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| What are the warnings that the final storm approaches? Fr H.J. Coleridge SJ, 1894 |
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Posted by: Stone - 11-13-2024, 07:00 AM - Forum: Resources Online
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What are the warnings that the final storm approaches? Fr H.J. Coleridge SJ, 1894
Fr Coleridge sets out the signs of the approaching end of the world. His warnings about the aims, ideas and even the slogans used to engender a falling away from the faith are alarmingly prescient.
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Image: Pillement, Shipwreck in a Storm – Wiki Commons CC
Fr Henry James Coleridge SJ/WM Review | Nov 20, 2022
Editors’ Notes
Fr Henry James Coleridge wrote prolifically about the life of Our Lord Jesus Christ.
This extract, from his book about the end of the world, shows how accurate his warnings were about the aims, ideas and even the slogans used to engender a falling away from the faith.
This is the first of three extracts from Fr Coleridge we will be publishing on the end of the world.
The Decay of Faith
What elements of heathenism might or might not return
We need not exaggerate the miseries of our own time; nor draw in darker colours than St. Paul, the evil features of the last great apostasy.
The Son of God, as another Apostle tells us, was “manifested that He might destroy the works of the devil”;[1] and I do not find, in any of the prophetic descriptions of the restored paganism of modern days, that the system of the worship of false gods is to revive, with its abominable rites of blood and its mysteries of licentiousness.
Wherever the Cross has been once firmly planted, we may surely hope that the world has seen the last of the public worship of Satan.
[Instead,] in St. Paul’s description of the latter days, I find the blasphemy of the true God substituted for the worship of devils.
But, my brethren, the Son of God was not manifested altogether to destroy the works of man. He came to raise man, change him, regenerate him, sanctify him, by uniting him to Himself.
He did not come to take away man’s free-will, or to tear out of his nature those seeds of possible evil which produced all the human part of the paganism on which we have been reflecting. The empire of Satan has been overthrown, but alas! Man is still his own great enemy, and though our Lord has armed him against himself, He has still left him the power to mar the work of God in his own soul; and this power, which each one of us possesses in his own case, is always fearfully active in the corruption of the Christian society, the character of which is the result and the reflection of that of the parts of which it is made up.
The revival of heathenism in our times
And now, my brethren, what need have we of any subtlety of inquiry or refinement of speculation to tell us that this modern heathenism of which the prophecies speak is around us on every side?
Mankind are in many senses far mightier, and the resources and enjoyments at their command are far ampler, than in the days of old. We are in possession of the glorious but intoxicating fruits of that advanced civilization and extended knowledge which has sprung up from the seeds which the Church of God has, as it were, dropped on her way through the world. Society has been elevated and refined, but on that very account it has become capable of a more penetrating degradation, of a more elegant and a more poisonous corruption.
Knowledge has been increased, but on the increase of knowledge has followed the increase of pride. Science has unravelled the laws of nature and the hidden treasures of the material universe, and they place fresh combinations of power and new revelations of enjoyment in the hands of men who have not seen in the discovery increased reasons for self-restraint or for reverence for the Giver of all good gifts.
The world, the home of the human race, has been opened to civilized man in all its distant recesses, and he has taken, or is taking, possession of its full inheritance; but his onward path is the path of avarice and greed, of lust and cruelty, and he seizes on each new land as he reaches it in the spirit of the merchant or the conqueror, not in that of the harbinger of peace, the bearer of the good tidings of God.
Charity growing cold
At home, in Christendom itself, we hear, as our Lord said, of wars and rumours of wars, nation rising against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. In the Apostles’ time, it was an unheard of thing that the majestic peace and unity of the Roman Empire should not absorb and keep in harmony a hundred rival nationalities. In our time it is not to be thought of that the supernatural bond of the Christian Church should be able to keep nations which are brethren in the faith from devouring one another.
Or, again, my brethren, let us turn from public to private life. Look at social life, look at domestic manners; consider the men and women of the present day in their amusements, their costumes, the amount of restraint they put upon the impulses of nature; compare them at their theatres and their recreations, compare them as to their treatment of the poor and the afflicted classes; compare them, again, as to the style of art which they affect, or the literature in which they delight, with the old heathen of the days of St. Paul.
I do not say – God forbid! – that there is not a wide and impassable gulf between the two, for that would be to say that so many centuries of Christendom had been utterly wasted, and that the Gospel law has not penetrated to the foundations of society, so that it is not true that our Lord rules, as the Psalmist says, “in the midst of His enemies,”[2] even over the world which would fain emancipate itself from His sway.
But I do say, that if a Christian of the first ages were to rise from the dead, and examine our society, point by point, on the heads which I have intimated, and compare it, on the one hand, with the polished refined heathen whom he may have known at the Courts of Nero or Domitian; and, on the other, with the pure strict holiness of his own brethren in the faith, who worshipped with him in the catacombs, he might find it difficult indeed to say that what he would see around him in London or Paris was derived by legitimate inheritance rather from the traditions of the martyr Church than from the customs of the persecuting heathen.
He would miss the violence, the cruelty, the riotous and ruffianly lust, the extraordinary disrespect for humanity and human life which distinguished the later Roman civilization; but he would find much of its corruption, much of its licentiousness, much of its hardness of heart.
The unregenerate instincts of human nature are surging up like a great sea all around us, society is fast losing all respect for those checks upon the innate heathenism of man which have been thrown over the surface of the world by the Church. It is becoming an acknowledged law that whatever is natural is right, and by nature is meant nature corrupted by sin, nature not illuminated by faith and unassisted by grace — that is, the lower appetites of man in revolt against conscience, looking for no home but earth and no satisfaction but in the present, “having no hope of the promise, and without God in this world.”[3]
The final struggle will destroy all sects, leaving the Church against the world
All these dangers with which we are beset, which have their roots in human nature, and whose growth is fostered by the condition of the world, have been met by our Lord Jesus Christ, and are provided for in the Church. We are apt to marvel at what we deem the superfluous richness and profusion of that which may be called the armament of the Church, the variety of the means of grace, the multiplied channels by which heavenly strength is conveyed to fainting and wounded souls.
And yet not one of all these is needless; the whole strength and all the weapons of the Church will be strained to the utmost in her final struggle.
The whole might of unregenerate nature, in its undying repugnance to submit to the restraints of the law of God, is bearing down upon the Christian bulwarks of society with a weight as immense, and as relentless in its pressure on every part, as the tide of a whole ocean, which is swung in its daily flow against the rocks and cliffs of a far-stretching continent. What can resist it?
One force alone, the force of God, who sets bounds to the sea, and can check the raging passions of a whole race.
We hear little, in the latter days, of heresies and schisms, of isolated communities and partial forms of Christianity. These things will have had their day and have done much evil in it, but they are too frail and miserable in themselves to live on the surges of that last tempest of humanity — the Church alone can ride out the storm.
But again, my brethren, how does the Church deal with such assaults as those we are contemplating?
She works, no doubt, by the sacraments and the other means of grace, by the Word of God preached and taught in the sanctuary, and the like. But the strongholds of the Church are in the family and the school.
Her battlefields are those on which such questions as that of the sanctity of marriage and that of the purity of Christian education are fought out.
Give her the forming of her children, and she will train up the Christian youth and maiden, she will join them in a holy bond to form the family, of Christian families she will compose Christian communities, Christian nations, and out of Christian nations she will build up Christendom, a Christian world.
She can cure nature, and nothing else can.
Give her free scope, and you will hear little of that long list of heathen vices of which you have heard to-day; little of men being covetous, contentious, slaves of avarice and licentiousness, there will be no complaints of the decay of mercy, or of natural affection, of human kindness, honesty, faithfulness.
Barbarians at the Gate
So then, in these our days, can we too often remind ourselves of the points of attack chosen by the enemies of faith and of society? Can we forget with what a wearisome sameness of policy the war is waged year after year, first in one place and then in another; how certain it is that, as soon as we hear that some nation hitherto guided by Catholic instincts has become a convert to the enlightened ideas of our times, the next day will bring the further tidings that in that nation marriage is no longer to be treated as a sacrament, and that education is to be withdrawn from the care of the Church and her ministers?
And, indeed, my brethren, we know not how soon we ourselves may be engaged in a deadly conflict, on one at least of these points.
Up to this time we, in England, have been able to train our children for ourselves. And, to give honour where honour is due, we have owed our liberty in great measure to the high value which certain communities outside the Church set upon distinctively Christian and doctrinal instruction. But we know not how soon the tide of war may come to our homes.
We hear a cry in the air — it says that the child belongs to the State, and that it is the duty of the State to take his education to itself.
The cry is false; the child belongs to the parent, belongs to the Church, belongs to God.
In that cry speaks the reviving paganism of our day. Surely it should teach us, if nothing else can, the paramount importance of Christian education. If we give in to that cry we are lost.
What should we do?
Train up your children, my brethren, in the holy discipline and pure doctrine of the Church, and they are formed thereby to be soldiers of Jesus Christ in the coming conflict against the powers of evil.
[But] train them up in indifference to religion and Christian doctrine, and if they are not at once renegades from their faith, then at least they will be far too weak and faint-hearted in their devotion to the Church, to range themselves courageously among her champions in her terrible battle against the last apostacy.
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| Three [Latin] Masses Banned Overnight in Naples Archdioceses |
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Posted by: Stone - 11-12-2024, 08:35 AM - Forum: Vatican II and the Fruits of Modernism
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Three [Latin] Masses Banned Overnight in Naples Archdioceses
gloria.tv | November 12, 2024
On 23 September, a group of 250 (!) signatories presented a petition to the Archdiocese of Naples to lift the ban on all diocesan Roman Masses, reports GazzettaDelSud.it (15 October).
