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Tuesday, April 3, 2018

Remnants of the Past: At the Catacomb’s Gate

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peter preaching inthe catacombsSt. Peter preaching in the Gospel in the catacombs

Editor’s Note: This article first appeared in The Remnant back in March of 2007.  Since that time, things have obviously gone from bad to worse, especially with arguably the worst pope in history sitting in Peter’s chair.  I’m publishing this again as a way of reminding our readers of just how rapidly the war against God and family is progressing. In eleven years what was regarded as imminent and apocalyptic is now mild when compared to the bizarre new "normal" of 2018. I'm also hoping to encourage visitors to our site to subscribe to The Remnant. Every two weeks for fifty-one years, this newspaper has been going to press in an unrelenting attempt to undermine the agenda of Modernists in the Church and Christophobes in the State. We didn't care then and we don't care now who calls us “rad trad” or “schismatic” for holding the Catholic ground. And neither are we looking for Team Francis to offer us a fig leaf of Novus legitimacy. They are the ones struggling with a legitimacy crisis; but as long as they remain in power they will have to contend with us...with traditional Catholics who will not back down. We’re not going anywhere. We're not leaving the Church and heading for the tall grass. We will stay and fight until God removes them from His Church. Please join us. Subscribe to The Remnant and help us to do our part to resist the enemies of Holy Tradition to their faces. MJM

 

AFTER DECADES OF COLD WAR who could have imagined the totalitarianism that would eventually force believers underground would not be atheistic Communism, but rather an ideology as old as human history itself.  Evidently, the Prince of this World is a big believer in sticking to what works, for just as homosexuality corrupted Sodom and Gomorrah and brought mighty Rome to its knees, its rise to “respectable” prominence today seems to signal the last hurrah of Western civilization. Modern gulags will evidently be neither yellow nor red, but pink.  Who woulda thunk it!

In the UK the Sexual Orientation Regulations (SORs) have been railroaded into law this month by the government headed up by “our great friend in the War on Terror”—Prime Minister Tony Blair.  The SORs will make it illegal for Brits to refuse to promote homosexual practices in England, Wales and Scotland. Christian landlords will be forced to rent to homosexual couples; Christian print shops will print homosexual literature or face prosecution; Christian schools will be forbidden to teach that homosexual acts are immoral; and who knows what’s to become of the few brave priests left who might dare speak from the pulpit against one of the four sins that cry to heaven for justice!

As unfathomable as all this sounds, it’s hardly surprising to those who’ve been paying attention to the way things have been going in the UK.  After legalized abortion, no fault divorce, adoption by homosexual couples, and civil unions, the SORs became more or less inevitable in Our Lady’s former bower. As we know from our history, however, all civilizations in decline tend to glorify this particular vice in the last days of their existence. And while the proclivity is nothing new, its deleterious effects on a civilization that embraces it are usually recorded as history’s proof of the existence of Natural Law.

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Here in the United States we’re not far behind the UK in pretending that Natural Law doesn’t exist.  The David Ray Hate Crimes Prevention Act of 2007 has been opposed by Christian groups, and, as a result, seems to be held up in Congress. But as was predicted in these columns some months ago, Stage 2 is already in full swing. It is called the Local Law Enforcement Hate Crime Prevention Act of 2007.  This Act, which has been vigorously promoted by the ADL, calls for the Federal government to unconstitutionally involve itself even more in local law enforcement by prosecuting crimes committed against certain groups in society but not others. Crimes committed against homosexuals, for example, would receive harsher penalties than crimes committed against housepainters. Is this fair? Of course not, but it’s ideologically driven and politically correct. And more importantly, it’s the legal framework for future laws prohibiting speech (and thought?) in defense of Christian morality.

The chairman of the Joint Chief of Staff, General Peter Pace, recently made front-page news around the world when he told the Chicago Tribune he believes homosexuality is immoral and the U.S. military should not condone the vice by allowing homosexuals to serve. The firestorm of media protest that resulted from those remarks speaks more to the dire moral condition of our country than anything else. Every talking head on Fox News and CNN suddenly found ample common ground from which to pontificate in unison against the General, who, for the most part, stood his ground. At least he didn’t grovel to what simply must be a gaggle of unpopular 5th grade girls in charge over at Political Correctness Headquarters.

Still, Senator Sam Brownback and Pat Buchanan were among the few public figures to stand with the General. In his March 15th column on Worldnetdaily.com, Buchanan reiterated what most Americans think but are afraid to admit:

It is John Warner, however, ex-chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, who hit the issue squarely. Of the moral beliefs of his fellow Marine, Parson Warner declared, “I ... strongly disagree with the chairman’s view that homosexuality is immoral.”

This brings us to the heart of the matter. Is homosexuality – not the orientation, but the activity – inherently immoral?

On Pace’s side, that homosexuality is immoral, we have the Bible and Quran, 2,000 years of Christianity, Orthodox Judaism and natural law, the moral beliefs of virtually every society to the present, and the laws of every state before the 1960s. Up to 1973, psychiatrists treated it as a disorder. Nations where homosexuality is rampant have been regarded as “decadent.”

