For the Love Of God let's DO something

[Edwardjohn]

Grace & Peace!

Soutane, I’m not in the same political camp as you are, nor am I a Roman Catholic. I am, however, a brother Christian. For what it’s worth, these are my thoughts on your call(s) to action:

Whether or not you you’re a fan of Marx, Guy Debord’s revision of Marxist theory in Society of the Spectacle is a fantastic cataloguing of what is wrong with contemporary late capitalist society. Part of Debord’s critique includes what is needful for a revolution to succeed–these are consciousness and relentless critique. Moreover, if the polemics of a revolution only require assent and falling into a particular party line, then consciouness and critique are missing–the revolutionary polemic must be de-polemiczed, that is, people must be empowered to be conscious and empowered to critique, they cannot be empowered to be preached to.

Lacking consciousness and critique, the revolutionary energies will be co-opted by the structures of sameness and separation that characterize much of modern life. For instance, it is absurd on a number of levels that people should be wearing Che Guevara t-shirts. But what enables them to do so? The idea of Che as a revolutionary is being sold to people who would very much like to participate in a revolutionary feeling or idea. Instead of acting on this idea, they are empowered by the social structure to purchase the image of the idea and are encouraged to view the image as the reality. The proliferation of Che Guevara t-shirts doesn’t mean that the people wearning them are pro-communist or pro-Cuba or pro-torture or pro-revolution. It means the social structures of disempowerment are working as they should, reifying and commodifying desire.

The exercise of consciousness and critique must be relentless and also self-directed, that is, aimed at ourselves as well. If we agree with Philip Zimbardo in his researches that social evil is not a matter of bad apples in a good barrel, but bad barrels corrupting good apples, then we have to realize that the structures of our lives that we take for granted–commerce, leisure, politics, entertainment, popular religion, our very understanding of history–are likely all engaged on a common exercise which is fundamentally one of disempowerment. As Noam Chomsky insists–power and power structures must always be forced to justify their existence–if they cannot or if their justifications are ludicrous or ineffectual, power and its structures must be dismantled.

HOWEVER! In Christian terms, there can never be a successful social revolution in which the end result is just another social realm. Which is to say–we are called to transform the social into this thing we call Ecclesia. The social will always be the realm of separation and alienation, of us and them, of this or that clique, of I and other. But Ecclesia is participation in the body of God.

And here are the revolutionary tools of the Christian: poverty, chastity, and obedience. Because these three practices totally disarm and disrupt the competing patterns of desire which make up the World and the common social realm. And here it’s important to remember that obedience is not blind obedience, but is related to an active and engaged listening and responding.

And what is the fuel that makes poverty, chastity and obedience run? Grace. And what does grace enables us to do? Love. And who does the practice of Love make us resemble? God, the source of all Love and Grace.

Which is all to say this: a revolution in which lines are drawn, territories mapped out, us and them made more clear is a romantic idea. But it’s nothing new. And it’s fruit will not be anything new either. What’s needed is a recognition that the structures of power that we cling to and hold as precious are illusions, patterns of desire that create a particular architecture of living in which life has become unbearable if not impossible. We are all in the same boat here. There is no us or them. We have to become conscious and critical. We have to practice poverty, chastity and obedience. We have to be love in the World, transforming it into the radical participation in Reality itself that characterizes Ecclesia.

At least that’s my Christian, semi-Situationist, post-Marxist, anarcho-sympathetic view of things…

Under the Mercy,
Mark

All is Grace & Mercy! Deo Gratias!

The Hollow Men
T. S. Eliot
Mistah Kurtz—he dead.

  A penny for the Old Guy

  I

We are the hollow men
We are the stuffed men
Leaning together
Headpiece filled with straw. Alas!
Our dried voices, when
We whisper together
Are quiet and meaningless
As wind in dry grass
Or rats’ feet over broken glass
In our dry cellar

Shape without form, shade without colour,
Paralysed force, gesture without motion;

Those who have crossed
With direct eyes, to death’s other Kingdom
Remember us—if at all—not as lost
Violent souls, but only
As the hollow men
The stuffed men.

 

[Deo_Volente]

Grace & Peace!

The Hollow Men
T. S. Eliot
Mistah Kurtz—he dead.

A penny for the Old Guy

Hi! Not sure if you quoted the lovely Eliot in sympathy or criticism, but it works nicely in both directions and I appreciate either way it was meant!

