Category Archives: Opinion

Mar 5 2013

Secularism: In the Arena with a Madman

Secularism means the separation of the parts of life, for example, education, politics, economics, and the family, from their center which is God. Each department of life is considered as having absolute autonomy and in no way to be brought under the sway of ethical principles of the sovereign law of God. 

Condemnation of the secularism of the Western World is not condemnation of the Western World. There is the same distinction between them as between a sick man and his disease.

-Address delivered on January 17, 1943, by Msgr. Fulton Sheen

Those people who believe in this modern secularism are diseased with the idea that the founders of America wished to have a separation of church and state, though such is not true and is written nowhere in our government documents. They believe that imposing religious values on matters of government, though supported by the natural order, as disordered, and irreligious views are reasonable. But what reason is there to impose one’s non-religion rather than one’s religion? Why is one logical and the other irrational?

Those who espouse a total separation of the society from God wish only to spread their own disdain for God on a societal level, desiring full participation by the masses. They wish to compete in the arena of ideology, and gut the opponent before spectators who would do nothing. Unfortunately, few Christians in the Western Word even know that they are in the arena with a madman.

As it always has been so, that the God-loving yield and yield until finally the Christian ideology is impaled by the oppressive ideology of secularism. Every system that seeks to replace God, whether it is communism, socialism, imperialism, Marxism, or liberalism, finds total hatred for God’s creation and followers. How could one oppose God and not be filled with hate? If God is love, and one opposes God, then one opposes love that is God.

What are these unloving acts by people who oppose God in this secular society? The biggest example is the murder of the unborn disguised as “choice”. Another example would be liberal sentences for repeat offenders, releasing hardened criminals into the streets out of perverted false compassion. Yet another example is the false compassion for the elderly and infirm, preferring to kill them instead of care of them. It is in the nature of those who oppose God to oppose love.

You will tell me you know many loving atheists. And, though that might be true to an extent, the atheist has such intense inner turmoil, disgust, and oftentimes rage against the beauty of God and His creation, or at minimum, a low tolerance for God talk. One distinct difference between the Christian ideology and the secular ideology is this: the Christian will permit the secularist to live secularly, but the secularist cannot permit the Christian to live Christianly. Prayers are taken down from government buildings and schools all the time, but teachings on gay rights, feminism, and relativism are abundant. There can be no compromising with the secularist; it is our way of life he hates. To compromise would be to submit, throw off the Christian armor, and put on the secular tunic.

At last, I will leave you with this call to action. I commit myself as I ask you to do the same, to say one prayer every day for this secular West, that it will pivot from its current downward spiral. Then, once prayed, do one beautiful act every day, so that those who see you might see the inner workings of our Blessed Lord.

God’s love!

Destiny waits in the hand of God, not in the hands of statesmen. -T. S. ELIOT, Murder in the Cathedral

Mar 3 2013

Dangerous to Devout: Some freestyle fun on fundamentalism

I was feeling creative the other day and decided to do some freestyle poetry, but the more I wrote, the more it appeared to be a “rap”. If you know me at all, you would know that that was not my intention at all since rap is a genre of music I try to stay very far from. But, if you know anyone who would want to use this, it’s all yours!
There is a great deal to tell you what I think of these two, the fundamentalist who judges man and the devout who loves you.

The fundamentalist will pick and choose what he wants use from the Bible to back his own perverse ways, to ridicule non-believers, hate on sinners, and to persecute women and gays. He ignores Christ’s teachings of love, choosing hate, to scold and scorn and retaliate. He wrongly hates God’s creature instead of man’s sin, unable to separate the evil from the good within.

The fundamentalist with a rigid finger, points to one Bible verse out of context and sends to hell a stranger. He is the opposite of God, unloving, unmerciful, unforgiving; more worried about how others offend him instead of how he himself is living. He is more interested in separating than bringing together, in dividing than loving one another. He memorizes some versus to use as knives; poking, sticking, stabbing untruths into your sides.

I can say all this because I was this man, thinking I knew it all, more than any could understand. Filled with pride, ego inexorably bloated, wanting a doctorate in theology to prove my own belief though I alone wrote it. I was anti-Christ in my evangelizing and witness, winning the debate as reward instead of showing the beauty of His gift.

The fundamentalist pushes souls away, is a thorn in your foot, an excuse for his opponent’s hate. The atheist is justified in his rebellion and disgust when he sees the fundamentalist condemning him and losing his trust.

