"BY THIS SIGN YOU WILL CONQUER" THE CROSS, SUFFERING AND THE DEATH OF THE WEST
I have never understood the aversion to the crucifix. The West has thrown it aside to its own detriment. But by this sign we can again conquer and overcome our grave inadequacies that have led us down a path of self destruction.
Why is it that so many have difficulty looking upon the Cross of Christ and His suffering? Many argue that Jesus is risen therefore why dwell on His suffering?
However, "[I]t is true and even tautological to say that the Cross is the crux of the matter." G.K. Chesterton. The lessons of the Cross are absolutely critical to living a truly christian life. The cross teaches us not only how to live but how to live with meaning and purpose. A christian is not truly a christian if they do not take up their cross.
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IF EUROPE HATES ITSELF
"Europe
will return to the Faith, or she will perish.
The Faith is Europe. And Europe is the
Faith."
Hillaire
Belloc, Europe
and the Faith.
The
following is excerpted from Joseph Ratzinger's speech
entitled "If Europe Hates Itself" given prior to his
becoming Pope.
"[W]hat is our culture, what’s left of it? Is the
civilization of technique and commerce spread
victoriously throughout the world actually European
culture? Or was this not perhaps rather born, in a
post-European way, from the end of the ancient
European cultures?
"Europe, precisely in this its hour of maximum
success, seems to have become empty inside, paralyzed
in a certain sense by a crisis in its circulatory
system, a crisis that puts its life at risk,
resorting, as it were, to transplants that cannot but
eliminate its identity. To this interior failure of
its fundamental spiritual powers corresponds the fact
that, even ethnically, Europe appears to be on the
way out. There is a strange lack of desire
for a future. Children, who are the future, are seen
as a threat for the present; the idea is that they
take something away from our life. They are not felt
as a hope, but rather as a limitation of the
present."