VATICAN CITY, MARCH 3, 2003 (Zenit.org).- John Paul II offered personal counsel when facing times of difficulty: the invocation “Jesus, I trust in you.”"It is a simple but profound act of trust and abandonment to the love of God,” the Pope said. “It is a fundamental point of strength for every man, as it is capable of transforming life.”"In the inevitable trials and difficulties of life, in moments of joy and enthusiasm, entrusting oneself to the Lord infuses the soul with peace, induces us to recognize the primacy of the divine initiative and opens the spirit to humility and trust,” he added.”In the heart of Jesus, those anguished by life’s sorrows find peace; those afflicted by suffering and illness find relief; those who feel constricted by uncertainty and anguish feel joy, because Christ’s heart is filled to overflowing with consolation and love for those who turn to it with trust,” he said.

postscript:

Peter Paul Rubens. Christ Risen.
1616. Oil on canvas. Palazzo Pitti, Galleria Palatina, Florence, Italy.

The Flemish baroque painter Peter Paul Rubens, b. June 28, 1577, d. May 30, 1640 was the most renowned northern European artist of his day, and is now widely recognized as one of the foremost painters in Western art history.

 HE IS RISEN, INDEED!!!

 Jesus is the Christ, is the Lord of the Universe and is the King of the World.  The ArchAngel Institute bows before, and pledges allegiance to, Jesus the only Christ. 

“Christ has died, Christ is risen, Christ will come again.”

As the above quote from the Roman Catholic Church’s liturgy acknowledges, Jesus Rules over the past, over the present and over the future.

Postscript (all that follows is from sources on the web):

Christ en majesté, painted 1515 by Matthias Grünewald as a panel from the Isenheim altarpiece: oil on wood 105 7/8 x 120 7/8 in; Musee d’Unterlinden, Colmar

The Risen Christ from the Isenheim Altarpiece. The Resurrection is represented as healing from bodily torment and sickness: Christ’s body is luminously cleansed, his face calm, and a golden light is shed from his wounds. www.etss.edu/hts/MAPM/isenres.jpg

Matthias Grünewald, c.1475-1528, whose real name was Mathis Gothart, called Nithart or Neithardt, was a major figure in a generation of great northern German Renaissance painters that also included Albrecht Dürer, Lucas Cranach, and Albrecht Altdorfer.

The final flowering of the Gothic came relatively late, in the work of the German artist, Matthias Grünewald . He was possibly an exact contemporary of Dürer, but while Dürer was deeply influenced by the Renaissance, Grünewald ignored it in his choice of subject matter and style. Much of his work has not survived to this day, but even from the small amount that has come down to us, it is possible to see Grünewald as one of the most powerful of all painters. No other painter has ever so terribly and truthfully exposed the horror of suffering, and yet kept before us, as Bosch does not, the conviction of salvation.

Art for him did not consist in the search for the hidden laws of beauty – for him it could have only one aim, the aim of all religious art in the Middle Ages – that of providing a sermon in pictures, of proclaiming the sacred truths as taught by the Church.

Source of above

www.ibiblio.org/…/auth/grunewald/crucifixion/

http://www.ibiblio.org/wm/paint/auth/grunewald/

Welcometo the website of the ArchAngel Institute, Inc.  The Institute is a unique not-for-profit organization dedicated to litigation, commemoration and communication advancing the Culture of Life.

The Institute is unique due to its ambitious Christian activist mission and the fact that it is headquartered in Fort Wayne’s former abortuary.  (The brick building on the right.)  The address is 827 Webster Street.

The Institute is also unique in that all of the Institute’s founding board members  took part in activities intended to save human lives on numerous occasion at this same location in years gone by, and the Executive Director was one of ten Fort Wayne pro-life activists dragged into federal court by the residents of 827 Webster Street for such activities over many years.

First time visitors are encouraged to gain an overview of the work of the Institute by reading the information at that tiles above.

The “fly the corridor” tile presents the inspirational parallels between the Institute and the Irish Underground (WWII). In brief, just as the Allies flew through allegedly hostile mountain passes to do battle against the Axis Powers, the ArchAngel Institute is using a former abortion clinic to do battle against the Culture of Death.

The mission, philosophical underpinnings and Christian inspiration of the Institute are located at the tile labeled “mission criticals.”

