'My Grace is Sufficient for Thee'

The gay lobby would appear to now have privileged access to the communication of the Church's doctrines.

According to One Peter Five, a revision has appeared on the Vatican online version of the Catechism that will doubtless cause a measure of jubilation in some quarters and highly justifiable consternation in others. Somebody (now who might that be?) has sanctioned the use of language which appeared in a rejected 1990s version of the Catechism (was it Cardinal Schoenborn's rejected first draft?) on homosexuality to replace that which we have hitherto known to be the definitive Catechism of the Catholic Church. The revision replaces the line on the condition of homosexuality or the inclination which described it as 'objectively disordered' with a rather nebulous phrase that declines to comment on the nature of the inclination itself, instead merely offering the insight that 'this condition is not chosen' or words to this effect. The replacement appears to be deliberate and don't doubt that there are intended consequences to follow.

Let nobody be mistaken that this move was in any way entirely unexpected. It is obvious that the replacement of the one holding back the wolves, Benedict XVI, with the wolves' ringleader, Francis, has brought a whole series of errors held by clergyman, bishops, Cardinals and lay folk into the mainstream of Catholic thought and discussion, now officially, since what was once described as dissent now constitutes a major platform in a Church so obsessed with 'dialogue' that it is unable to communicate effectively the treasures of divine truth in Her keeping. It was only a matter of time before those who are embarrassed of the Church's teachings or embarrassed because they contradict them in their lifestyle on this issue would dispense with language that asserts that a natural moral order exists and that not all things sexual are to be defended or praised. Fr James Martin S.J himself was appointed as a media advisor to the Vatican, but there has been so much confusion, scandal and uproar in the House of God, that even such news as this has not had much time to truly sink in. It is very clear that the much discussed 'gay lobby' has firm control over areas of the Church at its governmental and doctrinal centre. I dare say, too, that from this centre of the Mother Church will flow a veritable torrent of propaganda and deceit which will stealthily find its way to your Diocese some day. Let's see how your bishop deals with that. Let's face facts. For a time and a season the heretics have won even if everlasting disgrace and shame awaits them after they have lost.

Joseph Sciambra

So where to start? Where to begin? Let the reader understand that the prince of this world grants privilege and patronage to such figures as Fr James Martin S.J and those false teachers like him who always tell itching ears what their sexual proclivities wish to hear, but steers media organs away from the testimonies of homosexual persons who have by the grace of God and nothing else but the grace of God, lived a homosexual lifestyle but have put away the deeds of darkness to embrace the Light Who is Christ the Lord and find their true identity in Him alone. I myself can testify, and am honoured to be able to do so, to the grace of Our Lord Jesus Christ, Who, despite the stubbornness of my own pride, unnatural lust and wilfulness has enabled me to live chastely because of the grace He has lavished on me. One man who is prepared to tell his story and who does so with leonine courage, who with astonishing charity and zeal preaches the message of repentance to the 'gay community' in person, face-to-face is Joseph Sciambra and his apostolate is bearing much fruit around the world.

There are indeed two narrative running side-by-side on the issue of homosexuality that are like twins opposed, which can never see eye-to-eye and will both go their separate ways when Christ comes as Judge to reward each man according to his conduct. One is a view propagated within LGBT ministries, that the homosexual attraction comes naturally to certain men, that it forms an indellible mark on their identity and that little element of choice exists within the confines of this condition. It would assert that that which at night an undisciplined man, be he teenage or elderly, may think about while laying on his bed, that which becomes his fantasy, constitutes his very self and the focal point of his core identity. It is entirely graceless, it is Godless, hopeless, essentially nihilistic and, like a cancer, it voraciously eats away at a man's core being his acknowledgement of his natural human dignity but, more importantly for us, also his identity derived from his adopted sonship in Christ Jesus. It would assert that your temptation and that which you might fantasise about, that is what you are and that who you are attracted to, that is what you are. Unfortunately for this group of people, Christians have never believed this, and it is no surprise that among this community the teachings elaborated upon by St Paul are deeply reviled.