Under the Mercy,
Mark

All is Grace and Mercy! Deo Gratias!

 

[Mr_Sun]

I get you man, I am planning on making flyers and bringing the Church into the tech age when I get older. Spread the good word online rapidly rather through communities only.

I believe I am fighting for my Lord in the only way I know how at the age of 16. Making things out of my graphic design talent and believe me, I am GOOD at it! Im full of dreams and I want to be involved with Multimedia when I get older and choose it as a career but I know that will be a long and tedious process.

I would love to see people into revolution. To bring back our Country to its earlier and happier days before the modern era. But then you have so many people who are afraid to cause upset.

If we can learn one good thing from the Westboro Baptist Church is the way they present themselves worldwide. However they do it in a negative way.

 

[MrZetterlund]

The time for civil disobedience and personal revolution is here.We must be willing to be persecuted and jailed for our faith as ST Paul was and suffer literal crucifixtion if we must.All this whinging and complaining on these Catholic boards is beginning to sicken me.We are speaking to the converted or arguing about how many angels can dance on the head of a pin-it strikes me a Pharasical.Christ didn’t argue HE DID.So did His apostles and every single one was martyred except John…Let’s not emulate the Muslims but Ghandi and offer up our bodies and become figurative and literal martyrs.Let us conduct worldwide sit ins and passive resistance.Some will be hurt and some will die but ENOUGH!!!
You Americans where is your revolutionary spirit?.The greatest flag in the world is the coiled rattlesnake with "don’t tread on me"Perhaps one of the Body,Blood.Soul and Divinity with the same slogan is more apropos.The time for talk is over.the time for action is now.I don’t have a clue as to how one can start a movement but historically movements were started by the Faithful.Now is the time for or a Crusade against immoral secularism and the sidelining of Christianity.Christians are in the vast majority in both our countries but we feel alone and isolated and helpless.For GOD"S SAKE let’s DO SOMETHING.Come on we have smart powerful professional people here-LET IT BEGIN HERE…

I agree with doing something, I disagree with not arguing. But I do agree on mot arguing so much on CAF and not in real life. Jesus did argue to teach those who had knowledge of Scripture. We should rationalize with Muslims because there’s this one guy who’s very notorious in Iraq for “debunking” the Bible. He’s obviously wrong in every lecture I’ve watched of his. And no other Muslim apologetics are that far ahead of him.
We also need to stop persecuting Muslims by envoking our emotions due to recent terrorism. It’s hard to imagine a terrorist as another human being sometimes, isn’t it?

 

[OraLabora]

I am sick of the endless complaining,whinging,pacifism and handwringing on this board and others about the secular demonization of Catholicism in particular and Christianity in general.Bullies DON"T CARE ABOUT PLANTING TREES AND SINGING KUMBAYA.If that’s what you want to do join a contemplative order.

The thing is, the contemplative orders point the way on how to be “in this world, but not of this world”. I think the OP is suggesting that we no longer collaborate with the secular, and increasingly sick, world. And I am inclined to agree with that.

That implies being counter-cultural. And that means being in the world but not “worldly”. It means being in this world, and being “other-worldly”, that is of the world known as the Kingdom of God.

It is one reason I chose to become a Benedictine secular oblate: to withdraw from my attachments to worldly things. Not all at once, but gradually, and at the same time cementing my ties to things that are part of the Kingdom of God: God Himself in the person of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit; next my family, then all of humanity considering that, as Saint Benedict said, we should greet everyone as if we were greeting Christ Himself in person.

Without the contemplative orders to serve as an example, I am not certain how we would attain this. They are a great treasure to the Church, through their prayer and example.

It is very hard these days, living in the secular world, to avoid cooperation with evil. It becomes an almost daily occurrence. In my work for instance, in past years, I have been asked to do some very unethical things (including committing fraud to get a large customer to pay for something he wasn’t really getting or misrepresenting myself as a customer to gather competitive information), getting the message “everyone does it”.

I think the OP is suggesting that in the spirit of Gandhi, we say “no” to cooperation with evil, even if it means putting our jobs and our freedom, and ultimately our lives, on the line.

I suggest that prayer is a good way to start detaching yourself from this world. I pray the Liturgy of the Hours each and every day in a small oratory I have built in my home office, and it is a place where I can indeed detach myself from the secular world and place myself, even if only for a a brief 90 or so minutes a day, into His.