The Institute’s work is divided among three divisions – the Michael Division (litigation and litigation support), the Gabriel Division (communication and applied technology) and the Raphael Division (commemoration and abortion-related counseling). The mission statements of those three divisions, as well as the operational goals of each, are found at the above tiles describing each.

The categories on the right track articles written by and about the Institute. The “Open House 2008″ and “this old clinic” categories are probably of the most interest to first time visitors.

This introduction concludes with an overview of and link to our virtual open house (in seven stations), linking the Institute and its quite unique architectural setting:

Station #1 The Donegal Corridor

This station presents the mission and 2008 operational goals of the Institute’s landlord, the Donegal Corridor, LLC.

Click on the following title to be taken to the posts on Station 1:Open House Station One — The Mission and Flight Plan of Webster Street’s Donegal Corridor

Station #2 The ArchAngel Institute.

This station is located in the front office of the former clinic. It is the room in which former patients recovered from the deadly and intrusive work of the abortionists. From this same room the Institute now directs volunteer efforts seeking to heal our culture and address the harm caused by the Culture of Death.

Click on the following title to be taken to the posts on Station 2:Open House Station Two — The Vision and Mission Statement of the ArchAngel Institute

Station #3 The ArchAngel Raphael Division

This Division commemorates Christian chivalry in general, the harm done at 827 Webster Street in specific and seeks to help those wounded by the abortion industry.

Click on the following title to be taken to the posts on Station 3: Open House Station Three — The Mission and Deeds of the Raphael Division

Station #4 The ArchAngel Michael Division

This Division is dedicated to supporting and advancing litigation in the interest of the Culture of Life. A recent filing with the Kansas Supreme Court supporting the Wichita grand jury investigating the infamous abortionist George Tiller is just one example of this Division’s important work.

Click on the following title to be taken to the posts on Station 4:Open House Station Four — The Mission and Deeds of the Michael Division

Station #5 The ArchAngel Gabriel Division

This division communicates the social teachings of the Christian Church through many mediums and messages, including this website and studio-quality recording of interviews with Christian activists.

Click on the following title to be taken to the posts on Station 5:Open House Station Five: The Mission and Deeds of the Gabriel Division

Station #6 The Titanic Brigade

This work of the Raphael Division is a grassroots effort to bring about a great degree of inter-denominational understanding and Christian unity.

Click on the following titles to be taken to the posts on Station 6

 Open House Station Six: The Titanic Brigade

:Open House Station Six: Unity on a wounded ship

Station #7 The Pro-lifer’s Portico

This is a fund-raising project of the Donegal Corridor in which those who sacrificed to stand against the abortionists at 827 Webster Street can now sacrifice to stand with the Donegal Corridor and by so doing advance the goals of the Institute.

Click on the following title to be taken to the posts on Station 7:  Open House — Setting up Station Seven

Station Seven is our last stop on the open house tour of the Institute’s headquarters.   This post builds upon the previous post on Station Seven.  Read that post here:

This is the northwest corner of the Institute. Note the new ceiling tiles. Note the banner that hung in the front window throughout advent. It now hangs in the front office.

What a different message than that which greated those who entered the building when Susan Hill and George Klopfer held court over little lives and God’s people from the same location.

The frame on the left contains the final station in the open house walk through.

It reads as follows:

The Pro-lifer’s Portico Project

of the Donegal Corridor, LLC

The chimneys on this building must be repaired or removed. The bushes in front of the building are slated for removal. The concrete in the front of the building is in need of repair. Pro-lifers have spent countless thousands of hours counseling, praying and even sitting-in near the front door of this building.

The Donegal Corridor, LLC, in conjunction with the Raphael Division of the Institute, plans to harmonize the above statements in one fine work of art that memorializes the pro-life movement in Fort Wayne.

This plan is the Pro-lifer’s Portico.

Once completed, this front porch area will be a patio of inscribed bricks fashioned out of the chimneys. Each brick will be inscribed with the name of a pro-life individual or family that stood against the child killing that took place in this building in the years between 1977 to 2007.

The Donegal Corridor is using this project to raise monies for the much needed repairs to this building. Pro-life families whose member or members have stood against child killing on Webster Street are asked to pledge moneys toward this project. Once the pledges are met the chimney bricks will be inscribed and set in place as a silent memorial to faithful pro-life witnesses.

The suggested pledge amounts are as follows:

* The one percent of fees pledge: Pledge to pay off one percent of the amount of the legal fees that the Rescue Defendants were ordered to pay to the abortionist operating out of this building back in 1991. This one percent amount is $616. More on the quite symbolic nature of this amount is available upon request.

