Our Duty: To Suffer for the Truth!

Every now and then a theme crops up everywhere I look and demands attention. Over and over the echoes roll over me like a tidal wave: on social media, in news feeds I follow, in magazines I read, etc. Often it has a lot to do with what's happening in my life at the moment. "Pay attention!" my guardian angel reminds me, "This is important!"

The Shadow Magisterium Goes Mainstream Part 2

How many of the iconoclasts are attacking
the Church from within?

Editor's note: See The Shadow Magisterium Goes Mainstream Part 1 

Since the reign of Francis began, one thing is certain: the “hermeneutic of rupture” has returned with a vengeance and the crisis is worse than ever.

Of course, none of this can surprise informed Catholics, but how many pewsitters are informed? Collapse of catechesis has dumbed down several generations who don’t recognize novelties as the magnitude 7.0 earthquakes they are. One can only hope that shell-shocked Catholics don’t abandon their crumbling churches, but get serious instead. How? The first thing necessary is to pinpoint the problem which philosopher Dietrich von Hildebrand did in his 1967 book, Trojan Horse in the City of God. He decried the “dethronement of truth,” saying:

The Faith Wreckers at the Academy for Life Exposed

I once said to my husband that I would know the Catholic Church wasn't the true Church when she endorsed abortion and contraception. Of course, it can never happen! The Church is indefectible which means she cannot err. She is always led by the Holy Spirit. Unfortunately, that doesn't mean she won't fall into the hands of evil men. And that she has!

The Pontifical Academy of Life which, like the ministries in Orwell's 1984, has become the opposite of its name, recommends a "pardigm shift" in moral teachings. You know -- hate is love, death is life, slavery is freedom, etc. Really, folks, sin is beautiful and we can all be like gods.

As Fr. Jerry Pokorsky writes in Deja Vu All Over Again (sigh) we've been here before. The article begins with an interesting quote from Evalyn Waugh:

Sunday Meditation: Be Irrelevant to the Modern World, It's the Duty of a Good Catholic!

Fathers, love your children!

I've know Fr. Jerry Pokorsky for years.  I first met him when he headed the Pro-Life office in the Diocese of Arlington and was meeting individually with the chairmen of parish committees. He took me out to lunch. 

That, in itself, was unusual, and I later returned the favor. His articles at The Catholic Thing are always informative and wise. So if you want a mentor to give you some good advice in Catholic living, check him out. Here's the advice portion of his article, Dare to Be Irrelevant:

• Men, be faithful to your wives in marriage. Be kind and considerate. If you are involved with porn, give it up. Just do it.

• Ladies, this is from the Book of Proverbs: “It is better to sit in a corner of the housetop than with a quarrelsome wife and an unruly household.” (Prov. 25:24)

Another Round of Great Articles: From Fr. Jerry Pokorosky and Raymond De Souza

Protestants Saving the Catholic Church by Fr. Jerry Pokorsky

Father makes an important and sad point:

The sex abuse crisis within the Church, along with an increasingly top-heavy bureaucracy, has – arguably – caused a kind of institutional paralysis....How else can we explain the general institutional failure to guard religious liberty during the pandemic? Historians will forever argue whether respect for the common good, fear of legal action, or servile fear, motivated Church authorities to meekly comply with government edicts. Regardless, the Church’s bureaucratic behemoth – and virtually every Catholic parish and entity – have submitted.

Meditation for Sunday: The Beauty of the Communion Rail

The sanctuary at St. Catherine of Siena in Great Falls, VA

My husband and I will go to Front Royal today for the 12:30 Tridentine Mass. My heart leaps up to even think of it! The reverence is palpable and I rejoice to see all the families with many young children and the numerous altar boys assisting the priest.

Why Communion Rails Make a Difference

I attended mass on Sunday at St. Catherine’s of Sienna in Great Falls, VA.  It isn’t far from where I live and when I go there, I not only get to enjoy the Latin mass, but also a great sermon from Fr. Jerry Pokorsky who never fails to deliver a good dose of inspiration and truth.  I went this week to see for myself their new Communion Rail, having read his most recent article posted on “The Catholic Thing” website titled, “The Communion Rail and Complementarity.” I recognized his own church from the photo in the article and knew the rail in the picture was there waiting for me to experience firsthand... 

Ready to Start a Fire Storm?

I’m ready to start a fire storm.  Are you?  In his sermon yesterday at St. Catherine’s of Siena in Great Falls, VA, Pastor Jerry Pokorsky said it’s time to put away our Christmas decorations and it is also time for us to realize the outward appearance of our Catholic faith is too often only just that, decoration.  The very vestments he wears, he said, are only ornamentation, and it is what’s underneath that really matters.  He said we must stop hiding behind the ornaments and start to be true defenders of our faith.