Any of the radically effective saints in our history (think Mother Teresa for example), have said that prayer and contemplation are necessary, vital elements to doing God’s hard work in an indifferent and even hostile world. We could do worse than adding a contemplative dimension to our lives, even to those who take a very activist approach.

 

[Edwardjohn]

Grace & Peace!

Hi! Not sure if you quoted the lovely Eliot in sympathy or criticism, but it works nicely in both directions and I appreciate either way it was meant!

Under the Mercy,
Mark

All is Grace and Mercy! Deo Gratias!

It’s as true now as it was then. The key word; “We”.

 

[edwest2]

“It’s time for Revolution, my brothers and sisters!” Where did I hear this before? Oh yes, the late 1960s when Hippies threatened to burn this country down!

No, we must follow in the footsteps of the Prince of Peace. But it is very important to understand how we got here.

First, our trust was abused. As a Catholic growing up in the late 1950s and 1960s, I was not taught how to manipulate people. I was not taught how to take advantage of people. I was not taught how to lead others astray.

The first thing people should realize that while not perfect, that time period was one where Catholics had the open support of the Federal Government, who regularly told us we were in a struggle with Godless Communism. No one complained about the Nativity in front of the local City Hall, and restraint was shown in film and television. For the most, our society, our culture and our media reflected traditional Christian values. Yes, we trusted the government a lot more and the stranger. People did not cuss and swear in public, men and women dressed modestly and dating did not mean sex. Unmarried couples did not live together. Our beliefs were manifested in our daily lives. Neighbor helped neighbor. No, it was not perfect but it did tend in that direction. People tried and mostly succeeded in doing what was right.

Then the attack began but it was subtle. We were taken in by people regarded as “experts” and by strangers who wore colorful, non-average clothing who called themselves Hippies.

The primary attack was focused on destroying the family by encouraging what a few called “sexual freedom.” This was gradually expanded upon in the decades to follow.

In 1968, Pope Paul VI issued the encyclical, Humanae Vitae, on the regulation of births. Contrary to what you may have heard about women in the 1950s being always barefoot and pregnant, I was born in the mid 1950s and the average number of kids in my neighborhood was T W O. That’s right. Divorce was rare. Abortion was rare.

Now, the Church told men that we know The Pill will tempt you. You will regard the love of your life less. And if you do not heed this warning, promiscuity will follow. Guess what? All of those Hippies started yelling “Free love!” Sex with anyone. Marriage didn’t matter. “Don’t trust anyone over 30!” Mom, dad, priests, nuns, they don’t know anything.

The Hippies became the role models for some. And they introduced young people to speed, LSD, and smoking marijuana.

Continued —

 

[edwest2]

In 1969, Hollywood released the movie, Bob, Carol, Ted and Alice. A movie about wife swapping. It was regarded as strange, an anomoly and not representative of what the average person does, but artists were saying they wanted to present studies of what they called controversial subjects and mature themes in a “serious” and intellectual way. We thought their motivativation was “artistic.”

1970s A small group of lawyers, judges and members of organized crime decided to make it legal to make and sell magazines and movies that showed prostitutes, and Adult Bookstores appeared across the country, causing primarily men to become addicted to porn.

Topless go-go bars appeared, obviously to further encourage men to view women only as sex objects. Both were not supported by Christians who did protest, but the pornographers yelled “freedom of speech and expression.” It was OK to leer at topless young women, and in an attempt to dignify the undignified, they often referred to their establishments as “Gentlemen’s Clubs.”

Abortion is legalized in 1973, but right before that, women appeared on TV with the following: “Please, please, please have compassion for young women dying in back alley abortions. It will only be used in cases of emergency like rape, incest and to save the life of the mother.” And they added this to convince Christian voters: “Abortion is likely the most difficult decision a woman will ever have to make and is between her and her god.” Uh huh. You’ll notice God is nowhere to be seen today

Also in 1973, a small group of gay activists, by non-scientific vote, got homosexuality removed as a disorder by the American Psychological Association. Poof, it’s gone.

In 1978, the National Organization for Women encourages women to view themselves as the eternal victims of the eternal enemy - Men. Men who are your bosses, the men who run the Catholic Church and any other church. Men are called “male chauvenist pigs.” NOW succeeds in convincing some women to be suspicious, distrustful and even antagonistic towards men.

