Can you dig it?

Here's how it's done

Speaking of not lying, Archbishop Fulton Sheen did not lie in this story, but neither did he give in to the temptation of "non-violence". Excerpt:

She said "I will only come back if you promise you will not ask me to go to confession."

"OK, I promise I will not ask you to go to confession."

"Say it again, you will not ask me to go to confession".

"OK, I promise again, I will not ask you to go to confession".

She came back that afternoon and he met her at the church door. He told her that there were paintings by Rembrandt and Van Dyke in that chapel and would she like to see them? She said yes.

"And as we walked up the side aisle to see the paintings, I pushed her into a confession box. (I did not ask her if she wanted to go to confession.) I was present three months later when she took her veil as a member of the perpetual adoration sisters where she is to this day."

Yeah, he knocked the devil out of her. Reminds me of Christ's assertion the the Kingdom of Heaven being taken by force by "men of violence." OK, it wasn't too rough I'm sure; it wasn't violence for violence sake. He was a man who wasn't afraid to push and who understood that a little goes a long way.

Abp. Sheen: "I pushed her into a confession box."

Also reminds me of St. Jude's remark about "snatching" people from the fire.

Church Teaching on Families and State

I mentioned several weeks ago that I'd signed up to get these emails everyday to help me study the catechism. I've been doing pretty good at it, just missed a few days. The service uses the popular YOUCAT version which is based on the official catechism. I thought I'd post the two for today, questions 369 and 370.

Why are families irreplaceable?
Every child is descended from one father and one mother and longs for the warmth and safety of a family so that he may grow up secure and happy. The family is the basic cell of human society. The values and principles that are lived out in the small circle of the family are what make solidarity in the life of larger society possible in the first place.

---

Why should the State protect and promote families?
The welfare and future of a State depend on the ability of the smallest unit within it, the family, to live and develop. No State has the right to intrude on the basic cell of society, the family, by its regulations or to question its right to exist. No State has the right to define the family differently, for the family's commission comes from the Creator. No State has the right to deprive the family of its fundamental functions, especially in the area of education. On the contrary, every State has the duty to support families with its assistance and to ensure that its material needs are met.

These point segue with something else I've been studying in Vatican II's DECREE ON THE APOSTOLATE OF THE LAITY, written by Blessed Paul VI. Excerpt:

17. There is a very urgent need for this individual apostolate in those regions where the freedom of the Church is seriously infringed. In these trying circumstances, the laity do what they can to take the place of priests, risking their freedom and sometimes their life to teach Christian doctrine to those around them, training them in a religious way of life and a Catholic way of thinking, leading them to receive the sacraments frequently and developing in them piety, especially Eucharistic devotion. While the sacred synod heartily thanks God for continuing also in our times to raise up lay persons of heroic fortitude in the midst of persecutions, it embrace them with fatherly affection and gratitude.

 Yes. Truly a prophet.