Catholic Replies
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Q. At Mass on the feast of St. John Vianney, the priest said something about a time when the saint told a distraught woman that her husband, who had committed suicide by jumping off a bridge, was not in Hell, but in Purgatory. Do you know anything about this incident? — M.E.W., via e-mail.
A. Yes, we have heard of it. It seems that St. John Vianney (1786-1859), who had transformed a small lackluster parish in the French village of Ars by his prayers before the Blessed Sacrament, devoted up to 16-18 hours a day hearing Confessions in the last decade of his life. People came from everywhere to go to Confession to him, and they were willing to wait many hours, and even days, to have their sins forgiven. There were stories about his supernatural insights and his ability to read consciences if someone left out a sin.
On one occasion, the woman you asked about was waiting outside the church in Ars when St. John came up to her and whispered in her ear, “He is saved.” The woman was startled, so he repeated, “He is saved.” Asked how that were possible considering the manner of her husband’s death, the Curé of Ars replied: “I tell you he is saved. He is in Purgatory, and you must pray for him.” The saint said that between the top of the bridge and the water, her husband had time to make an Act of Contrition. He said that although the man did not practice his religion, he sometimes joined her in prayer, and that gesture made it possible for him to accept the grace of repentance at the last moment of his life.
Q. According to chapter four of St. Matthew’s Gospel, Satan took our Savior up on a mountain, showed Him all the kingdoms of the world, and promised to give them all to Jesus if He would “prostrate yourself and worship me.” Jesus responded, “Get away, Satan! It is written: / ‘The Lord, your God, shall you worship / and him alone shall you serve’.” I thought that God took away Satan’s ability to take physical form. — J.B., Pennsylvania.
A. Neither this Gospel passage, nor the one in chapter four of Luke, tells us in what form Satan appeared to Jesus, only that he tempted our Lord three times. In his Life of Christ, Giuseppe Ricciotti addressed the question of whether the temptations took place “in a real and objective manner or only in the form of suggestion or subjective vision.” He said that “in the Middle Ages, people began to believe that the whole episode occurred in a vision, for it was considered unworthy that Christ should be carried here or there by the devil and be even restricted in his power.
“The early Fathers, however, had no such difficulty and ordinarily interpreted the facts as real and objective happenings. In addition, Luke seems to have been of the opinion of the Fathers, for at the end of his account of the three temptations there is a veiled reference to the events of the Passion of Jesus as new assaults by the devil, and those events were certainly real and objective” (p. 275).
Msgr. Ricciotti is referring to Luke’s statement, “When the devil had finished every temptation, he departed from him for a time” (Luke 4:13). That time came in the Garden of Gethsemane in the early morning hours of Good Friday when Jesus was tempted to abandon His mission of redemption. Three times He asked His Father to spare Him the chalice of suffering that lay ahead, but then said, “Your will be done” (Matt. 26:42). There is no scriptural evidence of Satan’s physical presence in the Garden, but there was surely a shadowy presence, as depicted in the movie The Passion of the Christ.
We are not aware of God having taken away Satan’s ability to appear in physical form. After all, he appeared as a serpent in the Book of Genesis and as a dragon in the Book of Revelation. And he has taken on human form when inflicting physical beatings on such saints as John Vianney and Padre Pio. Pio’s fellow friars could hear the sounds of physical struggle from his room during the night, but the next day the saint would dismiss the events as of no consequence.
In his book An Exorcist: More Stories, Fr. Gabriel Amorth, the former chief exorcist of Rome, said that while Satan is a pure spirit, he can take on a physical image. He said that “when the demon wants to make himself visible to us and takes on a tangible form, he can appear as a frightening animal or a horrible man. But he can also masquerade as an elegant gentleman. He changes his appearance according to the effect he intends to achieve: fear or appeal….He can also affect our psyche through dreams, thoughts, and imagination. He can transmit his own thoughts to us, such as hatred or despair. All these phenomena can appear in victims of possession. The true perfidy and ugliness of this spiritual being is greater than anything we humans can imagine or depict” (pp. 187-188).
Q. I don’t understand why there are feast days for churches in Rome, such as the Basilica of St. Mary Major and the Basilica of St. John Lateran, and what’s the difference between a basilica and a regular church? — K.E., Pennsylvania.
A. Answering the second question first, basilica is a title of honor given to certain churches which may be classified either as major basilicas or minor basilicas. The only four major basilicas are located in Rome. They are St. John Lateran, St. Peter, St. Paul Outside the Walls, and St. Mary Major. Some churches outside of Rome have been designated minor basilicas and enjoy some of the privileges of the major basilicas.
As for celebrating feasts for churches in Rome, they are a way of expressing love and veneration for the Church of Rome, which St. Ignatius of Antioch said “presides in charity” over the whole Catholic world. These feasts also remind us of the importance of material buildings where the faithful gather to celebrate and praise God.
August 5 marks the feast of St. Mary Major, the first Marian basilica, which was dedicated by Pope Sixtus III around the year 435. The original building was built in the third century on a site apparently identified by the Blessed Virgin Mary herself with a snowfall in August. She later commanded a wealthy man named John to build the church and, after it was constructed, the Blessed Mother signaled her approval when a miraculous shower of white rose petals fell upon those gathered there. The basilica is still known today as “Mary of the Snows.”
Q. I read somewhere that Pope St. John Paul II predicted years ago the crisis facing the Church today. Can you provide any details? — M.C., South Dakota.
A. Back in 1976, two years before he became Pope, Karol Cardinal Wojtyla of Poland spoke at a Eucharistic Congress in Philadelphia. On that occasion, he said these prophetic words:
“We are now standing in the face of the greatest historical confrontation humanity has gone through. I do not think that wide circles of American society or wide circles of the Christian community realize this fully. We are now facing the final confrontation between the Church and the anti-Church, of the Gospel versus the anti-Gospel.
“We must be prepared to undergo great trials in the not-too-distant future; trials that will require us to be ready to give up even our lives, and a total gift of self to Christ and for Christ. Through your prayers and mine, it is possible to alleviate this tribulation, but it is no longer possible to avert it….How many times has the renewal of the Church been brought about in blood! It will not be different this time.”
