Psychological Healing
in the Roman Catholic Mystic Tradition

Questions and Answers

What about terrorism? Surely we have a legal right to avenge ourselves.

 
hen saying anything about terrorism, we must keep in mind two fundamental points:

1.	The agents of terrorism are agents of evil.
2.	Those attacked by terrorists are not necessarily innocent.

Now, the first point is self-evident. Using any means that they can—bypassing all rules, all justice, all fairness, all truth—terrorists seek to undermine and destroy all that opposes them. And that is the essence of evil, because evil will stop at nothing to achieve its own satisfaction.

The second point, though, is often overlooked.

We need to remember that no secular government on this earth seeks to do only God’s will. This country, for example, was founded on the pursuit of happiness, not on the desire for holiness. So there are many things in our society which are legal or socially accepted that are not holy and so don’t deserve to be defended. Abortion ... divorce ... assisted suicide ... artificial birth control ... embryonic stem-cell research ... lifestyles defiant of chastity ... pornography ... prostitution ... drugs ... exploitation of workers ... exploitation of the weak and helpless ... abuse of the environment ... greed ... gluttony ... and all contempt of Christian values in general. These things should be repented, not defended.

If these things are not repented, however, we push God out of our lives, and in the process we push away His protection. 

 

Read an excerpt from a homily attributed to Saint Macarius, bishop

And so, even though Christ commanded us to return a blessing for any insult and gave us the Golden Rule (“Do to others whatever you would have them do to you,” Matthew 7:12), when we push God out of our lives, we push away even the Golden Rule. After all, without God’s protection, those who don’t defend themselves will be annihilated by evil as soon as they turn their back.

A presidential candidate in a South American country ravaged by terrorist rebels ran on a platform of peace. She invited the terrorists to negotiate, saying, “Come on, guys, let’s be nice. Stop the kidnapping.” So what did they do? They kidnapped her.

Therefore, any civil government that rejects God as the center of its being—and as the only source of peace—has only one alternative when attacked by evil: to take matters into its own hands and fight back. It has to fight fire with fire. It has to fight evil on its own terms. Consequently, it is left holding the Satanic inversion of the Golden Rule: Do to others what they do to you. Deceive them and kill them. That’s called revenge.

When you fight fire with fire, however, you run the risk of getting burned yourself. And have no doubt that Satan knows this. If he cannot destroy you directly with an attack, he will try to make you destroy yourself in sin through the hatred and hostility you feel for being attacked.

What, then, can a faithful Christian do?

Well, note that when men such as Francis of Assisi and Ignatius of Loyola converted to Catholicism they gave up all their childhood illusions about military power, laid down their weapons, and took up real lives of Christian peace. They understood that the ultimate welfare of any soul must be a personal, not a political, matter.

If you want to preserve your own soul, therefore, turn your attention to defending the Magisterium of the Church: repent your own wickedness, detach yourself from the wickedness of the world, live in chastity, and pray constantly. And be prepared to suffer for witnessing your faith, because all true faith leads only to the cross.

Pray especially for the morally weak and the spiritually blind who have been seduced by evil into becoming terrorists.

Pray that all self-indulgent social impieties in our culture of “self” are seen for the sins they are, because these sins are what provoke terrorists in the first place.

Pray also that politicians who support these sins are brought to repentance—because, if they don’t repent, then we have to expect that they, and their governments with them, will be handed over for punishment, similar to the immoral man Paul “handed over to Satan, for the destruction of his flesh” so that, with his pride crushed, he might then repent his sins and “his spirit may be saved on the day of the Lord” (1 Corinthians 5:1-8).

In all of this, there is only one wisdom: If you want to change the world, begin by changing yourself. If you want the world to be more fair, treat the world fairly even when you are treated unfairly. If you want the world to be more kind, treat the world with kindness and return a blessing for every insult. Show the world by your good actions—not by empty protest, political sentimentality, or violence—that you are willing to live according to what you profess to believe. Regardless of how the world treats you, live the true Faith—anyway.

Let your country trust in itself, because, sadly, that’s all it has. But you have more, if you want to claim it: “Jesus, I Trust in YOU!”

Back to the list of questions

DID MY WORK help you? Have you found insight into your behavior? Have you found information unlike anywhere else? Then why not make a Quick & Easy donation to this freewill website to express your gratitude for my labor in creating something substantial, something that can change your life for the better? Huh? Donations? Freewill website? What’s this about?