Intolerance: Virtue And Vice

The Virtue of Intolerance

Intolerance can be both a virtue and a vice. On one hand, in today's world, we are told we must be tolerant of everything and everyone. If you say anything negative about another person's beliefs or actions, you will be accused of intolerance and extremism/fanaticism. The basis of this is the vile doctrine of religious and moral relativism, i.e.,"Whatever makes you happy and works for you is 'your truth,' and whatever makes me happy and works for me is 'my truth.'  We have Vatican II, and its poster-boy, Jorge Bergoglio, to thank for relativism's grip on the cultures of the world--- "Who am I to judge?" (moral relativism) and "Atheists can go to Heaven" (religious relativism). In the practical order, moral and religious relativism go hand-in-glove, as Bergoglio amply demonstrates. To be intolerant of evil and error, especially when not politically correct, is a virtue.

On the other hand, there are others (like "follow me or die" Traditionalist clerics), who insist on imposing theological opinions on others while having no Magisterial authority. Unfortunately, Fr. Anthony Cekada falls into this category, and this kind of intolerance is a vice. I'll write on the virtuous kind of intolerance first, and then Fr. Cekada's non-virtuous intolerance.

  Recently, I saw a citation I've used before from theologian Berry:

"The prophecies of the Apocalypse [book of Revelation] show that Satan will imitate the Church of Christ to deceive mankind; he will set up a church of Satan in opposition to the Church of Christ. Antichrist will assume the role of Messias; his prophet will act the part of Pope; and there will be imitations of the Sacraments of the Church. There will also be lying wonders in imitation of the miracles wrought in the Church. (See The Church of Christ: An Apologetic and Dogmatic Treatise [St. Louis, MO: B. Herder Book Co., 1927], p. 119).

This is most accurate, as even St. Augustine referred to Satan as Simius Dei---"the ape of God." Consider the words of St. Augustine and theologian Berry as they relate to the Vatican II sect:

• The "church" of Satan is clearly predicted in Apocalypse 2: 9. (Vatican II sect claims to be the Roman Catholic Church in a false imitation)

• It has its own invalidly ordained ministers who bring false sermons and invalid sacraments (except some baptisms and marriages)--See 2 Corinthians 11: 4-5. 

• It has its own system of theology (See the 16 Documents of Vatican II with the new and heretical ecclesiology)

• It has false and lying wonders (the "Charismatic movement," etc.)

Vatican II and Moral Relativism

 More than fifty years after the Council ended, and started a new sect, we are reaping the results of its "who am I to judge" moral relativism. Remember the words of Christ: "For as were the days of Noah, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. For as in those days before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day when Noah entered the ark, and they were unaware until the flood came and swept them all away, so will be the coming of the Son of Man." (St. Matthew 24: 37-39). I'm not predicting or hinting the end of the world, as false Protestant ministers like the late Harold Camping did. However, the times certainly seem to be like Noah. The statistics bear this out. 

• 71% of Americans believe divorce is morally acceptable

• 68% of Americans believe fornication is acceptable as long as the two people "love" each other

• 63% of Americans believe shacking up ("cohabitation") is okay

• 63% of Americans believe it's OK for married people to have sexual thoughts about someone other than their spouse

• 63% of Americans believe sodomite relations are okay

• 61% of Americans believe it is acceptable to have a baby out of wedlock

• 69% of Americans believe euthanasia should be permitted

• 53% of Americans think having an adulterous affair is justifiable

• 50% of Americans identify as "pro-choice"--the alleged right to murder an innocent unborn baby

(See George Barna, America at the Crossroads, (Grand Rapids, MI; Baker Books, [2016], pg. 9; abortion statistic from 2017 Gallup Poll).

Vatican II and Religious Relativism   

Let's look at two of the most Catholic countries in the world before Vatican II to see the decimation when "religious liberty" and the idea that "beliefs don't matter" take hold.

1. Ireland

Eighty-four percent of the Republic’s citizens still describe themselves as Catholic, but that’s becoming more of a cultural than a religious identity. According to the country’s archbishop, weekly church attendance has declined from 90 percent in 1984 to 18 percent in 2011. Less than half of Irish now consider themselves religious, and surveys show religiosity is declining faster in Ireland than almost every other country in the world. Ireland now ranks seventh in the world for atheism. And Ireland’s Catholics are decidedly non-orthodox about their faith: Ninety percent believe priests should be allowed to marry, for instance. Ireland once supplied priests to churches throughout the world, but the country now has so few that the church fears there may soon not be enough for weddings and funerals. (See http://www.slate.com/blogs/the_slatest/2015/05/22/ireland_was_once_the_most_catholic_country_now_it_might_be_the_first_to.html) They have legalized sodomite "marriage."

2. Belgium
Once one of the most Catholic countries, as of 2009, only 56.8% baptize their children and only 5% attend the Novus Bogus "mass." They have legalized abortion, euthanasia (including children who want to die), and sodomite "marriage."

Finally, how about these statistics from Kenneth C. Jones, Index of Leading Catholic Indicators (2003):

 A 1958 Gallup Poll reported that three in four Catholics attended church on Sundays. A recent study by the University of Notre Dame found that only one in four now attend.

Only 10 percent of lay religious teachers now accept church teaching on contraception. Fifty-three percent believe a Catholic can have an abortion and remain a good Catholic. Sixty-five percent believe that Catholics may divorce and remarry. Seventy-seven percent believe one can be a good Catholic without going to mass on Sundays. By one New York Times poll, 70 percent of all Catholics in the age group 18 to 44 believe the Eucharist is merely a "symbolic reminder" of Jesus.

 Intolerance is a virtue. It doesn't mean we go around hating people, but ideas and actions should be forcefully hated and condemned. We should be intolerant of abortion, sodomite "marriage" and the idea that beliefs don't matter, because "all religions lead to God." If someone believes all religions lead to salvation, then he believes he has the correct perspective to the exclusion of all who think otherwise, whom he would consider wrong and (ironically) be intolerant of their belief! Relativism is self-refuting, and has lead to the disaster of the moral and religious chaos all around us. Objective truth and  objective morality exist, and it carries with it great implications for us. We must strive to live in accordance with them. 

