Monday Morning Musing on Peace of Soul

What is one of the most important goals for the Christian striving to do God's will? ALWAYS maintain peace of soul. We all desperately need it, but how many are willing to do the hard work to achieve it.

The first step in examining anything is to understand what it is. So what exactly is peace of soul? When I have a question about faith, I often turn to Fr. John Hardon, that holy Jesuit who went to his eternal reward in 2000. I'll offer some of his insights from a sermon on Peace of Soul:

Planting the Seeds of Patience in the Soil of Silence

The last time I spoke about patience, I gave its etymology. today I'll offer Fr. John Hardon's definition from his Catholic dictionary, a source I often use. I want to understand what I'm talking about, particularly when it involves the faith. Fr. Hardon, S.J. can always be relied upon. Here's how he defines patience:

Thought for Monday on the Truth. Yes, Virginia, Truth Exists!

I had the great privilege of attending two retreats with Fr. John Hardon. The second in Windsor, Canada during the Fall of, I think 1999, was probably his last. Cardinal Raymond Burke (a bishop at the time) participated and Fr. Hardon passed the torch of the Marian Catechists to him. Those retreats were two of the greatest blessings of my life along with the two decades of the Spiritual Exercises retreats with Fr. James Buckley. God has blessed me abundantly with such great priest guides and continues to do so. The revival of the Church begins in the cradle and is magnified in the seminary. May God give us many holy priests to lead His Church. 

Fr. Hardon, Servant of God, please pray for us.

Sunday Meditation: O Lord, Give Us Many Holy Priests!

St. Jean Vianney, patron of parish priests

In these times, so like the ignorant days after the French Revolution when many people had lost the sense of the sacred and the knowledge of Catholic doctrine, we need priests who will instruct the ignorant, counsel the doubtful, admonish sinners, and pray diligently for the living and the dead. Just a handful like St. Jean Vianney, the patron of parish priests, could turn our pagan culture back to God.

Will the Three Pillars of the Catholic Faith Remain Firm?

Know the three pillars of the Catholic faith!

Editor's note: This is the lead article from the Spring issue of the Les Femmes newsletter. It isn't on line yet, but most of the past issues (from Volume 5 on) are posted. This is the 27th year of publication. The newsletter began in response to Call to Action invading our churches in the Diocese of Arlington. We were able to expose and even stops a number of scandals by the grace of God and by lifting the rock hiding the creepy crawlies underneath. The laity can play an important role in defending the faith, if we cooperate with God's grace and pursue the truth. And when the Blessed Mother, our 12-star general is the editor, how can you go wrong? She's kept us in print these many years. Thank you, Blessed Mother!

Will the Three Pillars of the Catholic Faith Remain Firm?

The Catholic Church stands on a solid foundation that can’t be shaken when its three pillars are upheld. Scripture and the ruling Magisterium are two of them. The third is Sacred Tradition. Think of a well-balanced three-legged stool. The legs provide a stable foundation for the seat. Now imagine a foolish person who decides to start trimming the legs because he doesn’t like the aesthetics of the chair or thinks it needs an updated look. Trouble ahead!

How Many Good Priests Have Been Thrown Under the Bus?

Double standard in action!

How many good priests have been thrown under the bus? Their number is legion. In my own diocese (Arlington) Bishop Burbidge eliminated two priests who were removed from ministry with the assurance they would be reinstated after a time. One was forced into early retirement; the other remains in liturgical limbo. Both are good priests who deserved better (as did their flocks). I grieve for these betrayed priests both of whom I know personally.

When I'm up before the early bird....

Well, it was one of those nights. I turned the light off around eleven, slept somewhat fitfully, and was wide awake at 4:30. So what does one do (after making coffee) when it's still pitch dark out and absolutely quiet? (Even the early bird is still in bed.) Here's my answer: Read morning prayer in my Magnificat, sit down with the unread stack of Wanderers, and then write a letter to my granddaughter.

The first article in The Wanderer that caught my eye was a reprint of Fr. John Hardon's commentary on the Real Presence. So many Catholics no longer believe and my granddaughter is working as the Admissions Director at a Catholic high school. She will have many opportunities to witness to her belief that Christ is really there in the school chapel simply by her reverence and frequent visits. 

So I was going to clip the article and mail it.

Sunday Meditation: Beauty, Our Invitation from God to Know Him

Changing colors in Maine

The other night we were sitting around a fire with some camping neighbors at St. Andrews on the bay (of Fundy) in New Brunswick. Overhead the moonless sky allowed a dazzling display of stars and the Milky Way. Breathtaking! On our drive through Maine the trees were changing from green to brilliant hues of gold, scarlet, and orange. We would go from a stretch of evergreens with only an occasional dash of color, follow a curve in the road to be met by a hillside of deciduous cousins dressed in fall finery. The sun was shining and the bright blue Mary sky provided the perfect background to set off their beauty.

