Venerable Archbishop Scheen: The antichrist signs of the times

Discussion in 'The Signs of the Times' started by non sum dignus, May 10, 2020.

  1. FROM ARCHBISHOP SHEEN:

    "Because the signs of our times point to a struggle between absolutes we may expect the future to be a time of trial for two reasons:

    Firstly, to stop disintegration. Godlessness would go on, and on, and on if there were no catastrophes. What death is to an individual, that catastrophe is to an evil civilization: the interruption life and for the civilization the interruption of its Godlessness. Why did God station an angel with a flaming sword at the Garden of Paradise after the Fall, if it was not to prevent our first parents from entering again and eating of the Tree of Life, which, if they ate they would have immortalized their guilt.

    And, God will not allow unrighteousness to become eternal. He permits revolution disintegration, chaos, to come as reminders that our thinking has been wrong, our dreams have been unholy. Moral truth is vindicated by the ruin that follows when it has been repudiated. The chaos of our times is the strongest negative argument that could ever be advanced for Christianity. Catastrophe reveals the evil is self-defeating and that we cannot turn from God as we have without hurting ourselves.

    The second reason why a crisis must come is in order to prevent a false identification of the Church and the world. Our Lord intended that those who were His followers should be different in spirit from those who were not. But, this line of demarcation has been blotted out. Instead of black and white, there is only a blur.

    Mediocrity and compromise characterize the lives of many Christians. They read the same novels as modern pagans, educate their children in the same godless way, listen to the same commentators who have no other standard than judging today by yesterday, and tomorrow by today, allow pagan practices to creep into family life, such as divorce and remarriage; there are not wanting, so-called Catholic labor leaders recommending Communists for Congress, or Catholic writers who accept presidencies in Communist front organizations to instill totalitarian ideas into movies.

    There’s no longer the conflict and opposition which ought to characterize us. We are influencing the world less than the world influences us. There is no apartness. We who were sent out to establish a center of health have caught the disease, and therefore have lost the power to heal. And, since the gold is mixed with an alloy, the entirety must be thrust into the furnace that the dross may be burned away. The value of the trial will be to set us apart.

    Evil catastrophe must come to reject us, to despise us, to hate us, to persecute us, and then, then we shall we define our loyalties, affirm our fidelity and state on whose side we stand. Our quantity indeed will decrease, but our quality will increase. It is not for the Church that we fear, but for the world. We tremble not that God may be dethroned but that barbarism may reign.

    ==

    And three practical suggestions then for the times as Christians realize that a moment of crisis is not a time of despair, but of opportunity. We were born in crisis, in defeat – the Crucifixion. And, once we recognize that we are under Divine Wrath, we become eligible for Divine Mercy. The very disciplines of God create hope. The thief on the right came to God by a crucifixion. And secondly Catholics ought to stir up their Faith, hang a crucifix in their home, remind them that they have a cross to carry; gather your family together every night to recite the rosary; go to daily Mass; make the Holy Hour daily in the Presence of our Eucharistic Lord and particularly in parishes where pastors are conscious of the world’s need and therefore conduct services of reparation.

    And, finally, Jews, Protestants, Catholics, Americans, all of us, must realize that the world is summoning us to heroic efforts at spiritualization. It is not a unity of religion we plead for that is impossible when purchased at the cost of the unity of truth, but a unity of religious people, wherein each marches separately according to the light of his conscience, but strikes together for the moral betterment of the world.

    The forces of evil are united; the forces of good are divided. We may not be able to meet in the same pew – would to God we did – but we can meet on our knees. You may be sure that no sordid compromises nor carrying of waters on both shoulders will see you through. Those who have the faith had better keep in the state of grace and those who have neither had better find out what they mean, for in the coming age there will be only one way to stop your trembling knees, and that will be to get down on them and pray.

    Pray to Michael, Michael the Prince of the morning, who conquered Lucifer who would make himself a god. When the world once cracked because of a sneer in heaven, he rose up and dragged down from the seven heavens the pride that would look down on the Most High.

    And, pray too, pray to Our Lady, and say to her “It was to thee who was given the power to crush the head of the serpent who lied to men that they would be like unto gods. And mayest thou who didst find Christ when He was lost for three days, find Him again for our world who has lost Him. Give to the senile incontinence of our verbiage the Word. And as thou didst form the Word in thy womb, form Him in our own hearts. Lady of the Blue of Heaven, in these dark days light our lamps. Give back to us the Light of the World that a Light may Shine even in these days of darkness.”

    God love you.”
     
    Sam, Jason Fernando and AED like this.
  2. AED

    AED Powers

    Wonderful. Thank you very much for this post.
     

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