This is terrifying - Could this be the end of the Church in America?

[mandateman]

The modern times is best seen in the vision of St Don Bosco. The church in the image of a ship was being attack by all the other ships at sea. Which represented all the false religions and philosophies and the enemies of the Mystical Body. As the cannon balls struck the ship it tore open and then immediately the damage to the ship that was the church were healed.

Finally all the ships orchestrated a major attack and then from the bottom of the ocean rose up two pillars. On top of the large pillar was the Blessed Sacrament and on the smaller pillar was a statue of Our Blessed Mother. The pope steered the ship between these two pillars and chained the church to them then immediately a terrible storm came up and all the ships other then the church floundered and sunk then the storm subsided and the church was alone.

No matter the opposition from hell, government, other religions even within our own church we are guaranteed final victory. The only thing is will the victory be in spite of us or because of us. People have been waiting for a particular anti-christ when the particular person was ceasar but the anit-christ people are waiting for has always been here growing along side the church. We have the mystical Body of Christ they have a mystical body of the anti-christ which is all those who seek the destruction of the church. Lives of licence. Lives of creature comforts all joined together knowing or unknowingly.

Jesus said the kingdom of heaven was like wheat growing with the weeds that an enemy had planted. The master said let it grow with the wheat so that when pulling up the weeds some of the wheat might be lost. But in the end they will be seperated from the wheat and cast into the fire. As the Mystical Body of Christ is the wheat the anti-christ is all those weeds.

 

[wisdomseeker]

The modern times is best seen in the vision of St Don Bosco. The church in the image of a ship was being attack by all the other ships at sea. Which represented all the false religions and philosophies and the enemies of the Mystical Body. As the cannon balls struck the ship it tore open and then immediately the damage to the ship that was the church were healed.

Finally all the ships orchestrated a major attack and then from the bottom of the ocean rose up two pillars. On top of the large pillar was the Blessed Sacrament and on the smaller pillar was a statue of Our Blessed Mother. The pope steered the ship between these two pillars and chained the church to them then immediately a terrible storm came up and all the ships other then the church floundered and sunk then the storm subsided and the church was alone.

No matter the opposition from hell, government, other religions even within our own church we are guaranteed final victory. The only thing is will the victory be in spite of us or because of us. People have been waiting for a particular anti-christ when the particular person was ceasar but the anit-christ people are waiting for has always been here growing along side the church. We have the mystical Body of Christ they have a mystical body of the anti-christ which is all those who seek the destruction of the church. Lives of licence. Lives of creature comforts all joined together knowing or unknowingly.

Jesus said the kingdom of heaven was like wheat growing with the weeds that an enemy had planted. The master said let it grow with the wheat so that when pulling up the weeds some of the wheat might be lost. But in the end they will be seperated from the wheat and cast into the fire. As the Mystical Body of Christ is the wheat the anti-christ is all those weeds.

Well done, my brother.

 

[wisdomseeker]

Hesychios,

**You wrote: ** *The Church always will survive. Even when it’s institutions are compromised (and it has happened many times before) the Church survives. If necessary (and when possible), it gives rise to new institutions. There are many examples of this. Oftentimes the Church has shed it’s skin ‘like a snake’ and emerged stronger and healthier than before. It doesn’t last… there are always new crises… but the Church lives on and saves souls. *​

You are partly right, partly wrong. Indeed, the Church will survive, despite persecutions from without and dissension and apostasy from within. Our Lord Jesus Christ Himself assured us of that, i.e. that not even the very Gates of Hell can annihilate His Church. However, the same Lord who gave that assurance ("… the gates of Hell shall not prevail against it" – St. Matt. 16:18-b, Douay-Rheims-Challoner Version) posed also the question “But yet the Son of Man, when He cometh, shall He find, think you, faith on earth?” (St. Luke 18:8, Douay-Rheims-Challoner Version). Both of these statements are true, but how do they work themselves ou in history?

