Ordinations for Carmel

+

J.M.J.

Feast of St. John of the Cross

Doctor of the Church and Father of the Teresian Carmel

Laudetur Jesus Christus!

We rejoice to share with our followers the call on our Friar to advance farther to the High Altar of our "Catholic God." The last of the Minor Ordinations (the Orders of Exorcist and Acolyte) shall be conferred on the 12th of December.

Deo gratias!

"Lingua Diabolica"

+

J.M.J.

Twenty-seventh and Last Sunday after Pentecost

Feast of our holy Father John of the Cross, one of the great Doctors of the Church

and co-reformer of Saint Teresa of Jesus

... The abomination of desolation 

(from today's Holy Gospel, Mt. 24.13-25)

ALL sins are hateful in the sight of God; but the sin of blasphemy ought more properly to be called an abomination to the Lord. Every mortal sin, as the Apostle says, dishonours God. By transgression of the law, thou dishonourest God (Rom. ii. 23). Other sins dishonour God indirectly by the violation of his law; but blasphemy dishonours Him directly by the profanation of His most holy Name. Hence St. Chrysostom teaches, that no sin exasperates the Lord so much as the sin of blasphemy against His adorable Name. ”Nihil ita exacerbat Deum, sicut quando nomen ejus blasphematur."

On the great enormity of the sin of blasphemy.

What is blasphemy? It is the uttering of language injurious to God; it is, according to the definition of theologians, "contumeliosa in Deum locutio ;" or, contumely against God. God! Whom does man assail when he blasphemes? He directly attacks the Lord. He hath strengthened himself against the Almighty. (Job. xv. 25.) Are you not afraid, blasphemer, says St. Ephrem, that fire will come down from heaven and devour you? or that the earth shall open and swallow you up?”Non metuis ne forte ignis de coelo descendat et devoret te, qui sic os adversus omnipotentem aperis? Neque vereris, ne terra te ab- sorbeat?" (Paren. 3.) The devil, says St. Gregory Nazianzen, trembles at the name of Jesus: and we are not afraid to profane it. ”Domones ad Christi nomen exhorrescunt, nos vero nomen adeo venerandum contumelia afficere nou veremur." (Orat. xx.) The vindictive assail a man who is their own equal; but, by their blasphemies blasphemers appear to seek revenge against God, who does or permits what is displeasing to them. There is a great difference between an act of contempt towards the portrait of a king, and an insult offered to his person. Man is the image of God; but the blasphemer offends God Himself. ”He who blasphemes” says St. Athanasius, ”acts against the very Deity itself." The man who violates the law is guilty of a crime; but he who attacks the person of his sovereign commits an act of treason; therefore he receives no mercy, but is chastised with the utmost severity. What, then, shall we say of the man who blasphemes and insults the majesty of God? If, says the high-priest Heli, one man shall sin against another, God may be appeased in his behalf; but if a man shall sin against the Lord, who shall pray for him? (1 Kings ii. 25.) The sin of blasphemy, then, is so enormous, that the saints themselves appear not to have courage to pray for a blasphemer.

Some sacrilegious tongues blaspheme the God who preserves their existence!”Tu Deo benefacienti tibi," says St. Chrysostom, ”et tui curam agenti maledicis." O God! you stand with one foot at the gate of hell; and if God, in His mercy, did not preserve your life you should be damned for ever: and, instead of thanking Him for His goodness, you, at the very time that He bestows His favours upon you, blaspheme His holy Name. If, says the Lord, my enemy hath reviled Me, I would verily have borne with it. (Ps. liv. 13.) Had you treated Me with contumely and insult at the time that I chastised you, I would be more willing to bear with your impiety; but you revile Me at the time that I confer My favours upon you. Diabolical tongue! exclaims St. Bernardine of Sienna, what could have induced you to blaspheme your God, who has created you, and redeemed you with his blood? "O lingua diabolica, quid, potest te inducere ad blasphemandum Deus tuum qui te plasmavit, qui te pretioso sanguine redemit?" (Serm. xxxiii.) Some expressly blaspheme the Name of Jesus Christ of that God Who died on a cross for the love of them. God! if we were not subject to death, we should be glad to die for Jesus Christ, in order to make some little return of gratitude to a God who gave His life for us. I say, a little return of gratitude; for there is no comparison between the death of a miserable creature, and the death of a God. But instead of loving and blessing this God, you, as St. Augustine says, revile and curse Him. ”Christ was scourged by the lash of the Jews; but He is not less scourged by the blasphemies of false Christians." (S. Aug. in Joan.) Some have blasphemed and insulted the Virgin Mary, that good Mother, who loves us so tenderly, and prays continually for us. Some of these blasphemers have received a horrible chastisement from God. Surius relates, in the 7th August, that a certain impious Christian blasphemed the blessed Virgin, and pierced Her image with a dagger. As soon as he went out of the church to which the image belonged, he was struck by a thunderbolt, and reduced to ashes. The infamous Nestorious blasphemed, and induced others to blaspheme, most holy Mary, by asserting that She was not the mother of God [the 'Pontifex of the Neo-Catholic DisOrder of Vatican II claimed: "There is no such thing as a Catholic God" and identified his pseudo-Christ as "the Son of God... incarnate in souls to intsill in them the feeling of brotherhood," cf., in our post Estote Sapientes]. But, before death, his impious tongue was eaten away by worms, and he died in despair.

Who is this who speaketh blasphemies? (Luke v. 21.) He is a Christian who has received the holy sacrament of baptism, in which his tongue has been in a certain manner consecrated to God. A learned author says, that on the tongue of all who are baptized is placed blessed salt , ”that the tongues of Christians may be made, as it were, sacred, and may be accustomed to bless God." (Clericat. torn. 1. Dec. Tract. 52.) And the blasphemer afterwards makes his tongue, as St. Bernardine says, a sword to pierce the heart of God. “Lingua blasphemantis efficitur quasi gladius cor Dei penetrans." (Tom. 4. serm. xxxiii.) Hence the saint adds that no sin contains in itself so much malice as the sin of blasphemy. ”Nullum est peccatum quod habet in se tantem iniquitatem sicut blasphemia." St. Chrysostom says, that”there is no sin worse than blasphemy; for in it is the accumulation of all evils, and every punishment." St. Jerome teaches the same doctrine. ”Nothing," says the holy doctor, ”is more horrible than blasphemy; for every sin, compared with blasphemy, is small." (In Isa. cxviii.) And here it is necessary to observe, that blasphemies against the saints, against holy things or holidays such as the sacraments, the Mass, Easter Sunday, Christmas Day, Holy Saturday are of the same species as blasphemies against God; for St. Thomas teaches, that, as the honour paid to the saints, to holy things, and holidays, is referred to God, so an insult offered to the saints is injurious to God, who is the foundation of sanctity. ”Sicut Deus, in sanctis suis laudatur," as we read in the 150th Psalm, "laudate Dominum in sanctis ejus, ita et blasphemia in sanctos in Deum redundat." (S. Thom, qu. 13, a 1 3, a 1, ad 2.) The saint adds, that blasphemy is one of the greatest of the sins against religion. (Ibid. a. 3.)

