Pride~The Common Denominator in All Things Evil

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IT MAKES SENSE TO ME

By Larry Peterson

“There is a danger that threatens everyone in the church, all of us. The danger of worldliness. It leads us to vanity, arrogance and pride.”
Pope Francis

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The headlines and newscasts are filled with the news of President Obama’s outrage over House Speaker John Boehner’s invitation to Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, to speak before the United States Congress in March. Apparently a protocol was violated and the Speaker did not inform the White House. 
So why is the President of the United States so angry over this supposedly unprecedented invitation to a foreign leader by the Congress? Who cares, right? WRONG? He was offended. Protocol was the excuse for his anger. The primary cause was “ego”. His ego was sand-blasted into disarray when he was ignored by a person who is NOT the “Big Cheese”. In other words, President Obama’s pride was deflated. Ah yes, that old ‘demon’ pride has once again reared its ignominious and ugly head. He sure knows how to spoil a salad. If protocol was stepped upon it still is no reason to get so angry. But stepping on the pride of someone, anyone, oftentimes yields this result.
Pope Francis’ quote above uses the words, “threatens everyone in the church, all of us”. He is referring to the Pride  that is part of all of us. There is “positive pride” which refers to taking pride in your  work, your appearance, how hard you study, how you treat others etc. Then there is “negative pride” which has been the downfall of so many. This is all about self-gratification and taking care of  your favorite and most revered son/daughter of  worldliness aka secularism, good old “#1”, yourself. This never reaps a fruitful harvest.
This “negative pride” has permeated every nook and cranny of humankind since the days of Adam and Eve. Satan aka Lucifer, the Prince of Darkness, used his main weapon to draw Eve into his realm. He used pride to tempt her. Consumed with her inner vanity she was easy pickings for Satan. “Eat the apple (yes, the apple is probably symbolic) and you will be like God.”  
Eve wanted to be like God and her Pride pushed her teeth into that apple and she bit, She turned it over to her man, Adam. Misery loves company and she was probably not feeling very well after that first swallow. Adam bit  into the other half of the apple. VOILA–Original sin and its primary effect, Pride, have been at the forefront of all chaos ever since.  
The untold and undocumented cause of countless cases of pain and suffering caused by Pride over the centuries cover the pages of history. Wars, genocide, torture, scorched-earth policies continue to this very day.  Countless friendships have been permanently severed and how many families have been torn apart?  All because Satan is able to wield his greatest tool, Pride, unchecked and freely. All because so many people willingly grab onto it and refuse to let go.

This incident is fresh in my mind so I would like to share. I was talking to a close friend of mine the other day and he had just finished talking to his younger brother on the phone. The brother told him that Catholics can eat meat on Fridays during Lent. My friend told him he was wrong. They got into an argument and my friend hung up on his brother. He told me he is not calling him back until he apologizes. I reminded him that he was the one who “hung up”. He did not care because his brother started it.

These two had not spoken in almost ten years and finally got back together and now—oh man, are you kidding me? And they will both go to Mass and Communion in their respective cities and pound their breasts and bow their heads and be totally oblivious to the two greatest commandments of Loving God and Loving their Neighbor that they are breaking. 

Ah, the great sin of Pride. We have all seen the results up close and personal within our own worlds. Just like my friend and his brother we may be a prisoner of Pride’s deadly grip on ourselves. Parents estranged from children, siblings estranged from each other, families torn apart. The common denominator is always Pride. But the good news is there is an antidote. It is called Humility. St. Augustine said, “It was pride that changed angels into devils; it is humility that makes men as angels.”

 Here is the link to the Litany of Humility. Truly, this prayer is a powerful weapon. It also takes courage to say it. This is how it begins:
O Jesus! meek and humble of heart, Hear me. 
From the desire of being esteemed,
Deliver me, Jesus

                                                          Copyright 2015 Larry Peterson

SATAN: the Supreme Commander of ISIS

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IT MAKES SENSE TO ME

by Larry Peterson

At 12:30 p.m. on August 31, 1939, Adolf Hitler made a decision.  He issued the order that was to plunge the entire world into its bloodiest war ever:  This is the order that started World War II

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SUPREME COMMANDER OF THE
ARMED FORCES
MOST SECRET

Berlin, August 31, 1939: Directive No.1 for the Conduct of the War;
1) Now that all the political possibilities of disposing by peaceful
means of a situation which is intolerable for Germany are exhausted, I
have determined on a solution by force.
2) The attack on Poland is to be carried out;
Date of attack: September 1, 1939.
Time of attack:  4:45 a.m. *
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The order was signed by Hitler and for the next six years the world would experience an unimaginable evil  that would cause such brutality, carnage and death it gave a complete new meaning to a heretofore biblical word.  That word was Holocaust.  (I view the words Holocaust and Genocide as synonyms.)

