Can we apply "Insurrection" to our government, our Church, or to ourselves?

Can we apply “Insurrection” to our government, our Church, or to ourselves?

We are living in a world filled with doubt and suspicion within the government that instituted freedoms via our Constitution, and is now failing before our eyes.  Two thousand years ago Jesus Christ walked and spoke of a kingdom that would be ours if we trust in his word.  Somehow, the Church has found a way of disbelief with leaders that lost their way of authority.  Our own prognosis of growing in faith and the ability to follow Christ the way we should has run against a blank wall of confusion. 

The Pharisees and Saddducees came and, to test him, asked him to show them a sign from heaven.  He said to them in reply,  “In the evening you say, tomorrow will be fair, for the sky is red;”  and in the morning, today will be stormy, for the sky is red and threatening.  You know how to judge the appearance of the sky, but you cannot judge the signs of the times.  An evil and unfaithful generation seeks a sign, but will not be given it except the sign of Jonah.”  (Mt 16: 1 - 4).

What times Jesus spoke of fit within our very troubling existence.  Look at Washington DC with all the indecisions that are filling the news on a daily basis.  Many of us are making choices that are not sealed with sound directions for children and our parenting requirements.  

However, it is the Church that most certainly affects the parishioners in the pews.  If we can remember the recent events of the priest scandal with pedaphilia, a Cardinal who stood at the forefront of the most insidious moral display of sexuality in the confessional, and our recent signs of anti-catholic and anti-Christian proponents within the walls of the Vatican, any good Catholic should be offended.

There is a recent Cardinal that has asked if Pope Francis is really the leader of the Catholic Church or just a fill-in for the antiChrist?  There have been lately many clergy of prominence in the Vatican and around the world that are asking that very question.  

One thing that still stands out as truth is, “Even if a priest is in sin, or has a difficult belief in the real presence of Christ in the Eucharist, it is not through his belief that Sacraments are made valid, it is Christ through his Holy Spirit that the validity stands.  

But, as we continue teaching our children about Christ,and the reality of the Catholic Church, we must be careful that evil does not enter our understanding of the actual truths that Jesus taught and died for our salvation.

Two years ago or around that time I wrote an article referring to “Schism” in the Church.    Because of looming problems within the Catholic Church in China, Pope Francis allowed the Chinese government to appoint their own Catholic bishops.  Therefore, the Catholic populace could worship without interference from the government.  Are you kidding, if the Chinese government is accepting the Catholic Church under their auspices, what type of ministry is actually being promoted there?  That could be compared to Jesus accepting the rules of the Old Testament and teaching from that perspective; i.e. stoning the woman caught in adultery, not allowing healings on the Sabbath, and not eating with sinners and tax-collectors.  He certainly would have gained the acceptance of the Pharisees, but would have become a rebel in the eyes of God.  But, that could never have occurred since he is God and could not create an existence of non-forgiveness.  That would be contrary to who God is; Love. 

Ralph B. Hathaway