1. The Church before and after the Fall.
Adam and Eve, before the Fall, were an image of the Catholic Church. But their status as first members of the Church had not been confirmed by God because they had not passed their test of obedience. Adam and Eve, after the Fall, were an image of the Catholic Church as ‘viatores’, i.e. on their way back to Paradise. Working their repentance on earth they passed their test the second time around thus they are included in the list of saints.
2. The Fall.
When Adam and Eve fell, thus becoming the first bad Catholics, we see the beginnings of the devil’s long range plan to start a new religion with a new god that will compete with the old true religion of God. It all started in Paradise.
3. The Fall happened within Paradise.
It would happen within the physical boundaries of the Church. The Fall is the beginning of the ‘new’ religion. As Eve demonstrated, this new religion will consist in doing one’s own will contrary to the known Will of God. And as Eve did afterwards, she enticed Adam to do the same.
Its followers will do the same. They will choose their own will contrary to the known Will of God. And then will entice others to do, also, their own will. This is the essence of this new religion. It’s god is the devil whose will the followers will obey in the belief that it is their own will.
Let us see how Eve practiced this new religion. Eve knew the expressed Will of God; that she could eat the fruits of all the trees in Paradise except the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. So Eve knew exactly what was the expressed Will of God; what she could eat and what she could not eat. She had made two judgments with her intellect. First, she correctly judged what was God’s Will; to eat any fruit of the garden and not to eat the fruit of the tree at the center. Secondly, she correctly judged what was her own will; to eat of the fruit of the tree at the center. . Acting according to this new religion she chose her own will over and above the known will of God. . This intellectual judgment to choose one’s own will over and above the known Will of God is the essence of this new religion. It consists in giving to someone else the obedience that is due to God.
Eve, forgot that that was not her own will. It was the will of the devil presented to her in the form of a temptation. There was a failure of intellectual judgment on the part of Eve. There was a defect in her human act. St. Thomas would describe it this way; the goodness of God was lacking in her act. And that made her act evil. She was not doing her own will. She was doing the will of the devil.
4. The new religion and the new god after the Fall.
So after the Fall, the new religion with the new god was established. It’s god is the devil. And the worship of the devil will consist in doing his will, erroneously thought as one’s own will, over and above the known Will of God.
5. God revealed His Will to begin the testing of men; as He tested Adam and Eve.
When God tested Adam and Eve, He first expressed His Will clearly to them; ‘You may eat of all the fruits in Paradise except the tree in the middle. ‘ Then God threatened them; ‘If you even touch it, you will die the death.’ There is the occasion of sin; to touch the fruit. And there is the actual sin; to eat the fruit.
The devil toned down God’s threat thus removing Eve’s fear of God by telling her. ‘You will not die.’ So she willed what the devil willed. That act of choosing the will of devil thought to be one’s own will over and above the known will of God is called disobedience. This act of disobedience is the sign of the absence of Faith that is necessary for salvation. Adam and Eve, at this point, should have gone straight to hell. But God in His mercy, prolonged their lives, sent them out of paradise, revealed to them once again His Will on their sojourn on earth and, this time, they preferred God’s Will over their own will.
6. Each man must passed his test to go to heaven. The test is identical to that of Adam and Eve. To help us pass God gave us Divine Revelation. Divine Revelation contains the test all men will undergo and how to pass those test. It is basically choosing between the old religion of the ‘antequated’ God and the ‘new’ religion of the ‘new’ god; it is a choice between the true God and bad angel who wanted to be like god.
7. God had set up the stage for the test.
With His Divine Revelation, God had revealed to us His expressed Will. Now, we should only find out the will of the devil which we will always erroneously think is our will. So here, we should make three intellectual judgments; first, which is God’s Will. Secondly, which is the devil’s will. And thirdly, which is our own will.
God’s Will is easy to know because it is written in our hearts, St. Paul reminds us. It is further written down in Sacred Scriptures and explained by both the apostles and the Fathers of the Church. And the main obligation of the Catholic Church is to teach the Will of God from these sources. It cannot be known from any other source.
How can we know the will of the devil. Well, if it goes against the Will of God; in exactly the same way the devil told Eve to go against God and even called God a liar. How can we know it is our will? By introspection, ( ‘know thyself’ is a great help.) Here the stage is set for the intellect to judge which is whose will.
8. The free will chooses.
After the intellect had made the above three judgments, the intellect informs the free will of its findings. Now the free will must choose. To follow God’s Will, to follow the devil’s will or to follow one’s will. Since the devil constantly tempts men, the last two wills are always identical.
9. There are only two choices in this battle.
The old God and the old religion on one hand. And the ‘new’ god and the ‘new’ religion. This is a real battle and we can witness it through the visible marks of the two contenders. The former is signed with the four visible Marks of the true Church of Christ. The latter do not have the four signs enumerated in the Nicene Creed.
10, Let us view one of this battle. The one in the Vatican on 2014.