* The one percent of income pledge: Pledge to donate one percent of your household income for 2008 to the Donegal Corridor, LLC and a brick will be inscribed with your family name and set in place.

Donations to the Donegal Corridor, LLC are not tax –deductible. Other items in this building of historic interest are available for sale to support the mission, including some of the steam radiators. See John R. Brown for details. If you wish to take part in this program but lack the funds see Bryan J. Brown for an alternative program toward the same end.

We had hoped to conclude the ongoing virtual open house tour of the Institute today, but headlines have necessitated an interruption of that plan.News comes out of California of a court decision that threatens home schooling in that state.  This is no mere lower court decision — it is an appellate court decision.  Click here to read the decision:  links.sfgate.com/ZCQR 

Recognizing that the greatest advances of the anti-family forces in our national history have come via the judiciary, the Institute thus pauses to consider the conflict between historic Christian teaching and the California court system.

Two recent catechisms of the Catholic Church strive to put in writing what the Church has affirmed over the past two millennia.  The three major branches of Christendom are in agreement with a good 90% of what in included in these magisterial documents.

The essential teaching of Christianity as to “homeschooling” is as follows:

2221 … The right and the duty of parents to educate their children are primordial and inalienable. …

2223 Parents have the first responsibility for the education of their children. ….

Source: http://www.scborromeo.org/ccc.htm

It would appear that the California Appellate Court system is not in agreement with the historic teaching of the Christian faith.   Just the opposite, in fact.

The essential holding of the California judiciary is as follows: 

“California courts have held that under provisions in the Education Code, parents do not have a constitutional right to home school their children.” Furthermore, the judge wrote, if instructors teach without credentials they will be subject to criminal action.

Judge H. Walter Croskey of the Second District Court of Appeals, February  28 in Los Angeles.  Source: http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-mehomeschool6mar06,0,7343621.story?track=ntothtml

The parents at issue may not have been the best of caregivers.  They were homeschooling their eight children and one of the oldest filed a report with the state alleging child abuse.  The parents deny these charges.  Our hearts go out to these parents.  We live in perilous times.  Source:  http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1720697,00.html?xid=feed-rss-netzero

Let us assume, however, for the sake of argument, that the parents are monsters.  That they did all that was alleged against them and more.  Do such “hard cases” justify an end to the right to homeschool?

The Church has already asked and answered this question:

99. To desire, therefore, that the civil power should enter arbitrarily into the privacy of homes is a great and pernicious error. If a family perchance is in such extreme difficulty and is so completely without plans that it is entirely unable to help itself, it is right that the distress be remedied by public aid, for each individual family is a part of the community. Similarly, if anywhere there is a grave violation of mutual rights within the family walls, public authority shall restore to each his right; for this is not usurping the rights of citizens, but protecting and confirming them with just and due care. Those in charge of public affairs, however, must stop here; nature does not permit them to go beyond these limits.(Rerum Novarum, n. 14)

Source:  http://www.thesocialagenda.org/

Nature itself calls out against the California appellate court decision?  Such appears to be the teaching of the Church, which is slow to catch up with the demand of our modern bureaucratic state.  (No apology necessary.)  The argument can be made, based upon the teaching above, that the California court’s determination that parents have no “right” to home school their children is not only a blatant rejection of church teaching, it is a rejection of the Natural Law.  If pushed to the obvious conclusion (and some will so push) the end of the court’s holding is that parents have no rights as to the education of their children.  The state’s interest trumps parental “rights,” comrade. 

Homeschool Legal Defense Association’s founder Michael Farris, one of the nation’s foremost authorities on homeschooling and the law, has recently written that “The right of parents to direct the upbringing and education of their children is hanging by a thread.”  Mike wrote this before the California court seemed to conclude that parental rights are creatures of statute.  The state giveth, the state taketh away. 

Real conflicts of conscience are now visited upon the homeschoolers of California.  The question now becomes who will prevail, the parents or the state?  What teaching will win out – the teachings of Christ’s Church or the teachings of modern man?   Whom will they obey, the teaching of the Lord or the teaching of the court?

The California Appellate Court’s core holding is worth repeating, this time with the notice of impending “re-education” included:

“Parents do not have a constitutional right to home school their children,” wrote Justice H. Walter Croskey in a Feb. 28 opinion signed by the two other members of the district court. “Parents who fail to [comply with school enrollment laws] may be subject to a criminal complaint against them, found guilty of an infraction, and subject to imposition of fines or an order to complete a parent education and counseling program.”