The Archbishop of Naples, Domenico Battaglia, was belatedly included in the list of new cardinals created on 7 December.
The suppression of the Mass came suddenly, like a blitzkrieg, with a decree of 10 May. Until then, there had been three diocesan Masses in the Roman rite in the Archdiocese of Naples, one of which had been celebrated for 20 years.
The only remaining Mass is celebrated by the Institute of Christ the King.
The petition (video here) has so far been unsuccessful.
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| Honoring Those Who Served |
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Posted by: Deus Vult - 11-11-2024, 10:32 AM - Forum: General Commentary
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Ever wonder why Veterans Day is on the 11th and does not change? World War I ended on the 11th month on the 11th day on the 11th hour.
Some years ago I saw a man selling poppies stop a lady and ask if he could re-position her poppy. While doing so he told the lady she should wear the poppy on their right side; the red represents the blood of all those who gave their lives, the black represents the mourning of those who didn't have their loved ones return home, the green leaf represents the grass and crops growing and future prosperity after the war destroyed so much. The leaf should be positioned at 11 o'clock to represent the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month, the time that World War I formally ended. He was worried that younger generations wouldn't understand this and his generation wouldn't be around for much longer to teach them.
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| Fulton Sheen's Ecumenical 'Firsts' as Bishop of Rochester |
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Posted by: Stone - 11-11-2024, 08:46 AM - Forum: Vatican II and the Fruits of Modernism
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Fulton Sheen's Ecumenical 'Firsts' as Bishop of Rochester
TIA | November 10, 2024
To implement the ecumenical directives of Vatican II, Bishop Fulton Sheen wanted to be one of the first U.S. Prelates to invite a Protestant to speak at his Cathedral. This was in keeping with his program to make the “little Diocese of Rochester in upper New York State” a catalyst of post-Vatican Council II renewal.
So, on September 13, 1968, a “first” occurred at Sacred Heart Cathedral when Mervis Chandler, the Protestant associate executive associate director of the Rochester Area Council of Churches, spoke from the pulpit at all six Sunday Masses at the invitation of Bishop Sheen.
Below, see the article in the diocesan paper The Courier Journal of September 13, 1968, p. 7. Click here to see whole page.
Then, only four months later in January 1969, Bishop Sheen himself spoke at the Sunday ecumenical ‘service’ in the Third Presbyterian Church before an audience of 1,000.
This was another ‘first’ in the Rochester Diocese. This sermon marked the first time he appeared before a Protestant congregation during a regular Sunday morning service. Sheen was commemorating the close of the Week of the Prayer for Christian Unity, another ecumenical innovation coming from Vatican II.
The Bishop emphasized “the bonds of unity” in his talk that bind together all “believers” – Catholics and Protestants.
Referring to the “person of Christ,” Bishop Sheen told the packed Protestant congregation: “You love Him deeply … We have differences in expressing truth, but these are merely ‘lovers quarrels.’ These are quarrels of great intensity, but merely the words are different. The expressions are the same.”
He also insisted that the understanding of “the cross” between Catholics and Presbyterians was the same and united “all friends of the Lord.” The enmity caused by emphasizing differences, he stated, has resulted in a “community of evil,” which “forces us to unite today … to save Christianity.”
We have already seen that Bishop Sheen made another “first” when he addressed the congregation of B’rith Kodesh in 1967, becoming the first head of the Rochester Diocese to speak in a Jewish house of worship.
At the end of this article, the Courier Journal reports how Bishop Sheen was busy making other ecumenical ‘firsts’ during his two innitial years at Rochester (1967-1968): Sheen addressed an evening Lenten service in Asbury First Methodist Church, spoke at a Lutheran Synod meeting in the Reformation Lutheran church, and gave a talk in Bethany Presbyterian Church on a Sunday afternoon. He also gave the final blessing at an ecumenical service in Christ Episcopal Church Cathedral.
Before Vatican II, no Catholic Prelate would go to Protestant temples to address the audience with friendly words, much less would a Bishop invite a minister to speak to a Catholic congregation as if they had a equal right to present their erroneous “truths.”
Sadly, the presupposition of the ensemble of Bishop Sheen’s actions and sermons to Protestants is precisely that all religions – at least all those present in those services – can lead to eternal salvation, which is a heresy that contradicts the dogma that outside the Catholic Church there is no salvation.
Among many other solemn declarations of the Church in this regard, we have the Bull Cantate Domino by Pope Eugene IV in union with the Council of Florence, which affirm this truth without possibility of any doubt, see here.
Below, see the article in the diocesan paper Courier Journal of January 31, 1969, p. 7. Click here to see whole page.
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| Transcription: Fr. Hekwo's Sermon for the 24th Sunday after Pentecost |
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Posted by: Stone - 11-11-2024, 08:42 AM - Forum: Rev. Father David Hewko
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Fr. Hewko: 24th Sunday after Pentecost
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☩PRAEDICATIO☩ from THE☩TRUMPET | November 5, 2024
Today is the Epistle and Gospel from the 4th Sunday after Epiphany. For today, the 24th Sunday after Pentecost. Here in Tannersville, Pocono Mountains, Pennsylvania.
The Epistle is taken from St. Paul's letter to the Romans, Chapter 13: “Brethren, owe no man anything but to love one another. For he that loveth his neighbor has fulfilled the law. For thou shalt not commit adultery. Thou shalt not kill. Thou shalt not steal. Thou shalt not bear false witness. Thou shalt not covet. And if there be any other commandment it is comprised in this word, Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. The love of our neighbor worketh no evil. Love, therefore, is the fulfilling of the law.”
The Holy Gospel, taken from St. Matthew, chapter 8: “At that time when Jesus entered into the ship, his disciples followed him. And behold, a great tempest arose in the sea, so that the ship was covered with waves. But he was asleep, and they came to him and awaked him, saying, Lord, save us, we perish. And Jesus saith to them, Why are ye fearful, O ye of little faith? Then rising up he commanded the winds in the sea, and there came a great calm. But the men wondered, saying, What manner of man is this? For the winds in the sea obey him.”
Thus are the words of the Holy Gospel.
Listen to the words of Pope Leo XIII: He says, “If the natural law enjoins upon us to love devotedly and to defend the country that gave us birth, very much more is it the urgent duty of Christians to be ever animated by like sentiments towards the Church. For the Church is the holy city of the living God, born of God himself, and by him built up and established. Therefore we are bound to love dearly the country once we have received the means of enjoyment this mortal life affords. But we have a much more urgent obligation to love with ardent love the Church to which we owe the life of the soul, a soul that will endure forever.”
That's Pope Leo XIII, Sapiensa Christiane. And then Pope Pius XI, in his Encyclical Caritate Christi Compulsi, he says, “To create this atmosphere of lasting peace, neither peace treaties, nor the most solemn pacts, nor international meetings or conferences, nor even the noblest and most disinterested efforts of any statesman will be enough, unless in the first place are recognized the sacred rights of natural and divine law.” Pius XI.
So in other words, if the natural law, which is the very bottom of morality, the very basis of morality, if that is violated, you cannot have lasting peace. And we just heard in the Epistle the basics of the natural law.
You shall not commit adultery. When a man is married to another woman, he cannot even think of another woman, nor a woman of another man in their marriage. They cannot even think of that, nor commit adultery, either in thought or actions.
It's against the natural law. It's also against the natural law to kill. Now, there's a legitimate self-defense. There's a legitimate self-defense of one's country. When it's being unjustly attacked, soldiers may rise up to defend their country. These are obvious duties of justice.
But outside of those extraordinary measures, we cannot kill. And abortion, as you know as well as I, I don't need to convince you, abortion is horrible murder. It is against the natural law.
And at any time, the moment there's conception, God infuses the soul. That's a living human being. And God showed this when St. John the Baptist danced in the womb of his mother, St. Elizabeth, when our Lord approached him in the womb of his mother, the Virgin Mary, the new tabernacle of the New Testament.
And St. John the Baptist, in his mother's womb, at about seven or eight months, was jumping with joy. So at any time, from conception to birth, after birth, until old age even, to kill anyone is murder and is against the natural law.
Listen to Pope Leo XIII on his encyclical, Immortale Dei, paragraph 46.
“In these are days as well to revive the examples of our forefathers. First and foremost, it is the duty of all Catholics, worthy of the name, and wishful to be known as most loving children of the Church, to reject without swerving whatever is inconsistent with so fair a title, to make use of popular institutions so far as can honestly be done for the advancement of truth and righteousness. To strive that liberty of action should not transgress the bounds marked out by nature and the law of God. To endeavor to bring back all civil society to the pattern and form of Christianity which we have described.”
So Pope Leo XIII had been describing in this encyclical the urgent necessity that the Church and State work together and that the State cannot be indifferent on religion. The State must profess the true religion.
Otherwise it will be a disaster for the country. So that is our goal as Catholics and not just as Catholics, it's just part of the natural law that we adore the true God and render to Him adoration and obedience and respect His law. And there's law that's His divine law that He revealed through His Holy Catholic Church the one true Church.
And then there is the human law of the civil law which is in accordance with reason, it's supposed to be anyway. Any laws that go against the laws of God are not laws at all. Such as euthanasia, abortion, sodomite parades and all that.
And then there's what's called the natural law and that's what's most attacked today. All the other laws of God are already out the window. The enemies of Christ are now attacking the very natural law.
And that's why we got this perversity, “oh I want to be a girl when I'm a boy, I'm a boy and I want to be a girl”, it's just sick, absolutely perverse. And all the body piercing and tattooing and all this just shows the revival of pagan practices because we've become pagans again. And when you look at history, what did all the pagans do? The Chaldeans, the Mayans, the Aztecs, the Assyrians, the Carthaginians, there was always child sacrifice, always.
