I have given it a lot of thought, especially since last Sunday and listening to the First Reading, from the book of Malachi. We're in for a rough time of it as Catholics in America. Perhaps not as rough as some other nations, but we're definitely going to return to the bad old days of the Know Nothing Party and the Nativists. Partly because Anticatholicism is one of the default settings for a large segment of the population, partly because the current regime and many entrenched interests among the apparatchiks of our huge, expanding and repressive Government bureaucracy., but mostly because we deserve it!
Part of me wonders how and when we should--I should--resist. But a bigger part of me remembers something my Dad taught me: Don't run away from a spanking. WE as a Church have failed to keep faith with the covenant God made with us, and with each other. We are divided internally on issues of life, social justice--especially a holistic understanding of social justice--prayer and morality. We no longer provide a clear, unmistakable witness to the Gospel and the Lordship of Christ. We are now being punished, and it will get worse. I hope that our Heavenly Father grants me the grace to bear the things that are happening, and will happen, as a penance for my failings in this matter.
The current regime and it's allies among the activist Left do not like us, and especially do not like us having a voice in the public square. This has manifested in various ways, from covering Christian Symbols when using Christian Venues to re-writing regulations to contravene laws providing for the respect of conscience and morality. And that's the easy part.
Obama appointed Dalia Mogahed to be one of his advisers on his little "faith based" committee. Ms Mogahed is a Sharia advocate, and has intellectual links and communicates with the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt--the oldest Islamic Terrorist group, predating the end of the Second World War. She has used her position to block American influence, or even concern, over the ongoing persecution of Orthodox and Catholic Christians in the Middle East, succeeding even in preventing the Maronite Patriarch from meeting the President to give him the truth about this continuing persecution that extends to rape, murder, slavery, kidnapping, forced marriage, vandalism, arson and expropriation of property. This wasn't a super human effort on her part, because the Regime has all but ignored this issue since it came to power in January of 2009. Obama does not care about the civil and human rights of Christians in general, and Catholic Christian in the us in particular. That's why he pushed to keep language protecting the conscience rights of Catholics out of legislation on concerning his health care plan, and regulations concerning a wide variety of other things.
Right now, nurses at The University of Medicine and Dentistry in New Jersey, an even dozen of them--are suing because they have been told, bluntly, that if they do not participate in abortions they will be fired. This violates State and Federal Statutes protecting health care workers from being forced to commit murder. But this isn't going to be an in-and-out case, where the University backs down, because the judiciary and the various agencies have been politicized into becoming arms for the usurpation of legislation by regulations aimed at silencing Catholics, and driving them out of certain professions, especially healthcare, allied fields and education.
The Department of Health and Human Services director has said her department is "at war" with those who do not actively support abortion, contraception and sterilization--in Kathleen Sebelious' mind, anything less than whole hearted support and participation is opposition, so that means actively supporting or feeling the wrath of her Department. To this end, she has promulgated new regulations that so restrict the protection to religious organizations that they are being forced to choose between their core religious values and providing services. She did this with essentially one sentence--a line in her new regulations that says a religious activity must serve primarily member of it's own religion to qualify for a religious exemption. That means things like hospitals, soup kitchens, schools and clothing drives are no longer considered religious activities, and must purchase insurance that pays for abortions, contraceptives and sterilization--paying for them, even if the employees don't use them, constitutes in the minds of many Catholics obtaining them, a mortal sin. More than that, the additional expense of paying for this sort of insurance coverage can push charitable outreaches over the edge financially--anyone who has been involved in these activities knows how close to the bone they play it, the resulting low wages offered and how easy it is to shut such a thing down. The result is a lowering of the visibility of Catholic charitable outreaches, an thus the visibility of Catholic witness. More than that, it makes it possible for the opponents of the Gospel to point to the Church and say "Yeah, you're saying that, but what are doing to help?" knowing that much of the help and services have been rendered impossible by the state.