Stalin had a similar program and so did Mao and Castro.

The California court ended with the implicit threat of incarceration or family separation:

“Additionally, the [homeschooling] parents are subject to being ordered to enroll their children in an appropriate school or education program and provide proof of enrolment to the court, and willful failure to comply with such an order may be punished by a fine for civil contempt.”

This is an implicit threat of incarceration or a taking of the children from the home for such would be the only orders left to the court if parents refused to pay the fines leveled by the court as civil sanctions. 

That said, it must be noted that the court decision does not slam the door to homeschooling in toto, and thus brings to the fore a discussion what standards the court can place upon homeschooling parents.  Quoting from the Time Magazine article, the California court “ruled that children ages six to 18 may be taught only by credentialed teachers in public or private schools – or at home by mom and dad but only if they have a teaching degree.”

Thus, according to the same source, “[p]arents of the approximately 200,000 home schooled children in California are reeling from the possibility that they may have to shutter their classrooms – and go back to school themselves, if they want to continue teaching their own kids.”

The ArchAngel Institute stands with those California parents and California bureaucrats facing difficult decisions.  One family interviewed plans to leave California rather than bow to its law.  Time Magazine notes that Jack O’Connell, the government bureaucrat charged with ‘rounding up” non compliant homeschooling parents, “now faces the potential crisis of dealing with tens of thousands of truants.”  The descendant of Irish ancestry (how ironic), when asked what he would do in the face of the ruling replied “I honestly don’t know,” adding that his department is reviewing the case.  O’Connell further noted that “There is some angst in the field.”

Those with a sense of history recognize angst as an understatement in this situation.  The Institute ends this special report on a section of the Catechism that has great relevance to the California conundrum:

2229 As those first responsible for the education of their children, parents have the right to choose a school for them which corresponds to their own convictions. This right is fundamental. As far as possible parents have the duty of choosing schools that will best help them in their task as Christian educators.³⁸ Public authorities have the duty of guaranteeing this parental right and of ensuring the concrete conditions for its exercise.

Source:  http://www.scborromeo.org/ccc.htm

Postscript:  We are delighted to have attracted a comment and site visitors from the Great White North.  Canada knows too well the dangers of runaway statism.  We welcome the insights of our Canadian cousins.  Especially when they are as well stated and well reasoned as the comment below.  

This is a picture of the area between the building and the public sidewalk at 827 Webster Street.  It is land that belongs to the building owner.  Which means that it was land off limits to pro-lifers back when Susan Hill owned the property. 

Take this front page newspaper picture, for example.  The pro-lifers are crawling toward the steps and toward the choice piece of real estate pictured above.  Three times in 1989 pro-lifers scuttled around those raggedly bushes to sit, in large quantities, on the contested ground pictured above. 

Donegal Corridor has announced plans to remove the ratty bushes with the spring thaw.  

The warmer  weather will bring about a fine opportunity for pro-lifers to loiter on the above ground without fear of trespassing charges.  But mud and dirt will not do.  What is needed is a porch of some kind, a portico if you will. 

But where to get the materials for such a structure?

(Hint:  The new gas furnace needs no chimney and the old chimneys need to come down.  Click on the picture below for a closer look.)  

Station Seven will take us back to the front of the Institute and back to a discussion of the Donegal Corridor, LLC.

In other words, Station Seven discusses bricks and mortar.

We traverse the original tile floor in the Institute to travel the approximately 17 yards from the Brown mirror to the front window. The Institute is abit over 7 yards wide. Thus, if my math is correct, the Institute’s entire office space could be renewed with less than 120 square yards of floor covering.

As we walk toward the front of the Institute (traversing from the east to the west, and thus walking toward the First Presbyterian Church) we pass by the kitchenette, using the term loosely, on the north. It was the “sterile room” back when the Institute was used for nefarious purposes, and is anything but that. It needs to be gutted and reborn.

Thus this virtual tour now moves from vision and ideological to the most practical of issues. The Institute could use your help in finishing up the remodeling of this old clinic. Thousands of dollars have been poured into the building by the Brown family already. The Corridor has agreed to allow the Institute to offset rent due by volunteer work and through upgrades to the building.  Thus your donations to the Institute, either in time, in kind or in money, can offset the rent and speed us on our important mission.  (In time gifts are not tax deductible, but Donegal Corridor has agreed to count them as rent.)