During the 20th century Genocide(s) claimed the lives of tens of millions of people.  Joseph Stalin, the brutal Soviet dictator and our “ally” during World War II, probably killed more people than Hitler and his primary means of execution was starvation.  Yup, “old Joe” was quite the guy.  Between 1932 and 1933 alone, Stalin actually starved over 7,000,000 of his OWN people to death.  By the time he died he had killed 25,000,000 people.  Now we are in the 21st century. What has changed?   Genocide continues in the most brutal fashion.  From North Korea to the Middle East to the African continent, genocide is claiming the lives of men , women and children by the thousands.  And God help us all,  most of the current human butchery is done under the banner of virtue:  “Praise Allah”.   How sick and evil is that?

I just used the word evil.  When I use that word I am not simply referring to something morally wrong or harmful or basically wicked.  When I use the word evil I am referencing Satan, the devil himself.  He is known by other names such as Lucifer, Beelzebub, Asmodeus, Leviathan, etc.  I must be clear so make no mistake; I believe (as do millions more) that Satan does exist and that he is spreading his unending and incomparable vitriolic hatred all over the world.  He is also cunning enough to use modern day communication techniques to advertise his  demonocity.

I write under the masthead of  IT MAKES SENSE TO ME.   It follows that what I write does, in fact, “make sense to me”.  I am a Catholic man and my faith is part of my very being.  Much of that faith is reinforced by what is called  Natural Law.  Natural Law is part of who we are.  It is (in my opinion) part of our genetic makeup.  It cannot be seen or touched or examined under a microscope.  It cannot even be proven.  However, “common sense” tells us it does exist.

Natural Law is what we all, as human beings, know to be right or wrong.  Some of us call it “our conscience”.  An example of Natural Law at work is when a mother asks her small child, “Did you eat that cookie I left out for your sister?”  The child, with crumbs and chocolate on her face answers, “No, mommy.”  She knew it was wrong  to take that cookie so she made a choice.  She used her “free will”.  She answered , “No”.  That is Natural Law at work.

Angels are God’s creations just as people are.  The bible references angels in many places.  It also references the evil angels.  These are the angels that, upon the moment of their creation, were so filled with their beauty and grandeur, that they decided they were greater than God Himself.  In that moment they lost everything.  Every last ounce of hope that might have been was gone forever.  Unlike mankind, who lives and has many chances, in the angelic world, this could not be.  Filled with an unimaginable hatred and loathing and unable to attack God and the Good Angels, Satan and his followers have focused on the ones with free will, the ones filled with pride and envy, the human race.

Adolf Hitler, Joseph Stalin, Saddam Hussein and Pol Pot are high profile followers of Satan.  But there are countless millions more who these demons  have been able to recruit and induct into their evil army.  Just the other day we all saw one of Satan’s followers  behead James Foley, an American journalist.  For full effect the grizzly execution was performed on camera, for all the world to see, including the Foley family.

How evil is this angel known as Satan?  How evil are the angels that followed him into hell?  The depths of their  hatred for God and all that is Good is incomprehensible.  These creatures were the brightest and the highest among all  others.  Now they are lower than  the lowest sinner because even that sinner still has hope for redemption.  The “fallen angels”,  filled with their own enormous pride and bursting with envy, are silently screeching and wailing as they skulk around the world seeking new followers.  Sadly, they have been very successful.

One of Satan’s greatest pupils had great success early on in his morbid career.  His name was Adolf Hitler.  He destroyed  millions.  In the end he and his followers were relegated to the ash heap of history.  ISIS and all those that are following Satan will suffer the same fate.  The cost might be very high but they can never ever win their ignominious war against God.  And that is exactly what they are waging, a war against God.

By the way, the greatest weapon at our disposal in this war is PRAYER.  Here is one written by Pope Leo XIII back in 1884. The Holy Father’s purpose back then was to combat the “father of lies”.

Saint Michael the Archangel,
defend us in battle.
Be our protection against the wickedness and snares of the devil.
May God rebuke him, we humbly pray;
and do Thou, O Prince of the Heavenly Host,
b
y the Divine Power of God,
cast into hell Satan and all the evil spirits
who roam throughout the world seeking the ruin of souls.

