Tag: Jesus Christ

The End of Slavery in the USA June 19th, 1865 

A Long-Fought Cause Finally Accomplished 

The education of our children is of the utmost importance. It becomes even more so when the topic is a moral one. That is why the history of crimes against humanity has to be made clear.

Slavery, an institution that has records of its existence as far back as 3500 BC in Mesopotamia and is mentioned directly in the Book of Hammurabi in 1750 BC is one dark side of mankind that still exists to this day. 

For this note’s purposes, I will reflect on more recent history.

In the year 1435 AD Pope Eugene the IV wrote a papal bull condemning slavery, in no uncertain terms, when he learned of the enslavement of the black people in the Canary Islands. He wrote the following argument as it pertained to the Christian Faithful and their responsibilities before God. 

“They have deprived the natives of their property or turned it to their own use, and have subjected some of the inhabitants of said islands to perpetual slavery (<subdiderunt perpetuae servituti>), sold them to other persons and committed other various illicit and evil deeds against them…. Therefore We … exhort, through the sprinkling of the Blood of Jesus Christ shed for their sins, one and all, temporal princes, lords, captains, armed men, barons, soldiers, nobles, communities and all others of every kind among the Christian faithful of whatever state, grade or condition, that they themselves desist from the aforementioned deeds, cause those subject to them to desist from them, and restrain them rigorously. And no less do We order and command all and each of the faithful of each sex that, within the space of fifteen days of the publication of these letters in the place where they live, that they restore to their pristine liberty all and each person of either sex who were once residents of said Canary Islands … who have been made subject to slavery (<servituti subicere>). These people are to be totally and perpetually free and are to be let go without the exaction or reception of any money.” 

Then again in 1537 Pope Paul III wrote another letter against its practice in learning of the enslavement of the Native Americans “The Sublime God”. Which is a strongly worded document against slavery and specifically defending Native Americans as right free human beings. Two other bulls would be published to implement the teaching of this letter, one to impose penalties on those who fail to abide by the teaching against slavery, and a second to specify the sacramental consequences of the teaching that the Indians are true men. 

Therefore, it is no surprise that George Washington in the year 1799, the first president of the United States of America, a right, just and learned man would in his last will grant freedom to his slaves upon his death. But it is sad that a man with a justly formed conscious such as he had, did not have the will strong enough to free his slaves while he lived. He was a southerner, and going against the will of society was surely a big deterrent at the time. 

This point acknowledges the fact that mankind already knew that slavery was unjust and should be abolished. In fact, by the early 1800s a term Southern Democrat came into existence referring to those in the south of the nation that did not agree with the abolishment of slavery. 

The Catholic Bishops in the country did not particularly come out against slavery. But just like the crime of abortion (infanticide), which is currently widely accepted in these United States, the bishops of the USA succumb to the social and political elites and are unwilling to risk it all to vocalize the truth taught by the Church. Abortion unjustly dehumanizes a human baby for the sole purpose of its destruction because of many issues other than self-preservation.  

Again, the bishops playing politics as a religious minority in the population did not strongly oppose this evil. Rome then continued to press the issue, building upon letters of the previous popes Gregory XIV (1591) and Urban VIII (1639) and in 1839, Pope Gregory the XVI wrote the following. 

“We, by apostolic authority, warn and strongly exhort in the Lord faithful Christians of every condition that no one in the future dare to bother unjustly, despoil of their possessions, or reduce to slavery (<in servitutem redigere>) Indians, Blacks or other such peoples.” 

Then it all came to a head with the Civil War which began in 1861 and lasted five years. The death toll was astronomical. The total death toll was 618,222 men, of which 360,222 were the Union Soldiers who fought for the freedom of the slaves. This represented 3.34% of the population and would be the equivalent of 11 million people (about twice the population of Arizona) in our country dying today for a just cause. Let us not ever forget the bloodshed given by honest freedom loving men to right this wrong. 

June 19th in the year 1865 is the day that the State of Texas declared the official emancipation of the slaves and from there is derived the contraction and term currently being used for this holiday “Juneteenth”, even though the president of the United States of America, Abraham Lincoln had already declared slavery illegal in the Emancipation proclamation of January 1, 1863.  