For that reason this sign hangs in the brown hallway of the institute . . .

Please Pardon Our Mess – especially the floor!

We are only in the Second Stage of our Launch.

Our Executive Director is officing in this building and will soon relocate his operations to the recently finished offices. (Just as soon as the flooring is finished.)

We are praying that someone will be moved to help with the flooring. We are praying for a donation to cover the cost, or a donation of materials and/or help laying the same.

We are open to donations of office equipment, office furniture, kitchen cabinets, windows, and window treatments and most all else necessary to take us past this Second Stage and into orbit as a fully functioning Institute.

The Institute is able to receive tax-deductible donations.

Thank you for joining us in praying for the success of our mission.

Too many official voices, both in government and the media, have attempted to persuade the American people that giving voice to patriotism or the robust expression of a Christ-centered worldview are hurtful acts.

The Titanic Brigade identifies this political correctness as nothing less than the iceberg that has ripped a gaping hole in our national fabric.

This searing tear, if not repaired, will sink the ship called the United States of America.

The hole must be repaired, the iceberg that tore the hole must melt.

To be less obscure, as St. Paul taught, everything raised up against the knowledge of Christ is to be torn down.

The Institute is not the first to declare that post-modernity is opposed to the Faith Once Delivered. It is no secret and the conflicts have become glaring during the past decades.

The only question is what the Church is prepared to do about it.

One of the inspirations for the ArchAngel Institute said it quite well way back in the 80’s. He is the Saint Francis of the Protestant Evangelicals, and has an honored place in the Institute’s pantheon of Christian leaders:

“Make no mistake. We as Bible-believing evangelical Christians are locked in a battle. This is not a friendly gentleman’s discussion. It is a life and death conflict between the spiritual hosts of wickedness and those who claim the name of Christ. It is a conflict on the level of ideas between two fundamentally opposed views of truth and reality. It is a conflict on the level of actions between a complete moral perversion and chaos and God’s absolutes. Do we really believe we are in a life and death battle? Do we really believe that the part we play in the battle has consequences for whether or not men and women will spend eternity in hell? Or whether or not in this life people will live with meaning or meaninglessness? Or whether or not those who do live will live in a climate of moral perversion and degradation? Sadly, we must say that very few in the evangelical world have acted as if these things are true. …”
[Excerpted from The Great Evangelical Disaster, Francis A. Schaeffer, Crossway Books, p.31,32]

The ArchAngel Institute ended its August 25, 2007 launch with a clip from Schaeffer’s truly profound film series “Whatever Happened to the Human Race?”

Schaeffer’s writings had a profound effect upon many young and idealistic evangelicals in the 1980’s. The principles and exhotations found in Schaeffer’s writings are found in the teachings of Popes John Paul II and Benedict XVI as well.

Those teachings form a common foundation from which an ecumenical evangelism addressing the whole of the human experience can be explored. Not a mere reactionary Christian Right, but a true Renaissance of the best in Christendom.

If not now, when? If not at 827 Webster Street, where?

The Titanic Brigade will answer Saint Francis’ call to faithful service while building a bridge between Faith communities that have for far too long been separated by walls.

The Institute is preparing a postal service mailing that will contain information which will not be posted on this site. 

Friends of the Institute will want to get this mailing.  So will enemies of the Institute.  (Rest assured that we have many enemies!)

Get on our mailing list through one of these three routes:

1.  Send an email containing your mailing address to archangelinstitute@gmail.com.  The email must have “Jesus is Lord” typed in the subject line to result in you being put on our snail mail list.

2.  Send a snail mail to us at the former abortion clinic’s address.  That address is 827 Webster Street, Fort Wayne, IN 46802.  Your letter must contain your mailing address and the handwritten line “Jesus is Lord.”

3.  Call us toll free at (800) 399-4620 and leave your snail mail address along with the greeting “Jesus is Lord.”

Sorry, but we are sticklers on the “Jesus is Lord” line.  It’s a Bible thang, if you do not understand read the book of Romans at chapter 10 and read the first letter of  John at chapter 4.  Best not try the entire book of Romans  if you do not understand, try the Gospel of Luke and then the first letter of John if the “Jesus is Lord” requirement is lost on you.  It is not rocket science, but it is Spirit and it is Life.

The walkthrough will continue Monday.