Thus, from the works of St. Jerome we may infer, that blasphemy is more grievous than theft, than adultery, or murder. All other sins, says St. Bernardine proceeds from frailty or ignorance; but the sin of blasphemy proceeds from malice. ”Omnia alia peccata vindentur procedere partim ex fragilitate, partim ex ignorantia, sed peccatum blasphemia procedit ex propria malitia." (Cic. serm. xxx.) For it proceeds from a bad will, and from a certain hatred conceived against God. Hence the blasphemer renders himself like the damned, who, as St. Thomas says, do not now blaspheme with the mouth for they have no body, but with the heart, cursing the divine justice which punishes them. ”The detestation of the divine justice is in them an interior blasphemy of the heart." (S. Thom. 2, 2, qu. 13, a. 4.) The Saint adds, that we may believe that as the saints in heaven, after the resurrection shall praise God with the tongue, so the reprobates in hell shall also blaspheme Him with the tongue. ”Et credibile est quod post resurrectionem erit in eis etiam vocalis blasphemiæ sicut in sanctis vocalis laus Dei." Justly, then, has a learned author called blasphemy the language of hell; because, as God speaks by the mouth of the saints so the devil speaks by the mouth of blasphemers. ”Blasphemia est peccatum diabolicum, loquela infernalis: sicut enim Spiritus Sanctus loquitur per bonos ita et diabolus per blasphemos." (Mansi. Discors, 7, num. 2.) When St. Peter denied Christ in the Palace of Pilate, and swore that he did not know him, the Jews said, that his language showed that he was a disciple of Jesus, because he spoke the language of his Master. Surely, they said, thou also art one of them; for even thy speech doth discover thee. (Matt. xxvi. 73.) Thus we may say to every blasphemer: You are from hell; you are a true disciple of Lucifer; for you speak the language of the damned. St. Antonine writes, that the entire occupation of the damned in hell consists in blaspheming and cursing God. ”Non aliud apus inferno exercent nisi blasphemare Deum et maledicere." (Part 2, tit. 7, cap. iii.) In proof of this doctrine the Saint adduces the following text of the Apocalypse: ”And they gnawed their tongues for pain: and they blasphemed the God of heaven." (Apoc. xvi. 10, 11.) The holy doctor afterwards adds, that he who indulges in the vice of blasphemy, already belongs to the number of the damned, because he practises their art. ”Qui ergo hoc vitio detinetur ostendit se pertinere ad statum damnatorum, ex quo exercet artem eorum." (Ibid.)

To the malice of blasphemy is added the malice of scandal, which generally accompanies blasphemy; for this sin is ordinarily committed externally and in presence of others. St. Paul reproved the Jews, because by their sins they caused the Gentiles to blaspheme our God, and to laugh at His law. For the name of God, through you, is blasphemed by the Gentiles. (Rom. ii. 24.) But how much more criminal are Christians, who, by their blasphemies, induce other Christians to imitate their example! How does it happen, that in certain provinces blasphemies are never, or at least very seldom, heard, and that in other places this horrible vice is so prevalent, that the Lord may say of them: My Name is continually blasphemed all the day long." (Isa. Iii, 5.) In the squares, houses, cities, villas, nothing is heard but blasphemies. How does this happen? Some of the inhabitants learn to blaspheme from others: children from their parents, servants from their masters, the young from the old. In some families particularly the vice of blasphemy seems to be transmitted as an inheritance. The father is a blasphemer; hence, the sons and nephews blaspheme: to this inheritance their descendants succeed. O accursed father! Instead of instructing your children to bless the name of God, you teach them to blaspheme him and his saint. ”But I reprove them when they blaspheme in my presence." Of what use are these reproofs, when with your own mouth you give them bad example. For God’s sake, for God’s sake, O fathers of families, never blaspheme; but be particularly on your guard never to blaspheme in presence of your children. This is a crime which God can no longer bear in you. And whenever you hear any of your children utter a blasphemy, reprove them severely, and, in obedience to the advice of St. Chrysostom, strike him on the mouth, and you shall thus sanctify your hand. ”Contere os ipsius, manum tuam percussione sanctificat." (Hom. i. ad pop.) Certain fathers unmercifully beat a child for the neglect of some temporal business; but if he blaspheme the Saints, they either laugh at his blasphemies, or listen to them in silence. St. Gregory relates (Dial. 4., cap. xvii.), that a child of five years, the son of a Roman noble man, was in the habit of profaning the name of God. The father neglected to correct him; but he one day saw his son pursued by certain black men. The child ran to embrace his father; but they, who were so many devils, killed him in the father's arms, and carried him with them to hell.

On the great rigour with which God punishes the sin of blasphemy.

Woe to the sinful nation... they have blasphemed the Holy One of Israel. (Isa. i. 4.) Woe to blasphemers, eternal woe to them: for, according to Tobias, they shall be condemned. They shall be condemned that blaspheme thee. (Job xiii. 16.) The Lord has said by the mouth of Job, Thou imitatest the tongue of blasphemers; thy own mouth shall condemn, and not I. (Job xv. 5, 6.) In pronouncing the sentence of their condemnation, God will say: It is not I that condemn you to hell; it is your own mouth, with which you have dared to revile Me and My Saints, that condemns you. Poor miserable blasphemers! They shall continue to blaspheme in hell for their greater torment: their very blasphemies in hell shall always remind them that they are damned for ever in punishment of their blasphemies on earth.

