Transcription
Thanks again for tuning in to Everything Catholic. Now, there are two clips I'm going to share with you in this video, and we'll start with this on miracles, communism, and the evil in the world today.
I had assisted in three causes of canonization, beatification for causes at the diccastry for the doctrine of faith when I worked. It was the congregation for the causes of saints. And um, I also know from working there, assisting them remotely on these causes, submitting my positio to the Vatican for these causes, that over 40 miracles are reported and approved by Rome every month. Now, there are hundreds of miracles reported to Rome, but only about, about over 40 on, on average, are approved every month. So, our God is a God of miracles. Most people don't realize how many miracles happen, are approved by the Vatican monthly. Now you know, but we don't know this because the media, for the most part, is in the hands of the evil one. He does not want God's work of triumph, victory over sin and evil, to be known. No news is influential. The more things you are exposed to negatively, the more they negatively affect your attitude, your words, your behavior. This is a fact, a psychological fact. The more good news you're exposed to, the more it influences your attitude, your words, your actions. We are creatures of influence and of habit. We are oftentimes conditioned by our circumstances. And God sees this. And God, therefore, knows how to apply justly his mercy and his justice according to our behavior, based upon our deliberation or lack thereof, due to influences that are external and internal. Only God sees these things. But going back to the God of miracles, the devil does not want the world to know this because he knows it harms his kingdom. So, I will begin by sharing with you some facts that have recently come forth about God performing miracles in the world in these days.
Take for example, the uh, approved decrees for two new blesseds and four venerables by Pope Leo. Pope Leo, in an audience, acknowledged the cause going forward for two new blessings and for venerables. He promulgated, therefore, promulgated decrees related to these people, and the decrees recognized the martyrdom of Father Augustine Raphael Ramirez um, he was a priest of the Friars Miners, the Franciscans, and a miracle was attributed to the intercession also, not just of Father August Rafael Ramirez Monasterio, but also Sister Maria Isaki, who is the founder of a congregation of the Earth Alliance of the Sacred Heart of Jesus of Azola, and both of these will become blessed, that will be declared blessed. Father Augustine Rafael Ramirez Monasteri was born in Guatemala City in 1937 into a Catholic family, and he discerned his vocation and um, began his Franciscan Nvicisha in Spain, where he completed his studies and was ordained a priest in 1967. He served [clears throat] as um, a guardian of a parish in San Francisco, Guatemala, Mexico, dedicating himself, you know, to the pastoral life, to the defenseless, the poor, and it was at a time when the country was going through a bit of a civil war in the late '70s. He was arrested in 1983. He was tortured, eventually released, put under surveillance, and received several death threats. Kind of reminds you of the 1917 attack on the Catholic Church under President Calles, where the Cristeros came to the defense of the Catholic faith and saved Catholicism in all of Mexico. This is a fact. If it had not been for the Cristeros, Christianity would not be alive today in Mexico. I believe it was under huge attack, the worst attack in its history, led by Freemasons, including Calles, the president. At the same time, the Bolshevik Revolution was waging war against Catholicism in Russia at the hands of the evil Vladimir Lenin. Jean Ulanos Vladimir Lenin, who led the Bolshevik Revolution of communism, which Mary forewarned in that same year, the seers of Fatima. About 1817 was a very important year for the, for Catholicism against the forces of Freemasonry and communism. The two heads of the beast mentioned in the book of Revelation. The first beast gave his authority to the second. The first beast represents communism. The second beast is masonry. The first beast works in the open, denying two great inalienable God-given rights, namely freedom of religion and freedom of conscience. Communism denies both. Saying God does not give you the rights, the state does. Sounds familiar today, doesn't it? Communism is no longer in the East. It's now