Who, Sen. Warner, are the moral authorities for your assertion that homosexual conduct is moral – other than the Bishop Robinson wing of the Episcopal Church?

What this uproar tells us is that America is no longer a moral community. On the most fundamental issues – abortion, promiscuity, homosexuality, euthanasia, sterilization, cloning, and the creation of, and buying and selling of, fetuses for research – we are at war. What part of the nation sees as progress, the other sees as depravity.

http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/printerfriendly.asp?ARTICLE_ID=54711

Precisely! Vice is becoming the new American pastime, and Buchanan is absolutely right: This isn’t progress—it’s depravity! And it’s only getting worse.

Democratic presidential hopeful Sen. Hillary Clinton is running around the country threatening a future for America that would give George Orwell a panic attack.  According to a recent Human Events report, Hillary made the following comments during a suspiciously unannounced speech to the pro-gay Human Rights Campaign:

“In the end, we stopped the Federal Marriage Amendment and we sent a strong message that we will not stand idly by when anyone tries to write discrimination into our Constitution.”

She assured the pro-gay group, “I want you to know this is exactly the kind of partnership we will have when I am President.”

She promised, “We’re going to reach out and work with our allies in Congress both to change laws and change hearts. We want to make sure that all Americans in committed relationships have equal benefits from health insurance and life insurance and Social Security and property rights and more.”
”These are fundamental rights,” she said.

Then, Hillary vowed to promote the most radical component of the gay agenda. “I have long supported civil unions,” she said. “We’re going to make sure that nothing stands in the way of loving couples, gay or straight, to adopt children.” Hillary also said as President she would end the military’s policy of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.”

http://www.humanevents.com/rightangle/index.php?p=21224

Ever wonder what the Founding Fathers of our country might have thought of the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy? A recent report on Wallbuilders.com addressed that very thing. George Washington, the nation’s first Commander-in-Chief, held strong opinions on the subject of homosexuality and gave a clear statement of his views in his general orders for March 14, 1778:

At a General Court Martial whereof Colo. Tupper was President (10th March 1778), Lieutt. Enslin of Colo. Malcom’s Regiment [was] tried for attempting to commit sodomy with John Monhort a soldier; Secondly, for Perjury in swearing to false accounts, [he was] found guilty of the charges exhibited against him, being breaches of 5th. Article 18th. Section of the Articles of War and [we] do sentence him to be dismiss’d [from] the service with infamy. His Excellency the Commander in Chief approves the sentence and with abhorrence and detestation of such infamous crimes orders Lieutt. Enslin to be drummed out of camp tomorrow morning by all the drummers and fifers in the Army never to return;

…George Washington,  The Writings of George Washington, John C. Fitzpatrick, editor (Washington: U. S. Government Printing Office, 1934), Vol. XI, pp. 83-84, from General Orders at Valley Forge on March 14, 1778

Did the Father of Our Country need some “hate management” therapy? And how about Thomas Jefferson—was he a ‘homophobe’? Based on his opinions on homosexuality, the Father of the Declaration of Independence surely would have earned a place on the Southern Poverty Law Center’s list of leaders of dangerous ‘hate groups’.  Consider this:

“Thomas Jefferson indicated that in his home state of Virginia, ‘dismemberment’ of the offensive organ was the penalty for sodomy.  In fact, Jefferson himself authored a bill penalizing sodomy by castration.” http://www.wallbuilders.com/resources/search/detailpf.php?ResourceID

So, clearly, it’s not just the Catholic Church which must apologize for “hateful” teachings of the past that “oppressed the people”. The great Enlightenment philosophers themselves must also be denounced to the new Committee of Public Safety.

Sound familiar? Remember where Maximilien Robespierre, a key agitator behind the French Revolution, ended up? With his neck stretched beneath the blade of Madame Guillotine, the mob having finally turned on him, too. And now we’re facing yet another clueless mob, screaming for the blood of priests, military heroes, and even the very revolutionaries who gave them their precious ‘liberty’ in the first place.

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They say that those who do not know history are doomed to repeat it. When even America’s actors and sports heroes are no longer granted immunity from the strong-arm politics of intimidation, it doesn’t take a prophet to decipher the handwriting on the wall—America in 2007 is reconstructing the Reign of Terror and calling it progress.

The head coach of the Super Bowl champion Indianapolis Colts, Tony Dungy, was raked over the coals recently by gay activists who were incensed that he, an African-American Christian, had agreed to speak at an event sponsored by the Indiana Family Institute. And what infraction had the Indiana Family Institute committed? Hate speech, of course, since they have the temerity to contend that marriage is between one man and one woman.

No one is above the Inquisition of Political Correctness that seeks to legislate depravity. Today it’s homosexual acts, tomorrow it will be sexual intercourse with children, and, the day after, legal protection for bestiality.  When is it going to end?  It isn’t, not until the Catholic Church finds her moral voice again. Until then there is nothing on earth capable of stopping this freefall into chaos.