But blasphemers are punished not only in hell, but even on this earth. In the Old Law they were stoned by the people. And he that blasphemeth the name of the Lord, dying let him die; all the multitude shall stone him. (Lev. xxiv. 76.) In the New Law they were condemned to death by the Emperor Justinian. St. Louis, King of France, ordered them to be punished by perforating their tongue, and by branding their forehead with a red hot iron; and when they afterwards relapsed into blasphemy, he ordained that they should die on the scaffold. (Homo Bon. de cas. res. p. 2, c. i.) Another author says, that the law renders blasphemers (as being infamous) incapable of giving testimony. (Navarr. cons. 11, de offic. ord.) By the constitution of Gregory the Fourteenth, they were deprived of Christian burial. In the "Authentica ut non luxur hom.," it is said that blasphemies bring on famine, earthquakes, and pestilence. ”Propter blasphemias, et fames, et terræmotus et pestilentia fiunt." You, O blasphemer, complain that though you labour and submit to fatigue, you are always in poverty. You say: ”I know not why I am always in misery: some malediction must have fallen on my family." No; the blasphemies which you utter are the cause of your wretchedness, and make you always an object of God’s malediction.

O! how many melancholy examples could I mention of blasphemers who have died a bad death. Father Segneri relates, (Tom. 1, Rag. 8,) that, in Gascony, two men who had blasphemed the blood of Jesus Christ, were soon after killed in a quarrel, and torn to pieces by dogs. In Mexico, a blasphemer being once reproved, answered: ”I will hereafter blaspheme more than I have hitherto done." During the night he found his tongue sowed under the palate, and died in that miserable state without giving the least sign of repentance. Dresselius relates, that a certain person was struck blind in the very act of blaspheming. Another, in uttering a blasphemy against St. Anthony, was seized by a flame which issued from the image of the saint, and was burnt alive. In his book against blasphemy, Sarnelli relates, that in Constantinople, a man called Simon Tornaco, who had blasphemed God, began like a mad dog to lacerate his own flesh, and died in his madness. Canta- pratensis states (cap. xlviii.), that a person who had been guilty of blasphemy, had his eyes distorted, and that falling on the ground he bellowed like an ox, and continued to roar aloud until he expired. In the Gallician Mercury (lib. x.) we read that a man named Michael, who had been condemned to be hanged, when he felt the pain of the halter, burst out into blasphemies, and died instantly. After death his head fell from the body, and the tongue remined hanging out from the neck, as black as coal. I abstain from fatiguing you with other terrible examples: you can find a great many of them in the work of Father Sarnelli against blasphemy.

But to conclude. Tell me, blasphemers, if there be any of you present, what benefit do you derive from your accursed blasphemies? You do not receive pleasure from them. Bellarmine says, that blasphemy is a sin which produces no pleasure. You derive no profit from them; for, as I have already said, your blasphemies are the cause of your poverty and wretchedness. You derive no honour from them; your fellow- blasphemers have a horror of your blasphemies, and call you a mouth of hell. Tell me, then, why you blaspheme. "Father, the habit which I have contracted is the cause of my blasphemies." But can this habit excuse you before God? If a son beat his father, and say to him: ”My father, have compassion on me: for I have contracted a habit of beating you :" would the father take pity on him? You say that you blaspheme through the anger caused by your children, your wife, or your master. Your wife or your master put you into a passion, and you take revenge on the saints. What injury have the saints done to you? They intercede before God in your behalf, and you blaspheme them. But”the devil tempts me at that time." If the devil tempts you, follow the example of a certain young man, who, when tempted to blaspheme, went for advice to the Abbot Pemene. The abbot told him, that as often as the devil tempted him to commit this sin, his answer should be: Why should I blaspheme that God who has created me, and bestowed so many benefits upon me? I will forever praise and bless him. The young man followed the advice, and Satan ceased to tempt him. When you are excited to anger, can you speak nothing but blasphemies? Say on such occasions: "Accursed sin, I hate thee: Lord, assist me: Mary, obtain for me the gift of patience." And if you have hitherto contracted the abominable habit of blaspheming, renew every morning, as soon as you rise, the resolution of doing violence to yourself to abstain from all blasphemies during the day: and then say three Aves to most holy Mary, that she may obtain for you the grace to resist every temptation by which you shall be assailed. - A sermon of St. Alphonsus Liguori, Bishop and another great Doctor of the Church.

A most blessed Feast to everyone!

See also: The Abomination of Desolation

"Mustard-Seed"

+

J.M.J.

26th Sunday after Pentecost

From you was spread abroad the word of the Lord… in every place, your Faith, which is towards God, is gone forth (from the Epistle, 6^th Sunday after Epiphany, 1 Thess. 1.2-10)

The kingdom of heaven is like to a grain of mustard-seed, which is the least of all seeds; but when it is grown up, it is greater that all herbs, and becometh a tree, so that the birds of the air come and dwell in the branches thereof (from the Holy Gospel, 6^th Sunday after Epiphany, Mt. 13.31-35)

The one true divine Religion which has God for its author and perfecter (Heb. 12.2) is called “Catholic” because, as St. Augustine says, “diffused by the splendor of one Faith [Eph. 4.5] from the rising to the setting sun [cf., Mal. 1.11].” And of the one true Church professing the one true divine Religion: “Unlike states of human institution, or the sects of heretics, she is not confined to any one country or class of men, but embraces within the amplitude of her love all mankind… Therefore it is written: Thou… hast redeemed us to God, in Thy Blood, out of every tribe, and tongue, and people, and nation, and hast made us to our God a kingdom [Apoc.  5.9,10]. Speaking of the Church, David says: Ask of me and I will give Thee the Gentiles for Thy inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth for thy possession [Ps. 2.8]…” (The Roman Catechism or The Catechism of the Council of Trent).

“Moreover,” continues the same Catechism, “to this Church belong all the faithful who have existed from Adam to the present day, or who shall exist, in the profession of the true Faith, to the end of time; all of whom are founded and raised upon the one corner-stone, Christ, who made both one, and announced peace to them that are near and to them that are far.” She is “also called universal because all who desire eternal salvation must cling to and embrace her, like those who entered the ark to escape perishing in flood… This [note of catholicity], therefore, is to be taught as a most reliable criterion, by which to distinguish the true from a false Church [a pseudo-Church].”