 Intolerance as a Vice

 As the regular readers of my blog know, I believe that it is OK to attend the Mass of a valid priest who professes the Integral Catholic Faith, is not in actual union with the Vatican II sect, yet uses the name of Bergoglio in the Canon of the Mass (so-called "Una Cum" Mass). Please see my posts of 7/10/17 ("Una Cum") and 8/14/17 ("Prayers For Non-Catholics") for the full background. 

My opinion has been challenged by Fr. Anthony Cekada, a leading sedevacantist priest, who thinks attendance is sinful and anyone who disagrees with him is somehow benighted. Here is what he had to say about my blog post "Una Cum":

More recently, an anonymous sedevacantist blogger put up a lengthy post with what he thought was the ultimate gotcha argument against Grain of Incense: In the beginning of the 19th century, Pope Pius VII, he claimed, allowed the phrase pro Rege nostro Georgio to be placed into the Canon of the Mass in England, just after the name of the pope and the bishop in the una cum.

Since George III, obviously, was a Protestant heretic and a pope approved inserting his name — the blogger’s argument went — there’s no real problem for sedes to assist at a Mass where the name of a heretical pope is inserted into the Canon.

The blogger cited no papal decree for his rather astounding factual claim, and nothing to this effect appears in the official Decreta Authenica of the Vatican’s Congregation of Sacred Rites.

The only source the blogger provided was this link, which leads to an 1806 Latin-English missal for the laity,  in which the phrase pro Rege nostro N. (for our King, N.) has been inserted into the Canon. How did it get to be put into a Missal for the laity? Who knows? We certainly don’t have to accept the authority of  its publisher,  P. Keating of Brown & Co., 37 Duke St., Grosvenor Square.

But in any event, as regards the priest’s altar Missal itself, the liturgical commentators are clear: The Missal of Pius V discontinued the mention of the king or civil rulers in the Te Igitur, and the practice was allowed only by way of privilege (as in Spain and Austria), where the ruler was a Catholic.

Caught out on the specific issue of the Canon, the blogger replied that, well, having consulted one of the four thousand books in his personal library, he finds that the Church allowed other public prayers to be chanted for a non-Catholic monarch or president.

Well sure, — but this was in the official’s civil capacity as head of a secular state. And in the case of England, this took the form of a prayer chanted after the Mass was over.

The Pope, on the other hand, is prayed for during the Canon of the Mass in his religious capacity as head of the Church.

If the blogger couldn’t figure out that basic distinction, his four thousand books haven’t done him a lot of good. Maybe he should get with (sic) the Bergoglio’s environmentalist program and recycle them. (See http://www.fathercekada.com/)

Got all that? Fr. Cekada has not engaged my arguments, but merely dismisses them in an intellectually shoddy manner.

 The fact that an 1806 missal for the laity in England contains a prayer for the King in the Canon, and that practice was eliminated since the 16th century, should raise some eyebrows that perhaps the King's name was used. Nevertheless, he wants to dismiss it for a lack of an authoritative decision from the Vatican. That's fair. However, one of those four thousand books I have in my library, was one contained in Fr. Cekada's library as well. It was theologian Szal,  The Communication of Catholics with Schismatics, CUA Press, [1948] which he cites in his article The Grain of Incense. I wasn't "caught out on the specific issue of the Canon," but rather Fr. Cekada got caught out on the portion of Szal he didn't cite. I went back and examined Fr. Cekada's article The Grain of Incense available to view/download at traditionalmass.org. On page 10, footnote 50, Fr. Cekada writes, "... From [theologian Fr. Ignatius] Szal (183), though, it seems that the most the Holy See occasionally tolerated was a prayer for a lay heretic or schismatic in his capacity as a head of state (King, President, etc.) — but never one for a heretical or schismatic cleric."

This changes his argument substantially to, "It's permissible to pray for a heretical head of state liturgically, but not a heretical cleric." Says whom? When I say, "whom" I mean what approved theologian, canonist, or decree of the Holy See supports this contention? Not theologian Szal. Now, Fr. Cekada is inferring something not expressly addressed. From page 183 of Szal's book, we read:

Benedict XIV, in an encyclical letter of March 1, 1756, condemned the practice of mentioning liturgically the name of the Bishop or Patriarch when he was recognized as a heretic or a schismatic. However, a favorable reply was given by the Holy Office on February 23, 1820, for the Archdiocese of Quebec. It was revealed in this case that prayers were said for the Pope, for the Bishop, and for the King, at Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament. And at Solemn Mass there was sung the "Domine, salvum fac Regem." The continuance of both practices was tolerated. Here, then, there was question of a heretical monarch, but the same principle of tolerance could also find application when there was question of a schismatic.

Fr. Cekada argues that it is a grave sin to attend an Una Cum Mass, and that the King of England (a) was only prayed for in his capacity as head of a secular state, and (b) in any event, his name did not appear in the Canon.

Here are the pertinent problems of Fr. Cekada's position and his attempted defense of it:

1. Theologian Szal makes it clear that the King of England was prayed for liturgically.

2. Fr. Cekada makes an unsupported assertion that it was strictly in his civil capacity as head of a secular state.

3. There is nothing in Szal’s text that supports this contention. It is Fr. Cekada’s assumption for which he supplies no citation to relevant authority.

4. In the case of England the monarch is also the Head of the false Anglican Sect. To hold one office necessarily entails the other. For example, if we pray for the U.S. President, we pray for the Chief Executive of the Nation. We also pray for the Commander-in-Chief of all armed forces serving the U.S., because that is intimately bound up as one of the powers and duties of the office. You cannot impeach and remove Donald Trump as Commander-in – Chief of the armed forces while retaining him as Chief Executive of the Nation, or vice-versa. To pray for the Commander-in-Chief of the armed forces is to pray for the Chief Executive of the Nation.