England, Ireland, France, Spain, Scotland, the U.S., Canada—they’re all in lockstep with the Thought Police. Even formerly Catholic Brazil, according to a March 18, 2007 report on Zenit.org, is contemplating a “homophobia law” which will lock priests in jail for preaching against sodomy:

Debate continues over so-called homophobia legislation, which seeks to criminalize anything considered a condemnation of homosexuality, including priests who speak against the practice in homilies. Priests could face two to five years imprisonment for preaching against homosexuality. And a rector of a seminary who refuses admission to a homosexual student could face three to five years. Thursday, Brazil’s Senate declined to vote on the legislation. Instead, the senators decided to form a work group, which will organize public audiences to hear specialists on the subject.  According to ZENIT sources, a number of citizens voiced opposition to the law, motivating in part the senators to form the study group.  Specialists say the “homophobia law” would essentially imply a legal frame for religious persecution.

Nothing is sacred anymore, not even our formerly vaunted freedoms of speech, religion, and the press.  Again, no surprise here.  These were first “granted”, let us recall, in order that the partisans of error might more rapidly undermine the Catholic Church. Back then our “God-given rights” were papally-condemned errors. They were condemned by the great popes precisely because of their capacity to lead entire nations into nightmarish scenarios such as the one unfolding before our eyes today. How could the great popes be so “blind” and “close-minded” not to appreciate the benefits of Freedom of the Press and Freedom of Speech?  Perhaps here in the darkness that is descending over our “enlightened” society, the answer to that question will become more obvious. 

From the UK to the U.S. and across the world, self-ruled governments of the people by the people and for the people are demonstrating precisely what happens to the people when Christ and His Church are voted out of politics. Suddenly, our “inalienable rights” become quite dispensable, and the gulag rises before us. Without the Church, the “New World Order” is just another euphemism for the crucifixion of the Mystical Body of Christ.

Hate crimes legislation, abortion, violence in the streets, sex in the classrooms, Sexual Orientation Regulations in old Christendom— these are just incidental aspects of the final phase of global de-Christianization that began when a German monk nailed his non serviam to the doors of the Catholic Church five centuries ago. First, Catholic thrones toppled, then Catholic empires fell; the Papal States became the “smallest country in the world” on the eve of that cold, dark morning when the Catholic Mass became protestantized. Since then it was a matter of time before the Catholic priesthood would become emasculated beyond recognition, and the family, aborted and divorced, would fall into total dysfunctionality.

Were we really surprised when, in the era of theological carnage that followed Christendom’s fall, the poor Catholic refugee so lost his identity that he began considering a laundry list of Masonic “freedoms” to be the only Gifts of the Holy Ghost that mattered? 

In other words, for five centuries it’s been all out war against the Catholic Church. And once the great lighthouse on the cliffs had doused her own guiding lamp at Vatican II, the children in the icy brine of the raging post-Christian seas could easily be subjected to a global indoctrination process only Hell could have conjured up. The signs and wonders of Hollywood and MTV robbed entire generations of their innocence while modern, godless educational systems exterminated the souls of entire nations.

shipwreck

Our “enlightened” social engineers sat back and twiddled their thumbs as harlots and homosexual activists posing as rock “artists” crooned soul-euthanizing nursery rhymes into the ears of infants. 

Is it any wonder that so many of our children have turned against us, and joined forces with the mob that is pushing Christians out of the public square and back against the catacomb gates?  We wanted our rock ‘n’ roll; we were hooked on movies produced by the enemies of our Lord; we just couldn’t end our love affair with the mainstream media.  And now when our very survival as a civilized, Christian people depends on how hard we pray and how many of us shout nonstop protest from the housetops, we find our little Catholic sanctuaries connected wirelessly to the largest pornography shop and red-light district in the history of humanity—the Internet!

When the Son of Man returns will He find Faith?  Good question! 

 

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Last modified on Wednesday, April 4, 2018
Michael J. Matt | Editor

Michael J. Matt has been an editor of The Remnant since 1990. Since 1994, he has been the newspaper's editor. A graduate of Christendom College, Michael Matt has written hundreds of articles on the state of the Church and the modern world. He is the host of The Remnant Underground and Remnant TV's The Remnant Forum. He's been U.S. Coordinator for Notre Dame de Chrétienté in Paris--the organization responsible for the Pentecost Pilgrimage to Chartres, France--since 2000.  Mr. Matt has led the U.S. contingent on the Pilgrimage to Chartres for the last 24 years. He is a lecturer for the Roman Forum's Summer Symposium in Gardone Riviera, Italy. He is the author of Christian Fables, Legends of Christmas and Gods of Wasteland (Fifty Years of Rock ‘n’ Roll) and regularly delivers addresses and conferences to Catholic groups about the Mass, home-schooling, and the culture question. Together with his wife, Carol Lynn and their seven children, Mr. Matt currently resides in St. Paul, Minnesota.