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Post by Pacelli on Mar 13, 2018 10:37:57 GMT -5
(The following was published in The Sacred Heart Review, Vol. 2, No. 16, September 14, 1889)
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Post by Pacelli on Mar 13, 2018 12:07:02 GMT -5
Clearly the beginning of this article is somewhat dated to the 19th century, but the principles expounded beginning in the paragraph beginning “let not such young men deceive themselves,” could easily be applied today in 2018.
Our test is today is keeping the Faith in light of the fact that the Church itself appears to be failing. Many are abandoning ship, I have known quite a few, in real life and in the “online world” some of whom were even regular communicants, and prayed the rosary daily. They think the Church is no longer what it was, say in 1950, therefore, in their mind it has defected, therefore it was never the true Church. This is a temptation of our time, but is based in the false assumption that the Church cannot change in its accidents, so long as it remains intact in its essentials.
Another powerful temptation for many in today’s time to is fall away into sin, which, for many over time, usually leads to a loss of Faith. We see this all over with Catholics using contraception, fornicating, divorcing and remarrying, viewing unspeakable images and acts on computers or tablets, and the list can go on. Even though sin does not equal the loss of Faith, it prepares the soul to fail in this regard. The consent to habitual serious sin easily paves the way for the consent to apostasy.
It seems that every day the Church gets smaller in size, and the legitimate successors of the Apostles are doing nothing to repel the attack against the Church. The Shepherds are standing idly by as the wolves devour the sheep. The laity are falling away in droves. In the face of this, our duty, as the article states, is to stay strong and keep the Faith, since “a Catholic has no good excuse for apostasy,”and “God will hold us responsible.”
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