Always the murder of children because Satan is bloodthirsty he wants blood and he wants the blood especially of children because he hates their innocence; he hates the fact that they can go to heaven; he hates the fact that our Lord loves children so much. Suffer the little children to come to me for of such is the kingdom of heaven, these little ones, so let's consider the little ones that the church defends. Pope Leo XIII is saying: I continue, “It is barely possible to lay down any fixed method by which such purposes are to be attained because the means adopted must suit places and times widely differing from one another nevertheless, above all things unity of aim must be preserved and similarity must be sought after in all plans of action both these objects will be carried into effect without fail if all will follow the guidance of the apostolic see of tradition of course as the rule of life and obey the bishops of tradition of course whom the Holy Ghost has placed to rule the church of God the defense of Catholicism indeed necessarily demands that in the profession of doctrines taught by the church all shall be of one mind and all steadfast in believing and care must be taken never to connive which is to work with evil in any way at false opinions never to withstand them less strenuously than truth allows, in mere matters of opinion it is permissible to discuss things with moderation but the desire of searching into the truth without unjust suspicion are angry recriminations” and so forth
Pope Leo XIII also stresses that he always stresses over and over again the importance of the state to recognize the natural law, to not violate the natural law to not violate the moral law and again and again and again the most basic moral law is you don't kill your baby in the womb or out of the womb you don't kill them and you don't kill them when they're old age either this is just again as Saint Paul says “the law of God is written in our hearts” nobody needs to be told you don't kill your neighbor everyone knows this is wrong and every woman that aborts her baby she hears the screams of that baby the rest of her life. It will always haunt her although God in his mercy he will always forgive such a crime of a repentant sinner he always will.
But I think we're at the point now where we Catholics we have to make reparation very much reparation to the Sacred Heart of Jesus and Mary because we're on the verge of elections and either candidate either one of them is going to continue the slaughter of the innocents. It's frightening that we have come to this in our country, in any modern country that the only way to be elected is that you want more blood of children. It's frightening that we have come to such a state of degradation and all this blood cries to heaven for vengeance so what do we Catholics do? we must make reparation we must make reparation to the Sacred Heart of Jesus to the Immaculate Heart of Mary and be prepared to do more and more because whoever gets in and that's decided, as we all know that's decided by the synagogue of Satan they decide who will run this country and we've already seen stolen elections not just in the United States, but in many other countries that's how the communists take over a country they steal elections they rig them, they lie, they cheat that's their method.
But we have come down to a time now where show me any candidate that's pro-life I mean this is just the basic natural law, where is any candidate running for presidency that's pro-life that will at least defend the most basic natural law the right to live as a human being which happens, you're a human being the moment the soul is infused into the mother by the miracle of this conception so in vitro fertilization involves at least for each child that's conceived in the test tube which is already against the natural law and condemned by the Catholic church and even, believe it or not, Pope Francis of all people condemned this because it's such a violent attack against the order that God established. But every IVF victim and child that survives there's always at least 40 to 50 and more abortions involved direct abortions the pill, which both candidates now fully endorse will go on with the bloodshed and the murder into millions and millions and millions.
As one politician told me, he said that with the pill now they're going to end up closing down the buildings to do abortions because the pills will do it early right through the mail and he made the point that these women who take these pills you're going to have some psychotic, crazy women more and more crazy women come down the road because they're going to see the little baby, which the pill has flushed out, they're going to see that little baby and that will always haunt them the rest of their life and into eternity. And if they're repentant, they're going to thank God for His mercy who is all loving and good and will forgive a repentant sinner there's no doubt about that and that goes for the doctors and nurses who are directly involved with abortions if they are sorry and repentant, God will forgive them.
Look at Abby Johnson she did over 20,000 abortions, poor thing but now she's doing everything to make reparations she's gone to confession, she's converted she's become Catholic, she's abandoned this, pray that she comes fully to Catholic tradition but at least she sees this horrendous crime and she's doing everything she can to stop it. Same with Dr. Bernard Nathanson he was the one that many years put out the film called, The Silent Scream, and now we know that the babies in the mother's womb when they're attacked by abortion and pulls off their legs and arms and rips them to shreds the babies are fighting for their life and some of them scream and now it's visible on the ultrasound. That's what converted Abby Johnson when she saw the horror of what she saw happening on the video of the ultrasound scan she was horrified and it changed her.
So again these are just questions of the natural law and we have fallen this low where the sins against the natural law have become the norm so we Catholics must make reparations because either candidate that is picked by the synagogue of Satan either one of them is going to continue the horrible massacre genocide so what do we do? We want to offer the Sacred Heart of Jesus in reparation, we want to pray the rosary every day in reparation and sometimes do extra prayers, extra penance in reparation. When you have the blessed sacrament, go and adore our Lord to make reparation and in this month of November. Go to the cemeteries, pray for the souls in Purgatory, because you can gain a plenary indulgence up until November 8th. You can gain a plenary indulgence for the souls in Purgatory by going to the cemetery and praying 6 Our Father, 6 Hail Mary, 6 Glory Be's for the souls in Purgatory and then add a 7th Our Father, Hail Mary, Glory Be for the Pope to gain the plenary indulgence. You can do that every day and families should go. In Mexico and in many good Catholic countries that used to be very Catholic this was the month many families just went to go pray the rosary at the cemeteries for the souls in Purgatory.
So that's something we can also do is make reparation because this country as Cardinal Pierre Poitier said once: “You don't want Christ the King and you reject his kingship you reject his laws over the government laws”, that now endorse even at the state level which is horrifying, abortion and all these horrible crimes and full rights for the sodomites and full rights for satanism and any false religion. This means the ruination and the collapse of any country, says Cardinal Pierre. If you will not have the blessings and the prosperity that comes with the social kingship of Jesus Christ you will have to endure the collapse the ruin, the devastation, the catastrophic disaster of rejecting him and that's where we're headed that's where we're headed there's a saying that if God doesn't punish us, the modern world, he owes an apology to Sodom and Gomorra. And our age has fallen worse now than the age of Sodom and Gomorrah. It's plunging fast so we must make reparation to the Heart of Jesus, live in the state of grace, keep the commandments.
And we know there are hundreds and hundreds of prophecies from the Blessed Virgin Mary to many, many saints and mystics who foretell a terrible chastisement on this world which will be one of the worst ever recorded in history, maybe even worse than the flood of Noah maybe even worse worse because one, it won't be by water it'll be by fire and at least by water, you know, when you start drowning you can make an act of contrition before you drown, but with fire, it'll be fast and many will die in mortal sin and that's a tragedy of tragedies. Sister Lucia saw the coming chastisement and she just shuddered in horror but she said that even the worst disaster, she said is that so many souls of children, of married people of boys, girls, men, women priests, bishops, popes go to hell, will go to hell many will be lost, she said and that's the worst disaster is the loss of so many souls.
So we Catholics, we have got to realize we live in Sodom and Gomorrah. It's on the verge of being punished and now we're at the point where there's no more pro-life candidates. There used to always be a pro-life candidate always and the bishops, even Novus Ordo ones and priests, even Novus Ordo ones used to preach you cannot vote pro-abortion you have to vote pro-life, always choose the one pro-life, always, that was always the Catholic position, even by Novus Ordos, and now, where are they? It's frightening that we have come to this, that to get anywhere in politics now, you have to be pro-abortion, which means continue the bloodshed continue the sacrifice of children like they did in the Old Testament giving full grown little babies to Moloch and burn them alive, give them to Satan to burn them alive. And they had to play the drums as Jeremiah shouts out at these people, God will destroy you for killing your young. These sins cry to heaven for vengeance, and then he used to preach to them in the valley of Jopheth. They would pound the drums to hide their conscience and to hide and cover the screams of the dying children which were done very frequently.
So by abortion we have passed it's 4,000 a day at least by abortion and when the pill comes more approved by state level the numbers will just skyrocket into the billions so there's a point when God says enough and we don't know when that is because God, His mercy far outweighs his justice. And we know that from the time he told Noah I'm going to destroy the earth, build the ark here's the instructions, here's the blueprint how many years was it from when he told Noah start building the ark to the actual flood it was 100 years, a whole century, so God is not in a rush to punish.
So while he does not punish us we must make reparation to Him and realize that we don't belong in this world, we should not pick up the spirit of this world and pick up it's fashions, pick up it's ways of thinking, pick up it's ways of speaking pick up it's whole worldly ways of living without prayer, without God, without self sacrifice without ordering our whole life to obedience to God's commandments. The best reparation we can do is to seek God with all our hearts love Him with all our hearts and love His commandments, keep His commandments and the modern world is trying to destroy what's left of God's commandments and make it seem normal to live in mortal sin and Pope Francis, he's added to this he's stacking souls in hell by the hundreds because he now permits giving communion to Catholics who've divorced their husband and wife and remarried and living in adultery and mortal sin and he has no problem giving them communion and approving their lifestyle, same with the rainbow lifestyle so he's just stacking more souls to hell this poor, poor unfortunate man poor unfortunate man so we Catholics, what do we do?
This is the age we must console the Heart of Jesus and Mary and make reparation that is what our lady asked “make reparation to my Immaculate Heart”, pull some thorns out, please and we do this by the daily rosary, keeping the commandments, sanctifying our life devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, doing our duties of state the best we can. We have to make reparation because maybe you're praying the rosary every day and carrying the cross every day when the chastisement does finally hit when it does hit, you might save many souls, you might win for them the grace of conversion and repentance before they die.