Remembering Fr. Hardon, S.J. and the Four Types of People

I had breakfast with a good friend this morning, a sister of the heart. How blessed we are if we have a few of those outside our biological family. We were talking about relationships and my friend reminded me of something Father said about the people in our lives. (I think this comes from the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius). There are four types of relationships:

Cut Off the Money to Bad Parishes and Dioceses

I've been saying this for years. The only thing some clergy understand is money. They have more faith in the almighty dollar than in Almighty God. So it's time to strip their idol, Mammon, from the altar. The way to do that? Stop giving. If your pastor spreads the faith, then financially support the parish. If he spreads heresy and persecutes faithful Catholics forget it.

For years, Larry and I have given our donations through the parish development collection because it is not assessed the diocesan tax. We don't give a nickel to the diocese. Does that mean we don't support some good things? Not necessarily. We can give to some of those things individually, e.g., by supporting the diocesan seminary directly or supporting an individual seminarian.

The situation in the Church today is terrible and Jesus knew it would happen. Hey, he had a traitor among his own twelve apostles! Fr. Hardon said often that Jesus did that to prepare us for apostate bishops. And we've certainly got them along with their weak sisters.

God help us. We need vigilant shepherds who protect us from the wolves. Where are they?

We're at War with Ourselves!

This morning at Mass the first reading was from St. Paul's letter to the Corinthians about the resurrection of the body. Some of the Corinthians believed only the soul would rise; the body would rot in the tomb. But if that's the case the Incarnation makes no sense and, as Paul says, "If the dead are not raised, then Christ was not raised; and if Christ was not raised, your faith is worthless. You are still in your sins, and those who have fallen asleep in Christ are the deadest of the dead....[and] the most pitiable of men."

Yes, we are body/soul creatures, united irrevocably although we will be separated temporarily from "brother ass" when we die. Because of original sin,

What a Joy to See and Hear the Voice of my Hero, Fr. John Hardon, S.J.

Thanks to Michael Voris for this walk down memory lane with Fr. Hardon. Every night when we pray our rosary and recite the tessera of the Legion of Mary we add his name and say, "Fr. Hardon, pray for us!" He truly was an icon of the 20th century preparing us for the difficult days of the 21st! And I was so blessed to attend two retreats he gave and many home school conferences at which he spoke. Thank you, Fr. Hardon, for giving us courage to resist.



Let me repeat Fr. Hardon's words:

Why was there a Judas? One of the reasons the Church gives is to prepare the faithful for apostate bishops. And you see how important it is for bishops to remain faithful to Jesus Christ and his vicar on earth. No heresy has ever succeeded in history unless and until it was backed by a bishop. Pray, pray, pray for bishops!

Yes, pray for the bishops. Many among them are Judases and apostates. Let's pray for the discernment to recognize them and warn the faithful against them.

Fr. John Hardon: Servant of God

I had the great privilege of making two retreats with Fr. John Hardon. A friend recently sent me the video below asking me if a photo in it was me? It was and I had no idea it had been included in a video. It was taken at the last retreat he gave for the Marian catechists which was held in Windsor, Canada. My sister Carol and I were thrilled to be on the retreat with Father and took the opportunity to get a snapshot before we left.  I thought another retreatant took it with Carol's camera, but maybe not. I have no idea how it ended up in the video. What a funny world! Fr. Hardon, pray for us!

It's Contraception, Stupid! It's Fatal to the Faith!

Yup, a root cause of our crumbling society is contraception. Mike Voris pegs it. All the sexual deviancies have their foundation in the rejection of the truth that sexual union and procreation are inextricably connected and cannot be separated without creating a spiritual explosion equivalent to splitting the atom.

Are you unsure about contraception? Read both Humanae Vitae and Fr.John Hardon's article Contraception: Fatal to the Faith. If you are practicing contraception you are in danger of hell. If you are promoting contraception to others, you are in danger of hell. Medical professionals who prescribe and dispense contraceptives are in danger of hell. That is the hard truth. We will be marching on the anniversary of Roe v. Wade, but Roe was an aftershock of the real earthquake, Griswold v. Connecticut. I remember a statement from one of my Natural Family Planning (NFP) students. "I was on the way to hell, and NFP saved my life." God made us in a way that allows the spacing of children. The Church teaches that couples may use NFP for serious reasons. When I had cancer and was on chemotherapy at age 39, NFP allowed my husband and me to comfort each other in sexual intimacy without fearing we would endanger a child's life. NFP and the Church's teaching on marriage and sexuality are not punishments; they are part of the good news. Embrace Church teaching on this issue that is so central to who we are as body/spirit persons. Like my young friend realized, the freedom you experience is life and soul-saving!

