What's Coming and Why it isn't here yet:

I was going to do two new podcasts this week-end and then for the first time, I clicked one of the names of the platforms that have the episodes, like Spotify and found out - YOU CAN'T HEAR THEM.

So, now they are are all much louder, listen well (I checked) but when you increase those dBs, suddenly a lot of hidden clicks and hissses emerge. (Yes, "hisses" actually has 4 esses, sometimes more, when I say it.) So, that's what took so long.

Today I'll record as soon as everyone is in bed. A lot of my visions are about the way things work between Time and Eternity. There's all this guessing and assuming. I don't think the world really needs one more contemplative telling them everyone eventually will be oned with God or that He is Love. But what happens and how and why is a lot of what Jesus talked about and people are missing the point.

There was a question on Galatians 6:8 in r/ChristianUniversalism today and part of my answer was:

The thing most people don't think about is that we are eternal beings, not after we die, right now. The Kingdom is right here, among us. We receive from Eternity through the Spirit, graces and information in this life.

The very fact that visionaries and mystics exist, that miracles happen, that consolations are given, is testimony to this essential fact about the way the Universe works. So first, I think I'll put aside the series in the Tribulation and just do "The Way Things Work."

Jesus talked about that all the time, He only spoke of tribulation and Parousia a couple times. So I guess this should come first. And - it leads right into the other.

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Of Washing Machines and Wondrous Things.

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I have lines again!!!  I also have a new branding thingy. And, there's a link now with a few podcasts! https://thehereticchristian.buzzsprout.com

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A new line! So, I do have this link on the Reddit site u/unbannablechristian, but I didn't know anyone was using it. I should probably shut this down, but then someone came and read the visions stuff at the top. Hey, I was about to come and read it and podcast them. 

Between the Calling the Elect Blog and the Podcast and stupid You Tube, which I shouldn't complain about because there are some pictures to put up, again, I don't have time for here. But I left a lot of good stuff here and I'm using it as a blog podcast resource. So ... ok - hang on....

Oh for goodness sake, I don't even have the companion blog link on reddit. I blame this on the fact it wasn't a supposed to be my forum

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https://callingthelect.blogspot.com

It's not making the podcasts, it's the upkeeping with all the places. 

Be back in another few months....

I was right - trying the podcast

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Podcast, anyone? Sept 1. I think. Maybe. Not live, don't have a link yet. 

WHAT I BELIEVE

As you can see, I haven't posted here in quite a while.  The comments section of the previous very simple template didn't allow for replying to individual posts and made exchange of ideas quite difficult. I felt like I needed to update things a bit, so here is the new, simplified version of the blog. I hope everyone finds it easier to comment and connect.

I am a proponent of Truth. I'm not sure I always know what that is, when written with a capital "T."  I am also, however,  proponent of facts and freedom.

The Corporate Roman Catholic Church, that is, the physical hierarchical set of persons that take it upon themselves to make rules for the rest of humanity is corrupt. Power corrupts. That's inevitable. Some Popes have been great villains, committed heinous, despicable acts. True for all ranks of persons in the cRCC.  Bishops, having so much power, are especially vulnerable. Which is not to deny the presence of great spiritual warriors in the cRCC. There has also always been Light.

This is no attack on the Church.  It's just a statement of fact.  What is also factual, IMO, is that each of us is responsible for our own salvation. If you are not following Christ, not feeding the hungry and clothing the naked, refraining from judgement and praying in a closet and taking the last seat at the table, you cannot expect to be excused by God because some corporate body, a Bishop, a self-appointed expert on Christianity, said it was okay.

It's not okay. Not because I say it's not okay, but because Christ did. Our Savior didn't tell us to go to Mass every Sunday and Holy Day of Obligation. He didn't tell us to confess or not masturbate or say a Rosary.

He told us to love one another.  Serve one another. Feed, clothe, visit the imprisoned. Pray. Pray. Pray. He gave us the Eucharist.  He didn't say it was the exclusive province of anyone. He didn't say who should and shouldn't receive.

It seems quite simple and anyone or anything that represses the simple message of Christ is just another in that nest of vipers blocking access to the fullness of life in God forever.

This is what I believe. I wanted to make it perfectly clear. 

Our History-Making Pope

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CNN PAGE ON THE POPE'S RESIGNATION

It occurred to me a while ago that the Pope is a very old man isolated amongst a savage pride of lions: powerful, ambitious and corrupt men.

