By BRIAN CLOWES
(Editor’s Note: Brian Clowes has been director of research and training at Human Life International since 1995. For an electronic copy of the book Call to Action or Call to Apostasy, consisting of a detailed description of the current forms of dissent and how to fight them, e-mail him at bclowes@hli.org.)
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Some Catholic pro-life and pro-family activists don’t really understand why they should be involved in fighting dissent in their dioceses and parishes, since this activity seems to be unrelated to the critical work they are doing. Similarly, those who fight dissent often believe that anti-abortion and pro-family activism, while important, is not relevant to what they are doing.
Besides, they are already busy enough; who needs even more work?
Even though pro-lifers, pro-family activists, and dissent busters must naturally focus on their own areas of activism, they must understand that the concerted attacks on the family, the unborn child, and on the Church are intimately connected.
As an institution, the Roman Catholic Church is almost alone in its opposition to the vast litany of sins that are sweeping across the globe today, killing tens of millions of people and capturing many millions of souls. The Pope, a handful of bishops from various countries, and a few leading lay people are virtually the only leaders speaking out against the evils of abortion, contraception, population control, divorce, homosexual acts, and pornography.
If the dissenters succeed in their mission to blunt or muffle the prophetic voice of the Church, there will be virtually no resistance to their agenda. All pro-lifers — not just Catholics — will find themselves much more isolated than they are now, and their fight against abortion and the homosexual agenda will be much more difficult. For this reason, pro-lifers of all faiths should support all of those denominations speaking out against the many evils of our age.
Fr. John Hardon, SJ, called the twentieth century the “Age of Martyrs,” since more Christians were murdered for their beliefs then than in any previous century. This hideous trend continues, but in different ways.
There have been more preborn Catholics slaughtered by abortionists in the United States over the past half-century than the number of Christian martyrs in all previous centuries all over the world combined. As of the end of 2015, there have been 57.6 million legal abortions in the United States. This means that about 10.9 million babies who would have been baptized Catholic have been aborted since 1966.
Among all of these babies predictably would have been two cardinals, 66 archbishops and bishops, 16 abbots, 5,707 priests, 7,190 religious sisters, 2,875 permanent deacons, and 623 religious brothers. For half a century, every single week, half a dozen future priests, sisters, deacons, and brothers are thrown into dumpsters behind abortion mills around the nation or ground up and flushed down the toilet.
Meanwhile, Call to Action and its fellow dissenting organizations heartily applaud abortion under the pretense of “freedom of choice” — and then gripe about the “priest shortage” that they in effect helped to create in the first place!
The Roman Emperor Diocletian could never have imagined such an effective attack upon the hierarchy and the people of the Church.
If such a slaughter of religious men and women and lay Catholics had taken place in the open, there would have been a worldwide cry of protest. However, since every murder by abortion takes place behind clinic doors and is committed by men and women who never have to raise their voices, few take heed. And since this slaughter is carried out in the name of the god “Choice,” even fewer dare interfere.
It is revealing to see how directly abortion affects the Catholic Church. Fourteen states legalized abortion in this country before Roe v. Wade. An examination of the number of Baptisms in these states shows that Baptisms were rising steadily in each state until just before surgical abortion was legalized. On the average, Baptisms in these states dropped 28 percent immediately after abortion was legalized — a percentage that is almost identical to the ratio of Catholic women obtaining abortions.
So, in a very real sense, those who defend the faith are fighting abortion, because they are speaking out against the root causes of abortion and so many other evils; modernism and indifference to the message of Christianity. And those who fight abortion are effectively defending the faith, since they are saving the lives of many future Catholics, including those of men and women religious not yet born.
Both groups of activists should work more closely together, since such cooperation renders both movements more effective. Their missions are not mutually exclusive; they are complementary.
Conclusion. A soldier would never go into armed conflict without intense and appropriate training. To do otherwise is fatal both to the soldier and to his mission.
Your work is infinitely more important as a warrior for Christ. You will be ready to step onto the battlefield only after you have established a firm foundation of prayer, organized with other orthodox Catholics, and learned your faith and the tactics of the dissenters.
It may take you a year or more of preparation before you are ready to act; but do not become discouraged. The better prepared you are, the more effective you will be as a soldier in the eternal struggle between the culture of life and the culture of death.
Your spiritual adviser and experienced dissent-busters will be able to help you determine when you are ready to engage in battle against the modernists.
Whenever an orthodox Catholic bishop, priest, or lay person fails to be absolutely perfect in some way, or appears to be inconsistent in any manner, dissenters invariably sneer “by their fruits you shall know them.”
The most wonderful gifts we can receive are the fruits of the Holy Spirit. Dissenters have rejected these fruits and have instead greedily clutched and consumed the decaying and corrupting “fruits” of Satan. Even the most cursory examination of their speeches and writings show that they have displaced love with selfishness; joy with dejection and anger; peace with endless, aimless agitation; patience with an unquenchable desire for immediate gratification; kindness with intolerance and judgmentalism; goodness with corruption; faithfulness with fickleness; gentleness with harshness; and self-control with self-indulgence.
The ultimate objective of the organized dissenters is not to give, but to take away. They want to take away the Rock of Peter and smash it into dust. They want to take away the sacraments and force every Catholic to depend upon his or her own minuscule powers. And they want the Church to stop preaching and teaching the truth so that they will feel accepted by everyone in our world.
As bad as things appear at times, we should remember the eternal words of Cicero in Familiares: Alios ego vidi ventos; alias prospexi animo procellas: “I have already seen other winds, I have already beheld other storms.” The Church has always resisted her enemies and has always triumphed and endured, because the Holy Spirit guides her even when her people go astray.
And she will continue to endure until the end of time. Jesus Christ Himself has made this vow to us.
There are signs of promise all over the country and all over the world. It can only be thus when the dissenters exterminate their own children while orthodox Catholics nurture large families. Even as things are getting darker in so many ways, the light is also getting brighter, and so the contrast is sharper.
More and more Catholics are asking themselves the question: “Do I want to be an American Catholic or do I want to be a Roman Catholic American?,” and are taking the latter course.
But this course requires action. James 4:17 tells us that “Faith without works is as dead as a body without breath.”
Ask yourself right now — “Which course will I take?”
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