“Universal because all who desire eternal salvation must cling to and embrace her…” But the “New” ‘Catholic’ DisOrder claims: “The churchES [this is belied by the Eternal Word: I will build My church (Mt. 16.18) – not “churches”!] and separated communities, although we once believed that they suffered from deficiencies [No! True Catholics take exception for it is of Apostolic teaching that they are sects of perdition (2 Pet. 2.1)], are not totally deprived of importance and value in the mystery of salvation. THE SPIRIT OF CHRIST [that is, the pseudo-Christ of the ‘Pontifex’ who, he claims, was “incarnate in souls to infuse the feeling of brotherhood” (1^st Oct interview with the Italian “La Reppublica” and quoted also by the “L’Osservatore Romano”; cf., our post Estote Sapientes and "The True God - The Catholic God") – the “New” ‘Christ’ of the Neo-Catholic creed or the “New” ‘Catholic theologism’ (cf., “The Ultimate Delusion ofVatican II ‘Catholicism’”):  the reason why a “New” Rite of ‘worship’ had to be, to quote Card. Ratzinger later Pope Benedict XVI, “fabricated”] DOES NOT REFUSE TO USE THEM AS MEANS OF SALVATION, through the strength deriving from the fullness of grace and truth which has been conferred on the Catholic Church [the Church is thereby “deprived of its essential unity,” explains Fr. Paul Kramer, “… united by some essential bond of communion with the (false) religions, and therefore distinguished from them not by essence but by degree” (The Suicide of Altering the Faith in the Liturgy, 43)!], thus Vatican II proclaims (“Unitatis Redintegratio”), the Neo-Catholic ‘Catechism’ (n. 819) proposes, and ‘Blessed’ John Paul II reiterated (“Ut unum sint,” 10).

“…Distinguish the true from a false Church.” In calling the sects of perdition “churches” (Vatican II document “Unitatis Redintegration” quoted above), the “New” ‘Catholic’ DisOrder inaugurated by the perverted Second Vatican Council betrays itself as that false or pseudo-Church – just as ‘Protestantism’ was a false or pseudo-Christianity (cf., our post “Anti-Christian Conspiracy: Scriptural Truthand Historical Fact”) – the putrid bastard seeds of which were sown in seminaries and monasteries in the 1930s (cf., our post “The Year 1929”): putting itself on equal footing with them. The regime of Msgr. Fellay of the Neo-SSPX has contributed to this “diabolical disorientation” with a false ecclesiology: mistaking the Church with its conquerably ubiquitous institutions.

The Holy Church has now been reduced to a mustard-seed – to the remnant (Is. 37.32) inhabiting the mountains (Mt. 24.16), the eagles gathered together… wheresoever the Body shall be (Mt. 24.28) – yet still scattered throughout the world professing the same Faith of the Apostolic Tradition, worshipping the true “Catholic God” of both mercy AND JUSTICE professed only in the same traditional Rite of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, and united with the same “hierarchical subordination by true obedience to the SUMMUS Pontifex [crowned with the Papal tiara as the Sovereign Vicar of the King of kings and Lord of lords]” through a truly Catholic bishop (cf., “Catholic Resistance”): purified, readied to be sown in their own [purified] fields (Jer.  23.2) – these good figs… I will bring them again into this land: and I will build them up… and I will plant them (Jer.  24.5,6) – during the “period of peace” promised by Our Lady of Fatima for the last measure of increase required for filling the empty places in Heaven.

"Now My Turn" - "Eternal Face to Face"

+

J.M.J.T.

Feast of All the Saints of the Order

Draw me and we will run (Cant. 1.3)… “until the shadows having disappeared [we] may be able to tell You of [our] Love in an Eternal Face to Face” (St. Therese, “Act of Oblation to Merciful Love”).

Draw me… “The Most Holy Virgin [of Carmel] alone,” says St. Francis de Sales, “was the first to be drawn by the Heavenly Spouse to consecrate and dedicate Herself totally to His service.” 

We will run. “But,” continues the holy Doctor, “as soon as She was drawn She drew a host of souls who offered themselves [as a most pleasing oblation] to God, to advance under Her sacred protection” in the observance of a perfect intimacy with Her Beloved Crucified possible in this exile – quenching the “heavenly Fiance’s thirst” (St. Therese, in her letters, 98): My child, give Me thy heart (Pr. 23.26). Ever since Our Glorious Immaculate Queen Beauty of Carmel led the way it has always been filled with souls who come to follow after Her standard, striving under the authority of this most tender yet most zealous Patron, Doctor, and Mother of Carmel against all kinds of enemies for the glory of the Name of Her Crucified: zelo zelatus sum pro Domino Deo exercituum, as the Prophet Elias declared on Mount Carmel which has since then become part of the coat of arms of Carmel.

“Until the shadows having disappeared…” Thus how they lived, they did not seek joy, delight, pleasure, and consolation save in pursuing, most perfectly adhering to, and accomplishing the beatings of the Heart of their Beloved – His loving and saving designs so opposed to the “New DisOrder” of things in the apostate 'Modernist' world (dominated by Masonic ‘dumbies’ of the Synagogue of Satan, Apoc. 2.9; 3.9) and even in His very own vineyard (that has become the den, as it were, of the revolutionary ‘dumbies’ of the Synagogue – cf., our post “The Year 1929” – clearly “prefigured,” cf., 1 Cor. 10.6, in the Book of Lamentations of the Prophet  Jeremias) built on “The Rights of Man”. “Joys in which everything created, which is nothing, gives room for the Uncreated, Which is Reality” (St. Therese, in her letters, 116).  

“To tell You of [our] Love in an Eternal Face to Face.” The Saints used to express that the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass – the Traditional Latin Mass; not the “New ‘M[e]ss’” designed by a Freemason with his six Protestant ‘observers’ and presented by ‘Pope Paul VI’ in his original “General Instructions [on the New Rite of M(e)ss]” as the Protestant “Lord’s Supper” – is our heaven here on earth. True enough for this, the Catholic “Beatific Vision”, is what the truly* Catholic priest teaches us by his traditional position and orientation in adoring, worshipping, and serving God at His high altar: standing and talking to God facie ad faciem (face to face, as with the intimate friend of God – Moses – on the summit of Sinai: And the Lord spoke to Moses face to face, as a man is wont to speak to his friend, Ex. 33.11). What a most blessed privilege in heaven for those who love God with all – no reservations, no compromises even with the minutest one for in heaven there is no “saint by halves” (St. Therese, Story of a Soul, Ch. I) - their mind, heart, soul, and strength!
---
* Not the bastard ‘ecumenical’ pastors ordained according to the New Rite, cf., our post Sacerdotes daemoniorum; not the Sedevacantists, for they are just as equally ‘mutant’, cf., our post "Against Sedevacantism II", as the bastard ‘ecumenical’ pastors of the New ‘Catholic’ DisOrder; and not the compromised: under the “Ecclesia Dei” Commission of the Disoriented Neo-Catholic Vatican and the loyalists of the subtly-dissimulating Fellayite regime of Neo-SSPX who accept the “bastard” (Abp. Lefebvre), “tampered” (Pope John Paul II) and “fabricated” (Card. Ratzinger)-“outbalanced” (Pope Benedict XVI) “New ‘Mass’” to have been “legitimately promulgated.”
---