 *“The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich” (abridged edition) by William Shirer  pg 117

Pride–the Main Ingredient in the Evil That Surrounds Us

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by Larry Peterson

Eleven Nuns of Nowogrodek.jpg
Blessed Martyrs of Nowogrodek

The abuse, torture and killing of men, women and children continues. Throughout the history of humankind this has been so.  Why?  We might say it is because of  prejudice or pride or ego or just unabashed hatred.  Maybe contempt and envy enter into it.  Whatever it is, whatever causes human beings who are supposed to have the use of reason to turn against their own kind, eludes me.  It also sickens me.

What causes others to  purposely and oftentimes, gleefully abuse, torture, rape and kill their own kind, makes no sense.  Scorn, loathing and derision can combine and form a hatred so deeply imbedded that people actually kill themselves (suicide bombers) to destroy their perceived enemy even if that person is a little child.  Where can such hatred come from? How can it be so deep and vicious?  And why, why is it, that so many times the killings are carried out using God and virtue as justification.  The God I know is all about love and forgiveness.  We must not forget that He has given us free will and we choose our behavior.

Killing out of hatred while using God as the reason is an abomination of all that is good and pleasing to God. It is the ultimate hypocrisy committed by men and women and this even applies to avowed atheists who deny God’s existence. They fit the profile simply because everyone knows, believer and non-believer alike, that NOT killing is the right thing.  It is part of our genetic material.

If you do kill due to pride, envy, anger, greed or lust you have abdicated your very self to the forces of evil.  Of all of these, pride is the greatest because it is the king of self-destruction and the primary portal to the evil that lurks waiting to embrace each and every one of us..                                                                                        

The word “genocide” was coined in 1948 by Raphael Lemkin. His word has been with us ever since. Scholars and historians can trace genocide all the way back to prehistoric man and some believe that even the Neanderthal was wiped out by genocide. The 20th century alone has seen seven periods of genocide.  It  started with the Armenians who were systematically murdered by the Turks between 1915 and 1918. The Turks managed to kill 1,500,000 of their “enemy”.

In 1933 the Nazis opened their first concentration camp, Dachau.  Here over 25,000 Jews and Christians were killed as the Nazi genocide began. The atrocities continued until 1945.  When the allies finally liberated Germany it was found that Hitler’s death machine had  managed to kill  more than 6,000,000 Jews and millions of others including Catholics and Christians, Gypsies, Hungarians, Romanians, Dutch, French, Poles, Russians, and the sickening list goes on.

We have seen genocide in Rwanda where, in 1994 alone, 800,000 people were brutally murdered.  Pol Pot in Cambodia managed to torture and kill over 2,000,000 people between 1975 and 1979.  Under Joseph Stalin’s  forced famine over 7,000,000 Russians died between 1932 and 1933.  Many millions more died under his brutal and paranoid dictatorship. The 20th century alone has seen literally countless millions of people,  people just like you and I, systematically exterminated usually because some maniacal individual has seized power and the people who follow him are ready and willing to do his killing.

During the Nuremberg Trials how many of the accused Nazis used the excuse that they were just “following orders”.  How cowardly to hide behind such an excuse. Yet, how many do that the world over?  Just because something has been declared a “law” does not necessarily mean it is right.  At what point do we as individuals stand up for what IS “right”?  How many of us would put ourselves on the line to defend what is ‘right”?  The fact is, most of us know what “right” is but what price honor and integrity and freedom?  When it comes right down to it, many choose to turn their backs.

The picture in the upper right is of eleven nuns. These Sisters had honor, integrity and loved their fellow man. They were  prisoners of the Nazis in the town of  Nowogrodek in Poland. The year was 1942. The Nazis had already exterminated or sent to work camps all of the 10,000 Jews in Nowogrodek and now they were killing the Polish people.

The Sisters volunteered to die in place of 120 other prisoners who were scheduled for execution. The Nazis agreed and released half of the Polish prisoners, sending  the rest to work camps. The nuns were taken out into the woods, made to stand next to an open pit, and individually shot to death. The date  was August 1, 1943.  They had such respect for life they willingly died to save ten times their number.

We can only imagine what they were feeling as they watched their friends before them fall into that pit, holding hands with each other one moment and dead the next. Today they are known as the Blessed Martyrs of  Nowogrodek. They were beatified by St. John Paul II on March 5, 2000.  How many of us would do that for people we did not know?