Telling no one, he planned a public announcement: he will resign.

As of Feb. 11, 2013, 67 of the 118 cardinal electors were appointed by Benedict. The rest were appointed by John Paul II. 

From: "Papal Transition" America Magazine  The vast majority of these Cardinals are under 80 years of age.   Because we are weeks from the date of resignation, all Cardinals have time to make their way to Rome by the resignation date so that the Conclave can begin at once.   All, we assume, will call upon the Pope before he retires.  All, I hope, will know the preference of the Pope for his successor.  Today, Vatican news announced the Pope will have a "farewell gathering" with the Cardinals on February 28th.

This Pope wants someone in place before Easter, and the Cardinals are already going to be winging their way to Vatican City.  What was most interesting in the story, was this:

Also during the course of the question and answer session following the briefing proper, Fr. Lombardi reaffirmed that Pope Benedict will be returning to live a life of prayer and reflection in the Vatican... 

I'll bet. It's like a clockwork, a well-thought plan to shepherd us through the coming tribulations, executed at speed and under the time demands of the Lenten season to get a Pope in place long before Easter.  .

In a recent address (which I'm having trouble finding a link to) Pope Benedict XVI said that the Church had plenty of structure, what the Church lacks is enough spirituality.  With his comments on the importance of the novissimi as he interpreted the 3rd secret of Fatima, I'm wondering when someone will trust us enough to let us in on the actual Secret and finally, over 50 years later, tell us what Mary wanted us to know.

It's going to be an interesting 8 weeks.

The "Smaller Church" Takes Shape

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Joseph Ratzinger (Benedict XVI), from his book Faith and the Future

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Then Cardinal Ratzinger wrote this in 1971.  Today (Oct 18th, 2012) over 40 years later, this article appeared: Vienna archdiocese to cut parishes by 75 per cent  which was referenced in a CAF thread of the same name.  Notice this is happening in Vienna, in the country of the Pope's birth and greatest influence.  Here's an excerpt:

The archdiocese’s 660 parishes will be merged over the next decade into around 150 larger parishes, each served by three to five priests and offering regular Masses.

Mr Prüller told the American Catholic News Service that falling numbers of clergy and laity had made the changes necessary. He said smaller affiliated communities within the parishes will be run by lay volunteers authorised to conduct the Liturgy of the Word. 

Prüller said archdiocesan bishops would draft the new parish boundaries and steps for implementing the reorganisation by January 1.

“The Church’s mission of apostolate and evangelisation isn’t just the responsibility of parish priests, but of the whole community of baptised and confirmed. If this reorganisation creates more vibrant Christian communities, praying, celebrating Mass, conducting mission and helping the needy together, then it could offer a model for Church reforms throughout Europe.”

“This is about a new cooperation between priests and laity from their common Christian vocation,” the cardinal told the news conference, which was reported by Austria’s Kathpress news agency. 

“We have to free ourselves of the traditional image that the Church is present only where there’s a priest and stress the common priesthood of all baptised,” he said.

The operative word is "if." Sounds good. Sounds like something I'd like.  But people who want to run things are usually the last people you want to run things and the lay people who show up are going to not necessarily be anyone we'd want leading us. The average parishioner will just be glad those Communion services are so short and still won't know any theology. 

Who's really going to end up in charge?

Threat Assessment

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"In order that the world might know His anger, the Heavenly Father is preparing to inflict a great chastisement on all mankind. ... akita 

 ...it should be sufficient for all Christians to know this: if there is a message in which it is written that the oceans will flood whole areas of the earth, and that from one moment to the next millions of people will perish... Pope John Paul II on why the 3rd Secret of Fatima has not been revealed

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Then-Cardinal Ratzinger in a 1984 interview in Jesus magazine, about the 3rd Secret of Fatima:

"Cardinal Ratzinger, have you read what is called the Third Secret of Fatima: i.e., the one that Sister Lucia had sent to Pope John XXIII and which the latter did not wish to make known and consigned to the Vatican archives?" 

"Yes, I have read it." 

"Why has it not been revealed?" 

"Because, according to the judgement of the Popes, it adds nothing new to what a Christian must know concerning what derives from Revelation: i.e., a radical call for conversion; the absolute importance of history; the dangers threatening the faith and the life of the Christian, and therefore of the world. And then the importance of the novissimi.  If it is not made public - at least for the time being - it is in order to prevent religious prophecy from being mistaken for a quest for the sensationalism. But the things contained in this Third Secret correspond to what has been announced in Scripture and has been said again and again in many other Marian apparitions, first of all that of Fatima in what is already known of what its message contains: conversion and penitence are the essential conditions for salvation."