The Media Lies About Bishop Jenky

Below is a portion of the sermon that has earned Bishop Daniel Jenky the foaming-at-the-mouth animosity of the media and the liberal apparatchiks. Daniel Jenky never called Obama a Nazi. He gave a history lesson and said the president was following a similar path of other tyrants of history. That is simply a fact and Bishop Jenky is absolutely correct. The Nazis didn't start by rounding up the Jews and herding them into concentration camps. Their persecution began with laws that violated the religious and civil rights of certain undesirable people. Can anyone doubt that Catholics are among the undesirables today? In Germany, Jewish synagogues, homes, and shops were vandalized in the early days of the persecution. Today it's Catholic churches (another), pro-life Christian churches (more), and the homes of pro-lifers.



Before he died in 2000, Fr. John Hardon warned, just as Bishop Jenky does, that Catholics will need heroic faith to survive the revolution that is coming as a result of the breakdown of religious life in the Western world.  Here's a portion of his prophetic warning made in 1999 at a National Meeting of the Institute on Religious Life:

The Holy See [Pope John Paul II was pope at the time.] seriously wonders how much of the Catholic Church will survive in wealthy prosperous nations of the Western world like our own. What then is the remedy? There is only one way which the revolution can be reversed -- and it had better be reversed. Professed Catholics who call themselves Christians must reexamine their faith. We must be sure we believe that God became man in the Person of Jesus Christ. We must believe that when God became man He instituted the Holy Eucharist. We must believe that the consecrated life -- of consecrated poverty, consecrated chastity, and consecrated obedience is most pleasing to Jesus Christ. When God became man He made sure He lived a life, I repeat, of consecrated chastity, obedience and poverty....Not only religious life, but the Catholic Church will be preserved only where there are -- hear it -- Catholics who are living martyrs....Ordinary Catholics will not survive this revolution. They must be Catholics who are thoroughly convinced that God became Man in the person of Jesus. They must be convinced there is only one supreme authority on earth: the authority of Jesus Christ vested in the Vicar of Christ. What the Church needs, desperately needs, is strong believing Catholics. Otherwise, one nation after another, like our own, will be wiped out as a Christian country. 

Father ended his talk with a prayer a portion of which read: "Lord Jesus...Help us, we beg You, to become more and more like You -- living examples of what the early Church showed the pagan world: that you are our God and we are Your creatures, born in this wold to convert a pagan world to Christianity."

Meditating on Lent: To Blog or not to Blog

I was thinking at morning Mass about Lent which starts on Wednesday. It is always a challenge to reflect on the path to holiness and how to get there. I've already decided to give up my evening video habit and stay off Facebook (which is no real sacrifice) and use the extra time to pray, read, and study. But then I wondered whether I should stop blogging altogether. It takes up a lot of time and, really, does it accomplish anything? Who knows?

But the next thought was a memory of one of my spiritual heroes, Fr. John Hardon, S.J. who died in 2000. I can't count the number of times I heard him say to groups things like, "Write, write, write. Write letters to the editor. Write letters to your children. Write books and write articles." In view of my high regard for Father and his wisdom, I'll continue to blog and pray for his intercession to do it better and with greater charity.

Another influence recently has been the approved apparitions in Champion, WI. I did an article about it in my latest Les Femmes newsletter (Winter issue) which is at the printers and will soon be in the mail and on the website. The message of the Blessed Mother to Adele Brise was "Teach the children." There's more than one way to teach. The internet is the biggest school in the world. It's also the biggest library and the biggest source of social contacts. I learn a lot from using it and I hope I offer at least a little to others who wander across my path, even if it's to visit for while engaging in argument (in the classical sense which means defending your position without acrimony).

My big prayer during Lent is to grow in charity through the Lenten trio of prayer, sacrifice, and almsgiving. I'll be offering my daily Mass and rosary for everyone who visits this site and hope you'll pray for me too. We are all brothers and sisters in the Lord no matter how vigorously we disagree.

