The Immaculate Conception of Our Lady December 8

Our Lady was conceived without original sin. She had a perfect purity, with no bad inclinations. Therefore, she had a great facility to correspond entirely with the grace of God at every moment. Natural and the supernatural grandeur merged together in her soul in a profound and extraordinary harmony. Above all others creatures, she had the highest notion of the sanctity of God and His correspondent glory. She also had the clear notion of what Creation owes to that glory. She knew, and knows, how all created beings should glorify God.

To show that Our Lady smashes all heresies, statues of the Immaculate Conception present her crushing the head of the serpent.

As a consequence, she also had a profound horror of the opposite of good, which is evil. She had a great intransigence to such evil, a complete rejection of it in its least forms and a strong combativeness against it. This is the reason Holy Scripture refers to Our Lady as “terribilis ut castrorum acies ordinata,” as terrible as an army set in battle array. The Church also says that it is she alone who smashes all heresies. To celebrate this fact, in statues of the Immaculate Conception, Our Lady is crushing the head of the serpent.

The feast of her Immaculate Conception is, then, in many senses, the commemoration of her purity, her intransigence, and her combativeness.

Let us look more closely at what intransigence is. When a person has a very clear notion of what is good and an understanding of the highest expressions of this good, this person knows that the opposite is bad. It is not a theoretical knowledge, like that of a scientist who analyzes a specimen in a laboratory, but rather a knowledge that comes hand in hand with a great love for good. The person naturally recognizes the opposite of such good, which is evil, and hates evil with an intensity proportionate to the magnitude of his love for the good.

Since he loves the highest ideals that good represents, he cannot tolerate the opposite of that good, because he clearly sees the evil that exists in it. He rejects evil not only in its ensemble, but in each of its parts. He rejects evil not only when it is very intense, but when it barely appears. This is intolerance or intransigence.

The human spirit is constituted in such a way that when a man hates evil, he increases and perfects his love for the good. In a certain way the presence of something that he rejects reinforces his conviction of, and his love for the good. The human psychology is so established that such contrast makes a person more acutely aware of how the good is good. For instance, we love our counter-revolutionary vocation more when we can see concretely how the revolutionaries hate it. Seeing this, we receive a confirmation that we are taking the right position.

What is combativeness? Combativeness is a consequence of intransigence. It is to make a deliberate decision to destroy the evil that opposes the glory of God. It is a calm deliberation followed by the utilization of every means one has at his disposal to achieve that goal. It is not a fleeting resolution to fight during one single episode when evil is attacking good, but it is a permanent determination applied to all aspects of evil and throughout the life of a person. The person does not rest until evil is destroyed.

A true combativeness does not rest until evil is reduced to ashes. In Portugal there was an expression regarding evil that was applied in different ways in old Portuguese Law: Evil shall be reduced to ashes by fire. If a man committed a horrific crime, he received the sentence of capital punishment: his body was burned, and his ashes dispersed either in the air or water. This was the application of that axiom.

Here I am not advocating this punishment be applied to this or that person in this or that present day State. I am taking it as a general principle to apply to the fight of ideas and institutions. A bad man can be killed, and he is gone. But who can kill a bad idea or destroy a revolutionary conspiracy that strives to prevent God from receiving the glory He deserves and Holy Mother Church from exerting her mission on earth? For this fight we need a true combativeness that reduces the Revolution and its cohorts to ashes by fire. This kind of intransigence and combativeness were two attributes of Our Lady that were consequences of the privilege of her Immaculate Conception.

What should we ask Our Lady on this feast day? We should ask for a great love of God and a high understanding of His glory, which will, as a natural consequence, give us a great intransigence and combativeness.

I remember that St. Therese of Lisieux used to lament that she could not be a warrior and fight with a sword against the enemies of God. This is the soul of a saint. She desired to fight for God in all place and all times. This is how we should be. Let us ask Our Lady for the purity and combativeness proper to sanctity so that we might be her true sons and daughters.

Prof. Plinio Corrêa de Oliveira The Saint of the Day features highlights from the lives of saints based on comments made by the late Prof. Plinio Corrêa de Oliveira. Following the example of St. John Bosco who used to make similar talks for the boys of his College, each evening it was Prof. Plinio’s custom to make a short commentary on the lives of the next day’s saint in a meeting for youth in order to encourage them in the practice of virtue and love for the Catholic Church. TIA thought that its readers could profit from these valuable commentaries.

