Author: Odon De Castro

The early Christian Church existed in an era of paganism. And the pagans had all the perversions of nature, being pagan. They had slavery, killing of babies, homosexuality, lesbianism, adultery, drunkenness, and many other vices.

Christianity came with emphasis on virtues that should replace the pagan vices. But in the process of conversion, the first Christians saw that it was impossible to practice the teachings of Christ amidst an environment of pure paganism. The two, Christian virtues and pagan vices were completely at odds. They found it necessary to fly away from the pagan environment. But there was still the flesh to overcome, aside from the devil and the world. The flesh had the defects that fallen nature have left in our souls. To overcome our fallen nature amidst a pagan environment would be impossible. So the first Christians embraced the ascetical practice called “Fuga Mundo,” flight from the world. You did’nt have to do this if you lived in a Catholic environment; it is needed if you live in a pagan environment.

If we live in a pagan ambiance, which seems to be the case at the time of St. Benedict, and which modern spiritual writers as Coleridge, Chesterton, Belloc described as the state of our present era, we would succumb to the pagan perversion like abortion and homosexuality.

Our priests and seminarians have been exposed to such an environment for the last two generations. Most of them had entered the seminary bitten by that pagan virus.

But in the early Christian times, St. Benedict, by an inspiration of the Holy Spirit, had devised a manner by which this perversion could be cured. It was the Gospel, presented in a concise form adapted to the simple minded, like the peasants of his time. Like the Gospel, its focus is in the development of virtues as cure for the perversion of pagan vices.

History tells us that the practice of slavery, common among the pagans, disappeared when the first Christian masters loved their slaves and Christian slaves honoured their masters. Christian love removed all borders that separated slave from master. The other pagan perversions, like homosexuality, lesbianism and adultery were replaced with Christian virtues.

Monasticism, i.e., living the Gospel, dispelled the vices by developing the virtues. And so even if these perversities were mentioned in the Old Testament, it was hardly mentioned in the early monastic history of the Catholic Church. The early Christians did not have these vices, neither among the lay nor the priests.

Why did it suddenly re-appear? Because our civilization had returned to paganism. Pope Benedict called it the dictatorship of relativism. He also referred to it as forgetting God. Pope Pius X called it the heresy of Modernism. Spiritual writer noticed it around the 1800 and it never left us.

What’s the point? The Catholic Church had corrected these pagan perversions when she first came in contact with paganism. How come the Bishops do not know how to cure these now? Their solutions, like “one strike and you’re out” and other solutions show ignorance of the Church’ s traditional solution to a problem that was cured and non-existent during the advent of monasticism. Why don’t they apply the solution well known within the Church and used with great success in her history . . . monastic life?

These priests are sick spiritually. The Church, as usual, knows the medicine. She had tried the solution before and found that it worked. Why don’t they try it now? Just to throw these priests away while they are sick and need spiritual help, goes against the spirit of Charity. Why not rehabilitate them in the way the Church had done to pagans all these centuries. This is not the first time that the Church had met this problem. It was prevalent at the time of St. Benedict. And she solved it.

Now that we lack priests, would not saving them by rehabilitating them an easier way of maintaining the parishes with priests?

The monastic life is a remedy, not a punishment. The monastic life is meant for the extirpation of vices, like homosexuality, says St. Benedict, and the preservation of charity. Imagine, not only healing the sickness of homosexuality but in addition to it making those priest saints. What else do you want? But nobody seems to know this answer. And those bishops plan to spend millions of dollars just for a study to find out the cause and attempt an answer? Don’t we say “Christ is the answer.” Why are we looking for other answers?

The cause of this perversion is deficient knowledge of Catholic truths and total ignorance of the spirituality of the Gospel…which is one and the same thing. In theological parlance, they lack knowledge of ascetical theology, which is the application of dogmatic and moral theology in everyday life. And Pope Benedict is telling us that the so-called Holy Rule of Saint Benedict is the application of the entire Gospel in everyday life “…for the extirpation of vices and the preservation and development of Charity.”

Dissident Bishops, hallucinating nuns, pagans in Church worship, homosexual priests, heads of Vatican Curias that had run amock, pro-abortion Catholic speakers treated as stars in Catholic schools, closing down of parishes … name it and Pope Benedict have it. So why does he not pick up the phone and simply fire all those cockles? Christ said the angels will do it when it is time for the second to the last Pope, or something to that effect.