Because of this newfound freedom the Catholic Church had its first black priest in the United States of America, Venerable Augustus Tolton, who had been born into slavery. It was no easy task for this young catholic to become a priest and he had to travel to Rome to get an education due to the racism he still faced in the country. He was the founder of the first black parish in Chicago Illinois. 

Sadly, in the professionally researched book Grant by Ron Chernow, we learn true freedom had to be continually fought for as the Southern Democrats still retained power and imposed cruel and unjust punishment on the black people that opposed them. This would continue up into the 1960s. It is terribly sad that a country born out of a fight for freedom would itself have this dark stain on its history. 

Growing up in the USA as a Cuban Immigrant I faced only minor racism and always felt compassion for the blacks that had it worse. As the years went on, here in the northeast of the country I believed relations had improved and in fact in the 1990s when Los Angeles had its riots due to the Rodney King incident, I recall everyone in NYC took the following day off knowing full well that there would be no riots here. In fact, I would say racism was at its lowest until President Obama in my estimation promoted racial division. 

Sadly, we are still fighting racism. But now we are also fighting modern slavery. Let us all on this day remember those who in the past gave their lives so that others can live in freedom and pray for those in the battle against human trafficking and all evils that beset mankind. 

I will end this with a prayer. 

Dear Lord Father in Heaven, 

May You open the eyes and hearts of all the people on this earth to know that the only way to happiness is by loving your neighbor as yourself. Only by giving of ourselves by showing kindness, love and respect will the world become a better and happier place for all peoples of any color or origin.  Please give us all the grace to make it so.

I ask this in the name of Jesus Christ our Lord, Amen. 

Family Man

A Country Song in My Mind

I literally woke up with this song on my mind. Now I got to get someone to put this to music.

Refrain

Family Man

I’m getting close to home,

I don’t want to be late.

I pray to the Lord Jesus

I get home by eight.

My five little children

I’m missing so much.

But most of all,

I miss my wife’s sweet touch.

It’s been a few weeks.

I’ve been on the road.

Crossing these highways

With a massive load.

It’s the nasty weather,

That makes me recall,

My Lord’s got this,

I ain’t in control

Refrain

At the truck stop

Feeling lonely and strange

Eating my beans

Playing with the food on my plate

A nice little woman

Comes by and says to me hey,

I make the cross on my heart

And tell her about my girl Kate.

Refrain

Well, Kate’s, sweet and strong.

And loves me so much.

She wants to have babies,

Because it’s God’s sweet touch

That brings us both closer,

To the eternal one

Plus, the act of creation,

Sure is fun!

 Refrain

I get some time,

Between the long trips

We thank the Lord,

For all our great gifts.

Our home, our food

And the holiday trips

I say my prayers,

In my room all alone.

It’s Kate and the kids

That bring me all my joy.

I could’ve been a rock star.

That ain’t no matter

‘Cause I’d rather have this.

Refrain

There was no Room at the Inn

It has been some time since I have written anything. Actually, other than a poem I wrote to my wife a few weeks ago I have been dry. Possibly, it is because I feel that there are so many more people wiser and more learned than I to reach out and makes the right cases for honesty. However, I read many articles and so many lack the entire truth. Some of the media that attempts at truth live in fear of the big media that will try to censor them, so they do not play from a position of strength. They play too close to the chest as we would say. But truth needs to be proclaimed.

Hence, here I am once again trying to bring truth, which is the only path to true love and peace to words.

I grew up in the 1970s. In my youth there was a constant barrage of news proclaiming that the world was going to destroy itself. The biggest was overpopulation, which claimed that if we did not stop having children that when we hit 5 billion people, the world would suffer famine globally and all the world would go into chaos. This was expected to happen in the 1990s and of course we hit that number and surpassed it and nothing of the like happened. One of the founders of this alarm, A Thomas Malthus from the 1700s, has been over and over proven wrong. Yet, the wealthy elites keep propagating this myth. (George Soros and Bill Gates, to name a few.)