We Christians have always believed we are children of God. We have always believed we are sinners in need of God's grace, that we are called to be Saints. We have never called ourselves anything but Catholics or Christians in name. We are not 'gay Catholics' even if a person has this tendency any more than those with a disordered drink problem are 'alcoholic Catholics'. It needs to be asserted quite plainly that such men who hold the views espoused by most LGBT ministries have no idea what they are, because essentially - at least implicitly - denying that Christ has come in the flesh, they exchange the immortal nature of their baptismal identity for an identity founded in the rags of illicit pleasures and then name themselves by their vice. Be in no doubt that it is the Devil himself who has persuaded men to do this, for he lives off telling a man that his weaknesses are so overpowering that he is precisely that kind of habit from which he feels he cannot escape, regardless of whether he wishes it to be so or not. Upon the homosexual tendency, the Devil lives off a man's fear that he is trapped in acting upon this tendency, ''If it feels good do it!" and can never leave it for the liberty of the sons and daughters of God. He does not wish for men to realise that Christ has come and is in His Church liberating today captives from the cavernous prison of sin, just as He did when he walked the Earth 2,000 years ago.

The Gospel of Our Lord Jesus Christ asserts that a man, all men in fact, may find their liberation in following Him and embracing His teachings. We are called to union with God. Nothing more, nothing less, but consider what this means for you. If you are called to union with God forever, and Christ unites Himself to you today in Holy Communion, you must put away your lustful desires and seek purity of life from Him whom you are called to reflect if men are to believe in Him. You are made in His image and likeness. He wishes you to be formed, by Him, in His glorious image, the image of God the Son, purified from all that offends Him. He came to find you, He does not want to lose you!

Of course, if men look within themselves, they may find a veritable cocktail of erotic mess and sexual confusion. A man might very well find within himself a tendency, a strong tendency even, towards attraction to men. He might even say that this tendency, something which he has struggled to come to terms with, even desperately, even with a degree of deep apprehension and fear, he has been forced to acknowledge and that this tendency is not actively chosen. He might say that he wished very much to be attracted to the opposite sex but that this attraction is nowhere within him and that, indeed, for some reason, be it innate or environmental - since the Church makes no proclamation on such mysteries - he is a homosexual person. It takes a measure of healthy honesty and self-examination to acknowledge this. Yes, and courage too. It is not for most persons a pleasant conclusion to draw. It wasn't for me, many tears were shed and nights spent thinking my life was now worthless. It has great implications for that individual's future, his state of life, his mental health, his vocation and a great deal more. But be of good cheer, because Christ has overcome the world and calls you to do so as well by following Him in His Church.

One of the reasons why such a self-realisation can be profoundly traumatic for men young and old is that men know that this important aspect of their personality, which we name as sexuality is disordered, that is, it is contrary to the natural order of things. Men are meant to be attracted to women and to procreate as couples and have children. We all know this. This is the natural order. Men have been known throughout history to be so ashamed of this tendency that suicide is openly contemplated, even becoming a decision taken in desperation. This sense of shame, which the LGBT ministries would abhor, is in fact entirely natural because the disposition towards persons of the same sex is not of the natural order. LGBT ministries, so bound up with an openly political agenda, would say this man should feel no sense of shame concerning this, but not because the discovery of the tendency is not the individual's own fault (there may be a variety of reasons why this has occurred) but rather that the disordered orientation itself is essentially good in and of itself. It becomes, therefore, something to be cheerful and proud of, something even to boast of, to proclaim to the world with a degree of self-satisfied contentment, not because like St Paul you can boast of a weakness that forces you to rely on God alone, but rather because you are full of yourself.

Let Jesus Christ shine His Light into your darkness. He will never fail you. You are most dear to Him.