5. Since the time of Henry VIII, the King (or Queen) of England is also the Head of the Anglican Church. Just as you can’t separate the functions of the American President, the same holds with regard to the English monarch. In order to be the Head of the Anglican sect, you must be the English monarch. To be the English monarch, you must be the Head of the Anglican sect. The monarch of England is therefore a religious office. In a real sense, one could consider the King/Queen of England a cleric.

6. It is not at all clear from the text of the prayer used liturgically that the King of England is only being prayed for as head of a secular state, especially when England in 1820 had a state religion and Catholicism was merely tolerated. The person in the pew would think that the King --and all he represents--are being prayed for, and if this were not true, (if he were only being prayed for as Head of a secular state, but people would think otherwise) the liturgical prayer would be scandalous.

7.  However, the Church cannot give that which is evil (scandalous), so praying for a heretic, even one who is the head of a false sect, cannot be considered wrong or contrary to Divine Positive Law. Fr. Cekada has also not shown how praying for a heretic in the Canon is qualitatively different than in other official liturgical functions. Is one fine, but the other a grave sin? Is it only the name of a heretic in the Canon that's sinful? What authority makes these distinctions? Fr. Cekada even contends that to make a visit to a Traditionalist chapel to adore the Blessed Sacrament is a sin if done while an Una Cum Mass is being offered!

8. Back to my analogy with the U.S., Fr. Cekada claims that in the Canon of the Mass, the pope is prayed for as Head of the Church. The 25th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution allows the U.S. President, when prevented from exercising his powers, to retain the office as a placeholder, while the Vice-President receives all powers and duties of office as Acting President. Here we have a "material" president who holds the office devoid of authority. Sound like sedeprivationism? It should! Why can’t we do the same in regard to Francis and pray for him as material papal placeholder? How about as Head of State of Vatican City?

9. Fr. Cekada offers no citations saying #8 above can’t be done, especially since theologian Guerard des Lauriers didn’t discuss his thesis until after the Great Apostasy of Vatican II, so you will find no approved pre-V2 theologians writing about its plausibility, merits, or demerits. Unlike Fr.Cekada, Fr. (later Bp.) Guerard des Lauriers was a top theologian pre-Vatican II. He drafted the Apostolic Constitution Munificentissimus Deus at the request of Pope Pius XII which defined the dogma of the Blessed Virgin Mary's Assumption into Heaven.  

10. What does Fr. Cekada offer to “prove” the name of Bergoglio can’t be used if the sedeprivationist theory is viable? His own ipse dixit.  (The authority of  P. Keating of Brown & Co., 37 Duke St., Grosvenor Square, is looking better all the time).

11. In the practical order, you cannot attend the Mass of a sedevacantist priest who disagrees with Fr. Cekada. One of the nine ways to be an accessory to another's sin is by counsel. The CMRI, SSPV, and some independent sedevacantist priests tell their congregations it's OK to attend an Una Cum Mass by the SSPX or other "R&R" clergy. If what Fr. Cekada says is true, they are telling people it's alright to commit a grave sin. That's public scandal, and manifestly evil. You could not go to that priest's Mass just as if he were to counsel people it's not a sin to go to an Eastern Schismatic liturgy, or the Novus Bogus "mass." Does Fr. Cekada believe this is the case? He may end up keeping many people "Home Alone" even when SSPV and CMRI chapels are readily available! 

As far as being able to discern basic distinctions, I have no problem in that area. For example, I know the distinction between ordinary and extraordinary means of life support. This prevents me from making a disgrace of myself by sanctioning the MURDER of Terri Schiavo by dehydration and starvation. My spiritual father, the late, great Fr. Gommar DePauw was a REAL Canonist, having received his JCD from Catholic University of America in 1955 (pre-Vatican II). He taught Canon Law and Moral Theology at Mount St. Mary’s Major Seminary for the Archdiocese of Baltimore from 1955-1962, and was a peritus (theological expert) at Vatican II, helping fight the Modernists. Fr. De Pauw, like ALL Traditionalist Catholic clergy (except Fr. Cekada and his buddy Bp. Dolan) roundly condemned what was happening to her from the pulpit using Catholic moral principles applied to the facts at hand. If Fr. Cekada claims he didn't know all the facts of the case (as some say in his defense), he had no business making such claims regarding (literally) life and death. 

Not only did Fr. Cekada disgrace himself, he made other Traditionalists look like ghouls by claiming a direct sin against the Fifth Commandment was morally permissible. To my knowledge, he has not been humble enough, nor man enough, to admit he was wrong and apologize for what scandal he caused.

Conclusion

Intolerance can be a virtue or a vice. In the Vatican II sect, they teach people must never be intolerant (except when it comes to Traditionalists). For some clerics, you must be intolerant of anything that contradicts them, even on matters not settled by those with Magisterial authority. I thought Fr. Cekada would give me a real intellectual challenge. Instead, he prefers to be flippant and dismissive. If this all he learned while at Econe, he may want to add his diploma to my books when I take them to the Bergoglian environmental recycling plant.

Addendum 10/1/17

This week Fr. Cekada added some material to his Quidlibet blog about this post. I reproduce it below and respond.

But even after the publication of the first version of this post on September 20, 2017,  our blogger still did not learn his lesson.

So, in a September 25 post, he went on a 1500-word tear against me based entirely on the assumption that the Prayer for the (Protestant) King permitted at Benediction in Canada took place during an “official liturgical service,” thus making (he assures us) an excellent analogical argument for tolerating the naming of a heretic/imposter as Vicar of Christ in the Canon of the Mass.

But all this windbaggery instantly collapses once you learn that, unlike the Mass, Benediction is not considered a true liturgical service.

Pfft. Strike three. And down goes yet another ignorantly made and pompously phrased objection.

And so here we are, ten years after my original article, and despite all the squawking, no one has yet been able to make a credible and coherent case against my arguments.