If you have paid any attention, you will see that career officers--professional civil servants as opposed to political appointees--are the one who have controlled and decided where the Department of Health and Human Services dispenses it's cash. For years, these civil servants have concentrated with the Catholic Church for services to and rescue of victims of human trafficking. Until this month, when Ms. Sebelius intervened in the process to freeze the Catholic Church out. She overrode the advice of her own professional staff, who favored the Church, not because of sectarian considerations, but because the Church had the best record of service to these victims, as well as the lowest percentage of funds spent on administrative overhead, salaries, and such like. But Ms Sebelius had just declared that her department was "at war" with opponents of abortion, sterilization and contraception--which in practical terms means the Catholic Church--and her decision was described by the career civil servants as the "ABC Rule"; anybody but Catholics. Ms Sebelius is supposedly Catholic herself, and we should pray that our Heavenly Father give her grace to return to the complete practice of the faith she espouses. ( As a humorous observation--the spell checker alerts on her name and gives as alternatives "rebellious" and "libelous".)
The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission is in on the act as well, singling out Catholic Schools at first, then branching into those of other denominations that support traditional morality, and have a case pending that they wish to bring before the Supreme court in order to gt the Court to define who is a minister, ovr the definitions of the various religious groups in this country. This is an unprecedented intrusion of the Federal Government into religious affairs, brought to us by people who are constantly touting their philosophy of "separation of church and state".
Speaking or Religious Exemptions, it seems that the FCC--who have been trying since 2009 to regulate speech on the internet despite repeated court rulings that they do not have that authority--are now "cracking down" on religious broadcasters, by eliminating their exemption to requirements for close captioning. Oh, they can still get them, but he application process has been made more difficult, and each outlet must apply for each exemption (and program, in some cases). The result is of course, to make it very expensive and difficult to continue. There are those who will point to "rich televangelists" and say they can afford it. They already have it. Who will be affected will be small local outlets, mostly...wait for it..Catholics, who are just getting into the game on the local level, and are underfunded. Notably, the ones with the least funding, and the least hope of help from the hierarchy, are those that are most pro-life and most orthodox. Another voice inhibited, or stifled by the decree of an unelected and largely uncountable bureaucracy, under the Obama regime. This comes at the same time as DHS--the Department of Homeland Security--has announced that it is stepping up surveillance of the internet--things like twitter and face book, and blogs--for signs of social unrest. Seeing as they have been trying since January of 2009 to point at pro lifers, religious conservatives, gun owners, verterans and white Americans as the potential threats to security, I'm pretty sure that someone will point out, perhaps on Obama's snitch page, that I've written this. Oh well, the reeducation camps will be something new, anyway.
Their idea of this principle is that the Churches should be subordinate to the state, their aim is to create a situation in which all religious denominations are Erastian, bolstering the goals of a given regime.
Normally we Americans would turn to the courts, especially the Federal Courts, for protection, but the regime's Department of Justice is less than reliable--having just promulgated internal regulations that render the provisions of statute law--the Freedom of Information Act--almost impossible to enforce, and for the first time authorizing the various agencies of the US Government to lie to the people, the press and possibly to Congress in writing. More than that, the Judiciary is compromised by some of Obama''s appointments, including at least one Federal Judge who is allowing a defeated congressman to sue opponents for "loss of livelihood". (This has never even been seriously considered before, and service in Congress hasn't been legally considered "livelihood" before. It opens the door for legal action against faith based groups, or free associations of people who share religious values but are not faith based to expensive, potentially bankrupting litigation--a very effective way to chill or even silence dissent.) It is also distrubing tht DOJ lawyers are assisting the EEOC in its' attempt to use the courts to establish that the Federal Government gets to say what and who is or is not ministry or a minister.
