Posted on 06/27/2015 2:51:11 PM PDT by markomalley
As everyone knows, the U.S. Supreme Court recently ruled gay marriage is a constitutionally protected right.
Christians around the country have already lost jobs and businesses because they believe in traditional, one-man one-woman marriage, and many fear that this ruling will lead to more persecution.
That may be so. But even if that does happen, it won’t be the worst result of our country’s acceptance of gay marriage.
The worst outcome of our country’s acceptance of gay marriage will be the loss of souls to hell.
Homosexual acts are gravely sinful. The approval of homosexual acts is gravely sinful. This court decision further entrenches and encourages both in our culture. And any serious sin, when left unrepented from and unwashed with the grace of Jesus, is exactly what sends a person to hell. The momentary persecutions any Christians might face is nothing in comparison to the eternal punishments people can suffer for their sins.
This is not to say that persecution can’t be extremely hard. But the cultural acceptance of sin shouldn’t make us turn inward, worrying about our own survival. We shouldn’t become angry, bitter, or despairing. We must maintain an eternal perspective. We should have an ever greater urgency in sharing the precious Gospel of Jesus Christ with those around us. It should spur us on to love our neighbors even more, spiritually fighting for their salvation. Because eternity is hanging in the balance.
Please remember that those who support gay marriage – even those who wish to stamp out all opposition – are not our enemies. Satan is our enemy. Rather, those deceived by him are our neighbors, fellow travelers on this short spiritual journey of life, and are in desperate need of the grace of Jesus for conversion and salvation. The ones who oppose us the most are the ones we should be trying to save the most.
And don’t forget that the battle for souls includes your own. We are all weak and sinful and in desperate need of Christ’s grace for daily conversion. So you don’t support gay marriage? The cultural acceptance of homosexual acts is just the latest development in a much larger cultural movement that includes the acceptance and practice of a wide variety of sexual perversions, including pornography, masturbation, fornication, contraception, adultery, divorce, etc. Sure you’re completely clean? And that’s just sins when it comes to sex, not to mention sins of all other areas of life.
A humble, serious acknowledgement of our own sinfulness – coupled with confession, penance, and prayer – and of the “amazing grace… that saved a wretch like me” should lead all of us to be that much more loving and merciful to those around us – as well as zealous to lead them to the same grace.
Persecution is hard. But it is a “light and momentary trouble” (2 Cor 4.17) in the perspective of eternity, whether that’s spent in heaven or hell – and it will be one of them.
Let’s be real clear about sedevacantists and any other Traditionalist group you seem to think enjoys tearing down the Church. They don’t want to see the Church torn down. Vatican II already accomplished that. Anything that has happened since then are just more “fruits” of VII. Blame VII, not the sedes or the resistance or the FSSP, etc.
People need to wise up and reject the idolatry of Enlightenment Man and his “Liberty”.
At least I've read that here and there from a few so if that's not tearing down the Church in your mind, what is ? The fact that the people who start a group have a point or that they may not be as radical as all the people they attract doesn't silence those extremists.
Some who take up that sedevacanist banner and either claim an association with it or who really are associated with it have no problem with helping anyone who is working to bring down the Catholic Church. Like I said, go on YouTube, talk to some of the nutcases. You'll find out that's a fact.
All I was doing was making the point that there are enemies of the Church on both ends of the Spectrum, left and right, very liberal and very conservative, however you want to frame it to fit description of the two ends of the spectrum. How that implies both ends are full of queers I really don't know.
have a lovely day
I guess I wasn’t clear. You’re not getting it.
But I get that.
At least this individual seems to have discounted the term of Pius XII for some reason or I guess he'd have gone with 1958. I said "a century" because he kept saying, "nearly a century" so my mistake for not being that specific.
The guy you were chatting with may be a rare sedevacantist who doesn’t think Pius XII is legitimate or you misunderstood him. Most Sedevacantists believe Pius XII was legitimate. Vatican II is the turning point for most sedevacantists. Vatican II is the turning point for all Traditionalists. Traditionalists just come to different conclusions about Vatican II and the post Vatican II popes. They all agree that something went terribly wrong.
Absolutely. Protestantism was a whole different animal when mitigated by denominational authority. Now it's fractured into the logical endpoint of all Protestantism which is Self and Self Alone faith in whatever each individual defines as Christ and Truth.
Someone here on FR was talking about their friend who had explained that homosexual sodomy was no different than eating shellfish, something from the old law or whatever they called it.
That's the end point of Protestantism, people each having their own personal variant of Christ with no concern whatsoever for whether it's the Christ who died for us because everyone is already forgiven in advance for any little mistakes they make when interpreting Scripture. Like in some article I scanned over yesterday that called queers marrying one another a victory for Christ because Christ said to love one another.
That actually does go straight from Luther to Enlightenment Man and the Nietzsche idea of godman which is what a lot of people get to when they elevate their Self to the role of the Holy Spirit and harden their heart against any still, small, voice that tries to shake their faith in their own interpretations.
I think the effects in the US have been magnified by the fact that there was already a strong strain of Americanism and/or Modernism here.
Gideon wasn't turned loose until his army was so small that no one could argue he and his army were victorious due to their own skill without the Lord taking part so I figure we're in the same situation. When the army is made up of the right number of the right sort of folks, it'll be unleashed and sweep all before it.
It will create more opportunities for those of them that would molest children get away with such under the guise of "normalcy/respectability".
Something in the Bible about how those who cause a child to sin would be better off with a millstone around their neck on a swimming trip....
The extreme sedevacanitsts advocate starting a whole new parallel Church while waiting on the One True Church to collapse.
Um... the ‘whole new parallel Church’ is in fact the same Church that was in place until 1964, when modernistic practices were introduced in the Mass, in the lectionary, and in the seminaries...
But since you brought it up as an argument, please elaborate on this ‘whole new Church’ arrangement that these mean ‘sedevancatists’, who represent about as much of a percentage as homosexuals, wish to foist upon us...
Either the Holy Spirit protects the One True Church that existed before 1964 still exists with the wrong people guiding the ship or the Holy Spirit doesn't protect His Church.
If the Holy Spirit doesn't protect His Church, then like Protestant folks, throw out whatever portion of Scripture you feel doesn't agree with your doctrines.
If the Holy Spirit doesn't protect His Church, then call a few folks Cardinal or have a popular election and elect yourself a new Pope to start the new Church or better still, just start thousands of Churches.
Vote on the dogmas of the new Church, or better still, go the tried and true Self and Self Alone alone approach that's the basis for all of Protestantism with each individual deciding for their self what Scripture and everything else means.
Half or more of the people who claim to be Catholic already go the Self and Self Alone route so go along with them, makes no difference to me.
For some strange reason, if anyone says anything some nitwit can interpret as attacking Traditionalists the knives come out when there seem to be about forty definitions of where Traditionalists begin and end their goals and arguments.
You interpret the net fringe any way you like, more power to you if you want to join them, elect a new Pope you and your friends like, and so on. I had my fill of one little ticked off bunch church splitting their church into two or three new ones each with no trace of a tie directly back to Christ during the thirty plus years before I became Catholic.
As far as I'm concerned, if the smoke of Satan enters the sanctuary, then find the damn fire and put it out instead of abandoning the sanctuary and throwing around lit tourches and gasoline as you leave.
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