The Holy Father knows we are living at a time where there is not much he can do about this state of affairs. He would be wasting his time trying to remedy this situation. He knows Scriptures point to this age as not only hopeless but will even get worse. “Their love will wax cold.” And he knows that the Holy Spirit is running the church.

I think we are now facing the same situation as what our Theology professors use to tell us in Casus Conscientiae. If you are in a sinking ship, you save those whom you can save; which could be a total stranger who is beside you while foregoing your loved one who is far from you. Difficult choice! But it must be made. Of course, you can try saving both and die trying.

Theologians distinguish between the “Ecclesia” and the “Elect.” When Christ said: “Many are called but few are chosen,” the “many” make up the “Ecclesia,” which in Scriptures refers to the fish-net that contained both the good and bad fishes, or the field with both the cockles and the wheat (that is the good and the bad). The “many” who are called constitute the Church, “Ecclesia,” who are called out from among ALL. While the “elect” are the few that are called out from among the “many.” The “Ecclesia” is one thing, the “elect” are another. And it was the capital mistake of Protestantism that it never realized that, thus believing they were all saved.

St. Paul clearly stated that he was sent to preach to the “elect” and prayed that by the end of his life he had done the will of God of having preached to the “elect,” though he found himself preaching to the Ecclesia, too. But the “elect” within the “Ecclesia” was the object of his preaching.

It is possible that, like St. Paul, Pope Benedict XVI will preach to the “Ecclesia” because that is his vowed duty, but his concentration will be on the “elect,” which he often referred to as the small Church? This would mean the fervent hidden nuns in convents, faithful monks in monasteries and all those lay writers and bloggers who are explaining and defending the Mystical Body of Christ. Don’t forget those mothers living quietly like Mary in their homes and the countless young boys and girls that they inspire to be saints.

Joshua had an army to fight his enemies. But he had to test them by a stream to choose the few from among the many who will fight the battles of the Lord.

There are some bloggers who are thinking of entering the convent (I just read two young girls) wondering whether they should enter an active or contemplative order. Let me clarify a small point regarding the story of Mary and Martha that had always been presented as the two ways of life in the service of Christ, the active and the contemplative life.

The story of Mary and Martha is not two exclusive ways of life. They are two activities in one way of life. Each Christian seeking to serve God must be a Martha and Mary at the same time. And the lesson Christ is advancing is that between the two activities, in one and the same way of life, the life of Mary must take precedence. Let me repeat. The Christian way of life requires we are Marys and Marthas at the same time with emphasis on being a Mary, because “Mary had chosen the better part.” Every active order must have a contemplative in spirit.

Pope Benedict presented St. Benedict of Nurcia as an exemplar for the renewal of the Catholic faith in Europe. St. Benedict’s motto is “Ora et Labora.” Work and pray. That is Martha and Mary. He gave emphasis to praying or contemplation and called it the “work of God.” This, of course is the Divine Office. And they had many activities, “labora,” farming, teaching in monastic schools, inventing farming implements, running hospitals, etc. The principle is that you can, always “Ora” while doing your “Labora” but not vice versa.

Dom Chautard, in his spiritual classic “Soul of the Apostolate” emphasized this principle. He compared contemplation to a fountain of water, the “soul,” while the apostolate as distributing this water with a glass. And he asked: what if you are not a fountain? You will run out of water to distribute in your apostolate. You must first be a inexhaustible fountain through contemplation before you distribute water in the apostolate. If in the apostolate you run out of water due to lack of a contemplative spirit, you would eventually burn out. And this would be a spiritual catastrophe.

In choosing a religious order, therefore, it is good to choose one that is more on the contemplative and less on the active, like St. Therese of the Child Jesus, who was contemplative and yet did more for the church than all the active sisters in her century. In the plan of God, the very active orders were raised by God for some temporary need of the Church. The contemplatives were raised for a permanent need of the Church.

If you noticed, during the elevation of the sacred host during Mass, it comes in line with the cross where either a dying or dead and broken Christ is crucified? That is no accident. The Catholic Church had studied that for 2000 years to teach us an important doctrine. In fact, there are three important doctrines that are being taught at that moment. First, an incident in the past, an ongoing truth in the present and an eschatological doctrine in the future. There is always a danger among Catholics to see only one… the historical past.

That aligning of the consecrated hosts with the crucified Christ reminds us of an incident in the past… that once upon a time, the Son of God, became man to make up for the sins of man. And to satisfy the justice of God, He had to die on the cross. No one else could do this to redeem mankind.