The texts of both the biographical data and the comments come from personal notes taken by Atila S. Guimarães from 1964 to 1995. Given the fact that the source is a personal notebook, it is possible that at times the biographic notes transcribed here will not rigorously follow the original text read by Prof. Plinio. The commentaries have also been adapted and translated for TIA’s site.

"That may be Pio's position, but it's not the position that the Church takes."

Wrong. Pio's position is the Church's infallible doctrine.

"God judges you on what you willfully do that is wrong, and if your Protestantism is an honest effort to serve him, heaven is not closed to you."

Only if they enter the Church before death. If you say otherwise, then you would be speaking heresy.

"I understand the RCC's position that salvation is confined to the RCC. If that is true, you're "good to go". Myself and fellow Prots, then, are doomed to hell. May I commend you on an excellent job of trying to bring us back into the fold!"

Let me grab my calculator. Obstinate denial of divinely revealed doctrines + bein' a real affable dood = salvation?

Here's what's going to happen.

Armydoc is going put on this humble approach, playing it slick and nice and well meaning and all. But he's going to come into a Catholic subject thread, alright, and place it off center.

Catholics, naturally defensive of their Mother, take umbrage at this. This is opportunity to tell us all how uncharitable we are. Never mind that real charity, first and foremost, is upholding the Catholic truth. Especially truths touching upon the very epicenter of salvation.

At this point it is no longer a theological or spiritual topic. It's an emotional, subjective and personal one.

So now Campion is going to yield some ground on doctrine, in order to make armydoc feel a little more comfortable. Of course, no matter how accommodating Campion is to armydoc, armydoc wasn't in the market for Catholic doctrine in the first place.

So the net result for Campion will be that he loses ground on immutable principle.

The net result for armydoc is that he has, in classic liberal style, moved to portray the Thesis, that is, Catholic doctrine (two doctrines total, this thread), as something unreasonable and undesirable.

Alright. One doctrine questioned, another doctrine compromised, and we are well on our way to synthesizing a false centrism in the mind of the Watchers.

By all means, continue. This should be interesting.

It's still December 8th, though.

The Epistle of the Mass of the Catholic Church for the Feast Day of the Immaculate Conception:

Proverbs 8;22-35

22 The Lord possessed me in the beginning of his ways, before he made any thing from the beginning. 23 I was set up from eternity, and of old before the earth was made. 24 The depths were not as yet, and I was already conceived. neither had the fountains of waters as yet sprung out: 25 The mountains with their huge bulk had not as yet been established: before the hills I was brought forth:

26 He had not yet made the earth, nor the rivers, nor the poles of the world. 27 When he prepared the heavens, I was present: when with a certain law and compass he enclosed the depths: 28 When he established the sky above, and poised the fountains of waters: 29 When he compassed the sea with its bounds, and set a law to the waters that they should not pass their limits: when be balanced the foundations of the earth; 30 I was with him forming all things: and was delighted every day, playing before him at all times;

31 Playing in the world: and my delights were to be with the children of men. 32 Now therefore, ye children, hear me: Blessed are they that keep my ways. 33 Hear instruction and be wise, and refuse it not. 34 Blessed is the man that heareth me, and that watcheth daily at my gates, and waiteth at the posts of my doors. 35 He that shall find me, shall find life, and shall have salvation from the Lord:

"For Jesus to be born without sin didn't require a sinless mother." aimhigh

"I agree, but we never said otherwise." Campion

Aimhigh did just such a thing in post #3:

If she was conceived without sin, then her parents must have also been born without sin.

"That may be Pio's position, but it's not the position that the Church takes."

Read the Catechism...new or old..I'm not making this stuff up, this is not my position. (n.b. the new catechism makes provisions for people who have never heard of Jesus Christ.)

Your position is entirely protestant, it has no basis in Christian Doctrine. The concept of salvation you put forth is pure heresy, it is Universalism.

Get thee to a Unitarian Church

"I understand the RCC's position that salvation is confined to the RCC."

Being inside the Church is necessary but not sufficient. Get it? No one can be sure of their salvation while they're still breathing. Only the born-agains seem to express their utmost confidence in their personal salvation. Catholics work it out, they pray, fear God, worship Jesus, obey the Commandments, repent when they sin and then pray some more.

There are provisions made for people who have never heard of Jesus Christ.

There are ways to challenge Christians about their ideas. We invented the University. You won't meet a bunch of people more willing to kick around ideas. (Hence our numerical domination of freepnet.) Can you open your mind to the concept that defaming Marian devotion (which has been a Christian practice that long predates any "denomination") as Satanic can rile people?

Again, I say, denouncing Mary (and what she tells us to do) as Satanic will get you nowhere with Christians nor with Christ.

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