So, here's the threat assessment:

Something big and bad is coming.  John Paul II characterized it correctly: millions will die very suddenly. So, I have a question: HOW IS THIS DIFFERENT FOR YOU OR I THAN WHAT WILL HAPPEN, ANYWAY?

If we are not among the dead, times will indeed be very hard and we may envy the dead very much.  But the fact is, your death or mine can come at any moment.  So all this sudden death is really not the point,  JPII is correct:

 "Here is the remedy against this evil.  Pray, pray, and ask for nothing more.  Leave everything else to the Mother of God." 

Or, yanno, her Son: 

198 On one occasion the Lord said to me, 
My daughter, your confidence and love restrain My justice, 
and I cannot inflict punishment because you hinder Me from doing so. 

Oh, how great is the power of a soul filled with confidence!  

-the Diary of Saint Faustina

Do you only pray when there is a problem?  Aren't we called to prayer in all cases, all days and times? If no one knows the day or hour, the world can end before I finish typing this line.  

Who is the Enemy? (Part 2)

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I wonder how many people even remember Pogo, anymore?  I agree with Kreeft when he says the enemy is the devil and his minions, I really do.  But I think  Kreeft gets off-track in Winning Strategy, he seems to think we have to be Mother Teresa to be warriors.  In fact, his whole quasi-military concept seems to me to be exacerbating the problem. The very last thing American Catholics need is to have their adrenaline pumped. 

I don’t mean merely that Western civilization will die. That’s a piece of trivia. I mean eternal souls will die. Billions of Ramons and Vladamirs and Janes and Tiffanies will go to Hell. That’s what’s at stake in this war: not just whether America will become a banana republic, or whether we’ll forget Shakespeare, or even whether some nuclear terrorist will incinerate half of humanity, but whether our children and our children’s children will see God forever. That’s what’s at stake in “Hollywood versus America.” That’s why we must wake up and smell the rotting souls. Knowing we are at war is the first requirement for winning it.

"...wake up and smell the rotting souls..." was my favorite bit.  Okay, so now Kreeft has us all juiced.  What's the answer?

And thus we have our third Necessary Thing: the weapon that will win the war and defeat our enemy.All it takes is saints.Can you imagine what twelve more Mother Teresas would do for the world? Can you imagine what would happen if just twelve readers of this article offered Christ 100% of their hearts and held back nothing, absolutely nothing?

I vote Kreeft becomes the first of the twelve.  Notice that in the previously cited section, Kreeft has already written off western civilization and America, specifically.  Becoming a "banana republic" is inevitable.   

What is the price? The answer is simple. T.S. Eliot defines the Christian life as: “A condition of complete simplicity/Costing not less than/Everything.”

Uh-HUH.  So, the decline and fall of everything is inevitable and the only answer against the devil is giving up everything.  This is a sure recipe for spreading despair: everything is going to go to hell and I am not good enough or willing enough or something enough to do thing one about it because my only option is becoming a living saint.  And I just have to get new brakes and help my daughter not flunk 6th grade.... 

But the article makes you wonder why bother at all?  What good are your few  prayers and attempts at a decent life?  Might as well sleep in on Sunday.

Kreeft, who do you work for?   

(next: threat assessment)

Who is the Enemy? (Part 1)

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To win any war, the three most necessary things to know are: (1) that you are at war, (2) who your enemy is, and (3) what weapons or strategies can defeat him.

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When we look at our culture of death, at the decline of faith in the Faith, we tend to pick one of the enemies Kreeft says the enemy is not:

Not Protestants.... Not Jews.... Not Muslims.... Our enemies are not “the liberals”.... Our enemies are not anti-Catholic bigots who want to crucify us....  Our enemies are not even the media of the culture of death....  Our enemies are not heretics within the Church, “cafeteria Catholics,” “Kennedy Catholics,” “I Did It My Way” Catholics....  Our enemies are not theologians....  Our enemy is not even the few really bad priests and bishops.... -Winning Strategy by Peter Kreeft

He clearly identifies the enemy, the same enemy as we've all had all along:

"Our enemies are demons. Fallen angels. Evil spirits."  