On a much happier note today we have the joy of first communion, little Marcella, she will make her first communion and she has a beautiful white dress on she has beautiful white gloves and a beautiful white veil God bless you, Marcella, but what our Lord really wants is your whiteness of soul the purity of our soul that's what He wants that we with all our heart want to love God and all of us with all our heart receive Him in communion asking a burning love of our Lord Jesus Christ and Jesus Christ crucified Jesus Christ showing His heart surrounded by thorns and dripping with blood that's the devotion praised by the Virgin Mary, praised by so many saints praised by the angels who adore the Heart of Jesus the loving Heart of Jesus.
And that's why that vision of Sister Faustina and that painting of the so-called Divine Mercy image, it was condemned by the church and partly because there's no Sacred Heart, there's rays of light from Christ's chest but there's no Sacred Heart and the devil has an immense hatred for devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus and the church had to defend the devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus against the attacks of the Jansenists of the Synod of Pistoia and all the modern liberals who called it ‘excessive or too sentimental’. And it was Pius XII who wrote a great encyclical defending devotion to the Heart of Jesus.
But that image of the Christ without the Sacred Heart that cannot be pleasing to God at all and this was recently promoted as you'll read in The Recusant, Bishop Williamson has been promoting recently some apparition in Texas where they're all about the Divine Mercy and all about Novus Ordo Mass so why is he doing this? I have no explanation, but don't listen to it because it's nonsense and it's deceitful. He knows better, you can read about it in The Recusant. I don't know why he's doing this. Archbishop Lefebvre would never approve of that, that's for sure.
So I remind you little flock here in Pennsylvania and those following the Mass, we have come to the time where we have to expect a terrible chastisement, for sure it's foretold, it's going to happen but we must make reparation because we come to a new dimension of evil where any candidate that gets in is pro-abortion and this is unbelievable that we have come to this. That means we have reached a new depth of depravity which will provoke the anger of God and there's a time when God just says “Enough”, as He's done many times in the history of the world and punished a nation and people. And the Virgin Mary gave us a little glimpse of how serious the Chastisement will be, whatever form it takes: world war, a comet, I don't know but she says “whole nations will be annihilated”. Whole nations blown off the face of the earth.
So Marcella, when you receive our Lord today, ask Him a great love for Him and ask Him to love Him with all your heart and your whole soul and your whole mind, and we must do the same. And ask always to be white, to be pure in your thoughts to be pure in what you see and permit yourself to see, ask yourself always “am I doing my actions alone or in public to please God?”, because our guardian angels always see us when we're alone or when we're in public it doesn't matter, our guardian angels always are with us. So it's always, St. John Bosco's advice was always, behave like you're in the presence of someone else, our guardian angel always, even in our thinking, in our words always so ask this purity of heart, this purity of soul. It is a grace in such an impure world that glories in its shame whose God is its belly and sins below the belly and glories in murdering children for the sake of convenience and pleasure and economic stability, but even that will be taken away
And in this month, in this month, Marcella, think of the souls in Purgatory you're receiving your First Communion in this month of November so maybe that's a little sign of God that you should have a great devotion to the souls in Purgatory, to pray for them also how many are in Purgatory and they can't help themselves but they can help us.
Let me just close with a few examples about Purgatory to inspire you all to pray for the souls in Purgatory this month and go frequently to the cemetery, especially these next eight days and then throughout November pray for the souls and don't forget them. This is taken from the book on Purgatory, a very good book and here's a few examples the angelic doctor St. Thomas Aquinas offered his prayers and sacrifices to God for his sister who had just died when he was professor of theology at the University of Paris. His sister who had just died in Capua at the convent of St. Mary of which she was the abbess, so his sister was a nun, as soon as he heard of her deceased he recommended her soul to God with great fervor. Some days later she appeared to St. Thomas asking him to have pity on her soul and to redouble his prayers because she suffered cruelly in the flames of Purgatory. St. Thomas hastened to offer for her all the satisfaction of his power and solicited also the suffrages of several of his friends so among his friends was St. Albert the Great, St. Bonaventure so he got the monks and the fellow Dominicans to pray and the nuns to pray and thus attained the deliverance of his sister who came herself to announce the happy news of her entering heaven.
Also sometime after this having been sent to Rome by his superiors the soul of this sister appeared to him in all the glory of triumphant joy she told St. Thomas Aquinas that his prayers had been heard that she was freed from suffering and was going to enjoy eternal rest in the bosom of God. Familiarized with these supernatural communications St. Thomas feared not to interrogate the apparition and asked what had become of his two brothers Arnold and Landolph who had died sometime previous. Arnold is in Heaven, replied his sister and there enjoys a high degree of glory for having defended the church and the sovereign Pontiff against the aggressions of the Emperor Frederick. As for Landolph he is still in Purgatory for he suffers much and is greatly in need of assistance. As regards yourself, my dear brother, she added, a magnificent place awaits you in paradise in recompense for all you have done for the Church. Hasten to put the last stroke of the different works which you have undertaken, for you will soon join us.
So St. Thomas at that time was working on the treatise of the Holy Eucharist. History tells us that in fact he lived but a short time after this event. On another occasion the same saint being in prayer at the church of St. Dominic at Naples, saw approaching him brother Romano who had succeeded him at Paris in the chair of theology teaching theology. St. Thomas Aquinas thought at first that he had just arrived from Paris for he was ignorant of his death. He therefore arose and went to meet him, saluted him and asked him about his health and the motive for his journey and brother Romano answered, I am no longer of this world, the religious said with a smile, and by the mercy of God I am already in the enjoyment of eternal beatitude. I come by the command of God to encourage you in your labors and then St. Thomas Aquinas asked immediately, Am I in the state of grace? He answered, Yes dear brother and your works are very agreeable to God. And you, had you to suffer any Purgatory, said St. Thomas. Yes, for 14 days on account of little infidelities which I had not sufficiently expiated on earth. Then St. Thomas whose mind was constantly occupied with questions of theology profited by the opportunity to penetrate the mystery of the beatific vision, but he was answered with this verse of psalm 47 “as we have learned by faith we have seen with our eyes in the city of our God”, saying these words the apparition of brother Romano vanished leaving St. Thomas Aquinas inflamed with the desire of eternal good.
And then so many other stories of saints seeing the souls in Purgatory burning, some of them in ice and encouraging others to pray for them and then many times the souls in Purgatory answer prayers, and they will protect those who pray for them on earth. They will visibly even intercede to protect them so there is one thing we must imbibe in this month of November, that spirit of the church which is to have pity and compassion on the souls in Purgatory.
“What you have done to the least of these”, our Lord says, “you have done to Me”. So remember always the souls in Purgatory and as the Holy Catholic Church enters into this, we are in a storm that has never been seen before and like the Apostles in the boat when Our Lord was sleeping, they came to Him and said, Lord wake up do something because we are drowning the boat is going to flip it is going to be the end of everything what does Our Lord do? He says very calmly, “Oh ye of little faith” and then Our Lord stands up and He commands the winds and the sea and they instantly obeyed His command, and the sailors who were in the ship who were used to reading the clouds, reading the ocean, reading the sea the waves, they never saw anything like this a sudden calm in the storm and this is what our Lord promises through the Immaculate Heart of Mary. We are in the worst storm in the history of the Church ever but through the Immaculate Heart of Mary, He will bring the great calm, the great triumph of the Immaculate Heart and that is what we want, that is what we are praying for, that is the candidate we are going to elect for, The Immaculate Heart of Mary to reign over us because only she can help us at this point.
So let's turn to her in the Heart of Jesus with all our heart, all our strength, to come to our assistance, have pity on us, have pity on this nation, have pity on the western world, on the verge of one of the greatest chastisements, and let's console the heart of Jesus and Mary. Help them rescue as many souls as possible from the eternal flames of hell. “O my Jesus, forgive us our sins. Save us from the fires of hell, lead all souls to heaven especially those most in need of thy mercy.” Amen.
In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.
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| Latin Mass at cathedral in Bishop Strickland’s former diocese to be canceled |
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Posted by: Stone - 11-11-2024, 07:47 AM - Forum: Vatican II and the Fruits of Modernism
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Latin Mass at cathedral in Bishop Strickland’s former diocese to be canceled
According to a letter written by the current head of Tyler, Texas, Joseph Vásquez, celebration of the TLM
at the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception will cease on November 30 following direction from the Vatican.
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Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception in Tyler, Texas
Google Maps
Nov 9, 2024
(LifeSiteNews) — Celebration of the traditional Latin Mass at the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception in Tyler, Texas, the diocese formerly headed by Bishop Joseph Strickland, is ending effective November 30.
According to a letter written by the current head of Tyler, Texas, Joseph Vásquez, celebration of the traditional Latin Mass at the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception will cease on November 30 following direction from the Vatican.
According to the letter, which has been shared widely on social media, the decision came directly from the Vatican’s Congregation (now Dicastery) for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments.
According to the letter, Vásquez, after becoming Apostolic Administrator of the diocese following Francis’ removal of Strickland last November, inquired with Rome about how to implement the demands of Francis’ 2021 motu proprio Traditionis custodes, which ended universal permission for the traditional liturgy.
“Following the guidance of the Holy See, the celebrations according to the 1962 Missal at the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception will come to an end on November 30, 2024,” explained Vásquez.
Vásquez did add that celebrations according to the 1962 Missal will still continue in the diocese at the parish of St. Joseph the Worker, which is headed up by the Priestly Fraternity of St. Peter.
Vásquez also acknowledged that the “transition” resulting from the decision may be “difficult” for some parishioners, assuring those in his diocese of his “pastoral concern” for them.