Holy Church prays with Carmel today that we may profit by the examples and merits of the Saints of “the Order of the Virgin” (Our Lord to St. Teresa of Jesus, Soliloquies) – “living for God alone in meditation of the yoke of His law [to wit: Thou shalt love the Lord thy God  with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole strength, and with thy whole mind: the greatest and the first commandment, Lk. 10.27; Mt. 22.37; and, that you love one another, as I have loved you, Jn. 13.34] and in perfect abnegation…” (Collect of the Mass) so that “one day,” according to our dear “Little Therese,” “ a grateful God will cry out:  Now, My turn “ – in that “the eye of man,” continues our same dear “Little Therese” and borrowing from the words of St. Paul the Apostle, “has not seen the uncreated light, his ear has not heard the incomparable harmonies, and his heart cannot have any idea of what God reserves for those [that love Him and] whom He loves” (in her letters, 94).

“…Going to Paradise? I do not count on the illness, it is too slow a leader. I count only on Love. Ask Good Jesus that all the prayers being offered for me may serve to increase the Fire which must consume me… 

[And now] I see [the “Catholic God”] I believed.

I possess what I hoped for.

I am united to Him Whom I loved

With all my power of loving”

- St. Therese

(in her letters, 242, 245)

“Try to convince [yourselves] that instead of losing [us] you will find [us], and that [we] will no longer leave you” (St. Therese in a letter to Fr. Belliere, 258). To the Filipino faithful then who have lost passing things (loved ones, goods and possessions) due to the calamities which pleased God to allow to purify you, if you have striven to please, love and serve our true God more than anything else – giving Him the primacy in all your considerations, concerns, and affairs – and directed to the same your loved ones and everything God has given you, they should not be lost but safe in the hands of God. “I am not dying, I am entering into Life” (St. Therese in her letters, 244).

A most blessed Feast to all especially to those who have followed us!

May the Glorious and Immaculate Queen Beauty of Carmel, with St. Joseph – our special Father, Patron and Protector, and all Her Saints make the countenance of Her little Jesus to shrine and smile brightly on us all!

Related post: "The Teresian Carmel of Traditional Observance"

The Mark of God's Elect

+

J.M.J.

Twenty-fifth Sunday after Pentecost

Today’s Epistle (from the 5^th Sunday after Epiphany, Col. 3.12-17), presents to us the ideal of the Christian life which is the distinctive mark of God’s elect: the duty of charity.

The spiritual life requires the use of so many means, calls for the exercise of so many virtues that care must be taken lest we become lost in details, forgetting the supernatural virtue of charity (that love flowing from the side of Christ to our hearts; not the natural inclination to something ‘good’ which even the wicked are still capable of) which should be the foundation and end of all. Of what value is the spiritual life, consecration to God, or even the vows of religion, if they do not help the soul to tend to the perfection of love manifested by the Crucified Lord and Master?

Consider the perfect love which the Apostle asks us to have for our neighbor: mercy, compassion, mutual forgiveness, and that love which leaves no room for divisions or dissensions, which overcomes strife and forgets offenses. This is long-suffering charity which makes every sacrifice and overcomes all difficulties in order to be in harmony with all, because we all form one mind, one heart, one spirit, one body in Christ. Fraternal charity of this kind is the surest guarantee of a spiritual life that is advancing toward sanctity.

The Holy Gospel  (Mt. 13.24-30) shows us the practical way to live this ideal. The kingdom of heaven is likened to a man that sowed good seed in his field. But… his enemy came and oversowed cockle among the wheat. God has sown the good seed generously in His field, the world; He has sown grace and charity, and the desire for total Christ-like oblation, the ideals of an apostolic, religious, saintly life. But, in the midst of all this good, even in His own vineyard, the Catholic Church, the enemy comes to sow evil. Why does God permit this? To sift His servants – even Peter (cf., Lk. 22.31) – as we sift grain, to test them.

Now, more than ever, we are scandalized, seeing evil working its way even to the best places (cf., our post “A Perilous ‘Catholic’ Voyage” and “The Year 1929”) – the Chair of Peter on which the ‘incument president’ of the Neo-Catholic DisOrder claims, though not ex cathedra, that there is “no such thing as a Catholic God” (in our post Estote Sapientes); also, to the ‘SSPX chair’ on which the SG formally declared that the “bastard Mass” (Abp. Marcel Lefebvre; Pope John Pal II: “tampered liturgy” in our post “OurLady and the Diabolical Campaign”, and Card. Ratzinger: “fabricated liturgy” in Msgr. Gamber’s  “The Reform of the Roman Liturgy”, later as Pope Benedict XVI: “outbalanced liturgy – more a [Protestant‘fellowship’] celebration than worship”), the “New” ‘M[e]ss’ which is the worship of the idol of the ‘incumbent’ ‘Pontifex’, “was legitimately promulgated”  – seeing that even among God’s ‘best friends’, among those who should be the bastion of the truth – of orthodoxy – and source of edification to others, there are those who speak and behave unworthily and most shamefully. Then we are filled with zeal, like the servants in the parable. We want to remedy this evil and root up the cockle. Wilt thou that we go and gather it up? But God answers, No, lest perhaps gathering up the cockle, you root up the wheat also together with it. The cockle is spared, not because it is good, but in order to save the wheat. In the same way God spares the wicked and does not destroy them, for the sake of the elect. When God asks us to endure with patience certain situations, as inevitable as they are deplorable, He asks for one of the greatest exercises of charity (as “CatholicResistance”). But one thing that is truly of the Catholic Christ – of the “Catholic God”: He does not tell us to ‘fraternize’ with evil – as the idol of the ‘incumbent’ ‘Pontifex’ and his Vatican II predecessors would “instill… the feeling of brotherhood” – to make a league with the cockle, but He tells us to endure it with the longanimity with which He Himself endured it. Was there not one who had the mind of Satan and another who was a traitor among the Apostles? Yet the Lord and Savior wanted them among His intimates – and with how much love He treated them that He did not spare them the severest rebukes!

Indeed one of the greatest opportunities for the practice of charity is offered us by those who by their evil conduct give us so many occasions for forgiving them, for returning good for evil, and for suffering injustice for the love of God. Moreover, we should consider that, whereas, cockle cannot be changed into wheat, it is always possible for the wicked to be converted and become good. Were not Magdalen, the good thief, and Peter, who had denied Jesus with swearings, coverted? 