In the same period, I recall magazine covers with the coming weather disaster to destroy the planet. It was expected that the entire planet would freeze, and we would all die if we did not change our actions. Then, when that did not happen, the propaganda was to change to a newer weather phenomenon called global warming. However, the media will have you believe that this is new science that was uncovered in the twentieth century however these observations of a coming global weather disaster of some sort had been in existence since as far back as the early as the 1820s. Back then as we have now there are scientists who also believe that the cause of climate change can be the minutest change of the earth’s motion around the sun.  There is room for debate because none of the science is proven it remains theoretical.

The problem, with all these discussions is not whether there is climate change, of course there is and always will be. A problem is: The religion founded and fueled by the same globalist extremists that want to curb the growth of mankind on the planet. The religion of environmentalism over human flourishing is really a return to the worship of nature, the sun, or the moon as our gods. This brings about a desire to feed them with the blood of man, and so we have rampant support for the murder of infants in the womb. Child sacrifice on the altar of environmentalism has become a very successful combination that the globalists support. The facts are abundant.

The truth is real science is the discovery of truth through testing. However, as globalist and industrialist with money in the game do not want to have any challenging opinions, they want to silence all others from having their say and will deride and insult them. Take for instance the recent case of a scientist who has discovered that alumina may be harmful to humans. He is being silenced while for years he had been their poster boy. This is the modus operandi of totalitarian states throughout history. It is still being used today more effectively thanks to the control of the media by the globalist and their agenda.

This is sadly, the way the world looks to me. We have returned to the times of Rome in decline. We as human beings are slipping down the slope of Gomorrah. We are regressing instead of progressing. Have we eliminated poverty? Have we eliminated homelessness? Have we helped our brothers and sisters live healthy and productive lives? Have we loved our human family?

These are the real questions. The world has an abundance of resources to be able to feed all mankind, but power and greed are what get in the way. Governments are the vehicle of the powerful and greedy to control the wealth and keep the poor under control. It is only out of true love and self-sacrifice that humankind’s real problems can be solved. Not by social engineering as the globalist want us to believe.

Luckily, in the USA there remains hope under the protection of our laws. As stated in the Declaration of Independence. “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”

As the Blessed Fulton Sheen once wrote, “The inn was the gathering place of public opinion, the focal point of the world’s moods, the rendezvous of the worldly, the rallying place of the popular and the successful.” Let us pray that there is room for the voice of all people, the outcasts, the poor and the forgotten. Let us hope, that at the end of time, that at this time and place the world opens its mind and heart to hear truth and make place for the love of Jesus Christ at the Inn. And that it does not come to be that once again, our society declares, there is no room in the inn.

 The New Old Evangelization

(Originally written in 2011)

The Catholic faith is constantly under attack, not only by those directly opposed to the faith but by Christians as well. Our stance against abortion and contraception, sexual promiscuity of any form and also for tenants of the faith are examples of issue which seem to be stumbling blocks. But we Catholics understand the truths handed down to us from the apostles through the church and the guidance of the Holy Spirit. We know these to be truth and with our eyes set on the things not seen we focus on the eternal. To gain the eternal, we must live a fruitful life through witness to the gospel in this world.

However we have a real problem here. The issue is that we have two types of horrible Catholics both in and out of the clergy. So many hypocrites exist but the biggest problem I fear are twofold, The disconnect that is often between the actions of our authorities within the church and what is preached and taught.

We often have Bishops and or priests that when the secular public makes a scene about the teachings of the faith they back track. In one instance in the Diocese of San Diego a Bishop twice back tracked when they denied a Christian funeral for two non-practicing catholic homosexual that owned gay bars. It has always been understood and is canon law that anyone who lived in obvious sin without any signs of repentance cannot receive a Christian funeral. But when they tried to enforce this rule public opinion and condemnation swayed the Catholic authority.

The attempt to prevent scandal in actuality created a double scandal. Not only did know they allow it, which then sent the message that it is ok to live in Sin. However then they also affirm that church teaching is essentially meaningless. If they are willing to back down to popularity, then they have lost all authority to teach. They have condemned themselves because these actions will certainly drive others to sin instead of show them the truths of the faith.