My response:

1. There was never a "first version of this post on September 20, 2017." My readers know I only publish posts on Mondays for the last three years. There were two previous posts that addressed this issue, "Una Cum" of July 10, 2017, and "Prayers For Non-Catholics" of August 14, 2017. I have no idea what, exactly, it is to which Fr Cekada refers. I do find it interesting that he knows the word count of the post! (If he even got that right).

2. If Benediction is not a "true liturgical service" why didn't he dismiss my objection about the king of England by saying so? Instead, he split hairs over the king being prayed for only as a secular head of state (an argument he used in a footnote to Grain of Incense).   When I pointed out that the king's office as head of state cannot be separated from his office as head of the false Anglican sect, he had to come up with something new.

3. Theologian Szal, whom we both cite, has Benediction under the heading, Commemorating Schismatics in the Liturgy. (See The Communication of Schismatics with Non-Catholics, pgs. 182-185) Certainly, the Mass is liturgical and the Holy See permitted Domine, salvum fac Regem to be sung. Let me guess his next excuse; "It's only sung, not a proper prayer! It's OK to sing A Mighty Fortress Is Our God just don't use Bergoglio's name."

4.  Fr Cekada is prideful and will never admit correction. He is sarcastic and condescending, and I will not lower myself to his level after a reader fraternally corrected me in the comments to this post. As proof of what I just asserted, when Fr. Cekada defended the murder of Terri Schiavo, he received much medical information from Dr. James Gebel, M.D. an expert in persistent vegetative states, and Fr. Cekada dismissed what he had to say based on Fr's alleged "common sense." To my knowledge, Fr Cekada has not been humble enough, nor man enough, to admit he was wrong and apologize for what scandal he caused.

5. Lastly, if he really believes that Una Cum Masses must be shunned, why does he not tell people to shun the Masses of sede priests who tell sede congregants that going to this evil Mass is ok? Isn't that counseling another to sin? How can you trust their moral judgement in Confession? He never even attempted to respond to this inherent inconsistency with what he professes and what he does.

---Introibo

NDE

 In 1975, Dr. Raymond Moody (b. 1944) published a most controversial and groundbreaking book entitled Life After Life. Dr. Moody (who impressively is a philosopher, psychologist, and medical doctor) coined the term "near death experience" or "NDE." His research began after meeting psychiatrist Dr. George Ritchie in 1965. Ritchie believed that when he was twenty-years-old, he journeyed into the afterlife for about nine minutes while clinically dead. He believed that his soul had left his body for a short time. Moody then began to investigate others who made similar claims. There was a definite pattern in what they had to report such as the feeling of being out of one's body, the sensation of traveling through a tunnel, making contact with dead relatives, and encountering a bright light during clinical death. To be "clinically dead"  means death as judged by means of medical observation of the complete cessation of a beating heart and respiration. It is distinguished from "actual death" because of the possibility of resuscitation within a reasonably short time.

 Moody is convinced that NDEs are scientific proof of life after death. Skeptics have accused Moody of "cherry-picking" his subjects to fit his preconceived ideas, and both doctors and scientists have offered naturalistic explanations for NDEs. The value of NDEs has also come under fierce criticism from Protestants and conservative members of the Vatican II sect because of Moody's later research which cannot be reconciled with Christian teaching. They say NDEs are of Satanic origin to confuse the faithful. The case against Moody's later research is strong:

• Moody claims that by staring into a mirror in a dimly lit room, people can summon "spiritual apparitions"

• Moody now believes in the false pagan belief of reincarnation (from his study of "past life regression") and claims to have had "nine past lives." 

 The NDE has been made very popular recently by the books Heaven Is for Real and Proof of Heaven, both of which had dominated the New York Times Bestsellers list. The former was also made into a 2014 movie.

 For a Traditionalist, is there any truth to NDEs? Are they merely the final hallucination of an oxygen-starved brain? Are they all deceptions of the father of lies? I think that based on all the available research, there are good reasons to believe NDEs may give certain people an actual glimpse into the hereafter. What I will attempt to do below is outline some common objections to the NDEs and give a brief rebuttal to each.

NDEs Under Scrutiny: Materialist Explanations

1. There is bias because the researchers already believe in life after death, or they want to believe it.

That objection can easily be flipped on those researchers who try to debunk NDEs because they allegedly don't believe in life after death or don't want to believe in it. According to Dr. Bruce Greyson, professor of Psychiatry and Neurobehavioral Sciences at the University of Virginia and a highly respected researcher, "Most near death researchers did not go into their investigations with a belief in mind-body separation, but came to that hypothesis based on what their research found." (See Dr. Bruce Greyson, Commentary on Psycho-physical and Cultural Correlates Undermining a Survivalist Interpretation of Near-Death Experiences, p. 140, cited in Chris Carter, Science and the Near-Death Experience (Rochester: Inner Traditions, 2010), p. 200).

2.  Oxygen deprivation causes an NDE.

 No, it doesn't account for many aspects. The research shows that many NDEs took place where the oxygen levels were being closely monitored in a hospital. The subject was able to tell what was accurately going on in his (and other!) rooms, while having sufficient oxygen in the brain. Researchers who are cardiologists and extremely familiar with oxygen deprivation, nevertheless reject it as a viable hypothesis (e.g. Drs. van Lommel, Sabom, and Rawlings who have all been published). 

Fighter pilots, during rapid acceleration, will sometimes experience tunnel vision, pass out, and dream of friends/family due to oxygen deprivation. However, there is a qualitative difference between the two accounts. The pilots report a dream-like state and experience a lack of peripheral vision, which makes it look like a tunnel around them. NDEs are experienced as vivid and describe a feeling of moving through a tunnel, not seeing things in a tunnel-like way.

3.  Science does not believe in immaterial components. There is a brain, but no "mind" or "soul" independent of the brain. To believe in a soul is like believing in goblins or ghosts for which we have no scientific evidence.