The news of the canceled liturgy in Tyler comes almost exactly one year after Strickland was removed as head of the diocese on November 11, 2023. Prior to his ouster by Francis, Strickland had expressed support for the Latin Mass and criticized Francis for suppressing its celebration.
Strickland has maintained an active public profile since being unceremoniously dismissed from his post. In fact, next week he will be leading a Rosary Rally outside the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops’ annual meeting, which will be covered live by LifeSiteNews.
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| Spain: Attacker Kills One Franciscan, Wounds Six |
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Posted by: Stone - 11-11-2024, 07:44 AM - Forum: Anti-Catholic Violence
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Spain: Attacker Kills One Franciscan, Wounds Six
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gloria.tv | November 10, 2024
A man broke into the Franciscan monastery of Santo Espíritu del Monte in Gilet (3300 inhabitants), Valencia, Spain.
The police were alerted on Saturday 9 November, at 10:00 in the morning.
The assailant jumped the fence of the monastery, reached the cells of several monks on an upper floor, entered the rooms and attacked them with sticks and a bottle, shouting 'I am Jesus Christ and I will kill the monks'.
One of the victims was taken to hospital in a critical condition where he died, another is in a serious condition and five others were injured to varying degrees.
The Franciscan killed was 76 years old. He suffered a severe traumatic brain injury and was taken to the Clinical Hospital of Valencia, where he later died.
Another friar remains in critical condition. Three friars, aged 57, 66 and 95, who were injured in the attack, suffered bruises and trauma of varying severity and were treated at the scene.
On Sunday morning, Spanish media reported that police had arrested a 46-year-old man of Spanish origin in connection with the crime.
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| Opinion: Synod Issues Anti-Monarchical Blueprint |
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Posted by: Stone - 11-10-2024, 08:51 AM - Forum: General Commentary
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SYNOD ISSUES AN ANTI-MONARCHICAL BLUEPRINT
TIA | November 8, 2024
The four-year process of the bombastically announced Synod on Synodality ended on October 27, 2024. Convened in 2021, it had a two-year preparation phase and then met at the Vatican in two sessions – one in October 2023 and another in October 2024 – bringing together 368 voting members of which 272 were Bishops. According to the media, these two sessions were meant “to change the face of the Church.”
Given that the Bishops issued a practically empty document in 2023 – perhaps sabotaging Bergoglio’s expectations – the latter took his revenge and emptied the second session by creating 10 commissions alongside the Synod to address the hot topics. These commissions, created in March 2024, will outlive the Synod and continue their work until at least June 2025. Depending on a papal stroke of the pen they may last much longer.
But for the 2024 session of the Synod, Francis determined that it should deal only with the very generic theme: “How to Be a Synodal Church in Mission.”
The Bishops obediently issued their final document: For a Synodal Church: Communion, Participation, Mission. I plan to say a word about it here.
But before I begin the analysis, let me set out some presuppositions.
- The word synodality as well as collegiality, communion and co-responsibility are code words in Conciliar Church parlance for the democratization of the Church. Fr. Karl Rahner spelled it out straightforwardly: “We could hope for a true democratization of the Church. … Democratization … should be understood as a key for integrating the Church into the temporal and pluralist society, the existential and permanent substractum for the formation of the Church.” (1)
![[Image: bev298_Rah.jpg]](https://www.traditioninaction.org/bev/bevimages(250-299)/bev298_Rah.jpg)
At right, Karl Rahner: ‘Democratization is key to integrate the Church into society’ - It is ironic that while the Bishops preach democracy in the Church and demand that inferiors should have all types of liberty and participation in decisions, they nonetheless obey the strict commands of the dictator Pope. They are not free to speak for themselves. The democratic liberty they preach is the opposite of the reality in which they live.
- As democracy is dying all over the world in the civil sphere and people are looking for a way to replace it, the Conciliar Church arrives on the scene breathless and boasting that it is democratic, trying to appear in style… It is a bit late; democracy is yesterday’s trend that has almost completely lost its appeal.
- Finally, let us not forget that the Catholic Church is essentially monarchical by divine institution. It is a Monarchy composed of the Sovereign Pontiff, the Hierarchy and the faithful. Pope St. Pius X in his letter Ex quo of December 26, 1910, condemned those who deny that the Catholic Church has been a Monarchy from her inception (DR 2147a, cf. 1822, 1825, 1827, 1831). When someone tries to destroy this order, he falls into either schism or heresy.
Bergoglio’s Synodal Church
The final document of the 2024 Synod is quite encompassing. It is one of the best syntheses I have read on the topic of democratizing the Church.
It establishes not only how the institutions of the Church should adapt to “synodality,” but also pledges to engender new styles of behaving, progressing spiritually, exerting authority, forming priests, being bishops and even being pope.
Some examples follow: (2)
- It is an extensive reform: “We ask all the local Churches to continue their daily journey with a synodal method of consultation and discernment, specifying concrete methods and formative ways to achieve a tangible synodal conversion in the various ecclesial realities (parishes, institutes of consecrated life, societies of apostolic life, groups of the faithful, dioceses, bishops’ conferences, regrouping of Churches etc.).” (§ 9)
- Synodality is a constitutive dimension of the Church: “With this document the Assembly recognizes and testifies that synodality, a constitutive dimension of the Church, is already part of the experience of many of our communities. At the same time, it suggests roads to walk, practices to enforce and horizons to explore.” (§ 11)
- It has multiple liturgies: “Deepening the understanding of the link between liturgy and synodality will help all Christian communities, in the plurality of their cultures and traditions, to adopt styles of celebration that manifest the face of the synodal Church.” (§ 27)
- It has an obligatory method: “Synodality is the walk together of Christians with Christ toward the Kingdom of God, united with all mankind; oriented toward the mission it includes gathering in assemblies at the different levels of the Church’s life, mutual listening, dialogue, community discernment, the formation of consensus as an expression of Christ’s presence in the Spirit, and the adoption of a decision in a differentiated co-responsibility.” (§ 28)
- “The synodal perspective, while touching the rich spiritual patrimony of Tradition, contributes to renewing its forms: a prayer open to participation, a discernment lived together, a missionary energy that is born from sharing and radiates as service.” (§ 44)
- It has a changeable theology: “Church synodality requires theologians to make theology in a synodal way, promoting among themselves the ability to listen, dialogue, discern and integrate the multiplicity and variety of requests and contributions.” (§ 67)
- It is a Church of the people for the people: “The synodal Assembly wants the People of God to have a greater voice in the choice of bishops.” (§70)
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A session of the Synod 2024 - “In particular, some concrete demands emerge from the synodal process that need to be responded to in an adequate way in different contexts: a) greater participation of lay men and women in all phases of decision-making processes; b) broader access of lay men and women to positions of responsibility in dioceses and church institutions …; d) an increase in the number of qualified lay men and women who perform the role of judge in canonical processes …” (§ 77)
- It moves toward including all religions: “On this road a synodal Church commits itself to walk, in the various places where it lives, with believers of other religions and with persons of other convictions, sharing freely the joy of the Gospel and gratefully welcoming their respective gifts: to build together as brothers and sisters in a spirit of mutual exchange and help, justice, fraternity, peace and inter-religious dialogue.” (§ 123)
Here the reader has some highlights of the “synodal” Church - or democratic Church - that Progressivism is planning to establish in the Church.
The document gives still other suggestions to change the Papacy based on the document The Bishop of Rome, which we have already studied. At the end it suggests that an Ecumenical Synod of all “Christian” religions be held in 2025 on the occasion of the 1700th anniversary of the Council of Nicaea (cf. §§ 138, 139)
We see that the Synod 2024 did not “change the face of the Church” in the field of institutions, as some had emotionally predicted. However, in the realm of ideas and plans it released a road map that intends to finish the work of destroying every residuum of the monarchical character of the Catholic Church that still stands after 60 years of continuous attack by the Conciliar Revolution.
1. K. Rahner, ”Theological reflections on the problem of secularizatiom,” in Theology of Renewal, Montreal: Palm Publishers, 1968, vol. 1, p. 175.
2. Since the Synod's Final Document is only available in Italian, I am offering the reader my translation of it.
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| Fr. Coleridge [1884]: The Parable of the Cockle amid the Wheat |
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Posted by: Stone - 11-10-2024, 08:38 AM - Forum: Church Doctrine & Teaching
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The Parable of the Cockle amid the Wheat
From The Training of the Apostles Vol. III
Fr Henry James Coleridge, 1884, Ch. IX, pp 148-159
St. Matt. xiii. 24–28, 36–53
Story of the Gospels, § 59-62
Sung at the Fifth Sunday after Epiphany and in one of the “spare” Sundays before Advent.
[Taken from here and here.]
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The second sowing parable
Of the series of parables of which we are now speaking, there are two only which have been explained for us at length by our Lord Himself. These are the two first in order, and, as we may fairly conclude, those which He thus explained may have been considered by Him as of the very highest importance.
Taken together, and with the rest, they present a very complete view of the conditions under which the Gospel teaching has to be carried on in the world, and they explain the principles of the Divine government in that teaching in a manner which it would have been difficult to ascertain so clearly if we had not this distinct interpretation of the figures by our Lord Himself. It is well, therefore, to subjoin at once this parable, with its explanation, to the Parable of the Sower, and the interpretation of that parable given by our Lord.
Quote:‘Another parable He proposed to them, saying, The Kingdom of Heaven is likened to a man that sowed good seed in his field. But while men were asleep, his enemy came and oversowed cockle among the wheat, and went his way. And when the blade was sprung up, and had brought forth fruit, then appeared also the cockle.
‘And the servants of the good man of the house coming said to him, Sir, didst thou not sow good seed in thy field? whence then hath it cockle? And he said to them, an enemy hath done this. And the servants said to him, Wilt thou that we go and gather it up?