When our love is perfect, we are able to live among the wicked without being harsh or contentious yet without being influenced by them!

"Sacerdotes daemoniorum"

+

J.M.J.

Feast of St. Charles Borromeo
Reformer of the clergy

...Made priests... for the devil

(2 Paralipomenon 11.15)

It is de fide that the duty of the Pope is not to promote a "New" doctrine but to faithfully preserve the traditional teaching. "Nothing," teaches Pope Agatho, "that has been regularly defined can bear dimunition, or change, or addition, and repels every alteration of sense, or even of words" (in Pope Gregory XVI, Mirari vos - Condemnation of 'Liberalism' and Religious Indifferentism which have become the driving force of the 'ecumenical' harlotry of the Vatican of "diabolical disorientation" or the Neo-Catholic Vatican).

In the rather notorious speech of Pope Paul VI before the seminarians at the Lombard College, where he acknowledged that "the smoke of Satan has entered the temple of God," the Neo-Catholic 'Pontifex' claimed: "We preach ecumenism" (in our post "Our 'Great Reversal'"). And what is this 'doctrine' of ecumenism? Not even any of the Neo-Catholic 'Pontifices' could define it. Pope John Paul II could only describe it in his mock-Encyclical 'Ut unum sint' as "a movement which originated [among the 'Bible-only' sectarians]" (cf., our post "Our 'Great Reversal'" - link above). That was the second time that a Pope spoke of a novelty - entirely never heard of in the Magisterium - though, always to the confusion of the 'Sedevacantists', not formally (that is, ex cathedra and binding the Universal Church "under pain of eternal damnation"). Yet this novelty was unprecedented for it was the formula by which the Second Vatican Council or Vatican II (1962-1965) came up with a mock-Catholicism (cf. also our post "The Year That Was 1929"): 'Catholicism'-redefined in adaptation to the modern times breathing in and out the air... darkened with the smoke of the bottomless pit (Apoc. 9.2); darkened with the 1789 Masonic Principles of the 'Rights of Man'.

In 1993, a document was issued from the organ of 'ecumenical' harlotry of the Neo-Catholic Vatican - the so-called 'Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity'. It was titled "The Directory for the Applications of the Principles and Norms of Ecumenism". "By this document," explains Fr. Kramer, "there will be no place in the [institutional] Church for any one, or any organization, or any religious institutes [Orders and Congregations], or any diocesan office, or any seminary, or any lay [association] that is not firmly committed to believing and practicing inter-faith ecumenism [why the 'incumbent' mad 'Pontifex' disowned the "Catholic God" or rather relegated Him to the 'non-existent category' of sick-head 'atheists' - for to a sane one, he cannot talk about a non-existent nay pronounce a judgment on it: as non-existent; the baptized cannot believe and practice the 'ecumenical' harlotry of Vatican II without confessing and worshipping (in the "New" 'Mass') its 'ecumenical' idol: the 'god of all mercy and luv' (cf., our post "The Ultimate Delusion of Vatican II 'Catholicism'")- the 'god' of contradiction, being the one 'god' of all conflicting creeds; in contradistinction to the "Catholic God" - the God of Truth Who will condemn those who refuse to believe Him (cf., Mk. 16.16) and hear the Catholic Church (Mt. 18.17) which is the pillar and ground of the truth (1 Tim. 3.15).]. Not even grade-school children are exempt" ("The Suicide of Altering the Faith in the Liturgy," 182).

Paragraph 22 of the diabolical "Directory" gives what could be the very mandate: "[Note here why there was a "New" Rite of 'Baptism'] Those who are baptized in the name of [pseudo-]Christ are, by that very fact, called to commit themselves to the search for unity." But the Lord and Savior, the King of kings and Lord of lords, has already instituted One Catholic Communion under subjection to the Catholic Summus Pontifex - not the tiara-less Neo-Catholic 'Pontifex'; it is already given - nothing to be 'searched' for! Then, the insistent call - throughout the "Directory" - rather for perversion: "...change of heart [in some places "renewal of attitudes"]... along with public... prayer [the "New" 'Mass'!] for the unity of Christians... this is what Vatican II regards as the soul of the ecumenical movement" (#25). Thus,"the objective of ecumenical formation is that all Christians be animated by the ecumenical spirit" (#58) in that "all the faithful are called upon to make a personal commitment  toward promoting and increasing communion with other Christians;" but, He Who Is the Truth says of those who refuse to hear His Church that they be treated as the heathens and publicans (Mt. 18.17) who, according to the Spirit of Truth speaking through the Apostle St. Paul, sacrifice to devils (1 Cor. 10.20) so that what fellowship hath... the faithful with the unbeliever (2 Cor. 6.14,15)! Paragraph #6 mandates that children and young people must receive an ecumenical formation in [Neo-Catholic]catechesis: "schools of every kind and grade should give an ecumenical dimension to their religious teaching[!]"

Therefore, the religious harlotry of Neo-Catholic Vatican calls for a "New" breed of priests - for if the Faith is taught to us through Catholic priests, Vatican II 'ecumenism', in which all the faithful, including the children and young people, are to be re-formed, is taught also through 'ecumenical priests': if there will be children of religious harlotry, so they must have fathers to feed them with and form them in the "principles" of spiritual harlotry.

"Before Vatican II," notes Fr. Kramer, "all the Popes were of one accord in commanding that bishops must ensure that their seminarians, their future priests, were thoroughly trained to adhere to the purity of Catholic doctrine." "Purity of doctrines," continues Fr. Kramer, "was always paramount." "And," emphasizes Fr. Kramer, "purity of doctrine necessitates not only adhering to truth, but also uncompromising refutation of error" - not an uncompromising 'respect' of errors: Vatican II 'ecumenical' pastors are nothing but men of human respect; thus, in them is fulfilled the Psalms: that God hath scattered the bones of them that please men (52.6), no wonder why Neo-Catholic 'seminaries' have become effeminate (1 Cor. 6.10) houses.