NOW does not teach men and women to better understand each other or how to solve their problems. They teach women how to become a group that is separate from men. That’s why colleges offer courses in Women’s Studies, and Women’s Culture. By building a wall of division between men and women, they make it easier to divide the family against itself, and set the stage for the next step in destroying the family.

No-Fault Divorce completes its sweep of the country in the 1980s. Who cares about the kids? Dad yelled at mom yesterday and she’s filing for divorce. Movies encourage men to get divorced. A typical scene is a guy walking into a bar to tell his buddies he just got divorced. Instead of feeling bad, his buddies tell him he’ll find someone “better” – what? The guy picked the wrong girl in the first place? Prior to this, marriage was taken very seriously by all parties and the families of the husband and the wife. You did not marry her before sitting down with her Dad who had been a teenager himself and knew about the effects of hormones on his daughter and the guy sitting across from him. He would discourage his daughter from marrying a drunk or a bum, and tell her she could change her mind at any time, up to and including the wedding itself.

But, as the culture became more dysfunctional and sexualized, I’m confused and saddened when porn ends up on cable and the local motel. I ask myself, at the time, who is allowing this? Who said this was OK? I’m watching DALLAS and there’s Sue Ellen drinking liquor straight out of the bottle while driving. This would never had been shown on TV just a few years before.

But you know what? We kept getting told that artists and writers wanted more “realism” and desired to present more “mature” themes in the arts. Stupid Catholics. Some of us, including me, believed them. After all, they had provided us with great movies and TV shows in the past, and we, including me, did not think it was ‘that bad.’

Bad mistake, since it kept getting worse. By the 1990s, it was very clear that the media was expanding on profanity and graphic sexuality. Shock jocks appeared spewing filth and interviewing prostitutes referred to as ‘porn stars.’ Church parking lots emptied and mall parking lots filled up. The “Me Generation” decided it was all about me. Too many Catholics began to live like agnostics, with only a vague relationship with God.

The radicals of the late 1960s wanted us to like what they liked and do what they did. The American Civil Liberties Union woke up one day and started yelling “illegal” and started emptying public buildings of religious paintings, statues and other monuments that had been there for decades. They “allowed” Christmas displays in front of public buildings but only if they were watered down with Santa, reindeer and snowmen, And, the ACLU claimed, they were only out to protect the rights of religious people!!

A local town passed an ordinance that stores were allowed to play religious music on speakers mounted outside their stores but not the words! Someone walking by might be offended!!

So, to my fellow Catholics, here are my suggestions:

Pray and stand in front of the local abortion clinic. If you are a woman and are trained or have a heart to speak in love to those young women, ask God for guidance and do it. Go to Project Rachel and the Priests for Life web sites.

Vote against embryonic stem cell research. Support Adult Stem Cell research which is ethical and which has given us treatments. Remember, embryonic stem cells are foreign material and will be rejected by the recipient’s body.

Go to the National Catholic Bioethics Center site and learn:

ncbcenter.org/NetCommunity/Page.aspx?pid=183

Continued —

 

[edwest2]

Encourage people to stop watching fictional stories on TV. Desperate Housewives should be called Dysfunctional Housewives. Grey’s Anatomy shows an attractive youg doctor going to a bar, picking up a man for anonymous sex and not caring to get his name. This in an era where AIDS is still a big problem and she’s supposed to be a doctor? Even a fictional character should not be portrayed as being so stupid. And if the next anonymous guy she encounters kills her, what do her friends tell police? “Uh. She never gets the names of the guys she has sex with.” Even dumber.

And all those people who say that if you don’t like what’s on TV to simply turn it off or change the channel. Think about that. Does that mean we should ignore what is being shown and said? Those who produce dysfunctional, perverted and offensive programming should not be left off the hook. Let the FCC know that such programs do not fit your community standards (fcc.gov).

God bless,
Ed

 

[prodigalson12]

We need a working game plan, some of the things mentioned sound good, nice start there.

We must prepare before we can do any kind of mobilization regardless, both Catholic and Protestants alike.

I’ve placed my focus within the church itself, such as getting the people to show respect and reverence for those in prayer. I was in my local parish, praying some of the rosary at Mary’s shrine area, some ladies are in the back, gabbing away loudly, typical behavior these days. At the end of my prayers, upon leaving, I spoke up, loud enough to be heard “people, you can keep it down while people are praying”. when I attend mass next, after the end of my prayers, I will address the priest himself, and tell him it is not appreciated at all for the loud chatting at the end of mass, not while there are people praying.