 Science actually does believe in components that are unseen and basically immaterial. Scientists believe in electrons which are invisible even when observed under the most powerful microscopes. Science sees their effects, so they must exist, but they function more like invisible waves than observable particles. Therefore, if we have enough evidence of the effects of a mind or soul, we should believe in it. 

Are NDEs Compatible with the Teaching of the Church?

•  Why would God permit an NDE? We are appointed to die only once and then to judgement.

True, but clinical death is not actual death which is irreversible (except in the case of rare miracles, such as Jesus raising Lazarus). There are many reasons that God could permit such an experience, not the least of which is to give people a realization there is an afterlife, you have a purpose, and you need to get right with God. I'm not God, so I may never understand why He permits the experience, but that doesn't mean NDEs aren't real. 

• NDEs are not compatible with Church teaching. Some people claim to see the false prophet Mohammed, or a false Hindu "god." An NDE is culturally determined and does not support the Traditional Catholic Church as the True Church.

 Did they get that information (they saw Mohammed, etc) from the experience itself, or did they assume it and make it conform to their already held beliefs? That's a big difference. Many researchers have proven that what people actually saw, and how they interpreted it, are entirely different!

• NDEs are of Satanic origin because (a) God would make Himself clearly known; (b) everyone seems to go to Heaven regardless of belief or the life they led; (c) some people report seeing pets. Animals have no immortal soul.

 In reply to (a), we are assuming we know what God would do. That's pretty arrogant.  "For My thoughts are not your thoughts: nor your ways My ways, saith the Lord.  For as the heavens are exalted above the earth, so are My ways exalted above your ways, and My thoughts above your thoughts." (Isaiah 55: 8-9). In reply to (b), this is not accurate. Beginning with Moody and continuing until today, there is a significant number of people who have frightening NDEs, mention the experience after being resuscitated, then forget about it; perhaps repressing its horror. Some people do report encounters with Hell.

Remember, an NDE does not guarantee your final destination. Just because you see Heaven doesn't mean you will go there, and the same holds true for Hell. Perhaps God is giving the one who has the experience more time to enter the Church and/or repent from sin. The repression of an NDE may also explain why, even though we all have a soul, only some people during clinical death assert they experienced it.  In response to (c), many who see pets are children. Perhaps God wants to make things as pleasant as possible for them; He is not teaching that animals have immortal souls.

Conclusion

 NDEs are not per se opposed to Church teaching. They actually serve as evidence of life after death, and the importance of finding and living the True Faith. The materialistic explanations are caving in as more and more research in this field is being done. The theological objections are not without merit. I'm certainly not claiming that all NDE experiences are true (some people lie) or good (some are of demonic origin). The majority of these experiences are compatible with Church teaching, even if we don't know why God permits them. We should go where the evidence leads. If anyone claiming an NDE speaks contrary to Church teaching, the NDE should be spurned as either a falsehood or of demonic origin. 

Just as there are true apparitions (Our Lady of Fatima) and false apparitions (Our Lady of the Roses at Bayside, New York), so too there can be true and false NDEs. We must learn to discern. As the Apostle St. John wrote under Divine Inspiration, "Dearly beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits if they be of God: because many false prophets are gone out into the world." (1 John 4: 1). 

Hitler's Demons

 They end their e-mails with "88" after their signatures. They are mostly in their teens and twenties, and claim to be Traditionalists. Their nightstand has a statue of the Sacred Heart of Jesus next to a copy of Mein Kampf, and a picture of Adolph Hitler. "8" represents the eighth letter of the alphabet (H), so "88" means "Heil Hitler!" Meet a strange new fringe group claiming to be Traditionalist Catholics. They are young historical revisionists who think the Nazis were "good guys;" they were anti-Communists and got "bad press" because of Jewish conspiracies lurking behind every door. I had the misfortune to know of one such young man; he wanted to be a Traditionalist priest, entered the seminary, and left to be an Eastern Schismatic. He descended into Neo-Nazism shortly thereafter. He always had a fascination with Nazis and Fascism.

 Just as Pope Pius XI famously said, "No one can be at the same time a sincere Catholic and a true socialist," there is also a mutually exclusive stance between Traditionalist Catholicism and Nazism/Fascism.  A phenomenal  scholarly book was released earlier this year entitled Hitler's Monsters, by Eric Kurlander and published by Yale University Press. As the subtitle declares, it is "a supernatural history of the Third Reich." I would suggest that anyone claiming to be Christian, and  flirting with the idea of Nazism, be given this book to read. It's 300 pages long, with myriad footnotes, but well worth the time to read. This is a serious work by a serious scholar.  I will give but a small exposition below how Hitler and Nazi Germany were deeply rooted in the occult and wanted Catholicism wiped off the face of the Earth.

The Nazis and Paganism

 People can make claims all they want. The crux of the issue is whether or not the claims are backed up by sound reasoning and sufficient evidence. One of the so-called "New Atheists," Dr. Richard Dawkins, enjoys quoting Hitler as saying,  "...as late as 1941 he told his adjutant, General Gerhard Engel, 'I shall remain a Catholic forever.' (See The God Delusion, pg. 274). Was Hitler Catholic? Not by a long shot. Yes, he was baptized in the Church, but the "god" he worshiped was not the historical Jesus Christ Who founded His One True Church.  Even Dawkins admits, "Hitler, oddly, was always adamant that Jesus himself was not a Jew."(Ibid, pg. 276). Why would the world's biggest anti-Semite worship a Man born of a Jewish woman as God?  The answer is simple: he didn't. 

 On March 14, 1937, Pope Pius XI issued his encyclical letter Mit Brennender Sorge (On the Church and the German Reich).  His words prove more true than ever, as greater evidence has been brought forth confirming his every contention. In paragraph # 7, His Holiness writes:

The believer in God is not he who utters the name in his speech, but he for whom this sacred word stands for a true and worthy concept of the Divinity. Whoever identifies, by pantheistic confusion, God and the universe, by either lowering God to the dimensions of the world, or raising the world to the dimensions of God, is not a believer in God. Whoever follows that so-called pre-Christian Germanic conception of substituting a dark and impersonal destiny for the personal God, denies thereby the Wisdom and Providence of God who "Reacheth from end to end mightily, and ordereth all things sweetly" (Wisdom viii. 1). Neither is he a believer in God.