‘And he said, No, lest perhaps gathering up the cockle, you root up the wheat also together with it. Suffer both to grow until the harvest, and in the time of the harvest I will say to the reapers, Gather up first the cockle, and bind it into bundles to burn, but the wheat gather ye into my barn.’
Explained to the disciples
This parable, then, was delivered to the multitudes, as well as to the disciples, and afterwards explained to the latter alone.
Quote:‘Then having sent away the multitudes, He came to the house, and His disciples came to Him, saying, Expound to us the parable of the cockle of the field.
‘Who made answer, and said to them, He that soweth the good seed is the Son of Man. And the field is the world, and the good seed are the children of the Kingdom, and the cockle are the children of the wicked one. And the enemy that soweth them is the devil. But the harvest is the end of the world, and the reapers are the angels. Even as cockle therefore is gathered up and burned with fire, so shall it be at the end of the world.
‘The Son of Man shall send His angels, and they shall gather out of His Kingdom all scandals and them that work iniquity, and shall cast them into the furnace, there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth. Then shall the just shine as the sun in the Kingdom of their Father. He that hath ears to hear, let him hear.’
In the Parable of the Sower, our Lord had described Himself as content with a good deal of failure in the beneficent work which He had undertaken for mankind.
He had intimated that He knew that much of the good seed which He came to sow would be wasted, and He had described the various manners in which that waste would be brought about. In some cases the seed was to be snatched away by the devil, as the seed by the pathside is snatched up by the birds.
In other cases, the seed was to fall as it were on stony ground, and wither away, the hearts in which it had been sown being too shallow and weak to give it strength enough to withstand temptation and trial.
In other cases the souls in which the seed was sown would be engrossed by worldly cares and ambitions, by the love of riches and other temporal things, unsatisfying in themselves and unable to supply the soul with true happiness, but still attractive and deceitful enough to occupy the mind and heart to the exclusion of the true goods.
In these cases the good seed would be stifled and made unfruitful. On the other hand, He was to find His reward and the recompense of His labours in the good seed which would spring up and return Him thirty for one, or sixty for one, or even a hundred for one.
The action of the evil one
Here, then, our Lord had said but little of the action of the evil one on the world.
It is true He had given a most important lesson as to that action, for He had pointed out that the utter forgetfulness and inattention with which so many careless persons come to lose their opportunities, and to be as if they had never heard the good word, were due, not simply to their own recklessness, but to the direct action of the devil, taking the seed out of their hearts, whether by direct action on their memories, or by filling their minds with other thoughts and affections which were sufficient to exclude the thoughts of faith and religion and the work of grace.
But for the remainder of the mishaps which were to prevent the fruitfulness of the seed, our Lord said nothing which could hint at the positive activity of the spirit of evil in the field which was sown by the word of God. There remained, therefore, these two great features in the description to be added by a new parable.
The first of these was the further action of the evil one which our Lord would permit, according to the general laws on which the universe is now governed, and the second was the manner in which God acts with regard to this action of His enemy. These two great features, then, form the special subject of this second parable.
Transfer of the image
In the Parable of the Sower, it will have been remarked that there is a transition from one point to another, in the use of the image, from the seed sown, to the persons in whose souls the seed is sown with so many diversities of issue, as to fruitfulness or the reverse.
The seed is the word of God, and yet the seed sown or dropped by the wayside are the heedless hearers, the seed sown among the thorns or on the stony ground are those who fail in this or that way to profit by the grace of God. So in the parable now before us, the seed is said to be the children of the kingdom and the children of the wicked one respectively, while the Son of Man sows the first and the evil one sows the other.
This transfer of the image is necessary in this second parable, for in this there is question of the manner in which God will treat those who are occasions of evil and scandal in His Kingdom. The parable deals with persons rather than with things.
But for the strict interpretation of the parable according to the lines of theological truth, we must remember the language of the Parable of the Sower, in which the seed is in the first instance the word of God, and in the second instance the persons in whom the word of God is sown.
The devil has no power to create evil, and our Lord in His dealings with the world gives or offers graces to all. He does not create good souls, and leave evil souls to be created by His enemy.
The parable speaks of the result of the action of our Lord on the one hand and of the action of Satan on the other, as being good and evil men, but in the truth to which the parable corresponds the evil are not purely and originally evil, nor so absolutely corrupted as to be beyond hope of recovery, and the good are not so good as to be preserved from the possibility of becoming evil, although wheat cannot become cockle nor cockle wheat. What is permitted to the devil is to ape and imitate, as well as to thwart as far as lies in his power, the action of God.
Phenomenon represented by the cockle
Our Lord looked forward prophetically to the history of the Church—nor had He far to look, when He knew already that among His own chosen disciples there was one who would turn out a true child of the wicked one—and He saw that which would always be the marvel of His saints and the special cross of His dearest friends, that the field in which the Gospel seed was to be sown would, when the time came for the fruits of the sowing to become manifest to the outward eye, be found to be full of a growth which certainly was not of the Gospel.
This is a phenomenon for which no account was furnished, as has been said, in the former parable, and our Lord represents it as a matter of surprise and complaint to the servants of the good master of the field. Who these servants are we are not distinctly told by our Lord, but the fact that the angels are said in the end of the parable to be the reapers is hardly sufficient to make us conclude that the angels are not also these good and zealous friends of their Master, Who would fain purge His field at once of the weeds which had so suddenly appeared.
The unfolding of the Divine plan of the government of the world, and especially of the Church, is spoken of in Scripture as the great study of the angels, who have not by nature the knowledge of the future, and to whom the beautiful wisdom of God reveals itself gradually in the course of events.
Angels and saints
And besides the angels, God has always among His servants on earth many who spend their days and nights in the prayerful contemplation of the progress of events in the world and in the Church, and to such also, far more even than to the angels, the phenomena of human history, and especially of that part of it which concerns the fortunes of the Catholic Church, are the subject and occasion of continual amazement and wondering surprise.
The angels, no doubt, would willingly, if it were the will of God, exert their wonderful power in the destruction and removal at once of all scandals in the Church. And the chosen saints and servants of God yet upon earth, must burn with zeal at the sight of so much evil and so much mischief, and would gladly call down fire from Heaven, as Elias did, and as the two Apostles, the sons of Zebedee, would have done on an occasion mentioned in the Gospel history itself.
For the desolation and ruin produced in the fair field of the Church by the evils of which our Lord speaks, are certainly enough to make the hearts of the friends of God boil over with indignation, and with desire for redress.
Satan using men
It is remarkable that in the parable itself the answer which our Lord puts into the mouth of the good householder is not simply, as might be supposed from the common version, ‘an enemy hath done this,’ but ‘a man who is an enemy hath done this.’
And when our Lord comes to explain the figure which He has used, He says simply the enemy is the devil. It may be that we are meant to understand, even from the language used by our Lord, that though the arch enemy and the principal agent in the attempted ruin of the fair harvest is the devil, still he acts mainly through the instrumentality of men.
Heresy, and oversowing what has already been sown
Another truth which may be conveyed by this language is, that the evil agencies are always posterior in date to the good agencies. The devil sows over the ground which has already been sown by the Son of Man, he follows the lines and works over the work of God.
The Fathers are very fond of understanding this parable, in a particular manner, of heresies, rather than of other evils, which proceed, like heresies, from the evil spirit and his subordinates, and according to this interpretation, it is very easy to see the force of this remark about the manner in which the evil one acts in spoiling the work of God.
For all heresies are perversions of the truth, they require the truth of the Catholic doctrine as their foundation, they have no originality in themselves, and the devil their author has no creative power, he can but mar and distort and pull to pieces.
But it is not necessary to confine the meaning of this great parable, in which the agency of the devil is described, to that single department of his work which issues in the production of heresies, and what is so plainly true of his procedure in this one part of his work, is also true of his work in other ways. He is essentially a copyist, a mimic of God, as if his insane thought that he would be as God was always repeating and forcing itself upon him, as the poor animals who ape man in his ways, are never quiet or happy, while they see him do anything, without attempting themselves to mimic him.
The intense malignity of the character of Satan must not make us forget this feature in the same character—the feature of the most insane and foolish vanity, a feature very remarkable in those who have sold themselves to do his work in the world.
One of the surest tests of the heretical spirit is the unwillingness to acknowledge mistakes and misrepresentations, when they are pointed out, and this unwillingness is founded on personal vanity.
It may safely be said that a writer on the side of heresy or schism who shows any eagerness to acknowledge and correct the errors in statement into which he has fallen, is already half converted.
And yet the want of this simple honesty is one of the commonest characteristics of heretical controversialists, and it shows most clearly the spirit by which they are guided.
The sleep of the servants of God
Another point may here be noticed. As God in His dealings with mankind acts according to His own infinite wisdom and knowledge of human nature, and so of all that it requires and of all that is adapted to influence it, and to supply its wants and cravings, the plan which He has followed in His Kingdom must of necessity cover the whole ground and penetrate every department of humanity.
It is the plan of the enemy, therefore, to proceed on his own work of mischief wherever God has extended His own beneficent operations, and thus the work of the evil one is aptly described as the sowing of bad seed over the good seed which God has sown.
This is said in the parable to have been done while men slept, and if this particular also is to have its counterpart in the truth, we must understand that our Lord refers to the necessity of the utmost vigilance on the part of those who are responsible for the good estate of the field sown by Him, and to the truth that the beginning of the activity of the evil influences is to be traced, more or less, to the want of watchfulness on the part of the rulers of the Church.