in the West, right in front of you, under your nose. The nations under NATO have apostatized. They're turning to communism. They're saying that you have no rights unless the state gives them to you. The same dictum of communism in 1917 in the East. Now it's in the West. But it's under the form of a different beast works in the shadows. Unlike communism that worked in the open. Father Gobi revealed this when he received dictations through apparitions from Mary. And this beast has entered every venue of society. So much so that it's openly being promoted by music artists, by filmmakers, by journalists, by authors, extolling anti-Christian movement that most people are unaware of that eviscerates traditional based values and mores, supplanting them and replacing them with anti-commandment. So, if the commandment says, "Thou shalt not commit adultery," what do we see everywhere on the film business? Adultery everywhere. This is not a coincidence. This is a deliberate mocking of the commandments on the part of the beast. And the beast works under the authority of the evil one. So, in 1917, we saw the attack against Christianity in a very intensified way in Mexico and in Russia. By the way, Lenin, who founded communism, was not even Russian. Well, he was born, he was partially Russian, but his roots go back to Germany. In fact, the Communist Manifesto by Arc Engels and Marx was written by two Germans that he adopted and applied to his communistic rule, brought it into the curriculum in Russia, into the governmental systems, seized all property. Doesn't this sound familiar? You know, you look at the situation in Ukraine today. What is happening there? They were locking up bishops and priests, creating their own church, seizing land property, sending people in battle to get killed. For what? For what? There's a hidden agenda here. We're seeing this movement spread in various countries now where they're seeking to seize land and property. Some people have spoken to me when there were these disasters, one after the other, a string of disasters. You remember these that hit Hawaii, and now nobody could even go there. It's now government property from what I understand. Why is that? Then it hit Carolinas. Nobody can go there either. And then it hit Acapulco. Then it hit another place and another place in Greece. And it's like, little by little, these disasters are coincidentally followed by the seizing of land on the part of the government. Why is this? Maybe there's a hidden agenda here we don't know about. I don't know. My point is, we're seeing patterns here, parallels that happened in the past, they're happening again.
So, what do we do in the face of all this confusion and precariousness where we cannot depend upon our future as we used to, let's say, 60 years ago? Things are changing very fast today. And now, if that's not enough to contend with, we have AI, which can be used for good. You know, I heard these crazy warnings of people claiming to receive messages of God and Mary, AI is evil, it's the devil, all technology is from Satan. This is false. Certainly, as I mentioned before, the media is being used by the evil one to avoid miracles being shared with the world of God doing his miracles these days in these end times. More than ever before today, the Holy Spirit's being outpoured, but we don't hear about it because the media is hiding it deliberately. These miracles, these conversions, all they reveal to you is negativity, death, division, and that's what they want. I say "they" because I refer to a specific group behind it. Pope Pius X the 11th identifies them in an, in a letter he wrote on the errors of communism. I think it was 1911 he put this out. I, I don't remember exactly the year. Um, but uh, the, uh, patterns we're seeing back then, we saw back then or we read about, we're now seeing today. So, we're living in very tenuous times. And this, uh, priest, Father Austoto Raphael Ramirez Monasterio, after having been tortured, received several death threats. He worked in Mexico, you know, where the Cristero thing began. That was why I mentioned it. He then was released in '83 and was seized again by soldiers, and this time he was killed during a transfer to the outskirts of the city. So, his death was related to his work for the poor, for the defenseless, for the Catholics, for the Christians. And therefore, he was considered a martyr.
And the next clip is, I'm sure many will find very useful, and that is on the crosses we have in our lives. Listen to this.
