Saturday, September 05, 2015

Saturday Detention: "Class, a review of what we studied - and remember, you'll be tested on this."


"Yes sister."

"This is going on your permanent record."




"Gay people are the biggest ____."

... "Just kidding class, and now we'll go over why you people are such whiners."

On the subject of self love and self pity.

"Now remember class, as the great Garrigou-Lagrange noted, 'the principal defect of the will is the lack of rectitude, called self-love or inordinate love of self...' - you know who you are!"
"St Augustine, with extraordinary perceptiveness, described the nature of sin as follows: 'self-love to the point of contempt for God'. It was self love which drove our first parents toward the initial rebellion and then gave rise to the spread of sin throughout human history. The book of Genesis speaks of this: 'You will be like God, knowing good and evil', in other words, you yourselves will decide what is good and evil.
The only way to overcome this dimension of original sin is through a corresponding 'love for God to the point of contempt for self'. This brings us face to face with the mystery of man's redemption, and here the Holy Spirit is our guide. It is he who allows us to penetrate deeply into the 'mystery of the Cross' and at the same time to plumb the depths of evil perpetrated by man and suffered from the very beginning of history. That is what the expression 'convince the world about sin' means, and the purpose of this 'convincing' is not to condemn the world. 
If the Church, through the power of the Holy Spirit, can call evil by its name, it does so only in order to demonstrate that evil can be overcome if we open ourselves to 'love for God to the point of contempt for self. This is the fruit of Divine Mercy..." - John Paul II, Memory and Identity
"And so this makes you sad, you say?"
Sadness, or self-pity, is the twin sister of acedia. They are similar in some respects, but not identical. The sad person finds relief more easily, whereas the one besieged by acedia is trapped. Sadness is a temporary, part-time experience, but acedia is global and permanent. In this sense it is opposed to human nature. 
The chief symptoms of this devilish “scourge that lays waste at noon” are inner instability and the need for change (with wandering fantasies of a better place), excessive care of one’s own health (with special emphasis on one’s food), escape from manual work (with laziness and inactivity), uncontrolled activism (under the appearance of charity), neglect of the monastic practices (reducing observance to a minimum), indiscreet zeal in a few ascetic exercises (with extreme criticism of one’s neighbor), generalized discouragement (with the beginnings of a depression). - Dom Bernardo Olivera, OCSO
"Excuse me, are we a little teapot?"
"...an especially common view of self (for the homosexual) is that of the wronged, rejected, 'poor me'. Homosexuals are therefore easily insulted; they 'collect injustice', as psychiatrist Berger has so well put it, and are liable to see themselves as victims. This explains the overt self-dramatization of the militants, who adroitly exploit their neurosis to gain public support. Attached to self-pity, they are inner (or manifest) complainers, often chronic complainers. Self pity and protest are not far apart. A certain inner (or overt) rebelliousness and hostility to others who do them wrong and to 'society' and a determinate cynicism, are typical of many homosexuals." - The Battle For Normality
Who?  Me?  You talkin' to me?

7 comments:

  1. Interesting that you should post this as I'm currently reading about abandonment to Jesus. We invite him to come to us but then don't let him in. That would mean changing ourselves.

    Recently the town I live in decided we needed a rainbow crosswalk. Our Catholic mayor is on board with it. Because 5 people protested the crosswalk there is suddenly a LGBTetc. group being formed. I really do believe the end times are coming.

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  2. Angela,

    Abandonment to Divine Providence by Jean-Pierre de Cassaude? If so, I've gotten through it the first time.

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    1. Hi Nan, no it was just a chapter in I Believe in Love by Fr. Jean C.J. d'Elbee. It's a personal retreat on the teaching of St. Therese of Lisieux. I am going to look into the book you mentioned.

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  3. Wasn't Garrigou-Lagrange that Olympic diver who hit his head on the diving board?

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    Replies
    1. Good catch Timothy! That's going on your permanent record.

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    2. Hehehe...that's Greg Louganis!

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