A priest from Fort Wayne addresses the question at hand
Father George Gabet (pictured celebrating the ancient Latin rite) is a good friend of the Institute, and is well known for his pro-life activism before becoming a priest. He was active in Fort Wayne, Wichita and more than a few cities across the nation.
He recently addressed the ideas that have been recently discussed on this site. The Institute did not solicit Father George’s commentary, but have it to post thanks to an email from Louise Gonya:
St. Mother Theodore Guerin Latin Community
(Established by Bishop D’Arcy for the Extraordinary form of the Mass)
Reprinted from the Sacred Heart Saint Henry Parish Bulletin July 4th issue
Happy 4th of July Weekend!
This past Friday we celebrated the 232nd birthday of the United States of
America born on the 4th of July 1776.
I recently found the Declaration of Independence on the Internet to read
through a transcript of our nation’s first document.
As I read through it I tried to put myself in the shoes of Thomas
Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin and the other 54 Fathers of our country.
How their hearts must have pounded as they signed the paper that they
fully realized would probably cost them dearly. Their
lives, their fortunes, their families and their sacred honor were all at
stake. This was no step they were taking but it was a step they felt
was absolutely necessary. In the Declaration, they state that normally
what they were doing would be wrong for they wrote,
“Prudence indeed will dictate that government long established should not
be changed for light and transient causes, and accordingly
all experience has shown that mankind is more disposed to suffer, while
evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing, by
abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed.” But because the King
- their rightful authority – had overstepped his power
by denying the inalienable right of life, liberty, and the pursuit of
happiness, rights by which the people were endowed by their
“Creator”, rights given by God Himself; the people need no longer obey
the King.
Isn’t that amazing! The whole rationale given by the Fathers of our
country as to why they were able to declare independence from a tyrant king was that he overstepped his rights given to the people by their Creator God.
There can be no doubt that God has blessed this undertaking. How else
could a small untrained, inexperienced colonial army defeat the greatest sea power on the planet at the time? This great country has truly been blessed by God with a superabundance of food and harvest. We have never been invaded by a foreign power. The Catholic Church has grown despite prejudices and the United States has been instrumental in ending the chastisements foretold by Our Lady of Fatima – WWI and WWII. The U.S.
has become the world superpower. Surely God has blessed us.
But where do we stand today? A hard look at ourselves will show that “We
the People” as our constitution begins, have seemingly declared independence from God Himself, the Kings of Kings, for we the people of this republic are indeed responsible that our country has embraced a “culture of death” as Pope John Paul II referred to it during his pontificate.
We have become a country that sacrifices 4,000 + of its young each day to
the goddess of choice in mockery of the 5th commandment. As if that were not enough we see the specter of the same gender unions hanging over us in mockery of the 6th commandment as well.
By overriding these commandments, it seems the nation has declared
independence from Almighty God: Isn’t it ironic that although the very rationale that was used to verify why we should be independent from Great Britain – because of rights endowed by our Creator were being denied – we now see this nation denying the Creator. This weekend let us therefore pray for the United States of America and declare our total dependence on our Creator God who has been so good to us. For as we read in
Psalm 32 “Blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord.”