Elizabeth Ann Seton, Founder of the Parochial School System

Today is the feast of the Elizabeth Seton and also the first day of school for most children returning after Christmas vacation. What an appropriate alignment. Elizabeth, a widow converted from the Episcopal faith after her husband's death. She was rejected by her anti-Catholic relatives and left destitute because her husband's import business had failed. To support herself and her five children she began a school in her home, but was unsuccessful. Archbishop John Carroll encouraged Elizabeth to found a school for girls and she did, in Emmitsburg, MD. Other women joined her in the venture and she began the Daughters of Charity. The Seton shrine in Maryland and the nearby grotto tell the story of the challenging early years.

The first reading for today's Mass, taken from the first letter of St. John, provides an interesting insight into what real education should do for the soul: make us critical thinkers who "test the spirits" and recognize the "spirit of truth" from the "spirit of deceit."

Beloved, do not trust every spirit but test the spirits to see whether they belong to God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world. This is how you can know the Spirit of God: every spirit that acknowledges Jesus Christ come in the flesh belongs to God, and every spirit that does not acknowledge Jesus does not belong to God. This is the spirit of the antichrist who, as you heard, is to come, but in fact is already in the world. You belong to God, children, and you have conquered them, for the one who is in you is greater than the one who is in the world. They belong to the world; accordingly, their teaching belongs to the world, and the world listens to them. We belong to God, and anyone who knows God listens to us, while anyone who does not belong to God refuses to hear us. This is how we know the spirit of truth and the spirit of deceit.

A major part of the spiritual journey is discernment of spirits. Why? Because it helps us recognize when we are being tempted toward evil or encouraged toward good. As St. Peter says, the devil is like a lion roaming the earth seeking prey. But he'd be a fool to expose himself in all his ugly evil, so he often appears as an angel of light or he dresses in sheepskin to blend in with his lunch. "This is so good for you," he says in a melodious voice pushing us toward the cliff. "Jump off; you can fly." And so we think the lustful or greedy or selfish choice is the quick road to bliss when it's a sure path to ultimate misery.

To recognize him and his tricks, we need to understand how he works, as well as knowing the good spirits who attempt to help us. Fr. John Hardon, S.J. who often gave retreats based on the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius wrote about Discernment of Spirits in his book All My Liberty. This chapter would make an excellent meditation for January. Think of how much you could progress in the spiritual life this year if you chose a specific spiritual subject each month to meditate on and study. Discernment of spirits would be a good place to begin the journey. And take St. Elizabeth, St. Ignatius, and Fr. Hardon along with you as mentors and teachers. As a wife and mother St. Elizabeth knew all about the struggles and hardships of family life. St. Ignatius was a master of the interior life whose Spiritual Exercises have transformed the lives of many. And Fr. Hardon was a tireless worker in the vineyard. Persecuted by his own religious order, he never failed in seeking God's will through obedience. Take these great souls with you on your journey.

P.S. Anything written by Fr. John Hardon, S.J. will lead you to God by a short path. Please pray for his canonization.

Gay Propaganda Reigns at Newsweek

Back in 1993 when the 500th anniversary of Christopher Columbus' arrival in the new world brought out the attack dogs to rage against white Christian Europeans, Fr. John Hardon, SJ predicted that the battle would be nothing compared to the one targeting Jesus Christ and his teachings at the beginning of the new millenia. Since faith and culture have been under attack for generations, Father really didn't need to be a prophet to make that prediction. He just needed to have his eyes open. The attack has been relentless in recent years and we are still two decades away from the 2000th anniversary of Christ's crucifixion. Newsweek's apologia for gay marriage earlier this month by religion editor Lisa Miller (Our Mutual Joy, December 6) represents just one more attack, this one on Biblical teaching about traditional marriage.

Miller's selective interpretation of the Bible leads to her conclusion that it defends gay marriage. This is how she puts it: "Should gay people be married in the same, sacramental sense that straight people are? I would argue that they should. If we are all God's children, made in his likeness and image, then to deny access to any sacrament based on sexuality is exactly the same thing as denying it based on skin color—and no serious (or even semiserious) person would argue that." Take that, you Christian homophobes; Lisa Miller has spoken. (This obviously also makes mincemeat out of the Catholic sacrament of priestly ordination since the Church teaches that only men can be ordained.) But Miller never even makes an argument to support her outlandish statement. Despite thousands of words she never addressed the central issue.

What is marriage? Is it a lump of playdough to be formed according to each man or woman? John wants to marry Dick. Jane plans to wed Jill. Betty wants a menage a trois with Susie and Bob. Woody wants to marry his daughter and Kitty wants....fill in the blank. Can all these situations be described as marriage in Miller's view? We can't say since she never defines what marriage is, except that homosexuals have a right to it, whatever it happens to be. But what possible reason can she use to exclude the rights of these other folks to define marriage however they want if marriage, by definition, has no definition?