You see what I mean, it’s not a passive element that’s leading this one, yet it is at the same time. We have to be of one body in order to do this, right now we are very fragmented, and we must speak up, there are many abuses and irrevencies going on, and simply allowing it to happen, saying nothing is the same as endorsing them.

So, this itself is what the other poster references with changing one’s heart, we must do so, otherwise what we have, force wise will be quickly muted.

 

[Deo_Volente]

Grace & Peace!

“It’s time for Revolution, my brothers and sisters!” [snip]

Edwest, I can certainly appreciate the depth of your convictions, but I htink your analysis is flawed. And the flaw lies in two assumptions: 1) that the times we live in are extraordinary; 2) that progress (for good or ill) is a fact. Both assumptions are untrue.

The more one looks at history, the more it becomes clear that the only thing that changes is the scenery. We may have made great technological advances of late, but that’s just a backdrop against which the human drama continues to be played. That’s not progress. And the players in the drama, people themselves, are neither better nor worse than they were 100, 200, 500, or 1500 years ago. History is more of a circle than a straight line–as Edwardjohn’s signature reads, the only thing we learn from history as that we learn nothing from history. We keep thinking it’s going somewhere, for good or ill. It’s not.

Do you think de Sade’s 120 Days of Sodom is more uplifting than Gray’s Anatomy? Would he, do you think, blush at today’s TV shows? Would any Roman sybarite blanch at the state of morals today, or would the participants in the Vatican’s notorious “Banquet of Chestnuts” be scandalized by what plays in the local theater? Would Gilles de Rais be surprised by our media? Would the architects of the Terror in France be put off by our politics and think them immoral? Would the builders of any Babylonian pleasure garden fail to see their own image in a red light district? Would Heliogabalus react with shocked amazement at contemporary pornography? Would Nero? The anwer to all these questions is: no.

The best gloss on all of this is Ecclesiastes: there is nothing new under the sun. And all is vanity. Vanity of vanities. And that’s the world. That’s history. That’s the Fall.

How did we get to where we are now? It didn’t start in the '60’s. It started with the first person who said, “my will be done.”

Under the Mercy,
Mark

All is Grace and Mercy! Deo Gratias!

 

[Edwardjohn]

Amen to edwest2 and prodigalson12. The time has come. The Holy Spirit is stirring hearts. Could this thread be the start of a spiritual revival in the Church? Can we keep this thread going until the Lord returns with updates, actions, etc.?

 

[OraLabora]

Edwest, I can certainly appreciate the depth of your convictions, but I htink your analysis is flawed. And the flaw lies in two assumptions: 1) that the times we live in are extraordinary; 2) that progress (for good or ill) is a fact. Both assumptions are untrue.

The more one looks at history, the more it becomes clear that the only thing that changes is the scenery.

Excellent point. Praying the Liturgy of the Hours, and therefore the Psalms, every day, I long ago concluded that the only difference between the era of the psalmist, and our era, was that we seem to be in more of a hurry or at least technological change has stepped up the pace of our sins.

But the fact is that the same sins, lusts, hatreds, violence, wars, idolatry of material wealth, etc etc and lots of etceteras, existed as much 4000 years ago as now.

We are just as human now, just as reluctant to accept the word of God now, as we were 4000 and even 2000 years ago.

After all humanity was evil enough to crucify God then. Humanity would probably be just as eager to crucify Him today as we were 2000 years ago.

 

[JohnCS]

65% of American Catholics voted for Obama… the revolution should start with prayer right now, then move into the election booths. If we continue to vote party line instead of who will most likely support God’s truth and way of life, then we can hoot and hollar all day long online and nothing will change. If you fear that society and the government are out to silence us (which can seem likely) then it is up to us to take them out of power. Elections are a good starting point though!

 

[Edwardjohn]

Thank the Lord for Soutane starting this thread. Now, even with different viewpoints, hearts are being stirred. Seriously, this could be the start of something mightily good.

 

[edwest2]

Grace & Peace!

Edwest, I can certainly appreciate the depth of your convictions, but I htink your analysis is flawed. And the flaw lies in two assumptions: 1) that the times we live in are extraordinary; 2) that progress (for good or ill) is a fact. Both assumptions are untrue.

