Author: Odon De Castro

Grace works on this principle: he who does not progress, retrogresses. God gives us grace every second. This grace contains three elements: the will of God, how to do the will of God and the strength to do God’s will. God does this every second so we move towards Him every second by responding favorably to these graces.

It also works on a negative way in that Grace tells us what is contrary to the Will of God, how to avoid it and the strength to avoid it. Every second God, through His grace, tells us what good we must do and what evil we must avoid, how to go about doing each and the strength to obey His graces.

But these graces does not come every second…unless we respond favorably to it. When we reject His promptings He withholds it to encourage us to ask for it in prayer thus the necessity for unceasing prayer in asking God to respond favorably to it.

Every second God presents to us the good we must do and the evil we must avoid. Sometimes He presents to us consecutive goods to do or consecutive evils we must avoid. So we need graces to do the consecutive goods God presents to us and graces to avoid the consecutive evils we have to avoid. Since these goods and evil comes in floods and graces (to do good and avoid evil) can only from God, if you are following my reasoning we would need to pray unceasingly.

The choice between the good we must do and the evil we must avoid does not cease. It is continuous. God constantly presenting the good and the devil presenting the evil. Now comes the problem, one cannot pray unceasingly in the world with all its destruction. More often than not, man misses the good he must do (if he is without God’s grace) and does the evil he must avoid (which is natural without grace.)

In fact, in the example of Christ, he demonstrated to us how to develop the habit of unceasing prayer during His 30 years of hidden life, before he went into the world (though He had the unceasing presence of God all the time.) That is why He overcame Satan in the desert. Without this habit of prayer it is impossible to walk through the world safely. What most people have is sporadic prayer. That won’t work.

The first monks, inspired by angels, tried developing this by reciting 150 psalms a day and keeping that attitude of prayer in between the divine office. That is impossible for most people, even for most monks today. That’s why Pope Benedict keeps on repeating the importance of prayer in his addresses to the Bishop. If they don’t do it, they won’t receive the grace to know God’s will, one of which is to pray. Without knowing how to pray, how can they teach people how to get those graces. Without those graces men will find it impossible to do good and avoid evil.

When we heard that the Pope would be going to Turkey, our panic button went wild. Why take such an unnecessry risk?! Now we hear him planning to go to Jerusalem and visit Gaza, there goes our panic button again! Why? Is this really needed?

Because He is the Pope, he must go about doing his act of love for Christ by feeding Christ’s lamb and sheep. And he knows his theology of grace which he has summarized in the first five items of his Compendium of the Catechism.

The Holy Father is always an external source of grace. This grace is given to those he gets in contact with in any way and has three effects on the recipients. First, it reveals to the soul what is the will of God. Secondly it makes the soul love the will of God. And thirdly, it gives the soul the strength to do the will of God. But, of course, the free will of the soul must give its stamp of approval to the grace of God. Just by going to those places mentioned above the Pope knows he is a Mediator of graces…..even without speaking. So much more when he speaks!

He also knows that if there is any one who has any evil design towards His holiness, the free will of that evil doer is under the control of God. For a person to sin he needs the permissive will of God. Without that permission, no one can do evil to anyone. God can even give such a person efficient graces to make him do good instead of evil, as what happened to St. Paul. So why worry since everything is in God’s hands?

It is for the same reason that the late Pope John Paul II was holding those much maligned ecumenical prayers at St. Francis church. He was not giving approval to the other religions or sects. He was allowing himself to be an instrument of God’s grace for the participants and for the whole non-catholic world. We can only understand such acts if we understand the theology of grace.

The documentary “Into the Great Silence” has caused waves around the world. But sadly, one comment was : “I just want to to go to heaven the ordinary way. That life is not for me.” If one truly understood the theology of grace, one would see that all the things the monks did had to be done in order to enter Heaven. And if any monk there left the monastery, the reason would simply be that ‘he did not learn the theology of grace;’ which shows the necessity of what the monks were doing: they were just responding to the movement of grace.