I recently finished reading a very interesting historical study of global Christianity, especially Christianity in antiquity and in “mediaeval” times (as they are called in the West) on up to the present in Northern Africa, the Middle East, Central Asia, and the Far East, which addresses this very issue. I refer to Philip Jenkins’ The Lost History of Christianity: the Thousand-Year Golden Age of the Church in the Middle East, Africa, and Asia, and How It Died (San Francisco, Calif.: Harper-Collins, 2008, in the series, “Harper-One”). Jenkins ackowledges the truth of what Jesus prophesied in both of those Bible passages that I cite. He shows how the Churches of Antiquity in entire regions of the world have flourished and spread to amazing geographical and demographic extent, yet then entirely disappeared in some of those areas (e.g., in Northern Africa and also in China before the 19th Century) or have been reduced to piteous levels in other regions. He also analyses why this has happened. He also takes some time and space to apply his reflections to our own current situation.

The proper question does not concern whether or not the Church will disappear, but whether it will continue to flourish, or even to continue to exist, in some areas where it has been strong until recent decades. Will the Church survive in the U. S. of A. and in the Dominion of Canada? Or will the Church flourish and expand elsewhere, e.g. continental Europe, while it atrophies or it is forcibly extinguished in English- and French-speaking North America? There are no grounds for apathy! It is not only persecution and inner dissension and rank heresy that can destroy the North American Anglophone and Francophone Church, but also a tendency in that Church to sacrifice the interests of Christian and Catholic truth to other agendas. This applies even (indeed, especially!) to the easy “civil religion” that so thoughtlessly plagues American Christianity and saps it of its strength and genuine witness and which can reduce the Church, especially when the onslaught on the Church is a combination of both of these factors (persecution and inner decline) as they ccur. So many young folk turn from the Church, recognising how toothless it has become, how irrelevant it is in dealing with current realities from a standpoint that takes what the Church and its Holy Scriptures truly say into account. Yes, the Church will survive the Gates of Hell – but will it do so only or mostly in what are “missionary areas” today, like Africa and the Far East? Will Our Lord find faith in the U. S. of A. and in the Dominion of Canada when, at last, He returns in glory?

Read Jenkins’ book and think about what he writes in it. Read the Holy Scriptures in the light of Faith, not with the blinders on of American complacency. Think, ponder, and pray about the consequences of creeping religious decline where Christianity and Catholicism itself are losing ground and relevancy. Do you want the Catholic Church to survive in your own nation and culture? The statistical indicators (those honestly calculated) are slipping. How far will they plunge? (I know that statistics are not “the whole story”, but over a long term they do tend to tell the tale.) Let’s attempt to turn things around, in our own lives and minds as well as in the Church itself in our North American nations.

Jerry Parker

Our Lord always provide an escape. just be still. No servant is greater than his Master. If Jesus suffered, so will we. we are going through a test of Faith now and days. that is ok.

I love to watch the Mass on EWTN. they have great priests who are not afraid to speak up.

Blessings.

 

[ToddM]

1. Point of research: the late Father Teilhard de Chardin, God rest him.
2. “Let not your heart be troubled.”
3. Will the gates of hell prevail after all? If so, we are on a boat long sunk.
4. I don’t have direct access to the material due to policy restraints, so I am operating second hand and playing catch up. However, I believe the above to be relevant.

In short, how many times has The Church dealt with the nothing new under the sun phenomenon?

Are we to resist the evil?

Instead, Christ is king, yes or no? We are to be like him. Kings act, know and so inspire.

This situation can be a call, a sort of bitter blessing if we use it in the right way.

What are we doing, and what should we be doing? My hypocrisy at least is that when I find myself fearful, it is that I fear death in error, not the situation that may cause my demise. Lying is easy in my case, honesty not so.

To be reactive is to be a cadaver in training. I’m not afraid of dying, just dying wrong.

God bless, and let us not just talk. Help us with our unbelief.

Oh, PS. If it makes you feel any better, IMHO, in spite of the Constitution America has long held to this ‘new’ faith. This seems more like a possible influx of it. Legions name, for now, is still secular humanism. This just prevents further personal complacency on my part, don’t know about the rest.

GB and keep