Had the Bishops stood up and in a loving manner explained the teachings of the faith and why the funerals would not be allowed it would have sent a signal that we stand for the truth. Now it appears to others that we stand for nothing that could not be changed with a popularity contest. I cringe when I see these types of reports; this is more hurtful to the conversion of souls than the actual sins perpetrated by others within our midst.

Another issue is those within our midst that do not live the Gospel but want to hit others over the head with our teachings.  What I mean is that we cannot change the hearts of others by attacking them with the truths or condemning their actions. So, often I see many people get into arguments instead of dialogue. To dialogue you need to have a loving respect for the other person. It is only through love that we will ever change the hearts of this society.

Recently, I have had a change of view about a serious issue. I may be wrong but the whole gay marriage issue I think is overblown. The civil form of marriage has little value in my eyes. I never thought highly about it when I got married, and I think less about it now. When we fight those trying to propagate this highly political issue we give these people a stage to call us all kinds of names like hate mongers and the like. Meanwhile the courts grant divorces at the drop of a hat. The fact that marriage is a business transaction in most cases should be made apparent. So, it is meaningless.

I believe we should drop this fight and instead focus on teaching within our own church the proper meaning and understanding of marriage.  But when we talk of marriage in the Catholic Church we speak about two people, a man and a woman, who join together in a complete natural union created by God that will bring the gift of life, which is children, if God wills it. Marriage is a gift of love which is a gift that comes from God. That way we understand and become open to life. At this time unfortunately most Catholics are not. It is that mentality that allows people to accept contraception and abortion since we think we are the arbiters of life and not God himself.

But the point I am trying to get at it is this. We need to focus on our own household. We have to build the proper supports and understanding that will lead to a life of living the gospel and the teachings of our faith in everything we do and say. That is how the church was born. That is how the church grew. It was by giving and loving and not by arguing with others. When others see the joy we have within our communities and in the way we live our lives and that we are faithful then they will join us. Then their hardened hearts will change. But when you look around at how poorly we are behaving it is no wonder that few truly believe that we have a real and vibrant faith.

We must turn our faith into one of love for our Church community but also for love of all outside our church as well. Even the sinners need our love. How will we save souls as God has asked us to do if we do not show them love? It will be by loving the world that we can affect the most change not by entering into political arguments or popularity contests. Hence it is the old way of evangelization that becomes new again.

As Saint Francis was quoted as saying, so we must live “It is no use walking anywhere to preach unless our walking is our preaching.”

On Doubt

Life is a difficult journey. Even more difficult than everyday life is the ability to maintain our faith. Over the years I have, lets’ say, been in and out of my faith. As a youngster, it was out of ignorance. As an adult, it was mostly due to complacency. Then as I grew older, it has been through temptation. It would be so easy to forget the faith and just roll along with what our society wants us to accept.

The times I have been tempted to forget our faith as if our Lord never existed are many. To turn my back on God is the biggest sin I can commit. Isn’t that what we do every time we fail to live the gospel? Every little sin is a step away from God.

By committing any sin knowing full well that it is against the wishes and demands of our faith, we are turning away from Jesus.  Jesus is still there for us, always waiting. All we need to do is ask forgiveness and turn back to him and the teachings of the church.

Wait, it isn’t that easy. Satan and his tempters are always close by to show you the easier, better path.  They are also there to point out to you how ridiculous and unbelievable our faith is. That the gospel we hear was contrived, and his followers were nothing more than propagandists.

The logical and austere mind easily succumbs to such diatribe. Even the most faithful are weakened at the knees by the argument. How can this be true? Is this all a farce to keep simple folk under control? It would make my life easier to cast it all off and do as I will.

These arguments are tempting and have some truth. But it is the truth turned inside out. Yes, life may appear to be easier if we cast it off, but it would be devoid of love and life. Yes, it is an unbelievable story, but it is true and holds the answers to our purpose and future. It is the Gospel that holds the key to the understanding of life here on earth and the one to come.