But the Bible is actually pretty clear about it. Jesus blessed the institution of marriage between a man and a woman at the wedding feast of Cana when he performed his first miracle. Miller ignores that Biblical event completely. The first book of Genesis is also very clear - God made Adam and Eve and blessed them and said, "That is why a man shall leave his father and mother and shall cleave to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh." That's pretty clear: 1 man plus 1 woman equals two in one flesh, also known as marriage.

There are two purposes for marriage. The first is to procreate and educate children to know, love, and serve God and be happy with him in heaven. That particular purpose is physically impossible for same-sex couples although, who knows, immoral technologies may one day be able to surgically alter a male so he can bear a child, not from a union with the "marriage" partner, but through another immoral technology like cloning. The other purpose of marriage is to unite the couple in love, a love that doesn't seek self-gratification through lust, but desires the good of the other. The depraved practices of homosexuality certainly don't resemble marital love as God intended.

Miller claims that 2000 years of interpreting the bible as defending traditional marriage is just plain wrong. The Bible wasn't written for our time, she says, and must be interpreted with modern eyes as a "living document." This is the same argument liberals use to undermine the Constitution. Whatever aberration they want is found in the document's "penumbra" (the term used in Roe v. Wade to create the right to abortion). Let's face it, very few people actually read, much less study, the Bible so Miller's distortions will no doubt be accepted by those who want to believe what she says. To hell with reality when it conflicts with what I want to do.

Columnist Don Feder and Biblical scholar Robert Gagnon demolish Miller's arguments better than I can. I was, however, intrigued by her comparison of the fight for same-sex marriage to the abolitionist fight to end slavery. "Not since 1860," Miller writes, "when the country's pulpits were full of preachers pronouncing on slavery, pro and con, has one of our basic social (and economic) institutions been so subject to biblical scrutiny."

There is an argument to be made using the issue of slavery for comparison, but it's not the one Miller puts forward. The civil right that applies will never scream for attention because these victims of discrimination are tiny and voiceless. Abortion is the new slavery that makes mothers the slavemasters of their unborn children. Keep them or kill them, it's the mothers right to decide just like keeping or selling slaves was the right of the master. Only one difference for the babies; there's no hope for freedom once the abortionist gets through with them. As for "gay rights" they are based, not on any physical characteristics, but on sinful choices. Gays have as much claim to civil rights protection as kleptomaniacs and adulterers.

Lisa Miller's article is just one more attack on Jesus Christ and his teachings. The saddest thing about the article to me, however, was the ending. She tells her readers, "My friend the priest James Martin says his favorite Scripture relating to the question of homosexuality is Psalm 139, a song that praises the beauty and imperfection in all of us and that glorifies God's knowledge of our most secret selves: 'I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made.' And then he adds that in his heart he believes that if Jesus were alive today, he would reach out especially to the gays and lesbians among us, for 'Jesus does not want people to be lonely and sad.' Let the priest's prayer be our own."

Fr. James Martin, is a Jesuit and acting publisher of America, a Catholic dissenters' magazine that has undermined Church teaching for years. If Miller's interpretation of Fr. Martin's words is correct, he needs to be disciplined. Psalm 139 no more relates to the "question of homosexuality" than it relates to fornication or adultery. Being "lonely or sad" is often part of the human condition and it does not excuse evil actions. Jesus would say to sodomite homosexuals exactly the same thing he said to the woman taken in adultery. "Neither do I condemn you. Go your way and sin no more."

It's hard to believe that Fr. John Hardon, a champion of orthodoxy who died on December 30, 2000 at the age of 86, came from the same religious order as Fr. James Martin. May Fr. Hardon pray for his confrere's conversion and for a renewal of sexual purity in the United States.

Another Jesuit Scandal

The Jesuits continue to build their reputation as the religious order most likely to be a scandal to the Church. One of their latest atrocities? Life News reported December 10th that the University of San Francisco has "crafted a new student health care plan that covers abortions... Full-time undergraduate students at USF are automatically enrolled in the university's plan unless they request a waiver and prove that they have other, comparable insurance."

Patrick Reilly of the Cardinal Newman Society told Life News USF's plan was not a generic one and appeared to include abortion deliberately. That would not be surprising as the school has a long history of pro-abortion activity (as do many other Jesuit schools in the United States).

Should USF continue to call themselves Catholic? No!

Write to USF President Father Stephen Privett at president@usfca.edu to protest this obvious formal cooperation with evil which is seriously sinful. And pray through the intercession of Fr. John Hardon, S.J. for the Jesuits to return to the holy model of St. Ignatius of Loyola, their founder.