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Speak the Truth with Boldness*

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Speak the Truth with Boldness*

Monthly Archives: March 2014

And the winner is…

30 Sunday Mar 2014

Posted by Fr. Moore in Catholic Obligations, Politically Incorrect, Pro-Life, Repentance, Salvation, What's Wrong with the World?

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Conscience, Elections, Margaret Sanger, Planned Parenthood

The title to today's post will make sense in a moment. First, please start with the quotes below. (Let it be known that I in no way support any of the following quotes.

We should hire three or four colored ministers, preferably with social-service backgrounds, and with engaging personalities. The most successful educational approach to the Negro is through a religious appeal. We don’t want the word to go out that we want to exterminate the Negro population, and the minister is the man who can straighten out that idea if it ever occurs to any of their more rebellious members. Continue reading →

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Our Earthly Pilgrimage

29 Saturday Mar 2014

Posted by Fr. Moore in C.S. Lewis, Salvation, Thought for the Day

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Heaven

About death, I go through different moods, but the times when I can desire it are never, I think, those when this world seems harshest. On the contrary, it is just when there seems to be most of Heaven already here that I come nearest to longing for the patria. It is the bright frontispiece [which] whets one to read the story itself. All joy (as distinct from mere pleasure, still more amusement) emphasises our pilgrim status: always reminds, beckons, awakes desire. Our best havings are wantings.

The Collected Letters of C.S. Lewis, Volume III

“Emphasises our pilgrim status” because our true joy is not to be found here below. A pilgrim is one who journeys to a holy place and we will only find true joy if (or when) our journey leads us to Heaven.

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The Truth is…Way Out There?

28 Friday Mar 2014

Posted by Fr. Moore in C.S. Lewis, Truth, What's Wrong with the World?

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Search for Truth

Perhaps some of you remember the TV show The X Files. To the best of my recollection, my wife and I watched every episode. (At this time – the beginning of our marriage – we were both still looking for the Truth, which we finally found, in its fullness, within the Catholic Church.) Some of the episodes were about paranormal activity but mostly it was about aliens. The above picture is a screen capture of the opening sequence of each episode. “The Truth Is Out There” it says, as if the Truth is not already known and must be discovered. It has been many years since I watched The X Files but it seems to me that in their search for aliens they were really searching for the meaning of life. They could not find meaning in their earthly existence (the main character was not religious and to a certain extent scoffed at religion) so they looked to the stars for other intelligent beings that might be able to tell them the Truth they sought.

Now I bring this up because of something I came across on a website which is, interestingly enough, called The Truth. Perhaps they chose this title because – like the main character in The X Files – they are looking for meaning in their lives. (I have not done much research into the site so I cannot say what they are referring to when they say Truth. At first glance what it seems they might mean is simply the uncovering of conspiracies – which doesn't really comprise Truth in the big scheme of things.)

So why comment on something from this site? And how does it pertain to this talk of aliens, which I started with? Because this website has posted something in regards to the Vatican and extraterrestrial life. The full article can be found here.

Our immediate reaction might be to roll our eyes at such a suggestion but we should not be too quick to dismiss this idea. After all, the universe is a big place. A Jesuit priest, Fr. Funes, from the Vatican Observatory said the following in the article.

Just as there is a multiplicity of creatures on earth, there can be other beings, even intelligent, created by God. This is not in contrast with our faith because we can’t put limits on God’s creative freedom. Why can’t we speak of a ‘brother extraterrestrial’? It would still be part of creation.

There is not really a problem with this thought. There is not even a problem with the possibility they suggest later – that another intelligent being in the universe may not be ‘fallen’ like mankind. In other words, they may still may be in a state of grace: what the Church calls Original Justice. This is really not a new thought at all. C.S. Lewis, in his Space Triology that was first published 75 years ago, brought up these ideas and dealt with them very well.

But, there is a problem with the conclusions that the website tries to jump to in regards to their misunderstanding of what some of the Vatican Obseratory priests say and also the website's apparent misunderstanding of Truth.

…there are some high profile Vatican astronomers that seem quite confident that ‘something’ is out there. In fact, one has stated that once it is revealed, ‘everything we think we know’ may have to ‘be thrown out’.

If something or someone else is “out there”, then there is really nothing to worry about at all. The Truth revealed to us by Jesus Christ, the Son of God through whom everything was created, cannot be contradicted by anything – not even aliens from another planet. Whatever an alien would have to tell us may lead us to a deeper understanding of what our Lord has taught us but it would never be able to abolish it.

So yes, the Truth is “out there” because God, who is Truth, is transcendent and therefore beyond our complete comprehension. But He is also immanent and we can truly know that which He has revealed to us through His Son. Remember the teaching of Christ, “If you continue in my word, you are truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free” (John 8:31b-32). There is no new or unknown Truth that can contradict this – not even from outer space.

 

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Heaven – the Desire of our Hearts

27 Thursday Mar 2014

Posted by Fr. Moore in C.S. Lewis, Salvation, The Problem of Pain, Thought for the Day

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Heaven

There have been times when I think we do not desire heaven; but more often I find myself wondering whether, in our heart of hearts, we have ever desired anything else. You may have noticed that the books you really love are bound together by a secret thread. You know very well what is the common quality that makes you love them, though you cannot put it into words: but most of your friends do not see it at all, and often wonder why, liking this, you should also like that. Again, you have stood before some landscape, which seems to embody what you have been looking for all your life; and then turned to the friend at your side who appears to be seeing what you saw—but at the first words a gulf yawns between you, and you realise that this landscape means something totally different to him, that he is pursuing an alien vision and cares nothing for the ineffable suggestion by which you are transported. Even in your hobbies, has there not always been some secret attraction which the others are curiously ignorant of—something, not to be identified with, but always on the verge of breaking through, the smell of cut wood in the workshop or the clap-clap of water against the boat’s side?