The 'Directory' says that 'priests' are to be formed with "an authentically ecumenical disposition" (#70) - what Our Lady of Fatima referred to as "diabolical disorientation"; these Neo-Catholic priests are stripped of the Catholic mind-set - yet, "thinking all the while that they are marching under the banner of the Apostolic keys" ("The Alta Vendita" or the "Masonic Blueprint for the Subversion of the Church From Within" in our post "A Perilous 'Catholic' Voyage"), their position falsified: being mere 'dialogue' interlocutors and, like to Protestant pastors, 'president' of an assembly gathered 'round the "Supper" "table" for 'fellowship celebration', and donned in the 'umble 'liturgical' costumes of head-laymen (see the mad Neo-Catholic 'Pontifex' in our post "Desacralization") or head-laywomen of 'Bible-only' sects. It also lays down that the episcopal 'Conferences' (the Neo-Catholic 'bishops') "must ensure that plans of study for seminarians  give an ecumenical dimension to each subject, and provide especially for the study of ecumenism" (#72). Paragraph #76: "ecumenical openness is a constitutive dimension of the formation of future priests and deacons" - in other words, if the seminarian is critical of any Vatican II madness inspired by its religious harlotry, he's not going to get ordained. It also encourages Neo-Catholic seminaries to invite non-Catholics to lecture (#81); also, meetings with formandees and students of false religions (#83) - as if Christ Who Is the Truth and the Catholic Church, the pillar and ground of the truth, has not actually the fullness of the truth! And after their mock-ordinations: the diabolical 'Directory' calls for "cotinuous 'aggiornamento' of ordained ministers and pastoral workers in view of the continual evolution within the ecumenical movement" - there, the so-called "aggiornamento" or the impious program of Vatican II in 'updating of the Church' (as if the Church, the Mystical Body of Christ, is liable to obsolescence!) not actually 'updating' but a revolutionary change that will refuse to settle on any ground where traces of Catholic Order remain (the obliteration of which of course drags only the revolutionary into a grand delusion). Finally, the same diabolical directive would have the pseudo-Catholic priests to invite ministers of false religions to discuss pastoral problems common to all (#91a), encourage inter-confessional meetings aimed at improving relations and trying to resolve pastoral problems together (#91b), and to hold also inter-confessional sharing of elements of spirituality held in common (#91e) - thus, placing the one true divine Religion Who has Christ for its author and perfecter (Heb. 12.2) on the same level as the false man-made creeds and opinions and their one common author and spirit: the "[non-]Catholic God" who is the devil.

MANY will say to Me in that day:

Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Thy Name,

and cast out devils in Thy Name,

and done many miracles in Thy Name?

And then will I profess unto them,

I never knew you: depart from Me, you that work iniquity

(Mt. 7.22-23).

Related post: "At the Heart of Catholic Crisis - the Priesthood"

Dangers to Eternal Salvation

+

J.M.J.

Twenty-fourth Sunday after Pentecost

On the greatness of the dangers to which our eternal salvation is exposed, and on the manner in which we ought to guard against them.

IN this day's Holy Gospel (from the 4th Sunday after Epiphany) we find that, when Jesus Christ entered the boat along with his disciples, a great tempest arose, so that the boat was agitated by the waves, and was on the point of being lost. During this storm the Saviour was asleep; but the disciples, terrified by the storm, ran to awake him, and said: Lord, save us: we perish (v. 25). Jesus gave them courage by saying: Why are ye fearful, ye of little faith? Then rising up, he commanded the winds and the sea, and there came a great calm. Let us examine what is meant by the boat in the midst of the sea, and by the tempest which agitated the sea.

The boat on the sea represents man in this world. As a vessel on the sea is exposed to a thousand dangers to pirates, to quicksands, to hidden rocks, and to tempests; so man in this life is encompassed with perils arising from the temptations of Hell from the occasions of sin, from the scandals or bad counsels of men, from human respect, and, above all, from the bad passions of corrupt nature, represented by the winds that agitate the sea and expose the vessel to great danger of being lost.

Thus, as St. Leo says, our life is full of dangers, of snares, and of enemies: The first enemy of the salvation of every Christian is his own corruption. But every man is tempted by his own concupiscence, being drawn away and allured (St. James i. 14). Along with the corrupt inclinations which live within us, and drag us to evil, we have many enemies from without that fight against us. We have the devils, with whom the contest is very difficult, because they are “stronger than we are." 

Hence, because we have to contend with powerful enemies, St. Paul exhorts us to arm ourselves with the divine aid: Put you on the armour of God, that you may be able to stand against the deceits of the Devil. For our wrestling is not against flesh and blood, but against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the world of this darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in high places (Eph. vi. 11, 12.). The Devil, according to St. Peter, is a lion who is continually going about roaring, through the rage and hunger which impel him to devour our souls. Your adversary, the Devil, like a roaring lion, goeth about seeking whom he may devour (1 Peter, v. 8). St. Cyprian says that Satan is continually lying in wait for us, in order to make us his slaves.

[And now] even the [Vatican itself] endanger[s] our salvation - preaching and worshipping a "[non-]Catholic God," according to the mad Neo-Catholic 'Pontifex' himself, cf., our posts Estote Sapientes and "The True God - The Catholic God"; see also articles in the right-side bar "Why Catholic Tradition". They persecute or betray us, or deceive us by their flattery and bad counsels. St. Augustine says that, among the faithful there are in every profession hollow and deceitful men. Now if a fortress were full of rebels within [the Vatican in the hands of Communists and Freemasons under ecclesiasticial trappings, cf., our posts "A Perilous 'Catholic' Voyage" and "The Year That Was 1929"], and encompassed by enemies from without, who is there that would not regard it as lost? Such is the condition of each of us as long as we live in this world. Who shall be able to deliver us from so many powerful enemies? Only God: Unless the Lord keep the city, he watcheth in vain that keepeth it (Ps. cxxvi. 2.).

What then is the means by which we can save our souls in the midst of so many dangers? It is to imitate the holy disciples to have recourse to our Divine Master, and say to him: Save us; we perish. Save us, Lord; if thou do not we are lost. When the tempest is violent, the pilot never takes his eyes from the light which guides him to the port. In like manner we should keep our eyes always turned to [the true God - the "Catholic God"] Who alone can deliver us from the many dangers to which we are exposed. It was thus David acted when he found himself assailed by the dangers of sin. I have lifted up my eyes to the mountains, from whence help shall come to me (Ps. cxx. 1). To teach us to recommend ourselves continually to Him who alone can save us by His grace, the Lord has ordained that, as long as we remain on this earth, we should live in the midst of a continual tempest, and should be surrounded by enemies. The temptations of the Devil, the persecutions of men, the adversity which we suffer in this world, are not evils: they are, on the contrary, advantages, if we know how to make of them the use which God wishes, who sends or permits them for our welfare. They detach our affections from this earth, and inspire a disgust for this world, by making us feel bitterness and thorns even in its honours, its riches, its delights, and amusements. The Lord permits all these apparent evils, that we may take away our affections from fading goods, in which we meet with so many dangers of perdition, and that we may seek to unite ourselves with him who alone can make us happy.