The second truth is that in the consecrated, elevated Host, Christ had once again returned to earth present in His mystical Body. That is why the whole mystical body of Christ, the Church militant, suffering and triumphant and the whole heavenly host are present at mass with the Blessed Trinity. And thirdly, the scene reminds us of the Apocalyptic event in heaven after the end times to which we all look forward to after winning our battles here on earth.

But let me focus on the cross (which should never hold a figure of the resurrected Christ but either a dying or dead Christ.) It should remind us of what Christ did for us… He suffered and died for us sinners. We must view this with great gratitude.

Isaias had mentioned that ingratitude is the very essence of sin. And gratitude is the foundation of holiness. And St. Paul reminded us constanctly to be thankful. If during Mass, we look at the cross, and simply be grateful to Christ for having done all those things for our salvation, that solitary act of gratitude will do more to lead us to holiness and deserving to join in the Apocalyptic celebration in heaven with the lamb than anything you can imagine.

It is often commented that Pope John Paul II did not do enough to discipline dissidents during his papacy. We have been dissidents in some way and great sinners in other ways. We have committed sins grievous enough to make it rain fire and brimstone. And yet God was quiet. He said nothing. Did you notice that? Could it be that Pope John Paul was just behaving like his God?

Saints and Popes know the importance of their jobs and tend to be very careful in that they did only God’s will. Even Christ reminded us that “I came not to do my will but the will of My Father in heaven.” Pope John Paul II was a prayerful man. Maybe disciplining dissidents was not God’s will for him just as building the temple was not God’s will for king David, and being a priest and a preacher was not for St. Therese, the little flower.

On the other hand, disciplining was God’s role for then Cardinal Ratzinger. Maybe it is still now, or maybe it is not.

Finding out God’s specific will can be very tricky. It is usually reserved for contemplatives. And while it is difficult for the person concerned, like Pope John Paul, to find out God’s will, it is impossible for spectators to find out God’s will for him. And so to the comment why Pope John Paul II did not discipline the bad buys? Well, God’s ways are not man’s ways. Maybe, it was not God’s will!

The ignorance of Catholics with regards to their Catholic religion is unimaginable. Ignorance is common among laymen, seminarians, priest and even a few bishops. And news show that the situation is world-wide.

Parents and godparents are totally incapable of transmitting religious knowledge to children. Catholic schools and universities have long abandoned their role of giving their students a Catholic education as John Newman had laid down. Sunday homilies of priests are either empty or pure entertainement. When Pope John Paul II came to Asia 27 years ago he encouraged the bishop’s conference to evangelize. The committee formed for it is still figuring out how to go about it. We, already, have a new Pope.

The worst politicians are catholics and the most corrupt law enforcers are also Catholics. And most of those in jail are Catholics. Ronald Knox, famed Anglican convert to Catholicism decried the fact that he would rather leave his umbrella in a Wesleyan service house than in a Catholic chapel. He would return to the Wesleyan chapel with the umbrella still there but gone in a Catholic chapel.

Add to this the fact that we live in an atmosphere of relativism wherein sound doctrines are repugnant to modern mankind.

The Catholic Church have many Catechisms that summarize the truths of Christ. From the Catechism of St. Cyprian, St. Peter Canisius, St. Thomas of Aquinas, St. John Vianney to the countless penny catechisms available. One can go and visit the information highways and learn everything about the Catholic Church. And still, ignorance is the common denominator of Catholics when it comes to the Catechism.

As a young seminarian I have been hearing about evangelizations and re-evangelizations. But nothing happened. No one had defined what evangelization meant and how to go about it. So it never began.

Here in Asia, whenever the state raises up an issue that goes against Catholic morals, the reponse from the Church is so ineffective, confused and unclear.

The local Catholic radio station did not have a program on Catechism though it had all kinds of programs. They were glad when I volunterred to hold the program on catechism. I use the present Catechism of the Catholic Church with explanations from St. Thomas of Aquinas and St. John Vianney.

Faced with such a situation, can we still look forward to our next generation as our future?

The Holy Father has plans to meet the bishops of Africa. Of course, there is hope for an ecumenical dialogue between the Catholics there and other religions or sects. Though it seems to be the policy of the Holy Father to have ecumenical dialogues with other groups, which is a mandate of the Gospel, the idea of ecumenism is futile. It is based on a wrong theological assumption. St. Paul mentioned that he is sent to the elect. And because he does not know who is the elect he preached to all that in some way he might reach the elect. Let me forgo the idea of predestination since it is complex and stick to ecumenism.

