Waking the Sleeping Giant
One of the more memorable (and apocryphal) quotes to come out of the Second World War was the quote of Admiral Isoruku Yamamoto, the Japanese commander and mastermind of the attack on Pearl Harbor. After the attack he was supposed to have said: “I fear all we have done is wake a sleeping giant and filled him with a terrible resolve.” This quote was given a dramatic flourish at the end of the 1970 movie Tora! Tora! Tora! I couldn’t help but recall this in the last week since religious liberty in the United States has been attacked by the action of the Obama Administration. Indeed, I must reiterate the point I’ve made before: the Obama Administration is at war with the Catholic Church. Since this decision, however, it strikes this writer that “the sleeping giant” is waking up. Consider the following statements:
Cardinal-designate Timothy M. Dolan, Archbishop of New York:
Bishop David A. Zubik, Bishop of Pittsburgh:
We’ll give you a year, they are saying, and then you have to knuckle under….
Bishop Alexander Sample, Bishop of Marquette:
A common paragraph from the letters of several of the bishops:
Finally,
Pope Benedict XVI:
It seems as if the sleeping giant has been roused to anger. A righteous anger it is. We are at war; let us acknowledge it and join our commanders–the bishops.
What next? How to combat the no-longer furtive attack on the Church and the transcendent? Utilize the powerful tools at our disposal: Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament and the Rosary. Families, parish associations, and all people of goodwill need to redouble their efforts to teach their children about God and His Church. Most importantly, in season and out, we must underscore that loving Christ means loving the Church. She is His Bride; one cannot truly love Him without loving Her. The reality on the horizon is that our bishops may one day be jailed. So too, many of our priests.
This week there was also a news story that a statue of the Blessed Mother–the one carried by Don Juan of Austria on the quarterdeck of his flagship in the Battle of Lepanto in 1571–was found. Currently it is being restored (see the image, left). In addition to being a wonderful find, the statue seems to this writer to be a metaphor for the state of the Church in the United States. She is badly damaged; beaten up, even. Many of these wounds are self-inflicted, but many more are from an environment inhospitable to her preservation. Yet, that which remains is beautiful. The visible eye of the statute shows us the love of tender Mother of God and Lady of the Rosary; and it also shows us the determination of the Destroyer of Heresy and the Lady of Victory.
If the readers will indulge me, I have one other tactic that may aid in the Catholic offensive in this battle–one that would, assuredly, make the powerful quake. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if every Cardinal, Archbishop, and Bishop in the United States–cultivating “a renewal of faith” called for by the Holy Father–marched to the White House, saying the Rosary, with this statue of Our Lady from the Battle of Lepanto held aloft? Wouldn’t it also be wonderful if the faithful were galvanized to join with their shepherds and commanders for such a public display of a confident and triumphant Catholic Faith? Perhaps this is a fantasy. Perhaps not.
This article, Waking the Sleeping Giant is a post from The Bellarmine Forum.
https://bellarmineforum.org/waking-the-sleeping-giant/
Do not repost the entire article without written permission. Reasonable excerpts may be reposted so long as it is linked to this page.
Bishop Zubik is best known for his cold and heartless treatment of a child rape victim in his parish.
It was proven that a pedophile priest in Zubik’s diocese raped a child. The church begrudgingly agreed to pay for therapy for the child, who thought he was raped by Christ (since they teach children that a priest is Christ on earth). They promsed to keep paying as long as necessary.
Zubik decided to prematurely cut off the therapy against the advice of the victims, and the victim, Michael Unglo, committed suicide.
Zubik saved money, and the Catholic church was responsible for the death of someone they raped as a child.
That is your Catholic church.
RIP, Michael Unglo, you will not see Bishop Zubik in the afterlife.
Mr. O’Malley,
Thank you for visiting the Wanderer Forum Foundation’s website. As an initial matter, sexual abuse of any kind is to be condemned–especially by those in the sacred priesthood or other positions of trust. The Wanderer Forum Foundation has a long history (since 1965) of calling our pastors to the highest ideals of doctrinal and moral orthodoxy; and we have been critical when that standard has not been met. In this fallen world, the “mysterium iniquitatis” is proof positive of the need for Christ and His Church more than ever. However, we cannot opine on your comment as we know nothing of the matter, nor of Bishop Zubik’s involvement. Nor will we presume to know the result of anyone’s final judgment by Christ. We can, however, pray for the repose of the soul of Mr. Unglo and that God’s mercy be with his loved ones. We can also pray for the criminal who perpetrated such a horrific crime upon an innocent child.
That said, the point of this article is to highlight that the bishops have responded correctly to the federal government’s violation of the Constitution and forcing American citizens to not only violate their consciences, but also to pay for contraceptives, sterilization and abortion-inducing drugs. Whatever your view of the Catholic Church, surely you can agree that no government can ever force its citizens to purchase products they do not want or to subsidize the murder of the innocent.
The time of “blending in” is rapidly coming to a close.
[…] the orthodox “right” and the dissenting “left”) speak of a proverbial “waking” of “the sleeping giant.” But I’m afraid a dose of ecclesiastical realism is in order. All indications are that the […]
You have to wonder how the bishops so studiously managed all these years to avoid reading or contemplating this line:
Then Jesus saith to him: Put up again thy sword into its place: for all that take the sword shall perish with the sword.
Matthew 26:52
In the early 90’s a preacher impressed me with the following quote:
“The problem with the North American Church is too often it prays for a lighter load rather than praying for a stronger back.”
The sad fact is that the winnowing fork that is the Bush-Obama regime may be what sorts the wheat from the chaf of the next few years as the Church transcendent regains the stronger back she had when she resisted earlier Ceasar’s.
I have no doub’t this persecution will work to G-d’s good. The results will be parishioners, decaon, priest, and bisshops strong in their faith and able to give a good account of why they have placed their faith in the resurrected Christ.
Blah Blah Blah bishops that’s all they are good at. A silly bunch of do nothings 50 years of doing nothing but dialogueing. As Obama illustrates nobody takes them serious.