Idemur. The Opening Ceremonies of the Paris Olympics last Friday would have been an insult to Caligula. He merely stood for perversity, sadism, and debauchery, while the opening ceremonies at Paris celebrated much, much more. They boldly trumpeted the end of Christianity, in particular, and of Western Civilization, in general. With their Last Supper blasphemy festooned with deviant LGBTQ+ burlesque, they intended nothing less than a battering ram against Christianity and the civilization to which she gave birth.

Aside from a handful of outrages, the general reaction ranged from mild amusement, to “ho-hum pass the salt,” to passionate agreement, to muted displeasure.

And therein lies the nightmare. Breaking Away: The Cas... McMaken, Ryan Best Price: $11.49 Buy New $11.50 (as of 11:37 UTC - Details)

Not in the debased performance, but rather in the chic acceptance. Even a Caligula would have been embarrassed. His depravity would never have dreamt of mocking the firmament of Roman gods, or dislodging the foundations of the Roman Imperium.

More than a few were probably haunted by the premonitory verses of Yeats in his “The Second Coming”:

Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere   
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst   
Are full of passionate intensity.

The tragedy was not the outrageous blasphemy. It was the absence of howling outrage. No such supine reaction would have met such an attack on Islam. For all its wild aberrations, it does not lack the manliness of instantaneous fury. Not so the once chest-thumping Catholicism of the saints and martyrs. Sixty years ago, that millennial Catholic trademark was thought embarrassing for a Church in a hurry to make friends with the world. Historic Catholic boasts such as the Crusades, the vanquishing of the Old Pagan gods, and the conversion of the nations have been quietly shelved for a more user-friendly Catholicism. Anathemas have been traded for something called “dialogical listening” and certitude by sensitivity to “difference.” Some members of the hierarchy have censured “proselytism,” a slur on bringing men to the Catholic Church. Psychological Warfare Linebarger, Paul M. A. Best Price: $26.84 Buy New $18.49 (as of 10:52 UTC - Details)

Catholics are now incessantly drilled on the one and only sin “crying out to heaven for vengeance”: “passing judgment.” (For you youngsters, there were once four such sins. Look it up.) Of course, that is precisely what the Decalogue is all about. Exactly the reason why religion classes no longer teach them. Well, some of them do. But you can count them on one hand.

This new irenicism-on-steroids is daily reinforced by liturgies eliciting as much fervor and passion for God as the weekly Ladies Auxiliary canasta club. It reminds one of Huxley’s Brave New World’ s daily doses of the “feelies” to maintain the proper insensate torpor. This whole dreadful picture is daily propped up by a clergy quite pleased with the standard of a decaying secularity rather than the Standard of Christ the King. Don’t believe me? Look at their seminaries-turned-ghost-towns, testament to aggiornamento gone awry. A recent Order of nuns called a festive dinner to celebrate the announcement of their demise.

Yes, you say, but wasn’t there the American bishop who registered a gentle reservation? Yes, true enough. But his gray suit and Roman collar seemed to dilute the effect. Call me old fashioned, but a priest in a gray suit does not make hearts race as does the sight of St. Francis Xavier in cassock holding high the cross.

Read the Whole Article