This, however, may perhaps be pressing the figure too far, for nothing is said in the explanation of the parable by our Lord of this want of vigilance. It may be that He means us to understand that there is always a great deal going on in the unseen world around us, and with direct reference to ourselves and to the welfare or ruin of our souls, of which we can have no more perception than men can have of what goes on in the hours in which they are naturally wrapt up in sleep.
Satan befouling everything
These few words, then, of our Lord, ‘an enemy hath done this,’ contain the whole of what He tells us here of the ever-active and most malicious exertions of the evil one and his emissaries for the purpose of destroying the good work which God has begun in the world.
As the enemy passes over the field in which the footsteps of the sower of the good seed have gone before him, and leaves no part of that field unvisited and, as far as lies in him, unspoiled by the seeds of evil, such we must suppose our Lord means us to consider is the activity of the enemy in scattering his evil influences wherever our Lord has left behind Him the principles of good.
Alas! it is but too true that there is no part of the field to which Satan is forbidden to penetrate. Nothing is too sacred for him to befoul. It is natural enough to expect his work in those regions of society which are more especially under his influence, which we call, by pre-eminence, ‘the world,’ the mass of those who worship temporal goods and aims, and regulate their conduct by the maxims of time and not by those of eternity.
But the work of the enemy is not only here. It is to be found in the sanctuary itself.
The hierarchy, religious life, the home
The Church of God is provided by the care of its Founder with an admirably organized hierarchy, a complete army of selected souls, vowed especially to the service of the altar, to the life of prayer, to the ministration of the sacraments, to the government of the general body, to the defence of the true doctrine, and to the preaching of the Word of God.
It is Satan’s chiefest joy and greatest triumph when he can sow seeds of evil in the sanctuary and around the altar of God, and though he has never been allowed for long together, or to any overwhelming extent, to corrupt the ruling body and fill the sees of Christendom with prelates who might be described as legitimate successors rather of Annas and Caiaphas, than of the Twelve Apostles, still he has not been altogether without his successes in this most vital assault on the good work of God. Incalculable as have been the services to the Church of God of the great majority of her chief rulers, her history would be different indeed from what it is if the world had never been able to intrude its own children into their ranks.
Pride, vanity, worldliness, personal ambition, jealousy, avarice, nepotism, an indolent and a luxurious life—if such scandals as these had never been in the sanctuary of the Church, she might not at this moment have to lament the falling away of so many fair kingdoms which once owned her gentle sway. As a matter of fact, the greater number of heresies and schisms in the Church have had their origin in the clerical order itself, and in many cases they have arisen among ecclesiastics of the highest rank.
If Satan has been allowed to see the evil shoots manifest themselves in the very highest orders of the hierarchy, it is not wonderful that in other parts of the field of the good householder the same miserable enjoyment should not have been denied to him. The enclosed garden of religious life, the cultivated retreat in which evangelical counsels are made the rule of daily practice under the sanction of vows, this also has been invaded by the malignity of the evil one, and the souls most immediately consecrated to God have sometimes been the occasions of the greatest triumphs to His enemy.
As the ecclesiastical state has its own peculiar temptations, such as those which have been enumerated, so also are there found, among the religious communities, the seeds of evil particularly fatal in their case.
So again it has been in that other garden of beauty and fruitfulness in virtue, the holy domestic life of the Christian family, formed on the model of the holy home at Nazareth, and the cares of a household and the lawful worldly callings to which the members of such families are naturally devoted have been the occasion of a thousand seductions and of a thousand instances of forgetfulness of God.
Not a calling, not a profession, not a pursuit, from the most laborious scientific investigations to the simplest relaxations and recreations, into which some evil seed has not been cast, as it were, to occupy the ground. The whole of society may be looked on as a field sown by the hand of God and intended to return to Him the fair fruit of obedience to His law and glorification of His bounties and benefits to man.
And yet every department has its evil traditions and examples and principles asserted against those of God and of our Lord, nor can there be any truer picture either of the natural society of man or of the supernatural kingdom of the Church, than that which our Lord here gives, the picture of a field covered with two growths of seed side by side, the one good, the other evil.
‘An enemy hath done this’
This, then, is the chief part, so to say, of the parable, the declaration on the part of our Lord as to what was to be expected in the field in which the evangelical labourers were to spend their work—a picture true indeed of the history of the world before He came and before the foundation of the Gospel kingdom, but far more true prophetically, as a forecast, for the benefit and warning of the Apostles and those who were to come after them in their work for God.
For the true picture of the state of the world before the times of redemption might perhaps have more properly been said to be that of a field in which there was but, here and there, a faint trace of the Divine culture, a few shoots of good wheat among a forest of shoots of cockle.
But it was all the more surprising, after the work of our Lord and after the establishment of His Church, that even in that chosen field so carefully cultivated and fenced round, there were still to be these many shoots of the evil seed in every department and in every corner.
Our Lord knew what was in man, as it is said of Him by St. John. He did not need the experience, even of His own reception at the hands of the chosen nation, to show Him what was to be expected by His Church at the hands of the world.
But He knew also what was in Satan, and He knew how intense would be the fresh activity into which the enemy of God and man would be roused by his defeat and by the destruction of his kingdom and power in the world. He knew how he would fasten on all the weak points in man, and work all the lower influences of his nature against his own good, all the more zealously because he would see, in the new creation of the Church, a world capable of giving far more glory to God than that former natural world which he had been allowed to deface and to turn into a dominion of his own. And the whole process of the efforts of Satan in the Church and their issue is summed up in these few words of our Lord, ‘an enemy hath done this.’
Evil and the Kingdom of God
The enemy of God and man will not be excluded from making his malignant attempts on the fair field of the Church, as he was not prevented from assailing the beautiful and innocent creation of God when man was first made.
The evil which sin has introduced into man remains in the Kingdom of God as long as the time of probation lasts, that is, the conflict of the flesh and the spirit is to go on even in regenerate man, although immense forces of grace have been supplied to him for his easy victory in the conflict. And so neither is the activity of the evil spirits fettered or put an end to, though men are wonderfully stronger for resistance against these deadly enemies than they were before the coming of our Lord.
As a consequence of these two truths, the field of the world in which the good seed has been sown is to be still what it always was, a field in which good and evil grow up side by side, nor is there to be any part of it in which the work of the evil one is not to be rewarded by a kind of miserable success of its own.
How will God deal with it?
But then, the question rises up—it must certainly have risen up in the minds of the angels as they watched the progress of the Gospel Kingdom—how will God deal with the evil shoots which have covered so large a space on this field which He has sown and is to be continually sowing?
When evil sprang up in Heaven, God did not tolerate it. The evil shoots were uprooted at once and cast away. Even in the history of His dealings with man, the principle of swift vengeance and extermination has not unfrequently been followed.
Once the whole race of man was destroyed, except eight persons, and there had been other instances of summary chastisements, only less signal than that.
What is to be the law of God’s action in the government of His Church, or of the world into which He has sent forth His Church?
From Fr Henry James Coleridge, The Training of the Apostles Vol. III
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| Fr. Ruiz: Renewal of the Consecration to the Virgin of Guadalupe - December 12th |
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Posted by: Stone - 11-09-2024, 08:06 PM - Forum: Rev. Father Hugo Ruiz Vallejo
- Replies (31)
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From an email dated November 9, 2024 [machine translated from the original Spanish]:
RENEWAL OF THE CONSECRATION TO THE VIRGIN OF GUADALUPE
NEXT DECEMBER 12
ACCORDING TO THE METHOD OF SAINT LOUIS DE MONFORT
To those who have made with us the Consecration to the Virgin Mary according to the method of St. Louis Marie Griñon de Monfort, but also to those who have not yet made this consecration and who wish to do it for the first time with us this year.
The preparation for this consecration for the first time, or for its renewal, begins this November 12 and culminates with the day of consecration on December 12, the Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe.
It is necessary to read the book of St. Louis de Monfort before beginning the days of preparation. Here I put at your disposal the PDF of this book as well as the same book in audio which is quite comfortable to listen to on Youtube (its duration is 4 hours and 50 minutes). Here is the link:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eumfKGRx...z9&index=1
The video that explains how to carry out the preparation for this consecration is ideal to listen to it before starting this preparation, it can be for example today, but in any case before November 12. Here is the link:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hhhZFk5u...z9&index=2
Each day begins with a meditation, which can be listened to a second time during the day, or even a third time. From November 12 to December 12 each day has its own meditation, starting with the next meditation and following in this list successively:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ohaV18Hy...z9&index=3
Attached is also the text of the consecration to be done on the final day, in front of an image of Our Lady of Guadalupe. This PDF must be printed on paper, on a single sheet of paper on both sides and must be signed together with the date and year on the day of the consecration. This document can be signed again each year when this consecration is renewed. It is not obligatory to renew this consecration every year but it is highly recommended.
It is also possible to make this consecration, if desired, at another time of the year or on the occasion of another feast of the Virgin Mary, but in that case the same procedure should also be followed.
May the Holy Spirit enlighten you and may Our Lady of Guadalupe guide you through her Holy intercession,
Father Hugo Ruiz Vallejo
Tratado-de-la-verdadera-devoción-a-la-Ssma-virgen.pdf
TRATADO DE LA VERDADERA DEVOCIÓN (S. Luis de Monfort) TEXTO CONSAGRACIÓN A MARÍA.pdf
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| US doctors pushback over massive new federal data collection rules |
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Posted by: Stone - 11-09-2024, 08:37 AM - Forum: Socialism & Communism
- No Replies
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US doctors pushback over massive new federal data collection rules
The AAPS is challenging a federal mandate requiring small entity managers to report personal data, arguing it violates constitutional rights and threatens privacy. The case is pending in Amarillo, Texas.