The Problem of Pain, C.S. Lewis

We all desire Heaven – God has put that desire within us. But we can only catch glimpses of it here on this earth. If we try to hold onto those fleeting moments in which we perceive the other side then we will never arrive where God is trying to lead us. If you want to find what you are looking for – the thing which you have always desired – then remember it is not on this earth.

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He who has ears to hear, let him hear.

26 Wednesday Mar 2014

Posted by Fr. Moore in Liturgy of the Hours, Pro-Life, Salvation, von Hildebrand

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Heaven, Truth

God is seen by those who have the capacity to see him, provided that they keep the eyes of their mind open. All have eyes, but some have eyes that are shrouded in darkness, unable to see the light of the sun. Because the blind cannot see it, it does not follow that the sun does not shine. The blind must trace the cause back to themselves and their eyes. In the same way, you have eyes in your mind that are shrouded in darkness because of your sins and evil deeds.

Saint Theophilus of Antioch, bishop

From today's Office of Readings (at the Universalis website) comes the above quote from St. Theophilus. The part that really caught my attention is in bold print. The main point in the passage is whether or not all people can see God. He says that this depends on whether or not the individual has the eyes of his mind and ears of his heart open in order to perceive God. This calls to mind what our Lord had to say in Matthew 11, “He who has ears to hear, let him hear.” Continue reading →

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Shield with Motto

25 Tuesday Mar 2014

Posted by Fr. Moore in Symbols, Update

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Auspice Maria, Chi Rho, Cross, Lindisfarne, Mary, Mother of God, St. Cuthbert

Shield with MottoThis is my shield, crest, seal, emblem…actually I am not sure what to call it. I don't want to call it a logo because that is usually associated with businesses and is commercial in nature. This, on the other hand, is intended to represent (to a certain degree) who I am and what I believe. I am writing this because I will be putting it in a prominent place on my blog and I wanted everyone to understand the meaning behind each of the parts. Continue reading →

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Don’t Be One of THOSE Parents

22 Saturday Mar 2014

Posted by Fr. Moore in Catholic Obligations, Humor

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Obedience, Sunday Mass

Tomorrow is Sunday…take your kids to Mass. Even if you don't have kids – go to Mass. If you are Catholic it is an obligation.

 

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…you were bought with a price.

21 Friday Mar 2014

Posted by Fr. Moore in C.S. Lewis, Repentance, Salvation, The Screwtape Letters, Thought for the Day, Transformation in Christ

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Becoming like Christ, Cross, Dying to Self

Today I have for you a selection from The Screwtape Letters. I have used bold to draw your attention to certain parts. Throughout the day, especially since it is the day of week that our Lord purchased your soul with His own Blood, try to reflect upon the fact that you are not your own. And, in addition, that you owe everything to Him.

The sense of ownership in general is always to be encouraged. The humans are always putting up claims to ownership which sound equally funny in Heaven and in Hell and we must keep them doing so. Much of the modem resistance to chastity comes from men’s belief that they ‘own’ their bodies—those vast and perilous estates, pulsating with the energy that made the worlds, in which they find themselves without their consent and from which they are ejected at the pleasure of Another! It is as if a royal child whom his father has placed, for love’s sake, in titular command of some great province, under the real rule of wise counsellors, should come to fancy he really owns the cities, the forests, and the corn, in the same way as he owns the bricks on the nursery floor.

We produce this sense of ownership not only by pride but by confusion. We teach them not to notice the different senses of the possessive pronoun—the finely graded differences that run from ‘my boots’ through ‘my dog’, ‘my servant’, ‘my wife’, ‘my father’, ‘my master’ and ‘my country’, to ‘my God’. They can be taught to reduce all these senses to that of ‘my boots’, the ‘my’ of ownership.

C.S. Lewis, The Screwtape Letters

“You are not your own; you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body.” 1 Corinthians 6:19b-20

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My Fourth Anniversary of Ordination to the Priesthood

20 Thursday Mar 2014

Posted by Fr. Moore in Christian Unity, Saints

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Lindisfarne, Ordination, St. Cuthbert

Today, March 20, 2014, is my fourth anniversary as a priest in the Holy Roman Catholic Church. In some calendars this is the memorial of St. Cuthbert. (Although Our Lady of the Atonement has, since my ordination, started using a different Church calendar and, therefore, I don't get to celebrate my anniversary on St. Cuthbert's day.) He was the Bishop of Lindisfarne and he had one of the most venerated holy sites located in Durham, England before Henry VIII desecrated it. This is the saint that was venerated at my ordination Mass and my patron saint as a Catholic priest. Below is what I wrote for the inside cover of my ordination booklet.

I give my thanks to God for making me a priest in the Catholic Church. I know this is what He has called me to do. Although, I am not sure why He chose me. Sometimes it seems to me to be some kind of cosmic joke to which only our Lord and the Blessed Virgin know the punch line. Nevertheless, this is where God has put me and I will do the best I can, with His help. God bless you all and thank you for your prayers – Heaven knows I need them! Continue reading →

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The Solemnity of St. Joseph

19 Wednesday Mar 2014

Posted by Fr. Moore in Pro-Family, Pro-Life, Saints

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fatherhood, Solemnity of St. Joseph, The Holy Family

So often when we see St. Joseph depicted in sacred art it is either by himself or in the background with Mary and Jesus. Both of these types of depictions have their own place and purpose but today I want to focus on some others that emphasize important aspects of St. Joseph’s life within the Holy Family.

First, I want to emphasize his role as a protector of the family.

Continue reading →

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Fr. Moore

Fr. Moore

Parochial Vicar Our Lady of the Atonement San Antonio, Texas FrMoore@truthwithboldness.com

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