Even the Occupy Movement is involved in this matter. I have noted that the "Occupy Movement" is the child of, and financed originally by, the Working Family Party, and that president Obama's political adviser (his Carl Rove) is Patrick Gaspard, a member of the WFP. Well, the Occupiers have managed to shut down St. Paul's Cathedral, in their British incarnation, and Occupy Vancouver held a debate about occupying the Cathedral in Vancouver--which was not given consensus by the protestors, but was attempted by a faction anyway, unsuccessful. For a group that is supposedly concerned about corruption in financial market and excess profits, they suddenly decided that sexual abuse of minors was a very important thing. I simply will observe that when the Catholic Church was providing the last organized resistance to the Third Reich, this same issue was brought to the fore and shouted from the rooftops. Not only can this happen here, it's almost a certainty to. For the truth is unbearable to those who reject the possibility of fixed truth.
Ladies and Gentlemen, my Brothers and Sisters in Christ, this is the opening of a Chastisement in this country, and around the world. We are being Chastised for our failure to keep faith with God and one another, and it's a chastisement we deserve. Our task now is not heroic resistance, but Christian resistance, sticking to our principles even when they result social, legal, financial debility, patiently bearing wrongs and witnessing our faith, which teaches us that even if we are attacked in our personal bodies, we are beyond harm from the evils which are loosed upon us, in eternity with Christ. I wash raised a Redneck, and a Redneck I remain, but I need to put away the cantankerous and confrontational aspects of my our cultural heritage, and accept what's coming in imitation of Christ, who accepted even a criminals death in obedience to the will of His Father. This is perhaps, the greatest penance a man like me can have--to suffer wrongs and injustice and not to fight back with any other means that prayer, fasting, sacrifice and the Sacraments.
Part of me wonders how and when we should--I should--resist. But a bigger part of me remembers something my Dad taught me: Don't run away from a spanking. WE as a Church have failed to keep faith with the covenant God made with us, and with each other. We are divided internally on issues of life, social justice--especially a holistic understanding of social justice--prayer and morality. We no longer provide a clear, unmistakable witness to the Gospel and the Lordship of Christ. We are now being punished, and it will get worse. I hope that our Heavenly Father grants me the grace to bear the things that are happening, and will happen, as a penance for my failings in this matter.
The current regime and it's allies among the activist Left do not like us, and especially do not like us having a voice in the public square. This has manifested in various ways, from covering Christian Symbols when using Christian Venues to re-writing regulations to contravene laws providing for the respect of conscience and morality. And that's the easy part.
Obama appointed Dalia Mogahed to be one of his advisers on his little "faith based" committee. Ms Mogahed is a Sharia advocate, and has intellectual links and communicates with the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt--the oldest Islamic Terrorist group, predating the end of the Second World War. She has used her position to block American influence, or even concern, over the ongoing persecution of Orthodox and Catholic Christians in the Middle East, succeeding even in preventing the Maronite Patriarch from meeting the President to give him the truth about this continuing persecution that extends to rape, murder, slavery, kidnapping, forced marriage, vandalism, arson and expropriation of property. This wasn't a super human effort on her part, because the Regime has all but ignored this issue since it came to power in January of 2009. Obama does not care about the civil and human rights of Christians in general, and Catholic Christian in the us in particular. That's why he pushed to keep language protecting the conscience rights of Catholics out of legislation on concerning his health care plan, and regulations concerning a wide variety of other things.
Right now, nurses at The University of Medicine and Dentistry in New Jersey, an even dozen of them--are suing because they have been told, bluntly, that if they do not participate in abortions they will be fired. This violates State and Federal Statutes protecting health care workers from being forced to commit murder. But this isn't going to be an in-and-out case, where the University backs down, because the judiciary and the various agencies have been politicized into becoming arms for the usurpation of legislation by regulations aimed at silencing Catholics, and driving them out of certain professions, especially healthcare, allied fields and education.