Real acceptance of the reality of the homosexual condition is incomplete without an understanding of the disordered nature of the tendency. No man is served by the withholding of this doctrine. This is why the Catechism should stay precisely as it is. The Lord Jesus Christ, as we know, did not come to affirm men in themselves and to make them feel good about themselves. The exaltation of self is simply called Pride and Pride is a capital vice. Conversely, neither did Our Lord come to make men feel terrible about themselves and to announce to men their need to continually lament their disordered or perverse sexual tendencies. This is called despair and despair is a sin against the Holy Ghost. Our Lord came to confront men with the truth, to convict the world of sin in His ineffable charity to teach men and lead men to accept the Truth, so that men, realising their inadequacy and sinfulness before the majesty and purity of God may find in Him all life, virtue, love and yes, ultimately happiness. It is Jesus Christ, the Truth, Who sets men free, it is not men themselves who set themselves free. Therein you will find the subtle heresy embraced by the LGBT advocacy machine embedded within the bosom of the Catholic Chruch. A man is not liberated from anything only with the acknowledgement that he is a homosexual. Indeed, the acknowledgement of this tendency brings with it an urgent responsibility for a man to refer himself to His Creator who loves him dearly and with compassion beyond all telling.

He Who is your remedy, is also your Saviour, Lord and your God

Now, when a man realises that all is not well within himself in this realm, and that he is disordered objectively, as the Church has hitherto taught, he realises that he is essentially wounded. This wound can be healed. Christ can heal the homosexual. Do you doubt this? Christ is our Healer. In what manner does Our Lord do this to those who are his willing patients? We can say that He does this in a manner which is most wonderful, since His desire is for sinners - all sinners - to know Him, to love Him and to lavish upon souls the inexhaustible grace, mercy and love in His Most Sacred Heart.

The Lord invites homosexuals to know Him, to share in His divine life, to find their joy in Him, to eschew all other for Him. Attachment to disordered pleasure can be healed by Jesus through a relationship with Him in His Church. As He brings a soul closer and closer to Him, the soul discovers that all other attractions of the flesh fade in comparison. This healing may take a lifetime. It may not end in this lifetime, but know this, that there can be no doubt that the Lord is at work in those souls of those homosexual persons who desire Him and permit Him to work in their souls. For them the Lord does great things!

The objection to this truth forms the second great denial of LGBT ministry advocated by such figures as Fr James Martin S.J, that Christ wills that we stay precisely as we are and we are unchanged by our encounter with the Lord of Life. It is a lamentable deceit and a pernicious error, because it refers man to himself, not to his Lord Who redeems him.

Let it be known that when a man opens himself up to God, confesses that he is disordered and shows his wounds to the Lord Jesus, wounded for our sake upon the Altar of Calvary, that he is permitting Our Lord to enter his innermost secret world, shrouded so often in darkness, self-love, self-loathing, confusion, perversity, sinfulness and conflicting and competing desires. It is in reality as such for all men. The Lord does not will for His children to tread a path of darkness, to lurch from solitary sin to solitary sin or to sin with others, nor for men to be enslaved to sinful pleasures of the flesh. Does the Lord wish for anything but good for us? No! He wishes to set men free to love Him intimately, to be men, women of prayer, to be souls Who will acknowledge and proclaim His Lordship over their whole lives, to glorify Him, to love Him, to serve Him and bring other men to Him because He is Saviour of all men.

What might this wonderful relationship with the Lord bring to those who embrace Him and His teachings, who live in the truth and in the light and presence of God? In a word, it might, no it will, bring Saints and Blesseds, men who have turned from themselves, their fixation upon themselves, reject a lifestyle of sin and self-love, to men and indeed women with eyes fixed firmly on Jesus Christ and His Cross and Resurrection. It will bring eunuchs for the sake of the Kingdom of God. Grace builds on nature, there is no limiting what grace will achieve in men of this tendency. It might bring chaste men who, having been given the grace of self-mastery, desire to serve the Lord in His Church in varied ways. In such cases, it may bring forth religious vocations. Depending on the rootedness of this tendency or upon the extent of its exclusivity to persons of the opposite sex, it might bring forth Christian marriage and children. The marvels that the Lord does for his servants and for His own glory cannot be underestimated.