Pope Benedict is not worried that the Church is disappearing from Europe and other parts of the world because he knows that God is not remiss in sending the needed graces for those meant to be saved. And with all the problems besetting the world today the Holy Father knows that those who respond favorably to the graces that God gives will know exactly what to do, will love to do His Will and will have the strength to do the right thing, while the rest of the world will continue to go on panic mode!

The Jesuits are commonly believed to have been established by St. Ignatius and the Franciscans by St. Francis of Assisi; the Dominicans by St. Dominic and the Redemptorists by St. Alphonsus of Liguori. But Monasticism is the replication of the Holy Family and a direct product of Pentecost.

In this short treatise, let me attempt to describe how, lately in our times, many priests have deteriorated into becoming “gays” or “pedophiles;” and how they can eventually be restored to be competent priests at the service of Holy Mother the Church.

First, let us recall one general principle of the Spiritual life, the violation of which leads to perversion, while obedience to it will cure all perversions and lead one to holiness of life.

This general principle often mentioned by St. Thomas of Aquinas is this: “He who does not progress in the spiritual life will regress.” The need to progress every second and every minute in the spiritual life is often referred to by great spiritual writers as “the sacrament of the present moment,” and was the “Little Way” of St. Therese of Lisieux, Doctor of the Church.

Now let us look at the different levels of human existence. There is the SUPERNATURAL level, which is when a person is in the state of sanctifying grace. Then there is the NATURAL level, which is the state of Adam and Eve after the fall and the state of souls without sanctifying grace. And lastly, there is the unnatural level which includes all perversions mentioned in Scriptures like the sins of Sodom and Gomorrha. (Let us skip the finer nuances of each level for the sake of brevity and deal with them in future.)

Applying the above principle of the spiritual life, he who progresses in the spiritual life within the SUPERNATURAL level will never regress down to the NATURAL AND UNNATURAL level. But he who does not progress towards the SUPERNATURAL level will regress down to the NATURAL level and even faster yet down to the UNNATURAL level.

Original sin is the inherited state in which, deprived of sanctifying grace, all men are born with the tendency to go down to the unnatural level.

Take a typical seminarian. Having been being baptized at infancy, he received sanctifying grace which raised him to the SUPERNATURAL level. This grace was what made him desire to serve God in the priesthood. But then because of a worldly way of life, he unawarely regresses down to the NATURAL level. But because he is still attracted to the priesthood, he still manages to enter the seminary in this NATURAL state. If, while in the seminary, any desire he has to love God is increased through sound teachings and deep spiritual life, he will progress from the natural level, and climb up the SUPERNATURAL LEVEL. And if this progress continues because the seminary continues to teach sound doctrine on the spiritual life, he will have no problem in becoming holy and an asset to the Church.

Another hypothetical case. If this baptized seminarian has lost sanctifying grace because of his worldly life, he enters the seminary in the NATURAL level. If there is a good theological curriculum in the seminary, but have a poor, or worse, no program in spirituality, he will NOT progress to the Supernatural level. So he remains as a seminarian in the NATURAL level. Though he could still desire to be a priest, he will have a strong tendency to regress. And the first sign of this regression is his desire to marry, though he may or may not retain a desire to remain a priest. This desire to marry shows that he is in the natural level.

If the seminary cannot raise him to the SUPERNATURAL level, they should encourage him to leave and marry because the Sacrament of Matrimony is precisely for that purpose: to keep him in the NATURAL level and prevent him from deteriorating down to the UNNATURAL level, with the hope that in the future he can progress again up to the SUPERNATURAL level, even as a married man.

But if the seminary does not have a good program of spirituality, thus preventing his spiritual progress that will cause his eventual spiritual regression, and they do not encourage him to marry, even when he has shown signs that he desires marriage, he will soon regress and descend to the UNNATURAL level.

Then the environment in the seminary will dictate the kind of perversion he will fall into. If his environment is with the presence of young children, he could turn out to be a pedophile. If his environment is just a seminary of men who would be priests, but does not offer the right curriculum as stated above; and because he is surrounded by men only (often not observing modesty) then he could regress to becoming gay. The culprit? A non-existent program of spirituality, thereby creating an environment conducive to homosexuality, i.e. the very ambience of present seminaries. Because the seminarian was not progressing in spirituality he regressed towards perversion.