Hitler only mentioned being Catholic once in the quote given by Dawkins. Hitler also wrote of "gods" and "goddesses" proving, if all of his religious utterances are to be believed literally, that he was a polytheist. The gods are referred to in Mein Kampf-"the manifestations of decay showed only that the gods had willed Austria's destruction" [vol. I chapt. 3]-and there are references to goddesses as well: to the "Goddess of Suffering" [vol. I chapt. 2] and the "Goddess of Destiny" [vol. I chapt.5]. There is even a "goddess of eternal justice and inexorable retribution" which Hitler believed "caused Archduke Francis Ferdinand, the most mortal enemy of Austrian- Germanism, to fall by the bullets which he himself had helped to mold" [vol I chapt.1].


There is also a "Goddess of Peace and a God of War." More significantly, there are numerous references to "Fate." For those unfamiliar with world religion and philosophy, Fate is a non-Christian term referring not to the personal God of the Bible, but to an impersonal force of unknown character. (See Keysor, Hitler, the Holocaust and the Bible, pgs. 87 et. seq.). In keeping with paganism, there is also evidence that the high ranking Nazis were sodomites. (See my post of 9/14/15, "Homo-Fascism").

Paragraph #9 of Pope Pius XI's encyclical reads:

Beware, Venerable Brethren, of that growing abuse, in speech as in writing, of the name of God as though it were a meaningless label, to be affixed to any creation, more or less arbitrary, of human speculation. Use your influence on the Faithful, that they refuse to yield to this aberration. Our God is the Personal God, supernatural, omnipotent, infinitely perfect, one in the Trinity of Persons, tri-personal in the unity of divine essence, the Creator of all existence. Lord, King and ultimate Consummator of the history of the world, who will not, and cannot, tolerate a rival God by His side.

 Rival "gods" were all Hitler and his henchmen knew. According to the latest research from Eric Kurlander:

"The irony is that the evidence indicating an important link between Nazism and the supernatural has never been greater. In the mid-1920s Hitler almost certainly read Ernst Schertel's parapsychology tome Magic: History, Theory, Practice, underlining sentences such as 'Satan is the fertilizing, destroying-constructing warrior' and 'He who does not carry demonic seeds within him will never give birth to a new world.' ..." (See Hitler's Monsters, pg. x)

 Kurlander also reveals how the Nazis held a seance on the night of February 26, 1933 using clairvoyant Erik Hanussen who "predicted" the next day's Reichstag fire, which helped justify the Nazi imposition of martial law. Deputy Fuhrer Rudolf Hess sponsored astrology, "cosmobiology," and other esoteric medical practices. SS Chief Heinrich Himmler encouraged research on the Holy Grail (the movie Raiders of the Lost Ark got their story-line from such records, albeit with great artistic license), witchcraft, and medieval devil worship (Luciferianism).

The Nazis were fascinated with "werewolves." Hitler revived belief in lycanthropy or "a magical change from man into wolf." While calling himself "Christian" or "Catholic"once or twice in his adult life, Hitler loved to compare himself to a wolf. "I don't need to be afraid of wolves, I myself am a wolf." He even named his headquarters Wolfschanze i.e., "Wolf's Lair." It is noted that while the Catholic Church may have associated werewolves with witchcraft and Satanism, lycanthropy was looked upon favorably and with awe in pagan Germany and Scandinavia.

In my personal experience, Fr. DePauw knew of a story, circulated by many high-ranking prelates, that circa 1941 Pope Pius XII called together all the cardinals of the Curia, and late at night in St. Peter's Basilica, attempted a "long distance exorcism" of Hitler and the Nazi officials. The story has never been proven (or disproven). Did Hitler submit to the teaching of Pope Pius XI in his encyclical as a good Catholic must? The answer is obvious.

Kurlander draws this conclusion:

Based on this evidence, I argue that no mass political movement drew as consciously and consistently as the Nazis on...occultism and "border science," pagan, New Age, and Eastern religions, folklore, mythology, and many other supernatural doctrines..in order to attract a generation of German men and women seeking new forms of spirituality..."

A State Religion Based on Racism

 These pagan ideas would be incorporated into a National German Church, where exaggerated nationalism and evil racism would reign supreme. According to the New York Times of January 2, 1942, there was to be such a sect. I reproduce below the beginning of the article and the first 5 of the "30 point program" for the sect's establishment:

BERNE, Switzerland, Jan. 2—Dr. Alfred Rosenberg, long the anti-religious polemicist of modern Germany and the protagonist of the “new national church,” has just released for publication a thirty-point program that will form at the same time the program and tenets of the “religion of National Socialism.”

The Nazi religious concept is founded not on the worship of Wotan and Valhalla, dear to the memory of General Erich von Ludendorff, but surprisingly enough, in view of Dr. Rosenberg's past attacks on Christianity and its teachings, on a partial worship of God, whose works are “eternal.”

Briefly but succinctly he outlines the organization and teachings of the church in the following phrases—for which, as the Swiss Socialist newspaper Volksrecht of Zurich points out, “one needs to be no ecclesiast to draw his own conclusion”:

1. The National Reich Church specifically demands the immediate turning over to its possession of all churches and chapels, to become national churches.

2. The German people have no call to serve the National Reich Church, but that church itself is called to serve its single doctrine—race and people.

3. The domain of the National Reich Church is limited by the territorial frontiers of the Reich and its colonies.

4. The National Reich Church will oblige no German to adhere to it. It is, however, ready to do all in its power to include in its ranks every German soul. Other churches or religious associations, above all those based on international bodies or directed from abroad, will not be tolerated in Germany by the National Reich Church.