Whatever it brings, this relationship with the Lord cannot fail to bring forth fruit of charity and models of Christian virtue since such men know that Christ alone can bestow on His children the virtues they most need. Men who know and are aware of their weakness, their deep need for Jesus will be able to proclaim to the whole world - and yes, to Christ's Church in those times when heralds of the Gospel are lacking- that Christ heals and is Victor. St Paul testifies to this truth, that upon receiving a thorn in his flesh, and asking the Lord to 'take it away' three times, the Lord replied, 'My grace is sufficient for thee'. The Lord laid upon St Paul something that enabled Paul always to depend on God for strength, not on himself. We are not informed what that was. It does not really matter. It is the same for all mankind. We are weak, God is strong and all-Holy. The Church's Sacraments of Confession and the Most Holy Eucharist, the life of prayer, the Most Holy Rosary, the Liturgy of the Hours will all strengthen the homosexual's relationship with the Lord Jesus and with faith on the part of the recipient of these wondrous gifts the Lord will effect change, real and substantial change in the whole person, his perception of his purpose and meaning, his true identity and his vocation. Were the men who fled the Crucifixion the same men who announced the Risen Lord on Pentecost? Same men, but different men! That is how it can be for us if we remain in the truth of the Lord.

Many Catholics can say that we are witnesses to these wondrous things, for in us the Lord has gone from being a shadowy figure in the peripheries of our lives, to becoming the King of our hearts, reigning to our delight, even if our lives do not always render Him the praise that is His due. We know that if we fail Him and refuse His grace, we can acknowledge our sins and turn to Him. He receives us tenderly and crowns our humble Confession with a crown of glory. We may forget God but God does not forget us. With a deeper awareness of God's presence in our lives we learn more and more to entrust everything in our life to Him. It is the abject forgetfulness of God that has brought the Church to this ruinous stage. Men who have rejected grace now reject the Church's teachings in this matter. Grace enables us to remember God and forget self. Forgetting himself, dying to self, rising to life in Christ is man's essential witness to the Christian life. If once we were immersed in ourselves and in the complexities of our particular state, we can become with God's grace men who radiate the love of God because we live for Him with our whole being, not for ourselves.

Discipleship involves taking up our Cross and following He Who by this instrument of suffering wrought the Salvation of the World. There can be no doubt that the realisation of an individual's homosexual tendency, as the Catechism affirms, constitutes a heavy Cross and it is laid upon men mysteriously in a fallen world tainted by Original Sin. No, in fallen world, all is not as it should be, but the Lord, if we permit Him, will make things new and make us how He wishes us to be. You are a new Creation in Christ. Do you know what this means? You have been baptised into the life of the Most Holy Trinity. This is not an ordinary thing. It is an extraordinary thing. You are called to a supernatural life of grace, not a natural life, without grace. In growing in knowledge and love of Jesus you do not know more and more a mere man but He Who is Man and God! Do not let men tell you that they know what you are if they do not acknowledge the Lord our God and His sovereignty over all or those who tell you that you are what you are and nothing more. You are far more than your sexual orientation. You are a child of God, chosen to be His Saint!

The Lord is good and brings good from affliction and misfortune. For sadness, he renders joy! He loves you as no other can and all men carry within themselves a nature that is to some extent wounded and flawed. If you are homosexual, then the Church does not proclaim you to be a worse person than others, more sinful than others, less loved by God than others nor less capable of sanctity. Whatever sexual tendency or attraction you may find within yourself do not let this be the end of your story. Turn to Jesus, look always to Jesus. His love will never fail you! Look towards him and be radiant, let your face not be abashed. All the ends of the earth have seen the Salvation of our God. Love God, seek His face always, serve Him with docile and loving fear. Tell Him everything, because He knows your hopes, fears and pain! Turn to your Mother and Queen, through whom her Divine Son wishes to dispense every heavenly grace and virtue. Entreat your patrons in Heaven, the Lord wishes to glorify them. Make yourself entirely dependent upon Him, ask Him to help you to love Him more and more. He never turns away anybody who seeks His divine grace. You know naturally to do good and shun evil. You know when you have done wrong. You know when you have done right. Christ has said to us all, 'Be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect'.