Even knowing and accepting this, I became like the wicked asking for a sign. But no sign shall be given. Why won’t any sign be given? Simply put, God does not serve us. He has given us his words and prophets that we may listen to them. Why should he give us more signs?

With that in mind, I began to ponder. Several times I was close to the precipice of despair. My soul felt thirsty and dry. I was drowning in the mire of confusion that the world offered. I finally focused on prayer and asked for the wisdom to see.

Then one day, as if an angel came to me and whispered in my ear, it came to me. It was with me all along. The Gospel stories and those of the apostles are so unbelievable! Their teachings, depth of meaning and love so intertwined that I cannot believe that any men even if they had a thousand years could have written this story.

The reason became suddenly obvious. The word, the teachings and the church are the sign we will be given. They are the contradiction against the society. It is obvious it was not built, written or designed by men. These things all point to the existence of God and the truth of His Son Jesus Christ and the mystery of the Holy Spirit.

Nothing Hollywood has or ever will come up with can rival the depth of the Gospel story. None is as incredible. But what convinced me was that it is certainly not the handiwork of mankind.

I do believe in one God, the Father Almighty, His Son Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit. Sure, it sounds crazy, but the simple fact that I know it makes me all the more certain.

Is Christmas Day Anticlimactic?

Is Christmas Day Anticlimactic?

Every year Christmas day will come. For many the preparations are many. Such as decorating their homes inside and out, buying gifts for loved ones, and planning the events that come along with the holiday. Christmas parties at friends’ homes, parties with our companies of employment and thanking people for their kindnesses during the year.

But where does this holiday really come from? Oh yes, I know people understand that it is about the birth of Jesus Christ in a manger with humble beginnings. It is the date the Church marks to celebrate his birthday and start the new church calendar year. It is only just that the beginning of the church calendar should start on the date of acknowledgment of the founder’s birthday. Then it begins.

But why do we give gifts? Some look to the Three Wise Men who brought the infant child who would be King; gold, frankincense and myrrh. They recognize who he is and what it meant to the people of the world. They knew that nothing would be the same after the infant child would grow old enough to make known his true purpose. Even they with their worldly knowledge did not discern the true purpose. They did not realize that the world would change.

The gift giving tradition which was accredited to have begun over 1500 years ago by a Christian Bishop by the name of Nicholas in what is now known as modern day Turkey. The birthday of Christ was set to be celebrated at the same time the pagans celebrated the winter solstice. This is of no consequence as ST. Nicholas did this out of his Christi love for the poor and needy. Still the real meanings lies deeper I believe.

The gift giving to each other is a symbol of the gift that God gave us on this earth. The god-man that came down to live with us to teach us the truth of what real love is. The truth of that love is a sacrifice and concern for our neighbors while always remembering our own lives are also a gift from God himself. Jesus Christ taught us that if we are to love we must learn to do it even unto death. He killed the selfishness that existed in the world at the time. He raised the Jewish tradition of love and concern for family to include all men of the world as they were born by God’s will. Jesus was a Jew who changed the world knowing from the moment he entered it he would have to give His life to do it. The true gift he gave us was He and the light which His light which we need every day to live in joy on this world and in exultation with God in the next.

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To answer my question; “is Christmas anticlimactic?” I pose to you that it cannot be. This is simply because it is only the beginning of our walk with Christ Jesus. We prepare for Christmas day by day sacrificing little bits and pieces of our lives for others, with prayer and good will. If we have done this when the day comes it is not anything like getting to the end of a show. Instead it is more like being at the gates to a beautiful paradise with hills and valleys that we know we will need to traverse over and over again until we achieve the true end of our work on earth. That is to create a peace and love on earth which knows no bounds.

Only one human being has been able to do this and it is His birth which we acknowledge during the twelve days of Christmas. But the gift we have given should not end on when Christmas ends but should continue for all 365 days of the year. However, there is no harm done in giving in a sign of the gift of love we all wish for and should try to grant everyone we meet.

 

Copyright 2015 Miguel Perez-Santalla