The more one looks at history, the more it becomes clear that the only thing that changes is the scenery. We may have made great technological advances of late, but that’s just a backdrop against which the human drama continues to be played. That’s not progress. And the players in the drama, people themselves, are neither better nor worse than they were 100, 200, 500, or 1500 years ago. History is more of a circle than a straight line–as Edwardjohn’s signature reads, the only thing we learn from history as that we learn nothing from history. We keep thinking it’s going somewhere, for good or ill. It’s not.

Do you think de Sade’s 120 Days of Sodom is more uplifting than Gray’s Anatomy? Would he, do you think, blush at today’s TV shows? Would any Roman sybarite blanch at the state of morals today, or would the participants in the Vatican’s notorious “Banquet of Chestnuts” be scandalized by what plays in the local theater? Would Gilles de Rais be surprised by our media? Would the architects of the Terror in France be put off by our politics and think them immoral? Would the builders of any Babylonian pleasure garden fail to see their own image in a red light district? Would Heliogabalus react with shocked amazement at contemporary pornography? Would Nero? The anwer to all these questions is: no.

The best gloss on all of this is Ecclesiastes: there is nothing new under the sun. And all is vanity. Vanity of vanities. And that’s the world. That’s history. That’s the Fall.

How did we get to where we are now? It didn’t start in the '60’s. It started with the first person who said, “my will be done.”

Under the Mercy,
Mark

All is Grace and Mercy! Deo Gratias!

Hi Mark,

Thank you for your thoughtful reply. First of all, most people do not live in reality but in a perception culture. Their perceptions are guided by a media that feeds them news every day and by the culture. If you look at current illiteracy and functional illiteracy, not counting those who choose not to read, you have a populace that has been trained to view many things in a superficial way.

Your historical references are meaningless except perhaps to those in their lates 40’s or 50’s.

The illusion of progress is kept alive by what I call the International Conspiracy of Relabelers and Signmakers. One day, there is a sign with the word, Personnel, a little later, Human Resources. I am not talking about political correctness - a meaningless term as far as I’m concerned. I am talking about the deliberate manipulation of perception that I see all the time, including here.

A box of cereal gets a new package and the word new, hairstyles change, car styling changes, a clique in the fashion industry selects a body type and presents it relentlessly as the new standard for ‘beauty.’

I find it very relevant to point out the things I do for two primary reasons.

1. The devil repackages deception constantly. And by working through men, he uses new mediums to spread his deceptions. Recently, radio, movies, television and now, the internet. The Catholic Church has tried to address these new media since the 1930s, but all it took was getting a handful of key people to just say yes and pornography has spread to a degree not possible in the past.
2. Some Catholics do not know how we got here and a few are even blaming Vatican II for our current ills. What they don’t know is that the changes attributed to Vatican II were not authorized by Vatican II.

As a Baby Roomer, I represent the biggest and most educated part of the population. My fellow Boomers are out there, reading this. I want them to see why and how they were manipulated. I want them to see a list of the events that gradually broke with a past that was good for society, Catholic and non-Catholic alike.

It cannot be overemphasized that key people manipulated individuals and groups in the Catholic community. Those outside and inside the Catholic community that chose to subvert it also need mentioning.

Some Catholics do not understand that as we were taught to love our neighbor as ourselves, that a few of those neighbors decided to take advantage of that trust and gradually, and gently, lead some of us by the hand to a bad place. In 1968, some priests signed a letter against the encyclical Humanae Vitae, against the writing of Pope Paul VI. Only in the last year have a few come to regret their decision. Catholics should know about that as well.

God bless,
Ed

 

[Soutane]