There was a person that had come to me several years ago, among others, that for about 10 years was going through an interior struggle. And um, this person was often saying, "If only this had happened in my life, things would be different," or "If this had happened, this would not have been the case today." Or, "If I didn't make this bad decision, I would not be in the situation I am." In other words, this person was regretting a lot of regrets of the bad things that happened to them, oftentimes at his or her own hand in the past. "If only had this not been, I should not have..." A lot of regret, a lot of guilt. And this was intensifying the darkness tremendously. This person could not advance in faith or in spirituality because this person was stuck in a state of depression, chronic depression. They could not grow in prayer, had no need, desire to pray. They felt abandoned by God, could not trust in God, and could not allow God to forgive him or her. This made it impossible for this person to find or to get along with a spouse. They were isolated. And this is exactly what the devil wanted. The devil had this person by the throat, and they had no idea that the devil was choking them. So, how could this person move forward? You see, this person, I want to address this from a psychological perspective, was looking at "if only" in the past as something that was essential to the present, upon which the present depended. And were rejecting the precise shape of the cross Jesus had offered them in the past, and is offering them in the present, by saying, "If only I did this in the past." They are effectively rejecting the specific shape of the cross Jesus offered them in the past, and he's offering them now. You see, if they had simply accepted what Jesus had given them, they could have said, "I have been crucified with Christ." As Paul says in Galatians 2:20, "I have been crucified with Christ." In the garden of Gethsemane, Jesus faced a great temptation. "If only" temptation. Had I only done this, let's say Jesus' humanity, not his divinity, would have said, "If only I would have approached Judas a different way. He would not have been lost." "If only I would have said to those hundred disciples about my body and blood, if I said it in a more delicate way, maybe they wouldn't have left." If there were a lot of "if onlys," Jesus could have gone back to and said, "If only I did this." If only. Jesus prayed, faced his supreme "if only" temptation in the garden of Gethsemane, but he triumphed over it by accepting the twisting and turning wood of the cross, according to the fashion of the Father's design. Jesus did not design the cross. He accepted it as it was presented to him by the Father. You see, from the cross and the grave, there's obedience to the Father's will. There's love, trust, surrender to the Father. And Jesus turned this attitude this person had that came to me. "If only I did this. If only I didn't have this cross in my past. If only I didn't have to deal with this bad memory or bad action of mine that's cost me the future of the rest of my life." If only this person followed Jesus' example by taking up the cross, not patterned by the person, but by God's providence, and followed him, the depression would dissipate. It will be the beginning of the end of the darkness. Remember, we are not authorized to shape our own cross. We are not. We have no authority by God to choose the dimensions, the weight, the size, the shape of our cross. We have no choice. And we do not have the authority to choose. God chooses that for us. And that includes our defects, our sins, however great they are, and our good charitable choices and actions in life. It includes the whole gamut of good and evil, our cross. So, the cross that we receive is never like anyone else's cross. And it's not supposed to be. We don't become a saint by constantly seeking freedom from all uncomfortable constraints and irritations. This is part of the devil's trick. "Oh, you're not fully free from uncomfortabilities, from difficulties, from troubles. So that means you have to live in constant regret of your past." That's the devil's voice. That does not make us a saint. Freeing ourselves from uncomfortable constraints and irritations or troubles, that does not make you a saint. As with any good work of art, the edges and the limits give life to its beautiful form. On all holiness is about the contours, the dimensions, the edges, the right form that God decides. Grace transforms, grace conforms, grace reforms, grace informs our life with the form of Christ's cross. Grace is infinitely superior to evil and can not only reverse evil, but can avail itself thereof to bring about not just the good that previously existed, but a greater good. So much so that had that evil not existed, we would not experience this great grace and great goodness. Talik culpa, happy fault. Thank God there was original sin because through it, we now inherit a greater glory that we would not have had there been no original sin. It's great for those who are saved. It's hellish for those who are lost. So, it's a 50/50 gamble. And it's not a gamble really. It's a decision that's made throughout tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands of choices in life. We have a choice to be saved to the last breath we take. So, this person's "if only" in the past were hemmed in a frame within which God can paint his masterpiece. They didn't see that. The devil was keeping this person blind from seeing that your past failures are the tapestry, the raw material, the essential means by which God can paint his masterpiece. And I told this person, "Did you not know that some of the greatest saints were the greatest sinners?" Is that a coincidence? We become holy by allowing God to frame our life according to and patterned after the measure, the width, the height, the length, the depth, the form, the shape of the cross. He permits through providence in our lives that include our evils and our goods. He foresees it all. Some people have this crazy idea that, "Oh, God did not expect me to commit this grave sin in the past, and therefore my life is doomed." As if God is not omniscient. Of course, he foresaw that. God foresees everything. And the fact that he foresaw all the great evils you did and permits you still to be holy is proof positive that he's using that for your betterment and for the betterment of all. Remember, Maximillian Kolbe in the bunker of Auschwitz? He didn't ask for that cross. Do you think St. Maximillian Kolbe said, "Oh God, I'm praying that I end up in the gas chamber, wherever I die by lethal injection or starve to death, one of the two." No, he never expected that. But what did he do? This is the attitude of the saints. He allowed God to frame his life, cutting his edges and painting away. Even in a starvation bunker, he was able to create a work of art the Church would later canonize and that would bequeath to him two crowns of martyrdom and virginity.