![[Image: Iris-Scan-shutterstock-e1719228451728-810x500.jpg]](https://www.lifesitenews.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/Iris-Scan-shutterstock-e1719228451728-810x500.jpg)
Shutterstock
AAPS
Nov 9, 2024
(AAPS) — The Association of American Physicians and Surgeons (“AAPS”) filed a Motion for a Preliminary Injunction against the new mandate requiring tens of millions of Americans to report personal information to the federal government.
By January 1, 2025, Americans who participate in managing small entities – even some political ones – must report their home addresses, birthdates, and other information such as driver’s license numbers to the federal government.
The Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (“FinCEN”) is creating a massive new database of personal information about ordinary, law-abiding Americans, to share widely with other agencies and even internationally to facilitate federal investigations and prosecutions. FinCEN will assign a “FinCEN identifier” to everyone about whom it receives this information, the brief notes.
While there are some exemptions, most small medical practices are subjected to this regulatory burden and possible investigatory harassment, as are non-profit groups not officially qualified under Section 501©(3), AAPS notes.
The Corporate Transparency Act (CTA) imposes up to two years imprisonment for failure to report this information to the federal government or failing to update home addresses. Fines can be up to $10,000 for violations.
“This is a vast expansion in federal police power, with its political bias that has worsened,” said AAPS General Counsel Andrew Schlafly. “Fortunately, multiple provisions of the U.S. Constitution stand firmly against this federal overreach.”
AAPS asks the federal court in Amarillo, Texas, to grant a preliminary injunction against this unconstitutional law based on the First, Fourth, Fifth, and Tenth Amendments. Other district courts have rendered decisions on both sides of this issue.
“Particularly alarming is how this new disclosure requirement will have the effect of taking away the right to own guns by those found to be in violation of the CTA,” Schlafly points out. “The two-year imprisonment under the CTA triggers revocation of the Second Amendment right under a federal gun control statute,” he adds.
This AAPS lawsuit is pending in U.S. District Court in Amarillo, Texas, No. 2:24-cv-210-Z.
Reprinted with permission from Association of American Physicians and Surgeons.
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| Attack on the Internet archive could memory-hole information globalists don’t want you to know |
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Posted by: Stone - 11-09-2024, 08:34 AM - Forum: General Commentary
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Attack on the Internet archive could memory-hole information globalists don’t want you to know
The Internet was founded to be free and democratic. It will require herculean efforts at this point to restore that vision as escalating censorship efforts are quickly suppressing that ideal.
![[Image: Untitled-9.png]](https://www.lifesitenews.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/11/Untitled-9.png)
Postmodern Studio/Shutterstock
Jeffrey A. Tucker and Debbie Lerman
Fri Nov 8, 2024
(Brownstone Institute) — Instances of censorship are growing to the point of normalization. Despite ongoing litigation and more public attention, mainstream social media has been more ferocious in recent months than ever before. Podcasters know for sure what will be instantly deleted and debate among themselves over content in grey areas. Some like Brownstone have given up on YouTube in favor of Rumble, sacrificing vast audiences if only to see their content survive to see the light of day.
It’s not always about being censored or not. Today’s algorithms include a range of tools that affect searchability and findability. For example, the Joe Rogan interview with Donald Trump racked up an astonishing 34 million views before YouTube and Google tweaked their search engines to make it hard to discover, while even presiding over a technical malfunction that disabled viewing for many people. Faced with this, Rogan went to the platform X to post all three hours.
Navigating this thicket of censorship and quasi-censorship has become part of the business model of alternative media.
Those are just the headline cases. Beneath the headlines, there are technical events taking place that are fundamentally affecting the ability of any historian even to look back and tell what is happening. Incredibly, the service Archive.org, which has been around since 1994, has stopped taking images of content on all platforms. For the first time in 30 years, we have gone a long swath of time – since October 8-10 – since this service has chronicled the life of the Internet in real time.
As of this writing, we have no way to verify content that has been posted for three weeks of October leading to the days of the most contentious and consequential election of our lifetimes. Crucially, this is not about partisanship or ideological discrimination. No websites on the Internet are being archived in ways that are available to users. In effect, the whole memory of our main information system is just a big black hole right now.
The trouble on Archive.org began on October 8, 2024, when the service was suddenly hit with a massive Denial of Service attack (DDOS) that not only took down the service but introduced a level of failure that nearly took it out completely. Working around the clock, Archive.org came back as a read-only service where it stands today. However, you can only read content that was posted before the attack. The service has yet to resume any public display of mirroring of any sites on the Internet.
In other words, the only source on the entire World Wide Web that mirrors content in real time has been disabled. For the first time since the invention of the web browser itself, researchers have been robbed of the ability to compare past with future content, an action that is a staple of researchers looking into government and corporate actions.
It was using this service, for example, that enabled Brownstone researchers to discover precisely what the CDC had said about Plexiglas, filtration systems, mail-in ballots, and rental moratoriums. That content was all later scrubbed off the live Internet, so accessing archive copies was the only way we could know and verify what was true. It was the same with the World Health Organization and its disparagement of natural immunity which was later changed. We were able to document the shifting definitions thanks only to this tool which is now disabled.
What this means is the following: any website can post anything today and take it down tomorrow and leave no record of what they posted unless some user somewhere happened to take a screenshot. Even then there is no way to verify its authenticity. The standard approach to know who said what and when is now gone. That is to say that the whole Internet is already being censored in real time so that during these crucial weeks, when vast swaths of the public fully expect foul play, anyone in the information industry can get away with anything and not get caught.
We know what you are thinking. Surely this DDOS attack was not a coincidence. The timing was just too perfect. And maybe that is right. We just do not know. Does Archive.org suspect something along those lines? Here is what they say:
Quote:Last week, along with a DDOS attack and exposure of patron email addresses and encrypted passwords, the Internet Archive’s website javascript was defaced, leading us to bring the site down to access and improve our security. The stored data of the Internet Archive is safe and we are working on resuming services safely. This new reality requires heightened attention to cyber security and we are responding. We apologize for the impact of these library services being unavailable.
Deep state? As with all these things, there is no way to know, but the effort to blast away the ability of the Internet to have a verified history fits neatly into the stakeholder model of information distribution that has clearly been prioritized on a global level. The Declaration of the Future of the Internet makes that very clear: the Internet should be “governed through the multi-stakeholder approach, whereby governments and relevant authorities partner with academics, civil society, the private sector, technical community and others.” All of these stakeholders benefit from the ability to act online without leaving a trace.
To be sure, a librarian at Archive.org has written that “While the Wayback Machine has been in read-only mode, web crawling and archiving have continued. Those materials will be available via the Wayback Machine as services are secured.”
When? We do not know. Before the election? In five years? There might be some technical reasons, but it might seem that if web crawling is continuing behind the scenes, as the note suggests, that too could be available in read-only mode now. It is not.
Disturbingly, this erasure of Internet memory is happening in more than one place. For many years, Google offered a cached version of the link you were seeking just below the live version. They have plenty of server space to enable that now, but no: that service is now completely gone. In fact, the Google cache service officially ended just a week or two before the Archive.org crash, at the end of September 2024.
Thus, the two available tools for searching cached pages on the Internet disappeared within weeks of each other and within weeks of the November 5 election.
Other disturbing trends are also turning Internet search results increasingly into AI-controlled lists of establishment-approved narratives. The web standard used to be for search result rankings to be governed by user behavior, links, citations, and so forth. These were more or less organic metrics, based on an aggregation of data indicating how useful a search result was to Internet users.
Put very simply, the more people found a search result useful, the higher it would rank. Google now uses very different metrics to rank search results, including what it considers “trusted sources” and other opaque, subjective determinations.
Furthermore, the most widely used service that once ranked websites based on traffic is now gone. That service was called Alexa. The company that created it was independent. Then one day in 1999, it was bought by Amazon. That seemed encouraging because Amazon was well-heeled. The acquisition seemed to codify the tool that everyone was using as a kind of metric of status on the web. It was common back in the day to take note of an article somewhere on the web and then look it up on Alexa to see its reach. If it was important, one would take notice, but if it was not, no one particularly cared.
This is how an entire generation of web technicians functioned. The system worked as well as one could possibly expect.
Then, in 2014, years after acquiring the ranking service Alexa, Amazon did a strange thing. It released its home assistant (and surveillance device) with the same name. Suddenly, everyone had them in their homes and would find out anything by saying “Hey, Alexa.” Something seemed strange about Amazon naming its new product after an unrelated business it had acquired years earlier. No doubt there was some confusion caused by the naming overlap.
Here’s what happened next. In 2022, Amazon actively took down the web ranking tool. It didn’t sell it. It didn’t raise the prices. It didn’t do anything with it. It suddenly made it go completely dark.
No one could figure out why. It was the industry standard, and suddenly it was gone. Not sold, just blasted away. No longer could anyone figure out the traffic-based website rankings of anything without paying very high prices for hard-to-use proprietary products.
All of these data points that might seem unrelated when considered individually, are actually part of a long trajectory that has shifted our information landscape into unrecognizable territory. The COVID events of 2020-2023, with massive global censorship and propaganda efforts, greatly accelerated these trends.
One wonders if anyone will remember what it was once like. The hacking and hobbling of Archive.org underscores the point: there will be no more memory.
As of this writing, fully three weeks of web content have not been archived. What we are missing and what has changed is anyone’s guess. And we have no idea when the service will come back. It is entirely possible that it will not come back, that the only real history to which we can take recourse will be pre-October 8, 2024, the date on which everything changed.
The Internet was founded to be free and democratic. It will require herculean efforts at this point to restore that vision, because something else is quickly replacing it.
Reprinted with permission from the Brownstone Institute.
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