The Department of Health and Human Services director has said her department is "at war" with those who do not actively support abortion, contraception and sterilization--in Kathleen Sebelious' mind, anything less than whole hearted support and participation is opposition, so that means actively supporting or feeling the wrath of her Department. To this end, she has promulgated new regulations that so restrict the protection to religious organizations that they are being forced to choose between their core religious values and providing services. She did this with essentially one sentence--a line in her new regulations that says a religious activity must serve primarily member of it's own religion to qualify for a religious exemption. That means things like hospitals, soup kitchens, schools and clothing drives are no longer considered religious activities, and must purchase insurance that pays for abortions, contraceptives and sterilization--paying for them, even if the employees don't use them, constitutes in the minds of many Catholics obtaining them, a mortal sin. More than that, the additional expense of paying for this sort of insurance coverage can push charitable outreaches over the edge financially--anyone who has been involved in these activities knows how close to the bone they play it, the resulting low wages offered and how easy it is to shut such a thing down. The result is a lowering of the visibility of Catholic charitable outreaches, an thus the visibility of Catholic witness. More than that, it makes it possible for the opponents of the Gospel to point to the Church and say "Yeah, you're saying that, but what are doing to help?" knowing that much of the help and services have been rendered impossible by the state.
If you have paid any attention, you will see that career officers--professional civil servants as opposed to political appointees--are the one who have controlled and decided where the Department of Health and Human Services dispenses it's cash. For years, these civil servants have concentrated with the Catholic Church for services to and rescue of victims of human trafficking. Until this month, when Ms. Sebelius intervened in the process to freeze the Catholic Church out. She overrode the advice of her own professional staff, who favored the Church, not because of sectarian considerations, but because the Church had the best record of service to these victims, as well as the lowest percentage of funds spent on administrative overhead, salaries, and such like. But Ms Sebelius had just declared that her department was "at war" with opponents of abortion, sterilization and contraception--which in practical terms means the Catholic Church--and her decision was described by the career civil servants as the "ABC Rule"; anybody but Catholics. Ms Sebelius is supposedly Catholic herself, and we should pray that our Heavenly Father give her grace to return to the complete practice of the faith she espouses. ( As a humorous observation--the spell checker alerts on her name and gives as alternatives "rebellious" and "libelous".)
The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission is in on the act as well, singling out Catholic Schools at first, then branching into those of other denominations that support traditional morality, and have a case pending that they wish to bring before the Supreme court in order to gt the Court to define who is a minister, ovr the definitions of the various religious groups in this country. This is an unprecedented intrusion of the Federal Government into religious affairs, brought to us by people who are constantly touting their philosophy of "separation of church and state".
Speaking or Religious Exemptions, it seems that the FCC--who have been trying since 2009 to regulate speech on the internet despite repeated court rulings that they do not have that authority--are now "cracking down" on religious broadcasters, by eliminating their exemption to requirements for close captioning. Oh, they can still get them, but he application process has been made more difficult, and each outlet must apply for each exemption (and program, in some cases). The result is of course, to make it very expensive and difficult to continue. There are those who will point to "rich televangelists" and say they can afford it. They already have it. Who will be affected will be small local outlets, mostly...wait for it..Catholics, who are just getting into the game on the local level, and are underfunded. Notably, the ones with the least funding, and the least hope of help from the hierarchy, are those that are most pro-life and most orthodox. Another voice inhibited, or stifled by the decree of an unelected and largely uncountable bureaucracy, under the Obama regime. This comes at the same time as DHS--the Department of Homeland Security--has announced that it is stepping up surveillance of the internet--things like twitter and face book, and blogs--for signs of social unrest. Seeing as they have been trying since January of 2009 to point at pro lifers, religious conservatives, gun owners, verterans and white Americans as the potential threats to security, I'm pretty sure that someone will point out, perhaps on Obama's snitch page, that I've written this. Oh well, the reeducation camps will be something new, anyway.
Their idea of this principle is that the Churches should be subordinate to the state, their aim is to create a situation in which all religious denominations are Erastian, bolstering the goals of a given regime.