Mis-identifying the enemy as one of those mentioned above, or as any person or group, leads us into the very serious danger of not being able to identify the solution.  We become so involved trying to change some earthly system or human person, so wrapped up in anger, judgement, accusation, frustration...  we fall into evil, ourselves, becoming our enemy's  weapon and never use the one great weapon of our own, the only weapon that ever worked or ever can work:

Pursuing Sanctity.

But before I get to that, my question is: when you read that our enemies are "fallen angels, demons and evil spirits," did you do this:  

Do we necessarily want to slip back to the time when people blamed everything on "evil spirits?" 

Uh... yeah... we do.  

And we'll still know the earth revolves around the Sun and that H.Sap evolved and we won't start burning witches at the stake. 

Evil is like gravity, it is that thing that wants to keep you from the Light, like gravity "wants" to keep you on the ground.  But evil becomes personified, just as Light does.  

Evil only serves itself, to feed itself, without concern for the individual.  This is why so much that is evil is characterized by a coldness toward individual need or well-being.  

Light also serves Itself, wanting to bring all the souls possible to be part of it, and that being part of, is the greatest joy a soul can experience.  God by definition is Love caring for each individual.  

Evil by definition is nothingness, souls left bereft of any comfort or hope.    

Owning Up: Cataclysms and Cosmic Shifts

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Night is falling. What Chuck Colson has labeled “a new Dark Ages” is looming. And its Brave New World proved to be only a Cowardly Old Dream. We can see this now, at the end of “the century of genocide” that was christened “the Christian century” at its birth. 

Peter Kreeft

"We must prepare ourselves to suffer great trials before long, such as will demand of us a disposition to give up even life, and a total dedication to Christ and for Christ … With your and my prayer it is possible to mitigate this tribulation, but it is no longer possible to avert it, because only thus can the Church be effectively renewed. How many times has the renewal of the Church sprung from blood! This time, too, it will not be otherwise. We must be strong and prepared, and trust in Christ and His Mother, and be very, very assiduous in praying the Rosary." 

Pope John Paul II

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I've been trying for a while now not to say this.  I wanted some validation, I wanted to say: I'm not the only one saying it...  John is!  I'm not not some apocalypse nut. 

But it's not the apocalypse I'm feeling, sensing, whatever....  it's some very bad times...

"As I told you, if men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one will never seen before. Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful. The survivors will find themselves so desolate that they will envy the dead."

~The Blessed Mother at Akita

Everyone all cheered up now, are you?  This is from the same article by Peter Kreeft: The Winning Strategy and I suggest y'all read it:

3. The Weapon
And thus we have our third Necessary Thing: the weapon that will win the war and defeat our enemy.

All it takes is saints.

Can you imagine what twelve more Mother Teresas would do for the world? Can you imagine what would happen if just twelve readers of this article offered Christ 100% of their hearts and held back nothing, absolutely nothing?

No, you can’t imagine it, any more than anyone could imagine how twelve nice Jewish boys could conquer the Roman Empire. You can’t imagine it, but you can do it. You can become a saint. Absolutely no one and nothing can stop you. It is your free choice. Here is one of the truest and most terrifying sentences I have ever read (from William Law’s Serious Call): “If you will look into your own heart in complete honesty, you must admit that there is one and only one reason why you are not a saint: you do not wholly want to be.”

That insight is terrifying because it is an indictment. But it is also thrillingly hopeful because it is an offer, an open door. Each of us can become a saint. We really can.

What holds us back? Fear of paying the price.

What is the price? The answer is simple. T.S. Eliot defines the Christian life as: “A condition of complete simplicity/Costing not less than/Everything.” The price is everything: 100%. A worse martyrdom than the quick noose or stake: the martyrdom of dying daily, dying to all your desires and plans, including your plans about how to become a saint. A blank check to God. Complete submission, “islam,” “fiat”—Mary’s thing. Look what that simple Mary-thing did 2000 years ago: It brought God down and saved the world.

As much as I believe people like Michael Voris are the antichrists of these times, they are the ones with the money to promote and produce the slick messages that eat into the substance of our Faith. But he stole the name we should all be proud to bear: we are the Church Militant. We fight the battle as our Warrior Prince taught us: 

...A worse martyrdom than the quick noose or stake: the martyrdom of dying daily, dying to all your desires and plans, including your plans about how to become a saint. A blank check to God. Complete submission...

It's time to follow Jesus.
 
I'm going to be talking about this now. I'm not going to be talking about anything else, actually. I might get a new format for it, I might ...  I dunno.  Oct 1st I begin to fight.