Телеграм канал «Ecce Verbum»

Note on some questions regarding the participation of Catholics in political life. 

II. Central points in the current cultural and political debate

2. Civil society today is undergoing a complex cultural process as the end of an era brings with it a time of uncertainty in the face of something new. The great strides made in our time give evidence of humanity’s progress in attaining conditions of life which are more in keeping with human dignity.  

The growth in the sense of responsibility towards countries still on the path of development is without doubt an important sign, illustrative of a greater sensitivity to the common good. At the same time, however, one cannot close one’s eyes to the real dangers which certain tendencies in society are promoting through legislation, nor can one ignore the effects this will have on future generations.

A kind of cultural relativism exists today, evident in the conceptualization and defence of an ethical pluralism, which sanctions the decadence and disintegration of reason and the principles of the natural moral law. Furthermore, it is not unusual to hear the opinion expressed in the public sphere that such ethical pluralism is the very condition for democracy.[12] As a result, citizens claim complete autonomy with regard to their moral choices, and lawmakers maintain that they are respecting this freedom of choice by enacting laws which ignore the principles of natural ethics and yield to ephemeral cultural and moral trends,[13] as if every possible outlook on life were of equal value. At the same time, the value of tolerance is disingenuously invoked when a large number of citizens, Catholics among them, are asked not to base their contribution to society and political life – through the legitimate means available to everyone in a democracy – on their particular understanding of the human person and the common good. The history of the twentieth century demonstrates that those citizens were right who recognized the falsehood of relativism, and with it, the notion that there is no moral law rooted in the nature of the human person, which must govern our understanding of man, the common good and the state.

🔗 continued1, 🔗2 🔗3

#politics

Saint Thomas and sexual sins

"We tend to think that when the Church speaks of morality, the only moral issue is the sexual sphere. In reality, there are far greater and more important matters."

Some seemed upset when Leo said sexual sins are not as grave as other sins, like injustice and oppression. This is theologically sound, and, incidentally, also accords with Aquinas. (Note that Leo did not say sexual sins are not important -- of course they are; they are mortal sins -- only that they are not as grave as certain other sins. Yet, there is an excessive focus on sex in today's world.)

St. Thomas Aquinas says the worst sin of all is hatred of God. He also explains that, all things being equal, "Spiritual sins are of greater guilt than carnal sins." "[O]f the seven capital sins five are spiritual (pride, greed, wrath, envy, sloth), and two carnal (lust, gluttony)." The reason sexual sins are grave is not merely because they are illicit pleasure, or wrong use of the body; they are fundamentally grave because they use another person as an object for personal gratification. Each person is created in the image of God, with profound dignity, and is meant to be loved, not used.

To use another person for one's own ends is a desecration of the human person, who bears the imago Dei. And that unlawful use can be applied towards many ends: lust, power, greed, etc.

https://drbo.org/summa/question/19205.htm

"Rebel like Athanasius during the Arian crisis"

You are probably familiar with the SSPX prayer that they must rebel like Athanasius during the Arian crisis.

The Arian crisis actually concerned precisely the fact that bishops began to ignore the will and decision of the pope. The main charge was that Arian bishops were convening synods without the pope's consent, meaning they were automatically invalid. Additionally, they ignored his rulings, especially when the pope revoked the suspension of Bishop Athanasius.

Therefore, unfortunately, the analogy to the Arian crisis, that the SSPX are like Athanasius, is inaccurate. Athanasius always sought salvation in the See of Peter and saw Peter as the guarantor of truth.

"...[Pope] Julius, having concluded that Athanasius's further stay in Egyptian territory for the time being was fraught with danger, summoned him to his side. To the bishops gathered in Antioch, from whom he had just then received a letter, he sent a writing accusing them of secretly introducing something new contrary to the exposition of the faith accepted by the Council of Nicaea and of failing to summon him to the synod in defiance of the Church's laws: for there exists a binding law for priests that all actions taken against the opinion of the Roman bishop must be deemed invalid. The proceedings initiated against Athanasius in Tyre and in Mareotes were not an act of due process."

source: Sozomen, Ecclesiastical History, chapter 10

Converting by force
Benedict XVI

“Violence is incompatible with the nature of God and the nature of the soul. ‘Not to act reasonably, not to act with logos, is contrary to the nature of God.’”

(2006 Regensburg Lecture)

Authentic truth is discovered through dialogue, conscience, and faith, not through force or ideological imposition. Whenever violence is used in the name of truth, the truth itself is corrupted: “The truth cannot impose itself except by virtue of its own truth.”