Like Eve, the participants in the Bishop’s Synod of 2014, knew the expressed Will of God revealed in the Old and New Testament and in all the teachings of the Magisterium of the Church; that adultery and sodomy are the forbidden tree cultivated in the middle of all modern culture. ‘Do not even touch it. Or you will die.’ All the bishops had made the intellectual judgment that those two acts are against the Will of God and are, therefore, sins. They, surely, had made this first judgment with their intellect. Secondly, everybody intellectually knew that adultery and sodomy is from the devil. St. Paul said so. Thirdly, one third of the bishops expressed their will to propose that these two commands of God may be disobeyed. And like Eve, they offered it to the other bishops for approval. So, one third of the bishops in the Synod were in fact practicing the ‘new religion’ where they followed their own will over and above God’s will even though they knew this is a temptation from the devil. Following the devil’s will they have the devil as their god.
Two thirds of the bishops, on the other hand, seems to have passed that test. They will still have many other test to pass in the future. But at the present, one third failed. They have to repent to be able to rise again to their previous spiritual level, as St. Peter immediately recovered when he repented having denied Christ three times.
But there is a problem. In their proposal to recommend a life of supervised repentance for the remarried before they can receive Holy Communion, their proposed life of supervised repentance was defective. It is very different from the evangelical repentance Pope Benedict ordered discussed during the Bishop’s Synod of 2012 and which they intentionally omitted. Thus they do not really know how to repent.
11. Now, let us look at the overall picture.
Let us look at the testing scenario; i.e. God testing men..
First; God expressed His Will to be obeyed by all men. God’s Will is expressed in three levels. God’s Will is expressed in the first natural level through the commands of God as expressed in the Old Testament. This is available to all men. The second level is God’s Will as expressed by Christ in the New Testament. This cannot be known by men unless they have Faith that comes with sanctifying grace. The third level of God’s Will is expressed by the Holy Spirit. This is revealed to all who have received the Holy Spirit. This is the mystical life that is available to very few.
Due to a defective evangelization, most souls do not know the Revealed Will of God. Not even in it shortest form, the ‘Golden Rule.’ Ignorance of the Will of God as expressed in the supernatural level of the New Testament is all the more unknown because Faith is needed to know this. All the more the Will of God as expressed to Mystics is not known. Christ called this state the ‘decay of Faith’ while Pope Benedict called it the crisis of Faith. This can be seen during the Bishop’s Synod of 2014 and in every day conversation. Most men are unconscious of the supernatural world; they do not know the face of God.
This is due to men’s complete involvement in the things of the natural world. It prevents them from knowing the supernatural world. As a consequence, men is conscious, only, of his own likes or the will of the devil as presented to him as his own personal likes and dislikes. Men is conscious of what he likes and everything is judged by that. And who presents to him the countless worldly likes, from NBA games to trips to the beaches of Thailand? The life of fun and enjoyment which essentially consist in doing what one likes is the forbidden tree, according to the ‘Following of Christ’…and it.come from the devil. Nobody will believe that because most do not have the Faith necessary to see supernatural realities.
12. We cannot die in this state.
In the recent crash of Malaysian Airline, where was all the emphasis? At the search for the black box, at the erratic flight path it took, where it probably crashed. And now at the pieces of debris found near Reunion island. The only important thing is where are all those people who died? Each has to answer this question though it is too late for all because they have suddenly found themselves in places they have never imagined.
For Catholics it is simple. If you belong to the ‘antiquated’ or old religion, as St. Robert Bellarmine described it, you will surely find yourself in heaven. But if you belong to the ‘new’ religion’, doing the will of the devil whose cousin is Lady Liberty, and forcing others to do your own will, then you certainly will be in hell. It would not matter where the debris of the wings are found.
13. The latest translation of St. Robert Bellarmine’s ‘In Controversiis’ is causing waves. There are not enough copies to go around. Some had voiced reprinting the copies and distributing it around free of charge. It is a book all Catholic should read……at least, this week. It contains the 15 Marks of the true Church of Jesus Christ. These 15 signs are an expanded list of the four classical visible signs of the true Church of Christ that Catholics recite in the Nicene Creed.
We must find out if we have these 15 signs before we take a plane ride. If we have them we do not have to worry where the debris of wings will be. If we do not have these signs, it will not matter where those debris will be.
14. The book is causing alarm because most Catholics do not have the signs of true Catholicity; whether they are laymen, priest, bishop or cardinal. Neither Jesuits, Benedictines, Dominicans, Franciscans or diocesans have them. Everybody can find this out for themselves by getting that book.
If it is difficult to have the four visible signs recited in the Nicene Creed, how much more the 15 MARKS since St. Bellarmine added signs implicit only in the four visible signs. This is the most urgent need for the Church to do today…..not tomorrow. Those 15 signs are like a winnowing fan that will separate the chaff from the grain. The majority of Catholics will be shocked to know where they belong. Until you know where you belong….don’t fly.