5. The National Reich Church is immutably fixed in its one objective: to destroy that Christian belief imported into Germany in the unfortunate year 800, whose tenets conflict with both the heart and the mentality of the German. (Emphasis mine)

Conclusion

Hitler, the Nazis, and fascism are incompatible with Catholicism. Anyone who thinks otherwise is deluding himself. It is based on all things not merely un-Christian, but decidedly ANTI-Christian. I wince when I hear that "nationalism" and "racial pride" (white, black or otherwise) are called compatible with the One True Church. Once more Pope Pius XI:

10. This God, this Sovereign Master, has issued commandments whose value is independent of time and space, country and race. As God's sun shines on every human face so His law knows neither privilege nor exception. Rulers and subjects, crowned and uncrowned, rich and poor are equally subject to His word. From the fullness of the Creators' right there naturally arises the fullness of His right to be obeyed by individuals and communities, whoever they are. This obedience permeates all branches of activity in which moral values claim harmony with the law of God, and pervades all integration of the ever-changing laws of man into the immutable laws of God.

11. None but superficial minds could stumble into concepts of a national God, of a national religion; or attempt to lock within the frontiers of a single people, within the narrow limits of a single race, God, the Creator of the universe, King and Legislator of all nations before whose immensity they are "as a drop of a bucket" (Isaiah XI, 15).

Hitler and the new "Nazi Traditionalists" can call themselves "Catholic" but they fail the test of Our Lord Himself, "By their fruits you shall know them. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? Even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit, and the evil tree bringeth forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and shall be cast into the fire." (St. Matthew 7: 16-19).

Singing For Satan--Part 2

 This week I continue my once-per-month series of posts regarding an informal study I undertook in the early 1990s regarding rock and pop music. The purpose of my study (and the background to it) can be read in the first installment of August 7, 2017. If you have not read that post, I strongly encourage you to do so before reading this installment. I will only repeat here the seven (7) evil elements that pervade today's music:

1. Violence/Murder/Suicide
2. Nihilism/Despair
3. Drug and alcohol glorification
4. Adultery/ Fornication and sexual perversion
5. The occult
6. Rebellion against lawful superiors
7. Blasphemy against God, Jesus Christ in particular, and the Church



 The exposing of the bands/artists continues.

The Eagles

 This rock group was founded in 1971 in Los Angeles, California. The original line-up consisted of Don Henley (drums, vocals, b. 1947), Glenn Frey (lead guitar and vocals; b. 1948, d. 2016), Bernie Leadon (guitars, vocals, b. 1947), and Randy Meisner (bass guitar, vocals, b. 1946). Both Henley and Frey would go on to have very successful solo careers as well.  Rolling Stone magazine ranked them #75 of the "100 Greatest Artists of All Time." The Eagles have never been considered a hard rock group, but rather a "melodic rock" or even a "country rock" band, due to the slow pace of most of their songs and the many ballads they sing. Like the group Journey they disprove the idea that only heavy metal groups are bad. 

 Despite protests from the band members and their adoring fans, The Eagles are seeped in the occult, blaspheme God, glorify drugs, and promote rebellion against lawful superiors, as will be shown below.

Occult Origins and Influences

 All the band members were raging drug addicts and alcoholics. The very name "The Eagles" was decided upon when they were under the influence of the hallucinogenic drug peyote. While drunk and stoned in a California desert, they chose the name in reverence to the "Chief Spirit of the Indian Cosmos." According to Time magazine, they wrote most of their songs while hallucinating on peyote (See Time, August 15, 1975 issue, pg. 4). 

  The song Witchy Woman is about witchcraft, alleged to be "good" or "white magick" (when spelled with a "k" at the end, it refers to the occultist "science and art of causing change to occur in conformity with the will" as opposed to Magic, which refers to slight-of-hand parlor tricks). Don Henley admits to the occult influence, yet tries to pass it off as a "phase" and not a big deal. In an interview with Rolling Stone magazine, Henley stated: 

Another inspiration for the song [Witchy Woman] was the roommate of a girl I was seeing in the early 1970s. All things occult were popular in those days. Ouija boards, séances, palm reading, etc. A lot of the girls were into what was called "white witchcraft," that is, they were practitioners of folk magic for benevolent purposes, as distinguished from malevolent witchcraft or black magic. I think some of them practiced a little of both. I thought it was charming and seductive, but I never took any of it seriously. For the most part, it was just a phase people were passing through, part of the overall youth movement and the quest for spirituality, which included a re-enchantment with the "old ways." It was harmless fun.

Another inspiration for that song may have been the shamanistic aspects of the Carlos Castaneda books we were intrigued with at the time. In the late Sixties and early Seventies, the Peruvian-born Castaneda became a popular American author while earning his Ph.D. at UCLA. (See http://www.rollingstone.com/music/lists/eagles-complete-discography-don-henley-looks-back-20160610/eagles-1972-20160609)

The Church certainly does not view Ouija boards, palm readings, and the like as "harmless fun" or a "quest for spirituality." There is also no distinction between alleged "white" and "black" witchcraft because God condemns it all as evil. As I've written before, witchcraft, Ouija boards, and all other occult practices Henley mentions are condemned by both the Bible and Church teaching. "Let no one be found among you who sacrifices their son or daughter in the fire, who practices divination or sorcery, interprets omens, engages in witchcraft,or casts spells, or who is a medium or spiritist or who consults the dead. Anyone who does these things is detestable to the LORD; because of these same detestable practices the LORD your God will drive out those nations before you." (See Deuteronomy 18:10-12; Emphasis mine.) According to theologian Jone, "Spiritism claims to be able to communicate with the spirit world and endeavors to establish such commerce with it. Although spiritism is for the most part fraud, still the intention alone to enter into communication with spirits is gravely sinful. Therefore, it is mortally sinful to conduct a spiritistic seance or to act as a medium." (See Moral Theology, pg. 100; Emphasis mine).

