God Has Not Abandoned Us by Fr. Bill Aitcheson

The wheat and the cockle will grow together until the harvest 

"For the time is, that judgment should begin at the house of God. But if first of us, what shall be the end of them that believe not in the gospel of God?" (1 Pt. 4:17)

Pope Francis has been the most controversial pope in Church history. He has promoted heresy and worhiped the Pachama, that filthy demon. He has talked out of both sides of his mouth by saying on the one hand, homosexual behavior is a sin, and giving the German bishops a rite for homosexual coupling on the other hand. His duplicity and his willfulness produced the permission for the traditionalist Society of St. Pius X to witness marriages and hear confessions, but has, by his document Traditiones custodis (ironically named), set about suppressing the celbration of the Traditional Latin Mass and the celebration of the other traditional sacraments. How could God, Who is Truth itself, place in the Chair of St. Peter, such a duplicitous and stubborn man who has caused so much scandal? 

There is an answer and it is based on Divine Providence.

From the very beginning of her existence, Holy Mother Church has been composed of persons of good character and bad character. The Lord Jesus spoke of this reality when He told the parable of the wheat and the cockle (false wheat): "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 bar.'" (Mt. 13:30) 

The emphasis here is for the faithful to wait patiently for the end when the righteous and the unrighteous will be separated to go each to his own reward. This means that the righteous will suffer as they wait for the consummation of the world. This suffering is nothing less than the Church's participation in the Passion of Our Lord God and Savior, Jesus Christ. It is such that we are undergoing now, have undergone in the past, and will undergo until the end of history.

Fear not, little flock, Satan and his minions are subject to God's Providence. 

God has not abandoned us! He has a plan and it is working the way it should considering the frailties of human nature. There is a pre-Final Judgment sifting that is taking place, because God only knows good for the Church and for all creation. Pope Francis is in the place that God wants him: apostasy, heresy, duplicity, willfulness, schismatic tendencies, and all. Francis is the Scourge of the Church, God's instrument of chastisement for the Church members' many betrayals of Christ, including Vatican II.

God is not the cause of Francis's sins, or anyone else's for that matter, but He has given power to this evil man in order to show the Church the infidelities of her people. The purpose of this revelation is to call the Church's laity and her ministers to repent and do penance for their many sins. We are not to be idle in this combat between the Sons of Light and the Sons of Darkness, bua re in the middle of the combat needing to choose our own side. Remember, indifference is the opposite of charity.

According to the great saints, St. Augustine and St. Thomas Aquinas, God's will is the cause of all that exists. He works His will in heaven and on earth as the Scriptures testify (see Ps 134:6) and He created all things out of nothing (see Apoc. 4:11) and governs all things with a mighty hand. So it is true that God works His will in His Church, which is most precious to Him, because she was created from the side of her Crucified Lord.

Since the Lord Jesus suffered for us, is it not reasonable that we should suffer His Passion with Him as a sacrifice to our shared glory? Through Baptism we mystically entered into Christ's death, burial, and glorious Resurrection. Shouldn't we too live this great Pascal Mystery every day (Rom 6:1-8), especially now, because God is calling us to choose Him in the of this terrible combat. Provided that we choose God for love of Him, we must choose to love His will too for a loving surrender to Divine Providence.