The “reverse” of this sad plight of most seminaries, which is to progress every second and every minute in the love of God, is both the cure and the way to holiness. St. Therese showed this to us in her “Little Way,” wherein she could make every tiny, insignificant acts into acts of love for God because her monastery had the right environment that could encourage progress in the spiritual life : a life of prayer, fasting, and good works.(Painting of “Sodom and Gomorrah” by Alte Pinakothek.)

The Liturgy of the Church is a chronological lesson on the Plan of Salvation made by God. It consists in the major mysteries in the Life of Christ which contain lessons for our imitation. The surrounding liturgies of these major mysteries explain the same mysteries in detail and how we can put them into practice.

God made Adam and Eve, a wife subject to the husband, as the first type of the Church. However, after the fall, the way to enter that elementary church was for the woman to bear children and for the man to till the soil.

1. There is so much talk about reason and faith among Catholic intellectuals. But much of them are easily misunderstood or misinterpreted precisely because there is no right reasoning; and the sad consequence? There is no faith.

2. The Catholic Church is the only institution that loves to use right (or sound)reasoning, and preserves it. Other philosophies or pseudo-religions either hate it or forbids the use of it. If a philosophy or religion is suspected of error, its promoters will forbid the use of reason lest their errors be discovered. Sometimes this prohibition comes in the form of forbidding their followers to analyze their beliefs. Or sometimes they forbid them to study other beliefs. Or some resort to downright threat of capital punishment for wanting to discover the truth or analyze one’s error. Now that is terribly unreasonable!

3. Fortunately, (though unfortunately for many), Truth is supernatural, i.e. it is over and above natural human reason. Commonly referred to as Divine Revelation, we would need divine grace to know and obey it. But we need a functioning reason to receive this grace. Considering that man has a fallen nature due to original sin; he is ruled by concupiscence which constantly tries to over-rule reason. In fact, it is the rule of rational psychology that concupiscence and reasoning cannot function at the same given time.

4. As long as man is ruled by fallen human nature, concupiscence dominates him . He will begin to reason rightly only after he has overcome concupiscence through repentance. Repentance is the main message of the Old Testament which was perfected by Christ in the New Testament. After repentance, man becomes poor in spirit and receives the gift of the Holy Spirit called the Fear of God; and only then does he receive the grace to reason reasonably or think rightly.

5.Thus, the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, because that is the only time man begins to use reason: this is the beginning of faith. Thus faith is built on reason. Man cannot think of Divine revelation unless he frees himself from his fallen human nature. Man cannot make an act of faith unless he uses his reason, because faith is an assent of his reason to the truths of faith. And he needs grace to be able to go deeper into the knowledge of God. In fact the first act of reason is to know God, commonly called the preamble of faith.

6. Man, as long as he is ruled by his fallen nature (which for many would be their entire life) cannot think rightly. (This is why it is impossible to talk about the true God except between thinking individuals.) That’s why no one can talk about the true God with just anyone. Discussion must be among thinking individuals. The very act of belief is an act of syllogism.

7. Pope Benedict is right when he says that there is no hope in any discussion unless we begin with the premise that reason must be the basis of discussion and reason must prevail. Otherwise, concupiscence, that dark inner self in man which St. Paul describes as the source of all evil, will prevail. (Picture is fragment of painting of St. Thomas of Aquinas.)

Whenever the Church has a problem, She only has to look at how God solved Her problems in the past and then solve it in exactly the same way. After all it was God who established Her.

Pope John Paul II’s main concern was gathering and leading other sheep into the fold and encouraging those within. (The job of checking the ones within the fold if they were sheep or goats fell onto the lap of Pope Benedict XVI.) From the very beginning of Vatican II, the colors began to show: those who were for Christ and those who were against Christ. And this has been continuing up to the present. And apparently, a polarization was taking place, or shall we say, a great apostasy was on the rise? The sheep were standing on one side; the goats on the other.