Today we watch mass killings taking place throughout the Middle East and parts of Asia and Africa. The murder and attempted annihilation of Christians continues unabated and is on the increase at this very moment.  From the individual killing of  Father Frans Van der Lugt, beaten and murdered in Syria in April for being a Catholic priest, to the 80 people in North Korea executed last November for owning Bibles to the imprisonment of Meriam Ibrahim with her two babies for being Christian to the massacres of  Christians taking place in so many places around the world, the hatred and demonic behavior increases day by day. It has been going on since the existence of mankind has been recorded.  It is a behavior that flies in the face of what we are as a species.  Somewhere, it is happening at this very moment.

                                                          Father Frans van der Lugt
I believe there is a self-centeredness and false pride that exists in all of us.  It is the gateway for evil to enter into us.  Many reject this evil.  Many have too much love in their hearts to be influenced by such temptation. Many do not.  Lucifer is alive and well and using these open “gateways” that are available to him all over the world.  Quite often he is very successful at gaining entrance into available souls.

Bottom line, Lucifer, aka Satan, was the greatest of all God’s angels. But his pride made him choose to challenge his Creator. He lost that battle and was cast out.  He is filled with a vitriolic hatred for God and Love and has been waging his evil war against  God and Love ever since.  Often time he finds an open “gateway” and has successfully used this path to recruit millions of willing souls. But, he can never win.

                                            ©Larry Peterson 2014 All Rights Reserved

    "Silent Night"– when Humility crushes Pride

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    by Larry Peterson

    Peace on earth? Where is it? Is it in Syria? How about Pakistan? Maybe Sudan or Iraq? It is definitely not hanging out in Afghanistan or Iran. How about Cuba?  What does “Peace on Earth” mean? It is not a cease fire between warring factions. It is not a complicated or even simple agreement between nations. True Peace on Earth can only come about by the destruction of the great demon, Pride, and there is only one true weapon that can go head-to-head with Pride and crush it. That weapon is more powerful than all the weapons in all of the arsenals in the world put together. That weapon is Humility.

    The weapon of Humility came to us in the form of a newborn baby on Christmas.  This story is so amazing that our simple common sense will tell us it was never fabricated or made up. The most creative writers who ever lived could not have conjured up such a preposterous tale. Imagine, a king being born in a smelly, dirty animal stall to a simple teenage girl whose husband was a struggling carpenter with no money. Then the couple would have to take the baby King and run for their lives because the reigning king, Herod, feared the baby might grow up and overthrow him. Herod’s Pride seizes him so he sends his soldiers to kill the baby King. You are  familiar with the rest of the story. As preposterous as this story may seem more than a billion people believe it. For two thousand years this belief  has continued to transform the world. Millions upon millions of us  celebrated His birth the world over the other night. How can that be? It is due to that great intangible we call FAITH. You can’t see it, you can’t touch it and you cannot  smell it. However, if you open yourself up to it, it can grab you in a life-long embrace that might take your breath away.

    Peace without love is an illusion. It cannot exist. It can never come from our own agenda. That is because the deadly toxin, Pride, gets inside us and drips its venom into our hearts filling our egos so much that they sometimes explode with hatred. This hatred is quite visible in the Middle East where Christians are being killed and tortured every day because they believe in this baby and who He grew up to be. The Good News is we have been given the antidote. It is Humility.

    Our greatest of all gifts, FAITH, allows us to  believe that God, the Creator of all that is, shared Himself with us through  His Son and, in so doing,  humbled Himself in the most profound act of selflessness that was and will ever be. This was God become man for us. He came as a helpless, innocent newborn, barely able to grasp the finger of his Mom. He allowed himself to be born amidst  the squalor and filth of a stable. Poor shepherds from the hillside were His first visitors. Humility lay in a pile of straw and  looked up into the beautiful face of His weary Mom. A few small pot fires provided enough light for the man of the family, Joseph, to see the two people that he had to care for and protect. No bells were ringing…no trumpets blaring …no cymbals were smashing. The deafening quiet made this the greatest of Silent Nights.  Thirty-three years later, booming thunder would echo His death and three days after that brilliant sunshine would announce our redemption. It is the most beautiful of all truths.

    Seventy-three years ago the story of Our Lady of Lourdes was presented in the movies under the title “The Song of Bernadette”. Franz Werfel, the author, had a prologue appear on screen before the movie began. It said, “For those who believe, no explanation is necessary; for those who do not believe no explanation is possible.”  That is not exactly true. FAITH is a gift that many non-believers have seen fit to grab onto. They have responded to God’s graces and listened. They have grabbed the ‘brass ring’. Many more cannot escape the all consuming Pride that keeps telling them they are so much smarter than all those ‘believers’. I only wish they would reach out and allow that little hand to squeeze their finger, just  for a moment. It will not hurt one bit and they might find out they were not so smart after all..