(Dignitatis Humanae)

“The Church proposes; she imposes nothing. She respects individuals and cultures, and she honors the sanctuary of conscience.”

(Homily, Jan 2006)

24th of April: Conversion of St. Augustine

Augustine of Hippo, growing up, chose a hedonistic lifestyle. He became involved with the Manichaean sect and began to believe in the teachings it proclaimed. His mother, St. Monica, undeterred by difficulties, prayed for her son's conversion. Worried about him, she followed him to Carthage, Rome, and Milan. A certain bishop prophesied: "Mother, I am certain that a son of so many tears must return to God." In his liberation from belief in astrology, Augustine was helped by a conversation in 386 with Firminus, one of his friends. Since he read many Platonic and Neoplatonic philosophical works, translated from Greek into Latin by Gaius Marius Victorinus, a famous rhetorician and philosopher who converted in 355, Augustine began to study the Holy Scriptures, primarily the letters of St. Paul. At the end of August 386, Pontician, a high imperial official from Africa—a deeply believing Catholic—visited him. He told him about his two companions who, in Trier, had joined the order founded by St. Anthony the Great. Augustine was seized by a strong desire to do likewise as those unlearned men: "What they can do, should you not be able to do as well?"

Augustine definitively decided to abandon his previous occupation, fulfilled his last duties as a professor of rhetoric, and went to the countryside at the foot of the Alps to regain his strength and prepare for receiving baptism. In the countryside, he began writing the Soliloquies and other dialogues about the soul. The ultimate reason for his complete transformation was a certain event. One day, weeping under the influence of inner turmoil, he ran into the garden to lie down under a tree in a distant corner and pray. Then he heard from the neighboring garden the song of a child repeating the words: "Tolle, lege! - Take up and read!" Augustine took these words to himself, interpreting them as a sign of Divine Providence. He returned home and took up the Letter to the Romans. His eyes fell on random words: "Let us live decently as in the daytime, not in carousing and drunkenness, not in sexual immorality and debauchery, not in dissension and jealousy, but put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh in regard to its lusts." (Rom 13:13-14)

In this experience, he was freed from attachment to sex, and in his heart arose the desire to maintain celibacy. This experience permanently changed his life. Soon he told his mother about it, who had prayed so long for his conversion. In early March 387, he returned to Milan, where on Holy Saturday he received baptism from Bishop Ambrose along with his son Adeodatus and his friend Alypius. Family and friends decided to return to their native Africa. However, upon arriving in the port of Ostia, St. Monica fell seriously ill with fever and died.

Augustine always considered his conversion an undeserved gift from God. In the "Confessions," he addressed the errors of his youth and described the experiences that were the reason for the complete change in his life. The intention of this work was to glorify God and thank Him for guiding him through life. The feast of St. Augustine's conversion should be a day of joy and thanksgiving for the fact that God can, for everyone in the darkness of unbelief and lostness, kindle the bright light of faith, hope, and love.

#converts

A note on masculinity and purity

The greatest and hardest battle of a man is the battle for purity: thoughts, glances, touches in relation to women, and the absence of betrayals and manipulations in relation to the woman with whom he lives. If someone loses it, he fabricates an ideology that justifies it. This is what Christianity has been saying for centuries.

Betrayals, manipulations clearly testify to a lack of masculine strength and love for the wife to whom one pledged one's love. It is also proof of a lack of honor and a lack of respect for one's own words that were spoken.

Real men are mature and do not live like playboys—they take care of and cherish the woman they married and the family they have founded. Infidelity, casual flings, and Don Juanism are foreign to them.

Virtuous women won't allow themselves to be treated like that because they respect their own dignity. Today's problem in the world in the realm of chastity is immature men and immature women.

#men

Preventive war in modern context

“The concept of a ‘preventive war’ does not appear in the Catechism of the Catholic Church… It was right to resist the war and its threats of destruction. It should never be the responsibility of just one nation to make decisions for the world… Given the new weapons that make possible destructions that go beyond the combatant groups, today we should be asking ourselves if it is still licit to admit the very existence of a ‘just war.’”

Benedict XVI
https://fff.org/2008/04/17/pope-benedict-bushs-war-iraq/

*Preemptive/preventive wars have been illegal in the West since the Treaties of Westphalia (1648) - and are illegal under the UN Charter

#war