Our error and mistake is, that when we find ourselves harassed by infirmities, by poverty, by persecutions, and by such tribulations, instead of having recourse to the Lord, we turn to men, and place our confidence in their assistance, and thus draw upon ourselves the malediction of God, who says, Cursed be the man who trusteth in man (Jer. xvii. 5). The Lord does not forbid us, in our afflictions and dangers, to have recourse to human means; but He curses those who place their whole trust in them. He wishes us to have recourse to Himself before all others, and to place our only hope in Him, that we may also centre in Him all our love.

As long as we live on this earth, we must, according to St. Paul, work out our salvation with fear and trembling, in the midst of the dangers by which we are beset (Phil. ii. 12.) Whilst a certain vessel was in the open sea a great tempest arose, which made the captain tremble. In the hold of the vessel there was an animal eating with as much tranquillity as if the sea were perfectly calm. The captain being asked why he was so much afraid, replied: If I had a soul like the soul of this brute, I too would be tranquil and without fear; but because I have a rational and an immortal soul, I am afraid of death, after which I must appear before the judgment-seat of God; and therefore I tremble through fear. Let us also tremble, beloved brethren. The salvation of our immortal souls is at stake. They who do not tremble are, as St. Paul says, in great danger of being lost; because they who fear not, seldom recommend themselves to God, and labour but little to adopt the means of salvation. Let us beware: we are, says St. Cyprian, still in battle array, and still combat for eternal salvation.

The first means of salvation, then, is to recommend ourselves continually to God, that He may keep His hands over us, and preserve us from offending Him. The next is, to cleanse the soul from all past sins by making a general confession. A general [Traditional Catholic] confession* is a powerful help to a change of life. When the tempest is violent the burden of the vessel is diminished, and each person on board throws his goods into the sea in order to save his life. folly of sinners, who, in the midst of such great dangers of eternal perdition, instead of diminishing the burden of the vessel that is, instead of unburdening the soul of her sins load her with a greater weight. Instead of flying from the dangers of sin, they fearlessly continue to put themselves voluntarily into dangerous occasions; and, instead of having recourse to God’s mercy for the pardon of their offences, they offend him still more, and compel him to abandon, them.
---
* In the "New" 'sacrament of reconciliation', the traditional form of absolution is not always used. And even if used, the minister is ordained in the "New" 'rite of ordinations' not as a Catholic priest who offers the Sacrifice of the Cross in an unbloody manner but as an 'ecumenical' pastor (according to the 'ecumenical directory' of Vatican II)!
---
Another means is, to labour strenuously not to allow ourselves to become the slaves of irregular passions (especially, lust - natural or unnatural (as masturbation and homosexuality); cf., our post "Vade retro Satana!"). Give me not over to a shameless and foolish mind (Eccl. xxiii. 6). Do not, Lord, deliver me up to a mind blinded by passion. He who is blind sees not what he is doing, and therefore he is in danger of falling into every crime. Thus so many are lost by submitting to the tyranny of their passions. Some are slaves to the passion of avarice. A person who is now in the other world said: Alas! I perceive that a desire of riches is beginning to rule over me. So said the unhappy man; but he applied no remedy. He did not resist the passion in the beginning, but fomented it till death, and thus at his last moments left but little reason to hope for his salvation. Others are slaves to sensual pleasures. They are not content with lawful gratifications, and therefore they pass to the indulgence of those that  are forbidden. Others are subject to anger; and because they are not careful to check the fire at its commencement, when it is small, it increases and grows into a spirit of revenge.

Disorderly affections, if they are not beaten down in the beginning, become our greatest tyrants. Many, says St. Ambrose, after having victoriously resisted the persecutions of the enemies of the faith, were afterwards lost because they did not resist the first assaults of some earthly passion. Of this, Origen was a miserable example. He fought for, and was prepared to give his life in defence of the faith; but, by afterwards yielding to human respect, he was led to deny it. We have still a more miserable example in Solomon, who, after having received so many gifts from God, and after being inspired by the Holy Ghost, was, by indulging a passion for certain pagan, women, induced to offer incense to idols. The unhappy man who submits to the slavery of his wicked passions, resembles the ox that is sent to the slaughter after a life of constant labour. During their whole lives worldlings groan under the weight of their sins, and, at the end of their days, fall into Hell.

Let us conclude. When the winds are strong and violent, the pilot lowers the sails and casts anchor. So, when we find ourselves assailed by any bad passion, we should always lower the sails; that is, we should avoid all the occasions which may increase the passion and should cast anchor by uniting ourselves to God, and by begging of him to give us strength (especially through the traditional Sacraments - particularly the Holy Eucharist - and our powerful Sacramentals blessed by our Traditional Catholic Priests) not to offend Him.

But some of you will say, What am I to do? I live in the midst of the world, where my passions continually assail me even against my will. I will answer in the words of Origen: "The man who lives in the darkness of the world and in the midst of secular business, can with difficulty serve God. Whoever then wishes to insure his eternal salvation, let him retire from the world, and take refuge in ["Catholic Resistance"]... secure [harbour] in the [putrid sea of Vatican Disorientation] and of this world. If he cannot actually leave the world, let him leave it at least in affection, by detaching his heart from the things of this world, and from his own evil inclinations: Go not after thy lusts, says the Holy Ghost, but turn away from thy own will (Eccl. xviii. 30). Follow not your own concupiscence; and when your will impels you to evil, you must not indulge, but must resist its inclinations.

The time is short: it remaineth that they also who have wives be as if they had none; and they that weep, as though they wept not; and they that rejoice, as it they rejoiced not; and they that buy, as if they possessed not; and they that use this world, as if they used it not; for the fashion of this world passeth away (1 Cor. vii. 29, etc.). The time of life is short; we should then prepare for death, which is rapidly approaching; and to prepare for that awful moment, let us reflect that everything in this world shall soon end. Hence, the Apostle tells those who suffer in this life to be as if they suffered not, because the miseries of this life shall soon pass away, and they who save their souls shall be happy for eternity; and he exhorts those who enjoy the goods of this earth to be as if they enjoyed them not, because they must one day leave all things; and if they lose their souls, they shall be miserable for ever. 

- a Sermon of St. Alphonsus Liguori, bishop and Doctor of the Church

Related post: The Great Tribulation