To read half these comments on this thread is to listen to the Jews “in authority” who dithered and argued while their confreres were being deported to auschwits from the Warsau Ghetto.Well finally the Jews of the Ghetto rose up and kicked the heck out of the Nazi’s.Like Masada,they lost but they won.
I’m not advocating Physical violence but Ghandi-like peaceful non-compliance and protest.Look at the homosexuals and how effective they are.Look at the women’s movement and how successful they were.There are over 1,000,000,000,000(billion )of us and if 5% rose up spiritually and collectively said “We’re mad as hell and we’re not going to take it any more”!Governments would crumble and would consult with US instead of the minority seculars of the world about laws etc.
Mao(shudder)said the long march began with moving one foot forward.
I repeat I am not advocating violence but silent witness,peaceful civil disobedience and telling Caesar to stuff it when he presumes too much and he DOES presume too much.We are being elbowed out of the public square and our voices are being silenced.Why do you think the atheists are being so bold because we are COWED and unwilling to stand up for Christ and the Truth.Prayer is required Contempletives are required but don’t get in our way.The time is ripe for direct Action.Surely to God there are some Rich Catholics out there who can sponsor a grassroots organization that will spread like wildfire.I repeat-there are over 1 billion of Catholics alone,let alone another half billion of our seperated brethren.I’m sure there are devout Jews and others who would be enthusiastic about this.My Parish priest says "be in the world,not of it"We can BECOME the world!I’m not talking about a theocracy but I’m sick of being sidelined and watching governments, courts,and special interest groups dictate morality and indoctrinate our children in modernist filth.Look at who participates in Pro-life Marches-The Young!These young people are fervent in their faith and they shame us complacent"I’m all right,Jack"Catholics.
Jesus Christ was NOT a pacifist.Look at what he did when His Father’s House was defiled.The world is HIS FATHER’S HOUSE.Let’s take it back bit by bit through activism.God helps those who help themselves.Whether you want to acknowledge it or not we are in a war and WE ARE LOSING-Gird your loins pick up your weapons(the Rosary) and elbow your way back INTO the public square.A hero dies once,a coward dies a thousand deaths(spiritually)We need Martyrs.We need Saints.NO Saint was EVER a coward.Emulate St Catharine of Alexandria or Blessed Miguel Pro or the Christians thrown to the lions but for the sake of God let’s DO something.

 

[AnthonytheGreat]

Anyone want to help make some Catholic advertisements, issue ads, etc to help this effort?

I have an HD video camera, professional audio gear and editing software.

Could use writers, I am good at the technical stuff but not so much writing material and story boarding.

This would be a good way to get the message out via youtube and other video outlets, I can also burn both standard and blu-ray dvds.

 

[LilyM]

.Surely to God there are some Rich Catholics out there who can sponsor a grassroots organization that will spread like wildfire.I repeat-there are over 1 billion of Catholics alone,let alone another half billion of our seperated brethren.

Can’t let this go without a comment. What makes you think you need someone who’s rich to sponsor you? I don’t know any successful grassroots organisation that sat and twiddled its thumbs until it had a rich sponsor to start up. The internet is free, and is a great tool for publicity - use it, and start now.

Begin by contacting the churches in your local area. Tell them about your ideas, ask if you can advertise in the bulletin to seek like-minded people to help you. Approach the local diocese, ask for their support and help in promoting your schemes. Contact your local religious houses - monasteries, convents etc. They can often be a good source of manpower.

Most of us know someone who’s skilled at creating webpages and the like - use them to get your message out there. Email letters to the editors of your local newspapers, your local tv and radio stations and your local poliitcians, that’s free as well.

Then go global!

 

[Soutane]

Can’t let this go without a comment. What makes you think you need someone who’s rich to sponsor you? I don’t know any successful grassroots organisation that sat and twiddled its thumbs until it had a rich sponsor to start up. The internet is free, and is a great tool for publicity - use it, and start now.

Begin by contacting the churches in your local area. Tell them about your ideas, ask if you can advertise in the bulletin to seek like-minded people to help you. Approach the local diocese, ask for their support and help in promoting your schemes. Contact your local religious houses - monasteries, convents etc. They can often be a good source of manpower.

Most of us know someone who’s skilled at creating webpages and the like - use them to get your message out there. Email letters to the editors of your local newspapers, your local tv and radio stations and your local poliitcians, that’s free as well.

Then go global!

Not to sponsor ME.I don’t have the first clue about organizing,public relations etc.I think that all your suggestions are valid and I will pursue them but we need knowledgeable competent generals to gather our forces and I know my limitations.What’s wrong with contacting the Founder of Domino’s Pizza for goodness sake.He built a Catholic Town did he not?
Look at the atheist homosexual billionaire who sponsors all kinds of anti-Christian measures.We need the equivalent.God gave certain Catholics certain resources,we should enlist them.I’m deadly serious here-this is not a pipe-dream.We ALL need to work on this somehow,because God IS WITH US.I’m not a prophet,a general,an orator but I am an angry Catholic who KNOWS that something MUST be done.What exactly I’m not sure but there are brilliant devout Catholics here and in the world who know how to do this.Help us find them.