The Church is the bride of Christ. The other groups are not parts of this bride that had been cut off or dismembered. They are completely other entities. The others are alien branches that cannot in anyway be grafted to the main branch. Today’s ecumenism is based on the wrong notion that the Church founded on earth has, in process of time, been split into many fragments and can be easily be reunited, noted Ronald Knox, a convert from Anglicanism to Catholicism. “To us Catholics such language is meaningless; we have not so learned Christ. For us, the Church is nothing less than His temple, his Bride, his own Body; and the idea that it could, by any conceivable historical circumstance be split into fragments, is a blasphemy.”

Ronald Knox continues “The reunion of the Churches is to us not merely impossible, it is unthinkable. You cannot reunite what has never been divided. For the Catholic Church to take part in a reunion of the churches would be a …contradiction in terms.”

The process should be “conversion” and not ecumenism. It is a process wherewith both born Catholics and non-Catholics are transformed and grafted into the Mystical Body of Christ. And if the great dissent made manifest by the elevation of Pope Benedict XVI shows how difficult to graft born-catholic theologians into the True Body of Christ, how much more those of other groups.

Of course, there is such a thing as the grace of conversion. This is given to converts from all religious groups. But this is not given to busloads of souls. It is given to specific individuals as is happening right now. One, two or three converts here and there and no more. Attempts, therefore, at ecumenical synods and the like are futile. It is not God’s way. Most converts I know are not the products of an ecumenical effort but merely by an individual effort in cooperation with God’s grace.

Africa, therefore, should concentrate on Catechizing the Catholics. Because of what Gilbert K. Chesterton said, that Catholics will always be persecuted because our claim is not that ours is just one of the religions but that ours is the only true religion. That should make everybody else angry. And what we expect is persecution and not ecumenism.

Today, Africa is described as one of great growth for Catholicism. As in the early times, when the Church is growing, it is purified through martyrdom. In the process it becomes small but fervent. Could this be the fate of the Church in Africa? The Church can only be prepared for martyrdom if they have a complete and pure knowledge of the teachings of Christ ….and trained in obedience to those teachings.

Today, the family is being assaulted from every side, even from the men of the Church! Why? Well, the family had always been assaulted. First, in the garden of Eden, where Adam and Eve demonstrated how not to be good parents. And God, after having expelled Adam and Eve pronounced an eternal warfare between the devil and his co-horts and the woman and her children. Why, that’s an eternal warfare between the devil and the family.

Have you not noticed that all the problems of the Church today are demonstrative of that conflict? Homosexuality, gay marriages, abortion, family planning, and contraceptives are aimed at the destruction of the family. The very secularistic system of our society militates against the family. When the child leaves the home early to go to school, the father goes to work, when the mother goes her own way, isn’t this a disruption of the family life? Our generations is spiritually mained to fight the battles of life.

The family is the target of destruction by the very brains in hell because, it is the natural place destined by God to be the workshop wherewith a soul can work out the salvation of his soul. Though the convents and monasteries are very good alternatives, the home is the God-given first choice. Then, of course the family must work out each member’s sanctification within a family that is within the Church, Pope Benedict reminds us in an address in St. Paul outside the walls.

The holy family is an eloquent model for us. Besides, the family is the only place where man can maintain his sanity amidst this world that has gone mad, G. K. Chesterton reminds us.
It is a place where man and woman can find their fulfilment and where each member can experience the freedom that the world cannot offer. Why, that sounds like heaven. And that was God’s mind in creating the family, to be a foretaste of heaven here on earth. Chesterton, again, reminds us that the family is the only institution on earth that is entered into with complete freedom by both parties and created out of love… and for the purpose of child-bearing for the kingdom of heaven. And the promises made in the Sacrament of Matrimony and the very natural institution of marriage are directed towards the welfare of the child.

The child is important. Because he is a reminder on what is necessary to enter the kingdom of heaven. Christ said:”unless you become like little children…” There is the model for adults.

Now, do you wonder why the devil hates this institution so much? And do you wonder why the Church is so easy in granting annulment? Well, Pope Paul VI, warned us that the devil had entered the Church. And his presence is all over: among dissident priests and nuns, among some Catholic media… but I think they have all gathered around the marriage tribunals that show greater enthusiasm in annulling marriages rather than in preserving them.

Pope Benedict XVI had mentioned this anarchy that had enterered all aspects of Catholic life, including Matrimony. The bases for the annulment is hardly 50 years old. That makes it a little older than the younger heresy, the liturgical novelties, that has devastated the Church. Well, it could’nt be a teaching of Christ or the apostles if it is only 50 years old.