 Moreover, Carlos Castaneda (d. 1998), was indeed a shaman who wrote a series of books that describe his training in shamanism. A "shaman" is defined as one who is "reaching altered states of consciousness in order to perceive and interact with a spirit world and channel these transcendental energies into this world." It is Castaneda's books that inspired The Eagles; a man who uses drugs to alter his consciousness and allow malevolent spirits (demons) access to himself. They can then use him to influence and possess others.

The Eagles' most controversial song is Hotel California. The band will tell you it's about excess in partying out in California. By now, you are probably convinced by the band's background that their explanation is a lie. So am I. The enigmatic song tells of the founding of the Church of Satan by the evil Anton LaVey, the founder of the Luciferian sect who died in 1997.  Below are the lyrics:

On a dark desert highway, cool wind in my hair
Warm smell of colitas, rising up through the air
Up ahead in the distance, I saw a shimmering light
My head grew heavy and my sight grew dim
I had to stop for the night.

There she stood in the doorway;
I heard the mission bell
And I was thinking to myself
'This could be heaven or this could be Hell'
Then she lit up a candle and she showed me the way
There were voices down the corridor,
I thought I heard them say

Welcome to the Hotel California
Such a lovely place (such a lovely place)
Such a lovely face.
Plenty of room at the Hotel California
Any time of year (any time of year) you can find it here

Her mind is Tiffany-twisted, she got the Mercedes bends
She got a lot of pretty, pretty boys, that she calls friends
How they dance in the courtyard, sweet summer sweat
Some dance to remember, some dance to forget

So I called up the Captain,
'Please bring me my wine'
He said, 'we haven't had that spirit here since nineteen sixty-nine'
And still those voices are calling from far away,
Wake you up in the middle of the night
Just to hear them say"

Welcome to the Hotel California
Such a lovely place (such a lovely place)
Such a lovely face.
They livin' it up at the Hotel California
What a nice surprise (what a nice surprise), bring your alibis

Mirrors on the ceiling,
The pink champagne on ice
And she said, 'we are all just prisoners here, of our own device'
And in the master's chambers,
They gathered for the feast
They stab it with their steely knives,
But they just can't kill the beast

Last thing I remember, I was
Running for the door
I had to find the passage back to the place I was before
'Relax' said the night man,
'We are programmed to receive.
You can check out any time you like,
But you can never leave!'

Hotel California refers to the infamous "Black House" where LaVey lived at 6114 California St, San Francisco, California from his founding of the sect in 1966 until his death in 1997. It was used for Satanic rituals and was bought because it was known to be used as a brothel ("mirrors on the ceiling" say the lyrics).
Heaven is written in lower case but "this could be Hell" is upper case. Note well, the fifth stanza calls up "the Captain" (Satan) who sacastically asks for wine, but "we haven't seen that spirit here since 1969." This is a reference to the authorship of the Satanic Bible (1969) and the institution of the invalid Novus Bogus "mass" of the V2 sect. Wine remains wine, and the "spirit" (Holy Ghost) is now gone. Below is a picture of the Black House.

Hotel California is also a a metaphor for Hell, because "you can never leave."

Backmasking is used in the song. Backmasking is a recording technique in which a sound or message is recorded backward onto a track that is meant to be played forward and the technique was first used by The Beatles in 1966. Many years ago, I worked for a year in radio as a part time gig. I literally heard the subliminal message played backwards. In Hotel California it clearly states, "Yeah. Satan organized his own religion."

Here are some "edifying" lyrics from Witchy Woman:

Raven hair and ruby lips
Sparks fly from her finger tips
Echoed voices in the night
She's a restless spirit on an endless flight
Wooo hooo witchy woman see how

High she flies (Emphasis mine)

The song One of These Nights contains these words:

You got your demons, you got your desires
Well, I got a few of my own.....
I've been searching for the daughter of the devil himself
I've been searching for an angel in white

I've been waiting for a woman who's a little of both (Emphasis mine)

You can't be on God's side and Satan's side for Christ said, "He who is not with Me is against Me, and whoever does not gather with Me scatters." (St. Matthew 12: 30).

The song Good Day In Hell mocks the names written in the Book of Life: (See Apocalypse 3:5)

 The devil's on the phone, he laughs 
And says you're doin' the just fine 
In that big book of names I want to go down 
In flames 
Seein's how I'm goin' down (Emphasis mine)

He doesn't want his name in the Book of Life, but wants to go "down in flames" to Hell instead.

For Drugs and Against Lawful Authority

The song Chug All Night tells the tale of a man who wants to drink all night, every night with a woman while engaging in sex:

I believe we could chug all night
I believe we could hug all night
The band is loose and the groove
Is right you're so much woman I

Believe we could chug all night
On the day that I die, well
I just might scream
If I'm alive in the morning

The song James Dean is a tribute to the iconic movie actor who died in a car crash at age 24 in 1955. He was the symbol of rebellion. According to co-star Sal Mineo, "Jimmy Dean started the whole youth movement."  Dean desired rebellion, confrontation, and defiance of authority just for the sake of doing so. This attack of moral conventions was a subtle indoctrination of the youth that was a catalyst to the counterculture movement in the 1960’s. He is alleged by several sources (although some claim otherwise) to have derided Christianity as "those destructive influences of beliefs based on torture and blood and crucifixion." He also supposedly said, "I believe in freedom, not God." Dean was raised a Quaker, but is claimed to have been sexually abused as a youth, and was bisexual. The tribute song says:

You were the lowdown rebel if there ever was 

Even if you had no cause 

James Dean, you said it all so clean 

And I know my life would look all right 

If I could see it on the silver screen  (Emphasis mine)

Conclusion

Don't let the slow tempo of many Eagles' songs fool you. The band members want you to believe that the occult is harmless and "just a phase" they went through. Drugs and alcohol were also "a phase." Yet the evidence shows that they were flying high as an eagle on drugs, wrote their songs in that state, were involved in the occult and consulted books written by a shaman. They even have backmasking on  Hotel California about Satan, while claiming the tune has nothing to do with the devil.  You can shut your eyes to the evidence, or ditch their music and their lies.