Do not look to yourself and your sexual attraction and ask Him to take away from you this, for in this request you may be disappointed. The Lord permits in this fallen world trials to fall upon His servants, but only to bring a greater good out of these trials. Instead, turn your whole being to Him and offer this to Him. Make an offering of yourself daily. Beg Him to guide you in all your ways. Wait on Him and ask Him for the grace to be pure in heart and to make you holy. This is what pleases Him. No man can love you like He loves you. It is your soul that He loves and treasures most of all. You may lose - eventually you will lose - everything this world has to offer, but the Lord desires firstly that you do not lose your soul. Embrace the Catholic Faith. Love the Catholic Faith, love the Church, love God, read the Gospels, pray as often as you can, knowing that everywhere you go, the Lord is with you!

Everything in this world is passing away, yes even if you are young, you will soon be old. Receive Jesus in Holy Communion in a state of grace as often as possible. If you offend God, turn to Him and ask His forgiveness and seek it through His Church's Sacrament of Penance. Jesus Himself receives you there. St Paul teaches us that nothing - nothing - in this world, nor in any other, can keep us or separate us from the love of God. Nothing can separate us from God unless we turn away from Him irrevocably and determine that we need neither His grace, nor His mercy. Yes, God has given to each and every man choice in this much, but only one choice brings true freedom to homosexuals, the choice to place ourselves in the loving care of the Most High and follow His ways, not our ways, but His ways or the choice to reject Him.

The Lord chooses men in every age for a variety of types of service and endows men with His gifts. Who knows what the Lord has in store for you? See what the Lord will do with you! With Him as your Saviour and Guide, you will never be abandoned and who knows what it is that He wishes for you and that you do for Him? My brother in Christ Jesus, here you are a young man reading this (since you could not find Christian teaching from official channels), and there you are in fifty years ascending to the Throne of Peter to exhort God's children to fidelity to Christ, feeding Christ's Faithful with pure undiluted doctrine to nourish them in their Christian mission, wiping the name of Francis from the lineage of Popes and clearing up his gargantuan mess. We do not yet know what God has planned for you! Be patient with yourself and wait on Him.

May the Lord confound those who seek to confuse the Faithful and the unfaithful in this area of Church teaching. May He bring an end to the wickedness of those who would deny that the Lord has truly come and that His grace can turn the tears of a homosexual into a life consecrated to joyful service of the Lord in His Church with an identity fixed firmly in Him alone. May God embolden homosexuals to embrace courageously the risen life offered by He Who, for our sake, died and rose again. May the Lord raise up more men who will proclaim to the Church and the World that no man is served by withholding the truth of this condition from him and that those who do, shield men not from God's displeasure, but rather, and most disastrously, from the love of God.

It is quite clear that within the Vatican, where the gay lobby has not only a foothold, but now control over the apparatus of the communication of the Church's doctrine, those who have forfeited the love of God and have exchanged it for the love of self and for the crude and dangerous errors that have flourished in our times will stop at nothing to corrupt the purity of the Church's doctrine and insodoing, corrupt the souls in the Church's care. Do not permit them to do this without protest. Make it loud. Be proud of one thing at least, that the fullness of truth is to be found within the Catholic Church, for the Salvation of the World. False Catechisms and sly, ambiguous doctrines must be rejected. Let them be ashamed and confounded, who seek to hide God and His Truth from His people and leave those in error uncorrected, ignorant of the Lord Who entrusted His Church to the governance of men in His name. These men have not come from Him, they are from the Enemy since they having come from our number have departed from God's Truth and wish to make ambiguous and opaque that laid down for our Christian instruction. This instruction is to teach us the truth and to save souls. What charge will the Lord lay at the feet of those Successors of the Apostles who deny this instruction to souls? I shudder at the thought! May God rebuke those who wish to distort Christian doctrine and in His mercy, convert these sorry creatures to Himself!