we will continue to blithely live on the quicksand
of loss of moral foundations.
The
very solid ground we need to build nation, family, faith, indeed self upon is
Jesus Christ and His Gospel of Life.
As St.
Paul urges: …..we earnestly ask and exhort you in the Lord Jesus that, as
you received from us how you should conduct yourselves to please God—and as you
are conducting yourselves—you do so even more. For you know what instructions
we gave you through the Lord Jesus. This is the will of God, your holiness:
that you refrain from immorality………For God did not call us to impurity but to
holiness…….Therefore, whoever disregards this, disregards not a human being but
God, who also gives His Holy Spirit to
you. [1Thess.1-3 &8]
The
following hymn, found in many hymnals, is used as the opening hymn for Vespers
of the 22nd week of Ordinary
Time. Given the heaviness of looking into the Sixties it is important to have
words of hope: Now fades all earthly
splendor, the shades of night descend; the dying of the daylight foretells
creation's end. Though noon gives place to sunset, yet dark gives place to
light: The promise of tomorrow with dawn's new hope is bright. The silver notes
of morning will greet the rising sun, as once the Easter glory shone round the
Risen One. So will the night of dying give peace to heaven's day and hope of
heaven's vision will light our pilgrim way. So will the new creation rise from
the old reborn to splendour in Christ's glory and everlasting morn. All
darkness will be ended as faith gives place to sight of Father, Son and Spirit,
One God, in heaven's light. [4]
[1] https://www.billdownscbs.com/2014/08/1958-murrows-speech-before-rtnda.html
[2]
citation from: https://yapdates.blogspot.com/2010/07/book-comfortable-pew-pierre-berton.html
[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Origins_of_Totalitarianism
[4] http://www.selahpub.com/SelahPeople/Quinn.html
© 2019
Fr. Arthur Joseph