But not all hardships and sufferings are willed by God for our life. We know sometimes we are the carpenter of our own cross. But even there, God enters and can use that like original sin. Suppose you have a broken relationship, and this has come to me quite often, and the person is regretting it, that "I should not have behaved as I did in the past. I kind of drove it into the ground after repeated bad attitudes and behaviors or whatever. I feel guilty. I feel guilty. I feel guilty." Much of discernment is the art of discerning limits, of judging what the proper limits are that are needed to protect your primary vocation and commitment in life. And when you come to your limits, then you discover your boundary. And that involves failure. You can't know your limit until you hit failure. It's like an athlete. He doesn't know his potential until he rivals it with other athletes better than him and fails in the process. Then he becomes better and becomes better, and he expands his potential. Our souls are expansive too. So, when we face trials or hardships, we need to learn our limits, and that's what failure is about. That's one of the great gifts of life's crosses. They expose our weakness and limits. The cross that Christ shapes exposes our weakness and limits. It's what I think Jesus means when he said to St. Paul, "My grace is sufficient, for power is made perfect in weakness." Now, you understand that meaning. Paul was pushed to his limit, and he discovered his weakness. He said, "I can't do this. I'm insufficient." And Christ said, "That's exactly where I want you." Because now you're discovering your limit. And in failing, not being able to go beyond this point, you expand through my grace. So, "my grace is sufficient in you." For power is made perfect in weakness. Power is made perfect because of in our exposed weakness. Our limits are exposed by the trials we face. We learn what are the delimiting borders of our vocation, of our potential, of our calling in life, in which we are to live out God's will. If you look at a river, it runs very fast, right? Some, often times it's rapidly and powerful. It wears down the rocks and, um, the river runs swift and powerful and clean because it has sharp edges that define it. The river didn't start running fast all of a sudden. Over the course of decades, it formed this bed, and the rocks have conformed to the power of the water shearing its edges to now make the river flow more quickly. Without this riverbed, the sharp edges, it would diffuse into a murky swamp filled with deadly, probably poisonous creatures. So, you see, the limits are the rocks of the water's expanses, and the water constantly pressing against those limits enables it to move more quickly over time. But we have to discern what are the crosses that God wants us to embrace in life in the present. The crosses of the past we necessarily embrace. We have to, because they're given to us by God's providence. Even if it's through our own goodwill or bad will, they're nonetheless a result of God's providence. But in the present, we have to pray for discernment to discern. There was a prayer, I think it was by, um, a man named Reinhold Niebuhr, when something like, "God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change." That's discernment. "God, grant me courage to change the things I can." That's discernment. And "God, grant me wisdom to know the difference." That's discernment. So, we are to avail ourselves of the grace of God that is right at our fingertips today. Don't look in the past and meditate on it to the point of depression, but rather look at it through modern lenses, through the work of grace in you today, that is availing itself of all past good and bad in order to make you that perfect masterpiece that God has intended from all eternity.
That will be all for the video this time, and as always, thank you so much for taking the time to be here with us. And hopefully, all of you have learned so much from this video. And remember, if ever you have any feedback or suggestions, please let us know in the comments below. And from the bottom of my heart, thank you so much for your continuous support, contributions, and prayers. And until the next one, thanks again for watching, and may God bless you.