Normally we Americans would turn to the courts, especially the Federal Courts, for protection, but the regime's Department of Justice is less than reliable--having just promulgated internal regulations that render the provisions of statute law--the Freedom of Information Act--almost impossible to enforce, and for the first time authorizing the various agencies of the US Government to lie to the people, the press and possibly to Congress in writing. More than that, the Judiciary is compromised by some of Obama''s appointments, including at least one Federal Judge who is allowing a defeated congressman to sue opponents for "loss of livelihood". (This has never even been seriously considered before, and service in Congress hasn't been legally considered "livelihood" before. It opens the door for legal action against faith based groups, or free associations of people who share religious values but are not faith based to expensive, potentially bankrupting litigation--a very effective way to chill or even silence dissent.) It is also distrubing tht DOJ lawyers are assisting the EEOC in its' attempt to use the courts to establish that the Federal Government gets to say what and who is or is not ministry or a minister.
Even the Occupy Movement is involved in this matter. I have noted that the "Occupy Movement" is the child of, and financed originally by, the Working Family Party, and that president Obama's political adviser (his Carl Rove) is Patrick Gaspard, a member of the WFP. Well, the Occupiers have managed to shut down St. Paul's Cathedral, in their British incarnation, and Occupy Vancouver held a debate about occupying the Cathedral in Vancouver--which was not given consensus by the protestors, but was attempted by a faction anyway, unsuccessful. For a group that is supposedly concerned about corruption in financial market and excess profits, they suddenly decided that sexual abuse of minors was a very important thing. I simply will observe that when the Catholic Church was providing the last organized resistance to the Third Reich, this same issue was brought to the fore and shouted from the rooftops. Not only can this happen here, it's almost a certainty to. For the truth is unbearable to those who reject the possibility of fixed truth.
Ladies and Gentlemen, my Brothers and Sisters in Christ, this is the opening of a Chastisement in this country, and around the world. We are being Chastised for our failure to keep faith with God and one another, and it's a chastisement we deserve. Our task now is not heroic resistance, but Christian resistance, sticking to our principles even when they result social, legal, financial debility, patiently bearing wrongs and witnessing our faith, which teaches us that even if we are attacked in our personal bodies, we are beyond harm from the evils which are loosed upon us, in eternity with Christ. I wash raised a Redneck, and a Redneck I remain, but I need to put away the cantankerous and confrontational aspects of my our cultural heritage, and accept what's coming in imitation of Christ, who accepted even a criminals death in obedience to the will of His Father. This is perhaps, the greatest penance a man like me can have--to suffer wrongs and injustice and not to fight back with any other means that prayer, fasting, sacrifice and the Sacraments.
5 comments:
Ah yup. It won't take any active resistance to find ourselves in the crosshairs of Moloch's posse. Just keep in line with the Magisterium, adhere to all Church teachings and you'd better get ready for the fun to begin. I doubt it will entail reeducation camps (although thats a favorite consequence I like to cite). What'll be more likely is to have agencies such as the IRS, CPS, etc. crawl up your ass with a microscope. They'll take away your minor children, your wages, your property and you'll find yourself dying in a charity ward of a state hospital, denied treatment because it's not "cost effective". Then you can look forward to an unmarked grave in whatever passes for Potters Field these days.
So the fate of the Faithful won't be a martyr's well publicized end. It'll be loss of family, anonymity as a pauper and complete erasure from any human memory after death.
Not with a bang but a whimper.
True, but we'll have the glory of heaven--God will know his own.
unfortunately, many will lose the faith, or never hear it, because of the Fascists of Progress.
miserere nobis!
Even though many may not hear of it won't extinguish the Church. We have Christ's promise it will endure till the end of time. My bitch is that my kids will be seperated and the two oldest euthanized while their sister gets pimped out to the highest bidder. Yes, my imagination is overactive. Someday I'll explain just why thats justifiable.
No explanation needed--I see shit like that coming too.
But perhaps it doesn't have to come to such a desperate pass. Could there be another Reagan waiting in the wings?
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