I am no longer this man as now I am devout. I love as Christ loves and leave no one out. There is no offense that would lead me astray, to hate my neighbor or walk in my own way. I don’t need a degree in theology to witness to others. I need only to love them and treat them as my sisters and brothers.

I will take the Bible in its full original meaning, not build my own following after what I think is seeming. I will lead no one into error or anger those who oppose me. I will only pray for all, love all, and give all, so that when all view me, it will be Jesus they see.

Going from fundamentalist to devout has been an evolution, going from judging others and winning arguments to praying for peace as the solution. My eyes finally rest on the goal of God in heaven, to bring all souls to Him through living as brethren. To love efficiently one must practice to love. To know God in heaven, one must allow God in from above.

To sum up my thoughts about what I am saying, I can do no more than to continue praying. The greatest enemy to the Church is not the enemy outside but the fallen human nature that inside resides. It is easy to hate, to anger, to be selfish and hurt, but it takes a great saint to love and know that we were crafted from dirt. That humility and chastity and self-sacrifice are needed but wanting, and desires of the flesh, selfishness, and false witness are immediate and daunting.

A Marine hardly knows valor until he is broken down bloodied and pallor. To be devout one’s human nature must be broken down, studied and disgracefully found. Then after lots of study and prayer, one can begin to understand the Father’s affair.

The fundamentalist will hardly know God alive, until he turns from himself and kneels before our King, beats his chest, and cries “through my fault, through my fault, through my most grievous fault, have I sinned.”

[END]

Feb 18 2013

The Beautiful Church: Why Must Catholic Churches Be So Ornate?

Reblogged from Reasonable Belief:

Click to visit the original post

Offending Judas

One of the biggest stumbling blocks for many fundamentalists is the beautiful but opulent churches that are so commonly associated with the Catholic faith. The common refrain goes along of the lines of "look at all that money they wasted on building a church when they could have put it to use helping the poor."

"Mary then took a pound of very costly perfume of pure nard, and anointed the feet of Jesus and wiped His feet with her hair; and the house was filled with the fragrance of the perfume.

Read more… 1,975 more words

Jan 24 2013

Women on the front lines: The continued loss of female dignity

Equal rights should be praised between all genders, classes, races, and religions. This makes for a great democracy. But what about at the expense of one’s dignity? The Catholic Church holds that male and female are uniquely different, but equal in dignity. One is not better than the other, as we can see the uniqueness of each role.

For instance, men throughout the Testaments and Church history have been the ones to fight, lay down their lives, and head rebellions and revolutions. I don’t know how to put it more delicate than to say what it is: men are somewhat expendable to bring about a better world. Woman, on the contrary, with equal dignity as a created human, has not ever been so actively in the role of a bloody sacrifice, but has instead played the role of perpetual love and service. Thousands of men will lay down their lives, but a woman’s beauty, compassion, charity, and essence can win wars.

This would make sense if man and woman were made in the image and likeness of God. God became a man and won the greatest victory of all mankind through his bloody sacrifice. Millions of men have laid down their lives for lesser gains since. Through His Church the beauty, charity, compassion, service, and other typical feminine qualities of God are available to the whole world. God in the one hand fought, won, and laid down His life in the greatest battle between good and evil, and in the other He embraces, cares for, serves, and desires the salvation of the whole world, even His enemies.

Woman in the West has traded in her dignity for the sake of a false freedom and equality, first through her rebellion against her male partner in the early 20th century, then her rebellion against herself in her bra-burning, against her own fertility through contraception, and finally against her very nature of beauty, love, service, and compassion through abortion. The Western woman sees the Eastern woman as the slave because she might be expected to act or dress a certain way, presumably limiting her freedom. But what is the greater good? Losing the right to wear low-cut shirts to maintain the dignity of a woman, or to lose all of one’s dignity for the current idea of freedom and equality?

Now, in the news, it appears the U.S. military will allow the further perversion of woman’s dignity by allowing her to fight alongside men in the front lines of conflict. This places men in a unique role: not protecting the dignity of woman for which he has fought so long and hard for throughout the history of the world, and instead, allows her to bleed and die beside him. No wonder these at war with the dignity of woman are so much at war with our Church! We hold a virgin woman above the angels in heaven, the mother of our Lord!

If we don’t fight and die for the dignity of the human person in America, for what do we struggle for? Do we dare call it freedom?

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