Homosexuality, the falling of priests, family planning, abortion, women who want to be priests… all these problems wouldn’t have arisen if these Catholics had good family lives. These evils are symptomatic of the absence of family life. The seminary and the convents should have solved these problems, but unfortunately, those running the seminary were fruits of the same non-existing family life syndrome. So what can you expect?

God had already warned us of this impending battle even from the time of creation. We were not ready; we were not equipped for battle. The way things are now, it will be a continuosly losing battle.

The enemy of the cross is what Pope Benedict XVI referred to as the dictatorship of relativism. It is, in fact, what spiritual writers in the last century, like Coleridge, Chesterton and Belloc, referred to as the return to paganism, a return to idolatry. The cross says: “Deny oneself.” The dictatorship of relativism says satisfy one’s every desire.

St. Paul writing to the Phillipians described this enemy as a spiritual malaise wherewith the mind is set on the things of the earth, where their glory is their shame and their god is their belly.

A simple illustration: a germ that has survived a dosage of anti-biotics becomes resistant to the medicine. We will need a stronger anti-biotic or at least a higher dosage of the same to hopefully overcome the virus. If, as some scientist had predicted, we have made the strongest anti-biotic and some germs or virus develop resistance to this then the world is in trouble.

The Catholic Church had conquered every evil in the world during her earlier history. A potent anti-biotic. But present Catholics who have been born within the Church (the anti-biotic) have developed resistance to this watered-down church and have become evil. The consoling thought is that the Catholic Church had been watered down through the centuries and it was understandable that she could not cure certain spiritual illness. Well, the only way to cure her, today, is to apply the full dosage of Catholic doctrine. And hope the illness of the dictatorship of relativism which is the enemy of the cross might be healed.

Their god is their belly. Monasticism is the only medication for such a terminal case. Well, there is fasting and Christ’s command to “deny oneself,” to cure the idolatry of the belly. And there is “fuga mundo” that should separate men from the world thus curing their sickness of having minds that are focused on the things of the earth. And there are the different monastic practices, spiritual readings, lectio divina, divine office and meditations that should make them realize that their sins are not the sources of glory but of shame. Chesterton and co. foresaw the coming doom of civilization. They proposed some semblance of monasticism in distributism but failed to prose monasticism as a whole.

Monasticism is an imitation of the 30 years of hidden life of Joseph, Jesus and Mary. By its very nature it must be hidden; that is why Christ, when preaching about good works, fasting and prayer, the three elements of the life of repentance, bade us to do all these “in secret.”

“You have cancer.” A doctor will truthfully declare to help you prepare yourself spiritually. “You need monasticism.” The Holy Father had declared to enable us to be free from the dictatorship of relativism and attain the freedom of true children of God.

“By this sign, thou shall conquer.” Seemingly heared by Emperor Constantine, he eventually conquered and became a Christian. By the Cross, we shall conquer… well.. didn’t Christ conquer death through the cross?

The cross as a Christian symbol consist of a “way of life” that consists in three things: voluntary act of poverty, chastity and obedience. That is the symbolism of the cross which all must carry and, if possible, be crucified. Many have the idea that these three, often called, religious vows or the Evangelical Counsels are for religious, only. No! It is for everyone; not the vows but the spirit of it. If Charity is needed to enter the kingdom of heaven, Charity had always been defined as obedience to the commands of Christ: “If you love Me, keep my commandments.” But obedience can only be done if we train ourselves, first, in poverty and chastity. Didn’t you notice the world had been trying to abolish poverty? That would be the work of the devil to prevent us from being chaste and obedient. No wonder St. Francis of Assisi preached it and every religious is vowing it. Of course, we must alleviate physical or economic poverty but we must practice evangelical poverty.

Some priests, part of the problem of the Church, are unable to keep their chastity because they failed to practice poverty. If they practiced poverty there won’t be any homosexuality or sexual abuses. And if Charity, today, have waxed cold, it is because Christians have no spirit of poverty and chastity. Briefly, the spirit of poverty consists in believing that we need nothing except the basic essentials, like food, clothing and shelter, to attain the kingdom of heaven. It is a spirit of detachment from the things of this world.

Chastity is detachment from the pleasures of the body or flesh. Isn’t the Sacrament of matrimony for the populating of heaven and not for the pleasure of the flesh? And Charity, the love of God, is detachment from one’s own will. Or putting it positively, attachment to God’s will.

Through poverty, chastity and obedience, a soul can conquer all… even the kingdom of God. “By this Sign….”