The Crisis is Much Bigger than the Sex Abuse and Cover Up! It's a Crisis of Fatherhood!

The sex abuse crisis in the Church has focused the spotlight on the evil of what is primarily the homosexual infiltration of the priesthood. Of course there are priests who violate chastity with women, but the overwhelming problem, as evidence continually shows, is ordination of same-sex attracted men, not pedophiles who prey on very young children, but ephebophiles who prey on adolescent boys and young male adults.

But there's more to the crisis than that and an article at First Things by a good priest in our diocese, Fr. Jerry Pokorsky, targeted it. The crisis in the Church is one of the failure of fatherhood. Father writes:

Sunday Meditation: Will Parents Being Non-Judgmental Lead their Children to Hell?

I was reading Fr. Jerry Pokorsky's article at The Catholic Thing this morning about non-judgmental clergy, a real indictment against priests who refuse to be shepherds warning their sheep. Instead, they let them run headlong into spiritual danger. But the paragraphs that really struck me had to do with parents:

Someone recently told me about a Catholic religion teacher who was called by a concerned parent. The teacher was presenting the Catholic faith in a methodical fashion. An upcoming topic was to be love and marriage. The parent wanted assurances that his young daughter would not be taught that the lesbian lifestyle of her older sister is immoral. 

If the younger sister came home with a crisp understanding of Christian marriage, she would become hopelessly “judgmental” – a truly horrible person – at least in Dad’s judgment. And she might even find herself denied entry to one or more colleges on the basis of her “intolerance.” You see, believing and living the Catholic faith is “judgmental” and it ruins education – and careers.

Sobering Meditation for Sunday: Have we made peace with evil?

Fall of the damned into hell - Rubens

Fr. Jerry Pokorsky offers a sobering article on the way "good" people make peace with evil in their lives. Death bed conversions are rare. As we live, so we are likely to die. If we have rationalized grave evils like abortion, contraception, "murdering" the reputations of others, etc. are we likely to even recognize them as evil on our death beds? If a personnel director makes sure abortion, contraception, physician-assisted suicide, trans gender surgery, etc. are covered in his company's health plan, well, how likely is he to see those things as evil? Even if he is personally against them, he is likely to rationalize offering "choices"  to others (even evil ones) as a necessary part of doing business. It isn't his sin, after all, if a woman decides to kill her baby or even herself. The fact that she might not have done it without the scandal of the company telling her abortion or physician-assisted suicide are acceptable "choices" will likely escape him.

We would do well to examine our consciences in the light of Christ's grace begging Him to reveal the sins we hide from ourselves. All of us have blind spots and just like missing the car in our "blind spot" on the road can lead to a disastrous accident, so can missing the serious sins in our lives have disastrous spiritual consequences. After all, what can be more disastrous than going to hell because we rationalized our gravest sins? Please Lord, don't let me blind to those things in my life that threaten my eternal salvation? Show me myself as You see me, so I can repent and turn to you with a clean heart.

I'll close with Fr. Pokorsky's question: 

"Have we ourselves – traditional-minded, pro-life Catholics made peace with some profound evil that has been buried somewhere in the tangle of our minds? What sins or patterns of sin are we overlooking or rationalizing when we go to Confession? If we could see ourselves with the eyes of others – through the eyes of God – what would we see?"

Comparing Planned Parenthood to ISIS? Right on!

Fr. Jerry Pokorsky got taken to the woodshed by a parishioner recently for comparing Planned Parenthood to ISIS in the weekly bulletin. (Seems apt to me. The only difference between the victims is their size and place of residence and the fact that the kid killers have the consent of the moms.)

The Catholic lady who pulled Father aside to remonstrate with him knows Cecile Richards, head of PP, personally and finds her "very friendly" (at least to born women). Really, the lady says she's pro-life, but finds Father's approach over the top, one that causes other parishioners (not her) to "roll their eyes" when they read the bulletin.

The Social Injustice of Our Deficit Economy

The author of this article, Fr. Jerry Pokorsky, is a priest in my diocese and pastor of St. Michael's in Annandale. Before he entered the priesthood, Father was a Certified Public Accountant. He knows of what he speaks. As he says, nobody (especially the bishops from my point of view) talks about the injustice of imposing a crushing debt on our children and grandchildren. We are giving the next generation, not just a stone in place of bread, but a massive rockslide that is likely to bury them. There doesn't seem to be a solution in sight from a human perspective, so we all had better be on our knees praying, praying, praying.

Big Picture Social Justice