The late Pope John Paul II, being a pastoral pope, made Evangelization the core of his pontificate. And understandably so because that is the primary role of a Pope and of the Church according to the words of Christ in His Apostolic Commission: first, to teach all His commandments and how to observe them; and secondly, to administer the Sacraments. ‘Evangelization’, ‘Conversion’, ‘Reform’ and ‘Renewal’ all mean the same thing, bestowing truth and grace, as the Gospel of John states.

Pope Benedict, even before his election to the papacy, wrote many articles on evangelization. As Pope, his addresses to bishops in their “ad limina” visits are almost all on evangelization. His talks in Brazil and to his own Curia were on evangelization.

The entire world has heard of the Christian truths from both Catholics and other christian sects and, in general, through mass media. The New Testament and religious books are available to everyone for the asking. Why the need for evangelization? There is a difference between informing and evangelizing. Information can be given by anyone. But true Evangelization can only be done by the Church.

The need for continuous Evangelization is based on Ecclesiology’s observation that the Faith can disappear in a locality within three generations. This observation is based on the story of St. Francis de Sales, a doctor of the Church, who arrived at Chablais, a locality that was Catholic three generations ago but at his time only 27 remained Catholic out of 72,000 former Catholics.

The proposition that the Catholic Faith could disappear in a locality within three generation is expected even more so today. Before, persecution and fines caused the loss of Catholics from the Church. Today materialism, skepticism and hedonism are more potent factors in making Catholics lose their faith. A father is helpless in keeping his children Catholic because of school atmosphere. These children, becoming fathers themselves, would eventually lose their children from the faith. It is easy to see how in three generations the Catholic Church can disappear in a locality if not from an entire diocese. We are not speaking of persecution or fines. Only of default, the inability of the older generation to instill the Faith in their children. Sadly this situation is made worst by our pagan environment.

A great consolation, however, is that St. Francis de Sales (in his book the “Great Controversies”) showed that faith could be re-established in four years with 72,000 becoming Catholics in Chablais and only 27 remaining Calvinists.

The apostles, the foundation in which Christ built His Church, would one day die. And the Church would need continuous Evangelization. The internal mechanism of the Church, the presence of Christic Charity (the soul of the Church) among her members will accomplish this.

Evangelization consists in the Church using her two Christ-given powers, namely that of Jurisdiction and of Orders: powers to bring souls to be completely Catholic through the four stages of Repentance, Faith, Hope and Charity. St. Francis enumerates these stages in his strategy in the re-conquests of Chablais and the Calvinist stronghold Geneva. He said, we must first live a life of repentance to reach Faith, thus entering the Catholic Church. Then we must grow in our faith and reach Charity before we can storm Geneva with Love.

The commands of Christ is the way to these four stages of Repentance, Faith, Hope and Love of God and neighbor. Evangelization, therefore, is teaching all the commands of Christ and how to observe them, thus giving us the proper disposition to be able to worthily receive the graces from the Sacraments.

Pope Benedict XVI had been hinting that the Catholic world today is similar to Chablais. The cause, he states in his “New Evangelization,” being that there is error in the contents and method in teaching Catechism recently. ( This is not so in the Catechisms of Cyprian, Augustine, Thomas of Aquinas up to Trent and John Vianney.) He does not say ‘how recent.’ If it has been for more than three generations then the Church would have disappeared in most localities, if not in many nations.

The Pope’s actions attest to this fact. He rewrites the Catechism of the Catholic Church with his ‘Compendium’ and writes ‘Deus Caritas Est’ followed with ‘Spe Salvi.’ This is what St. Francis de Sales did in Chablais and Geneva. ‘The stronghold of Geneva can only be conquered with Love.’ The stronghold of the world, the devil’s dominion, can only be Evangelized with Love.
And those who must conquer must know the science of Divine Love, like St. Therese.

St. Francis de Sales conquered Geneva becoming its bishop. How many generations was that ago. More than three generations. And Geneva is again gone from the Church.

Charity is the soul of the Church. She does not have to be told to Evangelize. She Evangelizes everywhere she is through her members and does it very well. Where is our Francis de Sales or better still where is the Church?